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[saros_shadow_follower]

Saint of Sinners wrote...

@Saros

Is IA6.0 very difficult compared to the earliest versions? The ones from a few years ago?

Yes. In IA 5.0, there was no experience cap, meaning a triple-class could reach levels 40/40/40. The Wish and Chain Contingency spells were un-nerfed. The multiclass HLA tables were untouched. Several powerful and early accessible weapons were unnerfed. Various important spells, like Spell Trap, were still present. Many important items were un-nerfed - like Potions of Invulnerability or Absorbtion, for example, but these are only few of the important examples. The Amulet of Power still granted immunity to Silence, and the Answerer still applied the 2 penalty to AC on each hit. Various powerful enemy abilities still allowed a saving throw (like the Stone Golem Slow, or the dragon's Greater Silence) although at great penalty. The random treasure slots (from monsters) were un-nerfed, allowing a character to gain access to some pretty powerful spell scrolls if he/she gets lucky with those random treasures. And finally, in IA 5.0 enemies didn't have cheating scripts, which trigger if: the PC is a fighter-mage of any kind, or the party consists of 4 or less alive party members. In IA 6.0 not only enemies have such scripts, but also certain powerful randomized items will not be dropped by the enemy if the party doesn't meet certain conditions (usually, alive party member count 5 or 6, and checks not only when battle ends, but several times in the dungeon as well, or upon entering - who knows for sure!).

Of course, there is the monster improvement abilites too. In IA 5.0, golems didn't dispel illusions on hit, which made Mirror Image, Blur and Improved Invisibility a viable protection vs them. And also, very few enemies had the cheating Purge Magic ability (dispels all buffs unquestionably), whereas in IA 6.0 each bigger golem has the ability. And not only golems, but certain other enemies have it too.

Saint of Sinners wrote...

It seems to me that every other post you have features some Skeleton Grandlord or whatnot. Weren't those kind of overpowered with regards to even SCSII? Also, is there any message board dealing with IA strategy? It seems like even David and the others don't play this (I used to be an observer at the G3 forums some time ago) anymore, what with some kind of feud. You're the only active person I see playing it, so much so that searching Improved Anvil on Google will basically net your name somewhere in them. )

Skeleton Grandlords are a common and powerful undead minion in IA. Right - minion. They're rarely alone, and usually accompany a powerful entity - be it a lich, or some sort of demon, or other force. Same goes for the lesser golems too, although a Grandlord is a much more dangerous adversary than a Gem Golem, for example.

Although these seem to be overpowered, I have to mention that Sikret's pet classes, like the Riskbreaker, aren't exactly vanilla either, as can be seen. Of course, this doesn't mean that the enemies aren't dangerous. To put it simply - even at present levels, if the tactic for a fight is picked unwisely, some party member may meet their untimely end by chunking very easily. Yes, even with physical resistances 65% or higher.

The message board dealing with IA strategy is behind an 'iron wall'. It is on the BlackWyrmLair forums, and you have to pay them to even get access for reading the forum. Not worth it. Besides, frankly, the info there is more than scarce. Because Sikret (the mod's author) doesn't like discussions of difficult battle tactics, various item locations or new quests spoilers, and deletes such posts quickly. Plus, when the access to their forums was still open, I read a lot of the topics there and didn't find much new info, however I did found out that the players there have somewhat limited knowledge on many of the game's aspects. That includes Sikret too.

I post on G3 forums as well, however I don't participate in any feud. Still, some people from the G3 forums, most impotantly the bigg, helped me a lot with info about the cheating ways of the IA 6.0 itself. Like when I was trying to figure out why my Berserker-Mage doesn't get the Spell Immunity scroll from Pai-Na's treasure trove. Turns out that the scroll is deleted if PC is a fighter-mage of any kind.

Yeah well, many people play the mod, I'm simply the one that writes about it. The others play it quietly.

Saint of Sinners wrote...

Anyway, good job with your run. Though I don't understand what's happening half of the time, I can basically see what is what. Still, Helm's Supreme Golem = crazy. I just don't understand that one. It's pretty much enough for that golem to kick Ascension's Demogorgon's arse without breaking a sweat. And *they* still need you to seal the Prince of Demons. Yeah, right.

Helm's supreme golem:
That guy has hilarious resistances to every type of physical damage. He's immune to +3 weapons or less, to missile damage, and to all types of magical/elemental damage. A 25-str fighter hitting the golem on Critical will inflict 3, maximum 4 points of damage. The golem itself has Purge Magic ability, which he hurls once every 5 rounds. It has an area of effect similar to Remove Magic and isn't stopped by any means (including Spell Immunity of some sort). The golem is also surrounded by a 9-th level Fireshield spell, which has some disabling effect (not sure what is it, my guys always save vs it). The Fireshield inflicts Fire, Cold, Electrical and Acid damage when anyone hits the golem in melee. The golem itself hits for a lot of damage, his attack is Crushing, but applies damage from the four elemental types as well. And his attack lowers the target's elemental resistances by 10% for 1 turn. And of course, his attack dispels illusions on hit. The golem has excellent THAC0 and armor class.

What else...oh right. The Supreme Golem gates in Elemental Golems in time. Each Elemental Golem gates in Gem and Coin golems.

Not that it's impossible to kill it, but in this case, the golem is the 'good guy'. He simply prevents the party to fight with the Green Wyrm and get some good items + the Scepter of Radiance. The party can kill the golem, but then they will never meet the Green Wyrm. The golem itself holds the Tome of Golems, which cannot be pickpocketed, and is usually lost forever in an Anvil game.

Since Sikret implemented new and powerful encounters, and left some of the old encounters untouched, there are hilarious differences in some battles. For example, Nalmissra and Aurnumach Rilmani are vanilla, as is Demogorgon, while the Orcish Horde is improved, and is a tougher fight than the three beforementioned ones together.

Yeah well, thanx, but I'm really not even close to the hardest fights in SoA or WK. But those will be on-line in chapter six, don't worry, and there are tons of improved enemies up to that moment. This now is simply a sparring routine, artifact collection and forging, because powerful battles require powerful party gear.

Edit: I cannot really describe each enemy's improvements, but let's keep it simple:

Most enemies are simply upgrades over vanilla monsters, with increased level, hitpoints, THAC0, armor class, and almost all have some sort of regeneration. More powerful enemies usually are immune to all types of elemental/magical/poison damage, and are resistant to some types of physical damage as well. Of course, almost all tough enemies are immune to all types of disabling effects. Many enemies carry undroppable weapons which dispel certain protections on hit (specific, combat, illusion) or apply certain effects (Miscast Magic), or grant the enemies undispellable buffs (Improved Haste, others).

Modifié par saros_shadow_follower, 27 juin 2011 - 11:05 .

[touch_of_the_void]

saros_shadow_follower wrote...

Skeleton Grandlords are a common and powerful undead minion in IA. Right - minion. They're rarely alone, and usually accompany a powerful entity - be it a lich, or some sort of demon, or other force. Same goes for the lesser golems too, although a Grandlord is a much more dangerous adversary than a Gem Golem, for example.

The presence of enemies like the Grandlords is xp-dependent; a party playing the game normally without any xp exploits (and choosing to finish Chapter 3 so as to encounter the easiest version of the Asylum) will not meet a single Skeleton Grandlord until Chapter 6.

[Shadow_Leech07]

Here is my short update

Rachel has reached level twelve and can now cast level three druid spells. She has learned various things, one being that she cannot be a full-time archer and that she needs to get her hands 'dirty' so to speak when it comes to dealing with enemies of arcane and clerical nature. Archery is beneficial when one is going head to head with fellow archers and fighters, there is a time and place for Rachel to excel, and a time and place for her to not.
Rachel gets the illithium from the Sir Sarles quest. She'll need it to upgrade the mace of disruption.

Tarner's Bandits
The battle beneath the Temple District seemed just like another day on the job for Rachel Woods. Using a potion of heroism, and oil of speed, Rachel was assailed by a bandit group lead by Tarner demanding she turn over all her gold. What nonsense was this? Rachel employed her new strategy of stealth and snipe, she coined the term as the sewers was a perfect opportunity for this. Two of the hoodlums was very angry at her for stealthing away and the mage Gaius cast true sight. When this had occurred, Rachel felt kind of stupid for leaving the cloak of nondetection behind in Waukeen Promenade. Nevertheless it made no difference, Rachel could wait the true sight out. She employed stealth and snipe on these idiots and they both fell in due time. Rachel stealthed around, making rounds and checking to see if Gaius's true sight wore off. She even launched a charge from the amulet of missiles hoping to draw something out. Apparently the cleric Rengaard wasn't so happy about this and chased after Rachel, leaving the side of the only thing saving his hide for now. All Rengaard could do was cast blade barrier on himself as Rachel laughed out loud and then stealthed again. Poor guy tried to run at Rachel but when he reached the corner, no one was there. Finally, all that was left was Gaius without his true sight, Tarner, and someone else. Rachel sniped off the someone else then started on Tarner. The mage Gaius remained by his side seemingly confused as ever as to what was happening. Tarner ran frantically at what seemed to be a shadow of an archer but he had gotten too far from his mage friend. Like a hunter springing to action, Rachel started a straight up archery brawl with Tarner and his throwing axe. Rachel was wearing the boots of avoidance but she did not bother with the cloak of nondetection. Down Tarner went, and then Rachel went after Gaius with improved invisibility buffed on her. Poor Gaius stood there doing nothing. He had a pointless spell deflection type spell around himself, but that was of no use against an archer with rings of air control. Down Gaius went with not a whimper.

Investigating the Vampires
Rachel pays off the man named Gaelen Bayle and is initiated into the Shadow Thieves Guild at least as a mercenary of sorts. A mercenary who just paid gold, well it doesn't make much sense. Anyways, she needs to find a ship to get to Spellhold and she needs to do a bit more just to get there. She is currently pondering whether to get more gold or go straight to Spellhold.

Modifié par Shadow_Leech07, 27 juin 2011 - 12:05 .

[Alesia_BH]

Wow! A lot of activity here since I last logged on. I'm glad to see everyone making progress.

As for Alesia, she is currently in Sendai's Lair. Diayatha is her next foe. I'll write more later.

Good hunting everyone.


A.


Btw. Funny story. In my real life, someone annoyed me today. Unconsciously, I made the little gesture that Alesia makes when tossing her Maze Traps...

Modifié par Alesia_BH, 27 juin 2011 - 01:36 .

[corey_russell]

Thanks to all of you who sent congratulations and well wishes. My adventure will continue tonight - this strange thing called "work" prevents from adventuring/posting earlier.

Good luck to everyone else's runs.

[saros_shadow_follower]

Astarta's current adventures:

The party quickly eliminated the Elemental and Shade lich which guard Kangaxx's remains, and went to challenge the demilich itself. Astarta was ready for Kangaxx and immediately greeted him with a Ruby Ray, followed by a Remove Magic. The effect of the RRR is still visible when Kangaxx was forced to shapeshift (he triggered 3*ADHW Chain Contingency before dying). Torham activated Contact with Nature to be immune to Imprisonment. The rest of the fighters have Death Ward active, and also everyone is still Improved Invisible. Alia moved close in case she's needed to refresh the Mass Invisibility on the fighters. Kangaxx chose the wrong spell, and before he finished the right one - a True Sight one - he was dead.

Loot: The Ring of Gaxx and a Freedom scroll.

Next, the party went inside the Planar sphere, finished the vanilla quests, Teos left, party looted once again the magical container (same scrolls as before), defeated a Steam Elemental Prince (tactic identical to the one in WK lvl 2), who was hiding in one of the furnaces (first Marvella task), took the second Marvella task, travelled to Trademeet, bought a Jeweled Casket from a beggar near a tent, and travelled to Windspear dungeon level 2. Here they fought a Wind Master.

The Wind Master has a dangerous ability called True Whirlwhind, which, well, must not be released! It dispels all buffs and drags all nearby party members and summons towards him, rendering them unconscious and inflicting cold and electrical damage upon them for 2 rounds. Alia and Astarta defeated the enemy in a snap:

One
Two
Three
Four
Five

Loot - the Dragon Helm.

That's it for now, going to rescue Garren's child and then complete the vanilla Paladin stronghold tasks and 2nd Marvella's task inside the Five Flaggons Inn.

Level ups - Alia, now level 34.

[Saint of Sinners]

[quote]saros_shadow_follower wrote...

And finally, in IA 5.0 enemies didn't have cheating scripts, which trigger if: the PC is a fighter-mage of any kind, or the party consists of 4 or less alive party members. In IA 6.0 not only enemies have such scripts, but also certain powerful randomized items will not be dropped by the enemy if the party doesn't meet certain conditions (usually, alive party member count 5 or 6, and checks not only when battle ends, but several times in the dungeon as well, or upon entering - who knows for sure!).[/quote]

Seriously, this is one of the many things that I found quite jarring about it. It's not like it's an improvement, it's more of a major wipe of everything tactical and replacing it with something only pure powerplaying can have a feel for.

[quote]saros_shadow_follower wrote...

Of course, there is the monster improvement abilites too. In IA 5.0, golems didn't dispel illusions on hit, which made Mirror Image, Blur and Improved Invisibility a viable protection vs them. And also, very few enemies had the cheating Purge Magic ability (dispels all buffs unquestionably), whereas in IA 6.0 each bigger golem has the ability. And not only golems, but certain other enemies have it too.[/quote]

I've never really understood how this marriage of magic and golem-making came about. Back in PnP, this couldn't have been possible as they were trying to virtually set up an enemy that has no access to magic while being immune to magic themselves. Anyone who saw the beginnings of AD&D knew that this was courting danger on so many levels. Now, I don't want to go all purist, but a golem that can hit illusions, I can go for. But purging magic? It made no sense especially when you consider how magic attacks happen in light of the workings of the Weave.

[quote]saros_shadow_follower wrote...
Although these seem to be overpowered, I have to mention that Sikret's pet classes, like the Riskbreaker, aren't exactly vanilla either, as can be seen. Of course, this doesn't mean that the enemies aren't dangerous. To put it simply - even at present levels, if the tactic for a fight is picked unwisely, some party member may meet their untimely end by chunking very easily. Yes, even with physical resistances 65% or higher.[/quote]

Somehow, it's always struck me as taboo for creature files/stats to be messed around with. A couple of scripts or a lost ability restored is good, or adjustment of difficulties that actually seems realistic (like giving SoA mages access to HLA's because you can have them too, etc.) are great, but when a goblin heals at a rate of 2d6 per second, I must say that I am getting screwed somewhere very quietly.

[quote]saros_shadow_follower wrote...
The message board dealing with IA strategy is behind an 'iron wall'. It is on the BlackWyrmLair forums, and you have to pay them to even get access for reading the forum. Not worth it. Besides, frankly, the info there is more than scarce. Because Sikret (the mod's author) doesn't like discussions of difficult battle tactics, various item locations or new quests spoilers, and deletes such posts quickly. [/quote]

I have a vague memory of reading about this some time ago. God, I wish I can remember but my memory is failing me.

[quote]saros_shadow_follower wrote...
Plus, when the access to their forums was still open, I read a lot of the topics there and didn't find much new info, however I did found out that the players there have somewhat limited knowledge on many of the game's aspects. That includes Sikret too.[/quote]

Wait, so Sikret isn't really, well, that good of a modder? Isn't IA virtually all done by him (if not completely by him)? I'm a bit confused. By game aspects, do you mean the way the engine sees patterns or the way spells, abilities, scripts, etc. flow or do you mean the AD&D factor of it?

[quote]saros_shadow_follower wrote...
I post on G3 forums as well, however I don't participate in any feud. Still, some people from the G3 forums, most impotantly the bigg, helped me a lot with info about the cheating ways of the IA 6.0 itself. Like when I was trying to figure out why my Berserker-Mage doesn't get the Spell Immunity scroll from Pai-Na's treasure trove. Turns out that the scroll is deleted if PC is a fighter-mage of any kind.[/quote]

Yikes. Severe control issues on creator's part. I do clearly remember some kind of a fight or insult-throwing however, something about a Lord of Cheese or something.

[quote]saros_shadow_follower wrote...
Yeah well, many people play the mod, I'm simply the one that writes about it. The others play it quietly.
[/quote]

Well, you might not be alone soon enough if this piques my interest. Heh.

[quote]saros_shadow_follower wrote...
Helm's supreme golem:
That guy has hilarious resistances to every type of physical damage.
...
What else...oh right. The Supreme Golem gates in Elemental Golems in time. Each Elemental Golem gates in Gem and Coin golems.[/quote]

Ouch. This hurts my eyes. A golem gating in golems. Seriously. Someone end the Blood War already.

[quote]saros_shadow_follower wrote...
Since Sikret implemented new and powerful encounters, and left some of the old encounters untouched, there are hilarious differences in some battles. For example, Nalmissra and Aurnumach Rilmani are vanilla, as is Demogorgon, while the Orcish Horde is improved, and is a tougher fight than the three beforementioned ones together.[/quote]

That's either a classic mistake of not bringing up to par the old stuff or a big blunder on Sikret's part. Either way, this is disconcertingly inconsistent...

[quote]saros_shadow_follower wrote...
... because powerful battles require powerful party gear.
[/quote]

Every time I read The Crystal Shard, it amuses me to no end that the, spoilers ahead, dragon Drizzt and Wulfgar took on, they defeated without resorting to powerful equipment. Yeah, Wulfgar's got Aegis-Fang and Drizzt has Greater Whirlwind on full power all the time, but powerful equipment didn't do it for them. It was flawless strategy one after another. This is the reason why I prefer to, eventually, rely on arcanists when it comes to my runs. Eventually, all it boils down to is the proper spell at the proper time... and woe to me if a game forces me to find some ridiculous equipment that cannot be substituted with usage of a sound strategy half of the time.

[quote]saros_shadow_follower wrote...
Most enemies are simply upgrades over vanilla monsters, with increased level, hitpoints, THAC0, armor class, and almost all have some sort of regeneration. More powerful enemies usually are immune to all types of elemental/magical/poison damage, and are resistant to some types of physical damage as well. Of course, almost all tough enemies are immune to all types of disabling effects. Many enemies carry undroppable weapons which dispel certain protections on hit (specific, combat, illusion) or apply certain effects (Miscast Magic), or grant the enemies undispellable buffs (Improved Haste, others).[/quote]

Well, after all, a modification is a modification. Sometimes, I chuckle at changes as radical as this because I still believe that however different the changes made are, often--and I mean really often--the basis of these changes are still the personal preference of someone who tries to create a mirror image of a great game. I sometimes wonder if the creator can actually shine in his own creation.

Good luck with your run, Saros. I wish you all the luck. If I ever get tired of my solo runs, I might go IA eventually, but not any time soon. I've just rediscovered BGII and I don't want a reason to change my installation just yet.

God, it's 2am here already. Cheers everyone, and good luck with your respective runs. I'm running a parallel game right now with my blade. While Monty the Blade is doing fine, Meejee the Archer (yet again) is running a gauntlet of strategies with her bow, as I've been inspired by Shadow_Leech and I've been wondering myself if there is a way to pull of an all-bows game for an archer well until maybe before the Ascension itself. It's pretty impossible as I see Gesen losing some steam later on, but I'll still try.

Random note: I remember this one particular item from a Forgotten Realm novel (to avoid spoilers, heh) that nullifies all magic in an area that it virtually renders everything else useless except for pure strength and speed. I was wondering if it's kind of a good thing to make a quest off of that idea. Scripting is getting more time than my playing right now.

Modifié par Saint of Sinners, 27 juin 2011 - 06:08 .

[Alesia_BH]

Minor Encoutners in Sendai's Lair (Or a One Scroll Revolution)

Since reading Masanobu Fukuoka's One Straw Revolution, I've become a fan of doing nothing when the going gets tough. Fukuoka was commening on agriculture, but his central insight seems applicable to Baldur's Gate: sometimes, doing nothing is the best course of action.

Alesia created a few messes for herself in Senda's Enclave. Doing nothing won the day.

In the first case, she was startled by a pair of demons that detected her while invisible, she raced away, was revealed, and ended up getting trapped by a large crowd. She tried to fight them off, but found she was losing. So she did nothing.

More precisely, she went invisible, and read a Fireshield Blue Scroll while wearing Jan's Adventurewear and Roranarch's Horn. The Drow, Spiders, and other assorted critters stopped attacking -they couldn't see Alesia. The Demons could attack her, but alone, they couldn't do enough damage to threaten Alesia with her 75% Crushing Resistance. They ended up killing themselves on her Fireshield.

And once they were gone, Alesia was free to cut her way through the thickets. Nothing worked.


Shortly thereafter, Alesia fouled up the encoutner with Odamaron. She had Mazed him but put down a Spike Trap first instead of a TIme Trap. He rolled a one, came back, survived the single Spike Trap, and then called in a pair of Time Stop casting apprentices. The Lich himself unloaded a fair share of HLA spells- including Dragon's Breath and summon Dark Planetar. There was a lot of magic flying around the room. Alesia was over-matched.


And so she did nothing.

More precisely, she raced around the room countering spells looking for an opening.

Eventually, the Lich gated two Pit Fiends. The Pit Fiends fought each other, and then angered the Planetar- occupying her untill unsummoned. Eventually, one of Odamaron's apprentices finished him off with an Incendiary Cloud.

Nothing worked again.


Doing nothing may not always be the best move, but sometimes it works.


Best,

A.

Modifié par Alesia_BH, 27 juin 2011 - 08:38 .

[saros_shadow_follower]

@Saint of Sinners

You don't have to get tired of solo no-reload runs in order to test Improved Anvil. In fact, the ultimate solo challenge IMO is a run of IA 5.0. In that version, Sikret didn't manage to cripple solo runs by emphasizing on cheats which trigger if the party consists only of 1 F/M type. Any type of F/M can do it, without any cheats or exploits, even on a no-reload, but don't go for a Blade or you'll have tons of trouble in the last fight. It's probably easiest for a F/M/T though. Best if imported from BG1.

Anyway, the adventure continues. The party quickly disposed of Conster. And of his 8 Skeleton Lords, which Firkraag gates in in 4 groups of 2 Lords. Loot: a Manual of Elaboration and some spell scrolls. With Garren's child freed, the party reported to his cottage and were rewarded with a position in MNORH. Also, Bane and Jack gained an experience level. Jack is now lvl 33-23, has ** in Two-Handed weapon style, and grandmastery in Halberds, Quarterstaves and TwoHanded swords. Also, he has 8 Criticals, 1 Smite and 4 Hardinesses. Last HLA at lvl 34 will probably be Hardiness. Bane put yet another star (now ***) in Shortswords, and picked his tenth Critical Strike HLA.

Afterwards, the party took care of the vanilla Paladin Stronghold quests, including the fight with the Improved Baron Metrich. And they accepted the quest to slay Firkraag as well.

End.

[Alesia_BH]

Quick Note on Alesia's Game:

Alesia is in the middle of a tough fight with Sendai. I'm not sure she's going to pull this one out.

In the original battle, each of the statues activated, and then you fought Sendai herself. In the SCS version, the Statues activate together and fight along side the real Sendai. Alesia doesn't have enough room to operate.

The truly troubling thing is that the engine isn't registering Alesia's Magic Damage resistance. I first noticed the problem against Odaramon when he was getting full damage from Wilting while Alesia was wearing the Belt of Inertial Barrier. A moment ago, Sendai cast Improved Alacrity +Time Stop via Wish and unloaded a bunch of Flame Arrows along with half a dozen Chromatic Orbs/Magic Missles and a Wilting. Alesia's counter was Belt of Inertial Barrier + Potion of Magic Protection + Reflection Shield which should have shut the entire assault down cold. The Flame Arrows were sent back, but Sendai got credit for full Magic Damage- despite Alesia's 100% Magic Damage resistance. That's a problem...

We'll see how it goes. Wish her luck!


Best,

A.


Btw. I just thought I'd make a quick comment on IA.
 
Warren Buffett is fond of saying that a profitable deal isn't worth it to him if it causes him to interact with someone unpleasant. I concur and I'm inclined to see that as doubly true in recreational realms.

In the case of IA, use does lead one to interact with someone unpleasant. And as of the version I tried (4.0), the work wasn't nearly good enough to compensate.

My main concern was that IA "canalized' the gaming experience by restricting the set of viable characters, party compositions, and tactical avenues. Based on reports I'vve read, it's quite evident that Sikret has taken more draconian measures along those lines- invoking out right kill scripts for certain character/party compositions.

In sum, I feel Sikret's work compromises many of the features of Baldur's Gate that I enjoy. And I have little desire to interact with one who would -of his own free will- choose to foster development of a closed, authoritarian community. It isn't worth it. I prefer good work, done by good people. Fortunately, we do have good work by good people available to us. And fortunately, we have an open community where we can freely share our enjoyment of it. I'm not inclined to give that up. 

Modifié par Alesia_BH, 27 juin 2011 - 08:34 .

[corey_russell]

@Alesia: Good luck against Sendai.

Wait, in SCS you have to deal with ALL Sendai AND the drow adds? That's a bit much. Some of those Sendia have some pretty nasty AoE. Also to your question I don't know if this helps, but in my Resistances screen I have a Fire dmg resistance AND magic fire resistance, did you check those in your character screen? Maybe that's why you were injured, just a thought.

This is my personal opinion (and I could be COMPLETELY wrong) but ToB seems a lot less solo-friendly than SoA is. (massive adds - dwarven soldiers in Sendai's lair, Balthsazar's monks before you get into the fortress, etc.).

[saros_shadow_follower]

I incline to agree with Alesia_BH about the IA mod, however I simply find the other mods too easy, and thus not quite enjoyable. IA 6.0 isn't fun to play at all, but at least it is challenging and always keeps me on my toes. BTW if anyone is wondering why I'm exploiting rather than take on the initial fights at low levels - I don't have neither the time to spend several hours thinking about each improved fight's strategy nor the patience for it right now, besides this is an Anvil no-reload insane game after all. Fights are pretty challenging even with exploiting.

A quick note on Astarta's game:

Astarta and party defeated Tor'Gal, his three Noble Trolls, one Gem Golem and two vanilla Giant Trolls. Torgal is a high-level cleric himself. At present levels - the battle is more than easy. Astarta got the keep as stronghold as well, and is so far completing the vanilla fighter stronghold tasks, and assembling potions and scrolls via the Alchemy and Scribe Scrolls HLAs. Abundance of defence potions and Ghost Armor and Blur scrolls is required for the tough fights ahead, not to mention some clerical potions like those of Vitality and Elixirs of health.

The party also defeated a Noble Marilith and his two Abyssal Escorts. The whole thing happened on lvl 2 of the Five Flaggons inn. This is Marvella's second task, and the Noble Marilith dropped some gold and a Laeral's tear necklace, which the party used to forge their fifth +2 cloak of protection.

Torham gained a level, being now 35-18.

Will next fight with the improved Lord Roenall.

BTW, forgot to mention that IA enemies are immune to some spells and spell effects. For example, Lord Roenall is immune to Breach, which means that his Hardiness cannot be dispelled for the duration. More annoying, he's immune to all physical damage while under Hardiness. Immunity to Cloud spells is applied to all Improved Anvil mages, so that the cloud spell disruption strategy doesn't work at all in IA, and cloud spells are absolutely useless (well, except vs some vanilla enemies maybe).

Modifié par saros_shadow_follower, 27 juin 2011 - 10:02 .

[Alesia_BH]

corey_russell wrote...

Wait, in SCS you have to deal with ALL Sendai AND the drow adds?

Yup. And they're a lot smarter

Also to your question I don't know if this helps, but in my Resistances screen I have a Fire dmg resistance AND magic fire resistance, did you check those in your character screen? Maybe that's why you were injured, just a thought.

Thanks for the suggestion.

We're not talking Fire- pure Magic Damage (Magic Missle, Skull Trap, Vampiric Touch, Wilting, ETC). Alesia used the Reflection Shield to send the Flame Arrows back at Sendai only the Magic Damage dealing spells got through. The Belt of Inertial Barrier confers 50% and Potions of Magic Shielding confer another 50%. It registered as 100% in the resistance screen but she took full damage.

This is my personal opinion (and I could be COMPLETELY wrong) but ToB seems a lot less solo-friendly than SoA is. (massive adds - dwarven soldiers in Sendai's lair, Balthsazar's monks before you get into the fortress, etc.).

Well I disagree- in a sense. I don't think you can be wrong.

Whether the game is solo friendly or not in a given stage is a function of playing style. That differs from player to player. For some, it may be, for others, not. I find it to be reasonably balanced for soloing throughout, but for others who play differently, it might not be. If it isn't for you, it isn't.


Best,

A.

[corey_russell]

@Alesia_BH

Hmm to be honest, I haven't tried a solo run thru ToB yet (several times through SoA). In fact think I have a solo Fighter/Mage/Thief active (not no-reload) who had just beaten Illsaera. Maybe will go back to him when my Candar run finishes/ends. I guess what I am thinking is that sometimes some fights (like Draconis) can be touch-and-go even with a full party, so not sure how I could solo, but like I said haven't tried it yet so haven't crossed the proverbial road. Melissan also often gives me trouble with the no resting feature of those battles. Have only beat Mellisan twice (and not no-reload runs). I have only MADE it to Melissan no-reload once (from BG 1).

At this point, Candar the berserker is my 2nd best no-reload ever in terms on how far a character got from the humble beginnings of Candlekeep.

[AnonymousHero]

corey_russell wrote...
Wait, in SCS you have to deal with ALL Sendai AND the drow adds? That's a bit much.

It's an optional component. You can chose to forego many of these tactical challenges and just go for the smarter overall AI. It's a huge improvement over vanilla BG2 in terms of believability without having to go whole hog.

[Aldain]

Odrelomp and his valiant companions press inorexably onwards. The final few tasks in Amn are being seen to, as described below.

The internal Shadowthief problems in the Docks are dealt with swiftly and decisively. Rayic Gethras thinks a lone Globe of Invulnerability is enough to stay our wrath. He's wrong


The fight with Maevar doesn't even merit a screenshot, as we don't bother to waste spells on him, rather opting to rudely cleave him in twain.

We're almost done now, nearly every sidequest (except those of the companions Odrelomp has rejected) is done.
That vile fiend Kangaxx yet remains, however. Dangerous if you're careless, but not a problem with proper preparation. And Odrelomp is nothing if not cautious. We begin by summoning a host of Skeleton Warriors to both help defeat Kangaxx in his lich form, and hold his attention for a few rounds when he turns into a Demilich, so we can regroup/reposition if necessary


His Lich form kills a single Warrior with Death Spell, then moves towards the next to cast Sunfire. Perfect. We have the Warrior lure him into the western corner, meaning that once he turns into a Demilich, he won't be able to see our unprotected group huddling at the entrance to the east


Once the Warriors chop his Lich form to pieces, Kangaxx the Demilich arrives. He promptly imprisons our poor Warriors, but they've done their job: The group is safely tucked away outside Kangaxx's field of vision. Imoen and Aerie cast Melf's Minute Meteors along with Spell Immunity: Abjuration and Necromancy (I think he only uses his Howl once but better safe than sorry). Jaheira applies a Protection from Undead scroll on Minsc, and the three mighty champions charge in! Of course, we don't actually have time to do anything, as Kangaxx fails his first save against death invoked by the Improved Mace of Disruption, and turns to dust before our eyes...


Admittedly using a PfU scroll is slightly cheesy, but I had one lying around so meh. And I would've taken him down regardless, it just would've taken a few more rounds. At any rate, Kangaxx's lovely ring is ours, and Minsc promptly hogs it. He is now more of a tank than previously, having swapped his iconic two-handed sword for an axe and a shield.

Nothing remains now but to confront Bodhi. We head to her lair, killing her little vampire cohorts as we go. Imoen puts the beat down on some poor Guard


We proceed downstairs, buff like there's no tomorrow, and storm in. With the vampires in this room completely lacking magical support, there is little they can do.. but that damnable Drizz't just has to steal our bloody kill and XP


I considered force-attacking the bastard for a moment, but he vacates the premises so swiftly once he performs the dastardly deed I doubt I would have been able to hit him more than once. Grrr.

We shop for everything we could possibly need, and once done, we actually only have 74k gold left. Having a party of 6 with two being arcane casters means there's a lot of stuff you can use from the shops.
We take the time to clear out the after-thought areas around the Underdark exit, and have a bit of a scare when we, rather carelessly, engage some random unnamed goons without applying even the basest of buffs


That's Aerie reduced to 1 hitpoint. A critical by that Rogue, or indeed just a slightly better damage roll, and she could've very easily gotten chunked. Pure laziness on my part. And the close calls aren't over with yet.
We proceed to the forest featuring Coran, kill some werewolves (and actually manage to keep him alive with the help of a perfect Emotion from Aerie). Running into some Wyvern cultists, I opt for ridicolous overkill and hit them with two Firestorms and an Incendiary Cloud. I had not anticipated that the enemy mage somehow would get a Symbol: Fear off despite three area effects tearing away at his hitpoints.. nor did I expect Aerie, Imoen and Jaheira to fail their saves and promptly run straight into these three spells' area of effect.


Here I was fully expecting to see both Imoen and Aerie get burnt to an unresurrectable crisp. As if by some small miracle however, Odrelomp had memorized Greater Restoration that day. Casting it immediately bought our cowardly mages another round of life, and they somehow shook off the Fear effect in that time.. enabling me to move them out of the cloud a few seconds before they were destroyed beyond hope of recovery. LAST bloody time I use so many persistent area effect spells when not fully buffed...

With the minor areas cleared, we proceed to open the path to Suldanesselar. Suneer proves rather harmless, and he and his chronies are disposed of (it helps that we now have enough arcane slots to reliably take down a bunch of protection spells on enemy mages)


We proceed through the elven city, running into a rather silly golem spawn. Thankfully Minsc doesn't have to handle two adamantite golems at once, as they block each other


Raamilat is next on the chopping block. We anger him, he casts Time Stop, summons a Pit Fiend, and proceeds to try and kill it with his best spells. Once he eventually manages to Maze it, we storm in and put him down



The final major opponent before Irenicus, Nizidramanii'yt, is helpless before our might, and falls. Doom and a Finger of Death was all it took


We awaken the Leaflord and have him open the way for us. Even though low on spells, we opt to engage Irenicus as we are, without resting. The final protections we have available are administered, and we engage the dread archmage. We're prepared, scroll-wise, for a lengthy battle, but in fact Irenicus runs out of powerful spells rather quickly, and starts flinging endless Cones of Cold at our highly resistant Skeleton Warriors, who naturally overpower him, and he falls



Sucked into hell! Not a pleasant way to voyage either. Beacon of light that he is, Odrelomp opts for the Good solution to every dilemma he is presented with. Vile Beholders are no match for two Firestorms and an Incendiary Cloud (this time we buff with Remove Fear first to prevent a repeat of the Wyvern Cultist-debacle)


Alright, time to get serious here. There's nothing left to do but destroy Irenicus once and for all, and get out of this dreary place. Contingencies and Spell Sequencers are set up for Imoen and Aerie. We then devote a large number of our spell slots to long lasting protections. Below can be seen Odrelomp's saves and resistances once fully buffed



Should be very little for him to fear in the final battle. We open the final barrier, and Irenicus is unleashed. Imoen gets her Time Stop off before Irenicus, and spends the three rounds tearing down his protections. Jaheira, Valygar and Minsc get to work on reducing the foul sorcerer's demonic support, while Aerie tries to Breach Irenicus, and Odrelomp tosses about summons/Bolts of Glory as the situation warrants


The demons fall within a few rounds, by now victory would seem a foregone conclusion. We chase Irenicus as he teleports around a bit, and then finally corner him with several powerful summons and our own fighters mercilessly pounding him into submission


The Shattered One falls before our righteous might! Odrelomp is restored to life in the elven city, rewarded with a fine Elven amulet, and is eventually sent to speak with the elven gods. He has now graduated from SoA and moved into ToB, where he is sitting pretty, about to speak with the stone faces.

Odrelomp is now a level 23 Cleric of Lathander.

[corey_russell]

Congrats on taking down SoA no-reload, Aldain! Good luck in ToB.

[Alesia_BH]

Quick Note on Alesia's Game:

I'm sad to report that Alesia was killed by Sendai's Horrid Wiltings.

There is definitely a bug with Magic Damage resistance in my install though.

I just did a test in the Pocket Plane with the Efreeti. I had Alesia wear the Belt of Inertial Barrier and drink a Potion of Magic Shielding. This should confer 100% Magic Damage resistance. I then had the Efreeti cast Magic Missle on Alesia. He still rolled 5s.

I did a parrallel test with Fire Resistance. I got Alesia to 100% Fire Damage and had the Efreeti cast Flame Strike. Alesia was immune to the damage.

I even had her read a Protection from Magical Energy scroll as well. Again, full damage was getting through from Magic Missle...





Weird. Has anyone seen this before? Any idea how to fix it? Magic Damage resistance was working fine earlier.

Modifié par Alesia_BH, 27 juin 2011 - 11:20 .

[Alesia_BH]

AnonymousHero wrote...

It's an optional component. You can chose to forego many of these tactical challenges and just go for the smarter overall AI. It's a huge improvement over vanilla BG2 in terms of believability without having to go whole hog.

Absolutely- you don't have to install the Tougher Sendai Lair. I should have made that clear earlier.

I whole-heartedly recommend SCS.


Best,

A.

[Alesia_BH]

Opps...

Modifié par Alesia_BH, 27 juin 2011 - 11:18 .

[corey_russell]

Sorry to hear the end of your run Alesia_BH. This probably isn't much consolation, but when I played ToB (for the first time) I kept getting killed by Sendai and gave up playing ToB for a couple of years. At the old Bioware board, people gave me some help to get past the road block I was having.

Just saying even vanilla, very easy to have a run end when dealing with Sendai, much less with SCS enhanced Sendai. Seems like you gave a good showing.

[Alesia_BH]

corey_russell wrote...

Sorry to hear the end of your run Alesia_BH. This probably isn't much consolation, but when I played ToB (for the first time) I kept getting killed by Sendai and gave up playing ToB for a couple of years.

Thanks.

The thing is that Alesia shouldn't have died. Some of the Wiltings should have been stopped cold by 100% Magic Damage Resistance. The rest should have done 1/2 as much damage due to the Belt of Inertial Barrier. Something is broken here.

Best,

A.

Modifié par Alesia_BH, 27 juin 2011 - 11:39 .

[corey_russell]

@Alesia_BH: I may have some found something to maybe explain what happened Alesia. I pulled up shadow keeper and looked in the item browser and found this text for the potion of magic shielding:
"This powerful elixir imbues the drinker with 50% resistance to all forms of magical damage. The effect lasts for 3 turns, making this potion slightly more battle specific"
Note that it says it SETS it to 50% not PLUS 50%. But it's still a bit unclear because in the text immediately after it it says +50%! Guess what I'm saying maybe the potion is supposed to set to 50% not plus 50% magic damage resistance.

MORE INFO: Went to Mike's RPG Center web site and it says it SETS magic dmg resistance to 50% (I know its set there because other potions listed there have +50% etc. if it applies). You might be confused with the potion of magic BLOCKING which increases magic resist +50%.

Modifié par corey_russell, 28 juin 2011 - 12:21 .

[Alesia_BH]

corey_russell wrote...

@Alesia_BH: I may have some found something to maybe explain what happened Alesia
.

I appreciate the effort, Corey but you aren't on the right track.

Potions of Magic Shielding actually do increase Magic Damage Resistance by 50%. In Near Infinity, you can see INC/DEC rather than SET in the applicable field. I use Potions of Magic Shielding often and know how they work.

Further, even if Potions of Magic Shielding did set to 50%, that wouldn't explain why she'd be getting rolls of 5 against Magic Missle. It also wouldn't explain why a Protection from Magic Energy scroll wouldn't stop Magic Damage. Magic Damage resistance isn't being applied at all for some reason.

It's defintely a bug associated with this particular install. I tested in my BG1 install and and an alternate BGII install- everything works fine there and it was working fine in this one earlier.

The breakage must have occured sometime after I tried to uninstall the Tactics Improved Irenicus fight. The alternate copy of my install was made just prior to that attempt. In all likelihood, it happened in the actual attempt.

Hopefully, I can transfer her save game.

Best,

A.

Modifié par Alesia_BH, 28 juin 2011 - 12:39 .

[Saint of Sinners]

@Alesia

Please do not give up the run yet. It's just another bug, and if you are able to solve it, then continue as per the last time you got bugged (Ust Natha).

Do you have, by any chance, Shadowkeeper or NearInfinity installed? I think I can help, but only with some testing. I tested this on a newly formed character as well as with others and I can't replicate it.

What you do is set your base Magic Damage resistance to 127 and not use anything else that raises it. Then do the test again. I know that, at times, the game recognizes values above 127 as -1. I've seen this with luck, morale, and some other rather invisible stats. Should this be the case, just try setting it to 127 first, then get Alesia unarmed, and have yourself MM'd. If it still deals damage, it might be an engine problem.

The only time this can happen, I suppose, is if MM'd suddenly set itself to a Dispel/Bypass Resistance parameter, with No Save. Not even full protection can stop that (in scripting, they're found as the Gorion Magic Missile or Magic Missile Sure Damage, wherein one was used by Imoen on Irenicus upon exiting the opening dungeon).

BTW, if the test succeeds, set it back to 0, and put on your items one by one. There might be an invisible conflict between them. The game adds all the stats and bonuses from your equipped items in a certain order. That might also be a problem, especially if BoIB is equipped after something else.

Do try! All the luck to you.

EDIT: If you are amenable to it, you can send me a copy of your save and I'll read it up. If the Tactics component uninstallation did this, then it might be some leftover junk or some conflict with the items or spells themselves.

Modifié par Saint of Sinners, 28 juin 2011 - 12:40 .