Hey, I was getting ready to boot up ToEE Co8, and I wanted to do a strong party-

Tank- (Bastard sword or long sword) Warrior-

2H Warrior- specializing in GS

dual wielding THF(maybe THF/WAR) I was thinking starting 1 lvl rogue, next four in fighter, then rogue for the rest., but is a straight THF a better build? Should I do a str THF or is DEX that much better? And, I guess it will dual wield.... Short Swords?

Cleric of Pelor(Not sure what weapon or domains)

Sorcerer- Heavy crossbow

I don't know what should really be filling in the holes with...

1. Bastard Sword or Longsword for my Tank?

2. THF/WAR or straight THF?

3. What should my THF use for weapons?

4. What domain and weapon for my cleric?

5. What are the important spells for SOR?

Maybe you're way ahead of me on what I'm going to suggest, but here's what I thought of, nevertheless.

1. You'd need the Exotic: Bastard Sword feat, which may not be such a big deal as a fighter.

2. I'm thinking it takes 2 feats for TWF, and Improved TWF, (and possibly TW Defense), which is a strain on the few feats you get as a rogue. Obviously the bonus Fighter feats would help. Still, I've never tried the combo, personally.

A Weapon Finesse (feat) DEX THF rogue is nice, since DEX is ideal for rogue skills. Or if STR and DEX are relatively close to each other, (16/16 or w/e), then you don't need to worry so much.

3. I'm fond of a longsword or rapier main hand, short sword off-hand. Or if you want to specialize in short sword, I suppose two short swords could work.

4. I just pick Good and maybe Law, and a warhammer. Donno if that's a decent pick or what.

5. As a Sorcerer, since they can't scribe scrolls, I don't know the "optimum" spells to pick.
Personal favorites: Charm Person, Grease, Mage Armor, Magic Missile, Cause Fear. Casting 4 charm persons in a row is nice. Mage Armor gives you a fighting chance if someone starts attacking you.

It's all subjective. I don't know if I'm especially smart with my ideas.

A few notes from an old playthrough on this post.

The first posts are completely spoiler free. After that, minor spoilers but nothing specific.

Longsword; the feat for exotic weapon proficiency isn't worth the minor damage upgrade (difference between longsword and bastard sword is, on average, 1 damage per hit). Maybe if there was some super-awesome bastard sword to be found in the game it might be worth it, but there isn't.

Sword and Shield is a mediocre choice for a warrior, unless your stats are really low. The AC benefit from the shield is decent, but it's static and remains the same regardless of your stats. On the other hand, the bonus from using a two-handed weapon grows with your strength score. The higher your stats, the bigger the benefit of going two-handed. Since a melee fighter should have his highest score in strength, and there's plenty of ways to increase it magically, going for sword-and-shield is usually a bad choice. Fighter/Rogue works great. Dual-wielding is a bit of a gamble (you'll have trouble hitting high AC opponents) but it shouldn't be too big of a problem, just be mindful that it will eat up pretty much all your feats. I ran a fighter/rogue in my playthrough (with a spiked chain rather than TWF) and she worked great.

Pure rogue also works fine, but you probably will want to avoid two-weapon fighting if you're taking this path. Shortswords. You'll be using weapon finesse, so anything bigger is out, and there's no benefit for using anything smaller. Law and Good; let's you craft holy and axiomatic weapons. Helps that pretty much everything you fight is chaotic evil. Weapon doesn't really matter much; he's a cleric first and a warrior second. If you can manage a higher strength score then a two-handed weapon might be worthwhile. Magic Missile - your standard "spam them with damage" spell.
Enlarge Person - why is this a 1st level spell!? Pure awesomeness
Invisibility - best way to stay alive in dire situations
Haste - best spell in all creation
Stinking Cloud - great way to disable enemies too strong to kill with AoE damage.
Improved Invisibility - cast on the rogue before combat
Confusion - auto-win battles against weak-minded foes

One thing you might consider is assigning one of your characters a reach weapon. Reach weapons can attack enemies from twice as far away (and "enlarge person" further doubles this!) which, combined with abilities like "combat reflexes", "whirlwind attack" or "great cleave" can cause massive carnage.

I had an Elf Fighter/Barbarian with a glaive in my party, and most enemies couldn't get by her once she was fully-buffed by the casters.

Just felt like mentioning that rapiers are finessable, despite not being light. Don't use one in the off-hand, though.

Darvin- did you do the spike chain rogue to use Combat reflexes?

Enlarged person with reach weapon, combat reflexes and cleave is amazing in this game.
Combat reflexes is brilliant if you have a reach weapon and decent dexterity.

Do AoOs get sneak attack bonus?

And now I saw your post- I was thinking THF/WAR, but THF RAN seems pretty solid too....especially with the spiked chain-

CAN I get more info on that build?

Oh, and what's a good keybinding setup?

Ranger isn't really much use in ToEE there's.. hmm.. I think no use for outdoorsman skills, favored enemy is nice addition but Fighter is probably better bet.
I don't really make maximum effect builds, I prefer roleplay-plausible parties with themes and stuff.

But in ToEE I'd actually recommend rerolling stats about 100 times or whatever it takes. It's mercilessly hard for beginners. Just skim this forum, about half of the threads are "why is this game so (/&#€()????)!!!!!!!"

Spiked chain is a bit tricky, needs a feat to use, but great for high dex characters with weapon finesse. Then combat reflexes, improved criticals, power attack + cleave and/or weapon focus + specialization also, but then you've pretty much used up the feats for a long time.

Glaive is pretty much the best weapon in the game. Good damage and reach.

Craft magic arms and armor, craft wondrous items, almost need to have these for caster. You make the best equipment.

Spell penetration and greater sp, for damage casters. Many of toughest opponents have magic resistance.
Cleric with good turning abilities is worth gold.


Key bindings.. I think I had "K" as kill for coup de grace
other important ones:

prepare for approach , or guard
read magic (bunch of scrolls and potions to identify)
5-foot step (really need to use this a lot)

And do you get sneak attack damage on attacks of Opportunity?

I don't remember. I'd guess no, but that's a guess.

While this is true, you'd need to sink two feats into weapon focus if you're using different weapons in each hand. This just is not worth it, especially if you later qualify for weapon specialization as a fighter/rogue. Yup, elf fighter/rogue with maxed DEX score, weapon finesse, and combat reflexes.

At low-levels it wasn't always assured to get sneak attacks, but once my sorcerer had improved invisibility I just used that spell as a prebuff before difficult battles to turn my rogue into a sneak-attacking machine. Definitely go for fighter/rogue if you want to do this! It's quite a feat-intensive path, so you absolutely need the fighter bonus feats. If you go pure rogue or rogue/ranger, you'll have to wait till level 6 before this character can actually use that spiked chain effectively, and you'll be level 9 before you get to add any additional feats into the mix. The extra feats from fighter are extremely welcome, and allow this character to start functioning at level 3.

You'll want to play as a halfling or elf to get the DEX bonus. The elf gives you the benefit of being a medium-sized creature, while the halfling gives you rogue as a favored class so you don't need to keep your fighter and rogue levels balanced.

This would be my suggested 10-level build (Elf - DEX > STR > CON > INT > CHA > WIS)
level 1 - Rogue - combat reflexes
level 2 - Fighter - weapon finesse
level 3 - Rogue - exotic weapon proficiency (spiked chain)
level 4 - Fighter - weapon focus (spiked chain)
level 5 - Rogue
level 6 - Fighter - iron will
level 7 - Fighter - weapon specialization (spiked chain)
level 8 - Rogue
level 9 - Fighter - dodge
level 10 - Rogue

Just use a rapier until you reach level 3. Technically if you took the first two levels as fighter you could start using it at level 2, but it's not worth the sacrifice of all the skill points you get from beginning your career as a rogue.

Alternately, you can skip weapon focus and weapon specialization and go for power attack and cleave instead. That will make you better against swarms of weaker enemies but less effective when you're targeting a single powerful enemy. Improved Invisibility. Makes your rogue happy, your enemies not so much :-)

I didn't even think of Imp. Invis!- You're awesome!

Not really; just give your cleric the "craft magical arms and armor" feat once he qualifies and then have him craft a holy glaive to kick ass. Yup, that holy longsword is definitely the best reason to play a sword-and-board character. That said, it's always funny when charisma dumps come back to bite you. It pales in comparison to the spiked chain. Spiked Chain has long reach, just like the glaive. Clerics don't have to be boxes of bandaids. Remember that you can spontaneously convert any spell into cure spells, so you can prepare a wide range of powers. As well, they can be pretty competent fighters in their own right if you assign them a decent strength score. Yeah, I don't get it either, but that's the way the spell works in ToEE. It'd be nice if it at least gave you a discount, but at full price it's just not worth the precious spell slot and spell known. Use "read magic" to identify potions and scrolls, then pay for merchants to ID anything big. I'd advise against multi-classing rogue with your glaive warrior. Even a single level of rogue will delay your base attack progression, which is costly for a primary warrior. In a more solo-oriented campaign like Neverwinter Nights a rogue dip is awesome for all the extra skill points and I'd endorse it whole-heartedly, but in a team-based game I can't really recommend it unless you're adamant this character is going to be the party face.

Now, Fighter/Barbarian is an awesome combo. The bonus feats of the fighter with the sheer muscle of the barbarian make a superb combination.