Continuation between BG1 and BG2

[berelinde]

Kivan is another possible choice. Both Xan and Kivan have BG1/BG2 presence.

[Domi]

Kivan doesn't have the voicing though.

[jester]

For those who have experience with Xan, is taking him along worth it if I don't plan to pursue a romance?

 

Why not, your quest is doomed anyhow.

[Simbul]

Both mods are very well done, it's more the matter of personal preference, I suppose. Although I haven't played Xan friendship in BG2, so I can't say anything about it yet.

Also... where did you find an open slot? O_o "Canon" BG1 party consists of PC, Imoen, Jaheira, Khalid, Minsc and Dynaheir, doesn't it? I was under the impression you wanted consistency.

 

Yeah, but her grandfather....

Still better than her, I say

 

The Tutu readme paints the Beregost crash bug as something that is likely to happen in many games, hence my concern.

I've found BGT more stable than EasyTutu, actually.

[dizzyorange]

Also... where did you find an open slot? O_o "Canon" BG1 party consists of PC, Imoen, Jaheira, Khalid, Minsc and Dynaheir, doesn't it? I was under the impression you wanted consistency.

 

I'm letting Dynaheir die early to free up the slot. So what if Minsc thinks Irenicus killed her? He's a bit confused anyways

[Kulyok]

If you want, you can add Xan's friendship for BG1 to your Tutu install, as well: http://pocketplane.net/tutumods

 

(Now that Domi mentioned a friendship path for Coran for BG1, I'll be downloading that and Kivan one, if she ever makes one, and together with Diriel romance to be... but, okay, okay, never mind me...)

 

And, yes, Xan for BG2 will have a friendship path automatically.

 

I especially enjoy having both Kivan and Xan in the group(and have Crossmod Banter Pack installed to have crossmod banter), since in a way, it feels like I never left BG1.

[Kitana]

I am leaning towards Xan at this point, as many of you seem to have enjoyed this mod and it is one of the few that extends continously from BG1 to ToB. For those who have experience with Xan, is taking him along worth it if I don't plan to pursue a romance?

 

Yes. Definitely yes.

[Starcrunch]

I am leaning towards Xan at this point, as many of you seem to have enjoyed this mod and it is one of the few that extends continously from BG1 to ToB. For those who have experience with Xan, is taking him along worth it if I don't plan to pursue a romance?

 

I've found it very hard not to have Xan in BG2, and haven't yet gotten to play the romance (his friendship path is very touching and be sure to ask him about your leadership!). For tutu I've not played Kulyok's newly released friendship, but if her other (prolific) writing is an indication, it will be terrific.

 

I've just started Kivan in BG2, having never played it befor, in part due to a lack of voicing. The writing thus far (again as can be expected from Domi; I'm only in ch2) is very good. In BG2 he has a dencet amount of crossmod material with Xan. BG1 Kivan is very well written, and while I don't play him all the time he makes a nice addition to the party. IMO he has the most interesting backstory in the game.

 

For a male romance I strongly recomend Dynaheir, though the tragic ending cannot be averted. She is intelligent, thoughtful, and for once, not emotionally damaged (cringes at the thought of a Minsc romance; the face the ladies love, indeed). I miss her dearly in BG2. Plus Minsc is a good character, aids in continuity, and features some of the better (well funnier) banters in the NPC project. His discussions with the PC/Dynaheir over the relationship are priceless. I see you plan on killing her off early, and I suppose that's fair enough as other wise you have a very inflexible group.

 

Now, I've always been a big Jaheria fan, and the NPC project adds a good deal of content for her and Khalid which adds a lot of emotion to his death. The biggest problem for me is that I can never include all the people in my party that I want! It's perhaps hard to justify two slots for them here. There is no easy way around this problem, I often use the tweaks component (it's tweaks right?) that allows you to separate the pairs, and then only run with Khalid from time to time. I see it as less a dismissal as having him off doing some other thing for the party (yeah lame, but I want to at least have one open spot!)

 

EDIT: Any time before traveling to Beregost make a new save game (not a quicksave or autosave; as occationally the autosave can be corrupted, IIRC). If you get the crash reload the save and travel again. As long as you do this you'll never be put back very far by the crash. I've never personally had a crash in Beregost but spent a lot of time browsing the forums for help on it before installing tutu because it concerned me. There are occasionally slow downs in some area (gnoll stronghold is often the worst), in these area setting the ambient sounds to zero volume solves the problem. Just set it back up after leaving the area (I can still remember my first tutu game before discovering this on the forums, I worked out a method to rescue Dynaheir due to this issue, and to this day have always used stealth to do the deed rather than force).

 

EDIT2: Changed BG2 Project -> NPC Project

 

-Starcrunch

[KIrving]

Now, I've always been a big Jaheria fan, and the BG2 project adds a good deal of content for her and Khalid which adds a lot of emotion to his death.

 

Yes, I loved the interplay between Jaheira and Khalid. The wonderful light hearted teasing between them and the sense of strong companionship.

I also enjoyed the banters with Kivan and found myself unable to kick him out of the party. I found myself far more interested in Kivan getting his revenge than that for my pc.(I haven't played BG2 Kivan yet but it is definitely next on my list)

[Guest Guest]

Now, I've always been a big Jaheria fan, and the BG2 project adds a good deal of content for her and Khalid which adds a lot of emotion to his death.

 

Yes, I loved the interplay between Jaheira and Khalid. The wonderful light hearted teasing between them and the sense of strong companionship.

I also enjoyed the banters with Kivan and found myself unable to kick him out of the party. I found myself far more interested in Kivan getting his revenge than that for my pc.(I haven't played BG2 Kivan yet but it is definitely next on my list)

 

So many NPCs, and so few slots

[cmorgan]

In general, agreed with almost everyone. If you are looking for a continuous game with a cutscene that transfers you and no worrying about importing your character, BGT is a solid playthrough of the saga [caveat - this is from testing and not from a full runthrough, though my first full BG saga run using BGT is scheduled for this coming summer.] EasyTutu will give you the best of both worlds, though, and gives you lots of flexibility in "interpreting" what happens between the two games. That way you can kida "slide" your brain a little, and try to avoid some of the glaring inconsistencies. Most of all, if you are romancing Dynaheir, the end sequence can only play on Tutu/EasyTutu (conceptual incompatibility between the end sequence of Dy's Romance and the BGT transition.)

 

But the two best full story-arc (cradle to grave) NPCs are Xan and Kivan. [Gavin will join them soon, if everyone keeps poking berelinde...]. As far as I can tell, there are no other NPCs that can really join you and go all the way through the saga [caveats aside - no spioilers, people]. If you like a female <charname>, toss in Coran in BG with The BG1NPC project, and you can have some serious love triangles; in BG2 you can carry a romance through SoA and potentially under some circumstances through ToB.

 

For male <charnames>, there are a few options, but no romances that can go from the beginning to the end. Of those, my favorite (so far) in BG is Dynaheir, and in BGII is Taisha (remix, action dialogues). Kivan is my favorite for friendship (with Minsc, we make the Three Musketeers look like novices. A solid buddy film. Pity we cant finish the thing with Dy back permanently, everybody happy ever after, as it would have to be PC and Dy, Kivan and D, and Minsc and ... Imoen??? Yuk - nope, no way. have to add two more characters, and the game can't do that.)

 

Things change if you break the game up into two big "chapters", and play them independently. Then, playing a male <CHARNAME>, I swap in Gavin and run with a 5 party listing of PC, Dy, Minsc, Gavin, and Kivan, with one rotationg slot for other NPCs. Then you have all sorts of possibilities for the second game. But it looks like you are looking for a true "Big Consistent Story Arc Playthrough", which means that some folks in the party have to be left behind.

 

And poor Khalid - I am afraid I always send him off on a personal mission for The Harpers (into a house in Nashkell, then kick him out ) and run along without him

[dizzyorange]

Thanks Starcrunch, CMorgan and others for your detailed responses. There's simply no way I can kill Dynaheir anymore. I just met her in game and she's too cool.

 

And how great is that State of the Tutu post in the general forum? I spent hours tracking down various readme's before stumbling on this post that lays it out clear simple exactly what to do. Just sublime.

 

Kivan is great too. BG2 Kivan isn't voiced, but he still has a soundset right? (when you click on him does he audibly respond?)

 

I'm thinking about this: PC, Imoen, Minsc, Dynaheir, Kivan, Gavin... arghh but what about Xan? ARGHHH can I just drop the PC..

[berelinde]

GemRB, where are you when we need you. Those extra party slots will be so sweet...

[Kulyok]

You'll never, ever be able to have more than 5 joinables in BG2, even if .exe is patched, since all checks, both in unmodded game AND in mods are Player2-Player6 only, and due to their sheer complexity at times, they're impossible to replace(much as it's impossible to replace IsValidForPartyDialogue with two commands, InParty and InMyArea - because of OR() triggers).

[Miloch]

The Tutu readme paints the Beregost crash bug as something that is likely to happen in many games, hence my concern.

This is a bug in vanilla BG1, Tutu and BGT. If it does happen to you on any platform and corrupts your savegame somehow, there is a utility to fix it. So I wouldn't worry too much about it, or at any rate, let it influence your choice of platform.