Just wanted to announce (because I'm really enjoying myself atm) that I beat Gothic 1 for the second time.

I was a Level 37 Necromancer with almost double maxed Strength, almost maxed Dexterity, one-handed mastery, bow mastery and circle 6 magic :D (It's really standing out to me that it's pretty easy to make a ridiculous character in G1, we'll see how G2 goes...)

Going onto Gothic 2 now and since I played around in G2 earlier I should do FAR better. (I'm specifically referring to the fact that putting points into skills increases by a multiplier every so many points!)

Anyone want to drop any generic (meaning not spoilerish) advice?

This is one of my saved game files, from a fight right before the Sleeper.

http://speedy.sh/JpYSC/Saves.zip

Don't remember much about it, except for the fact that I was a battle mage of sorts.

It's been said that the Night of the Raven add-on included with gOg's version really amps up the difficulty level. If you find Gothic 2 too difficult at first, you can uninstall the game and then reinstall without the add-on (there's a checkbox in the installer).

Definitely play with NotR installed, as it adds a lot to the game (and isn't something you can just add in halfway through). It definitely does ramp up the difficulty, but since you're just coming off of Gothic 1 having done quite a bit of asskicking there it should be just about right. As for general tips, when it comes to combat G2 is even more heavy on timing than G1, so figure out the tricks for each enemy type (you can even take out orcs and trolls at level 1 if you can keep your timing right). Blocking is also much more useful against humanoid opponents, and a block-side attack-block-side attack sequence can take down most early opponents without taking any damage. Melee damage is also handled a bit differently than in G1, in that your normal damage (weapon damage + str) is divided by 10 unless you score a critical hit, and your critical hit chance is equal to your weapon skill %.

There's still a minimum amount of damage that each attack will do (I think it's 10), but it's quite noticeable in that you can be hitting and hitting an opponent while doing almost no damage, then suddenly one of your attacks takes off a massive chunk of their health.

Ahh yeah, I see that a lot. Do ranged weapons also get critical hits?

No, ranged weapons always do full damage in G2 (this can make ranged characters quite a bit better at lower levels, although they're worse at higher levels when you're facing larger numbers of foes). Your skill % with ranged weapons affects your change to actually hit the enemy (even if an arrow seems to fly right into then it isn't an automatic hit).