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Icewind Dale 2: Review Retrospective


Icewind Dale 2 Review



Icewind Dale 2: Developed and published by Black Isle Studios and based on Wizards of the Coast's D&D 3rd Edition.


Welcome to my review retrospective of Icewind Dale 2, patched to v.2.01.

Released by Black Isle Studios in 2002, Icewind Dale 2 is a sweeping, six-chapter cRPG notable — in keeping with its predecessor, Icewind Dale 1 (1999) — for its full party creation, sprawling dungeon design, and emphasis on hack n slash as opposed to open exploration and deep role-playing.

IWD2 is the fifth and final Infinity Engine game, and the only one to employ the D&D 3rd Edition ruleset: the preceding IE games were AD&D 2nd Edition cRPGs.

In respect to its 3.x ruleset, IWD2 was preceded by Stormfront's RoMD (the first D&D 3.x game), was contemporary with BioWare's NWN (D&D 3.0), and was followed by Troika's ToEE (the first D&D 3.5 game).

As it pertains to cRPG Design, Icewind Dale 2 is rated as Well Above Average.


In order to incorporate this more complex ruleset into an antiquated engine (with its origin in Baldur's Gate four years prior), Black Isle were forced to redesign the user interface — almost from the ground up.

Icewind Dale 2 Setting & Scope


Icewind Dale is a barren and inhospitable polar region situated north of the Spine of the World, in the Frozenfar of Northwest Faerûn. "A dale" is a broad valley but the Icewind part of the name comes from the eastern winds that bring in freezing air from the Reghed Glacier.


[cf. IE world maps]

Icewind Dale 2 is set in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting (FRCS) published by Tactical Studies Rules (TSR). The lore related to FR is known as Realmslore. Originally created by Ed Greenwood, "The Realms", as it is colloquially known, is one of the most famous campaign settings in Dungeons & Dragons. Since 1987, it has been fleshed out by numberous AD&D publications and related novels.

One such prolific novelist is R.A Salvatore, author of the Icewind Dale Trilogy from which the Icewind Dale Series draws heavily. Whereas the events of the books take place in 1350-57 DR, the ones of the non-canon games take place earlier, in 1281-1312 DR.

Salvatore's most famous character, Drizzt Do'Urden, made a cameo in Baldur's Gate (set in 1370 DR), but Drizzt wasn't around for the Icewind Dale Series because, at that time, he was in Menzoberranzan.

Icewind Dale 2 takes place about three decades after the events of the original Icewind Dale. Not only does the sequel's plot frequently reference the events of the original game, but it also revisits famous areas, reintroduces key characters and brings back some classic foes as well, such as yuan-ti.

Due to the time that has passed, there is no continuity between the Heroes of IWD and the Heroes of the sequel, though the former's achievements are referenced. It's quite satisfying to adventure again in the Dale, remembering what our Heroes achieved 30 years prior.

From humble beginnings in the town of Targos, our party travels the length, breadth and depth of the Dale in search of the source of evil threatening the region:


These are some of the highlights of IWD2 quest and area design.

The heroic party battles all manner of powerful and exotic denizens as they crash through the Dale, some of which are unique to IWD2. These include half-goblins, half-dragons and driders as well as hatemasters, ruinlords and slayer knights of Xvim. 

In addition, there are bugbears, wererats and chimera along with feyr, treants and snakes; and all kinds of demons and devils as well as skeletal, spectral and cadaverous undead. In short, there is lots of aggro that is begging to be ripped a new asshole.

cf. Icewind Dale 2 Enemies.


Icewind Dale 2 Ruleset


As mentioned, Icewind Dale employs Tactical Studies Rules' AD&D 2nd Edition whereas IWD2 employs Wizards of the Coast's D&D 3rd Edition. 

Not only have some fundamental mechanics changed (e.g., THAC0 vs. BAB, rerolling vs. point-buy, static XP vs. CR etc.) but there are extra skills, feats, races and classes available in D&D 3rd Edition, along with extra freedom in multi-classing which facilitates Icewind Dale 2 Builds.

In AD&D and IWD, we don't so much as build a character as choose a class template and level it. With the exception of dual-classing, the nature of the character does not change from its template as it levels; it just gets more powerful or capable. A Fighter, for example, will always be a Fighter, and will auto-gain THAC0 and saving throw reductions as well as +HP and +ApR. 

But in D&D and IWD2, along with BAB and other basic auto-gains, that Fighter can mix in different classes as well as choose between a selection of skills and feats offered by each class chosen. Thus, there is much more flexibility and potential in a given character (though restrictions still exist). In IWD2, there are 16 races, 11 base classes, 75 feats and 16 skills.

While potentially complex and necessitating thought and planning, cRPG Builds are nothing more than a number of levels taken in one or more classes, along with the stats, feats and skills chosen (in the case of Bards and Sorcerers, spell selections are also part of the build).


Spellcasting works a little differently, too. In AD&D and IWD, the effectiveness of spells usually scales with caster level, but in D&D and IWD2, their effectiveness is not only dependent on caster level but also on the caster's spellcasting attribute and feats. To give an example, in the case of wizards, not only their level but their Intelligence score, along with their spell focus and elemental feats, determines the effectiveness of that Fireball. In addition, selection of those elemental feats is dependent on ranks in the Spellcraft skill.

Also notable is that heroes wielding two-handed weapons receive a bonus to damage based on their Strength score, making them even more attractive in IWD2 than they were in IWD. On top of that, IWD2 employs D&D's Cleave and Great Cleave feats, which basically equate to extra attacks and trigger more often when wielding 2-handers such as polearms, greataxes and greatswords. This results in "chunks" galore even without cranking Power Attack to 5.


Unlike IWD and BG2, there are also proper rules for dual-wielding in IWD2, and such setups can be made to work even if both weapons are, say, Bastard Swords.

Max ApR in IWD2 is 5 whereas in IWD it is 10. By rights, it would be 9 in IWD2: BAB (4) + Off-hand (1) + Haste (1) + Force of Lightning (2) [1] + Chain of Drakkas' Fury (1).
Remember, though: we also have Cleave and Great Cleave in IWD2.
[1] Thunder Clap bestows ApR +1.

Clerics are the biggest winners in 3.x and IWD2. In BG and IWD, Clerics were stuck on native ApR 1. But 3.x and IWD2 employ BAB which means Clerics can attain ApR 5 like warriors. Not only that, but Clerics can buff themselves into better tanks with Ironskins and better damage dealers with Holy Power. And this on top of their ability to debuff, ward, heal, summon, immobilize, disrupt undead and unleash damaging AoEs. Most commonly, Clerics are multi-classed with Fighter (4), Monk (1) and Paladin (2).


On the other hand, Rogues are devalued by IWD2 for the following reasons:

  • There are not many traps and they're not deadly, anyway (no need for Search/Disarm skills)
  • ANY lock can be forced open by characters with sufficient Strength scores. Plus, there is the arcane spell, Knock (no need for Open Lock skill)
  • Invisibility spells facilitate more reliable scouting (no need for stealth skills)
  • Barely any good items can be pick-pocketed (no need for Pick Pocket)
  • Sneak Attack doesn't work for ranged weapons and Sneak Attacks can only be executed once per four rounds. Subject to certain regulations, in Neverwinter Nights (also 3.0), ranged Sneak Attacks and many-attack Sneak Attacks are possible, which is much cooler.
  • Rogue-only feats such as Crippling Strike and Hamstring are cool but not very impacting. In addition, Mirror Image > Rogue Evasion and Mind Blank > Rogue Slippery Mind.
  • High INT builds (e.g, Wizards) can take Rogue skills as cross-class ones without putting a dent into their deep skillpoint pool.

That said, Rogues are flavorsome and fun to play around with.

***

Those familiar with both rulesets will know that a treatise could be written on the differences between AD&D and D&D; however, that is not within the scope of retrospectives for specific games. Suffice it to say that they're different, but not disarmingly so, and that Black Isle's employment of D&D 3rd Edition, while lacking many of its bells and whistles due to limitations of the Infinity Engine, is not going to be laughed off-stage when set against BioWare's seminal employment of AD&D 2nd Edition in Baldur's Gate. Indeed, it is impressive just how much juice Black Isle managed to squeeze out of an engine which was not designed for such a complex ruleset, and which only Troika's ToEE did full justice.


Icewind Dale 2 Dungeon Design


With the exception of the Severed Hand and Lower Dorn's Deep, dungeons were straightforward and relatively linear in IWD1: hack our way through the hordes, disable traps, find keys etc.

The dungeons in IWD2, on the other hand, are much more complex in that several are non-linear, feature heavy scripting and host puzzles that span multiple zones.

Take for example the Ice Temple that many players shudder at the thought of, which has the party moving between two levels in search of ways to travel to sealed-off chambers on the lower level. There are also two puzzles that involve rotating mechanisms in order to proceed:


Then we have refurbished Dragon's Eye the object of which is to open hydraulic doors leading into a magma chamber, but this, amongst several other things, requires detective work, alchemy and transforming ourselves into an abomination in order to negotiate a magical ward:


Constituting the sixth and final chapter, the Severed Hand is one of the best examples of area design by reason of its non-linear questing, great atmosphere and epic battles. Most campaigns lose steam towards the end or conk out: IWD2 is strongest at the end.


The Black Raven Monastery and Serpent Temple are also interesting in that they can both be infiltrated through a combination of stealth and diplomacy. We can also simply kick down the door and crash through them, but this comes at a penalty to experience point yield and lore acquisition.


Overall, in terms of actual content, IWD2 features the best dungeon design on the Infinity Engine. That is not to say that other IE entries don't have their moments: Durlag's Tower is the best megadungeon in cRPG history and IWD's yuan-ti lair represents one of the greatest in-dungeon climaxes.

cf. cRPG Dungeons.

Icewind Dale 2 Combat Encounter Design


cRPG Combat Encounter Design in the Icewind Dale Series is largely horde-based; that is, it pits the party of heroes against massive mobs of aggro. On one battlefield, our six-person party may need to hack and blast their way through three-score foes. And not just one kind of foe, but a variety. Flanking is often employed in order to force the player to adjust mid-battle. Enemies retreat, buff each other, and are generally good at making nuisances of themselves. Height-mapping is also employed for tactical purposes, making ranged attacks and spells situationally preferable.


Adventuring from Targos and up to Shaengarne Ford is fun; it's just battle after battle culminating in one of the biggest of all: as epic as it gets for low level parties (only 4th level assuming 6-person and no ECL penalty).

In terms of rival mage mobility, IWD2, through its Oria and Thorasskus encounters, matches the analogues in IWD1 and BG1; that is, Malavon and Davaeorn.


There are also rival parties sprinkled through IWD2 of which IWD1 does not have many, culminating in the Lost Followers.

One nice tactical innovation in IWD2 is that the player can use their Spellcraft skill in order to auto-identify spells as they are being cast and over the combat unit that is casting them.


It's better than looking for what's going on in a busy feedback window.

Icewind Dale 2 Kill Count


• Kill count comparison (Core/Normal rules only):


That is without farming on-rest respawns. IWD2 enemies are generally tankier and harder to kill than IWD ones. In fact, players with no previous IE experience, and who didn't RTFM, may find some of them impossible to kill on Normal/Core rules, and that's the way it should be. Lrn2play, get gud etc.

Expected level attainment in IWD2 is as follows: 16-18 on Normal mode and 30-33 in HoF mode. In IWD 1.06, the level attainment was 12-13 (max 15).

Icewind Dale 2 Itemization


As in IWD1, cRPG Itemization is both static and randomly drawn from preset, hand-crafted pools. The arms and armor are not as interesting as in IWD1, and nor is their lore.


Thankfully, it's not until Heart of Fury IWD2 mode that OP weapons are found. HoF mode is actually easier than Normal mode due to its OP weapons and spells.

No other Infinity Engine game calls for an armored front line like IWD does, and IWD2 is no different. However, in IWD2, the benefits of conventional armor (armorsets) are not only Dexterity-capped but are also easily outstripped by basic buffs on top of scaling Dexterity and Wisdom bonuses to AC. This does not mean that Armor Class is of no concern in IWD2; far from it. It's just that armor itself is not the be-all and end-all of defense; it does not keep pace with enemy BAB (in IWD and BG, armor more than keeps pace with enemy THAC0).

That said, there are a couple of interesting IWD2 armorsets of which the Chain of Drakkas is prime. This AB+7 armor requires no proficiency, does not penalize spellcasting or thieving skills, and can be worn by one and all. But it comes too late. As for the cool armors such as Abishai and Cornugon Hide, their DR isn't good enough: 5/+1 (Normal) and 10/+2 (HoF).

Shields are particularly disappointing. I can't think of a single shield that made by eyes light up. But then, that's true of most RPGs.

I think it's unfortunate that dual-wielding and shield setups are clearly inferior to two-handing. One-handed weapons could have been made more attractive by giving them more potent on-hit effects, and shields could have been made more attractive by giving them better AC bonuses, blanket wards or damage reduction. Two-handers get too much love from both the ruleset and itemization; they are King.

Ranged weapons can be useful. Our backrowers can fire from slings, bows and crossbows; there are also darts. While the weapons themselves are not going to blow our hair back, magical ammo is common and the collective ApR adds up, especially if all ranged units take the Rapid Shot feat (bows and slings only). Slings also apply the strength bonus to damage.

Icewind Dale 2 Spells


Including both arcane and divine spheres, there are 308 unique spells in IWD2. Some arcane spell circles have so many spells that if we tried to scribe them all to our spellbook, the UI bugs out.

Including overlap, the spell range for each caster-type are as follows:


As in other IE games, spells range in usefulness from OP/god-like down to utterly useless. Indeed, there is a lot of dead weight in each spell circle. Old faves such as Web, Fireball and Mirror Image carry over to 3.x, but there are tons and tons of new spells to experiment with as well. The most notable change to buffing is that Stoneskin can target non-casters. In the early game, Bull's Strength is very useful.

There is no change in what the best spellcasting tactic is: lock them down and light them up. (e.g, Web followed by Fireball.)

Icewind Dale 2 Reactivity


By virtue of being D&D 3.x-based, there are numberous examples of build-based cRPG Reactivity in IWD2. By "build-based", I'm talking about reactivity as it pertains to character builds: gender, race, class, alignment, stats, skills and feats/abilities (such as Turn Undead). As in IWD, this reactivity is token and fluff-based. What does that mean? It means that, while it sometimes tickles our fancy, it doesn't impact the campaign in any meaningful manner.

There is one example of far-reaching choice-based reactivity that I can recall, off-hand: a choice made in Chapter 1, along with items collected elsewhere, impacts an encounter in Chapter 6 (Yquog).

It's nice that we also have a choice on how to impact the combat encounter with the Twins in the Finale.

Icewind Dale 2 Dialogue


Dialogue is not as heavy as in PS:T but it's heavier than in IWD. Some of it's funny, some of it's interesting, and some of it's lousily written and boring. I don't play cRPGs for story and dialogue, though, so I don't care.


Because some dialogues can be worked through in discrete phases and exited at key points, it's possible to use the abilities of multiple characters within the one dialogue. Why would we do that? In order to fully milk their reactivity for extra flavor as well as experience point and itemization gains, of course.

Icewind Dale 2 Aesthetics


Like its predecessor, IWD2 is a gorgeous game to look at. Its pre-rendered backdrops and painted portraits are masterwork, and are only outstripped by IWD1, which generally employs a richer, more passionate color palette.


Close-up [pic]

Icewind Dale 2 Portraits



cf. IWD1 portraits.

IWD2 area design is certainly magnificent but there is nothing on par with IWD1's best examples [cite, cite, cite]. Not to mention IWD1's backdrops are all original whereas many of IWD2's are recycled (though the effort that went into their reconstitution and recoloring is admirable).


It is in spritework that IWD2 fails. Why? Because it employed BG2's grossly inferior sprite design for humans and demi-humans, and armors and shields, instead of sticking with BG1's. Sprites for monsters are well-done, though.

Also, IWD2 removed the paperdolls and replaced them with... sprites.


Ick.

In respect to OST and narration, IWD1 also remains supreme: Jeremy Soule's OST is superior to Inon Zur's (which is still amazing), and Kath Soucie's narration as Maralie Fiddlebender, while flawless, cannot hope to contend with the late, great David Ogden Stiers, who voiced Belhifet. 

As for voicesets, I'd say IWD1 also wins. The voice-acting for Isair, Madae and Sherincal is cringe-worthy, though IWD2 employs far more voiced lines than IWD1; too many.

Conclusion


The original IWD1 is pretty much perfect in its pacing and classic D&D adventuring feel, whereas IWD2 suffers from uneven pacing that sometimes sucks the life out of the campaign (e.g, Fellwood & Magma Chamber).

That said, I regard IWD2 as not only being the most polished of the Infinity Engine games, but also the one that pushed the then-aging engine to its limits in regards to ruleset employment, dungeon design and horde-based combat encounter design. This is where the Black Isle crew hit its high-point of efficiency, technical proficiency and dungeonmastery, and the result was a great D&D campaign that no fan of the genre should pass over, even two decades subsequent to its release.

If the idea of creating, building and controlling a party of six seems like too much trouble, at least make a solo Sorcerer IWD2 run to see what the campaign has to offer, which is a lot.


Note that my IWD2 commentary pertains only to the original Black Isle version of IWD2; that is, v2.01. No other version of IWD2, and no other mode of play, is recognized by my commentary as anything other than a laughing stock.

Black Isle's Icewind Dale 2 is the only Infinity Engine game for which there is no Enhanced Edition.

Icewind Dale 2 Stats IWD2 Races IWD2 Classes IWD2 Wizard Spells IWD2
Icewind Dale 2 walkthrough Skills IWD2 Feats IWD2 Best Party IWD2 Cleric Spells IWD2

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