Hi there,

I've played many RPGs over the years including the BG series, Icewinde Dale, etc....

A quick question, on NWM (just got the platinum to play over the holidays) how do you control NPCs? Aside from the default selections of "follow me" or "attack nearest"? Can you like in the other games change who leads, what they carry, and choose their various feats?

I've read the manual--not word for word--but anyone have some advice or a link on suggestions on how to best manage NPCs? Also, max is party of 3?

Many thanks!

In the original game, you had no control whatsoever over your henchman other than which one you would take with you.

In SoU you could access their inventory to give them stuff, and I think you could tell them (through dialog options) what class you want them to level up in if they were a multi-classed individual.

I'm not sure if there were additional improvements in HoU other than being able to take more than one henchman with you at one time.

You can give them even more detailed instructions via dialogue in HotU, but I don't think there's anything else that is new from SoU.

I've only played through SOU, but there are a thousand gripes about Henchman AI... At least 50% of my own posts refer to problems with henchmen. Easily, my most used hotkeys are Follow, Guard, and Stay. With the advent of SOU, of course, the Deekin Character made the henchman slot less a comrade in arms, and more a source of comic relief. In general, it seems to me that keeping henchmen alive is too difficult for a rear-of-the-party player character (ie. pure wizard). To this extent, I feel that, although a pure wiz is very playable in NWN, the game ends up playing entirely different than it would if the wiz had a player on the front line instead of a henchman. Front line characters, on the other hand, seem to play it straight, and absorb most of what kills your henchman. For hench-survivability, I liked playing front-line character with a front-line henchman like Grimnaw or Daelen... Actually, I play a pseudo-frontliner (1 Ranger/ X Rogue) for super-sneak-attack damage. Doubling up with a front-liner gets me tons of sneaks, but if I really need it, I just go invisible... This keeps me from needing a lock-picker, and (thanks to use magic device) I can use any magic item in the whole game, including scrolls, so I also don't need a spell caster. I point all this out, because it opens up more freedom to choose whichever henchman you really want...

As previously pointed out, when you get to SOU, you can start accessing your henchman's inventory. This can help solve another game logistic if you have a character with lower strength, you can get a henchman with higher strength (or magically boost your henchman's strength) to increase your overall carrying capacity.

For more info search this forum with keywords like, "AI," "Henchman" or "Deekin..."