The Tales of Rilthea, The Elven Fighter/Mage *Will Contain Spoilers*
Dragonspear
Member Posts: 1,838
This is the playthrough blog for the elven fighter/mage Rilthea.
In here I will list her stats, biography, general play style and progress throughout the games. While this will not be a solo run (teams are fun), nor a no death run, we are going modless (Subject to Change) and for as few deaths as relatively possible.
Some interesting things of note before delving too deep into her.
1. Her character concept will be based around that of a Bladesinger, as such this means that she will NOT be using a shield in either game and once she reaches SoA she will be taking single weapon style. I haven't decided yet whether or not she should use a bow in Elven fashion, as she is trying to emulate the heritage that she has not been able to participate in while in Candlekeep.
2. One of the requirements of a Bladesinger is that she help any elf or elven nature in need. For most of the game this is fairly simple, some things I wonder though are about party members. In particular Xan, Coran, Kivan and Aerie. Do you think she'd be more likely to travel with these as compared to others. I think she would probably find Haer'dalis interesting, especially compared to her own combat style and likely travel with him (maybe eventually dual-wielding after taking ideas she learns from him).
3. One of the main reasons I'm running this class is to make use of spells that I've commonly neglected through my regular Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale games. As I've primarily played Paladins and Rangers, most of my mages have sat in the back nuking so this gives me a good opportunity to use the wide selection of Touch and Cone spells.
In here I will list her stats, biography, general play style and progress throughout the games. While this will not be a solo run (teams are fun), nor a no death run, we are going modless (Subject to Change) and for as few deaths as relatively possible.
Some interesting things of note before delving too deep into her.
1. Her character concept will be based around that of a Bladesinger, as such this means that she will NOT be using a shield in either game and once she reaches SoA she will be taking single weapon style. I haven't decided yet whether or not she should use a bow in Elven fashion, as she is trying to emulate the heritage that she has not been able to participate in while in Candlekeep.
2. One of the requirements of a Bladesinger is that she help any elf or elven nature in need. For most of the game this is fairly simple, some things I wonder though are about party members. In particular Xan, Coran, Kivan and Aerie. Do you think she'd be more likely to travel with these as compared to others. I think she would probably find Haer'dalis interesting, especially compared to her own combat style and likely travel with him (maybe eventually dual-wielding after taking ideas she learns from him).
3. One of the main reasons I'm running this class is to make use of spells that I've commonly neglected through my regular Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale games. As I've primarily played Paladins and Rangers, most of my mages have sat in the back nuking so this gives me a good opportunity to use the wide selection of Touch and Cone spells.
2
Comments
I think it sounds like fun to assemble all the game's other elves given your character concept. I think Haer 'Dalis would be a great addition as well.
With the elven Bladesinger emphasis you could certainly start with bow and sword in BG1. You could cast disabling spells first, fire some arrows, and rush in to slap touch and cone spells, then melee.
Anyway, I look forward to reading your adventure! Nice concept!
(Looking forward to this with great interest, as my namesake character is a half-elven Fighter-Mage and I'm going to be taking him through BG:EE for the first run. So I'll be taking mental notes.)
The only half-elves I can think of (that are possible party members) are Khalid and Jaheria. I believe she'd prolly treat them as Elves, especially since her foster father suggested them. I don't know if she could abandon Imoen at this point.
Which I guess is part of the problem. I keep looking forward to BG2, since I like continuity in my parties, but obviously the "better" party combination for me is Khalid, Jaheria, Coran, Xan, Kivan.
I don't know why she'd see them as abominations though. I think the only abominations she'd see are the drow and I'm still not certain if she'd be willing to condemn Viconia on sight. She might not want to travel with her, on the other hand she might prefer to travel with Viconia to keep an eye on her.
So half-elves = Interesting curiosity, but still elves
Drow = actually in the underdark, easily enemies.
Drow on surface = cautious curiosity
Viconia = tough call
Sorry these help me flesh out my characters so thank you for all the advice and criticism. I don't have a lot of literature on Bladesingers other than what I can google.
Of particular note these are the quests I've done already:
Belt Fetish Ogre
Assassin at FAI
Picked up Khalid and Jaheria (Khalid was already a high level 2, Jaheria was a high level 1 in both Druid and Fighter)
Turned in Belt Fetish Ogre
Took the Pantaloons since some uppity noble confused my Elf for help. Thus Lawful Good or not, I had to feed him a sarcastic bs line. Haven't decided if I should return them yet or not.
Joia's ring
Of particular note I FORGOT to pick up the quest for the spiders, thus missing out on the very useful antidotes.
Went to High Hedge, picked up Kivan
Got Purdue's Short Sword
Walked in the front door, promptly got my face pummelled in by the flesh golems
RELOAD (Old arcane FPS shooter voice)
Waylaid on my way to High Hedge (Wild Dogs and Ogrillions)
Had the other eye caved in by this
RELOAD
Back to High Hedge, pick up Kivan again. MAKE SURE I QUICK SAVE THIS TIME
Talk to Talantyr, pick up Friends, Sleep and Blind
Go get our poor chicken Melicamp
Go back to High Hedge
Good Ole Mage Master Thalantyr minored in fried chicken.
RELOAD
Good Ole Mage Master Thalantyr majored in restoring his now apprentice.
Head on over to Beregost
Talk down Marl (Strange I guess its Tutu that gives you +1 rep here cause I didn't get any rep for talking him down)
Due Silke's quest. Kivan, Imoen and Jaheria all combine to decide that she really shouldn't be allowed to cast spells.
Fight Karlat, blind him, get far enough away so that he attacks Khalid, kill him
Give Purdue his short sword
Oh right Firebead, here's your book. Btw I wish you had that identify scroll I should have learned it instead of giving it to you.
Rest, memorize sleep along with armor
Blasted Spiders, poison my main character, use the last of my healing potions and jaheria's healing spells making sure I don't die.
Learn about the Ogrillion quest
Head south
Pick up Rue's letter
Pick up the OTHER halfling thief's boots of stealth
I decide about now I'm just going to head on south to Nashkel so I don't have to hear Jaheria whine about the quest. She started around the time of killing the spiders.
Continue south
Fight the pack of hobgoblins, oops forgot to memorize sleep. Hey they hurt when you're RPing your refusal to use a bow for the most part.
Continue South again, Hi Nashkel long time no see. It's been a few months.
Go into the Inn, kill another assassin (at this point my character, having 18 Int decides that going into cities with at least the armor spell on will prolly be a good point from here on out.
Talk to the mayor, hey what's up ya that's Jaheria sure I'll help.
Btw Khalid, happy birthday here is some plate mail to replace your outdated scale mail.
Wave hello (but don't talk to) Minsc and Edwin
Look up where the Ankheg armor is and pick it up for Jaheria. Important since I plan on making her wear it for the rest of the game.
Head BACK up to Beregost, turn in the boots and the letter.
Head back up to FAI and turn in the stuff from the spiders.
Currently stuck at 15 reputation which is kinda frustrating since my elf has 9 Charisma.
Also so that I could just go Longsword and Single Weapon style for now (herm, actually that would be rather broken right now since it would give me the AC of a Magical Shield, so maybe Longsword ++, Quarterstaff +, Single Weapon +). But also so that I could reach grand mastery in these weapons. I really don't intend on ever using my bow.
And also just to hide helmets ><.
Can't you change your sprite with Gatekeeper to a mage's? Or it might bug / glitch the game when you use weapons not allowed to mages (like longswords)?
I sorta sped through most of the early chapters in order to get Coran at a low enough level to have a significant influence over his thieving points (since he's replacing Imoen). The good news is that I picked him up at 3/3 and he dinged 4/4 not long after I got him. Now the bad news, Cloakwood is kicking my backside. Since Coran comes with a built in Quest timer for completing the Wyvern quest I had to rush through most of cloakwood ASAP. The spider map and the random encounters are giving me nightmares, partly cause of my level, partly cause I was low on arrows (to the point of being out at the end), the obscene amounts of poison and finally because sleep and blind are quickly beginning to lose their value, thus Xan is starting to lose his value.
First though, the party itself:
PC: Finally hit 3/3, but that has taken awhile. With Buffs (Shield, PoE, Mirror Image, Armor) I can get her rather beefy for a little bit but it takes time.
Khalid: Just hit level 5. He's also trying to fight multiple ettercaps and swordspiders by himself too often. That said I'm really beginning to think that I'm going to start dumping my strength spell on him instead of xan so he can start icking up some slack.
Jaheria: Between her annoyingly poor spell selection and her being the only divine caster, she's stuck being a massive workhorse. Also since I learned that Shelleigh and Flame Sword are both not considered magical weapons for purposes of hitting the target I had to get rid of my shield on her so she could use my magical quarterstaff. Not that she gets much time to use it. With the low health of my characters, she's spending a lot of the time healbotting.
Xan: Primarily been using him as a blind and sleep bot but those are really falling in effectiveness. Been casting strength on him and trying to use his moonblade to some effect but its not going so well. Also it may be a bug, but Xan using his Moonblade isn't getting the Elven sword thac0 bonus. Also horror hasn't been helpin as much as I thought it would be.
Kivan and Coran: Making up the back line they're shooting as fast as they can. Kivan is using the Longbow of Marksmenship while Coran uses the composite longbow +1. These guys are both getting a workout and seriously depleting their quivers about as fast as I can load them up. Like everyone else in the party they're having to pick up a lot of slack of Xan. However, Coran also needs to get some levels on him so he can start detecting traps like yesterday. He only managed to detect 1 web trap in cloakwood.
Overall things have gotten pretty painful and I think it might be time for my PC to recognize that maybe things won't be as easy as they originally seemed to be in order to get some Sarevok and might have to explore some and get some side work accomplished, both for xp and for gold (still can't afford even one, much less both robes of teh archi magi). Also the 3 multiclasses need to get up to snuff with everyone else already.