Astarta and party, final entry:
After defeating vanilla Balthazar and assembling as many valuable scrolls and potions as possible (stored in containers beforehand) as well as other items, the party had to fight a powerful enemy.
Namely, an old friend, a fighter, Pasha Mahmoud, appeared when PC wanted to leave the pocket plane for good (pocket plane challenges vanilla, all cleared). Pasha warned PC about a powerful enemy, and that the enemy cannot be defeated unless his powerful minions are destroyed first.
Prebuffing - carefully done. Long-lasting elemental protection spells cast first, as well as some shorter-lasting clerical buffs. Potions of Defense added for the riskbreakers (those are replenishable at least), as well as Ghost Armor scroll cast for Jack Sparrow (also replenishable). Gated in powerful summons, devices given to PC. In the end, warriors activated Hardiness, next round Riskbreakers activated Chain Breaker stance, while PC cast Alacrity under Foreknowledge, and buffed fighters with Ihaste and Giant Strength wherever needed, also cast ProEnergy, and with still running alacrity, cast RVE 10 times.
Some regenerations, but also, Magical rest. Rearranged spellbook before that of course. Mainly, the iidea was to replenish the amulet of Hades, Golden Spider Figurine and Ring of Greater Djinni Summoning, and gate in a second Greater Djinni (for now). Also, between the triggering of Pasha's conversation and the appearance of the Rakshasan prince himself, fighters managed to quaff 2 barbarian essence potions each.
The enemy himself,
the Rakshasa prince.
Party positions - scripted, but at least summons were directed and positioned in the upper left corner. PC positioned everyone accordingly. Summons - upper left corner. Fighters - lower left corner. PC - a bit above and to the right of the Rakshasan prince, thereby being the only target for his Remove Magic.
The prince is mage level 36, same as party mages, so there is a 50% chance that he'll dispel arcane buffs.
Unfortunately he did. Fortunately Astarta's buffs are unimportant. She was simply the bait.
PC cast ProMW from a scroll, fearing that her protective contingencies won't kick in on time.
Well they did.
This picture is still from the first round of the battle. What happened:
Rakshasan prince, seeing that PC is protected from his melee attacks, focused on Pasha Mahmoud, who was standing closest to PC and thus closest to the prince.
Upper-left appears an Ultra Golem. One Ultra Golem also appears in the lower-right corner. And in the lower-left corner, where all fighters are huddled, appears a Supreme Elemental Golem. Thankfully, these guys don't have the Purge Magic ability which all their copies have in IA v6. However, the lower-right ultra golem attacked some summons which he saw first. He had to be lured to the bottom! Navigating the summons did the trick, as can be seen.
The Ultra Golems gate in Amber golems in time. Amber golems in the original game tend to lower electrical resistance when they're hit - this is cumulative and does not allow save. However, in any other situation that lowered resistance dissipates in a couple of rounds. Not in EDE. Any kinda lowered electrical or fire resistance stays till the end, as far as I noticed.
The Supreme Elemental Golem has an 'Elemental Backlash' ability, which has some disabling effect (save or else), and hits like a powerful fireshield with all types of elemental damage. Also, it has a lower elemental resistance effect again if a save is failed on each hit. The golem also hits hard with all types of elemental damage in addition to powerful crushing attack. Very damage resistant, although not immune to critical strikes. The supreme golem gates in 3 elemental golems if not killed quickly. He starts gating those on the second round of combat!
Here's the other army, powerful summons led by PC's ally, Pasha Mahmoud. They're ready to take on the second Ultra Golem. Separating the enemies (and most importantly the Rakshasan prince out of sight) has few advantages:
Enemies which cannot see the party cannot 'gate in' minions. Meaning that the second Ultra Golem won't gate in any Amber Golems, at least not until he battles only summons + Pasha. If the golem even takes a glimpse on a party member however.... Almost the same story with the Rakshasan prince. He won't gate in Noble Rakshasas until he sees a party member. And by distracting him upon summons/Pasha, he won't be able to do nasty things or cast spells upon the party. Which is very relevant, as his spells are all unpleasant ones, even the Remove Magic.
The riskbreakers and assassin-fighter (Saros, Bane and Jack Sparrow) each consumed yet another potion of Barbarian essence before heading for the assembly point. So their resistances with Hardiness and Chain Breaker stance (and Jack's static resistances) is 125%. However they have no time to quaff more potions now. Hope Hardiness stays long enough to slay the Elemental Golems (both of them, first the Supreme one). First round of criticals not yet ended,
he's on Injured and gates in an Elemental Golem.
Here's why Farsight is important, via it the party can very well guide the summons. For example, that Dragon's breath could've devastated many, and even could've killed a Greater Djinni. Djinnies were made to cast Mirror Image, thus effectively negating the damage of the blast, and all other summons
were taken out of the blast radius ASAP.
The other Ultra Golem was desperately trying to squash the Noble Spider. He was denied the opportunity and finally had to
turn and attack Bane.
Everybody is at full health, and Saros is even beyond that, thanx to
Foebane's LMD accumulating effect.
Checking
the second battlefield.
This is
actually the third round of fighting the Supreme Golem. At the same time,
the Ultra Golem is Injured and the prince, by the looks of it, wants to cast ADHW. OK.
One Greater Djinni going critical. Soon to fall.
Urgent protection (cast ProMW under Farsight).
A second later -
Supreme Golem down. With still active Criticals, party started pounding the regular Elemental Golem. The elemental golem is
far less damage resistant than his big brother and
falls quickly.
Killed the lesser golems (an Amber one and a Gem one) first, not knowing that the lowered electrical resistance won't restore back to normal, as it should. Only Ultra Golem is against the party, they all equipped with good crushing weapons +4 or higher and attacked. Also, they now began drinking some more Barbarian essence potions, because Hardinesses waned, buffing their physical resistances to 100 (Jack has 105%), but not the R-C's resistances, he still relies only on Iron Skins (which he refreshed during the fight constantly).
However, the Ultra Golem hits with electrical as well as crushing damage. Very bad.
Tried the nerfed anvil Potions of Absorbtion - these either are bugged or occupy the same value as Protection from Electricity spell.
That was a bad move, summoning a Planetar. The Planetar has +3 weapons, so he actually cannot harm the Ultra golem. The upper Ultra Golem is almost dead, however due to the fact that I neglected the fight above a bit, a Greater Djinni (the one with more spells) and some other summons died. However, Planetars are immune to fire damage, and their value is to be reviewed later.
The party managed to slay
the Ultra Golem by switching places, but the gated in second Amber golem gave the party a hard time, because in that same time the Rakshasan Prince used the Universal Purge Magic (he obviously uses one each turn). Universal Purge dispels all buffs on all party members save from undispellable ones. But this does not dispel the lowered electrical resistance. Finally the party managed to slay the Amber golem by wasting several of Torham's Greater Restorations and a couple of Critical strikes with powerful slashing weapons.
The other Ultra Golem was
finally slain by Pasha after a bit more micromanagement with summons and a second Farsight spell. The Universal Purge Magic
was a second before the golem died.
Some buffing when all lower enemies were defeated.
That particular buff was a mistake. The party was hard-pressed in the end of the fight with both ProMagicEnergy spells/scrolls and with Improved Haste ones, despite the fact that PC had 9 ProMagicEnergy spells and 3 Improved Hastes memorized, despite the 3 Wish scrolls, and despite Alia's multiple 6th and 9th lvl slots. Each such slot is very valuable, and it's even justified to summon a Yuanti via a scroll rather than waste a 9th lvl slot casting or memorizing Monster Summoning lvl 7. On the other hand, Yantis are great decoys, as are Planetars. So it's simply about more judicious ratio of Wish/MS VII or Summon Planetar spell memorization/casting. And as for Giant strength type buffs - there are enough items and/or potions which increase str to giant proportions.
Pasha was knocked back by the Prince. 1 on 1 Pasha is no match for the prince, despite the fact that he can survive for some time. So the
Prince was lured to attack the Noble Spider, this one newly summoned by Alia.
Some more decoys.
Finally, Alacrity, some minor buffs,
party charges forward. Well, sorceress and R-C stay behind.
Seeing the party, the Prince immediately gated in 2 Noble Rakshasas, who gated in 2 Horrid Rakshasas each.
However, the ruse worked, and the rakshasas stupidly showered the party wtih lower-level Remove Magicks, wasting their action for the round and being unable to cast AI for yet another round. In that round the Noble Rakshasas must die!
Critical Strike HLAs are preserved for this occasion. One Critical strike for each fighter
takes care of the enemies.
Under still running Alacrity,
PC summoned some more fodder. Second
noble Rakshasa down.
What is needed now: Keeping fighters under 100% physical resistance (well, Barbarian essence potions last for 10 turns, but these 10 turns will eventually end, so now the party started gulping some extra barbarian essence potions - despite the fact that they consumed 13 already - 5 for Bane, 5 for Saros and 3 for jack - they have 18 more).
This way, with physical resistances of 127% for quite some time, they will even heal from enemy powerful melee hits.
Ugh, another Universal Purge.
Had to rebuff.
Ahahaha
Dragon Breath on Farsight-navigated Salamander Nobles and Planetar - all immune to fire damage.
Buffing. Each attacking warrior must fulfill the following requirements:
Be 100% resistant to physical harm permanently. The prince dispels Hardiness on hit, so one can't rely on it.
Be protected from Magical Energy. ProEnergy, although granting 75% resistance to magical damage, is simply not enough when playing on Insane difficulty. The prince is surrounded by a permanent Fireshield called Field of Repulse. It has the chance to knockback the target and render it unconscious on each hit, should the target fail save. Pasha, for example, fails save quite often. The save is vs spells, with a -5 penalty, so a -4 save vs spell saves always, but only Saros and Jack have such saves - Bane's save vs spells is -3. Torham will fly back often, because of his lousy -2 save vs spell. But the field inflicts magical damage on each hit as punishment, that's why ProMagicEnergy is absolutely essential.
Be Improved Hasted and with good Strength.
The prince regularly uses Greater Malison, hoping that fighters will be rendered unconscious on each hit vs his Field of Repulse. The counter of Malison is Potions of Magic shielding, which even if dispelled by enemy Remove magic,
still negate the Malison effect.
S
ummons have to be saved every time when possible, they're gonna be needed later, for a distraction.
Keeping Farsight active, waiting to retreat.
Retreat. All
except Jack. With his equipment (Master of the High Forest cloak, Master of Disciplines amulet, Improved Ring of Gaxx), Jack is 50% magic resistant. Equipping Carsomyr grants him 100%, thus effectively negating enemy Greater Malison or ADHW. He also has Poseidon's wrath halberd to negate ADHW. And his Dragon Lord halberd makes him immune to Dragon Breath, should the prince try it. And he's immune to prince's physical attacks while barbarian essence potions are still active.
After enemy's AI waned, PC had to step forward, because Pasha Mahmoud retreats to PC each time the Prince uses Absolute Immunity. Prince's AI can't be dispelled and lasts for the duration, in which time the Prince usually regenerates fully (exception, if he's at near-death, regenerates only to Injured). Pasha had to see the enemy in order to attack it. Two birds with one stone, as can be seen,
because the prince foolishly used Greater Malison on PC. OK. PC quickly retreated and was malisoned.
A third Noble Rakshasa gated in by the Prince -
eliminated fast along with the two minion Horrid Rakshasas. And again
purge.
Malison on Jack? OK.
Carsomyr in hand. However it seems
to be not enough. The prince has a chance to lower magic and elemental resistances on hit by 25%. Bad. Hopefully, that one wanes in time.
Buff, melee, field of repulse. Mages each have a bunch of ProMagicEnergy scrolls. Jack can cast those too, but his level, being lower, makes these to be dispellable easily if he casts them. Besides, he has to fight, not cast spells.
Second Absolute Immunity.
Uh-oh. Prince chasing pasha. Pasha retreats to PC because prince's under Absolute Immunity. Fighters run around trying to distract the prince, but he seems focused on Pasha. Finally,
a Lower Fire Resistance shot at PC help make him switch targets. The prince wouldn't have used that ability if PC wasn't wearing the Royal elemental staff (100% fire res).
Diverting attention to summons. Summoned Yuantis with PC and sorceress. Ahahaha -
ADHW for 10 dmg.
Buffing, attacking again. Here we see Bane charging in battle while Alia casts the touch-spell ProMagicEnergy from a distance. Can be done by moving the warrior away after casting had begun, even if the warrior moves to off-screen, the spell will take effect. Same not true about Improved haste though.
Nice,
Dragon Breath on clustered warriors/summons. No one is protected from fire. Even if they were, the prince would simply spam Lower Fire Resistance on them until it's -128%, and then any fire effect will deal more than double damage. However, Dragon Breath blast radius can be evaded by quickly escaping. With boots of speed of course.
Next, ADHW.
Fighters can take it, summons too.
Third Absolute Immunity. First two activated on Injured, that one on Badly Injured.
While the prince, under AI, is distracted by some summons, his final minions appear.
The last Noble Rakshasa and her 2 Horrid rakshasas arrive. Remove Magic takes care of Noble Rakshasa's AI,
and they're defeated fast.
Now the prince's all alone. But still, he has his combat capabilities, unlimited Dragon Breath, ADHW, Greater Malison and Remove Magic spells (and other, like Slow for example). And also, one-per-turn Universal Purge. Melee and
even spell disruption.
Fourth AI, also on Badly Injured (he regenerates fast, that's why I caught him on Injured already).
OK,
Jack's MR is back to normal.
Dragon Breath -
escape from blast radius, chapter 102.
Ugh,
another purge.
And another blast radius which catches no one of significance. Regularly, Jack may be in the blast radius with Dragon Lord halberd in hand.
Fifth Absolute Imminity - that one at Near-Death.
Tenser's Transformation for Jack, for some HP increase (and some more damage of course). Under Tensers, he cannot cast HLAs though. Big deal.
Melee after buffing. Frankly, keeping buffs intact is no simple thing. While the prince activates AI on Injured, things are quite simple as it takes a small amount of time to bring him to Injured. But bringing the prince to Near-Death - gives him plenty of time to try Remove Magicks for IHaste and/or ProMagicEnergy, and also gives him time to cast Universal Purge in some cases. Like
for example now, when all fighters are around him and bringing him to Badly Injured.
There are some good news and some bad news. Good news is that the prince has one more Absolute Immunity left. Bad news is, that party's almost out of ProMagicEnergy and ImprovedHaste scrolls/spells/items. Had to try and Wish. Two ninth-level slots remaining on sorc and 3 Wish scrolls in pack of PC (no wishes memorized). Good options will be either rest or Improved Haste for party/all, and an acceptable option would be proMagicEnergy on all. After 4 wishes,
got one IHaste for everyone (and one mass heal, healing the prince as well). Buffed fighters with the few remaining ProMagicEnergy scrolls.
Another Breath in a narrow corridor. Only Jack (with Dragon's Breath) a Yuanti and Pasha are in the blast radius, and btw the Yuanti somehow escaped the damage. Jack is immune to the spell, and pasha cannot be taken out by that lousy spell either.
Last Absolute Immunity. So far so good, but there are 4 more rounds to wait, and then the purge is near.
Another Malison on the decoy. Magic resistance, prince, magic resistance.
A bit of a mess-up here. PC tried to cast ProMagicEnergy on a fighter who was running from the Rakshasan prince. However, the prince switched targets right after PC completed the spell. She ran around like crazy, fearing to even activate a scroll (this takes some time and the prince is fast enough and may kill her before the scroll takes effect).
But she had an unused yet trigger, prepared for emergencies.
Last wish. ProMagicEnergy, Haste, no, I'm not hoping for Rest.
This, however, was the best option, believe it or not.
Torham, with his permanent Improved Haste, joined the fight now (and before the previous absolute immunity as well).
Saros was slowed via melee attack right after he successfully cast ImprovedHaste from the one and only improved cloak of protection +2 that the party has. Jack used the Darkfire Bow for that same purpose, while Bane used the Amulet of Cheetah Speed with much the same idea. After Saros was slowed, and everyone assembled to give final beating to the Prince, he cast another Dragon Breath. This time Saros could not escape the blast. That's why Jack quickly tossed him the Dragon Lord halberd, which Saros equipped ASAP. Other party members successfully escaped the blast.
This was the last trick which the prince had in his sleeve, and
he admitted defeat.
Exchanged final greetings with Pasha, and he left.
Modifié par saros_shadow_follower, 16 mai 2012 - 01:26 .
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