That's no fun. I had the same problem in my first run in SoD.
I usually pull back all party members but one before facing Belhifet so the introductory Dispel Magic only hits one character. It's nearly impossible to see it coming the first time around because the first several seconds of combat are so chaotic and the distance is so small, but if you know it's coming in advance, there's just enough time to get most of your party out of the way, provided they are hasted.
Once you're gotten past that first one, I don't think there are any other Dispel/Remove Magic spells for the rest of the fight.
TIL: Buffing up with some 20+ potions before the supposed "final battle" at Dragonspear was useless. Just got all of them dispelled.
Bummer!
But, yes, that happens. When I expect Remove, I'll typically open fights with minimal buffs, including one that I know will be detected and induce a cast. I then layer on my mission critical buffs after I've drawn out the Removes.
The traps are the dagger-shaped tiles on the floor. I don't think they can be disarmed regardless of your Detect Traps skill. It's usually best to walk around them, make your way to the walls of the room, and stick to the walls so you don't accidentally step on the traps.
SI: Abjuration can block the traps, I believe, but since I've heard there's only a single SI scroll in Trials of the Luremaster, near the end, basically the only characters who can avoid it are sorcerers.
Let's talk about Bodhi, SCS Bodhi, that is. She's tough. Tougher than nails; tougher than dragons; tougher than Irenicus; tougher than the pit beef at the Copper Coronet. Now that's tough.
What makes her challenging? The math. Let's forget about her allies, her mages. Let's focus on Bodhi herself. Bodhi's attacks drain 5 con points per hit. Even the stoutest of warriors theoretically possible can only withstand 5 blows. Bodhi, in contrast, can absorb a lot of damage: her HP total is moderately high, she enjoys resistances, she regenerates, and she has a bat form that grants her temporary immunity to targeting while she regenerates. On top of that, she's fast and has a low speed factor weapon. For a solo warrior, tilting the scales in ones favor requires focusing on the AC/THAC0 balance. Fortunately, Bodhi's status as a crusher provides an avenue. Otherwise, she'd be a brick wall to many a solo warrior.
Aestica overcame Bodhi. But it wasn't easy. She was Aestica's toughest opponent to date. Here's how it went.
We entered the crypts flanked by all possible allies. The plan was to buff the principles with ProUndead, greatly increasing their odds of making it to the final confrontation. Here we see the Knights of the Order contingent. Eric Vanstraaten received his Pro Undead immediately
The Pro Undead scrolls also had the effect of funneling the vampires to Aestica, and the iMoD- at least once the lackeys had been devoured- something that happened very quickly, as can be inferred from this screen shot. Eric is the only paladin still alive, and we haven't even reached Drizzt.
Here's Drizzt catching his Pro Undead.
His companions, were, like the Knights of the Order, shredded within a few rounds, despite our best efforts.
Arkanis caught his Pro Undead a touch late, due to his use of invisibility. We fixed that with a Restoration scroll before the final battle
The trickiest part of the Tanova fight was keeping her Removes away from Vanstraaten, Drizzt, and Arkanis. We achieved that by maintaining distance from our allies. We only gathered together for the finish once we knew there were no Removes left.
And now the hard part: Bodhi herself. I opened this fight with a misstep that may have been significant. I had clicked the pool of blood, expecting to apply the Elven holy water. What I did not recall, however, due to my rustiness, is that you need to click it twice and you have to click it close. Does this have any effect on the SCS Bodhi battle? I'm not certain.
In come the bats, in comes Bodhi's crew. I'm still not getting the blood thing right
Our plan had been to remain in the hall and fight alongside our allies. That position quickly became untenable, however. We fell back, allowing Drizzt et al to take on the mages while we focused on Bodhi. This worked well enough, but Bodhi had more than a few tricks up her sleeve: Touch of Death, the This-Life-Is Mine heal, and Bat Form
As in our prior encounter with Bodhi, our base AC + Girdle of Bluntness + Potion of Absorption was the core of our strategy. We had been hording Potions of Absorption for this fight, knowing that Bodhi's mages would dispel our buffs more than once. We were glad we hadn't wasted them on electricity damage earlier in the adventure. Protection from Electricity and Potions of Insulation are for lightning, Potions of Absorptions are reserved for crushers.
We were almost ready to finish when Bodhi's mages, having dispatched Drizzt and Co, Dimmension Doored in. We could not remain trapped in a corner with Bodhi at our feet and Remove in play. We were forced to disengage. Bodhi turned into a bat and fluttered away, leaving us with little choice, anyways.
While Bodhi was in bat form, we focused on taking down the mages. Now ProMW-less, both were dropped with the iMod. But by the time that happened, we had too little umph left to finish Bodhi. With our con drained to 9, following 2 criticals, we chose to withdraw and turn our battle into a multi-day raid.
We rested. We re-engaged. Finally, we finished her by, umm, throwing the IMoD at her from across the room. More on how that happened later. For now, let's just celebrate the victory. We're off to Suldanessellar
Happy to report that Khael the Aegis, the Cavalier, has successfully defeated [Antagonist] and finished Dragonspear.
Khael refused the deal of the Thrix. (Luckily I had some +3 weapons by that point, including arrows for Minsc.) [Antagonist] was Lower Resistanced by Dynaheir and Volghin (scroll) and bombarded with Wands of Frost.
Caelar died. (I wonder if there is any option to keep her alive in that fight.)
Overall, SoD is quite awesome.
All in all, the debacle of the Mazed Glint and waiting him out during the post-Hephernaan ambush was the toughest spot. Belhifet was managed with freely flowing potions. (Must have used 3-4 Potions of Clarity per person as they kept getting dispelled.)
Khael will likely wake in a dungeon far away soon.... if I can only get my mod installs working.
(It occurred to me I mistyped his name myself, poor fellow. Huzzah for Khael then -- which most of my frontliners get named for some reason. Though I should have a Khale run as well: perhaps a Gnome with a Turnip familiar.... Hmmm.)
Arriving at the ankheg nest the shamans proceeded to set up traps in the normal way. For ankhegs with their range attack that's best done by being relatively close to them, but hidden by a rock while producing spirits. The dancing shaman then passes over control to someone at greater distance while another shaman shows itself to the ankheg to draw it into the spirits. Once engaged it's no problem to keep producing spirits faster than the ankheg can kill them. However, I am a bit prone to accidentally moving a dancing shaman - causing spirits to disappear and leaving the ankheg with a nice juicy shaman for a target. On one occasion that resulted in a shaman being hit, but she had just enough HPs to survive. The nest provided not just a nice load of XP, but a decent addition to wealth as well from all the ankheg shells collected.
The ankhegs in the fields are much more dangerous, but with so much XP available the shamans took them on as well. They killed a half dozen more, but then got unlucky against their final intended victim when they missed with numerous shots trying to get the ankheg's final 2 HPs, while the ankheg killed the spirits and then one-shotted Grunt as a successful shot on it was still in mid-air.
The next challenge was at Firewine Bridge. That's dangerous to get to due to the potential kobold commando ambush. The shamans survived one of those on the way there and managed to get a scroll of magic protection by charming Bentan, but were then ambushed when trying to rest - and this time they didn't get away from a travel ambush unscathed. After more expensive requests at Nashkel Temple they returned and successfully charmed Poe - picking up his +1 spear after he had encountered some kobolds. Those kobolds are a pain to get past for my solo characters without invisibility, but spirits and charm persons made pretty light work of them for the shamans. Rather than just kill Meilum though the shamans charmed him and sent him in against Kahrk to soak up some damage there (although I was of course aware that taking on SCS Kahrk is asking for trouble ). After Meilum died, spirits drained a few more spells before Kahrk started chasing the party. Even though he was hasted I wasn't really worried about his physical attacks, but then he successfully dominated Pretty Boy and, despite being offered an alternative target to attack, chose to run over to him and give him 2 quick whacks. No surprise of course that Pretty Boy died, but I would have hoped that the SCS component to reduce the chance of chunking would have prevented the permanent death from the basic physical damage. Rather than continue with fewer characters I'll leave that run there.
(It occurred to me I mistyped his name myself, poor fellow. Huzzah for Khael then -- which most of my frontliners get named for some reason. Though I should have a Khale run as well: perhaps a Gnome with a Turnip familiar.... Hmmm.)
Yeah. I was one letter away from making a joke about leafy greens...
Tough break @Grond0 - I've had my fair share of chunked characters by him (poor Minsc has been chunked quite a few times by Kahrk in my runs). It's gotten to the point I don't mess with him unless I have massive summons or my party can't RP ignoring Kahrk (like my group of all paladins).
Ok, maybe I'm misquoting someone there, but that's how I feel about it- that's how I've long felt about it. To me, reaching Suldanessellar feels like finishing SoA.
It wasn't always that way. Once upon a time, long, long ago -before the HLAs came- Suldanessellar was an obstacle, filled with varied challenges. Now it reminds me of a pinball machine that never lights TILT. You just wrack up points until they kick you out of the bar. And what did Aestica with her HLAs and wicked sling think of it? She was all:
That sums it up, basically. But you'd like to hear more, no? We'll cover this quick.
The Golems
The golems were killed with The Defender in the mainhand and Sentinel in the off, with Destroyer of the Hills around the waist. Only criticals go through.
Raamilat
Raamilat went Improved Mantle, IIRC. Everard over the top Smite->Power Attack->GWW. Very quick kill. His demons got the sling, too.
Demin
Demin was very nearly saved- very nearly. The rhakshasas Cloudkill finished her.
Nizidramanii'yt
Niz had a sensible plan: Haste->Remove->Plant Growth->Melee + Acid Breath. Unfortunately for Niz, Aestica had a better plan: Buff light->Draw out Remove->Dispel Haste via arrow->layer in buffs->Evade Plant Growth->Everard. Unsurprisingly, Aestica's plan trumped Niz's. So long as you can negate ranged attacks, stay mobile and maintain a movement rate bonus, the sling always wins. We wore the Shadow Dragon Armor for this fight. Almost all of the damage came from the secondary damage MAA bug described earlier, and now reported to the EE team.
Here we see Niz, post Remove, seeking to immobilize Aestica with Plant Growth. The save on Plant Growth is nasty, -10. Rather than wasting potions, Aestica evaded the AoE.
Rebuilding our buffs on a shrunken battle field. Shield for MMs.
Getting to work.
The finish. In the end, Niz's most effective weapon was MAA, and that only because of a bug. Clean victory.
Tree Jon
Finally, Tree Jon. This was super-easy. First, his demons. Everard.
Then, Tree Jon himself: Arrow of Dispelling-> Everard GWW
WELLLLLL... I finally bit the dust tonight for the first time in my solo no reload challenges. A simple but stupid mistake. I chugged what I thought was a clarity potion to take on the sirines....turns out I mistook it for my potion of heroism. It was a good little run. I succumbed to their arrows and that was that. I was so disappointed with myself I didn't even snap a picture of it.
Well time to give it another go. I'm thinking dwarf fighter/thief for the next round. Ill get a good start on that hopefully this weekend.
A pre-emptive question as I am heading out to Amn with my Cavalier:
How do the demons in Dragonspear endgame compare to the SCS demons?
I am pondering whether or not to permit the SCS enhanced demon in my BG2EE install. Worried that the at-will abilities described at the SCS-readme maybe a bit too much in a no-reload map.
But, at the same time, my SoD party did reliably survive the demon assault at Insane (no damage bonus). Are they lesser enemies than the SCS-enhanced demons?
So, should I or should I not enhance my demons in my SCS install?
Ditto, for other enemies: Beholders? (what setting do you use in no-reload) Dragons? Golems? Illithids?
Though I can reliably finish BG1 in noreload, I am not particularly well versed in BG2. So, advice is welcome.
Fiends - If you don't enhance their hp then you probably won't notice the difference too much, unless something funny happens with Balor vorpals. Don't install fiendish gating from Atweaks...
Golems- probably not- cursed wound is irritating.
Beholders- sure, but I wouldn't let them burn through protections at will. Leave that for the main eye.
Dragons- Sure, they need the extra hp and aren't enough of a challenge in Vanilla.
Illithids- I let them see invisible but don't bump up their resistances.
Fiends - If you don't enhance their hp then you probably won't notice the difference too much, unless something funny happens with Balor vorpals. Don't install fiendish gating from Atweaks...
Golems- probably not- cursed wound is irritating.
Beholders- sure, but I wouldn't let them burn through protections at will. Leave that for the main eye.
Dragons- Sure, they need the extra hp and aren't enough of a challenge in Vanilla.
Illithids- I let them see invisible but don't bump up their resistances.
Thank you, this is very helpful.
Would you think the SoD demons are SCS-enhanced? (I can't remember if demon fights in late BG2 were similar or easier in vanilla.)
By now, we all know how this ended: Aestica defeated Irenicus and moved on to ToB. This fight tends to be a formality in my runs, so I usually cover it hastily. I'd like to make amends for that some day, but today will not be that day. Today we'll be covering Jonicus quickly- partly because I'm eager to resume playing and partly because I have relatively few screenshots from this fight.
I will, nonetheless, take a moment to discuss a few of the threats in this fight from the perspective of a solo warrior, just for the well-why-not of it. Note that this is not intended to be a comprehensive list of defensive strategies for the battle. It just covers a subset of the means of dealing with a subset of the threats. That is all.
Anyhoo, here we go.
Threat 1: Irenicus's Time Stop Melee. Shortly after the opening, Slayer Irenicus will attempt to execute Time Stop->Melee. This is dangerous- especially for a character like Aestica, lacking ProMW and exceptional resistances.
Counter: Irenicus's Time Stop melee can be countered like most Time Stop assaults, through use of invisibility and or spacing. Since Irenicus can not detect the invisible, invisibility works wonderfully. In the opening stages of the fight, keep your distance from Irenicus, but stay close enough to hear him incant. As soon as you hear "praeses" get as much distance as you can and quaff a Potion of Invisibility. Note that you will likely have to do this twice.
Threat 2: Balor vorpal hits. With the SCS demon component installed, the balors in this fight will vorpal at save v death -4. They can dimension door, though not as often as the older SCS ones, or the ATweaks ones. Their weapons have a range of 3 and a speed factor of zero. The threat is very real, and it's compounded by the fact that the balors cast Remove at will.
Counter: Staying ranged is advisable. If your unbuffed save v death is in the danger zone, be exceedingly conscientious about staying ranged. Recall that the "specialist" penalty may apply. Be mindful of Malison risk and do not expect your buffs to protect you. They can be Removed in an instant. This is not the time to be wearing the Claw of the Kazgaroth. Take all the save bonuses you can get. Don't forget the Cloak of Displacement. Keep the Spear of the Unicorn around for emergencies. It may get you out of a jam. If you somehow find yourself within range 3 with inadequate base saves.
Threat 3: Planetar vorpal hits. Similar considerations here, although now we're talking about a -2 v death, on a more easily avoided range 1, speed factor 5 weapon. Watch out for ambush attacks out of invisibility. Recall, too, that the planetar weapon has a 25% chance of dispelling. Your buffs are, again, best not relied on
Counter: Maintain unbuffed saves out of the danger zone. Keep your distance if possible. If you need to draw one out of invisibility, and your saves are in the danger zone, consider using a summon or equipping the Spear of the Unicorn (assuming that will get you out of the danger zone).
Threat 4: Symbol Spells. The planetars and balors will toss symbol spells,. Expect fear, stun and death. You'll need to be able to make the -4 v spells or maintain immunity
Counter: If you can't make a -4 without buffs, keep your distance, keep your aura clear and be ready to counter. Watch for Malison from Jonicus. Recall that under Boots of Speed + Oil of Speed you are faster than the Remove projectile, though not the Symbol projectile. Time your collisions with Remove projectiles to mitigate risk of exposure (EX- Collide when your aura is clear and there are no symbols en route). If your saves are likely to be an issue at any time in the fight, keep Dragonslayer and, if available, Arvoreen at the ready. Maintain hitpoints above 60 for symbol death,
Threat 5: Power Words: Stun. Self explanatory.
Counter: Maintain a hit point total above 90. If your hitpoint total drops below 90, equip Arvoreen until you can heal.
Are there other threats? Sure. But if you can reign in those five, your odds of surviving the battle should be pretty good.
To the fight. Sadly, I don't have a screenshot of the opening. We faded, listened for "praeses" and quaffed an invisibility potion. We evaded both Time Stops without difficulty. Here we see the second Time Stop pass uneventfully. Hurdle cleared.
Once the second Time Stop ended, we were free to use our aura offensively. What you're seeing here is the death of glabrezu 2. The first had fallen to the sling.
The balors. Aestica's save v death of -9 allowed her to fight in melee. Helm of Defense + Potion of Fire Resistance reduced damage from Aura of Flaming Death
Balor 2. Note that these blokes did have trouble hitting with Aestica holding the Sentinel in her offhand.
The best thing about killing the demons is that it gives you something to do while you're waiting for Jon-Jon to burn through his Abjuration stuff. Aestica made a point of flicking bullets at him whenever she ran by, in the interest of eliciting casts. By the time the last balor fell, he was ready for us.
Feeling vulnerable, I guess, he brought a planetar. Smite->Power Attack->GWW. It never got an attack roll in. We attacked the gate animation- we didn't even wait for the poor thing to appear.
Delaying the inevitable, Jon-Jon tossed a PW:B. We waited this out, running Hardiness + the Defender. Invisibility would have been a sensible choice here, but I didn't feel like digging through the Bag of Holding for a charge
Ok. Time for a showdown. Irenicus went Malison, Aestica went Potion of Invulerability. Seeking disruption, we attacked with Gessen while working through the skins. The physical damage seen here signaled that we were through.
To Everard, and the end of Jonicus.
Fin!
And with that, our intrepid halfling fighter is off to ToB. Wish her luck in Tethyr!
Though I can reliably finish BG1 in noreload, I am not particularly well versed in BG2. So, advice is welcome.
This may be a subject better suited to the Lounge.
I'll share some thoughts on SCS install options and A-Tweals over there, if you like. Or we can do it here. Your call
Looking forward to seeing Khael in Amn!
Best,
A.
Neat. I'll mosey over there and have a look.
Meanwhile, after wasting hours, I failed to install anything but SCS as mod to my BG2EE setup: Without the G3 site, my Mac/Steam install just proves too difficult to add mods to.
So, no fix pack, no IR, no SR currently.
(I am mid-install at the moment with SCS. If you have any quick insights on "tactical challenges" components, it would be immensely welcome right now.)
Caelar died. (I wonder if there is any option to keep her alive in that fight.)
there is an evil or good fight option but she stays behind no matter what else happens... of course her uncle can replace her so she gets what she wanted
Sod = harder than bg2 scs because many years dirty tricks got taken into account when they did the tactics
Congratulations, @Alesia_BH , on beating BG2:SoA. Each of your posts is interesting and insightful and almost always full of humor which makes me smile. Thanks for being here and good luck in your journeys!
All right everyone, since the rest of you have been posting some rather inspirational stuff lately, I couldn't resist the temptation anymore and would like to introduce a character.
Her name is Amaruq, which - as far as the Internet can be trusted - means "Grey Wolf" in Inuit (not to be confused with a certain bounty hunter though). She's kind of an impersonation of my boundless love of the Arctic. It's cool - and I like to think that so is her. And just in case you're wondering what'd be this fighter/druid's spirit animal, if she was to have one, it'd be them...
I apologize that this is to be slow going, but I've got my bar exam coming up early October and I don't expect to accomplish much up until then. Therefore, please accept this post as a teaser for all its current irrelevance. Nevertheless, I could possibly post some early highlights of the run soon.
In the meantime - keep rolling, all of you!
Note: The portrait has been borrowed from Dropdeadcoheed.
As it tends to run out (also speaking in the context of the recently observed save penalty bug), I'd rather wish her to maintain the same amount of wit and grace as shown up until now . Anyway, congratulations for reaching ToB - it's been a great ride thus far (for all of us, I believe).
Congratulations, @Alesia_BH , on beating BG2:SoA. Each of your posts is interesting and insightful and almost always full of humor which makes me smile. Thanks for being here and good luck in your journeys!
Our party cleared the western side of the Underground River surface map without any issues, having fire elementals deal with the orc group and freeing the druids. We talked our way out of a fight with another group of bandits, and Arbogast (or rather, his summons) fought for leadership of an ogre tribe:
I didn't know if the ogres would object to summons joining the fight, but they didn't. After we dealt with the myconids and ankhegs, it was time to wipe out the crusader camp in front of the dungeon entrance. This was a very strange battle for me - in one way, it wasn't difficult at all, as the enemy never even managed to take out all of my summons. On the other hand, we lost another party member - see, after opening combat, new crusaders spawn in at several places around the party, and some of them are crusader scouts - thieves that tend to use invisibility potions and go for a 5x backstab. One of them (I had no idea he was even there yet) went right after Safana, and her measly 56 hp obviously didn't help:
Two more scounts tried to kill Arbogast and Nahema, but were stopped by their stone/ironskins, though just to make sure, I had Nahema renew her defenses during the battle. Meanwhile, a couple of magical arrows and an insect plague were enough to take out two mages and most of the crusaders:
Behind the wooden gate, another group of foes awaited the party, but this time, they had no scouts or mages with them, so fire elementals easily killed them on their own:
With the Seal of Caelar in my position, I entered the Dragonspear Courtyard and completed all the minor quests there. The only significant battle was against the Sentry of Tempus, but Arbogast's summons easily dealt with him:
I had already planned to eventually replace Safana with Minsc - originally I was going to do it after having completed the entire Underground River area, but it seems like I have to set this plan into motion right away. This means I will have to deal with some traps with unknown effects and miss out on some loot, but so be it - there are no more thieves available in this game for me.
Oh, and look at this bug I just found: Voghiln just casually having a conversation with Glint, despite the fact that a) Glint is not in my party and b) Glint is actually dead and gone in this playthrough.
Next time, we will go to some very scary places at the Underground River.
I'm not that much into no-reloading nowadays, but I just wanted to stop by and say, it's a delight to see all the old Bioware veterans here and contributing so much life to our forum community.
Comments
I usually pull back all party members but one before facing Belhifet so the introductory Dispel Magic only hits one character. It's nearly impossible to see it coming the first time around because the first several seconds of combat are so chaotic and the distance is so small, but if you know it's coming in advance, there's just enough time to get most of your party out of the way, provided they are hasted.
Once you're gotten past that first one, I don't think there are any other Dispel/Remove Magic spells for the rest of the fight.
But, yes, that happens. When I expect Remove, I'll typically open fights with minimal buffs, including one that I know will be detected and induce a cast. I then layer on my mission critical buffs after I've drawn out the Removes.
Best
A.
SI: Abjuration can block the traps, I believe, but since I've heard there's only a single SI scroll in Trials of the Luremaster, near the end, basically the only characters who can avoid it are sorcerers.
Let's talk about Bodhi, SCS Bodhi, that is. She's tough. Tougher than nails; tougher than dragons; tougher than Irenicus; tougher than the pit beef at the Copper Coronet. Now that's tough.
What makes her challenging? The math. Let's forget about her allies, her mages. Let's focus on Bodhi herself. Bodhi's attacks drain 5 con points per hit. Even the stoutest of warriors theoretically possible can only withstand 5 blows. Bodhi, in contrast, can absorb a lot of damage: her HP total is moderately high, she enjoys resistances, she regenerates, and she has a bat form that grants her temporary immunity to targeting while she regenerates. On top of that, she's fast and has a low speed factor weapon. For a solo warrior, tilting the scales in ones favor requires focusing on the AC/THAC0 balance. Fortunately, Bodhi's status as a crusher provides an avenue. Otherwise, she'd be a brick wall to many a solo warrior.
Aestica overcame Bodhi. But it wasn't easy. She was Aestica's toughest opponent to date. Here's how it went.
We entered the crypts flanked by all possible allies. The plan was to buff the principles with ProUndead, greatly increasing their odds of making it to the final confrontation. Here we see the Knights of the Order contingent. Eric Vanstraaten received his Pro Undead immediately
The Pro Undead scrolls also had the effect of funneling the vampires to Aestica, and the iMoD- at least once the lackeys had been devoured- something that happened very quickly, as can be inferred from this screen shot. Eric is the only paladin still alive, and we haven't even reached Drizzt.
Here's Drizzt catching his Pro Undead.
His companions, were, like the Knights of the Order, shredded within a few rounds, despite our best efforts.
Arkanis caught his Pro Undead a touch late, due to his use of invisibility. We fixed that with a Restoration scroll before the final battle
The trickiest part of the Tanova fight was keeping her Removes away from Vanstraaten, Drizzt, and Arkanis. We achieved that by maintaining distance from our allies. We only gathered together for the finish once we knew there were no Removes left.
And now the hard part: Bodhi herself. I opened this fight with a misstep that may have been significant. I had clicked the pool of blood, expecting to apply the Elven holy water. What I did not recall, however, due to my rustiness, is that you need to click it twice and you have to click it close. Does this have any effect on the SCS Bodhi battle? I'm not certain.
In come the bats, in comes Bodhi's crew. I'm still not getting the blood thing right
Our plan had been to remain in the hall and fight alongside our allies. That position quickly became untenable, however. We fell back, allowing Drizzt et al to take on the mages while we focused on Bodhi. This worked well enough, but Bodhi had more than a few tricks up her sleeve: Touch of Death, the This-Life-Is Mine heal, and Bat Form
As in our prior encounter with Bodhi, our base AC + Girdle of Bluntness + Potion of Absorption was the core of our strategy. We had been hording Potions of Absorption for this fight, knowing that Bodhi's mages would dispel our buffs more than once. We were glad we hadn't wasted them on electricity damage earlier in the adventure. Protection from Electricity and Potions of Insulation are for lightning, Potions of Absorptions are reserved for crushers.
We were almost ready to finish when Bodhi's mages, having dispatched Drizzt and Co, Dimmension Doored in. We could not remain trapped in a corner with Bodhi at our feet and Remove in play. We were forced to disengage. Bodhi turned into a bat and fluttered away, leaving us with little choice, anyways.
While Bodhi was in bat form, we focused on taking down the mages. Now ProMW-less, both were dropped with the iMod. But by the time that happened, we had too little umph left to finish Bodhi. With our con drained to 9, following 2 criticals, we chose to withdraw and turn our battle into a multi-day raid.
We rested. We re-engaged. Finally, we finished her by, umm, throwing the IMoD at her from across the room. More on how that happened later. For now, let's just celebrate the victory. We're off to Suldanessellar
Best,
A.
Khael refused the deal of the Thrix. (Luckily I had some +3 weapons by that point, including arrows for Minsc.)
[Antagonist] was Lower Resistanced by Dynaheir and Volghin (scroll) and bombarded with Wands of Frost.
Caelar died. (I wonder if there is any option to keep her alive in that fight.)
Overall, SoD is quite awesome.
All in all, the debacle of the Mazed Glint and waiting him out during the post-Hephernaan ambush was the toughest spot. Belhifet was managed with freely flowing potions. (Must have used 3-4 Potions of Clarity per person as they kept getting dispelled.)
Khael will likely wake in a dungeon far away soon.... if I can only get my mod installs working.
Onto Amn!
(It occurred to me I mistyped his name myself, poor fellow. Huzzah for Khael then -- which most of my frontliners get named for some reason. Though I should have a Khale run as well: perhaps a Gnome with a Turnip familiar.... Hmmm.)
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https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/905711/#Comment_905711
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/905839/#Comment_905839
Arriving at the ankheg nest the shamans proceeded to set up traps in the normal way. For ankhegs with their range attack that's best done by being relatively close to them, but hidden by a rock while producing spirits. The dancing shaman then passes over control to someone at greater distance while another shaman shows itself to the ankheg to draw it into the spirits. Once engaged it's no problem to keep producing spirits faster than the ankheg can kill them. However, I am a bit prone to accidentally moving a dancing shaman - causing spirits to disappear and leaving the ankheg with a nice juicy shaman for a target. On one occasion that resulted in a shaman being hit, but she had just enough HPs to survive. The nest provided not just a nice load of XP, but a decent addition to wealth as well from all the ankheg shells collected.
The ankhegs in the fields are much more dangerous, but with so much XP available the shamans took them on as well. They killed a half dozen more, but then got unlucky against their final intended victim when they missed with numerous shots trying to get the ankheg's final 2 HPs, while the ankheg killed the spirits and then one-shotted Grunt as a successful shot on it was still in mid-air.
The next challenge was at Firewine Bridge. That's dangerous to get to due to the potential kobold commando ambush. The shamans survived one of those on the way there and managed to get a scroll of magic protection by charming Bentan, but were then ambushed when trying to rest - and this time they didn't get away from a travel ambush unscathed. After more expensive requests at Nashkel Temple they returned and successfully charmed Poe - picking up his +1 spear after he had encountered some kobolds. Those kobolds are a pain to get past for my solo characters without invisibility, but spirits and charm persons made pretty light work of them for the shamans. Rather than just kill Meilum though the shamans charmed him and sent him in against Kahrk to soak up some damage there (although I was of course aware that taking on SCS Kahrk is asking for trouble
Rather than continue with fewer characters I'll leave that run there.
In any case, safe journeys in Amn!
Best,
A.
Ah, Suldanessellar. Sweet!
Ok, maybe I'm misquoting someone there, but that's how I feel about it- that's how I've long felt about it. To me, reaching Suldanessellar feels like finishing SoA.
It wasn't always that way. Once upon a time, long, long ago -before the HLAs came- Suldanessellar was an obstacle, filled with varied challenges. Now it reminds me of a pinball machine that never lights TILT. You just wrack up points until they kick you out of the bar. And what did Aestica with her HLAs and wicked sling think of it? She was all:
That sums it up, basically. But you'd like to hear more, no? We'll cover this quick.
The Golems
The golems were killed with The Defender in the mainhand and Sentinel in the off, with Destroyer of the Hills around the waist. Only criticals go through.
Raamilat
Raamilat went Improved Mantle, IIRC. Everard over the top Smite->Power Attack->GWW. Very quick kill. His demons got the sling, too.
Demin
Demin was very nearly saved- very nearly. The rhakshasas Cloudkill finished her.
Nizidramanii'yt
Niz had a sensible plan: Haste->Remove->Plant Growth->Melee + Acid Breath. Unfortunately for Niz, Aestica had a better plan: Buff light->Draw out Remove->Dispel Haste via arrow->layer in buffs->Evade Plant Growth->Everard. Unsurprisingly, Aestica's plan trumped Niz's. So long as you can negate ranged attacks, stay mobile and maintain a movement rate bonus, the sling always wins. We wore the Shadow Dragon Armor for this fight. Almost all of the damage came from the secondary damage MAA bug described earlier, and now reported to the EE team.
Here we see Niz, post Remove, seeking to immobilize Aestica with Plant Growth. The save on Plant Growth is nasty, -10. Rather than wasting potions, Aestica evaded the AoE.
Rebuilding our buffs on a shrunken battle field. Shield for MMs.
Getting to work.
The finish. In the end, Niz's most effective weapon was MAA, and that only because of a bug. Clean victory.
Tree Jon
Finally, Tree Jon. This was super-easy. First, his demons. Everard.
Then, Tree Jon himself: Arrow of Dispelling-> Everard GWW
Fin!
I'll see you in hell.
Best,
A.
Well time to give it another go. I'm thinking dwarf fighter/thief for the next round. Ill get a good start on that hopefully this weekend.
Looking forward to your F/T!
Best,
A.
Y'all who do solo runs are amazing in a way I could never emulate. My hats off to you all, successful or not.
How do the demons in Dragonspear endgame compare to the SCS demons?
I am pondering whether or not to permit the SCS enhanced demon in my BG2EE install. Worried that the at-will abilities described at the SCS-readme maybe a bit too much in a no-reload map.
But, at the same time, my SoD party did reliably survive the demon assault at Insane (no damage bonus). Are they lesser enemies than the SCS-enhanced demons?
So, should I or should I not enhance my demons in my SCS install?
Ditto, for other enemies:
Beholders? (what setting do you use in no-reload)
Dragons?
Golems?
Illithids?
Though I can reliably finish BG1 in noreload, I am not particularly well versed in BG2. So, advice is welcome.
Golems- probably not- cursed wound is irritating.
Beholders- sure, but I wouldn't let them burn through protections at will. Leave that for the main eye.
Dragons- Sure, they need the extra hp and aren't enough of a challenge in Vanilla.
Illithids- I let them see invisible but don't bump up their resistances.
Would you think the SoD demons are SCS-enhanced? (I can't remember if demon fights in late BG2 were similar or easier in vanilla.)
By now, we all know how this ended: Aestica defeated Irenicus and moved on to ToB. This fight tends to be a formality in my runs, so I usually cover it hastily. I'd like to make amends for that some day, but today will not be that day. Today we'll be covering Jonicus quickly- partly because I'm eager to resume playing and partly because I have relatively few screenshots from this fight.
I will, nonetheless, take a moment to discuss a few of the threats in this fight from the perspective of a solo warrior, just for the well-why-not of it. Note that this is not intended to be a comprehensive list of defensive strategies for the battle. It just covers a subset of the means of dealing with a subset of the threats. That is all.
Anyhoo, here we go.
Threat 1: Irenicus's Time Stop Melee. Shortly after the opening, Slayer Irenicus will attempt to execute Time Stop->Melee. This is dangerous- especially for a character like Aestica, lacking ProMW and exceptional resistances.
Counter: Irenicus's Time Stop melee can be countered like most Time Stop assaults, through use of invisibility and or spacing. Since Irenicus can not detect the invisible, invisibility works wonderfully. In the opening stages of the fight, keep your distance from Irenicus, but stay close enough to hear him incant. As soon as you hear "praeses" get as much distance as you can and quaff a Potion of Invisibility. Note that you will likely have to do this twice.
Threat 2: Balor vorpal hits. With the SCS demon component installed, the balors in this fight will vorpal at save v death -4. They can dimension door, though not as often as the older SCS ones, or the ATweaks ones. Their weapons have a range of 3 and a speed factor of zero. The threat is very real, and it's compounded by the fact that the balors cast Remove at will.
Counter: Staying ranged is advisable. If your unbuffed save v death is in the danger zone, be exceedingly conscientious about staying ranged. Recall that the "specialist" penalty may apply. Be mindful of Malison risk and do not expect your buffs to protect you. They can be Removed in an instant. This is not the time to be wearing the Claw of the Kazgaroth. Take all the save bonuses you can get. Don't forget the Cloak of Displacement. Keep the Spear of the Unicorn around for emergencies. It may get you out of a jam. If you somehow find yourself within range 3 with inadequate base saves.
Threat 3: Planetar vorpal hits. Similar considerations here, although now we're talking about a -2 v death, on a more easily avoided range 1, speed factor 5 weapon. Watch out for ambush attacks out of invisibility. Recall, too, that the planetar weapon has a 25% chance of dispelling. Your buffs are, again, best not relied on
Counter: Maintain unbuffed saves out of the danger zone. Keep your distance if possible. If you need to draw one out of invisibility, and your saves are in the danger zone, consider using a summon or equipping the Spear of the Unicorn (assuming that will get you out of the danger zone).
Threat 4: Symbol Spells. The planetars and balors will toss symbol spells,. Expect fear, stun and death. You'll need to be able to make the -4 v spells or maintain immunity
Counter: If you can't make a -4 without buffs, keep your distance, keep your aura clear and be ready to counter. Watch for Malison from Jonicus. Recall that under Boots of Speed + Oil of Speed you are faster than the Remove projectile, though not the Symbol projectile. Time your collisions with Remove projectiles to mitigate risk of exposure (EX- Collide when your aura is clear and there are no symbols en route). If your saves are likely to be an issue at any time in the fight, keep Dragonslayer and, if available, Arvoreen at the ready. Maintain hitpoints above 60 for symbol death,
Threat 5: Power Words: Stun. Self explanatory.
Counter: Maintain a hit point total above 90. If your hitpoint total drops below 90, equip Arvoreen until you can heal.
Are there other threats? Sure. But if you can reign in those five, your odds of surviving the battle should be pretty good.
To the fight. Sadly, I don't have a screenshot of the opening. We faded, listened for "praeses" and quaffed an invisibility potion. We evaded both Time Stops without difficulty. Here we see the second Time Stop pass uneventfully. Hurdle cleared.
Once the second Time Stop ended, we were free to use our aura offensively. What you're seeing here is the death of glabrezu 2. The first had fallen to the sling.
The balors. Aestica's save v death of -9 allowed her to fight in melee. Helm of Defense + Potion of Fire Resistance reduced damage from Aura of Flaming Death
Balor 2. Note that these blokes did have trouble hitting with Aestica holding the Sentinel in her offhand.
The best thing about killing the demons is that it gives you something to do while you're waiting for Jon-Jon to burn through his Abjuration stuff. Aestica made a point of flicking bullets at him whenever she ran by, in the interest of eliciting casts. By the time the last balor fell, he was ready for us.
Feeling vulnerable, I guess, he brought a planetar. Smite->Power Attack->GWW. It never got an attack roll in. We attacked the gate animation- we didn't even wait for the poor thing to appear.
Delaying the inevitable, Jon-Jon tossed a PW:B. We waited this out, running Hardiness + the Defender. Invisibility would have been a sensible choice here, but I didn't feel like digging through the Bag of Holding for a charge
Ok. Time for a showdown. Irenicus went Malison, Aestica went Potion of Invulerability. Seeking disruption, we attacked with Gessen while working through the skins. The physical damage seen here signaled that we were through.
To Everard, and the end of Jonicus.
Fin!
And with that, our intrepid halfling fighter is off to ToB. Wish her luck in Tethyr!
Best,
A.
I'll share some thoughts on SCS install options and A-Tweals over there, if you like. Or we can do it here. Your call
Looking forward to seeing Khael in Amn!
Best,
A.
Meanwhile, after wasting hours, I failed to install anything but SCS as mod to my BG2EE setup:
Without the G3 site, my Mac/Steam install just proves too difficult to add mods to.
So, no fix pack, no IR, no SR currently.
(I am mid-install at the moment with SCS. If you have any quick insights on "tactical challenges" components, it would be immensely welcome right now.)
Sod = harder than bg2 scs because many years dirty tricks got taken into account when they did the tactics
All right everyone, since the rest of you have been posting some rather inspirational stuff lately, I couldn't resist the temptation anymore and would like to introduce a character.
Her name is Amaruq, which - as far as the Internet can be trusted - means "Grey Wolf" in Inuit (not to be confused with a certain bounty hunter though). She's kind of an impersonation of my boundless love of the Arctic. It's cool - and I like to think that so is her. And just in case you're wondering what'd be this fighter/druid's spirit animal, if she was to have one, it'd be them...
I apologize that this is to be slow going, but I've got my bar exam coming up early October and I don't expect to accomplish much up until then. Therefore, please accept this post as a teaser for all its current irrelevance. Nevertheless, I could possibly post some early highlights of the run soon.
In the meantime - keep rolling, all of you!
Note: The portrait has been borrowed from Dropdeadcoheed.
Best,
A.
Previous posts:
BG1 end: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/904835/#Comment_904835
SoD start: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/904866/#Comment_904866
Part XIV: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/904934/#Comment_904934
Part XV: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/904982/#Comment_904982
Part XVI: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/905032/#Comment_905032
Part XVII: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/905184/#Comment_905184
Part XVIII: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/905354/#Comment_905354
Part XIX: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/905559/#Comment_905559
Part XX: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/905700/#Comment_905700
Our party cleared the western side of the Underground River surface map without any issues, having fire elementals deal with the orc group and freeing the druids. We talked our way out of a fight with another group of bandits, and Arbogast (or rather, his summons) fought for leadership of an ogre tribe:
I didn't know if the ogres would object to summons joining the fight, but they didn't. After we dealt with the myconids and ankhegs, it was time to wipe out the crusader camp in front of the dungeon entrance. This was a very strange battle for me - in one way, it wasn't difficult at all, as the enemy never even managed to take out all of my summons. On the other hand, we lost another party member - see, after opening combat, new crusaders spawn in at several places around the party, and some of them are crusader scouts - thieves that tend to use invisibility potions and go for a 5x backstab. One of them (I had no idea he was even there yet) went right after Safana, and her measly 56 hp obviously didn't help:
Two more scounts tried to kill Arbogast and Nahema, but were stopped by their stone/ironskins, though just to make sure, I had Nahema renew her defenses during the battle. Meanwhile, a couple of magical arrows and an insect plague were enough to take out two mages and most of the crusaders:
Behind the wooden gate, another group of foes awaited the party, but this time, they had no scouts or mages with them, so fire elementals easily killed them on their own:
With the Seal of Caelar in my position, I entered the Dragonspear Courtyard and completed all the minor quests there. The only significant battle was against the Sentry of Tempus, but Arbogast's summons easily dealt with him:
I had already planned to eventually replace Safana with Minsc - originally I was going to do it after having completed the entire Underground River area, but it seems like I have to set this plan into motion right away. This means I will have to deal with some traps with unknown effects and miss out on some loot, but so be it - there are no more thieves available in this game for me.
Oh, and look at this bug I just found: Voghiln just casually having a conversation with Glint, despite the fact that a) Glint is not in my party and b) Glint is actually dead and gone in this playthrough.
Next time, we will go to some very scary places at the Underground River.
Enuhal