ToB Final Battle help

SnesleyWipes

I'm at the final battle. I've being playing this game on the hardest mode (unmoved) since about chapter 3 in SoA and am loathed to turn it down at this point, but this is another level of Throne of Bhaal Cruelty over Draconis (2 hours of reloads/long fights), Sendai and that goddamn Ravager.

Those fights were fun, this fight is not.

I just don't see how I could last 3-4 rounds of Mellisan without being able to refresh spells/fighter abilities. Any tips?

My next attempt will be to spam as many floating swords as possible to take the heat off my guys from her seemingly unlimited nasties.

Groan.

Arunsun

Focus her and not her summonings. She has an unlimited amount of them, and they will vanish between the various phases of the fight.

lunar

Focus on Melissan. Use wands of spell striking to breach/pierce magic her and let your fighters go gww on her. Use weapons with elemental damage, flail of ages and Gram sword of Grief are very useful. Dorn was able to dirsupt M's time stop spells with Gram, even though she is immune to poison damage, it still disrupts her casting.

Use project image spells to conserve your spell book. Set thief traps to where M will appear, she will take damage when she spawns again. Use wish spell with 18 wisdom character to get 'rest' option. Gulp a potion of insight to set wisdom 18, if needed. Always have a planetar or deva and/or an elemental prince summon active and going. Use other tough summons too, to buy time and delay her own summons. Slayer shadows are particularly fierce, but they lack good thac0, so a very low ac character (I used Viconia with str belt and heaviest armor) can tank them well. ditto for a mage or bard with pro from magic weapons running. Beholders are more troublesome, you may want to smite/stun them or power word:blind them as fast as possible, immediately when they appear.

semiticgoddess

The previously posted advice is very excellent, especially the traps and the Wish spell.

Melissan inflicts disease on hit, and it does over 30 damage before it dies down. The Ring of Gaxx will stop it, but if you don't have that, you can heal it with potions, provided that you can absorb the piercing damage safely. A fighter can stack Hardiness spells, and clerics and druids can stack Armor of Faith, and gain immunity or near-immunity to the piercing damage. A mage can cast Protection from Magical Weapons and gain immunity to both the disease and the piercing damage.

Cast a couple of Teleport Field spells, perhaps via a Spell Sequencer, and it will keep the Slayer Shadows and other enemy critters at bay for 10 rounds. They'll still be able to attack, but the teleporting will keep them out of range for much of the time, decreasing the number of hits they can make. This will keep you a lot safer than summons.

The Rod of Resurrection can heal any character to full health with only one charge. To recharge it, sell it to a merchant and buy it back.

Grum

Spike traps make the final fight something of a joke. Especially when combined with wish so that you can get a full rest to get them back...

Lord_Tansheron

Grum said:

Spike traps make the final fight something of a joke.

Spike Traps make any fight a joke ¬_¬ They should be banned by international treaties.

Gallowglass

Well, the Final Boss is pretty tough, and it seems to me that this is the sort of situation for which Spike Traps exist. You likely have only enough Traps to take her out once, and you've still got to beat her by other methods three other times, so it doesn't seem to me to be excessively cheesy to win one confrontation by using Traps. I don't always have a high-level Thief who can do this, but when I've got the Thief, I'll usually use the Traps.

However, I avoid Wishing to renew the Traps, that'd be when it got too cheesy for my taste ... but each to his own, tastes vary.

SnesleyWipes

Well this is all exemplary advice, thank you. I'll report back.

Wish does sound a little cheese so I'll do my best to avoid that. I'd already thought of the spike trap thing but haven't tried it yet.

Cheers!

Jarrakul

Worth noting: Amelyssan's Stoneskin spell is treated as a Spell Protection, mechanically, rather than a Combat Protection. That means Breach doesn't touch it, but a whole slew of other spells do.

SnesleyWipes

What about these fucking 2 Medussa things on the last in-between battle with the Fallen Solar?! These are the worst lackeys so far. GETTING THERE

Jarrakul

The mariliths? Yeah, they're pretty mean. I recommend Breach spells, especially from wands if you have any lying around, as mariliths like to use Stoneskin and Protection from Magic Weapons to become nearly invulnerable to physical attacks. They also inflict poison, which can be annoying if they get in melee with casters, so either don't let them do that or take precautions against poison.

matrice

have a mage with protection from magic weapon tanking her (and protection from abjuration aswell so she cann't dispel)
Focus with everyone.

I personnaly used this strategy with a solo kensai mage.
And it was a piece of cake. (i could have literally let a fluff playing for me and still win)
I believe that a full party can mb even clean her fast enough for you to only need to cast 2 time those protection.

SnesleyWipes

Ahhh finally did it. The rod of resurrection as an insta-cure was the best new tactic by far, then teleport field. I ended up becoming the slayer combined with breaches to kill the mariliths.

Strangely I got the evil God ending having been a pretty decent guy the whole way... can't think why.

Thanks for your help!

lelag200

Grum said:

Spike traps make the final fight something of a joke. Especially when combined with wish so that you can get a full rest to get them back...

That's been fixed. Only one trap will hit, sometimes not at all now.

Arunsun

SnesleyWipes said:

Strangely I got the evil God ending having been a pretty decent guy the whole way... can't think why.

I think this is based on your alignment, and does not take your reputation into account. Note that Hell Trials set your alignment to Neutral Evil if you take at least one evil path and are not evil originally. It might have changed then, if you chose a good/neutral one originally.