16394 replies to this topic

[Wierdo]

Wierdo's Bhaalspawn Bretheren

Final Stats

I took these screenshots just before finally defeating Sarevok. You can see that all are getting somewhere close to next level. This is important as Imoen needs to be a thief-******-mage in Irenicus' dungeon.


Wierdo





Annakin




Buddha



Imoen

Edited by Wierdo, 16 April 2011 - 03:42 AM.

[Grond0]

Congratulations Wierdo - I was starting to worry something had gone wrong in your final battle! Best of luck in your continuing adventures in BG2.

[SpiffyKeen]

Congrats Wierdo and company!  It sounds like the final battle was rather fun. 

Mirima on the other hand did not make it.  She and Safana were able to clear the Ulcaster Ruins and the Firewire Ruins (which I usually have a harder time with), but died from two Doomguard hits before getting into Durlag's Tower.  Ugh!!!  The creature saved vs. the wand of paralyzation 4 times in a row and Mirima got clipped twice turning around while running away.  I was mad (probably should have used summons too), so I reloaded and tried again, and she paralyzed both Doomguards in one shot each.  I had just obtained lots of level 2 & 3 mage spells for her, a recharged fire wand, and a nice archmage robe.  I am considering continuing anyway and entering the BG2 Challenge if I can make it the rest of the way without another death... or I will try another class, perhaps a fighter/thief.  

[Gate70]

Yes well done, and bad luck SpiffyKeen.

Fimm the feralan ranger. Travelling with Imoen, Khalid,  Jaheira, Kivan and now Alora.

In Gullykin we sort out Jenkal, an ogre mage and Lendarn. Alora may be an ace with locks but I'm not trusting our lives to her trapping skills so we leave the rest of Firewine ruins for a braver adventurer. Instead we check her skills out in the bandit camp, finding a second cursed spear (two backbiters so looks like I may need to re-install after messing up the randomiser).

Jaheira brokers a truce between Aldeth Sashenstar and Seniyad, and while we ponder the disparity in size of the hunting lodge (twice the size on the outside as the inside) Alora loots a chest. Next we deal with Centeol and her pets, where I need a single green potion.

Edited by Gate70, 14 April 2011 - 10:01 PM.

[Thailog]

Wierdo wrote...

Wow! They made it! Time for re-installing BG2!

Congrats!

Looking forward to reading about Wierdo's adventures in BG2.

[Wierdo]

Thanks for all the well wishes!

The final battle took me some time to get to, as real-world responsibilities were taking their toll. I actually played out the fight over two nights, leaving the PC on with the game paused as there is no way to save mid-battle.

I'm considering re-install options for BG2. The Item Randomiser sounds like fun, but a little scary! Still, it might just be what I need to spice up the game a bit! Whatever it is, it'll probably be a few days away yet as I have picked up some flu or something.

[Thailog]

Wierdo wrote...

I'm considering re-install options for BG2. The Item Randomiser sounds like fun, but a little scary! Still, it might just be what I need to spice up the game a bit! Whatever it is, it'll probably be a few days away yet as I have picked up some flu or something.

I'd reccomend Item and Spell Revisions if you haven't got them already. They really breathe new life into BG2.

Also, Quest Pack is pretty good and Rogue Rebalancing too if you like thieves.

[Yogohong]

Congratulations, Wierdo! Remember not to die in BG2 .

And now for something completely different...

The Gilded Rose Part Three - Of Forest and Cave Dwellers.

With documents in hand indicating a base in the Cloakwood Forest, our group of heroes gathered their belongings and headed into the thick forest. A seemingly peaceful forest, but looks can be deceiving. Within a few miles of travel, they discovered a cabin and the owner. He has been attacked by druids and asked for our assistance. Tiax made a persuasive argument for starting up a timber industry and so our heroes turned to capitalism and sided with the owner. The druids died swiftly thereafter.




After having saved the cabin owner, the group headed further into the forest. The dangers of the forest became more apparent when the group was assaulted by a horde of spiders. Luckily, it is going to take more than a few spiders to defeat Mad Man.



Tiax's ghast assisted against some Ettercaps while Mad Man shows off his prowess and might.



Besides the roaming horde of spiders, the group also encountered a very fat lady sitting on a pile of treasure. Feeling the need to liberate the treasure from its oppressive owner, our heroes engaged in combat with the lady and her spider minions. Tiax had to flee the scene and was killed by two sword spiders. Mad Man and The All Seing Eye held there ground while Quin hid in the shadows.

With the loot in hand, the road led the group further into the forest. Here they discovered a cave which was the nesting place for a wyvern pack. Our heroes had no choice other than to attack least they become snacks for the hungry wyverns.



At last the purported base indicated in the documents has been found. However, it was guarded by a mercenary band looking for a bit of sport. When negociations failed, Quin had to resort to bow and arrow diplomacy. Mad Man impressed the group by deliverying some swift criticals to Drasus. Rest in Pieces, Drasus.




The group headed inside the mines and encountered resistance in form of guards, hirelings and a few mages. Caution was of essence and our heroes prevailed due to some commonsense tactics. Deeper and deeper into the mines they went until they came to the bottom level where the master of mine, Davaeron, was residing. After a few failed attempt to come to a peaceful solution, Davaeron and a duo of battle horrors launched their attack. Sadly for Davaeron, the group had gulped some magical protection potions and most of his spells were for naught. Mad Man delivered the killing blow.



Documents inside Davaeron's chest shows a clear link between the Nashkel Mines incident, the bandits and the Iron Throne. Before leaving the mine, our heroes liberated the slaves and flooded it, returning it to its previous state before the Iron Throne overtook it.

As the Gilded Rose marched on towards Baldur's Gate, they were ambushed by three giant spiders. Quin got captured in a captive hold and a single spider managed to inflict its nasty poison. The situation looked dire, but Mad Man once again proved his worth by attracting the attention of all three spiders and promptly dismembering them. The All Seing Eye provided medical assistance until Quin was able to move again and neutralize the poison.




Next Up - A trip to Durlags Tower, Exploration of Baldur's Gate and a surprise visit to the Iron Throne.

Edited by Yogohong, 15 April 2011 - 10:03 AM.

[Gate70]

Fimm the feralan ranger. Travelling with Imoen, Khalid and Jaheira.

Seniyad is pleased to hear of our shadow druid dealings. Alora heads back to the FAI so Coran can travel with us. A cavern of wyverns almost kill me (enjoying the fight and didn't notice the rapid poison until 10hp remained). Anyway, after killing Lakadaar and guards Imoen fireballs Rezdan while Kivan kills Kysus with an arrow. My axe finishes a doomed Drasus while Genthore has been badly wounded by Imoen and her magic missiles. Jaheira finally manages a second spell.

Edited by Gate70, 15 April 2011 - 09:43 PM.

[Grond0]

Entering the challenge with Axel.

He'll almost certainly remain a kensai throughout BG1, although he'll probably dual to a thief if he gets as far as BG2 (don't think I've ever played a thief in BG2).  Mods in use are:
CharmPatch
BG2 Fixpack
BGT
Dark Horizons
Dark Side of the Sword Coast
Northern Tales of the Sword Coast
Northern Tales of the Sword Coast (dialogue patch)
The Secret of Bone Hill
BG1 Mini-quests and encounters
The Grey Clan
BG1 NPC Project
Gavin
BG1 UB
Gavin BG2
BG2 UB
SCS
Solaufein
G3 anniversary
BGT Tweak Pack
Turambar Fixes and Tweaks
SCS II (also shown in BWP order after Worldmap)
BG2 Tweak Pack
Item Pack
aTweaks
Ding0's Experience Fixer (reducing creature experience by 25%)
Worldmap
L1 NPCs
Widescreen Mod
Generalised Biffing

This time through I won't be using any mod items that are more powerful than those found in vanilla BG.  However, I am allowing sale of mod items and shopping with the proceeds.  Hence Axel has already acquired a throwing axe using funds from Tristan and Isolde's equipment.  So far have gone from Candlekeep down the road to Nashkel - no deaths or serious injuries yet.  Travelling with Gavin, Kivan and Imoen.  Minsc is likely to be recruited at some point, when I think the party is strong enough to take on the DH assassins at the gnoll stronghold in order to rescue Dynaheir. 

[Gate70]

Fimm the feralan ranger. Travelling with Imoen, Khalid, Jaheira, Kivan and Coran.

I hold off the guards while Hareishan collects arrows, bolts, bullets and a fireball. The two Black Talon Elite archers are next then we kill the remnants before my rage wears off.

After telling Yeslick to go to the Friendly Arm Inn we attack a ghast in a narrow corridor. Our positioning isn't great but it's only a ghast. Ah, it holds and half-kills Khalid and as we try to save him Imoen dies instead. Back to a temple.

Natasha and an ogre mage are a brief warm-up for Davaeorn. My plain old axe finishes him off after he kills my summoned wolf.

We deal with an ankheg nest then head to Baldurs Gate only for Imanel Silversword to attack us. Imoen finishes her off with a Scorcher.

An ogre mage and carrion crawlers are our first encounter inside the city, followed by Desreta (easy) and Vay-ya (almost a game-ender but Khalid and Imoen kept their heads, webbed everything else and killed her before waiting for confusion to wear off). There is more confusion against five ogre mages but Khalid, Coran and I are enough to finish them off too.

It's a goood job we check the drawers in the Seven Suns, finding boots of avoidance. At the Merchants League I turn up to the party in a barkskin rage but have to run away while the last four doppelgangers are shot down. Aldeth gives me a wand of frost - I don't want to sound ungrateful but don't bother next time.

Larze the ogre forces me to run too but a Melf, doom, insect summons and missiles soon have him on the floor. Jardak and his butler won't need to be rude to anybody else again either.

Gretek and the brawlers of undermountain are easy prey. By the time I injure Gretek my companions have scared Wilf off and killed the remainder. Even with their help it takes as long again for me to kill Gretek, then we step outside to attack Wilf. He runs inside again where we manage to kill him. Gorpal Hind and his gang are still at the bar, thanks guys couldn't have done it without you. My axe is in pieces so I buy a couple more.

Degrodel has some very tough guards, even two or three at a time. The Cloak of Balduran seems a fair reward.

Rafefast and Ramazith are next, then Jalantha Mistmyr. Her death helps with Varci Roaringhorn and then Lothander, leading us to Marek.

Imoen pipes up, asking if we're on a treasure hunt or what. OK, OK. Back to the plot, starting with the Iron Throne HQ. On the fifth floor Kivan, Khalid and Coran disrupt Diyab and Aasim while I clobber a doppelganger. Jaheira is summoning nymphs while Imoen starts with a fireball then horror. The doppelganger and Diyab die first, and I move on to Alai.

Our only injury is a flame strike on Kivan, and (as usual) Gardush is the last man standing.


Cloudewulfe has a magical axe so no more tainted axes and hammers. We spare Thaldorn (wonder if he had randomised loot) and step outside for some air.


So how are we looking?

Edited by Gate70, 16 April 2011 - 05:19 PM.

[Gate70]

Fimm the feralan ranger. Travelling with Imoen, Khalid, Jaheira, Kivan and Coran.

I've found a second supplier for Khalid's surprise. Can't wait, but will have to.

Imoen regains her thieving skills so we return to Firewine ruins and return some ancient armour to some dead knights. On the way out we agree to help Amelia and then kill Kahrk.

Now Imoen is losing patience with me, insisting we help Scar as requested. As she's able to deal with traps we can indeed proceed. On the way she's filling my ears about what I'd waste my time with if she ever got in trouble and needed my help. As if.

Scar leads us to Duke Eltan who sends us back to Candlekeep. As Koveras approaches I slip into the shadows but he still talks to me. As an experiment I cast DUHM before killing the Iron Throne leaders (AC -10, THACO 5).

Coran empties his backpack, grabs the boots of speed and sneaks off to clear the fourth floor. On the fifth floor he reads a letter to me from Gorion, and the guards are called. Back into the shadows and off he goes, only for me to read the letter two floors below. Worse, Jaheira starts to question me about the contents.

Coran is noticed and sneaks off again. Only the seventh floor is left, but there are obstacles. Tethtoril is happy to talk but calls the guards at the same time. Ulraunt is oblivious to his potions and gold being removed, then Coran only manages one bookcase before being unable to hide. The gatewarden arrests us.

We turn ourselves in but a watcher has other ideas and wants all our gold. Coran bluffs that we have none and as the watcher attacks we all arrive in a cell where Ulraunt can taunt us. After lying through our teeth to him we distract Tethtoril by asking about Koveras and are rewarded with an escape to the catacombs. I quickly check our reputation and gold are unsullied.

Our backpacks are bursting so we drop any jewelry, gems and stones. Imoen takes the boots of grounding and ring of fire resistance so she can lead us through the many traps that must lie ahead. Coran watches her deal with half a dozen then concentrates on hiding in shadows (up to 100% with the shadow armour) before improving his detection skills.

Our progress is smooth until four phase spiders attack. I've grown lax and attack without protection. A single bite costs half my health before Jaheira can heal me. The rest of our escape is uneventful, other than Prat having a magical throwing axe for me.

I have enough cash to start shopping for special equipment now, so add a few items to my reserves and sell or store a lot of other items. I find the time to deal with Driennes cat (funeral), Zargal and Melicamp (death) before returning for Duke Eltan.

Rashad the healer thinks he has me cornered until Kivan and Coran join in. Duke Eltan is soon safe so we take a scenic route to Slythe and Kristin (basilisk in the warehouse then Cythandria). After their death we are able to attend the coronation.

Most of the guards die, and we cannot save Liia but Belt survives. Sarevok kills some more guards, hits Belt hard then hits me hard too. Then he gets bored and vanishes, so Belt sends us after him.

Edited by Gate70, 17 April 2011 - 10:52 AM.

[Grond0]

Axel has made some solid progress today.  First trip was to the xvart village.  They were not very welcoming and chased the party into a corner of the map, where Kivan bravely barred the way with his spear.  After finishing off the main contingent Kivan doffed his armour to scout for shamans.  With the party being low level there was only 1 around (although a couple more were hiding in the cave) and he didn't last long.  With 4 in the party I was happy to take on Borda.  Everyone kept spaced out to avoid being all caught in a single spell, though as it happened he only successfully completed one spell and Kivan saved against that.

After more than a week of travelling Axel finally returned to the scene of Gorion's demise.  Fortunately the weather had been cold and the body seemed not to have changed at all when it was buried.  Kivan sneaked up on the caravan bandits before putting his armour back on and the leader didn't last long.  Kivan also charmed the only visible one of the Dark Horizons assassins in that area, but when the others killed him and promptly went back invisible everyone ran for the Friendly Arms before a confusion or something worse arrived.

Alora was recruited for trap support and the Nashkel mines were cleared without any real bother, though there were a couple of rests during the process.  On exiting the back door the party proceeded to clear the valley of the tombs.  The revenant caused more trouble than expected.  On my last run I thought that he just had a long reach, but this time it was clear he has actually acquired a paralyzing distance attack.  No harm done, but I'll be a bit more careful with him next time.

There was another close escape in that area when Kivan was enfeebled by the mage and taken down close to death by the mustard jellies.  Fortunately the other characters managed to attract the jellies attention in time to save him.


I half thought about travelling up to Ulgoth's Beard to acquire some goodies, but was ambushed by the amazons en-route.  With 2 of them invisible and no means of detecting them (other than waiting for a possibly fatal back-stab) I opted for a strategic retreat.  Instead I picked up Minsc and went off to rescue his witch.  However, Minsc rapidly became the only casualty so far.  Approaching where I knew a nasty ogre mage would be lurking I activated Minsc's berserk ability to protect against confusion, forgetting that Minsc would not then be under control.  As a result he went toe to toe with an ogre berserker and got comprehensively sliced in half.


Some careful work at the gnoll stronghold succeeded in subverting most of the assassins there and getting them to kill each other off and the gnolls themselves presented their usual innocuous challenge.  Dynaheir seemed entirely happy to travel with us in the absence of Minsc.  I wonder how strong her attachment to him really was given that I was still carrying his body when I met her!

North of the stronghold I picked up some furry boots and helped quell a gibberling invasion.  Actually there seemed fewer of them than I expected.  A couple of bears that Kivan had persuaded to guard us didn't last long, but a single sleep from Imoen took out enough to leave just a bit of mopping up.  Finally we've done our good deed for the day by persuading Brage to come back to the temple and atone for his crimes.

Party is now:
Kivan, L5 ranger, 36 HP, 378 kills (acts as the tank most of the time)
Gavin, L6 priest of Lathander, 47 HP, 97 kills (main role is healing, but acts as replacement tank on demand)
Axel, L5 kensai, 54 HP, 549 kills (hasn't yet made use of his kai ability as his throwing axe is lethal anyway)
Imoen, L6 bard, 31 HP, 139 kills (normally shoots with rest of the party, with just occasional use of spells / song)
Alora, L6 thief, 18 HP, 108 kills (with so few hits she does not try back-stabbing, but just lurks at rear of party)
Dynaheir, L5 invoker, 24 HP, 3 kills (still very new to the party, but her magic missiles were handy for doomsayer)

Edited by Grond0, 17 April 2011 - 02:57 PM.

[Grond0]

Further adventures of Axel at the hub of the universe.  The party continued to clean up the southern areas.  An early objective was the Firewine Ruins.  The intention for Kaahrk was to kill all monsters in the area first to give room to move around.  However, a zombie introduced by NTOTSC distracted things slightly and Kaahrk became active before we were prepared.  A couple of quick web spells succeeded in holding him before he got a minor globe up and he was quickly killed.  The ruins themselves were navigated safely.  Lendarn came out to fight, but his teleport field spell was a poor choice and he died without inflicting any damage.  Coming out into the halfling burrow the party took turns in absorbing backstabs to use up Jenkal's potions, so it was annoying when he did a scripted disappearance just as he was about to get his come-uppance.

Gavin had been asking us to go after Bassilus for some time.  When we eventually did so Alora indulged in a rare back-stab and Bassilus failed to survive the follow-up spell attacks.


Molkar et al have been slow to get in on the action this run, but eventually turned up in the basilisk area.  The arcance caster was targeted first and fell to a missile barrage (magic and otherwise).  When Molkar was held that left only mopping up to do.  The basilisks themselves were a different matter.  Usually I don't have any problem with them, but this time Mutamin cleverly did a remove magic on Kivan and suddenly the party had no gaze protection!

Alora and Dynaheir are looking decorative in the picture and Kivan was also stoned while running away before Axel found the appropriate potion and turned back to bring things under control.

The stonings were probably a warning I had been playing too long as the two party casualties today (other than the stonings) came at the end of the session.  First Kivan was caught in a web with hungry spiders approaching.

Dynaheir thought she would save him by turning him invisible, but got a bit too clever by trying to use invis 10'.  I realised why I've never used this spell in combat as it took an age to cast and by the time it did it only turned Kivan's dead body invisible along with a bunch of spiders.


Final action of the day was against the Red Wizards.  The last few times I've seen them I've had Edwin in the party and he's stopped the combat, so I was a bit unprepared for dealing with 4 high level mages at once.  Gavin was stunned early on and eventually killed towards the end of the combat and I was lucky that everyone else survived - one sunfire came dangerously close to wiping out both Alora and Dynaheir.  With all areas south of the Friendly Arm explored, except Durlag's Tower, next up will be the bandit camp.

Edited by Grond0, 18 April 2011 - 09:58 AM.

[The Fred]

Yogohong wrote...

Jeff W wrote...

Yogohong wrote...

Modding stats is not permitted within the no reload challenge.

Silly rule... rerolling stats is not a test of skill. 

True and while this challenge has transgressed into the territory of personal skill, I feel that one should stay true to the roots of the challenge. In my view it is a slippery slope once you begin to modify the game in any area save for fixing game crashing bugs (which is permitted by the challenge rules).

It is indeed a slippery slope, but if one has rolled certain stats legitimately, they should be able to hack them back in following a crash (after all, a crash allows an exception to even the most key of no-reload rules, "No reloading"). Furthermore, people can legitimately use whatever mods they want (and believe me, the DH items are far more imbalancing than a couple of points of strength, even if you do have a tough time surviving early on) so hacking things to be the same as a mod (e.g. hacking characters when you pick them up, not so different from using Level 1 NPCs) shouldn't really be seen as any worse. One thing I would say, though, is just mention anything "non-strictly-legal" that you do, including installing mods, just for the record (it's not like someone's going to come and strip you of your no-reload title or anything, but still).

And congrats to Wierdo!

[Yogohong]

The Gilded Rose Part Four - Confronting Our Assailants

After having left the confines of the Cloakwood Forest, our group of heroes ventured deep down south to the forgotten tower of Durlag. Hoping to find some easy treasure, the group entered with caution. Bows and swords were raised, ready to fight whatever evils lay inside.

The group decided to check the upper levels out first. Here they encountered a ghost, a possible friend of the late Durlag. The ghost attacked the group and Mad Man and The All Seing Eye died in one swift stroke from a cloudkill spell. Quin went invisible and gathered their belongings. She and Tiax went to the closest temple, resurrected their friends and headed back into the tower. This time around Mad Man was out for revenge and the ghost stood no chance against his fury.



On the top level of the tower, the group encountered a succubus. Although she did not attack straight away, her threats made Tiax and Mad Man uneasy and they took the fight to her. Mad Man finished her off with a devastating blow.



Seing as the only other way is down, our heroes went down to the basement and into the first level of Durlag's Tower. Many enemies and traps awaited them, but careful planning and skill proved to be the savior of the day.



The four riddles were solved, but the fight exhausted the group. Love was still standing and disappeared after the group had rested. He did leave behind his bottle of love as a reminder of the battle that could have been (I could have edited the savegame to give me the wardstone, but I opted to keep the game as clean as possible).

With the door into the lower levels locked and sealed forever, The Gilded Rose went north to the glorious city of Baldur's Gate. They were met by Elminster again and a representative of the Thieves' Guild. They were offered a job to steal some items. Sounding easy, Quin accepted the job on behalf of the group. Before leaving the Guild, Quin found a special book and upon reading it, she learned some tricks as to stay ever vigilant and agile in combat (19 -> 20 dex).



The group left the Guild and wandered into a random tavern. Here they were greeted by another band of adventures. A drink was shared, but the festivities were ruined when a rival adventure band entered the tavern. A fight ensured between the two groups with The Gilded Rose as the ultimate winner.



Before any real work was to be done, the group decided to explore the city. They came upon a wizard's tower. Quin opted to explore it invisible while the rest of the group stayed behind. Inside she found another strange tome and upon reading it felt she had gained a better understanding of the intricate mysteries of magic.





After returning to the group, it was decided that play time was up. Time to confront the Iron Throne. They made their way to the dockside and found the building described in the documents taken from Cloakwood Forest. Making their way to the top, they discovered a plot to dupe the Grand Dukes into going to war with Amn. Despite their best efforts they could not stop the emissary of the Grand Dukes from going to a meeting at the top floor. Our heroes went to investigate and were assaulted by a group of six well skilled men. A battle ensured.





Quin stayed in the shadows before entering the fray while Mad Man hacked away in delight. Tiax summoned his ghast while The All Seing Eye summoned a few skeletons to keep the ranged support busy. An enemy was captured in a Hold Person spell and when Quin entered the fray, it was all over.



Rummaging through the pile of bodies, our heroes discovered the whereabouts of the real leaders of the Iron Throne and evidence implicating them in the troubles plaguing the Sword Coast. They headed back to Duke Eltan and reported their findings...

Next Up - Candlekeep revisted

Edited by Yogohong, 18 April 2011 - 09:09 PM.

[Grond0]

Axel continued his progress towards the bandit camp by trying to join up with the bandits at Larswood.  Kivan attacked them in a rage, but calmed down enough to be recruited by the group in Peldvale.  At the camp Tazok attacked, but would neither die nor run away despite taking many hundreds of hits.  I think this was the result of a dialogue bug with Kivan - here is what he said in the next area.  Back at the camp we stranded Tazok off in a corner of the map and went to deal with the rest of the crew.  A single web did most of the work.  The main tent was approached invisible and the inhabitants quickly succumbed.

Finally going north towards Ulgoth's Beard Axel found the amazons still patiently waiting.  However, by now the party was too strong for them and the amazons went down hard.  After a bit of shopping in Ulgoth's Beard it was on to the Ice Island for a reunion with Andris who ended my last run.  He caused some problems again - here is the fourth sunfire he threw in the combat:

I was glad when we were eventually able to hack through his umpteen spell defenses.

Moving on to the cloakwood webs were used to get a bit of revenge on those nasty spiders that Gavin hates.

A double-stacked version also made the battle outside the mines simple.

Inside the mines Kivan ploughed forwards through all opposition.  Daveorn died without killing anyone, but one of his battle horrors did inflict a fatal wound on Alora just before he was drawn into death after Daveorn.  We burned a raise dead scroll to avoid having to travel to a temple and this nearly backfired when a guard, who had somehow survived the earlier combat, let fly with arrows of detonation that nearly caused further casualties.


Outside the mines the Archdruid was waiting for us.  I thought he would be easy after Alora poisoned him with a backstab:

However, he still put up quite a fight and Kivan was kept busy charming the bears he summoned.

After a quick run through most of the Baldurs Gate encounters the party set off for the Northern Citadel (from NTOTSC).  I haven't done this before and found the story-line a bit hard to follow, but thought the final battle (in this section) was going to be quite straightforward:

However, the presence of undetectable traps in the area made it difficult to manouvre and casualties resulted, although there never seemed any doubt about the final outcome.

Next time looking forward to seeing some old friends at Candlekeep.

Edited by Grond0, 19 April 2011 - 09:21 PM.

[Grond0]

Axel returned to Baldurs Gate and breezed through the encounter at the Iron Throne before chasing the culprits to Candlekeep.  After being imprisoned the party set out to escape through the catacombs, picking up some nice treasure on the way.  I attempted to trigger the encounter with Prat's group by webbing the area, but they didn't respond.  Still didn't respond when I fireballed the area - several times.  Eventually, after all his compatriots were dead, Prat deigned to make an appearance. 

He did then put up a decent fight, that accounted for Jaheira.  Fortunately the temple at Candlekeep had provided us with a scroll for just this occasion so the whole group soldiered on.  Axel dealt with the basilisks himself before theparty encountered Diarmid.  I let them pound on him for a minute or so (about a thousand hits) before letting him go and proceeding back to the big city.

To save time I travelled the city and rescued Eltan while invisible.  This was straightforward despite the annoying habit of mages of sensing movement:


After tracking down Slythe and Kristin Axel found himself with an invitation to a party and his party has just arrived at the palace to see what fun can be had.

[Charlestonian Knight Templar]

Thinking about trying to join you folks and give it a whirl.

Question about the rules. Do you allow your forekknowledge of 'what monsters are hiding where' (since you've played many times over) to give your parties an advantage when playing the no-reload challenge?

Having played, I know where the boogie man is at and can gather my party just outside his visual range, buff up, and then attack and take most out with ease.

On the other hand, the first time I played I walked right into the fight and, often times, got smoked.

Further, I had a tough time with Aec'Letec recently but now I know if he even gets a whiff of cloudkill he's toast.

Just wonderin' how you "no relaoad challengers" handle that.

[The Fred]

I'd say it's pretty much impossible to play without using "out-of-character" (OoC) knowledge once you have it, and certainly trying to succeed in a no-reload challenge without it would be difficult indeed. Some people do try to role-play things a bit or put certain restrictions on themselves (personally I don't pick up the "easter egg" items beyond the wand of frost) but there's really no requirement to do so.

[Grond0]

I agree that it's not really realistic to say you can't use your knowledge. Part of the point of the challenge is to make the game more difficult when you know what the challenges are in advance. Having said that one of the advantages of mods is that you can add new ones from time to time to get back a taste of the nerves associated with exploring virgin territory.

[Grond0]

Well that's a shame. Axel & co. chased after Sarevok to the undercity and confronted him in the temple. Sarevok himself was significantly tougher with high magic resistance and quite quick regeneration, but would still have been easy enough to kill except that only Tazok and Semaj of his acolytes turned up and he was therefore scripted not to die. I tried reloading the autosave once, but the same thing happened, so it's probably a bug with the installation as a whole. C'est la vie.

[Gate70]

Irritating - but any reason why you can't carry on to SOA?

Fimm the feralan ranger. Travelling with Imoen, Khalid, Jaheira, Kivan and Coran.

A skeleton warrior in the maze badly wounds me, and Imoen misses one trap (penultimate one) with impatience. Winski is left to bleed and we enter the Undercity. Jaheira, Khalid and Imoen all have sage words about this being the end of my journey - I'm not so sure.

Rahvin and his mercenaries die quickly, but I'm smouldering too. I forgot to take the fire resistance ring back from Imoen and also to ask Jaheira to protect me from fire. Careless.

Tamoko has every spell disrupted, and then I announce we are leaving Sarevok until later. More stuff is sold and we talk to Shandalar before visiting an ice island. Andris is very hard work, Garen a bit easier and Cuchol simple.

Andris, Garen and Cuchol cast a deja-vu spell (frozen laptop taking me back to ice island auto save). This time we all melee Andris only for him to commit suicide with a lightning bolt. I'm living on borrowed time (rage, 8hp, Melfed) so gulp a potion and get a couple of quick healing spells in.

Garan and Cuchol are easy thanks to a charmed mountain bear. Tellan eventually kills it so we melee him before finding Dezkiel. We fear the worst but our missiles kill him almost immediately, and we can return to Shandalar.

Durlags Tower is next. Kirinhale is elusive (aTweaks?) but charms/drains Khalid and charms Jaheira. With the succubus dead I end up standing between husband and wife until they recover. Khalid has regressed (level drained to 4) but after a temple visit ends up learning a final lesson (level 8) and becoming the most experienced of us.

(now thinking about randomised loot)
We briefly help Hulrik with some xvarts, enlist Garrick at the expense of Imoen to deal with an un-dead bard called Myr'Cutio, retrieve Imoen and head back to Ulcaster. Icharyd soon relents and we descend into the ruins (carefully as this is an area I rarely bother with now).

The greater skeleton mage fires spell after spell at me, but I have used a protection from magic scroll. I dispose of a vampiric wolf and invisible stalker before finally being injured by a fireshield so step back and use a throwing axe instead.

Eventually his attacking spells are used up, and his first attack hits me. I'm grinding down stoneskins, and call my companions in to help now there is no magic to fear.

He tries and fails to dominate Kivan as his stoneskins fail, then calls a vampiric wolf up. Once that is dead I DUHM and swot him to the floor. There is another vampiric wolf behind his remains so we kill that and escape a stinking cloud.

(be interested to know what else works against the GS Mage, I've just defaulted to protection from magic every time now).

Edited by Gate70, 22 April 2011 - 05:15 PM.

[Wierdo]

Grond0 wrote...

Well that's a shame. Axel & co. chased after Sarevok to the undercity and confronted him in the temple. Sarevok himself was significantly tougher with high magic resistance and quite quick regeneration, but would still have been easy enough to kill except that only Tazok and Semaj of his acolytes turned up and he was therefore scripted not to die. I tried reloading the autosave once, but the same thing happened, so it's probably a bug with the installation as a whole. C'est la vie.

Oh no! As this is a bug, you should be able to simply import characters from your last save into SOA. You won't be missing much, except perhaps for an opportunity to pick up
Semaj's Ring of Protection +3.

If you really want to do the Sarevok fight, you could try re-installing and loading from the last save. It might work.

Another idea is: CLUAconsole Angelo and Diarmid in. Then you can kill them and Sarevok can die properly.

[Grond0]

Thanks for the thoughts. I did consider Cluaing in the others, but that sometimes causes its own problems as there are different versions. I've noticed on several occasions during the game that Kivan' dialogue seems to cause problems and suspect this may have been the problem here - he was scripted to say something to Tazok, but by the time he did so the trigger for the other acolytes to appear had passed. I'll probably try something a bit different.