BG2: Jan Jansen is great
Maddog
me he was totally worthless; not that good of a thief and limited
abilities in the spell caster area. Deadweight. I dumped him for Aerie.
Funny how people playing the same game can have so different
perspectives about the NPC's.
Maddog
Herbie Jurvanen wrote:
>
> A while back I stayed up late worrying about whether or not I should replace
> Yoshimo with Jan Jansen. I did, and I haven't regretted it. Most of his
> thief stats are good out-of-the-box (even better than a L14 Yoshimo). His
> stealth blows but that is what Minsc is there for. He's a little chatty, but
> he pisses Anomen off, which is good. His only disadvantages are his low HP
> and his dependence on his Jansen AdventureGear. It's hard to give him
> interesting gloves, etc. because he would lose his good thief stats without
> his custom garb.
>
> Jan's story about "Ano" has, so far, been the high point of the game for me.
>
> Herbie J.
> Famous Curator
J Amos
composition of my party. He offers something in most areas apart from
meelee. One good thing is that he memorises all those spells which are
useful but not good enough for my primary mage to carry around. So he gets
the wizard eye, remove magic, spell thrust and breach type spells leaving
Edwin to stack up on offensive spellpower. Thieving - I have not yet a
found a non-magical lock he has not picked. Plus as the only crossbowman in
my party his ranged attacks with the amount of magical bolts in the game are
another plus.
"Yes, Yes, a standard tactic that."
Brian H.
some adventure games or adventure-style RPGs (like most console type) that
everyone plays the game the same way. I think every joinable NPC in BG2 is
good just because any of them is NOT a must-have in the game. Jan is
actually *THE* best thief in the game unless your main character is a thief.
Still, without him, you can use thief-only equipment to boost Nalia &
Imoen's thieves' skills to suit your needs. Even if you intend to not have
a thief in your party, clerics can cast FindTrap and mages can cast globe of
invulnerability to run through the traps.
In my current game, Jan performs well, as so the other characters did, which
include universally considered "sucks" characters like Haer'Dalis & Cernd.
In my next game, I will not use them and I will choose another NPCs.
Maddog <nu...@nowhere.com> wrote in message
news:3A2D9672...@nowhere.com...
mtKafka
Jan is my favorite BG2 character. . . he cracks me up!!! and he may seem
cartoony at first but after doing his quest, the guy is more 3 dimensional . . .
his family and stories actually become real to me. the great thing about bg2 is
that even a "wacky" a bit too nostalgic cliche character like Jan is given more
depth.
PLUS hes an excellent thief and illsuionist!
etc
Dirk Brüggemann
>
> Must agree - I found him to be very good value with regard to the
> composition of my party. He offers something in most areas apart from
> meelee. One good thing is that he memorises all those spells which are
> useful but not good enough for my primary mage to carry around. So he > gets
> the wizard eye, remove magic, spell thrust and breach type spells > leaving
> Edwin to stack up on offensive spellpower. Thieving - I have not yet > a
> found a non-magical lock he has not picked.
Additionally, it is often nice to have an easy way to dispel those
illusion spells. No more trouble with mislead mages: simply let Jan
detect traps, and the illusion is no more.
dirk
tse...@my-deja.com
>
> In my current game, Jan performs well, as so the other characters
did, which
> include universally considered "sucks" characters like Haer'Dalis &
Cernd.
> In my next game, I will not use them and I will choose another NPCs.
>
I think Bioware did an excellent job balancing the NPCs in that if you
know how to use their individual strengths, no single NPC
really "sucks". At first glance, Haer'Dalis might seem poor due to his
stats, but with the proper spell arsenal he can actually become your
most powerful melee NPC. And even though Cernd is my least favourite
NPC, he certainly has his strengths as well: best druid, no equipment
necessary, Irons Skins + Greater Werewolf = very tough melee NPC.
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
Brian H.
<tse...@my-deja.com> wrote in message news:90m5qr$pqv$1...@nnrp1.deja.com...
>
> >
> > In my current game, Jan performs well, as so the other characters
> did, which
> > include universally considered "sucks" characters like Haer'Dalis &
> Cernd.
> > In my next game, I will not use them and I will choose another NPCs.
> >
>
> know how to use their individual strengths, no single NPC
> really "sucks". At first glance, Haer'Dalis might seem poor due to his
> stats, but with the proper spell arsenal he can actually become your
> most powerful melee NPC. And even though Cernd is my least favourite
> NPC, he certainly has his strengths as well: best druid, no equipment
> necessary, Irons Skins + Greater Werewolf = very tough melee NPC.
>
Agreed. That's why I would like to try them all. By choosing Jan,
Haer'Dalis, and Cernd in my current game, I missed Mazzy, Valygar, Korgan,
Viconia, Edwin, and many others. Definitely I need to create another game
later to use them.
In my game, Haer'Dalis dual wields Celestial Fury and the Pixie Prick
dagger, wears cloak of displacement (Blurred), cast offensive spin & mirror
image before combat, which makes him very formidable. In range combat, he
throws a lot of darts of wounding & darts of stunning, and he also have the
magic bow +3 that purchased from Trademeet which doesn't require arrows.
For Cernd, he uses the boomerang dagger for range combat, and I put most of
the staves for him (except the staff of magi for my fighter/mage). In open
areas he will use staff of thunder & lightning to cast call lightning. In
melee he will use staff of fire +2 to cast Fireshield on him, then he'll
shapeshift himself into a flaming werewolf.
Htn963
Same here, best thief, best lines...try having Keldorn and Aerie with him
after completing the Unseeing Eye Avatar Rod Quest for the funniest (IMO)
dialogue exchange in the game:
Jan: "reminds me of the time I met the God of Wisdom... he was lying
drunk in my cousin's backyard though and had his underwear pulled up to his
shoulder blades..."
Keldorn: "how dare you make fun of Gods..."
Aerie: "hehe, you are just so bad..."