64 réponses à ce sujet

[Grond0]

In a brief discussion here I thought a no XP run shouldn't be too difficult.  In case I was being over-optimistic I thought I should test it out.

Here's the starting character:


My initial thought was to try it as a poverty run as well, i.e. making use of no items, but thinking about it I can't imagine any way at the moment to get past the palace fight without killing anything and without using items.  However, I'll probably try to avoid using any items up to that point if possible.

I won't be looking to die, but it's not expected to be a no-reload run!  Apart from the palace fight other bits I think are likely to be particularly troublesome are the traps near Daveorn and the final fight with Sarevok itself. 

[corey_russell]

Good luck Grond0! You'll need it...

[PicklePepperPiper]

So enemies you *have* to kill are Davaeorn and Sarevok, right?

What's your plan of attack? Will follow this run, sounds really interesting! Best of luck.
-PPP

[Grimwald the Wise]

My non-violent game is similar but slightly different. I wasn't trying to minimise exp just avoid killing.

You don't have to kill anyone. I have completed the game without killing a single character. That does not mean that there were no deaths. Davaeorn was charmed using a certain cloak and was then killed by those bad guys who appear if you trigger a trap.

I must admit that I did injure Saverok with my fists before he was taken out by one of those exploding arrows aimed at me. That was a sheer fluke, but could happen again. That was in an unmodded game. Not sure if I could do it with my current set up though.

In that game, my favourite weapon was fists and my favourite spell cure small wounds. I played a halfling fighter/thief. Stealth was used a LOT. Mulahey was charmed and his summoned monsters killed him. I think that the total number of deaths was six, one of those was caused by a kobold who wouldn't let me get at Mulahey's symbol. He just stood on top of it. Had to charm another to get him to move. This was years ago so my memory is a bit hazy but it should be still in the archives. Look for non-violent I think if you're interested.

Or follow this:
http://www.bing.com/...m=QBRE&filt=all

Just found what I wrote in one game:

Having played a non-violent fighter/thief, I thought that it might be fun to try with a solo non-violent cleric/illusionist. The advantage is that you can use charm spells and of course sanctuary to avoid fighting. The disadvantage is that you can't get Algernon's cloak without killing him. All went well until I met Mulhaney. He kept saving whenever I tried to make him my friend. However, after sleeping, I was able to charm him and the bad guys that he had summoned then turned on him. I could only take on Durlag's Tower up to the point that Love has to die if I was to . I managed the bandit camp without any fighting at all. The next major problem was the Cloakwood mines.
I couldn't avoid setting off the traps at the bottom which meant that I had both Davercorn and the guys with flameswords to deal with. I thought, now all I have to do is charm either and hopefully Davercorn will be the one that dies. I couldn't charm any of them! I therefore had to sleep in order to try again. I was interrupted in my sleep by two gaurds. Them I could charm and they were immediately attacked by Davercorn. Silly man. He died.
To defeat Saverok I used dispell magic and Cloudkill. That only weakened him.
I then approached him and ran away using a potion of oil of speed. I was attacked with the arrows of detonation and I also set off a trap that produced a lightning bolt. One of them killed him, I don't know which as I was out of sight at the time. Hence, this time I didn't kill anyone, the minimum number of people died, and I didn't even use my fists. Hope this is of interest as I haven't seen any thread where somebody has won without even using fists.

Modifié par Grimwald the Wise, 18 octobre 2011 - 05:36 .

[Grond0]

Thanks a lot for that Wise - very interesting.

@PicklePepperPiper. For most of the game I'll just be stealthing past things. Where things have to die (greater dopplegangers in the palace in addition to the ones you mention) I've got charm person available, which gives some options as well as the possibility of using enemies own spells against them.

[Grond0]

Killjoy is under way.  Summary of progress to date is as follows.

Went straight to Gorion and left Candlekeep.  Then travelled to High Hedge, Beregost, south to Nashkel mines - didn't see a single creature on this journey.  In the mines stealthed through the top 2 levels before facing her first obstacle with some traps.  By hiding, detecting traps, running and hiding, disarming traps, running and hiding, she was able to get past without the kobolds next to the traps noticing.


Her first real challenge was the kobold roadblock on the 3rd level (there are far fewer kobolds in vanilla, so that's not an issue there).

Some of the kobolds move over time, but not the ones actually blocking the passage if left to themselves.  I wasn't sure what would happen if kobolds were slept, i.e. if they would move on waking, so Killjoy threw in a sleep from out of sight range.  She gave it a couple of rounds then moved in to see what was happening, but her stealth failed and she was spotted.  However, this was a blessing in disguise as she found just enough of a blank spot to hide again before the kobold reinforcements arrived.

She then managed to bump her way through all the kobolds in pursuit into clear territory.

Carefully walking round the walls she avoided the traps and exited to Mulahey's cave - phew.


Still no reloads at this stage - I wouldn't have bet on that - but luck ran out against Mulahey.  My plan here was to stealth in, take the letters from the chest and hide again before Mulahey reacted. 

In vanilla this would be easy, but using SCS Mulahey reacts very, very quickly to a visible presence.  First attempt failed.

There are around 20 enemies between him and the door and this failure confirmed my initial view that it would be impossible to get past them, even in the unlikely event their attacks failed to kill her.  Therefore tried again, and again, and again!  I was starting to think that I would have to try a different strategy (such as charming Mulahey and getting him to fight for Killjoy) when the 5th attempt succeeded.


Killjoy successfully exited the mine under stealth and has travelled back to Beregost for the next stage of her adventure.
 
Edit: reading through the post I noticed that I had overlooked she got some XP for disarming the traps.  I'll probably try starting the run again tonight to see if I can avoid that - I think there's a chance that the damage from those traps won't kill her.

Modifié par Grond0, 18 octobre 2011 - 07:28 .

[Grimwald the Wise]

Even if you get the letters and pickpocket his symbol, you still have to kill him.

I tried doing what you tried in my first no-killing game (fighter/thief), and unfortunately, although the mayor says he will send in troops to finish the kobolds off, you have to arrange for Mulahey's death for the chapter to end. Hence I charmed him and let his minions kill him.

You could say that is not non-violent. It is certainly poetic justice.

You get experience for disarming traps. If you really want a minimal experience game, you really need a high constitution character who can survive the traps rather than disarm them.

[Humanoid_Taifun]

You could just remove the XP for traps and locks. aTweaks has an option like that. Since only BG1 can be used for no-XP runs, this shouldn't be a cheat - in the original BG1 you didn't get this XP either.

[Grond0]

Grimwald the Wise wrote...

Even if you get the letters and pickpocket his symbol, you still have to kill him.

I tried doing what you tried in my first no-killing game (fighter/thief), and unfortunately, although the mayor says he will send in troops to finish the kobolds off, you have to arrange for Mulahey's death for the chapter to end. Hence I charmed him and let his minions kill him.

OK - thanks for the info.  I'll have to get that charm person ready after all then.

[Grond0]

Humanoid_Taifun wrote...

You could just remove the XP for traps and locks. aTweaks has an option like that. Since only BG1 can be used for no-XP runs, this shouldn't be a cheat - in the original BG1 you didn't get this XP either.

I agree that would be entirely reasonable, but I think these are the only traps where this will be an issue (she won't be able to disarm the ones near Daveorn anyway) so I'll just try and let her tough it out through them.

[Grond0]

Killjoy's next incarnation followed the same route down to the Nashkel mines.  One ambush this time, but no missile users - so no danger. 

In the mines she stealthed through the top 2 levels and then braved the traps on the third - both did 5 HP damage, so she survived (resting in-between).


The first time she tried to get through the roadblock she attracted their attention and successfully got back into stealth, but then failed to find a gap through the mob and got surrounded - death inevitable from there.

Next attempt rather than try and find a route through immediately she took the followers homing in on her for a rather longer tour before coming back - this time successfully.

Moving down to Mulahey's cave I was surprised that she managed on her first attempt to both charm him and get him to move far enough away to allow her to take the letters from the chest without being seen.  There were still anxious moments, however, as it was not until her 4th attempt that she succeeded in getting back into stealth.  When she did, she managed to wriggle through the minions to get to the exit just before Mulahey snuffed it.


She's now back in Beregost, but having successfully triggered the next chapter this time round!

[corey_russell]

Nice work.

[Grond0]

For Tranzig the initial plan was to charm him and then get Marl to kill him for me.  However, Tranzig saved against the first 6 charm attempts; the 7th appeared to get through, but nothing happened (so he appears to be immune to charm). 


Plan B was to blind him and get him to chase Killjoy out into the street and find a helpful guard.  For a pretty pathetic mage he has rather good saving throws - saving with a 3 - but on about the 30th attempt he was blinded.  However, that seemed to have been a waste of time as he still showed not the slightest interest in melee, but just kept trying to cast spells when Killjoy was close and running round when not.

On to Plan C - to try and get him to use all his spells up by running up and down the stairs.  Eventually managed that though was getting a bit careless and 3 deaths occurred in this sequence when she was slow to react to magic missiles.  Out of spells he finally looked to use his big stick and chased Killjoy outside.  Tiax, Garrick and Silke showed no interest in punishing the raging Tranzig

but fortunately there were some individuals with more sense of civic responsibility in a local inn. 

After a few whacks from them Tranzig surrendered in the face of Killjoy's overwhelming power and told her where to go to find the bandits.

On the way to the bandit camp Killjoy noted an old man waiting on the road - hang on didn't I just talk to him a minute ago in Beregost!

At the camp Plan A was for Killjoy to show herself to sound the alarm and then hide again, while all the bad guys came out of the tent.  She tried this and got shot once, then crushed in an ambush on the way back, but succeeded the 3rd time.  Unfortunately, under SCS some of the bandit camp seem to be scripted to follow anywhere whether characters are visible or not

even back into the tent

so that plan was a dud. 

Plan B was to stealth into the tent without being seen at all.  That seemed to work fine

and as everyone inside starts non-hostile the tent is safe territory for the time being.
 
The next question was whether she could survive the trapped chest.  To my surprise she did survive on her very 1st attempt

but failed to restealth and was cut down.  However, reassured that this could work she tried again - again survived the trap (which seems to be less vicious than I feared), but failed to hide.  The third time she again had 8 damage done by trap (which makes me wonder if it is scripted not to kill somehow) and again failed to hide, but this time managed to get out of visual range of Raemon before he reacted - and was able to then hide at her leisure.  I thought I had taken a screenshot of this, but it appears not, but her safe place was next to the shield on the north wall.  Her stealth lasted long enough to get out of visual range of the enemies outside the tent so that's another chapter completed.

After having Killjoy die 8 times so far (makes my no-reload attempts seem veritable masterpieces) that's quite enough for one day!  She'll try her luck at the Cloakwood mines tomorrow evening.

Modifié par Grond0, 18 octobre 2011 - 08:39 .

[Humanoid_Taifun]

Grond0 wrote...

After a few whacks from them Tranzig surrendered in the face of Killjoy's overwhelming power and told her where to go to find the bandits.

So there was no point in not fighting him yourself? (using your fists to avoid killing him)

[Grond0]

Using fists would have been Plan D. A precursor to that probably would have needed to be emptying him of spells anyway (though I did consider trying to manoeuvre him next to an exit and then doing it). By the time I had done that I think it was quicker to lead him to get beaten up by the guards than repeatedly stealth and use fists - I didn't really care if they killed him or not as I would have been happy to use one of the bandits in Larswood or Peldvale to teleport into the camp.

[Grond0]

Some hard grind tonight with Killjoy for very little reward. 

The opening was fine, trying to get through the Cloakwood unscathed.  A potential problem was in the spider area when 3 phase spiders teleported in to greet her on arrival.  That forced her to run for it straight through the web trap, which she managed, and head south where she found enough room to hide again.  An ambush by wyverns and spiders was also safely negotiated when none of the spiders fired off a web attack until too late, while the wyverns on their own never stood a chance of catching her.

Arriving at the mines she successfully stealthed past the guards outside the mine and down on to the second level.  There's just enough room there to hide again from the nearby guard.

After sneaking past the ghasts Rill wanted a word, but refused to accept Killjoy's genuine poverty - calling her a "black-hearted bastard".

On the next level down there was time to get out of visual range of the guards before stealth failed.

Killjoy then continued on down to Daveorn's level.  The first objective was to charm the guard by the door and send him down for a chat with Daveorn and that succeeded in drawing him up through the traps.


I thought it might be possible to get him to use up his stoneskins and then irritate the battle horrors with a sunfire - allowing them to kill him (in my experience they don't stay angry long enough to have a chance of killing him if he has stoneskins up).  Therefore Killjoy waited long enough that the first stoneskin should have expired before looking to see what had happened.  Although he didn't see her this resulted in Daveorn's initial buffs firing again and him and the battle horrors coming to investigate - so it looks like it's not going to be possible to use up stoneskins just by waiting. 

Instead Killjoy retreated to the previous level and rested to get her charm person back and then tried casting that - Daveorn saved, but it did get the chance to take effect before his buffs kicked in

so she kept trying.  Trying to rest again upstairs brought guards running - as they block the upstairs passageway and Daveorn the downstairs that's a death sentence.  It would be possible to avoid that by moving much further away, but I didn't bother going to that trouble since this is not a no-reload attempt.  Continuing to try charm person a further 3 deaths occurred before I concluded that Daveorn could not be affected by that, i.e. he didn't save against the spell, but was still unaffected.

The first attempt was actually a bit unusual as the majority of the time Daveorn's improved invisibility took effect before the charm person reached him.

Plan B was to exhaust all Daveorn's spells, beat him up from stealth and then finish him off with a charmed hobgoblin.  However, the first attempt on this line got sidetracked when Daveorn chose to follow Killjoy (who was under stealth) up the stairs. 

She just had time to go away and hide again before considering what to do.  She rested and came back with charm person, but Daveorn dispelled her stealth before she could cast it and she had to charm a hobgoblin and run for the corner. 

Also, each time she rested more hobgoblins were spawning so that seemed to be a dead end.  Two more deaths convinced me Killjoy needed to tackle Daveorn on the lower level and another two deaths were then required to get from the previous main save (post bandit camp) back to Daveorn.

I still think there's a possibility Plan B could work, though it won't be as simple as with Tranzig.  It would be made easier if Daveorn could be convinced to kill the battle horrors, e.g. with a couple of cones of cold.  I'll have another stab at it tomorrow night.  If that provides no joy I might have to bite the bullet and go and get Algernon's Cloak.

Modifié par Grond0, 19 octobre 2011 - 08:38 .

[Grond0]

Killjoy has finally arrived in Baldur's Gate, although not by a route I was expecting.

For quite a while she was continuing to try to beat Daveorn down:

while chasing round the area hiding when she could:

this was made more difficult because his buffs seemed to reactivate erratically; in particular he several times suddenly produced MMM he shouldn't have had:


However, after numerous (probably at least a dozen, though I gave up counting) reloads the job was done - Daveorn was out of spells and beaten by fists down to a couple of HP. 


Killjoy then went to get a hobgoblin to charm - the idea was to try and get it to attack Daveorn near the end of the charm with the hope that it would kill him when no longer actually charmed (charmed creatures normally keep attacking their existing target for a short period after the spell ends).  However, as soon as she had got the hobgoblin into position this happened:

It appeared that Daveorn was happy to let himself be beaten unconscious, but was unwilling to allow even the possibility that friendly hobgoblins would be turned hostile!

At this point I decided that Plan B was not a goer.  However, before giving up I thought I would have another go at Plan A (charming Daveorn).  This was because I had noted a hobgoblin exhibiting the same behaviour as Daveorn, i.e. not saving against a spell, but also not being affected by it.  As I knew that hobgoblins could be charmed I thought it worth trying again with Daveorn.  And indeed it didn't take long before he joined the side of the angels.  There was still the question of how to finish him off as the battle horrors did not attack him - their scripts seem to be interdependent with Daveorn and they won't attack unless he is present and hostile.  Fortunately Daveorn had a nice spell book to play with.  First up he cast breach on himself to get rid of the stoneskin.  He followed that up with a fireball at his feet. 


That turned him hostile, but also triggered one of the battle horrors to treat him as an enemy and it didn't take it long to finish Daveorn off.


That was rather a marathon encounter.  Pity I didn't know to start with that charm person could affect him - could have saved a number of hours then.

 

[polytope]

Grond0 wrote...
The third time she again had 8 damage done by trap (which makes me wonder if it is scripted not to kill somehow)

The game doesn't actually let a 1st level character (provided they are in the party) be killed in one hit from full health. A starting level character will never take more than maximum hp -1 from any attack.

Magic missiles can still kill a 1st level character in one shot, because they strike multiple times.

[Grimwald the Wise]

Grond0 wrote...

The next question was whether she could survive the trapped chest.  To my surprise she did survive on her very 1st attempt

but failed to restealth and was cut down.  However, reassured that this could work she tried again - again survived the trap (which seems to be less vicious than I feared), but failed to hide.  The third time she again had 8 damage done by trap (which makes me wonder if it is scripted not to kill somehow) and again failed to hide, but this time managed to get out of visual range of Raemon before he reacted - and was able to then hide at her leisure.  I thought I had taken a screenshot of this, but it appears not, but her safe place was next to the shield on the north wall.  Her stealth lasted long enough to get out of visual range of the enemies outside the tent so that's another chapter completed.

After having Killjoy die 8 times so far (makes my no-reload attempts seem veritable masterpieces) that's quite enough for one day!  She'll try her luck at the Cloakwood mines tomorrow evening.

For hiding, your positioning is very important. keep out of sight of the people you want to hide from. Alternatively all you have to do is keep far enough away from the guy who initiates conversation. If you do that you don't even need to hide.

By positioning, pausing, and moving quickly, it is also possible to avoid being hurt by the trap.

Regarding your encounter with Davaeorn. Once he has been charmed, you can get him to attack a battle horror. No need for magic, just his staff. The battle horrors then attack him. Sometimes you might find that you then have to charm something else so that you can bick up the booty. (Sleeping will bring more guards on the scene if you need them, but Davaeorn's assistant should work.)

Modifié par Grimwald the Wise, 21 octobre 2011 - 04:59 .

[corey_russell]

Very interesting, Grond0. Hope you can keep it up.

[Grond0]

polytope wrote...

Grond0 wrote...
The third time she again had 8 damage done by trap (which makes me wonder if it is scripted not to kill somehow)

The game doesn't actually let a 1st level character (provided they are in the party) be killed in one hit from full health. A starting level character will never take more than maximum hp -1 from any attack.

Magic missiles can still kill a 1st level character in one shot, because they strike multiple times.

That explains it - thanks for the info.

Grimwald the Wise wrote...
Alternatively all you have to do is keep far enough away from the guy who initiates conversation. If you do that you don't even need to hide.

Unfortunately Raemon (like a lot of characters under SCS) initiates conversation when he sees you, so just keeping away from him doesn't work.

By positioning, pausing, and moving quickly, it is also possible to avoid being hurt by the trap.

I did try that, but again didn't have any joy, so the behaviour of that trap may also have been changed.

[Grond0]

Killjoy has made further progress in her attempt to become a super-experienced 0 experience character.

After leaving the Cloakwood mines I realised I'd missed tricks earlier.  Although Killjoy doesn't want to kill anyone there have been several occasions when being able to damage them would have been useful, e.g. in interrupting spells.  She should therefore have reduced her reputation right at the start in order to acquire the evil Bhaal powers.  Rather too late she decided to do this prior to getting the last two, but it was actually more difficult than I expected.  Couldn't kill anyone and it took an age to find a householder whose door was both unlocked and who wanted to report burglaries to the authorities - but she managed it in the end.

Moving on to Baldur's Gate she avoided all conflicts and quests other than the investigation of the Iron Throne.  This was done by stealth, but she still acquired money for it - uhhh (she quickly threw that away).  Off to Candlekeep which stealth made easy.  The only part where I thought there was potential danger was on arrival in the caves where she was likely to be greeted by spiders.  However, she managed to renew stealth just before the spider arrived and safely got out.


Back in Baldur's Gate Killjoy tracked down Cythandria.  First things first - let's see if she can be charmed; no (the +3 bonus to save means that she had a die roll of 1).


However, Aasim could be charmed - and soon was.  He didn't have the firepower to kill Cythandria directly, but I thought his mental domination might be able to affect her.  It was certainly not easy:

but with the -2 penalty to save there was still a chance and indeed he did eventually bring her onto Killjoy's side.  I tried Cythandria aggravating some of the Iron Throne party with a fireball

but their reaction was to buff themselves rather than attack immediately and she escaped.  I'm sure a route like that would be possible, but moved on to try and get her to catch herself in a repeating lightning bolt.  Again I think that must be possible (her own spells and the availability of other characters around Cythandria means there are a multitude of possible ways to deal with her), but couldn't get it to work in a few tries.  Next thing was for Aasim to use his second mental domination to pull Diyab into the fray:


I don't think actually that Diyab did any damage - I think a combination of flame strike from Aasim and Cythandria's fireball just did a bit more than usual and scared her enough to submit.

Things were still not quite over as Alai came to investigate and nearly finished Killjoy before she could hide again (made more difficult as the golems had slowed her).  However, she eventually got a bit of room while Alai was buffing and made her escape.

Most of that action took place last night.  I've spent several hours today trying to kill Slythe - definitely the hardest technical challenge to date.  However, he has now fallen.  I'll post more on that later.

[Grond0]

Killjoy set off in search of Slythe.  Although she could have sneaked past him it amused me to be able to genuinely plead being unable to pay the 2 gold entrance fee to the undercellar.  First job was to check whether the easy solution would be possible - nope:


Next was to see whether Krystin was also off limits - getting her on her own took a bit of manoeuvreing, but got there in the end.  A bit surprisingly her saving throws proved not as good as Slythe's:


However, I didn't think there was any real chance of Krystin being able to kill Slythe in the 5 round window of her being charmed.  Casting a spell (such as domination) on him would have been a possibility, but first I looked for other potential support - hmm looks like a handy ogre over there.  With Larze safely captured by Krystin, Killjoy dragged Slythe into the room for a heart to heart with the big guy:


From this point killing Slythe is no problem (Larze has a big advantage over him in combat).  Here's one attempt that ended up with Slythe in lots and lots of little pieces:


However, it's a bit more difficult to kill him without getting any XP.  I thought of a possible solution that seemed quite elegant.  This was to get Krystin to start casting skull trap as the charm person was about to wear off, so that the spell would be finished by a hostile:

Larze would then beat Slythe up to near death and lead him into the skull trap.  Everything seemed to be going perfectly, but somehow Slythe survived the trap.  I would have tried again, but first looked to see if I could get Larze to kill Slythe just after he had reverted to hostile (in order to avoid the XP).  This worked:


There was still a small amount of work to do as some summoned skeletons were standing on top of Slythe's equipment so that a right-click pickup was not possible.  However, after a rest they had gone and Krystin's attempt to detect him was too late to stop Killjoy escaping with the invitation.


Next stop the palace.

[Grond0]

Quick update for Killjoy.

As I thought, the palace fight was easy.  My initial idea was to try and draw a batch of the greater dopplegangers upstairs - making the rest easy for the Flaming Fist - and then bring them back down again.  However, in order to avoid the initial spells the dopplegangers cast Killjoy needed to be close to the stairs - which meant nothing followed him.

However, I also wondered how the dopplegangers AI would function if Killjoy was present, but not visible.  The answer was, not very well.  They didn't gang up on the dukes and in the initial melee 3 died and 3 fled.  Killjoy tracked the scared ones down - one upstairs, one downstairs and one outside - and dragged them back to the main hall.  She died 4 times in the process, but eventually the last doppleganger was facing Duke Belt (all the Flaming Fist were dead by now) and the welcome news came that the coast was clear:


Killjoy found out where Sarevok has fled and followed down through the maze.  By keeping next to the wall she was able to skip past the various traps without trouble:


She is now in the temple girding her loins for the final conflict.

[corey_russell]

Congratulations Grond0 at getting this far! If you can pull this off, this really should go in a record-book somewhere...