Arstereth bought some gear, memorized some Sunscorches, and set off!
After Gorion's death, Arstereth and Imoen fought a wolf, on which Arstereth blinded with Sunscorch:
(I was expecting it to say "Blinded." But "Get him!" also fits the situation. )
At the Friendly Arm Inn, Tarnesh hit Arstereth with Horror... only slightly after he got hit by Sunscorch.
The party did not recruit Khalid or Jaheira. After resting at the inn, they headed back south.
Later on, at the Nashkel Carnival, the two of them fought Zordral, and Zordral killed Imoen with Melf's Acid Arrow. Arstereth used the rest of his healing potions and abilities to survive Zordral's Minor Drains until the mage ran out of spells, then Arstereth kited him to death. Arstereth then went back to town and had Imoen brought back to life.
Not too long after, Arstereth reached level 3 and gained his first gamebreaking spell: Web! They went to the Gnoll Stronghold to test out this new spell:
The two of them had gone to the Gnoll Stronghold without recruiting Minsc or Edwin, because my original plan was to recruit Dynaheir and not Minsc. But then I realized that Minsc would also be great later on by charging into the party's Webs with Spider's Bane, so I decided to go back to Nashkel and pick him up. They then returned to the Gnoll Stronghold and rescued Dynaheir. Dynaheir is an even better Web-caster because of her Invoker spell enhancements.
Then back to Nashkel! It's time for the mines! After beating Greywolf, that is.
The mines were no problem, since my party was overleveled. Within the mines, Arstereth reached level 5 and gained his second gamebreaking spell: Spike Growth!
Now that Arstereth has Spike Growth, he's ready to go on a rampage throughout the Sword Coast!
By the end of the rampage, the party had killed multiple assassin teams, 6 Sirines, 5 Flesh Golems, 7 Lesser Basilisks, 5 Greater Basilisks, 2 Battle Horrors, 1 Succubus, and lots of Ghasts. Arstereth was at level 7.
@Mantis37: Could you add links to the first and last posts of your run so people viewing the Hall can skip right to them?
The Hall of Heroes is for continuous saga runs with no reloads at any point between Candlekeep and the Throne of Bhaal. Restarting from Candlekeep and then completing the rest of the game without reloading is acceptable; restarting at Chateau Irenicus after dying in Spellhold would not qualify for the Hall. Siege of Dragonspear is optional by precedent, since many runs predated SoD, but I think it's an important part of the saga for the purposes of this challenge, since SoD is complex and roughly as difficult to beat no-reload as the rest of the saga. All of my saga runs thus far have been tetralogy runs with SoD.
My apologies, added some links.
Perhaps my opinion is an outlier but I do not regard SoD as being especially difficult- but then I almost never play solo and haven't tried insane level! Playing through it blind my first character perished when I discovered that if feared opponents got behind your lines in the camp battle everyone retreats & an explosion occurs in short order... I didn't do SoD this run as the procedure for modding the separate android app wasn't yet settled.
I just lost a "no magical items" run at Davaeorn. The idea for the run was that you could only use nonmagical weapons and armor, and no other items aside from mage scrolls, which could only be used for scribing. My Charname got killed in one shot by a Lightning Bolt spell. The party build was: FMC, Sorcerer, Totemic Druid, Bounty Hunter, Wizard Slayer, Blade.
I had been using the Reform Party trick to spam summons and traps from my Totemic Druid and Bounty Hunter, but when Davaeorn closed in on us, we had no way to stop him. Our Wizard Slayer didn't have the THAC0 to hit him reliably, and we weren't high enough level to cover anyone with Protection from Lightning. In retrospect, the fight could probably have been done by abusing Invisibility and allowing a horde of guards to congregate around Davaeorn while our Bounty Hunter flung Special Snares at them from the fog of war.
It's unfortunate, because we had a decent strategy for a saga run:
1. Spamming traps and Spirit Animals could get us through BG1 and SoD, with our Wizard Slayer to neutralize mages like Angelo
2. Our Blade could use Enchanted Weapon to let us kite Belhifet with missile weapons, since the Better Enchanted Weapon mod makes the spell set the user's weapon enchantment equal to caster level divided by 4 (a level 12 bard could grant a +3 enchantment)
3. The Wizard Slayer could get us through the dangerous SoA mage fights, and Enchanted Weapon and buffing spells could let our FMC and Wizard Slayer deal enough damage to handle melee threats
4. Late in the saga, our Bounty Hunter could spam Maze traps indefinitely, our Fighter/Mage/Cleric could combine Critical Strike with Harm for guaranteed kills while using PFMW to avoid disruption, our sorcerer could Wish-rest via Project Image, our Totemic Druid could provide healing and Implosion while using Earth Elemental form to tank, our Blade could use the Improved Bard Song to improve our damage output, and our two fighters could use Smite to pin down dangerous threats at the Throne, with a level 20 Enchanted Weapon spell to let everyone's attacks strike as +5 weapons.
Initially, I planned on using a Fighter/Mage/Thief instead of a Bounty Hunter and playing the game without using glitches, but when I did the numbers, it seemed unrealistic that we'd be able to bomb Sarevok properly using Fireballs alone given how few mage levels we had. Infinite traps via the Reform Party trick was a safer approach, though it involved a glitch.
In my poverty run, I got past Davaeorn because I had two sorcerers who could spam Magic Missile and Melf's Acid Arrow when his MGOI ran out. But I didn't want to have that many single-classed mages in the party--the point of the "no magic items" rule was that I could still have fighters in the party.
I don't want to deal with early BG1 again, so this run is probably dead. This run would be easier than my poverty run, but it's not worth the effort.
No-reload BG1 gameplay with SCS is so incredibly dependent on items. Unless you have lots of invisibility spells, you need potions (Magic Blocking is the best by far) or a Protection from Magic scroll to handle Davaeorn's spells, because Arrows of Dispelling aren't yet available. His Evocation spells are potentially game-ending, and I don't know how easy it is to maintain multiple resistance buffs (I always assumed that Remove Magic would ruin that strategy).
I've been having a go at this with a few characters to try and find something I fancied. The obvious answer to HoF is to use summons and a totemic druid made progress relatively simple until I abandoned that near the end of the Vale of Shadows. A fighter/illusionist was also potentially promising with the help of his familiar - and thanks to the totemic druid run I now know where a scroll of invisibility can be found in the Vale of Shadows to make scouting easier if I pursued that character in the future.
I also tried a few runs with a bard. The large groups of enemies inside the caravan cave stymied him, but I did try leaving those (though that grates on me). In 3 runs, he was twice successful in running the gauntlet of Kuldahar Pass. Mistakes proved costly fairly early on both times after that, though I can see how it would be possible to make progress onwards.
Ideally I wanted though to have a go with a character not using magic at all and tried out a monk for size in several runs. Getting up to level 7 around Easthaven is not difficult, but I again found the caravan cave near impossible to complete. Enemies can be pulled outside, but there's not much room there to dodge around there. Using area transitions you can get some free attacks in, but the enemies will automatically move towards you and try and surround you even when stealthed (I think that's unintended behavior, so might get removed in a future patch to make a stealthy character a real option). That means that, well before you can kill any of them, they will be grouped around the exit point closely enough that an area transition is likely to trap you if there are more than 7 or 8 enemies in total. The enemies will partly redistribute around the area if you rest, but that heals them so is no help.
In the end I gave up on the idea of completing Easthaven with the monk. Unlike the bard he had an easy run through the goblin hordes in Kuldahar Pass - stealth only failing once he'd bypassed everything. In Kuldahar he found that, unlike orcs, yetis have fast weapon speed so he couldn't consistently use melee attacks. That was going to make progress in the Vale of Shadows slow whatever happened, but in fact he died to the very first yeti taken on there. He had badly damaged it with a couple of activations of stunning blow and had nearly finished it off by sling, but the close confines meant even a tiny mistake in movement would be a problem and when the icon didn't react to a movement click the yeti got an attack in - with devastating results. In the process of trying out characters I noticed a diary note I wrote for a sorcerer trying HoF out. That apparently must have made a fair amount of progress, as I recorded it at level 19, though I have absolutely no memory of it and it must have predated the EE. That would be another option, but I thought if I had to resort to magic I should give a shaman a go first - that seems better suited to the snowy wastes.
I spent a fair while rerolling to get some lovely stats and then found an immediate problem on character creation - there are too many spells available! The shaman in BG is very restricted in available spells and I was expecting to have more choice in IWD due to the greater variety of attacking druid spells. However, the IWD shaman also has the slightly odd ability to pick spells which are limited to clerics in BG (like remove fear and PfE), so there are real choices to be made even at 1st level.
More choices were soon required as killing some beetles took Scorch to level 4. There were not as many spells at level 2 as I expected though. The list ended at Know Alignment, thus missing out things like Resist Fire & Cold and Slow Poison that are available in BG - I'm not sure whether these omissions were actually intended or if they spell list was just cut off at the wrong point. A couple more jobs around town then moved Scorch onto level 5.
I thought working his way through the nearby goblins would get him to level 6 and obtain his first 3rd level spell as well as a spirit summons upgrade, but a charmed goblin killed its companion just after charm wore off and lost the XP as a result - leaving Scorch just short. However, a wolf in the caravan area soon sorted that out. Now with Spike Growth to add to the area damage already offered by Writhing Fog, I thought Scorch might have easy progress in the cave. However, the first large group there reacted to damage by chasing him even without seeing him and made him retreat outside. A couple of false starts and rests later though he managed to get a full complement of spirit summons going and they did a good job in clearing that group. Not all the orcs in the cave realized where area damage was coming from though and a couple more separated ones was enough for Scorch to get to level 8 and get some controllable summons in the form of giant beetles. Dealing with a few more isolated groups of orcs left only the other large group headed by 4 ogres. I was sure they wouldn't meekly allow area damage to take them down - and they didn't - but beetles helped lock them in place, getting Scorch to level 9 during the clearance. With a nice set of HP rolls he should have a decent chance of progressing on well from here.
From Trademeet we returned back to Athkatla to pay out the Shadow Thieves and collect the jewelry starter pack from Aran.
The casting time reduction granted by the Amulet of Power may not be material. However, Anomandra is a cleric and clerics lack the necessary protections to warrant uninteruptible spellcasting. Therefore, every frame counts. NPP is just a nice bonus before we'll be able to get our hands on the improved Mace of Disruption.
With Aran's RoP +2 further upgrading our saving throws, we were slowly entering the negative safe zone - these are Anomandra's unbuffed saves at level 13 (she's equipped with the Claw, RoP +2, Cloak of Displacement and Belt of Inertial Barrier):
Random observation/fun fact: According to the Cowled Wizards' interpretation, using RoAC in the public requires a spellcasting licence. Mages and legal practice apprently don't like each other!
Instead of attending to Aran's tasks right away, we visited the Government District, where we saved Viconia from being baptised by fire. Conveniently, we also learned about the trouble in Umar which marked our next destination.
In the village Anomandra first assisted Jermien with locating the mimic blood and eliminating his juggernaut golem.
Then we proceeded to the Shadow Temple. Anomandra approached the entrance with Sanctuary, blasting the shadows on the surface with Turn Undead.
Once inside the temple, she repeated the process with the shade wolfs and shadows, including the jailor. Having had lost my previous character in these very same ruins, I was being extra careful.
The skeleton warriors, however, had to be dealt with face to face.
On the bridge, we got heavily outnumbered by the enemies and Anomandra used all the anti-undead arsenal she had available. That included False Dawn...
...as well as Flame Strike (used against inflammable mummies).
Nevertheless, we didn't have enough punch to take out the Bone Golem and the remaining skellies and so Anomandra retreated and crossed the rest of the temple under Sanctuary. She then adjusted her spellbook and rested in front of the entrance to Thaxxy's cave.
I should note that I don't have the "Improved Shade Lord" SCS component installed and therefore the battle was supposed to be relatively easy. Still, we didn't want to underestimate the situation - Anomandra quaffed an Oil of Speed (in addition to her regular combat buffs) and also activated Repulse Undead. Normally, this priest spell is just a poor man's Teleport Field, but the specific set-up of this particular fight at hand seemed to invite its usage.
We opened by landing Harm on Shadow Partick and activating RoAC.
Shade Lord and Patrick were each repulsed in a separate direction and Anomandra could safely finish the latter.
Temporarily blinded by the returning Shade Lord, Anomandra opted for False Dawn cast.
Bringing Mr. Turban into play finally tipped the scales in our favour.
In case you ask why Anomandra wasn't running her Storm Shield then I honestly have no idea. A silly move right there, although it's true that the Shade Lord was not running elemental protections either.
By completing the quest we got enough XP for Anomandra to reach level 14 and thus gain her first L7 spell slot. Hurrah!
The bandit camp was easy, since the party was overleveled and well-equipped, and I'm not using SCS. The party simply kited everyone. They lured the four bandits in Tazok's tent out of the tent and into the Webs.
Before going to Cloakwood, the party returned to the Friendly Arm Inn to pick up Landrin's antidotes and obtain the Golden Pantaloons:
Yes, I had indeed made a mistake in room numbers. The party went upstairs and retrieved the pantaloons.
The party then went on another rampage through the Cloakwood.
Eventually the party fought their way to Davaeorn. Minsc used some Potions of Magic Blocking and sliced him up.
Arstereth then hacked the Mustard Jelly to death with Beast Claws.
Dreadnought has arrived in Irenicus' Dungeon along with Imoen and Jaheira and Minsc are also available.
However Artemis and Tenya are not there.
I am playing EET. Will I meet my other characters later, or do I have to import them?
This is my first EET run that has got this far.
@Wise_Grimwald only player characters are imported to Irenicus' dungeon. Aren't Artemis and Tenya NPCs? Or is EET like BGT? Even if NPCs were supposed to go to Irenicus' dungeon, I suspect only those that came with EET would transfer, and not modded NPCs. Perhaps someone with more knowledge with EET can give their feedback on this.
EET doesn't change the storyline at all, so characters are where you would expect them to be in BG2. The difference is that when you pick them up they are the characters you developed in BG1 rather than new versions - meaning it seems much more worthwhile to give tomes to an NPC for instance.
An army of beetles, supported by the incredibly vicious call lightning, cleared most of the goblins from Kuldahar Pass, though a bit of dancing was done to deal with a few stragglers in order to get up to level 10 - providing Pixie Dust to allow invisible resting in the wilderness. After resting, a fresh lot of spells were used to deal with some caves and buildings - putting an ogre out of its misery at the end of that was enough for level 11. In Kuldahar, Hjolldar's home yielded a useful sling +1, though Scorch doesn't use that as much as other characters might. Scorch's high strength also allowed him to find a ring to expose an innkeeper's misdeeds.
He soon moved on to the Vale of Shadows, where summons allowed pretty quick progress. A few skeletons from the start of the final tomb got him to level 12 and access to a further upgrade to spirit summons. With lots of enemies in there he got to level 13 just before entering the final guarded hall. At the end of that I decided to use Scorch's new Insect Plague for the first time, but almost immediately got the vanishing portrait bug as a result - I hope that's not going to be a regular occurrence. However, I was annoyed to find that undead are immune to the insects anyway - I'd specifically chosen that as a spell that would damage undead as they're immune to the cold damage from another area option (it's also party unfriendly, so it's easy to nerf your own casting).
After speaking to Kresselack, Scorch went in search of Lysan. Insect plague worked there to pacify her and, even though Scorch also suffered spell failure, that didn't prevent him dancing. Somewhat to my surprise Scorch was thus able to complete the area and open up the Temple of the Forgotten God. I did very little buffing against traps in the various tombs, but was either lucky or the nature of the traps is more benign towards solo play than I was expecting.
The Temple was pretty straightforward. With groups of enemies tending to be smaller Scorch normally used a mixture of a couple of insects to drag enemies back, with a couple of spirits to tank them. That tactic brought a steady flow of XP and he hit level 14 to get a first 7th level spell - Impervious Sanctity of Mind will prevent charm among other things (at least if I actually bother casting it ). Soon after that Scorch penetrated to the inner sanctum and discovered that the search will have to move on to Dragon's Eye ...
I'm wondering if it is ethical to import BG1 NPCs into my SoA game for a no reloads game. I know that it is possible to do it if I open my game in Multiplayer mode. I have become quite attached to Tenya even if she is a little brat.
In the party's time in the city of Baldur's Gate, they became MUCH more powerful. Right off the bat, I bought 60 Arrows of Detonation for Minsc and Imoen. The party then traveled throughout the city and nabbed the major magic items (Helm of Glory, Helm of Balduran, Cloak of Balduran, Gauntlets of Ogre Power, Ring of Wizardry, Lothander's Boots of Speed, Eagle Bow, Nymph Cloak, Gold Digger, several stat-increasing tomes, etc.). They also got lots of extra loot to sell, and I used the extra money to buy lots and lots of magic arrows for Imoen and Minsc. By the end of the chapter, Imoen had over 200 Arrows of Piercing and Minsc had over 300 Acid Arrows.
By the way, I had dual-classed Imoen at level 6. This means she can still reach level 9 as a mage. At the beginning of Chapter 5, she had already regained her thief levels.
Once Dynaheir obtained Fireball, she basically became the new Arstereth, capable of obliterating entire encounters.
In all honesty, I think I like Dynaheir more than Edwin. Those invoker save penalties are so good.
The end-of-chapter encounter lasted a matter of seconds.
However, my addiction to Arrows of Detonation got the better of me later on in a random encounter with an ogrillion where I forgot to make Minsc unequip them.
Chapter 6! I didn't kill Rieltar. The chapter was simple enough.
Chapter 7! I rushed through this chapter as well. I simply killed Tamoko, went to the Iron Throne, killed Cythandria, went to the Undercellar, killed Slythe and Krystin, and went to the Ducal Palace. I had turned Slythe hostile before he had said any dialogue; this meant that Krystin did not turn hostile, so she was still invisible. I used some Potions of Firebreath (targeting a Skeleton Warrior) to kill her without killing any innocents.
I fully buffed my party before the Ducal Palace fight, including with Potions of Storm Giant Strength and hasted Skeleton Warriors. This battle also lasted a matter of seconds.
In this Thieves' Maze, Minsc baited the two Skeleton Warriors back up the corridor away from the traps and into melee range.
(Having enemies follow you doesn't always make things harder)
The battle in the Undercity went as you might have expected.
Time for the final battle. I had my party put on full buffs again, using all the Potions of Magic Shielding they had.
Prepare to die, Sarevok!
First, I got Angelo and Semaj out of the way.
Now the rest of them are melee fighters. Tazok came out of invisibility and dealt Imoen a nasty blow, but he didn't last much longer.
Now there was only Sarevok left. Sarevok could easily kill any of our party members in two or three hits, and no Armor Class could plausibly stop him. The party could simply kite him to death, but I figured it would be more interesting to fight him in melee. Arstereth entered melee with Sarevok while under the effect of Iron Skins. Sarevok started attacking him; meanwhile a nearby dwarf with 25 Strength was ready to give Sarevok a walloping.
Sarevok has fallen! The battle is won! I beat the game!
I do believe that this party may be the most powerful BG1 party I've ever made using existing NPCs. Minsc and Dynaheir aren't just decent party members; they're really, really good. In total, there was only one death this whole game: when Imoen died to Zordral. Otherwise, I just flew through the game.
On to Siege of Dragonspear! The opening dungeon went the same as always with this party.
I managed to clear the entire dungeon without resting, including the optional encounters.
I don't know how Siege of Dragonspear is going to go. I'm not too familiar with Siege of Dragonspear as I've only beaten it once. I haven't ever completed the Dwarves of Dumathoin quest, so I'll be going partly blind there. On the other hand, Siege of Dragonspear is full of the kinds of battles that this team is really good against.
I faced a conundrum while thinking about what to play next. Should I wait until AionZ updates Shadow Magic again? Should I wait until SCS gets an official v32 release instead of an RC? Will Beamdog release v2.6 shortly after I install v2.5? Will EEex get updated for v2.6 with another must-have feature once I update to v2.5?
The answer to all of this was relatively simple: Just play another kit I already have installed. That should keep me occupied.
So, I introduce to you,
Torque the (Rebalanced) Wizard Slayer!
(kit link) (SHS seems to be down at the moment...)
Kit description:
Advantages: - Starts with 10% base magic resistance - Gains an additional +2% bonus to magic resistance for every level of experience - Gains the Disrupt Magic passive ability at first level - Gains the Shatter Magic ability at first level and every 8 levels thereafter
Disadvantages: - Cannot use any magic items except for weapons, armor and healing potions - Cannot dual-class
Disrupt Magic: Whenever a Wizard Slayer lands a successful hit on an arcane spellcaster the target is afflicted with a cumulative spell failure penalty. During the next 3 rounds, the victim has a 10% base chance to miscast any arcane spell plus 1% for every experience level the Wizard Slayer attains. This passive ability is always in effect.
Shatter Magic: A Wizard Slayer can channel his innate magic resistance into his weapons in order to break through the magical defenses of arcane spellcasters. During the round when this ability is activated, each successful hit removes one combat and one specific protection from his target. However, this temporarily nullifies the Wizard Slayer's innate magic resistance making him vulnerable to magic during the next 2 rounds. Until his magic resistance recovers, the Wizard Slayer cannot use any special abilities that rely on it.
Moderately loosened item restrictions are also installed. This allows Wizard Slayers to also use items that increase their Magic Resistance, or protect against magic in some form (such as potions of magic blocking, the Cloak of Mirroring, Ring of Spell Turning, Belt of Inertial Barrier, etc.). Wizard Slayers are otherwise limited to magical armor, weapons, shields, helmets, and healing potions/antidotes.
Mod installation is unchanged from the Rejects' latest success. This will be a solo Insane run with extra damage disabled, as usual.
Candlekeep is easier than usual because both Shank and Carbos are shot dead with a Composite Shortbow. Added by Rogue Rebalancing, these shortbows take more strength to wield but they do a slight damage bonus. A gibberling is shot on the way to Beregost. Firebead's is given his book and Landrin's spiders are taken out at range too.
There's no point in killing Algernon for his cloak, since I can't use it to charm Firebead, Silke, or Kelddath's sirenes. Neera is killed for her gem bag. I pay Taerom a visit instead and buy a Composite Shortbow +1 so I can take out the vampiric wolf pack at the Temple. Kiting the wolf pack and killing it gets me two levels.
I'm pretty decently leveled now. I take care of some assorted easy fetch quests and go down to Nashkel for the Healing Touch Bhaal power, the Ankheg Full Plate, and the Quiver of Plenty for sale at the store. Ankhegs are exterminated, Farmer Brun's son is returned, and so is Tenya's bowl. Vitiare provides the last bit of XP to level up.
Meanwhile at the carnival, I buy the scroll of Protection from Petrification and use the item duplication glitch to make more copies that I know I'll need later. Korax helps take out Mutamin, buying me valuable time to get a couple of spell-failure-inducing hits in, but Mutamin renders me blind for a long time. That was the last spell he could cast at me, as he had exhausted the rest of his spells and resorted to melee. He is killed, and so are all of the basilisks on the map, despite being blinded.
I leave Kirian's party alone since they don't have anything that I can use anyway. I head over to Durlag's Tower and carefully take out the Doom Knights guarding the tower. Once inside, I kite a bunch of ghasts and get to the roof. The Chromatic Orb trap on the way there simply causes stun, but I saved against it both times. I use a copy of the Protection from Petrification scroll to take out the three Greater Basilisks on the roof for a level.
I kill the ghasts in the cellar of Durlag's Tower as well, but leave afterward. I head for Gullykin since I'm in the area. Jenkal is killed and the ogre magi is cheesed via area transitions before he can casts spells at me. I get several hits in and the ogre gives up casting spells on me, opting for melee instead. He loses.
His human compatriot Lendarn is dealt with the same way. Lendarn manages to get a Lightning Bolt off at me, but Magic Resistance saved me. Stoneskin protects him from direct hits from my composite shortbow, but he still experiences significant spell failure. It is enough that he simply stands still and waits for death instead of attempting melee.
I'm getting pretty confident in my wizard slaying skills now. I buy a Composite Shortbow +2 from Ulgoth's Beard and 150 Arrows of Biting to really ruin a mage's day. Nym Phaundal, one of Kryn Darkflame's insane Shadow Mage apprentices, is next. I take the initiative with a poisonous arrow. I leave immediately after he gets poisoned since he summoned three shadows. The poison only seems to do damage if I'm in the same area as Nym. The shadows chase me all over the map south of Beregost until they get unsummoned. I try some more Arrows of Biting, but I get hit with a Night Terrors spell just a couple of frames too late, as I managed to escape the area but was still struck with panic anyway. One turn passes and I'm okay. Nym is lured outside into the sunlight where he is weakened, but he's still very difficult to hit. I finally manage to kill him. I return with Nym's staff to Kryn Darkflame for a reward of 1000 gold and XP. I buy some more Potions of Magic Blocking from Thalantyr since I already bought the ones that Darkflame sells.
Tarnesh is dealt with easily with Arrows of Biting. I buy Buckley's Buckler for 20 CON for regeneration. I defeat Greywolf for Varscona +2. I'm going to take out Shoal next, but I want a sacrifice to go in my stead because I also want Droth's Helm of Defense. Eldoth is willing to help. After Droth initiates conversation, Shoal is finished off.I have to use a Potion of Magic Blocking against Droth as I couldn't take the chance of either saving against Hold Person successfully or having my MR resist it. He gets poisoned and takes several casting-failure-inducing hits and resorts to melee, just like his other ogre mage cousin.
The giant humanoid band south of Shoal is kited and killed and Mad Arcand is helped too. Bassilus and Melicamp are next. I interrupt Bassilus' casting of Aerial Servant! Wizard Slayer spell failure only applies to mage spells, so clerics can be much more dangerous.The Rejects had to face the Aerial Servant. They hit extremely hard, although only once per round. Bassilus then tries Hold Person, but I use another Potion of Magic Blocking and kill him. Melicamp is successfully anti-chickenated.
At the seawatcher area, I gain another level from some hobgoblins. A fan of efficiency, just one Protection from Magic scroll is employed to clear out the sirenes and the traps in Black Alaric's cave. Now level 8, I have 26% MR and cause 18% spell failure per hit. Silke is next. I stand next to the door transition at the house just north of Silke for extra safety. She prebuffs with Haste, causing her to take quadruple poison damage over time from being poisoned twice. She loses morale but uses an invisibility minor sequencer just beforehand. I lose track of her, but I follow the sound of her footsteps with my own keen senses. She regains morale after about a minute and tries casting more spells, but I poison her yet again, causing her spell to fail and to lose morale a second time.
I lose track of her after this since it begins raining in game, so I can't hear where she's trying to flee to. I stick by the door transition for a while, then try investigating again. I run into her at the eastern edge of the map near the Travenhurst Manor and finally finish her off. Torque - (Rebalanced) Wizard Slayer 8
The saga continues. Amahoro and her companions defeat the last of Sarevok's followers. Porios surrendered peacefully after some summons caused the guards to clear the way to him.But the second catacombs saw a messy performance of the party. First, Imoen's replacement Safana failed a stealth check and panicked when facing a mummy, and she was killed before Amahoro could remove that effect.She was slain. Second, the battle with Korlasz was hard. A simple Flamestrike *my usual approach) didn't damage her at all, and she fell back and had her lackeys go after the party. (This might be SCS v32 at work, as it affects SoD as well as BG1 and BG2, or maybe I was just unlucky). One of those aides stunned Khalid with darts and the party couldn't save him.The party had to dispatch the entire opposition before they could take on Korlasz. It allowed her to cast some disablers at the party (Slow, Blindness, and a Confusion that bounced off Amahoro's MR). Eventually it was Dynaheir that petrified Korlasz with a Chromatic Orb. After some side-questing and recruiting Minsc and Jaheira in the city, Amahoro reached the Coastway Crossing where Glint took Safana's place. Teleria's sculpture garden project ended shortly after she'd added Minsc to her collection.Maybe Amahoro shouldn't have focused on the golem; she might have prevented Teleria from petrifying Minsc. In any case there was a spare Stone to Flesh scroll, and Minsc was soon his old meaty self again.
Thanks AoE fire damage - wands, necklaces of missiles, potions- as well as to Dynaheir's Webs and Minsc, Jaheira (who joined at Troll Claw Woods), and Amahoro's free action, enemy hordes were manageable, so progress was fairly fast.
At the Dwarven Digsite, Minsc and Amahoro used PfU, speed, and necklaces of missiles to cleanse the place. Minsc obtained level 9 and grandmastery in 2h-swords in the process. The Coldhearth Lich was beaten by two crits from Minsc and Amahoro.The latter managed to timely destroy the phylactery thanks to her boots and oil of speed.
The ambush at the bridge was a success with the party of four slaying all the crusaders before Caelar made her appearance, despite Amahoro being the target of Barachus's brutal melee attacks and a Druid's Lightning strikes.This was the first time I accomplished that.
In the Forest of Wyrms, AoE fire (2x) and party-wide PfPoison took much of the sting out the confrontation with Morentherene and her dragonlings and wyverns.Webs accounted for bugbears and cult enforcers. AoE fire plus ranged attacks finished Ziatar's mages. The half-dragon herself was done in with wand of the heavens flamestrikes while she was under Sanctuary. The Neothelid succumbed to brute force before the party moved on to Darskhelin. Webs, AoE fire and Spike Growths did much to neutralize the enemy. Only the dwarf, an umber hulk and Darskhelin managed to reach the companions, only to fall to brute force and Dynaheir's wand of frost.The Shadow Aspect got a taste of PfU Amahoro's Ashideena with invisible Glint detecting illusions to get rid of its at-will misleads. Dealing with Darskhelin before confronting Akanna led to the latter being very kind. Akanna's mind had been controlled my the illithid, and she was most thankful for her release by the companions. They parted amicably even the party had slain all her cult members except the mad one.At Bridgefort both Jaheira and Glint got some armor upgrades (rhino beetle and dragon scale) from Jegg Hillcarver, and Amahoro had the dwarf fashion some bullets of darkness +3 for her.
Options for the Bridgefortians were discussed with Khalid and it was decided that the fort was not to be surrendered. The party traveled back to the camp, where they instructed Corwin to get the Fist to travel to Bridgefort and wait for the drawbridge to be lowered. The companions did a lot of pre-buffing inside the fort, and that proved wise. There were loads of enemies, led by the Barghest who personally slew a near-naked Khalid.Friendly fire was a genuine concern, so Dynaheir contributed mostly with wand summons and Glint with flamestrikes from afar. The others did the heavy melee work, with Minsc requiring many a potion of extra healing. When the remainder of Bridgefort's vanguard had fallen, Dynaheir started throwing webs at the enemy.It made a huge difference, as it basically only left three enemy mages as a threat. The webbed enemies were made short work of with fire, Dynaheir got stuck in her own webs but didn't get into danger. Jaheira, Minsc, and Amahoro suffered a Malison and a Silence but that didn't stop them from defeating the mages and a few stray crusaders mages through melee force.On the bridge, Minsc and Amahoro disrupted and slew the wizard while the other crusaders were held by more of Dynaheir's webs (cast from scroll). The Coalition camp and vicinity were a great source of XP and valuable items. It also saw the party welcome Schael Corwin into their ranks. The companions did Bloodbark Grove first, to stop a disease from spreading, infiltrated the crusaders at the Dragonspear Courtyard thanks to Malden Cal's badge that Glint had pickpocketed, and then proceeded to Underground River. The harder encounters were in Kanaglym, with Ferrusk, and in the Dragonspear Castle basement. (The party didn't fight the drow or the wyrmlings.)
In Kanaglym, Zhadroth was rendered harmless by the Secret Revealed, netting Dynaheir a Spell Sequencer. Amahoro burned a scroll of PfU to deal with the undead to the east. Then the party buffed and focused their weapons and spells on Kherrium,prompting Halathlaer to appear and help out against the other dark magicians. Hephernaan's ritual notes found after battle served to convince Julann to dissociate from the crusade. She gave Minsc Rigah's Dragon Blade.
The party decided not to engage Ferrusk's army in close quarters. Instead they retreated,Instead, they retreated and used the gate as a bottleneck. The biggest hurdle by far though, was the Dragonspear basement. The party ambushed HephernaanSoon the premises were replete with crusaders. Glint served as scout with moderate success. His stealth + non-detection caused the enemy to waste many a detection spell. At one point he failed a stealth check, so he had to quaff an invisibility potion and get away. He succeeded but I had him return a split second too soon when I read the True Seeing expiration notice in the combat log. He was slain and had to be raised by Amahoro. Glint then read a scroll of PfPoison and drank potions of fire resistance. He became an invisible gatekeeper as Dynaheir Cloudkilled and Webbed a host of enemies. Minsc, Jaheira, and Amahoro attacked them with their missile weapons.Using the same tactics, they slowly cleared the way to the exit.
With the food and water supplies poisoned, the party returned to the Coalition camp. Crusader attacks were nipped in the bud with trusty AoE fire before the party took the battle to Dragonspear Castle. Amahoro buffed with lots of spells and potions (giant strength, magic resistance, clarity, absorption being the most prominent ones). She then turned left and was challenged by Ashatiel. The avariel had no answer to Amahoro's bullets and flamestrikes.She's an interesting character and her ending is a sad one. I would have liked to get to know her better. Charname supposedly wronged or even killed her brother? What I like about SoD is that the enemy isn't as obviously evil as other BG villains and their followers
With Ashatiel gone, the way to Dragonspear Castle and into Avernus was clear. Everyone in the party had free action, and mind protection, and Minsc, Jaheira, Corwin, and Amahoro had some warrior-only potions as well. They battled their way to Belhifet, with the four warriors doing the fighting, Dynaheir using wands (frost, monster summoning), and Glint detecting illusions and launching an occasional bullet.Jaheira's weapon was the Root of the Problem, Minsc used his Dragon Blade, and Amahoro took some risk in wielding Sundermaul (she had no other +3 weapon, and Dynaheir, being an Invoker, couldn't cast Enchanted Weapon). Corwin launched acid arrows or arrows +2, saving her +3 arrows for Belhifet.
The elevator was used to buff the party (fire and electricity resistance, refreshing mind shields and boosts). Upon arrival they chose to fight Belhifet with Caelar Argent. Amahoro slew Hephernaan very early on while Caelar occupied Belhifet. She was no match for him, but the party used scrolls of Greater Restoration to keep her alive while they made short work of the summons. It took four of those scrolls, cast in the nick of time (Caelar's health bar very low, cries for aid), but she survived. Belhifet removing Dynaheir's buffs in the middle of the battle was a surprise. I thought his Dispel was a scripted one at the beginning of combat. He also cast a Symbol, Pain spell at her, but she saved against its effects. Other than that Belhifet was mainly occupied with Caelar. And with four buffed warriors his summons didnt last long enough to overwhelm the party. The companions couldstrike at Belhifet with increasing frequency, until he was no more.
@OlvynChuru, congrats to you, and best of luck in SoD! @Borco, am really enjoying your updates. You really seem to be making the most out of your priest. @Flashburn, a solo Wizard Slayer, always exciting! I once took one into ToB, but she didn't quite make it all the way. (She was a vanilla WS though). Good luck! @Mantis37, hats off to beating the game on a freaking phone... I can't begin to imagine myself pulling that off ever... @Grond0, Gorch is looking good. I don't know IWD very well, so I just stat my hope that he'll be able to deal with upcoming challenges. @Wise_Grimwald, wishing you good luck in Amn. And like @Enuhal said, feel free to import Tenya or any other NPCs. With a custom party you'd do the same, so I see nothing unethical about it.
Nice to the thread so alive at the moment. Am really enjoying this!
Second, the battle with Korlasz was hard. A simple Flamestrike *my usual approach) didn't damage her at all, and she fell back and had her lackeys go after the party. (This might be SCS v32 at work, as it affects SoD as well as BG1 and BG2, or maybe I was just unlucky).
@Blackraven my memory might be playing tricks again, but I thought Korlasz came buffed with protection from fire even in vanilla - as a result I tend to use the Ring of Energy on her, that reliably hits through her buffs and mirrors. Possibly you're used to shooting her with a dispelling arrow before using flamestrike?
@Blackraven my memory might be playing tricks again, but I thought Korlasz came buffed with protection from fire even in vanilla - as a result I tend to use the Ring of Energy on her, that reliably hits through her buffs and mirrors. Possibly you're used to shooting her with a dispelling arrow before using flamestrike?
That is indeed quite possible. I've always been a fond user of arrows of dispelling but in my current install they are so rare that I no longer even think of using the few I have.
These two rogues had an enjoyable outing today. Sure, there were a couple of deaths and a stoning with a near-miss thrown in to boot but that's all part of the fun.
We started off by heading to the coast - Henn bemoaning selling the free ankheg plate and Qat saying Henn should would be OK. After killing fivie sirines, Qat tries to hide for a backstab on the sixth but triggers a carrion crawler. He gets held with his crossbow equipped, perhaps due to a multiplayer lag. Henn is of course, miles away, and Qat resigns himself to an early death. Henn draws back his longbow and scores a critical hit to save the day thief.
With the sirines all dead, we head into the cave and kill off the flesh golems despite their best efforts with multiplayer lag and cave-line-of-sight.
Henn bumps reputation to 20 and we purchase a staff +3 for Qat with a cloak of displacement for Henn to use, alongside Bjornin's shield (Henn's constitution is now 20, so Buckleys Buckler is passed to Qat for use during travel and reducing the need for healing).
Next on our list of follies is the ankheg nest. Qat suggests the sold ankheg plate would have been nice here, Henn has to agree but we persevere and make it through with the consumption of 6 healing potions.
Qat suggests Durlag's Tower next, having bought four potions of mirrored eyes. Towers have ears though and the basilisks there send an ambush our way. Henn reacts in time to throw Qat a potion but he scorns it. The basilisk gazes and Qat reconsiders. Only to find he cannot gulp it in time.
Henn gulps a potion and kills the basilisk. Then he travels to a temple and purchases a stone to flesh scroll. Then he travels around to a two-wolf ambush and finds the sQatue to use the scroll on. Welcome back Qat.
At Durlag's Tower, the Doom Guards outside put up a decent fight. After a while, Henn decides to melee briefly to give Qat a backstab opportunity before running until Qat is ready to strike again. This works for a time but then Henn gets badly wounded (1 skeleton hit and one doom guard hit with added fire damage leaves 1hp) and we have to retreat and be more careful.
The battle continues across the map.
Qat keeps getting stuck under the doom guard and eventually his luck at moving away before failing to hide runs out.
Henn has used all his healing potions by this point so will resort to hit and fade attacks. The second attempt is a success.
Qat is raised, dying shortly with 1hp as Henn tries to rest. We raise him again and eventually manage to rest. Back to Durlag's Tower, and two mirrored eyes potions are used by Henn to kill off the basilisks on the roof.
With the session having been off-plot we decide to clear Nashkel mine (a backstab scares Mulahey and he fails to survive a follow-up so we don't get to see our snares used on his minions).
The amazons look worrying. Lamahla and Telka fail to survive the opening backstabs, and Maneira runs into traps. Zeela is too occupied casting at Qat to realise that Henn has is close enough to snuff out her light.
Nimbul and Tranzig will be ready for us next time.
The large numbers of enemies at the entrance to Dragon's Eye makes it hard to get going as a solo. However, the unlimited summons available to the shaman can do the job. They worked their way through the rest of the top level, with even the Lizard King being danced to death. Towards the end of that Scorch got another level, just after I got careless in letting a wraith spider too close. I wasn't sure what the effect of disease was in IWD, so used a Mummy's Tea potion just in case that could be fatal. I didn't feel right about that though and won't allow that in future (in BG I specifically prohibit use of healing potions and antidotes, but there aren't any potions that cure disease, so I haven't taken a position on that before). Just in case the same situation occurred later though, Scorch took Heal as her latest 6th level pick. He also made use of several choke points in the area to deal with larger enemies. Here a phase spider is too stupid to teleport past a choke point with her enemy so tantalizingly close. Heading into the second level there was the same potential problem of lots of enemies waiting nearby to pounce. However, by using barkskin and entropy shield, Scorch could get his AC down to -11 (reduced to -7 when dancing). Even in HoF that's low enough to pose some problems to enemies and extend the life of iron skins (in IWD they also have a casting time of 1, so are relatively easy to renew). That makes it realistic to stand about dancing for a while until summons can establish themselves or put up insects and replace them with spirits as they die. Finishing off large numbers of trolls was a problem though. After a couple of times going in and out of the level, only one of those had been killed by a fire spirit and Scorch sped things up by waiting until unconscious trolls blocked the passage and using flaming oil on them.
With the entrance area eventually secure, moving round the area dealing with a few opponents at a time was no real challenge and Scorch picked up another level there. He had to resort to similar entrance-based tactics against another large group of trolls, but otherwise there were no problems until I came across some priests. They really shouldn't have been a problem either, but the line between life and death is always a fine one - I must have moved a beetle acting as scout too close to Scorch as it retreated and he suddenly froze in place from the area effect of hold person. The choke point meant the beetles lasted quite a long time - but not quite long enough ...
Edit: just looking at the spell description I see the area of effect is a 20' radius from the target rather than the 5' applied in BG - so it's no wonder I got caught in it. I might have to rethink tactics against that .
Carelessness strikes again... Alastre the chaotic neutral FMC survived many battles only to walk into a ghoul in Durlag's tower, failing his save. Safana could do nothing to save him.
Next random character: Gorch the neutral-evil half-orc shadowdancer. Party size capped at 4 (although he's likely to play solo a lot in order to make stealth more useful.) Hardcore difficulty. SCS v32b, BG1 NPC, randomizer, some tweaks & quests. Hopefully he doesn't do anything too reckless.
Sadly my installation has broken at the beginning of SoA. When it crashed the Baldur.exe file disappeared. I will therefore have to do a new EET installation so it will be some time before I start playing again.
On the plus side I have discovered that it is just as well that Jarlaxle died in SoD as the prologue to SoA has him resurrected and creating the Region of Terror.
Let's hope that I can get Dreadnought up and running in Amn some time in the coming week. At least he finished SoD and had hardly started SoA. A good place for the problem to occur. Only problem is that with the sites that supply the mods being down, up to date versions of the mods won't be available.
Coremage the human berserker update Traveling with: Khalid, Ajantis, Imoen, Garrick, Jaheira
I am pleased to report that Coremage has made it to Shadows of Amn. We go through chapters 5-7 without much problem. Khalid attempted to solo the Undercity Iron Throne party, but instead he could only soften them up before retreating and having the party help finish off the enemies.
As for the Sarevok battle, rather than describe it, you can see it yourself in the video below.
It appears that Imoen's gear from the Baldur's Gate 1 part of the playthrough has been lost permanently. What a shame. She been carrying a lot of good stuff, including a Ring of Wizardry and the party's entire supply of Protection from Magic scrolls.
After completing Korlasz's dungeon and leaving the palace, Arstereth only went to the Three Old Kegs to get Minsc and Dynaheir back, and to Sorcerous Sundries to sell their leftover loot and get lots of magic items. I didn't recruit Safana because I was planning on taking Glint.
Once the party reached the Coast Way Crossing, they recruited Glint and Corwin and went to the wilderness area to the west. There they slew a vampire and blew up some orcs.
Then they went back to the main area and headed to the east forest. Bad news: I forgot to have someone scout ahead in stealth or invisibility, and I accidentally aggroed the spider encounter before I was ready. The Gargantuan Spider webbed Corwin, and the spiders killed her! The first death in six chapters! Dynaheir avenged her though.
After raising Corwin, the party headed into the dwarven excavation. The undead in the first area weren't a big deal. I used my favorite anti-undead tactic from Icewind Dale: cast Wall of Moonlight and have all the undead walk into the wall! 5d10 magic damage with no save is an enormous amount of damage for basic undead creatures.
Against the umber hulks, I had Minsc go berserk (protection from confusion), equip Spider's Bane, and charge into Dynaheir's Webs. I must say, Minsc and Dynaheir make a great team!
The inner dungeon started off as it usually does for this party.
But at one point, the party accidentally set off a fireball trap, and a fireball was about to strike the entire party. Dynaheir was at 38 HP while the rest of the party had far more health left, so I paused and gave her a Ring of Fire Resistance, which had previously been worn by Arstereth. I expected my party would survive.
I unpaused. This was what happened.
Well, Arstereth survived (barely), but Glint got burned to ashes! He took 90 damage! That means that this fireball must have been cast at at least 8th level (and probably more) to do 45 normal damage. It wasn't one of those puny 5d6 damage fireballs that are common in Baldur's Gate 1.
Glint hadn't been as useful as the rest of the party, but his permanent death meant that I was left without a thief. The party retreated from the dungeon and recruited Safana.
Before the party returned to the dungeon, I had the party kill Edwin, because I had heard he had a special robe that makes the wearer do more fire damage.
It looks like Edwin had read my mind!
But he didn't have the special robe, so I consoled it in:
I gave it to Dynaheir, to enhance her fireballing.
Back to the dungeon! I was still going partly blind. I had done a previous playthrough in which I had stopped playing in the middle of this dungeon. I hadn't reached Coldhearth, though by looking in the game's files and reading on this forum I had learned that Coldhearth becomes a lich and you fight him. But I still didn't know anything else about him.
After fighting through the dungeon, the party finally encountered Coldhearth! I was REALLY scared. Here I was in a no-reload run on Insane and I was going blind against a lich with a low-level party! Arstereth used the first Protection from Undead scroll of the playthrough on Minsc. The party had two more of them.
I started off with my usual tactics against really powerful mages: I had Dynaheir animate some skeletons, and I threw them at the lich one by one, so that the lich would waste his spells on them.
It worked initially. Coldhearth cast Time Stop and then cast Lower Resistance and a few other spells on the skeleton. He killed the first skeleton with Abi-Dalzim's Horrid Wilting (this spell apparently was not using its Icewind Dale version; that version doesn't affect undead). But there were two more skeletons were that came from.
However, Coldhearth started coming up the stairs. I had Minsc go forward while the rest of the party ran for their lives. Surprisingly, the lich just stood there once Minsc came near. I waited until Coldhearth ran out of Protection from Magical Weapons spells and his Fire Shields expired, then Minsc dispelled the lich's sequencered Fire Shields, and the two remaining Skeleton Warriors killed the lich.
The party took Coldhearth's key, destroyed the lich's own Skeleton Warrior, and headed into the back chamber. Unfortunately, I was playing blind here, and I didn't notice that I could interact with things on the side of the room. It seemed like the room was just empty, as if it was something for a quest that I missed (perhaps Coldhearth's evil quest to kill the dwarves). The party stood around in the seemingly empty room for a little while.
Then Coldhearth came back. Oh crap. I was worried that this would happen.
Coldhearth had us cornered. We were still in the "empty room," which I still had not realized the purpose of. Dynaheir cast Haste on the party, and everyone fled past the lich while he began casting Time Stop. Once again, he wasted some spells on the skeletons that I put in his way, but then he walked past them and left his own Skeleton Warrior to deal with them. By this point, the party had fled back to the door that is opened by the four pillars. Arstereth summoned a few more bombardier beetle meatshields, but then Coldhearth cast a Minor Sequencer Stinking Cloud and Web on them, followed by a Death Spell. He kept following the party. Even Minsc's Protection from Undead effect didn't stop the lich this time: he simply walked past Minsc, pursuing the rest of the party. At one point, Coldhearth actually cast Remove Magic on himself while he was near Minsc, in order to remove the scroll (clever SOD AI), but Minsc got out of the way and was safe.
I suspected there must have been something in that secret room that I missed. I used CTRL-4 to outline all triggers in the area and saw that there were bunch of interactable skulls on the wall in that room. Now I realized that I needed to get back to that room. But now that the party had fled it, Coldhearth stood between the party and the room.
I devised a plan. The party was coming to a set of rooms that they could use to evade Coldhearth.
The party went counter-clockwise around the rooms while Coldhearth followed them. Then they ran back toward Coldhearth's secret room. But there was a problem.
The Web and Stinking Cloud spells that Coldhearth had previously released were still there. The party walked right into them. Dynaheir (who gets save bonuses against invocation spells) and Arstereth got through them just fine, but Corwin and Safana got stuck. Minsc tried to stand in Coldhearth's way, blocking his movement through a doorway, but he got through. By the time Safana and Corwin got loose, the lich was upon them. Coldhearth cast Power Word, Stun on Corwin. She had JUST too few HP to avoid getting stunned. Minsc fired an Arrow of Dispelling at her to dispel the effect, but it wasn't dispelled.
By this point, Arstereth had reached the secret room and retrieved the phylactery! Now he just needed to get to the fire portal! He used a second Scroll of Protection from Undead to get past the lich safely.
But Corwin was in trouble. She was still stunned and Coldhearth began casting a necromancy spell on her. Uh-oh. There was nothing any of the other party members could do to help her at the moment.
The lich finished casting the spell. It was Abi-Dalzim's Horrid Wilting.
...
Well, there goes another party member permanently.
Just kidding!
Now that's what you call a miracle. The small amount of magic resistance from Corwin's special armor saved her from almost certain death.
But Corwin was still stunned. Coldhearth began casting another necromancy spell on her. I couldn't count on her Magic Resistance saving her this time. So Arstereth used the party's last Protection from Undead scroll on her while the lich was casting the spell. This cancelled the lich's spell.
Then the stun ended. Arstereth put on Protection from Fire and rushed to the fire portal, throwing in the phylactery before the Fire Salamanders could stop him. Then Corwin finished off Coldhearth, this time permanently!
Victory!
Wow, that was more satisfying than beating Sarevok.
Next, we move on to the bridge, where we meet Caelar Argent!
Trio Update Yeldon - half-elf cleric/ranger, protagonist (Corey_Russell) Keras - dwarven kensai (Grond0) Denko - human dark moon monk (Gate70)
The Trio made great progress, though we did get the dropped connection issues on occasion. We got the key for the jail and wiped out the vampires. We carefully worked our way to to the level before Gromnir. We then rested and then returned, and went invisible before entering Gromnir's Throne Room.
The battle went well and Gromnir was indeed defeated.
So the next challenge was clearing the forest area. We managed it, but party was badly wounded from the affair.
Next was undead before Nylee - we played it carefully though surely our 2x sunrays from our items helped.
Unsurprisingly, Yaga's Temple was very dangerous and in fact had a number of deaths. The first one was when we were battling a group of fire giants and Keras gets killed by a trap, though he swears he was no where near it when it went off.
We make it to the next area and were SUPPOSED to range the enemies. However, Denko managed to get himself killed.
Keras isn't paying attention and doesn't notice when the fire giant cleric puts up physicial mirror - thus Keras' own Azuredge kills himself. Yeldon was paying attention however and stayed alive. He resurrected his friends and the rest of the temple went smoothly enough, if you don't count Yeldon mazing himself from a trap.
We come for Nylee and she was pretty easy. Yeldon warned about the nymphs, but Denko says he's targeting them first so should be fine. He still manages to get himself killed by a shambling mound, though. So another resurrection.
Finally it's time for Yaga himself. Keras nearly dies, but manages to kill the big giant in time. The party appreciates the upgrades from Yaga's stuff and time to save our session.
Comments
Arstereth the Avenger: Part 1
Here's my character:My mods: IWD Divine Spells in BGEE, SOD and BG2EE by @Grammarsalad .
I'm playing on Insane.
Arstereth bought some gear, memorized some Sunscorches, and set off!
After Gorion's death, Arstereth and Imoen fought a wolf, on which Arstereth blinded with Sunscorch:
(I was expecting it to say "Blinded." But "Get him!" also fits the situation. )
At the Friendly Arm Inn, Tarnesh hit Arstereth with Horror... only slightly after he got hit by Sunscorch.
The party did not recruit Khalid or Jaheira. After resting at the inn, they headed back south.
Later on, at the Nashkel Carnival, the two of them fought Zordral, and Zordral killed Imoen with Melf's Acid Arrow. Arstereth used the rest of his healing potions and abilities to survive Zordral's Minor Drains until the mage ran out of spells, then Arstereth kited him to death. Arstereth then went back to town and had Imoen brought back to life.
Not too long after, Arstereth reached level 3 and gained his first gamebreaking spell: Web! They went to the Gnoll Stronghold to test out this new spell:
The two of them had gone to the Gnoll Stronghold without recruiting Minsc or Edwin, because my original plan was to recruit Dynaheir and not Minsc. But then I realized that Minsc would also be great later on by charging into the party's Webs with Spider's Bane, so I decided to go back to Nashkel and pick him up. They then returned to the Gnoll Stronghold and rescued Dynaheir. Dynaheir is an even better Web-caster because of her Invoker spell enhancements.
Then back to Nashkel! It's time for the mines! After beating Greywolf, that is.
The mines were no problem, since my party was overleveled. Within the mines, Arstereth reached level 5 and gained his second gamebreaking spell: Spike Growth!
Now that Arstereth has Spike Growth, he's ready to go on a rampage throughout the Sword Coast!
By the end of the rampage, the party had killed multiple assassin teams, 6 Sirines, 5 Flesh Golems, 7 Lesser Basilisks, 5 Greater Basilisks, 2 Battle Horrors, 1 Succubus, and lots of Ghasts. Arstereth was at level 7.
Next up is the Bandit Camp!
Lol, looks like a bug I've got to fix
Perhaps my opinion is an outlier but I do not regard SoD as being especially difficult- but then I almost never play solo and haven't tried insane level! Playing through it blind my first character perished when I discovered that if feared opponents got behind your lines in the camp battle everyone retreats & an explosion occurs in short order... I didn't do SoD this run as the procedure for modding the separate android app wasn't yet settled.
I had been using the Reform Party trick to spam summons and traps from my Totemic Druid and Bounty Hunter, but when Davaeorn closed in on us, we had no way to stop him. Our Wizard Slayer didn't have the THAC0 to hit him reliably, and we weren't high enough level to cover anyone with Protection from Lightning. In retrospect, the fight could probably have been done by abusing Invisibility and allowing a horde of guards to congregate around Davaeorn while our Bounty Hunter flung Special Snares at them from the fog of war.
It's unfortunate, because we had a decent strategy for a saga run:
1. Spamming traps and Spirit Animals could get us through BG1 and SoD, with our Wizard Slayer to neutralize mages like Angelo
2. Our Blade could use Enchanted Weapon to let us kite Belhifet with missile weapons, since the Better Enchanted Weapon mod makes the spell set the user's weapon enchantment equal to caster level divided by 4 (a level 12 bard could grant a +3 enchantment)
3. The Wizard Slayer could get us through the dangerous SoA mage fights, and Enchanted Weapon and buffing spells could let our FMC and Wizard Slayer deal enough damage to handle melee threats
4. Late in the saga, our Bounty Hunter could spam Maze traps indefinitely, our Fighter/Mage/Cleric could combine Critical Strike with Harm for guaranteed kills while using PFMW to avoid disruption, our sorcerer could Wish-rest via Project Image, our Totemic Druid could provide healing and Implosion while using Earth Elemental form to tank, our Blade could use the Improved Bard Song to improve our damage output, and our two fighters could use Smite to pin down dangerous threats at the Throne, with a level 20 Enchanted Weapon spell to let everyone's attacks strike as +5 weapons.
Initially, I planned on using a Fighter/Mage/Thief instead of a Bounty Hunter and playing the game without using glitches, but when I did the numbers, it seemed unrealistic that we'd be able to bomb Sarevok properly using Fireballs alone given how few mage levels we had. Infinite traps via the Reform Party trick was a safer approach, though it involved a glitch.
In my poverty run, I got past Davaeorn because I had two sorcerers who could spam Magic Missile and Melf's Acid Arrow when his MGOI ran out. But I didn't want to have that many single-classed mages in the party--the point of the "no magic items" rule was that I could still have fighters in the party.
I don't want to deal with early BG1 again, so this run is probably dead. This run would be easier than my poverty run, but it's not worth the effort.
No-reload BG1 gameplay with SCS is so incredibly dependent on items. Unless you have lots of invisibility spells, you need potions (Magic Blocking is the best by far) or a Protection from Magic scroll to handle Davaeorn's spells, because Arrows of Dispelling aren't yet available. His Evocation spells are potentially game-ending, and I don't know how easy it is to maintain multiple resistance buffs (I always assumed that Remove Magic would ruin that strategy).
I've been having a go at this with a few characters to try and find something I fancied. The obvious answer to HoF is to use summons and a totemic druid made progress relatively simple until I abandoned that near the end of the Vale of Shadows. A fighter/illusionist was also potentially promising with the help of his familiar - and thanks to the totemic druid run I now know where a scroll of invisibility can be found in the Vale of Shadows to make scouting easier if I pursued that character in the future.
I also tried a few runs with a bard. The large groups of enemies inside the caravan cave stymied him, but I did try leaving those (though that grates on me). In 3 runs, he was twice successful in running the gauntlet of Kuldahar Pass. Mistakes proved costly fairly early on both times after that, though I can see how it would be possible to make progress onwards.
Ideally I wanted though to have a go with a character not using magic at all and tried out a monk for size in several runs. Getting up to level 7 around Easthaven is not difficult, but I again found the caravan cave near impossible to complete. Enemies can be pulled outside, but there's not much room there to dodge around there. Using area transitions you can get some free attacks in, but the enemies will automatically move towards you and try and surround you even when stealthed (I think that's unintended behavior, so might get removed in a future patch to make a stealthy character a real option). That means that, well before you can kill any of them, they will be grouped around the exit point closely enough that an area transition is likely to trap you if there are more than 7 or 8 enemies in total. The enemies will partly redistribute around the area if you rest, but that heals them so is no help.
In the end I gave up on the idea of completing Easthaven with the monk. Unlike the bard he had an easy run through the goblin hordes in Kuldahar Pass - stealth only failing once he'd bypassed everything. In Kuldahar he found that, unlike orcs, yetis have fast weapon speed so he couldn't consistently use melee attacks. That was going to make progress in the Vale of Shadows slow whatever happened, but in fact he died to the very first yeti taken on there. He had badly damaged it with a couple of activations of stunning blow and had nearly finished it off by sling, but the close confines meant even a tiny mistake in movement would be a problem and when the icon didn't react to a movement click the yeti got an attack in - with devastating results.
In the process of trying out characters I noticed a diary note I wrote for a sorcerer trying HoF out. That apparently must have made a fair amount of progress, as I recorded it at level 19, though I have absolutely no memory of it and it must have predated the EE. That would be another option, but I thought if I had to resort to magic I should give a shaman a go first - that seems better suited to the snowy wastes.
I spent a fair while rerolling to get some lovely stats and then found an immediate problem on character creation - there are too many spells available! The shaman in BG is very restricted in available spells and I was expecting to have more choice in IWD due to the greater variety of attacking druid spells. However, the IWD shaman also has the slightly odd ability to pick spells which are limited to clerics in BG (like remove fear and PfE), so there are real choices to be made even at 1st level.
More choices were soon required as killing some beetles took Scorch to level 4. There were not as many spells at level 2 as I expected though. The list ended at Know Alignment, thus missing out things like Resist Fire & Cold and Slow Poison that are available in BG - I'm not sure whether these omissions were actually intended or if they spell list was just cut off at the wrong point. A couple more jobs around town then moved Scorch onto level 5.
I thought working his way through the nearby goblins would get him to level 6 and obtain his first 3rd level spell as well as a spirit summons upgrade, but a charmed goblin killed its companion just after charm wore off and lost the XP as a result - leaving Scorch just short. However, a wolf in the caravan area soon sorted that out.
Now with Spike Growth to add to the area damage already offered by Writhing Fog, I thought Scorch might have easy progress in the cave. However, the first large group there reacted to damage by chasing him even without seeing him and made him retreat outside. A couple of false starts and rests later though he managed to get a full complement of spirit summons going and they did a good job in clearing that group. Not all the orcs in the cave realized where area damage was coming from though and a couple more separated ones was enough for Scorch to get to level 8 and get some controllable summons in the form of giant beetles.
Dealing with a few more isolated groups of orcs left only the other large group headed by 4 ogres. I was sure they wouldn't meekly allow area damage to take them down - and they didn't - but beetles helped lock them in place, getting Scorch to level 9 during the clearance. With a nice set of HP rolls he should have a decent chance of progressing on well from here.
Scorch, shaman 9, 79 HPs, 15 kills
Previous posts (BG1): 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
Previous posts (SoA): 6, 7, 8, 9, 10
From Trademeet we returned back to Athkatla to pay out the Shadow Thieves and collect the jewelry starter pack from Aran.
The casting time reduction granted by the Amulet of Power may not be material. However, Anomandra is a cleric and clerics lack the necessary protections to warrant uninteruptible spellcasting. Therefore, every frame counts. NPP is just a nice bonus before we'll be able to get our hands on the improved Mace of Disruption.
With Aran's RoP +2 further upgrading our saving throws, we were slowly entering the negative safe zone - these are Anomandra's unbuffed saves at level 13 (she's equipped with the Claw, RoP +2, Cloak of Displacement and Belt of Inertial Barrier):
Random observation/fun fact: According to the Cowled Wizards' interpretation, using RoAC in the public requires a spellcasting licence. Mages and legal practice apprently don't like each other!
Instead of attending to Aran's tasks right away, we visited the Government District, where we saved Viconia from being baptised by fire. Conveniently, we also learned about the trouble in Umar which marked our next destination.
In the village Anomandra first assisted Jermien with locating the mimic blood and eliminating his juggernaut golem.
Then we proceeded to the Shadow Temple. Anomandra approached the entrance with Sanctuary, blasting the shadows on the surface with Turn Undead.
Once inside the temple, she repeated the process with the shade wolfs and shadows, including the jailor. Having had lost my previous character in these very same ruins, I was being extra careful.
The skeleton warriors, however, had to be dealt with face to face.
On the bridge, we got heavily outnumbered by the enemies and Anomandra used all the anti-undead arsenal she had available. That included False Dawn...
...as well as Flame Strike (used against inflammable mummies).
Nevertheless, we didn't have enough punch to take out the Bone Golem and the remaining skellies and so Anomandra retreated and crossed the rest of the temple under Sanctuary. She then adjusted her spellbook and rested in front of the entrance to Thaxxy's cave.
I should note that I don't have the "Improved Shade Lord" SCS component installed and therefore the battle was supposed to be relatively easy. Still, we didn't want to underestimate the situation - Anomandra quaffed an Oil of Speed (in addition to her regular combat buffs) and also activated Repulse Undead. Normally, this priest spell is just a poor man's Teleport Field, but the specific set-up of this particular fight at hand seemed to invite its usage.
We opened by landing Harm on Shadow Partick and activating RoAC.
Shade Lord and Patrick were each repulsed in a separate direction and Anomandra could safely finish the latter.
Temporarily blinded by the returning Shade Lord, Anomandra opted for False Dawn cast.
Bringing Mr. Turban into play finally tipped the scales in our favour.
In case you ask why Anomandra wasn't running her Storm Shield then I honestly have no idea. A silly move right there, although it's true that the Shade Lord was not running elemental protections either.
By completing the quest we got enough XP for Anomandra to reach level 14 and thus gain her first L7 spell slot. Hurrah!
Regards,
B.
Next random character up:
Alastre the half-elven chaotic neutral FMC. Shamelessly min-maxed stats. Hardcore difficulty. SCS v32, item randomizer, some tweaks, unfinished business. Dice roll capped party size at 2.
Here he is after beating up some basilisks:
However Artemis and Tenya are not there.
I am playing EET. Will I meet my other characters later, or do I have to import them?
This is my first EET run that has got this far.
Arstereth the Avenger: Part 2
The bandit camp was easy, since the party was overleveled and well-equipped, and I'm not using SCS. The party simply kited everyone. They lured the four bandits in Tazok's tent out of the tent and into the Webs.Before going to Cloakwood, the party returned to the Friendly Arm Inn to pick up Landrin's antidotes and obtain the Golden Pantaloons:
Yes, I had indeed made a mistake in room numbers. The party went upstairs and retrieved the pantaloons.
The party then went on another rampage through the Cloakwood.
Eventually the party fought their way to Davaeorn. Minsc used some Potions of Magic Blocking and sliced him up.
Arstereth then hacked the Mustard Jelly to death with Beast Claws.
On to Baldur's Gate!
Previous updates:
An army of beetles, supported by the incredibly vicious call lightning, cleared most of the goblins from Kuldahar Pass, though a bit of dancing was done to deal with a few stragglers in order to get up to level 10 - providing Pixie Dust to allow invisible resting in the wilderness. After resting, a fresh lot of spells were used to deal with some caves and buildings - putting an ogre out of its misery at the end of that was enough for level 11.
In Kuldahar, Hjolldar's home yielded a useful sling +1, though Scorch doesn't use that as much as other characters might. Scorch's high strength also allowed him to find a ring to expose an innkeeper's misdeeds.
He soon moved on to the Vale of Shadows, where summons allowed pretty quick progress. A few skeletons from the start of the final tomb got him to level 12 and access to a further upgrade to spirit summons. With lots of enemies in there he got to level 13 just before entering the final guarded hall. At the end of that I decided to use Scorch's new Insect Plague for the first time, but almost immediately got the vanishing portrait bug as a result - I hope that's not going to be a regular occurrence. However, I was annoyed to find that undead are immune to the insects anyway - I'd specifically chosen that as a spell that would damage undead as they're immune to the cold damage from another area option (it's also party unfriendly, so it's easy to nerf your own casting).
After speaking to Kresselack, Scorch went in search of Lysan. Insect plague worked there to pacify her and, even though Scorch also suffered spell failure, that didn't prevent him dancing.
Somewhat to my surprise Scorch was thus able to complete the area and open up the Temple of the Forgotten God. I did very little buffing against traps in the various tombs, but was either lucky or the nature of the traps is more benign towards solo play than I was expecting.
The Temple was pretty straightforward. With groups of enemies tending to be smaller Scorch normally used a mixture of a couple of insects to drag enemies back, with a couple of spirits to tank them. That tactic brought a steady flow of XP and he hit level 14 to get a first 7th level spell - Impervious Sanctity of Mind will prevent charm among other things (at least if I actually bother casting it ). Soon after that Scorch penetrated to the inner sanctum and discovered that the search will have to move on to Dragon's Eye ...
Scorch, shaman 14, 99 HPs (incl. 10 from Talisman), 142 kills
I'm wondering if it is ethical to import BG1 NPCs into my SoA game for a no reloads game. I know that it is possible to do it if I open my game in Multiplayer mode. I have become quite attached to Tenya even if she is a little brat.
Arstereth the Avenger: Part 3
In the party's time in the city of Baldur's Gate, they became MUCH more powerful. Right off the bat, I bought 60 Arrows of Detonation for Minsc and Imoen. The party then traveled throughout the city and nabbed the major magic items (Helm of Glory, Helm of Balduran, Cloak of Balduran, Gauntlets of Ogre Power, Ring of Wizardry, Lothander's Boots of Speed, Eagle Bow, Nymph Cloak, Gold Digger, several stat-increasing tomes, etc.). They also got lots of extra loot to sell, and I used the extra money to buy lots and lots of magic arrows for Imoen and Minsc. By the end of the chapter, Imoen had over 200 Arrows of Piercing and Minsc had over 300 Acid Arrows.By the way, I had dual-classed Imoen at level 6. This means she can still reach level 9 as a mage. At the beginning of Chapter 5, she had already regained her thief levels.
Once Dynaheir obtained Fireball, she basically became the new Arstereth, capable of obliterating entire encounters.
In all honesty, I think I like Dynaheir more than Edwin. Those invoker save penalties are so good.
The end-of-chapter encounter lasted a matter of seconds.
However, my addiction to Arrows of Detonation got the better of me later on in a random encounter with an ogrillion where I forgot to make Minsc unequip them.
Chapter 6! I didn't kill Rieltar. The chapter was simple enough.
Chapter 7! I rushed through this chapter as well. I simply killed Tamoko, went to the Iron Throne, killed Cythandria, went to the Undercellar, killed Slythe and Krystin, and went to the Ducal Palace. I had turned Slythe hostile before he had said any dialogue; this meant that Krystin did not turn hostile, so she was still invisible. I used some Potions of Firebreath (targeting a Skeleton Warrior) to kill her without killing any innocents.
I fully buffed my party before the Ducal Palace fight, including with Potions of Storm Giant Strength and hasted Skeleton Warriors. This battle also lasted a matter of seconds.
In this Thieves' Maze, Minsc baited the two Skeleton Warriors back up the corridor away from the traps and into melee range.
(Having enemies follow you doesn't always make things harder)
The battle in the Undercity went as you might have expected.
Time for the final battle. I had my party put on full buffs again, using all the Potions of Magic Shielding they had.
Prepare to die, Sarevok!
First, I got Angelo and Semaj out of the way.
Now the rest of them are melee fighters. Tazok came out of invisibility and dealt Imoen a nasty blow, but he didn't last much longer.
Now there was only Sarevok left. Sarevok could easily kill any of our party members in two or three hits, and no Armor Class could plausibly stop him. The party could simply kite him to death, but I figured it would be more interesting to fight him in melee. Arstereth entered melee with Sarevok while under the effect of Iron Skins. Sarevok started attacking him; meanwhile a nearby dwarf with 25 Strength was ready to give Sarevok a walloping.
Sarevok has fallen! The battle is won! I beat the game!
I do believe that this party may be the most powerful BG1 party I've ever made using existing NPCs. Minsc and Dynaheir aren't just decent party members; they're really, really good. In total, there was only one death this whole game: when Imoen died to Zordral. Otherwise, I just flew through the game.
On to Siege of Dragonspear! The opening dungeon went the same as always with this party.
I managed to clear the entire dungeon without resting, including the optional encounters.
I don't know how Siege of Dragonspear is going to go. I'm not too familiar with Siege of Dragonspear as I've only beaten it once. I haven't ever completed the Dwarves of Dumathoin quest, so I'll be going partly blind there. On the other hand, Siege of Dragonspear is full of the kinds of battles that this team is really good against.
That's it for now.
The answer to all of this was relatively simple: Just play another kit I already have installed. That should keep me occupied.
So, I introduce to you,
Torque the (Rebalanced) Wizard Slayer!
(kit link) (SHS seems to be down at the moment...)Kit description:
- Starts with 10% base magic resistance
- Gains an additional +2% bonus to magic resistance for every level of experience
- Gains the Disrupt Magic passive ability at first level
- Gains the Shatter Magic ability at first level and every 8 levels thereafter
Disadvantages:
- Cannot use any magic items except for weapons, armor and healing potions
- Cannot dual-class
Disrupt Magic:
Whenever a Wizard Slayer lands a successful hit on an arcane spellcaster the target is afflicted with a cumulative spell failure penalty. During the next 3 rounds, the victim has a 10% base chance to miscast any arcane spell plus 1% for every experience level the Wizard Slayer attains. This passive ability is always in effect.
Shatter Magic:
A Wizard Slayer can channel his innate magic resistance into his weapons in order to break through the magical defenses of arcane spellcasters. During the round when this ability is activated, each successful hit removes one combat and one specific protection from his target. However, this temporarily nullifies the Wizard Slayer's innate magic resistance making him vulnerable to magic during the next 2 rounds. Until his magic resistance recovers, the Wizard Slayer cannot use any special abilities that rely on it.
Moderately loosened item restrictions are also installed. This allows Wizard Slayers to also use items that increase their Magic Resistance, or protect against magic in some form (such as potions of magic blocking, the Cloak of Mirroring, Ring of Spell Turning, Belt of Inertial Barrier, etc.). Wizard Slayers are otherwise limited to magical armor, weapons, shields, helmets, and healing potions/antidotes.
Mod installation is unchanged from the Rejects' latest success. This will be a solo Insane run with extra damage disabled, as usual.
Candlekeep is easier than usual because both Shank and Carbos are shot dead with a Composite Shortbow. Added by Rogue Rebalancing, these shortbows take more strength to wield but they do a slight damage bonus. A gibberling is shot on the way to Beregost. Firebead's is given his book and Landrin's spiders are taken out at range too.
There's no point in killing Algernon for his cloak, since I can't use it to charm Firebead, Silke, or Kelddath's sirenes. Neera is killed for her gem bag. I pay Taerom a visit instead and buy a Composite Shortbow +1 so I can take out the vampiric wolf pack at the Temple. Kiting the wolf pack and killing it gets me two levels.
I'm pretty decently leveled now. I take care of some assorted easy fetch quests and go down to Nashkel for the Healing Touch Bhaal power, the Ankheg Full Plate, and the Quiver of Plenty for sale at the store. Ankhegs are exterminated, Farmer Brun's son is returned, and so is Tenya's bowl. Vitiare provides the last bit of XP to level up.
Meanwhile at the carnival, I buy the scroll of Protection from Petrification and use the item duplication glitch to make more copies that I know I'll need later. Korax helps take out Mutamin, buying me valuable time to get a couple of spell-failure-inducing hits in, but Mutamin renders me blind for a long time. That was the last spell he could cast at me, as he had exhausted the rest of his spells and resorted to melee. He is killed, and so are all of the basilisks on the map, despite being blinded.
I leave Kirian's party alone since they don't have anything that I can use anyway. I head over to Durlag's Tower and carefully take out the Doom Knights guarding the tower. Once inside, I kite a bunch of ghasts and get to the roof. The Chromatic Orb trap on the way there simply causes stun, but I saved against it both times. I use a copy of the Protection from Petrification scroll to take out the three Greater Basilisks on the roof for a level.
I kill the ghasts in the cellar of Durlag's Tower as well, but leave afterward. I head for Gullykin since I'm in the area. Jenkal is killed and the ogre magi is cheesed via area transitions before he can casts spells at me. I get several hits in and the ogre gives up casting spells on me, opting for melee instead. He loses.
His human compatriot Lendarn is dealt with the same way. Lendarn manages to get a Lightning Bolt off at me, but Magic Resistance saved me. Stoneskin protects him from direct hits from my composite shortbow, but he still experiences significant spell failure. It is enough that he simply stands still and waits for death instead of attempting melee.
I'm getting pretty confident in my wizard slaying skills now. I buy a Composite Shortbow +2 from Ulgoth's Beard and 150 Arrows of Biting to really ruin a mage's day. Nym Phaundal, one of Kryn Darkflame's insane Shadow Mage apprentices, is next. I take the initiative with a poisonous arrow.
I leave immediately after he gets poisoned since he summoned three shadows. The poison only seems to do damage if I'm in the same area as Nym. The shadows chase me all over the map south of Beregost until they get unsummoned. I try some more Arrows of Biting, but I get hit with a Night Terrors spell just a couple of frames too late, as I managed to escape the area but was still struck with panic anyway.
One turn passes and I'm okay. Nym is lured outside into the sunlight where he is weakened, but he's still very difficult to hit. I finally manage to kill him.
I return with Nym's staff to Kryn Darkflame for a reward of 1000 gold and XP. I buy some more Potions of Magic Blocking from Thalantyr since I already bought the ones that Darkflame sells.
Tarnesh is dealt with easily with Arrows of Biting. I buy Buckley's Buckler for 20 CON for regeneration. I defeat Greywolf for Varscona +2. I'm going to take out Shoal next, but I want a sacrifice to go in my stead because I also want Droth's Helm of Defense. Eldoth is willing to help.
After Droth initiates conversation, Shoal is finished off.I have to use a Potion of Magic Blocking against Droth as I couldn't take the chance of either saving against Hold Person successfully or having my MR resist it. He gets poisoned and takes several casting-failure-inducing hits and resorts to melee, just like his other ogre mage cousin.
The giant humanoid band south of Shoal is kited and killed and Mad Arcand is helped too. Bassilus and Melicamp are next. I interrupt Bassilus' casting of Aerial Servant! Wizard Slayer spell failure only applies to mage spells, so clerics can be much more dangerous.The Rejects had to face the Aerial Servant. They hit extremely hard, although only once per round. Bassilus then tries Hold Person, but I use another Potion of Magic Blocking and kill him.
Melicamp is successfully anti-chickenated.
At the seawatcher area, I gain another level from some hobgoblins.
A fan of efficiency, just one Protection from Magic scroll is employed to clear out the sirenes and the traps in Black Alaric's cave.
Now level 8, I have 26% MR and cause 18% spell failure per hit. Silke is next. I stand next to the door transition at the house just north of Silke for extra safety. She prebuffs with Haste, causing her to take quadruple poison damage over time from being poisoned twice. She loses morale but uses an invisibility minor sequencer just beforehand. I lose track of her, but I follow the sound of her footsteps with my own keen senses. She regains morale after about a minute and tries casting more spells, but I poison her yet again, causing her spell to fail and to lose morale a second time.
I lose track of her after this since it begins raining in game, so I can't hear where she's trying to flee to. I stick by the door transition for a while, then try investigating again. I run into her at the eastern edge of the map near the Travenhurst Manor and finally finish her off.
Torque - (Rebalanced) Wizard Slayer 8
BG1: 1, 2, 3, 4
The saga continues. Amahoro and her companions defeat the last of Sarevok's followers. Porios surrendered peacefully after some summons caused the guards to clear the way to him.But the second catacombs saw a messy performance of the party. First, Imoen's replacement Safana failed a stealth check and panicked when facing a mummy, and she was killed before Amahoro could remove that effect.She was slain. Second, the battle with Korlasz was hard. A simple Flamestrike *my usual approach) didn't damage her at all, and she fell back and had her lackeys go after the party. (This might be SCS v32 at work, as it affects SoD as well as BG1 and BG2, or maybe I was just unlucky). One of those aides stunned Khalid with darts and the party couldn't save him.The party had to dispatch the entire opposition before they could take on Korlasz. It allowed her to cast some disablers at the party (Slow, Blindness, and a Confusion that bounced off Amahoro's MR). Eventually it was Dynaheir that petrified Korlasz with a Chromatic Orb.
After some side-questing and recruiting Minsc and Jaheira in the city, Amahoro reached the Coastway Crossing where Glint took Safana's place. Teleria's sculpture garden project ended shortly after she'd added Minsc to her collection.Maybe Amahoro shouldn't have focused on the golem; she might have prevented Teleria from petrifying Minsc. In any case there was a spare Stone to Flesh scroll, and Minsc was soon his old meaty self again.
Thanks AoE fire damage - wands, necklaces of missiles, potions- as well as to Dynaheir's Webs and Minsc, Jaheira (who joined at Troll Claw Woods), and Amahoro's free action, enemy hordes were manageable, so progress was fairly fast.
At the Dwarven Digsite, Minsc and Amahoro used PfU, speed, and necklaces of missiles to cleanse the place. Minsc obtained level 9 and grandmastery in 2h-swords in the process. The Coldhearth Lich was beaten by two crits from Minsc and Amahoro.The latter managed to timely destroy the phylactery thanks to her boots and oil of speed.
The ambush at the bridge was a success with the party of four slaying all the crusaders before Caelar made her appearance, despite Amahoro being the target of Barachus's brutal melee attacks and a Druid's Lightning strikes.This was the first time I accomplished that.
In the Forest of Wyrms, AoE fire (2x) and party-wide PfPoison took much of the sting out the confrontation with Morentherene and her dragonlings and wyverns.Webs accounted for bugbears and cult enforcers. AoE fire plus ranged attacks finished Ziatar's mages. The half-dragon herself was done in with wand of the heavens flamestrikes while she was under Sanctuary. The Neothelid succumbed to brute force before the party moved on to Darskhelin. Webs, AoE fire and Spike Growths did much to neutralize the enemy. Only the dwarf, an umber hulk and Darskhelin managed to reach the companions, only to fall to brute force and Dynaheir's wand of frost.The Shadow Aspect got a taste of PfU Amahoro's Ashideena with invisible Glint detecting illusions to get rid of its at-will misleads.
Dealing with Darskhelin before confronting Akanna led to the latter being very kind. Akanna's mind had been controlled my the illithid, and she was most thankful for her release by the companions. They parted amicably even the party had slain all her cult members except the mad one.At Bridgefort both Jaheira and Glint got some armor upgrades (rhino beetle and dragon scale) from Jegg Hillcarver, and Amahoro had the dwarf fashion some bullets of darkness +3 for her.
Options for the Bridgefortians were discussed with Khalid and it was decided that the fort was not to be surrendered. The party traveled back to the camp, where they instructed Corwin to get the Fist to travel to Bridgefort and wait for the drawbridge to be lowered. The companions did a lot of pre-buffing inside the fort, and that proved wise. There were loads of enemies, led by the Barghest who personally slew a near-naked Khalid.Friendly fire was a genuine concern, so Dynaheir contributed mostly with wand summons and Glint with flamestrikes from afar. The others did the heavy melee work, with Minsc requiring many a potion of extra healing. When the remainder of Bridgefort's vanguard had fallen, Dynaheir started throwing webs at the enemy.It made a huge difference, as it basically only left three enemy mages as a threat. The webbed enemies were made short work of with fire, Dynaheir got stuck in her own webs but didn't get into danger. Jaheira, Minsc, and Amahoro suffered a Malison and a Silence but that didn't stop them from defeating the mages and a few stray crusaders mages through melee force.On the bridge, Minsc and Amahoro disrupted and slew the wizard while the other crusaders were held by more of Dynaheir's webs (cast from scroll).
The Coalition camp and vicinity were a great source of XP and valuable items. It also saw the party welcome Schael Corwin into their ranks. The companions did Bloodbark Grove first, to stop a disease from spreading, infiltrated the crusaders at the Dragonspear Courtyard thanks to Malden Cal's badge that Glint had pickpocketed, and then proceeded to Underground River. The harder encounters were in Kanaglym, with Ferrusk, and in the Dragonspear Castle basement. (The party didn't fight the drow or the wyrmlings.)
In Kanaglym, Zhadroth was rendered harmless by the Secret Revealed, netting Dynaheir a Spell Sequencer. Amahoro burned a scroll of PfU to deal with the undead to the east. Then the party buffed and focused their weapons and spells on Kherrium,prompting Halathlaer to appear and help out against the other dark magicians. Hephernaan's ritual notes found after battle served to convince Julann to dissociate from the crusade. She gave Minsc Rigah's Dragon Blade.
The party decided not to engage Ferrusk's army in close quarters. Instead they retreated,Instead, they retreated and used the gate as a bottleneck.
The biggest hurdle by far though, was the Dragonspear basement. The party ambushed HephernaanSoon the premises were replete with crusaders. Glint served as scout with moderate success. His stealth + non-detection caused the enemy to waste many a detection spell. At one point he failed a stealth check, so he had to quaff an invisibility potion and get away. He succeeded but I had him return a split second too soon when I read the True Seeing expiration notice in the combat log. He was slain and had to be raised by Amahoro. Glint then read a scroll of PfPoison and drank potions of fire resistance. He became an invisible gatekeeper as Dynaheir Cloudkilled and Webbed a host of enemies. Minsc, Jaheira, and Amahoro attacked them with their missile weapons.Using the same tactics, they slowly cleared the way to the exit.
With the food and water supplies poisoned, the party returned to the Coalition camp. Crusader attacks were nipped in the bud with trusty AoE fire before the party took the battle to Dragonspear Castle. Amahoro buffed with lots of spells and potions (giant strength, magic resistance, clarity, absorption being the most prominent ones). She then turned left and was challenged by Ashatiel. The avariel had no answer to Amahoro's bullets and flamestrikes.She's an interesting character and her ending is a sad one. I would have liked to get to know her better. Charname supposedly wronged or even killed her brother? What I like about SoD is that the enemy isn't as obviously evil as other BG villains and their followers
With Ashatiel gone, the way to Dragonspear Castle and into Avernus was clear. Everyone in the party had free action, and mind protection, and Minsc, Jaheira, Corwin, and Amahoro had some warrior-only potions as well. They battled their way to Belhifet, with the four warriors doing the fighting, Dynaheir using wands (frost, monster summoning), and Glint detecting illusions and launching an occasional bullet.Jaheira's weapon was the Root of the Problem, Minsc used his Dragon Blade, and Amahoro took some risk in wielding Sundermaul (she had no other +3 weapon, and Dynaheir, being an Invoker, couldn't cast Enchanted Weapon). Corwin launched acid arrows or arrows +2, saving her +3 arrows for Belhifet.
The elevator was used to buff the party (fire and electricity resistance, refreshing mind shields and boosts). Upon arrival they chose to fight Belhifet with Caelar Argent. Amahoro slew Hephernaan very early on while Caelar occupied Belhifet. She was no match for him, but the party used scrolls of Greater Restoration to keep her alive while they made short work of the summons. It took four of those scrolls, cast in the nick of time (Caelar's health bar very low, cries for aid), but she survived.
Belhifet removing Dynaheir's buffs in the middle of the battle was a surprise. I thought his Dispel was a scripted one at the beginning of combat. He also cast a Symbol, Pain spell at her, but she saved against its effects. Other than that Belhifet was mainly occupied with Caelar. And with four buffed warriors his summons didnt last long enough to overwhelm the party. The companions couldstrike at Belhifet with increasing frequency, until he was no more.
@Borco, am really enjoying your updates. You really seem to be making the most out of your priest.
@Flashburn, a solo Wizard Slayer, always exciting! I once took one into ToB, but she didn't quite make it all the way. (She was a vanilla WS though). Good luck!
@Mantis37, hats off to beating the game on a freaking phone... I can't begin to imagine myself pulling that off ever...
@Grond0, Gorch is looking good. I don't know IWD very well, so I just stat my hope that he'll be able to deal with upcoming challenges.
@Wise_Grimwald, wishing you good luck in Amn. And like @Enuhal said, feel free to import Tenya or any other NPCs. With a custom party you'd do the same, so I see nothing unethical about it.
Nice to the thread so alive at the moment. Am really enjoying this!
Henn (dwarf fighter/thief, Gate70); Qat (dwarf thief, Grond0)
These two rogues had an enjoyable outing today. Sure, there were a couple of deaths and a stoning with a near-miss thrown in to boot but that's all part of the fun.
We started off by heading to the coast - Henn bemoaning selling the free ankheg plate and Qat saying Henn
shouldwould be OK. After killing fivie sirines, Qat tries to hide for a backstab on the sixth but triggers a carrion crawler. He gets held with his crossbow equipped, perhaps due to a multiplayer lag. Henn is of course, miles away, and Qat resigns himself to an early death. Henn draws back his longbow and scores a critical hit to save thedaythief.Henn bumps reputation to 20 and we purchase a staff +3 for Qat with a cloak of displacement for Henn to use, alongside Bjornin's shield (Henn's constitution is now 20, so Buckleys Buckler is passed to Qat for use during travel and reducing the need for healing).
Next on our list of follies is the ankheg nest. Qat suggests the sold ankheg plate would have been nice here, Henn has to agree but we persevere and make it through with the consumption of 6 healing potions.
At Durlag's Tower, the Doom Guards outside put up a decent fight. After a while, Henn decides to melee briefly to give Qat a backstab opportunity before running until Qat is ready to strike again. This works for a time but then Henn gets badly wounded (1 skeleton hit and one doom guard hit with added fire damage leaves 1hp) and we have to retreat and be more careful.
With the session having been off-plot we decide to clear Nashkel mine (a backstab scares Mulahey and he fails to survive a follow-up so we don't get to see our snares used on his minions).
The amazons look worrying. Lamahla and Telka fail to survive the opening backstabs, and Maneira runs into traps. Zeela is too occupied casting at Qat to realise that Henn has is close enough to snuff out her light.
Previous updates:
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1043147/#Comment_1043147
The large numbers of enemies at the entrance to Dragon's Eye makes it hard to get going as a solo. However, the unlimited summons available to the shaman can do the job. They worked their way through the rest of the top level, with even the Lizard King being danced to death. Towards the end of that Scorch got another level, just after I got careless in letting a wraith spider too close. I wasn't sure what the effect of disease was in IWD, so used a Mummy's Tea potion just in case that could be fatal. I didn't feel right about that though and won't allow that in future (in BG I specifically prohibit use of healing potions and antidotes, but there aren't any potions that cure disease, so I haven't taken a position on that before). Just in case the same situation occurred later though, Scorch took Heal as her latest 6th level pick. He also made use of several choke points in the area to deal with larger enemies. Here a phase spider is too stupid to teleport past a choke point with her enemy so tantalizingly close.
Heading into the second level there was the same potential problem of lots of enemies waiting nearby to pounce. However, by using barkskin and entropy shield, Scorch could get his AC down to -11 (reduced to -7 when dancing). Even in HoF that's low enough to pose some problems to enemies and extend the life of iron skins (in IWD they also have a casting time of 1, so are relatively easy to renew). That makes it realistic to stand about dancing for a while until summons can establish themselves or put up insects and replace them with spirits as they die. Finishing off large numbers of trolls was a problem though. After a couple of times going in and out of the level, only one of those had been killed by a fire spirit and Scorch sped things up by waiting until unconscious trolls blocked the passage and using flaming oil on them.
With the entrance area eventually secure, moving round the area dealing with a few opponents at a time was no real challenge and Scorch picked up another level there. He had to resort to similar entrance-based tactics against another large group of trolls, but otherwise there were no problems until I came across some priests. They really shouldn't have been a problem either, but the line between life and death is always a fine one - I must have moved a beetle acting as scout too close to Scorch as it retreated and he suddenly froze in place from the area effect of hold person. The choke point meant the beetles lasted quite a long time - but not quite long enough ...
Edit: just looking at the spell description I see the area of effect is a 20' radius from the target rather than the 5' applied in BG - so it's no wonder I got caught in it. I might have to rethink tactics against that .
@Blackraven On an 8 inch tablet actually, but I suppose it still fits in my capacious pockets! Never easy but surprising what one can get used to .
Next random character: Gorch the neutral-evil half-orc shadowdancer. Party size capped at 4 (although he's likely to play solo a lot in order to make stealth more useful.) Hardcore difficulty. SCS v32b, BG1 NPC, randomizer, some tweaks & quests. Hopefully he doesn't do anything too reckless.
On the plus side I have discovered that it is just as well that Jarlaxle died in SoD as the prologue to SoA has him resurrected and creating the Region of Terror.
Let's hope that I can get Dreadnought up and running in Amn some time in the coming week. At least he finished SoD and had hardly started SoA. A good place for the problem to occur. Only problem is that with the sites that supply the mods being down, up to date versions of the mods won't be available.
Traveling with: Khalid, Ajantis, Imoen, Garrick, Jaheira
I am pleased to report that Coremage has made it to Shadows of Amn. We go through chapters 5-7 without much problem. Khalid attempted to solo the Undercity Iron Throne party, but instead he could only soften them up before retreating and having the party help finish off the enemies.
As for the Sarevok battle, rather than describe it, you can see it yourself in the video below.
Coremage battle vs. Sarevok (video)
Arstereth the Avenger: Part 4
It appears that Imoen's gear from the Baldur's Gate 1 part of the playthrough has been lost permanently. What a shame. She been carrying a lot of good stuff, including a Ring of Wizardry and the party's entire supply of Protection from Magic scrolls.After completing Korlasz's dungeon and leaving the palace, Arstereth only went to the Three Old Kegs to get Minsc and Dynaheir back, and to Sorcerous Sundries to sell their leftover loot and get lots of magic items. I didn't recruit Safana because I was planning on taking Glint.
Once the party reached the Coast Way Crossing, they recruited Glint and Corwin and went to the wilderness area to the west. There they slew a vampire and blew up some orcs.
Then they went back to the main area and headed to the east forest. Bad news: I forgot to have someone scout ahead in stealth or invisibility, and I accidentally aggroed the spider encounter before I was ready. The Gargantuan Spider webbed Corwin, and the spiders killed her! The first death in six chapters! Dynaheir avenged her though.
After raising Corwin, the party headed into the dwarven excavation. The undead in the first area weren't a big deal. I used my favorite anti-undead tactic from Icewind Dale: cast Wall of Moonlight and have all the undead walk into the wall! 5d10 magic damage with no save is an enormous amount of damage for basic undead creatures.
Against the umber hulks, I had Minsc go berserk (protection from confusion), equip Spider's Bane, and charge into Dynaheir's Webs. I must say, Minsc and Dynaheir make a great team!
The inner dungeon started off as it usually does for this party.
But at one point, the party accidentally set off a fireball trap, and a fireball was about to strike the entire party. Dynaheir was at 38 HP while the rest of the party had far more health left, so I paused and gave her a Ring of Fire Resistance, which had previously been worn by Arstereth. I expected my party would survive.
I unpaused. This was what happened.
Well, Arstereth survived (barely), but Glint got burned to ashes! He took 90 damage! That means that this fireball must have been cast at at least 8th level (and probably more) to do 45 normal damage. It wasn't one of those puny 5d6 damage fireballs that are common in Baldur's Gate 1.
Glint hadn't been as useful as the rest of the party, but his permanent death meant that I was left without a thief. The party retreated from the dungeon and recruited Safana.
Before the party returned to the dungeon, I had the party kill Edwin, because I had heard he had a special robe that makes the wearer do more fire damage.
It looks like Edwin had read my mind!
But he didn't have the special robe, so I consoled it in:
I gave it to Dynaheir, to enhance her fireballing.
Back to the dungeon! I was still going partly blind. I had done a previous playthrough in which I had stopped playing in the middle of this dungeon. I hadn't reached Coldhearth, though by looking in the game's files and reading on this forum I had learned that Coldhearth becomes a lich and you fight him. But I still didn't know anything else about him.
After fighting through the dungeon, the party finally encountered Coldhearth! I was REALLY scared. Here I was in a no-reload run on Insane and I was going blind against a lich with a low-level party! Arstereth used the first Protection from Undead scroll of the playthrough on Minsc. The party had two more of them.
I started off with my usual tactics against really powerful mages: I had Dynaheir animate some skeletons, and I threw them at the lich one by one, so that the lich would waste his spells on them.
It worked initially. Coldhearth cast Time Stop and then cast Lower Resistance and a few other spells on the skeleton. He killed the first skeleton with Abi-Dalzim's Horrid Wilting (this spell apparently was not using its Icewind Dale version; that version doesn't affect undead). But there were two more skeletons were that came from.
However, Coldhearth started coming up the stairs. I had Minsc go forward while the rest of the party ran for their lives. Surprisingly, the lich just stood there once Minsc came near. I waited until Coldhearth ran out of Protection from Magical Weapons spells and his Fire Shields expired, then Minsc dispelled the lich's sequencered Fire Shields, and the two remaining Skeleton Warriors killed the lich.
The party took Coldhearth's key, destroyed the lich's own Skeleton Warrior, and headed into the back chamber. Unfortunately, I was playing blind here, and I didn't notice that I could interact with things on the side of the room. It seemed like the room was just empty, as if it was something for a quest that I missed (perhaps Coldhearth's evil quest to kill the dwarves). The party stood around in the seemingly empty room for a little while.
Then Coldhearth came back. Oh crap. I was worried that this would happen.
Coldhearth had us cornered. We were still in the "empty room," which I still had not realized the purpose of. Dynaheir cast Haste on the party, and everyone fled past the lich while he began casting Time Stop. Once again, he wasted some spells on the skeletons that I put in his way, but then he walked past them and left his own Skeleton Warrior to deal with them. By this point, the party had fled back to the door that is opened by the four pillars. Arstereth summoned a few more bombardier beetle meatshields, but then Coldhearth cast a Minor Sequencer Stinking Cloud and Web on them, followed by a Death Spell. He kept following the party. Even Minsc's Protection from Undead effect didn't stop the lich this time: he simply walked past Minsc, pursuing the rest of the party. At one point, Coldhearth actually cast Remove Magic on himself while he was near Minsc, in order to remove the scroll (clever SOD AI), but Minsc got out of the way and was safe.
I suspected there must have been something in that secret room that I missed. I used CTRL-4 to outline all triggers in the area and saw that there were bunch of interactable skulls on the wall in that room. Now I realized that I needed to get back to that room. But now that the party had fled it, Coldhearth stood between the party and the room.
I devised a plan. The party was coming to a set of rooms that they could use to evade Coldhearth.
The party went counter-clockwise around the rooms while Coldhearth followed them. Then they ran back toward Coldhearth's secret room. But there was a problem.
The Web and Stinking Cloud spells that Coldhearth had previously released were still there. The party walked right into them. Dynaheir (who gets save bonuses against invocation spells) and Arstereth got through them just fine, but Corwin and Safana got stuck. Minsc tried to stand in Coldhearth's way, blocking his movement through a doorway, but he got through. By the time Safana and Corwin got loose, the lich was upon them. Coldhearth cast Power Word, Stun on Corwin. She had JUST too few HP to avoid getting stunned. Minsc fired an Arrow of Dispelling at her to dispel the effect, but it wasn't dispelled.
By this point, Arstereth had reached the secret room and retrieved the phylactery! Now he just needed to get to the fire portal! He used a second Scroll of Protection from Undead to get past the lich safely.
But Corwin was in trouble. She was still stunned and Coldhearth began casting a necromancy spell on her. Uh-oh. There was nothing any of the other party members could do to help her at the moment.
The lich finished casting the spell. It was Abi-Dalzim's Horrid Wilting.
...
Well, there goes another party member permanently.
Just kidding!
Now that's what you call a miracle. The small amount of magic resistance from Corwin's special armor saved her from almost certain death.
But Corwin was still stunned. Coldhearth began casting another necromancy spell on her. I couldn't count on her Magic Resistance saving her this time. So Arstereth used the party's last Protection from Undead scroll on her while the lich was casting the spell. This cancelled the lich's spell.
Then the stun ended. Arstereth put on Protection from Fire and rushed to the fire portal, throwing in the phylactery before the Fire Salamanders could stop him. Then Corwin finished off Coldhearth, this time permanently!
Victory!
Wow, that was more satisfying than beating Sarevok.
Next, we move on to the bridge, where we meet Caelar Argent!
We'll see what happens next some other time.
Yeldon - half-elf cleric/ranger, protagonist (Corey_Russell)
Keras - dwarven kensai (Grond0)
Denko - human dark moon monk (Gate70)
The Trio made great progress, though we did get the dropped connection issues on occasion. We got the key for the jail and wiped out the vampires. We carefully worked our way to to the level before Gromnir. We then rested and then returned, and went invisible before entering Gromnir's Throne Room.
The battle went well and Gromnir was indeed defeated.
So the next challenge was clearing the forest area. We managed it, but party was badly wounded from the affair.
Next was undead before Nylee - we played it carefully though surely our 2x sunrays from our items helped.
Unsurprisingly, Yaga's Temple was very dangerous and in fact had a number of deaths. The first one was when we were battling a group of fire giants and Keras gets killed by a trap, though he swears he was no where near it when it went off.
We make it to the next area and were SUPPOSED to range the enemies. However, Denko managed to get himself killed.
Keras isn't paying attention and doesn't notice when the fire giant cleric puts up physicial mirror - thus Keras' own Azuredge kills himself. Yeldon was paying attention however and stayed alive. He resurrected his friends and the rest of the temple went smoothly enough, if you don't count Yeldon mazing himself from a trap.
We come for Nylee and she was pretty easy. Yeldon warned about the nymphs, but Denko says he's targeting them first so should be fine. He still manages to get himself killed by a shambling mound, though. So another resurrection.
Finally it's time for Yaga himself. Keras nearly dies, but manages to kill the big giant in time. The party appreciates the upgrades from Yaga's stuff and time to save our session.
Imoen's stuff is in the top room of the Ducal Palace where your stuff is, in the dresser in the bottom left corner.