Throne of Bhaal. Succubus vorpalled, Alu-Fiends vorpalled, Irenicus vorpalled.
@histamiini Great stuff - as always. Will look forward to Sevens ascension.
I see that you have put the Ravager +6 into good use. Would the axe of the unyielding +5 be able to do the same? Or is the +6 a must for bypassing absolute immunity?
Btw. Please disregard my comment in the UCL thread where I compared Barca to the Sigil Troupe (great actors...). Getting rid of Alves and Neymar has helped a lot.. if only Suarez...
The Axe of Unyielding +5 also vorpals Demons and Planetars @StummvonBordwehr. Ravager +6 on top of this bypasses absolute immunity which works wonders especially against Melissan. I am sure @histamiini will show us its true power soon!
@Harpagornis He's alive, but I'm too somewhat busy, I'll see if I can take a crack at it today.
@StummvonBordwehr Axe of Unyealding +5 does work, but because it gives a save -4 penalty for Death and Fallen Solars having -2 Death in LoB, the chance of Vorpalling them is 0,1*0,1 or 1/100. Basically its Vorpal effect is pretty useless in the end battle. The Ravager +6 is the only weapon that gives a flat rate of 10% to Vorpal, without a save, so it's wonderful against the ever teleporting and healing Solars.
Wait what, there's a UCL thread in here? Have to take a peek. Well Suarez has been better lately, although start of the season he was probably the worst player I've ever seen playing football.
With patch 2.5 on the horizon and Martyrs Morningstar most probably no more working (except for Mages) the Noble Adventurer Challenge will run in to deep trouble against Big B. Some classes like Cavalier or Dwarven Defender or Fighter/Mage still might be able to tank him down but the other ones will have to use hit & run at some point. Without Invisibility Potions this will be very, very painful. Therefore my suggestion is:
Each character can you use their Oaths of Devotion not only to bind charged items but also to select specific encounters which will allow them to place three more magic items that can only be used in this fight.
This should make fights like Big B - or Melissan - a bit easier and gives each player a little it more freedom.
With the new update for the "Noble Adventurer Challenge" i restarted with Krell the Human Berserker7/Druid.
After Shoal was daggered down & Ankheg Armor put him in green he prepared the Basilisk XP Loop. This lead to lots of traveling as the Lesser Basilisk resisted the charm four times so Talanthyr had to recast Invisibility. Once the charm worked the rest was easy going. With max XP reached and level 9 Druid Krell buried Dushai who was fast-charmed with only four tries this time.
Soon it will be time to follow the mainquest again but unlike Xaghul the Barbarian Krell only wears three Magic Items so far: Algernons Cloak, Ring of Free Action & some healing potions. The rest is filled with Throwing Daggers. Thanks to three points in Daggers they hurt quite much: 11-14 damage, 3 APR. Scimitars were pushed to GM - should be helpful against Big B later on. If he gets this far!
I played around with the group of Rahvin @semiticgod and - holy cow - the strongest member is by far Shaldrissa!!
After they went hostile i used CTL+Q to get the other five into my group to watch the following 1vs5. I was quite suprised that Shaldrissa quite regularly managed to kill of them if she manages to caught them in her Web + Stinking Cloud combo. With a lot of Fireballs, Lightning Bolts and Cone of Colds following she can melt the others down really fast (thanks to double damage).
I did the same with the rest but all got melted in no time. The lesson to be learned? Mages have to be banned from this game!
I assumed Shaldrissa wouldn't be very useful in the Sarevok fight, since her mage spells would fail against the magic-immune Skeleton Warriors. Since Semaj, Diarmid, and Tazok can be bombed to death from afar, the only critters you really need to fight are Angelo, Sarevok, and some Skeleton Warriors. Gorf and Haseo excels at that role; Shaldrissa would suffer.
Sure, against Sarevok she isnt that helpful @semiticgod - but that wasnt my point. My playing around was "just for fun" showing her power when fighting the other five. As they tend to fail their saves against web and/or stinking cloud she has a lot of time dishing out free damage. Not to mention her Mirror Image/Stoneskins. Too funny that the Single Skeleton Warrior Wudei can summon would turn the tide easily in favor of the five. However: All of this is just of theoretical value.
Finally had time for Melissan. Start of the battle Sim PfM'd Sendai and Abazigal, and I charmed Sarevok. Then it was just a matter of smacking everybody and keeping Sarevok alive with RoR. And after everybody were close to death I wasted Sendai, because she was the only one healing and teleporting with her stupid ring.
Didn't save you that time, huh? Melissan spawned and then Sarevok wasted Gromnir, and I smacked Abazigal, Yaga-Shura and Illasera down with Gww's. And Melissan concentrated on Sarevok, at this point the battle was still well in control, I was going to waste the couple demons hunting me, and then retreat to the corner to jump to Pocket Plane. But I just noticed too late that Sarevok was on his last health bar, of course Melissan wasted him with the last hit she got through before my RoR rescued him. Then she did what any computer would do at that point, summon the biggest and hardest mob I've seen her summon, and many, many Cambions, of course.
Tanked her Time Stop easily with 100 DR, but then Cambions stole my Thac0 and what was I supposed to do then? I Dimension Door'd a while, but computer smartly positioned Cambions in all pools to counter this. So then I just thought, forget it and started tanking Melissan. And it was going nowhere with bad Thac0, but I still had 7 minutes of 100 DR though.
Boom, death, charmed, what? Turns out end battle Succubus can Charm with -10 penalty to spells, and I "only" had -7 saves, had Hardiness (-7) instead of Defensive Stance (-9). Again had no idea about this because my Cavalier was immune to Charm. Damn that's it, the real killers in the end battle are the Cambions and Succubus, not the Big Five or Melissan. If Cambions steal your Thac0 that's basically it because Melissan will constantly teleport onto you and grind you down. The same goes for Succubus, not many classes can protect against -10 penalty vs spells, because all normal buffs will get quickly dispelled. I could beat Melissan now reloading, but I'm not going to bother, I need cheese, I need cheese to counter her cheese, and that's what Six has in her pockets.
A bit unlucky with the big incoming demon wave @histamiini after everything was prepared for the last dinner. Yeah, the Cambions are really annoying for Warriors but up to now i wasnt aware that the succubus charm got a -10 penalty. Should remember this. However: Six should have an easier time beating big bad Melissan into the ground - good hunting!
@histamiini Aaah, shoot man !! I thought Seven was gonna do it. Well, if you have to go down, might as well go down proudly like Seven did !! Awesome, awesome job getting there !!
@Harpagornis Yeah made one mistake not keeping Sarevok alive long enough, and then the huge Cambion/Succubus spawn was just unlucky. I don't really like the balance in the end battle, because the critters are almost the main opponents, so it's just roll of the dice how many you'll get them summoned to you each time and how hard the end battle is. Got tired of the ToB, so I'm probably going to start another character, you can erase Natural Redux and Seven from the list.
@Arctodus Seven did very well, ToB was quite easy to that point, but then it got quickly turned around with Cambions, and eventually a Succubus. End battle still needs a lot of work to be comfortable with.
Hard luck @histamiini. I've not ever tried the final battle with mods, but I have a vague recollection that the succubus charm modifier only works against males. If that's right then perhaps you need to demonstrate some girlpower .
Any idea which class to play next @histamiini or are you going to take a break?
I parked Krell my Berserker7/Druid in Baldurs Gate to restart with one of my very first Baldurs Gate characters: Thorgrim the Dwarven Fighter/Thief. He got the same name and portrait like nearly 23 years ago even though i only rolled a 75 for him. The low charisma will it make a bit harder to convince others and also push the prices so he will have to do more quest stuff. Still not sure if i should go for the Basilisk-XP-Loop this time cause - hands down - its killing the fun of the game a bit. I am sure @Grond0 would agree - no?
@Grond0 You're right, end battle Succubus has different Charm spell against male and female, and only male version has -10 bonus, against female there's no bonus.
Hrhrhr... could get interesting @histamiini. In the "Noble Challenge" Mages will quickly run into troubles with all the Mage Scrolls around. Hoarding them to gulp Int Potions for flawless scribing will get tricky!
Thorgrim kited Shoal in the meanwhile and helped Arcand. A short visit in Beregost (Cloak) and a quick trip to Tenya pushed him to level 4/4. Time to visit the Basilisks - without the cheating scrolls.
EDIT: Korax cleared the house! Mutamin got paralyzed right at the start so the rest was easy going shooting with Composite Longbow whenever the basilisks were hold. Level 5/6 reached. Time for Dushai and some reputation questing to lower the prices a little bit!
Still not sure if i should go for the Basilisk-XP-Loop this time cause - hands down - its killing the fun of the game a bit. I am sure @Grond0 would agree - no?
In principle I would certainly agree. In practice I do remember being tempted by the idea of short-cuts while painfully working a wizard slayer up through levels for the 4th or 5th time - I resisted though . One of the advantages of having so many classes to choose from is you can swap between those to change the nature and length of grinding required to help keep things fresh.
Seeing that 2.5 will introduce quite a few big changes, like Oil of Speed will now double apr and enemies no longer hunt you being invisible, I think I'll delay starting the next character to when it's released, and continue Six meantime to Melissan, shouldn't take too long. Then I can wipe the EET from my computer and make a real fresh start.
@histamiini I hope they won't make potions of Haste double APR. That would be stupidly overpowered. CamDawg said that they're still reviewing these changes, so it *might* not make it in the final version.
I think the Oil of Speed change is good, it makes fighters apr more valuable and takes the edge slightly from the mages. To this point Oil of Speed did nothing with Grand Mastery,
BG1 Fighter Specialized 2 apr, 3 apr with Oil of Speed Fighter Grand Mastery 2,5 apr, 3 apr with Oil of Speed
BG2 Fighter Specialized 3 apr, 4 apr with Oil of Speed Fighter Grand Mastery 3,5 apr, 4 apr with Oil of Speed
Well, I believe that having access to an effect equivalent to a level 7 arcane spell as soon as you talk to Imoen in BG1 is a bit much. It also only increases the dps gap between dual-wielding and any other style of fighting. I don't mind that it doesn't do much to fighters with GM, because they already have better thac0 and damage for equivalent strength. And they do attack more when they're not hasted.
Well, that's my two cents...
And don't forget the duration : double apr for five turns (!!!). To me, that's clearly OP stuff.
@Arctodus There's not that many Oil of Speeds before Baldur's Gate I don't think. Grand Mastery is a huge investment of ***** and then you're married with it, so I think it should have more of an edge than 3 dmg and -2 Thac0. Now every specialized kit is pretty much superior because they get other goodies that aren't balanced I don't think.
@histamiini While I agree with you that hasted GM doesn't give all that much compared to hasted SPEC, I just don't think that making an external item OP is the way to balance proficiencies. Haste should give a flat +1 apr, for instance. Or maybe use the Tweak Anthology component that gives +1.5 apr on GM instead of just 1.
Having a level 7 fighter rocking 6 apr while dual weilding in BG1 is too much. It can trivialize too many things. Those are BG2 numbers, not BG1.
Edit : and you'll create other imbalancement. What will be the point in using shields ? Is a few more points of AC a worthy loss to have -2 apr ?
@Arctodus Maybe you're right, I agree 6 apr would make the game easier in BG1, but it would be more balanced in BG2 because mages wouldn't be the only one access to easy never ending double apr. Mages too would get 4 apr in BG1, the change affects everyone. If Ring of Gaxx would be unnerfed back to give the full time Improved Haste, I wouldn't mind if Oil of Speed wasn't changed. But I kind of would like to experience how the new change works.
Personally I don't think you should be able to achieve grand mastery in BG1 anyway - the ability to do so depends on dualling from a warrior class into a non-warrior class and allowing the result to get better proficiencies than staying as a warrior seems counter-intuitive to me.
@histamiini Yep, if the change would be applied to BG2 only, that wouldn't be as bad in my opinion. There's plenty of badass creatures in BG2 to hit back, even if you have a few more apr. And since Improved Haste can be acquired fairly soon, it wouldn't change much is the greater scheme of things. My beef is mainly for BG1, actually.
Comments
I am already planning for another run but time is lacking so its up to @histamiini to continue the show. Is Seven still alive?
Great stuff - as always. Will look forward to Sevens ascension.
I see that you have put the Ravager +6 into good use. Would the axe of the unyielding +5 be able to do the same? Or is the +6 a must for bypassing absolute immunity?
Btw. Please disregard my comment in the UCL thread where I compared Barca to the Sigil Troupe (great actors...). Getting rid of Alves and Neymar has helped a lot.. if only Suarez...
@StummvonBordwehr Axe of Unyealding +5 does work, but because it gives a save -4 penalty for Death and Fallen Solars having -2 Death in LoB, the chance of Vorpalling them is 0,1*0,1 or 1/100. Basically its Vorpal effect is pretty useless in the end battle. The Ravager +6 is the only weapon that gives a flat rate of 10% to Vorpal, without a save, so it's wonderful against the ever teleporting and healing Solars.
Wait what, there's a UCL thread in here? Have to take a peek. Well Suarez has been better lately, although start of the season he was probably the worst player I've ever seen playing football.
Each character can you use their Oaths of Devotion not only to bind charged items but also to select specific encounters which will allow them to place three more magic items that can only be used in this fight.
This should make fights like Big B - or Melissan - a bit easier and gives each player a little it more freedom.
Does this sound like a decent plan?
After Shoal was daggered down & Ankheg Armor put him in green he prepared the Basilisk XP Loop. This lead to lots of traveling as the Lesser Basilisk resisted the charm four times so Talanthyr had to recast Invisibility. Once the charm worked the rest was easy going. With max XP reached and level 9 Druid Krell buried Dushai who was fast-charmed with only four tries this time.
Soon it will be time to follow the mainquest again but unlike Xaghul the Barbarian Krell only wears three Magic Items so far: Algernons Cloak, Ring of Free Action & some healing potions. The rest is filled with Throwing Daggers. Thanks to three points in Daggers they hurt quite much: 11-14 damage, 3 APR. Scimitars were pushed to GM - should be helpful against Big B later on. If he gets this far!
After they went hostile i used CTL+Q to get the other five into my group to watch the following 1vs5. I was quite suprised that Shaldrissa quite regularly managed to kill of them if she manages to caught them in her Web + Stinking Cloud combo. With a lot of Fireballs, Lightning Bolts and Cone of Colds following she can melt the others down really fast (thanks to double damage).
I did the same with the rest but all got melted in no time. The lesson to be learned? Mages have to be banned from this game!
Didn't save you that time, huh? Melissan spawned and then Sarevok wasted Gromnir, and I smacked Abazigal, Yaga-Shura and Illasera down with Gww's. And Melissan concentrated on Sarevok, at this point the battle was still well in control, I was going to waste the couple demons hunting me, and then retreat to the corner to jump to Pocket Plane. But I just noticed too late that Sarevok was on his last health bar, of course Melissan wasted him with the last hit she got through before my RoR rescued him. Then she did what any computer would do at that point, summon the biggest and hardest mob I've seen her summon, and many, many Cambions, of course.
Tanked her Time Stop easily with 100 DR, but then Cambions stole my Thac0 and what was I supposed to do then? I Dimension Door'd a while, but computer smartly positioned Cambions in all pools to counter this. So then I just thought, forget it and started tanking Melissan. And it was going nowhere with bad Thac0, but I still had 7 minutes of 100 DR though.
Boom, death, charmed, what? Turns out end battle Succubus can Charm with -10
@Arctodus Seven did very well, ToB was quite easy to that point, but then it got quickly turned around with Cambions, and eventually a Succubus. End battle still needs a lot of work to be comfortable with.
I parked Krell my Berserker7/Druid in Baldurs Gate to restart with one of my very first Baldurs Gate characters: Thorgrim the Dwarven Fighter/Thief. He got the same name and portrait like nearly 23 years ago even though i only rolled a 75 for him. The low charisma will it make a bit harder to convince others and also push the prices so he will have to do more quest stuff. Still not sure if i should go for the Basilisk-XP-Loop this time cause - hands down - its killing the fun of the game a bit. I am sure @Grond0 would agree - no?
Thorgrim kited Shoal in the meanwhile and helped Arcand. A short visit in Beregost (Cloak) and a quick trip to Tenya pushed him to level 4/4. Time to visit the Basilisks - without the cheating scrolls.
EDIT: Korax cleared the house! Mutamin got paralyzed right at the start so the rest was easy going shooting with Composite Longbow whenever the basilisks were hold. Level 5/6 reached. Time for Dushai and some reputation questing to lower the prices a little bit!
Well, that's my two cents...
And don't forget the duration : double apr for five turns (!!!). To me, that's clearly OP stuff.
Having a level 7 fighter rocking 6 apr while dual weilding in BG1 is too much. It can trivialize too many things. Those are BG2 numbers, not BG1.
Edit : and you'll create other imbalancement. What will be the point in using shields ? Is a few more points of AC a worthy loss to have -2 apr ?