Minsc and the Amazons (with a question about Berserk)
LordRumfish
Member Posts: 937
Heya peeps. So, in classic restartitis (in my defense, shaman wasn't even available before) I have started a new game of BG:EE with a sorcerer PC and a secondary shaman PC (secondary because of the stronghold issue in BG2:EE). I went through the Nashkel mines, Minsc quaffed an oil of speed when we took down Mulahey, and there was still plenty of duration left by the time I got to the surface. Often I leave the amazon encounter for later, because it is fairly difficult at lower levels. However, Minsc was still hasted, so I thought, "Why not try it?"
I sent Minsc speeding up there and he was basically upon them before dialogue started. I ran him between the two ranged combatants and, on a whim, made him berserk. Now mind you, Minsc was decently well equipped here for being low level. Ankheg plate, ring of the princes, dex bracers. So, the two ranged combatants took the bait and switched to melee weapons while the clerics cast some spells. My other characters joined the battle, but the closest cleric shrugged off the first Blindness I cast on her. The clerics got some spells in aimed at Minsc... and they did nothing whatsoever. Minsc had killed the archer at this point and was lighting into the dart-thrower.
I finally landed a Blindness on the closer cleric and set my sights on the next cleric, having everyone interrupt her. Minsc ran off in his berserk rage after the dart-thrower when she had morale failure at really low HP. The rest of the team managed to control the clerics and I blinded the second one, spelling doom for them. Minsc finished off the dart-thrower, and then I let him cool off from his berserk state before bringing him back to the party.
Anyway, aside from that being probably the easiest kill of the amazons I have ever had, I had a question about Minsc's berserk special ability. Does Minsc get the same sorts of immunities during that state that berserkers or barbarians have? It seemed like their Hold Person spells and such were just having no effect. I could have gotten lucky on the saves, I guess, but I was curious.
I sent Minsc speeding up there and he was basically upon them before dialogue started. I ran him between the two ranged combatants and, on a whim, made him berserk. Now mind you, Minsc was decently well equipped here for being low level. Ankheg plate, ring of the princes, dex bracers. So, the two ranged combatants took the bait and switched to melee weapons while the clerics cast some spells. My other characters joined the battle, but the closest cleric shrugged off the first Blindness I cast on her. The clerics got some spells in aimed at Minsc... and they did nothing whatsoever. Minsc had killed the archer at this point and was lighting into the dart-thrower.
I finally landed a Blindness on the closer cleric and set my sights on the next cleric, having everyone interrupt her. Minsc ran off in his berserk rage after the dart-thrower when she had morale failure at really low HP. The rest of the team managed to control the clerics and I blinded the second one, spelling doom for them. Minsc finished off the dart-thrower, and then I let him cool off from his berserk state before bringing him back to the party.
Anyway, aside from that being probably the easiest kill of the amazons I have ever had, I had a question about Minsc's berserk special ability. Does Minsc get the same sorts of immunities during that state that berserkers or barbarians have? It seemed like their Hold Person spells and such were just having no effect. I could have gotten lucky on the saves, I guess, but I was curious.
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Comments
"For the two turns (2 minutes in real-time) that it lasts it increases his strength and dexterity by 2 and increases his total health by 15. It also provides immunity to charm, panic, sleep, confusion, maze, level drain, hold, and feeblemind. However, in combat situations you will lose control of him so its best used with caution. Also the 15 health that he gains will be removed when the effect ends, so make sure to not have less than 15 health with him while he is going berserk."
Also, if you have a Priest of Tyr in the party, she can make so that Minsc, even using the berserk ability, stays under your control.
Part of my early-game strategy (which may continue throughout their careers) for the sorcerer / shaman duo is to lay down areas of crowd control and pick off enemies through various means. At low levels, this meant throwing a Grease/Entangle combo and using ranged weapons (start casting Entangle first, since it has a longer casting time); this is all assisted by a rogue doing some scouting for you to see where the enemies are lined up.
Now they are level 5, and I have been killing things sometimes with nothing more than Writhing Fog for damage (Web has joined the crowd control parade, and occasionally Stinking Cloud from Dynaheir). Quite by accident, I discovered that since Minsc had the Belt of Antipode he was unaffected by the cold from Writhing Fog, and now that he has Spider's Bane he can literally go scouting around the crowd control area of death with no ill effects. This is particularly hilarious if he manages to encounter other nearby monsters and they follow him back into the death trap.
Nowhere was this more effective than in the xvart village. We arrived at night, and as you may know, the xzarts keep popping up like crazy every time you turn around and pull back the fog of war. I am pretty sure I killed over 20 xvarts using a couple of Writhing Fogs, Greases, Entangles, and one Web.
And yeah, I am well aware we could have handled them using ranged weapons and a little bit of melee, but that's not the point. The point was to see whether shaman spells could be made useful, and I can attest now that my shaman is more than pulling her weight in group kills (not as many as Coran, but I think she has started outstripping Minsc sometimes). Also, having so many Cure Light Wounds available means that we usually just need to sleep 8 hours to heal up, never more than 16.
Zakana'we (my shaman) has been queen of level 4 and 5 with her AOE damage-over-time shenanigans. I expect at level 6, Miriadne (my sorceress) will start reclaiming her arcane throne with fireballs (or maybe skull traps? But fire damage can be useful... perhaps she will take both). Dynaheir could theoretically be doing this already, except that I haven't acquired a fireball scroll just yet so she is casting haste instead.
I wish clerics had better crowd control / AOEs, but that's okay. It means that Yeslick handles buffing and single-target shenanigans, and he's also the secondary tank. He doesn't really need to handle any curative things yet, since Zakana'we has Cure Light Wounds and Slow Poison when she needs them.
Oh, one last thing. If I have ever bad-mouthed Blindness before, I was wrong. That is one heck of a 1st-level spell, taking down everything from Tarnesh to Taurgosz Khosann. My sorceress might not have the highest kill count (yet), but she's right up there for MVP. The main feather in my shaman's cap is that she soloed Davaeorn with 3 Writhing Fogs. Cheesy, yes. Effective, yes.
For 3rd level spells, I figure Summon Insects and Dispel Magic are shoe-ins. I'm not quite as sure after that. Is Invisibility Purge worth it, y'think? Especially considering there might be True Seeing down the road. I'm also curious about how exactly Call Lightning works, and if it is worth it or not. It seems like you would get the first bolt aimed at an enemy when it finishes casting, and then sometime during the next turn (not round, turn) a random enemy somewhere within the huge radius would get struck by any follow-up bolts. I'm a patient guy when it comes to the duration, but just how big IS that radius? Is it going to be striking enemies halfway across the map?
I'm almost certainly going to pick up Call Woodland Beings at 4th level, why wouldn't I want a summoned creature, and a group heal, and a dominate, and a confusion, and a dispel, and... you get the idea. I'm pretty well sold on Death Ward and Defensive Harmony. Plus, shamans get Spirit Fire, I know from using M'Khiin a little that it's quite good. Negative Plane Protection doesn't last long enough to suit my tastes (I could just send in Minsc or Korgan berserking), and I might have access to a cleric anyway. That leaves me looking between Poison (a fair single-target damage spell if it wasn't for the abysmal range), Animal Summoning I (summons are always somewhat useful, but this one doesn't impress me), or Neutralize Poison (a quick 10 HP heal that also gets rid of some status conditions). I'll give it some thought.
Iron Skins at 5th is going to make her tough as nails, and she's already no slouch. Insect Plague is clearly amazing. True Seeing is a staple, and all that. My 4th choice here might be Pixie Dust, I know it's just normal Invisibility and not Greater but the long duration could let me completely scout out a zone with my whole team before deciding where to plant myself and start fighting. Magic Resistance might come in at number 5, aside from being a buff I have heard that you can debuff a high-MR creature with this. Free Raise Dead just for being a shaman.
Higher than this, and I guess I'm getting into BG2:EE... but it never hurts to think about the future.
At 6th level spells, Dolorous Decay looks amazing. Is it amazing? I hope it's amazing. It has a casting time of 1! Heal is a no-brainer. Pick number 3 seems like it's in some tight contention. Harm could be great, or it could be hard to pull off. There are 3 different summoning spells here, which one is the best out of Animal Summoning III, Conjure Animals and Conjure Fire Elemental? Something tells me it's the elemental, even though bears are pretty cool. Fire Seeds seems a bit subpar, and Wondrous Recall doesn't seem all THAT wondrous, really. Is Physical Mirror worth it? Shamans get Spiritual Lock, which is a nice single-target "save-or-lose" effect.
Finally, the capstone spells at 7th level. Shamans get Ether Gate, their very own Maze variant. I'm having trouble narrowing these down, they all look pretty useful. Creeping Doom for sure, and Earthquake because that's the kind of game I'm playing here (AOE crowd control and damage). Shield of the Archons looks pretty cool. Then there's HLAs or something. Baaah, I guess I'll figure it out when I get there. I've only played BG2 up to the end of the Underdark, and never ToB really.
Hmph. I've gone and talked too much. =P
Insect plague and creeping doom are great. Only problem is the relatively slow casting and the time it takes for the swarm to reach the target. I am in ToB, and I discovered that the swarm is effective even when the target is in time stop.
I am not playing a shaman charname, but for my present game I EEKeepered Dynaheir and then Aerie to shaman. I mostly use her to summon spirits and for protection spells. I have Minsc and Wilson as my frontliners who both have a habit of getting carried away in battle. For 5th level spell you get recall spirit, which is like raise dead. It's great to have that and Heal and chaotic command almost at will. Regeneration is useful, because in ToB enemy fighters can often damage your tanks incredibly fast.
I think my next playthrough I will play a charname shaman that will be more melee and damage oriented.
It seems like every time I try to find Captain Brage, I forget just how far off the beaten path he is. By the time I stumble across the right zone, I've basically stopped looking for him and I'm just exploring the map. This was my reaction on finding the zone again (and going the wrong direction, subsequently fighting tasloi and junk):
That doesn't mean I gave Zakana'we no opportunities. In the southeast zone with the big gibberling encounter, I set up one of the classic Entangle/Grease/Web/Writhing Fog killing fields and let Minsc draw the stragglers in to the slaughter (btw, have you ever seen a slowed creature trying to cross a Grease spell? It's kinda sad). I also used this setup for some of the various mercenary/assassin encounters we ran across. One of the plus sides to this setup, even though it takes multiple spell castings and requires waiting around, is that it uses lower-level spell slots. If the enemies have too many HP for one full run of Writhing Fog (which is 1 turn, which means 10d3 cold damage, 20 damage on average), you can either rinse and repeat or you can supplement with ranged attacks. I only tend to pull out tricks like Horror and Glitterdust when I'm taken off-guard or maybe waylaid by enemies. If I know a big fight is coming, Zakana'we casts Bless just before we walk in. Oh, Zakana'we has also learned Summon Insects, and it does good work against a single target. I am looking forward to tripping up some spellcasters with it.
I am continuing to enjoy the sorceress / shaman run. Lots of spells per day + no memorization = fun. I admit that I have not been bothering to use the shaman spirit dance, but if I'm up to the next tier of animal spirits I may give it a try soon and see how it does. The percentage chance of success seemed too low at level 1, so I decided I would revisit it when Zakana'we was higher level.
Fireball is a useful spell, but Writhing Fog has it outnumbered on uses per day. Zakana'we continues to be a useful spellcaster even as Miriadne begins leveling the playing field (and the battlefield). Dynaheir helps out with double-Fireball shenanigans sometimes, and even Yeslick has been known to toss a Glyph of Warding into the mix when he isn't summoning the undead (in the most lawful and good of ways, of course). Minsc and Coran don't really need any help with their kill counts, and Yeslick doesn't do too shabby either.
My hope is that once I finally do get to Baldur's Gate, I will have Coran ready to thief up every part of the city (I am holding off on my final loot run of Beregost and Nashkel too right now). I often feel like I miss things in Baldur's Gate, and I am determined to scour every inch of the city on this playthrough. I may have to rely on single-target spells a bit more than AOEs within city limits, so Minsc, Coran and Yeslick will no doubt be quite handy.
Oh, one extra note: Coran was amazing all throughout the Firewine Bridge ruins. He often found opportunities to single-handedly take out 2-3 kobold commandos, starting with a nice backstab using Varscona. With all the twists and turns and narrow corridors and traps, Coran was by far the MVP of that whole mess. Luck may be a lady, but Coran was the *man.* ^_~
P.P.S. - I wonder if an "underground" themed party would work? I know Viconia is constantly talking about the differences between the surface and her home, and Yeslick makes a lot of similar comments. I don't know that Baeloth or Kagain make much commentary that way, but perhaps they would suit the theme as well. Anyone else have any thoughts on the matter?