Who are the five best NPCs?

Edwin
Alora
Ajantis
Xan
Shar-Teel are my favorites!

Alora ??
Xan ??

How can you like THOSE two ?

You only get Alora at the end (almost), so all her skills are already set, you can't choose them yourself. And Xan is just a wimp. You'll have to be very lucky to get him to 20HP at the end of the game. Get Dynaheir instead.
I agree on Ajantis though, he's just awesome.

My personal favorite still remains Coran though : give him boots o' speed and gaunts of Ogre Power and he's a VERY mean assassin. (I used him to kill the 4 dwarven warders in DT on his lonesome !!!).

I agree Xan is crappy but I keep him because of his awesome moonblade. However I still like Alora!

Although Alora isn't the MOST annoying character in the game, (That Title goes to Quayle :p ), she is still a pain. With Imoen you simply don't need anyone else. Of all the NPC's Safana is the most obscure. I never met her in the game untill I saw her on an NPC list. Xan is terrible as well, seeing that he can't cast invocation spells (I like my magic missle) and has a sword. Unless a mage is a Fighter Mage, swords are stupid for Mages. Finaly the last character I'm going to trash is Khalid. Strength 15 on a fighter says everything, and that whinny voice of his....

Imoen is the most annoying although she is a good character. Give Khalid a Composite bow and he rocks so he really doesn't need strength. Alora you get two 2\3 of the way through so you can somewhat choose her skills, and even if you don't have complete control as with Imoen she's still an awesome thief and certainly a good fighter for her class. Xan I got up to nearly 40 hp and since you get him in the middle of the game he is good to keep. I've seen him inflict 30 points of damage which for a mage is just great! Not the least bit of exageration here either!!!!

Xan has an absolutely awesome moonblade. Why the hell can't I find one for me anywhere?
Other than him, the best NPC is Kivan. He is so good with a composite bow and cloak of the wolf.
Worst? Kahlid or Garrick. They are complete fools.

You cannot find a moonblade for you, because you're the offspring of Bhaal, not of a noble Elf family from Evermeet. Drawing a moonblade would kill you.

I can't believe you don't like Khalid!

Kivan is the man, a better replacement shoud Khalid die. Khalid cant fight well w/ a melee weapon early on in the game.... although he his good as an archer.

How could anyone like Khalid? :eek: Khalid is such a whinner, why bother with a fighter who only has strenght 15. Since you can only spend 3 weapons points on missle weapons, Minsc makes a much better Composite Bow guy. The best missle shooter is however Coran, how can you go wrong with dexterity 20? :D Although Xan's moonblade is good, it is really useless because it is stupid to have a mage engage in hand-to-hand combat. I just don't care for mages who can't cast Invocation spells.

[This message has been edited by Gunthar (edited July 24, 2000).]

as much as i like Kivan, Edwin is no doubt the best NPC in the game. he has an 18 INT and gets +2 HP per level, plus he's a conjurer, (too bad, cant cast I.D.). his DEX is low, but no problem there; gautlents of DEX.
Coran is also very good, too bad so many points are spent on steath by the time you get to him.
Xan sucks, plus he's a whinner too.

What many of you are failing to notice is that Khalid has very high hp and you get him in the beginning so you can choose his skills. As for strength, can anyone say gauntlets of ogre power? Therefor Khalid kicks a**!!!!!

you cant the gautlents til you get to BG(unless you cheat ofcourse)
you can do the same w/Kivan, you get him early on...only problem is he has a low CON,
a 14 i think, but you can get the manual that raises CON by 1 in the cave w/ the Flesh Golems. He has a much better STR than Khalid.

Easy!
Viconia, for the Drow thang

Imoen, for that good ol' mage/thief thing and she's great!!

Minsc, 'cos anyone who goes on about the famous spelljamming giant space hamsters is COOL!!

Branwen, for being a Psycho cleric

and last but not least, Safana, to be a pure thief

Imoen is a bad mage!!!!! Safana and Alora are better thieves!!!!! Khalid, Kivan, and Coran are all better long and short range fighters!!!!! Although Imoen is good she's not the best in any field except annoyance!!!!

why do you find Imoen such a bad thief ??
She has 18 dex, which is excellent, and you get her at the very begin !!
Both Coran and Alora, and Safana, always have stealth and open locks maxed out, never find traps...

Yeah, but Garrick is FA Carling premiership RUBBISH

Perhaps imoen is useful for finding traps!!! However in every other instance I've never found her useful!!!!

[This message has been edited by The Fat Egg (edited July 24, 2000).]

I bet that anyone who thinks Khald is a good fighter and an annoying whining fool thinks Shirley Manson isn't attractive...

Best five for me:

Imoen (dual class her to a mage)
Jaheira (good fighter plus healing power)
Viconia (cleric & not as annoying as Branwen)
Coran (great archer)

And last but not least - Garrick. GASP, GASP, GASP (From reading other posts I know most of you disagree with this one) He's great for casting backup mage spells and using mage wands. I don't know about you but I had numerous wands of monster summoning and fire by the end of the game and Garrick uses them just as good as a mage. Plus he can sing to help the rest of your party on the minor battles.

Vermillion, who are you refering your last reponse to? Oh, and as for you Khalid goes along with Jaheira!!!!!

I hate Garrick!!!!!

It was reffering to anyone who thinks Khalid isn't an annoying whining waste of a perfectly good party space who will wander off and get himself killed 9 times out of 10 when in a dungeon and 6 times out of 10 in the wilderness.

Khalid and Jaheira can be split up very easily as can Minsc and Dyanheir and Xzar and Montaron. All you have to do is send the character you no longer want into a building by themself. Make sure its one you never plan on going in again (like one of the many in Beregost). Then dismiss that character. The other character doesn't seem to mind. I've done it several times. The only problem comes in if you back to that room without the second half. Then you get to meet Biff the understudy (try it and you'll see what I mean).

Or you can send the unwanted NPC on a suicide mission and get him\her killed.

Only if he has no armor, is on level 2, and a dagger for a weapon!!!! By the way Vermillion, just use him as an archer and he'll be doing 20-30 damage with the right bow, namely a composite bow+1!!!! 2000+ bucks with an average reputation is how much they cost!!!! Not to shabby!!!!! And if you want whiny get Imoen!!! "Boring" "I'm feeling a little sleepy (yawn)", and don't forget she's still a teenager!!!! Oh, and she snoops at Gorion's letters in Candlekeep, and she calls your character a rumduke!!! Now that is annoying!!! She whines more than Xan!!!!! And she has the most high-pitch, annoying voice!!! Although a good NPC she is certainly more annoying than Khalid!!!!!!

Enough Imoen trashing!!!! Anyone with any sense would use her. Case closed. :D Although Khalid can be good with the gauntlets of Ogre Power, it takes too long to find them and when they are found I find it better to put them on Yeslick. Yes, Yeslick. Remember him? Probably not. In my opinion he is an excellent NPC that most people seem to have forgotten. As the only Cleric/Fighter in the game (correct me if I'm wrong) it would be foolish to forget him. With gauntlets of Ogre Power he kicks ass, plus you don't have to wait forever because you are close to being in Baldur's Gate when you pick up Yeslick. Don't waste the gauntlets on making Mr.Whinny Khalid into a good fighter. Khalid... I spit in disgust at the sound of his name. :p

Yesssssssssssssssslick.... the name says it all.

[This message has been edited by Gunthar (edited July 26, 2000).]

Fat egg, if you want an archer, use someone with a high dex, it improves chances of hitting thing's and bows get no strengh bonus and in AD&D only get to about 8 points of damage non-magicaly and even magic I can't work out how 30 odd points of damage is being done. I would like to know though.
And fighters are there to be used as shields for the more fragile party members, and to hack things into little bits. A strength of 15 rarely accomplishes this.
Oh, very witty comment that "yawn i'm sleepy". Got to remember that one.
And you don't find Khalid's character sounds annoying?!? You must play with the sound off then...
And what difference does an NPC's age make, the main character's only 16ish too!!

[This message has been edited by Vermillion (edited July 26, 2000).]

Yes Yeslick rocks!!!! I'm not thrashing Imoen, She is a good NPC and I've said that several times. Perhaps you should stop thrashing Khalid about him being annoying!!!!!! And once again, Kivan is a better archer than Khalid, I've mentioned that a lot!!!!! Khalid can be switched in combat, in a situstion where he's not doing enough close range damage switch to a bow!!!!! Has anyone ever tried that, hhmmm??

Your character is 20!!!!! And that comment was not ment to be witty, it's and I quote, exactly what she says!!!!! Before you write something you should get your story straight!!! And you're right thirty is fairly steep, I was using it to prove a point!!!!! Once again, I'm sorry if some people feel I'm to extreme about Imoen being annoying, I'll be more suttle!!!! Fine, now is that good enough for you???!!!!!!

If the NPC "bashing" stops, subtle or no, then yep, good enough.
And yes switching between melee and ranged combat is a good idea sometimes, but with only a strength of 15, and not a lot of damage from a bow Khalid's got to be doing something special to be on par with other fighters....
Oh, I'm sure the age of the main character is around Imoens....

[This message has been edited by Vermillion (edited July 27, 2000).]

Ajanis (sp?) has worse lines than Immoen. They are soooooooo corny.
"Helm...give me strength!"
"My honour is my life!"
"Yeh!"

What a moron. But he is a good Paladin, so I like to keep him.

Paladins are a little messed up in the head (AD&D prejudice there from an old character),
they HAVE to say stuff like that, I think it's to ease thier consience about chopping things up into tiny little peices

I cannot believe that you do not find Khalid annoying! "Better part of valour! Better part of valour!" :rolleyes: THAT'S when I dropped him. Xan was too depressing, "We're all doomed." I dropped him too. Imoen is actually one of my favorite characters. Yeah, she gets on my nerves, but (if you actually play your characters role!) you've been friends for a long time, and SHOULD use her.

Who cares about friendship in a computer game???

Precisely my thought. I don't feel obligated to use an NPC because according to plot lines they are "friends." If I stuck to plot lines, then the game wouldn't be as good.

Again, we agree, eerie isn't it???

The five best npc's would have to be:
Imoen
Xan
kivan
coran
and then either yeslick or viconia

:cool:

My new roster is:

Alora
Edwin Substitute Perhaps Xzar
Coran
Khalid
Xan

:D