Shooting down Shoal provided a couple of levels before a bit more axe work around Beregost got me to level 4. Moving down to Nashkel I picked up the ankheg armour (which is pretty good for a wizard slayer that can't use magical protections) and rested to get Bhaal healing. The next 3 Bhaal powers I want are the evil ones though, which was bad news for Bentan (his scroll of magic protection is also very handy for a wizard slayer). I could have run away off the map against him if necessary, but both my first 2 shots hit.
Since I was in the area anyway I also axed Meilum, although his bracers are not usable by a wizard slayer.
Next in line for some whirling axes was Arghain (to get his magic 2-handed sword) and I completed my collection of bags in Beregost before moving on to the basilisk area. Sword and axes quickly put paid to them with the last basilisk getting me up to level 6.
Korax joined the team to sort out Mutamin
and lasted long enough to paralyse Peter as well.
Baerin was drawn away and died in melee before Kirian was engaged at range: she managed a lightning bolt, but was then axed (leaving Lindin helpless against ranged attacks).
In the Nashkel Mine the kobolds needed criticals to hit - and didn't get enough of those to force resting until I arrived in Mulahey's cave. The cleric himself was cut up by axes without being allowed close enough to have a conversation (the relatively poor weapon speed for the axe means that with a poor iniative roll there's not enough time to throw and run away round the pond again, so that encounter took a while).
Back in Nashkel I dodged into the shop to avoid Nimbul's horror, though stayed there to eat various magic missiles before going into hand to hand. There was a bit more dodging to avoid Neira's spells before the inn was rendered safe to rest in. There was no need for dodging with Tranzig though after an opening axe shot sent him running.
At the bandit camp two sets of rests was needed to heal damage while clearing the exterior and gaining some improved armour.
I then popped into the main tent long enough for Raemon and Britik to follow me out - the former falling to the sword, leaving Britik helpless against axes. I then dodged in and out again to avoid a horror before making Venkt pay for the use of an acid arrow.
After hacking down Hakt another rest then ensured plenty of HPs were available to trigger the lightning trap - I got a little bonus there by pushing Ender Sai into the path of the lightning.
Edit: in the second Cloakwood area I pulled a number of ettercaps and spiders away from web traps and towards the map edge to be able to run away and cure poison if necessary. However, I didn't bother doing that with the final ettercap, despite knowing that it would be touch and go from that position if I did get poisoned. There was a touch - and I went ...
Steinarr the Barbarian is off to a strong start. BG1 1st post:
He raged across the Sword Coast for a while, discovering how much damage he could do with a sling and some rocks. (And the answer was, quite a lot).
He recently partnered with Branwen. The two of them have a similar attitude about obstacles. (Talk is cheap. Hammers are better.)
His vulnerability to nasty spells has been greatly lessened by the helm of charm protection that we found in Ulcaster (obtained by a sanctuary-protected Branwen without challenging the SCS-enhanced vampire wolf).
Bassilus took a silence spell and couldn't put up much resistance. Mulahey went down to a hold spell. Nimbul either had really bad saves or we got lucky with a dart of wounding and a silence spell:
I suspect that clearing the mine has raised Steinarr's profile... The next bunch of assassins had better get some extra potions. They're going to need them to deal with the barbarian's rage...
Branwen is proving to be fragile, despite her ankheg plate armor. She went down for the first time to Molkar & Co. Then again in Tazok's tent. Then again after the amazons put her to sleep and pummeled her with poison darts and flame arrows.
However, Steinarr just shrugs it off when enemies hit him. (Having 100+ HPs is pretty nice in BG1.)
The action:
Steinarr hits hard:
Steinarr doesn't care how many bandits show up: they all get electricity bullets to the face:
Steinarr surveys the wreckage:
Steinarr poisons both amazon clerics, but Branwen fails to complete her detect invisibility spell before getting backstabbed:
Branwen needs to learn how to rage:
Steinarr cleans up. Now how to get all this loot back to Thalantyr without Branwen, any nearby chests, or a bag of holding? Ah well...
And if my hearing and discerning skills are accurate, the plot implications are.... substantial.
--
[note: Just as I was unloading a round-full of explosion potions in to the room (as per my standard "oh shit" protocol) the game crashed. Now I need to reload from before the encounter. So, very curious. Well done, Beamdog.]
Didn't you have special dialogues with Glint? From what I recall, they are not explicitly romantic, but mostly about his family. Maybe it is a gnome thing?
Hmm I would love to see the dialogue about Glint with Corwin. Glint is kinda cute and funny, but Corwin is a strong and beautiful no-nonsense womanly woman, not teenagey and whimsical like Neera. Then again Neera is fun, too. Would have been hard for my pc to choose. I really need a 'concurrent romances' kind of mod for my game. Romances make a no-reload especially cruel, if the npc is chunked, that is so sad you have to move on. I lost Glint permanently in the final fight, so I still feel sad for the little fella. (I was playing minimal reload, and was exhausted by the final fight, and it made the thing more memorable and dramatic.)
@lunar I felt that way when Xan died in a recent game.
A new run with Gorvenal Stonefist, a Dwarven Berserker. He hasn't yet decided whether or not he will have other party members.
In Candlekeep he was killed at the first attempt by Mendas. In the position he was in, he wasn't landing any blows and the rats stopped him moving.
Second run was more successful and he gratefully picked up the +1 axe that Mendas was carrying.
He made his way to the Friendly Arms Inn where he found his rage an excellent defence against Tarnesh. He was a bit annoyed when it was a guard who delivered the killing blow.
He returned Joia's ring, helped a widow in the ankheg area and helped Tanya against the fishermen before heading south to Beregost where he calmed down Marl and took a tome to Firebead. He then killed some ogrillon and gladly received the reward. Afyter picking up some ankheg armour in Nashkel, he was attacked by an assassin near the mines.
Upon the assassin's body was the +1 axe with which he had attacked Gorvenal. Gorvenal was delighted as it meant that he no longer had to worry about his weapon breaking. He then killed Greywolf and shortly afterwards Prism sadly died.
He then helped a dryad and her tree.
He then returned to the Carnival where he tried to help a mage, but sadly failed.
In transit he was pleased that his rage protected him from a ghast.
All this made Gorvinda rather tense, so he was delighted when Lena gave him a MOST relaxing massage.
He was given some potions which made the battle against some spiders less fraught with anxiety.
He then went to the gnoll fortress and killed some dangerous assassins with his newly aquired necklace of missiles. Amongst the loot was a very good axe, even better than his +1 axe.
He then went on to kill a revenant.
and after that cleared a barrow that was full of ghasts. He got hurt, but enrage was a life saver. When attacked by Narcillicus Harwilliger Neen and some mustard jellies, he emerged victorious despite being badly hurt. Narcillicus actually killed himself with a rebounding lightning bolt. I'll have to remember that as a tactic to use.
He then went to Firewine Bridge where killing a couple of zombies brought him to level 6. Meilum was next to fall, and Gorvinda then had a difficult choice to make. One pair of gauntlets improved his dexterity and armour class (by 1), whereas the other pair helped his attack.
He then fought the mighty Khaark. Apparently Khaark was pleased by that. Whether he was still pleased as Gorvinda rained blows down upon him again and again, might be another matter entirely. Gorvinda himself was beginning to wonder if the fight was a good idea. In the end, his decisions proved to be good ones.
The ambush by Ogre Mages wasn't dangerous - after all, it wasn't a solo, so vulnerable party members could retreat to the safer place (West), so that the rest of the party could deal with these enemies.
Killing a greater doppleganger brought a new level for Hades, who now had 75 in Open Locks and 80 in Find Traps, which was enough for the Candlekeep catacombs.
During the battle against Prat and his group Uzume helped Mortuus to overcome the confusion state (the additional bonus of this priest's ability is that it can't dispel protections while curing Chaos).
Prat tried to flee from the main battlefield but couldn't resist Hold Person from a dryad summoned by Yahiko.
Yahiko reached the 5th spell level (yay, Insect Plague) (and some people say druids in BG1 are weak), so the party could now face any enemy in BG1. I decided to use this plot stage (when the party is accused of murdering the Iron Throne leaders) to explore all the remaining BG1 areas and the TotC content). Kahrk was first.
Xan casted Spell Thrust on him to dispel MGoI:
After several tries Mortuus managed to remove all Kahr's combat protections:
Kahrk was gone:
The next stop was Firewine. A backstab from Hades inflicted poison on Lendarn so it stopped his casting.
Elemental damage from Ashideena and poison quickly killed the mage, even though his protections were on.
For the Ogre Mage in Firewine Hades used the only arrow of slaying bought in Baldur's Gate (I needed to kill him quickly before he could start casting).
The party then visited Icharyd. Fully buffed Woden defeated this undead warrior one on one.
Wolf of Ulcaster and his ghouls weren't dangerous to the party thanks to Remove Fear and Free Action.
The fight against the Red Wizards had to be a test. After all, there're 4 mages in that group. As always, Spell Thrust for Xan was the first thing we did. After that magic missiles finished Denak. Yahiko casted Insect Plague and the battle was basically won.
Now, the trip to the Ice Island was on the timetable.
Personally, I just find druids weak soloers, in part due the long casting times of their more useful and important spells. I always find them excellent support characters in a party.
Personally, I just find druids weak soloers, in part due the long casting times of their more useful and important spells. I always find them excellent support characters in a party.
I just don't like the druid concept. I like good best. I can live with the fact that some people are plain evil. I can also live the fact that some people aim to be good, but are unable to live up to their own standards. In my book they are neutral. What I can't stand is the idea that being neutral is something to aim for. Let's face it, those who aim high usually fall short, so why aim low? Doing that, you'll probably end up being evil.
Good and evil are types of thinking that humans need to understand themselves and it doesn't apply to the natural world i.e, a lion isn't evil because it eats a rabbit however man (good |evil) builds cities that destroy the natural environment... Driuds see this as a philosophical point that needs to be countered
For solo play I'd recommend shape shifter or Avenger (slightly harder start) and human for the late game dual option but I agree they are much more of a party support class
Glad to report that I have just completed a Blind, Insane (no damage bonus) run of SoD.
Will post something like a review eventually, but would rate the game as a solid "A".
It took me about 60 hours to get through (quite a few uncompleted quests still)/
All encounters, especially the final fight, was treated as if it could be a game ender: every round, each character did something useful, drank a potion etc.
Corwin carried the day. I am glad I did not leave her behind for a caster.
She single handedly slew [end-game-enemy-types] by the dozen, when spells were impotent and even the charname had difficulty hitting. Give her some +3 arrow and she can bring down anyone.
For best effect she always had a Potion of Clarity and Boots of Speed on for major fights, and sometime Heroism etc. Basically, she moves to a corner a deals upto 60 damage per round to ANY enemy.
Charname mostly tanked (layers of physical and magical protections; could stand in that firestorm and not flinch!) Had about 87% Magic Resistance at the Final Fight (+50% from the potion).
Very enjoyable. Money well spent.
Now, I gotta see if Khael goes on to BG2 -- or if I start a Neutral Evil David Warner run instead....
Steinarr spent a lot of time preparing for his assault on the Cloakwood, collecting equipment, potions, scrolls and companions.
Dynaheir and Imoen joined the team to provide a little arcane and thieving support ... because as tough as it is to admit, Steinarr wonders if there might be some problems that cannot be solved with barbarian rage.
The bounty hunters got a stinking cloud, web and some fireballs to start. Drasus charged the party, only to be blocked by skelly warriors. Dynaheir then blinded him, basically taking him out of the fight.
Rezdan and Genthore got stuck in stinky webs and bulleted down. Kysus, however, managed to get his protection spells up, and then he became a problem. He blasted Dynaheir out of the fight with a sunfire while the rest of the party whittled away his images and stoneskins. Branwen killed him with a flame strike.
Steinarr raged through the mines, bashing guards and hobgoblins out of the way. We picked up Yeslick (never played him before, so thought I'd give it a try. He has underwhelming intelligence and can't use wands or scrolls.... I hope his banter makes up for it.)
For Davaeorn, the strategy was to have Branwen buff up with a scroll of magic protection and try to take out the mage with flame strike scrolls and a wand of the heavens, ignoring the battle horrors, while Steinarr & Co took care of any additional guards. The strategy went off without a hitch. Davaeorn migrated up to the entryway, but we had knocked down his defenses by that point, so it was just a matter of logging enough wand strikes to end the fight. (It's satisfying to have this battle start to feel easy ... I've had so many charname deaths here!)
Steinarr is starting to think that more of this magic stuff might come in handy someday..... Nahh! He's gonna just go to Baldur's Gate and rage!
Gorvenal used his berserker rage and necklace of missiles combination to good effect in the Nashkel Mines. He weakened the assassins with the necklace of missiles, but when it was down to one charge used enrage. He also used enrage against Mulahey to good effect. He pleaded for mercy whereupon Gorvenal killed the rest of the kobolds and had a rest.
Upon opening the chest Mulahey rather foolishly considering the state of his health, attacked again.
He returned to Nashkel to receive his reward and dealt with two assassins, one outside the inn, and one inside.
On his way back to Beregost, he dealt with Bassilus using rage.
To the west he used a combination of rage and tact against some sirene, and used rage against the flesh golems, one rage being sufficient for them all.
He then helped Drittz and killed Teygnan and some half-ogres before telling Bjornan about his exploits.
Heading north, he then killed every ankheg he could find, 20 in all.
I tried to replicate a recent image on this thread which showed about 5 dead ankheg. I never got to more than three before sleep was successful and they disappeared. They were almost too easy to kill due to Gorvenal being extremely strong now. Gorvenal sold his shells and paid for some ankheg armour. With the gold he spent a small fortune in identifying his loot, recharging the necklace of missiles and buying a better axe. He now has two good axes. He also bought a scroll of protection from petrification. To buy all of this, the gold from the ankhegs was insufficient, so he sold some surplus equipment,
Starting with ToB, Illasera was simply trapped to death:
Goibniu completed the first pocket plane challenge, entered Saradush and started completing various minor quests. Then, I bought all of the remaining missing spells for Owain from Lazarus. Also got multiple boots of speed. Kiser had to deal with a fully buffed party and a Deva:
In the prison, I had Anapa use another protection from undead scroll, and for the sewers, Goibniu used turn undead against the various shadows:
Now, for Gromnir's palace, I used Owain's mass invisibility to great effect. First, it allowed Helios to backstab a mage while the others killed the rest of the group:
And against Gromnir, Helios and Donar backstabbed both mages before they could do anything, shortly before the fighters killed Gromnir himself with some GWW's:
We got a lot done this session. For one thing, we got the Carsomyr for Keldorn, and cleared out the enemies in the Windspear Hills. Was pretty straightforward for this team. For Firkraag the main defences were protection from fire (arcane), group haste and resist fear - this was enough to beat the lizard, though it did manage to kill Viconia and Keldorn.
Apparently it was an error on my part to not choose either Vic or Keldorn - because eventually they battled then after Keldorn killed Viconia, he took all of his awesome equipment with him! The critical stuff I lost by him donig this were the following:
* Shield of Balduran (yikes!) * Lilacor (Minsc will miss this) * Hill Giant Strength belt (our party has serious strength issues) * Fire shield and dragon fear sword, could have used either.
I never had them come to blows before, I thought I got to keep one not lose both. Oops.
The party also did the following:
* Sir Sarles and Dawn Ring quests. * Finally got rid of the remaining slavers for Hendak * Fallen Paladin quest * Smashed Neb (easy when 2x True Seeing are running)
So since we need strength badly, recruited Minsc and Anomen.
And the quest continues, we want to get Imoen soon, so will be working on the main quest next session.
Meanwhile Gorvenal has visited the bandit camp and defeated Tazok and some assassins. He then raided Durlag's Tower, reaching level 9 during the battle against the warders. He only used one potion, invisibility during that last battle so that the warders hurt each other badly before Gorvenal attacked in a rage. That battle and a few others were touch and go due to being too frugal with potions. It is now time to return to the camp.
Whoops, I have just realised that I am over the 161,000 experience limit. I had intended to keep my level at that until it was time for the Drizzt Saga when you need all the experience you can get.
Just had a scary moment when ambushed by a basilisk with no potions of mirrored eyes in the backpack. Fleeing did the trick. However, must get a potion or two when practicable. Had to forego all that lovely experience as fighting it would have been far too dangerous.
@ Corey_Russell, does he return to the order building?
I did check both the Order and his home but he wasn't in either place, so have to assume he's gone for good. Forgot to mention I also lost the haste boots he was wearing as well as the fire dragon armor...
Oh right and also lost the Daystar...he had a lot of stuff. He had almost all the long swords of the game lol.
And he also had the Cloak of the Sewers - I like any random non-armor item that boosts AC, so not great losing this.
So the party solved all the Linvail quests pretty easily, including clearing out Bodhi's guild. As is my custom for my 5 man parties, I recruited Yoshimo just before leaving for Brynnlaw. This way you get the 200,000 exp for turning in his heart to the priest of Illmater when you return to Athkatla. Imoen could use the experience after all...
In Brynnlaw, only did Ginia's quest and took out Galvena. To be safe, I had just minions fight her, that way the lightning bolt they get off doesn't hit the party (which it didn't) - it did kill Claire, however. Hmm, guess she won't be able to help us.
Fortunately, Hax felt a disturbance in the force and attacked Perth the Adept - he didn't last long and then a way to Spellhold was made clear. We traveled in daylight so we didn't have to deal with any undead, so was easy to make our way to the top. As is my custom, I dualed Yoshimo to level 1 fighter just before entering and gave him **** in bastard sword - I'm sure those pips will come in handy!
We are having money issues this run, so made sure to pick up all the freebies while getting to Imoen (Najer Skal, and the crazy wolf guy's table). Mazzy activated her personal haste so she could loot the rogue stone on the table in the room Imoen was before Irenicus could do his dialog and do the forced capture of us.
Hax then had a strange dream. A demon said Hax had to sacrifice something, so Hax sacrificed his wisdom - he's down to 2 - woot! He then laid some traps by Imoen, did a few buffs and brought Bhaal to him and Imoen - with his dual-wielding clubs and trap damage and the vampiric drain, Bhaal just couldn't live very long.
We then had to clear the first half of the 1st level. It went well, except the mephits and the Rakshashka did HUGE damage to the party - we fled to the starting area, then attacked and won, but took big damage. We rested to heal up.
For the book we were really careful - I realized that because Jaheira's chunking meant loss of the ring of earth control we don't have any way to bring any one back if they petrified by the beholder! Uh, oh. (Yes I know about the green scrolls, but money issues, remember?). So I used spells to protect Aerie and Hax from petrification and stun, since they are the two I want to survive to the end. Fortunately, it didn't matter as both the Illithid and Beholder were killed quick.
For the bone golem and powerful undead just before Dace, I had a buffed up Minsc solo them - I even had Minsc go berserk (I rarely use his ability in BG 2), which actually worked good this time around. We got Dace's hand (we had already got the crystal from the kobolds) and left the 1st level.
The party is still on the 2nd level. We used summons from out of sight on the Yuan-ti group, though the summons couldn't finish it so the party did. Minsc braved the trapped paintings, though was at little risk as before he did he was buffed with death ward and protection from fire.
We then dealt with the minions behind the secret doors. For once, the two hand sword you can get here is actually worth-while for Minsc, as he doesn't have a good one, since Keldorn took Lilacor...Mazzy got the haste boots from the machine in the area.
We ran out of time (gotta go to work), so saved here.
Incidentally realized yet one more thing Keldorn took with him we would have rather kept - he took Frostweaver!
Comments
Previous update at: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/818389/#Comment_818389
Shooting down Shoal provided a couple of levels before a bit more axe work around Beregost got me to level 4. Moving down to Nashkel I picked up the ankheg armour (which is pretty good for a wizard slayer that can't use magical protections) and rested to get Bhaal healing. The next 3 Bhaal powers I want are the evil ones though, which was bad news for Bentan (his scroll of magic protection is also very handy for a wizard slayer). I could have run away off the map against him if necessary, but both my first 2 shots hit.
Next in line for some whirling axes was Arghain (to get his magic 2-handed sword) and I completed my collection of bags in Beregost before moving on to the basilisk area. Sword and axes quickly put paid to them with the last basilisk getting me up to level 6.
In the Nashkel Mine the kobolds needed criticals to hit - and didn't get enough of those to force resting until I arrived in Mulahey's cave. The cleric himself was cut up by axes without being allowed close enough to have a conversation (the relatively poor weapon speed for the axe means that with a poor iniative roll there's not enough time to throw and run away round the pond again, so that encounter took a while).
At the bandit camp two sets of rests was needed to heal damage while clearing the exterior and gaining some improved armour.
Edit: in the second Cloakwood area I pulled a number of ettercaps and spiders away from web traps and towards the map edge to be able to run away and cure poison if necessary. However, I didn't bother doing that with the final ettercap, despite knowing that it would be touch and go from that position if I did get poisoned. There was a touch - and I went ...
--
A quick question to the thread, as I lost track if this has changed post 2.0:
- Do Ioun Stones etc. prevent Critical Hits?
(Or do you need the "Helmet"-like item to explicitly state that?)
BG1 1st post:
He raged across the Sword Coast for a while, discovering how much damage he could do with a sling and some rocks. (And the answer was, quite a lot).
He recently partnered with Branwen. The two of them have a similar attitude about obstacles. (Talk is cheap. Hammers are better.)
His vulnerability to nasty spells has been greatly lessened by the helm of charm protection that we found in Ulcaster (obtained by a sanctuary-protected Branwen without challenging the SCS-enhanced vampire wolf).
Bassilus took a silence spell and couldn't put up much resistance. Mulahey went down to a hold spell. Nimbul either had really bad saves or we got lucky with a dart of wounding and a silence spell:
I suspect that clearing the mine has raised Steinarr's profile... The next bunch of assassins had better get some extra potions. They're going to need them to deal with the barbarian's rage...
BG1 1st post:
Branwen is proving to be fragile, despite her ankheg plate armor. She went down for the first time to Molkar & Co. Then again in Tazok's tent. Then again after the amazons put her to sleep and pummeled her with poison darts and flame arrows.
However, Steinarr just shrugs it off when enemies hit him. (Having 100+ HPs is pretty nice in BG1.)
The action:
Steinarr hits hard:
Steinarr doesn't care how many bandits show up: they all get electricity bullets to the face:
Steinarr surveys the wreckage:
Steinarr poisons both amazon clerics, but Branwen fails to complete her detect invisibility spell before getting backstabbed:
Branwen needs to learn how to rage:
Steinarr cleans up. Now how to get all this loot back to Thalantyr without Branwen, any nearby chests, or a bag of holding? Ah well...
"Ioun Stones now universally have a weight of 0, and no longer protect the wearer from critical hits."
Meanwhile, in the Dragonspear Castle....
--
THE VOICE?!
Can it be?
THE VOICE?
I recognize the voice actor, of course.
And if my hearing and discerning skills are accurate, the plot implications are.... substantial.
--
[note: Just as I was unloading a round-full of explosion potions in to the room (as per my standard "oh shit" protocol) the game crashed. Now I need to reload from before the encounter. So, very curious. Well done, Beamdog.]
(Corwin just complained that I have to choose between them.)
[this happened while still on the run in the underground tunnels.... haven't made out yet... almost out of spells...]
Hmm I would love to see the dialogue about Glint with Corwin. Glint is kinda cute and funny, but Corwin is a strong and beautiful no-nonsense womanly woman, not teenagey and whimsical like Neera. Then again Neera is fun, too. Would have been hard for my pc to choose. I really need a 'concurrent romances' kind of mod for my game.
Romances make a no-reload especially cruel, if the npc is chunked, that is so sad you have to move on. I lost Glint permanently in the final fight, so I still feel sad for the little fella. (I was playing minimal reload, and was exhausted by the final fight, and it made the thing more memorable and dramatic.)
@Blind_Visionary The toughness of the barbarian certainly does make up for the poorer armour.
A new run with Gorvenal Stonefist, a Dwarven Berserker. He hasn't yet decided whether or not he will have other party members.
In Candlekeep he was killed at the first attempt by Mendas.
In the position he was in, he wasn't landing any blows and the rats stopped him moving.
Second run was more successful and he gratefully picked up the +1 axe that Mendas was carrying.
He made his way to the Friendly Arms Inn where he found his rage an excellent defence against Tarnesh. He was a bit annoyed when it was a guard who delivered the killing blow.
He then killed some ogrillon and gladly received the reward.
Afyter picking up some ankheg armour in Nashkel, he was attacked by an assassin near the mines.
He then killed Greywolf and shortly afterwards Prism sadly died.
I'll have to remember that as a tactic to use.
He then went to Firewine Bridge where killing a couple of zombies brought him to level 6.
Meilum was next to fall, and Gorvinda then had a difficult choice to make. One pair of gauntlets improved his dexterity and armour class (by 1), whereas the other pair helped his attack.
Start of this run
Previous update
The ambush by Ogre Mages wasn't dangerous - after all, it wasn't a solo, so vulnerable party members could retreat to the safer place (West), so that the rest of the party could deal with these enemies.
Killing a greater doppleganger brought a new level for Hades, who now had 75 in Open Locks and 80 in Find Traps, which was enough for the Candlekeep catacombs.
During the battle against Prat and his group Uzume helped Mortuus to overcome the confusion state (the additional bonus of this priest's ability is that it can't dispel protections while curing Chaos).
Prat tried to flee from the main battlefield but couldn't resist Hold Person from a dryad summoned by Yahiko.
Yahiko reached the 5th spell level (yay, Insect Plague) (and some people say druids in BG1 are weak), so the party could now face any enemy in BG1. I decided to use this plot stage (when the party is accused of murdering the Iron Throne leaders) to explore all the remaining BG1 areas and the TotC content). Kahrk was first.
Xan casted Spell Thrust on him to dispel MGoI:
After several tries Mortuus managed to remove all Kahr's combat protections:
Kahrk was gone:
The next stop was Firewine. A backstab from Hades inflicted poison on Lendarn so it stopped his casting.
Elemental damage from Ashideena and poison quickly killed the mage, even though his protections were on.
For the Ogre Mage in Firewine Hades used the only arrow of slaying bought in Baldur's Gate (I needed to kill him quickly before he could start casting).
The party then visited Icharyd. Fully buffed Woden defeated this undead warrior one on one.
Wolf of Ulcaster and his ghouls weren't dangerous to the party thanks to Remove Fear and Free Action.
The fight against the Red Wizards had to be a test. After all, there're 4 mages in that group. As always, Spell Thrust for Xan was the first thing we did. After that magic missiles finished Denak. Yahiko casted Insect Plague and the battle was basically won.
Now, the trip to the Ice Island was on the timetable.
Personally, I just find druids weak soloers, in part due the long casting times of their more useful and important spells. I always find them excellent support characters in a party.
What I can't stand is the idea that being neutral is something to aim for. Let's face it, those who aim high usually fall short, so why aim low? Doing that, you'll probably end up being evil.
Good and evil are types of thinking that humans need to understand themselves and it doesn't apply to the natural world i.e, a lion isn't evil because it eats a rabbit however man (good |evil) builds cities that destroy the natural environment... Driuds see this as a philosophical point that needs to be countered
For solo play I'd recommend shape shifter or Avenger (slightly harder start) and human for the late game dual option but I agree they are much more of a party support class
Glad to report that I have just completed a Blind, Insane (no damage bonus) run of SoD.
Will post something like a review eventually, but would rate the game as a solid "A".
It took me about 60 hours to get through (quite a few uncompleted quests still)/
All encounters, especially the final fight, was treated as if it could be a game ender: every round, each character did something useful, drank a potion etc.
Corwin carried the day. I am glad I did not leave her behind for a caster.
She single handedly slew [end-game-enemy-types] by the dozen, when spells were impotent and even the charname had difficulty hitting.
Give her some +3 arrow and she can bring down anyone.
For best effect she always had a Potion of Clarity and Boots of Speed on for major fights, and sometime Heroism etc. Basically, she moves to a corner a deals upto 60 damage per round to ANY enemy.
Charname mostly tanked (layers of physical and magical protections; could stand in that firestorm and not flinch!) Had about 87% Magic Resistance at the Final Fight (+50% from the potion).
Very enjoyable. Money well spent.
Now, I gotta see if Khael goes on to BG2 -- or if I start a Neutral Evil David Warner run instead....
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Steinarr spent a lot of time preparing for his assault on the Cloakwood, collecting equipment, potions, scrolls and companions.
Dynaheir and Imoen joined the team to provide a little arcane and thieving support ... because as tough as it is to admit, Steinarr wonders if there might be some problems that cannot be solved with barbarian rage.
The bounty hunters got a stinking cloud, web and some fireballs to start. Drasus charged the party, only to be blocked by skelly warriors. Dynaheir then blinded him, basically taking him out of the fight.
Rezdan and Genthore got stuck in stinky webs and bulleted down. Kysus, however, managed to get his protection spells up, and then he became a problem. He blasted Dynaheir out of the fight with a sunfire while the rest of the party whittled away his images and stoneskins. Branwen killed him with a flame strike.
Steinarr raged through the mines, bashing guards and hobgoblins out of the way. We picked up Yeslick (never played him before, so thought I'd give it a try. He has underwhelming intelligence and can't use wands or scrolls.... I hope his banter makes up for it.)
For Davaeorn, the strategy was to have Branwen buff up with a scroll of magic protection and try to take out the mage with flame strike scrolls and a wand of the heavens, ignoring the battle horrors, while Steinarr & Co took care of any additional guards. The strategy went off without a hitch. Davaeorn migrated up to the entryway, but we had knocked down his defenses by that point, so it was just a matter of logging enough wand strikes to end the fight. (It's satisfying to have this battle start to feel easy ... I've had so many charname deaths here!)
Steinarr is starting to think that more of this magic stuff might come in handy someday.....
Nahh! He's gonna just go to Baldur's Gate and rage!
He weakened the assassins with the necklace of missiles, but when it was down to one charge used enrage.
He also used enrage against Mulahey to good effect. He pleaded for mercy whereupon Gorvenal killed the rest of the kobolds and had a rest.
Upon opening the chest Mulahey rather foolishly considering the state of his health, attacked again.
He then helped Drittz and killed Teygnan and some half-ogres before telling Bjornan about his exploits.
Heading north, he then killed every ankheg he could find, 20 in all.
I tried to replicate a recent image on this thread which showed about 5 dead ankheg. I never got to more than three before sleep was successful and they disappeared. They were almost too easy to kill due to Gorvenal being extremely strong now.
Gorvenal sold his shells and paid for some ankheg armour. With the gold he spent a small fortune in identifying his loot, recharging the necklace of missiles and buying a better axe. He now has two good axes. He also bought a scroll of protection from petrification. To buy all of this, the gold from the ankhegs was insufficient, so he sold some surplus equipment,
Continued from https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/818475/#Comment_818475
Starting with ToB, Illasera was simply trapped to death:
Goibniu completed the first pocket plane challenge, entered Saradush and started completing various minor quests. Then, I bought all of the remaining missing spells for Owain from Lazarus. Also got multiple boots of speed. Kiser had to deal with a fully buffed party and a Deva:
In the prison, I had Anapa use another protection from undead scroll, and for the sewers, Goibniu used turn undead against the various shadows:
Now, for Gromnir's palace, I used Owain's mass invisibility to great effect. First, it allowed Helios to backstab a mage while the others killed the rest of the group:
And against Gromnir, Helios and Donar backstabbed both mages before they could do anything, shortly before the fighters killed Gromnir himself with some GWW's:
Time to leave Saradush.
Enuhal
Traveling with: Minsc, Mazzy, Anomen, Aerie
Permanently dead/gone: Jaheira, Keldorn, Viconia
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We got a lot done this session. For one thing, we got the Carsomyr for Keldorn, and cleared out the enemies in the Windspear Hills. Was pretty straightforward for this team. For Firkraag the main defences were protection from fire (arcane), group haste and resist fear - this was enough to beat the lizard, though it did manage to kill Viconia and Keldorn.
Apparently it was an error on my part to not choose either Vic or Keldorn - because eventually they battled then after Keldorn killed Viconia, he took all of his awesome equipment with him! The critical stuff I lost by him donig this were the following:
* Shield of Balduran (yikes!)
* Lilacor (Minsc will miss this)
* Hill Giant Strength belt (our party has serious strength issues)
* Fire shield and dragon fear sword, could have used either.
I never had them come to blows before, I thought I got to keep one not lose both. Oops.
The party also did the following:
* Sir Sarles and Dawn Ring quests.
* Finally got rid of the remaining slavers for Hendak
* Fallen Paladin quest
* Smashed Neb (easy when 2x True Seeing are running)
So since we need strength badly, recruited Minsc and Anomen.
And the quest continues, we want to get Imoen soon, so will be working on the main quest next session.
@Corey_Russell Ouch! Quite a loss there.
Meanwhile Gorvenal has visited the bandit camp and defeated Tazok and some assassins. He then raided Durlag's Tower, reaching level 9 during the battle against the warders.
He only used one potion, invisibility during that last battle so that the warders hurt each other badly before Gorvenal attacked in a rage. That battle and a few others were touch and go due to being too frugal with potions.
It is now time to return to the camp.
Whoops, I have just realised that I am over the 161,000 experience limit. I had intended to keep my level at that until it was time for the Drizzt Saga when you need all the experience you can get.
Just had a scary moment when ambushed by a basilisk with no potions of mirrored eyes in the backpack. Fleeing did the trick.
Oh right and also lost the Daystar...he had a lot of stuff. He had almost all the long swords of the game lol.
And he also had the Cloak of the Sewers - I like any random non-armor item that boosts AC, so not great losing this.
:-)
Traveling with: Minsc, Mazzy, Anomen, Aerie, Imoen
Permanently dead/gone: Jaheira, Viconia, Keldorn
So the party solved all the Linvail quests pretty easily, including clearing out Bodhi's guild. As is my custom for my 5 man parties, I recruited Yoshimo just before leaving for Brynnlaw. This way you get the 200,000 exp for turning in his heart to the priest of Illmater when you return to Athkatla. Imoen could use the experience after all...
In Brynnlaw, only did Ginia's quest and took out Galvena. To be safe, I had just minions fight her, that way the lightning bolt they get off doesn't hit the party (which it didn't) - it did kill Claire, however. Hmm, guess she won't be able to help us.
Fortunately, Hax felt a disturbance in the force and attacked Perth the Adept - he didn't last long and then a way to Spellhold was made clear. We traveled in daylight so we didn't have to deal with any undead, so was easy to make our way to the top. As is my custom, I dualed Yoshimo to level 1 fighter just before entering and gave him **** in bastard sword - I'm sure those pips will come in handy!
We are having money issues this run, so made sure to pick up all the freebies while getting to Imoen (Najer Skal, and the crazy wolf guy's table). Mazzy activated her personal haste so she could loot the rogue stone on the table in the room Imoen was before Irenicus could do his dialog and do the forced capture of us.
Hax then had a strange dream. A demon said Hax had to sacrifice something, so Hax sacrificed his wisdom - he's down to 2 - woot! He then laid some traps by Imoen, did a few buffs and brought Bhaal to him and Imoen - with his dual-wielding clubs and trap damage and the vampiric drain, Bhaal just couldn't live very long.
We then had to clear the first half of the 1st level. It went well, except the mephits and the Rakshashka did HUGE damage to the party - we fled to the starting area, then attacked and won, but took big damage. We rested to heal up.
For the book we were really careful - I realized that because Jaheira's chunking meant loss of the ring of earth control we don't have any way to bring any one back if they petrified by the beholder! Uh, oh. (Yes I know about the green scrolls, but money issues, remember?). So I used spells to protect Aerie and Hax from petrification and stun, since they are the two I want to survive to the end. Fortunately, it didn't matter as both the Illithid and Beholder were killed quick.
For the bone golem and powerful undead just before Dace, I had a buffed up Minsc solo them - I even had Minsc go berserk (I rarely use his ability in BG 2), which actually worked good this time around. We got Dace's hand (we had already got the crystal from the kobolds) and left the 1st level.
The party is still on the 2nd level. We used summons from out of sight on the Yuan-ti group, though the summons couldn't finish it so the party did. Minsc braved the trapped paintings, though was at little risk as before he did he was buffed with death ward and protection from fire.
We then dealt with the minions behind the secret doors. For once, the two hand sword you can get here is actually worth-while for Minsc, as he doesn't have a good one, since Keldorn took Lilacor...Mazzy got the haste boots from the machine in the area.
We ran out of time (gotta go to work), so saved here.
Incidentally realized yet one more thing Keldorn took with him we would have rather kept - he took Frostweaver!