khnk222: I'm at the point in the game where I go to the Isle of Despair, so far it doesn't feel like I have done that much, and I just want to know how far I have gotten in the game and some opinions on my character build.

khnk222: the Black Mountain Clan was hell for the most part around level 15 to 18

khnk222: I have Magnus, Virgil, and Jayna from Dernholm

MackieStingray: You're getting closer to finding out what happened to the Black Mountain Clan, but even once you make that discovery (which won't be quite yet), you've got quite a bit of work ahead of you in following up that lead.

@I think I have a while till completion then, right, if so then thats good. MackieStingray: How's that working out for you so far? It's an interesting variety of skills and talents you picked.
Have you learned to make any guns, or have you simply worked to become skillful with the guns you acquire? A fellow who can't make guns can yet learn to produce some pretty monstrous cannons, either by certain quests or by finding schematics and producing what they show via components on site and tech manuals from Tarant.

@I want to be more melee focused right now and have yet to invest one point in the gun smithing tech tree, I might go to guns again though, I could sit back and shoot while my party does melee, I do have have the firearms skill filled about midway. MackieStingray: They're awful for everybody. It's the game's Scrappy Level. Glad you got through in one piece!

@Thats good to know I thought I might just have a crappy character, phew. Also "Scrappy Level" what do you mean, I haven't heard that one before? MackieStingray: O.o
Ours is not to wonder why, ours is to take advantage. Though I don't imagine you have a staggeringly high and well-trained Persuasion skill? I know that can have an impact. And I also assume you don't have anything which temporarily but significantly increased your Charisma, then returned it to the lower number?
Here's something to try. Save your game, tell a party member to wait around so he or she is no longer in your party, then try to invite him or her back. If that works, then try it again but use their newly freed slot to recruit somebody else, such as Gar the orc in Tarant or whoever else springs to mind. If that doesn't work, then it's a good bet you've somehow actually exceeded your maximum followers.
If you do this, don't save! It's just tinkering, that's all.

@I had the smoking jacket on when I spoke with Jayna, not sure, but maybe that was it, otherwise I have no clue as to why I can have three followers, I have all the patches(including the UAP) so glitches should not be a problem.

Which I were more knowledgeable.

Starmaker: You're about 1/3 to 1/2 into the main plot (depending on whether you're capable of avoiding another annoying dungeon), but since you made it through BMC at levels 15 to 18 with a reasonably fighty character, there's quite an amount of optional stuff you haven't done.

Expert Persuasion grants an additional follower - however, your character sheet should say so outright (e.g. mine says "max 6 followers" - five for CH 20 and one for Expert Persuasion; I walk around with seven because Dog does not count against the limit). When hiring followers, it's your current CH stat that matters. Be aware, however, that the game checks for CH every time someone joins your party, whether they're joining for the first time or you kicked them out or just told to wait.Starmaker: BMC at 15 without the dog? I bow to your power.

Waltorious: As others have said, you are about halfway through the game, and the Black Mountain Clan Mines are definitely the most annoying part of the game. Having gotten through them, you shouldn't need to change your character's strategy up too much, since you're past the hardest bit anyway.

Melee is a good thing to have, but I've heard that trying to do magic and tech at the same time doesn't work very well. I think that with low magical aptitude spells simply aren't that effective. Using tech when you are relatively neutral on the tech/magic scale is not as bad, but you may find you have an extra chance of critical failures when using high-level tech items.

But mostly, just do what seems fun. Arcanum is one of those games that you'll want to play several times, trying different character builds and making different choices.

khnk222: I think I'm going to play the game now, from the answers and feedback I'm getting it sounds like I am doing Ok, so I will go see what I can do. I will post back anything else I want to ask about.

Waltorious: Cool. To address the questions you just asked:

You should not have any trouble with the Isle of Despair.

The smoking jacket should not allow you to get an additional follower, it just means that people are more likely to react favorably to you when they first meet you (their "reaction" number will start out higher). @ I didn't think it would help anything.

The dog they are referring to is indeed the dead one in Ashbury... apparently if you find the dog fast enough after arriving in Ashbury you will see someone attacking it, and if you get them to stop attacking the dog then it will join you. If you wait too long the dog will be killed. I missed it on my first playthrough too, though, so don't worry about it. The dog is helpful but not necessary to finish the game. @ Resurrect it maybe, I hope I can do that but I think its gone now the body and all and if not, I would have to get a scroll.

You can use tech manuals to help you CREATE tech items, but if you are magically aligned you will have a lot of trouble USING tech items. There is an extra chance of critical failure when using tech items if you have magical affinity. To check this, get a tech item (like a gun) and mouse over it so that there its info is displayed in the box at the bottom of the screen. One of the stats there will say something like "Chance of critical failure" and then give a percentage. This is the EXTRA chance of critical failure that you will get due to being magically aligned (or simply not having enough tech alignment). If this percentage reads zero, that just means there's no EXTRA chance of failure... you can still fail if you have low skill, for example a highly tech-aligned character with no firearms skill will still critically fail when shooting guns, due to low skill rather than their alignment. Keep in mind that you can still use manuals to create items for your tech-aligned followers. @ I noticed this already, but thanks for the extra insight about the tech and magic problems one can have as you explained.

Similarly, magical items have enchantments that will only partially work for those with tech alignment. Also, tech aligned characters will fail a lot when using spells and spells won't really work on them. Virgil's healing magic stops working on you if you are highly tech aligned. Anyway, for magic items there's a stat that's like a percentage of the magical power available or something. If you mouse over a magic sword, let's say one that has extra fire damage, it will say something like "fire damage 4-8" but then it will also give a percentage of magical power avilable. If this says 50%, then you only get 2-4 fire damage. The percentage goes up with higher magical alignment, and down with higher tech alignment. Full tech alignment usually means that enchantments don't work at all, but it varies item to item.