I'm not video game player, so forgive me. I've played through parts of the game a couple of times, but I haven't gotten any feel for how to actually play the game, if you know what I mean. How do some of you actually run/play combat? The lack of pausing like in Icewind Dale has really thrown me for a loop. Is it easy to use power attack, or am I not a moron, for example..... I struggle with all of the combat, frankly.
The combat in TOEE is turn-based and based on initiative. When combat starts each of your party members and the enemy make an initiative check. The initiative check is based on the character's dexterity modifier which is added to a random roll of 1d20 die (one 20 sided die). Same for the enemy. Initiative determines the order in which combat proceeds. The order of combat stays the same until the end of combat. So let's say you have a party that consists of two fighters, a cleric, thief and wizard. You are fighting three bugbears. The dexterity modifier for your fighters is 2, the cleric 1 , the thief 5 and the wizard 3. The random roll for the first fighter is a 10. Add the dexterity modifier of 2. Fighter one's initiative check is 12. The second fighter random roll is 15 and add the modifier for a initiative of 17. The cleric random roll is 15 and add the modifier of 1. The check is 16. The thief's random roll is 20 and add the modifier of 5. The thief's initiative is 25. The wizard rolls a 18 and add a modifier of 3. The wizards initiative is 21. The order in which you characters will act is: thief (25), wizard (21) ,fighter2 (17), cleric (16) and fighter1 (12). Now we need to throw in the enemy. We have three bugbears. Each bugbear has a dexterity modifier of 1. Bugbear1 rolls a 3 and add modifier of 1. Bugbear 1 has an initiative check of 4. Bugbear2 rolls a 19 and adds 1 for the modifier. Bugbear2 has an initiative of 20. Bugbear3 rolls a 8 and add modifier of 1. Bugbear3's initiative is 9. Now we put the bugbears in the combat order. The order is: thief (25), wizard (21), bugbear2 (20), fighter2 (17), cleric (16), fighter1 (12), bugbear3 (9), bugbear1 (4). Your thief gets to act first, you can move and attack, if you have enough time. The wizard can throw a spell. Then the first enemy will act and combat will follow the initiative order. The second turn begins again with your thief. Combat continues until it ends in your party being victorious (killing all the bugbears) or feeling the agony of defeat (either by dying or running away). Unlike the Icewind Dale or Baldur's Gate games you cannot pause and issue a chain of commands. The Infinity engine games are real-time that is why they have a pause feature.
Power attack can be used if you are standing next to the enemy. Right click on the enemy to bring up the radial menu. Select power attack. Your character will power attack that enemy, but you cannot move and power attack. If you have to move to reach the enemy you will get a single normal attack.
Have you read the ToEE game manual.pdf? That is a good place to start. There is also a roll counter above the mini menu on the lower-right corner of your screen.
Thanks. My questions are more generic, as in, I suck at actually being able to play. I'm wondering how people right click, pick an option, do something, over and over with different characters, and manage to manage it all. But thanks, I need to re-find the manual and re-read it again.
Just save the pdf to your documents and you can refer to them as you play. OP start a basic party with the iconic classes, fighter, rogue, cleric, ans wizard. Fill in with NPCs if you are having a hard time with combat.. But if you try the in town quests, you should be level 3 before you face any real combat, and you will have enough money to outfit your party with decent weapons and armor. Try walking back and forth from town to one of the spots on the map. You should get some random encounters to practice fighting and spell casting. After a few skeleton or bandit encounters you should have some loot to sell and upgrade your stuff.
I think I see what you mean. Trying to learn how to play one character in pnp D&D is tough enough, but here you've got 4 or 5 characters to figure out for the first time. Ranth's suggestion is a good one, playing a few random encounters will give you a few things to try. Also, you could try just playing one character for a short time, then try another single character of a different class. Don't feel bad about trying to manage the game. I've been playing pnp D&D (the basis for this game, if you didn't know) for over 20 years and I still get a little flummoxed playing TOEE once in a while. It happens. If you stick with it, you'll get the hang of it soon enough.
Thanks for the further replies. I've been playing PnP D&D since it was written. Frankly, I am annoyed that I can't find one of the original books in my house. I thought I had them all..... Random encounter fishing, I hadn't thought of that. Thanks.
