[twillight]

Bard SUX. Again. It is true bard develops hard to hit, especially if you're Blade subclass, but it can't hit squat. That smoke mephit at the first corridor almost killed me, I needed all 3 offensive spin, the +1 ench dagger used prophicient.
So I think that "blade is cool with dual wield" is just freakin' theorycrafting not working in the actual world (at least not without party).
Well, that's 3 proficiencies to spend elsewhere...

To be said, bard isn't terrible. Challenging, yes, but not undoable. All hardcore people looking for what is traditionally THEY name "challenge" bard is the way to play BG1 (BG2/ToB not yet played).

Heck, I'm thinking about freeing Jaheira for the romance. I'd just sleep/stand around endlessly to get that stupid Harper's Pin. We'll see.

Don't forget that bard can steal. This makes choosing a familiar easier (anyone ever used a familiar, or just summoned to take precious backpack-space?), and actually provides INFINITE MONEY once you're out of Irenicus' Dungeon - because of the shopkeeper on the east who buys stolen items - and allows you to steal from her/him.

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As you can't hit the blinding-mephits (dusk, steam, whatever), and the rest are hard to hit too (goblins are goblins of course), it is preferable to only fight goblins in armor, and memorize direct damage spells instead of useless buffs.
Also start using scrolls you find.
Do not fight the golems (no entry to the wife's bedroom), leave the cambion alone.

Imported items:
- even as I weared Mail of the Dead, there's nothing under Weidu here. Fok it, I'll manually add. It isn't that big of an issue, but c'mon! (I still can't register to the weidu forum, or contact the developers in any way)
- I had both Claw of Kazgaroth and Helm of Balduran on me in BG1 areas. Here there were both items in the closet. To avoid cheating I left behind the Claw.
- again that stupid Sword of Chaos, although I made doubly sure I only have that weapon. Oh well, manual import then.

I lvled up at the djin,, and invested the prof-point into quarterstaves. Those'll be my blunt weapons against clay golems if I must, and that category has some useful (aka. lategame still), AND early access items, unlike maces (they are good mid-game weapons, but nah), or flail (a proper warrior can have good use of Flail of Ages, but not anyone else). Clubs would be an alternative as they're good early-BG2 items dealing acid damage to trolls and stuff, but they are lame at ToB and can't buy at every corner anyway.

The mephit portal room is tricky. What I did was cast a fireball to get rid of the mephits at the door, but staying outside the view of the portals, so no replacement arrives. Summoned some creatures in the middle as meatshield, then I started shooting from (short)bows the portals until they fell using offensive spin as buff. Unfortunate that bard can't use composite bows (of the goblins), and there's no plain longbow anywhere in the dungeon.

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After getting out of the dungeon sleep until it is night, get money (ca. 50K) by selling/stealing/selling, buy all available spells which you don't have but can memorize (and any mislead, simularcum, project image etc.), Aeger's Hide (will have to do until we reach lvl 20, where we'll choose Use Any Item and thus reach the Promised Land of That Guy Who Saw It), Staff of Rhynn, longbow +2, Vhailors Helm, whatnot. Watch out to NOT have 15K gold until we're done with certain quests, especially as Jaheira is around.
Keep note that you MUST buy Wizard Licence, again 'cause Jaheira - friends incoming.