Coming back from a long hiatus... amazing to see that the challenge continues unabated!
After some quick deaths while I remembered what not to do, I have a new character up and running. Introducing Jaay - neutral good Jester. My 18th documented attempt.
Key mods: EE 2.5; SCS (default prebuffs and all tactical challenges); item randomiser; BG1NPC.
Self-imposed rules: character class, race, alignment, etc selected randomly. Stats - highest total after 50 rolls. Core rules. Must role-play CHARNAME's alignment to the best of my ability, even if there will be negative consequences. No adding party members with severe alignment conflicts. Random number of allowed party members.
Jaay rolled a 6 on party size. She's picked up Imoen, Jaheira, Khalid, Branwen and Yeslick. Just defeated Davaeorn (where many previous attempts have ended). She's now level 8...
Before departing to take on the Balor, I actually invest in, and scribe, a few scrolls: With no Cleric, Imoen needs Animate Dead, and while at it, she might as well have Spell Shield, Minor Sequencer and Secret Word too. We also grab the five Potions of Genius, foreseeing many Mind Flayer battles to come.
Alright. The Balor has a host of powers, but we can negate all of them with SI: Abjuration, Protection from Fire, Resist Fear, Death Ward and Chaotic Commands. To this end, the non-Mages stay outside the room, with Cassius and Imoen conjuring four Skeleton Warriors and a Fire Elemental to hold the line while we reduce the Balor's Magic Resistance and start taking it down. While the Balor cannot hurt Cassius and Imoen, it certainly can and does hurt our summons. However, following three Lower Resistance and a Greater Malison, a Finger of Death from Cassius solves the encounter.
That went nice and smooth! We retire to the inn, as we have many, many times before. The decision on which den of evil to hit first is easy: The Kuo-Toans, though greatly annoying with their Haste and constant dispelling of Illusions, are much less dangerous than Beholders or Illithids. We'll need Chaotic Commands to remove the threat of being stunned by their bolts, and defensive Illusions are pointless, but most anti-humanoid spells work, as do regular damage spells
We enter the Kuo-Toa lair. The small group to the north is quickly dispatched through brute force. To the northeast is a larger, more potent group, sporting both a Priest and a Wizard. Once engaged, they are joined by a similar group from further north! Minsc takes a real beating despite wearing Drow Full Plate +5/Drow Medium Shield +3 and has to quaff one of our precious few Potions of Extra Healing, but manages to retreat behind the lines to provide ranged support instead. Mazzy holds the line, and once some area-of-effect damage and a Chaos gets thrown into the mix, we carry the day.
We press north. After a solid round of buffs, Mazzy nips into the throne room and adds some diseased tadpoles to the healthy ones, supposedly weakening the prince. He seems mighty weak regardless, as he fails to do much of anything.
On our way back out, we deploy our Skeleton Warrior army against the Beholder and two Gauths in the room to the west. They perform admirably: The Beholder and its Gauth guards fall in short order, with the party never having been in danger.
And that's it for the Kuo-Toans. Not so for their lair, however... there remain those fiends, the Demon Knights! Proper fiends they are too, with a host of mighty powers, and a most unpleasant Level Drain on hit. But they have Armor of the Hart +3 and Girdle of Frost Giant Strength. There's no choice: The Fiends must perish!
So, again (and slightly overused with fiends, in my opinion), Demon Knights cast Remove Magic at a way too high caster level, and will then proceed to drop Symbol: Stun/Death, Power Word: Stun/Blind/Kill, and a 20D6 Fireball to make things even more ridicolous. Basically, no one is surviving that without buffs, and only Mages can protect their buffs. So, the decision is made to send Cassius in alone with Skeleton Warriors. The rest of the party will wait, hasted and buffed, beyond the door: Hopefully Cassius can bait most of the Demon Knights spells (they do not get at-will spells, thankfully) and maybe even kill a few of them, so that the party can mop up the remainder.
So, my first mistake: I forgot to put Amulet of Power on Cassius (I put it on him, but got distracted and had to close the game down, and when I started again, I forgot to equip it). When he was about to open up with a volley of Finger of Death, he had been Level Drained to level 10. A few Cone of Cold were insufficient to kill any Demon Knight, so the party had to come rushing in. Imoen eventually popped Limited Wish for party-wide NPP, and until that happened Minsc and Cassius juggled the Amulet of Power to keep more Level Drain from occuring.
Unfortunately, one Demon Knight still had a Remove Magic left. Mazzy is stripped of all protections, and is thus Level Drained several times. We prevail in the end, but not without injury: Note that Cassius' Stoneskin dropped while he was tanking a Demon Knight, which brought him perilously close to death. It's somewhat comforting to see that Contingencies based on caster hitpoints still are not working properly: Cassius lost his Stoneskin, got reduced below 50% HP, and still had to run for his life for the better part of a round before his Contingency kicked in.
Hooray! Hooray! Hooray! Victory, as well as a nice set of armor and a very useful Girdle of Giant Strength is ours. But wait... we have no Cleric. Jaheira can't cast Lesser Restoration. Do we have any scrolls of Lesser Restoration? Hm.. no. Crap. Crap! Are we going to be stuck with Level Drain for the rest of the Underdark!?
We hobble back to the Duergar Merchants. Nope, no Restoration scroll here. In a desperate last bid, we march north to the merchant in the inn. Can it be?
Oh you glorious gnome! I could kiss you! I won't, because your beard has things crawling in it and you smell like fungus. But I could! He only has four Restoration scrolls for sale, but we scoop them all up. Cassius and Mazzy are restored. Huzzah!
But that's it for easy (hah! Not so easy, I'd say) encounters. Time to get serious. The Beholder Hive will be hit next, simply because if things turn hairy, we can exit: The Illithid City locks down once you enter. We will solve the fact that fighting Beholders typically means death by simply not fighting them; rather, the fighting will be left to Skeleton Warriors under Haste/Strength of One/Bless, with invisible spotters (indeed, the entire party will be under Invisibility 10' Radius most of the time) directing the action and a few area-of-effect spells to start the battles.
We depart for the Beholder Hive. The Kuo-Toans at the bridge have respawned, but by now we can just power through them unbuffed. That poor Ring of Regeneration must be up to 10k HP regenerated by now, but what can you do? We need Jaheira's slots for other things than healing.
Alright. We buff to the absolute hilt (including Improved Invisibility for everyone), Jaheira casts Harm, and we enter. Of course, this was overkill, as SCS moves the Elder Orb from the entrance to furthest into the Hive. Still, Jaheira smashes one Beholder into smithereens, and is joined by Mazzy and Minsc in quickly beating the second one down: With Haste and Death Ward, three fighter-types have no problem killing a single Beholder before it can kill one of them in return.
I realize now that that was an unnecessary risk. If Jaheira drops, we have no way to revive her at present. She'll have to stay out of the fighting when possible from now on. A little further in, five Drow take down a Beholder without breaking a sweat. They actually prove very nasty: +5 Full Plate, +3 Medium Shields and +3 Flails (and at least three of them quaffed Potions of Hill Giant Strength) means we struggle to take them down. We end up needing both Cassius and Imoen tanking, and even so, take a lot of damage.
We even went so far as to summon two Mordenkainen's Swords and go invisible... but the Swords could barely hit the Drow! Tough cookies, to say the least. Alright, we came prepared for the next bit. Four Skeleton Warriors and our single remaining Mordenkainen's Sword are summoned, buffed, and sent into the action. The Hive Mother sees straight through Invisibility and is very difficult to hurt (50% physical resistance and constantly casts Stoneskin), but her fellow Beholders and Gauths are much easier targets. We start the fight by dropping a Skull Trap and Stoneskin on the group, causing them to scatter somewhat. The Skeleton Warriors do eventually go down, but they take many Beholders with them.
And here we have to retreat for the first time. We've put a dent in the Beholder population, but we came equipped to fight an Elder Orb (Breach etc), yet there's no such Elder Orb within reach. We retreat, rest (memorizing scores of Animate Dead, and two Project Image for Cassius) and return. That Hive Mother is a right pain: We send in five Skeleton Warriors, they kill many Beholders... but the Hive Mother comes gunning for us once the Skeletons have all dropped! Minsc and Mazzy are forced to intercept her, with predictable results. They were heavily buffed, but the Hive Mother cares not for such things, and promptly applies Remove Magic followed by Death Ray on Minsc (Mazzy got Mazed).
Still, Minsc can be Raised. As long as Cassius and Jaheira survive, we'll be fine. Cassius and Imoen are just outside the Hive Mother's sight, and so are safe. They keep the pressure up by animating Skeleton Warriors to replace those that fall. Though the Hive Mother is difficult to damage, there's not much she can do against near-endless undead hordes... and she falls! Hooray!
Jaheira had Wondrous Recall (this spell is just... ooooh, so good!), and Minsc is returned to the land of the living. We still have our buffs available, so Minsc, Mazzy and Jaheira get Improved Invisibility/Haste/Chaotic Commands, and proceed to make mincemeat out of the Mind Flayers to the south (Improved Invisibility really borks them, they struggle to hit you), though Jaheira catches a few Ballistic Attack.
Strangely, there are no Beholders at all in the southernmost room. The northeast room holds some Gauths, easily dispatched by Skeleton Warriors, and a fair bit of gold/gems as well as a scroll of Protection from Magical Energy (not bad!). We're actually doing a good job clearing the Hive: There remains an Elder Orb, a handful of Gauths and about six Beholders guarding the path to the second Elder Orb, and that's it. Again, we conjure: Imoen does the honours, bolstering her ranks of Skeleton Warriors with a Mordenkainen's Sword (Imoen doesn't know Project Image) and an Air Elemental (Imoen doesn't know many good L6 spells either).
Cassius and Imoen approach the Beholder group through the southernmost tunnel, fire off an Acid Fog and Fireball... and the silly Beholders just run around looking for us, but never reaching far enough to find the party. They take damage from the Death Fog, though, loads of damage. In fact, a second Death Fog kills off most of them!
We send in Imoen's by now four summons. The Air Elemental gets Petrified early on, but the Skeleton Warriors succeed in killing all the regular Beholders. With our last five 5th level slots, Cassius conjures up another five Skeleton Warriors. They destroy the first Elder Orb.
The second Elder Orb fares no better than the first. It too is destroyed! Hooray!
We gather up the Eyestalk, the Blade of the Equalizer and the incredibly potent Amulet of Spell Warding (which goes to Mazzy). And that's.. it? The Beholder Hive is cleansed! Huzzah! We retire, once more, to the inn.
Neither my nerves nor Cassius' can take much more of this, so best to stop here for now. Great successes, near escapes, and consequently tackling every problem with Animate Dead... who can ask for more? Next time, we will assault the Illithid City, and with any luck, live to tell the tale.
Baldur's Gate's sidequest hell goes smoothly and we get lots of easy XP. Spaz and Gaspar level up toward the end of it when we investigate the Merchant's League.
Spaz steals the WIS tome from Chanthalas Ulbright and Rufus consumes it for +5% spell duration.
Ramazith's tower is a bit dicey because our party is ill-suited for cramped spaces like this. Rufus gets killed by Ramazith when he unleashes an acid arrow and gets hit with a couple of Minute Meteors. Rufus is super squishy because of a couple of Shadow Adept items he wears reduces his max HP. He gets even squishier if he fails a save from his Shadow Weave spells that take him below 16 CON.
Rufus is raised after we deal with Ramazith and he levels up after dealing with Jardak and his master. Notice his 13 max HP after failing a save from casting shadow magic.
We get Lothander to hand over his part of the antidote and we kill him by blocking off the exit he normally scampers into. Now we have a second pair of Boots of Speed, but nobody really benefits from it. But hey, it's 4000 free XP.
Garos levels up as we fight Degrodel's Invisible Stalkers and Doom Guards, learning Static Charge. I hope this version of Static Charge works, because it did basically nothing after the first strike in the older version of IWDification that I was using.
We get to test it out against the group at the top of the Iron Throne. There's a new thief here that I haven't seen before who facestabs Gaspar for most of his health. He runs downstairs and gulps an invis potion but manages to charm Cloudwulfe after leaving the fight.
The first static charge works and Garos enrages immediately afterward to help fight. I think there's actually two thieves here with the same name, because that thief that facestabbed Gaspar is now on top of Garos and Spaz at the same time. Spaz will be okay because his AC is an incredible -13, which is at least 7 points better than anyone else right now. Rufus throws out a Black Mist from behind to blind everyone who isn't against the walls.
Ok, there actually are two thieves with the same name, because Shennara dies to Bruss while Shennera is busy fighting Garos.
Rufus then casts Night Terrors, which panics Aasim and an invisible Shennara. Garos' Static Charge from earlier discharges a second time, so at least it actually does work. We're almost done.
Then the fighter/mage throws out a Chaos spell from toward the back room, which Bruss fails to save against. Garos uses an Arrow of Dispelling to rip apart his Mirror Images and Minor Globe. Rufus finishes him off with a wand of frost, turning him into a statue and shattering him. The other Shennara is revealed by Spaz's See the Unseen invocation and killed with Shadow Missiles from Rufus and an acid arrow from Garos.
All of us are pretty beaten up but we prevailed. At Candlekeep, we run into the dreaded Ogre Magi ambush that I've heard about. SCS just loves being cheap like this. It's really annoying! Why just outside the walls of Candlekeep, right after a chapter transition of all places? Couldn't this have been placed in a better spot???
Rufus uses the Soulflare Candle to cast Umask, shattering the magi's mirror images. Bruss performs a Solar Flare which blinds several of them. The magi all waste their first round by casting Sleep on a Carrion Crawler that Gaspar recruited. I must not have been paying attention because Rufus is then cut down by one of the magi.
I so cannot wait for Shadeskin. Gaspar charms one of the ogres while Krieg, Bruss, and Garos cut down the rest. I think there's one that got away because we couldn't find it while it was invisible, because it took some damage from it's Spirit Armor after we rested at the inn.
After raising Rufus yet again at the temple of Oghma, we kill the Shistal Doppelganger and Gaspar reaches the top of Candlekeep for the...something of protection +1. I forget if it's a cloak or a ring. Anyway, we kill the iron throne leaders for the free XP and descend into the catacombs. Rufus and Gaspar work together to obtain the third WIS tome.
The last of Darkflame's appentices is guarding the STR tome. We send in 3 skellybros and the carrion crawler to kill him. The crawler paralyzes him, making the skeletons' job easy. Mak'kai drops shadow scrolls for levels 3 and 4 as well as a Wand of Shadow Fire. His robe increases spell duration and cold damage dealt slightly, in exchange for reduced fire resistance and max health. With Rufus as fragile as he already is, I decide to stick with the Evil Archmagi robe.
Gaspar recruits the ghasts that are hanging out nearby. With them, the carrion crawler, and some skellies, Prat's group is vanquished easily. We unfortunately learn that Diarmid is now immortal for no reason, so we have to squeeze our way past him when we usually just kill him on our way out. Thanks again, SCS...
We return the last of the apprentices' staves to Kryn Darkflame. In addition to the usual 1000 gold/XP, he rewards us with this amulet.
Good stuff. This will negate the casting speed penalty for using shadow magic in daylight. Time for TotSC. I'm not really feeling the ice island this time because it doesn't hold anything useful for us, so we just kill Shandalar. This is done by casting spells in this sequence: Sigil of Despair (Rufus) -> Doom (Garos) -> Impose (Rufus) -> Chant (Garos) -> ghast, carrion crawler, Bruss (stunning fist), and Gaspar (darts of stunning) paralyze Shandalar while he's stunned.
This sequence causes a total of a -5 save penalty. Impose is extremely good. It's a 3rd level spell that does 3d8 crushing damage and sends the target flying away for a second and stuns it for one round. It bypasses magic resistance and has no save. Gaspar, Spaz, and Bruss all level up. Bruss and Spaz both learn teleport abilities: Bruss with Flash Step and Spaz with Flee the Scene.
- FLASH STEP: Once per 5 rounds, the Saiyan may instantaneously dash to any location in sight range.
The werewolf island and Durlag's Tower both fill me with dread. Only Krieg can hit Karoug with the Sword of Balduran unless Rufus paralyzes him so someone else can use Werebane. The werewolf army of Kaishas doesn't exactly thrill me either, but werewolves are easier to kill than wolfweres and they're worth 1400 XP a pop. Maybe I could farm them if I can kill Karoug. Durlag's Tower's chess game has been improved by SCS so I can't use Spaz's preferred strategy to kill them using the lightning traps.
Krieg - War Hulk 7 Garos - Warhorn Shaman 8 Bruss - Saiyan Monk(ey) 8 Rufus - Thief 7/Shadow Adept 6 Spaz - Warlock 9 Gaspar - Seducer 9
In the prologue, Burl just persuaded Porios to surrender and then went invisibly down to find Korlasz. A single charge from the Ring of Energy (handy due to the magic damage it inflicts and its ability to ignore mirror images) was enough to get her to surrender.
Before leaving Burl bought a few things from the Flaming Fist Healer - he has scrolls of greater restoration among other goodies.
In the City Burl slaughtered a few NPCs to get their equipment. He also had another run in with Korlasz while on a quest to get the tankard head gear - just waiting there until the mage had used all her spells up on the guards.
Staying with the idea of doing the minimum possible, Burl didn't bother going in search of a regeneration ioun stone, but just hid behind the tent at Boareskyr Bridge until Caelar called a parley. He then ran through Troll Claw Woods and then used invisibility to pass through the outer portions of the temple.
Shutting himself in Ziatar's room to avoid any guards interfering, he used a potion of invulnerability while killing the half-dragon.
Still slightly down on HPs he went invisibly to attack the Neothelid. He took quite a bit of damage from the swords there though - normally he would have been running round between his attacks, but doing that with the Neothelid would have caused it to go underground. As with one occasion in BGEE he probably would have died there if he had got a critical miss when the Neothelid was at near death (that fight would probably have been safer if he'd used an invisibility potion after each of his first 2 attacks, rather than trying firebreath potions that the Neothelid mainly resisted).
He used a potion of regeneration, along with an oil of speed to make that work faster, while dealing with a few crawlers on the way to find Darskhelin. The potion of invulnerability was still active while he used potions of firebreath to speed up the action there.
I decided not to attack the Shadow Aspect - while the +3 sword there is superficially attractive, its ability to dispel invisibility on Belhifet is arguably more of a liability than an asset (as it results in him freshly casting improved invisibility). Burl used the Horn of Kazgaroth for the first time to protect against greater command from Akanna - and then retreated out of range while the priest died of poison.
Even though Burl couldn't use throwing daggers, he still wanted to kill Morentherene to get an upgraded shield. He buffed up with protection from poison and potion of invulnerability and managed to get one blow in before the dragon used stoneskin.
A series of blasts from the Ring of Energy finished him off.
At Boareskyr, a whack and fiery breath sorted out Vichand before he could call for help.
Burl made sure to buy a few more potions from the seller on the roof - including all 10 firebreath as the damage from those is a great replacement for low APR. After surrendering the fort, Burl used a couple of those potions on the mage on the bridge to prevent him summoning helpers to blow it up.
Back at the Camp, Burl just bought a couple of things from the genie before running through Dead Man's Pass. After rescuing Skie he went to the Underground River and drew away the Cyclops to get a seal. He then went invisibly underground to place the Bwoosh and poison the food and water - then running away invisibly once more. The latter used the last charge of his ring, but he's got loads of invisibility potions that he won't need anyway.
Once more at the Camp, Burl had a series of invasions to stop. He hadn't bothered picking up any summons, but relied essentially on firebreath potions. He started with 23 of those and used 2 of those on each of the first 3 waves and 4 on the final wave - along with a few other potions (including 2 invulnerability as a result of the first being dispelled). Grimgor survived the fiery baths, but not the backstabs from several spies.
At the Castle, Burl buffed up before going to find Ashatiel. Two firebreath potions persuaded him to seek sanctuary, while two energy charges ensured he wouldn't find any.
I noticed on following Caelar into the abyss that Burl had gained his 10th level at some point and he took that. He ran through the first area before a combination of energy charges and stabs cleared Thrix' crew.
After resting to heal up Burl took some long-term buffs and started up the elevator. On nearing the top he added a few more potions ready for the big fight, including a magic shielding to make quite sure he wouldn't fail a saving throw as a result of taking damage. He let Caelar act on her own to occupy Belhifet initially while he dealt with the others, then came to take over the tanking. Typically I wouldn't do that, but with no need to worry about attack rolls and so many HPs, Burl was comfortable being the target and that meant only a single restoration was needed to keep Caelar going until Belhifet kicked the bucket.
I ran safely through the epilogue and saved the game. I'll need though to add the kit mod to my v2.5 BG2 installation and then recreate Burl there (importing causes problems with the kit not properly transferring between the games). War Hulk L10, 173 HPs, 463 kills I see that last time he finished SoD Burl had 663 kills, so he has substantially cut down on the amount of work done this run.
Sharsteal was doing quite well until she came up against Gnarl, another character who apparently has good AI. He had to go right through the midst of the summoned weasels to get to her, but ignored them all. Despite being buffed, she was no match for him.
@Wise_Grimwald were you a solo thief, Wise? Solo thiefs can have a heck of a time at low levels. Toe-to-toe is a no-go against strong melee enemies, but if there's no maneuvering room can be tricky. I don't know Gnarl's level, but if he's lower than level 5 then he might be a good candidate for the sleep wand.
The werewolf island is up first. Garos clears out the first 3 levels of the ship with just his spirits.
Karoug's wife gives him some trouble by enfeebling and blinding him. Krieg and Bruss come up the stairs to finish her off. She really likes enchantment spells. With Karoug alone and Garos' spirits unable to hurt the greater wolfwere, Garos unsummons his spirits and opts to debuff him instead with Rufus' help. It's not enough for Shadow Binding or Inertia to work, so Spaz and Rufus just use their wands of fire.
Karoug is now toast. Rufus gains level 4 mage spells, finally. Shadeskin, Negative Immunity, Summon Shadow, and Sigil of Misfortune are learned, two of which are via the shadow scrolls from Darkflame's reward and from Mak'kai. -Shadeskin: As Stoneskin, but offers 25% elemental resistance as long as at least 1 skin is still up. -Negative Immunity: For 1 turn/level, give 1 creature immunity to blind, fear, sleep, confusion, and level drain -Sigil of Misfortune: As Greater Malison, but also bypasses magic resistance. -Summon Shadow: For 2 hours, depending on the caster's level, gets you these summons: lvl 7 = 3 shadows; lvl 9 = 3 shadow fiends; lvl 12 = 3 wraiths; lvl 16+ = 2 wraiths and 1 devil shade. These summons are weakened in daylight.
On our way back from victory, we forgot that we had to kill the sirene queen. Two other normal sirenes showed up but they were butchered. Krieg uses a Potion of Stone Form to negate any chance of being charmed. He levels up from this.
Against Kaishas's Loup Garou form, it's the same strategy as the greater wolfwere. Garos holds off the werewolves with his spirits, although they're only worth 420 XP apiece, not the 1400 like I thought. Krieg goes berserk against Kaishas, but regains control the next round. Rufus uses the Soulflare Candle to lower Kaishas' MR and he and Spaz team up to use scorcher charges.
Now back at Ulgoth's Beard, we do battle with Mendas. Of course, SCS has to start him off as a mage first before he becomes a Loup Garou too.
For some reason, 2 Loup Garous inside Mendas' house spawn on top of each other and they can't move. They still hit hard though, as Krieg finds out. Rufus and Garos debuff their saves and Rufus uses Shadow Binding to hold them still. Krieg, Rufus, and Spaz finish them off.
The werewolf island wasn't so bad, but I've got a really bad feeling about Durlag's Tower. It goes mostly as usual, except a couple of phase spiders teleporting right on top of us despite them not knowing where we even were. Garos levels up in the gym of the first floor of the dungeon. He learns Wall of Moonlight. I'm hoping this will be useful later in SoD.
The fight with the warders is much harder. Love constantly tries to charm Bruss and eventually succeeds. One of our summoned shadows blasts him away with Impose to remove him from the fight temporarily. Gaspar keeps tries to dispel his charm but it's not working. Frustration! I have Rufus cast Expunge Magic and it removes the charm effect, but takes down our buffs too. Pride is hacking up our back line.
Rufus uses the Soulflare Candle to get rid of Love's buffs so we can hit the bastard. Love goes down and Fear is finished with a Fire Arrow from Garos, because apparently it's wearing the troll regeneration ring. Pride is the last one standing and almost kills Bruss because he was slowed. RUfus pulls him away with Shadow Rope, letting Krieg get the last hit.
Man, these battles are just brutal. I'm beginning to see how weak our melee strength is with only 2 characters that can do it. Bruss earns his 2nd Zenkai Boost as we rest after the fight. Bruss could've used extra-healing potions, but if Vegeta can learn to exploit Zenkai Boosts, so can Bruss.
At the second level, Rufus gains a thief level when we get to Kiel's throne.
Level 3 goes as usual but we avoid the maze with the Ashirukurus. Who knows what kind BS they'll pull with SCS installed? Thanks to @aldain's human conjurer run, I learn that the chess fight's pieces immediately charge at you, so we buff with potions of absorption before killing Kaldran the bear. Upon entry, Garos buffs with Fury of the Winds and shoots Arrows of Detonation while Rufus casts Inertia, slowing many of the pieces. Krieg is juuuust out of range of the fireballs and Bruss shoots an energy wave for underwhelming damage.
The next round, Rufus summons his shadows. Their shadow weave spells are quite helpful. With most of the pressure relieved, Spaz summons a skeleton while Krieg and Bruss beat down the King, with Rufus using the Soulflare Candle to knock out his illusions.
For being "improved," the chess fight still boils down to bombarding everything with AoE damage before a piece reaches your side of the board. It doesn't deserve its name, honestly.
On level 4, Gaspar levels up and truly begins to shine. We recruit most of the Crypt Crawlers and Greater Ghouls to our cause. Ettercaps and Sword Spiders are paralyzed and devoured nearly instantly.
The same goes for the Demon Knight. With this many enemies that can paralyze on hit, even it succumbs to it.
: Ahh, I finally have my hellfire blade back!
And now, the moment I've been waiting this whole run for. We return to Basilisk Country. Rufus drinks a Potion of Genius to pump up his caster level to at least 12 to summons wraiths using Summon Shadow. He then goes invisible to scout ahead for Gaspar. The wraiths find the lesser basilisk we left behind and they hit it a couple of times to level drain it. Gaspar assumes direct control of it and recruits the basilisk!
We set the basilisk to the side. It's too valuable to let it get hurt any more. Our greater ghoul army devours Mutamin within 1 round.
I send the army away but leave one ghoul behind to act as bait for the basilisks. I send back in one of the wraiths to level drain the lesser basilisk and Gaspar recruits it too.
The remaining greater basilisk will take more hits to recruit. It gets perilously close to death, so I call off the wraith for a minute and send in Garos after drinking a Potion of Mirrored Eyes to heal the basilisk.
After about 5 level draining hits and 5 healing spells later, it's level drained enough to recruit it. Finally!
We've got 3 basilisks on our side for 5 gaze attacks per round! Some foolish gnolls are the first to taste our power.
We return to Ulgoth's Beard with our new army. A couple of the cultists die to pre-laid traps from Rufus, while the rest are paralyzed and petrified by our army. The same happens to the guards at the cultist compound, though the Cult Wizard on the inside has to be Breached by Rufus's Soulflare Candle first.
I can already taste the victory at Sarevok's coronation. I'm not too sure how we'll hold up in the final fight though. One wayward Chaos or Confusion cast at the basilisks could spell instant defeat for us. I think I'll hide them in the corner until they need to attack.
Krieg - War Hulk 8 Garos - Warhorn Shaman 9 Bruss - Saiyan Monk(ey) 8 Rufus - Thief 8/Shadow Adept 7 Spaz - Warlock 10 Gaspar - Seducer 10
We're heading back to the city. First we save Duke Eltan. In the interest of speed, I take Bruss and my greater ghoul army to infiltrate the Flaming Fist HQ and eliminate the Rashad doppelganger. It has great saves and despite being hit at least 20 times by ghouls, it never got paralyzed. The same cannot be said of Slythe.
Krystin has PfMW(!), but the Crypt Crawlers ignore that and paralyze her too.
At the coronation, we charm Ithtyl Calantryn with Algernon's Cloak. It's so nice to have a normal mage for once. If only we could recruit her. Weave and Shadow Weave work together to haste our army and slow the doppelgangers. They are wiped up pretty cleanly, except for an assassin that facestabs Gaspar.
Rufus levels up in the thieves' maze, choosing to learn Dread Whispers for a level 4 spell. For 5 rounds, enemies in 30' suffer 50% casting failure with no save. Every round after the first, they must also save vs. spell at -6 or panic for 1 round.
We avoid Sarevok's Undercity party entirely. No need to risk our army for a couple of arrows of detonation. Once inside the temple, we buff up. Krieg uses potions of magic resistance, invulnerability, and speed. Bruss just uses a potion of invulnerability. Garos protects us from fear with Rallying Cry. We send Rufus ahead to direct our army. Sarevok is by himself for about one and a half rounds, but then his cronies finally teleport in.
Semaj begins with PfMW and Diarmid with a Protection from Magic scroll. When I noticed they were teleporting in, I directed the greater ghouls and crypt crawlers to attack Diarmid, but then told the crawler to attack Semaj with their normal weapons.
Diarmid is definitely paralyzed. I have them move on to Angelo, but Semaj toasts my army with a fireball. The basilisks are coming up from behind and trying to petrify anyone. But Semaj then casts Chaos on them! This is exactly what I didn't want. They all get confused, and since we were all waiting on Semaj to get paralyzed, I reach into my potion case and have everyone drink a potion of Mirrored Eyes. The basilisks get overwhelmed.
Damn. All those ghouls and those three basilisks combined would've been worth about 16k XP if we'd just killed them instead. Not sure if it was worth the trade. With no meatshields left, it's our turn. Angelo is the first one to come down to play. Rufus responds with the Soulflare Candle, but Angelo also has a Stoneskin that he's been saving.
Tazok and Sarevok join the fun. I decide to have Spaz kite Sarevok while Rufus holds Tazok with Shadow Binding. Krieg, Bruss, and Garos work on peeling off Angelo's stoneskins. Garos is having a hard time hitting Angelo with Arrows of Dispelling. He does get hit but responds with more Mirror Images.
Screw this, let's just kill Tazok. We gang up on him and he transforms into a skeleton warrior.
Spaz continues to kite Sarevok and this is when I notice that Diarmid is still paralyzed. I need to finish him before it wears off. Rufus had previously chugged a potion of Genius to increase his caster level, so he summons his wraiths.
Semaj tries casting Greater Malison at Bruss, so Krieg and Bruss respond with Potions of Magic Shielding to guarantee saving throws. Semaj is otherwise mostly content to huck Minute Meteors and constantly wink in and out of visibility for no reason. He tries to Glitterdust Gaspar, but it fails. Gaspar is not much help here. Tazok's skeleton finally dies.
Bruss rushes off to kill Diarmid. Semaj's PfMW has definitely worn off by now so Garos tags him with an Arrow of Dispelling. Gaspar manages to stun him with a Dart of Stunning as well!
Angelo is now stalking Rufus. I try to keep him out of melee range, but my attention wavers and Angelo uses a Wand of Lightning on Rufus. Rufus fails his saving throw and is fried. Semaj dies at about the same time.
Rufus is going to unleash hell on the nonbelievers once he gets strong enough, I swear it. The lightning bolt rebounds off Rufus and manages to hit Gaspar too, but he saves against it. Bruss soon kills Diarmid's skeleton and comes back to help.
We ignore Semaj's skeleton and instead focus on getting revenge for Rufus. Garos rebuffs with Fury of the Winds and then casts Battle Ardor for a THAC0 and damage bonus. Angelo is stuck with an Arrow of Dispelling and is promptly killed.
We clean up the two remaining skeletons and focus on Sarevok. Garos enrages and our wraiths cast spells on him. Shadow Rope holds Sarevok down for an extended period. Garos is hitting him with every shot for a lot of elemental damage. Sarevok quickly falls!
BG1 with SCS complete!
Krieg - War Hulk 8 Garos - Warhorn Shaman 9 Bruss - Saiyan Monk(ey) 8 Rufus - Thief 8/Shadow Adept 8 Spaz - Warlock 10 Gaspar - Seducer 10
Burl the War Hulk has just finished SoD, but progress with him has been feeling rather too easy. That changes in ToB, but for now I thought I'd put that run on hold for a while and have a sterner challenge with the Crew. Up to now they have always operated at Core Difficulty, but I thought this time I'd pitch them against Legacy of Bhaal. Having experimented a bit, I suspect it may well be overkill, but for this run anyway they've also got to deal with SCS. It's not so much the spells that make that problematic as the AI and calls for help - when even a single kobold is a significant danger, having one of those call on a host of nearby friends can be a real pain .
With combat being difficult and time-consuming, they left Carbos and Shank alone in Candlekeep (though they did kill the rats - who no longer do any damage in v2.5). They also intended to restrict their killing in the next area to Imoen, Xzar and Montaron - as NPCs don't benefit from the LoB upgrades. However, a pathfinding glitch resulted in activating a wolf and they ran that round for quite a while until the criticals eventually mounted up.
Moving on to Beregost, Algernon was surrounded and hacked down pretty quickly. His cloak was used to charm the sirines at the temple. Wearing them down against dogs wasn't that easy given the Crew needed criticals to hit the dogs (and they had a tendency to call for help from nearby groups), but they got the job done eventually. Finishing off the last few HPs of the sirines was also not a given due to the difficulty of hitting and the danger of a sirine killing a feebleminded character. However, everyone survived - though they did need to resort to Imoen's magic missile wand on one occasion.
Travelling further East they arrived at the basilisk area and immediately dragged Korax to the south. After eventually letting him close enough to talk and be charmed he went to find the southern group of basilisks and drag a couple of those away to be paralyzed (with SCS installed the Crew couldn't allow themselves to be seen until that was done) - that was sufficient for a level up.
In solo LoB the time taken to kill paralyzed basilisks makes it difficult to get them all before Korax goes hostile. However, with everyone attacking it didn't take the Crew too long to kill paralyzed basilisks and they chose to take the long way round the edge of the map rather than risk running into further enemies while going north. The remaining separated basilisks soon provided another level to give the Crew another proficiency point.
On core difficulty they always improved their melee weapons to help the transition from ranged attacks as they got more HPs. However, with LoB their ability to survive in melee is far lower and so is their ability to hit targets - so they all took a 3rd pip in missile weapons.
Korax successfully tagged Mutamin
and finished off the basilisks before being sent to be beaten up by a nearby bear. The Crew then found their improved shooting meant they no longer required criticals as they worked through some gnolls to get a look at Baerin. He was charmed and worn down for successful disposal - that gained some splint to supplement the Crew's existing armor stocks at that point of 1 suit of splint and 1 of studded leather.
Numerous encounters with gnolls and travel ambushes later and Lindin was finally charmed. He was successfully worn down and finished off as well, though Vito took a blow from a gnoll during that this time.
That gained not just some plate armor, but a +1 long sword - their first proficient magical weapon. In contrast to Lindin, Peter was charmed at the first attempt and worn down pretty easily.
For Kirian they charmed Shar-Teel and rested before charming a gnoll. The gnoll attacked Kirian first, but died almost immediately from a chromatic orb. Shar-Teel then attacked, with the huge advantage she couldn't be killed by standard damage (she could be instant death effects, which is why the gnoll went in first). Shar-Teel soaked up several magic missiles, but Kirian didn't try any 2nd level spells on her. When one of the Crew had a look at Kirian she immediately launched a horror at him, but he saved. I suspected Kirian probably still had at least one acid arrow left so was reluctant to probe further. At that point Shar-Teel's charm wore off, but she continued attacking and I decided to just leave her to it, even though that meant a long wait for the required critical hits to chew through 180 or so HPs. In fact it took even longer than expected as, with Kirian down to her last 20 HPs, she got a fresh batch of spells and HPs as if she'd rested (it's not unusual to see that happen in very long battles). As Shar-Teel wasn't hostile though, Kirian still didn't attack her and Shar-Teel's attacks eventually wore through all her defenses.
@Wise_Grimwald were you a solo thief, Wise? Solo thiefs can have a heck of a time at low levels. Toe-to-toe is a no-go against strong melee enemies, but if there's no maneuvering room can be tricky. I don't know Gnarl's level, but if he's lower than level 5 then he might be a good candidate for the sleep wand.
She was an illusionist/thief. She had done very well against ankhegs and other powerful enemies such as Vax and Zal, by summoning weasels and using her bow. The weasels do little damage, but keep the enemy distracted. I thought, why not use the same tactics here? However Gnarl just ignored them and went straight for her.
Alright. There's one thing left to do before tackling the Illithid city: Well, two things, really. Raevilin Strathi and Alchra Diagott! Not that they have much (though Alchra Diagott carries a scroll of Spell Turning), but they're there, so... let's beat them.
Though it's difficult with SCS, the tactic of just letting Mages exhaust themselves on summons still work, to a degree. We scout the site of Raevilin's appearance with Farsight, have Mazzy speak to him, and once he turns hostile, she races off, leaving only Skeleton Warriors. Since Raevilin sees no "real" character to fight, he goes after the Skeleton Warriors. Unfortunately, once done with those, sending more summons at him just causes him to start roaming (more like gunning straight for us despite having no way of knowing where the party is), and Minsc suffers the consequences.
It just wouldn't be a proper battle without Minsc dying. Raevilin pulls some more mischief, including summoning an Efreeti, but with his most powerful spells exhausted, we take him out, looting a few scrolls. We rest up, raise Minsc, and prepare for the much more dangerous Lich, Alchra Diagott.
I'm not sure how others do it, but... I have a very hard time fighting Liches in stand-up battle before ToB levels. They pretty much always use SI: Abjuration, meaning you need Ruby Ray of Reversal (and lots of it) to get through their protections and start Breaching them. Ruby Ray of Reversal typically isn't available yet, unless you got really lucky with a random drop. And that means you have to wait out the numerous PfMW. Standing around in a Lich's line of sight is generally a very bad idea. Even a Mage with proper protections will just get torn to shreds by the multitude of Demons the Lich will summon.
So, we send a few summons at Alchra and try to keep our distance. SCS Liches move at a decent pace, but we keep running away, sending summons towards Alchra that typically distract him for a round. Here's Alchra sprinting after us, once he took care of our initial waves of summons:
Once we reach the Swirfneblin outpost, Alchra's short-time buffs are gone. Maybe we can attack now?
Or not... double length Time Stop + Improved Alacrity. Sheesh. All this for a scroll of Spell Turning? So, Alchra takes out Imoen with ADHW, tries to do the same to Mazzy (but she makes her save), and is then finally out of killer spells. Mazzy destroys the foul Lich.
That was probably not worth the excitement, but it's over and done with. Time for Illithids! The best use for Mage slots in the Illithid city is summons (Skeleton Warriors and Magical Swords are immune to most of the things the Illithids can do: They'll get Detonated into bits pretty quickly, but at least they provide a distraction) and buffs. Cassius has Improved Haste scribed now, so we memorize three of those, two Project Image, five Animate Dead, four Improved Invisibility.. you get the drift. Imoen follows suit, as much as her spell repertoire allows. Jaheira goes two Chaotic Commands, two Wondrous Recall, and the rest of her slots don't really matter.
We enter the city, are captured and put into the ring. We easily best the three Umber Hulks, and then agree to work with Simyaz to escape. Once again pulled into the ring, we take down the three Kuo-Toans and start roaming the city. We've long since started wearing the Drow Full Plate +5, and it enables us to just tank the Ogre Jailer, though he has gargantuan amounts of hitpoints. We clear the other prisoners, then head east (Minsc and Mazzy under Chaotic Commands, everyone else under Invisibility 10' Radius). We get the strange liquid, head south and free the slaves/get Mind Control Circlets, killing Mind Flayers as we go.
The tactics are simple: There are three major encounters in here, two with Mind Flayers/Ullitharids and Umber Hulks, and the final one with the Elder Brain. For the minor encounters with just a few Mind Flayers, Chaotic Commands and a couple of Potions of Genius are enough. For the major ones, we summon a full batch of distractions, apply Improved Haste and Improved Invisibility to Minsc/Mazzy via Cassius' Project Image, and let them go to town. It works surprisingly well, as the Mind Flayers seem to prefer destroying our Skeletons, giving Mazzy and Minsc plenty of time to kill them off one by one.
We kill the three slaves in the pods: The Dwarf Warrior has the very nice Ring of Fire Control, which goes to Mazzy. We also raid the "hidden" room, gaining the Staff of Command... 21 charges of Domination, 12 hour duration, with no save. I'd say it's exceptionally potent, but by now, anything vulnerable to Domination isn't really going to help us much in a fight.
We head north to take on the Elder Brain and finish this. Skeletons are sent in ahead of us... and the Elder Brain locks the door. Leaving the party to deal with a few Mind Flayers that teleported in behind us. Fine. We'll kill them and finish off the Elder B-
I'm telling you.. Skeleton Warriors are where it's at. They kill the Elder Brain, on their own, before we can even finish the two Mind Flayers and join in the fight. We move in anyway and help them mop up the Brain Golems (as they require Blunt damage). And so we are free to leave! Well, not quite. The ingrate Simyaz and his Githyanki are poised to ambush us. I'm so worried about them from the ship fight that we apply Invisibility 10' Radius and risk a rest in the Underdark proper... which we pull off. I needn't have bothered, however: They're absolute pushovers, utilizing low-level Mage spells like MAA, Slow etc.
We return to the inn and rest. All three major areas are cleared... no more Illithids, Beholders or Kuo-Toans. I must say, of the three, the Beholder Hive was probably the least fun, mostly since the Hive Mother seems so incredibly out of place, given how powerful she is. Still, they're dead, and we're not.
All that remains is to proceed with the plot. We go have a chat with Adalon, and are transformed into Drow. Having spoken with Soulafein and been tasked with rescuing Phaere, we prepare thoroughly for the second bridge ambush.
No sweat, really. The only one that presented any obstacle was N'ashtar, but even so, he botched his initial Remove Magic (I think he targetted Minsc, who promptly ran away), and so couldn't really do much except refuse to die. But that only gets you so far. We happily swipe his scroll of ADHW.
Phaere is rescued without incident, though Soulafein gets beaten to Badly Injured. Back in Ust Natha, Mazzy partakes of some pit fighting, even soloing a Beholder. She had Death Ward up, and when the Anti-Magic Ray stripped that, she immediately quaffed a Potion of Invulnerability and kept fighting.
Mazzy also beats Lasonar (his Bastard Sword of Searing +3 going to Minsc), and Chalinthra. Figuring Imoen should be able to beat at least the lowest-level Drow Mage, I send her in next.
Sigh. So the weakest of Drow Mages have access to L8 spells. That's just dandy. I'm not risking Cassius against that crap, and Imoen doesn't have the spell repertoire to deal with it. The Mage duels will have to make do without us.
We take the time to do the Quile quest. Her servants are incredibly annoying, all popping various protections, but we brought excessive amounts of Breach for this very purpose. They all fall in relatively short order, and the Boneblade +4 goes to Imoen.
I can accept a high-level Mage running things... but when you have 5 high-level Mages apparently being the servants (!) of a fairly low-level Priestess? Maybe it's Drow society that works like this, but still, I have trouble envisioning it. Anyway. We proceed with the main plot, letting Jaheira handle the Beholder.
Afterwards, we of course spare the Swirfneblin (having sent Soulafein back to Ust Natha beforehand), and in turn spare Soulafein as well. We are brought before Matron Mother Ardulace, and agree to return with the blood we already have, to buy us time to do the quests that only become available once you've spoken with her.
First, the Ghaunadaur worshippers. They're way too low-level to stand up to us, as even their Mage lacks proper spell protections.
Next... Deirex. Friggin' Liches. We threaten what's-his-face, the Drow with the rope, into giving it up for free (I'm not paying for faulty merchandise!), and enter Deirex's abode, and subsequently end up accepting Jarlaxle's offer. We buff extensively, enter again, have Cassius pop Kitthix, and run like the dickens for the other side of the map.
Again, we just can't fight a Lich in straight-up combat. Minsc and Mazzy will get dispelled and killed, most likely Jaheira too. And even though Cassius and Imoen can protect their buffs, they can't survive indefinitely against the host of Demons (immune to Death Spell) that the Lich will summon.
So, we run around. Summons are sent at Deirex while everyone else does what they can to avoid being in his line of sight. There's a great deal of shuffling, but... to my surprise it actually works. Deirex wastes a great many spells on our summons, and then, his myriad of PfMW having run out, fails a save against Azuredge. Goodbye, Deirex.
He actually got a Time Stop and ADHW x2 off, one at Minsc, one at Mazzy... but they both made their saves. We loot his tower, but surprisingly, there's not really much to write home about (a scroll of Ruby Ray of Reversal is the best of the lot). With only House Jae'llat left to plunder, we swing by the Drow Merchants, buying the Sentinel +4, Spear of Withering +4, Firetooth +3, and some scrolls.
Erring on the side of caution, we buff profusely before attacking the Jae'llats.
I thought I had a screenshot of what happens next, but apparently not. You'll note Cassius has no Contingency active: He had Improved Invisibility on Helpless, but since Project Image renders you helpless, it was triggered back in the Illithid City and I forgot to renew it with Stoneskin for Ust Natha. So. Cassius is surrounded by three servants, his Mirror Image long gone due to enemy True Sight. His Stoneskin gives out. Minsc and Mazzy are busy killing enemy Mages. I try to reapply Stoneskin, but Cassius' aura was clouded from casting that entirely non-necessary Detect Invisibility. With no Stoneskin, Cassius drops in three hits. Game over.
It's pointless, it's stupid, and it's frustrating, but that's the way it is. I got overconfident and it came back to bite me: Though very powerful, a Diviner is also very frail.
I sort of lost my heart for the run when Anomen kicked the bucket: I usually install the component that makes chunkings much less likely, but with SCS 31 it's been moved to Tweaks. I'll probably install Tweaks strictly for this component, as I dislike chunkings due to the randomness of it: You either allow killed NPC's to be raised, or you don't. You do not add an arbitrary mechanism that may prevent raising and give no way to protect against it.
I think I'll need a while to work up the enthusiasm for another run. Unlike Hubblepot's demise, this wasn't even a close fight. Every single enemy in there was garbage, they literally stood no chance against our frontliners, and had accomplished nothing at all before Cassius fell. At least I got a refresher on SCS Spellhold/Underdark, and should I make it back there, I've little doubt I can navigate both areas safely.
South of Beregost the Crew charmed one of Mirianne's half-ogres. After killing his companion I tried to rest in order to be able to charm one of the Flaming Fist nearby as well, but got ambushed by a hobgoblin elite. That proved an extremely tough opponent, but it was almost dead when it somehow managed to switch targets at the last moment and strike down Bugsy a couple of seconds before a final critical got it.
After raising Bugsy at the Temple, the Crew didn't bother spending time resting but made their way directly to the FAI - timing their journey to avoid any possibility of encounters on the way. The two gate guards were charmed and taken to attack Tarnesh without activating him (unlike the guards closer to Tarnesh the gate ones don't have a wandering script and hence will keep attacking a neutral target).
The Crew then splashed out on Buckley's Buckler to allow any of them to activate regeneration to heal up quickly.
After spending a while charming Jaheira (in order to take her outside and get her potion of invisibility), the Crew went back south of Beregost. Ambushing hobgoblin elites meant they needed several attempts, but finally managed to get both an ogrillon and Flaming Fist charmed in order to kill the other Fist and get armor upgrades for several of the Crew.
Moving on down to Nashkel, they picked up the ankheg armor and Al learnt LMD. Retracing their steps a bit they then went back to the Lake area where Vito activated a couple of gnolls to attack Drizzt. Settling in for a long wait the others patiently listened to the sounds of halberds hitting armor. With the number of hits required to bring down Drizzt in LoB it would in the past have been almost certain that both of the gnolls would break their weapons and Drizzt could then be killed to get his XP after he was unconscious. However, although there's nothing in the v2.5 patch notes about breaking weapons, my experience of this encounter is that the chance of breakage for these specific gnolls (though not other ones) has been very substantially reduced in v2.5. It was no great surprise therefore that the gnolls killed Drizzt - while his XP would have been much appreciated, his equipment is a major gain in itself.
In the same area, Bjornin's half-ogres fought among themselves.
They provided Vito with a +1 shield to boost his standard AC to -7 - together with an appropriate belt that's starting to make him difficult for weaker enemies to hit. Talking about appropriate belts, the next task was to go and get the piercing belt by running the ogre round. Further north, returning a bowl to Tenya got them to the fringe of another level. Tackling the nearby ankheg was too dangerous, but killing a few zombies for the farmer to the north provided an easy substitute.
The main purpose of the trip north though was to get the ring of free action and it didn't take too long to charm Dushai and pull her away from nosy neighbors.
It was time then for the Crew to improve their reputation and they started doing various quests. That included quite a struggle to subdue the diggers at the mine-site
and there was no way they could contemplate taking on the Doomsayer there. They managed to speed up dealing with the xvarts attacking Arabelle (and save ammunition) by leading them into cages.
The Crew are not attempting to totally clear every map in my usual way with parties, but are normally doing all the major encounters they come across. Where they can't avoid encounters with groups of things like hobgoblins and gnolls they typically charm one of those to act as the tank while the others are shot down - though they tend to end up doing a reasonable amount of running and shooting as well. They picked up some bracers to help their archery in the Cloud Peaks,
shortly before Vito took a nasty blow when he tripped over a tree root and allowed Sendai too close.
They picked up the tome at the Gnoll Stronghold (along with Gloves of Dexterity to further improve Vito's AC), but couldn't face trying to deal with the hordes in the fortress itself.
By this time reputation was up to 19 and they returned to High Hedge to try and get the last one. First though Al took a potion of heroism and used +1 arrows gained on their travels to shoot down the golems.
Unfortunately Melicamp didn't make it, but a scroll of stone to flesh later and Tamah put in a good word for them. With prices as low as they're going to go for quite a while (until they can get the Helm of Glory), the Crew picked up items including a +1 axe, light crossbow of speed, full plate, composite long bow +1, short bow +1 and the Horn of Kazgaroth.
I reckon they've done pretty well so far, but I don't think it's going to get any easier going forward . Incidentally, it's perhaps worth clarifying that making progress in LoB in v2.5 is easier than it should be, particularly early on. That's a result of all saving throws being mistakenly set 5 too high. The enemies still get a bonus of +5 added to their dice roll, so for higher level enemies their net saving throw is the same as at Core (rather than having been improved by 5 as should have happened). For lower level enemies, however, the addition of 5 to the base is likely to take the saving throw up to 20. A quirk of the game engine means that saving throws with a requirement of 20+ always fail - even if the adjusted roll is above the saving throw. Therefore something like a xvart will always be charmed by Algernon's cloak. Note that spells and effects (like malison, level drain and called shot) change base saving throws rather than the adjustment to the die roll - a run with a balanced party could potentially benefit from this by getting guaranteed failed saves even from relatively strong enemies.
Does anybody of you beat the game on SCS, Ascension, Atweak, Item Revisions, Spell Revisions and Refinements? ToB part of the game must be extraordinarily difficult. Facing all the demons who can dispel magic at will and gate strong reinforcements.
Does anybody of you beat the game on SCS, Ascension, Atweak, Item Revisions, Spell Revisions and Refinements? ToB part of the game must be extraordinarily difficult. Facing all the demons who can dispel magic at will and gate strong reinforcements.
I've had several attempts with this install (I revise kits as well, but whatever). Best I could do is Odamaron battle in Sendai's enclave. Party was f/m/c, archer, sorcerer and shaman. Wiped in cca 5 rounds... I had this recorded on Youtube. It was w/o ATweaks. With it, the Drow party just outside the entrance to Odamaron's lair. Iirc, I've had about 7-8 Cornugons teleporting to back line and ripping Aerie and Xan to shreds....fun times... I don't think anybody has done it yet..but I will!
Hey everybody! Belated congratulations @Enuhal, on another entry into the Hall of Heroes. Commiserations @aldain, your "honorable" way of playing the game and your detailed reports are inspiring. And somehow I like the fact that you make mistakes once in a while (as sorry as I am for your loss), probably because I can relate to that so much... Hopefully you'll find new motivation soon. Leaving the game for some time may make you forget important little things. @Corey_Russell good luck in ToB. @StummvonBordwehr, where is your Barbarian? I thought you had made major progress with her (barely escaping a couple of times).
I'm here to report that my Bounty Hunter Gilyn has fallen. Frantic playing and a general feeling of cba'ness with taking notes ("can't-be-arsedness" as a dear friend of mine and me tend to call it) led to me making good progress without sharing any updates. I'll suffice with some highlights / points of interest.
Irenicus' Dungeon
Imoen releases Gilyn from his cell and joins him as do Minsc and Jaheira. I take Irenicus' dungeon very seriously. The two extra levels from SoD make little difference for a character that depends on items rather than spells. Besides, with only 16 DEX out of a possible 20, his thieving skills (stealth) are not all that. Imoen and Jaheira do have spells of course, but they level up upon joining, so they don't have their best spells memorized. And with only one rest available, immediately resting seems unwise. The companions proceed with caution. Duergar are separated and battled piecemeal. Healing potions are for immediate consumption.
Imoen comes with 95 skill points in both lockpicks and detect traps (in my memory that used to be 70). Detecting traps and picking locks is pretty much all that Imoen does, and then only when Gilyn's skills do not suffice, as Gilyn gets more XP for thieving.
Gilyn finds Varscona and uses it for slaying the otyugh with backstabs. Minsc and Jaheira dispatch the inactive guardian golems. The party moves on to the next level, leaving Ilych, the plane of air, and the cambion for later and having Yoshimo join. The Bounty Hunters kill the mephit portals with thrown traps. More snares are laid at strategic places before the party rests. Traps and backstabs become the principal means of handling enemies, over Jaheira and Minsc's melee ability.
The cambion does however require Minsc and Jaheira's assistance as it sees through invisibility. The party suffers but prevails.
Special traps lock the mephits in the plane of air in place (the hold effect hits monsters as well as humanoids).
Back on the second level, the dreaded salt mephit stuns Yoshimo, and some duergar drawn to the hubbub finish him off. The plan of finishing the mephit with two stabs proves foolish.
Jaheira's fire elemental and an occasional backstab deal with remaining duergar and assassins and nearly slays Ulvaryl, but that honor goes a shadow thief battlemage.
In any case, escape mission completed!
Waukeen's Promenade
Imoen is taken by the cowled ones, Yoshimo raised by Jaheira, and like Minsc, thanked for his help. Jaheira and Gilyn remain and start their exploration of Athkatla by clearing out the circus tent with little difficulty thanks to Jaheira's Insect Plague.
Aerie offers to join the duo, but Gilyn decides to sleep on that offer in the Den of the Seven Vales. Little does he know that a bunch of brigands will want to stop him from using Jaheira's and his room. Jaheira summons two fire elementals (the greater ones, luckily), and two nymphs while Gilyn places traps upstairs as well as downstairs. Special snares injure and hold Mencar, who is promtly slain through ranged attacks. Full plate for Jaheira, check! Gilyn's regular traps and their poison do Smaeluv in, while the fire elementals have Brennan Risling against the wall and finish him, earning Gilyn a nice invisibility ring, check!
Pooky falls quickly in melee, but Amon casts a Flame Arrow at Gilyn, making the rogue quaff a potion of magic blocking just looted from Mencar. Gilyn has the last laugh though, as the mage walks into his traps downstairs. Cloak of non-detection: check!
Jaheira and Gilyn head into the slums to deal with Gaelan Bayle, and to visit the Copper Coronet. Korgan joins, and helps Hendak take over the inn from Lethinan. Despite traveling invisibly thanks to Jaheira's Pixie Dust the Eldarin ambush doesn't go too well when everyone (including a nymph), except enraged Korgan and a fire elemental are Horrored. There are no casualties though, and Gilyn is still invisible when hit by the Horror.
The party survives, realizing recruiting Aerie with her Remove Fear spell isn't such a bad idea. The Skinner murder mystery is resolved before Brus indicates the Umar Hills on the map.
Umar Hills
Valygar joins. I forget about Shadow Fiends' paralyze ability. Korgan falls. Gilyn, having used the mirror, still gets paralyzed but survives.
Inside the temple Jaheira's fire elementals make all the difference against the skeletons and shadows. Mazzy joins.
A resurrected Korgan complains about his quest, so the party head back to Athkatla. In the crypts, undead are bypassed, except those in Korgan's chamber, which are dispatched by fire elementals. On the way to the Coronet, party gets ambushed again. Most enemies fall to traps and ranged attacks, but a mage manages to charm Mazzy, Gilyn, and Jaheira!
With luck everyone survives. Aerie casts Slow and it hits Jaheira and Mazzy. And Valygar moves up close to Mazzy, making her ranged attacks a lot less dangerous. Korgan's former friends are no match for the party and summons (fire elementals and nymphs). At this point, the companions still cannot cast arcane spells, so they rely on divine magic.
Back to the Umar Hills. It's still fairly early for the Shade Lord, but with the door to Thaxxy's lair, there's always an escape option. First attempt sees a sunstone bullet destroy the shadow altar, enraged Korgan engage the Shade Lord, and the other companions finish Shadow Patrick. Several attempts eventually lead to success. Enraged Korgan melees him. Allowing the others to cast spells, set snares (Gilyn) and attack with ranged weapons as soon as PfMW expires. Jaheira casts True Seeing. After a bit Korgat gets blinded by a PW:Blind and has to retreat because the Shade Lord activates a Blade Barrier.
It is then that I start using Insect Plague in a rather devious (cheesy? not imo) way. Patrick's armor is dropped on the ground in the middle of the area, the Shade Lord is lured by Korgan toward the armor, Jaheira's Insect Plague is cast from out of sight of the Shade Lord at the armor, and the insects find their way to the Shade Lord from there.
It doesn't stop the Shade Lord from slaying Korgan with a Finger of Death, but Gilyn's snares, Mazzy's arrows, and eventually a sling bullet from Aerie finish him off.
Trademeet
Party goed straight to Faldorn (invisibly, stopping only for the druids in front of her lair, who fall thanks to good preparation with traps and summons). CDTweaks' all strongholds tweak (which I had decided to install so as to give party members a stronghold as well) places Gilyn as Faldorn's challenger in the pit, without equipment... Companions had to approach to hand him his equipment...
Potions (clarity, invisibility, speed) saved the day. He prevailed with a Bhaal DUHM followed by acid arrows.
Dao are dealt with through snares and the Efreeti bottle.
Astral Prison
Back in Athkatla the slavers are dealt with. Reputation boosts lead to Korgan's departure (I thought I had the happy patch installed, turns out I hadn't. He didn't have great equipment because shopping had been postponed until 20 rep). I'm fastforwarding from here, past the Shadow Thieves quests, Mekrath, the sewer party,
to the Astral Prison, visited in order to get Haer'Dalis as Korgan's replacement.
The second pit to the right is used as a safe space for the invisible party. No enemies can follow them there and it can be entered whenever enemies upstairs are casting detection spells. The Gish warriorsin the area can neither see through invisibility nor cast detection spells.
Meanwhile Gilyn sees if he can trap the master of thralls. It paralyzed invisible Gilyn, and that would have been the end of the run if it weren't for two air elementals, that could not see through invisibiltiy, blocking its path.
Gilyn retreats. He kills the Gish warriors with backstabs (using invisibility potions) until het gets hit by the Knight's psionic powers, the last of the Gish. The party finish him off.
Gilyn also soloes the bounty hunter mages, relying on his detect illusions skill, snares, and a few arrows of dispelling (Mazzy had Vhailor's helm at this point, and she would usually have her simulacrum fire those arrows, which is why Gilyn allowed himself to fire some real dispelling arrows). With the mages gone, the rest of the party joins in to clean up, not just the bounty hunters, but also yuan-ti mages, one at a time, and a few thralls (we miss the thrall with Kundane though). Mazzt takes out the air elementals, and fire elementals melee the master of thralls as the party attacks woth missiles. The party rests, and rather anti-climactially, fire elementals slay the warden.
(I reloaded to see if there was a bug, but the warden did all his usual SCS stuff: auto-cast ADHW, PW:Blind (at will?), hitting enemies and healing himself with Adjatha the Drinker, but fire elementals slew him again.
Planar Sphere
Uneventful until the party fights the demons. With two demons down, the last one, a Nabassu death gazes Gilyn as he is scouting the area, paralyzing the elf. There is no spell projectile, so it takes me by surprise. With his allies too far away to release him, there is no escape this time.
Trio Update Yeldon - half-elf cleric/ranger, protagonist (Corey_Russell) Keras - dwarven kensai (Grond0) Denko - human monk (Gate70)
The first thing the Trio worked on was the Unseeing Eye quest. The first death was Keras who died very quickly when we battled the beholders and undead just past the bridge. Denko and Yeldon did manage to kill the enemies and raise their friend.
Next, the next major battle was against the blind priests. Rather than wait for Yeldon to silence the priests, Grond0 and Gate70 got impatient and attacked anyways. Denko then got held and died.
Yeldon, with the help of the shield of balduran, was working on clearing out the lair. While he could easily handle this on his own, Grond0 just couldn't resist attacking a "paralyzed" gauth. The gauth nevertheless managed to kill Grond0. Our Rod of Resurrection was down to a single charge.
We did manage to clear the rest of the lair, as well as take out the Unseeing Eye. Fortunately we were quick to get rid of the "great device". Naturally we also took down Gaal then we collected our reward.
Yeldon noticed we hadn't even done the Temple quests, so we worked on those, starting with Sir Sarles. No real problem doing Sarles. We also found Travin and recovered the Dawn Ring. This resulted in the Peripait, which put Denko's save vs. death to 0. We got a ton of basic ambushes but the slavers really have no chance.
We then worked on the main quest, in dealing with Mook, and the Shadow Thief traitors. We also defeated P'anaii for their ion stone. We then worked on Bodhi's lair. With Yeldon's excellent tanking, and the power of Azuredge wielded by Keras, the lair was cleared and Bodhi gave up in no more than two rounds.
Looking around for relatively easy things to do didn't show too many options. The Crew did a bit of work clearing ghasts at the Valley of the Tombs. After activating Narcillicus though I realized trouble was in store after seeing Al (who has a THAC0 of 8) missing him with a 19 and the Crew ran away while they still had the chance (I should have tried to charm him, but forgot to do that in the stress of seeing him teleport in among the Crew).
Moving on to Firewine Bridge, Bentan was charmed and shot down by the kobold hordes. Several rests while retreating allowed kobolds to be charmed and whittle away at the hordes and eventually they were cleared. Poe joined the fun for the assault on Meilum, but he was quickly cut down leaving Vito to lead Meilum round while the criticals slowly mounted up.
The best option remaining looked like the ankheg area and Vito made a good start there by charming the first ankheg he met before it could attack. That helped kill one ankheg and take another to near death, Vito briefly tanking that one to finish it off.
Coming back again, more charming helped take down all but one of the remaining ankhegs. Vito tanked that until he was splashed by acid and the remaining Crew all then took their turn until Al finally presided over the victory.
A load of ankheg shells were traded in to purchase a new suit of ankheg armor to upgrade defenses a bit more. They did one tour of the area to bag a few more ankhegs and handed Farmer Brun back the remains of his son. By now they were finally getting close to another level and various low-level enemies left Al only needing a handful more of XP. At Gullykin he attempted to get those from a group of kobolds - only to find some dire wolves joining the fight. That still seemed manageable, but then another group of kobold commandos heard the noise and attacked from the flank. Mad Dog was hit twice and nearly killed before he knew he was under attack, but fortunately one more shot before he could get out of range missed. They tried to retreat in the direction they'd just come from, only to find another horde of kobolds had appeared in the way.
They were able to circle round back to the west though and escape without taking any more damage.
Al then got his final XP from killing a couple of hobgoblins at the Beregost Temple. Despite searching the surrounding area several times, once battle commenced some war dogs soon appeared (that can be one of the more irritating aspects of having SCS installed - respawns can occur like that in the unmodded game, but are less likely and won't in any case react unless you come into sight range of them). Everyone took their levels at that point before continuing the fight.
With no attractive path to getting anywhere near enough XP for another level, I decided it was time to visit the Nashkel Mine. Going through there I was wary of groups moving in behind the Crew when they were already wounded, so they were trying to clear things pretty comprehensively on the way down. That therefore took quite a while and required plenty of rests just to clear the first couple of levels - apart from the many kobolds with bows, it was also hard in the confined spaces to run lots of them round, so the Crew were in melee far more than usual and therefore taking more damage.
On the third level they tried pulling some kobolds back to the second level. That worked well for the first 4 or 5, but then a group of about 15 kobolds all piled back through at once, ignoring the fact that none of them were actually near the entrance (that's another aspect of playing with SCS I don't like). They blocked the corridor, so the Crew immediately jumped back to the 3rd level. I thought they would be able to finish off the remaining kobolds nearby, but Vito was unfortunate enough to pick up 3 critical hits almost together (that's made easier as the kobolds could get a critical with a 19) and he died.
The remaining kobolds were killed without further problems, but the situation for the Crew was still extremely precarious. They couldn't go back to the 2nd level to rest due to the hordes waiting there and there were far too many kobolds still in the way further into the 3rd level to be able to fight through them. I decided the best idea was to try and rest in place - if successful that would not only regenerate some HPs, but might cause some of the blocking kobolds to disperse. The rest was successful, but when they looked all or most of the blockers were still there and they had to jump straight back.
Fortunately they found a good place for further resting, where even if kobolds ambushed them they appeared out of sight and the Crew were able to try resting again until that worked. That allowed them to fully regenerate their HPs. An hour or so of real time then saw them bouncing backwards and forwards to gradually work through the enemies until the way was clear to go and get Vito raised.
Back again, they were able to separate most of the remaining kobolds into manageable groups of 3 or 4 and made much quicker progress. When they finally contacted the kobolds near the shaman they immediately ran back to the second level. In doing that they only ever saw a kobold guard chasing and pulled him back towards the exit to the first level. By that point, however, I had assumed there was nothing else chasing and was caught out when the shaman suddenly appeared and launched a horror.
Unable to run from it and with insufficient time and room to restrict it to one character I just had to hope for the best. The outcome wasn't great, with four of the Crew running in fear - including two of them that actually saved against the spell according to the text (though that is quite unreliable about effects).
Fortunately though, no other kobolds appeared and the shaman seemed to have no other offensive spells. That allowed the Crew to recover and then run him round.
They restocked on missiles and went to find the kobold chieftain. His poison arrows can be lethal in combination with horror, but on his own he's not too much of a threat.
Moving on, they had another very difficult fight with the kobolds outside Mulahey's cave - a lot of the damage there caused by a single kobold commando that refused to stop firing arrows of fire even while in melee.
They were able to rest and heal up though on entering the cave. When they went to find Mulahey they successfully managed to charm him.
Even with his help though, they couldn't shut down all the archers. At this point, with 2 characters almost dead, they tried to exit,
but pathfinding wouldn't let them - and moments later they had 2 dead bodies. The others managed to clear the immediate press while Mulahey distracted several enemies, but when he finally fell they were still faced with 3 enemies, including a skeleton archer - with everyone low on HPs.
With the odds looking very poor they chose to grab items from the floor and run away.
The Chapter Change triggered as they were leaving, so Al learnt CLW while resting and healing in the mine. The Crew then went back to get the others raised and healed. I made a mistake near the Nashkel temple though in trying to visit the shop - doing that with a solo character won't bring you into sight of Nimbul, but the bumping in a party clearly can.
Fortunately he didn't do anything nasty like immediately use haste and chase them and they were able to run away.
After resting at the Carnival it was back down through the mine to finish off the remaining fodder and loot the chest. They then emerged from the back entrance and were delayed by some gnolls. That gave a chance for someone else I'd forgotten to make an appearance - time for another swift exit.
Well, as I suspected the Nashkel Mine was a bit of a nightmare. Assuming I can deal with Narcillicus, Nimbul and Tranzig though that will mean the Bandit Camp is the next main target. That's going to take a lot of care if it's not to prove a nightmare squared .
Back in Nashkel the Crew knew that Nimbul would seek them out as soon as they entered the area. They dodged one spell by running to the carnival before successfully charming him. After wasting his spells and waiting for his haste and mirrors to wear off he was ripe for attack.
They went to find Narcillicus at the Valley of the Tombs, but his elven heritage blocked the attempt to charm him. Running away, they were ambushed by Molkar. That looked like a dodgy fight to me and fortunately Vito saved against an attempted charm and then both he and Mad Dog saved against an unholy blight - allowing them to survive (and in fact if either had failed their saves they would have been chunked).
Something like 15 journeys back and forth trying charm on Narcillicus failed, but eventually they got lucky with their attacks and were able to get through his stoneskins while he was casting dimension door. That triggered him to trying to improve his defenses and heal himself - giving them the opportunity to try and wear them down quicker. Mad Dog had to save against a chromatic orb and several of the Crew were slowed, but they did finally get the kill.
They wanted the XP for Narcillicus' mustard jellies, though they are a pretty formidable obstacle in LoB. Trying the first one they were doing well initially, but with the jelly at near death it suddenly started consistently rolling high attacks. The Crew tried successively ducking behind a rock to make it switch targets and did that successfully a number of times - but eventually Carlo failed to make it away in time and he died. The others tried to press the attack, but shortly afterwards Bugsy went the same way. With only 1, or at most 2, hits needed on the jelly and it attacking Vito (and needing a 20 to hit him), the odds still heavily favored the Crew. However, odds don't mean much in a no-reload and there was a major shift in those when the jelly got 2 criticals in a row to chunk Vito. I don't continue party runs after one of the members has been chunked, so that would have been the end of the run anyway. However, the Crew kept attacking to see if they could get revenge. The jelly then missed a few attacks and was taken down to 3 HPs before finding another streak - hitting Al twice in succession and poisoning him the second time. He stayed alive for a few seconds longer by using CLW - long enough to see Baby Face go down. However, the jelly remained alive and quivering to the end as Al fell to the floor.
Tried another run with Sharsteal. Ended with her being one-shotted by an ankheg after killing three of them. If she had survived that one she would have levelled up.
@Wise_Grimwald were you a solo thief, Wise? Solo thiefs can have a heck of a time at low levels. Toe-to-toe is a no-go against strong melee enemies, but if there's no maneuvering room can be tricky. I don't know Gnarl's level, but if he's lower than level 5 then he might be a good candidate for the sleep wand.
She was an illusionist/thief. She had done very well against ankhegs and other powerful enemies such as Vax and Zal, by summoning weasels and using her bow. The weasels do little damage, but keep the enemy distracted. I thought, why not use the same tactics here? However Gnarl just ignored them and went straight for her.
Ah. Maybe web or blindness might have been more effective - blindness lasts for 100 rounds after all!
Tried another run with Sharsteal. Ended with her being one-shotted by an ankheg after killing three of them. If she had survived that one she would have levelled up.
If you are solo, protection from acid scroll while taking on ankhegs is a good idea. Thalantyr should have one.
EDIT: Also, their acid attack counts as a missile. This means you should wear all things that reduce chance of missile damage, such as cloak of displacement or boots of avoidance. And if you get within melee, you want girdle of bluntness, as their melee counts as blunt.
After a bit of masochism playing LoB with a bunch of fighters, I was happy to revert to a much easier challenge with Burl. After installing the War Hulk kit in BG2 I recreated the character as at the end of SoD and started him in Jon's dungeon. A while ago I suffered a death there when the radiant mephit's color spray lasted longer than it's supposed to, so there was a bit of nervousness when Burl went down there - but he soon recovered.
He used a firebreath potion to ensure Ulvaryl wouldn't run away.
After restoring the circus, Burl checked in with Gaelan Bayle and went to sort out the Copper Coronet. His lack of APR gave a guard there the opportunity to hold him.
With his high HPs that wouldn't have been particularly dangerous normally, but his War Hulk special ability allowed him to throw off the effect quickly anyway. He got up to level 11 there.
At the Graveyard he dodged a horror from the Crypt King before striking him down.
With a death save of 0 there was nothing else to worry about while clearing the upper tombs. On travelling back from there Burl triggered the Suna Seni ambush. That could have been a potential problem with his low APR as I can't remember what spells the mage has later on. A Bhaal horror was successful in sending him running. Even through scripted creatures will still attack under horror, that will reduce the amount of spells they can successfully cast - and when Namarra silenced the mage the contest was pretty much decided.
Going to the Bridge District to follow up on the kidnapping, Burl also solved the skinner murders - that partially offset the reputation hit for collecting the pantaloons.
Horror helped again in saving Renfeld in another ambush
and Burl diverted to the Docks to drop him off. While there he upgraded his armor thanks to Officer Dirth
and then dodged in and out of a house to avoid all Prebek & Sanasha's spells
before getting up to level 12 by looting the harpers.
Thinking again about reputation, Burl did the Sir Sarles quest and handed in Neb's head.
Unfortunately I then forgot to drop the illithium before going back to talk to Sir Sarles. I considered killing him, but left him alone for the time being ...
After another quest for the Temple, Burl returned to the Copper Coronet and dived into the sewers. He picked up Lilarcor there and soon put that to use on Captain Haegan.
He had no way yet to kill trolls though, so didn't complete work there. Instead he started doing a few tasks for Mae'Var. That soon got him up to level 13.
With his spell save down to 1 (giving an automatic save against petrification), he decided to go lich hunting. That involved getting rid of a rakshasa to ensure an easy passage back through the sewers.
In MP we've found Kangaxx ignoring PfU scrolls in v2.5, but there's no problem about that in SP and the Ring of Gaxx soon had a new owner.
To get his levels restored from the trap on Kangaxx's tomb, Burl went to the cheap temple services at Watcher's Keep. While there he bought a potion case to ease inventory restrictions and beat up the statues on the top floor to get to level 14.
His standard save against spells is -1, so there's no real risk of going berserk if he's careful to manage incoming damage. The +4 ninjato found there is also a nice weapon for him because of the 0 weapon speed.
Back in the Slums, Burl invaded the front door of the Slaver HQ - his low saves providing protection until Namarra shut the mages up (neither had vocalize).
He comfortably killed everything except the trolls, but still had no ability himself to kill them. I had a feeling though that one of the chests had a fireball trap and aimed to lead both of those into that for a bit of fun. Unfortunately, in avoiding the prismatic spray trap Burl got stuck in a corner. After considering options for a bit I decided to try and bump them out of the way by using the mustard jelly shape, but didn't work - and despite it's apparent small size the rat shape couldn't slip away. I tried going invisible, but the trolls wouldn't move away. Changing shapes also nearly killed Burl as shifting between shapes like that meant all equipment was no longer active, so he was effectively unarmored and could very easily have died in a rage spiral. Putting on and off everything except his armor at least made him difficult to hit, even if he remained rather more vulnerable than he should have been.
Giving up on the use of equipment to save himself, Burl tried attacking for a while until eventually he got a critical hit - his special ability producing a stun and knock back to finally get room to move away. Shortly afterwards he was able to put his plan into action - no XP of course, but a lot of satisfaction for burning up that troublesome pair.
War Hulk L14, 213 HPs (incl. 5 from Helm), 296 kills (463 in BGEE/SoD)
Tried another run with Sharsteal. Ended with her being one-shotted by an ankheg after killing three of them. If she had survived that one she would have levelled up.
If you are solo, protection from acid scroll while taking on ankhegs is a good idea. Thalantyr should have one.
EDIT: Also, their acid attack counts as a missile. This means you should wear all things that reduce chance of missile damage, such as cloak of displacement or boots of avoidance. And if you get within melee, you want girdle of bluntness, as their melee counts as blunt.
Thanks for the advice. Unfortunately only had the girdle of piercing. I could have had the scroll though.
I am still trying to get to grips with the summon weasels spell. I think that what is happening is that the enemies home in on the first enemy that they see.
This is fine when the first enemy is the weasels, but if the weasel spell runs out, then they home in on the PC even if the next spell puts them between the enemy and the PC.
With Sharsteal who has an invisibility spell due to being svirfneblin, I think that I need to use that smartish, or hide smartish before the acid attack comes. I can then summon some more weasels in safety.
For the successful attacks on them I had managed to move away before my summons disappeared which is probably why I wasn't attacked before a second summons spell was cast.
For a first level spell, summon weasels is usually highly effective, but I need to learn its limitations.
Without it I wouldn't have considered taking on ankhegs with a level 1 mage/level 2 thief. However the fact that I killed three of them without injury indicates that my tactics just need refining somewhat.
I will investigate further.
Thanks for the suggestions, some of which are applicable to my situation, though some weren't.
Jaay has bumped off the Iron Throne lackeys and is now on her way back to Candlekeep. Imoen softened them up with the necklace of missles from the shadows, but paid for it with a brutal life-ending backstab. Yeslick took a few too many arrows from Cloudwulfe, and went down too. The rest of the party was able to hold it together long enough to survive (major injuries sustained though). Fortunately, the two deaths were not permanent.
Jaheira tried to clean out the basilisks at Durlag's Tower with two potions of mirrored eyes. That went poorly; she was petrified by the final lizard while it was still uninjured. I thought she was chunked; but fortunately a scroll of stone to flesh sorted her out and she was able to rejoin the party.
The party is wealthy and well-equipped; good randomizer drops have included numerous wands and the boots of speed.
@Blind_Visionary just so you know there are 4 basilisks at Durlag's Tower - and 4 mirror eyes potions at Ulgoth's Beard merchant! Also if you want a character to solo the basilisks, it's a good idea to buff them with potion(s) that increase damage dealing, such as strength/haste potions. For a powerful fighter, 10 rounds is usually enough, but with a minimal strength character like Jaheira she can use all the help she can get. All it would take is 1-2 critcal misses and then she might have trouble finishing them off. Even the mage strength spell would help her.
@Blind_Visionary A potion of oil of speed also makes them effectively last longer.
I also use oil of speed for making thieving enhancement potions last longer, if not in time, in how large an area you can clear the traps/unlock chests. (I don't bother collecting the loot until later as I don't want to waste the time when the buffs are active in performing tasks that can be done later)
I'm making all sorts of mistakes this run... and hit something I've never seen before.
Imoen got chunked by a lightning trap beneath Candlekeep. (Sloppiness on my part...)
Having no thief is bad. So I replaced her with Coran. He almost didn't last though; Cythandria petrified him with a chromatic orb back at the Iron Throne. She also got a Chaos off, which affected the entire party. Miraculously, somehow we survived being helpless and then beat her into submission.
Upon leaving the tower, the Flaming Fist arrested us. We insulted Angelo and he killed Jaheira. Branwen raised her in a jail cell... but the Flaming Fist confiscated her belongings. (I forgot to sneak back in there to get her items after escaping, and instead went to rest and heal up... so items disappeared.) That was a major hit. Boots of speed, gauntlets of ogre power, club +1, shield amulet, helm of balduran, and a pile of potions... ouch.
But worst of all... the Merchants' league quest never finished earlier in the game, even though I killed all the dopplegangers. So I went back up there to see if Aldeth had gotten his act together. Instead, Aldeth summoned the Flaming Fist, who arrested us and took us back to Angelo for a repeat of the earlier scene. So now we're back in jail. Except this time, Neb isn't there and it looks like there's no way to escape.
Is that the end of the run? I didn't get a "you must restart" screen, but I think I'm out of options.
@Blind_Visionary I've had the same thing happen with the Aldeth quest. I have found sometimes that a lone surviving doppie has run clean out into the streets that I could not find inside (as far as finishing his quest).
As to the 2nd arrest I feel like that is a bug that should not happen and does result in being stuck in jail with no options. There might be a code to get out of that but never searched and when I decided to reload an earlier save my no-reload habit kept me from continuing regardless. Now I just steer clear of him after the first arrest if his quest line fouls up. The whole Aldeth thing has always been a hit or miss thing for me personally as far as it working correctly.
Comments
After some quick deaths while I remembered what not to do, I have a new character up and running. Introducing Jaay - neutral good Jester. My 18th documented attempt.
Key mods: EE 2.5; SCS (default prebuffs and all tactical challenges); item randomiser; BG1NPC.
Self-imposed rules: character class, race, alignment, etc selected randomly. Stats - highest total after 50 rolls. Core rules. Must role-play CHARNAME's alignment to the best of my ability, even if there will be negative consequences. No adding party members with severe alignment conflicts. Random number of allowed party members.
Jaay rolled a 6 on party size. She's picked up Imoen, Jaheira, Khalid, Branwen and Yeslick. Just defeated Davaeorn (where many previous attempts have ended). She's now level 8...
Gonna keep the updates short and sweet. Onward!
BG1EE updates: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
SoD updates: 1, 2, 3, 4
BG2EE SoA updates: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7
Before departing to take on the Balor, I actually invest in, and scribe, a few scrolls: With no Cleric, Imoen needs Animate Dead, and while at it, she might as well have Spell Shield, Minor Sequencer and Secret Word too. We also grab the five Potions of Genius, foreseeing many Mind Flayer battles to come.
Alright. The Balor has a host of powers, but we can negate all of them with SI: Abjuration, Protection from Fire, Resist Fear, Death Ward and Chaotic Commands. To this end, the non-Mages stay outside the room, with Cassius and Imoen conjuring four Skeleton Warriors and a Fire Elemental to hold the line while we reduce the Balor's Magic Resistance and start taking it down. While the Balor cannot hurt Cassius and Imoen, it certainly can and does hurt our summons. However, following three Lower Resistance and a Greater Malison, a Finger of Death from Cassius solves the encounter.
That went nice and smooth! We retire to the inn, as we have many, many times before.
The decision on which den of evil to hit first is easy: The Kuo-Toans, though greatly annoying with their Haste and constant dispelling of Illusions, are much less dangerous than Beholders or Illithids. We'll need Chaotic Commands to remove the threat of being stunned by their bolts, and defensive Illusions are pointless, but most anti-humanoid spells work, as do regular damage spells
We enter the Kuo-Toa lair. The small group to the north is quickly dispatched through brute force.
To the northeast is a larger, more potent group, sporting both a Priest and a Wizard. Once engaged, they are joined by a similar group from further north! Minsc takes a real beating despite wearing Drow Full Plate +5/Drow Medium Shield +3 and has to quaff one of our precious few Potions of Extra Healing, but manages to retreat behind the lines to provide ranged support instead.
Mazzy holds the line, and once some area-of-effect damage and a Chaos gets thrown into the mix, we carry the day.
We press north. After a solid round of buffs, Mazzy nips into the throne room and adds some diseased tadpoles to the healthy ones, supposedly weakening the prince. He seems mighty weak regardless, as he fails to do much of anything.
On our way back out, we deploy our Skeleton Warrior army against the Beholder and two Gauths in the room to the west. They perform admirably: The Beholder and its Gauth guards fall in short order, with the party never having been in danger.
And that's it for the Kuo-Toans. Not so for their lair, however... there remain those fiends, the Demon Knights! Proper fiends they are too, with a host of mighty powers, and a most unpleasant Level Drain on hit. But they have Armor of the Hart +3 and Girdle of Frost Giant Strength. There's no choice: The Fiends must perish!
So, again (and slightly overused with fiends, in my opinion), Demon Knights cast Remove Magic at a way too high caster level, and will then proceed to drop Symbol: Stun/Death, Power Word: Stun/Blind/Kill, and a 20D6 Fireball to make things even more ridicolous. Basically, no one is surviving that without buffs, and only Mages can protect their buffs. So, the decision is made to send Cassius in alone with Skeleton Warriors. The rest of the party will wait, hasted and buffed, beyond the door: Hopefully Cassius can bait most of the Demon Knights spells (they do not get at-will spells, thankfully) and maybe even kill a few of them, so that the party can mop up the remainder.
So, my first mistake: I forgot to put Amulet of Power on Cassius (I put it on him, but got distracted and had to close the game down, and when I started again, I forgot to equip it). When he was about to open up with a volley of Finger of Death, he had been Level Drained to level 10. A few Cone of Cold were insufficient to kill any Demon Knight, so the party had to come rushing in. Imoen eventually popped Limited Wish for party-wide NPP, and until that happened Minsc and Cassius juggled the Amulet of Power to keep more Level Drain from occuring.
Unfortunately, one Demon Knight still had a Remove Magic left. Mazzy is stripped of all protections, and is thus Level Drained several times. We prevail in the end, but not without injury: Note that Cassius' Stoneskin dropped while he was tanking a Demon Knight, which brought him perilously close to death.
It's somewhat comforting to see that Contingencies based on caster hitpoints still are not working properly: Cassius lost his Stoneskin, got reduced below 50% HP, and still had to run for his life for the better part of a round before his Contingency kicked in.
Hooray! Hooray! Hooray! Victory, as well as a nice set of armor and a very useful Girdle of Giant Strength is ours. But wait... we have no Cleric. Jaheira can't cast Lesser Restoration.
Do we have any scrolls of Lesser Restoration? Hm.. no. Crap. Crap! Are we going to be stuck with Level Drain for the rest of the Underdark!?
We hobble back to the Duergar Merchants. Nope, no Restoration scroll here. In a desperate last bid, we march north to the merchant in the inn. Can it be?
Oh you glorious gnome! I could kiss you! I won't, because your beard has things crawling in it and you smell like fungus. But I could! He only has four Restoration scrolls for sale, but we scoop them all up. Cassius and Mazzy are restored. Huzzah!
But that's it for easy (hah! Not so easy, I'd say) encounters. Time to get serious.
The Beholder Hive will be hit next, simply because if things turn hairy, we can exit: The Illithid City locks down once you enter. We will solve the fact that fighting Beholders typically means death by simply not fighting them; rather, the fighting will be left to Skeleton Warriors under Haste/Strength of One/Bless, with invisible spotters (indeed, the entire party will be under Invisibility 10' Radius most of the time) directing the action and a few area-of-effect spells to start the battles.
We depart for the Beholder Hive. The Kuo-Toans at the bridge have respawned, but by now we can just power through them unbuffed. That poor Ring of Regeneration must be up to 10k HP regenerated by now, but what can you do? We need Jaheira's slots for other things than healing.
Alright. We buff to the absolute hilt (including Improved Invisibility for everyone), Jaheira casts Harm, and we enter. Of course, this was overkill, as SCS moves the Elder Orb from the entrance to furthest into the Hive. Still, Jaheira smashes one Beholder into smithereens, and is joined by Mazzy and Minsc in quickly beating the second one down: With Haste and Death Ward, three fighter-types have no problem killing a single Beholder before it can kill one of them in return.
I realize now that that was an unnecessary risk. If Jaheira drops, we have no way to revive her at present. She'll have to stay out of the fighting when possible from now on.
A little further in, five Drow take down a Beholder without breaking a sweat. They actually prove very nasty: +5 Full Plate, +3 Medium Shields and +3 Flails (and at least three of them quaffed Potions of Hill Giant Strength) means we struggle to take them down. We end up needing both Cassius and Imoen tanking, and even so, take a lot of damage.
We even went so far as to summon two Mordenkainen's Swords and go invisible... but the Swords could barely hit the Drow! Tough cookies, to say the least.
Alright, we came prepared for the next bit. Four Skeleton Warriors and our single remaining Mordenkainen's Sword are summoned, buffed, and sent into the action. The Hive Mother sees straight through Invisibility and is very difficult to hurt (50% physical resistance and constantly casts Stoneskin), but her fellow Beholders and Gauths are much easier targets. We start the fight by dropping a Skull Trap and Stoneskin on the group, causing them to scatter somewhat. The Skeleton Warriors do eventually go down, but they take many Beholders with them.
And here we have to retreat for the first time. We've put a dent in the Beholder population, but we came equipped to fight an Elder Orb (Breach etc), yet there's no such Elder Orb within reach.
We retreat, rest (memorizing scores of Animate Dead, and two Project Image for Cassius) and return.
That Hive Mother is a right pain: We send in five Skeleton Warriors, they kill many Beholders... but the Hive Mother comes gunning for us once the Skeletons have all dropped! Minsc and Mazzy are forced to intercept her, with predictable results. They were heavily buffed, but the Hive Mother cares not for such things, and promptly applies Remove Magic followed by Death Ray on Minsc (Mazzy got Mazed).
Still, Minsc can be Raised. As long as Cassius and Jaheira survive, we'll be fine.
Cassius and Imoen are just outside the Hive Mother's sight, and so are safe.
They keep the pressure up by animating Skeleton Warriors to replace those that fall.
Though the Hive Mother is difficult to damage, there's not much she can do against near-endless undead hordes... and she falls! Hooray!
Jaheira had Wondrous Recall (this spell is just... ooooh, so good!), and Minsc is returned to the land of the living. We still have our buffs available, so Minsc, Mazzy and Jaheira get Improved Invisibility/Haste/Chaotic Commands, and proceed to make mincemeat out of the Mind Flayers to the south (Improved Invisibility really borks them, they struggle to hit you), though Jaheira catches a few Ballistic Attack.
Strangely, there are no Beholders at all in the southernmost room. The northeast room holds some Gauths, easily dispatched by Skeleton Warriors, and a fair bit of gold/gems as well as a scroll of Protection from Magical Energy (not bad!). We're actually doing a good job clearing the Hive: There remains an Elder Orb,
a handful of Gauths and about six Beholders guarding the path to the second Elder Orb, and that's it.
Again, we conjure: Imoen does the honours, bolstering her ranks of Skeleton Warriors with a Mordenkainen's Sword (Imoen doesn't know Project Image) and an Air Elemental (Imoen doesn't know many good L6 spells either).
Cassius and Imoen approach the Beholder group through the southernmost tunnel, fire off an Acid Fog and Fireball... and the silly Beholders just run around looking for us, but never reaching far enough to find the party. They take damage from the Death Fog, though, loads of damage. In fact, a second Death Fog kills off most of them!
We send in Imoen's by now four summons. The Air Elemental gets Petrified early on, but the Skeleton Warriors succeed in killing all the regular Beholders. With our last five 5th level slots, Cassius conjures up another five Skeleton Warriors. They destroy the first Elder Orb.
The second Elder Orb fares no better than the first. It too is destroyed! Hooray!
We gather up the Eyestalk, the Blade of the Equalizer and the incredibly potent Amulet of Spell Warding (which goes to Mazzy). And that's.. it? The Beholder Hive is cleansed! Huzzah!
We retire, once more, to the inn.
Neither my nerves nor Cassius' can take much more of this, so best to stop here for now.
Great successes, near escapes, and consequently tackling every problem with Animate Dead... who can ask for more? Next time, we will assault the Illithid City, and with any luck, live to tell the tale.
Cassius is now a L15 Elf Diviner.
Flashburn's Rejects
BG1: Prologue, 1, 2, 3, 4Baldur's Gate's sidequest hell goes smoothly and we get lots of easy XP. Spaz and Gaspar level up toward the end of it when we investigate the Merchant's League.
Spaz steals the WIS tome from Chanthalas Ulbright and Rufus consumes it for +5% spell duration.
Ramazith's tower is a bit dicey because our party is ill-suited for cramped spaces like this. Rufus gets killed by Ramazith when he unleashes an acid arrow and gets hit with a couple of Minute Meteors. Rufus is super squishy because of a couple of Shadow Adept items he wears reduces his max HP. He gets even squishier if he fails a save from his Shadow Weave spells that take him below 16 CON.
Rufus is raised after we deal with Ramazith and he levels up after dealing with Jardak and his master. Notice his 13 max HP after failing a save from casting shadow magic.
We get Lothander to hand over his part of the antidote and we kill him by blocking off the exit he normally scampers into. Now we have a second pair of Boots of Speed, but nobody really benefits from it. But hey, it's 4000 free XP.
Garos levels up as we fight Degrodel's Invisible Stalkers and Doom Guards, learning Static Charge. I hope this version of Static Charge works, because it did basically nothing after the first strike in the older version of IWDification that I was using.
We get to test it out against the group at the top of the Iron Throne. There's a new thief here that I haven't seen before who facestabs Gaspar for most of his health. He runs downstairs and gulps an invis potion but manages to charm Cloudwulfe after leaving the fight.
The first static charge works and Garos enrages immediately afterward to help fight. I think there's actually two thieves here with the same name, because that thief that facestabbed Gaspar is now on top of Garos and Spaz at the same time. Spaz will be okay because his AC is an incredible -13, which is at least 7 points better than anyone else right now. Rufus throws out a Black Mist from behind to blind everyone who isn't against the walls.
Ok, there actually are two thieves with the same name, because Shennara dies to Bruss while Shennera is busy fighting Garos.
Rufus then casts Night Terrors, which panics Aasim and an invisible Shennara. Garos' Static Charge from earlier discharges a second time, so at least it actually does work. We're almost done.
Then the fighter/mage throws out a Chaos spell from toward the back room, which Bruss fails to save against. Garos uses an Arrow of Dispelling to rip apart his Mirror Images and Minor Globe. Rufus finishes him off with a wand of frost, turning him into a statue and shattering him. The other Shennara is revealed by Spaz's See the Unseen invocation and killed with Shadow Missiles from Rufus and an acid arrow from Garos.
All of us are pretty beaten up but we prevailed. At Candlekeep, we run into the dreaded Ogre Magi ambush that I've heard about. SCS just loves being cheap like this. It's really annoying! Why just outside the walls of Candlekeep, right after a chapter transition of all places? Couldn't this have been placed in a better spot???
Rufus uses the Soulflare Candle to cast Umask, shattering the magi's mirror images. Bruss performs a Solar Flare which blinds several of them. The magi all waste their first round by casting Sleep on a Carrion Crawler that Gaspar recruited. I must not have been paying attention because Rufus is then cut down by one of the magi.
I so cannot wait for Shadeskin. Gaspar charms one of the ogres while Krieg, Bruss, and Garos cut down the rest. I think there's one that got away because we couldn't find it while it was invisible, because it took some damage from it's Spirit Armor after we rested at the inn.
After raising Rufus yet again at the temple of Oghma, we kill the Shistal Doppelganger and Gaspar reaches the top of Candlekeep for the...something of protection +1. I forget if it's a cloak or a ring. Anyway, we kill the iron throne leaders for the free XP and descend into the catacombs. Rufus and Gaspar work together to obtain the third WIS tome.
The last of Darkflame's appentices is guarding the STR tome. We send in 3 skellybros and the carrion crawler to kill him. The crawler paralyzes him, making the skeletons' job easy. Mak'kai drops shadow scrolls for levels 3 and 4 as well as a Wand of Shadow Fire. His robe increases spell duration and cold damage dealt slightly, in exchange for reduced fire resistance and max health. With Rufus as fragile as he already is, I decide to stick with the Evil Archmagi robe.
Gaspar recruits the ghasts that are hanging out nearby. With them, the carrion crawler, and some skellies, Prat's group is vanquished easily. We unfortunately learn that Diarmid is now immortal for no reason, so we have to squeeze our way past him when we usually just kill him on our way out. Thanks again, SCS...
We return the last of the apprentices' staves to Kryn Darkflame. In addition to the usual 1000 gold/XP, he rewards us with this amulet.
Good stuff. This will negate the casting speed penalty for using shadow magic in daylight. Time for TotSC. I'm not really feeling the ice island this time because it doesn't hold anything useful for us, so we just kill Shandalar. This is done by casting spells in this sequence:
Sigil of Despair (Rufus) -> Doom (Garos) -> Impose (Rufus) -> Chant (Garos) -> ghast, carrion crawler, Bruss (stunning fist), and Gaspar (darts of stunning) paralyze Shandalar while he's stunned.
This sequence causes a total of a -5 save penalty. Impose is extremely good. It's a 3rd level spell that does 3d8 crushing damage and sends the target flying away for a second and stuns it for one round. It bypasses magic resistance and has no save. Gaspar, Spaz, and Bruss all level up. Bruss and Spaz both learn teleport abilities: Bruss with Flash Step and Spaz with Flee the Scene.
The werewolf island and Durlag's Tower both fill me with dread. Only Krieg can hit Karoug with the Sword of Balduran unless Rufus paralyzes him so someone else can use Werebane. The werewolf army of Kaishas doesn't exactly thrill me either, but werewolves are easier to kill than wolfweres and they're worth 1400 XP a pop. Maybe I could farm them if I can kill Karoug. Durlag's Tower's chess game has been improved by SCS so I can't use Spaz's preferred strategy to kill them using the lightning traps.
Krieg - War Hulk 7
Garos - Warhorn Shaman 8
Bruss - Saiyan Monk(ey) 8
Rufus - Thief 7/Shadow Adept 6
Spaz - Warlock 9
Gaspar - Seducer 9
Previous updates:
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1025419/#Comment_1025419
In the prologue, Burl just persuaded Porios to surrender and then went invisibly down to find Korlasz. A single charge from the Ring of Energy (handy due to the magic damage it inflicts and its ability to ignore mirror images) was enough to get her to surrender.
In the City Burl slaughtered a few NPCs to get their equipment. He also had another run in with Korlasz while on a quest to get the tankard head gear - just waiting there until the mage had used all her spells up on the guards.
Staying with the idea of doing the minimum possible, Burl didn't bother going in search of a regeneration ioun stone, but just hid behind the tent at Boareskyr Bridge until Caelar called a parley. He then ran through Troll Claw Woods and then used invisibility to pass through the outer portions of the temple.
Shutting himself in Ziatar's room to avoid any guards interfering, he used a potion of invulnerability while killing the half-dragon.
He used a potion of regeneration, along with an oil of speed to make that work faster, while dealing with a few crawlers on the way to find Darskhelin. The potion of invulnerability was still active while he used potions of firebreath to speed up the action there.
Even though Burl couldn't use throwing daggers, he still wanted to kill Morentherene to get an upgraded shield. He buffed up with protection from poison and potion of invulnerability and managed to get one blow in before the dragon used stoneskin.
At Boareskyr, a whack and fiery breath sorted out Vichand before he could call for help.
Back at the Camp, Burl just bought a couple of things from the genie before running through Dead Man's Pass. After rescuing Skie he went to the Underground River and drew away the Cyclops to get a seal. He then went invisibly underground to place the Bwoosh and poison the food and water - then running away invisibly once more. The latter used the last charge of his ring, but he's got loads of invisibility potions that he won't need anyway.
Once more at the Camp, Burl had a series of invasions to stop. He hadn't bothered picking up any summons, but relied essentially on firebreath potions. He started with 23 of those and used 2 of those on each of the first 3 waves and 4 on the final wave - along with a few other potions (including 2 invulnerability as a result of the first being dispelled). Grimgor survived the fiery baths, but not the backstabs from several spies.
At the Castle, Burl buffed up before going to find Ashatiel. Two firebreath potions persuaded him to seek sanctuary, while two energy charges ensured he wouldn't find any.
I noticed on following Caelar into the abyss that Burl had gained his 10th level at some point and he took that. He ran through the first area before a combination of energy charges and stabs cleared Thrix' crew.
After resting to heal up Burl took some long-term buffs and started up the elevator. On nearing the top he added a few more potions ready for the big fight, including a magic shielding to make quite sure he wouldn't fail a saving throw as a result of taking damage. He let Caelar act on her own to occupy Belhifet initially while he dealt with the others, then came to take over the tanking. Typically I wouldn't do that, but with no need to worry about attack rolls and so many HPs, Burl was comfortable being the target and that meant only a single restoration was needed to keep Caelar going until Belhifet kicked the bucket.
I ran safely through the epilogue and saved the game. I'll need though to add the kit mod to my v2.5 BG2 installation and then recreate Burl there (importing causes problems with the kit not properly transferring between the games).
War Hulk L10, 173 HPs, 463 kills
I see that last time he finished SoD Burl had 663 kills, so he has substantially cut down on the amount of work done this run.
Flashburn's Rejects
BG1: Prologue, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5The werewolf island is up first. Garos clears out the first 3 levels of the ship with just his spirits.
Karoug's wife gives him some trouble by enfeebling and blinding him. Krieg and Bruss come up the stairs to finish her off. She really likes enchantment spells. With Karoug alone and Garos' spirits unable to hurt the greater wolfwere, Garos unsummons his spirits and opts to debuff him instead with Rufus' help. It's not enough for Shadow Binding or Inertia to work, so Spaz and Rufus just use their wands of fire.
Karoug is now toast. Rufus gains level 4 mage spells, finally. Shadeskin, Negative Immunity, Summon Shadow, and Sigil of Misfortune are learned, two of which are via the shadow scrolls from Darkflame's reward and from Mak'kai.
-Shadeskin: As Stoneskin, but offers 25% elemental resistance as long as at least 1 skin is still up.
-Negative Immunity: For 1 turn/level, give 1 creature immunity to blind, fear, sleep, confusion, and level drain
-Sigil of Misfortune: As Greater Malison, but also bypasses magic resistance.
-Summon Shadow: For 2 hours, depending on the caster's level, gets you these summons: lvl 7 = 3 shadows; lvl 9 = 3 shadow fiends; lvl 12 = 3 wraiths; lvl 16+ = 2 wraiths and 1 devil shade. These summons are weakened in daylight.
On our way back from victory, we forgot that we had to kill the sirene queen. Two other normal sirenes showed up but they were butchered. Krieg uses a Potion of Stone Form to negate any chance of being charmed. He levels up from this.
Against Kaishas's Loup Garou form, it's the same strategy as the greater wolfwere. Garos holds off the werewolves with his spirits, although they're only worth 420 XP apiece, not the 1400 like I thought. Krieg goes berserk against Kaishas, but regains control the next round. Rufus uses the Soulflare Candle to lower Kaishas' MR and he and Spaz team up to use scorcher charges.
Now back at Ulgoth's Beard, we do battle with Mendas. Of course, SCS has to start him off as a mage first before he becomes a Loup Garou too.
For some reason, 2 Loup Garous inside Mendas' house spawn on top of each other and they can't move. They still hit hard though, as Krieg finds out. Rufus and Garos debuff their saves and Rufus uses Shadow Binding to hold them still. Krieg, Rufus, and Spaz finish them off.
The werewolf island wasn't so bad, but I've got a really bad feeling about Durlag's Tower. It goes mostly as usual, except a couple of phase spiders teleporting right on top of us despite them not knowing where we even were. Garos levels up in the gym of the first floor of the dungeon. He learns Wall of Moonlight. I'm hoping this will be useful later in SoD.
The fight with the warders is much harder. Love constantly tries to charm Bruss and eventually succeeds. One of our summoned shadows blasts him away with Impose to remove him from the fight temporarily. Gaspar keeps tries to dispel his charm but it's not working. Frustration! I have Rufus cast Expunge Magic and it removes the charm effect, but takes down our buffs too. Pride is hacking up our back line.
Rufus uses the Soulflare Candle to get rid of Love's buffs so we can hit the bastard. Love goes down and Fear is finished with a Fire Arrow from Garos, because apparently it's wearing the troll regeneration ring. Pride is the last one standing and almost kills Bruss because he was slowed. RUfus pulls him away with Shadow Rope, letting Krieg get the last hit.
Man, these battles are just brutal. I'm beginning to see how weak our melee strength is with only 2 characters that can do it. Bruss earns his 2nd Zenkai Boost as we rest after the fight. Bruss could've used extra-healing potions, but if Vegeta can learn to exploit Zenkai Boosts, so can Bruss.
At the second level, Rufus gains a thief level when we get to Kiel's throne.
Level 3 goes as usual but we avoid the maze with the Ashirukurus. Who knows what kind BS they'll pull with SCS installed? Thanks to @aldain's human conjurer run, I learn that the chess fight's pieces immediately charge at you, so we buff with potions of absorption before killing Kaldran the bear. Upon entry, Garos buffs with Fury of the Winds and shoots Arrows of Detonation while Rufus casts Inertia, slowing many of the pieces. Krieg is juuuust out of range of the fireballs and Bruss shoots an energy wave for underwhelming damage.
The next round, Rufus summons his shadows. Their shadow weave spells are quite helpful. With most of the pressure relieved, Spaz summons a skeleton while Krieg and Bruss beat down the King, with Rufus using the Soulflare Candle to knock out his illusions.
For being "improved," the chess fight still boils down to bombarding everything with AoE damage before a piece reaches your side of the board. It doesn't deserve its name, honestly.
On level 4, Gaspar levels up and truly begins to shine. We recruit most of the Crypt Crawlers and Greater Ghouls to our cause. Ettercaps and Sword Spiders are paralyzed and devoured nearly instantly.
The same goes for the Demon Knight. With this many enemies that can paralyze on hit, even it succumbs to it.
And now, the moment I've been waiting this whole run for. We return to Basilisk Country. Rufus drinks a Potion of Genius to pump up his caster level to at least 12 to summons wraiths using Summon Shadow. He then goes invisible to scout ahead for Gaspar. The wraiths find the lesser basilisk we left behind and they hit it a couple of times to level drain it. Gaspar assumes direct control of it and recruits the basilisk!
We set the basilisk to the side. It's too valuable to let it get hurt any more. Our greater ghoul army devours Mutamin within 1 round.
I send the army away but leave one ghoul behind to act as bait for the basilisks. I send back in one of the wraiths to level drain the lesser basilisk and Gaspar recruits it too.
The remaining greater basilisk will take more hits to recruit. It gets perilously close to death, so I call off the wraith for a minute and send in Garos after drinking a Potion of Mirrored Eyes to heal the basilisk.
After about 5 level draining hits and 5 healing spells later, it's level drained enough to recruit it. Finally!
We've got 3 basilisks on our side for 5 gaze attacks per round! Some foolish gnolls are the first to taste our power.
We return to Ulgoth's Beard with our new army. A couple of the cultists die to pre-laid traps from Rufus, while the rest are paralyzed and petrified by our army. The same happens to the guards at the cultist compound, though the Cult Wizard on the inside has to be Breached by Rufus's Soulflare Candle first.
I can already taste the victory at Sarevok's coronation. I'm not too sure how we'll hold up in the final fight though. One wayward Chaos or Confusion cast at the basilisks could spell instant defeat for us. I think I'll hide them in the corner until they need to attack.
Krieg - War Hulk 8
Garos - Warhorn Shaman 9
Bruss - Saiyan Monk(ey) 8
Rufus - Thief 8/Shadow Adept 7
Spaz - Warlock 10
Gaspar - Seducer 10
Flashburn's Rejects
BG1: Prologue, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6We're heading back to the city. First we save Duke Eltan. In the interest of speed, I take Bruss and my greater ghoul army to infiltrate the Flaming Fist HQ and eliminate the Rashad doppelganger. It has great saves and despite being hit at least 20 times by ghouls, it never got paralyzed. The same cannot be said of Slythe.
Krystin has PfMW(!), but the Crypt Crawlers ignore that and paralyze her too.
At the coronation, we charm Ithtyl Calantryn with Algernon's Cloak. It's so nice to have a normal mage for once. If only we could recruit her. Weave and Shadow Weave work together to haste our army and slow the doppelgangers. They are wiped up pretty cleanly, except for an assassin that facestabs Gaspar.
Rufus levels up in the thieves' maze, choosing to learn Dread Whispers for a level 4 spell. For 5 rounds, enemies in 30' suffer 50% casting failure with no save. Every round after the first, they must also save vs. spell at -6 or panic for 1 round.
We avoid Sarevok's Undercity party entirely. No need to risk our army for a couple of arrows of detonation. Once inside the temple, we buff up. Krieg uses potions of magic resistance, invulnerability, and speed. Bruss just uses a potion of invulnerability. Garos protects us from fear with Rallying Cry. We send Rufus ahead to direct our army. Sarevok is by himself for about one and a half rounds, but then his cronies finally teleport in.
Semaj begins with PfMW and Diarmid with a Protection from Magic scroll. When I noticed they were teleporting in, I directed the greater ghouls and crypt crawlers to attack Diarmid, but then told the crawler to attack Semaj with their normal weapons.
Diarmid is definitely paralyzed. I have them move on to Angelo, but Semaj toasts my army with a fireball. The basilisks are coming up from behind and trying to petrify anyone. But Semaj then casts Chaos on them! This is exactly what I didn't want. They all get confused, and since we were all waiting on Semaj to get paralyzed, I reach into my potion case and have everyone drink a potion of Mirrored Eyes. The basilisks get overwhelmed.
Damn. All those ghouls and those three basilisks combined would've been worth about 16k XP if we'd just killed them instead. Not sure if it was worth the trade. With no meatshields left, it's our turn. Angelo is the first one to come down to play. Rufus responds with the Soulflare Candle, but Angelo also has a Stoneskin that he's been saving.
Tazok and Sarevok join the fun. I decide to have Spaz kite Sarevok while Rufus holds Tazok with Shadow Binding. Krieg, Bruss, and Garos work on peeling off Angelo's stoneskins. Garos is having a hard time hitting Angelo with Arrows of Dispelling. He does get hit but responds with more Mirror Images.
Screw this, let's just kill Tazok. We gang up on him and he transforms into a skeleton warrior.
Spaz continues to kite Sarevok and this is when I notice that Diarmid is still paralyzed. I need to finish him before it wears off. Rufus had previously chugged a potion of Genius to increase his caster level, so he summons his wraiths.
Semaj tries casting Greater Malison at Bruss, so Krieg and Bruss respond with Potions of Magic Shielding to guarantee saving throws. Semaj is otherwise mostly content to huck Minute Meteors and constantly wink in and out of visibility for no reason. He tries to Glitterdust Gaspar, but it fails. Gaspar is not much help here. Tazok's skeleton finally dies.
Bruss rushes off to kill Diarmid. Semaj's PfMW has definitely worn off by now so Garos tags him with an Arrow of Dispelling. Gaspar manages to stun him with a Dart of Stunning as well!
Angelo is now stalking Rufus. I try to keep him out of melee range, but my attention wavers and Angelo uses a Wand of Lightning on Rufus. Rufus fails his saving throw and is fried. Semaj dies at about the same time.
Rufus is going to unleash hell on the nonbelievers once he gets strong enough, I swear it. The lightning bolt rebounds off Rufus and manages to hit Gaspar too, but he saves against it. Bruss soon kills Diarmid's skeleton and comes back to help.
We ignore Semaj's skeleton and instead focus on getting revenge for Rufus. Garos rebuffs with Fury of the Winds and then casts Battle Ardor for a THAC0 and damage bonus. Angelo is stuck with an Arrow of Dispelling and is promptly killed.
We clean up the two remaining skeletons and focus on Sarevok. Garos enrages and our wraiths cast spells on him. Shadow Rope holds Sarevok down for an extended period. Garos is hitting him with every shot for a lot of elemental damage. Sarevok quickly falls!
BG1 with SCS complete!
Krieg - War Hulk 8
Garos - Warhorn Shaman 9
Bruss - Saiyan Monk(ey) 8
Rufus - Thief 8/Shadow Adept 8
Spaz - Warlock 10
Gaspar - Seducer 10
Previous run:
Burl the War Hulk has just finished SoD, but progress with him has been feeling rather too easy. That changes in ToB, but for now I thought I'd put that run on hold for a while and have a sterner challenge with the Crew. Up to now they have always operated at Core Difficulty, but I thought this time I'd pitch them against Legacy of Bhaal. Having experimented a bit, I suspect it may well be overkill, but for this run anyway they've also got to deal with SCS. It's not so much the spells that make that problematic as the AI and calls for help - when even a single kobold is a significant danger, having one of those call on a host of nearby friends can be a real pain
With combat being difficult and time-consuming, they left Carbos and Shank alone in Candlekeep (though they did kill the rats - who no longer do any damage in v2.5). They also intended to restrict their killing in the next area to Imoen, Xzar and Montaron - as NPCs don't benefit from the LoB upgrades. However, a pathfinding glitch resulted in activating a wolf and they ran that round for quite a while until the criticals eventually mounted up.
Moving on to Beregost, Algernon was surrounded and hacked down pretty quickly. His cloak was used to charm the sirines at the temple. Wearing them down against dogs wasn't that easy given the Crew needed criticals to hit the dogs (and they had a tendency to call for help from nearby groups), but they got the job done eventually. Finishing off the last few HPs of the sirines was also not a given due to the difficulty of hitting and the danger of a sirine killing a feebleminded character. However, everyone survived - though they did need to resort to Imoen's magic missile wand on one occasion.
Travelling further East they arrived at the basilisk area and immediately dragged Korax to the south. After eventually letting him close enough to talk and be charmed he went to find the southern group of basilisks and drag a couple of those away to be paralyzed (with SCS installed the Crew couldn't allow themselves to be seen until that was done) - that was sufficient for a level up.
Korax successfully tagged Mutamin
Vito - L3, 42 HPs, 9 kills, 0 deaths, ** scimitar / *** darts
Baby Face - L3, 36 HPs, 12 kills, 0 deaths, ** long sword / *** crossbow
Mad Dog - L3, 41 HPs, 6 kills, 0 deaths, *** axe / ** dual wielding
Carlo - L3, 45 HPs, 14 kills, 0 deaths, ** flail / *** sling
Bugsy - L3, 35 HPs, 12 kills, 0 deaths, ** hammer / *** shortbow
Al (PC) - L3, 37 HPs, 11 kills, ** 2-handed sword / *** longbow
I thought, why not use the same tactics here? However Gnarl just ignored them and went straight for her.
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. There's one thing left to do before tackling the Illithid city: Well, two things, really. Raevilin Strathi and Alchra Diagott! Not that they have much (though Alchra Diagott carries a scroll of Spell Turning), but they're there, so... let's beat them.
Though it's difficult with SCS, the tactic of just letting Mages exhaust themselves on summons still work, to a degree. We scout the site of Raevilin's appearance with Farsight, have Mazzy speak to him, and once he turns hostile, she races off, leaving only Skeleton Warriors. Since Raevilin sees no "real" character to fight, he goes after the Skeleton Warriors. Unfortunately, once done with those, sending more summons at him just causes him to start roaming (more like gunning straight for us despite having no way of knowing where the party is), and Minsc suffers the consequences.
It just wouldn't be a proper battle without Minsc dying. Raevilin pulls some more mischief, including summoning an Efreeti, but with his most powerful spells exhausted, we take him out, looting a few scrolls.
We rest up, raise Minsc, and prepare for the much more dangerous Lich, Alchra Diagott.
I'm not sure how others do it, but... I have a very hard time fighting Liches in stand-up battle before ToB levels. They pretty much always use SI: Abjuration, meaning you need Ruby Ray of Reversal (and lots of it) to get through their protections and start Breaching them. Ruby Ray of Reversal typically isn't available yet, unless you got really lucky with a random drop. And that means you have to wait out the numerous PfMW. Standing around in a Lich's line of sight is generally a very bad idea. Even a Mage with proper protections will just get torn to shreds by the multitude of Demons the Lich will summon.
So, we send a few summons at Alchra and try to keep our distance. SCS Liches move at a decent pace, but we keep running away, sending summons towards Alchra that typically distract him for a round.
Here's Alchra sprinting after us, once he took care of our initial waves of summons:
Once we reach the Swirfneblin outpost, Alchra's short-time buffs are gone. Maybe we can attack now?
Or not... double length Time Stop + Improved Alacrity. Sheesh. All this for a scroll of Spell Turning?
So, Alchra takes out Imoen with ADHW, tries to do the same to Mazzy (but she makes her save), and is then finally out of killer spells. Mazzy destroys the foul Lich.
That was probably not worth the excitement, but it's over and done with. Time for Illithids!
The best use for Mage slots in the Illithid city is summons (Skeleton Warriors and Magical Swords are immune to most of the things the Illithids can do: They'll get Detonated into bits pretty quickly, but at least they provide a distraction) and buffs. Cassius has Improved Haste scribed now, so we memorize three of those, two Project Image, five Animate Dead, four Improved Invisibility.. you get the drift. Imoen follows suit, as much as her spell repertoire allows. Jaheira goes two Chaotic Commands, two Wondrous Recall, and the rest of her slots don't really matter.
We enter the city, are captured and put into the ring. We easily best the three Umber Hulks, and then agree to work with Simyaz to escape. Once again pulled into the ring, we take down the three Kuo-Toans and start roaming the city. We've long since started wearing the Drow Full Plate +5, and it enables us to just tank the Ogre Jailer, though he has gargantuan amounts of hitpoints. We clear the other prisoners, then head east (Minsc and Mazzy under Chaotic Commands, everyone else under Invisibility 10' Radius).
We get the strange liquid, head south and free the slaves/get Mind Control Circlets, killing Mind Flayers as we go.
The tactics are simple: There are three major encounters in here, two with Mind Flayers/Ullitharids and Umber Hulks, and the final one with the Elder Brain. For the minor encounters with just a few Mind Flayers, Chaotic Commands and a couple of Potions of Genius are enough. For the major ones, we summon a full batch of distractions, apply Improved Haste and Improved Invisibility to Minsc/Mazzy via Cassius' Project Image, and let them go to town. It works surprisingly well, as the Mind Flayers seem to prefer destroying our Skeletons, giving Mazzy and Minsc plenty of time to kill them off one by one.
We kill the three slaves in the pods: The Dwarf Warrior has the very nice Ring of Fire Control, which goes to Mazzy. We also raid the "hidden" room, gaining the Staff of Command... 21 charges of Domination, 12 hour duration, with no save. I'd say it's exceptionally potent, but by now, anything vulnerable to Domination isn't really going to help us much in a fight.
We head north to take on the Elder Brain and finish this. Skeletons are sent in ahead of us... and the Elder Brain locks the door. Leaving the party to deal with a few Mind Flayers that teleported in behind us.
Fine. We'll kill them and finish off the Elder B-
I'm telling you.. Skeleton Warriors are where it's at. They kill the Elder Brain, on their own, before we can even finish the two Mind Flayers and join in the fight. We move in anyway and help them mop up the Brain Golems (as they require Blunt damage). And so we are free to leave! Well, not quite. The ingrate Simyaz and his Githyanki are poised to ambush us. I'm so worried about them from the ship fight that we apply Invisibility 10' Radius and risk a rest in the Underdark proper... which we pull off.
I needn't have bothered, however: They're absolute pushovers, utilizing low-level Mage spells like MAA, Slow etc.
We return to the inn and rest. All three major areas are cleared... no more Illithids, Beholders or Kuo-Toans. I must say, of the three, the Beholder Hive was probably the least fun, mostly since the Hive Mother seems so incredibly out of place, given how powerful she is. Still, they're dead, and we're not.
All that remains is to proceed with the plot. We go have a chat with Adalon, and are transformed into Drow.
Having spoken with Soulafein and been tasked with rescuing Phaere, we prepare thoroughly for the second bridge ambush.
No sweat, really. The only one that presented any obstacle was N'ashtar, but even so, he botched his initial Remove Magic (I think he targetted Minsc, who promptly ran away), and so couldn't really do much except refuse to die. But that only gets you so far. We happily swipe his scroll of ADHW.
Phaere is rescued without incident, though Soulafein gets beaten to Badly Injured. Back in Ust Natha, Mazzy partakes of some pit fighting, even soloing a Beholder. She had Death Ward up, and when the Anti-Magic Ray stripped that, she immediately quaffed a Potion of Invulnerability and kept fighting.
Mazzy also beats Lasonar (his Bastard Sword of Searing +3 going to Minsc), and Chalinthra.
Figuring Imoen should be able to beat at least the lowest-level Drow Mage, I send her in next.
Sigh. So the weakest of Drow Mages have access to L8 spells. That's just dandy.
I'm not risking Cassius against that crap, and Imoen doesn't have the spell repertoire to deal with it. The Mage duels will have to make do without us.
We take the time to do the Quile quest. Her servants are incredibly annoying, all popping various protections, but we brought excessive amounts of Breach for this very purpose. They all fall in relatively short order, and the Boneblade +4 goes to Imoen.
I can accept a high-level Mage running things... but when you have 5 high-level Mages apparently being the servants (!) of a fairly low-level Priestess? Maybe it's Drow society that works like this, but still, I have trouble envisioning it. Anyway. We proceed with the main plot, letting Jaheira handle the Beholder.
Afterwards, we of course spare the Swirfneblin (having sent Soulafein back to Ust Natha beforehand), and in turn spare Soulafein as well. We are brought before Matron Mother Ardulace, and agree to return with the blood we already have, to buy us time to do the quests that only become available once you've spoken with her.
First, the Ghaunadaur worshippers. They're way too low-level to stand up to us, as even their Mage lacks proper spell protections.
Next... Deirex. Friggin' Liches. We threaten what's-his-face, the Drow with the rope, into giving it up for free (I'm not paying for faulty merchandise!), and enter Deirex's abode, and subsequently end up accepting Jarlaxle's offer. We buff extensively, enter again, have Cassius pop Kitthix, and run like the dickens for the other side of the map.
Again, we just can't fight a Lich in straight-up combat. Minsc and Mazzy will get dispelled and killed, most likely Jaheira too. And even though Cassius and Imoen can protect their buffs, they can't survive indefinitely against the host of Demons (immune to Death Spell) that the Lich will summon.
So, we run around. Summons are sent at Deirex while everyone else does what they can to avoid being in his line of sight. There's a great deal of shuffling, but... to my surprise it actually works. Deirex wastes a great many spells on our summons, and then, his myriad of PfMW having run out, fails a save against Azuredge. Goodbye, Deirex.
He actually got a Time Stop and ADHW x2 off, one at Minsc, one at Mazzy... but they both made their saves.
We loot his tower, but surprisingly, there's not really much to write home about (a scroll of Ruby Ray of Reversal is the best of the lot).
With only House Jae'llat left to plunder, we swing by the Drow Merchants, buying the Sentinel +4, Spear of Withering +4, Firetooth +3, and some scrolls.
Erring on the side of caution, we buff profusely before attacking the Jae'llats.
I thought I had a screenshot of what happens next, but apparently not. You'll note Cassius has no Contingency active: He had Improved Invisibility on Helpless, but since Project Image renders you helpless, it was triggered back in the Illithid City and I forgot to renew it with Stoneskin for Ust Natha.
So. Cassius is surrounded by three servants, his Mirror Image long gone due to enemy True Sight.
His Stoneskin gives out. Minsc and Mazzy are busy killing enemy Mages.
I try to reapply Stoneskin, but Cassius' aura was clouded from casting that entirely non-necessary Detect Invisibility. With no Stoneskin, Cassius drops in three hits. Game over.
It's pointless, it's stupid, and it's frustrating, but that's the way it is. I got overconfident and it came back to bite me: Though very powerful, a Diviner is also very frail.
I sort of lost my heart for the run when Anomen kicked the bucket: I usually install the component that makes chunkings much less likely, but with SCS 31 it's been moved to Tweaks.
I'll probably install Tweaks strictly for this component, as I dislike chunkings due to the randomness of it: You either allow killed NPC's to be raised, or you don't. You do not add an arbitrary mechanism that may prevent raising and give no way to protect against it.
I think I'll need a while to work up the enthusiasm for another run. Unlike Hubblepot's demise, this wasn't even a close fight. Every single enemy in there was garbage, they literally stood no chance against our frontliners, and had accomplished nothing at all before Cassius fell. At least I got a refresher on SCS Spellhold/Underdark, and should I make it back there, I've little doubt I can navigate both areas safely.
Previous updates:
South of Beregost the Crew charmed one of Mirianne's half-ogres. After killing his companion I tried to rest in order to be able to charm one of the Flaming Fist nearby as well, but got ambushed by a hobgoblin elite. That proved an extremely tough opponent, but it was almost dead when it somehow managed to switch targets at the last moment and strike down Bugsy a couple of seconds before a final critical got it.
After raising Bugsy at the Temple, the Crew didn't bother spending time resting but made their way directly to the FAI - timing their journey to avoid any possibility of encounters on the way. The two gate guards were charmed and taken to attack Tarnesh without activating him (unlike the guards closer to Tarnesh the gate ones don't have a wandering script and hence will keep attacking a neutral target).
After spending a while charming Jaheira (in order to take her outside and get her potion of invisibility), the Crew went back south of Beregost. Ambushing hobgoblin elites meant they needed several attempts, but finally managed to get both an ogrillon and Flaming Fist charmed in order to kill the other Fist and get armor upgrades for several of the Crew.
Moving on down to Nashkel, they picked up the ankheg armor and Al learnt LMD. Retracing their steps a bit they then went back to the Lake area where Vito activated a couple of gnolls to attack Drizzt. Settling in for a long wait the others patiently listened to the sounds of halberds hitting armor. With the number of hits required to bring down Drizzt in LoB it would in the past have been almost certain that both of the gnolls would break their weapons and Drizzt could then be killed to get his XP after he was unconscious. However, although there's nothing in the v2.5 patch notes about breaking weapons, my experience of this encounter is that the chance of breakage for these specific gnolls (though not other ones) has been very substantially reduced in v2.5. It was no great surprise therefore that the gnolls killed Drizzt - while his XP would have been much appreciated, his equipment is a major gain in itself.
In the same area, Bjornin's half-ogres fought among themselves.
It was time then for the Crew to improve their reputation and they started doing various quests. That included quite a struggle to subdue the diggers at the mine-site
The Crew are not attempting to totally clear every map in my usual way with parties, but are normally doing all the major encounters they come across. Where they can't avoid encounters with groups of things like hobgoblins and gnolls they typically charm one of those to act as the tank while the others are shot down - though they tend to end up doing a reasonable amount of running and shooting as well. They picked up some bracers to help their archery in the Cloud Peaks,
By this time reputation was up to 19 and they returned to High Hedge to try and get the last one. First though Al took a potion of heroism and used +1 arrows gained on their travels to shoot down the golems.
I reckon they've done pretty well so far, but I don't think it's going to get any easier going forward
Vito - L4, 54 HPs, 34 kills, 0 deaths, ** scimitar / *** darts
Baby Face - L4, 50 HPs, 30 kills, 0 deaths, ** long sword / *** crossbow
Mad Dog - L4, 54 HPs, 25 kills, 0 deaths, *** axe / ** dual wielding
Carlo - L4, 55 HPs, 43 kills, 0 deaths, ** flail / *** sling
Bugsy - L4, 48 HPs, 35 kills, 1 death, ** hammer / *** shortbow
Al (PC) - L4, 48 HPs, 39 kills, ** 2-handed sword / *** longbow
I had this recorded on Youtube. It was w/o ATweaks.
With it, the Drow party just outside the entrance to Odamaron's lair. Iirc, I've had about 7-8 Cornugons teleporting to back line and ripping Aerie and Xan to shreds....fun times...
I don't think anybody has done it yet..but I will!
@Corey_Russell good luck in ToB.
@StummvonBordwehr, where is your Barbarian? I thought you had made major progress with her (barely escaping a couple of times).
I'm here to report that my Bounty Hunter Gilyn has fallen. Frantic playing and a general feeling of cba'ness with taking notes ("can't-be-arsedness" as a dear friend of mine and me tend to call it) led to me making good progress without sharing any updates. I'll suffice with some highlights / points of interest.
Irenicus' Dungeon
Imoen releases Gilyn from his cell and joins him as do Minsc and Jaheira. I take Irenicus' dungeon very seriously. The two extra levels from SoD make little difference for a character that depends on items rather than spells. Besides, with only 16 DEX out of a possible 20, his thieving skills (stealth) are not all that. Imoen and Jaheira do have spells of course, but they level up upon joining, so they don't have their best spells memorized. And with only one rest available, immediately resting seems unwise. The companions proceed with caution. Duergar are separated and battled piecemeal. Healing potions are for immediate consumption.
Gilyn finds Varscona and uses it for slaying the otyugh with backstabs. Minsc and Jaheira dispatch the inactive guardian golems. The party moves on to the next level, leaving Ilych, the plane of air, and the cambion for later and having Yoshimo join.
The Bounty Hunters kill the mephit portals with thrown traps. More snares are laid at strategic places before the party rests. Traps and backstabs become the principal means of handling enemies, over Jaheira and Minsc's melee ability.
Back on the second level, the dreaded salt mephit stuns Yoshimo, and some duergar drawn to the hubbub finish him off. The plan of finishing the mephit with two stabs proves foolish.
Waukeen's Promenade
Imoen is taken by the cowled ones, Yoshimo raised by Jaheira, and like Minsc, thanked for his help. Jaheira and Gilyn remain and start their exploration of Athkatla by clearing out the circus tent with little difficulty thanks to Jaheira's Insect Plague.
Jaheira and Gilyn head into the slums to deal with Gaelan Bayle, and to visit the Copper Coronet. Korgan joins, and helps Hendak take over the inn from Lethinan.
Despite traveling invisibly thanks to Jaheira's Pixie Dust the Eldarin ambush doesn't go too well when everyone (including a nymph), except enraged Korgan and a fire elemental are Horrored. There are no casualties though, and Gilyn is still invisible when hit by the Horror.
Umar Hills
Valygar joins. I forget about Shadow Fiends' paralyze ability. Korgan falls. Gilyn, having used the mirror, still gets paralyzed but survives.
A resurrected Korgan complains about his quest, so the party head back to Athkatla. In the crypts, undead are bypassed, except those in Korgan's chamber, which are dispatched by fire elementals. On the way to the Coronet, party gets ambushed again. Most enemies fall to traps and ranged attacks, but a mage manages to charm Mazzy, Gilyn, and Jaheira!
Back to the Umar Hills. It's still fairly early for the Shade Lord, but with the door to Thaxxy's lair, there's always an escape option. First attempt sees a sunstone bullet destroy the shadow altar, enraged Korgan engage the Shade Lord, and the other companions finish Shadow Patrick.
Several attempts eventually lead to success. Enraged Korgan melees him. Allowing the others to cast spells, set snares (Gilyn) and attack with ranged weapons as soon as PfMW expires. Jaheira casts True Seeing. After a bit Korgat gets blinded by a PW:Blind and has to retreat because the Shade Lord activates a Blade Barrier.
Trademeet
Party goed straight to Faldorn (invisibly, stopping only for the druids in front of her lair, who fall thanks to good preparation with traps and summons).
CDTweaks' all strongholds tweak (which I had decided to install so as to give party members a stronghold as well) places Gilyn as Faldorn's challenger in the pit, without equipment... Companions had to approach to hand him his equipment...
Astral Prison
Back in Athkatla the slavers are dealt with. Reputation boosts lead to Korgan's departure (I thought I had the happy patch installed, turns out I hadn't. He didn't have great equipment because shopping had been postponed until 20 rep). I'm fastforwarding from here, past the Shadow Thieves quests, Mekrath, the sewer party,
The second pit to the right is used as a safe space for the invisible party. No enemies can follow them there and it can be entered whenever enemies upstairs are casting detection spells. The Gish warriorsin the area can neither see through invisibility nor cast detection spells.
Mazzt takes out the air elementals, and fire elementals melee the master of thralls as the party attacks woth missiles. The party rests, and rather anti-climactially, fire elementals slay the warden.
Planar Sphere
Uneventful until the party fights the demons. With two demons down, the last one, a Nabassu death gazes Gilyn as he is scouting the area, paralyzing the elf. There is no spell projectile, so it takes me by surprise. With his allies too far away to release him, there is no escape this time.
Yeldon - half-elf cleric/ranger, protagonist (Corey_Russell)
Keras - dwarven kensai (Grond0)
Denko - human monk (Gate70)
The first thing the Trio worked on was the Unseeing Eye quest. The first death was Keras who died very quickly when we battled the beholders and undead just past the bridge. Denko and Yeldon did manage to kill the enemies and raise their friend.
Next, the next major battle was against the blind priests. Rather than wait for Yeldon to silence the priests, Grond0 and Gate70 got impatient and attacked anyways. Denko then got held and died.
Yeldon, with the help of the shield of balduran, was working on clearing out the lair. While he could easily handle this on his own, Grond0 just couldn't resist attacking a "paralyzed" gauth. The gauth nevertheless managed to kill Grond0. Our Rod of Resurrection was down to a single charge.
We did manage to clear the rest of the lair, as well as take out the Unseeing Eye. Fortunately we were quick to get rid of the "great device". Naturally we also took down Gaal then we collected our reward.
Yeldon noticed we hadn't even done the Temple quests, so we worked on those, starting with Sir Sarles. No real problem doing Sarles. We also found Travin and recovered the Dawn Ring. This resulted in the Peripait, which put Denko's save vs. death to 0. We got a ton of basic ambushes but the slavers really have no chance.
We then worked on the main quest, in dealing with Mook, and the Shadow Thief traitors. We also defeated P'anaii for their ion stone. We then worked on Bodhi's lair. With Yeldon's excellent tanking, and the power of Azuredge wielded by Keras, the lair was cleared and Bodhi gave up in no more than two rounds.
We ran out of time, so saved our session here.
Previous updates:
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1026237/#Comment_1026237
Looking around for relatively easy things to do didn't show too many options. The Crew did a bit of work clearing ghasts at the Valley of the Tombs. After activating Narcillicus though I realized trouble was in store after seeing Al (who has a THAC0 of 8) missing him with a 19 and the Crew ran away while they still had the chance (I should have tried to charm him, but forgot to do that in the stress of seeing him teleport in among the Crew).
Moving on to Firewine Bridge, Bentan was charmed and shot down by the kobold hordes. Several rests while retreating allowed kobolds to be charmed and whittle away at the hordes and eventually they were cleared. Poe joined the fun for the assault on Meilum, but he was quickly cut down leaving Vito to lead Meilum round while the criticals slowly mounted up.
The best option remaining looked like the ankheg area and Vito made a good start there by charming the first ankheg he met before it could attack. That helped kill one ankheg and take another to near death, Vito briefly tanking that one to finish it off.
A load of ankheg shells were traded in to purchase a new suit of ankheg armor to upgrade defenses a bit more. They did one tour of the area to bag a few more ankhegs and handed Farmer Brun back the remains of his son. By now they were finally getting close to another level and various low-level enemies left Al only needing a handful more of XP. At Gullykin he attempted to get those from a group of kobolds - only to find some dire wolves joining the fight. That still seemed manageable, but then another group of kobold commandos heard the noise and attacked from the flank. Mad Dog was hit twice and nearly killed before he knew he was under attack, but fortunately one more shot before he could get out of range missed. They tried to retreat in the direction they'd just come from, only to find another horde of kobolds had appeared in the way.
Al then got his final XP from killing a couple of hobgoblins at the Beregost Temple. Despite searching the surrounding area several times, once battle commenced some war dogs soon appeared (that can be one of the more irritating aspects of having SCS installed - respawns can occur like that in the unmodded game, but are less likely and won't in any case react unless you come into sight range of them). Everyone took their levels at that point before continuing the fight.
With no attractive path to getting anywhere near enough XP for another level, I decided it was time to visit the Nashkel Mine. Going through there I was wary of groups moving in behind the Crew when they were already wounded, so they were trying to clear things pretty comprehensively on the way down. That therefore took quite a while and required plenty of rests just to clear the first couple of levels - apart from the many kobolds with bows, it was also hard in the confined spaces to run lots of them round, so the Crew were in melee far more than usual and therefore taking more damage.
On the third level they tried pulling some kobolds back to the second level. That worked well for the first 4 or 5, but then a group of about 15 kobolds all piled back through at once, ignoring the fact that none of them were actually near the entrance (that's another aspect of playing with SCS I don't like). They blocked the corridor, so the Crew immediately jumped back to the 3rd level. I thought they would be able to finish off the remaining kobolds nearby, but Vito was unfortunate enough to pick up 3 critical hits almost together (that's made easier as the kobolds could get a critical with a 19) and he died.
The remaining kobolds were killed without further problems, but the situation for the Crew was still extremely precarious. They couldn't go back to the 2nd level to rest due to the hordes waiting there and there were far too many kobolds still in the way further into the 3rd level to be able to fight through them. I decided the best idea was to try and rest in place - if successful that would not only regenerate some HPs, but might cause some of the blocking kobolds to disperse. The rest was successful, but when they looked all or most of the blockers were still there and they had to jump straight back.
Back again, they were able to separate most of the remaining kobolds into manageable groups of 3 or 4 and made much quicker progress. When they finally contacted the kobolds near the shaman they immediately ran back to the second level. In doing that they only ever saw a kobold guard chasing and pulled him back towards the exit to the first level. By that point, however, I had assumed there was nothing else chasing and was caught out when the shaman suddenly appeared and launched a horror.
They restocked on missiles and went to find the kobold chieftain. His poison arrows can be lethal in combination with horror, but on his own he's not too much of a threat.
The Chapter Change triggered as they were leaving, so Al learnt CLW while resting and healing in the mine. The Crew then went back to get the others raised and healed. I made a mistake near the Nashkel temple though in trying to visit the shop - doing that with a solo character won't bring you into sight of Nimbul, but the bumping in a party clearly can.
After resting at the Carnival it was back down through the mine to finish off the remaining fodder and loot the chest. They then emerged from the back entrance and were delayed by some gnolls. That gave a chance for someone else I'd forgotten to make an appearance - time for another swift exit.
Well, as I suspected the Nashkel Mine was a bit of a nightmare. Assuming I can deal with Narcillicus, Nimbul and Tranzig though that will mean the Bandit Camp is the next main target. That's going to take a lot of care if it's not to prove a nightmare squared
Vito - L5, 63 HPs, 60 kills, 2 deaths, ** scimitar / *** darts
Baby Face - L5, 65 HPs, 71 kills, 0 deaths, ** long sword / *** crossbow
Mad Dog - L5, 66 HPs, 54 kills, 1 death, *** axe / ** dual wielding
Carlo - L5, 67 HPs, 71 kills, 0 deaths, ** flail / *** sling
Bugsy - L5, 63 HPs, 63 kills, 1 death, ** hammer / *** shortbow
Al (PC) - L5, 57 HPs, 88 kills, ** 2-handed sword / *** longbow
Previous updates:
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1026237/#Comment_1026237
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1026393/#Comment_1026393
Back in Nashkel the Crew knew that Nimbul would seek them out as soon as they entered the area. They dodged one spell by running to the carnival before successfully charming him. After wasting his spells and waiting for his haste and mirrors to wear off he was ripe for attack.
They went to find Narcillicus at the Valley of the Tombs, but his elven heritage blocked the attempt to charm him. Running away, they were ambushed by Molkar. That looked like a dodgy fight to me and fortunately Vito saved against an attempted charm and then both he and Mad Dog saved against an unholy blight - allowing them to survive (and in fact if either had failed their saves they would have been chunked).
They wanted the XP for Narcillicus' mustard jellies, though they are a pretty formidable obstacle in LoB. Trying the first one they were doing well initially, but with the jelly at near death it suddenly started consistently rolling high attacks. The Crew tried successively ducking behind a rock to make it switch targets and did that successfully a number of times - but eventually Carlo failed to make it away in time and he died. The others tried to press the attack, but shortly afterwards Bugsy went the same way. With only 1, or at most 2, hits needed on the jelly and it attacking Vito (and needing a 20 to hit him), the odds still heavily favored the Crew. However, odds don't mean much in a no-reload and there was a major shift in those when the jelly got 2 criticals in a row to chunk Vito. I don't continue party runs after one of the members has been chunked, so that would have been the end of the run anyway. However, the Crew kept attacking to see if they could get revenge. The jelly then missed a few attacks and was taken down to 3 HPs before finding another streak - hitting Al twice in succession and poisoning him the second time. He stayed alive for a few seconds longer by using CLW - long enough to see Baby Face go down. However, the jelly remained alive and quivering to the end as Al fell to the floor.
Corey
EDIT: Also, their acid attack counts as a missile. This means you should wear all things that reduce chance of missile damage, such as cloak of displacement or boots of avoidance. And if you get within melee, you want girdle of bluntness, as their melee counts as blunt.
Previous updates:
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1025419/#Comment_1025419
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1025988/#Comment_1025988
After a bit of masochism playing LoB with a bunch of fighters, I was happy to revert to a much easier challenge with Burl. After installing the War Hulk kit in BG2 I recreated the character as at the end of SoD and started him in Jon's dungeon. A while ago I suffered a death there when the radiant mephit's color spray lasted longer than it's supposed to, so there was a bit of nervousness when Burl went down there - but he soon recovered.
After restoring the circus, Burl checked in with Gaelan Bayle and went to sort out the Copper Coronet. His lack of APR gave a guard there the opportunity to hold him.
At the Graveyard he dodged a horror from the Crypt King before striking him down.
Going to the Bridge District to follow up on the kidnapping, Burl also solved the skinner murders - that partially offset the reputation hit for collecting the pantaloons.
Thinking again about reputation, Burl did the Sir Sarles quest and handed in Neb's head.
After another quest for the Temple, Burl returned to the Copper Coronet and dived into the sewers. He picked up Lilarcor there and soon put that to use on Captain Haegan.
With his spell save down to 1 (giving an automatic save against petrification), he decided to go lich hunting. That involved getting rid of a rakshasa to ensure an easy passage back through the sewers.
To get his levels restored from the trap on Kangaxx's tomb, Burl went to the cheap temple services at Watcher's Keep. While there he bought a potion case to ease inventory restrictions and beat up the statues on the top floor to get to level 14.
Back in the Slums, Burl invaded the front door of the Slaver HQ - his low saves providing protection until Namarra shut the mages up (neither had vocalize).
Giving up on the use of equipment to save himself, Burl tried attacking for a while until eventually he got a critical hit - his special ability producing a stun and knock back to finally get room to move away. Shortly afterwards he was able to put his plan into action - no XP of course, but a lot of satisfaction for burning up that troublesome pair.
War Hulk L14, 213 HPs (incl. 5 from Helm), 296 kills (463 in BGEE/SoD)
Jaay has bumped off the Iron Throne lackeys and is now on her way back to Candlekeep. Imoen softened them up with the necklace of missles from the shadows, but paid for it with a brutal life-ending backstab. Yeslick took a few too many arrows from Cloudwulfe, and went down too. The rest of the party was able to hold it together long enough to survive (major injuries sustained though). Fortunately, the two deaths were not permanent.
Jaheira tried to clean out the basilisks at Durlag's Tower with two potions of mirrored eyes. That went poorly; she was petrified by the final lizard while it was still uninjured. I thought she was chunked; but fortunately a scroll of stone to flesh sorted her out and she was able to rejoin the party.
The party is wealthy and well-equipped; good randomizer drops have included numerous wands and the boots of speed.
Next up: Candlekeep.
I also use oil of speed for making thieving enhancement potions last longer, if not in time, in how large an area you can clear the traps/unlock chests. (I don't bother collecting the loot until later as I don't want to waste the time when the buffs are active in performing tasks that can be done later)
Imoen got chunked by a lightning trap beneath Candlekeep. (Sloppiness on my part...)
Having no thief is bad. So I replaced her with Coran. He almost didn't last though; Cythandria petrified him with a chromatic orb back at the Iron Throne. She also got a Chaos off, which affected the entire party. Miraculously, somehow we survived being helpless and then beat her into submission.
Upon leaving the tower, the Flaming Fist arrested us. We insulted Angelo and he killed Jaheira. Branwen raised her in a jail cell... but the Flaming Fist confiscated her belongings. (I forgot to sneak back in there to get her items after escaping, and instead went to rest and heal up... so items disappeared.) That was a major hit. Boots of speed, gauntlets of ogre power, club +1, shield amulet, helm of balduran, and a pile of potions... ouch.
But worst of all... the Merchants' league quest never finished earlier in the game, even though I killed all the dopplegangers. So I went back up there to see if Aldeth had gotten his act together. Instead, Aldeth summoned the Flaming Fist, who arrested us and took us back to Angelo for a repeat of the earlier scene. So now we're back in jail. Except this time, Neb isn't there and it looks like there's no way to escape.
Is that the end of the run? I didn't get a "you must restart" screen, but I think I'm out of options.
As to the 2nd arrest I feel like that is a bug that should not happen and does result in being stuck in jail with no options. There might be a code to get out of that but never searched and when I decided to reload an earlier save my no-reload habit kept me from continuing regardless. Now I just steer clear of him after the first arrest if his quest line fouls up. The whole Aldeth thing has always been a hit or miss thing for me personally as far as it working correctly.
Others may offer some better insight.