15202 réponses à ce sujet

[polytope]

@Grond, good job with the new incarnation of Killian, things should go smoother now that you've got HLA's.

Jehoahaz wrote...
With his death it is evident that all is lost. Next to go is Hayk, who had 5 hp left at this point. Then Hizkiah, who was at three hit points anyway. Last one to fall is Eir the child of Bhaal. And so ends her story.

Planar Prison is tough at low levels even with a regular party, but you needn't give up on the idea of random parties; I know Enuhal beat SoA + ToB with a randomized party (earlier in this thread).

Satyricon331 wrote...

fwiw, on my SCS2 v21 install, Spell Thrust removes Spell Shield correctly (the "Initialise" component fixes Spell Shield, but are you referring to another component?)

I think the culprit is actually globe of invulnerability, which blocks spell thrust (but not secret word) now. This seems to make spell thrust almost useless (except in the early game) and secret word essential (it was the other way round in previous versions of SCS).

corey_russell wrote...

The duo were caught flat-footed but we concentrated on the vamps - well, a little problem - Wewa got level drained and chunked!! Bannen used an invis potion and escaped the zone. But he returned to loot Wewa's stuff, which for some reason wasn't lost like it usually is in single player mode.

Sorry to hear. It sucks to lose a character you've taken all the way from Candlekeep.

Serg BlackStrider wrote...

As this will be my first SCS-Ascension Throne challenge ever I have watched a lot (and I mean a lot!) of youtube videos, inspected our forumites' posts here thoroughly for just to know what to expect there. I hear in my head as Melissan screams again and again: *Doom awaits thee!!!* We will see, Melissan. We will see...

I wish I could give you advice but my last SCS + Ascension game died to bugs, your party looks pretty strong though and I believe they can succeed.

An update on Aleks (since I don't know how much longer I'll be able to post here).

In Brynnlaw, saved Claire and Ginia, confronted Perth the Adept... he was pretty easy after his spell immunity was removed (Keldorn's dispel succeded). He was smart enough to use Absolute Immunity when debuffed rather than ProMW, but didn't last much longer.

It's a bad day for my character, not only his soul is stolen but the party is striped of all of our items and forced to play hide and seek with a vampire... I consider SCS improved asylum a real hurdle for most parties, if I can survive this things look promising for the rest of the game.

First up, a clay golem is taken out with a +3 mace created by enchanted weapon spell and improved haste. It was guarding a bag of holding with some non magical weapons and armor. This is also a particularly appropriate time for Keldorn's observation.

Interestingly, the Yuan-Ti from outside the riddle room came to investigate as we killed the goblins (getting a +3 spear for Keldorn which he's at least proficient in). Fortunately the mage didn't come with them, but they're formidable fighters without our magical equipment or healing potions (Valygar backstabbed this one but couldn't finish it off, it has only a -4 penalty to hit in spite of Pro Evil, Improved Invisibility and studded leather, so must gain +4 to hit normally).

The undead outside the library are dealt with using some sunfires, fireballs and holy smite spells (not going to risk meleeing that greater mummy with no elixirs of health/staff of curing handy), Valygar backstabs the skeleton archer.

Dace Sontan summons some wolves and then turns into a wolf, which is just confusing, he also does vicious melee damage but Aleks has to tank him - with Valygar and Nalia contributing with +2 arrows and magic missiles - as he is the only party member reliably immune to level drain (ProMW and NPP not suitable here for reasons noted earlier).



Well, our party found some lesser healing potions on the kobolds and an extra healing potion on the Yuan-Ti mage near the riddle statue. We needed them all.

Now for the next real challenge, the squad of Yuan-Ti (including 3 mages) blocking the exit. I thought I was in trouble here, although Keldorn dispelled 2 out of 3 mage's buffs all of the Yuan-Ti mages made their MR check/saving throw against web and chaos, they also interrupted Nalia's emotion spell with meteors. Fortunately my second attempt at chaos confuses two mages and the coherent one (his globe dispelled) is taken out with ranged weapons and fireballs.



Ambush by Bodhi, I cast holy power beforehand just for the hp boost (Aleks made level 13 fighter just before this room, Nalia also got level 15 somewhere and Keldorn level 14) Imoen and Nalia contribute improved invisibility and spirit armor spells. Aleks still took massive damage from the vampires' attacks.



See those rats? I was very lucky not to get hit by those. They are summoned by the vampires and infect with you a disease that ticks at about the same rate as phase spider venom... and of course, curing is hardly an option with an uncontrollable PC attacking everything nearby.

I'm not going to use SCS improved vampires again, their abilities (like turning into rats and backstabbing and their buggy teleporting) are largely nonsensical, and this "cutscene" stands out as a place where any non-arcane caster has a great chance to get killed no matter what they do, if I played on insane instead of core I would've certainly died. [/rant}

...moving along, the beholder summoned from the tome fell to standard tactics (Nalia acting as a decoy to soak up the AMR). The portal creatures didn't stand up to Improved Haste even without our usual weapons.

Randomized items found in the maze: cutthroat the +4 shortsword from the tome, golden girdle from the riddle statue, shadow armor from the chest puzzle, darkmail chain from the portal, warblade the +4 zweihander from the chest guarded by golems, pale green ioun stone from the spirit troll, cloak of the stars from the Illithid... and a girdle of hill giant strength from the troll altar! Keldorn will use this and warblade in future rather than the harmonium halberd. Also found scrolls of PW:Stun, PW:Blind, spell sequencer, incendiary cloud, maze and secret word for Imoen - I turned down the difficulty to scribe this last one because it would be really annoying for Imoen not to have it in the final spellhold fight and ofc we don't have any potions of genius, it's the only time I'll do that. Got the usual boots of speed + north.

Talked my way past Lonk (as Aleks's predecessors have done) and grabbed our stolen gear from the bedroom.

Improved Irenicus fight in spellhold. The clones are actually quite dangerous being copies of party members; same stats, spells and equipment - and will put them to good use with SCS scripts - you could probably render the fighter clones harmless by dropping your weapons beforehand and picking them up after the clones are summoned, but that would be cheating.



In this screenshot I'm trying to command Nalia's clone, both Keldorn and Aleks are under attack by their own clones who've just killed Dradeel - his last act was breaching Irenicus after Imoen and Nalia stripped the evil elf's spell protections with secret word + ruby ray... the freed mages are actually pretty useful in this fight.

The clones actually put up much more resistance than Irenicus himself who did no damage before fleeing, but we're still in good health when the last one falls:



We'll be leaving the Island in pursuit shortly. Current party gold ~100,000 - more than I've ever had at this stage of the game, more than I've even had in ToB I think...

Modifié par polytope, 15 novembre 2013 - 10:39 .

[Grond0]

polytope wrote...
An update on Aleks (since I don't know how much longer I'll be able to post here).

Is that due to your own circumstances or a reference to the expected changes to the forums?

[Gate70]

Nice work with the gloves Grond0.
& looking good Polytope.

Modifié par Gate70, 15 novembre 2013 - 01:47 .

[Grond0]

Killian {2} - gnome barbarian (update 5)

With improved saving throws, HPs and HLAs Killian is now significantly over-powered for most encounters and zipped through a number of areas this afternoon.

In the de'Arnise Hold Kitthix webbed the yuan-ti mage, while Killian avoided getting into fights with lots of trolls at once.  He force-attacked the golems one at a time - having the flail of ages equipped by the time he got to the iron golem.  He gave the umber hulks a final meal before meleeing them individually (level 21 - WW).  I decided to see how Killian did fighting Torgal and the giant trolls all at once - the answer was pretty damn well.  He took responsibility for the stronghold, though I don't suppose he'll spend too much time there.

With far more money than he needs Killian bought up some arrows of dispelling and some weapons from Joluv that might come in handy in ToB.  Then he headed for the Bridge District to give Haer'Dalis a hand.  Going into the Planar Prison invisible, he was able to kill both mages with a single WW and rapidly finished the rest of the welcoming party off.  Bhaal horror affected 2 of the 3 yuan-ti mages, which made that encounter simple and Killian moved on after resting.  Buffed again, he used a WW to kill the Master of Thralls and went to destroy the orb.  He tried an immediate strike on the Warden, but without WW he couldn't get through buffs in time and made a strategic retreat here.  Two of the yuan-ti mages followed a long way, but struggled to cast spells through FoA slow and 2 elemental damage weapons and soon died (level 22 - GWW).  Kitthix and the Warrior then localized the Warden and an assault on him with his new GWW saw Killian successful within a couple of seconds.  A couple more yuan-ti mages were pretty helpless on their own and Killian was able to see Haer'Dalis safely back to the inn.

He progressed rapidly through the initial Umar Hills quests - too rapidly in fact as a mis-click saw him fighting Madulf rather than making friends.  On to the ruined temple where (for the first time for a while) Killian got all the answers for the statue right first time (he celebrated by getting to level 23 - power attack).  The liches were kept at range and destroyed with Azuredge, while other things were mainly meleed with FoA and iMoD in the off-hand.  The Shade Lord killed one of my characters recently, but never stood much chance against an Azuredge GWW (level 24 - GWW).  For Thaxy the simmy got another run-out and Ilbratha was used for the first time.  Under attack from 2 lots of GWWs Thaxy used a wing buffet, but just too late to save himself.

Killian briefly visited the city to get the Shadow Armour made up and then moved on to Trademeet.  Two opening critical misses allowed Taquee to get a stoneskin up and survive a WW, but not the follow-up attack.  The other genies fared worse and Killian soon moved on to the Druid Grove.  He quickly stormed through there - mainly just melee, though did use Kitthix and the Warrior against Kyland Lind.  He picked up Belm to use off-hand.  Left the rakshasas alone for now in the unlikely event that he decides he needs to use their potions in future.  Cernd took 5 attacks to kill Faldorn, allowing her to get a nibble in of her own before she died.  Back at Trademeet Killian reported in to the mayor (level 25 - critical strike) and then did the tomb and helped Tiris.

After sorting out equipment Killian set off for Windspear Hills.  Some paladins bit the dust before he could help himself and he set off for the dungeon to get revenge (dropping off the acorns, which I'd remembered for once, on the way).  He fought his way through the early encounters, then used a rare Sunray on the vampires (level 26 - GWW).  After carving up some werewolves and golems Killian used a potion of fire resistance (I think that's his first potion in BG2) to take on the genies (level 27 - hardiness).  His simmy joined him to crush Samia's intended ambush before he made his way to Firkraag.  Conster somehow shrugged off numerous GWW hits to produce a delayed blast fireball, but was already dead by the time it went off.  For Firkraag, Killian and his simmy again attacked using GWW.  Firkraag did a bit better than Thaxy - buffeting them away when he was at near death and trying a breath out on the simmy.  It was unprotected from fire, but took no damage - presumably due to mirror image.  Meanwhile, Killian had come back in and got the killing blow.  Both Killian and his simmy used FoA, but surprisingly Firkraag was not slowed by any of the hits he took.  Reporting back to Garren got Killian to level 28 - GWW.

[DMWW]

polytope wrote...
I'm not going to use SCS improved vampires again, their abilities (like turning into rats and backstabbing and their buggy teleporting) are largely nonsensical, and this "cutscene" stands out as a place where any non-arcane caster has a great chance to get killed no matter what they do, if I played on insane instead of core I would've certainly died. [/rant}

Can you do me a favour and write up this in a bit more detail on G3? I don't want to derail the no-reload thread but it sounds as if this is important feedback. (My own rant is that I wish people with genuinely critical feedback would do it in places I'm more reliably likely to see it! Nice though it is to get lots of fluffy positive comments, it's less useful for actually making improvements) Some of what you're writing (excessive rat damage?) is I think fixed on current versions (you're using v21?) but some of it looks like possibly-unfixed bugs and some might be useful content feedback.

[DeeKayNL]

Little update on Anthal. Not much progress. We went to Trademeet. Killed the Genies and talked to the mayor. We went to the druid grove and cleared the Troll Mound and defeated Faldorn.

Also bought the Girdle of Hill Giant Strenght and Did the first part in Anomens quest conerning his little sister.

I also installed 1PP mod. Had some troubles in combination with the widescreen mod. Got them fixed and adjusted my resolution for screenprint purposes. I love the new cloud animations:

Modifié par DeeKayNL, 15 novembre 2013 - 08:35 .

[polytope]

Grond0 wrote...

polytope wrote...

An update on Aleks (since I don't know how much longer I'll be able to post here).

Is that due to your own circumstances or a reference to the expected changes to the forums?

Both, actually.

Grond0 wrote...

Both Killian and his simmy used FoA, but surprisingly Firkraag was not slowed by any of the hits he took.

Dragons are immune to slow, if you want to remove their haste you need arrows of dispelling... or Carsomyr once Firkraag is defeated.

DMWW wrote...

Can you do me a favour and write up this in a bit more detail on G3? I don't want to derail the no-reload thread but it sounds as if this is important feedback. (My own rant is that I wish people with genuinely critical feedback would do it in places I'm more reliably likely to see it! Nice though it is to get lots of fluffy positive comments, it's less useful for actually making improvements) Some of what you're writing (excessive rat damage?) is I think fixed on current versions (you're using v21?) but some of it looks like possibly-unfixed bugs and some might be useful content feedback.

Maybe my comment was unnecessarily bad tempered but I'd just watched my PC get beaten into 2/3 rds red while unable to do anything about it.

I'll write up a report in that future versions thread on G3.

As an aside - for any other SCS players reading - I've got a reliable strategy for beating improved Irenicus in hell without reloads or cheese (...except for metagaming), provided you have 2 arcane casters. It doesn't require epic levels either.

Highlight to show (it's sort of long and complex and geeky but I can't help that):

As you probably know, you've got to interrupt his timestop or some party members will die (most likely permanently, and most likely including your bhaalspawn).

Unlike most SCS mages he always uses the same prebuffs - Spell Trap, SI:Abjuration and Divination, Globe of Invulnerability, illusions, elemental protections and ProMW (with another contingencied ProMW if he gets breached).

The obvious way to do it is to debuff him under Improved Alacrity, but I won't be using the silly HLA's in this run.

So, one mage or sorc prepares a sequencer with 2X secret word (I've got the "area of effect" option installed) and 1X Larloch's minor drain - thanks to Saros for discovering this - and a chain contingency (cast from a scroll) with 3X pierce shield (well, Imoen and Nalia at 17th level could only memorize two 8th level spells, so maybe 2x pierce shield and 1x warding whip) with the condition "on hit" set to target nearest enemy.

Run your "contingencied" mage up to Irenicus after his starting buffs fire and use the sequencer on yourself, the LMD triggers the "on hit" chain contingency (do NOT prep with mirror image as that would prevent damage from the LMD) and the combination of pierce shields and secret words will remove all his spell protections and lower his magic resistance to zero, you should have a few characters running True Sight and/or detecting illusions to make him targettable.

Now that slayer Irenicus is visible and has no MR or protections your other mage or bard - who hasn't yet cast anything, so their aura is still clear - should use a PW:Silence spell to stop him casting time stop (damage interrupts casting like 80% of the time, but silence is surefire). A 2x melf sequencer is great to interrupt the next spell of Irenicus (vocalize, of course).

I just tested this with two multiplayer sorcerers created in ToB (I don't usually "playtest" battles as it seems to defeat the purpose of playing no-reload, but I'll make an exception this once because I remember it being really easy to die if you do anything wrong in the SoA finale). I consoled in Irenicus the slayer and it worked perfectly, you'd just need to make sure none of the demons get close enough that they become the "nearest enemy" targetted by CC, thus cast ProMW on your mages before opening the door so that they're not instantly targetted by the demons. Once Irenicus is shut down it's a fairly straightforward battle with the demons - even improved demons, at this stage of the game - just watch out for the balors' vorpal attacks.

Modifié par polytope, 16 novembre 2013 - 05:15 .

[Grond0]

Killian {2} - gnome barbarian (update 6)

Killian has completed his chapter 2/3 encounters and arrived in Brynnlaw.

After returning from Windspear Killian sorted out his equipment again - selling the red dragon scales as he can't wear plate armour.  Then he went to use the sewer key found on Tazoks body.  He pretty much just meleed his way through the mindflayer enclave: portions of his brain were devoured a number of times, but his intelligence of 20 proved sufficient to keep him going.

I forgot to pick up Valygar's body from Umar Hills before, so went to do that (level 29 - GWW) before returning to the Planar Sphere.  The halflings there proved more difficult than I expected.  I intended Killian to stay at range, but somehow he provoked a maze here - good job he was running rage!  He was also having no joy getting through Kayardi's defences so just retreated and sat around for a while to let them die down.  After many more hits I eventually decided that Azuredge must be bugged for this fight so switched to acid arrows and finished Kayardi and Mogadishu with those.  More halfling and elementals died before some golems showed Killian how to make his own - and it soon helped him take out an elder orb.  Summons, including a first use of the efreeti, kept Lavok occupied until Killian's missile attacks told (level 30 - smite).  The same sort of strategy was tried with Tolgerias, but he killed all the summons at the cost of his supporting mage, meaning Killian had to finish things off himself - interrupting spells with acid arrow GWW before coming in for the kill.  Moving quickly on, Killian collected some easy XP using Azuredge on the golems in the engine room and then went to look for a new power source - getting that just as an initial GWW ran out.  Repowering the sphere got him to level 31 (critical strike) and shortly afterwards he was watching Lavok get his final breath of fresh air.

The next objective was the Guarded Compound.  Downstairs, he triggered the spawns and then retreated while the glabrezu killed the rest before coming in to finish off the demon.  He then went up and down stairs a couple of times to split the opposition up - none of the fighters caused much of a problem (Ketta getting annoyed that backstabs seemed so ineffective).  Sion managed some spells, but eventually got cut up by a flying Azuredge (I decided it wasn't worth using up magic arrows) with Killian still above 100 HPs.

After selling/storing stuff Killian headed for his final objective in Athkatla for the moment - the Twisted Rune.  To be cautious he used a protection from undead scroll, but his first attack with Azuredge destroyed Shangalar anyway.  At that point I realised I'd forgotten the Shield of Balduran, but no matter - an Azuredge GWW being more than enough for the beholder.  The vampire was also destroyed and Revanek meleed before Killian waited out Layene's time stop, then used an arrow of dispelling to set her up for the kill.

One final objective before setting sail was the top floor of Watcher's Keep.  I tend to do this quite early on when it can be challenging, but the 2 vampiric wraiths waiting there got a nasty shock this time!  It didn't take Killian too long to clear the level, getting up to level 32 in the process (GWW).  The collection of extra-healing potions he's found also got up above 100.

Back in Athkatla Killian reviewed his equipment for the journey and then took ship for Brynnlaw.  He's just arrived there and seen off a vampire ambush (level 33 - GWW).

[Grond0]

Killian {2} - gnome barbarian (update 7)

In Brynnlaw, Killian headed straight for Perth and struck him down.  His book showed up wyvern call and farsight among others, but Killian pushed for something better - and failed.

Moving on to the Asylum he lost his Bhaal powers and a point of wisdom, but gained entrance.  He gratefully picked up a bag of holding and set about clearing the enemies.  There were no problems with that as he got to level 34 on the first level.  He didn't bother with any summons there, FoA GWWs keeping the yuan-ti mages pretty much suppressed.

It was pretty much the same story on the next level.  The only time he took significant damage was against the gauth - I didn't use GWW there as having Belm equipped bugs it.  Even so his high HPs meant he only went down to 74.  Got to level 35 there - critical strike.  Picked up Boots of the North / Grounding from the machine.

On to the confrontation with Irenicus.  An opening Azuredge GWW had him in trouble and he made a run for it immediately after Wanev's time stop, while Killian dealt with his clone.

Back in Brynnlaw Killian stole surplus equipment and then went after the Pirate Horn.  I was concerned when that was not there at 4.00 in the morning, but Cayia is obviously just an early riser as it was there at 9.00 pm.  Fighting a few guards for its possession got Killian to level 37 - GWW - and he soon boarded ship for another incident-filled trip.

At the City-of-Caverns the Spectator wouldn't let Killian look in the chest, so got a GWW instead.  Killian took the Cloak of Mirroring from a priestess, but otherwise bypassed combat on the way to the Prince.  He accepted a reward from the King, before killing him before the Prince arrived.  The Prince then got the same ungrateful treatment before he shinned down a rope to the Underdark.

A group of drow were mainly taken down with Azuredge - as were various inhabitants of a giant soul gem (level 37 - GWW).  At the svirfneblin village a mixture of critical strike and GWW was used on the balor (Azuredge would have been safer there).  Summons were produced for the first time in a long while for the demon knights in the kuo-toa compound, though Killian still needed to do virtually all the work himself with Azuredge.  The Prince got a couple of FoA GWWs (level 38 - hardiness) and the drow were also cleared before Killian left (Gaxx haste and critical strike taking the 3 visible ones down before they could blink).

After struggling slightly to get through the kuo-toa on the bridge Killian invaded the beholder hive.  He entered invisible and a couple of FoA GWWs accounted for the elder orb before it could do anything nasty.  He then just picked up the green amulet and left. 

Not bothering with the illithid, Killian went to get his disguise from Adalon and has just entered Ust Natha (restraining himself just in time from giving his correct name).

[Serg BlackStrider]

The Avatars had won the first Throne fight vs Jon, Bodhi and two Fallen Solars with Slayer Imoen get underfoot.

As soon as fight fired *eastern* Solar hit Krimlor with Remove Magic (who rushed toward him to minimise effect) and aimed Grond with his bow. Alesia threw him her Reflex Shield and chased *western* Solar dualwielding Spectral Brand / Scarlet after casting PvMW (her Contingency See Enemy>PvMW fired a way later so pretty unreliable). BlackStrider fired PvMW as well and joined Krimlor vs *eastern* Solar while Pot called for Planetar to help Balthazar and Corey vs Bodhi and started to work on Jon's defences with Ruby Rays. Jon hit with Time Stop but pretty much wasted it. Balthazar being immune to TS made some free hits on Bodhi and *eastern* Solar. Soon Bodhi fell but *western* Solar stripped Alesia's protections with Mordenkainen's Disjunction (I was afraid she to be vorpalled so run away for an oppotunity to cast PvMW, sent Krimlor to intervene and Grond to support). Meanwhile *eastern* Solar full-healed himself, vorpalled our Planetar and aimed Pot with his bow (ouch!). Luckily Pot made a save vs vorpal and at the moment Grond killed *western* Solar (Imoen had released from her Slayer's chains as well) so we could concentrate on the remaining one. He went invisible so Corey called for Deva while Krimlor fired True Seeing. Solar incapacitated Deva with Earthquake and aimed Grond with his bow. That eventually proved his doom as we gave Grond a Reflex so Solar killed himself naturally. Irenicus hit Krimlor with Comet but was revealed by Dragonslayer's Detect Invisibility, stripped of remaining protections and finished soon after.


  

  

  

  

Modifié par Serg BlackStrider, 17 novembre 2013 - 12:59 .

[DeeKayNL]

Next update on Anthal:

note 1: We experienced our first death of the run. Anomen was killed when turning undead against a group of Shadows. Because of my own stupidity I thought he could handle it like al the other shadows sofar. But he got held and the rest of my party was to far away to be there on time.

note 2: I killed the genies so I could use the rashaka for potions and so on. But Jan saw the illusion right away and they turned hostile right away.

quests done:

-D'arnise Keep
-Cult of the unseeying eye
-Jan's personal quest
- Anomen is now Sir Anomen

Now I want to go get Kitthix figurine and Horn of Valhalla. Then probably umar hills.

[Grond0]

Good start at the throne Serg - keep concentrating!

Killian {2} - gnome barbarian (update 8)

Meanwhile, Killian is moving on apace and has just arrived in Suldanesselar.

There was another close escape for him on the way to save Phaere.  During the ambush I hadn't intended to allow N'ashtar close, but he snuck up on Killian without me noticing it - rage saved him from maze again.

Phaere was rescued without further trouble and Killian helped her again by killing a beholder (level 39 - critical strike).  She was fobbed off with a helmet and a cloak before Killian disposed of previously obtained bodily fluids to Matron Mother Ardulace.  Phaere sent Killian to steal some eggs: on the way Solaufein tried to intercept him, but was too slow - however, he did manage to throw another set of eggs through the Temple door after Killian.  Using those, it wasn't long before a demon had his little laugh at the expense of Phaere and the Matron Mother.

Killian quickly left the city before the rest of the drow realised what had happened and made his way back to Adalon.  His simmy got a rare run-out here and, as with Thaxy, Adalon managed to get her wing buffet off, but not in time to deflect deadly damage.

After passing invisibly through some drow Killian talked his way past Elhan and travelled back to the City.  Initially he tried fighting Kruin, but this encounter seems to be bugged in the latest version of BGT so that the PC can't take any action after the conversation is supposed to have ended.  Therefore Killian ended up using the autosave to just give Kruin the Silver Sword.  After sorting out his stored equipment, Killian got Crom Faeyr, Wave and Gesen forged and went to pick up the human flesh armour.

Off to the Graveyard District where an opening ambush by vampires got Killian to the XP cap (level 40 - critical strike).  He just off-handed the iMoD there and whacked his way through vampire HQ rather than using any summons.  As usual he had to stop attacking Bodhi long enough to allow her to get her dying words out.

[Grond0]

Killian {2} - gnome barbarian (update 9)

In Suldanesselar Killian quickly worked his way through the opposition - using FoA, with Crom Faeyr for quick disposal of the lesser golems.  Nizi fell to FoA GWWs from Killian and his simmy.  On the Tree of Life Killian exterminated the parasites and got teleported to Jon.  He immediately ran away and used Kitthix to trigger time stops.  Further summons drew out more spells until he was able to use a single Gesen GWW to send Irenicus to hell.

For the Hell trials Killian accepted the nymph cloak (+2 constitution), sacrificed a companion (-2 AC), took Blackrazor (+15 HP), let the dragon go (+20% resistance to fire, cold and electricity) and shot Sarevok up with Gesen (+2 strength).  Those adjustments took Killian to a healthy standard of 249 HPs.  For the final fight with Irenicus he used Gesen GWWs on the balors and then ran the glabrezu round shooting them up.  Hardiness, mirror image and rage were then put on for battle with the slayer.  Various buffs kept Jon going through several GWWs, but he eventually had to concede defeat as Killian reclaimed the missing portion of his soul.

[WaterMane]

 No-Reload Challenge attempt # 5:

For this attempt I'll be playing a solo character, Zakaril, who is a half elf fighter/mage/thief. I'm playing on Core difficulty and am using SCSII, Ascension, G3 Tweaks and Dungeon Be Gone. 

[Gate70]

Tidy work Serg.

& just "the easy bit" left now Grond0...

[Serg BlackStrider]

Thanks, friends!
I'm glad to see Killian graduated into the ToB part of Trilogy. Keep rocking, Grond0!

And best of luck with your new aspirant, WaterMane!

[WaterMane]

 Zakaril Solo Half Elf fighter/mage/thief update 1:

First order of business is to buy a couple of master thievery potions from the adventurer's mart, down them and help myself to some spells at the nearby scroll merchant as well as the other scroll salesman in the promenade. After this I made my way to Mrs. Cragmoon to load up on potions. Back to the slums to free Hendak and his gladiator buds. Oil of speed + Heroism potion + Spirit armor made the Beastmaster encounter pretty trivial but I spent a charge of the monster summoning wand as well for added insurance. With just enough gold to get a spell casting licence I headed to purchase one at the government district. While on my way to the Temple district to help out Talos I my travels were interupted by Suna Seni. I tried to fight but unfortunately had used most of my spells already and my previously cast ones had worn off, after dipping below half health within a few seconds, courtesy of a well place backstab and other hits, I booked it down the alleyway to complete my trek to the Temple district.

Once I had picked up a couple of quests from Talos I was on my way to see the artist in the Government district but was stopped by a hostile group with which was an ill Renfeld. I rushed him to the docks where his friends could aid him further and also completed the help get Xzar get killed quest while I was there. From here we visited the graveyard to help Risa find a caretaker and discover Tirdir to be buried alive, luckily I found him he was still breathing. With red cloth in hand I found a matching candidate in the Bridge district. He was hacked up by his accomplices but they were both ended shortly there after by some swift swordplay and pre-layed traps. I advanced as far along with the tanner murders investigations as I felt comfortably strong for which meant stopping before going down to the bottom floor of the tanner's shop. I'll return and see the tanner off at a later date. 

Now to finish up the slaver quest in the slums. Making good use of the wands from CI, the slaver compound is cleared and the children are rescued. Next up is the circus, I simply ran past the shadows, after freeing Aerie, straight up to Kalah and finished him in a couple of strikes. I remember the shadows being able to stun so I sped past them to avoid getting Held. 

My weapons could use some upgrading so on to Trademeet I go to obtain Belm. I thought I could invis past all the monsters and snag belm but it looks like theres some invisible spirit trolls blocking my path. 



I summoned some monsters and attempted to kill the trolls but they proved too many so I had to invis again and continue onward. Luckily I did not encounter any further resistance in grabbing Belm from the hay. The rakshasa were slain fairly easily, though I needed belm to do so as it was my only +2 weapon seeing as my +1 weapon had no effect. The shambling mounds on the way to the actual druid grove were body blocking me so they had to be killed. The remainder of the quest gave me no trouble. After letting the Trademeet officials know of my success, helping Tiris and allowing the high merchant to deal with the feuding families I was laden with excess coin. With it I purchased the vecna robe and kachiko's wakizashi. I'm pretty sure I need a +3 weapon to hit the fiend that spawns in the guarded compound in the Temple district which is home to the mighty Celestial Fury. 

On the first level of the guarded compound I was hesitant to go into melee to go at it with the glabrezu at first but I saw that he was busy beating on the gaseous form left behind by an Efreeti. His attention remained on the gas form long enough for a couple of backstabs to land.



Dismantling the upper level involved alot of stair climbing as it was difficult to get the inhabitants up there to come down. The mage and thief did come down however but were met with a 5 man ghast task force which quickly disabled them, stunning the mage through his protections and, after casting a detect invisible spell, the thief met the same fate. Mr. Celestial Fury himself took some major coaxing to come down stairs though he did in the end. He managed to cast kai and swat down a ghast before getting stunned and meeting oblivion. The remaining berserker, cleric and other fighter type refused to come down stairs no matter what I did. The thief from earlier dropped 10 potions of invisibility which allowed for enough backstabs to take them out. Overall the encounter went much more smoothly than I had anticipated. I did take some 30 damage hits which left me scurrying away out of sword's reach before cautiously returning for another backstab attempt.

From here I headed to the Bridge district to slay Neb then turn in his head for a bump in reputation and deliver the illithium to Sir Sarles. I had the extra coin so I paid Gaelan Bayle his fee and spoke to Aran Linvail for the amulet of power. Before exploring his quest line too much I'll be doing the rest of chapter 2. From the docks I travel back to the Promenade to take out Pebblecrusher and crew. Captain Dennis is the next target in the Bridge district. One would think that these guys would go hostile when someone is trying to stun them with a wand of paralyzation, but they don't. 



Everyone is already stunned before the battle has even begun, this wand is pretty overpowered in this sort of encounter. Well it would have been if I hadn't forgotten about the cleric hiding in the corner, doh!



As you can see he knows exactly what to cast and sets his companions free to fight a little bit longer. They all fall in the end to backstabs and the ghast army. 

Modifié par WaterMane, 19 novembre 2013 - 07:32 .

[DeeKayNL]

Great progress everyone!!!

Update on Anthal:

-We got the silver horn of Valhalla and got the first upgrade, I was missing the gem for the second upgrade.
-We got the Black Spider Figurine and Pale green ioun stone after defeating Pai'Na.
-We started working for Renal Bloodscalp and are on our first quest for Maevar the retreave the necklace from the temple of Talos.
-While in the Temple district we tried clearing the Guarded Compound. It went really well.
We let the Glabrezu destroy all other creatures before attacking the Glabrezu. I had Jan set three traps on the stairs before going up. When we went up the stairs we immidiately retreated back downstairs. We were followed by Maferan and Ketta. Ketta was hit by the three traps and was Badly Injured. I had Anthal run Thrue Sight so Ketta wouldnt backstab me. Ketta fell quickly. After this we attacked Maferan. For some reason (or bug) he didnt respond to our attacks and just stood there.

The next step went like step 1. Go upstairs and back downstairs. This time Stahlman and Koshi followed. We took some heavy melee damage but took care of both.

Step 2 was getting Sion and Olaf Rassmusen to follow. This also work like a charm. When Kitthix took care of Sion I wanted to make a screenshot. So I started FRAPS and made a screenshot. Followed by a crash of BG2..... I had to reload ( I assume this is allowed?)



I reloaded a autosave when going downstairs trying to get Sion and Olaf Rassmusen to follow me.
When the y followed me I concentrated everything on Sion. He went down quickly.



Only on left was Rassmusen. He was dealt with quickly eventhough his melee was also impressive.



Next update will be with Character stats.

[Grond0]

Gate70/Grond0 multiplayer attempt 31 - (update 1)
Ivy, human blackguard (Grond0) & Derva, human inquisitor (Gate70)

After completing their BG1 journey against Sarevok the 'good cop, bad cop' paladin combination just had time last night to make it out of Irenicus' dungeon.

The characters appeared to import across correctly and they had no real problems in making their way through - resting as needed to regain health.  I just took a couple of screenshots:
- destroying the last of the mephit portals
- being slightly too slow to finish off Ulvaryl before she turned into a bat.

Stats:
Ivy, blackguard 8, 93 HPs (incl. 5 from Helm), 51 kills
Derva, inquisitor 8, 80 HPs, 38 kills, 0 deaths

[Grond0]

Killian {2} - gnome barbarian (update 10)

Killian made some more progress this morning and is now preparing for his second pocket plane challenge.

After arriving in a stone circle, a couple of Gesen GWWs punched through Illasera's mirrors to make a start on ToB.  Moving on to his pocket plane he gave a bit of his reclaimed soul to Sarevok before telling him to get lost.  Reviewing his equipment he noted he can no longer use Azuredge due to the alignment change from the Hell trials, but can now use the human flesh armour and the Soul Reaver sword.

The first pocket plane challenge was pretty easy.  When the final set of characters arrived Killian immediately used GWW to kill Aran and Ellisime, though not before she had covered him with insects.  Once they'd stopped, a couple more GWWs finished off Duke Eltan.

In Saradush he got access to Lazurus's shop and then agreed to follow a 'courtesan' to the prison.  With iMoD in his offhand he had no concerns about vampires or backstabs and rapidly made his way to the palace.  For the first group, he attacked in melee and improved haste and critical strike allowed him to quickly go through the guards.  The mage's buffs protected him, so Killian retreated a bit and used Gesen to finish him off.  Before proceeding he nipped to the pocket plane to upgrade Foebane and get the Improved Cloak of Protection.  Upstairs, both mages fell to a single critical strike HLA and Gromnir didn't last too long.

On the way to find Yaga-Shura Killian ran into a group of soldiers.  He tested out Foebane for the first time and that kept his HPs up without the need for any HLAs.  On to the Temple of Mir, where a couple of iMoD GWWs left the Master Wraith alone - Gesen finished him off.  With the undead dead Nyalee gave Killian directions to Yaga-Shura's temple.

At the temple Killian put on Roranach and off-handed the Defender of Easthaven for the first time.  With hardiness running, that allowed him to mix it with groups of fire giants and he quickly moved through the temple.  As usual he resorted to fists for the magic golem, with Kitthix providing the coup de grace.  More giants proved no real obstacle and he moved on to secure a couple of hearts.  He ensured rage was up before moving around near Imix (in case of maze traps) - he was killed with Gesen, though I realised afterwards that Killian has the Wave halberd in his pack.

Back at the Temple of Mir Nyalee regretted her treatment of Yaga-Shura too late and Killian moved on to the Siege Camp.  After wounding Yaga-Shura he went invisible and waited for Yaga to return.  Unfortunately, Yaga was stuck between his subordinates so Killian couldn't get him to follow while invisible.  So he buffed up and came in to beat him up anyway.

[corey_russell]

@Grond0 - Grats on taking down Irenicus! I too had success this weekend, though not BG - I won a tournament in Klamath Falls, Oregon. Corbeast and friends are still trying to work their way out of the dungeon.

[Grond0]

Killian {2} - gnome barbarian (11th and final update)

For the first pocket plane challenge Killian went in aggressively with a pre-buffed simmy.  Killian clone was the first to go and Tamoko and Angelo soon followed.  Semaj did have a chance as rage ran out during his time stop, so a maze there could have been fatal.  However, he failed to try that and was dead in a few seconds thereafter.

At the Oasis Killian just killed Jamis with a GWW and ran on to Amkethran.  There, I made sure that Killian was more aggressive than my last character that got this far, in order to save the smuggler from attacking monks. 

For Draconis Killian just ran round throwing the occasional axe at his human form until the dragon awoke.  Then he wanted to attack, but had to respond to malison and remove magic with potions of invulnerability and magic shielding.  He did also manage to get an arrow of dispelling into Draconis.   He then used a couple of GWWs with Soul Reaver to try and shut down Draconis' attacks.  I've not used that sword before, but either it's entirely bugged or it doesn't work on dragons as Draconis was still hitting easily, despite having been hit by the sword at least 10 times (which would be -20 to his THAC0).  Killian kept out of the way of Draconis for quite a while in order to regenerate and then produced his simmy and turned to attack.  Draconis managed to hit him with another remove magic, but Killian outran the follow-up breath.  Meanwhile, the simmy was walloping away with FoA and it wasn't long before the dragon fell.

Moving on into the enclave, Killian immediately took lots of damage against frost salamanders, so had to switch to throwing axe.  That also served him well against some water elementals guarding a monk.  I did waste a bit of time looking for a key to his cell before belatedly just bashing the door down.  A few eyes later and Bondari was commissioned to hand over an eyestalk and a pair of pantalettes.  After trading in the eyestalk Killian was able to persuade the guardian dragon to leave and open the way to Abazigal.

For Abazigal the first job was to run round throwing axes to kill the salamanders.  He then did the same to Abazigal until the dragon finally made its appearance.  Killian immediately summoned his simmy while the dragon was buffing and tried attacking.  Together they badly wounded Abazigal, but unfortunately his simmy got stunned by a shockwave.  Rather than break off the attack, Killian tried to finish the dragon off before it could heal - big mistake.  His rage had protected him against maze several times before in his run, but this time he had omitted buffing with that to try and get a quick kill before his electricity resistance disappeared.

[Serg BlackStrider]

Sad news, Grond0... At least Killian is not alone wandering in the Maze. How many of your characters are there at the moment, I wonder? Nonetheless, great run!

[Gate70]

Sad news Grond0. I tend to look for 100% MR against Abazigal for that reason. I'm sure you can remember that until say Friday afternoon when your next barbarian will have got to the same point

& looks like you're putting the hours in too WaterMane, DeekayNL. I'm enjoying your write-ups while on a break.

[corey_russell]

Sorry to hear of you demise, Grond0. Seems like a pretty good run though...and Serg has a good point, you must have have a huge number or characters wandering around in that maze...

Modifié par corey_russell, 18 novembre 2013 - 08:08 .