How do you deal with Sendai?

Pokota

So my F>C and his company are up to the Sendai battle in Throne of Bhaal, and I keep getting my butt handed to me. I think I've got the first two rounds down, but eventually I just start drowning in drow. What I want to do is drop a bunch of skeletons and my Simuladeste near the entrance and have them beat up on the interlopers, but that still leaves me with Sendai herself.

So how do you deal with Sendai?

Skaffen

Your party composition would be helpful. Some general suggestions:

Park some strong summon like Planetar/Deva or Elemental Lord if you have a druid at the entrance. Last time I had Chan with his normally horrible globe of blades there and didn't have to deal with a single drow

Put traps at the opposite side to where you are fighting her at still unactivated statues. It's out of sight range. Cast simulacrum on Jan if you have him for double traps.

Get more people - summons, simulacrum incl. the one from the helmet.

Potions potions potions!

Pokota

I always neglect potions.

It may actually be worthwhile to leave Sendai alone for a bit and attack Watcher's Keep (or Abazigal, even).

I'll post a more complete party composition later as I can't access levels right now, but I have a Fighter>Cleric wearing Vhailor's Helm (hence my Simuladeste), Minsc, Mazzy, Jan, Imoen, and Neera. Imoen and Neera both have Improved Alacrity and Neera has Dark Planetar and Time Stop as well. I stupidly gave Jan UAI for his first HLA and can't remember what else I gave him but I should have him abuse the Vhailor Helm if I can since I don't think he can cast Simulacrum yet. Minsc and Mazzy both have Improved Whirlwind. Neera's wearing the Robe of Vecna and I want to say Imoen is wearing the Amulet of Power. If not then that's something I need to adjust.

Heindrich

Did they make Sendai harder in the EE? Or are you playing with mods?

The following was my first effort vs Sendai in BG 2 Vanilla (Core Rules). By no means a good example of what you should do... like I totally messed up Imoen's big Timestop combo, after saving it for half of the Enclave for the final encounter. XD

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJsTmMjVYac

Edit:
ps: It might be a personal thing, but I found Abazigal's Lair much harder than Sendai's Enclave...

ps2: I used a lot of custom portraits. But my party is F/M Charname, Imoen, Aerie, Minsc, Jaheira and Anomen.

elminster

Assuming he's got skill towards Set Traps I'd have Jan strategically lay down a bunch of regular traps. They won't decide the battle for you but they'll help speed it up a bit.

Pokota

I'll give regular traps a try. When I tried to have Neera set some Skull Traps on top of Sendai #2, the one that drops a Pit Fiend on me, they all just exploded as I set them. If regular traps do stick I'll plant them under Sendai #4.

Also, I've found that Nishruu bombing the 2nd Sendai helped a little bit, so I'll try that with #4 as well. Just need to be careful to trick her into wasting her death spell before dropping loads of them on her.

Skaffen

Put Jan on trap duty, even normal ones. Improve-haste Mazzy, give her Tuigan and she will have 10 shots without whirlwind. A bit caster heavy party...

Do you have Mordenkainen's Swords? If not, why not?

You can make your key summons like Planetar or major elementals immune to death spell by casting death ward on them (you shoukd be swimming in priest spells....)

bbear

Focus fire on the drows and ignore Sendai for a while. Or simply spam some wand cloudkills at the entrance. Those drows dont know what hit them.

Mitchfork

Skaffen said:

Put Jan on trap duty, even normal ones. Improve-haste Mazzy, give her Tuigan and she will have 10 shots without whirlwind. A bit caster heavy party...

Do you have Mordenkainen's Swords? If not, why not?

You can make your key summons like Planetar or major elementals immune to death spell by casting death ward on them (you shoukd be swimming in priest spells....)

Planetars, Devas, and Elemental Princes should be immune to Death Spell because they are considered Gated instead of Summoned. I think the other Elemental summons are vulnerable, though. Death Ward isn't a terrible idea for stuff like Mordenkainen's Sword, though, since it becomes fairly invulnerable once immune to death magic.

Pokota

Nishruu versus Magic Elemental is funny as hell, by the way. The Nishruu is healed by the Magic Elemental, and since its attack counts as a magical weapon the Magic Elemental is immune to it.

I'm going to try some rearranged spells this time around to see if I can do this with what I've got. With three arcane casters and a demigod I'd better be able to pull this off. I just wish I knew where to get a Spellstrike scroll and a Potion of Genius. I'll need to go back and get more Swords and some Improved Haste scrolls if I can't pull this off with what I've got now.

Mazzy's got the Gesen Bow, so I may settle for the lower APR for the fact that she can pierce the first Sendai's defenses really well (I've only got the +2 Quiver and maybe some arrows of biting on hand). Even with Sendai's MR, Mazzy's doing very well at spell disruption. Much better than my casters are, at any rate. She's wearing a Ring of Free Action, too, and I'm not sure who else I'd want to give it to since everyone else has other ways of dealing with being held/whatevered.

Does the Ring of Free Action help against Maze? I know that was an issue on my last serious attempt.

I'm half-tempted to leave Adeste and a Simuladeste at the entrance since he's got all these True Seeings.

Adeste: Armor of Faith x 10, Remove Fear, Sanctuary, Find Traps x 4, Silence x 4, Hold Person x 4, Animate Dead x 10, Zone of Sweet Air x 2, Protection from Evil 10' Radius x 12, True Seeing x 11, Heal x 7, Summon Deva x 3, Slayer Change. Helm of Vhailor. Runehammer +5 and Crom Freyr +5.
Jan: Magic Missile x 6, Acid Arrow x 6, Flame Arrow x 6, Greater Malision x 4, Stoneskin, Breach x 5, Nishruu x 3, Mordenkainen's Sword x 2, Trap x 4, Spike Trap x 1, Use Any Item;. Firetooth +5.
Imoen: Magic Missile x 5, Acid Arrow x 5, Haste x 5, Improved Invis, Minor Globe, Red Fireshield, Blue Fireshield, Stoneskin, Breach x 5, Nishruu x 4, Hakeashar x 3, Horrid Wilting x 3, Improved Alacrity. Amulet of Power. Tuigan Bow +1, Quiver of Plenty +2
Neera: Magic Missile x 6, Mirror Image, Invisibility, Acid Arrow x 6, Skull Trap x 7, Stoneskin, Secret Word x 6, Lower Resistance x 3, Breach x 3, Nishruu x 4, Hakeashar x 5, Fiend x 4, Improved Alacrity, Dark Planetar. Robe of Vecna. Sling of Everard +5.

Imoen and Neera both have access to Simulacrum, in case that's a better choice for 8th level. Jan can't cast 8th level yet but he does also know Simulacrum. This is the main reason I'm thinking I should tackle Abazigal first and then come back to finish Sendai. Besides, I may get lucky with Abazigal like I did with that black dragon in Suldanesselar and score a Petrification Wild Surge on the first attack spell, or something else hilariously anticlimactic. I can't get that against Sendai.

EDIT: I pulled it off. Grabbed Mass Raise Dead as my next HLA since everybody else died in the attempt, but I still pulled it off. I love having an instant army ^^

elminster

If Jan can cast 7th level spells then its worth looking into giving him a Minor Sequencer, Spell Sequencer, and Contingency prior to the fight (as well as preparing sequencer/trigger/continguency spells for Imoen and Neera).

Pokota

I'm going to have to do that for Abazigal. Neera can drop six Lower Resistances in the first round between Chain Contingency and Spell Trigger.

While I'm thinking of it, I need to get Jan and Imoen Sequencer and Secret Word. The only thing I'd fail to break with that setup is Spell Trap, and for that I'd just pop an instant army anyway.

randykurm

As far as I am concerned about the Sendai It is the capital city of Miyagi Prefecture, Japan, and the largest city in the Tōhoku region. In 2005, the city had a population of one million, and was one of Japan's 20 designated cities. The city was founded in 1600 by the daimyo Date Masamune, and is well known by its nickname, the City of Trees ; there are about 60 zelkova trees on Jōzenji Street and Aoba Street.
In order to deal with the same I think one is liable to know the various aspects of the same first.

Mitchfork

randykurm said:

As far as I am concerned about the Sendai It is the capital city of Miyagi Prefecture, Japan, and the largest city in the Tōhoku region. In 2005, the city had a population of one million, and was one of Japan's 20 designated cities. The city was founded in 1600 by the daimyo Date Masamune, and is well known by its nickname, the City of Trees ; there are about 60 zelkova trees on Jōzenji Street and Aoba Street.
In order to deal with the same I think one is liable to know the various aspects of the same first.

This is my new favorite post.