I suppose I should say that my most memorable fight was trying to kill Gorion in Candlekeep. Back before Algernon's Cloak was fixed to only have one charge I would use it to hurl the entirety of outdoors Candlekeep at him. Before he could insta-kill your charname, I would stand back and watch him blast wave after wave of tutors, townsfolk, guards, and even the choir of singers. I would use Phylidia and myself as a mage to shoot back, but of course I was probably about level 3 or so, so I was pretty useless. I think I managed to swarm him down once or twice.
My most memorable challenge (not necessarily the toughest) was the first time I wandered into the Twisted Rune. I had found a Rogue Stone and was keeping it because it mentioned the Gemjump spell, which I remembered from the PnP Forgotten Realms material...I thought it would come in handy somewhere along the line. So I had one in my backpack when I opened that unassuming door in the Bridge District, at around level 10 with a very poorly balanced party. Seeing the lich show up got me excited for the fight, and then I found out he'd brought friends! I hadn't seen any complex fights yet, and I loved that there were a variety of foes that you had to figure out how to deal with in that single encounter. I spent a few attempts on it, and decided to come back later...I had ideas on how to deal with the different foes, but needed to get some levels and gear. I spent a good bit of time looking at the types of enemies, what specific abilities they had, and what I had available (or could get my hands on) that would be useful.
There are a few other battles in the series that give me the same vibe (most notably the final seal group in Watcher's Keep - Xei Win Toh, Huntress, et al), but the Twisted Rune was the first fight that made me think 'hmm, how am I going to get past this?'
Thinking back, another element of the fight that I really appreciated was the feeling that these were personalities, individuals that were working together for some purpose. Part of that was because they had NAMES. It wasn't just 'Lich', 'Vampire', and so forth. I would really have liked to see some backstory - I know there is some sort of non-implemented quest that leads up to that encounter, and that's probably the only thing that could have made it more meaningful. Why are these folks working together? What are their goals?
So I guess for me the important elements are 1) a tactically diverse group and 2) some understanding of who that group is and what they're about.
So I only just realized today, after nearly a decade of playing these games, that it IS possible to do all of Chapter 7 in BGEE without being arrested by the flaming fist.
Running around dodging them all might be my new most memorable challenge. (Extra credit points go to the 2 different flaming fist guards that would have had me too, if they'd just followed me into the sewers).
So I only just realized today, after nearly a decade of playing these games, that it IS possible to do all of Chapter 7 in BGEE without being arrested by the flaming fist.
Aye.. I tend to get caught on purpose as the section with meeting Angelo and getting out of jail is kind of foreshadowing. Especially Neb and his reemergence in Athkatla.
Also, if you visit Aldeth Sashenstar in chapter 7 (if you sided with him in the Cloakwood and saved his consortium), the bastard will sell you out to the Flaming Fist. I like it as an RP-ish way of getting caught, attempting to hide with an influential friend.
This may be a broader definition of "challenge" than you're looking for, but the most immersive way to play the game for me has been to
roleplay what it seems to me every character would do (i.e., avoid meta-gaming) in any given circumstance--this means all the NPCs in addition to the protagonist
adopt what feels like a 'realistic' approach to whatever the game world presents (i.e., no exploits, no cheese)
leave certain decisions to chance by flipping a playing card (red suit = yes, black suit = no) or rolling a die (using the WotC dice roller)
I've also really enjoyed the labor of love of chronicling it 1st person journal style from the protagonist's point of view. But that's a one-time project to demonstrate the concept (and I'm doting on it as such).
Anyway, I love the fact that I don't always know what's going to happen in a game like this. There's a fascinating sort of synergy that takes place between the creative imagination of roleplaying of all the characters, on the one hand, and the element of chance from the card flips and die rolls, on the other. There are aspects of the game that are plot driven and determined by the game engine. But there's still a surprising amount of room for unknowns about how the game might take shape using this approach.
As for the standard way of playing the game, I suppose the dragon battles in BG2 stand out most for me. There's just something awe-inspiring about dragons.
One of the funnest times playing BG I can ever recall was facing the dragon in Dark Side of the Sword Coast using a custom party of four paladins, a cleric-thief (SKed to human form), and a wizard, a la an Arthurian knights concept. Even though it was a wyvern scripted to fight like a dragon, it still felt epic. I guess in the DSotSC reboot for EE it will be (is?) a BG2 dragon?
I guess the other single most memorable experience of enjoyment for this game in all these years was playing a custom party of specialist mages that used only their specialization school spells; and at least early on, what a nail-biter every battle was. IIRC by around the time they reached chapter 4 they had really come into their own, though. They were actually having a relatively easy time of it by that point.
One day I got pissed off and decided that I was going to solo Firkraig clean. I had a lot of advantages, playing a cavalier with enough stuff of fire resistance on to actually heal when he breathed on me. I had an armor class of "ha hah ha try again numbnuts!" and that was before I cast draw on holy might to jack up my dexterity. I walked up to him and did the dialogue that I was going to kill him for the radiant heart (to fulfill that quest) and I had left my party in the previous room to twiddle their thumbs. I had the dragonslayer sword and red dragon shield. That was the longest fight ever. I must have drank 100 potions of extra healing and those potions of regeneration. My pissed off paladin would not be denied. When that Damn dragon finally ran out of stoneskins and various bullcrap he hit the ground, my cavalier ripped the Holy Avenger out of his hoard and bellowed to the skies like Rambo when he put that torch in his side. To this day I cannot duplicate the feat with anybody, so that character must have been something special (or they made the dragon harder).
Thinking about all the fights, I think my favorite fight in BG1, 2 or the EE's is pretty much the Fire Giant at the end of Black Pits... It's an actually hard fight, and doesn't contain any bullshit to make it "harder" like certain bosses in ToB or fights in Black Pits 2... No being immortal for like the first minute of the fight, no unresistable/unsaveable insta deaths, no endless spawn of extra enemies to overrun you, no instant death traps all over the place and taking damage from weapons below +6 enhancements...
Though he does get like 6 attacks per turn + Agannazar's Scorcher... But that's as cheap as the fight gets... You get hit a lot, you can manage that, none of those hits instantly kill you...
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There are a few other battles in the series that give me the same vibe (most notably the final seal group in Watcher's Keep - Xei Win Toh, Huntress, et al), but the Twisted Rune was the first fight that made me think 'hmm, how am I going to get past this?'
Thinking back, another element of the fight that I really appreciated was the feeling that these were personalities, individuals that were working together for some purpose. Part of that was because they had NAMES. It wasn't just 'Lich', 'Vampire', and so forth. I would really have liked to see some backstory - I know there is some sort of non-implemented quest that leads up to that encounter, and that's probably the only thing that could have made it more meaningful. Why are these folks working together? What are their goals?
So I guess for me the important elements are 1) a tactically diverse group and 2) some understanding of who that group is and what they're about.
Running around dodging them all might be my new most memorable challenge. (Extra credit points go to the 2 different flaming fist guards that would have had me too, if they'd just followed me into the sewers).
Also, if you visit Aldeth Sashenstar in chapter 7 (if you sided with him in the Cloakwood and saved his consortium), the bastard will sell you out to the Flaming Fist. I like it as an RP-ish way of getting caught, attempting to hide with an influential friend.
- roleplay what it seems to me every character would do (i.e., avoid meta-gaming) in any given circumstance--this means all the NPCs in addition to the protagonist
- adopt what feels like a 'realistic' approach to whatever the game world presents (i.e., no exploits, no cheese)
- leave certain decisions to chance by flipping a playing card (red suit = yes, black suit = no) or rolling a die (using the WotC dice roller)
I've also really enjoyed the labor of love of chronicling it 1st person journal style from the protagonist's point of view. But that's a one-time project to demonstrate the concept (and I'm doting on it as such).Anyway, I love the fact that I don't always know what's going to happen in a game like this. There's a fascinating sort of synergy that takes place between the creative imagination of roleplaying of all the characters, on the one hand, and the element of chance from the card flips and die rolls, on the other. There are aspects of the game that are plot driven and determined by the game engine. But there's still a surprising amount of room for unknowns about how the game might take shape using this approach.
As for the standard way of playing the game, I suppose the dragon battles in BG2 stand out most for me. There's just something awe-inspiring about dragons.
I guess the other single most memorable experience of enjoyment for this game in all these years was playing a custom party of specialist mages that used only their specialization school spells; and at least early on, what a nail-biter every battle was. IIRC by around the time they reached chapter 4 they had really come into their own, though. They were actually having a relatively easy time of it by that point.
Though he does get like 6 attacks per turn + Agannazar's Scorcher... But that's as cheap as the fight gets... You get hit a lot, you can manage that, none of those hits instantly kill you...