BG2 Hardcore Playthrough (SCS/No Reload/No Resting)
Jaheiras_Witness
Member Posts: 614
Thought I'd do an update on my current playthrough, which I didn't think was possible but is still going strong.
It's the usual standard mods plus nearly all of SCS (no Improved Shade Lord is about the only omission). The variants are no reloading, no resting and no cheese (no running up and down stairs to avoid spells, simulacrums cannot use Quick Items etc). The only tweaks in my favour are No Traps & Locks and all items are identified.
I chose a Dwarven Berserker. Casters are useless without resting and with a Berseker I can continue to get more and more Enrages (which are key for survival) just through levelling up.
This was more an experimental run but it's turned out to be incredibly fun and a lot easier than I expected! I'm about to set off for Spellhold...here's the character.
Level 34 already :0.
I blitzed through all Athkatla quests in about 3 days. Then did a full tour of the provinces, de'Arnise Keep, Umar Hills, Trademeet and Windspear Hills, before coming back to Athkatla and doing the Planar Sphere and Chapter 3 quests. Note that of the 14 days and 2 hours, nearly half that time is Cromwell upgrading stuff for me and 2 or 3 days were travel time. The actual adventuring has been done in about 5 days! It's just constant blitz when there's no resting, I'm going straight from one fight to another, which has the advantage of preserving buffs.
I've been fatigued since day 7 but it's hardly made a noticeable difference. When THAC0 is so low you only ever miss on a 1 and when AC is so good, most non-boss enemies can only hit on a 20.
The only Athkatla fights I haven't done so far are those for which I want the Cloak of Mirroring before attempting: Guarded Compound, the 3 liches across Athkatla, Kangaxx, the Twisted Rune and the Shadow Dragon (I had no consistent way to avoid level drain when I went to Umar Hills since Enrage only lasts 10 rounds - I have the upgraded Mace now so will do in Chapter 6). Firkraag was surprisingly easy - I used the Vhailor's Helm Simulacrum for that fight and then used a Restoration scroll on my clone. The sheer melee power of 2 level 26 Dwarven Berserkers was too much for the Dragon to handle, the fight lasted less than 30 seconds and I only used the clone's HLAs, didn't even need to touch my PCs GWWs.
I will continue to update as I progress into Spellhold. The key so far is potions, I buy every useful potion I can get my hands on and use them constantly to make the PC immune to as many status effects as possible.
So as I set off for Spellhold I'm about to get my only rest until the very end of SoA (the next one will be the transition from Suldanesselar to Hell)! When I get to Brynnlaw I will have 9 x Enrage, 3 x Hardiness, 1 x WW, 7 x GWW, 1 x Power Attack, 1 x Critical Strike and 1 x Smite to get me through the rest of the game, plus any gained through level ups (I'm playing without a XP cap but I believe I can still only get up to level 50, so only another 16 HLAs left). I also have a few 1 use per day items which will help, including the Iron Horn of Valhalla and Vhailor's Helm, plus 19 charges of Fireshield Red/Summon Fire Elemental from the Staff of Fire.
I didn't originally plan to do a write up for this playthrough since I didn't think it would last, but since I've got this far I will now post updates and take any questions on strategy and tactics
.
It's the usual standard mods plus nearly all of SCS (no Improved Shade Lord is about the only omission). The variants are no reloading, no resting and no cheese (no running up and down stairs to avoid spells, simulacrums cannot use Quick Items etc). The only tweaks in my favour are No Traps & Locks and all items are identified.
I chose a Dwarven Berserker. Casters are useless without resting and with a Berseker I can continue to get more and more Enrages (which are key for survival) just through levelling up.
This was more an experimental run but it's turned out to be incredibly fun and a lot easier than I expected! I'm about to set off for Spellhold...here's the character.
Level 34 already :0.
I blitzed through all Athkatla quests in about 3 days. Then did a full tour of the provinces, de'Arnise Keep, Umar Hills, Trademeet and Windspear Hills, before coming back to Athkatla and doing the Planar Sphere and Chapter 3 quests. Note that of the 14 days and 2 hours, nearly half that time is Cromwell upgrading stuff for me and 2 or 3 days were travel time. The actual adventuring has been done in about 5 days! It's just constant blitz when there's no resting, I'm going straight from one fight to another, which has the advantage of preserving buffs.
I've been fatigued since day 7 but it's hardly made a noticeable difference. When THAC0 is so low you only ever miss on a 1 and when AC is so good, most non-boss enemies can only hit on a 20.
The only Athkatla fights I haven't done so far are those for which I want the Cloak of Mirroring before attempting: Guarded Compound, the 3 liches across Athkatla, Kangaxx, the Twisted Rune and the Shadow Dragon (I had no consistent way to avoid level drain when I went to Umar Hills since Enrage only lasts 10 rounds - I have the upgraded Mace now so will do in Chapter 6). Firkraag was surprisingly easy - I used the Vhailor's Helm Simulacrum for that fight and then used a Restoration scroll on my clone. The sheer melee power of 2 level 26 Dwarven Berserkers was too much for the Dragon to handle, the fight lasted less than 30 seconds and I only used the clone's HLAs, didn't even need to touch my PCs GWWs.
I will continue to update as I progress into Spellhold. The key so far is potions, I buy every useful potion I can get my hands on and use them constantly to make the PC immune to as many status effects as possible.
So as I set off for Spellhold I'm about to get my only rest until the very end of SoA (the next one will be the transition from Suldanesselar to Hell)! When I get to Brynnlaw I will have 9 x Enrage, 3 x Hardiness, 1 x WW, 7 x GWW, 1 x Power Attack, 1 x Critical Strike and 1 x Smite to get me through the rest of the game, plus any gained through level ups (I'm playing without a XP cap but I believe I can still only get up to level 50, so only another 16 HLAs left). I also have a few 1 use per day items which will help, including the Iron Horn of Valhalla and Vhailor's Helm, plus 19 charges of Fireshield Red/Summon Fire Elemental from the Staff of Fire.
I didn't originally plan to do a write up for this playthrough since I didn't think it would last, but since I've got this far I will now post updates and take any questions on strategy and tactics
.14
Comments
Tagging "a group of no-reload monsters" like @BelgarathMTH @Blackraven @lolien @CrevsDaak @Gotural @Elrandir @kcwise - a solo berserker is entertaining
Good luck to you as you continue your run.
Even when I'm this close he just won't follow. No idea what to do.
I think that you should have chosen a Half-Orc Barbarian, since Zerker's Rage make you fatigued when it ends. Wizard Slayer Dwarf could also be a good one here too.
Not that any of that is relevant unless I can get past this bug
According to this http://www.sorcerers.net/forums/archive/index.php/t-20514.html it really works!
Most x use/day items are useless in this variant. I normally use the single charge and then sell them. The only ones I kept were the Iron Horn (the level 9 berserker is pretty decent and for the absolute toughest fights summons are handy. Curiously the berserker summons use and drop potions too under SCS!) And I bought Vhailor's Helm, just because the Simulacrum is so powerful that it's worth it even if I can only use it 3 times in all SoA (3 times is because of the free rests when going to Spellhold and Hell, which recharge the Helm). So far I had used Vhailor's against Firkraag and I intended to use the second time for Demogorgon's 5 Demon Knights. Third time would be in the final battle against Irenicus.
Conserving HLAs is a non-issue...I was getting HLAs faster than I could use them. With 9/2 APR and only 5% miss, not to mention the FoA Slow effect, nothing lasts more than a couple of rounds anyway, so I was very rarely needing to use HLAs. In fact after Chapter 3 Bodhi, which was supposed to be my last fight before Spellhold, I had a Hardiness and 2 GWWs left over, so I travelled across the city until I got a random encounter just to burn those HLAs
Enrages are more precious, but only to counter Maze spells and level drain (could also use the mace for the latter). Saving throws and innumerable Potions of Invulnerability could deal with everything else, but Enrage is the only defence against Maze (if an enemy mage ever started casting a long conjuration spell "Kyo wocho...", I used that as my cue to Enrage, even if the majority of the time it turned out to be a summoning spell! I was paranoid of Maze, such an annoying spell and so unfair for solo no-load characters).