Continuation between BG1 and BG2

[Domi]

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

 

You can always tweak Xan into a mage-thief (or simply give him (or Minsc, or Kivan, seeing they are rangers) stuff like trap finding and disarming, and use his knock to open the tough locks), ditch Imoen, see how you like him, and if you like Imoen more, collect her back. Yes, Kivan has a voice-set in BG2, but Xan has a complete voicing work, which is very well made, even matching the second line of the banter for the NPCs. Pretty neat.

[Jarno Mikkola]

You'll never, ever be able to have more than 5 joinables in BG2,

With cheats keys enabled and with few modifications on the romance continuity after forced droppings, you can have as many party members as one wishes, at least in principle. And there shall be a few bugs, such as the Xps wont distribute equally, but that's just a few cheats away, too.

[Kulyok]

Exactly: having a party of more than five fully-functional joinables whose inventory you can access at any given time, who do not require additional management/cheats - this is impossible, I'm afraid. But you'll be my hero if you achieve this perfection and preserve backwards compatibility, naturally.

[Sorrow]

The BG1 -> BG2 continuity fails completely. NPCs are forced, a lot of things are based on present reputation of character and one NPC is needed for plot, which sucks.

 

I was very disappointed with it - I played game for the first time, I was importing from save, where Imoen died early in BG1, same for Khalid and Jaheira, IIRC I soloed the end of the game because I ran out of NPCs. And the game presumed that I have some of those NPCs with me :/ .