DIIscIIple

This annoys me also.

How could I ever accept balance in a game that's supposedly for fans of the infinity engine games?

I'm only on normal but I've been doing well with a 'run right at these fools' style party. I still use paladin heals, knockdowns, prebuffs with foods, and also potions. I still focus fire diligently. This style doesn't eliminate the need for micromanagement by any means but must simplify things quite a bit. I too found this difficult at the beginning and I restarted a couple of times to tweak (min/max further) but the party never felt viable. I felt like I'd have to give in to 'tank and spank' tactics before I discovered two things: 1) The Opening Volly: You can vastly improve the performance of a six melee party by equipping guns or arbelests and murdering one mage (or priest) at the beginning of the fight. After that first volley switch immediately to melee weapons and bash away. This makes a BIG difference. But the even bigger improvement... 2) The Paladin Skill 'Zealous Charge': I sometimes use the opening volly to lead in to the most difficult fights but only those. This skill changes everything. I play every fight in slow mode and my dudes still look like little crackmuffins chasing down nerd mages. Give these a try - all I do in battle is to make sure that I go for mages types first, heal characters who are low, and focus fire when possible. I really think that these simple changes make a massive difference. My current party is doing fine without even six characters - I use my main character as a fighter, one other fighter, and two paladins - and I can travel with 'story' characters whenever I want. GL

I would love to have a hotkey that would switch between all ranged or all melee weapons for evertyone in the party. I usually fire an opening salvo and then charge everybody in (four fighters, two paladins in the party). And I find it annoying to switch each dude's weapon manually one by one.

A Will-0-The-Wisp charmed a party member and so I had a fighter use knockdown on my charmed party member. My dude wouldn't stand up after the fight ended. He just sat there and wouldn't join the party even when it was time to venture forth. I reloaded no problem. There's my issue. This happened at Caed Nua before it became my stronghold.