The first act in the session was to draw some spiders out of their house and dance up spirits to deal with them - taking me to level 8, with yet another 10 HPs .
I grabbed the pantaloons before heading to the coast to find some sirines - nymphs making those pretty easy.
Shooting down the golems got me access to the constitution tome to activate regeneration.
After a quick shopping trip, I decided it was time to tackle the main quest. Slinging and Fogs took me through to Mulahey, where I was spoilt for choice with options. I decided to go for a first use of Spirit Fires on him, while a Fog cut down most of Mulahey's would-be rescuers. Mulahey himself panicked and ran into the Fog to finish himself off.
More area damage then sorted out the Amazons.
In Nashkel, Nimbul failed to survive the probing hands of a couple of nymphs even long enough to get hammered by lightning.
Nymphly hands were even more deadly against Tranzig - causing deadly wounds there.
With time starting to run short, I went for speed at the Bandit Camp, using lightning to take down opponents without bothering about minimising damage taken. Taurgosz was the last of the first tranche of victims there before I rested.
Nymphs then waited outside the tent to ambush anyone brave enough to chase me. Venkt was the last to go - he was dominated and then waited patiently to see how many of the five bolts of lightning he could survive (one).
After selling surplus loot, there was just enough time to run through the Cloakwood to the mine - where Drasus will have to wait a bit longer to meet his nemesis.
Hal and I helped to reunite Albert and Rufie and killed Vax and Zal before heading westward where we helped a dryad against Caldo and Krumm. However we neglected to tell her about it. We then killed Ingot before going in search of Mutamin.
We killed some "Adventurers" who attacked us, then several basilisks before finally killing Mutamin himself.
Saving against silence was no help once his illusions were dispelled.
An SCS Insane Trilogy run of Rangers & Thieves [Halfling Swash]
Party is making its way through chapter 2. We recruited Nalia and did some early quests (CC, CC sewer) to hit 250k xp and then picked up Jan and Valygar.
Nalia has a 7 day timer before she leaves the party to go wait outside her Keep. I used that time to do trademeet/druids, and tried to sneak in a little athkatla questing as well but ran out of time.
The early green rElec scroll got used by charname in the druid grove. Wisely it turned out, as he got hit by a call lightning bolt.
We saved the troll cave for after Faldorn, and bought 10x invisibility potions from the rakhshasas (leaving the fight with them for chapter 6). Cernd killed Faldorn, and traps/backstab killed the Dao genies. One chapter 2 quest arc down!
Back in Athkatla, Nalia soon left the party, saying she could wait no longer and would meet us outside the De'arnise Keep. My thinking on the DK in SCS insane has changed a few times over the years. In the pre-SCS days, I used to think of the DK as the chumpiest of the four remote chapter 2 dungeons (DK, druids, windspear, shadow temple). All it had were some dumb trolls with no magic.
But in SCS, DK is probably the second most dangerous dungeon after Windspear. The trollish regeneration is very strong if you can't control it with fire/acid, and the spirit trolls have very nasty spell books as well as substantial damage resistance. In particular, they can cast greater command, and my party doesn't have chaotic commands.
But, this run through DK I think I finally have it solved pretty well (at least for this party comp). Always, always fight spirit troll packs with fireballs, don't try to melee them to death to save on resting. Then, the only issue is Torgal himself.
Torgal is a very dangerous opponent in SCS insane. He has ~200 hp with very high regen, a fear aura, and 3 apr at -1 thac0 that do ~25 damage a hit. While it is not impossible to tank him (lots of MI / stoneskin, or very good AC), he will easily burn down the hp of less well defended characters. And if he isn't killed, he will regen back to full very quickly.
He also comes with 2 spirit trolls, an umber hulk elder, 1-2 giant troll(s), a spectral troll, and two yuanti mages.
It's very easy to lose control of this fight, either to greater command or damage spells from the spirit trolls, yuanti casting, umber hulk confusion, torgal's fear aura or dps, or just the initial bum rush of enemy melee combatants.
So this time, the party decided to aggressively commit consumable resources to victory. We had 3 firebreath potions, 1 potion of explosions, 3 fiery burning potions, 2 charges from the lost amulet, as well as a few elemental scrolls for summoning. Yoshi and charname set traps at the edge of the room, intending to use Torgal's "detect invisible" script to pull him forward into the traps. I did realize before the fight started that we did not have resist fear, which was concerning, but we decided to press forward anyway.
Overall, the fight went mostly as planned, and we got through without any deaths (a rarity for me on this fight). Torgal died to traps + two firebreath potions, which a hasted valygar also used to tag the other trolls. 3-4 fireballs were sent after the fight open to the main body of the enemy squad, which also dealt substantial damage.
A little melee clean-up just left the yuanti mages. Unfortunately, I missed or they resisted both chaos spells from Jan and Nalia, and their script was smart enough to walk them out of the cloud kill zone created by Nalia later in the fight. However, they didn't do anything too nasty and were ultimately killed by spell thrusts, dispel illusion, and magic arrows.
That leaves the party relatively safe for the rest of chapter 2/3. The toughest fight we'll do before leaving for brynlaw is probably the vampires in windspear, but the party should have the MoD by then and Minsc is racial enemy vampire, so it shouldn't be too bad as long as I tag them with malison first.
At the Cloakwood Mine, Kysus died just as the nymphs launched a round of confusions - essentially ending the fight as a contest.
Inside the mine, spirits cleared a path to the second level where Spirit Fire and then Writhing Fog helped discourage the waiting ambushers.
At the bottom it took a while for Fogs and spirits to wear down the first battle horror, but I was rewarded for the wait with a final BGEE level - unfortunately though my almost perfect HP record couldn't quite be maintained to the close, with just 5 HPs this time.
Davaoern then died of area damage. I thought that might prompt the other battle horror to run away, so used a wand for the first time to strike him down.
With the mine still gurgling behind me, I raced on to find the City. The tomes were an early target, with Ramazith showing his spirit to open the way up his tower.
Spirits were set up on each level to ambush pursuers as I worked upstairs to get the intelligence tome.
Jalantha was held by a nymph to give the chance to pick up the wisdom tome before Lothander and Marek also ran into trouble with nymphs, while in between Larze was undone by a first use of stunning darts.
Shopping and inventory management used up the remaining time in the session, so a return to Candlekeep will have to wait for next time.
After we killed the basilisks and Mutamin we were joined by Shar-Teel.
We hunted ankheg to pay for some Shadow Armour and The Army Scythe. Strangely, for an evil character she was not fazed by our reputation of 20.
We killed Droth and Shoal and then with the help of Hal's True Sight we killed some sirine.
Ajantis and Dynaheir then joined us and we went to Durlag's Tower where wand of frost was highly effective .
Shar-Teel pick-pocketted Kirinhale's spear and we then went for the kill but Kirinhale escaped by leaving our plane.
Shar-Teel was badly injured after being poisoned by a phase spider and Ajantis was badly injured by a skeleton warrior. Nevertheless, we are all still alive.
There is still one of the warders riddles left to solve but that will have to await another time. We are now resting at the Carnival and once we are fully prepared the Nashkel Mines await.
Shar-Teel now has two suits of armour to wear. Durlag's Plate when her role is a fighter and Shadow Armour for when she needs to act as a thief.
EDIT
In the mines we joined up with Xan before dealing with Mulahey.
Upon leaving we killed the Amazons before leaving Xan in the safety of the Carnival. At Beregost Officer Vai took nearly two dozen bandit scalps off our hands.
At the start of the session I decided to go and get the Ring of Energy before I forgot that.
Then it was back to the City where lightning, nymphs and spirits killed Degrodel's guards. The mage himself died in a few Fogs after handing over some scrolls.
A few statues were next before I went to pick up the Cloak of Balduran - the last item upgrade sought.
The dopplegangers at the Seven Suns were beaten up with my non-proficient club before I tackled the Iron Throne. That involved leaving a nymph downstairs for distraction while enemies were picked off with stunning darts or poison arrows.
With the casters all dead, spirits could handle Gardush and Zhalimar.
I reported for duty in Candlekeep and used the violet potion there to loot the tombs. After working through some dopplegangers, nymphs spread confusion among Prat's gang before finishing off the leftovers.
I had plenty of Fogs left to grind down the basilisks on the way out to save me using any resources to get past them. The few remaining minutes saw a bit of inventory management to get ready for the final battles before going after Sarevok tomorrow.
I tried to have a bit of fun by dominating Slythe and making him go after Krystin, but he must have treated a follow-up domination as hostile and turned back to attack the nymphs almost instantly - and was held for his pains.
Krystin was confused from out of sight and soon showed herself to also be held.
At the palace, the nymphs wasted their dominations to avoid any nasty accidents during the fight. Their confusions were nicely timed to arrive just after the dopplegangers showed themselves and affected 4 of them. The other 2 were hit with dispelling arrows before I switched to acid to help the nymphs clear the field - Belt and Liia both surviving comfortably.
After pulling Belt into the back room, I allowed Sarevok to kill Liia (to get her equipment) before showing myself.
A PfU scroll helped make the trip through the maze easier and that lasted long enough to deal with the 4 skeleton warriors in the Undercity as well. Area damage with a few final touches from spirits accounted for the party nearby, to provide me with another couple of exploding arrows.
I decided to play fair(ish) in the final battle. A Writhing Fog brought Sarevok out on the attack, but he was immediately evaded using the pillars. Semaj teleported out in support, but was distracted by a single pre-summoned nymph and he, Tazok and Angelo were then killed using more Fogs.
A 5th shot got through Sarevok's defences and dispelled his haste, making it easy to continue to shoot him.
When he was almost dead I decided to switch to using spirits to finish him off and a single critical hit duly did that, though as usual it took a moment or two after being hit for Sarevok to realize he was supposed to be dead.
I still had a bit of time left in the session. I had just enough XP to take a level in SoD, learning Pixie Dust in the process. I also bought up useful equipment from the cleric there, but decided to save there rather than spend the last few minutes exploring the dungeon. Here's my character record and inventory at the start of SoD.
Shaman 10, 88 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 288 kills
Spells to date (in order of selection, though the first spells listed at each level are shaman only additions not requiring a pick):
L1 - Spirit Ward, CLW, Bless, Armor of Faith, Entangle, Doom
L2 - Writhing Fog, Charm P / M, Resist Fire / Cold, Slow Poison, Barkskin
L3 - Spiritual Clarity, Call Lightning, Summon Insects, Protection from Fire
L4 - Spirit Fire, Call Woodland Beings, Death Ward
L5 - Recall Spirit, Pixie Dust
Pearl, Ruva, Valos, Rila Lira, Poppy, and Yi Grovana in IWD2:EE
Part 3
Time to tackle the Horde Fortress! Since we finally have a little breathing room, I decide to go ahead and create our final, 6th party member, a mage.
Yi Grovana is an old name with a new portrait. The EE specialist schools are changed up, and as a Necromancer, Yi will only lose out on Conjuration spells.
We have to be super careful since Yi only has 5 HP and a single hit can kill her. But then, our primary tank, Valos, is also pretty easy to kill in Insane mode.
She was wounded when this hit landed, but still, these half-goblins don't even need to roll critical hits to deal 30+ damage. We lose most of our remaining funds bringing Valos back.
Trugnuk has always been a very scary encounter in IWD2, as he comes bolstered with multiple spellcasters and LOTS of fighters. As I nearly always do, I summon monsters and then sneak over to Trugnuk's band. This is a tricky encounter with multiple competing threats: we use Entangle to thwart the enemies coming in from the west, a party-friendly Web spell to disrupt the spellcasters to the east, send Valos to shut down Trugnuk's spells with the Moonblade, and have our primary damage dealer, Ruva, slash up the War Drum before any enemies can use it to summon enemy worg riders. We fail to snare a couple of Ice Trolls, who easily land hits on Ruva. Only Ruva's crazy maximum HP keeps her safe.
Trugnuk can't do much with the Moonblade bearing down on him, and Valos thankfully dodges the one Call Lightning spell with her Mirror Image pre-buff (as a deep gnome she gets a free casting of the spell once per day). Once the drum is gone, Ruva marches over to help clear up the spellcasters to the east before the Web spell wears off, and we keep throwing out area-effect disablers to keep the pressure off of our vulnerable spellcasters and keep the fighters to the west safely pinned down. When the coast is clear, Pearl, our druid, helps clear the field with Rainstorm.
An unfortunate crash forces us to repeat the fight, which we badly mismanage. Thankfully some dense layering of party-friendly Web spells in a narrow area held down both enemy spellcaster and fighter and our sorcerer barely clung to life with Mirror Image.
We suffer another two avoidable deaths in the goblin warrens when I fail to appreciate how vulnerable Pearl is to Flame Arrows, which hit very hard and bypass AC. Yi Grovana also died, less surprisingly. We actually had to sell off some stuff just to afford the resurrections.
Yi Grovana is an elf and can only be raised by Resurrection (when we're at a healer, anyway; things will be different when our own cleric can cast Raise Dead), which is far more expensive. Mercifully, Yi is low-level and so the cost is only so high. Otherwise elves can be very pricey to revive.
We chop through a bunch of fights by relying on Web, Spider Spawn, and Valos and Ruva's tanking abilities (thankfully we're about done with half-goblins and their high attack bonuses). We hit level 7, getting level 4 cleric and druid spells and allowing our druid to finally use polar bear form, which gives her an extra attack per round and sky-high Strength.
The problem is the rooftop battle, which is very long and has more enemies than we've EVER faced before. And since I don't like fleeing fights in IWD2, we have to clear the field before we can leave.
It's ugly.
Seeing Yi Grovana die again is no surprise. But in a grim repudiation of my faith in the Toughness feat, Ruva is getting thrashed, and she is trapped. Even Ruva can't chop through enemies fast enough to get to safety.
We need to get Rila Lira, our cleric, over to Ruva so she can heal up our best fighter. Ruva is our best hope of actually putting down these enemies, and if we can get our cleric close enough, we can spam spontaneously cast healing spells to repair her.
But that will take a little time, and right now our cleric can't reach her. Instead, Rila Lira casts Hold Monster, and since we're no longer in Shaengarne and not every enemy in sight has rage immunities, she can actually freeze a lot of critters here.
It won't be enough, though; we've got even more enemies coming in from the west, and archers attacking from the east. This area is a terrifying mix of melee fighters, archers, and spellcasters both arcane and divine.
Finally we do enough chopping to break free, though our cleric is occupied for the moment. With Ruva out of the crowd, our sorcerer, Poppy, uses a Fireball scroll we've been hoarding for emergencies. Valos' monk level lets her dodge the whole thing by making a Reflex save.
The enemy launches a Fireball of their own, but Ruva is out of range--though Pearl suffers for it. Finally, finally we get Ruva to our healer.
Spontaneous casting ignores aura, and Improved Initiative gives us a -1 bonus to casting speed--and healing spells are very quick. In seconds, our cleric restores over 100 HP, and our fighter is back up to speed. Our other party members are struggling, though; we haven't been able to keep all the enemy mages webbed.
We withdraw from the Web now that the field is a bit more clear and we start chipping away at the enemy. Pearl uses winter wolf form to deal area-effect cold damage from afar; we do NOT want to wrestle with the Verbeegs and their deadly Knockdown spells.
The enemy is too hobbled to break us. We stay afloat with potions and healing spells and fight from a safe distance while most of the survivors are struggling to move. Every little number counts; IWD2 is very much a game of optimizing numbers.
Once the field is clear, we soldier on and head west to finish off the enemies--I could slip away and rest, but for purism reasons I want to take down everything in the area first, even if we're low on spells. We use some Burning Oils and Snilloc's Snowball Swarms to get some early kills on the archers so they won't use up their valuable magic ammunition--I want that for gold fodder.
This section of the fight isn't nearly as intense, so we can get by without full buffs and our best spells. It's just cleanup at this point.
With the rooftop bloody and the battlefield quiet, we head home to resurrect our flimsy elf. The leader of the horde, Guthma, waits for us to return. We have some bugbears to kill.
Corethief XXX the halfling thief Update - BG 2 EE, no mods, core rules
Traveling with: Korgan, Mazzy, Jaheira, Yoshimo, Aerie
Chunked: Minsc, Nalia (both killed by Firkraag)
Permanently dead: Valygar (used his body to open planar sphere)
We have made tremendous progress - most of Chapter Two complete, just need to deal with the Illithid hideout in the sewers. We decided we should be strong enough to take on some dragons. Well, that was true, only barely. Despite 3 snares and lots of good summons, the fight went badly - mostly because Firkraag opened with a dispel (which removed our fear protection) then made characters run in fear. This made the fight chaos. Eventually, Nalia and Minsc were chunked, and all other party members dead. I only prevailed because Corethief XXX put on the haste boots, used a haste potion (keeping in mind Firkraag is still hasted himself), and ran around throwing bullets - this was enough to get the kill. RIP Nalia and Minsc. Nalia in particular will be sorely missed, as she had memorized many of our high level spells we had collected to this point.
Since I was intending to recruit Imoen all along, we recruited Yoshimo and Mazzy. With Yoshimos traps, the fight with Thaxxy went much better, and we won quickly, maybe 3 rounds.
We will deal with the Illlithid hideout next, then go to Brynnlaw to get Imoen. The quest continues...
Dassareth, Undead Hunter with a custom party, Introduction
Hey everyone; Over half a year ago, I started an Undead Hunter run, and while I've been moving at a snails pace (about one area per week), now it's time to post some updates.
I'm playing with SCS+Ascension, using the previous SCS version (because I started before the new one came out), and the tactical variant of SCS, with all of the options installed (including some I've never tried, such as the party losing their gear in Spellhold). My party setup is a full custom party inspired by my LoB run, where a half-orc Kensai wielding throwing daggers was my most effective damage dealer. It's very heavy on physical damage and buffs. The only reason I chose an Undead Hunter PC is because the kit is still missing in the Hall of Heroes.
Now, let's meet our characters:
Dassareth, lawful good human female Undead Hunter
18/46, 18, 18, 11, 13, 18
Our Bhaalspawn is starting with **Maces and **Longbows - Longbows are purely for BG1, Maces are there as an anti-skeleton weapon early on. She'll add specializations in Axes (for Azure Edge and the two +3 axes in early BG2) and later on various two-handed weapons (for Carsomyr and, eventually, The Ravager). Dassareth will wear my most powerful defensive items, but unlike previous PCs, I won't shy away from using her at the front lines. I intend to use her kit in order to seek out several types of undead early on to get some relatively easy experience.
Starting with **War Hammers and **Short Swords, this one is your typical super-powerful melee fighter with berserker immunities. I'm going for Ashideena in BG1, Dwarven Thrower in early SoA, and Crom Faeyr + Kundane in the late game, so he'll eventually end up having grandmastery in War Hammers and some dual wielding skills.
Starting with **Daggers and **Long Swords, this one will use throwing daggers for most of the game, going for early grandmastery. Later on, there will be some option to dual wield a powerful Long Sword with Belm in the offhand. However, I realized pretty early on that the power this kind of character had in LoB is simply not there on a regular difficulty level - there just isn't that much danger when it comes to going into melee combat, and my berserker ended up being much more useful in pretty much every way, so I ended up not playing around the Kensai as much as I had planned to.
Galderan, true neutral gnomish male Cleric/Thief
18/18/18/12/17/3
This one is my typical pure utility character, mainly here to deal with traps, locks, illusions, buffing the party and summoning skeletons. Will be using slings and various blunt weapons, plus some quarterstaff action for backstabbing.
There's nothing better in order to buff up a fighter-heavy six person party than a Skald - and in the late game, improved Bard Song does grant some extremely important undispellable immunites, while HLA traps are very broken. This one isn't going to attack much, except maybe with some wands in SoD.
Rowin, true neutral elven male Sorcerer
18/19/17/18/5/9
Now that I have more knowledge of the new IWD spells in the current SCS versions, I'm fine with playing a sorcerer again. This will give me early access to Emotion: Hope and Emotion: Courage, for example - great buffs for this type of party. Here are some rough ideas about the key spell choices I plan to go with:
Level 1: Usual stuff - blind, shield, magic missle, pfp, maybe spook?
Level 2: Web and defensive spells (blur, MI, resist fear)
Level 3: Haste and Slow, dispel and remove magic, maybe flame arrow?
Level 4: Stoneskin and the two positive emotions, secret word
Level 5: Spell immunity and spell shield + breach, maybe animate dead
Level 6: Death spell, improved haste, and some utility or defensive stuff
Level 7: Mass Invis, Mordy Swords and Ruby Ray, not sure what else
Level 8: Mind Blank and Horrid Wilting, will see what else we need
Level 9: Spell Strike and Time Stop, propably wish?
So, all in all, how will this party funcion? For the most part, our skald will cast some defensive self-buffs and sing, our cleric/thief will cast buffs such as bless, prayer, recitation, pfe 10' radius for general purposes and specific immunities if needed (remove fear, death ward, chaotic commands etc.) with the ability to protect his buffs later on (entropy shield, impervious sanctitity of mind), the sorcerer will also buff up the party (emotions, haste/ihaste, mass invis and the like) while disabling spell protections, breaching and throwing down some nukes if needed, while the three fighter-types will do most of the actual fighting.
In my previous SCS run, I noted that I wanted to up the SCS difficulty slider from tactical to insane for my next attempt, but since I've taken such a long break from the game, I decided not to do so yet - this turned out to be a mistake, at least for BG1. Enemy spellcasters don't pre-buff with enough defenses to make them challenging, as our fighter-types can just cut through their few buffs with sheer force, and often, there isn't even a shield present, so we can simply use magic missles. This may change later on - we shall see.
I'll try to write an update every day, but I won't go into too much detail, mostly because I hardly remember anything about the early parts of the run, having started over half a year ago.
Enuhal said...
I decided not to do so yet - this turned out to be a mistake, at least for BG1.
While I only play unmodded and core rules, it is rarely BG 1 that sets me back. In fact, most times, if I do fail a run, it's usually in ToB. In order to get that far (especially on SCS) will take a great amount of consistency on your part, so if you do end up succeeding, it will still be well earned, even if BG 1 was nearly routine. Just my 2 cents, anyways!
Some explanation for my thinking:
With SCS, I do not enjoy how the difficulty levels of BG1 and ToB compare - BG1 is, in comparison, mostly unchanged, with the exception of a few spellcaster battles on the most difficult settings, while ToB tends to go completely overboard with additional dragons, liches, tons of HLAs flying around, having to strip every spellcaster of multiple spell protections and breaching them etc. - not that it's impossible to do, but because you are forced into taking you own power to the same extremes, you spend tons of time pre-buffing, and battles can take a very, very long time to resolve (especially the Ascension battles). It just feels tedious to me after a while. Having more of a challenge in BG1 and a more subdued version of ToB (doesn't need to be easier, just less stuff going on, maybe even a strong reduction in available experience and levels for all involved) would help me keep my interest througout the series a lot more - and I would enjoy new challenges in BG1, because I like the lower level gameplay and it doesn't feel quite as bad to lose a run early on compared to losing one in ToB.
I'm frustrated by ToB in general, even without SCS (so just uninstalling the improved lairs wouldn't be helpful for me) - in vanilla mode, it feels like 90% of the expansion is the Bhaalspawn somewhat effortlessly, but tediously wading through hordes of enemies (oh, how I hate Sendai's Enclave), while 10% of the time you have to stay super alert to avoid getting oneshot by bosses like Draconis. Very uneven, and overall not very exciting to me. SoA-style gameplay with fewer, but more unique encounters is certainly more enjoyable in my opinion.
...
I'll try to write an update every day, but I won't go into too much detail, mostly because I hardly remember anything about the early parts of the run, having started over half a year ago.
It's too late for this run, but general advice for any run you might post: keep a log of events as you play. It doesn't have to be anything fancy; I just use a plain text file describing what happened and marking where I took screenshots. Then refer back to the log when writing the posts.
...
I'll try to write an update every day, but I won't go into too much detail, mostly because I hardly remember anything about the early parts of the run, having started over half a year ago.
It's too late for this run, but general advice for any run you might post: keep a log of events as you play. It doesn't have to be anything fancy; I just use a plain text file describing what happened and marking where I took screenshots. Then refer back to the log when writing the posts.
Another way to do basically the same thing is to take lots of screenshots. You wouldn't necessarily have to use all the screenshots in your posts, but they would clue you in on what you did, and also the portraits can clue you in on other events - characters confused, dead, etc.
I do have over 300 screenshots already - if something major, such as a character death, the main character getting hit by a disabling status effect, a chapter-ending battle etc. happens, there's always at least one screenshot of the event, often multiple ones - but I mostly won't be able to reconstruct exact battle sequences from these, and a lot of minor quests and battles get lost. However, since I've done hundreds of battle reports in earlier runs and I rarely completely change my strategies, I feel like only significant milestones, failures and unusual approaches require a more detailed write-up at this point.
As for taking notes, sadly, I'm just way too lazy for that One time many years ago, I planned on taking detailed notes and writing RP descirptions for one run, but I stopped after just a couple of sessions because it felt like too much work to me.
With the sheer power of the skald song in early levels, wandering monsters didn't stand much of a chance against the party. For early encounters against bounty hunters and other potential threats, I used a combination of blindness and command, hoping that at least one of these would stick - and it usually did:
Having made our way to Nashkel, we completed some of the easier quests around the Lion's Way to gather some experience. In the process, we obtained some powerful weapons for our three fighter-types: The Stupefier for Dassareth was easy to get, Ashideena +2 only required for us to disrupt Bassilus' spellcasting, and while Greywolf made his saves against all attempts to disable him, his bad armor allowed the party to easily hit him with a bless and the skald song buffing everyone's thac0:
With the party at around level 3, Rowin had enough PfP spells for an extended basilisk hunt:
One tiny personal challenge I decided to set myself for this run was to never run from ambushes - with my levels and the ability to swap around equipment with extra AC against missle weapons, the dreaded mass bandit ambush wasn't all that dangerous at this point:
Once Rowin got access to Web, I was able to take on some of the more threatening groups of enemies - I bought some magical ammo for these vampire wolves:
And claimed the Golden Girdle in a rather uneven battle against webbed adventurers:
With most of the easier wilderness areas cleared, I made my way down the Nashkel mines. Cadrax and Dassareth were easily capable of tanking the masses of improved kobolds, and Mulahey didn't even survive long enough for our first spells to hit him:
Bonus: Silke, despite being at quite a high level, forgets to add shield to her prebuff-list:
Next time, I will report on a sequence of events I like to call "The Great Silencing", plus the clearing of the remaining wilderness areas (not including the dungeons) and the battle for the bandit camp - and we will get to see the first signs of trouble and bad play.
In the SoD prologue, Porios was as usual intimidated into surrendering. PfU allowed me to kill 3 groups of undead without difficulty. Mainly that was using melee, but I kept Spirit Fire back to catch the invisible wraith in - in fact a single one of those was sufficient thanks to the double damage against spectral undead.
That left a number available for the group of mercenaries blocking the way to Korlasz - entangle helping to lock them into place while damage rained down.
I rested before assaulting Korlasz - those deadly nymph touches were at it again there.
The nymphs didn't last long after that, but retreating to the Flaming Fist and summoning some spirits completed the victory.
In the City various NPCs were killed and their equipment sold off to supplement the 62k or so worth of items in my containers. The only quests done were to grab the Spectacles and retrieve some wine to get the Battle Tankard, to be able to avoid fatigue against Belhifet when using restoration scrolls. Apart from potions and scrolls I bought the Buckler of the Fist - that's not only a good shield in SoD, but will reappear again in SoA if you have it in your inventory (not a bag) at the end of SoD.
There was just time to do the battle at the Coast Way Forest, although that didn't turn out as intended. I mis-clicked on the conversation and fought Tsolak rather than helping him (missing out on the regeneration ioun stone, though that's not much use to this character anyway). I could have just retreated, but decided to run the gauntlet of traps to go and stake the vampire.
On the way back to the Coast Way Crossing I came across some orcs and trolls. I wanted the Firefly sling from that encounter, but thought the few minutes available wouldn't have been sufficient to fight everything there - so just recovered it invisibly. That meant there was still time to give Takos back his heirlooms - and take back the identification mirror as a reward - before saving.
I'm frustrated by ToB in general, even without SCS (so just uninstalling the improved lairs wouldn't be helpful for me) - in vanilla mode, it feels like 90% of the expansion is the Bhaalspawn somewhat effortlessly, but tediously wading through hordes of enemies (oh, how I hate Sendai's Enclave), while 10% of the time you have to stay super alert to avoid getting oneshot by bosses like Draconis. Very uneven, and overall not very exciting to me. SoA-style gameplay with fewer, but more unique encounters is certainly more enjoyable in my opinion.
I hear that. I've finished I and II many times but never managed to get through ToB. I always get bored somewhere around whatever is past the fire giant temple. Every fight is like 10 minutes of prep for 1 minute of combat, and stressful because you have to worry that you missed an immunity somewhere or some mage casts a wish or some monster has a special ability you weren't prepared for...
Anyway; trying to commit to not getting bored in ToB so I can at least get to throne - even if my party wipes there.
The only other thing I really don't like in SCS is the lich in spellhold..
During the BG1 midgame, the save penalty integrated into Silence 15' radius is hard to beat. Additionally, a lot of spellcasters don't have MGoI or Vocalize available in the current SCS version, at least on the tactical setting. As a result, a whole bunch of would-be assassins and wandering wizards fell to the power of Galderan's Silence - Nimbul, Molkar's Party, Narcillius and the Amazons, to name but a few (though in case of the ambush parties, webs were also involved):
While exploring the Sword Coast, the first death in the party occured (on purpose) due to Shoal's Kiss, but I accidentally killed the Nereid, despite remembering to only use fists when facing Tenya earlier on:
Too bad. After a quick visit to the temple, the eastern parts of the map were explored, and while I did quite well against the red wizards (with the help of some skeletons, silence, berserker rage etc.), my first big blunder occured when facing the big group of spiders to the east of the old ruins in the center of the map. As far as I remember, I entered this encounter by accident, with a somewhat exhausted party and without any summons or major spells left, and I completely forgot about the fact that SCS grants giant spiders the ability to shoot webs at their foes. As soon as I saw the first webs flying, I knew that I was in trouble, and both of my fighters got webbed pretty much right away - and a webbed target getting attacked by sword spiders, wraith spiders and/or phase spiders can die within seconds. I was forced to kill quickly or be killed, and my only options were for my spellcasters to use their wand charges - first, monster summoning to distract some of the foes, and heavens+frost to nuke down the sword spider, which had the potential to be incredibly dangerous due to its high APR:
Khelbara was already poisoned by the phase spider with its deadly 5 damage per tick poison, but 19 constitution results on lots of hitpoints, so she would stand a chance of survival if the phase spider was taken out quickly - which it was, with the second round of wand charges. I also had to watch the combat log with great care, in order to identify the next potential victim of a web tangle before the ability would hit - and Dassareth herself was the target. Luckily, she was able to drink a potion of freedom before impact, keeping her safe:
With Dassareth tanking, our fighters recovered from being webbed with one third of their hitpoints left - a somehwat painful, but not too costly victory was claimed:
This, once again, goes to show how powerful wands are in BG1 - I didn't really get punished for my lack of caution (though I did decide to stock up on potions of freedom as a consequence).
I fared much better with the remaining outdoor wilderness areas - no trouble with any flesh golems, black talon elites, sirens and the like. With only the rather dangerous dungeon areas, some specific super-hard battles (such as Kahrk), TotSC content and the main questline available, I decided to storm the bandit camp next - and things started off great, with a wand of paralyzation hit on Taugosz, before the bandits could even gather up and defend:
As bandits started approaching my position, Rowin began throwing down multiple webs, and Sentenza used one or two wand of fire charges, while Cadrax, equipped with very good AC against missle weapons, tanked most incoming hits, and the others provided targeted ranged damage:
Venkt didn't get webbed right away, so I tried to silence him, but he was the first enemy spellcaster to actually roll good saving throws. Still, the next round, web did finally affect him, and so did the wand of paralyzation:
The remaining webbed enemies were shot down, and as the battle ended, only Cadrax and Dassareth ended up slightly wounded:
Pretty decent results. I never really use Web or Silence outside of BG1, but they sure do pack a punch at this point of the game. I guess mages would be more likely to start with MGoI on the insane SCS setting, so that would certainly make things a bit more interesting.
Next time, we will enter Cloakwood and do much of the same - web hostile parties, use powerful wands and consumables, but this time, hopefully with less urgency - oh, and a spell I almost never use makes a surprisingly successful appearance.
There's not much required combat in SoD, so I was able to make quite a bit of progress today ...
I approached the Coast Way Crossing bridge invisibly, in order to make it even easier to nip behind the tent to avoid any combat there before Caelar arrived.
Then I skipped through the Troll Claw Woods and on to the Forest of Wyrms. Still invisible, I bypassed various groups to get into the temple and seek out Ziatar - or, more accurately, seek out the location where I knew him to be and subject that to area bombing .
After resting, I summoned some nymphs and buffed up to ensure none of the many disabling effects from the Neothelid could affect me while dealing with that.
Akanna was confused by a nymph early on, before she could sanctuary, and was about to die even before she was then held.
Firebreath potions finished off the aerial servants quickly. On the way out a single non-proficient dagger found a draconic target to get me another level.
Call lightning got an outing on the way to Boareskyr Bridge - helping, rather than hurting, a green dragon this time.
Vichand got the same treatment, dying to my blast without the need for the additional nymphly ones.
Before going into the fort, I visited the local goblin cave. Spirit Fire helped cleanse that, allowing me to pick up the shaman-only Circlet of Lost Souls.
Inside the Fort I had some dragon armor made - for most characters I prefer the shield, but the shaman can't use that while the armor is a significant upgrade on studded leather (3 better AC, with bonus of poison immunity). After shooting down a wraith I had some stones reshaped into sling bullets (which, slightly oddly given the nature of other available options, do benefit from strength bonuses). Then I bought some more potions from Thirrim (it was day-time so no need to worry about being interrupted there) and surrendered the fort.
That still left the potentially tricky fight on the bridge, where it's a really bad idea to let the mage open a fire portal . Normally I use the Ring of Energy to disrupt him, but an opening shot with a dispelling arrow struck home, allowing a follow-up arrow of piercing to break his concentration. He was almost dead following that anyway, when one of the nymph holds took effect on him.
I tried summoning spirits, but they were clearly not up to dealing with the remaining guards and I tackled those myself - briefly putting on the Circlet meant Call Lightning generated 3 of those vicious bolts from a single spell to make short work of the enemies.
I bypassed a big hole in the ground on the way to the Coalition Camp, where the Spectacles generated Nazramu for a bit of shopping. After a quick chat with the camp commanders I moved on to Dead Mans Pass. As usual I just skipped through there, though I did take the time to pick up another shaman-specific item.
Then it was on to Dragonspear to find Skie. I once more tried out spirits, this time wearing both shaman items to upgrade them. They were still pretty hopeless against multiple enemies though and I needed to run round a bit to split those up to allow the spirits to triumph.
The extra time that took used up the remainder of the session, so the Underground River will have to wait until tomorrow.
Looking at the world map there didn't seem to be much to gain from further exploration, so we headed for the Nashkel Mine. Voka used her staff almost exclusively going through there - and did a pretty good job with it. On arrival at Mulahey there was plenty of time for a rest before Wacky silenced any prospect of having to listen to competing clerical philosophies and melee did the rest.
Outside the mine Voka rediscovered her spells with a vengeance. Blinds, stinking clouds and skull traps were already overkill in combination - but Wacky still couldn't resist adding her own minor contribution with silence and holy smite.
Nimbul was another to go silently to his grave before we returned to Beregost to pick on some spiders and find Tranzig. Wacky was just considering what to use on him when Voka attacked without preparation. He soon took an acid arrow for his pains, so Wacky hurriedly reviewed his options for helping out and came up with a holy smite - that did indeed do a bit of damage to Tranzig, but rather more to Wacky's evil companion and Tranzig took advantage to inflict a death.
After a temple visit and finishing off Tranzig, it was time to visit the Bandit Camp. After pacifying the exterior, Voka sneaked inside where blind and webs set up a skull trap finish. Wacky wanted to set off the trap - preferring to get a few gold from Ender Sai than a few XP for disarming it - but neglected to warn Voka of what he was doing. Fortunately she was out of the firing line that time .
After an abortive trip and a return to the Bandit Camp to read the correct letter, we moved on to the Cloakwood. Voka immediately got involved in meleeing some xvarts and Wacky sized them up for a holy smite before taking pity on Voka and settling for a hold person this time .
In the second area Wacky got poisoned by a spider while disarming the first trap and Voka triggered the remainder invisibly to allow us to run through - and we kept running on to the mine. There the blind and web combination proved deadly once more - this time to Drasus & co. There was no real trouble in the mine, with Wacky choosing to trigger the traps controlling the battle horrors, so Voka could use skull traps on them. Davaeorn survived that, but not the follow-up backstab on him.
In the City an ogre mage died in webs and we worked up through Ramazith's Tower despite making hard work of the ghasts when Wacky's turn undead failed to keep them running reliably enough. Voka had obviously been planning ahead as he had a PfP ready for Wacky to tackle a basilisk - though a critical backstab meant the spell was not actually needed.
While doing the poison quest we tried to tackle Degrodel's guards, but quickly found that most of our damage options were a bit dodgy to use in the crowded city. Voka resorted to the wand of frost on a couple of enemies outside before Wacky tried to collect a grouping together inside to provide a nice target. Her intended sanctuary was interrupted though and she became surrounded - a potion of invisibility being required to save her there.
Voka acted as a distraction to free Wacky and we then had quite a long period of running round outside with the odd backstab and wand blast to kill all those attackers. Wacky thought there might still be an invisible stalker hiding though and, despite being low on HPs and out of useful spells, couldn't resist the challenge. Putting on her full plate and golden girdle meant the stalker needed a critical to hit and for a while things were looking good. However, when the stalker did get a blow in Wacky was down to single figure HPs and moved back out of range. Voka still had 2 wand charges left and fired one of those to take the stalker from badly wounded to near death, before running out of the house. Wacky tried to get sufficient space to use her magic missile wand, but that was slow to fire and the stalker was in no mood to give any more second chances ...
On the way to Cloakwood we killed an ogre with a belt fetish.
In Cloakwood I proved that the name that I had been given was quite apt.
The mines had no major problems.
Hareishan's spells proved to be no match for those of Dynaheir.
Nor did Natasha's.
However, a confusion spell cast by an ogre mage was more of a problem. Only I remained unconfused. I fled from the others after the mage had been killed and waited until the spell wore off.
Upon facing Davaeorn, Dynaheir summoned some monsters. Minsc followed them and after talking with Davaeorn he moved to a side room. Davaeorn blasted the monsters first with a lightning bolt and then a fireball.
This wiped them out. Minsc then approached by himself and was charmed. We waited until the charm wore off and attacked. He had no answer other than summoning a few monsters who were dispatched once he was dead.
However an ettercap did poison Minsc. As he was enraged he couldn't use a potion so Dynaheir had to step in to help.
Once the enemy were dead we kept out of his way until he calmed down.
We will take our wyrm trophies to the temple before proceeding to Baldur's Gate.
Eyulf has entered my Hall of Zeroes. He weathered the perils of the Isle of Balduran, thwarted Sarevok's coup at the Ducal Palace, and even defeated his half-brother in his own hideout, only to succumb in melee combat to a gargantuan spider's Sleep attack at the Coastway Crossing in SoD. Safana was with him, but she couldn't save him.
Loury looks at Swish and Corecleric - are they happy with the starting SoA equipment they have been given. It's up to them if they want to change anything, so let's crack on. This dungeon is full of traps and Swish should be in his element being both able to disarm them or to blunder into them when he forgets his profession. Loury and Corecleric are naturally more averse to traps so fingers crossed they won't fall foul of any deadly snares.
Off we go. Swish duly deals with every trap and we kill anything that moves. We're not carelessly quick, just able to deal with most encounters rapidly. Loury gestures at the skeleton warriors that Corecleric has summoned and we have a philosophical debate about an Undead Hunter having these minions on our side. It's not that philosophical though as the practicality of the skeletons is a huge advantage to us.
Once we are out of the dungeon we grab a breath of promenade air and head into the circus tent. Corecleric uses True Sight to remove the illusionary werewolves from combat and the shadows are summarily dealt with.
We go to speak to Gaelan Bayle, and then put Hendak in charge of the Copper Coronet. Loury moves as if to deal with the slaver ship but his party are heading to the other door - so that will have to wait.
Instead we find ourselves ambushed by Suna Seni and her slavers. They briefly regret trying this, and then we head out to Watchers Keep. Loury is pleased to find there are no vampiric wraiths inside but Swish is voicing his discontent about the lack of XP from their non-appearance.
There is plenty for us to do, resulting in Loury obtaining a +3 bastard sword inscribed with the name "foebane". We've taken a battering by the first pair of statues to retrieve this sword so will have to exit and rest - here we are mid-combat at the point where we switched from melee to heartlessly shooting them down without mercy.
Swish reckons we can tackle the remaining statues. This is either confidence on his part or a desire to grab the +4 ninja-to"Usuno's Blade". After only a minute of combat we are all wounded and retreat into a side-room to shut ourselves in with one of the statues. We are victorious - just three more to deal with.
Loury is prepping himself and suspects Corecleric is girding his Lathanderly ways too, while Swish opens a door to take a look at which enemy is where. A big fist announces it's presence and Swish is down.
Corecleric and Loury try to manouvre their way out and take a few more hits so run around and eventually isolate one of the enemies. Corecleric runs it ragged as Loury shoots arrows from the +1 quiver at it.
Once that enemy is down we make our escape and Corecleric rest-raises Swish. We head back inside and kill the remaining pair of statues one at a time (and safely through a door for the golem).
We can now head back into the city, refuse to worship with a cleric and pick up some armour at the Sea's Bounty tavern. Loury purchases a scroll case to go with the potion case and gem bag while Swish has the ammo belt. Meanwhile Swish has enticed a trio of minotaurs out to their demise and we obtain a job for Renal Bloodscalp.
Valen turns up to make us an offer we can refuse, and Brus informs us of a revised deal. We'll probably head to the Slaver compound next time - and if we remember we can pay Gaelan on the way.
Eyulf has entered my Hall of Zeroes. He weathered the perils of the Isle of Balduran, thwarted Sarevok's coup at the Ducal Palace, and even defeated his half-brother in his own hideout, only to succumb in melee combat to a gargantuan spider's Sleep attack at the Coastway Crossing in SoD. Safana was with him, but she couldn't save him.
Eyulf has entered my Hall of Zeroes. He weathered the perils of the Isle of Balduran, thwarted Sarevok's coup at the Ducal Palace, and even defeated his half-brother in his own hideout, only to succumb in melee combat to a gargantuan spider's Sleep attack at the Coastway Crossing in SoD. Safana was with him, but she couldn't save him.
I had forgotten all about that ability.
I hadn't forgotten about it. I didn't even know that it existed!!
I hadn't forgotten about it. I didn't even know that it existed!!
Happened to me in one of my first times in SoD. I've always dealt with those spiders with ranged attacks since then. But it had been a while for me to reach SoD so....
After my somewhat precarious encounter with the spiders near the red wizard ruins, I was a lot more careful in Cloakwood. By this point, Rowin had learned third level spells - so haste was at my disposal, making it quite easy to lure spiders and ettercaps out of Centeol's cave without the risk of getting webbed, as a hasted character can easily run outside before the web will be able to connect - this allowed me to deal with the hostile forces in small and easy groups:
With Spider's Bane now at my disposal, I had a decent way to keep my characters safe from any further web tangles. However, sadly for him, Drasus didn't have this option when dealing with my very own webs - his party failed to resist Rowin's spells:
With four difficult wizard encounters waiting in the Iron Mines, I had a couple of different strategies prepared. First: Hareishan - an invisible Galderan disarmed the traps on the way to her lair and lured her into a trap of our own, where her entire entourage would easily be killed by wand of fire and necklace of missle charges:
Next: The invisible ogre mage. He's not as dangerous as the others, so I decided to just send in a few summons to draw out some spells and let Cadrax finish him. However, I forgot to use Cadrax' berserker rage, which resulted in him getting stunned by a chromatic orb, so the others had to charge in and save the day:
Now, there's Natasha. She has given me trouble in the past, so I buffed up for this one. This turned out to be unneccessary, as Rowin was able to neutralize her with a single first level spell - he recently got access to Spook, a spell that I usually never use - obviously, it sounds nice in theory, but if I need single target disable early on, I use blindness, because feared enemies can still be somehwat annoying - they are sometimes hard to chase down or will walk into other groups of enemies. However, blindness doesn't stop spellcasting. Spook does, and the saving throw penalty is a nice bonus, so I tried my luck with Natasha (since she had a shield up, magic missles weren't an option):
Finally, I had to deal with Davaeorn. My approach was simple: Cadrax would use a protection from magic scroll and take out the wizard (while mostly kiting any battle horrors), while the others would stay far away, close to the entrance, and take care of the spawning guards added by SCS. Worked like a charm:
And there we have it - the gates of Baldur's Gate stand open to our party. Next time, we will hunt for some of the most powerful items in the game, go on a surprise expedition we really didn't want to go on, explore a few dangerous dungeons and deal with some EE content for fun and profit.
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The first act in the session was to draw some spiders out of their house and dance up spirits to deal with them - taking me to level 8, with yet another 10 HPs
After a quick shopping trip, I decided it was time to tackle the main quest. Slinging and Fogs took me through to Mulahey, where I was spoilt for choice with options. I decided to go for a first use of Spirit Fires on him, while a Fog cut down most of Mulahey's would-be rescuers. Mulahey himself panicked and ran into the Fog to finish himself off.
In Nashkel, Nimbul failed to survive the probing hands of a couple of nymphs even long enough to get hammered by lightning.
With time starting to run short, I went for speed at the Bandit Camp, using lightning to take down opponents without bothering about minimising damage taken. Taurgosz was the last of the first tranche of victims there before I rested.
After selling surplus loot, there was just enough time to run through the Cloakwood to the mine - where Drasus will have to wait a bit longer to meet his nemesis.
Shaman 8, 76 HPs, 187 kills
Hal and I helped to reunite Albert and Rufie and killed Vax and Zal before heading westward where we helped a dryad against Caldo and Krumm. However we neglected to tell her about it. We then killed Ingot before going in search of Mutamin.
We killed some "Adventurers" who attacked us, then several basilisks before finally killing Mutamin himself.
Saving against silence was no help once his illusions were dispelled.
Party is making its way through chapter 2. We recruited Nalia and did some early quests (CC, CC sewer) to hit 250k xp and then picked up Jan and Valygar.
Nalia has a 7 day timer before she leaves the party to go wait outside her Keep. I used that time to do trademeet/druids, and tried to sneak in a little athkatla questing as well but ran out of time.
The early green rElec scroll got used by charname in the druid grove. Wisely it turned out, as he got hit by a call lightning bolt.
We saved the troll cave for after Faldorn, and bought 10x invisibility potions from the rakhshasas (leaving the fight with them for chapter 6). Cernd killed Faldorn, and traps/backstab killed the Dao genies. One chapter 2 quest arc down!
Back in Athkatla, Nalia soon left the party, saying she could wait no longer and would meet us outside the De'arnise Keep. My thinking on the DK in SCS insane has changed a few times over the years. In the pre-SCS days, I used to think of the DK as the chumpiest of the four remote chapter 2 dungeons (DK, druids, windspear, shadow temple). All it had were some dumb trolls with no magic.
But in SCS, DK is probably the second most dangerous dungeon after Windspear. The trollish regeneration is very strong if you can't control it with fire/acid, and the spirit trolls have very nasty spell books as well as substantial damage resistance. In particular, they can cast greater command, and my party doesn't have chaotic commands.
But, this run through DK I think I finally have it solved pretty well (at least for this party comp). Always, always fight spirit troll packs with fireballs, don't try to melee them to death to save on resting. Then, the only issue is Torgal himself.
Torgal is a very dangerous opponent in SCS insane. He has ~200 hp with very high regen, a fear aura, and 3 apr at -1 thac0 that do ~25 damage a hit. While it is not impossible to tank him (lots of MI / stoneskin, or very good AC), he will easily burn down the hp of less well defended characters. And if he isn't killed, he will regen back to full very quickly.
He also comes with 2 spirit trolls, an umber hulk elder, 1-2 giant troll(s), a spectral troll, and two yuanti mages.
It's very easy to lose control of this fight, either to greater command or damage spells from the spirit trolls, yuanti casting, umber hulk confusion, torgal's fear aura or dps, or just the initial bum rush of enemy melee combatants.
So this time, the party decided to aggressively commit consumable resources to victory. We had 3 firebreath potions, 1 potion of explosions, 3 fiery burning potions, 2 charges from the lost amulet, as well as a few elemental scrolls for summoning. Yoshi and charname set traps at the edge of the room, intending to use Torgal's "detect invisible" script to pull him forward into the traps. I did realize before the fight started that we did not have resist fear, which was concerning, but we decided to press forward anyway.
Overall, the fight went mostly as planned, and we got through without any deaths (a rarity for me on this fight). Torgal died to traps + two firebreath potions, which a hasted valygar also used to tag the other trolls. 3-4 fireballs were sent after the fight open to the main body of the enemy squad, which also dealt substantial damage.
A little melee clean-up just left the yuanti mages. Unfortunately, I missed or they resisted both chaos spells from Jan and Nalia, and their script was smart enough to walk them out of the cloud kill zone created by Nalia later in the fight. However, they didn't do anything too nasty and were ultimately killed by spell thrusts, dispel illusion, and magic arrows.
That leaves the party relatively safe for the rest of chapter 2/3. The toughest fight we'll do before leaving for brynlaw is probably the vampires in windspear, but the party should have the MoD by then and Minsc is racial enemy vampire, so it shouldn't be too bad as long as I tag them with malison first.
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At the Cloakwood Mine, Kysus died just as the nymphs launched a round of confusions - essentially ending the fight as a contest.
Davaoern then died of area damage. I thought that might prompt the other battle horror to run away, so used a wand for the first time to strike him down.
With the mine still gurgling behind me, I raced on to find the City. The tomes were an early target, with Ramazith showing his spirit to open the way up his tower.
Shopping and inventory management used up the remaining time in the session, so a return to Candlekeep will have to wait for next time.
Shaman 9, 86 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 218 kills
After we killed the basilisks and Mutamin we were joined by Shar-Teel.
We hunted ankheg to pay for some Shadow Armour and The Army Scythe. Strangely, for an evil character she was not fazed by our reputation of 20.
We killed Droth and Shoal and then with the help of Hal's True Sight we killed some sirine.
Ajantis and Dynaheir then joined us and we went to Durlag's Tower where wand of frost was highly effective .
Shar-Teel pick-pocketted Kirinhale's spear and we then went for the kill but Kirinhale escaped by leaving our plane.
Shar-Teel was badly injured after being poisoned by a phase spider and Ajantis was badly injured by a skeleton warrior. Nevertheless, we are all still alive.
There is still one of the warders riddles left to solve but that will have to await another time. We are now resting at the Carnival and once we are fully prepared the Nashkel Mines await.
Shar-Teel now has two suits of armour to wear. Durlag's Plate when her role is a fighter and Shadow Armour for when she needs to act as a thief.
EDIT
In the mines we joined up with Xan before dealing with Mulahey.
Upon leaving we killed the Amazons before leaving Xan in the safety of the Carnival. At Beregost Officer Vai took nearly two dozen bandit scalps off our hands.
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At the start of the session I decided to go and get the Ring of Energy before I forgot that.
The dopplegangers at the Seven Suns were beaten up with my non-proficient club before I tackled the Iron Throne. That involved leaving a nymph downstairs for distraction while enemies were picked off with stunning darts or poison arrows.
I reported for duty in Candlekeep and used the violet potion there to loot the tombs. After working through some dopplegangers, nymphs spread confusion among Prat's gang before finishing off the leftovers.
Shaman 9, 86 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 254 kills
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I tried to have a bit of fun by dominating Slythe and making him go after Krystin, but he must have treated a follow-up domination as hostile and turned back to attack the nymphs almost instantly - and was held for his pains.
At the palace, the nymphs wasted their dominations to avoid any nasty accidents during the fight. Their confusions were nicely timed to arrive just after the dopplegangers showed themselves and affected 4 of them. The other 2 were hit with dispelling arrows before I switched to acid to help the nymphs clear the field - Belt and Liia both surviving comfortably.
A PfU scroll helped make the trip through the maze easier and that lasted long enough to deal with the 4 skeleton warriors in the Undercity as well. Area damage with a few final touches from spirits accounted for the party nearby, to provide me with another couple of exploding arrows.
I decided to play fair(ish) in the final battle. A Writhing Fog brought Sarevok out on the attack, but he was immediately evaded using the pillars. Semaj teleported out in support, but was distracted by a single pre-summoned nymph and he, Tazok and Angelo were then killed using more Fogs.
I still had a bit of time left in the session. I had just enough XP to take a level in SoD, learning Pixie Dust in the process. I also bought up useful equipment from the cleric there, but decided to save there rather than spend the last few minutes exploring the dungeon. Here's my character record and inventory at the start of SoD.
Shaman 10, 88 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 288 kills
Spells to date (in order of selection, though the first spells listed at each level are shaman only additions not requiring a pick):
L1 - Spirit Ward, CLW, Bless, Armor of Faith, Entangle, Doom
L2 - Writhing Fog, Charm P / M, Resist Fire / Cold, Slow Poison, Barkskin
L3 - Spiritual Clarity, Call Lightning, Summon Insects, Protection from Fire
L4 - Spirit Fire, Call Woodland Beings, Death Ward
L5 - Recall Spirit, Pixie Dust
Part 3
Time to tackle the Horde Fortress! Since we finally have a little breathing room, I decide to go ahead and create our final, 6th party member, a mage.
We have to be super careful since Yi only has 5 HP and a single hit can kill her. But then, our primary tank, Valos, is also pretty easy to kill in Insane mode.
Trugnuk has always been a very scary encounter in IWD2, as he comes bolstered with multiple spellcasters and LOTS of fighters. As I nearly always do, I summon monsters and then sneak over to Trugnuk's band. This is a tricky encounter with multiple competing threats: we use Entangle to thwart the enemies coming in from the west, a party-friendly Web spell to disrupt the spellcasters to the east, send Valos to shut down Trugnuk's spells with the Moonblade, and have our primary damage dealer, Ruva, slash up the War Drum before any enemies can use it to summon enemy worg riders. We fail to snare a couple of Ice Trolls, who easily land hits on Ruva. Only Ruva's crazy maximum HP keeps her safe.
We suffer another two avoidable deaths in the goblin warrens when I fail to appreciate how vulnerable Pearl is to Flame Arrows, which hit very hard and bypass AC. Yi Grovana also died, less surprisingly. We actually had to sell off some stuff just to afford the resurrections.
Yi Grovana is an elf and can only be raised by Resurrection (when we're at a healer, anyway; things will be different when our own cleric can cast Raise Dead), which is far more expensive. Mercifully, Yi is low-level and so the cost is only so high. Otherwise elves can be very pricey to revive.
We chop through a bunch of fights by relying on Web, Spider Spawn, and Valos and Ruva's tanking abilities (thankfully we're about done with half-goblins and their high attack bonuses). We hit level 7, getting level 4 cleric and druid spells and allowing our druid to finally use polar bear form, which gives her an extra attack per round and sky-high Strength.
The problem is the rooftop battle, which is very long and has more enemies than we've EVER faced before. And since I don't like fleeing fights in IWD2, we have to clear the field before we can leave.
It's ugly.
We need to get Rila Lira, our cleric, over to Ruva so she can heal up our best fighter. Ruva is our best hope of actually putting down these enemies, and if we can get our cleric close enough, we can spam spontaneously cast healing spells to repair her.
But that will take a little time, and right now our cleric can't reach her. Instead, Rila Lira casts Hold Monster, and since we're no longer in Shaengarne and not every enemy in sight has rage immunities, she can actually freeze a lot of critters here.
Finally we do enough chopping to break free, though our cleric is occupied for the moment. With Ruva out of the crowd, our sorcerer, Poppy, uses a Fireball scroll we've been hoarding for emergencies. Valos' monk level lets her dodge the whole thing by making a Reflex save.
Spontaneous casting ignores aura, and Improved Initiative gives us a -1 bonus to casting speed--and healing spells are very quick. In seconds, our cleric restores over 100 HP, and our fighter is back up to speed. Our other party members are struggling, though; we haven't been able to keep all the enemy mages webbed.
Once the field is clear, we soldier on and head west to finish off the enemies--I could slip away and rest, but for purism reasons I want to take down everything in the area first, even if we're low on spells. We use some Burning Oils and Snilloc's Snowball Swarms to get some early kills on the archers so they won't use up their valuable magic ammunition--I want that for gold fodder.
With the rooftop bloody and the battlefield quiet, we head home to resurrect our flimsy elf. The leader of the horde, Guthma, waits for us to return. We have some bugbears to kill.
Traveling with: Korgan, Mazzy, Jaheira, Yoshimo, Aerie
Chunked: Minsc, Nalia (both killed by Firkraag)
Permanently dead: Valygar (used his body to open planar sphere)
We have made tremendous progress - most of Chapter Two complete, just need to deal with the Illithid hideout in the sewers. We decided we should be strong enough to take on some dragons. Well, that was true, only barely. Despite 3 snares and lots of good summons, the fight went badly - mostly because Firkraag opened with a dispel (which removed our fear protection) then made characters run in fear. This made the fight chaos. Eventually, Nalia and Minsc were chunked, and all other party members dead. I only prevailed because Corethief XXX put on the haste boots, used a haste potion (keeping in mind Firkraag is still hasted himself), and ran around throwing bullets - this was enough to get the kill. RIP Nalia and Minsc. Nalia in particular will be sorely missed, as she had memorized many of our high level spells we had collected to this point.
Since I was intending to recruit Imoen all along, we recruited Yoshimo and Mazzy. With Yoshimos traps, the fight with Thaxxy went much better, and we won quickly, maybe 3 rounds.
We will deal with the Illlithid hideout next, then go to Brynnlaw to get Imoen. The quest continues...
Hey everyone; Over half a year ago, I started an Undead Hunter run, and while I've been moving at a snails pace (about one area per week), now it's time to post some updates.
I'm playing with SCS+Ascension, using the previous SCS version (because I started before the new one came out), and the tactical variant of SCS, with all of the options installed (including some I've never tried, such as the party losing their gear in Spellhold). My party setup is a full custom party inspired by my LoB run, where a half-orc Kensai wielding throwing daggers was my most effective damage dealer. It's very heavy on physical damage and buffs. The only reason I chose an Undead Hunter PC is because the kit is still missing in the Hall of Heroes.
Now, let's meet our characters:
Dassareth, lawful good human female Undead Hunter
18/46, 18, 18, 11, 13, 18
Cadrax, true neutral dwarven male Berserker
18/91, 17, 19, 18, 3, 1
Khelbara, true neutral half-orcish female Kensai
19/18/19/16/10/3
Galderan, true neutral gnomish male Cleric/Thief
18/18/18/12/17/3
Sentenza, true neutral half-elven female Skald
18/18/18/18/5/15
Rowin, true neutral elven male Sorcerer
18/19/17/18/5/9
Level 1: Usual stuff - blind, shield, magic missle, pfp, maybe spook?
Level 2: Web and defensive spells (blur, MI, resist fear)
Level 3: Haste and Slow, dispel and remove magic, maybe flame arrow?
Level 4: Stoneskin and the two positive emotions, secret word
Level 5: Spell immunity and spell shield + breach, maybe animate dead
Level 6: Death spell, improved haste, and some utility or defensive stuff
Level 7: Mass Invis, Mordy Swords and Ruby Ray, not sure what else
Level 8: Mind Blank and Horrid Wilting, will see what else we need
Level 9: Spell Strike and Time Stop, propably wish?
So, all in all, how will this party funcion? For the most part, our skald will cast some defensive self-buffs and sing, our cleric/thief will cast buffs such as bless, prayer, recitation, pfe 10' radius for general purposes and specific immunities if needed (remove fear, death ward, chaotic commands etc.) with the ability to protect his buffs later on (entropy shield, impervious sanctitity of mind), the sorcerer will also buff up the party (emotions, haste/ihaste, mass invis and the like) while disabling spell protections, breaching and throwing down some nukes if needed, while the three fighter-types will do most of the actual fighting.
In my previous SCS run, I noted that I wanted to up the SCS difficulty slider from tactical to insane for my next attempt, but since I've taken such a long break from the game, I decided not to do so yet - this turned out to be a mistake, at least for BG1. Enemy spellcasters don't pre-buff with enough defenses to make them challenging, as our fighter-types can just cut through their few buffs with sheer force, and often, there isn't even a shield present, so we can simply use magic missles. This may change later on - we shall see.
I'll try to write an update every day, but I won't go into too much detail, mostly because I hardly remember anything about the early parts of the run, having started over half a year ago.
While I only play unmodded and core rules, it is rarely BG 1 that sets me back. In fact, most times, if I do fail a run, it's usually in ToB. In order to get that far (especially on SCS) will take a great amount of consistency on your part, so if you do end up succeeding, it will still be well earned, even if BG 1 was nearly routine. Just my 2 cents, anyways!
With SCS, I do not enjoy how the difficulty levels of BG1 and ToB compare - BG1 is, in comparison, mostly unchanged, with the exception of a few spellcaster battles on the most difficult settings, while ToB tends to go completely overboard with additional dragons, liches, tons of HLAs flying around, having to strip every spellcaster of multiple spell protections and breaching them etc. - not that it's impossible to do, but because you are forced into taking you own power to the same extremes, you spend tons of time pre-buffing, and battles can take a very, very long time to resolve (especially the Ascension battles). It just feels tedious to me after a while. Having more of a challenge in BG1 and a more subdued version of ToB (doesn't need to be easier, just less stuff going on, maybe even a strong reduction in available experience and levels for all involved) would help me keep my interest througout the series a lot more - and I would enjoy new challenges in BG1, because I like the lower level gameplay and it doesn't feel quite as bad to lose a run early on compared to losing one in ToB.
I'm frustrated by ToB in general, even without SCS (so just uninstalling the improved lairs wouldn't be helpful for me) - in vanilla mode, it feels like 90% of the expansion is the Bhaalspawn somewhat effortlessly, but tediously wading through hordes of enemies (oh, how I hate Sendai's Enclave), while 10% of the time you have to stay super alert to avoid getting oneshot by bosses like Draconis. Very uneven, and overall not very exciting to me. SoA-style gameplay with fewer, but more unique encounters is certainly more enjoyable in my opinion.
It's too late for this run, but general advice for any run you might post: keep a log of events as you play. It doesn't have to be anything fancy; I just use a plain text file describing what happened and marking where I took screenshots. Then refer back to the log when writing the posts.
Another way to do basically the same thing is to take lots of screenshots. You wouldn't necessarily have to use all the screenshots in your posts, but they would clue you in on what you did, and also the portraits can clue you in on other events - characters confused, dead, etc.
As for taking notes, sadly, I'm just way too lazy for that
Previous updates:
With the sheer power of the skald song in early levels, wandering monsters didn't stand much of a chance against the party. For early encounters against bounty hunters and other potential threats, I used a combination of blindness and command, hoping that at least one of these would stick - and it usually did:
Bonus: Silke, despite being at quite a high level, forgets to add shield to her prebuff-list:
Next time, I will report on a sequence of events I like to call "The Great Silencing", plus the clearing of the remaining wilderness areas (not including the dungeons) and the battle for the bandit camp - and we will get to see the first signs of trouble and bad play.
Previous updates at:
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1151349/#Comment_1151349
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1151491/#Comment_1151491
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1151645/#Comment_1151645
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1151758/#Comment_1151758
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1151849/#Comment_1151849
In the SoD prologue, Porios was as usual intimidated into surrendering. PfU allowed me to kill 3 groups of undead without difficulty. Mainly that was using melee, but I kept Spirit Fire back to catch the invisible wraith in - in fact a single one of those was sufficient thanks to the double damage against spectral undead.
In the City various NPCs were killed and their equipment sold off to supplement the 62k or so worth of items in my containers. The only quests done were to grab the Spectacles and retrieve some wine to get the Battle Tankard, to be able to avoid fatigue against Belhifet when using restoration scrolls. Apart from potions and scrolls I bought the Buckler of the Fist - that's not only a good shield in SoD, but will reappear again in SoA if you have it in your inventory (not a bag) at the end of SoD.
There was just time to do the battle at the Coast Way Forest, although that didn't turn out as intended. I mis-clicked on the conversation and fought Tsolak rather than helping him (missing out on the regeneration ioun stone, though that's not much use to this character anyway). I could have just retreated, but decided to run the gauntlet of traps to go and stake the vampire.
On the way back to the Coast Way Crossing I came across some orcs and trolls. I wanted the Firefly sling from that encounter, but thought the few minutes available wouldn't have been sufficient to fight everything there - so just recovered it invisibly. That meant there was still time to give Takos back his heirlooms - and take back the identification mirror as a reward - before saving.
Shaman 10, 88 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 340 kills
I hear that. I've finished I and II many times but never managed to get through ToB. I always get bored somewhere around whatever is past the fire giant temple. Every fight is like 10 minutes of prep for 1 minute of combat, and stressful because you have to worry that you missed an immunity somewhere or some mage casts a wish or some monster has a special ability you weren't prepared for...
Anyway; trying to commit to not getting bored in ToB so I can at least get to throne - even if my party wipes there.
The only other thing I really don't like in SCS is the lich in spellhold..
After the killing of Mulahey and rescue of Xan we escaped the mine only to be attacked by ogrillon when we attempted to sleep.
They were wiped out as was the party of Lamalha.
In Nashkel Minsc joined us and we left Xan there.
We headed to Firewine Bridge and killed Melium and Khark.
We went in search of the bandit camp and when resting were attacked by two parties of three ankheg
At the camp Taurgosz was killed.
Web and silence were effective in the tent.
And on the way to kill Tranzig we ran into an ogre followed by Deke and some more bandits.
Tranzig was no problem. We then looted the bandit camp and proceeded to Cloakwood.
Previous updates:
Update 1: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1151944/#Comment_1151944
During the BG1 midgame, the save penalty integrated into Silence 15' radius is hard to beat. Additionally, a lot of spellcasters don't have MGoI or Vocalize available in the current SCS version, at least on the tactical setting. As a result, a whole bunch of would-be assassins and wandering wizards fell to the power of Galderan's Silence - Nimbul, Molkar's Party, Narcillius and the Amazons, to name but a few (though in case of the ambush parties, webs were also involved):
I fared much better with the remaining outdoor wilderness areas - no trouble with any flesh golems, black talon elites, sirens and the like. With only the rather dangerous dungeon areas, some specific super-hard battles (such as Kahrk), TotSC content and the main questline available, I decided to storm the bandit camp next - and things started off great, with a wand of paralyzation hit on Taugosz, before the bandits could even gather up and defend:
Next time, we will enter Cloakwood and do much of the same - web hostile parties, use powerful wands and consumables, but this time, hopefully with less urgency - oh, and a spell I almost never use makes a surprisingly successful appearance.
Previous updates at:
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1151349/#Comment_1151349
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1151491/#Comment_1151491
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1151645/#Comment_1151645
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1151758/#Comment_1151758
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1151849/#Comment_1151849
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1151956/#Comment_1151956
There's not much required combat in SoD, so I was able to make quite a bit of progress today ...
I approached the Coast Way Crossing bridge invisibly, in order to make it even easier to nip behind the tent to avoid any combat there before Caelar arrived.
Then I skipped through the Troll Claw Woods and on to the Forest of Wyrms. Still invisible, I bypassed various groups to get into the temple and seek out Ziatar - or, more accurately, seek out the location where I knew him to be and subject that to area bombing
Call lightning got an outing on the way to Boareskyr Bridge - helping, rather than hurting, a green dragon this time.
That still left the potentially tricky fight on the bridge, where it's a really bad idea to let the mage open a fire portal
I bypassed a big hole in the ground on the way to the Coalition Camp, where the Spectacles generated Nazramu for a bit of shopping. After a quick chat with the camp commanders I moved on to Dead Mans Pass. As usual I just skipped through there, though I did take the time to pick up another shaman-specific item.
Shaman 11, 90 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 392 kills
Wacky (female half-orc cleric/thief, Grond0); Voka (female human invoker, Gate70)
Previous updates:
Looking at the world map there didn't seem to be much to gain from further exploration, so we headed for the Nashkel Mine. Voka used her staff almost exclusively going through there - and did a pretty good job with it. On arrival at Mulahey there was plenty of time for a rest before Wacky silenced any prospect of having to listen to competing clerical philosophies and melee did the rest.
Outside the mine Voka rediscovered her spells with a vengeance. Blinds, stinking clouds and skull traps were already overkill in combination - but Wacky still couldn't resist adding her own minor contribution with silence and holy smite.
Nimbul was another to go silently to his grave before we returned to Beregost to pick on some spiders and find Tranzig. Wacky was just considering what to use on him when Voka attacked without preparation. He soon took an acid arrow for his pains, so Wacky hurriedly reviewed his options for helping out and came up with a holy smite - that did indeed do a bit of damage to Tranzig, but rather more to Wacky's evil companion and Tranzig took advantage to inflict a death.
After a temple visit and finishing off Tranzig, it was time to visit the Bandit Camp. After pacifying the exterior, Voka sneaked inside where blind and webs set up a skull trap finish. Wacky wanted to set off the trap - preferring to get a few gold from Ender Sai than a few XP for disarming it - but neglected to warn Voka of what he was doing. Fortunately she was out of the firing line that time
After an abortive trip and a return to the Bandit Camp to read the correct letter, we moved on to the Cloakwood. Voka immediately got involved in meleeing some xvarts and Wacky sized them up for a holy smite before taking pity on Voka and settling for a hold person this time
In the City an ogre mage died in webs and we worked up through Ramazith's Tower despite making hard work of the ghasts when Wacky's turn undead failed to keep them running reliably enough. Voka had obviously been planning ahead as he had a PfP ready for Wacky to tackle a basilisk - though a critical backstab meant the spell was not actually needed.
While doing the poison quest we tried to tackle Degrodel's guards, but quickly found that most of our damage options were a bit dodgy to use in the crowded city. Voka resorted to the wand of frost on a couple of enemies outside before Wacky tried to collect a grouping together inside to provide a nice target. Her intended sanctuary was interrupted though and she became surrounded - a potion of invisibility being required to save her there.
Voka acted as a distraction to free Wacky and we then had quite a long period of running round outside with the odd backstab and wand blast to kill all those attackers. Wacky thought there might still be an invisible stalker hiding though and, despite being low on HPs and out of useful spells, couldn't resist the challenge. Putting on her full plate and golden girdle meant the stalker needed a critical to hit and for a while things were looking good. However, when the stalker did get a blow in Wacky was down to single figure HPs and moved back out of range. Voka still had 2 wand charges left and fired one of those to take the stalker from badly wounded to near death, before running out of the house. Wacky tried to get sufficient space to use her magic missile wand, but that was slow to fire and the stalker was in no mood to give any more second chances ...
On the way to Cloakwood we killed an ogre with a belt fetish.
In Cloakwood I proved that the name that I had been given was quite apt.
The mines had no major problems.
Hareishan's spells proved to be no match for those of Dynaheir.
Nor did Natasha's.
However, a confusion spell cast by an ogre mage was more of a problem. Only I remained unconfused. I fled from the others after the mage had been killed and waited until the spell wore off.
Upon facing Davaeorn, Dynaheir summoned some monsters. Minsc followed them and after talking with Davaeorn he moved to a side room. Davaeorn blasted the monsters first with a lightning bolt and then a fireball.
This wiped them out. Minsc then approached by himself and was charmed. We waited until the charm wore off and attacked. He had no answer other than summoning a few monsters who were dispatched once he was dead.
However an ettercap did poison Minsc. As he was enraged he couldn't use a potion so Dynaheir had to step in to help.
Once the enemy were dead we kept out of his way until he calmed down.
We will take our wyrm trophies to the temple before proceeding to Baldur's Gate.
Eyulf has entered my Hall of Zeroes. He weathered the perils of the Isle of Balduran, thwarted Sarevok's coup at the Ducal Palace, and even defeated his half-brother in his own hideout, only to succumb in melee combat to a gargantuan spider's Sleep attack at the Coastway Crossing in SoD. Safana was with him, but she couldn't save him.
Loury - male, human undead hunter (Gate70)
Swish - male, dwarf swashbuckler (Grond0)
Corecleric - male, halfling priest of Lathander (Corey_Russell)
Loury looks at Swish and Corecleric - are they happy with the starting SoA equipment they have been given. It's up to them if they want to change anything, so let's crack on. This dungeon is full of traps and Swish should be in his element being both able to disarm them or to blunder into them when he forgets his profession. Loury and Corecleric are naturally more averse to traps so fingers crossed they won't fall foul of any deadly snares.
Off we go. Swish duly deals with every trap and we kill anything that moves. We're not carelessly quick, just able to deal with most encounters rapidly. Loury gestures at the skeleton warriors that Corecleric has summoned and we have a philosophical debate about an Undead Hunter having these minions on our side. It's not that philosophical though as the practicality of the skeletons is a huge advantage to us.
Once we are out of the dungeon we grab a breath of promenade air and head into the circus tent. Corecleric uses True Sight to remove the illusionary werewolves from combat and the shadows are summarily dealt with.
Instead we find ourselves ambushed by Suna Seni and her slavers. They briefly regret trying this, and then we head out to Watchers Keep. Loury is pleased to find there are no vampiric wraiths inside but Swish is voicing his discontent about the lack of XP from their non-appearance.
There is plenty for us to do, resulting in Loury obtaining a +3 bastard sword inscribed with the name "foebane". We've taken a battering by the first pair of statues to retrieve this sword so will have to exit and rest - here we are mid-combat at the point where we switched from melee to heartlessly shooting them down without mercy.
Loury is prepping himself and suspects Corecleric is girding his Lathanderly ways too, while Swish opens a door to take a look at which enemy is where. A big fist announces it's presence and Swish is down.
Once that enemy is down we make our escape and Corecleric rest-raises Swish. We head back inside and kill the remaining pair of statues one at a time (and safely through a door for the golem).
We can now head back into the city, refuse to worship with a cleric and pick up some armour at the Sea's Bounty tavern. Loury purchases a scroll case to go with the potion case and gem bag while Swish has the ammo belt. Meanwhile Swish has enticed a trio of minotaurs out to their demise and we obtain a job for Renal Bloodscalp.
Valen turns up to make us an offer we can refuse, and Brus informs us of a revised deal. We'll probably head to the Slaver compound next time - and if we remember we can pay Gaelan on the way.
Here they are in all their spoils of venture.
I hadn't forgotten about it. I didn't even know that it existed!!
Previous updates:
Update 1: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1151944/#Comment_1151944
Update 2: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1152025/#Comment_1152025
After my somewhat precarious encounter with the spiders near the red wizard ruins, I was a lot more careful in Cloakwood. By this point, Rowin had learned third level spells - so haste was at my disposal, making it quite easy to lure spiders and ettercaps out of Centeol's cave without the risk of getting webbed, as a hasted character can easily run outside before the web will be able to connect - this allowed me to deal with the hostile forces in small and easy groups: