Longtooth decided to wipe out all the ankheg that he could find in the area where he killed Sonner. To do this safely he used command a lot. This meant that usually he had to sleep after every two ankheg. However, he reached level 5 and could now probably be able to take on three one after the other. He was able to take on two at a time and prevail. He discovered that his Spiritual Hammer Weapon is useless as it never struck the enemy. However getting a +1 flail from Sonner's body meant that the ankheg's were at a great disadvantage. He has now gone to the FAI to rest and will then go to sell his ankheg shells. Current reputation is 16.
We return to our party, poised to cleanse the De'Arnise Keep of its invaders. With countermeasures in place against the most devastating power of the Spirit Trolls (Chaotic Commands to ward off Greater Command), things proceed apace. Cassius unleashes flame and ash upon the vile Trolls.
Unfortunately, one Spirit Troll has a bit of flame and ash of his own to retaliate with.
Some panicked scrambling and healing later, we press on, dealing with the next group in much the same fashion.
The interior of the first level cleansed, we head outside, kill the Otyugh and the four dogs, and ascend unto the parapets, where a massive group of Trolls lie in wait. But as they have no Spirit or even Spectral Trolls among them, we simply weave a few protective/augmenting enchantments and charge.
We open the drawbridge, prepare a batch of Dog Stew á la Anomen, and climb the stairs to the second level. The Yuan-Ti Mage here is momentarily distracted via the single-charge Wand of Summoning from Irenicus' dungeon, but we needn't have bothered: He is apparently a Necromancer. Necromancers, while very appealing RP-wise, are just too vulnerable without defensive Illusions. The Yuan-Ti spends his first action casting PfMW, which a single Breach clears right up, along with his Stoneskin and sundry other defensive buffs. Immediate application of mass ranged attacks ensures the Necromancer's demise.
We clear all the Trolls on this level before going for Glaicus (there were only small groups of mostly regular Trolls, easily handled even without buffs). Cautious Cassius sends Mazzy to occupy Glaicus while he Dispels the powerful Enchantment the former is under, and that was probably a wise decision, as Glaicus beats poor Mazzy quite severely before coming to his senses (horrible though it sounds, better Mazzy than Cassius).
Almost all Trolls are cleared out now, so we proceed to the Golems. The first two pairs (one Stone, one Flesh) are as always no issue, especially since we've called upon five 7HD Skeleton Warriors to absorb the damage. The final duo (Iron and Clay) surprisingly goes smoothly as well: We merely apply a few basic buffs, Jaheira and Anomen swiftly destroy the Clay Golem with two Skeleton Warriors attracting its attention, and then Mazzy, Minsc and Anomen go after the Iron Golem. It seems to prefer going after the Skeleton Warriors swarming it, stopping only occasionally to cast its Gas Cloud, which we dodge as best we can by scattering. Soon, the powerful construct falls.
We make a quick detour into the dungeons: The initial group of Trolls is cleared out (again, just a small group, so no worries), after which the Umber Hulks are lured away by Anomen's cooking. We actually clear them out as well afterwards; Cassius had an Improved Invisibility left, and with Chaotic Commands still running, Mazzy (popping the Mirror Image 1/day from Ibratha +1) takes the fore, cleaving through carapaces with ease using her potent new Frostreaver +3.
We swipe everything, and as alluded to previously, retreat. We are in no shape to fight TorGal, let alone his massive group of melee brutes and (let us not forget) two high-level Yuan-Ti Mages. We forge the Flail of Ages +3 on the way out, which goes to Anomen: He'll slowly build up his proficiency with Flails to utilize it properly.
Once outside, we apply Invisibility 10' Radius, and Cassius (after quaffing potions to reach 24 Intelligence) scribes a fair few scrolls, including Spell Trap and Mordenkainen's Sword: The latter might actually come in very handy within a fairly short amount of time.. the former less so. Here's a picture of his L6 spells after scribing.
That's actually a pretty darn good selection. L6 isn't a spell level for big damage, instant death or potent summons; it's a level for defenses, utility and anti-Mage spells. And we've got all the important ones now: PfMW, True Sight (yes, Priests can cast this.. but a properly buffed Cassius will never be interrupted while casting it, unlike Anomen and even Jaheira), Pierce Magic, Death Spell, Contingency.. good stuff!
So, TorGal. He's a big melee threat, as are his (in my view perhaps a few too many) Giant Trolls/Spirit Trolls/Umber Hulk Elder... but the real issue is his two attendant Yuan-Ti Mages. Alright. We'll need a wall of summons to hold the melee bruisers off as long as possible, while the party proper throws everything they have into killing the enemy Mages.
Jaheira prepares 2x Conjure Fire Elemental, while Anomen goes for 1x Aerial Servant and 2x Animate Dead. Remaining slots go to buffs, an Insect Plague and Iron Skins, and three Death Ward. Why? Two Death Ward will go on the Fire Elementals (so that if a Yuan-Ti Mage has Death Spell, they must get a successful Remove Magic off before they can dismiss our most powerful summons), and one Death Ward goes on Cassius, because I don't want him dropping from a random Chromatic Orb. Note that I don't actually know if summons are protected from Death Spell by Death Ward, but there wasn't a whole lot of devastating options for divine L4 slots, so why not?
Cassius prepares True Sight x1, PfMW x1, Breach x2, Lower Resistance x2 and a Spell Immunity, with the rest going to defensive buffs, Slow/Haste and some Fire/Acid damage. Cassius' role in the battle will be to remove the defenses of the enemy Mages, and if he gets a chance, knock out TorGal's Magic Resistance and start applying Slow and some damage. But really, all he needs to do is help remove the enemy Mages and he's done his part.
Yoshimo unfortunately only manages to set two Special Snares in the room before TorGal, but it'll have to do. This time, we won't drag the enemy group in here: We'll battle them where they stand, and if things look bad, do a fighting retreat into the previous room (hoping that the traps at least kill something following us). Jaheira gets a 12 HD and (what must be at least) a 16HD elemental. Combined with the Aerial Servant and two 7HD Skeleton Warriors, the wall will hold. I hope. Into the fray! CHAAAAARGE! Hamsters first.
Oh, that's very good. Neither Yuan-Ti here was a Necromancer unfortunately, but neither prebuffed with PfNM, and their first action was to cast PfMW. Leaving them completely exposed to Masterwork Arrows/Bullets. While our summons (mostly) distract the enemy melee brutes, Cassius casts True Sight, dispelling all protective Illusions. His second action is to cast PfMW since TorGal has now zeroed in on him.
Hooray! And hm. Excellent that one Yuan-Ti Mage dropped, and we didn't even have to use Breach: With no defensive Illusions, everyone was hitting with nearly every shot, and its Stoneskin gave out in record time. But the snake's last defiant act was to cast Secret Word on Cassius, stripping his SI: Abjuration... and the second Yuan-Ti Mage is casting something Abjuration-y.
OW! What the what? That Yuan-Ti Mage, with one Remove Magic, removed 16 buffs from Cassius! It even stripped TorGal's Slow effect AND his Strength Drain effect from Cassius! That seems.. wildly improbable. Some of those buffs were from Anomen, granted, who is only level 11. But still.
Let the probability that each buff gets dispelled be a random variable, and assume that each pair of such random variables are independent. Then the probability of a L13 Yuan-Ti Mage (they have no 7th level spell slots) successfully dispelling 16 buffs from a level 11 caster (some were from Cassius who is level 12, but OK, for simplicity's sake) should be 0.6^16 = 0,000282, or strictly less than a 0,003% chance. That's exceptionally unlikely, yet it happened. I'd wager that either the Yuan-Ti Mage is actually a much higher caster level than its spell slots would imply, or it has some cheat version of Remove Magic.. but SCS prides itself on not cheating. I don't know, I don't like it though!
So Cassius, with not even a Stoneskin left operational, flees for his life into the previous room. TorGal goes to work on the Skeleton Warriors, and meanwhile, Masterwork Arrows and Bullets finally spell the end of the master Dispeller.
Alright. With the Mages down, this is no longer life or death: We might be forced to retreat, we might even lose someone, but Cassius is in no mortal danger. We wail away at TorGal, but despite being at Near Death and consistently taking damage, he just refuses to die. Absolutely refuses. We switch tactics, opting to instead clear out his (still many) cronies: TorGal really, really hurts, but he can only hurt one person at a time, whilst his seven friends can hurt many more (and do).
It's a long grind of a battle, but one by one, TorGal's allies fall. TorGal himself eventually goes after Cassius, who keeps him chasing with the help of an Oil of Speed. Finally, with no other enemies in play we can focus our attention back on TorGal, and at long last, the dread Troll falls (it helped that our 16HD Fire Elemental finally shook off the Greater Command it dropped from at the start of the fight, though TorGal took it out before meeting his end).
Jeez. I'd like to cheer, but that was just a tangled mess of unexpected nastiness and constant quaffing of Potions of Greater Healing. I'm starting to think that, at least at these character levels, there are no "fair" tactics to take TorGal on without a bunch of complications. If there are, I've failed to find them. But still, a victory is a victory, and we didn't even have anyone die. We gather up the hidden stash, and make our way outside, reporting our success to Nalia. After the customary Invisibility 10' Radius, we rest up, and head back to Athkatla.
I think we're powerful enough to at least have the potential to survive Spellhold and the Underdark now. We'll proceed with the main plot. Gaelan gets his money, and we agree to help Aran. For once, Lassal doesn't make an extreme nuisance of himself, and strangely enough only targets Minsc with his attacks (who is conveniently immune, wearing the Amulet of Power). So, Cassius didn't spend all his L3 slots on Invisibility 10' Radius, but I'm sure quickly nipping over to the Bridge district won't trigger anyt-
I blame myself more than the bandits. Fine. Enjoy a Greater Malison + Emotion: Hopelessness. Or just fall down and die. Yeah, do the second one.
There, that should be the last of the ambushes. We arrive at the Bridge District, swing by to pick up the Horn of Valhalla, and let Cassius have some fun with Jaylos and Caehan.
We return and report our success to Aran, and are in turn instructed to take the fight to the enemy, so to speak. Alright. But first, a well-deserved rest at the Copper Coronet, because we're really quite low on sp-
Once again, fortune farts in my face Baldrick! I would like to say this is the last time I ever travel without Invisibility 10' Radius, but let's be realistic: I'll keep making the same mistakes. Alright, let's try and sort this out... we have almost no anti-Mage spells, but we have a few strong summons available, so if we can just get them out and let them do most of the fighting, we should be fine. Oh, note also that this group has something like 4-5 invisible Thieves, all with plenty of Potions of Invisibility.
No! Minsc! Why are you Minsc?! Can't you make one save vs spell with a +6 bonus? Gah! OK. Draw them away from Minsc, and make sure not to entice any use of area-of-effect spells near him! And kill those bloody Mages!
Phew! Hooray! Huzzah! Damnable bandits. This would be a real problem, especially since SCS bandits eventually stop attacking you (and thus Minsc could be a stone statue in this area forever, with us unable to get back to him)... but we have the Ring of Earth Control on Mazzy, with a 1/day use of Stone to Flesh!
Welcome back Minsc! And since you're not Jaheira, you getting petrified won't destroy your romance in a fiery conflagration of a hundred bugs. Good stuff!
We shuffle-limp back to the Copper Coronet, get a good night's rest in, heal up, and buy Azuredge +3 (it's not even that expensive: 2600ish gold) for Mazzy on the way out. Gorf tries to bully Mazzy and gets poked to death for his troubles, then we're off to the Graveyard.
Jaheira has a single Fire Elemental prepared, and we let it lead the way against the entirely helpless Spiders: None of them have a +2 weapon. We arrive uneventfully at the entrance to the Vampire Lair, Haz falls, and we let the Fire Elemental (very slowly) kill off the Grimwarders, as they have good THAC0 but non-magical weapons. Nice.
Finally, we swing back and go up against Pai'Na. Cassius had Death Spell prepared, but really, a regular old Fireball + Protection from Fire combo works just as well (but third level arcane slots are more useful against Vampires than sixth level, what with Slow).
And here, rather anti-climactically, I think we will leave the party for now. Next time, Cassius and his stalwart allies will brave the dank dark depths of the Vampire crypts, cleansing them with fire and Azuredge. Then, Brynnlaw awaits.. and the asylum, Spellhold. Cassius is concerned, but not frightened: His power is growing. It will not be long now, Imoen. Help is coming. We are coming.
@Enuhal Thank you for the appreciation! I enjoy playing all sorts of arcane casters, but specialist mages are my absolute favourite. I'm hoping my familiarity with them will allow Cassius to reach farther than anything I've done so far (I firmly believe my ancient run with Aldain the Conjurer would've gotten well past the Underdark if not for the sudden surprise of having two Mind Flayers teleport on top of him when he didn't have Chaotic Commands up).
I prefer strategies that work the absolute majority of the time. Once I find one such strategy for an encounter I tend to stick to it: My BG1 runs essentially boil down to Web, Animate Dead and Wands of Fire... which is why I'm glad I'm finally back in SoA. Here, there's usually more than one efficient way of solving an encounter, although the good old summons/area-of-effect damage-and-disablers is almost never a bad bet.
Today's session saw quite a bit of dicing with death - with Meldar being the one consistently denied by Lady Luck .
Things started with the decision to work on reputation and Greywolf soon fell to the epidemic of blindness sweeping across the Sword Coast. Moving on from him, Samuel was picked up and carried in the direction of the FAI. Some hobgoblins staged an ambush to try and prevent travel, but the duo struggled on bloody but unbowed - only to run into a bandit ambush. It looked like they would escape that as well, but as Rev was leaving the area he saw Meldar collapse behind him and hastily cancelled the trip in order to pick up equipment.
Doing further reputation quests saw a bit more use for sleep as well as blind - Bjornin's half-ogres and some interfering doggies deciding to take 40 winks here.
Moving west to the Lighthouse, the duo were expecting some thanks from Ardrouine, but she couldn't be convinced that all the nearby wolves had been wiped out. An oddity about this screenshot is also Rev (the host PC) being told she can't initiate dialogue .
After picking up a bit more reputation from Charleston Nib, the Doomsayer was targeted with about half a dozen blindness spells - but to no avail. Meldar had Melf's Acid Arrow, but we had no other spells that could damage the Doomsayer - so Rev helped out with some wand damage to avoid any need to rest.
With the major encounters in the Cloud Peaks complete and reputation nearing its maximum, Rev led the way to the ankheg area. At this point Gate70 got a phone call and we lost voice communication - that meant that when I asked if he wanted to risk taking on the ankhegs he didn't reply (and obviously silence implies assent ). Unfortunately it transpired that Meldar was out of spells at this point, but Rev managed to deal with the first couple of ankhegs anyway using blindness and stinking cloud.
The one guarding the treasure though saved against blindness and Meldar needed to get a good whack in to finish it off before it could do the same to him.
After giving Tenya her bowl back it seemed only reasonable to chance our arms once more against the nearby ankheg. By this stage Gate70 was back in contact and Meldar was fully rested - so the odds seemed good. However, we failed to disable the ankheg and Rev was soon in serious trouble. She called for Meldar to leave the area, but wouldn't have made it if the ankheg hadn't missed here.
After buying a few things at Ulgoth's Beard we did come back though and this time a blindness quickly stuck.
Going to the Valley of the Tombs in search of a wand of monster summoning, the Revenant was another blind victim - holding still while we battered it to death with some long sticks.
We then tried to rest, but only managed to produce some ogrillons. Gate70 didn't allow enough for MP lag when running those round and a critical made him pay the price (you can see one tell-tale sign of the lag, which is his equipment is displaced from his body).
After a trip to the temple the ghasts were pulled out of their tomb and blinded.
The purpose for the wand of monster summoning was really to take on the sirines. With 2 mages they would be easy enough to kill with skull traps, but we had a total of 0 3rd level spells known between us (we were happy to keep things interesting!). The sirines wouldn't have lasted long against monsters, but Rev couldn't resist first seeing how they did against stinking clouds. That was actually reasonably effective and 1 sirine died before another managed to escape and circle around some trees to shoot Meldar from an unexpected direction. He was poisoned, but I thought he was going to escape - until pathfinding got messed up as Rev bounced around with MP lag and Meldar turned back towards his attacker for a moment too long ...
After another trip to the temple Rev did summon monsters to finish off the sirines - and the second group of those also lasted long enough to pull a couple of golems out of the cave to their doom. With only one golem left Meldar threw 10 magic darts at it from behind Rev - who had gone invisible for the first time. He rolled a poor set of attacks though and the golem was only badly wounded when Meldar was out of darts. Rev couldn't contemplate just running away though and had a whack at the golem himself - surviving the retaliatory blow while moving back quickly. Fortunately, Meldar's strength, +3 staff and gauntlets of weapon expertise meant he was able to do just enough damage to put the golem down before it could launch another blow.
The last action was invading the Nashkel Mine. Things seemed to be going smoothly enough on the way through there - until Meldar was hit by simultaneous criticals from both a kobold and a kobold commando who both briefly recovered consciousness at the same time inside a stinking cloud. Only the ring of fire protection he had on allowed him to survive that.
He managed to hang on to his last HP while getting into Mulahey's cave and killing some kobolds there - allowing resting to recover health.
Mulahey was placed inside some stinking clouds, but managed to escape from those quickly and resist an attempt to blind him while summoning a group of helpers. Rev ran one way to take on and kill a number of those, while Meldar had a trickier task with Mulahey himself as well as more fodder. Meldar managed to get an acid arrow away, but then found himself held. Rev dashed back to try and make him invisible, but the automatic hits from his attackers was always likely to make that effort fail.
However, thanks to the continuing acid damage Mulahey decided to seek peace at that point rather than have a go at Rev as well. With the rest of the kobolds and skeletons dead, Rev then blinded Mulahey - but that just prompted him to summon another large group of monsters. This time Rev said "Sod that for a game of soldiers" and summoned his own shock troops who quickly brought the situation under control.
Rev than took Meldar back to the temple to be raised once more before closing the session.
If they can't do it alone, they can do it together!
For this run, I'm actually using SCS for BG1 with short-term prebuffs and almost all of the tactical challenges. My installation from my previous runs is mostly unchanged aside from SCS. There's going to be all kinds of firsts for me in this run.
I've never used SCS in BG1 before
Even when I've played with SCS in BG2, I never installed the tactical challenges except for Bodhi
And I always played with spellcasters having long-term prebuffs only
So, if I'm going to ramp up the difficulty this much, I'm going to need the help of some familiar faces who are all incredibly strong on their own. Putting them all together should make them unstoppable!
And so, I introduce to you the CHARNAME of this playthrough, Krieg II the War Hulk! (kit link)
Of all the rejects, Krieg is the one who made it furthest. Alone, he chunked and one-shotted his way across the Sword Coast, Amn, and Tethyr until finally reaching the Throne of Bhaal itself. Krieg survived a Time Stop -> Whirlwind Attack combo from Melissan and had health left to spare, but his AC was reduced to 20, his save vs. spell shot up to 20, and he went berserk, making him easy prey for Melissan's demons. In the end, Melissan got the killing blow on Krieg.
Coming in as a summoner, healer, melee fighter, and unkillable rage-tank all in one package is Garos the Warhorn Shaman. (kit link)
Garos was retired due to character fatigue as he hit his power cap quite early. Now that he's on a team, that won't matter as much because he makes a far better force multiplier for a party than he does a combatant clearing the saga by himself.
Returning for the third time is Spaz IV the Warlock, spamming Eldritch Blasts and Skeleton Warriors. (kit link)
Spaz is no stranger to the no-reload challenge. Let's count all the ways he's died so far:
Level drain turning off all his saving throw boosts, followed by being Commanded by a traitorous cleric of Dumathoin and held by a ghast Critical hit from one of Kelddath's sirenes Constitution drained to 0 by vampires despite having the means to protect himself from it. This third death is more of a result of lazy gameplay on my part than anything else.
The most recent Reject is Rufus II the Thief/Shadow Adept (AKA Nightblade). (kit link)
Despite doing all the early-game XP gathering correctly, he was killed by a drow Shadow Weave user who employed 6th-level spells despite being just outside the starting town of Beregost, of all places. I played with him more after that, and he becomes a monstrosity of shadowy strength without even needing to be triple-classed with Fighter. He becomes truly ridiculous (just like every mage with Improved Alacrity) - all the more reason for him to join this party in their conquest of SCS with short-term prebuffs and tactical challenges.
This one has not graced the no-reload thread with his presence, but Gaspar the Seducer is the suavest swashbuckler to sail the seven seas. (kit link)
Gaspar was a character I made for a ctrl+Q playthrough of BG1 and BG2 way back in the days of v1.2. The Seducer kit can simulate ctrl+Q, but can also have the seduced victims follow a full party instead. Gaspar is going to have a very interesting synergy with Rufus later on...
And lastly, the monk that I lost to Blind Albino Wyrmlings, Bruss. He seems to be convinced that he's a Super Sand Lesbian or something. The rest of his party doesn't believe him, but that d12 HD and that 18/87 Exceptional Strength do seem pretty suspicious...
In all honesty, I don't know how to make kit mods with Weidu, but I made all of his abilities in NearInfinity and will add them using EEKeeper. I've played through the game several times with Bruss, both solo and with a party. He's really fun and surprisingly balanced. If semiticgod can do Undertale themed runs with self-made kits, I don't see why I can't take the same concept a bit further.
The stage is set and the actors are ready to put on the show. All that's left is to play and see what happens.
In the previous update there was quite a bit of dicing with death. The problem with doing that of course is that there's a strong tendency to eventually get diced.
The early stages of the session went smoothly enough, with Nimbul choking inside a stinking cloud and Tranzig's good saves being not quite good enough to avoid being blinded.
Moving on to the Bandit Camp, Meldar relied on the Cloak of Displacement and Nimbul's boots to deflect bandit arrows - though he almost died anyway to a critical hit. By the time Taurgosz was activated the duo had already used most of their spells and settled in for a bit of running and shooting. That can be tricky in a laggy environment and Meldar didn't allow enough gap as Taurgosz teleported towards him and struck him down.
By that time Taurgosz was at near death, but Rev decided not to finish him off - so as not to get further out of XP alignment with her mage colleague. Instead, she picked up most of the remains and ran off to the FAI to get Meldar raised. Although there was no real worth in the equipment left behind, the duo still hurried back without resting in order to try and recover a large quantity of darts before they evaporated. Taurgosz was of course waiting for them and immediately started chasing Meldar. Rev didn't have much in the way of spells, but did have a pair of improved invisibilities and one of those made Meldar disappear. Rev then tried to get enough distance from Taurgosz to cast the second on himself. I was admittedly a bit hasty in doing that and cutting things fine - so it was no surprise when Rev's spell was interrupted. Given that was no surprise, however, she did immediately start running and expected to be able to get clear - the follow-up hit therefore was a surprise .
Probably should've mentioned this is on Insane (minus extra damage). I always play with max HP, but every creature in the game has max HP as well thanks to Tweaks Anthology.
Candlekeep goes like it always does. The belt ogre is taken down by Spirit Archers. It's when we get to the Friendly Arm that SCS shows but the tiniest hint of its AI improvements. We had cleared the hobgoblins around the fortress and recruited one to our cause. Rufus went to scout ahead and check out Tarnesh when his stealth suddenly wore off. Tarnesh now speaks from a distance!
Aw crap. Tarnesh prebuffs with Shield and Mirror Image. Rufus backs off and sends in the hobgoblin instead. It gets put to sleep and finished with a magic missile. Some guards join the fight and help take down some of Tarnesh's mirror images. Unphased, Tarnesh casts Horror on Krieg. I'm not wasting the Potion of Clarity on something as trivial as this.
Krieg runs away from the party but I misjudge the AoE size on it and Bruss is also afflicted.
Spaz is hit with an Acid Arrow and finished with another Magic Missile. Garos stops dancing to heal Spaz, but it's too late. Bruss and Krieg had the healing potions, too.
The guards have Tarnesh at near death and Gaspar kills Tarnesh. We raise Spaz for just 100 gold.
At Beregost, we deal with Marl and have Spaz steal and wear Algernon's Cloak. Gaspar neutralizes Silke with Domination. We have her expend her impressive spell arsenal and have her Haste us. Once we attack, she has two different ways of going invisible: one by sequencer and one by potion. She gets a good hit on Bruss but is put down.
Next are Kelddath's sirenes. After killing the second one, Gaspar and Spaz level up, with Bruss not far behind after killing the third one. Garos has accumulated quite the host of spirits, so we decide to hunt the wolf pack with them. Using their magical weapons, they slaughter the wolves with ease. Krieg and Garos level up, while Spaz and Gaspar earn a second level. Now everyone has at least 2 levels under their belts. Bruss learns Ki Blast volley and Spaz learns Dark One's Own Luck.
KI BLAST VOLLEY: A saiyan may hurl 1 ball of condensed ki energy at an opponent for every 2 levels they have, up to a maximum of 11 ki blasts at level 22. Each blast deals 1d4 magical damage. Save vs. Death for half damage, possibly reducing it to 0. Ki blasts can be negated by magic resistance but they can hit improved invisible opponents. This ability is useable once every 3 turns.
: Go to Hell, ya fricken sirenes!
Now that Gaspar's Domination ability has improved a bit, we try it out on Firebead. We expend all of his spells and have him summon monsters for us. He's completely surrounded by a wall of monsters and a second line of spirits stands between us and him. He's as good as dead. No reputation loss was incurred because Gaspar had Firebead dominated at his time of death! Bruss levels up to 3, learning Ki Deflection.
KI DEFLECTION: With a wave of force, the Saiyan may deflect direct-damage projectiles harmlessly away for 2 seconds. Failing to save vs. wand results in the Saiyan unsuccessfully deflecting the projectile(s). The Saiyan may instead choose to reflect projectiles back to their origin. A save vs. wand at -5 negates any chance of failure to reflect projectiles. Projectiles include arrows, bolts, bullets, Magic Missiles, Acid Arrows, Flame Arrows, Fireballs, etc. Does not work on debuffs, disablers, or gas-based spells. Only works on things with a projectile. Ki Deflection can only be attempted once per round.
Up at the ankheg nest, Krieg levels up to 3. The bounty hunts begin, or so I've read. Even the ankhegs are smarter; they'll wait for you to come to them rather than vice-versa. Just as well though, since they get overwhelmed anyway. Returning Farmer Brun's son earns Rufus, Garos, Gaspar, and Spaz a level too.
Bruss gains another level from returning Tenya's bowl, learning Solar Flare. Spaz steals Dushai's Ring of Free Action and gives it to Garos so he can move at normal speed while dancing.
SOLAR FLARE: With the aid of the light produced by the sun or reflected by the moon, the Saiyan manifests an extremely bright light that blinds opponents in visual range who fail a save vs. polymorph for 6 rounds. This ability can be used once every 10 minutes, and even then only when in exterior areas.
We clear out the zombies up north and head back to Beregost. Krieg makes a small fortune selling off 6 ankheg shells, but it's still not enough money for us. South of Beregost, we revisit the cave where Rufus died last time. This time Rufus takes the initiative and backstabs Nym while following up with a scorcher charge from the Wand of Fire. It makes a dent in him before he speaks, but then he throws up a bunch of buffs and summons 3 shadows!
Luckily Rufus got out of there in time, before the drow or the shadows could get him. Garos has 2 spirits waiting outside to take on the shadows using their magical weapons. One follows Rufus outside and promptly gets defeated. Rufus goes back inside the cave under stealth to check on Nym. He'll do anything to stay alive, including leeching health from his own summons. He even tries to smoke Rufus out with a Shadowblast fireball, but it only ends up killing one of his shadows. Rufus lays a trap for Nym and re-stealths but his Dark Mirage just eats it. Rufus tries a Wand of Missiles, and just barely makes it out in time, but not before being hit with Power Word, Sleep.
Luckily, the drow does not follow. Rufus wakes up okay, and he and Bruss continue to bait out spells from Nym, though Bruss suffers half of a Negative Energy Ray. Once Nym's exhausted, Rufus lures him outside, but everyone is having trouble hitting this guy. Even Krieg can't seem to hit him!
: GET BACK HERE YOU SLIPPERY MEAT PUPPET
Must be because of Shield of Shadows. Fortunately, Shadow Adepts are weakened somewhat in sunlight and Nym resorts to melee attacks. Gaspar charms him and reveals he still has some spells up his sleeve. He commands Nym to swap to his magical throwing dagger's ranged attack and also to drain his own CON score by 4 points with Drain Vitality.
Even this doesn't really help us hit him. Spaz's Eldritch Blasts are resisted half the time because of Nym's 50% MR, and he saves against a Solar Flare from Bruss, but several rounds later, Rufus gets his revenge for the last playthrough using the Wand of Missiles.
: I told you I'd be back to collect! I told you!
Nym has some pretty nice stuff on him, including a scroll. Rufus learns Decoy from it.
Basilisk Country is up next. I think this is where the bounty hunts begin.
Krieg - War Hulk 3 Garos - Warhorn Shaman 3 Bruss - Saiyan Monk(ey) 4 Rufus - Thief 3/Shadow Adept 2 Spaz - Warlock 4 Gaspar - Seducer 4
Upon returning to the Sword Coast he took on Gnarl and Hairtooth and prevailed. He then started to leave and as he did so, discovered that Garrat an invisible thief was trying to attack him. He will just have to wait for me to get a bit stronger before Longtooth fights him. Longtooth then went to kill Sonner and friends before killing the ankheg who ate Nester.
Longtooth decided to wipe out all the ankheg that he could find in the area where he killed Sonner. To do this safely he used command a lot. This meant that usually he had to sleep after every two ankheg. However, he reached level 5 and could now probably be able to take on three one after the other. He was able to take on two at a time and prevail. He discovered that his Spiritual Hammer Weapon is useless as it never struck the enemy. However getting a +1 flail from Sonner's body meant that the ankheg's were at a great disadvantage.
He has now gone to the FAI to rest and will then go to sell his ankheg shells. Current reputation is 16. He then fought Zordral a battle which was essentially won with Command.
The wolves in the temple area were next.
Longtooth picked up Montaron and hung around while Montaron plundered first Beregost and then afterwards the two went to Ulgoth's Beard. There Montaron was only spotted once as he utilised his pick-pocketting abilities. He utilised our high reputation to avoid any comeback. Montaron was left at Ulgoth's and Longtooth went to seek out Mutamin. He dealt with the adventurers first. Using haste and his wand of missiles. This all but exhausted the necklace. He also used a command spell when necessary. He then went around killing the basilisks and Medusae. Since his crossbow was ineffective against the medusae he used his throwing daggers. He almost ran out of them, but not quite. The medusae did poison him twice, but potions rectified that. He used his necklace of missiles against Mutamin before putting it in his backpack not wanting to exhaust it completely. Mutamin used a healing potion and then cast blindness and slow. This slowed the battle considerably but he had run out of effective offensive spells so the end was just a matter of time in coming as all his allies were already dead.
EDIT Upon going to Beregost for some rest, Longtooth headed south and took on Tristan and Isolde. Having aquired Ushai's ring, they were not a major problem.
The bandits in the Lake District were next. The hobgoblin was killed first and after him Teygnan was doomed, Whilst Longtooth was casting that spell, Jemby cast enfeeblement. Seeing it coming, Longtooth retreated. Teygnan closed in on him but was badly wounded by Longtooth's dagger before he did so. Longtooth waited until he was in stgriking distance before he cast command and then finished him off with his flails. He then moved away and slept before moving in on Jemby. Jemby again cast enfeeblement and Longtooth command. Both spells were successful, but Longtooth was able to kill Jemby with his throwing dagger before she had a chance to retaliate.
The half-ogres were very suceptible to command and thus easy to kill as were the gnolls attacking Drizzt. A visit to beregost to recieve various rewards now seems in order.
EDIT I wasn't expecting this. Longtooth was investigating the area where two brothers who are both druids have a conflict. Longtooth didn't come across them, but did come across some goblins which he hasn't met before.
One of them was a shaman who cast rigid thinking. This led to Longtooth attacking the goblin slave who counter-attacked and did serious harm.
The other goblins then joined in and quickly brought Longtooth's demise.
Before heading out to Basilisk Country, we return Nym's staff to Kryn Darkflame for 1k XP and gold. At Ulgoth's Beard, we buy the Darkveil for Bruss from Rogue Rebalancing. Not only does it protect from crits, but it also gives the wearer immunity to gaze attacks and a tiny stealth boost, at the cost of a +2 THAC0 penalty vs. creatures that use gaze attacks.
With Bruss now immune to basilisk gazes, he clears out Basilisk Country by himself, with the exception of Mutamin and his two pet basilisks, and another lesser basilisk nearby.
Rufus also learns the Shadow Weave versions of Invisibility and Silence. If Bruss tries to take on Mutamin by himself, he'll surely be killed. Trying to flee back to the party will just result in everyone getting petrified as the basilisks chase Bruss, although I think the basilisks' new AI still doesn't take into account being immune to the gaze projectile. Now for Kirian's group.
To start, Korax paralyzes Kirian, neutralizing the biggest threat.
Gaspar charms Lindin the fighter. Luckily, it lasts a full 3 rounds.
Krieg is stabbed by Baerin's spear and goes berserk, pulverizing him with a critical in response.
: YOUR VENA CAVA SCREAMS FOR ME!
Peter is blinded by Rufus and mopped up. Kirian is released from Korax's paralysis immediately afterward, casting Sleep on Garos. Everyone moves to get out of the way, so only Garos is put under. Spirit archers remove her Mirror Images before they get unsummoned and Gaspar manages to charm her. He commands her to cast Acid Arrow on herself and we finish her off. I thought I took a screenshot of this part but the keypress must not have registered.
At Durlag's Tower, Bruss levels up to 5 from a Doom Knight, learning Kaioken x2 (.webm video) and Energy Wave.
-Editing dialogue.tlk just to add proper strings to abilities seems like a really bad idea, so I just used approximations. -Saiyans do not receive disease/haste/slow immunity.
-ENERGY WAVE: Once per day, the Saiyan summons great power from within and condenses it into a ball of bluish energy in their hands, then fires it at a target within 120 ft. The energy ball explodes with great force in a 30 ft. diameter, dealing 1d10 magical damage every 2 levels, plus 1 per 4 levels as bonus damage (rounded down). Targets may save vs. breath for half damage, with a -1 penalty for every 10 levels of the Saiyan. A level 12 Saiyan, for example, would fire a blast that deals 6d10+3 damage with a save vs. breath at -1 for half. Charging time: 13
-KAIOKEN: Kaioken greatly increases the user's physical abilities and effectively multiplies the sensitivity of the user's senses. While the Saiyan is faster and stronger while maintaining this technique, the Saiyan becomes more fatigued and any damage received is also increased, plus the user's Constitution drains over time. Maintaining this technique for too long CAN and WILL kill the user via Constitution drain. Powering up and down from this state is a free action. Any Constitution drained will not be restored for 8 hours and the damage vulnerability will persist for 10 minutes. Powering down to lower multiplications after using higher multiplications will not decrease the damage vulnerability; they will actually stack instead. Powering up to higher multiplications after using lower multiplications will not cause the damage vulnerabilities to stack, however, but the higher of the two will still be imposed. - x2: +2 THAC0/damage/AC/movement, +1 attack/round, fists count as +1; -1 CON/2 rounds, +2 fatigue after 5 rounds, 10% damage vulnerability. Power up time: 2
Rufus and Gaspar are killed by a lightning trap in the 2nd above-ground floor of Durlag's Tower because of a trapped chest. 35 Find Traps causes a critical failure. We pick up their stuff and go back to Beregost to have them raised. Spaz was hit but he survived thanks to Dark One's Own Luck's saves+Luck bonuses.
Back at Durlag's, Bruss solos the roof basilisks using his Darkveil, earning Krieg a level.
At the third above-ground floor of Durlag's, Gaspar picks up the WIS tome thanks to his immunity to charm. Rufus consumes it and reaches 18 WIS. Wisdom increases a Shadow Adept's spell duration by 5% for every point above 15.
We're pretty much finished at Durlag's right now since Rufus' Find Traps is definitely not ready to tackle it. We go over to High Hedge and assemble quite the host of creatures using Gaspar's Recruit Follower. This is thanks to Rufus's invisibility letting him scout ahead and the fact that Recruit Follower's range is longer than sight range and does not require LoS to use.
At Shoal's area, Bruss chooses to sacrifice himself so we can get Droth's helmet. Krieg beats Shoal a couple of times until she surrenders. After Droth appears, Krieg finishes her off and we sic our army on him. Krieg now owns Droth's helmet.
The giant humanoid band to the south is taken care of by skeletons and spirit archers. I want to save our ghouls because of their incredibly useful paralysis. Spaz, Garos, and Rufus level up from them, thanks to Shoal's big XP boost. Rufus also learns Shield of Shadows this level.
Some dire wolves provide the last push of XP that Gaspar needs for another level.
The nearby trio of sirenes are killed by our pack of ghasts, skeletons, and Kivan. Rufus scouts ahead while invisible to survey the carnage.
At this point, we're just doing wilderness quests and collecting a couple of tomes.
We eventually travel to Ulcaster. Icharyd has apparently been beefed up more from SCS. He still hits hard and often, although I thought Icharyd calling down lightning bolts was pretty contrived. Like, okay, it's challenge for the sake of challenge I guess, but lightning bolts are Talos' domain, not Myrkul's.
Inside Ulcaster, we run into another one of Kryn Darkflame's apprentices. A while ago, Gaspar brainwashed Tiax into following us just for his Ghast, so we're putting it to use. The apprentice is paralyzed and Krieg finishes her off. She has some nice stuff for Rufus, too, and he chooses to learn Night Terrors from the scroll.
I believe it's time for the Wolf of Ulcaster. I'm not really sure what to expect, but I remember reading about a fear howl, so I have Garos cast Rallying Cry before encountering it. And then things get hectic.
: KAIOKEN!
It's like something straight out of SoD, although I don't dislike it. Bruss powers up with Kaioken and teams up with Krieg to pound away at the wolf. Spaz spams Eldritch Blasts on it to deal damage every round. Gaspar is on Charm duty to relieve some of the pressure on us. I can't be sure what else the wolf does, so I have Garos actually attacking while enraged for once instead of dancing. Rufus does absolutely nothing for the whole fight for several reasons. -Attacking means no more invisibility. -I don't want him attacked because his AC is bad. -His magic won't be of any help here. Sleep and Silence are useless here, and I can live without Blindness.
The wolf uses a Remove Magic howl, followed by a Malison howl. Garos re-casts Rallying Cry to prevent a Fear howl. Bruss has spent a good while in Kaioken and his Constitution is now falling below 16, so he powers down briefly and assists Garos. Kaioken is intended to be used in short bursts anyhow. Fortunately, the wolf has had enough because Spaz kills it with an Eldritch Blast.
The rest of the undead are cleaned up and Krieg redeems his level. Good progress today. Haven't run into any bounty hunters yet.
Krieg - War Hulk 6 Garos - Warhorn Shaman 5 Bruss - Saiyan Monk(ey) 6 Rufus - Thief 5/Shadow Adept 4 Spaz - Warlock 6 Gaspar - Seducer 6
Seeing @Flashburn with a War Hulk active, I thought perhaps it was time for me to have another go with one of those. My last attempt with Burl got to the Throne before losing out to Melissan, so this one's got big shoes to fill - fortunately he has big feet . I've added the kit to an unmodded v2.5 installation and have the additional restriction to the standard kit that I'm not allowing any use of thrown weapons. The kit can be found here.
Burl had to struggle a bit to kill Xzar & Montaron, but after collecting Algernon's cloak he was able to pick up the XP for 3 of the sirines in the Beregost temple - enough, with a few other little tasks, to take him to level 4.
He went to Nashkel to get the ankheg armor and learn Bhaal LMD - but also got a nice one-shot critical on Oopah there.
Following Korax round the basilisk area then gained him a couple more levels.
He did though need to save against a hold person from Peter, who had been charmed, but threw that off after killing Kirian for Burl.
To plug that gap in his defenses he went to Ulgoth's Beard to get Dushai's ring. Up to this point the enemies had had a fighting chance as Burl had been using a relatively slow long sword. He had got an improved +1 sword from Lindin and briefly upgraded to Greywolf's +2 version.
However, for a War Hulk weapon speed is so crucial I decided I should really play safe and get something quicker. Thus, while doing a few reputation quests, Burl picked up the +2 dagger from Hentold. Using that with hit and fade tactics, few enemies could touch him. Those tactics weren't suitable for the sirines at the coast, but a potion of clarity allowed him to get into close contact there. He was trying to get them to follow closely enough between his attacks not to switch to arrows of biting, but didn't get movement quite right there and lost control of himself for the first time.
He recovered quickly though and the sirines don't do enough damage in melee anyway to be any threat. Burl got level 7 there before moving on to the golems in the pirate cave. They managed a couple of hits between them, but couldn't prevent him stealing their treasure - the tome providing him with regeneration (I hadn't bothered buying Buckley's Buckler this time).
After moving through the Nashkel Mine, there was a small possibility of danger in Mulahey's cave if the fodder there had got lucky with initial attacks - as being hit damages AC it's possible for a large group to very rapidly move from needing lucky hits to hitting easily. Burl countered that possibility with a touch of oil.
Fang killed the hobgoblins around the FAI next. However one of his backstabs didn't work with almost catastophic results.
He returned Joia's ring with the result that his reputatioin went up.
It went up again when he turned down a reward from Oublek.
After speaking to Noober his level went up.
When attacked by bandits he ran away.
He then picked up a ring of protection from fire and rescued Samuel, again improving his reputation.
He then killed an ogre with a belt fetish followed by two ogrillon.
He then took Rufie back to Alfie.
He had to have two bites at the cherry in order to defeat Krumm and Caldo, but once they were separated they soon fell.
This raised his reputation once more.
Three dir wolves were killed next followed by xvarts. Drienne's cat was then restored to her, bumping reputation up yet again.
Fighting Zordral also took two bites at the cherry, but once he was poisoned the end was in sight for him.
He then raised his reputation by returning the Colquetle Amulet.
Giving the Dudley Necklace to the daughter raised the reputation yet again.
As did the restoration of Mellicamp.
Fang then cured a werewolf of lycanthropy gaining a +1 sword as a reward.
His reputation was raised yet again by restoring Alanna's neighbour.
His reputation was now 19. You may ask why an evil thief should have such a high reputation. It is because nobody caught him doing evil acts. For instance he pickpocketted Algernon's cloak without getting caught and stole a fortune in Beregost also without getting caught. Honesty is for fools, but apparent honesty is a very valuable thing, and subtlety is everything. https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Mask
This and the next part are really the same update, but I'll divide it into two parts, as otherwise it turned out prohibitively long.
We engage the Vampires in their nest: Minsc and Mazzy will lead the charge, with the rest of the party kept out of arm's (or fang's) reach. Though they can do nothing to harm the named Vampires, Skeleton Warriors (by their sheer numbers) still do a good job of blocking the bloodsuckers from reaching Mazzy, and so we keep a number of them at the fore, Azuredge hurtling through the gaps in the line.
We pick up the Mace of Disruption and descend the stairs. Minsc is granted an Improved Invisibility, and does a good job blocking the would-be ambushers down here: These are only Fledgling Vampires, and so much less lethal. Minsc takes a handful of hits throughout the entire fight, but Azuredge carries the day. Yoshimo's traps were pointless, as the Grimwarders triggered them, and they're entirely immune to missile damage.
Doing surprisingly well so far. Tanova must be dealt with for us to proceed: We top off our Skeleton Warriors, buff a little, and have half the party (Yoshimo, Anomen and Jaheira) stay out of reach. Cassius will pop into view, cast True Sight, and pop back out. Once his aura clears, he'll pop back in, Breach, and pop back out. Hopefully, the Skeleton Warriors can hold Tanova long enough for us to thus clear her defenses and drop her.
How about that: Quick and clean. Tanova used to be a major headache, but I've got her figured out now. Her remaining Mordenkainen's Sword kills a Skeleton Warrior, but they're easily replaced.
On to Lassal. Cassius gets a Chaotic Commands and goes to draw him. Unfortunately, Lassal is not in the mood: He turns into a rat and hides for about 15 rounds. Eventually, we're able to draw him out, but he tries to hide twice more. Minsc does not care for such nonsense.
Only Bodhi remains. While I think it would be possible to damage her enough to force a withdrawal with this party... why risk it? We leave her some Skeleton Warriors as pasttime, and though she follows Minsc around for a bit, eventually she loses the scent, kills the Skeletons, then just sits there until retreating.
Well that was refreshingly non-horrific! We cleared the Vampire crypts with nearly no damage taken. Cassius applies Invisibility 10' Radius and we head back for the Slums, but are, once again, interrupted by bandits. We barely have any spells left, but let's try it... the party retreats to the edge of the map and draws the attention of a single bandit.
Huh. For some reason, they don't all seem to be linked! We gather them in ones and twos, leaving the Mage for last. As we really have no anti-Mage spells, we simply wait out her Shield and PfNM.
Let's see if that's the last straw for the (by now quite diminished) bandit/slaver population of Athkatla. I'm not kidding, we've killed something like three dozen of their best Fighters/Thieves/Clerics/Mages.. heck, if you count the slaver ship, we're probably up to 50! It's got to start showing at some point.
A rest at the Copper Coronet later, we're tying up loose ends: We still need to visit Watcher's Keep for the potion case, and I would like to take down Mencar and his crew, mainly for the Full Plate. However, navigating through Waukeen's Promenade, we are interrupted by Vampires in pursuit of... what's his name.. Saniki? Eh. The naked guy with the katana. Didn't I already clear the Vampires out of this town?
A defensive Minor Sequencer saves Cassius from what could've quite probably been a bad situation, and we opt for full summons and buffs, erring on the side of caution.
That over and done with, we go after Mencar. I may have overestimated him and his band... 2x Aerial Servants, 2x Fire Elementals, 6 traps by the exit for Brennan and a full complement of buffs (including Cassius taking command of the summons on the frontline, with every conceivable protection spell active) was a bit of overkill. At least Brennan didn't get away.
We go for the potion case, with no ambushes on the way. Back at the Copper Coronet, we do a final rest, then report our success to Aran, and set sail for Brynnlaw.
There's no reason to go easy on the three named Vampires here... along with Venkt they're the only major encounter this rest cycle. Skeleton Warriors hold the line, with a buffed Minsc and Mazzy doing the slaying. Del tried to flee in bat form, but we were able to box her in.
We roam around town, killing the completely outmatched stealthed pirates that for some reason attack us by their lonesome, and deal with Chremy, saving Ginia and Ason. Sanik is assassinated, and we head into Lady Galvena's feasthall. Front doesn't buff with PfNM, so True Seeing is sufficient to spell his end (that's a nice critical from Anomen). Oh, and I learn yet again that Conjure Animals are not worth it, ever. The mountain bears lasted literally two rounds, and that's only because we got two of them.
We push through the corridor. This time, a single Fire Elemental does a good job holding off the guards in here, as we kill the guard with a +2 Halberd before he can kill the elemental.
Cassius almost winds up in an unpleasant situation here. We had four Skeleton Warriors and a Fire Elemental up, distracting Vadek, but Cassius (who was in the room to cast True Sight) got hit by Remove Magic, which of course stripped all his defensive buffs. Galvena noticed and went for the kill. Fortunately, I had remembered to recast our defensive Minor Sequencer, and it saves the Elf's bacon yet again. Vadek, while protected from the physical damage of Yoshimo's many traps, has no defense against the poison damage, to my great delight.
Alright! Claire is rescued and returned to Golin, and we retire to the Vulgar Monkey. Now... let's be smart. I have little doubt there'll be a similar spawn of mass Yuan-Ti Mages blocking our escape from the Spellhold maze as last time. I think the best approach is the clear the rest of the maze first, then do an inventory of what spells we have remaining, and decide on a tactic. With all other rooms cleared, we can if necessary split the enemy up and do fighting retreats.
Spell selections: Cassius spends all his 6th and 5th level slots on True Sight and Breach. Anomen and Jaheira basically have to use all their 5th level slots (along with a Wondrous Recall each) to provide enough Chaotic Commands, and they both get a Harm as well, so we have a primary and backup insta-kill option for the Beholder. We'll deal with Yuan-Ti Mages by dispelling their Illusions, Breaching them, and then applying mass ranged attacks. If they have SI: Abjuration up (I've never seen them do it, but I guess it's possible)... we will just have to run and try to wait it out. The rest of our slots go to standard buffs and debuffs, including a few Invisibility 10' Radius; Cassius picks only two Chromatic Orbs and a Skull Trap for damage. We'll be relying on melee/ranged to carry us through, with Cassius to negate the defenses of enemy Mages.
We go have a chat with Desharik (after looting his house). We might be able to kill Perth the Adept, but it's too risky for too small a reward... better the safe option. Off to Spellhold, and our doom! Well, hopefully not the last bit.
Unintentional comedy ensues when Bhaal quaffs a Potion of Magic Shielding. Cassius was hoping to just burn him down with a Wand of Magic Missiles (saving all his spells for the maze), but end up also having to discharge a six charge Wand of Frost.. and Bhaal is still standing. Cue a Benny Hill chase sequence with Cassius taking occasional potshots with darts and, when they run out, his sling. I'm just glad Bhaal didn't get an Oil of Speed.
We are dropped in the maze and reunited with Imoen. Hooray! Less jubilations are inspired by her getting bumped only to 1 million XP, but it'll do. Following the plan, we head north-west (a quick scouting by Minsc confirms that yes, there are two Yuan-Ti, one Greater Yuan-Ti and three Yuan-Ti Mages blocking the path to the next level) in order to clear everything else out before engaging the main enemy group.
First thing's first: We pick up the Ring of Regeneration by applying Cassius' razor-sharp intellect to the twelve riddles. Very, very good! If we're a little patient, we can now enter every battle with everyone in top shape. Even if we're not so patient, the Ring will drastically cut down our dependency on potions/healing spells. The Ruhk's Mephits are cleared by the single-charge Wand of Cloudkill from Irenicus' dungeon, with the Ruhk itself falling to a simple melee assault. Mazzy takes a little damage, but that's what the Ring of Regeneration is for. The Doomplate +3 goes to Minsc, as Mazzy is using Full Plate in conjunction with Ring of Protection +2 for exquisite saves. On our way to the next level, we also clear the Clay Golem. Anomen gets hit and suffers Cursed Wounds, but Cassius wisely had a single Remove Curse prepared. With the Bag of Holding in tow, we press south.
We want the Ring of Free Action.. which means tackling a Mind Flayer and a Beholder. Alright. Minsc and Mazzy get Chaotic Commands, and everyone else go under Invisibility 10' Radius. Since Mind Flayers cannot see through Invisibility in my install (I think they're terrifying enough just with the extra resistances), the rest of the party is safe. The Mind Flayer gets a single hit on Mazzy, but she quaffs a Potion of Genius and keeps wailing at it.
Why is she at 72 HP? Because the Mind Flayer did its Ballistic Attack, so Mazzy suffered 30ish unresistable damage with no save. Alright.. Beholder time. I've zero interest in fighting this unofficial King of Cheese fairly. Anomen, still invisible, applies to himself Death Ward (in case he whiffs his attack, this should entice the Beholder into casting Anti-Magic Ray at him, making him safe against the other Rays for one round), Holy Power, DUHM and Righteous Magic. With 25 Strength and Fighter THAC0, he gets to THAC0 -6. Finally, he casts Harm, right before turning the pages of the book.
Hooray! This tactic can only fail if Anomen rolls a critical miss, which is why I like it so much. Obviously it's not great against many Beholders at once. Notice invisible Jaheira in the background; had Anomen missed, she would have cast her Harm and tried her luck (hopefully landing the blow before the Anti-Magic Ray wore off and Anomen became vulnerable to the other Rays).
We clear out the Kobolds with no trouble whatsoever. There's a single Mist Horror to the south (which apparently casts Chaos), but Minsc deals with it using the Mace of Disruption for an instant kill. There are a few Mummies and Ghasts along the corridor, but Azuredge destroys them all before they can reach us.
Inside the library is another story. A Greater Mummy, two Skeleton Warriors (one ranged) and a Bone Golem. While Azuredge eventually spells the end of the undead, the Bone Golem is a construct, and hurts like nobody's business: Not even Mazzy can tank it for more than a few rounds. But why fight it fairly? The rest of the party retreats while Mazzy leads the slow Bone Golem around by the nose, taking shots with Azuredge (which can still hurt the Golem, being a +3 weapon). Eventually, we bring it down. Hooray!
Dace Sontan proves a bit of a menace, as he makes his save against both Azuredge and the Mace of Disruption every single time. Eventually he dies, but it's from the pure damage.
Finally, we head north again. Mazzy under Improved Invisibility is sent ahead, tanking a room full of Umber Hulks, while the rest of the party deals with the other room. We emerge back in the first area of the maze. There remains only the massive spawn at the exit, and a group of Yuan-Ti with a single attendant Mage. I'll clear these out too, because I do not want them joining in the battle.
A single Yuan-Ti Mage is no problem. We use a few Monster Summoning I (Imoen has one memorized, and we had a few scrolls of it too) to help drag the enemy after us, killing the Yuan-Ti at range as we retreat. Once the Mage is all that remains, elemental damage ammunition works nicely to bring about its demise.
OK. Time for the big fight. This is probably the most difficult part of the entire maze: We face three high-level enemy Mages, as well as a few melee grunts. I think the key is just to not underestimate them. A little dishonourable, but we have stealthed Minsc bait out three Oracles from the Mages, so they can't dispel our Illusions so easily later. And, well, what can we do? We must pass. Buff and attack!
Well that's just silly! What happened: We drew the Yuan-Ti toward us, as I'd rather fight them where we have clear lines of retreat. Cassius was busily Breaching after having first cast True Sight, and as Imoen has such a woeful initial memorization of spells, all I found for her to do was try and use our Wand of Paralyzation. And it stuck! Not once, but twice! Once paralyzed, a quick Breach followed by ranged damage meant the death of two of the Mages.
With two Mages down, we briefly turn our attention towards killing the melee grunts while Cassius strips the third one of its defenses. It has one unpleasant card up its sleeve, though: In a final act of defiance, it tosses a Finger of Death at Minsc! I pause and have Minsc quaff a Potion of Invulnerability. The save boost is sufficient to keep him alive, and the last Mage falls! Huzzah!
We're through! And we didn't even lose anyone! AND we still have spells remaining! We enter the second level, going east first to clear a spawn of Yuan-Ti with a singular Mage attached. And.. once again, the Wand of Paralyzation just works.
Once stunned, the dread Mage falls within seconds, followed by its fellow Yuan-Ti. We head south, clearing the Trolls (they're three regular ones and a single Spirit Troll, but our frontliners got a new batch of Chaotic Commands to keep them safe). A single Web does for the Minotaurs. Imoen pops a scroll of Minor Spell Deflection after receiving Protection from Fire + Resist Fire and Cold off Jaheira, allowing her to fetch the portraits in total safety (the statues cast Disintegrate, Incendiary Cloud and Fireball). We move back north.
We'll do all the fights here. Yes, even that abominable Noble Djinni, though he gives you nothing. First: The Ulitharid. With Chaotic Commands it can't do much to Mazzy and Minsc, but it does hit often and I don't want to spend too many Potions of Genius. Solution: Kite it. It soon falls to concentrated fire, but invisible Cassius had to strip its Improved Invisibility, as it was just too difficult to hit with it active. Oh, it also heals itself with CSW three times. Pfeh.
We clear the Umber Hulk while our Chaotic Commands are still running (it's just a melee brute). The Spirit Troll has trouble hitting us, but we also have trouble hitting it. Since there should be no Mage fights left, Cassius expends his final True Sight to bring it into view.
Note that we are actually making use of all the magical ammunition we find. It's true that ranged is inferior to melee damage-wise in BG2. But there are still many situations where you may want to use ranged attacks instead, particularly against enemies with nasty on-hit effects, or Mages that tend to run around inbetween casting spells.
I thought that three True Sight and five Breach on Cassius for the maze was a little bit of overkill, but turns out it wasn't quite enough: Jaheira has to spend her Wondrous Recall to get a True Seeing for dealing with the Noble Djinni. After turning to mist and regenerating once, and zapping us with lightning twice, he drops a Black Opal. I'm skipping him next time around.
We proceed to deal with the Werewolves and single Stone Golem to the northeast. The room with three Clay Golems is handled via a wall of Skeleton Warriors to absorb their curse-inducing blows, with Anomen, Minsc and Jaheira dismantling the Golems.
We swing back towards the south. Cassius manifests the Slayer against Bodhi, but once she flees, a Troll (I think it was trying to path to us) remains, beating on Cassius who, despite being supposedly overcome with bloodlust, do nothing at all to the Troll in return. Good thing Cassius had Stoneskin up or that might've been unpleasant.
We use our remaining Skeleton Warriors to help clear out the Minotaurs and singular Gauth on this level. Passing through the exit, we are subjected to tests, which we pass with flying colours. Cassius finds a use for his Skull Trap, as we use that and Imoen's Fireball to weaken the Trolls in the area with the altar.
Finally.. we are freed from the maze. We've got one spell above 2nd level left, so even though Irenicus awaits, we will certainly rest first. The most important thing in the fight to come is, of course, that Cassius survives. He'll get every protection spell available, and have several Spell Immunity memorized to keep them from being stripped. We'll kill the Clones first: Irenicus buffs with SI: Abjuration and has many Improved Mantle available, so we have little choice but to wait him out.
Also, we're going to bribe Lonk into letting the inmates out. We can certainly fight and beat him: But we may lose someone, Lonk gives no loot at all, and (most importantly) our short-timed buffs will expire before we face Irenicus. No. Lonk gets his blood money.
Cassius gets his protections: Protection from Fire/Cold/Lightning, Fireshield: Red/Blue, Death Ward, Chaotic Commands. That's as safe as we can make him currently. We also put up Minor Spell Deflection/Turning, MGOI and SI: Abjuration. Everyone gets Death Ward and Chaotic Commands, then a few general-purpose buffs, and away we go.
We fall back to the right edge of the room after the battle starts. Unfortunately, Irenicus leads with Remove Magic. Every single buff is stripped from everyone except Cassius. Damnit. Nothing we can do about that, just fight!
Clone Cassius is killed quickly, but Clone Jaheira gets an Insect Plague off (which fortunately only reaches Imoen, Mazzy and Jaheira as we scatter as best we can). Clone Imoen dies next... but manages to get Chaos off on Mazzy and Jaheira. Clone Minsc dies to a Chromatic Orb (hehe... I knew he'd fail his save!). Clone Anomen gets his Harm off, but goes after Tiax. A fitting end, I'd say. Clone Anomen is in turn held and killed.
Right around here.. this is where things turn really, really bad. Irenicus casts Symbol: Stun. Thankfully, Cassius' Chaotic Commands are untouched, so he is immune, and Mazzy and (how can this be?!) Minsc make their saves. Which of course means Jaheira, Imoen and Anomen fail theirs. They're essentially out of this fight now: With Irenicus' caster level, that'll last for 12 or so rounds.
Irenicus follows up by summoning an Efreeti. Cassius tries to counter with a Death Spell.. but nothing happens. I can't recall if this is vanilla behaviour or if it's SCS that makes them immune to it. Anyway, we have no way to kill it: I suppose a LOT of damage in rapid succession might work, but we can't bring such to bear right now. When we try to take it out, it just reverts to gaseous form and comes back in prime health. The reason you as a player never cast the spell is that your Efreeti/Djinni will go hostile if it is damaged enough to turn into mist, but enemy spellcasters of course do not have this problem.
So the Efreeti starts tossing out its instant-cast Fireball, which naturally hits all three incapacitated party members. Cassius desperately tries to get Invisibility off on Imoen, but it's too late, as the Efreeti launches an instant-cast Magic Missile.
At least Jaheira and Anomen are safe under Invisibility 10' Radius (Cassius cast it after they were affected by Symbol: Stun). And.. then Irenicus pulls out his Spell Trigger. 3x Chain Lightning.
So that's Jaheira down. Guess I'm lucky she wasn't chunked. Oh: That Nabassu was summoned by the tactical mastermind Dradeel. Sigh. Things are not good. We're running out of crazies to act as meatshields. But finally, finally, finally Irenicus has no more Improved Mantles. Mazzy lands an Arrow of Dispelling, and we are able to force his withdrawal!
That damnable Efreeti is still running around, but fine. And now, Yoshimo enters. Note that Anomen is still stunned, and is now visible: After summoning a demon to attack us, Dradeel caught Anomen with Remove Magic (don't ask me why an enemy-only spell affects us when Dradeel casts it, the crazies are crazy)... which of course only dispelled his Invisibility, not the stun effect.
Yoshimo gives his little self-indulgent speech and goes invisible. We have no True Sight or Detect Invisibility left... and of course Yoshimo goes for Anomen. I try to cast Cassius' Minor Sequencer on Anomen, but for some reason, it fails (it always seems to do this when loaded with Invisibility and not targetted at the caster... why? There's no reason for it). Cassius has no Invisibility left memorized. We try to block the cowardly traitor Yoshimo so that the Efreeti has time to kill Anomen first, but no.
Our rage is terrible to behold. The would-be Murderers that flood the room are mercilessly hacked down by Mazzy, their bodies burned by both frost and acid. Yoshimo is cleaved in twain by Minsc. Our fury is such that even the Efreeti turns to mist and flees. But it is all for naught. Anomen lies dead, and with such horrific injuries that no raising is possible.
We gather up our dead friends' belongings, and make for the exit. We will have to rest again: Who knows what foul things wait for us outside? And there are only three of us still standing. Cassius replenishes his power, and we head upstairs. We sneak by Saemon Havarian under Invisibility 10' Radius, dismantle the Stone Golem protecting Irenicus' office, and discover his notes. We know where you are going now, Irenicus. There will be no mercy, there will be no respite. You shall get exactly what you deserve.
We take the knave Havarian up on his offer, and are teleported outside. Nothing barrs our path but four Lizard Men. We casually dispose of them, and return to Brynnlaw.
The Temple raises Jaheira for 1200 gold, and as she comes back with Wondrous Recall memorized, she in turn raises Imoen. We use a scroll of Friends on Cassius and buy-out the Temple's stock of Potions of Genius for 3500 gold. We will be fighting Mind Flayers soon enough, and there will be scrolls we want to scribe. We also have a last look at the storekeep here: Cassius spends 2300 gold on a scroll of Spell Deflection. I'll not have him killed from lacking proper spell protection.
Imoen and Cassius scribe everything they have, boosted by Potions of Genius. Following this, a round of sherry is ordered. Everyone raises their glass to Anomen: A bit of a dunce sometimes, but our loyal friend nonetheless. I wish we could give you the sendoff you deserve, Anomen, but we are still in danger. We'll honour your name and deeds by hunting and slaying the vile wretch responsible for your fall.
I try to cast Cassius' Minor Sequencer on Anomen, but for some reason, it fails (it always seems to do this when loaded with Invisibility and not targetted at the caster... why? There's no reason for it).
What was the other spell in the sequencer (assuming you didn't have 2 x invisibility)? If that was self only, like mirror image, that wouldn't work on someone else.
I try to cast Cassius' Minor Sequencer on Anomen, but for some reason, it fails (it always seems to do this when loaded with Invisibility and not targetted at the caster... why? There's no reason for it).
What was the other spell in the sequencer (assuming you didn't have 2 x invisibility)? If that was self only, like mirror image, that wouldn't work on someone else.
Indeed, the other spell was Mirror Image. I've tested a Minor Sequencer with Invisibility and Luck, however.. and that still will fail if targetted on someone besides the caster. I'd argue that the desirable outcome should be that the spell/spells in the sequencer that is caster only fails, while the rest work (assuming you are close enough, in case the remaining spell/spells are touch range... and Cassius was standing right next to Anomen).
Anyway, I knew it would happen since I've tested it before, but figured I might as well hope against hope.
We return the second apprentice's staff to Kryn Darkflame. We visit Larswood and jack Baeloth's Evil Archmagi robe. I think it's time to clear the Nashkel Mines. We barrel right through it, though a Kobold Shaman gives Bruss a scare, causing him to set off all 3 traps near the entrance to the mine's 4th level. Garos has to stop dancing and cast Rallying Cry twice because the first one misses Bruss.
At Mulahey's fight, the half-orc manages to mentally dominate Spaz. Gaspar frees him with Dispel Charm. Bruss kills Mulahey soon after.
Rufus puts the kobold trash to sleep and they get cleaned up.
At the Valley of the Tombs, the Revenant is killed thanks to Garos' spirit bros. Narcillicus is neutered by Gaspar's charms. Another of Darkflame's apprentices, Xarius the Black, is in the tomb with 3 ghasts. Krieg lures out the ghasts one by one and they get killed by a firing line of spirit archers. Rufus tries to silence Xarius but he saves against it.
Spaz tries a Wand of Paralysis, but Xarius fires his prebuffs before the projectile arrives.
Krieg, Spaz, and Rufus escape outside and Garos goes in instead. The spirit army gets several hits on the shadow mage, but he blocks any further attempts with Black Mist, blinding the spirits. With them disabled, Garos also escapes outside to summon more spirits, but Xarius follows. Gaspar manages to charm him, but he wriggles free of his control before the round is over.
The shadow mage's prebuffs expire and his Shadeskins are all destroyed by Bruss and and a spirit archer. Rufus and a spirit defeat Xarius.
He has a couple of neat items on him too, including shadow scrolls for level 1 and level 2. Rufus learns Curse (Shadow Weave version of IWDification Curse but ignores MR) and Black Mist (blindness cloud in 60' diameter for 1 turn, save vs. spell at -2 negates).
We return to Beregost to eliminate a certain meddlesome old man. This is why I specc'd Rufus into trap-setting. Garos learns Dispel Magic and Fury of the Winds, and can summon spirit berserkers now. Spaz can spam skeleton mooks for us, and Rufus learns Expunge Magic (as Dispel Magic but cast at 1.5x level) and Inertia (as Slow; also make a second save vs. spell but at no modifier or be held for 1 round).
: Come try me again after another 2000 more years, old man.
: Did something just happen? I feel stronger now for no reason. : Dunno, but I feel it too. : So do I! That's so weird!
After selling the loot we've found, we buy a bunch of specialty items from Kryn Darkflame for Rufus, including a scroll for levels 1, 2, and 3. He learns Shadow Rope (guaranteed stun effect for 1 round and pulls target toward you), Dark Mirage (Blur+Mirror Image for 5 turns), and Shadow Binding (Hold Person, but works on almost anything, save vs. spell at -4 negates).
Now for the bandit camp. A bandit calls the alarm and sends everyone and their mama out to get us. In the ensuing chaos, Bruss and Krieg are slowed by Venkt, forcing us to use our only 2 invisibility potions on them so they can escape. The archers keep targeting Garos as he dances, so he takes several hits from them. When Garos leaves the spirits' sight range, they are compelled to follow until they physically bump into him. This makes our retreat dicey.
Spaz attempts to summon skeletons for us and Gaspar tries to charm bandits. They gain us precious seconds, but they can't kill any of them. The spirits make some headway in culling the horde as they take out Taurgosz.
They just keep barreling toward us. Rufus puts many of the grunts to sleep, but there's just too many. If Garos or Bruss take one more hit, they're dead, and I can't count on Krieg to take out this many enemies without falling into a rage spiral. We are forced to retreat to the Friendly Arm Inn.
We rest at the Inn. Bruss gains his first Zenkai Boost as a result.
- ZENKAI BOOST: Saiyans are the perfect fighting machines. When a saiyan survives and fully recovers from a near-death experience by natural or artificial healing, they become stronger, faster, and tougher than they were before. Saiyans receiving a Zenkai Boost gain +1 AC/THAC0/damage and +3 max HP. Zenkai Boosts cannot be caused by self-inflicted wounds or wounds caused by party members.
We return to the bandit camp but they only give us about 2 rounds to prebuff before finding us again. Spaz begins spamming The Dead Walk while Bruss and Krieg get into the thick of it. Rufus puts the lower level bandits to sleep and Bruss's Solar Flare works this time, blinding most onlookers.
With Shadow Rope added to his arsenal, Rufus pulls Venkt away from the crowd and stuns him for a round. This is just long enough for a spirit berserker to chunk him.
Though Gaspar is on charm duty, his multi-charm ability isn't very effective. Spaz continues spamming skellybros. Rufus casts Dark Mist, blinding most caught in the massive AoE cloud. Garos' spirits have bad saves vs. spell, so they are blinded for most of the time. Should've had him stop dancing and switch to Fury of the Winds with his bow.
We're making headway now that the bandits are blind and because Spaz has many skeletons summoned. They're somewhat magic resistant so they can fight well in the fog. Bruss and Krieg clear out any detritus that has escaped the fog. Soon, all of the bandits are dead. Phew... Wouldn't want to try that solo.
Ender Sai is freed and we return to the Friendly Arm Inn. A certain old man is back from the dead, but Rufus makes sure he stays down.
: It's been two days, not two thousand years! Can you even count? : So that's what that was! : HE'LL MAKE A GREAT CENTERPIECE FOR YOUR MANTLE
The Cloakwood awaits. I'm going to stock up on potions before leaving.
Krieg - War Hulk 6 Garos - Warhorn Shaman 6 Bruss - Saiyan Monk(ey) 6 Rufus - Thief 6/Shadow Adept 5 Spaz - Warlock 7 Gaspar - Seducer 7
@Flashburn Just wondering who Kryn Darkflame is. The name doesn't ring a bell.
Silly me, I keep forgetting to include screenshots of that guy. When you arrive at the Friendly Arm Inn for the first time, he teleports in when you get close enough to this spot. He can give you a quest to find his missing apprentices who have gone mad with power after they let the Shadow Weave take too much of themselves. He sells normal wares (basically a copy of High Hedge's store) and special wares for Shadow Weave users. He's from the Shadow Magic mod.
Before wrapping up chapter 3 Itis decided to clean the sewers and the second level of WK.
A nice flail head as the most notable loot.
Then did the planar prison for the cash and some boots.
In BG1 Itis didnt wear the boots, but for the lack of an obvious alternative the boots of speed will have to suffice.
Windspear hill was cleared.I left the sewer key and the dragon for Bondari
The golems pack a punch in this place, so Tasherons bow worked well whilst the ring of gaxx healed Itis.
Bodhi was beaten and Itis finally set sail. Packed with scrolls and gems for sale in the City of caverns. Spellhold was cleared in great style.
No Spellhold lich - nice
I went to the underdark by boat. The grand sale by the merchant netted 200.000 gp, and the ensuing debacle yielded two cloaks. Itis will wear one of these until Cespenar can work wonders on the other.
I got True Sight from my page turning - fortunate I dare say.
The underdark was done quick and dirty 1) killed a demon 2) promised a dragon this and that 3) went shopping in Ust Natha 4) killed the said dragon 5) killed the kua toa and the drow gatekeepers 6) and got the hell out
On the way back I recruited Drizzt for the Bodhi fight. I had dumped his scimitars when exporting...
Before the Bodhi fight Itis got an armor upgrade and some new pants.
Itis is starting to look like a solid contender
Bodhi was easy with all the help. Drizzt dealt the final blow..
Picked up the greenstone amulet in the underdark as the final detour before facing Irenicus. The elven city was a breeze - besides the hard hitting golems
The first Irenicus fight is pretty easy when SCS isnt installed. Some low lever summons baited out the best spells. An easy victory
In hell Itis picked up a nifty long sword and 50 % mr ( she was so clumsy with those tears...). The last Irenicus fight was fought and won with some HLA help..
Fang joined up with Montaron to do some pickpocketting as his own pickpocketting ability is abysmal. On the way they killed an ankheg with digestion due to eating something that would have been better left.
This was primarily to get the ring of freedom of action as he intended to go to Durlag's Tower next and the big danger for a solo character is being held by the ghasts. He left Montaron at Ulgoth's Beard. He discovered that his trap detecting ability wasn't great even with buffs so he used thge potion of clarity in order to get the Wisdom boosting tome and the loot from the chests with similarly life-threatening traps. Before releasing Kirinhale he pickpocketted her several times.
Some chests had to be left as he couldn't disarm them. He didn't even attempt some rooms. However he left with considerable loot and one level higher. He will return after levelling up and having more skill in disarming traps. Backstabbing the ghasts turned out to be easy.
Upon returning to beregost he took a tome to Firebead thus getting his reputation to 20.
He then went to hunt Bassilus. Hen used the Cloak of Algernon to charm him which was timed perfectly as the aerial servant also became an ally. They then took on Zargal et al with no problems. Bassilus was held by a ghast which made killing him much easier.
The aerial servant was then used to clear the area. EDIT Fang then took on the assassins Tristan and Isolde. Killing them turned out to be no mean feat and took a long time. At first I thought that they were immune to backstab as Fang tried it over and over again without success. I managed to separate them which helped somewhat. Eventually Fang both wounded and poisoned Tristan. Tristan then went here and there quickly so that there was no chance of backstabbing almost as if panicked, but no yellow circle. At that point Fang switched targets and was almost killed. He therefore quit the area and returned when healed. Isolde was invisible upon fang's return and delivered an almost fatal blow. ONce more flight seemed the best option. Upon returning for about the fourth time a backstab on Tristan worked and he fell with just one blow. The same then happened to Isolde.
Thorin, a dwrven defender who wants to go to Durlag's then jpoined Fang. This is intended to be a long term partnership.
Outside the Nashkel Mine the amazons were pulled away individually for easy disposal.
Back in Nashkel Burl dodged a horror from Nimbul before stabbing him through his mirrors.
A single hit prompted Tranzig to run - without success - and Burl was able to move on to the Bandit Camp. That would be a formidable obstacle in SCS due to the danger of going berserk in response to the hordes of missiles coming. However, in this unmodded installation Burl could work his way through ones or twos pretty much untroubled. At Tazok's tent he dodged in and out, evading spells while killing Venkt's companions. He wasn't too worried though about being hit by Venkt's LMDs while working through mirrors.
After resting to get Bhaal horror, Burl did a quick questing tour to push reputation up to 20 and recover the charisma tome. He then invested in some equipment upgrades, including swapping his +2 dagger for a poisonous variety. The poison didn't work on battle horrors, but that didn't make much difference as Burl picked up his final BG1 level while going to get the tome at Durlag's Tower.
After skipping through the Cloakwood, Burl charmed and killed Genthore. Kysus was then charmed and killed Rezdan with a fireball before Burl cleaned up.
Inside the mine he rapidly went down to find Davaeorn. The battle horrors were disposed of before a potion of magic blocking and Greenstone Amulet charge let him melee Davaeorn freely - ignoring the summoned monsters attempting to help the mage.
In the City Burl picked up the tomes. He did though have his most worrying moment to date when a single hit from Larze sent him berserk. By that stage the ogre had been hit several times and was himself in trouble, but his greater APR let him do significant further damage to Burl and a critical miss with his final blow would have been fatal to him.
There were no more problems though, with the Iron Throne fight being split up into chunks on the stairs as usual.
At Candlekeep Burl's War Hulk strength meant he didn't need any potions to loot the tombs. On exiting he took a diversion to find the Red Wizards - using a few fireballs there to acquire the Ring of Energy.
Back at Baldur's Gate Burl didn't bother activating Krystin - just using LMD to annoy Slythe before he got close enough to talk. A bit of running round and stabbing with his poisoned dagger then did the trick.
Before going to the palace Burl bought a Wand of Sleep to help compensate for his poor APR. Though I don't normally resort to using charms on the doppleganger noblemen I did do lower myself to doing that this time to a couple of them. As it happened a first use of the wand rendered 2 of the dopplegangers unconscious, which would probably have made the fight simple anyway.
I also don't normally allow use of autopause, but enabled that as well to make sure there were no mishaps when the other dopplegangers eventually recovered from charm and showed themselves.
As usual I failed to bypass all the maze traps - setting off one of the lightning ones. I'm not really sure why it seems to be more difficult to avoid those in v2.5. High HPs meant there was no danger there though.
The Undercity party were left alone as Burl went to find Sarevok. A magic missile was used to activate just him and Semaj. The mage teleported close to the dais to get the others involved and Angelo came out to play even though Burl used the Ring of Energy to finish Semaj off from a distance. Angelo's exploding arrows then did some damage before the poisoned dagger got him. Tazok missed his free attack from invisibility though and was far too slow to get another chance. Sarevok is not quite as slow to attack, but still failed to even make an attack as Burl stabbed him to death.
Burl levelled up immediately on entry to SoD. Here's his character record and inventory at that point:
War Hulk L9, 166 HPs (incl. 5 from Helm), 351 kills
Alright, no sense in moping about. We need to get out of Brynnlaw, we need to pass through all manner of dangerous locales, and we need to do so without our Cleric.
We'll replace Anomen with Viconia, assuming we live long enough to get back to Athkatla. Since she has a slight Strength problem, we try to steal back the Ashen Scales +2 from the Brynnlaw storekeep (Imoen gets to 100 Pick Pockets with a Potion of Master Thievery, Gloves of Pickpocketing and Luck)... but it's not enough, so we are caught and lose 2 reputation. Which I guess isn't terrible since we'll need to manage reputation if we want to keep Viconia, anyway.
We steal the Horn and a few gems, and power through the would-be enslaving pirates blocking our path. The Pirate Mage casts Dimension Door and... disappears? Truly strange: Mazzy ran through the entire town, but the Mage was nowhere to be found. Eh, she drops a Quarterstaff +1 and that's it, no great loss. Saemon takes the helm of Desharik's ship, and we are away.
I should've remembered to prebuff extensively before we left, as we are now forced into fighting a bunch of heavily buffed Githyanki and their weird powers. We are Confused, Stunned and forced to Sleep... I'm surprised no one died. Sauhagin interrupt the one-sided battle, and we awake in the City-Of-Caverns.
Slightly unfortunate behaviour here: The negative effects from the Githyanki fight are still in play. Fortunately, Confused Imoen/Cassius do not start attacking the Sauhagin during the cutscenes, and even though Mazzy/Minsc are Mazed, we draw out the fight with the Ettin until they return and can handle it for us. We agree to go after the Rebel Prince, and are given free (well... supposedly Loyalist forces still attack us) reign of the city.
We head south first to grab Sekolah's tooth. Another Bone Golem lies in wait, but Mazzy has Boots of Speed now, and we easily kite it around, taking potshots with Azuredge. I'd prefer fighting it properly, but it just deals too much damage. We play a game with the Imps, get our reward, and Sekolah's tooth (the Spectator is allowed to depart peacefully, as wise Cassius argues in favour of allowing us to retrieve the tooth).
This whole city is basically a respite from horrendous, life-threatening encounters. The Sauhagin have excellent THAC0 and good damage, can poison on hit, and have a few bolts that stun on a failed save. But damage can be mended, poison can be cured, and stun can be prevented with Chaotic Commands, so in the end, there's not much danger here, as long as we keep hitpoints high and Chaotic Commands up. They have a handful of Priestesses, but they are easily kept interrupted, even with their Stoneskins.
Cassius pops a Project Image (one of several potent spells we now have access to), just so we can conjure up a wall of Skeleton Warriors without wasting real spell slots (the Image casts Invisibility 10' Radius as well, so Cassius won't catch a stray bolt stunning him). These five Skeleton Warriors are enough to help us clear almost all of the city, including the big gaggle of undead to the south (with some help from Mazzy).
As they cannot follow us down the stairs, we dismantle the remaining Skeleton Warriors before going down: Only two remained, but they did their job well. I try something out here, and it does work: There are eight Sauhagin down the stairs, two in the water next to where you appear, and six further south. The ones to the south are not called in to help by the ones in the water, and so Mazzy can shoot them down with impunity (no Sauhagin can outshoot Mazzy). Once they are removed, Cassius heads down and pops his second Project Image, which in turn conjures five more Skeleton Warriors and, under PfMW, goes forth to slay the remaining Sauhagin at no risk to us.
We speak with the Prince and agree to help him. We have no Monk, and I would like Jaheira to eventually wield Spears (i.e. the Impaler +3, even though we'll likely have better options by the time she has amassed the necessary proficiencies). Having used Project Image for dealing with the spawns throughout the city, Cassius and Imoen have nearly all their spells remaining. Four Skeleton Warriors and a Fire Elemental (conjured by Imoen, and thankfully it didn't turn on us) form a wall upon which the Sauhagin crash like waves.
We receive our reward, and head for the entrance to the Underdark. I intend to take my time with the Underdark, clearing the Kuo-Toans, Beholders and Mind Flayers before entering Ust Natha, simply because I absolutely do not want to be rushed. Heck, the Beholder Hive doesn't even need to be entirely cleared in one go. We might go after the imprisoned souls, but there's a Lich among them who will certainly summon a Pit Fiend. We'll decide on that later. Following a rest, we set out. The great depths of the Underdark stretch before us...
Deep breaths. The Underdark isn't guaranteed to be lethal! Only nearly so. Let's start by not dying in the same ignoble fashion as Aldain the Conjurer. Invisibility 10' Radius is applied after Minsc and Mazzy receive Chaotic Commands from Jaheira. They'll dispose of the three Mind Flayers directly north of where we enter, while the rest of the party relaxes in perfect safety.
Truly, words cannot encompass the totality of our failure. So: Minsc and Mazzy moved north. The Mind Flayers are permanently and undispellably invisible until they spot an enemy (Divination spells reveal them, but they immediately turn invisible again), so Mazzy goes visible. And the literal bombardment of Ballistic Attack begins.
Mazzy and Minsc try ranged attacks first, but they're dealing too little damage, and our rapidly dwindling potion supply just can't keep up with the damage (I'm not exaggerating: While I'm not sure of the cooldown, Ballistic Attack deals 30-40ish blunt damage with no save, and apparently never misses either). They close to melee, but the Mind Flayers are just hitting too often and draining Intelligence. We might have been able to kill at least one, but Mazzy uncharacteristically suffered morale failure and started running all over the caverns.
Well, there's no way we can kill them now: Ballistic Attack automatically kills Skeleton Warriors, and anything else in way of summons will just get Held and eaten. So, we stealthily pick up the Bag of Holding, stuff everything into it, and sneak towards the Deep Gnome village in the northwest. How do we get past the Drow War Party? We bait out each and every one of their 6 Divination spells by ducking around the corner when they start to cast. Yes, it took quite some time.
We arrive at the Swirfneblin village and agree to help them, but that is for later (much, much later...). Jaheira had Wondrous Recall memorized and so returns our valiant frontliners to life.
Alright. Clearly, we cannot afford to underestimate any enemy down here. I don't like it, but we're going to have to go in guns blazing against every encounter (read: Buffed to the hilt). Which will mean one, maybe two encounters per rest, as with only Jaheira to cover Death Ward and Chaotic Commands, that's all we can scrounge up divine spell slots for.
So, we rest up. The Myconid colony closest to the village is handled via Skeleton Warriors, with some Skull Trap/Fireball/Haste support from Imoen and Cassius, and invisible Mazzy directing the action.
Next, the Mind Flayers must die. If we leave them, it's a matter of time until we're headed back to the Swirfneblin village and forget all about them in their little corner overlooking the path to the village.. and then it's just game over, man! We buff extensively, key spells being Haste (of course), Chaotic Commands, Improved Invisibility for Mazzy/Minsc/Jaheira, an early True Sight, and two Mordenkainen's Sword. Things go much better this time: The Mind Flayers die before they can get the Ballistic Attack spam going. In fact, they accomplish almost nothing.
With two encounters cleared, we don't feel like pressing our luck, and so retreat to rest up. Next, the Drow War Party. Jaheira has to spend both L6 slots on Wondrous Recall to cover everyone with Chaotic Commands (Minsc can technically make do without as he has Lilarcor, but I'm worried about stuns), so she can't provide any Fire Elementals: Imoen picks up the slack, and neither of her conjured Fire Elementals turn on us. Joined by two Mordenkainen's Sword and a Skeleton Warrior at the fore, we charge in!
We're able to quickly kill off two Priestesses, but the rest take much longer. There are two Drow Mages here, they both start with full defensive buffs... and when we Breach them, they apply a Spell Sequencer with Stoneskin/FS:R/FS:B. Sigh. Still, we make progress, even though a Death Spell eventually knocks out our wall of summons. Unfortunately, while the enemy Mages aren't dreadfully effective, one of them manages to get Remove Magic off on Minsc (who is a bit wounded since he had to hold the line once our summons dropped). With almost no protective magics to keep him safe, the result is not unexpected.
Honestly, had that been a chunking, I would've cancelled the run.. Anomen is one thing, but Cassius ain't going nowhere without Minsc and Boo. But Minsc is alive (well no, but he can be brought back!). We apply yet more Breach, and the vaunted Mages soon fall, as do their wicked compatriots.
Friggin' Drow. We rest up yet again, and Minsc is returned to us. Thinking we're in for another massive fight, we approach the bridge, again with mighty summons and full defensive spellworks... but these Drow prove no difficulty whatsoever. They have not a single Mage among them, and their laughable Priestess has only 4th level spells available. I'm making a mental note: Bridge Drow = Pushovers.
On our way back to the village for yet another rest, we free the Swirfneblin, and tackle the easier trapped souls: Madman Aganalo and Riti. Aganalo accomplishes nothing save hurting our Fire Elemental a little bit, and Riti similarly falls swiftly after True Sight and Breach. Jhor the Bleeder +2 actually goes to Minsc... that's right, he now has ++ in Bastard Swords! Because he's Minsc, and Minsc uses swords.
We rest for what seems the twentieth time, but is probably only the fifth or so. Another fight that is way easier than I had envisioned follows, as the Kuo-Toan party to the southeast can do nothing to us. Noted.
Alright! We rest... again. Now is probably a good time to help Vithal. I know it's way more profitable to just kill him in the end, but we're nice people. The first wave of Elementals are by far the most annoying, as the Greater Earth Elemental casts Stoneskin on itself constantly, and leads with an Earthquake. A few Breach are required to bring it down, but we manage to get Chaos off on its three summoned Earth Elementals. Improved Invisibility was helpful, as the Earth Elementals hit hard.
Fire elementals aren't a big deal, as long as everyone has Protection from Fire, and we do. The Greater Fire Elemental casts Flame Strike incessantly, but since we're all but immune, little comes of it.
The Greater Air Elemental has some kind of push attack that's quite irritating and actually casts Chain Lightning, but it's not overly dangerous. Still, we break out our last two Improved Invisibility.
And that's it! Upon Vithal's return, we gently suggest our reward is a bit on the small side (a one-charge item seems a bit cheap...), and we get a scroll of Simulacrum (eh) and ADHW (hooray!) for our troubles. We once more tread the by now familiar path to the Swirfneblin village. Next time, we shall deal with the Balor, and then (following careful deliberation) decide which evil-infested hovel shall be the first cleansed.
But that is for later. For now, we leave the party at the Swirfneblin inn. Though saddened by Anomen's demise, the party is happy to still be alive. The Swirfneblin brew a strange ale from fungus, and Cassius is brave enough to try it. Soon, the entire party is partaking of the brew, chatting amicably amongst themselves: It is a welcome respite from the overbearing dangers that still threaten them.
Aldain said... We'll replace Anomen with Viconia, assuming we live long enough to get back to Athkatla. Since she has a slight Strength problem, we try to steal back the Ashen Scales +2 from the Brynnlaw storekeep ...
@aldain - good armor for Viconia is the Ankheg plate as she is strong enough to use it. The spawn for the Ankheg is near the cabin in Windspear Hills. You can also get a war dog on the spawn point. Just keep resting until you get an ankheg and its shell. Then go to Cromwell and forge the ankheg plate and voila! Decent armor for Viconia.
We buy some potions from High Hedge and Kryn Darkflame, and buy the Quarterstaff +3 and Greenstone Amulet at Ulgoth's Beard. On the way back to the Friendly Arm to travel to Cloakwood, we finally encounter the first of the bounty hunters. They are no trouble, they just caught us unawares.
Cloakwood 1 is pretty standard. The druids may have had prebuffs and a panther and a bear helping them, but they fell all the same. As soon as we arrive in Cloakwood 2, three Phase Spiders teleport over! This is really gamey, SCS, come on. At least give me a minute to get my bearings first! The spiders are dispatched, and though Bruss and Krieg get poisoned, I am quick to use antidotes on them. If not cured immediately, Krieg will spiral out of control because of poison ticks.
The rest of Cloakwood 2 is handled by 4 of Spaz's skellybros escorted by an invisible Rufus. Rufus digs out Spider's Bane +2 from the Centeol's nest without breaking invisibility via the inventory screen and brings it to Krieg, who equips it. The rest of the party is parked outside the nest. Krieg enters and baits the spiders into following him, only to have them slaughtered by spirits and skellies.
Moving on to Cloakwood 3, another set of bounty hunters appears. The amazon band is more dangerous than the Gullykin hunters. Two of them start invisible. One backstabs Gaspar, but he has health to spare. Rufus pulls the cleric using Shadow Rope to interrupt her casting.
But he gets backstabbed for it by the other invisible amazon that I forgot about. If it was a critical, he would've died. Shadeskin can't come soon enough. Garos blasts the cleric with Fury of the Winds' bonus damage while Bruss finishes her off. Rufus casts Inertia, paralyzing the last amazon for 1 round, but it's long enough to kill her. He levels up to 7 and learns Kaioken x3 and Blind Fight.
-KAIOKEN x3: +4 THAC0/AC/damage/movement, +1 attack/round, fists count as +2; -1 CON/round, +4 fatigue after 3 rounds, 15% damage vulnerability. Power up time: 4 -BLIND FIGHT: The Saiyan's senses become so keen that they can fight with their eyes closed or while blinded as well as they can with their normal vision. Blind Fight effectively renders the Saiyan immune to Blindness, as they do not need to see their opponent in order to know where they are.
I skip Cloakwood 3 and 4 and just head straight for the mines. Spaz summons 3 skellybros and Rufus scouts ahead. The skellies kill Kysus before they even knew what hit him.
The other mage Rezdan freaks out and throws up prebuffs, trying to escape from the skeletons. But that just leads him right into our party and 3 spirit archers. Gaspar manages to charm him.
He commands the mage to throw out a Chaos on Drasus and Genthore. Genthore is confused but Drasus resists. Gaspar also charms Drasus and makes him fight Genthore. Krieg is taking care of those two fighters. Everyone else is focused on the mage. Rezdan's Mirror Images are all destroyed and Rufus grabs him with a Shadow Rope to keep him from casting anything.
Drasus and Genthore are wiped up. Krieg gets the Boots of Speed so he can retreat if he needs to. In the second level of the mine, I come up with a pincer attack plan for the big room with all the bandits and the female mage in it. Garos summons spirits in the south while Spaz summons skellies and sends them in from the side with the hidden wall. It takes way longer than I thought it would, but the rest of our party doesn't have to lift a finger.
Trying to ride the spirit wave, Garos has an army at his command on the third level. They butcher all opposition, but it's difficult for them to attack anything that tries to flee. Natasha the mage does exactly this, as she continuously pelts Garos with Minute Meteors, bringing him down to critical health. He rounds a corner to escape her line of sight while Bruss and a skeleton warrior give chase. She eventually sees where we're holed up and Slows the party.
But Krieg responds with a mighty blow that stuns Natasha for 1 round. Bruss and a skeleton warrior can only remove so many mirror images in one round, and she starts escaping again. They chase her down the hallway and into a room. But Bruss is wise to her Evocation chant and senses something is amiss. He flees the room just as a Sunfire bursts out of Natasha. The skeleton's MR prevails and it keeps attacking. Natasha tries using Magic Missile on Bruss, but he successfully swats it away with Ki Deflection.
Slow has worn off, so Krieg joins the fight. Natasha is finally dead. Krieg gives Garos his only extra-healing potion to maintain his spirit army.
In Davaeorn's sanctum, Rufus disables the traps in the hallway and scouts ahead. Dave tries Detect invisibility, but Rufus is immune thanks to his Cloak of Non-Detection. Spaz sends in his skellies to draw the Battle Horrors into the spirits' line of sight. Dave releases a minor sequencer of Web+Stinking Cloud onto them.
The spirits hold on just fine, but Dave teleports away somewhere after wasting a couple of enchantment spells on the spirits. I can't figure out where he went. The Battle Horrors are killed and Garos levels up.
Suddenly, guards come through the door to the upper levels.
The last Battle Horror is destroyed by the spirits and they rally around Garos, now focusing on Dave because he unwisely teleported right into the center of our party. The fighters quickly tear away his Mirror Images and he tries to teleport away, but Bruss interrupts his casting with a Ki Blast Volley.
Dave pelts Garos with Minute Meteors, but he is easily eviscerated. Chapter 5 complete!
We pay Drizzt a visit. Rufus keeps Drizzt still for a few rounds using Shadow Rope since it bypasses magic resistance, but learns that it only pauses the target instead of stunning it, which means you still have to roll to hit. Krieg levels up from him.
At Wyrm's Crossing, another of Darkflame's apprentices awaits us, Chang Yu'ke. This one summons wraiths!
: NO! Not again! Not the level drain!
We take out two wraiths and Rufus tries Expunge Magic to take down Chang's buffs, but it fails. Chang casts Black Lightning. It's Chain Lightning that does half fire and half electrical damage, and save vs. spell or go berserk for 3 rounds. Bruss fails to save and goes berserk. Krieg and Gaspar get tagged by wraiths, draining them of one level. Gaspar manages to charm it before getting hit. I have them NOPE out of there and go back across the bridge. Rufus casts Shadow Binding which holds all of the enemies except one wraith.
This wraith, our temporary former ally, is now badly injured after being focused on and turns on his summoner by casting Lifedrinker Touch to heal itself, which kills Chang.
The healed wraith is killed and then the rest of the held wraiths are destroyed. Phew.
Chang has a ring that gives +1 CON and +4 to saves vs. death for Shadow Adepts, but a Ring of Protection +1 and Ring of Wizardry are a better fit. He also drops shadow scrolls for level 2 and 3, plus a wand of Shadow Missiles.
Rufus learns Ghostly Visage (level 2: for 1 turn/level, +10% physical damage resistance and immunity to level 1 spells) and Shadow Spear (level 3: as Spell Thrust, plus some additional side effects on a failed save vs. spell, but you have to throw it at the target for it to work). The big city and its oodles of safe XP await.
Krieg - War Hulk 7 Garos - Warhorn Shaman 7 Bruss - Saiyan Monk(ey) 7 Rufus - Thief 6/Shadow Adept 5 Spaz - Warlock 7 Gaspar - Seducer 7
And coming back after a hiatus, it's nice to see the place still so active (and with a couple new runs in the hall of fame!) My own run of Shaman + Wizard Slayer got cut tragically short as I forgot a Remove Fear prebuff on my Wizard Slayer Tilly and the Dragon Fear aura around the Gate Lich meant she couldn't keep nullifying its spells. The rest of the party inadvisedly tried to save her, but an unseen sequencer with Web and Stinking Cloud in a tiny room gave the Lich time to recover from its spell failure and... the results were inevitable.
I thought I'd have a go with the poverty challenge with one small change: I'm allowing myself to purchase temple services from gold directly obtained from quests, so stuff like the reward for Basillus, or from Berrun Ghastkill. I don't think I can survive until my cleric hits level 9 with only one death.
Introducing the team:
Credit for these portraits go to... Um... razors, shizen1102, Dyzdar, quickreaver, kittypinkart, Marikunochka all from Deviantart for Aster, Tanriq, Eona, Thaddeus, Kyra, and Raven respectively, and of course LadyRhian for compiling these pictures into an easy-to-find thread.
So all these classes are fairly standard, except that I'm fielding one less sorcerer and one more druid-spellcaster than most, and I think the Priest of Helm hasn't been used in a poverty run yet? Could be wrong. Anyhow, Priest of Helm is for his +4, 3APR Seeking Sword and True Seeing at low levels is always nice. Thaddeus is interesting, and my possible answer to the lategame: his stats are all within dual range, and there's a possibility of going either Shapeshifter 13 -> Fighter or Shapeshifter 15 -> Fighter. Greater Werewolf + Enchanted Weapon + Fighter HLAs has potential to be decent, though Earth Elemental + Enchanted Weapon + Fighter HLAs is probably better... but comes online ~3m experience later. I'll decide if I somehow get to BG2.
Known spells: Tanriq: Shillelagh, CLW. Raven: Protection from Petrification, MM Eona: Blindness, MM
I decided to postpone Wulfred Whitebeard for a while as I have had a few Berserker runs recently. Instead I am going with Sharsteal, a Svirfneblin Illusionist/Thief.
The extra dexterity and stealth for being Svirfneblin will improve her thieving abilities considerably, but the 30% penalty in experience will I think more than compensate.
Summoning weasels worked very well against Shank and Carbos as the assassins attacked the weasels.
However the AI for Mendas was much better. He ignored the weasels and went straight for Sharsteal. What is more, he used stealth and backstab whenever possible. This brought Sharsteal down to 1 HP twice so Sharsteal had to use two healing potions. It was just as well that he had used the oil of speed in the training room!
When it came to the fight against Tarnesh, the weasels worked well in absorbing Tarnesh's magic missiles. They only deliver non-lethal damage, so unfortunately, it was the guards who delivered the final blow.
Comments
The basilisks are next on the agenda.
BG1EE updates: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
SoD updates: 1, 2, 3, 4
BG2EE SoA updates: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7
We return to our party, poised to cleanse the De'Arnise Keep of its invaders.
With countermeasures in place against the most devastating power of the Spirit Trolls (Chaotic Commands to ward off Greater Command), things proceed apace. Cassius unleashes flame and ash upon the vile Trolls.
Unfortunately, one Spirit Troll has a bit of flame and ash of his own to retaliate with.
Some panicked scrambling and healing later, we press on, dealing with the next group in much the same fashion.
The interior of the first level cleansed, we head outside, kill the Otyugh and the four dogs, and ascend unto the parapets, where a massive group of Trolls lie in wait. But as they have no Spirit or even Spectral Trolls among them, we simply weave a few protective/augmenting enchantments and charge.
We open the drawbridge, prepare a batch of Dog Stew á la Anomen, and climb the stairs to the second level.
The Yuan-Ti Mage here is momentarily distracted via the single-charge Wand of Summoning from Irenicus' dungeon, but we needn't have bothered: He is apparently a Necromancer. Necromancers, while very appealing RP-wise, are just too vulnerable without defensive Illusions. The Yuan-Ti spends his first action casting PfMW, which a single Breach clears right up, along with his Stoneskin and sundry other defensive buffs. Immediate application of mass ranged attacks ensures the Necromancer's demise.
We clear all the Trolls on this level before going for Glaicus (there were only small groups of mostly regular Trolls, easily handled even without buffs). Cautious Cassius sends Mazzy to occupy Glaicus while he Dispels the powerful Enchantment the former is under, and that was probably a wise decision, as Glaicus beats poor Mazzy quite severely before coming to his senses (horrible though it sounds, better Mazzy than Cassius).
Almost all Trolls are cleared out now, so we proceed to the Golems. The first two pairs (one Stone, one Flesh) are as always no issue, especially since we've called upon five 7HD Skeleton Warriors to absorb the damage. The final duo (Iron and Clay) surprisingly goes smoothly as well: We merely apply a few basic buffs, Jaheira and Anomen swiftly destroy the Clay Golem with two Skeleton Warriors attracting its attention, and then Mazzy, Minsc and Anomen go after the Iron Golem. It seems to prefer going after the Skeleton Warriors swarming it, stopping only occasionally to cast its Gas Cloud, which we dodge as best we can by scattering. Soon, the powerful construct falls.
We make a quick detour into the dungeons: The initial group of Trolls is cleared out (again, just a small group, so no worries), after which the Umber Hulks are lured away by Anomen's cooking.
We actually clear them out as well afterwards; Cassius had an Improved Invisibility left, and with Chaotic Commands still running, Mazzy (popping the Mirror Image 1/day from Ibratha +1) takes the fore, cleaving through carapaces with ease using her potent new Frostreaver +3.
We swipe everything, and as alluded to previously, retreat. We are in no shape to fight TorGal, let alone his massive group of melee brutes and (let us not forget) two high-level Yuan-Ti Mages.
We forge the Flail of Ages +3 on the way out, which goes to Anomen: He'll slowly build up his proficiency with Flails to utilize it properly.
Once outside, we apply Invisibility 10' Radius, and Cassius (after quaffing potions to reach 24 Intelligence) scribes a fair few scrolls, including Spell Trap and Mordenkainen's Sword: The latter might actually come in very handy within a fairly short amount of time.. the former less so.
Here's a picture of his L6 spells after scribing.
That's actually a pretty darn good selection. L6 isn't a spell level for big damage, instant death or potent summons; it's a level for defenses, utility and anti-Mage spells. And we've got all the important ones now: PfMW, True Sight (yes, Priests can cast this.. but a properly buffed Cassius will never be interrupted while casting it, unlike Anomen and even Jaheira), Pierce Magic, Death Spell, Contingency.. good stuff!
So, TorGal. He's a big melee threat, as are his (in my view perhaps a few too many) Giant Trolls/Spirit Trolls/Umber Hulk Elder... but the real issue is his two attendant Yuan-Ti Mages.
Alright. We'll need a wall of summons to hold the melee bruisers off as long as possible, while the party proper throws everything they have into killing the enemy Mages.
Jaheira prepares 2x Conjure Fire Elemental, while Anomen goes for 1x Aerial Servant and 2x Animate Dead.
Remaining slots go to buffs, an Insect Plague and Iron Skins, and three Death Ward. Why? Two Death Ward will go on the Fire Elementals (so that if a Yuan-Ti Mage has Death Spell, they must get a successful Remove Magic off before they can dismiss our most powerful summons), and one Death Ward goes on Cassius, because I don't want him dropping from a random Chromatic Orb. Note that I don't actually know if summons are protected from Death Spell by Death Ward, but there wasn't a whole lot of devastating options for divine L4 slots, so why not?
Cassius prepares True Sight x1, PfMW x1, Breach x2, Lower Resistance x2 and a Spell Immunity, with the rest going to defensive buffs, Slow/Haste and some Fire/Acid damage. Cassius' role in the battle will be to remove the defenses of the enemy Mages, and if he gets a chance, knock out TorGal's Magic Resistance and start applying Slow and some damage. But really, all he needs to do is help remove the enemy Mages and he's done his part.
Yoshimo unfortunately only manages to set two Special Snares in the room before TorGal, but it'll have to do. This time, we won't drag the enemy group in here: We'll battle them where they stand, and if things look bad, do a fighting retreat into the previous room (hoping that the traps at least kill something following us).
Jaheira gets a 12 HD and (what must be at least) a 16HD elemental. Combined with the Aerial Servant and two 7HD Skeleton Warriors, the wall will hold. I hope. Into the fray! CHAAAAARGE! Hamsters first.
Oh, that's very good. Neither Yuan-Ti here was a Necromancer unfortunately, but neither prebuffed with PfNM, and their first action was to cast PfMW. Leaving them completely exposed to Masterwork Arrows/Bullets. While our summons (mostly) distract the enemy melee brutes, Cassius casts True Sight, dispelling all protective Illusions. His second action is to cast PfMW since TorGal has now zeroed in on him.
Hooray! And hm. Excellent that one Yuan-Ti Mage dropped, and we didn't even have to use Breach: With no defensive Illusions, everyone was hitting with nearly every shot, and its Stoneskin gave out in record time.
But the snake's last defiant act was to cast Secret Word on Cassius, stripping his SI: Abjuration... and the second Yuan-Ti Mage is casting something Abjuration-y.
OW! What the what? That Yuan-Ti Mage, with one Remove Magic, removed 16 buffs from Cassius! It even stripped TorGal's Slow effect AND his Strength Drain effect from Cassius!
That seems.. wildly improbable. Some of those buffs were from Anomen, granted, who is only level 11. But still.
Let the probability that each buff gets dispelled be a random variable, and assume that each pair of such random variables are independent. Then the probability of a L13 Yuan-Ti Mage (they have no 7th level spell slots) successfully dispelling 16 buffs from a level 11 caster (some were from Cassius who is level 12, but OK, for simplicity's sake) should be 0.6^16 = 0,000282, or strictly less than a 0,003% chance. That's exceptionally unlikely, yet it happened. I'd wager that either the Yuan-Ti Mage is actually a much higher caster level than its spell slots would imply, or it has some cheat version of Remove Magic.. but SCS prides itself on not cheating. I don't know, I don't like it though!
So Cassius, with not even a Stoneskin left operational, flees for his life into the previous room. TorGal goes to work on the Skeleton Warriors, and meanwhile, Masterwork Arrows and Bullets finally spell the end of the master Dispeller.
Alright. With the Mages down, this is no longer life or death: We might be forced to retreat, we might even lose someone, but Cassius is in no mortal danger. We wail away at TorGal, but despite being at Near Death and consistently taking damage, he just refuses to die. Absolutely refuses.
We switch tactics, opting to instead clear out his (still many) cronies: TorGal really, really hurts, but he can only hurt one person at a time, whilst his seven friends can hurt many more (and do).
It's a long grind of a battle, but one by one, TorGal's allies fall. TorGal himself eventually goes after Cassius, who keeps him chasing with the help of an Oil of Speed. Finally, with no other enemies in play we can focus our attention back on TorGal, and at long last, the dread Troll falls (it helped that our 16HD Fire Elemental finally shook off the Greater Command it dropped from at the start of the fight, though TorGal took it out before meeting his end).
Jeez. I'd like to cheer, but that was just a tangled mess of unexpected nastiness and constant quaffing of Potions of Greater Healing. I'm starting to think that, at least at these character levels, there are no "fair" tactics to take TorGal on without a bunch of complications. If there are, I've failed to find them.
But still, a victory is a victory, and we didn't even have anyone die. We gather up the hidden stash, and make our way outside, reporting our success to Nalia. After the customary Invisibility 10' Radius, we rest up, and head back to Athkatla.
I think we're powerful enough to at least have the potential to survive Spellhold and the Underdark now.
We'll proceed with the main plot. Gaelan gets his money, and we agree to help Aran.
For once, Lassal doesn't make an extreme nuisance of himself, and strangely enough only targets Minsc with his attacks (who is conveniently immune, wearing the Amulet of Power).
So, Cassius didn't spend all his L3 slots on Invisibility 10' Radius, but I'm sure quickly nipping over to the Bridge district won't trigger anyt-
I blame myself more than the bandits.
Fine. Enjoy a Greater Malison + Emotion: Hopelessness. Or just fall down and die. Yeah, do the second one.
There, that should be the last of the ambushes. We arrive at the Bridge District, swing by to pick up the Horn of Valhalla, and let Cassius have some fun with Jaylos and Caehan.
We return and report our success to Aran, and are in turn instructed to take the fight to the enemy, so to speak. Alright. But first, a well-deserved rest at the Copper Coronet, because we're really quite low on sp-
Once again, fortune farts in my face
Baldrick!I would like to say this is the last time I ever travel without Invisibility 10' Radius, but let's be realistic: I'll keep making the same mistakes. Alright, let's try and sort this out... we have almost no anti-Mage spells, but we have a few strong summons available, so if we can just get them out and let them do most of the fighting, we should be fine. Oh, note also that this group has something like 4-5 invisible Thieves, all with plenty of Potions of Invisibility.
No! Minsc! Why are you Minsc?! Can't you make one save vs spell with a +6 bonus? Gah!
OK. Draw them away from Minsc, and make sure not to entice any use of area-of-effect spells near him! And kill those bloody Mages!
Phew! Hooray! Huzzah! Damnable bandits. This would be a real problem, especially since SCS bandits eventually stop attacking you (and thus Minsc could be a stone statue in this area forever, with us unable to get back to him)... but we have the Ring of Earth Control on Mazzy, with a 1/day use of Stone to Flesh!
Welcome back Minsc! And since you're not Jaheira, you getting petrified won't destroy your romance in a fiery conflagration of a hundred bugs. Good stuff!
We shuffle-limp back to the Copper Coronet, get a good night's rest in, heal up, and buy Azuredge +3 (it's not even that expensive: 2600ish gold) for Mazzy on the way out. Gorf tries to bully Mazzy and gets poked to death for his troubles, then we're off to the Graveyard.
Jaheira has a single Fire Elemental prepared, and we let it lead the way against the entirely helpless Spiders: None of them have a +2 weapon. We arrive uneventfully at the entrance to the Vampire Lair, Haz falls, and we let the Fire Elemental (very slowly) kill off the Grimwarders, as they have good THAC0 but non-magical weapons. Nice.
Finally, we swing back and go up against Pai'Na. Cassius had Death Spell prepared, but really, a regular old Fireball + Protection from Fire combo works just as well (but third level arcane slots are more useful against Vampires than sixth level, what with Slow).
And here, rather anti-climactically, I think we will leave the party for now.
Next time, Cassius and his stalwart allies will brave the dank dark depths of the Vampire crypts, cleansing them with fire and Azuredge. Then, Brynnlaw awaits.. and the asylum, Spellhold.
Cassius is concerned, but not frightened: His power is growing.
It will not be long now, Imoen. Help is coming. We are coming.
Cassius remains a L12 Elf Diviner.
I prefer strategies that work the absolute majority of the time.
Once I find one such strategy for an encounter I tend to stick to it: My BG1 runs essentially boil down to Web, Animate Dead and Wands of Fire... which is why I'm glad I'm finally back in SoA. Here, there's usually more than one efficient way of solving an encounter, although the good old summons/area-of-effect damage-and-disablers is almost never a bad bet.
Rev (elf female diviner, Grond0); Meldar (human male abjurer, Gate70)
Previous updates
Today's session saw quite a bit of dicing with death - with Meldar being the one consistently denied by Lady Luck
Things started with the decision to work on reputation and Greywolf soon fell to the epidemic of blindness sweeping across the Sword Coast. Moving on from him, Samuel was picked up and carried in the direction of the FAI. Some hobgoblins staged an ambush to try and prevent travel, but the duo struggled on bloody but unbowed - only to run into a bandit ambush. It looked like they would escape that as well, but as Rev was leaving the area he saw Meldar collapse behind him and hastily cancelled the trip in order to pick up equipment.
Doing further reputation quests saw a bit more use for sleep as well as blind - Bjornin's half-ogres and some interfering doggies deciding to take 40 winks here.
After picking up a bit more reputation from Charleston Nib, the Doomsayer was targeted with about half a dozen blindness spells - but to no avail. Meldar had Melf's Acid Arrow, but we had no other spells that could damage the Doomsayer - so Rev helped out with some wand damage to avoid any need to rest.
With the major encounters in the Cloud Peaks complete and reputation nearing its maximum, Rev led the way to the ankheg area. At this point Gate70 got a phone call and we lost voice communication - that meant that when I asked if he wanted to risk taking on the ankhegs he didn't reply (and obviously silence implies assent
After giving Tenya her bowl back it seemed only reasonable to chance our arms once more against the nearby ankheg. By this stage Gate70 was back in contact and Meldar was fully rested - so the odds seemed good. However, we failed to disable the ankheg and Rev was soon in serious trouble. She called for Meldar to leave the area, but wouldn't have made it if the ankheg hadn't missed here.
Going to the Valley of the Tombs in search of a wand of monster summoning, the Revenant was another blind victim - holding still while we battered it to death with some long sticks.
The purpose for the wand of monster summoning was really to take on the sirines. With 2 mages they would be easy enough to kill with skull traps, but we had a total of 0 3rd level spells known between us (we were happy to keep things interesting!). The sirines wouldn't have lasted long against monsters, but Rev couldn't resist first seeing how they did against stinking clouds. That was actually reasonably effective and 1 sirine died before another managed to escape and circle around some trees to shoot Meldar from an unexpected direction. He was poisoned, but I thought he was going to escape - until pathfinding got messed up as Rev bounced around with MP lag and Meldar turned back towards his attacker for a moment too long ...
After another trip to the temple Rev did summon monsters to finish off the sirines - and the second group of those also lasted long enough to pull a couple of golems out of the cave to their doom. With only one golem left Meldar threw 10 magic darts at it from behind Rev - who had gone invisible for the first time. He rolled a poor set of attacks though and the golem was only badly wounded when Meldar was out of darts. Rev couldn't contemplate just running away though and had a whack at the golem himself - surviving the retaliatory blow while moving back quickly. Fortunately, Meldar's strength, +3 staff and gauntlets of weapon expertise meant he was able to do just enough damage to put the golem down before it could launch another blow.
The last action was invading the Nashkel Mine. Things seemed to be going smoothly enough on the way through there - until Meldar was hit by simultaneous criticals from both a kobold and a kobold commando who both briefly recovered consciousness at the same time inside a stinking cloud. Only the ring of fire protection he had on allowed him to survive that.
Mulahey was placed inside some stinking clouds, but managed to escape from those quickly and resist an attempt to blind him while summoning a group of helpers. Rev ran one way to take on and kill a number of those, while Meldar had a trickier task with Mulahey himself as well as more fodder. Meldar managed to get an acid arrow away, but then found himself held. Rev dashed back to try and make him invisible, but the automatic hits from his attackers was always likely to make that effort fail.
Rev, diviner L7, 36 HPs, 122 kills
Meldar, abjurer L7, 41 HPs, 86 kills, 5 deaths
Flashburn's Rejects
If they can't do it alone, they can do it together!
For this run, I'm actually using SCS for BG1 with short-term prebuffs and almost all of the tactical challenges. My installation from my previous runs is mostly unchanged aside from SCS. There's going to be all kinds of firsts for me in this run.- I've never used SCS in BG1 before
- Even when I've played with SCS in BG2, I never installed the tactical challenges except for Bodhi
- And I always played with spellcasters having long-term prebuffs only
So, if I'm going to ramp up the difficulty this much, I'm going to need the help of some familiar faces who are all incredibly strong on their own. Putting them all together should make them unstoppable!And so, I introduce to you the CHARNAME of this playthrough, Krieg II the War Hulk! (kit link)
Of all the rejects, Krieg is the one who made it furthest. Alone, he chunked and one-shotted his way across the Sword Coast, Amn, and Tethyr until finally reaching the Throne of Bhaal itself. Krieg survived a Time Stop -> Whirlwind Attack combo from Melissan and had health left to spare, but his AC was reduced to 20, his save vs. spell shot up to 20, and he went berserk, making him easy prey for Melissan's demons. In the end, Melissan got the killing blow on Krieg.
Coming in as a summoner, healer, melee fighter, and unkillable rage-tank all in one package is Garos the Warhorn Shaman. (kit link)
Garos was retired due to character fatigue as he hit his power cap quite early. Now that he's on a team, that won't matter as much because he makes a far better force multiplier for a party than he does a combatant clearing the saga by himself.
Returning for the third time is Spaz IV the Warlock, spamming Eldritch Blasts and Skeleton Warriors. (kit link)
Spaz is no stranger to the no-reload challenge. Let's count all the ways he's died so far:
Critical hit from one of Kelddath's sirenes
Constitution drained to 0 by vampires despite having the means to protect himself from it. This third death is more of a result of lazy gameplay on my part than anything else.
The most recent Reject is Rufus II the Thief/Shadow Adept (AKA Nightblade). (kit link)
Despite doing all the early-game XP gathering correctly, he was killed by a drow Shadow Weave user who employed 6th-level spells despite being just outside the starting town of Beregost, of all places. I played with him more after that, and he becomes a monstrosity of shadowy strength without even needing to be triple-classed with Fighter. He becomes truly ridiculous (just like every mage with Improved Alacrity) - all the more reason for him to join this party in their conquest of SCS with short-term prebuffs and tactical challenges.
This one has not graced the no-reload thread with his presence, but Gaspar the Seducer is the suavest swashbuckler to sail the seven seas. (kit link)
Gaspar was a character I made for a ctrl+Q playthrough of BG1 and BG2 way back in the days of v1.2. The Seducer kit can simulate ctrl+Q, but can also have the seduced victims follow a full party instead. Gaspar is going to have a very interesting synergy with Rufus later on...
And lastly, the monk that I lost to Blind Albino Wyrmlings, Bruss. He seems to be convinced that he's a Super Sand Lesbian or something. The rest of his party doesn't believe him, but that d12 HD and that 18/87 Exceptional Strength do seem pretty suspicious...
In all honesty, I don't know how to make kit mods with Weidu, but I made all of his abilities in NearInfinity and will add them using EEKeeper. I've played through the game several times with Bruss, both solo and with a party. He's really fun and surprisingly balanced. If semiticgod can do Undertale themed runs with self-made kits, I don't see why I can't take the same concept a bit further.
The stage is set and the actors are ready to put on the show. All that's left is to play and see what happens.
Rev (elf female diviner, Grond0); Meldar (human male abjurer, Gate70)
Previous updates
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1024660/#Comment_1024660
In the previous update there was quite a bit of dicing with death. The problem with doing that of course is that there's a strong tendency to eventually get diced.
The early stages of the session went smoothly enough, with Nimbul choking inside a stinking cloud and Tranzig's good saves being not quite good enough to avoid being blinded.
Moving on to the Bandit Camp, Meldar relied on the Cloak of Displacement and Nimbul's boots to deflect bandit arrows - though he almost died anyway to a critical hit. By the time Taurgosz was activated the duo had already used most of their spells and settled in for a bit of running and shooting. That can be tricky in a laggy environment and Meldar didn't allow enough gap as Taurgosz teleported towards him and struck him down.
By that time Taurgosz was at near death, but Rev decided not to finish him off - so as not to get further out of XP alignment with her mage colleague. Instead, she picked up most of the remains and ran off to the FAI to get Meldar raised. Although there was no real worth in the equipment left behind, the duo still hurried back without resting in order to try and recover a large quantity of darts before they evaporated. Taurgosz was of course waiting for them and immediately started chasing Meldar. Rev didn't have much in the way of spells, but did have a pair of improved invisibilities and one of those made Meldar disappear. Rev then tried to get enough distance from Taurgosz to cast the second on himself. I was admittedly a bit hasty in doing that and cutting things fine - so it was no surprise when Rev's spell was interrupted. Given that was no surprise, however, she did immediately start running and expected to be able to get clear - the follow-up hit therefore was a surprise
Flashburn's Rejects
BG1: PrologueProbably should've mentioned this is on Insane (minus extra damage). I always play with max HP, but every creature in the game has max HP as well thanks to Tweaks Anthology.
Candlekeep goes like it always does. The belt ogre is taken down by Spirit Archers. It's when we get to the Friendly Arm that SCS shows but the tiniest hint of its AI improvements. We had cleared the hobgoblins around the fortress and recruited one to our cause. Rufus went to scout ahead and check out Tarnesh when his stealth suddenly wore off. Tarnesh now speaks from a distance!
Aw crap. Tarnesh prebuffs with Shield and Mirror Image. Rufus backs off and sends in the hobgoblin instead. It gets put to sleep and finished with a magic missile. Some guards join the fight and help take down some of Tarnesh's mirror images. Unphased, Tarnesh casts Horror on Krieg. I'm not wasting the Potion of Clarity on something as trivial as this.
Krieg runs away from the party but I misjudge the AoE size on it and Bruss is also afflicted.
Spaz is hit with an Acid Arrow and finished with another Magic Missile. Garos stops dancing to heal Spaz, but it's too late. Bruss and Krieg had the healing potions, too.
The guards have Tarnesh at near death and Gaspar kills Tarnesh. We raise Spaz for just 100 gold.
At Beregost, we deal with Marl and have Spaz steal and wear Algernon's Cloak. Gaspar neutralizes Silke with Domination. We have her expend her impressive spell arsenal and have her Haste us. Once we attack, she has two different ways of going invisible: one by sequencer and one by potion. She gets a good hit on Bruss but is put down.
Next are Kelddath's sirenes. After killing the second one, Gaspar and Spaz level up, with Bruss not far behind after killing the third one. Garos has accumulated quite the host of spirits, so we decide to hunt the wolf pack with them. Using their magical weapons, they slaughter the wolves with ease. Krieg and Garos level up, while Spaz and Gaspar earn a second level. Now everyone has at least 2 levels under their belts. Bruss learns Ki Blast volley and Spaz learns Dark One's Own Luck.
Now that Gaspar's Domination ability has improved a bit, we try it out on Firebead. We expend all of his spells and have him summon monsters for us. He's completely surrounded by a wall of monsters and a second line of spirits stands between us and him. He's as good as dead. No reputation loss was incurred because Gaspar had Firebead dominated at his time of death! Bruss levels up to 3, learning Ki Deflection.
Up at the ankheg nest, Krieg levels up to 3. The bounty hunts begin, or so I've read. Even the ankhegs are smarter; they'll wait for you to come to them rather than vice-versa. Just as well though, since they get overwhelmed anyway. Returning Farmer Brun's son earns Rufus, Garos, Gaspar, and Spaz a level too.
Bruss gains another level from returning Tenya's bowl, learning Solar Flare. Spaz steals Dushai's Ring of Free Action and gives it to Garos so he can move at normal speed while dancing.
We clear out the zombies up north and head back to Beregost. Krieg makes a small fortune selling off 6 ankheg shells, but it's still not enough money for us. South of Beregost, we revisit the cave where Rufus died last time. This time Rufus takes the initiative and backstabs Nym while following up with a scorcher charge from the Wand of Fire. It makes a dent in him before he speaks, but then he throws up a bunch of buffs and summons 3 shadows!
Luckily Rufus got out of there in time, before the drow or the shadows could get him. Garos has 2 spirits waiting outside to take on the shadows using their magical weapons. One follows Rufus outside and promptly gets defeated. Rufus goes back inside the cave under stealth to check on Nym. He'll do anything to stay alive, including leeching health from his own summons. He even tries to smoke Rufus out with a Shadowblast fireball, but it only ends up killing one of his shadows. Rufus lays a trap for Nym and re-stealths but his Dark Mirage just eats it. Rufus tries a Wand of Missiles, and just barely makes it out in time, but not before being hit with Power Word, Sleep.
Luckily, the drow does not follow. Rufus wakes up okay, and he and Bruss continue to bait out spells from Nym, though Bruss suffers half of a Negative Energy Ray. Once Nym's exhausted, Rufus lures him outside, but everyone is having trouble hitting this guy. Even Krieg can't seem to hit him!
Must be because of Shield of Shadows. Fortunately, Shadow Adepts are weakened somewhat in sunlight and Nym resorts to melee attacks. Gaspar charms him and reveals he still has some spells up his sleeve. He commands Nym to swap to his magical throwing dagger's ranged attack and also to drain his own CON score by 4 points with Drain Vitality.
Even this doesn't really help us hit him. Spaz's Eldritch Blasts are resisted half the time because of Nym's 50% MR, and he saves against a Solar Flare from Bruss, but several rounds later, Rufus gets his revenge for the last playthrough using the Wand of Missiles.
Nym has some pretty nice stuff on him, including a scroll. Rufus learns Decoy from it.
Basilisk Country is up next. I think this is where the bounty hunts begin.
Krieg - War Hulk 3
Garos - Warhorn Shaman 3
Bruss - Saiyan Monk(ey) 4
Rufus - Thief 3/Shadow Adept 2
Spaz - Warlock 4
Gaspar - Seducer 4
Longtooth then went to kill Sonner and friends before killing the ankheg who ate Nester.
Longtooth decided to wipe out all the ankheg that he could find in the area where he killed Sonner. To do this safely he used command a lot. This meant that usually he had to sleep after every two ankheg. However, he reached level 5 and could now probably be able to take on three one after the other. He was able to take on two at a time and prevail. He discovered that his Spiritual Hammer Weapon is useless as it never struck the enemy. However getting a +1 flail from Sonner's body meant that the ankheg's were at a great disadvantage.
He has now gone to the FAI to rest and will then go to sell his ankheg shells. Current reputation is 16.
He then fought Zordral a battle which was essentially won with Command.
The wolves in the temple area were next.
Longtooth picked up Montaron and hung around while Montaron plundered first Beregost and then afterwards the two went to Ulgoth's Beard.
There Montaron was only spotted once as he utilised his pick-pocketting abilities. He utilised our high reputation to avoid any comeback.
Montaron was left at Ulgoth's and Longtooth went to seek out Mutamin.
He dealt with the adventurers first. Using haste and his wand of missiles. This all but exhausted the necklace. He also used a command spell when necessary.
He then went around killing the basilisks and Medusae.
Since his crossbow was ineffective against the medusae he used his throwing daggers. He almost ran out of them, but not quite. The medusae did poison him twice, but potions rectified that.
He used his necklace of missiles against Mutamin before putting it in his backpack not wanting to exhaust it completely. Mutamin used a healing potion and then cast blindness and slow. This slowed the battle considerably but he had run out of effective offensive spells so the end was just a matter of time in coming as all his allies were already dead.
EDIT
Upon going to Beregost for some rest, Longtooth headed south and took on Tristan and Isolde. Having aquired Ushai's ring, they were not a major problem.
The bandits in the Lake District were next. The hobgoblin was killed first and after him Teygnan was doomed, Whilst Longtooth was casting that spell, Jemby cast enfeeblement. Seeing it coming, Longtooth retreated. Teygnan closed in on him but was badly wounded by Longtooth's dagger before he did so. Longtooth waited until he was in stgriking distance before he cast command and then finished him off with his flails. He then moved away and slept before moving in on Jemby. Jemby again cast enfeeblement and Longtooth command. Both spells were successful, but Longtooth was able to kill Jemby with his throwing dagger before she had a chance to retaliate.
The half-ogres were very suceptible to command and thus easy to kill as were the gnolls attacking Drizzt.
A visit to beregost to recieve various rewards now seems in order.
EDIT
I wasn't expecting this. Longtooth was investigating the area where two brothers who are both druids have a conflict.
Longtooth didn't come across them, but did come across some goblins which he hasn't met before.
One of them was a shaman who cast rigid thinking. This led to Longtooth attacking the goblin slave who counter-attacked and did serious harm.
The other goblins then joined in and quickly brought Longtooth's demise.
THE END
Flashburn's Rejects
BG1: Prologue, 1Before heading out to Basilisk Country, we return Nym's staff to Kryn Darkflame for 1k XP and gold. At Ulgoth's Beard, we buy the Darkveil for Bruss from Rogue Rebalancing. Not only does it protect from crits, but it also gives the wearer immunity to gaze attacks and a tiny stealth boost, at the cost of a +2 THAC0 penalty vs. creatures that use gaze attacks.
With Bruss now immune to basilisk gazes, he clears out Basilisk Country by himself, with the exception of Mutamin and his two pet basilisks, and another lesser basilisk nearby.
Rufus also learns the Shadow Weave versions of Invisibility and Silence. If Bruss tries to take on Mutamin by himself, he'll surely be killed. Trying to flee back to the party will just result in everyone getting petrified as the basilisks chase Bruss, although I think the basilisks' new AI still doesn't take into account being immune to the gaze projectile. Now for Kirian's group.
To start, Korax paralyzes Kirian, neutralizing the biggest threat.
Gaspar charms Lindin the fighter. Luckily, it lasts a full 3 rounds.
Krieg is stabbed by Baerin's spear and goes berserk, pulverizing him with a critical in response.
Peter is blinded by Rufus and mopped up. Kirian is released from Korax's paralysis immediately afterward, casting Sleep on Garos. Everyone moves to get out of the way, so only Garos is put under. Spirit archers remove her Mirror Images before they get unsummoned and Gaspar manages to charm her. He commands her to cast Acid Arrow on herself and we finish her off. I thought I took a screenshot of this part but the keypress must not have registered.
At Durlag's Tower, Bruss levels up to 5 from a Doom Knight, learning Kaioken x2 (.webm video) and Energy Wave.
-Saiyans do not receive disease/haste/slow immunity.
-ENERGY WAVE: Once per day, the Saiyan summons great power from within and condenses it into a ball of bluish energy in their hands, then fires it at a target within 120 ft. The energy ball explodes with great force in a 30 ft. diameter, dealing 1d10 magical damage every 2 levels, plus 1 per 4 levels as bonus damage (rounded down). Targets may save vs. breath for half damage, with a -1 penalty for every 10 levels of the Saiyan. A level 12 Saiyan, for example, would fire a blast that deals 6d10+3 damage with a save vs. breath at -1 for half. Charging time: 13
-KAIOKEN: Kaioken greatly increases the user's physical abilities and effectively multiplies the sensitivity of the user's senses. While the Saiyan is faster and stronger while maintaining this technique, the Saiyan becomes more fatigued and any damage received is also increased, plus the user's Constitution drains over time. Maintaining this technique for too long CAN and WILL kill the user via Constitution drain. Powering up and down from this state is a free action. Any Constitution drained will not be restored for 8 hours and the damage vulnerability will persist for 10 minutes. Powering down to lower multiplications after using higher multiplications will not decrease the damage vulnerability; they will actually stack instead. Powering up to higher multiplications after using lower multiplications will not cause the damage vulnerabilities to stack, however, but the higher of the two will still be imposed.
- x2: +2 THAC0/damage/AC/movement, +1 attack/round, fists count as +1; -1 CON/2 rounds, +2 fatigue after 5 rounds, 10% damage vulnerability. Power up time: 2
Rufus and Gaspar are killed by a lightning trap in the 2nd above-ground floor of Durlag's Tower because of a trapped chest. 35 Find Traps causes a critical failure. We pick up their stuff and go back to Beregost to have them raised. Spaz was hit but he survived thanks to Dark One's Own Luck's saves+Luck bonuses.
Back at Durlag's, Bruss solos the roof basilisks using his Darkveil, earning Krieg a level.
At the third above-ground floor of Durlag's, Gaspar picks up the WIS tome thanks to his immunity to charm. Rufus consumes it and reaches 18 WIS. Wisdom increases a Shadow Adept's spell duration by 5% for every point above 15.
We're pretty much finished at Durlag's right now since Rufus' Find Traps is definitely not ready to tackle it. We go over to High Hedge and assemble quite the host of creatures using Gaspar's Recruit Follower. This is thanks to Rufus's invisibility letting him scout ahead and the fact that Recruit Follower's range is longer than sight range and does not require LoS to use.
At Shoal's area, Bruss chooses to sacrifice himself so we can get Droth's helmet. Krieg beats Shoal a couple of times until she surrenders. After Droth appears, Krieg finishes her off and we sic our army on him. Krieg now owns Droth's helmet.
The giant humanoid band to the south is taken care of by skeletons and spirit archers. I want to save our ghouls because of their incredibly useful paralysis. Spaz, Garos, and Rufus level up from them, thanks to Shoal's big XP boost. Rufus also learns Shield of Shadows this level.
Some dire wolves provide the last push of XP that Gaspar needs for another level.
The nearby trio of sirenes are killed by our pack of ghasts, skeletons, and Kivan. Rufus scouts ahead while invisible to survey the carnage.
At this point, we're just doing wilderness quests and collecting a couple of tomes.
We eventually travel to Ulcaster. Icharyd has apparently been beefed up more from SCS. He still hits hard and often, although I thought Icharyd calling down lightning bolts was pretty contrived. Like, okay, it's challenge for the sake of challenge I guess, but lightning bolts are Talos' domain, not Myrkul's.
Inside Ulcaster, we run into another one of Kryn Darkflame's apprentices. A while ago, Gaspar brainwashed Tiax into following us just for his Ghast, so we're putting it to use. The apprentice is paralyzed and Krieg finishes her off. She has some nice stuff for Rufus, too, and he chooses to learn Night Terrors from the scroll.
I believe it's time for the Wolf of Ulcaster. I'm not really sure what to expect, but I remember reading about a fear howl, so I have Garos cast Rallying Cry before encountering it. And then things get hectic.
It's like something straight out of SoD, although I don't dislike it. Bruss powers up with Kaioken and teams up with Krieg to pound away at the wolf. Spaz spams Eldritch Blasts on it to deal damage every round. Gaspar is on Charm duty to relieve some of the pressure on us. I can't be sure what else the wolf does, so I have Garos actually attacking while enraged for once instead of dancing. Rufus does absolutely nothing for the whole fight for several reasons.
-Attacking means no more invisibility.
-I don't want him attacked because his AC is bad.
-His magic won't be of any help here. Sleep and Silence are useless here, and I can live without Blindness.
The wolf uses a Remove Magic howl, followed by a Malison howl. Garos re-casts Rallying Cry to prevent a Fear howl. Bruss has spent a good while in Kaioken and his Constitution is now falling below 16, so he powers down briefly and assists Garos. Kaioken is intended to be used in short bursts anyhow. Fortunately, the wolf has had enough because Spaz kills it with an Eldritch Blast.
The rest of the undead are cleaned up and Krieg redeems his level. Good progress today. Haven't run into any bounty hunters yet.
Krieg - War Hulk 6
Garos - Warhorn Shaman 5
Bruss - Saiyan Monk(ey) 6
Rufus - Thief 5/Shadow Adept 4
Spaz - Warlock 6
Gaspar - Seducer 6
Original post and previous run:
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/975170/#Comment_975170
Seeing @Flashburn with a War Hulk active, I thought perhaps it was time for me to have another go with one of those. My last attempt with Burl got to the Throne before losing out to Melissan, so this one's got big shoes to fill - fortunately he has big feet
Burl had to struggle a bit to kill Xzar & Montaron, but after collecting Algernon's cloak he was able to pick up the XP for 3 of the sirines in the Beregost temple - enough, with a few other little tasks, to take him to level 4.
He went to Nashkel to get the ankheg armor and learn Bhaal LMD - but also got a nice one-shot critical on Oopah there.
To plug that gap in his defenses he went to Ulgoth's Beard to get Dushai's ring. Up to this point the enemies had had a fighting chance as Burl had been using a relatively slow long sword. He had got an improved +1 sword from Lindin and briefly upgraded to Greywolf's +2 version.
After moving through the Nashkel Mine, there was a small possibility of danger in Mulahey's cave if the fodder there had got lucky with initial attacks - as being hit damages AC it's possible for a large group to very rapidly move from needing lucky hits to hitting easily. Burl countered that possibility with a touch of oil.
War Hulk L7, 124 HPs, 134 kills
He returned Joia's ring with the result that his reputatioin went up.
It went up again when he turned down a reward from Oublek.
After speaking to Noober his level went up.
When attacked by bandits he ran away.
He then picked up a ring of protection from fire and rescued Samuel, again improving his reputation.
He then took Rufie back to Alfie.
He had to have two bites at the cherry in order to defeat Krumm and Caldo, but once they were separated they soon fell.
Drienne's cat was then restored to her, bumping reputation up yet again.
Fighting Zordral also took two bites at the cherry, but once he was poisoned the end was in sight for him.
He then raised his reputation by returning the Colquetle Amulet.
Giving the Dudley Necklace to the daughter raised the reputation yet again.
As did the restoration of Mellicamp.
Fang then cured a werewolf of lycanthropy gaining a +1 sword as a reward.
His reputation was raised yet again by restoring Alanna's neighbour.
His reputation was now 19. You may ask why an evil thief should have such a high reputation.
It is because nobody caught him doing evil acts. For instance he pickpocketted Algernon's cloak without getting caught and stole a fortune in Beregost also without getting caught.
Honesty is for fools, but apparent honesty is a very valuable thing, and subtlety is everything.
https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Mask
BG1EE updates: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
SoD updates: 1, 2, 3, 4
BG2EE SoA updates: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7
This and the next part are really the same update, but I'll divide it into two parts, as otherwise it turned out prohibitively long.
We engage the Vampires in their nest: Minsc and Mazzy will lead the charge, with the rest of the party kept out of arm's (or fang's) reach. Though they can do nothing to harm the named Vampires, Skeleton Warriors (by their sheer numbers) still do a good job of blocking the bloodsuckers from reaching Mazzy, and so we keep a number of them at the fore, Azuredge hurtling through the gaps in the line.
We pick up the Mace of Disruption and descend the stairs. Minsc is granted an Improved Invisibility, and does a good job blocking the would-be ambushers down here: These are only Fledgling Vampires, and so much less lethal. Minsc takes a handful of hits throughout the entire fight, but Azuredge carries the day.
Yoshimo's traps were pointless, as the Grimwarders triggered them, and they're entirely immune to missile damage.
Doing surprisingly well so far. Tanova must be dealt with for us to proceed: We top off our Skeleton Warriors, buff a little, and have half the party (Yoshimo, Anomen and Jaheira) stay out of reach.
Cassius will pop into view, cast True Sight, and pop back out. Once his aura clears, he'll pop back in, Breach, and pop back out. Hopefully, the Skeleton Warriors can hold Tanova long enough for us to thus clear her defenses and drop her.
How about that: Quick and clean. Tanova used to be a major headache, but I've got her figured out now. Her remaining Mordenkainen's Sword kills a Skeleton Warrior, but they're easily replaced.
On to Lassal. Cassius gets a Chaotic Commands and goes to draw him. Unfortunately, Lassal is not in the mood: He turns into a rat and hides for about 15 rounds. Eventually, we're able to draw him out, but he tries to hide twice more. Minsc does not care for such nonsense.
Only Bodhi remains. While I think it would be possible to damage her enough to force a withdrawal with this party... why risk it? We leave her some Skeleton Warriors as pasttime, and though she follows Minsc around for a bit, eventually she loses the scent, kills the Skeletons, then just sits there until retreating.
Well that was refreshingly non-horrific! We cleared the Vampire crypts with nearly no damage taken.
Cassius applies Invisibility 10' Radius and we head back for the Slums, but are, once again, interrupted by bandits. We barely have any spells left, but let's try it... the party retreats to the edge of the map and draws the attention of a single bandit.
Huh. For some reason, they don't all seem to be linked! We gather them in ones and twos, leaving the Mage for last. As we really have no anti-Mage spells, we simply wait out her Shield and PfNM.
Let's see if that's the last straw for the (by now quite diminished) bandit/slaver population of Athkatla.
I'm not kidding, we've killed something like three dozen of their best Fighters/Thieves/Clerics/Mages.. heck, if you count the slaver ship, we're probably up to 50! It's got to start showing at some point.
A rest at the Copper Coronet later, we're tying up loose ends: We still need to visit Watcher's Keep for the potion case, and I would like to take down Mencar and his crew, mainly for the Full Plate.
However, navigating through Waukeen's Promenade, we are interrupted by Vampires in pursuit of... what's his name.. Saniki? Eh. The naked guy with the katana. Didn't I already clear the Vampires out of this town?
A defensive Minor Sequencer saves Cassius from what could've quite probably been a bad situation, and we opt for full summons and buffs, erring on the side of caution.
That over and done with, we go after Mencar. I may have overestimated him and his band... 2x Aerial Servants, 2x Fire Elementals, 6 traps by the exit for Brennan and a full complement of buffs (including Cassius taking command of the summons on the frontline, with every conceivable protection spell active) was a bit of overkill. At least Brennan didn't get away.
We go for the potion case, with no ambushes on the way. Back at the Copper Coronet, we do a final rest,
then report our success to Aran, and set sail for Brynnlaw.
There's no reason to go easy on the three named Vampires here... along with Venkt they're the only major encounter this rest cycle. Skeleton Warriors hold the line, with a buffed Minsc and Mazzy doing the slaying. Del tried to flee in bat form, but we were able to box her in.
We roam around town, killing the completely outmatched stealthed pirates that for some reason attack us by their lonesome, and deal with Chremy, saving Ginia and Ason. Sanik is assassinated, and we head into Lady Galvena's feasthall. Front doesn't buff with PfNM, so True Seeing is sufficient to spell his end (that's a nice critical from Anomen). Oh, and I learn yet again that Conjure Animals are not worth it, ever. The mountain bears lasted literally two rounds, and that's only because we got two of them.
We push through the corridor. This time, a single Fire Elemental does a good job holding off the guards in here, as we kill the guard with a +2 Halberd before he can kill the elemental.
Cassius almost winds up in an unpleasant situation here. We had four Skeleton Warriors and a Fire Elemental up, distracting Vadek, but Cassius (who was in the room to cast True Sight) got hit by Remove Magic, which of course stripped all his defensive buffs. Galvena noticed and went for the kill.
Fortunately, I had remembered to recast our defensive Minor Sequencer, and it saves the Elf's bacon yet again. Vadek, while protected from the physical damage of Yoshimo's many traps, has no defense against the poison damage, to my great delight.
Alright! Claire is rescued and returned to Golin, and we retire to the Vulgar Monkey.
Now... let's be smart. I have little doubt there'll be a similar spawn of mass Yuan-Ti Mages blocking our escape from the Spellhold maze as last time. I think the best approach is the clear the rest of the maze first,
then do an inventory of what spells we have remaining, and decide on a tactic.
With all other rooms cleared, we can if necessary split the enemy up and do fighting retreats.
Spell selections: Cassius spends all his 6th and 5th level slots on True Sight and Breach.
Anomen and Jaheira basically have to use all their 5th level slots (along with a Wondrous Recall each) to provide enough Chaotic Commands, and they both get a Harm as well, so we have a primary and backup insta-kill option for the Beholder.
We'll deal with Yuan-Ti Mages by dispelling their Illusions, Breaching them, and then applying mass ranged attacks. If they have SI: Abjuration up (I've never seen them do it, but I guess it's possible)... we will just have to run and try to wait it out. The rest of our slots go to standard buffs and debuffs, including a few Invisibility 10' Radius; Cassius picks only two Chromatic Orbs and a Skull Trap for damage. We'll be relying on melee/ranged to carry us through, with Cassius to negate the defenses of enemy Mages.
Spellhold awaits. To be continued (soon!).
BG1EE updates: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
SoD updates: 1, 2, 3, 4
BG2EE SoA updates: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7
We go have a chat with Desharik (after looting his house). We might be able to kill Perth the Adept, but it's too risky for too small a reward... better the safe option.
Off to Spellhold, and our doom! Well, hopefully not the last bit.
Unintentional comedy ensues when Bhaal quaffs a Potion of Magic Shielding. Cassius was hoping to just burn him down with a Wand of Magic Missiles (saving all his spells for the maze), but end up also having to discharge a six charge Wand of Frost.. and Bhaal is still standing. Cue a Benny Hill chase sequence with Cassius taking occasional potshots with darts and, when they run out, his sling.
I'm just glad Bhaal didn't get an Oil of Speed.
We are dropped in the maze and reunited with Imoen. Hooray!
Less jubilations are inspired by her getting bumped only to 1 million XP, but it'll do.
Following the plan, we head north-west (a quick scouting by Minsc confirms that yes, there are two Yuan-Ti, one Greater Yuan-Ti and three Yuan-Ti Mages blocking the path to the next level) in order to clear everything else out before engaging the main enemy group.
First thing's first: We pick up the Ring of Regeneration by applying Cassius' razor-sharp intellect to the twelve riddles. Very, very good! If we're a little patient, we can now enter every battle with everyone in top shape. Even if we're not so patient, the Ring will drastically cut down our dependency on potions/healing spells.
The Ruhk's Mephits are cleared by the single-charge Wand of Cloudkill from Irenicus' dungeon, with the Ruhk itself falling to a simple melee assault. Mazzy takes a little damage, but that's what the Ring of Regeneration is for. The Doomplate +3 goes to Minsc, as Mazzy is using Full Plate in conjunction with Ring of Protection +2 for exquisite saves.
On our way to the next level, we also clear the Clay Golem. Anomen gets hit and suffers Cursed Wounds, but Cassius wisely had a single Remove Curse prepared. With the Bag of Holding in tow, we press south.
We want the Ring of Free Action.. which means tackling a Mind Flayer and a Beholder. Alright. Minsc and Mazzy get Chaotic Commands, and everyone else go under Invisibility 10' Radius. Since Mind Flayers cannot see through Invisibility in my install (I think they're terrifying enough just with the extra resistances), the rest of the party is safe. The Mind Flayer gets a single hit on Mazzy, but she quaffs a Potion of Genius and keeps wailing at it.
Why is she at 72 HP? Because the Mind Flayer did its Ballistic Attack, so Mazzy suffered 30ish unresistable damage with no save.
Alright.. Beholder time. I've zero interest in fighting this unofficial King of Cheese fairly.
Anomen, still invisible, applies to himself Death Ward (in case he whiffs his attack, this should entice the Beholder into casting Anti-Magic Ray at him, making him safe against the other Rays for one round), Holy Power, DUHM and Righteous Magic. With 25 Strength and Fighter THAC0, he gets to THAC0 -6.
Finally, he casts Harm, right before turning the pages of the book.
Hooray! This tactic can only fail if Anomen rolls a critical miss, which is why I like it so much.
Obviously it's not great against many Beholders at once. Notice invisible Jaheira in the background; had Anomen missed, she would have cast her Harm and tried her luck (hopefully landing the blow before the Anti-Magic Ray wore off and Anomen became vulnerable to the other Rays).
We clear out the Kobolds with no trouble whatsoever. There's a single Mist Horror to the south (which apparently casts Chaos), but Minsc deals with it using the Mace of Disruption for an instant kill.
There are a few Mummies and Ghasts along the corridor, but Azuredge destroys them all before they can reach us.
Inside the library is another story. A Greater Mummy, two Skeleton Warriors (one ranged) and a Bone Golem.
While Azuredge eventually spells the end of the undead, the Bone Golem is a construct, and hurts like nobody's business: Not even Mazzy can tank it for more than a few rounds.
But why fight it fairly? The rest of the party retreats while Mazzy leads the slow Bone Golem around by the nose, taking shots with Azuredge (which can still hurt the Golem, being a +3 weapon).
Eventually, we bring it down. Hooray!
Dace Sontan proves a bit of a menace, as he makes his save against both Azuredge and the Mace of Disruption every single time. Eventually he dies, but it's from the pure damage.
Finally, we head north again. Mazzy under Improved Invisibility is sent ahead, tanking a room full of Umber Hulks, while the rest of the party deals with the other room. We emerge back in the first area of the maze. There remains only the massive spawn at the exit, and a group of Yuan-Ti with a single attendant Mage. I'll clear these out too, because I do not want them joining in the battle.
A single Yuan-Ti Mage is no problem. We use a few Monster Summoning I (Imoen has one memorized, and we had a few scrolls of it too) to help drag the enemy after us, killing the Yuan-Ti at range as we retreat. Once the Mage is all that remains, elemental damage ammunition works nicely to bring about its demise.
OK. Time for the big fight. This is probably the most difficult part of the entire maze: We face three high-level enemy Mages, as well as a few melee grunts.
I think the key is just to not underestimate them. A little dishonourable, but we have stealthed Minsc bait out three Oracles from the Mages, so they can't dispel our Illusions so easily later.
And, well, what can we do? We must pass. Buff and attack!
Well that's just silly! What happened: We drew the Yuan-Ti toward us, as I'd rather fight them where we have clear lines of retreat. Cassius was busily Breaching after having first cast True Sight, and as Imoen has such a woeful initial memorization of spells, all I found for her to do was try and use our Wand of Paralyzation. And it stuck! Not once, but twice! Once paralyzed, a quick Breach followed by ranged damage meant the death of two of the Mages.
With two Mages down, we briefly turn our attention towards killing the melee grunts while Cassius strips the third one of its defenses. It has one unpleasant card up its sleeve, though: In a final act of defiance, it tosses a Finger of Death at Minsc! I pause and have Minsc quaff a Potion of Invulnerability. The save boost is sufficient to keep him alive, and the last Mage falls! Huzzah!
We're through! And we didn't even lose anyone! AND we still have spells remaining!
We enter the second level, going east first to clear a spawn of Yuan-Ti with a singular Mage attached.
And.. once again, the Wand of Paralyzation just works.
Once stunned, the dread Mage falls within seconds, followed by its fellow Yuan-Ti.
We head south, clearing the Trolls (they're three regular ones and a single Spirit Troll, but our frontliners got a new batch of Chaotic Commands to keep them safe). A single Web does for the Minotaurs. Imoen pops a scroll of Minor Spell Deflection after receiving Protection from Fire + Resist Fire and Cold off Jaheira, allowing her to fetch the portraits in total safety (the statues cast Disintegrate, Incendiary Cloud and Fireball). We move back north.
We'll do all the fights here. Yes, even that abominable Noble Djinni, though he gives you nothing.
First: The Ulitharid. With Chaotic Commands it can't do much to Mazzy and Minsc, but it does hit often and I don't want to spend too many Potions of Genius. Solution: Kite it.
It soon falls to concentrated fire, but invisible Cassius had to strip its Improved Invisibility, as it was just too difficult to hit with it active. Oh, it also heals itself with CSW three times. Pfeh.
We clear the Umber Hulk while our Chaotic Commands are still running (it's just a melee brute).
The Spirit Troll has trouble hitting us, but we also have trouble hitting it. Since there should be no Mage fights left, Cassius expends his final True Sight to bring it into view.
Note that we are actually making use of all the magical ammunition we find.
It's true that ranged is inferior to melee damage-wise in BG2. But there are still many situations where you may want to use ranged attacks instead, particularly against enemies with nasty on-hit effects, or Mages that tend to run around inbetween casting spells.
I thought that three True Sight and five Breach on Cassius for the maze was a little bit of overkill, but turns out it wasn't quite enough: Jaheira has to spend her Wondrous Recall to get a True Seeing for dealing with the Noble Djinni. After turning to mist and regenerating once, and zapping us with lightning twice, he drops a Black Opal. I'm skipping him next time around.
We proceed to deal with the Werewolves and single Stone Golem to the northeast. The room with three Clay Golems is handled via a wall of Skeleton Warriors to absorb their curse-inducing blows, with Anomen, Minsc and Jaheira dismantling the Golems.
We swing back towards the south. Cassius manifests the Slayer against Bodhi, but once she flees, a Troll (I think it was trying to path to us) remains, beating on Cassius who, despite being supposedly overcome with bloodlust, do nothing at all to the Troll in return. Good thing Cassius had Stoneskin up or that might've been unpleasant.
We use our remaining Skeleton Warriors to help clear out the Minotaurs and singular Gauth on this level.
Passing through the exit, we are subjected to tests, which we pass with flying colours.
Cassius finds a use for his Skull Trap, as we use that and Imoen's Fireball to weaken the Trolls in the area with the altar.
Finally.. we are freed from the maze. We've got one spell above 2nd level left, so even though Irenicus awaits, we will certainly rest first.
The most important thing in the fight to come is, of course, that Cassius survives.
He'll get every protection spell available, and have several Spell Immunity memorized to keep them from being stripped. We'll kill the Clones first: Irenicus buffs with SI: Abjuration and has many Improved Mantle available, so we have little choice but to wait him out.
Also, we're going to bribe Lonk into letting the inmates out.
We can certainly fight and beat him: But we may lose someone, Lonk gives no loot at all, and (most importantly) our short-timed buffs will expire before we face Irenicus. No. Lonk gets his blood money.
Cassius gets his protections: Protection from Fire/Cold/Lightning, Fireshield: Red/Blue, Death Ward, Chaotic Commands. That's as safe as we can make him currently. We also put up Minor Spell Deflection/Turning, MGOI and SI: Abjuration. Everyone gets Death Ward and Chaotic Commands, then a few general-purpose buffs, and away we go.
We fall back to the right edge of the room after the battle starts. Unfortunately, Irenicus leads with Remove Magic. Every single buff is stripped from everyone except Cassius. Damnit. Nothing we can do about that, just fight!
Clone Cassius is killed quickly, but Clone Jaheira gets an Insect Plague off (which fortunately only reaches Imoen, Mazzy and Jaheira as we scatter as best we can). Clone Imoen dies next... but manages to get Chaos off on Mazzy and Jaheira.
Clone Minsc dies to a Chromatic Orb (hehe... I knew he'd fail his save!). Clone Anomen gets his Harm off, but goes after Tiax. A fitting end, I'd say. Clone Anomen is in turn held and killed.
Right around here.. this is where things turn really, really bad. Irenicus casts Symbol: Stun. Thankfully, Cassius' Chaotic Commands are untouched, so he is immune, and Mazzy and (how can this be?!) Minsc make their saves. Which of course means Jaheira, Imoen and Anomen fail theirs. They're essentially out of this fight now: With Irenicus' caster level, that'll last for 12 or so rounds.
Irenicus follows up by summoning an Efreeti. Cassius tries to counter with a Death Spell.. but nothing happens. I can't recall if this is vanilla behaviour or if it's SCS that makes them immune to it. Anyway, we have no way to kill it: I suppose a LOT of damage in rapid succession might work, but we can't bring such to bear right now. When we try to take it out, it just reverts to gaseous form and comes back in prime health.
The reason you as a player never cast the spell is that your Efreeti/Djinni will go hostile if it is damaged enough to turn into mist, but enemy spellcasters of course do not have this problem.
So the Efreeti starts tossing out its instant-cast Fireball, which naturally hits all three incapacitated party members. Cassius desperately tries to get Invisibility off on Imoen, but it's too late, as the Efreeti launches an instant-cast Magic Missile.
At least Jaheira and Anomen are safe under Invisibility 10' Radius (Cassius cast it after they were affected by Symbol: Stun). And.. then Irenicus pulls out his Spell Trigger. 3x Chain Lightning.
So that's Jaheira down. Guess I'm lucky she wasn't chunked. Oh: That Nabassu was summoned by the tactical mastermind Dradeel. Sigh.
Things are not good. We're running out of crazies to act as meatshields.
But finally, finally, finally Irenicus has no more Improved Mantles. Mazzy lands an Arrow of Dispelling, and we are able to force his withdrawal!
That damnable Efreeti is still running around, but fine. And now, Yoshimo enters. Note that Anomen is still stunned, and is now visible: After summoning a demon to attack us, Dradeel caught Anomen with Remove Magic (don't ask me why an enemy-only spell affects us when Dradeel casts it, the crazies are crazy)... which of course only dispelled his Invisibility, not the stun effect.
Yoshimo gives his little self-indulgent speech and goes invisible. We have no True Sight or Detect Invisibility left... and of course Yoshimo goes for Anomen. I try to cast Cassius' Minor Sequencer on Anomen, but for some reason, it fails (it always seems to do this when loaded with Invisibility and not targetted at the caster... why? There's no reason for it). Cassius has no Invisibility left memorized. We try to block the cowardly traitor Yoshimo so that the Efreeti has time to kill Anomen first, but no.
Our rage is terrible to behold. The would-be Murderers that flood the room are mercilessly hacked down by Mazzy, their bodies burned by both frost and acid. Yoshimo is cleaved in twain by Minsc. Our fury is such that even the Efreeti turns to mist and flees. But it is all for naught. Anomen lies dead, and with such horrific injuries that no raising is possible.
We gather up our dead friends' belongings, and make for the exit. We will have to rest again: Who knows what foul things wait for us outside? And there are only three of us still standing.
Cassius replenishes his power, and we head upstairs. We sneak by Saemon Havarian under Invisibility 10' Radius, dismantle the Stone Golem protecting Irenicus' office, and discover his notes.
We know where you are going now, Irenicus. There will be no mercy, there will be no respite. You shall get exactly what you deserve.
We take the knave Havarian up on his offer, and are teleported outside. Nothing barrs our path but four Lizard Men. We casually dispose of them, and return to Brynnlaw.
The Temple raises Jaheira for 1200 gold, and as she comes back with Wondrous Recall memorized, she in turn raises Imoen. We use a scroll of Friends on Cassius and buy-out the Temple's stock of Potions of Genius for 3500 gold. We will be fighting Mind Flayers soon enough, and there will be scrolls we want to scribe. We also have a last look at the storekeep here: Cassius spends 2300 gold on a scroll of Spell Deflection. I'll not have him killed from lacking proper spell protection.
Imoen and Cassius scribe everything they have, boosted by Potions of Genius.
Following this, a round of sherry is ordered. Everyone raises their glass to Anomen: A bit of a dunce sometimes, but our loyal friend nonetheless. I wish we could give you the sendoff you deserve, Anomen, but we are still in danger. We'll honour your name and deeds by hunting and slaying the vile wretch responsible for your fall.
Cassius is now a L14 Elf Diviner.
Anyway, I knew it would happen since I've tested it before, but figured I might as well hope against hope.
Flashburn's Rejects
BG1: Prologue, 1, 2We return the second apprentice's staff to Kryn Darkflame. We visit Larswood and jack Baeloth's Evil Archmagi robe. I think it's time to clear the Nashkel Mines. We barrel right through it, though a Kobold Shaman gives Bruss a scare, causing him to set off all 3 traps near the entrance to the mine's 4th level. Garos has to stop dancing and cast Rallying Cry twice because the first one misses Bruss.
At Mulahey's fight, the half-orc manages to mentally dominate Spaz. Gaspar frees him with Dispel Charm. Bruss kills Mulahey soon after.
Rufus puts the kobold trash to sleep and they get cleaned up.
At the Valley of the Tombs, the Revenant is killed thanks to Garos' spirit bros. Narcillicus is neutered by Gaspar's charms. Another of Darkflame's apprentices, Xarius the Black, is in the tomb with 3 ghasts. Krieg lures out the ghasts one by one and they get killed by a firing line of spirit archers. Rufus tries to silence Xarius but he saves against it.
Spaz tries a Wand of Paralysis, but Xarius fires his prebuffs before the projectile arrives.
Krieg, Spaz, and Rufus escape outside and Garos goes in instead. The spirit army gets several hits on the shadow mage, but he blocks any further attempts with Black Mist, blinding the spirits. With them disabled, Garos also escapes outside to summon more spirits, but Xarius follows. Gaspar manages to charm him, but he wriggles free of his control before the round is over.
The shadow mage's prebuffs expire and his Shadeskins are all destroyed by Bruss and and a spirit archer. Rufus and a spirit defeat Xarius.
He has a couple of neat items on him too, including shadow scrolls for level 1 and level 2. Rufus learns Curse (Shadow Weave version of IWDification Curse but ignores MR) and Black Mist (blindness cloud in 60' diameter for 1 turn, save vs. spell at -2 negates).
We return to Beregost to eliminate a certain meddlesome old man. This is why I specc'd Rufus into trap-setting. Garos learns Dispel Magic and Fury of the Winds, and can summon spirit berserkers now. Spaz can spam skeleton mooks for us, and Rufus learns Expunge Magic (as Dispel Magic but cast at 1.5x level) and Inertia (as Slow; also make a second save vs. spell but at no modifier or be held for 1 round).
After selling the loot we've found, we buy a bunch of specialty items from Kryn Darkflame for Rufus, including a scroll for levels 1, 2, and 3. He learns Shadow Rope (guaranteed stun effect for 1 round and pulls target toward you), Dark Mirage (Blur+Mirror Image for 5 turns), and Shadow Binding (Hold Person, but works on almost anything, save vs. spell at -4 negates).
Now for the bandit camp. A bandit calls the alarm and sends everyone and their mama out to get us. In the ensuing chaos, Bruss and Krieg are slowed by Venkt, forcing us to use our only 2 invisibility potions on them so they can escape. The archers keep targeting Garos as he dances, so he takes several hits from them. When Garos leaves the spirits' sight range, they are compelled to follow until they physically bump into him. This makes our retreat dicey.
Spaz attempts to summon skeletons for us and Gaspar tries to charm bandits. They gain us precious seconds, but they can't kill any of them. The spirits make some headway in culling the horde as they take out Taurgosz.
They just keep barreling toward us. Rufus puts many of the grunts to sleep, but there's just too many. If Garos or Bruss take one more hit, they're dead, and I can't count on Krieg to take out this many enemies without falling into a rage spiral. We are forced to retreat to the Friendly Arm Inn.
We rest at the Inn. Bruss gains his first Zenkai Boost as a result.
We return to the bandit camp but they only give us about 2 rounds to prebuff before finding us again. Spaz begins spamming The Dead Walk while Bruss and Krieg get into the thick of it. Rufus puts the lower level bandits to sleep and Bruss's Solar Flare works this time, blinding most onlookers.
With Shadow Rope added to his arsenal, Rufus pulls Venkt away from the crowd and stuns him for a round. This is just long enough for a spirit berserker to chunk him.
Though Gaspar is on charm duty, his multi-charm ability isn't very effective. Spaz continues spamming skellybros. Rufus casts Dark Mist, blinding most caught in the massive AoE cloud. Garos' spirits have bad saves vs. spell, so they are blinded for most of the time. Should've had him stop dancing and switch to Fury of the Winds with his bow.
We're making headway now that the bandits are blind and because Spaz has many skeletons summoned. They're somewhat magic resistant so they can fight well in the fog. Bruss and Krieg clear out any detritus that has escaped the fog. Soon, all of the bandits are dead. Phew... Wouldn't want to try that solo.
Ender Sai is freed and we return to the Friendly Arm Inn. A certain old man is back from the dead, but Rufus makes sure he stays down.
The Cloakwood awaits. I'm going to stock up on potions before leaving.
Krieg - War Hulk 6
Garos - Warhorn Shaman 6
Bruss - Saiyan Monk(ey) 6
Rufus - Thief 6/Shadow Adept 5
Spaz - Warlock 7
Gaspar - Seducer 7
Itis - on her way to the throne
Previous updatesBefore wrapping up chapter 3 Itis decided to clean the sewers and the second level of WK.
Then did the planar prison for the cash and some boots.
Windspear hill was cleared.I left the sewer key and the dragon for Bondari
Bodhi was beaten and Itis finally set sail. Packed with scrolls and gems for sale in the City of caverns. Spellhold was cleared in great style.
I went to the underdark by boat. The grand sale by the merchant netted 200.000 gp, and the ensuing debacle yielded two cloaks. Itis will wear one of these until Cespenar can work wonders on the other.
The underdark was done quick and dirty
1) killed a demon
2) promised a dragon this and that
3) went shopping in Ust Natha
4) killed the said dragon
5) killed the kua toa and the drow gatekeepers
6) and got the hell out
On the way back I recruited Drizzt for the Bodhi fight. I had dumped his scimitars when exporting...
Before the Bodhi fight Itis got an armor upgrade and some new pants.
Bodhi was easy with all the help. Drizzt dealt the final blow..
Picked up the greenstone amulet in the underdark as the final detour before facing Irenicus. The elven city was a breeze - besides the hard hitting golems
The first Irenicus fight is pretty easy when SCS isnt installed. Some low lever summons baited out the best spells.
An easy victory
In hell Itis picked up a nifty long sword and 50 % mr ( she was so clumsy with those tears...). The last Irenicus fight was fought and won with some HLA help..
Onwards to ToB
He discovered that his trap detecting ability wasn't great even with buffs so he used thge potion of clarity in order to get the Wisdom boosting tome and the loot from the chests with similarly life-threatening traps.
Before releasing Kirinhale he pickpocketted her several times.
Some chests had to be left as he couldn't disarm them. He didn't even attempt some rooms. However he left with considerable loot and one level higher. He will return after levelling up and having more skill in disarming traps. Backstabbing the ghasts turned out to be easy.
Upon returning to beregost he took a tome to Firebead thus getting his reputation to 20.
The aerial servant was then used to clear the area.
EDIT
Fang then took on the assassins Tristan and Isolde. Killing them turned out to be no mean feat and took a long time.
At first I thought that they were immune to backstab as Fang tried it over and over again without success.
I managed to separate them which helped somewhat. Eventually Fang both wounded and poisoned Tristan. Tristan then went here and there quickly so that there was no chance of backstabbing almost as if panicked, but no yellow circle.
At that point Fang switched targets and was almost killed. He therefore quit the area and returned when healed.
Isolde was invisible upon fang's return and delivered an almost fatal blow. ONce more flight seemed the best option. Upon returning for about the fourth time a backstab on Tristan worked and he fell with just one blow. The same then happened to Isolde.
Thorin, a dwrven defender who wants to go to Durlag's then jpoined Fang. This is intended to be a long term partnership.
EDIT
Picked up Gavin in order to do his quests.
Ankhegs next until we are told to do one of them.
Previous updates:
Outside the Nashkel Mine the amazons were pulled away individually for easy disposal.
A single hit prompted Tranzig to run - without success - and Burl was able to move on to the Bandit Camp. That would be a formidable obstacle in SCS due to the danger of going berserk in response to the hordes of missiles coming. However, in this unmodded installation Burl could work his way through ones or twos pretty much untroubled. At Tazok's tent he dodged in and out, evading spells while killing Venkt's companions. He wasn't too worried though about being hit by Venkt's LMDs while working through mirrors.
After resting to get Bhaal horror, Burl did a quick questing tour to push reputation up to 20 and recover the charisma tome. He then invested in some equipment upgrades, including swapping his +2 dagger for a poisonous variety. The poison didn't work on battle horrors, but that didn't make much difference as Burl picked up his final BG1 level while going to get the tome at Durlag's Tower.
After skipping through the Cloakwood, Burl charmed and killed Genthore. Kysus was then charmed and killed Rezdan with a fireball before Burl cleaned up.
In the City Burl picked up the tomes. He did though have his most worrying moment to date when a single hit from Larze sent him berserk. By that stage the ogre had been hit several times and was himself in trouble, but his greater APR let him do significant further damage to Burl and a critical miss with his final blow would have been fatal to him.
At Candlekeep Burl's War Hulk strength meant he didn't need any potions to loot the tombs. On exiting he took a diversion to find the Red Wizards - using a few fireballs there to acquire the Ring of Energy.
Back at Baldur's Gate Burl didn't bother activating Krystin - just using LMD to annoy Slythe before he got close enough to talk. A bit of running round and stabbing with his poisoned dagger then did the trick.
Before going to the palace Burl bought a Wand of Sleep to help compensate for his poor APR. Though I don't normally resort to using charms on the doppleganger noblemen I did do lower myself to doing that this time to a couple of them. As it happened a first use of the wand rendered 2 of the dopplegangers unconscious, which would probably have made the fight simple anyway.
As usual I failed to bypass all the maze traps - setting off one of the lightning ones. I'm not really sure why it seems to be more difficult to avoid those in v2.5. High HPs meant there was no danger there though.
The Undercity party were left alone as Burl went to find Sarevok. A magic missile was used to activate just him and Semaj. The mage teleported close to the dais to get the others involved and Angelo came out to play even though Burl used the Ring of Energy to finish Semaj off from a distance. Angelo's exploding arrows then did some damage before the poisoned dagger got him. Tazok missed his free attack from invisibility though and was far too slow to get another chance. Sarevok is not quite as slow to attack, but still failed to even make an attack as Burl stabbed him to death.
Burl levelled up immediately on entry to SoD. Here's his character record and inventory at that point:
War Hulk L9, 166 HPs (incl. 5 from Helm), 351 kills
EDIT
Just when I thought that all the assassins were dead:
BG1EE updates: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
SoD updates: 1, 2, 3, 4
BG2EE SoA updates: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7
Alright, no sense in moping about. We need to get out of Brynnlaw, we need to pass through all manner of dangerous locales, and we need to do so without our Cleric.
We'll replace Anomen with Viconia, assuming we live long enough to get back to Athkatla.
Since she has a slight Strength problem, we try to steal back the Ashen Scales +2 from the Brynnlaw storekeep (Imoen gets to 100 Pick Pockets with a Potion of Master Thievery, Gloves of Pickpocketing and Luck)... but it's not enough, so we are caught and lose 2 reputation. Which I guess isn't terrible since we'll need to manage reputation if we want to keep Viconia, anyway.
We steal the Horn and a few gems, and power through the would-be enslaving pirates blocking our path.
The Pirate Mage casts Dimension Door and... disappears? Truly strange: Mazzy ran through the entire town, but the Mage was nowhere to be found. Eh, she drops a Quarterstaff +1 and that's it, no great loss.
Saemon takes the helm of Desharik's ship, and we are away.
I should've remembered to prebuff extensively before we left, as we are now forced into fighting a bunch of heavily buffed Githyanki and their weird powers. We are Confused, Stunned and forced to Sleep... I'm surprised no one died. Sauhagin interrupt the one-sided battle, and we awake in the City-Of-Caverns.
Slightly unfortunate behaviour here: The negative effects from the Githyanki fight are still in play.
Fortunately, Confused Imoen/Cassius do not start attacking the Sauhagin during the cutscenes, and even though Mazzy/Minsc are Mazed, we draw out the fight with the Ettin until they return and can handle it for us. We agree to go after the Rebel Prince, and are given free (well... supposedly Loyalist forces still attack us) reign of the city.
We head south first to grab Sekolah's tooth. Another Bone Golem lies in wait, but Mazzy has Boots of Speed now, and we easily kite it around, taking potshots with Azuredge. I'd prefer fighting it properly, but it just deals too much damage. We play a game with the Imps, get our reward, and Sekolah's tooth (the Spectator is allowed to depart peacefully, as wise Cassius argues in favour of allowing us to retrieve the tooth).
This whole city is basically a respite from horrendous, life-threatening encounters.
The Sauhagin have excellent THAC0 and good damage, can poison on hit, and have a few bolts that stun on a failed save. But damage can be mended, poison can be cured, and stun can be prevented with Chaotic Commands, so in the end, there's not much danger here, as long as we keep hitpoints high and Chaotic Commands up. They have a handful of Priestesses, but they are easily kept interrupted, even with their Stoneskins.
Cassius pops a Project Image (one of several potent spells we now have access to), just so we can conjure up a wall of Skeleton Warriors without wasting real spell slots (the Image casts Invisibility 10' Radius as well, so Cassius won't catch a stray bolt stunning him). These five Skeleton Warriors are enough to help us clear almost all of the city, including the big gaggle of undead to the south (with some help from Mazzy).
As they cannot follow us down the stairs, we dismantle the remaining Skeleton Warriors before going down: Only two remained, but they did their job well. I try something out here, and it does work: There are eight Sauhagin down the stairs, two in the water next to where you appear, and six further south. The ones to the south are not called in to help by the ones in the water, and so Mazzy can shoot them down with impunity (no Sauhagin can outshoot Mazzy).
Once they are removed, Cassius heads down and pops his second Project Image, which in turn conjures five more Skeleton Warriors and, under PfMW, goes forth to slay the remaining Sauhagin at no risk to us.
We speak with the Prince and agree to help him. We have no Monk, and I would like Jaheira to eventually wield Spears (i.e. the Impaler +3, even though we'll likely have better options by the time she has amassed the necessary proficiencies). Having used Project Image for dealing with the spawns throughout the city, Cassius and Imoen have nearly all their spells remaining. Four Skeleton Warriors and a Fire Elemental (conjured by Imoen, and thankfully it didn't turn on us) form a wall upon which the Sauhagin crash like waves.
We receive our reward, and head for the entrance to the Underdark.
I intend to take my time with the Underdark, clearing the Kuo-Toans, Beholders and Mind Flayers before entering Ust Natha, simply because I absolutely do not want to be rushed. Heck, the Beholder Hive doesn't even need to be entirely cleared in one go. We might go after the imprisoned souls, but there's a Lich among them who will certainly summon a Pit Fiend. We'll decide on that later.
Following a rest, we set out. The great depths of the Underdark stretch before us...
Deep breaths. The Underdark isn't guaranteed to be lethal! Only nearly so.
Let's start by not dying in the same ignoble fashion as Aldain the Conjurer. Invisibility 10' Radius is applied after Minsc and Mazzy receive Chaotic Commands from Jaheira. They'll dispose of the three Mind Flayers directly north of where we enter, while the rest of the party relaxes in perfect safety.
Truly, words cannot encompass the totality of our failure.
So: Minsc and Mazzy moved north. The Mind Flayers are permanently and undispellably invisible until they spot an enemy (Divination spells reveal them, but they immediately turn invisible again), so Mazzy goes visible. And the literal bombardment of Ballistic Attack begins.
Mazzy and Minsc try ranged attacks first, but they're dealing too little damage, and our rapidly dwindling potion supply just can't keep up with the damage (I'm not exaggerating: While I'm not sure of the cooldown, Ballistic Attack deals 30-40ish blunt damage with no save, and apparently never misses either). They close to melee, but the Mind Flayers are just hitting too often and draining Intelligence. We might have been able to kill at least one, but Mazzy uncharacteristically suffered morale failure and started running all over the caverns.
Well, there's no way we can kill them now: Ballistic Attack automatically kills Skeleton Warriors, and anything else in way of summons will just get Held and eaten. So, we stealthily pick up the Bag of Holding, stuff everything into it, and sneak towards the Deep Gnome village in the northwest.
How do we get past the Drow War Party? We bait out each and every one of their 6 Divination spells by ducking around the corner when they start to cast. Yes, it took quite some time.
We arrive at the Swirfneblin village and agree to help them, but that is for later (much, much later...).
Jaheira had Wondrous Recall memorized and so returns our valiant frontliners to life.
Alright. Clearly, we cannot afford to underestimate any enemy down here.
I don't like it, but we're going to have to go in guns blazing against every encounter (read: Buffed to the hilt). Which will mean one, maybe two encounters per rest, as with only Jaheira to cover Death Ward and Chaotic Commands, that's all we can scrounge up divine spell slots for.
So, we rest up. The Myconid colony closest to the village is handled via Skeleton Warriors, with some Skull Trap/Fireball/Haste support from Imoen and Cassius, and invisible Mazzy directing the action.
Next, the Mind Flayers must die. If we leave them, it's a matter of time until we're headed back to the Swirfneblin village and forget all about them in their little corner overlooking the path to the village.. and then it's just game over, man!
We buff extensively, key spells being Haste (of course), Chaotic Commands, Improved Invisibility for Mazzy/Minsc/Jaheira, an early True Sight, and two Mordenkainen's Sword. Things go much better this time: The Mind Flayers die before they can get the Ballistic Attack spam going. In fact, they accomplish almost nothing.
With two encounters cleared, we don't feel like pressing our luck, and so retreat to rest up.
Next, the Drow War Party. Jaheira has to spend both L6 slots on Wondrous Recall to cover everyone with Chaotic Commands (Minsc can technically make do without as he has Lilarcor, but I'm worried about stuns), so she can't provide any Fire Elementals: Imoen picks up the slack, and neither of her conjured Fire Elementals turn on us. Joined by two Mordenkainen's Sword and a Skeleton Warrior at the fore, we charge in!
We're able to quickly kill off two Priestesses, but the rest take much longer. There are two Drow Mages here, they both start with full defensive buffs... and when we Breach them, they apply a Spell Sequencer with Stoneskin/FS:R/FS:B. Sigh. Still, we make progress, even though a Death Spell eventually knocks out our wall of summons. Unfortunately, while the enemy Mages aren't dreadfully effective, one of them manages to get Remove Magic off on Minsc (who is a bit wounded since he had to hold the line once our summons dropped). With almost no protective magics to keep him safe, the result is not unexpected.
Honestly, had that been a chunking, I would've cancelled the run.. Anomen is one thing, but Cassius ain't going nowhere without Minsc and Boo. But Minsc is alive (well no, but he can be brought back!).
We apply yet more Breach, and the vaunted Mages soon fall, as do their wicked compatriots.
Friggin' Drow. We rest up yet again, and Minsc is returned to us. Thinking we're in for another massive fight, we approach the bridge, again with mighty summons and full defensive spellworks... but these Drow prove no difficulty whatsoever. They have not a single Mage among them, and their laughable Priestess has only 4th level spells available. I'm making a mental note: Bridge Drow = Pushovers.
On our way back to the village for yet another rest, we free the Swirfneblin, and tackle the easier trapped souls: Madman Aganalo and Riti. Aganalo accomplishes nothing save hurting our Fire Elemental a little bit, and Riti similarly falls swiftly after True Sight and Breach. Jhor the Bleeder +2 actually goes to Minsc... that's right, he now has ++ in Bastard Swords! Because he's Minsc, and Minsc uses swords.
We rest for what seems the twentieth time, but is probably only the fifth or so. Another fight that is way easier than I had envisioned follows, as the Kuo-Toan party to the southeast can do nothing to us. Noted.
Alright! We rest... again. Now is probably a good time to help Vithal. I know it's way more profitable to just kill him in the end, but we're nice people. The first wave of Elementals are by far the most annoying, as the Greater Earth Elemental casts Stoneskin on itself constantly, and leads with an Earthquake. A few Breach are required to bring it down, but we manage to get Chaos off on its three summoned Earth Elementals.
Improved Invisibility was helpful, as the Earth Elementals hit hard.
Fire elementals aren't a big deal, as long as everyone has Protection from Fire, and we do. The Greater Fire Elemental casts Flame Strike incessantly, but since we're all but immune, little comes of it.
The Greater Air Elemental has some kind of push attack that's quite irritating and actually casts Chain Lightning, but it's not overly dangerous. Still, we break out our last two Improved Invisibility.
And that's it! Upon Vithal's return, we gently suggest our reward is a bit on the small side (a one-charge item seems a bit cheap...), and we get a scroll of Simulacrum (eh) and ADHW (hooray!) for our troubles.
We once more tread the by now familiar path to the Swirfneblin village.
Next time, we shall deal with the Balor, and then (following careful deliberation) decide which evil-infested hovel shall be the first cleansed.
But that is for later. For now, we leave the party at the Swirfneblin inn.
Though saddened by Anomen's demise, the party is happy to still be alive. The Swirfneblin brew a strange ale from fungus, and Cassius is brave enough to try it.
Soon, the entire party is partaking of the brew, chatting amicably amongst themselves: It is a welcome respite from the overbearing dangers that still threaten them.
Cassius remains a L14 Elf Diviner.
We'll replace Anomen with Viconia, assuming we live long enough to get back to Athkatla.
Since she has a slight Strength problem, we try to steal back the Ashen Scales +2 from the Brynnlaw storekeep ...
@aldain - good armor for Viconia is the Ankheg plate as she is strong enough to use it. The spawn for the Ankheg is near the cabin in Windspear Hills. You can also get a war dog on the spawn point. Just keep resting until you get an ankheg and its shell. Then go to Cromwell and forge the ankheg plate and voila! Decent armor for Viconia.
Flashburn's Rejects
BG1: Prologue, 1, 2, 3We buy some potions from High Hedge and Kryn Darkflame, and buy the Quarterstaff +3 and Greenstone Amulet at Ulgoth's Beard. On the way back to the Friendly Arm to travel to Cloakwood, we finally encounter the first of the bounty hunters. They are no trouble, they just caught us unawares.
Cloakwood 1 is pretty standard. The druids may have had prebuffs and a panther and a bear helping them, but they fell all the same. As soon as we arrive in Cloakwood 2, three Phase Spiders teleport over! This is really gamey, SCS, come on. At least give me a minute to get my bearings first! The spiders are dispatched, and though Bruss and Krieg get poisoned, I am quick to use antidotes on them. If not cured immediately, Krieg will spiral out of control because of poison ticks.
The rest of Cloakwood 2 is handled by 4 of Spaz's skellybros escorted by an invisible Rufus. Rufus digs out Spider's Bane +2 from the Centeol's nest without breaking invisibility via the inventory screen and brings it to Krieg, who equips it. The rest of the party is parked outside the nest. Krieg enters and baits the spiders into following him, only to have them slaughtered by spirits and skellies.
Moving on to Cloakwood 3, another set of bounty hunters appears. The amazon band is more dangerous than the Gullykin hunters. Two of them start invisible. One backstabs Gaspar, but he has health to spare. Rufus pulls the cleric using Shadow Rope to interrupt her casting.
But he gets backstabbed for it by the other invisible amazon that I forgot about. If it was a critical, he would've died. Shadeskin can't come soon enough. Garos blasts the cleric with Fury of the Winds' bonus damage while Bruss finishes her off. Rufus casts Inertia, paralyzing the last amazon for 1 round, but it's long enough to kill her. He levels up to 7 and learns Kaioken x3 and Blind Fight.
-BLIND FIGHT: The Saiyan's senses become so keen that they can fight with their eyes closed or while blinded as well as they can with their normal vision. Blind Fight effectively renders the Saiyan immune to Blindness, as they do not need to see their opponent in order to know where they are.
I skip Cloakwood 3 and 4 and just head straight for the mines. Spaz summons 3 skellybros and Rufus scouts ahead. The skellies kill Kysus before they even knew what hit him.
The other mage Rezdan freaks out and throws up prebuffs, trying to escape from the skeletons. But that just leads him right into our party and 3 spirit archers. Gaspar manages to charm him.
He commands the mage to throw out a Chaos on Drasus and Genthore. Genthore is confused but Drasus resists. Gaspar also charms Drasus and makes him fight Genthore. Krieg is taking care of those two fighters. Everyone else is focused on the mage. Rezdan's Mirror Images are all destroyed and Rufus grabs him with a Shadow Rope to keep him from casting anything.
Drasus and Genthore are wiped up. Krieg gets the Boots of Speed so he can retreat if he needs to. In the second level of the mine, I come up with a pincer attack plan for the big room with all the bandits and the female mage in it. Garos summons spirits in the south while Spaz summons skellies and sends them in from the side with the hidden wall. It takes way longer than I thought it would, but the rest of our party doesn't have to lift a finger.
Trying to ride the spirit wave, Garos has an army at his command on the third level. They butcher all opposition, but it's difficult for them to attack anything that tries to flee. Natasha the mage does exactly this, as she continuously pelts Garos with Minute Meteors, bringing him down to critical health. He rounds a corner to escape her line of sight while Bruss and a skeleton warrior give chase. She eventually sees where we're holed up and Slows the party.
But Krieg responds with a mighty blow that stuns Natasha for 1 round. Bruss and a skeleton warrior can only remove so many mirror images in one round, and she starts escaping again. They chase her down the hallway and into a room. But Bruss is wise to her Evocation chant and senses something is amiss. He flees the room just as a Sunfire bursts out of Natasha. The skeleton's MR prevails and it keeps attacking. Natasha tries using Magic Missile on Bruss, but he successfully swats it away with Ki Deflection.
Slow has worn off, so Krieg joins the fight. Natasha is finally dead. Krieg gives Garos his only extra-healing potion to maintain his spirit army.
In Davaeorn's sanctum, Rufus disables the traps in the hallway and scouts ahead. Dave tries Detect invisibility, but Rufus is immune thanks to his Cloak of Non-Detection. Spaz sends in his skellies to draw the Battle Horrors into the spirits' line of sight. Dave releases a minor sequencer of Web+Stinking Cloud onto them.
The spirits hold on just fine, but Dave teleports away somewhere after wasting a couple of enchantment spells on the spirits. I can't figure out where he went. The Battle Horrors are killed and Garos levels up.
Suddenly, guards come through the door to the upper levels.
The last Battle Horror is destroyed by the spirits and they rally around Garos, now focusing on Dave because he unwisely teleported right into the center of our party. The fighters quickly tear away his Mirror Images and he tries to teleport away, but Bruss interrupts his casting with a Ki Blast Volley.
Dave pelts Garos with Minute Meteors, but he is easily eviscerated. Chapter 5 complete!
We pay Drizzt a visit. Rufus keeps Drizzt still for a few rounds using Shadow Rope since it bypasses magic resistance, but learns that it only pauses the target instead of stunning it, which means you still have to roll to hit. Krieg levels up from him.
At Wyrm's Crossing, another of Darkflame's apprentices awaits us, Chang Yu'ke. This one summons wraiths!
We take out two wraiths and Rufus tries Expunge Magic to take down Chang's buffs, but it fails. Chang casts Black Lightning. It's Chain Lightning that does half fire and half electrical damage, and save vs. spell or go berserk for 3 rounds. Bruss fails to save and goes berserk. Krieg and Gaspar get tagged by wraiths, draining them of one level. Gaspar manages to charm it before getting hit. I have them NOPE out of there and go back across the bridge. Rufus casts Shadow Binding which holds all of the enemies except one wraith.
This wraith, our temporary former ally, is now badly injured after being focused on and turns on his summoner by casting Lifedrinker Touch to heal itself, which kills Chang.
The healed wraith is killed and then the rest of the held wraiths are destroyed. Phew.
Chang has a ring that gives +1 CON and +4 to saves vs. death for Shadow Adepts, but a Ring of Protection +1 and Ring of Wizardry are a better fit. He also drops shadow scrolls for level 2 and 3, plus a wand of Shadow Missiles.
Rufus learns Ghostly Visage (level 2: for 1 turn/level, +10% physical damage resistance and immunity to level 1 spells) and Shadow Spear (level 3: as Spell Thrust, plus some additional side effects on a failed save vs. spell, but you have to throw it at the target for it to work). The big city and its oodles of safe XP await.
Krieg - War Hulk 7
Garos - Warhorn Shaman 7
Bruss - Saiyan Monk(ey) 7
Rufus - Thief 6/Shadow Adept 5
Spaz - Warlock 7
Gaspar - Seducer 7
My own run of Shaman + Wizard Slayer got cut tragically short as I forgot a Remove Fear prebuff on my Wizard Slayer Tilly and the Dragon Fear aura around the Gate Lich meant she couldn't keep nullifying its spells. The rest of the party inadvisedly tried to save her, but an unseen sequencer with Web and Stinking Cloud in a tiny room gave the Lich time to recover from its spell failure and... the results were inevitable.
I thought I'd have a go with the poverty challenge with one small change: I'm allowing myself to purchase temple services from gold directly obtained from quests, so stuff like the reward for Basillus, or from Berrun Ghastkill. I don't think I can survive until my cleric hits level 9 with only one death.
Introducing the team:
Credit for these portraits go to... Um... razors, shizen1102, Dyzdar, quickreaver, kittypinkart, Marikunochka all from Deviantart for Aster, Tanriq, Eona, Thaddeus, Kyra, and Raven respectively, and of course LadyRhian for compiling these pictures into an easy-to-find thread.
So all these classes are fairly standard, except that I'm fielding one less sorcerer and one more druid-spellcaster than most, and I think the Priest of Helm hasn't been used in a poverty run yet? Could be wrong. Anyhow, Priest of Helm is for his +4, 3APR Seeking Sword and True Seeing at low levels is always nice. Thaddeus is interesting, and my possible answer to the lategame: his stats are all within dual range, and there's a possibility of going either Shapeshifter 13 -> Fighter or Shapeshifter 15 -> Fighter. Greater Werewolf + Enchanted Weapon + Fighter HLAs has potential to be decent, though Earth Elemental + Enchanted Weapon + Fighter HLAs is probably better... but comes online ~3m experience later. I'll decide if I somehow get to BG2.
Known spells: Tanriq: Shillelagh, CLW.
Raven: Protection from Petrification, MM
Eona: Blindness, MM
Instead I am going with Sharsteal, a Svirfneblin Illusionist/Thief.
The extra dexterity and stealth for being Svirfneblin will improve her thieving abilities considerably, but the 30% penalty in experience will I think more than compensate.
Summoning weasels worked very well against Shank and Carbos as the assassins attacked the weasels.
However the AI for Mendas was much better. He ignored the weasels and went straight for Sharsteal.
What is more, he used stealth and backstab whenever possible. This brought Sharsteal down to 1 HP twice so Sharsteal had to use two healing potions. It was just as well that he had used the oil of speed in the training room!
When it came to the fight against Tarnesh, the weasels worked well in absorbing Tarnesh's magic missiles. They only deliver non-lethal damage, so unfortunately, it was the guards who delivered the final blow.