In all honesty, I'm pretty terrified to enter SoD. There's massive enemy pressure in numerous battles through the game and my only source of Raise Dead is my cleric. I can probably beat the game if the cleric dies, but if I lose another character, I might have to resort to setting the difficulty to Normal mode if I'm going to survive Belhifet. At least in BG2 there are enough high-XP side quests that we can always wait until epic levels so a planetar can cast Raise Dead for us.
And I honestly don't know how I'm going to tackle Hephernaan; my party is really not optimized to handle mages. Unless he comes without Fire Shield active, in which case the fight may well be very easy.
I've only ever beaten the final SoD fight once - and since I didn't know what I was doing the conversation options I followed led to Caelar joining Belhifet as a blackguard. To balance that, however, Hephernaan was executed - which seemed like a decent trade-off to me. You might want to consider @semiticgod if that would be a preferable set up for your party.
I don't know, @Grond0. Her gear is perfect to counter all the worse things that can happen in this fight, she has a lot of hp and she hits really hard. I believe that, in a poverty challenge, Caelar should be allied with - but not taken in the group, obviously. She probably can give you a few rounds of freedom that should allow you to cast your Lower Resistances, for instance.
It's nice when a plan works out perfectly, but it's always more thrilling when it doesn't work out, but you pull through somehow anyway .
Normally I'd agree; the most exciting fights I've had are those where stuff goes wrong. But this case was different: my reaction to those events was pure horror.
Starting out alone, Kain does a lot of song-twisting to speed up the killing of kited enemies. He manages to finish the rogue ogre this way before he travels south. We’re neutral evil, so we don’t really care about what our foster dad said about this Khalid and Jaheira duo. (My good-aligned Skalds actually recruited Xzar, Monty, and Eldoth to help out with Tarnesh.) We escape a kobold archer attack,
and reach Beregost in good shape. We do some mini questing in and south of Beregost, and we slay Landrin’s spiders with throwing daggers. Kain’s reputation is 10 when he first visits Nashkel, so his first Bhaal dream grants him a healing touch ability.
Making friends
At level 3 Kain meets Tiax (Strifeleader of Cyric/Thief) at Feldepost’s Inn. Now Tiax, with his Ghast summons, is just amazing on LoB difficulty. The Ghast pretty much dispenses with the need for a Totemic Druid in BG1 or the need of using invisible blockers all the time. His low level Cleric spells are also still good on LoB difficulty, plus he's to be the party thief. It’s thanks to Tiax’s ghast with its paralyzing attack that we manage to save Viconia (Nightcloak of Shar) from the Flaming Fist mercenary that’s after her. The priestess joins our party.
Kain has great difficulty defeating Shar-Teel in single combat. He has Tiax and Viconia walk in the amazon’s way so he can throw his daggers at her. Shar-Teel (Barbarian) joins, albeit reluctantly. But it takes only a couple of days, during which Kagain (Dwarven Defender) joins as the fifth member of the company, for Shar-Teel and Kain to become lovers.
. In search of some good armor for his new mate, Kain stumbles upon Drizzt who’s surrounded by gnolls. Kain orders his followers to attack the dark elf, but it’s the gnolls that finish him. It doesn’t detract from Shar-Teel’s satisfaction with her new suit of armor. She also keeps Icingdeath for its fire resistance, but we sell Twinkle.
Kagain has us locate his lost caravan north of Beregost. The bandit archers that raided it are very dangerous but thankfully we only have to deal with the sword-wielding leader and one archer, as the others remain hidden in the fog of war. The Ghast and a Hold Person from Vicky ensure victory.
When we refuse to answer a Flaming Fist Mercenary’s questions down south in the Gibberling Mountains, and slay him in self-defense, again with the priceless help of the Ghast, we take our first reputation hit.
It goes down to 4 but we raise it by 1 by taking Samuel to Gellana at the FAI. There we also dispatch Tarnesh, once more with Tiax’s ghast. We proceed to kill some hobgoblins, enough for Kain to reach level 4 (allocated a pip to S&S style), but we sell Joia’s ring.
Some early power leveling
We buy a green scroll of PfPetrification but find we don’t need it in Mutamin’s Garden, thanks to our ghast.
Several level-ups ensue, with defensive character Viconia taking S&S proficiency like Kain had done. We leave Kirian & Co for later and go ankheg hunting.
With Tiax’s scouting work and the ghast for the meleeing, the ankhegs prove doable. Especially when we manage to creep up on them, so that they don’t have many free shots from range, if any, at our ghast. The other party members join each time an ankheg gets paralyzed. We slay three to four ankhegs per ghast summoning. One of them drops an invisibility scroll that Kain manages to copy without any INT boosters. Tiax sadly falls when we mistakenly think him safe outside of one ankheg’s line of sight. Thankfully he doesn’t get chunked.
We raise Tiax, and return to clear the entire cave (and get another randomly dropped Invisibility scroll). Tiax becomes a level 4 Cleric and takes S&S proficiency as well. We return Tenya’s bowl and Brun’s son’s dead body, but we don’t give the farmer any money (yet).
A short-lived alliance and a lasting one (hopefully)
Kivan joins the party because we want Jozzi Seasnake’s returning throwing dagger +2 (which deals 1d4 +2 damage as opposed to its 2d4+2 BG2 counterpart) and because we need a scapegoat to deal with Droth. Jozzi’s Sahuagin pursuers are no problems thanks to Jozzi’s melee prowess and Viconia’s Confusion special ability (she gets that once per day every 5 levels as a Divine Remix Nightcloak of Shar).
Droth gets paralyzed by our ghast, which seals the Ogre's fate.
Also on the coast, but further south, we kill three sirines with our skellies plus ghast. It leads to Kain reaching 16,000 XP, a nice landmark for us to recruit Edwin. Kain casts Invisibility on the low dex, high AC red wizard every time we travel, to keep him from harm.
Sendai, Vax, Zal, Gnarl and Hairtooth all succumb to our summons. At the Gnoll Fortress we patiently deal with the gnolls, with two invisible blockers on the bridge allowing us to fall back when necessary. Shar-Teel gets swarmed though when four gnolls spawn behind her. She falls. Nalin raises her and we finish the remaining gnolls. We dismiss Kagain for a short while so that we can recruit Dynaheir for a moment (I just can’t murder in cold blood any NPC who has given me joy in other playthroughs.) She “sadly” falls in a skeleton ambush, but Kain secretly gets her raised at the Temple of the Morning, then sends her off, all behind Edwin’s back. (I roleplay that Kain likes having people indebted to him.) Kagain rejoins.
Becoming true villains (and eager shoppers)
Our summons kill six more Sirines, the boomerang dagger serves to destroy three flesh golems, and Shar-Teel, Tiax and Viconia deal with the Ogres on the north coast with ranged attacks. Laryssa and Brage don’t put up much of a fight against our summons.
Instead of killing Charleston Nib for Gellor, we betray the latter but he doesn’t drop the money he promised. (Letting Nib go gave us 1,000 XP but not a reputation point after we had promised Gellor to kill him.)
Back in Nashkel we lie to Oublek but, unexpectedly, the bounty agent doesn't buy it. Our reputation drops by 1 and an Amnian Soldier turns hostile right in front of us. Now things are getting really tricky. We really don’t want the whole town to turn hostile. Vicky Holds him, and we finish him before any other soldiers notice. The children standing nearby don’t seem to care.
Still, this bloodshed further hurts our reputation; it goes down to 2. Flaming Fist Mercenaries and bounty hunters can now appear anywhere to take our hides. Invisibility becomes essential. We have Edwin try his luck with copying the second Invisibility scroll we had found, and he succeeds! It means that the whole party can now stay invisible when we want to.
An advantage of our terrible rep is shop prices. In my install, a rep of 1 gives the same discount as a rep of 20, a 2 rep discount equals a 19 rep discount, etc. Tiax nicks Algernon’s Cloak to boost Kain’s Charisma to 20 so that we can do some shopping. Thankfully I notice in the combat log a message that guards have arrived at Feldepost's Inn, and thankfully the party, except Tiax, is invisible.
The gnome hides in shadows, buys a helmet of charm protection for Kagain without being seen by the guards, and we leave. At the Carnival we buy a suit of caster’s chain for Kain (even though Invisibility is still the only spell he can cast).
We decide to disappear for a while from the strong arm of the law, and pay a first visit to Durlag’s Tower. Kain hadn’t done much killing yet, but now he scorchers two Battle Horrors to death with the wand of fire. All party members are invisible as they enter the tower. Tiax removes any accessible traps on the upper levels and in the basement. On the roof we decide to use the PfPetrification scroll that we had previously bought for Mutamin’s Garden. It allows Shar-Teel to comfortably take down all basilisks without having to worry about the duration of her gaze protection. She also deals with the ghasts inside with the help of invisible blockers. The loot we sell, and taking advantage of the near maximum discount for our miserable reputation we purchase the Shadow Armor for Tiax and the Claw of Kazgaroth for Shar-Teel.
So far my intention to keep a villain's reputation hasn't called for any unprovoked killing of innocents. I find the role-playing of evil quite satisfactory up till now. We're not playing stupid/sadistic evil, but rather defiant, self-serving evil.
In the city, Iloïnen quickly completed the minor quests, though the only item of relevance she picked up was the amulet that grants "bless". At the Coast Way Crossing, I did the Menhir quest (with low charisma, but none of the "punishments" involved were a big deal) and the bridge battle - though calling it a "battle" would be generous, as I simply activated sanctuary and waited out the duration:
I went to the Coast Way Forest next, where the vampire was killed - I used another chaotic commands scroll for this one:
This provided me with a shield with one sunfire charge per day (which I won't be giving to the halfling). Luckily, none of the traps around there proved fatal.
I quickly made my way to the Repository of the Undead. Why? Well, I propably could and should've skipped the entire place, but I thought getting to 20 con with the Helm of Dumathoin in order to regenerate while travelling might be nice. I mostly used skeletons, buffs and resting under sanctuary to get rid of the undead groups, though sometimes, turn undead, sunfire and wand of the heavens charges were added. Now, things got out of hand when I approached the Coldhearth Lich - instead of running back to get The Secret Revealed, I (being half asleep at this point - I had aready taken many stupid risks by triggering traps without protecting myself against as many effects at possible. I could've gotten charmed by a trap at some point, for example) talked to the lich instead, and combat ensued. I learned that you can't even leave this area once this happens! Well... turns out this lich does indeed have level 9 spells. I was completely unbuffed, and the only thing I managed to do before he cast timestop was trying to go invisible (which he countered with true sight), using another chaotic commands scroll and running away for a bit - when time stopped, I thought he would just kill me:
Any save-or-die effect could've ended me, and any reasonable combination of damage spells (AHWs, skull traps etc.) could've done the same thing. Instead, my foe chose... powerword silence, greater malison and remove magic - and he removed his own silence and malison effect with the latter! As he was already doing no damage, he activated a web + stinking cloud sequencer next - I dodged with ring of free action and saved against the cloud:
After recasting chaotic commands from another scroll (now I only had two left, and I would go on to use one more because of another remove magic hitting me), my opponent finally went for some actual damage spells: AHW - which I countered by a) drinking a potion of magic shielding to halve any possible damage and guarantee any future saves for now and b) swap in the boots you get from the Menhir quest, because why not increase magic resistance? Indeed, that worked out rather well:
Next AHW - I had meanwhile started summoning skeletons - and the potion of magic shielding does great work, turning a deadly level 8 spell into a minor annoyance:
Coldhearth tries to kill my skeleton warriors with skull traps and the like - which is strange, because I soon learn that he could've just death spelled them - he only did so after getting them low with damage spells already. Anyway, by this point, he was still doing well in terms of hp, mostly because he continued to renew PFMW. However, I finally realized that I could've made this entire fight much, much easier and didn't have to waste all those resources to win it: While looking through my scroll case, I realized that I had multiple scrolls of protection from undead and protection from magic with me - either one would've easily ended the fight by itself, without any risk for Iloïnen.
I simply used a protection from undead scroll and hacked through all of Coldhearth's stoneskins until he was dead:
When I returned to Brother Deepvein, he actually didn't believe my story and attacked me, so I had to kill him to get the Helm:
While this entire expedition was a bit pointless and poorly played, I did end up getting my final levelup for SoD, giving me access to level 5 cleric spells - so I don't really need CC scrolls anymore. Having CC active at all times will be very good, as it reduces the chance of several instant-death effects like charm or maze affecting me via unknown traps.
Anyway, in my session today, I skipped the entire troll claw woods and most of the Forest of Wyrms (just killing the wyverns and spiders in my way). I got rid of the bugbears with some kiting and slinging before making my way to the Temple of Bhaal (I ignored the dragon, by the way - not worth the risk). There, I started clearing the cultists with skeletons and bullets. I eventually ran out of summons, so kiting was the easy solution - for some reason, the imprisoned crusaders turned hostile:
Ziatar was defeated in a duel - it was pretty hard for her to hit me:
I charmed the crusaders to finish their quest, rested and took out Akanna to get the wardstone - no reason to mess with the shadow aspect or the mind flayer:
At bridgefort, I encountered a Greater Feyr (who appears if you talk to one of the NPCs at nighttime) for the first time during my various playthroughs - it used some disabling spells like emotion and horror, but had no success against Iloïnen:
The only quest I wanted to do here was killing Vichand to get the 80 +3 bullets for Belhifet:
After that, I attacked the fort with my allied forces - however, my damage wasn't high enough to keep the flaming fist soldiers alive, so I had to kite the remaining foes, using some healing and buffing potions (oil of speed + invulnerability) plus Gorion's belt, because Oloneiros has a wand of frost:
Finally, I threw a couple of necklace charges at the soldiers guarding the bridge and killed the mage with the help of a potion of magic blocking (as I have far too many of these in my potion bags):
I also quickly completed some minor quests at camp and activated the merchant genie (access to permanent chant and permanent luck!) before quitting for now.
Next time, we will try to get get the remaining useful items in the game and weaken the crusaders as much as possible.
I don't know, @Grond0. Her gear is perfect to counter all the worse things that can happen in this fight, she has a lot of hp and she hits really hard. I believe that, in a poverty challenge, Caelar should be allied with - but not taken in the group, obviously. She probably can give you a few rounds of freedom that should allow you to cast your Lower Resistances, for instance.
I'll bow to your superior knowledge @Arctodus. I don't really know what Hephernaan brings to the fight, but was fearful of mage spells that couldn't be countered in a poverty run - whereas Caelar is almost entirely hack and slash (so if you can avoid Belhifet you can avoid him as well).
@Grond0 I think @semiticgod isn't so much worried about fighting Hephernaan during the Belhifet battle (where he's very much kiteable himself, because he transforms into a devil and goes for melee attacks), but rather about fighting him in the Dragonspear Castle basement, which is where he will use his full array of spells against the party (and he is accompanied by many allies, including more spellcasters). It should be noted that it isn't neccessary to actually finish the basement fight - you only need to poison the food and/or water supplies and beat the guards that spawn at the elevator, and if you're quick, it's possible to flee before Hephernaan does anything dangerous (which is pretty much what I did in my LoB run, because I, too, though that Hephernaan might be too much to handle).
OK. Thanks @Enuhal. The few times I've been there I've never fought him either - I just poison and run away (though I have noted that the elevator doesn't seem to activate until after Hepharnaan's dialogue has triggered).
@Enuhal: So, you don't have to actually fight Hephernaan to complete the quest? Do you have to even confront him in the third area, or can you just place the barrel of Bwoosh in the first area (with the Water Elemental), poison the food and water in the second area (the one with the trolls?), and then scurry back to the Coalition camp?
@semiticgod Indeed, fighting Hephernaan is not needed. Once you poison the supplies, three things will happen: Hephernaan will start to enter the room in order to confront you, a couple of crusaders will spawn at the elevator to investigate, and the elevator will be blocked from use. The elevator will become available again and you can flee once Hephernaan spots you and opens dialogue (this is according to @Grond0) - in my run, he wasn't even close enough to throw a spell when talking to me, as I had everyone hastily make their way to the elevator right away (and he was also distracted by summons), so I could safely get away. I also killed the guards spawning at the elevator, and I thought this was actually the requirement to make the elevator available again, but according to @Grond0 , it's simply Hephernaan talking to you (which I can't 100% confirm, but killing the guards (traps might be extremely helpful there) and Hephernaan talking to you should definitely do it).
I might just do some quick testing to find out what how exactly things work down there.
Edit: @Grond0 is right - once Hephernaan talks to you, you can use the elevator, not even a single guard needs to be killed.
I also killed the guards spawning at the elevator, and I thought this was actually the requirement to make the elevator available again, but according to @Grond0 , it's simply Hephernaan talking to you (which I can't 100% confirm, but killing the guards (traps might be extremely helpful there) and Hephernaan talking to you should definitely do it).
Either condition is enough. The writers really wanted for the Heph dialog to trigger, but it was a long way from his room, so it was impossible to expect that players would wait obediently for him to arrive, and not try to flee or hide, for example. Hence the guards, to provide some more or less believable reason why you can't escape right away. And if they aren't enough of a delay, then too bad for Heph.
After we returned to the Temple near Beregost, we tried to help Mellicamp but failed, though we did help to cure a werewolf of lycanthropy and we managed to find a replacement apprentice for Mellicamp. We then went in search of Bassilus, found him, and killed him. Zargos was next and we then headed west to the coast. Shoal wouldn't talk to Tenya, so we carried onwards where we killed a sirine who had a magical axe in her possession. We returned a ring to its owner and later on killed some more sirines. We proceeded to the lighthouse area where we killed yet more sirines, but when we came across Sil she was not hostile and we killed the pirates who were her enemies. She gave us a magical cloak and gave her permission to take the contents of the cave. The first defender of the cave was a flesh golem who hurt us badly. However the battle taught us how to deal with his kind, so after resting we were able to kill the other golems without being hurt. We had already rescued a boy from some beasts, so we headed southwards where we helped Charleston and Brage. After escorting Brage to the temple, we were rewarded handsomely so our next task was to visit Aerie and get her to identify the items that we have acquired. After heading southwards we met up with Zargos Flintblade who attacked us which resulted in his death. The same happened when we met Greywolf. At that point Isra, a Cavalier joined our party. She is VERY weak, so I hope that the half-decent weapons and armour that I gave her will be sufficient to keep her alive. We sold some ivory that we had found to a disenchanted artisan. Hopefully he wil make something beautiful from it.
Summons and area-effect spells were sufficient to deal with the starting dungeon, including Korlasz. Invisibility 10' Radius let us wait out the fight at the bridge, but I saw a disturbing sign: Carl got stunned, so apparently one of the enemies here uses Darts of Stunning. Make sure you're immune to stun or can guarantee a successful save vs. spell during the bridge fight if you're playing SoD no-reload.
I used Special Snares, Fireball, Slow, and summons to get through the undead dungeon, but I did not pay a visit to the lich. I wasn't sure I could survive a fight with the lich without items, and I didn't like the idea of betraying the dwarves, so I just left.
I killed Isabella and Ikros with traps and used more summons and area-effect options against the trolls, with Invisibility 10' Radius to make sure we traveled safely. When Carrion Crawlers joined the fight in a cave, we used Fireball to take them out early--trolls just deal damage, but Carrion Crawlers can paralyze on hit, which could easily be fatal in a poverty run. When we had a Troll Shamaness to worry about, I used Invisibility 10' Radius to make sure we could throw out Fireball, Skull Trap, a Special Snare, and two summons without breaking invisibility, since I was worried the Troll Shamaness might hit us with an enchantment spell of some sort.
Carl hit level 9 and chose Greater Malison and Agannazar's Scorcher. I have little use for Agannazar's Scorcher now, but I wanted to make sure I wouldn't forget to pick it later on. I want to be able to create a scorcher loop in BG2.
I snuck past Morentherene; I was sure that she would have been able to slay my cleric if Onion-san failed a save vs. breath and Morentherene got two or three hits in.
Summons killed the cultists in the temple of Bhaal and Special Snares paralyzed Ziatar, earning us an easy kill. Chara hit level 11, allowing them to cast Wondrous Recall and therefore get two extra castings of Chaotic Commands. With Onion-san's help, we were able to cover five party members with immunity to Darskhelin's Psionic Blast (assuming he uses it on Core Rules). Darskhelin died to Special Snares, the enemy fighters died to Fireballs, and the enemy mage died to our summons, notably the Spirit Snakes with their poison.
The Neothelid charmed Chara, but with lots of hasted summons and DUHM and Flame Blade on Onion-san, we were able to kill the Neothelid in short order. No one got poisoned; I steered clear of the grease.
Special Snares paralyzed Akanna while our summons dealt with her Aerial Servants. Unfortunately, somehow the jail cell key from Ziatar just... vanished, so I'll have to look up the item code so I can console it in and free Madele and the crusaders.
I think I will fight for Bridgefort rather than surrender it as I had previously considered. With three Special Snares on hand, the enemy fighters should be pretty easy, and our Spirit Snakes should be able to handle the mages. Besides, I can pre-set some normal snares to deal lingering poison damage as well.
Bounty Hunters, Totemic Druids, and Invisibility 10' Radius are all incredibly powerful. I realize that I'm doing the same "use the same old tricks, but harder" thing that I hoped I could avoid, but the limitations of the poverty run--namely, the complete inability to pay for resurrections and the complete absence of fast-acting escape options--have kept the game interesting.
I'll probably avoid a lot of side quests in this run. We only really need enough XP to get my first two sorcerers up to level 11 so I can get Lower Resistance for Belhifet. I don't like our odds at Dragonspear Castle, but then, I've never poisoned the Crusaders' food before that fight, so maybe things will be easier.
@Enuhal, do you happen to know exactly what impact the poison has on the fight?
After killing Silke, we head to High Hedge to antichickenate Melicamp. He does not survive.
Then we move on to someone I've been putting off until now: Tarnesh the Terrible, killer of more CHARNAMEs than any other enemy. Imoen sets 2 batches of normal and alchemical traps at the foot of the stairs to the inn. Kagain goes in and lures him into the traps. Tarnesh dies instantly once he goes hostile.
Once inside, we get the Golden Pantaloons and return all of Landrin's stuff. Then we head for the Nashkel mines so I can start selling these accumulated bandit scalps. Greywolf is killed though he damages Kagain for half his health.
The mines go by uneventfully. Imoen traps Mulahey's room and prevents most of the kobolds from swarming us, though the skeltons survive. Ajantis is badly damaged by a misfired Lightning Bolt from my wand. We rest in Mulahey's lair and completely recover. Tiax levels up from the gray oozes outside.
Exiting the cave system, we're in the Valley of the Tombs area. We loot the ghoul tomb easily and come upon Hentold, who gives us the +2 dagger. Next we take on the Revenant. It has a better THAC0 than I thought and badly injures Ajantis, who swaps tanking duty to Kagain with Defensive Stance. A potion and a couple healing spells from Tiax keep Kagain alive through the fight, which earns Ajantis a level.
We rest inside the Revenant's tomb and its safe. Then we take on Narcillicus and his mustard jellies. Montaron takes to stealth and escorts Tiax's ghast next to Narcy. Ajantis initiates dialogue and Narcy goes hostile. Monty flubs his backstab but Tiax's ghast paralyzes Narcy, which makes fighting the jellies a breeze.
We go back to the Revenant's tomb to rest but are ambushed by a skeleton and some rabid dogs. After putting the puppies to sleep, Tiax gains another level.
We rest in the tomb as we planned, then took on the band of amazons up north. Again, Monty escorted Tiax's ghast towards the group and chose Maneira as its first target, whom it paralyzes. The amazons go hostile and target it with Rigid Thinking and Hold Person, both of which it is immune to. Monty's stealth wears off just as the ghast attacks, so he flees away from the group so he doesn't get caught in the Hold Person's AoE.
The amazons continue to cast spells at the ghast and it paralyzes a second amazon. One of them casts Glyph of Warding on our backliner thieves and me. I'm already wearing Mulahey's Boots of Grounding, but I drink a potion of absorption just to make sure I don't die. Tiax and Imoen fail their saves but I succeed on mine, taking no damage. The rest of the amazons are defeated and I gain a level.
Now to return to Nashkel, deal with Nimbul and Tranzig, and get Algernon's Cloak.
@semiticgod Sadly, I have no idea what exactly the effects are, and I have no comparison to non-poisoned crusaders, as I've always applied the poison in my previous runs. Several guides mention the poison "weakening" the crusaders, and there's an ingame comment during the battle that they seem a bit sluggish, but I'm not sure how that translates into actual stats (I'd guess levels, thac0 and/or hp might be lowered).
We return to Nashkel and inform Mayor Ghastkill about what happened. Monty levels up.
I had forgotten to lay traps for Nimbul so I relied on my other strategy: Monty and Ghastly teaming up. Ghastly attacks Nimbul first and Monty flubs a backstab, causing Nimbul to buff with Mirror Image.
Kagain and Ajantis charge Nimbul but Ghastly paralyzes him.
Monty waits until all of Nimbul's images are destroyed, then gibs him with a backstab.
Another assassin defeated, we make for Beregost. We stop by the temple and buy all of Kelddath's Stone to Flesh scrolls, then sell bandit scalps to Officer Vai. At Feldepost's, I charm Algernon and have him attack Tranzig. He gets wasted by the mage, letting me pick up his cloak for no penalty.
Tranzig himself is soundly defeated, but not before putting a few magic missiles into Kagain.
Now that I have Algernon's cloak, this opens up quite a few options. I'll have Ajantis use it. The Charm effect it has comes from the "NONE" school (strangely), so Ajantis will make enemies save against it vs. breath at -3 instead of -1. It also does not count as a hostile action, so victims who succeed at their save will not turn hostile.
For the plan I have in mind, I need to clear the bandit camp and get to the cloakwood. Monty begins our assault with a critical backstab. I'm glad I turned him into an Assassin.
He picks off the bandit goons one by one under the cover of night and we all kill Ardenor Crush. There's a large group of goons near the main tent with Taurgosz Tenhammer guarding them. Kagain and Ajantis rush forward to ward off their arrows and Kagain takes on Tenhammer in defensive stance. I cast sleep to little avail, so I use a potion of fiery burning to soften them up.
Monty flees the scene to try for another backstab as I cast Sleep again, taking out all the mooks. The thieves and I clean up the trash while Kagain and Ajantis fight Tenhammer, who is putting the hurting on both of them.
One second after that screenshot, Tenhammer finally dies, surrending his full plate to Kagain, who swaps his ankheg armor to Ajantis. We rest in one of the tents that we cleared, then clear out the gnoll time-out cave. The rest of the goons guarding the main tent are picked off by Monty again, and Ajantis and Kagain rush Credus, who whips out his bow to attack them. Little did he know that Monty was right behind him, which made this backstab all the sweeter.
Before entering the main tent, our tanks buffed with strength potions and I put up invisibility. The fight opens with Tiax using a wand of fear, which scares the poison-using hobgolin as well as the mage.
I charm Raemon and set him to attack his friends.
The fight is soon over, and to tie up all loose ends, I have Raemon equip his bow and Monty gibs him with a backstab.
We loot the chest and free Ender Sai. The Cloakwood awaits, but there's a couple side-trips I want to make first...
Bridgefort was a breeze. Pre-set traps severely weakened the first wave of enemies; summoned critters held the fort alongside the coalition fighters, allowing the party to hang back and fight from afar; and a combination of Greater Malison, Emotion: Hope, Slow, and Special Snares crippled the enemy fighters. The enemy mages lasted longer, but they failed to accomplish much because our summons had so many immunities to disablers. A True Seeing spell robbed Mae of her blindness before she could use one of her lingering damage traps in plain sight (True Seeing dispels illusion spells, which includes Blindness but not Power Word: Blind), but on the bridge, Mae was able to land a normal snare while under the effects of Blindness.
Our primary sorcerers finally hit level 11 on reaching the Coalition camp and chose Lower Resistance. Our third sorcerer and cleric are still stuck at level 9 and our druid and Bounty Hunter are stuck at level 11, but that should change by the final battle.
I didn't do many of the optional quests inside the tunnels. All I did was use summons and spell damage against the Dark Treants and Myconids (I stopped summoning Fire Elementals after the first one got confused, lest it wander off and attack a neutral critter), kill the evil priest in the southeast with traps, and talk my way to the warrens and into the basement.
Per @Enuhal's advice, I set traps on the elevator while Frisky Bits used invisibility to poison the food and water safely. After the first poisoning, a hostile guard appeared on the elevator, triggering Mae's traps, but then two others appeared after the traps had already been triggered, and turned Bennan and the other nearby guards hostile. We were largely unbuffed and without summons.
Knowing that my mages would survive for a moment thanks to their Stoneskins, I had them break invisibility first by casting Greater Malison and Emotion: Hopelessness, allowing my cleric and druid to cast Barkskin. Meanwhile, Frisky Bits went off to finish poisoning the Crusader supplies.
Once Barkskin was on line, Chara summoned some spirit critters, Frisky Bits returned, and I shored up our defenses with Mirror Image, only for the cleric to cast True Seeing. But with Slow and Emotion: Hopelessness hobbling the enemy, we had enough time to bring out more summons and cast SI: Enchantment, since I had spotted Hephernaan wandering our way. I kept him at bay by ordering a Spirit Lion to move away from the doorway.
Chara normally memorizes Ironskins and Chaotic Commands for safety's sake, but since we needed an anti-mage option, they took Insect Plague for this fight, and successfully shut down both the Crusader Cleric and Hephernaan, who does not in fact have Fire Shield to block it.
Hephernaan spoke to us, but I didn't see the elevator become active, so I kept fighting, layering on even more disablers, casting Shillelagh and Flame Blade to help clear out the fighters, and finally removing the last of the enemies from the elevator. This allowed Mae to throw a trap out into the chamber beyond, paralyzing one of the mages, Olvenaun, in the process (apparently Hephernaan comes flanked by mages even on Core Rules). Unfortunately, Hephernaan's Physical Mirror bounced the trap back at Mae and paralyzed her.
Which I really, really should have seen coming.
We struggled to take down Hephernaan's defenses before Insect Plague ran out, but failed. He healed himself under Sanctuary until we exposed him (apparently divination spells remove Sanctuary, at least in my install), but despite Hephernaan having no Stoneskins left, we were unable to stop him from casting Fireball.
We probably could have taken him down, but I saw no reason to gamble with our HP levels and went down the elevator to dodge the Fireball.
Back at the Coalition Camp, we took down the trolls and ogres using Greater Malison and Slow. Pre-set traps obliterated the mages in the second wave, and Greater Malison, Slow, and charm spells from Call Woodland Beings broke the enemy paladins and clerics in the third wave. We conserved our limited summoning spells across the waves.
I used Dosia to rest the party, only for a Messenger to inform me that I had retreated from combat and had to protect the barrels at the far south. Apparently this means two or three crummy fighters approach the barrels and then the final wave, with Bird-Dog and the other named bosses, approaches from the east.
I summoned the last of my critters and sent them all out to engage the enemy. It was a crushing defeat for the Crusaders: with our summons forming a wall and our party casting spells from a safe distance, we imposed Greater Malison, charm spells, Slow, Insect Plague (which required Wondrous Recall to re-cast it to hit the distant mage), Special Snare, Emotion: Hopelessness, and some spell damage as well. None of the spellcasters has any defense against Insect Plague, and since Chara cast it at a healthy skeleton as we sent the skeleton up north, Chara was able to start and finish casting Insect Plague without ever getting close to the enemy's field of vision.
There are only two major fights left: the attack on Dragonspear Castle itself, and Belhifet. Our druid and thief should hit level 12 and our mage should hit level 10 by the end of the siege, leaving us just strong enough to tackle Belhifet using the Lower Resistance strategy I'd planned out before this run ever began.
I've decided to memorize Wondrous Recall instead of Conjure Fire Elemental. The elemental would be great, but I'm more concerned about the two clusters of spellcasters near the end of the fight. I'm hoping that our existing area-effect spells will get us through the melee-heavy early waves without wearing down the summons I need to finish off Ashatiel's gang.
Still searching for that elusive perfect run I made a 5th start which went well up to level 4/5. That ended last night at Durlag's Tower when I was slow to react to poor pathfinding on a routine movement and the Doom Guard got a chop in on one of the sorcerers.
This morning a pre-breakfast session saw: - the first level taken after trapping the ankheg near Tenya. - after ending the main ankheg menace (until the next time), the last few XP needed for another level came from some wild dogs on the way to the basilisk area. - the basilisk area was cleared when Kirian's group regretted picking a fight. That provided a further level. - they'd pretty much cleared the upper part of Durlag's and went downstairs to look for the last bit of XP needed for another level. On arrival a phase spider teleported in on them. I could have run immediately, but stayed around to throw in a couple of magic missiles and Hardup was poisoned as a result. He still had 25 HPs though and with 2 characters (apart from him) who could cast slow poison there didn't seem too much danger. However, in such close quarters the computer can get a bit confused about exactly where icons are. Hence, even though Beggar appeared to be right next to Hardup, he was extremely slow in starting his spell - and in fact was too slow.
We continue our adventure with a rather challenging encounter, the Wolf of Ulcaster. A ghoul summoned by the Wolf paralyzes Shar-Teel. Kain is close by and casts Invisibility. As a Rogue Rebalancing Skald he suffers a casting speed penalty of +1; Shar-Teel falls just as he finishes his casting.
I blame this partly on myself (absent-mindedness) and partly on Shar-Teel’s recently equipped Claw of Kazgaroth, which makes her look blurred/invisible. We have her raised and return determined to deal with the Wolf. And we do. Given the rate at which new Dread Wolves keep appearing, we need invisible blockers here. Kain’s song keeps the Wolf’s dread howl from affecting us. The following screenshot pretty much sums everything up.
Shar-Teel takes them all down, including the Wolf of Ulcaster. Kagain and Shar-Teel reach level 6 here, with the Dwarf becoming a crossbow specialist, and the Barbarian specializing in daggers. In fact Shar-Teel’s work brings us close to 40,000 XP per party member, arguably a legit way of farming XP in SCS/LoB (I mean it’s not our fault that we’re slow at killing those critters with 179 HPs a piece).
Killing more wolves in the Temple of the Morning area earns Kain another level (7).
Edwin and Tiax level up when the party concludes their business in the Red Canyons. We Silence and Algernon-charm Bassilus right after the dialogue has ended, have the priest summon his massive skeleton warrior, and pretty much clear the map. Eventually we have Bassilus waste his last semi-useful spells and cast Doom on himself. We then finish him with the help of his own skeleton warrior. The bounty allows us to buy Kagain the Army Scythe and a case of plenty with unlimited (unenchanted) bolts.
Getting ready for the Nashkel Mines
There’s still some quests/encounters we want to do and items we’d like to acquire before shifting our focus to the main plot. Some of these we take on before the Nashkel Mines, others will have to wait a bit longer. Greywolf stands no chance against our undead army. He bequeaths his blade to Shar-Teel. Meilum gets Confused and Held by Viconia before we finish him. Silke gets paralyzed by our ghast. Tiax nicks two potions of defense from “Feldepost’s thugs” (he fails with one of his marks), and we receive a third one for helping them.
Upon leaving the Thunderhammer Smithy we are surrounded by Flaming Fist enforcers. We manage to distance ourselves and have our undead summons, that were still around from Silke, occupy them. Sadly the enemy makes short work of the summons. Viconia Confuses a battle wizard and we fight him out of sight of the others. Even when his buffs expire we have great difficulty dealing with him. Shar-Teel gets stuck and has no choice but to tank him. She quaffs several healing potions but not enough. We underestimate the guy. He hits like a truck and takes Shar-Teel down right before Kagain finishes him.
We raise Shar-Teel, buy the Greenstone Amulet, now at the lowest possible price thanks to our reputation having dropped to 1.
Nashkel Mines
We explore the mines invisibly and reveal ourselves only to a couple of (melee) kobolds we slay for a vial of mysterious liquid (which Thalantyr will investigate for 750 XP). In Mulahey’s lair we rest first. We then summon an undead army of four skeleton warriors and a ghast, and we have Tiax or Vicky cast PfE 10’Radius. The undead stay close to the entrance, so that they can keep Mulahey’s minions busy. Vicky and Tiax cast Sanctuary and position themselves in the back of Mulahey’s chamber, Kagain and Shar-Teel, still invisible, walk up to the Half-Orc, and Kain stands with Edwin in the middle so as to reach as many allies as possible with his song. Mulahey opens with a Hold Person, but loses his spell when het gets Silenced by Vicky and/or Tiax, who by initiating their casting had triggered the dialogue. The Silence also affects Kain, neutralizing his song. Kagain and Shar-Teel melee Mulahey and see their job eased by our priests as they manage to Hold the Half-Orc.
With our summons we defeat the minions.
We loot the tombs with the help of invisible blockers, and back in Nashkel our five undead summons + PfE + Skald song manage to slay two hostile Amnian soldiers as well as Nimbul.
Tranzig receives the same treatment in Beregost. At Thalantyr’s we buy the Deep Red Ioun Stone (+1 DEX) for Tiax.
Facing the assassin groups
We travel around a lot, mainly for gear we still want. We always make sure we’re invisible when we travel because of Molkar and Lamalha and their crews. Our undead dispatch Krumm and Caldo, and they also help out against Ingot. Lamalha’s group is the first to appear. We buff with PfE 10’Radius. Kagain moves to Lamalha, Shar-Teel to Zeela. We make sure that she’s closest to the rogues as well, because as a Barbarian she’s immune to their backstabs. She gets stabbed indeed by Telka, right when Kagain disrupts Lamalha’s casting.
A critical that would have killed Kain. Only when both rogues have revealed themselves does Kain use the wand of monster summoning for some back up. Vicky Confuses Telka, Maneira and Zeela, but the latter still finishes a casting of Hold Person at Kain that she has already started. Kain swigs a potion of freedom to be safe. Vicky then Holds both Telka and Zeela because Maneira has wandered off out of sight of everyone but invisible Edwin. Kagain and the summons slay Lamalha. We deal with Telka and Zeela before we finish Maneira.
This encounter went pretty well so we decide to fight another party: we return to Mutamin’s garden to confront Kirian. Having the advantage here of being the ambushers, we get our undead army ready and buff with PfE. Kain charms Peter with his cloak but he somehow goes hostile again. Kirian tries to charm Kain in turn, but he swigs a potion of magic blocking. Vicky then confuses Baerin and Peter. Kirian wastes her magic on our undead until she runs out of spells and tries to melee our group. Shar-Teel and our undead deal with Peter and Lindin, thanks to the ghast’s paralyzing attack.
Baerin escapes our attention while Kagain tanks Kirian until we finish her.
At the FAI Edwin sees Dynaheir, so role-playing required us to have him to finish her with a Larloch’s Minor Drain. (Shame we didn’t have her wait elsewhere.)
Molkar ambushes us next. This party is somewhat less dangerous in that it harbors no backstabbers. Our clergy fails to Silence Halacan and Drakar but those two get too busy with Kain’s wand summons to be much of a threat to any of our party. Still, even while attacked by our summons and our warriors Halacan succeeds at casting a Charm Person at Kain. Thankfully we make our save because we had no instant protections against the spell. Our priests manage to Hold both Drakar and Molkar.
Halacan falls soon after, and we have enough power to deal with Morvin, so victory is ours.
Spending gold
We sell a lot of loot and buy Kain the Fragment of Enlightenment ioun stone (+20 lore, turning him into a walking Identifier). We also buy several scrolls at Thalantyr’s and at the Ulgoth’s Beard Inn and we have both Kain, with the red potion because his INT isn’t 17 yet, and Edwin, with regular INT boosters, copy them into their spell books. Kain also buys a buckler + 2 in Ulgoth’s Beard.
All the way south, near the the Gnoll Fortress we save Jared from a Polar Bear. Kain casts Friends to raise his CHA to 25 for the reaction adjustment, and is rewarded the Boots of the North.
Edwin has been wearing Mutamin’s Adventurer’s Robe, but if we find five other, different robes Thalantyr can combine them into one. Bentha and Zordral (slain by our undead) provide us with two. We get two more from Jemby and Arkushule (both overwhelmed by our undead as well), and we take the last one, a Traveler’s Robe from Neera after Edwin’s intervention between her and the Thayvians. The Mage Robe of Practical Protection that Thalantyr produces for Edwin gives the wearer +20% fire/cold/electricity resistance, +2 AC, and +1 to saves.
What’s next?
There’s still a number of challenging wilderness encounters that we have shunned so far: Icharyd, Kahrk, and the Firewine Ruins. We may go for those in our next session, or we may just travel to the Wood of Sharp Teeth to seek out the bandits.
BTW I really miss Invisibility 10' Radius. Our party has to be invisible pretty much the whole time: not just when traveling but also in towns as bounty hunters and law enforcers keep tracking us down.
Just catching up on what you guys have been doing - I haven't done that much reading since grad school. I'm amazed that everyone finds the time not only to play, but to write such great, detailed reports, not to mention keeping up with all the other runs on here. Amazing.
As for me, I just installed SCS and am gearing up for another run. I've only installed better A.I., calls for help, smarter mages/priests, carrion crawlers, basilisks, etc.. I haven't added the tactical challenges, like improved Durlag's Tower or Ulcaster, and I'm already feeling guilty after reading your epic posts (especially after reading how @Blackraven just iced the Ulcaster wolf, which I've read so much about. Should I install the extra components? I've only gone through BG1 twice (with reloads) on SCS and I worry about getting my ass kicked. Darn you all for getting me hooked on this!
Hey @OrlonKronsteen, I agree that it's hard to keep up. Being away for only a couple of days can easily mean having two or three pages to catch up with.
As for your setup, I really can't give you any advice. I personally enjoy using relatively challenging setups that include the SCS tactical challenges you mentioned as they tend to offer the most exciting battles for me. But that's very much a personal preference. Even a successful no-reload run through a vanilla install requires a lot of skill and focus.
The good thing about this thread is that there's lots of knowledgeable players that post here. So you can always ask around for tips on specific aspects of the game or specific enemies or battles, irrespective of the install you're going to opt for.
Good luck man, and am looking forward to reading about your upcoming run!
Just catching up on what you guys have been doing - I haven't done that much reading since grad school. I'm amazed that everyone finds the time not only to play, but to write such great, detailed reports, not to mention keeping up with all the other runs on here. Amazing.
I find it easiest to open Notepad to keep track of what I've just done in-game. When it's suitably long enough or when I hit a certain milestone, then I post it. Speakng of which, its time for
Attack on Brunash, the (Titanic) Halfling Enchanter!
Armed with Algernon's cloak, it was time to pay Kelddath's harem of Sirines a visit.
Each one was murdered for a total of 6k XP. Nobody leveled up though. We stopped by the Friendly Arm and bought a ton of healing potions and protection from petrification scrolls, then went into Cloakwood. Monty incinerated the tasloi that had stolen Gurke's cloak. Now it belongs to him.
Imoen set a bunch of traps for Seniyad's group. I was most fearful of Seniyad himself because of his Call Lightning spell: something that one-shot me when I was playing on LoB once. I kept Brunash hidden inside Aldeth's cabin under invisibility as everyone else dealt with the druids. Thankfully, Seniyad himself died instantly from Imoen's traps. The other druids were no trouble.
We make it to Cloakwood 2. The spiders cause us no trouble. I had Tiax go into the Centeol's cave to use a wand of fear charge, but a sword spider was too quick for that to be viable. He ran outside and had Kagain tank it. Kagain leveled up from the sword spider. He was hit repeatedly, so I left the tanking to Ajantis instead. He pulled spiders one at a time from out of the cave. Soon the spiders and ettercaps were all dead. Ajantis and Montaron leveled up from these fights.
Chelak's body was too heavy for any of us to carry, so we had to "toss" him along the ground via quickloot to return him to his brother. After resting, we were going to move on to Cloakwood 3 but a nasty web trap ensnared us! I had forgotten exactly where this first trap was; I was a smidgen too far to the north.
If I hadn't been invisible, it might have been the end of the run right there! Kagain had a potion of freedom so he used that and tanked the ettercaps so they wouldn't hit Imoen. He was beaten up pretty badly in that fight and poisoned twice, but everyone survived.
We rested again and Kagain was back to full health. His 20 CON is proving invaluable, which is exactly why I rushed to recruit him in the first place.
We make it to Cloakwood 3 and recruit Faldorn, replacing Imoen. I turn her into a Totemic Druid, despite having no previous experience using one. It seems like the best option for a kit, given how everyone is just buzzing about it.
Now, to step 1 of my grand plan for phat L00t: Basilisk Country. Utilizing the pet basilisk loop for extreme gains to XP, I dump all of my party members except Faldorn at the edge of the map. The weight of impending failure crushes down on me. In my haste to execute my plan, I've forgotten to memorize Protection from Petrification and more invisibility spells. I memorize a single PfP and rest, though we are ambushed by flinds. Faldorn summons her Dread Wolf and they are taken down. I rest again, this time with no interruptions. I cast invisibility on myself and scout around the map, searching for the Greater Basilisks. I find one, then lead Faldorn close to it and cast PfP on her. She uses Algernon's Cloak and charms a lesser basilisk and I use the green PfP scroll on it too.
The loop works for a time, but the basilisk we charmed just isn't cooperating now and wants to use its melee attack instead of the gaze attack. So does the greater basilisk.
RIP. There's still another greater one out there and more lessers where that came from. This time I find the perfect place to farm XP.
I'm out of stone to flesh scrolls. Im level 10 and Faldorn is level 9. I wish I hadn't installed the "druids use cleric level progression" tweak. I would have Fire Seeds by now and could proceed to the next step of my master plan. I need more stone to flesh scrolls. I join up with my companions again and set out for the Gauntlets of Dexterity.
I find it easiest to open Notepad to keep track of what I've just done in-game. When it's suitably long enough or when I hit a certain milestone, then I post it.
Me too. Of course allowing the game to continue in the background while you write up notes is a great timesaver - I've had lots of runs hugely shortened by that tactic .
Greater Malison and Emotion: Hopelessness triggered in the wrong order, but they still proved decisive in the first few rounds of the siege of Dragonspear Castle. Notice the Water Elementals--apparently they only show up if you fail to kill Strunk in the tunnels.
My party is largely unbuffed; I'm expecting an extremely long battle and I don't want to cast my buffs early considering I'll need them the most at the end, where my summons might grow thin. Hopelessness isn't enough to win the first wave, so I throw out a Special Snare. Bounty Hunter traps are just so incredibly strong.
The enemy mages use Fireballs, so it's a really good idea to keep the party out of the way. We don't have the spell slots to keep everyone immune to fire, after all.
We respond in kind, with Fireballs and another Special Snare, at which point I realize that we only have a single Special Snare left. Our Bounty Hunter is already half-spent.
Chara has memorized four castings of Call Woodland Beings, but unfortunately that doesn't get four castings of Confusion, Hold Monster, Mass Cure, and Call Lightning. All it gets us is a whole bunch of charm spells, but it's hard to optimize the use of charm spells when it's not safe for us to monitor the situation and therefore give orders to charmed enemies. Plus, our allies have a habit of attacking charmed enemies, so the charm spells buy us even less.
Somehow, Strunk gets hit by a hostile Acid Arrow while his Globe of Invulnerability is still active. Really shouldn't be possible, but it does work in our favor.
The enemy disintegrates, we move forward to the next group, and new Hamadryads Entangle the enemy, allowing us to bomb them while they're still clustered together.
We proceed to Ashatiel, but things don't play out the way they did last time. Instead of teleporting to the far west with a completely new group of enemies, Ashatiel stays put, fighting alongside the party where she first appears. Chara deploys their first Insect Plague spell, targeting the Spirit Snake so they don't have to enter the enemy's line of sight... but a backstab slays the snake, which cancels the spell even after Chara has finished casting it.
Then a Hamadryad dies, and I notice that the enemy party includes some fighters--and that we don't have a proper wall set up. We hurry to land Greater Malison and Emotion: Hopelessness. Down south, Chara casts Wondrous Recall to get their Insect Plague back.
The nearest enemies, all stunned for 10 rounds, collapse under coalition missile fire. Deciding this batch of enemies is still a critical threat, I have Mae throw her last Special Snare, though the enemy makes good saving throws, and only one petty archer gets paralyzed.
Chara now has Insect Plague again, but this time, I want to use a target that won't die on me. I pick Carl, who wades into the fray with Stoneskin and Mirror Image. He tries to use Agannazar's Scorcher to disrupt an enemy cleric's enchantment spell despite the cleric's spell deflection buff, but his aim is off. Luckily, Chara's is not, and both Ashatiel and the cleric suffer spell failure. Carl turns invisible to escape.
We apply spell damage and the enemy gradually breaks down.
There are more enemies left, but apparently you don't need to fight them. The siege is over earlier than I had expected.
In Avernus, we buff the hell out of the party and approach the enemy with traps and summons. Everyone is buffed with either Chaotic Commands, SI: Enchantment, or multiple Spirit Armor spells (the save bonus from Spirit Armor stacks with multiple castings) because I'm anxious about Illaruel charming people.
We use Invisibility 10' Radius to rest before the next fight and use blind traps to give us a party-friendly area-effect damage spell.
Only Belhifet is left. We've finally at our maximum levels, except for Carl, our earliest death in BG1, who remains at level 10. Despite the fact that Frisk is a Dragon Disciple and therefore has one less Lower Resistance spell than normal, I choose Spell Immunity as Carl's first and only level 5 spell pick, because I do not think we will need three sorcerers with Lower Resistance going into BG2.
But it gives us less wiggle room to deal with Belhifet's massive MR.
We cast all of our longest-term buffs and board the elevator. But shortly after boarding, I realize that I've made a mistake: I haven't memorized Spiritual Hammer for Onion-san, which means we only have 5 means of killing the demons before Belhifet:
1. Magic Missile and Melf's Acid Arrow, which we need for Belhifet 2. Traps, which we need for Belhifet 3. Seeking Sword, which we need for Belhifet 4. Summons, which we need for Belhifet 5. Shillelagh and Minute Meteors
It takes time to kill the first few enemies, and when I look for a healing spell for Onion-san, I realize that we've memorized almost no healing spells.
We still have more demons to fight, and I realize that the only way we can save enough summons to distract Belhifet and enough damage spells to kill Belhifet is to use the Seeking Sword. It costs us a great deal, though; I was banking on Seeking Sword to take down the Abishais who spawn upstairs.
Judging by our spell notifications, the elevator ride did not take 15 rounds, like I had expected. It took 20 rounds or more, apparently because it took us so long to kill those demons.
Since we're on Core Rules and Belhifet only uses Remove Magic on Insane mode, we enter the fight with no SI: Abjuration. We just have Shield, Chaotic Commands, Remove Fear, and Protection from Fire, plus Spirit Armor for Chara and Onion-san, since Barkskin doesn't last very long. Unfortunately, we're low on level 2 spells due to using Mirror Image.
We open with Spirit Lions, but we only get two; we had to use our first one on the elevator. Two Abishais flank us, but with Seeking Sword expired, we have to rely on Minute Meteors to do much of the work.
We make progress on the Abishais, but Belhifet destroys our Spirit Lions with ease and teleports over to us.
Caelar slays Hephernaan and we run from Belhifet, who lands a heavy blow on Onion-san but fails to poison her due to her low saves, courtesy of being a halfling cleric.
When Belhifet casts Fireball, I know his aura is clouded, which means it's safe to cast Lower Resistance.
Belhifet is now alone, but our Hamadryads aren't as sturdy as I had hoped. I'm pretty sure they have MR, but it's only 50 and therefore unreliable.
I wait for Belhifet to teleport once again before I cast Lower Resistance; I really can't afford to have Improved Invisibility or a teleport spell disrupt our very limited Lower Resistance spells. We land two more before Belhifet vanishes, costing us our first Melf's Acid Arrow spell.
Mae hurries over to use Detect Illusions on Belhifet, allowing our other sorcerers to follow up with more Acid Arrows. His health bar begins to shrink.
Then I see Belhifet cast Gate, and I am greeted by a Cornugon.
I am totally unprepared for a Cornugon; I didn't think Belhifet summoned anything on Core Rules. Cornugons cast Lightning Bolt and have a poison attack that I believe also stuns on a failed save vs. spell. If we don't take down the Cornugon soon, it could start knocking down party members, and our most important party members, the mages, are also the most vulnerable to Lightning Bolts.
Mercifully, the Cornugon focuses on Caelar, the nearest target. Mae launches a Special Snare and Asriel throws Minute Meteors to damage the Cornugon, but we reserve our Acid Arrows for Belhifet.
Belhifet approaches death, so we switch to faster-acting Magic Missiles, anxious to finish him off before Lower Resistance wears off and his MR jumps back up to 100.
We keep up the pressure, but discover that Belhifet's MR is going back up.
But his MR isn't quite at 100 yet, and Asriel manages to sneak in the last bit of damage.
The only fight left is the Unknowable Horror, which Frisky Bits kills with one punch. Siege of Dragonspear is over, and the party enters Shadows of Amn.
From here on out, things should be much, much easier. I'll still have to be extremely careful, but I'm far more familiar with BG2 and even ToB than BG1 or SoD. Plus, SoA is very nonlinear, which gives us a lot of wiggle room to plan for encounters. Most importantly, random chance plays a smaller role at higher levels due to increased access to immunities.
I'd like to thank @Enuhal and @Grond0 for their advice. I don't think I could have made it to BG2 without you guys; the fight with Sarevok and the siege of Dragonspear Castle could have easily swung the other way if I hadn't isolated Angelo and poisoned the crusaders' food supply.
A no-reload poverty run of BG1 and SoD is indeed possible, but a few precious kits and classes seem to be all but mandatory. Without Command, Sleep, and spirit critters, early BG1 is extremely challenging; Invisibility on a level 4 sorcerer is the only way to avoid certain threats; and it's extremely hard to muster enough damage output to kill enemies without relying on a Totemic Druid's early summons, the Seeking Sword, or a Bounty Hunter's extra traps.
My run was unorthodox due to mods. We had to deal with a few extra threats, one of which killed our Totemic Druid, but the XP from those enemies obviated the need for some side quests and the disabled XP cap let us recover them before SoD. Overall, I'm not actually sure if the extra mods added to the difficulty or subtracted from it. And unlike @Grond0, I did lean heavily on farming ankhegs to gain XP in the early game. And the removed cap on celestials will radically overhaul the difficulty in ToB (although Project Image could also bypass the cap in a less-modded game).
Going forward, I do not think I'll start over from Candlekeep if I should die in BG2. Instead, I'll restart at Chateau Irenicus. It might not be a continuous narrative, but I don't want to wade through BG1 and SoD again. My favorite game in the series is BG2, and I haven't gotten to spend very much time in it lately due to restarting at Candlekeep.
If I can make it to epic levels, we're pretty much in the clear.
The previously reported couple of deaths were both a bit unlucky - but that just points up the need to leave nothing to chance in a no-reload run. I didn't do that in a 7th run where fairly early on I travelled on the road at the wrong time of day and a group of bandits took advantage. An 8th attempt also ended relatively early when an ankheg spat at a sorcerer quicker than expected, while ankhegs were also responsible for number 9 though as a result of me attacking recklessly that time.
I don't actually think it should be that difficult to get this party at least through BG1, even though double figures on the number of attempts might suggest I'm suffering from optimism bias .
This time I got an extra XP boost in Shoal's area by killing Mad Arcand - I wanted a reputation drop anyway, so might as well kill something worthwhile. In a further change to previous attempts I went straight on to trap Bassilus. That gained not just 975 XP for him directly, but 1,000 more from Kelddath. Then of course there was no reason not to trap Kelddath and the sirines - netting loads more XP and a first level.
While in the mood for mayhem, the golems at High Hedge were trapped before talking to Thalantyr (hence not making him hostile). Melicamp was then revived for another XP boost. That meant just a couple of little tasks in Beregost provided another level.
Moving on to the basilisk area a further level was gained from the monsters before Kirian & co were trapped.
The next XP feast was at Durlag's Tower, where I used invisibility ruthlessly to give the occupants of the upper tower little chance. That left about 1,000 XP each needed for another level and that was picked up in a running fight with the wolf pack at Beregost Temple. With the improvement in finding traps from that Washout was able to disarm the trap near the underground entrance to Durlag's and a few greater dopplegangers and spiders were added to the casualty list. I didn't think Washout's skills were up to clearing the whole area, but before leaving the Tower Pauper's new ability to produce skeleton warriors helped kill the ghost, while a full stack of traps were too much for Kirinhale.
A return to Shoal's area accounted for one group of sirines and a couple more of those didn't last long at the Lighthouse. There's still a long way to go to pick up the next level, but there's enough decent XP still around to do that reasonably quickly tomorrow.
Beggar, Totemic Druid - L6, 58 HPs, 5 kills Pauper, Priest of Helm - L5, 43 HPs, 19 kills, 0 deaths Hardup, Shaman - L5, 45 HPs, 45 kills, 0 deaths Washout, Bounty Hunter - L6, 41 HPs, 29 kills, 0 deaths Aspire, Sorcerer - L5, 24 HPs, 26 kills, 0 deaths Skint, Sorcerer - L5, 26 HPs, 18 kills, 0 deaths HPs are very good so far this run, which provides a bit of extra incentive to make better progress this time.
Actually, we return to Beregost and buy Monty the Shadow Armor and get Faldorn a few things, then jump over to High Hedge because I forgot Perdue's short sword. Seems like pocket change now but I'll take what I can get. Tiax levels up from the gnolls guarding Perdue's sword and we return the normal-sized halfling's sword.
Now we set out for the Gauntlets of Dexterity for real this time. The Xvart village is massacred and Borda is killed for being a fraud. The Bear River is completely cleared with nothing worthy of note. Hairtooth and Gnarl are butchered and the Gauntlets of Dexterity now belong to Kagain. I retrieve the Charisma tome and use it. The Gnoll Fortress is cleared out.
On the way to the Gibberling Mountains, we encounter a polar bear, earning Monty a level. We made it there and were accosted by a flaming fist, who talked to Kagain, and was looking for Samuel. Kagain is not very good at lying so we had to fight the officer, losing 9 points of reputation for killing him. Fantastic...
We take Samuel back to the FAI's temple and set out for Cloakwood. We make it to Cloakwood 4 and kill the wyverns in the cave. Now we go to the Cloakwood Mines entrance. To start the group fight, I would have Monty escort Ghastly and Faldorn's Spirit Snake to one of the mages, and have Monty backstab the other one. Monty's stealth wore off at a very inopportune moment as I was getting the summons into position. As a result, Monty spent the whole fight confused, but since there were 3 enemies bunched together, I casted Hold Person on them. Drasus and one of the mages failed their saves. Faldorn had an Insect Plague traveling slowly toward the group to shut down any potential comebacks.
We focused on killing the enemies who weren't disabled, though I made it a priority to kill the held mage before anything could be done about him. The group soon fell and Montaron now owns the boots of speed, which will make it far easier to go backstab fishing.
After killing some guards, we descend into the mine. I put Monty's improved backstabbing prowess to the test. Ajantis hands over the Gauntlets of Weapon Expertise to him and, with his x4 multiplier, Monty gibs all the guards on the first level. This process is repeated on the second level, except for the large room with all the guards in it plus the mage. After killing the two guards in the left side of the big room, the mage came looking for us and most of our party was in the prison cells. This is totally not good. I back out of the prison cells but the mage casts Lightning Bolt on Kagain, which rebounds and kills her.
The guards in the big room are all put to sleep and mopped up. Now on level 3, every single enemy is backstabbed to death by Montaron except the initial surprise party at the stairs you just come in from.
Level 4: Davaeorn's lair. The guard's plate armor turns Monty's backstab attempts aside but he still falls. All the traps behind the hidden door are disabled. Now to make a plan to beat Davaeorn. From experience with my previous playthrough with Cernd, I wanted to use Insect Plague on Dave without being detected. I dropped the wyvern heads on the floor with Monty and had Faldorn cast the spell on it. The insects flew over to the heads and then spread to Davaeorn.
Given the way he teleports around, I was praying the normal spells he cast weren't scripted, and so susceptible to casting failure. I had Ghastly and the spirit snake rush Dave to soak up his spells just in case. Turns out he DOES suffer casting failure, much to my relief. Monty takes to the shadows and predicts Dave's next teleport. Before he can reach his destination, Monty's blade strikes true and kills Dave!
Montaron is definitely a contender for MVP of the party. Baldur's Gate and all of its Stone to Flesh scrolls await.
Okay, I’m starting an SCS no-reload run and I’m going to try and document it as well as you guys. My settings: core rules, max hit points, and munchkin stats allowed (legitimately rolled, as always, though). SCS – improved AI, calls for help, smarter mages/priests (but no pre-buffing), and smarter monsters (sirens, basilisks, etc.). I’m not trying the improved tactical challenges this time. It’s only my third run with SCS, and I want to feel a semblance of hope, rather than drooping my head muttering like Xan with each click of the mouse. My biggest fear in this game: Kahrk. The last time I played SCS he fracked up my party, and fracked it up good. I had to reload like 10 times to beat him, adjusting my spell selection, tactics and everything. But I digress, so…
Meet the players
Charname: Samara, a LE blackguard.
The Beamdog blackguard bio captures Samara’s essence perfectly. I’d only add that she’s been growing angrier and angrier by the day, frustrated by being trapped in Candlekeep and with Gorion’s incessant moral lecturing. She can’t wait to blow this pop stand. What could this trip possibly be about?
Samara’s companion, Lamia, is a CE sorcerer.
Lamia is from a noble, elven family in Waterdeep (due to my utter lack of FR lore, I couldn’t think of anything more exotic than that). As a child, her innate arcane powers began to develop, along with a cruel streak. Her parents sent her to Candlekeep to study in the hopes that wise sages could set her on the right path. Good luck with that. She met charname in a forbidden area of the library and they struck up an immediate friendship. Lamia is sorry to be losing her friend, and wishes she, too, were getting the hell out of Candlekeep.
Candlekeep
And so it begins (as a writer, I promised myself I’d never, ever use that phrase in a story, but this is going to be pulpy story-telling at best, so there you have it). Gorion was either a complete miser, or else he was a rather unsuccessful adventurer, because: 100 gold pieces??? Samara could only shake her head at such a pitifully small allowance. Did Gorion not know what a two-hander was going for these days, not to mention a good suit of armor and a crossbow? The first order of business, then, was to raise more money, because gear not withstanding, Samara swore she would not settle for staying in shabby inns, no matter where this journey led. Samara and Lamia accepted Firebead’s quest and set off through the library grounds to meet Tethoril. They got the identify scroll, and continued past Imoen and out to Hull, who, according to rumour, had a paying job. Turns out he was merely hungover and forgot his sword – a quest that’s beneath our protagonists, surely, but Samara really needed the money so they agreed. Hull also mentioned something about a sick cow.
Hull’s sword was easily secured, along with the antidote (which went not to the cow, but right into Samara’s inventory). Since Samara has an 18 charisma, Hull was nice to her upon receiving the sword, and he doesn’t know how lucky he is. In alternate universes, where some blackguards had less than an 18 cha, Hull was chopped to bits for his lip.
On the way back to Firebead, Samara and Lamia decided to break into the priests quarters to steal some money. At which point Samara was attacked by an assassin. She chopped the assassin to pieces on the first swing, but how could this have happened? Why would anyone want her dead? And funny timing, what with Gorion urging her to prepare for the journey… Samara and Lamia rushed back to the inn. Samara ran upstairs and looted all of the chests, knocking the nobleman unconscious with her fists so that he couldn’t sound an alarm when she broke into his dresser. With an abundance of loot in hand, they returned to Winthrop, and Samara stocked up on supplies.
It was now time to say good bye and they walked back to the front of the library. Samara left Lamia with Imoen and told Gorion she was ready to go. Little did she know, Lamia and Imoen were plotting to sneak out of Candlekeep and follow her.
Ambush and on the road
I’ll not blather on about the ambush as we’ve all been through the cut scene a million times. Needless to say, the morning after arrived and Samara was surprised by Lamia and Imoen. Stunned by the night’s events, the three characters returned to the site of the ambush. Seeing Gorion’s corpse in the light of day woke unexpected feelings in Samara. Despite that they had not seen eye-to-eye for a long time, he was her father. Rage towards his killers – and her would be killers - swelled inside her. Oh, would they pay. But revenge would have to wait until they actually knew who their attackers were, and what the hell they wanted. Gorion had urged Samara to go to the Friendly Arm Inn should disaster strike, but having already been besieged on the road and in Candlekeep itself, the Inn sounded like a death trap. Thus, the adventurers decided to go south and stay out of sight for a night or two, then maybe over to Beregost where they might blend in with the crowd, look for allies, and most importantly, find an inn with luxurious accommodations, a hot bath, and fine wines.
All this is metagaming speak for the fact that I’m not going anywhere near Tarnesh right now. I died facing him in a vanilla no-reload run, and I’ll not try my luck with him in SCS - at least until I get Tiax, who’s chilling at Feldepost’s Inn in Beregost. I’ll feel a lot more confident in my chance at survival by having command spells at my disposal and his summoned ghast.
This ends the first stage of my game. I hope I don’t die soon, because it took a fair chunk of time to type this up, and I’d hate to waste the effort. In fact, I’m not sure how long I can keep this up. I’m probably throwing too much role-playing stuff in here and wasted time covering the easiest part of the game. I guess I'll figure out how to cover this as I go....
Trio (Corey_Russell, Grond0, Gate70) Corthief XIV - elven thief (protagonist, controlled by corey_russell) Berk - dwarven berserker (controlled by Grond0) Stinkimo - dwarven defender (controlled by Gate70)
The Trio made some more progress today - and with no deaths, though not without Grond0 making it close a few times.
Corthief XIV wanted to go to Trademeet, but we didn't go there right away, as we got the Renfeld ambush. So we went to do docks and started the Harper quest. First challenge was to deal with Prebek and Sansha - this went pretty well, as Corthief XIV went to the corner while hidden, then the dwarves did their self-buffs and showed themselves. Corthief XIV decided to use darts of wounding and the party won the fight handily.
Nothing remarkable while looting the Harper compound, other than the dwarves were getting impatient with Corthief XIV picking up the 41 gold in the back room. Xzar met his fate and we could not avenge him. Corthief XIV decided to use the staff spear for now.
We also did the Suna Sunei ambush, which was pretty easy for the party. We then went to Watcher's Keep and did the 1st level. We did not get vampiric wraiths, fortunately. There some undead, but not too worrisome with a berserker in the party. Corthief XIV did good traps/locks like usual.
Finally head off to Trademeet - we get the obligatory Orog ambush, but the dwarves by this point had full plate (from Officer Dirth and Mencar Pebblecrusher respectively) so handled this fine.
Once we get to Trademeet, we deal with the genies immediately. Corthief XIV laid 3 snares outside and 3 inside - the dwarves then triggered the fighting and didn't get petrified so worked pretty well. Stinkimo will of course use the shield of harmony.
We talk to the Mayor, decline Cernd's help and head to the Druid Grove. The dwarves tanked the enemies well here - the only hiccup was Berk got sent running in fear when fighing the 1st group of druids. However, with Corthief XIV using acid arrows on the mage, they weren't getting many more spells off and we all survived. The rest of the enemies were slaughtered without incident. Cernd of course defeated Faldhorn.
Once back in Trademeet, we got a few usual goodies (Belt of Inertial Barrier, Cloak of Displacement, Tasheron's Short Bow). We then cleared out the tomb easily. The dwarves were in a such a hurry to clear it, then the enemies were mopped up after Corthief XIV got the quest from Lady Larroxal. We turned in the circlet for a reputation increase.
There was only about 13 min. left in the session about this time, so we used the remaining time to clear the surface of the Graveyard, as well as the spiders/Panaii at the lower level (though leaving the large group of undead alone). While Corthief XIV did get two backstabs on Pan'aii, he then run around while the dwarves mopped up the small spiders. The last action was looting the +2 axe from the crypt, and the session was saved here.
After getting a lift to Nashkel with Brage I forgot that I hadn't been there yet and rested without checking reputation. Fortunately that didn't trigger a Bhaal power and I was able to slaughter an innocent before resting again.
The next target was the Valley of the Tombs where I tried to kill both mustard jellies at once rather than playing it safe. The second one got lucky and I needed to use invisibility to switch targets around before crawling away to lick my wounds.
There were no more close shaves while doing the major encounters in the southern areas, but problems are always around the corner. After killing Meilum I was heading for the ankheg area, but hadn't bothered renewing invisibility. That's not necessarily a problem when a basilisk ambush triggers as they don't attack that quickly - so there's time to run away if you react immediately. However, if you're not paying full attention ...
Comments
And I honestly don't know how I'm going to tackle Hephernaan; my party is really not optimized to handle mages. Unless he comes without Fire Shield active, in which case the fight may well be very easy.
Starting out alone, Kain does a lot of song-twisting to speed up the killing of kited enemies. He manages to finish the rogue ogre this way before he travels south. We’re neutral evil, so we don’t really care about what our foster dad said about this Khalid and Jaheira duo. (My good-aligned Skalds actually recruited Xzar, Monty, and Eldoth to help out with Tarnesh.) We escape a kobold archer attack,
Making friends
At level 3 Kain meets Tiax (Strifeleader of Cyric/Thief) at Feldepost’s Inn. Now Tiax, with his Ghast summons, is just amazing on LoB difficulty. The Ghast pretty much dispenses with the need for a Totemic Druid in BG1 or the need of using invisible blockers all the time. His low level Cleric spells are also still good on LoB difficulty, plus he's to be the party thief.
It’s thanks to Tiax’s ghast with its paralyzing attack that we manage to save Viconia (Nightcloak of Shar) from the Flaming Fist mercenary that’s after her. The priestess joins our party.
Kain has great difficulty defeating Shar-Teel in single combat. He has Tiax and Viconia walk in the amazon’s way so he can throw his daggers at her. Shar-Teel (Barbarian) joins, albeit reluctantly. But it takes only a couple of days, during which Kagain (Dwarven Defender) joins as the fifth member of the company, for Shar-Teel and Kain to become lovers.
In search of some good armor for his new mate, Kain stumbles upon Drizzt who’s surrounded by gnolls. Kain orders his followers to attack the dark elf, but it’s the gnolls that finish him. It doesn’t detract from Shar-Teel’s satisfaction with her new suit of armor. She also keeps Icingdeath for its fire resistance, but we sell Twinkle.
Kagain has us locate his lost caravan north of Beregost. The bandit archers that raided it are very dangerous but thankfully we only have to deal with the sword-wielding leader and one archer, as the others remain hidden in the fog of war. The Ghast and a Hold Person from Vicky ensure victory.
Some early power leveling
We buy a green scroll of PfPetrification but find we don’t need it in Mutamin’s Garden, thanks to our ghast.
With Tiax’s scouting work and the ghast for the meleeing, the ankhegs prove doable. Especially when we manage to creep up on them, so that they don’t have many free shots from range, if any, at our ghast. The other party members join each time an ankheg gets paralyzed. We slay three to four ankhegs per ghast summoning. One of them drops an invisibility scroll that Kain manages to copy without any INT boosters. Tiax sadly falls when we mistakenly think him safe outside of one ankheg’s line of sight. Thankfully he doesn’t get chunked.
A short-lived alliance and a lasting one (hopefully)
Kivan joins the party because we want Jozzi Seasnake’s returning throwing dagger +2 (which deals 1d4 +2 damage as opposed to its 2d4+2 BG2 counterpart) and because we need a scapegoat to deal with Droth. Jozzi’s Sahuagin pursuers are no problems thanks to Jozzi’s melee prowess and Viconia’s Confusion special ability (she gets that once per day every 5 levels as a Divine Remix Nightcloak of Shar).
Also on the coast, but further south, we kill three sirines with our skellies plus ghast. It leads to Kain reaching 16,000 XP, a nice landmark for us to recruit Edwin. Kain casts Invisibility on the low dex, high AC red wizard every time we travel, to keep him from harm.
Sendai, Vax, Zal, Gnarl and Hairtooth all succumb to our summons. At the Gnoll Fortress we patiently deal with the gnolls, with two invisible blockers on the bridge allowing us to fall back when necessary. Shar-Teel gets swarmed though when four gnolls spawn behind her. She falls. Nalin raises her and we finish the remaining gnolls.
We dismiss Kagain for a short while so that we can recruit Dynaheir for a moment (I just can’t murder in cold blood any NPC who has given me joy in other playthroughs.) She “sadly” falls in a skeleton ambush, but Kain secretly gets her raised at the Temple of the Morning, then sends her off, all behind Edwin’s back. (I roleplay that Kain likes having people indebted to him.) Kagain rejoins.
Becoming true villains (and eager shoppers)
Our summons kill six more Sirines, the boomerang dagger serves to destroy three flesh golems, and Shar-Teel, Tiax and Viconia deal with the Ogres on the north coast with ranged attacks.
Laryssa and Brage don’t put up much of a fight against our summons.
Back in Nashkel we lie to Oublek but, unexpectedly, the bounty agent doesn't buy it. Our reputation drops by 1 and an Amnian Soldier turns hostile right in front of us. Now things are getting really tricky. We really don’t want the whole town to turn hostile. Vicky Holds him, and we finish him before any other soldiers notice. The children standing nearby don’t seem to care.
An advantage of our terrible rep is shop prices. In my install, a rep of 1 gives the same discount as a rep of 20, a 2 rep discount equals a 19 rep discount, etc. Tiax nicks Algernon’s Cloak to boost Kain’s Charisma to 20 so that we can do some shopping. Thankfully I notice in the combat log a message that guards have arrived at Feldepost's Inn, and thankfully the party, except Tiax, is invisible.
We decide to disappear for a while from the strong arm of the law, and pay a first visit to Durlag’s Tower. Kain hadn’t done much killing yet, but now he scorchers two Battle Horrors to death with the wand of fire. All party members are invisible as they enter the tower. Tiax removes any accessible traps on the upper levels and in the basement. On the roof we decide to use the PfPetrification scroll that we had previously bought for Mutamin’s Garden. It allows Shar-Teel to comfortably take down all basilisks without having to worry about the duration of her gaze protection. She also deals with the ghasts inside with the help of invisible blockers. The loot we sell, and taking advantage of the near maximum discount for our miserable reputation we purchase the Shadow Armor for Tiax and the Claw of Kazgaroth for Shar-Teel.
So far my intention to keep a villain's reputation hasn't called for any unprovoked killing of innocents. I find the role-playing of evil quite satisfactory up till now. We're not playing stupid/sadistic evil, but rather defiant, self-serving evil.
Previous posts:
Part II: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/916040/#Comment_916040
Part III: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/916127/#Comment_916127
In the city, Iloïnen quickly completed the minor quests, though the only item of relevance she picked up was the amulet that grants "bless". At the Coast Way Crossing, I did the Menhir quest (with low charisma, but none of the "punishments" involved were a big deal) and the bridge battle - though calling it a "battle" would be generous, as I simply activated sanctuary and waited out the duration:
I went to the Coast Way Forest next, where the vampire was killed - I used another chaotic commands scroll for this one:
This provided me with a shield with one sunfire charge per day (which I won't be giving to the halfling). Luckily, none of the traps around there proved fatal.
I quickly made my way to the Repository of the Undead. Why? Well, I propably could and should've skipped the entire place, but I thought getting to 20 con with the Helm of Dumathoin in order to regenerate while travelling might be nice. I mostly used skeletons, buffs and resting under sanctuary to get rid of the undead groups, though sometimes, turn undead, sunfire and wand of the heavens charges were added. Now, things got out of hand when I approached the Coldhearth Lich - instead of running back to get The Secret Revealed, I (being half asleep at this point - I had aready taken many stupid risks by triggering traps without protecting myself against as many effects at possible. I could've gotten charmed by a trap at some point, for example) talked to the lich instead, and combat ensued. I learned that you can't even leave this area once this happens! Well... turns out this lich does indeed have level 9 spells. I was completely unbuffed, and the only thing I managed to do before he cast timestop was trying to go invisible (which he countered with true sight), using another chaotic commands scroll and running away for a bit - when time stopped, I thought he would just kill me:
Any save-or-die effect could've ended me, and any reasonable combination of damage spells (AHWs, skull traps etc.) could've done the same thing. Instead, my foe chose... powerword silence, greater malison and remove magic - and he removed his own silence and malison effect with the latter! As he was already doing no damage, he activated a web + stinking cloud sequencer next - I dodged with ring of free action and saved against the cloud:
After recasting chaotic commands from another scroll (now I only had two left, and I would go on to use one more because of another remove magic hitting me), my opponent finally went for some actual damage spells: AHW - which I countered by a) drinking a potion of magic shielding to halve any possible damage and guarantee any future saves for now and b) swap in the boots you get from the Menhir quest, because why not increase magic resistance? Indeed, that worked out rather well:
Next AHW - I had meanwhile started summoning skeletons - and the potion of magic shielding does great work, turning a deadly level 8 spell into a minor annoyance:
Coldhearth tries to kill my skeleton warriors with skull traps and the like - which is strange, because I soon learn that he could've just death spelled them - he only did so after getting them low with damage spells already. Anyway, by this point, he was still doing well in terms of hp, mostly because he continued to renew PFMW. However, I finally realized that I could've made this entire fight much, much easier and didn't have to waste all those resources to win it: While looking through my scroll case, I realized that I had multiple scrolls of protection from undead and protection from magic with me - either one would've easily ended the fight by itself, without any risk for Iloïnen.
I simply used a protection from undead scroll and hacked through all of Coldhearth's stoneskins until he was dead:
When I returned to Brother Deepvein, he actually didn't believe my story and attacked me, so I had to kill him to get the Helm:
While this entire expedition was a bit pointless and poorly played, I did end up getting my final levelup for SoD, giving me access to level 5 cleric spells - so I don't really need CC scrolls anymore. Having CC active at all times will be very good, as it reduces the chance of several instant-death effects like charm or maze affecting me via unknown traps.
Anyway, in my session today, I skipped the entire troll claw woods and most of the Forest of Wyrms (just killing the wyverns and spiders in my way). I got rid of the bugbears with some kiting and slinging before making my way to the Temple of Bhaal (I ignored the dragon, by the way - not worth the risk). There, I started clearing the cultists with skeletons and bullets. I eventually ran out of summons, so kiting was the easy solution - for some reason, the imprisoned crusaders turned hostile:
Ziatar was defeated in a duel - it was pretty hard for her to hit me:
I charmed the crusaders to finish their quest, rested and took out Akanna to get the wardstone - no reason to mess with the shadow aspect or the mind flayer:
At bridgefort, I encountered a Greater Feyr (who appears if you talk to one of the NPCs at nighttime) for the first time during my various playthroughs - it used some disabling spells like emotion and horror, but had no success against Iloïnen:
The only quest I wanted to do here was killing Vichand to get the 80 +3 bullets for Belhifet:
After that, I attacked the fort with my allied forces - however, my damage wasn't high enough to keep the flaming fist soldiers alive, so I had to kite the remaining foes, using some healing and buffing potions (oil of speed + invulnerability) plus Gorion's belt, because Oloneiros has a wand of frost:
Finally, I threw a couple of necklace charges at the soldiers guarding the bridge and killed the mage with the help of a potion of magic blocking (as I have far too many of these in my potion bags):
I also quickly completed some minor quests at camp and activated the merchant genie (access to permanent chant and permanent luck!) before quitting for now.
Next time, we will try to get get the remaining useful items in the game and weaken the crusaders as much as possible.
Enuhal
I might just do some quick testing to find out what how exactly things work down there.
Edit: @Grond0 is right - once Hephernaan talks to you, you can use the elevator, not even a single guard needs to be killed.
Journal of Hrothgara
After we returned to the Temple near Beregost, we tried to help Mellicamp but failed, though we did help to cure a werewolf of lycanthropy and we managed to find a replacement apprentice for Mellicamp.We then went in search of Bassilus, found him, and killed him. Zargos was next and we then headed west to the coast. Shoal wouldn't talk to Tenya, so we carried onwards where we killed a sirine who had a magical axe in her possession. We returned a ring to its owner and later on killed some more sirines.
We proceeded to the lighthouse area where we killed yet more sirines, but when we came across Sil she was not hostile and we killed the pirates who were her enemies. She gave us a magical cloak and gave her permission to take the contents of the cave. The first defender of the cave was a flesh golem who hurt us badly. However the battle taught us how to deal with his kind, so after resting we were able to kill the other golems without being hurt.
We had already rescued a boy from some beasts, so we headed southwards where we helped Charleston and Brage.
After escorting Brage to the temple, we were rewarded handsomely so our next task was to visit Aerie and get her to identify the items that we have acquired.
After heading southwards we met up with Zargos Flintblade who attacked us which resulted in his death. The same happened when we met Greywolf.
At that point Isra, a Cavalier joined our party. She is VERY weak, so I hope that the half-decent weapons and armour that I gave her will be sufficient to keep her alive.
We sold some ivory that we had found to a disenchanted artisan. Hopefully he wil make something beautiful from it.
I used Special Snares, Fireball, Slow, and summons to get through the undead dungeon, but I did not pay a visit to the lich. I wasn't sure I could survive a fight with the lich without items, and I didn't like the idea of betraying the dwarves, so I just left.
I killed Isabella and Ikros with traps and used more summons and area-effect options against the trolls, with Invisibility 10' Radius to make sure we traveled safely. When Carrion Crawlers joined the fight in a cave, we used Fireball to take them out early--trolls just deal damage, but Carrion Crawlers can paralyze on hit, which could easily be fatal in a poverty run. When we had a Troll Shamaness to worry about, I used Invisibility 10' Radius to make sure we could throw out Fireball, Skull Trap, a Special Snare, and two summons without breaking invisibility, since I was worried the Troll Shamaness might hit us with an enchantment spell of some sort.
Carl hit level 9 and chose Greater Malison and Agannazar's Scorcher. I have little use for Agannazar's Scorcher now, but I wanted to make sure I wouldn't forget to pick it later on. I want to be able to create a scorcher loop in BG2.
I snuck past Morentherene; I was sure that she would have been able to slay my cleric if Onion-san failed a save vs. breath and Morentherene got two or three hits in.
Summons killed the cultists in the temple of Bhaal and Special Snares paralyzed Ziatar, earning us an easy kill. Chara hit level 11, allowing them to cast Wondrous Recall and therefore get two extra castings of Chaotic Commands. With Onion-san's help, we were able to cover five party members with immunity to Darskhelin's Psionic Blast (assuming he uses it on Core Rules). Darskhelin died to Special Snares, the enemy fighters died to Fireballs, and the enemy mage died to our summons, notably the Spirit Snakes with their poison.
The Neothelid charmed Chara, but with lots of hasted summons and DUHM and Flame Blade on Onion-san, we were able to kill the Neothelid in short order. No one got poisoned; I steered clear of the grease.
Special Snares paralyzed Akanna while our summons dealt with her Aerial Servants. Unfortunately, somehow the jail cell key from Ziatar just... vanished, so I'll have to look up the item code so I can console it in and free Madele and the crusaders.
I think I will fight for Bridgefort rather than surrender it as I had previously considered. With three Special Snares on hand, the enemy fighters should be pretty easy, and our Spirit Snakes should be able to handle the mages. Besides, I can pre-set some normal snares to deal lingering poison damage as well.
Bounty Hunters, Totemic Druids, and Invisibility 10' Radius are all incredibly powerful. I realize that I'm doing the same "use the same old tricks, but harder" thing that I hoped I could avoid, but the limitations of the poverty run--namely, the complete inability to pay for resurrections and the complete absence of fast-acting escape options--have kept the game interesting.
I'll probably avoid a lot of side quests in this run. We only really need enough XP to get my first two sorcerers up to level 11 so I can get Lower Resistance for Belhifet. I don't like our odds at Dragonspear Castle, but then, I've never poisoned the Crusaders' food before that fight, so maybe things will be easier.
@Enuhal, do you happen to know exactly what impact the poison has on the fight?
Brunash "Triple Extra-Large," the Halfling Enchanter!
BG1: 1, 2After killing Silke, we head to High Hedge to antichickenate Melicamp. He does not survive.
Then we move on to someone I've been putting off until now: Tarnesh the Terrible, killer of more CHARNAMEs than any other enemy. Imoen sets 2 batches of normal and alchemical traps at the foot of the stairs to the inn. Kagain goes in and lures him into the traps. Tarnesh dies instantly once he goes hostile.
Once inside, we get the Golden Pantaloons and return all of Landrin's stuff. Then we head for the Nashkel mines so I can start selling these accumulated bandit scalps. Greywolf is killed though he damages Kagain for half his health.
The mines go by uneventfully. Imoen traps Mulahey's room and prevents most of the kobolds from swarming us, though the skeltons survive. Ajantis is badly damaged by a misfired Lightning Bolt from my wand. We rest in Mulahey's lair and completely recover. Tiax levels up from the gray oozes outside.
Exiting the cave system, we're in the Valley of the Tombs area. We loot the ghoul tomb easily and come upon Hentold, who gives us the +2 dagger. Next we take on the Revenant. It has a better THAC0 than I thought and badly injures Ajantis, who swaps tanking duty to Kagain with Defensive Stance. A potion and a couple healing spells from Tiax keep Kagain alive through the fight, which earns Ajantis a level.
We rest inside the Revenant's tomb and its safe. Then we take on Narcillicus and his mustard jellies. Montaron takes to stealth and escorts Tiax's ghast next to Narcy. Ajantis initiates dialogue and Narcy goes hostile. Monty flubs his backstab but Tiax's ghast paralyzes Narcy, which makes fighting the jellies a breeze.
We go back to the Revenant's tomb to rest but are ambushed by a skeleton and some rabid dogs. After putting the puppies to sleep, Tiax gains another level.
We rest in the tomb as we planned, then took on the band of amazons up north. Again, Monty escorted Tiax's ghast towards the group and chose Maneira as its first target, whom it paralyzes. The amazons go hostile and target it with Rigid Thinking and Hold Person, both of which it is immune to. Monty's stealth wears off just as the ghast attacks, so he flees away from the group so he doesn't get caught in the Hold Person's AoE.
The amazons continue to cast spells at the ghast and it paralyzes a second amazon. One of them casts Glyph of Warding on our backliner thieves and me. I'm already wearing Mulahey's Boots of Grounding, but I drink a potion of absorption just to make sure I don't die. Tiax and Imoen fail their saves but I succeed on mine, taking no damage. The rest of the amazons are defeated and I gain a level.
Now to return to Nashkel, deal with Nimbul and Tranzig, and get Algernon's Cloak.
Brunash "Vanderhuge," the Halfling Enchanter!
BG1: 1, 2, 3We return to Nashkel and inform Mayor Ghastkill about what happened. Monty levels up.
I had forgotten to lay traps for Nimbul so I relied on my other strategy: Monty and Ghastly teaming up. Ghastly attacks Nimbul first and Monty flubs a backstab, causing Nimbul to buff with Mirror Image.
Kagain and Ajantis charge Nimbul but Ghastly paralyzes him.
Monty waits until all of Nimbul's images are destroyed, then gibs him with a backstab.
Another assassin defeated, we make for Beregost. We stop by the temple and buy all of Kelddath's Stone to Flesh scrolls, then sell bandit scalps to Officer Vai. At Feldepost's, I charm Algernon and have him attack Tranzig. He gets wasted by the mage, letting me pick up his cloak for no penalty.
Tranzig himself is soundly defeated, but not before putting a few magic missiles into Kagain.
Now that I have Algernon's cloak, this opens up quite a few options. I'll have Ajantis use it. The Charm effect it has comes from the "NONE" school (strangely), so Ajantis will make enemies save against it vs. breath at -3 instead of -1. It also does not count as a hostile action, so victims who succeed at their save will not turn hostile.
For the plan I have in mind, I need to clear the bandit camp and get to the cloakwood. Monty begins our assault with a critical backstab. I'm glad I turned him into an Assassin.
He picks off the bandit goons one by one under the cover of night and we all kill Ardenor Crush. There's a large group of goons near the main tent with Taurgosz Tenhammer guarding them. Kagain and Ajantis rush forward to ward off their arrows and Kagain takes on Tenhammer in defensive stance. I cast sleep to little avail, so I use a potion of fiery burning to soften them up.
Monty flees the scene to try for another backstab as I cast Sleep again, taking out all the mooks. The thieves and I clean up the trash while Kagain and Ajantis fight Tenhammer, who is putting the hurting on both of them.
One second after that screenshot, Tenhammer finally dies, surrending his full plate to Kagain, who swaps his ankheg armor to Ajantis. We rest in one of the tents that we cleared, then clear out the gnoll time-out cave. The rest of the goons guarding the main tent are picked off by Monty again, and Ajantis and Kagain rush Credus, who whips out his bow to attack them. Little did he know that Monty was right behind him, which made this backstab all the sweeter.
Before entering the main tent, our tanks buffed with strength potions and I put up invisibility. The fight opens with Tiax using a wand of fear, which scares the poison-using hobgolin as well as the mage.
I charm Raemon and set him to attack his friends.
The fight is soon over, and to tie up all loose ends, I have Raemon equip his bow and Monty gibs him with a backstab.
We loot the chest and free Ender Sai. The Cloakwood awaits, but there's a couple side-trips I want to make first...
Brus - Enchanter 4
Kagain - Dwarven Defender 4
Ajantis - Cavalier 4
Montaron - Fighter 3/Assassin 4
Tiax - Priest of Talos 4/Thief 4
Imoen - Bounty Hunter 5
Our primary sorcerers finally hit level 11 on reaching the Coalition camp and chose Lower Resistance. Our third sorcerer and cleric are still stuck at level 9 and our druid and Bounty Hunter are stuck at level 11, but that should change by the final battle.
I didn't do many of the optional quests inside the tunnels. All I did was use summons and spell damage against the Dark Treants and Myconids (I stopped summoning Fire Elementals after the first one got confused, lest it wander off and attack a neutral critter), kill the evil priest in the southeast with traps, and talk my way to the warrens and into the basement.
Per @Enuhal's advice, I set traps on the elevator while Frisky Bits used invisibility to poison the food and water safely. After the first poisoning, a hostile guard appeared on the elevator, triggering Mae's traps, but then two others appeared after the traps had already been triggered, and turned Bennan and the other nearby guards hostile. We were largely unbuffed and without summons.
Knowing that my mages would survive for a moment thanks to their Stoneskins, I had them break invisibility first by casting Greater Malison and Emotion: Hopelessness, allowing my cleric and druid to cast Barkskin. Meanwhile, Frisky Bits went off to finish poisoning the Crusader supplies.
Once Barkskin was on line, Chara summoned some spirit critters, Frisky Bits returned, and I shored up our defenses with Mirror Image, only for the cleric to cast True Seeing. But with Slow and Emotion: Hopelessness hobbling the enemy, we had enough time to bring out more summons and cast SI: Enchantment, since I had spotted Hephernaan wandering our way. I kept him at bay by ordering a Spirit Lion to move away from the doorway.
Chara normally memorizes Ironskins and Chaotic Commands for safety's sake, but since we needed an anti-mage option, they took Insect Plague for this fight, and successfully shut down both the Crusader Cleric and Hephernaan, who does not in fact have Fire Shield to block it.
Hephernaan spoke to us, but I didn't see the elevator become active, so I kept fighting, layering on even more disablers, casting Shillelagh and Flame Blade to help clear out the fighters, and finally removing the last of the enemies from the elevator. This allowed Mae to throw a trap out into the chamber beyond, paralyzing one of the mages, Olvenaun, in the process (apparently Hephernaan comes flanked by mages even on Core Rules). Unfortunately, Hephernaan's Physical Mirror bounced the trap back at Mae and paralyzed her.
Which I really, really should have seen coming.
We struggled to take down Hephernaan's defenses before Insect Plague ran out, but failed. He healed himself under Sanctuary until we exposed him (apparently divination spells remove Sanctuary, at least in my install), but despite Hephernaan having no Stoneskins left, we were unable to stop him from casting Fireball.
We probably could have taken him down, but I saw no reason to gamble with our HP levels and went down the elevator to dodge the Fireball.
Back at the Coalition Camp, we took down the trolls and ogres using Greater Malison and Slow. Pre-set traps obliterated the mages in the second wave, and Greater Malison, Slow, and charm spells from Call Woodland Beings broke the enemy paladins and clerics in the third wave. We conserved our limited summoning spells across the waves.
I used Dosia to rest the party, only for a Messenger to inform me that I had retreated from combat and had to protect the barrels at the far south. Apparently this means two or three crummy fighters approach the barrels and then the final wave, with Bird-Dog and the other named bosses, approaches from the east.
I summoned the last of my critters and sent them all out to engage the enemy. It was a crushing defeat for the Crusaders: with our summons forming a wall and our party casting spells from a safe distance, we imposed Greater Malison, charm spells, Slow, Insect Plague (which required Wondrous Recall to re-cast it to hit the distant mage), Special Snare, Emotion: Hopelessness, and some spell damage as well. None of the spellcasters has any defense against Insect Plague, and since Chara cast it at a healthy skeleton as we sent the skeleton up north, Chara was able to start and finish casting Insect Plague without ever getting close to the enemy's field of vision.
There are only two major fights left: the attack on Dragonspear Castle itself, and Belhifet. Our druid and thief should hit level 12 and our mage should hit level 10 by the end of the siege, leaving us just strong enough to tackle Belhifet using the Lower Resistance strategy I'd planned out before this run ever began.
I've decided to memorize Wondrous Recall instead of Conjure Fire Elemental. The elemental would be great, but I'm more concerned about the two clusters of spellcasters near the end of the fight. I'm hoping that our existing area-effect spells will get us through the melee-heavy early waves without wearing down the summons I need to finish off Ashatiel's gang.
Previous run
Still searching for that elusive perfect run I made a 5th start which went well up to level 4/5. That ended last night at Durlag's Tower when I was slow to react to poor pathfinding on a routine movement and the Doom Guard got a chop in on one of the sorcerers.
This morning a pre-breakfast session saw:
- the first level taken after trapping the ankheg near Tenya.
- after ending the main ankheg menace (until the next time), the last few XP needed for another level came from some wild dogs on the way to the basilisk area.
- the basilisk area was cleared when Kirian's group regretted picking a fight. That provided a further level.
- they'd pretty much cleared the upper part of Durlag's and went downstairs to look for the last bit of XP needed for another level. On arrival a phase spider teleported in on them. I could have run immediately, but stayed around to throw in a couple of magic missiles and Hardup was poisoned as a result. He still had 25 HPs though and with 2 characters (apart from him) who could cast slow poison there didn't seem too much danger. However, in such close quarters the computer can get a bit confused about exactly where icons are. Hence, even though Beggar appeared to be right next to Hardup, he was extremely slow in starting his spell - and in fact was too slow.
1st report
Hunting wolves
We continue our adventure with a rather challenging encounter, the Wolf of Ulcaster. A ghoul summoned by the Wolf paralyzes Shar-Teel. Kain is close by and casts Invisibility. As a Rogue Rebalancing Skald he suffers a casting speed penalty of +1; Shar-Teel falls just as he finishes his casting.
Killing more wolves in the Temple of the Morning area earns Kain another level (7).
Getting ready for the Nashkel Mines
There’s still some quests/encounters we want to do and items we’d like to acquire before shifting our focus to the main plot. Some of these we take on before the Nashkel Mines, others will have to wait a bit longer.
Greywolf stands no chance against our undead army. He bequeaths his blade to Shar-Teel. Meilum gets Confused and Held by Viconia before we finish him. Silke gets paralyzed by our ghast. Tiax nicks two potions of defense from “Feldepost’s thugs” (he fails with one of his marks), and we receive a third one for helping them.
Upon leaving the Thunderhammer Smithy we are surrounded by Flaming Fist enforcers. We manage to distance ourselves and have our undead summons, that were still around from Silke, occupy them. Sadly the enemy makes short work of the summons. Viconia Confuses a battle wizard and we fight him out of sight of the others. Even when his buffs expire we have great difficulty dealing with him. Shar-Teel gets stuck and has no choice but to tank him. She quaffs several healing potions but not enough. We underestimate the guy. He hits like a truck and takes Shar-Teel down right before Kagain finishes him.
Nashkel Mines
We explore the mines invisibly and reveal ourselves only to a couple of (melee) kobolds we slay for a vial of mysterious liquid (which Thalantyr will investigate for 750 XP). In Mulahey’s lair we rest first. We then summon an undead army of four skeleton warriors and a ghast, and we have Tiax or Vicky cast PfE 10’Radius. The undead stay close to the entrance, so that they can keep Mulahey’s minions busy. Vicky and Tiax cast Sanctuary and position themselves in the back of Mulahey’s chamber, Kagain and Shar-Teel, still invisible, walk up to the Half-Orc, and Kain stands with Edwin in the middle so as to reach as many allies as possible with his song.
Mulahey opens with a Hold Person, but loses his spell when het gets Silenced by Vicky and/or Tiax, who by initiating their casting had triggered the dialogue. The Silence also affects Kain, neutralizing his song. Kagain and Shar-Teel melee Mulahey and see their job eased by our priests as they manage to Hold the Half-Orc.
We loot the tombs with the help of invisible blockers, and back in Nashkel our five undead summons + PfE + Skald song manage to slay two hostile Amnian soldiers as well as Nimbul.
Facing the assassin groups
We travel around a lot, mainly for gear we still want. We always make sure we’re invisible when we travel because of Molkar and Lamalha and their crews. Our undead dispatch Krumm and Caldo, and they also help out against Ingot.
Lamalha’s group is the first to appear. We buff with PfE 10’Radius. Kagain moves to Lamalha, Shar-Teel to Zeela. We make sure that she’s closest to the rogues as well, because as a Barbarian she’s immune to their backstabs. She gets stabbed indeed by Telka, right when Kagain disrupts Lamalha’s casting.
This encounter went pretty well so we decide to fight another party: we return to Mutamin’s garden to confront Kirian. Having the advantage here of being the ambushers, we get our undead army ready and buff with PfE. Kain charms Peter with his cloak but he somehow goes hostile again. Kirian tries to charm Kain in turn, but he swigs a potion of magic blocking. Vicky then confuses Baerin and Peter. Kirian wastes her magic on our undead until she runs out of spells and tries to melee our group. Shar-Teel and our undead deal with Peter and Lindin, thanks to the ghast’s paralyzing attack.
At the FAI Edwin sees Dynaheir, so role-playing required us to have him to finish her with a Larloch’s Minor Drain. (Shame we didn’t have her wait elsewhere.)
Molkar ambushes us next. This party is somewhat less dangerous in that it harbors no backstabbers. Our clergy fails to Silence Halacan and Drakar but those two get too busy with Kain’s wand summons to be much of a threat to any of our party. Still, even while attacked by our summons and our warriors Halacan succeeds at casting a Charm Person at Kain. Thankfully we make our save because we had no instant protections against the spell. Our priests manage to Hold both Drakar and Molkar.
Spending gold
We sell a lot of loot and buy Kain the Fragment of Enlightenment ioun stone (+20 lore, turning him into a walking Identifier). We also buy several scrolls at Thalantyr’s and at the Ulgoth’s Beard Inn and we have both Kain, with the red potion because his INT isn’t 17 yet, and Edwin, with regular INT boosters, copy them into their spell books. Kain also buys a buckler + 2 in Ulgoth’s Beard.
All the way south, near the the Gnoll Fortress we save Jared from a Polar Bear. Kain casts Friends to raise his CHA to 25 for the reaction adjustment, and is rewarded the Boots of the North.
Edwin has been wearing Mutamin’s Adventurer’s Robe, but if we find five other, different robes Thalantyr can combine them into one. Bentha and Zordral (slain by our undead) provide us with two. We get two more from Jemby and Arkushule (both overwhelmed by our undead as well), and we take the last one, a Traveler’s Robe from Neera after Edwin’s intervention between her and the Thayvians. The Mage Robe of Practical Protection that Thalantyr produces for Edwin gives the wearer +20% fire/cold/electricity resistance, +2 AC, and +1 to saves.
What’s next?
There’s still a number of challenging wilderness encounters that we have shunned so far: Icharyd, Kahrk, and the Firewine Ruins. We may go for those in our next session, or we may just travel to the Wood of Sharp Teeth to seek out the bandits.
BTW I really miss Invisibility 10' Radius. Our party has to be invisible pretty much the whole time: not just when traveling but also in towns as bounty hunters and law enforcers keep tracking us down.
The party:
Kain, level 7 Skald, 13 kills (Battle Horror)
Kagain, level 6 Dwarven Defender, 17 kills (Sil), 0 deaths
Shar-Teel, level 6 Barbarian, 201 kills (Greater Basilisk), 3 deaths
Tiax, level 5/6 Strifeleader of Cyric/Thief, 22 kills (Doomsayer), 1 death
Viconia, level 6 Nightcloak of Shar, 15 kills (Ankheg), 0 deaths
Edwin, level 6 Conjurer, 1 kill (???), 0 deaths
As for me, I just installed SCS and am gearing up for another run. I've only installed better A.I., calls for help, smarter mages/priests, carrion crawlers, basilisks, etc.. I haven't added the tactical challenges, like improved Durlag's Tower or Ulcaster, and I'm already feeling guilty after reading your epic posts (especially after reading how @Blackraven just iced the Ulcaster wolf, which I've read so much about. Should I install the extra components? I've only gone through BG1 twice (with reloads) on SCS and I worry about getting my ass kicked. Darn you all for getting me hooked on this!
As for your setup, I really can't give you any advice. I personally enjoy using relatively challenging setups that include the SCS tactical challenges you mentioned as they tend to offer the most exciting battles for me. But that's very much a personal preference. Even a successful no-reload run through a vanilla install requires a lot of skill and focus.
The good thing about this thread is that there's lots of knowledgeable players that post here. So you can always ask around for tips on specific aspects of the game or specific enemies or battles, irrespective of the install you're going to opt for.
Good luck man, and am looking forward to reading about your upcoming run!
Attack on Brunash, the (Titanic) Halfling Enchanter!
BG1: 1, 2, 3, 4Armed with Algernon's cloak, it was time to pay Kelddath's harem of Sirines a visit.
Each one was murdered for a total of 6k XP. Nobody leveled up though. We stopped by the Friendly Arm and bought a ton of healing potions and protection from petrification scrolls, then went into Cloakwood. Monty incinerated the tasloi that had stolen Gurke's cloak. Now it belongs to him.
Imoen set a bunch of traps for Seniyad's group. I was most fearful of Seniyad himself because of his Call Lightning spell: something that one-shot me when I was playing on LoB once. I kept Brunash hidden inside Aldeth's cabin under invisibility as everyone else dealt with the druids. Thankfully, Seniyad himself died instantly from Imoen's traps. The other druids were no trouble.
We make it to Cloakwood 2. The spiders cause us no trouble. I had Tiax go into the Centeol's cave to use a wand of fear charge, but a sword spider was too quick for that to be viable. He ran outside and had Kagain tank it. Kagain leveled up from the sword spider. He was hit repeatedly, so I left the tanking to Ajantis instead. He pulled spiders one at a time from out of the cave. Soon the spiders and ettercaps were all dead. Ajantis and Montaron leveled up from these fights.
Chelak's body was too heavy for any of us to carry, so we had to "toss" him along the ground via quickloot to return him to his brother. After resting, we were going to move on to Cloakwood 3 but a nasty web trap ensnared us! I had forgotten exactly where this first trap was; I was a smidgen too far to the north.
If I hadn't been invisible, it might have been the end of the run right there! Kagain had a potion of freedom so he used that and tanked the ettercaps so they wouldn't hit Imoen. He was beaten up pretty badly in that fight and poisoned twice, but everyone survived.
We rested again and Kagain was back to full health. His 20 CON is proving invaluable, which is exactly why I rushed to recruit him in the first place.
We make it to Cloakwood 3 and recruit Faldorn, replacing Imoen. I turn her into a Totemic Druid, despite having no previous experience using one. It seems like the best option for a kit, given how everyone is just buzzing about it.
Now, to step 1 of my grand plan for phat L00t: Basilisk Country. Utilizing the pet basilisk loop for extreme gains to XP, I dump all of my party members except Faldorn at the edge of the map. The weight of impending failure crushes down on me. In my haste to execute my plan, I've forgotten to memorize Protection from Petrification and more invisibility spells. I memorize a single PfP and rest, though we are ambushed by flinds. Faldorn summons her Dread Wolf and they are taken down. I rest again, this time with no interruptions. I cast invisibility on myself and scout around the map, searching for the Greater Basilisks. I find one, then lead Faldorn close to it and cast PfP on her. She uses Algernon's Cloak and charms a lesser basilisk and I use the green PfP scroll on it too.
The loop works for a time, but the basilisk we charmed just isn't cooperating now and wants to use its melee attack instead of the gaze attack. So does the greater basilisk.
RIP. There's still another greater one out there and more lessers where that came from. This time I find the perfect place to farm XP.
I'm out of stone to flesh scrolls. Im level 10 and Faldorn is level 9. I wish I hadn't installed the "druids use cleric level progression" tweak. I would have Fire Seeds by now and could proceed to the next step of my master plan. I need more stone to flesh scrolls. I join up with my companions again and set out for the Gauntlets of Dexterity.
Brunash - Enchanter 10
Kagain - Dwarven Defender 5
Ajantis - Cavalier 5
Montaron - Fighter 4/Assassin 4
Faldorn - Totemic Druid 9
Tiax - Priest of Talos 4/Thief 4
Nice to see someone who really understands what blocking is all about
My party is largely unbuffed; I'm expecting an extremely long battle and I don't want to cast my buffs early considering I'll need them the most at the end, where my summons might grow thin. Hopelessness isn't enough to win the first wave, so I throw out a Special Snare. Bounty Hunter traps are just so incredibly strong.
The enemy mages use Fireballs, so it's a really good idea to keep the party out of the way. We don't have the spell slots to keep everyone immune to fire, after all.
We respond in kind, with Fireballs and another Special Snare, at which point I realize that we only have a single Special Snare left. Our Bounty Hunter is already half-spent.
Chara has memorized four castings of Call Woodland Beings, but unfortunately that doesn't get four castings of Confusion, Hold Monster, Mass Cure, and Call Lightning. All it gets us is a whole bunch of charm spells, but it's hard to optimize the use of charm spells when it's not safe for us to monitor the situation and therefore give orders to charmed enemies. Plus, our allies have a habit of attacking charmed enemies, so the charm spells buy us even less.
Somehow, Strunk gets hit by a hostile Acid Arrow while his Globe of Invulnerability is still active. Really shouldn't be possible, but it does work in our favor.
The enemy disintegrates, we move forward to the next group, and new Hamadryads Entangle the enemy, allowing us to bomb them while they're still clustered together.
We proceed to Ashatiel, but things don't play out the way they did last time. Instead of teleporting to the far west with a completely new group of enemies, Ashatiel stays put, fighting alongside the party where she first appears. Chara deploys their first Insect Plague spell, targeting the Spirit Snake so they don't have to enter the enemy's line of sight... but a backstab slays the snake, which cancels the spell even after Chara has finished casting it.
Then a Hamadryad dies, and I notice that the enemy party includes some fighters--and that we don't have a proper wall set up. We hurry to land Greater Malison and Emotion: Hopelessness. Down south, Chara casts Wondrous Recall to get their Insect Plague back.
The nearest enemies, all stunned for 10 rounds, collapse under coalition missile fire. Deciding this batch of enemies is still a critical threat, I have Mae throw her last Special Snare, though the enemy makes good saving throws, and only one petty archer gets paralyzed.
Chara now has Insect Plague again, but this time, I want to use a target that won't die on me. I pick Carl, who wades into the fray with Stoneskin and Mirror Image. He tries to use Agannazar's Scorcher to disrupt an enemy cleric's enchantment spell despite the cleric's spell deflection buff, but his aim is off. Luckily, Chara's is not, and both Ashatiel and the cleric suffer spell failure. Carl turns invisible to escape.
We apply spell damage and the enemy gradually breaks down.
There are more enemies left, but apparently you don't need to fight them. The siege is over earlier than I had expected.
In Avernus, we buff the hell out of the party and approach the enemy with traps and summons. Everyone is buffed with either Chaotic Commands, SI: Enchantment, or multiple Spirit Armor spells (the save bonus from Spirit Armor stacks with multiple castings) because I'm anxious about Illaruel charming people.
We use Invisibility 10' Radius to rest before the next fight and use blind traps to give us a party-friendly area-effect damage spell.
Only Belhifet is left. We've finally at our maximum levels, except for Carl, our earliest death in BG1, who remains at level 10. Despite the fact that Frisk is a Dragon Disciple and therefore has one less Lower Resistance spell than normal, I choose Spell Immunity as Carl's first and only level 5 spell pick, because I do not think we will need three sorcerers with Lower Resistance going into BG2.
But it gives us less wiggle room to deal with Belhifet's massive MR.
We cast all of our longest-term buffs and board the elevator. But shortly after boarding, I realize that I've made a mistake: I haven't memorized Spiritual Hammer for Onion-san, which means we only have 5 means of killing the demons before Belhifet:
1. Magic Missile and Melf's Acid Arrow, which we need for Belhifet
2. Traps, which we need for Belhifet
3. Seeking Sword, which we need for Belhifet
4. Summons, which we need for Belhifet
5. Shillelagh and Minute Meteors
It takes time to kill the first few enemies, and when I look for a healing spell for Onion-san, I realize that we've memorized almost no healing spells.
We still have more demons to fight, and I realize that the only way we can save enough summons to distract Belhifet and enough damage spells to kill Belhifet is to use the Seeking Sword. It costs us a great deal, though; I was banking on Seeking Sword to take down the Abishais who spawn upstairs.
Judging by our spell notifications, the elevator ride did not take 15 rounds, like I had expected. It took 20 rounds or more, apparently because it took us so long to kill those demons.
Since we're on Core Rules and Belhifet only uses Remove Magic on Insane mode, we enter the fight with no SI: Abjuration. We just have Shield, Chaotic Commands, Remove Fear, and Protection from Fire, plus Spirit Armor for Chara and Onion-san, since Barkskin doesn't last very long. Unfortunately, we're low on level 2 spells due to using Mirror Image.
We open with Spirit Lions, but we only get two; we had to use our first one on the elevator. Two Abishais flank us, but with Seeking Sword expired, we have to rely on Minute Meteors to do much of the work.
We make progress on the Abishais, but Belhifet destroys our Spirit Lions with ease and teleports over to us.
Caelar slays Hephernaan and we run from Belhifet, who lands a heavy blow on Onion-san but fails to poison her due to her low saves, courtesy of being a halfling cleric.
When Belhifet casts Fireball, I know his aura is clouded, which means it's safe to cast Lower Resistance.
Belhifet is now alone, but our Hamadryads aren't as sturdy as I had hoped. I'm pretty sure they have MR, but it's only 50 and therefore unreliable.
I wait for Belhifet to teleport once again before I cast Lower Resistance; I really can't afford to have Improved Invisibility or a teleport spell disrupt our very limited Lower Resistance spells. We land two more before Belhifet vanishes, costing us our first Melf's Acid Arrow spell.
Mae hurries over to use Detect Illusions on Belhifet, allowing our other sorcerers to follow up with more Acid Arrows. His health bar begins to shrink.
Then I see Belhifet cast Gate, and I am greeted by a Cornugon.
I am totally unprepared for a Cornugon; I didn't think Belhifet summoned anything on Core Rules. Cornugons cast Lightning Bolt and have a poison attack that I believe also stuns on a failed save vs. spell. If we don't take down the Cornugon soon, it could start knocking down party members, and our most important party members, the mages, are also the most vulnerable to Lightning Bolts.
Mercifully, the Cornugon focuses on Caelar, the nearest target. Mae launches a Special Snare and Asriel throws Minute Meteors to damage the Cornugon, but we reserve our Acid Arrows for Belhifet.
Belhifet approaches death, so we switch to faster-acting Magic Missiles, anxious to finish him off before Lower Resistance wears off and his MR jumps back up to 100.
We keep up the pressure, but discover that Belhifet's MR is going back up.
But his MR isn't quite at 100 yet, and Asriel manages to sneak in the last bit of damage.
The only fight left is the Unknowable Horror, which Frisky Bits kills with one punch. Siege of Dragonspear is over, and the party enters Shadows of Amn.
From here on out, things should be much, much easier. I'll still have to be extremely careful, but I'm far more familiar with BG2 and even ToB than BG1 or SoD. Plus, SoA is very nonlinear, which gives us a lot of wiggle room to plan for encounters. Most importantly, random chance plays a smaller role at higher levels due to increased access to immunities.
I'd like to thank @Enuhal and @Grond0 for their advice. I don't think I could have made it to BG2 without you guys; the fight with Sarevok and the siege of Dragonspear Castle could have easily swung the other way if I hadn't isolated Angelo and poisoned the crusaders' food supply.
A no-reload poverty run of BG1 and SoD is indeed possible, but a few precious kits and classes seem to be all but mandatory. Without Command, Sleep, and spirit critters, early BG1 is extremely challenging; Invisibility on a level 4 sorcerer is the only way to avoid certain threats; and it's extremely hard to muster enough damage output to kill enemies without relying on a Totemic Druid's early summons, the Seeking Sword, or a Bounty Hunter's extra traps.
My run was unorthodox due to mods. We had to deal with a few extra threats, one of which killed our Totemic Druid, but the XP from those enemies obviated the need for some side quests and the disabled XP cap let us recover them before SoD. Overall, I'm not actually sure if the extra mods added to the difficulty or subtracted from it. And unlike @Grond0, I did lean heavily on farming ankhegs to gain XP in the early game. And the removed cap on celestials will radically overhaul the difficulty in ToB (although Project Image could also bypass the cap in a less-modded game).
Going forward, I do not think I'll start over from Candlekeep if I should die in BG2. Instead, I'll restart at Chateau Irenicus. It might not be a continuous narrative, but I don't want to wade through BG1 and SoD again. My favorite game in the series is BG2, and I haven't gotten to spend very much time in it lately due to restarting at Candlekeep.
If I can make it to epic levels, we're pretty much in the clear.
Previous run
The previously reported couple of deaths were both a bit unlucky - but that just points up the need to leave nothing to chance in a no-reload run. I didn't do that in a 7th run where fairly early on I travelled on the road at the wrong time of day and a group of bandits took advantage. An 8th attempt also ended relatively early when an ankheg spat at a sorcerer quicker than expected, while ankhegs were also responsible for number 9 though as a result of me attacking recklessly that time.
I don't actually think it should be that difficult to get this party at least through BG1, even though double figures on the number of attempts might suggest I'm suffering from optimism bias
This time I got an extra XP boost in Shoal's area by killing Mad Arcand - I wanted a reputation drop anyway, so might as well kill something worthwhile. In a further change to previous attempts I went straight on to trap Bassilus. That gained not just 975 XP for him directly, but 1,000 more from Kelddath. Then of course there was no reason not to trap Kelddath and the sirines - netting loads more XP and a first level.
While in the mood for mayhem, the golems at High Hedge were trapped before talking to Thalantyr (hence not making him hostile). Melicamp was then revived for another XP boost. That meant just a couple of little tasks in Beregost provided another level.
Moving on to the basilisk area a further level was gained from the monsters before Kirian & co were trapped.
The next XP feast was at Durlag's Tower, where I used invisibility ruthlessly to give the occupants of the upper tower little chance. That left about 1,000 XP each needed for another level and that was picked up in a running fight with the wolf pack at Beregost Temple. With the improvement in finding traps from that Washout was able to disarm the trap near the underground entrance to Durlag's and a few greater dopplegangers and spiders were added to the casualty list. I didn't think Washout's skills were up to clearing the whole area, but before leaving the Tower Pauper's new ability to produce skeleton warriors helped kill the ghost, while a full stack of traps were too much for Kirinhale.
A return to Shoal's area accounted for one group of sirines and a couple more of those didn't last long at the Lighthouse. There's still a long way to go to pick up the next level, but there's enough decent XP still around to do that reasonably quickly tomorrow.
Beggar, Totemic Druid - L6, 58 HPs, 5 kills
Pauper, Priest of Helm - L5, 43 HPs, 19 kills, 0 deaths
Hardup, Shaman - L5, 45 HPs, 45 kills, 0 deaths
Washout, Bounty Hunter - L6, 41 HPs, 29 kills, 0 deaths
Aspire, Sorcerer - L5, 24 HPs, 26 kills, 0 deaths
Skint, Sorcerer - L5, 26 HPs, 18 kills, 0 deaths
HPs are very good so far this run, which provides a bit of extra incentive to make better progress this time.
Brunash "Supersize Me," the Halfling Enchanter!
BG1: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5Actually, we return to Beregost and buy Monty the Shadow Armor and get Faldorn a few things, then jump over to High Hedge because I forgot Perdue's short sword. Seems like pocket change now but I'll take what I can get. Tiax levels up from the gnolls guarding Perdue's sword and we return the normal-sized halfling's sword.
Now we set out for the Gauntlets of Dexterity for real this time. The Xvart village is massacred and Borda is killed for being a fraud. The Bear River is completely cleared with nothing worthy of note. Hairtooth and Gnarl are butchered and the Gauntlets of Dexterity now belong to Kagain. I retrieve the Charisma tome and use it. The Gnoll Fortress is cleared out.
On the way to the Gibberling Mountains, we encounter a polar bear, earning Monty a level. We made it there and were accosted by a flaming fist, who talked to Kagain, and was looking for Samuel. Kagain is not very good at lying so we had to fight the officer, losing 9 points of reputation for killing him. Fantastic...
We take Samuel back to the FAI's temple and set out for Cloakwood. We make it to Cloakwood 4 and kill the wyverns in the cave. Now we go to the Cloakwood Mines entrance. To start the group fight, I would have Monty escort Ghastly and Faldorn's Spirit Snake to one of the mages, and have Monty backstab the other one. Monty's stealth wore off at a very inopportune moment as I was getting the summons into position. As a result, Monty spent the whole fight confused, but since there were 3 enemies bunched together, I casted Hold Person on them. Drasus and one of the mages failed their saves. Faldorn had an Insect Plague traveling slowly toward the group to shut down any potential comebacks.
We focused on killing the enemies who weren't disabled, though I made it a priority to kill the held mage before anything could be done about him. The group soon fell and Montaron now owns the boots of speed, which will make it far easier to go backstab fishing.
After killing some guards, we descend into the mine. I put Monty's improved backstabbing prowess to the test. Ajantis hands over the Gauntlets of Weapon Expertise to him and, with his x4 multiplier, Monty gibs all the guards on the first level. This process is repeated on the second level, except for the large room with all the guards in it plus the mage. After killing the two guards in the left side of the big room, the mage came looking for us and most of our party was in the prison cells. This is totally not good. I back out of the prison cells but the mage casts Lightning Bolt on Kagain, which rebounds and kills her.
The guards in the big room are all put to sleep and mopped up. Now on level 3, every single enemy is backstabbed to death by Montaron except the initial surprise party at the stairs you just come in from.
Level 4: Davaeorn's lair. The guard's plate armor turns Monty's backstab attempts aside but he still falls. All the traps behind the hidden door are disabled. Now to make a plan to beat Davaeorn. From experience with my previous playthrough with Cernd, I wanted to use Insect Plague on Dave without being detected. I dropped the wyvern heads on the floor with Monty and had Faldorn cast the spell on it. The insects flew over to the heads and then spread to Davaeorn.
Given the way he teleports around, I was praying the normal spells he cast weren't scripted, and so susceptible to casting failure. I had Ghastly and the spirit snake rush Dave to soak up his spells just in case. Turns out he DOES suffer casting failure, much to my relief. Monty takes to the shadows and predicts Dave's next teleport. Before he can reach his destination, Monty's blade strikes true and kills Dave!
Montaron is definitely a contender for MVP of the party. Baldur's Gate and all of its Stone to Flesh scrolls await.
Orlon's first SCS Blackguard no-reload run
Okay, I’m starting an SCS no-reload run and I’m going to try and document it as well as you guys. My settings: core rules, max hit points, and munchkin stats allowed (legitimately rolled, as always, though). SCS – improved AI, calls for help, smarter mages/priests (but no pre-buffing), and smarter monsters (sirens, basilisks, etc.). I’m not trying the improved tactical challenges this time. It’s only my third run with SCS, and I want to feel a semblance of hope, rather than drooping my head muttering like Xan with each click of the mouse. My biggest fear in this game: Kahrk. The last time I played SCS he fracked up my party, and fracked it up good. I had to reload like 10 times to beat him, adjusting my spell selection, tactics and everything. But I digress, so…Meet the players
Charname: Samara, a LE blackguard.The Beamdog blackguard bio captures Samara’s essence perfectly. I’d only add that she’s been growing angrier and angrier by the day, frustrated by being trapped in Candlekeep and with Gorion’s incessant moral lecturing. She can’t wait to blow this pop stand. What could this trip possibly be about?
Samara’s companion, Lamia, is a CE sorcerer.
Lamia is from a noble, elven family in Waterdeep (due to my utter lack of FR lore, I couldn’t think of anything more exotic than that). As a child, her innate arcane powers began to develop, along with a cruel streak. Her parents sent her to Candlekeep to study in the hopes that wise sages could set her on the right path. Good luck with that. She met charname in a forbidden area of the library and they struck up an immediate friendship. Lamia is sorry to be losing her friend, and wishes she, too, were getting the hell out of Candlekeep.
Candlekeep
And so it begins (as a writer, I promised myself I’d never, ever use that phrase in a story, but this is going to be pulpy story-telling at best, so there you have it). Gorion was either a complete miser, or else he was a rather unsuccessful adventurer, because: 100 gold pieces??? Samara could only shake her head at such a pitifully small allowance. Did Gorion not know what a two-hander was going for these days, not to mention a good suit of armor and a crossbow? The first order of business, then, was to raise more money, because gear not withstanding, Samara swore she would not settle for staying in shabby inns, no matter where this journey led. Samara and Lamia accepted Firebead’s quest and set off through the library grounds to meet Tethoril. They got the identify scroll, and continued past Imoen and out to Hull, who, according to rumour, had a paying job. Turns out he was merely hungover and forgot his sword – a quest that’s beneath our protagonists, surely, but Samara really needed the money so they agreed. Hull also mentioned something about a sick cow.
Hull’s sword was easily secured, along with the antidote (which went not to the cow, but right into Samara’s inventory). Since Samara has an 18 charisma, Hull was nice to her upon receiving the sword, and he doesn’t know how lucky he is. In alternate universes, where some blackguards had less than an 18 cha, Hull was chopped to bits for his lip.
On the way back to Firebead, Samara and Lamia decided to break into the priests quarters to steal some money. At which point Samara was attacked by an assassin. She chopped the assassin to pieces on the first swing, but how could this have happened? Why would anyone want her dead? And funny timing, what with Gorion urging her to prepare for the journey… Samara and Lamia rushed back to the inn. Samara ran upstairs and looted all of the chests, knocking the nobleman unconscious with her fists so that he couldn’t sound an alarm when she broke into his dresser. With an abundance of loot in hand, they returned to Winthrop, and Samara stocked up on supplies.
It was now time to say good bye and they walked back to the front of the library. Samara left Lamia with Imoen and told Gorion she was ready to go. Little did she know, Lamia and Imoen were plotting to sneak out of Candlekeep and follow her.
Ambush and on the road
All this is metagaming speak for the fact that I’m not going anywhere near Tarnesh right now. I died facing him in a vanilla no-reload run, and I’ll not try my luck with him in SCS - at least until I get Tiax, who’s chilling at Feldepost’s Inn in Beregost. I’ll feel a lot more confident in my chance at survival by having command spells at my disposal and his summoned ghast.
This ends the first stage of my game. I hope I don’t die soon, because it took a fair chunk of time to type this up, and I’d hate to waste the effort. In fact, I’m not sure how long I can keep this up. I’m probably throwing too much role-playing stuff in here and wasted time covering the easiest part of the game. I guess I'll figure out how to cover this as I go....
Corthief XIV - elven thief (protagonist, controlled by corey_russell)
Berk - dwarven berserker (controlled by Grond0)
Stinkimo - dwarven defender (controlled by Gate70)
The Trio made some more progress today - and with no deaths, though not without Grond0 making it close a few times.
Corthief XIV wanted to go to Trademeet, but we didn't go there right away, as we got the Renfeld ambush. So we went to do docks and started the Harper quest. First challenge was to deal with Prebek and Sansha - this went pretty well, as Corthief XIV went to the corner while hidden, then the dwarves did their self-buffs and showed themselves. Corthief XIV decided to use darts of wounding and the party won the fight handily.
Nothing remarkable while looting the Harper compound, other than the dwarves were getting impatient with Corthief XIV picking up the 41 gold in the back room. Xzar met his fate and we could not avenge him. Corthief XIV decided to use the staff spear for now.
We also did the Suna Sunei ambush, which was pretty easy for the party. We then went to Watcher's Keep and did the 1st level. We did not get vampiric wraiths, fortunately. There some undead, but not too worrisome with a berserker in the party. Corthief XIV did good traps/locks like usual.
Finally head off to Trademeet - we get the obligatory Orog ambush, but the dwarves by this point had full plate (from Officer Dirth and Mencar Pebblecrusher respectively) so handled this fine.
Once we get to Trademeet, we deal with the genies immediately. Corthief XIV laid 3 snares outside and 3 inside - the dwarves then triggered the fighting and didn't get petrified so worked pretty well. Stinkimo will of course use the shield of harmony.
We talk to the Mayor, decline Cernd's help and head to the Druid Grove. The dwarves tanked the enemies well here - the only hiccup was Berk got sent running in fear when fighing the 1st group of druids. However, with Corthief XIV using acid arrows on the mage, they weren't getting many more spells off and we all survived. The rest of the enemies were slaughtered without incident. Cernd of course defeated Faldhorn.
Once back in Trademeet, we got a few usual goodies (Belt of Inertial Barrier, Cloak of Displacement, Tasheron's Short Bow). We then cleared out the tomb easily. The dwarves were in a such a hurry to clear it, then the enemies were mopped up after Corthief XIV got the quest from Lady Larroxal. We turned in the circlet for a reputation increase.
There was only about 13 min. left in the session about this time, so we used the remaining time to clear the surface of the Graveyard, as well as the spiders/Panaii at the lower level (though leaving the large group of undead alone). While Corthief XIV did get two backstabs on Pan'aii, he then run around while the dwarves mopped up the small spiders. The last action was looting the +2 axe from the crypt, and the session was saved here.
Party Stats:
Corthief XIV, 47 kills
Berk, 163 kills
Stinkimo, 139 kills
Previous updates
After getting a lift to Nashkel with Brage I forgot that I hadn't been there yet and rested without checking reputation. Fortunately that didn't trigger a Bhaal power and I was able to slaughter an innocent before resting again.
The next target was the Valley of the Tombs where I tried to kill both mustard jellies at once rather than playing it safe. The second one got lucky and I needed to use invisibility to switch targets around before crawling away to lick my wounds.
There were no more close shaves while doing the major encounters in the southern areas, but problems are always around the corner. After killing Meilum I was heading for the ankheg area, but hadn't bothered renewing invisibility. That's not necessarily a problem when a basilisk ambush triggers as they don't attack that quickly - so there's time to run away if you react immediately. However, if you're not paying full attention ...