Paladin in nwn

[Toon Fighter]

I have this gnome paladin in nwn. She is currently at level 5, but I feel like it is very weak for her level.

Stats:
Str 6
Con 14
Dex 16 (weapon Finnese (sp))
Wis 14
Int 12
Cha 15

What can I do to make her better in combat? Should I multiclass?

[The Gilded Duke]

NWN 1 or 2?

Your big problem seems to be strength.
Yes you have Weapon Finesse to do Dex to attack, but you still do strength to damage, and right now that is giving you -4.

So each hit you are taking right now has 4 damage subtracted from it. Weapon finesse can work, but generally only through some method of gaining bonus damage such as rogue.

I don't think you will be able to multiclass to rogue without some wierd alignment stuff. Eventually you might be able to get a power boost from Weapon Master, but really, the character concept starting out at least defeats itself.

If you restarted, a gnome with high strength instead of dex could do better, however gnome doesn't really get a paladin that much. If you want to focus on melee damage a Dwarf or Half Orc could work, or if you don't want the charisma hit you could go with human.

[jiriku]

With those stats you are pretty much hosed. Strength is the most important stat for a paladin. Normally I'd suggest you multiclass to cleric, since you've at least got a decent Wis, but with five levels of paladin already set down, it's a little late for that.

Switching to bard might be helpful, as the bard song will improve your damage somewhat. Alternately, if you tough it out as a paladin, be sure to cast divine favor and bull's strength as often as possible to shore up your low strength.

Honestly, it might be better to reroll a new pally right now, one with about 10 more points in strength.

[jmbrown]

Neverwinter Nights uses 3.0 rules and the paladin's only use in that game is as a stepping stone into sorcerer.

[Optimystik]

Neverwinter Nights uses 3.0 rules and the paladin's only use in that game is as a capstone to sorcerer.

Fixed that for you (if you take Paladin early, you can't retroactively max Discipline - that's the other reason to dip Paladin besides CHA to saves.)

@ OP: Str 6 means you'll be useless in melee unless you're a rogue. You're best off starting over, getting to level 5 in NWN is cake.

[AslanCross]

I recommend starting over as well. 6 Strength really does not work if you want to be in melee.

[Foryn Gilnith]

NWN is weird with paladins. Once had a paladin who didn't realize that he fell to Lawful Neutral until level-up time came. You don't lose your smites or anything.

[taltamir]

Playing a STR6 paladin is like playing an Int 6 wizard. (give the wizard a sword and have him hit stuff).

Start over, max out strength, and use a two handed weapon. (greatsword is best, greataxe works ok too)

[Arakune]

Now people, let's try a different approach: how to make this Str6 Paladin go to the end of the original campaign?

[Thane of Fife]

Some alternative advice to starting over:

1. Use a missile weapon. I don't think you'll get the penalty from strength if you do so. Be sure to pick up Rapid Shot and Point Blank Shot and other such feats.

2. If you're using Patch 1.69, then I think that you'll be getting your mount soon. You can try to use it to hit-and-run together with your bow.

3. Maximize your attacks! Wield two weapons if possible - kukris are probably your best options, though you'll need Exotic Weapon Proficiency to get them.

4. Consider dipping into monk - you've got decent wisdom, and there are lots of monk gloves that could give you bonus damage, if I recall correctly.

5. Do something other than just damage - try to get weapons that cause sleep, elemental damage, or something, anything, besides just damage.

6. I assume that you're playing the original campaign. If so, hire Daelan. Do his quest. He's a generally helpful guy to have around regardless, but his quests give you an amulet that boosts your strength. Very helpful.

7. Get lots of Bags of Holding - you'll want the inventory space.

I've beaten NWN and HotU with a Str 8 elven finesse fighter, without too much trouble, so this shouldn't be too much harder for you.

[LibraryOgre]

I wound up playing a Paladin all the way through the first NWN. While I generally agree that your stats as-is are not good, I was playing a Human and slipped in a single level of sorcerer... then went Dragon Disciple. Massive Strength, some AC boosts, and not losing much by missing out on levels of Paladin, while gaining for levels of DD.

[Starbuck_II]

I have this gnome paladin in nwn. She is currently at level 5, but I feel like it is very weak for her level.

Stats:
Str 6
Con 14
Dex 16 (weapon Finnese (sp))
Wis 14
Int 12
Cha 15

What can I do to make her better in combat? Should I multiclass?

Why did you dump Str?
I see Weapon Finesse, but you kinda want at least 10.
You deal 1d6 (small longsword) -2 (Str) damage.

[taltamir]

I wound up playing a Paladin all the way through the first NWN. While I generally agree that your stats as-is are not good, I was playing a Human and slipped in a single level of sorcerer... then went Dragon Disciple. Massive Strength, some AC boosts, and not losing much by missing out on levels of Paladin, while gaining for levels of DD.

yes, you can play it, but his complaint is that it feels "weak". NWN doesn't have a terrible many ways to unweakify such a build, he can't just pull some feats from an obscure rule book that lets him get around it. Within the constraints of NWN that character is weak, it just is.
My first NWN1 character was a wiz1, sorc1, bard 1... It was terrible... so I started learning the rules and figured out WHY it doesn't work.
He is not doing damage because he is:
1. losing damage due to being small
2. losing damage due to low str (he should be gaining damage)...

PS. If playing a primary caster never ever EVER use a familiar in NWN1. Familiars reduce your XP by over a third... also get rid of the meat shield, and never use a summon... if you play a caster with no cohorts, summons, or familiars (each significantly lowers your XP), you can end up more than twice the expected level... which means you have powerful enough spells to make everything a cakewalk.

Can it be done? sure, when I learned the game I actually had a playthrough with a melee sorcerer and other weird things.
But to answer the op: Op your character is just not build to do damage well in melee... and you wasted some feats on it already. I suggest you make her an archer... use the console to set your XP at 0 (making you level 1), then set your XP back at what it is currently. And relevel it from 1 through 5 as an archer. And get a bow.

[Rad]

With the console you can reset your stats to any level you wish. I would not consider it cheatin if you switched to a set of scores that you could have legitimately picked at level 1.

Str 6 is a problem. You can try to fix with Red Dragon Disciple (you need 1 level of sorcerer before; not bard because of your alignment).

Another idea could be to try a "lots of attacks" build, involving TWF, and probably kukris and weapon master levels to increase the crit range.

Another idea in theory could be to be a shifter, so that the actual str score is irrelevant, but switching to druid, with 5 level of Paladin completely wasted, an alignment shift and feat issues might be a problem.

I find that 2-handed weapons are not reall needed in NWN, since power attack is only 1:1 there you give up a noticeable chunk of AC for about 3.5 damage more.

[Maho-Tsukai]

Do you mind adding hacks to your game? If not, then I HIGHLY recomend the PrC pack for NWN. It's an amazing, amazing, amazing hack that gives you more options then any other RPG PC game. It first of all updates NWN to 3.5e in most areas(though certain classes from 3.0 are still in there despite...Lasher and 3.0 True Necromancer come to mind, though there may be some more.)and second of all it adds countless new prestige classes, feats, spells and even new base classes INCLUDING Tome of Battle classes and their manuvers, Psionic classes and their psychic powers and many other great base classes like the Dread Necromancer, Warlock, Dragonfire adapt, Anti-Paladin ect.. It also fixes a lot of the PrCs that where nerfed by NWN.(The PrC gives Blackguards and Assassins their spells that they get in PnP and MOST of the caster prestige classes that the PrC adds actually advance spellcasting as they do in PnP. The Pale Master, sadly, did not recive that bonus so while casters actually have good PrCs to chose from the Pale Master remains stinky.) The PrC even improves(or makes worse) epic levels with the addition of PnP style epic spellcasting rather then the feat based kind non PrC NWN uses.


Now, to get back on topic, 6 strength on a Paladin will kill you. /thread. If you want to be a gnome paladin I would advise rebuilding your character and focusing on strength, con and cha, but mostly strength, and put just enough points into wisdom to get 4th level spells.