I have just noticed that since I got my berserker active again, she no longer has her **** in short swords.
Clearly a bug somewhere.
I went to a lot of trouble to her those, the main reason for being a berserker prior to dualling to thief.
Trio 53 (lLinks to part 1+23)
Crispin - human dragon disciple (Gate70)
CoreArcher XII - elven archer (Corey_Russell)
Stoic - dwarven defender (Grond0)
Part 4 of our adventure saw the Dragon Disciple marvel at a tanky dwarven defender and ranged archer. We rapidly closed off quests in the city, hit Durlags Tower and then returned to Candlekeep making it back in time for the Coronation. Both dukes were badly mauled but survived.
We wasted no time in following Sarevok into the Thieves Maze and the aforementioned immovable dwarven object and hard elf place kicked in. Crispin would like to say he helped out with many spells but after two he was hunting for a third to cast when this happened.
On to Amn then where we took our remaining 30 minutes to bust out of the first part of our cells, and stopped as we told Yoshimo where to go.
BG kills, pre Sarevok: Crispin 66, CoreArcher XII 230 , Stoic 227
BGII kills: Crispin 21, CoreArcher XII 16 , Stoic 26
Blunt weapons *
Missile wewapons *
Two handed weapons **
That's after 183,000 experience. (64,000 as Fighter 119,000 as thief.)
I remember that when I dualled, I had **** in small swords and ** in single weapon style.
I think that what I have lost is my fighter proficiencies and I am left with just my thief proficiencies..
A quick question. If your character loses proficiency points through a bug, is it OK to restore them using keeper?
If not, I think that I'll dump this run.
maybe its possible to change the proficiency level ups to give you in the next level up +6 profs and +5 max. then after set it back to the original values. the only part i am unsure about is whether you can get +6 in one level.
alternatieve is to mod and create a spell that gives you +profs in the desired weapons.
It is always a bummer to abandon a run for these reasons
I've recently discovered how useful the spell feeblemind is against dragons. For one, it's only a level 5 spell, which I can try to cast it multiple times, which is much harder to do with finger of death which is a level 7 spell.
In addition, discovered one of the best ways to open the fight by using the cleric spell magic resistance. Even though this lowers the magic resistance of dragons, it's a buff and as such does not make the dragon hostile. This in turn means I can actually open the fight with the mage level 5 spell lower magic resistance, which means spells like blind and feeblemind have a much better chance of landing.
Sure enough, both FIrkraag and Thaxxy died to these strategies with no deaths for m party. I have had many failed runs dealing with those dragons before.
Trio 53 (lLinks to part 1+234)
Crispin - human dragon disciple (Gate70)
CoreArcher XII - elven archer (Corey_Russell)
Stoic - dwarven defender (Grond0)
Crispin decided for a day of stealth, in a fashion (not taking any screenshots and the screen capture had limited audio). This meant his version of events would be difficult to challenge.
We started off by making good our escape from the chateau in about 15 minutes, taking care to fill our backpacks and the net result was that the merchant outside replenished their stocks nicely while we had about 11000gp. We sorted out the circus, went to see Gaelan Bayle and then visited a temple (Stoic having overextended himself on the traps upstairs. Gaelan's buddy merchant had also died from Stoic setting off traps but he was not raised)
We picked up a potion case at Watchers Keep and left without venturing inside. On our return we paid for a magic licence (Crispin knowing full well that he'd be unable to prevent himself from inviting Cowled Wizards forth)
Officer Dirth's finest armour found it's way onto Stoic which meant we could finish off our second ambush of the day by returning a harper and ransacking their quarters. We emptied the Talos temple while picking up a necklace for Mae'Var, kicked off several more quests then eliminated Rayic Gethras. Mae'Var was downed, we did the first part of Hendak's quest by letting him take over the Copper Coronet then retired to the Temple sewers for a rakshasa cloak and a no trouble today sea troll. Our session ended with us staring at Mekrath's lab; the alternative being a fight with the Hatchetman crew
One death sounded good, however we did experience a second as the third ambush slavers surrounded CoreArcher and despite glitterdust + slow he failed to escape. Stoic did a fine job of eliminating them, however he did move slightly and the jury is out whether Crispins fireball injured him because of that or would have got him anyway
Our two hours ran out, I'd not noticed so had got drawn into the game - it's a real effort to plan next steps on the fly with a fast progress trio while also picking up loot, stuffing it into containers, and identifying magical items as you go. Still, it's a good survival tactic to be slightly slower than your two companions
Crispin has Rayic's +2 staff and a sling but is mainly spelling and looting. 42 kills
Stoic is dual wielding the Stonefire axe and Arbane's short sword. 89 kills
CoreArcher has a composite longbow and Azuredge for distance, and Varscona +2 longsword plus offhand longsword. 76 kills
It was Gorion who suggested that I adopt the name Drizzt Do'Urden. He said that adopting that name would confuse both my own enemies and those of Drizzt himself.
The future will determine whether or not he was correct.
After his death i was able to help Melicamp, Firebead and Marl. Heading north, I helped Joia and Tenya.
When I took on Tarnesh he panicked me with his spells. This resulted in him being killed by the guards. It took me some time to discover his corpse.
I headed south to Nashkel where I took on Greybeard. One again I missed out on experience because like Tarnesh, he was killed by guards. I did however survive.
Afterwards I became a true hero with a reputation of 17, and after helping Samuel and the Colquetle family, this was bumped to 19.
I headed south and helped Albert and a Dryad before raiding part of the gnoll stronghold.
Using stealth, I raided part of Durlag's Tower. I found that there were several locks that I could not open.
I did however find a second tome. I need a thief next time that I return. I did however come across several potions that wiould help a thief.
I now have wisdom 18, charisma 19 and reputation 20. If I had gold it would be time to shop.
I therefore went ankheg hunting and in so doing reached level 6. I put a proficiency point in flails at that point.
When I challenged Bassilus he cast rigid thinking which landed when I was out of sight of him.
When the spell wore off, I killed him.
I helped Charlestonian Nib and then went to the lighthouse area where Safana joined me after I had killed the sirines. We then killed the golems and looted the cave.
Safana failed in her attempt to pickpocket Algernon's Cloak but immediately gave him a kiss. Her next attempt was successful.
We killed one basilisk at Durlag's but didn't notice that my potion had expired.
A bit more progress in SoD saw us fighting our way through to the temple in the Forest of Wyrms. It took a while to deal with the various groups of bugbears before we could move on to the more exciting action. Against Ziatar, Ash said that he was vulnerable to darts of stunning - but Whurr was rather disgusted when dart after dart failed to hit. Eventually, Ash managed to down him with a command and Whurr's last dart then took fatal effect.
We buffed for the Neothelid - Whurr downing a second potion of invulnerability to make sure his saves would be good enough. We quickly got the creature down to near death, but it managed to delay the end by diving underground. Fortunately it didn't spend too long there though and, once it resurfaced, it was soon finished off.
Still buffed, Whurr led the way to take on Darskhelin. His HPs lasted long enough to deal with the ranged and magical opponents before he retreated to use arrows. Mohad Flintborn was proving quite hard to hit - until he failed to save against a final hold person attempted by Ash.
Skeletons then made short work of Akanna.
On the way out, Whurr picked up a big scalp thanks to a few throwing daggers.
At Boareskyr Bridge, a general attack gave Vichand no chance to call for help from the camp.
We took the easy way out there by surrendering the fort, meaning only the mage on the bridge remained an obstacle. A successful initial dispelling arrow from Whurr ensured that was easily overcome.
After reporting in to the Coalition Camp, we set off for the Underground River. We weren't using invisibility, so that meant fighting or running past various groups on the way. There was one near escape during that when Ash didn't notice a bombardier beetle sneaking up behind while he was concentrating on some hill giants in front of him - fortunately the beetle's vapours didn't stun him.
At the Underground river, some myconids and spiders were safely negotiated. However, attacking the cyclops proved more troublesome. The cyclops itself went down easily enough under attack from skeletons. However, Whurr was not using buffs this time and was confused by one of the mages teleporting in - that left him an easy victim for the guards.
Ash retreated from the remaining enemies and the joint session ended there. However, to allow a quick start to the action next time, I did have Ash use a raise dead scroll on Whurr and use sanctuary to go and get his equipment.
Priest of Lathander 9, 66 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 153 kills
Undead hunter 9, 126 HPs (incl. 10 from ring), 446 kills, 3 deaths
Trio 53 part 6 (lLinks to part 1+2345)
Crispin - human dragon disciple (Gate70)
CoreArcher XII - elven archer (Corey_Russell)
Stoic - dwarven defender (Grond0)
Mekrath and his lab took almost no time, so we powered on through Tarnor the Hatchetman and his party - Stoic admiring his fire and lightning resistance as Crispin used three wand of fireball charges and CoreArcher shot anything that remained standing.
After that we emptied our backpacks by returning Littleman the bear to the Graveyard district and while there it made sense to loot all the crypts and eliminate any undead with Stonefire and Azuredge.
With that done we buffed for Vampiric Wraithes at Watchers Keep but they sniffed out a reasonably prepared party and left us to deal with mere underlings so we had an easy arrival. Stoic looted freely
Crispin had his plan well mapped out but CoreArcher was talking about getting a better longbow. He intended purchasing one but Crispin was thinking otherwise, and unfortunately the one he was thinking of helped THAC0 more than damage. One thing CoreArcher doesn't need help with is THAC0. Anyways, we soon had this better bow in our sights, just have to kill this final enemy.
CoreArcher suggested using Azuredge and +3 returning dart but to quote Stoic "Where's the fun in that".
Hint: the fun is taking a lot of damage.
While at the De'Arnise hold we felt obliged to deal with Torgal and haul out more loot to sell.
Next on Crispin's list was Trademeet - with the Stonefire axe and arrows of fire / acid this should be no problem. A djinn decided to play hard-to-get but you can't outrun Magic Missile.
We returned to the Bridge District to deal with Reijik Hidesman meaning we'll have to return to Trademeet later. This also saw muggers and Salia try to pick us off but neither they nor the two Rune Assassins managed to do this.
We ended the session with CoreArcher venturing that Crispin had outscored him on the killboard. Crispin suspected otherwise and soon confirmed that despite repeated fireballing of spiders in the druid grove and against Pai'Nai and a late use of Death spell this was not the case. Something like 80 kills for Crispin, 150 for CoreArcher and 190 for Stoic (not exact figures but close enough).
Our equipment at the session close. CoreArcher was best candidate for the bracers of archery and his THAC0 becoming ever more threatening to enemies.
Crispin is thinking our next session should involve a lich hunt and Umar Hills. Given the rapidity of todays session with a dual wielding dwarf backed by a ranged archer and minion clearance dragon disciple maybe he should add a couple more things to his plan if he doesn't want to let chaos evolve naturally.
Drizzt Do'Urden reached level 6 and recruited Safana before looting the cave. Then went ankheg hunting until she levelled up.
Using stealth they entered Durlag's Tower. Judicious buying of potions enabled us to clear the upper regions down as far as the wardens. They solved three of their quests but left the wine in a container for a future visit.
Drizzt killed Kirinhale, but in the process Safana was killed.
Raising her caused Drizzt to become poverty stricken so the two of them are now raising enough gold for needed items.
Safana is currently level 8
When we have sufficient gold we will recruit a mage and a cleric and perhaps a tank as well.
I really enjoyed the visit to Durlag's as the planning worked to perfection.
In the end it was an unplanned encounter with a couple of ghouls that brought the run to an end they approached from behind while we were dealing with some kobolds. My tactics weren't great. I should have just ignored the kobolds and made sure that the ghouls condn't strike.
Decided to change the portrait and edited the one at the start.
I have now reached the carnival, but had to use 3 blue potions to do so.
I helped Melicamp, Firebead, and Marl on the way and bought a second dagger +1.
In the process got boots of stealth. Next priority is invisibility spell.
We helped Melicamp, Marl, Samuel and Joia.
Took an amulet to the Colquetle Family, and killed Sonner et al. Tenya was pleased to get her bowl back.
Fighting an ogre, I had blinded him and was moving away to kill him with knives. Too late. One blow was enough to end the run.
Not the nicest of characters, but quite powerful! Second run.
The image of the dwarf is all over the web one of them being here: https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/280138039306977744/. The background is a tiny church building near to where I lived until recently. Eyes created in Photoshop to make her look evil.
I thought that I would use a halberdier for a change since there is an easily available +2 halberd in EE.
No mods.
I have helped the dryad and killed Ingot. As a result I now have a +2 Halberd. I have ** in two handed weapons and *** in halberds.
Greywolf and Bassilus were no problem.
The first ankheg was, but after killing it I levelled up and subsequent ones were easy to kill.
We killed many bandits etc in transit followed by Droth and Shoal, an ogre with a belt fetish, and Zargal.
We helped Mad Arcand and killed many sirine both in that area and near the lighthouse. Rage helped considerably against the sirine.
I recruited Ajantis which enabled me to recruit Safana. She enabled me to acquire Algernon's Cloak as well as numerous items at Ulgoth's Beard. I left the two of them there and recruited Viconia.
Trio 53 part 7 (lLinks to part 1+23456)
Crispin - human dragon disciple (Gate70)
CoreArcher XII - elven archer (Corey_Russell)
Stoic - dwarven defender (Grond0)
Session 7 saw Crispin with a plan of sorts. Would we follow it?
Trademeet > Reijiek
Mook > iMoD
Fallen Paladins
Kidnapper
Liches
Twisted Rune?
Slavers
Umar
Planar Sphere
Planar Prison
It was easy enough to start with Trademeet and finish off Rijiek Hidesman as we started in his tannery.
(at this point I referred to the screen capture and found it wanting once more, so had to rely on memory)
Never mind, that's what screenshots are for (memories). We got to Mook after 23 minutes, so she was probably the first on our list after returning from Trademeet. Or second perhaps as the City Gates lich was treated to a beating while we had fire, lightning, improved invisibility and spirit armour protections running.
Five minutes later we picked off vampires in the Bridge district on our way to deal with thief deserters.
On our way to Bodhi we re-homed an orphan. CoreArcher led against the vampires, using the Amulet of Power to nullify level drains. This worked well for about 20 minutes until Bodhi's attacks were too much and he stepped away. Stoic held the line, taking a few drains and Bodhi quit first.
Crispin had purchased 3 lesser restoration scrolls last session and used one on the skindancer victim earlier today. He used a second on Stoic and we rested up.
The next 25 minutes or so had us upgrade the Mace of Disruption courtesy of Cromwell, and help Sir Sarles leave town in a grump before handing over the besmirched alloy to a temple. Also handing in Neb's head, and each time we visited the temple district we picked up, progressed, and completed the Fallen Paladins quest. Suffice to say they did not appreciate our haste, their slow, a glitterdust and a Daystar Sunray.
Time was ticking away, so we did enough of the Unseeing Eye to buff ourselves against the lich nearby, then the bridge district lich. For Kangaxx we used three scrolls of protection from Undead and Daystar (CoreArcher) plus the Improved Mace (Stoic) made appreciably short work of him.
We had about 20 minutes of the session remaining so Crispin headed to the Slums intent on dealing with slavers until CoreArcher mentioned the Lathander / Talos disputed ring. It was the right time of day (3am) for Travin to show up but he had to wait while we dealt with vampires. Stoic was protected from level drain but was charmed. CoreArcher went one way, getting drained while Crispin went the other with Stoic chasing him.
Stoic got through Crispin's stoneskins as a guard was attacking him and Crispin wanted to make sure we didn't have a reputational disaster affecting our archer. He managed to apply another stoneskin and keep Stoic's attention until he recovered, then applied a spirit armour so Stoic could not be charmed again (reduced from 5% chance to zero). Crispin used his third lesser restoration scroll on CoreArcher.
Then we dealt with Travin, handed in the reward and returned to enter the slaver compound by the ship entrance. This may slightly have disorientated CoreArcher, not helped by Stoic pushing on quickly and Crispin not being able to draw enemies into spells as a result. This ended with Crispin getting into range of a confusion, meaning Stoic pushed ever further ahead and we had to catch him up by following the trail of bodies.
We ended the session after moving into the sewers so will be picking up Lilacor first next time.
Crispin has 101 kills, CoreArcher 190 and Stoic 261. Party gear / loot
The mines were navigated easily and Xan joined us. We tried to get Oublek killed by an assassin butt things went wrong and he was killed by one of my summoned skeletons. So instead of gaining gold, we lost gold as we needed to regain reputation.
That was the first major set-back.
Xan has been replaced by Baeloth and we are now at the FAI.
I am finding that I am not enjoying this run despite being successful to this point, I am therefore abondoning it in favour of a Drow Priest of Helm run.
Helma is attempting to go one better than Drizzt by being Lawful Good not Chaotic Good. As a drow her reputation has been reduced by 2.
I don't know about your runs @Wise_Grimwald but in my runs Xzar dies all the time. He says some funny things, but losing so much gold to resurrect him all the time does get a bit old. Montaron on the other hand is a very useful fighter/thief. He makes for a good scout.
I don't know about your runs @Wise_Grimwald but in my runs Xzar dies all the time. He says some funny things, but losing so much gold to resurrect him all the time does get a bit old. Montaron on the other hand is a very useful fighter/thief. He makes for a good scout.
The reason why I replaced Montaron with Safana was that I had put all his points in pickpocketting. I think that in future I will be using Safana for the pickpocketting and him for lockpicking, opening chests and the like. Pickpocketting is only needed for a very short time, mainly for Algernon's Cloak, and various items at Ulgoth's Beard.
Xzar didn't die once in this run. He survived until replaced by Baeloth.
Here are Helma's pretty good stats. I should have perrhaps dropped constitution and boosted charisma, but not a major issue.
I quite like the portrait. Didn't have to do much with it at all to make the image on the web into portraits.
The thieves in Candlekeep were given better weapons and armour. The armour is leather +1 so was only good for selling. The weapons apart from a staff were unusable by her so she sold the +1 small sword.
I like having those thieves a bit stronger as occasionally they kill charname particularly mages. Of course even if I had given them plate, command would have been sufficient to deal with them.
Imoen did a walkabout in Beregost and returned with a magical mace, a few potions and a considerable amount of gold. She advised me not to enter certain properties, so I suspect that she was seen performing tasks which were not exactly legal.
Being a Helmite I decided that it would be best if we parted company.
In an inn I calmed Marl and bought a tome which I took to Firebead.
I was able to help Melicamp.
Helma returned Tenya's Bowl to her and Joia's ring to her before taking on Tarnesh. A guard killed him!
Helma was sanctuaried and was waiting for the guards to weaken him before using the command spell. However she cast the spell too soon due to her script, and it became a touch and go battle.
She reached level 5 but died when she tried to kill one ankheg too many. She had cast seeking sword, so all her buffs/healing spells were unavailable. The ankheg was also near dead, but luck was not on Helma's side.
Trio 53 part 8 (lLinks to part 1+234567)
Crispin - human dragon disciple (Gate70)
CoreArcher XII - elven archer (Corey_Russell)
Stoic - dwarven defender (Grond0)
Crispin steadily worked down his plan of action, the items below were more or less completed in 2 hours meaning the bulk of the plan remains)
Slavers
Twisted Rune? (Staff Crispin)
Umar (Shadow armour CoreArcher)
Planar Sphere
Planar Prison (Boots of speed Stoic)
We had a gentle introduction, picking up the 4 items to retrieve Lilacor. Next should have been the Twisted Rune but CoreArcher mentioned shadow dragon armour and as Crispin already had it on his plan was a good excuse to delay the Twisted Rune, so we headed there next. It all went quite smoothly up until we reached Thax'llssillyia.
The dragon found it didn't go smoothly. Stoic had undertaken a do or die effort, with dwarven stance meaning he'd have been hard pressed to retreat anyway.
Ye olde Shade Lord survived momentarily, long enough to see his Shade Altar eat a sunstone bullet just as Azuredge landed to destroy him (probably).
We then returned to the Bridge district where CoreArcher played 30 questions around why are we here, what equipment, which weapon (he got it by that point as not much remained unvisited in the area). Crispin was coyly avoiding mentioning our destination as he thought maybe it was a bit too risky. CoreArcher seemed up for the challenge though, saying it was only Crispin's neck on the line.
We made a strong start against these varied enemies but as time ticked by Stoic was de-buffed and taking damage. Crispin was wary of moving in too close as he was susceptible to area effects. We held on though and clawed our way to victory, Stoic managing to hold fast at the front.
On to the Planar Sphere. We had matters nicely under control.
Then we had a slight hiccup, Stoic leaving a golem alive as CoreArcher got stuck in multiplayer dialogue lag to become a hapless victim. This was enough for us to be glad Mekrath had left us a rod of resurrection in his will.
With our party back in order we ventured outside and picked up a demon heart before clearing both the fire and ice chambers on our way to the sphere's engine room.
Golems aplenty failed to stop us with Stoic once more proving the worth of a Dwarven Defender > Dentfender.
With about 10 minutes of the session remaining we foolhardily stepped into the Planar Prison. We'd have cleared it but for the pesky kids time taken to loot, identify and rest for further identifications. We'll start the next session with our exit from there.
Crispin mentioned that the final battle was very quick and CoreArcher suggested a sorcerer fireball had sped things along. Crispin had to admit he'd not even arrived before the combat was over. Who'd have thought that Improved Haste on his companions would have seen such a rapid demise.
Reporting current no-reload run with yet again another divine caster.
Buck Greenteeth, Chaotic Good Halfling Cleric.
15/16/16/10/17/11 (85) with * in hammers and slings.
After 50 days solo having advanced to Chapter 4, Buck assembled a team of 4 with:
- Safana
- Minsc
- Dynaheir
Cloakwood Mines were cleared, as well as almost all wilderness areas, Ice Island, most of Chapter 5 quests in the big City. No real scary moment, other than Safana dying at an undetected lightning bolt trap in Firewine Bridge.
Now trying my hand at Durlag's Tower which I have never fully completed. Upper levels were cleared, so was Labyrinth lvl 1.
We are almost through Labyrinth lvl2 but had 2 very rough moments there. First in the throne room, got trapped in a Cloudkill against 4 great doppelgangers. Each party member lost consciousness at one point except Buck. Buffed skeletons and shorty saving throws saved the day.
Next the Dwarven Doom Guards were tough nuts to crack. A Stoneskinned Dynaheir ran around them with several Agannazar's Scorcher rays, only to get trapped in her own Web at some point. Minsc hasted with an oil of speed, and rushed in wielding Spider's Bane to save his witch. We all somehow managed to retreat to the bridge room were both Buck and Minsc tanked the dwarves, taking a lot of damage ; they had to pop more than 10 healing potions (each) to make it alive. They also drank potions of cloud giant strength, invulnerability, heroism, fire resistance.. our fastest movement speed helped us prevail eventually, many wand charges were used as well, it was a fun but highly chaotic battle scene!
Entering DT Labyrinth lvl3 now... Minsc managed to run across the first room and avoid that fireball. I carefully position Safana on the edge of the AoE and she... drops dead, 54 damage in one shot! And she was wearing Batalista's Passport (40% fire resistance). Avoided chunking by only 2 HP...
I do not know what hit her, was that a trap she failed to detect? Cannot be that fireball surely...
Hey everyone. For the past few months, I have played a little bit of Baldur's Gate, on and off, and now I'm at a point where I want to report on the results of this gameplay. My primary goal for now is filling up the Hall of Heroes with the missing kits. However, since just playing a basic powerful party through the games without anything extra can get a bit stale for me at this point, I came up with a few themed groups - in the end, I couldnt decide which one to run first, so I decided to run three of them at the same time.
The idea was to create 3 groups with different approaches to the game and do the same content in one session with each of these groups - so, for example, one session would be: Ulcaster Ruins with group a), Ulcaster Ruins with group b) and Ulcaster Ruins with group c) - as a consequence, the pace of these runs was quite a bit slower. All runs are played on unmodded core rules, and I will skip TotSC (except for Durlag's upper levels) + SoD content (and most EE content, with one exception). Now, here are the groups:
Spearkensai party: This party is based around the fact that spears are, by any estimation, the least used weapon type, at least in this no-reload community, throughout these games. I thought about every single other weapon profiency and found people (and myself) using these at certain points, but spears are by far the least popular - so I decided to counteract that by focusing a party entirely on a Kensai with a planned grandmastery in spears. Since the Hall already has a Kensai - and the Kensai needs support - my bhaalspawn is a diviner, and we are joined by a cleric/thief, so we have alle types of spells/skills available - but the Kensai is supposed to the the actual damage, with the other two mostly using buffs or crowd control spells to support her.
Hastaria, elven diviner, lawful good.
12/19/17/18/18/8, *Sling; Starting with Sleep, Charm Person and Identify.
Anti-Magic party: Going further with my previous "no arcane spellcasting"-party, this one doesn't use spellcasters at all (or, almost none at all - the bhaalspawn is a stalker and might use haste to save on oils of speed) - in fact, every party member is chosen for their ability to hunt evil mages. This one should have fast-paced and easy gameplay early on due to powerful fighters, though the lack of supporting spells might become problematic much later in the game.
Acid&Ice party: The plan for this party is to heavily rely on elemental damage. I thought about a group based on fire damage, but that's just a very common source of damage anyway and wouldn't involve that many unusual approaches. I thought about lightning damage as well, but Alesia has recently been playing a Priest of Talos, and that would've been the same bhaalspawn kit. Because there are almost no acid damage spells/weapons, I decided to combine this one with frost damage, leading to a party that's meant to combine as many sources of acid & frost damage as possible. As soon as weapons with the respective damage types are available, they should be used exclusively (exceptions are allowed for enemies immune to these damage types). Casters can't use any damaging spells except for those that deal acid or frost damage (I'll make an exception for chromatic orb - it will EVENTUALLY deal acid damage, so I count it as an acid damage spell right away), and they'll have to fill half of their spellslots on levels with available acid&frost damage spells with those. Here are the classes I chose (note: gore is turned off in this run, so the ice spells don't destroy all of our loot):
Firl, human invoker, lawful good. Our Bhaalspawn.
12/18/18/18/3/18, *Sling.
Invoker is the best choice for optimizing our chosen damage types, though the kit only improves chromatic orb and cone of cold, as the other spells have no saving throws available. For reference, here's a list of all the spells he can use for damage:
Chromatic Orb, Melf’s Acid Arrow, Fireshield: Blue, Icestorm, Cone of Cold, Death Fog. Not many. Other slots will have to be filled with all kinds of support spells. Fireshield: Blue will propably not get used because of the scary fireshield bug. Most of these spells quickly fall off in later BG2, though I imagine spell triggers with triple cones of cold can deal tons of damage even in the late game.
Delo, half-orc shaman, true neutral.
19/18/17/16/12/3, *Axe, *Shortbow
Why a shaman? Well, he does have one unique frost damage spell - writhing fog. It's very bad and does very little damage, but I wanted to assemble every possible unique source of my available damage types. He can also wield the Frostreaver Axe and use acid and ice arrows.
Koschmara, human dark moon monk, lawful evil.
18/18/18/18/9/6, *Sling, *Single-Weapon Style
This one's here for two things: The frozen fist ability, and a very specific item: The Gauntles of Aln Zekk, acquired in Rasaad's SoA questline. They add +3 damage on fist attacks and 15% chance of inflicting 1d10 cold damage on each successful melee attack (this is our exception for EE content).
Irmdor, half-elven totemic druid, true neutral
11/18/16/11/18/15, *Club, *Sling
Once again only here for one ability: Summon Spirit Wolves - right from the get go, these deal frost damage with their attacks. Other spirit summons aren't allowed, and we can't use insect plague or fire elementals, so this will be very much a supporting druid. He also can use Blackblood, one of the few acid damage weapons.
That's it for unique acid&ice abilites, so the other two characters are here to wield weapons with those damage types. Note that I won't allow for weapons that deal other types of elemental damage as well (FoA and Dragon's Breath).
Romero, elven fighter/thief, true neutral
18,87/19/17/16/3/8, **Longsword, **Longbow
Our Varscona user early on, + acid&ice arrows. Will later on get points in halberds (Duskblade), flails (Icestar) and, if we get lucky, scimitars (Spectral Brand).
Xerane, dwarven berserker, true neutral
18,88/17/19/18/8/1, **Two-Handed Sword, **Halberd
Joril's Dagger as a weapon of choice in early SoA (I didn't know this one did cold damage until I researched it), later on The Wave.
These are our parties. My expectation, when starting, was to get at least one of them into the Hall, though I hoped for as many as possible. Let's see how things went.
Reporting current no-reload run with yet again another divine caster.
Buck Greenteeth, Chaotic Good Halfling Cleric.
15/16/16/10/17/11 (85) with * in hammers and slings.
After 50 days solo having advanced to Chapter 4, Buck assembled a team of 4 with:
- Safana
- Minsc
- Dynaheir
Cloakwood Mines were cleared, as well as almost all wilderness areas, Ice Island, most of Chapter 5 quests in the big City. No real scary moment, other than Safana dying at an undetected lightning bolt trap in Firewine Bridge.
Now trying my hand at Durlag's Tower which I have never fully completed. Upper levels were cleared, so was Labyrinth lvl 1.
We are almost through Labyrinth lvl2 but had 2 very rough moments there. First in the throne room, got trapped in a Cloudkill against 4 great doppelgangers. Each party member lost consciousness at one point except Buck. Buffed skeletons and shorty saving throws saved the day.
Next the Dwarven Doom Guards were tough nuts to crack. A Stoneskinned Dynaheir ran around them with several Agannazar's Scorcher rays, only to get trapped in her own Web at some point. Minsc hasted with an oil of speed, and rushed in wielding Spider's Bane to save his witch. We all somehow managed to retreat to the bridge room were both Buck and Minsc tanked the dwarves, taking a lot of damage ; they had to pop more than 10 healing potions (each) to make it alive. They also drank potions of cloud giant strength, invulnerability, heroism, fire resistance.. our fastest movement speed helped us prevail eventually, many wand charges were used as well, it was a fun but highly chaotic battle scene!
Tara is now level 6 with a reputation of 20. Still in Chapter 2. She killed a lot of ankheg and is now proficient in doing so having faced two at a time.
She retrieved the Charisma tome but has not yet met Dynaheir. Currently resting at the Carnival. Needs to do some shopping whilst reputation is high.
Comments
Clearly a bug somewhere.
I went to a lot of trouble to her those, the main reason for being a berserker prior to dualling to thief.
Blunt weapons *
Missile wewapons *
Two handed weapons **
That's after 183,000 experience. (64,000 as Fighter 119,000 as thief.)
I remember that when I dualled, I had **** in small swords and ** in single weapon style.
I think that what I have lost is my fighter proficiencies and I am left with just my thief proficiencies..
Crispin - human dragon disciple (Gate70)
CoreArcher XII - elven archer (Corey_Russell)
Stoic - dwarven defender (Grond0)
Part 4 of our adventure saw the Dragon Disciple marvel at a tanky dwarven defender and ranged archer. We rapidly closed off quests in the city, hit Durlags Tower and then returned to Candlekeep making it back in time for the Coronation. Both dukes were badly mauled but survived.
BG kills, pre Sarevok: Crispin 66, CoreArcher XII 230 , Stoic 227
BGII kills: Crispin 21, CoreArcher XII 16 , Stoic 26
A quick question. If your character loses proficiency points through a bug, is it OK to restore them using keeper?
If not, I think that I'll dump this run.
It doesn't work as the proficienct rules in Keeper differ from those in my set-up.
Never mind, I'll perhaps play an unmodded game next then the situation won't arise.
Of course in an unmodded game I won't be able to dual-class a half-orc.
alternatieve is to mod and create a spell that gives you +profs in the desired weapons.
It is always a bummer to abandon a run for these reasons
If it does, I'll avoid it by playing without dual classing.
In addition, discovered one of the best ways to open the fight by using the cleric spell magic resistance. Even though this lowers the magic resistance of dragons, it's a buff and as such does not make the dragon hostile. This in turn means I can actually open the fight with the mage level 5 spell lower magic resistance, which means spells like blind and feeblemind have a much better chance of landing.
Sure enough, both FIrkraag and Thaxxy died to these strategies with no deaths for m party. I have had many failed runs dealing with those dragons before.
For the portrait I used this image
https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/317222367508177721/
and added a photo of my own for the background.
Became a hero before foolishly taking on an ogre-mage who ambushed him.
He wasn't quite strong enough to survive.
Crispin - human dragon disciple (Gate70)
CoreArcher XII - elven archer (Corey_Russell)
Stoic - dwarven defender (Grond0)
Crispin decided for a day of stealth, in a fashion (not taking any screenshots and the screen capture had limited audio). This meant his version of events would be difficult to challenge.
We started off by making good our escape from the chateau in about 15 minutes, taking care to fill our backpacks and the net result was that the merchant outside replenished their stocks nicely while we had about 11000gp. We sorted out the circus, went to see Gaelan Bayle and then visited a temple (Stoic having overextended himself on the traps upstairs. Gaelan's buddy merchant had also died from Stoic setting off traps but he was not raised)
We picked up a potion case at Watchers Keep and left without venturing inside. On our return we paid for a magic licence (Crispin knowing full well that he'd be unable to prevent himself from inviting Cowled Wizards forth)
Officer Dirth's finest armour found it's way onto Stoic which meant we could finish off our second ambush of the day by returning a harper and ransacking their quarters. We emptied the Talos temple while picking up a necklace for Mae'Var, kicked off several more quests then eliminated Rayic Gethras. Mae'Var was downed, we did the first part of Hendak's quest by letting him take over the Copper Coronet then retired to the Temple sewers for a rakshasa cloak and a no trouble today sea troll. Our session ended with us staring at Mekrath's lab; the alternative being a fight with the Hatchetman crew
One death sounded good, however we did experience a second as the third ambush slavers surrounded CoreArcher and despite glitterdust + slow he failed to escape. Stoic did a fine job of eliminating them, however he did move slightly and the jury is out whether Crispins fireball injured him because of that or would have got him anyway
Our two hours ran out, I'd not noticed so had got drawn into the game - it's a real effort to plan next steps on the fly with a fast progress trio while also picking up loot, stuffing it into containers, and identifying magical items as you go. Still, it's a good survival tactic to be slightly slower than your two companions
Crispin has Rayic's +2 staff and a sling but is mainly spelling and looting. 42 kills
Stoic is dual wielding the Stonefire axe and Arbane's short sword. 89 kills
CoreArcher has a composite longbow and Azuredge for distance, and Varscona +2 longsword plus offhand longsword. 76 kills
It was Gorion who suggested that I adopt the name Drizzt Do'Urden. He said that adopting that name would confuse both my own enemies and those of Drizzt himself.
The future will determine whether or not he was correct.
After his death i was able to help Melicamp, Firebead and Marl. Heading north, I helped Joia and Tenya.
When I took on Tarnesh he panicked me with his spells. This resulted in him being killed by the guards. It took me some time to discover his corpse.
I headed south to Nashkel where I took on Greybeard. One again I missed out on experience because like Tarnesh, he was killed by guards. I did however survive.
Afterwards I became a true hero with a reputation of 17, and after helping Samuel and the Colquetle family, this was bumped to 19.
I headed south and helped Albert and a Dryad before raiding part of the gnoll stronghold.
Using stealth, I raided part of Durlag's Tower. I found that there were several locks that I could not open.
I did however find a second tome. I need a thief next time that I return. I did however come across several potions that wiould help a thief.
I now have wisdom 18, charisma 19 and reputation 20. If I had gold it would be time to shop.
I therefore went ankheg hunting and in so doing reached level 6. I put a proficiency point in flails at that point.
When I challenged Bassilus he cast rigid thinking which landed when I was out of sight of him.
When the spell wore off, I killed him.
I helped Charlestonian Nib and then went to the lighthouse area where Safana joined me after I had killed the sirines. We then killed the golems and looted the cave.
Safana failed in her attempt to pickpocket Algernon's Cloak but immediately gave him a kiss. Her next attempt was successful.
We killed one basilisk at Durlag's but didn't notice that my potion had expired.
Game over.
I helped Marl, Firebead and Mirianne and so reached level 3.
Ash (male dwarf priest of Lathander, Grond0); Whurr (male human undead hunter, Gate70)
Previous updates
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1200529/#Comment_1200529
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1200827/#Comment_1200827
Priest of Lathander 9, 66 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 153 kills
Undead hunter 9, 126 HPs (incl. 10 from ring), 446 kills, 3 deaths
Crispin - human dragon disciple (Gate70)
CoreArcher XII - elven archer (Corey_Russell)
Stoic - dwarven defender (Grond0)
Mekrath and his lab took almost no time, so we powered on through Tarnor the Hatchetman and his party - Stoic admiring his fire and lightning resistance as Crispin used three wand of fireball charges and CoreArcher shot anything that remained standing.
With that done we buffed for Vampiric Wraithes at Watchers Keep but they sniffed out a reasonably prepared party and left us to deal with mere underlings so we had an easy arrival. Stoic looted freely
CoreArcher suggested using Azuredge and +3 returning dart but to quote Stoic "Where's the fun in that".
Hint: the fun is taking a lot of damage.
We ended the session with CoreArcher venturing that Crispin had outscored him on the killboard. Crispin suspected otherwise and soon confirmed that despite repeated fireballing of spiders in the druid grove and against Pai'Nai and a late use of Death spell this was not the case. Something like 80 kills for Crispin, 150 for CoreArcher and 190 for Stoic (not exact figures but close enough).
Our equipment at the session close. CoreArcher was best candidate for the bracers of archery and his THAC0 becoming ever more threatening to enemies.
Using stealth they entered Durlag's Tower. Judicious buying of potions enabled us to clear the upper regions down as far as the wardens. They solved three of their quests but left the wine in a container for a future visit.
Drizzt killed Kirinhale, but in the process Safana was killed.
Raising her caused Drizzt to become poverty stricken so the two of them are now raising enough gold for needed items.
Safana is currently level 8
When we have sufficient gold we will recruit a mage and a cleric and perhaps a tank as well.
I really enjoyed the visit to Durlag's as the planning worked to perfection.
In the end it was an unplanned encounter with a couple of ghouls that brought the run to an end they approached from behind while we were dealing with some kobolds. My tactics weren't great. I should have just ignored the kobolds and made sure that the ghouls condn't strike.
Hey ho. Another one bites the dust.
I have arrived in Beregost and am using my thieving skills to boost both wealth and experience.
I have now reached the carnival, but had to use 3 blue potions to do so.
I helped Melicamp, Firebead, and Marl on the way and bought a second dagger +1.
In the process got boots of stealth. Next priority is invisibility spell.
We helped Melicamp, Marl, Samuel and Joia.
Took an amulet to the Colquetle Family, and killed Sonner et al. Tenya was pleased to get her bowl back.
Fighting an ogre, I had blinded him and was moving away to kill him with knives. Too late. One blow was enough to end the run.
The image of the dwarf is all over the web one of them being here: https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/280138039306977744/. The background is a tiny church building near to where I lived until recently. Eyes created in Photoshop to make her look evil.
I thought that I would use a halberdier for a change since there is an easily available +2 halberd in EE.
No mods.
I have helped the dryad and killed Ingot. As a result I now have a +2 Halberd. I have ** in two handed weapons and *** in halberds.
Greywolf and Bassilus were no problem.
The first ankheg was, but after killing it I levelled up and subsequent ones were easy to kill.
We killed many bandits etc in transit followed by Droth and Shoal, an ogre with a belt fetish, and Zargal.
We helped Mad Arcand and killed many sirine both in that area and near the lighthouse. Rage helped considerably against the sirine.
I recruited Ajantis which enabled me to recruit Safana. She enabled me to acquire Algernon's Cloak as well as numerous items at Ulgoth's Beard. I left the two of them there and recruited Viconia.
Crispin - human dragon disciple (Gate70)
CoreArcher XII - elven archer (Corey_Russell)
Stoic - dwarven defender (Grond0)
Session 7 saw Crispin with a plan of sorts. Would we follow it?
Mook > iMoD
Fallen Paladins
Kidnapper
Liches
Twisted Rune?
Slavers
Umar
Planar Sphere
Planar Prison
(at this point I referred to the screen capture and found it wanting once more, so had to rely on memory)
Never mind, that's what screenshots are for (memories). We got to Mook after 23 minutes, so she was probably the first on our list after returning from Trademeet. Or second perhaps as the City Gates lich was treated to a beating while we had fire, lightning, improved invisibility and spirit armour protections running.
On our way to Bodhi we re-homed an orphan. CoreArcher led against the vampires, using the Amulet of Power to nullify level drains. This worked well for about 20 minutes until Bodhi's attacks were too much and he stepped away. Stoic held the line, taking a few drains and Bodhi quit first.
The next 25 minutes or so had us upgrade the Mace of Disruption courtesy of Cromwell, and help Sir Sarles leave town in a grump before handing over the besmirched alloy to a temple. Also handing in Neb's head, and each time we visited the temple district we picked up, progressed, and completed the Fallen Paladins quest. Suffice to say they did not appreciate our haste, their slow, a glitterdust and a Daystar Sunray.
Stoic got through Crispin's stoneskins as a guard was attacking him and Crispin wanted to make sure we didn't have a reputational disaster affecting our archer. He managed to apply another stoneskin and keep Stoic's attention until he recovered, then applied a spirit armour so Stoic could not be charmed again (reduced from 5% chance to zero). Crispin used his third lesser restoration scroll on CoreArcher.
Crispin has 101 kills, CoreArcher 190 and Stoic 261. Party gear / loot
Xzar and Montaron joined me followed by Dorn.
We killed Kryll next.
The mines were navigated easily and Xan joined us. We tried to get Oublek killed by an assassin butt things went wrong and he was killed by one of my summoned skeletons. So instead of gaining gold, we lost gold as we needed to regain reputation.
That was the first major set-back.
Xan has been replaced by Baeloth and we are now at the FAI.
I am finding that I am not enjoying this run despite being successful to this point, I am therefore abondoning it in favour of a Drow Priest of Helm run.
Helma is attempting to go one better than Drizzt by being Lawful Good not Chaotic Good. As a drow her reputation has been reduced by 2.
The reason why I replaced Montaron with Safana was that I had put all his points in pickpocketting. I think that in future I will be using Safana for the pickpocketting and him for lockpicking, opening chests and the like. Pickpocketting is only needed for a very short time, mainly for Algernon's Cloak, and various items at Ulgoth's Beard.
Xzar didn't die once in this run. He survived until replaced by Baeloth.
Here are Helma's pretty good stats. I should have perrhaps dropped constitution and boosted charisma, but not a major issue.
I quite like the portrait. Didn't have to do much with it at all to make the image on the web into portraits.
The thieves in Candlekeep were given better weapons and armour. The armour is leather +1 so was only good for selling. The weapons apart from a staff were unusable by her so she sold the +1 small sword.
I like having those thieves a bit stronger as occasionally they kill charname particularly mages. Of course even if I had given them plate, command would have been sufficient to deal with them.
Imoen did a walkabout in Beregost and returned with a magical mace, a few potions and a considerable amount of gold. She advised me not to enter certain properties, so I suspect that she was seen performing tasks which were not exactly legal.
Being a Helmite I decided that it would be best if we parted company.
In an inn I calmed Marl and bought a tome which I took to Firebead.
I was able to help Melicamp.
Helma returned Tenya's Bowl to her and Joia's ring to her before taking on Tarnesh. A guard killed him!
Helma was sanctuaried and was waiting for the guards to weaken him before using the command spell. However she cast the spell too soon due to her script, and it became a touch and go battle.
She reached level 5 but died when she tried to kill one ankheg too many. She had cast seeking sword, so all her buffs/healing spells were unavailable. The ankheg was also near dead, but luck was not on Helma's side.
Now for a berserker and cleric drow duo
Both Neutral Good followers of Lathander
EDIT
I decided not to start with two characters, I'll play the cleric another time. Here is Tara, dwarven berserker.
Crispin - human dragon disciple (Gate70)
CoreArcher XII - elven archer (Corey_Russell)
Stoic - dwarven defender (Grond0)
Crispin steadily worked down his plan of action, the items below were more or less completed in 2 hours meaning the bulk of the plan remains)
Twisted Rune? (Staff Crispin)
Umar (Shadow armour CoreArcher)
Planar Sphere
Planar Prison (Boots of speed Stoic)
The dragon found it didn't go smoothly. Stoic had undertaken a do or die effort, with dwarven stance meaning he'd have been hard pressed to retreat anyway.
We made a strong start against these varied enemies but as time ticked by Stoic was de-buffed and taking damage. Crispin was wary of moving in too close as he was susceptible to area effects. We held on though and clawed our way to victory, Stoic managing to hold fast at the front.
Then we had a slight hiccup, Stoic leaving a golem alive as CoreArcher got stuck in multiplayer dialogue lag to become a hapless victim. This was enough for us to be glad Mekrath had left us a rod of resurrection in his will.
With our party back in order we ventured outside and picked up a demon heart before clearing both the fire and ice chambers on our way to the sphere's engine room.
With about 10 minutes of the session remaining we foolhardily stepped into the Planar Prison. We'd have cleared it but for the pesky kids time taken to loot, identify and rest for further identifications. We'll start the next session with our exit from there.
Crispin mentioned that the final battle was very quick and CoreArcher suggested a sorcerer fireball had sped things along. Crispin had to admit he'd not even arrived before the combat was over. Who'd have thought that Improved Haste on his companions would have seen such a rapid demise.
Reporting current no-reload run with yet again another divine caster.
Buck Greenteeth, Chaotic Good Halfling Cleric.
15/16/16/10/17/11 (85) with * in hammers and slings.
After 50 days solo having advanced to Chapter 4, Buck assembled a team of 4 with:
- Safana
- Minsc
- Dynaheir
Cloakwood Mines were cleared, as well as almost all wilderness areas, Ice Island, most of Chapter 5 quests in the big City. No real scary moment, other than Safana dying at an undetected lightning bolt trap in Firewine Bridge.
Now trying my hand at Durlag's Tower which I have never fully completed. Upper levels were cleared, so was Labyrinth lvl 1.
We are almost through Labyrinth lvl2 but had 2 very rough moments there. First in the throne room, got trapped in a Cloudkill against 4 great doppelgangers. Each party member lost consciousness at one point except Buck. Buffed skeletons and shorty saving throws saved the day.
Next the Dwarven Doom Guards were tough nuts to crack. A Stoneskinned Dynaheir ran around them with several Agannazar's Scorcher rays, only to get trapped in her own Web at some point. Minsc hasted with an oil of speed, and rushed in wielding Spider's Bane to save his witch. We all somehow managed to retreat to the bridge room were both Buck and Minsc tanked the dwarves, taking a lot of damage ; they had to pop more than 10 healing potions (each) to make it alive. They also drank potions of cloud giant strength, invulnerability, heroism, fire resistance.. our fastest movement speed helped us prevail eventually, many wand charges were used as well, it was a fun but highly chaotic battle scene!
Buck lvl 8
Safana lvl 9
Minsc lvl 7
Dynaheir lvl 9
I do not know what hit her, was that a trap she failed to detect? Cannot be that fireball surely...
Hey everyone. For the past few months, I have played a little bit of Baldur's Gate, on and off, and now I'm at a point where I want to report on the results of this gameplay. My primary goal for now is filling up the Hall of Heroes with the missing kits. However, since just playing a basic powerful party through the games without anything extra can get a bit stale for me at this point, I came up with a few themed groups - in the end, I couldnt decide which one to run first, so I decided to run three of them at the same time.
The idea was to create 3 groups with different approaches to the game and do the same content in one session with each of these groups - so, for example, one session would be: Ulcaster Ruins with group a), Ulcaster Ruins with group b) and Ulcaster Ruins with group c) - as a consequence, the pace of these runs was quite a bit slower. All runs are played on unmodded core rules, and I will skip TotSC (except for Durlag's upper levels) + SoD content (and most EE content, with one exception). Now, here are the groups:
Spearkensai party: This party is based around the fact that spears are, by any estimation, the least used weapon type, at least in this no-reload community, throughout these games. I thought about every single other weapon profiency and found people (and myself) using these at certain points, but spears are by far the least popular - so I decided to counteract that by focusing a party entirely on a Kensai with a planned grandmastery in spears. Since the Hall already has a Kensai - and the Kensai needs support - my bhaalspawn is a diviner, and we are joined by a cleric/thief, so we have alle types of spells/skills available - but the Kensai is supposed to the the actual damage, with the other two mostly using buffs or crowd control spells to support her.
Hastaria, elven diviner, lawful good.
12/19/17/18/18/8, *Sling; Starting with Sleep, Charm Person and Identify.
Doria, half-orc kensai, true neutral.
19/18/19/12/3/18, **Spear, **Two-Handed Weapon Style.
Praida, gnomish cleric/thief, true neutral.
18/18/18/14/17/3, *War Hammer, *Sling.
Anti-Magic party: Going further with my previous "no arcane spellcasting"-party, this one doesn't use spellcasters at all (or, almost none at all - the bhaalspawn is a stalker and might use haste to save on oils of speed) - in fact, every party member is chosen for their ability to hunt evil mages. This one should have fast-paced and easy gameplay early on due to powerful fighters, though the lack of supporting spells might become problematic much later in the game.
Karon, elven stalker, lawful good.
18,90/19/17/11/14/10, **Long Sword, ** Longbow.
Dominga, halfling bounty hunter, true neutral.
17/19/18/13/2/18, *Quarterstaff, *Shortbow.
Nita, human inquisitor, lawful good
18,78/18/18/10/13/18, **Two-Handed Sword, **Crossbow.
Brodmar, half-orc wizard slayer, true neutral.
19/18/19/16/9/3, **Flail, **Longbow.
Acid&Ice party: The plan for this party is to heavily rely on elemental damage. I thought about a group based on fire damage, but that's just a very common source of damage anyway and wouldn't involve that many unusual approaches. I thought about lightning damage as well, but Alesia has recently been playing a Priest of Talos, and that would've been the same bhaalspawn kit. Because there are almost no acid damage spells/weapons, I decided to combine this one with frost damage, leading to a party that's meant to combine as many sources of acid & frost damage as possible. As soon as weapons with the respective damage types are available, they should be used exclusively (exceptions are allowed for enemies immune to these damage types). Casters can't use any damaging spells except for those that deal acid or frost damage (I'll make an exception for chromatic orb - it will EVENTUALLY deal acid damage, so I count it as an acid damage spell right away), and they'll have to fill half of their spellslots on levels with available acid&frost damage spells with those. Here are the classes I chose (note: gore is turned off in this run, so the ice spells don't destroy all of our loot):
Firl, human invoker, lawful good. Our Bhaalspawn.
12/18/18/18/3/18, *Sling.
Invoker is the best choice for optimizing our chosen damage types, though the kit only improves chromatic orb and cone of cold, as the other spells have no saving throws available. For reference, here's a list of all the spells he can use for damage:
Chromatic Orb, Melf’s Acid Arrow, Fireshield: Blue, Icestorm, Cone of Cold, Death Fog. Not many. Other slots will have to be filled with all kinds of support spells. Fireshield: Blue will propably not get used because of the scary fireshield bug. Most of these spells quickly fall off in later BG2, though I imagine spell triggers with triple cones of cold can deal tons of damage even in the late game.
Delo, half-orc shaman, true neutral.
19/18/17/16/12/3, *Axe, *Shortbow
Why a shaman? Well, he does have one unique frost damage spell - writhing fog. It's very bad and does very little damage, but I wanted to assemble every possible unique source of my available damage types. He can also wield the Frostreaver Axe and use acid and ice arrows.
Koschmara, human dark moon monk, lawful evil.
18/18/18/18/9/6, *Sling, *Single-Weapon Style
This one's here for two things: The frozen fist ability, and a very specific item: The Gauntles of Aln Zekk, acquired in Rasaad's SoA questline. They add +3 damage on fist attacks and 15% chance of inflicting 1d10 cold damage on each successful melee attack (this is our exception for EE content).
Irmdor, half-elven totemic druid, true neutral
11/18/16/11/18/15, *Club, *Sling
Once again only here for one ability: Summon Spirit Wolves - right from the get go, these deal frost damage with their attacks. Other spirit summons aren't allowed, and we can't use insect plague or fire elementals, so this will be very much a supporting druid. He also can use Blackblood, one of the few acid damage weapons.
That's it for unique acid&ice abilites, so the other two characters are here to wield weapons with those damage types. Note that I won't allow for weapons that deal other types of elemental damage as well (FoA and Dragon's Breath).
Romero, elven fighter/thief, true neutral
18,87/19/17/16/3/8, **Longsword, **Longbow
Our Varscona user early on, + acid&ice arrows. Will later on get points in halberds (Duskblade), flails (Icestar) and, if we get lucky, scimitars (Spectral Brand).
Xerane, dwarven berserker, true neutral
18,88/17/19/18/8/1, **Two-Handed Sword, **Halberd
Joril's Dagger as a weapon of choice in early SoA (I didn't know this one did cold damage until I researched it), later on The Wave.
These are our parties. My expectation, when starting, was to get at least one of them into the Hall, though I hoped for as many as possible. Let's see how things went.
Durlag's is both fun and dangerous!
Tara is now level 6 with a reputation of 20. Still in Chapter 2. She killed a lot of ankheg and is now proficient in doing so having faced two at a time.
She retrieved the Charisma tome but has not yet met Dynaheir. Currently resting at the Carnival. Needs to do some shopping whilst reputation is high.