In long-running semiticgoddess fashion, I've been doing a solo run with a kit I created recently, the Sniper. Basically, it can't backstab with melee weapons, it can't set traps, and it has lower HP and fewer skill points than a regular thief, but it can pseudo-backstab with ranged weapons if it has been invisible for at least 1 second before attacking.
It's a bit stronger than I intended, but it's very fun! The backstabs aren't usually as powerful as you'd see from a vanilla thief, but it's much easier to land them at range, which makes them very efficient at dealing combat damage. They also get some other bonuses to ranged attacks, which make kiting a lot faster. The lack of traps, though, has made some fights a lot trickier than they could have been. Stoneskin is a big obstacle, and groups of enemies are almost always too much for us.
We've had a few close calls, largely due to our poor AC and HP, but we just made it past Shadows of Amn! The kit is vicious at high levels; it gets bonuses to critical hit rolls as well as to hit and damage rolls, on top of the pseudo-backstab. We just landed our strongest backstab yet, a 240-damage crime against mathematics that killed the Slayer almost instantly--after, of course, we baited and waited out its PFMW spells and dispelled its Stoneskins, which took many rounds.
I think I enjoy solo runs a bit more than party runs. They seem to move faster and get access to my favorite toys sooner. But they can be really stressful; the margin for error is even more narrow than normal.
Thank you for your interest! I have two active runs right now: a fast tactical run with a kensai and a super-slow narrative run with Jan Jansen's niece, Anne Jansen. The AJ run isn't suited for this thread, but the kensai run would fit right in.
I have a backlog of posts, atm, covering the Planar Prison through the Underdark. Once I get a handle on the backlog I'll consider cross posting.
As for the difficulty of a kensai solo, it's fine in BG1, obviously, and it's not terrible in SoA, especially if you embrace the new Pixie Prick and Victor. In SoA a kensai's main concern is the dearth of mage fighting tools, intersected with the inability to take elemental resistances through the armor, helm and shield slots. Pixie Prick and the Victor help mitigating those concerns.
In ToB the elemental resistance issue will become a major problem. It'll be an issue in WK, too, especially on level 3. If she makes it to the throne, her inability to use the Reflex will pose a challenge. My kensai has an excellent chance of making it to ToB, having already escaped the Underdark, but she'll be 50/50 at best in ToB. We'll see how it goes!
The Sniper I was running died at Melissan! Though I might reload, since it was due to a game-ending bug.
It was the circle trap bug. Melissan teleported on top of us, we couldn't move, and the only way out was to use the Ascension teleport ability. So we did!
Then Melissan did it again, and we had no teleport ability to save us. And our aura was fogged. So, we used our special kit ability to teleport.
But it wasn't fast enough. We escaped as the final blow struck.
I'm not sure I'll give up the run or just reload and use CTRL-J to teleport next to Melissan if it happens again, replicating a bug-free fight. But... I kinda don't want to kite down the Five again. That took forever.
The death was avoidable, at least temporarily. If I had known the bug would have happened twice, then I could have used a PFMW scroll in advance of Time Stop ending, but then I'd burn another kit ability teleport to escape, and I'd be at the mercy of the bug if it ever happened again--which seems likely, given that our only viable strategy with a Sniper is kiting.
Whether I reload or not, it's still really frustrating. We were on track for a clean win up until the bug happened, and even then it had to happen twice to kill the Sniper.
Melissan opened with True Sight instead of Time Stop because I had cast Mislead, and I spent a little bit kiting as a result, only to fail to see it when Melissan really did cast Time Stop. It was entirely foreseeable this time--I just let my attention falter because the previous attempt had gone so well.
Single-classed thieves have it pretty rough against Abazigal and Melissan. You need Oil of Speed on top of Boots of Speed to outrun every enemy, and the former is eminently dispellable, since SI: Abjuration scrolls are limited. Kiting is viable, but it is SO very time-consuming. Even with a Sniper's bonuses to ranged attacks, it takes a very long time to kill anything.
A dwarf would be a superior pick from a powergaming perspective, but I have trouble saying no to playing a gnome.
The Sniper kit is all about ranged backstabs. It can't set traps or backstab with melee weapons, but it gets a bonus to missile damage while it's invisible, which scales with level, as well as flat bonuses to hit and damage with ranged weapons. It only gets as much HP per level as a mage, so it's extra vulnerable when it gets caught in melee range.
Most of the gameplay was standard solo thief fare, with aggressive use of Algernon's Cloak and stealth to break or bypass the fights we weren't strong enough to take head-on. For mages, we relied heavily on the Ring of Energy; for fighters, we kited.
Early on, the ranged backstabs were pretty lousy, only dealing an extra 50% damage. But the kit grows over time, and eventually it can land very solid backstabs from a safe distance. Here's one of our best BG1 backstabs:
I was especially afraid of enemy backstabbers due to Moth Sibula's poor HP, so I resorted to drastic measures against enemies. Notably, I recruited a very brave cook from the Iron Throne headquarters to help us sniff out Shennara and Kaalos.
I failed to use Algernon's Cloak and the Nymph Cloak to slow down the Ducal Palace doppelgangers' transformations, and as a result we ended up with a VERY close fight. No traps means no quick kills, and no tanking ability or spells means no summons, no blockers, and no crowd control. All we had is our arrows, and they weren't enough to save poor Belt.
Sarevok was an easy fight, albeit micro-heavy, thanks to our extra bonuses with Arrows of Detonation. But due to a bug that I didn't fix until I was already in BG2, the pseudo-backstab would often fail to trigger. Sometimes we'd land the backstab; other times we'd just do normal damage. Sarevok got a generous heap of both.
Siege of Dragonspear was going well until I discovered a new bug: apparently Morentherene can hear if a bugbear outside the cave casts a spell!
We were all ready to dagger the dragon, but entering the cave before the bugbear's divination spell went off apparently was our undoing, and we had to run past the dragon instead.
Mediocre preparation nearly got us killed at Bridgefort. Between Arrows of Dispelling and the Ring of Energy, the mage was not a big problem, but failing to stack Shield Amulet charges meant we took a LOT of damage from the archers in the meantime.
We actually had to summon the little golem to distract the enemies for us to scrape through the fight.
Arrows of Detonation worked wonders against the coalition camp invasion, but using them too quickly in Avernus turned Thrix hostile and got a bunch of demons turned against us. Luckily I always hoard plenty to spare, and bombed our way to Belhifet. Caelar did most of the work, since we spammed Greater Restoration scrolls on her, but Moth Sibula got the last hit in.
In Chateau Irenicus, I deployed a trick I've never really explored before: if you right-click on a container like a bookcase, something you can walk behind, and get your character's circle on top of the container's polygon, you can loot the container without breaking invisibility by picking up the items from the inventory screen.
Not all containers can be looted like this, but it's a great way to avoid breaking invisibility for characters who can't cast Sanctuary.
Chateau Irenicus was pretty rough. With limited access to ammo and narrow spaces, we couldn't really kite the enemies much, and again, we had no traps to pave the way. We had to use the Staff Spear and hit-and-fade tactics against the otyugh, and since I didn't trust myself not to die to the golems, I used the Sniper's Dimension Door ability to hop over the trigger that alerts them.
We didn't see many uses for Dimension Door, since I hate clouding my aura, but then I discovered that it failed to break invisibility when I used it to escape some vampire-summoned Giant Rats (I copied the vanilla spell when making the kit). Dimension Door with invisibility is probably very exploitable, though I never used it much.
Early SoA was VERY heavy on micromanagement, as I was determined not to underestimate anything. I think early SoA is the ideal time to burn resources, especially for a solo character; hoarding potions gets less and less important as you gain levels. Burning a Potion of Freedom on the Tanar'ri (Death Gaze!) in the Planar Sphere was an excellent example.
We struggled to deal with Tolgerias, who summoned demons who could see through our invisibility. We even had to flee the area to rest and return, a tactic I've resisted using for many years. We managed to deal a bit of damage, and ultimately Tolgerias' own demons helped us out.
A lot of situations are just beyond the Sniper before epic levels. We never finished the De'Arnise Hold quest, never dared enter the Planar Prison, and didn't try to finish the Windspear Hills or the Unseeing Eye until Chapter 6. We never killed Ilyich, either.
I failed to apply the same reasoning to the Clay Golems in the Spellhold labyrinth, however, and nearly lost the run there! We had zero ability to handle Clay Golems, and I foolishly thought I could teleport out of the chamber before the door locked.
We had to bust out a Limited Wish scroll just to cast Time Stop. That was the only way we could deal enough damage to bring down the golems.
Even that wasn't enough. We had to cast Fire Shield via the Staff of Fire and then tank out the rest of the fight with a PFMW scroll.
All that risk and effort just to get me the last few Mithril Tokens and purchase the Boots of the North, which I never once equipped in the entire run. And the Gesen Bow String, which I never even forged.
One of the key tools in our arsenal was Astral Shot, which makes your next attack within 6 seconds a guaranteed critical hit that strikes as a +6 weapon and deals 10d10 magic damage with a save for half. This was a huge deal, both for the reliability of the attack and the enchantment bonus. For enemies like Balors, who spam Stoneskin but are otherwise immune to Arrows of Dispelling, Astral Shot was our only safe way of bringing them down.
The Underdark didn't go so well after that. Apparently Solaufein and Phaere really do need your help to survive the Umber Hulks. Running off to kite the mind flayers is not a safe bet.
On the plus side, it gave me an excuse to kill Phaere, which I've never done before.
Back in Athkatla, we finally tackled the circus quest. While we were out shopping, Yoshimo decided to ambush us at the Copper Coronet.
He was immortal, it turns out, so we had to flee.
Since the Staff of the Magi feels mandatory for a solo thief in ToB (Sendai is too much otherwise), we had to fight the Twisted Rune. It went very cleanly: we used summons to bait out Layenne's starting invisibility, then used Detect Illusions to fully reveal her and Astral Shot to debuff her. After that, a single shot put her down.
Kangaxx took a lot of Breach scrolls to bring down, but it was very satisfying to hit a demilich for 17 missile damage.
Fun fact: if you accidentally try to steal from a merchant before drinking your Potions of Master Thievery, then try to charm him to talk to him again, all it will do is cost you another two points of reputation.
Firkraag nearly killed us when I mishandled the kiting, but it was a lot of fun to backstab a dragon.
One of the Sniper HLAs lets you land vorpal strikes on critical hits, which got us past the Adamantite Golems in the endgame and also killed a Balor for us in Hell. After spending who knows how many rounds summoning elementals with the Staff of Fire to hassle the Slayer, we landed an Arrow of Dispelling and then killed the Slayer in one shot, after several turns of preparation.
When ranged attacks weren't viable, we deployed Use Any Item. The Tyrant Golems fell to INT drain under Time Stop, and many other enemies died to the Wand of Cloudkill.
The dragons of ToB required a lot of Arrows of Dispelling, both to remove Stoneskins and their haste, without which we couldn't outrun them. It also took a lot of expendables. Check out what happens when you fail to keep Stoneskin active against Tamah:
Abazigal was horrific. One of the only reasons we survived the long process was probably a very subtle decision: I deliberately left most of the smaller enemies alive, because their presence slows down the dragons more than it slows down you. That's what the dragons get for having such big circles.
Ogremoch brought us down to 22 HP before we had to flee the fight. Trying to dispel his Stoneskins and then land a kill was just not workable; he was too sturdy for us. We ended up resorting to INT drain.
By the way, if you ever try to run a solo Sniper, watch out for enemy clerics: some of them buff with Physical Mirror, and landing a 200-damage critical hit backstab on an enemy with Physical Mirror WILL instantly kill you. A Bounty Hunter's special traps can also be bounced by Physical Mirror, which is equally fatal for a solo Bounty Hunter.
At the Throne, the Mariliths gave us a lot of trouble until I remembered we had Breach scrolls. Sendai managed to cast Dispel Magic on us despite us hitting her with a Protection from Magic scroll, but somehow it failed to remove any of our defenses, even the easy-to-dispel potion buffs.
Right before we died (the second death, the one without a bug), we landed the highest damage backstab in the entire run.
That was it!
This run was a LOT of fun, despite the failure at Melissan. Backstabs are fun, and being able to land them at range means you get to enjoy backstabbing far more often than otherwise, even though they start out very weak.
It's a strong kit. It has some critical weaknesses, like its lower HP (the margin for error is very low) and lack of traps to break key encounters like the Ducal Palace, but it's an excellent archer that can land early kills. It plays just like I wanted it to.
Siege of Dragonspear was going well until I discovered a new bug: apparently Morentherene can hear if a bugbear outside the cave casts a spell!
My guess on that waking dragon is that it's this block in the area script for the dragon cave:
IF
Global("BD_GREEN_DRAGON_AWAKE","GLOBAL",0)
OR(3)
SpellCast([GOODCUTOFF],0)
SpellCastPriest([GOODCUTOFF],0)
SpellCastInnate([GOODCUTOFF],0)
THEN
RESPONSE #100
SetGlobal("BD_GREEN_DRAGON_AWAKE","GLOBAL",1)
END
Never mind that the bugbear's an enemy and isn't even in the same area. The spell counts, somehow. Definitely a bug, though.
Your kit's ranged sneak attacks apparently ignore normal backstab immunity. Interesting choice there. And it doesn't matter if they see you, so long as you're invisible. Dragons both see through invisibility and have immunity to backstabs, for example. But come on - everyone knows you can take down a dragon with a good hit to their voonerables!
@jmerry: They do ignore backstab immunity. I don't know how to do it otherwise, actually. I implemented the pseudo-backstab by borrowing a spell from the Artisan Kitpack (the on-invisible Assassin effect) and making the game check every 1 second to see if the Sniper is invisible. If it is, it gets a percentile bonus to missile damage for a few seconds, and that percentile bonus is the multiplier.
Fun fact: the reason why the pseudo-backstab fails to trigger sometimes is because on rare occasions the game will check to see if you're invisible while the projectile is in midair, after you broke invisibility but before you deal any damage. Point-blank shots minimize the chance.
I think I'm done with running Snipers for now, but I'm really glad I made the attempt. It was fun. I just don't know what my next run will be.
Backstab immunity is stat #175, so it is at least possible to test against it with a SPLPROT check. Except for barbarians, who get the immunity hardcoded to their kit ID but don't necessarily have the stat set. So that's a composite check now, and the kit check can't be done through SPLPROT...
And of course, all that would require massaging things into a form that makes checking the victim viable in the first place.
Now running Tempua the Good, a dwarven cleric of Tempus.
The innate Holy Power spell is great for opening chests, though it is not powerful enough to open the chest in Candlekeep which contains a gem worth 1000 gp.
Opening one chest cost me all my gold, anf the one after that cost me a severe whipping.
Killing Carbos resulted in me gaining a cloak which I found to be ineffectual.
After breaking open one chest I discovered that I needed to cast sanctuary in order to avoid being caught.
Shank was the next to fall.
At the FAI I used sanctuary to avoid being caught after aquiring a potion.
I used sanctuary to avoid being hurt when attacked by Tarnesh.
I levelled up after being attacked in the Beregost.
I just lost another run early in BG1. Turns out clerics can kill you instantly even if you have the Greenstone Amulet active if you have IWD spells installed in SCS. My Mystic Fire paladin just got hit with Cause Disease, which drains CON by 5-20 points. It's not actually a 5d4, contrary to the description; there's an equal chance of getting hit for 20 points as there is for 10 points. That means that even for folks with 18 Strength, Cause Disease has a 15% kill chance on a failed save.
Corey's Avatar Run - Lilacor Quest, Umar Hills
All five avatars still alive
My Avatars are still kicking. I was about to go Windspear hills and then realized Umar Hills was still not done. I prefer to do that early so worked on that. Surprisingly the entire party saved vs the trap mephit's hold effect - not complaining. With the Shield of Harmony on Corey, the Umber Hulks were no problem. Cowled Wizard in the area was happy for his mephit blood, though we had to kill his crazed golem.
At this point was about to go to the old temple, but realized I hadn't even yet obtained Azuredge or Lilacor. So went back Copper Coronet and bought the nice axe which unfortunately Grond0 can't use (being evil and all). So Corey will use, despite no axe skill. With summons, the Lilacor quest was very straightforward. I left most of the kobolds by the staff alone, and let the kobolds kill their buddy - you get this option if you try to bribe him into giving you his staff. You get the gold right back when he dies so it's a good deal.
I then realized I still hadn't got the illithium as I want to forge the IMoD at some point. So battled Neb, though party took huge damage, which was surprisingly considering Corey had his true sight running.
There were a huge amount of ambushes this session with the generic slavers, a lot of resting to heal up. We eventually returned to the old temple area - now we are ready! Will tackle that next session.
My Mystic Fire paladin just got hit with Cause Disease, which drains CON by 5-20 points. It's not actually a 5d4, contrary to the description; there's an equal chance of getting hit for 20 points as there is for 10 points. That means that even for folks with 18 Strength, Cause Disease has a 15% kill chance on a failed save.
Ouch, that's a nasty spell. Level 3, capable of instant kills on almost anyone. At least it's restricted to melee-range targeting, and it takes basically a full round to cast. (Slight correction: it's STR drain)
As implemented, 12-15 drain each have a 10% chance, while 5-11 and 16-20 each have a 5% chance. What would an honest 5d4 actually look like, shoehorned into the percentage framework that the game has to use?
These numbers are based on rounding the cumulative probabilities to the nearest percent.
Running that hypothetical fairer table based on actual 5d4 probabilities, I'd make it a 1% chance each of 18 or 19 points of strength drain, and no chance at all of 20. Still a 2% death chance for your 18 STR paladin on a failed save, but that's a lot less scary than a 15% chance.
@jmerry: It's possible to implement it fully using the percentile system, I think. You'd just need to create a spell that drains 1-4 points of Strength with a 25% chance of each value, and then have Cause Disease cast that spell five times. That way, the game would effectively roll a d4, five times in a row.
I helped Mellicamp, calmed down Marl, and took a tome to Firebead, after which I proceeded to Nashkel, picking up the Colquetle amulet on the way. I found some ankheg armour and returned to Beregost after chatting to Noober. By then I had reached level 3 and became more proficient in using two-handed weapons.
Upon retutning to Beregost I returned the Colquetle amulet, went to High Hedge for a Freedom of Action Potion which enabled me to take on Bassilus in safety. I then killed the ogre with the belt fetish.
Went to the FAI where I helped Joia and killed Tarnesh. I upgraded a belt for 10,000 gp and bought a cloak and bracers. Now poor again!
Headed north and killed all the ankheg that i could find. Now at level 6. Put the extra * in bows.
Now have ** in bows, large swords and two handed weapons.
Dorn's quest was finished after which I bade him farewell.
I then dealt with Teyngan and company as well as some half ogres.
Recharging my necklace of missiles left me poor!
After picking up Khaled and Jaheira, I left them in Nashkel, Khaled being far too much of a goody-goody for my liking!
At that point I decided that acquiring a party would be in my best interest as my lack of magical skills was becoming a problem.
I therefore joined up with Tenya who helped me against some sirines before we helped Charlestonian. Our reputation is now 20, but perhaps that will have to drop if I join up with evil NPCs.
As it happened our reputation did NOT drop as the NPCs that joined were Alora, Dynaheir and Xan, all of whom appear to be happy with our current reputation.
Mulahey is dead and we are currently resting in Beregost.
Trio 51 - Escaping Spellhold, Sahaugin City, Underdark
Corecleric XX - halfling priest of Lothander, protagonist (Corey_Russell)
Mirazi - human mage (Grond0)
Betson - human dark moon monk (Gate70)
So the first task was convincing Lonk to let us free the prisoners. To make sure that worked, Corecleric used the ring of human influence (which did work). We did a few buffs in prep for our encounter with Irenicus, resist fear, death ward for all characters and chaotic commands on Corecleric to make sure he doesn't get stunned.
The battle with Irenicus was a bit anti-climatic. Corecleric's true seeing was a big problem for Irenicus - having a particular monk beat on him wasn't helping either. And Mirazi's death spells were a big problem for the general assassins. Success!
So ended up trying to go with Saemon. We had to rest quite a bit to try to get the bay horn. We belatedly realized we didn't free Ginia and Ason because Ason pick-pocketed Corecleric for 10 gold. So Betson reported to Ginia after Corecleric talked to the smuggler. While on his way back Betson ran into a large group of slavers - his party members came to his rescue. He took some damage, but he held together. Of course sanctuary makes it easy to get the bay horn.
We finally make it to the Sahuagin City. The first test was an Ettin fighting us - a finger of death from Corecleric ended his meager resistance. The Sahuagin City was cleared pretty easily by the party. Betson with his considerable melee power, Mirazi with her many death spells and Corecleric with his powerful aerial servants. A protection from undead spell was given to Betson so he could easily solo a group of undead. We battled to the prince and wiped out the prince so that Betson could get the nice bracers that greatly pump his fist power. We report our success to the king and finally make it to the Underdark.
Our first challenge was to deal with three illithids. Corecleric was asking if Mirazi could so the illithids, but she wasn't very confident on that. Betson thought he was awesome but got stunned. Luckily some skeleton warriors from Corecleric and MIrazi spells were able to keep Betson alive.
Our next challenge was to wipe out a large amount of elementals. This was straight-forward for the party. Our next action was to free the mage with a freedom scroll. We then needed to get the gnome city to get his book. Some spores were in a our way but both Betson and Corecleric has poison immunity (ring of Gaxx) so that was easy.
We then needed to deal with a powerful demon. However, it was anti-climatic as it seemed Betson got a successful quivering palm off.
We decided to deal with the Kua-Toa lair. Lots of Mirazi spells and Corecleric summons, supplemented by Betson melee made very good progress here. Death ward was used to protect the party against the demon knights. But Corecleric forgot to equip his Mace of Disruption so he got level drained - doh! Betson got level drained as well, but he has no protection from that. Victory was won all the same. Most of the equipment was useless but the strength belt increases Betson's melee power even more. Corecleric is using the hill giant belt, so his melee power is ok (though still slow at his 1 APR).
Next up was the Beholder's Lair. Corecleric used shield of Balduran and Betson used cloak of mirroring. Most of the beholders were cleared out fairly easily. The illithids refused to die to Mirazi's spells, so melee/ranged power was still necessary to finish them off. There was a fight with a large numbers of beholders and gauths. An Elder Orb tried to cast imprisonment. As a precaution, Corecleric activated slayer form to be immune to imprisonment. Once the beholder died, Corecleric went back to his normal self. Rest of lair cleared out without further incident.
Now for the real challenge, the illithid lair. Generally, Coercleric who has automatic saves vs stun, puts up very high AC (-16) and gulped many genius potions, he goes forward as a distraction for the enemies and his party contributes with ranged power. Occasionally Mirazi used death spells to get rid of the umber hulks. Corecleric tanked quite well in this area. His party members managed to avoid dying.
Strangely, despite giving back the Silver Sword, the githyanki still demanded combat and died. Possibly this happened because of Corecleric's poor Charisma. After selling and resting, it would appear we were out of time and saved our session here.
Corey's Avatar Run - Old Temple, Shadow Dragon
All Avatars still alive
The party battled their way through the old temple. Many undead had to be churned through. The party took a good amount of damage but with 3 healers in the group and a steady supply of heal potions, we were able to keep together. The party also usually had a good number of summons as distractions. We were able to make it all the way to the dragon. With 3 casters there was no way we were going to chicken out of a fight.
The fight lasted a good while and many characters had to run for their lives and heal. Grim Face in particular got to a sliver of life. While all this was going on, the party was doing things like blind, lower magic resist, doom, enfeeblement. Something must have took hold as near the end the dragon just stood there and took a beating. Success! This was our greatest success yet!
The entire party was protected by death ward then we showed ourselves. The Shade Lord and his minions could do nothing but die. On our way back to report our success to the Mayor we had to kill a certain ranger to open a certain sphere...we told his buddies "Valygar who?" and incredibly they believed us all the while we are carrying Valygar's body...a bit gullible these rangers. We sold our junk reported our success and saved our progress.
Well I had a rough session here. First we tried to go to Windspear hills, but Alesia got killed (though not chunked) by the paladins. Then we tried to open the planar sphere but got hit by what I think is the very last vampire ambush - the 3 vampires. Corey was safe since he has the AoP, but Grond0 with his poor barbarian AC was not so fortunate - Grond0 was level drained to nothing and CHUNKED! Poor Grond0...
But the quest must go on. We also belatedly realized we still don't have a magic license. Now that we lost Grond0, we surely need that. We also go the shield of Balduran. We then finished up clearing the sewers. We will try the Unseeing Eye next session.
I'm in ToB with a solo illusionist/thief and I'm wondering if I can actually bring down Melissan. We just got done with Abazigal, and while we survived, I feel like it might have gone differently if Abazigal had not spent multiple rounds outside of combat, too far south to attack us while we killed Tamah, and I think Abazigal's magic attacks might have burned through our Spell Immunity spells and gotten us killed if it weren't for some weird behavior in which some enemy magic attacks seem to fail to dispel our buffs.
More importantly, I apparently forgot to purchase the Shield of Reflection in SoA, which means our only defense against Illasera is PFMW, a finite resource. It also means kiting Melissan won't be truly safe, since we can't really stay out of range indefinitely.
I think I might have a chance if I open with PFMW, spam scrolls of Time Stop and Protection from Magic while Balthazar attacks the Five, and run to the west where Illasera can't see us. After enough Time Stop scrolls, we should be able to at least kill Illasera and wound the others, at which point we start kiting. But Melissan has 500 HP, we have horrible APR and THAC0, and there's going to be lots of summoned demons to get in the way. Eventually, Balthazar will die.
Sure, we can keep running, but SI: Abjuration runs out after 20 rounds, and when it goes away, our haste and saving throw buffs go away, too. Can I actually end the fight before we just run out of spell slots and get ground down?
I was hoping to land a quick kill on Melissan by using Improved Alacrity+Power Word, Blind+Spike Traps, but I've only got 8 of them. Melissan has 50% magic damage resistance, so if we burn all of our Spike Traps on her, that's only 280 damage, barely over half of her maximum HP.
The illusionist/thief has been crushing it everywhere else, but Melissan is just a different kind of fight.
@Grond0 defeated Melissan with a solo Wild Mage. Granted, that wasn't Ascension but I wonder if his tactics might work here. I think one of his key combos was sequencer/skull traps then somehow he got free rests - wish scrolls maybe? not sure if his tactics work in the context of Ascension - hopefully he'll see your question and comment.
The party did well in dealing with the Unseeing Eye quest. A protection from undead scroll helped with the undead. The DEX gauntlets went to Enuhal since he is helping to off-tank with Grond0's absence. The quest went well.
We then went into Watcher's Keep. While we did get the dreaded vampiric wraiths, however with haste and summons and spells, we did win. The rest of the level 1 was cleared other than statues. The crimson dart went to Alesia_BH. The ammo belt went to her as well. The Foebane was a needed upgrade for Corey as now he has a good 1-hand melee weapon. If you pick up the book and don't don't put everything in it, you only need to fight the 2 closest statues. Alesia_BH did a lot of snares. Success.
Woops forgot to mention we did the planar prison. I think Alesia_BH died but our RoR put her back together. It went pretty smooth, a lot of summons helped for the harder fights. Haste boots to Corey.
Armor is now good for the party, full plate for Corey, Ankheg armor for Enuhal, AC 3 bracers for Grim Face and Robe of Vecna for Alesia_BH. Enuhal has a nice AC of -7, he's a helpful off-tank and he can even do some damage with the Belm he uses.
Ran into a problem in Windspear Hills though. Somehow an orc got into the cabin and when we attacked that orc who was attacking us the quest giver (the father who needs his daughter rescued) WENT HOSTILE! Yikes! We can't kill him we will lose Reputation so ran. So can't do the paladin stronghold now though wasn't planning to do it. Can't get the experience for rescuing the daughter either. This never happened before.
M/Ts are well suited to the Ascension Melissan fight, in my opinion. IIRC, with my M/T, Alyssa, I opened with Time Stop ->Mislead, pre-buffed with IH and a Black Blade of Disaster. She dealt heavy damage, and finished one of the five. I don't recall which, but it was probably Sendai, simply because I don't allow offensive use of pro magic. In your case I'd pick Illasera.
Leaving the Reflex behind is a serious hardship, though. That changes the fight. Illasera is a concern, of course, but if you're playing on insane I'd be fretting about the pair of fallen solars that Mel summons. You have an advantage, since you're playing with the bugged versions that can't cast Heal at will, but still: I don't envy you. Hopefully Balthazar with still be around by that point, and Melissan will Time Stop them for you. If you can't nix them early in a time stop, I imagine they'll be a nuisance- at best a drain on ProMWs and possibly worse. I agree that finishing Mel quickly enough will be a concern, too- especially if you use ProMWs elsewhere.
It'll be a tough fight. I image it's one that can be perfected with practice, but is hard to win as a one off. Good luck!
Best,
A.
NW: Blinding yourself and spamming Spike Traps or Time Traps under IA is an option for the fallen solars, ofc. I can't comment on that from experience, though, since I don't allow my thieves to blind themselves, or take advantage of blindness to facilitate trapping. In fact my bounty hunter's personal item, Quine's Hood, typically gets a Cespenar upgrade to grant blindness immunity just so that I don't accidentally do it.
@Corey_Russell Glad to see your Avatars making progress! Sorry to hear about Grond0, and Garren Windspear.
As for Garren, I, too, have never heard of him going hostile, and especially not in that way. It's non-sensical, for sure. If you're 100% certain you didn't injure him, his child or Jum in the encounter it arguably qualifies for a remedy via the console.
Btw, I never knew that the gender of Garren's child changes based on the gender of the PC. I thought it was always a male named Taar. Weird decision on BioWare's part, imo.
@Corey_Russell Glad to see your Avatars making progress! Sorry to hear about Grond0, and Garren Windspear.
As for Garren, I, too, have never heard of him going hostile, and especially not in that way. It's non-sensical, for sure. If you're 100% certain you didn't injure him, his child or Jum in the encounter it arguably qualifies for a remedy via the console.
Btw, I never knew that the gender of Garren's child changes based on the gender of the PC. I thought it was always a male named Taar. Weird decision on BioWare's part, imo.
Similarly the gender of potential lovers changes according to the gender of the PC in the romantic encounters mod.
Just started a halfling swashbuckler who barely survived Candlekeep due to tweaks that I had made. It is well that I gave her points in lockpicking. The stone upstairs enabled the buying of a katana and a wakizashi which in turn helped in the defeat of the improved Mendas. Three potions of healing were needed to survive.
A gnomish fighter illusionist did not survive that encounter despite playing it well. A one-shot death. Couldn't even attempt to use a healing potion!
I subsequently had a re-run and the PC wiped out Mendas with one blow. Perhaps I haven't boosted the assassins too much after all.
@Corey_Russell Glad to see your Avatars making progress! Sorry to hear about Grond0, and Garren Windspear.
As for Garren, I, too, have never heard of him going hostile, and especially not in that way. It's non-sensical, for sure. If you're 100% certain you didn't injure him, his child or Jum in the encounter it arguably qualifies for a remedy via the console.
Btw, I never knew that the gender of Garren's child changes based on the gender of the PC. I thought it was always a male named Taar. Weird decision on BioWare's part, imo.
The reason the gender changes is the daughter says I (a paladin) am almost perfect - do I have a betrothed? And when I say no, she says I can fight in her name.
As for Garren, I don't see that as a bug. By that point, the orc had been in his house for quite a while, perhaps Garren befriended him? Also too, Garren lives in the area, so maybe he knew the orc by name. So by Garren's viewpoint I attacked his friend and neighbor and went hostile. I'm not going to worry about it. With only 4 party members I should be getting quite a bit of experience and probably will reach the ToB level cap, so it's no big deal in this case. It does mean, however, I can't regain my paladinhood if I were to become fallen (returning to Garren restores your paladin abilities if you were fallen before that).
Comments
In long-running semiticgoddess fashion, I've been doing a solo run with a kit I created recently, the Sniper. Basically, it can't backstab with melee weapons, it can't set traps, and it has lower HP and fewer skill points than a regular thief, but it can pseudo-backstab with ranged weapons if it has been invisible for at least 1 second before attacking.
It's a bit stronger than I intended, but it's very fun! The backstabs aren't usually as powerful as you'd see from a vanilla thief, but it's much easier to land them at range, which makes them very efficient at dealing combat damage. They also get some other bonuses to ranged attacks, which make kiting a lot faster. The lack of traps, though, has made some fights a lot trickier than they could have been. Stoneskin is a big obstacle, and groups of enemies are almost always too much for us.
We've had a few close calls, largely due to our poor AC and HP, but we just made it past Shadows of Amn! The kit is vicious at high levels; it gets bonuses to critical hit rolls as well as to hit and damage rolls, on top of the pseudo-backstab. We just landed our strongest backstab yet, a 240-damage crime against mathematics that killed the Slayer almost instantly--after, of course, we baited and waited out its PFMW spells and dispelled its Stoneskins, which took many rounds.
I think I enjoy solo runs a bit more than party runs. They seem to move faster and get access to my favorite toys sooner. But they can be really stressful; the margin for error is even more narrow than normal.
I have a backlog of posts, atm, covering the Planar Prison through the Underdark. Once I get a handle on the backlog I'll consider cross posting.
As for the difficulty of a kensai solo, it's fine in BG1, obviously, and it's not terrible in SoA, especially if you embrace the new Pixie Prick and Victor. In SoA a kensai's main concern is the dearth of mage fighting tools, intersected with the inability to take elemental resistances through the armor, helm and shield slots. Pixie Prick and the Victor help mitigating those concerns.
In ToB the elemental resistance issue will become a major problem. It'll be an issue in WK, too, especially on level 3. If she makes it to the throne, her inability to use the Reflex will pose a challenge. My kensai has an excellent chance of making it to ToB, having already escaped the Underdark, but she'll be 50/50 at best in ToB. We'll see how it goes!
Best wishes to all the active challengers!
A.
It was the circle trap bug. Melissan teleported on top of us, we couldn't move, and the only way out was to use the Ascension teleport ability. So we did!
Then Melissan did it again, and we had no teleport ability to save us. And our aura was fogged. So, we used our special kit ability to teleport.
But it wasn't fast enough. We escaped as the final blow struck.
The death was avoidable, at least temporarily. If I had known the bug would have happened twice, then I could have used a PFMW scroll in advance of Time Stop ending, but then I'd burn another kit ability teleport to escape, and I'd be at the mercy of the bug if it ever happened again--which seems likely, given that our only viable strategy with a Sniper is kiting.
Whether I reload or not, it's still really frustrating. We were on track for a clean win up until the bug happened, and even then it had to happen twice to kill the Sniper.
Melissan opened with True Sight instead of Time Stop because I had cast Mislead, and I spent a little bit kiting as a result, only to fail to see it when Melissan really did cast Time Stop. It was entirely foreseeable this time--I just let my attention falter because the previous attempt had gone so well.
Single-classed thieves have it pretty rough against Abazigal and Melissan. You need Oil of Speed on top of Boots of Speed to outrun every enemy, and the former is eminently dispellable, since SI: Abjuration scrolls are limited. Kiting is viable, but it is SO very time-consuming. Even with a Sniper's bonuses to ranged attacks, it takes a very long time to kill anything.
First, our Sniper, Moth Sibula!
The Sniper kit is all about ranged backstabs. It can't set traps or backstab with melee weapons, but it gets a bonus to missile damage while it's invisible, which scales with level, as well as flat bonuses to hit and damage with ranged weapons. It only gets as much HP per level as a mage, so it's extra vulnerable when it gets caught in melee range.
Most of the gameplay was standard solo thief fare, with aggressive use of Algernon's Cloak and stealth to break or bypass the fights we weren't strong enough to take head-on. For mages, we relied heavily on the Ring of Energy; for fighters, we kited.
Early on, the ranged backstabs were pretty lousy, only dealing an extra 50% damage. But the kit grows over time, and eventually it can land very solid backstabs from a safe distance. Here's one of our best BG1 backstabs:
Mediocre preparation nearly got us killed at Bridgefort. Between Arrows of Dispelling and the Ring of Energy, the mage was not a big problem, but failing to stack Shield Amulet charges meant we took a LOT of damage from the archers in the meantime.
Arrows of Detonation worked wonders against the coalition camp invasion, but using them too quickly in Avernus turned Thrix hostile and got a bunch of demons turned against us. Luckily I always hoard plenty to spare, and bombed our way to Belhifet. Caelar did most of the work, since we spammed Greater Restoration scrolls on her, but Moth Sibula got the last hit in.
Chateau Irenicus was pretty rough. With limited access to ammo and narrow spaces, we couldn't really kite the enemies much, and again, we had no traps to pave the way. We had to use the Staff Spear and hit-and-fade tactics against the otyugh, and since I didn't trust myself not to die to the golems, I used the Sniper's Dimension Door ability to hop over the trigger that alerts them.
Early SoA was VERY heavy on micromanagement, as I was determined not to underestimate anything. I think early SoA is the ideal time to burn resources, especially for a solo character; hoarding potions gets less and less important as you gain levels. Burning a Potion of Freedom on the Tanar'ri (Death Gaze!) in the Planar Sphere was an excellent example.
We struggled to deal with Tolgerias, who summoned demons who could see through our invisibility. We even had to flee the area to rest and return, a tactic I've resisted using for many years. We managed to deal a bit of damage, and ultimately Tolgerias' own demons helped us out.
I failed to apply the same reasoning to the Clay Golems in the Spellhold labyrinth, however, and nearly lost the run there! We had zero ability to handle Clay Golems, and I foolishly thought I could teleport out of the chamber before the door locked.
We had to bust out a Limited Wish scroll just to cast Time Stop. That was the only way we could deal enough damage to bring down the golems.
All that risk and effort just to get me the last few Mithril Tokens and purchase the Boots of the North, which I never once equipped in the entire run. And the Gesen Bow String, which I never even forged.
One of the key tools in our arsenal was Astral Shot, which makes your next attack within 6 seconds a guaranteed critical hit that strikes as a +6 weapon and deals 10d10 magic damage with a save for half. This was a huge deal, both for the reliability of the attack and the enchantment bonus. For enemies like Balors, who spam Stoneskin but are otherwise immune to Arrows of Dispelling, Astral Shot was our only safe way of bringing them down.
Back in Athkatla, we finally tackled the circus quest. While we were out shopping, Yoshimo decided to ambush us at the Copper Coronet.
Since the Staff of the Magi feels mandatory for a solo thief in ToB (Sendai is too much otherwise), we had to fight the Twisted Rune. It went very cleanly: we used summons to bait out Layenne's starting invisibility, then used Detect Illusions to fully reveal her and Astral Shot to debuff her. After that, a single shot put her down.
Fun fact: if you accidentally try to steal from a merchant before drinking your Potions of Master Thievery, then try to charm him to talk to him again, all it will do is cost you another two points of reputation.
The dragons of ToB required a lot of Arrows of Dispelling, both to remove Stoneskins and their haste, without which we couldn't outrun them. It also took a lot of expendables. Check out what happens when you fail to keep Stoneskin active against Tamah:
Ogremoch brought us down to 22 HP before we had to flee the fight. Trying to dispel his Stoneskins and then land a kill was just not workable; he was too sturdy for us. We ended up resorting to INT drain.
By the way, if you ever try to run a solo Sniper, watch out for enemy clerics: some of them buff with Physical Mirror, and landing a 200-damage critical hit backstab on an enemy with Physical Mirror WILL instantly kill you. A Bounty Hunter's special traps can also be bounced by Physical Mirror, which is equally fatal for a solo Bounty Hunter.
At the Throne, the Mariliths gave us a lot of trouble until I remembered we had Breach scrolls. Sendai managed to cast Dispel Magic on us despite us hitting her with a Protection from Magic scroll, but somehow it failed to remove any of our defenses, even the easy-to-dispel potion buffs.
Right before we died (the second death, the one without a bug), we landed the highest damage backstab in the entire run.
This run was a LOT of fun, despite the failure at Melissan. Backstabs are fun, and being able to land them at range means you get to enjoy backstabbing far more often than otherwise, even though they start out very weak.
It's a strong kit. It has some critical weaknesses, like its lower HP (the margin for error is very low) and lack of traps to break key encounters like the Ducal Palace, but it's an excellent archer that can land early kills. It plays just like I wanted it to.
My guess on that waking dragon is that it's this block in the area script for the dragon cave:
IF Global("BD_GREEN_DRAGON_AWAKE","GLOBAL",0) OR(3) SpellCast([GOODCUTOFF],0) SpellCastPriest([GOODCUTOFF],0) SpellCastInnate([GOODCUTOFF],0) THEN RESPONSE #100 SetGlobal("BD_GREEN_DRAGON_AWAKE","GLOBAL",1) ENDNever mind that the bugbear's an enemy and isn't even in the same area. The spell counts, somehow. Definitely a bug, though.Your kit's ranged sneak attacks apparently ignore normal backstab immunity. Interesting choice there. And it doesn't matter if they see you, so long as you're invisible. Dragons both see through invisibility and have immunity to backstabs, for example. But come on - everyone knows you can take down a dragon with a good hit to their voonerables!
Fun fact: the reason why the pseudo-backstab fails to trigger sometimes is because on rare occasions the game will check to see if you're invisible while the projectile is in midair, after you broke invisibility but before you deal any damage. Point-blank shots minimize the chance.
I think I'm done with running Snipers for now, but I'm really glad I made the attempt. It was fun. I just don't know what my next run will be.
And of course, all that would require massaging things into a form that makes checking the victim viable in the first place.
The innate Holy Power spell is great for opening chests, though it is not powerful enough to open the chest in Candlekeep which contains a gem worth 1000 gp.
Opening one chest cost me all my gold, anf the one after that cost me a severe whipping.
Killing Carbos resulted in me gaining a cloak which I found to be ineffectual.
After breaking open one chest I discovered that I needed to cast sanctuary in order to avoid being caught.
Shank was the next to fall.
At the FAI I used sanctuary to avoid being caught after aquiring a potion.
I used sanctuary to avoid being hurt when attacked by Tarnesh.
I levelled up after being attacked in the Beregost.
and then dealt with some nearby gnolls.
Then killed Algernon.
North of the FAI we helped Leila.
And killed some troops.
All five avatars still alive
My Avatars are still kicking. I was about to go Windspear hills and then realized Umar Hills was still not done. I prefer to do that early so worked on that. Surprisingly the entire party saved vs the trap mephit's hold effect - not complaining. With the Shield of Harmony on Corey, the Umber Hulks were no problem. Cowled Wizard in the area was happy for his mephit blood, though we had to kill his crazed golem.
At this point was about to go to the old temple, but realized I hadn't even yet obtained Azuredge or Lilacor. So went back Copper Coronet and bought the nice axe which unfortunately Grond0 can't use (being evil and all). So Corey will use, despite no axe skill. With summons, the Lilacor quest was very straightforward. I left most of the kobolds by the staff alone, and let the kobolds kill their buddy - you get this option if you try to bribe him into giving you his staff. You get the gold right back when he dies so it's a good deal.
I then realized I still hadn't got the illithium as I want to forge the IMoD at some point. So battled Neb, though party took huge damage, which was surprisingly considering Corey had his true sight running.
There were a huge amount of ambushes this session with the generic slavers, a lot of resting to heal up. We eventually returned to the old temple area - now we are ready! Will tackle that next session.
Ouch, that's a nasty spell. Level 3, capable of instant kills on almost anyone. At least it's restricted to melee-range targeting, and it takes basically a full round to cast. (Slight correction: it's STR drain)
As implemented, 12-15 drain each have a 10% chance, while 5-11 and 16-20 each have a 5% chance. What would an honest 5d4 actually look like, shoehorned into the percentage framework that the game has to use?
6: 5/1024 -> 1%
7: 15/1024 -> 1%
8: 35/1024 -> 3%
9: 65/1024 -> 7%
10: 101/1024 -> 10%
11: 135/1024 -> 13%
12: 155/1024 -> 15%
13: 155/1024 -> 15%
14: 135/1024 -> 13%
15: 101/1024 -> 10%
16: 65/1024 -> 7%
17: 35/1024 -> 3%
18: 15/1024 -> 1%
19: 5/1024 -> 1%
20: 1/1024 -> no chance
These numbers are based on rounding the cumulative probabilities to the nearest percent.
Glad to see you making progress again, Corey!
I helped Mellicamp, calmed down Marl, and took a tome to Firebead,
Upon retutning to Beregost I returned the Colquetle amulet, went to High Hedge for a Freedom of Action Potion which enabled me to take on Bassilus in safety. I then killed the ogre with the belt fetish.
Went to the FAI where I helped Joia and killed Tarnesh. I upgraded a belt for 10,000 gp and bought a cloak and bracers. Now poor again!
Headed north and killed all the ankheg that i could find. Now at level 6. Put the extra * in bows.
Now have ** in bows, large swords and two handed weapons.
Dorn's quest was finished after which I bade him farewell.
I then dealt with Teyngan and company as well as some half ogres.
Recharging my necklace of missiles left me poor!
After picking up Khaled and Jaheira, I left them in Nashkel, Khaled being far too much of a goody-goody for my liking!
At that point I decided that acquiring a party would be in my best interest as my lack of magical skills was becoming a problem.
I therefore joined up with Tenya who helped me against some sirines before we helped Charlestonian. Our reputation is now 20, but perhaps that will have to drop if I join up with evil NPCs.
As it happened our reputation did NOT drop as the NPCs that joined were Alora, Dynaheir and Xan, all of whom appear to be happy with our current reputation.
Mulahey is dead and we are currently resting in Beregost.
Corecleric XX - halfling priest of Lothander, protagonist (Corey_Russell)
Mirazi - human mage (Grond0)
Betson - human dark moon monk (Gate70)
So the first task was convincing Lonk to let us free the prisoners. To make sure that worked, Corecleric used the ring of human influence (which did work). We did a few buffs in prep for our encounter with Irenicus, resist fear, death ward for all characters and chaotic commands on Corecleric to make sure he doesn't get stunned.
The battle with Irenicus was a bit anti-climatic. Corecleric's true seeing was a big problem for Irenicus - having a particular monk beat on him wasn't helping either. And Mirazi's death spells were a big problem for the general assassins. Success!
So ended up trying to go with Saemon. We had to rest quite a bit to try to get the bay horn. We belatedly realized we didn't free Ginia and Ason because Ason pick-pocketed Corecleric for 10 gold. So Betson reported to Ginia after Corecleric talked to the smuggler. While on his way back Betson ran into a large group of slavers - his party members came to his rescue. He took some damage, but he held together. Of course sanctuary makes it easy to get the bay horn.
We finally make it to the Sahuagin City. The first test was an Ettin fighting us - a finger of death from Corecleric ended his meager resistance. The Sahuagin City was cleared pretty easily by the party. Betson with his considerable melee power, Mirazi with her many death spells and Corecleric with his powerful aerial servants. A protection from undead spell was given to Betson so he could easily solo a group of undead. We battled to the prince and wiped out the prince so that Betson could get the nice bracers that greatly pump his fist power. We report our success to the king and finally make it to the Underdark.
Our first challenge was to deal with three illithids. Corecleric was asking if Mirazi could so the illithids, but she wasn't very confident on that. Betson thought he was awesome but got stunned. Luckily some skeleton warriors from Corecleric and MIrazi spells were able to keep Betson alive.
Our next challenge was to wipe out a large amount of elementals. This was straight-forward for the party. Our next action was to free the mage with a freedom scroll. We then needed to get the gnome city to get his book. Some spores were in a our way but both Betson and Corecleric has poison immunity (ring of Gaxx) so that was easy.
We then needed to deal with a powerful demon. However, it was anti-climatic as it seemed Betson got a successful quivering palm off.
We decided to deal with the Kua-Toa lair. Lots of Mirazi spells and Corecleric summons, supplemented by Betson melee made very good progress here. Death ward was used to protect the party against the demon knights. But Corecleric forgot to equip his Mace of Disruption so he got level drained - doh! Betson got level drained as well, but he has no protection from that. Victory was won all the same. Most of the equipment was useless but the strength belt increases Betson's melee power even more. Corecleric is using the hill giant belt, so his melee power is ok (though still slow at his 1 APR).
Next up was the Beholder's Lair. Corecleric used shield of Balduran and Betson used cloak of mirroring. Most of the beholders were cleared out fairly easily. The illithids refused to die to Mirazi's spells, so melee/ranged power was still necessary to finish them off. There was a fight with a large numbers of beholders and gauths. An Elder Orb tried to cast imprisonment. As a precaution, Corecleric activated slayer form to be immune to imprisonment. Once the beholder died, Corecleric went back to his normal self. Rest of lair cleared out without further incident.
Now for the real challenge, the illithid lair. Generally, Coercleric who has automatic saves vs stun, puts up very high AC (-16) and gulped many genius potions, he goes forward as a distraction for the enemies and his party contributes with ranged power. Occasionally Mirazi used death spells to get rid of the umber hulks. Corecleric tanked quite well in this area. His party members managed to avoid dying.
Strangely, despite giving back the Silver Sword, the githyanki still demanded combat and died. Possibly this happened because of Corecleric's poor Charisma. After selling and resting, it would appear we were out of time and saved our session here.
All Avatars still alive
The party battled their way through the old temple. Many undead had to be churned through. The party took a good amount of damage but with 3 healers in the group and a steady supply of heal potions, we were able to keep together. The party also usually had a good number of summons as distractions. We were able to make it all the way to the dragon. With 3 casters there was no way we were going to chicken out of a fight.
The fight lasted a good while and many characters had to run for their lives and heal. Grim Face in particular got to a sliver of life. While all this was going on, the party was doing things like blind, lower magic resist, doom, enfeeblement. Something must have took hold as near the end the dragon just stood there and took a beating. Success! This was our greatest success yet!
The entire party was protected by death ward then we showed ourselves. The Shade Lord and his minions could do nothing but die. On our way back to report our success to the Mayor we had to kill a certain ranger to open a certain sphere...we told his buddies "Valygar who?" and incredibly they believed us all the while we are carrying Valygar's body...a bit gullible these rangers. We sold our junk reported our success and saved our progress.
Avatars permanently dead: Grond0 (vampire chunking)
Well I had a rough session here. First we tried to go to Windspear hills, but Alesia got killed (though not chunked) by the paladins. Then we tried to open the planar sphere but got hit by what I think is the very last vampire ambush - the 3 vampires. Corey was safe since he has the AoP, but Grond0 with his poor barbarian AC was not so fortunate - Grond0 was level drained to nothing and CHUNKED! Poor Grond0...
But the quest must go on. We also belatedly realized we still don't have a magic license. Now that we lost Grond0, we surely need that. We also go the shield of Balduran. We then finished up clearing the sewers. We will try the Unseeing Eye next session.
More importantly, I apparently forgot to purchase the Shield of Reflection in SoA, which means our only defense against Illasera is PFMW, a finite resource. It also means kiting Melissan won't be truly safe, since we can't really stay out of range indefinitely.
I think I might have a chance if I open with PFMW, spam scrolls of Time Stop and Protection from Magic while Balthazar attacks the Five, and run to the west where Illasera can't see us. After enough Time Stop scrolls, we should be able to at least kill Illasera and wound the others, at which point we start kiting. But Melissan has 500 HP, we have horrible APR and THAC0, and there's going to be lots of summoned demons to get in the way. Eventually, Balthazar will die.
Sure, we can keep running, but SI: Abjuration runs out after 20 rounds, and when it goes away, our haste and saving throw buffs go away, too. Can I actually end the fight before we just run out of spell slots and get ground down?
I was hoping to land a quick kill on Melissan by using Improved Alacrity+Power Word, Blind+Spike Traps, but I've only got 8 of them. Melissan has 50% magic damage resistance, so if we burn all of our Spike Traps on her, that's only 280 damage, barely over half of her maximum HP.
The illusionist/thief has been crushing it everywhere else, but Melissan is just a different kind of fight.
Permanently dead: Grond0 (vampire chunking)
The party did well in dealing with the Unseeing Eye quest. A protection from undead scroll helped with the undead. The DEX gauntlets went to Enuhal since he is helping to off-tank with Grond0's absence. The quest went well.
We then went into Watcher's Keep. While we did get the dreaded vampiric wraiths, however with haste and summons and spells, we did win. The rest of the level 1 was cleared other than statues. The crimson dart went to Alesia_BH. The ammo belt went to her as well. The Foebane was a needed upgrade for Corey as now he has a good 1-hand melee weapon. If you pick up the book and don't don't put everything in it, you only need to fight the 2 closest statues. Alesia_BH did a lot of snares. Success.
Woops forgot to mention we did the planar prison. I think Alesia_BH died but our RoR put her back together. It went pretty smooth, a lot of summons helped for the harder fights. Haste boots to Corey.
Armor is now good for the party, full plate for Corey, Ankheg armor for Enuhal, AC 3 bracers for Grim Face and Robe of Vecna for Alesia_BH. Enuhal has a nice AC of -7, he's a helpful off-tank and he can even do some damage with the Belm he uses.
Ran into a problem in Windspear Hills though. Somehow an orc got into the cabin and when we attacked that orc who was attacking us the quest giver (the father who needs his daughter rescued) WENT HOSTILE! Yikes! We can't kill him we will lose Reputation so ran. So can't do the paladin stronghold now though wasn't planning to do it. Can't get the experience for rescuing the daughter either. This never happened before.
M/Ts are well suited to the Ascension Melissan fight, in my opinion. IIRC, with my M/T, Alyssa, I opened with Time Stop ->Mislead, pre-buffed with IH and a Black Blade of Disaster. She dealt heavy damage, and finished one of the five. I don't recall which, but it was probably Sendai, simply because I don't allow offensive use of pro magic. In your case I'd pick Illasera.
Leaving the Reflex behind is a serious hardship, though. That changes the fight. Illasera is a concern, of course, but if you're playing on insane I'd be fretting about the pair of fallen solars that Mel summons. You have an advantage, since you're playing with the bugged versions that can't cast Heal at will, but still: I don't envy you. Hopefully Balthazar with still be around by that point, and Melissan will Time Stop them for you. If you can't nix them early in a time stop, I imagine they'll be a nuisance- at best a drain on ProMWs and possibly worse. I agree that finishing Mel quickly enough will be a concern, too- especially if you use ProMWs elsewhere.
It'll be a tough fight. I image it's one that can be perfected with practice, but is hard to win as a one off. Good luck!
Best,
A.
NW: Blinding yourself and spamming Spike Traps or Time Traps under IA is an option for the fallen solars, ofc. I can't comment on that from experience, though, since I don't allow my thieves to blind themselves, or take advantage of blindness to facilitate trapping. In fact my bounty hunter's personal item, Quine's Hood, typically gets a Cespenar upgrade to grant blindness immunity just so that I don't accidentally do it.
As for Garren, I, too, have never heard of him going hostile, and especially not in that way. It's non-sensical, for sure. If you're 100% certain you didn't injure him, his child or Jum in the encounter it arguably qualifies for a remedy via the console.
Btw, I never knew that the gender of Garren's child changes based on the gender of the PC. I thought it was always a male named Taar. Weird decision on BioWare's part, imo.
Similarly the gender of potential lovers changes according to the gender of the PC in the romantic encounters mod.
Just started a halfling swashbuckler who barely survived Candlekeep due to tweaks that I had made. It is well that I gave her points in lockpicking. The stone upstairs enabled the buying of a katana and a wakizashi which in turn helped in the defeat of the improved Mendas. Three potions of healing were needed to survive.
A gnomish fighter illusionist did not survive that encounter despite playing it well. A one-shot death.
I subsequently had a re-run and the PC wiped out Mendas with one blow. Perhaps I haven't boosted the assassins too much after all.
Time to continue with Stygianna I think.
The reason the gender changes is the daughter says I (a paladin) am almost perfect - do I have a betrothed? And when I say no, she says I can fight in her name.
As for Garren, I don't see that as a bug. By that point, the orc had been in his house for quite a while, perhaps Garren befriended him? Also too, Garren lives in the area, so maybe he knew the orc by name. So by Garren's viewpoint I attacked his friend and neighbor and went hostile. I'm not going to worry about it. With only 4 party members I should be getting quite a bit of experience and probably will reach the ToB level cap, so it's no big deal in this case. It does mean, however, I can't regain my paladinhood if I were to become fallen (returning to Garren restores your paladin abilities if you were fallen before that).