NWN2 Tips for NWN2 beginners - waiting for 1.07

Neverwinter Nights 2
Start at 18 (or more, if you're one of the races that have that), raise it every time you earn an ability point, do the rest with items and buffs. You get a bonus feat every other level past 20, which you can use to bump it up one more point, up to 10 points. Or be a bard/red dragon disciple with a high starter STR. You can get any of your abilities to or near 40 in MotB this way, just not all at the same time.

Something like 18 + 7 (from raises) + 9 (from epic feats) + 6 (from item) = 40.

And anyway it doesn't make much difference if you're at 36 or 40, the end result is the same -- massive damage with two-handers, especially if you're a frenzied berserker.
 
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I always enjoyed Dungeons & Dragon games. I have finished Baldur's Gate, Tales of the Sword Coast, Baldur's Gate II, Throne of Bhaal, Icewind Dale, Heart of Winter, Icewind Dale II, Neverwinter Nights, Shadows of Undrentide, Hordes of the Underdark, Neverwinter Nights II and Planescape Torment. I also finished Eye of the Beholder I, II and III and Temple of Elemental Evil.

I also own the Dungeons & Dragons rulebooks and I have gamemastered a few campaigns.


My favorite class as main character have always been the Cleric, but it's definitely a class for advanced users. When you know the spellist and the system I consider Clerics to be the most diversive class in Dungeons & Dragons since they can replace pretty much every class just by reassigning their spells and they can also "fix" just any party's weaknesses/shortcomings with buffing spells.

For example; if the game offers good fighters as recruitable companions, the Cleric can stand behind them and act as a spellcaster/buffer. If the game offers good spellcasters as recruitable companions, the same Cleric can stand in front of them and act as a melee tank/buffer just after reassigning their spells. When a fight is too tough for you you can always massively improve your chances just by using the right buffs.

Even if you do not pick Cleric as your main character, you will benefit alot by learning how to use your party's Clerics and when they are not available, the Druids.
 
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Having played through the original NWN2 campgaign for the first time now (I started playing with 1.10) there is one piece of advice I want to give to all NWN2 newcomers:

Play the game. It's very good. I don't really understand what the fuss about the NWN2 OC being bad or painfull is. Well OK, the first part of the game was a bit dull and wasn't exactly filled with fresh ideas but it worked and it was fun. After you play a while the game got interesting and nearer to the end the game got VERY interesting. I really, really liked this game. Of course it's not as good as BG2 or Torment but it's certainly much better than NWN1 or any other "RPG" released after BG2:ToB.

It's quite long, lot's of interesting (and less interesting) characters and a satisfactory amoung of dialogue (compared to other modern games). Also, the game is filled with interesting places and events. I'm not mentioning anything cause I'm keeping this spoilerless.

Play it. Use the strategic camera mode and use the AI of the companions but don't let them cast spells or use items on their own. Pause a lot. This way the game is easy and fun to play and you control which spells and items are going to be used but don't have to micromanage all the combat and movement.

I played a pure ranger. He was very fun to play and he was quite powerfull also. I had a wolf animal companion whom I buffed up with some ranger spells and I wielded two katanas.
 
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I'm starting to slog through it, quite slow going so far I have to say . . .

I'm wondering whether to soldier on or just skip it and go straight to MoTB. I need to clear time for the Witcher as well, but my girlfriend's away over christmas so I might save it till then for some uninterrupted playtime.
 
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I went straight for MotB. Only got to level 8 in the original campaign, due to the endless combating.

If you don't like "endless combating," I'm not sure you'll like MotB either. There's a lot of fighting to wade through there too.
 
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If you don't like "endless combating," I'm not sure you'll like MotB either. There's a lot of fighting to wade through there too.

Well, from what I've seen of MotB so far, there's at least something in between the battles to look forward to. Allso, the combat seems more motivated (in the first campaign I often stopped and wondered "why am I doing this again?). Besides, I think combat with high level characters is more interesting than combat with low level characters (you're a mage and can throw THREE magic missiles/day! You can allso throw cat's grace which ends the second you stop casting it.)...

(And I liked BG2 (for a while...), and there was quite a lot of combat in that too.)

Übereil
 
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I'm still finding annoying cut scenes before battles!! I HATE that!!!!
 
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I'm getting a bit further now (I'm in Neverwinter) and it's not too bad now I guess. I found some of the early side quests really annoying though.

In its defence I'm actually finding it something of a role playing challenge, I started off with a chaotic neutral character and before I knew it I'd ended up chaotic good. Now I'm having to be a total cunt to get back to where I meant to be.
 
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@Ubereil: yes, it does. Haste too: the only thing that matters is your number of attacks, no matter how you get them.

If you want to roll up the ultimate parry master, do a fighter/duelist/weapon master specializing in rapier and maxing out Dex. Then dual-wield. If mobbed, go into parry mode, and you're just about untouchable.
 
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I haven't actually tried using parry since the prologue of NWN1 but I've heard it said multiple times that parry works quite poorly since you can't parry attacks while in a parry/attack animation.
 
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Not my experience. I played halfway through MotB with pretty much what I describe above (no weapon master levels, though), and he was untouchable in melee, even when mobbed.
 
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