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[corey_russell]

CoreTalos the Priest of Talos and his random party - Update 5

Traveling with: Paja (berserker), Misty (kensai), Hanna (sorcerer)

Party about level 12

 

CoreTalos and gang have made more progress. We've solved the issues in the druid grove, murder mystery in bridge district, survived many vampire ambushes, and even took out Kangaxx. The vampire ambushes were pretty tough, even with spirit armor, Misty was getting murdered - I had to turn off AI and gulp an invis potion and basically keep her out of the battle, in two different vampire ambushes. Hanna died in one, though not chunked. Fortunately I remembered to activate Paja's enrage so she wouldn't get level drained.

 

I very rarely use CoreTalos lightning, mainly as to not hurt his own party. However, I finally got a great use out it - CoreTalos approached Mekrath by himself, and fired a single lightning bolt - in such a small room, it bounced a ton of times and killed Mekrath quickly.

CoreTalos tried the same thing with the nearby Yuan-tis but that didn't work out quite as well - he still had all his buffs he prepped for Mekrath, so he used his flail of ages on the Yuan-tis.

 

We've also cleared out most of Watcher's Keep 1st level, except the 2nd group of statues. I want a bit more power before dealing with those. The primary reasons we did this was for the ammo belt (Hanna can finally get all those bullets out of her inventory and help loot), the Foebane for Paja, and the crimson dart for Paja as well.

 

For the Kangaxx battle, Misty was protected by scroll of magic protection. However, Kangaxx morale broke and she needed help. Hanna then did SI:abjuration and summoned Meteors and attacked Kangaxxx the Demi-Lich. Took a while and Kangaxx even ran by the party members who had no defense a few times, but fortunately Misty and Hanna got the job done. The ring went to Paja, to help with AC and saves and the poison immunity is helpful as well.

[Grond0]

Pally - human cavalier (1st and last update)

 

Pally moved on from BG1 to seek fresh challenges.  They didn't really arise in the dungeon, with everything going smoothly.  Her vampiric touch ability meant there was no need to use the firebreath potion to finish Ulvaryl off.  I consoled in a bag of holding so she was even able to carry the loot out.

 

Minutes later the circus was restored to normal and not long after that the Copper Coronet was under new management (level 10) and Pally had bought Azuredge and Stonefire.   Going down into the sewers she used the RoAC and Horn of Kazgoroth to protect against hobgoblin shamen and then myconid confusion.  Picked up Lilarcor before using the RoAC again to invade the slaver ship.  The guards died in the initial attack while Captain Haegan stayed oblivious in the corner.  After refreshing PfE Pally undertook a missile duel with him.  Stonefire dealt with the trolls before she moved on to the slaver wizards - one meleed using RoAC and one scared by Bhaal horror.

 

Next she went to tackle Mencar's gang.  The mage died in a firebreath and his familiar was bamboozled by II.  Mencar and Brennan were horrified, allowing Pally a bit of time to kill Smaeluv.  However, I wasn't quick enough to react when horror wore off - resulting in Brennan getting a nasty 59 HP backstab in while Pally still had Azuredge equipped.  She tried to run for the temple to pay for some healing, but despite her having a potion of speed active Brennan somehow managed to get there first (if someone is chasing you and you are occupying the normal entrance point they tend to leap frog over you).

 

Normally in that encounter I kill Brennan first with the help of 2 or 3 summons (in order to make sure he doesn't run away with his ring of invisibility).  As a result it's a long time since I had trouble with him and I hadn't remembered him using haste.

[corey_russell]

It's sad to hear the end of your pally, Grond0. I usually leave Mencar for later, such as with Ilbratha, maybe two RoAC, potion of absorption, perhaps RoR, etc. What's next?

[Grond0]

It's sad to hear the end of your pally, Grond0. I usually leave Mencar for later, such as with Ilbratha, maybe two RoAC, potion of absorption, perhaps RoR, etc. 

Yes.  I normally do it later as well, but had been playing her in a fairly cavalier fashion and that time just pushed it a bit too much.

 

 

What's next?

I thought I might have a go at a sorceror restricted to only killing things in melee.

[Alaestr]

Sorry to hear of your cavalier demise, Grond0.

 

Dori Gray, the stumbling F/T. Update No.3 and Finale.

 

I decided to check out the Planar Sphere with Dori. Everything went smoothly up to the fight with Tolgerias. I tried to one shot backstab him , but to my surprise he survived the 72 damage hit and then some - 22 damage. I don't know how many hitpoints this guy has, but it is a lot. I consider looking at his stats in shadowkeeper (I did it with dragons and liches). All things went downhill from there. I retreated, equipped flail of ages and shield of harmony, then charged at the side-kick mage. While Dori was whacking at the mage, Tolgerias summoned a demon. Dori fell back to the small corridor, that way he fought only the demon. Dori quickly took out the infernal fiend, but not without taking mediocre damage. Dori went out of the hiding, then got power word stunned and I assume Power Word Killed. I learned the hard way the importance of maintaining one's character's hitpoints well above 90.

 

It was a pleasant adventure - F/T are quite the characters, although mages have too easy life dispelling them for my taste. I think next time I will be rolling Swashbuckler, if I ever come back to the fightery/thieving business. Might revisit the R/C idea or try something new - it seems Berserkers are viable to solo with. 

[corey_russell]

Sorry to hear your character's demise, Aleastr. Was there anything in the planar sphere you actually needed? Because if SCS and solo, I would have been tempted to skip it. Best of luck in your next attempt.

[Alesia_BH]

Congratulations on your two victories Grondo! I'm glad to see your persistence paying off!

 

Best,

 

A.

 

 I learned the hard way the importance of maintaining one's character's hitpoints well above 90.

 

Condolences Alaestr. I consider PW:S to be one of the greatest threats in BGII SCS. As a reminder, the Sword of Arvoreen, which is available to halflings and UAI thieves, is a useful tool for foiling PW:S. When facing enemies that cast PW:S, I keep it nearby and then equip it if and when my hit points dip below 90. 

[Grond0]

Hard luck Alaestr.  In my installation Tolgerias has 96 HPs, so you nearly had him!

 

Thanks Alesia - hope the travels are going well.

[Grond0]

Gate70/Grond0 multiplayer attempt 42 - (update 1)
Rees, half-elf cleric / ranger (Grond0) & Derrack, human bard (Gate70)
 

After their run through the Sword Coast this pairing got their first outing in Amn yesterday with generally pretty smooth progress as they:

- cruised through the dungeon.  Ulvaryl struggled to get around a group of skeletons and failed to kill even one of the assassins before dying herself.

- shrank the circus tent.

- changed management at the Copper Coronet.

- skull trapped / holy smited Suna Seni & co.

- picked up the berserker horn.

- saved Renfeld (using another skull trap, but with targeting a bit more important this time!).

 

The one encounter that was rather a shambles was the assault on Prebek's house.  The first problem was when I hadn't expected casting remove fear to make Rees visible and he was immediately spotted, allowing the mages to buff.  Rees ran outside while Derrack tried his luck with a skull trap - killing Sanasha and the goblins, though he had to save against confusion in response.  Derrack then ran outside while Rees returned back in under sanctuary.  Derrack mentioned that a cowled wizard was now looking for him to give him a warning notice and came back in just as Rees was targeting Prebek with a holy smite - that killed him, although Rees was a bit miffed about Derrack's targeting of his belated magic missile .

 

Derrack disdained to give the cowled wizards any money, so the duo just looted the Harpers and watched Xzar perish before calling it a day.

 

 

Stats:

Rees, cleric 8 / ranger 8, 87 HPs (incl. 5 from Helm), 314 kills
Derrack, bard 11, 65 HPs, 97 kills, 0 deaths

[polytope]

  

Sorry to hear your character's demise, Aleastr. Was there anything in the planar sphere you actually needed? Because if SCS and solo, I would have been tempted to skip it. Best of luck in your next attempt.

 

Personally, I wouldn't want to miss out on the Ring of the Ram or Staff of Fire for a solo F/T.

 

And once again, I see Grond has completed an entire run in less time than between my updates...

 

Eryx the blade and party continued:

 

After defeating Tahazzar they returned to the dead magic room (through the portal we came), then Eryx - ignoring Yakman's journal in favour of the metagaming voices only he could hear - went south, to a room full of Alu-fiends, good thing I didn't throw away those charm protection helmets. Then south again to make a deal with a rhyming devil. South again to a room with two glabrezu summoners. From here the party buffs well and travels west to the room with a tree, then immediately North through the portal we came out of (this was to avoid fighting the demon knights and the wraith spellcaster back-to-back, not good at these levels and without a safe place to rest).

 

 

I managed to set off the damn Wail of the Banshee trap, I think my character's warped into the room right on top of it... PC had Death Ward ofc, but the sorcerer Randolph was lucky to make his save here. Aleks also got silenced by another trap (had to run him over it so the entire party wasn't debuffed by remove magic)

 

Fought the slave wraiths, the alternative seems to be running around a room full of traps to avoid them until their master is defeated.

 

The demon wraith herself is highly resistant to physical attacks, the best way to destroy her is with magic damage (Ring of the Ram, Holy Smite and MM) after sorc uses a scroll of pierce shield to bring her MR and protections down. I was pleased to find a Spell Shield scroll in this room.

 

Now, on to end of the maze and a game of cards with a demon before retiring (for those who don't know, it IS safe to rest in this cave).

 

This cambion is cheating though (no Spectral Brand for us this game...), Eryx calls shennanigans and another battle starts.

 

 

Things don't look so bad at first, though 3 of the party get their buffs dispelled immediately, used an oil of speed for Aragrish here (few things in this game are as frustrating as layering protection spells on a character only to see them all vanish with a wave of an enemy mage's hand). Aesgareth and his mage both had wilting in their initial contingency, fortunately no vulnerable characters were close enough. Two Greater Command spells from Leksa and Aleks knocked out the tiefling thiefling while Artemisia with called shot + Kuo bolts stunned their fighter immediately.

 

Killing the fell cats was a priority as SCS gives them the ability to lower fire resistance on hit; this is very bad with enemy mages around who are quite likely to have triple Flame Arrow sequencers up their sleeves, fortunately the cats were distracted by summons and only Aragrish took a hit.

 

My Remove Magic failed to dispel any of Aesgareth's buffs but it did wake up the tiefling backstabber, who I had somehow forgotten about in the past six seconds... 

 

 

The enemy cleric managed to cast an uninterruptible Summon Deva spell, the wizard chain cast 2x time stop, spellstrike on Eryx (my Spell Shield was already gone) and several wiltings which were luckily spread out around the party. At least we'd chopped up their thief before he turned invisible again.

 

 

Now things are getting problematic, I've got three enemies who can breach or dispel me (the Deva, Mage and Aesgareth) and no spell protections.

 

I rebuffed Aleks, with Boon of Lathander & Improved Haste to slay the Deva, oh joy, another remove magic from that mage.

 

 

Not content with dispelling and wilting the party, the very annoying mage zapped Aragrish with a triple Chain Lighting trigger, he's on 1/3rd hp here after taking one of those superior healing potions, and just about to be hit by energy blades... Very close thing.

 

 

I'll say this much for fallen Devas, at least I get xp for killing them, unlike enemy summoned demons. Fortunately the Deva attacked Aleks, who has a good AC especially against crushing with the girdle of bluntness and pro evil from the sensate amulet, he was luck to save against the Deva's Chaos (they cast instantly, like demons in my games), also the party was lucky the Deva's next spell was heal on self... Globe of Blades could be nasty against our mid game saving throws. Called shot worked well to weaken both the Deva and Aesgareth when he wandered over. His mage was delayed for one round casting Death Spell on a fire elemental from the staff, after slaying Aesgareth we just ran past that mage and rebuffed a little in the room beyond the portal (I try to avoid this kind of thing, because enemies protections just wear off in the meanwhile, but that mage had proven herself to be quite formidable). Got a robe of the Good Archmagi from that mage when we finally took her down, and some useful potions (magic protection, clarity, super healing) from the other tieflings. Finally we can leave this maze!

 

Met Carston, annoyed him enough to summon four mind flayers, who were dispatched with ease, even with buffs running low. Further on, party finds some Yuan-ti, and where there's Yuan-Ti, there's Yuan-Ti mages! Even this late in the game I'm not going to risk it against them without buffs, so escaped the level for now.

 

Returning the next day, the Yuan-Ti are mopped up with ease, as are the Githyanki - I wasted my time buffing with spell protections, their mages are apparently really low leveled and with no anti-magic spells. It's a pretty easy fight even though they swarm you all at once (typical behaviour with SCS), the only ones to watch out for are the anti-paladins - in my game their Unholy Reaver swords can dispel on hit like Carsomyr - they were handled with called shot, Holy word and Greater Command.

 

Mind flayers were easy too, fewer of them here than in the sewers hideout.

 

Minotaurs - even super minotaurs - were also easy, got Axe of the Unyielding for Aragrish.

 

Carston cringes as his case crumbles, and the party finally gets to play with the machine of Lum, getting +1 strength for Aragrish, +1 dex & cha for Eryx, +1 con for Artemisia, +1 wis for Randolph.

 

Haven't fought demi-lich or Saladrex, I doubt I will... Saladrex - like Vithal - usually survives my games even if it would be more profitable to attack him. Some of the final level of WK will be left for ToB, as certain encounters there would be a bit much even for this party without HLA's (I have a personal rule about not wasting time in WK during chapter 6).

 

Returning to Athkatla, forge white dragon armor and upgrade the thieves' hood, quiver of plenty and golem manual (as I say, it's either that or leave the components cluttering my inventory till ToB). I guess that concludes our search for supplies, time to return to Aran and set sail!

 

Party is now in Brynnlaw, current levels:

 

Eryx, blade 20

Aleks, priest of Lathander 11 -> fighter 14

Randolph, sorcerer 16 (chose Horrid Wilting as first 8th level spell)

Leksa, swashbuckler 10 -> cleric 17

Artemisia, archer 15

Aragrish the Cliched, barbarian 17

 

Still no deaths, fingers crossed...

[Alesia_BH]

Nice work Polytope!

 

Best,

 

A.

[corey_russell]

CoreTalos the Half-Orc Priest of Talos and his random party - Update 6

Traveling with: Paja (half-orc berserker), Misty (halfling kensai), Hanna (elven sorcerer)

 

CoreTalos has made tremendous progress since last update. For one, he got the ring of holiness from the Talosians once he finished the Sir Sarles quest (so that's where that ring is...). The gang has also destroyed the Unseeing Eye and minions. It was pretty clean...CoreTalos got to use his pro lightning spell to protect from a trap.

 

Captain Dennis and the hostile party in the Warehouse in the bridge district were both destroyed using the same buffs, and pretty cleanly at that.

 

We also destroyed the Windspear Hills enemies, including Firkraag. While doing this, Hanna got her first level 7 spell, I had her choose Mordy Sword which got to use against Firkraag. Paja got killed but success!

 

Party is working on planar sphere. The only stuff not done, not counting Watcher's Keep, is Twisted Rune guarded compound and hideout. Not certain if will do those now or later.

[corey_russell]

CoreTalos the Cleric of Talos with random party - update 7 - Planar Sphere

Start of this Session - Traveling with: Paja (berserker), Misty (Kensai), Hanna (sorcerer), Valygar

End of this Session - Traveling with: Paja, Korgan, Hanna, Yoshimo

 

So the start of the Planar Sphere went well. We used summons vs. the first group of halfling mages, and 2nd as well, though Valygar assisted. Incidentally, we allowed Valygar to join us temporarily as we didn't have the heart to kill him. A single skeleton warrior and Valygar soloed Lavok.

 

We used whatever summons we had left to clear out the plane and get out demon heart - so far, so good.

 

Against pure mages, I usually use a super-buffed fighter, and I wished I had done that. But first, Valygar had the cloak of non-detection and wanted him to open the door and get into position (we were unbuffed, though invisible). Well, Valygar got spotted and then started talking to the mages..uh, oh, Valygar ran inside and eventually found a spot to hide - so he was ok.

 

What to do, what to do, Hanna tried to throw in 2 cloudkills, but she was spotted and insta-killed. Hmm...I raised her again to throw in another cloudkill, but she was spotted again, but she was naked - she gulped a invis potion, but the Hakeasher wasn't fooled, uh, oh time for entire party to assist - the Hakeasher was killed. Misty had the best saves, so we sent her in alone, at first, but it wasn't working well. Eventually decided she needed help and everyone came in. Well, Valygar was killed and Misty was PERMANENTLY killed, probably disintegrate. I don't thik the resulting group is viable (for me), so will recruit now. We lost a huge amount of unique items when Misty was killed, as all her equipment is gone as well - this is what was lost, best as I can remember:

 

* Shield Amulet

* Ring of Human Influence

* Panaii's ioun stone

* Belt of Hill Giant Strength

* Boots of Grounding

* +1 ring

* Cloak of Displacement

* Namuraa

* Belm

* Arbane

* Sword of Drinking

* Blade of Roses

* Improved Mace of Disruption

* Sword of Flame

* Dragon Halberd

* Staff of Ryhnn

* Boomerang Dagger

* Forget name, but the blade that gives fear immunity, regeneration, and double damage vs. dragons

 

We used RoR to raise our fallen, buffed what we could, and managed to take out the fire and cold rooms. The golems in the engine room were pretty difficult, but Paja's Crimson Dart managed to take out most of them. When we fixed the engine room, we reported to Lavok and got out of there.

 

We immediately recruited and equipped Korgan and Yoshimo. Yoshimo won't be in our party long at all, since in Spellhold we will replace with Imoen. We got a huge amount of spells in Planar Sphere, which we decided to keep after all for Imoen. We ended the session in Graveyard, preparing to do Korgan's quest.

[Grond0]

Geduld - elven melee sorcerer (update 1)

 

Geduld successfully completed BG1 using the restriction that all deaths in this run credited to Geduld must be caused by melee combat (including indirect effects such as shape-changed spider venom).  That means he has to be pretty careful in the use of direct damage spells and summons (and effectively rules out a planetar if he gets as far as HLAs).  He's now underway in the dungeon.

 

Spell choices (in order of being picked)

1st level spells - blind, identify, chill touch, shield, pfe

2nd level spells - invisibility, knock, mirror image, blur

3rd level spells - slow, remove magic, minor spell deflection

4th level spells - polymorph self, stoneskin

[Grond0]

Gate70/Grond0 multiplayer attempt 42 - (update 2)
Rees, half-elf cleric / ranger (Grond0) & Derrack, human bard (Gate70)
 

This duo continued to make decent progress yesterday.  After picking up the potion case from Watcher's Keep they paid Gaelan Bayle and picked up goodies from Aran Linvail.  With the amulet I thought it would be possible to take on Hareishan (who was waiting outside in the Docks).  However, Rees didn't have a +2 weapon and Derrack couldn't do damage quickly enough so we eventually just had to run away.

 

In the sewers the only encounter of concern in the session was with the sea troll.  He was started with only 1 skeleton helping out and Rees slowed by a mustard jelly.  As a result he was quickly tearing through Rees' defences (+4 to hit against slowed opponents); fortunately Derrack had now memorised MMM and was able to tear through the troll in time! He did the same to the rakshasa before the duo started the Unseeing Eye quest to open up access to the lich.

 

Back to Watcher's Keep where careful preparations were made for a pair of vampiric wraiths - who prudently stayed away and let some mephits take the punishment.  We thought for a while how saving throws could be reduced far enough to protect against the FoD trap - before Rees eventually remembered he knew death ward.

 

In the City again they sought a better weapon for Rees.  Mook was avenged and a Guild Contact traced to the Graveyard.  There, some spiders and Pai'Na led to vampire HQ.  Wearing the helm of charm protection Rees finished off the vampires, while Derrack used Arbane and took over against the greater ghouls.  A series of summons drained Tanova of spells before she was meleed.  Bodhi stood no chance against a pre-prepared ambush.

 

Stats:

Rees, cleric 9 / ranger 9, 98 HPs (incl. 5 from Helm), 383 kills
Derrack, bard 12, 73 HPs (incl. 6 from ioun stone), 145 kills, 0 deaths

[Grond0]

Geduld - elven melee sorcerer (update 2)

 

In the dungeon the first radiant mephit stunned him twice with colour spray, working through all his mirror and stoneskins before he went invisible.  After that he always slowed dangerous opponents from out of sight before engaging.  Most of the time he attacked in spider shape, although the ogre was more effective against some opponents - only taking 3 swipes to finish off a pair of golems for instance.  Blind, which was by far his most used tactic in BG1, wasn't used in the dungeon.

 

Geduld got to level 10 on the elemental plane and I inadvertently accepted chaos while looking at spell choices.  That wouldn't have been my first choice, but it's a reasonable selection for this character so no great harm done.

 

Following recent practice I consoled in a bag of holding.

 

Slow and vampiric touch helped get Ulvaryl to near death, but the ogre missed what would have been a killing blow and she turned into bat form to escape.

 

The circus was quickly set to rights (level 11) before Geduld went to buy a magic license (he could kill the Cowled wizards easily enough from a distance, but not in melee).  Then cleared some beasties in the process of sweeping out the Copper Coronet.

 

Incidentally, it's only just occurred to me that confusion could be regarded as breaching my restriction of no deaths other than melee (if a confused creature kills something else).  However, in that case the game doesn't treat it as a party death (no XP awarded) as the confused creature is not under party control - and I'm not treating such deaths as a problem.  Just to prove the point, chaos was used to good effect on Suna Seni's gang and again to save Renfeld.  It also caused dissension in Prebek's house - the argument continuing after the chaos wore off.  A first use of web provided an opportunity to blind Sanasha - effectively ending the contest.

 

Looted both thieves guilds before undertaking Mae'Var's tasks.  An encounter with Salia during that provided a find familiar scroll to give Geduld a HP boost.  A single cast of chaos also made a nasty mess of an orog ambush.  Rayic's golems took a while to work through with the non-proficient staff spear, but stoneskins and mirror images outlasted them.  The mage himself was webbed while neutral, then annoyed with a LMD before being subjected to malison, then chaos.  However, his buffs provided protection and he recovered control with a sunfire causing Geduld to go downstairs and go invisible.  There was a bit more use of stairs before Rayic cast shadow door - and disappeared.  He wouldn't reappear even after Geduld rested and spells cast in the house showed no indication he was still there.  So it looks like Mae'Var is going to be reprieved this run.

 

Geduld looted the berserker horn in the Bridge District (using spell immunity: conjuration to protect against maze) and moved on to solve the skinner murders.  The Rune Assassins were pulled upstairs one at a time (using invisibility) and malisoned / blinded / slowed for a spider finish.  The ghasts were blinded and brought to near death with missiles before being slowed (to avoid any chance of retaliation when attacking and retreating) and finished off.  Reporting to Lt Aegisfield got Geduld to level 12.  Once again I inadvertently selected a spell while looking at the options (this is getting to be a bad habit) - this time PW:silence

 

Spell choices (in order of being picked)

1st level spells - blind, identify, chill touch, shield, pfe

2nd level spells - invisibility, knock, mirror image, blur, web

3rd level spells - slow, remove magic, minor spell deflection, hold person

4th level spells - polymorph self, stoneskin, greater malison

5th level spells - chaos, spell immunity

6th level spells - PW:silence 

[polytope]

@Alesia, are you still travelling, or have you found time to roll up a new candidate?

 

What to do, what to do, Hanna tried to throw in 2 cloudkills, but she was spotted and insta-killed. Hmm...I raised her again to throw in another cloudkill, but she was spotted again, but she was naked - she gulped a invis potion, but the Hakeasher wasn't fooled, uh, oh time for entire party to assist - the Hakeasher was killed. Misty had the best saves, so we sent her in alone, at first, but it wasn't working well. Eventually decided she needed help and everyone came in. Well, Valygar was killed and Misty was PERMANENTLY killed, probably disintegrate. I don't thik the resulting group is viable (for me), so will recruit now. We lost a huge amount of unique items when Misty was killed, as all her equipment is gone as well 

 

Sorry to hear that, but you made it pretty far without anyone perma killed. Retreating up the stairs to buff before engaging Tolgerias might have worked better.

 

Once again I inadvertently selected a spell while looking at the options (this is getting to be a bad habit) - this time PW:silence

 

There are worse spells, clerics in ToB like to cast Insect Plague or Creeping Doom, which your melee-restricted sorc (interesting idea btw.) might otherwise have trouble interrupting.

 

Eryx the blade, adventures in Brynnlaw.

 

Perth the Adept proved adept at annoying me, he used his cheaty wish spell to remove the party's protections, also making his save against GC and shrugging off Holy Word (maybe he isn't evil, many cowlies aren't).

 

 

After defeating Perth, flipped through the book of infinite spells, ignoring True Sight (thieves hood casts that instantly) and Farsight (we have more priest spells than we know what to do with), nope, no Spell Turning.

 

I still have the Deck of Many things floating around in my pack, but given the luck we had with it so far, I think I won't mess with it just yet. At least, not until we've bought/upgraded everything we need.

 

Irenicus takes a cue from Perth with a similarly irresistible spell that steals my blade's soul (I had to reload here btw. that infamous bug with Bhaal in the dream refusing to admit defeat).

 

Met Imoen, sorry little sister, but if we let another person into our party the pathfinding will become so bad that Polytope goes insane, then we'll be stuck in this asylum forever...

 

The lich here fumbled a couple of his spells due to Leksa's Holy Word, and showed questionable judgement in shooting a triple Lower Resistance spell trigger at our summoned skeleton warrior... However that trigger would normally be a good way to foil Carsomyr or Viconia with MR items (or Mustard Jelly polymorph, but I don't use that against mages).

 

 

Well, the Lich was dispatched with no problems and a couple of groups of Yuan-Ti were also tackled without rest. Btw. this screenshot shows an intriguing bug, a Yuan-Ti mage has spawned in the crystal room on the other side of the wall to the rest of the group of Yuan-Ti, and also started out invisible... could be a nasty surprise for a less powerful party.

 

Rested after meeting Bodhi and chasing her off, slightly better RP since now the hunter becomes the hunted. Managed to kill the beholder before it shot a single ray at anyone. 

 

I overprepared for the fight with Irenicus and our clones, another interesting bug occurred here.

 

 

He only summoned clones of Aleks, Aragarish and Artemisia, presumably because everyone else had spell protections that blocked the "Spawn Clones" spell. Stranger still, it seems to have actually reflected off Randolph's Spell Turning and created a clone of Irenicus!

 

This surely isn't the first time I've gone into this battle with spell protections up, but it is the first time that I've seen the cloning process bug out... 

 

Also of note, Artemisia's clone prefered to attack her with the Flame of the North, not realizing she was cloned from an archer, meanwhile Wanev cast Improved Alacrity and Comet; Irenicus and his clone may have had HLA's but certainly didn't get a chance to use them!

 

Anyway, since this wasn't a game breaking bug (and I'm not sure of how to prevent it except starting the fight unbuffed, not such a good idea...) I decided to continue.

 

Nearly got our sorc killed when Saemon's ship was boarded by Gith, he had no protections and the Githyanki mages started spamming him with magic missile. It would be pretty embarrassing for the party's first death to occur here... Still managed to chop up Saemon before he escaped (slightly more difficult with SCS due to his prebuffs). Just a reminder for me never to start ANY battle unprepared.

 

Sahuagin city a breeze, cleared the place without rest. The priestess who formerly wore the Cloak of Mirroring didn't buff whereas the other Sahuagin casters (cleric/mages) do. I'm not sure what to make of this, another bug with my old SCS version I think. This was also a first use of Limited Wish for globes on everybody, one of my favourite options for this spell.

 

I was going to sell some stuff to the Sahuagin priestess, then realized it's not exactly good RP to sell powerful magic items to a bunch of sharks known for hating humanity. It's not like we're in need of cash anyway (currently just over 100,000 gp).

 

Current levels:

 

Eryx, blade 22

Aleks, priest of Lathander 11 -> fighter 16

Randolph, sorcerer 17 (chose Limited Wish & Spell Trigger)

Leksa, swashbuckler 10 -> cleric 19 (finally her THAC0 & saving throws are decent)

Artemisia, archer 17

Aragrish the Cliched, barbarian 19

[Alesia_BH]

 

@Alesia, are you still travelling, or have you found time to roll up a new candidate?

 

I'm still at home and available to play actually: I'm not leaving until next Wednesday. 

 

Alora is alive and well, but, to be honest, I'm nervous about sending her off to face Sarevok. This is my first BG: EE+SCS v. 28 run; Alora isn't exactly a powerhouse and her resources are a bit thin. I'm worried that I might get her killed if I take her any further. She's basically been retired by default.

 

I'm also having technical problems with the MLP party, so that's out for the time being.

 

I'm tempted to start a character based on Maud Pie (think Aubrey Plaza as a rock themed super-hero), but I probably wouldn't have time to finish. 

 

I'm pretty much in spectator mode at this point.

 

Your run has been interesting, Polytope. I'm sorry I haven't commented much. I've been enjoying it nonetheless.

 

Best,

 

A.

[Alesia_BH]

 

There are worse spells, clerics in ToB like to cast Insect Plague or Creeping Doom, which your melee-restricted sorc (interesting idea btw.) might otherwise have trouble interrupting.

 

 

Agreed. It's possible to get mileage out of Power Word: Silence.

 

Transmuter Alastria found it helpful as a means of foiling spells (notably divination magicks). You may discover uses for it.

 

Best,

 

A.  

[corey_russell]

CoreTalos the Priest of Talos and his rag-tag party - Update 8

Traveling with: Paja, Korgan, Hanna, Yoshimo

 

After taking care of Korgan's quest (pretty easy with our summons assisting), we reported to LInvail and set sail on Saemon Havarian's ship. CoreTalos summons have been real useful of late, with his animate dead resulting in skeleton warriors. Our rep is at 19, so we need to avoid gaining any reputation or Korgan will leave. All we really need is the slayer change ability, then we'll drop our rep. But that means we also left Ginia alone and the brothel alone. Korgan was buffed to the max and he soloed Perth. The party is just about to make it to spellhold proper.

 

Polytope wrote...

Sorry to hear that, but you made it pretty far without anyone perma killed. Retreating up the stairs to buff before engaging Tolgerias might have worked better.

I'm sure you are right. The entire party really needed to get involved...what's silly is Hanna could have done SI:E and SI:N so that she wouldn't be killed by simple spells...hindsight 20/20 as they say...

[Grond0]

Geduld - elven melee sorcerer (update 3)

 

Used a protection from undead scroll along with a couple of potions of speed and a strength scroll to clear the top of the graveyard.  Did the quests there as well - successfully saving Nevin by leading him away and then blinding Uncle Lester.

 

Working downstairs Geduld confused lots of spiders.  Those in Pai'Na's nest seemed reluctant to attack their former mistress, but with only three of them left finally did so - their poison making short work of her.  A further protection from undead scroll then helped clear the Southern tombs.

 

At the Bridge District Kitthix webbed both kidnappers before leaving poisoning duties to Geduld.

 

In the Temple sewers I considered for a while how to kill the sea troll, initially thinking about the fact that MMM could be used in melee, before remembering the flind shape-change form does fire damage with its halberd.  After buffing up Geduld tackled the rakshasa, testing out various forms before settling on the spider (needed a critical anyway, so the bonus poison damage seemed best).  After getting 3 criticals each the rakshasa was dead, while Geduld was untouched.  Geduld has put the sewer cloak on, although it's not offering any polymorph options (possibly a conflict due to picking it up while in shapechanged form already?).

 

The Fallen Paladins were handled easily enough - the majority of the damage their being done by their own side under the influence of chaos.

 

Did the Sir Sarles quest and retrieved the Dawn Ring.  Handing over Neb's head got reputation back up to 20 and Geduld bought an ogre strength belt and bracers AC3 to help with fighting in his own form.

 

Worked through the de'Arnise Hold, though there were some challenges there.  The ogre form to put trolls down and the flind to finish them off worked fine, but the spirit trolls and spectral trolls were more difficult due to the need for magic weapons and giant trolls hit pretty easily, so for those Geduld needed to get them on their own, buff more fully and use slow, blind and chill touch as disablers.  He still had to resort to wand use to soften up one spectral troll - who was regenerating faster than the flind could hurt him.  Geldud tried using PW:silence on the yuan-ti mage, but he vocalised the first one immediately and then resisted the second before getting a chaos spell out just as the 3rd took effect.  The mage didn't make any progress with melee though and Geduld rebuffed and exchanged fairly ineffectual spells for a while before a chill touch eventually bypassed stoneskins.

 

His hardest fight there was against Glaicas - he ran out of buffs quickly and couldn't get away from the hasted warrior to renew them.  Finally he had to use a potion of invisibility to stay safe before putting on fresh stoneskins then malisoning, blinding and holding Glaicas.  He got to level 13 while fighting golems before having another nasty moment when umber hulk confusion bypassed spell immunity.  However, Geduld was well buffed and managed to blind the umber hulk at the same time, so that it needed a critical to hit (and failed to get any).  At the end, Torgal's magic resistance protected him against a number of spells, but he was finally slowed, then blinded before being finished.

 

Back in the City Geduld has just paid Gaelan Bayle and collected some goodies from Aran Linvail.

 

Spell choices (in order of being picked)

1st level spells - blind, identify, chill touch, shield, pfe

2nd level spells - invisibility, knock, mirror image, blur, web

3rd level spells - slow, remove magic, minor spell deflection, hold person

4th level spells - polymorph self, stoneskin, greater malison, minor sequencer

5th level spells - chaos, spell immunity, shadow door

6th level spells - PW:silence, improved haste

[corey_russell]

CoreTalos the Priest of Talos and is rag-tag band - Update 9

Traveling with: Paja, Korgan, Imoen, Hanna

 

CoreTalos survived fighting the essence of Bhaal - he had 3 aerial servants to make sure he won that fight...Once Bodhi let us into her little maze, Imoen joined the party. Going to stay with this party, except we might let Sarevok join in ToB, or another character join if someone gets chunked.

 

We completed the first level of Spellhold without any issues. The hardest part is the that large group of undead on the way to Dace (and a lich too, yikes!) - Korgan soloed them with a protection from Undead scroll, as well as Dace. Imoen's lore is helping out quite a bit.

 

We then tried to do the 2nd level of spellhold, but the game crashed. Rather than do that again right now, instead I went to watch some Psych - I'll try again another day.

[corey_russell]

Quick Update about CoreTalos and Gang: We got out of spellhold, but a little sloppy play in Spellhold resulted in the permanent death of Korgan (a trap). I thought with spell save at 2 and pro evil active he should be OK, but apparently the trap spell must have a save penalty applied and he was chunked. His stuff disappeared too, this is the stuff we lost:

 

* Shield of Grace +3

* Fire Scale Armor (will miss this in ToB)

* Frostweaver

* Cloak of Sewers

* Helm of Defense

* Hammer of Giantkin

* Tarnor's throwing hammer

* Ilbratha

 

Will try to be more careful in the Underdark.

[Grond0]

Geduld - elven melee sorcerer (update 4)

 

Geduld is still just going, despite my best efforts to get him killed!

 

Spell immunity protected against domination while Geduld beat up Lassal.  I was a bit wasteful with the guild contact - just attacking in spider form, which gave him time to drink all his potions.  Reporting back to Aran got Geduld to level 14.

 

At vampire HQ Geduld beat up the Grimwarders and sent Lassal downstairs before using another scroll of undead protection.  With his low APR I prioritised the greater ghouls and Tanova before moving downstairs.  He was out of improved hastes before finishing off the grimwarders there and on his last spell immunity when the final vampire fled.  He rested upstairs before taking on Bodhi. She struck down one set of mirrors, but plenty more were available and she decided to make a tactical withdrawal.

 

Now that Geduld had the Amulet of Power he was happy to head for Umar Hills.  However, before moving on to the temple he tried to do some local quests. Unfortunately he mis-spoke to Madulf in the process; he was out of most spells, but a couple of chaos spells left the survivors as easy meat.  After resting he picked up some mimic blood and destroyed a rogue golem.

 

Making his way to the temple Geduld was potentially vulnerable to shadow fiends, so made sure to blind then slow them before using hit and run melee tactics.  In the temple he successfully answered the statue and got level 15 as a reward.  He took the light gem immediately - requiring him to do quite a bit of running round while killing the shadows that follow even if you're invisible (using blind on the shadow fiend, which oddly stops the follow-while-invisible behaviour).  There was no lich, but a single hit from a greater mummy triggered a worrying amount of damage (about 60 HPs over 4 rounds - triggering Geduld's contingency for the first time in the process) - clearly Geduld can't afford to be hit by them! After other enemies had been killed the greater mummy was slowed and made to run around in a fire pit until Geduld took a final swipe at it in order to claim the XP.

 

After resting Geduld used his newly learned mordy swords to occupy the attention of the second group of undead while he beat them up - that made things much easier, with just a need to be careful that the sword only attacked things with lots of HPs left.

 

Thaxy came within a whisker of ending the run when I forgot to bring along a scroll of remove fear, but was 'ssillyia enough to attack anyway.  Geduld started running immediately and, even though his stoneskins survived a remove magic and he saved against a chaos, things looked bleak when 2 of Thaxy's bites drew blood.  However, with the dragon already rearing his head for a final chomp, Geduld recovered control.  Fortunately, the Amulet of Power not only protects against level drain, but also changes the casting time for stoneskin from 1 to 0 and that proved just quick enough to save Geduld (at which point he imitated brave Sir Robin!).

 

Seeking something easier than dragons to pick on Geduld has just travelled to Trademeet, where some genies were pre-blinded then held to make it easy to pick up an efreeti bottle.

 

Spell choices (in order of being picked)

1st level spells - blind, identify, chill touch, shield, pfe

2nd level spells - invisibility, knock, mirror image, blur, web

3rd level spells - slow, remove magic, minor spell deflection, hold person

4th level spells - polymorph self, stoneskin, greater malison, minor sequencer

5th level spells - chaos, spell immunity, shadow door, hold monster

6th level spells - PW: silence, improved haste, contingency

7th level spells - spell sequencer, Mordenkainen's sword

[Grond0]

Gate70/Grond0 multiplayer attempt 42 - (3rd and final update)
Rees, half-elf cleric / ranger (Grond0) & Derrack, human bard (Gate70)
 

After a generally pretty high quality run this duo saw their bid for glory ended by a (my) lamentable mistake.

 

The Sir Sarles quest had been completed and the Mace of Disruption forged.  That was the signal to go lich hunting and the liches in the temple sewer and at the City Gates had been duly destroyed.  The one in the Bridge District was next and Rees had already pointed out the need for Derrack to take along some protection against the petrification trap there.  They arrived, Derrack cast protection on himself and Rees opened the door ...