Hi,

I recently purchased Arcanum from Gog.
Seemed like a fun little game and I always wanted to get into old school RPGs.
I bought Fallout 1 and had some great fun with it , well , until the Glow that is.

Anyway , I never did get games like Arcanum or D&D , where you would miss with melee weapons. And I don;t know what to do , I read that dexterity helps , but I got 10 dexterity and 10 strength , got a sword and shield and got killed by a blue shaman. I just can't hit anything.Also , I am playing TBS since I read that the real time combat is broken.

Please recommend me a simple starting build that can use Melee and later on Tech.

Probably should've posted this in the Arcanum forum (we've got some helpful folks hanging about, it's not too dead), but I'll give you some thoughts:

If you wanna go straight Melee bruiser your best bet race-wise is Half-ogre, Half-orc, or Dwarf. Keep in mind though that Half-ogres get a Int penalty (which'll make learning tech recipes harder) and people tend to hate Half-orcs. Both also get a Charisma penalty. Dwarves are more or less built for Tech Melee (though you'll want to raise your Dex early), but really any race is viable except for Elf (due to the Magick bonus).

Secondly, make sure you put a point or two into Melee at character creation. This is extremely important, without it you'll miss like crazy.

Thirdly, if you're planning on going Tech (I'm assuming you'll be making your own stuff, yes?) I'd recommend one of two things: 1. Choose a high Int background or race and put a point or two in Smithy from the get go (up to the Balanced Sword should be good) and then leave it there while you raise your combat stats or 2. Ignore Int and focus exclusively on raising combat then, when it's all high, start raising Int and learning to craft.

Lastly, Persuasion is a lot of fun, so you might wanna try that out if you have some extra points.

So in conclusion: You'll want a point or two in Melee at character creation, otherwise choose when you want to get Tech and go from there.

EDIT: Oh, and keep in mind that as your Tech Aptitude raises, Virgil's healing will start to fail on you.

Half Ogre mage (just focus on caster skills), it's seriously more fun than you'd think.

I was actually considering building a 1 Int Mage just for the hilarity. :)

That would be awesome. All powerful mage, but can't summon followers, and everyone thinks he is an idiot who drools on the carpet. I could see that becoming an issue where the PC just kills everyone because he is angry that no one appreciates his magical skill.

Anyway, to the OP: what Gazoinks said is good advice. And what I would say is if you want a tech melee character go with a dwarf. It makes both of those routes quite easy (as long as you invest in melee early). You can quickly tech up in the Smithy discipline which will give you melee weapons, and armor for both you and followers if you have them/the required components.

And to what Gazoinks said about Virgil not being great at healing you when you become more techy - if you want a tech healer look for her in Dernholm (no more spoilers unless you want them).

But yeah, Arcanum is a wonderful game, still one of my favorites, if not my favorite after 11 years of playing it. Have tons of fun with it, and if you need anything else post it in the Arcanum forum, there are a good number of us that frequent it. :)

An Idiot Savan Mage might be a bit more fun to roleplay, but also less silly.

Anyway, a note on the tech healer: She's good, so you can't get her if you're evil (well, unless you max Persuasion). It's probably best to play good for your first playthrough anyway though.

@Gazoinks
Thanks mate , sorry I didn't post this properly but it was posted in frustration and after a few beers :))
I'll try and add a few points to Melee and see how it goes.

@SheBear
OK , I'll use the Arcanum forums in the future.

@orcishgamer
Seems a bit painful for a beginner like me...

A Half-ogre Mage actually wouldn't be as hard to build as you might expect (depends on the type of Mage, though). Willpower is the main caster stat and no race gets a penalty to that. Int determines how many spells you can maintain at a time, so it's useful for Summoners, Buffers, etc. but not really necessary for Nukers. Though the really ridiculous Mage build is Gnome Only Child so you can max Wil at lv. 1.

Oh, and for priority for putting points into combat stuff, I'd recommend: Melee>Dex>Dodge>Str>Con. So try to max out your Melee ASAP (which'll also involve you almost maxing Dex). Dex is, in my opinion, more important than Str and Con because it increases Speed and AC and limits a lot of skills. And, as I said before, you may want to get enough Int early to learn a bit of smithing. Up to you, realy.