Name: de’Arnise Romance (SoA)Version: 2 Website: http://www.pocketplane.net/naliaType: NPC ExpansionScore: 92 %Overview:The de’Arnise Romance mod gives the Bioware NPC Nalia a romance dialogue tree along with new quests and a flirtpack. Although I typically play BG2 for the gameplay and not the storylines I would be giving you a disservice if I did not recommend this mod. It’s simply the best mod I’ve played to date.
Balance: N/ANalia’s character is not changed initially so this category was not rated.
Creativity: 20/20Giving Nalia a romance seems like a no brainer considering all the effort the main character goes through to save her and her keep in the unmodified game. By filling such an obvious gap in the game you might expect a low creativity score, but how the author differentiates Nalia from the other Bioware NPCs is amazing. In comparison to the relatively shorter dialogues of the other romancable females, many of Nalia’s dialogues are drawn out and almost always have to do with central themes of her character such as class struggle and aiding others. Also the way in which dialogues are scripted in this mod makes it seem as you are almost talking to a
real person given how much she brings up previous conversations and how you responded to them. Overall I was just impressed by the quality of writing – the presentation and writing itself is just so damn good, and I’m not even really a huge fan of the romance plots.
Dialogue & Quests: 20/20Nalia’s dialogue is very consistent with the theme that Bioware had set for her and is very distinct from that of other NPCs. There isn’t an overbearing amount of quest content but the excellent dialogue and expansion of Nalia’s character is what this mod is all about anyway. Also the amount and quality of dialogue responses for the main character are amazing. They range from the humorous, to the serious, to the annoyed in such a large gradient that you find you have 4-5 response choices for almost any line of dialogue.
Integration: 48/50There are parentheticals here, but with the Flirtpack (
http://www.pocketplane.net/npcflirt) consistency is not broken that much. The times when parentheticals (or action descriptions) are used instead of dialogue or in-game actions are well done and interesting. As opposed to many other mods where parentheticals seem to be used because it is easier to convey an idea; in the de’Arnise Romance parentheticals seem to only be used in the flirts (where their use is the status quo) and in instances where using dialogue or in-game actions are simply
unable to convey what the author is trying to do. In all honesty this is the only mod where I have seen this done effectively. This de’Arnise mod is the
definitive example for use of parentheticals without breaking integration.
Portrait: N/ANo alternate portrait was set up during my install, so I’m not going to evaluate this category. The mod promo art does include a nice alternate portrait, in case you are looking for one though.
Voicing: 13/20Nalia doesn’t get any extra voicing from the mod other than here already included Bioware lines. The music associated with the Nalia romance is adequate; I personally would not have chosen a guitar (or whatever string instrument is chosen here) but it still gets the job down by not breaking the mood or by being irritating.
Name: Kelsey (ToB)Version: 2.2Website: http://www.pocketplane.net/kelseyType: NPCScore: 88 %Overview:The Kelsey NPC mod features a neutral good, male, human, sorcerer with a large amount of dialogues and banters. Additionally Kelsey has possible romance tracks with both the PC and Imoen. Of important note is that a significant amount of Kelsey’s lines are voiced, making him possibly the most complete non-Bioware NPC available. Unlike most NPC’s available, Kelsey does not have ridiculous stats and instead derives most of his strength and usability from his class.
Balance: 9/10Kelsey’s character is well balanced and is not overally powerful. He features average stats and only one over-powered item instead deriving most of his usefulness from his class, sorcerer. Kelsey won’t make your game ridiculously hard with unavoidable sidequests nor will he make it boringly easy with overpowered abilities, resulting in a near-perfect balanced NPC.
Creativity: 18/20One of the top aims for any mod is that it should add new creative and original content to Baldur’s Gate II. Kelsey, being a neutral good male sorcerer adds something that is sorely missed in unmodified Baldur’s Gate II – a good aligned single class magic user (not to mention a sorcerer, a class not represented among the default NPCs). Kelsey’s romance with Imoen is also a creative plus as it helps not only to expand Kelsey’s character but also the character of Imoen. Even Kelsey’s seemingly uneventful background as a merchant is original compared to other NPCs (who hail from distant lands or were born from nobility). Kelsey’s items could use a little more background but they do allow Kelsey to cast completely new spells which have new graphics.
Dialogue & Quests: 15/20Kelsey’s dialogue is particularly well written and fits in fairly well with the normal game. Although the Kelsey and Imoen romance is an inventive aspect of the mod, I found their dialogue to be largely marginal but with a few bright spots – not quite as good as the rest of his dialogue. The largest mark against Kelsey’s dialogue is the volume (size) of it, there is a ton of it, and it seemed as if Kelsey’s relationship with Imoen attempted to push itself in front of the main storyline in Throne of Bhaal (this may not be as big an issue with people who have completed the game multiple times, but this was on my first go around of Throne of Bhaal). (On a side note I never did Kelsey’s Shadows of Amn quests as I only played Throne of Bhaal with him – as such they have not been taken into consideration.)
Integration: 45/50Kelsey’s character integrates with the game and normal Bioware NPCs fairly well, and with few exceptions makes a smooth addition Baldur’s Gate II. The most stark examples of how Kelsey does not quite fit in are that he levels up during your first meeting, which allows you to set most of his spells (not wholly a bad thing, just inconsistent), and he talks far more than any other NPC. Besides those couple points Kelsey fits into Baldur’s Gate II extremely well.
Portrait: 8/10Most people may think it odd that I rate portraits when I rate a mod, but what is the most eye-catching part of any NPC mod? What initially grabs your interest? What gets you to click on that link to a site to learn more about the NPC? That’s right, it's the portrait! I normally pick my class, race, and gender for a PC based on the most interesting portrait I kind find, in a large sense the portrait of a character is just as defining as his/her/its dialogue. Although Kelsey’s portrait is not a particularly riveting work of art, it does have correct head proportions and fits in very nicely with the other portraits of normal Bioware NPCs, which easily projects it ahead of many other mods in this category.
Voicing: 20/20Kelsey’s voicing is exceptional – it has the correct volume to be consistent with Bioware’s NPCs, is in character, and he has some entertaining select sounds. Just about perfect.
Name: Saerileth (SoA)Version: 13Website: http://www.gilalion.com/saerilethmod.htmType: NPCScore: 85 %Overview:Saerileth is a 15-year old Cavalier sent form Outer Planes to destroy an ancient enemy. She offers a surprisingly amount of dialogue in an antiquated dialect in addition to a multitude of quests and some of the most interesting plot twists outside of Yoshimo. Although more prone to bugs than some other mods – if you are playing BG2 for a roleplaying aspect you should definitely look at installing this mod. The romance portion of the mod seems to be widely regarded as one of the community’s favorites.
Balance: 7/10Saerileth is one the weaker characters you can acquire initially. Notably she doesn’t have many points in two-handed sword proficiency (IE, not optimized for using Carsomyr) but she also has a few nifty items which give her things like permanent protection from evil. Her stats aren’t particularly amazing either so don’t expect her account for 80% of your party’s kills but she won’t finish too far behind the stock NPCs. She’s not a power-gaming caliber NPC but you probably won’t be focusing on doing a speed run with her anyway.
Creativity: 20/20I have to commend the author’s on their creativity here – Saerileth speaks in old-English and is not really from around Amn, she’s also a lot younger than the other characters, and has a somewhat interesting but naïve view of the world. Basically she adds something that is refreshingly new in comparison to the stock NPCs. All of these things combined with well done quests and plot twists throughout her dialogue trees easily catapult this mod to near the top of any modlist.
Dialogue & Quests: 18/20Excellent dialogue, although there is a fair amount of parentheticals. Her dialogue and romance/friendship trees are well written and worth looking into if you typically enjoy the ones from the original NPCs. She also likes to comment on items, which is a nice change that could be added for the Bioware NPCs. Her quests are pretty grand in scale and ambition but suffer from a lack of polish – having said that they add much more than a few bugs can detract and help flesh out Saerileth’s character.
Integration: 41/50A few bugs can force you to do some reloading and can cause some pretty horrendous compatibility issues with other mods but in general you’ll be okay as long as you don’t go overboard on installing NPCs. The quests do take the focus off the main storyline a bit, but if your beating BG2 for the Nth time you probably won’t mind. You’ll be able to tell the Saerileth mod is a mod NPC but it won’t detract from your experience too much as she offers such a different experience than the stock NPCs.
Portrait: 10/10Portrait is very well done and has good head/body ratios compared to the stock NPCs. The portrait does a good job of showing a young character who could be a Paladin.
Voicing: 15/20Like the Yasraena mod Saerileth’s volume level is a little high but her voiceover is much less monotone and sounds much more sincere. The audio could be better but the current voiceover set does an adequate job of expressing Saerileth’s concerns.
Name: Valen (SoA)Version: 45Website: http://weidu.org/valen.htmlType: NPCScore: 82%Overview: The Valen NPC makes Valen, your contact with the rival guild, a possible party member. Valen is a chaotic evil, thief/fighter vampire with ridiculously high stats and advantages, but at the cost of some serious disadvantages. In comparison with many other NPC mods, Valen makes many sections of the games easier rather than harder, although there is a wealth of new additions to pose problems for her. The real strength of the Valen NPC mod is its unique presentation of the NPC’s character through her in-game actions more than her dialogue.
Balance: 9/10Valen’s stats are insane. There is no other way to put it, she has high marks in every statistic and her stats increase as the game progresses. Additionally she has the ability to level drain opponents and as the game progresses she can drain as many as
four levels per hit. Besides being able to level drain opponents she moves at incredible speed at night, outstripping any character not wearing boots of speed. On top of all these advantages Valen even has a custom script that allows her to search for traps and remain hidden in shadows. Furthermore she turns into gas form when lowered to 25% health. So how’s all this balanced? Valen has a serious aversion to sunlight, its not instant death thanks to some nifty armor, but I assure you she is toast in any daylight battles. To counter her level drain you can install a component that gives more enemies immunity to level drain, but even without it you will still run into some challenging encounters. Although it is almost impossible to actually kill Valen (enemies must kill her gaseous form) she cannot be revived which I believe is a reasonable enough counter balance. The biggest balancing factor, though, is Valen’s attitude. She will basically cause riots by munching on peasants, backtalking nobles, and laying waste to temples. You may have a real tough character in Valen, but fighting your way every where and missing out on the “Good” quests and items is a tradeoff you have to be willing to take.
Creativity: 20/20What I love about the Valen mod is its creativity – rather than emphasize the NPC’s character through parentheticals, or even dialogue, her character is displayed more through her actions (and not just quest-related actions). Weimer has created an NPC that utilizes the gaming medium, other NPCs are revealed through that dialogue box on the bottom screen, heck even the Bioware ones tend to follow this pattern. Weimer’s presentation of Valen is much different than any other NPC, but I would say to a large degree, his presentation is simply superior to the traditional “read a bunch of dialogue on the bottom of the screen.” Even if you prefer the presentation of an NPC through the traditional manner, Valen should give you a refreshing change.
Dialogue & Quests: 18/20Valen does not have many quests (I believe she only has one specific encounter) but she changes the outcome of many of the current ones and injects where appropriate. The lack of a huge overarching quest may be a little disappointing (but not as disappointing as a poorly done overarching quest), but it keeps the focus on the main character and storyline.
Integration: 42/50The largest noticeable difference of Valen is her items. Most of her special abilities are conferred by her items, which seems a little sloppy in terms of making her seamless integration into the game. She also has little variety in voiceover which can become annoying (hearing “I am hidden” can be a little irritating after the 500th time). Additionally her ability to hide in shadows and find traps seems a little on the excessive side. Besides these few minor things I believe she integrates fairly well, her presence is reacted to a significant amount of characters throughout the game so she doesn’t feel left out.
Portrait: 8/10The flower in her portrait seems a little out of place, but otherwise the portrait has fairly good proportions and fits in fairly well with Bioware NPC portraits.
Voicing: 10/20Valen just uses a standard voiceset, and while not that great, it is still way better than a poor voiceset.