Overkill skills

fable · #1 (**permalink**) 10-30-2002, 12:02 PM

Deadly Gifts: Definitely. I wish I had a couple of scorpion traps in BG2: ToB. Some of those battles would have been a piece of cake on insane mode.

Freeze: In the upper reaches of the spell skill, the number of seconds you get to wail on a frozen adversary is little short of ridiculous. I think it's better balanced in the lower end.

For that matter, the same applies to weapons with cold magic. In fact, they're even worse, since you don't have to take the time to cast the spell. You can just hit somebody, doing considerable body damage, and the spell also fires.

Poison Weapon: Good skill, simply too much bang for the buck at the higher level. I think 10 or 20 hits per poison dose makes sense; when you get much more than that, it's no longer a strategic option, but a luxury.

cjdevito · #2 (**permalink**) 10-31-2002, 08:38 AM

Thing about freeze is it won't work on anything with a spiritual resistance over 25 (at level 5 of the skill). -Everything- in the last significant portion of the game has a spiritual resistance over 50. So, like Stun (which is similiar in terms of spiritual resistance) it goes from overpowered to useless once you become Divine.

fable · #3 (**permalink**) 10-31-2002, 09:02 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by cjdevito
Thing about freeze is it won't work on anything with a spiritual resistance over 25 (at level 5 of the skill). -Everything- in the last significant portion of the game has a spiritual resistance over 50. So, like Stun (which is similiar in terms of spiritual resistance) it goes from overpowered to useless once you become Divine.

True. It's just that you don't become divine until late in the midgame. Before that, it works even on some of the boss monsters (*cough* dragon rider *cough*) who you'd think would be immune to it.

cjdevito · #4 (**permalink**) 10-31-2002, 09:23 AM

Sure, no argument, it's -great- early on. The thing is, though, that a number of the best skills worth pumping five points into turn out to be useless at the end.... so it's possible to hit the last portion with a level 40 character who has five points in freeze, five points in stun, five points in deathblow, five points in polymorph, etc...... and suddenly discover that all those skill points won't do you a bit of good, and that you're now gimped at the very end.

It's not such a big deal if you've only built one or two of these skills.... but if you've built multiples, it's essentially hitting the end game without half or more of your skills.

fable · #5 (**permalink**) 10-31-2002, 12:34 PM

So what do you feel all the best longterm skills, besides poison? Or maybe we should take this over to the other thread, again.

cjdevito · #6 (**permalink**) 10-31-2002, 12:52 PM

Best longterm skills? Any weapon mastery EXCEPT bow, augment defense, poison weapon (iffy at the end, but still better then any other non-mastery damage aug at that point), hell spikes if NOT playing a warrior, vermin if NOT playing a warrior, deadly gift (but only if you start building it up....1 point death scorpions don't cut it after the midgame).

Those are for combat, at least... for non-combat, lockpick and a single point in repair are the only 'must-haves', though charm weapon is incredibly useful to the point that I wouldn't consider going without it.

fable · #7 (**permalink**) 10-31-2002, 01:17 PM

Yeah, I find Deadly Gifts actually overpowering, especially if you put all five points into the thing. A good scorpion trap or two will take out nearly anything.

cccc · #8 (**permalink**) 11-24-2002, 10:44 AM

Hi,
I´d say, for my personal opinion: taking a look on for example the "Holy Sword" you get with 90% of the randomized damage being 21-50 (I´d call that a butter knife) and special items as the Chaos sword being sometimes rather low as well, a freezelvl. 4 gives at least a slight chance to survive...remembering situations the right mouse button wouldn´t react even third time being pressed a.s.o.
greetings,
cccc

Mr Sleep · #9 (**permalink**) 11-28-2002, 03:16 AM

I think the Frost on weapons is majorly overpowering, I am currently nearing the end and the Death Knights are dying very easily, I agreed with myself last night that I will wander through and see how far I get not using a health potion without dying, 20 minutes later I was still wandering through killing everything around me, The Singing Blade absolutely rules!

cccc · #10 (**permalink**) 12-01-2002, 11:03 AM

Hi MrSleep,
happy you, with a well randomized singing blade - I had that one already twice completely uselessly put together; in one of these games there was, good luck, a bow around that outnumbered all my blade weapons and I went with it to the end (damage 50-187, frost 2, poison 3 ). Was the only usabe bow till now - pity, I love that weapon.....
greetings,
cccc

fable · #11 (**permalink**) 12-01-2002, 05:02 PM

While a frost weapon is a definite plus, you don't absolutely need it. I played through until hitting the Dwarven halls with only the frost spell at my disposal. It worked perfectly well, though you obviously had to spend twice as much time on your targets.

cjdevito · #12 (**permalink**) 12-01-2002, 06:42 PM

Whereas I largely didn't bother with frost in any of the three games I played, either on a weapon or via spell. It came in real handy a few times, but otherwise wasn't neccessary.

OTOH, I also thought the game was a lot easier then most of the recent posts in this thread seem to.

Mr Sleep · #13 (**permalink**) 12-02-2002, 02:48 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by cjdevito
OTOH, I also thought the game was a lot easier then most of the recent posts in this thread seem to.

Hey, I was none too shabby on the time it took to complete thank you very much

fable · #14 (**permalink**) 12-02-2002, 05:17 AM

I guess it depends on your playing style: the skills you take, but also the way you deal with battles. Some people rush in and take on whatever is thrown at them; others run, or pick off individual attackers. Some prefer spells, ranged weapons, or melee attacks. I tended to like some fast and furious melees with a frost spell to control things, but on occasion my warrior would just do his special attack and gut everything in sight. Fun for the whole family.

Mr Sleep · #15 (**permalink**) 12-02-2002, 05:43 AM

Funnily enough I stopped on my first run through, just after the Lord Protector bit I was running around with my mage but due to the fact that I had to keep running back for mana boosts I got bored and decided to start again with a fighter, I found he was much more fun. So if I had carried on with my mage I would have done it even quicker.

I don't think the game is difficult per say it just depends on one doing certain bits first and racking up as much XP as possible, anyone could finish it with a little application. Not like Unreal Tournament type games which require a certain amount of speed, skill timing etc. DD was mostly just click on something and solve something else.