Wheels of Prophecy without Ascension?

[Lemernis]

Main question: is WoP enjoyable enough without Ascension installed?

 

I see that WoP can be installed with or without Ascension. Although near as I can tell, you'll get the most out of WoP with Ascension installed.

 

I do want to install WoP. I'm just not sure if I can handle Ascension given the party I'll have and AI/Tactical components I'll be using. Hopefully you all can advise me.

 

I'm unfamilar with Ascension, never played it. I'm reluctant to install it for my next game because the party will be relatively light on tanks. My party will consist of

 

multiclass (SKed) Kensai-Mage

Ariena

Viconia

Nalia (pure Generalist Mage)

Imoen (pure Thief)

Kelsey

 

The PC and Ariena will be front line meleers. And I'm hopeful that cleric buffs will allow Viconia to melee fairly effectively (plus Strength-increasing belt or gauntlets).

 

I will also have SCS II installed, but in a 'lite' form, i.e., only

 

Blade Barrier and Globe of Blades only affect hostile creatures

Make Freedom scrolls available earlier

Recover lost items from Hell

Remove animation from the Cloak of Mirroring (leave it for other spells and effects that use the same graphic)

Move Boo into Minsc's pack

Faster bears

Make Watchers' Keep accessible between SoA and ToB

Ease-of-use party AI

 

Smarter general AI

Better calls for help

Potions for NPCs

Smarter mages

Smarter Priests

 

Other things affecting play balance/difficulty will be some BG2 Tweaks components

 

Wear Multiple Protection Items

True Grand Mastery (Schumacher, Weimer)

Un-Nerfed THAC0 Table

Maximum HP Creatures (all creatures)

Higher HP on Level Up (maximum)

ToB-Style NPCs

 

Sooo...

 

I'm thinking that given the party's relatively low number of tanks in the party, Ascension will make the game too difficult at the end. But what do you all think?

[DavidW]

Main question: is WoP enjoyable enough without Ascension installed?

 

I see that WoP can be installed with or without Ascension. Although near as I can tell, you'll get the most out of WoP with Ascension installed.

 

I do want to install WoP. I'm just not sure if I can handle Ascension given the party I'll have and AI/Tactical components I'll be using. Hopefully you all can advise me.

 

I'll leave others to comment on the tactical side of things. Not having Ascension installed won't make a huge amount of difference to WoP though (there's a random joke that you won't notice unless you know Ascension, and Balthazar will be a little less interesting in chapter 10 without Ascension - that's about it, I think).

[Lemernis]

Thanks. I'm wondering can I install Ascension just for the expanded roleplaying it offers sans the various components that make the enemies more difficult to fight?

[coaster]

You can choose not to install the harder individual battle components (Improved Yaga-Shura, Improved Ilasera etc) but the main Ascension component (which alters the final Throne battle) is a combination of harder difficulty+increased roleplaying etc, and the two can't be separated. There was some talk of trying to break the two up over at PPG a while back but I don't think it went anywhere.

 

That said, I believe that the final battle does respond to the difficulty slider so you might be able to get by on Easy...and although you are still unable to rest at will at the Throne, unlike in vanilla you do get your spells refreshed at a couple of points, which makes life a little easier.

[Cal Jones]

I'm not a huge fan of uber battles either but I do run Ascension for the added RP (I usually install tougher Illasera and Gromnir as they're quite fun, and tougher Illasera has boots of speed that I can loot . Tougher Yaga Shura is also quite fun but I find him a bit buggy. I guess someone out there finds Tougher Demogorgon enjoyable, but it isn't me.) The end battle is a bit silly, really, but I'll put up with it for the other benefits of the mod. The Sarevok and Imoen stuff is worth it, IMHO. And there's always Ctrl-Y if you run out of patience.