SPOILER - Ways to Permanently Reduce Stats?

Covert9

I know this is crazy but I'm interested in doing a playthrough of a very frail character - I was thinking it would be challenging to keep a very weak child of Bhaal alive. My goal is to have all stats as 1. What are all of the ways stats can be permanently decreased? I am aware of a few:

• Vial of mysterious liquid (BG 1): Reduces CON by 1
  
• Rod of Terror (BG 2): Reduces charisma (20% chance to reduce CHA by 1 per strike)
  
• Spellhold dream sequence (BG 2): Reduces CON, DEX, INT or WIS by 1
  
• Hell Trials (BG 2): Reduces DEX by 1
  
• Machine of Lum the Mad (BG2/TOB): Can reduce DEX and INT by 1
  

I'm only looking at methods with permanency, so that means no temporary stat decreases or cursed items. I plan on choosing my character class based on which stats can be decreased. Any info is appreciated - thanks!

Grond0

Good luck with this @Covert9. I've played quite a bit with a solo, no-reload minimum stat sorcerer on LoB difficulty. It's not that difficult to make progress with that, but the carrying capacity of 5 lbs is a bit of a pain to manage after a while - and I hadn't considered deliberately trying to reduce stats further!

The only other reduction that I can immediately think of is that arcane classes lose a constitution point whenever a familiar is killed. If you're into mods of course you can find other ways to reduce stats - I remember years ago experimenting with a weapon that could reduce a range of stats in the same way as the Rod of Terror (seeing if I could wrap other things than charisma round to 25).

I think you may have trouble with your goal though. On character creation you may find it's not possible to reduce some stats below 3 (for instance strength can't be brought below that either using an avenger or a halfling).

Covert9

Ah, thank you @Grond0! I almost forgot about familiars. I'm assuming the weapon you mentioned was part of a mod. I couldn't find any mention of a weapon (other than the Rod of Terror) that will permanently lower stats in vanilla.

I did some experimenting last night and it seems like a human mage would be my best bet. That would allow me to start with 3s in all stats except for INT which is 9. Killing the familiar twice would allow for a CON of 1 right off the bat. Funny thing about having 1hp was that my character became immune to all damage. I think I saw some mention of this somewhere so I will have to do some research.

As far as other stats go, there doesn't seem to be a way to permanently lower STR below 3.

Grond0

1 HP level 1 characters do indeed allow a lot of progress. Level 1 protection for characters means that a character with fewer than 14 HPs can't be reduced below 1 HP with a single attack if they start at maximum HPs. That was bugged in the original such that damage exactly equal to your HPs would kill you, but I think that's been fixed in the latest EE update.

With more HPs level 1 protection would often not help against even a single attack, as many attacks can involve more than one sort of damage, e.g. a weapon with elemental damage could reduce your HPs to one from the basic blow and then finish you off with the elemental damage. However, if 1 HP is your maximum you can't ever take damage to reduce below the maximum. That doesn't mean you can't be killed, e.g. by something like finger of death or level drain - but you could have a fun ride through BG1 at least .

You'll have to be careful about killing a familiar to take you down to 1 HP - you not only lose the bonus HPs you had, but also take a penalty as well, which would normally kill you. However, practicing your LMD spells on your familiar should help you survive .

The weapon I was talking about was from a mod, yes.