Shield amulet has never failed me before. Do you guys have mods installed? In general I do not...
In the single-player it haven't failed me as well, both with the SCS mod installed and not. Rasaad has been heavily relying on it so far.
But in the MP it indeed has been working randomly: at one time preventing the damage from MM and at another not preventing it.
The duo monks run is difficult because I can't let any of the characters to get close to the majority of enemies, no matter how low their AC is - they are being hit even with -9 AC that potions of invulnerability provide. A wizard slayer or a shapeshifter druid can at least wear helmets, so they may not be afraid to tank in different situations.
Also, this run has changed my view on monks - they are actually not "one-trick ponies" - they require a lot of micromanagement, starting with constant kiting and switching fists for daggers and darts. They can hide in shadows, and I constantly use this skill - the added speed lets them run away from enemies and hide often. The ring of free action works on monks not slowing their speed.
But for a run with the full party I wouldn't risk choosing a monk, even a dark moon monk, as charname.
Tresset read that Nabassu had 50% MR and regenerated 2 HP/round, but it turned out this one didn't.
I actually checked its stats in NI when I told you that. The Nabassu does have 50% MR, but the regeneration rate was what I was unsure of. Now that I have time to check more thoroughly it turns out that it has an extremely slow regeneration rate of 1 HP per 6 hours.
I have lost quite some characters in a noreload on impossible odds critical hits, well, then you do the math and your character is bound to be hit with one throughout the game... I can understand micromanagement being need for safety.
Update from the Monty Python Crew. ( @bengoshi If you want to edit my post to add some of the screenshots you must have taken then feel free to do so because I didn't take any.)
When we resumed our adventure we were terrified to find that a horrible spambot had joined the group!
The spambot then tried to kill us with its powerful spammy black magic. We were very lucky that its magic failed and instead it just made some botty nonsense happen instead.
Thinking quickly, Shari countered its chaos with some righteous magic of her own and banned the fearsome creature forever!
Having destroyed the spambot the heroes decided it was time to investigate the Nashkel mines. Though the mine was infested with a great many kobolds, none of them withstood the passing of the heroes. Even the Chieftain and Shaman of the tribe were no match for the brave heroes.
Then the time came to confront Mulahey. He died before he knew what was happening to him.
The heroes left the mine by an alternate exit and found themselves in a desert area. After exploring a bit they were given a dagger by a madman and told to return it to a nearby tomb. Wanting to keep the dagger for themselves the group started to debate whether or not they could defeat the creature inside the tomb. Shari decided to take the undead beast on by herself using a scroll of Protection from Undead. After returning from the tomb without a scratch the rest of the party was amazed by how clever the paladin was in doing this.
The group then met Narcillicus Harwilliger Neen, a mage who summoned a pair of mustard jellies to attack them. After shattering his magical protections with a Dispel Magic, Shari shot him down with her crossbow ending his existence in moments. The mustard Jellies followed soon after.
Retuning to Nashkel to report that the trouble in the mines was over, the group was attacked by some manner of assassin. For how arrogant he was this Nimbul was rather quick to die.
The group moved on to Beregost to kill Tranzig, rest, and restock before going to the Wood of Sharp Teeth to confront the bandits. After exploring Peldvale and Larswood and killing all the bandits they found there they went to the bandit camp and killed all the bandits there too.
An excellent idea of making a post here: this way one person can write a report and I can add screenshots (it looks like it's easier for me to take them than for others).
The spirit of MP run lives even in such united reports.
I had no more scrolls of Protection from Magic neither in the backpack nor in shops. So I couldn't participate in additional fights that don't lead to the final. Invisible, the monks went through the Candlekeep catacombs and returned to the BG city.
Slythe and Krystin were the next target.
Thanks to potions and Blur, the Sigyn's AC was -15, plus additional -3 against piercing from the girdle. But still Slythe managed to backstab her. If Rasaad was the target, he would be dead, but Sigyn, who before the fight had increased her HPs to 80 thanks to the Vampiric Touch, survived.
Both Monks kept using the wands of Heavens, and Slythe died before he could hit Sigyn once more (who retreated after being hit) or Rasaad and berore Krystin entered the fight (the monks were under the effects of the Shield and Greenstone Amulets, and potions of Magic Shielding (automatic saving throws and 50% res. to magical attacks), but still Krystin was not a desired opponent).
Fighting Krystin was not mandatory because the invitations to the Grand Dukes' Palace were among Slythe's items, so the monks retreated.
The fight against doppelgangers started badly. Rasaad was backstabbed for 66 damage.
But Sigyn, whose AC thanks to Blur, was better than the Rasaad's, stayed on the battlefield and managed to slay one greater doppelganger rather quickly. Sigyn stayed as close as she could to the Grand Dukes, so that doppelgangers attacked her and not the Dukes. A summoned Ogre Berzerker didn't help but there was simply no other choice than to rely on a very low AC and 88 HPs.
A doppelganger mage then confused all the guards and the Grand Dukes, but Sigyn was well protected against this effect and killed a doppelganger assassin soon afterwards.
Even confused, the guards and Dukes continued to fight, Sigyn finished another greater doppelganger. And then another one.
A doppelganger shaman and a doppelganger mage were left, as well as a summoned Ogre Berzerker, a Skeleton warrior and a phase spider. Sigyn had to heal herself from the Acid Arrow which the doppelganger mage casted on her.
A little change of places because of healing lead to a situation when the skeleton and the ogre were attacking Liia, while Sigyn approached both doppelgangers. The spider was horrored by Sigyn.
The shaman was slayed first, then the ogre unsummoned. The slow effect on Belt ended and the Duke helped to finish the doppelganger mage.
Thankfully, the Sarevok's attack on Belt didn't last long, and Sigyn even managed to save Liia, so that both Grand Dukes survived the fight.
To tell the truth, the outcome of both fights - against Slythe and doppelgangers was based entirely on luck. Slythe could inflict much more that 66 in his attack, he could hit not once but twice or more, but it didn't happen. The doppelgangers and the ogre berzerker could roll a critical on Sigyn while she was alone, the doppelgangers could succeed in killing the Dukes.
These things were not in my hands, but for now Sigyn and Rasaad continue their quest. Only Sarevok and his helpers are left.
Ah a new post in this thread. I thought it was the calm before the storm. Or perhaps everyone is busy beta-testing or they went skiing.
Indeed your monks were lucky guys, not sure there is a way to eliminate such a factor under your conditions but I am not used to monks in BG1. Do you have a way to identify the assassin before he strikes ?
I started a new run with a Fighter/Cleric and Mage/Thief, but I survived one fight mostly thanks to the WoL trick and it feels illegitimate, since the trick was unplanned. I'm probably going to restart again.
Indeed your monks were lucky guys, not sure there is a way to eliminate such a factor under your conditions but I am not used to monks in BG1. Do you have a way to identify the assassin before he strikes ?
The Dark Moon Monk has the Detect Illusion skill (and according to https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/498586/#Comment_498586 it should work against a thief who used the potion of invisibility) but Slythe is hasted and there's simply no time to dispel his invisibility before he strikes. Even if Sigyn retreated, Slythe would still get her due to his speed being faster than the monk's of the 8th level.
Sigyn and Rasaad, or the Duo Monks' Tale, the final
The first of Sarevok's acolytes, Diarmid, was taken down due to my favourite method: hide in shadows - stand on the line of sight of an enemy - attack with missile weapon (throwing daggers this time) - retreat immediately - repeat. This way you can inflict damage while the enemy actually doesn't see you.
After that I buffed Rasaad to the max, including potions of magic shielding (50% MR for 2 hours) - did you know these potions can stack, thus providing 100% MR?
Anyway, I expected that as soon as Rasaad started using the Necklace of Missiles at the place where enemies stood, they would go out of there, Semaj for example. But it turned out to be a "No". They simply stayed there, while Rasaad attacked empty spaces with his Missile Blasts (about 10 charges were needed).
Angelo (who stayed a bit to the left, so previous Missile Blasts didn't hit him) at first behaved the same, but soon revealed himself. All this time Sigyn just stayed invisible, detecting and dispelling illusions from time to time.
Rasaad still had 100% MR, as well as 100% Fire resistance, so he simply kept running in circles so that Angelo's Fireshield could wore off. Angelo couldn't get close to Rasaad for a full attack, and when the monk chose to turn around one of the statues to the left, Angelo lost the monk from his sight. After that happened, Rasaad used his Wand of Heavens on Angelo. Repeating this procedure again and again led to the Angelo's death.
I wondered why Angelo could never get close to Rasaad, paused and went searching the Internet. Monks move +2 points faster than normal units from the start. They gain +1 for every five levels. So Rasaad moved at +3 points faster than the norm. From what I've read, the default movement speed in BG2 is 9 units, the speed from the Speed spell and/or the Boots of Speed make it 11. From the game it looked like Rasaad and Angelo had the same speed, so maybe in BGEE it works differently, but the main thing here is that monks of the 8th level move with the same speed as hasted characters.
So, @Musigny, maybe during the fight against Slythe, the monks could indeed constantly run so that the thief didn't get them - but that time the thief was invisible so it was impossible to guess where to run so that he couldn't come close.
Anyway, this time, I had no choice other than to test how it worked against Sarevok, using Rasaad for kiting while Sigyn used the wand of heavens on him.
It worked just fine, though: hasted Sarevok couldn't hit constantly running Rasaad, while Sigyn used her wand.
Then I had to switch the monks, as the Sigyn's wand had no more charges.
Between every use of the wand, Rasaad attacked with throwing daggers, while Sigyn simply ran around the Bhaal's symbol. The much desired win came soon enough.
I have to check whether you can dispel Slythe's illusion. I tend to believe you cannot, again to be checked. In fact my initial question was more related to the dopplegangers (sorry for the lack of precision)
Here that's even different. From the general perspective one thing that may help a bit is to "track" a hidden guy with the ring scorcher obtained from the red wizards but you need the opportunity to do so and this may never come. Obvioulsy in the no-reload you don't want to take the first hit. Anyway this lasts two rounds. The way you managed Sarevok perfectly makes sense but it makes me think that the designers who initially made him 100% magic resistant were not entirely wrong. I like the SCS idea to decrease his elemental resistance. Taking one more step and having average score in all categories would make him a challenge for most party composition.
After the Bandit Camp we decided to go straight to the Cloakwood forest, without exploring the Sword Coast.
There, when we reached the archdruid tree, Tresset expressed a desire to see how powerful the archdruid was. Gotural and me previously shared our thoughts on this: "We need to fight with druids as little as possible". But brave Shari went upstairs. The Dispel Magic ability from the Inquisitor works wonders in BG1. After the druid's protections were gone, Shari attacked with bolts of biting. The poisoned archdruid couldn't do anything. When my character reached the second floor, the druid was already dead.
The journey through the Cloakwood forest was rather smooth. We reached the Mines but still didn't get any ambushes. So we decided to travel back and forth till we get one - we didn't want to get an ambush when we wouldn't be prepared.
And again the Inquisitor was the main character here. The True Seeing ability - and both thieves went visible.
After the main threat was cancelled, the fight didn't last too long.
Before facing the Drasus's party we discussed how we were going to do it. Webs-Fireballs and summons to distract them.
After Gotural casted Webs, we waited several rounds till Drasus could spoke. But he didn't. And then Gotural released a fireball. Then I added another from the Necklace of Missiles. The fight didn't even start before it was over. Later we discussed it a bit - I said that it was our 3rd time and we won twice in a fair way, so maybe cheating a bit this time was OK. Gotural said we didn't cheat because we prepared for the fight but it turned out our preparation was not needed. Tresset said that basically you couldn't expect Drasus and Co to be friendly because it was the bandit's territory.
In the Mines Shari, being a paladin, talked to a bandit's soul:
Then, because of the wrong pathfinding, our Mr. L&T got trapped by bandits. We decided we would ctrl+r him later and concentrated on fighting this group of bandits from the start.
Hareishan was the first enemy in BG1, on whom Shari's Dispel didn't work:
Then Shari got into a sutuation when Chaos was flying into her way. Tresset gulped a potion of Magic Blocking, which was the only correct option. Even a Gotural's advice came later.
Then Meshanis was pushed through the wall by his own summons:
The next level of the Mines was a bit buggy. At first, Meshanis nearly died because Gotural was not ready for an area switch.
Then Meshanis inflicted 48 damage on my character, although he casted Skull trap on the normal level and it should have inflicted 36 damage maximum.
It was an obvious bug, so we revived my character. At last, our summons became permanent - they didn't unsummon with time:
Both Ogre Mage and Natasha fell because of bolts of biting, used by Shari.
Our Inquisitor should have been a Blackguard inside.
Before facing Davaeorn, we again discussed the strategy. It was decided Shari should face him, use Dispel (because it's possible even under the effect of Protection from Magic), while my character would gulp potions of heroism, invulnerability, and frost giant strength and would block the way for bandit guards, with the support of Meshanis.
Davaeorn almost from the start teleported to the main group. That was a bit scary but... he was dispelled, he didn't have protections. I used the Crev's character and casted Command - it succeeded, then Shari poisoned him with her crossbow.
Gotural: "Is this real life? Am I dreaming? It should be a dream".
It was probably the easiest and the fastest Davaeorn in my history of playing BG, just like the Bandit camp previously had been.
Tresset later said that the Dave's saving throws are 4,3,5,7,5 - in our case he failed his 2 saving throws against Spells (Command) and Poison (bolts of biting).
Overall, it was a great session. I'm very impressed by the Inquisitor. I had read in the past @Lord_Tansheron 's view that an Inquisitor is a must for SCS no-reload party runs but actually haven't tried this kit much. And our current run shows that probably the Inquisitor is the best option for the Bhaalspawn. At least, in the MP, when you have not much time to go inventory management and have to react quickly to glitches and unexpected actions, the character who can dispel almost everything, who can stop enemies' invisibility, and do both these things very quickly, who has a lot of HPs, a good armor and whose weapon causes poison in mages is definitely the "man of the game".
In the end, we had a small chat about, you know, a pity that there're only three of us currently participating in the MP. It was very fun when GemHound, Meyahi, semiticgod, Neverused, CrevsDaak played. Even while there're only three of us, it's very cool, the coolest way of playing BG is to play in a team. The playthrough will be quite a long one, and maybe we'll even play SoD - and it will be the first ever playthrough of a BG game for all of us.
It was a really great session! Not only very fun, but also very productive.
To my mind Inquisitors are better in BG1 than in BG2 if SCS is installed. The first reason being their immunities to Hold and Charm effects which are so dangerous early in the game. In BG2 you can find many ways to make you immune to these and your saving throws are good enough anyway.
Then their Dispel Magic and True Sight abilities are, I think, far better in the first game where enemies don't have access to Spell Immunity : Abjuration / Divination and your own casters won't get Remove Magic until a good portion of the game. And you won't be able to use Breach at all during BG1.
Meanwhile in BG2, every casters come prebuffed with Spell Immunity : Abjuration/Divination which makes the Inquisitor abilities useless as long as you don't destroy them, then all it takes is a Breach from your Mage to bring down the enemy's protections (Dispeling the smalls buffs like Shield, Chant, Free Action, and so forth isn't really important).
The instant cast True Sight is still very good though, especially against all the Thieves who drink Potions of Invisibility every rounds.
Meanwhile in BG2, every casters come prebuffed with Spell Immunity : Abjuration/Divination which makes the Inquisitor abilities useless as long as you don't destroy them, then all it takes is a Breach from your Mage to bring down the enemy's protections (Dispeling the smalls buffs like Shield, Chant, Free Action, and so forth isn't really important).
It's not EVERY mage that has SI:A (though it's frequent), also Dispel can hit invisible enemies, multiple enemies, and your own party when needed. It's also instant and, more importantly, lvl 0 meaning it penetrates spell level immunities.
I continue to find Inquisitors extremely useful in SCS, but it's by no means "required". However, given how good Paladins are in general (thanks in large parts due to Carsomyr) I find Inquisitor to be perhaps the best choice among their kits in BG2.
I suppose you could also boil things down to whether you want to trade Paladin spell levels or Mage spell levels for your dispel. Paladins aren't terribly great casters (DuHM is essentially the only thing you'd ever really want to cast) - but mages are.
The True Sight is also a big part, by the way, especially in SCS.
Playthrough number 4 or 5 is here. SCS core settings with slightly harder spawns, everything smarter but not with extra health, most high level mages with HLAs, beholders cant see invis but illithids can, Robe of Vecna and Vhailors helm in ToB. I didnt like the random ambushes so I turned it off after the first try. Every area that can be "improved" is, so is Bodhi. NOT naked in spellhold though. I also play with limited resting. No cheating. No exploiting poor AI or game engine.
Meet Chaen, an elven FMT with an insane roll, 18/98 19 17 18 11 11, starting with 3 pips in TWF, 2 pips in longswords and 1 pip in katana. Planning for another pip in katana and then 2 warhammer for a nice crush weapon. Thief skills in order: trap/open lock, detect illusion, set trap, hide/MS. Not an RP run I just try to play when I get a few minutes alone in front of my beloved computer.
Wakes up in prison, Imoen helps him out, he frees Jaheira and Minsc and flees as fast as he can. Completing all quests and killing every foe while doing so. Of course he cannot rest because he doesn't know when Irenicus is coming back, a shame he didn't memorize any spells before dozing off. Also a shame that Imoen and Jaheira memorized stupid spells. It goes smoothly even so, getting out of prison with quite a few potions intact.
First thing Chaen does once out in the open is to say bye bye to Minsc and Yoshimo. Jaheira is kind of powerful so she gets to stay.
Circus. Odd place. A sad evil gnome dies and a cute elven M/C gets to join the party. Also a very strong character. Gone through a rough patch but she seems to do ok fighting the most horrible creatures of the realms so I guess she is stronger than she looks. Also I find cleric buffs really great in the early game where THACO and AC is a big deal.
Running around the city completing quests for my friend in the copper coronet, the radiant heart, the thieves guild, Xzar > the harpers, killing an evil party of adventurers in waukeens promenade, killing an evil party and a rakshasa below the temple district. Gaining quite a few easy exp and gold, earning enough gold to buy gear for Jaheira to turn her into a good fighter and enough exp to get her fire elemental spell.
Goes to a trading post that has some druid trouble. Also trouble with evil blue merchants. Jaheira gets to kill the evil druid using the fire elementals and cleric/druid buffs to kill everything on the way there (except the really annoying fungus, Chaen needs to kill them himself with AoE support from the cute elf and a few wands). I get to kill the evil blue merchants almost by myself. Yields me a surprisingly healthy amount of gear and gold.
Too much gear though, need a bag of holding badly. So back to copper coronet I go to partake in an awful awful quest, but it does yield me a bag of holding. So mission accomplished.
Meet a crazy (must be due to the really poor dialogue) monk at the trading post. Figure I should help him since he is of good alignment. Get some great gear but the monk decides to ditch me. Go figure. Met a bear though that the internet tells me has a friend in the hidden refuge.
Goes to the hidden refuge, does all kinds of fetch quests, really tedious stuff. Finally get ready for a big showdown after letting Neera open the door to the red wizards enclave (or kill the guard really). Memorize a lot of useful spells for fighting high level mages. Tell Neera I don't need her (this is a no-reload after all). Goes to sleep at the closest inn. And Jaheira packs her bags and leaves on some harper business!
I get kind of tired of this playthrough mostly due to Rasaad, Neera and Hexxat quests. First of all they kind of suck. And second they sure have you running around a lot (and I try to play really limited resting). So I decide to risk a restart at the hands of the gate district lich. Surprisingly the fight goes smoothly (thanks to a wand of spell striking recently bought from the red wizards and spell immunity, spell shield and all the other lovely buffs) and I am the proud owner of a unique +4 longsword! I can't say he used his time stop well though, almost makes me feel like I cheated. But the happiness over the new sword wins out and I continue with the run.
Now where did Jaheira go? I guess I'll soon find out.
Thoughts so far. FMT is an excellent class, now he is 9/10/11 with almost 1 M xp. Starting to level slower ofc, but he is already a good enough thief with very good backstabs, a decent fighter/dpser, a kinda bad mage but the mage part makes him ok at debuffing, can throw out a web or two, but simply stellar at tanking. When up against the really tough fights having a tank with spirit armor, blur, MI, stoneskin, SI: abjuration, impr invis, SI: div, spell shield etc on top of the cleric party buffs makes really tough fights trivial. Also protecting chaotic commands and death ward with SI: abjuration is fantastic.
Most used spells are buff and debuff spells even though the party consists of only casters.
Alright... I finally got around to finishing Farien in BG1EE with SCS. I have lots of pictures, but most of them are of my squishy targets eating arrow after arrow and dying. Dwarven defenders in SCS have the problem that they simply aren't focused, ever, and the ones you're trying to protect take all the archer aggression. I had intended at the beginning of the run to donate significant sums to the temples... I revised the idea as I spent around half my gold on resurrections anyways.
Let's see, memorable moments: I almost got wiped trying to rescue Jaheira's old boyfriend (NPC Project). I was fighting that ridiculous Hamadryad that's just randomly in the Cloakwood, and she ran away afraid, four people Entangled. Farien and Khalid followed her, running directly into seven or so high level druids; there were at least 3 nymphs on the field, Call Lightnings were going crazy, and all my spell casters were out of range and couldn't shut down their casters. Only Farien and Imoen survived, and to save the gear from despawning the duo took apart the Wyvern cave and stashed the equipment they couldn't carry on the body in the cave, the only container I know of.
Neera died to archers soon after, but we pushed after Daveaorn. One Pro. Magic lets Farien 1v1 him while Khalid leads the remaining 4 against the Black Talon Elites. Branwen almost dies 3 or 4 times because the archers absolutely refuse to retarget onto Khalid who is next to them; many health potions were burnt that fight.
Iron Throne fight was messy; I actually reloaded here because for some reason there's a duplicated character, Shanarra, up there and the second backstabber proves too much. Second time it's just Farien buffed to the gills fighting solo against everybody: I find that this is the only SCS solution at times, sadly. Trying to take the Gorpel Hind fight, Neera wildsurges a Fireball accidentally killing the bartender. Oops. Had to pay around 2-3k gold to recover 8 of that 10 reputation at a temple, supposedly paying for the Raise Deads of all the innocents she burnt. Whoops.
Um. Imoen dies in the Ducal Palace fight to a backstab, Neera and Branwen die to traps in the Undercity due to me not knowing that there's 4 and not 2 traps on the Skeleton Warrior aisle. They again die in the final battle, but the remaining 4 survive the full spell-loadout of the mages. We're nowhere close to the Experience cap, but I'm moving to BG2 anyways; I'm kind of sick of having so few reliable, reusable ways to protect my mages and clerics.
Iron Throne fight was messy; I actually reloaded here because for some reason there's a duplicated character, Shanarra, up there and the second backstabber proves too much.
I've always thought it's an intended behaviour of the tougher Iron Throne fight. One Shanarra is a girl, another is a boy. They remind me rune assassins from BG2 a bit, the fact they have one name - in my head - always made me imagine it was for an additional confusion of your party: you hit one Shanarra - but get hit by another in a moment.
The Iron Throne fight is definitely challenging and needs a lot of pausing. I've found the semiticgod's BG2 approach VERY helpful during this fight: when I paused every round "for future reports" I could control the battlefield. You can't let yourself miss even one round of that fight if you don't want to reload.
Ooh, I didn't notice that. In that case a reload may've been completely unfounded, in which case I'll retire Farien entirely. I have a solo I need to restart anyhow.
Davaeorn almost from the start teleported to the main group. That was a bit scary but... he was dispelled, he didn't have protections. I used the Crev's character and casted Command - it succeeded, then Shari poisoned him with her crossbow.
@bengoshi I don't think I did cast dispel on him actually... I just poisoned him and figured that while he was poisoned he was not enough of a threat to try to dispel. And then he got commanded so I was not about to dispel that. I just beat him down with my crossbow and sword and he died before I had a chance to dispel him.
So it wasn't until my most recent sitting that I decided to add a raise once rule. Characters that have died so far: Neera * 2 Khalid * 2 Jahiera * 1
After Imoen joined, the first thing we did was clear the map and send the mad wizard and his lackey off on their merry way. We then moved down to Beregost and talked down Marl, and then went North. We killed the Ogre and then killed Tarnesh.
Once inside the Inn, Khalid and Jahiera were recruited. We killed the Hobgoblins and then went back to Beregost, where we recruited Neera. Then we killed Karlat and then Silke.
We next killed the ogrillons, stole the stealth boots, and defended ourselves against a party of Flaming Fist - nice equipment. Khalid died to an Ogrillon.
We next killed the Hobgoblins on the road and returned both the letter and the family ring.
We then went to Nashkel and killed Neira, and then cleaned out the carnival. We also hired Minsc.
Then the party went into the Cloud Peaks and killed Zal, and then went to the Xvart camp where Neera died to the first swing of an xvart.
Borda then permanently killed Khalid, and killed Jahiera. We then went and rescued Brage, and razed the two that could still be raised.
We then went deeper into the Cloakwood, and rescued the Dryad's tree, only for Neera to get killed by Ingot. I didn't want to permakill her quite yet but my own rules made me. The party proceeded to cut its way through the Gnoll Stronghold without resting.
The party then went North and killed the polar bear only to NOT get the Boots of the North. We managed to get the paladin there to talk to the party by hiding Imoen, and killed everything but the creatures on the Northern Bridge. We then returned to the temple and had the tome of charisma identified so Xyrwenys could use it.
That was the last little part for the two sessions.
Also, it seems I've found a solution to my all-time question of "how do you roll stats for six characters", which has been troubling me for years in terms of IWD. The solution was to get rolls as they are, with rerolling not limited but without adjusting the results. This way it's VERY hard to end up with characters with optimal stats, which actually has left me with a party of adventurers who have both strong and weak sides.
I have to note that using this rule makes you not only notice the overall amount of stat points, but pay attention to actual distribution. It's the best cure of "I've rolled 95 but clicked reroll". Also, with this approach (without adjusting the results) some rolls below 90 were actually better than some 90+ rolls.
Meet a party that includes some familiar faces:
[spoiler=Eastheaven Adventurers]
[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Hypnos, the Bard]
[/spoiler]
The leader of the party is a Bard. High CHA, good songs. And overall, a bard is a natural leader. While I was rolling for his stats, my main aim was INT and CHA, and after a 92 roll came, which gave exactly that, I was happy.
[spoiler=Raijin, the FMC]
[/spoiler]
It was very hard to roll a FMC without adjusting stats. I needed CON because this character will be my main tank, but in the same time STR and DEX couldn't be too low. After seeing a lot of rolls, I dared to take a character with low INT and WIS, so I'll have to use potions while memorizing spells for him.
[spoiler=Hades, the FMT]
[/spoiler]
With a FMT, it was a bit easier than with a FMT. CON could be neglected, and I was lucky to get two 18 in STR and DEX - exaxtly what was needed for backstabs.
[spoiler=Styx, the Conjurer]
[/spoiler]
Although there're 2 mages in the party, but they're only partly mages, and their INT is very low. I needed a good arcane caster. I decided to choose a Conjurer, as I thought losing an access to Invocation is neglectable. After rolling the most difficult chatacters, it was easier with a mage. I needed INT, and after getting a roll which also brought STR and CON, I took it.
[spoiler=Amaterasu, the Druid]
[/spoiler]
I like druids and couldn't start a run in IWD without one. I wasn't lucky with a druid in getting 18 WIS, but it is because I wanted to have maximum bonus to HPs.
[spoiler=Hachiman, the Cleric Thief]
[/spoiler]
I needed a thief for locks and traps, and also some cleric spells, so the choice for the 6th party member was obvious. I looked for high DEX and WIS, but couldn't get it, so I went with a balanced roll here.
If you remember, before we decided to enter the Mines we had tried to get one of two ambushes at least. And just when we left the Mines map, we were ambushed by Morvin and Co.
Because it didn't come as a suprise, we acted calmly. Shari, the Bhaalspawn, gulped a Potion of Magic Blocking, our cleric casted the Holy Smite, while others retreated a bit to the north.
Basically, my character, with Meshanis and Mister L&T, were kiting, while Shari was ripping enemies to pieces:
Because we had defeated Davaeorn, but still were not of the optimal levels, we decided to explore the Sword Coast a bit.
We encountered the Surgeon, although he shouldn't have been there after the Mines:
Also, we managed to backstab a flesh golem, although these creatures are immune to backstab in the single player:
When helping the archaeological expedition, we found out that a wall was imposed between two chambers after the diggers had gone hostile:
The MP has its own bugs
We decided to give tomes of CON and DEX to Shari so that our leader could survive more attacks. After all level ups Shari now had 82 HPs, with the Helm of Balduran 87. Meshanis was also lucky with his HP rolls, having 41 in total for the 7th level mage (which brought an access to level 4 spells, by the way).
Tresset bought 16 scrolls of Chaos in Baldur's Gate.
Gotural: We're going to destroy everything in our paths. bengoshi: Didn't he ask you questions why do you need 16 Chaos? Tresset: I just told him that Crevs demanded them.
After Gotural had said Meshanis was the happiest mage, I too wanted to make my FMT the happiest FMT in Faerun. For that, we needed the Boots of Speed from Lothander.
We succeeded in not letting him flee after freeing him from his geas.
We decided to take on Degrodel's guards. With new spells (Haste, Slow, Greater Malison), higher levels and boots of speed letting my character quickly go out of a fight to hide and come back, it was easier to deal with them. Although several wild surges happened, but nothing serious.
Tresset voiced an idea to charm Degrodel, so that we could move him and not let him flee after returning with the Helm of Balduran.
Overall, this particular setup has been working fine so far, with lots of fun in seeing how our Inquisitor is shining, our Wild Mage becoming more and more influential, and of course my FMT getting more prebuffs to let him fight longer.
For the Iron Throne fight we decided to split forces - I and Gotural, invisible, stood at the back of the room, while Shari, buffed with Potions, entered from the stairs. I opened the fight with Chaos, casted from one of our numerous Chaos spell scrolls, Meshanis continued with Web.
Then Tresset added Mister L&T and the Crev's character to the fight. Mister was unlucky to die quickly, while Ajshenrtvarden successfully blinded two foes, one of them with a strange name "What?":
Meshanis casted another Chaos into the enemy group and then, protected with MGoI, went to help Shari.
The fight was basically won because enemies had too many negative effects on them. Especially when our Inquisitor could inflict as much as 31 damage from a distance.
After the fight, when Tresset went to the roof of the Iron Throne building, Gotural couldn't stop his surprise:
Not long after that, it was my turn to be surprised, when Gotural showed one of the biggest exploits ever, with unlimited infinite casting of any spell:
We decided to get Stoneskin for our wild mage, and cleared the Ice dungeon. Much more effective than when we went here during our first MP attempt - my FMT and Shari used the Greenstone amulet not to fall under Chaos and other enemy spells, while Meshanis used all his arsenal of wands and spells.
When we returned to Ulgoth's Beard, I tried to paralyze Shandalar with the wand - and BOOM! He failed his saving throw. For the first time even I managed to actually experience it - killing this mage who can flee very quickly after the dialogue about his quest.
We restored our reputation in a temple, but how fun it was to manage to kill Shandalar if we had only one attempt.
Maybe IWD has more combat and no banters than BG games, but one thing it does better - the class/race-specific dialogues. It adds greatly to the experience of role-playing your character.
A townsperson recognised Hypnos as a bard, and after Hypnos sang a bit, he was rewarded with a moonstone:
As a bard, Hypnos was able to recognize a siren's song from Jhonen's dreams. Later, Hypnos responded to a siren with his own song and asked to teach him her song. Of course, all this brough additional XP to the group.
Hypnos got a new level (4 from 7 HPs) and managed to scribe the Sleep spell, which in IWDEE has only 18' radius.
2 Sleep from Styx the Conjurer and Commands from Hachiman the Cleric/Thief let the group to deal with the first big group of orcs from the cave near Eastheaven.
I preferred to draw out enemies from the cave so that the party could easily retreat to the town if needed.
The second group, which also had 4 ogres, was approached with the same spells. While dealing with them Raijin the FMC was killed in one hit but otherwise it was alright.
Additional ogres brought not only XP but also wolf pelts, and selling them provided some money the party could spend on healing potions for the future.
After reporting to Hrothgar about orcs and buying supplies for the expedition to Kuldahar Hypnos reached the 3rd level (7 HPs max), Amaterasu the Druid and Styx the Conjurer - the 2nd level (with 10 HPs max and 5 HPs max respectively). Hachiman the Cleric/Thief was not so lucky, getting only 3 HPs as a thief. I suspect the game will laugh at me when both fighters will get low HP rolls, because so far it was too kind to the bard, the druid and the mage.
Comments
But in the MP it indeed has been working randomly: at one time preventing the damage from MM and at another not preventing it.
The duo monks run is difficult because I can't let any of the characters to get close to the majority of enemies, no matter how low their AC is - they are being hit even with -9 AC that potions of invulnerability provide. A wizard slayer or a shapeshifter druid can at least wear helmets, so they may not be afraid to tank in different situations.
Also, this run has changed my view on monks - they are actually not "one-trick ponies" - they require a lot of micromanagement, starting with constant kiting and switching fists for daggers and darts. They can hide in shadows, and I constantly use this skill - the added speed lets them run away from enemies and hide often. The ring of free action works on monks not slowing their speed.
But for a run with the full party I wouldn't risk choosing a monk, even a dark moon monk, as charname.
I can understand micromanagement being need for safety.
When we resumed our adventure we were terrified to find that a horrible spambot had joined the group!
The spambot then tried to kill us with its powerful spammy black magic. We were very lucky that its magic failed and instead it just made some botty nonsense happen instead.
Thinking quickly, Shari countered its chaos with some righteous magic of her own and banned the fearsome creature forever!
Having destroyed the spambot the heroes decided it was time to investigate the Nashkel mines. Though the mine was infested with a great many kobolds, none of them withstood the passing of the heroes. Even the Chieftain and Shaman of the tribe were no match for the brave heroes.
Then the time came to confront Mulahey. He died before he knew what was happening to him.
The heroes left the mine by an alternate exit and found themselves in a desert area. After exploring a bit they were given a dagger by a madman and told to return it to a nearby tomb. Wanting to keep the dagger for themselves the group started to debate whether or not they could defeat the creature inside the tomb. Shari decided to take the undead beast on by herself using a scroll of Protection from Undead. After returning from the tomb without a scratch the rest of the party was amazed by how clever the paladin was in doing this.
The group then met Narcillicus Harwilliger Neen, a mage who summoned a pair of mustard jellies to attack them. After shattering his magical protections with a Dispel Magic, Shari shot him down with her crossbow ending his existence in moments. The mustard Jellies followed soon after.
Retuning to Nashkel to report that the trouble in the mines was over, the group was attacked by some manner of assassin. For how arrogant he was this Nimbul was rather quick to die.
The group moved on to Beregost to kill Tranzig, rest, and restock before going to the Wood of Sharp Teeth to confront the bandits. After exploring Peldvale and Larswood and killing all the bandits they found there they went to the bandit camp and killed all the bandits there too.
The spirit of MP run lives even in such united reports.
8546
Female, Half-elf, Cleric of Helm
474
Lawful Neutral, 7 rerolls, Female2(I changed it to default)
I'm not gonig to roll my characters this run.
I had no more scrolls of Protection from Magic neither in the backpack nor in shops. So I couldn't participate in additional fights that don't lead to the final. Invisible, the monks went through the Candlekeep catacombs and returned to the BG city.
Slythe and Krystin were the next target.
Thanks to potions and Blur, the Sigyn's AC was -15, plus additional -3 against piercing from the girdle. But still Slythe managed to backstab her. If Rasaad was the target, he would be dead, but Sigyn, who before the fight had increased her HPs to 80 thanks to the Vampiric Touch, survived.
Both Monks kept using the wands of Heavens, and Slythe died before he could hit Sigyn once more (who retreated after being hit) or Rasaad and berore Krystin entered the fight (the monks were under the effects of the Shield and Greenstone Amulets, and potions of Magic Shielding (automatic saving throws and 50% res. to magical attacks), but still Krystin was not a desired opponent).
Fighting Krystin was not mandatory because the invitations to the Grand Dukes' Palace were among Slythe's items, so the monks retreated.
The fight against doppelgangers started badly. Rasaad was backstabbed for 66 damage.
But Sigyn, whose AC thanks to Blur, was better than the Rasaad's, stayed on the battlefield and managed to slay one greater doppelganger rather quickly. Sigyn stayed as close as she could to the Grand Dukes, so that doppelgangers attacked her and not the Dukes. A summoned Ogre Berzerker didn't help but there was simply no other choice than to rely on a very low AC and 88 HPs.
A doppelganger mage then confused all the guards and the Grand Dukes, but Sigyn was well protected against this effect and killed a doppelganger assassin soon afterwards.
Even confused, the guards and Dukes continued to fight, Sigyn finished another greater doppelganger. And then another one.
A doppelganger shaman and a doppelganger mage were left, as well as a summoned Ogre Berzerker, a Skeleton warrior and a phase spider. Sigyn had to heal herself from the Acid Arrow which the doppelganger mage casted on her.
A little change of places because of healing lead to a situation when the skeleton and the ogre were attacking Liia, while Sigyn approached both doppelgangers. The spider was horrored by Sigyn.
The shaman was slayed first, then the ogre unsummoned. The slow effect on Belt ended and the Duke helped to finish the doppelganger mage.
Thankfully, the Sarevok's attack on Belt didn't last long, and Sigyn even managed to save Liia, so that both Grand Dukes survived the fight.
To tell the truth, the outcome of both fights - against Slythe and doppelgangers was based entirely on luck. Slythe could inflict much more that 66 in his attack, he could hit not once but twice or more, but it didn't happen. The doppelgangers and the ogre berzerker could roll a critical on Sigyn while she was alone, the doppelgangers could succeed in killing the Dukes.
These things were not in my hands, but for now Sigyn and Rasaad continue their quest. Only Sarevok and his helpers are left.
Or perhaps everyone is busy beta-testing or they went skiing.
Indeed your monks were lucky guys, not sure there is a way to eliminate such a factor under your conditions but I am not used to monks in BG1. Do you have a way to identify the assassin before he strikes ?
The first of Sarevok's acolytes, Diarmid, was taken down due to my favourite method: hide in shadows - stand on the line of sight of an enemy - attack with missile weapon (throwing daggers this time) - retreat immediately - repeat. This way you can inflict damage while the enemy actually doesn't see you.
After that I buffed Rasaad to the max, including potions of magic shielding (50% MR for 2 hours) - did you know these potions can stack, thus providing 100% MR?
Anyway, I expected that as soon as Rasaad started using the Necklace of Missiles at the place where enemies stood, they would go out of there, Semaj for example. But it turned out to be a "No". They simply stayed there, while Rasaad attacked empty spaces with his Missile Blasts (about 10 charges were needed).
Angelo (who stayed a bit to the left, so previous Missile Blasts didn't hit him) at first behaved the same, but soon revealed himself. All this time Sigyn just stayed invisible, detecting and dispelling illusions from time to time.
Rasaad still had 100% MR, as well as 100% Fire resistance, so he simply kept running in circles so that Angelo's Fireshield could wore off. Angelo couldn't get close to Rasaad for a full attack, and when the monk chose to turn around one of the statues to the left, Angelo lost the monk from his sight. After that happened, Rasaad used his Wand of Heavens on Angelo. Repeating this procedure again and again led to the Angelo's death.
I wondered why Angelo could never get close to Rasaad, paused and went searching the Internet. Monks move +2 points faster than normal units from the start. They gain +1 for every five levels. So Rasaad moved at +3 points faster than the norm. From what I've read, the default movement speed in BG2 is 9 units, the speed from the Speed spell and/or the Boots of Speed make it 11. From the game it looked like Rasaad and Angelo had the same speed, so maybe in BGEE it works differently, but the main thing here is that monks of the 8th level move with the same speed as hasted characters.
So, @Musigny, maybe during the fight against Slythe, the monks could indeed constantly run so that the thief didn't get them - but that time the thief was invisible so it was impossible to guess where to run so that he couldn't come close.
Anyway, this time, I had no choice other than to test how it worked against Sarevok, using Rasaad for kiting while Sigyn used the wand of heavens on him.
It worked just fine, though: hasted Sarevok couldn't hit constantly running Rasaad, while Sigyn used her wand.
Then I had to switch the monks, as the Sigyn's wand had no more charges.
Between every use of the wand, Rasaad attacked with throwing daggers, while Sigyn simply ran around the Bhaal's symbol. The much desired win came soon enough.
Well done!
I have to check whether you can dispel Slythe's illusion. I tend to believe you cannot, again to be checked.
In fact my initial question was more related to the dopplegangers (sorry for the lack of precision)
Here that's even different.
From the general perspective one thing that may help a bit is to "track" a hidden guy with the ring scorcher obtained from the red wizards but you need the opportunity to do so and this may never come. Obvioulsy in the no-reload you don't want to take the first hit. Anyway this lasts two rounds.
The way you managed Sarevok perfectly makes sense but it makes me think that the designers who initially made him 100% magic resistant were not entirely wrong.
I like the SCS idea to decrease his elemental resistance. Taking one more step and having average score in all categories would make him a challenge for most party composition.
After the Bandit Camp we decided to go straight to the Cloakwood forest, without exploring the Sword Coast.
There, when we reached the archdruid tree, Tresset expressed a desire to see how powerful the archdruid was. Gotural and me previously shared our thoughts on this: "We need to fight with druids as little as possible". But brave Shari went upstairs. The Dispel Magic ability from the Inquisitor works wonders in BG1. After the druid's protections were gone, Shari attacked with bolts of biting. The poisoned archdruid couldn't do anything. When my character reached the second floor, the druid was already dead.
The journey through the Cloakwood forest was rather smooth. We reached the Mines but still didn't get any ambushes. So we decided to travel back and forth till we get one - we didn't want to get an ambush when we wouldn't be prepared.
And again the Inquisitor was the main character here. The True Seeing ability - and both thieves went visible.
After the main threat was cancelled, the fight didn't last too long.
Before facing the Drasus's party we discussed how we were going to do it. Webs-Fireballs and summons to distract them.
After Gotural casted Webs, we waited several rounds till Drasus could spoke. But he didn't. And then Gotural released a fireball. Then I added another from the Necklace of Missiles. The fight didn't even start before it was over. Later we discussed it a bit - I said that it was our 3rd time and we won twice in a fair way, so maybe cheating a bit this time was OK. Gotural said we didn't cheat because we prepared for the fight but it turned out our preparation was not needed. Tresset said that basically you couldn't expect Drasus and Co to be friendly because it was the bandit's territory.
In the Mines Shari, being a paladin, talked to a bandit's soul:
Then, because of the wrong pathfinding, our Mr. L&T got trapped by bandits. We decided we would ctrl+r him later and concentrated on fighting this group of bandits from the start.
Hareishan was the first enemy in BG1, on whom Shari's Dispel didn't work:
Then Shari got into a sutuation when Chaos was flying into her way. Tresset gulped a potion of Magic Blocking, which was the only correct option. Even a Gotural's advice came later.
Then Meshanis was pushed through the wall by his own summons:
The next level of the Mines was a bit buggy. At first, Meshanis nearly died because Gotural was not ready for an area switch.
Then Meshanis inflicted 48 damage on my character, although he casted Skull trap on the normal level and it should have inflicted 36 damage maximum.
It was an obvious bug, so we revived my character. At last, our summons became permanent - they didn't unsummon with time:
Both Ogre Mage and Natasha fell because of bolts of biting, used by Shari.
Our Inquisitor should have been a Blackguard inside.
Before facing Davaeorn, we again discussed the strategy. It was decided Shari should face him, use Dispel (because it's possible even under the effect of Protection from Magic), while my character would gulp potions of heroism, invulnerability, and frost giant strength and would block the way for bandit guards, with the support of Meshanis.
Davaeorn almost from the start teleported to the main group. That was a bit scary but... he was dispelled, he didn't have protections. I used the Crev's character and casted Command - it succeeded, then Shari poisoned him with her crossbow.
Gotural: "Is this real life? Am I dreaming? It should be a dream".
It was probably the easiest and the fastest Davaeorn in my history of playing BG, just like the Bandit camp previously had been.
Tresset later said that the Dave's saving throws are 4,3,5,7,5 - in our case he failed his 2 saving throws against Spells (Command) and Poison (bolts of biting).
Overall, it was a great session. I'm very impressed by the Inquisitor. I had read in the past @Lord_Tansheron 's view that an Inquisitor is a must for SCS no-reload party runs but actually haven't tried this kit much. And our current run shows that probably the Inquisitor is the best option for the Bhaalspawn. At least, in the MP, when you have not much time to go inventory management and have to react quickly to glitches and unexpected actions, the character who can dispel almost everything, who can stop enemies' invisibility, and do both these things very quickly, who has a lot of HPs, a good armor and whose weapon causes poison in mages is definitely the "man of the game".
In the end, we had a small chat about, you know, a pity that there're only three of us currently participating in the MP. It was very fun when GemHound, Meyahi, semiticgod, Neverused, CrevsDaak played. Even while there're only three of us, it's very cool, the coolest way of playing BG is to play in a team. The playthrough will be quite a long one, and maybe we'll even play SoD - and it will be the first ever playthrough of a BG game for all of us.
To my mind Inquisitors are better in BG1 than in BG2 if SCS is installed. The first reason being their immunities to Hold and Charm effects which are so dangerous early in the game. In BG2 you can find many ways to make you immune to these and your saving throws are good enough anyway.
Then their Dispel Magic and True Sight abilities are, I think, far better in the first game where enemies don't have access to Spell Immunity : Abjuration / Divination and your own casters won't get Remove Magic until a good portion of the game. And you won't be able to use Breach at all during BG1.
Meanwhile in BG2, every casters come prebuffed with Spell Immunity : Abjuration/Divination which makes the Inquisitor abilities useless as long as you don't destroy them, then all it takes is a Breach from your Mage to bring down the enemy's protections (Dispeling the smalls buffs like Shield, Chant, Free Action, and so forth isn't really important).
The instant cast True Sight is still very good though, especially against all the Thieves who drink Potions of Invisibility every rounds.
I continue to find Inquisitors extremely useful in SCS, but it's by no means "required". However, given how good Paladins are in general (thanks in large parts due to Carsomyr) I find Inquisitor to be perhaps the best choice among their kits in BG2.
I suppose you could also boil things down to whether you want to trade Paladin spell levels or Mage spell levels for your dispel. Paladins aren't terribly great casters (DuHM is essentially the only thing you'd ever really want to cast) - but mages are.
The True Sight is also a big part, by the way, especially in SCS.
Meet Chaen, an elven FMT with an insane roll, 18/98 19 17 18 11 11, starting with 3 pips in TWF, 2 pips in longswords and 1 pip in katana. Planning for another pip in katana and then 2 warhammer for a nice crush weapon. Thief skills in order: trap/open lock, detect illusion, set trap, hide/MS. Not an RP run I just try to play when I get a few minutes alone in front of my beloved computer.
Wakes up in prison, Imoen helps him out, he frees Jaheira and Minsc and flees as fast as he can. Completing all quests and killing every foe while doing so. Of course he cannot rest because he doesn't know when Irenicus is coming back, a shame he didn't memorize any spells before dozing off. Also a shame that Imoen and Jaheira memorized stupid spells. It goes smoothly even so, getting out of prison with quite a few potions intact.
First thing Chaen does once out in the open is to say bye bye to Minsc and Yoshimo. Jaheira is kind of powerful so she gets to stay.
Circus. Odd place. A sad evil gnome dies and a cute elven M/C gets to join the party. Also a very strong character. Gone through a rough patch but she seems to do ok fighting the most horrible creatures of the realms so I guess she is stronger than she looks. Also I find cleric buffs really great in the early game where THACO and AC is a big deal.
Running around the city completing quests for my friend in the copper coronet, the radiant heart, the thieves guild, Xzar > the harpers, killing an evil party of adventurers in waukeens promenade, killing an evil party and a rakshasa below the temple district. Gaining quite a few easy exp and gold, earning enough gold to buy gear for Jaheira to turn her into a good fighter and enough exp to get her fire elemental spell.
Goes to a trading post that has some druid trouble. Also trouble with evil blue merchants. Jaheira gets to kill the evil druid using the fire elementals and cleric/druid buffs to kill everything on the way there (except the really annoying fungus, Chaen needs to kill them himself with AoE support from the cute elf and a few wands). I get to kill the evil blue merchants almost by myself. Yields me a surprisingly healthy amount of gear and gold.
Too much gear though, need a bag of holding badly. So back to copper coronet I go to partake in an awful awful quest, but it does yield me a bag of holding. So mission accomplished.
Meet a crazy (must be due to the really poor dialogue) monk at the trading post. Figure I should help him since he is of good alignment. Get some great gear but the monk decides to ditch me. Go figure. Met a bear though that the internet tells me has a friend in the hidden refuge.
Goes to the hidden refuge, does all kinds of fetch quests, really tedious stuff. Finally get ready for a big showdown after letting Neera open the door to the red wizards enclave (or kill the guard really). Memorize a lot of useful spells for fighting high level mages. Tell Neera I don't need her (this is a no-reload after all). Goes to sleep at the closest inn. And Jaheira packs her bags and leaves on some harper business!
I get kind of tired of this playthrough mostly due to Rasaad, Neera and Hexxat quests. First of all they kind of suck. And second they sure have you running around a lot (and I try to play really limited resting). So I decide to risk a restart at the hands of the gate district lich. Surprisingly the fight goes smoothly (thanks to a wand of spell striking recently bought from the red wizards and spell immunity, spell shield and all the other lovely buffs) and I am the proud owner of a unique +4 longsword! I can't say he used his time stop well though, almost makes me feel like I cheated. But the happiness over the new sword wins out and I continue with the run.
Now where did Jaheira go? I guess I'll soon find out.
Thoughts so far. FMT is an excellent class, now he is 9/10/11 with almost 1 M xp. Starting to level slower ofc, but he is already a good enough thief with very good backstabs, a decent fighter/dpser, a kinda bad mage but the mage part makes him ok at debuffing, can throw out a web or two, but simply stellar at tanking. When up against the really tough fights having a tank with spirit armor, blur, MI, stoneskin, SI: abjuration, impr invis, SI: div, spell shield etc on top of the cleric party buffs makes really tough fights trivial. Also protecting chaotic commands and death ward with SI: abjuration is fantastic.
Most used spells are buff and debuff spells even though the party consists of only casters.
Please do not hesitate to paste your weidu log as well as a few screenshots (me like pictures, cannot read, raahh).
Let's see, memorable moments: I almost got wiped trying to rescue Jaheira's old boyfriend (NPC Project). I was fighting that ridiculous Hamadryad that's just randomly in the Cloakwood, and she ran away afraid, four people Entangled. Farien and Khalid followed her, running directly into seven or so high level druids; there were at least 3 nymphs on the field, Call Lightnings were going crazy, and all my spell casters were out of range and couldn't shut down their casters. Only Farien and Imoen survived, and to save the gear from despawning the duo took apart the Wyvern cave and stashed the equipment they couldn't carry on the body in the cave, the only container I know of.
Neera died to archers soon after, but we pushed after Daveaorn. One Pro. Magic lets Farien 1v1 him while Khalid leads the remaining 4 against the Black Talon Elites. Branwen almost dies 3 or 4 times because the archers absolutely refuse to retarget onto Khalid who is next to them; many health potions were burnt that fight.
Iron Throne fight was messy; I actually reloaded here because for some reason there's a duplicated character, Shanarra, up there and the second backstabber proves too much. Second time it's just Farien buffed to the gills fighting solo against everybody: I find that this is the only SCS solution at times, sadly. Trying to take the Gorpel Hind fight, Neera wildsurges a Fireball accidentally killing the bartender. Oops. Had to pay around 2-3k gold to recover 8 of that 10 reputation at a temple, supposedly paying for the Raise Deads of all the innocents she burnt. Whoops.
Um. Imoen dies in the Ducal Palace fight to a backstab, Neera and Branwen die to traps in the Undercity due to me not knowing that there's 4 and not 2 traps on the Skeleton Warrior aisle. They again die in the final battle, but the remaining 4 survive the full spell-loadout of the mages. We're nowhere close to the Experience cap, but I'm moving to BG2 anyways; I'm kind of sick of having so few reliable, reusable ways to protect my mages and clerics.
The Iron Throne fight is definitely challenging and needs a lot of pausing. I've found the semiticgod's BG2 approach VERY helpful during this fight: when I paused every round "for future reports" I could control the battlefield. You can't let yourself miss even one round of that fight if you don't want to reload.
Neera * 2
Khalid * 2
Jahiera * 1
After Imoen joined, the first thing we did was clear the map and send the mad wizard and his lackey off on their merry way. We then moved down to Beregost and talked down Marl, and then went North. We killed the Ogre and then killed Tarnesh.
Once inside the Inn, Khalid and Jahiera were recruited. We killed the Hobgoblins and then went back to Beregost, where we recruited Neera. Then we killed Karlat and then Silke.
We next killed the ogrillons, stole the stealth boots, and defended ourselves against a party of Flaming Fist - nice equipment.
We next killed the Hobgoblins on the road and returned both the letter and the family ring.
We then went to Nashkel and killed Neira, and then cleaned out the carnival. We also hired Minsc.
Then the party went into the Cloud Peaks and killed Zal, and then went to the Xvart camp where Neera died to the first swing of an xvart.
Borda then permanently killed Khalid, and killed Jahiera. We then went and rescued Brage, and razed the two that could still be raised.
We then went deeper into the Cloakwood, and rescued the Dryad's tree, only for Neera to get killed by Ingot. I didn't want to permakill her quite yet but my own rules made me. The party proceeded to cut its way through the Gnoll Stronghold without resting.
The party then went North and killed the polar bear only to NOT get the Boots of the North. We managed to get the paladin there to talk to the party by hiding Imoen, and killed everything but the creatures on the Northern Bridge. We then returned to the temple and had the tome of charisma identified so Xyrwenys could use it.
That was the last little part for the two sessions.
I've decided to respect an opinion by Josh Sawyer (https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/39669/josh-sawyers-thoughts-on-iwd-ee) and not choose classes and kits that the EE brought to IWD. My party is far from being a powergamey, it's an attempt to see how triple classes behave in IWD with a full party.
Also, it seems I've found a solution to my all-time question of "how do you roll stats for six characters", which has been troubling me for years in terms of IWD. The solution was to get rolls as they are, with rerolling not limited but without adjusting the results. This way it's VERY hard to end up with characters with optimal stats, which actually has left me with a party of adventurers who have both strong and weak sides.
I have to note that using this rule makes you not only notice the overall amount of stat points, but pay attention to actual distribution. It's the best cure of "I've rolled 95 but clicked reroll". Also, with this approach (without adjusting the results) some rolls below 90 were actually better than some 90+ rolls.
Meet a party that includes some familiar faces:
[spoiler=Eastheaven Adventurers]
[/spoiler]
[spoiler=Hypnos, the Bard]
[/spoiler]
The leader of the party is a Bard. High CHA, good songs. And overall, a bard is a natural leader. While I was rolling for his stats, my main aim was INT and CHA, and after a 92 roll came, which gave exactly that, I was happy.
[spoiler=Raijin, the FMC]
[/spoiler]
It was very hard to roll a FMC without adjusting stats. I needed CON because this character will be my main tank, but in the same time STR and DEX couldn't be too low. After seeing a lot of rolls, I dared to take a character with low INT and WIS, so I'll have to use potions while memorizing spells for him.
[spoiler=Hades, the FMT]
[/spoiler]
With a FMT, it was a bit easier than with a FMT. CON could be neglected, and I was lucky to get two 18 in STR and DEX - exaxtly what was needed for backstabs.
[spoiler=Styx, the Conjurer]
[/spoiler]
Although there're 2 mages in the party, but they're only partly mages, and their INT is very low. I needed a good arcane caster. I decided to choose a Conjurer, as I thought losing an access to Invocation is neglectable. After rolling the most difficult chatacters, it was easier with a mage. I needed INT, and after getting a roll which also brought STR and CON, I took it.
[spoiler=Amaterasu, the Druid]
[/spoiler]
I like druids and couldn't start a run in IWD without one. I wasn't lucky with a druid in getting 18 WIS, but it is because I wanted to have maximum bonus to HPs.
[spoiler=Hachiman, the Cleric Thief]
[/spoiler]
I needed a thief for locks and traps, and also some cleric spells, so the choice for the 6th party member was obvious. I looked for high DEX and WIS, but couldn't get it, so I went with a balanced roll here.
The journey begins!
super team!
If you remember, before we decided to enter the Mines we had tried to get one of two ambushes at least. And just when we left the Mines map, we were ambushed by Morvin and Co.
Because it didn't come as a suprise, we acted calmly. Shari, the Bhaalspawn, gulped a Potion of Magic Blocking, our cleric casted the Holy Smite, while others retreated a bit to the north.
Basically, my character, with Meshanis and Mister L&T, were kiting, while Shari was ripping enemies to pieces:
Because we had defeated Davaeorn, but still were not of the optimal levels, we decided to explore the Sword Coast a bit.
We encountered the Surgeon, although he shouldn't have been there after the Mines:
Also, we managed to backstab a flesh golem, although these creatures are immune to backstab in the single player:
When helping the archaeological expedition, we found out that a wall was imposed between two chambers after the diggers had gone hostile:
The MP has its own bugs
We decided to give tomes of CON and DEX to Shari so that our leader could survive more attacks. After all level ups Shari now had 82 HPs, with the Helm of Balduran 87. Meshanis was also lucky with his HP rolls, having 41 in total for the 7th level mage (which brought an access to level 4 spells, by the way).
Tresset bought 16 scrolls of Chaos in Baldur's Gate.
Gotural: We're going to destroy everything in our paths.
bengoshi: Didn't he ask you questions why do you need 16 Chaos?
Tresset: I just told him that Crevs demanded them.
After Gotural had said Meshanis was the happiest mage, I too wanted to make my FMT the happiest FMT in Faerun. For that, we needed the Boots of Speed from Lothander.
We succeeded in not letting him flee after freeing him from his geas.
We decided to take on Degrodel's guards. With new spells (Haste, Slow, Greater Malison), higher levels and boots of speed letting my character quickly go out of a fight to hide and come back, it was easier to deal with them. Although several wild surges happened, but nothing serious.
Tresset voiced an idea to charm Degrodel, so that we could move him and not let him flee after returning with the Helm of Balduran.
Overall, this particular setup has been working fine so far, with lots of fun in seeing how our Inquisitor is shining, our Wild Mage becoming more and more influential, and of course my FMT getting more prebuffs to let him fight longer.
For the Iron Throne fight we decided to split forces - I and Gotural, invisible, stood at the back of the room, while Shari, buffed with Potions, entered from the stairs. I opened the fight with Chaos, casted from one of our numerous Chaos spell scrolls, Meshanis continued with Web.
Then Tresset added Mister L&T and the Crev's character to the fight. Mister was unlucky to die quickly, while Ajshenrtvarden successfully blinded two foes, one of them with a strange name "What?":
Meshanis casted another Chaos into the enemy group and then, protected with MGoI, went to help Shari.
The fight was basically won because enemies had too many negative effects on them. Especially when our Inquisitor could inflict as much as 31 damage from a distance.
After the fight, when Tresset went to the roof of the Iron Throne building, Gotural couldn't stop his surprise:
Not long after that, it was my turn to be surprised, when Gotural showed one of the biggest exploits ever, with unlimited infinite casting of any spell:
We decided to get Stoneskin for our wild mage, and cleared the Ice dungeon. Much more effective than when we went here during our first MP attempt - my FMT and Shari used the Greenstone amulet not to fall under Chaos and other enemy spells, while Meshanis used all his arsenal of wands and spells.
When we returned to Ulgoth's Beard, I tried to paralyze Shandalar with the wand - and BOOM! He failed his saving throw. For the first time even I managed to actually experience it - killing this mage who can flee very quickly after the dialogue about his quest.
We restored our reputation in a temple, but how fun it was to manage to kill Shandalar if we had only one attempt.
Maybe IWD has more combat and no banters than BG games, but one thing it does better - the class/race-specific dialogues. It adds greatly to the experience of role-playing your character.
A townsperson recognised Hypnos as a bard, and after Hypnos sang a bit, he was rewarded with a moonstone:
As a bard, Hypnos was able to recognize a siren's song from Jhonen's dreams. Later, Hypnos responded to a siren with his own song and asked to teach him her song. Of course, all this brough additional XP to the group.
Hypnos got a new level (4 from 7 HPs) and managed to scribe the Sleep spell, which in IWDEE has only 18' radius.
2 Sleep from Styx the Conjurer and Commands from Hachiman the Cleric/Thief let the group to deal with the first big group of orcs from the cave near Eastheaven.
I preferred to draw out enemies from the cave so that the party could easily retreat to the town if needed.
The second group, which also had 4 ogres, was approached with the same spells. While dealing with them Raijin the FMC was killed in one hit but otherwise it was alright.
Additional ogres brought not only XP but also wolf pelts, and selling them provided some money the party could spend on healing potions for the future.
After reporting to Hrothgar about orcs and buying supplies for the expedition to Kuldahar Hypnos reached the 3rd level (7 HPs max), Amaterasu the Druid and Styx the Conjurer - the 2nd level (with 10 HPs max and 5 HPs max respectively). Hachiman the Cleric/Thief was not so lucky, getting only 3 HPs as a thief. I suspect the game will laugh at me when both fighters will get low HP rolls, because so far it was too kind to the bard, the druid and the mage.