You don't need a mod. Just put make the highest charisma character the leader. If he/she is really squishy you can use different formations so the leader is not in the front.

Nonsense. CHARNAME can solo the entire game, including collecting the demon hearts and whipping Irenicus into shape.

As for 'want'? Well, if the alternative is worse, one can be inspired.

You seemed to be asking after possible rationalizations. Evil characters ditching someone, even in the Nine Hells, does make sense in certain contexts.

I am quite well aware of how reputation is handled in BG2, even more than you are, apparently, since I am also quite well aware that the canon route does NOT force you into high rep. If you want a neutral path, then mix good and bad deeds together.

Your response has little or nothing to do with what you quoted.

Evil characters will bail if you have a high rep. If the leader of your party has a high charisma your evil party members will begrudgingly stay. I've had playthroughs where I had Viconia or Edwin and they stayed with me throughout the game.

In this case the canon behavior forces high rep. I remember a place where starting dialogue with prisoners inside their cells automatically gave +1 rep, and you had 2-3 of them. You can't avoid rep gains without locking yourself out of content.

When I said no amount of experience can possibly prepare a lone adventurer survive to the Nine Hells, I was talking from a realistic role-playing perspective, which is what the story should be based on.

When I asked "what the actual fuck?" it was more of a rhetorical question. There is no legitimate excuse for this to be possible.

By the way mixing good and evil deeds does not count as a neutral position from a role-playing perspective.

The canon does strongly push you into high rep and has many forced rep gains along the path. The evil choices often feel extreme or unsatisfying to role-play too.

I have never heard of party leader's charisma keeping NPCs in your party past their rep break point; I'm pretty sure it would have come up before, if true. Do you have another source that agrees with you? They'll stick with you up through rep 18, but 19/20 are the breaking point for Evil characters.

Yes, there are certain actions that make the general populace think better of you. Funny how they tend to like groups that do deeds which make the world a nicer place.

There are also certain actions that make the general populace think worse of you.

Neither the rep gains nor the rep losses mean you have to high (or low) rep throughout the game.

Oh. Your way is the One True Way. I apologize for being mistaken.

You are correct. Party leader charisma has no bearing on member leaving break points, only *certain* conflict dialogue/resolution.

I mean if you just try to role-play as an average sane person you end up with heroic rep. You really need to be evil to change that.

Good timing! I tried to ping you in chat to see if you knew about some special case here, but your chat is restricted.

Yeah, my chat is restricted because of past hate mongers.

I just remember being able to keep Viconia and Edwin. I guess I just got lucky.

And that's pretty similar to most other RPG's. But I agree that it's a good thing to give an RPG player option to make his own choices. The problem is that creating a full-fledged evil path doubles the amount of work developers need to do in many areas of the game. Statistics show that players tend to choose good paths when playing games. This means putting a lot of effort into content that will be experienced by a quite small group of people. I presume this is the main problem in the development of evil path. There are a few games which offer it though. There's of course Tyranny, there's NWN2 Mask of the Betrayer, Fallout 2 also has a quite nice evil path.

Realism and fantasy games don't come together. ;) I really don't see a reason why a very experienced character wouldn't be able to survive in Nine Hells solo. Like I said, it's possible to beat NWN HotU without any companions and it's not that hard if you have a properly developed character. Same applies to BG2. It's the same setting.

Could you provide an example of a true neutral path in a setting that rarely uses shades of grey? Ok, druids and the balance of nature. But apart from that?

Or something bugged itself. :)

It makes perfect sense. No matter where I am, my chance of surviving is a lot higher alone rather than being with a group full of people who do not agree with me.

Assuming mods weren't in use, then you may have routinely used the Slayer form, which would give you rep dips that might have kept you under 19 whenever the break point was checked (one source says it checks whenever you get experience).

I mean you gain rep for helping out people even if you ask for a reward and then ask for some more reward. I was just playing a lawful money & power hungry adventurer and ended up with heroic rep.

Other RPGs are similar but then again they dont focus as much on large parties.

Maybe statistics say that players prefer the good path but that is because for most RPGs the evil path is shoehorned and not very fleshed out.

Again you're missing the point about a solo adventurer being able to survive the Nine Hells, I was talking from a role-playing perspective. With your logic I could complain about puny bandits trying to rob my OP party loaded epic gear.
I wouldn't use NWN as a standard for comparison too.

I couldn't give an example of a true neutral path in BG since it doesn't really offer one, which is why I am complaining about reputation effects.

I strongly doubt that the group can afford to fight each other in such a situation. If anything they must work together to have a chance to escape or be forever stuck with people they dont like.

If you do a good deed which is widely recognized by the community, it'll bring you a good reputation even if you ask for a higher reward. It's only a matter of discussion whether the rep gain should be lower or not.

There's quite a lot of RPG's with parties similar in size to those from BG series. It has started long ago. Check Eye of the Beholder for example. It doesn't have a true evil path. None of the Infinity Engine games has it (maybe PT is close, but it focuses on saving yourself rather than the world). Pillars of Eternity is based on fraction and area reputation so your deeds are considered good or evil from the perspective of a certain community or group. Like I said, not many games offer to be a true asshole without loosing access to most of the content. :)

Most people want to save the world, not destroy it. :) That's why they often choose a good path, when they have a choice. I don't deny a possibility that evil path could be chosen more frequently, if it had a good execution. Especially on the second playthrough.

I don't think that D&D handbooks say something about surviving solo in Nine Hells. So there's no canon version.

I'm not asking you to provide an example from the game. I'd like you to think your own example of a true neutral path in Forgotten Realms setting. It's possible, but requires to incline some of the rules in a way Obsidian did in KOTOR2 with Star Wars setting.