In my spare time, what little of it I have had lately, I have been playing BGII.
I took Butterfingers and made a copy of his char file. The first copy went into making a Blade. He works with a party. The second copy I made a Skald. He works alone
Skald with out a party? Crazy? No. Summons
I made a post over at Ironworks just a moment ago about this.
Solo Skald is finished. Blade Butterfingers still needs a little more. (Been playing both at once. I get bored having the party in the way when I want to throw Skull Traps)
The Blade is really turning into a powerhouse though. If you remember, Butterfingers' stats after BG were 19/19/16/15/15/19. Having that much strength on a Blade really makes him shine. His weapons are Celestial Fury, Frostreaver, Equilizer, and Daystar, depending on what I am fighting. Equilizer is glued to left hand. When fighting mages, the axe comes out, because it chops through stone skins. Daystar for undead. Celestial Fury for general purposes.
Damage and critical hits. You do maximum posible damage when in offensive spin. I have seen some SICK numbers roll by in combat. With the Equilizers bonuses getting added to the right hand (Anything in left hand gets added to the right, extra damage to undead, etc) I have seen criticals around 100 points of damage on occasion.
Melf's Minute Meteors. When I cast these, I switch the CF to the left hand. I get meteors that stun, and cause hefty electrical damage. It's like I can throw Celestial Fury as a missle weapon. It rocks. Enemies don't know what hits them. Gross disturbing damage. Equip Crom Faer left hand, and, you get MMMs that kill trolls and clay golems in one hit, from a distance, safely. (My Skald does this)
BGII is better in most aspects, but, there is some stuff I miss from BG1.