Cookies comes with lots of attack power, lots of immunities, and casts PFMW via a scroll. On top of that, any attacker who strikes him with a weapon or a hostile spell, or even a trap, will trigger an "Acidic Backlash," a custom spell that deals lingering acid damage every second. It makes spellcasting nearly impossible, and quickly dissolves most melee attackers. He's one of the most powerful critters in the game, and will not leave you alone as long as you hold Celestial Fury.
But Cookies has the notable weakness of being unable to see through invisibility, and does not really know when to use a divination spell. Also, after 60 rounds, he vanishes and comes back a day later at full strength. This means it's easy to test him out and then flee under invisibility before committing to a fight (since we purchased a magic license, we can safely cast Invisibility 10' Radius in Athkatla without worrying about the Cowled Wizards).
I let Viora stay visible so he can begin his standard dialogue before attacking. She vanishes right afterwards.
I send out Azelos' clone, equipped with Arrows of Dispelling. Contrary to what I thought earlier, Cookies' ridiculous +20 bonus to all of his saving throws is dispellable, just like the Potion of Magic Shielding that the bonus is supposed to emulate. He's got some other bonuses of the same kind, including +50 MR. Beneath that defense, however, Cookies has no defense against disablers beyond his saves and magic resistance; he has no Ring of Free Action.
All we have to do to bring him down is land an Arrow of Dispelling and then stun him with a Dart of Stunning. But his AC is pretty solid, and Azelos' clone has trouble.
As a Kensai/Mage, Cookies doesn't use any ranged weapons. But he can cast damage spells, to the detriment of everybody nearby.
He comes for Viora, who I accidentally let become visible. He always makes a beeline for Charname if Charname is visible. She barely escapes.
I need more time if I'm going to land that Arrow of Dispelling and stun Cookies. To do so, I have to prep the area with Teleport Field spells. We rest for a day to make Cookies leave and return, then scoot away to create a safe spot in which to fight him. Once it's ready, Yorun Zovai goes out to start the attack dialogue before disappearing for her own safety.
I try to dispel his buffs again, but PFMW blocks Arrows of Dispelling, and Cookies loves that spell.
My attempts fail. The clone cannot debuff Cookies before running out of time, much less debuffing and disabling him.
The strategy still has merit, though, and as long as we don't use up scarce resources in the process, we can try as many times as we like. The only problem is PFMW. But Cookies casts that spell whenever he sees an enemy and does not already have it active. We can exhaust his supply of PFMW scrolls by baiting them out with summons.
We organize another playdate the next day and send a Fire Elemental down to fight him. Cookies wins.
That Death Fog spell is keeping us from going over and luring him out (he's immune to that spell thanks to his undroppable Cloak of Mirroring), so Viora clears it up.
More summons march out to their doom. Cookies takes the time to show off his limited AI.
I don't think SCS gave him improved AI; they really just stuck with the original Tactics version of the fight. Another curious thing, which actually makes more sense, is seeing him running away from a low-level animal summons.
I think Cookies realizes that that wolf is coming at him with a nonmagical weapon, which will bypass his PFMW spell. His response is to flee. When pressed, of course, he fights back, and kills the wolf in one hit.
With Cookies' PFMW spells exhausted, I prepare for the real attack. Laosha brings forth some Spirit Animals. Azelos conjures her clone and sends it out to try and dispel Cookies again.
When I see its attack roll, I realize PFMW isn't my only problem.
Cookies wears the standard late-game equipment for a Kensai/Mage, a notable exception being his boots. He wear the Boots of Avoidance, not the Boots of Speed, which means his AC vs. missile weapons should be somewhere around -17.
Even the original Azelos can't expect to land a hit on him. Her clone would need a critical hit. Now what?
I have a backup strategy, and though it would work better if Cookies was debuffed, it still has a decent chance of success. Unfortunately, it relies on scrolls. I only get one shot at this, and if it doesn't work the first time, I can't try it again.
This time we invite him to the Docks District, since it's a bit more wide-open than the Slums. Yoren Zovai approaches Cookies and casts PFMW via a scroll (she's only level 12 and can't cast it herself just yet).
She turns visible, to my surprise.
It shouldn't matter. His weapons can't harm her, and Death Fog won't deal enough damage to be a problem. So how we supposed to kill this guy?
Bigby's Clenched Fist holds the target for up to four rounds. The first round, notably, does not offer a save. This means Cookies' save bonuses won't help him.
But magic resistance can block the spell entirely. And with his buffs, Cookies has 70% magic resistance. What good is Bigby's Clenched Fist if it only has a 30% chance of holding him only one round?
Well, that means we can get one round of automatic attacks in one Cookies before the hold wears. That's a guaranteed dispel magic with an Arrow of Dispelling. Then we can try to disable him with Darts of Stunning and the Wand of Paralyzation.
And because I'm a bit desperate, I'm going to use the Wand of Lightning trick to cast Bigby's Clenched Fist 6 times, one after another. He has precious little chance of making a save against each one. Cookies moves in for the kill. His weapons bounce off of PFMW, and his Death Fog does not disrupt Yorun Zovai's spellcasting.
She gets the first spell off the ground. The outcome surprises me.
The spell bounced off of him. Cookies had a spell turning pre-buff.
But the Wand of Lightning trick is hard to stop. The moment Yorun Zovai recovers, she starts casting the spell again.
But Cookies' Spell Turning buff still has some spell levels in it. The spell bounces off again.
Her Protection from Magical Weapons scroll won't last long enough to keep her alive. But it's worse than I thought.
Yorun Zovai is gone. We only just got her to level 12 and therefore Improved Haste, a huge turning point for a party with an Archer.
I gather her equipment and hide to the west. I rest and let Cookies vanish.
I consider moving on, and just fleeing from Cookies until Chapter 6, when I'm sure to have better options. But I'm not quite ready to give up. Not yet.
I move the save file to the multiplayer save folder so I can re-create Yorun Zovai, whose name I misspell to Yoren Zovai. I also decrease her STR to add to her INT so she can use the Golem Manual without drinking potions.
Yoren Zovai should probably get at least to level 8 before we fight Cookies, since it's only 1000 XP away for her. I visit the Graveyard and finish the quest with Kamir the paladin and Risa the orphan. I rest right afterward so I can talk to Wellyn, and then Cookies appears.
See that little girl just south of Cookies? That's Risa, the orphaned child we just united with Kamir the paladin, who adopted her as part of his penance for failing to save the life of his own child.
I have everyone drink a Potion of Invisibility to escape Cookies' attacks, but unfortunately, Ruva, as a Wizard Slayer, cannot do so, and I can't cast Invisibility on her without leaving Yoren Zovai vulnerable.
We run away from Cookies, who cannot reach the only visible target because the invisible characters are getting in his way. His response?
Death Fog.
Cookies just murdered an innocent little girl, right before she was about to start out on a bright new life.
That's not okay. We have to kill this guy.
After fleeing the area, we proceed to the Promenade and get ready. He arrives while we're all invisible--apparently you don't have to have a visible character for him to appear--and Yoren Zovai grants herself immunity to acid with a scroll of Protection from Acid. Since I don't like using such limited items when it's not really an emergency, I use the Wand of Lightning trick to make one scroll last a lot longer.
I've had luck in the past using the feedback loop against Cookies. Both Cookies' Acidic Backlash and a standard Fire Shield effects will trigger each other infinitely, causing a chain reaction that quickly kills whoever lacks an immunity to the backlash they're triggering. Yoren Zovai casts Fire Shield: Red via a scroll before attacking Cookies. When Cookies attacks back, he triggers the feedback loop. The backlashes fire off against each other.
But Cookies is unaffected by the damage. The Cloak of Mirroring blocks offensive damage spells, but the Fire Shield backlash counts as a specific protections spell, so I thought Cookies would be vulnerable. But Cookies suffers no damage.
And though Yoren Zovai is immune to acid and therefore Acidic Backlash, she is not immune to Cookies' Fire Shield spells, which lack a visual effect to give them away. Yoren Zovai gets killed by the backlash. Cookies is unharmed.
Out of curiosity, I do a test run to see if a Protection from Magic scroll will dispel Cookies' buffs. They do, but only for the duration of the fight; not when he comes back. And since a Protection from Magic scroll grants spell level immunities for 60 rounds, using one on Cookies will make him immune to the Wand of Paralyzation anyway.
I go back to the basics, arriving at the fight while invisible and summoning a clone to fire an Arrow of Dispelling at him. I notice something unusual.
If you attack him with a simulacrum before he gives his attack dialog, he won't turn hostile. This means the clone can fire off arrow after arrow without Cookies casting PFMW.
I repeat the process until finally the clone gets a critical hit. Even when he gets hurt, he doesn't turn hostile. His buffs are gone.
I keep attacking, just to see. He never fights back. It would be entirely possible to kill him without any danger.
But I don't want to kill him while he's just standing there. I rest and come back to see him.
He's still there, without Stoneskin. Cookies is scripted to teleport away after 60 rounds, but that timer only begins when he delivers his dialogue. We can start afresh with a new use of Vhailor's Helm even after we use it to debuff him.
But Cookies has -17 AC vs. Darts of Stunning, and his Spell Turning will block the Wand of Paralyzation. The Wand of Paralyzation can break down his Spell Turning, but it could prove fatal to Yoren Zovai if she fails her save. I could use Chaotic Commands on Yoren Zovai, but I didn't think of that at the time.
To keep Yoren Zovai safe and render Cookies vulnerable to the Wand of Paralyzation, Viora memorizes some extra copies of a long-range, fast-casting, friendly spell. She uses Hide in Plain Sight after every casting, which allows her to burn through Cookies' Spell Turning.
Without his save buffs or his Spell Turning, he is vulnerable to the Wand of Paralyzation. We just need one failed save to win. Yoren Zovai drinks an Oil of Speed to improve her movement speed and rushes in to use the wan before running away.
Cookies can't move fast enough to retaliate. He uses Shadow Door, which will boost his saves considerably, so Zulfer hurries over to dispel it.
After many tries, I finally see Cookies frozen in place.
Laosha calls in his Spirit Animals. We pounce on Cookies, only to see a PFMW contingency thwart our attacks.
But PFMW only lasts 4 rounds, and the Wand of Paralyzation lasts 10. We finally put down the Acid Kensai.
Sanchuudoku, the most powerful katana in the game, is ours. But it came at the cost of 700,000 XP, taken from our sorcerer.
Nevertheless, I am happy. It was a long and complicated process, and it was fun to break the puzzle.
Gerland of Candlekeep, NG Half-Elf Skald, 1st BG1 report
The Skald is one of my favorite classes/kits. Some of you might have guessed this: I think Gerland is my 4th Skald to enter the no-reload challenge. Unlike my previous Skalds though, Gerland's Skald kit is not the Rogue Rebalancing version of the kit. I created him with two components of the Might & Guile mod installed, namely (1) Revised Bard Kits, which gives Skalds one fewer spell per level in exchange for improved combat prowess, and (2) Revised Stat Bonuses, which spreads the stat bonuses for most abilities over a larger range of stats. E.g. it significantly boosts Intelligence with an extra level 1 spell slot for 13 Int, an extra level 2 spell slot for 14 Int, etc. The value of Charisma is boosted as well: the higher it is, the better one's saves/luck. However, after two or three level-ups and some experimenting with EEKeeper and Ctrl-Q I uninstalled said components. First of all because I realized that possibly due to installing M&G after SCS, enemy wizards did indeed get high Int bonus spell slots but they didn't have any memorized spells in them. This seemed unfair to me. Also, I expected my Skald's high Int to nullify the one fewer spell per level penalty, but some testing (raising XP) in EEKeeper showed me he got fewer spells than a vanilla Skald would. To make a long story short, Gerland is a vanilla Skald, albeit capable of mastering weapon styles (like all rogues thanks to Rogue Rebalancing), with the possibility of casting up to level 8 spells (Rogue Rebalancing PnP spell progression for Bards), and with an illegal 19 Cha at character creation. This supernatural Cha score is thanks to the fact that I created Gerland using the aforementioned Might & Guile stats revision component, which allows Half-Elves to have 19 natural Cha.
Here's a character creation screen shot of Gerland (as often, I forgot to take a starting screenshot).
Got an amazing 99 roll. Still waiting to break 100 though... Starting profs were Axes and Warhammers. Mods are my usual stuff: BG2 Fixpack including Free Action protects against Stun, Song & Silence, Rogue Rebalancing without kit revisions, SCS with full enemy prebuffs, aTweaks, and some BG2 Tweaks including max HPs for enemies (I'm maxing Charname's HPs and those of his companions as well, as I generally like a level playing field).
Gerland is NG with LG tendencies, but open-minded enough to get along with CG folk. Goodness is what matters most to him. He's as knightly as any Bard can be: honest, courteous, and valiant. Skalds aren't generally the most lettered of Bards, but Gerland is an exception thanks to his upbringing by Gorion and the Candlekeep Monks. What follows are excerpts from his diary.
2 Mirtul, 1368 Nothing seems to be going as it should be. Her sullenness tells me that Imoen is still devastated by Gorion's death, much like myself to be honest, and now we haven't even been able to enter the Friendly Arm Inn to meet Gorion's friends Khalid and Jaheira. Ill-equipped for battle, we barely managed to escape the fangs of hungry Wolves and Dire Wolves in the lands south of the Inn. That didn't help us much, for at the entrance to the Inn we were accosted by a black-robed, bloodthirsty wizard, another mysterious bounty hunter like the two I slew in Candlekeep I suspect.
We found refuge in the sanctity of Gellana Mirrorshade's Temple of Garl Glittergold, and left the premises under the cover of night.
5 Mirtul, 1368 Beregost is a friendly place. Imoen and I have spent some time with old Firebead, we befriended a man who had recently lost his son, and we've completed a couple of relatively simple jobs for some of the locals.
8 Mirtul, 1368 We've traveled further south, to Nashkel, but this place is a lot smaller than Beregost, and doesn't seem to offer as many job opportunities, even though an Amnian soldier by the name of Bardolan told us that his captain, a man named Brage, had gone missing without a trace after killing several people.
12 Mirtul, 1368 Life on the road isn't always comfortable for both Imoen and me, used as we are to Candlekeep, our home, but it isn't boring either. Far to the west of Nashkel we saved a historian whose own men turned against him at an excavation site, and we actually found Captain Brage, reasoned with him, and escorted him back to Nashkel. The poor man had picked up a cursed sword that had made him go berserk.
16 Mirtul, 1368 Imoen and I have a new comrade in arms, an Elven Archer by the name of Kivan. He helped us out near Thalantyr the Conjurer's High Hedge west of Beregost when we were under attack of Gnolls. Kivan is a skilled marksman and, it seems, a good man. He has been roaming the wilds much like Imoen and I, albeit with more of a purpose than the two of us: to kill bandits. His main quarry is an Ogrish figure named Tazok, his torturer and the murderer of his mate Deheriana.
24 Mirtul, 1368 Our Elven companion is not much of talker, though he does seem increasingly willing to put his trust in me. He's told me a bit more about his family and about the terrible fate he and Deheriana suffered at the hands of Tazok. He has also been our guide and tutor in the wilds. He's led us through the Cloudpeaks where we fought monsters (mostly Gnolls) and wild animals. We stayed out of sight of hunting parties though, after my axe broke in a fight with a Gnoll. We pushed further west, as I still had my throwing axes, until we came upon a Gnoll Fortress.
We didn't invade the stronghold (yet), but we did take some loot from a nearby cave guaded by Xvarts. We're now preparing for our journey back to civilization. Hopefully I can find a decent, preferably enchanted axe somewhere.
27 Mirtul, 1368 On our way back to Beregost we rescued a wizard named Melicamp who had somehow, unwillingly, polymorphed into a rooster, from an attacking wolf. He asked us to bring him to his master, Thalantyr. The latter successfully retransformed Melicamp, an impressive feat. He also gave Kivan an enchanted spear, for previous services provided. I purchased two Ioun Stones, a purple one for Imoen to enjoy infravision, and a 'Fragment of Enlightenment' that increased my lore. At Feldepost's Inn I bought a Battle Axe +1. Hopefully it'll last a bit longer than my last axe.
3 Kythorn, 1368 On our second incursion into the Cloudpeaks we were a bit more thorough, and we didn't shun confrontations with hostile creatures, mostly hunters and brigands. Two particularly insolent bandits, Vax and Zal, gave Kivan and me a hard time.
Still, we prevailed, earning ourselves a pair of Bracers of Achery.
8 Kythorn, 1368 We finally made it to the Friendly Arm Inn. Our trip north was relatively uneventful. Worth mentioning are our dispatching of an Ogre that dropped the girdle Elves' Bane, and the fact that our party has grown into a party of four. A few hours north of the Inn we met a young man named Ajantis, a squire paladin of Helm, who like the rest of us, had made it his business to make the Sword Coast a safer place. I was pleased to have a virtuous man like Ajantis join our ranks. At the entrance to the FAI we were surprised to find the black-robed wizard still there, or maybe he had just returned. At any rate, we confronted him. He put Ajantis to Sleep, but Imoen saved vs a Horror, and he had no answer to Imoen's, Kivan's and my salvo of arrows and axes.
Imoen picked up the wizard's spellbook. She's now studying it. It's clear to me she wants to become a Mage even though she hasn't told me this explicitly. I learned a couple of spells from Gorion and I've picked up a few more on the road, but I doubt I'd be a good tutor for her. We'll have to see what fortune favors. We might meet an adventuring Mage somewhere, willing to join us and instruct Imoen in the arcane arts. Inside the FAI we met Khalid and Jaheira, a Fighter and a warrior Druid. I'm sure they're well-meaning folk, but after four tendays on the road, surviving dangerous encounters with wizards, bandits, monsters, and wild animals, and with two competent warriors by my side as well as trusty old Imoen, we all understood that there was no real need for their guardianship anymore. We parted amicably.
12 Kythorn, 1368 Some days pass by with hardly anything happening. The party may be enjoying the comfort on an inn or the entertainment of the Nashkel Carnival. The past 24 hours have not been like that. East of Beregost, we encountered what seemed to be at first glance a perfect statue of a priestess. Upon closer inspection we found that the woman had been petrified. Unfortunately we had no Stone to Flesh scrolls, but we were warned. We bought a Protection from Petrification scroll at the Nashkel Carnival and indeed found a lounge of Basilisks twelve hours east of Beregost. Kivan cast Protection from Petrification on himself and I went invisible (a spell I had recently learned) to encourage the Elf with my song unseen. The Archer had no trouble dispatching most of the giant lizards, and we had a somehow Dire Charmed Ghoul paralyze a Gnomish wizard, the master of the Basilisks,
as well as the largest of the Basilisks. I slew the creature with my throwing axes. In the same area we met a hunting party that unlike others hadn't been turned to stone yet, much to my surprise. Instead of thanking us for our efforts against the Basilisks, they picked a fight wit us. We retreated and found that only their leader, a female battlemage came for us. Ajantis and Kivan made short work of her after she failed to Dire Charm highly charm-resistant Kivan.
Two of the female's warrior companions suffered the same fate, discovering Kivan's brutal bow skills.
Their last man standing was a bit trickier for he was a spell caster, a Cleric. When he started casting Hold Person, we retreated to make him waste his spell. We fanned out and then initiated a joint attack, preventing the priest from casting any more spells before he fell.
Gerland of Candlekeep, NG Half-Elf Skald, 2nd BG1 report
16 Kythorn, 1368 Ajantis, a Cavalier Paladin and a very strict follower of his deity's ethos, has expressed his satisfaction with our party's conduct, even though Kivan, Imoen and I are of somewhat more flexible morality. He's also pleased with our combat prowess. After our successful campaign against the Basilisks and the battle against the quarrelsome hunters, he told of us an Ankheg infestation north of the FAI, near the place where we first met. He warned us of the creatures' acid spit but considered us ready to deal with the monsters. He was not mistaken. With Ajantis in the front, Kivan and Imoen in the back with their bows, and me chanting and launching the occasional axe we cleared the area without difficulty. The Ankheg hoard held some impressive loot. For a girl priestess we procured a ritual bowl of Umberlee from three fishermen that had killed her mother.
20 Kythorn, 1368 A bout of nostalgia made Imoen long to behold the sea again, as the two of us used to do on the walls of Candlekeep. I find it hard to say no to whatever the lass proposes. She's my dearest friend, almost a sister to me really. Anyway, we had no urgent business requiring our attention, so there was no reason for KIvan, Ajantis and me not to humor Imoen. Along the shores I, invisible, scouted small groups of Sirines, treacherous creatures. I reported back to Kivan. Being an Elf, and one who still mourning the loss of his beloved Deheriana, he was least likely to fall victim to the Sirines' charms. Indeed, inspired by my battlesong, he had no trouble dispatching the creatures,
clearing the way toward a cave they had seemed to be guarding. The cave was heavily trapped, but nimble Imoen deftly disarmed all the traps. There were also three Flesh Golems, suggesting there was treasure somewhere. We battled the constructs, and with difficulty (Ajantis suffered many a blow), destroyed them.
We were rewarded generously, for we found a treasure chest in a pool of water, containing several enchanted items and alchemical brews. A magical tome I read increased my physical fitness.
25 Kythorn, 1368 On the north coast we encountered a perfidious Nereid that seemingly killed and later raised Imoen, and her improbable mate, an evil Ogre Mage that attacked uson sight. Having studied some basic magic myself, and read about advanced magic, I'm uneasy facing hostile Mages of any type. Thankfully, Kivan understood the peril of the situation. Instead of his normal unenchanted arrows, he pelted the Ogre Mage with some of his arrows of biting. They poisoned our enemy effectively neutralizing the danger of spells.
The Ogre Mage dropped a Helmet of Defense, a worthy prize for Kivan, for pretty much single-handedly felling the creature. In the same area we also killed a band of Ogres, Half-Ogres and Ogrillons, and we defended a Seasnake and an Elf against three Sahuagin. [The latter encounter is content of the BG1 NPC Pack. Unfortunately the Seasnake died after inadvertently blocking our path to the Sahuagin, preventing the game from placing a returning throwing dagger, an excellent missile weapon for Cavalier Ajantis, in the shipwreck.]
6 Flamerule, 1368 In the Halfling village of Gullykin, which was to be our base from which to explore the notorious Firewine Ruins and Durlag's Tower, a new companion, a Halfling Swashbuckler named Alora, joined us. Alora made it clear to us that she was a seasoned adventurer, skilled with locks and with setting and disarming snares. However she didn't come very well-equipped for adventure, so we postponed our visits to Firewine and Durlag's Tower. We acquired a Deep Red Ioun Stone for her, from Thalantyr, that increased her dexterity, and we traveled to the southern coastlands with her. We dispatched three Amnian troublemakers in the Cloudpeaks.
Their leader, a warrioress, wore a suit of enchanted studded leather armor. It now protects Alora little torso. Further west we routed a Xvart village, showing the devious creatures no mercy. We also saved a nobleman from an attacking Polar Bear, defeated a bandit named Neville and helped a Paladin of Helm reduce the local Gibberling population.
10 Flamerule, 1368 We returned to Beregost, where we bought Ajantis a suit of full plate mail, and he in turn tipped us about a store in Ulgoth's Beard where we might encounter some useful goods. (As a Waterdhavian, Ajantis had traveled the lands north of Baldur's Gate.) We bought Alora a returning frost dart there, and a Greenstone Amulet for all of us to use. Southwest of Beregost we tracked down Bassilus the killer, a priest of Cyric with a hefty price on his head (5000 GP), at a ritual site in the Red Canyons. I failed to paralyze him with a wand, and Bassilus failed to Hold Ajantis.
The priest's subsequent attempts at spell casting were consistently thwarted by Kivan's and Alora's missiles,
before I finished him off with a throwing axe.
I took his war hammer, Ashideena, a glorious weapon. And we also picked up his holy symbol. Near the ritual site we ran into three Hobgoblins that made the mistake of attacking us. We slew them, and took an enchanted short sword from their leader.
I'm rather upset at having to re-create Yoren Zovai, as she lost 4 levels in the process, and without Improved Haste, our Called Shot ability will be much weaker, but we have to move on. Most of our party remains intact, and thanks to our party setup we already have excellent anti-mage options, plenty of immunities and healing, lots of escape options, and three fighter types, plus a whole bunch of late-game equipment and some of the best summons in the game.
We haven't done the De'Arnise Hold yet, mostly because I don't like dealing with SCS Spirit Trolls. But we really need the XP to bring Yoren Zovai up to speed, so we go in and throw elementals and Spirit Animals at the Trolls.
The Trolls crumple. Totemic Druids have lots of attack power. I've played lots of druids and so far, the Totemic Druid seems a hell of a lot stronger than even the Avenger, with whom I have a lot more experience.
Zulfer has crazy damage output with Poison Weapon (12 damage per hit without save!), and most enemies have no defense against it. It wrecks Glaicas' group.
We have to cast Protection from Fire on him, however, to make sure he doesn't get killed by a feedback loop from that enemy mage's Fire Shield.
We mob TorGal downstairs. He's practically helpless, despite his ludicrous damage bonuses.
And the Yuan-ti Mages with their various debuffers and disablers? Vhailor's Helm and Arrows of Dispelling render them helpless.
Gerland of Candlekeep, NG Half-Elf Skald, 3rd BG1 report
13 Flamerule, 1368 Our band seems to have earned itself a certain prestige. Not only have I seen store owners like Thalantyr (who sold me the Claw of Kazgaroth at a bargain price) and Taerom Fuiruim lower their prices, we also seem to attract more and more fellow adventurers that wish to associate themselves with us. First there was Neera in Beregost, a Wild Mage whom we helped against a group of Thayan wizards and bodyguards that sought to capture her.
Imoen seemed understandably eager to welcome a Mage into our group, but Ajantis, Kivan and I were less enthusiastic what with wild magic being extremely unreliable and all. We agreed with Neera to meet up later at the FAI. Also in Beregost, we slew another bounty hunter, a Dwarf named Karlat. Finding a bounty notice on the Dwarf's corpse surprised Ajantis a lot, but he was understanding when I explained to him that I honestly had no idea who wanted me dead or why.
It's good to know Ajantis (and the others) trust me. A second adventuring type that wished to join our party was a Half-Orc Blackguard, Dorn. We fought together against a band of marauders south of Nashkel, but we declined his proposal to join forces. A few hours further to the south we reached the Nashkel Mines area where we stopped a ruthless bounty hunter from taking wanted sculptor Prism's life (for a simple theft of two gems), only to see the artist collapse lifeless on the ground. We're back in Nashkel now and have just slain what must have been the fifth or sixth bounty hunter that has come for me, and we've also accepted a Ranger into our party, a scatterbrained giant of a man by the name of Minsc. His need seems urgent. He told us that the lady he's supposed to protect, has been taken hostage by Gnolls in the lands west of Nashkel. Kivan, Imoen and I know all about the Gnoll Stronghold, so we're going there straight away.
16 Flamerule, 1368 Our campaign against the Gnolls has been a resounding success. We slew each and every Gnoll that inhabited the fortress,
and thankfully we arrived in time to rescue Minsc's lady, a mage and a mystic [Half-Elf Cleric/Mage in this playthrough] from the same foreign land as Minsc, Rashemen. Lady Dynaheir was so grateful that she was not only willing to travel with us but also to instruct Imoen in the arcane arts should she consider Imoen worthy, even after we told the two that we had no room for Minsc. (In reality, we had been impressed with Minsc's fighting skills, but he had also shown himself prone to entering in frenzy-like states in which he proved as dangerous to the party as he was to our enemies. Our adventuring party is consistently exposed to all manner of perils as it is. Sadly I see no place in our band for such a volatile sort as Minsc.)
24 Flamerule, 1368 We returned to Beregost with Dynaheir, bought her an enchanted sling and gave her a powerful mace that Imoen had found somewhere. We also gave her two potions (mind focusing and genius) that allowed her to copy several spells from scrolls into her spellbook. Thus prepared we set out to do what we had long intended to do: explore the Firewine Ruins and Durlag's Tower. We started with the tower. A narrow bridge that led toward the tower was guarded by two Battle Horrors. We took them on one at a time, with Ajantis and Kivan doing melee duty, Imoen and Alora attacking from a distance, and myself inspiring the others through my song and throwing an axe every now and then.
We slew another Battle Horror as well as a Doomguard, and when we took a break from battle, Dynaheir expressed her willingness to teach Imoen magic. [Imoen dual-classed upon reaching level 7, as per canon. Since I had her kitted as an Adventurer, she had a few more skill points than she would have had as a normal Thief, at the cost of a non-increasing x1 backstab modifier.] Inside the majestic tower we cleared the upper levels, defeating several powerful foes. A spell casting spectre only fell thanks to Alora's traps,
and if it weren't for Kivan's mastery of the longbow I doubt that we'd have been able to slay Kirinhale, a demoness no less.
The upper levels also harbored numerous Ghasts and two roof terraces with four Basilisks. As I knew the spell Protection from Petrification, I protected Kivan so that he could get rid of the Basilisks. After that Ajantis, Kivan, Alora and I took care of the Ghasts while Imoen was taking her first magic classes with Dynaheir.
Alora managed to disarm most if not all traps, so we left the place with our backpacks filled with loot. I read an enlightening tome, and we found a Cloak of Protection +1 that we kept. Most of the loot we sold though, allowing us the purchase of a Robe of the Good Archmagi for Dynaheir. There was more treasure to be found on the lower levels, but a wounded thief in the basement suggested that those levels were far more dangerous than the upper levels we had visited.
28 Flamerule, 1368 Our trip to the Firewine Ruins was an interesting one. The plains that stretch from Nashkel to the ruins were inhabited by bandits, both (demi-)human and monstrous ones. We spared none. Dynaheir cleverly cast a Stinking Cloud on a band of Xvarts that were attacking a farmer's cow. Most of the Xvarts passed out, allowing us to finish the Xvarts with ranged attacks before they could seriously injure the cow. Near the bridge Kivan felled a competent duelist who dropped a pair of Gauntlets of Weapon Expertise. The ruins themselves were infested with Kobolds, harmless critters individually, although their Commando troops were not to be underestimated with their fire arrows. Further in the labyrinth of corridors we ran into a Human wizard who had been in charge of the Kobolds. We retreated but not quick enough to prevent him from launching two Minor Sequencered Chromatic Orbs at me. I quaffed a potion of magic blocking, apprehensive of the orbs' unpredictable effects. Alora returned, hidden in shadows, to look for the wizard. She found him soon enough and had Dynaheir cast Silence 15' Radius at him from out of sight. That spell shut him up, and allowed us to finish our foe at minimal risk.
The clamor of battle alarmed the wizard's partner, an Ogre Mage. With a Glitterdust it Blinded pretty much all of us except Imoen, whose casting of Spook made the monster shrink back in fear.
When we regained our sight, and the Ogre Mage its senses, Dynaheir Commanded the creature to sleep. We failed to kill the monster there and then. It awoke and injured Dynaheir with a Magic Missile, but she then felled our foe with the same spell. We left the ruins via a tunnel that led to Gullykin. Apparently the wizards and their Kobold minions had been planning a raid on the village. Town elder Gandolar Luckyfoot thanked us for our intervention with 250 GP. By the way Dynaheir seems to be taking some kind of interest in me. It's almost as if she knows me, or knows things about me that I myself don't even know. She also considers me capable of somehow preventing the imminent war with Amn.
Personally I can't see how I'm supposed to do that.
OK, since I missed yesterday's session, I was selected to post about last Monday's. So, behold! The Adventures of the Monty Python Crew™!
We did various quests, starting with killing the guy in the Elfsong Tavern for the lady in the Three Old Kegs Inn, reporting back to her, we also did some shopping, and while Tresset was busy selling and buying items, Gotural, bengoshi and me found a way to entertain ourselves:
(Edit: Just in case you didn't notice, Gotural was running in circles, bengoshi was following him, and I was following bengoshi. All while Tresset was trading!)
After that, we finished Maerk's and the Poison quest, but not after realising the game was bugged, since we had killed the Priestess of Umberlee while looking for the kid's corpse, so it took us a while more and several travels to one area and the other. We had considered that, if we could not complete the quest, we would rush to end the game in less than 10 days, to add some challenge to the run. Right after we went to Oberan's state and stole the components, I accidentally lured the sisters downstairs, but Tresset had already managed to get the components (and I, the scrolls in the other floor), so we left. We went to Middle BG mistakenly, but we took a chance and killed the Rabid Chickens™, which were a good snack for the Party's Pet Wolf (me with Relair's Mistake).
Then, I think that it was to get the reward for giving the kid's corpse back (or something else I certainly can't remember), we went to West BG. A big surprise awaited there. Trying to get the Golden Axe, Llolnae had attracted several Flaming Fists, and made Fentan angry, so they pursued her outside house. Tresset, joking with the console, had spawned a handful of Squirrels, and, for some odd reason, one of them was green-circled and was attacking Fentan. Yes, that's right, he almost got killed, but the Squirrel was Ctrl+Y'd out of existence before it did so.
I hunted down the rest of the Squirrels as the party's Pet Wolf while that happened and then we finally talked to Brielbara (who didn't appear at first, then, I left so I could eat, but the guys crashed, and they hadn't saved, so, upon reload, Brielbara appeared), killed Yago and cured Brielbara's baby.
We had forgotten, LOL! I got drunk, heh! Dem guys were shopping and I was getting bored ;p
At last, we killed Sunin for the 2nd Ring of Wizardry (Tresset talked to him and held him still while he buffed, I dispelled his buffs with an Arrow of Dispelling, the rest of the party arrived and we took him down in two rounds), talked to Eltan and traveled to Candlekeep. The battle against the Ogres was pretty forward: none of us got CC'd, and, Loki's recently acquired level 5 spellslot gave us access to Chaos, which helped us a lot against the Ogres.
We're running out of quests to do in Athkatla. I go to the Unseeing Eye quest, one of my least favorite quests in no-reload runs because I almost always put off fighting the Unseeing Eye. Because Viora is a Chaotic Neutral cleric, we are asked to investigate the cult by a priest of Talos instead of the normal priest of Helm.
The guy's a jerk. I don't like talking to him. I don't know why anybody worships evil gods when there are plenty of good gods to choose from.
Against Draug Fea and the sewer dwellers, I accidentally the dialogue.
We actually lost several thousand gold in loot, but what most irks me is the loss of XP. The rest of the party looks unimpressed when she goes back to face them.
Next, the Yuan-ti Mages. This group is pretty good at dealing with mages, so it shouldn't be too hard. I go with my normal strategy of sending out summons into the other room.
Viora is there to guide them. And to help keep the Yuan-ti away from the rest of the party, I add a summons coming in from the north, rather than the west.
The Yuan-ti aren't fooled when I try to lure them north. They find the party in the main room. Azelos' clone, which is named Viora by default in the dialogue box, successfully dispels one of the enemy's buffs with an Arrow of Dispelling, but gets confused by an enemy spell.
Luckily it doesn't turn those arrows onto us.
Our attention is split between multiple threats, and due to restraint on our part, the enemies are still getting spells off the ground.
Eventually, though, with enough pressure from Zulfer and Ruva, the mages can't get any more spells off the ground.
Mekrath comes along and all our pressure is focused on him. It's an easy battle.
Assassin/Fighters are great anti-mage characters, but getting the three castings of Poison Weapon that Zulfer has takes time.
Gauth Beholders in my install can attack despite invisibility, and normally I CTRL-J past them, but this time, I decide to fight the pack of Beholders after the riddle bridge.
Zulfer has the Shield of Balduran thanks to a shopping spree after we got 100,000 gold, and he's been wearing it ever since. As a thief dualed to fighter, his STR is only at 18, not 18/xx, which means the SOB only costs him 1 point of damage. And since he's got a marvelous katana, I figure he's well-equipped to deal with Beholders.
But I know better than to send in Zulfer himself, since SCS Beholders can steal the SOB eventually. They do not, however, try to steal the shield from clones. If it were even possible, it would open up an exploit of letting a Beholder steal the thing and then looting it from the Beholder's corpse, allowing you to duplicate the shield.
So I send in a clone, along with a Fire Elemental and some Spirit Animals, since the latter gets tons of immunities. Beholders are immune to paralysis-type effects, so the Spirit Wolves can't hold them, but Spirit Snakes can poison them, as can Zulfer's clone.
Odd thing is, the SOB doesn't make Zulfer's clone immune to the Beholders' Repulsion ray, which knocks back the clone constantly. Yoren Zovai is sticking around to clear the fog of war, and when the clone isn't around, the Gauths disable her.
Another curious thing is that the Gauths can cast mage spells.
Zulfer's clone lasts just long enough to take down the Beholders before it vanishes.
We nab the Gauntlets of Dexterity, only to realize that Viora's dump stat is CON, not DEX. I guess I was worried about her safety during the dual-class period when she couldn't hide.
We use the same tactic against the Beholders in the hive, with a Flesh Golem as support. All golems from the Golem Manuals are immune to magic, so they work great against Beholders, although they can still literally chew apart the Flesh Golems with their physical attacks.
For some reason, the spawns here are unusually scant.
I was expecting big packs of Beholders all around. It saves us time but costs us XP.
We still have a gang of blind clerics to deal with. As always, Greater Malison and Silence 15' Radius are a near-guaranteed shutdown of the entire group.
I drop the Rift Device on the way out. I'm not messing with the Unseeing Eye just yet. The loot is minimal anyway. I can do without the Amulet of 5% Magic Resistance.
As long as we've got the Planar Gem (which really looks nothing like a gem), we may as well go to the Planar Sphere. We enter invisible and Viora tries to charm Aawill with the Nymph Cloak. When that doesn't work, she just uses Hide in Plain Sight.
I don't like the two Yuan-ti in this fight, so I break out the Staff of Striking for one of them.
The other mage apparently has no spell protections, so it's easy to disrupt his spells. Aawill falls to our Spirit Wolves, who paralyze him before chowing down.
That battle can get hectic due to the tight corners, but our party is well-adapted to make it work. Laosha can bring out three summons at once, Ruva can chunk an important target with a backstab, and when we visit the human mage to the east, Zulfer poisons her.
The group of Yuan-ti Mages further east are another concern. So after triggering their buffs with some summons, I give Zulfer some Fire Seeds and send his clone out to handle them. With Fire Seeds and Poison Weapon, he can shut down the whole group of mages on his own.
The Wyvern suffers, too, which makes it a lot easier to bring it down.
The Yuan-ti manages to bump off Zulfer's clone with a single spell, but the clone had already used its last Fire Seed.
And Zulfer is ready to follow up with more poisoned Fire Seeds.
That basically broke the entire fight.
Zulfer gets lucky against the Master of Thralls. Everyone besides Yoren Zovai goes out buffed with Chaotic Commands to block Death Gaze, but Zulfer goes out first and gets debuffed by Remove Magic and hit with Death Gaze at the same time. He makes his save vs. death and escapes the hold effect. Viora could have freed him with Remove Paralysis (she keeps multiple castings memorized), but any delay could mean his doom; his Assassin levels mean he has rather poor HP, at 78.
The Warden himself shouldn't be hard, but he comes with a lot of spellcasters alongside him, and we can't disrupt multiple spellcasters so reliably. Poisoned Fire Seeds would work, but only against the Yuan-ti; the Warden is immune. Instead, we send out some summons to pester the enemy, with Laosha guiding them via Farsight.
The summons we use are very weak, so they don't last long. The Yuan-ti come for us.
I was hoping they wouldn't come over to meet us. We summon Kitty, the Berserk Warrior, and our Efreeti to to occupy the Yuan-ti for a bit, while an Aerial Servant goes to the east in case any other enemies are coming around to flank us. Our summons get confused, but they let us concentrate on one mage at a time.
We get flanked despite our Aerial Servant, but it's only one enemy. Our fighters are busy, so Yoren Zovai takes care of the threat.
The Yuan-ti who attacked us go down. Laosha re-casts Farsight to check on the Warden. He's still got some snakes around, so we send out Kitty, who survived the previous encounter, to go bother them, along with a Fire Elemental. She actually disables one of the tougher enemies.
While Kitty and our Fire Elemental are busy with their suicide mission, we go around the eastern route to reach the Warden.
But when we get there, we find that Kitty and the Fire Elemental's suicide mission was quite successful.
The Planar Sphere quest has come to a safe but kind of anti-climactic end.
Once again, we start to run out of quests. We move on to the Shadow Thief headquarters. It's nothing special. The first mage gets poisoned and dies. Dedral activates Power Attack and might have torn us apart, but Yoren Zovai disabled him with Feeblemind. Haz got poisoned by Fire Seeds. Summons wore down Aran Linvail's mage buddy. A Blade Barrier chopped up some of their goons.
Viora tried to summon an Aerial Servant to use against Aran Linvail, but he stopped her with Power Word: Silence, forcing her to hide. Zulfer's clone slew the other mage with poison, but Aran Linvail backstabbed the clone half to death, only to see the real Zulfer rush in with poisoned nonmagical darts and rolling high on attack rolls, flooding poor Aran with poison.
Zulfer's clone had already gotten confused, however, and eventually turned on Zalos, nearly killing her with poison damage before Laosha hurried over to cast Slow Poison. Yoren Zovai hit the clone with Spook to protect the party. By then, Aran Linvail had already died to poison.
Gerland of Candlekeep, NG Half-Elf Skald, 4th BG1 report
5 Elesias, 1368 I'm pleased to report that we have contributed to solving the iron crisis. Last time we were in Nashkel, mayor Berrun Ghastkill requested us to enter the Nashkel Mines and find an explanation for the disappearances of miners and for the contamination of iron ore. We found the mines infested with Kobolds, and took the trouble of dispatching the little buggers.
On the lowest level we entered a round structure that turned out to be an office of sorts of the leader of the Kobolds, a Half-Orc priest of Cyric. I paralyzed him with my wand and then struck him down.
The others dealt with his lackeys. We left the mines through a tunnel that led to an area we hadn't explored before. In it we slew two Ankhegs, several undead creatures and a rather pugnacious wizard that might have caused us trouble with his two Mustard Jellies if it weren't for Kivan disabling the man with poison-tipped arrows from a Kobold Chieftain we had slain in the mines.
Back in Nashkel we dealt with another aggressive wizard, at the Carnival, in much the same manner,
and with an assassin named Nimbul, hired to kill me by none other than Kivan's nemsis Tazok. War dogs summoned with a Wand of Monster Summoning kept Nimbul busy before Ajantis struck him down.
Interestingly, correspondence we found on Mulahey and on Nimbul suggests that the iron crisis and the bandit trouble are the work of one and the same organization.
9 Elesias, 1368 In Beregost we met another pawn in the mysterious organization behind the iron crisis and the bandits, a wizard named Tranzig. We ended up killing him after he attacked us. On his body we found a letter that hinted at a bandit camp somwhere in the Wood of Sharp Teeth. We also slew a thespian that attacked us after we refused to kill three innocent men for her.
We'll soon be off to look for the bandit camp.
20 Elesias, 1368 After roaming the vast Wood of Sharp Teeth, and dealing with several patrols of bandits (as well as two feuding Druids,
we finally located the bandit camp. We carefully explored the surroundings and cleared them of (mostly undead) hostile creatures. Our subsequent assault on the camp is difficult for me to describe because many things happened at the same time. I remember I went invisible and followed a buffed up Kivan as he took down some stray bandits in his typical sniper style. When we returned to our companions to get Ajantis and Alora to join us, we noticed that some of the bandits had caught our trail. Soon, more and more bandits came after us, amongst them a wizard. Ajantis, buffed with potions, tanked several bandits, and with his poisoned arrows Kivan made sure the wizard became no threat.
I limited myself mostly to chanting my battlesong, but targeted their archers with a Skull Trap and with my Wand of Fire.
When all our enemies were down, we entered the actual camp and we easily dispatched the few bandits that had stayed behind. Sadly we found no trace of Tazok, so Kivan will have to wait for his chance at revenge. We looted the camp and freed an Elven prisoner named Ender Sai. He divulged to us the name of the organization we had been opposing in the Nashkel Mines and now at the bandit camp: the Iron Throne. This surprised me because the Iron Throne is a respected mercantile syndicate that operates all over Faerun. According to Ender Sai, they have a hidden base somewhere in Cloakwood.
22 Elesias, 1368 With plenty of gold in our coffers, we traveled to Ulgoth's Beard and bought several useful items: two magical harps (one that charms listeners and one that dispels confusion), an enchanted staff for Imoen and a Sandthief ring.
27 Elesias, 1368 We've been trying to reach Cloakwood but annoyingly bounty hunters keep holding us up. First there was a party of two female rogues and two priestesses. With Ajantis, Kivan, Alora, and myself occupying one opponent each in melee combat, and with Dynaheir and Imoen ready to cast their spells, we were quite effective at disposing of our enemies.
A second group of bounty hunters, four male warriors caused us more trouble. We focused our attention first on their battlemage, allowing their priest to hurt us with an Unholy Blight and, just when we had felled the mage, to Hold Ajantis.
Fortunately Kivan finished the priest soon after that, and Dynaheir had Remove Paralysis memorized, so she could free Ajantis.
The party had no difficulty with the remaining warriors. I'm probably asking too much when I say I hope no more bounty hunters will come for us now.
4 Eleint, 1368 Having spent days of roving the Cloakwood in search of the Iron Throne base, and of defending ourselves against vicious creatures and vindictive druids inhabiting the forest,
we finally received confirmation that we're on the right track. Archdruid Amarande has directed us to a fort to the northeast. Two or three days separate us now from the Iron Throne installation.
Gerland of Candlekeep, NG Half-Elf Skald, 5th BG1 report
8 Eleint, 1368 It's late and I'm tired. What we've just done will probably make us the Iron Throne's archenemy. We've battled their local leader and flooded their base, a mine, but possibly at a price I would rather not pay. As we approached the fort we first eliminated all guards that were patrolling around the walled complex. Within the walls stood four well-equipped guards, two of them wizards. My uncertainty about the outcome of our mission made me express my feelings for Dynaheir through a kiss,
and then strode with Ajantis by my side to the four guards. The others stayed behind and prepared several snares (Alora's traps and a Skull Trap from Imoen) for our foes. One of them was hasted. We retreated and lured him into said snares; Kivan finished him off.
The warrior's haste was due to a pair of Boots of Speed that I took from him. With Ajantis, also hasted, I returned to the fort to look for the other guards, found them and injured them with my wand of fire. We retreated once more, but one of their wizards Dimension Doored right to us, and injured Ajantis with a Lightning Bolt. Our subsequent collective assault meant the end of our enemy, but the second wizard appeared almost as sudden as his late colleague. He Spooked Kivan and Confused Alora. Thankfully Kivan didn't panic but for a brief moment and confused Alora simply kept attacking the wizard with her dart. He didn't last long.
We slew the fourth guard and entered the mine. The mine was operated by slaves. With one of the slaves we designed an escape plan for the miners. It involved bribery of some of the guards, and flooding the mine by opening a flood gate with a special key that was in the possession of the master of the mine, a wizard named Davaeorn. We had to battle our way past dozens of guards. As such this was not a problem for our crew, as we were better equipped, more disciplined, and stronger, but they had wizards we never saw coming. The first one, on the second level, we handled well. Ajantis quaffed a potion of magic shielding and engaged her most of the time, while Kivan and a surprisingly capable Alora dealt with the guards (until the mage Confused her). I suffered a Spook and Kivan an Enfeeblement, but that wasn't enough to stop us.
A second mage we encountered on the third level wasn't as forgiving. A Lightning Bolt she cast into the corridor where most of our group were standing kept ricocheting from between two points, with Kivan stuck in the middle. Unlike the rest of us he failed to quaff a protective potion, and he did not survive.
Ajantis and Alora avenged the Elf,
and then we paused. We hesitated between pushing on and heading back to the FAI to see Kivan resurrected (his body was remarkably hale). As we were a three day trek removed from the inn, we decided to push on, fully aware that we were weakened both physically and emotionally by the loss of our friend. With the help of some summoned Gnolls we killed an Ogre Mage and cleared the remainder of the floor, before we reached Davaeorn's lair. It held several traps, but Alora detected and removed without difficulty. Ajantis, Alora and I drank protective (magic, fire) and strength potions and attacked the wizard and two Battle Horror guards. Imoen and Dynaheir stayed back, near the entrance. They were invisible. We had no trouble with the Battle Guards,
but as soon as they were down groups of guards kept streaming in,
diverting our attention from our main target, Davaeorn, who had retreated to one of his back chambers. As soon as Ajantis, Alora, and I had felled the last of the guards we went after Davaeorn again. I went invisible, and attacked the wizard from behind with wand scorchers, Alora pelted him with her returning frost dart, and Ajantis took him on in melee combat. Our foe was no match for our combined strengths.
We've just pillaged the place and are now ready to make the long trek to the FAI.
12 Eleint, 1368 Great news: Gellana Mirrorshade succussfully brought Kivan back to life!
15 Eleint, 1368 Our involvement with the Iron Throne has led us to the city of Baldur's Gate. We haven't seen much of it yet though. By the gate we helped Kivan defeat an old acquaintance of his, a female Elf that had joined Tazok and Co for some reason.
We've just done some shopping but it's past midnight, time for bed.
Anselm the Blackguard, SoA part 10 : the remaining secondary quests
After escaping the Underdark, Anselm's party encountered Drizzt for the second time on their way back to Athkatla. The dark knight was eager to get the Drow's weapons back and initiated the fight.
A pretty straightforward battle, Edwin casted Mass Invisibility to increase everyone AC and prevent spellcasting from their enemies. Anselm can now use Hardiness to increase his physical damage reduction up to -75%.
[spoiler=Drizzt][/spoiler]
In the city, they finished what they started in the Illithid's base in the sewers, dispatching the Alhoon in the process. They also completed the Guarded Compound and the Elemental Lich. A funny thing happened, Dorn was able to kill an "uninjured" Sion through Stoneskin with Poison Weapon + Whirlwind Attack in less than a round. And the Elemental Lich died to their Fallen Deva's Mace of Disruption. They also took the time to craft all the weapons they could, including Crom Faeyr which is being used by Korgan.
After theses battles, the party decided to tackle the Twisted Rune. It is the first time I'm doing this fight, I even had to look the location on the internet. It's pretty well hidden I think. It must be quite the surprise if you end up finding this encounter by wandering in Athkatla without knowing about it.
First, the anti-heroes summoned 4 Skeletons Warriors + a Fallen Deva and buffed with the usual spells : Prot from Evil 10 Radius, Stoneskin, Spirit Armor, Haste, Chant, and so forth. Then they sent Korgan with the Shield of the Balduran and the summons to initiate the fight.
As soon as the battle started, Shangalar teleported in front of the party but both Anselm and Dorn managed to get a quick hit before the prebuffing occured, resulting in a slowed and poisoned Shangalar while the rest of the party was able to dodge his Chain Contingency ADHW by moving next to the wall, hasted.
Edwin casted a first Time Stop and dispelled Shangalar's protections with Warding Whip, Pierce Shield and Breach. Luckily, he fell a second after, instantly destroyed by the Mace of Disruption of our Fallen Deva (again!).
During this time, the opposition summoned a Dark Planetar which teleported on Edwin and a few Fiends. Edwin first protected himself with PfMW then stopped time once again, threw a Greater Malison and two Slow spells into the battle to weaken their foes. The rest of the party then focused on killing the Dark Planetar as quickly as possible while Korgan and the summons were still holding the frontline.
But Layene, another powerful spellcaster, also casted Time Stop and swiftly summoned another Dark Planetar. Most of the Skeletons Warriors were destroyed by now, so Korgan summoned a Valhalla Berserker, Anselm his Simulacrum while Edwin threw a Dragon's Breath and Hexxat slit Revanek's throat with a nice 98 damage backstab thanks to her Mislead spell.
Anselm tried to join the battle, but as soon as he approached, he was stripped of his buffs by the Anti-Magic Ray of the Beholder so he went back to safety. They managed to kill the second Dark Planetar but their own summons were extinct so Viconia had to summon others Skeletons Warriors while Dorn summoned another Fallen Deva.
Finally Vaxall went down thanks to Dorn's poisoned ranged attacks + Edwin's MMM. Layene was the last enemy remaining and Dorn killed her once again from range with Poison Weapon. It was a great battle, and now Edwin has the Staff of the Magi.
[spoiler=Twisted Rune][/spoiler]
And to conclude this report, Anselm's party faced the fearsome Kangaxx.
Against his Lich's form, Edwin prepared a Chain Contingency spell with Warding Whip + Ruby Ray of Reversal + Pierce Magic triggered on sight to strip him from his spell protections, then a quick Breach spell from Hexxat pretty much ended this part of the fight as the summons were hacking him to pieces.
At this point he went into his Demilich's form and SCS gives him the spellcasting ability of a level 35 Mage with permanent increased casting speed. The evil crew retreated swiftly and casted every buff they could including a lot of Death Ward, Spell Immunity : Abjuration, Spell Shield, Spell Trap, Protection from the Elements, Spell Turning, Protection from Fire, and so forth. My goal here was to protect everyone form the Demilich's Howl, Trap the Soul, and a possible devastating spell combo with Dragon's Breath + Comet.
Edwin initiated the fight with Time Stop, then he casted Dragon's Breath, Spellstrike and Comet but to no avail, the spells did no damage to the floating skull but at least intterupted his spellcasting. Hexxat drank a Potion of Invulnerability to lower her saves vs death to protect herself from Trap the Soul.
They retreated upstairs, but Kangaxx followed them with a Dimension Door. Hopefully after a bit of running back and forth, he was out of Protection from Magical Weapons spells, and Korgan was able to kill him slowly with the electrical damage from Crom Faeyr, disrupting his spellcasting in the process. The rest of the party was well protected against everything and did not suffer casualties.
[spoiler=Kangaxx][/spoiler]
Anselm was able to pick up the Ring of Gaxx and now they are heading for Bodhi!
Thank you @Blackraven ! As far as I know it is SCS that tweaks Trap the Soul to allow a save vs death at -4, and it drains 4 levels even on a succesful save. Hopefully with two Blackguards, a Vampire and a Berserker my party is well protected against energy drain.
I also wanted to add that your writing is absolutely stellar! I really like it a lot. Good job with Davaeorn!
I would like to add to the @CrevsDaak 's post above that Moros was appoached by his comrades of old and had to leave the party, promising he would come back when needed (i.e. @Gotural suggested we had to remove unused party members till their players come back, and I agreed with it; removing Llolnae was not an option, though, because the drow was our main lock picker and trap disarmer, she consumed several tomes, and overall was too beautiful to leave behind; also, we hope that @GemHound is successful with his exams and will soon be available). @Meyahi , rest assured Moros was imported and saved.
Going though the Candlekeep catacombs was a lot of fun.
Llolnae: Searching for traps Gotural: "be careful" Llolnae: Trap Sprung Llolnae: Magic Resistance Tresset: good start so far
When the party face their first greater doppelgangers, Loki casted Chaos so that hasted doppelgangers fought each other.
After that @Tresset had to log off due to having some PC problems, and only me and @Gotural were to face the Prat's group.
A backstab from Gowrek meant a dead mage, the wand of paralysis was enough to stun Prat itself, while Web and hasted Gotural and Glincuwen managed to deal with others.
Thanks to a Protection from Petrification mage scroll, Gowrek then killed two greater basilisks so that the party finally could reach the surface again.
After that (Tresset fixed his problems) we decided to clear the rest outside areas from pre-TotSC BG1, starting with Ulcaster. There we were joined by Crevs, who gave an immediate effect against the Wolf of Ulcaster.
Tresset: "no more wolf" Gotural: "Ulcaster is really well done with SCS I think" Tresset: "llolnae squirreled it: Bengoshi: "pun intended"
Then we went to the Firewine Ruins, and were careful enough while tracking all the kobolds and traps there... only till Gowrek rushed to both enemy mages in the end. Thankfully, the first one was killed by our half-orc and dwarf before the mage finished both Loki and Glincuwen (webbed and with lighting bolt casted in their direction), while the second fell under the Chaos spell.
The Red Wizards weren't dangerous against us, maybe due to the no-prebuffing component, maybe due to the fact everyone had more than 100k XP already, and CrevsDaak was amased his archer with THAC0 -1 still managed to roll 1 against an enemy.
Then we went for Kahrk. The battle went as it often does. Spell Thrust from Gotural didn't work because of Kahrk having GoI, not MGoI. Loki misplaced the Chaos spell. Llolnae was killed in 3 blows because it's hard to manage more than one character in the MP. Then Gowrek was killed because Tresset forgot to activate the Greenstone amulet.
But still, Loki twice successfully dispelled magic on Kahrk, so that Gotural and Glincuwen could finish the ogre-mage with arrows and wands.
After that fight, Tresset, not having alive characters to control, spawned Noober on Glincuwen. And then another Noober. And another. Crevs went AFK for several minutes, and it looked like Noober succeeded in what the developers wanted from this character - in bugging the player out.
On a side note, I think it showed that BG in the MP could be - with limits, of course, played as if it had a DM - a player with no characters to control but who can use the console to spawn characters and spells on the party.
I decide to try out some of the new EE content. For the first time ever, I go to the Wild Forest. I'm sure we'll have to deal with wild surges, but I figure we'll do okay without Yoren Zovai's magic.
Turns out the wild surges also affect divine magic.
So none of us can safely use magic. But I figure we'll do okay without any magic.
Turns out they also have horrific traps around here, which trigger multiple times.
I give Viora the Ring of Fire Resistance and have her drink a potion to keep her alive. Ruva takes off her armor so she can disarm the trap.
I could disarm all of the traps in the area with a little work, but I figure two bad omens are sufficient reason to back out of the questline. At least for now. No sense taking on more danger than we can handle.
I figure taking on a couple of liches will be a much safer prospect. We put Death Ward and Chaotic Commands on as many characters as we can, bring out some Skeleton Warriors, hand a bunch of Fire Seeds to Ruva, conjure a clone of Ruva, and haste the whole group. I distribute the group so we'll avoid getting nailed by any first-round Horrid Wilting spells.
Before combat begins, I have Yoren Zovai summon a Flesh Golem and have both copies of Ruva attack it with Fire Seeds, inflicting 50% spell failure on the first round.
To my disappointment, the traps trigger before the lich's Stoneskins, nearly killing him.
The lich's Chain Contingency brings out a Cornugon and a Magical Sword. Those two will be pretty strong, but my primary concern is the lich.
I don't like that Cornugon. I send Zulfer after it, only to see him poisoned the moment he closes in on it.
Cornugon poison is pretty nasty. But the battle is already over. The lich dies to lingering poison damage--for some reason he's not immune.
The Cornugon follows soon after, even though it didn't get hit by any traps. Zulfer and Azelos are just that strong.
Not a very satisfying fight. It's not so much fun to win with a big cluster of traps, particularly when I had a really good feeling about our real strategy.
We still have the Elemental Lich to deal with. I use the same setup, but this time, I set the traps a short distance away from the lich, so they'll be an emergency backup instead of our main attack. Once again, we use the Flesh Golem as a high-AC target for area-effect spell failure from Ruva and her clone, both hasted for a total of 2 APR apiece.
With 4 APR total, and a 95% hit chance against that Flesh Golem, we have a near-guaranteed 100% spell failure for 5 rounds on that lich, using 1/6 of our total Fire Seeds. Since Ruva's clone lasts 16 rounds, we have more than enough time to outlast any PFMW spells it may have. And once those go down, Ruva can switch to the Crimson Dart, and apply 100% spell failure on her own, in a single round, even without haste.
An extra bonus is that the Flesh Golem is immune to magic, meaning our Fire Seeds can't actually harm it, though it will still run away from the lich to attack us if we do not keep ordering it to stick close to the lich.
But we can't just assign it to attack the lich, or else it will kill itself on the lich's Fire Shield. Fire Shield damage bypasses magic resistance (I've considered using it to kill dragons).
Turns out my fears were misplaced. The Flesh Golem isn't immune to fire, but it is immune to cold.
Even so, being close to the lich poses a problem. The lich knows the Flesh Golem is a threat, and deems it a bigger threat than our Skeleton Warriors. The lich has spell failure above 100% and the Flesh Golem is immune to magic anyway, so the lich resorts to physical attacks.
The same base 9 AC that makes it easy for us to hit the Flesh Golem with Fire Seeds also makes it easy for the lich to punch it to death. The Flesh Golem is extremely easy to kill with physical attacks.
You seldom ever see it since their THAC0 and APR are so poor, but liches can paralyze with their melee attacks.
With the Flesh Golem gone, we no longer have a good target for our Fire Seeds. We can still attack our Skeleton Warriors, but with less chance of a successful hit.
It doesn't matter much. The lich is already unable to cast spells, and we have another 5 whole rounds before the spell failure wears off. That's plenty of time for us to land a few other hits. But because we're safe for the time being, I stop Ruva and her clone from attacking, since we only have so many Fire Seeds to throw.
With spell failure active, the lich can't hurt us much, but it can still use contingencies and sequencers.
The Skeleton Warriors are immune to the sequencer thanks to being undead; Zulfer is immune thanks to Chaotic Commands. The lich's efforts would be a waste anyway; the Skeleton Warriors have nonmagical weapons because of SCS and could never hurt the lich, while Zulfer still can't break through the lich's PFMW.
The lich refreshes its PFMW via a contingency. Spell failure can't stop that.
We just wait. Azelos has been attacking nonstop so I know exactly when the lich becomes vulnerable to magical weapons like her Firetooth. Ruva and her clone keep attacking, maintaining the spell failure with Fire Seeds.
At some point I lose track of the clone... I don't even see where it went in the screenshots. We don't need it anymore; though. The lich is on its last PFMW. Once that's gone, we can move in for the kill.
We don't have enough sources of cold resistance to make more than one character immune, so I give the Dragon Helm and Dragonscale Shield to Ruva and have Laosha fill out the rest.
Azelos attacks from afar with Firetooth; Zulfer uses the Crimson Dart. Ruva, with 100% resistance to cold damage, marches right through to hack at the lich with Frostreaver.
It doesn't matter that the lich is still immune; we lose nothing by attacking under these circumstances. This just means we'll be hitting it the moment its PFMW runs out.
But the lich has one more left, via a Spell Trigger.
After this is over, we'll have about one round before it regains its spellcasting. We're out of Fire Seeds, and Ruva can only afford one missed attack roll if she switches to the Crimson Dart, so Laosha brings out some Spirit Wolves to help put pressure on the lich.
They will deal cold damage through Stoneskin, which will help disrupt the lich's spells. I bring Ruva back to use the Crimson Dart to increase her APR, while Zulfer attacks with Sanchuudoku until I realize the Acidic Backlash is bouncing back at him due to the lich's Spell Turning effect, and finally switch him to Celestial Fury for his own safety.
Ruva's spell failure makes the difference. The lich cannot harm us.
It's only a matter of time. Without spellcasting to protect it, it cannot replenish its Stoneskins, nor can it attack us. The battle is won.
Wizard Slayers, Fire Seeds, the Golem Manual, Haste, and Vhailor's Helm are enough to take down an SCS lich with a little timing. There is almost no chance of failure, and it can be done at basically any level, so long as you have those ingredients.
Some say Wizard Slayer spell failure doesn't matter because the wizard is already doomed by the time you can hit it. This is not true. Our Wizard Slayer was single-handedly holding off the lich for 12 rounds before the rest of the party could even begin to attack.
The last chapter of the Adventures of the Monty Python Crew in 2015. Bad and good news.
Being hunted in the Baldur's Gate city by authorities, the group decided to try the TotSC content.
The first quest included retrieving the Shandalar's cloak from an Ice Island.
Tresset: "So, how will we deal with Andris (and his 2 wizard friends" Bengoshi: "We'll fight them" Gotural: "Is there other way?" Bengoshi: "Skip them invisibly" Gotural: "It's more fun not to skip any encounter"
So, we were ready (at least, we thought so). But in seconds Gowrek's buffs were dispelled and he was sleeping under the Emotion effect. One mage had become confused, but the enemies answered exactly the same, and Glincuwen became confused as well. Both the half-orc and the elven archer were dead soon afterwards. We had to retreat a bit, to summon a skeleton and nymphs. They helped to take some damage, which in the end led to the victory. We had to accept the consequencies in losing 2 party members without an immediate possibility to go to a temple, and a need to continue relying on potions and wands.
We managed to get to the end of the dungeon, carefully using what we had left.
The next stop was the Durlag's Tower. The upper levels of it didn't have any danger in them, Loki reached the 10th level and got another Tome of WIS, while Llolnae managed to get exactly 60k in each of her classes:
Gowrek hit a spider for 94 damage - one of his highest damage.
Gotural saw a lot of Biffs everywhere and even fought them - while Loki and Gowrek only saw the dwarf fighting with the air:
After clearing the whole level and resting, the party (having pre-buffed because it was obvious this Tower had nothing else than enemies) assumed they were ready to face the 4 wardens. Oh, how much they mistaked...
The fight started rather well. Glincuwen quickly killed Fear, while Love was under the effect of Insect Plague and the whole party concentrated on Avarice.
Love then killed Glincuwen and nearly finished Gowrek, only to die from the half-orc's backstab.
The fight had not been fought yet, as Tresset warned about one dwarven ghost left - Pride. We saw him from the invisibility and I proposed to web him while Pride still didn't see us. And yet, Llolnae, under the control of @Tresset went straight to shoot Pride (the mistake number 1). That resulted in Pride activating his rage and thus becoming immune to Web due to getting low saving throws. Llolnae and Gowrek fell soon afterwards due to the Pride's high damage and speed.
When only Loki and Gotural were left, we decided to tank Pride with Gotural while Loki would use his wand on the enemy. And yet, Loki, under my control, went straight to the web zone (Pride was in his line of sight, Loki had only one order - to use the wand, and still went to the zone). The mistake number 2.
As you can see, Gotural wished to take the boots of speed from the Gowrek's body, but was several steps away from it. The Quick Loot in BGEE hasn't been upgraded yet and doesn't work as it does in BG2EE and IWDEE, when you can take items without moving to them.
And due to the Pride's high damage and speed, Gotural couldn't tank the enemy. The only way was to run north.
Then Loki became active again, and gulped an invis potion. We were pausing every second then. @Gotural gulped the potion of speed (instead of the potion of invis, as I would have done in that situation)... but with the Ring of Free Action the potion didn't work. The mistake number 3.
And then, the bad thing happened.
This is why many no-reloaders never visit the Durlag's Tower, or at least its lower levels. We all understood that Gotural is gone for good, because of the @Gotural 's principles, of which I have a great respect. I felt as if the game was lost. But then I realised that I simply can't let Pride to kill Loki too. This MP run shouldn't finish. Not yet.
It was a solo from that. The Avenger had to avenge his fallen comrades.
So, we won in the end. But at what price... And this is exactly what makes Baldur's Gate such an outstanding game. I'm terribly sorry that Loki went straight to the area of Web, which meant Gotural sacrificed himself. @Gotural will return in the New Year with a new character, so this brave dwarf will always stay in our hearts.
For those wondering, how a triple-class character is in a full-party, check the screen above. As the game progressed, the FMC became more and more useful, in the latest chapter having 41% of kills (146 agains Gowrek's 103). I hope more people would realize that a triple-class character is a very solid option evern for a full-party, when @Gotural creates a separate thread about his thoughts on this class.
Again, the death of Gotural the dwarf is bad news, very bad. But the MP run can continue.
Running low on pre-Spellhold quests. I decide we're ready to take on the last group of Statues on the first level of Watcher's Keep, which include a large group of fighters, a single backstabber, and two epic-level mages.
But I'm not going to use Wizard Slayer Fire Seeds on the mages, because they are too far apart for me to reliably shut down both of them. But both of them are perfectly vulnerable to nonmagical weapons and poison, so Zulfer can slay both of them rather quickly.
Except I didn't know they were vulnerable to either of those things until just now, when I checked. Also, confronting the mages directly would expose us to lots of attacks from enemy fighters, which we didn't have to deal with in the fights with the liches. So instead of using Assassin or Wizard Slayer Fire Seeds to shut down the enemy mages, we're going to rely on evasive tactics.
Everyone starts out invisible, with Viora activating the altar since she can turn invisible right afterward without expending any resources.
The mages activate their prebuffs when I pester them. Looks pretty wicked.
The Statues start bringing in demons, since demons can see through invisibility. But demons don't wander around if nobody's there when they appear. This means Viora can avoid them simply by scurrying away before the demons can appear.
Notice the Statue taking lingering poison damage from Ruva's traps. I set up 7 traps by the southern and western doors of the area to hit any Statues who might follow us. One of the Statues wandered into the room with the Demogorgon statue, triggering the traps.
Capitalizing on the Statue's weakness, we bring in the party. Ruva uses the Staff of Striking and brings the Statue to Near Death. It doesn't last much longer. When we're done, Yoren Zovai hides us once more.
I take the group south by the other traps. Meanwhile, Viora's patience pays off.
The enemy is now blind, and Viora can return to the center of the area without getting attacked. Divination spells do not help when Viora is hiding with the Cloak of Non-Detection installed.
The mages are still strong. I need to drain some more spells. To do that, we need summons. Since we don't have many summoning spells memorize, I want to make the most of the ones we have. Yoren Zovai gives them a buff to increase their impact.
I run them past the enemy fighters into the sight of the mages, to trigger some more buffs.
The summons don't last long after that. The Statues are very high-level fighters.
Viora draws out more spells by hitting and fading with Hide in Plain Sight.
Another pack of summons crumples under the Statues' might.
But they are weaker than before. Zulfer selects the most fragile target. He only has 9 thief levels, so his backstabs aren't very strong, but his fighter bonuses compensate somewhat.
Zulfer heads north to check out the male mage, but vanishes when he sees the mage is prepared to handle him.
Back at the south end of the chamber, Azelos hauls out a clone use Arrows of Dispelling on the female mage. With her Stoneskins gone, Zulfer can land a backstab.
The Iron Golem remains. I assign Zulfer to help bring it down, but find that Zulfer isn't quite cut out for the job.
Azelos' clone goes out to tackle the male mage Statue, but he erects a barrier against her Arrows of Dispelling and Darts of Stunning. She flees to the nearest room, but can't escape the fighter Statues.
The Iron Golem is rather tough, but it doesn't have much HP left. We bring it to its knees while the other enemy fighters are away.
We bring out a third group of summons. Now, the male mage is out of his best buffs. Laosha's Spirit Wolves paralyze him.
Gerland of Candlekeep, NG Half-Elf Skald, 6th BG1 report
23 Eleint, 1368 Our stay in the city has brought us plenty of jobs and, as a consequence, plenty of gold. The six of us did some of the work together, especially a number of rougher encounters with wizards that wanted us dead for different reasons.
Arrows of dispelling and plenty of elemental damage dealing weapons (arrows, my trusty Ashideena, Alora's frost dart) made these encounters more than manageable. Imoen and Alora have become very dear friends. They went on some adventures of their own and often returned with impressive amounts of gold or valuable items. I know those two well enough to be suspicious of the origins of their prizes, but I also know they're too kind to seriously harm innocent people so I've decided to condone their behavior. Our main business in the city was to confront the Iron Throne about their actions. First, two Iron Throne employees we met near the Thieves Guild told us they had poisoned us. Indeed, with the passing of a day or two we all started getting sick. Our search for antidotes ended with the party killing both Throne associates. They had the antidotes on their bodies (and one of them had a pair of Boots of Speed, a nice consolation).
A day or two later we cleared one trading house of Doppelgangers for the Flaming Fist, and another one for our friend Aldeth Sashenstar. The Doppelgangers had nearly caused the bankruptcy of both houses, with a number of inexplicable, and above all unfavorable business decisions for their respective employers. The mysterious infiltrations among the Iron Throne's competitors were sufficiently suspicious for the Fist to authorize and pay us to enter the Iron Throne building to get some answers. We met no resistance but weren't given any answers either, until we reached the building's top floor. There, a party of seven or eight acolytes and another Doppelganger awaited us, not to provide information but to kill us! They did give us a name though: Sarevok seems to be one of the local leaders of the Throne.
What our enemy clearly didn't foresee was that at that point we had two wands of fire and three necklaces of missiles. The conflagration we exposed our foes to, killed several of the acolytes.
The others fell soon after. There was one rogue who seriously injured Imoen with a backstab, but I paralyzed the assassin with my wand before she could do any more harm.
Eventually we learnt that Iron Throne leader Rieltar was at a business meeting in Candlekeep, and that's where the Fist wants us to go now. They even gave me a book with which we should be allowed entrance into what used to be my home for many years.
26 Eleint, 1368 Well, the party's visit to Candlekeep didn't work out the way I would have wanted it to. Yes, Imoen and I caught up with several of our old friends, but we also slew Rieltar and his associates (using the same tactic as we had used at the Iron Throne building).
Instead of becoming heroes for ridding the Sword Coast of the people who had caused so much destruction over the past several months, we became villains. Apparently you're free of blame if, rather than doing the dirty work yourself, you're in a high enough position to order others to enslave miners, to rob and kill travelers, or to murder competitors and replace them with Doppelgangers. Luckily Tethtoril sympathized with our cause. Before we were to be transported to Baldur's Gate to be put to justice, the old sage teleported us to secret catacombs below the citadel. We found some valuable treasure there, and many, many Doppelgangers that had taken the shape of Candlekeep residents. At first I feared my former neighbors had been slain, but my hopes returned when I encountered three Doppelgangers that had taken the shape of Gorion, Elminster, and Tethtoril. Gorion had fallen months ago, and I refused to believe the shapeshifting creatures capable of murdering Elminster or Tethtoril. We slew all the Doppelgangers we saw, hoping this would be sufficient help for Candlekeep.
The catacombs led to dark caverns where we were held up by four more hostile Iron Throne hirelings. More fire from our wands and necklaces killed two of them instantly.
The survivors were a warrior, who was felled soon after by Kivan, and a wizard named Prat. The wizard nearly Confused Ajantis: he activated the Greenstone Amulet just in time.
The Cavalier, aided by Kivan's arrows of dispelling and by Alora's darts, and inspired by my song, then slew Prat in melee combat. Amongst the loot was an enchanted, returning throwing axe that now functions as my range weapon. By the gates of Candlekeep we slew four Ogre Mages that had been hired by the Throne to deal with us as well.
Reluctant to return to Baldur's Gate because of our new status as outlaws, we've just agreed to travel to Ulgoth's Beard to see if the offer Shandalar made us a tenday or two ago, to retrieve a cloak for him, still stands. Oh, by the way, apparently my biological father (and Sarevok's) is Bhaal, the dead Lord of Murder. My companions Dynaheir, who had suspected as much, and Ajantis seem more shaken by it than I am. I can't see how this revelation may change who I am. I've been doing what I can to be a good man. I've surrounded myself with good people, and together we've done countless good deeds, big and small. My blood doesn't make me who I am. I'm my own man. What does worry me though, is Alaundo's prophecy of many children of Bhaal killing each other for power, sowing chaos and destruction with their passage...
Higharvestide, 1368 A miniscule ice island in the middle of the sea isn't exactly the place where I'd celebrate Higharvestide, but it's where Shandalar sent us. It appeared to be an asylum of sorts for insane mages. We battled our way past a party of three, after Imoen and I cast a Chaos on them (read from scrolls). It confused two of them, and bought us just enough time to finish of one before he'd come to his senses. The second mage managed to cast a Web, which Kivan and I countered with free action potions. Ajantis and Alora were immune to Webs thanks to special rings they wore, and Dynaheir remained outside the spell's area of effect. Only Imoen got stuck.
The third wizard, who had temporarily gone invisible, fell soon after Kivan dispelled his protections with an arrow of dispelling. We had the most difficulty against a mage named Garan who summoned four or five Ankhegs to aid him. Ajantis' full plate armor broke in the middle of battle which made him a lot more vulnerable against the Ankhegs, some of the Ankhegs attacked unbuffed Dynaheir and Imoen, and Garan lasted longer than the other mages we had battled. We prevailed thanks (once more) in large part to Kivan's superb skills with his bow.
Near what seemed to be an exit, a wizard named Dezkiel failed to Horror us, saw his protections dispelled by Kivan, and fell to our collective onslaught of magic and missiles. On his body we found a Stoneskin scroll and Shandalar's cloak.
10 Marpenoth, 1368 We've agreed to help another resident of Ulgoth's Beard, a scholar named Mendas who asked us to travel the Trackless Sea and fetch him Balduran's logbook. We have obtained a sea chart from a captain in Baldur's Gate, where we kept a very low profile, and are already on our way.
3 Uktar, 1368 Our ship didn't make it to its destination due to a heavy storm, but fortunately we did. What we found was not what we expected. We helped the islanders by destroying a large pack of Wolfweres - my song, strength potions, and speed oils were sufficient for Kivan, Alora and Ajantis to defeat the most powerful of the creatures -
only to be awarded with betrayal. The islanders themselves were Werewolves. They all turned on us, and paid for that with their lives, except for a few grateful females: a girl named Delainey and a woman named Maralee (whose baby son we'd saved from the alpha Wolfwere). They convinced headwoman Kaishas Gan to let us leave the island in peace, on a ship she had prepared.
We hope to reach Ulgoth's Beard within two tendays.
24 Uktar, 1368 Our voyage home went well, without incident, but the same cannot be said of our meeting with Mendas. It turned out he was a Werewolf and Kaishas Gan's husband and he had expected her with us. With two powerful allies, he attacked us, initally in human form, later as Loup Garous. It mattered not. Ajantis with his enchanted blade Kondar and Kivan with Balduran's bastard sword (a type of sword the use of which he wasn't even proficient in), both buffed, destroyed the wicked creatures.
Months have passed since the incident at Candlekeep, so we might see how Baldur's Gate receives us. On the other hand, now would also be a good time to further explore Durlag's Tower...
When they arrived in the Graveyard, Bodhi appeared and took Viconia away from Anselm before escaping in her base. The party followed her through the lower tombs and fought their way through an army of Vampires and their servants.
Without a Cleric, it could have been difficult to clear this place but everyone except Edwin is immune in a way or another to level drain. As usual, the Devas proved very powerful with their Maces of Disruption, instantly killing many of their foes.
Hexxat was also really useful here because Vampires cannot see through Invisibility, so she was able to backstab quite a lot of them.
[spoiler=Vampires][/spoiler]
The hunt continued until they reached Bodhi in her inner sanctum. Hexxat sneaked inside her room, but the mistress was able to see through the Thief's stealth. She rushed toward Hexxat who started to retreat after backstabing a Vampire. Soon after, Edwin's image casted Time Stop and unleashed his wrath against the undeads, obliterating them with multiples ADHW. Bodhi ignored the spellcaster copy and faced Anselm&Co in melee.
Some foes remained after Edwin's magical assault, so his Project Image stayed near the entrance and start to protect himself with a lot of spells to draw their attention while the rest of the party was busy killing Bodhi. Dorn, Korgan and Anselm used Whirlwind Attack together and the sheer force of their assault brang her on her knees nearly instantly, she healed herself back to full while increasing her power but died again a split second after. At this point the party was dealing more than a hundred damages per second.
[spoiler=Bodhi][/spoiler]
Hexxat finished the last Vampires with some backstabs and the party looted the Rhynn Lanthorn.
Thy returned to the temple of Amaunator and brang Viconia back to life, then they visited the new areas in the forest, dispatched some Vampires, Yuan-Tis, Priests of Cyrics, Wyvern Cultists, Werewolves and killed Coran before heading for the Watcher's Keep.
There, they completed the first floor for some more XP. Hexxat was killed by a Comet spell but apart from that, everything went as expected. They ran away from the Statues casting Time Stop before killing them in another room.
[spoiler=Watcher's Keep][/spoiler]
Finally for today's report, they went to Suldanessalar and vanquished everyone who stood in their way : Golems, Rakshasas, Drows, Nizidramanii'yt.
The second level of Watcher's Keep isn't quite as tough as the first, and has some important loot, notably a Wand of Spell Striking.
A few fights can still be tough. For one thing, the air elemental room deals lots of electricity damage. A Protection from Lightning spell keeps Zulfer safe while he wades in with Spirit Animals, who are all immune to electricity by default.
Zulfer runs into trouble with some golems, who are more than enough to slay him. As always, my favorite escape option is a Potion of Invisibility.
Rested and buffed later on, we easily topple the golems.
I forget once again that you have to retrieve a key from the southeast room before you open the second door to the slime room. While I'm heading over to grab it, I ignore the rest of the party, to Laosha's considerable misfortune.
I have no idea how a Vortex Spider could do that so quickly, so I have the other party members escape its grasp.
Ruva can't drink any potions besides healing potions, however, so she has to fight it alone. She axes the thing in short order.
I get caught off-guard once again near the ice room. Viora is almost impossible to target, but stealth gives no defense against area-effect spell damage.
There aren't a lot of items or spells that grant cold resistance, so Cone of Cold is something of a wild card.
All that's left is the Fire Giant and the Chromatic Demon.
I had intended to use Called Shot to force the Chromatic Demon to fail a save against Feeblemind. It fails its save twice, but it keeps on attacking--it's immune to the Feeblemind effect.
Luckily, we have a backup. Azelos is now level 13 and her Called Shot also deals STR drain. When Feeblemind fails, Ray of Enfeeblement succeeds.
The nice thing about the Chromatic Demon is that it has no magic resistance, so it only has its saves to protect it. Azelos re-casts Called Shot to apply further STR drain, and brings the demon's STR to 0.
We don't get any XP, but it's cool to do it, and it's much faster than any other method.
We cast Heal on Yakman and ditch Watcher's Keep. The third level is very dangerous, with lots of nasty magical effects all over the place, and some really hard-hitting demons. We have little reason to tackle it just now.
Instead, we go back to finish the Unseeing Eye quest. In retrospect, the Unseeing Eye doesn't really require much from this party. The formula is simple: Zulfer goes out with the Shield of Balduran alongside his clone, Azelos uses the Rift Device, and Zulfer and his clone attack with Poison Weapon. The Beholder falls within two rounds.
The Death Tyrants suffer the same fate; their rays cannot harm Zulfer or his clone, and poison is just as effective against them as it was against the Unseeing Eye.
I reject the Talassans' offer to take up the cleric stronghold. I don't want to work for Talos. He's a terrorist version of Zeus and his clerics in Athkatla are jerks. It's not worth the XP. Instead, we start the illithium quest and go just far enough to upgrade the Mace of Disruption.
We've got one big quest left: the Planar Sphere. Kayardi and his gang get poisoned by Fire Seeds, and also fail some important saves against our Nymph's spells.
We lost the XP for Kayardi's death, since the last point of damage came from a clone that had already vanished early. I don't really know what causes the clone to vanish; it couldn't have taken enough damage to die.
We poison Necre and Taibela with the same trick. Easy.
We also steal a few thousand XP from the Guardian Golem by sending out a clone of Zulfer with the Shield of Balduran and some poisoned darts to fight the Elder Orb.
@lunar: The success against spellcasters is very much a product of this particular party, which has multiple fantastic anti-mage options and the PWWP strategy (provoke, weaken, withdraw, pounce) I developed during a Nightmare mode run with a blind Kensai/Thief.
Zulfer, our Assassin/Fighter, has the high APR to make optimal use of Poison Weapon, and because he specializes in darts, we can attack with nonmagical darts or Darts +5 from the Cloak of Stars to bypass even PFMW or Improved Mantle and deal poison damage, without a saving throw, despite all defenses. Poison Weapon deals 12 poison damage over 6 seconds even if the target makes its save, so it's one of the best means of disrupting spells around.
Ruva, our Wizard Slayer/Thief, also with specialization in darts, can inflict 25% arcane spell failure, which can prevent spells for 5 rounds instead of 1. SCS spellcasters will not even attempt to cast spells if their spell failure is high enough, so they won't waste spells; they'll just delay casting them. It's a form of silence that is impossible to dispel or block, and unlike Poison Weapon, it also affects liches and mages with the MINHP1 item, such as Lavok and Irenicus.
Laosha, our Totemic Druid, brings three things to the table. First, he can cast Fire Seeds, which, like flashers, are area-effect projectiles. This property means we can apply poison and spell failure as area effects, and therefore deal spell failure and poison even against invisible enemies, Liches with PFMW, and mages with Absolute Immunity. By summoning a Flesh Golem, with its 9 AC, we can get a 95% hit chance with Fire Seeds, and because the golem is immune to magic, we don't even harm the golem in the process.
Second, Laosha may summon Spirit Animals. At level 10, all Spirit Animals attack with +6 weapons, which can bypass Improved Mantle. Spirit Snakes can deal poison damage on a failed save, while Spirit Wolves can deal cold damage without save, and paralyze the target on a failed save vs. death at +1. They are very effective at disrupting and disabling mages through spell protections. They also have immunities to basically all disablers and last 60 rounds, making it very difficult for enemies to get rid of them.
Third, Laosha, like Viora, can cast Death Ward, Remove Fear, and Chaotic Commands, which make the targets immune to nearly all disablers (Free Action is still needed to prevent slow, but precludes haste). This is a reliable means of surviving enemy disablers.
This party was designed to take down mages. The only way it could be strengthened would be for us to bring an Inquisitor into the party.
The PWWP strategy involves throwing weak summons at enemies and repeatedly fleeing and turning invisible to wait out enemy buffs and waste the enemy's best spells. In my install, SCS spellcasters come out with lots of prebuffs. This party can get past all of them with Fire Seeds, but it's also possible for us to scurry away, and just avoid confronting the enemy when it's at the peak of its strength. We repeatedly provoke the enemy and withdraw before the enemy can gain an advantage. Then, when the enemy is low on buffs and low on spells, we bring out our best buffs and rush them. This means we attack when we are at our strongest and the enemy is at its weakest, because the nature of the AI--which does not know how to do the same against us--means that the player can choose the terms of the fight.
The PWWP strategy, however, relies on having a certain amount of room in which to operate, and this does not always hold. Also, many SCS spellcasters carry the Death Spell or are accompanied by fighters, which means our summons don't always last long enough to make a big difference. Finally, SCS spellcasters often carry divination spells--but because they only carry so many, and don't always have True Seeing, you can simply memorize more invisibility spells to counter their divinations. Also, many divination spells have long casting times, which means you can run away from them if you hear the incantation.
Put all these things together, and we have the ability to bypass or wait out enemy buffs, and resist or evade enemy spells.
Lavok has the MINHP1 item, which makes him immune to all disablers as well as poison, silence, level drain, and instant death effects. In EE, this also makes him immune to stat drain.
He is still, however, perfectly vulnerable to spell failure. The only critters that are immune are SCS celestials, demons, dragons, and genies. Ruva can shut down his spellcasting with Fire Seeds. And now that Yoren Zovai has hit level 12, we can bump up Ruva's clone to 3 APR instead of 2.
Again, the clone's dialog box name is Viora by default. The real Viora is hiding near Lavok. Notice the spell deflection visual around her: she just hit level 14 and can now cast Shield of the Archons.
Turns out Lavok uses Improved Mantle instead of Absolute Immunity. We could hit him with Darts +5 if we wanted. But Ruva's clone only has nonmagical darts and Fire Seeds equipped, and I think Ruva herself still has a better chance of hitting Lavok with Fire Seeds against the Flesh Golem rather than using Darts +5 against Lavok himself.
Lavok suffers total spell failure and resort to sequencers.
Ruva can no longer equip Frostreaver for when Lavok closes in on her and his Improved Mantle wears off. Her clone vanishes for reasons I don't understand, but soon, Lavok is out of Stoneskins, and wanders right into Ruva's traps.
Tolgerias is next. I want to backstab Tolgerias' friend, and turn Ruva invisible since her stealth is poor, but his friend is invisible and Ruva can't reveal her with Detect Illusions.
I could use the Staff of Striking to chunk Tolgerias in one blow, but I feel like fighting him. I use a nonmagical staff instead.
This turned out to be a bad idea. I don't put enough pressure on Tolgerias, and his spellcasting is safe.
It's a classic combination on Tolgerias' part. He brings out a Fallen Planetar. Viora escapes to the east, while Ruva lingers to serve as a decoy.
While Ruva is fleeing the Planetar to the northwest, and trying to escape a Dragon's Breath spell at the same time, Viora starts heading for the exit. Meanwhile, our summons start marching out in the hopes of keeping the Planetar busy while we make our escape.
But we can't flee the area, and therefore the Planetar's vorpal strikes, unless Ruva is with us. And when Ruva gets charmed, we're stuck.
Notice Viora is running back to the east. This is because I feared the Fallen Planetar would abandon Ruva and come after Viora instead. I bring her back a moment later, with Zulfer running up to meet her so I can have them switch boots. With the Boots of Speed, Viora can reach the exit a second sooner. The Planetar comes towards Viora, but changes its mind at the last second and re-targets Ruva.
While the Planetar is waffling, Tolgerias makes the most of his Improved Alacrity, and uses another HLA. This time, he targets Viora.
Viora has just now gotten the Boots of Speed and can re-join the party by the exit. But this would bring the Comet right onto the rest of the party.
We have to let it happen. We can't let Viora stay out in the open. Otherwise the Planetar might change its mind, and Viora could get chunked.
I give Viora the Ring of Fire Resistance at the last second. Without it, she would have died.
We heal up the group within the round, using the Rod of Resurrection on Viora.
A moment later, we get an auto-pause. Ruva has fallen.
Another character, chunked. With Ruva gone, we're able to flee the area.
I use CTRL-T to imitate waiting out the Planetar's duration.
The rest of the fight is a non-issue. Zulfer takes down both enemies with nonmagical darts.
Another huge XP loss for the party. I switch our save file back to the mpsave folder to re-create Ruva. She gets another marvelous stat roll, at 88 with 18/98 STR, but this time I give her grandmastery in axes, since Bala's Axe is coming up soon.
I dual-class Ruva to thief immediately and invest in Find Traps, since we have a few traps coming up, but no locks to pick. Any chunking in a no-reload is awful, particularly this late in the game, but Ruva was the best possible target, as her power was the least dependent on her levels.
This party is great at dealing with mages, but it requires high pressure on the first round. We didn't apply that, allowing Tolgerias to secure an advantage.
The rest of the Planar Sphere isn't too hard. We use Spirit Wolves on the ice room and Zulfer with Protection from Fire on the fire room. A feedback loop with Sanchuudoku's Acidic Backlash slows down the computer but quickly kills the Efreeti, which too often turns to mist to regenerate. Viora uses Hide in Plain Sight to fetch Bala's Axe without fighting the golems near the engine room. Finally, Chaotic Commands and Free Action protect the party from the Tanar'ri's Death Gaze ability, while Zulfer cuts down the Tanar'ri itself. We are free from the Planar Sphere.
There are no more quests left that I feel confident we can overcome. I could probably take on the Twisted Rune with the same formula I used in my Nightmare mode run, since Viora can use Hide in Plain Sight, but it's not worth the risk. As for Kangaxx, I don't know how I would deal with him. His lich form would be little different from any other lich--Fire Seeds from Ruva would doom him--but his demi-lich form would be a problem. SCS Kangaxx regenerates, and Viora doesn't have much damage output. I don't know if she could handle him on her own, not without using a Protection from Magic scroll that's probably better suited for the main quest.
We set sail for Spellhold. After Galvena's hall is wiped out, Ruva regains her Wizard Slayer levels, and we are back up to speed, more or less.
Perth the Adept comes out with an impressive set of pre-buffs, starting out with two clones. Ruva and her clone try to disable him with Fire Seeds, but at 2 APR apiece, it takes them just under a full round to achieve 100% spell failure. This means that faster-casting spells can still get through.
Curiously, Ruva's clone takes no damage. It does, however, fail a save vs. death, and is out commission for 3 rounds.
But damage awakens sleeping characters in BG2:EE, so Azelos can easily bring the clone back.
For some reason, I didn't think to have Zulfer throw the Fire Seeds, since Perth has no immunity to poison. Once Perth is visible, Zulfer seals his fate with darts.
In Spellhold itself, Viora defeats Bhaal by hiding and kiting, with DUHM to strengthen her sling damage.
The maze is next, and then Irenicus. Irenicus will be immune to poison, but spell failure will still work fine. Things might, however, get awfully messy, as there is little room to run and the inmates and clones can complicate the fight. Zulfer's clone and Ruva's clone will likely be high-priority targets, as they will have spell failure and poison at their disposal.
Before entering the Tree of Life area, Anselm interrogated every members of his group to be sure of their loyalty. They all expressed how far the warband has come since they started to work together a long time ago, especially for Viconia, Edwin and Dorn who were here since the very beggining. The Drow also showed her feeling toward Anselm before what could be their last battle.
They prepared and memorized a lot of spells dedicated to fight a Mage this powerful, including a lot of Breach and a Chain Contingency with Ruby Ray of Reversal + Pierce Shield + Warding Whip. Then Anselm went alone and felled the two first parasites, he retreated, the party casted a lot of buffs and finally he slew the last parasite. The battle could start.
Irenicus started the fight well protected, as expected and managed to cast a Time Stop, despite Edwin's assault on his spell protections. He summoned a Dark Planetar, and casted Comet + Dragon's Breath on Viconia and Dorn. He also threw a Chaos spell against Edwin and it worked, despite having only 20% to do so. Edwin was out of the fight for a moment, but he was nearly defenseless after, Viconia used True Sight as soon as the fight started to get rid of his illusions after his Spell Immunity : Divination was destroyed.
Irenicus retaliated by dispelling her True Sight with a Remove Magic spell before turning invisible again with Shadow Door. The party took this time to dispose of the Dark Planetar.
Then he casted Wish, and wished for an AoE version of Breach, it could have been worse, before escaping and gating a Balor. Viconia used True Sight again. Korgan alone was getting seriously injured so Anselm and Hexxat came to his rescue and together they killed the fiend.
Afterward, they decided to retreat for a moment and let the summons do their work. They recasted a lot of buffs and at this moment the Chaos spell which affected Edwin ended. The Red Wizard was really furious to have been rendered useless so easily and started to wreak havoc with his magic. He casted Time Stop + Warding Whip + Improved Alacrity + Spell Shield + Prot from the Elements + Spell Immunity : Abjuration + Mass Invisibility then he recasted Time Stop before the first one was over and finally he threw Breach + Dragon's Breath + Comet.
Finally he was stripped of all his buffs, it was time to close in for the kill. When he tried to escape, Hexxat followed him invisible thanks to a Mislead spell to backstab him. He still had Stoneskin, Hexxat broke the first one, but he replaced it. So she hit him 9 times instead of 10 to break the Stoneskin, waited for Irenicus to use his aura to cast an ADHW spell, broke the Stoneskin then she quickly casted Shadow Door again to finish him off with backstab before he could protect himself once again.
Comments
Cookies comes with lots of attack power, lots of immunities, and casts PFMW via a scroll. On top of that, any attacker who strikes him with a weapon or a hostile spell, or even a trap, will trigger an "Acidic Backlash," a custom spell that deals lingering acid damage every second. It makes spellcasting nearly impossible, and quickly dissolves most melee attackers. He's one of the most powerful critters in the game, and will not leave you alone as long as you hold Celestial Fury.
But Cookies has the notable weakness of being unable to see through invisibility, and does not really know when to use a divination spell. Also, after 60 rounds, he vanishes and comes back a day later at full strength. This means it's easy to test him out and then flee under invisibility before committing to a fight (since we purchased a magic license, we can safely cast Invisibility 10' Radius in Athkatla without worrying about the Cowled Wizards).
I let Viora stay visible so he can begin his standard dialogue before attacking. She vanishes right afterwards.
I send out Azelos' clone, equipped with Arrows of Dispelling. Contrary to what I thought earlier, Cookies' ridiculous +20 bonus to all of his saving throws is dispellable, just like the Potion of Magic Shielding that the bonus is supposed to emulate. He's got some other bonuses of the same kind, including +50 MR. Beneath that defense, however, Cookies has no defense against disablers beyond his saves and magic resistance; he has no Ring of Free Action.
All we have to do to bring him down is land an Arrow of Dispelling and then stun him with a Dart of Stunning. But his AC is pretty solid, and Azelos' clone has trouble.
As a Kensai/Mage, Cookies doesn't use any ranged weapons. But he can cast damage spells, to the detriment of everybody nearby.
He comes for Viora, who I accidentally let become visible. He always makes a beeline for Charname if Charname is visible. She barely escapes.
I need more time if I'm going to land that Arrow of Dispelling and stun Cookies. To do so, I have to prep the area with Teleport Field spells. We rest for a day to make Cookies leave and return, then scoot away to create a safe spot in which to fight him. Once it's ready, Yorun Zovai goes out to start the attack dialogue before disappearing for her own safety.
I try to dispel his buffs again, but PFMW blocks Arrows of Dispelling, and Cookies loves that spell.
My attempts fail. The clone cannot debuff Cookies before running out of time, much less debuffing and disabling him.
The strategy still has merit, though, and as long as we don't use up scarce resources in the process, we can try as many times as we like. The only problem is PFMW. But Cookies casts that spell whenever he sees an enemy and does not already have it active. We can exhaust his supply of PFMW scrolls by baiting them out with summons.
We organize another playdate the next day and send a Fire Elemental down to fight him. Cookies wins.
That Death Fog spell is keeping us from going over and luring him out (he's immune to that spell thanks to his undroppable Cloak of Mirroring), so Viora clears it up.
More summons march out to their doom. Cookies takes the time to show off his limited AI.
I don't think SCS gave him improved AI; they really just stuck with the original Tactics version of the fight. Another curious thing, which actually makes more sense, is seeing him running away from a low-level animal summons.
I think Cookies realizes that that wolf is coming at him with a nonmagical weapon, which will bypass his PFMW spell. His response is to flee. When pressed, of course, he fights back, and kills the wolf in one hit.
With Cookies' PFMW spells exhausted, I prepare for the real attack. Laosha brings forth some Spirit Animals. Azelos conjures her clone and sends it out to try and dispel Cookies again.
When I see its attack roll, I realize PFMW isn't my only problem.
Cookies wears the standard late-game equipment for a Kensai/Mage, a notable exception being his boots. He wear the Boots of Avoidance, not the Boots of Speed, which means his AC vs. missile weapons should be somewhere around -17.
Even the original Azelos can't expect to land a hit on him. Her clone would need a critical hit. Now what?
I have a backup strategy, and though it would work better if Cookies was debuffed, it still has a decent chance of success. Unfortunately, it relies on scrolls. I only get one shot at this, and if it doesn't work the first time, I can't try it again.
This time we invite him to the Docks District, since it's a bit more wide-open than the Slums. Yoren Zovai approaches Cookies and casts PFMW via a scroll (she's only level 12 and can't cast it herself just yet).
She turns visible, to my surprise.
It shouldn't matter. His weapons can't harm her, and Death Fog won't deal enough damage to be a problem. So how we supposed to kill this guy?
Bigby's Clenched Fist holds the target for up to four rounds. The first round, notably, does not offer a save. This means Cookies' save bonuses won't help him.
But magic resistance can block the spell entirely. And with his buffs, Cookies has 70% magic resistance. What good is Bigby's Clenched Fist if it only has a 30% chance of holding him only one round?
Well, that means we can get one round of automatic attacks in one Cookies before the hold wears. That's a guaranteed dispel magic with an Arrow of Dispelling. Then we can try to disable him with Darts of Stunning and the Wand of Paralyzation.
And because I'm a bit desperate, I'm going to use the Wand of Lightning trick to cast Bigby's Clenched Fist 6 times, one after another. He has precious little chance of making a save against each one. Cookies moves in for the kill. His weapons bounce off of PFMW, and his Death Fog does not disrupt Yorun Zovai's spellcasting.
She gets the first spell off the ground. The outcome surprises me.
The spell bounced off of him. Cookies had a spell turning pre-buff.
But the Wand of Lightning trick is hard to stop. The moment Yorun Zovai recovers, she starts casting the spell again.
But Cookies' Spell Turning buff still has some spell levels in it. The spell bounces off again.
Her Protection from Magical Weapons scroll won't last long enough to keep her alive. But it's worse than I thought.
Yorun Zovai is gone. We only just got her to level 12 and therefore Improved Haste, a huge turning point for a party with an Archer.
I gather her equipment and hide to the west. I rest and let Cookies vanish.
I consider moving on, and just fleeing from Cookies until Chapter 6, when I'm sure to have better options. But I'm not quite ready to give up. Not yet.
Yoren Zovai should probably get at least to level 8 before we fight Cookies, since it's only 1000 XP away for her. I visit the Graveyard and finish the quest with Kamir the paladin and Risa the orphan. I rest right afterward so I can talk to Wellyn, and then Cookies appears.
See that little girl just south of Cookies? That's Risa, the orphaned child we just united with Kamir the paladin, who adopted her as part of his penance for failing to save the life of his own child.
I have everyone drink a Potion of Invisibility to escape Cookies' attacks, but unfortunately, Ruva, as a Wizard Slayer, cannot do so, and I can't cast Invisibility on her without leaving Yoren Zovai vulnerable.
We run away from Cookies, who cannot reach the only visible target because the invisible characters are getting in his way. His response?
Death Fog.
Cookies just murdered an innocent little girl, right before she was about to start out on a bright new life.
That's not okay. We have to kill this guy.
After fleeing the area, we proceed to the Promenade and get ready. He arrives while we're all invisible--apparently you don't have to have a visible character for him to appear--and Yoren Zovai grants herself immunity to acid with a scroll of Protection from Acid. Since I don't like using such limited items when it's not really an emergency, I use the Wand of Lightning trick to make one scroll last a lot longer.
I've had luck in the past using the feedback loop against Cookies. Both Cookies' Acidic Backlash and a standard Fire Shield effects will trigger each other infinitely, causing a chain reaction that quickly kills whoever lacks an immunity to the backlash they're triggering. Yoren Zovai casts Fire Shield: Red via a scroll before attacking Cookies. When Cookies attacks back, he triggers the feedback loop. The backlashes fire off against each other.
But Cookies is unaffected by the damage. The Cloak of Mirroring blocks offensive damage spells, but the Fire Shield backlash counts as a specific protections spell, so I thought Cookies would be vulnerable. But Cookies suffers no damage.
And though Yoren Zovai is immune to acid and therefore Acidic Backlash, she is not immune to Cookies' Fire Shield spells, which lack a visual effect to give them away. Yoren Zovai gets killed by the backlash. Cookies is unharmed.
Out of curiosity, I do a test run to see if a Protection from Magic scroll will dispel Cookies' buffs. They do, but only for the duration of the fight; not when he comes back. And since a Protection from Magic scroll grants spell level immunities for 60 rounds, using one on Cookies will make him immune to the Wand of Paralyzation anyway.
I go back to the basics, arriving at the fight while invisible and summoning a clone to fire an Arrow of Dispelling at him. I notice something unusual.
If you attack him with a simulacrum before he gives his attack dialog, he won't turn hostile. This means the clone can fire off arrow after arrow without Cookies casting PFMW.
I repeat the process until finally the clone gets a critical hit. Even when he gets hurt, he doesn't turn hostile. His buffs are gone.
I keep attacking, just to see. He never fights back. It would be entirely possible to kill him without any danger.
But I don't want to kill him while he's just standing there. I rest and come back to see him.
He's still there, without Stoneskin. Cookies is scripted to teleport away after 60 rounds, but that timer only begins when he delivers his dialogue. We can start afresh with a new use of Vhailor's Helm even after we use it to debuff him.
But Cookies has -17 AC vs. Darts of Stunning, and his Spell Turning will block the Wand of Paralyzation. The Wand of Paralyzation can break down his Spell Turning, but it could prove fatal to Yoren Zovai if she fails her save. I could use Chaotic Commands on Yoren Zovai, but I didn't think of that at the time.
To keep Yoren Zovai safe and render Cookies vulnerable to the Wand of Paralyzation, Viora memorizes some extra copies of a long-range, fast-casting, friendly spell. She uses Hide in Plain Sight after every casting, which allows her to burn through Cookies' Spell Turning.
Without his save buffs or his Spell Turning, he is vulnerable to the Wand of Paralyzation. We just need one failed save to win. Yoren Zovai drinks an Oil of Speed to improve her movement speed and rushes in to use the wan before running away.
Cookies can't move fast enough to retaliate. He uses Shadow Door, which will boost his saves considerably, so Zulfer hurries over to dispel it.
After many tries, I finally see Cookies frozen in place.
Laosha calls in his Spirit Animals. We pounce on Cookies, only to see a PFMW contingency thwart our attacks.
But PFMW only lasts 4 rounds, and the Wand of Paralyzation lasts 10. We finally put down the Acid Kensai.
Sanchuudoku, the most powerful katana in the game, is ours. But it came at the cost of 700,000 XP, taken from our sorcerer.
Nevertheless, I am happy. It was a long and complicated process, and it was fun to break the puzzle.
The Skald is one of my favorite classes/kits. Some of you might have guessed this: I think Gerland is my 4th Skald to enter the no-reload challenge. Unlike my previous Skalds though, Gerland's Skald kit is not the Rogue Rebalancing version of the kit. I created him with two components of the Might & Guile mod installed, namely (1) Revised Bard Kits, which gives Skalds one fewer spell per level in exchange for improved combat prowess, and (2) Revised Stat Bonuses, which spreads the stat bonuses for most abilities over a larger range of stats. E.g. it significantly boosts Intelligence with an extra level 1 spell slot for 13 Int, an extra level 2 spell slot for 14 Int, etc. The value of Charisma is boosted as well: the higher it is, the better one's saves/luck.
However, after two or three level-ups and some experimenting with EEKeeper and Ctrl-Q I uninstalled said components. First of all because I realized that possibly due to installing M&G after SCS, enemy wizards did indeed get high Int bonus spell slots but they didn't have any memorized spells in them. This seemed unfair to me. Also, I expected my Skald's high Int to nullify the one fewer spell per level penalty, but some testing (raising XP) in EEKeeper showed me he got fewer spells than a vanilla Skald would.
To make a long story short, Gerland is a vanilla Skald, albeit capable of mastering weapon styles (like all rogues thanks to Rogue Rebalancing), with the possibility of casting up to level 8 spells (Rogue Rebalancing PnP spell progression for Bards), and with an illegal 19 Cha at character creation. This supernatural Cha score is thanks to the fact that I created Gerland using the aforementioned Might & Guile stats revision component, which allows Half-Elves to have 19 natural Cha.
Here's a character creation screen shot of Gerland (as often, I forgot to take a starting screenshot).
Mods are my usual stuff: BG2 Fixpack including Free Action protects against Stun, Song & Silence, Rogue Rebalancing without kit revisions, SCS with full enemy prebuffs, aTweaks, and some BG2 Tweaks including max HPs for enemies (I'm maxing Charname's HPs and those of his companions as well, as I generally like a level playing field).
Gerland is NG with LG tendencies, but open-minded enough to get along with CG folk. Goodness is what matters most to him. He's as knightly as any Bard can be: honest, courteous, and valiant. Skalds aren't generally the most lettered of Bards, but Gerland is an exception thanks to his upbringing by Gorion and the Candlekeep Monks. What follows are excerpts from his diary.
2 Mirtul, 1368
Nothing seems to be going as it should be. Her sullenness tells me that Imoen is still devastated by Gorion's death, much like myself to be honest, and now we haven't even been able to enter the Friendly Arm Inn to meet Gorion's friends Khalid and Jaheira. Ill-equipped for battle, we barely managed to escape the fangs of hungry Wolves and Dire Wolves in the lands south of the Inn. That didn't help us much, for at the entrance to the Inn we were accosted by a black-robed, bloodthirsty wizard, another mysterious bounty hunter like the two I slew in Candlekeep I suspect.
5 Mirtul, 1368
Beregost is a friendly place. Imoen and I have spent some time with old Firebead, we befriended a man who had recently lost his son, and we've completed a couple of relatively simple jobs for some of the locals.
8 Mirtul, 1368
We've traveled further south, to Nashkel, but this place is a lot smaller than Beregost, and doesn't seem to offer as many job opportunities, even though an Amnian soldier by the name of Bardolan told us that his captain, a man named Brage, had gone missing without a trace after killing several people.
12 Mirtul, 1368
Life on the road isn't always comfortable for both Imoen and me, used as we are to Candlekeep, our home, but it isn't boring either. Far to the west of Nashkel we saved a historian whose own men turned against him at an excavation site, and we actually found Captain Brage, reasoned with him, and escorted him back to Nashkel. The poor man had picked up a cursed sword that had made him go berserk.
16 Mirtul, 1368
Imoen and I have a new comrade in arms, an Elven Archer by the name of Kivan. He helped us out near Thalantyr the Conjurer's High Hedge west of Beregost when we were under attack of Gnolls. Kivan is a skilled marksman and, it seems, a good man. He has been roaming the wilds much like Imoen and I, albeit with more of a purpose than the two of us: to kill bandits. His main quarry is an Ogrish figure named Tazok, his torturer and the murderer of his mate Deheriana.
24 Mirtul, 1368
Our Elven companion is not much of talker, though he does seem increasingly willing to put his trust in me. He's told me a bit more about his family and about the terrible fate he and Deheriana suffered at the hands of Tazok. He has also been our guide and tutor in the wilds. He's led us through the Cloudpeaks where we fought monsters (mostly Gnolls) and wild animals. We stayed out of sight of hunting parties though, after my axe broke in a fight with a Gnoll. We pushed further west, as I still had my throwing axes, until we came upon a Gnoll Fortress.
27 Mirtul, 1368
On our way back to Beregost we rescued a wizard named Melicamp who had somehow, unwillingly, polymorphed into a rooster, from an attacking wolf. He asked us to bring him to his master, Thalantyr. The latter successfully retransformed Melicamp, an impressive feat. He also gave Kivan an enchanted spear, for previous services provided. I purchased two Ioun Stones, a purple one for Imoen to enjoy infravision, and a 'Fragment of Enlightenment' that increased my lore. At Feldepost's Inn I bought a Battle Axe +1. Hopefully it'll last a bit longer than my last axe.
3 Kythorn, 1368
On our second incursion into the Cloudpeaks we were a bit more thorough, and we didn't shun confrontations with hostile creatures, mostly hunters and brigands. Two particularly insolent bandits, Vax and Zal, gave Kivan and me a hard time.
8 Kythorn, 1368
We finally made it to the Friendly Arm Inn. Our trip north was relatively uneventful. Worth mentioning are our dispatching of an Ogre that dropped the girdle Elves' Bane, and the fact that our party has grown into a party of four. A few hours north of the Inn we met a young man named Ajantis, a squire paladin of Helm, who like the rest of us, had made it his business to make the Sword Coast a safer place. I was pleased to have a virtuous man like Ajantis join our ranks.
At the entrance to the FAI we were surprised to find the black-robed wizard still there, or maybe he had just returned. At any rate, we confronted him. He put Ajantis to Sleep, but Imoen saved vs a Horror, and he had no answer to Imoen's, Kivan's and my salvo of arrows and axes.
Inside the FAI we met Khalid and Jaheira, a Fighter and a warrior Druid. I'm sure they're well-meaning folk, but after four tendays on the road, surviving dangerous encounters with wizards, bandits, monsters, and wild animals, and with two competent warriors by my side as well as trusty old Imoen, we all understood that there was no real need for their guardianship anymore. We parted amicably.
12 Kythorn, 1368
Some days pass by with hardly anything happening. The party may be enjoying the comfort on an inn or the entertainment of the Nashkel Carnival. The past 24 hours have not been like that. East of Beregost, we encountered what seemed to be at first glance a perfect statue of a priestess. Upon closer inspection we found that the woman had been petrified. Unfortunately we had no Stone to Flesh scrolls, but we were warned. We bought a Protection from Petrification scroll at the Nashkel Carnival and indeed found a lounge of Basilisks twelve hours east of Beregost.
Kivan cast Protection from Petrification on himself and I went invisible (a spell I had recently learned) to encourage the Elf with my song unseen. The Archer had no trouble dispatching most of the giant lizards, and we had a somehow Dire Charmed Ghoul paralyze a Gnomish wizard, the master of the Basilisks,
In the same area we met a hunting party that unlike others hadn't been turned to stone yet, much to my surprise. Instead of thanking us for our efforts against the Basilisks, they picked a fight wit us. We retreated and found that only their leader, a female battlemage came for us. Ajantis and Kivan made short work of her after she failed to Dire Charm highly charm-resistant Kivan.
16 Kythorn, 1368
Ajantis, a Cavalier Paladin and a very strict follower of his deity's ethos, has expressed his satisfaction with our party's conduct, even though Kivan, Imoen and I are of somewhat more flexible morality. He's also pleased with our combat prowess. After our successful campaign against the Basilisks and the battle against the quarrelsome hunters, he told of us an Ankheg infestation north of the FAI, near the place where we first met. He warned us of the creatures' acid spit but considered us ready to deal with the monsters. He was not mistaken. With Ajantis in the front, Kivan and Imoen in the back with their bows, and me chanting and launching the occasional axe we cleared the area without difficulty. The Ankheg hoard held some impressive loot.
For a girl priestess we procured a ritual bowl of Umberlee from three fishermen that had killed her mother.
20 Kythorn, 1368
A bout of nostalgia made Imoen long to behold the sea again, as the two of us used to do on the walls of Candlekeep. I find it hard to say no to whatever the lass proposes. She's my dearest friend, almost a sister to me really. Anyway, we had no urgent business requiring our attention, so there was no reason for KIvan, Ajantis and me not to humor Imoen.
Along the shores I, invisible, scouted small groups of Sirines, treacherous creatures. I reported back to Kivan. Being an Elf, and one who still mourning the loss of his beloved Deheriana, he was least likely to fall victim to the Sirines' charms. Indeed, inspired by my battlesong, he had no trouble dispatching the creatures,
25 Kythorn, 1368
On the north coast we encountered a perfidious Nereid that seemingly killed and later raised Imoen, and her improbable mate, an evil Ogre Mage that attacked uson sight. Having studied some basic magic myself, and read about advanced magic, I'm uneasy facing hostile Mages of any type. Thankfully, Kivan understood the peril of the situation. Instead of his normal unenchanted arrows, he pelted the Ogre Mage with some of his arrows of biting. They poisoned our enemy effectively neutralizing the danger of spells.
In the same area we also killed a band of Ogres, Half-Ogres and Ogrillons, and we defended a Seasnake and an Elf against three Sahuagin. [The latter encounter is content of the BG1 NPC Pack. Unfortunately the Seasnake died after inadvertently blocking our path to the Sahuagin, preventing the game from placing a returning throwing dagger, an excellent missile weapon for Cavalier Ajantis, in the shipwreck.]
6 Flamerule, 1368
In the Halfling village of Gullykin, which was to be our base from which to explore the notorious Firewine Ruins and Durlag's Tower, a new companion, a Halfling Swashbuckler named Alora, joined us. Alora made it clear to us that she was a seasoned adventurer, skilled with locks and with setting and disarming snares. However she didn't come very well-equipped for adventure, so we postponed our visits to Firewine and Durlag's Tower. We acquired a Deep Red Ioun Stone for her, from Thalantyr, that increased her dexterity, and we traveled to the southern coastlands with her.
We dispatched three Amnian troublemakers in the Cloudpeaks.
Further west we routed a Xvart village, showing the devious creatures no mercy. We also saved a nobleman from an attacking Polar Bear, defeated a bandit named Neville and helped a Paladin of Helm reduce the local Gibberling population.
10 Flamerule, 1368
We returned to Beregost, where we bought Ajantis a suit of full plate mail, and he in turn tipped us about a store in Ulgoth's Beard where we might encounter some useful goods. (As a Waterdhavian, Ajantis had traveled the lands north of Baldur's Gate.) We bought Alora a returning frost dart there, and a Greenstone Amulet for all of us to use.
Southwest of Beregost we tracked down Bassilus the killer, a priest of Cyric with a hefty price on his head (5000 GP), at a ritual site in the Red Canyons. I failed to paralyze him with a wand, and Bassilus failed to Hold Ajantis.
Near the ritual site we ran into three Hobgoblins that made the mistake of attacking us. We slew them, and took an enchanted short sword from their leader.
We haven't done the De'Arnise Hold yet, mostly because I don't like dealing with SCS Spirit Trolls. But we really need the XP to bring Yoren Zovai up to speed, so we go in and throw elementals and Spirit Animals at the Trolls.
The Trolls crumple. Totemic Druids have lots of attack power. I've played lots of druids and so far, the Totemic Druid seems a hell of a lot stronger than even the Avenger, with whom I have a lot more experience.
Zulfer has crazy damage output with Poison Weapon (12 damage per hit without save!), and most enemies have no defense against it. It wrecks Glaicas' group.
We have to cast Protection from Fire on him, however, to make sure he doesn't get killed by a feedback loop from that enemy mage's Fire Shield.
We mob TorGal downstairs. He's practically helpless, despite his ludicrous damage bonuses.
And the Yuan-ti Mages with their various debuffers and disablers? Vhailor's Helm and Arrows of Dispelling render them helpless.
13 Flamerule, 1368
Our band seems to have earned itself a certain prestige. Not only have I seen store owners like Thalantyr (who sold me the Claw of Kazgaroth at a bargain price) and Taerom Fuiruim lower their prices, we also seem to attract more and more fellow adventurers that wish to associate themselves with us. First there was Neera in Beregost, a Wild Mage whom we helped against a group of Thayan wizards and bodyguards that sought to capture her.
Also in Beregost, we slew another bounty hunter, a Dwarf named Karlat. Finding a bounty notice on the Dwarf's corpse surprised Ajantis a lot, but he was understanding when I explained to him that I honestly had no idea who wanted me dead or why.
A second adventuring type that wished to join our party was a Half-Orc Blackguard, Dorn. We fought together against a band of marauders south of Nashkel, but we declined his proposal to join forces.
A few hours further to the south we reached the Nashkel Mines area where we stopped a ruthless bounty hunter from taking wanted sculptor Prism's life (for a simple theft of two gems), only to see the artist collapse lifeless on the ground.
We're back in Nashkel now and have just slain what must have been the fifth or sixth bounty hunter that has come for me, and we've also accepted a Ranger into our party, a scatterbrained giant of a man by the name of Minsc. His need seems urgent. He told us that the lady he's supposed to protect, has been taken hostage by Gnolls in the lands west of Nashkel. Kivan, Imoen and I know all about the Gnoll Stronghold, so we're going there straight away.
16 Flamerule, 1368
Our campaign against the Gnolls has been a resounding success. We slew each and every Gnoll that inhabited the fortress,
24 Flamerule, 1368
We returned to Beregost with Dynaheir, bought her an enchanted sling and gave her a powerful mace that Imoen had found somewhere. We also gave her two potions (mind focusing and genius) that allowed her to copy several spells from scrolls into her spellbook. Thus prepared we set out to do what we had long intended to do: explore the Firewine Ruins and Durlag's Tower.
We started with the tower. A narrow bridge that led toward the tower was guarded by two Battle Horrors. We took them on one at a time, with Ajantis and Kivan doing melee duty, Imoen and Alora attacking from a distance, and myself inspiring the others through my song and throwing an axe every now and then.
Inside the majestic tower we cleared the upper levels, defeating several powerful foes. A spell casting spectre only fell thanks to Alora's traps,
28 Flamerule, 1368
Our trip to the Firewine Ruins was an interesting one. The plains that stretch from Nashkel to the ruins were inhabited by bandits, both (demi-)human and monstrous ones. We spared none. Dynaheir cleverly cast a Stinking Cloud on a band of Xvarts that were attacking a farmer's cow. Most of the Xvarts passed out, allowing us to finish the Xvarts with ranged attacks before they could seriously injure the cow. Near the bridge Kivan felled a competent duelist who dropped a pair of Gauntlets of Weapon Expertise.
The ruins themselves were infested with Kobolds, harmless critters individually, although their Commando troops were not to be underestimated with their fire arrows.
Further in the labyrinth of corridors we ran into a Human wizard who had been in charge of the Kobolds. We retreated but not quick enough to prevent him from launching two Minor Sequencered Chromatic Orbs at me. I quaffed a potion of magic blocking, apprehensive of the orbs' unpredictable effects. Alora returned, hidden in shadows, to look for the wizard. She found him soon enough and had Dynaheir cast Silence 15' Radius at him from out of sight. That spell shut him up, and allowed us to finish our foe at minimal risk.
We left the ruins via a tunnel that led to Gullykin. Apparently the wizards and their Kobold minions had been planning a raid on the village. Town elder Gandolar Luckyfoot thanked us for our intervention with 250 GP.
By the way Dynaheir seems to be taking some kind of interest in me. It's almost as if she knows me, or knows things about me that I myself don't even know. She also considers me capable of somehow preventing the imminent war with Amn.
We did various quests, starting with killing the guy in the Elfsong Tavern for the lady in the Three Old Kegs Inn, reporting back to her, we also did some shopping, and while Tresset was busy selling and buying items, Gotural, bengoshi and me found a way to entertain ourselves:
Right after we went to Oberan's state and stole the components, I accidentally lured the sisters downstairs, but Tresset had already managed to get the components (and I, the scrolls in the other floor), so we left. We went to Middle BG mistakenly, but we took a chance and killed the Rabid Chickens™, which were a good snack for the Party's Pet Wolf (me with Relair's Mistake).
Then, I think that it was to get the reward for giving the kid's corpse back (or something else I certainly can't remember), we went to West BG. A big surprise awaited there. Trying to get the Golden Axe, Llolnae had attracted several Flaming Fists, and made Fentan angry, so they pursued her outside house. Tresset, joking with the console, had spawned a handful of Squirrels, and, for some odd reason, one of them was green-circled and was attacking Fentan. Yes, that's right, he almost got killed, but the Squirrel was Ctrl+Y'd out of existence before it did so.
The guy's a jerk. I don't like talking to him. I don't know why anybody worships evil gods when there are plenty of good gods to choose from.
Against Draug Fea and the sewer dwellers, I accidentally the dialogue.
We actually lost several thousand gold in loot, but what most irks me is the loss of XP. The rest of the party looks unimpressed when she goes back to face them.
Next, the Yuan-ti Mages. This group is pretty good at dealing with mages, so it shouldn't be too hard. I go with my normal strategy of sending out summons into the other room.
Viora is there to guide them. And to help keep the Yuan-ti away from the rest of the party, I add a summons coming in from the north, rather than the west.
The Yuan-ti aren't fooled when I try to lure them north. They find the party in the main room. Azelos' clone, which is named Viora by default in the dialogue box, successfully dispels one of the enemy's buffs with an Arrow of Dispelling, but gets confused by an enemy spell.
Luckily it doesn't turn those arrows onto us.
Our attention is split between multiple threats, and due to restraint on our part, the enemies are still getting spells off the ground.
Eventually, though, with enough pressure from Zulfer and Ruva, the mages can't get any more spells off the ground.
Mekrath comes along and all our pressure is focused on him. It's an easy battle.
Assassin/Fighters are great anti-mage characters, but getting the three castings of Poison Weapon that Zulfer has takes time.
Zulfer has the Shield of Balduran thanks to a shopping spree after we got 100,000 gold, and he's been wearing it ever since. As a thief dualed to fighter, his STR is only at 18, not 18/xx, which means the SOB only costs him 1 point of damage. And since he's got a marvelous katana, I figure he's well-equipped to deal with Beholders.
But I know better than to send in Zulfer himself, since SCS Beholders can steal the SOB eventually. They do not, however, try to steal the shield from clones. If it were even possible, it would open up an exploit of letting a Beholder steal the thing and then looting it from the Beholder's corpse, allowing you to duplicate the shield.
So I send in a clone, along with a Fire Elemental and some Spirit Animals, since the latter gets tons of immunities. Beholders are immune to paralysis-type effects, so the Spirit Wolves can't hold them, but Spirit Snakes can poison them, as can Zulfer's clone.
Odd thing is, the SOB doesn't make Zulfer's clone immune to the Beholders' Repulsion ray, which knocks back the clone constantly. Yoren Zovai is sticking around to clear the fog of war, and when the clone isn't around, the Gauths disable her.
Another curious thing is that the Gauths can cast mage spells.
Zulfer's clone lasts just long enough to take down the Beholders before it vanishes.
We nab the Gauntlets of Dexterity, only to realize that Viora's dump stat is CON, not DEX. I guess I was worried about her safety during the dual-class period when she couldn't hide.
We use the same tactic against the Beholders in the hive, with a Flesh Golem as support. All golems from the Golem Manuals are immune to magic, so they work great against Beholders, although they can still literally chew apart the Flesh Golems with their physical attacks.
For some reason, the spawns here are unusually scant.
I was expecting big packs of Beholders all around. It saves us time but costs us XP.
We still have a gang of blind clerics to deal with. As always, Greater Malison and Silence 15' Radius are a near-guaranteed shutdown of the entire group.
I drop the Rift Device on the way out. I'm not messing with the Unseeing Eye just yet. The loot is minimal anyway. I can do without the Amulet of 5% Magic Resistance.
I don't like the two Yuan-ti in this fight, so I break out the Staff of Striking for one of them.
The other mage apparently has no spell protections, so it's easy to disrupt his spells. Aawill falls to our Spirit Wolves, who paralyze him before chowing down.
That battle can get hectic due to the tight corners, but our party is well-adapted to make it work. Laosha can bring out three summons at once, Ruva can chunk an important target with a backstab, and when we visit the human mage to the east, Zulfer poisons her.
The group of Yuan-ti Mages further east are another concern. So after triggering their buffs with some summons, I give Zulfer some Fire Seeds and send his clone out to handle them. With Fire Seeds and Poison Weapon, he can shut down the whole group of mages on his own.
The Wyvern suffers, too, which makes it a lot easier to bring it down.
The Yuan-ti manages to bump off Zulfer's clone with a single spell, but the clone had already used its last Fire Seed.
And Zulfer is ready to follow up with more poisoned Fire Seeds.
That basically broke the entire fight.
Zulfer gets lucky against the Master of Thralls. Everyone besides Yoren Zovai goes out buffed with Chaotic Commands to block Death Gaze, but Zulfer goes out first and gets debuffed by Remove Magic and hit with Death Gaze at the same time. He makes his save vs. death and escapes the hold effect. Viora could have freed him with Remove Paralysis (she keeps multiple castings memorized), but any delay could mean his doom; his Assassin levels mean he has rather poor HP, at 78.
The Warden himself shouldn't be hard, but he comes with a lot of spellcasters alongside him, and we can't disrupt multiple spellcasters so reliably. Poisoned Fire Seeds would work, but only against the Yuan-ti; the Warden is immune. Instead, we send out some summons to pester the enemy, with Laosha guiding them via Farsight.
The summons we use are very weak, so they don't last long. The Yuan-ti come for us.
I was hoping they wouldn't come over to meet us. We summon Kitty, the Berserk Warrior, and our Efreeti to to occupy the Yuan-ti for a bit, while an Aerial Servant goes to the east in case any other enemies are coming around to flank us. Our summons get confused, but they let us concentrate on one mage at a time.
We get flanked despite our Aerial Servant, but it's only one enemy. Our fighters are busy, so Yoren Zovai takes care of the threat.
The Yuan-ti who attacked us go down. Laosha re-casts Farsight to check on the Warden. He's still got some snakes around, so we send out Kitty, who survived the previous encounter, to go bother them, along with a Fire Elemental. She actually disables one of the tougher enemies.
While Kitty and our Fire Elemental are busy with their suicide mission, we go around the eastern route to reach the Warden.
But when we get there, we find that Kitty and the Fire Elemental's suicide mission was quite successful.
The Planar Sphere quest has come to a safe but kind of anti-climactic end.
Viora tried to summon an Aerial Servant to use against Aran Linvail, but he stopped her with Power Word: Silence, forcing her to hide. Zulfer's clone slew the other mage with poison, but Aran Linvail backstabbed the clone half to death, only to see the real Zulfer rush in with poisoned nonmagical darts and rolling high on attack rolls, flooding poor Aran with poison.
Zulfer's clone had already gotten confused, however, and eventually turned on Zalos, nearly killing her with poison damage before Laosha hurried over to cast Slow Poison. Yoren Zovai hit the clone with Spook to protect the party. By then, Aran Linvail had already died to poison.
5 Elesias, 1368
I'm pleased to report that we have contributed to solving the iron crisis. Last time we were in Nashkel, mayor Berrun Ghastkill requested us to enter the Nashkel Mines and find an explanation for the disappearances of miners and for the contamination of iron ore. We found the mines infested with Kobolds, and took the trouble of dispatching the little buggers.
We left the mines through a tunnel that led to an area we hadn't explored before. In it we slew two Ankhegs, several undead creatures and a rather pugnacious wizard that might have caused us trouble with his two Mustard Jellies if it weren't for Kivan disabling the man with poison-tipped arrows from a Kobold Chieftain we had slain in the mines.
9 Elesias, 1368
In Beregost we met another pawn in the mysterious organization behind the iron crisis and the bandits, a wizard named Tranzig. We ended up killing him after he attacked us. On his body we found a letter that hinted at a bandit camp somwhere in the Wood of Sharp Teeth.
We also slew a thespian that attacked us after we refused to kill three innocent men for her.
20 Elesias, 1368
After roaming the vast Wood of Sharp Teeth, and dealing with several patrols of bandits (as well as two feuding Druids,
We carefully explored the surroundings and cleared them of (mostly undead) hostile creatures. Our subsequent assault on the camp is difficult for me to describe because many things happened at the same time. I remember I went invisible and followed a buffed up Kivan as he took down some stray bandits in his typical sniper style. When we returned to our companions to get Ajantis and Alora to join us, we noticed that some of the bandits had caught our trail. Soon, more and more bandits came after us, amongst them a wizard. Ajantis, buffed with potions, tanked several bandits, and with his poisoned arrows Kivan made sure the wizard became no threat.
22 Elesias, 1368
With plenty of gold in our coffers, we traveled to Ulgoth's Beard and bought several useful items: two magical harps (one that charms listeners and one that dispels confusion), an enchanted staff for Imoen and a Sandthief ring.
27 Elesias, 1368
We've been trying to reach Cloakwood but annoyingly bounty hunters keep holding us up. First there was a party of two female rogues and two priestesses. With Ajantis, Kivan, Alora, and myself occupying one opponent each in melee combat, and with Dynaheir and Imoen ready to cast their spells, we were quite effective at disposing of our enemies.
4 Eleint, 1368
Having spent days of roving the Cloakwood in search of the Iron Throne base, and of defending ourselves against vicious creatures and vindictive druids inhabiting the forest,
8 Eleint, 1368
It's late and I'm tired. What we've just done will probably make us the Iron Throne's archenemy. We've battled their local leader and flooded their base, a mine, but possibly at a price I would rather not pay.
As we approached the fort we first eliminated all guards that were patrolling around the walled complex. Within the walls stood four well-equipped guards, two of them wizards. My uncertainty about the outcome of our mission made me express my feelings for Dynaheir through a kiss,
The mine was operated by slaves. With one of the slaves we designed an escape plan for the miners. It involved bribery of some of the guards, and flooding the mine by opening a flood gate with a special key that was in the possession of the master of the mine, a wizard named Davaeorn.
We had to battle our way past dozens of guards. As such this was not a problem for our crew, as we were better equipped, more disciplined, and stronger, but they had wizards we never saw coming. The first one, on the second level, we handled well. Ajantis quaffed a potion of magic shielding and engaged her most of the time, while Kivan and a surprisingly capable Alora dealt with the guards (until the mage Confused her). I suffered a Spook and Kivan an Enfeeblement, but that wasn't enough to stop us.
With the help of some summoned Gnolls we killed an Ogre Mage and cleared the remainder of the floor, before we reached Davaeorn's lair. It held several traps, but Alora detected and removed without difficulty. Ajantis, Alora and I drank protective (magic, fire) and strength potions and attacked the wizard and two Battle Horror guards. Imoen and Dynaheir stayed back, near the entrance. They were invisible. We had no trouble with the Battle Guards,
12 Eleint, 1368
Great news: Gellana Mirrorshade succussfully brought Kivan back to life!
15 Eleint, 1368
Our involvement with the Iron Throne has led us to the city of Baldur's Gate. We haven't seen much of it yet though.
By the gate we helped Kivan defeat an old acquaintance of his, a female Elf that had joined Tazok and Co for some reason.
After escaping the Underdark, Anselm's party encountered Drizzt for the second time on their way back to Athkatla. The dark knight was eager to get the Drow's weapons back and initiated the fight.
A pretty straightforward battle, Edwin casted Mass Invisibility to increase everyone AC and prevent spellcasting from their enemies. Anselm can now use Hardiness to increase his physical damage reduction up to -75%.
[spoiler=Drizzt]
In the city, they finished what they started in the Illithid's base in the sewers, dispatching the Alhoon in the process. They also completed the Guarded Compound and the Elemental Lich. A funny thing happened, Dorn was able to kill an "uninjured" Sion through Stoneskin with Poison Weapon + Whirlwind Attack in less than a round. And the Elemental Lich died to their Fallen Deva's Mace of Disruption. They also took the time to craft all the weapons they could, including Crom Faeyr which is being used by Korgan.
After theses battles, the party decided to tackle the Twisted Rune. It is the first time I'm doing this fight, I even had to look the location on the internet. It's pretty well hidden I think. It must be quite the surprise if you end up finding this encounter by wandering in Athkatla without knowing about it.
First, the anti-heroes summoned 4 Skeletons Warriors + a Fallen Deva and buffed with the usual spells : Prot from Evil 10 Radius, Stoneskin, Spirit Armor, Haste, Chant, and so forth. Then they sent Korgan with the Shield of the Balduran and the summons to initiate the fight.
As soon as the battle started, Shangalar teleported in front of the party but both Anselm and Dorn managed to get a quick hit before the prebuffing occured, resulting in a slowed and poisoned Shangalar while the rest of the party was able to dodge his Chain Contingency ADHW by moving next to the wall, hasted.
Edwin casted a first Time Stop and dispelled Shangalar's protections with Warding Whip, Pierce Shield and Breach. Luckily, he fell a second after, instantly destroyed by the Mace of Disruption of our Fallen Deva (again!).
During this time, the opposition summoned a Dark Planetar which teleported on Edwin and a few Fiends. Edwin first protected himself with PfMW then stopped time once again, threw a Greater Malison and two Slow spells into the battle to weaken their foes. The rest of the party then focused on killing the Dark Planetar as quickly as possible while Korgan and the summons were still holding the frontline.
But Layene, another powerful spellcaster, also casted Time Stop and swiftly summoned another Dark Planetar. Most of the Skeletons Warriors were destroyed by now, so Korgan summoned a Valhalla Berserker, Anselm his Simulacrum while Edwin threw a Dragon's Breath and Hexxat slit Revanek's throat with a nice 98 damage backstab thanks to her Mislead spell.
Anselm tried to join the battle, but as soon as he approached, he was stripped of his buffs by the Anti-Magic Ray of the Beholder so he went back to safety.
They managed to kill the second Dark Planetar but their own summons were extinct so Viconia had to summon others Skeletons Warriors while Dorn summoned another Fallen Deva.
Finally Vaxall went down thanks to Dorn's poisoned ranged attacks + Edwin's MMM.
Layene was the last enemy remaining and Dorn killed her once again from range with Poison Weapon.
It was a great battle, and now Edwin has the Staff of the Magi.
[spoiler=Twisted Rune]
And to conclude this report, Anselm's party faced the fearsome Kangaxx.
Against his Lich's form, Edwin prepared a Chain Contingency spell with Warding Whip + Ruby Ray of Reversal + Pierce Magic triggered on sight to strip him from his spell protections, then a quick Breach spell from Hexxat pretty much ended this part of the fight as the summons were hacking him to pieces.
At this point he went into his Demilich's form and SCS gives him the spellcasting ability of a level 35 Mage with permanent increased casting speed. The evil crew retreated swiftly and casted every buff they could including a lot of Death Ward, Spell Immunity : Abjuration, Spell Shield, Spell Trap, Protection from the Elements, Spell Turning, Protection from Fire, and so forth.
My goal here was to protect everyone form the Demilich's Howl, Trap the Soul, and a possible devastating spell combo with Dragon's Breath + Comet.
Edwin initiated the fight with Time Stop, then he casted Dragon's Breath, Spellstrike and Comet but to no avail, the spells did no damage to the floating skull but at least intterupted his spellcasting. Hexxat drank a Potion of Invulnerability to lower her saves vs death to protect herself from Trap the Soul.
They retreated upstairs, but Kangaxx followed them with a Dimension Door. Hopefully after a bit of running back and forth, he was out of Protection from Magical Weapons spells, and Korgan was able to kill him slowly with the electrical damage from Crom Faeyr, disrupting his spellcasting in the process.
The rest of the party was well protected against everything and did not suffer casualties.
[spoiler=Kangaxx]
Anselm was able to pick up the Ring of Gaxx and now they are heading for Bodhi!
I also wanted to add that your writing is absolutely stellar! I really like it a lot. Good job with Davaeorn!
I would like to add to the @CrevsDaak 's post above that Moros was appoached by his comrades of old and had to leave the party, promising he would come back when needed (i.e. @Gotural suggested we had to remove unused party members till their players come back, and I agreed with it; removing Llolnae was not an option, though, because the drow was our main lock picker and trap disarmer, she consumed several tomes, and overall was too beautiful to leave behind; also, we hope that @GemHound is successful with his exams and will soon be available). @Meyahi , rest assured Moros was imported and saved.
Going though the Candlekeep catacombs was a lot of fun.
Llolnae: Searching for traps
Gotural: "be careful"
Llolnae: Trap Sprung
Llolnae: Magic Resistance
Tresset: good start so far
When the party face their first greater doppelgangers, Loki casted Chaos so that hasted doppelgangers fought each other.
After that @Tresset had to log off due to having some PC problems, and only me and @Gotural were to face the Prat's group.
A backstab from Gowrek meant a dead mage, the wand of paralysis was enough to stun Prat itself, while Web and hasted Gotural and Glincuwen managed to deal with others.
Thanks to a Protection from Petrification mage scroll, Gowrek then killed two greater basilisks so that the party finally could reach the surface again.
After that (Tresset fixed his problems) we decided to clear the rest outside areas from pre-TotSC BG1, starting with Ulcaster. There we were joined by Crevs, who gave an immediate effect against the Wolf of Ulcaster.
Tresset: "no more wolf"
Gotural: "Ulcaster is really well done with SCS I think"
Tresset: "llolnae squirreled it:
Bengoshi: "pun intended"
Then we went to the Firewine Ruins, and were careful enough while tracking all the kobolds and traps there... only till Gowrek rushed to both enemy mages in the end. Thankfully, the first one was killed by our half-orc and dwarf before the mage finished both Loki and Glincuwen (webbed and with lighting bolt casted in their direction), while the second fell under the Chaos spell.
The Red Wizards weren't dangerous against us, maybe due to the no-prebuffing component, maybe due to the fact everyone had more than 100k XP already, and CrevsDaak was amased his archer with THAC0 -1 still managed to roll 1 against an enemy.
Then we went for Kahrk. The battle went as it often does. Spell Thrust from Gotural didn't work because of Kahrk having GoI, not MGoI. Loki misplaced the Chaos spell. Llolnae was killed in 3 blows because it's hard to manage more than one character in the MP. Then Gowrek was killed because Tresset forgot to activate the Greenstone amulet.
But still, Loki twice successfully dispelled magic on Kahrk, so that Gotural and Glincuwen could finish the ogre-mage with arrows and wands.
After that fight, Tresset, not having alive characters to control, spawned Noober on Glincuwen. And then another Noober. And another. Crevs went AFK for several minutes, and it looked like Noober succeeded in what the developers wanted from this character - in bugging the player out.
On a side note, I think it showed that BG in the MP could be - with limits, of course, played as if it had a DM - a player with no characters to control but who can use the console to spawn characters and spells on the party.
Turns out the wild surges also affect divine magic.
So none of us can safely use magic. But I figure we'll do okay without any magic.
Turns out they also have horrific traps around here, which trigger multiple times.
I give Viora the Ring of Fire Resistance and have her drink a potion to keep her alive. Ruva takes off her armor so she can disarm the trap.
I could disarm all of the traps in the area with a little work, but I figure two bad omens are sufficient reason to back out of the questline. At least for now. No sense taking on more danger than we can handle.
I figure taking on a couple of liches will be a much safer prospect. We put Death Ward and Chaotic Commands on as many characters as we can, bring out some Skeleton Warriors, hand a bunch of Fire Seeds to Ruva, conjure a clone of Ruva, and haste the whole group. I distribute the group so we'll avoid getting nailed by any first-round Horrid Wilting spells.
Before combat begins, I have Yoren Zovai summon a Flesh Golem and have both copies of Ruva attack it with Fire Seeds, inflicting 50% spell failure on the first round.
To my disappointment, the traps trigger before the lich's Stoneskins, nearly killing him.
The lich's Chain Contingency brings out a Cornugon and a Magical Sword. Those two will be pretty strong, but my primary concern is the lich.
I don't like that Cornugon. I send Zulfer after it, only to see him poisoned the moment he closes in on it.
Cornugon poison is pretty nasty. But the battle is already over. The lich dies to lingering poison damage--for some reason he's not immune.
The Cornugon follows soon after, even though it didn't get hit by any traps. Zulfer and Azelos are just that strong.
Not a very satisfying fight. It's not so much fun to win with a big cluster of traps, particularly when I had a really good feeling about our real strategy.
We still have the Elemental Lich to deal with. I use the same setup, but this time, I set the traps a short distance away from the lich, so they'll be an emergency backup instead of our main attack. Once again, we use the Flesh Golem as a high-AC target for area-effect spell failure from Ruva and her clone, both hasted for a total of 2 APR apiece.
With 4 APR total, and a 95% hit chance against that Flesh Golem, we have a near-guaranteed 100% spell failure for 5 rounds on that lich, using 1/6 of our total Fire Seeds. Since Ruva's clone lasts 16 rounds, we have more than enough time to outlast any PFMW spells it may have. And once those go down, Ruva can switch to the Crimson Dart, and apply 100% spell failure on her own, in a single round, even without haste.
An extra bonus is that the Flesh Golem is immune to magic, meaning our Fire Seeds can't actually harm it, though it will still run away from the lich to attack us if we do not keep ordering it to stick close to the lich.
But we can't just assign it to attack the lich, or else it will kill itself on the lich's Fire Shield. Fire Shield damage bypasses magic resistance (I've considered using it to kill dragons).
Turns out my fears were misplaced. The Flesh Golem isn't immune to fire, but it is immune to cold.
Even so, being close to the lich poses a problem. The lich knows the Flesh Golem is a threat, and deems it a bigger threat than our Skeleton Warriors. The lich has spell failure above 100% and the Flesh Golem is immune to magic anyway, so the lich resorts to physical attacks.
The same base 9 AC that makes it easy for us to hit the Flesh Golem with Fire Seeds also makes it easy for the lich to punch it to death. The Flesh Golem is extremely easy to kill with physical attacks.
You seldom ever see it since their THAC0 and APR are so poor, but liches can paralyze with their melee attacks.
With the Flesh Golem gone, we no longer have a good target for our Fire Seeds. We can still attack our Skeleton Warriors, but with less chance of a successful hit.
It doesn't matter much. The lich is already unable to cast spells, and we have another 5 whole rounds before the spell failure wears off. That's plenty of time for us to land a few other hits. But because we're safe for the time being, I stop Ruva and her clone from attacking, since we only have so many Fire Seeds to throw.
With spell failure active, the lich can't hurt us much, but it can still use contingencies and sequencers.
The Skeleton Warriors are immune to the sequencer thanks to being undead; Zulfer is immune thanks to Chaotic Commands. The lich's efforts would be a waste anyway; the Skeleton Warriors have nonmagical weapons because of SCS and could never hurt the lich, while Zulfer still can't break through the lich's PFMW.
The lich refreshes its PFMW via a contingency. Spell failure can't stop that.
We just wait. Azelos has been attacking nonstop so I know exactly when the lich becomes vulnerable to magical weapons like her Firetooth. Ruva and her clone keep attacking, maintaining the spell failure with Fire Seeds.
At some point I lose track of the clone... I don't even see where it went in the screenshots. We don't need it anymore; though. The lich is on its last PFMW. Once that's gone, we can move in for the kill.
We don't have enough sources of cold resistance to make more than one character immune, so I give the Dragon Helm and Dragonscale Shield to Ruva and have Laosha fill out the rest.
Azelos attacks from afar with Firetooth; Zulfer uses the Crimson Dart. Ruva, with 100% resistance to cold damage, marches right through to hack at the lich with Frostreaver.
It doesn't matter that the lich is still immune; we lose nothing by attacking under these circumstances. This just means we'll be hitting it the moment its PFMW runs out.
But the lich has one more left, via a Spell Trigger.
After this is over, we'll have about one round before it regains its spellcasting. We're out of Fire Seeds, and Ruva can only afford one missed attack roll if she switches to the Crimson Dart, so Laosha brings out some Spirit Wolves to help put pressure on the lich.
They will deal cold damage through Stoneskin, which will help disrupt the lich's spells. I bring Ruva back to use the Crimson Dart to increase her APR, while Zulfer attacks with Sanchuudoku until I realize the Acidic Backlash is bouncing back at him due to the lich's Spell Turning effect, and finally switch him to Celestial Fury for his own safety.
Ruva's spell failure makes the difference. The lich cannot harm us.
It's only a matter of time. Without spellcasting to protect it, it cannot replenish its Stoneskins, nor can it attack us. The battle is won.
Wizard Slayers, Fire Seeds, the Golem Manual, Haste, and Vhailor's Helm are enough to take down an SCS lich with a little timing. There is almost no chance of failure, and it can be done at basically any level, so long as you have those ingredients.
Some say Wizard Slayer spell failure doesn't matter because the wizard is already doomed by the time you can hit it. This is not true. Our Wizard Slayer was single-handedly holding off the lich for 12 rounds before the rest of the party could even begin to attack.
Being hunted in the Baldur's Gate city by authorities, the group decided to try the TotSC content.
The first quest included retrieving the Shandalar's cloak from an Ice Island.
Tresset: "So, how will we deal with Andris (and his 2 wizard friends"
Bengoshi: "We'll fight them"
Gotural: "Is there other way?"
Bengoshi: "Skip them invisibly"
Gotural: "It's more fun not to skip any encounter"
So, we were ready (at least, we thought so). But in seconds Gowrek's buffs were dispelled and he was sleeping under the Emotion effect. One mage had become confused, but the enemies answered exactly the same, and Glincuwen became confused as well. Both the half-orc and the elven archer were dead soon afterwards. We had to retreat a bit, to summon a skeleton and nymphs. They helped to take some damage, which in the end led to the victory. We had to accept the consequencies in losing 2 party members without an immediate possibility to go to a temple, and a need to continue relying on potions and wands.
We managed to get to the end of the dungeon, carefully using what we had left.
The next stop was the Durlag's Tower. The upper levels of it didn't have any danger in them, Loki reached the 10th level and got another Tome of WIS, while Llolnae managed to get exactly 60k in each of her classes:
Gowrek hit a spider for 94 damage - one of his highest damage.
Gotural saw a lot of Biffs everywhere and even fought them - while Loki and Gowrek only saw the dwarf fighting with the air:
After clearing the whole level and resting, the party (having pre-buffed because it was obvious this Tower had nothing else than enemies) assumed they were ready to face the 4 wardens. Oh, how much they mistaked...
The fight started rather well. Glincuwen quickly killed Fear, while Love was under the effect of Insect Plague and the whole party concentrated on Avarice.
Love then killed Glincuwen and nearly finished Gowrek, only to die from the half-orc's backstab.
The fight had not been fought yet, as Tresset warned about one dwarven ghost left - Pride. We saw him from the invisibility and I proposed to web him while Pride still didn't see us. And yet, Llolnae, under the control of @Tresset went straight to shoot Pride (the mistake number 1). That resulted in Pride activating his rage and thus becoming immune to Web due to getting low saving throws. Llolnae and Gowrek fell soon afterwards due to the Pride's high damage and speed.
When only Loki and Gotural were left, we decided to tank Pride with Gotural while Loki would use his wand on the enemy. And yet, Loki, under my control, went straight to the web zone (Pride was in his line of sight, Loki had only one order - to use the wand, and still went to the zone). The mistake number 2.
As you can see, Gotural wished to take the boots of speed from the Gowrek's body, but was several steps away from it. The Quick Loot in BGEE hasn't been upgraded yet and doesn't work as it does in BG2EE and IWDEE, when you can take items without moving to them.
And due to the Pride's high damage and speed, Gotural couldn't tank the enemy. The only way was to run north.
Then Loki became active again, and gulped an invis potion. We were pausing every second then. @Gotural gulped the potion of speed (instead of the potion of invis, as I would have done in that situation)... but with the Ring of Free Action the potion didn't work. The mistake number 3.
And then, the bad thing happened.
This is why many no-reloaders never visit the Durlag's Tower, or at least its lower levels. We all understood that Gotural is gone for good, because of the @Gotural 's principles, of which I have a great respect. I felt as if the game was lost. But then I realised that I simply can't let Pride to kill Loki too. This MP run shouldn't finish. Not yet.
It was a solo from that. The Avenger had to avenge his fallen comrades.
So, we won in the end. But at what price... And this is exactly what makes Baldur's Gate such an outstanding game. I'm terribly sorry that Loki went straight to the area of Web, which meant Gotural sacrificed himself. @Gotural will return in the New Year with a new character, so this brave dwarf will always stay in our hearts.
For those wondering, how a triple-class character is in a full-party, check the screen above. As the game progressed, the FMC became more and more useful, in the latest chapter having 41% of kills (146 agains Gowrek's 103). I hope more people would realize that a triple-class character is a very solid option evern for a full-party, when @Gotural creates a separate thread about his thoughts on this class.
Again, the death of Gotural the dwarf is bad news, very bad. But the MP run can continue.
But I'm not going to use Wizard Slayer Fire Seeds on the mages, because they are too far apart for me to reliably shut down both of them. But both of them are perfectly vulnerable to nonmagical weapons and poison, so Zulfer can slay both of them rather quickly.
Except I didn't know they were vulnerable to either of those things until just now, when I checked. Also, confronting the mages directly would expose us to lots of attacks from enemy fighters, which we didn't have to deal with in the fights with the liches. So instead of using Assassin or Wizard Slayer Fire Seeds to shut down the enemy mages, we're going to rely on evasive tactics.
Everyone starts out invisible, with Viora activating the altar since she can turn invisible right afterward without expending any resources.
The mages activate their prebuffs when I pester them. Looks pretty wicked.
The Statues start bringing in demons, since demons can see through invisibility. But demons don't wander around if nobody's there when they appear. This means Viora can avoid them simply by scurrying away before the demons can appear.
Notice the Statue taking lingering poison damage from Ruva's traps. I set up 7 traps by the southern and western doors of the area to hit any Statues who might follow us. One of the Statues wandered into the room with the Demogorgon statue, triggering the traps.
Capitalizing on the Statue's weakness, we bring in the party. Ruva uses the Staff of Striking and brings the Statue to Near Death. It doesn't last much longer. When we're done, Yoren Zovai hides us once more.
I take the group south by the other traps. Meanwhile, Viora's patience pays off.
The enemy is now blind, and Viora can return to the center of the area without getting attacked. Divination spells do not help when Viora is hiding with the Cloak of Non-Detection installed.
The mages are still strong. I need to drain some more spells. To do that, we need summons. Since we don't have many summoning spells memorize, I want to make the most of the ones we have. Yoren Zovai gives them a buff to increase their impact.
I run them past the enemy fighters into the sight of the mages, to trigger some more buffs.
The summons don't last long after that. The Statues are very high-level fighters.
Viora draws out more spells by hitting and fading with Hide in Plain Sight.
Another pack of summons crumples under the Statues' might.
But they are weaker than before. Zulfer selects the most fragile target. He only has 9 thief levels, so his backstabs aren't very strong, but his fighter bonuses compensate somewhat.
Zulfer heads north to check out the male mage, but vanishes when he sees the mage is prepared to handle him.
Back at the south end of the chamber, Azelos hauls out a clone use Arrows of Dispelling on the female mage. With her Stoneskins gone, Zulfer can land a backstab.
The Iron Golem remains. I assign Zulfer to help bring it down, but find that Zulfer isn't quite cut out for the job.
Azelos' clone goes out to tackle the male mage Statue, but he erects a barrier against her Arrows of Dispelling and Darts of Stunning. She flees to the nearest room, but can't escape the fighter Statues.
The Iron Golem is rather tough, but it doesn't have much HP left. We bring it to its knees while the other enemy fighters are away.
We bring out a third group of summons. Now, the male mage is out of his best buffs. Laosha's Spirit Wolves paralyze him.
The Statues fall. The way forward is clear.
Very nice work @semiticgod with the Liches
Gerland of Candlekeep, NG Half-Elf Skald, 6th BG1 report
23 Eleint, 1368
Our stay in the city has brought us plenty of jobs and, as a consequence, plenty of gold. The six of us did some of the work together, especially a number of rougher encounters with wizards that wanted us dead for different reasons.
Imoen and Alora have become very dear friends. They went on some adventures of their own and often returned with impressive amounts of gold or valuable items. I know those two well enough to be suspicious of the origins of their prizes, but I also know they're too kind to seriously harm innocent people so I've decided to condone their behavior.
Our main business in the city was to confront the Iron Throne about their actions. First, two Iron Throne employees we met near the Thieves Guild told us they had poisoned us. Indeed, with the passing of a day or two we all started getting sick. Our search for antidotes ended with the party killing both Throne associates. They had the antidotes on their bodies (and one of them had a pair of Boots of Speed, a nice consolation).
We met no resistance but weren't given any answers either, until we reached the building's top floor. There, a party of seven or eight acolytes and another Doppelganger awaited us, not to provide information but to kill us! They did give us a name though: Sarevok seems to be one of the local leaders of the Throne.
26 Eleint, 1368
Well, the party's visit to Candlekeep didn't work out the way I would have wanted it to. Yes, Imoen and I caught up with several of our old friends, but we also slew Rieltar and his associates (using the same tactic as we had used at the Iron Throne building).
Luckily Tethtoril sympathized with our cause. Before we were to be transported to Baldur's Gate to be put to justice, the old sage teleported us to secret catacombs below the citadel. We found some valuable treasure there, and many, many Doppelgangers that had taken the shape of Candlekeep residents. At first I feared my former neighbors had been slain, but my hopes returned when I encountered three Doppelgangers that had taken the shape of Gorion, Elminster, and Tethtoril. Gorion had fallen months ago, and I refused to believe the shapeshifting creatures capable of murdering Elminster or Tethtoril. We slew all the Doppelgangers we saw, hoping this would be sufficient help for Candlekeep.
By the gates of Candlekeep we slew four Ogre Mages that had been hired by the Throne to deal with us as well.
Oh, by the way, apparently my biological father (and Sarevok's) is Bhaal, the dead Lord of Murder. My companions Dynaheir, who had suspected as much, and Ajantis seem more shaken by it than I am. I can't see how this revelation may change who I am. I've been doing what I can to be a good man. I've surrounded myself with good people, and together we've done countless good deeds, big and small. My blood doesn't make me who I am. I'm my own man. What does worry me though, is Alaundo's prophecy of many children of Bhaal killing each other for power, sowing chaos and destruction with their passage...
Higharvestide, 1368
A miniscule ice island in the middle of the sea isn't exactly the place where I'd celebrate Higharvestide, but it's where Shandalar sent us. It appeared to be an asylum of sorts for insane mages. We battled our way past a party of three, after Imoen and I cast a Chaos on them (read from scrolls). It confused two of them, and bought us just enough time to finish of one before he'd come to his senses. The second mage managed to cast a Web, which Kivan and I countered with free action potions. Ajantis and Alora were immune to Webs thanks to special rings they wore, and Dynaheir remained outside the spell's area of effect. Only Imoen got stuck.
We had the most difficulty against a mage named Garan who summoned four or five Ankhegs to aid him. Ajantis' full plate armor broke in the middle of battle which made him a lot more vulnerable against the Ankhegs, some of the Ankhegs attacked unbuffed Dynaheir and Imoen, and Garan lasted longer than the other mages we had battled. We prevailed thanks (once more) in large part to Kivan's superb skills with his bow.
10 Marpenoth, 1368
We've agreed to help another resident of Ulgoth's Beard, a scholar named Mendas who asked us to travel the Trackless Sea and fetch him Balduran's logbook. We have obtained a sea chart from a captain in Baldur's Gate, where we kept a very low profile, and are already on our way.
3 Uktar, 1368
Our ship didn't make it to its destination due to a heavy storm, but fortunately we did. What we found was not what we expected. We helped the islanders by destroying a large pack of Wolfweres - my song, strength potions, and speed oils were sufficient for Kivan, Alora and Ajantis to defeat the most powerful of the creatures -
24 Uktar, 1368
Our voyage home went well, without incident, but the same cannot be said of our meeting with Mendas. It turned out he was a Werewolf and Kaishas Gan's husband and he had expected her with us. With two powerful allies, he attacked us, initally in human form, later as Loup Garous. It mattered not. Ajantis with his enchanted blade Kondar and Kivan with Balduran's bastard sword (a type of sword the use of which he wasn't even proficient in), both buffed, destroyed the wicked creatures.
When they arrived in the Graveyard, Bodhi appeared and took Viconia away from Anselm before escaping in her base.
The party followed her through the lower tombs and fought their way through an army of Vampires and their servants.
Without a Cleric, it could have been difficult to clear this place but everyone except Edwin is immune in a way or another to level drain. As usual, the Devas proved very powerful with their Maces of Disruption, instantly killing many of their foes.
Hexxat was also really useful here because Vampires cannot see through Invisibility, so she was able to backstab quite a lot of them.
[spoiler=Vampires]
The hunt continued until they reached Bodhi in her inner sanctum. Hexxat sneaked inside her room, but the mistress was able to see through the Thief's stealth. She rushed toward Hexxat who started to retreat after backstabing a Vampire.
Soon after, Edwin's image casted Time Stop and unleashed his wrath against the undeads, obliterating them with multiples ADHW.
Bodhi ignored the spellcaster copy and faced Anselm&Co in melee.
Some foes remained after Edwin's magical assault, so his Project Image stayed near the entrance and start to protect himself with a lot of spells to draw their attention while the rest of the party was busy killing Bodhi.
Dorn, Korgan and Anselm used Whirlwind Attack together and the sheer force of their assault brang her on her knees nearly instantly, she healed herself back to full while increasing her power but died again a split second after. At this point the party was dealing more than a hundred damages per second.
[spoiler=Bodhi]
Hexxat finished the last Vampires with some backstabs and the party looted the Rhynn Lanthorn.
Thy returned to the temple of Amaunator and brang Viconia back to life, then they visited the new areas in the forest, dispatched some Vampires, Yuan-Tis, Priests of Cyrics, Wyvern Cultists, Werewolves and killed Coran before heading for the Watcher's Keep.
There, they completed the first floor for some more XP. Hexxat was killed by a Comet spell but apart from that, everything went as expected. They ran away from the Statues casting Time Stop before killing them in another room.
[spoiler=Watcher's Keep]
Finally for today's report, they went to Suldanessalar and vanquished everyone who stood in their way : Golems, Rakshasas, Drows, Nizidramanii'yt.
[spoiler=Suldanessalar]
Only Irenicus is left.
The second level of Watcher's Keep isn't quite as tough as the first, and has some important loot, notably a Wand of Spell Striking.
A few fights can still be tough. For one thing, the air elemental room deals lots of electricity damage. A Protection from Lightning spell keeps Zulfer safe while he wades in with Spirit Animals, who are all immune to electricity by default.
Zulfer runs into trouble with some golems, who are more than enough to slay him. As always, my favorite escape option is a Potion of Invisibility.
Rested and buffed later on, we easily topple the golems.
I forget once again that you have to retrieve a key from the southeast room before you open the second door to the slime room. While I'm heading over to grab it, I ignore the rest of the party, to Laosha's considerable misfortune.
I have no idea how a Vortex Spider could do that so quickly, so I have the other party members escape its grasp.
Ruva can't drink any potions besides healing potions, however, so she has to fight it alone. She axes the thing in short order.
I get caught off-guard once again near the ice room. Viora is almost impossible to target, but stealth gives no defense against area-effect spell damage.
There aren't a lot of items or spells that grant cold resistance, so Cone of Cold is something of a wild card.
All that's left is the Fire Giant and the Chromatic Demon.
Luckily, we have a backup. Azelos is now level 13 and her Called Shot also deals STR drain. When Feeblemind fails, Ray of Enfeeblement succeeds.
The nice thing about the Chromatic Demon is that it has no magic resistance, so it only has its saves to protect it. Azelos re-casts Called Shot to apply further STR drain, and brings the demon's STR to 0.
We don't get any XP, but it's cool to do it, and it's much faster than any other method.
We cast Heal on Yakman and ditch Watcher's Keep. The third level is very dangerous, with lots of nasty magical effects all over the place, and some really hard-hitting demons. We have little reason to tackle it just now.
Instead, we go back to finish the Unseeing Eye quest. In retrospect, the Unseeing Eye doesn't really require much from this party. The formula is simple: Zulfer goes out with the Shield of Balduran alongside his clone, Azelos uses the Rift Device, and Zulfer and his clone attack with Poison Weapon. The Beholder falls within two rounds.
The Death Tyrants suffer the same fate; their rays cannot harm Zulfer or his clone, and poison is just as effective against them as it was against the Unseeing Eye.
I reject the Talassans' offer to take up the cleric stronghold. I don't want to work for Talos. He's a terrorist version of Zeus and his clerics in Athkatla are jerks. It's not worth the XP. Instead, we start the illithium quest and go just far enough to upgrade the Mace of Disruption.
We've got one big quest left: the Planar Sphere. Kayardi and his gang get poisoned by Fire Seeds, and also fail some important saves against our Nymph's spells.
We lost the XP for Kayardi's death, since the last point of damage came from a clone that had already vanished early. I don't really know what causes the clone to vanish; it couldn't have taken enough damage to die.
We poison Necre and Taibela with the same trick. Easy.
We also steal a few thousand XP from the Guardian Golem by sending out a clone of Zulfer with the Shield of Balduran and some poisoned darts to fight the Elder Orb.
Lavok awaits.
Zulfer, our Assassin/Fighter, has the high APR to make optimal use of Poison Weapon, and because he specializes in darts, we can attack with nonmagical darts or Darts +5 from the Cloak of Stars to bypass even PFMW or Improved Mantle and deal poison damage, without a saving throw, despite all defenses. Poison Weapon deals 12 poison damage over 6 seconds even if the target makes its save, so it's one of the best means of disrupting spells around.
Ruva, our Wizard Slayer/Thief, also with specialization in darts, can inflict 25% arcane spell failure, which can prevent spells for 5 rounds instead of 1. SCS spellcasters will not even attempt to cast spells if their spell failure is high enough, so they won't waste spells; they'll just delay casting them. It's a form of silence that is impossible to dispel or block, and unlike Poison Weapon, it also affects liches and mages with the MINHP1 item, such as Lavok and Irenicus.
Laosha, our Totemic Druid, brings three things to the table. First, he can cast Fire Seeds, which, like flashers, are area-effect projectiles. This property means we can apply poison and spell failure as area effects, and therefore deal spell failure and poison even against invisible enemies, Liches with PFMW, and mages with Absolute Immunity. By summoning a Flesh Golem, with its 9 AC, we can get a 95% hit chance with Fire Seeds, and because the golem is immune to magic, we don't even harm the golem in the process.
Second, Laosha may summon Spirit Animals. At level 10, all Spirit Animals attack with +6 weapons, which can bypass Improved Mantle. Spirit Snakes can deal poison damage on a failed save, while Spirit Wolves can deal cold damage without save, and paralyze the target on a failed save vs. death at +1. They are very effective at disrupting and disabling mages through spell protections. They also have immunities to basically all disablers and last 60 rounds, making it very difficult for enemies to get rid of them.
Third, Laosha, like Viora, can cast Death Ward, Remove Fear, and Chaotic Commands, which make the targets immune to nearly all disablers (Free Action is still needed to prevent slow, but precludes haste). This is a reliable means of surviving enemy disablers.
This party was designed to take down mages. The only way it could be strengthened would be for us to bring an Inquisitor into the party.
The PWWP strategy involves throwing weak summons at enemies and repeatedly fleeing and turning invisible to wait out enemy buffs and waste the enemy's best spells. In my install, SCS spellcasters come out with lots of prebuffs. This party can get past all of them with Fire Seeds, but it's also possible for us to scurry away, and just avoid confronting the enemy when it's at the peak of its strength. We repeatedly provoke the enemy and withdraw before the enemy can gain an advantage. Then, when the enemy is low on buffs and low on spells, we bring out our best buffs and rush them. This means we attack when we are at our strongest and the enemy is at its weakest, because the nature of the AI--which does not know how to do the same against us--means that the player can choose the terms of the fight.
The PWWP strategy, however, relies on having a certain amount of room in which to operate, and this does not always hold. Also, many SCS spellcasters carry the Death Spell or are accompanied by fighters, which means our summons don't always last long enough to make a big difference. Finally, SCS spellcasters often carry divination spells--but because they only carry so many, and don't always have True Seeing, you can simply memorize more invisibility spells to counter their divinations. Also, many divination spells have long casting times, which means you can run away from them if you hear the incantation.
Put all these things together, and we have the ability to bypass or wait out enemy buffs, and resist or evade enemy spells.
He is still, however, perfectly vulnerable to spell failure. The only critters that are immune are SCS celestials, demons, dragons, and genies. Ruva can shut down his spellcasting with Fire Seeds. And now that Yoren Zovai has hit level 12, we can bump up Ruva's clone to 3 APR instead of 2.
Again, the clone's dialog box name is Viora by default. The real Viora is hiding near Lavok. Notice the spell deflection visual around her: she just hit level 14 and can now cast Shield of the Archons.
Turns out Lavok uses Improved Mantle instead of Absolute Immunity. We could hit him with Darts +5 if we wanted. But Ruva's clone only has nonmagical darts and Fire Seeds equipped, and I think Ruva herself still has a better chance of hitting Lavok with Fire Seeds against the Flesh Golem rather than using Darts +5 against Lavok himself.
Lavok suffers total spell failure and resort to sequencers.
Ruva can no longer equip Frostreaver for when Lavok closes in on her and his Improved Mantle wears off. Her clone vanishes for reasons I don't understand, but soon, Lavok is out of Stoneskins, and wanders right into Ruva's traps.
Tolgerias is next. I want to backstab Tolgerias' friend, and turn Ruva invisible since her stealth is poor, but his friend is invisible and Ruva can't reveal her with Detect Illusions.
I could use the Staff of Striking to chunk Tolgerias in one blow, but I feel like fighting him. I use a nonmagical staff instead.
This turned out to be a bad idea. I don't put enough pressure on Tolgerias, and his spellcasting is safe.
It's a classic combination on Tolgerias' part. He brings out a Fallen Planetar. Viora escapes to the east, while Ruva lingers to serve as a decoy.
While Ruva is fleeing the Planetar to the northwest, and trying to escape a Dragon's Breath spell at the same time, Viora starts heading for the exit. Meanwhile, our summons start marching out in the hopes of keeping the Planetar busy while we make our escape.
But we can't flee the area, and therefore the Planetar's vorpal strikes, unless Ruva is with us. And when Ruva gets charmed, we're stuck.
Notice Viora is running back to the east. This is because I feared the Fallen Planetar would abandon Ruva and come after Viora instead. I bring her back a moment later, with Zulfer running up to meet her so I can have them switch boots. With the Boots of Speed, Viora can reach the exit a second sooner. The Planetar comes towards Viora, but changes its mind at the last second and re-targets Ruva.
While the Planetar is waffling, Tolgerias makes the most of his Improved Alacrity, and uses another HLA. This time, he targets Viora.
Viora has just now gotten the Boots of Speed and can re-join the party by the exit. But this would bring the Comet right onto the rest of the party.
We have to let it happen. We can't let Viora stay out in the open. Otherwise the Planetar might change its mind, and Viora could get chunked.
I give Viora the Ring of Fire Resistance at the last second. Without it, she would have died.
We heal up the group within the round, using the Rod of Resurrection on Viora.
A moment later, we get an auto-pause. Ruva has fallen.
Another character, chunked. With Ruva gone, we're able to flee the area.
I use CTRL-T to imitate waiting out the Planetar's duration.
The rest of the fight is a non-issue. Zulfer takes down both enemies with nonmagical darts.
Another huge XP loss for the party. I switch our save file back to the mpsave folder to re-create Ruva. She gets another marvelous stat roll, at 88 with 18/98 STR, but this time I give her grandmastery in axes, since Bala's Axe is coming up soon.
I dual-class Ruva to thief immediately and invest in Find Traps, since we have a few traps coming up, but no locks to pick. Any chunking in a no-reload is awful, particularly this late in the game, but Ruva was the best possible target, as her power was the least dependent on her levels.
This party is great at dealing with mages, but it requires high pressure on the first round. We didn't apply that, allowing Tolgerias to secure an advantage.
There are no more quests left that I feel confident we can overcome. I could probably take on the Twisted Rune with the same formula I used in my Nightmare mode run, since Viora can use Hide in Plain Sight, but it's not worth the risk. As for Kangaxx, I don't know how I would deal with him. His lich form would be little different from any other lich--Fire Seeds from Ruva would doom him--but his demi-lich form would be a problem. SCS Kangaxx regenerates, and Viora doesn't have much damage output. I don't know if she could handle him on her own, not without using a Protection from Magic scroll that's probably better suited for the main quest.
We set sail for Spellhold. After Galvena's hall is wiped out, Ruva regains her Wizard Slayer levels, and we are back up to speed, more or less.
Perth the Adept comes out with an impressive set of pre-buffs, starting out with two clones. Ruva and her clone try to disable him with Fire Seeds, but at 2 APR apiece, it takes them just under a full round to achieve 100% spell failure. This means that faster-casting spells can still get through.
Curiously, Ruva's clone takes no damage. It does, however, fail a save vs. death, and is out commission for 3 rounds.
But damage awakens sleeping characters in BG2:EE, so Azelos can easily bring the clone back.
For some reason, I didn't think to have Zulfer throw the Fire Seeds, since Perth has no immunity to poison. Once Perth is visible, Zulfer seals his fate with darts.
In Spellhold itself, Viora defeats Bhaal by hiding and kiting, with DUHM to strengthen her sling damage.
The maze is next, and then Irenicus. Irenicus will be immune to poison, but spell failure will still work fine. Things might, however, get awfully messy, as there is little room to run and the inmates and clones can complicate the fight. Zulfer's clone and Ruva's clone will likely be high-priority targets, as they will have spell failure and poison at their disposal.
Before entering the Tree of Life area, Anselm interrogated every members of his group to be sure of their loyalty. They all expressed how far the warband has come since they started to work together a long time ago, especially for Viconia, Edwin and Dorn who were here since the very beggining.
The Drow also showed her feeling toward Anselm before what could be their last battle.
They prepared and memorized a lot of spells dedicated to fight a Mage this powerful, including a lot of Breach and a Chain Contingency with Ruby Ray of Reversal + Pierce Shield + Warding Whip.
Then Anselm went alone and felled the two first parasites, he retreated, the party casted a lot of buffs and finally he slew the last parasite.
The battle could start.
Irenicus started the fight well protected, as expected and managed to cast a Time Stop, despite Edwin's assault on his spell protections. He summoned a Dark Planetar, and casted Comet + Dragon's Breath on Viconia and Dorn. He also threw a Chaos spell against Edwin and it worked, despite having only 20% to do so.
Edwin was out of the fight for a moment, but he was nearly defenseless after, Viconia used True Sight as soon as the fight started to get rid of his illusions after his Spell Immunity : Divination was destroyed.
Irenicus retaliated by dispelling her True Sight with a Remove Magic spell before turning invisible again with Shadow Door. The party took this time to dispose of the Dark Planetar.
Then he casted Wish, and wished for an AoE version of Breach, it could have been worse, before escaping and gating a Balor. Viconia used True Sight again.
Korgan alone was getting seriously injured so Anselm and Hexxat came to his rescue and together they killed the fiend.
Afterward, they decided to retreat for a moment and let the summons do their work. They recasted a lot of buffs and at this moment the Chaos spell which affected Edwin ended.
The Red Wizard was really furious to have been rendered useless so easily and started to wreak havoc with his magic.
He casted Time Stop + Warding Whip + Improved Alacrity + Spell Shield + Prot from the Elements + Spell Immunity : Abjuration + Mass Invisibility then he recasted Time Stop before the first one was over and finally he threw Breach + Dragon's Breath + Comet.
Finally he was stripped of all his buffs, it was time to close in for the kill. When he tried to escape, Hexxat followed him invisible thanks to a Mislead spell to backstab him.
He still had Stoneskin, Hexxat broke the first one, but he replaced it. So she hit him 9 times instead of 10 to break the Stoneskin, waited for Irenicus to use his aura to cast an ADHW spell, broke the Stoneskin then she quickly casted Shadow Door again to finish him off with backstab before he could protect himself once again.