I can't remember my roll right now, but I must have spent 2 hours rolling to get an 18/00 stat for my kensai. The total was 96, if I remember correctly. I could just use a trainer, I suppose, but there's some sort of masocistic fun to rolling up a character.

Save often, and be prepared to die.

A lot.

Bump - Yeah, I did get that impression.

I have made a start and am liking it so far. I've only just finished exploring the Friendly Arms Inn, so still very early days.

Are certain decisions complete game-breakers? i.e: Is it likely that, irrespective of saves, that I'll be completely stuffed and unable to complete the game or will perseverance eventually see me through?

I just hate the idea of spending 50 hours on a game, only to have to start from scratch!

p.s - I'm a lightweight, so am playing on the easiest setting...

Are you using Tutu or BGT? If not, and you are playing vanilla BG, turn your difficulty back up to normal, because lower difficulties give you less XP and make the game harder overall.

Thanks for the reply. I'm using Tutu.

Edit: Does this mean I'm going to get penalised XP and will suffer later in the game? Soooo many questions!

Well if I could beat BG1 on "normal" + lots of autopausing, anyone can. Some of the fights took many tries, though.

Edit: corrected "may" to "many".

Thanks Eggman! I may crank the difficulty up if I'm finding it too easy but just want to ease in to it first as I'm still finding my way around the controls.

i.e. The formation is a pain, no matter what order I put them in, they always seem to change who's in the lead (even after right clicking, holding and spinning the paths around).

They don't actually move in formation, it's just the positions they end up in when they get to their destinations.

Thank you - I also can't find if EasyTutu penalises XP if on easy setting. Sorry for the million questions. As mentioned earlier, I have actually read (most of) the manual and done what research I can..

Have delved in to this game since this thread started and ......oh my god - where have you been all my life Minsc, Imoen, Jaheira and co? I love this game!

That is all - I have Half-Ogres to find.

I've just started playing BG1 again after finishing it in the 90s, I'm just about to head to the mines...

My tip would be to always fully explore each area and to take your time wandering around before following the story. Just through bits of exploring and completing all the quests I can find (largely without walkthroughs unless I get really stuck) my party (entirely self made plus imoen) is already level 3/4. Being a higher than necessary level for Nashkel Mines will make it much easier and carry through for quite a lot of the game. Also wandering + killing the peole you meet = magical items :)

One issue with "take your time, explore everything" is that when an NPC with a quest of his/her own joins the party, that NPC will leave again if you wait too long before doing that quest. This happened to me with the guy who wants to kill a wywern, on account of me exploring everything between where he was picked up and where the wywerns were he split just prior to the wywern fight.

Agreed, you need to be careful of that but I was really meaning take your time with the main story rather than rush from the Friendly Arm straight to Nashkel Mines and from there rush straight to the next area/encounter that relates to the main story line.

Thanks guys - good advice indeed.

I've started exploring everywhere, only to pause for Minsc's and that nutty, evil necromancers (I forget his name) quests.

Really enjoying it although I'm a bit lost on the main quest.. For now, I'm just enjoying moving around the map killing foes and being a hero to friends.

This is the first BG experience for me having come from the console generations (from NES to PS3) and sod the graphics - I just love this game.