So I needed another "make a party, kill monsters" fix and not wanting to go through Elemental Evil again, I decided to dig up the Icewind box.

First I tried ID2. The character graphics were bad enough that I almost gave it up right away, but then didn't.

My first try was with an all multiclass all elven party, which was a bit crappy choice. Nobody had decent armour, nobody did anything good and I got my rear assed to me all the time. Gave up when it got too frustrating.

The second try was in ID1, this time a bit more traditional party. Although I multi- or dual classed pretty much everybody. (And that's pretty obviously such a good way to go I can't see a good reason to not have a couple of fighter levels in there). Eventually I grew bored with that too (after snake temple).

Then I decided to give a smaller party a go in ID2. And that's clearly the most fun experience so far.

The interesting part is, the going seems actually a lot easier this way!!

The abundant experience I was ready for, but didn't really factor in the abundant loot! At the battle of palisade, my elven party was still soldiering on with a mismatch of leather and chain armor, whatever weapons, only a few of them having magic- or even quality weapons of any kind. My party of 3 were a level higher and with magic swords and half plate cut the goblins down like nothing! I can sell a ton of good magic items and buy/keep only the best stuff, not having to spread the items 6 ways.

The party is:

Pacifier, a human Paladin, all good and noble and deadly as hell with a greatsword.
Temporal, a human Cleric/1 level of fighter. Focusing on shield and axe.
Smartypants, a human female Rogue/Ranger/Wizard, being mostly a wizard but also pretty devastating with dual swords (or crossbows or bows).

With fewer characters, they also start to develop as characters and pretty much get a life of their own with half a try.

Once I grow bored again, I think I'll try to solo ID1!

Guess it'll have to be cleric-something, Pure cleric, a fighter/cleric dual-class or fighter/cleric/thief multi-class?

Thousand re-rolls or a touch of dale keeper...

I shy away from multi/dual classes. I get confused with the older D&D editions & I'm always afraid I won't put enough of one or the other into them. I prefer just to play full classes & know exactly what each character excels at.

The games are balanced for a party of 6, so it's no surprise that some things are easier and some things are harder with a smaller party.

Your party of 3 will have a hard time in the later IWD2 chapters. The faster levelling you had in the beginning will soon be evened out and multiclass casters gain their spells slower than pure class casters.

IWD is soloable with any class, even with pure cleric. Fighter/mage/cleric or ranger/cleric multiclass are the cleric builds which are the easiest to play.

Haa! I actually gave ID1 a shot right away!
It's fun early on when levels just come a *pling*, *pling*, *pling*.

A lone fighter, raised a couple of levels right in the beginning village just by talking.
The goblins/orcs were pretty easy then, got to level 6 and Kuldahar all easy and simple.

Then dual-classed into cleric and things got a bit tough. Cant hit worth damn, but high HP allows to take hits.
(Although it's a bit unnerving to sleep for two weeks after a fight. No time limits, right.)

Surprisingly impossible fight in valley of shadows. Can't beat a lowly carrion crawler no matter what! Once it get's a hit in, it's almost certainly a paralysing one (level 2 cleric saving throws), then it get's every hit in, keeps me paralysed and off to deadland I go. The first time ever in any d&d game when I've had trouble with one of these.

Will have to do something else and level up, come back when I can summon something distracting.

Got past that, a bunch of yetis was just what the XP-doctor ordered.
Now Fighter6/Cleric7 and the going is pretty smooth again, with good THACO and good saves.

Final dungeon in the valley and I'm not expecting too much difficulties.
Have to be really careful with disabling effects though, out of action even for a second and thats it.

I expect things'll get real tough pretty soon though.
Planning to give up at that point, but it'll be interesting to see how far this flyes.

I want to try ToEE

But I have my party choices in any D&D game

Damn, Jarmo, you've inspired me to start another run through IWD. I'm thinking a party of 2... perhaps a FTR/Mage/Thief and a FTR/Cleric (or maybe a Cleric/Illusionist... hmmmm).

I'm enjoying hearing about your adventures, Jarmo. Keep us updated!

Love being able to splurge all the gathered gold for a fancy +3 mace!
Valley cleared, no real problems although that was quite a bunch of killing near the end.

The serpent thingy next.

A fun fact I didn't know. Turn undead is a status that remains in effect even when immobilised/paralysed. A couple of ghouls (or wights or something) jumped & stunned me, I just managed to hit "turn" on, but it didn't take before I was out of action. Then spent a minute radiating "turning rays", ghouls running away, running back, turned again and repeat. There's a wicked cool helmet in Kuldahar you can only use with a gnome or a halfling. Just FYI.

Aye, I remember that. Also some good loot to pick pocket (ring of free action, etc.)

Temple of forgotten god is where things start looking difficult.

Shouldn't come as a huge surprise, before it was mostly undead, easy pickings for a high level cleric.
Now its those pesky little giants. I can handle a couple, but have to run out of temple to rest all the time.
Not horribly difficult, not undoable, but I seem to remember this was easier with a party of 6.

I'd imagine things will just get harder now on.

10K XP more and I'll have 5th level spells though.
Will have to see if that smoothes the field again.

Jarmo, I suspect the whole thing will be an up/down kind of experience, as you described in a previous post. (i.e. hard for a while, then easy, then hard, etc.) But the game can definitely be soloed, as I've read on other forums where people have done it.

I've decided on going with a two character party:

Half Elf Ranger/Cleric. This is (obviously) the healer, but will also serve as the main tank. Will likely go without a shield to get the extra attack per round.

Elf Fighter/Mage/Thief. Going to try primarily ranged for this character, although I know melee is going to be unavoidable. But I'm hoping this one can play support through most battles.

Going to munchkin the stats on these though. I've rolled the Ranger/Cleric and gotten an incredible array - after many, many tries:**

STR 18/00
DEX 18
CON 16
INT 6
WIS 18
CHA 18

Now it's just a matter of rolling the F/M/T...

**I know I could just set the stats with Dalekeeper, but it's a weird point of honor for me to actually have to roll the stats for these characters.

I've solo'd as both a Bard and a Paladin. Tried with a druid, and it was pretty hard... lacked the offensive punch to get through Dorn's Deep.

I used to, but no such honour anymore. NWN and a hundred fan modules cured me of that (or spoiled me).
Nowadays I just make whatever kind of character I happen to want.
For soloing IWD, I figure it'll have to be some kind of one in a million divine champion...

Anyway. Closing in on Presio. Getting almost easy again, fun to see waves of undeads charge 11th level cleric with turning on maximum, and watch them explode as if moved down by a holy chaingun!

Well that was kind of a surprise. She went down almost effortlessly.
Guess it's hard to be all tough when your hench-undead are exploded and you're being swarmed by my undead horde,
while being scorched by flame strikes! Good times. :)