Even though this thread is a bit old, it inspired me to try a no reload run and I thought I'd share the exploits of Daryn the elven Dragon Disciple, my first successful solo no reload run through BGEE
His starting stats were STR: 18 DEX: 19 CON: 13 INT: 12 WIS: 12 CHA: 15
I guess having 18 str doesn't fit RP-wise but it helped for carrying and packing a punch with those sling bullets! My reasoning for only having 13 con was that I'd get +1 from the tome and (eventually) +2 from the kit. Bit risky early on (started with 6 HP) but I relaxed core rules for levelling up to get the max HP bonuses, and once I had a few defensive spells I didn't have to worry too much about being critted by a stray attack.
Daryn's adventure almost came to an untimely end at the hands of the mage outside the FAI. I had chosen sleep and magic missile for my level 1 spells, but sleep failed to affect the powerful mage (in retrospect, shield would have been the sensible choice at level 1). His horror spell sent me fleeing, fortunately in the opposite direction, and in the distance Daryn could hear his assailant being slowly hacked to pieces by the FAI guards. Shaken but resolute, he continued his quest.
After that I procured the services of Korax to slay a few basilisks, which immediately shot me up to level 5 or so. This helped massively in the early game, and from there it was just all about being careful and resting lots! Invisibility and web were the obvious level 2 spell choices, and eventually I also went with knock, fireball (very useful), monster summoning (useful, but ultimately replaced by the wand), remove magic (less useful), stoneskin (duh) and minor sequencer (almost purely for the ducal palace fight - I was planning ahead quite heavily).
I had a few scares where saving throws alone saved me (a hairy encounter with Bassilus comes to mind) but other than that the only hard fight was the Ducal Palace one. I used minor sequencer to fire a double web in the area (Daryn having guzzled two +50% magic resist potions), which held 3 of the dopplegangers before they transformed. I proceeded to bash away with the +3 staff I acquired in Ulgoth's Beard, assisted by a rare potion of power and oil of speed. Along with the wand of paralyzation, this allowed Daryn to thwack merrily away at the creatures before they could slay either of the dukes.
By the time I reached Sarevok in his lair I had so many absurdly useful potions, wands and scrolls that I could control the battle fairly easily.
So yeah, it was such a great feeling when I'd accomplished it! I had got a bit bored of the game before that, but this added a whole new dimension. I'll be trying to get Daryn through BG2 without reloading, which I know even better. I think being new in a big city he may prefer to have some travelling companions to show him the ropes... I'm thinking of trying to use all 4 of the new EE characters in one party. I guess it'll require some reputation management and I'm not too familiar with their sidequests so I'm not sure how long my no-reload run will last, but I'll try my best!
Oh also, the DD's breath weapon is hilariously powerful at low levels, I just had to be really careful not to obliterate any innocent bystanders with it ^^
Just got the enhanced edition, so am going for a complete no reload, mainly solo run through from BG1 right to the end of BG2. Have done a no reload of BG2 once before, a long time ago, so I used to know it really well. Baldurs gate 1, not so much.
The plan is Swashbuckler 25, then dual class to Cleric 26 ish. (Did it with dual barbarian mage before so want to try something different.
So far I've visited the basilisks, and got as far as Naashkel. Need to raise enough money to get enough potions, arrows to feel secure, then will probably take an invisibilty potion to get to the end of the mines and fight the wizard type there. Then go straight to the camp around the top right and do that. Then stealth through the spidery maps till I get to the fight outside the other miney place where the boots of speed live, life gets much easier after that. Then I may round up some of the Tomes and do more money raising stuff, and evaluate from there. May go through the baldurs gate plot stuff as fast as I can to get the other Tomes. Then get as much money together as posdible. Am considering getting some friends in before doing the end game stuff, I remember some of those fights (having to kill some enemies really quickly) and the final fight being tricky, and as quick death by that point would be really annoying.
But right now I need a good healing option, not making any money healing myself in Temples, and don't like resting for a week after taking any damage. Will find a cleric character and can befriend to get free healing.
I am not sure that swash 25/cleric 26 is a good choice for a no reload run : - Playing as a single class cleric for 5M xp will be very painful. Being ultra powerful for the end game is not as useful as not being gimped for any part of the game (especially since most characters are anyway overly powerful at HLA levels) - can you use any other weapon than clubs (using UAI)? if not you will be stuck at 2APR which sucks deeply
Swashbuckler is a great pick but i would personnally do something more like swash 16/mage xx
Anyway, a few words of advice for BGEE : - if you have 18 in CON, buying the magical buckler from the FAI + the tome of CON will give you 20 which will make you regenerate. If not don't worry, you will very soon swim in gold by selling a few items you cannot use anyway. That way you can buy as much healing potion as you want. - 2 items make your life much much easier : the ring of free action and the greenstone amulet, both available in ulgoth's beard - use potions for difficult fight. They make most of them (including the final one) extremely easy. - you are indeed right, the only real difficulty in the game is the fight with some kind of timer. Unfortunately as a swashbuckler i have found no safe solution for winning this fight. Just buff like crazy (potions) and hope to be a little bit lucky. (for caster types it is much easier since they can use crowd control to freeze the fight)
Here is the status on my latest no reload run (part 1, BGEE)
CHARNAME is an elven sorcerer with really good stats (10-19-15-14-15-18). I am trying to avoid cheese as much as possible to be the very close to a "normal" playthrough
BG1 : Starting spells : sleep/shield/magic missile. For a change, I wanted to avoid the usual free xp (basilisks, shoal). Therefore I started by fetch quests in FAI/Beregost/Nashkel and the areas on the SW of the map (using mostly sleep + darts) to get xp and books (CHA, CON).
Once she got to level 4, she picked invisibility and used it to get the wand of paralyzation from the lighthouse cave. She then went to Mulahey using invisibility and paralyzed him with the wand. Still using invisibility she picked the wand of fire from the ankheg map and ulgoth’s beard for the greenstone amulet. Then some leveling on basilisks (east of the temple, durlag (get the book of WIS)) and battle horrors (durlag) using wands. At this point she was level 6-7, equipped with web and MMM and ready to finish the game with no risk.
Bandit camp was dealt with invisibility and web for the main tent. Running through cloakwood using invisibility, she killed the group at the entrance of the mines using web/MMM/wands and then went directly to Davaevorn : the battle horrors fell to the wand of frost while Davaevorn was helpless against a simple potion of magic blocking.
In baldur’s gate she did the minimum quests to get the books (WIS, INT, DEX) and some xp. The top of the iron throne group was dealt with web/wands/MMM (as usual).
Then she ran through the catacombs using invisibilty and protection from lightning to get the books (WIS, STR) while avoiding the fights.
Getting back to baldur’s gate, she did everything without resting (to get it more real): - Top of iron throne + slythe using wand of paralyzation - Duchal palace using the total lockdown tactic (web x3 + spider spawn), which is completely safe. - Run through the maze using invisibility and protection from fire/lightning potions - Kill Sarevok using magic missile while running and being immune to magic thanks to 2 magic resistance potions
At the end of the BGE she was level 9, at the xp cap with the following stats : 11-20-16-15-18-19.
As for BG2, i still wanted to avoid cheese as much as possible.
Therefore, i waited a very long time (level 16 for kangaax, 18 for twisted rune) before doing kangaax and twisted rune because i wanted to do them without using protection from undead scroll/skull traps. If you are willing to use them it is possible to do these as soon as you get out of chateau irenicus.
Chateau irenicus was very easy and dealt with 1 rest (self imposed limit). From there she did all easy quests using mainly one tactic : web + MMM + spiderspawn. In case of mage fights using improved invisibility + SI divinition did the trick marvelously : - Circus - copper coronet - bridge district ripper (did not go to the basement, too dangerous) - random fights (sua seni) + harper quest (improve invis for the mage fight) - trademeet quests : invisibility through the grove, killed the genies. The raksasha are too painful to kill as a low level arcane caster - thieves guild quests - Umar village quests - Got the ioun stone from the spiders lair in the catacomb - Slavers (copper coronet part 2). I wanted to have the ioun stone for +10% life before because there is a VERY nasty trap which can 1-shot you if you are unlucky. Also, don't forget to use spell immunity alteration for the flesh to stone trap in the sewers - Shadow thieves main quest until the last one - with mordenkainen sword d'arnise hold was a joke. (otherwise the torgal fight can be tricky and the golem fights painfully long)
This is the end of what i consider the very easy part of the game (basically nothing is really dangerous). At this point she was level 15.
Time for the harder quests : - despite it being probably the most difficult i started with the astral prison (limitation on no resting inside). The demon and demon knight were dealt with using mostly skeleton summons.
- firkraag quest yields very good xp. Since it is features almost only physical opponents (golems, werewolfs, vampire,...)and is therefore not very difficult using mordenkainen swords which are completely immune to them. She did not kill firkraag. She upped to level 16 during the course of the quest
- Time to kill some liches! ADHW make short work of them (and any kind of caster) since they never get protection against AOE and 2-3 casting kill them. Using it (and some spell immunity to be safe) she killed the elemental lich and shadow lich. Kangaax was dealt with spell immunity abjuration and MMM. The first attempt of killing it failed because of bad THACO rolls and i had to flee by lack of ammunition. I came back and killed it after a good night of rest and some MMM scrolls to ensure i would not lack ammo.
- She was then level 17, just a few 100kxp short of godlike power. This was done in the temple ruin (umar quest), which is actually a very easy quest if you do it early. At this level the dungeon was populated with liches which did not prove to be a real threat using ADHW and spell immunity. Getting level 18 during the course of the dungeon, she killed the shadow dragon using her newly acquired time stop and improve alacrity spells (+ lower resist + ADHW)
- At level 18 time for twisted rune. I made a mistake on that one and add to roll a saving throw on the vampire domination before doing the usual time stop+IA+ADHW! Even if my saves were basically all at 1 or 2, rolling a saving throw is never a good thing.
From there, since she got all the equipment she would ever need (save for the circlet of netheril in TOB) she left for the asylum.
I do not need to give much detail on the rest. on level 19 she picked wish (no need to rest anymore) and summon planetar (no need to do anything and all monsters are dead). Each area is dealt with summoning one planetar which slaughter everything effortlessly. Sometimes i cast a few spells when bored or when the fight is really dangerous. The staff of mage protection is permanently up to avoid bad surprises from traps.
I basically fly through the asylum, sahuagin city and the underdark (doing all quests in Ust Natha). Back to the surface i go straigth to body which does not stand a chance.
She is now currently in sudalnessalar and i guess they will not be anything even remotely dangerous by the end SOA. I am looking forward to TOB to see if anything challenging comes up.
I am not sure that swash 25/cleric 26 is a good choice for a no reload run : - Playing as a single class cleric for 5M xp will be very painful. Being ultra powerful for the end game is not as useful as not being gimped for any part of the game (especially since most characters are anyway overly powerful at HLA levels)
Making the changeover is part of the fun. I’ve completed a no reload runthrough in BG2 before, with a very high level Beserker dual classing to Mage. The epic abilities are still available after dual classing, or at least they were in the old version. So I will still hopefully be able to have the ‘use any item’ thief ability, which will allow me to use the Maggi staff and gain ability. Plus by this point, I should be very well equiped.
The switch over point I have used before is in the underdark, maybe just after the first dark elf quest involving being ambushed by beholders + friends. If I switch just before this finished, there are a few quest you can finish without really doing very much. I leave a lot of quests not quite finished, so my low level Cleric can have the final conversation and mop up the experience.
The combintion of being part very weak, and part very powerful is lots of fun, and one I recommend.
My first two attempts failed. Once while suffering Panic in the bandit camp, and once while stealthing though to Davaeoron, I set off a Lightning trap, on a corner, which rebounded through me til death. Will have to get a Potion of Absorbtion for that bit next time. And may drink a few of them at key points, I can’t really remember where the dangerous traps are, and the rebounding lightning is a killer.
This time I’m going to do the basilisks, and follow the plotline as quickly as possible, using lots of potions, until the return to candlekeep, so I can get the Tomes. Then I’ll go round and get as much xp and cash up together as I can, before doing the timed battle. I will get some friends in for that one, and keep them to the end.
The ring of free action, and greenstone amulet would certainly make life so much easier, thanks, I’ll get them as soon as I can.
She is now currently in sudalnessalar and i guess they will not be anything even remotely dangerous by the end SOA. I am looking forward to TOB to see if anything challenging comes up.
Will you do the final battle at the end of Watchers Keep? That is the toughest battle I remember, and definitely plan to avoid it for a no reload runthrough.
I do agree with you that dual classing is fun because of being much weaker for the swap period. I would not put them to the extreme like you do but with careful planning its perfectly doable.
A few more advice for BG1 :
I find that most of my run fail on : - early mages/cleric if you don't play safe (safe = get the ring of free action/greenstone amulet first)
- ligthning bolt traps. The one in the mines can be avoided. In the catacomb it can be more difficult. Just use potions to protect
- davaevorn can be a pain with both direct damage and crowd control spells. However he casts very few spells (1 lightning bolt, 1 fireball, 1 charm, 1 hold, 1 summon). Therefore using 1 potion of magic blocking (the one that makes you immune to level 1-5 spells for 5 rounds makes this fight extremely easy. Be careful though : sometimes he is lazy and takes too much time to cast his 4 spells. For that case it's better to have 2 potions ready (1 to be bought at high edge, 1 in the tent in the bandit camp)
- The end game group fights (iron throne, catacombs, before the final fight) can be deadly if you are not serious. The catacomb one is the worst : the mage cast lightning bolt in the narrow corridor, 1 archer with poison arrows, 1 theif with stunning dart. My recommandation is to purely skip them. If you want to fight, make sure your prepare properly (fire resistance for the iron throne, lightning prot for the catacomb) and use your best items like arrows of detonation
- Be very careful with spider poison in the catacombs : it hurts VERY bad. I've lost 1-2 runs to it due to being careless and having no antidote.
-Duchal palace is very hard if you have no crowd control (fighter and thief types). Your option to take a few friends with you is a good bet.
I decided to try something a little different for me, I'm just about to start a probably foooour person play through at this point using one of the pre-made characters. Possibly the Mage or Cleric. I was settled 100% on the mage but I'm now not completely certain!
Baldur's Gate Fighter/Mage/Cleric walk-through SOLO NO RELOAD. [part 1]
My friends told me its impossible to finish Baldur's Gate in a solo run without reloading, I wanna try and prove them wrong ! If I die -- I start all over again ! however... I'm not planing to die so easily... Join my adventure of fk#ing the hell out of Faerûn with my power hungry fighter cleric majestic bitch DiViNA
In Baldur's Gate 1 there's a very small amount of cheese u can apply due to the level restriction [xp cap] so most of the Arcane magic shenanigans are out of reach. what you CAN do [and its really doesn't count as cheese ] is use the fact the most enemies have rather low saving throws and Hit Dice.
This is basically my plan... things like "Command" [cleric spell] are under your reach even at Level 01 and they actually work on a lot of enemies lol. I haven't finished my run yet though... but I tell you this, I never had that much fun playing Baldur's Gate 1, my heart stops at every hostile encounter ! This is great experience whether I succeed or not ^^
This is NOT a speed run. I am playing a Half-Elf (for the cleric multiclass) and got nice stats. After rolling stats for about 1 minute or so I ended with the following stats :
Arulfstan gnome berserker. Rolled 94 at the start and ended with 22 str and con in TOB. He soloed bg ee and then romanced aerie. Had keldorn as a battlebrother. It was a great run, nothing could stand against em.
just finished the full saga without dying .... first time yeeee !!!
started bg1 blackguard NE/ Str18/72 Dex 18 / Con 18 / Int 14 / Wis 7 / Chr 18 specialized longbow+poison = owned wizards , and halberd Chesley crusher+2 did crit 60 dmg with it few times ) used imoen dualed lvl 5,kagain as tank, dorn me and montaron used bows mostly, edwin and xzar watched from behind with slings :)and cast spells in the tougher fights ... clerics are pointess in bg1 I realized
the most dangerous thing to happen is encountering a basilisk while traveling, so always keep potion of mirrored eyes on the main char and some stone to flash scroll so you don't lost npcs with the whole inventory in the middle of nowhere
bg2&tob party : nalia-later switched to imoen/edwin/korgan/anomen/keldorn my strat was a bit boring sometimes...anomen cast 6 choatic commands and 6 deathwards on us + protection from petrification on the main char before every battle + resist fear ... that's everything you need basicly to avoid the situations getting out of hand these spells last for 1 min/level so I could do a whole map without resting in the boss fights used potions, in bg2 they last for 1-3 hours (invulnerability, heroism,prot from fire...keep these potions for the big fights only, buy all of them off from SoA traders before Tob because there are only a few traders there)
the only time I was close to disaster was a demi lich battle in watchers keep level 4 where the lich not picked berserked korgan in front for imprisonment but started randomly disappearing my other characters from the back..shh avoid this one if you do a no reaload I was damn lucky there... this lich is much smarter then most of his kind was level 3 was also hard, keep the no fear items for that part.... fighters should only choose greater whirlwind the other hlas are pretty useless because the dmg reduction on bosses I found wizards should use spell trigger with 1 pierce shield + 2 lower resistance on bosses and then hack'em up the demogorgon and melissan battle was surprisingly easy in the end with lvl 27 main char
now I am a god, dreaming for bg 3 ... destroy that cyric guy perhaps
**Updates** One of my video files got corrupted, so this is a relatively "short" episode. I'll be looking for ways to fix it, however theres a chance that the next episode will have a tiny gap in between.
**What I do in this episode** -Flirt with Sirense -Discovering the Gypsy's treasures
Please share, Like and subscribe - this will get me laid tnx
Ok people, this is the great day. I finally did it. I completed a no reload run of BG1. With "no reload" I mean I did not reload ONCE That was hard and required many attempts throughout the years, but time passed essentially waiting for the release of BGEE and then for patch 1.2 and then again 1.3. I played with core rules, and without XP cap. I thought that removing the XP cap was more realistic and that allowing me to progress a bit further that what was supposed would be a fair counterbalance to the hard challenge I was about to start. I ended with about 380K experience points, that means about one or two levels more than the cap. My main character was Anthony, a Cavalier with amazing stats that I rolled with quite much work As for the rest of the party, I chose to stay canon, not recruiting anyone else not to waste a single XP. So, I was with Minsc, wielding dual maces (Stupefier and +3 from Durlag), Jaheira (+2 club from the boss of the druids in Cloakwood and +3 sling from Durlag), Khalid (using only longbow, with stunning 4 points of proficiency), Imoen (dual classed at 7, level 10 mage at the end of the game) and Dynaheir (who reached level 11 during the final battle). It's been really amazing to reach this result, considering also I completed Durlag's Tower and any other part of the game. In the final battle my main reached 4 hps, you can't know how I felt, it was terrible :-P Luckily I casted haste before the beginning of the battle and I was able to disengage and heal up. Now I'm waiting for the next patch of BG2EE to continue the saga in the same way :-) In the meantime I'm seeking some method to bring my party's NPCs stats, proficiencies and everything else to the new game. That's it :-)
After one failure and one voluntary restart, Alazor & Friends humiliated Sarevok by killing his entire party without getting hit once.
Attempt -1- Everything was going fine, my party was strong and prepared for most things, except that they did not expect a pile of corpses in Ulcaster to be rigged by a trap, the double damage Fireball of that trap hit with an unlucky high roll.
Attempt -2- Less smooth yet managable, but when assaulting the Cloakwood Mine, one of the level 10 mages there managed to throw a Fireball through the obstacles of being barraged by web, stinking cloud and 3 missile weapon users. The Fireball did not chunk anyone, and damage was relatively low, but Baeloth permanently died. Unsure whether that was a bug or intended, I restarted voluntarily.
Attempt -3- After running into the Assassins in F.A.I. and Beregost Red Sheaf Inn, Alazor was smart and avoided civilization for a while, resting only outside, traveling alone for a while. Instead of lurking around thieving and doing meager quests for the commoners, he focused on fighting, observing and finding equipment. Rough as survival was in the Sword Coast, despite him being Chaotic Neutral with a tendency to good, he drifted into the company of Dorn, Kagain and Edwin. Trouble was abound, both enjoyable and violent, and their influence clearly reduced Alazor's patience for insults and the despotic flaming fist guards. While nobody in need of aid was pushed away, a few flaming fist mercenaries trying to order them around, and a number of commoners who thought it necessary to insult or provoke the group were blown to bits, leading to an all-out fight between them and a flaming fist headhunter squad. Pleasently, this neutral path equipped Alazor with a wide spread array of Bhaalspawn abilities, as the jumpy Reputation Value was rarely consistent.
Eventually, the group considered assaulting High Hedge as to per the hints given by the thief lurking around there, but Kagain, failing morale and panicking after the very first hit, was blasted to bloody chunks by the Flesh Golems there. Running faster than the mindless brutes, Alazor could dispatch them with +1 Arrows, but decided to adjust their path slightly after the accident. Khalid and Jaheira filled up the slots left and despite the druidess' unbearable bickering, the party was travelling content due to an average reputation. The Bandit Camp and Cloakwood were no challenge to the wanton throng of adventurers running wild, and they successfully fought their way through Baldurs Gate, Ulgoth's Beard and Durlag's Tower. In the latter, although things almost went to hell due to a dimensional anomaly (glitch. Screen lagged, got stuck, 1 Minute later death cinematic plays eventho the party is still standing around idle and unharmed in the "the main character died" dialogue.)
In the end, the many potions the party had collected, together with a strong defensive force (Web and Grease by Edwin and Baeloth, two summoned animals, and Darts of Wounding, Arrows of Biting, Poisoned Bolts of Biting by the whole group) proved to be a barrage that tore Sarevok's group into pieces, and all but Tazok the Ogre did not even reach the group to attack once.
Comments
His starting stats were
STR: 18
DEX: 19
CON: 13
INT: 12
WIS: 12
CHA: 15
I guess having 18 str doesn't fit RP-wise but it helped for carrying and packing a punch with those sling bullets! My reasoning for only having 13 con was that I'd get +1 from the tome and (eventually) +2 from the kit. Bit risky early on (started with 6 HP) but I relaxed core rules for levelling up to get the max HP bonuses, and once I had a few defensive spells I didn't have to worry too much about being critted by a stray attack.
Daryn's adventure almost came to an untimely end at the hands of the mage outside the FAI. I had chosen sleep and magic missile for my level 1 spells, but sleep failed to affect the powerful mage (in retrospect, shield would have been the sensible choice at level 1). His horror spell sent me fleeing, fortunately in the opposite direction, and in the distance Daryn could hear his assailant being slowly hacked to pieces by the FAI guards. Shaken but resolute, he continued his quest.
After that I procured the services of Korax to slay a few basilisks, which immediately shot me up to level 5 or so. This helped massively in the early game, and from there it was just all about being careful and resting lots! Invisibility and web were the obvious level 2 spell choices, and eventually I also went with knock, fireball (very useful), monster summoning (useful, but ultimately replaced by the wand), remove magic (less useful), stoneskin (duh) and minor sequencer (almost purely for the ducal palace fight - I was planning ahead quite heavily).
I had a few scares where saving throws alone saved me (a hairy encounter with Bassilus comes to mind) but other than that the only hard fight was the Ducal Palace one. I used minor sequencer to fire a double web in the area (Daryn having guzzled two +50% magic resist potions), which held 3 of the dopplegangers before they transformed. I proceeded to bash away with the +3 staff I acquired in Ulgoth's Beard, assisted by a rare potion of power and oil of speed. Along with the wand of paralyzation, this allowed Daryn to thwack merrily away at the creatures before they could slay either of the dukes.
By the time I reached Sarevok in his lair I had so many absurdly useful potions, wands and scrolls that I could control the battle fairly easily.
So yeah, it was such a great feeling when I'd accomplished it! I had got a bit bored of the game before that, but this added a whole new dimension. I'll be trying to get Daryn through BG2 without reloading, which I know even better. I think being new in a big city he may prefer to have some travelling companions to show him the ropes... I'm thinking of trying to use all 4 of the new EE characters in one party. I guess it'll require some reputation management and I'm not too familiar with their sidequests so I'm not sure how long my no-reload run will last, but I'll try my best!
Oh also, the DD's breath weapon is hilariously powerful at low levels, I just had to be really careful not to obliterate any innocent bystanders with it ^^
The plan is Swashbuckler 25, then dual class to Cleric 26 ish. (Did it with dual barbarian mage before so want to try something different.
So far I've visited the basilisks, and got as far as Naashkel. Need to raise enough money to get enough potions, arrows to feel secure, then will probably take an invisibilty potion to get to the end of the mines and fight the wizard type there. Then go straight to the camp around the top right and do that. Then stealth through the spidery maps till I get to the fight outside the other miney place where the boots of speed live, life gets much easier after that. Then I may round up some of the Tomes and do more money raising stuff, and evaluate from there. May go through the baldurs gate plot stuff as fast as I can to get the other Tomes. Then get as much money together as posdible. Am considering getting some friends in before doing the end game stuff, I remember some of those fights (having to kill some enemies really quickly) and the final fight being tricky, and as quick death by that point would be really annoying.
But right now I need a good healing option, not making any money healing myself in Temples, and don't like resting for a week after taking any damage. Will find a cleric character and can befriend to get free healing.
- Playing as a single class cleric for 5M xp will be very painful. Being ultra powerful for the end game is not as useful as not being gimped for any part of the game (especially since most characters are anyway overly powerful at HLA levels)
- can you use any other weapon than clubs (using UAI)? if not you will be stuck at 2APR which sucks deeply
Swashbuckler is a great pick but i would personnally do something more like swash 16/mage xx
Anyway, a few words of advice for BGEE :
- if you have 18 in CON, buying the magical buckler from the FAI + the tome of CON will give you 20 which will make you regenerate. If not don't worry, you will very soon swim in gold by selling a few items you cannot use anyway. That way you can buy as much healing potion as you want.
- 2 items make your life much much easier : the ring of free action and the greenstone amulet, both available in ulgoth's beard
- use potions for difficult fight. They make most of them (including the final one) extremely easy.
- you are indeed right, the only real difficulty in the game is the fight with some kind of timer. Unfortunately as a swashbuckler i have found no safe solution for winning this fight. Just buff like crazy (potions) and hope to be a little bit lucky. (for caster types it is much easier since they can use crowd control to freeze the fight)
CHARNAME is an elven sorcerer with really good stats (10-19-15-14-15-18). I am trying to avoid cheese as much as possible to be the very close to a "normal" playthrough
BG1 :
Starting spells : sleep/shield/magic missile.
For a change, I wanted to avoid the usual free xp (basilisks, shoal). Therefore I started by fetch quests in FAI/Beregost/Nashkel and the areas on the SW of the map (using mostly sleep + darts) to get xp and books (CHA, CON).
Once she got to level 4, she picked invisibility and used it to get the wand of paralyzation from the lighthouse cave. She then went to Mulahey using invisibility and paralyzed him with the wand.
Still using invisibility she picked the wand of fire from the ankheg map and ulgoth’s beard for the greenstone amulet. Then some leveling on basilisks (east of the temple, durlag (get the book of WIS)) and battle horrors (durlag) using wands.
At this point she was level 6-7, equipped with web and MMM and ready to finish the game with no risk.
Bandit camp was dealt with invisibility and web for the main tent.
Running through cloakwood using invisibility, she killed the group at the entrance of the mines using web/MMM/wands and then went directly to Davaevorn : the battle horrors fell to the wand of frost while Davaevorn was helpless against a simple potion of magic blocking.
In baldur’s gate she did the minimum quests to get the books (WIS, INT, DEX) and some xp. The top of the iron throne group was dealt with web/wands/MMM (as usual).
Then she ran through the catacombs using invisibilty and protection from lightning to get the books (WIS, STR) while avoiding the fights.
Getting back to baldur’s gate, she did everything without resting (to get it more real):
- Top of iron throne + slythe using wand of paralyzation
- Duchal palace using the total lockdown tactic (web x3 + spider spawn), which is completely safe.
- Run through the maze using invisibility and protection from fire/lightning potions
- Kill Sarevok using magic missile while running and being immune to magic thanks to 2 magic resistance potions
At the end of the BGE she was level 9, at the xp cap with the following stats : 11-20-16-15-18-19.
Therefore, i waited a very long time (level 16 for kangaax, 18 for twisted rune) before doing kangaax and twisted rune because i wanted to do them without using protection from undead scroll/skull traps. If you are willing to use them it is possible to do these as soon as you get out of chateau irenicus.
Chateau irenicus was very easy and dealt with 1 rest (self imposed limit). From there she did all easy quests using mainly one tactic : web + MMM + spiderspawn. In case of mage fights using improved invisibility + SI divinition did the trick marvelously :
- Circus
- copper coronet
- bridge district ripper (did not go to the basement, too dangerous)
- random fights (sua seni) + harper quest (improve invis for the mage fight)
- trademeet quests : invisibility through the grove, killed the genies. The raksasha are too painful to kill as a low level arcane caster
- thieves guild quests
- Umar village quests
- Got the ioun stone from the spiders lair in the catacomb
- Slavers (copper coronet part 2). I wanted to have the ioun stone for +10% life before because there is a VERY nasty trap which can 1-shot you if you are unlucky. Also, don't forget to use spell immunity alteration for the flesh to stone trap in the sewers
- Shadow thieves main quest until the last one
- with mordenkainen sword d'arnise hold was a joke. (otherwise the torgal fight can be tricky and the golem fights painfully long)
This is the end of what i consider the very easy part of the game (basically nothing is really dangerous).
At this point she was level 15.
- despite it being probably the most difficult i started with the astral prison (limitation on no resting inside). The demon and demon knight were dealt with using mostly skeleton summons.
- firkraag quest yields very good xp. Since it is features almost only physical opponents (golems, werewolfs, vampire,...)and is therefore not very difficult using mordenkainen swords which are completely immune to them. She did not kill firkraag. She upped to level 16 during the course of the quest
- Time to kill some liches! ADHW make short work of them (and any kind of caster) since they never get protection against AOE and 2-3 casting kill them. Using it (and some spell immunity to be safe) she killed the elemental lich and shadow lich. Kangaax was dealt with spell immunity abjuration and MMM. The first attempt of killing it failed because of bad THACO rolls and i had to flee by lack of ammunition. I came back and killed it after a good night of rest and some MMM scrolls to ensure i would not lack ammo.
- She was then level 17, just a few 100kxp short of godlike power. This was done in the temple ruin (umar quest), which is actually a very easy quest if you do it early. At this level the dungeon was populated with liches which did not prove to be a real threat using ADHW and spell immunity. Getting level 18 during the course of the dungeon, she killed the shadow dragon using her newly acquired time stop and improve alacrity spells (+ lower resist + ADHW)
- At level 18 time for twisted rune. I made a mistake on that one and add to roll a saving throw on the vampire domination before doing the usual time stop+IA+ADHW! Even if my saves were basically all at 1 or 2, rolling a saving throw is never a good thing.
From there, since she got all the equipment she would ever need (save for the circlet of netheril in TOB) she left for the asylum.
I do not need to give much detail on the rest. on level 19 she picked wish (no need to rest anymore) and summon planetar (no need to do anything and all monsters are dead).
Each area is dealt with summoning one planetar which slaughter everything effortlessly. Sometimes i cast a few spells when bored or when the fight is really dangerous. The staff of mage protection is permanently up to avoid bad surprises from traps.
I basically fly through the asylum, sahuagin city and the underdark (doing all quests in Ust Natha).
Back to the surface i go straigth to body which does not stand a chance.
She is now currently in sudalnessalar and i guess they will not be anything even remotely dangerous by the end SOA. I am looking forward to TOB to see if anything challenging comes up.
The switch over point I have used before is in the underdark, maybe just after the first dark elf quest involving being ambushed by beholders + friends. If I switch just before this finished, there are a few quest you can finish without really doing very much. I leave a lot of quests not quite finished, so my low level Cleric can have the final conversation and mop up the experience.
The combintion of being part very weak, and part very powerful is lots of fun, and one I recommend.
This time I’m going to do the basilisks, and follow the plotline as quickly as possible, using lots of potions, until the return to candlekeep, so I can get the Tomes. Then I’ll go round and get as much xp and cash up together as I can, before doing the timed battle. I will get some friends in for that one, and keep them to the end.
The ring of free action, and greenstone amulet would certainly make life so much easier, thanks, I’ll get them as soon as I can.
A few more advice for BG1 :
I find that most of my run fail on :
- early mages/cleric if you don't play safe (safe = get the ring of free action/greenstone amulet first)
- ligthning bolt traps. The one in the mines can be avoided. In the catacomb it can be more difficult. Just use potions to protect
- davaevorn can be a pain with both direct damage and crowd control spells. However he casts very few spells (1 lightning bolt, 1 fireball, 1 charm, 1 hold, 1 summon). Therefore using 1 potion of magic blocking (the one that makes you immune to level 1-5 spells for 5 rounds makes this fight extremely easy. Be careful though : sometimes he is lazy and takes too much time to cast his 4 spells. For that case it's better to have 2 potions ready (1 to be bought at high edge, 1 in the tent in the bandit camp)
- The end game group fights (iron throne, catacombs, before the final fight) can be deadly if you are not serious. The catacomb one is the worst : the mage cast lightning bolt in the narrow corridor, 1 archer with poison arrows, 1 theif with stunning dart.
My recommandation is to purely skip them. If you want to fight, make sure your prepare properly (fire resistance for the iron throne, lightning prot for the catacomb) and use your best items like arrows of detonation
- Be very careful with spider poison in the catacombs : it hurts VERY bad. I've lost 1-2 runs to it due to being careless and having no antidote.
-Duchal palace is very hard if you have no crowd control (fighter and thief types). Your option to take a few friends with you is a good bet.
My friends told me its impossible to finish Baldur's Gate in a solo run without reloading,
I wanna try and prove them wrong !
If I die -- I start all over again ! however... I'm not planing to die so easily...
Join my adventure of fk#ing the hell out of Faerûn with my power hungry
fighter cleric majestic bitch DiViNA
In Baldur's Gate 1 there's a very small amount of cheese u can apply due to the level restriction [xp cap] so most of the Arcane magic shenanigans are out of reach.
what you CAN do [and its really doesn't count as cheese ] is use the fact the most enemies have rather low saving throws and Hit Dice.
This is basically my plan... things like "Command" [cleric spell] are under your reach even at Level 01 and they actually work on a lot of enemies lol.
I haven't finished my run yet though... but I tell you this, I never had that much fun playing Baldur's Gate 1, my heart stops at every hostile encounter !
This is great experience whether I succeed or not ^^
This is NOT a speed run.
I am playing a Half-Elf (for the cleric multiclass) and got nice stats.
After rolling stats for about 1 minute or so I ended with the following stats :
Strength :17
Dexterity :18
Constitution :18
Intelligence :17
Wisdom :17
Charisma
And here is the video :
Arulfstan gnome berserker. Rolled 94 at the start and ended with 22 str and con in TOB. He soloed bg ee and then romanced aerie. Had keldorn as a battlebrother. It was a great run, nothing could stand against em.
I used no mods or exploits. It was alot of fun
started bg1 blackguard NE/ Str18/72 Dex 18 / Con 18 / Int 14 / Wis 7 / Chr 18
specialized longbow+poison = owned wizards
used imoen dualed lvl 5,kagain as tank, dorn me and montaron used bows mostly, edwin and xzar watched from behind with slings :)and cast spells in the tougher fights ... clerics are pointess in bg1 I realized
the most dangerous thing to happen is encountering a basilisk while traveling, so always keep potion of mirrored eyes on the main char and some stone to flash scroll so you don't lost npcs with the whole inventory in the middle of nowhere
bg2&tob party : nalia-later switched to imoen/edwin/korgan/anomen/keldorn
my strat was a bit boring sometimes...anomen cast 6 choatic commands and 6 deathwards on us + protection from petrification on the main char before every battle + resist fear ... that's everything you need basicly to avoid the situations getting out of hand
these spells last for 1 min/level so I could do a whole map without resting
in the boss fights used potions, in bg2 they last for 1-3 hours (invulnerability, heroism,prot from fire...keep these potions for the big fights only, buy all of them off from SoA traders before Tob because there are only a few traders there)
the only time I was close to disaster was a demi lich battle in watchers keep level 4 where the lich not picked berserked korgan in front for imprisonment but started randomly disappearing my other characters from the back..shh avoid this one if you do a no reaload I was damn lucky there... this lich is much smarter then most of his kind was
level 3 was also hard, keep the no fear items for that part....
fighters should only choose greater whirlwind the other hlas are pretty useless because the dmg reduction on bosses I found
wizards should use spell trigger with 1 pierce shield + 2 lower resistance on bosses and then hack'em up
the demogorgon and melissan battle was surprisingly easy in the end with lvl 27 main char
now I am a god, dreaming for bg 3 ... destroy that cyric guy perhaps
**Updates**
One of my video files got corrupted, so this is a relatively "short" episode. I'll be looking for ways to fix it, however theres a chance that the next episode will have a tiny gap in between.
**What I do in this episode**
-Flirt with Sirense
-Discovering the Gypsy's treasures
Please share, Like and subscribe - this will get me laid tnx
I completed a no reload run of BG1. With "no reload" I mean I did not reload ONCE
That was hard and required many attempts throughout the years, but time passed essentially waiting for the release of BGEE and then for patch 1.2 and then again 1.3.
I played with core rules, and without XP cap. I thought that removing the XP cap was more realistic and that allowing me to progress a bit further that what was supposed would be a fair counterbalance to the hard challenge I was about to start. I ended with about 380K experience points, that means about one or two levels more than the cap.
My main character was Anthony, a Cavalier with amazing stats that I rolled with quite much work
It's been really amazing to reach this result, considering also I completed Durlag's Tower and any other part of the game. In the final battle my main reached 4 hps, you can't know how I felt, it was terrible :-P Luckily I casted haste before the beginning of the battle and I was able to disengage and heal up.
Now I'm waiting for the next patch of BG2EE to continue the saga in the same way :-) In the meantime I'm seeking some method to bring my party's NPCs stats, proficiencies and everything else to the new game.
That's it :-)
Out of curiosity, my main character's name was a homage to a game with I grew up which: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dungeons_&_Dragons:_Warriors_of_the_Eternal_Sun
Anthony was the name of the default party's warrior.
18 - 18 - 16 - 10 - 12 - 18
+Daggers +Shortbow
Chaotic Neutral
Hard Difficulty - No Reload to change outcomes - No Metagaming
Alazor - Dorn - Khalid - Jaheira - Edwin - Baeloth
After one failure and one voluntary restart, Alazor & Friends humiliated Sarevok by killing his entire party without getting hit once.
Attempt -1-
Everything was going fine, my party was strong and prepared for most things, except that they did not expect a pile of corpses in Ulcaster to be rigged by a trap, the double damage Fireball of that trap hit with an unlucky high roll.
Attempt -2-
Less smooth yet managable, but when assaulting the Cloakwood Mine, one of the level 10 mages there managed to throw a Fireball through the obstacles of being barraged by web, stinking cloud and 3 missile weapon users. The Fireball did not chunk anyone, and damage was relatively low, but Baeloth permanently died. Unsure whether that was a bug or intended, I restarted voluntarily.
Attempt -3-
After running into the Assassins in F.A.I. and Beregost Red Sheaf Inn, Alazor was smart and avoided civilization for a while, resting only outside, traveling alone for a while. Instead of lurking around thieving and doing meager quests for the commoners, he focused on fighting, observing and finding equipment. Rough as survival was in the Sword Coast, despite him being Chaotic Neutral with a tendency to good, he drifted into the company of Dorn, Kagain and Edwin. Trouble was abound, both enjoyable and violent, and their influence clearly reduced Alazor's patience for insults and the despotic flaming fist guards. While nobody in need of aid was pushed away, a few flaming fist mercenaries trying to order them around, and a number of commoners who thought it necessary to insult or provoke the group were blown to bits, leading to an all-out fight between them and a flaming fist headhunter squad. Pleasently, this neutral path equipped Alazor with a wide spread array of Bhaalspawn abilities, as the jumpy Reputation Value was rarely consistent.
Eventually, the group considered assaulting High Hedge as to per the hints given by the thief lurking around there, but Kagain, failing morale and panicking after the very first hit, was blasted to bloody chunks by the Flesh Golems there. Running faster than the mindless brutes, Alazor could dispatch them with +1 Arrows, but decided to adjust their path slightly after the accident. Khalid and Jaheira filled up the slots left and despite the druidess' unbearable bickering, the party was travelling content due to an average reputation. The Bandit Camp and Cloakwood were no challenge to the wanton throng of adventurers running wild, and they successfully fought their way through Baldurs Gate, Ulgoth's Beard and Durlag's Tower. In the latter, although things almost went to hell due to a dimensional anomaly (glitch. Screen lagged, got stuck, 1 Minute later death cinematic plays eventho the party is still standing around idle and unharmed in the "the main character died" dialogue.)
In the end, the many potions the party had collected, together with a strong defensive force (Web and Grease by Edwin and Baeloth, two summoned animals, and Darts of Wounding, Arrows of Biting, Poisoned Bolts of Biting by the whole group) proved to be a barrage that tore Sarevok's group into pieces, and all but Tazok the Ogre did not even reach the group to attack once.
http://forum.baldursgate.com/categories/challenges-and-playthroughs