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Dual-Class Kensai/Mage and Dual-Class Berserker/Mage. It's a long debate (i'm kensai/mage faction) so feel free to decide by yourself or, as a guide, just state the discussion.
Inside this discussion, also there's the proper time to dual class:
lvl 3 for extra proficiency point - terrible choice
lvl 7 for extra 1/2 APR - moderate choice, make the restoration of the first class faster
lvl 9 for max HP as fighter and extra proficiency point - neutral choice
lvl 13 for 2x 1/2 APR, max HP as fighter with more proficiency points - Most powerful choice, but also the hardest to reactivate the innative class
*Take a note that Kensai receive benefits per each set of levels, apart of the above mentioned.
Other discussions happened, some people even debated fighter/mage multi-class. The point in BG2 is: Mage is always a more powerful class than others.
If you use this search on google (kensai berserker mage site:forums.beamdog.com) you will find a lot of material to consult.
Apart of that there are many other combinations that are cool to do too. Here are some examples:
Barbarian/Druid - Before an illegal dual-class (but many times done on shadow keeper or EE Keeper), this one is focused on reduce physical damage, you use barbarian bonus + shield of faith spell + Defender of Easthaven flail among other items to reduce the % of physical damage you can receive. As a Druid you're entitled to use scimitar, wakizaki and ninja-to, which allow the choice of some scimitar's that give +1 APR when wield, allowing to hit the cap of 5 APR per round.
Can also goes easily Barbarian/Cleric, you get a lousier alignment choice, no scimitars, lose access to iron skin (stone skill, but for druids) but get an overall number of better buff spells.
Shadowdancer/Cleric - This one i made and i really like the concept of this class, a micro backstaber with quarterstaff, using staff of the ram and striking staff when possible and also being a buffer in the party. I have to say i love this class concept and in the last years was responsible for the most fun playthroughs i had.
But my vote would be for Dragon Disciple Sorcerer. The other character I currently have in TOB is one. Many have said that is a class you can use to solo the game but not my style. I like parties. The advantages are 6 HP die vice 4 for regular sorcerers and mages plus Con bonus you can get 8 HP per level. Since their Con improves as you level they have a good HP total. They also gain fire resistance as you level, By late SOA you can stand in the middle of your own Firestorm unaffected. They have a handy breath weapon you can use daily and it scales as you level. The one (and to my knowledge only) disadvantage is that they can cast "one" less spell per level. Not a bad trade off for what you gain IMHO.
I would recommend getting the Robe of Vecna from Deidre, a merchant in Ribald's store, as it greatly decreases casting time. You can insta-cast any spell 4th level and under. Along the way you will find items that will give you extra spells per level to cast and help mitigate the loss of one spell. They were designed for mages but work fine on sorcerers.
You will start a 3+ million XP character on BG:EE, not much surprises there.
I would say Berserker 9/mageX or fighter/mage
If there's a doubt on the long run between Berserker/mage and kensai/mage, watching the entire walkthrough there's no doubt that berserker/mage is much better. Kensai is difficult to play at low level and without an helm it is really easy to die or lose a lot of HP even near the end of BG1. Berserker walkthrough in BG1 is really easy from second one of the game.
For the same reason, and always thinking about the entire walwthrough , dualling at 13 can be really annoying, better to dual at 9 (otherwise 13 is the better option). And I would not do it at 7, because you will have some annoying recovery time in BG1, while dualling at 9 you can recover very fast in SoD, going solo for very few encounters. For weapon it all depends on what you wanto to take in BG2, I would choose flail or even staff, but other options are good. Dual wielding.
Fighter/mage can be another good alternative, depending on your game style, because you don't have to bother with recovery time, and you get HLA both as a warrior and mage, but you reach them quite late, probably needing some metagaming stuff to harvest XP. You are more free about proficiencies, since you can specialize in more weapons (probably I would take swords, katanas, axes). Dual wielding. Race half-elf, because you will get 20 constituion easier (you can get in hell also starting from 16-17) and as MC you want access to all the schools (no illusionist).
For BG, the easiest solo runs are:
- Shadowdancer. No enemy other than Aec'Letec can find a hidden character in BG. So abuse HiPS and win. However, the fight where you have to keep the grand dukes alive is kind of tough, because you lack the DPS to take out the dopplegangers easily.
- Fighter/Mage. Fighter gives you focused DPS, Mage gives you AoE, CC, defensive spells and wand spam.
- Mage (also best character for a speed run). Wand spam your way to victory. You basically cast Sleep on the Ankhegs to get to the treasure vault in the cave and then Wand of Fire everything to death.
- Berserker. Rage gives you immunity to most nasty effects and you have good HP, good AC and good single target DPS.
You don't need to worry too much about healing. You can buy heals from the temples, and once you get the Cure Light Wounds dream ability you can heal incidental damage. Later on, once you get Draw Upon Holy Might, you can boost your con to regen levels before resting for a full heal.Outside of Durlag's Tower, traps aren't that lethal. Most of the time you walk through them and just take the damage, or let a summon set off the trap.
If you're including EEKeeper combos, here are a few strong ones:
My vote goes to the Dwarven Defender. The character is strong in BG 1 thanks to shorty bonus to saving throws and hit point bonus. In BG 2 you can reach 90% physical damage resistance using Defensive Stance and the right items. Vhailor's Helm and two Protection From Magic Scrolls can be acquired very early in BG 2, which is basically a permanent way to become immune against magic (the summoned clone of the helmet can be used to cast the scroll on your character, so you have an unlimited source of Protection From Magic Scrolls).
Why mess around with multiclasses when you can get a character that is nearly immortal relatively early in the game? (Just my thought and expierences, no claim to absolute truth)
Thanks for the tips! And no, I'm not planning on going through Durlag's tower as a solo run. I'm doing that right now in "story mode," and that's challenging enough for me.
One of the main reasons I was thinking of doing a fighter / mage combo is because I know that mages can't use spells when armored... but I believe they can still use wands and scrolls. Is that correct? Or are those prohibited whenever a fighter / mage puts on armor, too?
And that way you can create more than one player character. So, for example, the popular Fighter13>Mage or Berserker9>Cleric or even one similar to (Sir)Anomen, e.g. a Fighter7>Cleric.
So, create no more than 3-4 party members, keep some free slots for story companions - or even replace custom companions later.
About what's "ultimate", that's a highly controversial topic. Depending on your party members, you don't strictly need dual-class characters. But depending on difficulty mode and which special high-level foes you want to take up with (liches, dragons, mindflayers, elder orbs, vampires and others), certainly you want a cleric and a mage in your party. In other cases, brute-force warriors can be beneficial, especially if receiving support/aid.
2. Elf fighter/mage (mix class)
3. Bezerker/Mage (dual class)
My judgement below matters both for solo and a party. Even as part of a team the below information is still if not more important(the experience gain).
First my friend the all powerful Sorceror alone is probably the best. Its increase in power at EVERY STAGE is insurmountable. He does not need to "FIND" spells. Do you know how great it is to just automatically get your spell sequencer, spell trigger, contingency, chain contingency. ... as well as anything you want to pick... this is a big reason why the sorceror is so powerful. Simply gets things like that. No worrying about where those rare scrolls are. When it does hit its level cap its ok because you can deal with basically everything in the game. There is 1 or 2 places where you need to learn and preplan your way through it.
The anti-magic zones in BG2EE is one and only pain in the a$$ place and you can still get thew it with your sorceror. You only need to preplan your contingencies and your spell triggers. I think triggers can still be activated in there but the contingencies 100% could do so in the past without a doubt.
Every other mix and match class combo grows at a significant reduction in power.
The sorceror or Dragon Disciple are definitely best.
I am also a big Bezerker/mage player. This is in close competition with the sorceror.
So let me tell you some info on this.
Its great except it will grown much slower still and the big downside to dualing is the fact that back in the day they thought it was a intelligent idea to make your weapon proficiencies fighting styles be unavailable until you surpass it with your new class.
You know what else you cannot use during this time? Well its rather important you cannot use your bezerkers special ability "rage".
The best thing about adding in the bezerker into the mage is the fact you get your weapon skills and your fighting styles... BUT ALSO you get to cover 1 huge weakness of the mage which is the fact he is vulnerable to the psionic attacks by mind flayers. I think its strange that no spell was put in BGEE to fix this hole in his defense as it does exist in dnd.
Anyway.
Kensai is nice but its still without question weaker than bezerker mage.
The mage can buff himself enough to make his attacks already amazing when combined with bezerker but he gains the #1 ability to protect a mages weak spot he gets "rage"
What does the Kensai get? His strong ability allows him to max out damage for a few rounds. That is great no doubt. But it does NOT max out the damage of your spells only your physical attacks. Which is already being buffed into amazing god levels with a bezerker+mage spells.
So when understanding that you will understand why Bezerker/mage is superior.
Look at a battle betweent he two if a bezerker/mage fights a kensai/mage understand that stoneskin,mirror image, blur, etc all these spells will still negate the kensai/mages special max damage .... but the bezerker mage will be immune to mind affects with rage and still gain a +2 thaco, armor class and a nice +15 hitpoints.
So the bezerker/mage wins a dual as well.
I am also wondering if the Elf Fighter/mage is better than the bezerker/mage dual.
Elf fighter/mage is amazing it gets 1 more bonus to thaco with longswords and there are two nice longswords to pick up easily the +2 is right at the mines early on (go east find dude who stole the emeralds and then kill the dude that shows up to get his sword).
But the fighter mage will NEVER lose his abilities so that is huge.
In addition he will get high level abilities from both fighter and mage.
This makes him easily more powerful than a dual/kensai mage off as getting whirlwind greater whirl wind etc with your mage spells is going to be amazing.
Hell at that late stage it is probably more powerful than the sorceror but its always a question as the sorceror will gain more spells.
You combine all the spells of a buffed mage with whirlwind... really and like wow. You everything is toast.
Very hard to decide now between this and sorceror. Sorceror gets all his spells though and more of them which is so powerful in game as you play. You need to know "WHAT SPELLS TO PICK. As a sorceror though. But if you have a party its less worrysome because they can fill in whatever you don't get. But if you solo you really need to pick carefully but then again... you could fill in with potions for many spells and still use scrolls.
Oh the weakness of the fighter/mage is that he can not get to max out his skills in weapons. But as a mage... you can get Black Blade of disaster and you are automatically a GM with it after you cast it. (but only for that weapon obviously).
Probably the best weapon in the game as well.
I've run it solo a few times with a Fighter/Mage, Swashbuckler/Mage and Berserker. F/M and S/M weren't too bad, S/M could disable traps and F/M could use summons, although there are a few traps that reset if you don't disable them. Berserker had to face tank all the traps though, that wasn't fun.
They can use both wands and scrolls while wearing armor but, outside of anti-magic zones (there's one in SoD if you decide to solo that, and one of the levels of Watcher's Keep in BG2 has them), I don't really see a reason to wear armor. Their armor spells (Shield, Ghost Armor and Spirit Armor) are pretty good and I find they last long enough to go from rest to rest.