Maxing strength?

[Onkel_Enkel]

I'm thinking about creating a Half-Orc for HotU:
Bard(1) Fighter(4)Red Dragon Disciple(10) with Great Sword.
If I max STR I will have 31 at clvl 15... is this a good idea?

[shift244]

there is nothing wrong with maxing STR in any case, esp when u'r a warrior. go ahead..

[Darthel]

If you run through the OC and figure in the Uthgardt Amulet, Gauntlets of Ogre Power and one of the Belts of Giant Strength that can be found in various chests you will be able to take that max STR 10 points higher as well.
BTW - 40-STR means mod of 15 to hit & damage and being able to carry over 1700lbs (notice the double-zero) of gear.

[shift244]

if u do not have the expansions, the original NWN, actually restricts any attribute bonus to a +10 max. so a 40 and a 30 will make no difference in terms of bonus to attack (i'm not sure about carry weight though).

supposedly, this value was increased to +12 for one of the expansions, i'm not sure which, but i guess its the 1st one, and is probably increased again with the 2nd one. this latter increase, i have not actually tried.. just thought i'd let ppl know.

[Onkel_Enkel]

yeah, that makes sence... when I tried it he was not much better than a fighter with 10 less str...

thanks

[Aremah]

Given that you're talking about HotU, consider this: you don't really need to max your strength, but 25 is definitely worth getting (this is 25 base, not considering enhancements), because of the Overwhelming Critical and Devastating Critical feats. Combined with an earlier Improved Critical, this could be devastating (though I don't know how many critical hit immune creatures there are in HotU).

Those feats are only available at level 21+, so it's your choice what to do until then, but Going above 25 base strength seems overkill, at any rate (especially since you can increase it through the various available items). If I was you, I'd keep it at 25 and put the remaining points into Constitution (seeing as you're going to be taking Red Dragon Disciple a lot, and that means less HP).

[shift244]

to me the 4-8 HP (about that considering that you get a d12 after a certain level, that would balance off the d8s, so its only the d6s that would hurt) does not really factor in to consider putting values into Con. if you must, then the Con will of course help, since each point is multiplied with your character level in values of HP.

maxing out Str is a two-fold advantage. you hit better, and deal more damage. each +1 to hit and +1 to damage will mean alot by being able to attack many times per round... conversly at that high levels, a +4 Cons will give you like 80 HP, which equals to slightly more then 1 fireball blast, 2 hits from another warrior, barely 1 (successful) sneak attack. you could argue that you would have survived at least one extra round... but the point is that pushing Cons should hvae nothing to do with taking RDD levels... oh i'm c*@&-ing again aren't i?