Solo poverty no reload legacy of bhaal challenge
monico
Member Posts: 571
Before anyone asks: no, I’m not a masochist.
It just so happens that this challenge revolves around 3 of my current favourite characters (more on that later).
I don’t have SCS, never tried it, and still did not get around modding my iOS version of the game, so, this challenge is the most difficult available to me I guess.
Now, this is a mix of well known rules:
- solo : self explanatory, you play with your character only, no companions ever.
- poverty : no items allowed but a starting club or staff, and quest items. Outside quests, Gold can (and should) only be used in Inns and Temples (donations and healing)
- no-reload: a first for me, it was about time I tried it. It means that once you make a mistake, it stays. Once you die, you reroll a new character.
- Legacy of Bhaal: 80+3*base HP, -5 thac0, -11 AC... That’s gonna make every fight very difficult and really long.
The run will be BG1+BG2 and ToB if the gods want it. No SoD (not enough metaknowledge of the game, and LoB-Belhifet is probably unbeatable without proper gear anyway).
The three classes I will alternate between will be:
- Sorcerer (or Dragon Disciple), trying to make use of the shapeshifting spells ‘cause I’ve fallen in love with them lately
- Cleric/Thief (traps, stealth, buffs, summons. Quite the arsenal)
- Totemic Druid (summons summons summons, and interesting ones at that)
Another class I might try is the Dark Moon Monk. Loved it a few years ago in a non-LoB, non-Poverty run. The lack of +1 weapons in BG1 is a bit of a problem though.
It just so happens that this challenge revolves around 3 of my current favourite characters (more on that later).
I don’t have SCS, never tried it, and still did not get around modding my iOS version of the game, so, this challenge is the most difficult available to me I guess.
Now, this is a mix of well known rules:
- solo : self explanatory, you play with your character only, no companions ever.
- poverty : no items allowed but a starting club or staff, and quest items. Outside quests, Gold can (and should) only be used in Inns and Temples (donations and healing)
- no-reload: a first for me, it was about time I tried it. It means that once you make a mistake, it stays. Once you die, you reroll a new character.
- Legacy of Bhaal: 80+3*base HP, -5 thac0, -11 AC... That’s gonna make every fight very difficult and really long.
The run will be BG1+BG2 and ToB if the gods want it. No SoD (not enough metaknowledge of the game, and LoB-Belhifet is probably unbeatable without proper gear anyway).
The three classes I will alternate between will be:
- Sorcerer (or Dragon Disciple), trying to make use of the shapeshifting spells ‘cause I’ve fallen in love with them lately
- Cleric/Thief (traps, stealth, buffs, summons. Quite the arsenal)
- Totemic Druid (summons summons summons, and interesting ones at that)
Another class I might try is the Dark Moon Monk. Loved it a few years ago in a non-LoB, non-Poverty run. The lack of +1 weapons in BG1 is a bit of a problem though.
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Lawful neutral because of the ferret (50% pickpocket) that I thought would be useful for pickpocketing quest items.
And so I decided to pick Find Familiar and Charm Person as my first spell picks.
I did all the quests that don’t need fighting (or not much at least), cleared Mutamin’s garden with Korax and my ferret familiar (immune to petrification), and even managed to charm a blinded Bassilus and sent him to his death against the nearby hobgoblins.
Since I have basically no punching power whatsoever, I really don’t see how I’ll advance for the rest of the game. I picked Monster Summoning I as my first lvl3 spell... Well, even in LoB, this is bad. It was a mistake I think. MMM’s would have been better, maybe even slow.
Right now, killing 1 enemy requires several casts of blind + web (very tricky, i need to target the spell so that my enemy is in the radius, but my Ferret, myself and the eventual summon can still hit it from outside the webs).
Also, shouldn’t have picked Dragon Disciple. I thought the extra AC and CON would be useful, but any kobold will hit me despite the mere +2 AC, the high CON was in case my Familiar would die, but i only use him if the enemy is not a threat anyway (cause of web or the like). Only the Fire innate spell has some use.
And losing 1 spell/day is a bigger drawback in early LoB where fights last forever. In normal play, not such a big deal.
Obviously, the tanking abilities from the DD will only prove useful later, once (if?) I start making use of the polymorph spells. Right now, its just a drawback.
Also, my strategy of charming enemies and either pickpocketing their quest items or using them in a fight does not work that well. Many enemies (everything that is not human-size anyway) are just unaffected, and when it works, the duration is awfully short (5 rounds).
So many mistakes, I wonder how far i’ll make it...
Right now, having cleared most of the easy quests, my DD is lvl6 with 44k XP.
Spell picks (weird ones to be honest):
Lvl1 : Find Familiar, Charm Person, Blindness, Shield
Lvl2 : Web, Invisibility
Lvl3: Monster Summoning I
Here are a few screenshots:
quite the talkative ferret
the webs were not enough to finish Bassilus, so I recharmed him and sent him to die against Zarkal’s hobgoblins
A talking ferret met a talking chicken. The engine could not support so much randomness and I ended up with 2 melicamps in my backpack
Made it to baldur’s gate somehow. I thought I would die more than once, but at least, even though my character has trouble doing enough damage to kill his enemies, at least between blindness, charm person and invisibility, I have many ways to escape a fight, rest, and try again.
And those spells have very short casting time, which is a must.
The basic strategy is:
- aggro one enemy at a time
- blind him (probably the most potent lvl1 spell, casting time 2, enemy suffers -4 thac0 and AC, can’t target you if you use 2handed weapons out of his blinded sight, lasts 2 hours)
- cast a few web spells, carefully targeted so the enemy is within the radius but can be hit in melee
- summon some help
- hit, hit, hit, and hope that the summons/webs don’t expire before the enemy is dead.
It rarely works on the first try, and I make sure to always have at least 1 lvl2 spell in reserve to go invisible in a pinch and flee.
I managed this way to kill quite a few enemies, notably:
- Krumm and Caldo ("please kind spirits, a wondrous ancient oak is in peril"),
- Mulahey: positioning was key in this battle, my webs prevented his troops from joining while I barely managed to kill him before runing out of webs, took his belongings, and went invisible a few seconds before the reinforcements entered the room.
- Silke: the battle made us roam many streets of Beregost, but evading her was not too problematic
- Tranzig: dammit that one was difficult, had to rest and try again at least 5 or 6 times, since webbing him in his room was impossible, and aggroing him out his quite difficult. In the end, his own spells killed him.
- Seniyad’s party: summoned monsters beforehand to take aggro, blinded a few druids, aggroed another, and killed them one by one, resting between each kill....
- Amarande: tough one, lots of good spells, good AC and high HP pool. Had to aggro him outside his tower, took me 3 or 4 rests (enemies heal up when you rest, I think it’s a LoB feature, never noticed it on vanilla. Not that I often flee battles midway in vanilla anyway...). I was quite disappointed when I recalled that I went through so much trouble for a mere 120 XP
- Drasus’ party: i started by blinding the axe thrower, out of view of the rest of his party, charmed him and had him aggro Drasus away, webbed the two mages, once they both failed their saves, managed to charm one on the 3rd (and last) try, had them fight each other, then summoned monsters to kill them while they were distracted (quite easily for once). Rested, and then took on Drasus (who had long ago killed his former ally).
- Davaeorn: I honestly did not think I would kill him. Luckily, after killing Drasus, I hit lvl7 and took Magic Missile, Strength and Minute Melf’s Meteors. I first alternated using the meteors and invisibility spells to empty his spellbook, then blinded him (with much much difficulty, he has good saves), used Magic Missiles to dispel his mirror images, and had summons and ferret (buffed with strength) help me take him on. Had to rest a few times (under invisibility) to finally make it (resting in his dungeon is difficult, Talons mercenaries often spawn, I had to go from room to room and try sleeping until it worked. Luckily, once you rest, all the Talons that woke you up despawn).
I also managed to recover Chelak’s body on the way back: cast Strength (Chelak is heavy) and Invisibility beforehand, entered the spider’s nest, found a spot out of view of the spiders, summoned a few monsters (2 casts) to take aggro especially of the 2 sword spiders, recovered Chelak’s body and quickly cast invisibility again. This was very risky, I don’t know why I put myself in such danger for some 800 or so XP.
Anyway, I’ve managed to get to Baldur’s gate, despite my many mistakes and very strange spell pick.
Here are a few screenshots:
So, BG city was a walk in the park, did a lot of quests who did not nvolve much fighting, got much much XP, cleared the Seven Suns, Merchant League, with the same old strategy of summoning, aggroing and webbing enemies one after the other. Took me ages since I had to rest a lot of times (generally had enough spells/summons to kill 3-4 doppelgangers per rest, at most).
Resolved Lothander’s quest by giving up on the WIS tome since it is a poverty run anyway, and had quite a fright when Marek’s confusion spell hit most of my summons and my main character. Luckily, it doesn’t last very long, and Marek targeted my summons not me, and no neutral NPC was killed in the process (my summons wandered into webs, Marek regularly failed his own saves, and my PC was just standing there doing nothing (lucky me, part 1).
Had to go down, rest, and try again, making sure that Marek was blinded and webbed before I attacked him. He then fell rapidly.
Then used invisibility to loot the Iron Throne building and trigger chapter 6.
Candlekeep was also rapidly cleared, did not stop to fight or loot anything except the two greater basilisks at the end of the catacombs with the help from my immune ferret.
It allowed me to hit lvl9 (XP cap), and chose to rely on luck by picking Polymorph Other as my 2nd lvl4 spell (first one was obviously Greater Malison.
Stealthed my way back into BG city, rescued Duke Eltan, cheesed Slythe&Kristin by casting a few webs beforehand, aggroing Slythe near the edge of the webs, and attacking him only while Kristin was out of sight and did not join the battle (good ol’ multiple webs+GM+blind+slow+summons made short work of Slythe even when he managed to make a save against the webs).
The ducal palace was even cheesier, I carefully launched webs to prevent the nobles from transforming into doppelgangers, only fighting 1 or 2 doppelgangers at a time (their noble forms have very crappy saves, they can’t resist a web).
Even with such precautions and my summons, Duke Jannath died and Belt was barely alive (had to use my healing innate spells to make sure he wouldn’t die too). Close call (lucky me, part 2).
Chased after Sarevok in the maze, rested inside and ran through the maze invisible, carefuly triggering the Lightning traps but avoiding their trajectories, easily swallowed the fireball trap with my 50% innate resistance, and Shielded myself for the magic missile traps.
Made a beeline for the temple, rested outside.
Entered the temple, triggered a few traps beforehand to get a better feel of the room, since reloading was out.
It was a good initiative, I mistakenly summoned a Battle Horror, webbed, blinded, slowed him, than cast a Polymorph other, he failed his save on the third try.
Went back out, slept, went back in.
I decided that I’d try to aggro Sarevok alone in the western side of the room, summoned a few monsters as decoys.
They survived long enough to take aggro, let me cast Greater Malison (bypassed Sarevok’s MR on the first try, damn was I lucky again, part3 edit, Sarevok has no MR since ToSC. That was only in old vanilla BG), and then Invisibility.
Alas, Tazok and Angelo followed him. Funny enough, Angelo’s arrows of detonation hit Sarevok too, who did not like the feel and killed him.
Made a round trip to the north-eastern side, carefully staying out of sight of Semaj (south of me) and Tazok+Sarevok (west of me).
Cast all my webs, waited until Sarevok failed a save, and tried my luck with a Polymorph Other spell, knowing fully that Sarevok still had 80% chances of saving against it even with his lowered saves from Greater Malison, and I only had 2 lvl4 spells left after GM, which meant I had only 36% of beating Sarevok (I knew that I would not be able to kill him otherwise)
Yeah well, he failed his save on the first try, immediately triggering the end cinematic.... I guess I should rename my character "Lucky One" !!!
I was a bit overconfident after having killed Sarevok, and started making my way into Irenicus dungeon, killing kobolds as they come.
I thought I could manage absorbing the traps in Irenicus bedroom to retrieve the key to the next level. Did not prebuff at all.
Died immediately...
Thus ends One’s run.
Since a trap ended my run, I decided to roll a gnomish cleric/thief.
So, please make room for Number Two (sorry, couldn’t resist):
I have also decided to allow my characters to use the tomes to get better stats. It makes no sense to not use them, yet it is ok to use Lum’s machine. It’s the same thing but differently implemented in my opinion
- First completed many quests not requiring any fighting between Beregost and the areas north of FAI for nice XP
- unlocked each and every chest (not looting them, just unlocking like it’s an OCD), got around 600 XP in Beregost alone I think
- made my way to Mutamin’s garden. With Korax’ help, cleared 3 lesser basilisks in the upper area, and the group in the south-center one. Also had Korax attack Mutamin himself, using his stun ability to kill him with no retaliation.
It took quite some time and I was afraid Korax would turn on me so I did not push it and sent him in some corner of the map.
- Killed the lone basilisk in the north-east with traps. Lots of traps.
- Since I was still a few thousand XP shy of lvl5 cleric (and access to skeletons), I decided to kill Mutamin’s greater basilisks (he doesn’t turn hostile) by spending hours attacking him and trying to land crits and backstabs
- with a few levels under my belt, useful spells and even more useful summons available, I decided to start doing some fighting. Classic strategy is : summon 2 skeletons, doom -> Chant (-3 enemy saves) -> Hold (if eligible), Silence (if spellcaster), or more buffing my summons and help them hack enemies (I generally only hit on a crit, but since I took club + 1handed weapons, I have 10% chances of crits).
- after Melicamp sadly did not survive the antichickenator spell, I decided to go kill some Sirines (since skeletons are immune to their charms) and grab the CON tome. It did not go as easily as planned : while skeletons shrug at the charm spells, they can still be feebleminded (strangely) by their melee attacks. Thus ensued a war of attrition where I pulled the sirines one by one in traps and had my 2 skeletons attack, one inevitably ending up feebleminded for the rest of the fights.
I almost died on the way to Sil’s group, where I accidently aggroed a carrion crawler. I rapidly fell to his stunning attacks, but luckily for me, he kept changing focus between me and my summons who managed to kill him before he did too much damage.
Then it was just me casting Sanctuary, disarm some traps and grab the CON tome.
This allowed me to hit lvl6 cleric, and I think it is now time to go to Nashkell.
Next part was easy, with skeletons, buffs and stealth to avoid unnecessary fights, made my way to Davaeorn.
Filled my lvl2 spellbook with Silences, once doomed, he regularly failed his saves, my summons barely managed to go through his mirror images and get him to near death when I heard my last Silence expire, and quickly cast Sanctuary to prevent him from charming or disabling me. He died just as I finished casting anyway, but better safe than sorry.
Went to BG city, did a few quests, barely fought anything, grabbed the available tomes (which reminded me that I forgot to go make a visit to Durlag’s tower), looted the Iron Throne and reported to Duke Eltan.
Nothing worth of note in Candlekeep and the catacombs.
Oh, by the way, I’ve searched around on the forum and elsewhere on the internet, I’ve seen many posts about how much STR you need to open the chests containing the tomes (which is 24 FYI), but none about the minimumopen locks requirement :
It’s 75 Open Locks (don’t know the minimum for traps since I already had it very high), although you might have to try several times for the one near the spiders (with 80 open locks, you can open the chest without failure, with 75 you can open it, sometimes after a few tries).
It might be interesting for people who want to min-max their thieves skills (early duals and/or no potions allowed).
Killed the 2 basilisks on the way out, and made a detour to Durlag’s tower to grab the last WIS tome.
I had 90% find traps, went up to 100% with DuHM boost to DEX.
I was under the impression that 100% in find/disarm traps was required to disarm it, apparently not. I triggered the trap by trying to disarm it, but luckily managed to save against the charm spell !! My run almost ended there !
Luck was again on my side it seems.
Anyway, back to BG city, three fights worth to note:
- Cythiandra : triggered the dialogue, lured the two ogres downstairs, cast Sanctuary and went back upstairs, put 2 traps in the big room, summoned 3 skeletons, cast Silences (she failed her save on the second one) and launched everyone and every spell at her. Once silenced, she obviously fell rapidly.
- Slythe: lured him away from "Krystin honey", cast all my buffs/debuffs but couldn’t manage to get a Hold or other spell past his saves. My buffed up skeletons still managed to kill him (2 casts of Vampiric Touch from dreams helped too).
- Coronation: this fight is generally where solo no-reload runs end in BG. I prepared carefully beforehand, made sure to have many summons and debuff on hand. I managed to Hold 3 of them (took a while though, Duchess Jannath was already near death), one attacking Jannath was severely wounded from traps+minions, one was attacking my summons, while the 6th one was hitting Duke Belt. I first finished the one fighting Jannath, then the last non-held (still had many debuffs on hand, dooms and command namely), then hack the held ones. For the first time in a long long time, both Dukes survived the assassination attempt!
This is it for now, next stop: Sarevok... I have no idea what to do except pray for a Hold spell to get through his saves (obviously after doom+chant)...
EDIT: forgot the screenshots:
you never need more than 90 in open locks in bg1, this includes durlags tower and the duchal palace
for traps, there are only 2 traps that require more than 95, and they are both in durlags tower
the wisdom tome trap i believe requires 110
and the statue that holds the level 2 key wardstone has a trap on the floor that requires 100
other than that you only need 95, for just bg1 traps your probably only need perhaps 80
....
just checked out some areas in bg1 and found some interesting results; for bg1 without TotSC you only need 70 for the catacombs ( all traps are around 60 or 70 )
in the shadow thief maze all traps are either 40 or 50 ( lol ) except one of them is 90
in sarevok's temple where you battle him all the traps around the skull area are 100 ( although you only need 50 to spot them ) and the traps around the temple some are 50, some are 100, and then the traps in front of sarevok, looks like there was 4 of them, which require 100 to find and disarm, with the web one, being impossible to find and disarm
so yeah, other than sarevok's temple and durlag's tower you only need 70 in find traps
...
also, just checked the wisdom tome altar for kicks, and by the looks of it you only need a 90 to find it and a 100 to disarm it, apparently it also has a lock value of 100, but the "is locked flag" is not selected haha, can someone say oops?
so if for some reason if 100 does not disarm it, then maybe 105 should work, and if that doesn't work then i don't know why it can't be disarmed
Since it is a no-reload, I tend to very carefuly plan the fight by entering, making use of terrain, going out and rest a few times (you can do that as long as you don't trigger Sarevok's speech).
This time:
- entered a few times to put 7 traps in the west side of the room
- pinpointed Sarevok and his henchmen's spot with the use of Farsight and Dispel magic (they re-stealth everytime you go out and rest though)
- summoned 3 skeletons and 2 Animals (wardogs... peuh)
- cast Silence (at first, I was targeting Angelo, but although he saved, Sarevok failed his save !!)
I thought "a mute Sarevok ? Let's try some cheese !"
- cast a few spells (doom, larloch's minor drain) on Sarevok. He doesn't turn hostile, but he took a few steps from the altar, which meant I could aggro him out of sight of his henchmen (mainly Angelo on the northwest and Semaj after he teleports south)
- once Silence expired, the fight started. Made sure that my summons stayed put and did not aggro Angelo or Semaj, while still making a meat(&bone)-wall between me and Sarevok
- cast Doom on Sarevok, then Chant. By that time, one of my skeletons was already dead.
- cast Hold (had 4 of them in reserve), THE FIRST ONE WENT THROUGH !!!! (which means he rolled a 3 or worse
- HACK HACK HACK HACK
And that's it for Sarevok
EDIT : screens
haha, thx. Actually, not sure if it is because of the iPad version, or LoB or something, but I often get XP twice when killing Sarevok.
Not that it changes anything since I’m always at lvl cap by that time, and can’t export the final save because of Semaj’s script launching Dispel Magic every time I load the final save, and no bonus XP is carried over between games on iPad it seems (at least not when exporting from character sheet, which I generally do)
my gnomish cleric/thief still hasn't died in BG2. Cleared the slavers quest, and a few other in Athkatla.
Thing is: it takes ages without any gear. It's all summons, buffs, summons, buffs, summons. And without any incentive to gather gear, it is a bit... annoying in fact.
So, while the challenge is really challenging, i've already grown tired of it. I think I'll go back to "normal" challenges (solo, as it has become my playstyle, sometimes LoB sometimes not, but no poverty).
Probably a dwarven defender next (damage sponge). Not sure if LoB or not (the damage reduction and great survivability almost counters the LoB bonus to monsters, but the -11 AC is still a major problem)
Solo-poverty-no reloads is already to much.
I have been away from the game a bit, and re-started lately with more "casual" gameplay (solo minimal-reload).
I'm playing a Dwarven Defender right now (i love the tankiness of this character), and managed to reach ToB's final boss with a solo sun-soul monk before that (couldn't kill that boss though).
I'll need to refine my skills before taking this challenge again, although to be honest, I don't see any way to tackle ToB with such a character (and I don't have as much metaknowledge of ToB as I have of BG1, restartitis obliges).
I guess a sorcerer, with access to the wish spell, could barely face this battle in LoB+poverty (that's a devastating combo). Definitely not no-reload though ^^
I continued my attempt #2, the gnomish cleric/thief. It was quite enjoyable to come back to this character (way more effective than I remembered).
I cleared the slaver’s quests, exposed Mae’Var’s treachery, helped some harpers along the way, solved the skinner’s murders and completed Aran Linvail’s first 2 tasks.
Normally, that takes about 1 hour of normal gameplay. It takes at least two or three times as long as a SIPNRLOB playthrough alas (between lack of boots of speed, loads and loads of summons/prebuffs, and having to rest between each fight).
Also, I tend to play extra careful, since, although once summons and buffs are up this character is quite powerful, if ambushed he has no survivability, since sanctuary is easily interrupted, and he can’t easily outrun opponents to hide in shadows, nor use items/potions to go invisible.
Well, in general, the long casting time of cleric spells is quite problematic anyway.
The most frustrating thing right now is that XP builds up really slowly, especially as a multiclass, but I’m not powerful enough yet to tackle big rewarding fights/quests.
I might actually try the unseeing eye quest next, but avoiding any beholder on the way (which is where most xp comes from anyway in this quest). I’ll allow using the rod against the boss, since it is a quest item specifically designed to beat that monster, so definitively ok to use.
My character sheet right now (my skellies definitely do 90% of the job) :
The strategy hasn’t really changed much since mid-BG1:
- summon 4 skellies
- prebuff a bit (Barks’in, PfE 10’ radius, Bless, Defensive Harmony, and often Chaotic Commands depending what I face)
- round 1 : skellies go melee, MC approaches to cast Chant (especially for the -1 ST)
- round 2 : Silence 15’ radius if there are (dangerous) spellcasters / if not, Doom on the toughest enemy/primary target
- round 3 : Hold if elligible, other debuff if not (Greater Command, Domination)
- round 4 and onward : alternate debuffs / recast of buffs / summon help if needed
- cleared the Unseeing Eye quest, avoiding all enemies making sure to be both under sanctuary to avoid the shadows/wraiths who can see through invisibility and stealth to avoid the beholders who can bypass sanctuary
- about the same went for Windspear Hills, summons killed the paladins, avoided Garren's hut and went directly for the dungeon (Garren shows up before the entrance telling you his child was kidnapped). Sanctuary+stealth allowed me to avoid all fights until Tazok. Summons (skellies and now Aerial Servant too) killed him, talked to Firkraag to rescue the child (said summons easily killed the mage), and fled Firkraag's lair.
- Trademeet was the same again, avoided the southern part of the map, entered Ithafeer's hut and summoned minions outside line of sight, triggered the fight and cheesed the repetitive castings of Cloudkill (summons autokill) by exiting-reentering the hut each time a rakshasa started casting..... Then rested and resummoned a team to take care of the party before the druid grove's entrance, then sent Cernd to kill Faldorn (without recruiting him of course).
- back to athkatla, recruited Sir Sarles' help, did some minor quests and finally confronted Bodhi's lair (level 11 cleric/ 13 thief, barely enough), making sure to always be under Chaotic commands. It took quite a while but skellies (immune to level drain) and Aerial Servant (hits hard), plus sometimes Animal Summonings killed all the undead. I almost died when the Clay Golem wandered and showed up behind my back, hit me twice before my summons managed to take his aggro leaving me with.... 2 HP !!
- Finally faced Bodhi (lvl12/14 by then, so 2 lvl6 spells), first layed a few traps and summoned skellies, buffed up and triggered the fight only to notice that Bodhi needs +2 weapons to be hit (even at max lvl, skellies only hit at +1), fled and rest, went back with 3 skellies (bait) and 2 aerial servants (only summons available that can hit her), buffed/debuffed Bodhi and helped my summons with Spiritual Hammer (landed 2 crits during the long fight), and finally managed to make her flee.
The more I advance, the more it is going to be difficult to actually kill enemies.
For example, I rescued Haer'Dalis from Mekrath's lair (did not follow him to the planar prison though, I'm not suicidal), and my summons had to fight a Umber Hulk. It took me 3 tries of full summons and buffs to actually kill just one Umber Hulk (I was only lvl9 cleric by the time though, so pretty bad skellies and no Aerial Servant by the time, but still).
I stand at 2 mil XP right now, so it shouldn't be too long before lvl7 spells and HLA's, which is going to be very helpful I guess.
I'll probably try and get those 3 mil XP before going to spellhold (still have the Umar Hills and Planar Sphere to clear, plus the many enemies I avoided along the way)
EDIT : Umar Hills cleared. Avoiding fights and getting used to the very particular gameplay of this run makes things go much faster (although it is hard to go past so much juicy xp).
I avoided most of the fights, more for the time consuming chore than real difficulty. Unfortunately, liches see through both invisibility AND sanctuary (did not expect that one), so I had to fight one at some point. I first aggroed the surrounding Skeletons/mummies and 2 Aerial Servants + 3 Skellies made short work of them.
Then I first sent the Skellies on the lich to absorb the enemy spells, then the Aerial Servants joined the fray and killed it and its efreeti summon quite easily (I saw an aerial servant do more than 70 damage on a crit, and liches have very bad combat stats even after LOB boosts).
I did not expect that.
I still avoided the dragon, way beyond my capabilities, and easily dispatched the shadow lord and his minions (first found a spot southeast barely out of their vision field and started summoning and buffing)
I first cleared a few more quests/maps to get the needed 3 mil XP:
- first the Planar Sphere, surprisingly easy. 2 Aerial Servants (flanked by Skellies as meat shields) punch hard enough to take care of the Clay Golem ; Skellies' magic resistance is perfect counter to any magic spellcaster (I generally send one alone first to absorb the eventual Death Spell), and 2 teams of buffed summons were enough to clear all the Demons and their goons outside.
To note : Aerial Servants are really a blessing, since the skellies, despite their high survivability, only hit as +1. Not sure how high the weapon enchantment of the Aerial Servants is, but so far I have not encountered any enemy they couldn't hit.
- Then I went to clear Nalia's Keep. It took a lot of rests because of the lack of fire spells : only the lvl2 flaming sword (short duration, barely enough to kill 2 trolls in general) and the lvl5 Flame Strike can kill trolls. Taking care of the Spirit Trolls was a bit of a problem, since I can't target spells at them (because of their invisibility), and they are immune to normal weapons (Flaming Sword has no enchantment).
I could have just avoided him/them (can't remember if there were several or not), but I wanted to try to kill them anyway, and finally found a way : the thief traps (from lvl11 to 15) deal poison damage for 3 rounds, and after lots of tries I finally managed to make it unconscious right before the final poison damage kicked in.
... Only to learn afterwards (from the Wiki) that apparently, once they are unconscious, you can target spells at them........
I also killed all the golems except the Iron Golem in the treasury room (also noticed that, apparently, just clicking on the containers without taking the loot doesn't turn the golems hostile. Pretty useless fun fact
- still missing a bit of XP, I decided to clear the Mindflayer's lair in the sewers. Once again, the skellies' immunities plus their high INT (16 INT on a mindless skeleton ? seriously ?) were a blessing.
First HLA was, naturally, Summon Fallen Deva, the most powerful summon available to me (her weapon dispels + stuns + destroys undead on hit).
I then picked randomly between cleric spells and traps, although having only 1 lvl7 spell slot for quite some time made those spells useless (that spell slot was obviously used for the Fallen Deva).
By the time, I was in Spellhold, didn't spend long there, avoided most fights/riddles. Actually, the first test with the kobolds was the most annoying one, since neither my summons nor I had ranged weaponry. I had to resort to multiple castings of Poison or Flame Strikes (and rest inbetween) to kill the 2 kobolds that can't be reached.
After escaping the asylum, it was time to face Irenicus: first summoned a Fallen Deva and a few more skellies/Aerial Servants, but then for whatever reason, all the prisoners turned hostile and I was killed by one of their spells...
This cleric/thief combo is very interesting, and would probably make a really interesting character in a "normal" playthrough, especially at high level with UAI and cheese the sequencer spells, robe of vecna, vhailor helm and other stuff. Still underwhelming powerhouse-wise, but fun and interesting.
I rolled a Totemic Druid, a personal favourite.
The totemic summons are very diverse and powerful, have lots of immunities (especially immunity to normal weapons at BG1 lvl cap, which is almost game breaking).
The lack of sanctuary/stealth makes the beginning very very dangerous, and I was especially afraid of being attacked between travels.
So I decided to immediately go for Mutamin's Garden : with Korax's help at first, cleared a few basilisks. From lvl3 onward, some of the spirit animals start gaining immunity to petrification (snake & wolf at lvl3, Bear at lvl7, and lion at lvl10).
I soon reached lvl7 (35k XP) and opened lvl4 spells (for the awesome "call woodland beings" summon).
From then on it is a simple matter of 2 spirit animals, 1 Animal Summoning and 1 Nymph steamrolling any fight.
Regarding the spirit animals, I alternate depending on what's needed:
1. Bear: hit fast & hard, but despite the high HP pool has very bad defense, and the fear-on-hit effect is more a liability than a boon. I generaly only use them on fear-immune opponents (undead).
2. Lion: best unbuffed offense, with relatively good defense, good for taking care of fighters and the like, with minimal need of buffing
3. Snake: perfect against mages thanks to the poison effect (save vs death at +1 to avoid, but save vs death is a mage's worst ST). Also at lvl1, the free action combines well with the Entangle spell (which soon becomes obsolete since it allows saves at +3 and its only real effect on a failed save is lowering the target's AC by 2).
4. Wolf: my personal favourite because : 1. I just love wolves, and 2. once buffed with the strength spell, they have the best offense/defense ratio and can "stun" on hit (short duration & save at +3 at lvl7, but still). A Doomed enemy against 2 spirit wolves can regularly become stun-locked. The stun effect and the elemental damage makes the wold almost better than the snake against mages (almost).
I am now on my way to Nashkell to clear the mines and will advance in the main quest until I hit lvl 9 (90kXP).
Once I hit 90k XP and gain access to lvl5 spells, I'll have so much more versatility:
- chaotic commands to get that WIS tome in Durlag's Tower
- Iron Skins for survivability
- Pixie Dust, my only access to invisibility, with a 24 hours duration (great for map transitions/looting). Although the long casting time (9) reduces its utility mid-combat.
- Insect Plague, for 100% spell failure with no saving throw. Bye-bye spellcasters
- True Seeing, probably not going to be used much, but it's there in case I need it.
- I followed the main story for a while, the lack of invisibility means that I can’t avoid fights so I had to kill each kobold. I still somehow managed to clear the nashkell mines and the bandit camp (well, the main tent at least).
- I decided to go grab the CHA tome, easiest one to get. Although once my summons despawned and left me facing a lone surviving xvart that started pounding me, I felt it was time to farm ankhegs a bit up to 90k XP (I was sitting at 70k XP at the time).
- So I fled and made my way north again, killed lots and lots of ankhegs, until I finally got access to lvl5 spells
- With now access to Pixie Dust, went back south to grab that CHA tome, also grabbed the CON tome (taking the path on the right: first trap was absorbed with Lightning Resistance spell, second magic missile trap was no threat, then summoned a spirit bear as decoy while MC grabbed the tome and cast Pixie Dust)
- Then went due east to Durlag’s Tower, avoided the enemies thanks to Pixie Dust, rested under invisibility to memorize Chaotic Commands, grabbed the first WIS tome, and fled the map.
- Made a new short detour south to Nashkell Carnival, decided to buy the violet potion from the merchant, my only exception to the no-item rule, just to have some way to get the last WIS tome in the future (I felt the 3 DEX & CON for 24h was a good tradeoff for that small rule-bending)
- Then it was back to the main questline, avoided the whole Cloakwood thanks to Pixie Dust, killed (easily) Drasus’ Party thanks to spirit animals, Nymph’s spells and Insect Plague.
- Again stealthed my way through the mines under Pixie Dust, charmed the Guard before Davaeorn’s room, used him to lure the 2 Battle Horrors in the northwest room, then summoned my helpers and started the fight against Davaeorn with a cast of Insect Swarm. Then it was just a matter of time before he fell.
- Made my way to BG city, grabbed the DEX, INT and second WIS tome. Clearing Lothander’s quest allowed me to reach lvl10 (2nd lvl5 spell slot + maxed spirit animals, yay)
- Pixiedusted my way into the Iron Throne, grabbed the letters in the last floor and left the building with none the wiser.
- Reported to Scar, « failed » to discover any suspicious activities in the seven suns, and was sent back to Candlekeep to investigate some more.
I decided to stop here for the night, I’m still not decided on using the violet potion in the catacombs to grab the remaining WIS tome (couldn’t care less about the STR one). In the end, it’s just one more lvl3 and lvl5 spell slots, and I don’t think those will change much in the final fight.
For this final fight (if I get there), the way I see it, I’ll have to first take care of Semaj with Insect Plague, then lure Sarevok and have meatshields last long enough for a Doom + Hold Monster (saves at -2) from the nymphs to go through his saves, I’ll probably need several nymphs to increase my chances. I don’t think one extra lvl3 and lvl5 slot will make any difference.
And in BG2, once I hit 3 mil XP (hopefully), I’ll be swimming in spell slots anyway.
Easily made my way back to BG city (finally decided to grab the tomes with the help of the violet potion), and I saved both dukes (barely injured) with 3 nymphs helping CC the enemies.
I followed Sarevok to his temple, triggered some traps, rested outside and prepared for the fight.
I summoned 2 spirit wolves and 3 nymphs, and triggered the fight. I managed to fall back near the entrance without Sarevok or his henchmen following me, and had the wolves attack Semaj while the 3 nymphs cast Spell Failure and I cast Insect Plague, turning Semaj into a useless spellcaster.
Or so I thought. A scripted confusion spell hit the three nymphs, who aggroed the whole group of enemies.
Angelo’s fire arrows killed all the summons (and Semaj).
Sarevok and Tazok killed Angelo (friendly fire), then turned to me who was out of useful summons and debilitating spells.
I fell soon after obviously.
I think that’s it for my SIPNRLOB runs for now. I might attempt it again in the future with a sorcerer (the only character who has more to offer than just summons, at least in BG2).
For now, I’ll go back to my randomized solo no-reload (no poverty nor LoB) challenge.