Solo HoF spellcasters against bosses?
Aerich
Member Posts: 276
Tell me your tricks and exploits! I see @Wisterias has one with Time Stop, Shapechange, and Enchanted Weapon. What else is out there, especially for divine casters against the biggest bosses?
Note: I took a break at Lower Dorn’s and ended up losing my saves from my solo totemic Druid run. I’m currently running a near-max Cleric/Illusionist and thinking ahead to the toughest fights.
Note: I took a break at Lower Dorn’s and ended up losing my saves from my solo totemic Druid run. I’m currently running a near-max Cleric/Illusionist and thinking ahead to the toughest fights.
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Aerial Servants!
Mmmm, will have to test this...
Tested. Yes, Aerial Servants can damage B. by themselves, but the hard part is to keep them alive xD
Who counts? 🤔
Show us the way, bro! 😸
If you are lvl 30 cleric, you can destroy them with turn undead+Sanctuaty or Invisibility, just walking around.
To be fair, there's only a handful of classes that can reliably PLAY the game on a solo HoF EL1 run. (EL = Experience Level)
Honestly, 5% is a pretty high success rate for a global metric that accounts for everyone on an internet message board playing a game mode that you will likely lose if you make a single mistake, and almost definitely if it's a serious one.
If you leave the double quest XP on then there's a riskless 18,160 XP you can get in Easthaven from Jed + Jhonen (Good) + Grisella. After that you have to kill Apsel's Wolf (reliable to do with kiting and abilities for most classes), and you can get another 4840 XP.
At this point, you have 23040 XP. Solo classes will be either EL5 or EL6. Multi-classes will all be either 4/5 or 4/4. F/M/T's and F/M/C's will be 3/3/4.
In order to advance further at this point you have two options:
(1) Kill the Goblins across the south bridge out of town
(2) Run past them, and east into the Wolf Valley
The only classes that can do (1) with effectively no risk are the Cleric, as at EL5 you have access to Animate Dead, a Cleric SL3 (SL = Spell Level) spell, the Shaman, and the Totemic Druid as they have Summon Spirit Animal. Every other class will need to implement a "one-by-one" kiting strategy. It is not always possible to implement this strategy reliably and practically. Fortunately, it is here for most classes as Easthaven provides ample space and terrain to evade enemies and squeeze off ranged attacks, or spells.
(2) is an extremely poor strategy to implement in my view, although I have not conducted the routing analysis yet to say definitively. It is essentially a defeatist one. If you can't handle eight goblins then how are you going to handle three Wolves, a cave full of orcs, or a pass of goblins? You aren't, and so what this strategy implies for the route is that you're going to be running away and living off quest XP until you can get to a place where you're strong enough to go back and clear them.
Okay, so let's say every class in the game is able to accomplish (1) in a reliable, and practical manner. That means they leave Easthaven east to the Wolf Valley with 42040 XP. Let's be clear that kiting the Wolves is NOT possible, and in my view fighting them without summons is not reliable or practical. The best I've managed to do is catching one with Entangle as a min-maxed Archer, and killing it before it escaped. I haven't run the numbers to see how likely this was but it only took a couple of tries.
However, I could not get past the other two because they get pulled at the same time.
I'll accept that if you can pull them one-by-one, perhaps you can get fortunate enough to manage to kill them with some classes which have access to crowd control (CC). What's the point? The point is that only summoning classes have the tools to clear the Orc Cave. A full clear of Orc Cave nets you ~100k XP, and a magic item going into Goblin Pass. Not full clearing Orc Cave at this time implies that you don't have the ability to handle the enemies of HoF, and it's going to be a long road getting there.
Anyone rolling one of these classes, and there many, is going to be facing and unreliable, and impractical playthrough.
I'm far away from bosses in my current games, except for Berserker/Cleric of level 29/30 just before the fight with Belhifet. However, he's not ready for that fight (I wanted to go to HoW, but missed the last opportunity). Almost no healing potions, no bullets+3. I tried several times with a hit-and-run tactics, wounding Belhifet, but was unable to win that fight. 😼
I also need some additional ideas for divine spellcasters. 🤔
A mage, sorc, with Find familiar (LEGAL EVIL) imp, polymorphed into a mustard jelly... it can tank normal wapons, so it's perfect for the start.
Normally in IWD:EE you can always pre-buff everything before bosses with arcane casters, then cast Spell Inmunity: Abjuration to not get dispelled. Contingencies or Chain contingencies too.
Divine casters are other world, casting times are long... but you can always summon something to distract the enemies, better from some item like that chess piece ''Black night'' or something. It will give some time to cast your buffs while you move the 'decoy' at least...
I didn't think of that. That's a brilliant idea!
Sounds like Mages have a reliable early game, but it's going to be boring as hell, and arguably impractical, because it takes a long time for a single Mustard Jelly to full-clear the HoF Prologue, and that's a lot of opportunities for enemies in cramped spaces like Wolf Valley or Kuldahar Pass to get onto the PC. Not saying it's necessarily impractical, but something to consider before sinking a half-dozen hours into watching a Mustard Jelly march through Orc Cave.
Kuldahar Pass is also still a question mark due to the number of enemies, but I suppose you can stay way back while your jelly goes forth, and clears the way to Kuldahar. Since you've already got EL9 by that point, you don't really need the XP so you want to minimize risk, and get to Kuldahar ASAP.
Still, it's an extremely time-consuming method, and one mistake in positioning or a cluster of archers scoping onto your PC, and those hours in Easthaven are wasted. Lastly, even if you get to HoW as a Mage, where's the gold for your spellbook? Implies to me that you've got to be a Thief multi, and do some stealin' (if you can). I don't know off the top of my head what shops can be stolen from in IWD:EE so that's something to learn.
Sorry, I didn't mean to derail the thread with an apparent non sequitur.
Afaik you can Ultra-buff before every boss. Really fun to do this in Icarasarcht's lair as an F/M/C post-ToTL because you just run down the Sahuagin. The biggest dangers in the run IF you are going to ToTL are easily:
(1) Crieck of Bane (Dispel Magic + High Level Party + Before Spell Immunity)
(2) Luremaster (Ruby Ray)
Otherwise, the biggest dangers are naturally "anyone with Dispel Magic" because you don't have protection from it, and enemies on HoF probably have the caster level to get you with it. This is why I'd argue that the most consistent route is:
Prologue (Full Clear / EL9 Clear) -> HoW (Gloomfrost Clear) -> ToTL -> HoW -> Chapter 1 -> Rest of Game
Dunno if that seems obvious, I know it might be better to clear up to Yxunomei first, and that there might be some nuance to how you play things after getting Hjollder off the Burial Isle.
I guess you could also just say "nah, I don't want to sink all that time into Luremaster, let me just quaff an Invis potion if I get Dispelled, and I'll rebuff" but I think that approach risks getting destroyed before you can. Also Invis is not the same thing as being completely protected from everything, for example, the Djinni in Crieck's fight can still hurt you with Whirlwind.
I believe Dispel Magic always works and there is no comparative caster level check as in the BG version. So, the prudent solo caster takes steps to avoid being targeted with dispel.
Welp, nevermind that
Way too much time, and why not just play a Cleric/Mage? Literally no reason when there's bushels of XP growing on HoF trees for those who can summon zombies to pick them.
Even more reason for Spell Immunity. Granted, I'm approaching this from a no-reload perspective. You can always bang your head on a boss enough times to not be dispelled, but for a no-reload attempt I'd personally want the consistency
Well, nevermind that then
Takes way too much time, and why not just play a Cleric / Mage instead when there's bushels of XP growing on HoF trees for those who can summon zombies to pick them.
In fairness, ToTL has a lot of the best spells, and crucially, Spell Immunity.
Granted, I'm approaching this from a no-reload perspective where the consistency is needed. In a reloaded run you can always just try again
I also used that Imp/Mustard Jelly trick, but in BG1 😉 :
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/87774/little-survival-guide-for-a-solo-vanilla-level-1-mage-on-lob-difficulty
You can overlap Webs, cast Chromatic orbs, and most of enemies are disabled for you to kill them with some sling shots and some spells; you'r familiar is inmune to Web. If you are a dragon disciple, you can use the breath weapon; the mustard jelly can become a Polar Bear, it hits hard and fast (with haste) while mobs are disabled.
Not to mention, escape options with invisibility, etc. are there.
If you feel the need of getting some more levels to have better spells to continue, you can farm some orcs in the cave, it's pretty safe.
Ofc it's not something easy, but HOF is not easy for no one xD And sorc will shine in future areas where other chars will have a hard time.
Edit: this all is only doable with sorc because mages don't have acces to scrolls... Sorcs are so great xD
The only bad thing is that I hate Lawful evil alignment... My fav is Chaotic Neutral always