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"Maybe this time" [NO-RELOAD THREAD]: "The Tale of TEN THOUSAND Trials"

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  • ArthasArthas Member Posts: 1,091
    edited August 2018
    Grond0, don't the traps piss you off after a while? I play solo, but most of the time facing locks+traps proves to be one of the most painful thing inside a no reload playthrough.

    There are times when I go solo, but actually add imoen just to disable traps and so on. Would that be forbidden? That's the point of annoyance I reached.

    By the way, I'm sorry for your character.
    Wise_GrimwaldCrevsDaak
  • ArctodusArctodus Member Posts: 992
    edited August 2018
    Enuhal said:

    @semiticgod I've killed Morentherene with throwing daggers many times now, often with multiple misses before getting a hit in, and she has never woken up. While buffing in her cave makes her attack immediately, it seems that she's rather bad at noticing someone throwing daggers at her.

    Actually, if you buff just outside the cave, she will attack you when you get in. It happened to me once while I was buffing the thac0 on my dagger thrower. As soon as I got in, boom ! Here she was, ready to fight.

    Edit : Sorry your Blackguard fell, @Grond0.
    Grond0EnuhalCrevsDaak
  • Wise_GrimwaldWise_Grimwald Member Posts: 3,837
    Arctodus said: Enuhal said:@semiticgod I've killed Morentherene with throwing daggers many times now, often with multiple misses before getting a hit in, and she has never woken up. While buffing in her cave makes her attack immediately, it seems that she's rather bad at noticing someone throwing daggers at her.

    Actually, if you buff just outside the cave, she will attack you when you get in. It happened to me once while I was buffing the thac0 on my dagger thrower. As soon as I got in, boom ! Here she was, ready to fight.

    Edit : Sorry your Blackguard fell, @Grond0.


    That happened to me too.
    Grond0EnuhalArctodusCrevsDaak
  • Corey_RussellCorey_Russell Member Posts: 995
    edited August 2018
    @grond0 said...
    "..meant the mephits were a real threat. In the elemental plane I was stunned by the steam mephit and lost 50% of HPs before recovering and finishing it off with a drain life."


    For solo characters, I will in fact skip the plane of air if I don't have a safe way to deal with the mephits - note there are two stunners, one short duration and one longer. If I can go invisible past them to complete the genie quest I will do that. Even if your character actually uses two hand swords, you hardly need the Sword of Chaos reward since Lilacor is obtainable so early and Lilacor is better. And if solo, you don't need the exp either since you will hit the level cap before Melissan.
    Grond0Wise_GrimwaldCrevsDaak
  • ArthasArthas Member Posts: 1,091
    For everyone using a fighter kit solo, do you go for SCS improvement, or don't? Because I've read a post by David Weimer suggesting not to go for AI improvements without a mage.

  • Grond0Grond0 Member Posts: 7,305
    @Arthas I'm not sure if I understand what you mean. I can't see any reason to use SCS only if you're playing a mage PC though. I suppose if you particularly like indulging in games of 'mage chess' you might feel like that and I know some people enjoy that - I don't though.
    StummvonBordwehrWise_GrimwaldCrevsDaak
  • ArctodusArctodus Member Posts: 992
    edited August 2018
    @Arthas SCS is totally beatable with a pure fighter. I personally got very deep into BG2 with a solo kitless fighter on LoB with SCS. I didn't quit because it was too hard, I quit because I got back to no-reloading (the run was with reload).

    Numerous persons beated the whole saga with SCS with solo classes other than mages. That shouldn't be a concern in itself. It does make the game significantly harder and forces you to elaborate better strategies, but it's definitively doable.
    Wise_GrimwaldGrond0CrevsDaak
  • Corey_RussellCorey_Russell Member Posts: 995

    I am really annoyed, all the saves that I made today have disappeared. I hope it is nothing to do with installing Avast. If it is I may have to uninstall it. :(

    @Wise_Grimwald I use Avast - I have had no problems with my save games with BG, vanilla or EE.
    Grond0CrevsDaakWise_Grimwald
  • semiticgoddesssemiticgoddess Member Posts: 14,903
    @Grond0: If v2.5 gives -12 AC to all LoB enemies, that's a serious change in gameplay. It makes a solo run seem extremely unrealistic for characters who don't rely on summons or wands to deal damage. Granted, your own summons should also be much harder to hit (right?), but the player will be crippled. Even a fighter would struggle to land hits on all kinds of critters, and I'm not sure how well even a Cavalier or a ranger with Demon as a racial enemy would handle Belhifet. Things might operate similarly for shamans, clerics, and druids (those with long-lasting summons that can stick around long enough to make progress on the enemy with that -12 AC boost in the way), but fighter levels wouldn't be remotely as useful as they were before.

    Also, I thought the previous THAC0 bonus was +5, not +12.
    Grond0
  • Wise_GrimwaldWise_Grimwald Member Posts: 3,837
    @Grond0 RIP Frey
    Grond0
  • semiticgoddesssemiticgoddess Member Posts: 14,903

    semi: No-Reload Dragon Warrior Monsters Run

    Part 11

    Into the Gate of Temptation! Rime the Lavaman gets some nice stat boosts early on, especially in defense and MP, but it will hardly matter; our future GoldGolem won't need the extra bonuses. Fittingly enough, the Gate of Temptation features Momonjas who use LureDance. As I've said before, LureDance is the best disabler in the game, and you can pretty easily dance-lock almost anything for 2 MP a round. Thankfully, very few enemies ever use it, because even our monsters are highly susceptible.

    The KingCobras are a menace, inflicting poison with PoisonHit and casting Curse. We have Antidote on hand, but not Curseoff, so hopefully we'll avoid getting cursed (being cursed lasts even after the fight is over and drains MP).

    We run into a bunch of Mimics once again. StopSpell neutralizes them, and after a few fights, Rime gets a new skill: Biattack!




    Biattack strikes twice at 75% damage, which sounds like it would deal a total of 50% more damage than normal, but because damage rolls in DWM operate on thresholds, it's entirely possible (in fact, rather common) for Biattack to deal less damage than a normal attack, because the monster's attack stat isn't quite high enough to match the target's defense. Biattack (and especially the upgraded skill, QuadHits, which strikes 4 times at 50% strength) are better suited for critters with very high attack.

    We catch a SpikyBoy, a Mommonja, and a KingCobra on the way. Since we put most of the monsters on the farm to sleep, we can spare the room.



    The Mommonja is a convenient source of the LureDance skill, but it doesn't fit into any good breeding patterns for us.

    Deeper in the Gate of Temptation, we discover that KingCobras can also use Beat to instantly slay party members. Rime the Iceman goes down. With our KingLeo gone (we bred him into our Iceman), we no longer have any party members who are 100% immune to Beat. Fortunately, our Hornbeet can bring back our Iceman thanks to its Orc ancestor.

    We catch a MistyWing, a DarkEye (notable for having the rare skills Radiant and PalsyAir, an area-effect paralysis breath attack), and even catch another Lavaman!



    Rime and Sky by now have both succumbed to a KingCobra's Curse skill, and they're gradually losing MP as we travel through the wilderness. Worse still, I remember that Curse has a small chance of paralyzing the victim during combat... and if all of your surviving party members are paralyzed, the game is over.

    If Orca dies to a Beat spell and Sky and Rime get paralyzed or killed in combat, we could get a game over.

    We don't have any MoonHerbs or Laurels, which means we have no items that can cure either curses or paralysis. Also, we keep failing to run into priests who could heal our party. There's only one way to cure our curses:

    I set each party member to "Command," which means none of them will use any special skills in combat. I then let Rime gradually take more and more damage until he dies. Death removes all status ailments, so we can bring back Rime and cure him of the curse!

    I do the same thing for Sky, then use a precious ElfWater to get Sky's MP from zero to maximum. Here we are at the end of the gate.



    Rime the Iceman has surprisingly excellent stats, rivaling Orca the Hornbeet's, but she suffers from a horribly low HP score, so she's not nearly as resilient as her allies.

    Sky, notably, has developed the highest personality type, Hotblood, because I've been steadily giving Sky all three types of orders to maximize her bravery, cunning, and compassion.

    Orca and Rime aren't quite as smart, so their personalities are both Daring.

    Even with our third party member reduced to a crummy Iceman (relatively crummy, anyway; that low HP is a major disadvantage compared to our Hornbeet), we're still in solid shape. Every single party member has HealAll, two have Revive while one has Vivify, and we even have TwinHits and LureDance.

    The boss here is a Servant, a rare type of Zombie monster that honestly should be a Material instead (it's a suit of armor, after all). The Servant is a pyromanic destroying a village, and is curiously frustrated when it discovers that you don't share its interests.




    That's the "temptation" part of the Gate of Temptation. Not very tempting for non-pyromaniacs, but whatevs.

    Anyhoo, the Servant comes flanked by a Centasaur and an EvilArmor--which also should be a Material, since it's a suit of armor just like a RogueNite, but EvilArmors are Devils instead for some reason. Since the Servant in this fight is joinable if you feed it enough treats, we start shelling out Sirloins.

    The fight turns out to be a cakewalk. The enemy has no resistance against LureDance or StopSpell, we have the stats to overwhelm them, and Orca even knows DevilCut, which can deal extra damage to the Centasaur and EvilArmor. Even Radiant works on them!





    We empty our inventory of meat treats, but the Servant still refuses to join us when the fight is over.

    Back at GreatTree, we breed a StagBug with a Mommonja for a Gophecada so we can later breed it with Orca for a stronger Hornbeet, a MistyWing with a KingCobra for another Wyvern to breed into our WhipBird, and most importantly, Rime the Iceman with a Lavaman (note that the Iceman has to be the first monster, the "pedigree," for this to work) for a GoldGolem.

    GoldGolems look stupid, what with their three-clawed hands on a centaur body, bright purple mane, and dark goggles, but it'll be worth it.

    Hope the GoldGolem gets all of the lovely skills from our Iceman and therefore our old KingLeo, who was already a brilliant monster. Better still, GoldGolems get a suite of immunities and resistances that render them all but impervious to disablers and spell damage. On top of that, they have incredibly high stats, including the best defense in the game. Metallic Slimes get more defense per level, but GoldGolems don't grow as slowly as a Metaly, Metabble, MetalKing, or GoldSlime, and their HP isn't so terrible.

    We enter the Gate of Happiness and Hope's stats begin to skyrocket.

    We grab a Pixy, an Oniono, and a DeadNite, but we're quickly reaching the point at which we simply don't need any others.



    Pixies are notable, though, for knowing the TwinHits skill. We even grab a Gigantes from a foreign trainer, though we unfortunately fail to catch a StubBird late in the gate (StubBirds also know TwinHits).

    Here we are at the end of the gate. Hope's defense is just as high as I expected, and his other stats are also competitive with his elders'. Curiously, our Hornbeet's HP is actually higher than our WhipBird's, even though WhipBirds are supposed to have the best HP in the game!



    The boss at the Gate of Happiness is a Jamirus, currently preaching to his followers on a stage and offering them meat if they vote for him or whatever.


    A Jamirus is an extremely hard-to-get Devil monster that really should be a Bird, because it literally is just a bird. Look at it!

    Why would it be a Devil?

    The Jamirus is very dangerous, using Blazemost to deal heavy fire damage and QuadHits to spread around physical damage. But we have LureDance and StopSpell and TwinHits and DevilCut, so...




    We dance-lock it and stomp it into the ground.

    We've got one last gate before tackling S class at the arena. It's time to make our way to the Gate of Judgment.
    StummvonBordwehrAerakarlolien
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