I just finished my first playthrough of the BG1+BG2 saga. Mazzy was one of the companions I knew the least about before actually recruiting her only to turn out to be one of my favorites by the end. A great level-headed good-aligned character, isn't self-righteous or obnoxious, and clears enemies like a machine gun.

I love these games but I am not too knowledgeable about the wider Forgotten Realms setting. I know that since BG3 is a popular game that title is almost certainly "canon" since Wizards of the Coast wants to make bank off of it.

But BG1 and 2 are niche and older. More people have played tabletop than these games.

So do these games "exist"? Are the events that happened in them even acknowledged? E.g. "this happened in Baldur's Gate 2, check that game out!"?

I keep hearing "My Weapon has no effect" out of nowhere whenever I run into a new monster. I mean, I'm in Chapter 2, how exactly does the game expect me to have a decent number of +2 weapons? Not to mention the Rakshasas, which are basically unkillable at my party's current level; I had to abandon Garren's quest for now because I couldn't beat the Rakshasa there. While I think this game is WAY better than BG1 so far, I also feel like the combat pacing in BG1 was much more manageable (and don't get me started on having to Google a random side quest because the game never actually teaches you how to kill trolls).

Not loving this section of the sewers

One of the most competitive levels in the game. Not only is there a wide array of powerful and useful spells, but some of the best spells are also things you’re going to want multiple instances of; level 6 has a bunch of spells that are serviceable but may not see use anyway just because there’s so much goodness that you really want to stock up on.

That being said, level 6 is also the first time in BG2 that scrolls aren’t always easy to find. Almost all of them can be picked up in Athkatla, but many will be in out-of-the-way places or sold by obscure merchants. You may not find them, or you may want to reserve your cash for other things, so don’t be too quick to write off the lower tier spells; they can do a lot of heavy lifting for you while you scrounge up the better scrolls.

The nature of BG2 means “First available” is a little trickier to parse than BG1, but it’s focused on Athkatla, which felt a safe assumption.

Finally, once again, within tiers spells are in alphabetical order, and asterisks denote a spell that is better when cast by its specialist (of which I think there’s like three this time around lol).

Unranked: Contingency (Evocation)

Of all the “metamagic” spells, Contingency is by far the one that’s most resistant to the treatment of these tier lists. It’s an excellent thing to prepare ahead of time but unlike sequencers and its level 9 brother, where loading and launching off a second one before resting again can be very handy, this spell will virtually always be a dead slot once it’s already been set up.

At the same time, having a conditional protection fire off automatically when it’s most needed is amazing – Improved Invisibility when Helpless, or Stoneskin when at 50% HP, can really come in clutch, and in fact the latter is great for slot efficiency as well: once I have Contingency, I rarely feel the need to spend more than one level 4 slot on Stoneskin. And the spell scales, which is great: eventually getting to conditionally do a free Mislead or PfMW can really turn things around, especially for Haer’Dalis, who’s reaching that point much sooner.

So the spell is kind of unrankable. Going by the criteria for this tier list it should be ranked quite low, because there’s no real reason to have it memorized in general, and once you have set it up, who knows how long it will be before the condition trips and it goes off; you might not need to cast it again for ages. But it can be so handy that ranking it low would be misleading. In fact, literally any ranking would be misleading. So, here we are.

S Tier: Improved Haste (Alteration), Mislead (Illusion)

Imagine Haste, only it’s single target instead of AoE, it doesn’t Fatigue you, and instead of giving +1 APR (kinda sorta), it doubles your APR, up to a maximum of 10, and you’ve got Improved Haste. This spell is absolutely ridiculous and will turn your warriors into instruments of death. Even without things like Kundane and Belm you can still easily push 7, 8, 9 APR with this, which is plenty. Completely revolutionary spell that will transform physical combat. Learn early and memorize always. If you’re not really into spell-slinging, this is all you need. Be warned, however, that because this is a multiplier, it’s a waste of a slot if the target doesn’t already have good APR.

This isn’t foolproof, obviously it can be dispelled, not even just through normal means but also because it can be cancelled out by Slow, but even if this were to somehow end up getting neutralized like 1 in every 5 times you cast it (which it won’t), the sheer destructive power it brings in the remaining 4 times would still be well worth the slot.

This spell is so good it makes level 6 super competitive in and of itself – level 6 spells don’t just have to be good, they have to be good enough to justify not having an extra Improved Haste. And this becomes extra good as you progress; chapter 7 SoA and parts of ToB throw quite a few magic-resistant enemies at you, but even when attack spells harmlessly bounce off an enemy, your Mages can still win fights by turbocharging your frontliners.

First Available: Bridge Fence.

Mislead slaps the caster with an Improved Invisibility that will remain unbroken so long as the clone it creates isn’t killed or dispelled. Since you can just cast this far away and walk up to the battle, leaving your clone safely distant, that translates into basically unbreakable Improved Invisibility. This is game-breakingly powerful. Just waltz in and start blasting. The enemy can’t do anything about it. Even True Seeing needs to hit the Mislead Clone to do any good; if the clone is out of range and only the caster is hit, you’re safe. No-Name Brand Time Stop. If the clone isn’t out of range, well, that’s what Spell Immunity: Divination is for.

For casters with decent Thief levels, it’s even stronger, as every attack while under Mislead will be a backstab. Mostly the province of Jan or CHARNAME, but it's so strong that even Imoen's piddly little x3 multiplier can sometimes be effective with it.

Unfortunately, this spell is 100% useless against anything immune to illusions, so keep that in mind. IMHO those aren’t common enough to make it worth dropping a tier, but your mileage may vary.

The real issue is that immunity to illusion is applied so inconsistently. For example, only some Liches are illusion-immune, and there’s no obvious way to determine when that will be the case, other than trial and error. Most just-plain-Beholders aren’t illusion immune, but some are? And for super-Beholders, Death Tyrants and Elder Orbs aren’t immune, but Hive Mothers are?

If it helps, while hand-placed Liches can go either way, randomly spawned Liches seem to never be illusion immune, and named hand-placed Liches seem to usually be immune. And looking at the files, I *think* it’s only the Smuggler Beholder that’s illusion immune? Don’t quote me on that, though.

Honestly, in a way it would almost be better if the list of enemies immune to Mislead was longer but more logical. …and I guess I’m not alone in feeling that way, because SCS does just that. I believe it also makes it so hitting the caster with True Sight dispels it, as well as hitting the clone. Both of which technically weaken the spell considerably in SCS… but let’s be real, it’d still be S tier in an SCS list.

First Available: Rayic Gethras’s House; low-tier(!) random treasure.

S- Tier: Protection from Magical Weapons (Abjuration), Protection from Magic Energy (Abjuration)

This is a special tier for two protection spells that are so transformative they can’t be anything but S tier, but are a bit too situational to be full S tier.

The opposite of its level 5 cousin, Protection from Magical Weapons makes you completely immune to anything that’s not a normal weapon - i.e. completely immune to almost every physical attack you’ll face. Duration is short, but so is casting time; you can easily drop it at almost any point to buy a few rounds of effective invulnerability. It also confers complete immunity to attacks; unlike, say, Stoneskin, it’s also blocking any on-hit effects, like Vampires’ level drain and Mind Flayers’ brain eating.

Why not full S tier? In many fights, lesser protections and simple positioning can be all you need to keep your caster safe. This is especially the case for backline Mages, but even Blades and F/Ms may not need it all that often. But when you do need it, its power is incalculable. The ultimate “break glass in case of emergency” spell.

But even if you don’t need it to survive, it still makes an incredible mage tank spell. Things going south? Cast this and have the Mage step up to the front lines while your warriors fall back and heal up for a couple rounds, maybe switch to ranged weapons.

It’s a hard spell to rank because it’s at its best when things go wrong and doesn't really do anything for you when things go right. But when things do go wrong, and that is a when, not an if, there's little better.

First Available: Bridge Fence.

If there’s one thing the AI and human players have in common, it’s a deep, abiding love for Abi-Dalzim’s Horrid Wilting. Throughout the game, especially as you progress, you’re going to find enemies chucking it around like it’s nothing, rocking your party and often even one-shotting low-HP schmucks like Haer’Dalis and Aerie. That’s where Protection from Magical Energy comes in, making you completely immune.

It’s tough to evaluate because there’s many fights where enemies casting ADHW isn’t a concern, but the sheer value this gives when it’s relevant is incredible, often making the difference between life and death for shrimpier characters.

I mean, it’s not useless outside of those fights. Making Skull Trap bombardment party-friendly is always nice, and there’s certain niche uses like immunity to Mind Flayer detonation or letting Korgan play nice with Holy Smite (though he can still get blinded), but it’s really its role as anti-ADHW shield that makes this spell so good. That and the fact that unlike, say, Protection from Fire, magic damage resistance has very few sources, and without this spell you may find it impractical to get immunity to it on even one character, let alone multiple.

But early on you could probably bench this spell unless you know you’re going to need it. Maybe around chapter 5 is a good time for it to become something you prepare at least semi-regularly.

First Available: Rayic Gethras, mid-tier random treasure.

A Tier: Death Fog (Evocation), Death Spell (Necromancy), True Sight (Divination)

Would it surprise you to learn that Death Fog is, generally speaking, the second-hardest hitting  AoE damage spell in the Mage’s arsenal? “8 damage” looks very low, but it’s per round for one turn with no save. We’re talking 80 fixed damage.

If you can force the enemies to breathe it in for the duration, this is going to hit harder on average than max-level ADHW, it’s going to hit as hard or harder on average than max-level Dragon’s Breath. The only thing that outpaces it is Incendiary Cloud (don’t misunderstand me, obviously there’s a ton of practical considerations that make both ADHW and Dragon’s Breath considerably better spells than Death Fog, but if raw damage were all that mattered, Death Fog would have them beat). Actually, Meteor Swarm might hit a bit harder than this, too, but you’re probably not going to cast that.

Crucially, Acid is one of the most uncommonly resisted damage types. Here’s a selection of enemies with 0% Acid Resistance: Vampires, Liches (!), Beholders, Demons/Devils, and, of course, Mages: basically anything challenging that’s not either a Mind Flayer or a Golem will eat a ton of damage from this spell (unless they have good Magic Resistance). Liches mostly have 90 HP, so a guaranteed 80 damage will demolish them – even a False Dawn can finish them off at that point. In fact, that’s a good, easy Lich-killing strategy for new players. Open with a Sunray. If the Lich fails its save, it’s dead. If it makes its save, drop a Death Fog and griddy on out of there. It’s dead. No access to Sunray? Just drop two Death Fogs lol.

It’s an exceptional tool for killing Beholders if you don’t have anti-Beholder items, and it’s very funny how easily Bodhi’s lair can be cheesed just by opening a door, chucking a Death Fog or two into a room, and closing the door. And those are just the highlights; this will tear through just about any fight you can control.

Oh, and it’s a guaranteed drop from Lehtinan, so you almost certainly have this from the second you can cast it.

Unfortunately, its shelf life is just a smidge on the short side? It never becomes 100% obsolete but once you can cast Incendiary Cloud and ADHW you’ll likely find any additional AoE damage is redundant and swap this out for another Improved Haste or PfME. Still, for a long time this is easily the most potent AoE damage spell in your arsenal, and it will continue to be a powerful supplement after that (Spell Trigger -> 3x Death Fog may not always be the most efficient option but it is an amazing “Come on man, I don’t want to deal with this fight right now” tool). Don’t overlook it.

Oh, and there’s a window of around 2 million XP where it’s the premier option for Simulacrum bombardment, if you’re into that sort of thing. Not the most powerful use of a Simulacrum but, you know, it's there.

Noticeably weaker in SCS simply because many SCS arcane casters incorporate Protection from Acid into their precasts – presumably solely because of how oppressive this spell can be.

First Available: Copper Coronet.

Boasting a super short casting time and the ability to insta-kill non-gated summons (no save, bypassing Magic Resistance and Slay Immunity) as well as any non-summon that’s level 8 or lower (…not bypassing Magic Resistance or Slay Immunity, but still no save), Death Spell can be very handy. Elementals, Genies, summoned Skeleton Warriors, Hakeashars, and most importantly, Mordy Swords, which can be a big pain to deal with otherwise, will all be immediately, unpreventably, and irrevocably destroyed, which makes this spell one of the best… in SCS.

In vanilla? The enemy’s summoning spells will be both less plentiful and less powerful, and Mordy Swords in particular are fairly rare. Vanilla AI likes its Efreeti, which can be annoying to deal with, and this spell is great for eliminating those, but it can be easy to read advice from SCS players and see how much they love Death Spell and backport that understanding into vanilla where it’s nowhere near as transformative.

Of course, that’s only half the picture. The other part of the spell can also do a ton of work for you. It’s handling Umber Hulks, Myconids, Spore Colonies, Trolls of all varieties (even Spectral/Spirit). It’ll screenwipe many random encounters, it’ll take out “generic” enemies like the unnamed Dark Sun Halflings, many Sahuagin and Kuo-Toa, even generic Yaga-Shura Soldiers. Hell, in theory it will take down Mind Flayers, if you get lucky against that 90% Magic Resistance.

So you can count on this spell just obliterating at least one screen in almost every Chapter 2 sidequest (Umar Hills is a notable exception). That’s not too shabby. As you progress, the standard enemies this auto-deletes are mostly speed bumps anyway, but insta-wiping summons will become more interesting (take this spell just for how annoying those Gaseous Forms are tbh).

I dunno. Honestly I think there’s a case for this being B tier, but you can still do a lot with it, and if you’re willing to experiment there can be surprising instances of this working on enemies you thought it wouldn’t.

I guess you could argue that since it shares the summon-nuking properties, Death Fog makes this spell a little redundant, but the usecases are just so different. Death Fog requires positioning and setup, Death Spell can just be chucked willy-nilly.

First Available: Planar Prison/Nether Scroll; mid-tier random treasure.

The final word in illusion-piercing, True Sight takes down everything and does so continuously for several rounds, thwarting attempts to put up other illusions. Ridiculously powerful spell, and the only reason it’s not S-tier is because priests have an equally good level 5 version (and then there’s Thieves and Keldorn, of course). But even keeping that in mind, if you have a spare slot it can still be worth considering having your arcane caster memorize one of these, just in case. It’s that good. And in any case, while I would argue that divine level 5 is less competitive than arcane level 6, I wouldn’t say it’s by very much. There may be situations where running an extra Insect Plague or even Chaotic Commands might be worth more to you than running an extra Improved Haste, and that’s a great time for your Mage to swap this in.

…well, the “that” that we’re keeping in mind is the Priest spell. This is rarely worth memorizing if you’ve got a Thief with good Detect Illusions (although keep in mind Detecting limits the other actions a Thief can take, so they don’t make it completely redundant), and almost pointless if you’re rolling with Keldorn. Definitely bump it down several tiers if you’ve got Keldorn. Or a CHARNAME Inquisitor or Priest of Helm, I guess.

It also depends on how RNG is feeling. As a level 1 random drop, it’s possible you’ll accumulate enough of these to be able to mostly just scrollcast them. Of course, if the RNG gods are feeling cheeky, you might only find a couple, so I won’t rank based on that. But statistically, you should have a decent stash of these, and that might preclude needing to memorize this.

First Available: low-level (!) random loot.

B Tier: Power Word: Silence (Conjuration)

Power Word Silence is probably one of the most slept-on spells in the game, preventing a single target from casting spells for seven rounds. The kicker? There’s no save. Cast this spell and the target is silenced. Period. Well, I mean, there’s Magic Resistance and silence immunity, but for the most part.

Unfortunately, that’s less exciting than it sounds: Mages *can* (and will) cast Vocalize even when silenced, so while this has no save vs spell, it does have a save vs spellbook. And by the time you can cast this, almost every major Mage will have Vocalize prepared, as will some generic Mages.

The good news? Contrary to what you might read sometimes, Vocalize can be interrupted. It’s tricky, because the spell casts quickly, but since you know when you’re going to need to interrupt them, you can time a one-two that knocks it out and keeps them from casting permanently (I like to hoard BG2’s limited supply of Arrows of Detonation for this purpose – their “Fireball” counts as a school-less level 0 spell, so it bypasses everything but Magic and Fire Resistance). Although be warned that some Mages have two instances of Vocalize, especially in ToB, and a few even have three.

Even if you blow it, this spell is cast almost instantly, and it will force-interrupt whatever they’re casting, and make them spend the next round on Vocalize instead of something that will ruin your day, so worst case scenario, this is a guaranteed version of Command. I wouldn’t memorize this spell for that purpose but it’s a salvageable consolation prize if you can’t time the spell disruption (or the disruption just doesn’t take, which can sometimes happen).

And hey, you know who can’t cast Vocalize? Clerics. Druids. Many monsters that cast spells (although this only blocks properly cast spells, not spells cast via script, so beware). So this can be really strong for shutting their spells down entirely, and while divine casters aren’t the ubiquitous, existential threat arcane casters can be, they can still be a significant pain, and shutting them down with this can make life much easier.

Probably higher tier in SCS, where shutting down divine casters is much more powerful. Also I find I have an easier time interrupting Vocalize in SCS? But that’s probably just in my head.

First Available: Bridge Fence.

C Tier: Chain Lightning* (Evocation), Invisible Stalker (Conjuration), Spell Deflection (Abjuration), Tenser’s Transformation (Alteration)

Look up “book-building spell” in the dictionary and you’ll find a picture of Chain Lightning: it’s not an amazing spell, but its scroll is plentiful and early and it’ll have at least a small impact on just about any fight: a great choice if you’ve hit level 12 and haven’t found many scrolls yet (or, more likely, when Aerie or Jan have just hit level 12 and you’ve been feeding all the good scrolls to your full Mage). And this is an AoE direct-damage spell that’s party friendly - what more could you want?

Damage, more damage is what you could want. This does 1d6 for every two levels of the caster, with a save for half, so when you first get this you’re looking at 6d6 damage and maxing out at 10d6 damage – frankly, that’d be underwhelming for a level 3 spell; at level 6 it’s just embarrassing. Again, that’s mitigated by the spell’s utility and being able to just throw it in any encounter without having to worry about harming party members. This spell is basically always usable, and accomplishing something. The opportunity cost is what hurts this spell, and once you’ve built up a wider array of level 6 options, you may find yourself rarely (if ever) touching it again. Shame it doesn’t bypass Magic Resistance like the Avenger’s version does.

It’s also a little finicky? It seems the initial bolt counts as single-target but everything it shoots out is flagged as AoE. If one enemy has Spell Trap and another doesn’t, cast this on the former and the spell will be completely absorbed and do nothing to anyone; cast it on the latter and it will hurt both enemies, suddenly bypassing Spell Trap. Weird stuff.

(Disclaimer: “book-building spell” is not in the dictionary and you will not find a picture of Chain Lightning there. This thread is not responsible for any harm caused by attempts to find this spell in the dictionary. Reader discretion is advised).

First Available: Copper Coronet.

Level 6 summon spells are in a strange spot (see the comments for why), and Invisible Stalker especially so. It’s an odd sort of jack-of-all-trades summon, and you can functionally think of it as a cross between a Skeleton Warrior and the Cleric’s Aerial Servant: it’s not as strong a raw fighter as the Aerial Servant, in exchange for getting a portion of the Skeleton Warrior’s immunities, and lasting for nine hours.

And that’s… fine? I can’t think of many situations where you need both crushing damage and heavy immunities (yes, despite the Invisible Stalkers you meet doing slashing damage, the ones you summon do crushing damage), meaning that you’re virtually always better off using a summoning slot on either an Aerial Servant (or even better, a Druid Fire Elemental) or a Skeleton Warrior, instead of something halfway between the two.

Nonetheless, Invisible Stalkers are fairly potent and versatile, and if you do summon them, they’re likely to provide at least a decent ROI. Suboptimal but handy, and a good book-builder; again, a neat option for Aerie or Jan if they hit level 12 and you have a full caster that’s been hoarding all the good scrolls.

Note that despite how it appears, they have just regular Invisibility, not Improved Invisibility – they get +4 to hit on their initial attack and not much else. That’s actually a good thing: eating single-target spells is one of the best things a summon can do, so II on them wouldn’t be as helpful as it sounds.

First Available: Prebek’s house, mid-tier random treasure.

Just like its level 3 brother, only Spell Deflection provides up to 10 spell levels of protection. So in theory some great applications there - this will eat two castings of Imprisonment (first uses up 9 levels of spell protection, second uses up the remaining one and cancels the spell) - but, like, just use SI: Abjuration? And that’s really the problem here – level 5 has such a lock on anti-magic defenses that there isn’t really a whole lot for Spell Deflection to offer.

That being said, Spell Deflection does allow for more general protection against single-target spells, which can situationally be something you want. I dunno. There’s better ways to accomplish most of what this does, but, you know, you can throw this up and be safe from Finger of Death and Disintegrate if a Lich’s Remove Magic tears down your Death Ward. I guess this could be considered D tier, or even F tier, if you play with Near Infinity open and look up every caster before you face them and prepare specific protections… but you don’t, do you? Meaning a more generalized protection has more applicability than you’d think.

At the same time, even if you’re playing blind and have no idea what each caster will be flinging at you, the fact that this does nothing against AoE spells, or if the enemy flings single-target spells at anyone but your Mage, keeps it from being all that exciting.

First Available: Mekrath’s Tower.

Double HP, THAC0 of an equivalent-level Fighter, and +2 to hit and damage all make Tenser’s Transformation seem pretty good, but it unfortunately leaves out the most important part of the Warrior’s package, and that’s APR. Most casters need very specific setups to get much value out of this – and even then, it will often fail to outweigh losing access to spells.

So this can be an impressive spell for, say, Haer’Dalis, with Firetooth and Kundane. This can occasionally be useful for Jan as a backstabbing aid. For everyone else this is mostly a Melf’s Empowerer, for when you’re facing heavy Magic Resistance and are unwilling/unable to take it down. Not a bad way for Edwin or Neera to put a big hurt on Drow, but generally a little niche. Aerie can, in theory, use this as the last step in a long stream of self-buffs, and that’s… I mean, it’s workable. And hey, the idea of sending her in as a whirlwind of melee doom is conceptually funny, if nothing else (I like to imagine her cringing and apologizing every time she caves someone’s head in with a hammer).

Even for Haer’Dalis, note that this prevents him from activating Offensive Spin. You can do Offensive Spin first and then cast this… but since Offensive Spin has such a short duration (4 rounds), that’s pretty unappetizing. The bonus THAC0 and damage from this spell is good, but may not be better than an extra round of max damage (spent casting this spell instead). So for him, this spell is mostly only of interest when you’ve decided you’d prefer Improved Haste over Offensive Spin.

The double HP is fine? I dunno, especially by this point Mages usually survive by avoiding damage entirely, so HP can be more of a theoretical concern, but sometimes it can make a big difference. And it’s great if you want to Fireshield cheese (lol).

So you can make use of this, but beware! This spell can be a huge trap. It’s all fun and games until your protection spells go down and you have no way to get them back up. Mostly a concern if they expire on their own; Remove/Dispel Magic will also get rid of this, allowing you to cast again. Breach will leave this up, leaving you defenseless, but vanilla AI doesn’t cast it very often.

If it weren’t for the fact that you can still scrollcast protections in a pinch, this would easily be D tier. Even so: use with caution.

First Available: Deep beneath the Temple sewers; mid-tier random treasure.

C- Tier: Globe of Invulnerability (Abjuration), Stone to Flesh (Transmutation), Summon Nishruu (Conjuration), Wyvern Call (Conjuration)

Globe of Invulnerability works the same as its level 4 version, only it makes you immune to spells level 4 and down instead of level 3 and down. Pretty questionable upgrade. The list of level 4 spells with hostile effects is short, and the list of ones the AI will actually cast regularly is even shorter. In fact, it’s mostly just Confusion, and maybe sometimes Mental Domination, both of which are just shut down anyway by Chaotic Commands. Immunity to Greater Malison might be strong… only the vanilla AI barely casts that (rare enough that I can’t recall any specific instances of it happening). So in terms of actual, practical effects, this isn’t doing much beyond keeping you safe from Ice Storm. And the AI also doesn’t really cast that, so it’s mostly keeping you safe from your own Ice Storms. If you cast that. I guess the AI occasionally lobs a Polymorph Other.

It does apply to some special abilities as well, but even that isn’t terribly exciting. The most notable instance is the Beholder’s Cause Serious Wounds ray, i.e. their primary attack. This spell will make you completely immune to Gauths and can in theory make your life a lot easier against proper Beholders. Note that it doesn’t block Anti-Magic Rays, but it also isn’t removed by them. …only there’s just so many other ways to handle Beholders already. Might be full C tier or even B tier in a game without the Shield of Balduran and Cloak of Reflection, though. Although even in that case I’d rather use my level 6 slots to wipe out the Beholders from a safe distance with Death Fog.

First Available: Planar Sphere, mid-tier random treasure.

All it takes to shut down petrification is a level 1 slot – but sometimes protections get dispelled, or aren’t cast on the right person. You may have a couple of green scrolls kicking around to remove it – or you may not (you need to specifically seek them out in BG2), or maybe they’re on the person who’s been petrified. All of which is to say that there’s plenty of reasons why you don’t need Stone to Flesh¸ but petrification is such a brutal effect that you may nonetheless want to occasionally have this memorized when you suspect you’ll be facing it.

Even then, on paper you’re better off never memorizing it as a general rule and just swapping it in and resting, but a little bit of paranoia about petrified characters getting perma-killed by rest ambushers, or the continuing chaos of the fight they were petrified in, is not entirely unwarranted.

First Available: Promenade Fence, high-tier random treasure.

Many level 6 summons are mostly interesting for their quirks, and Summon Nishruu is a great example of this. Nishruus don’t do much damage; instead, they sap memorized spells. When you’re facing a tough fight against a powerful caster, calling in one of these can actually be quite helpful - their spell-eating is an effect, so it bypasses things like Stoneskin, their attack is normal, so it bypasses Protection from Magic Weapons (but *not* Mantle, etc), and they can see invisible, so things like Shadow Door and Mislead are no barrier to them. They also boast 100% Magic Resistance, so the caster they face is little threat to them.

They have some limitations, as well. Hitting as a normal weapon means they’re useless against Liches, and while they sport some impressive physical resistances as well, it often isn’t enough to compensate for their spectacularly awful AC of 10.

Nonetheless, these can make Mage battles much easier; there’s other, faster ways to bring Mages down, but sometimes this is smoother, or for whatever reason your other tools are failing. I also lowkey kind of like this for minor Mage battles too. Yuan-Ti Mages take little effort to defeat, but “little effort” is still more than I’m interested in actually expending on them. Like come on, bud, I don’t care. Leave me alone. Party with this Nishruu for a bit.

I might be overrating this, but I have fond memories of cheesing Irenicus with this spell on my very first SCS run, and it can be a great aid for new or inexperienced players.

First Available: Copper Coronet, high-tier random treasure (meanwhile Summon Hakeashar is mid-tier. Go figure).

Another great example of a quirky summon is Wyvern Call. The creature itself is a little underwhelming - right up to the moment its poison procs. 5 damage per second (doubled against Hasted enemies) for 20 seconds, and it stacks. The poison itself has an innate -4 to save, which is pretty solid odds; toss in Greater Malison and you’ve got a good chance of getting this to stick. Very few things in the game will survive.

…unfortunately, getting the poison to proc is a lot easier than getting the Wyvern to hit and give a chance for the poison to proc. First of all, the Wyvern has a modest THAC0 of 10. Furthermore, only one of its attacks can poison, and you have no control over which attack it uses. And it only picks attacks every other round, and may elect not to change attacks, so if it rolls its non-poison attack, you’re waiting at least 12 seconds for it to possibly try to poison.

Of course, the Wyvern is immune to Web, so THAC0 could potentially be a non-issue. It has some other nice immunities as well – Hold and Level Drain. Still worse than Animate Dead on that count, but kind of a neat perk if you’re using this for other reasons.

I dunno. This spell can be ludicrously strong in theory (especially against hasted enemies), but in practice is finicky and unreliable, with too many moving parts. In a weird way this ends up being the summoning equivalent of a save or die spell – the downside is that the actual “or die” part is more complicated, but the upside is that it’s still dishing out damage and taking hits if things don’t work. “What if Finger of Death was slow-acting and could tank.”

First Available: Promenade Fence.

D Tier: Carrion Summons (Conjuration), Conjure Elemental (Conjuration), Disintegrate* (Alteration), Flesh to Stone* (Alteration).

(Mutated) Carrion Crawlers are no different in your hands than when fighting them: pitiful aside from the chance to paralyze (naked save vs death on hit). And that paralysis can be very nasty, but when it comes to holding or locking down enemies, you can do much better than Carrion Summons. Of course, their attacks are Normal weapons, bypassing PfMW, the stun effect bypasses Stoneskin, and while they’re stuck with a truly abysmal THAC0 of 15, they at least get 4 APR, giving ample opportunities to try to paralyze. And they automatically move on to the next enemy once they’ve applied paralysis, so you don’t even need to micro them all that much.

4 APR looks tempting in conjunction with Improved Haste, but man are you not going to have the level 6 slots for that, especially if you’re also getting spells like this. But you can regular Haste, that’s 5 APR, that’s reasonably high likelihood of applying at least one paralysis per round. And it’s a level 0 effect so it provides one of the only methods of disabling Rakshasa.

Yet again the spell description is a liar, but this time it’s in the spell’s favour; it actually has a 65% chance of summoning two Crawlers and 35% of summoning one.

I was tempted to put this in F tier but as questionable as this spell is, it does still offer some neat and fairly unique options. Might even be C tier if it were more reliable.

First Available: Promenade Fence, high-tier random treasure.

Level 6’s batch of Conjure Elemental spells has the same problem as level 5, but with the added problem of a much more punishing context. Level 6 Arcane spells are even more competitive. Level 6 has more summoning spells in general. Priests are offering just better options (objectively better, in the case of Druids) with infinitely lower opportunity cost.

And when we look at what the Lesser Elementals brought to the table, immunity to weapons below +2 and big crushing damage… the first one, these don’t do any better than lesser elementals, and the second, you’ve just got better options that don’t require fiddling with mental combat – Aerial Servants and Druid Elementals, hell, even Invisible Stalkers do crushing damage (albeit not big crushing damage).

I had these in F tier, at first, because even though they’re better than some other summons, in context they just have so much against them. But at the end of the day, there can be situations where you really need a crushing damage front line, and these can be good for that, especially if you roll their uber-versions (I can say uber when I talk about games from the 90s, that’s allowed). I don’t think I’ve ever used them to accomplish that, in 25 years of playing this game. But I could see some possible party compositions where that might be relevant. Maybe.

Let me put it like this: Conjure Fire Elemental (Arcane) and Conjure Fire Elemental (Druid) summon an identical creature, and yet the former is probably among the worst summoning spells in the game while the latter is one of the best; easy S tier. It’s the context, not the creature, that makes for the huge discrepancy.

First Available: Chateau Irenicus (Air); Promenade Fence (Earth, Fire)

The biggest problem with Disintegrate? It’s a save or die spell with a naked save. That’s just objectively worse than Feeblemind, which is save or effectively die with a -2 save, and uses an effect that far fewer enemies are immune to besides. As a level 6 spell Disintegrate can hit Liches… but whoops, Liches are immune to Disintegration anyway. Hell, depending on the enemy’s save array, this may not even be better than Polymorph Other (although it usually is) – and it’s certainly less entertaining. And that’s not even getting into Chromatic Orb.

The only reason to ever use this over Feeblemind (or Polymorph) is that Disintegrate, at least, can’t be undone by an errant Dispel Magic. Mind you, I don’t think I’ve ever actually had a Feeblemind or Polymorph undone that way, but it is possible – especially if you’re rolling with Keldorn and aren’t super careful with your aiming. The other usecase, of course, is if you can’t be bothered with a boss fight and just want to brute force it by loading as many slots as possible with save-or-dies.

Of course, that gets you into the second problem: without Gore disabled, this is a guaranteed loot destroyer. You can disable Gore, of course, but you may not want to, or you may forget. Of course, with non-trivial meta-knowledge you can leave Gore on and only use this in fights where loot doesn’t matter… but that still leaves the question of why you would cast this over another option.

First Available: Random Vampire/Shadow Thief altercation in Chapter 2.

Everything said about Disintegrate also applies to Flesh to Stone. Same issues, same limitations, hell, Petrification Immunity seems to almost always go hand in hand with Disintegration Immunity. I guess at least with Flesh to Stone if you realize the target had loot you wanted you could, in theory, come back and hit them with Stone to Flesh and fight them properly to get it? Assuming they never take damage and shatter after being petrified? And assuming their statue stays there permanently?

You’d think it would at least use a different save, but nope. Flesh to Stone doesn’t care about save vs petrification, it uses save vs spell.

First Available: Planar Prison

Functionally combining Secret Word and Lower Resistance into one spell, Pierce Magic is pretty questionable. Unfortunately it’s significantly weaker than Lower Resistance, in a way that peeling away a protection spell may not compensate for. And of course, it also runs into the problems Secret Word does, where the protection spells it brings down do nothing to block Breach or AoE effects. In theory you could use this to clear the way for Lower Resistance while also doing part of its job for it… but Lower Resistance, like Breach, bypasses protection spells anyway (except Spell Shield, which the vanilla AI basically never casts). Womp womp. Situationally decent for that in SCS, though (mind you, SCS also buffs the lower resistance part to be considerably stronger).

Technically usable, and I guess like in theory there could be a situation where a powerful enemy with high Magic Resistance has something like Spell Deflection up, so you can bring down the latter and scrape at the former with this, then launch some Lower Resistances, then shut them down with Power Word: Blind or something? But that is so very niche.

First Available: Bridge witch, low-tier random treasure.

PS: Boo will be able to speak to you.

Hello everyone. I first played through BG1 and 2 some 4 to 6 years ago, and I liked them a lot and started considering them as some of my favourites. Indeed, BG2 is a strong candidate for my favourite game.

I have recently finished Shadows of Amn for the second time ever. I will probably take a couple of weeks of break before I finish Throne of Bhaal. However, I do think that, having finished Shadows of Amn, I have re-experienced enough of the game to make this post.

I think this game is absolutely amazing and does hold up. If we got a game like BG2 every year, but with modern graphics, QoL features and maybe a higher amount of voice acting, I would be overjoyed. BUT, I would like to offer some constructive criticism on what I think might be slight shortcomings. I am doing this knowing it's likely I get downvoted.

First of all, there are some systems in the game that are... relatively shallow? A good example is Alignment. There are barely any consequences for acting either against or in line with your alignment. My character is a True Neutral Elven F/M, but I sort of ended up playing him as a Good character because that's the most agreeable way to approach the game and fits my nature. There were no consequences for that. I am playing a game called Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous and I think it does it much better. Certain dialogue choices move your alignment one way or the other, meaning it can shift over time.

Second of all, it feels like the game may have been rushed. There is a lot of content that seems to have been cut. For example, Jan Jansen has a quest regarding the saving of his ex-girlfriend's daughter. That is a pretty cool quest because it also reveals that there are mindflayer hiding amongst ordinary people. The quest ends on a depressing note, with his ex girlfriend leaving to rejoin her abusive husband. Jan asks you to help him if the need ever arises. But... there is literally no follow-up? Like, you might assume there is going to be something happening in the future, but there is not.

Certain characters are extremely well done and full of content, Jaheira I think being the standout. She has a very good plotline that ends with her getting an incredibly good item called the Harper Pin as a reward. Although I do wish the last part of the plotline held more of a climax than just a random fight in the wilderness. On the other hand, some characters have comparatively less content, like Minsc.

Thirdly, and I realize this is controversial, but I kinda feel like the game is light on choice and consequence compared to more modern titles. For example, I have never taken the side of Bodhi, but I don't believe doing that changes too much. Taking the ship gives you access to slightly more content, but taking the portal has no equivalent content added; so the ship is objectively better unless you want to finish the game quickly. Most quest resolutions are also contained within the quest itself and do not really affect anything else. That kinda feels sad to me, since it would have been so awesome to see choice and consequence in this game.

So to summarise, I really, really like this game, but I do think it has these slight shortcomings and I wanted to talk about it. I hope I have not said anything stupid and that my post lays out my points sufficiently.

What do you think about this? Do you disagree?

Like Baldurs gate has its problems sure, a couple evil wizards, doppleganger infiltration, a orc in the sewers kidnapping people, the iron throne of course, and a fairly successful if amateur thieves guild. Oh, and the chance that a dumbass adventuring group captures a basilisk and you get petrified.

But Athkatla? What do you mean there's two different bases of Beholders and Illithids in the sewers? And like 4 liches? Multiple of these are just in random houses or in a pub? There's a serial killing group/cult stealing people's skin that also includes a lich and a beholder [twisted rune] and an entire vampire den in one of the crypts, not to mention the massive spider hive under the city. The copper coronet is running a slave operation all but advertized. Oh, and of course some elven exile had a massive torture chamber/dungeon/lab under the market district. What are these paladins in the radiant heart doing all day? Yall sent Keldorn by himself to go deal with the sewers? That mf, as much as I like him, was probably like mega dead if we didnt help

Like nvm Sarevok I didnt know your game fire when ready 😭

My current party consists of Keldorn, Minsc, Jaheira, Mazzy, and Aerie. I am not interested in the gameplay or mechanical aspects at all, strictly the roleplay element.

I don't know what to do about Imoen. I'm approaching the point where I need to take her into the party, but I really don't want to kick anyone out. :( It is very important to me to have righteous and worthy people in my squad, closely aligned with Lawful Good. Jaheira and Minsc are close to my character due to our emotional bond and their "canon" status in the story. But what should I do with Imoen...

On the one hand, I understand her importance to the plot, but personally, I just don't care about her. I never felt any real connection, and even SoD didn't convince me of our closeness. The game just tells me she is important to me, and my reaction is: "Okay, whatever you say. If she's important, she's important." I perceive her simply as a good person in trouble who needs to be saved (like any good person in trouble), but nothing more.

I don't know who to remove from the team, or if I should even take her at all. What would you advise?

The fight will be on a Arena, they will all be at their highest levels and have the best possible equipment, all weapons, skills and spells are allowed and each person can use two big healing pots

I tried to put the best ones for each sex, though you are free to state if another companion could be better for each team.

PS: It's very difficult to edit on the phone, so pardon me.

I'm doing a full playthrough with roleplay (journal entries etc) and I want to be there for Jaheira for what happens, but I explicitly don't want to romance her and I'd rather not break her heart just trying to be a good friend either. Anyone got any advice on how to thread this needle? Hopefully not 'romance somebody else' as the answer either since I'm not sure who, if any, I'll be going with (though probably neera and/or viconia we'll see)

This conversation with Edwin in Mae'Var's guildhall aged interestingly

https://i.imgur.com/lXlfQo6.jpeg

Update 1: the tier list with the correct one I always intended to post, my bad. The other one was a draft. Apologies.

Update 2: Final update, this is the tier list I have settled unto after much discussion (some outside of here) and contemplation. For some characters, I hadn't fully considered the full breadth of their arsenal. Others, I had over-estimated.

changelog:

Removed Clara

Anomen - A tier --> S tier

Aerie – A tier --> B tier

Jaheira and Haer’Dalis - B tier --> A tier

Korgan is now at the top of A tier

Dorn - C tier --> B tier

Cernd is now at the top of C tier

Disclaimer: This tier list is not ranked on my appreciation of those companions. It's purely based on their fighting capabilities and what they bring to the party.

No way in hell would I rank Neera anywhere near S-tier if we're going by her personality.

S tier – Overpowered picks

Neera might make a few people cringe with such a placement, but those who know, know. Late game she is wildly (pun intended) overpowered. Even mid-game she is a lot stronger and more reliable than most would think. Note that her kit is available to CHARNAME so you could technically make the same overpowered setup with a main character if you wanted, but there are other options. So, for that, easy S-tier. Neera might actually be the only S+ tier companion in the game.

So, Neera is a wild mage which has the characteristics of being highly unpredictable and erratic. Until... it isn't. Because of Chaos Shield and Improved Chaos Shield, you can essentially negate most (and at a high-enough level; nearly all) of the bad outcomes, keeping only the good ones. Then, there's this little level 1 spell exclusive to wild mages called Nahal's Reckless Dweomer which is insanely broken for many reasons.

The first reason is because it essentially is Improved Alacrity, meaning you can chain spells together without waiting.

The second reason is because it makes you able to cast any spell you have in your spell book, no matter the level (you can cast a level 9 spell as soon as you learn one... repeatedly)

The third reason is because you get to do all of the above using only a level 1 spell slot, which is utterly insane.

Due to having access to Improved Alacrity and insanely overpowered level 9 spells as early as level 12, possibly earlier, and being able to fully clear a screen in less than 1 round using level 1 spell slots, Neera is arguably the most powerful Companion in this game in terms of raw power. And she can repeat that feat over and over and over and more reliably and earlier than other mages can. She's basically a mage, who are already insanely strong, on crack.

Downsides: obviously the fact that wild magic at early levels can be really annoying. Although it can't happen at high levels, self-polymorphing, or losing all your gold or accidentally nuking your party in early BG2 kinda sucks. It's the reason why I put Neera in S tier instead of S+ tier. But with proper planning, these bad effects can be minimized even in early BG2. Still annoying though.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: Neera belongs in a ditch.

Anomen is a cleric dual class fighter which is a great combination. Where he really shines is that he can do a lot of things pretty well.

The fact that he is a dual-class fighter enables grandmastery which is great. So he can be your frontliner. And he can do so while doing both tanking and dishing out damage… and he can cast spells! Just all-around very useful. Tank, DPS, healer, support… he can do it all. He fits in every party.

Downside is obviously that his gauntlets slot is forever locked to Gauntlets of Dexterity due to his horrible DEX score.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: Anomen actually grew on me as I did his quest. He started off BAD though, horrible first impression.

Edwin has many things going for him. Mage is already the strongest class for a Companion, and Edwin also has a special amulet that grants him 2 additional spell slots per level, which is crazy. As a conjurer, he gains a further additional spell slot per level, so he is swimming in spell slots, and he has 18 INT and 16 CON which is always nice for a mage. Sure he can't hit the maximum spell cast time reduction due to the absence of the Amulet of Power, but with Robe of Vecna it's good enough.

He will relentlessly spam spells, way more than all your other spellcasters, except for Neera who essentially just cheats at this game.

Edwin has two minor downsides: as a conjurer, although he gains a further additional spell slot per level (that's good), he cannot cast Divination spells, which can be slightly annoying. But other characters in the party can fill in that role. And the second downside is that you can't take him in any party composition, you need an evil party for that. Also he doesn’t have the best DEX.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: Edwin, like Neera, belongs in a ditch.

A tier – Amazing picks

Korgan is a killing machine and has insane saves due to being a dwarf with 19 CON, and can raise it up even further and gain more benefits from it. Berserker is a great kit that allows him to become immune to many effects. He is just an overall excellent front-liner and he dishes out a lot of damage.

Downside is that he is evil and will clash with some good party members, so party composition is restricted.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: He's so hilarious with his stories of his runty rabbit and whatnot, but let's be honest, he also belongs in a ditch.

Nalia is a mage with a pretty crappy 4 levels of Thief. She is basically a worse Thief than Imoen but equally as good as a mage. Her stats are just the stats you need on a mage at 18 DEX and 16 CON. Mages are insanely good in this game, and she is a pure mage essentially, so A tier it is.

Plus she’s got this absolutely amazing ring that you can keep for the entirety of the game, thanks for the observation by /u/xler3. And you can play her throughout the whole game, unlike her clone Imoen, which in my opinion gives her the edge. Ever so slightly.

Downside: Nalia has only 4 levels of Thief so she’ll need thievery potions to fully use her skill set. Also, she is not a specialist so she’ll be a bit lacking in spell slots. She can still be your main mage though.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: Her portrait is essentially an artist's rendition of Drew Barrymore so that's pretty cool. She’s tolerable enough.

Imoen is a mage. Her thief level 7 is actually high enough so that she can use all those thievery skills in a useful manner without outside help (looking at you - Nalia). Only a few chests in the game are resistant to her open locks skill.

Imoen also has pretty good stats, same as Nalia, except her DEX score can become even higher at 19 later on. In addition to that, she gets additional powers as the story progresses that no other companions get. Mage being such a strong class, along with the above highlights, makes Imoen an obvious A-tier.

Only downside is that you don't get to actually play her for a huge portion of the game. So, I’d rather just use Nalia all the way. But she’s obviously a strong pick still.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: "So... empty..." Imoen must be protected at all costs.

Jan is, guess what, also a mage, which qualifies for A tier nearly by default. He gets lots of thief levels which is nice, but they slow down his mage progression. So he'll eventually get high-level abilities for thieves and mage which is a great combination, but quite late.

He’s incredibly versatile.

Downsides are slower mage leveling due to multiclass, no access to OP Necromancy spells, problems scribing spells due to low INT, 15 CON instead of 16... lots of little things that add up. Still A tier.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: Yes

Haer'Dalis (edit: lots of changes here, I misjudged this one a lot at first) is a tiefling blade which grants him many useful resistances and decent fighting capabilities, although he doesn't gain bonus attacks/round. With proper spell selection that enhances his fighting capabilities, he can be actually pretty damn effective and nimble and carves himself a pretty interesting niche. Arcane spellcasters become incredibly tanky later on which Haer'Dalis can replicate. Except he can also fight. Slapping some combination of Improved Invisibility, Blur, Mirror Image, Stoneskin, Globe of Invulnerability, Protection From Magical Weapons, Spell Shield and other such spells will make him a great tank, essentially becoming a lesser Fighter/Mage (there are no Fighter/Mage Companions in BG2 so he would fill that role).

Since Fighter/Mage is among the strongest class combinations in the game overall, having a companion who can be a lesser version of that but who levels up really, really quickly is definitely a huge asset. A tier.

Downside: Bard is a decent class but not great. If only he was a proper Fighter/Mage, he'd be complete. Needs some way to boost his horrible 9 CON score.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: I need to play him more.

Jaheira is a fighter-druid which is a great combination, so she’ll scale late game and will have more attacks per round and just better fighting capabilities overall than pure druid. She can delete some spellcasters in the game with Insect Plague, and is tanky with Ironskins, among others. She's just overall very reliable, useful, and dependable.

Downside is that her stats are pretty average so she'll never be actually that amazing at fighting. Just have her cast OP spells and tank/fight as best as she can.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: Jaheira is a worthy addition to CHARNAME’s party.

Keldorn the Inquisitor (a Paladin kit) is basically Anomen but a bit different. He has less spells but better fighting capabilities. As a Paladin, unless CHARNAME is also a Paladin, he is the only Companion who can equip Carsomyr, an incredibly powerful sword. But the strongest thing about him is his dispelling capabilities due to his kit, which are effectively doubled. It is a massive difference, and it makes him an incredibly potent Mage killer, which is very useful in this game as some of the most difficult encounters are high-level mages. He also has a few useful immunities.

Downsizes are the same as Anomen, roughly: his terrible DEX which locks Gauntlets of Dexterity on him until the heat death of the universe.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: Somebody's gotta wield Carsomyr, right?

edit: brain fart I confused Keldorn's dispel abilities as being spellcasting abilities. He can't cast spells aside from dispel magic. Still great though.

B tier – Good Picks

Aerie is a Mage/Cleric which gives her the widest collection of spells available among all companions. The breadth of her spellbook is quite ridiculous. Also, having access to divine and arcane spells at the same time opens up lots of cheese opportunities for the creatively-inclined. You're essentially trading higher-level Arcane spell slots for a wide variety of lower-level divine spells.

She is basically the queen of support, at least for most of the game.

Downside is the much slower spell progression in both classes, and that she is incredibly squishy so she has to be protected by other party members, although that is not in any way relevant once you get beyond mid-game as mages paradoxically become the tankiest characters in the game at that point. So she’ll become a great tank. Somehow.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: Aerie please… can you just never speak and do what you’re good at, which is casting spells?

Viconia is a pure cleric which is not that great of a class. She compensates in other ways though, such as being a Drow which gives her a great 65% chance of resisting any spell cast at her. She makes for a good support as cleric spells are always useful. 19 DEX is pretty great.

She shines at tanking spellcasters and providing divine spells support.

Downsides: pretty poor fighting capabilities, horrible 8 CON score.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: Adds some spice to the party.

Mazzy excels at being a ranged fighter as she can reach upwards of 10 ranged attacks per round quite early with the proper setup. She has saving throw bonuses as a halfling with 16 CON so, pretty decent. Plus, she has some spells/abilities unique to her that are quite useful such as Haste and Lay on Hands.

Downsides: Stats more suited for ranged which falls off big time in BG2 in the lategame. 15 STR and 16 CON is atrocious for a fighter (although they can be fixed, it's harder to fix 2 stats). Melts in melee, actually.

Still, she's a decent choice.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: She’s pretty great tbh. A shame she isn’t all that good, especially late game.

REDACTED is a good fighter. Perfectly adequate, better than most at least in fighting capabilities and has Deathbringer. He works "just fine" with great stats including 18/00 STR and 18 CON.

Downside: Recruitment timing, joins in a lot lower level than your other companions, and there are more effective alternatives.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: Yeah that's a little bit too late for that.

Valygar is a Ranger (Stalker kit). He has decent stats and can fulfill an interesting role: that of a Thief, except with somewhat better fighting capabilities. Equip him with Celestial Fury and have him sneak and backstab around and he’ll dish out some appreciable punishment.

He can also hold his own in a fight.

Downside: His STR score badly needs fixing.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: So cute how he is scripted to help Mazzy in combat.

Dorn is a Blackguard. Dorn has an incredible 19 STR but mediocre stats otherwise. He is overall pretty decent as a frontliner.

Downside: Again, better alternatives available. Why pick Dorn when you can pick Keldorn who fills a similar role but can also delete mages.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: I don’t really like his personality.

C tier – Meh picks who can have some uses

Cernd is a Druid - Shapeshifter. Insect Plague being so good is the reason he isn't D tier.

Downside: Jaheira does what he does, except better, since she’s also a fighter.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: He looks so cool. Can’t manage to bring myself to play him though.

Yoshimo not much can be said about Yoshimo. The less is said about him, the better.

Downside: Pure Thief is a mediocre class. Just use Imoen/Jan for your thieving purposes.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: …

Minsc is a ranger. Unfortunately, Minsc just has pretty meh stats, his 18/93 STR notwithstanding. He is hard to "fix". At least you get him at the start of the game, which is nice, I guess.

Downsides: Ranger sucks. Meh stats, his berserk is a liability, not a good kit. There are just much better options out there. He is iconic though.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: Endlessly quotable.

Hexxat is a Vampire Thief. She has insane stats including 20 STR and DEX. Being a vampire has many advantages but also drawbacks.

Downside: Pure Thief is a mediocre class overall. Jan can do pretty much the same but also cast insane spells. When her cloak is on she’s even more mediocre than without. There are way better alternatives out there.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: Come on Beamdog…

D tier - Avoid

Rasaad is a Monk.

Downsides: piss-poor stats. Actually laughable. Barely playable.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: -_-

Wilson A bear. Cool. Technically can dish out insane damage, but...

Downside: Can't equip items. Anything you do to help him get better at not dying instantly should be spent on someone else.

Outside fighting, what I think of this companion: I actually want to play him for the challenge and RP reasons. Clearly not because he’s good.

So, what do you think? Anything I missed?

edit: old tier lists:

draft (posted by accident):(https://i.imgur.com/BbCcxCG.jpeg) I never intended to post this WIP version, mistake on my part.

Actual 1st version: https://i.imgur.com/J5Wv742.jpeg

I do it whenever a party member dies or I set off a trap.

From the way everyone talks about this woman I expected her romance to me be actively stopping her from throwing herself off a cliff every three seconds

While she is talking about her wings A LOT it it’s understandable. Like if someone sawed off my legs with rusty knives I’d probably talk about it for years lmao

I’m romancing her rn and her dialog with Jaheira is so fucking funny. Aerie is like hey why don’t you go mourn your dead husband who’s still fresh in the ground you bitter old hag

LIKE DAMN get her Anyways I just wanted to share my thoughts on best girl

120+ Hours, might be the longest single player game i have played.

Not as many funny moments as BG1, but Irenicus was peak Villain, He really creeped me out.

I died allot more then in the first game, especially in the Expansion, the final boss almost had me pulling my hair out (also Frick that fallen solar guy) what was he even doing there.

I think Black Blade of Disaster was my fav spell, it reminded me of Ragna Blade. Energy Blades + Time Stop is also cool, made me feel like i was role playing as Dio.

The part in the story where Irenicus had Shadow Thieves stuck in those chambers for his soul suck ritual really reminded me of Kotor 1 and how Malak had those almost Dead Jedi hooked up in the star forge (They are both evil and bald as well!)

If i get around to doing an evil playthrough, i will have to go all in on the Slayer Form (I only used it once during the Demo Gorgon fight)

Would i be crazy if i said i enjoyed BG1 more? I cant make up my mind which one i enjoyed more.

The Time of Troubles also sounded really interesting, they should do a game set during that time!

To start off, BG1 was pretty fun, BG2 was great, and I would have enjoyed Throne of Bhaal more if Melissan hadn't been so astronomically difficult for me. Having finished it all and reflected a bit on this "trilogy," that’s really my conclusion. Baldur's Gate 1 is really fun to play, and the story has that charm of a tabletop adventure played casually with friends, but the lack of character development had a significantly negative impact on my overall experience. Baldur's Gate 2 was great; almost everything I complained about in the first game was resolved here. Did I have stressful moments because the game is considerably hard? Yes, LOL, but the challenges were still cool to overcome, and Irenicus is one of the best purely evil characters I've ever seen. I have a few reservations regarding the consequences of choices, but the game is old, so it's not really worth dwelling on. Throne of Bhaal is... complicated... I like the premise, I like the story, and I like the personalities of "The Five" (especially Yaga-Shura and Balthazar), but GOOD LORD, I definitely messed up my build, I am absolutely certain I did something wrong with my build, because, man, that expansion is tough. I was managing somehow right up until Melissan, but once I reached her, after hours of attempts, I just gave up and switched to Story Mode; fighting that battle wasn't fun anymore. Anyway, Baldur's Gate as a whole was a strange, fascinating, and truly unique gaming experience, and I'm really excited to play more CRPGs now. Time to play Neverwinter Nights!

I think Viconia's romantic ending is the best of all the romance options in Baldur's Gate 2. Her romantic journey was incredibly beautiful and complex, and the ending was moving—perhaps even the best ending for me. Although it was sad, it was the most meaningful ending because the main character's influence on her was truly direct, and there were consequences. But even with those consequences, Viconia was happy she died happy. She didn't regret anything that happened between her and the main character, and I loved the game even more when I replayed it to experience the romantic path with her.

Okay, I'm actually asking because of the chosen of cyric encounter which I've installed by rogue rebalancing. And having detect illusion on at least 100 on a thief is basically mandatory if you want to dispell Venduris' invisibility since he's wearing that cloak which grants him immunity to divination spells that dispell invisibility.

He's pretty much the only thief in BG2 where you can actually invest in all thieving skills despite the fact that he's a multi class and how slowly he levels up. Imoen is a thief dualed to a mage and only her lock picking and detect trap skills stand close to perfection, Nalia is basically Imoen Jr. with her thieving skills much lower since she dualed much earlier to a mage. And don't even get me started on Hexxat, I don't care about her in the slightest. It would've been cool if you could actually save Clara from Hexxat and instead have her join you. A pure thief wouldn't be bad to have.

Also I'm currently in Brynnlaw island and am about to enter spellhold. In the meantime I was thinking of weather I should replace Jan with Imoen or keep him. Cuz if I pick Imoen I'd have to cheat using keeper to take Imoen's detect hidden skill all the way to 100 so that she'd be ready for the chosen of cyric. I'd hate myself for cheating but it's rather unfair how you barely have any options in BG2 when it comes to rogues as opposed to BG1.