I FINALLY got done reading through. (Been a busy weekend...) This is, as your's alway are, a great play-through. I hope Lenno's larcenous ways bring him nothing but success!
Hey @Elrandir, thanks so much The writing is fun, but it in the game life is by no means a breeze for Lenno.
***
On the road between Beregost and Nashkel Lenno and Eldoth ran into many hobgoblin thugs. With their daggers and arrows respectively, they managed to slay most of them. [It helped both rogues reach level 4.] One of the hobgoblins dropped a pair of soft leather boots that Lenno picked up for further inspection or identification if necessary. Both Lenno and Eldoth suffered various hits from the hobgoblin archers. [Interestingly the SCS hobgoblins picked Eldoth, a caster with a higher AC than Lenno, as their prime target even when Eldoth positioned himself farther away from them than Lenno.] When their injuries were getting serious and when Lenno ran out of throwing daggers the adventurers decided to retreat. Lenno’s lack of throwing daggers practically forced him to return to Beregost to barter with Fuiruim, and he would also have the blacksmith take a look at the boots he’d found on one of the hobgoblins. They decided to approach the town from the east, via the Temple of Lathander. That way they could enter Beregost, hopefully trade with Fuiruim, and leave right away in case any Flaming Fist mercenaries or bounty hunters would be looking for them after their nightly burgling spree through town. Such circumspection proved to be unnecessary. There were no Flaming Fist or bounty hunters, and the townspeople greeted the companions with politeness. They rested for a few days in order to fully recover from their wounds.The fact that it took them days to recover had the duo conclude that some type of clerical backup would be most welcome in their party. At the Thunderhammer Smithy Taerom Fuiruim identified the hobgoblin's boots as a pair of Worn Whispers, boots that increased the wearer’s ability to hide in shadows and move silently, very useful for Lenno. The Swashbuckler also bought four sets of throwing daggers to keep himself well-supplied for their trip to Nashkel. They had decided to go there because they were curious why different folk like Xzar and Montaron, and Khalid and Jaheira, had all wanted to go there. During the trip they met the same type of resistance as the first time: groups of hobgoblins, of which only the archers posed a threat, especially to Eldoth. The companions managed to kill a couple of them, but chose to not waste their energy and their resources on the critters.
They outran the hobgoblins and made it to Nashkel. There wasn’t much going on there although Lenno and Eldoth learned that there were more bounties up for grabs: an emerald thief and a murderous Amnish guard captain, Commander Brage. Finding a way to track down and bring in these two, as well as Bassilus the mad Cleric would considerably increase their funds. This much was crystal clear to both Lenno and Eldoth. The difficult part would be finding their prey. They were also told by the town's mayor, Berrun Ghastkill, that he'd reward them handsomely if they investigated and solved problems in the Nashkel mines with disappearing miners. Lenno and Eldoth promised Ghastkill to look into the matter, but they also remained interested in the bounties. They decided to visit the Nashkel Carnival to speak with some of the merchants and with the general public for some clues, but they found none. One of the merchants had an oil of speed for sale, which reminded Lenno of Thalantyr. The wizard had told him that he could enchant Lenno’s Dagger +1 and craft it into a returning throwing dagger if Lenno would give him an oil of speed. Lenno bought the oil and travelled with Eldoth to the High Hedge. For 500 GP and the oil of speed Lenno had Thalantyr craft the returning throwing dagger for him, a very handy weapon that would take away the need to carry the burden of dozens of throwing daggers and the risk of running out of throwing daggers.
From the High Hedge the duo returned to Beregost, where they rested at Feldepost's and visited a store that had been unmanned on the night of their burgling spree. This time however, they met a Dwarf by the name of Kagain who was in need of help finding a missing caravan north of Beregost. It was as if destiny had wanted them to meet because Kagain was a bounty hunter of sorts, a Battlerager/Thief with some experience in tracking and an aptitude for ensnaring unsuspecting victims [all his skillpoints are in Set Traps]. Lenno and Eldoth agreed to help Kagain, allowing them to appraise the Dwarf. If all was to go well they might ask him join them in their search for the heads of Bassilus, the emerald thief, and the guard captain.
They first went to the Red Sheaf, Kagain’s favorite tavern. Eldoth and Lenno could only hope that that they wouldn’t get caught up in another dust-up with brigands as had happened before at Feldepost’s. Unfortunately, they did. Another bounty hunter who was after Lenno’s head, a dwarf named Karlat. Kagain didn’t hesitate to charge in, Eldoth attacked with his poisoned arrows, and Lenno decided to test his brand new returning throwing dagger. Their joint effort was too much for the bounty hunter.
Afterward Lenno had some explaining to do, but he couldn’t. He had no idea what he was supposed to have done, let alone to whom, to merit the apparent price on his head. Eldoth, familiar with Lenno's naïveté, seemed to believe the Halfling, but Kagain eyed the Swashbuckler suspiciously. They rested and Lenno had a dream about Gorion's death and about gaining power, the power that Gorion’s killer wielded, or even more. Lenno awoke, startled. He had never really been interested in becoming powerful. He never even gave any thought to what his future could be like. Either way, he got up and felt an unfamiliar power within him, without having any idea what it was. He decided not to discuss this with Eldoth or Kagain. He hardly knew Kagain and he was unsure whether he could see Eldoth as a friend already.
The three didn’t take long in tracking Kagain’s lost caravan. It had been waylaid by four bandits who were still around when the Lenno and company arrived. The bandits attacked the party on sight. Kagain responded with his axe in melee, and Eldoth and Lenno from a distance with their arrows and throwing dagger respectively. They slew one of the bandits but had to retreat to Beregost when both Eldoth and Kagain had consumed all the party’s healing potions and still got severely injured by the bandits’ many arrows. Lenno was uninjured.
When they returned, Kagain was fully recovered (thanks to his great constitution), but Eldoth was still injured. As darkness had fallen, Lenno had little difficulty scouting the area without being noticed. When he found the still injured bandit leader he attacked from stealth, causing her to pursue him. The two fought a duel out of sight of their respective companions. Lenno took a few hits, but he prevailed and called Kagain to take on the remaining bandits in melee. They were easy pickings. Lenno found Eddard Silvershield’s fibula on the bandit leader’s corpse, much to Kagain’s distress. His reputation as a reliable mercenary would suffer greatly. Eldoth remained completely quiet about the death of his girlfriend’s brother. When Lenno sought a reaction from him, the Bard did little more than uttering a platitude about how it must be a sad day for Skie, his girl.
The companions visited the Temple of Lathander to get themselves healed, and on Kagain’s behest proceeded to explore the wilderness area south of Beregost. Eldoth and Lenno had travelled there more than once, but they had always stayed on the road. They were approached by an attractive elven female of obvious drow heritage. She asked them for protection against a Flaming Fist officer she said was after after her. Lenno and Eldoth, ever the gentlemen, especially when dealing with a beautiful creature such as this elf, agreed to help her. The Flaming Fist officer was no pushover though. Kagain enraged and charged in with his battle axe, and Lenno and Keldoth attacked from a distance, as always. It was a good thing that the Battlerager had gone berserk because it made him immune to the various Hold spells that their foe cast at him and that otherwise would have possibly affected the Dwarf. The companions, aided by the drow, had to give their utmost to gain the upper hand. The priest cast a Holy Smite that severely hurt both Kagain and Eldoth, and he also tried to cast a Hold Person in Lenno’s way, to which Lenno responded by preventively quaffing a potion of invisibility. The party’s incessant attacks eventually brought their foe down, but nor before he slew Kagain with a final blow.
The drow was relieved and thankful but at the same time ill-at-ease for having indirectly caused Kagain’s death. She presented herself as Viconia, explained she was a rogue priestess of Shar who had recently fled the Underdark, and offered to serve the party. Eldoth and Lenno accepted her offer. They could use a cleric and one so pleasing to eyes they wouldn't encounter every day.
As you can See Viconia is a Sharpshooter/Cleric:
SHARPSHOOTER: This sort of thief tends to be a stealthy character, preferring to engage a target from afar with bolt or arrow rather than face them in dangerous melee combat. Unlike the ranger, the Sharpshooter uses her skills to aid her dubious activities involving the property and lives of others rather than the protection of the great outdoors.
Although well-versed in the use of many missile weapons, the sharpshooter is not as resilient as a true warrior and the propensity for missile attacks over melee means that they lack the opportunism of other thieves when it comes to backstabbing. They tend not to see this as a disadvantage, instead striking from the shadows with a well-aimed projectile, or setting a deadly trap for those who would follow, when necessary.
Advantages: - Can attain Grand Mastery in any missile weapon a thief can use - May coat his missile weapon in poison once per day per 4 levels. Attacks made with the weapon in the next round will inject the poison into the target, dealing out 1 damage per second for 24 seconds (3 damage for the first 6 seconds). A saving throw vs. poison limits damage to 12 total.
Disadvantages: - No backstab multiplier
Viconia comes with one pip in Maces and one in Slings, the only ranged weapon she can use and will try to master up to the point of grandmastery. For roleplaying purposes I'll have her focus on stealth and trap setting.
[The party’s reputation decreased to a mere 3, an all-time low for me in all my playthroughs. The funny thing is, Lenno hasn’t really done anything wrong, except for committing some petty theft he hasn't been caught at but once in the FAI. The situation somhow fits Lenno's carelessness and his gullibility.]
At the Temple of Lathander they had the high priest raise Kagain, after which the four companions walked to Feldepost’s Inn to take some well-earned rest. The plan remains to be the same: raising funds, i.e. investigating the mines and taking the bounties on Bassilus, the emerald thief and Brage.
In Beregost, Lenno spoke with some of the townsfolk in the hopes of finding any clues as to their marks’ whereabouts. A man told him that that the priest Bassilus killed people and raised them as his undead family members.
When Lenno and Eldoth explained to Kagain that they had encountered groups of skeletons in the High Hedge area, the Dwarf replied that it would be a good idea to start looking for Bassilus there. Viconia mentioned that many competent priests knew how to animate dead, but she agreed that it would make sense to investigate the area. Thus Bassilus became the party's first target.
The party travelled west toward the High Hedge, and were again confronted with hostile skeletons. Viconia was wearing a suit of splint mail armor, which combined with her agility, made her quite difficult to hit for the skeletons and for the gnolls that also roamed about. The same could not be said of Kagain. In spite of being clad in plate mail, he took a serious beating. In his defense it must be said that he somehow drew more aggression from their foes than Viconia. [This might be SCS at work here.]
In the heat of battle against three gnolls a dexterous Elf came to the party’s aid. His bow was a great tool and certainly sped up the positive outcome of the fight. After their foes were slain, the party had a word with him. The Elf introduced himself as Kivan, a bandit-hunting Stalker. He was on a vendetta against some brute named Tazok, who had killed the love of his life, Deheriana, for no particular reason. Lenno replied that he and his comrades were on a hunt of their own. He told the Elf about Bassilus, his way of killing people and animating their corpses, and the bounty on the priest’s head. Kivan was sympathetic to the party’s cause and proposed to join with them, and Lenno replied that he would be happy to have him in the party and help him against the bandits.
Kivan is a Stalker, and thus formally not a rogue, but as I mentioned in my first post in this thread, the kit and Kivan’s vigilante rogue personality make him an exception (the only exception) to my rogues-only rule. He has three pips in dual wield, two in longswords and two in long bows.
The party of five cleared out most of the High Hedge area. They spoke with Thalantyr, to find out if the Mage knew anything about Bassilus and his undead, but he didn’t. It seems he simply lives as a recluse with little or no idea of what’s going on around him. Lenno also entered a home to enquire into the presence of undead in the area, but the house was abandoned. In a chest, he found an aquamarine gem he pocketed before he rejoined with the others. They made their way further to the west when they were beset by a large group of about twelve skeletons. Neither his dwarven constitution nor his plate mail armor saved Kagain against the onslaught of throwing daggers flying in at him. He fell for the second time in only a few days. It left Viconia [with AC -1 thanks to Splint Mail + Ring of the Princes, but with only 17 HP] alone against nine remaining skeletons, Kivan [AC 4, only mundane studded leather] switched his bows his blades and presented himself at the frontline. The party then killed off all the remaining skeletons with relative ease, although Viconia did quaff a healing potion when her health was getting dangerously low.
After the battle Lenno wrapped Kagain’s body in a blanket and stored it in his magical bag of holding. Viconia and Eldoth had proposed that they just leave the body behind, but Kivan lauded Lenno’s plan to have the Dwarf raised when they were to encounter a Temple.
They continued their way westward until they reached the north coast [where the slaying of a dread wolf helped Viconia reach Cleric level 3, an important moment because it gave her access to level 2 spells.] Lenno scouted a bit to see if any other dangers were around, but the area was peaceful and quiet. He encountered no undead, which made him fear they might have lost track of Bassilus. But that was a concern for the next day. The party set up camp and rested after their long journey in search of the evil priest. Well-rested they decided to do a more thorough exploration of the area, to make sure there was indeed no trace of Bassilus, as Lenno feared. The party met a Nereid named Shoal that insisted in accompanying them, but they didn’t trust the creature, and declined. Shoal turned hostile, summoned a Water Weird and beguiled Eldoth. However, the others’ incessant ranged attacks had her beg for mercy soon after. She came up with a story even gullible Lenno had difficulty to believe: she claimed to be under a geas or charm-like effect from some ogre mage. Viconia told her to leave the party alone, and in return they would leave her alone. But then the ogre mage, Droth showed up indeed. Again the party proposed, this time to he ogre, that they just leave each other alone, but Droth had different plans and proceeded to attack, while his slave stuck passively by his side.
The inexperienced [level 3-4] party of three was up against a heavily buffed ogre mage. (The fourth party member, Eldoth, was under the effect of Shoal’s charm for most of the battle.) Viconia immediately silenced their foe, against which it had no answer, fortunately. It caused the hasted ogre mage to attack in melee. For some reason it went after Lenno all the time, so the Halfling had to run for his life while Vicky and Kivan tried to take down his spell protections with ranged attacks to hurt the ogre. Kivan encountered a pack of three wolves and charmed them, so they would attack Droth while Lenno, Vicky and he could attack with their ranged weapons.
The wolves wouldn’t last long against their foe, although their fierce attacks did inflict some minor injuries just as the companions’ ranged attacks did. When Droth got his voice back, he started casting a Chaos spell. Highly magic resistant Vicky stayed where she was, while Kivan and Lenno moved in different directions to prevent the AoE spell from affecting all of them. The spell didn’t bypass Viconia’s magic resistance, nor did it reach Lenno or Kivan.
Thus the party survived the final trick that Droth would try to pull on them. Right after it slew the last of Kivan’s wolves, the monster fell to the elf’s bow.
On its body they found a beautiful helmet that looked like it was possibly enchanted. Lenno put it in his bag of holding. They left Shoal and further south they ran into a large group of ogres (some of them berserkers), half-ogres and ogrillons. There was no way the party could engage these giant-like creatures in melee. But in spite of their size, or maybe because of it, the monsters were slow, slower than Lenno and his companions. This Lenno remembered from his confrontation with the rogue ogre south of the Friendly Arm Inn.
With patience and careful manoeuvering (sometimes even having to split), they managed to take them all down with their ranged weapons. The only one who had suffered any serious injuries, was Eldoth, but these were remedied with healing potions. So when the battle was done, the party was still standing, with only minor injuries. A friendly priest, dressed in back, completely restored the companions’ health with his healing magic. He introduced himself as ‘The Surgeon’ and warned the party of his evil brother, a man by the name of Davaeorn, who apparently deserved nothing but death.
In a shipwreck they found an enchanted ring, but a Gnome they met shortly after, told them in a riddle-like fashion that the ring was his and that it was cursed. He urged them not to use it or it would addle their minds. He would trade it with them for an oil of fiery burning. Viconia observed that if they were to keep the ring, they would have to get it identified first, before anyone could try it on. Kivan stated that children and mad men generally speak the truth. He was inclined to trust the Gnome. Eldoth remarked that the purportedly mind-addling ring might well have been the cause of the Gnome’s awkard manner of speech and Lenno figured that an oil of fiery burning wasn’t a bad reward for returning a simple item (even though they’d had to slay a giant centipede to find it). So they agreed to the Gnome’s proposal.
As the area was indeed devoid of undead as Lenno had thought, the party tracked back to the High Hedge. They had Thalantyr identify Droth’s helmet as a Helmet of Defense that increases the wearer’s elemental resistances. Viconia, the party’s (frail) tank thanks to her admirable agility and her great magic resistance, got to wear it.
The party conferred on which way to go to get to Bassilus. If they were going to follow the skeletons, they had only one option: south. East of the High Hedge, toward Beregost, there were no skeletons. Viconia could attest to that. North of the area they would reach the Candlekeep coast way area which housed mainly gibberlings and wolves, but no skeletons. They just returned from a long trek westward with no trace of Bassilus. So south they went. Their journey was uneventful, although they were “waylaid” by a dread wolf [the killing of which had Eldoth and Lenno reach level 5]. Further south they saved a talking chicken from a wolf. The creature introduced itself as Melicamp and begged them to escort it to Thalantyr who would restore it to its human form. The party was quite puzzled by the “animal” and was unsure whether to even trust it, but they did trust grumpy old Thalantyr. Therefore, they agreed to help Melicamp. Lenno was actually quite curious to see what would happen with Melicamp. However, they wouldn’t return to the High Hedge before having properly investigated the area they were in. Three hobgoblins threatened to kill the companions if they didn’t hand over their gold. The band had dealt with hobgoblins in the past without trouble, so they weren’t really upset by this trio. Not surprisingly, they declined to hand over their gold, and battle ensued. These hobgoblins were actually tougher than most. While Viconia successfully tanked the hobgoblin’s leader, the other two hit Kivan with poisoned arrows. Viconia had to quaff a healing potion and Kivan an antidote before the party could slay their foes. When they searched the fallen hobgoblins’ corpses they found a wand on one of them. Eldoth remarked that as a Bard he was able to use wands. He identified it as a wand of lightning, and observed that these wands are highly sought after, so they could also sell it for a handsome amount of gold, and maybe buy some useful gear at Thalantyr’s or at the Thunderhammer Smithy in Beregost.)
A little child approached the party, speaking of Bassilus and his ‘funny spooks’. They had finally found their prey! He was standing in the middle of a stone circle, surrounded by skeletons and zombies. Lenno stealthily approached, followed by Viconia. They heard him speak to his ‘family’, and Viconia told Lenno that the undead company Bassilus kept seemed to have noticeably dimmed the priest’s wits. They would try to play along and get him to accompany them to Beregost. Lenno presented himself as Bassilus’ father. The plot seemed to work until the priest saw through it in a moment of clarity and turned hostile. The undead fell though, meaning they would only have to deal with Bassilus himself. While the priest buffed himself, Viconia cast a Hold Person his way. The spell took effect.
Lenno realized at that point that given her poweful magics, Viconia must have been truly blessed indeed by her goddess Shar. Meanwhile the young Swashbuckler had difficulty not seeing Viconia as a goddess herself. Seldom, if ever, had he seen such a beautiful creature, and apart from her appearance she had made some astute and insightful observations in their dealings with others, she could tank all kinds of foes, and as said her magic had proven to be potent (first against Droth, now against Bassilus).
The four companions attacked Bassilus with their ranged weapons and saw how he took hit after hit but wouldn’t fall. Viconia even poisoned her sling bullets, and with them the priest, in the hopes that the poison would fell him. It took many more attacks until Bassilus would finally fall [he has around 100 HP in SCS].
Morale in the party was high, after this successful expedition, and they were all more than willing to continue travelling together. Kivan proved to a bit of a dissonant, when he remarked that he saw a similarity between Bassilus who had created his own undead family, and himself, for longing after a ghost, that of his beloved Deheriana. Lenno understood that it would be a good thing to help the sullen Stalker get his revenge against this Tazok.
First however, the party returned to the High Hedge where they sold the wand of lightning as well some minor loot (mundane weapons, some gems). Ironically the wand they had stumbled upon by accident was worth more than twice as much as the bounty on Bassilus’ head they had been after all those days. Lenno bought a Deep Red Ioun Stone which increases the user’s dexterity [+1]. For Eldoth he bought a Deep Purple Ioun Stone that provides 60’ infravision (and allows the user to see Smoke on the Water). Importantly, both items, like all ioun stones, protect against critical hits. There was also an ioun stone for sale that gives a lore bonus, very useful for Eldoth, but it was a bit too expensive for the time being.
Thalantyr miraculously restored Melicamp, apparently a former student of his, to his human form. The party was somewhat disappointed with not receiving any form of reward, but decided not to make a fuss. First of all Thalantyr had just proved himself a powerful mage. Besides, he somehow managed to acquire all kinds of interesting items he offered for sale. The party would surely want to return at a later time to see his wares and possibly new items of interest.
At the Temple of Lathander Lenno handed Bassilus’ holy symbol to high priest Keldath Orlmlyr to claim the 5000 GP bounty. They also had the priest raise Kagain. [I lowered his CON by -1 as per the self-imposed rule.] He was then dismissed from the party, as he had seemed to be too much of a liability and besides Lenno wouldn’t want Kagain to suffer any further permanent health declines. Lenno gave the Dwarf his weapons and armor, but no gold because the gold he was due at the moment of his decease equaled the amount of gold the party had just paid Keldath for raising him.
Lenno and his companions are currently enjoying some time to relax at the Jovial Juggler in Beregost. The Halfling is in high spirits, more than content with his party members and with the band’s great feats. He thinks he’s becoming quite the hero, completely unaware of his abysmal reputation. [The party’s reputation is 4: despised. I’ve got a mod component installed which gives slight store discounts at low reputation. Lenno actually thinks merchants’ and other people’s kindness is based on respect and admiration rather than fear.]
The party is still conferring over their next step. There are two more unclaimed bounties: the emerald thief, and Commander Brage. At the same time Lenno wants to help Kivan.
Does anyone who made it all the way here know how long I can wait with taking on Tazok and the Bandit Camp before Kivan leaves?
@MacHurto, @Gotural, thanks! Yes it's fun playing a supernaive charname. Also works as an extra impetus to refrain from metagaming, although his wiser companions influence him. As to Kivan0s timer, that's interesting. I think I picked him up in Chapter 3 (i.e. after having spoken to Berrun Ghastkill) Means I have to rush or roleplay and lose him...
All I know is that it's a bit too short for my liking. I would honestly use the console to set it back some, were I ever to take him. He just leaves too quickly.
Does anyone who made it all the way here know how long I can wait with taking on Tazok and the Bandit Camp before Kivan leaves?
You do not have very long: 10 days maybe at most. I found this out the hard way in my play-through with Ellsbeth. You have no more than 7 days after he gives his first warning. Also, his quest is not considered completed (in a vanilla or SCS-only setup) until you speak with the Lieutenant at the Jovial Juggler, after defeating the bandits, and having 0 scalps in your possession.
@Elrandir, hmm I thought Chapter 3 was triggered when you speak with Berrun and get the first Bhaalspawn dream, but maybe you're right. You're saying it's something like this:
1: Candlekeep 2: Gorion's Death - Nashkel Mines cleared 3: Nashkel Mines cleared - Bandits cleared 4: Bandits cleared - Daveorn killed 5: Davaeorn killed - Candlekeep for Duke Eltan 6: Candlekeep for Eltan - Endgame 7: Endgame
No prob! Happy to help. Actually, now that I'm thinking about it, chapter two triggers just by entering Nashkel. I rarely talk to Ghastkill right off the bat, but the chapter changes and the dream can be triggered.
Prologue: Candlekeep 1. Gorion's death - speaking with Ghastkill 2. Speaking with Ghastkill - Nashkel mines cleared. ect. ect.
1 - Gorion's death to reaching Nashkel. 2 - Reaching Nashkel to Picking the Letters form Mulahey's body. edit; duh i did not read Elrandir's second post about this
2 - Reaching Nashkel to Picking the Letters form Mulahey's body. edit; duh i did not read Elrandir's second post about this
Yeah... that´s correct. Picking up the letters from Mulahey advances the chapter. You do not have to meet with Ghastkill a second time to advance the plot. All you receive from Ghastkill is 900 gold, +1 reputation, and I believe 1000 xp.
Similarly picking up the letters from the chest in the bandit camp advances the chapter as well. So you never need to sell all the bandit scalps and lose the Flaming Fist lieutenant in the Juggler. You can actually sell her Wyvern heads from Cloakwood later for 1000 gp each. But this does not complete Kivan´s quest. You still have to sell all the bandit scalps and then speak with the Lieutenant again at the Jovial Jugglar to complete Kivan´s quest.
Too bad you can't sell wyvern heads to Vai in EE. =\ It'd be so nice to get 1k for them. Thalantyr only gives... 250? I think that's how much he gives. But I digress. XD
@Blackraven, wow, what a great run. You must really enjoy writing. It looks like you're spending a lot of time and hard work on your chapters.
Do you have "happy patch - npc's never leave" from Tweaks? I assume that's how you're keeping Kivan in a party with a reputation of four. That same component of Tweaks may affect Kivan's timer, and the NPC Project might also affect it. It seems like you should be getting attacked by the Flaming Fist, too, unless that's also modded. Or does that only happen at reputation three?
I notice some aesthetic enhancements in your screen shots, like Kivan's black hair. I found that shade of black once in Keeper and put in on Kivan. Did you also Keeper it, or do you have an aesthetics mod? The armor looks really sharp - are you using Erephine's 1PP by any chance?
It looks like Kivan isn't wearing a helmet when he should be. Is that a choice to live dangerously, or do you have helmet animations turned off?
EDIT: I found your WEIDU log posted in the third and fourth posts that answered most of my questions. I still didn't see under Tweaks or anywhere else where you had reputation reactions adjusted, though. It's probably in there and I'm just not spotting it.
@BelgarathMTH, thanks for taking your time again. Yes, I do enjoy the writing. It's time-comsuming but for the love I have for this game I want to do at least one journalled playthrough of the entire trilogy. I've made the mistake before to combine extensive journalling with no-reload, but for this run I explicitly opted for minimal reload. So far I haven't reloaded, although current events (to be reported in my next installment had me consider a reload). I like the 'band of rogues' idea, and charname's personality. For fun gameplay and for power I might have preferred a Cleric/Thief, especially at later levels, but that's water under the bridge... As to your emaining question, I don't have the 'Happy Patch' or any other reputation reaction adjusting mod component. My party's reputation is 4. According to this link good-aligned party members only leave at reputation 1-2. If that's incorrect, then maybe it has to do with the fact that my reputation was already 4 when Kivan joined? He never saw the party's reputation decrease.
I removed the helmet animations, but I understand your confusion: Viconia's Helmet of Defense is visible for some reason.
Btw I also read part of your Nordic Warriors playthrough. Highly enjoyable. I see you also placed a strong emphasis on RP aspects, intra-party relationships, etc. Branwen says she misses the coasts of her homeland and Todek, eager to plese, immediately has the party travel to the Sword Coast. Stuff like that. Highly entertaining.
In the Jovial Juggler Lenno ran into Gurke before he was able to cover his Cloak of Non-Detection. Lenno had completely forgotten about the dwarf. Interestingly, instead of demanding his cloak back, Gurke actually wanted Lenno to keep it. Apparently the dwarf was living off his fame for being the fellow that lost his cloak in the Cloakwood. As far as Lenno was concerned the party’s next step would be to go after Tazok, to show Kivan some goodwill, but the Elf couldn’t tell where his nemesis could be found. The party then agreed to go and investigate the Nashkel Mines. At least the mines were easy to find, unlike Brage, Tazok and the emerald thief. They explored the area, and stumbled upon the emerald thief, an artist by the name of Prism, who was sculpting the image of his muse in stone. Prism admitted his crime but said that the emeralds were better used for his sculpture than in some fat noblewoman’s purse.
Lenno, quite flexible himself when it comes to property rights, liked Prism’s line of thought. He was going to tell Prism he would forget about the price on the artist’s head, when another came to claim the bounty. A bounty hunter called Greywolf. This bounty hunter wasn’t much of a talker. All he had to say was that he was going to kill Lenno and his companions, and then take the bounty on Prism. But Viconia had a different outcome in mind. She held Greywolf, after which the companions pelted him with arrows, throwing daggers and bullets until he fell.
During the commotion Prism finished his work, but when Lenno approached him to praise his work, the artist dropped dead from apparent heart failure. Both Lenno and Kivan expressed their grief for what had happened to Prism. Eldoth, ever the practical thinker, picked up the emeralds and said they might as well return to Nashkel to claim their bounty. This cheered Lenno up a bit. He wouldn’t consider the way they had dealt with Prism and Greywolf a heroic feat, but it couldn’t be denied that his band had done the Sword Coast yet another service. Surely it would further improve their rapport with the local community, giving them a sense of security and the knowledge that crimes don’t go unpunished. Nothing could have been further from the truth, as they would learn upon arrival in Nashkel. The entire town was hostile, commoners and guards alike. And the latter didn’t hesitate to attack the party on sight.
None of them had a clue what brought this on. Viconia used to having to defend herself against unprovoked attackers observed that they could probably take on the guards but that the wiser course of action would be to lay low for a while. She recommended returning to the desolate coastlands. None of the other had any better idea, so west they travelled.
‘I have been looking for… strong men. Like yourselves.’ Eldoth and Lenno looked at each other, both suppressing a smile. On the coast a beautiful half-elven Gypsy approached the party and had an interesting proposition for them:
Both Lenno and Eldoth would have probably accepted the sultry lady into the party even if she hadn’t mentioned the treasure, but now that she had, they welcomed her without even asking Kivan or Viconia for their opinions. Fortunately neither Kivan nor Vicky had any objections, so they too welcomed Safana.
The party of (now) five went on to kill various worgs and dread wolves. Thus, without knowing it, they helped a boy return to his mother. The boy had fled from a number of worgs and only dared look for his mother after the party had killed the beasts. Lenno scouted the area and spotted various sirines along the shore. These were perfidious creatures, Kivan told them, with powerful charms and knowledge of poisons. Lenno’s excellent stealth skill made him the ideal candidate to sneak past them and enter the treasure cave Safana had mentioned.
[end of journal entry]
***
This plan worked pretty well, until one three sirines right in front of the entrance to the cave detected him. They proceeded to attack, but Lenno swiftly entered the cave, where he hid again. As he ventured deeper into the cave he triggered a web trap. He got held in it, and suffered a number of hits from the sirines' arrows. (Apparently the sirines had followed Lenno inside.) Once he got free, he quaffed a healing potion and rushed away from the still active web, past a flesh golem, toward an open space with a pool of water and another flesh golem. There he triggered another trap that did him in.
I know: (1) that the cave is trapped in BGEE and probably in the original game as well. But in my modded BGT setups, it wasn't, possibly because of the Lure of the Sirines mod I used to play with until recently. As a consequence I simply wasn't prepared for any traps. (2) that this is a so-called minimal reload game. But I notice that 'minimal reload' is easier said than done for a compulsive no-reloader such as myself (as lacklustre as my performances may be). I feel I should at least survive BG1 without reloading as I've done that various times before with different characters. And with a potion of invisibility available, I could have so easily gotten Lenno out of trouble that it makes me feel undeserving of a reload. (3) that if I give up on this playthrough and thus the journal, that any future playthroughs will be reported very concisely, if at all. It's either an extensive journalling and heavy RPing, or no-reload + metagaming. The two don't go together. I think I can't be bothered with extensively detailing the same (first) part of the game over and over again. I'm going to keep the save, and see if I can set my mind on minimal reload. Maybe I'll just stop playing for a while, until I feel like picking up Lenno again.
Ouch... It's unfortunate to see him fall... I hope this truly WILL be a minimal reload game, even if you take a bit of time off from it. Do you know why everyone in Nashkel was aggressive? That seems... strange, at best.
@Elrandir, no clue about the situation in Nashkel. Lenno & company had done nothing wrong there, not even stolen anything. Reputation was low (4), but afaik that should only cause the appearance of Flaming Fist or bounty hunters, not the hostility of an entire town (inlcluding the shopkeeper and Berrun Ghastkill). All in all, Luckyhand has been pretty unlucky, but that's one of the things I liked about this run.
Thanks for your words. I think I will continue this run in the same spontaneous way, after the disappointment has somewhat subsided... It makes no sense to expect myself to complete a no-reload run if I don't metagame at all. (The only metagamey thing I did this time was to place Montaron behind Tarnesh.) I might start another no-reload run with a new character, to keep the no-reloader in me busy.
Sorry for your loss, @Blackraven. I hope you will consider continuing as a minimal reload at some point.
Confusion about what's installed and what's not is one reason why I like to keep my mods to a minimum, especially the ones that change gameplay significantly. Even with reviewing the Weidu log, you can't always remember what mod does what and where it does it, so, when I do play with a heavily modded setup, I always proceed with extreme caution and make no assumptions about what I'll find in different areas.
Even uninstalling a mod doesn't necessarily get rid of everything that mod changed when it was first installed. I learned that the hard way with SCS and NPC Project. I once got a setup so mucked up installing and uninstalling and reinstalling those two, I had no choice but to trash the whole setup and start over with a clean install, which is a very inconvenient and tedious process.
To ease your pain, let me share with you how one of my druids died on that same map. We killed all the worgs, all the hobgoblins, the sirines, the flesh golems, disarmed the traps, looted the cave, recruited Safana... the works. We did this all at level 4. I was quite pleased with myself and Charname was 300 xp away from level 5.
Then I talked to that fortune teller and pleaded with her to share her information. She turned hostile and cast sleep before we could do anything. She slept everyone except Imoen. She cast acid arrow and Charname. Imoen attacked her, got her agro, and pulled her away from the sleeping party, right into a pack of Tasloi that had spawned. Imoen kept agro of the witch and the tasloi, running around for a while, until she got too close to the party. The tasloi started attacking the sleeping characters. Imoen shot some arrows at the tasloi and pulled them away from the party, right into a group of dire wolves that had spawned. The party woke up and immediately set after the mage. She slept the entire party again immediately (except Imoen). Imoen kept running around, but could not keep the wolves, the mage, and the tasloi all from attacking the sleeping characters. A dread wolf killed charname while he slept: killed by the easiest encounter on the map.
I checked my WEIDU-log, and found the answer: ~SETUP-BGTTWEAK.TP2~ #0 #902 // Random activated traps in the pirate cave -> Game-time randomisation: 11 (5 Feb 12)
I must have never used that component before, or maybe it got overwritten by something else in previous installs. I will continue this playthrough as a minimal-reload run with no metagaming and RP-based stroytelling, because I like it. The fact that I don't know exactly what to expect from all my mods goes well with this approach. I agree with you though, that for no-reload this is unwise. That much has become clear already
@Aurorus, thanks for sharing. A painful and frustrating way to see your charname fall, as you say right after you tackled the truly challenging aspects of that map. Very sorry about that, but least you admirably did what you could. My frustration was that I was too busy looking for a place to HiS to even notice my potion of invisibility that would have allowed me to heal, detect traps, even return to the party. Oh well, nothing that can be done now.
Have you ever played a PnP game like Warhammer or WH40K ? In these games, your character have something called "Fate Points" which act like a reload (your character takes a hit and die, but instead you burn a Fate Point and he survives). You have something like 2 or at most 3 of them and you can't earn them except by doing truly incredible things.
Maybe you could do something of the sort for Lenno, allowing yourself 2-3 reloads over the course of the saga (Defeating Sarevok / Irenicus could make you gain one Fate Point I think).
That way it could be a playthrough between the no-reload and the minimal reload !
Gotural, never heard of fate points. Thanks, I like the idea. I'm going to use it, and if I die too often I'll go back to minimal reload. On the one hand I want to try my hand at a complete, heavily roleplayed trilogy playthrough, and on the other hand I'm addicted to the no-reload challenge, so I want my character and the NPCs to die as little as possible. I think your suggstion could offer be a very nice way to continue to combine great carefulness with immersive and non- metagemed roleplaying. Thanks agian!
Comments
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On the road between Beregost and Nashkel Lenno and Eldoth ran into many hobgoblin thugs. With their daggers and arrows respectively, they managed to slay most of them. [It helped both rogues reach level 4.] One of the hobgoblins dropped a pair of soft leather boots that Lenno picked up for further inspection or identification if necessary. Both Lenno and Eldoth suffered various hits from the hobgoblin archers. [Interestingly the SCS hobgoblins picked Eldoth, a caster with a higher AC than Lenno, as their prime target even when Eldoth positioned himself farther away from them than Lenno.] When their injuries were getting serious and when Lenno ran out of throwing daggers the adventurers decided to retreat. Lenno’s lack of throwing daggers practically forced him to return to Beregost to barter with Fuiruim, and he would also have the blacksmith take a look at the boots he’d found on one of the hobgoblins. They decided to approach the town from the east, via the Temple of Lathander. That way they could enter Beregost, hopefully trade with Fuiruim, and leave right away in case any Flaming Fist mercenaries or bounty hunters would be looking for them after their nightly burgling spree through town. Such circumspection proved to be unnecessary. There were no Flaming Fist or bounty hunters, and the townspeople greeted the companions with politeness.
They rested for a few days in order to fully recover from their wounds.The fact that it took them days to recover had the duo conclude that some type of clerical backup would be most welcome in their party. At the Thunderhammer Smithy Taerom Fuiruim identified the hobgoblin's boots as a pair of Worn Whispers, boots that increased the wearer’s ability to hide in shadows and move silently, very useful for Lenno. The Swashbuckler also bought four sets of throwing daggers to keep himself well-supplied for their trip to Nashkel. They had decided to go there because they were curious why different folk like Xzar and Montaron, and Khalid and Jaheira, had all wanted to go there. During the trip they met the same type of resistance as the first time: groups of hobgoblins, of which only the archers posed a threat, especially to Eldoth. The companions managed to kill a couple of them, but chose to not waste their energy and their resources on the critters.
They outran the hobgoblins and made it to Nashkel. There wasn’t much going on there although Lenno and Eldoth learned that there were more bounties up for grabs: an emerald thief and a murderous Amnish guard captain, Commander Brage. Finding a way to track down and bring in these two, as well as Bassilus the mad Cleric would considerably increase their funds. This much was crystal clear to both Lenno and Eldoth. The difficult part would be finding their prey. They were also told by the town's mayor, Berrun Ghastkill, that he'd reward them handsomely if they investigated and solved problems in the Nashkel mines with disappearing miners. Lenno and Eldoth promised Ghastkill to look into the matter, but they also remained interested in the bounties. They decided to visit the Nashkel Carnival to speak with some of the merchants and with the general public for some clues, but they found none. One of the merchants had an oil of speed for sale, which reminded Lenno of Thalantyr. The wizard had told him that he could enchant Lenno’s Dagger +1 and craft it into a returning throwing dagger if Lenno would give him an oil of speed. Lenno bought the oil and travelled with Eldoth to the High Hedge. For 500 GP and the oil of speed Lenno had Thalantyr craft the returning throwing dagger for him, a very handy weapon that would take away the need to carry the burden of dozens of throwing daggers and the risk of running out of throwing daggers.
From the High Hedge the duo returned to Beregost, where they rested at Feldepost's and visited a store that had been unmanned on the night of their burgling spree. This time however, they met a Dwarf by the name of Kagain who was in need of help finding a missing caravan north of Beregost. It was as if destiny had wanted them to meet because Kagain was a bounty hunter of sorts, a Battlerager/Thief with some experience in tracking and an aptitude for ensnaring unsuspecting victims [all his skillpoints are in Set Traps]. Lenno and Eldoth agreed to help Kagain, allowing them to appraise the Dwarf. If all was to go well they might ask him join them in their search for the heads of Bassilus, the emerald thief, and the guard captain.
They first went to the Red Sheaf, Kagain’s favorite tavern. Eldoth and Lenno could only hope that that they wouldn’t get caught up in another dust-up with brigands as had happened before at Feldepost’s. Unfortunately, they did. Another bounty hunter who was after Lenno’s head, a dwarf named Karlat. Kagain didn’t hesitate to charge in, Eldoth attacked with his poisoned arrows, and Lenno decided to test his brand new returning throwing dagger. Their joint effort was too much for the bounty hunter.
Afterward Lenno had some explaining to do, but he couldn’t. He had no idea what he was supposed to have done, let alone to whom, to merit the apparent price on his head. Eldoth, familiar with Lenno's naïveté, seemed to believe the Halfling, but Kagain eyed the Swashbuckler suspiciously. They rested and Lenno had a dream about Gorion's death and about gaining power, the power that Gorion’s killer wielded, or even more. Lenno awoke, startled. He had never really been interested in becoming powerful. He never even gave any thought to what his future could be like. Either way, he got up and felt an unfamiliar power within him, without having any idea what it was. He decided not to discuss this with Eldoth or Kagain. He hardly knew Kagain and he was unsure whether he could see Eldoth as a friend already.
The three didn’t take long in tracking Kagain’s lost caravan. It had been waylaid by four bandits who were still around when the Lenno and company arrived. The bandits attacked the party on sight. Kagain responded with his axe in melee, and Eldoth and Lenno from a distance with their arrows and throwing dagger respectively. They slew one of the bandits but had to retreat to Beregost when both Eldoth and Kagain had consumed all the party’s healing potions and still got severely injured by the bandits’ many arrows. Lenno was uninjured.
When they returned, Kagain was fully recovered (thanks to his great constitution), but Eldoth was still injured. As darkness had fallen, Lenno had little difficulty scouting the area without being noticed. When he found the still injured bandit leader he attacked from stealth, causing her to pursue him. The two fought a duel out of sight of their respective companions. Lenno took a few hits, but he prevailed and called Kagain to take on the remaining bandits in melee. They were easy pickings.
Lenno found Eddard Silvershield’s fibula on the bandit leader’s corpse, much to Kagain’s distress. His reputation as a reliable mercenary would suffer greatly. Eldoth remained completely quiet about the death of his girlfriend’s brother. When Lenno sought a reaction from him, the Bard did little more than uttering a platitude about how it must be a sad day for Skie, his girl.
The companions visited the Temple of Lathander to get themselves healed, and on Kagain’s behest proceeded to explore the wilderness area south of Beregost. Eldoth and Lenno had travelled there more than once, but they had always stayed on the road. They were approached by an attractive elven female of obvious drow heritage. She asked them for protection against a Flaming Fist officer she said was after after her. Lenno and Eldoth, ever the gentlemen, especially when dealing with a beautiful creature such as this elf, agreed to help her. The Flaming Fist officer was no pushover though. Kagain enraged and charged in with his battle axe, and Lenno and Keldoth attacked from a distance, as always. It was a good thing that the Battlerager had gone berserk because it made him immune to the various Hold spells that their foe cast at him and that otherwise would have possibly affected the Dwarf. The companions, aided by the drow, had to give their utmost to gain the upper hand. The priest cast a Holy Smite that severely hurt both Kagain and Eldoth, and he also tried to cast a Hold Person in Lenno’s way, to which Lenno responded by preventively quaffing a potion of invisibility. The party’s incessant attacks eventually brought their foe down, but nor before he slew Kagain with a final blow.
The drow was relieved and thankful but at the same time ill-at-ease for having indirectly caused Kagain’s death. She presented herself as Viconia, explained she was a rogue priestess of Shar who had recently fled the Underdark, and offered to serve the party. Eldoth and Lenno accepted her offer. They could use a cleric and one so pleasing to eyes they wouldn't encounter every day.
As you can See Viconia is a Sharpshooter/Cleric:
SHARPSHOOTER: This sort of thief tends to be a stealthy character, preferring to engage a target from afar with bolt or arrow rather than face them in dangerous melee combat. Unlike the ranger, the Sharpshooter uses her skills to aid her dubious activities involving the property and lives of others rather than the protection of the great outdoors.
Although well-versed in the use of many missile weapons, the sharpshooter is not as resilient as a true warrior and the propensity for missile attacks over melee means that they lack the opportunism of other thieves when it comes to backstabbing. They tend not to see this as a disadvantage, instead striking from the shadows with a well-aimed projectile, or setting a deadly trap for those who would follow, when necessary.
Advantages:
- Can attain Grand Mastery in any missile weapon a thief can use
- May coat his missile weapon in poison once per day per 4 levels. Attacks made with the weapon in the next round will inject the poison into the target, dealing out 1 damage per second for 24 seconds (3 damage for the first 6 seconds). A saving throw vs. poison limits damage to 12 total.
Disadvantages:
- No backstab multiplier
Viconia comes with one pip in Maces and one in Slings, the only ranged weapon she can use and will try to master up to the point of grandmastery. For roleplaying purposes I'll have her focus on stealth and trap setting.
[The party’s reputation decreased to a mere 3, an all-time low for me in all my playthroughs. The funny thing is, Lenno hasn’t really done anything wrong, except for committing some petty theft he hasn't been caught at but once in the FAI. The situation somhow fits Lenno's carelessness and his gullibility.]
At the Temple of Lathander they had the high priest raise Kagain, after which the four companions walked to Feldepost’s Inn to take some well-earned rest. The plan remains to be the same: raising funds, i.e. investigating the mines and taking the bounties on Bassilus, the emerald thief and Brage.
When Lenno and Eldoth explained to Kagain that they had encountered groups of skeletons in the High Hedge area, the Dwarf replied that it would be a good idea to start looking for Bassilus there. Viconia mentioned that many competent priests knew how to animate dead, but she agreed that it would make sense to investigate the area. Thus Bassilus became the party's first target.
The party travelled west toward the High Hedge, and were again confronted with hostile skeletons. Viconia was wearing a suit of splint mail armor, which combined with her agility, made her quite difficult to hit for the skeletons and for the gnolls that also roamed about. The same could not be said of Kagain. In spite of being clad in plate mail, he took a serious beating. In his defense it must be said that he somehow drew more aggression from their foes than Viconia. [This might be SCS at work here.]
In the heat of battle against three gnolls a dexterous Elf came to the party’s aid. His bow was a great tool and certainly sped up the positive outcome of the fight. After their foes were slain, the party had a word with him. The Elf introduced himself as Kivan, a bandit-hunting Stalker. He was on a vendetta against some brute named Tazok, who had killed the love of his life, Deheriana, for no particular reason. Lenno replied that he and his comrades were on a hunt of their own. He told the Elf about Bassilus, his way of killing people and animating their corpses, and the bounty on the priest’s head. Kivan was sympathetic to the party’s cause and proposed to join with them, and Lenno replied that he would be happy to have him in the party and help him against the bandits.
Kivan is a Stalker, and thus formally not a rogue, but as I mentioned in my first post in this thread, the kit and Kivan’s vigilante rogue personality make him an exception (the only exception) to my rogues-only rule. He has three pips in dual wield, two in longswords and two in long bows.
The party of five cleared out most of the High Hedge area. They spoke with Thalantyr, to find out if the Mage knew anything about Bassilus and his undead, but he didn’t. It seems he simply lives as a recluse with little or no idea of what’s going on around him. Lenno also entered a home to enquire into the presence of undead in the area, but the house was abandoned. In a chest, he found an aquamarine gem he pocketed before he rejoined with the others.
They made their way further to the west when they were beset by a large group of about twelve skeletons. Neither his dwarven constitution nor his plate mail armor saved Kagain against the onslaught of throwing daggers flying in at him. He fell for the second time in only a few days. It left Viconia [with AC -1 thanks to Splint Mail + Ring of the Princes, but with only 17 HP] alone against nine remaining skeletons, Kivan [AC 4, only mundane studded leather] switched his bows his blades and presented himself at the frontline. The party then killed off all the remaining skeletons with relative ease, although Viconia did quaff a healing potion when her health was getting dangerously low.
After the battle Lenno wrapped Kagain’s body in a blanket and stored it in his magical bag of holding. Viconia and Eldoth had proposed that they just leave the body behind, but Kivan lauded Lenno’s plan to have the Dwarf raised when they were to encounter a Temple.
They continued their way westward until they reached the north coast [where the slaying of a dread wolf helped Viconia reach Cleric level 3, an important moment because it gave her access to level 2 spells.] Lenno scouted a bit to see if any other dangers were around, but the area was peaceful and quiet. He encountered no undead, which made him fear they might have lost track of Bassilus. But that was a concern for the next day. The party set up camp and rested after their long journey in search of the evil priest. Well-rested they decided to do a more thorough exploration of the area, to make sure there was indeed no trace of Bassilus, as Lenno feared.
The party met a Nereid named Shoal that insisted in accompanying them, but they didn’t trust the creature, and declined. Shoal turned hostile, summoned a Water Weird and beguiled Eldoth. However, the others’ incessant ranged attacks had her beg for mercy soon after. She came up with a story even gullible Lenno had difficulty to believe: she claimed to be under a geas or charm-like effect from some ogre mage. Viconia told her to leave the party alone, and in return they would leave her alone. But then the ogre mage, Droth showed up indeed. Again the party proposed, this time to he ogre, that they just leave each other alone, but Droth had different plans and proceeded to attack, while his slave stuck passively by his side.
The inexperienced [level 3-4] party of three was up against a heavily buffed ogre mage. (The fourth party member, Eldoth, was under the effect of Shoal’s charm for most of the battle.) Viconia immediately silenced their foe, against which it had no answer, fortunately. It caused the hasted ogre mage to attack in melee. For some reason it went after Lenno all the time, so the Halfling had to run for his life while Vicky and Kivan tried to take down his spell protections with ranged attacks to hurt the ogre. Kivan encountered a pack of three wolves and charmed them, so they would attack Droth while Lenno, Vicky and he could attack with their ranged weapons.
The wolves wouldn’t last long against their foe, although their fierce attacks did inflict some minor injuries just as the companions’ ranged attacks did. When Droth got his voice back, he started casting a Chaos spell. Highly magic resistant Vicky stayed where she was, while Kivan and Lenno moved in different directions to prevent the AoE spell from affecting all of them. The spell didn’t bypass Viconia’s magic resistance, nor did it reach Lenno or Kivan.
Thus the party survived the final trick that Droth would try to pull on them. Right after it slew the last of Kivan’s wolves, the monster fell to the elf’s bow.
On its body they found a beautiful helmet that looked like it was possibly enchanted. Lenno put it in his bag of holding. They left Shoal and further south they ran into a large group of ogres (some of them berserkers), half-ogres and ogrillons. There was no way the party could engage these giant-like creatures in melee. But in spite of their size, or maybe because of it, the monsters were slow, slower than Lenno and his companions. This Lenno remembered from his confrontation with the rogue ogre south of the Friendly Arm Inn.
With patience and careful manoeuvering (sometimes even having to split), they managed to take them all down with their ranged weapons. The only one who had suffered any serious injuries, was Eldoth, but these were remedied with healing potions. So when the battle was done, the party was still standing, with only minor injuries. A friendly priest, dressed in back, completely restored the companions’ health with his healing magic. He introduced himself as ‘The Surgeon’ and warned the party of his evil brother, a man by the name of Davaeorn, who apparently deserved nothing but death.
In a shipwreck they found an enchanted ring, but a Gnome they met shortly after, told them in a riddle-like fashion that the ring was his and that it was cursed. He urged them not to use it or it would addle their minds. He would trade it with them for an oil of fiery burning. Viconia observed that if they were to keep the ring, they would have to get it identified first, before anyone could try it on. Kivan stated that children and mad men generally speak the truth. He was inclined to trust the Gnome. Eldoth remarked that the purportedly mind-addling ring might well have been the cause of the Gnome’s awkard manner of speech and Lenno figured that an oil of fiery burning wasn’t a bad reward for returning a simple item (even though they’d had to slay a giant centipede to find it). So they agreed to the Gnome’s proposal.
As the area was indeed devoid of undead as Lenno had thought, the party tracked back to the High Hedge. They had Thalantyr identify Droth’s helmet as a Helmet of Defense that increases the wearer’s elemental resistances. Viconia, the party’s (frail) tank thanks to her admirable agility and her great magic resistance, got to wear it.
The party conferred on which way to go to get to Bassilus. If they were going to follow the skeletons, they had only one option: south. East of the High Hedge, toward Beregost, there were no skeletons. Viconia could attest to that. North of the area they would reach the Candlekeep coast way area which housed mainly gibberlings and wolves, but no skeletons. They just returned from a long trek westward with no trace of Bassilus. So south they went. Their journey was uneventful, although they were “waylaid” by a dread wolf [the killing of which had Eldoth and Lenno reach level 5]. Further south they saved a talking chicken from a wolf. The creature introduced itself as Melicamp and begged them to escort it to Thalantyr who would restore it to its human form. The party was quite puzzled by the “animal” and was unsure whether to even trust it, but they did trust grumpy old Thalantyr. Therefore, they agreed to help Melicamp. Lenno was actually quite curious to see what would happen with Melicamp. However, they wouldn’t return to the High Hedge before having properly investigated the area they were in.
Three hobgoblins threatened to kill the companions if they didn’t hand over their gold. The band had dealt with hobgoblins in the past without trouble, so they weren’t really upset by this trio. Not surprisingly, they declined to hand over their gold, and battle ensued. These hobgoblins were actually tougher than most. While Viconia successfully tanked the hobgoblin’s leader, the other two hit Kivan with poisoned arrows. Viconia had to quaff a healing potion and Kivan an antidote before the party could slay their foes. When they searched the fallen hobgoblins’ corpses they found a wand on one of them. Eldoth remarked that as a Bard he was able to use wands. He identified it as a wand of lightning, and observed that these wands are highly sought after, so they could also sell it for a handsome amount of gold, and maybe buy some useful gear at Thalantyr’s or at the Thunderhammer Smithy in Beregost.)
A little child approached the party, speaking of Bassilus and his ‘funny spooks’. They had finally found their prey! He was standing in the middle of a stone circle, surrounded by skeletons and zombies. Lenno stealthily approached, followed by Viconia. They heard him speak to his ‘family’, and Viconia told Lenno that the undead company Bassilus kept seemed to have noticeably dimmed the priest’s wits. They would try to play along and get him to accompany them to Beregost. Lenno presented himself as Bassilus’ father. The plot seemed to work until the priest saw through it in a moment of clarity and turned hostile. The undead fell though, meaning they would only have to deal with Bassilus himself. While the priest buffed himself, Viconia cast a Hold Person his way. The spell took effect.
Lenno realized at that point that given her poweful magics, Viconia must have been truly blessed indeed by her goddess Shar. Meanwhile the young Swashbuckler had difficulty not seeing Viconia as a goddess herself. Seldom, if ever, had he seen such a beautiful creature, and apart from her appearance she had made some astute and insightful observations in their dealings with others, she could tank all kinds of foes, and as said her magic had proven to be potent (first against Droth, now against Bassilus).
The four companions attacked Bassilus with their ranged weapons and saw how he took hit after hit but wouldn’t fall. Viconia even poisoned her sling bullets, and with them the priest, in the hopes that the poison would fell him. It took many more attacks until Bassilus would finally fall [he has around 100 HP in SCS].
Morale in the party was high, after this successful expedition, and they were all more than willing to continue travelling together. Kivan proved to a bit of a dissonant, when he remarked that he saw a similarity between Bassilus who had created his own undead family, and himself, for longing after a ghost, that of his beloved Deheriana. Lenno understood that it would be a good thing to help the sullen Stalker get his revenge against this Tazok.
First however, the party returned to the High Hedge where they sold the wand of lightning as well some minor loot (mundane weapons, some gems). Ironically the wand they had stumbled upon by accident was worth more than twice as much as the bounty on Bassilus’ head they had been after all those days. Lenno bought a Deep Red Ioun Stone which increases the user’s dexterity [+1]. For Eldoth he bought a Deep Purple Ioun Stone that provides 60’ infravision (and allows the user to see Smoke on the Water). Importantly, both items, like all ioun stones, protect against critical hits. There was also an ioun stone for sale that gives a lore bonus, very useful for Eldoth, but it was a bit too expensive for the time being.
Thalantyr miraculously restored Melicamp, apparently a former student of his, to his human form. The party was somewhat disappointed with not receiving any form of reward, but decided not to make a fuss. First of all Thalantyr had just proved himself a powerful mage. Besides, he somehow managed to acquire all kinds of interesting items he offered for sale. The party would surely want to return at a later time to see his wares and possibly new items of interest.
At the Temple of Lathander Lenno handed Bassilus’ holy symbol to high priest Keldath Orlmlyr to claim the 5000 GP bounty. They also had the priest raise Kagain. [I lowered his CON by -1 as per the self-imposed rule.] He was then dismissed from the party, as he had seemed to be too much of a liability and besides Lenno wouldn’t want Kagain to suffer any further permanent health declines. Lenno gave the Dwarf his weapons and armor, but no gold because the gold he was due at the moment of his decease equaled the amount of gold the party had just paid Keldath for raising him.
Lenno and his companions are currently enjoying some time to relax at the Jovial Juggler in Beregost. The Halfling is in high spirits, more than content with his party members and with the band’s great feats. He thinks he’s becoming quite the hero, completely unaware of his abysmal reputation. [The party’s reputation is 4: despised. I’ve got a mod component installed which gives slight store discounts at low reputation. Lenno actually thinks merchants’ and other people’s kindness is based on respect and admiration rather than fear.]
The party is still conferring over their next step. There are two more unclaimed bounties: the emerald thief, and Commander Brage. At the same time Lenno wants to help Kivan.
Does anyone who made it all the way here know how long I can wait with taking on Tazok and the Bandit Camp before Kivan leaves?
As to Kivan0s timer, that's interesting. I think I picked him up in Chapter 3 (i.e. after having spoken to Berrun Ghastkill)
1: Candlekeep
2: Gorion's Death - Nashkel Mines cleared
3: Nashkel Mines cleared - Bandits cleared
4: Bandits cleared - Daveorn killed
5: Davaeorn killed - Candlekeep for Duke Eltan
6: Candlekeep for Eltan - Endgame
7: Endgame
Prologue: Candlekeep
1. Gorion's death - speaking with Ghastkill
2. Speaking with Ghastkill - Nashkel mines cleared.
ect. ect.
2 - Reaching Nashkel to Picking the Letters form Mulahey's body.
edit; duh i did not read Elrandir's second post about this
Similarly picking up the letters from the chest in the bandit camp advances the chapter as well. So you never need to sell all the bandit scalps and lose the Flaming Fist lieutenant in the Juggler. You can actually sell her Wyvern heads from Cloakwood later for 1000 gp each. But this does not complete Kivan´s quest. You still have to sell all the bandit scalps and then speak with the Lieutenant again at the Jovial Jugglar to complete Kivan´s quest.
Do you have "happy patch - npc's never leave" from Tweaks? I assume that's how you're keeping Kivan in a party with a reputation of four. That same component of Tweaks may affect Kivan's timer, and the NPC Project might also affect it. It seems like you should be getting attacked by the Flaming Fist, too, unless that's also modded. Or does that only happen at reputation three?
I notice some aesthetic enhancements in your screen shots, like Kivan's black hair. I found that shade of black once in Keeper and put in on Kivan. Did you also Keeper it, or do you have an aesthetics mod? The armor looks really sharp - are you using Erephine's 1PP by any chance?
It looks like Kivan isn't wearing a helmet when he should be. Is that a choice to live dangerously, or do you have helmet animations turned off?
EDIT: I found your WEIDU log posted in the third and fourth posts that answered most of my questions. I still didn't see under Tweaks or anywhere else where you had reputation reactions adjusted, though. It's probably in there and I'm just not spotting it.
As to your emaining question, I don't have the 'Happy Patch' or any other reputation reaction adjusting mod component. My party's reputation is 4. According to this link good-aligned party members only leave at reputation 1-2. If that's incorrect, then maybe it has to do with the fact that my reputation was already 4 when Kivan joined? He never saw the party's reputation decrease.
I removed the helmet animations, but I understand your confusion: Viconia's Helmet of Defense is visible for some reason.
Btw I also read part of your Nordic Warriors playthrough. Highly enjoyable. I see you also placed a strong emphasis on RP aspects, intra-party relationships, etc. Branwen says she misses the coasts of her homeland and Todek, eager to plese, immediately has the party travel to the Sword Coast. Stuff like that. Highly entertaining.
Lenno, quite flexible himself when it comes to property rights, liked Prism’s line of thought. He was going to tell Prism he would forget about the price on the artist’s head, when another came to claim the bounty. A bounty hunter called Greywolf. This bounty hunter wasn’t much of a talker. All he had to say was that he was going to kill Lenno and his companions, and then take the bounty on Prism. But Viconia had a different outcome in mind. She held Greywolf, after which the companions pelted him with arrows, throwing daggers and bullets until he fell.
During the commotion Prism finished his work, but when Lenno approached him to praise his work, the artist dropped dead from apparent heart failure. Both Lenno and Kivan expressed their grief for what had happened to Prism. Eldoth, ever the practical thinker, picked up the emeralds and said they might as well return to Nashkel to claim their bounty. This cheered Lenno up a bit. He wouldn’t consider the way they had dealt with Prism and Greywolf a heroic feat, but it couldn’t be denied that his band had done the Sword Coast yet another service. Surely it would further improve their rapport with the local community, giving them a sense of security and the knowledge that crimes don’t go unpunished. Nothing could have been further from the truth, as they would learn upon arrival in Nashkel. The entire town was hostile, commoners and guards alike. And the latter didn’t hesitate to attack the party on sight.
None of them had a clue what brought this on. Viconia used to having to defend herself against unprovoked attackers observed that they could probably take on the guards but that the wiser course of action would be to lay low for a while. She recommended returning to the desolate coastlands. None of the other had any better idea, so west they travelled.
‘I have been looking for… strong men. Like yourselves.’ Eldoth and Lenno looked at each other, both suppressing a smile. On the coast a beautiful half-elven Gypsy approached the party and had an interesting proposition for them:
Both Lenno and Eldoth would have probably accepted the sultry lady into the party even if she hadn’t mentioned the treasure, but now that she had, they welcomed her without even asking Kivan or Viconia for their opinions. Fortunately neither Kivan nor Vicky had any objections, so they too welcomed Safana.
The party of (now) five went on to kill various worgs and dread wolves. Thus, without knowing it, they helped a boy return to his mother. The boy had fled from a number of worgs and only dared look for his mother after the party had killed the beasts.
Lenno scouted the area and spotted various sirines along the shore. These were perfidious creatures, Kivan told them, with powerful charms and knowledge of poisons. Lenno’s excellent stealth skill made him the ideal candidate to sneak past them and enter the treasure cave Safana had mentioned.
[end of journal entry]
***
This plan worked pretty well, until one three sirines right in front of the entrance to the cave detected him. They proceeded to attack, but Lenno swiftly entered the cave, where he hid again. As he ventured deeper into the cave he triggered a web trap. He got held in it, and suffered a number of hits from the sirines' arrows. (Apparently the sirines had followed Lenno inside.) Once he got free, he quaffed a healing potion and rushed away from the still active web, past a flesh golem, toward an open space with a pool of water and another flesh golem. There he triggered another trap that did him in.
I know:
(1) that the cave is trapped in BGEE and probably in the original game as well. But in my modded BGT setups, it wasn't, possibly because of the Lure of the Sirines mod I used to play with until recently. As a consequence I simply wasn't prepared for any traps.
(2) that this is a so-called minimal reload game. But I notice that 'minimal reload' is easier said than done for a compulsive no-reloader such as myself (as lacklustre as my performances may be). I feel I should at least survive BG1 without reloading as I've done that various times before with different characters. And with a potion of invisibility available, I could have so easily gotten Lenno out of trouble that it makes me feel undeserving of a reload.
(3) that if I give up on this playthrough and thus the journal, that any future playthroughs will be reported very concisely, if at all. It's either an extensive journalling and heavy RPing, or no-reload + metagaming. The two don't go together. I think I can't be bothered with extensively detailing the same (first) part of the game over and over again. I'm going to keep the save, and see if I can set my mind on minimal reload. Maybe I'll just stop playing for a while, until I feel like picking up Lenno again.
Thanks for your words. I think I will continue this run in the same spontaneous way, after the disappointment has somewhat subsided...
Confusion about what's installed and what's not is one reason why I like to keep my mods to a minimum, especially the ones that change gameplay significantly. Even with reviewing the Weidu log, you can't always remember what mod does what and where it does it, so, when I do play with a heavily modded setup, I always proceed with extreme caution and make no assumptions about what I'll find in different areas.
Even uninstalling a mod doesn't necessarily get rid of everything that mod changed when it was first installed. I learned that the hard way with SCS and NPC Project. I once got a setup so mucked up installing and uninstalling and reinstalling those two, I had no choice but to trash the whole setup and start over with a clean install, which is a very inconvenient and tedious process.
To ease your pain, let me share with you how one of my druids died on that same map. We killed all the worgs, all the hobgoblins, the sirines, the flesh golems, disarmed the traps, looted the cave, recruited Safana... the works. We did this all at level 4. I was quite pleased with myself and Charname was 300 xp away from level 5.
Then I talked to that fortune teller and pleaded with her to share her information. She turned hostile and cast sleep before we could do anything. She slept everyone except Imoen. She cast acid arrow and Charname. Imoen attacked her, got her agro, and pulled her away from the sleeping party, right into a pack of Tasloi that had spawned. Imoen kept agro of the witch and the tasloi, running around for a while, until she got too close to the party. The tasloi started attacking the sleeping characters. Imoen shot some arrows at the tasloi and pulled them away from the party, right into a group of dire wolves that had spawned. The party woke up and immediately set after the mage. She slept the entire party again immediately (except Imoen). Imoen kept running around, but could not keep the wolves, the mage, and the tasloi all from attacking the sleeping characters. A dread wolf killed charname while he slept: killed by the easiest encounter on the map.
I checked my WEIDU-log, and found the answer:
~SETUP-BGTTWEAK.TP2~ #0 #902 // Random activated traps in the pirate cave -> Game-time randomisation: 11 (5 Feb 12)
I must have never used that component before, or maybe it got overwritten by something else in previous installs. I will continue this playthrough as a minimal-reload run with no metagaming and RP-based stroytelling, because I like it. The fact that I don't know exactly what to expect from all my mods goes well with this approach. I agree with you though, that for no-reload this is unwise. That much has become clear already
@Aurorus, thanks for sharing. A painful and frustrating way to see your charname fall, as you say right after you tackled the truly challenging aspects of that map. Very sorry about that, but least you admirably did what you could. My frustration was that I was too busy looking for a place to HiS to even notice my potion of invisibility that would have allowed me to heal, detect traps, even return to the party. Oh well, nothing that can be done now.
Have you ever played a PnP game like Warhammer or WH40K ? In these games, your character have something called "Fate Points" which act like a reload (your character takes a hit and die, but instead you burn a Fate Point and he survives).
You have something like 2 or at most 3 of them and you can't earn them except by doing truly incredible things.
Maybe you could do something of the sort for Lenno, allowing yourself 2-3 reloads over the course of the saga (Defeating Sarevok / Irenicus could make you gain one Fate Point I think).
That way it could be a playthrough between the no-reload and the minimal reload !
On the one hand I want to try my hand at a complete, heavily roleplayed trilogy playthrough, and on the other hand I'm addicted to the no-reload challenge, so I want my character and the NPCs to die as little as possible. I think your suggstion could offer be a very nice way to continue to combine great carefulness with immersive and non- metagemed roleplaying. Thanks agian!