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EverythingXen
Arch-villain
Joined: 01 Feb 2002
Posts: 4342
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| TOEE First Impressions and Tips |
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Well, I bought TOEE... excellent purchase. 
I love it. The intro movie seriously put me in the mood to get down to some serious hacking. The combat is beautiful, the feats are perfect, and very few changes to the rules were made. The backgrounds are excellent (though the dungeons are a little dark for my tastes.). The NPCs are ... well... NPCs. It's no Gothic 2, but what is?
The quests are fairly Mickey Mouse, too, which is par for the course. No doubt about it... this game is built around the combat, and the play manual even says so. Which has led me to an epiphany:
Combat intense CRPGs are fun, if done well. I'd forgotten that due to all the bad ones (Dungeon Siege and IWD2 in particular... neither bad (especially IWD2) but both a little hack happy and reload intensive for me (well, not Dungeon Siege... that was dirt easy)). Forget pre-generated histories and party interaction (the NPCs are vivid, however... though I don't use them because I don't like to share, and they take all the best loot!!!) for a minute and enjoy TOEE for what it is... that's my advice. The module was a hackfest and the game is too... but an INTERESTING hackfest. Oh, and try the various opening scenes... I love the neutral and chaotic evil opening movies!
Here's a few tips (not that anyone needs them, as I'm sure everyone else here has completed the game at least once. Sigh. ).
- Rogues and two weapon fighting. They go hand in hand. One sneak attack a round is good, two is better, and three is best.
- Fighters. There's a lot of feats available to keep you fat-happy in featly goodness if you have an int of 13 or higher or are an archer. If you don't, though, multiclass after level 4 or 6. Paladin is a good alternate, as is barbarian (especially barbarian).
- Clerics - Choose a god with Sun and Strength (I think Pelor has those domains) if at all possible. Sun, with its Greater Turning power, is incredibly useful... why chase the stupid undead down when they run when you can SEAR THEM FROM THE FACE OF THE WORLD with the same turn check?
- Wizards. Scribe scrolls and craft wands. Just do it. Scrolls are cheap to make and each scroll you make is just like another spell per day. If you're running out of spells or wishing you had prepared 'this' instead of 'that'... these feats will fix that. My first action with 250 gold and 25 experience was to make 10 scrolls of enlarge person and my fighter truly appreciates being size Large every major fight. Also you can pass these scrolls and wands to sorcerers to greatly extend their versatility (while they in turn blow everything to high heaven and back with spontaneous nuclear death).
- Sorcerers. Ah, sorcerers. Beautiful, wonderful sorcerers. Rated as one of the 'weakest' classes (third weakest, after bard and fighter) on the official D&D boards they are absolutely godly powerful. The whiners evidently don't know how to play one or understand that D&D is a team based game. Wizard makes scrolls and wands so the sorcerer has support spells in case the wizard goes down. Sorcerer blows everything up so the wizard doesn't go down. It's just that easy. I'm not using one this play through but they're a great class regardless.
- Bards. Ah, Bards. The whipping boys of D&D they are the most hated and most whined about class in existence (ranger is a close second, and fighter is recently climbing in popularity in Whineville). Again, it's about TEAMWORK. I have a bard in my playtest party... and this is what he can do: Heal in a pinch (spontaneous cure spells), call for backup (spontaneous summoning), enhance the party (+1 to everything is never to be laughed at), decimate the NPC quests (high charisma + maxed out bluff, sense motive, gather information, perform, and diplomacy = all your quests are belong to us ), ranged weapon support for the fighter (point blank shot and precise shot at level 1 and he's never drawn his melee weapon), save or die spells (hold person. level 10 fighter whimpers and fails his save. My mage then coupe de graces him. 1000 xp for everyone, bard shrugs and says 'tweren't nothing'.), crowd control (grease spell = 'oh look... a hoarde of enemies. Oh look... a hoard of tripped enemies. Fire away), Mage suppression (silence 15 foot radius ... silence is golden ), heavy artillery (wand of fireballs with his charisma driven maxed out use magic device).
Yeah, sounds REAL useless to me. He has something to contribute in every situation.
Rangers - Best used as archers backing up a melee tank. Favored enemy undead is possibly the best, though favored enemy human will get a lot of mileage too.
Druids - What's to say... druids are godly powerful. Stop the enemies, heal the party, summon creatures like a madman, or turn into a bear and mix it up right next to the fighter. Or simply blow enemies to pieces with flame strike spells and such. Then turn into a bear and eat them.
Barbarian - You can't go wrong with a barbarian in the party. Power attack + two handed weapon + barbarian rage bonuses to strength = SPLAT! They have a lot of hit points, but the ac isn't too great. Best used paired with a fighter.
Monk - Tricky to use properly in pen and paper, and still are. They're brutally fast and can tumble like madmen. Combine this with stunning blow (fortitude save), incredible saves, and evasion and they make pretty good enemy spellcaster harriers. Plus they can contemptuously knock one arrow fired at them a round away. How cool is that?
Paladin - Not many feats for paladins, unfortunately. Of course... they don't really need them. Their immunity to disease and charisma bonus to saves is excellent early game. Smite evil just keeps getting better and better, of course. Give a fighter a greatsword and he'll make the demon think twice. Give a paladin a greatsword and he'll make the demon repent in tears as its sent plunging back to hell. Yes, smite damage doubles on a critical hit. Power attack + smite + high strength + lucky critical hit = Mostly dead hill giant (or Balor) in one shot.
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Estuans interius, Ira vehementi
"The old world dies and with it the old ways. We will rebuild it as it should be, MUST be... Immortal!"
=Member of the Nonflamers Guild=
=Worshipper of the Written Word= |
Fri Oct 10, 2003 12:48 pm |
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stanthony
One Smart Dog
Joined: 28 Oct 2002
Posts: 556
Location: Tallinn, Estonia |
Nice tips, Xen. I need to think about some of them. BTW, when do you plan to write a full review for RPGDot? I'd love to read one.
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- Druids do not fight with metal weapons! Sit here, and you over here. Put the elbows of your right arms on the table...
- Arm-pulling? Get me back me pan!
R.A.Salvatore The Cleric Quintet. Canticle |
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Fri Oct 10, 2003 1:13 pm |
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EverythingXen
Arch-villain
Joined: 01 Feb 2002
Posts: 4342
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It will be a while. I've got to complete the game at least three ways (good, neutral, evil)... I'd love to do all 9, but that's a little nuts. I just got the game on Wednesday and I've probably logged 20 hours into it easy ... impressive when you consider that I've got a real job to go to. My level 6 good party is largely unstoppable, so they'll be the blitzers... first party through the game so I'll know where to go and such with the other two.
Once I get level 9 as a wizard it will be game over for any major encounter (as long as they're not undead or constructs).
"Knock knock... who's there.... hold monster... hold monster wh---" *coup de grace*
I built a wand of hold person and level 10 fighters fall like leaves from a tree.
_________________
Estuans interius, Ira vehementi
"The old world dies and with it the old ways. We will rebuild it as it should be, MUST be... Immortal!"
=Member of the Nonflamers Guild=
=Worshipper of the Written Word= |
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Fri Oct 10, 2003 2:04 pm |
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hollaholla
Guards Lieutenant
Joined: 19 Aug 2003
Posts: 161
Location: at my computer desk!~ |
Thats GREAT to read and to hear someone here give it accolades. I knew the game was good but people kept griping and crap like that. Thanks again and I will be looking forward to your review of The Temple of Elemental Evil.
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**I just chose a new avatar because I just saw the characters for the new Final Fantasy and got ....excited!!! |
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Fri Oct 10, 2003 2:08 pm |
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corwin
On the Razorblade of Life
Joined: 10 Jun 2002
Posts: 8376
Location: Australia |
Xen, I enjoyed your post as always, but is there any class you don't like? We can't run all of them in a party, so I'd be really interested to hear your suggested combinations. I love sorcerers and I really know how to use them, so I agree with you; in a team situation they are instant death. Would you pair one with a wiz, or just have the one main caster? Do you need a cleric? If you go with , or without one, which is the best second tier healer? I've been thinking: Barb, sorc, cleric, rogue and one more. What are your thoughts? I have no intention of using NPC's. One final question. Do you think in this game, it's a good idea to give a sorc a level of fighter or barb at level one for the extra HP and feats before multying to the caster class?
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If God said it, then that settles it!
I don't use Smileys, I use Emoticons!!
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Fri Oct 10, 2003 2:14 pm |
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EverythingXen
Arch-villain
Joined: 01 Feb 2002
Posts: 4342
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HOnestly... no... I like all classes. Some are harder to use properly than others, but all are useful if played well.
If you're only going to have one arcane caster, it should be a wizard. Their versility may be bogged down by having to memorize a smaller variety of spells that the sorcerer knows.... but it comes back by scribing scrolls if nothing else.
If you're going with two casters (a solid choice) then definitely pair a sorcerer up with a wizard.
Party configuration... well... my party is largely unstoppable, and I have a fighter, a cleric, a rogue, a wizard, and a bard. Basically your classics with a 5th Wheel who can support ANY of the other four.
But by level 6 I'm pretty much out of low int fighter feats and wishing I wasn't lawful neutral as a fighter so I could take barbarian for my last four levels. Oh well.
You don't need a cleric, but you do need a healer. Druid would be a good replacement for his stronger offensive spell selection. If he has brew potion he can make dozens of potions of cure light wounds to free up his spell slots for non-healing spells. Bard might actually work if, again, he takes brew potion at level 3. When push comes to shove, though, being able to drop a spell to heal a fighter half his hit points in a flash is pretty handy and only clerics can pull that off.
A game breaking COMBAT build for TOEE is basically:
Melee +1 base attack class (fighter, paladin, barbarian... ranger if you boost con a little more than the others)
Healer (Druid, Cleric)
Two arcane casters (one wizard, one sorcerer is best... two of either will work just as well. Actually, two sorcerers... one a conjuring madman and one a nuclear deathmage... would do really, really well).
Trapkiller (Rogue). Good to support your fighter anyways. I haven't found a lot of traps, but I recall a fiendish amount in the actual Temple in the module, so I take no chances.
My second arcane caster is the bard, for the reasons I mentioned previously (especially since first time through I want to hit as much dialogue option as possible).
My Evil party is Fighter, Rogue, Sorcerer, Cleric, Monk. It replaces a second arcane caster with an arcane killer. They'll miss a lot of dialogue options compared to my good group.
My Chaotic Neutral party is ... uh... Barbarian, Barbarian, Barbarian/Fighter, Barbarian/Rogue, Cleric. They're all half orcs and they all have 20 strengths (yes, even the cleric and the rogue). They all rage at the start of a big fight and... everything DIES. For a lark after saving I had them rage and destroy the Moathouse. They did so with much screaming, blood splatter, and mocking of bandit girly-man physiques. Sometimes subtlety is over-rated. Though they'll miss pretty much all dialogue options.
And do NOT multi-class a primary caster in this game. In NWN you can get away with it because you have 20 levels to play with and only need 17 or 18 to get your maximum level spells. TOEE you only have 10... if your sorcerer takes a level in something not sorcerer they will NOT get their level 5 spells at all.
Clerics, druids, and wizards can afford ONE level in something else... which typically isn't worth the effort. With a party there's nothing they can do with one level that someone else in the party isn't a master at.
_________________
Estuans interius, Ira vehementi
"The old world dies and with it the old ways. We will rebuild it as it should be, MUST be... Immortal!"
=Member of the Nonflamers Guild=
=Worshipper of the Written Word= |
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Fri Oct 10, 2003 2:41 pm |
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Seth
Last Man Standing
Joined: 23 Jan 2002
Posts: 1008
Location: Faerun |
Excellent… (ala Mr. Burns) 
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Money - An article which may be used as a universal passport to everywhere except heaven, and as a universal provider of everything except happiness. |
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Fri Oct 10, 2003 4:31 pm |
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Val
Risen From Ashes
Joined: 18 Feb 2002
Posts: 14724
Location: Utah, USA |
Time to go out and pick this one up. I need a good ole hackfest. 
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Freeeeeeedom! Thank heavens it's summer!
What do I have to show for my hard work? A piece of paper! Wee!
=Guardian, Moderator, UltimaDot Newshound=  |
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Fri Oct 10, 2003 5:57 pm |
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The Hurricane
Tempered Warlord
Joined: 01 Jun 2002
Posts: 299
Location: The Sword Coast |
Thanks Xen. I thought scribe scroll would be useless...  My stupidity shows... Anyway, I think ToEE is underrated. It's the best hackfest to come out in a long time and combat is great. You have to rate this one higher than 80%  Please Xen?
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Fri Oct 10, 2003 11:18 pm |
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corwin
On the Razorblade of Life
Joined: 10 Jun 2002
Posts: 8376
Location: Australia |
Thanks Xen, I really appreciate your thoughtful and well reasoned comments.
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If God said it, then that settles it!
I don't use Smileys, I use Emoticons!!
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Fri Oct 10, 2003 11:58 pm |
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Dhruin
Stranger In A Strange Land
Joined: 20 May 2002
Posts: 1825
Location: Sydney, Australia |
A couple of quick comments from an average player...
Cleric - there's quite a lot of undead so a Cleric with Sun domain can destroy a dozen pesky undead at once. Some undead can't be damaged by piercing weapons so if you've gone heavy on ranged weapons a cleric will help.
Rogue - Flanking is cool in ToEE. Use your high Dex rogue with his various Dodge-type feats to flank an enemy from behind with a fighter from the front - and dual-weapon sneak attack. You get bonuses for flanking and sneak - and then your fighter gets a flank bonus for his turn. Add a char with polearm like a glaive that can reach past the fighter from behind him.
If you can't find room in your preferred party configuration for both a sorc and a wizard and you're going to stick with a sorc, Spugnoir the wizard NPC only takes spell scrolls (no other loot or payment required) so he's a fairly low-maintenance NPC. Haven't tried getting him to make scrolls, so keep Xen's comments on the value of scrolls in mind.
Or...install CoE's fan patch to disable NPC looting. You need to install the patch BEFORE taking an NPC - NPCs currently in your party aren't fixed.
Finally, use the hyperlinked die-roll thingy to examine your hits and misses. Unless you're Xen you might realise you've stuffed something up that's affecting your hits (like accidentally leaving Power Attack on, or you didn't realise that weapon wasn't proficient) OR pick up something good like a bonus you didn't know about so you can make sure you take full advantage of it. |
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Sat Oct 11, 2003 2:09 am |
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EverythingXen
Arch-villain
Joined: 01 Feb 2002
Posts: 4342
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I've been playing around with a glaive fighter with improved trip. I have to say... it's pretty awesome against humanoid foes. I knew that but I wanted to see how the game handled it...
Basically, I select trip and trip the guy... if he falls I immediately get to attempt to hit him. When he stands up on his turn I (and everyone else in melee) gets an attack of opportunity. The roll is strength + feat bonus + size bonus ONLY ... so it's brutally effective even against high level foes.
I did it to the cleric in the moathouse with my half-orcs. He fell down, got smashed hard, stood up, and dissappeared in a bloody explosion.
Currently I can't play, though. I get an unpassable error - DDHELP has caused an error in <unknown> - when I try and load a game. I'm HOPING it's just a corrupted save file or even sound affect in that area and that an earlier save or a new game won't run into this problem. I tried for two hours to fix it last night... but without net access at home I can't check for new drivers that are compatible with DX 9.0b from their install CD and reinstalled TOEE didn't fix the problem, and neither did reinstalling DX from the CD. So I'm out of luck if it applies to all my saves or new games.
Sigh.
e-mail in to tech support. might call them on their toll free number from home too. Never know. They might know more about fixing software or hardware issues than I do (it would be a first, though. Normally I'm much more knowledgeable than whoever I speak to on the phone, which tends to a) intimidate them b) relieve them or c) anger them so they call me an idiot who doesn't know what he's doing and that all the problems are my fault.
_________________
Estuans interius, Ira vehementi
"The old world dies and with it the old ways. We will rebuild it as it should be, MUST be... Immortal!"
=Member of the Nonflamers Guild=
=Worshipper of the Written Word= |
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Sat Oct 11, 2003 2:47 pm |
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Remus
Overgrown Cat
Joined: 03 Jul 2002
Posts: 1657
Location: Fish bowl |
Might be helpful to check up the bug list (parts 1-2) at Atari forums?
BTW if you use "DDHELP has caused an error" in the searh on Google will produced truckload of links/results that seem useful to understand the problem.
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Sat Oct 11, 2003 4:29 pm |
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EverythingXen
Arch-villain
Joined: 01 Feb 2002
Posts: 4342
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I know. I'm turning down the hardware acceleration on my graphics card when I get home in a bit (first thing I was going to try today anyways... troubleshooting at 2 am misses a few things). I can't update my video card drivers because I don't have net access at home to even check if I have the most current WHCL quality drivers.
Still.... sigh.
_________________
Estuans interius, Ira vehementi
"The old world dies and with it the old ways. We will rebuild it as it should be, MUST be... Immortal!"
=Member of the Nonflamers Guild=
=Worshipper of the Written Word= |
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Sat Oct 11, 2003 4:44 pm |
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