Questions Questions

[*Mick64]

Well when I talk balance I don't usually refer to PvP but PvE, which is what we balance things around here. Sure a wizard is strong in a one on one fight where he can unload everything at once, but when you're trying to go through Carceri? Someone who can dish out 500 damage per round for the whole dungeon while being near untouchable is going to be more useful then someone who's really a glorified buff bot with a trick or two for the boss.

[*Ceremorph]

Although I do have to admit, clerics are stupid easy to play if your primary goal is survival. Sure they won't be soloing the painbringer, but as long as you can avoid being zapped by a Mord's you kinda have to make a mistake to die here.

[*Miraie]

To be fair, there is a special place in my heart for all buff bots. Especially wizard/cleric or sorcerer/FS theurges.

As for Terrifying Rage, I would not worry about it too much. It will probably be alright in the Abyss, but fairly useless afterwards due to immunities. Whether you can take it on a non-Barb level, though, is something I do not know : p I suspect not, but could easily be wrong.

Druids are not actually as powerful as they could be. Simply because their base damage (even with flurry) comes from too many sources and everything has resistances here. You will end up hitting the Painbringer in Carceri for 5 magic damage/hit. A weapon master with knockdown will indeed deal with the boss in a few rounds if they can survive the spirits surrounding it. If you want a silly druid powerbuild, something like 9 cleric, 10 druid, 1 monk and 10 theurge gets you Magical Beast Wild Shape (if you take it at level 25, which should also be your 10th druid level). Cleric/Druid buffed shifter is ridiculous.. but also suffers from the above problem (spread damage). A druid without monk is even worse due to less overall damage (even the basic flurry is awesome).

[*Sleven]

Ze wall o' text was only meant to make the point that the tried and true tier list still holds true in NWN2. And yes, the gaps in power between tiers are much less prominent because of in game limitations, but they're still there.

If we want to do the whole which class is more powerful and why thing, I'd be more than willing to. I enjoy good discourse, even when I disagree with people.

Just to jump in with my two cents, but a lot of what you're saying there makes sense, but it utterly predicated on one thing: you're playing alone.

Even in party play, if someone told me to assemble the strongest possible team for X job (could be anything) I would choose a group of all primary casters. Don't get me wrong, I love archers, rogues, barbarians, monks, and all sorts of quirky non-caster builds myself, but are you sure you wouldn't do the same if told to assemble your party strictly based on power?

So when you start to say certain classes are at a disadvantage, what they really are is at a disadvantage when ALONE (and not equipped with the right gear).

I disagree here. Gear doesn't make up for the power curve provided by full 9th level caster progressions in NWN2. But please don't think that I'm advocating for casters above all. Power =/= fun. Most of the classes I personally enjoy playing either have limited spell selection or rely on special tricks and abilities.

Well when I talk balance I don't usually refer to PvP but PvE, which is what we balance things around here. Sure a wizard is strong in a one on one fight where he can unload everything at once, but when you're trying to go through Carceri? Someone who can dish out 500 damage per round for the whole dungeon while being near untouchable is going to be more useful then someone who's really a glorified buff bot with a trick or two for the boss.

Oh I wasn't talking about strictly PvP. In fact, PvP was only an afterthought when making my post (I much prefer party play and storytelling in both PnP and NWN2).

Now bear in mind, I haven't played much here (beyond seeing what's available for classes, changes, and races), but I've never had a problem on servers and modules with MotB or SoZ style rest and/or over-tuned/frequent encounters. Spell selection and use is key; and I often find people make big mistakes in this area. Furthermore, I think you're valuing damage waaaay too much. It's not what strictly makes one class better than another, especially when casters don't even have to use damage to remove a threat permanently.

Albeit, this is NWN2, so casters' options are limited compared to PnP. But you would have to work hard at it to make an area capable of dethroning casters. But even then, they could always just build gish. ;)

Although I do have to admit, clerics are stupid easy to play if your primary goal is survival. Sure they won't be soloing the painbringer, but as long as you can avoid being zapped by a Mord's you kinda have to make a mistake to die here.

How does this "Painbringer" compare for level 30s (relatively speaking) to an enemy like Thopylax (or whatever that Red Dragon's name is) in the OC for level 20s. Because I have made builds for solo campaign runs that were able to 1v1 him (not that it's a crazy accomplishment or anything), a solo Painbringer build might be another interesting challenge.

As for Terrifying Rage, I would not worry about it too much. It will probably be alright in the Abyss, but fairly useless afterwards due to immunities. Whether you can take it on a non-Barb level, though, is something I do not know : p I suspect not, but could easily be wrong.

Well that's discouraging. I take it even the penalties are considered a fear and/or mind-affecting effect and you're throwing monsters at people immune to either one or both? 'S too bad, I had a Terrifying Rage build on NWN2db that I kinda wanted to try here... oh well.

Druids are not actually as powerful as they could be. Simply because their base damage (even with flurry) comes from too many sources and everything has resistances here. You will end up hitting the Painbringer in Carceri for 5 magic damage/hit. A weapon master with knockdown will indeed deal with the boss in a few rounds if they can survive the spirits surrounding it. If you want a silly druid powerbuild, something like 9 cleric, 10 druid, 1 monk and 10 theurge gets you Magical Beast Wild Shape (if you take it at level 25, which should also be your 10th druid level). Cleric/Druid buffed shifter is ridiculous.. but also suffers from the above problem (spread damage). A druid without monk is even worse due to less overall damage (even the basic flurry is awesome).

Meh, if you're a Druid in NWN2 you really shouldn't be using Wild Shape for anything other than Oaken Resilience. It's just that bad. A shame it has to be that way though...

Guess I should roll a Druid on here to bring attention to this undervalued class ;) .


All of this class discussion made me think of another question: Do Bards get access to the spells Dismissal and Gust of Wind on this server? I know they were supposed to in NWN2 but something in the 2da got botched.

[*Miraie]

I think a non-shifter druid could indeed be an interesting experiment here. Not one I've been eager to try, but definitely something I am curious about. Both Niflheim and Carceri (which are sort of the endgame areas) feature a lot of mobs that are immune to mind-affecting effects and critical hits. Among other things, like consistent 50% concealment. The Painbringer is ridiculous in comparison to anything in OC, but not as ridiculous as the big red dragon - neither of which is truly insurmountable, though!

[*Sleven]

Apologies for the double post, but after a quick 5 min search, the only thing I could find on the Flee the Scene to Dimension Door discussion was two topics. Posts from people I'm assuming are in charge of this seem to be as follows:

Tomekk - March 24, 2015 05:08 PM (GMT)
Making Flee the Scene a bit better can be easily considered after our current projects are finished... but no, you will never get Dimensional Door as a spammable ability, its already cheesy enough to see roughly every wizard use it to go from stall to stall.

AND

Agony_Aunt - September 5, 2014 02:56 AM (GMT)
We won't go changing an existing spell that is used by 99% of Warlocks to something different. Adding a dimension door type spell as a separate invocation could be possible, but to be honest, i wish we had never included Dim Door in the first place... such an annoying ability.

Still if a builder was willing to add it, i can't argue strongly against it.

The only reasons given appear to be "just cuz I don't like that ability". If your devs/whateveryoucallthemhere don't like it, I'm not sure why the spell was made for the server in the first place.

I agree Flee the Scene's current iteration should still exist (after all, why take options away from people?), but I don't really see any compelling evidence for why this dead horse is something that should not be implemented. Heck, Agony_Aunt seemingly admits to this.

[*Sleven]

Miraie! You ninja!

I think a non-shifter druid could indeed be an interesting experiment here. Not one I've been eager to try, but definitely something I am curious about.

Probably what I'll make then. With full Ammon Jerro appearance.

Both Niflheim and Carceri (which are sort of the endgame areas) feature a lot of mobs that are immune to mind-affecting effects and critical hits. Among other things, like consistent 50% concealment.

It seems Necromancers and Enchanters get screwed on every server. Not to mention Barbarians.

The Painbringer is ridiculous in comparison to anything in OC, but not as ridiculous as the big red dragon - neither of which is truly insurmountable, though!

Yea, beating a level 32? dragon as a level 20 isn't easy, but it's doable, so I thought the comparison might be suitable.

[*Mander]

It seems Necromancers and Enchanters get screwed on every server.

Control Undead doesn't count as a mind affecting spell, it's necromancy and lasts for real life hours. The niflheim ghosts have terrible will saves too, as do most undead who think their mind immunity replaces the need for it.

[*Miraie]

The Painbringer and the red dragon both have so many attacks the game fails to register them. Among other things : p They're silly. And have silly resistances and other things. It is possible to trick the Painbringer into a spellcasting loop by disabling its Greater Invisibility with Invisibility Purge, however. Also, you'd want to be around 69 AC to be mostly immune to crits. 65 AC should be good for Carceri. Being able to UMD will be critical. If you don't need CHA (probably not, as a druid) getting Living Undeath could be sensible.

And, alas! Blind is one of the few things mobs in those areas are vulnerable to. And healing in Niflheim, of course. Almost everything has some form of DR and elemental resistances, also.

As for Dimension Door for warlocks, I am actually in support of the idea. But I cannot script it myself so there's a bit of a problem there : p Shadowdancers already get to jump as much as they want *nodnod* Furthermore, Warlocks could use a bunch of other fixes (esp. blasts counting as spells of higher level, slight DC buffs and/or extending the duration of warlock CC to 2 rounds). Things! Several of them.

Edit: The undead in Niflheim also have reasonably bad fort saves. Which is nifty when you can make use of it (blinds). Undeath to Death remains a stellar mage thing to do while at Niflheim. Alas, not so good in Carceri. Because the concealed spirit things are in fact spirits and not undead.

[*Sleven]

Control Undead doesn't count as a mind affecting spell, it's necromancy and lasts for real life hours. The niflheim ghosts have terrible will saves too, as do most undead who think their mind immunity replaces the need for it.

Oh I was more referring to the fear effects they have access to. Also the rampant Death Magic/Ability Drain/etc immunities on creatures and items.

The Painbringer and the red dragon both have so many attacks the game fails to register them. Among other things : p They're silly. And have silly resistances and other things. It is possible to trick the Painbringer into a spellcasting loop by disabling its Greater Invisibility with Invisibility Purge, however. Also, you'd want to be around 69 AC to be mostly immune for crits. 65 AC should be good for Carceri. Being able to UMD will be critical. If you don't need CHA (probably not, as a druid) getting Living Undeath could be sensible.

Ha, well if my solo Painbringer build (I don't even know what this BBEG can do yet) must be Druid (cuz I said I'd make one earlier) then I could easily draft something with > 70 AC, crit immunity, and a few other tricks. Probably only 16 UMD though...

And, alas! Blind is one of the few things mobs in those areas are vulnerable to. And healing in Niflheim, of course. Almost everything has some form of DR and elemental resistances, also.

Yea, blind is just great in general.

As for Dimension Door for warlocks, I am actually in support of the idea. But I cannot script it myself so there's a bit of a problem there : p Shadowdancers already get to jump as much as they want *nodnod* Furthermore, Warlocks could use a bunch of other fixes (esp. blasts counting as spells of higher level, slight DC buffs and/or extending the duration of warlock CC to 2 rounds). Things! Several of them.

Warlocks got it pretty bad all around. So many bugs and poorly implemented features =/ (that poor server devs have to deal with). And although I'm not a huge fan of the class (it really does get boring), they certainly need help in more than one area. A popular Lock boost/fix in PnP campaigns with mostly Tier 3+ characters was to allow them to take a new Invocation at every Warlock level up to 20.

Although... I do enjoy playing Monks... so that Shadowdancer info makes me want to build one with Shadowfu.