Dorian II, half-elven lawful neutral bard, fifteenth update
I didn't find time to write the Sarevok update or play for a few days, so my memory of the battle isn't exactly fresh, but I'll try to do my best:
First, I made my way to the undercity while disarming traps in the maze with an invisibly Imoen. For the undercity party, I threw webs and cloudkills at them from off-screen. For some reason, there were A LOT of summoned skeleton warriors with the party, far more than should be possible:
Since I only had two webs, some of the enemies made enough of their saves to escape the cloudkill effect, so we had three badly wounded enemies (and 11 skelton warriors) left:
I decided to rest to get the skeletons to expire, which made it much easier to clean up the party. Tamoko summoned a skeleton as well, but didn't stand much of a chance as I went for a quick hasted assault with some added wand charges:
Now, for the final battle: After summoning skeletons and buffing with every conceivable potion and spell, I approached Sarevok and made sure to retreat immediately to get the enemy party to split a bit. Diarmid looked like a promising first target for my fighters, given that his PfM scroll procluded him from having any defensive buffs going. Meanwhile, Angelo used remove magic on Ajantis, so our paladin ran away to stop the spell from spreading while Dorian and Dynaheir went for a double spell thrust to destroy Angelo's spell protections - Sarevok, after getting in two hits, was luckily kept busy by our skeletons, same as Tazok:
The party converged on Angelo next, with wand charges helping out thanks to his spell protections being gone. He tried casting domination on Minsc, who drank a potion of clarity in response. Meanwhile, Semaj used his own dispel magic, the target being Branwen - she quickly moved to Ajantis' previous spot to spare the party:
Angelo got killed/frozen by a wand of frost charge (interestingly, this doesn't trigger his skeleton to spawn - I had to shatter his body first) while the party took on Tazok - a very powerful 60 damage crit from Minsc sped this kill up immensely. Meanwhile, Semaj improved on his spell protections, but didn't do anything too dangerous:
Dynaheir had summoned some Monsters to keep Semaj busy, and he ran away to the north, giving us time to deal with the spawning skeleton warriors in the meantime:
With everybody else dealt with, we rushed down Semaj and took him out without much trouble due to overwhelming numbers and buffs:
After that, taking down Sarevok was mostly a formality:
Due to a lot of other obligations the run is currently paused in the SoD opening dungeon. I'm sure I will find time to continue eventually
Whilst looking unsuccessfully for Malden Col, a suspected traitor, I spoke to Hobart Stubbletoes who transported us into the middle of a dangerous battle which included harpies. We survived with difficulty and were then able to sleep and followed this with long-term buffs such as stoneskin. We will now investigate further. Being buffed may make the area a little safer. We had to use potions of extra healing to survive. Hobart sold us some useful items, but nothing of great import. The harpies outside were no problem once we were buffed. One battle later and I was wishing that I hadn't bought things from Hobart as I got them for nothing. I also got a +4 sword. A while later, a +4 flail for Viconia. In this area I am not quite so lost as I have completed the Trials of the Luremaster in Icewind Dale.
I think that this is part of the Trials of the Luremaster mod.
The problem is that the place is filled with too many secret doors. I don't remember where the last one is.
I guess if you feel you are stuck, you were indeed not able to solve the task of the lure master after all XD
Dorian II, half-elven lawful neutral bard, sixteenth update
Found some time to squeeze in a bit of SoD gameplay. For Korlasz's tomb, I used PfU scrolls on Minsc and Ajantis, firebombing the two groups of humanoids and taking down Korlasz with a bunch of magical arrows and a spell thrust for her MGOI:
SCS does give a lot of enemies here better access to potions, which is why Safana actually died in Baldur's Gate near the end of the sidequest and shopping marathon to the group in front of the Five Flagons Inn - an unlucky backstab crit. I didn't plan to take her along anyway, but kept her in the party in order to resurrect her at the Coast Way:
At the bridge, I recruited my planned party: Dynaheir (now with lots of new scrolls) + Minsc, Corwin, Glint and M'Khin (my first time taking her along). We now have stoneskins and Ironskins plus a ton of defensive potions, making our party much safer. The bridge battle was solved by mass fireballs:
We took down the vampire near the forest and made sure to clear the Repository of Undeath under PfU with Minsc (using two scrolls + strength and speed potions) - finally, The Secret Revealed allowed us to dispose of the lich:
I found one door where I wasn't expecting one and that led to another door opening.
Here is hoping that I can now finish the quest. I have just received a +4 sword and a +2 shield.
Reached 16 in the list of things to do and went on to enter the keep.
It is difficult due to Viconia being killed. If I return in the future I will keep my cleric well protected, perhaps even come with two clerics just in case. This is certainly strengthening the party. Not having a cleric necessitated a lot of sleeping and the usage of healing potions.
In the next battle Edwin was slain. It loo0ks suspiciously as if I will fail the Trials by attrition. However if we do survive, we will have gained a lot of equipment and experience!
Dorian II, half-elven lawful neutral bard, seventeenth update
I cleared the Troll Claw Woods without trouble, using the anti-troll sword on Minsc to great effect. At the Forest of Wyrms, I forgot to take throwing daggers along and didn't feel like using poison protection scroll against the dragon, instead opting for a fight without special immunities - I buffed up with my usual spells, plus a fire giant strength potion for Minsc plus agility for M'khin and Corwin and made sure to breach the dragon's stoneskin ASAP. Corwin and Minsc got hit by the breath weapon once, but all in all, this was a quick and easy battle:
Making my way to the temple, I finally used my green scrolls after a rest to take down Ziatar (who didn't get to sanctuary this time around). A skeleton was sent into the Neothelid room to tank the domination and we took down the beast before it could disappear:
I summoned more skeletons and buffed up for the shadow aspect - having no true sight, I made sure to be well-prepared with detect illusions on Glint, but the fight was over before it really started:
Notice that the blindness effect from the darkness hasn't even hit us yet. I firebombed and shot the mind flayer group before taking down the priestess (with Dorian tanking) and making my way to Bridgefort, where I got the scroll via assassination:
Luckily, I actually got a genuine pair of speed boots this time around. I also forged a few items, including the ever-important void-tipped arrows for Big B later on. With the sidequests done and everything explored, I finally called on the fist to attack the camp, making only sparing use of fireballs this time around as I had so much ranged power and didn't want to kill my own troops. Oloneiros was the first signifcant enemy to appear - arrow of dispelling + quick ranged attacks:
The Barghest: 4 wands at once.
And the other mage, once again, was taken down via arrows of dispelling. Another few arrows (now 9 in total) were used at the bridge battle to get the interrupt on the mage there:
I always found trials too tough for noreload. Not sure anymore why though, it has been a long time for me. But once you get through it, the end game becomes so much easier.
We were inside Cloakwood mine, and made short work of dealing with Davaeorn.
Baldur's Gate was ours for the taking, unfortunately Dendy took it for granted and Metran was killed, followed moments later by Willaim also dying. Dendy ducked out to a temple and we did things properly on our return.
The tables were turned shortly after when Dendy managed to corner himself attempting to backstab Desreta - and with no potion of invisibility to save him resorted to a potion of firebreath.
Willaim was once more killing all comers, and Dendy had boots of speed to help his kill count. Eventually we got Metran some slicker footwear.
Marek managed to confuse both Metran and Willaim. After barely a pause Dendy stood next to Willaim believing the elf was most likely to kill bystanders. Metran took the chance to up his tally by one. Reputation plummeted from 20 to 10 and Dendy thought he'd have a Fallen archer before everyone calmed down. Fortunately Metran stood alone for a bit and Willaim only landed one shot onto Dendy.
We'd picked up tomes of dexterity and intelligence (plus constitution much earlier in the session) so headed into Durlags Tower for a wisdom tome. After a double dose of lightning Dendy decided he should not fiddle with traps but leave such contrivances to Metran.
Dendy had a nice time in the Iron Throne HQ while his companions took minor damage.
Our two hours were up, having taken six hours to return to Candlekeep. That's next time.
Dorian II, half-elven lawful neutral bard, eighteenth update
We did the sidequests at Coalition Camp before exploring the remaining three wilderness areas, including a vampire lair where we swapped around a helmet of charm protection:
A mimic against whom everyone drank a potion of freedom:
And finally the outside of the underground river, where I got the Seal of Caelar in order to do the courtyard sidequests as well. With a bunch of new gear and some final purchases, I made my way back to the underground river, using acid protection scrolls agains the albino wyrmlings:
While trying to find prove of Hephernaan's misdeeds, Minsc used our final PfU scroll:
And M'khin obtained some powerful warrior gear, including an axe with +1 APR amongst other things. We cleared the place with some firebombing and used The Secret Revealed to defeat a lich:
After returning to the surface to turn in two quests and rest, we finanlly made it down to the castle basement, quickly poisoning food and water before a quick retreat - I had to kill one of the guards on my way out because they were blocking the exit:
Defending the coalition camp was an easy matter of throwing tons of fireballs, and spell thrusts + insect plague helped to ensure victory against the final enemy assault team:
At this point, I was drinking potions left and right - agility, strength, speed, heroism of all kinds - I had tons of them in reserve. For the siege, it was the Corwin show, using my arrows of detonation to take down most opponents by herself:
I turned down the offer to duel Ashatiel, throwing fireballs at her party instead:
Finally, I assaulted the northern troops to finish the Mizhena quest:
I made a mistake now, buffing my party before entering the portal room - Having skipped SoD in my last two runs meant my memory wasn't perfect, and I forgot that all buffs get dispelled in there. Still, I made it to Belhifet with ease - still had tons of potions left. After extensive buffing with the usual list of immunities, we engaged our foe. Corwin was mostly on Belhifet duty with the others taking down his allies first:
Glint used his detect illusions to get rid of Big B's improved invisibility:
Caelar barely survived - another improved invisibility had to be dispelled, and after that, the devil was defeated with the party taking barely any damage:
I installed Ascension and SCS for BG2. Next up, the start of SoA!
Dorian II, half-elven lawful neutral bard, nineteenth update
Early SoA was a bit tricky for me - mostly because of me having the SCS NPC customization options active (this is the last time I will use them - I have encountered way too many bugs in this run, 90% of them involving this option). I couldn't really take Jaheira - she started at level 1/1, didn't get the experience boost the option should give her, and you don't get an option to rehire her in the dungeon - she just leaves (unlike Minsc). I also planned to have my party involve Nalia, Valygar and Mazzy, which meant I had to do Temple Ruins and De'Arnise keep really, really early to obtain and keep these characters. The other party members: Aerie and Anomen. Two divine and three arcane spellcasters, with 2-3 fighter types.
Still, with only one rest available, Imoen having 0 spells in her spellbook before this one rest (thanks again to SCS customization) and only three party members, the opening dungeon was actually kind of hard due to SCS improvements. I had to be very careful to use every one of my very limited spells to the maximum effect. Due to very low hitpoints on every party member and essentially no spells left I had to rest before entering the library, where I used slow + fireball against Illyich and his group:
Minsc, who was often the target of duergar crossbowmen, dropped to very low hitpoints over the course of the dungeon, forcing me to start using healing potions to get his hp back. I recruited Yoshimo as a secondary frontliner (dualling him to fighter using SCS customization once he had the neccessary thief skills) and used my planned spider spawn + web combo for the dangerous mephit group in the air elemental plane:
The first post-rest haste was used against mephit portals, with Yoshimo doing most of the work:
After using magic missles against the vampire, I found myself with zero defensive spells left and using my last fireball on the final duergar group, with everyone quite wounded:
Being out of useful spells and facing backstabs, I drank another bunch of healing potions and left Imoen outside before using my second haste to take down the shadow thieves:
That was surprisingly challenging.
Anyway, in the city, I quickly did the circus tent (direct assault on Khala - I knew that Aerie would start without spells memorized, so I went all out against him, since I'd have to rest anyway) and went to the slums to recruit Anomen and Nalia. Since I planned to use SCS customization to turn Valygar into an axe-user (weapon profiencies are the only thing I'm changing), I also had to free Hendak in order to get Stonefire and Azuredge (also, The Sleeper for Anomen - he'd need a magical weapon before getting FoA). Not too much trouble here, this is always relatively easy. With these three weapons we made our way to Umar Hills to complete the party. Azuredge is our key to clearing the Temple Ruins early on while staying safe. We also can't rest a lot because Nalia's quest timer is ticking - This was mostly Anomen summoning a few skeletons as blockers while Valygar threw Azuredge at shadows, shadow fiends, shade wolves, skeletons warriors and the like:
Going here super early meant: No liches, and only the one bone golem (kited via Azuredge). The main problem is of course the SCS-improved shade lord, who not only has quite a few defensive spells, but also the constantly level-draining aura of darkness. I initially wanted to kite him with Azuredge, but that seemed too risky, because I didn't know what offensive spells he would maybe unleash on us if we gave him too much time. Instead, I went for the all out assault - Aerie started with a sunstone bullet on the altar with the party taking down Shadow Patrick while Nalia used secret word, followed up by Aerie's Breach, in order to make the shade lord vulnerable. Anomen activated repulse undead, we attacked with our magical weapons and a few magic missles (which barely did anything due to high magic resistance) - the shade lord was able to twice drain a level from everyone with his aura before it perished:
Very good - Luckily, we get an automatic restoration here. Now, I had to finish De'Arnise keep in order to keep Nalia happy. Spirit trolls were of course not without their dangers, but having Valygar with Stonefire was quite helpful. I was able to approach the first Yuan-Ti mage via the roof, getting him very low before his buffs kicked in and punching through his stoneskins with elemental damage on my weapons before any follow-up:
I failed to charm Glacias, and he was quite dangerous with his oil of speed - After a few tries, I managed to hold him, though:
Clearing the golems wasn't too hard, though I had to kite the iron golem to the entrance with Valygar throwing Azuredge at him. The targeted poisoning cloud forced me to use two antidotes and one elixir. After that, we cleared the trolls downstairs, fed and killed the umber hulks using a chaotic commands spell for safety, rested and prepared for Tor'Gal. Luckily, the troll leader only had one, not two, yuan-ti mages with him. Even better, an initial slow spell literally affected all targets on the battlefield:
The yuan-ti mage, strangely enough, didn't start with any spell protections, and his first cast was PFMW - I was already casting breach, so he was just breached and killed:
Even SCS Tor'gal couldn't stand against the combined and heavily buffed power of my party - already using quite powerful weapons at this early point:
I travelled back to the city, using Azuredge to explore and clear out the graveyard district, with a quick fireball for the spider cave and some summons as shields for the southern crypt. The vampyr got to use level drain twice, and in our weakened state, we travelled to the promenade to rest, but got our first ambush instead - could've been quite dangerous, but with our still remaing arsenal of spells (including a quick slow + fireball), the enemy didn't get to kill anyone despite facing a very bloodied party:
I rested, met Quayle, did Anomen's companion quest and bought a magic license. Now we're up to date again.
I failed to charm Glacias, and he was quite dangerous with his oil of speed - After a few tries, I managed to hold him, though:
SCS kind of screws you on this one; vanilla Glaicus has a 6-point penalty to his spell save (13 instead of 7 for a level 15 fighter), but the "normalize weird creature stats" routine SCS does eliminates that. Which makes charming him a lot harder.
On the other hand, dispelling him is also an option, and one that doesn't worry about saving throws. He's only an enemy because of a charm-like effect he's under. Which has caster level 1 and is dispellable. Catch him in basically any dispel, and he'll go friendly.
Cavora is the opposite of Skaraxe Whitebeard and I feel more comfortable with her.
She is a Dwarven Cavalier which means that if we have the same problems as the last game, she can use a raise dead scroll: a bit easier, but more importantly for me, I prefer to play good aligned characters.
All my starting characters are a-typical dwarves: a Paladin; a dragon disciple; and a Helmite Cleric.
I made a mistake. The cleric wasn't Helmite and I don't like the Dragon Disciple for my style of play (first time playing it), so I will start again with a Helmite Cleric and a standard sorcerer.
I failed to charm Glacias, and he was quite dangerous with his oil of speed - After a few tries, I managed to hold him, though:
SCS kind of screws you on this one; vanilla Glaicus has a 6-point penalty to his spell save (13 instead of 7 for a level 15 fighter), but the "normalize weird creature stats" routine SCS does eliminates that. Which makes charming him a lot harder.
On the other hand, dispelling him is also an option, and one that doesn't worry about saving throws. He's only an enemy because of a charm-like effect he's under. Which has caster level 1 and is dispellable. Catch him in basically any dispel, and he'll go friendly.
Good to know for future runs, if I can manage to remember it
Dorian II, half-elven lawful neutral bard, twentieth update
Now, it was time to complete all non-stronghold sidequests in Athkatla. There really wasn't much trouble with this: With the powerful addition of IWD buffs (emotion hope/courage, prayer, recitation etc.) and a bunch of good early-game crowd control spells always available (slow, chaos, holy smite) plus enough secret word/breach spells for the relatively low level spellcasters we were facing here, most battles ended very quickly in our favor. Here's Mencar as an early example:
A quick fireball + holy smite can still take out entire hostile groups, and you really can tell the difference between tactical and insane SCS here, as not all spellcasters actually have enough spell protections at the start to survive an early onslaught:
Even Dorian's horror spell, which I kept in his spellbook because it was quite useful in BG1, can still easily turn the tides of battle:
The sewer party was amongst the more powerful foes that I decided to deal with. Valygar missed his opening backstab on their mage with a critical fail, allowing him to cast mantle, which forced me to actually breach him (no secret word needed, as his only spell protection was a MGOI):
In terms of spending, I bought an early bracers of ac3 and belt of hill giant strength, went to WK for the Shortsword of Mask +4 and eventually got 2 scrolls of improved haste from a pickpocket and payed Gaelan after the final vampire encounter was over. I also did Aran's first two quests, killed the grimwarders at Bodhi's and went in with an invisible Nalia to steal the Mace of Disruption. Very easy to get if you don't want to deal with vampires yet, because you can stay invisible the entire time (neither opening the secret door nor picking the mace from the blood pool will remove invisibility, and the vampires can't break it either):
With all the sidequests, early game encounters and companion quests done (including Nalia's abduction and Anomen's knighthood), it's time to get going on stronghold quests - propably starting with the druid grove, which should be exceptionally easy by now (usually the first or second one I do with SCS). By now, we have sixth level mage spells, a seventh level cleric spell, the most powerful version of skeleton warriors and already some very good weapons on our fighters.
Between the holidays and a little IWDEE break, some times have passed since my last update.
Gwydion is now in chapter 9 SoD, just having reunited with Jaheira.
How did he got here ?
After dealing with city quests, I did Ice Island easily and then Durlag's Tower. Jaheira died against the wardens which hold her, and in level 2 it was Minsc who died, stunned by a false Islanne.
Beside those deaths, the tower was pretty straightforward, for level 3 I did my usual invisibility trick for disarming traps and turn undead the skeletons.
The chess game was won with web, grease, arrows of detonation, potions of explosions and fireballs :
The Demon Knight did have a surprise for us : it was escorted by some undeads. Still, the outcome was the same as usual :
I didn't bring back the dagger immediately, and instead did the Werewolves Island, without difficulties. Karoug fell easily to Burning Earth from Khalid and Werebane from Jaheira. The only bad surprise was before shipping, since I didn't remember where I stored Kondar...
The Serpents of Abbathor were far more difficult, killing Khalid and Minsc two times. So, in the Nashkel Mines. I use all my buffs and didn't let the final boss have a chance, by casting silence, web, spike growth, fireball and holy blight.
Final fight from chapter 5 was did with first invisibility to go to the back, then casting the usual AoE spells.
Chapter 6 was a walk in the park.
Slythe and Kristin couldn't even talk with a silence well placed :
I supposed Kristin had some scrolls because she could cast some spells even while silenced.
Maze and Undercity went smooth.
Sarevok was underwhelming, cloudkill killed Semaj and Tazok, Angelo, Darmyd and Sarevok were hit by dispel arrrows, and so soon only Sarevok stood up, and after a backstab from Imoen, was killed by a shot from Gwydion.
I play with Endless BG1 mod, so I could did the cult and Aec Letec after that. Thanks to dispel arrows, the initial fight against the cultists was not too hard.
For Aec Letec I tried to backstab the mage with Imoen alone, but I missclick on her potion of invisibility after that and she was held then killed by Aec Letec...
All the party rushed to her rescue in vain, but managed to kill Aec Letec with only Dynaheir sharing Imoen's fate (forgot to drink her potion of mirror eyes).
For SoD I have some mods as well :
- Road to Discovery
- Another fine Hell
- Broaskir Bridge
- Imoen 4 Ever
Imoen reached level 10 trickster at the end of Korlaz tomb, so I dual classed her to a mage and finish the side quests after, so she was level 2.
With chapter 8 she reached level 5 in mage.
The chapter 8 party was Minsc, Dynaheir, Imoen, Corwin and Glint, and chapter 9 is now Minsc, Dynaheir, Imoen, Glint and Jaheira. If all goes well, Khalid will replace Dynaheir for chapter 10.
Gwydion went to the frontline for chapter 8, but with Jaheira's comeback he can again be an archer.
Dorian II, half-elven lawful neutral bard, twentyfirst update
Before travelling to the druid grove: Last time, I forgot to take on the bridge district party - this was remedied with a quick secret word + breach for their mage and a clean victory:
I challenged myself to do the druid grove without resting - still walked through the place without many issues:
The lack of confusion immunity effects available to me at this point (too lazy to rest and learn a bunch of chaotic commands) made the myconids a bit annoying, but not enough to be real trouble. We did the remaining trademeet sidequests and bought some gear from the merchant before going back to Athkatla for the thief stronghold. Rayic Gethras was in the unfortunate position of not even getting his buffs to fire up before his death:
Mae'var and his lackeys got hit by slow + chaos:
Turning in this quest gave Nalia her first 7th level spell, so we used some one-time wishes, including the golem battle:
Dorian II, half-elven lawful neutral bard, twentysecond update
We entered the windspear dungeon, quickly clearing the first level. SCS clay golems were their usual annoying selves, cursing our party, but in the end, the Flail of Ages and some aerial servants did the job. Next, I buffed a (still cursed) Anomen up to the max, using the iMoD +2. With everything going, including improved haste, he took on the vampire room on his own - sadly, his one sunray got interrupted, so he just had to hit his way to victory - a bit risky because of the curse, but he succeeded:
Fighting our way forward, we got to the next two golem groups - for the adamantite one, I lured him to a doorway, shooting him with Tansheron's and Azuredge:
After killing Tazok with a few buffs, I challenged Conster - in response to PFMW, the party equipped non-magical weapons, and our secret word + breach combo was too late to actually matter - the fighters had already punched through the wizard's stoneskins:
For Samia's quest, Dorian cast protection from fire on Mazzy, who took down the guardians by herself. A quick round of buffs, and Samia's party easily fell after a slow, chaos, holy smite combo:
We returned to the city and entered the temple sewers, making our way past our first few beholders via skeleton warrior summons. The ghoul town didn't have a lich spawn yet, so it was easy to clear with iMod and Azuredge:
After a quick rest, another 5 skeleton warriors cleared out the beholder lair and the sightless priests. We kind of overbuffed for the Unseeing Eye - I forgot that it doesn't spawn in the two death tyrants on tactical difficulty:
This was our first time making use of spell shield, SI:A, entropy shield and impervious sanctity of mind, though it wasn't really needed this time around. These spells will of course be more important when facing the last two remaining strongholds, the planar prison and planar sphere.
Following the utter failure of the dwarves, I may try a similar party of gnomes.
However, beore that I will try Cavalo again, only this tim without the other two party members.
Journal of Cavalo
I barely escaped the ambush with my life and after making my way to the Friendly Arms Inn I was once more attacked, this time by a mage. Without the aid of Gorion, this time I was seriously hurt.
After a long rest, I fully recovered.
The battle was considerably more dangerous without a cleric to use command or to use true sight.
I then headed south to the Nashkel Mines area, picking up a letter, the Colquetle amulet and ankheg armour on the way.
Then I took Samuel to the FAI and returned the amulet to the Colquetle family.
By then I was level 4, reputation 20 and charisma 18.
I found a charisma increasing tome in a cave near Lathander's Temple.
I just had enough gold to buy a +1 long sword.
I tried to help Tonder but to no avail. However with difficulty, I was able to slay him with the sword.
The reward was a +1 sword that does fire damage. I now look like my portrait.
With two +1 swords and ankheg armour, I felt ready to face Zargos Flintblade and Greywolf.
The battle with Greywolf was touch and go, and to survive a healing potion was needed. However with his sword in my possession I feel much more secure. I spent some time resting at the Carnival.
Dorian II, half-elven lawful neutral bard, twentythird update
The planar sphere: This time, I had enough remove curse spells memorized to deal with clay golems. I buffed up for the named halfling group, waited out a mantle and countered the follow-up PFMW with normal weapons. The other halfling casters fell to secret word + breach for one of them, normal weapons for the other. Tolgerias failed to put up his buffs in time, making this battle rather easy:
After clearing the ice and fire rooms, we had to fight some more highly annoying golems, using our wizards to tank a bit and Anomen as the primary clay golem destroyer:
Good to have the ring of danger sense - Nalia can finally deal with most traps now. Now, with most of my buffs gone and hitpoints low, I should have rested. Instead, since I still had my skeleton summons ready, I decided to send some towards Lavok - drawing out his death spell with two of them, sending more after that. However, I should have known that SCS Lavok might be too smart for that - he just walked past the additional skeletons until he found my unprotected party and cast timestop, under which he was able to use suffocate, some other spell (I forgot which one, it didn't do anyhting important) and notably, symbol: death - now, Dorian had death ward on him, but none of the others did, and in the end, we suffered our first SoA character death in Valygar, who failed his safe - luckily, soon after that, Lavok's main protections ran out and we were able to damage and defeat him:
After that, we used the RoR on Valygar and finally rested before buffing up (with chaotic commands on everyone this time around) for the demons, turning them into easy prey and finishing this quest.
For the planar prison, my initial buffs included pretty much everything (including all buff protections available to me), because I usually do the entire place in one go without rebuffing - quickly crushing the opening group, we made our way east:
Both slave wizards used PFMW, so they fell to normal weapons, and we took down the demon, sacrificing the orb quickly and immediately making our way to the warden - the key is to get to him while a lot of slaves are still alive, so he will spend his time casting finger of death and the like on them instead of doing anything dangerous to the party. He had quite a few pre-buffs, though, with two secret words needed at first, and he renewed one spell protection, forcing me to use a third before I was finally able to breach and kill him:
Luckily, he had no spell trap (which was something I was a bit worries about, because I didn't find a scroll of ruby ray so far) - allowing for us to take control of the bard stronghold, which we finished next. Finally, before closing the session, I cleared WKI without the statues, mostly for the ammunition belt. Next time, we will deal with Bodhi's lair.
Dorian II, half-elven lawful neutral bard, twentyfourth update
Anomen did most of Bodhi's Lair with the iMoD +2, a few buffs and improved haste - Tanova was the only one we avoided intially, going downstairs first while her short duration buffs ran out - upon return, a single hit from Anomen was enough:
Bodhi was taken down almost right away despite not a huge amount of buffs on our side:
We made our way through Brynnlaw, taking down Perth from invisibility. Now, Dorian had to duel Bhaal, which was done by kiting him via throwing weapon:
I managed to clear the entirety of Spellhold without resting once. For the initial yuan-ti mages, normal weapons did the trick against their PFMW:
The other yuan-ti mage killed himself by trying to flee through the big trap:
Our fighters had little trouble with all other encounters, we didn't have a lich with the undead group (allowing Anomen to do his thing) and summoned aerial servants to help with the clay golems. Soon, we were already at Jon, put him to near death and waited through the timestop for his fleeing-trigger:
No trouble here at all, especially compared to our poor performance in the planar sphere. Now, it's time for the City of Caverns.
Dorian II, half-elven lawful neutral bard, twentyfifth update
Not much to say about the city of caverns - another area I decided to clear without resting:
I went to the underdark and cleared the outside area, buffed with chaotic commands. The kuo-toa caves were next, with skeletons taking care of beholders. For the demon knights, I rested and buffed, this time including fire protection and buff protections such as SI:A/Spell Shield/Entropy Shield/ISOM, which are now more and more starting to be part of my standard buffs as I face more powerful spellcasters (fire protection and protection from magical energy as well, as they counter most of the dangerous lategame damage spells). No screenshots here, though I faced the balor with similiar buffs:
He didn't get to use his remove magic on my death wards before dying to my hasted warriors.
Skeleton warriors did their job in the beholder hive:
I did have to resummon the group once when facing the elder orbs due to a death spell - I already had a few wondrous recall spells to also regain chaotic commands in preparation for the illithid city - my next target. There, I actually took the opportunity to use some of my potions such as heroism, strength etc. - can't rest there anyway, so they will be useful for their entire duration. I had enough chaotic commands to renew them for the entire party at least once, though this ended up not being needed - we were fast enough. I made sure to protect Aerie and Nalia with protection from magical energy to counter the detonation ability added by SCS, though Mazzy was also quite good of luring out detonations away from the party:
Opening the final door somehow didn't turn the controlled mind flayer hostile, which is the first time this has happened to me:
The elder brain was no trouble:
With our recent mind flayer experiences, freeing Phaere wasn't an issue - in fact, I did this while still buffed from the illithid city. Shortly after that, most of our buffs were starting to go, and I was very low on spells - still, I decided to do the arena fights in Ust'Natha before resting, which turned out to be a huge mistake when Nalia, freshly blessed with her first HLA, summoned a planetar in the first mage battle and utterly failed to dispel the enemy mages buffs and breach him before the planetar duration ended, leaving her basically without spells. The only outside help possible here was giving her items, which allowed us to get a few statue summons in, but none of them did the job. Finally, with Nalia's buffs running out and a Nishruu having drained all her remaining spells, she got hit with a PW:Stun:
I thought this would seal her fate, but the enemy mage barely had anything left himself - the only relevant thing he did during the duration was a double acid arrow sequencer, and Nalia was free again:
At this point I at least felt that Nalia would propably not die, but the mage had still quite a few stoneskins, mirror images and the like, and I didn't look forward to punching through all that with a mage in melee combat - I found a few summoning scrolls in my scroll bag and threw them to Nalia, allowing her to make use of three air elementals, which finally did the job:
Not exactly the battle I expected to be one of the closest and most notable in the run so far. Anyway, after that, Aerie fought the two remaining mage battles and easily won, mostly due to the air elementals still remaining in the ring and having the spellbook to secret word and breach the drow mages in time:
We quickly cleared the other arena and finally rested, taking down the next beholder with skeletons, and peacefully doing the main questline until faced with the opportunity to take down Deirex. I had bought a ruby ray scroll at the entrance of the city to make sure Nalia would be prepared for a potential spell trap by the lich (and any future liches, since ruby ray scrolls don't exactly grow on trees). Deirex didn't have spell trap. In fact, despite a very long and impressive bufflist - he didn't have anything that would prevent a breach spell. Seems like a very strange oversight from the script here, but it made this battle rather short:
After that, I grew a bit overcondident when facing house Jae'llat - these guys have a ton of high level fighters, and just walking up to them without some precautions, maybe hard-to-kill summons or arcane spellcasters as tanks is a bit fishy, which Valygar soon learned when he died just before I tried to save his life with an invisibility potion:
That was just stupid. At least Anomen had armor of faith going and managed to survive. Not much of an issue to use my second RoR charge and get Valygar back up, though, and the battle didn't last too long after I finally took it a bit more seriously. Quile was next on our list, and this one was over in an instant due to an approach from mass invisibility (another scroll I had bought near the entrance):
We also took down the slime worshippers before finishing this plot and leaving the underdark for good. Now, we still have quite a few encounters with liches, dragons, mind flayers and powerful mages left. Before closing the session, I made sure to buy the Defender of Easthaven for Anomen.
Everyone has their first 2 HLAs by now, so we should be able to deal with all that, as long as we don't get overconfident and skip crucial buffs.
Dorian II, half-elven lawful neutral bard, twentysixth update
Time to hunt some liches - we can do that relatively safely now that we have both ruby ray and enough spellslots for fire protection and protection from magical energy plus buff protections for four of our party members, leaving only the high-hp Mazzy and Valygar vulernable who are unlikely to directly die to one or two spells, and they have access to item-based immunities and spell protections. With three arcane spellcasters, even if a lich starts off with two spell protections or something like SI:A or spell shield in the mix, we can time our opening in such a way to get ruby rays and breaches in often before the lich can cast its initial timestop:
We did this to the elemental lich and shade lich as well and, being down in the sewers, cleared the mind flayer enclave. A planetar and a quick death spell via helmet helped out against the alhoon in order to grant us time to dispel his buffs as well:
The fact that we are playing on tactical and not insane means that we usually only have to dispel one spell protection before breaching - I think so far I've only encountered 2-3 wizards who had 2 of them in their pre-buffs, though this will become more common. The guarded compound was our next target, and that one was very quick:
I made a short stop at Bodhi's, not really taking her down yet, instead just clearing the upstairs area mostly using Anomen again - he surprised the guardian via sanctuary here:
The two dragons open up combat with remove magic, but with entropy shields and SI:A at our side plus splitting our party a bit, we can get around that:
Next, we got our fastest Kangaxx ever: I was able to force-attack and destroy the lich form before its pre-buffs fired up, and as soon as he turned and got his new name and model, I unleashed triple sunrays:
The twisted rune has the enemy variety to avoid being easily cheesed, but with a full arsenal of buffs and buff protections, they still can do very little against an aggressive approach. The lich opened up under invisibility, so we focused on dispelling Vaxall while the fighters took care of the fighter&vampire:
As Shangalar re-appeared with a timestop, he assessed the situation and found our party immune to fire, immune or resistant to magical energy and otherwise well protection against simple breach or remove magic plays, so he went for a death fog - though the lich wasn't that smart and threw it in an area were he himself would be affected (coincidentally, with acid being the only element he himself was vulernable to) - he interrupted a few of his own spells:
A quick double secret word + breach and a single iMoD attack, and he was done:
I didn't check out Layana's prebuffs but assumed that she had a spell trap going, so I used my last ruby ray on her, but she was able to cast another spell trap because she still had one more spell protection active - this meant that I wouldn't be able to breach her, though this ended up not being important, as this was the point when her improved mantle ran out:
Our final loose end was Watcher's Keep level 1 (statues) and level 2 (complete). The statue battle was fairly straightforward after dealing with the much more dangerous twisted rune:
I used the approriate protection spells for the scepter rooms before preparing a bunch of damaging spells and fire protection buffs for the chromatic demon. I made sure to catch him in ice golem form, though I definitely should have buffed with frost protection buffs against his powerful cone of cold, which interrupted basically all of my opening fire spells, allowing him to transform into a shambling mounds. I did manage to throw down two fire storms, so the hope was that he would go into ice form again. Two chain lightnings and a few crom faeyr hits did at least some damage, and his next move was indeed ice golem form once more - the next cone of cold almost took down Anomen and Nalia, but after that, I was able to throw down a couple of flame strikes and flame arrows to finish the battle:
Finally, it was time to challenge Bodhi. When it comes to SCS I'm kind of used to/traumatized by the tactics version of Bodhi which involves an ADHW-like ability that does a ton of frost damage, and which she tends to use after getting a second wind which returns her to full hp - plus, she also has a very powerful ice shield. I think she does use that on insane (not sure, honestly, my memory is very hazy), and I prepared for that for this run as well with frost protection spells and scrolls, but apparently (and I propably should've remembered this, since this isn't my first tactical run), she doesn't do that at all on tactical, so that was a bit of a waste. Straightfoward fight here - using the holy water, triple sunray, and improved hasted fighters bringing down Bodhi:
It seems like she also doesn't get her wizard ally on tactical? I defintely remember that one from the insane run.
Dorian II, half-elven lawful neutral bard, twentyseventh update
We start exploring the elven city, taking down golems, going invisible for the drow mage. The best way to deal with huge groups of Rakshasas: Horrid wilting.
Since we had buffed for this encounter, I travelled west to use my buffs in order to take down the dragon - this might've been one of my fastest kills on this guy, he got to do nothing except for his opening prebuffs and a wing buffet:
After that, I luckily remembered that I hadn't killed Renal for his boots of speed yet, so I rectified that before clearing the remainder of the city and challenging Irenicus at the tree. While Dorian does have some spike traps by now, I didn't plant any of them here and instead went for the straightforward battle, though that was over pretty fast with ruby ray + secret word by Nalia + Aerie and a slightly delayed breach by Dorian:
All of the hell trials were completed the good way (in order to preserve our alignment for Balthazar' Ascension conversation) and we prepared buffs for Jon, including some potion buffs. 3 spike traps killed one of the demons - sadly not a balor, so my party had to carefully take these on - carefully, because I finally got a serious amount of my buffs dispelled - not only the two fighters, but also Aerie - though I'm not sure how exactly the enemy got past her buff protections. I must have missed something. I had to make sure that the balors only were able to attack party members still protected by death ward, which worked out, but took a little bit of time. Meanwhile, the slayer was able to cast timestop and used his entire time to go after Nalia with melee attacks (casting improved haste inbetween) - luckily, her AC/MI/Stoneskins prevented her from taking any damage:
While renewing some of our buffs, Anomen took down the final Balor:
Though the vulnerability of Mazzy, Valygar and Aerie forced the three to drink healing potions from time to time, I was eventually able to get enough ruby rays and secret words out to breach the slayer, which sealed its fate:
SCS is starting to seriously be felt now that we're facing truly high level spellcasters. No longer is one secret word and one breach enough to deal with almost everything, and our buffs aren't all too safe any longer. I decided to continue playing, buffing up again for improved Ilasera, who lacked the defenses to stand against us:
One of the most surprising difficulty spikes with SCS is the first pocket plane challenge, which turns from trivial to propably the hardest encounter you're likely to face until this point. I tend to forget how dangerous the final encounter is (Sarevok + Bodhi + Irenicus) - still using the buffs from Ilasera, quite a few short-duration buffs ran out during the encounter. I got lucky that I got out a ruby ray + secret word + breach combo on Irenicus before Bodhi made spellcasting mostly impossible with her version of insect plague (I'm not using fireshields because I'm scared of the double fireshield bug, though I guess I should have prepared SI:C):
Bodhi, however, is no pushover, and even Sarevok deals very high melee damage. I had to rotate out my fighters as they kept taking lots of damage, until finally Aerie's implosion HLA allowed us to pin down Bodhi, and we took down Sarevok by kiting him with energy blades:
Entering Saradush, I did the minor sidequests and bought tons of spellcrolls for Nalia and Aerie (I even ran out of money, forcing me to wait for more loot before I was able to buy the final few still left). Anomen cleared the prison for us:
The sewer mages weren't too much trouble, one was easily dispelled, the other one taken down from invisibility:
The mage in the cellar was more dangerous and managed to renew his buffs at the end of a timestop with a spell trigger - he hit us good with a horrid wilting (though our most vulnerable party members were protected) and only went down after his second improved mantle ran out:
Before resting, we cleared the level before Gromnir with our remaining buffs and spells, including a decent dragon's breath:
Now, one final round of buffs before Gromnir. For some very strange reason, my party got teleported back to the stairs a milisecond after the encounter started. This teleportation effect also canceled our opening spells (including Nalia's timestop). I have no idea what happened there. Since we were relatively far away from the two mages, we took down the fighters/thieves first. While our HLA-buffed fighters took on Gromnir with great success (double critial strike with 10/9 APR respectively will do that), Nalia was actually able to snipe the il-khan mage with dragon's breath, as he seemingly had no fire protection going:
Gromnir died within moments, and Karun the Black, our final foe, finally unleashed his timestop, using his time to summon a fallen planetar amongst other things. However, with none of our buffs getting dispelled, we confidentally took down the powerful celestial while starting to dispel Karun with ruby rays:
A final breach granted us victory:
We also cleared the area outside Saradush and are currently resting in the pocket plane.
We defeated the dwarves at the bottom of Nashkel Mines who were following the Serpent. We have retrieved the dwarven artifact but have no idea what to do with it.
We thought that we should take it to a temple of Helm but nobody is interested. No sign of Wostok in either temple.
Xan got separated from the rest of the party and ran out of healing potions. With all the gold that we have, raising him yet again was no problem.
It looks as if the quest is virtually finished but not quite.
EDIT
After doing the minor quests in Baldur's Gate now returned to Candlekeep, thhough not entered.
Comments
I didn't find time to write the Sarevok update or play for a few days, so my memory of the battle isn't exactly fresh, but I'll try to do my best:
First, I made my way to the undercity while disarming traps in the maze with an invisibly Imoen. For the undercity party, I threw webs and cloudkills at them from off-screen. For some reason, there were A LOT of summoned skeleton warriors with the party, far more than should be possible:
Whilst looking unsuccessfully for Malden Col, a suspected traitor, I spoke to Hobart Stubbletoes who transported us into the middle of a dangerous battle which included harpies. We survived with difficulty and were then able to sleep and followed this with long-term buffs such as stoneskin. We will now investigate further. Being buffed may make the area a little safer. We had to use potions of extra healing to survive. Hobart sold us some useful items, but nothing of great import. The harpies outside were no problem once we were buffed. One battle later and I was wishing that I hadn't bought things from Hobart as I got them for nothing. I also got a +4 sword.
I think that this is part of the Trials of the Luremaster mod.
I am near the end but cannot enter for the big battle.
I have cleared the areas above and taken the keys from the tombs.
I cannot however find the Final Door. Without it, I am stranded and cannot finish the game.
If anyone can give me the requisite information I would be most grateful, perhaps copy my map and put an x where the door is.
I do hope that I don't have to abandon the game at this stage.
https://pbg.bgforge.net/iwd/walktrials/crypt.shtml.html
The problem is that the place is filled with too many secret doors. I don't remember where the last one is.
I guess if you feel you are stuck, you were indeed not able to solve the task of the lure master after all XD
Thanks but I already had that one. It's the Watchknight's Tomb Door that I need. It should be in the circular room, but I can't find it.
Found some time to squeeze in a bit of SoD gameplay. For Korlasz's tomb, I used PfU scrolls on Minsc and Ajantis, firebombing the two groups of humanoids and taking down Korlasz with a bunch of magical arrows and a spell thrust for her MGOI:
Stubborness is an undervalued attribute.
I found one door where I wasn't expecting one and that led to another door opening.
Here is hoping that I can now finish the quest. I have just received a +4 sword and a +2 shield.
Reached 16 in the list of things to do and went on to enter the keep.
It is difficult due to Viconia being killed. If I return in the future I will keep my cleric well protected, perhaps even come with two clerics just in case. This is certainly strengthening the party. Not having a cleric necessitated a lot of sleeping and the usage of healing potions.
In the next battle Edwin was slain.
I cleared the Troll Claw Woods without trouble, using the anti-troll sword on Minsc to great effect. At the Forest of Wyrms, I forgot to take throwing daggers along and didn't feel like using poison protection scroll against the dragon, instead opting for a fight without special immunities - I buffed up with my usual spells, plus a fire giant strength potion for Minsc plus agility for M'khin and Corwin and made sure to breach the dragon's stoneskin ASAP. Corwin and Minsc got hit by the breath weapon once, but all in all, this was a quick and easy battle:
I always found trials too tough for noreload. Not sure anymore why though, it has been a long time for me. But once you get through it, the end game becomes so much easier.
Dendy - asssassin (Gate70) halfling
Metran - thief (Corey_Russell) halfling
Willaim - archer (Grond0) elf
We were inside Cloakwood mine, and made short work of dealing with Davaeorn.
We did the sidequests at Coalition Camp before exploring the remaining three wilderness areas, including a vampire lair where we swapped around a helmet of charm protection:
Early SoA was a bit tricky for me - mostly because of me having the SCS NPC customization options active (this is the last time I will use them - I have encountered way too many bugs in this run, 90% of them involving this option). I couldn't really take Jaheira - she started at level 1/1, didn't get the experience boost the option should give her, and you don't get an option to rehire her in the dungeon - she just leaves (unlike Minsc). I also planned to have my party involve Nalia, Valygar and Mazzy, which meant I had to do Temple Ruins and De'Arnise keep really, really early to obtain and keep these characters. The other party members: Aerie and Anomen. Two divine and three arcane spellcasters, with 2-3 fighter types.
Still, with only one rest available, Imoen having 0 spells in her spellbook before this one rest (thanks again to SCS customization) and only three party members, the opening dungeon was actually kind of hard due to SCS improvements. I had to be very careful to use every one of my very limited spells to the maximum effect. Due to very low hitpoints on every party member and essentially no spells left I had to rest before entering the library, where I used slow + fireball against Illyich and his group:
Anyway, in the city, I quickly did the circus tent (direct assault on Khala - I knew that Aerie would start without spells memorized, so I went all out against him, since I'd have to rest anyway) and went to the slums to recruit Anomen and Nalia. Since I planned to use SCS customization to turn Valygar into an axe-user (weapon profiencies are the only thing I'm changing), I also had to free Hendak in order to get Stonefire and Azuredge (also, The Sleeper for Anomen - he'd need a magical weapon before getting FoA). Not too much trouble here, this is always relatively easy. With these three weapons we made our way to Umar Hills to complete the party. Azuredge is our key to clearing the Temple Ruins early on while staying safe. We also can't rest a lot because Nalia's quest timer is ticking - This was mostly Anomen summoning a few skeletons as blockers while Valygar threw Azuredge at shadows, shadow fiends, shade wolves, skeletons warriors and the like:
On the other hand, dispelling him is also an option, and one that doesn't worry about saving throws. He's only an enemy because of a charm-like effect he's under. Which has caster level 1 and is dispellable. Catch him in basically any dispel, and he'll go friendly.
Baerloth fell to a couple of Spectral Guards
Artemis fell next as we had no counter to demons.
In the same battle I fell to a spell, (I think) It might have been a critical.
The Trial of the Luremaster is certainly challenging.
My next game is with a paladin-led party. He can use scrolls tto raise the dead. If I get this far with him, it could well be a different experience.
It has been a most enjoyable run.
She is a Dwarven Cavalier which means that if we have the same problems as the last game, she can use a raise dead scroll: a bit easier, but more importantly for me, I prefer to play good aligned characters.
All my starting characters are a-typical dwarves: a Paladin; a dragon disciple; and a Helmite Cleric.
I made a mistake. The cleric wasn't Helmite and I don't like the Dragon Disciple for my style of play (first time playing it), so I will start again with a Helmite Cleric and a standard sorcerer.
Good to know for future runs, if I can manage to remember it
Dorian II, half-elven lawful neutral bard, twentieth update
Now, it was time to complete all non-stronghold sidequests in Athkatla. There really wasn't much trouble with this: With the powerful addition of IWD buffs (emotion hope/courage, prayer, recitation etc.) and a bunch of good early-game crowd control spells always available (slow, chaos, holy smite) plus enough secret word/breach spells for the relatively low level spellcasters we were facing here, most battles ended very quickly in our favor. Here's Mencar as an early example:
Between the holidays and a little IWDEE break, some times have passed since my last update.
Gwydion is now in chapter 9 SoD, just having reunited with Jaheira.
How did he got here ?
After dealing with city quests, I did Ice Island easily and then Durlag's Tower. Jaheira died against the wardens which hold her, and in level 2 it was Minsc who died, stunned by a false Islanne.
Beside those deaths, the tower was pretty straightforward, for level 3 I did my usual invisibility trick for disarming traps and turn undead the skeletons.
The chess game was won with web, grease, arrows of detonation, potions of explosions and fireballs :
I didn't bring back the dagger immediately, and instead did the Werewolves Island, without difficulties. Karoug fell easily to Burning Earth from Khalid and Werebane from Jaheira. The only bad surprise was before shipping, since I didn't remember where I stored Kondar...
The Serpents of Abbathor were far more difficult, killing Khalid and Minsc two times. So, in the Nashkel Mines. I use all my buffs and didn't let the final boss have a chance, by casting silence, web, spike growth, fireball and holy blight.
Final fight from chapter 5 was did with first invisibility to go to the back, then casting the usual AoE spells.
Chapter 6 was a walk in the park.
Slythe and Kristin couldn't even talk with a silence well placed :
Maze and Undercity went smooth.
Sarevok was underwhelming, cloudkill killed Semaj and Tazok, Angelo, Darmyd and Sarevok were hit by dispel arrrows, and so soon only Sarevok stood up, and after a backstab from Imoen, was killed by a shot from Gwydion.
For Aec Letec I tried to backstab the mage with Imoen alone, but I missclick on her potion of invisibility after that and she was held then killed by Aec Letec...
All the party rushed to her rescue in vain, but managed to kill Aec Letec with only Dynaheir sharing Imoen's fate (forgot to drink her potion of mirror eyes).
For SoD I have some mods as well :
- Road to Discovery
- Another fine Hell
- Broaskir Bridge
- Imoen 4 Ever
Imoen reached level 10 trickster at the end of Korlaz tomb, so I dual classed her to a mage and finish the side quests after, so she was level 2.
With chapter 8 she reached level 5 in mage.
The chapter 8 party was Minsc, Dynaheir, Imoen, Corwin and Glint, and chapter 9 is now Minsc, Dynaheir, Imoen, Glint and Jaheira. If all goes well, Khalid will replace Dynaheir for chapter 10.
Gwydion went to the frontline for chapter 8, but with Jaheira's comeback he can again be an archer.
Before travelling to the druid grove: Last time, I forgot to take on the bridge district party - this was remedied with a quick secret word + breach for their mage and a clean victory:
I challenged myself to do the druid grove without resting - still walked through the place without many issues:
The lack of confusion immunity effects available to me at this point (too lazy to rest and learn a bunch of chaotic commands) made the myconids a bit annoying, but not enough to be real trouble. We did the remaining trademeet sidequests and bought some gear from the merchant before going back to Athkatla for the thief stronghold. Rayic Gethras was in the unfortunate position of not even getting his buffs to fire up before his death:
We helped Joia and killed Tarnesh.
We were able to help Melicamp, but a later battle with a skeleton proved dangerous.
We calmed Marl and took a tome to Firebead.
EDIT
Upon trying to help Tonder, he killed us as the Guril Berries failed to work.
We entered the windspear dungeon, quickly clearing the first level. SCS clay golems were their usual annoying selves, cursing our party, but in the end, the Flail of Ages and some aerial servants did the job. Next, I buffed a (still cursed) Anomen up to the max, using the iMoD +2. With everything going, including improved haste, he took on the vampire room on his own - sadly, his one sunray got interrupted, so he just had to hit his way to victory - a bit risky because of the curse, but he succeeded:
However, beore that I will try Cavalo again, only this tim without the other two party members.
Journal of Cavalo
I barely escaped the ambush with my life and after making my way to the Friendly Arms Inn I was once more attacked, this time by a mage. Without the aid of Gorion, this time I was seriously hurt.
After a long rest, I fully recovered.
The battle was considerably more dangerous without a cleric to use command or to use true sight.
I then headed south to the Nashkel Mines area, picking up a letter, the Colquetle amulet and ankheg armour on the way.
Then I took Samuel to the FAI and returned the amulet to the Colquetle family.
By then I was level 4, reputation 20 and charisma 18.
I found a charisma increasing tome in a cave near Lathander's Temple.
I just had enough gold to buy a +1 long sword.
I tried to help Tonder but to no avail. However with difficulty, I was able to slay him with the sword.
The reward was a +1 sword that does fire damage. I now look like my portrait.
With two +1 swords and ankheg armour, I felt ready to face Zargos Flintblade and Greywolf.
The battle with Greywolf was touch and go, and to survive a healing potion was needed. However with his sword in my possession I feel much more secure. I spent some time resting at the Carnival.
The planar sphere: This time, I had enough remove curse spells memorized to deal with clay golems. I buffed up for the named halfling group, waited out a mantle and countered the follow-up PFMW with normal weapons. The other halfling casters fell to secret word + breach for one of them, normal weapons for the other. Tolgerias failed to put up his buffs in time, making this battle rather easy:
For the planar prison, my initial buffs included pretty much everything (including all buff protections available to me), because I usually do the entire place in one go without rebuffing - quickly crushing the opening group, we made our way east:
I returned to the Carnival where I helped Bentha by killing Zordral.
I helped Khaled and Jaheira get to Nashkel.
After joining up with Dorn, we killed Kryll.
I then bade Dorn farewell.
I helped Albert before killing Vax and Zal. We then killed Caldo, Krumm and Ingot.
The Gnoll Stronghold was next.
Serious injuries forced me to flee.
After recuperation I went to the Lighthouse Area where I killed Sirenes and Flesh Golems.
I then did a lot of Ankheg hunting, sometimes taking on two at once.
I recruited Tiax who picked a lot of pockets before I bade him farewell.
Thorin joined me whereupon we did more Ankheg hunting.
We Dealt with Bassilis and Zorgal easily.
EDIT
We then picked up Dynaheir, Tenya and Tiax before visiting Shoal.
Having allies made the gnoll stronghold much easier!
When Tiax was killed, we allowed him to stay dead. The Sword Coast is better without him.
Being a Cavalier, the sirine were no problem. We didn't bother with the ogres, though killed two ogrillon that attacked.
We then cleared the basilisk area. The medusae almost cleared us.
One crept up behind us and petrified Tenya and Dynaheir.
I moved quickly to avoid being petrified since Thorin was the only one who was protected from her gaze.
At that moment Mutamin came into view and Thorin had to deal with a medusa, a greater basilisk and Mutamin almost single handed.
Without having spells, that was tough.
We had no stone to flesh scrolls on us so we visited the temple. There, Thorin got healed and we bought the scrolls.
We returned and now have Tenya and Dynaheir back in the party.
Sorry, no images of the basilisk encounter which was quite scary.
Neera joined us and we went to see Aerie at the carnival to get items identified. Whilst there Tenya told us about Lethe, so we will visit her next.
Lethe attacked us and was killed.
Bandits then attacked.
We helped Aldeth after sinding Gurke's Cloak.
We recovered Dynaheir's Journal after which Neera requested that we seek out Adoy.
Following NBeera's request, we helped her to find Adoy.
We bade her farewell before getting into combat with Meilum.
Centeol was next on the list followed by a dragon.
I have an almost irrational dislike of druids which is why I killed Selene. I suppose that it is because I have yet to come across a good one.
We then cleared out a nest of wyvern and afterwards claimed the reward.
Perhaps we are now strong enough to face the demon in Nashkel Mines.
Anomen did most of Bodhi's Lair with the iMoD +2, a few buffs and improved haste - Tanova was the only one we avoided intially, going downstairs first while her short duration buffs ran out - upon return, a single hit from Anomen was enough:
Mulahey was no problem
Xan joined us and after we left the mines we killed the Amazons.
We then killed the Revenant.
Then raided the tombs and killed Narcillicus.
Nimbul killed Oublek and we killed Nimbul.
We cleared the bandit camp and then killed Tranzig.
We have left the Cloakwood Mines. Summoned monsters absorbed Davaeorn's spells and killed most of his monsters. Davaeorn then killed in melee.
Now at the Gate where Xan was killed by an ogre. He later levelled up after being raised.
Not much to say about the city of caverns - another area I decided to clear without resting:
Skeleton warriors did their job in the beholder hive:
Everyone has their first 2 HLAs by now, so we should be able to deal with all that, as long as we don't get overconfident and skip crucial buffs.
Time to hunt some liches - we can do that relatively safely now that we have both ruby ray and enough spellslots for fire protection and protection from magical energy plus buff protections for four of our party members, leaving only the high-hp Mazzy and Valygar vulernable who are unlikely to directly die to one or two spells, and they have access to item-based immunities and spell protections. With three arcane spellcasters, even if a lich starts off with two spell protections or something like SI:A or spell shield in the mix, we can time our opening in such a way to get ruby rays and breaches in often before the lich can cast its initial timestop:
Next up: The endgame of SoA.
We start exploring the elven city, taking down golems, going invisible for the drow mage. The best way to deal with huge groups of Rakshasas: Horrid wilting.
We defeated the dwarves at the bottom of Nashkel Mines who were following the Serpent. We have retrieved the dwarven artifact but have no idea what to do with it.
We thought that we should take it to a temple of Helm but nobody is interested. No sign of Wostok in either temple.
Xan got separated from the rest of the party and ran out of healing potions. With all the gold that we have, raising him yet again was no problem.
It looks as if the quest is virtually finished but not quite.
EDIT
After doing the minor quests in Baldur's Gate now returned to Candlekeep, thhough not entered.