Jaheira Advice

[Saelune]

I dont know what to do with her. If I dismiss her, she seems to permanently leave after having done her quest with the Harpers. I am not sure if I should bite the bullet and just lose her forever, or if I should just keep her permanently. She seems to be my weakest companion, but maybe I am just not using her properly enough.

My current party is Me (Cleric), Minsc, Yoshimo, Aerie, Mazzy and ofcourse Jaheira.

Bonus question, Aerie or Nalia? I just finished Nalia's quests and picked Aerie back up, but maybe I should stick with Nalia instead?

[D'amarr from Darshiva]

Jaheira with shield and 1H weapon plus druidic supports spells can become a capable defender. Her higher level spells are good.

If you take Nalia, who is sort of a weaker Imoen, you can kick Yoshimo, since Nalia can do most of the traps handling (with/without equipment to improve skills).

Aerie can be rather annoying due to her personal story. Plus, she drowns in spells due to multi-classing. In the heat of combat, you want dedicated casters, and deciding between casting divine spells or arcane spells is a tough choice. A few nice spell combinations exist for a multiclass character like her, but specialists are more efficient.

[Leeux]

Aerie is really powerful mid/late game if you use her properly (see this thread[forums.beamdog.com], with the caveat that maybe not all tactics in that thread are still relevant, as there were some patches since that time that may have changed things) specially with the robe of vecna+amulet of power combo.

As for Jaheira, I always used her as dual wielding Scimitars past mid-game, but up to that point it's clubs + shields... I normally switch her after the underdark, maybe... she always receives the belt of 19 str in my games initially, and switching to the 20 str as soon as it's available, and I always try to give her the best armor class equipment I can, at least while I'm in the SoA part.

As for your party, if you keep Yoshimo up to Spellhold you'll have story implications that otherwise you'll miss. But you can use Nalia as replacement early game until you get Imoen back.

EDIT: Here's another good thread about Jaheira[forums.beamdog.com]

[voehringer_nitron]

Jaheira has long been one of my favorite companions, and my most frequent romance partner. (This is probably why she leaves, if you were progressing the romance and she says "Things won't be the same" or some such)

Her STR score is decent, but not great. The Adventure Mart has a Girdle of Hill Giant Strength for sale, and you can also find Stone Giant and Frost Giant girdles and the Gauntlets of Ogre Power as you travel. Some good armor, a nice shield and she can tank very well, especially if she has Iron Skins memorized. Other good spells are Insect Plague (especially against spell casters), Harm and Conjure Fire Elemental. Good weapons are Blackblood (+3 Club with extra acid damage) Belm (+2 scimitar which gives 1 extra attack per round).

Aerie used to annoy the crap out of me, but I've gotten a little more tolerant of her. Cleric/Mages can be very powerful. Cleric spells can be placed in sequencers and contingencies. The Robe of Vecna can reduce the casting time of both mage and cleric spells. Some spells can be both divine and arcane, like the Symbol spells and Elemental summons. The Cleric elementals don't have the risk of turning on you and with the Symbol spells you can free up some level 8 mage spell slots for things like Horrid Wilting or Spell Trigger.

Nalia has fewer Thief levels than Imoen, so you may need to be swapping the Ring of Lock Picks and Ring of Danger Sense on her one free ring slot. This would preclude the use of the Ring of Acuity or Wizardry.

As for Yoshimo, I don't want to spoil anything, but I have never taken him all the way through, even before I knew what would happen.

[Tasi]

Originally posted by Leeux:

there were some patches since that time that may have changed things) specially with the robe of vecna+amulet of power combo.

Wait, what have changed? You mean something cleric/mage specific?
Thanks

[Tasi]

Originally posted by Saelune:

Bonus question, Aerie or Nalia? I just finished Nalia's quests and picked Aerie back up, but maybe I should stick with Nalia instead?

My pick between these two would be Aerie. Cleric/mage is potent combo.

Jaheira is very strong. She needs +strength belt. She is very powerfull combatant with it (spear, or staff or two weapons).
Iron Skin [baldursgate.fandom.com] spell makes her very good tank. Amazing romance.

Yoshimo: I like him. His traps are very strong (even so that you may call it cheese). I like his story and I usually keep him utill I get Imoen back.

[ÄmJii]

I'd go for Nalia, since you currently don't have a pure mage in your group. Cleric/Mage reaches 7th level mage spells at 3 mil EXP, whereas pure mage has 9th level spells and HLAs to choose from.
I'd also take Jan over Yoshimo any day of the week, but I won't delve into it more than that.

Jaheira is very potent with her Woodland Beings (nymph casts lots of CC), Insect Plague (shuts down just about any spellcaster) and Conjure Fire Elementals (which are always friendly).

Later on she gets strong HLAs, Greater Elemental Summoning calls forth elemental princes which are insanely strong (almost up there with Planetars). There's few reasons I like 'em:
1) They can't be insta-killed like regular summons (same immunity as Devas and Planetars)
2) You can summon Planetars and elemental princes simultaneously
3) They have Dispel-on-hit effect.

[Leeux]

Originally posted by Tasi:

Originally posted by Leeux:

there were some patches since that time that may have changed things) specially with the robe of vecna+amulet of power combo.

Wait, what have changed? You mean something cleric/mage specific?
Thanks

I mean, yeah... some changes introduced in patches could have affected some of the tricks/combos people described in that thread... some of them could have "expired" :P

One examples people in that thread posited was Minor Sequencer with double Doom, but Doom stacking with itself was fixed at some point... even before that thread, I think.

There could be others, haven't read all the posts in that thread myself and also I'm not on top of the changes that have been done over the past 2 years, either.

[Saelune]

Ok, so I think I will keep Jaheira and just reconsider how I use her.

I am aware of Yoshimo's situation, which is why I am keeping him, atleast for this first playthrough.

I think I will stick with Aerie. I like her more than Nalia, and I kind of prefer just using her for most battle casting, even if it is inneficient. I am currently just playing on Normal, so min/maxing is not life or death, but I will keep the advice given since I do one day want to get the Legacy of Bhaal achievements which will require far more advanced play.

Thanks everyone for your advice and suggestions.

[JohnyT]

if you want to get rid of jaheira but no regrets later, send her to northeast room inside he copper coronet, close the door and she wont make you decide stay with me/ bye forever.

[Godsarm]

I'd take Yoshimo to Spellhold...you get a big experience bump if you complete his quest and it gives you a free slot to take Imoen back with you.

I've taken Jaheira to the end of ToB...the big issue is the enormous 1 million exp wait for her to level up, I think from 14 to 15 as a Druid. Actually it's 2 million because of her multi class. If you have the patience, she gets lots of extra spells. I usually dump her after the Harper/Romance quests are complete...lots of dinking around waiting for stuff to happen. When Elminster/Terminsel shows up to congratulate you, have your Thief pre-chug several potions of Master Thievery and Haste him...then pick his pocket multiple times for among other things, a +2 Ring of Protection and a +2 Cloak of Protection, which means that you can get two of each in the game. You will have problems using them all with Magic Armor etc...but it's nice to have options.

[SMJSMOK]

Originally posted by Godsarm:

I usually dump her after the Harper/Romance quests are complete

A real romantic, I see :-D

[red255]

but to prevent her from permanently leaving we turn her to stone, in case we change our mind.

anyways Jahiera is an issue mainly of getting her a decent weapon. she needs pips, 2 pips in dual wield and 1 in scimitars, which is quite a few levels I believe 3 million XP.

at that point she can use hardiness and the spell to reduce damage, to reduce damage.

normally you give her the spectral brand and Belm as I recall. using blast bark or whatever you buy from trademeet in the meantime.

in BG1 I gave her dagger spec. and had her use daggers.

[voehringer_nitron]

Blast Bark? You can buy Blackblood, and one of the Shadow Druids drops Gnasher, which has the splinters that do damage for a few rounds. Jaheira starts off with one point in scimitars already. On the disc based version I would often use Shadow Keeper to remove that point in Sword & Shield and put it in Two Weapon Fighting, adding a second one when she leveled up enough. I usually kept the point in quarterstaves for the extra reach and there are some nice staves out there anyways.