@Arctodus: Maybe. I'm not entirely sure just yet. I've created a new install without SR and IR, because I noticed a lot of important options that people have mentioned here don't work in SR/IR. Once I get accustomed to BG without SR/IR, maybe I'll know.
Another thing: Polymorph Other in EE sets the target's maximum HP to 5 on a failed save vs. wand. Most enemies with immunity to the polymorph opcode are immune to the Polymorph Other spell (and the wild magic variants of the spell), but the same does not apply for Wands of Polymorphing, which does not count as a spell.
If you have Item Revisions installed, the Wand of Polymorphing does work using a spell, but it looks like enemies don't have immunity to that, either. Plus, IR Wands of Polymorphing apply a -3 penalty to the save vs. wands.
There's a crafting mod (I think it's one of @subtledoctor's) that allows mages to craft wands. You can spend several thousand gold crafting a Wand of Polymorphing that works just like the normal one (I don't know if having IR installed gets you the same, more powerful IR type).
The final boss of Siege of Dragonspear has a base save vs. polymorph of 3, which amounts to -2 in Legacy of Bhaal mode. With Greater Malison, Doom, and Chant, you can get it up to 4, which effectively means every charge from a Wand of Polymorphing amounts to a 20% chance of instantly killing the final boss. This would be a viable option for Cleric/Mages.
If you have Item Revisions and Spell Revisions installed, and the final boss is not patched to be immune to the right spell, then the situation is more complicated. Greater Malison only penalizes saves by -2 in Spell Revisions, and Doom offers a save vs. spell, which compensates for the IR Wand of Polymorphing's -3 save penalty. With Greater Malison, Chant, and the IR Wand of Polymorphing, the final boss' effective save vs. polymorph is 3, or 5 if you can get Doom to work. That amounts to a 10% chance per charge of slaying the final boss, but having Item Revisions installed also means you can use the Wand of Lightning trick to triple the chances of success.
If you had Item Revisions installed but not Spell Revisions (the mods are designed to work in concert), then things get more generous: Greater Malison: -4 Doom: -2 Chant: -1 Wand of Polymorphing: -3 Which would amount to a 35% chance of instant death.
Polymorph Other can only be cast so many times per day, but that does not apply to Wands of Polymorphing. It's like a ranged Harm spell that offers a saving throw and strikes as a level 4 spell.
And it appears that the final boss is also not immune to Hold Monster, which uses opcode 175. With a base save of 5 and an LoB save of 0, the spell should have a 5% chance of success for anyone besides an Enchanter. If you have the mod that lets you scribe scrolls, you could spam Hold Monster (and also Lower Resistance) until it worked. An Archer/Mage could also use Called Shot to increase the chances of success.
Last I checked, the Ravager was also vulnerable to Hold Monster, but it may have been changed since then.
Bear in mind that, despite the name, the Wand of Paralyzation actually stuns the target (opcode 45), and the final boss is immune to that, though Melissan notably is not.
@semiticgod, could you elaborate on the Wand of Lightning trick? Or post a link to a thread discussing it? I feel like I've just spammed the insightful button on all of your posts! Thanks for sharing all of these
@semiticgod, good stuff man. Thank you for taking the time to write all this down. As you probably know I avoid exploits that, imo, go completely against the spirit of the game (to me the WoL trick and saving/resting shenenigans while blinded are examples of that), but it's good that you share them anyway. I'll never berate anyone for using them. And the info on the Big Metal Rod and its ammo, the Wand of Polymorphing, and Hold Monster I find just great. It's very good to know that there are options against powerhouses with loads as immunities like Belhifet and Mel.
When my current character, a Fighter/Illusionist, picked up a Hold Monster scroll in Durlag's Tower, I made a mental note to investigate options of holding Belhifet with Hold Monster. My plan B is to prepare several castings of Enchanted Weapon to make sure he never runs out of ammo to hit Belhifet with. Mel has always seemed so far away from me that I haven't really given her much thought yet. Some of us did know she was vulnerable to stuns, so that's pretty much the only tactic we've discussed since the final battle loomed for @Harpagornis and @Arctodus. Thank you for sharing your wisdom here, and who knows we'll see you in action here soon.
I have good and bad news. The good one: Korgath managed to storm through BG 1 and finally took out Sarevok. The whole run - up to this point - was easy like never before cause luck always seems to be on his side. Charms working mostly on the first try while critting like crazy with backstabs - looks like the god of murder smiles upon him! I would give more details but i severely lack time. Which leads directly to the bad news: Thanks to some real life issues i will have to pause the challenge for some time. I hope that i can return at some point and will try to take a look at your posts from time to time. Good luck to everyone! As i said earlier: F/M is too easy for you @Blackraven!
Hey friend, I'm sorry to read you're not going to be around much for some time. Hopefully it's mainly good things that's keeping you busy, and nothing bad. I wish you all the best, and I want to thank you for creating this thread and liven it up as much as you've done. We're going to miss your expertise, and your cheerful presence, hopefully not for long. Keep well!
@Blackraven: There's a lot of stuff in this game that's wildly overpowered and makes no conceptual sense. But yes, the Wand of Lightning trick is definitely at the top of the stack.
@Noobacca: The Wand of Lightning trick is pretty simple, but I'll go in precise detail to make sure it's absolutely clear.
If you want to duplicate a Potion of Extra Healing and heal 180 HP in one round:
1. Put a Potion of Extra Healing in one quick slot. Put the Wand of Lightning in another. 2. Leave the inventory screen and click the Wand of Lightning. If you move around the cursor, you'll notice there's a number "6" next to it. That's how many targets the wand has. 3. Click on the character him or herself six times. Don't double click; just click one at a time. Or, press the character's number 6 times (for a person at the front of the party, you can just mash the "1" key six times). Your character is now targeting all 6 lightning bolts on him or herself. 4. While the game is still paused, click on the Potion of Extra Healing. Or, go to the inventory screen and switch the potion and wand's places. 5. Your character will drink the potion six times at once, but only use up a single charge (a stack of 5 potions will just go down to 4, not 0).
If you want to duplicate a Sunfire spell:
1. Put a Wand of Lightning in your quick slot. 2. Click the wand. 3. Click on your character six times. 4. While the game is paused, click the Sunfire spell. 5. Your character will cast Sunfire normally, but it will hit 6 times.
If you want to duplicate a Wand of Cloudkill:
1. Put a Wand of Lightning in your quick slot. 2. Click the wand. 3. Click any character or any item on the ground. You can spread out the charges across multiple targets--you can even target things out of your field of vision! 4. While the game is paused, switch out the Wand of Lightning for the Wand of Cloudkill. 5. Your character will use a single charge of the Wand of Cloudkill, but it will fire one Cloudkill at each target you chose.
Most of the time, the effect is instantaneous; all 6 charges/spells/potions/whatever happen at once. But if you're duplicating a mage scroll, your character will cast the spell 6 times one after another. Thus, it will take 6 rounds to cast Meteor Swarm 6 times.
In vanilla, scrolls were unaffected by casting speed bonuses like those of the Robe of Vecna, but in EE, those bonuses apply. So a mage with the Amulet of Power can cast Magic Missile 6 times instantaneously via a scroll and the Wand of Lightning trick.
The Wand of Lightning trick only works with things you can put in your quick slot (Efreeti Bottle, potions, scrolls) or spells that can ONLY target the caster. So you can duplicate a Sunfire spell, a Sunfire scroll, and a Fireball scroll, but not a Fireball spell.
I didn't invent the WoL trick--I just read about it somewhere--but I did kind of pioneer it. All of this was just me experimenting with the thing.
In theory these exploits are always interesting to know. The other day I saw a guy streaming a SoA speedrun (no scs or lob) and he "talklocked" characters he wanted to kill by spamclicking talk on them while bombarding them with Melfs meteors. He also spamclicked quicksave which somehow prevented the non hostile character from alerting his allies (which stood right next to him) so neither the target nor the allies ever turned hostile. Idk if this would work with chars like Drasus and Kirian who start a dialogue on sight (it should if you are fast enough) but either way I didn't even try for it, since I feel like exploits take the challenge out of the game for me personally, but I've got to add that even the cheese I personally regularly use (wand of fire when enemies are not in sight) absolutely drags down my mood when I know I have no other way of winning an encounter.
If it wasn't for chars like the druid, DD and a couple others I would totally despise LoB and some might remember that I started out this challenge by not really liking LoB. But I learned so much about the game BECAUSE OF LoB and you guys coming up with new stuff, so big thanks to you for reviving my interest in a game that I last played start to finish years ago.
Coastway Did several side quests at the crossing, including the Dwarves of Dumathoin. Failed to save the Dwarves themselves from an overwhelming undead force, but ventured on anyway. As he only read a PfU scroll after having entered the dig site, undead mobs kept swarming him. He chose to use a Teleport Field to get past them once he had looted Crommus' grave.
On the next level he made sure to be PfU before revealing himself, to prevent the hordes from following him around. He slew the Bronze Sentry (a construct unaffected by PfU, so it kept attacking Oaen) with the wand of frost, and brought the Coldhearth Lich some amulets in exchange for help against the crusade. In the woods Oaen sided with a vampire after he expressed his disapproval of Isabella's aggressive tone. He also hoped the vamp would join in the battle against the crusaders, but he was merely rewarded an ioun stone. In sum, more evilish action by the neutral good Gnome. I've now reached the stage where I just see Oaen as as this loose cannon the coalition really aren't comfortable with, but heck, he's the best they've got!
Troll Claw Woods and Forest of Wyrms Left Morentherene alone, and snuck through the caves to the old temple. Wand summons caused Ziatar and her wizards to waste some of their spells. Oaen was fortunate that Ziatar came outside to the corner of the corridor to fight one of the summons, while the wizards were back dealing with other summons. Oaen seized the opportunity to Malison and paralyze the priestess, and finished her with his trademark bolts of lightning.
With access to the ritual chamber secured, Oaen proceeded to battle the Neothelid, relying on @Harpagornis's strategy as described here and here. It worked as Harpagornis described. The Neothelid only uses its spells and summons from afar, once it pops up in melee range, it can be taken down with hit and run tactics. The creature did burn through Oaen's stoneskins, and Oaen also got poisoned once when he stepped into the poisonous substance surrounding it, but no mordy swords, ego whips, etc.
(Oaen did use charges of his greenstone amulet, just to stay on the safe side of things.) Akanna's aerial servants were lured away from her room, after which Oaen shut the door. The Gnome prebuffed out of sight of the priestess, Malisoned her, charmed her with Algernon's cloak while she was in the middle of casting Unholy Blight, stunned her with the wand of paralyzation, cast DUHM, and finished her with Drizzt's scimitars.
Bridgefort Oaen stole Vichand's scroll right in front of a not so watchful guard and got the void sword forged. (That proved a mistake. In hindsight I would have preferred the hammer. But the dialogue option "What do you have in the way of swords?" suggested that she could forge different types of void swords, perhaps a greatsword conform Oaen's specialization. Unfortunately Jegg just took it as an instruction to forge a long sword.) The Gnome had Khalid negotiate a surrender. On the Boareskyr bridge Oaen didn't make Mordica's eventually fatal mistake of allowing the crusader wizard to finish a fire elemental summoning spell. He took his Deadshot and dispelled the wizard's buff with an arrow of dispelling. A bolt of lightning then interrupted the wizard's spell casting.
Oaen finished the mage (which required a second arrow of dispelling), and after that the crusader warriors with the help of some wand summons, and so he held the bridge.
The Gnome has just completed the long trek north to the coalition camp, where he is currently bartering goods with Nazramu. It may take some time before you'll hear more of him. I'm not familiar with the remainder of SoD, so I'll do some testing with Mordica or with my Cleric/Illusionist before continuing with Oaen.
BTW The ambushes were quite profitable for Oaen. He secured scrolls of Enchanted Weapon and Lower Resistance, scrolls that Belegarm didn't have for sale.
Just a short hello! Everything is fine despite the time for playing!
Big thanks @semiticgod for sharing his huge experience and giving us new ideas for the challenge - thats great!
I dont like the WoL cheese but i wont bother if anyone wants to use it. The Wand of Polymorph on the other hand sounds quite interesting! Big Metal Rod + The Scorcher Ammu works - at least to get down some of the Big Five. Mel only takes 1 damage per hit and just gets too much time for gating or casting - at least when playing a Warrior. But - as @semiticgod said - Power Attack and its stun works quite well against Mel as her Save vs Death is 1. With the -4 penalty it goes up to 5 - which is enough to stun her quite regularly. But this also works only with one enemy around so Warriors should still have a very hard time to get through this horror.
I can agree that the Lower Resistance + Greater Malison + Hold Monster combo works on Big B even though the casting will take some time (you remember that his MR is somewhat higher than displayed in his file?!). Dont forget: Thanks to his Improved Invisibilty he gets another +4 to his Saving Throws! And even if it somehow works you will still have to take an eye on all the demons around that will constantly attack you - how long can a Mage survive this?
No more time for writing! Good luck @Blackraven who seems to roll through SoD at the moment!
Now that Evil Aerie the F/M/C completed Baldur's Gate, Droolit the Druid felt it was time to get back into it for real. The first vict... um targets were Kirian and her group for the famed Golden girdle. Being outside this is a pretty easy encounter for any druid, but especially easy for totemic with it's invincible dogees. The strategy was as simple as against Drasus and party but much easier due to kirian and pals being much weaker. Summon dogees and nymphes from out of sight then turn invisible via pixie dust, move into sight, let the nymphs cast lightning and watch the carnage. Since the lightning alone kills almost any enemy there is no reason to ever go out of invis, but since Kirian is pretty lippy Droolit decided to join in on the fun with a couple of totally unnecessary dooms and poisons just to give them a "fair" chance by triggering their precast buffs, which don't help against lightning, since neither of them has minor globe.
After that it was time for Durlag's and to my eternal shame I realized the chest I couldn't open before doesn't contain the grapes and I missed the room with the grapes right next to it.
Necklace of missiles were not necessary and the dogees killed all but fear, which was enough for Droolit looting Love and moving on.
Oh wow @Harpagornis I completely forgot about improved invis giving saving throws. As you know I've been playing on the sides with a DD which is great because of it's saves but has some downsides namely having to equip elemental resistances, which works fine for everything but acid and magic dmg and also while the dd almost takes no damage its AC is only mediocre. So I also tried out swashie 24 dualed into fighter which is much better in many reards than the DD getting MR up to 95% (ideal equip is 80% tho) but if you want the best possible ac equip (-23 before bonuses) your saving throws are not good enough to soak up malison + doom, which potentially could be bad vs hive mothers and the likes who other than that can't really touch this char. Now improved invis solves this issue with the air control ring which also makes the saving throws of many other chars very viable and not only dwarves.
I agree it's useful, but remember that invisibility is highly likely to be dispelled by many opponents (including beholders) - so you can't afford to rely on it too much. A mage of course has the option of regularly using spell shield and spell immunity to lock in the improved invisibility ...
Yes, very true my plan was to use it only if malison is on me because without malison the saves are below -1 anyway, up to that point most enemies deplete their remove magic even if you have no actual removable buffs on. I also did not give beholder rays a chance to burn thru spell protections in my latest SCS install.
On another note: What do you guys think about removing BG1 xp cap for classes that are severally weakened in BG1? I was specifically thinking about the monk who in my eyes has gotten a lot more interesting in SoA/ToB due to improved invis saving throw bonus, but doesn't even get +1 weapons in BG1 xp cap. I alos found this mod: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/33618/mod-monk-overhaul
What would the XP values look like for a solo LoB character, with or without LoB XP bonuses? I can only guess at some numbers, but some of you folks have already made it a ways into the saga and would know.
A solo character should get about 6 times as much XP as a full party and LoB bonuses roughly quadruple XP in my experience (more in BG1 due to 1000 XP kobolds, less in BG2), so this is what I would assume would happen.
BG1 party of 6: 100,000 XP (level 7-9) BG1 solo: 600,000 XP (level 10-13) BG1 party of 6 with LoB XP bonuses: 400,000 XP (level 9-12) BG1 solo with LoB XP bonuses: 2.4 million XP (level 14-21)
SoD party of 6: 500,000 XP (level 10-13) SoD solo: 3 million XP (level 15-24) SoD party of 6 with LoB XP bonuses: 2 million XP (level 14-19) SoD solo with LoB XP bonuses: 12 million XP
BG2: maxed out regardless for a solo character
If these numbers are correct, a solo character should be able to get a single HLA by the end of SoD--which would notably open up the options of Summon Deva, Summon Planetar, Earth Elemental form, and Hardiness, plus level 9 spell picks for sorcerers. In my install (I installed a bunch of stuff via BWS), it's possible to pick HLAs in BG1.
This has bearing on the polymorph strategy for players without the scroll scribing mod, as you only get so many spells to use against the final boss of SoD.
I'd also like to call attention to the Martyr's Morningstar +2 in SoD. You need Enchanted Weapon to hit the final boss of SoD with it, but on a critical hit, it deals damage equal to 15% of the target's maximum HP. The final boss's resistances might reduce the damage, but Single Weapon Style could give you a 10% chance of landing a critical hit, which amounts to dealing 1.5% of the final boss's total HP per hit on average, 1.125% if crushing resistance applies to it. This means you could kill the final boss after making only 70-100 attack rolls on average.
The spider gnome trick works in SoD, so a hasted gnome using the morningstar in spider form at 5 APR could expect to win after 14-20 rounds of attacking, even if his or her THAC0 was poor. A hasted fighter could hit 3 APR and win after 23-33 rounds on average, though the fighter would still need to be able to cast Enchanted Weapon.
If you can get two HLAs by the end of SoD, a fighter/mage could use Critical Strike (you'd need to select Power Attack as a prerequisite first) to guarantee 4 critical hits, taking out 40-60% of the final boss's HP.
Even though i lack time i have to give my five cents here...
Yeah, XP values like in IWD - plus XP cap remover - would lead to even more powerful chars - no dought about that. But i must admit that i do not like the whole idea. Put this in and you can replace the phrase "challenge" with "hey, lets have a walk in the park".
Maybe i should rework the OP to exclude things like that - what do you think?
P.S. An old RPG companion will replace me for some time - and hopefully join the challenge with his own char!
P.P.S After reading your very insightful comments @semiticgod i have came to the conclusion that any kind of Mages should be banned from this Challenge cause of their Bag of Endless Cheese - no?
For this specific challenge things like xp-bonus oder xp-cap removal is not allowed as it makes things too easy in my opinion. SCS is a bonus but not a must have. Anyway: You can play the game like you want - have fun and feel free to update your progress!
Everyone has disabled XP bonuses afaik, so if you went with that, you'd end up with a maximum of 161k XP in BG1, and 500k XP in SoD. To be honest, the early game can be a bit tedious in terms of effort required to kill something and the XP gained for it. I therefore kill very few enemies in the early game, doing quests that give XP without requiring any kills instead. It's quite doable to gain four or five levels without killing many foes: Shoal, Tenya, Brun (requires stealth, sanctuary or invisibility), Marl, Coquetle, Brage, Albert, Drienne, and Noober are good for circa 12k XP.
Edit: btw I do have wizard scroll scribing as of level 9. It's an aTweaks feature. What do people think about it? Is it fair game? It would be nice for wizards not be forced into using wand on Belhifet no?
P.P.S After reading your very insightful comments @semiticgod i have came to the conclusion that any kind of Mages should be banned from this Challenge cause of their Bag of Endless Cheese - no?
Nooooo, I'm enjoying my run with Oaen too much for that!
Would be great to have another participant around btw.
Ah yes... it's been so long since I visited this thread that I forgot the early rules.
I wasn't entirely sure beating LoB as a solo character was possible without the XP bonuses, but after reading about you guys' work, I've changed my mind.
BG1 party of 6: 100,000 XP (level 7-9) BG1 solo: 600,000 XP (level 10-13)
You get around 170,000 XP per character in BG1 if you complete *everything* which amounts at least one million XP for a solo character. I've very rarely finished BG1 solo with less than 800,000 XP while having done most of the quests in the game as well.
@semiticgod is right: The Martyr's Morningstar +2 works even against Big B when critting him. But the big question is: Will the suffering to roll 20´s be really better than just hacking him down with +3 weapons? Tanking him as a Warrior is no option and F/M i dont count as they are banned! LOL!!!
@Harpagornis what are your thoughts on Monk mods, if xp cap removal is too cheesy in your opinion? I've found a mod called Monastic order of Faerun, which would make monks super viable vs Melissan giving Stunning and Killing blows save malus from level 15 onward (up to -5 I believe). This would still make SoD a big pain, you get +1 fists in BG1 with that mod, but your Armor class is quite low and Big B can't be hit by fists, so I'm not even sure if I'd have the balls for a full monk playthru.
Maybe instead after finishing ToB with Droolit I make a BG2 only playthru with the Monk mod, but somehow that would feel incomplete.
Droolit in the meantime got Durlag's goblet and Kiel's helm, fighting 2 doppelgangers 1on1 cuz she was too lazy to rest for her dogees, but due to her -14 ac vs slash they didn't prove much of a challenge as only crits hit for pitiful 2 damage (she had 15% dr from AoF). After that she murdered Ragefast, even tho he agreed to let the nymph go free due to her high CH.
@Harpagornis: The advantage of the morningstar is that classes with poor THAC0 get more out of the critical hit bonuses, as they'll be more reliant on critical hits just to touch the final boss. But for fighters with Grandmastery, a +3 weapon with 1d8 or 1d10 base damage is indeed better.
There are some mods that influence critical hit rolls--I think there's one that grants +1 to critical hits if your Intelligence is high--which could tip the balance in favor of the morningstar.
SoD spoiler:
What about Caelar? In normal mode, she's almost strong enough to take down Belhifet solo. And though a single-classed cleric or druid would struggle to hurt Bellyfat, they can cast Heal on her and give her a strong advantage against him.
Hello everyone! I used several hours to read though all of the amazing stuff here after @Harpagornis finally convinced me to pull myself together and join the challenge. As he stated above i am and old companion that also has played dozens of RPG´s in the last thirty years - mostly offline.
As i am also a big Druid Freak and i prefer to play No-Reload i will give the Totemic Druid a good try. The posts from @Victor_Creed_SFV convinced me that this Kit has some potential. Lets see what i can bring to the table in the next time!
I created my Character in IWD as i wanted to start with an Elf cause i dont like Humans that much. Here are his stats:
Everything clear? Okay, lets go! After getting out of Candlekeep Vyz directly traveled to Shoal. A big bear in front of her nose made sure that she never was able to reach Vyz who slinged her down from safe distance. Easy 5k XP that pushed Vyz right to level 3.
In Beregost it was time for some sleeping while sweet talking to Marl and helping old Firebead to get another – even older – book. While staying at Feldposts Inn Vyz also killed Algernon with another Bear to take the Cloak of Cheesines.
Vyz traveled further through the wilderness to avoid any Bandit ambushes and met good old Drizzt. After some thought he decided not the help him and waited until the Drow was taken down by rolling 20´s. With his Scimitars and Mithrill Armor Vyz quickly retreated to reach Nashkel.
Once he arrived at the village he sold a lot of stuff and walked out of the shop with more than 10k gold. Another target was the hidden Ankheg Armor that not only protects a lot better than usual leather but also looks pretty nice!
Neira was tanked by the Bear which did a great job while Vyz was slinging from the background. Once the bear was near death he used him as a running decoy. Too bad Vyz had to roll a 19+ to hit Neira so the whole process took some time. But – to be honest – the Helm just looks too cool to pass on!
On his way to the north he caught a thievish Ogre who was kited with Darts and Sklinghots while the Bear feared the big one several times. Once he dropped down Vyz took his fine belt and traveled further to the north!
At the Friendly Arms Inn a funny battle took place. With a charmed Guard and his Bear he approached Tarnesh. Once the battle started the Mage quickly casted a Horror at Vyz who couldnt escpape to th nearby door. He failed his saved and started to run – only to see that Tarnesh not only wasted his Missiles on the bear but also panicked. After some running from both sides Vyz was the first one to recover and together they put a swift end to the helpless Tarnesh! He also grabbed the Ring of Wizardry and spared some gold to improve his reputation a bit – before planning his next crime!
After takling to some farmers north of the Inn Vyz came near the city of Baldurs Gate where he met Tenya the young Priestress of Umberlee. As he knew what was coming he summoned a wolf that quickly attacked once she turned hostile. This gave Vyz enough time to retreat before any spell could come for him. After a little beating she asked for help cause the farmers had killed her mother Vyz quickly agreed to support her and retrieved the Bowl from Sonner for another 2.5 k XP..
He also made a short trip to Ulgoths Beard to get the wonderful Ring of Free Action from Dushai. He charmed the Gnome on his second try and killed him with the help of a Wolf outside of the village – time to increase reputation again!
Said is done he retrieved the lost Ring for Joia at the Friendly Arms Inn after spending some gold at the church. With reputation up to 15 again Vyz was back on the good side of life!
With level 5 in reach i had to stop the game - real life is calling again. I hope that i can play on the next days a bit. To success!
Aahw @Harpagornis, you're almost making me feel bad about Oaen, almost... I like him too much (not just the class, but also the portrait and the RPing, the ruthless vigilante man he's becoming). Btw I'm not exactly powergaming him. Oaen has ** in two-handed weapon style and ** in greatswords, but he never uses his sword. He would certainly be better dual-wielding, if only to finish stunned foes a lot faster.
@Victor_Creed_SFV, personally I would welcome any Monk attempt. I aborted my Dark Moon Monk run early on, simply because I felt the odds were completely stacked against her. I have the Oversight HLAs in my install as well, and I think the Monastic Order of Faerun Monk could be interesting to watch.
LoB is still quite new, and so is this solo LoB/SCS challenge. With more people playing no-reload I'd recommend players to pick classes they're comfortable with. At this point any no-reload success with any class would be a major accomplishment.
@semiticgod, good call on morningstar. Note that the Cloverleaf belt grants +1 to Luck, so you a character with single-weapon style proficiency will get a critical on a roll of 18. There's also a pair of boots that increases luck by 3, but I think it's Dwarf only, and would therefore require an illegal Dwarven Cleric/Mage or Fighter/Mage. But imagine that: 1 in 4 hits would be a HP draining critical.
@Blackraven - I agree entirely with your feeling that any no-reload success would be a major accomplishment and think you should continue with Oaen .
In relation to the Martyr's Morningstar it's not a weapon I've come across, but presumably it could be used by other classes than a mage. The text on the Lucky Boots says they increase saving throws rather than luck - is that wrong? In any case though I don't believe that luck affects critical hit chances in Baldur's Gate, so unless you have mods that change it you would only get a critical on 19 (with single weapon proficiency) or 20.
Comments
I thought it was just the doppelgangers that could do that...
...Do you care to try your luck at this challenge, the good ol' no reload way ?
Another thing: Polymorph Other in EE sets the target's maximum HP to 5 on a failed save vs. wand. Most enemies with immunity to the polymorph opcode are immune to the Polymorph Other spell (and the wild magic variants of the spell), but the same does not apply for Wands of Polymorphing, which does not count as a spell.
If you have Item Revisions installed, the Wand of Polymorphing does work using a spell, but it looks like enemies don't have immunity to that, either. Plus, IR Wands of Polymorphing apply a -3 penalty to the save vs. wands.
There's a crafting mod (I think it's one of @subtledoctor's) that allows mages to craft wands. You can spend several thousand gold crafting a Wand of Polymorphing that works just like the normal one (I don't know if having IR installed gets you the same, more powerful IR type).
The final boss of Siege of Dragonspear has a base save vs. polymorph of 3, which amounts to -2 in Legacy of Bhaal mode. With Greater Malison, Doom, and Chant, you can get it up to 4, which effectively means every charge from a Wand of Polymorphing amounts to a 20% chance of instantly killing the final boss. This would be a viable option for Cleric/Mages.
If you have Item Revisions and Spell Revisions installed, and the final boss is not patched to be immune to the right spell, then the situation is more complicated. Greater Malison only penalizes saves by -2 in Spell Revisions, and Doom offers a save vs. spell, which compensates for the IR Wand of Polymorphing's -3 save penalty. With Greater Malison, Chant, and the IR Wand of Polymorphing, the final boss' effective save vs. polymorph is 3, or 5 if you can get Doom to work. That amounts to a 10% chance per charge of slaying the final boss, but having Item Revisions installed also means you can use the Wand of Lightning trick to triple the chances of success.
If you had Item Revisions installed but not Spell Revisions (the mods are designed to work in concert), then things get more generous:
Greater Malison: -4
Doom: -2
Chant: -1
Wand of Polymorphing: -3
Which would amount to a 35% chance of instant death.
Polymorph Other can only be cast so many times per day, but that does not apply to Wands of Polymorphing. It's like a ranged Harm spell that offers a saving throw and strikes as a level 4 spell.
EDIT: corrected some numbers.
Last I checked, the Ravager was also vulnerable to Hold Monster, but it may have been changed since then.
Bear in mind that, despite the name, the Wand of Paralyzation actually stuns the target (opcode 45), and the final boss is immune to that, though Melissan notably is not.
As you probably know I avoid exploits that, imo, go completely against the spirit of the game (to me the WoL trick and saving/resting shenenigans while blinded are examples of that), but it's good that you share them anyway. I'll never berate anyone for using them.
And the info on the Big Metal Rod and its ammo, the Wand of Polymorphing, and Hold Monster I find just great. It's very good to know that there are options against powerhouses with loads as immunities like Belhifet and Mel.
When my current character, a Fighter/Illusionist, picked up a Hold Monster scroll in Durlag's Tower, I made a mental note to investigate options of holding Belhifet with Hold Monster. My plan B is to prepare several castings of Enchanted Weapon to make sure he never runs out of ammo to hit Belhifet with. Mel has always seemed so far away from me that I haven't really given her much thought yet. Some of us did know she was vulnerable to stuns, so that's pretty much the only tactic we've discussed since the final battle loomed for @Harpagornis and @Arctodus. Thank you for sharing your wisdom here, and who knows we'll see you in action here soon.
@Noobacca: The Wand of Lightning trick is pretty simple, but I'll go in precise detail to make sure it's absolutely clear.
If you want to duplicate a Potion of Extra Healing and heal 180 HP in one round:
1. Put a Potion of Extra Healing in one quick slot. Put the Wand of Lightning in another.
2. Leave the inventory screen and click the Wand of Lightning. If you move around the cursor, you'll notice there's a number "6" next to it. That's how many targets the wand has.
3. Click on the character him or herself six times. Don't double click; just click one at a time. Or, press the character's number 6 times (for a person at the front of the party, you can just mash the "1" key six times). Your character is now targeting all 6 lightning bolts on him or herself.
4. While the game is still paused, click on the Potion of Extra Healing. Or, go to the inventory screen and switch the potion and wand's places.
5. Your character will drink the potion six times at once, but only use up a single charge (a stack of 5 potions will just go down to 4, not 0).
If you want to duplicate a Sunfire spell:
1. Put a Wand of Lightning in your quick slot.
2. Click the wand.
3. Click on your character six times.
4. While the game is paused, click the Sunfire spell.
5. Your character will cast Sunfire normally, but it will hit 6 times.
If you want to duplicate a Wand of Cloudkill:
1. Put a Wand of Lightning in your quick slot.
2. Click the wand.
3. Click any character or any item on the ground. You can spread out the charges across multiple targets--you can even target things out of your field of vision!
4. While the game is paused, switch out the Wand of Lightning for the Wand of Cloudkill.
5. Your character will use a single charge of the Wand of Cloudkill, but it will fire one Cloudkill at each target you chose.
Most of the time, the effect is instantaneous; all 6 charges/spells/potions/whatever happen at once. But if you're duplicating a mage scroll, your character will cast the spell 6 times one after another. Thus, it will take 6 rounds to cast Meteor Swarm 6 times.
In vanilla, scrolls were unaffected by casting speed bonuses like those of the Robe of Vecna, but in EE, those bonuses apply. So a mage with the Amulet of Power can cast Magic Missile 6 times instantaneously via a scroll and the Wand of Lightning trick.
The Wand of Lightning trick only works with things you can put in your quick slot (Efreeti Bottle, potions, scrolls) or spells that can ONLY target the caster. So you can duplicate a Sunfire spell, a Sunfire scroll, and a Fireball scroll, but not a Fireball spell.
I didn't invent the WoL trick--I just read about it somewhere--but I did kind of pioneer it. All of this was just me experimenting with the thing.
The other day I saw a guy streaming a SoA speedrun (no scs or lob) and he "talklocked" characters he wanted to kill by spamclicking talk on them while bombarding them with Melfs meteors.
He also spamclicked quicksave which somehow prevented the non hostile character from alerting his allies (which stood right next to him) so neither the target nor the allies ever turned hostile.
Idk if this would work with chars like Drasus and Kirian who start a dialogue on sight (it should if you are fast enough) but either way I didn't even try for it, since I feel like exploits take the challenge out of the game for me personally, but I've got to add that even the cheese I personally regularly use (wand of fire when enemies are not in sight) absolutely drags down my mood when I know I have no other way of winning an encounter.
If it wasn't for chars like the druid, DD and a couple others I would totally despise LoB and some might remember that I started out this challenge by not really liking LoB.
But I learned so much about the game BECAUSE OF LoB and you guys coming up with new stuff, so big thanks to you for reviving my interest in a game that I last played start to finish years ago.
Coastway
Did several side quests at the crossing, including the Dwarves of Dumathoin. Failed to save the Dwarves themselves from an overwhelming undead force, but ventured on anyway. As he only read a PfU scroll after having entered the dig site, undead mobs kept swarming him. He chose to use a Teleport Field to get past them once he had looted Crommus' grave.
In the woods Oaen sided with a vampire after he expressed his disapproval of Isabella's aggressive tone. He also hoped the vamp would join in the battle against the crusaders, but he was merely rewarded an ioun stone.
In sum, more evilish action by the neutral good Gnome. I've now reached the stage where I just see Oaen as as this loose cannon the coalition really aren't comfortable with, but heck, he's the best they've got!
Troll Claw Woods and Forest of Wyrms
Left Morentherene alone, and snuck through the caves to the old temple. Wand summons caused Ziatar and her wizards to waste some of their spells. Oaen was fortunate that Ziatar came outside to the corner of the corridor to fight one of the summons, while the wizards were back dealing with other summons. Oaen seized the opportunity to Malison and paralyze the priestess, and finished her with his trademark bolts of lightning.
Akanna's aerial servants were lured away from her room, after which Oaen shut the door. The Gnome prebuffed out of sight of the priestess, Malisoned her, charmed her with Algernon's cloak while she was in the middle of casting Unholy Blight, stunned her with the wand of paralyzation, cast DUHM, and finished her with Drizzt's scimitars.
Bridgefort
Oaen stole Vichand's scroll right in front of a not so watchful guard and got the void sword forged. (That proved a mistake. In hindsight I would have preferred the hammer. But the dialogue option "What do you have in the way of swords?" suggested that she could forge different types of void swords, perhaps a greatsword conform Oaen's specialization. Unfortunately Jegg just took it as an instruction to forge a long sword.)
The Gnome had Khalid negotiate a surrender. On the Boareskyr bridge Oaen didn't make Mordica's eventually fatal mistake of allowing the crusader wizard to finish a fire elemental summoning spell. He took his Deadshot and dispelled the wizard's buff with an arrow of dispelling. A bolt of lightning then interrupted the wizard's spell casting.
The Gnome has just completed the long trek north to the coalition camp, where he is currently bartering goods with Nazramu. It may take some time before you'll hear more of him. I'm not familiar with the remainder of SoD, so I'll do some testing with Mordica or with my Cleric/Illusionist before continuing with Oaen.
BTW The ambushes were quite profitable for Oaen. He secured scrolls of Enchanted Weapon and Lower Resistance, scrolls that Belegarm didn't have for sale.
Big thanks @semiticgod for sharing his huge experience and giving us new ideas for the challenge - thats great!
I dont like the WoL cheese but i wont bother if anyone wants to use it. The Wand of Polymorph on the other hand sounds quite interesting! Big Metal Rod + The Scorcher Ammu works - at least to get down some of the Big Five. Mel only takes 1 damage per hit and just gets too much time for gating or casting - at least when playing a Warrior. But - as @semiticgod said - Power Attack and its stun works quite well against Mel as her Save vs Death is 1. With the -4 penalty it goes up to 5 - which is enough to stun her quite regularly. But this also works only with one enemy around so Warriors should still have a very hard time to get through this horror.
I can agree that the Lower Resistance + Greater Malison + Hold Monster combo works on Big B even though the casting will take some time (you remember that his MR is somewhat higher than displayed in his file?!). Dont forget: Thanks to his Improved Invisibilty he gets another +4 to his Saving Throws! And even if it somehow works you will still have to take an eye on all the demons around that will constantly attack you - how long can a Mage survive this?
No more time for writing! Good luck @Blackraven who seems to roll through SoD at the moment!
The first vict... um targets were Kirian and her group for the famed Golden girdle.
Being outside this is a pretty easy encounter for any druid, but especially easy for totemic with it's invincible dogees.
The strategy was as simple as against Drasus and party but much easier due to kirian and pals being much weaker.
Summon dogees and nymphes from out of sight then turn invisible via pixie dust, move into sight, let the nymphs cast lightning and watch the carnage.
Since the lightning alone kills almost any enemy there is no reason to ever go out of invis, but since Kirian is pretty lippy Droolit decided to join in on the fun with a couple of totally unnecessary dooms and poisons just to give them a "fair" chance by triggering their precast buffs, which don't help against lightning, since neither of them has minor globe.
After that it was time for Durlag's and to my eternal shame I realized the chest I couldn't open before doesn't contain the grapes and I missed the room with the grapes right next to it.
Necklace of missiles were not necessary and the dogees killed all but fear, which was enough for Droolit looting Love and moving on.
As you know I've been playing on the sides with a DD which is great because of it's saves but has some downsides namely having to equip elemental resistances, which works fine for everything but acid and magic dmg and also while the dd almost takes no damage its AC is only mediocre.
So I also tried out swashie 24 dualed into fighter which is much better in many reards than the DD getting MR up to 95% (ideal equip is 80% tho) but if you want the best possible ac equip (-23 before bonuses) your saving throws are not good enough to soak up malison + doom, which potentially could be bad vs hive mothers and the likes who other than that can't really touch this char.
Now improved invis solves this issue with the air control ring which also makes the saving throws of many other chars very viable and not only dwarves.
I also did not give beholder rays a chance to burn thru spell protections in my latest SCS install.
On another note: What do you guys think about removing BG1 xp cap for classes that are severally weakened in BG1? I was specifically thinking about the monk who in my eyes has gotten a lot more interesting in SoA/ToB due to improved invis saving throw bonus, but doesn't even get +1 weapons in BG1 xp cap.
I alos found this mod: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/33618/mod-monk-overhaul
A solo character should get about 6 times as much XP as a full party and LoB bonuses roughly quadruple XP in my experience (more in BG1 due to 1000 XP kobolds, less in BG2), so this is what I would assume would happen.
BG1 party of 6: 100,000 XP (level 7-9)
BG1 solo: 600,000 XP (level 10-13)
BG1 party of 6 with LoB XP bonuses: 400,000 XP (level 9-12)
BG1 solo with LoB XP bonuses: 2.4 million XP (level 14-21)
SoD party of 6: 500,000 XP (level 10-13)
SoD solo: 3 million XP (level 15-24)
SoD party of 6 with LoB XP bonuses: 2 million XP (level 14-19)
SoD solo with LoB XP bonuses: 12 million XP
BG2: maxed out regardless for a solo character
If these numbers are correct, a solo character should be able to get a single HLA by the end of SoD--which would notably open up the options of Summon Deva, Summon Planetar, Earth Elemental form, and Hardiness, plus level 9 spell picks for sorcerers. In my install (I installed a bunch of stuff via BWS), it's possible to pick HLAs in BG1.
This has bearing on the polymorph strategy for players without the scroll scribing mod, as you only get so many spells to use against the final boss of SoD.
The spider gnome trick works in SoD, so a hasted gnome using the morningstar in spider form at 5 APR could expect to win after 14-20 rounds of attacking, even if his or her THAC0 was poor. A hasted fighter could hit 3 APR and win after 23-33 rounds on average, though the fighter would still need to be able to cast Enchanted Weapon.
If you can get two HLAs by the end of SoD, a fighter/mage could use Critical Strike (you'd need to select Power Attack as a prerequisite first) to guarantee 4 critical hits, taking out 40-60% of the final boss's HP.
Yeah, XP values like in IWD - plus XP cap remover - would lead to even more powerful chars - no dought about that. But i must admit that i do not like the whole idea. Put this in and you can replace the phrase "challenge" with "hey, lets have a walk in the park".
Maybe i should rework the OP to exclude things like that - what do you think?
P.S. An old RPG companion will replace me for some time - and hopefully join the challenge with his own char!
P.P.S After reading your very insightful comments @semiticgod i have came to the conclusion that any kind of Mages should be banned from this Challenge cause of their Bag of Endless Cheese - no?
Edit: btw I do have wizard scroll scribing as of level 9. It's an aTweaks feature. What do people think about it? Is it fair game? It would be nice for wizards not be forced into using wand on Belhifet no? Nooooo, I'm enjoying my run with Oaen too much for that!
Would be great to have another participant around btw.
I wasn't entirely sure beating LoB as a solo character was possible without the XP bonuses, but after reading about you guys' work, I've changed my mind.
@Harpagornis what are your thoughts on Monk mods, if xp cap removal is too cheesy in your opinion?
I've found a mod called Monastic order of Faerun, which would make monks super viable vs Melissan giving Stunning and Killing blows save malus from level 15 onward (up to -5 I believe).
This would still make SoD a big pain, you get +1 fists in BG1 with that mod, but your Armor class is quite low and Big B can't be hit by fists, so I'm not even sure if I'd have the balls for a full monk playthru.
Maybe instead after finishing ToB with Droolit I make a BG2 only playthru with the Monk mod, but somehow that would feel incomplete.
Droolit in the meantime got Durlag's goblet and Kiel's helm, fighting 2 doppelgangers 1on1 cuz she was too lazy to rest for her dogees, but due to her -14 ac vs slash they didn't prove much of a challenge as only crits hit for pitiful 2 damage (she had 15% dr from AoF).
After that she murdered Ragefast, even tho he agreed to let the nymph go free due to her high CH.
There are some mods that influence critical hit rolls--I think there's one that grants +1 to critical hits if your Intelligence is high--which could tip the balance in favor of the morningstar.
SoD spoiler:
What about Caelar? In normal mode, she's almost strong enough to take down Belhifet solo. And though a single-classed cleric or druid would struggle to hurt Bellyfat, they can cast Heal on her and give her a strong advantage against him.
As i am also a big Druid Freak and i prefer to play No-Reload i will give the Totemic Druid a good try. The posts from @Victor_Creed_SFV convinced me that this Kit has some potential. Lets see what i can bring to the table in the next time!
I created my Character in IWD as i wanted to start with an Elf cause i dont like Humans that much. Here are his stats:
Everything clear? Okay, lets go! After getting out of Candlekeep Vyz directly traveled to Shoal. A big bear in front of her nose made sure that she never was able to reach Vyz who slinged her down from safe distance. Easy 5k XP that pushed Vyz right to level 3.
In Beregost it was time for some sleeping while sweet talking to Marl and helping old Firebead to get another – even older – book. While staying at Feldposts Inn Vyz also killed Algernon with another Bear to take the Cloak of Cheesines.
Vyz traveled further through the wilderness to avoid any Bandit ambushes and met good old Drizzt. After some thought he decided not the help him and waited until the Drow was taken down by rolling 20´s. With his Scimitars and Mithrill Armor Vyz quickly retreated to reach Nashkel.
Once he arrived at the village he sold a lot of stuff and walked out of the shop with more than 10k gold. Another target was the hidden Ankheg Armor that not only protects a lot better than usual leather but also looks pretty nice!
Neira was tanked by the Bear which did a great job while Vyz was slinging from the background. Once the bear was near death he used him as a running decoy. Too bad Vyz had to roll a 19+ to hit Neira so the whole process took some time. But – to be honest – the Helm just looks too cool to pass on!
On his way to the north he caught a thievish Ogre who was kited with Darts and Sklinghots while the Bear feared the big one several times. Once he dropped down Vyz took his fine belt and traveled further to the north!
At the Friendly Arms Inn a funny battle took place. With a charmed Guard and his Bear he approached Tarnesh. Once the battle started the Mage quickly casted a Horror at Vyz who couldnt escpape to th nearby door. He failed his saved and started to run – only to see that Tarnesh not only wasted his Missiles on the bear but also panicked. After some running from both sides Vyz was the first one to recover and together they put a swift end to the helpless Tarnesh! He also grabbed the Ring of Wizardry and spared some gold to improve his reputation a bit – before planning his next crime!
After takling to some farmers north of the Inn Vyz came near the city of Baldurs Gate where he met Tenya the young Priestress of Umberlee. As he knew what was coming he summoned a wolf that quickly attacked once she turned hostile. This gave Vyz enough time to retreat before any spell could come for him. After a little beating she asked for help cause the farmers had killed her mother Vyz quickly agreed to support her and retrieved the Bowl from Sonner for another 2.5 k XP..
He also made a short trip to Ulgoths Beard to get the wonderful Ring of Free Action from Dushai. He charmed the Gnome on his second try and killed him with the help of a Wolf outside of the village – time to increase reputation again!
Said is done he retrieved the lost Ring for Joia at the Friendly Arms Inn after spending some gold at the church. With reputation up to 15 again Vyz was back on the good side of life!
With level 5 in reach i had to stop the game - real life is calling again. I hope that i can play on the next days a bit. To success!
@Victor_Creed_SFV, personally I would welcome any Monk attempt. I aborted my Dark Moon Monk run early on, simply because I felt the odds were completely stacked against her. I have the Oversight HLAs in my install as well, and I think the Monastic Order of Faerun Monk could be interesting to watch.
LoB is still quite new, and so is this solo LoB/SCS challenge. With more people playing no-reload I'd recommend players to pick classes they're comfortable with. At this point any no-reload success with any class would be a major accomplishment.
@semiticgod, good call on morningstar. Note that the Cloverleaf belt grants +1 to Luck, so you a character with single-weapon style proficiency will get a critical on a roll of 18. There's also a pair of boots that increases luck by 3, but I think it's Dwarf only, and would therefore require an illegal Dwarven Cleric/Mage or Fighter/Mage. But imagine that: 1 in 4 hits would be a HP draining critical.
In relation to the Martyr's Morningstar it's not a weapon I've come across, but presumably it could be used by other classes than a mage. The text on the Lucky Boots says they increase saving throws rather than luck - is that wrong? In any case though I don't believe that luck affects critical hit chances in Baldur's Gate, so unless you have mods that change it you would only get a critical on 19 (with single weapon proficiency) or 20.