I can't imagine that squad is going to last long; are you running a mod that prevents party conflict? I know at least Aerie and Hexxat go at it, and having three good and two evil seems like another fight is likely to brew. Besides that, fairly solid team, except for the severe lack of anything resembling a front line until Rasaad gets fairly high up.
I'm very interested in that multiplayer project of yours guys, if you care to tell its tale that is. A micromanaged thief (or fighter/thief since you're going scs) can do work mid saga and hold his own early and late. An Inquisitor or a revised druid (but I don't see that component) can make excellent and useful front liners. Arcane Casters are strongest later (specifically mages or fighter mages) but may I advise sorcerer to reduce resting. Divine casters have the life saving chaotic commands and an easy time protecting against fire for fireball madness. Since it would be a no reload run, resurrecting is important.
Not sure how much caster level is important (single or multi classed casters) to avoid protection dispelling.
I just failed a no-reload run in Spellhold. I kept delaying posting it. It was an Illusionist that I was going to dual-class to fighter right after Spellhold. The idea was to get to Spellhold using a no-reload-friendly mage type (most of the game was pretty easy, actually), then switch to a fighter once I could rely on the Slayer form instead of spells.
Problem is, the modified version of Slayer form from Ascension doesn't behave quite like the normal EE version. For one thing, the weakest form only decreases your reputation by 1. Also, the Slayer weapon no longer persists indefinitely, though it's still possible to prolong the Slayer form with Mirror Image. Without the Slayer weapon, we lose out on a lot of immunities--namely, the immunity to Power Word: Stun.
And apparently the Ring of Free Action no longer blocks Power Word: Stun, either, or even normal stun. Nor does a Potion of Freedom; I nearly died when a Mind Flayer stunned me earlier on.
So when a Glabrezu hit me with Power Word: Stun, Irenicus' Planetar rushed in and took us down in four hits. Unfortunately, he failed on each hit to dispel the stun effect. I don't think I like Glabrezus.
The Ascension Slayer form also grants 15% resistance to physical damage and 50% resistance to elemental damage, and the MR gets bumped up from 40 to 50. But only the physical damage resistance stacks with items. The loss of the Slayer weapon itself means that we no longer need the Cowl of Stars or Shocking Grasp sequencers to use other weapons, but it also deprives us of various immunities and costs us a +5 weapon that can deal damage through Stoneskin (almost no other weapon before ToB can do that). It also costs us a lot of THAC0 and some excellent save bonuses.
And apparently the Ring of Free Action no longer blocks Power Word: Stun, either, or even normal stun. Nor does a Potion of Freedom; I nearly died when a Mind Flayer stunned me earlier on.
So when a Glabrezu hit me with Power Word: Stun, Irenicus' Planetar rushed in and took us down in four hits. Unfortunately, he failed on each hit to dispel the stun effect.
This bothers me immensely: What protects against stun consistently?
I think Chaotic Commands does. But it can be dispelled.
I thought the FixPack made the Ring of Free Action protect against Stun and that the FixPack was incorporated into EE. Is that not true?
[NOTE: This is a bit academic for my run though. For some reason, I haven't found any Ring of Free Action yet. I'm refusing to look up where it may be.]
Keldorn, my front liner, got killed to Stuns so many times, I lost count. (My current Dragon Disciple *always* runs under Chaotic Commands -- but there is not enough spells to cover both her and my melee line.)
I handled the Illithids and Demon Knights basically by emptying the Staves of Fire and Earth of elemental summoning charges on them -- and Keldorn and Jaheira still got cut down consistently! (I gave Imoen the other Chaotic Commands and Improved Haste: she can do immense damage that way [she is a FM in my run].)
@Ygramul: I understand the FixPack did grant stun immunity to the ring, but apparently that part of it wasn't brought into EE, unless SCS or BP has removed it from the Ring of Free Action in my install.
Chaotic Commands blocks both stun and PW: Stun (they use two different opcodes). So do Barbarian and Berserker rage. The Slayer weapon can also protect against it, but the weapon won't persist indefinitely with Ascension installed. Otherwise, your options are limited. A save vs. spell can block virtually any hostile source of stun (the sole exception I think is the Wand of Paralyzation, which nobody uses on you), while magic resistance and spell protections can block PW: Stun. But MR and spell protections usually can't block stun, and a save vs. spell can never block PW: Stun. Also, the Shield of Reflection will bounce Kuo-toa Bolts, Paralytic Bolts, and Drow Bolts of Stunning, all of which use the stun opcode.
Glabrezus spam PW: Stun all the time, and SCS spellcasters summon them with great frequency, and often use the spell themselves. @Alesia_BH has rightly named it a prominent cause of death in solo no-reload runs. Minor Spell Deflection is a common and cheap way to block it and similar spells (but don't rely on MSD for everything; it won't block Maze or PW: Kill).
Any of those Wednesdays, Thursdays, or Friday times up until GMT 20:00 should work.
Edit: Hymn, 2nd and final update And Hymn met his end at the hands of a certain Ogre mage named Khark; Sirius, Quill, and Sapphire had all died, so I had Hymn use a charge of the Wand of Summon Monsters, breaking invisibility. Two high rolls later, and Hymn was dead.
The entire fight, lasting over 2 turns at least, had Khark with Haste as a prebuff active throughout the fight, with no secondary activation. This implies that either the Haste prebuff is broken, or that Khark is a level 17 mage, which I doubt. If the haste effect had ever disappeared, I could've successfully kited him, but as it is... Ah well. Things to know for future runs.
Bronwynn has fallen. I lost a great deal of the screenshots leading up to his suprising demise, but after exploring Cloakwood, Baldur's Gate, and most of Sword Coast, he was backstabbed to death by an assassin in the SCS Iron Throne fight. A fun run to rp, but here are my thoughts ooc, concerning my next attempt.
1. I played half the game with a tweak that gave me max hit points, explaining how I got so far. That'll be disabled next game. 2. I chose Xzar, Montaron, Khalid, and Jahiera purely for the ooc reason of wanting to see them fight; next time I'll roleplay how my character would want people to join or leave, and try and find some more "roleplay-centric" challenges. If I do make it more about the story for this next run, do leave suggestions on how to format such. 3. I abused my prior knowledge of where the Ring Of Protection was, among a few other trinkets, so I'll have to do some sort of roll to see if the Protagonist comes across such treasures. More immersion, less cheese, summed up.
Keep on fightin' you lot. My second attempt will probably be my last, though damn it's fun.
Valkalyn - thief -> Managing to just barely stay alive. Valkalyn left Jahiera and Minsc in Irenicus's Dungeon and backstabbed and sneaked her way out.
Once on the surface, she immediately went into the circus tent and recruited Aerie. I threw the +3 chain on Aerie for now to have her act as a temporary tank. They ignored the werewolves and fully focused on the shadows. When they reached Kalah, Aerie cast hold person on him and then both Valkalyn and Aerie cleaned up Kalah's minions. Once the last shadow fell the two fully focused on Kalah himself.
We then found two others in the Copper Coronet after Gaelan Bayle offered to help Valkalyn. We proceeded to sneak into the back rooms, Nalia, Hexxat, and Valkalyn triple backstabbed the beastmaster. He died instantly, and then the three slowly mopped up his toys. They escaped the Copper Coronet without incident, and Lehtinan has yet to figure out who killed the beast master, since the three thieves were quite thorough. The next place the party went was the Bridge District where we solved the Skinner murders. The assassin at the bottom was especially tough to defeat.
At this point Hexxat threatened to leave if we did not go to Dragomir's tomb. She died halfway through the tomb and we had to raise her in the temple district and return. When we had returned, we got into a tough fight with Dragomir himself. Nalia and Aerie emptied their offensive arsenals on him while Hexxat and Valkalyn forced him to switch his attention between the two thieves. He died to a critical hit from Nalia who was shapeshifted into an ogre. Hexxat(Clara) was killed by the real Hexxat who joined us after we released her and gave her Dragomir's Cloak. At this point Nalia started to complain about not going to her keep yet. At the gates we met a messenger from Trademeet, and we went there to investigate. On our way to Trademeet, we were ambushed by brigands that had a severely injured person with them. I had not noticed the innocent until the Cloudkill spell was already flying.(I legitimately had forgotten this encounter) We ran into a monk named Rasaad, after he knocked two monks of his order into the nine hells. We let him join us and then went to De'Arnise Keep. We emptied the trolls out of all but the temple in the cellar The Umber Hulks were lured into the dungeons and the doors closed and bared.(I need some help with trying to figure out how to beat Tor'Gal without any tanks before I attack him, Rasaad and Valkalyn together though do deal staggering amounts of damage, not as much as tanky Kagain though who had 5 THAC0, -8 AC and 25% Magic Resistance at the end of BG1:EE without buffs... I'm missing my Kagain lol)
On our return to the city, we were ambushed by more brigands.
The party then went to check out the job that the Shadow Thieves had for us, to find out that Renal Bloodscalp wanted us to spy on Mae'Var... Mae'Var sent the party out to steal a necklace from the the temple Talos, we were successful. Edwin then sent us out to kill a cowled wizard - I had to dodge the stone golems on the second floor - Nalia and Aerie both managed to get Melf's Acid Arrows in before Rayic Gethras's contingencies fired. Aerie then cast Breach, and Nalia cast fire arrow as Rayic's protections fell around him. Valkalyn then came out of the shadows and backstabbed Rayic and was given a death Ward since Rayic was still standing. Hexxat stabbed Rayic through before he could attempt to kill Valkalyn. We saved the one who spoke against Mae'Var, and then Edwin joined us. Renal sanctioned us to kill Mae'var and the party went through the tunnel near the Sea. We had only been gone for less than half an hour so Mae'Var's voice and the screams of his victim could be heard from the tunnel. Nalia and Edwin flung a web while Aerie cast holy smite on the area twice. Nalia and Edwin filled the room with a cloudkill and a fireball. Edwin finished Mae'Var off with a magic missile. Planned and carried out like true assassins. We then returned to Renal who gave Valkalyn run of Mae'Vars guildhall.
On going to the guildhall, we were told that an Ama from another chapter of Thieves was setting up a meeting in Waukeen's Promenade that she wanted Valkalyn to conduct. Multiple of Valkalyn's underlings stated that they did not know her, but then the prisoner Valkalyn had freed told Valkalyn that he had seen her in Mae'var's prisons multiple times. This last straw made Valaklyn focus on preparing for Ama's betrayal, and she bought a license from the cowled wizards so half of her party could defend themselves in the streets. It only became more telling of an ambush when Ama told Valkalyn's party to conceal all weapons since the contact was a "nervous one". The party gripped their weapons tighter and the three mages began to cast protections on themselves while Ama looked around nervously. Then her thieves were in place and she launched her assault, on a fully prepared party.
I think Hexxat and Rasaad are going to come to blows soon since they are both going after Valkalyn. So two questions:
1. Is it possible to attack the Druid Grove and successfully expel the shadow druids without a druid in the party? Or will Cernd wait for you at the grove and challenge Faldorn for you? 2. What are people's strategies for Tor'Gal in De'Arnise Keep? I have never successfully fought Tor'Gal without reloading, never mind without tanks...
@Meyahi The ability drain plus imp haste with his two minions, high magic resistance and low THAC0 make him difficult in my eyes when you have no fighters.
The best way to reduce magic resistance is to have a low level or multiclassed (Aerie) caster with the magic resistance spell. Then you can reduce it to nothing easily. Doom+greater malison ensure that you can easily use crowd control spells. From there it is a piece of cake. You do have a 5man party (without a STR belt and levels Rasaad is useless until the later stages of the game) but 3 spells per round and 2 backstabbers should be enough. Too bad you only have Aerie which is a multiclass since barkskin can become one hell of a buff for monks. To make a pseudo tank, take you highest hp mage, buff her (since it is Nalia) and pool your best items; she should be fine. Just keep recasting iron skins.
PS: when Edwin will be Edwina, Rasaad will have his own harem gender bender included.
Valkalyn - thief We ambushed the Djinni in Trademeet and then left for the Druid Grove.
At the Druid Grove we killed all of the trolls, Aerie fell in the first attempt, then we brought her back in Trademeet. We returned again and had Nalia shapeshift into a mustard jelly to tank the trolls while Edwin and Aerie shot fireballs and flamestrikes from wands. We defeated the trolls in the troll mound, and then proceeded North killing even more trolls, until we reached some druids. They were fighting trolls as well, yet were forsure a part of Faldorn's group. So we dropped Cloudkills on them and peppered them with fireballs, but their mage got a fateful spell off and Valkalyn became held as their spearman ran up and repeatedly stabbed Valkalyn. The party could do nothing as Valkalyn disintegrated faster than she would have being the target of a disintegration spell.
RIP Valkalyn the pure thief without even shorty saves. Not having free action on your Charname is a big nono since (not sure if SCS) a stunned/held character is usually doomed unless you: 1.Dispell immediately 2.Fire all you crowd control spells (especially if Charname is in danger) 3.Have an invis spell handy (this is very shaky with true sight et all) 4.Have a defensive contigency
@Meyahi 1. No dispels were remaining except 1 scroll in a scroll case on Valkalyn 2. Fire your crowd control spells - exactly what I did 3. She literally disintegrated before one spell could get cast. Aerie is casting cure serious wounds, while I had Nalia run forward and try to cast improved invisibility on Valkalyn. 4. Didn't have access to level 6 spells
@Neverused If I had thought to memorize one. Edit: I just looked through my spellbooks pre-battle and there are no sequencers that can be memorized, only contingency is known for those types of spells, yet it can't be cast.
@Meyahi Well, I learned something new. Is it the merchant at the back of the Adventurer's Market? Just so everyone knows, I have only played BG2EE twice and BG2 about 6 times throughout the past. Unlike BG1EE which is 7 times... and BG1 is undefined.... So I think I got pretty far for the first time doing a no reload run of BG2. Edit: I'm not even sad, I think I did really well. Well regardless, the next plan after the Druid Grove was to give Aerie the belt of Hill giant strength and go after the Unseeing eye since she would then be able to equip the shield of Balduran.
Minor Sequencer can be bought from the little merchant in front of the derelict house in the west end of the Bridge District. He only appears in the evening.
Escape options are a huge priority for me in no-reload runs. Clerics always have Remove Paralysis and mages always have Invisibility, Invisibility 10' Radius, and/or Teleport Field to get us out of ugly situations. I usually put them in contingencies before fights. Remove Paralysis also cures stun as well as hold and paralysis. Invisibility 10' Radius is an excellent way to get the whole party out of danger, and can be cast without breaking prior invisibility. Plus, it lasts more than one rest period, so you can turn the party invisible before you rest and enter the next challenge already invisible. Teleport Field won't stop all threats, but it does move enemies out of the way, and is sometimes the only way to reach the exit without fighting a losing battle. SCS enemies are very good at blocking you in.
One neat trick with Contingency is to set up an Invisibility 10' Radius spell on hit. You can approach an enemy while invisible, cast Sunfire, and then instantly vanish, preventing any retaliation.
I also keep a supply of Potions of Invisibility, Potions of Freedom, Potions of Clarity, and Potions of Invulnerability, Magic Protection, or Magic Shielding, especially for solo runs. In battle, I time my actions so that I can use those potions immediately after an enemy mage casts a spell, either to block the spell or to escape it. If my solo character has a charm spell coming her way, for instance, she can drink a Potion of Clarity instead of relying on her saves. If I get targeted by a hold spell, I can block it with a Potion of Freedom. But if the enemy has already spent their divination spells, I can instead use a much more common invisibility potion, which will let me wait out the duration of the hold effect in safety.
Another Charname died before I posted about her. It was a Shadowdancer. She got boxed in by Giant Rats and was using HiPS to cut them down quickly. Then, she got hit by Secret Word. Apparently a Domination spell was on its way in the fraction of a second during which she was visible, and with a save vs. spell at 1 and her Potion of Clarity long since worn off, she failed her save against the odds.
SCS vampires' domination spells appear to have a 0 casting time, which means our only defense against it before Use Any Item would have been Adjatha the Drinker, which blocks charm and domination. Adjatha is probably a necessity for a solo no-reload thief against SCS vampires, since Potions of Clarity are limited and will run out if you rely on hit and fade tactics. But you get Adjatha from the Warden in the Planar Prison, who can see through invisibility and has a lot of Power Word spells to use against you, so getting that immunity is itself risky.
Having used a blind thief and a Shadowdancer, they seem to be fairly equal. A blind thief gets traps; a Shadowdancer gets missile weapons, better AC and THAC0, and Shadowstep. They can't really accomplish the same things offensively, but both of them are extremely difficult to harm. Even in ToB, only a handful of enemies can see through invisibility. As we saw in Imber's run, Sendai was stumped by Potions of Invisibility.
A Shadowdancer can make a very excellent defensive build. Aside from perpetual invisibility via HiPS, Shadowstep is a great escape option, particularly since it refreshes your stealth timer. The Time Stop effect allows you to slip away not just from enemies, but even incoming spells.
And apparently it lasts during area transitions. I didn't think that was possible. You can leave an area during Shadowstep and it will still be in effect when you enter the next one--unless there's a cutscene, it seems. Plus, if there's a traveling period (a 10-hour journey), you can attack and use spells when you arrive for the remainder of the Shadowstep, though I don't see quite that many ways to make much use of it. And since Shadowstep uses the same opcode as Time Stop, you can chain-cast them to help wait out enemy buffs, like Protection from Magic Weapons, and unlike waiting out buffs using HiPS, it works for the whole party, and against enemies who can see through invisibility.
@bengoshi thanks! Lots of the times I would get delayed half an hour after I had finished writing the updates for the pictures to upload. I would normally have to start the uploading before I started to write my post, this will be much much quicker.
Anyways, I already have continued on with another character, though I'm not doing a no reload with her. Just a solo run through BG2:EE which is at 1 reload so far(due to a mistake that would have broken multiple quests). I have been avoiding mages as of yet due to being unable to dispel their protections. This one:
She's emptied the de'Arnise Hold and used a summoned Efreeti to kill Tor'Gal. The Efreeti cast spells while she kept Tor'Gal's attention. She managed to even slip a backstab in when Tor'Gal focused on the Efreeti. She also manually killed the Umber Hulks due to wearing Aeger's Hide. She's freed the slaves of the slums district, and found out what happened to Montaron. She has yet to even attempt to go after the cowled wizard Edwin wants her to kill though. She is on her way now to finish investigating the Skinner Murders.
Edit: Well that was interesting. A bone golem was at the bottom, well I can tell you that Victasaadi had lots of fun dodging it and the two twisted rune assassins. All but the bone golem fell, and well, the bone golem didn't fall because she couldn't really do much to it so there is still a bone golem at the bottom of Rejiek's tannery. She killed everyone else though.
Wow. I just had thugs that seemed more knowledgeable than humans are. I went into the Shadow Thieves Guildhall being chased by thugs and they didn't follow. I appeared on the other end of the docks a couple of hours later and went into the barracks...
The thugs opened the door to the Guard barracks and entered from the other side, and went through the door to the area I was in just to resume their assault upon me. O_O talk about single-minded homing thieves. I beat them but seriously, they shouldn't be able to track that well.
Edit: She did pay the shadow thieves though and got her thieves guild up and running.
Comments
http://www.playithardcore.com/pihwiki/index.php?title=Baldur's_Gate_2:_NPC_Rundown#Wilson
18 - Rasaad
4 - Nalia
21 - Hexxat
16 - Edwin
3 - Aerie
I'll drop Imoen in Irenicus's Dungeon and solo my way out.
A micromanaged thief (or fighter/thief since you're going scs) can do work mid saga and hold his own early and late.
An Inquisitor or a revised druid (but I don't see that component) can make excellent and useful front liners.
Arcane Casters are strongest later (specifically mages or fighter mages) but may I advise sorcerer to reduce resting.
Divine casters have the life saving chaotic commands and an easy time protecting against fire for fireball madness. Since it would be a no reload run, resurrecting is important.
Not sure how much caster level is important (single or multi classed casters) to avoid protection dispelling.
Problem is, the modified version of Slayer form from Ascension doesn't behave quite like the normal EE version. For one thing, the weakest form only decreases your reputation by 1. Also, the Slayer weapon no longer persists indefinitely, though it's still possible to prolong the Slayer form with Mirror Image. Without the Slayer weapon, we lose out on a lot of immunities--namely, the immunity to Power Word: Stun.
And apparently the Ring of Free Action no longer blocks Power Word: Stun, either, or even normal stun. Nor does a Potion of Freedom; I nearly died when a Mind Flayer stunned me earlier on.
So when a Glabrezu hit me with Power Word: Stun, Irenicus' Planetar rushed in and took us down in four hits. Unfortunately, he failed on each hit to dispel the stun effect. I don't think I like Glabrezus.
The Ascension Slayer form also grants 15% resistance to physical damage and 50% resistance to elemental damage, and the MR gets bumped up from 40 to 50. But only the physical damage resistance stacks with items. The loss of the Slayer weapon itself means that we no longer need the Cowl of Stars or Shocking Grasp sequencers to use other weapons, but it also deprives us of various immunities and costs us a +5 weapon that can deal damage through Stoneskin (almost no other weapon before ToB can do that). It also costs us a lot of THAC0 and some excellent save bonuses.
I think Chaotic Commands does. But it can be dispelled.
I thought the FixPack made the Ring of Free Action protect against Stun and that the FixPack was incorporated into EE. Is that not true?
[NOTE: This is a bit academic for my run though. For some reason, I haven't found any Ring of Free Action yet. I'm refusing to look up where it may be.]
Keldorn, my front liner, got killed to Stuns so many times, I lost count. (My current Dragon Disciple *always* runs under Chaotic Commands -- but there is not enough spells to cover both her and my melee line.)
I handled the Illithids and Demon Knights basically by emptying the Staves of Fire and Earth of elemental summoning charges on them -- and Keldorn and Jaheira still got cut down consistently! (I gave Imoen the other Chaotic Commands and Improved Haste: she can do immense damage that way [she is a FM in my run].)
Chaotic Commands blocks both stun and PW: Stun (they use two different opcodes). So do Barbarian and Berserker rage. The Slayer weapon can also protect against it, but the weapon won't persist indefinitely with Ascension installed. Otherwise, your options are limited. A save vs. spell can block virtually any hostile source of stun (the sole exception I think is the Wand of Paralyzation, which nobody uses on you), while magic resistance and spell protections can block PW: Stun. But MR and spell protections usually can't block stun, and a save vs. spell can never block PW: Stun. Also, the Shield of Reflection will bounce Kuo-toa Bolts, Paralytic Bolts, and Drow Bolts of Stunning, all of which use the stun opcode.
Glabrezus spam PW: Stun all the time, and SCS spellcasters summon them with great frequency, and often use the spell themselves. @Alesia_BH has rightly named it a prominent cause of death in solo no-reload runs. Minor Spell Deflection is a common and cheap way to block it and similar spells (but don't rely on MSD for everything; it won't block Maze or PW: Kill).
I think you also forgot
Monday: GMT 00:00 - 08:00
Tuesday: GMT 00:00 - 08:00
Wednesday: GMT 00:00 - 08:00
Thursday: GMT 00:00 - 08:00
Friday: GMT 00:00 - 08:00
People do need sleep, you know?;)
Congratulations to Valkalyn! Baeloth just proved that he's indeed one of the most powerful mages in Faerun.
Good luck in Amn! Yeah, I think that the shapeshifting component changes too much, it may be a bad thing considering not all the players are used to the SCS mod.
Also, nice to see the idea is quite popular. I didn't expect it, to be honest
General offline times:
Monday: GMT 09:00 - 17:00, 21:00 - 00:00
Tuesday: GMT 09:00 - 17:00, 19:00 - 00:00
Wednesday: GMT 00:00 - 01:00, 09:00 - 17:00
Thursday: GMT 09:00 - 17:00, 23:00 - 00:00
Friday: GMT 00:00 - 01:00, 09:00 - 17:00
Monday: GMT 17:00-21:00
Tuesday: GMT 17:00-19:00
Wednesday: GMT 17:00-24:00
Thursday: GMT 17:00-23:00
Friday: GMT 17:00-24:00
BTW, to understand the time zones better, I use this site: http://www.timezoneconverter.com/cgi-bin/tzc.tzc
How do they fit for others?
Edit: Hymn, 2nd and final update
And Hymn met his end at the hands of a certain Ogre mage named Khark; Sirius, Quill, and Sapphire had all died, so I had Hymn use a charge of the Wand of Summon Monsters, breaking invisibility. Two high rolls later, and Hymn was dead.
The entire fight, lasting over 2 turns at least, had Khark with Haste as a prebuff active throughout the fight, with no secondary activation. This implies that either the Haste prebuff is broken, or that Khark is a level 17 mage, which I doubt. If the haste effect had ever disappeared, I could've successfully kited him, but as it is... Ah well. Things to know for future runs.
1. I played half the game with a tweak that gave me max hit points, explaining how I got so far. That'll be disabled next game.
2. I chose Xzar, Montaron, Khalid, and Jahiera purely for the ooc reason of wanting to see them fight; next time I'll roleplay how my character would want people to join or leave, and try and find some more "roleplay-centric" challenges. If I do make it more about the story for this next run, do leave suggestions on how to format such.
3. I abused my prior knowledge of where the Ring Of Protection was, among a few other trinkets, so I'll have to do some sort of roll to see if the Protagonist comes across such treasures. More immersion, less cheese, summed up.
Keep on fightin' you lot. My second attempt will probably be my last, though damn it's fun.
Valkalyn left Jahiera and Minsc in Irenicus's Dungeon and backstabbed and sneaked her way out.
Once on the surface, she immediately went into the circus tent and recruited Aerie. I threw the +3 chain on Aerie for now to have her act as a temporary tank. They ignored the werewolves and fully focused on the shadows. When they reached Kalah, Aerie cast hold person on him and then both Valkalyn and Aerie cleaned up Kalah's minions. Once the last shadow fell the two fully focused on Kalah himself.
We then found two others in the Copper Coronet after Gaelan Bayle offered to help Valkalyn. We proceeded to sneak into the back rooms, Nalia, Hexxat, and Valkalyn triple backstabbed the beastmaster. He died instantly, and then the three slowly mopped up his toys. They escaped the Copper Coronet without incident, and Lehtinan has yet to figure out who killed the beast master, since the three thieves were quite thorough.
The next place the party went was the Bridge District where we solved the Skinner murders. The assassin at the bottom was especially tough to defeat.
At this point Hexxat threatened to leave if we did not go to Dragomir's tomb. She died halfway through the tomb and we had to raise her in the temple district and return. When we had returned, we got into a tough fight with Dragomir himself. Nalia and Aerie emptied their offensive arsenals on him while Hexxat and Valkalyn forced him to switch his attention between the two thieves. He died to a critical hit from Nalia who was shapeshifted into an ogre. Hexxat(Clara) was killed by the real Hexxat who joined us after we released her and gave her Dragomir's Cloak.
At this point Nalia started to complain about not going to her keep yet. At the gates we met a messenger from Trademeet, and we went there to investigate. On our way to Trademeet, we were ambushed by brigands that had a severely injured person with them. I had not noticed the innocent until the Cloudkill spell was already flying.(I legitimately had forgotten this encounter)
We ran into a monk named Rasaad, after he knocked two monks of his order into the nine hells. We let him join us and then went to De'Arnise Keep. We emptied the trolls out of all but the temple in the cellar The Umber Hulks were lured into the dungeons and the doors closed and bared.(I need some help with trying to figure out how to beat Tor'Gal without any tanks before I attack him, Rasaad and Valkalyn together though do deal staggering amounts of damage, not as much as tanky Kagain though who had 5 THAC0, -8 AC and 25% Magic Resistance at the end of BG1:EE without buffs... I'm missing my Kagain lol)
On our return to the city, we were ambushed by more brigands.
The party then went to check out the job that the Shadow Thieves had for us, to find out that Renal Bloodscalp wanted us to spy on Mae'Var... Mae'Var sent the party out to steal a necklace from the the temple Talos, we were successful. Edwin then sent us out to kill a cowled wizard - I had to dodge the stone golems on the second floor - Nalia and Aerie both managed to get Melf's Acid Arrows in before Rayic Gethras's contingencies fired. Aerie then cast Breach, and Nalia cast fire arrow as Rayic's protections fell around him. Valkalyn then came out of the shadows and backstabbed Rayic and was given a death Ward since Rayic was still standing. Hexxat stabbed Rayic through before he could attempt to kill Valkalyn. We saved the one who spoke against Mae'Var, and then Edwin joined us. Renal sanctioned us to kill Mae'var and the party went through the tunnel near the Sea. We had only been gone for less than half an hour so Mae'Var's voice and the screams of his victim could be heard from the tunnel. Nalia and Edwin flung a web while Aerie cast holy smite on the area twice. Nalia and Edwin filled the room with a cloudkill and a fireball. Edwin finished Mae'Var off with a magic missile. Planned and carried out like true assassins. We then returned to Renal who gave Valkalyn run of Mae'Vars guildhall.
On going to the guildhall, we were told that an Ama from another chapter of Thieves was setting up a meeting in Waukeen's Promenade that she wanted Valkalyn to conduct. Multiple of Valkalyn's underlings stated that they did not know her, but then the prisoner Valkalyn had freed told Valkalyn that he had seen her in Mae'var's prisons multiple times. This last straw made Valaklyn focus on preparing for Ama's betrayal, and she bought a license from the cowled wizards so half of her party could defend themselves in the streets. It only became more telling of an ambush when Ama told Valkalyn's party to conceal all weapons since the contact was a "nervous one". The party gripped their weapons tighter and the three mages began to cast protections on themselves while Ama looked around nervously. Then her thieves were in place and she launched her assault, on a fully prepared party.
Character - Level
Valkalyn - 12
Aerie - 11,11
Nalia - 11,4
Hexxat - 12
Rasaad - 9
Edwin - 10
I think Hexxat and Rasaad are going to come to blows soon since they are both going after Valkalyn. So two questions:
1. Is it possible to attack the Druid Grove and successfully expel the shadow druids without a druid in the party? Or will Cernd wait for you at the grove and challenge Faldorn for you?
2. What are people's strategies for Tor'Gal in De'Arnise Keep? I have never successfully fought Tor'Gal without reloading, never mind without tanks...
I don't know about Tor'Gal he never seemed that hard to me...
Doom+greater malison ensure that you can easily use crowd control spells.
From there it is a piece of cake.
You do have a 5man party (without a STR belt and levels Rasaad is useless until the later stages of the game) but 3 spells per round and 2 backstabbers should be enough. Too bad you only have Aerie which is a multiclass since barkskin can become one hell of a buff for monks.
To make a pseudo tank, take you highest hp mage, buff her (since it is Nalia) and pool your best items; she should be fine. Just keep recasting iron skins.
PS: when Edwin will be Edwina, Rasaad will have his own harem gender bender included.
We ambushed the Djinni in Trademeet and then left for the Druid Grove.
At the Druid Grove we killed all of the trolls, Aerie fell in the first attempt, then we brought her back in Trademeet. We returned again and had Nalia shapeshift into a mustard jelly to tank the trolls while Edwin and Aerie shot fireballs and flamestrikes from wands. We defeated the trolls in the troll mound, and then proceeded North killing even more trolls, until we reached some druids. They were fighting trolls as well, yet were forsure a part of Faldorn's group. So we dropped Cloudkills on them and peppered them with fireballs, but their mage got a fateful spell off and Valkalyn became held as their spearman ran up and repeatedly stabbed Valkalyn. The party could do nothing as Valkalyn disintegrated faster than she would have being the target of a disintegration spell.
Not having free action on your Charname is a big nono since (not sure if SCS) a stunned/held character is usually doomed unless you:
1.Dispell immediately
2.Fire all you crowd control spells (especially if Charname is in danger)
3.Have an invis spell handy (this is very shaky with true sight et all)
4.Have a defensive contigency
1. No dispels were remaining except 1 scroll in a scroll case on Valkalyn
2. Fire your crowd control spells - exactly what I did
3. She literally disintegrated before one spell could get cast. Aerie is casting cure serious wounds, while I had Nalia run forward and try to cast improved invisibility on Valkalyn.
4. Didn't have access to level 6 spells
Escape options are a huge priority for me in no-reload runs. Clerics always have Remove Paralysis and mages always have Invisibility, Invisibility 10' Radius, and/or Teleport Field to get us out of ugly situations. I usually put them in contingencies before fights. Remove Paralysis also cures stun as well as hold and paralysis. Invisibility 10' Radius is an excellent way to get the whole party out of danger, and can be cast without breaking prior invisibility. Plus, it lasts more than one rest period, so you can turn the party invisible before you rest and enter the next challenge already invisible. Teleport Field won't stop all threats, but it does move enemies out of the way, and is sometimes the only way to reach the exit without fighting a losing battle. SCS enemies are very good at blocking you in.
One neat trick with Contingency is to set up an Invisibility 10' Radius spell on hit. You can approach an enemy while invisible, cast Sunfire, and then instantly vanish, preventing any retaliation.
I also keep a supply of Potions of Invisibility, Potions of Freedom, Potions of Clarity, and Potions of Invulnerability, Magic Protection, or Magic Shielding, especially for solo runs. In battle, I time my actions so that I can use those potions immediately after an enemy mage casts a spell, either to block the spell or to escape it. If my solo character has a charm spell coming her way, for instance, she can drink a Potion of Clarity instead of relying on her saves. If I get targeted by a hold spell, I can block it with a Potion of Freedom. But if the enemy has already spent their divination spells, I can instead use a much more common invisibility potion, which will let me wait out the duration of the hold effect in safety.
SCS vampires' domination spells appear to have a 0 casting time, which means our only defense against it before Use Any Item would have been Adjatha the Drinker, which blocks charm and domination. Adjatha is probably a necessity for a solo no-reload thief against SCS vampires, since Potions of Clarity are limited and will run out if you rely on hit and fade tactics. But you get Adjatha from the Warden in the Planar Prison, who can see through invisibility and has a lot of Power Word spells to use against you, so getting that immunity is itself risky.
Having used a blind thief and a Shadowdancer, they seem to be fairly equal. A blind thief gets traps; a Shadowdancer gets missile weapons, better AC and THAC0, and Shadowstep. They can't really accomplish the same things offensively, but both of them are extremely difficult to harm. Even in ToB, only a handful of enemies can see through invisibility. As we saw in Imber's run, Sendai was stumped by Potions of Invisibility.
A Shadowdancer can make a very excellent defensive build. Aside from perpetual invisibility via HiPS, Shadowstep is a great escape option, particularly since it refreshes your stealth timer. The Time Stop effect allows you to slip away not just from enemies, but even incoming spells.
And apparently it lasts during area transitions. I didn't think that was possible. You can leave an area during Shadowstep and it will still be in effect when you enter the next one--unless there's a cutscene, it seems. Plus, if there's a traveling period (a 10-hour journey), you can attack and use spells when you arrive for the remainder of the Shadowstep, though I don't see quite that many ways to make much use of it. And since Shadowstep uses the same opcode as Time Stop, you can chain-cast them to help wait out enemy buffs, like Protection from Magic Weapons, and unlike waiting out buffs using HiPS, it works for the whole party, and against enemies who can see through invisibility.
BTW, there was a talk about ways to make screenshots easier to upload for this kind of threads. Have a look here: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/44455/theres-a-way-to-always-make-screenshots-in-the-jpeg-format-right-off?new=1
Anyways, I already have continued on with another character, though I'm not doing a no reload with her. Just a solo run through BG2:EE which is at 1 reload so far(due to a mistake that would have broken multiple quests). I have been avoiding mages as of yet due to being unable to dispel their protections.
This one:
She's emptied the de'Arnise Hold and used a summoned Efreeti to kill Tor'Gal. The Efreeti cast spells while she kept Tor'Gal's attention. She managed to even slip a backstab in when Tor'Gal focused on the Efreeti. She also manually killed the Umber Hulks due to wearing Aeger's Hide. She's freed the slaves of the slums district, and found out what happened to Montaron. She has yet to even attempt to go after the cowled wizard Edwin wants her to kill though. She is on her way now to finish investigating the Skinner Murders.
Edit: Well that was interesting. A bone golem was at the bottom, well I can tell you that Victasaadi had lots of fun dodging it and the two twisted rune assassins. All but the bone golem fell, and well, the bone golem didn't fall because she couldn't really do much to it so there is still a bone golem at the bottom of Rejiek's tannery. She killed everyone else though.
The thugs opened the door to the Guard barracks and entered from the other side, and went through the door to the area I was in just to resume their assault upon me. O_O talk about single-minded homing thieves. I beat them but seriously, they shouldn't be able to track that well.
Edit: She did pay the shadow thieves though and got her thieves guild up and running.