@Neverused I agree it's not an easy task, but I think that my party composition was really really strong.
I even think that my party was maybe stronger when Viconia died, as my two Blackguards were now very high level and could cast many spells (I'm playing with IWD spell progression for Paladin, so they had access to spells lvl 1-6), they were earning more xp.
But I have no idea how to do ToB solo without being somekind of Fighter/Mage, it seems so much harder. I want to try with my Sorcerer or a Shadowdancer solo but I don't know how I will beat Dragons, Demogorgon or Amelyssan, notably with the component which prevent you from using quickslot items with clones.
I don't think that disabling the quick item slots for clone is a problem for the sorcerer class. I really needed them for my fighter/thief as this was the way for a simulacrum to cast spells. It was also convenient for a couple of other things. The sorcerer is by far the class I love the most. One of the easiest way to solo the game (including tactical challenge mods). Such ranking would depend on extra features you may have enabled though. I would be glad to share some thoughts in a longer post.
The party successfully reached the Chess fight in the Durlag's Tower. The previous 2 levels were done by careful use of all the resourses we had. This fight, though, gave the new experience.
At first, due to the know SCS bug, we had to use Cluaconsole to teleport to the Chessboard, which resulted in everyone needing to gulp a potion of invis, in order to only start this fight.
After a small pre-planning, this was the set-up:
We started the fight rather well, with webs on the battlefield.
The problem happened when I realized Gowrek was stuck in webs. Somehow @Tresset didn't switch to his sword, this resulting in his character's death.
Another problem arose when @CrevsDaak didn't succeed in saving Llolnae from poison.
Both these things resulted in Loki becoming an easy target of an enemy archer. All Loki's invisibilities (and there were 6 of them, 2 potions and 4 spells) were spent already. The potion case was not here. And it looked like nobody could save the druid.
In the last effort, Loki ran to the NW corner (using the potion of speed he had), but the archer still followed him, and neither Proesis, a sorcerer by @Gotural, nor Glincuwen could help here.
I felt very bad that moment. Maybe the worst feeling in my gaming experience. I remember the @Blackraven 's words: "I'll be able to join you, guys, in late January. You'll be in BG2 then". I felt as if I failed all the participants (old and new) of this run, all the followers.
The next day, I was able to reflect on the run more:
1. I've liked the MP! It's an unbelievable and amazing feeling, to play, to interact, to chat will all of the participants. All those who took part in the run, you're more than fellow no-reloaders and fellow players now, you're friends of mine.
2. The MP is harder. Just because someone always can unpause the game, just because of numerous lags, just because of not being able to control everything and every time.
3. All the participants are real men. I mean, not even for a moment, @Tresset , @CrevsDaak , @Gotural and @GemHound hesitated to start a new run, a new "maybe this time" MP attempt. I just don't have enough words to praise you and to thank you for your determination, even if our 3 month experience was lost...
4. ... and to tell the truth, it wasn't lost. We're much more experienced now, in terms of playing as a team.
This is what we decided on the run's rules:
A. The main character, when push came to shove, couldn't use any potion he potentially was able to: magic blocking, invisibility, anything. Reason: the potioncase was not in the inventory. If we're on a such run as we're doing, it's a mistake. If the situation is bad, the least the main character can do is to gulp a saving potion. In any case, he'll be the last standing on the battlefield.
For fighter-type characters it could be even more useful: instead of hoarding all those potions, we could use them. But when the potioncase is used more as a container, and not a useful tool, it can't help. As yesterday showed, the situation becomes worse when the character who carries it is dead. At least, if the potioncase is in the main character's inventory, he could give a potion to anyone else till the very last second of the game.
For wizard-type characters the same could be said in terms of the scrollcase.
B. Managing the inventory is quite important, even more so in MP. Everyone really need to have at least one Potion of Invisibility on himself at all times, but the more the better. Potions of Magic Shielding are also very important to have in one inventory.
C. From now on, when we are in a difficult fight and someone pause the game, EVERYONE should write a quick "r" or "ready". When everyone but the one who started the pause wrote "r", then the one who initiated the pause can resume the game when he's ready too.
D. The run showed that no matter who manages not his character, this character will always be overlooked. Since GemHound had become unavailable, Llolnae became the most dying character in the group. Also, in many fights she wasn't used till the most effectiveness. So, if someone is unavailable for this or that session and we're not ready to dismiss the character from the party (knowing it's only for one or two sessions), I suggest we kill the character, so that it doesn't distract from managing the own character.
5. As for the run itself, the avenger druid proved to be a two-faced god:
- his webs and chaos spells drove the party through nearly all the encounters; - in the same time his webs were a reason of many party deaths, in the end resulting in the fail of the whole attempt; - although the Avenger druid is very good offensively, it's a very squishy character for a MP run. Because of the MP nature of the run, it's not always possible to control everything. The main character should have more "meat" in him, be much less likely to get hit.
I have two more things to add:
- a FMC character, even in the party, proved to be badass; - a F/T character is the main option to deal with single targets, and combining staffs and two-handed swords is a decent choice.
The Monty Python's Baldur's Gate adventures. Version 2.0
Enters Lucius, a chaotic good dwarven Fighter/Cleric, the Bhaalspawn:
Scvertvdendinw (an additional cookie for reading it successfully), a lawful evil elven F/M/T, by @CrevsDaak :
Hadhod, a lawful neutral Dwarven Defender, a brother-in-law of the Bhaalspawn, by @Gotural :
Drassisseilla, a neutral good gnome Dragon Disciple, by @Tresset :
Elian, a mysterious chaotic neutral Assassin, by @GemHound :
The adventure has been quite speedy so far: High Hedge - Beregost - Nashkel Carnival - basilisks - Tarnesh - ankhegs - Gnoll Stronghold - Nashkel Mines
We had to deal with the kobolds in the mines with only three player-controlled characters: the F/C, the Dragon Disciple and the Assassin, without a single rest.
You can see how fully buffed (from potions only) Lucius stuns Mulahey, while Drassisseilla fries all incoming skeletons and kobolds:
Before triggering the main quest, Imoen and Jurs want to explore Gullykin, the ruins of Firewine Bridge and the valley of tombs. This excludes fighting the ogre mage at the bridge though (perhaps later). Jurs bought a splendid robe allowing him to cast spells while being sufficiently protected, well almost.
Jurs is invited to a duel with Meilum. How to refuse?
In Gullykin, the two friends face another group of bounty hunters. Nothing that a good web, blindness, spook and well shot arrows can't manage. Imoen gets charmed at some point with no consequence. Drakar is the first to sink, completly disabled by the web. Followed by Molkar who, once blinded decided to go back to the web. Perhaps Morvin was initially under the effect too but now he is fully active. The magic missiles partially cancel his mirror image. Jurs and Imoen totally fail to disrupt his spellcasting, as a result Imoen is now dire charmed. However she is going to remain inactive. There is no immediate danger, Jurs casts spook... successfully. Less succesful are his several attempts to shoot the guy with his bow (a kind of remarkable score in this category). Blindness fails. Meanwhile Halagan shows up with a warm welcome. Imoen gets out of the charm effect at the same time. Soon after, Morvin collapses too. No fireball or skull trap bombing this time. Almost under control (Imoen charmed because she used the bow instead of her wand ... that seemed so easy) but clearly not memorable.
Aahhh Gullykin's "temple" - I like the way they worship their god! Back to Beregost to sell many items. Can someone tell the towncrier to shut up? Yes we are famous but we are hunted, always on the move!
Back to Firewine Bridge, now it's dungeon and ... kobolds party time. The undead can hit hard but Aganazzar's scorcher does wonders. A sneaky kobold is awfully effective against Imoen. I am happy I did not attempt this dungeon exploration much earlier.
The final battle is a matter of assaulting and retreating at the right time. Magic missile as the opening sequence to disrupt the mage, then melee till Jurs can cast again, now aganazzar's for good measure. This Lendarn is quite resilient but he is wasting time while drinking a potion of defense, it seems odd at that point in time. Varscona finishes the job. Jurs tries to get rid of the nearby kobolds but doing so attracts the four ogrillons. The heroes step back and Jurs refuses to activate a wand charge. Shoot, move back, shoot... they all fall easily. What's unexpected is the presence of the ogre-mage just a few meters behind. This guy was born under a bad sign... a very early magic missile spell succeds in disrupting the mage despite the distance, then Jurs and Imoen shoot three lethal arrows, up to the point the ogre panics. Yet another magic missile spell and he dies. There are nice spells found on the dead body of the human mage.
On the way to the valley of tombs, a bad surprise awaits our two friends, a basilisk ambush. Imoen is the closest, defenseless. Jurs has no spell memorized to prevent a petrification and the dragon is in the bag. This is where we can thank that petrified girl (from Unfinished Business) we saved on the Beregost temple map. She provided advices and a potion of mirrored eyes. Imoen takes it from the potion case and gives it to Jurs. All of that at a speed which defies the universe physics rules, well at least from the poor basilisk standpoint.
Another map, another group of bounty hunters. Four amazons this time, not well prepared but full of resources. I had forgotten how good their equipment was. Dealing with them earlier is worth more than killing the average hunting group. However I got distracted by the postponement of the Nashkel's mines quest. Aganazzar's scorcher again. Strangely one of them comes, invisible, to commit suicide against the beam. Jurs (and to a lesser extent Imoen) does not fear their initial backstab, should it connect. Here this is even easier than usual. Casting (wand) from a position at the north with both spellcasters aligned makes things easier. In this particular fight, basically nothing more was required to kill three of them. The fourth amazon enters a pitiful duel with darts. She joins her friends in death within seconds.
The tomb revenant is an easy opponent once you know that paralyse is its only threat. By the way there is a potion of freedom in one of the coffin but drinking such a potion prior to entering the tomb is obvioulsy much safer. Narcillicus has the pleasure to be enlightened by an Aganazzar's scorcher (well this is a temporary obession) The mustard jellies were dangerous but had something gone wrong, Jurs could just have fled on the map cleaned of all other threats beforehand.
I am desperately attracted by the spiders / red wizards map. There is nothing fundamental to be found on this map but I see two micro reasons and one real reason to face the challenge: - more than 10K xp of ettercaps and spiders. - a ring with 19 charges of a beam with no saves. - the fight with the wizards is one of the best in that game (well it depends in your level).
I know this is a no reload challenge but I do not play often (late August for the previous time) and I really want to enjoy a little more than a safer no-reload path. For sure I won't play the ToSC parts with one exception: grabbing the tome of wisdom.
As soon as Imoen and Jurs arrive, they are welcome by a sample of the local species. Imoen detects traps and she moves very slowly. At some point the two friends see a wave of spiders rushing on them. It looks like the call for help or embedded procedure works very well. This is the first occurence of this little mental music "I am going to die here" Emergency case, emergency solutions. Fireball from Imoen (necklace) and Aganazzar's scorcher from Jurs for a change. Everything goes well. Too well... during the spider attacks I was able to notice (not the first time but I am not entirely sure) that the Stratagems spiders fail to cast web on the party. I know the problem quite well, due to a difference between the EE and non EE games. Despite her cautiousness (or my lack of knowledge about the trap difficulty) Imoen is about the step on one trap and she fails to detect the next trap. Second occurence of "I am going to die here".
Now comes the real substance. I love the fight against those mages. I did not want to use my best scrolls and potions and I did not want to pull the trigger from afar, in a blind and unfair manner. Therefore it took more time to defeat them.
Imoen stays in the back waiting for the right moment to step in. Jurs casts a few buff spells. He doesn't have many of them, this is primarily to force the stratagems mages (and there are only mage enemies in this fight) to cast their debuff spells early on, if any. We have no clue about how many debuff spells and more specifically remove/dispel magic are available in their spell catalogs (I did not spoil the fun). What Jurs needs is a way to force the mages to cast most of their damaging spells on anything but him. This is where the recently acquired (tombs) wand of summoning comes in handy. Here Jurs cannot activate the wand and send his summons one by one thus trying to control the opponent actions. There are four mages and if they show up at the same time with their full catalog, Jurs is dead. A massive sacrifice is required. After the Denak's dialog, Jurs takes the time to shoot an arrow (nothing is faster), steps back and activates the wand mid way between him and the wizard. Denak casts his protections, that's really impressive. Unfortunately Lasala is already there and Jurs doesn't want to be targetted yet. Third occurence of "I am going to die here". Fortunately the storm of spells does not strike the dogs yet! Lasala is poorly protected, Jurs commands the dogs to attack her and he starts shooting arrows too. She falls and basically had no time to use her spells. The mages are coded to move but they are not visible yet. Actually you can see on the picture where Lasala dies that two of the dogs commited a useful suicide (one dies at the same time on the platform) thus slowing the mage progressions. Denak goes downstairs, well protected (anyway I have no spellthrust to oppose). Jurs still has the mirror image on and he is waiting for the next move. It's a total relief when Jurs sees Denak's spell flowing towards him, it's a remove magic spell. He starts moving back, letting the dog go to a certain death. He is effectively debuffed. Time to rebuff more consistenly with a lvl1 shield from his amulet, a potion of invunerability (for the saving throws) and a potion of magic protection (+50% resistance). He also has other potions ready to be used (magic shielding, magic blocking and even the scroll of protection from magic). Imoen was not exposed at all. She could have been useful at that time because Jurs has no visibility on the opponent placement and he is reluctant to activate a wand or blindly cast web (anyway the scrolls of web and grease are saved for another hard fight to come and the two lvl 2 slots he has are used for his defense). It doesn't matter much. Jurs want to see if another mage is going to debuff him so he moves forward. All the poor dogs are dead, victims of several spell sequencers. It makes Jurs think it is not mandatory to summon another group of creatures. However this might have been an option to support the strategy: survive long enough to see the mage protections disappear and, if possible, fight them one by one. As the mages start summoning many creatures, Jurs goes southeast, keeping Imoen at a distance. Brendan follows him with a couple of summons. The guy does not seem able to detect Jurs's shield, his magic missiles are ineffecient. Meanwhile Jurs pierces his stoneskins and casts magic missiles too. The problem is that the summons limit Jurs hit rate with the bow, he needs to eliminate them and starts moving towards Imoen who begins her progression too. This could have been a bad decision but Jurs did not want to stay on the same spot for too long, one mage at a time is much safer. In fact Denak was joining the fight. Other summons, spiders this time. Guess what? Aganazzar's scorcher evaporates Brendan and one of the summon. The two heroes quickly kill the other spider and move towards the place where they expect to meet and slay Denak. Denak lost his minor globe of invulnerability, all of that bodes well with the plan. However that was too optimistic. Imoen is victim of Emotion Hopeless and Jurs resists slow (which wouldn't have been a tremendous problem IF Imoen was still active). Denak slowly but surely loses his defense and his magic missiles are useless. When the mirror image is finally removed, Jurs activates the wand of lightning then magic missiles and ultimately hits with varscona twice. Denak is no more, what an opponent! Imoen gains a level. Let's find Diana now. This does not take long. Of course she has stonekins protecting her but she probably cast most of her spell on the dogs during the initial sequence. Jurs and Imoen almost have regrets. She should have participated to one of the previous fights. Let's be cautious though. Jurs magically resists her Melf's arrow, not a critical point to be honest. Jurs who runs out of spells can still cast Larloch's and Imoen shoots arrows, certain of their victory. One final spark of prestige and Diana dies whereas her last magic missiles haven't reached their target, the symbol of the red wizards failure.
Imoen wears a new and superb leather armor. Of course, the armor provides a good protection and a bonus for her skills but one point she appreciates very much is the light weight, 8 pounds!
Ulcaster is one of the rare area not visited yet. The first real challenge they face is Icharyd, a dead knight who entered into a pact with Myrkul. The opponent can be deadly but its two types of attack require a single counter-measure, a potion of absorption granting protection against electrical damage and strongly reducing the chance to be hit by a blunt weapon. Jurs casts a few buffs for the first part of the fight. A melee fight ensued between the two warriors. At some point, Icharyd, seeing his chance of victory seriously receding, called for Myrkul's help. A different fight started. Jurs gulped his potion of absorption and Imoen took the opportunity to test her brand new ring formerly owned by Denak. She went back as soon she got damaged by a lightning strike while Jurs was calmly destroying the dead knight.
Apparently the wolf of Ulcaster is an entirely different beast. There is one common point: both of those Stratagems encounters do not rely on a script with random or adaptive features. It's programmatic, a simple sequential behaviour. The wolf is weaponized with horror spells and paralyzing attacks, and those two aspects are helped by a single occurence of remove magic and greater malison. Moreover its attacks are a kind of life stealer, gaining 10 HP each time it hits. If you cannot massively deal a huge amount of damage within a very few rounds (Probably you can also disable the wolf itself as he is not resistant to magic.) then it is a simple matter of diverting the remove magic attack to keep your buffs active. Jurs does it with an activation of the wand of summoning. He and Imoen subsequently deals with the beasts which are spawned next to them. After that when Jurs is certain that the wolf wasted his spells he drinks a potion of freedom. He and Imoen are also protected against fear, moreover Jurs is under protection from fire. The nice irony is that the wand summons wolves... Wolves everywhere! In sequence, a first fireball on self starts to deal damage, then Jurs blinds the wolf for fun. It is a bad decision, this looks like an attempt to remove a non existing threat. A second fireball follows. The blinded wolf moves erratically and when they all reach the room to the west, Jurs unintentionally triggers the trap which deals fire damage to everyone but Jurs (he has 120% resistance). The wolf continues to dance around Jurs who uses magic to hit the beast from a small distance. As the wolf of Ulcaster keeps calling for help and summoning a pair of dire wolves every three rounds, the stock of local wolves gets renewed and Jurs cannot escape the traffic jam being formed. As a sign of destiny this is yet another aganazzar's scorcher that ends this unrealistic situation. The treasure is not exceptional but the adventurers already collected a 8 charge wand of fire as well as a potion of absorption replacing the one used to counter Icharyd.
Next step: destination Larswood. Imoen and Jurs meet Nim. I use a blatant cheat as I move Jurs north of the aggressive wolves (not sure about the name of these beasts, wolves belong to species which are so rarely met those days...) For a few seconds the wolves turn against Jurs who fireballs them. When they move back to go and eviscerate the dogs, it is too late and they quickly fall. All of that for a useless reward as none of the adventurers can use the scroll they receive (flame strike IIRC)
After that, they interfere with a dark plan involving shadow druids. Jurs casts spook on the first druid encounters and it works well. When the second druid confesses his crime, Jurs casts another spook spell which somehow works. It is funny. In fact it is annihilated by a not yet active precast spell, remove fear, which suddenly comes into effect. The two panthers helping the druid burn and die under the effect of a mysterious spell. Jurs finds a welcome potion of invulnerability on Osmandi dead body.
Seeing a group of innocent bandits is almost relaxing, most of them don't howl. This is less disturbing than the next encounter who claims to be dangerously deteriorated. The two heroes help him recover his mental stability at the cost of his own life.
A well deserved rest awaits the adventurers at the Beregost Inn. Imoen can't hide her rapturous mood: jugged wolf for dinner!
Finally decided to restart another run after a month; my other no-reloads having bland personalities forced a break from me.
Introduction: If you had visited Candlekeep a couple years back, before the deaths of the Dukes and the prevention of the war, you might've come across a young dwarf by the name of Farien. He was always a bit peculiar-looking for a dwarf, staying clean shaven and shunning the beard that almost all of his race pride in. His hair was still brown then, a light hazel color, if you will. When he spoke, it had no trace of the thick accent that dwarves are typically known for, but he enunciated clearly in his low voice.
If you had noticed, you probably wondered how this atypical dwarf came to be, though you probably know now. He was raised in Candlekeep, though not born there, and his upbringing was under the tutorage of Gorion, that old Harper from years back. Gorion taught Farien as he himself believed, that much of what is stereotypical may be due to nurture, rather than nature. He emphasized that greatly, moreso to Farian than any other, perhaps, that birth and species may not determine who someone is, and Farien, so you know, grew to understand the concept and took it for his own, even applying it to himself. So Farien grew in the library city, physically a dwarf, but not having any of the standard dwarves habits.
There would also have been his foster sister, Imoen, also brought up under the instruction of Gorion. If any of your valuables went missing during the stay, odds are that she... liberated it from you. Gorion's morality did not quite pass on as strongly to the girl. But oh, the competitions between the two! As iron sharpens iron, so these two competed mightily against each other for most of their childhoods. I dare say that Farien wouldn't have nearly as much of his agility as now if it weren't for Imoen. They climbed bookshelves, trying to beat the other to the top, attempted to scale the near-flawless spire that was the library; Imoen was always slightly quicker. They competed in their studies as well, and Imoen was again the quicker to pick up the information, though Farien the better at applying it.
It must be said, though, that Farien was far stronger than his almost-sibling, and his body far firmer than Imoen's frame. There was the advantage of the dwarves, of course, since due to their size their organs and bodies have to be firmer than a human's, but Farien was stronger and hardier than most of his kind.
He was trained, as well as in schooling, in the guard of Candlekeep, the Watchers. It functions as a small city, of course, so there is generally some protection, and the summons of the mages in the library-city are not bright enough to decide friend from foe. Because of his size, he at least followed his kinsmen in their weapon choice, and primarily trained with a warhammer. He was also trained in shooting a crossbow, as his height, or lack thereof, generally disallowed bows, though Imoen was fairly skilled at hitting a target with a short bow.
His past aspirations must also be explained: the training of Gorion had so impacted him in the concept of grace, mercy, and protection of the innocent, that he had attempted to be admitted to the order of the Paladins. Silly, I know; the order still only accepts humans, and not a single other race, but Farien was young then, still younger than twenty at that time. Though not admitted, he was steadfastly committed to relieving suffering, defending the oppressed, and helping the poor by whatever means, and practiced the art of defense rigorously. He never was able to cast a single spell, but he was as good as a paladin ever was, perhaps better; I'm sure you would know.
The story truly begins in the year 1368, the first day of Mirtul. Gorion had become increasingly perturbed by letters coming from outside, and so secure were the letters that not even Imoen could catch even a glimpse of their contents. That day, he told Farien to don his armor and hammer, and prepare for a journey. He specified no length of trip, nor location, replying to Farien's questions evasively and flitting his eyes back and forth, as though he were unsure if they were being overheard.
It was never proven if he were or not, but the timely order to put his armor was just in time for a man, thought to be a visiting scholar from Baldur's Gate, name of Shank, to dive from the shadows and swing a poisoned dagger at the young dwarf. It clashed upon the splint, doing damage to neither the armor nor its wearer. With a short cry - Farien tended not to curse, either - Farien grabbed his hammer, and with a solid blow, drove it into the ribcage of his would-be assassin with a terrible crack.
Suffice it to say that Shank did not live the blow.
Farien was shaken by the attempt, and met Gorion in his quarters soon thereafter. Imoen was there too, to say goodbye, or possibly an attempt to stop her from robbing visiting noblemen blind: I don't know, and she refuses to answer straightly. Upon hearing of the attack, Gorion left with Farien with all haste, not bothering to stop for anything besides a hug from Imoen. ____________________
Gameplay:
Pips are two in Warhammers, one in Crossbow, and one in Dart.
This is SCS-modified, with every difficult option opted for. It will be party, picking up NPCs as they make sense. BG1NPC, Rogue Rebalancing, and options from BGTweaks are installed.
The duo covered the whole worldmap with the following exception: - elements related to the main quest. This is the sequence encompassing the Nashkel's mines, Nimbul, Tranzig, Peldvale, the Bandit camp and beyond it the cloakwood areas etc... The first cloakwood area was very partially explored, the intent was to find the whispers of silence cloak. - all ToSC areas - Kahrk at the firewine bridge. We will perhaps come back. I just want Jurs to learn some L4 spells and at this point in time he can cast one L4 spell but he hasn't been able to find such a L4 scrolls yet.
Imoen reached the level 10 when Denak (red wizard) died and she can gain another level. Jurs reached the level 7 in the mage class while fighting in the dungeon just before the final battle with the wolf of Ulcaster. He reached the level 7 in the fighter class at some point in Larswood. That's all he can expect but he still needs to learn many spells.
That's part of the deal, it is now time to start the main quest. There is no challenge in the Nashkel mines. At the bridge on level 3, Jurs doesn't even use a spell, all the kobolds die pierced by arrows. The chieftain and his guards succumb to an Aganazzar's scorcher, one of the last available from the first wand. Mulahey is interrupted by a beam of frost and, two fireballs later, the world explodes (but there is no mine cave-in).
A dialog sequence with Berrun Ghastkill, Taerom Fuiruim the blacksmith and Thalantyr the conjurer is a very nice addition to the game (thanks UB). On their way to Beregost, a bounty hunter by the name of Nimbul labouriously tries to stop them. Tranzig at the Feldpost Inn is an even lesser threat. A few hours later, the adventurers head towards Peldvale where they expect to find the bandit leaders. Just before leaving the town, Imoen buys a deadly dagger. She can't backstab but she surely can poison her enemies.
At last they find a way leading to the bandit camp.
Even though a clever approach is usually preferred by the players, I personally like to simply attack the camp thus triggering a massive fight. The opportunity to have such a huge fight is too good to be ignored. Fighting within the main building is not without danger, remaining outside is not that much difficult if you are used to such a battle and your team is made up of high level characters.
The strategy is to lure the bad guys into a zone where they will be choked with their own traffic. The north west corner is suitable, mostly because of the long woods, the narrow pathway between the tents and the relatively large area south of these tents. The point is to slow them in this large area and create a bottleneck between the tents. Rather quickly some of them will get around the north wood, creating a second frontline thus dividing their forces. Sometimes a few of them come from the south west but this remains unlikely. Regular bandits and hobgoblins are not dangerous. Among the named foes, two of them usually require a specific attention, Taugosz Khosann (strongest opponent) and Venkt (a mage is always dangerous). The real threat is the Stratagems black talons elite guys, their arrows of ice can deal a lot of damage to your non heavily-armored team members. In the current situation this means both Imoen and Jurs because he is wearing the robe to be able to cast spells (this, despite the Nimbul's senses-of-the-cat boots).
The scrolls play the main role. Jurs saved two scrolls of web and three scrolls of grease. 1 web and the 3 grease are used to slow down everyone coming to the main area. The remaining scroll of web is kept as a safeguard, just in case a flow control is required to limit the bandit progression at the north point, casting from scroll cannot be disrupted even if Jurs is hit. The two L3 slots are filled with fireball spells, L1 and L2 spells are a mix of defensive and offensive options, 2 mirror image spells are memorized.
As soon as Jurs is seen by the local hobgoblin, the general alert rings. Everyone will join coming from various distances. He starts with web and then greasex3, hitting the hobgobelin with his sword between each spell. By the time he is able to cast the first fireball, the first bandits appear at the north point. They are regular bandits and Imoen successfully casts sleep on them (from the wand). Jurs moves north to slay these enemies. The first black talon elite guys show up. Imoen helps Jurs with a fireball (cast from the necklace). Jurs notices that one of the opponent is Taugosz himself and they start a melee fight. Incidentally Jurs is hit by a poisonned arrow but he has no time to manage it and he lets the poison do its effect. Taugosz can't easily hit thanks to the extra protection provided by the belt and the mirror image. However Jurs also fails to quickly eliminate this boss. As more archers appear in the line of sight, Jurs uses a charge of Aganazzar's scorcher to hit a couple of foes at once and then he retreats (the main reason is that I had difficulty to see the state of his mirror image hidden by the trees). Meanwhile Imoen shoots on Britik (the gnoll) who moves extremely slowly. Jurs activates the wand of lightning on Taugosz Khosann but he is still alive. Imoen finally kills the gnoll boss but almost immediatlely a couple of archers appear within her line of sight and she fails to identify Raemon amongst them. It is too late to make an offensive decision and unfortunately she is seriously hit. She retreats, moving towards Jurs. At this moment, the two adventurers think that they failed, ready to trigger the emergency case with invisibility potions ready for use. This would allow them to heal and reorganize an attack, fully armored, re-buffed with their fingers eager to activate the wands. However Jurs finally dismembers Taugosz and he launches his assault against the archers. A surprise awaits, Venkt went forward, he basically overtook Raemon. This is a top priority (unfortunately I failed to capture the quick spell fight betwenn Venkt and Jurs). Jurs quickly acts and casts a magic missile spell to eliminate venkt's mirror image. He has the time to cast a second spell before hitting him with the sword. Venkt is defeated, a few seconds later Raemon expires too. Jurs casts mirror image again and decides to go north where the main opponents are likely to be. Nothing can resist his attacks. Hakt falls. Ardenor Crush falls. Jurs almost closed the loop around the tents when he meets the last opponent, Credus, who, all of a sudden, has something to say. One more sword swing and he dies. A couple of guys took refuge in the nearby tent, that's the last piece of this huge fight. Imoen and Jurs take their time to collect all the scalps that they can monetize. The next action is to break the gnoll's cover in their cave. Finally they reach the main tent where they meet a very informative prisoner.
Ultimately no less than 80 scalps are sold to Officer Vai. More than a half of them were obtained prior to cleaning this final map.
The Merries arrive at the Vale of Shadows to find tombs guarded by lesser shadows.
The first tomb was filled with skeletons and zombies.
John used enrage for the first time to fight a carrion crawler, but the beast died before it could land a solid hit.
Continuing along the platforms, the team encounters a group of yetis
The Merries kill a few more lesser shadows on the way to the next tomb, then have their first encounter with a ghast. His treasure trove includes a potion of genius for Alan to use later.
Down a hall guarded by ghoul, Nasir finds a magic suit of leather armor.
In the East side of the tomb, Nasir finds a high quality longsword for Will.
On the way out they trigger a trap that summons 4 lesser shadows... they don't last long.
20 damage from a normal arrow at level 3!
Back outside, the Merries fight their way through more yetis, finally encountering the yeti chieftain and retrieving Mirek's heirloom and a magic morningstar.
Inside the yeti lair, the party was attacked from three sides, forcing Alan and Tuck to tank. They started with Alan's opponent, then worked their way around to Tuck's. It took several healing potions, but Tuck held his own until the last ape fell.
The Merries dispatch a few yeti stragglers in the rear of the cave and find a cache of treasure including a magic mace, gems, clerical scrolls and a toolbox with gnomish writing on it.
North of the yeti lair, they found a tomb protected by a horde of skeletons and a ghoul. With Will and John tanking, the party was able to whittle them down to nothing. They cleared out the rest of the tomb's guardians and found a suit of magic chainmail for Alan.
Inventories were full and healing spells were low, so they went back to town to sell their loot, rest and tie up a few loose ends. Mirek gave Tuck a magic sling as a reward for finding his heirloom and Oswald paid handsomely for the gnomish tools.
Once all the loot was sold, it was time to do something about Alan's empty spellbook.
A good night's sleep and it's back to the Vale. This time the Merries enter a tomb guarded by an undead creature named Therik. On his body they find a phase dagger.
The party works their way through the tomb, fighting skeletons, ghouls and ghasts.
Nasir finds a dagger +1 along with various scrolls and potions.
Heading North from Therik's tomb, the Merries fought lesser shadows and a full shadow. They decided to go back to Kuldahar to rest before continuing into the huge, elaborate tomb at the end of the pathway.
I kind of put this run on hold because GOG put IWD2 on sale for $4. Then I put that game on hold because my son bought me Civilization: Beyond Earth for Christmas. Then I put that game on hold because he bought me Pillars of Eternity for my birthday. I also have a Snow White run going on my new Kindle Fire.
Anyway, Alan's got his spells, but I completely forgot about his song. He's going to need more attention as we go through Kresselack's tomb. I'm loving Robin's archer bonuses, with a longbow, he gets +10 to to-hit rolls against non-corporeal undead, and +6 against everyone else, and he's only at 3 pips in bow so far.
I initially planned to totally ignore Durlag's tower but I changed my mind and decided to go and take the tome of wisdom. Imoen and Jurs deal with a thief and Kirinhale but they consciously refuse to explore Daital's apartment (where Sidonie fell, killed by a cloudkill). Kirinhale surprisingly succeeds in draining Jurs once but this has no consequence. At the top of tower, Imoen gained a final level thanks to the enormous amount of XP provided by the basilisks.
Tourism in the Cloakwoods.
This starts with some shadow druids in conflict with a noble. Jurs and Imoen do not know this noble but they never liked these druids. The short discussion led to an inevitable conclusion.
Next, they investigate a strange arachnid nest. I really wanted the sword but later, I forgot I had it and it was and remains used. Side note: During the fight with Centeol I saw a web correctly cast by one of the spider. Imoen and Jurs launch a double fireball attack when the dialog ends. This is a salutary decision because they forgot to protect themselves against a web effect. Imoen is a superstar. Now she masters her dagger so well that even spiders get poisoned (vengeance for all the fallen, victims of their poisonous attacks!).
Then came the moment I felt like the worst no-reload player of the galaxy. I just wanted to steal the archdruid but I totally forgot (again!) the presence of two druid groups in this area. I was lucky they were not able to cast their spells. On the first group I instinctively cast hold with success. The battle with the second group was less expeditious. The adventurers won mostly because Imoen saved against charm and poisoned two druids. Perhaps because they survived but also because they knew that a hard fight was awaiting them inside the mine, they defied Amarande, a kind of training session. It is a quite dangerous fight, primarily a classic battle where you have to continuously disrupt your super opponent. A fireball deals important damages to the two lesser druids but it does'nt kill them. Jurs is about to launch a second fire attack but Imoen is sure to prevail and to kill those two druids with her ring while moving around them. Jurs focuses on Amarande, it is critical to disrupt his spell casting. To increase the chance of disruption both Imoen and Jurs activate their wands (missile for Imoen and frost or Aganazzar's for Jurs) each time Amarande starts a new incantation. And this occurs many times! Jurs can't prevent the release of the very short spells (two chromatic orbs in this case) but ultimately Amarande dies.
Side note: there are stratagems spiders failing to use their web ability. You can see the full circle in grey color, next to the trees (over the water). It goes from the spider to an ilusionary destination in the north-west.
There is a reception committee at the mine entrance but Jurs and Imoen have no taste for a mundane or subtle approach. Imoen, while hidden, detects their presence. After a serious series of enhancing spells and potions, Jurs moves forward. As expected the opponents have no good intention. A double fireball strikes them. Jurs moves back. Two of the guys follow and Imoen throws a potion of burning oil, everyone can hear the agonizing screams of dying mages at the back of the yard. Jurs assails one the guys but Imoen is faster and shoots down the guy. The last guy survives a bit longer but the outcome is just the same. The fact the two mages had no party member in their line of sight probably made the fight much easier but nothing was intentional (no specific approach).
Nyalee is next. I lay some traps beforehand, and it helps us a lot against Nyalee. We Breach her, she starts summoning clones of our party, and when she finally collapses, I discover that she was immune to physical damage thanks to her Earth Elemental form.
I reduced our Earth Elemental Token's resistances down to 50%, but SCS enemies use a slightly different version that cannot be dropped.
When Nyalee is gone, the clones remain. I kill the enemy Zulfer with a feedback loop; Acidic Backlashes trigger each other. Unfortunately he doesn't survive the process.
Sanchuudoku grants immunity to acid damage, but also lowers it on its targets, which means Zulfer can render his clone vulnerable to Acidic Backlash. I have no idea why Zulfer died; I was pretty sure his acid resistance stayed at 100%.
I want more levels before we take on Yaga-Shura, so it's time to go back to Watcher's Keep and try to finish the 3rd level. On the way, I trigger the "Red Badge" poison encounter thingy from SCS. I leave and come back for some reason or another, and after the second encounter, they finally attack me.
I arrived without buffs, which is a problem. To buy us time, Ruva sets a snare to Maze the enemies before they turn hostile. Unfortunately, they don't turn hostile at the same time, so not all of them vanish.
Appropriately enough, the poison-based encounter sees our group get poisoned early on. The attacker, Bloodspear, picks one of our most vulnerable characters. We don't have many ways to cure poison due to poor preparation my part, but we have enough.
We do have plenty of Antidotes, but those take a round to use. Unfortunately, Laosha could not save Yorun Zovai. The damage left her weakened, and the next blow from Project Force, takes her out.
I spread out our party a bit to keep the most vulnerable out of danger. Zulfer and Laosha are immune to poison thanks to the Ring of Gaxx and druid immunities, so we don't have to resort to ranged weapons and Teleport Field to stay safe.
Viora raises Yorun Zovai with a spell and our tanks bring down the enemies still present. Raise Dead isn't very safe to use in battle, but it saves us a charge from a Rod of Resurrection. When the screen is clear, Ruva lays a trap to prepare for the remaining enemies when they escape the Maze effect.
We take a moment to buff ourselves and summon some critters, then pick off the enemies as they appear. Ruva's Maze traps give us a lot of time to recover when things go bad.
It finally occurs to me to export my characters. I don't know why I didn't do this sooner.
Exporting characters would allow me to retrieve chunked characters by importing older versions of them, provided they are player-created (NPCs like Imoen can't be exported and are therefore irretrievable). This would have saved me millions of XP in lost characters, as well as some important items on Ruva 1... including those Arrows of Dispelling.
I forgot to mention that, just before reaching the mines map, the adventurers went back to Beregost to sell or store the items they recently accumulated.
Davaeorn I haven't found a 100% satisfactory approach for this fight, this makes it even more interesting. Moreover, I do not know what kind of spells Davaeorn can use because this is a new installation of Stratagems. What is known for sure is that every six rounds 2+2 guards go downstairs and join the fight. In this duo configuration, I want Jurs to attack Davaeorn while Imoen is opposing the guards. The heroes own most (if not all) of the interesting potions, at least a couple of each, that is the main part of their enhancements. Jurs adds a few spells for himself + remove fear for both. Noticeably he casts protection from fire whereas Imoen relies on potions to increase her resistance. Both of them are also under the effects of a potion of absorption. Doing so allows Jurs to conveniently use the wand of fire and the wand of lightning. Invulnerability, Strength, Heroism potions help Jurs to become even more dangerous. Both of them have a potion of magic resistance, Imoen uses it immediately. Jurs next safeguard primarily consists of magic blocking potions and, ultimately, the scroll of protection from magic ready to be used. Imoen is more likely to use the potions of invisibility as a last resort. None of them has arrows of dispelling or detonation but Imoen equips a set of 18 poisoned arrows obtained in the Nashkel's mines (she won't use them on Davaeorn, she will just use the arrows of ice on the guards and a few on Davaeorn - I forgot to switch between the two...) In order to contain the guards and keep them in a small area, Jurs casts web+grease+stinking cloud at the entrance prior to engaging the fight with Davaeorn. The resulting efficiency is passable but it's better than nothing at all. The guards are no big threat as long as he is still protected from fire and electricity because his wands can deal a fair amount of damage. However the situation may become awkward if too many opponents walk in the same small room, potentially preventing the team from attacking the right target(s). As I do not want to prevent Jurs from casting spells, he is going to wear the robe and statistically the blacktalons archers have non neglectable chancs to hit. Especially if Davaeorn de-buffs Jurs at such a time. Talking about debuff, Jurs has the wand of summoning ready for distracting Davaeorn but other actions should have a higher priority. Both Jurs and Imoen prefer potions of freedom to haste / boots of speed. This was the right decision.
Jurs meets Davaeorn, Imoen stays in the first room. After the dialog, Jurs moves forward and then casts a skull trap to soften the battle horrors. It actally hits Davaeorn before his protections are on (unexpected to be honest). Davaeorn immediately triggers a minor spell sequencer combining web and stinking cloud (it sounds familiar!) and then teleports. The battle horrors stop Jurs. Davaeorn appears next to Imoen but largely ignores her. She throws a potion and start shooting at the first guards conveniently webbed in the corridor, thus demonstrating no sign of hostility toward Davaeorn. Twenty meters away, Jurs fires the wand of lightning for the first time, luckily both battle horrors get damaged. Davaeorn disappears again, the first battle horror explodes soon followed by the other. Jurs moves back to the first room where he expects to find Davaeorn who shows up in the adjacent room. Both web/stinking cloud combos are still active and Imoen is somehow trapped in this room. That's ok because she does a good job, killing the guards one by one. A key factor is that Davaeorn fails to dispel Jurs effects. I believe this wouldn't have been critical, it would have taken longer to kill Davaeorn though. Jurs was ready to cast a fire shield to recover most of his fire resistance (his only L4 spell being memorized) and another potion of absorption was ready - like as most other defensive options. The guards are dead, Imoen looks for a new position and angle to shoot at Davaeorn. The mage uselessly casts a fireball whereas Jurs hits his stoneskins (with the extra cold damage). A few seconds later the area effects vanish, a new batch of guards joins the fight, some are still under the dying grease effect. Jurs, who cannot yet cast spells on Davaeorn who is still protected by a mGoI, uses his wand of lightning on the guards. Davaeorn recasts a mirror image. Imoen steps in and throws another potion onto the guards. Davaeorn, himself, casts another fireball thus wiping out his own guards. Imoen realizes she is within the explosion range of such a spell and it is urgent to find another suitable place but that's too late, Davaeorn strikes again. A sunfire hits her, she partially absorbs the damage (the BG maths are somewhat special 17-8=9 ok; 24-19=19 ) Davaeorn who is under Jurs pressure, moves again. Imoen walks in the opposite direction, now facing the last guard. She won't be able to kill him, in fact all of Jurs attacks hit Davaeorn who falls at the crossway. Imoen was supposed to use her ring on Davaeorn but this proved unecessary and I preferred to protect her most of the time. A good battle with no artifice.
There was a certain lack of diversity in Davaeorn's spellcasting. I was curious and had a look at his files. "My" Davaeorn memorized 4 fireballs and 3 sunfire! He was also able to cast one ice storm...
On to Watcher's Keep. The 3rd level can be quite challenging, as it has dead magic rooms and wild magic rooms that dispel your buffs and make spellcasting difficult or impossible. Worse yet, the demons there often have fear auras, and if Remove Fear isn't active, we could be in trouble. Our only means of blocking fear without a spell are Potions of Clarity, which take a round to use, the Cloak of Bravery, which I forgot I had at the time, and Dragonslayer, which can't be used by Viora or Azelos, the only two of us who can cast Remove Fear or Resist Fear to rescue other party members.
We get overwhelmed by a Succubus and her Alu-Fiends. Laosha, our best tank, got charmed due to my giving him a nonmagical helm instead of a Helm of Charm Protection, and then got Mazed immediately after. Without Laosha to tank the enemy's physical damage, Zulfer struggled to survive. Ruva saved his life several times by Mazing the enemies with her Special Snares, with Azelos casting Power Word: Blind on her to make sure she could lay the traps when enemies were near. She also took down one of the Alu-Fiends with a backstab with the Staff of Striking, despite the THAC0 penalty from her blindness.
When Laosha returned, he was still charmed. We escaped him with Invisibility 10' Radius and waited out the duration.
Gerland and his party completed the Unseeing Eye (lvl 15 castings of Animated Dead), Astral Prison (lots of dispellers for the Yuan-Tis, brute force against Master of Thralls and surprisingly meek Warden), and Planar Sphere quests without much difficulty. The battles against Lavok and Tolgerias were a bit underwhelming, not least because they couldn't cast HLA spells. I checked my weidu-log and saw that I installed the SCS component that limits HLA spells to a few selected SoA enemies. I did have full-prebuffing installed, and found that I didn't enjoy that at all. My characters never prebuff except with long duration spells (i.e. Stoneskin) and in dungeons, with medium duration buffs (a la Death Ward). Only if the character knows they are going to confront a powerful foe, will they prebuff. An example is when Firkraag tells the party they'll have to fight Conster to get the key to release Windspear's child.
Anyway, the party continued for a while, and even made it through Spellhold, but then a few silly deaths fllowed each other (Jan and Aerie in the City of Caverns final battle due to to bad positioning on my part and poisoned Sahuagin bolts; Anomen and Jaheira twice each in the Underdark's Beholder lair due to me underestimating the Beholders' better calls for help). What had been a very clean run up till Chapter 3, turned into a resurrection fest. As some of you know, I tend to lose interest and focus in my party runs when I have to resurrect NPCs a lot, especially if their deaths could have been prevented relatively easily, so I've decided to retire Gerland from the no-reload challenge.
I hope to report on the progress of a new Charname soon.
It's a pity, @Blackraven. Your writing has been stunning. But I can understand losing interest with numerous resurrections. I can add that when (if) you play on the Insane, it becomes a thing even more (if you don't go with your custom created parties, when nearly everyone can protect himself with spells).
@Musigny Nice to read about your adventures, it's been some time.
@BillyYank So happy to see the continuation of your IWD run.
@Blackraven I am not trying to change your mind but I would like to point out that HLAs have a limited influence on Lavok and Tolgerias efficiency. Reason being that they are level 21 and they can cast 3 L9 or L10 spells. Stratagems does not cheat (from that perspective) and the spell selection at install time does not necessarily grant them lvl 10 spells (they can get an additional L6/7/8 spell). As matter of fact, I have a Stratagems modded game with HLAs enabled for everyone and it is not surprising to see that Lavok memorized no L10 spell and Tolgerias #1 (government) can cast planetar whereas Tolgerias #2 (planar sphere) memorized no L10 spell.
I'm playing with the HLAs only to a few selected SoA enemies component, and don't feel bad about it. The game is still challenging, especially if you try to mitigate metagaming if possible. The same can be said about not installing the full-prebuffing component.
Anyway, back to the Monty Python crew. Really, it would be cool to read other participants' reports on the run
Our dwarven defender, Hadhod, is such a good tank. Lots of HPs, low saving throws, and the Defensive Stance. It let's us breeze though encounters difficult for low-level parties. Till the Bhaalspawn gets to 50+ HPs, Hadhod is the only party member who can reliably melee in this run, even against magic users.
During one of area transitions, we were attacked by the Molkar's group.
Being still relatively low-level for such encounters, it was decided Lucius will gulp an invis potion, while Hadhod will use the green scroll of magic protection, even if they're are rare in this game.
CrevsDaak and Gemhound didn't participate at that moment, so their characters were quickly killed in the process, while Drassisseilla, brave enough not to gulp an invis potion with Lucius, fell dead the moments later.
Meanwhile, Hadhod was doing his business, so Lucius could finally help.
Not long after that, Lucius got another level as a cleric, getting 5 additional HPs, and with 30+ HPs could start tanking enemies (with DUHM and Armour of Faith, of course).
I have to admit, that I'm beginning to like a F/C more and more. This combination offers a quite reliable ranged damage dealer (with 2 pips in slings, good STR and 18 DEX thanks to the bracers), who will become a second melee tank in the future. I feel myself more involved in everything, if compared to the Avenger druid. Actually, I've been surprised at how good a sling can be, the cleric's buffs add here. It compliments Hadhod with his two hammers finely.
After some shopping we decided to attack the Bandit camp.
Hadhod gulped potions of free action and fire resistance, so that he could "draw aggro" while Drassisseilla webbed and fried groups of bandits. Buffed Lucius and Scvertvdendinw (CrevsDaak came to the game) helped from the distance. In no time, all the bandits were defeated (only for the game to crash right after it, so we'll have to replay the fight)
Thanks @Musigny and @bengoshi for your input. I agree that there's nothing wrong with HLAs for selected SoA casters only, especially taking Musigny's info into account. Maybe I just expected the likes of Tolgerias, Lavok, and the Warden to be scarier than they were, able to wipe out complete parties with Comets and Dark Planetars. Anyway this was only one of my issues. I think the many deaths in a short time were more influential. Bengoshi, I think nightmare mode is not my cup of tea then, until I up my game. I want an NPC death to be a rare and poignant event. If NPCs die all the time, they become little more than glorified summons to me. That doesn't generally feel right.
Having said that, I rolled three new characters, one of them a Chaotic Evil Half-Elf Cleric/Mage (possibly to be kitted as a Priest of Talos and focusing on elemental damage). He should be evil enough to see his companions as dispensable tools, and he might raise them or not if they fall, depending on the situation or on his humor. Could be an interesting character for party play. The second character I rolled is a Chaotic Good Halfling Swashbuckler lass, one of my favorite Charname archetypes. But it was my third Charname who first left Candlekeep,
Bardin:
Bardin is an unusual Rock Gnome in that he's not a mischievous goofball but rather a stalwart exactor of justice. His deity is respected but not widely venerated Gaerdal Ironhand the Stern, and Bardin (which means something like 'hidden weapon' according to the Raced of Stone D&D supplement) is one of the select few Cleric/Thieves (1%) in Gaerdal's clergy. Starting profs were Clubs and Slings. Clubs was a bit of a compromise influenced by RP considerations: I wanted Bardin to be able to backstab but I also envisioned him with a shield. Rather poor backstabs would be the result, but in BG2 I have the itemupgrades mod installed, which allows Cromwell to forge a good +4 or +5 Club, so Bardin may fare better in the backstabbing department in Amn. Besides staves will become not just an option but almost necessary anyway in BG2 if Bardin is to make it to the Throne of Bhaal. The Staff of the Magi is one - and probably the best - of very few dispelling instruments for a Cleric/Thief.
Early Days
Spoilered to shorten this overlong post, and because most of the early stuff wasn't very problematic for Bardin.
Shortly after the fall of Gorion, Bardin traveled to the Friendly Arm Inn where he found an expensive ring he'd later sell. Interestingly his Lord told him not to enter the inn. Gaerdal guided his young follower to Beregost and Nashkel instead, and later toward the coast for reasons the Gnome didn't understand at the time. Either way he obliged. In and around Beregost he carried out several tasks for the common folk, the most intriguing of which must have been his contribution to the anti-chickenation of Thalantyr's apprentice Melicamp.
On the south coast Bardin protected researcher Charlestonian Nib from bandits and his own subordinates alike, and he found a very confused Nashkel Guard captain whom he would escort to a temple dedicated to an allied deity, Helm. In the coast's lighthouse area Bardin relieved three flesh golems of the treasure they were guarding whilst he was protected by a Sanctuary. He did not mess with either the golems or nearby sirines though. Further north Bardin did not fall for the charms of a Nereid, and ended up slaying the creature instead with his sling. Bardin also explored the lands north of the FAI, where the Gnome's intervention in a dispute between followers of Talos and Umberlee may well have saved the life of the young priestess of Umberlee Tenya. Also in those lands a second treasure hoard, this one assembled by ankhegs, fell into the Gnome's hands. Thus the patronage of Gaerdal Ironhand allowed young Bardin to make a number of useful purchases, such as a suit of Shadow Armor and a Claw of Kazgaroth in Beregost, and a Wand of the Heavens, a Cloak of Displacement, and a Greenstone Amulet in Ulgoth's Beard. In that town Bardin also taught fellow Gnome Dushai that the hand of justice shall not be stayed.
Excursions to the Firewine Ruins and Durlag's Tower yielded Bardin a pair of Legacy of the Masters gauntlets as well as a wealth of experience,
while a confrontation with the infamous bounty hunter Greywolf (taken down with sling bullets after Greywolf saved vs Hold Person) left the Gnome with an enchanted longsword, and two stolen emeralds for him to hand over to a bounty handler in Nashkel. The rock garden of Mutamin, which consisted of people and animals petrified by mind-controlled Basilisks, was another source of good experience. There was some unfortunate collateral damage as Bardin blasted the scaly beasts with Necklace of Missiles fireballs,
but all in all Bardin reckoned he'd done a good job when he was done with the Basilisks and their master (whom he had rendered all but helpless with a successful Silence before slaying him).
His mood only improved when on his way back to Beregost he was given the opportunity to rid the Sword Coast of more brigands (using a divide and conquer strategy).
A few tendays had passed since his departure from Candlekeep, but Bardin had already started to make a difference on the Sword Coast.
Not as good for his mood was Bardin's violent confrontation in Beregost with a Dwarven bounty hunter who had been out for his hide for some reason, nor that with four Thayvians who had wanted to abduct a Half-Elf wizardess named Neera. The Gnome dealt competently with two bodyguards, both were Held and subsequently slain, but he could not stop a Thayvian wizard from killing Neera. Not a 'licensed cleric' yet, Bardin could do nothing for the young Half-Elf other than exacting justice on the Thayvian.
An exploration of the Cloudpeaks followed. Animate Dead and Hold Person became staple spells during that trip.
Bardin explored those lands all the way west to a Gnoll Stronghold, and returned to the civilized world a richer and (slightly) comelier Gnome. Another contributor to Bardin's purse was Keldath Ormlyr of the Temple of the Morning. He rewarded the Gnome with no less than 5k GP for Holding and slaying Bassilus the murderer.
Following this feat, Free Action-protected Bardin cleared the area surrounding the Lathandrite Temple of its dire, dread and vampiric wolves,
and he also dispensed with the ankhegs north of the FAI relying on the help of his Skeletons.
More incompetent bounty hunters had tried in vain to take Bardin's scalp, including one at the FAI, up to the point that the Gnome got fed up with being followed everywhere he went, and decided he would find out why people wanted him dead. He started with a trip to the troubled Nashkel Mines, the source of the iron crisis and also the place that two close but overly secretive friends of his late foster father, Khalid and Jaheira, wanted investigated. Not much of a lead, but anything or anyone somehow related to himself or to Gorion might bring him closer to answers.
Nashkel Mines
Stealth allowed Bardin to navigate the Nashkel Mines at his convenience. He dispatched groups of Kobolds with fire but more important was his vanquishing of their master, a Half-Orc priest of Cyric and the organizer of the iron ore contamination.
Back in Nashkel Bardin entertained the possibility that his meddling with the ore corrupters had been against the ones that wanted him dead. An assassin named Nimbul awaited him near the tavern, only to meet his end at the hands of soldiers, Skeletons, and Wand of the Heavens wielding Bardin.
Nimbul's contact Tranzig suffered the same fate in Beregost.
A letter the wizard had carried revealed to Bardin the location of a bandit camp in the Wood of Sharp Teeth.
Bandit Camp
Still in Beregost, Bardin taught a fork-tongued thespian not to lie to him, admittedly with his Skeletons doing much of the dirty work,
before he set out and infiltrated into the bandits' ranks via a fellow named Raiken. At their base, Bardin - despite being one Thief level shy of the Cleric/Thief BG1 level cap - feared for his life when his strategy to defeat the bandit leaders failed. He had found a quiet corner in the tent (out of Raemon's sight), where he hoped to summon three Skeletons without being interrupted. Not only did the bandits find Bardin out, their Gnoll warrior also cornered him so that he couldn't escape. Bardin quaffed an invisibility potion and buffed himself as much as he could (potions of regeneration, defense, Greenstone amulet charge; HP + DUHM). He then managed to take out the bandits' wizard even after he got Slowed by the latter. However, Bardin suffered at least five critical hits, including three poisoned arrows from Hobgoblin Elites.
His regeneration potion really made a difference here. Bardin went invisible a second time, healed and prepared for battle again (expending an oil of speed for this purpose), defeated the Gnoll, and took care of the others with Necklace of Missiles fireballs.
Prisoner Ender Sai revealed to Bardin that the Gnome's conflict was with the Iron Throne, with a hidden base in the Cloakwood. Bardin was still injured when a group of bounty hunters ambushed (Molkar & Co) him on his way to the FAI, but given his physical state and the fact that he was low on spells, the Gnome decided to run.
Cloakwood
In the Cloakwood, Bardin helped some Druids but battled others.
(The Mighty Oak +2 Club became Bardin's end game weapon.) The Gnome also dealt with loads of spiders, but he ran from another ambush (Lamalha), fearful of the woods' plentiful and dangerous web traps. In front of the Iron Throne base, a mine, Bardin softened up a warrior named Drasus with six traps before felling him with a backstab.
The warrior's companion Genthore fell as well, but two wizards went invisible after wasting some of their spells on Bardin's Skeleton Warriors, avoiding a fight with the Gnome.
Inside the mine Bardin went straight for the master of the mine, Davaeorn. Two potions of magic protection kept the Gnome safe from the wizard's spells while fire proved fatal for Davaeorn's minions and for the mage himself.
Baldur's Gate
Bardin traveled to the city of Baldur's Gate to pay the Iron Throne HQ a visit. First however he undertook several lucrative missions in the city, rewarding himself with a Shield of the Falling Stars, Helm and Cloak of Balduran, two Necklaces of Missiles, three stat-increasing Tomes, a plethora of potions, and several green scrolls. At the Iron Throne HQ Bardin summoned his Skeleton Warriors on the fourth floor, and buffed them with Strength of One. The Gnome himself taunted a group of Iron Throne acolytes on the fifth floor, and successfully lured some of them downstairs to finish them with the help of his summons.
Upstairs Bardin dispatched two warriors, a wizard (Naaman with a backstab and Wand of the Heavens Flamestrike), and - with some difficulty - one backstabbing rogue. A last acolyte had hidden in one of the offices behind the hall. Bardin pressured him into divulging the Iron Throne leaders' whereabouts. He learned they were in Candlekeep.
Candlekeep
Bardin learned a lot more in that citadel, his former home. First of all he discovered he was an offspring of Bhaal and secondly the man that had wanted him dead, the man that had killed Gorion, was his brother Sarevok. Sarevok had been using the Iron Throne to pursue his own agenda: inciting a war on the Sword Coast. He framed Bardin for the murder of the Iron Throne leaders, whom he no longer had use for, but Bardin escaped with the help of Tethtoril, and with a number of valuable items in his pack.
Finale
Bardin traveled south to the Nashkel region, stocked up on potions, and returned to Baldur's Gate where he kept a low profile as he was now wanted for murdering the Iron Throne leaders. Sarevok's (former) lover Tamoko, of all people, informed Bardin of his brother's plans: killing the Dukes and becoming the new Archduke of Baldur's Gate. Bardin eliminated the assassin Slythe hired by Sarevok to kill duke Belt and duchess Jannath. A backstab delivered while the assassin was occupied with a summon, and four traps did Slythe in.
The Gnome took an invitation to Sarevok's inauguration at the Ducal Palace from the assassin's corpse, rested at the Blushing Mermaid, and went to the palace to protect the Dukes from Sarevok and his Doppelganger cronies. He set about seven snares there (I've lost too many no-reload solo characters there to both Dukes' dying to bother about cheesy resting), summoned and buffed three Skeletons and heavily buffed himself as well. With 25 STR from the violet potion plus other buffs Bardin allowed himself to dual-wield two clubs. A Rogue Rebalancing phial of poison plus traps plus Skeleton Warriors plus Flaming Fists soon had all the Doppelgangers down but one, a mage that had retreated to an antechamber.
The Doppelganger Mage killed several Flaming Fists with a Sunfire, and confused others before Bardin struck it down.
Sarevok than slew duchess Jannath, and a confused Flaming Fist guard must have hit one of Bardin's Skeleton Warriors, because a fight ensued and soon all the Flaming Fists as well as duke Belt were hostile. Fortunately the duke didn't have hard feelings, at least not so hard as to refuse to help Bardin find Sarevok after the latter fled the scene.
Bardin made his way through a maze and through the undercity to Sarevok's lair, a temple of Bhaal. In front of it, Tamoko understandably but foolishly insisted on fighting Bardin (despite the Gnome's stellar reputation).
Inside the temple, Bardin slew Sarevok's acolytes Tazok (with poisoned and hasted sling attacks), Diarmid (idem), Semaj (fireballs because he went invisible), and Angelo (poison), as well as their animated skeletons. A series of backstabs, two traps, and ranged attacks combined with potion of firebreath scorchers then felled Sarevok.
This is Bardin's endgame inventory:
A quick run through BG1, in which I've been more lenient with myself than I sometimes am. More specifically I allowed Necklace of Missiles and Wand of the Heavens recharges. The reason for that is that I recently accomplished a complete, roleplayed and pretty clean playthrough of BG1, with Gerland and his party. Also, I was pretty eager to make it into SoA because I did a reinstall of BG2EE with a number of interesting mods.
@Blackraven: I normally post at least half of the screenshots I take. It's still a lot. I like to let the screenshots illustrate not simply the killing blow, but also every turning point and every surprise, hence the large number. I use screenshots to highlight stuff that threatened to hurt the party, and show how I turned the situation around before things got bad. Or, show how things got bad and I couldn't fix them.
The idea is to tell a detailed explanation of why a battle turned out the way it did.
After searching through the bandit camp. we decided to start Cloakwood right away.
There, we helped the druids against Aldeth this time (from the previous experience, the Aldeth's quest in the BG city was bugged anyway) and tried to find a ring of luck in the forest:
We lured all the spiders from the Centeol's cave outside and carefully dealt with them, so that Drassisseilla, under the protection from cold from the belt, could kill the Joneleth's lover alone.
Before going to the next area, Lucius warned the party about a possible ambush by a group of amazon bounty hunters. It turned out to be true:
Hadhod activated his Defensive Stance, Lucius casted AoF (which helped a lot against the Unholy Blight) and then gulped a potion of Frost Giant Strength, while Drassisseilla retreated to the north, nearly dying in the process.
In several moments, I saw Scvertvdendinw with 1 HP left and poisoned. Hadhod said the elf is nothing but dead, but we still tried to give her an elixir of health. It helped! Lucius also casted Command on Telka (instead of the first thought of casting Sanctuary), to stop her from wounding Scvertvdendinw further.
The battle was won.
The next area surprised us with a relatively hard fight against a Hamadryad.
First, she dire-charmed Lucius, and while charname ran after Hadhod (who ran after the constantly teleporting Hamadryad), she held Drassisseilla. To make things worse, Lucius started to attack Drassisseilla. But the dire-charm wore off just in time, before the final blow to our dragon disciple.
I thought we saved Drassisseilla, but nope - it turned out Hadhod, while chasing Hamadryad and becoming entangled, took throwing axes. So when he was charmed by the Hamadryad, he killed Drassisseilla from the distance. Soon afterwards, a bullet from Lucius stopped this madness.
We had to retreat to Beregost, to raise Drassisseilla and buy some stuff (spells for Scvertvdendinw, a robe for Drassisseilla, among other things).
@Blackraven You've got a talent for creating interesting characters. Where does Bardin's picture come from ?
Thank you @Musigny. I always try to invest in my characters so as to feel more involved with them. I like your writing style. It's detailed and insightful. I hope to see Jurs in Amn. I'm sure I could learn a lot from your descriptions. As to Bardin's portrait, I found the image here. But as you can see I edited it a bit to make Bardin look more like a D&D Rock Gnome (gave him a bit of a tan, dyed the green hair blonde, also darkened the armor to make it look more roguey since Bardin's a Cleric/Thief).
Bardin, LN Cleric/Thief, in SoA
At the beginning of the SoA portion of Bardin's adventure I'm quite curious as to how a solo Cleric/Thief performs in late SoA and in ToB in general, and Bardin in my current setup in particular. My most succesful Cleric/Thief so far has been Bartholomew (who got vorpaled last year by his own celestial that had gone hostile due to friendly fire, during an otherwise succesful Irenicus battle in Spellhold), but he had a full party at his disposal.
Possible issues I can think of are the following:
* slow casting Many spells have too long casting times to be reliably used in battle. This includes offensive spells like Doom (casting time 9), Hold Person (5), Miscast Magic (5), Flamestrike (8), False Dawn (9), and Harm (9). It also applies to buffs like Death Ward (casting time 9), Free Action (5), or PfE 10' Radius (7), that the Cleric/Thief may want to refresh during battle if/when the enemy removes them. The Amulet of Power plus the Robe of Vecna come UAI should help mitigate this drawback of divine casting.
* lack of protections against buff removals Clerics have lots of great buffs and combat protections but limited means to keep them in place, unlike Mages. The only spell protection they get is the level 7 spell Shield of the Archons (a divine Spell Deflection). Unfortunately a Cleric/Thief gets no more than three level 7 spell slots, as of level 22 (plus one extra level 7 spell slot via the holy symbol at level 25). This means that Shield of the Archons will have to compete with several other good spells for just a few slots. Due to being a multiclass a Cleric/Thief's Shield of the Archons will only absorb up to 12 or 13 spell levels whereas a straight Cleric's SotA will eventually absorb up to 20 spell levels. In other words a Cleric/Thief has fewer level 7 spell slots but needs more SotA per day than a straight Cleric to keep their buffs up. Of course the Thief part in a Cleric/Thief can be helpful here as well: hit and fade tactics, stealth and non-detection, UAI scroll-casting are all tools with which a Cleric/Thief can prevent and/or repair exposure. I haven't decided yet whether or not to install the SCS component that treats mages' and priests' HLAs as innate abilities rather than memorisable spells. On the one hand having Implosion, Summon Deva, and Storm of Vengeance as innates will mean more slots for Shield of the Archons and other level 7 spells. On the other hand, Quest Spells can only be picked once and thus cast only once per day as a special ability. This means less flexibility. Besides clones (Simulacra etc) do get to cast level 7 spells but they do not get access to the original's innate SCS HLAs. Any insights?
* difficulty removing enemy spell/combat protections Clerics' only means of dispelling enemy combat and spell protections is Dispel Magic. Clerics are actually quite good dispellers, especially in small parties or as solo characters, since they level up relatively fast and they can reach level 40 eventually. Thieves can specialize in shortbows and rely on arrows of dispelling until they get UAI and learn to cast from scrolls or use weapons like the Staff of the Magi or Carsomyr. Unfortunately, a Cleric/Thief has neither a powerful Dispel Magic, due to being a multiclass, nor access to arrows of dispelling, due to being restricted to blunt weapons. A Cleric/Thief will have to wait until UAI before they reliably remove enemy protections.
* limited APR Backstabs don't work against all foes and are difficult to execute in confined spaces with numerous enemies. Clerics' wonderful combat buffs simply lose much of their effectiveness if the priest has only one APR. Thieves' Time Traps aren't much good if a Cleric/Thief can only perform two actions per round (one attack and one spell). Faster casting thanks to Amulet of Power and Robe of Vecna makes extra attacks more than welcome. It's considerations like these that really make me want my Cleric/Thief to get as many APR as possible, and not just in the form of summons. As always I play with Rogue Rebalancing's Proper dual-wielding implementation for Thieves and Bards as per pnp. This means that all rogues, including Cleric/Thieves, can get three pips in TWF, and thus that my Cleric/Thief will be able to become a better dual-wielder than a vanilla Cleric/Thief. With UAI a lot of items become available to the Cleric/Thief to further increase APR. With full Cleric buffs, Belm and Scarlet Ninja-To might actually be a good combo against many enemies, despite non-proficiency in Scimitars. This is something I'll have to see for myself though. Together, the Ring of Gaxx, Improved Cloak of Protection +2, and Bracers of Blinding Strike are good for 5 Improved Hastes per day. Additionally there are several scrolls of Improved Haste scattered throughout the game. A Cleric/Thief does well to hoard these scrolls (and many other scrolls too). If attainable the Gauntlets of Extraordinary Specialization will add another 1/2 attack. So a Cleric/Thief could get 9 APR with Belm and Scarlet Ninja-To, Gauntlets of Extraordinary Specialization, and Improved Haste. In fights where Scarlet Ninja-To isn't good enough for a main hand weapon, that weapon can go to the off-hand while a good blunt weapon occupies the main hand (FoA, Crom Faeyr, or in the case of Bardin probably an upgraded club as per Item Upgrades).
* new setup Another potential issue is lack of familiarity with my current install. I installed several Big Picture components in addition to the Ascension components, including some Tactics stuff:
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #625 // Hellhounds: v181-b4611 ~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #675 // Knights and Paladins: v181-b4611 ~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1080 // Vampire Encounters -> Chapter 3 and 6 (no bodhi): v181-b4611 ~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1100 // Copper Coronet and Slavers: v181-b4611 ~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1140 // Druidic Improvements -> Druid Grove (with Druid Encounter): v181-b4611 ~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1170 // Treant Encounter: v181-b4611 ~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1600 // Improved Suldanessallar: v181-b4611 ~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1625 // Tanners Quest: v181-b4611 ~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1650 // Trademeet Enhancements: v181-b4611 ~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1400 // Improved Random Encounters, by Gebhard Blucher and Kensai Ryu: v181-b4611 ~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1110 // Kensai Ryu's Brown Dragon: v181-b4611 ~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1175 // Kensai Ryu's Gnome Fighter/Illusionist in the Docks: v181-b4611 ~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1275 // Gebhard Blucher's Lich in the Docks: v181-b4611 ~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1525 // Improved Small Teeth Pass, by Kensai Ryu: v181-b4611 ~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1250 // Kuroisan the Acid Kensai, by Westley Weimer: v181-b4611 ~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1425 // Red Badge, Poison-Based Encounter, by Westley Weimer: v181-b4611
I've got SCS almost fully installed, but I made two significant changes compared to my previous install. First of all I decided to no longer play with full enemy pre-buffing. Instead I opted for the option that triggers enemy casters' short-duration buffs at the start of combat if they are created in sight of the PC. The reason is that my characters don't pre-buff with short duration spells themselves unless they know they're about to face off with a powerful opponent. That's the roleplayer in me. Secondly, I installed HLA for all eligible spellcasters in SoA and ToB, meaning that many Mage battles become less predictable and more dangerous. I've also added a number of encounters mods via D0QuestPack, and quests: Assassinations, Back to Brynnlaw, and Sellswords, all subject to SCS scripts. On the other hand I also have a number of Tweaks (P&P Celestials, Improved Horns of Valhalla, some BG2 Tweaks, and the already mentioned ItemUpgrades) that should make my characters slightly more powerful. I've attached the full WEIDU-log.
These are just some thoughts I've had about what SoA and hopefully ToB will have in store for Bardin. I wrote them down because I'm forgetful and who knows they might be insightful for others or cause people to come up with interesting feedback.
As to Bardin's current status, he's taking a break at Waukeen's Promenade, having recently escaped Chateau Irenicus with some difficulty. His stats and thieving skills at character creation:
Weapon profs were *Clubs, *Slings, *TWF. Extra experience from BG1 meant an immediate level-up as both a Cleric and a Thief (and was soon followed by a second Thief level-up). MS and HiS were improved with 10 each, Find Traps with 5. The problem initially was that Bardin didn't really have the right spells memorized for escaping chateau Irenicus. He had one Sanctuary (a second one being greyed out due to losing the Honorary Ring of Sune from BG1), and he had to get a Club from Ilych's room. Bardin rested pretty much immediately and memorized six Sanctuaries. He also memorized three Spiritual Hammers to deal with enemies he'd face before getting his hands on the club. The unexpectedly pathetic damage the Spiritual Hammers dealt, combined with their limited duration, taught us that was a bad decision.
Even a single Smoke Mephit proved quite a challenge for unarmed Bardin. His Divine Wrath Bhaalpowers bailed him out.
This difficult start inspired Bardin to shamelessly take advantage of the fact that SCS' reduction on resting in Irenicus' Dungeon doesn't apply to solo characters. He snuck through the halls, hidden in shadows, procured the club from Ilych's room under Sanctuary, backstabbed an Otyugh,
and fled from some Duergar into the Dryads' garden after his distraction with a summoned animal failed due to stubborn AI forcing it into the Duergar's hallway.
Traps, backstabs and Skeletons helped Bardin prevail over pursuing Duergar and two Flesh Golems.
Stealth and Sanctuary allowed the Gnome to receive Arla's Dragonbane from a Genie in return for a flask, and with careful ranged sneak attacks, he killed Ilych so that he could honor his word given to the Dryads to bring their acorn to the Windspear Hills.
(Bardin's Lawful Neutral after after all.) On the second dungeon floor, Bardin had the help of three Skeleton Warriors in destroying our Mephit Portals,
although the mindless summons easily got distracted by the less urgent Mephit spawns. The undead lasted long enough to also serve against Duergar, Frennedan the Doppelganger, and a couple of assassins.
Bardin was Sanctuaried when he procured a Girdle of Bluntness from a room guarded by Duergar, before he escaped and witnessed hs captor Irenicus and his old friend Imoen being arrested by Cowled Wizards.
Thank you @Musigny. I always try to invest in my characters so as to feel more involved with them. I like your writing style. It's detailed and insightful. I hope to see Jurs in Amn. I'm sure I could learn a lot from your descriptions.
My writing style? You are too kind! I cannot write correctly, that's not my language. Musigny casts dispel illusion
I read your weidu.log and I have a few quick comments: 1-BP was the only way to get ascension running on BG2EE but there is another project refreshing the mod with the clear intent to support it on EE. BP installs on EE but it is not supported and probably not verified script by script. I haven't tried the new attempt yet but that sounds like the best way to plug SCS on top of Ascension (using BP+Stratagems has never been 100% satisfactory despite the thread flagged as an announcement on this very forum...) 2- BP and Tactics. I know a guy who can confirm that several components that you use have a better implementation in EEtactics, at a minimum the gnome fighter/illusionist, the lich in the docks, redbadge and to a lesser extent Kuroisan. It is primarily not a question of installation method. It includes fixes for a few bugs and the AI compatibility with EE. Tactics Torgal and Tactics Mae'Var are nice too but I can't recommend them in your installation because I do not know if there is a conflict with the Quest Pack (see 5) but the new Mae'Var would have no conflict with Stratagems despite the warning in the SCS readme. 3- BP/Tactics Improved random encounters. Just don't do that because later you deploy both Unfinished Business and Stratagems random encounters. And honestly you won't miss it. 4- I think the individual PnP celestial mod creates problems but I don't remember the details, I will tell you later. 5- Quest pack : General AI + Creature and areas improvements. Perhaps not as mod friendly as you may think. Some Undeads and Umber Hulks are likely to be the only creatures not overriden by Stratagems. Unless you really want those creatures, you don't really improve your setup. (don't know if there are drawbacks). aTweaks Undeads perhaps? 6- aTweaks Prevent Project Image and Simulacrum clones from using quickslot items AND Stratagems Prevent Simulacra and Projected Images from using magical items. I think that's the same. 7- IMHO ascension Demogrogon is better than Stratagems. Unfortunately Demorgon is packaged in the Improved Fiends component. Again IMHO another reason to use the aTweaks fiends, a bit less intelligent but what an implementation !!
@Musigny, one doesn't have to be a native speaker to write meaningful and fun contributions to these forums Thanks very much for your feedback! Re: 1. I think people have completed the game with BP Ascension, so I'm inclined to give it a chance for now, though I'd love to know more of the other project you refer to. Re: 2. Yeah, I thought of EETactics later, after I included BP Tactics stuff when I installed BP for Ascension If I uninstall BP Tactics and installed EETactics instead, would I have to install EETactics very early on in my setup? Re: 3. Ok, will uninstall. Re: 4. I only used P&P Celestials in my BGT setup once, and I had Anomen successfully summon a Movanic Deva in BG2EE (Gerland's party). I'm going to give them a try. Is there another mod containing P&P Celestials that works better? Re: 5. I don't think I really want Quest Pack Umber Hulks or Undead, but if SCS overrides everything but those creatures anyway, I can't see Quest Pack doing much harm. Am I wrong? Re: 6. You're probably right. Do you think having both installed will cause any problems? Re: 7. I've considered installing aTweaks' 3rd Fiends component: SCS stats with aTweaks abilities and behavior.
Comments
I even think that my party was maybe stronger when Viconia died, as my two Blackguards were now very high level and could cast many spells (I'm playing with IWD spell progression for Paladin, so they had access to spells lvl 1-6), they were earning more xp.
But I have no idea how to do ToB solo without being somekind of Fighter/Mage, it seems so much harder. I want to try with my Sorcerer or a Shadowdancer solo but I don't know how I will beat Dragons, Demogorgon or Amelyssan, notably with the component which prevent you from using quickslot items with clones.
I really needed them for my fighter/thief as this was the way for a simulacrum to cast spells. It was also convenient for a couple of other things.
The sorcerer is by far the class I love the most. One of the easiest way to solo the game (including tactical challenge mods). Such ranking would depend on extra features you may have enabled though.
I would be glad to share some thoughts in a longer post.
Down is the new up Tom Yorke
The party successfully reached the Chess fight in the Durlag's Tower. The previous 2 levels were done by careful use of all the resourses we had. This fight, though, gave the new experience.
At first, due to the know SCS bug, we had to use Cluaconsole to teleport to the Chessboard, which resulted in everyone needing to gulp a potion of invis, in order to only start this fight.
After a small pre-planning, this was the set-up:
We started the fight rather well, with webs on the battlefield.
The problem happened when I realized Gowrek was stuck in webs. Somehow @Tresset didn't switch to his sword, this resulting in his character's death.
Another problem arose when @CrevsDaak didn't succeed in saving Llolnae from poison.
Both these things resulted in Loki becoming an easy target of an enemy archer. All Loki's invisibilities (and there were 6 of them, 2 potions and 4 spells) were spent already. The potion case was not here. And it looked like nobody could save the druid.
In the last effort, Loki ran to the NW corner (using the potion of speed he had), but the archer still followed him, and neither Proesis, a sorcerer by @Gotural, nor Glincuwen could help here.
I felt very bad that moment. Maybe the worst feeling in my gaming experience. I remember the @Blackraven 's words: "I'll be able to join you, guys, in late January. You'll be in BG2 then". I felt as if I failed all the participants (old and new) of this run, all the followers.
1. I've liked the MP! It's an unbelievable and amazing feeling, to play, to interact, to chat will all of the participants. All those who took part in the run, you're more than fellow no-reloaders and fellow players now, you're friends of mine.
2. The MP is harder. Just because someone always can unpause the game, just because of numerous lags, just because of not being able to control everything and every time.
3. All the participants are real men. I mean, not even for a moment, @Tresset , @CrevsDaak , @Gotural and @GemHound hesitated to start a new run, a new "maybe this time" MP attempt. I just don't have enough words to praise you and to thank you for your determination, even if our 3 month experience was lost...
4. ... and to tell the truth, it wasn't lost. We're much more experienced now, in terms of playing as a team.
This is what we decided on the run's rules:
A. The main character, when push came to shove, couldn't use any potion he potentially was able to: magic blocking, invisibility, anything. Reason: the potioncase was not in the inventory. If we're on a such run as we're doing, it's a mistake. If the situation is bad, the least the main character can do is to gulp a saving potion. In any case, he'll be the last standing on the battlefield.
For fighter-type characters it could be even more useful: instead of hoarding all those potions, we could use them. But when the potioncase is used more as a container, and not a useful tool, it can't help. As yesterday showed, the situation becomes worse when the character who carries it is dead. At least, if the potioncase is in the main character's inventory, he could give a potion to anyone else till the very last second of the game.
For wizard-type characters the same could be said in terms of the scrollcase.
B. Managing the inventory is quite important, even more so in MP. Everyone really need to have at least one Potion of Invisibility on himself at all times, but the more the better. Potions of Magic Shielding are also very important to have in one inventory.
C. From now on, when we are in a difficult fight and someone pause the game, EVERYONE should write a quick "r" or "ready". When everyone but the one who started the pause wrote "r", then the one who initiated the pause can resume the game when he's ready too.
D. The run showed that no matter who manages not his character, this character will always be overlooked. Since GemHound had become unavailable, Llolnae became the most dying character in the group. Also, in many fights she wasn't used till the most effectiveness. So, if someone is unavailable for this or that session and we're not ready to dismiss the character from the party (knowing it's only for one or two sessions), I suggest we kill the character, so that it doesn't distract from managing the own character.
5. As for the run itself, the avenger druid proved to be a two-faced god:
- his webs and chaos spells drove the party through nearly all the encounters;
- in the same time his webs were a reason of many party deaths, in the end resulting in the fail of the whole attempt;
- although the Avenger druid is very good offensively, it's a very squishy character for a MP run. Because of the MP nature of the run, it's not always possible to control everything. The main character should have more "meat" in him, be much less likely to get hit.
I have two more things to add:
- a FMC character, even in the party, proved to be badass;
- a F/T character is the main option to deal with single targets, and combining staffs and two-handed swords is a decent choice.
Enters Lucius, a chaotic good dwarven Fighter/Cleric, the Bhaalspawn:
Scvertvdendinw (an additional cookie for reading it successfully), a lawful evil elven F/M/T, by @CrevsDaak :
Hadhod, a lawful neutral Dwarven Defender, a brother-in-law of the Bhaalspawn, by @Gotural :
Drassisseilla, a neutral good gnome Dragon Disciple, by @Tresset :
Elian, a mysterious chaotic neutral Assassin, by @GemHound :
The adventure has been quite speedy so far: High Hedge - Beregost - Nashkel Carnival - basilisks - Tarnesh - ankhegs - Gnoll Stronghold - Nashkel Mines
We had to deal with the kobolds in the mines with only three player-controlled characters: the F/C, the Dragon Disciple and the Assassin, without a single rest.
You can see how fully buffed (from potions only) Lucius stuns Mulahey, while Drassisseilla fries all incoming skeletons and kobolds:
Before triggering the main quest, Imoen and Jurs want to explore Gullykin, the ruins of Firewine Bridge and the valley of tombs. This excludes fighting the ogre mage at the bridge though (perhaps later).
Jurs bought a splendid robe allowing him to cast spells while being sufficiently protected, well almost.
Jurs is invited to a duel with Meilum. How to refuse?
In Gullykin, the two friends face another group of bounty hunters. Nothing that a good web, blindness, spook and well shot arrows can't manage. Imoen gets charmed at some point with no consequence.
Drakar is the first to sink, completly disabled by the web. Followed by Molkar who, once blinded decided to go back to the web. Perhaps Morvin was initially under the effect too but now he is fully active. The magic missiles partially cancel his mirror image. Jurs and Imoen totally fail to disrupt his spellcasting, as a result Imoen is now dire charmed. However she is going to remain inactive. There is no immediate danger, Jurs casts spook... successfully. Less succesful are his several attempts to shoot the guy with his bow (a kind of remarkable score in this category). Blindness fails. Meanwhile Halagan shows up with a warm welcome. Imoen gets out of the charm effect at the same time. Soon after, Morvin collapses too.
No fireball or skull trap bombing this time. Almost under control (Imoen charmed because she used the bow instead of her wand ... that seemed so easy) but clearly not memorable.
Aahhh Gullykin's "temple" - I like the way they worship their god!
Back to Beregost to sell many items. Can someone tell the towncrier to shut up? Yes we are famous but we are hunted, always on the move!
Back to Firewine Bridge, now it's dungeon and ... kobolds party time.
The undead can hit hard but Aganazzar's scorcher does wonders.
A sneaky kobold is awfully effective against Imoen. I am happy I did not attempt this dungeon exploration much earlier.
The final battle is a matter of assaulting and retreating at the right time.
Magic missile as the opening sequence to disrupt the mage, then melee till Jurs can cast again, now aganazzar's for good measure. This Lendarn is quite resilient but he is wasting time while drinking a potion of defense, it seems odd at that point in time. Varscona finishes the job.
Jurs tries to get rid of the nearby kobolds but doing so attracts the four ogrillons. The heroes step back and Jurs refuses to activate a wand charge. Shoot, move back, shoot... they all fall easily. What's unexpected is the presence of the ogre-mage just a few meters behind. This guy was born under a bad sign... a very early magic missile spell succeds in disrupting the mage despite the distance, then Jurs and Imoen shoot three lethal arrows, up to the point the ogre panics. Yet another magic missile spell and he dies. There are nice spells found on the dead body of the human mage.
On the way to the valley of tombs, a bad surprise awaits our two friends, a basilisk ambush.
Imoen is the closest, defenseless. Jurs has no spell memorized to prevent a petrification and the dragon is in the bag. This is where we can thank that petrified girl (from Unfinished Business) we saved on the Beregost temple map. She provided advices and a potion of mirrored eyes. Imoen takes it from the potion case and gives it to Jurs. All of that at a speed which defies the universe physics rules, well at least from the poor basilisk standpoint.
Another map, another group of bounty hunters. Four amazons this time, not well prepared but full of resources. I had forgotten how good their equipment was. Dealing with them earlier is worth more than killing the average hunting group. However I got distracted by the postponement of the Nashkel's mines quest.
Aganazzar's scorcher again. Strangely one of them comes, invisible, to commit suicide against the beam. Jurs (and to a lesser extent Imoen) does not fear their initial backstab, should it connect. Here this is even easier than usual. Casting (wand) from a position at the north with both spellcasters aligned makes things easier. In this particular fight, basically nothing more was required to kill three of them. The fourth amazon enters a pitiful duel with darts. She joins her friends in death within seconds.
The tomb revenant is an easy opponent once you know that paralyse is its only threat. By the way there is a potion of freedom in one of the coffin but drinking such a potion prior to entering the tomb is obvioulsy much safer.
Narcillicus has the pleasure to be enlightened by an Aganazzar's scorcher (well this is a temporary obession)
The mustard jellies were dangerous but had something gone wrong, Jurs could just have fled on the map cleaned of all other threats beforehand.
I am desperately attracted by the spiders / red wizards map.
There is nothing fundamental to be found on this map but I see two micro reasons and one real reason to face the challenge:
- more than 10K xp of ettercaps and spiders.
- a ring with 19 charges of a beam with no saves.
- the fight with the wizards is one of the best in that game (well it depends in your level).
I know this is a no reload challenge but I do not play often (late August for the previous time) and I really want to enjoy a little more than a safer no-reload path.
For sure I won't play the ToSC parts with one exception: grabbing the tome of wisdom.
As soon as Imoen and Jurs arrive, they are welcome by a sample of the local species.
Imoen detects traps and she moves very slowly. At some point the two friends see a wave of spiders rushing on them. It looks like the call for help or embedded procedure works very well. This is the first occurence of this little mental music "I am going to die here"
Emergency case, emergency solutions. Fireball from Imoen (necklace) and Aganazzar's scorcher from Jurs for a change. Everything goes well. Too well... during the spider attacks I was able to notice (not the first time but I am not entirely sure) that the Stratagems spiders fail to cast web on the party. I know the problem quite well, due to a difference between the EE and non EE games.
Despite her cautiousness (or my lack of knowledge about the trap difficulty) Imoen is about the step on one trap and she fails to detect the next trap. Second occurence of "I am going to die here".
Now comes the real substance. I love the fight against those mages.
I did not want to use my best scrolls and potions and I did not want to pull the trigger from afar, in a blind and unfair manner. Therefore it took more time to defeat them.
Imoen stays in the back waiting for the right moment to step in.
Jurs casts a few buff spells. He doesn't have many of them, this is primarily to force the stratagems mages (and there are only mage enemies in this fight) to cast their debuff spells early on, if any. We have no clue about how many debuff spells and more specifically remove/dispel magic are available in their spell catalogs (I did not spoil the fun).
What Jurs needs is a way to force the mages to cast most of their damaging spells on anything but him. This is where the recently acquired (tombs) wand of summoning comes in handy. Here Jurs cannot activate the wand and send his summons one by one thus trying to control the opponent actions. There are four mages and if they show up at the same time with their full catalog, Jurs is dead.
A massive sacrifice is required.
After the Denak's dialog, Jurs takes the time to shoot an arrow (nothing is faster), steps back and activates the wand mid way between him and the wizard. Denak casts his protections, that's really impressive. Unfortunately Lasala is already there and Jurs doesn't want to be targetted yet. Third occurence of "I am going to die here". Fortunately the storm of spells does not strike the dogs yet! Lasala is poorly protected, Jurs commands the dogs to attack her and he starts shooting arrows too. She falls and basically had no time to use her spells. The mages are coded to move but they are not visible yet.
Actually you can see on the picture where Lasala dies that two of the dogs commited a useful suicide (one dies at the same time on the platform) thus slowing the mage progressions.
Denak goes downstairs, well protected (anyway I have no spellthrust to oppose). Jurs still has the mirror image on and he is waiting for the next move. It's a total relief when Jurs sees Denak's spell flowing towards him, it's a remove magic spell. He starts moving back, letting the dog go to a certain death. He is effectively debuffed. Time to rebuff more consistenly with a lvl1 shield from his amulet, a potion of invunerability (for the saving throws) and a potion of magic protection (+50% resistance). He also has other potions ready to be used (magic shielding, magic blocking and even the scroll of protection from magic).
Imoen was not exposed at all. She could have been useful at that time because Jurs has no visibility on the opponent placement and he is reluctant to activate a wand or blindly cast web (anyway the scrolls of web and grease are saved for another hard fight to come and the two lvl 2 slots he has are used for his defense).
It doesn't matter much. Jurs want to see if another mage is going to debuff him so he moves forward. All the poor dogs are dead, victims of several spell sequencers. It makes Jurs think it is not mandatory to summon another group of creatures. However this might have been an option to support the strategy: survive long enough to see the mage protections disappear and, if possible, fight them one by one.
As the mages start summoning many creatures, Jurs goes southeast, keeping Imoen at a distance. Brendan follows him with a couple of summons. The guy does not seem able to detect Jurs's shield, his magic missiles are ineffecient. Meanwhile Jurs pierces his stoneskins and casts magic missiles too. The problem is that the summons limit Jurs hit rate with the bow, he needs to eliminate them and starts moving towards Imoen who begins her progression too. This could have been a bad decision but Jurs did not want to stay on the same spot for too long, one mage at a time is much safer. In fact Denak was joining the fight. Other summons, spiders this time. Guess what? Aganazzar's scorcher evaporates Brendan and one of the summon.
The two heroes quickly kill the other spider and move towards the place where they expect to meet and slay Denak. Denak lost his minor globe of invulnerability, all of that bodes well with the plan. However that was too optimistic. Imoen is victim of Emotion Hopeless and Jurs resists slow (which wouldn't have been a tremendous problem IF Imoen was still active). Denak slowly but surely loses his defense and his magic missiles are useless. When the mirror image is finally removed, Jurs activates the wand of lightning then magic missiles and ultimately hits with varscona twice. Denak is no more, what an opponent! Imoen gains a level.
Let's find Diana now. This does not take long. Of course she has stonekins protecting her but she probably cast most of her spell on the dogs during the initial sequence. Jurs and Imoen almost have regrets. She should have participated to one of the previous fights. Let's be cautious though. Jurs magically resists her Melf's arrow, not a critical point to be honest. Jurs who runs out of spells can still cast Larloch's and Imoen shoots arrows, certain of their victory. One final spark of prestige and Diana dies whereas her last magic missiles haven't reached their target, the symbol of the red wizards failure.
Imoen wears a new and superb leather armor. Of course, the armor provides a good protection and a bonus for her skills but one point she appreciates very much is the light weight, 8 pounds!
Ulcaster is one of the rare area not visited yet.
The first real challenge they face is Icharyd, a dead knight who entered into a pact with Myrkul.
The opponent can be deadly but its two types of attack require a single counter-measure, a potion of absorption granting protection against electrical damage and strongly reducing the chance to be hit by a blunt weapon.
Jurs casts a few buffs for the first part of the fight. A melee fight ensued between the two warriors. At some point, Icharyd, seeing his chance of victory seriously receding, called for Myrkul's help. A different fight started. Jurs gulped his potion of absorption and Imoen took the opportunity to test her brand new ring formerly owned by Denak. She went back as soon she got damaged by a lightning strike while Jurs was calmly destroying the dead knight.
Apparently the wolf of Ulcaster is an entirely different beast. There is one common point: both of those Stratagems encounters do not rely on a script with random or adaptive features. It's programmatic, a simple sequential behaviour.
The wolf is weaponized with horror spells and paralyzing attacks, and those two aspects are helped by a single occurence of remove magic and greater malison. Moreover its attacks are a kind of life stealer, gaining 10 HP each time it hits.
If you cannot massively deal a huge amount of damage within a very few rounds (Probably you can also disable the wolf itself as he is not resistant to magic.) then it is a simple matter of diverting the remove magic attack to keep your buffs active.
Jurs does it with an activation of the wand of summoning. He and Imoen subsequently deals with the beasts which are spawned next to them. After that when Jurs is certain that the wolf wasted his spells he drinks a potion of freedom. He and Imoen are also protected against fear, moreover Jurs is under protection from fire. The nice irony is that the wand summons wolves... Wolves everywhere!
In sequence, a first fireball on self starts to deal damage, then Jurs blinds the wolf for fun. It is a bad decision, this looks like an attempt to remove a non existing threat. A second fireball follows. The blinded wolf moves erratically and when they all reach the room to the west, Jurs unintentionally triggers the trap which deals fire damage to everyone but Jurs (he has 120% resistance). The wolf continues to dance around Jurs who uses magic to hit the beast from a small distance. As the wolf of Ulcaster keeps calling for help and summoning a pair of dire wolves every three rounds, the stock of local wolves gets renewed and Jurs cannot escape the traffic jam being formed. As a sign of destiny this is yet another aganazzar's scorcher that ends this unrealistic situation.
The treasure is not exceptional but the adventurers already collected a 8 charge wand of fire as well as a potion of absorption replacing the one used to counter Icharyd.
Next step: destination Larswood.
Imoen and Jurs meet Nim. I use a blatant cheat as I move Jurs north of the aggressive wolves (not sure about the name of these beasts, wolves belong to species which are so rarely met those days...)
For a few seconds the wolves turn against Jurs who fireballs them. When they move back to go and eviscerate the dogs, it is too late and they quickly fall.
All of that for a useless reward as none of the adventurers can use the scroll they receive (flame strike IIRC)
After that, they interfere with a dark plan involving shadow druids.
Jurs casts spook on the first druid encounters and it works well. When the second druid confesses his crime, Jurs casts another spook spell which somehow works. It is funny. In fact it is annihilated by a not yet active precast spell, remove fear, which suddenly comes into effect. The two panthers helping the druid burn and die under the effect of a mysterious spell.
Jurs finds a welcome potion of invulnerability on Osmandi dead body.
Seeing a group of innocent bandits is almost relaxing, most of them don't howl.
This is less disturbing than the next encounter who claims to be dangerously deteriorated. The two heroes help him recover his mental stability at the cost of his own life.
A well deserved rest awaits the adventurers at the Beregost Inn. Imoen can't hide her rapturous mood: jugged wolf for dinner!
Introduction:
If you had visited Candlekeep a couple years back, before the deaths of the Dukes and the prevention of the war, you might've come across a young dwarf by the name of Farien. He was always a bit peculiar-looking for a dwarf, staying clean shaven and shunning the beard that almost all of his race pride in. His hair was still brown then, a light hazel color, if you will. When he spoke, it had no trace of the thick accent that dwarves are typically known for, but he enunciated clearly in his low voice.
If you had noticed, you probably wondered how this atypical dwarf came to be, though you probably know now. He was raised in Candlekeep, though not born there, and his upbringing was under the tutorage of Gorion, that old Harper from years back. Gorion taught Farien as he himself believed, that much of what is stereotypical may be due to nurture, rather than nature. He emphasized that greatly, moreso to Farian than any other, perhaps, that birth and species may not determine who someone is, and Farien, so you know, grew to understand the concept and took it for his own, even applying it to himself. So Farien grew in the library city, physically a dwarf, but not having any of the standard dwarves habits.
There would also have been his foster sister, Imoen, also brought up under the instruction of Gorion. If any of your valuables went missing during the stay, odds are that she... liberated it from you. Gorion's morality did not quite pass on as strongly to the girl. But oh, the competitions between the two! As iron sharpens iron, so these two competed mightily against each other for most of their childhoods. I dare say that Farien wouldn't have nearly as much of his agility as now if it weren't for Imoen. They climbed bookshelves, trying to beat the other to the top, attempted to scale the near-flawless spire that was the library; Imoen was always slightly quicker. They competed in their studies as well, and Imoen was again the quicker to pick up the information, though Farien the better at applying it.
It must be said, though, that Farien was far stronger than his almost-sibling, and his body far firmer than Imoen's frame. There was the advantage of the dwarves, of course, since due to their size their organs and bodies have to be firmer than a human's, but Farien was stronger and hardier than most of his kind.
He was trained, as well as in schooling, in the guard of Candlekeep, the Watchers. It functions as a small city, of course, so there is generally some protection, and the summons of the mages in the library-city are not bright enough to decide friend from foe. Because of his size, he at least followed his kinsmen in their weapon choice, and primarily trained with a warhammer. He was also trained in shooting a crossbow, as his height, or lack thereof, generally disallowed bows, though Imoen was fairly skilled at hitting a target with a short bow.
His past aspirations must also be explained: the training of Gorion had so impacted him in the concept of grace, mercy, and protection of the innocent, that he had attempted to be admitted to the order of the Paladins. Silly, I know; the order still only accepts humans, and not a single other race, but Farien was young then, still younger than twenty at that time. Though not admitted, he was steadfastly committed to relieving suffering, defending the oppressed, and helping the poor by whatever means, and practiced the art of defense rigorously. He never was able to cast a single spell, but he was as good as a paladin ever was, perhaps better; I'm sure you would know.
The story truly begins in the year 1368, the first day of Mirtul. Gorion had become increasingly perturbed by letters coming from outside, and so secure were the letters that not even Imoen could catch even a glimpse of their contents. That day, he told Farien to don his armor and hammer, and prepare for a journey. He specified no length of trip, nor location, replying to Farien's questions evasively and flitting his eyes back and forth, as though he were unsure if they were being overheard.
It was never proven if he were or not, but the timely order to put his armor was just in time for a man, thought to be a visiting scholar from Baldur's Gate, name of Shank, to dive from the shadows and swing a poisoned dagger at the young dwarf. It clashed upon the splint, doing damage to neither the armor nor its wearer. With a short cry - Farien tended not to curse, either - Farien grabbed his hammer, and with a solid blow, drove it into the ribcage of his would-be assassin with a terrible crack.
Suffice it to say that Shank did not live the blow.
Farien was shaken by the attempt, and met Gorion in his quarters soon thereafter. Imoen was there too, to say goodbye, or possibly an attempt to stop her from robbing visiting noblemen blind: I don't know, and she refuses to answer straightly. Upon hearing of the attack, Gorion left with Farien with all haste, not bothering to stop for anything besides a hug from Imoen.
____________________
Gameplay:
This is SCS-modified, with every difficult option opted for. It will be party, picking up NPCs as they make sense. BG1NPC, Rogue Rebalancing, and options from BGTweaks are installed.
The duo covered the whole worldmap with the following exception:
- elements related to the main quest. This is the sequence encompassing the Nashkel's mines, Nimbul, Tranzig, Peldvale, the Bandit camp and beyond it the cloakwood areas etc... The first cloakwood area was very partially explored, the intent was to find the whispers of silence cloak.
- all ToSC areas
- Kahrk at the firewine bridge. We will perhaps come back. I just want Jurs to learn some L4 spells and at this point in time he can cast one L4 spell but he hasn't been able to find such a L4 scrolls yet.
Imoen reached the level 10 when Denak (red wizard) died and she can gain another level.
Jurs reached the level 7 in the mage class while fighting in the dungeon just before the final battle with the wolf of Ulcaster. He reached the level 7 in the fighter class at some point in Larswood. That's all he can expect but he still needs to learn many spells.
That's part of the deal, it is now time to start the main quest.
There is no challenge in the Nashkel mines. At the bridge on level 3, Jurs doesn't even use a spell, all the kobolds die pierced by arrows. The chieftain and his guards succumb to an Aganazzar's scorcher, one of the last available from the first wand. Mulahey is interrupted by a beam of frost and, two fireballs later, the world explodes (but there is no mine cave-in).
A dialog sequence with Berrun Ghastkill, Taerom Fuiruim the blacksmith and Thalantyr the conjurer is a very nice addition to the game (thanks UB).
On their way to Beregost, a bounty hunter by the name of Nimbul labouriously tries to stop them. Tranzig at the Feldpost Inn is an even lesser threat. A few hours later, the adventurers head towards Peldvale where they expect to find the bandit leaders.
Just before leaving the town, Imoen buys a deadly dagger. She can't backstab but she surely can poison her enemies.
At last they find a way leading to the bandit camp.
Even though a clever approach is usually preferred by the players, I personally like to simply attack the camp thus triggering a massive fight. The opportunity to have such a huge fight is too good to be ignored.
Fighting within the main building is not without danger, remaining outside is not that much difficult if you are used to such a battle and your team is made up of high level characters.
The strategy is to lure the bad guys into a zone where they will be choked with their own traffic.
The north west corner is suitable, mostly because of the long woods, the narrow pathway between the tents and the relatively large area south of these tents.
The point is to slow them in this large area and create a bottleneck between the tents.
Rather quickly some of them will get around the north wood, creating a second frontline thus dividing their forces. Sometimes a few of them come from the south west but this remains unlikely.
Regular bandits and hobgoblins are not dangerous. Among the named foes, two of them usually require a specific attention, Taugosz Khosann (strongest opponent) and Venkt (a mage is always dangerous). The real threat is the Stratagems black talons elite guys, their arrows of ice can deal a lot of damage to your non heavily-armored team members. In the current situation this means both Imoen and Jurs because he is wearing the robe to be able to cast spells (this, despite the Nimbul's senses-of-the-cat boots).
The scrolls play the main role. Jurs saved two scrolls of web and three scrolls of grease. 1 web and the 3 grease are used to slow down everyone coming to the main area. The remaining scroll of web is kept as a safeguard, just in case a flow control is required to limit the bandit progression at the north point, casting from scroll cannot be disrupted even if Jurs is hit. The two L3 slots are filled with fireball spells, L1 and L2 spells are a mix of defensive and offensive options, 2 mirror image spells are memorized.
As soon as Jurs is seen by the local hobgoblin, the general alert rings. Everyone will join coming from various distances. He starts with web and then greasex3, hitting the hobgobelin with his sword between each spell. By the time he is able to cast the first fireball, the first bandits appear at the north point. They are regular bandits and Imoen successfully casts sleep on them (from the wand). Jurs moves north to slay these enemies. The first black talon elite guys show up. Imoen helps Jurs with a fireball (cast from the necklace). Jurs notices that one of the opponent is Taugosz himself and they start a melee fight. Incidentally Jurs is hit by a poisonned arrow but he has no time to manage it and he lets the poison do its effect. Taugosz can't easily hit thanks to the extra protection provided by the belt and the mirror image. However Jurs also fails to quickly eliminate this boss. As more archers appear in the line of sight, Jurs uses a charge of Aganazzar's scorcher to hit a couple of foes at once and then he retreats (the main reason is that I had difficulty to see the state of his mirror image hidden by the trees). Meanwhile Imoen shoots on Britik (the gnoll) who moves extremely slowly. Jurs activates the wand of lightning on Taugosz Khosann but he is still alive. Imoen finally kills the gnoll boss but almost immediatlely a couple of archers appear within her line of sight and she fails to identify Raemon amongst them. It is too late to make an offensive decision and unfortunately she is seriously hit. She retreats, moving towards Jurs.
At this moment, the two adventurers think that they failed, ready to trigger the emergency case with invisibility potions ready for use. This would allow them to heal and reorganize an attack, fully armored, re-buffed with their fingers eager to activate the wands. However Jurs finally dismembers Taugosz and he launches his assault against the archers. A surprise awaits, Venkt went forward, he basically overtook Raemon. This is a top priority (unfortunately I failed to capture the quick spell fight betwenn Venkt and Jurs). Jurs quickly acts and casts a magic missile spell to eliminate venkt's mirror image. He has the time to cast a second spell before hitting him with the sword. Venkt is defeated, a few seconds later Raemon expires too.
Jurs casts mirror image again and decides to go north where the main opponents are likely to be. Nothing can resist his attacks. Hakt falls. Ardenor Crush falls. Jurs almost closed the loop around the tents when he meets the last opponent, Credus, who, all of a sudden, has something to say. One more sword swing and he dies.
A couple of guys took refuge in the nearby tent, that's the last piece of this huge fight. Imoen and Jurs take their time to collect all the scalps that they can monetize. The next action is to break the gnoll's cover in their cave. Finally they reach the main tent where they meet a very informative prisoner.
Ultimately no less than 80 scalps are sold to Officer Vai. More than a half of them were obtained prior to cleaning this final map.
The Merrie Men of Easthaven
A no-reload full party modded IWD run
What's holding these bridges up anyway?
The Merries arrive at the Vale of Shadows to find tombs guarded by lesser shadows.The first tomb was filled with skeletons and zombies.
John used enrage for the first time to fight a carrion crawler, but the beast died before it could land a solid hit.
Continuing along the platforms, the team encounters a group of yetis
The Merries kill a few more lesser shadows on the way to the next tomb, then have their first encounter with a ghast. His treasure trove includes a potion of genius for Alan to use later.
Down a hall guarded by ghoul, Nasir finds a magic suit of leather armor.
In the East side of the tomb, Nasir finds a high quality longsword for Will.
On the way out they trigger a trap that summons 4 lesser shadows... they don't last long.
20 damage from a normal arrow at level 3!
Back outside, the Merries fight their way through more yetis, finally encountering the yeti chieftain and retrieving Mirek's heirloom and a magic morningstar.
Inside the yeti lair, the party was attacked from three sides, forcing Alan and Tuck to tank. They started with Alan's opponent, then worked their way around to Tuck's. It took several healing potions, but Tuck held his own until the last ape fell.
The Merries dispatch a few yeti stragglers in the rear of the cave and find a cache of treasure including a magic mace, gems, clerical scrolls and a toolbox with gnomish writing on it.
North of the yeti lair, they found a tomb protected by a horde of skeletons and a ghoul. With Will and John tanking, the party was able to whittle them down to nothing. They cleared out the rest of the tomb's guardians and found a suit of magic chainmail for Alan.
Inventories were full and healing spells were low, so they went back to town to sell their loot, rest and tie up a few loose ends. Mirek gave Tuck a magic sling as a reward for finding his heirloom and Oswald paid handsomely for the gnomish tools.
Once all the loot was sold, it was time to do something about Alan's empty spellbook.
A good night's sleep and it's back to the Vale. This time the Merries enter a tomb guarded by an undead creature named Therik. On his body they find a phase dagger.
The party works their way through the tomb, fighting skeletons, ghouls and ghasts.
Nasir finds a dagger +1 along with various scrolls and potions.
Heading North from Therik's tomb, the Merries fought lesser shadows and a full shadow. They decided to go back to Kuldahar to rest before continuing into the huge, elaborate tomb at the end of the pathway.
Party status
Robin: Archer level 3, 33 hpLongbow, longsword, helmet, Stoutward +1 (small shield), studded leather
Will: Fighter level 4, 40 hp - 2 deaths
Longbow, HQ longsword, helmet, large shield, splint mail
John: Berserker level 4, 44 hp - 1 death
Longbow, quarterstaff, mace +1, helmet, splint mail
Nasir: Assassin level 4, 24 hp
Shortbow, dagger +1, phase dagger, leather +1
Tuck: Priest of Lathander level 4, 32 hp
Sling +1, morning star +1, helmet, medium shield, studded leather
Alan: Bard level 4, 24 hp
Shortbow, Apsel's dagger (HQ dagger), buckler +1, chain +1
Total raise cost: 300
I kind of put this run on hold because GOG put IWD2 on sale for $4. Then I put that game on hold because my son bought me Civilization: Beyond Earth for Christmas. Then I put that game on hold because he bought me Pillars of Eternity for my birthday. I also have a Snow White run going on my new Kindle Fire.
Anyway, Alan's got his spells, but I completely forgot about his song. He's going to need more attention as we go through Kresselack's tomb. I'm loving Robin's archer bonuses, with a longbow, he gets +10 to to-hit rolls against non-corporeal undead, and +6 against everyone else, and he's only at 3 pips in bow so far.
I initially planned to totally ignore Durlag's tower but I changed my mind and decided to go and take the tome of wisdom.
Imoen and Jurs deal with a thief and Kirinhale but they consciously refuse to explore Daital's apartment (where Sidonie fell, killed by a cloudkill). Kirinhale surprisingly succeeds in draining Jurs once but this has no consequence. At the top of tower, Imoen gained a final level thanks to the enormous amount of XP provided by the basilisks.
Tourism in the Cloakwoods.
This starts with some shadow druids in conflict with a noble. Jurs and Imoen do not know this noble but they never liked these druids. The short discussion led to an inevitable conclusion.
Next, they investigate a strange arachnid nest.
I really wanted the sword but later, I forgot I had it and it was and remains used.
Side note: During the fight with Centeol I saw a web correctly cast by one of the spider.
Imoen and Jurs launch a double fireball attack when the dialog ends. This is a salutary decision because they forgot to protect themselves against a web effect.
Imoen is a superstar. Now she masters her dagger so well that even spiders get poisoned (vengeance for all the fallen, victims of their poisonous attacks!).
Then came the moment I felt like the worst no-reload player of the galaxy.
I just wanted to steal the archdruid but I totally forgot (again!) the presence of two druid groups in this area. I was lucky they were not able to cast their spells. On the first group I instinctively cast hold with success. The battle with the second group was less expeditious. The adventurers won mostly because Imoen saved against charm and poisoned two druids.
Perhaps because they survived but also because they knew that a hard fight was awaiting them inside the mine, they defied Amarande, a kind of training session. It is a quite dangerous fight, primarily a classic battle where you have to continuously disrupt your super opponent.
A fireball deals important damages to the two lesser druids but it does'nt kill them. Jurs is about to launch a second fire attack but Imoen is sure to prevail and to kill those two druids with her ring while moving around them. Jurs focuses on Amarande, it is critical to disrupt his spell casting. To increase the chance of disruption both Imoen and Jurs activate their wands (missile for Imoen and frost or Aganazzar's for Jurs) each time Amarande starts a new incantation. And this occurs many times! Jurs can't prevent the release of the very short spells (two chromatic orbs in this case) but ultimately Amarande dies.
Side note: there are stratagems spiders failing to use their web ability. You can see the full circle in grey color, next to the trees (over the water). It goes from the spider to an ilusionary destination in the north-west.
There is a reception committee at the mine entrance but Jurs and Imoen have no taste for a mundane or subtle approach.
Imoen, while hidden, detects their presence. After a serious series of enhancing spells and potions, Jurs moves forward. As expected the opponents have no good intention. A double fireball strikes them. Jurs moves back. Two of the guys follow and Imoen throws a potion of burning oil, everyone can hear the agonizing screams of dying mages at the back of the yard. Jurs assails one the guys but Imoen is faster and shoots down the guy. The last guy survives a bit longer but the outcome is just the same.
The fact the two mages had no party member in their line of sight probably made the fight much easier but nothing was intentional (no specific approach).
I reduced our Earth Elemental Token's resistances down to 50%, but SCS enemies use a slightly different version that cannot be dropped.
When Nyalee is gone, the clones remain. I kill the enemy Zulfer with a feedback loop; Acidic Backlashes trigger each other. Unfortunately he doesn't survive the process.
Sanchuudoku grants immunity to acid damage, but also lowers it on its targets, which means Zulfer can render his clone vulnerable to Acidic Backlash. I have no idea why Zulfer died; I was pretty sure his acid resistance stayed at 100%.
I want more levels before we take on Yaga-Shura, so it's time to go back to Watcher's Keep and try to finish the 3rd level. On the way, I trigger the "Red Badge" poison encounter thingy from SCS. I leave and come back for some reason or another, and after the second encounter, they finally attack me.
I arrived without buffs, which is a problem. To buy us time, Ruva sets a snare to Maze the enemies before they turn hostile. Unfortunately, they don't turn hostile at the same time, so not all of them vanish.
Appropriately enough, the poison-based encounter sees our group get poisoned early on. The attacker, Bloodspear, picks one of our most vulnerable characters. We don't have many ways to cure poison due to poor preparation my part, but we have enough.
We do have plenty of Antidotes, but those take a round to use. Unfortunately, Laosha could not save Yorun Zovai. The damage left her weakened, and the next blow from Project Force, takes her out.
I spread out our party a bit to keep the most vulnerable out of danger. Zulfer and Laosha are immune to poison thanks to the Ring of Gaxx and druid immunities, so we don't have to resort to ranged weapons and Teleport Field to stay safe.
Viora raises Yorun Zovai with a spell and our tanks bring down the enemies still present. Raise Dead isn't very safe to use in battle, but it saves us a charge from a Rod of Resurrection. When the screen is clear, Ruva lays a trap to prepare for the remaining enemies when they escape the Maze effect.
We take a moment to buff ourselves and summon some critters, then pick off the enemies as they appear. Ruva's Maze traps give us a lot of time to recover when things go bad.
It finally occurs to me to export my characters. I don't know why I didn't do this sooner.
Exporting characters would allow me to retrieve chunked characters by importing older versions of them, provided they are player-created (NPCs like Imoen can't be exported and are therefore irretrievable). This would have saved me millions of XP in lost characters, as well as some important items on Ruva 1... including those Arrows of Dispelling.
I forgot to mention that, just before reaching the mines map, the adventurers went back to Beregost to sell or store the items they recently accumulated.
Davaeorn
I haven't found a 100% satisfactory approach for this fight, this makes it even more interesting. Moreover, I do not know what kind of spells Davaeorn can use because this is a new installation of Stratagems. What is known for sure is that every six rounds 2+2 guards go downstairs and join the fight.
In this duo configuration, I want Jurs to attack Davaeorn while Imoen is opposing the guards. The heroes own most (if not all) of the interesting potions, at least a couple of each, that is the main part of their enhancements. Jurs adds a few spells for himself + remove fear for both. Noticeably he casts protection from fire whereas Imoen relies on potions to increase her resistance. Both of them are also under the effects of a potion of absorption. Doing so allows Jurs to conveniently use the wand of fire and the wand of lightning. Invulnerability, Strength, Heroism potions help Jurs to become even more dangerous. Both of them have a potion of magic resistance, Imoen uses it immediately. Jurs next safeguard primarily consists of magic blocking potions and, ultimately, the scroll of protection from magic ready to be used. Imoen is more likely to use the potions of invisibility as a last resort.
None of them has arrows of dispelling or detonation but Imoen equips a set of 18 poisoned arrows obtained in the Nashkel's mines (she won't use them on Davaeorn, she will just use the arrows of ice on the guards and a few on Davaeorn - I forgot to switch between the two...)
In order to contain the guards and keep them in a small area, Jurs casts web+grease+stinking cloud at the entrance prior to engaging the fight with Davaeorn. The resulting efficiency is passable but it's better than nothing at all. The guards are no big threat as long as he is still protected from fire and electricity because his wands can deal a fair amount of damage. However the situation may become awkward if too many opponents walk in the same small room, potentially preventing the team from attacking the right target(s).
As I do not want to prevent Jurs from casting spells, he is going to wear the robe and statistically the blacktalons archers have non neglectable chancs to hit. Especially if Davaeorn de-buffs Jurs at such a time. Talking about debuff, Jurs has the wand of summoning ready for distracting Davaeorn but other actions should have a higher priority. Both Jurs and Imoen prefer potions of freedom to haste / boots of speed. This was the right decision.
Jurs meets Davaeorn, Imoen stays in the first room. After the dialog, Jurs moves forward and then casts a skull trap to soften the battle horrors. It actally hits Davaeorn before his protections are on (unexpected to be honest). Davaeorn immediately triggers a minor spell sequencer combining web and stinking cloud (it sounds familiar!) and then teleports. The battle horrors stop Jurs.
Davaeorn appears next to Imoen but largely ignores her. She throws a potion and start shooting at the first guards conveniently webbed in the corridor, thus demonstrating no sign of hostility toward Davaeorn. Twenty meters away, Jurs fires the wand of lightning for the first time, luckily both battle horrors get damaged. Davaeorn disappears again, the first battle horror explodes soon followed by the other. Jurs moves back to the first room where he expects to find Davaeorn who shows up in the adjacent room. Both web/stinking cloud combos are still active and Imoen is somehow trapped in this room. That's ok because she does a good job, killing the guards one by one.
A key factor is that Davaeorn fails to dispel Jurs effects. I believe this wouldn't have been critical, it would have taken longer to kill Davaeorn though. Jurs was ready to cast a fire shield to recover most of his fire resistance (his only L4 spell being memorized) and another potion of absorption was ready - like as most other defensive options.
The guards are dead, Imoen looks for a new position and angle to shoot at Davaeorn. The mage uselessly casts a fireball whereas Jurs hits his stoneskins (with the extra cold damage). A few seconds later the area effects vanish, a new batch of guards joins the fight, some are still under the dying grease effect. Jurs, who cannot yet cast spells on Davaeorn who is still protected by a mGoI, uses his wand of lightning on the guards.
Davaeorn recasts a mirror image. Imoen steps in and throws another potion onto the guards. Davaeorn, himself, casts another fireball thus wiping out his own guards. Imoen realizes she is within the explosion range of such a spell and it is urgent to find another suitable place but that's too late, Davaeorn strikes again. A sunfire hits her, she partially absorbs the damage (the BG maths are somewhat special 17-8=9 ok; 24-19=19
Davaeorn who is under Jurs pressure, moves again. Imoen walks in the opposite direction, now facing the last guard. She won't be able to kill him, in fact all of Jurs attacks hit Davaeorn who falls at the crossway.
Imoen was supposed to use her ring on Davaeorn but this proved unecessary and I preferred to protect her most of the time.
A good battle with no artifice.
There was a certain lack of diversity in Davaeorn's spellcasting. I was curious and had a look at his files.
"My" Davaeorn memorized 4 fireballs and 3 sunfire! He was also able to cast one ice storm...
On the way back home, the duo kills two wyverns
Now lets set sail for Baldur's Gate!
We get overwhelmed by a Succubus and her Alu-Fiends. Laosha, our best tank, got charmed due to my giving him a nonmagical helm instead of a Helm of Charm Protection, and then got Mazed immediately after. Without Laosha to tank the enemy's physical damage, Zulfer struggled to survive. Ruva saved his life several times by Mazing the enemies with her Special Snares, with Azelos casting Power Word: Blind on her to make sure she could lay the traps when enemies were near. She also took down one of the Alu-Fiends with a backstab with the Staff of Striking, despite the THAC0 penalty from her blindness.
When Laosha returned, he was still charmed. We escaped him with Invisibility 10' Radius and waited out the duration.
Gerland and his party completed the Unseeing Eye (lvl 15 castings of Animated Dead), Astral Prison (lots of dispellers for the Yuan-Tis, brute force against Master of Thralls and surprisingly meek Warden), and Planar Sphere quests without much difficulty. The battles against Lavok and Tolgerias were a bit underwhelming, not least because they couldn't cast HLA spells. I checked my weidu-log and saw that I installed the SCS component that limits HLA spells to a few selected SoA enemies. I did have full-prebuffing installed, and found that I didn't enjoy that at all. My characters never prebuff except with long duration spells (i.e. Stoneskin) and in dungeons, with medium duration buffs (a la Death Ward). Only if the character knows they are going to confront a powerful foe, will they prebuff. An example is when Firkraag tells the party they'll have to fight Conster to get the key to release Windspear's child.
Anyway, the party continued for a while, and even made it through Spellhold, but then a few silly deaths fllowed each other (Jan and Aerie in the City of Caverns final battle due to to bad positioning on my part and poisoned Sahuagin bolts; Anomen and Jaheira twice each in the Underdark's Beholder lair due to me underestimating the Beholders' better calls for help). What had been a very clean run up till Chapter 3, turned into a resurrection fest. As some of you know, I tend to lose interest and focus in my party runs when I have to resurrect NPCs a lot, especially if their deaths could have been prevented relatively easily, so I've decided to retire Gerland from the no-reload challenge.
I hope to report on the progress of a new Charname soon.
@Musigny Nice to read about your adventures, it's been some time.
@BillyYank So happy to see the continuation of your IWD run.
I am not trying to change your mind but I would like to point out that HLAs have a limited influence on Lavok and Tolgerias efficiency. Reason being that they are level 21 and they can cast 3 L9 or L10 spells. Stratagems does not cheat (from that perspective) and the spell selection at install time does not necessarily grant them lvl 10 spells (they can get an additional L6/7/8 spell). As matter of fact, I have a Stratagems modded game with HLAs enabled for everyone and it is not surprising to see that Lavok memorized no L10 spell and Tolgerias #1 (government) can cast planetar whereas Tolgerias #2 (planar sphere) memorized no L10 spell.
Anyway, back to the Monty Python crew. Really, it would be cool to read other participants' reports on the run
Our dwarven defender, Hadhod, is such a good tank. Lots of HPs, low saving throws, and the Defensive Stance. It let's us breeze though encounters difficult for low-level parties. Till the Bhaalspawn gets to 50+ HPs, Hadhod is the only party member who can reliably melee in this run, even against magic users.
During one of area transitions, we were attacked by the Molkar's group.
Being still relatively low-level for such encounters, it was decided Lucius will gulp an invis potion, while Hadhod will use the green scroll of magic protection, even if they're are rare in this game.
CrevsDaak and Gemhound didn't participate at that moment, so their characters were quickly killed in the process, while Drassisseilla, brave enough not to gulp an invis potion with Lucius, fell dead the moments later.
Meanwhile, Hadhod was doing his business, so Lucius could finally help.
Not long after that, Lucius got another level as a cleric, getting 5 additional HPs, and with 30+ HPs could start tanking enemies (with DUHM and Armour of Faith, of course).
I have to admit, that I'm beginning to like a F/C more and more. This combination offers a quite reliable ranged damage dealer (with 2 pips in slings, good STR and 18 DEX thanks to the bracers), who will become a second melee tank in the future. I feel myself more involved in everything, if compared to the Avenger druid. Actually, I've been surprised at how good a sling can be, the cleric's buffs add here. It compliments Hadhod with his two hammers finely.
After some shopping we decided to attack the Bandit camp.
Hadhod gulped potions of free action and fire resistance, so that he could "draw aggro" while Drassisseilla webbed and fried groups of bandits. Buffed Lucius and Scvertvdendinw (CrevsDaak came to the game) helped from the distance. In no time, all the bandits were defeated (only for the game to crash right after it, so we'll have to replay the fight)
Having said that, I rolled three new characters, one of them a Chaotic Evil Half-Elf Cleric/Mage (possibly to be kitted as a Priest of Talos and focusing on elemental damage). He should be evil enough to see his companions as dispensable tools, and he might raise them or not if they fall, depending on the situation or on his humor. Could be an interesting character for party play. The second character I rolled is a Chaotic Good Halfling Swashbuckler lass, one of my favorite Charname archetypes. But it was my third Charname who first left Candlekeep,
Bardin:
Starting profs were Clubs and Slings. Clubs was a bit of a compromise influenced by RP considerations: I wanted Bardin to be able to backstab but I also envisioned him with a shield. Rather poor backstabs would be the result, but in BG2 I have the itemupgrades mod installed, which allows Cromwell to forge a good +4 or +5 Club, so Bardin may fare better in the backstabbing department in Amn. Besides staves will become not just an option but almost necessary anyway in BG2 if Bardin is to make it to the Throne of Bhaal. The Staff of the Magi is one - and probably the best - of very few dispelling instruments for a Cleric/Thief.
Early Days
Spoilered to shorten this overlong post, and because most of the early stuff wasn't very problematic for Bardin.
Shortly after the fall of Gorion, Bardin traveled to the Friendly Arm Inn where he found an expensive ring he'd later sell. Interestingly his Lord told him not to enter the inn. Gaerdal guided his young follower to Beregost and Nashkel instead, and later toward the coast for reasons the Gnome didn't understand at the time. Either way he obliged. In and around Beregost he carried out several tasks for the common folk, the most intriguing of which must have been his contribution to the anti-chickenation of Thalantyr's apprentice Melicamp.
Bardin also explored the lands north of the FAI, where the Gnome's intervention in a dispute between followers of Talos and Umberlee may well have saved the life of the young priestess of Umberlee Tenya. Also in those lands a second treasure hoard, this one assembled by ankhegs, fell into the Gnome's hands. Thus the patronage of Gaerdal Ironhand allowed young Bardin to make a number of useful purchases, such as a suit of Shadow Armor and a Claw of Kazgaroth in Beregost, and a Wand of the Heavens, a Cloak of Displacement, and a Greenstone Amulet in Ulgoth's Beard. In that town Bardin also taught fellow Gnome Dushai that the hand of justice shall not be stayed.
The rock garden of Mutamin, which consisted of people and animals petrified by mind-controlled Basilisks, was another source of good experience. There was some unfortunate collateral damage as Bardin blasted the scaly beasts with Necklace of Missiles fireballs,
Not as good for his mood was Bardin's violent confrontation in Beregost with a Dwarven bounty hunter who had been out for his hide for some reason, nor that with four Thayvians who had wanted to abduct a Half-Elf wizardess named Neera. The Gnome dealt competently with two bodyguards, both were Held and subsequently slain, but he could not stop a Thayvian wizard from killing Neera. Not a 'licensed cleric' yet, Bardin could do nothing for the young Half-Elf other than exacting justice on the Thayvian.
Another contributor to Bardin's purse was Keldath Ormlyr of the Temple of the Morning. He rewarded the Gnome with no less than 5k GP for Holding and slaying Bassilus the murderer.
More incompetent bounty hunters had tried in vain to take Bardin's scalp, including one at the FAI, up to the point that the Gnome got fed up with being followed everywhere he went, and decided he would find out why people wanted him dead. He started with a trip to the troubled Nashkel Mines, the source of the iron crisis and also the place that two close but overly secretive friends of his late foster father, Khalid and Jaheira, wanted investigated. Not much of a lead, but anything or anyone somehow related to himself or to Gorion might bring him closer to answers.
Nashkel Mines
Stealth allowed Bardin to navigate the Nashkel Mines at his convenience. He dispatched groups of Kobolds with fire but more important was his vanquishing of their master, a Half-Orc priest of Cyric and the organizer of the iron ore contamination.
Bandit Camp
Still in Beregost, Bardin taught a fork-tongued thespian not to lie to him, admittedly with his Skeletons doing much of the dirty work,
Cloakwood
In the Cloakwood, Bardin helped some Druids but battled others.
In front of the Iron Throne base, a mine, Bardin softened up a warrior named Drasus with six traps before felling him with a backstab.
Inside the mine Bardin went straight for the master of the mine, Davaeorn. Two potions of magic protection kept the Gnome safe from the wizard's spells while fire proved fatal for Davaeorn's minions and for the mage himself.
Baldur's Gate
Bardin traveled to the city of Baldur's Gate to pay the Iron Throne HQ a visit. First however he undertook several lucrative missions in the city, rewarding himself with a Shield of the Falling Stars, Helm and Cloak of Balduran, two Necklaces of Missiles, three stat-increasing Tomes, a plethora of potions, and several green scrolls.
At the Iron Throne HQ Bardin summoned his Skeleton Warriors on the fourth floor, and buffed them with Strength of One. The Gnome himself taunted a group of Iron Throne acolytes on the fifth floor, and successfully lured some of them downstairs to finish them with the help of his summons.
A last acolyte had hidden in one of the offices behind the hall. Bardin pressured him into divulging the Iron Throne leaders' whereabouts. He learned they were in Candlekeep.
Candlekeep
Bardin learned a lot more in that citadel, his former home. First of all he discovered he was an offspring of Bhaal and secondly the man that had wanted him dead, the man that had killed Gorion, was his brother Sarevok. Sarevok had been using the Iron Throne to pursue his own agenda: inciting a war on the Sword Coast. He framed Bardin for the murder of the Iron Throne leaders, whom he no longer had use for, but Bardin escaped with the help of Tethtoril, and with a number of valuable items in his pack.
Finale
Bardin traveled south to the Nashkel region, stocked up on potions, and returned to Baldur's Gate where he kept a low profile as he was now wanted for murdering the Iron Throne leaders. Sarevok's (former) lover Tamoko, of all people, informed Bardin of his brother's plans: killing the Dukes and becoming the new Archduke of Baldur's Gate. Bardin eliminated the assassin Slythe hired by Sarevok to kill duke Belt and duchess Jannath. A backstab delivered while the assassin was occupied with a summon, and four traps did Slythe in.
With 25 STR from the violet potion plus other buffs Bardin allowed himself to dual-wield two clubs. A Rogue Rebalancing phial of poison plus traps plus Skeleton Warriors plus Flaming Fists soon had all the Doppelgangers down but one, a mage that had retreated to an antechamber.
This is Bardin's endgame inventory:
The idea is to tell a detailed explanation of why a battle turned out the way it did.
You've got a talent for creating interesting characters. Where does Bardin's picture come from ?
There, we helped the druids against Aldeth this time (from the previous experience, the Aldeth's quest in the BG city was bugged anyway) and tried to find a ring of luck in the forest:
We lured all the spiders from the Centeol's cave outside and carefully dealt with them, so that Drassisseilla, under the protection from cold from the belt, could kill the Joneleth's lover alone.
Before going to the next area, Lucius warned the party about a possible ambush by a group of amazon bounty hunters. It turned out to be true:
Hadhod activated his Defensive Stance, Lucius casted AoF (which helped a lot against the Unholy Blight) and then gulped a potion of Frost Giant Strength, while Drassisseilla retreated to the north, nearly dying in the process.
In several moments, I saw Scvertvdendinw with 1 HP left and poisoned. Hadhod said the elf is nothing but dead, but we still tried to give her an elixir of health. It helped! Lucius also casted Command on Telka (instead of the first thought of casting Sanctuary), to stop her from wounding Scvertvdendinw further.
The battle was won.
The next area surprised us with a relatively hard fight against a Hamadryad.
First, she dire-charmed Lucius, and while charname ran after Hadhod (who ran after the constantly teleporting Hamadryad), she held Drassisseilla. To make things worse, Lucius started to attack Drassisseilla. But the dire-charm wore off just in time, before the final blow to our dragon disciple.
I thought we saved Drassisseilla, but nope - it turned out Hadhod, while chasing Hamadryad and becoming entangled, took throwing axes. So when he was charmed by the Hamadryad, he killed Drassisseilla from the distance. Soon afterwards, a bullet from Lucius stopped this madness.
We had to retreat to Beregost, to raise Drassisseilla and buy some stuff (spells for Scvertvdendinw, a robe for Drassisseilla, among other things).
As to Bardin's portrait, I found the image here. But as you can see I edited it a bit to make Bardin look more like a D&D Rock Gnome (gave him a bit of a tan, dyed the green hair blonde, also darkened the armor to make it look more roguey since Bardin's a Cleric/Thief).
Bardin, LN Cleric/Thief, in SoA
At the beginning of the SoA portion of Bardin's adventure I'm quite curious as to how a solo Cleric/Thief performs in late SoA and in ToB in general, and Bardin in my current setup in particular. My most succesful Cleric/Thief so far has been Bartholomew (who got vorpaled last year by his own celestial that had gone hostile due to friendly fire, during an otherwise succesful Irenicus battle in Spellhold), but he had a full party at his disposal.
Possible issues I can think of are the following:
* slow casting
Many spells have too long casting times to be reliably used in battle. This includes offensive spells like Doom (casting time 9), Hold Person (5), Miscast Magic (5), Flamestrike (8), False Dawn (9), and Harm (9). It also applies to buffs like Death Ward (casting time 9), Free Action (5), or PfE 10' Radius (7), that the Cleric/Thief may want to refresh during battle if/when the enemy removes them.
The Amulet of Power plus the Robe of Vecna come UAI should help mitigate this drawback of divine casting.
* lack of protections against buff removals
Clerics have lots of great buffs and combat protections but limited means to keep them in place, unlike Mages. The only spell protection they get is the level 7 spell Shield of the Archons (a divine Spell Deflection). Unfortunately a Cleric/Thief gets no more than three level 7 spell slots, as of level 22 (plus one extra level 7 spell slot via the holy symbol at level 25). This means that Shield of the Archons will have to compete with several other good spells for just a few slots. Due to being a multiclass a Cleric/Thief's Shield of the Archons will only absorb up to 12 or 13 spell levels whereas a straight Cleric's SotA will eventually absorb up to 20 spell levels. In other words a Cleric/Thief has fewer level 7 spell slots but needs more SotA per day than a straight Cleric to keep their buffs up. Of course the Thief part in a Cleric/Thief can be helpful here as well: hit and fade tactics, stealth and non-detection, UAI scroll-casting are all tools with which a Cleric/Thief can prevent and/or repair exposure.
I haven't decided yet whether or not to install the SCS component that treats mages' and priests' HLAs as innate abilities rather than memorisable spells. On the one hand having Implosion, Summon Deva, and Storm of Vengeance as innates will mean more slots for Shield of the Archons and other level 7 spells. On the other hand, Quest Spells can only be picked once and thus cast only once per day as a special ability. This means less flexibility. Besides clones (Simulacra etc) do get to cast level 7 spells but they do not get access to the original's innate SCS HLAs. Any insights?
* difficulty removing enemy spell/combat protections
Clerics' only means of dispelling enemy combat and spell protections is Dispel Magic. Clerics are actually quite good dispellers, especially in small parties or as solo characters, since they level up relatively fast and they can reach level 40 eventually. Thieves can specialize in shortbows and rely on arrows of dispelling until they get UAI and learn to cast from scrolls or use weapons like the Staff of the Magi or Carsomyr. Unfortunately, a Cleric/Thief has neither a powerful Dispel Magic, due to being a multiclass, nor access to arrows of dispelling, due to being restricted to blunt weapons. A Cleric/Thief will have to wait until UAI before they reliably remove enemy protections.
* limited APR
Backstabs don't work against all foes and are difficult to execute in confined spaces with numerous enemies. Clerics' wonderful combat buffs simply lose much of their effectiveness if the priest has only one APR. Thieves' Time Traps aren't much good if a Cleric/Thief can only perform two actions per round (one attack and one spell). Faster casting thanks to Amulet of Power and Robe of Vecna makes extra attacks more than welcome. It's considerations like these that really make me want my Cleric/Thief to get as many APR as possible, and not just in the form of summons.
As always I play with Rogue Rebalancing's Proper dual-wielding implementation for Thieves and Bards as per pnp. This means that all rogues, including Cleric/Thieves, can get three pips in TWF, and thus that my Cleric/Thief will be able to become a better dual-wielder than a vanilla Cleric/Thief. With UAI a lot of items become available to the Cleric/Thief to further increase APR. With full Cleric buffs, Belm and Scarlet Ninja-To might actually be a good combo against many enemies, despite non-proficiency in Scimitars. This is something I'll have to see for myself though. Together, the Ring of Gaxx, Improved Cloak of Protection +2, and Bracers of Blinding Strike are good for 5 Improved Hastes per day. Additionally there are several scrolls of Improved Haste scattered throughout the game. A Cleric/Thief does well to hoard these scrolls (and many other scrolls too). If attainable the Gauntlets of Extraordinary Specialization will add another 1/2 attack. So a Cleric/Thief could get 9 APR with Belm and Scarlet Ninja-To, Gauntlets of Extraordinary Specialization, and Improved Haste. In fights where Scarlet Ninja-To isn't good enough for a main hand weapon, that weapon can go to the off-hand while a good blunt weapon occupies the main hand (FoA, Crom Faeyr, or in the case of Bardin probably an upgraded club as per Item Upgrades).
* new setup
Another potential issue is lack of familiarity with my current install. I installed several Big Picture components in addition to the Ascension components, including some Tactics stuff:
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #675 // Knights and Paladins: v181-b4611
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1080 // Vampire Encounters -> Chapter 3 and 6 (no bodhi): v181-b4611
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1100 // Copper Coronet and Slavers: v181-b4611
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1140 // Druidic Improvements -> Druid Grove (with Druid Encounter): v181-b4611
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1170 // Treant Encounter: v181-b4611
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1600 // Improved Suldanessallar: v181-b4611
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1625 // Tanners Quest: v181-b4611
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1650 // Trademeet Enhancements: v181-b4611
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1400 // Improved Random Encounters, by Gebhard Blucher and Kensai Ryu: v181-b4611
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1110 // Kensai Ryu's Brown Dragon: v181-b4611
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1175 // Kensai Ryu's Gnome Fighter/Illusionist in the Docks: v181-b4611
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1275 // Gebhard Blucher's Lich in the Docks: v181-b4611
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1525 // Improved Small Teeth Pass, by Kensai Ryu: v181-b4611
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1250 // Kuroisan the Acid Kensai, by Westley Weimer: v181-b4611
~BP/SETUP-BP.TP2~ #0 #1425 // Red Badge, Poison-Based Encounter, by Westley Weimer: v181-b4611
These are just some thoughts I've had about what SoA and hopefully ToB will have in store for Bardin. I wrote them down because I'm forgetful and who knows they might be insightful for others or cause people to come up with interesting feedback.
As to Bardin's current status, he's taking a break at Waukeen's Promenade, having recently escaped Chateau Irenicus with some difficulty. His stats and thieving skills at character creation:
The problem initially was that Bardin didn't really have the right spells memorized for escaping chateau Irenicus. He had one Sanctuary (a second one being greyed out due to losing the Honorary Ring of Sune from BG1), and he had to get a Club from Ilych's room. Bardin rested pretty much immediately and memorized six Sanctuaries. He also memorized three Spiritual Hammers to deal with enemies he'd face before getting his hands on the club. The unexpectedly pathetic damage the Spiritual Hammers dealt, combined with their limited duration, taught us that was a bad decision.
He snuck through the halls, hidden in shadows, procured the club from Ilych's room under Sanctuary, backstabbed an Otyugh,
On the second dungeon floor, Bardin had the help of three Skeleton Warriors in destroying our Mephit Portals,
I read your weidu.log and I have a few quick comments:
1-BP was the only way to get ascension running on BG2EE but there is another project refreshing the mod with the clear intent to support it on EE. BP installs on EE but it is not supported and probably not verified script by script.
I haven't tried the new attempt yet but that sounds like the best way to plug SCS on top of Ascension (using BP+Stratagems has never been 100% satisfactory despite the thread flagged as an announcement on this very forum...)
2- BP and Tactics. I know a guy who can confirm that several components that you use have a better implementation in EEtactics, at a minimum the gnome fighter/illusionist, the lich in the docks, redbadge and to a lesser extent Kuroisan. It is primarily not a question of installation method. It includes fixes for a few bugs and the AI compatibility with EE. Tactics Torgal and Tactics Mae'Var are nice too but I can't recommend them in your installation because I do not know if there is a conflict with the Quest Pack (see 5) but the new Mae'Var would have no conflict with Stratagems despite the warning in the SCS readme.
3- BP/Tactics Improved random encounters. Just don't do that because later you deploy both Unfinished Business and Stratagems random encounters. And honestly you won't miss it.
4- I think the individual PnP celestial mod creates problems but I don't remember the details, I will tell you later.
5- Quest pack : General AI + Creature and areas improvements. Perhaps not as mod friendly as you may think. Some Undeads and Umber Hulks are likely to be the only creatures not overriden by Stratagems. Unless you really want those creatures, you don't really improve your setup. (don't know if there are drawbacks). aTweaks Undeads perhaps?
6- aTweaks Prevent Project Image and Simulacrum clones from using quickslot items AND Stratagems Prevent Simulacra and Projected Images from using magical items. I think that's the same.
7- IMHO ascension Demogrogon is better than Stratagems. Unfortunately Demorgon is packaged in the Improved Fiends component. Again IMHO another reason to use the aTweaks fiends, a bit less intelligent but what an implementation !!
Thanks very much for your feedback!
Re: 1. I think people have completed the game with BP Ascension, so I'm inclined to give it a chance for now, though I'd love to know more of the other project you refer to.
Re: 2. Yeah, I thought of EETactics later, after I included BP Tactics stuff when I installed BP for Ascension
Re: 3. Ok, will uninstall.
Re: 4. I only used P&P Celestials in my BGT setup once, and I had Anomen successfully summon a Movanic Deva in BG2EE (Gerland's party). I'm going to give them a try. Is there another mod containing P&P Celestials that works better?
Re: 5. I don't think I really want Quest Pack Umber Hulks or Undead, but if SCS overrides everything but those creatures anyway, I can't see Quest Pack doing much harm. Am I wrong?
Re: 6. You're probably right. Do you think having both installed will cause any problems?
Re: 7. I've considered installing aTweaks' 3rd Fiends component: SCS stats with aTweaks abilities and behavior.