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PICKING A PARTY
The most crucial aspect of Baldur’s Gate is the composition and abilities of your party. There are times, particularly later on in the game, where you will really struggle if you do not have a particular type of character or are weak in a certain skill.
Your first concern, though, is your main character; ‘you’. For an easy life, pick a warrior class, as you will be doing a great deal of fighting early on. Picking a Mage, Druid, Thief or Cleric will certainly be more challenging, as at first you will lack the protection of powerful fighters. Take your time rolling attributes; they may not seem very important now, but they can’t be changed. When you ‘roll’ stats, count up how many points you get in total, as it varies from roll to roll. Remember that you can alter where the points are allocated, so what really matters is the total number of points - a total of 90 is pretty good, but invest some time here and it will pay dividends later.
Look for a high Constitution whatever your class, as this affects how much damage your character can take. Warriors also need a high Strength, Thieves need a high Dexterity, Clerics and Druids rely on Wisdom and Mages need high Intelligence scores. If your main character has a high Charisma score, you will be more likely to retain fractious members of your party and receive positive results when interacting with people.
Over the course of the game, you will meet a wide variety of characters who want to join your party; around twenty-five in all. Their level and experience points depend on that of your main character when you meet them, so don’t worry about going back to pick up people later on; provided they have not been in your party at any time. If you ditch someone, and then try to get them back, beware that they will not have gained any experience points in your absence!
The issue of alignment will prevent some potential party members hanging around with you for long, so when you create your main character you should have in mind whether you want to play as an essentially ‘good’ or ‘bad’ character. Obviously, characters will be happy joining you if their alignment roughly matches yours, and if they are unhappy they will tell you so. In terms of difficulty, you may find it harder to play as a ‘bad’ party, as some people won’t trust you, the authorities may cause problems, and shopping will be more expensive (no, really). Depending on your alignment, certain sub-quests won’t be available to you.
The actual composition of your party is a moot point. Most people prefer to have a mixed party with a wide range of abilities, but others prefer to specialise and have, say, a majority of magic users and just a couple of fighters. While this will give excellent ranged abilities, the party would struggle in confined spaces where toe-to-toe combat is essential, or when a specialist archer is required. My personal preference is for a mixed good-aligned party comprising the following characters which are found in the game:
Main character, Fighter
Ajantis, Paladin
Branwen, Cleric
Kivan, Ranger
Imoen, Thief
Dynaheir, Mage
The party’s marching order is very important: remember that your leading characters will be attacked much more often than characters further down your order, so warriors with lots of hit points should be at the top. The top character will also do much of the interaction with NPCs, so high Charisma is also important here. If you are going to be attacked from the side, you may want to alter this order so that tougher characters will be on the right side of the formation to receive any attacks.
Give some thought to formations, and pick suitable configurations according to environment, group composition and personal preference. Characters purely armed with missile weapons should be at the back, as should magic-users. Bear in mind, though, that some spells (e.g. Aganazzar’s Scorcher, a personal favourite, and lightning spells) need a clear line of sight to avoid damaging your own characters.
Underground, or where navigation is difficult, try using the ‘follow’ formation; however, this is notoriously fickle and can result in your characters scuttling off into the darkness. Instead, you can try moving them one at a time. The wedge formation is a good all-rounder for exploring open areas.