15250 réponses à ce sujet

[Gate70]

Thanks; I started cropping them after seeing your initial results (also is your brightness turned up to eleven?)

[Gate70]

Vemric, LG human male monk. Travelling with Minsc, Jaheira, Yoshimo, Nalia and Keldorn.

Isaea Roenall spoils a good funeral then "arrests" Nalia but we soon have her free and him under investigation.

Timing is everything, and these guys don't have it.


Keldorn doesn't hear me obtain the golden nay, silver pantaloons, but our reputation is sullied 18, done my shopping anyway and Nalia is just as far away but has better hearing, scolding me from a distance.

Keldorn suggests we complete the Cult of the Eyeless and use any proceeds to buy equipment from Sister Garlena. Minsc equips and buffs, killing one gauth and scaring two more before switching to melee Azuredge and hacking into shadows I have been drained here so make sure he has negative plane protection.


Nalia steps up to magic missile one of the gauth while Jaheira summons a fire elemental. They needn't have bothered as Minsc powers through everything in moments. Nalia deals with a huge trap and our healing spells leave us with part of a rift device.

Modifié par Gate70, 12 septembre 2011 - 10:11 .

[Gate70]

Vemric, LG human male monk. Travelling with Minsc, Jaheira, Yoshimo, Nalia and Keldorn.

Thessal and minions are our first encounter as we search for the Unseeing Eye. Bracers of dexterity transform Keldorn AC goes from -5 to -9. Minsc takes the bracers and various other items as we enter the beholder lair.


Minsc clears the entire level of gauth and beholders, calling for help with the blind priest. Once the rift device is restored he attacks the Unseeing Eye. As he uses the device he is stunned so we rush to his aid. I kill the Eye but Keldorn has fallen to power word, kill. We pick up his gear and rest so Jaheira can cast Harpers Call.

Are you feeling better Keldorn? Looks like you are back to normal.


We return the rift device and deal with Gaal then sort out Anarg. May go for Imoen now, think I can do Spellhold but fish city and the underdark could be tricky.

Vemric, monk level 12. Unseeing Eye. 425 kills 172 of these from BG1.
Minsc, ranger 11. vampire. 180 kills.
Keldorn, inquisitor 11. Shade Lich, 115 kills.
Jaheira, fighter 10 druid 12. 103 kills, Glaicus.
Nalia, mage 12 thief 4. 72 kills, Firkraag.
Yoshimo, thief 14. 59 kills, Samia.

[Alesia_B_H]

Hi all.

I'm just dropping by to wish everyone luck. I thought I'd also mention that I'm getting in the mood for a run and may get back into action soon.

Good Hunting.

A.

[Serg BlackStrider]

@Alesia
Good to hear that!

Tiny update of BlackStrider & Co (not much time to play now...)
Band has defeated the rival guild (no issues at all) and (as it's nighttime now) planning to perform at Mae'Var Guild before Unseeing Eye quest.

to be continued... (hope it will be sooner than as of late )

[Gate70]

Vemric, LG human male monk. Travelling with Minsc, Jaheira, Yoshimo, Nalia and Keldorn.

Yoshimo lays three special snares, then three normal ones. Minsc and Keldorn equip themselves and we buff them up. But who are we expecting? No no no this is madness. Yes yes yes it will be fun. Shangalar wasn't expecting snares.


With him dead Minsc picks on Vaxall the beholder while we cast greater malison. Insect plague and hold monster stop Revanek for a while. A dispel has removed negative plane protection from Minsc so we pick on Shyressa who has drained him to level 7 I was a bit slow in noticing this. Vaxall has petrified itself while a pit fiend fireball killed Shyressa, crumples Vaxall and forced Minsc to gulp an extra healing potion despite the fear icon he's still OK, not sure why.


Keldorn takes care of the pit fiend with a mighty blow.


He dispels some buffs from Layenne with another hit, but Minsc dies trying to escape meteor storm? Layenne is trying to maze Keldorn but suffers the same fate as Minsc.


Layenne kills Revanek from the grave as we attack him. Keldorn is now mazed and I retreat injured.


We clear the room of loot, wait for Keldorn to return and leave. Jaheira calls Minsc back from the dead yet again and he drags us into a nearby building. No no no this is madness. Yes yes yes it will be fun.


Didn't feel I played the Twisted Rune that well but Yoshimo and Keldorn make a huge difference, much easier than the usual mess I make of it.

Vemric, monk level 12. Unseeing Eye. 425 kills 172 of these from BG1.
Minsc, ranger 11. vampire. 180 kills.
Keldorn, inquisitor 11. Shade Lich, 116 kills.
Jaheira, fighter 10 druid 12. 103 kills, Glaicus.
Nalia, mage 12 thief 4. 72 kills, Firkraag.
Yoshimo, thief 14. 61 kills, Shangalar.

[Gorthaur X]

Wierdo wrote...

Wierdo and her merry band are also about to enter Spellhold, having completed EVERYTHING (I think) in Chapter 2 and Watcher's Keep and killed Demogorgon, even Kangaxx. All with an install that includes SCSII, Ascension, Improved Vampires/undead, Improved Fiends and Smarter Mages/Priests.

I'm a bit late, but still: 1) that's awesome, and 2) I wish you'd have made a post on Kangaxx. That guy is a beast in SCS.

[AnonymousHero]

Serena the solo Monk (L38):

Serena went into the Illithid Lair... the mind control circlets were just too tempting. Her saves should be good enough under Shadow Stance and AC -13 is probably enough to evade most Illithid hits (Improved Illithid notwithstanding). She'd collected a bunch of Potions of Genius to counteract INT drain in an emergency.

After joining forces with the Gith to try to escape, Serena went to work on the Illithid. She used the Berserk Warrior to lure them. Most of the encounters involved a lot of trying to lure them away individually, but their Dimension Door ability made this difficult. Still, her incredible speed was sometimes able to break the groups apart. Solar Stance also seemed effective for breaking groups apart, but had the unfortunate side effect of sometimes pushing enemies through doors.

To preserve mind control circlets, Serena used the Slayer Form to open the first "impenetrable" door. Until now, Serena had been plodding along killing Ulitharid, but approaching the central room, she was suddenly completely surrounded. Fortunately, she was able to use Faster Than The Eye (teleport) to briefly escape from the Umber Hulks and Illithid which were bearing down on her. She used Ras to lure enemies into taking her on one-on-one. After thinning the groups things became more manageable.

By this time Serena was level 39. HLA pick: Dragon Fist (5 total).

Serena turned Slayer again, and went to take on the Master Brain. She used Solar Stance. Apparently, the Brain is vulnerable to the knockback effect, and ended up out of melee range. Serena killed the Illithid guarding the Brain. She used Solar Stance  to bring the Brain to Near Death status, and was able to finish it off using the Fire Tooth throwing dagger. The Brain Golems died last and Serena hightailed it out of there.

Serena had reached level 40 and her last HLA pick was Lunar Stance.

[Gate70]

Nice going.

Vemric, LG human male monk. Travelling with Minsc, Jaheira, Yoshimo, Nalia and Keldorn.

Time to rescue Imoen, but first we must deal with Alhelor and the five Sir's they are in the way and not going to negotiate.


Mage first then knights. Sir Beverus is last, and he knows when to run. Renal Bloodscalp wants proof of Mae'Var's treachery so we steal a necklace. On our way back we rescue some shadow thieves from Bodhi, although she scares and drains Keldorn to level 1 before I frighten her off.

With Keldorn restored Rayic Gethras is sword fodder and Marcus chooses to hand over some documents. Edwin tells me about some secret documents and Renal Bloodscalp asks me to deal with Mae'Var. I learn a new skill, where shall I try it?


Lassal kills Mook and drains me of two levels I HATE vampires. A pair of deserters and their contact put up a brief fight, then Aran Linvail asks me to sort out the vampire lair. He hands over a couple of treasures, and Nalia suggests Keldorn should wear the amulet for now.

Dermin interferes again and I fear Jaheira will leave us once more. At least she helps clear part of the lair, until we find a mace of disruption. Boo reminds Minsc what Cromwell said about the illithium so we retreat to get the mace upgraded, and for Minsc to reluctantly store Azuredge in his backpack what a waste, pity it won't dual wield in melee. Back to the vampires, and for Tanova to stun Keldorn before Minsc iMoD's her.

A greater ghoul holds Minsc but Keldorn slays it. I drag Lassal out and everybody attacks, but a quivering palm does the job.


So here is Bodhi, we are prepared.


Minsc and I hit her hard but Keldorn glugs an extra healing potion and hits her harder still.


Vemric, monk level 13. Unseeing Eye. 462 kills 172 of these from BG1.
Minsc, ranger 12. Vaxall. 189 kills.
Keldorn, inquisitor 11. Shade Lich, 146 kills.
Jaheira, fighter 10 druid 12. 111 kills, Glaicus.
Nalia, mage 13 thief 4. 75 kills, Firkraag.
Yoshimo, thief 15. 66 kills, Shangalar.

Modifié par Gate70, 15 septembre 2011 - 11:38 .

[Wierdo]

@Gate70

Thanks about the screenshots.

The way to make your's "brighter" and clearer is to save your screenshots as PNG files. That is all it is! Saving screenshots as PNGs seems to give surerior results compared to JPG or other formats. BMP is still good but the files are too large.

I like your way of taking the portraits and placing them on the pic near where the character is. It gives one a better sense of what is going on. Trouble is, as you get higher level (e.g. Wierdo) your characters can commonly be completely obscured by buffing icons.

Modifié par Wierdo, 16 septembre 2011 - 06:23 .

[Wierdo]

Gorthaur X wrote...

Wierdo wrote...

Wierdo and her merry band are also about to enter Spellhold, having completed EVERYTHING (I think) in Chapter 2 and Watcher's Keep and killed Demogorgon, even Kangaxx. All with an install that includes SCSII, Ascension, Improved Vampires/undead, Improved Fiends and Smarter Mages/Priests.

I'm a bit late, but still: 1) that's awesome, and 2) I wish you'd have made a post on Kangaxx. That guy is a beast in SCS.

Sorry, I didn't even take a screenshot! Terribly remiss of me.

Preparation is the key for Kangaxx. Being of relatively high level helps a lot too.

Having up front a monk like Bruce (+4 fists after finishing SOA:Ch2 and Watcher's Keep) and a paladin with Carosymr (high magic resistance), with potions of Magic Protection and Magic Shielding on top, really helps.

Wierdo herself was protected by spells like Spell Turning and SI: Abjuration, as was Annakin. Annakin was also berserk.

Starria (Cleric/Ranger) and Jaheira (Fighter/Druid) has to make so with Shield of the Archons.

Keeping the party spread out helps to minimise the imacts of spells like ADHW.

Summons like planetars and devas can help a bit too.

[Gate70]

Vemric, LG human male monk. Travelling with Minsc, Jaheira, Yoshimo > Imoen, Nalia and Keldorn.

Aran Linvail introduces us to Saemon Havarian, who takes us to Brynnlaw where we are met by Parisa, Del and Valen. Minsc snuffs Parisa with a single iMoD blow, moves to help Keldorn and does the same to Del but can't reach Valen before I kill her vampires are fun with two protective items and the mace.

With Chremy dead Calaham accepts 200gp to transport Ginia and her brother away. Then we take care of Perth the adept and witness the assassination of Sanik. After killing the assassin I pay a courtesan 50gp have the medallion but fancied some bartering we are inside "Lady" Galena's Festhall and free Claire. Greyhand fails to stop us finding Spellhold.

Minsc and Keldorn make short work of various mists and horrors, although a final group of shadows manage to energy drain Minsc NPP doesn't help there then?

I ask Yoshimo to travel light in case we need extreme caution, and we enter Spellhold. Yoshimo is forced to betray us and I'm subjected to a strange vision of facing Bhaal I clicked on the bouncer again so didn't lose any wisdom, naughty but nice. Afterwards we are discarded, as is Imoen. She takes Yoshimo's place, and we hand her some equipment then try to find our way out of a maze avoiding the strange trap of course.

Jaheira matches riddles to items, we kill a pit fiend and meet a genie who hands over some armour. Then I solve a series of faced statue riddles before moving on to umber hulks that almost kill Minsc and do kill Jaheira forgot to switch her from melee to ranged. I use a rod of resurrection charge and re-equip her.

Minsc borrows some gear from Keldorn to distract a larger group of umber hulks, after them we kill some yuan-ti. A greater mummy and a variety of skeletons are next no lich, thought there was one here so not sure if it varies by level.

Keldorn has to un-charm Minsc during our next battle.

I tried JPG and PNG of same edited TIFF (had to go BMP to TIF as GIMP won't open a BMP for me). JPG version;


PNG - see if it looks any different; Quite a bit brighter...


We find a bag of holding before we return to the genie portal. A greater wolfwere is despatched I guess the genie shouldn't have handed the armour over earlier. Our exit takes us through what may be the face of Dace.

All goes well on the next level until I move ahead and confront Bodhi. My blood boils and I turn into the slayer. Bodhi finds this interesting and decides to run off and tell Irenicus so I rock to and fro until my temper cools. As we prepare to exit I change again and chase Minsc. He's remarkably cool about it.

A series of apparitions pass uneventfully, although I use my haste and boots of speed to snaffle any loot on the way. We face Irenicus, and are strong enough to make him run. Shades of ourselves are left to be defeated, then Yoshimo is forced to attack us. I take his heart in case it can be purified.

Saemon offers us passage, I agree then we turn back to deal with a stone golem and loot the remaining room in Spellhold. Then we head back to Brynnlaw and agree to steal a ship for Saemon. But first we must have a good nights sleep.

Vemric, monk level 15. Unseeing Eye. 493 kills 172 of these from BG1.
Minsc, ranger 13. Greater wolfwere. 244 kills.
Keldorn, inquisitor 13. Shade Lich, 189 kills.
Jaheira, fighter 11 druid 13. 122 kills, Perth the adept.
Nalia, mage 14 thief 4. 86 kills, Firkraag.
Imoen, mage 13 thief 7. 7 kills, umber hulk.

Modifié par Gate70, 16 septembre 2011 - 10:06 .

[corey_russell]

Gate70 wrote...


Minsc borrows some gear from Keldorn to distract a larger group of umber hulks, after them we kill some yuan-ti. A greater mummy and a variety of skeletons are next no lich, thought there was one here so not sure if it varies by level.

The undead encounter does indeed vary depending on levels - perhaps it just averages the total levels of all party members and I see a multi-class and a dual-class in your group so that probably brought the levels down.

Modifié par corey_russell, 16 septembre 2011 - 11:31 .

[corey_russell]

Corey the Level 7 Inquisitor entering the challenge...

Corey and his fellow 5 paladins have made it no-reload through BG 1. As this is a trilogy no-reload run, they are now entering the BG 2 no-reload portion. As usual, when importing my characters into BG 2, the HPs are wrong again. I think I finally discovered why it's happening, though not how to fix it. The PCs that had their HP wrong, they ALL had used tomes to increase their base stats. The PCs that did not use tomes HP were unaffected. In any case, had to use shadowkeeper to fix them to match their BG 1 HP.

Here are the characters and their proficiencies:

Joshua's Character Sheet
** Flails
** Axe
** Long sword

Hanna's Character Sheet
** Halberd
** short bow
** War Hammer

Lily Gene's Character Sheet
** Axe
** Dagger
** War Hammer
The axe and dagger proficiencies I'm trying to use for missile weapons, as cavaliers can't use missile weapons.

Uriah's Character Sheet
** Spear
** quarterstaff
** crossbow

Paja the "loremaster" character sheet
** short sword
** quarter staff
** short bow

Corey's character sheet
** 2-hand sword
** long bow
* mace
* shortbow

They are currently working their way through Irenicus' dungeon. Somewhat suprisingly, Joshua had his fists selected, and managed to hit for 22 points with them, not bad for a non-monk. The starting equipment is clearly not for a full party, not enough armor to go around, so Corey and Paja have to trudge around naked at the moment.

Modifié par corey_russell, 17 septembre 2011 - 01:06 .

[Grond0]

Risque has completed BG1 as a fighter and has just worked her way through the dungeon.  I normally use ranged tactics with my fighters, but she has grand mastery with axes and no other weapon proficiencies.  Therefore she used melee exclusively, except that the 5 throwing axes found were just enough to take out the cambion.

There were a few moments of danger:
- one of the mephits in the elemental plane stunned her and she took considerable damage before coming to her senses.
- she was using the horn of Kazgoroth to try to protect against magic-users as far as possible, but still had to save or die twice - once against charm person from the clone coming out of invisibility and once against chromatic orb from the battlemage (I was surprised when she suddenly went hostile, while still fighting the vampire, when I had done nothing to provoke her).

I had been umming and aahing about whether to dual to a wild mage at level 9 or 12/13.  I finally decided that there was very little benefit to waiting, but unfortunately did not dual until after leaving the dungeon (if done just before leaving the quest experience would have given a nice kick-start to the mage).  Experience from learning scrolls is significantly nerfed in my install, but learning all the scrolls from the dungeon + a few bought outside still got her up to level 4.  I now need to think about what should be done next to get XP without having to use spells if at all possible.

Mods installed (that affect BG2) are:
BG2 Fixpack
BGT
Chosen of Mystra Encounters
Unfinished Business
SCS
Solaufein
G3 Anniversary
BGT Tweak
Turambar Fixes and Tweaks
SCSII
BG2 Tweaks
Item Pack
Atweaks
Worldmap
Widescreen
Generalised Biffing

[corey_russell]

Corey the level 8 inquistor and 5 paladin friends adventure continues...

When we last heard from Corey and the gang they were working their way through Chateau Irenicus. The only detail of note is that we did not try to loot everything in Ellesime's bedroom - just the portal key. This was to conserve heal potions.

When we saw daylight, we saw our captor exchange blows with Imoen, but then some wizards took them both away. I suppose we should chase after Imoen, she did get me out of my cage...that powerful wizard needs to be stopped as well, though he is under guard now, is he still a threat to others? Not sure, need more information. (entire party leveled to 8 at once)

After selling our junk, we examined our situation. Joshua still had a +1 long sword. Hanna doesn't have a magical weapon, nor does Lily Gene. Joshua has a +1 quarter staff, Paja has a few magical arrows, and Corey has the sword of chaos. To solve the circus problem think we just need to give the other front-liner (Hanna) a magical weapon. She used a halberd to defeat Sarevok, so looked for one of those, no cheap +1 Halberds, though just a +2. So we spent 4500 of our 4900 gold and bought that for her.

We then investigated the circus. A genie appeared, but just had a riddle for that. Paja with her 19 INT solved it easily. Then we found an ogre with a woman's voice (or is it a little girl, hard to say). She wanted us to get a sword for her she said it would free it. We decided to humor her, if she was really an ogre, she will not survive the betrayal. After killing some "peasants" turned orc, we returnd the ogre's sword and appeared this ogre was telling the truth - she was a avariel. She wanted to join us and I thought about it - do I want a scrawny, whiny, inexperienced little girl, or a tough, armored, strong and experienced paladin? Told her we would solve this problem and wait here.

Next room had some werewolves and shadows, but turns out the werewolves were illusions dispelled by Paja's True Sight.  Met that dang genie again - he's not attacking us, so guess that's OK. Finally found the master mind of this nonsense, Kalah. We let hiim have it, and he took fatal wounds almost immediately. He had some random final comments and died. Turned out he had a charisma ring -- Joshua is a natural 18, so he doesn't need it. I put it on Paja for now, guess we might be able to charm something sometime.

We didn't see anything else of interest and tried to leave the area -- all the roads were closed except the road to slums, guess are headed there. Met an odd character named Gaelan Bayle -- he said he could help us, for a price. We are sorely lacking information right now, and more allies might be helpful, so we agreed for now.

We met Corvale and his dwarven buddy by the Copper Coronet. The two of them tried to tell the 6 of us to move out of his way, I think we had the right of way. We more or less told him that and he decided to attack. A bad call on his part.

We had a few things to sell and talked to the owner of the Copper Coronet. He had some gambling operations going on, but it wasn' t the usual variety, so we decided to take a look. We opened a door in the back and found some cells. A guard yelled for us to leave, I just asked him what his name was, and he and his friends attacked us. Thanks to Corey and Paja the inquistors, their mages were not effective. Talked to a slave named Hendak -- appears this operation is unjust, might as well free them while we are here, but first he says we need a key from a beastmaster.

The beastmaster had various animals and gibberlings, but the party is well versed in dealing with such creatures by now. Hanna's halberd was way too much problem for the beastmaster. We took his stuff, the bow gonig to Paja, and his plate toHanna, and the dead chainmail going to Paja since it requires low strength to use. We gave the key to Hendak, and helped him liberate the place, just had to deal with a few more guards. Hendak asked us to deal with more slavers, we agreed to when we could find the time. But now we thought we would help that noble named Nalia.

We tried to head for the gate but got ambushed by Suna Sunai. That group of slavers weren't a match for the party, though we did have to gulp a few heal potions. Then we found some thugs picking on a sick man named Rielev I think. The thugs were simple enough to deal with, but another side track, to the docks now.

At the docks found a vampire fighting some shadow thieves. We attacked the vampire and it died almost instantly. Suppose that isn't a suprise with two undead hunters at the front of our column. Some muggers appeared as well, but someone shoudl have told them that if a battle occurs between guys in leather and non-magical weapons vs. guys in plate mail and magical weapons, the leather will lose, which in fact they did. Moved a bit further and found a cleric of Cyric who attacked us. We had to mow him down.

Finally we get to Rielev's friends' building. They take him off our hands, but with all these ambushes we actually have some junk to sell. So we sell at the shadow thieve's building, and realize we have just enough for the +2 medium shield at Ribald's. That extra AC will help Joshua a lot at D'arnise Keep, we would think. So we get that for him and finally are on the road to the Keep.

But wouldn't you know it, now we get ambushed by these rather large fellows, called Orogs Paja tells me. This challenged our party far more than any previous ambush - the party gets battered but wins the fight without a casualty. We had to use quite a few heal potions, though.

We finally meet up with Naila at the Keep. She finally tells us who is attacking, its trolls. Fortunately we had bought the stonefire from Bernard, so that shouldn't be too much a problem.  We tell her to stay out of harm's way, we will take care of this.

We had reclaim a lot of equipment, but the 1st level of the keep was successfully cleared. The 2nd level however had some meaner opponents. We found a yuan-ti mage -- the party all charged except Corey. Corey stayed a bit back so that he could dispel any confusion that might be cast. However, Paja's tactic was superior (well she does have 13 more INT than Corey does) -- she cast dispel magic at the mage, and then he was cut down in one round.

Nearby, we found a guard named Glaicas who had gone turncoat. We had to cut him down, using the most powerful ammo that we had available. The full plate went to Hanna, putting her AC with the halberd at -4. We found a room of golems the same level -- fortunately we could fight them one at a time, so they weren't any trouble. The treasure they were guarding was quite helpful -- warhammer went to Hanna to be used againts any future clay golems we encounter. The Elven Court Bow went to Corey - his Thac0 is now 4 - not bad at all for a level 8! The frost axe went to Lily Gene, though most of the time she will be using the Azuredge.

In the dungeon (strange how the dungeon is accessed by the top floor rather than the main floor), the party encountered 3 more trolls, but simply dispatched. Then Joshua pulled some Umber Hulks, trying to do 1 or 2 at a time. The first pull he got 1 and killed it easily. Next pull he got 2 and go confused. Corey dispelled magic the confustion however, and so Joshua lived. The last pull was 2, Corey was out of dispel magics at this point so told Paja to do it. Joshua was dying, told Paja to do it again but nothing was happening. Turned out Paja was "caught" on a door. If I had just targeted the floor instead of Joshua (who was trapped in the doorway), Joshua would have lived but ended up dying. The party avenged his death, but then did the long trek to a temple. This is the first death -- in a way it's a good thing, because now Corey knows what the next major purchase will be - rod of ressurection!

We finally return and Joshua is able to pull the biggest troll yet, named Torgal we believe. Again, everyone had the most powerful ammo equipped such as arrows fo biting, piercing and bolts of lightning. Paja activated her arbane's sword and was firing a ridiculous amount of shots per round (she already get 4 attacks per round NATURALLY). Torgal died fast. We finish off his two buddies who didn't help him, and Corey busted a lock open to get some items (we haven't been paid yet).

We report our success to Nalia and she gives us a whopping 650 gold - I think our risks were more than that. However we are paladins, so let that stand. We do feel battle hardened though, as if we might gain new skills soon.

[Gate70]

Welcome back Corey, Grond0. Dualling to a wild mage sounds interesting.

[Gate70]

Vemric, LG human male monk. Travelling with Keldorn, Jaheira, Nalia, Imoen and Minsc.

Imoen buys a couple of restoration scrolls and learns lower resistance from an unmarked store, then we rest until night, steal a horn and a ship before being attacked by Githyanki and Sahuagin.

I agree to help the Sahuagin king gauntlets of crushing please. After obtaining the Cloak of Mirroring, boots of etherealness, a cloak of protection +2 and Sekolah's tooth we track down the rebel prince. A brief battle ensues and I have my gauntlets. On to the Underdark.

We buy more scrolls from a merchant before we haste two skeletons, a fire elemental and a Mordy. These four deal with three mindflayers, then help with drow clerics and warriors before finishing off spore colonies.

Imoen uses a scroll of freedom to release Vithal. Then we empty a soul machine, kill some Kua Toan's and head into the Swirf village. After some trading and the use of a stoneshape scroll we return to Vithal. He rewards us handsomely, then a drow war party falls to our buffs. Adalon has a job for us, but first we take a detour. Danger, but nothing quivering palm then hasted FoA and Carsomyr can't stop.


I insist on Minsc taking the belt and braces approach. Or this time the belt, bracers, shield and cloak approach.


We buff chaotic commands, protection from evil, etherealness him and send him off. A few mind flayers, gauth and beholders are no threat now, neither is a second elder orb. He finds a greenstone amulet and we return to try the other tunnel.

Flayers. We are forced to fight in a tournament then meet a type of creature we've not met before oh except for those other githyanki who we fought on the ship remember. We forge a plan with them to break out of our captivity.

As the githyanki distract the mindflayers we explore. Our hastened progress cuts through the few flayers around. Keldorn gets stunned and drained so Jaheira uses Harper Call again. Nalia has grown in experience, so summons two skeleton warriors. They don't last long so we continue on our own. We defeat the master brain, only for Minsc to be de-brained in the final room. Jaheira calls him back again.

Next, the drow city.

Vemric, monk level 17. Unseeing Eye. 560 kills 172 of these from BG1.
Minsc, ranger 14. Balor. 304 kills.
Keldorn, inquisitor 14. Shade Lich, 227 kills.
Jaheira, fighter 12 druid 13. 135 kills, Perth the adept.
Nalia, mage 15 thief 4. 90 kills, Firkraag.
Imoen, mage 15 thief 7. 12 kills, drow.

[corey_russell]

@Grond0: the trademeet problem can be solved with just invisibilities, how about that?

[Grond0]

@corey_russell.  Trademeet would have been a possibility, but I didn't want to get ambushed until better prepared so have stayed just in Promenade and Slums so far.  Risque has made decent progress, though has needed a bit of luck.

- with funds from the dungeon bought boots of speed from Ribald and headed for a day at the circus.  Ignored the werewolves and shadows and went straight for Kalah and quickly finished him.   The various XP from that outing got Risque up to level 7. 
- in the Slums had an argument with Cohrvale and Bregg.  With only puny sling damage that took a long time to resolve, while Risque ran round and round (though a guard did help out a bit).  Their XP got Risque to level 8.
- in the Copper Coronet Amalas challenged Risque to a duel.  She tried using spells under protection of chaos shield, but unfortunately managed to hit Nalia with a wild magic missile (Nalia was not visible, but obviously within targeting range).  Rather than have to use several hundred sling bullets against Amalas or risk more wild surges after chaos shield had worn off Risque used her fists (which were her best weapon at that time) to knock him unconscious before finishing the job with her sling.  On finishing the battle there was no sign of Nalia - guess she must have got the hump for some reason (lucky this is a solo attempt).
- liberated the Copper Coronet for Hendak.  The animals were taken down with the sling using Risque's greater mobility.  The guards were a mixture of sling, fist and Bhaal powers.  That provided Risque with level 9 - only 1 more to go.  She was also now able to buy the sling of seeking to speed up similar future encounters.
- down in the sewers some hobgoblins were chewed through (ring of human influence got a rare outing here to cause dissension in the ranks while Risque targeted the shamans).  She took staff proficiency at level 6 and used a +1 staff on the mustard jellies.  I was again surprised at how high a level some things are casting - only just saved against a mental domination from the kobold shaman.  Really should get some better spell defenses, though I'd been trying to get fighter levels back before organising that. 
- further on in the sewers there's a party of high level thieves who needed preparation.  After quite a bit of resting Risque managed to get a stoneskin prepared and dragged a couple of thieves away to their doom.  More resting took care of the other two and got Risque up to level 10 - regaining her fighting abilities.  No more criticals means at least one less thing to worry about. 
- went to purchase Azuredge and then recovered Lilarcor - that covers charm and confusion.  Used Azuredge to overcome Captain Haegan and his merry men before nipping back to Bernard again to sell equipment and buy Stonefire axe and sell/buy wand of fire from the dungeon.  That made the trolls easy.  Released the children before going all the way round the other side of the slavers HQ to avoid a game-ending trap. 
- strength of 23 was insufficient to break the slavers' door down, so went for a rest before knocking it down instead.  Also had to hurry inside before the mage police could talk to Risque, as she had already been cautioned for casting friends in a public place.  One of the mages got off a confusion, but Lilarcor countered and then both of them were confused in turn, which made finishing off the slavers relatively easy.  With the reward purchased a few more scrolls and a couple of protective potions.

Apart from Nalia there have been quite a few wild surges.  I've seen descriptions saying the chance of a wild surge is both 1% and 5%; I think my experience so far is probably more like 10%.  None of the results have been too bad (in nearly all cases I've had chaos shields).  There was one fireball, which damaged Risque, but that was actually helpful as it doubled up with a flame arrow to damage one of the thieves.  I was hoping that the Bhaal powers would not be subject to wild surges as they are non-standard spells, but I was disappointed here.

I think Risque probably will head to Trademeet fairly soon.  I seem to remember they sell minor sequencer there, which she could do with to speed up casting chaos shield.

[corey_russell]

Corey the level 8 inquisitor and fellow adventuring paladins...

We decided now was the time to deal with that slaver problem, but first we had to go through the sewers, as we are too weak to bash the slaver's door in an no thief, so...First we encountered some hobgoblins. You would think these hobgoblins would have heard of all the ones we have already defeated and pass up the fight, but no was not to be. They were beat with just PfE buff.

We found in various places, a hand, ring, staff, and some blood in the sewers. Then when we put these things into some pipes we got a powerful 2-hand sword. This went to Corey. The party is all stronger now as well (level 8). 2/3 of the party can cast a single level 1 spell as well - we had them memorize heal. We had to be real careful, as Paja's sharp eye noticed a petrification trap. We had a bad scare when Joshua was trying to get the staff from some kobolds and he set it off - fortunately he saved. After selling the junk we collected here and returned and entered the slaver's moored ship.

Standard buffs again (PfE, true sight and remove fear). The party's melee/ranged power was way too much for these slavers. Found two trolls threatening children, but thanks to stone fire easily dealt with. We found color spray trap so had to work to avoid being hit by it. While dealing with some Yuan-ti and getting the party past the trap one at a time some one got spotted when we weren't ready -- uh oh. Nothing to do about it now, charge! Things were going good at first then Uriah got held. He was getting picked on by the slavers so people that had a few heals left were trying to help him, but it was all for nought as a slaver wizard fired a lightning bolt into the group, right at Uriah, killing him. Fortunately he was still resurrectable. Time to pick up the junk and head for a temple (could have actually done resurrection wand, but forgot about - I had to ID some things in any case, in particular a +1 cloak we found, which went to Joshua).

So on our return we continued to loot items not nailed down. Corey's DUHM was enough to bash some chests though he had to eat some traps. We were all done and wanted to leave, but I really didn't want to painstakingly walk around the petrification trap in the sewers, so we walked to the door. Well this wasn't the greatest choice either, as most of the party now were poisoned due to that trap on the small stairs. Enough is enough -- party is definitely getting some antidotes so we don't lose anyone to poision next. We had enough money to buy some full plate from Ribald for Joshua, and Joshua's +1 plate went to Paja. Joshua is now -6 AC and Hanna -5 AC, think now is a good time for Trademeet.

The Trademeet genies were dealt with my "standard" way -- protection from petrification on Corey and stone to flesh scrolls on Corey to restore party members. We killed the genie outside the tent, to get the genie lamp. We walked inside and sure enough Joshua got turned to stone. Paja was able to fix him, however. After reporting our results to the guildmistress, Joshua will use the shield of harmony, and Lily Gene will use the +2 medium shield. Since the SoH doen's help with missile weapons, we had just enough to buy Joshua the cloak of displacement to help with that.

We headed to the druid grove and battled trolls, spiders and shadow druids. The 2 front-liners tanked great, and in particular both Hanna and Lily Gene got a lot of criticals. Paja with her 4 APR and Corey with his 3 APR were going through arrows like they are out of style. Would like to get the ammo container in Watcher's Keep, but not sure that is a good risk with no way to disarm the many traps there. Found a belm but no one will be dual-wielding, so just sold it. We found Cernd and he challenged Faldorn successfully, problem solved. Even though Cernd is the guy that did the deed, Trademeet gave us the rewards, interesting how that worked.

After the reward ceremony, we approached by two nobles who want us to get a circlet. We have to get past some undead, so that seems like a worthy challenge. Hanna and Joshua being undead hunters, the undead did not last long. We gave the circlet to the Mayor, no reason to risk unnecessary bloodshed.

Modifié par corey_russell, 17 septembre 2011 - 07:20 .

[Grond0]

Risque's run came to an end in the druid grove.  Having already taken out the genies it seemed only fair to do the same thing to the rakshasas.  Ihtafeer was already dead and the second about to die when this happened.  I don't know what killed her, but it was obviously some form of instant death magic - it does annoy me that the game does not give you the opportunity to see the text explaining what killed you.

[corey_russell]

Grond0 wrote...

Risque's run came to an end in the druid grove.  Having already taken out the genies it seemed only fair to do the same thing to the rakshasas.  Ihtafeer was already dead and the second about to die when this happened.  I don't know what killed her, but it was obviously some form of instant death magic - it does annoy me that the game does not give you the opportunity to see the text explaining what killed you.

My guess is flesh to stone, since most normal buffs don't protect against that. You specifically have to put protection from petrification on yoru character. Well ok guess you don't if you have 100% magic resistance.

In any case, sorry to hear the end of your run. Grond0, didn't you say you haven't even beat BG 2 yet? Shouldn't you wait to add difficulty mods to it until after you do?

Modifié par corey_russell, 17 septembre 2011 - 11:51 .

[Grond0]

Could have been. Might also have been power word: kill. If she was hit by the other rakshasa at the same time she would have been somewhere around the 60 HP mark.

[corey_russell]

Corey the level 10 inquisitor and his fellow paladins continue their adventure...

We met Renal Bloodscalp and agreed to help him with Maevar. While we doing odds and ends for Maevar we ran into Sansuki and 3 vampires. By this point I had already paid the shadow thieves, so a fight was going to happen. The undead hunters proved their worth several times, as they got hit and not level drained. Paja however DID get level drained -- she ran all over the place while a vampire chased her. Eventually the party killed the other two vampires and finally killed Paja's vampire for her. Overall the party handled it well, I'm pleased with the party's peformance.

As always, in my opinion, the hardest task is taking care of Rayic Gethras. With two inquisitors though the battle went something like this -- go upstairs, dispel Rayic's protections -- he's dead. He died so fast, I didn't even realize he was dead (thought he went invisible).

Battling Maever's thieve's went mostly okay. However, even with 2 true sights running, Uriah must have got hit with a huge backstab and killed. Rod of resurrection time...the rest of the guild, including Maevar himself was defeated using basic buffs and melee/ranged. Took two trips to loot everything. We reported our success to Renal Bloodscalp and the whole party except Joshua got to level 10. Oh we also killed Dirth in the Sea's Bounty since there's no rep loss for doing that, mainly for his full plate for an upgrade for Lily Gene. We also defeated some pirates hiding out at the Sea's Bounty, fairly easily.

We are feeling pretty tough, so headed for the Temple Sewers. Before proceeding further into the sewers, buffed with PfE, remove fear, bless, armor of faith on the 2 meles, true sight and DUHM on Corey. We move into visual rane and Tarnor wants us to give him 1000 gold. No can do. The entire party has ranged weapons equipped and we target Gaius. Corey fires dispel magic at Gaius couple of times to remove his defenses. Eventually the ranged attacks were effective and Gaius went down. With him down, now we don't think anyone should die.

One of the other casters got a stun off we believe - Lily Gene was out of action and dying, we had to use a Rod of Resurreciton wand to keep her alive. This didn't stop Rengaard from falling. Joshua managed to kill Tarnor and got a fitting reward for removing this menace, level 10. Paja then kills Gallchobhair and now it's 6 on 1 - their fate is sealed.

The full pate +1 will go to Paja, as soon as we sell the junk from this battle as then we can afford a STR belt for her so she can wear it. The +2 throwing axe will go to Joshua, he no longer has to carry around non-magical throwing axes, which will help his looting since they are so heavy. The rest was sold. We go to Ribald's and get Paja equipped. Feeling pretty confident after that last battle, we decided there was another belligerent group around lead by Mencar Pebble Crusher.

Our strategy was basically the same as against Tarnor, a few buffs, the two melees keep Mencar busy, rest of the party range attacks the mages, and the inquisitors keep the mages defenses down. This worked like a charm. Brennan Risling escaped, but we don't really need the invisibility ring (paladins have sanctuary!). Corey was stunned, but being in the back he never got hurt. Mencar had trouble connecting with Joshua (Joshua has -9 to blunt weapons) so he only had to potion a few times and then Mencar fell. Victory without casualty is now certain.

Uriah received Mencar's full plate. Now the entire party is using full plate plus a +1 save/AC item except Paja, who is using full plate +1. Despite Paja's horrible DEX, she finally has an acceptable AC (zero).

I think the party's equipment is finally stable enough that it makes sense to show the party's equipment and configuration at this point, so here they are:

Joshua
Hanna
Lily Gene
Uriah
Paja
Corey

As you can see, Hanna got the best HP rolls by far with her 113 HP. We use her to set off traps, since she's the mostly likely to survive it.

Modifié par corey_russell, 18 septembre 2011 - 12:38 .