Line #42 YMMV/NeverwinterNights


1	* AdaptationDisplacement: Very few people today are aware that ''{{VideoGame/Neverwinter Nights\|AOL}}'' was originally a MMORPG released in 1991, hosted by the web portal AOL. Eventually Creator/BioWare acquired the rights to the name and reused it for their own video game.
2	* SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic:
3	** On "vanilla" Neverwinter, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VEcM78jVtI Castle]], [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcG-pEqGBwo Forest Day]], and especially [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mpu-rkCENrE Heart of the Forest]] (and there're others).
4	** A lot of the music in Hordes of the Underdark, especially [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r46yzCB82kA Rebel Camp]], [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQ3s8ywQlKA Large Battle]] and [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJiVI9do4O0 Final Boss]].
5	* BaseBreakingCharacter: Deekin's fans love him for the uniqueness of his race/class combo as a companion, his utility, his humorous dialogue, and for his adorable personality combined with genuine heroic moments, while people who dislike him find him grating and overly cutesy, or feel his shtick gets old fast.
6	* BestLevelEver: Chapter 3 in ''Hordes''. There are enough characters, plot elements, and unique and creative puzzles to fill an entire game. And then comes the FinalBoss...
7	* BetterOffSold: Taken to a new extreme in ''Hordes of the Underdark'' compared to the original game and ''Shadows''. In addition to the random scrolls, potions, gemstones and other valuables you'll expect to find, ''Hordes'' throws ridiculously overpowered equipment at you like it's going out of style to the extent they become this trope. You are going to constantly trip over +6 and higher weapons with other bonus effects, equipment with powerful statuses like Haste and Regeneration, magic wands, magic rings, magic armor, equipment that lets you cast magic spells every day for free, etc. Turns out you'll need it though, because there's a MoneySink in the last chapter where you'll need to pay a heavy price for critical pieces of information -- the most important will cost around a million gold, and getting all of them requires double that. The game throws all this high-value stuff at you so you can actually have a chance to get your hands on that kind of money.
8	* BigLippedAlligatorMoment: While exploring the VeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon, you come across a doppelganger of Aribeth named Asheera, who seems to come from a parallel world that the villains are also trying to invade. After a brief bit of conversation, she gives you a necklace with bonuses helpful in the upcoming gauntlet of end-game enemies, and then departs. The encounter comes out of nowhere with no foreshadowing, has no impact on the story whatsoever, and is never explained or discussed again.
9	* ClicheStorm: The base campaign, in spades. Your hero is the newest graduate from the Academy (which is [[DoomedHomeTown attacked by goblins]]) and Neverwinter's only hope to stop the ancient SealedEvilInACan from collecting the {{Plot Coupon}}s that will let her TakeOverTheWorld, and your companions include a halfing Rogue, a half-orc Barbarian, and a gnome Sorceror.
10	* DesignatedEvil: The quest "Bounty Hunt" in Chapter 2 plays this several ways with a group of five escaped prisoners the player has to track down.
11	** One such escaped prisoner is Wyvern, a ranger who was the son of rangers who lived in the forest. When a group of knights on leave came into the forest and burned it and poached the animals, his parents tried to reason with them; the knights beat his father and strung him up to make him watch while they raped and killed his mother, and then left his father for dead afterward. Wyvern hunted the knights down in a vengeful rage, though taking it too far in that he also killed their families and horses. Despite Wyvern being ALighterShadeOfGrey than the others, which include a child killer and a BlackWidow, the game considers it an Evil act to let him go on promise to vanish into the wilderness and become a recluse.
12	** The leader of the group is Yesgar, a half-orc, who reveals himself when he kidnaps the daughter of the mayor. When you weaken him he surrenders and tries to claim she seduced him to run away together, but on a Persuade check he admits he got her drunk before taking her away, and when you speak to her afterward she implies he let his full-blood orc minions rape her. If you decide to kill him after hearing his story, the game marks this as an Evil act, but your only other option at that point (which gives no alignment check) is to let an unrepentant murderer walk free. The only way to kill him without a reputation change is to do it without talking to him, which means that when your enemy surrenders and tries to reason with you, you must ignore them and kill them without hearing them out, which isn't exactly a moral act itself.
13	* EnsembleDarkhorse: Valen Shadowbreath is ''very'' popular with fangirls due to being a badass with a tragic backstory and a prehensile tail.
14	* EvenBetterSequel: The original campaign was generally well received, but had very repetitive quests, fairly simple and two-dimensional characters, and gameplay that could be stilted at times. The expansions had much more creative and engaging quests, very complex and likeable characters, and new gameplay features and tweaks. As a whole, the expansions are more refined and polished than the base game and it shows.
15	* FanPreferredCouple: In the base game, Lady Aribeth is the only official romance for male players, and Aarin Gend for female players. Yeah, most male players prefer Sharwyn and/or Linu La'neral, and most female players prefer Daelan Red Tiger and/or Tomi Undergallows. (It doesn't help that the official romances are pretty sloppily written, while the mentioned henchmen all have varying degrees of ShipTease with the player.)
16	* FanWorkOnlyFans: The game was insanely popular with modders who created AAA-length campaigns in its engine, but its own original campaign was rather lackluster (by Creator/BioWare standards), so a lot of players have never even given it a shot, instead buying the game for its engine and jumping straight into more popular fan-made modules like ''VideoGame/TheBastardOfKosigan'', ''VideoGame/ADanceWithRogues'', and ''VideoGame/{{Gladiatrix}}''.
17	* GameBreaker:
18	** The game hands you one at the start -- the Stone of Recall. It teleports you from your current location to the nearest Temple of Tyr, where there is always a priest on-hand to fully restore your HP, cure all debuffs, and offer shop services. Furthermore the Temple is where your henchman respawns when they die, there's a portal back to where you used the Stone, ''and'' the Stone has unlimited charges each day. Any time you start to lose a fight, just use the Stone of Recall to warp away, get full healing, buy any potions you might need, then use the portal in the temple to warp back to the spot you used the Stone and keep fighting. The only downside to this? The portal costs money to use, but it's pennies in a game where ShopFodder is plentiful. The two expansions, who have their own counterpart warping items, noticeably nerfed them.
19	** Knock and Find Traps. They're low level spells so you can carry plenty of charges and get them early in the game. Knock unlocks all locked doors and containers over a large radius around you, Find Traps finds and disarms all traps over a large radius around you, even ones flaggered as unable to be disarmed. You'll never need a Rogue again.
20	** Clerics. Wearing full-plate armor with no magic penalty? Check. Equipping most kinds of weapons by default? Check. Casting the best spells of the game by far, like Harm? [[RuleOfThree Check.]] Doing so without even having to learn and dislearn spells like the arcane classes? [[{{Pun}} Checkmate.]]
21	** The "Harm" spell in itself was this throughout the game, lowering the hitpoints of any non-undead enemy down to 1 (and anyone with Harm also gets Heal, which can do the same thing to undead as well as [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin healing]] themselves if needed). It's a sixth-level-spell, meaning you get it at level 11 and will just keep on using it forever all the way to level 40. The only thing that stops it is spell resistance and even that is only a chance, not a certainty. This particular brokenness was, of course, imported from 3rd edition D&D.
22	** In ''Hordes of the Underdark'', take Sorcerer classes until you get all three auto still spells, then 10 levels of Dragon Disciple, then the rest paladin. The result? A killing machine that slaughters its way through a literal army of demons effortlessly. Now add the fact that you an easily get Enserric the longsword to +10, and find an amulet of regeneration early in the game...
23	** Five words - Maximized Isaac's Greater Missile Storm. To summarize, IGMS is a Level 6 Wizard/Sorcerer spell that fires magic projectiles, one for each caster level up to 20. They seek out and hit targets in the area of effect and do 2d6 damage each. Enter Maximize Spell, which raises the level of the target spell by three (making IGMS Level 9) and removes the variables from its effect, placing the values at maximum damage. This means that a Maximized IGMS will fire up to 20 projectiles, each doing 12 damage, for a total of 240 damage for one spell. Oh, and if you use this against a lone enemy (ie, a boss), all the projectiles fire at them. Add in the fact that in ''Hordes'' in particular you begin the game at Level 15 and keep going so you'll have a lot of spell slots for higher-level spells. To put that damage into perspective, the "Epic Spell" Greater Ruin (that is, one of the top-level spells in the game) does 35d6 damage, to a maximum of 210 damage under optimal conditions--keeping in mind that a Maximized Missle Storm is guaranteed to do 12 damage a missile, while Greater Ruin you still need to rely on the luck of the roll.
24	** Traps. You can beat the game before reaching level 10 with them by using a glitch to stack them together and killing storyline-required enemies.
25	** As pointed out below, undead bosses often have loads of defenses and immunities as well as fear auras and buffs like stone skin, which makes them very difficult for most character builds...except for paladins who are immune to fear and can cast Lay On Hands which goes right past all of the undead's defenses. While a sword or mace might slowly chip away a hitpoint at a time on Brother Tomas, one casting of Lay On Hands can take a third of his health down.
26	** In chapter two of ''Hordes of the Underdark'', The Drow smith Rizolvir will upgrade your weapons for huge amounts of gold. If the player has been careful to save up gold throughout the campaigns they've played they can end up with enough gold to get all of the upgrades on a single weapon. The best possible weapon in the game with the best possible character build can be upgraded to do a maximum of nearly [[InfinityPlusOneSword 300 DAMAGE PER ROUND!]]
27	** In ''Hordes of the Underdark'', Enserric the Sword can become more powerful while vampirizing the health of the Player. Wearing the Greater Amulet of Health will make the Player immune in stat drains. This very worthy combination (powerful upgradable sword and amulet immunizing from poison, diseases, and stat drains) is a game breaker. And for added fun, play as a Fighter / Weapon Master (8/7 is a good level split), with your feat choices centering on Greatsword (Weapon Focus, Improved Critical). Tell Enserric you don't need a longsword, but that a greatsword would be a much more useful weapon. Enjoy your health-restoring slab of [[SnarkyNonHumanSidekick sarcastic oversized death.]]
28	** Greater Sanctuary (6th level cleric / 7th level sorcerer or wizard spell) makes the caster ethereal and undetectable by hostiles as long as the caster doesn't do anything hostile themselves. Black Blade of Disaster (9th level sorcerer/wizard spell) creates a free-thinking weapon with some very nice bonuses that does all the fighting for you as long as you don't do anything other than move around. If you cast Greater Sancturary, then Black Blade, Greater Sanctuary doesn't lose its effect (summoning spells don't count as hostile actions). The only thing threats end up noticing is the weird-looking black thing about to slice them into easy-to-carry pieces.
29	** When you start a new game, nothing prevents you from picking a preset character who's well above the default starting level of the campaign you chose (level 1 for base campaign and ''Shadows'', level 15 for ''Hordes''), making the entire playthrough ridiculously easy. It's not just the character stats that are retained, also their ''inventory'' remains. This is easier to pull off in the base campaign and ''Shadows'', since installing ''Hordes'' comes with a group of premade level 15 characters (or if you want a custom character you can create one and start ''Hordes'' which will instantly give you enough xp to reach level 15, then export the character at that level and start another campaign); for ''Hordes'' you'd need first to complete the campaign at least once to have an overpowered character to reuse in a later gameplay.
30	* GoodBadBugs: In earlier version of the game, you could pickpocket the heads of your targets and claim their bounties, rather than killing them. This was fixed in later patches.
31	* MagnificentBastard: Mepistopheles is the Archduke of the Eighth Hell Cania who has been roped into the service of an ambitious drow sorceress, the Valsharess. Wishing to free himself, Mephistopheles subtly draws the PlayerCharacter into conflict with the Valsharess, as they own a relic of his that binds them to Mephistopheles. When the Valsharess tries to order the Devil to strike the player down, Mephistopheles is able to break their covenant and turn on her. Banishing the player to Cania in his place, Mephistopheles begins his conquest of Toril with the intent to [[HellOnEarth turn it into the Tenth Hell]], lowering it below the Ninth Hell ruled by Asmodeus so Mephistopheles [[TheStarscream may be the most powerful Devil in the planes]]. Witty, charismatic, diabolical, and always staying one step ahead of everyone else in his schemes, Mephistopheles is the very definition of a Devil.
32	* {{Narm}}: Some of the art for equipment can be quite cringe worthy:
33	** Leather armor +1 are colored bright red and studded leather armor +1 are bright blue. These are usually worn by rogues and rangers who try to blend in the shadows while these armors make them more conspicuous.
34	** Wizards can wear magic circlets that look like a fighter's helms, which fully conceal their faces. This completely mismatch with the rest of their wizards' robes.
35	* OneSceneWonder: For an otherwise unremarkable and unnotable NPC, the hilarious InsaneTrollLogic of the Guardian golem in ''Shadows'' makes it a very memorable encounter.
36	* ScrappyMechanic:
37	** Aura of Fear. Many high-level boss-type enemies, particularly Mummies and Dragons, have Auras of Fear around them that inflict the Frighten status on anyone who comes inside the aura. Characters under Fear become ''entirely uncontrollable'' and wander around aimlessly, suffering a -2 penalty to all saving throws, and it lasts for a ''long'' time. You need equipment to prevent Fear or a high enough Will to make your saving throw against it, and even then as long as you remain within the aura you will need to continue to roll to save against the Aura of Fear. The gods help you if you're fighting a whole set of enemies that have the aura, because you'll have to make saving throws against each one every round, and there's a minimum 5% chance of failing. The worst part is that the ability doesn't even work like it should by forcing you to run away from the enemy, but rather just has you wander around at a very slow pace. And your henchmen? Forget them, they will pretty much always fall victim to it. Getting hit with Frightened is pretty much a death sentence any time it happens, and can make otherwise unremarkable foes into a GoddamnedBoss. It also makes Potions of Clarity one of the most unexpectedly useful buffing potions in the game.
38	** Whenever you enter conversation mode, the camera will always pan and zoom to a certain angle, leading to many EventObscuringCamera situations.
39	* SpiritualSuccessor: ''Darkness Over Daggerford'' is something of a loving tribute to the gameplay style of the first ''VideoGame/BaldursGate.''
40	* TakeThatScrappy: Bioware poke fun at Deekin in the ''Kingmaker'' premium module:
41	-->'''Calibast''': What I like about these kobolds is that they aren't singin'. Nothin' more irritatin' than a singin' kobold.
42	* ThatOneBoss:
43	** The first chapter of the original campaign has the Intellect Devourer. It is highly resistant to physical attacks and has mind-affecting spells. Luckily, this can be remedied early on by equipping gear that provides mind-affecting spell immunity or drinking a Clarity potion beforehand.
44	** ''Shadows of Undrentide'' has a Blackguard Skeleton appear in a mid-level dungeon. It does not sound so bad, but it is an extreme DamageSpongeBoss (with lots of regular damage sponge skeletons [[FlunkyBoss acting as bodyguards]]) whose undead status makes it immune to [[ContractualBossImmunity anything besides straight-up damage]]. They will surround you, and you will die again, and again, and again. At least Fighters can walk around in the Blackguard's [[PaintItBlack fancy armor]] afterwards. Thankfully, you can always retreat to safety through a secret door nearby. (Unless you FailedASpotCheck) Cheap, but effective.
45	** In ''Hordes of the Underdark'' there's Vixthra the dracolich of Drearing's Deep. He can revive himself as many times as long as his [[SoulJar phylactery]] remains intact, which is guarded by 2 skeleton golems. Vixthra himself has a huge amount of hit points and his breath weapon can do insane amounts of damage. Tank characters can take more punishment but lighter classes can have a hard time due to small amount of HP. And even though there's a shortcut door to the phylactery, the golems can gang up on you and Vixthra can even fly to your location to defend it. At least Vixthra is undead, so you can always use "Lay on Hands" as an attack if you're a Paladin/Champion of Torm - just make sure you have enough charisma to inflict all that damage... and make sure that the phylactery is broken ''first''.
46	** In the Isle of the Maker in ''Hordes of the Underdark'', there's a room in that animates your weapons and turns them against you. It's even more devastating for those who dual-wield weapons and you're forced to use the spare weapons scattered on the floor or from your inventory. The game warns you about this, but it can also be countered by equipping a weak weapon BEFORE entering this room's floor, which the weapon spirit will detect. Reequip your weapon after entrance to the floor.
47	** The Valsharess is a high-level spellcaster, and you have to leave your allies behind to fight her one-on-one. Due to spell resistances, if you're a spellcaster class yourself prepare for a long, drawn-out battle, unless you can cast a spell lowering spell resistance like Mordekainen's Disjunction before firing off your damage spells.
48	* ThatOneSidequest:
49	** The henchmen quests. Completing them requires talking to your henchmen about themselves in stages, culminating with them telling you they could use a particular rare item -- that item can be found in the current chapter and given to them for a magic item (in Chapter 1 they give you the item, in Chapters 2 and 3 they upgrade the previous item they gave you). The catch is that getting them to complete their stories cannot be done until you get at a high enough level, the items they need are easily overlooked if you don't know what they are and that a henchman needs them (which is very possible), you usually don't get any hints as to how to find the item they need, the quests cannot be continued if you lost the magic item they gave you previously, and if you forgot to do a henchman's quest in the past chapter, you cannot do their quest in subsequent chapters. This can overall result in players being unable to continue a henchman quest because their henchman won't talk to them any more about their personal story, and for it they'll miss out on good magic items and romance options.
50	** Particular mention to Daelan Red-Tiger's quest in Chapter 2. The item he needs is a notched axe, but it's found on a corpse in an area you can't revisit. The game will have certain plot-critical items, including the items needed for the henchmen quests, retained in the pool in the Temple of Tyr for you to retrieve, but it ''only'' retains items left on the ground; since the axe is found on a corpse, it will not appear in the pool, and once you leave the area you cannot return to get it later. The axe is also an unremarkable weapon aside from its unique description, so if the player doesn't know Daelan is looking for a notched axe, a player is highly likely to ignore it and leave it where they found it. Fortunately console commands offer ways to fix this.
51	* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot:
52	** The city of Luskan has a rich history in the ''Forgotten Realms'' setting, a high-class WretchedHive that it is ruled by five High Captains who constantly make power plays against each other, and this game particularly emphasizes that Luskan and Neverwinter have a history of hostility towards each other. Despite the location being ripe for adventures and questing, by the time you get to Luskan it's caught up in a war between the High Captains and most of the city has been abandoned or closed off. The result is that the player only gets to explore a small area of Luskan and only do a few small sidequests in it, and the city is basically a pit stop before moving on to the Host Tower for the ''actual'' final leg of the chapter.
53	*** The Five Captains are treated even worse. Three of them are already dead by the time you arrive, making it a simple one-on-one war and you have to choose which of them to kill in order to get into the Host Tower. But even then, both Kurth and Baram are made slimy, heartless bastards who are engaging in horrifically amoral acts (Kurth is summoning demons and abducted a civilian girl to keep her as a sex slave, and Baram is engaging in necromancy and has mass-murdered children) and will cut deals with you to get you to kill the other and then go back on their word once you do the deed. Thus neither of the two is any better than the other, and since the story progresses the same way regardless of which High Captain comes out on top, there's no reason to side with one or the other, you may as well just flip a coin to decide who to kill (or kill both since they're so awful).
54	** Chapter 4 as a whole is basically just filler before the final dungeon. It sees you return to WhereItAllBegan, with you returning to Neverwinter as it is under siege. However, instead of being able to explore the entire city in the midst of the battle, you're restricted to the City Core and a single "War Zone" area which is entirely new. Your ability to take part in the siege is limited to destroying a handful of wizards and catapults, too, instead of allowing for a BigBadassBattleSequence.
55	* TheUntwist: You mean, [[spoiler:the {{Jerkass}} who has been ridiculing efforts to find a cure for the plague and his priests who cast "blessings" that have the appearance and sound effect of a Negative Energy spell, are actually evil?]] Ya don't say!
56	* WhatDoYouMeanItsNotPolitical: The ''Shadowguard'' premium module is this full spades. The Sarakhan empire is threaten by a [[EvilSorcerer mage]] named the [[BigBad Crimson Prophet]]. Promotional material show him wielding a staff with a crescent moon on top of it. The game was released in 2004, [[UsefulNotes/TheWarOnTerror 3 years after 9/11 and 1 year after the war in Iraq]]. Think about that.
57	* {{Woobie}}: Deekin, if the PC is mean to him.

Context YMMV / NeverwinterNights