Started a new game of Shattered lands with:

Mul Fighter/Thief/Druid
Dwarf Fighter/Psionic/Cleric
Half-Elf Fighter/Druid/Psionic
Half-Elf Fighter/Psionic/Preserver

I finished the game years ago without a psionicist in my party, this time I went over the top and made it the theme of the party.

The party I played through both games with consisted of the following:

Human Gladiator8/Druid8/Preserver 9
Half-Giant Ranger/Cleric
Thri-Kreen Fighter/Druid/Psionic
Half-Elf Fighter/Thief/Preserver

I think the party I started with (but stopped early, before even leaving the arena) was something like this:

Half-Giant Ranger/Psionic
Thri-Kreen Fighter/Druid/Psionic
Halfling Druid/Psionic
I don't remember the 4th character, but her class definitely included Preserver.

Edit: Halfling, not Half-Elf.

i usually run 4 thrikreens love that HtH XD

It just occurred to me; that party might actually be really good if you want to try speedrunning the game.

*: 5 attacks, STR bonus on each one lets you deal good damage
*: No need to find weapons, so you can skip all of that to save time

The only problem, of course, is enemies that need to be hit with magical weapons, but you might be able to use weapon-creating spells, or even just use Disintegrate (the fact that psionic powers are not level-gated the way spells are is *very* nice from a speedrun perspective; you only need to gain one level to get powers like Disintegrate and Mass Dominate).

Has anyone tried speedrunning these games? I think it would be interesting to see what strategies get used.

You could probably pick up some magic weapons just for those enemies. What classes are the thri-kreen? All fighter/psionic/druids?

Honestly, I don't know what would work best here.

The problem with picking up magic weapons in a speedrun is that it takes time to do so, and if there is any other way of dealing with the enemies, it's possible that getting the magic weapon might be too slow.

I note that single-class druids would need less XP to get higher level spells than triple-class druids, but, of course, are those spells worth it in a speedrun?

I'm actually not familiar with the game, and I would want to play it normally before even thinking about attempting a speedrun (and I am more interested in routing than actually doing the run).

One other fact that is worth noting: If every enemy has been dominated, the battle will end, but you won't get any XP for the dominated enemies. Given that Mass Dominate would likely be the fastest way to win many battles, this needs to be considered.

good points dtgreene good points

Mul Fighter-Pycionics
Half Giant Gladiator
Half Elf Fighter-Cleric-Thief
Half Elf Fighter-Driud-Preserver

Im liking the whole team, I just finished the mountain top castle and about 10 hours in. I think the preserver will get better later on as she gets some more mage spells. The half giant is the boss in melee. I dont think I understand how pysionics work though because im not getting much milage out of the Mul and his mental abilities. HIs powers dont work half the time and I dont understand the numbers by the spell descrption. Great game though, having a lot of fun with this one.

I decided to make all brawn no brains party with
Halfling fighter/thief
Half Giant Gladiator
Mul Gladiator
Thri Kreen Gladiator
in arena they are doing marvelous, lets see how they'll do later on

Finished the game with;
Human Ranger 15/Thief 3 / Metabolic
Thri-Kreen Ranger 15 / Metabolic
Dwarf Cleric 15 (earth) / Kinetic
Elf Preserver 15 / Telepath

Only regret is earth cleric. Cleric should probably always be cosmos. Ironskin was op though.

I don't remember Cosmos being an option for clerics; I'm pretty sure you have to choose one of the elements, and only get minor access to the Cosmos domain, meaning you only ever get access to the weakest healing spell. (Well, there are a couple water spells that can heal, but one is worse than the Cosmos spell of its level, and the other only appears in the second game.)

About the only time I'd really use Cleric, and this could arguably be an exploit, is a Ranger->Cleric dual class, With this particular combination, you choose one domain as a Ranger, another as a Cleric, and you actually get both domains for your Cleric spells. (Note that your Ranger domain won't be available until your Cleric level surpasses your Ranger level, so it's best to choose a domain that gets its good spells later as your Ranger domain, in this case.)

If you want good healing spells, or other Cosmos spells above 3rd level, you need to go Druid.

If you want to try an absolute gamebreaking party, go with 3 Giant Gladiators and a half-elf Fighter/Druid/Preserver. The giants can heal each other with their Psionic that trades off HP and the Druid can Heal. During battles, the half-elf hangs back and buffs or range attacks while the Giants (hasted of course) dominate everything with ease.

Mul Fighter/Druid (Fire)
HalfGiant Fighter/Cleric (Water)
Dwarf Fighter/Thief
Half-Elf Preserver/Druid (Earth)

Worth noting that this only applies to the second game.

In the first game:
* The health transfer power isn't one of the wild talents. This means you need to add the Psionic class to use it, which cuts into your HP and (IIRC) precludes using Gladiator, so you're using Fighter or Ranger instead. (Note: Don't use a Half Giant Ranger in the second game because of the racial level cap.)
* There's no Heal or Water of Life spell, and no heal that scales with max HP, so even if you can transfer health, healing it isn't so easy. (And health regen over time that comes with high Constitution is slow.)