Larian Studios Forums Divinity - Original Sin Divinity Original Sin - Help/Tips/Tricks Help!! Character Creation :/ Help!!!

Good Evening,

This is my first post on this forum, hopefully not even remotely my last. :(

I bought this game in hopes of reliving some classic childhood RPG love....
Unfortunately, I've found myself arguing with (myself!) over character creation and the problem consists with determining what I want to play vs. what I should play.

I think I over killed research into this game (review's, video's, tutorials etc). Anyways, I've basically come to a deep set fear of creating failing characters......

Is there anyway to work around this?(Meaning playing whatever class I want without having to reroll 45 hours into the game)
Any and all help is greatly appreciated........

You "should" play what you "want" to play.. there is no help there we can give you in that regard. There are no fixed classes in the game. You can skill any class however you feel like, including the npc companions. Class only defines what your dudes start with, not what they can learn.

And when you want to do a rogue that can cast magic and swing 2 handed weapons.. well feel free (though he'll do neither very well). NO combat becomes impossible because of it, but if you don't have magic at all on any of your characters the game becomes very difficult. But I think you could get through just with scrolls, arrows and potions even if you had 4 completely useless characters ,)

Having 1 char that can use fire and ice magic is very useful though

Ha! Reminds me of my first RPG. Like what the prior post said, it doesn't matter - especially on easy, needless to say.

In my experience, I started out with a shadow blade character and Mage (elementalist? I think). I had lofty plans for my rogue/wizard/ranger/warlock and he ended up pretty useless for the better half a bad playthrough. I had a story in mind. My story. Personally that's what I think RPGs are about. Not the hardcore stat-boosting and impregnable character builds. Don't take what people say too seriously especially if it stops you from enjoying the game from the start and end up not playing it.

As for my shadow blade, he ended up pretty badass by the end of the game. And in addition, earth spells... Meh.

He'll actually do very terribly.

You seem to want some security. So I can share some of my experience:
-Having at least one mage in the party is very good, because there are 5 magic schools and only 3 non-magic schools, and magic heals are very important. Without a mage, you will not experience a good portion of the game's mechanics: Manipulating enviromental effects and elemental interactions;
-Creating hybrid classes (that mix 2 or 3 of the offensive attributes: Dex, Str and Int) is very complicated and has a risk of resulting in very weak characters;
-Magic dmg is stronger than physical dmg in the beginning and as enemies tend to have higher elemental resistances at some point, things reverse completely, with phys dmg > mag dmg. Magic in forms of crowd control, buffs and debuffs never stops being very useful;
-Crowd control is one of the most important aspects in fights. Mages are the best for this, Rangers come in the 2nd position;
-Weapon abilities such as 1h, 2h, bow and x-bow become obsolete at around lvl13, because there is another skill that doesn't stack with them and can contribute to more dmg than the others;
-The game becomes progressively easier because of increasing versatility, AP and lower cooldowns on mages. The first map is hard compared to the rest of the game, especially without Pyro and Hydro schools;
-With Crafting and Blacksmithing it's possible to create very powerful equipments, especially STR weapons;
-Lockpicking and Pickpocketing are worthless. Lucky Charm's extra item chance is not worthy;
-You can respec your 2 main characters far in the game, but you'll have to buy all the skill books you want to (re)learn;
-If you end up creating weak characters, you can lower the game difficulty;
-This game has decent replay value, so you can play differently next time.

tl;dr For beginners, it's good to have at least one mage and one physical attacker, and it's complicated to create satisfying hybrid classes. If you end up with a weak party, decrease game difficulty.