SoD scales very highly with the difficulty selection (adds not only the extra damage, but tons of new enemies and even new abilities to existing ones - the Shadow Aspect and Belhifet himself being the most extreme examples), so insane is much harder than core compared to the base game or BG2. It's not advisable to just go in and straight up fight any of the big groups of undead in the opening dungeon (or later on) - they can be beaten that way with full buffs, but it's risky, will take a lot of resources and resting in that dungeon is a pain. Protection from Undead scrolls on a single character to clear most of those (with some summons added when fighting the non-corporeal undead to draw out invisible opponents) are the easiest way to deal with the dungeon, the other typical way is to have a bunch of necklaces of missles and wands of fire (and potions of explosion/fiery burning) ready on all your characters and throw a bunch of them at each group to pretty much kill them instantly (careful positioning is required). There are more options, but a lot of them require specific party setups, lots of time or skipping a bunch of stuff.
And I agree, the fact that there's no way to resurrect fallen party members in Chapter 1 of SoD (when it's already been shown in BG1 that there are a ton of temples in the city) is a huge oversight and very annoying if you lose someone in the dungeon. It has caused me a lot of pain before as well. Still, I believe you can recover - the official SoD NPCs are fairly strong after all and can replace even chunked party members, and two lost tomes isn't the end of the world, when, in BG2 there are multiple ways to boost your ablities via items or potions to whatever level you need them to be at.
I could talk about how the party did well in Durlag's Tower, or how Daveourn and his battle horror friends were destroyed by skull traps. But it all came undone against the necromancers on the 2nd floor of Sorcerous Sundries. The safest play here by far was 1) remove fear on party 2) send couple of skeleton distractions 3) silence them 4) kill them. However Boor was very impressed by his skull traps in the Cloakwood and wanted to impress the party again. Well this time the skull trap didn't kill a single mage and the whole party failed their save vs horror. Predictably everyone died - RIP Corecleric XIX.
I've not got much in the way of commitments today and thought I would see if I could manage another one-day challenge as part of my ongoing long-life challenge. I spent some time in advance rolling up a high-stat archer, which is one of the relatively few classes left that I've not yet attempted, so was able to start straight in with the action at 2.30 am my time.
Hour 1
Buy equipment and leave Candlekeep. Kill Imoen / Xzar / Montaron for their equipment
Shoal (level 3 - +25 HPs)
Marl
Shoot Neera for gem bag
Stealth boots from hobgoblin
Nip to Nashkel to learn Bhaal CLW
Scroll case from Firebead
Shoot Algernon for cloak
+1 bolts for High Hedge golems and get potion case (level 4 - +14 HPs). Buy potions magic blocking and mirrror eyes for emergencies
Basilisks with Korax (level 5 - +13 HPs; level 6 - +10 HPs)
Piercing belt from ogre
Pick up pantaloons at FAI and kill Jaheira for invisibility potion
Nashkel Mine. Rest to get LMD
Grab potions freedom and invisibility from Revenant
Sneak attack Nimbul
Shoot Tranzig
Charm Taurgosz at Bandit Camp to get his equipment. Sneak in to Tazok's tent to grab letters. Rest for Bhaal horror
Sil and sirines using clarity potion. Shoot golems to get constitution tome
I have taken a number of screenshots, which I might add in later if the run goes well. Here though is my character record at end of first hour. Archer L6, 76 HPs, 66 kills
Hour 2
Sneak in to loot ankheg nest. Return Tenya's bowl
Amulet for Mr Colquetle
Help Dryad of Cloud Peaks (level 7 - +7 HPs)
Resurrect cat
Grab charisma tome
Return Joia's ring
Escort Brage to temple and talk to Oublek
Kill Greywolf
Take Samuel to FAI
Help Ardrouine
Save Arabelle
Help Bjornin (rep 20)
With prices now at their keenest, so a bit of shopping
Sneak through Cloakwood with help of potion of freedom
Necklace of Missiles for Drasus
Sneak through mine and use fireballs on battle horrors. Potion of magic blocking for Davaeorn
Dexterity tome
Two more Necklaces
Shoot Ramazith then sneak up through his tower for intelligence tome
Picked up Helm of Balduran
Sneaked into see Degrodel. He managed to cast horror, so had to take a quick potion to avoid risk there
Picked up Cloak of Balduran
Do poison quest to get wisdom tome. Lothander got away, but Marek was poisoned by both dagger and dart (level 8 - +8 HPs)
Hour 3
Iron Throne Level skip and darts of stunning for enemies
Back at Candlekeep loot tombs using giant strength / DUHM
Ignore Prat, but kill greater basilisks on way out
Back in City final bit of shopping then darts of stunning for Slythe
At palace, buffed up and used bolts of lightning. Two of the dopplegangers attacked me, so I didn't think it was worth trying Bhaal horror to disrupt the attacking pattern. Belt was only slightly injured
Sneaked through the maze and remembered to rest to get second DUHM
Semaj and Tazok were killed by lightning trap. Angelo is harder to get so he was persuaded to show himself before I used stealth to disappear and then shoot him. A dispelling arrow for Sarevok made him easy, though I had to quickly disappear before that when the web/stinking cloud trap triggered
Sneaked through the SoD dungeon and used bolts of lightning to persuade Korlasz to surrender. Got to level 9 (+11 HPs) shortly after that
Did a bit of shopping
Hour 4
Iron Throne Level skip and darts of stunning for enemies
Back at Candlekeep loot tombs using giant strength / DUHM
Ignore Prat, but kill greater basilisks on way out
Back in City final bit of shopping then darts of stunning for Slythe
At palace, buffed up and used bolts of lightning. Two of the dopplegangers attacked me, so I didn't think it was worth trying Bhaal horror to disrupt the attacking pattern. Belt was only slightly injured
Sneaked through the maze and remembered to rest to get second DUHM
Semaj and Tazok were killed by lightning trap. Angelo is harder to get so he was persuaded to show himself before I used stealth to disappear and then shoot him. A dispelling arrow for Sarevok made him easy, though I had to quickly disappear before that when the web/stinking cloud trap triggered
Sneaked through the SoD dungeon and used bolts of lightning to persuade Korlasz to surrender. Got to level 9 (+11 HPs) shortly after that
Did a bit of shopping. Killed Korlasz while getting wine
At Coast Way Crossing used stealth to avoid combat on bridge
Ignored Coast Way Forest. Sneaked through Troll Claw Woods
Sneaked into get Firefly sling in orc and troll ambush area
Dart of stunning for Ziatar
Full buffs for Neothelid and a couple of potions of firebreath - then another of those for Akanna
Single dagger for Morentherene on way out
Young green dragon stunned in ambush area
At Boareskyr Bridge killed Vichand for his scroll and then surrendered fort.
On the bridge, I didn't have the Ring of Energy but had a decent attack with dispelling arrows and had no problems after disrupting the mage's initial spell
Ignored the myconid ambush area on the way to the Coalition Camp. Did a bit more shopping there and picked up Bwoosh and poison
Ignored dead magic ambush area and sneaked through Dead Man's Pass on the way to rescue Skie at Dragonspear
At Underground River, killed some myconids for their summoning pod. Stunned cyclops and used firebreath to quickly kill first lot of guards.
It's getting towards 7 am my time, so time for some breakfast I think .
Hour 5
Placed Bwoosh and then poisoned food and water while invisible before running away
Game crashed when travelling back to Coalition Camp, but autosave quickly got me underway again
Exploding arrows made short work of the invasion forces. Swift Rabbit got one nasty backstab in, but died from the explosion that killed the last of his companions
Ashatiel was stunned by my first dart
Ran through first hell area before using arrows of explosion in second (archer bonuses making those very effective even without fire damage)
Buffed up and took the Hellevator. Once all enemies were dead, used 5 Champions Strength scrolls. Even using non-proficient sling, I had THAC0 of -17 and it only took 27 of the 80 +3 bullets of darkness to kill Belhifet
Ran through epilogue, remembering to take pantaloons out of the bag of holding before ending the game
I transferred to SoA with 730k XP, so was able to take level 10 immediately
Not yet finished the first level of Jon's dungeon.
Archer L10, 121 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 33 kills (+280 in BGEE/SoD)
Hour 6
Didn't bother with elemental plane on first dungeon level
Annoyingly, Ulvaryl narrowly survived a bolt and then disappeared the same instant that I gulped a potion of firebreath to finish her off
Made a few donations at the temple
Restored the circus (level 11)
Transferred Copper Coronet to Hendak
Counter-ambushed Suna Seni
Rescued Renfeld, stealth shot Prebek & Sanasha and looted harper building
Paid Gaelen Bayle and got goodies from Aran Linvail
Ran away from orog ambush on way to Trademeet
Had first real escape of the run, when trying to stealth-shoot Taquee to get the efreeti - he ignored the fact I disappeared into the shadows and continued casting flesh to stone (a bit odd as he clearly could not see through invisible as he wasn't trying to attack me when in stealth before that). I had no counter to that, but managed to save
Archer L11, 129 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 104 kills (+280 in BGEE/SoD)
Hour 7
Efreeti soaked up stone to flesh from other genies
Picked up shield of harmony and bought cloak of displacement
At Watcher's Keep bought potion case. Cleared top level (apart from FoD trap), getting to level 12 in process
Went to de'Arnise Hold, but changed my mind before entering
Instead went to Temple sewers and killed rakshasa for its cloak, then dealt with Mekrath. I had a bit of an aberration when I left there thinking I'd not got any protection against charm to get the portal gem and then realised I just had my crossbow equipped and hence was not benefitting from the SoH. I then compounded that error by wasting far too long killing the umber hulks on guard there, rather than just leaving them alone
Solved the skinner murders, but not yet dealt with Rune Assassins
Progress through BGEE/SoD felt pretty good, but it feels like I'm making rather heavier weather of SoA so far. I've got a couple of other RL things to do for a little bit now though, so hopefully will be able to concentrate better after that.
Archer L12, 132 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 162 kills (+280 in BGEE/SoD)
Hour 8
Finishing off the Rune Assassins was enough to get to level 13 and a nice APR boost
Sneaked into the Planar Prison and worked through there, picking up boots of speed and the nice Pixie Prick dagger from the bounty hunter. I had another lucky escape there when I failed to notice that the Warden was casting at me and a clouded aura meant I couldn't block a disintegrate spell - but once more I saved and escaping the place got me to level 14
Then it was off to de'Arnise. I didn't bother with most of the trolls there, but have made the FoA and just got TorGal left to finish off
Archer L14, 138 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 235 kills (+280 in BGEE/SoD)
Hour 9
TorGal died without fuss and I reported in to Nalia
Next up was Umar Hills, where I soon got another level for investigating some mysterious disappearances
In the temple, sneaked past the early encounters and the first lich. The second was worn down with summons. For Thaxy I hid behind the pillars and shot him when not blinded. The Shade Lord was just shot up, gaining me another level
Neb was rendered unconscious by the Pixie Prick while doing the Sir Sarles quest. Unfortunately, writing these notes broke my concentration and I then handed over the genuine illilthium to Sir Sarles. However, given I can use the AoP that's not a major issue for this character
Opened up access to the lich in the sewers and then used a PfU scroll on that. The RoAC gave me a safe save to access the lich in the Bridge District and the City Gates lich provided me with Daystar. That just left Kangaxx and Daystar made short work of him
Off to Windspear, where planting some acorns provided yet another level. Inside, the hour ran out with the Ruhk Transmuter rendered unconscious
Archer L17, 147 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 313 kills (+280 in BGEE/SoD)
'Long-life challenge' - archer (10th and final update)
Hour 10
Moving into the dungeon, the golems took a little while to shoot down, but a Daystar sunray seemed to have speeded things up against undead, though there were three vampires left after that. My melee vs them wasn't great and I had a mindless moment when deciding to open a bit of distance and switch to crossbow. That would have been fair enough if just taking a single shot, but I didn't immediately switch back to my dagger to get the benefit of the SoH.
That may have been because I'd been thinking just before then that it wouldn't be too long before I could switch to dual wielding for some fights, but at this time my spell save of 1 was not safe. I'd previously got away twice with saves at rather worse odds, but this occasion was third time unlucky as the 9% chance of failure proved too great ...
@Grond0 Sorry to hear of the demise of your archer. Seems like the charm helmet could have come in handy that fight...and is there any reason you couldn't just dual-wield daystar and IMoD? Seems even with archer melee penalty that would work...
@Grond0 Sorry to hear of the demise of your archer. Seems like the charm helmet could have come in handy that fight...and is there any reason you couldn't just dual-wield daystar and IMoD? Seems even with archer melee penalty that would work...
I never had a charm helmet and wouldn't have used one anyway with the Helm of Balduran available - it would be easier for me to make the SoH active rather than switch helmets. I lost the chance to make the iMoD, but it was charm rather than level drain that was the problem with the vampires anyway. If I'd got around to dual wielding I guess I would have used Belm in order to allow 8 APR with the Pixie Prick using Gaxx haste - that would paralyze most enemies quickly, thus making relatively poor AC less of an issue.
@grond0 I suppose another option is that sword from Planar Prison - that gives charm immunity. With that you could then dual-wield and still use HoB. EDIT: I forgot to mention when I am solo I often use a protection from undead scroll. There quite a few scrolls available and if solo could afford one that fight.
@Grond0 Sorry to hear of the demise of your archer. Seems like the charm helmet could have come in handy that fight...and is there any reason you couldn't just dual-wield daystar and IMoD? Seems even with archer melee penalty that would work...
I never had a charm helmet and wouldn't have used one anyway with the Helm of Balduran available - it would be easier for me to make the SoH active rather than switch helmets. I lost the chance to make the iMoD, but it was charm rather than level drain that was the problem with the vampires anyway. If I'd got around to dual wielding I guess I would have used Belm in order to allow 8 APR with the Pixie Prick using Gaxx haste - that would paralyze most enemies quickly, thus making relatively poor AC less of an issue.
When I face vampires, I always switch to helm of charm protection on all characters able to wield helmet.
Domination is more dangerous than level drain IMHO.
I’ve decided to start over with another minimum stat party (my tablet crashed since the last time this happened). One thing I’ve learned: I’m going to try to go with a smaller party. The real punch in a minimum stat challenge comes from the dragon disciple. With a 4 person party, the sorcerer will level up faster, which is what we really want.
The party will consist of:
Stumpy Rockbottom (LG Dwarven Defender) level 1 12/9/16/3/3/1 14 HP
Hala Penyo (CN Elf Dragon Disciple) level 1 10/14/6/8/3/15 5 HP
Ban Daide (NG Half Elf Cleric/Ranger) level 1/1 13/13/14/4/14/3 9 HP
Robyn Banx (CG Gnome Illusionist/Thief) level 1/1 6/16/8/9/2/3 5 HP
Robyn is the protagonist. I figure we can get her a familiar this way, because she has the lowest natural HP. She should stay relatively safe in the back with a short bow.
I am going to allow myself to add characters along the way, but only so I can do their quests or steal some gear (I’m looking at that invisibility potion Jahiera!). If I’m doing a characters quest, s/he won’t help out.
Trio 64 - update 1 Wolfie - half-elf shapeshifter (Grond0)
Ash - human dragon disciple (Gate70)
Russell XXXVI - human paladin (Corey_Russell)
Previous run
With just over half the session available, there was plenty of time for a new party to make a splash (of blood). Gate70 is once more trying his luck with a dragon disciple, but this time that looks to be part of a well-balanced party.
As usual we headed for Shoal after leaving Candlekeep. Wolfie was keen to get up close and personal to take full advantage of her lack of a melee weapon.
After confirming, not to his surprise, that Ash had protection from petrification available, Wolfie led the party to the basilisk area. He would have liked to stay in melee there, but the second basilisk tackled took a chomp out of him. That led to the nearby greater basilisk being attacked with missiles - which took quite a while to take effect.
By the time the other basilisks were dead though, Wolfie had rather more HPs and the second greater basilisk only took a round or so to deal with thanks to a nice critical finish.
Mutamin proved a bit more of a problem. Ash successfully webbed him, but he broke free at the first opportunity and targeted Ash with horror. He saved vs that though and, by taking one each of the succeeding Melf's Acid Arrows, everyone stayed healthy enough while Mutamin was shot down.
Kirian's group were also webbed, but they were also already blind, so not in a position to do anything even if they had broken free of the web.
A trip to the FAI secured the Ring of Wizardry for Ash. Wolfie was level 5 by this time and keen to demonstrate to Tarnesh that mirror images were no protection against Call Lightning.
Lightning was also used in Beregost to get the gem bag safely from Neera. Ash then blinded Silke, though it took him 6 attempts to manage that.
Meilum was the next target, with the aim of getting his bracers. Ash attempted to blind him, but Meilum saved and started a conversation. Ash hadn't really been expecting that and chose the wrong option there - Meilum then managing to get away before we could chew through his HPs.
There was no similar reprieve for Greywolf though, in the last action of the session.
Leaving Candlekeep after looting a bunch of crates. The only significant change is Robyn’s HP went to 11 after summoning a pseudo dragon, which will be taking up an inventory spot for the rest of the game.
Oh well, we met Imoen, who was kind enough to give us her bow and some potions. Robyn is the only one who can use her wand, so she took that as well.
We wandered around a bit, met a useless guy who wouldn’t help us out, and ended up looting Gorion and a few guys he managed to take out. Even if I can’t use this stuff yet, we can sell it if we ever find this Friendly Arms Inn he kept yamming on about. We ended up running into a wolf who looked really mean and Stumpy had to go into his defense mode to fight him off, while the rest of the gang shot missiles at it. Stumpy got hurt a bit but he insists it’s just a scratch.
Then we met two dorks that were kind of mean when Robyn spoke to them, but they still wanted to come with us.
We invited them, but ended up just borrowing their gear and ditching them, just like Imoen.
We moved on towards the FAI, met an old man who gave us directions. We killed a gibberling who was kind of annoying and found a ring in a rock. Weird.
Then Robyn, Ban and Hala got really tired. We decided to push on to the FAI though, none of us are in the mood for camping out here when an inn is so close.
Ah, that sword... Adjatha the Drinker. A +2 longsword, requiring beating one of the more brutal mini-bosses in the game (at least when using SCS).
Does anyone ever end up using it? I wonder how the design decision for where to include that, and what its power should be, went...
I would say the drinker is most useful for Haer'Dalis which makes sense considering where you get the sword. I will sometimes use for my thieves since they can't use SoH or charm helmets.
The Crew have put in some more work, starting with a trip to the Umar Hills. They made short work of the initial quests there. At the temple area they punished Anath for his misdeeds before putting an end to large quantities of undead. The groups inside the temple were led by greater mummies, which were easy kills and it didn't take long to get to level 13. They ran Thaxy round while shooting, at the cost of an oil of speed for Vito who accidentally became the target at one point and needed to break off. The Shade Lord was shot down before he could buff.
After paying at Watcher's Keep to restore level drain (I'd originally thought that was temporary) they briefly nipped back to Umar to pick up Valygar's body. Then they used that to open up the Planar Sphere. Inside, Kayardi stunned one of them and mazed another, but was still no real threat. Lavok was beaten down by missile attacks that could bypass his improved mantle and Tolgerias went the same way. Without the same level of protection, the demons lasted only moments each.
The Crew had bought the Shield of Balduran some time ago and decided it was about time that saw some use - Baby Face got the opportunity to pad his kills with that. The Crew were still not high enough level to generate a lich, so quickly disposed of the undead on the way to find more beholders - where they soon gained another level. All but one of the blind priests died quickly, but the last one had missile reflection up. I have a bad habit of not noticing that, but did eventually do so here and switch to melee to finish the priest off. The Rift Device was used to set the Unseeing Eye up for the kill. I took the device straight back to the temple before going to sort Gaal out.
The only major remaining encounter area in Athkatla was the Planar Prison and that was the Crew's next target. On entry they shot the bounty hunter mage down before he could buff and soon moved on round. All the encounters were pretty quick, with only the umber hulks supporting the Warden doing much damage.
That still left Windspear Hills in the surrounding area and the Crew went there next. The game froze in a cutscene at the start of that, so I had to load the autosave again. Chieftain DigDag died at the entrance to the dungeon, before could run away, and the Crew worked through most enemies just as quickly. They got to level 15 while fighting Samia's mob and went on to take on Firkraag. That was the only worrying fight, with the dragon's speed making it difficult for a lead character to kite him - but missile fire took him down before he could inflict any casualties.
Al (PC) - L15, 128 HPs (incl. 5 from Helm), 142 kills (+305 in BGEE/SoD), ***** 2-handed sword / **** longbow
Baby Face - L15, 129 HPs, 220 kills (+298 in BGEE/SoD), 2 deaths, ***** long sword / **** crossbow
Bugsy - L15, 123 HPs, 146 kills (+260 in BGEE/SoD), 0 deaths, ***** hammer / **** shortbow
Carlo - L15, 133 HPs, 166 kills (+283 in BGEE/SoD), 0 deaths, ***** flail / **** sling
Mad Dog - L15, 143 HPs, 329 kills (+290 in BGEE/SoD), 3 deaths, ***** axe / *** dual wielding / * dagger
Vito - L15, 126 HPs, 150 kills (+286 in BGEE/SoD), 1 death, ***** scimitar / **** darts
@Grond0 said, "After paying at Watcher's Keep to restore level drain (I'd originally thought that was temporary)..."
I remember the level drain from Thaxxy as being temporary as well, maybe 30 seconds? Maybe that's only in vanilla and not EE.
It was like that in EE as well for quite a while. I think it was only the last update (or maybe the one before) when that changed, but I'd forgotten that at the time.
I'm suffering from restartitis at the moment and, even though I've got a number of other runs currently active, I fancied another go at Biff. Once again he's only allowed to use his own melee in combat, so no summons, NPCs, charmed allies (looking at you Korax), invisible blockers (hello familiar) or use of spells / magic items on anyone but Biff. I'm not sure whether I permitted casting positive spells on friendly targets in the previous run, but definitely not this time.
He's again had a good share of luck so far. The first close incident was relatively early on when he just survived a skeleton archer ambush - 2 attackers missing with shots when he was down to 3 HPs and running for the map edge. He also got away with one of my bad habits when forgetting to use PfP after a rest - very fortunately his ghoul touch attack from invisible not only hit, but paralysed, a greater basilisk. He also only just survived a critical from an ankheg taking away 27 of the 30 HPs he had available.
After going through the Nashkel Mine, a ghoul touch on Mulahey worked, saving any need to retreat or use the Greenstone Amulet there. His death provided Biff his final BGEE level. At the Bandit Camp, improved invisibility rendered Venkt harmless and the rest were easy meat. The same applied to Davaeorn and there were no further problems in the City or during the return to Candlekeep.
After beating Slythe up, Biff headed for the palace. I thought the odds were stacked against him managing this fight, but he again got lucky with a couple of the dopplegangers targeting him initially, while another attacked a guard. That reduced the pressure on Belt enough for him to survive.
After fighting through the maze, Biff went into the old temple and showed himself to Sarevok - before using an invisibility potion to make a swift withdrawal. A PfM scroll allowed him to beat up Semaj before Biff pulled out Tazok and took advantage of a decisive weapon speed advantage to attack him without response. I wanted to avoid dealing with Angelo's exploding arrows, so Sarevok was pulled out next - after the PfM scroll had expired so that Biff could use stoneskins. Sarevok wasn't easy to hit in standard hit and run attacks and got some retaliations in himself. However, Biff still had plenty of resources in hand when the big man was on his last legs and he went invisible and used DUHM to set up the finish.
Biff transferred to SoD with 342k XP, so was able to immediately take his 10th level.
Sorcerer L10, 56 HPs (incl. 6 from familiar), 239 kills
The first target for the day was the Gnoll Stronghold to get the charisma tome. Ash has been pretty restrained so far about using his breath weapon when that might hit his companions. That spreads so far to the sides of him that he needs to be in the lead to avoid collateral damage and he did manage to get ahead enough to take out one group of xvarts.
A bit more reputation gathering culminated in reaching reputation 20 by sorting out some half-ogres for Bjornin. That also gained Russell a magic shield and he now indicated his willingness to take on some ankhegs. Those fights were made much easier as Ash hit a great streak in their nest with his blindness spell - the final one there making it 9 out of 9 successes. He rounded that up outside to 10 out of 10.
To gather funds, we carried 7 of the shells back to sell in Beregost. Wolfie did the wolf's share of that task with 5 in his inventory - which, even with 19 strength, saw him struggling to walk. On a couple of occasions on the way he needed to heal Russell, but with a natural strength of 9 his weight limit was only 10% as great in human form and he had to persuade Russell to come to him to get the healing. The cash was soon put to good use with Ash being pleased with his new dagger (that regularly turned enemies green), while Russell's full plate made him a slightly tougher nut to crack.
Wolfie was interested in taking on the sirines next, but Russell pointed out that the clarity potion found in Candlekeep had disappeared into thin air last session and we had no obvious alternative way to deal with them safely. Successfully rejecting his immediate impulse to deal with them not safely, Wolfie went to Ulgoth's Beard to get the Greenstone Amulet. Russell used that to kill the first group of sirines, but there was a slight hiccup with Sil's group when most of the initial charge used expired while chasing a late appearing carrion crawler - meaning Russell got charmed and chased his companions around for a while. After finishing off the sirines, Russell led the way inside the pirate cave to tackle some golems. The first of those got a couple of hits on him and Russell used a potion of absorption to render the others pretty helpless.
The Doomsayer was hit hard by magic missiles and insect bites and failed to get through any of Russell's defenses. Ash thought Durlag's Tower might be the source for further quick XP, but Wolfie decided that we should already be plenty tough enough to do a bit of work on the main quest. At the Nashkel Mine, Mulahey got stuck in a web and didn't manage to call for help. After reporting to the mayor in Nashkel, Ash used web again to deal with Nimbul - part of the intention of that being to ensure that Rasaad was also stuck in order to prevent him getting the kill this time. Back in Beregost, Tranzig was attacked by a charmed Algernon and provided Wolfie with a new cloak.
On to the Bandit Camp, where Wolfie produced a nymph for the first time - which immediately showed its value by holding Taurgosz. Inside Tazok's tent, a potion of magic blocking allowed Russell to ignore Venkt's spells. The others joined him inside once the horror had been used to quickly deal with the opposition.
In the Cloakwood we had no options for invisibility or freedom, so were careful initially around the web traps in the second area - Ash making a rare use of his wand of fire to kill the last of the group of ettercaps rather than risk triggering the trap. Russell did though get a bit over-confident after that while activating the nearby traps and got held while in the sight of a huge spider. Ash and Wolfie were also held and couldn't immediately come to his aid, but huge spider venom is pretty benign and Russell didn't take much damage before Ash was able to unlimber his wand once more. Inside Centeol's lair, Russell took a couple of potions to help him deal with the opposition there and grab Spider's Bane.
At the Cloakwood Mine, Ash blinded Genthore and attempted to do the same to Kysus, but was spotted by Drasus in the process. However, a quick web helped disable the opposition and they were dealt with at the small cost of an acid arrow for Russell. We moved into the mine and rested there, to be ready for some immediate action next time.
I'm suffering from restartitis at the moment and, even though I've got a number of other runs currently active, I fancied another go at Biff. Once again he's only allowed to use his own melee in combat, so no summons, NPCs, charmed allies (looking at you Korax), invisible blockers (hello familiar) or use of spells / magic items on anyone but Biff. I think I may have permitted casting positive spells on friendly targets in the previous run, but not this time.
He's again had a good share of luck so far. The first close incident was relatively early on when he just survived a skeleton archer ambush - 2 attackers missing with shots when he was down to 3 HPs. He also got away with one of my bad habits when forgetting to use PfP after a rest - very fortunately his ghoul touch attack from invisible not only hit, but paralysed, a greater basilisk. He also only just survived a critical from an ankheg taking away 27 of the 30 HPs he then had available.
After going through the Nashkel Mine, a ghoul touch on Mulahey worked, saving any need to retreat or use the Greenstone Amulet there. His death provided Biff his final BGEE level. At the Bandit Camp, improved invisibility rendered Venkt harmless and the rest were easy meat. The same applied to Davaeorn and there were no further problems in the City or during the return to Candlekeep.
After beating Slythe up, Biff headed for the palace. I thought the odds were against him managing this fight, but he got lucky with a couple of the dopplegangers targeting him initially, while another attacked a guard. That reduced the pressure on Belt enough for him to survive.
After fighting through the maze, Biff went into the old temple and showed himself to Sarevok - before using an invisibility potion to make a swift withdrawal. A PfM scroll allowed him to beat up Semaj before Biff pulled out Tazok and took advantage of his weapon speed advantage to attack him without response. I wanted to avoid dealing with Angelo's exploding arrows, so Sarevok was pulled out next - after the PfM scroll had expired so that Biff could use stoneskins. Sarevok wasn't easy to hit in standard hit and run attacks and got some retaliations in himself. However, Biff still had plenty of resources in hand when the big man was on his last legs and went invisible and used DUHM to set up the finish.
Biff transferred to SoD with 342k XP, so was able to immediately take his 10th level.
Sorcerer L10, 56 HPs (incl. 6 from familiar), 239 kills
In the SoD opening dungeon, Biff persuaded Porios to surrender the first group of enemies. PfU helped him beat up several more groups on the way to find Korlasz. She was paralysed by his opening attack, but Biff let her recover so she could surrender her group - getting to level 11 there. He still managed to prevent Korlasz escaping though.
After stocking up on yet more scrolls and potions in the City, Biff headed for the Coast Way Crossing - though he did nothing there, other than use invisibility to avoid any combat on the bridge. He moved swiftly on to the Forest of Wyrms and sneaked into the old temple to find Ziatar - improved invisibility and stoneskins kept him safe there until ghoul touch demonstrated its magic. I doubted that ghoul touch would work against the neothelid, so Biff just buffed up for protection before beating it up with his staff. Ghoul touch was effective against Akanna and her aerial servants, but with one of those still active I failed to notice Biff's stoneskin had dissipated and a 46 HP critical sent him running away to quickly renew that before returning to finish the job. There was not much to be gained by killing Morentherene, so the sleeping dragon was left in peace for once. However, one of its offspring was taken down on the road to Boarskyr Bridge.
Biff avoided most combat there, just intimidating Vichand into giving up the spell scroll. He buffed up fully for the fight on the bridge, but that proved much easier than expected after the mage was paralysed before he could buff.
At the Coalition Camp, Biff picked up the Bwoosh and poison. Those were placed invisibly at the Underground River before Biff returned to the Camp to await the invasion forces. His buffs made him difficult for the ogres and trolls to hit and archers soon cut those down. He added spell immunity to buffs for the mages with the intention of preventing dispel magic working, but got caught out there when spell thrust removed spell immunity and he was dispelled before he could restore it. That made the fight a bit more nervous than expected, but the wizard slayers did a good job of helping him. For the third fight I forgot to use spell immunity and things looked bad when Biff was dispelled and his HPs suddenly tumbled down to 3 - fortunately his aura was clear and an invisibility potion saved him there. Left to manage on their own for a few rounds, the supporting war mages all died, but Biff managed to come through once more against the half dozen remaining enemies.
Dosia rejuventated him - though at the cost of her own life - for the final conflict. Spell thrust was used again on him early on there, but Biff managed to withdraw and reapply spell immunity - only to find shortly afterwards that he hadn't got electricity protection and lose half his HPs. A couple of potions of magic protection provided general support against magic while Biff used his own spells for to support his melee against the remaining enemies.
At Dragonspear, Biff failed this time to paralyze Ashatiel immediately. A couple more potions of magic protection helped him gradually grind his way through mirrors and stoneskins though until Ashatiel finally succumbed.
In hell, just for the hell of it, Biff again rested without killing all Thrix's summoned devils. This time though he was careful not to get trapped while waiting for the door to allow his exit. After buffing up he took the Hellevator up to find Belhifet. For most characters I rely heavily on Caelar in that fight - not controlling her, but keeping her alive using restoration scrolls. Biff was not permitted to do that in this run, so I allowed Caelar to join Belhifet. One problem with that I hadn't realised was that Caelar followed Biff when he was invisible - so could attack the moment he showed himself. That meant most of the damage against Belhifet was through fire shield (blue) and he still had more than 200 HPs at the point Biff had already used most of the stoneskins and mirror images he had available. There were still dozens of invisibility potions available and I had a number of Otiluke's scrolls that would potentially allow Belhifet to damage himself on fireshields a bit quicker than his regeneration revived him. However, success in the fight still seemed problematic when another oddity ended the run with a bang. I saw an attack from Belhifet take away Biff's last stoneskin and immediately paused to allow him to cast a new one. The casting animation showed well before the next attack came in, so I assumed all was well - but Belhifet's next attack was a critical hit and no stoneskin stopped it for some reason ...
Biff had had more than his share of luck in that run, so I don't feel too bad about the ending. However, it would be nice at some point to see how Biff would fare in BG2EE. I think I need to review my tactics for the final battle in SoD though to be more confident of having the resources to beat Belhifet.
Deciding I had unfinished business, I quickly started a new run with Biff. The previous attempt had had a number of close shaves and I've been trying to reduce risks taken thus far - still using the same set of melee-only rules. The only thing I think I will change (if I get that far) is to allow Caelar to join me. Given she won't be controlled or given any spell support, she's really no different to the dukes fighting Sarevok at the coronation. I think in any case it's a game design mistake that requires her to join you to fight Belhifet rather than having the option to fight as a neutral - if you have a full party, she will in fact fight in that way as a neutral and her behavior up to that point suggests that would be more appropriate whether or not there's a party slot available. I still won't allow casting spells on her though, so that change will make things easier but not simple.
Minimising risks meant being choosy about which XP I went after early on. That was gained from:
Candlekeep tasks - 345
Gnolls at High Hedge - 165
Firebead book - 300
Calm Marl - 900
Perdue's sword - 500
Hobgoblins and Joia's ring - 610 (level 2 - +6 HPs)
Hobgoblins and Zhurlong's boots - 530
Noober - 415
Revenant dagger - 900
Repatriate Brage - 1000 (level 3 - +5 HPs)
Biff now knew PfP and went to pick on some lesser basilisks. He used his staff there rather than the higher APR from chill touch as that allowed him to attack from distance and hence get the chance to retreat if a basilisk switched to melee. The first 3 of those took him to level 4 - +6 HPs.
With travel now safe, Biff did a few reputation quests. While in the Cloud Peaks in search of the charisma tome, he took advantage of a winter wolf ambush - he still had Gorion's belt, so that was free XP. Shortly after that he beat up a couple of ogrillons to get to level 5 - +5 HPs.
He could now use invisible attacks using ghoul touch to make many encounters simple - like the couple of greater basilisks left earlier. Greywolf and then Meilum gave a bit more XP to take him to level 6 - +5HPs.
Helping Charleston Nib got reputation to 20 and, with friends now available, Biff benefited from the cheapest shop prices while doing a bit of shopping. That included the +3 staff and dagger of venom to greatly improve his melee. The staff was used to kill the High Hedge golems before heading for Durlag's Tower to kill more basilisks and get to level 7 - +4 HPs.
At the Lighthouse area, a couple of Greenstone charges allowed him to deal with the first group of sirines and get to level 8 - +5 HPs.
In the Nashkel Mine, Mulahey survived an initial paralyzing attack, but after resting and working through his supporters Biff used invisibility to dodge various spells before successfully touching him.
After beating up Nimbul and Tranzig and buying a Robe of the Archmagi, Biff headed for the Bandit Camp. A plague of paralysis spread across Taurgosz and his bandits before the occupants of Tazok's tent caught the disease.
After being pretty cautious up to this point, I was rather careless in the Cloakwood when trying to run through a web trap in the second area thinking (wrongly) I was still invisible after travelling. I had no stoneskin and was duly held and poisoned twice by a huge spider, but that's such a mild poison that after breaking free and using Bhaal slow poison Biff still had 24 of his original 50 HPs. I saved the game there to forestall any further tendency to drift towards carelessness ...
Sorcerer L8, 50 HPs (incl. 6 from familiar), 139 kills
Comments
And I agree, the fact that there's no way to resurrect fallen party members in Chapter 1 of SoD (when it's already been shown in BG1 that there are a ton of temples in the city) is a huge oversight and very annoying if you lose someone in the dungeon. It has caused me a lot of pain before as well. Still, I believe you can recover - the official SoD NPCs are fairly strong after all and can replace even chunked party members, and two lost tomes isn't the end of the world, when, in BG2 there are multiple ways to boost your ablities via items or potions to whatever level you need them to be at.
Corecleric XIX - dwarven fighter/cleric, protagonist (Corey_Russell)
Boor - elven sorcerer (Grond0)
Whisper - halfling assassin (Gate70)
I could talk about how the party did well in Durlag's Tower, or how Daveourn and his battle horror friends were destroyed by skull traps. But it all came undone against the necromancers on the 2nd floor of Sorcerous Sundries. The safest play here by far was 1) remove fear on party 2) send couple of skeleton distractions 3) silence them 4) kill them. However Boor was very impressed by his skull traps in the Cloakwood and wanted to impress the party again. Well this time the skull trap didn't kill a single mage and the whole party failed their save vs horror. Predictably everyone died - RIP Corecleric XIX.
I've not got much in the way of commitments today and thought I would see if I could manage another one-day challenge as part of my ongoing long-life challenge. I spent some time in advance rolling up a high-stat archer, which is one of the relatively few classes left that I've not yet attempted, so was able to start straight in with the action at 2.30 am my time.
Hour 1
Buy equipment and leave Candlekeep. Kill Imoen / Xzar / Montaron for their equipment
Shoal (level 3 - +25 HPs)
Marl
Shoot Neera for gem bag
Stealth boots from hobgoblin
Nip to Nashkel to learn Bhaal CLW
Scroll case from Firebead
Shoot Algernon for cloak
+1 bolts for High Hedge golems and get potion case (level 4 - +14 HPs). Buy potions magic blocking and mirrror eyes for emergencies
Basilisks with Korax (level 5 - +13 HPs; level 6 - +10 HPs)
Piercing belt from ogre
Pick up pantaloons at FAI and kill Jaheira for invisibility potion
Nashkel Mine. Rest to get LMD
Grab potions freedom and invisibility from Revenant
Sneak attack Nimbul
Shoot Tranzig
Charm Taurgosz at Bandit Camp to get his equipment. Sneak in to Tazok's tent to grab letters. Rest for Bhaal horror
Sil and sirines using clarity potion. Shoot golems to get constitution tome
I have taken a number of screenshots, which I might add in later if the run goes well. Here though is my character record at end of first hour.
Archer L6, 76 HPs, 66 kills
Hour 2
Sneak in to loot ankheg nest. Return Tenya's bowl
Amulet for Mr Colquetle
Help Dryad of Cloud Peaks (level 7 - +7 HPs)
Resurrect cat
Grab charisma tome
Return Joia's ring
Escort Brage to temple and talk to Oublek
Kill Greywolf
Take Samuel to FAI
Help Ardrouine
Save Arabelle
Help Bjornin (rep 20)
With prices now at their keenest, so a bit of shopping
Sneak through Cloakwood with help of potion of freedom
Necklace of Missiles for Drasus
Sneak through mine and use fireballs on battle horrors. Potion of magic blocking for Davaeorn
Dexterity tome
Two more Necklaces
Shoot Ramazith then sneak up through his tower for intelligence tome
Picked up Helm of Balduran
Sneaked into see Degrodel. He managed to cast horror, so had to take a quick potion to avoid risk there
Picked up Cloak of Balduran
Do poison quest to get wisdom tome. Lothander got away, but Marek was poisoned by both dagger and dart (level 8 - +8 HPs)
Archer L8, 102 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 123 kills
Hour 3
Iron Throne Level skip and darts of stunning for enemies
Back at Candlekeep loot tombs using giant strength / DUHM
Ignore Prat, but kill greater basilisks on way out
Back in City final bit of shopping then darts of stunning for Slythe
At palace, buffed up and used bolts of lightning. Two of the dopplegangers attacked me, so I didn't think it was worth trying Bhaal horror to disrupt the attacking pattern. Belt was only slightly injured
Sneaked through the maze and remembered to rest to get second DUHM
Semaj and Tazok were killed by lightning trap. Angelo is harder to get so he was persuaded to show himself before I used stealth to disappear and then shoot him. A dispelling arrow for Sarevok made him easy, though I had to quickly disappear before that when the web/stinking cloud trap triggered
Sneaked through the SoD dungeon and used bolts of lightning to persuade Korlasz to surrender. Got to level 9 (+11 HPs) shortly after that
Did a bit of shopping
Archer L9, 113 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 160 kills
Hour 4
Iron Throne Level skip and darts of stunning for enemies
Back at Candlekeep loot tombs using giant strength / DUHM
Ignore Prat, but kill greater basilisks on way out
Back in City final bit of shopping then darts of stunning for Slythe
At palace, buffed up and used bolts of lightning. Two of the dopplegangers attacked me, so I didn't think it was worth trying Bhaal horror to disrupt the attacking pattern. Belt was only slightly injured
Sneaked through the maze and remembered to rest to get second DUHM
Semaj and Tazok were killed by lightning trap. Angelo is harder to get so he was persuaded to show himself before I used stealth to disappear and then shoot him. A dispelling arrow for Sarevok made him easy, though I had to quickly disappear before that when the web/stinking cloud trap triggered
Sneaked through the SoD dungeon and used bolts of lightning to persuade Korlasz to surrender. Got to level 9 (+11 HPs) shortly after that
Did a bit of shopping. Killed Korlasz while getting wine
At Coast Way Crossing used stealth to avoid combat on bridge
Ignored Coast Way Forest. Sneaked through Troll Claw Woods
Sneaked into get Firefly sling in orc and troll ambush area
Dart of stunning for Ziatar
Full buffs for Neothelid and a couple of potions of firebreath - then another of those for Akanna
Single dagger for Morentherene on way out
Young green dragon stunned in ambush area
At Boareskyr Bridge killed Vichand for his scroll and then surrendered fort.
On the bridge, I didn't have the Ring of Energy but had a decent attack with dispelling arrows and had no problems after disrupting the mage's initial spell
Ignored the myconid ambush area on the way to the Coalition Camp. Did a bit more shopping there and picked up Bwoosh and poison
Ignored dead magic ambush area and sneaked through Dead Man's Pass on the way to rescue Skie at Dragonspear
At Underground River, killed some myconids for their summoning pod. Stunned cyclops and used firebreath to quickly kill first lot of guards.
It's getting towards 7 am my time, so time for some breakfast I think
Archer L9, 113 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 213 kills
Hour 5
Placed Bwoosh and then poisoned food and water while invisible before running away
Game crashed when travelling back to Coalition Camp, but autosave quickly got me underway again
Exploding arrows made short work of the invasion forces. Swift Rabbit got one nasty backstab in, but died from the explosion that killed the last of his companions
Ashatiel was stunned by my first dart
Ran through first hell area before using arrows of explosion in second (archer bonuses making those very effective even without fire damage)
Buffed up and took the Hellevator. Once all enemies were dead, used 5 Champions Strength scrolls. Even using non-proficient sling, I had THAC0 of -17 and it only took 27 of the 80 +3 bullets of darkness to kill Belhifet
Ran through epilogue, remembering to take pantaloons out of the bag of holding before ending the game
I transferred to SoA with 730k XP, so was able to take level 10 immediately
Not yet finished the first level of Jon's dungeon.
Archer L10, 121 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 33 kills (+280 in BGEE/SoD)
Hour 6
Didn't bother with elemental plane on first dungeon level
Annoyingly, Ulvaryl narrowly survived a bolt and then disappeared the same instant that I gulped a potion of firebreath to finish her off
Made a few donations at the temple
Restored the circus (level 11)
Transferred Copper Coronet to Hendak
Counter-ambushed Suna Seni
Rescued Renfeld, stealth shot Prebek & Sanasha and looted harper building
Paid Gaelen Bayle and got goodies from Aran Linvail
Ran away from orog ambush on way to Trademeet
Had first real escape of the run, when trying to stealth-shoot Taquee to get the efreeti - he ignored the fact I disappeared into the shadows and continued casting flesh to stone (a bit odd as he clearly could not see through invisible as he wasn't trying to attack me when in stealth before that). I had no counter to that, but managed to save
Archer L11, 129 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 104 kills (+280 in BGEE/SoD)
Hour 7
Efreeti soaked up stone to flesh from other genies
Picked up shield of harmony and bought cloak of displacement
At Watcher's Keep bought potion case. Cleared top level (apart from FoD trap), getting to level 12 in process
Went to de'Arnise Hold, but changed my mind before entering
Instead went to Temple sewers and killed rakshasa for its cloak, then dealt with Mekrath. I had a bit of an aberration when I left there thinking I'd not got any protection against charm to get the portal gem and then realised I just had my crossbow equipped and hence was not benefitting from the SoH. I then compounded that error by wasting far too long killing the umber hulks on guard there, rather than just leaving them alone
Solved the skinner murders, but not yet dealt with Rune Assassins
Progress through BGEE/SoD felt pretty good, but it feels like I'm making rather heavier weather of SoA so far. I've got a couple of other RL things to do for a little bit now though, so hopefully will be able to concentrate better after that.
Archer L12, 132 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 162 kills (+280 in BGEE/SoD)
Hour 8
Finishing off the Rune Assassins was enough to get to level 13 and a nice APR boost
Sneaked into the Planar Prison and worked through there, picking up boots of speed and the nice Pixie Prick dagger from the bounty hunter. I had another lucky escape there when I failed to notice that the Warden was casting at me and a clouded aura meant I couldn't block a disintegrate spell - but once more I saved and escaping the place got me to level 14
Then it was off to de'Arnise. I didn't bother with most of the trolls there, but have made the FoA and just got TorGal left to finish off
Archer L14, 138 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 235 kills (+280 in BGEE/SoD)
Hour 9
TorGal died without fuss and I reported in to Nalia
Next up was Umar Hills, where I soon got another level for investigating some mysterious disappearances
In the temple, sneaked past the early encounters and the first lich. The second was worn down with summons. For Thaxy I hid behind the pillars and shot him when not blinded. The Shade Lord was just shot up, gaining me another level
Neb was rendered unconscious by the Pixie Prick while doing the Sir Sarles quest. Unfortunately, writing these notes broke my concentration and I then handed over the genuine illilthium to Sir Sarles. However, given I can use the AoP that's not a major issue for this character
Opened up access to the lich in the sewers and then used a PfU scroll on that. The RoAC gave me a safe save to access the lich in the Bridge District and the City Gates lich provided me with Daystar. That just left Kangaxx and Daystar made short work of him
Off to Windspear, where planting some acorns provided yet another level. Inside, the hour ran out with the Ruhk Transmuter rendered unconscious
Archer L17, 147 HPs (incl. 5 from helm), 313 kills (+280 in BGEE/SoD)
Hour 10
Moving into the dungeon, the golems took a little while to shoot down, but a Daystar sunray seemed to have speeded things up against undead, though there were three vampires left after that. My melee vs them wasn't great and I had a mindless moment when deciding to open a bit of distance and switch to crossbow. That would have been fair enough if just taking a single shot, but I didn't immediately switch back to my dagger to get the benefit of the SoH.
That may have been because I'd been thinking just before then that it wouldn't be too long before I could switch to dual wielding for some fights, but at this time my spell save of 1 was not safe. I'd previously got away twice with saves at rather worse odds, but this occasion was third time unlucky as the 9% chance of failure proved too great ...
Does anyone ever end up using it? I wonder how the design decision for where to include that, and what its power should be, went...
Domination is more dangerous than level drain IMHO.
The party will consist of:
Stumpy Rockbottom (LG Dwarven Defender) level 1 12/9/16/3/3/1 14 HP
Hala Penyo (CN Elf Dragon Disciple) level 1 10/14/6/8/3/15 5 HP
Ban Daide (NG Half Elf Cleric/Ranger) level 1/1 13/13/14/4/14/3 9 HP
Robyn Banx (CG Gnome Illusionist/Thief) level 1/1 6/16/8/9/2/3 5 HP
Robyn is the protagonist. I figure we can get her a familiar this way, because she has the lowest natural HP. She should stay relatively safe in the back with a short bow.
I am going to allow myself to add characters along the way, but only so I can do their quests or steal some gear (I’m looking at that invisibility potion Jahiera!). If I’m doing a characters quest, s/he won’t help out.
Wolfie - half-elf shapeshifter (Grond0)
Ash - human dragon disciple (Gate70)
Russell XXXVI - human paladin (Corey_Russell)
Previous run
With just over half the session available, there was plenty of time for a new party to make a splash (of blood). Gate70 is once more trying his luck with a dragon disciple, but this time that looks to be part of a well-balanced party.
As usual we headed for Shoal after leaving Candlekeep. Wolfie was keen to get up close and personal to take full advantage of her lack of a melee weapon.
Dragon disciple 4, 26 HPs, 12 kills, 0 deaths
Paladin 4, 40 HPs, 24 kills, 0 deaths
Oh well, we met Imoen, who was kind enough to give us her bow and some potions. Robyn is the only one who can use her wand, so she took that as well.
We wandered around a bit, met a useless guy who wouldn’t help us out, and ended up looting Gorion and a few guys he managed to take out. Even if I can’t use this stuff yet, we can sell it if we ever find this Friendly Arms Inn he kept yamming on about. We ended up running into a wolf who looked really mean and Stumpy had to go into his defense mode to fight him off, while the rest of the gang shot missiles at it. Stumpy got hurt a bit but he insists it’s just a scratch.
Then we met two dorks that were kind of mean when Robyn spoke to them, but they still wanted to come with us.
We invited them, but ended up just borrowing their gear and ditching them, just like Imoen.
We moved on towards the FAI, met an old man who gave us directions. We killed a gibberling who was kind of annoying and found a ring in a rock. Weird.
Then Robyn, Ban and Hala got really tired. We decided to push on to the FAI though, none of us are in the mood for camping out here when an inn is so close.
I would say the drinker is most useful for Haer'Dalis which makes sense considering where you get the sword. I will sometimes use for my thieves since they can't use SoH or charm helmets.
Previous updates:
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1208151/#Comment_1208151
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1208190/#Comment_1208190
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1208288/#Comment_1208288
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1208297/#Comment_1208297
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/1208312/#Comment_1208312
Baby Face - L15, 129 HPs, 220 kills (+298 in BGEE/SoD), 2 deaths, ***** long sword / **** crossbow
Bugsy - L15, 123 HPs, 146 kills (+260 in BGEE/SoD), 0 deaths, ***** hammer / **** shortbow
Carlo - L15, 133 HPs, 166 kills (+283 in BGEE/SoD), 0 deaths, ***** flail / **** sling
Mad Dog - L15, 143 HPs, 329 kills (+290 in BGEE/SoD), 3 deaths, ***** axe / *** dual wielding / * dagger
Vito - L15, 126 HPs, 150 kills (+286 in BGEE/SoD), 1 death, ***** scimitar / **** darts
I remember the level drain from Thaxxy as being temporary as well, maybe 30 seconds? Maybe that's only in vanilla and not EE.
I'm suffering from restartitis at the moment and, even though I've got a number of other runs currently active, I fancied another go at Biff. Once again he's only allowed to use his own melee in combat, so no summons, NPCs, charmed allies (looking at you Korax), invisible blockers (hello familiar) or use of spells / magic items on anyone but Biff. I'm not sure whether I permitted casting positive spells on friendly targets in the previous run, but definitely not this time.
He's again had a good share of luck so far. The first close incident was relatively early on when he just survived a skeleton archer ambush - 2 attackers missing with shots when he was down to 3 HPs and running for the map edge. He also got away with one of my bad habits when forgetting to use PfP after a rest - very fortunately his ghoul touch attack from invisible not only hit, but paralysed, a greater basilisk. He also only just survived a critical from an ankheg taking away 27 of the 30 HPs he had available.
After going through the Nashkel Mine, a ghoul touch on Mulahey worked, saving any need to retreat or use the Greenstone Amulet there. His death provided Biff his final BGEE level. At the Bandit Camp, improved invisibility rendered Venkt harmless and the rest were easy meat. The same applied to Davaeorn and there were no further problems in the City or during the return to Candlekeep.
After beating Slythe up, Biff headed for the palace. I thought the odds were stacked against him managing this fight, but he again got lucky with a couple of the dopplegangers targeting him initially, while another attacked a guard. That reduced the pressure on Belt enough for him to survive.
After fighting through the maze, Biff went into the old temple and showed himself to Sarevok - before using an invisibility potion to make a swift withdrawal. A PfM scroll allowed him to beat up Semaj before Biff pulled out Tazok and took advantage of a decisive weapon speed advantage to attack him without response. I wanted to avoid dealing with Angelo's exploding arrows, so Sarevok was pulled out next - after the PfM scroll had expired so that Biff could use stoneskins. Sarevok wasn't easy to hit in standard hit and run attacks and got some retaliations in himself. However, Biff still had plenty of resources in hand when the big man was on his last legs and he went invisible and used DUHM to set up the finish.
Biff transferred to SoD with 342k XP, so was able to immediately take his 10th level.
Sorcerer L10, 56 HPs (incl. 6 from familiar), 239 kills
Wolfie - half-elf shapeshifter (Grond0)
Ash - human dragon disciple (Gate70)
Russell XXXVI - human paladin (Corey_Russell)
Previous updates
The first target for the day was the Gnoll Stronghold to get the charisma tome. Ash has been pretty restrained so far about using his breath weapon when that might hit his companions. That spreads so far to the sides of him that he needs to be in the lead to avoid collateral damage and he did manage to get ahead enough to take out one group of xvarts.
A bit more reputation gathering culminated in reaching reputation 20 by sorting out some half-ogres for Bjornin. That also gained Russell a magic shield and he now indicated his willingness to take on some ankhegs. Those fights were made much easier as Ash hit a great streak in their nest with his blindness spell - the final one there making it 9 out of 9 successes. He rounded that up outside to 10 out of 10.
To gather funds, we carried 7 of the shells back to sell in Beregost. Wolfie did the wolf's share of that task with 5 in his inventory - which, even with 19 strength, saw him struggling to walk. On a couple of occasions on the way he needed to heal Russell, but with a natural strength of 9 his weight limit was only 10% as great in human form and he had to persuade Russell to come to him to get the healing. The cash was soon put to good use with Ash being pleased with his new dagger (that regularly turned enemies green), while Russell's full plate made him a slightly tougher nut to crack.
Wolfie was interested in taking on the sirines next, but Russell pointed out that the clarity potion found in Candlekeep had disappeared into thin air last session and we had no obvious alternative way to deal with them safely. Successfully rejecting his immediate impulse to deal with them not safely, Wolfie went to Ulgoth's Beard to get the Greenstone Amulet. Russell used that to kill the first group of sirines, but there was a slight hiccup with Sil's group when most of the initial charge used expired while chasing a late appearing carrion crawler - meaning Russell got charmed and chased his companions around for a while. After finishing off the sirines, Russell led the way inside the pirate cave to tackle some golems. The first of those got a couple of hits on him and Russell used a potion of absorption to render the others pretty helpless.
The Doomsayer was hit hard by magic missiles and insect bites and failed to get through any of Russell's defenses. Ash thought Durlag's Tower might be the source for further quick XP, but Wolfie decided that we should already be plenty tough enough to do a bit of work on the main quest. At the Nashkel Mine, Mulahey got stuck in a web and didn't manage to call for help. After reporting to the mayor in Nashkel, Ash used web again to deal with Nimbul - part of the intention of that being to ensure that Rasaad was also stuck in order to prevent him getting the kill this time.
On to the Bandit Camp, where Wolfie produced a nymph for the first time - which immediately showed its value by holding Taurgosz. Inside Tazok's tent, a potion of magic blocking allowed Russell to ignore Venkt's spells. The others joined him inside once the horror had been used to quickly deal with the opposition.
In the Cloakwood we had no options for invisibility or freedom, so were careful initially around the web traps in the second area - Ash making a rare use of his wand of fire to kill the last of the group of ettercaps rather than risk triggering the trap. Russell did though get a bit over-confident after that while activating the nearby traps and got held while in the sight of a huge spider. Ash and Wolfie were also held and couldn't immediately come to his aid, but huge spider venom is pretty benign and Russell didn't take much damage before Ash was able to unlimber his wand once more. Inside Centeol's lair, Russell took a couple of potions to help him deal with the opposition there and grab Spider's Bane.
At the Cloakwood Mine, Ash blinded Genthore and attempted to do the same to Kysus, but was spotted by Drasus in the process. However, a quick web helped disable the opposition and they were dealt with at the small cost of an acid arrow for Russell. We moved into the mine and rested there, to be ready for some immediate action next time.
Shapeshifter 7, 60 HPs, 160 kills
Dragon disciple 6, 37 HPs, 46 kills, 0 deaths
Paladin 6, 69 HPs, 100 kills, 0 deaths
I'm suffering from restartitis at the moment and, even though I've got a number of other runs currently active, I fancied another go at Biff. Once again he's only allowed to use his own melee in combat, so no summons, NPCs, charmed allies (looking at you Korax), invisible blockers (hello familiar) or use of spells / magic items on anyone but Biff. I think I may have permitted casting positive spells on friendly targets in the previous run, but not this time.
He's again had a good share of luck so far. The first close incident was relatively early on when he just survived a skeleton archer ambush - 2 attackers missing with shots when he was down to 3 HPs. He also got away with one of my bad habits when forgetting to use PfP after a rest - very fortunately his ghoul touch attack from invisible not only hit, but paralysed, a greater basilisk. He also only just survived a critical from an ankheg taking away 27 of the 30 HPs he then had available.
After going through the Nashkel Mine, a ghoul touch on Mulahey worked, saving any need to retreat or use the Greenstone Amulet there. His death provided Biff his final BGEE level. At the Bandit Camp, improved invisibility rendered Venkt harmless and the rest were easy meat. The same applied to Davaeorn and there were no further problems in the City or during the return to Candlekeep.
After beating Slythe up, Biff headed for the palace. I thought the odds were against him managing this fight, but he got lucky with a couple of the dopplegangers targeting him initially, while another attacked a guard. That reduced the pressure on Belt enough for him to survive.
After fighting through the maze, Biff went into the old temple and showed himself to Sarevok - before using an invisibility potion to make a swift withdrawal. A PfM scroll allowed him to beat up Semaj before Biff pulled out Tazok and took advantage of his weapon speed advantage to attack him without response. I wanted to avoid dealing with Angelo's exploding arrows, so Sarevok was pulled out next - after the PfM scroll had expired so that Biff could use stoneskins. Sarevok wasn't easy to hit in standard hit and run attacks and got some retaliations in himself. However, Biff still had plenty of resources in hand when the big man was on his last legs and went invisible and used DUHM to set up the finish.
Biff transferred to SoD with 342k XP, so was able to immediately take his 10th level.
Sorcerer L10, 56 HPs (incl. 6 from familiar), 239 kills
Previous updates:
In the SoD opening dungeon, Biff persuaded Porios to surrender the first group of enemies. PfU helped him beat up several more groups on the way to find Korlasz. She was paralysed by his opening attack, but Biff let her recover so she could surrender her group - getting to level 11 there. He still managed to prevent Korlasz escaping though.
After stocking up on yet more scrolls and potions in the City, Biff headed for the Coast Way Crossing - though he did nothing there, other than use invisibility to avoid any combat on the bridge. He moved swiftly on to the Forest of Wyrms and sneaked into the old temple to find Ziatar - improved invisibility and stoneskins kept him safe there until ghoul touch demonstrated its magic. I doubted that ghoul touch would work against the neothelid, so Biff just buffed up for protection before beating it up with his staff. Ghoul touch was effective against Akanna and her aerial servants, but with one of those still active I failed to notice Biff's stoneskin had dissipated and a 46 HP critical sent him running away to quickly renew that before returning to finish the job. There was not much to be gained by killing Morentherene, so the sleeping dragon was left in peace for once. However, one of its offspring was taken down on the road to Boarskyr Bridge.
Biff avoided most combat there, just intimidating Vichand into giving up the spell scroll. He buffed up fully for the fight on the bridge, but that proved much easier than expected after the mage was paralysed before he could buff.
At the Coalition Camp, Biff picked up the Bwoosh and poison. Those were placed invisibly at the Underground River before Biff returned to the Camp to await the invasion forces. His buffs made him difficult for the ogres and trolls to hit and archers soon cut those down. He added spell immunity to buffs for the mages with the intention of preventing dispel magic working, but got caught out there when spell thrust removed spell immunity and he was dispelled before he could restore it. That made the fight a bit more nervous than expected, but the wizard slayers did a good job of helping him. For the third fight I forgot to use spell immunity and things looked bad when Biff was dispelled and his HPs suddenly tumbled down to 3 - fortunately his aura was clear and an invisibility potion saved him there. Left to manage on their own for a few rounds, the supporting war mages all died, but Biff managed to come through once more against the half dozen remaining enemies.
Dosia rejuventated him - though at the cost of her own life - for the final conflict. Spell thrust was used again on him early on there, but Biff managed to withdraw and reapply spell immunity - only to find shortly afterwards that he hadn't got electricity protection and lose half his HPs. A couple of potions of magic protection provided general support against magic while Biff used his own spells for to support his melee against the remaining enemies.
At Dragonspear, Biff failed this time to paralyze Ashatiel immediately. A couple more potions of magic protection helped him gradually grind his way through mirrors and stoneskins though until Ashatiel finally succumbed.
In hell, just for the hell of it, Biff again rested without killing all Thrix's summoned devils. This time though he was careful not to get trapped while waiting for the door to allow his exit. After buffing up he took the Hellevator up to find Belhifet. For most characters I rely heavily on Caelar in that fight - not controlling her, but keeping her alive using restoration scrolls. Biff was not permitted to do that in this run, so I allowed Caelar to join Belhifet. One problem with that I hadn't realised was that Caelar followed Biff when he was invisible - so could attack the moment he showed himself. That meant most of the damage against Belhifet was through fire shield (blue) and he still had more than 200 HPs at the point Biff had already used most of the stoneskins and mirror images he had available. There were still dozens of invisibility potions available and I had a number of Otiluke's scrolls that would potentially allow Belhifet to damage himself on fireshields a bit quicker than his regeneration revived him. However, success in the fight still seemed problematic when another oddity ended the run with a bang. I saw an attack from Belhifet take away Biff's last stoneskin and immediately paused to allow him to cast a new one. The casting animation showed well before the next attack came in, so I assumed all was well - but Belhifet's next attack was a critical hit and no stoneskin stopped it for some reason ...
Biff had had more than his share of luck in that run, so I don't feel too bad about the ending. However, it would be nice at some point to see how Biff would fare in BG2EE.
Deciding I had unfinished business, I quickly started a new run with Biff. The previous attempt had had a number of close shaves and I've been trying to reduce risks taken thus far - still using the same set of melee-only rules. The only thing I think I will change (if I get that far) is to allow Caelar to join me. Given she won't be controlled or given any spell support, she's really no different to the dukes fighting Sarevok at the coronation. I think in any case it's a game design mistake that requires her to join you to fight Belhifet rather than having the option to fight as a neutral - if you have a full party, she will in fact fight in that way as a neutral and her behavior up to that point suggests that would be more appropriate whether or not there's a party slot available. I still won't allow casting spells on her though, so that change will make things easier but not simple.
Minimising risks meant being choosy about which XP I went after early on. That was gained from:
Candlekeep tasks - 345
Gnolls at High Hedge - 165
Firebead book - 300
Calm Marl - 900
Perdue's sword - 500
Hobgoblins and Joia's ring - 610 (level 2 - +6 HPs)
Hobgoblins and Zhurlong's boots - 530
Noober - 415
Revenant dagger - 900
Repatriate Brage - 1000 (level 3 - +5 HPs)
Biff now knew PfP and went to pick on some lesser basilisks. He used his staff there rather than the higher APR from chill touch as that allowed him to attack from distance and hence get the chance to retreat if a basilisk switched to melee. The first 3 of those took him to level 4 - +6 HPs.
With travel now safe, Biff did a few reputation quests. While in the Cloud Peaks in search of the charisma tome, he took advantage of a winter wolf ambush - he still had Gorion's belt, so that was free XP. Shortly after that he beat up a couple of ogrillons to get to level 5 - +5 HPs.
He could now use invisible attacks using ghoul touch to make many encounters simple - like the couple of greater basilisks left earlier. Greywolf and then Meilum gave a bit more XP to take him to level 6 - +5HPs.
Helping Charleston Nib got reputation to 20 and, with friends now available, Biff benefited from the cheapest shop prices while doing a bit of shopping. That included the +3 staff and dagger of venom to greatly improve his melee. The staff was used to kill the High Hedge golems before heading for Durlag's Tower to kill more basilisks and get to level 7 - +4 HPs.
At the Lighthouse area, a couple of Greenstone charges allowed him to deal with the first group of sirines and get to level 8 - +5 HPs.
In the Nashkel Mine, Mulahey survived an initial paralyzing attack, but after resting and working through his supporters Biff used invisibility to dodge various spells before successfully touching him.
After beating up Nimbul and Tranzig and buying a Robe of the Archmagi, Biff headed for the Bandit Camp. A plague of paralysis spread across Taurgosz and his bandits before the occupants of Tazok's tent caught the disease.
After being pretty cautious up to this point, I was rather careless in the Cloakwood when trying to run through a web trap in the second area thinking (wrongly) I was still invisible after travelling. I had no stoneskin and was duly held and poisoned twice by a huge spider, but that's such a mild poison that after breaking free and using Bhaal slow poison Biff still had 24 of his original 50 HPs. I saved the game there to forestall any further tendency to drift towards carelessness ...
Sorcerer L8, 50 HPs (incl. 6 from familiar), 139 kills