Any Advantage to Dismissing Party NPCs?

[thelebk]

The in game advantages to maintaining as many characters as possible, even those with diametrically opposed alignments, are fairly obvious. You have more party flexibility and get more quests, items, experience, and assistance in the final battle. Is there any in game advantage to dismissing despicable party members permanently or is that for role playing purposes only?

[AlexMBrennan]

Is there any in game advantage to dismissing despicable party members permanently

Yes - you don't have to micromanage their levels, mythic levels and gear.

assistance in the final battle

That is what cheat mods are for. If you expect me to level up all the NPCs I never use for one cutscene then you need to get your head checked.

[thelebk]

@AlexMBrennan This seems like a regressive benefit. While its true that fewer assets mean fewer assets to maintain, I'm not sure that provides an in game advantage. It does provide a (minor) real life advantage for the player. With auto level enabled (does not make great choices but not the worst) the only real time load for the human player is the regular gear updates. Not a big deal IMHO.

[Drake]

There is no advantage whatsoever to dismiss a companion. You should only do it when the game forces you to because of a mythic path requirement. Otherwise just leave them at camp, they won't bother you if you don't try to advance their quest. If you're doing manual crusade, they provide options in the throne room, so dismissing a companion usually means locking yourself out of a project or a special unit.

[GunStarX]

The only advantage I can think of would be if you keep less than 5 total, and turn on the only active companions receive experience option. You will level up really fast, but you will be at a disadvantage at the end of the game

[thelebk]

@Drake No advantage at all? That's what I figured. Sad that the game encourages meta-gaming like that. There is no incentive not to advance their quests as each gives more experience, items, and play opportunities.

@GunStarX I'm not sure you have to dismiss them to increase XP gain. My understanding is that you just take fewer along in your active party and it will dive XP by that number.

[zombygunner]

hell no i make the decisions the ai in this game is terrible not the worst but no all set. they have a bad habit of making crappy pc's to play with the merc's may be better im not sure i did a regular playthrough with most of the pcs but i havent played since they added the guy in the statue or whatever

[Drake]

Originally posted by GunStarX:

The only advantage I can think of would be if you keep less than 5 total, and turn on the only active companions receive experience option. You will level up really fast, but you will be at a disadvantage at the end of the game

You don't need to dismiss them for that. As long as they're in camp and not in party, you get the bonus xp on reduced party if you turn on the active party xp option.

Originally posted by thelebk:

@Drake No advantage at all? That's what I figured. Sad that the game encourages meta-gaming like that. There is no incentive not to advance their quests as each gives more experience, items, and play opportunities.

@GunStarX I'm not sure you have to dismiss them to increase XP gain. My understanding is that you just take fewer along in your active party and it will dive XP by that number.

It's only metagaming if you do metagaming. That's an RPG, if you want to ditch someone, just do it. You'll lose some items and some xp (considering you're going to hit lv 20 way before the end of the game anyway, it's not a big deal), some projects for the crusade, but that's it.
As long as you understand what you're going to miss and how to do without, that's your playthrough, you do what you want.

Also note that each companion has several paths they can take. Like if you think you should pick ember because you're doing an evil run, think again, there is a path to corrupt her, and she gets somethign special for it. Like there is a path to redeem wenduag.
They can all fit in several types of playthroughs.

[GunStarX]

Yes I'm aware that you do not have to dismiss companions to utilize the active experience option. I'm more thinking that you wouldn't have to worry about carrying a gang of barely useful companions around if you were to fully commit to the idea

[thelebk]

Not sure how you carry them, they just come with you. Low hassle.

[igor140]

As to the annoyance of leveling them... there IS the auto-level feature if it really bothers you that much...

As to the original question: there is no mechanical advantage, but I think there's a lot of roleplay value in certain situations. most of the companions absolutely do NOT fit in with one alignment or another. In fact, several require that you basically break your alignment/ roleplay if you're not willing to kick them out.

[thelebk]

@Igor140 completely concur.

[Southernshark]

The ones I really hate like Regill and Camellia, I keep around long enough to kill them.

[igor140]

Well, depending on your alignment, roleplaying, the following companions may not fit in with your playstyle or party:

Regill
LIGHT SPOILERS: He's an ***hole

MORE SERIOUS SPOILERS: Actually, that's pretty much it. When you first meet him, you watch him murder a bunch of his "allies" because they're inconvenient. He doesn't apologize or see anything wrong it with; they were slowing him down and he took care of the problem. But obviously that won't fit in with every party.


Seelah
LIGHT SPOILERS: She's a paladin. Not sure that qualifies as a spoiler...

MORE SERIOUS SPOILERS: She WILL leave your party if you follow certain mythic paths. She tends not to be too judgemental, especially because of her personal past... but at the end of the day, she's lawful good, and lives up to it.


Daeran
LIGHT SPOILERS: He's also an ***hole. On a surface level, he combines the selfishness of Camelia with the cruelty of Regill

SERIOUS SERIOUS SPOILERS: He's possessed by an eldritch being, that is trying to use him as a gateway to invade this world. In his Act 5 personal quest, you are forced into a choice where you have to either kill him, or murder a hardworking, law-abiding inquisitor who has done everything possible to stop things from progressing this far. The dude is a jerk, but less of a jerk than Daeran; he's honest, forthright, and genuinely contrite about his role in the past... and you have to murder him.


Camelia
LIGHT SPOILERS: She's a lot less... sane... than she first appears. Her whole entitled rich girl thing is the tip of the iceberg.

SERIOUS SERIOUS SPOILERS: She's a serial killer. You find that she's been doing "ritual sacrifices" to the spirit in her amulet for decades. The REALLY crazy part is that if you pass a skill check, you can determine that... there's no spirit in the amulet at all; she's just a serial killer.


Sosiel
LIGHT SPOILERS: He's a goody two-shoes. He's very judgemental of any "evil" actions you make

MORE SERIOUS SPOILERS: Not much else, really. His personal quest is fair in-depth, but it's expected you treat him with civility and respect. If you're role-playing an EVIL character... it doesn't really fit in with anything about Sosiel


Wenduag
LIGHT SPOIlERS: She's an ***hole

MORE SERIOUS SPOILERS: She betrays you... like three times. There's no good-guy "redemption" story here: if you keep forgiving her, she keeps betraying you.


Wojif
LIGHT SPOILERS: He's a thief and a liar, and betrays you more than once

MORE SERIOUS SPOILERS: He can be redeemed, but he puts you through a lot of crap before that happens. Technically if you're strictly role-playing a Lawful Good character, you should kick him out or put him to death somewhere along the way.


The others more or less fit into any party composition, to a greater or lesser degree. But if you're playing a straight barbarian playthrough, Nenio won't fit in well, obviously.

Ember's personality also runs into some issues with Chaotic Evil parties... but she will eventually get "broken". It's actually horrifying.

[Raikon]

That's a lot of black igor. You should just say some real advantages to dismissing party members.

If you don't recruit daeran, your inventory won't fill up with 10lb heads.

If you don't recruit seelah, she wont drink all the rum.

[thelebk]

@Igor140 Concur with most of your observations. If I was truly role-playing my alignment I would get rid of half the party permanently.

@Raikon I think you have mentioned the first actual mechanical benefits from dismissing a party member per my OP... They are small benefits, but hey you're correct!