Just started, solo mage, difficulty insane

Ossory

Hey all,

I've been waiting for this for so long... Good it's finally here

I've just started a new adventure - playing on highest difficulty and solo (no worries, once I beat the game I'll start another one with EE characters). After about an hour of rolling I finally got satisfactory stats - Str: 16, Dex: 18, Con: 18, Int: 18, Wis: 3, Cha: 18, pretty nice considering average is over 15.

The beginning was a bit hard since I could memorise only 2 1st level spells (Magic Missile and Armour, playing pure Mage without a specialisation, as I dislike limiting my access to different magic schools) so there was a lot of running away and firing one thrown dagger every 10 seconds until the bully would die. A number of times, while running away from one danger, I would ran into a completely new one ;D

So far my greatest battle was the one against Silke (Thespian Extraordinaire :P) - had to run around Beregost like mad, managed to survive a Lightning Bolt (though Garrick and one bystander did not). Currently, I'm in Nashkel, preparing for the assassination attempt at the inn. At the moment my biggest treasure would probably be the Ring of Wizardry but I definitely need to increase my AC (got only the Ring of Protection +1). I'm looking for good protective spells - Reflected Image for starters would be nice, until I'm able to use Mirror Image.

Also, I noticed that thrown daggers weigh 1 lbs each - it wasn't so in the original BG, right? Anyway, good thinking, adds to the difficulty, increases the game realism.

Anyone ever tried playing a solo mage game?

misiekbe

Not yet, playing my mage in team is still pretty tough in the begining, but your idea seems very challenging and I'll try it out on my next run:)

Oxford_Guy

If you cast find familiar (a level one spell), you character will permanently gain up to 12 HPs and the use of the familiar itself, some of which are very useful. If you didn't take the spell at the start, though, you'll need to find the scroll (there is at least one quite early on in BGEE)

Etamin

With familiar soloing mage is trivial. At least at normal difficulty. I just killed without any problem this mage in Candelkeep inn. BTW, why did you put 18 points in Constitution? 16 is enough for mage.

Dragonspear

@Etamin

If you put 18 points in con on a mage, then you can use the Claw that Thalantyr sells without losing any of your HP bonuses. It's a cursed item with a build in -2 Constitution.

Etamin

What it gives, cause i dont remember? Is it so good to sacrafice 2 atribute points?

Dragonspear

I don't remember off the top of my head as I've never used it. I believe it improves most of your saves at the expense of your con and your save v poison or death. It also might have an AC bonus to it. I really don't remember right now but someone else might.

Edit: Furthermore, you're not really sacrificing 2 attribute points unless you're playing a gnome anwyay. As you stated, there is no benefit to constitution above 16 for a mage, so really he has 2 points going to relative waste right now. Unless he chooses to reroll and put those points into strength instead, those points will forever be fluff.

Mungri

You should have dual classed from a level 6 thief or swashbuckler for a solo run. That way you would be able to handle traps, have some extra HP, and a little extra ability with weapons.

Etamin

But you have to put those 2 points in Con rather into Str, to not lose HP bonus after buying this claw. So for me it's a waste.

Mungri

So roll more points. You can do 18 in str, dex, con, and int if you really want to.

Nitram_Vi_Hermannia

If solo i would prefer wild mage
And invisibility is one of major spell for solo mage.
But I am really impress that you are going for solo run

Oxford_Guy

Etamin said:

With familiar soloing mage is trivial. At least at normal difficulty. I just killed without any problem this mage in Candelkeep inn. BTW, why did you put 18 points in Constitution? 16 is enough for mage.

Only worth doing if a Gnome, for the extra +1 to saves

Mungri

Oxford_Guy said:

Etamin said:

With familiar soloing mage is trivial. At least at normal difficulty. I just killed without any problem this mage in Candelkeep inn. BTW, why did you put 18 points in Constitution? 16 is enough for mage.

Only worth doing if a Gnome, for the extra +1 to saves

And its worth doing if you plan to equip the claw from high hedge, or if you want to play through the game twice and get two constitution tomes for 20 con and regeneration.

Ossory

Oxford_Guy said:

If you cast find familiar (a level one spell), you character will permanently gain up to 12 HPs and the use of the familiar itself, some of which are very useful. If you didn't take the spell at the start, though, you'll need to find the scroll (there is at least one quite early on in BGEE)

I'm not really sure what to think of Find Familiar. I mean I consider it a bit cheesy. Similar to Wand of Summoning - I remember I once swarmed Sarevok and Drizzt with hordes of Gnolls and stuff and they both went down after a couple of minutes. I believe Find Familiar can be bought at High Hedge, so I will think some more about that later. So far, I'm managing without it.

Etamin said:

(...) BTW, why did you put 18 points in Constitution? 16 is enough for mage.

Etamin said:

What it gives, cause i dont remember? Is it so good to sacrafice 2 atribute points?

To be honest I didn't know what to do with these 2 points. Since I don't care for Lore, Wis would have been a waste. I either could have spent them on Str or Con. I decided to go for Con to get the Claw of Kazgaroth, primarily to boost my saves (+3 against Wands, Breath, Spells and Polymorph), but also to get a sweet AC bonus (+1 overall, +4 vs. missiles), even though it decreases Save vs. Death by 4.

Mungri said:

You should have dual classed from a level 6 thief or swashbuckler for a solo run. That way you would be able to handle traps, have some extra HP, and a little extra ability with weapons.

That wouldn't be a pure solo mage experience now, would it

Dragonspear said:

@Etamin

If you put 18 points in con on a mage, then you can use the Claw that Thalantyr sells without losing any of your HP bonuses. It's a cursed item with a build in -2 Constitution.

Exactly

Nitram_Vi_Hermannia said:

If solo i would prefer wild mage
And invisibility is one of major spell for solo mage.
But I am really impress that you are going for solo run

Just bought Invisibility from Talanthyr

Oxford_Guy

BTW good luck in Durlag's Tower, without any thief levels, you'll need it!

Mungri

When you make a pure mage you can pick any two starting spells, make one of them find familiar. For pure cheese be a Lawful Evil mage.

And if you are doing a pure solo, without any trap and lock removal skills you are going to struggle severely, I don't even think you can get through Durlags Tower without being able to disarm traps, and no you won't have anywhere near enough health potions to keep yourself alive.

Oh, and another trick for a 18 starting con thief / mage - +1 con tome plus +1 con buckler = recreate all your health in about 20-30 minutes or everytime you rest.

Also if you plan on taking your mage into BG2, you should never dump stat wisdom.

Fredjo

I'm doing a duo run with swashbucklerlvl5/mage dual and Imoen thieflvl4/mage. Right now I'm preparing for the holocaust of beholders in the BG2 Underdark.

Abel

Seriously, you play solo and you picked Magic Missile? Sleep was a way better option. And you also took Armor instead of Shield? It seems you still have a few things to learn.
Even without Find Familiar solo Mage on maximum difficulty is not that hard. If you go kill Ankhegs you will level up very quickly. Then, of course, you need to find scrolls. And then, there's a high chance you will first struggle with large groups of enemies.

knas

Mungri said:

And if you are doing a pure solo, without any trap and lock removal skills you are going to struggle severely, I don't even think you can get through Durlags Tower without being able to disarm traps, and no you won't have anywhere near enough health potions to keep yourself alive.

Summons can take care of the traps, no?

Mungri

Abel said:

Seriously, you play solo and you picked Magic Missile? Sleep was a way better option. And you also took Armor instead of Shield? It seems you still have a few things to learn.

For mages its better to take Armor than shield because it lasts a lot longer. Shield is better taken on sorcerers, and mages can use the shield amulet. Overall it doesnt matter what spells you take as you will get the scrolls later, but I took Finds Familiar and Spook at level 1 mage because I didnt know if those had been added to the game. They have, but you get a find familiar scroll too late.

knas said:

Summons can take care of the traps, no?

Even if they can its a PITA to remember where everysingle trap is. Theres nothing wrong with dual classing from a level 5 or 6 thief / swashbuckler to a mage.

Abel

Shield lasts 5 turns, it's plenty enough.
Actually, it seems some spells aren't available. But they are level 5 spells, from what I understand.
I'm opening a new thread with a xcl sheet giving infos about most useful spells locations.

Mungri

Armor is 8 hours, and selling and rebuying the shield amulet recharges it with 50 uses, so why bother wasting a mage slot on the spell? Actually just the 10 base uses are good enough to get you up to level 7 and spirit armor on top of the level 1 armor spell.

IN1

Good luck!

I'm going for a vastly different approach, but then again, I play it hardcore (no reloading), so the playthrough must be as safe and optimized as possible. In a nutshell, what I do is: http://www.wikihost.org/w/inassorted/bgeesolohardcore

P. S.: Maybe my other guides and notes will interest you as well: http://www.wikihost.org/w/inassorted/start

Elendar

IN1 said:

Good luck!

I'm going for a vastly different approach, but then again, I play it hardcore (no reloading), so the playthrough must be as safe and optimized as possible. In a nutshell, what I do is: http://www.wikihost.org/w/inassorted/bgeesolohardcore

P. S.: Maybe my other guides and notes will interest you as well: http://www.wikihost.org/w/inassorted/start

traps are such cheese :P

IN1

Well, BG2 (and, consequently, BG:EE) is an incredibly easily exploitable game. That's true not only for thieves (that are actually seriously nerfed by inability to spam traps and by a relative uselessness of Bounty Hunter pre-level 11); I can name at least 4 low-level wizard spells that seriously threaten game balance. In what way is Melf's Minute Meteors less cheesy than traps?

That said, BG:EE does a good job of keeping the cheese somewhat proportional by sticking with a strict BG1 xp cap, as well as by nerfing some classes/kits that really ruined the balance in BGTutu. It's still not nearly as an old-school challenge as IWD1 in HoF mode is, but few things are.

Dragonspear

@Mungri

You can still dump wisdom because you can just drink a potion of insight before you cast your Wish spell. That's the only spell IIRC that has a wisdom component to it and potion of insight sets your wisdom to 18.

Ossory

Oxford_Guy said:

BTW good luck in Durlag's Tower, without any thief levels, you'll need it!

Yeah, I'm dreading that very moment. I'm hoping that with a maxed out character and with a full package of protective spells on, I'll be able to spring them one by one and reheal after each one. Although I realise I may be way off in my hopes. If that's the case, I'll have to let Durlag's Tower go.

Mungri said:

When you make a pure mage you can pick any two starting spells, make one of them find familiar. For pure cheese be a Lawful Evil mage.

I think FF can be bought from Talanthyr. And I've got one stashed in my chest (in case I decide I actually want to use it), so I must have found it somewhere during Nashkel Mines.

Mungri said:

And if you are doing a pure solo, without any trap and lock removal skills you are going to struggle severely, I don't even think you can get through Durlags Tower without being able to disarm traps, and no you won't have anywhere near enough health potions to keep yourself alive.

As above.

Mungri said:

Also if you plan on taking your mage into BG2, you should never dump stat wisdom.

Why?

Abel said:

Seriously, you play solo and you picked Magic Missile? Sleep was a way better option.

In my opinion there's no better spell than MM and I'm not sure where the first MM scroll is. I can't really imagine starting as a Mage without MM o.O

Abel said:

And you also took Armor instead of Shield?

What @Mungri said. If I were to take Shield, I would have to cast it at least once every single battle, and in most cases at the very beginning it would shake off before the battle was over. So in order to avoid resting after every single pack of Kobolds or Gibberlings, I would have to spend each memory slot on Shield, which means I would have no offensive spells (like MM). So basically I'd be quite well protected (arguably better than with Armour), however, I'd be significantly handicapped in fighting. Makes no sense.

Abel said:

It seems you still have a few things to learn.

Oh I'm pretty sure I do, but it seems, so do you

Abel said:

Even without Find Familiar solo Mage on maximum difficulty is not that hard.

I guess patience is the issue. Some battles aren't, per se, more difficult, they just take longer. You also need a good deal of self-control.

Abel said:

If you go kill Ankhegs you will level up very quickly. Then, of course, you need to find scrolls. And then, there's a high chance you will first struggle with large groups of enemies.

Well, I did feel a bit silly hurling Fireballs (from the Gift amulet from Carnival) at small groups of Kobolds, but then again, it was either that or killing one group with 4 or 5 MMs and resting, which would have been very tedious.

IN1 said:

Good luck!

I'm going for a vastly different approach, but then again, I play it hardcore (no reloading), so the playthrough must be as safe and optimized as possible. In a nutshell, what I do is: http://www.wikihost.org/w/inassorted/bgeesolohardcore

P. S.: Maybe my other guides and notes will interest you as well: http://www.wikihost.org/w/inassorted/start

This sounds very interesting, I might as well start a parallel game like that. Although I dislike setting traps very much. I'm thinking about soloing with a Fighter/Thief but no traps. How do you guys feel about that?

IntoTheDarkness

I did sorcerer solo on BGT. I used a familiar to detect traps and knock spell to unlock chests. I wonder if BG:EE has familiar scrolls. I used darts as they have the highest damage per second early in the game.

Mungri

Nimbul drops a find familiar scroll, so if you go ahead and to the Nashkel mines first you can get it.

However if you pick find familiar as a starting spell, you can kill a load of stuff in candlekeep and do other things before Nashkel with it.

bbear

Mage seems harder to play than a sorcerer because a sorcerer can have access to certain spells way earlier than a regular mage find in a scroll.

Mungri

Not really, sorcerers get each spell level 1 level later than mages, also with BG1's EXP cap a sorcerer wont be able to cast level 5 spells.