Are NPCs worth taking/trying out? I wanna try almost all NPC party

Hello, so I can't find any good information on the available NPCs in the game which is disappointing and I will keep looking. However I am considering taking 1-2 player characters and recruiting the rest, I am curious on your guys opinion on this.

Do the NPCs have unique dialogues? Is there enough level 1 NPCS to make a proper party? Are they too weak to want to take?

I was hoping to bring a paladin and marry the druid for the holy sword. recruit the cleric in the Temple, grab the wizard in the Inn and I think you can get a level 1 fighter out of the brewers apprentice I just don't remember how.
I beat the game with 4 maxed characters before except for the fight with the god at the end as he splits into 4 beings.

Lastly it's been a while since I played do you know of any guides to completing the hommlet quests?

 

Elmo is a powerhouse addition for a low level party.
Melany is an absolute powerhouse if you know how to use a 3.5e druid, though she probably won't come into her own until lvl 5 or so.

Most of the Hommlet recruits are trash... other than maybe Burne who can be a passably decent mage just because he's higher level... but if you have your own wizard they'll eventually surpasses his effectiveness.
Furnok is useful for a trap/chest or two, but mostly good for bringing along to be a human shield for the characters that matter; after he dies loot him.
Oh, and Fruella has some hilarious lines (Elmo does a rather amusing impersonation of her) and is decent at low levels, a poor man's version of Elmo for a lvl 1 party... until the party quickly outgrows her effectiveness at which point letting her die to hear her choice parting words of tender affection ... is worth the effort of getting her in the first place.

Eventually you can recruit some higher powered NPCs outside of Hommlet, but honestly by then your own party is probably going to be strong enough they're fairly redundant.

 

It's all here: https://co8.org/community/threads/g...le-of-eight-modpack-new-content-edition.8742/

It's a rare thing in this game. Some have a few unique lines, but almost all of the time they're just silent.

Remember that you can only have 1-3 PCS + 0-5 NPCs (with Temple+).

One of the worst NPCs that will be silent for the whole game (no reactions to anything at all).

 

running with just one PC and the rest npcs in your party can be fun, but don't a Baldurs Gate experience of NPC banter.

 

Ronald Rynnwrathi - whom I designed and voice acted for many years ago - likely has the most personality of any recruitable NPCs in ToEE or Co8.

 

You can make a decent party out of Hommlet NPCs. Elmo is fourth level, Fruella third and Furnok is fourth, and Spugnoir second. Early on, the extra levels of Elmo and Fruella can help you steamroller the low-level fights, yet they aren't so advanced that they can't subsequently be molded how you want to. All have pretty good stats and gear. If you have Elmo and Fruella, she will nag and Elmo can be persuaded to do impersonations of her. Meleny comes with the fancy sword and a druid is a druid in terms of power level. Pishella has the stats and the start to make her into an Ultimate Magus if you want to explore non-standard class options from Temple+. Ronald has something of an Easter Egg ending to his story if you go on long enough with him on the team.

 

Ronald and Meleny are my favorites of the Hommlet folks.

 

I appreciate the love for Ronald who was inspired by Baldur's Gate II's recruitable NPCs.

 

It's a shame that wotc and Atari didn't give the Devs more time to flush out the NPCs and the rich history of the game.

The might have been of expansions featuring the Slavers or Giants modules...

 

I have taken Ronald in the past and he was greet fun to have around, I want to say thank you for putting in the time and effort to make a character, to voice him and bring him to life, he may not be overpower but having a "living NPC" was worth the trade.

 

@Danny the lazy Paladin
Ronald was inspired heavily by NPC interactions from Baldur's Gate II. I expected this from RPGs after BG2, and Ronald was an inspiration to think big and try to make an interesting character.

I've made games and played tabletop RPGs for about 20 more years since making Ronald, and I've learned a lot about what makes for interesting characters that work well in games and stories. For example, I wrote this script for Hull from BG1 to make him a recruitable companion throughout the Enhanced Editions of BG1 & 2, and I wrote this script for a BG2EE mod which ties it to a custom campaign and world I made involving The Metaphysical Revolution. (The Metaphysical Revolution's script is for a mod which is an adapted version of the final adventure for The Metaphysical Revolution as played in the BG2EE engine. It's meant to be a high-danger, high-power, story-rich adventure that uses and builds on the themes from The Metaphysical Revolution. As of this writing, it's also largely but not yet fully done.)

If I ever ran Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil, I planned to use Ronald as a successor to Terjon. The idea was to handle many events of the module but have the final confrontation take place in the Far Realm to stop Tharzidun.

Thankee!