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[Gate70]

Yep, congratulations again Corey.

[corey_russell]

Thanks all!

[Grond0]

Gate70/Grond0 multiplayer attempt 34 - (update 3)
Spiro, half-elf beastmaster (Grond0) & Shuern, elf enchanter (Gate70)

Some decent progress for the duo today, despite it being a bit of a struggle to cover the lack of a true melee specialist.

The first objective was Watcher's Keep.  There were no vampiric wraiths there, so the initial entry was no problem.  Shuern was held by a shadow fiend, but it died before it could do any damage.  She also took a bit of a risk with other traps:
- opening the container trapped with FoD despite only having a spell save of 6, but she got away with it.
- saving again, but still taking a nasty shock from a lightning trap

On to Trademeet in search of a magic club or two for Spiro.  The genies seemed a bit tougher in melee than we're used to in BGT and Spiro used a couple of healing potions in the fight before the Khan had had enough.  With most of the shops open for business funds were scraped together for Blackblood, Cloak of Displacement and Belt of Inertial Barrier.  Moving on to the Grove the initial encounters were no problem, but taking on 2 giant trolls at once in the Troll Mound again pointed up AC problems and Spiro used 2 more healing potions.  The druids caused no trouble, with Shuern's malison + emotion combination for Kyland Lin being particularly effective.

After watching Cernd take 5 bites of the cherryFaldorn the duo reported back to Trademeet.  As an encore they cleared the tomb, but Tiris will have to wait for help until the skinner murders have been investigated.

Stats:
Spiro, beastmaster 9, 104 HPs (incl. 6 from familiar, 5 from Helm), 157 kills
Shuern, enchanter 11, 43 HPs, 36 kills, 4 deaths (including 2 in BG1)

Modifié par Grond0, 12 janvier 2014 - 06:12 .

[Grond0]

Ludd - elf wild mage (update 1)

Having received the rub of the green in BG1 Ludd started his journey in Amn by escaping from the dungeon.  His work there was largely done with summons and area effect spells.  His high HPs meant the traps offered no real threat, particularly with vampiric touch available on summons.  The only fight which was a bit tricky was when 4 of his 5 summons fell asleep facing the radiant mephit and Ludd ended up having to run that mephit around and lock him in the side room before destroying the final portal.  Summons helped him kill Ulvaryl.

He got yet another 6 HPs for his final level with hit dice - ending up just 3 points below the possible maximum.

To make sure that he wasn't caught unawares by the Cowled Enforcers Ludd started working through them using webs/stinking cloud together with malison and cloudkills (with the odd skull trap available in support). 
- The first group was cleanly killed.
- While the second group was under attack a third group teleported in without me initially noticing!  Ludd quickly ran back while they were buffing and managed to kill 3 of that group with the spells intended for the second, but then had to run away and rest (meaning the others disappeared). 
- The fourth group was cleanly killed (level 11), as was the fifth.
- The sixth group was the big boys.  Three of them died, but Zallanora appeared to survive 2 and a half cloudkills (4 were attempted, but one was lost to a surge and another had its duration halved).  Ludd waited for the pit fiend to disappear, then went to investigate, but there was no-one there. 

After resting to make sure that Zallanora wasn't just hiding invisibly for some reason Ludd moved on to the circus - now enjoying the freedom of being able to cast anywhere without any danger (other than the normal one of petrifying or incinerating himself of course).  After going invisibly upstairs Ludd tried to summon some help.  The first attempt failed, but again to a harmless surge and the second attempt provided him with the support needed to make short work of Kalah.

[Serg BlackStrider]

Nice start there with all those Cowled Enforcers, Grond0! Now, I hope, it's only a matter of time when Ludd could show Jon what is it to be a true wizard!

[Grond0]

Thanks Serg.  Still no nasty surges and starting to look good!

Ludd - elf wild mage (update 2)

Cleared the Copper Coronet - a skeleton warrior being generated for the first time to help against the animals.

Travelled round invisibly to trigger the Suna Seni (summons + cloudkill) and Renfeld (summons + chaos) ambushes.  Returned Renfeld and sneaked into the corner of Prebek's house to produce some skeletons to help kill the mages.  Then looted Harper HQ.

Bought various scrolls, including spell immunity - used that to foil the maze trap on the berserker horn.

Off to Watcher's Keep to pick up the crimson dart and golem manual.  I thought I'd have a chance against the vampiric wraiths, but there were only mephits defending anyway.  Reached level 12 there by clearing the top level with the exception of the statues.

In the City again solved the skinner murders, bringing enemies upstairs to face summons.  There was nearly a problem when Ludd generated a demon during preparation, but he managed to get out of the room just in time.

Opened up access to the liches, picking up the Cloak of the Sewers on the way.  Then used green scrolls for protection while killing those - for Kangaxx used improved haste and potions of mind focusing and power: he still required a MMM scroll in addition to the 6 spells of Ludd's own (no surges with those).

Although Ludd's charisma was not too bad anyway I couldn't resist making use of the Rod of Terror.  The pirates in the Sea's Bounty saw charisma reduced from 8 to 0 - kept up by ring.  Fortunately I hadn't rested before that as I only realised after the fight I'd forgotten to pick up the Ring of Gaxx!  The final charisma modification came courtesy of some mutated gibberlings in the Temple sewers and Ludd was able to put on the Ring of Gaxx.

Surprisingly, Ludd also managed to save Sansuki - he appeared out of sight of Del, allowing Ludd to summon 5 skeletons to help against the vampires before they went hostile.

[corey_russell]

Looking good so far Grond0, keep it up. You need to have Ludd join Corbeast in godhood! <wink>

[Grond0]

Maybe Corey, although he's been riding his luck rather a lot.  I think perhaps having got this far I should try and carry on in safe mode rather than doing things like casting spells in sight of enemies.

Ludd - elf wild mage (update 3)

Did the Fallen Paladins (a cloudkill from out of sight while they were occupied with skeletons doing most of the damage) and got to level 13.  Finally got around to going to the Graveyard and cleared the top area using another green scroll.  While preparing for Pai'Na a nice surge produced a pierce shield spell for Ludd to learn; the druid himself was onto a loser after Ludd produced some skeletons in the shadows.  I thought another surge in the southern dungeons was a problem for a moment, but the petrification was on a skeleton rather than Ludd.

Following a clue went to the Bridge District.  I carelessly let Camitis escape, but Ludd did manage to extort a ransom.  Doing the Sir Sarles quest restored a bit of reputation courtesy of Neb's head, although there was another nasty moment against Neb when I wasn't sure what this surge was.

The slaver ship provided the remaining missing bit of reputation, although I played that area badly and Ludd was lucky to escape.  First, while skeletons distracted the wizards Ludd put a cloudkill on top of them.  However, rather than retreat back Ludd stayed too close to the skeletons (while unbuffed) and got affected by a chaos.  He then attacked a skeleton warrior - turning it hostile, but luckily then retreated away from them and the cloudkill area and regained his senses.  Second, after killing all the guards, he went after Haegan and I forgot about the acid trap at the bottom of the stairs.  Fortunately that was a rare occasion when Ludd had mirror image up and that caught the acid.  After that bad passage of play Ludd recovered to cleanse the sewers with no further trouble (level 14).

With reputation now maximised I decided Ludd needed to spend some of his almost 43,000 gold before a surge burned a hole in his pockets.  He bought the Robe of Vecna and various scrolls and then went to pay Gaelan Bayle.

[Grond0]

Ludd - elf wild mage (update 4)

A much more safely played session saw Ludd through to get his first HLA.

He started by reporting to Aran Linvail and equipped the Amulet of Power (though the Claw of Kazgoroth is being preferred to the +2 ring for the time being).  Some summons were produced to deal with Tanova's ambush and they also helped revenge Mook.

Moving on to Mae'Var's tasks Ludd collected the necklace and then invaded Rayic's house.  Following his new policy of safety first he used the cloudkill wand for the first time to deal with some mephits.  The golems were enticed downstairs to face a first Mordy sword, while Ludd got out of sight range of Rayic before bringing out summons.  The other tasks were quickly done and the guild defences were far too weak to cope with Ludd's summoning ability.  Reporting back got Ludd to level 15 before he looted both thieves guilds.

With surplus money Ludd bought fully charged wands of fire, cloudkill and monster summoning.  He then quickly ran through Aran's tasks and invaded the vampire HQ.  No problems for his summons there in initially clearing the area - Tanova defeated 1 skeleton warrior, but there were 2 more waiting!  His best summons were used downstairs and he didn't rest for Bodhi.  That resulted in the need to produce 3 lots of summons from his wand before she had had enough - Ludd also lost quite a bit of money in that encounter.

Returning to the Temple sewers Ludd used the old web / stinking cloud / cloudkill routine to dispose of Tarnor and his party.  Mekrath was attacked by summons, while his yuan-ti were largely dealt with by more cloudkills.

Ludd followed Haer'Dalis to the Planar Prison.  Entering there invisible, he got out of sight range before true sight was cast allowing him to safely generate summons to kill the greeting party.  He worked his way round without problems to the warden.  By that stage summons were growing short and he supplemented with a couple of charges from his wand mixed in with cloudkills.  I didn't notice at the time, but one of those obviously finished off the warden and, after checking the rest of the area was clear, Ludd looted the bodies and released Haer'Dalis and the others.

On to the Unseeing Eye.  Summons cleared the way to the bridge and dealt with chasing gauths while cloudkills killed the beholders (level 17).  On the way back up I was trying to loot a chest, but generated a first fireball surge instead - left quickly without killing anyone to avoid reputation loss.  Underground, summons killed most of the undead and beholders, although Ludd did the bulk of the work on the lich himself with MMM after losing the first lot of summons to a death spell.  After the Unseeing Eye closed for the last time, Ludd returned the Rift Device (level 18 - taking Summon Planetar as his first HLA).

Back in the Promenade, Ludd went after Mencar's group.  After having recently had his first fireball surge he produced his first lightning bolt surge - which proved unlucky for Pooky.  The planetar then got a first outing - killing Brennan while he was stuck in a web and going on to finish off the rest of them before a follow-up skeleton warrior could get into the action.

[Grond0]

Gate70/Grond0 multiplayer attempt 34 - (update 4)
Spiro, half-elf beastmaster (Grond0) & Shuern, elf enchanter (Gate70)

This duo had a short session a few days ago that I didn't write up.  The action started with solving the skinner murders.  The only potential problem there was forgetting that the EE has added a fireball trap on top of the lightning one on the intermediate floor - fortunately Spiro had plenty of HPs to cope with it.

The next step was to open up access to the liches, with the intention of going after Kangaxx.  However, Spiro had no weapon that could hurt Kangaxx and needed to raise funds to buy the Staff of Rhynn.  To help with that they invaded the slaver ship.  The mages and their guards were killed without too much trouble and Captain Haegan looked an easy target until Shuern tried to cast a spell near him, walked forward to get within range and triggered the acid trap - instant death.  Spiro finished Haegan before getting Shuern raised and picking up her equipment.

Today's session finished off the slaver ship by releasing the troll prisoner.  The funds from that were put towards paying Gaelan Bayle, since he was in the area.  After collecting the goodies from Aran Linvail the duo moved on to do Mae'Var's tasks by invading Rayic Gethras' house.  A stream of summons was directed to him - that was complicated slightly by an air elemental Schuern summoned going hostile, but there were still enough to use up all his spells and he was eventually cut down by the efreeti.  Mae'Var and his gang were no trouble and the funds from that were used to buy the Staff of Rhynn.

In the Temple sewers the duo used scrolls of undead protection and cut down the lich there.  The same treatment was meted out to the City Gates lich and the one in the Bridge District before moving on to Kangaxx.  With improved haste on Spiro was comfortably outpacing Kangaxx's regeneration and it didn't take long to cut him down - he tried running away scared only to find he was blocked in.

With Spiro's melee capabilities now significantly better the duo had no problems doing Aran's tasks and they headed for the Graveyard.  On the way to the vampires Pai'Na was relieved of her ioun stone.  There was a slight glitch in vampire HQ when Durst ignored Spiro, running straight past him to attack Shuern - she was drained down to level 6 as a result.  On returning from a temple visit Tanova died of a surfeit of summons on the way to confront Bodhi.  She was hitting quite hard, but also taking lots of damage and ran away before Spiro had to consider whether to use a healing potion.

Some pantaloons made an atypical ransom before the duo returned to the Temple Sewers.  Mekrath tried running out of his house and had the satisfaction of mazing Shuern just before dieing himself.  The umber hulks also offered a slight threat when one pushed past a stealthed Spiro in what looked a narrow passage and managed to confuse Shuern.  However, it turned back to confront Spiro and offered no further problem.

Then Tarnor's party were led into chasing Spiro and picked off one by one.  Gaius didn't chase far and was the last to go with another stream of summons directed at him.
 
Stats:
Spiro, beastmaster 12, 113 HPs (incl. 6 from familiar, 5 from Helm), 323 kills
Shuern, enchanter 13, 49 HPs, 73 kills, 5 deaths (including 2 in BG1)

[polytope]

Looking good Grond, I'd like to see a successful run with just two of the "weaker" kits, Enchanter & Beastmaster - I think Corey is the first to no-reload the trilogy with a Beastmaster PC.

Anyway, I just realized I've died often enough to make a party of the unsuccessful candidates - so that's what I did:

1) Eryx - the PC - LN human Blade, 17 ,17, 16, 17, 11, 15

Cause of death; various (I've tried with more than one blade), I believe this one (or his twin) died in spellhold. Outstanding stats though that's not hard to roll for a bard.

2) Aleks LG human Priest of Lathander (who will later due to fighter) 17, 17, 16, 10, 18, 13

Cause of death; the rift device my stupidity

3) Randolph CG human Sorcerer 10, 17, 16, 11, 17, 15 (<- were these his actual stats? I don't remember and went with a pre-rolled sorcerer I had saved)

Cause of death; Alhoon and Ulitharids

4) Leksa, CN human Swashbuckler (and future cleric) 16, 18, 16, 10, 17, 14 (another amazing roll)

Cause of death; probably the same as Randolph, game was over so I never found out... she shouldn't really be here as she wasn't one of my PC's but I hate being unable to deal with locks and traps.

5) Artemisia NG human archer 14, 18, 18, 11, 14, 13

Cause of death; shade lord (first time I tried that battle with SCS... must've been years ago)

6) Aragrish the Cliched CG 1/2 orc barbarian 19, 18, 19, 8, 10, 9

Cause of death; failing saving throws against the beholders in the sewers (that's what I get for playing with maximum difficulty spawns!), last words "I shoulda been a dwarf!"

I've also attempted a couple of F/M/C's but ugh, imagine a triple multiclass in a party of 6... Bad enough that I've got 2 dual-class candidates.

Still, since this party is way more powerful than reg bioware NPCs I need to increase the difficulty a bit more than usual:

~SETUP-TACTICS.TP2~ #0 #0 // Improved Ilyich (requires ToB)

~SCSII/SETUP-SCSII.TP2~ #0 #6137 // Add high-level abilities (HLAs) to ToB mages -> All ToB mages who can cast 9th-level spells get HLAs: v21
~SCSII/SETUP-SCSII.TP2~ #0 #6139 // Add high-level abilities (HLAs) to SoA mages -> All SoA mages who can cast 9th-level spells get HLAs: v21
~SCSII/SETUP-SCSII.TP2~ #0 #6150 // Smarter Mages -> Mages cast some short-duration spells instantly at start of combat, to simulate pre-battle casting: v21 (<-I always use full prebuff enemy casters)

Other mods the same as usual (including Ascension), but no creature changes from aTweaks (not sure about the game balance of those elemental summons are...). Playing on core, but then again, didn't turn difficulty down for max hp, even so the barbarian and archer have really good starting hp of 102 and 80 respectively (which they'll need!).

Start by freeing Minsc, Jaheira and doing the usual boring early stuff (I'm playing with reduced xp from traps/locks/scrolls, so only the sorc has gained a level so far), the party's first real challenge are the (lumpen) duergar proletariats led by a duergar party member (mage) in the corridor.

The barbarian receives a free-action spell and enrages, making him mostly immune to the mage's annoying save-or-else stuff, the sorc contributes a web spell (which the enemy mage cleverly runs out of).



Soon the duergar party member's globe wore off, and he was commanded and chopped up, although he hurt our barbarian quite badly, including a 2x chromatic orb sequencer just after rage wore off, Aragrish made his save, but I doubt him being stunned would have made a difference at this point.

But wait, there's more! We don't need to fight them though, it's a good thing the archer can hide in the shadows.

The greater otyugh was also commanded - the sorc with Mirror Image (which blocks poison) soaked up the initial Dolorous Decay spell he shoots every few rounds.

Now here I misclicked and had my blade protagonist use defensive spin instead of offensive spin, this was bad, because the greater otyugh explodes in an insect plague when killed, which I couldn't get out of range of:



It would be bad for my pc to run around in fear and possibly encounter other enemies, so I had the sorc use the scroll of dispel magic on him. Ah well, it wasn't a useful scroll anyway.

Next up, Improved Illyich himself...

Modifié par polytope, 17 janvier 2014 - 09:43 .

[polytope]

...and it was a success! The Ilyich fight was, anyway.

I took the risk of having Artemisia grab the oil of speed from the library, only to be attacked by a clay golem coming around the corner. Unlike most clay golems, this one doesn't haste himself, which is a very good thing as it means the archer could flee without wasting the oil of speed.

My blade casts Invis-10-foot radius then we rest in the crystal room, a duergar patrol spawns (they appear first after 12 hours then every few hours after that, you could fight them endlessly for experience but I refuse to xp farm).

Our priest grabs a fireball scroll from the urn in front of the portal using sanctuary, mages with SCS scripts (including that duergar mage!) would normally chase sanctuaried characters, but he can't chase us through the portal...

I was surprised by an invisible duergar mage in the corridor leading from the mephit room, well, he blinded Artemisia and slowed Aragrish, but all was well in the end.

Next we took on the shadow thieves at the exit, because with SCS these guys have potions of invisibility, which are great "panic buttons". Unfortunately PC got in sight range of the mage/thief who cast hold person at me, immediately ran out of his LoS and blocked the door with the priest and sorcerer (stone-skinned and mirror-imaged ofc) in case Eryx was disabled and attacked by invisible the thieves - but they were webbed anyway and my bard also had mirror images. On the rare occasions I've done this dungeon solo with SCS I don't bother with the thieves unless my PC can berserk/cast minor globe.

Again cast invis-10' and rested by Frennedan's room. Oops, should've got the girdle of bluntness first, oh well, we'll manage.

Now for Ilycih's party! The first enemy to be lured is the monk, Rasputin, Artemisia broke stealth by shooting an arrow at him, then used an oil of speed and lured him back to the party... being a monk, Rasputin moves fast and also can deliver stunning blows, so it was necessary for our archer to be hasted to escape him. We only have one round for short term buffs, so PC uses weapon's display (a new Rogue Rebalancing ability for blades, gives the party a small to hit bonus and can panic low level enemies), sorc casts haste, priest casts DUHM and barb flys into a rage: Rasputin fell in seconds. Aragrish was tanking him, because he may stun, although Aleks had a remove paralysis spell ready.

Now the party runs back into the corridor leading to the jail (to avoid pursuit) then Artemisia stealths and sneaks back to the library, to check who has followed.

Here things went horribly wrong...

Illyich had apparently wandered off to the portal room and blindsided the party on his return, this was bad because we weren't buffed (except haste that was about to expire) and Ilyich has an AoE slow (save vs spell) + fatigue (no save) ability, fortunately he casts it just on Leksa the swashbuckler, although the barbarian was also in range.

I had my blade cast MI and join Aragrish in an unfair beatdown on Ilyich (...though we're not the only ones playing unfair), then I misclicked and used defensive spin instead of offensive spin... bad, very bad, I couldn't back away from Ilyich when he hit me a couple of times (through mirror images) and worse still, the cavalry arrived!



The clay golem made it through the door a few seconds before Ilyich died (and attacked the archer, forcing her to switch from her bow and run around), fortunately Ilyich wields a +2 hammer (with +2 ice damage) which Aleks immediately picked up and a +3 club which he tossed to the swash (although she was fatigued), the barbarian used the +1 quaterstaff, inspite of being unproficient he was hasted and still enraged, the sorc threw meteors at the golem... but the PC was stuck in place because of defensive spin!

Fortunately the sorc interrupted the cleric Zhivago from summoning his fallen deva with magic missile, and Eryx's defensive spin wore off a round later, so my (re-hasted) party ran for it after finishing the golem. That was close.

Thoughts on this run so far: One thing I dislike about the blade class is defensive spin, which has the very dangerous side effect of fixing you in place for 4 rounds and which I've misclicked twice already; if no one minds, I think I'll remove DS from my blade (a tradeoff for weapon's display). I've posted more screenshots than usual, but it's pretty easy to die here especially with smarter mages. Also, not even the swash or blade have leveled up yet, a smaller party is better...

Modifié par polytope, 18 janvier 2014 - 03:39 .

[Grond0]

Well done for escaping the dungeon Polytope. I don't like the sound of clerics summoning fallen devas in there!

[polytope]

Thanks, but it's not actually as bad as it sounds provided you have invisibility, haste etc, I hadn't escaped yet though, we returned to finish that damn high level cleric!

First, the party needed to take care of the duergar mage lurking in the library, because the remaining two members of Ilyich's gang - Zhivago the cleric and Karamazov the archer - being a spellcaster and ranged attacker respectively can not be safely lured out to fight.

The solution is to rather cheesily nuke the mage with round-the-corner fireballs (using both scrolls), one fireball might do, but the mage would trigger his globe and other prebuffs if he took non-fatal damage. Hmm, Eryx almost singed his outrageous mustache (standing just on the edge of one of the fireballs blast radius there), should've taken a step back after casting, then again, one fireball wouldn't be fatal for a 50+ hp character on core difficulty.

The cornugon (he's a weaker variant, no lightining bolt or stun + bleeding on hit) was lured out to the sewer room, Eryx attacks with offensive spin + haste using Ilyich's hammer, Leksa the swash uses Ilyich's +3 club, Aleks uses spiritual hammer and Randolph uses meteors, no one else can hit the demon, but he goes down quickly enough, providing three of the party with a level up!

The party then ambushes the cleric and archer in the library (the dryad's acorns can summon 2x nymphs with regular nymph spells and a moose):



Most of Zhivago's spells were interrupted by Melf's Acid Arrow, MM and melee attacks, he does have Unholy Word though which is fast and hard to interrupt so Artemisia and Randolph had to stand well back from him, whilst Aragrish was enraged to avoid being stunned. The cleric died quickly, but Karamazov hurt our barbarian pretty bad, on insane he should probably be tanked by someone with stoneskin/ironskin. Looted a +1 flail from Zhivago, +2 shortsword, +2 heavy crossbow, +3 bolts and full plate from Karamazov. Long while since I've played Tactics, but that was easier than I remember.

Rest of the dungeon more or less vanilla and completed with ease... even with the extra xp from Ilyichs crew Leksa and Eryx didn't hit level 10 before answering the genie's riddle in the circus (I repeat myself here, but a party of six is really too many...), at this point Leksa dualled to cleric (though I dislike doing the slaver ship without a thief for the nasty repeating traps).

Anyway, freed Hendak and the others and set off to battle the slavers anyway, since I didn't yet have Chaotic Commands I just scattered my hasted party in case of a Greater Command from the cleric (...should've gone in invisible), well, whatever he was casting was interrupted, then by amazing good fortune one of the slaver mages wandered over and joined in; an extra enemy spellcaster would normally be bad, but this means we don't have to cross that Prismatic spray trap to get him! Even better, an archer closely followed him into the room, thus blocking the door and preventing him from running around when attacked the way most SCS mages do. This mage managed to cast confusion on Randolph (I ran our sorc away from the other party members, but he saved anyway), then was gibbed in barbaric fashion by Aragrish, fortunately I'd used a scroll of Protection from Acid on him beforehand just in case the fight moved up those trapped stairs.

The gnome mage was just around the corner, and was dealt with in a cheesy way by having the nymphs cast 2x confusion at him from offscreen, thus the kids are freed. I'll start playing fairer once I have some way to protect my party from save or else spells... Speaking of which, after reporting back to Hendak we got level ups for Aleks (9th) Leksa (10th -> 7th) and Eryx (11th), Randolph isn't far from getting 5th level spells either.

Modifié par polytope, 19 janvier 2014 - 11:08 .

[Grond0]

Gate70/Grond0 multiplayer attempt 34 - (update 5)
Spiro, half-elf beastmaster (Grond0) & Shuern, elf enchanter (Gate70)

Today's session saw another couple of potentially troublesome areas crossed off the list. 

Things started by following Haer'Dalis to the Planar Prison.  The duo entered there invisible and quickly got out of range of true sight to allow uninterrupted buffing and summons, which made the initial fight with the Bounty Hunters fairly straight-forward.  However, a group of umber hulks further down shredded summons quicker than anticipated and managed to get through Shuern's stoneskins before she went invisible and Spiro picked them off with stealth attacks.  The Master of Thralls saw through Shuern's invisibility and got a couple of drains in, but perished in among summons when trying to chase.  After resting more summons occupied the Warden's attention while Spiro filled him full of arrows.

After using some of the funds earned to buy the Robe of Vecna, the duo headed for the Windspear Hills (before heading straight back again to get the acorns).  Moving on to the dungeon they made steady progress, though Spiro took several nasty blows from the various golems and left most of the work to Shuern using the crimson dart.  Samia blocked the doorway after talking, preventing Shuern from getting past until she was briefly put under Grond0 control to allow her to push through. 

Clerical fire resistance helped Spiro past the genies and on the final confrontation with Samia.  The intention was for a Nabassu to be unleashed on the ambushers, but it was generated outside the doorway and couldn't get through.  Nevertheless it killed a couple of them and soaked up a few spells before it died - making things easy enough to finish off.  After Tazok was swamped by summons a few more were left behind to occupy Conster and he caused no problems.
 
Stats:
Spiro, beastmaster 13, 116 HPs (incl. 6 from familiar, 5 from Helm), 411 kills
Shuern, enchanter 14, 50 HPs, 90 kills, 5 deaths (including 2 in BG1)

[Grond0]

Ludd - elf wild mage (update 5)

Ludd bought the last few spells available in Athkatla that he didn't already know and is well into a whirlwind tour of Amn.

First up was the de'Arnise Hold.  He got to level 19 by feeding some umber hulks there before watching the planetar chop up Torgal.

On to Umar Hills.  The mimic managed to hold Ludd, but couldn't cope with a couple of skeleton warriors.  At the temple the planetar was stunned by the first lich, but stayed alive as a distraction while Ludd and a magical sword killed it.  The second lich managed to scare the planetar away, but a couple of back-up skeleton warriors finished the job - got to level 20 there (extra 7th level spell).  The planetar was briefly stunned against Thaxy, but stayed on to be in at the death, while it was even more successful against the Shade Lord.

Finally there was a quick trip to Trademeet.  No problems with the tasks there, although I made it a marginally more difficult challenge by not allowing resting.  That meant Ludd used a couple of cloudkills and risked a first sunfire spell to finish off the last group of druids (level 21 - extra 8th level spell).  The rakshasas were left in peace while Cernd was crunching Faldorn.

[Grond0]

Ludd - elf wild mage (update 6)

Ludd's tour of Athkatla continued with a trip to Windspear Hills.  Arriving invisibly meant he could ambush the initial ambushers and a planetar made short work of them.  Similarly, once the bandits turned up at Garren's house they found a skeleton warrior waiting.  On arrival in the dungeon Digdag failed to survive the initial encounter and the planetar also made mincemeat of the hobgoblins and rakshasa there.  A couple of skeleton warriors were generated out of sight of ambushing orcs and the skellies also saw off the initial golems.  A first use of an incendiary cloud killed all but one vampire of the large undead group as Ludd moved swiftly on - getting to level 22 here (energy blades).

A fire elemental and a skeleton warrior proved too much for the genies, while a hakeashar watched the director kill itself.  Ludd was pretty short of summoning spells by the time he got to Samia so used a couple of symbol stuns, a web and a stinking cloud to set up for cloudkills.  Legdoril was the only one who managed to move around enough early on to spot him, but he failed to get a spell off.  Samia and Chak did arrive eventually, but were badly injured and the golem finished them off.

Tazok was weakened by a skull trap and finished off by missile fire.  Ludd left behind an invisible stalker and his simmy (his last spell summons) to occupy Conster's attention before disabling him with a PW:silence.  Conster replied with a vocalise, but was unable to complete another spell before dying.  Reporting to Garren Windspear got Ludd to level 23 (improved alacrity).

Back in Athkatla Ludd decided it was finally time to replace the Claw with his +2 ring and he made a bit of room in his inventory before returning to Windspear to deal with Firkraag.  Lower resistance set him up for magic missile damage while he was occupied with summons, though the precaution of putting on fire resistance proved a wise one when Ludd was targeted after a wing buffet.

After using Tazok's key, a bunch of illithid were no problem with a Mordy sword leading the way.  A couple of them also led the invasion of the Guarded Compound and summons lay in wait for the party upstairs as they chased Ludd back down.

The final objective for the moment was the Twisted Rune.  The planetar dealt with most things in the main room, while Ludd and his simmy (+ a Mordy sword) were too much for Shangalar (level 24 - dragon's breath).  A first use of energy blades accounted for a remaining pit fiend.  Ludd then reported back to Aran Linvail and has just arrived in Brynnlaw.

[Grond0]

Ludd - elf wild mage (update 7)

Ludd has moved smoothly through Spellhold and arrived in the Underdark.

In Brynnlaw he rather meanly stayed out of sight while summons destroyed Perth.  His book took ages to read through with 5 copies of fireball, 3 of lightning and 4 of stinking cloud among a number of others.  However, nothing convinced Ludd it was worth keeping and, as usual, the book was consigned to the dustbin.

I didn't really want to lose any stat, so tried a fake-talk strategy on the demon outside.  However, that appeared to render Bhaal unkillable.  Even after Ludd went back outside and gave up a point of dexterity Bhaal still refused to die - even to the planetar's vorpal - and that remained the case even after dragging him outside and back in.  In the end I reluctantly had to reload from the autosave to complete the dream sequence.

There were no problems in Spellhold with summons being mixed in with area effect spells and use of wands.  Ludd also relied on staff invisibility a bit, e.g. to help with the ambushing umber hulks.  Cremating Dace Sontan got Ludd to level 25 - comet.  Used the machine to generate Boots of Grounding / the North as Ludd is speedy enough already.

A skeleton warrior failed to remove Lonk, but a planetar was more successful and Ludd moved on to Irenicus.  Ludd's clone was stunned early on by Wanev, quickly removing him from the action.  Ludd threw up the golem and it lasted long enough for the Crimson Dart to pierce Jon's defences.  That got Ludd to level 26, but no HLAs were available.

He took ship with Saemon and soon arrived in the City-of-Caverns.  The spectator was killed by summons to get the tooth and a planetar helped collect the priestess' cloak.  I had intended to kill the king and leave the prince alone, but must have skipped some dialogue as he was hostile - which proved costly for him.

[Arbitorius]

I'm importing my most recent character from Baldur's Gate Enhanced Edition into Baldur's Gate 2 Enhanced Edition to try my hand at the no reloads challenge. I am unsure if this is against the rules (importing, I mean)

[Grond0]

Certainly not - the bulk of attempts here are to try and get right through the trilogy, i.e. using a character started in BG1. There's no reason not to have a no-reload go just at BG2 using a character imported in the same way.

[Grond0]

Ludd - elf wild mage (8th and final update)

In the Underdark a planetar helped deal with some ambushing drow and then releasing souls from the giant gem.  Reporting the return of a deep gnome child got Ludd to level 27.  A first use of project image generated some supporting summons to destroy a balor in the village.  The remaining skeleton warriors from that encounter helped Vithal pillage the elemental planes before being joined by a planetar that vorpalled Vithal himself.

Into the kuo-toa enclave,  where Ludd relied on summons to dispose of the Prince.  A planetar joined in against the demon knights and was stunned, but that made no difference.

At the beholder hive Ludd entered invisible and moved out of sight of the elder orb while he worked through some drow to gain a level.  The orb imprisoned a planetar, which meant Ludd couldn't summon any more of those.  However, skeleton warriors, simulacra and Mordy swords led the way to clear the area.

The illithid city was pretty straightforward - until Ludd died from a moment of carelessness!  He'd just released the githyanki (level 29) and was working his way through the last major group of illithid.  Ludd was in the rear and was in the process of summoning a skeleton warrior while a simmy was occupying the illithid up front.  I clicked on the simmy and then again on an illithid to attack.  However, I didn't check that the simmy had properly accepted its selection and found Ludd himself charging towards the illithid.  He had no buffs at the time, which meant his save vs spell was 0 - that made him susceptible to domination with a roll of a 1 and Ludd duly switched sides immediately.

Modifié par Grond0, 22 janvier 2014 - 11:23 .

[Matuse]

One thing I dislike about the blade class is defensive spin, which has the very dangerous side effect of fixing you in place for 4 rounds and which I've misclicked twice already; if no one minds, I think I'll remove DS from my blade (a tradeoff for weapon's display).

It's a bit down to the road, game-wise, but when you get Free Action, it allows you to move while running the defensive spin. The ring from Spellhold is quite handy in that regard.

[corey_russell]

Sorry to hear that Grond0 - Ludd was doing so well too, sad...

[polytope]

Hard luck Grond, I guess a wild mage can't safely buff their saves with Spirit Armor... or maybe Contingency doesn't have a risk of surge? (I confess I have little knowledge of the class)

Matuse wrote...

It's a bit down to the road, game-wise, but when you get Free Action, it allows you to move while running the defensive spin. The ring from Spellhold is quite handy in that regard.

Thanks, but since Defensive Spin blocks Offensive Spin I doubt I'd use it anyway: Regular melee mobs can be handled with Spirit Armor + blur + II and ProEvil, while bosses can regularly hit any AC and/or have nasty on hit effects that make ProMW a better choice.

Eryx and party are trundling through Ch 2. Decided to memorize True Seeing (for the invisible thief) rather than Chaotic Commands and just fan out (everyone but Aragrish the barbarian invisible, sanctuaried or hid in shadows) versus the Slaver ambush - the mage didn't manage to cast anything threatening before her stoneskins were stripped by meteors, arrows and the barb's short swords (SS proficiency is surprisingly good for a barbarian with SCS, as mages tend to run away when attacked, so a weapon with low natural speed factor - no GM for barbs - is needed to hit them). Got the ambush with Renfield's attackers immediately afterwards which was good, as Aleks the PoL's TS was still running and detected the second invisble thief.

Accepted Rylock's quest, killed Xzars apprentices and their creations and opened Harper Hold. The eye painting is trapped and un-bashably locked, so cast Knock and had PC open it with Chaotic Commands, MSD and MI up... suspected lightning trap and was ready to race for the door. Nope, a golden ball of something (absorbed by MSD).

Didn't go upstairs in the HH yet, our looting capcity is compromised by no thief.

Explored the graveyard district, took the western path to the lower catacombs as there's fewer traps that way, just a ray-of-enfeeblement trap as I remember. Got Ioun stone for PC and a scroll of spell immunity (no, I didn't install Item Randomizer this time, but my in-development Polytweak mod which moves some powerful items). 

Turning in the Tanner is a tempting source of xp, but his house is full of traps and I don't remember what they all do either, so my good aligned party will just have to let this serial killer rampage for a while. 

Fought some pirates, crushed the Seven Vale's dude's pebbles.

Currently in Druid Grove, with Artemisia the archer finally getting level 9 and 102 hp, Aragrish has 126 - great luck and I had to check I was playing on core rules.

Didn't bother to screenshot as most of this is trivial for a powerful MP party, however they are slightly nerfed by all being of such low level.

Modifié par polytope, 24 janvier 2014 - 01:32 .

[Arbitorius]

Thanks for the info. I'm currently doing my playthrough of BG with a redone version of my very first BG character. Once I beat that, i'll be importing

Sorry to hear about Ludd's death. You were kicking ass, man. Wild Mage's have a lot of problems with their surges but it sounds like you just made a simple mistake