You people are odd. Of the hundreds of runs I've seen over the last decade MR was a factor in maybe a dozen of them. But so far I've seen a grand total of zero runs which did not rely on physical damage protection of some kind (Toughness, Stone/Ironskins, PmfW, Invisibility/Sanctuary, etc)
But... That's sort of it? Even "walking around" is physical damage protection. You can't help but be protected from physical damage because "not being naked" is total protecting you against physical damage. It's cheap and simple, every spell you've mentioned is at most level 6. Between the two, physical damage is so much easier to deal with that even your lowly peons even have this special buffer for dealing with it, known as "HP".
Let's compare: Firkraag rolls a 20? Ow, immune to crits, but that really rather hurt your HP. Better chug a potion quick! Wizard rolled a 20 on Disintegrate, aka you rolled a 1 on your saving throw? There goes your no reload game. Better luck next time.
Magic deals in absolutes, you save or you die, really doesn't matter if you had 200 HP left or not. The closest physical damage comes to that are vorpal effects, and those are vanishingly rare and generally avoided the exact same way as you avoid any other physical damage: At most a level 6 spell, probably a level 1 or 2, or again, Beat Feet.
Yes, there are a few magic items to protect a few people against a few of the nastiest status effects (pretty sure Cloak of the Sewers isn't one of them, since their jelly is only 10% MR last I checked), and one of these items is considered to be one of the most overpowered items in the game because Magic is so super dangerous and hard to deal with that wearing the cloak of mirroring is effectively turning on godmode. But that's only one person, and without those items only mages and clerics get the tools to deal with other mages and clerics (while yes, also being better at dealing with lowly peons because they're called lowly for a reason).
You're comparing Disintegrate to a single attack? Why not compare Timestop to Fireball while you're at it? And you DO have ways to protect yourself from Disintegrate, especially if you know it's coming. Because no one does no-reload challenges without using metaknowledge. The thing about magic is that it's also predictable. It has definite counters, and you have clear options when dealing with it. When something uses "x", you use "y". That's how challenge runs have always worked. The one thing that is -always- a problem and which can -always- kill you is physical damage.
The Cloak of the Sewers form is a Mustard Jelly. They should have high MR, but even that particular form doesn't for some reason I know for a fact that it's still immune to status effects like Mindflayer psionics.
You people are odd. Of the hundreds of runs I've seen over the last decade MR was a factor in maybe a dozen of them. But so far I've seen a grand total of zero runs which did not rely on physical damage protection of some kind (Toughness, Stone/Ironskins, PmfW, Invisibility/Sanctuary, etc)
But... That's sort of it? Even "walking around" is physical damage protection. You can't help but be protected from physical damage because "not being naked" is total protecting you against physical damage. It's cheap and simple, every spell you've mentioned is at most level 6. Between the two, physical damage is so much easier to deal with that even your lowly peons even have this special buffer for dealing with it, known as "HP".
Let's compare: Firkraag rolls a 20? Ow, immune to crits, but that really rather hurt your HP. Better chug a potion quick! Wizard rolled a 20 on Disintegrate, aka you rolled a 1 on your saving throw? There goes your no reload game. Better luck next time.
Magic deals in absolutes, you save or you die, really doesn't matter if you had 200 HP left or not. The closest physical damage comes to that are vorpal effects, and those are vanishingly rare and generally avoided the exact same way as you avoid any other physical damage: At most a level 6 spell, probably a level 1 or 2, or again, Beat Feet.
Yes, there are a few magic items to protect a few people against a few of the nastiest status effects (pretty sure Cloak of the Sewers isn't one of them, since their jelly is only 10% MR last I checked), and one of these items is considered to be one of the most overpowered items in the game because Magic is so super dangerous and hard to deal with that wearing the cloak of mirroring is effectively turning on godmode. But that's only one person, and without those items only mages and clerics get the tools to deal with other mages and clerics (while yes, also being better at dealing with lowly peons because they're called lowly for a reason).
I'm starting to find this smartalec shtick pretty boring. Especially when time and again you're talking crap, like thinking there is a critical fail on saving throws if you roll a 1.
The one thing that is -always- a problem and which can -always- kill you is physical damage.
Doesn't the same line of argument work for both?
At the end of the day, MR is also just one of the options you have of dealing with things. However, as far as options go, it is fairly powerful because it's always on (in the case of the Monk) and stops the vast majority of things, no questions asked.
I'm not denying that you need to protect yourself against physical damage, I just find that fairly easy to do for most characters. And when I mess up somewhere, it's usually less of a punishment compared to magic, which really can just end you if you miss once. Physical attacks rarely just kill you if you fail to stop one of them.
Sensing a bit of a tendency towards overly binary thinking here, though, which obviously isn't the case. Not like MR and physical protection are mutually exclusive either.
No. Physical damage is something you protect yourself temporarily from, using Stoneskins/PfMW/etc. It's more of a borrowed time kind of thing. It gets even more complicated when things like Dispel/Remove Magic enter the picture.
With magic, as long as you know what type of spells are going to be cast during a particular battle and take steps to counter those spells then that's it.
You're comparing Disintegrate to a single attack? Why not compare Timestop to Fireball while you're at it? And you DO have ways to protect yourself from Disintegrate, especially if you know it's coming. Because no one does no-reload challenges without using metaknowledge. The thing about magic is that it's also predictable. It has definite counters, and you have clear options when dealing with it. When something uses "x", you use "y". That's how challenge runs have always worked. The one thing that is -always- a problem and which can -always- kill you is physical damage.
The Cloak of the Sewers form is a Mustard Jelly. They should have high MR, but even that particular form doesn't for some reason I know for a fact that it's still immune to status effects like Mindflayer psionics.
Yes, I'm comparing a mid-level spell to a single critical hit from one of the hardest hitting enemies in the trilogy. The fact you consider this to be an unfair comparison says more about the comparative strength of magic and physical attacks than anything I've said.
And I'm fascinated how you say that magic is predictable. Yes, you know when you see a mage that the mage will probably cast some kind of spell. Perhaps that Elder Orb will cast Imprisonment or some manner of deathray? Yet... Are you somehow shocked to discover that the ogre is going to hit you with a blunt object? Does your character just stand still while the dragon chews their face off? When you trigger a paladin kill squad, do you frantically take out the melee-only paladins while ignoring the Mage who drops a Horrid Wilting on your party?
Honestly I don't remember the last game I ran where CHARNAME was killed by melee damage where they weren't already dead because they failed a saving throw that stopped them from just running away. I remember plenty of games where they died because they failed a saving throw to something or other. Confusion, fear, hold, stun, death, petrification, or that mage with his damnable Magic Missile standing outside the Friendly Arm Inn.
I'm starting to find this smartalec shtick pretty boring. Especially when time and again you're talking crap, like thinking there is a critical fail on saving throws if you roll a 1.
Bizarre, unprovoked hostility aside, thank you, I did not know that saving throws in Baldur's Gate operated differently to PnP. This does not particularly change my stance, but it's always nice to know that Gnomes are even more badass than I originally thought.
Honestly I don't remember the last game I ran where CHARNAME was killed by melee damage where they weren't already dead because they failed a saving throw that stopped them from just running away.
This is my experience also. Fights against pure physical attackers I just cannot see myself ever losing. It's always the mage/druid/cleric in the back that's messing things up for me.
But this game is very diverse in its setups, so maybe it's just because of how I play.
Yes, I'm comparing a mid-level spell to a single critical hit from one of the hardest hitting enemies in the trilogy. The fact you consider this to be an unfair comparison says more about the comparative strength of magic and physical attacks than anything I've said.
I'm not saying it's unfair, I'm saying the comparison is stupid and gross oversimplification. Disintegrate is a spell with a casting time, a short "cooldown" time because of pauses between casts and which any sane wizard wouldn't cast without protections up. And you're comparing it to a single attack (requires zero preparation) which takes up like what? 1/2 of a second? Yeahhhhh. Timestop VS Fireball.
And I'm fascinated how you say that magic is predictable. Yes, you know when you see a mage that the mage will probably cast some kind of spell. Perhaps that Elder Orb will cast Imprisonment or some manner of deathray? Yet... Are you somehow shocked to discover that the ogre is going to hit you with a blunt object? Does your character just stand still while the dragon chews their face off? When you trigger a paladin kill squad, do you frantically take out the melee-only paladins while ignoring the Mage who drops a Horrid Wilting on your party?
Exaggeration. You know the info bar at the bottom tells you what spells enemies are casting. That's why people know what to expect especially after their nth run. Also, trial and error. Also, audio. You know what type of spell they're casting and can make an educated guess about what to expect next based on what the enemy caster is chanting. Also scouting, because randomly walking around when you know that there's good chance that a group of Umber Hulks can spawn in the area is just begging for a possible game over.
And now you're just running random scenarios. An Elder Orb and an... ogre. OK. Paladin cannon fodder and a mage. OK. I'm pretty sure all of us here know how to counter these on our own.
Honestly I don't remember the last game I ran where CHARNAME was killed by melee damage where they weren't already dead because they failed a saving throw that stopped them from just running away. I remember plenty of games where they died because they failed a saving throw to something or other. Confusion, fear, hold, stun, death, petrification, or that mage with his damnable Magic Missile standing outside the Friendly Arm Inn.
Back when I still played the game all the time, the last time I died to a status effect was probably when I couldn't recite all of Irenicus' speeches word for word yet. That tends to happen when you play the same game for month son end because the only interesting game at the time was Diablo 2, which didn't really require a lot of brainpower. People have been playing BG2 for 10+ years now. Spells are easy counter because people know they're coming, and they have definite counters. Simply exiting the room or changing locations even works.
In the vanilla game magic tends to be more dangerous simply because non-casters are basically cannon fodder. Relatively speaking, of course, since if you play the vanilla game you will always know what to expect and you have so many options to help you deal with magical attacks anyway. You can forget, or you can get lazy, but that's more of an excuse.
That changes with difficulty mods though, when the Elder Orb in the above example could spawn with epic drow warriors/casters (feel free to tackle these using just magic) or if the paladins that come with the mage in the above example are inquisitors who spam dispel magic on your group + pepper your casters with bolts of biting. Suddenly warriors don't seem like peons anymore, especially when your own mages have to play 1 on 1 with the enemy mage and you need your own warriors to keep the other side busy while your mage deals with the threat. You know, because you can't keep re-casting Stoneskins/PfMW while also casting offensive/anti-spellcaster defensive spells.
In the end, between all the protection spells and immunities (including Timestop immunity, in several of those mods) the only reliable to fall back on has always been physical damage. Doesn't matter where it comes from, what matters is that you do have access to it. The same is true for enemies, which is why physical damage is so dangerous.
I enjoyed a monk run once. In the end he was like a whirling flying fist of death, not as fun as monks were in NWN, but fun nonetheless. The class does not seem very popular though. the Dark Moon monk looks fun and may think about trying it out after I complete my current Assassin Elf run (still in BG1...).
Ran through BG with an unkitted monk - before the EE versions were around. Good run. Great character. Now arn through BGEE and big chunk of BG2EE with Dark Moon Monk + Rasaad (Sun Soul) and the kits rock.
Honestly, it might just be Rasaad that makes me give Monk another go. He seems to have a lot of items associated with him that make Monks more interesting, and like others I have also not played Monk since before the EE (I changed Rasaad to another class when I played with him).
I'm sorry, I wasn't aware that my examples of "Obvious Magic User" and "Obvious Melee User" really needed to have parity with one another. Feel free to substitute whichever example is stunningly obvious it uses magic versus is stunningly obvious it will waddle up and punch you, and then try to gauge why saying that Magic is predictable compared to melee is... "not quite the case".
And... Don't want to come across as snide, but you do realise that your example of lowly peons trying to be threatening to a mage... Involves them using magic, right?
Anyway, apart from the fact that you can move away from any melee peon to eliminate 95% of their damage while they chase you around like a lemon (a tactic that everyone can fall back on), field Mordenkainen's Swords to tank for you, or just unleash an army of expendable summons to act as substitute lowly peons... let's break this sucker. With a gnome.
Jansen Adventurewear + Roranach's Horn + Defender of Easthaven: 95% Crushing Resistance. 45% Slashing Resistance, 45% Piercing Resistance. The biggest insult to humanity is that they changed UAI to stop me from using Jan's robe of badassery with other characters. Polymorph Self Mustard Jelly: 100% Piercing Immunity. You'd be surprised how many enemies deal piercing damage. Like pit fiends. 5000 GP Shield of Reflection: Complete missile Immunity and reflection. No exceptions. Ring of Gaxx: Poison immunity. Just in case.
The only one remotely tricky for the gnome is slashing resistance, but that's what Stoneskins, Mirror Images and PfMWs are for. A Lowly Peon can manage an easy 60% with Hardiness for 6+ rounds. A Fighter/Cleric or F/M/C (strictly superior to the F/C) can handle 85% with Armour of Faith on top of that.
And while we're at it: No. Mages ignore peons.
Spell Immunity: Abjuration: Immune to Dispel Magic and Remove Magic. 10+ rounds, ignores aura. Spell Immunity: Divination: Immune to True Seeing. 10+ rounds, ignores aura. Improved Invisibility: 11+ rounds. Immune to Breach and every other single target spell. Fireshields Red + Blue: 11+ rounds each. 2D8+4 damage in two different elements to any lowly peon that dares attack you every time they try to attack you. Ignores MR. Project Image: Yeah, send this guy to tank with that lot of buffs. Jan's invisible and in the next room.
So... yeah, maybe it's because I tend to play Arcane Overlord types rather than Lowly Peons who forgot that they have no place in high level play and refuse to move away from melee beatsticks, but give me physical damage to deal with any day, it's much simpler to deal with.
Honestly, it might just be Rasaad that makes me give Monk another go. He seems to have a lot of items associated with him that make Monks more interesting, and like others I have also not played Monk since before the EE (I changed Rasaad to another class when I played with him).
Since I have an aversion to Pure and Human CHARNAMEs he gave me the first excuse to play a Monk ever. I quite enjoyed playing with him in my party, I must say, though the Sun Soul Monk is by far the weakest of the three by my reckoning. He couldn't even handle the enemies in his own ToB questline.
Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's a mod of Nuin's. That being said... It's really a joke trying to claim that the "mundanes" have no right to be in high-leveled fights. Solos of pretty much every stripe have been taken to the Throne, even no-reloads. Surprise, surprise: not only mages are capable of winning the game.
Generally, yes, mages are better, but ONLY if played in an absolutely perfect manner. One mistake, one round miscount of your buffs? Dead, right then and there. The reason that @Alesia_BH even uses Fireshield(Blue) at all? Because it runs out one round before her SI:Abjuration, letting her know that she HAS TO GET OUT OF THERE NOW. Mundanes have a bit more leeway in that, since their general strategy is either permanently low saving throws, or permanent immunities through items that mages can't use like the Shield of Harmony, or any weapon besides daggers, clubs, and staffs that contains a useful immunity. Plus, their damage generally doesn't take up their aura use, meaning you can use potions to escape certain effects if you're good enough.
Oh, by the way: Yeah, you broke the game with a Gnome. A gnome that happens to be a I/T, not just an Illusionist: 4/5 of your equipment choices require UAI to actually use, and the Mustard Jelly form leaves you at one attack with a thieves' THAC0, and without spell casting, so, um... You could probably break the game just as hard as a F/T because equipment and UAI are kinda really powerful, especially in ToB where it gets really Monty Haul with effects.
To get back on topic of Monks: Monks are useful because they have yet another layer of defenses they can fall back on, if they have to: they have to both fail the save AND have it get past their MR. They have innate speed, giving a boost and allowing another party member to wear the boots of Cheetah speed. Against things that don't have invisibility detection running, a stealth + Stunning Blow can end fights instantly. They have their weaknesses lategame, sure, same as quite a few classes, but to say they're absolutely useless is dissing them way too much.
Monks get 40% damage resistance via Hardiness, MR close to 100 with the right equipment, and very low AC. They can't tank everything forever, but they're perfectly capable of holding their own.
And yes, let us not discuss mages vs. fighters in a thread about monks, given the fact that monks are good at tanking both, and not just one.
* Well of course I broke the game with a Gnome, gnomes are the best race, and Mage/Thieves the best class. That said, note that the context of the first part of the post was in demonstrating long term non-ablative (so non-MImg, non-SSkin) methods of damage resistance - specifically as part a discussion about whether magic or physical damage was more dangerous. Physical damage, as demonstrated, has numerous counters to it beyond AC and the ones being accounted for, and every type except slashing (which has the worst time getting through AC) can get up to 95%.
* As such, the fact he's an illusionist has very little to do with the fact he has 25% physical damage reduction gear that makes him a permanent crushing damage tank using an underused magical item (the awesome helm of Roranach) and immunity to missile damage via a shield available in early chapter 2 (which was being used as an example of a high optimisation level counter-mage strategy to show the danger of peon classes, the context of the second half of the post was rebuffing "dispel magic" as a feasible counter).
* Yes, I'm sure the game has been soloed by every class. The AI is far less cruel than I, and Hardiness used to stack. And yes, monks do have a place in ToB which I covered specifically in my first post in the thread. They're a valuable support character that doesn't need to worry about friendly fire and can shut down enemy mages. I actually consider monks to have the most tactical value of any martial character because of their Magic Resistance and that they actually get some save or sucks of their own.
* As for mages making mistakes being dead? No, quite the opposite, it's fighters that are the glass cannons, mages generally have less risk. Need to fight a bunch of people? Send an image and a scout (the monk makes an excellent scout, since they can resist most of the junk, and if they do die.... Eh, they didn't need much gear anyway, send them back in. And if someone does break through and kill the mage? Then the mage just... sends another image, perhaps refreshes their Wizard Eye, and sends in the clones. Mage CHARNAMEs have effective Power Word: Reloads without the game over screen.
* Secondly, note that if things are hitting the mage, jelly or not, they're taking damage from Fireshields - and as I've mentioned repeatedly, even one colour of shield can easily outdamage Dragon's Breath over the course of four rounds without requiring a single aura against any target meleeing you (example: 3 APR and 50% fire resistance means Draconis kills himself against your dual shields within four rounds more often than not if he doesn't wing buffet, and you may as well iHaste him). It's a hugely powerful attack option, and while the mage is dealing damage by standing still they have four rounds of peace and quiet where they can recast any buffs they're feeling particularly anxious about (who cares about spell slots, you have invisibility 10'), attack with the Staff of the Magi to get a free dispel, summon a buddy to deal extra damage, or learn to knit (difficult because they're not proficient with needles).
Ideally it's while they're performing this tanking role that the monk is taking out mages (potentially with the magetank dropping a breach to help) while other martial characters help kill the targets meleeing the mage even faster.
Okay, two edits before I remembered how to differentiate "are" and "is", I should probably sleep.
All I got from that was that you basically named every counter to melee and tried to make it seem like all of it can fit into one character, and all the while that character is also casting spells and attacking stuff in melee. Funny you should mention how "lowly peons" becoming a threat to mages involves using magic. I'm pretty sure my argument was that physical damage was more dangerous than magical damage. I never said anything about not actually using magic, because that's how classes like F/Ms and R/Cs work. Buff self + smash things.
Am I missing something? In my game I don't get to know what spell the enemy is casting until they've already cast it.
I see: "Random Mage casts Lightning Bolt Random Mage does 34 damage to Minsc Random Mage does 17 damage to Jaheira"
Not: "Random Mage is casting Lightning Bolt. You better protect your ass with whatever you've got in the next three seconds or risk getting fried."
1) Auditory cues. All spells from the evocation school have the same incantation. 2) Metaknowledge. If a certain mage casts lightning bolt then expect that same mage to still to cast lightning bolt on your next run. Or the run after that. Or the run after the run after that. Etc. 3) It's a lightning bolt, not Dragon's Breath. Moving out of the way/not hugging walls works.
Since we seem to be just bragging now I broke the game with a wolf once. I summoned about a dozen or so images with my bard and then watched the wolf go on a killing spree. It was amusing. I don't need to be a gnome to kill godlike beings in the most humiliating way possible.
BTW, fireshields still do fire/cold damage. It's a shame mobs in vanilla are too stupid to carry basic elemental protection potions/scrolls, considering these are supposed to be epic-level enemies. It's also a shame that they can't even seem to do anything worthwhile like spam Smite on some smug enemy mage who thinks not using PfMW is a good idea against epic level enemies with access to warrior HLAs. Unfortunately that's just the way it is. It's easy to take physical damage for granted in the vanilla game I suppose, especially if you're just starting out and you don't know what that enemy mage around the corner has in store for you. You also did an incredible job demonstrating how well magic counters itself, with that mention of the SI/Improved Invisibility/etc. defense. At that point pretty much only physical attacks (I just realized I should be arguing for physical -attacks-, not physical damage) are dangerous, which is exactly the case in a lot of modded fights.
Damnit, I knew my inability to hear was ruining my meta somehow.
I wasn't aware of self-aggrandisement on my part, I was merely trying to show that there are ways of maxing out physical damage resistances, several of which are naturally undispellable. There is one small chink in the damage immunity armour though, having tested Arrows of Detonation ignore the shield of reflection. That explosive Achilles heel.
But yeah, I think we've more or less said our respective piece?
Pan: Magic is more dangerous, because magic is the thing that kills you (the physical damage is just a symptom of getting wrecked by a spellcaster), and it takes slightly more resources for mages to become immune to magic than physical damage.
Nuin: Physical attacks are more dangerous, because it's generally the damage that kills you when mages wreck you (the physical damage is the dangerous thing, mages are just breaking down the wards keeping it out), and there are plenty of items you can bring along for immunities to common mage effects.
Does this difference actually change how you treat monks tactically? Or is it pretty much the same as myself, a quick striker working around a Magetank?
Random Monk sidenote: Improved Invisibility your monk. It costs peanuts as a level 4 spell slot for a 4 AC and to hit bonus and it helps protect them from getting targeted by Lower Resistance.
Another benefit I like about Monks (and Skalds and Sorcerers) is that they don't really need a lot of gear to be viable, so you can safely add one to your party without making the other characters weaker.
I enjoyed a monk run once. In the end he was like a whirling flying fist of death, not as fun as monks were in NWN, but fun nonetheless. The class does not seem very popular though. the Dark Moon monk looks fun and may think about trying it out after I complete my current Assassin Elf run (still in BG1...).
Ran through BG with an unkitted monk - before the EE versions were around. Good run. Great character. Now arn through BGEE and big chunk of BG2EE with Dark Moon Monk + Rasaad (Sun Soul) and the kits rock.
Especially the DMM.
@Southpaw, how did you roleplay/justify the DMM and Rasaad adventuring together? I will say I am enjoying the banter now between Rasaad and Viconia in my assassin's party on Shar.
I enjoyed a monk run once. In the end he was like a whirling flying fist of death, not as fun as monks were in NWN, but fun nonetheless. The class does not seem very popular though. the Dark Moon monk looks fun and may think about trying it out after I complete my current Assassin Elf run (still in BG1...).
Ran through BG with an unkitted monk - before the EE versions were around. Good run. Great character. Now arn through BGEE and big chunk of BG2EE with Dark Moon Monk + Rasaad (Sun Soul) and the kits rock.
Especially the DMM.
@Southpaw, how did you roleplay/justify the DMM and Rasaad adventuring together? I will say I am enjoying the banter now between Rasaad and Viconia in my assassin's party on Shar.
Well, in SoA at least, both might want to join forces because they both doubt their respective faith and want to give a try to the Twofold Goddess. And as such, when they are betrayed by Alorgoth, both want a revenge and hunt him down in ToB. Moreover it is hard to justify some of the kits, even without considering other party members. Gorion's ward could be any type of warrior, mage, good/neutral cleric, that's easily roleplayable. Even an unkitted monk could fit. But a Dark Moon Monk? I am quite sure that Dark Moon is not amongst the sects that are present in Candlekeep.
@Pantalion : Improved invisibility does not give you 4 AC points. It gives the enemies a +4 malus to hit you. It is even better considering that it allows you to bypass the AC cap. A monk with 18 dex and -24 AC (which is the cap with 18dex) and improved invisibility has an effective AC of -28, which is not achievable otherwise. And even better than that: if I am not mistaken Shadow Door does the same. And Night Walkers (from Rasaad ToB quest) give 3 uses of Shadow Door per day.
As for the debate on "what is more dangerous between magic and physical damage?", they are not that easily comparable. Magic might be useless against a properly equipped character 90% of the time, if it works once (whether an instant death spell or a crowd control, like Symbol, Stun), you are basically dead. On the other hand, physical damage is something a lot more regular. You can estimate how much damage you will take, you can estimate how long your stoneskin will last, etc... But that does not make it less threatening in the end. Let's take an example: Rasaad's SoA quest, the final fight. It's one of the rare fights that can be really really hard if you are not experienced enough. Even if you know what to expect, this fight can be really hard to win if you do not have enough raw power, because there are too many fighters (physical type). You know full well what you are going to face, yet that hardly makes the fight any easier. Another example. One fight that used to cause me a lot of trouble was the fight in the DeArnise keep, the once against two trolls and a yuan-ti mage, in the room with the keep master key. Back when I first played Baldur's Gate 2 12years ago, I remember reloading countless times on that one till I got enough characters unaffected by the Chaos spell from the Yuan-Ti Mage (because I would always go with my full team, I was young and not that smart at the time). I would easily have dealt with another two or three trolls instead of the Yuan Ti mage, but here, magic won the fight with a single spell. And that's what magic does: when one spell gets through, you're screwed.
Ran through BG with an unkitted monk - before the EE versions were around. Good run. Great character. Now ran through BGEE and big chunk of BG2EE with Dark Moon Monk + Rasaad (Sun Soul) and the kits rock.
Especially the DMM.
@Southpaw, how did you roleplay/justify the DMM and Rasaad adventuring together? I will say I am enjoying the banter now between Rasaad and Viconia in my assassin's party on Shar.
Two words - "Pragmatic Villainy". (Or 6 words "My enemy's enemy is my friend")
Another benefit I like about Monks (and Skalds and Sorcerers) is that they don't really need a lot of gear to be viable, so you can safely add one to your party without making the other characters weaker.
That's what I don't like about monks. There isn't much gear you can give them to make them better, or prepare them for a specific situation. Their prowess depends almost entirely on their XP level.
Pros and cons, I suppose. There can be advantages to freeing up gear pieces in a 6-person party, especially considering that many of the items Monks do want are exclusive to them (like the special bracers/gloves).
The fact that they scale with XP and not gear also makes them an interesting choice for Nightmare Mode. They can quickly reach weapon levels otherwise unavailable at that point in the game to most other classes.
Two cases: you have played BG1 and used STR tome on your PC. You can then get a natural 22 STR (18base+1 tome+2 hells+1 Machine) and get to 25 through the Headband Righteous magic.
Monks can actually reach 23 STR. 18 Natural, +1 Tome in BG1, +1 Machine of Lum the Mad, +1 Deck of Many Things, +2 Hell Trial, for 23 total STR. 20 DEX as well.
Well PW:Walk also walks for spells too - run away until protections run out, chop helpless mages to pieces.
An always valid tactic. Note, however, that any ranged attack, spell or otherwise, will hunt you down wherever you are on the map, and is generally a lot harder to outrun. Hence why the monk's MR and high missile defence can remain important all the way through TOB.
Comments
Let's compare:
Firkraag rolls a 20? Ow, immune to crits, but that really rather hurt your HP. Better chug a potion quick!
Wizard rolled a 20 on Disintegrate, aka you rolled a 1 on your saving throw? There goes your no reload game. Better luck next time.
Magic deals in absolutes, you save or you die, really doesn't matter if you had 200 HP left or not. The closest physical damage comes to that are vorpal effects, and those are vanishingly rare and generally avoided the exact same way as you avoid any other physical damage: At most a level 6 spell, probably a level 1 or 2, or again, Beat Feet.
Yes, there are a few magic items to protect a few people against a few of the nastiest status effects (pretty sure Cloak of the Sewers isn't one of them, since their jelly is only 10% MR last I checked), and one of these items is considered to be one of the most overpowered items in the game because Magic is so super dangerous and hard to deal with that wearing the cloak of mirroring is effectively turning on godmode. But that's only one person, and without those items only mages and clerics get the tools to deal with other mages and clerics (while yes, also being better at dealing with lowly peons because they're called lowly for a reason).
And you DO have ways to protect yourself from Disintegrate, especially if you know it's coming. Because no one does no-reload challenges without using metaknowledge.
The thing about magic is that it's also predictable. It has definite counters, and you have clear options when dealing with it. When something uses "x", you use "y". That's how challenge runs have always worked.
The one thing that is -always- a problem and which can -always- kill you is physical damage.
The Cloak of the Sewers form is a Mustard Jelly. They should have high MR, but even that particular form doesn't for some reason I know for a fact that it's still immune to status effects like Mindflayer psionics.
At the end of the day, MR is also just one of the options you have of dealing with things. However, as far as options go, it is fairly powerful because it's always on (in the case of the Monk) and stops the vast majority of things, no questions asked.
I'm not denying that you need to protect yourself against physical damage, I just find that fairly easy to do for most characters. And when I mess up somewhere, it's usually less of a punishment compared to magic, which really can just end you if you miss once. Physical attacks rarely just kill you if you fail to stop one of them.
Sensing a bit of a tendency towards overly binary thinking here, though, which obviously isn't the case. Not like MR and physical protection are mutually exclusive either.
With magic, as long as you know what type of spells are going to be cast during a particular battle and take steps to counter those spells then that's it.
And I'm fascinated how you say that magic is predictable. Yes, you know when you see a mage that the mage will probably cast some kind of spell. Perhaps that Elder Orb will cast Imprisonment or some manner of deathray? Yet... Are you somehow shocked to discover that the ogre is going to hit you with a blunt object? Does your character just stand still while the dragon chews their face off? When you trigger a paladin kill squad, do you frantically take out the melee-only paladins while ignoring the Mage who drops a Horrid Wilting on your party?
Honestly I don't remember the last game I ran where CHARNAME was killed by melee damage where they weren't already dead because they failed a saving throw that stopped them from just running away. I remember plenty of games where they died because they failed a saving throw to something or other. Confusion, fear, hold, stun, death, petrification, or that mage with his damnable Magic Missile standing outside the Friendly Arm Inn. Bizarre, unprovoked hostility aside, thank you, I did not know that saving throws in Baldur's Gate operated differently to PnP. This does not particularly change my stance, but it's always nice to know that Gnomes are even more badass than I originally thought.
But this game is very diverse in its setups, so maybe it's just because of how I play.
Disintegrate is a spell with a casting time, a short "cooldown" time because of pauses between casts and which any sane wizard wouldn't cast without protections up.
And you're comparing it to a single attack (requires zero preparation) which takes up like what? 1/2 of a second?
Yeahhhhh. Timestop VS Fireball.
Exaggeration.
You know the info bar at the bottom tells you what spells enemies are casting. That's why people know what to expect especially after their nth run.
Also, trial and error. Also, audio. You know what type of spell they're casting and can make an educated guess about what to expect next based on what the enemy caster is chanting. Also scouting, because randomly walking around when you know that there's good chance that a group of Umber Hulks can spawn in the area is just begging for a possible game over.
And now you're just running random scenarios.
An Elder Orb and an... ogre. OK.
Paladin cannon fodder and a mage. OK.
I'm pretty sure all of us here know how to counter these on our own. Back when I still played the game all the time, the last time I died to a status effect was probably when I couldn't recite all of Irenicus' speeches word for word yet. That tends to happen when you play the same game for month son end because the only interesting game at the time was Diablo 2, which didn't really require a lot of brainpower.
People have been playing BG2 for 10+ years now. Spells are easy counter because people know they're coming, and they have definite counters. Simply exiting the room or changing locations even works.
In the vanilla game magic tends to be more dangerous simply because non-casters are basically cannon fodder. Relatively speaking, of course, since if you play the vanilla game you will always know what to expect and you have so many options to help you deal with magical attacks anyway. You can forget, or you can get lazy, but that's more of an excuse.
That changes with difficulty mods though, when the Elder Orb in the above example could spawn with epic drow warriors/casters (feel free to tackle these using just magic) or if the paladins that come with the mage in the above example are inquisitors who spam dispel magic on your group + pepper your casters with bolts of biting. Suddenly warriors don't seem like peons anymore, especially when your own mages have to play 1 on 1 with the enemy mage and you need your own warriors to keep the other side busy while your mage deals with the threat.
You know, because you can't keep re-casting Stoneskins/PfMW while also casting offensive/anti-spellcaster defensive spells.
In the end, between all the protection spells and immunities (including Timestop immunity, in several of those mods) the only reliable to fall back on has always been physical damage. Doesn't matter where it comes from, what matters is that you do have access to it. The same is true for enemies, which is why physical damage is so dangerous.
Now arn through BGEE and big chunk of BG2EE with Dark Moon Monk + Rasaad (Sun Soul) and the kits rock.
Especially the DMM.
And... Don't want to come across as snide, but you do realise that your example of lowly peons trying to be threatening to a mage... Involves them using magic, right?
Anyway, apart from the fact that you can move away from any melee peon to eliminate 95% of their damage while they chase you around like a lemon (a tactic that everyone can fall back on), field Mordenkainen's Swords to tank for you, or just unleash an army of expendable summons to act as substitute lowly peons... let's break this sucker. With a gnome.
Jansen Adventurewear + Roranach's Horn + Defender of Easthaven: 95% Crushing Resistance. 45% Slashing Resistance, 45% Piercing Resistance. The biggest insult to humanity is that they changed UAI to stop me from using Jan's robe of badassery with other characters.
Polymorph Self Mustard Jelly: 100% Piercing Immunity. You'd be surprised how many enemies deal piercing damage. Like pit fiends.
5000 GP Shield of Reflection: Complete missile Immunity and reflection. No exceptions.
Ring of Gaxx: Poison immunity. Just in case.
The only one remotely tricky for the gnome is slashing resistance, but that's what Stoneskins, Mirror Images and PfMWs are for. A Lowly Peon can manage an easy 60% with Hardiness for 6+ rounds. A Fighter/Cleric or F/M/C (strictly superior to the F/C) can handle 85% with Armour of Faith on top of that.
And while we're at it: No. Mages ignore peons.
Spell Immunity: Abjuration: Immune to Dispel Magic and Remove Magic. 10+ rounds, ignores aura.
Spell Immunity: Divination: Immune to True Seeing. 10+ rounds, ignores aura.
Improved Invisibility: 11+ rounds. Immune to Breach and every other single target spell.
Fireshields Red + Blue: 11+ rounds each. 2D8+4 damage in two different elements to any lowly peon that dares attack you every time they try to attack you. Ignores MR.
Project Image: Yeah, send this guy to tank with that lot of buffs. Jan's invisible and in the next room.
So... yeah, maybe it's because I tend to play Arcane Overlord types rather than Lowly Peons who forgot that they have no place in high level play and refuse to move away from melee beatsticks, but give me physical damage to deal with any day, it's much simpler to deal with.
Since I have an aversion to Pure and Human CHARNAMEs he gave me the first excuse to play a Monk ever. I quite enjoyed playing with him in my party, I must say, though the Sun Soul Monk is by far the weakest of the three by my reckoning. He couldn't even handle the enemies in his own ToB questline.
I see:
"Random Mage casts Lightning Bolt
Random Mage does 34 damage to Minsc
Random Mage does 17 damage to Jaheira"
Not:
"Random Mage is casting Lightning Bolt. You better protect your ass with whatever you've got in the next three seconds or risk getting fried."
Generally, yes, mages are better, but ONLY if played in an absolutely perfect manner. One mistake, one round miscount of your buffs? Dead, right then and there. The reason that @Alesia_BH even uses Fireshield(Blue) at all? Because it runs out one round before her SI:Abjuration, letting her know that she HAS TO GET OUT OF THERE NOW. Mundanes have a bit more leeway in that, since their general strategy is either permanently low saving throws, or permanent immunities through items that mages can't use like the Shield of Harmony, or any weapon besides daggers, clubs, and staffs that contains a useful immunity. Plus, their damage generally doesn't take up their aura use, meaning you can use potions to escape certain effects if you're good enough.
Oh, by the way: Yeah, you broke the game with a Gnome. A gnome that happens to be a I/T, not just an Illusionist: 4/5 of your equipment choices require UAI to actually use, and the Mustard Jelly form leaves you at one attack with a thieves' THAC0, and without spell casting, so, um... You could probably break the game just as hard as a F/T because equipment and UAI are kinda really powerful, especially in ToB where it gets really Monty Haul with effects.
To get back on topic of Monks: Monks are useful because they have yet another layer of defenses they can fall back on, if they have to: they have to both fail the save AND have it get past their MR. They have innate speed, giving a boost and allowing another party member to wear the boots of Cheetah speed. Against things that don't have invisibility detection running, a stealth + Stunning Blow can end fights instantly. They have their weaknesses lategame, sure, same as quite a few classes, but to say they're absolutely useless is dissing them way too much.
And yes, let us not discuss mages vs. fighters in a thread about monks, given the fact that monks are good at tanking both, and not just one.
* Well of course I broke the game with a Gnome, gnomes are the best race, and Mage/Thieves the best class. That said, note that the context of the first part of the post was in demonstrating long term non-ablative (so non-MImg, non-SSkin) methods of damage resistance - specifically as part a discussion about whether magic or physical damage was more dangerous. Physical damage, as demonstrated, has numerous counters to it beyond AC and the ones being accounted for, and every type except slashing (which has the worst time getting through AC) can get up to 95%.
* As such, the fact he's an illusionist has very little to do with the fact he has 25% physical damage reduction gear that makes him a permanent crushing damage tank using an underused magical item (the awesome helm of Roranach) and immunity to missile damage via a shield available in early chapter 2 (which was being used as an example of a high optimisation level counter-mage strategy to show the danger of peon classes, the context of the second half of the post was rebuffing "dispel magic" as a feasible counter).
* Yes, I'm sure the game has been soloed by every class. The AI is far less cruel than I, and Hardiness used to stack. And yes, monks do have a place in ToB which I covered specifically in my first post in the thread. They're a valuable support character that doesn't need to worry about friendly fire and can shut down enemy mages. I actually consider monks to have the most tactical value of any martial character because of their Magic Resistance and that they actually get some save or sucks of their own.
* As for mages making mistakes being dead? No, quite the opposite, it's fighters that are the glass cannons, mages generally have less risk. Need to fight a bunch of people? Send an image and a scout (the monk makes an excellent scout, since they can resist most of the junk, and if they do die.... Eh, they didn't need much gear anyway, send them back in. And if someone does break through and kill the mage? Then the mage just... sends another image, perhaps refreshes their Wizard Eye, and sends in the clones. Mage CHARNAMEs have effective Power Word: Reloads without the game over screen.
* Secondly, note that if things are hitting the mage, jelly or not, they're taking damage from Fireshields - and as I've mentioned repeatedly, even one colour of shield can easily outdamage Dragon's Breath over the course of four rounds without requiring a single aura against any target meleeing you (example: 3 APR and 50% fire resistance means Draconis kills himself against your dual shields within four rounds more often than not if he doesn't wing buffet, and you may as well iHaste him). It's a hugely powerful attack option, and while the mage is dealing damage by standing still they have four rounds of peace and quiet where they can recast any buffs they're feeling particularly anxious about (who cares about spell slots, you have invisibility 10'), attack with the Staff of the Magi to get a free dispel, summon a buddy to deal extra damage, or learn to knit (difficult because they're not proficient with needles).
Ideally it's while they're performing this tanking role that the monk is taking out mages (potentially with the magetank dropping a breach to help) while other martial characters help kill the targets meleeing the mage even faster.
Okay, two edits before I remembered how to differentiate "are" and "is", I should probably sleep.
Funny you should mention how "lowly peons" becoming a threat to mages involves using magic. I'm pretty sure my argument was that physical damage was more dangerous than magical damage. I never said anything about not actually using magic, because that's how classes like F/Ms and R/Cs work. Buff self + smash things. 1) Auditory cues. All spells from the evocation school have the same incantation.
2) Metaknowledge. If a certain mage casts lightning bolt then expect that same mage to still to cast lightning bolt on your next run. Or the run after that. Or the run after the run after that. Etc.
3) It's a lightning bolt, not Dragon's Breath. Moving out of the way/not hugging walls works.
Since we seem to be just bragging now I broke the game with a wolf once. I summoned about a dozen or so images with my bard and then watched the wolf go on a killing spree. It was amusing.
I don't need to be a gnome to kill godlike beings in the most humiliating way possible.
BTW, fireshields still do fire/cold damage. It's a shame mobs in vanilla are too stupid to carry basic elemental protection potions/scrolls, considering these are supposed to be epic-level enemies. It's also a shame that they can't even seem to do anything worthwhile like spam Smite on some smug enemy mage who thinks not using PfMW is a good idea against epic level enemies with access to warrior HLAs.
Unfortunately that's just the way it is. It's easy to take physical damage for granted in the vanilla game I suppose, especially if you're just starting out and you don't know what that enemy mage around the corner has in store for you.
You also did an incredible job demonstrating how well magic counters itself, with that mention of the SI/Improved Invisibility/etc. defense. At that point pretty much only physical attacks (I just realized I should be arguing for physical -attacks-, not physical damage) are dangerous, which is exactly the case in a lot of modded fights.
I wasn't aware of self-aggrandisement on my part, I was merely trying to show that there are ways of maxing out physical damage resistances, several of which are naturally undispellable. There is one small chink in the damage immunity armour though, having tested Arrows of Detonation ignore the shield of reflection. That explosive Achilles heel.
But yeah, I think we've more or less said our respective piece?
Pan: Magic is more dangerous, because magic is the thing that kills you (the physical damage is just a symptom of getting wrecked by a spellcaster), and it takes slightly more resources for mages to become immune to magic than physical damage.
Nuin: Physical attacks are more dangerous, because it's generally the damage that kills you when mages wreck you (the physical damage is the dangerous thing, mages are just breaking down the wards keeping it out), and there are plenty of items you can bring along for immunities to common mage effects.
Does this difference actually change how you treat monks tactically? Or is it pretty much the same as myself, a quick striker working around a Magetank?
Random Monk sidenote: Improved Invisibility your monk. It costs peanuts as a level 4 spell slot for a 4 AC and to hit bonus and it helps protect them from getting targeted by Lower Resistance.
Moreover it is hard to justify some of the kits, even without considering other party members. Gorion's ward could be any type of warrior, mage, good/neutral cleric, that's easily roleplayable. Even an unkitted monk could fit. But a Dark Moon Monk? I am quite sure that Dark Moon is not amongst the sects that are present in Candlekeep.
@Pantalion : Improved invisibility does not give you 4 AC points. It gives the enemies a +4 malus to hit you. It is even better considering that it allows you to bypass the AC cap. A monk with 18 dex and -24 AC (which is the cap with 18dex) and improved invisibility has an effective AC of -28, which is not achievable otherwise. And even better than that: if I am not mistaken Shadow Door does the same. And Night Walkers (from Rasaad ToB quest) give 3 uses of Shadow Door per day.
As for the debate on "what is more dangerous between magic and physical damage?", they are not that easily comparable.
Magic might be useless against a properly equipped character 90% of the time, if it works once (whether an instant death spell or a crowd control, like Symbol, Stun), you are basically dead. On the other hand, physical damage is something a lot more regular. You can estimate how much damage you will take, you can estimate how long your stoneskin will last, etc... But that does not make it less threatening in the end.
Let's take an example: Rasaad's SoA quest, the final fight. It's one of the rare fights that can be really really hard if you are not experienced enough.
Even if you know what to expect, this fight can be really hard to win if you do not have enough raw power, because there are too many fighters (physical type). You know full well what you are going to face, yet that hardly makes the fight any easier.
Another example. One fight that used to cause me a lot of trouble was the fight in the DeArnise keep, the once against two trolls and a yuan-ti mage, in the room with the keep master key.
Back when I first played Baldur's Gate 2 12years ago, I remember reloading countless times on that one till I got enough characters unaffected by the Chaos spell from the Yuan-Ti Mage (because I would always go with my full team, I was young and not that smart at the time). I would easily have dealt with another two or three trolls instead of the Yuan Ti mage, but here, magic won the fight with a single spell. And that's what magic does: when one spell gets through, you're screwed.
(Or 6 words "My enemy's enemy is my friend")
The fact that they scale with XP and not gear also makes them an interesting choice for Nightmare Mode. They can quickly reach weapon levels otherwise unavailable at that point in the game to most other classes.