If you want to powergame this ideally your stats would be around

STR 18/xx (ideally you want the second number here to be at least about 50. But there are lots of strength enhancing items in game)
DEX 18
CON 18
INT 3-6
WIS 13
CHR 17-18

I wouldn't worry about mindflayers too much. There is a level 6 wizard spell called "Death spell" that takes care of them fairly easily. At least the ones in Shadow of Amn anyways. That just leaves a few Ulitharid to worry about.

Based on the stats you've provided however (if you don't want to reroll) I would go with this.

Str = 18/97

Dex = 15

Con = 18

Int = 3

Wis = 13

Cha = 17

Why should CON be higher than DEX? whats wrong with 16 balance for both? Pros and Cons?

You can get the gloves of dexterity (though it takes more effort to do this in BG2 compared to BG1) which will give you 18 dexterity anyways. Also its much easier to reduce your AC than it is to increase your health (spells like defensive stance). The difference between 15 dexterity and 18 dexterity is -3 AC (along with some ranged attack and reaction adjustment benefits), which obviously sucks to lose, but it makes more sense from a powergaming standpoint to max one of the stats over splitting them. Your use of a shield will benefit your AC anyways and if you really need to you can also buy potions of mind focussing (from temples namely) that will bring both your intelligence and dexterity up by 3 (to 18 and 6) in the meantime. By putting your constitution up to 18 and your dexterity down to 15 you only need to use 1 potion to get STR 18, DEX 18, CON 18, INT 6, rather than 2 potions. Its really also just more convenient in that sense.

You can see the effect that different amounts for stats has (for dexterity and others) here

[url=http://playithardcore.com/pihwiki/index.php?title=Baldur's_Gate:_Races_and_Stats#Dexterity]http://playithardcore.com/pihwiki/index.php?title=Baldur's_Gate:_Races_and_Stats#Dexterity[/url]

You could go with 16 dexterity and 16 constitution. There isn't anything wrong with that. You'll lose out on 18 health over someone with 18 constitution (unless you use potions of fortitude or choose to use the girdle of fortitude- which you have to activate each time you want to get its benefit).

I'm rambling but basically its just more convenient to go with 15 dex and 18 con. Its better to save the CON boosting girdle/potions for some of the low con spellcasters in my opinion.

I did a better role:

Str=18/85

Dex=18

Con= 18

Int= 5

Wis= 15

Cha= 18


How good is 18/85 is in the long run until I get the Gear that gives 18/00 STR.

The difference is so slight its not worth sweating about. A Thac0 difference of 2 and a damage difference of 2. Its a good roll. Go with it :)

Yes, your CON and DEX are high enough to start getting bonuses, but the bonuses are still minimal. Baldur's Gate (and 2nd edition in general) has a very strong "18 or bust" mentality when it comes to attributes. My opinion is that you're better off putting an 18 into one of constitution or dexterity, and then lowering the other to distribute the points elsewhere.

There is a "set your dexterity to 18" item found in the game, but no equivalent one for constitution (they exist, but you need to activate them and they have limited durations, so they're much less convenient than the dex-boosting one). Yeah, you're loaded. That's an insanely good roll. Do be careful with downplaying the value of small bonuses, because they add up. The real reason not to worry about 18/00 is because there are items that can boost you up to this level, but if those weren't around then it would be an advantage that would stay with you the entire game.

Also I made an error, it was 14 Wis, not 15. Still good though?

Indeed small bonuses do add up however I don't see the value for someone who wants to play the game to roll until they get 18/00 particularly in the case of BG2. As a paladin Draw upon holy might (either the priest spell or your innate ability) will make up for whatever your 18/xx strength is anyways. Not to mention all the items that boost strength beyond 18. Wisdom doesn't give any extra spells for Paladins and doesn't affect your casting failure rate or anything. It only provides extra spells for clerics and druids. For a Paladin or Ranger there is no benefit to having it at 14 and only a +5 to lore benefit for having 15, but don't worry about it.

Oh, I fully agree with you when it comes to the amount of time/effort put into rolling, or with respect to the way strength-boosting spells and items work in the BG series. My only objection to your statement was dismissing the bonuses solely on the basis of being small.


I concur that 14 wisdom is nothing to be concerned about; those stats are fantastic and you should be very happy with them (just be cautious around mind flayers)

Is there a way to have the game run in the background? Some time I wanna alt tab for a sec to check on something on the web and the game stops. Even in windowed mode, if I dont have the game window selected the game just stops. There a way to change this?

Not as far as I know. Playing on a Windows 7 OS, I personally got into the habit of hovering over the 'preview' box from the taskbar to see what the thing I wanted to check on was showing, and only actually switching to the program to press page down or suchlike.

There is no reason to have this feature. It's not like the game needs to keep processing things when it loses focus. I mean it's not processing data like research or anything. Seriously, why would you want this?

I'm streaming the game on twitch and I sometimes like to use the chat window. When I switch to the chat window it interrupts the game and sound. Plus when I walk a long distance I can use the time to read the guide or something. It's not needed but I was just wondering if it's possible.

In BG it's not possible in single player mode. It should be possible if you played in multiplayer mode, though, as the game has to be synchronised, and so losing focus would not be good. I haven't tested this though. I know it's probably too late for you now, but remember you can play single player in multiplayer mode without problems.