How do you ... ?

justfeelinathome

... make Neera survive her recruiting encounter on Legacy of Bhaal difficulty?

I play as a semi-solo Shadowdancer (was planing to go legitimate solo at first, but then i figured "Why leave the EE content out, since I'd like to play it?"), meaning that I'll take Dorn, Neera and Rasaad with me for their respective quest-line and dump them straight after.

The new NPC-leveling system doesn't help either: She's a squishy 4 HP mage I can not control during the battle. While sneaking and poisoning the enemy mage to neutralize it for 15 seconds is easy enough, the two fighters get to and make short work of her in that time. The only reliable solution I could come up with is resilient sphere, but sadly my PC can't cast any spells. Suggestions? How did you (if you did) tackle this battle?

P.S.: It doesn't have to be all that reliable of a solution. Reload-counts don't matter to me.

Belfaldurnik

justfeelinathome said:

Reload-counts don't matter to me.

It took me a dozen retries, and I noticed the red wizard doing 30 damage with magic missiles, but I didn't do anything special in that battle, and not all were level 2 yet. Five custom characters however plus Imoen: http://steamcommunity.com/app/228280/discussions/3/364040166676601606/#c364040961435281305
Afterwards, I kicked Imoen out for Neera to take her gem bag, then replaced her with Imoen again.

SirBatince

I imagine you could sell evermemory and go buy a wand of sleep at thalanthyrs

justfeelinathome

@SirBatince Unfortunately, that's not an option: I just checked and on LoB their levels are of the charts (2x13 and 17), so Sleep won't affect them at all (they don't even have to safe).

I think this encounter would be much better handled if it would resolve somewhat differently, at least on LoB. Maybe have the two fighter goons use bare fists and just the mage would need to be taken care of quickly? Make Neera unkillable for the duration of this battle? Or make it a scripted event all together? That'd be a shame, however, since I feel that little scirmishes like this add to the liveliness of the game world.

alceryes

justfeelinathome said:

I'll take Dorn, Neera and Rasaad with me for their respective quest-line and dump them straight after.

You may have answered your own question. Could Dorn and Rasaad run enough interference (and stay alive) while you slip all the bad guys a Mickey?

JuliusBorisov

@justfeelinathome is right about the Sleep spell/wand. It doesn't work in the LoB mode.

Try summons. Summon skeleton warriors or any other summons you can get before the talk starts, move them to the place of the future fight, so that after the dialogue these summons could get all the enemies' attention.

Wowo

Wand of Fear or Monster Summoning but need someone to use it ...

Maybe you can use the Fear wand actually?

RelSundan

JuliusBorisov said:

@justfeelinathome is right about the Sleep spell/wand. It doesn't work in the LoB mode.

Try summons. Summon skeleton warriors or any other summons you can get before the talk starts, move them to the place of the future fight, so that after the dialogue these summons could get all the enemies' attention.

Can you summon skeletons through a wand? He mentioned he is a shadowdancer and can't cast spells.

lunar

It is sad and disturbing to picture poor scared Neera being cut down by those ruffians wielding swords.
In the first versions of ee, she was unkillable, right?
Maybe you can give her cre file a minhp1 item via eekeeper, and then remove it again with eekeeper after recruiting her?
Otherwise, it will be too difficult to keep her alive during the encounter if not outright impossible in LoB. Even if you cast invisibility on herself she will go and attack and blow her cover, right? Not a stellar move for 17 int. (You do NOT melee with only 4 hp. This is something like a principle.)

justfeelinathome

Yeah, I faintly remember something as @lunar mentioned. Now I managed with good ol' Dwarven Muscle No. 2 as a back up: Kagain was recruited for the sole purpose of (repeatedly) knocking Neera unconscious. I stayed stationary and in plain sight until the mage had expended all of his spells trying to cast them despite poison ticks, so he'd start meeleing me and not stand still on the spot to hurl spells in Neeras way.

With the undivided attention of the three goons, I kited them out of Neeras (and her AIs) sight, kicked Kagain first and then their butts. So, technically I did all the work on the enemies. However, this cost me quite a few potions (tanking with a thief) and was only possible because I got decent gear and level (8) by now, meaning I'm OP for her quest. Well, at least it's short.

I'll make her temporary invincibility a feature ticket on redmine, since this isn't an intuitive way of doing things and I've yet to come up with another one. Players shouldn't be punished for her AI. Either the afore mentioned way, or by making her join the party during combat.

ConjurerDragon

justfeelinathome said:

... make Neera survive her recruiting encounter on Legacy of Bhaal difficulty?

I play as a semi-solo Shadowdancer (was planing to go legitimate solo at first, but then i figured "Why leave the EE content out, since I'd like to play it?"), meaning that I'll take Dorn, Neera and Rasaad with me for their respective quest-line and dump them straight after.

The new NPC-leveling system doesn't help either: She's a squishy 4 HP mage I can not control during the battle. While sneaking and poisoning the enemy mage to neutralize it for 15 seconds is easy enough, the two fighters get to and make short work of her in that time. The only reliable solution I could come up with is resilient sphere, but sadly my PC can't cast any spells. Suggestions? How did you (if you did) tackle this battle?

P.S.: It doesn't have to be all that reliable of a solution. Reload-counts don't matter to me.

Can´t you have Edwin join you and simply send them away?

justfeelinathome

ConjurerDragon said:

justfeelinathome said:

... make Neera survive her recruiting encounter on Legacy of Bhaal difficulty?

I play as a semi-solo Shadowdancer (was planing to go legitimate solo at first, but then i figured "Why leave the EE content out, since I'd like to play it?"), meaning that I'll take Dorn, Neera and Rasaad with me for their respective quest-line and dump them straight after.

The new NPC-leveling system doesn't help either: She's a squishy 4 HP mage I can not control during the battle. While sneaking and poisoning the enemy mage to neutralize it for 15 seconds is easy enough, the two fighters get to and make short work of her in that time. The only reliable solution I could come up with is resilient sphere, but sadly my PC can't cast any spells. Suggestions? How did you (if you did) tackle this battle?

P.S.: It doesn't have to be all that reliable of a solution. Reload-counts don't matter to me.

Can´t you have Edwin join you and simply send them away?

...now I feel really dumb for going through such lengths, even though I, at some point, knew this was possible. Thanks though, for if I'll ever find myself in this situation again, I'll do it that way. Cheers, @ConjurerDragon!