Had this game for a while and started playing it. Right now, I'm in the Dead Nations, trying to get out and find that bronze thing Pharod was talking about.

I'm not sure what to think of the game, I'm not really enjoying it, but I think it's mostly because of my own incompetence. I already got Morte killed and I'm all alone, I can't seem to win most battles even on the easiest difficulty setting and I'm not really sure what to do next. Is this normal for a first time player?
To make it a little worse, this is my first time in a really long while playing a PC game seriously, so my keyboard and mouse skills are still very poor (though it's still manageable in this game). I'm kind of considering restarting a new game since I'm worried I screwed up my own game.

Maybe it'll get better, I plan on playing it through the end regardless.
Some tips or advice would be appreciated.

Okay, thanks.
I think I'm going to restart. Seems like the best choice and I'm not that far in the game. Then I'll make my constitution and wisdom 19 and the other points will be put in dexterity and strength evenly.
About the other party members, how many of these are missable, not counting Morte?


I've also been thinking about following a walkthrough, but since my laptop is the only thing with decent internet capabilities, it'd break the immersion a bit. Is it possibly to get hopelessly stuck in this game (not counting bugs or glitches), because of poor builds or anything like that?

Minor spoilers about recruitables and their names: It is possible to miss all party members except Morte (Mortimer Rictusgrin) - technically. But realistically, all recruitables (Annah of the Shadows, Dak'kon, Fall-From-Grace) except two (Nordom Whistleklik, Vhailor) are either very easy to run into, notice and get, or have subquests associated with them that makes them available (Ignus).

Nordom is somewhere in the Modron Cube and Vhailor is in a prison, quite far into the game, behind the portal out of the prison - so both of these are very easily missable, to the point where I know that multiple people managed to play through the entire game at least twice (back when it was released) without even knowing they were in the game.As far as I know, there is no way to "break" the game at all. I'd put it into practice to not let my party members die, though. The ones I mentioned are the only ones in the game and they ALL have relevant input everywhere and are extremely interesting, even those that appear shallow - such as Morte.

Just assume that everyone you meet in the entire game are eternally damned screwups.

Don't worry about meeting all possible party members, you can't take everyone since party space is limited and you'll level up faster in a smaller party. You'll find descriptions of possible party members as soon as you've talked to them but it can take a very long time until you get the opportunity to have them join you, just like with Annah you can meet very early but won't join you before much later.

You can choose as bad stats as possible and still win the game.

If you're going to loose a fight make sure your character is the first one to die, if other party members die you'll have to heal them after resurrecting and get their inventory back.

Alright, thanks for the advice, Luckmann and kmonster. Good to know the game is very beatable even for me, I didn't get that impression when playing on my first save file. I guess being thorough in general is the key to being very succesful in this game.

I've been playing a little more and still haven't made much progress. Mostly exploring the city and talking to most people. I'll try to get ready to hunt down Pharod this evening and play a lot more tomorrow.
But I was wondering what saving throws are? Are they basically a resistance to a certain type of magic?

Basically yes. The lower they are the better, that's all you need to know about them.

Been playing for a while and I'm starting to enjoy it a lot more. But I get the feeling combat is pretty hard, even on the lowest difficulty setting. Magic and special abilities can only be used daily, depending on the skill, there aren't a lot of places to rest (so I can recharge my skills) and healing is pretty much completely up to you and your preparation, aside from Nameless One's regeneration. Not that I mind, it's just an observation. Maybe it's just me. I guess I should spend my money on buying healing items for the most part? Bandages are cheap, but kind of slow when it comes to recovery.

If combat is still too hard raise your character's con even further, at level up or with tattoos. This will allow your character to regenerate HP even faster. Just don't complain about the game getting too easy if you regenerate faster than monsters can hurt you even at the hardest difficulty.

3e came out after PST, so there's literally no way for them to have implemented that ruleset.

Personally I generally still prefer mages, though, except for stuff like BG2 where you're just doing damage spells all the time anyway, because mages/wizards have much greater versatility. Effective 3e sorcerers generally end up being "blaster sorcs" or "diplomancers" anyway, with little in between, if you're going for fully optimized builds that is, while wizards (or some variation thereof) have a huge array of good builds. It all depends on what type of game you're playing, though, so it might be different for other folks with different gaming groups.

I played a 2e transmuter who ONLY cast transmutation spells for his entire career in a PnP game once. The DM looked at me like I was insane when I told him I wasn't taking Magic Missile at first level, but he ended up being an incredibly effective character. (Though it helps that Transmutation is an incredibly powerful school in 2e.) A Sorcerer would likely never learn Stone to Flesh, for instance, because it's highly situational, but a wizard would have no trouble preparing it overnight, and if you happen to get lost in your dungeon, NO PROBLEM! Just cast it at the wall, and you instantly have both a passage into the next room, AND dinner!

Sorcerer style spellcasting was implemented long before PST, the Dark Sun games had it even for priests. It's far better than the stupid "know one day before what you're going to do next day" D&D metagaming which only makes sense if you have to provide ingredients.

Just completed the game. Everything went surprisingly smooth after the Dead Nations, all thanks to the advice in this thread.
I definitely enjoyed the game, the story and atmosphere did it for me.

(Spoilers!)

Although the ending, if I understood it correctly, is pretty depressing. I know The Nameless One has done some horrible things, but still... I think I'd have preferred a more forgiving ending, I guess I'm not really used to such endings in games.

I guess this thread has no point anymore, I'll give Luckmann and kmonster extra reputation as a way of thanking you. The help was much appreciated.
EDIT: It seems you can mark only one post as a solution. I'm sorry Luckmann, I hope you don't mind.

It's been ages since I've played this game, but I think there were multiple possible endings, LoversArcana.

If you raise your INT for example, you get different options in your conversations, which will allow you to finish differently.