Guttax the half-elf cleric/range - update 2
Traveling with: Khalid, Minsc, Jaheira, Imoen, Dynaheir, (Garrick)
The team successfully rescued Dynaheir - due to engine limitations we had to kick out Garrick. Garrick is relaxing at the now safe Gnoll Stronghold...guess he figures no one will bother him there.
Now that have Dynaheir, there are a number of quests to accomplish. The first one we did was search the area S-S-SW, per Bjornin's directions, for the 4 half-ogres. We cleared the area of hostiles and reported to Bjornin - Khalid got a much needed +1 shield.
We decided we really should deal with this Bassilus fellow, he's a threat to the population. We explored an area where he was rumored to be and found a talking chicken named Melicamp - when we get time will go to Thalantyr's and see if Thalantyr can restore him (incidentally, Melicamp did not survive). But before that we have a pretty difficult battle with a strong hobgoblin (Zorgal I think) and two elite hobgoblin archers - Khalid is getting repeatedly poisoned and used up all his antidotes, we had to hand him one and Guttax and Jaheira had to spam heals on Khalid to keep him in one piece - but everyone lived and the hobgoblin bandits eventually succumbed to our attack. A nice short sword went to Imoen.
The battle with Bassilus was tough. For one, Guttax did the response options that Corey_Russell would actually say - this resulted in a mass battle with both Bassilus and the many skeletons and zombies nearby. We don't have fireballs or anything like that. Khalid was closest to Bassilus so he opened with a invulnerability potion - the rest of the party opened fire on Bassilus himself with range weapons. Khalid got hit with rigid thinking and starting attacking party members - this was disrupting our attacks on Bassilus. Khalid even was trying to kill Jaheira and got a good hit on her - Jaheira and Guttax did entangle, partly to root Bassilus but also to lower the defense scores of the skeletons so we can kill them quicker. Basically who wasn't being attacked by Khalid continued attacks on Bassilus and his friends - Bassilus down, Minsc charges into melee on the undead. Khalid and Imoen are being sniped, Imoen runs around trying to get out of the range of the skeleton attacking her (which isn't hard since its still entangled). Khalid finally regains his senses - he gulps two blue potions and with his help the undead soon all fall.
We report to Keldath our success, and spend a huge chunk of our reward on potions, both blue and antidotes - the Bassilus area just drained us to almost none. We also bought a magical long sword for Khalid.
The next quest was finding the stealth boots for the halfing in the central inn at Beregost. We found them and returned them to the halfling (though from a meta-gaming point of view I would never do so if I have a thief, which I do this run). We also buy AC 8 bracers for Dynaheir (because from RP view we don't know about the bracers at the Xvart Village) and with our last spare change shield amulet for Dynaheir.
We got in ambush about this time, but the party held their ground and did ok as you can see.
There's a lot of things we would get but no more money - playing this RP way, feels like Hard Times. So the party was browsing tent wares, at least tried to, when we found Zordral threatening a mage named Bentha. Once again, Guttax chose dialog that Corey_Russell would actually choose - but this got Bentha killed - Zordral paid for that murder with his life - his robe was a upgrade for Dynaheir.
While in the Nashkel Mine area, we found a soldier telling us about Prism. We listened to Prism's story, and decided to guard him for now, though when we get a chance was going to encourage him to return the stolen emeralds. A rather mean bounty hunter named Greywolf appeared - we asked him to back off but Greywolf refused - Greywolf was hitting Minsc pretty hard, he resisted almost everything, but the party still defeated him - Greywolf's sword went to Minsc. Guttax brought both emeralds to Oublek so that they can be returned to their rightful owner. (Incidentally, I never do this when meta-gaming - 1500 gold is far more helpful than 200 experience - but Corey_Russell would return lost items to their rightful owners if he could, so that's what Guttax did).
The entire Nashkel Mine was explored and cleared of all hostiles - this took two trips as we looted everything, since our gold was so bad (this brought back memories - my very FIRST run though this is exactly what I did - I haven't done in this a long time, since form meta-gaming point of view, taking these risks for 7 experience creatures just isn't worth it - but poor Guttax must do what Corey_Russell would have done).
I didn't meta-game for Mulahey - e.g., I sent Khalid and Minc into his cave, then Imoen, Dynaheir, Jaheira and Guttax had to deal with Mulahey's Minions. Jaheira did an entangle on the minons and Guttax tried a turn undead which wasn't very successful - one skeleton wasn't entangled so Guttax and Jaheira meleed that one. Dynaheir did a color spray on 3 kobolds to make sure they wouldn't case problems for while. Minsc and Khalid continued to pressure Mulahey with their swords, but probably the biggest help is Imoen used these fire arrows we picked up from kobold commandos on Mulahey - Mulahey is slain and fails to rigid thinking/hold anyone - with the fighters help, the minions soon fall without further incident.
From meta-gaming point of view, I always go to Carnival from killing Mulahey - not this time, if Guttax was Corey_Russell, I really would report to the Mayor of Nashkel right away, not to mention relax at an inn after seeing the horrors of the mine. We encountered Nimbul but did no buffs until AFTER Nimbul declared his intentions - Jaheira did resist fear, Guttax did a hold person and Dynheir burning hands - This was too much for Nimbul.
We have a little bit of cash with our reward money. So we get a +1 shortbow for Imoen and a +1 dagger for Jaheira - entire party now has magical melee weapons. We follow up on Mulahey's letter and confronted the mage Tranzig - Tranzig wanted to surrender almost immediately, but Guttax reasoned that Tranzig directly or indirectly caused the deaths of many innocent Nashkel Miners, creating many widows and orphans - he isn't going to get away with that and he was slain. The +1 ring went to Minsc.
The party heard from a commoner about some possible treasure in Ulcaster School and Firewine Ruins - we will investigate both of those before investigating the bandits in the NE - Guttax reasoned based on the trouble we had with Mulahey (and the Bassilus area), we need better equipment and experience before taking on the bandits directly.
Retour en haut
and then flooded it for real. Now with boots of speed on, it was even easier to run away from ambushes and it didn't take long for her to arrive in Baldur's Gate.
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