Sophia, the Elven Lawful Good Dragon Disciple, with the boon of MYSTRA
Currently Level 7
Zero deaths
Lvl 1 spells: find familiar, blindness, protection from petrification, shield, expeditious retreat (maybe should have taken mm for disruption)
Lvl 2 spells: Invisibility, mirror image, knock
Level 3 spells: monster summoning 1, haste
Thoughts on Cataclysm:
Cyric: 2 things, 1st - what about casting shield (1h) for traps and the like? 2nd - Does it count as being in "combat" if you are invisible post-aggro?
Malar: Does this include or exclude familiar?
Tempus: I only had 2 ambushes so far (kobolds and gibberlings), I think its key to only travel 8h or less per jump?
Waukeen: lets see if there are enough wands to get through.
Sophia is currently chilling in Mulahey's room, next to Xan after aggroing Mulahey and realizing that Monster Summoning 1 has a feeble duration at lvl 7 (9 rounds)
Cyric: 2 things, 1st - what about casting shield (1h) for traps and the like? 2nd - Does it count as being in "combat" if you are invisible post-aggro?
Combat doesn't end immediately you go invisible, so you would be able to initiate combat with something nearby and use invisibility, without giving them a chance to retaliate, before casting shield.
Malar: Does this include or exclude familiar?
The situation hasn't arisen for me yet, but my assumption would be exclude.
Tempus: I only had 2 ambushes so far (kobolds and gibberlings), I think its key to only travel 8h or less per jump?
The chance of an ambush is not affected by how far you travel - each leg between areas has a defined % chance with the type of ambush set depending on the time you travel. However, if you travel a long way the game will set the route for you - and that may not be what you want. For instance one way to avoid the bandit ambush is not to travel on the main road, but that's the default option for the game given the chance - so you may not wish to give it that chance by just travelling individually from one area to the next.
Okay, i have leveled several Mage-Dual-Combos for now and thanks to the Familiar this felt too easy. As @Grond0 and me really like suffering i would propose the following new curse
Torm: Familiars cannot attack but are allowed to take other actions as normal
As Torm is the right hand of Tyr - who curses us not attacking any innocents - this looks good to me. Or should we allow combat actions for instance after a specific level? Or should we merge it with Tyr´s curse?
If we put this in active runs do not have to retire but should adapt to it. However: Any feedback is welcome!
Interesting @Harpagornis and @alice_ashpool, that you've managed to level up your wizards so swiftly, and that your familiars played such a big part in it. Care to share any tricks beyond having them walk around as decoys?
During one of my first ambushes a gnoll critted my pseudo dragon for 20 damage, i.e. about half HPs, on a roll of 19 (many enemies have pips in single weapon style or two-handed weapon style). I've been pretty careful with mine ever since.
Also I wouldn't expect restricting familiars from attacking to make a huge difference. Has anyone made good use of them as damage dealers? Maybe with spells like PfE, Strength, Haste they can become somewhat useful for dealing damage? Or is this proposed restriction meant to make ambushes harder? But mages can use the wand of magic missiles to deal certain damage faster.
@Blackraven: Well, my Pseudo-Dragons could easily dispatch all Basilisks (Mutamin with help of Korax) so i jumped to 52800 XP (+5k from Shoal) while i had to do nearly nothing except to watch if the Greater Ones would manage to poison the Dragon. Yeah, its definitly not game breaking and if you got another idea fell free to post it!
Sophia killed Mulahey with some creative invisible pseudo-dragon aiming, 10 charges of the wand of frost, dragons breath, blindness and some monster summoning 1 orcs + goblins, looting his corpse, abandoning hope of reaching his chest and fleeing back up the mine with her last invisibility, having already destroyed the Tombs exit in her first abortive attempt.
Wearing talos's gift, and with a potion of insulation (2h), and a minor sequencer with invisibility, the bandit camp was looted for the letters, waiting for everyone to aggro before disappearing and running away, and just like that chapter 3 was done.
(I have the part of SCS which puts sequencers as innate abilities it seems - I really like this but its certainly a power boost for DDs)
Collected 2 wands of fire (Ankheg pit and Durlag merchant), potion of magic blocking and 2 potions of freedom and went through cloakwood.
Had am ambush by 2 spiders while invisible. Drink potion of freedom, wand of missiles again 1, run to edge, take hit, get poisoned, leave area, poison disappears...
Same thing happens again, same strat works, now out of potions of freedom.
Stealth down to Dave. Mess up with the guard - aggro him in order to use shield amulet, don't realize he will pursue while the other guards will cluster, spend too many spells trying to lose him. Dave clusters in areally awkward place in the corridor between his starting room and the cross-4-way junction so the guards are constantly shifting and looping around.
Use final invisibility and try and wait it out.
In the end a whole OGL, 7 fireballs from WoF, 3 WoMS and a Monster Summoning 1 to put him down.
The final Expeditious retreat to run past Drasus, and...
Interesting @Harpagornis and @alice_ashpool, that you've managed to level up your wizards so swiftly, and that your familiars played such a big part in it. Care to share any tricks beyond having them walk around as decoys?
I went ring of wizardry then umberlee bowl for level 2 straight away, figuring if I got the 10 bandits I would re-roll immediatly, no big loss. Cleared up around Beregost then with pseudo-dragon, korax, darts and quarterstaff the whole of Mutamins can be cleared out which I think put me up to 5 and got me those bracers of defense and invisibility. Then Durlag's with invisibility, my stack of 400 odd darts, 10 PfP casts and the pseudo-dragons petrification immunity.
Monster Summoning 1 allowed killing the Ogrillons, and some other stuff I couldn't attempt with my monk like the Gnoll half-ogres, the guys trying to cut down the tree and so on. Thats about where the above starts.
He beat Mulahey the old fashioned way with potion buffs: mind focusing from Gellana Mirrorshade, cloud giant strength from the ankheg nest, defense from Gullykin, heroism from Samuel's quest, and about 30 healing potions. Amnian soldiers dealt with Nimbul. Tranzig was skipped. He got through the amazon ambush with sandthief > greenstone > Bhaal drain > absorb Hold Person.
Raiken brought him to the bandit camp. He entered and looted the chest, used the sandthief ring. Venkt cast Glitterdust after Murdo turned invisible, but the spell projectile followed him anyway and revealed him. With a clouded aura the archers had no trouble finishing him off.
Edit: It maybe worth mentioning that Blindness from Glitterdust doesn't seem to stop enemies from seeing you, unlike regular Blindness (which I know has been used on Bounty Hunters to set snares near enemies.)
Hhmmmm... lets do not put Torm in for now cause even though Familiars are really helpful they are not broken. I would like to introduce something new. At the moment the challenge is mostly about fighting all kinds of monsters (while also fighting against the curses). But what about fighting something like dehydration? My idea is that Charname ist forced to drink one potion of its choice every 24 hours otherwise he will die. So what about:
Umberlee: To avoid dehydration Charname has to drink one potion of its choice every 24 hours or get a drink at an inn
As Umberlee is the Queen of water and the oceans this fits perfectly but on the other hand this makes playing a bit more complicated and - well - we would finally be forced to watch the in game time a bit more closely which i most of the time tend to ignore. What do you think about that one?
Sorry to read about your loss @Blackraven! I also have lost some chars there and it was always when using the Sandthief Ring - this damn slow thing!
@Blackraven: Well, my Pseudo-Dragons could easily dispatch all Basilisks (Mutamin with help of Korax) so i jumped to 52800 XP (+5k from Shoal) while i had to do nearly nothing except to watch if the Greater Ones would manage to poison the Dragon. Yeah, its definitly not game breaking and if you got another idea fell free to post it!
I understand. I'm not really bothered by the power of familiars because having one is an early game advantage just like Totemic Druids' and Shamans's summons are, and there are other ways to get the basilisk XP. But Torm's curse sounds fine the way you put it.
Hhmmmm... lets do not put Torm in for now cause even though Familiars are really helpful they are not broken. I would like to introduce something new. At the moment the challenge is mostly about fighting all kinds of monsters (while also fighting against the curses). But what about fighting something like dehydration? My idea is that Charname ist forced to drink one potion of its choice every 24 hours otherwise he will die. So what about:
Umberlee: To avoid dehydration Charname has to drink one potion of its choice every 24 hours or get a drink at an inn
As Umberlee is the Queen of water and the oceans this fits perfectly but on the other hand this makes playing a bit more complicated and - well - we would finally be forced to watch the in game time a bit more closely which i most of the time tend to ignore. What do you think about that one?
Sorry to read about your loss @Blackraven! I also have lost some chars there and it was always when using the Sandthief Ring - this damn slow thing!
Haha, you're pushing me more and more toward lifting Ilmater's curse... Inventory limitations were my biggest issue with Murdo. Let me think of a character that can live with the other curses well enough to be able to lift Ilmater's curse without dire consequences, or a character that needs fewer items... I do think I'll be too forgetful to monitor the clock all the time to comply with the potion consumption rule.
Yeah, i totally agree that forgetting about the clock is really easy @Blackraven so if you think that its going to make playing too complicated as you constantly have to watch all kinds of things (and curses) we might drop it. Or do you have another idea thats easier to watch with regard to dehydration?
Another idea: You cannot sell named magical items! This would make gold more special and one really has to think about how to get it. Too brutal? Cool?
I can see in some days only @Grond0 and me will play this challenge!
I don't have any immediate ideas. You do remind me of Umberlee's ally Talos though. Do people here play with weather on or off? I think I have the weather effects switched off, but the least we could do is add Talos's curse: the weather has to be on. (That lightning can be very destructive...)
Another idea: You cannot sell named magical items! This would make gold more special and one really has to think about how to get it. Too brutal? Cool?
I can see in some days only @Grond0 and me will play this challenge!
Maybe it would make sense to make us actually spend our gold? How realistic is it to walk around with say 20k GPs? Maybe something like:
Liira's curse: the player character cannot carry more than xx GPs; any gold obtained beyond that amount has to be donated at temples.
This could lead to interesting interplay with Ilmater's curse.
Thoughts for DD and CATACLYSM so far, early game BG1. I am loving this, its great fun. Love to waste my free time away.
Chauntea: No XP farming unless Charname has gained 3.000.000 XP´s
- No problem at all in BG1. An XP loop would have gotten levels up earlier but since it is relativly simple to unlock BG I don't think this is an issue at all. No dualing either.
- Difficulty: very easy
Cyric: Potion- and spellbuffs with a duration of less than 2 hours may only be applied during combat
- A little bit tricky... Mostly for casting of shield and mirror image for getting around traps. A way I thought to get round this is Monster summoning 1, attack 1 with the others to hostile, then buffing and going through traps. Cheesy, yes please.
- Difficulty: easy/moderate
Gond No forged items by Jegg Hillcarver, Cromwell & Cespenar
- Non issue for DD in BG1, later who knows I've never played SCS ToB
- Difficulty: negligible
Ilmater: No containers of any kind
- Annoying, but not the end of the world, containers are a bit of a crutch and its nice to think through exactly what I will need for encounters. The main issue is not looting things until you need them... and more traveling to pick up the tools for a particular job, which risks ambushes. Can be got round by selling things to mrchants then buying them back when needed? So long as it doesn't also recharge?
- Difficulty: moderate
Lolth: No antidots or elixirs of healt
- Leaving a map seems to get rid of poison with no heath loss? Was not an issue so far but might prove to be one later e.g. for wyvern ambushes
- Difficulty: unknown
Malar: Except for Beast Masters only one summon spell can be active in combat
- Not a big issue at the moment, just need to cycle summons and wait for them all to die before summoning the next round and remember to stuff familiar in bag. The wording does say "active in combat" so I took that to mean an invisible familiar chilling out is fine, when another summon is fighting.
- Difficulty: unknown in the long run
Mask: The inventory may be accessed during combat to use consumables but not to switch items
- Not an issue for DD in BG1 so far but not being able to swap rings may prove an issue later.
- Difficulty: unknown
Mystra: Each creature gains the saving throw fix
- This is my single boon, and it sure does make blinding things easy. I took it instead of the recharge, because that seemed to trivialise things, plus the idea of burning up wands is fun, and will potentially bork the game
- Difficulty: unknown
Selune: Resting is only allowed in inns and cleared dungeon floors. In the wilderness it only works near houses
- Up until cloakwood this was very easy. Resting only in inns, temple, carnival and bandit camp will get you through. However, it essentially meant that from the FAI -> Davetheon -> FAI needed to be done in one sitting, with a potential 4 ambushes, and a single spellbook.
- Difficulty: moderate/hard (only for cloakwood though), negligible otherwise
Sune: Creatures cannot be charmed or dominated unless using an innate ability
- This combined with Tyr makes Algernon's out of bounds for anyone without pickpocket
- Difficulty: Hard
Tempus: Except for Wizard Slayers retreats from ambushes are only possible if
1. At least one enemy takes damage
2. Charname takes damage from a physical attack or gets hit by a spell/gaze
- Easy for the DD, with wand of missiles and hanging onto a couple of MM/LMD scrolls in inventory + travelling under invisibility allowing things to be set up... until cloakwood. Potentially weathering 4 ambushes, needing 4 means to deal damage, 4 hits taken, avoiding webs with potions of freedom, or other method.
- Recommended for casters: 4 ways to avoid webs, protection from poison scrolls, Invisibility scrolls
- The other consideration is ambushes by things which can stun. Potions of freedom very valuable.
- Difficulty: Hard
Tymora: Random number of Hit Points on level up and no INT-buffing for scroll scribing
- Not a big issue for DD at the moment, helped by some good rolls: 8, 4, 8, 3, 8, 5, 8 I think.
- Dificulty: Easy/Moderate
Tyr: No attacking or killing of innocents unless they can be provoked through dialogue
-Im Lawful Good!
- Difficulty: combined with Sune
Waukeen: No recharging of items in shops
-The BIG one
- Difficulty: Potentially impossible?
----
A suggestion @Harpagornis re-dehydration would be a time limit of in-game days to complete each stage e.g. BG1 in 60 days, or 45, or 30?
I agree that drinking potions regularly would be a pain - in general I'm not really a fan of timed quests even when they're part of the main game .
Weather on sounds like a good curse, and while thinking about that I suggest gore should also be enabled so that item destruction becomes a possibility.
Not sure about the various ideas about gold use. There's probably something there, but I'm not sure it would be appropriate to penalize characters for saving too much.
Wisp - shadowdancer (update 1)
Proving once more the triumph of hope over expectation, I've started Wisp again. Last time I never got around to going after Shoal and Ogre Droth, so this time I headed there straight out of Candlekeep in order to minimise wasted time if Wisp found Shoal's kiss too hot to handle.
However, he kept his wits about him and sneaked away as Droth arrived on the scene.
Things continued to go well with the successful acquisition of Algernon's Cloak. Last time Algernon went hostile immediately after a failed attempt, but this time there was another delay for Wisp to fail twice before making it 3rd time lucky.
The thieving potion allowed him to loot the rest of the town as well, racking up the 10 XPs for opening locks.
The XP tipped over 5k thanks to the fishermen in the ankheg area and Wisp levelled up there, gaining a handy 21 out of a maximum 24 HPs. That allowed him to improve his stealth and the ankhegs were looted without trouble.
After returning the bowl, Wisp travelled south again. Finding Rufie was enough for another level, although the 5 HPs gained were marginally disappointing in the context of a really smooth run to this point.
In his previous run Wisp was only being required to suffer attacks in ambushes, but this time he needed to actually be hit - and with still pretty low HPs that was a nervous business. It also meant he needed to do lots of resting, so it's a good job he wasn't restricted in that.
Wisp rested once on the journey to deliver Samuel back to the FAI and managed to avoid any ambushes doing that - pushing reputation to 20 to unlock the best prices.
After a bit of shopping, Wisp called on Ogre Droth. He needed a critical to hit and had to knock repeatedly to get the ogre's attention, but had got a few hits home when Droth suddenly decided he could ignore invisibility.
That seemed pretty bizarre - I didn't think I'd moved after selecting stealth and before hiding and anyway don't think that can have been the case as the ogre showed no inclination to follow up that initial attack. However, I decided to rest up and restart the battle the following night. Fortunately Wisp didn't get a critical stealth failure until Droth was out of spells, so there was no need for any emergency use of resources then, or the few following times that happened out of the hundreds of attacks necessary while the ogre was gradually worn down to size.
Wisp can't wear the helm of peace at the moment, but hopefully it won't be too long now .
Thanks for your detailed feedback @alice_ashpool and glad to see that you are having fun! I agree that the Waukeen curse is really strong - especially for Mage classes while others are annoying but not so hard to come by. I think generally we are walking into the right direction!
As @Grond0 does not like the gold limit we might do it in another way...
Lliira: After each chapter Charname has to donate 10.000 gold at a temple
As Lliira is the goddess of joy she should be pleased by this a lot. What about other numbers? And what about the idea that named magical items cannot be sold @Grond0? And what about the idea that Familiars cannot attack?
Not to forget: Good progress @Grond0 - i think i will roll another Shadow Dancer soon too!
10k is a decent whack - if that much is being sacrificed I don't think you should also be restricting sales of items.
As for familiars I don't mind. I agree they make the early stages far easier ( @Blackraven, facing a single gnoll should be no problem for a pseudo dragon - even with a critical it won't do enough damage to cause a loss of morale, so you can just run it round while regenerating. That still leads to shorter battles than most early characters could manage themselves against relatively weak enemies).
If the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Familiars bans attacking, they can still do good service as invisible blockers, as well as acting as a damage sponge in early ambushes and offering a big HP boost to give sorcerers some sort of chance of surviving the requirement to lose blood themselves.
Thanks for the response @Grond0, we could lower the gold sacrifice to 5k but that wont hurt as much! I agree that selling items should be allowed then. With regard to Familiars i will put it onto the list of curses making early game a little bit harder for some classes while it still remains useful. Here we go...
Torm: Familiars cannot attack but are allowed to take other actions as normal
Will add this one to the list while waiting for more feedback on the Lliira curse!
BtW: Whats this talking about dying to Shoal? I havent lost any stealth character there for ages. After attacking her out of stealth i immediately move back, restealth and once approaching her she still triggers her talking/kiss but could not kill me thanks to stealth. After that its all just normal stabbing or kiting.
BtW: Whats this talking about dying to Shoal? I havent lost any stealth character there for ages. After attacking her out of stealth i immediately move back, restealth and once approaching her she still triggers her talking/kiss but could not kill me thanks to stealth. After that its all just normal stabbing or kiting.
Sounds like your installation may be a bit different. I think the expected behavior if you fail to save against her kiss is not only to reduce you to 1 HP, but also render you unconscious. At that point she's still hostile, so if you drop out of stealth she can kill you. There's of course no problem in killing Shoal - it was just surviving her kiss I was concerned about.
Its the same her... she kisses me... i most of the time fail the save... and my char goes unconsious... but this does NOT break stealth... after some seconds... with stealth still active... char awakes and can start kiting/stabbing. The trick is to attack her, when she is still neutral and retreat immediately so she cannot trigger the talking... then its restealthing... and let her move nearby for the trigger... or does in your installation stealth breaks after you re-engage her?
I don't know - maybe you just use slightly different mechanics than I've tried. In Wisp's current run he let her chase him to the edge of the map before disappearing into stealth. That didn't prevent her demanding a kiss and I've had experience before of dropping out of stealth while unconscious, so was concerned about that. However, maybe I've just been unlucky or tried it with a character with insufficiently good stealth.
Even with my Level 1 Shadow Dancers i never drop out of stealth before unconcsiousness ends, i just make sure that she triggers the talking right after the stealth check message appears. Works fine for me.
Lost one Shadow Dancer some minutes ago after Droth managed to land Chromatic Orb... stealth failed... save failed... GG. Next time i will grab the Inv Potion from Beregost!
I referred to the danger before of having to take damage in ambushes. Here, Wisp was ambushed by half-ogres, which are not a particularly hard-hitting enemy. However, this critical hit would have killed him if he hadn't already used LMD on one of them.
While stealth remained available, Wisp went to relieve an ogre of its belt collection. Next up he attacked another dangerous enemy - the revenant. That was a lot easier to hit than Ogre Droth, but because it wandered around almost constantly it was much more difficult for Wisp to set up attempted backstabs without exposing himself. I thought that was going well and the Revenant was down to a mere 67 HPs when stealth failed for the first time. That prompted a first use of shadowstep in the run - the problem with that is it's a bit slow to cast, so quite a lot of types of attacks will get in first, but not the Revenant. Coming back, it didn't take too much longer to finish him off, partly thanks to getting several hits in while he was trapped up against a bat.
Another encounter where stealth would make things much easier was Meilum. I was put off doing that last run due to the difficulty of hitting him, but after already dealing with the more dangerous Ogre Droth and Revenant I decided Meilum should be easy enough - and he was.
After that lot, the High Hedge gnolls, Karlat & Perdue and various spiders for Landrin were pretty easy pickings. That took Wisp within 300 of being able to dual. I was intending to seek some low value XP enemies to get that, but Wisp was ambushed by a ghast and didn't really fancy letting it attack him - so unloaded more backstabs. However, with the ghast all but dead I was just a fraction slow in moving after an attempted attack and the ghast managed an instant retaliation. I thought that Lady Luck was on the job as Wisp was both shown as rolling a successful saving throw and didn't show any effect on his character record or portrait. On the downside though, he was in fact paralyzed and couldn't be selected, access his inventory, or move to avoid a follow-up attack. I had intended to use some potions and go and get the ring of free action as soon as he levelled up - left it too late again .
After one death against Droth and another Shadow Dancer dying against the Bandit Archers we finally managed to reach Level to let the dual classed Shadow Dancer6/Fighter start running...
- Candlekeep: 375 XP
- Beregost: Rested to make sure arriving Shoal at night, grabbed Invisbility Potion
- -Lured the Hobgoblin Thief to the Flaming Fist, stealthed and waited for kill to grab Boots of Stealth
- Shoal: 5000 XP, stealth worked to get out unseen after Droth appeared, lured Shoal away with arrow shot and stabbed her down, Level (29 HP)
- Drizzt: Just grabbed the items for some gold after the Gnolls did their job
- Bandit Archer Ambush: Stealth worked, but three attacks missed before stealth failed and Loreth got hit two times. More Bandits moved in so Invisbility Potion was used before the fourth attack landed dealing 11 damage
- Ulgoths Beard:Bought Silver Staff of Aule and Greenstone Amulet
- Farmer Brun: 500 XP, grabbed stuff in Ankheg Cave, stealth worked
- Ogre Thief: 270 Xp after some easy stabbing
- Battle Horrors: 8000 XP, the first one took nearly one hour reaching Level 5 (35 HP). Getting 2x backstabbing factor increasing killing speed a lot against the second Horror
-Doom Guard: 2000 XP this forced Loreth to drink 10 Healing Potions due to the shooting Skels
Ogrillons 350
-Skeleton Archers + Ghuls Ambush: Stealth failed five times in a row, three Healing Potions wasted, before landing a stab on one Ghul
- Digging Site: Nearly got killed by the Diggers thanks to their insane range, burned all Healing Potions and with a desperate all or nothing travel (as i wanted to save Brage for the Fighter leveling) Loreth managed to safely travel back to Nahskel for a rest.
- Doom Singer 4000 XP, finally a fine stabbing session, no hits even though it took more than half an hour to stab the beast down, Level 6 (42 HP)
This was such a pain. Not only to get XP but also to survive several ambushes while also burning lots of Healing Potions. Now lets see if we can get the Fighter up to Level 7. Before we will try to steal Dushai´s ring...
@Grond0: What a pity. Looked so smooth and then....
@Grond0 Oh, I see, I have difficulty based damage turned off in settings, because I am casual, ho hum
Anyway, a suggestion about Tempus would be that 1 and 2 apply unless all enemies in ambush are killed: which can occur without taking any damage or being targetted as I just found out with a basilisk ambush.
Also I'm not sure how it works with the SCS non hostile wolves. Sophia the Elven Lawful Good Dragon Disciple - Update 2
I resurrected Sophia via Bhaalpower: reload and left Cloakwood again, only for the same Spider ambush to kill me again. Travelling between zones in cloakwood is lethal and needs to be planned for more than Davaeorn imo.
Getting to Baldur's Gate she killed the docks basilisk and did some small quests to get to level 8, choosing Monster Summoning 2. This combined with haste allowed her to go toe-to-to with two (two!) regular dopplegangers at a time in the seven suns building and complete that quest.
With c35,000 XP still needed for level 9, she completed 3 of the 4 requirements for the golem fight in Durlag's tower, managing to not die at all (a new best for me), thanks to invisibility, expeditious retreat, lightning resist, innate fire resistance (thanks DD), and of course metaknowledge.
Still needing 30,000 XP and a bit unsure she went back to cloakwood to kill Drasus. He had been lured out earlier and all it took was 2 Monster Summoning 2 + haste (she dies a further 2 times to spiders but... I was getting a bit fed up at this point.)
Also expeditious retreat does not stack with boots of speed...
Went through candlekeep - sequencer invisibility is just too slow for the ogre-mages, fortunately I was only blinded (glitterdust?), grabbed the str tome and killed the basilisks. Was out of invisibility casts by the end so burned an oil of speed to super-speed past the ogre-ambush on the way back out.
Now its just a matter of the 3 of 4 CATACLYSM challenges to go for. And of course Dukes Ambush and Sarevok...
Currently have the game minimized while Sophia tries to kill a battle horror with a blocking invisible familiar, swinging that +3 staff for natural 20s. Struggling to think of easy 16,000 to get the last level. Time to siege this Dungeon down.
Sophia v1 Deaths: 4 (all to cloakwood spider ambushes)
If it would be possible to get Monster Summoning 2 before getting to drasus 1st time cloakwood could be done in one go, because I really think coming back here is a terrible idea. Or perhaps just lured then WoMS charges + haste? - I only brought the 1st level Durlags one when I came, so maybe with the Tombs one it would be easy? I was being super stingy with WoMS charges because of no recharging.
@alice_ashpool once you've got access to Baldur's Gate your supply of WoMS is only restricted by your available cash.
On ambushes, if all enemies are dead you're not retreating - just travelling on. If wolves are non-hostile, they're not enemies.
I agree those spiders are lethal. With some characters it would be worth grabbing Spider's Bane for free action, for others Dushai's free action ring can be stolen. If neither are accessible to you, but you've managed to get access to the City you could get a free action ring from the Iron Throne fight.
Even though there were lots of mistakes luck was on our side. Leveling the Fighter up to 7 was easier than expected. The only dangerous ambush of 12 Goblin Archers was solved by burning them with Fiery Oil and getting out quickly. After that the rest was more or less smooth sailing...
- Digging Site: 1000 XP after talking to Charleston Nib
- Brage: 1000 XP
- Noober: 400 XP
- Albert & Rufie: 1000 XP
- Samuel: 500 XP, got really lucky cause no ambushes at all
- Mutamins Garden: 25000 XP, missed only one Lesser Basilisk, drinking Potion of Stone Giant Strength while banging on paralyzed basilisks with Staff +3 or shooting bolts from distance
- Mirianne: 300 XP
- Firebead: 300 XP
- Marl: 900 XP
- High Hedge Golems: 4000 XP, kited in the inner ring with +1 bolts, reached Fighter Level 6
- Melicamp: Tanked the Skels who needed a crit to hit, luckily Melicamp survived this time
- Ankheg Cave: 2925 XP, kiting three Ankhegs took some time cause Loreth needed 19+ rolls
- Brun: 1000 XP
- Durlag Basilisks: 22400 XP, PfP + Potion of Cloud Giant Strength, Killed the Ghast using Potion of Freedom, Grabbed the Scimitar while protected from PfF potion and Ring
- Kirinhale: 4000 XP, finally reached Level 7 (55 HP)
After all far more work than using Mage Duals. Lost three Shadow Dancers today in the very early game so its nice to see the fourth one getting through this early-game-bottleneck. With stealth powers back next targets are Dushai, Droth, Meilum and hopefully some more. Reputation is at 17 so some more quests are needed before going shopping. But not today...
Comments
Sophia, the Elven Lawful Good Dragon Disciple, with the boon of MYSTRA
Currently Level 7
Zero deaths
Lvl 1 spells: find familiar, blindness, protection from petrification, shield, expeditious retreat (maybe should have taken mm for disruption)
Lvl 2 spells: Invisibility, mirror image, knock
Level 3 spells: monster summoning 1, haste
Thoughts on Cataclysm:
Cyric: 2 things, 1st - what about casting shield (1h) for traps and the like? 2nd - Does it count as being in "combat" if you are invisible post-aggro?
Malar: Does this include or exclude familiar?
Tempus: I only had 2 ambushes so far (kobolds and gibberlings), I think its key to only travel 8h or less per jump?
Waukeen: lets see if there are enough wands to get through.
Sophia is currently chilling in Mulahey's room, next to Xan after aggroing Mulahey and realizing that Monster Summoning 1 has a feeble duration at lvl 7 (9 rounds)
Combat doesn't end immediately you go invisible, so you would be able to initiate combat with something nearby and use invisibility, without giving them a chance to retaliate, before casting shield.
The situation hasn't arisen for me yet, but my assumption would be exclude.
The chance of an ambush is not affected by how far you travel - each leg between areas has a defined % chance with the type of ambush set depending on the time you travel. However, if you travel a long way the game will set the route for you - and that may not be what you want. For instance one way to avoid the bandit ambush is not to travel on the main road, but that's the default option for the game given the chance - so you may not wish to give it that chance by just travelling individually from one area to the next.
For the rest i agree with @Grond0. Good luck with your Dragon Disciple!
Torm: Familiars cannot attack but are allowed to take other actions as normal
As Torm is the right hand of Tyr - who curses us not attacking any innocents - this looks good to me. Or should we allow combat actions for instance after a specific level? Or should we merge it with Tyr´s curse?
If we put this in active runs do not have to retire but should adapt to it. However: Any feedback is welcome!
During one of my first ambushes a gnoll critted my pseudo dragon for 20 damage, i.e. about half HPs, on a roll of 19 (many enemies have pips in single weapon style or two-handed weapon style). I've been pretty careful with mine ever since.
Also I wouldn't expect restricting familiars from attacking to make a huge difference. Has anyone made good use of them as damage dealers? Maybe with spells like PfE, Strength, Haste they can become somewhat useful for dealing damage? Or is this proposed restriction meant to make ambushes harder? But mages can use the wand of magic missiles to deal certain damage faster.
Wearing talos's gift, and with a potion of insulation (2h), and a minor sequencer with invisibility, the bandit camp was looted for the letters, waiting for everyone to aggro before disappearing and running away, and just like that chapter 3 was done.
(I have the part of SCS which puts sequencers as innate abilities it seems - I really like this but its certainly a power boost for DDs)
Collected 2 wands of fire (Ankheg pit and Durlag merchant), potion of magic blocking and 2 potions of freedom and went through cloakwood.
Had am ambush by 2 spiders while invisible. Drink potion of freedom, wand of missiles again 1, run to edge, take hit, get poisoned, leave area, poison disappears...
Same thing happens again, same strat works, now out of potions of freedom.
Stealth down to Dave. Mess up with the guard - aggro him in order to use shield amulet, don't realize he will pursue while the other guards will cluster, spend too many spells trying to lose him. Dave clusters in areally awkward place in the corridor between his starting room and the cross-4-way junction so the guards are constantly shifting and looping around.
Use final invisibility and try and wait it out.
In the end a whole OGL, 7 fireballs from WoF, 3 WoMS and a Monster Summoning 1 to put him down.
The final Expeditious retreat to run past Drasus, and...
...ambushed by spiders, held, killed.
Deaths: 1
I went ring of wizardry then umberlee bowl for level 2 straight away, figuring if I got the 10 bandits I would re-roll immediatly, no big loss. Cleared up around Beregost then with pseudo-dragon, korax, darts and quarterstaff the whole of Mutamins can be cleared out which I think put me up to 5 and got me those bracers of defense and invisibility. Then Durlag's with invisibility, my stack of 400 odd darts, 10 PfP casts and the pseudo-dragons petrification immunity.
Monster Summoning 1 allowed killing the Ogrillons, and some other stuff I couldn't attempt with my monk like the Gnoll half-ogres, the guys trying to cut down the tree and so on. Thats about where the above starts.
He beat Mulahey the old fashioned way with potion buffs: mind focusing from Gellana Mirrorshade, cloud giant strength from the ankheg nest, defense from Gullykin, heroism from Samuel's quest, and about 30 healing potions. Amnian soldiers dealt with Nimbul. Tranzig was skipped. He got through the amazon ambush with sandthief > greenstone > Bhaal drain > absorb Hold Person.
Raiken brought him to the bandit camp. He entered and looted the chest, used the sandthief ring. Venkt cast Glitterdust after Murdo turned invisible, but the spell projectile followed him anyway and revealed him. With a clouded aura the archers had no trouble finishing him off.
Edit: It maybe worth mentioning that Blindness from Glitterdust doesn't seem to stop enemies from seeing you, unlike regular Blindness (which I know has been used on Bounty Hunters to set snares near enemies.)
Umberlee: To avoid dehydration Charname has to drink one potion of its choice every 24 hours or get a drink at an inn
As Umberlee is the Queen of water and the oceans this fits perfectly but on the other hand this makes playing a bit more complicated and - well - we would finally be forced to watch the in game time a bit more closely which i most of the time tend to ignore. What do you think about that one?
Sorry to read about your loss @Blackraven! I also have lost some chars there and it was always when using the Sandthief Ring - this damn slow thing!
I understand. I'm not really bothered by the power of familiars because having one is an early game advantage just like Totemic Druids' and Shamans's summons are, and there are other ways to get the basilisk XP. But Torm's curse sounds fine the way you put it.
Haha, you're pushing me more and more toward lifting Ilmater's curse... Inventory limitations were my biggest issue with Murdo. Let me think of a character that can live with the other curses well enough to be able to lift Ilmater's curse without dire consequences, or a character that needs fewer items... I do think I'll be too forgetful to monitor the clock all the time to comply with the potion consumption rule.
I can see in some days only @Grond0 and me will play this challenge!
Maybe it would make sense to make us actually spend our gold? How realistic is it to walk around with say 20k GPs? Maybe something like:
Liira's curse: the player character cannot carry more than xx GPs; any gold obtained beyond that amount has to be donated at temples.
This could lead to interesting interplay with Ilmater's curse.
Lliira: Charname cannot carry more than 20.000 gold. Any gold obtained beyond that amount has to be donated at temples
Sounds like a plan and i also like the potential snyergy with Ilmater. Other opinions on that one?
Chauntea: No XP farming unless Charname has gained 3.000.000 XP´s
- No problem at all in BG1. An XP loop would have gotten levels up earlier but since it is relativly simple to unlock BG I don't think this is an issue at all. No dualing either.
- Difficulty: very easy
Cyric: Potion- and spellbuffs with a duration of less than 2 hours may only be applied during combat
- A little bit tricky... Mostly for casting of shield and mirror image for getting around traps. A way I thought to get round this is Monster summoning 1, attack 1 with the others to hostile, then buffing and going through traps. Cheesy, yes please.
- Difficulty: easy/moderate
Gond No forged items by Jegg Hillcarver, Cromwell & Cespenar
- Non issue for DD in BG1, later who knows I've never played SCS ToB
- Difficulty: negligible
Ilmater: No containers of any kind
- Annoying, but not the end of the world, containers are a bit of a crutch and its nice to think through exactly what I will need for encounters. The main issue is not looting things until you need them... and more traveling to pick up the tools for a particular job, which risks ambushes. Can be got round by selling things to mrchants then buying them back when needed? So long as it doesn't also recharge?
- Difficulty: moderate
Lolth: No antidots or elixirs of healt
- Leaving a map seems to get rid of poison with no heath loss? Was not an issue so far but might prove to be one later e.g. for wyvern ambushes
- Difficulty: unknown
Malar: Except for Beast Masters only one summon spell can be active in combat
- Not a big issue at the moment, just need to cycle summons and wait for them all to die before summoning the next round and remember to stuff familiar in bag. The wording does say "active in combat" so I took that to mean an invisible familiar chilling out is fine, when another summon is fighting.
- Difficulty: unknown in the long run
Mask: The inventory may be accessed during combat to use consumables but not to switch items
- Not an issue for DD in BG1 so far but not being able to swap rings may prove an issue later.
- Difficulty: unknown
Mystra: Each creature gains the saving throw fix
- This is my single boon, and it sure does make blinding things easy. I took it instead of the recharge, because that seemed to trivialise things, plus the idea of burning up wands is fun, and will potentially bork the game
- Difficulty: unknown
Selune: Resting is only allowed in inns and cleared dungeon floors. In the wilderness it only works near houses
- Up until cloakwood this was very easy. Resting only in inns, temple, carnival and bandit camp will get you through. However, it essentially meant that from the FAI -> Davetheon -> FAI needed to be done in one sitting, with a potential 4 ambushes, and a single spellbook.
- Difficulty: moderate/hard (only for cloakwood though), negligible otherwise
Sune: Creatures cannot be charmed or dominated unless using an innate ability
- This combined with Tyr makes Algernon's out of bounds for anyone without pickpocket
- Difficulty: Hard
Tempus: Except for Wizard Slayers retreats from ambushes are only possible if
1. At least one enemy takes damage
2. Charname takes damage from a physical attack or gets hit by a spell/gaze
- Easy for the DD, with wand of missiles and hanging onto a couple of MM/LMD scrolls in inventory + travelling under invisibility allowing things to be set up... until cloakwood. Potentially weathering 4 ambushes, needing 4 means to deal damage, 4 hits taken, avoiding webs with potions of freedom, or other method.
- Recommended for casters: 4 ways to avoid webs, protection from poison scrolls, Invisibility scrolls
- The other consideration is ambushes by things which can stun. Potions of freedom very valuable.
- Difficulty: Hard
Tymora: Random number of Hit Points on level up and no INT-buffing for scroll scribing
- Not a big issue for DD at the moment, helped by some good rolls: 8, 4, 8, 3, 8, 5, 8 I think.
- Dificulty: Easy/Moderate
Tyr: No attacking or killing of innocents unless they can be provoked through dialogue
-Im Lawful Good!
- Difficulty: combined with Sune
Waukeen: No recharging of items in shops
-The BIG one
- Difficulty: Potentially impossible?
----
A suggestion @Harpagornis re-dehydration would be a time limit of in-game days to complete each stage e.g. BG1 in 60 days, or 45, or 30?
Weather on sounds like a good curse, and while thinking about that I suggest gore should also be enabled so that item destruction becomes a possibility.
Not sure about the various ideas about gold use. There's probably something there, but I'm not sure it would be appropriate to penalize characters for saving too much.
Wisp - shadowdancer (update 1)
Proving once more the triumph of hope over expectation, I've started Wisp again. Last time I never got around to going after Shoal and Ogre Droth, so this time I headed there straight out of Candlekeep in order to minimise wasted time if Wisp found Shoal's kiss too hot to handle.
Things continued to go well with the successful acquisition of Algernon's Cloak. Last time Algernon went hostile immediately after a failed attempt, but this time there was another delay for Wisp to fail twice before making it 3rd time lucky.
The XP tipped over 5k thanks to the fishermen in the ankheg area and Wisp levelled up there, gaining a handy 21 out of a maximum 24 HPs. That allowed him to improve his stealth and the ankhegs were looted without trouble.
After returning the bowl, Wisp travelled south again. Finding Rufie was enough for another level, although the 5 HPs gained were marginally disappointing in the context of a really smooth run to this point.
In his previous run Wisp was only being required to suffer attacks in ambushes, but this time he needed to actually be hit - and with still pretty low HPs that was a nervous business. It also meant he needed to do lots of resting, so it's a good job he wasn't restricted in that.
Wisp rested once on the journey to deliver Samuel back to the FAI and managed to avoid any ambushes doing that - pushing reputation to 20 to unlock the best prices.
After a bit of shopping, Wisp called on Ogre Droth. He needed a critical to hit and had to knock repeatedly to get the ogre's attention, but had got a few hits home when Droth suddenly decided he could ignore invisibility.
shadowdancer 5, 34 HPs, 20 kills
As @Grond0 does not like the gold limit we might do it in another way...
Lliira: After each chapter Charname has to donate 10.000 gold at a temple
As Lliira is the goddess of joy she should be pleased by this a lot. What about other numbers? And what about the idea that named magical items cannot be sold @Grond0? And what about the idea that Familiars cannot attack?
Not to forget: Good progress @Grond0 - i think i will roll another Shadow Dancer soon too!
As for familiars I don't mind. I agree they make the early stages far easier ( @Blackraven, facing a single gnoll should be no problem for a pseudo dragon - even with a critical it won't do enough damage to cause a loss of morale, so you can just run it round while regenerating. That still leads to shorter battles than most early characters could manage themselves against relatively weak enemies).
If the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Familiars bans attacking, they can still do good service as invisible blockers, as well as acting as a damage sponge in early ambushes and offering a big HP boost to give sorcerers some sort of chance of surviving the requirement to lose blood themselves.
Torm: Familiars cannot attack but are allowed to take other actions as normal
Will add this one to the list while waiting for more feedback on the Lliira curse!
BtW: Whats this talking about dying to Shoal? I havent lost any stealth character there for ages. After attacking her out of stealth i immediately move back, restealth and once approaching her she still triggers her talking/kiss but could not kill me thanks to stealth. After that its all just normal stabbing or kiting.
Sounds like your installation may be a bit different. I think the expected behavior if you fail to save against her kiss is not only to reduce you to 1 HP, but also render you unconscious. At that point she's still hostile, so if you drop out of stealth she can kill you. There's of course no problem in killing Shoal - it was just surviving her kiss I was concerned about.
Lost one Shadow Dancer some minutes ago after Droth managed to land Chromatic Orb... stealth failed... save failed... GG. Next time i will grab the Inv Potion from Beregost!
I referred to the danger before of having to take damage in ambushes. Here, Wisp was ambushed by half-ogres, which are not a particularly hard-hitting enemy. However, this critical hit would have killed him if he hadn't already used LMD on one of them.
While stealth remained available, Wisp went to relieve an ogre of its belt collection. Next up he attacked another dangerous enemy - the revenant. That was a lot easier to hit than Ogre Droth, but because it wandered around almost constantly it was much more difficult for Wisp to set up attempted backstabs without exposing himself. I thought that was going well and the Revenant was down to a mere 67 HPs when stealth failed for the first time. That prompted a first use of shadowstep in the run - the problem with that is it's a bit slow to cast, so quite a lot of types of attacks will get in first, but not the Revenant. Coming back, it didn't take too much longer to finish him off, partly thanks to getting several hits in while he was trapped up against a bat.
Another encounter where stealth would make things much easier was Meilum. I was put off doing that last run due to the difficulty of hitting him, but after already dealing with the more dangerous Ogre Droth and Revenant I decided Meilum should be easy enough - and he was.
After that lot, the High Hedge gnolls, Karlat & Perdue and various spiders for Landrin were pretty easy pickings. That took Wisp within 300 of being able to dual. I was intending to seek some low value XP enemies to get that, but Wisp was ambushed by a ghast and didn't really fancy letting it attack him - so unloaded more backstabs. However, with the ghast all but dead I was just a fraction slow in moving after an attempted attack and the ghast managed an instant retaliation. I thought that Lady Luck was on the job as Wisp was both shown as rolling a successful saving throw and didn't show any effect on his character record or portrait. On the downside though, he was in fact paralyzed and couldn't be selected, access his inventory, or move to avoid a follow-up attack. I had intended to use some potions and go and get the ring of free action as soon as he levelled up - left it too late again
- Candlekeep: 375 XP
- Beregost: Rested to make sure arriving Shoal at night, grabbed Invisbility Potion
- -Lured the Hobgoblin Thief to the Flaming Fist, stealthed and waited for kill to grab Boots of Stealth
- Shoal: 5000 XP, stealth worked to get out unseen after Droth appeared, lured Shoal away with arrow shot and stabbed her down, Level (29 HP)
- Drizzt: Just grabbed the items for some gold after the Gnolls did their job
- Bandit Archer Ambush: Stealth worked, but three attacks missed before stealth failed and Loreth got hit two times. More Bandits moved in so Invisbility Potion was used before the fourth attack landed dealing 11 damage
- Ulgoths Beard:Bought Silver Staff of Aule and Greenstone Amulet
- Farmer Brun: 500 XP, grabbed stuff in Ankheg Cave, stealth worked
- Ogre Thief: 270 Xp after some easy stabbing
- Battle Horrors: 8000 XP, the first one took nearly one hour reaching Level 5 (35 HP). Getting 2x backstabbing factor increasing killing speed a lot against the second Horror
-Doom Guard: 2000 XP this forced Loreth to drink 10 Healing Potions due to the shooting Skels
Ogrillons 350
-Skeleton Archers + Ghuls Ambush: Stealth failed five times in a row, three Healing Potions wasted, before landing a stab on one Ghul
- Digging Site: Nearly got killed by the Diggers thanks to their insane range, burned all Healing Potions and with a desperate all or nothing travel (as i wanted to save Brage for the Fighter leveling) Loreth managed to safely travel back to Nahskel for a rest.
- Doom Singer 4000 XP, finally a fine stabbing session, no hits even though it took more than half an hour to stab the beast down, Level 6 (42 HP)
This was such a pain. Not only to get XP but also to survive several ambushes while also burning lots of Healing Potions. Now lets see if we can get the Fighter up to Level 7. Before we will try to steal Dushai´s ring...
@Grond0: What a pity. Looked so smooth and then....
Anyway, a suggestion about Tempus would be that 1 and 2 apply unless all enemies in ambush are killed: which can occur without taking any damage or being targetted as I just found out with a basilisk ambush.
Also I'm not sure how it works with the SCS non hostile wolves.
Sophia the Elven Lawful Good Dragon Disciple - Update 2
I resurrected Sophia via Bhaalpower: reload and left Cloakwood again, only for the same Spider ambush to kill me again. Travelling between zones in cloakwood is lethal and needs to be planned for more than Davaeorn imo.
Getting to Baldur's Gate she killed the docks basilisk and did some small quests to get to level 8, choosing Monster Summoning 2. This combined with haste allowed her to go toe-to-to with two (two!) regular dopplegangers at a time in the seven suns building and complete that quest.
With c35,000 XP still needed for level 9, she completed 3 of the 4 requirements for the golem fight in Durlag's tower, managing to not die at all (a new best for me), thanks to invisibility, expeditious retreat, lightning resist, innate fire resistance (thanks DD), and of course metaknowledge.
Still needing 30,000 XP and a bit unsure she went back to cloakwood to kill Drasus. He had been lured out earlier and all it took was 2 Monster Summoning 2 + haste (she dies a further 2 times to spiders but... I was getting a bit fed up at this point.)
Also expeditious retreat does not stack with boots of speed...
Went through candlekeep - sequencer invisibility is just too slow for the ogre-mages, fortunately I was only blinded (glitterdust?), grabbed the str tome and killed the basilisks. Was out of invisibility casts by the end so burned an oil of speed to super-speed past the ogre-ambush on the way back out.
Now its just a matter of the 3 of 4 CATACLYSM challenges to go for. And of course Dukes Ambush and Sarevok...
Currently have the game minimized while Sophia tries to kill a battle horror with a blocking invisible familiar, swinging that +3 staff for natural 20s. Struggling to think of easy 16,000 to get the last level. Time to siege this Dungeon down.
Sophia v1 Deaths: 4 (all to cloakwood spider ambushes)
If it would be possible to get Monster Summoning 2 before getting to drasus 1st time cloakwood could be done in one go, because I really think coming back here is a terrible idea. Or perhaps just lured then WoMS charges + haste? - I only brought the 1st level Durlags one when I came, so maybe with the Tombs one it would be easy? I was being super stingy with WoMS charges because of no recharging.
On ambushes, if all enemies are dead you're not retreating - just travelling on. If wolves are non-hostile, they're not enemies.
I agree those spiders are lethal. With some characters it would be worth grabbing Spider's Bane for free action, for others Dushai's free action ring can be stolen. If neither are accessible to you, but you've managed to get access to the City you could get a free action ring from the Iron Throne fight.
- Digging Site: 1000 XP after talking to Charleston Nib
- Brage: 1000 XP
- Noober: 400 XP
- Albert & Rufie: 1000 XP
- Samuel: 500 XP, got really lucky cause no ambushes at all
- Mutamins Garden: 25000 XP, missed only one Lesser Basilisk, drinking Potion of Stone Giant Strength while banging on paralyzed basilisks with Staff +3 or shooting bolts from distance
- Mirianne: 300 XP
- Firebead: 300 XP
- Marl: 900 XP
- High Hedge Golems: 4000 XP, kited in the inner ring with +1 bolts, reached Fighter Level 6
- Melicamp: Tanked the Skels who needed a crit to hit, luckily Melicamp survived this time
- Ankheg Cave: 2925 XP, kiting three Ankhegs took some time cause Loreth needed 19+ rolls
- Brun: 1000 XP
- Durlag Basilisks: 22400 XP, PfP + Potion of Cloud Giant Strength, Killed the Ghast using Potion of Freedom, Grabbed the Scimitar while protected from PfF potion and Ring
- Kirinhale: 4000 XP, finally reached Level 7 (55 HP)
After all far more work than using Mage Duals. Lost three Shadow Dancers today in the very early game so its nice to see the fourth one getting through this early-game-bottleneck. With stealth powers back next targets are Dushai, Droth, Meilum and hopefully some more. Reputation is at 17 so some more quests are needed before going shopping. But not today...