Board Thread:Questions and Answers (Q&A)/@comment-82.224.81.100-20131211134428/@comment-173.66.142.208-20140903013202

It helps if you can position them in your sequence of characters (the sidebar display) so neither of the good pair are adjacent to either of the evil pair, but at best that postpones the inevitable.

It IS, however, possible to play the entire game with Viconia or Dorn (and maybe just about any single evil character) in your party. You have to manage your reputation very carefully. Learn all the events/actions that will raise/lower rep.

You have to keep your rep below 19 while the evil character is in the party, else they will get disgusted and leave the party (and the game melieu); permanently! (Dorn may only return to the FAI; not sure about him.)

Further, you must never attempt to temporarily remove/leave behind an evil character while your party rep is 18. They will leave the game permanently. (Some evil characters may do this if you drop them off at rep 17, as well. Not sure for every one.)

If you want to take advantage of the steep discounts on purchased goods, especially unique magic items, available at rep 20, you must: 1) get your rep to no more than 17;   2) drop (reforem party) your evil character's at a safe rendezvous, where you can find them again. I use either Kagain's Shop, Feldepost's Inn, or the Friendly Arm Inn; 3) do three of the shorter, less dangerous quests that will raise your rep to 20 (Dryad of the Cloudpeaks, Drienne's Cat, Honesty with Oublek, etc);   4) have your shopping spree; 5) Kill someone (drastic rep reduction), or steal/bribe/escape the Flaming Fist (minor rep reduction) a couple of times to get you rep down to 18 or below (not necessary if re-recruiting Viconia or Dorn);   6) re-recruit your waiting evil party member.

I recommend waiting til you have at least 30K GP to do this. Do almost all the "good item" shopping at once. There are only so many rep events to manipulate with, so you can probably only manage this technique twice.

Most evil characters are not worth the trouble. Edwin is, Dorn is, Viconia mostly is, especially if you have a soft spot of continuity into the sequel.

dreamrider