Hello,

I am hoping that some people who have played either or both of the above games could give me some advice on which I should try next.

I had a look at IWD2 but the character creation but it looks very complicated. I can handle choosing fighter, mage, thief, cleric, ranger, pally, but there are so many options, as well as feats, etc. I had a look at some guides and they are all about power gaming and I don't really understand them. I'm a little worried that I will make some team that just fails miserably.

I don't know much about TOEE other than its buggy and that I need to install the Circle of Eight patches..

So my question is, which one would you recommend I try next?

I'm going to snag TOEE VERY shortly now (for some reason I've been conditioned to wait for a sale that may never come ;) ) but from what I remember, if you're daunted by the IWD2 character creation and the idea of powergaming you MIGHT want to hold off on TOEE. It's fairly difficult, it's easy to make life VERY hard by choosing the wrong character party and instead of building ONE character you really need to properly construct a full party before you set off - though you might want to see if anyone had success with a stock character party build.

Thanks for that, apparently IWD2 is 3.0 something or rather and TOEE is 3.5 something or rather so I guess I will go with IWD2, do my best to put together a party that doesn't suck and see what happens...

TOEE have a very high learning curve, you cant just jump and play the game and if you think icewind is complicated well Toee is a lot more , ice windale it's hard but not the same, go for icewindale, both in the part of plot are kinda meh but toee is pretty bad, dialogs are very very bad :( but again you dont play this games for the story.

I would recommend you baldurs gate 2 if you havent played yet if yes go for icewindale.

Thanks of that, I have been through BG1, BG2 and IWD1 so I guess IWD2 is the next logical step. I guess once I get into it it will be fine. I was intimidated by BG the first time I played it, a lot more complicated than Curse of the Azure Bonds...

well, with BS2 you got the best of icewindale but with a plus of an awesome story so I say go for it
If you want just "light" rpg elements but just one of the best if not the best plot ever play planescape torment, it uses the same engine as bs or icewindale but very simplified and changed.

Icewind Dale 2 without a question. I've played both, but IWD2 was the first DnD game I ever played.

ToEE Pros:
- Combat's awesome
- Robust character creation
- Missions are interesting
- Looks nice

ToEE Cons:
- Really short
- Really buggy (constant crashes even with the Co8 mod); on my second playthrough, I could no longer switch floors on the Temple without getting a crash to desktop 100% of the time.
- Really difficult: you have to have good knowledge of great party combinations and how you wanna develop your characters, otherwise you're gonna have problems

IWD2 Pros:
- Beyond robust character creation (I know you were scared of all the choices but just take your time and plan your party thoroughly, it's really interesting and sort of like a mini-game in itself; if you're not sure what races and classes to pick, look up a guide)
- Interesting world
- Interesting missions
- Combat's good (I prefer ToEEs because it's turn-based unlike in IWD2, but it's still fun here too)
- Not too easy and not too difficult; imo the perfect balance in all the DnD games I've played

IWD2 Cons:
- A couple of areas that aren't that fun (incl. one maze)
- A couple of harder fights near the beginning, but it's get easier when you get more levels

I was clueless when I went to IWD2, but I just picked what I liked the most , and what I thought would be a decent party (three melee fighters, a thief with a ranged attack, and two wizards with bows) and I had no huge problems. If you're new to DnD then IWD2 is definitely a better choice for a beginner.

If the past is any predictor of the future, it goes on sale about 5 times a year. Unless you're itching to play it right this second, I recommend waiting if you can :)

I don't remember the details of IWD 2 but I dislike reading manuals and guides and I managed to complete the game nevertheless. I think if you stick to what you know from other D&D games (e.g. a balanced party of various classes, make characters' main attributes the highest etc.) and apart from that just choose what sounds good to you, you should be fine. If you're intimidated by the choices, just go with the basic stuff (e.g. human instead of drow, pure fighter instead of some fancy sounding combi class etc.).

Icewind Dale 2 uses the D&D 3 ruleset, while ToEE uses 3.5.

Seems to me finishing the Icewind Dale Saga (the games are related storywise) first is the obvious course of action. Don't worry, if you've played through all these games and understand the basic rules of party composition, there's absolutely no way you'll end up with a team that you can't finish the game with. Pick something that's reasonably balanced and seems fun to you and you'll be fine.

Both games are based on D&D, but what I liked most of ToEE was the ruleset, as it much resembles the pen&paper one. If you have not played D&D for real, I would suggest IWD 2 first, as IMHO, is more "newcomer-friendly".

As games, I like them both, so I would suggest to grab them all when resources are available.

I adored Temple, I never managed to get into Icewind.

Icewind is basically the combats of Baldur. Both Icewind and Temple are combat oriented, but Temple feels much more roleplay-y, not sure why. And it features the best rpg interface ever (I wish all other rpgs had the same wheel-click interface system), and it's real great turn-based action, as opposed to the continuous pause hybrid thingy of Baldur/Icewind. Also, Temple has the frogs.

So, as far as I'm concerned, Temple is vastly superior to Icewind. But again, I must admit that I prefer Temple to Baldur itself.

I enjoyed Icewind Dale 2 a lot. The character creation is not as complicated as it looks since there are only a couple of skills each character truly needs to get by.

I haven't played Temple of Elemental Evil so I can't comment.

- The (vast majority of) the rules can be read online if you need to look something up: http://www.d20srd.org/index.htm.

That said, I'm currently playing through ToEE (and haven't yet played IWD2), but from what's been said I would recommend IWD2 to be played first if you haven't played dnd. If you had, that would be a different matter.

If you want some background, the 3.0 and 3.5 editions of dnd are nearly the same (as you might suspect, given the names). Some things were rebalanced and changed around when Wizards of the Coast (the then and current developers of dnd) released 3.5, and they also released it under an "open game license" which allowed it to be distributed online for free, with the exception of one or two key things like levelling up.

Thanks all. I've made an IWD2 team. It took a lot out of me but I got there in the end. Now I am going to put the game to one side, take some deep breaths and try to get my energy back.

I think I need a little rpg break (even if only for a few days) before a commit to this :)