(light act one spoilers ahead)

I've got about 200 hours in bg3, I'm close to finishing my first game on tactician and I've also got an honour mode run that's going pretty well so far. I've watched a lot of tier list content etc and I'd say I have a pretty solid grasp of the game.

I've started a new game with a friend who has very little gaming experience. we're playing on balanced and it feels pretty easy so far. mostly I'm letting her call the shots and be the "main character." she's decided she wants to do an evil run. she's not particularly interested in powergaming and is playing a human trickery cleric, and I'm playing a female drow swords bard. my friend is also controlling astarion and wants to romance him.

currently our other companion is shadowheart respecced as a wizard. we're level 4. the composition is working fine so far, although my character and astarion definitely have some overlap, both primarily using ranged weapons and probably will be competing for similar gear.

we're getting close to the point that we can recruit Minthara. I think I want to, because I never have before and I think it would be good to have a frontline tanky character. but this would leave us without a wizard/sorcerer/warlock.

I'm wondering how viable this comp would be? I definitely don't want to ask her to respec. if it were just me I'd make astarion a wizard but I feel that may be a little complicated for her; she's only just getting the hang of playing a cleric. I would also prefer to continue playing a bard as that's novel for me and I'm really enjoying the class so far.

what do y'all think? is a trickery cleric, arcane trickster rogue, ranged swords bard, and vengeance paladin a viable comp for balanced? (I'm considering at some point respeccing astarion as an assassin/gloomstalker ranger because I think arcane trickster is pretty underwhelming and also unnecessarily complicated).

any advice is appreciated!