I think I am playing this wrong. (very minor spoiler)
Chiyosuke
Member Posts: 7
I feel like I am abusing the game, for example after you finish exploring the nashkal mines and run into the those 4 Amazons (as you so put it). I end up having to bait one of them over to us outside of her posse's range and beating the hell out of her, sleeping and doing it again. I also end up having to bait out most of their hold spells.
It just feels so cheap on my part. Am I doing this wrong? What are my other options?
It just feels so cheap on my part. Am I doing this wrong? What are my other options?
3
Comments
For example, setting up a group of bounty hunters outside of the exit to a map where you just finished off the first main boss in the main quest line and then following that up with another insanely powerful assassin you meet before reaching the closest inn, followed by another assassin inside said Inn (if you didn't take care of her before this all went down.)
There is nothing wrong with employing that tactic.
Your other options however is to ignore the battle altogether, and exit the mine in which you came in (lame, I know), or going west to fight Ankhegs instead, or south to fight everything else on the map.
Or you could have completed the map prior to entering the mines, meta-gaming the encounter to memorize spells like silence and hold person to negate some of them as your fighters close in on them.
But it is your game. How you choose to complete it is entirely up to you. If you feel like you are being cheap, try doing a straight out fight. It maybe harder, but if you win, you may get more satisfaction out of it. If you don't win, don't sweat it. Just continue on how you were playing prior to your moral dilemma.
I recommend scs mod to remedy that. Just general ai enchantments will ensure grouped monsters follow and help each other. Improved mages/clerics may be a bit hardcore for new players, though you can customise the difficulty to your taste while installing. Definitely skip improved chapter end boss fights if it is your first time.
Kiting is something different, when fighting a melee opponent, running in circles so that he can not touch you is kiting. Your other members can pelt the enemy with missiles and spells meanwhile. Or, with a fast quarterstaff and two handed weapon style you can smack the enemy once and run in circles for 6 seconds, never allowing it to touch you, then attack again.
If you wish to avoid the feeling of guilt, tackle all of them head on, but use entangle, web, charm, sleep, hold spells to disable them and finish one by one.
For me encounters like this go through three evolutions/reloads:
First: The sudden 'game over' screen followed by thoughts like "What the Hell just happened?", "Why didn't I scout ahead properly?" and "Why wasn't I better prepared?".
Second: A cautious 'Let's see if this will work' approach designed mainly to appraise the strengths and weaknesses of my opponents that invariably ends in a slower, yet no less final, defeat.
Third: Make a plan to defeat them in a fair fight (the definition of "fair" being entirely my own and dependant on my mood at the time). Or run away and come back later when my party is stronger.
However, if you feel the tactic you are using is cheating or abusing the way the game works, then force yourself to change that tactic. For example, I used to find on my runs I would end up with lots and lots of potions left over, in fact, after chapter 2 or 3 I was finding that potions were just taking up space because I never needed them. By changing the way I played, I found that I was working more strategically and abusing less, but also using more potions.
However, baiting like this makes me feel lousy. Worse even, than reloading 5 times until all the saving throws go my way, (save scumming).
I am alright with separating in general though. As long as I get the whole party in view and then scatter, that feels ok with me. This can split both teams up, with random encounters added on top, creating chaos. But then your team can consolidate and start picking off the scattered opponents. Sure, they should be able to consolidate too, so it's still cheesy, but somehow better.
1. You can rest in Mulahey's cave without fear of being attacked. I don't know if that's ever explicitly explained to the player through the various dialogues that appear but it really ends up making that fight less of a pain - particularly if you don't know your way through the mines. I know when I was a kid playing this game I never knew that and so that whole area was extraordinarily difficult - when it doesn't mean to be, or indeed, was not intended to be.
2. The 2 rogues can typically by nixed by the spell sleep - which makes it a 2v6 in most instances - unless you're soloing or playing with a reduced party. The spells the two clerics cast can be pretty nasty for your party, but it's not the end of the world if only *some* of the party is taken out and it's also not too difficult to interrupt their casting using missile weapons, evocation spells you may have, or command: die (or more powerful mage spells). You can also utilize sneaking, invisibility, or sanctuary to position yourself better for the fight if you so desire.
There's a lot you can do to them - also of note is that you can web them and snipe them out with missile weapons (a pretty basic tactic in BG1 and early BG2 if you just don't know what else to do) - particularly since you find a scroll of web in Mulahey's cave IIRC that's just begging to be used.
If kiting feels cheap to you, I would instead opt to just take the fight straight up and try different tactics - particularly if you've got casters you've got a spot *right* before the fight where you can rest and experiment with different spell set-ups. If you're well and truly desperate there's also a wand of frost near the Nashkel mine's entrance that can make the fight a cinch at the cost of some lewts. Oils of speed on a strong archer (particularly if they're using arrows of biting) can really just end the fight outright fairly quickly lol. But there's no right or wrong way to approach the game it's just what you find most enjoyable. Even if you've not bought any arrows of biting you may have some laying around depending no where you've been since sometimes hobgoblins you meet out on the sword coast are carrying some. All those kobold fire arrows can do pretty substantial damage too.
You can try adjusting the difficulty down a notch or two for just that particular encounter.
I've also got a residual memory that tells me to always rest before exiting the mines and never under any circumstances rest immediately after exiting (this is just ingrained habit now and I've got no Idea what the original reason for this was).
If you think about it, in PnP version you can do it in a lot of ways. I see the baiting-separating as a way to emulate what you can do in PnP.
While drawing one enemy at a time always felt unseemly, the game only offered the other option of running across open ground to attack enemies who could start casting spells and preparing to fight while my side was trying to close the gap. The Go-Go's are the ones who want this fight--Belinda Carlisle should be coming at me, not the other way around. (Especially since she never returned my calls in the 80's, and I'm still kinda bitter.)
I use a mixture of the tactics mentioned above depending on my playthrough; leave it for later (you can avoid this fight by going west from the cave and returning to Nashkel to recover and restock your supplies), or use disabling spells, wants and buffing potions. Don't forget you can cast from scrolls too if your magic users are low-level.
Alternatively, do a few side quests before tackling the mines to level up your party to make things a bit easier.
It's only cheese if you think it is! if you feel really bad you could always donate to the temple
earthFaerun.