GS: Since the game lets players choose a party of up to five characters from 11 different professions and nine different ethical alignments, balancing the game for different party sizes and compositions must have been pretty challenging. What was the hardest part of making all these different parties work within the game?

Tim Cain: Well, we didn't balance these parties in the sense that we made sure all of them were equally difficult. Instead, we just made sure they were capable of finishing the game. So we couldn't add a main-story quest that required a wizard, because you might not have one the party. But we could add a quest that had a magic-susceptible creature that is much easier to defeat with a wizard. Similarly, it is harder to play the game all of the way through with just a single character party, but it is possible. Playing with a party of five bards is harder than a party of five fighters, but both groups can finish the game.