So I've been wanting to replay the Baldur's gate games for a while now (it's been 8 or so years since last time on my disc copies) and with Siege of Dragonspear out and GOG accepting my local currency it seems like a good time to do that. However, while I might be new to GOG, I'm an old timer when it comes to RPGs, and I've played enough games close to launch to know it usually hurts (Wasteland 2 I'm looking at you). While I know SOD has been out for a while, it's not that long. But the thing is, I waited 8 years, if the game is still being patched/updated I could easily wait another few months. I looked for news on that regard, but could find none, so any ideas?

On a side note, as I said, I'm new to GOG, but I'm used to Steam's package deals at this point. And I noticed BG1+BG2+SOD package there saves me 10%. I would much rather buy the games here regardless, but if there is a package option I couldn't find it. I remember that some years ago GOG used to sell the complete saga as a package deal, is that option simply not available for the Enhanced Editions? It could be that I just suck at searching the store, but I just wondered if anyone could solve this doubt and/or point me in the right direction.

Thanks in advance.

The (cough) 'enhanced' editions are tightly controlled by Beamdog. Best to ask there. Beamdog forced a scummy move.

Yeah, I had heard about that. From what I had read about the EE, I would probably just get the old original saga instead. Thanks for that link, I didn't notice the original saga came bundled with the BGEE. I was interested in SOD but it might be hard to justify paying three times the price when I could just mod the original saga like I always did before.

Edit: typo.

Siege of dragonspear is only for the EE. Every last thing I heard about it says it's not worth the time or money to play.

So far, I have enjoyed the EE. I like it mostly bc of the zoom feature and it running natively on Linux. Besides that, I can't get MP game to work without crashing, I have found a few weird bugs that I dont remember in the original, and graphics upgrade doesn't really add much.

I used to be excited about EE bc that meant BG3 might happen. Bit if Bg1.5 has anything to say about it, I'd rather just not see bg3.

imo Siege of dragonspear is one of the best mods around but it only works with EE and (for now) other mods such as SCS don't work with it

Sure if you don't count the gaping plot-holes it creates, and the complete lack of freedom.

All the Enhanced Editions (BG1, SoD, BG2, IWD) will get at least one more patch, referred to as "version 2.4".

But it will still take a while, as the president of Beamdog stated on Twitter yesterday: https://twitter.com/TrentOster/status/795721971375837184

They haven't said how long exactly it will take, but based on that tweet my guess is a few more months. It's not nearly as bad as people in these parts make it out to be.

I'm not thrilled by the main plot of SoD either, but the dungeon-crawling side quests were plenty of fun, and made the expansion worthwhile for me.

It's as if Beamdog had different people working on different parts of the expansion:

Inexperienced writers with too little passion for medieval fantasy and a tad too much tumblr / "San Francisco values" socialization writing the main plot & city side-quests & NPCs, but veteran dungeon-masters and modders creating the wilderness side-quests and dungeons.

If you can bring yourself to overlook the former, you can have much fun exploring the latter.

When it contradicts the Forgotten Realms Lore, Baldur's Gate 2, and force feed you American social issues constantly, then; YES. It is that bad.

The creator of D&D sure seemed like he thought it was in line. But I guess you know better.

You a Trump Voter?

... is out of touch.

I don't have the 2e description of the spell, but the 3.5e version, at least, is unsuitable for two reasons.
1. It is not available to divine casters. (Brd 2, Sor/Wiz 2) Therefore, a powerful cleric wouldn't have access to that spell. (Not to mention the spell doesn't actually exist in the Baldur's Gate series anyway.)
2. The duration is only 10 minutes per level; that's not long enough to maintain it through the entire day and night. (Remember that you need 8 consecutive hours of sleep to regain the spell, and under P&P rules the spell will wear off during the night (under BG rules it wears off as soon as you wake up).)

Can make a magic item with the spell on it. Permanency spell.

It isn't in BG because it serves no purpose in a video game. It is still a part of the gameworld, however, and could easily be included in the game for plot-purposes. Irenicus uses a Geas spell on Yoshimo, for example. The player doesn't get access to that spell in the game.

Except that (aside from the spell's non-existence in the Baldur's Gate series), there are two issues with that:
1. Permanency is, again, not a priest spell.
2. Alter Self isn't on the list of spells that can be made permanent.

So, unfortunately, this won't work.

Anyway, in the P&P game, if the PC has access to Permanency, she likely has access to Limited Wish, which might be able to accomplish that change.

It's already in the game: The Girdle of Gender.
;)