GameBanshee Forums

1.) I was able to find three Small Steam Engines without having to wait at all! One was from the Inventor at the Wheel Clan and two were from Tarant. So now, I'm level 28, and have three Mechanical Arachnids following me. Now, to find some Elite Plate...

As for this seedier side of town, I wasn't able to defeat the gangs there until just a few moments ago, but I'll be sure to explore it.

2.) That's a good point! Perhaps I'll find another race, or simply choose a trait that grants a high intelligence bonus.

3.) Can orcs use guns? In general, how are the followers with ranged weapons?

4.) What melee weapon do you recommend for Tech users? Or was the Katana the recommendation? As a mage (if I decide not to go melee) is the Arcane Great Sword still worth it or should I just grab a staff? Is it possible to "backstab" with guns? (Since D&D lets you sneak attack with ranged weapons.)

5.) Galraen, do you usually play without followers then or do you just have a different set of followers than on your first playthrough? I've found a few voiced NPCs so far (Magnus and Torian Kel), but neither of them wanted to join my cause. Unfortunately my dog didn't make it back from the Isle of Despair and has been replaced by mechanical pets.

6.) Alright. I'll be sure to try using chemicals. xD

7.) Does strength also increase the damage of guns?

8.) Is perception useful for guns or does it do the same thing for them as it does for bows? I currently have only 15, but my t-hit chance is over a hundred percent.

9.) What are your thoughts on the Tesla Gun? Is it worth investing in Electrical to make it or should I just stick with my Elephant Gun?

3) Yes, not brilliant unless you are a gunny educator. If you're going gunny, and you want your followers to do likewise, then educator isn't a bad cjhoice IMO.

4) Arcane Greatsword (it doesn't take damage from hitting rock monsters and breaking locks), Katana, the ballanced sword. Bear in mind magical creatures reduce damage from techno weapons (another blow against the pyro Axe)

5) Always take minimum followers as pack mules, and never let them fight

7) No

8) Yes, but minimal use, always relied on boosters myself

9) Tesla gun aint bad, you can get it fairly early on.

Errata: I f your not using the level cap remover the Tla gun isn't worth investing in elec for.

I found the Pyro Axe tremendously useful early one for attacking "hard" monsters and knocking locks. (Untill I got the Knock spell).

Thanks for your replies!

What are your thoughts on Prowling and Backstab skills in this game?

Not worth it. Prowling maybe if you want to steal, but then you'd need lockpicking as well. Backstab is just a waste. Granted, good damage, but things die swiftly anyway.

Prowling and Backstab (along with Pickpocket) are good if you want to roleplay as a thief. IIRC, Backstab expertise allows you to use just about any bladed melee weapon.

If you're going the Firearms route, then PE is essential; for one thing, you won't be able to achieve mastery of that skill without it.

I also prefer magic to tech, and the game is biased to be somewhat easier that way. But if you do go tech, consider being a Dwarf: they get a boost to TA right off the bat, and as a small character they can wear Gnomish chainmail, the best normal armor in the game.

And there's a side-quest in which they can get the best tech armor in the game (it starts in the Wheel Clan; spoilers if you want 'em) which IIRC requires them to be a Dwarf, Gnome or Halfling to wear.

The downside of being a Dwarf is their somewhat slower attack speed; starting out with a DX of 7 means that they'll max out at 19 (never achieving the +5 speed bonus for a DX of 20) unless you choose one of these less-than-ideal backgrounds: Troll offspring, Raised in the pits, or Beat with an ugly stick.

To partly counter this, be sure to wear two charged rings; you can either invest in Electrical, or acquire Sebastian (in the Boil) long enough to have him make 'em for you and all your nonmagical followers.

One of the fun things I did as a Dwarf was collect nothing but Dwarven followers; there are up to four of them available, including Magnus... and of all things, a Dwarf sorcerer!

And galraen, I'm pretty sure half-ogres CAN use two-handed firearms, just not handguns. I'll see if I can confirm this.

I only have 13 Perception, with a +2 bonus from my helm and I was able to achieve mastery.

My character is currently a dwarf, but I'm really having a difficult time finding armor his size. Why is that chainmail considered the best? My character is currently using Dwarven Plate Mail, which seems to grant more AC.

That's what my character has right now - two charged rings and 18 dexterity. I have 6 points to spare, but I'm not sure if I want invest the two in the stat or get the rest of the Smithy disciplines for Elite Plate Mails - so I can upgrade my Mechanical Arachnids to Automatons (and I also found my fourth Small Steam Engine, unfortunately Sogg didn't survive).

Also, the unofficial patch seems to be a restoration pack/bug-fix project, similar to Qwinn's Planescape: Torment patches.

Why is that chainmail considered the best?

I don't know, prefer home made personally if I'm tech, if I'm mage then any old rags will do eventually. I suspect it's a trade off of Armour Class/Damage Resistance against encumbrance though.

I have to say you're very careless with your followers, I remember losing Virgil on a regular basis early on, and Jayna once (reloaded the game), I guess that's another advantage with automatically hitting the 'Back off' button.

What happened with Sogg was that he died while we were clearing out the Dredge, but instead of hitting "quick load" I hit "quick save". In any case, in recent months, I've been neglecting the "load game" feature for a lot of games, taking things as they come, whether I like it or not. On the bright side, my four mechanical arachnids all became automatons.

As for home-made armor, as soon as I can find a minute steam engine, I'll be making a Machined Plate for myself. Speaking of which, the description says that it adds to strength, but the item statistics here at GB don't seem to have it. Is the item bugged?

Crenshinibon wrote:Speaking of which, the description says that it adds to strength, but the item statistics here at GB don't seem to have it. Is the item bugged?

In the vanilla game it is bugged and it doesn't ass to strength, but I thought the unofficial patch fixed that.

I just looked at the patch notes and it says that it now DOES give a strength bonus, or "ass to strength" as you put it. :laugh:

Is there any particular reason as to why you don't use the unofficial patch? Or does the game run fine without it? I think it adds some balance to the mix, especially with tech characters and throwers.

Crenshinibon wrote:My character is currently a dwarf, but I'm really having a difficult time finding armor his size. Why is that chainmail considered the best? My character is currently using Dwarven Plate Mail, which seems to grant more AC.

galraen wrote:I don't know, prefer home made personally if I'm tech, if I'm mage then any old rags will do eventually. I suspect it's a trade off of Armour Class/Damage Resistance against encumbrance though.

That's it exactly. Encumbrance cuts down on the speed of your attacks; so anything with about 2/3 the stopping power at 1/6 the weight is a winner in my book. YMMV.

And by the way, Dwarves are considered small characters (same as Halflings and Gnomes) so only armor that says Small will ever fit them.

Where can I see by how much the attack is reduced when wearing heavy armor?

For mages, wouldn't it be the best choice to wear no armor (or one that doesn't reduce attack speed) and use Shield of Protection for the AC bonus?

So, when my character goes to craft his Machined Plate, do I need to use small leather armor to make it a small size or will it always be normal-sized?

EDIT: galraen, what XP Remover do you use? Do you find that it makes the game too easy or that it makes your character/party too overpowered?

If you open your inventory screen, hover the pointer ofer the Shield symbol you'll see your total defence, Total AC, Damage Resistance and other resistances. I'm not sure if Damager Resistance (DR) is acapped at 95 or not, too long since I played the game to be certain. DR is more important that AC in my opinion, but once you get totally magical (100) the AC and Damage resistance you get from Shield of Protection almost make armour redundant. Until then wear whatever armour you can without reducing your speed.

It's been so long since I installed the game, and the level cap remover I can't remember where I got it. I think that all you need is the file I've attached which goes in the Sierra\Arcanum\Date\Rules folder if I'm remembering correctly. The major difference it makes is that you don't have to juggle with disciplines if you are a techie, you can advance in which ever one you want. It doesn't help a Mage much at all, they own the game as it is. the main gain for an Arcan Warrior is that you get a sense of progression after level 50, if in fact you ever get that high as a mage. There comes a point in the game for a mage that you don't know where to spend your advancement points on magic. There are so few spells that are worth bothering with, you stop bothering to spend points on spell colleges well before level 50 and just throw everything on skills and abilities.

Once you have Teleportation*, Strength of Earth, Agility of Fire, Bolt of lightning*, Harm, Sanctuary*, and Hasten (* plus of course the preceding spells in the college) you don't need anything else, that's a total of 19 spells, which you can fairly easily obtain by level 30, after that level ups are almost meaningless. Compare that with the technology disciplines and the imbalance becomes apparent. It is fun to play through as an Arcane Warrior once mind, although you soon find out that magical followers are not only more useless than their technological counterparts, they can be positively dangerous to have around, Raven in particular is a major menace. To say the AI for mages leaves a lot to be desired is a severe understatement.

PS You need to use small leather to manufacture the Featherweight Chainmail.

Thanks for your detailed reply.

Is it possible to get to such a point where damage is completely nullified? Is AC treated here as it is in D&D?

How do the levels after fifty work? Is it the same requirement every time (say a hundred thousand experience between each level) or does it scale up as you progress (the experience needed to level up increases exponentially)? Currently I'm level thirty-eight and already have no idea as to what to invest in. I already have five automatons (I heard Small Steam Engines were really difficult to find, but I see them being sold every once in a while - my first one was at around level twenty or twenty five, at the Wheel Clan). My dexterity is twenty and I can't think of anything to invest in aside from charisma and the chemical-related disciplines that you mentioned before.

I think I know what you're talking about with the followers. Jormund is the newest addition to my group, and I noticed that he likes to cast Fireflash at point-blank range... especially since all characters except for my dwarf are melee.

While I've yet to play magically inclined characters, I'm going to assume that those that specialize in technology are more interesting to play, as their development is more apparent and that they can actually craft their own equipment, which can be found much later in the game. I *just* found another elephant gun, in my mid to late thirties, whereas I crafted the same gun as soon as I got to Tarant.

Also, do you think that the Elephant Gun is worth upgrading to the Blade Launcher?

My style is a bit different from galraen's; so while I agree with him that mages totally pwn Arcanum, I prefer to play as more of a tank than a pure mage.

My preferred character is a Gnome with two points in Haggle (expertise lets you sell ice to an Eskimo; it's handy when you can dump off all your magical booty at the general store), two in Persuasion, and a Professional Knife Tosser background.

He learns 16 ranks of spells, including Major Healing, Hasten, and Teleport; he eschews followers, and thanks to his background, he's able to achieve Throwing mastery with only 15 DX.

He gets to a full 100% MA by exploiting a glitch in the game (spoiler):

Spoiler

If you put on a Dark Helm, it duplicates the effect of the 'Sold Your Soul' background, including giving you +4 ranks to MA. This was supposed to be only while the Helm was being worn, but a game glitch makes the effect permanent... and cumulative. If you put the Helm on and off five times, you'll be as fully magical and irredeemably evil as Satan himself, no matter how many kittens you save or babies you kiss.

(end spoiler)

As I get the money, my Gnome power shops the Wise Women until he has a (small) Arcane Traveler's Cloak, Helm, Gauntlets and a pair of Rings, to which he adds a Shield of Force, Enchanted War Boots (they boost speed, too!), a Dorian amulet and eventually Azram's Star.

The Arcane Traveler's Cloak is for me the best magical armor in the game: it weighs a bare 60 coins (6 lbs.) and yet at full strength is almost as good as chainmail. With all the other arcane bonuses, my PC gets to a maximum 95% in just about every resistance category in no time!

And then (powergamer that I am) I go for overkill by following the Gods' Quest, which if done right gives him ridiculous bonuses including +4 to DX, +100 to HP and Fatigue, and lots more.

Then, using a found schematic and a jar of Unobtanium found near the end of the game, I boost all eight stats by another +1 (at least, those that haven't already been maxed out).

By the time he gets to the final boss, he's so ridiculously overpowered that he basically spits in the guy's eye and watches him drop. Good times.

My style is a bit different from galraen's

Actually when playing a mage it's almost exactly the same. I bet you pickpocket the teleportation scrolls, get the quest from the halfling in Stilwater and teleport to the Ruby Glade. Then head to the Strange Pond and The Bog as early as possible too!:laugh: Do you then go on to find the Lethe Wyvern Bridge then on to Caladon too? Did that once, but made the mistake of going to Qnitara too early and screwed the game up, that's poetic justice for you!

I expect you extract maximum xp out of Liam's Works portal quest too. The first time I did that I closed the portal as quickly as possible, what a blunder that was!

Also, do you think that the Elephant Gun is worth upgrading to the Blade Launcher?

No, I'll be interested to see other's take on this, but a lot of the harder to make 'found' schematics for firearms are crap.

How do the levels after fifty work?

The file I attached can be opened with any text editor, including Notepad, so you can see for yourself exactly how it works in terms of XP.

PS Shield of Protection when MA is at 100, in conjunction with any armour, virtually totally negates any damage.

PPS Do you also search out Vendigroth Ruins as early as possible too? I do that with a Techy of course, can't get Drog's Warbringer or the boosters too soon can you?

TwoHandedSword:

I'm pretty sure that this glitch was fixed in the unofficial patch, though, I was just wondering, in the unpatches game, doesn't a throwing character decimate absolutely everything, since the attack costs zero APs?

Do you actually use followers for fighting, or do you use them to carry equipment, as galraen does?

galraen:

I was under the impression that teleportation only allowed you to go to known locations. Or do you teleport to ONLY the Ruby Glade for the purpose of bypassing the mountain range?

What are your thoughts on the Tesla Gun? I haven't used any electrical weapons so far.

I took a look at the file and saw what looked like leveling schemes, unless I missed the experience table.

Doesn't Blur also add to your AC?

Also, I heard of a bug that if you go invisible, or if you prowl, you can "collapse" automatons and mechanical arachnids. I'm pretty sure that I've encountered a few arachnids in Tarant. Do you know anything about this one?

The leveling schemes are there, so your companions "know" where to put those unforeseen points.

Oops, wrong file!!

I've now attached the correct one. The Gamelevel file I uploaded by mistake is actually a tweak of the original that seriously improves your followers; allowing Magnus to get to level 7 in all disciplines for example. It was an experiment I was trying out that worked a little too well, definitely makes your followers worth having, but would make you wonder who was following who!:laugh: