Yet. Yet another journal., Turbocharging Shaman & maximising exp & skipping difficulty Options

[pekkae]

Journal Part 0. Prologue.

Welcome. Again.

Ahem. Will play super slowly. (edit: have actually pretty much stormed past the initial encounters)

We're trying to skip some of the most difficult things in the game while maximising exp. And also, we'll be turbocharging our Shaman throughout the game. We'll also ben the rules for a little bit to try some uncoventional things.

So yet again we are not aiming to survive, we are aiming to anhilate. Every an all content in the mod. We think we have what it takes. Ahem. Again.

The Rules

- No non-protagonist related forgin
- We rolled a 96 for our PC (I have a screen cap to prove it =))
- 92 pts for the custom character(s) we have
- We have tomes from bg1 to spread among the crew
- Max HP's for NPC's
- Rotating crew in the beginning, one change towards the end
- Insane all the way
- T/M can use Githzerai Blade. I mean, thiefs can use Katana's so ... I don't get why it's not available?
- Ribald's exteneded store sells Amulet of Master Harper

!! Some items are treated as consumables. Like ring of danger sense (it will give permanent bonus to detect traps). Ditto for reaching ring (S/M will get it) & the druid's ring for extra 5th & 7th level spell slot. Will not spend time on swapping rings

We are going to max out our XP throughout the game. That is the key reason we're taking a Thief with as well.


***

The crew:

Vagrant

Late game tanking, great summons. Str 18, Dex 18, Con 19, Int 9, Wis 12, Cha 18.


Jaheira

Early game comprehensively OP character. Summons Clan Spirits, so an additional damage dealing machine.


Neera

Because her personal item is superb. Early access to swords, trolls + 5 improved hastes.


Swashbuckler/Mage

We need a thief. This should be about the best possible version, combining both effective melee with really good casting ability.


Aerie the Shaman

Aerie, but a Shaman. Shall get a personal item. We haven't decided yet, but +2 spells per level seems like an "IA standard" or so. Not sure what else we should do with it. We'll decide later.


The last slot

Custom DD early game, switch to Keldorn the Undead Hunter later on (90% sure this will happen but one never knows)


***

This post has been edited by pekkae: Mar 19 2024, 02:01 PM

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[pekkae]

Journal, Part 1.

**
Skipping Suna-Seni
**

Chapter 0

Skpity skip

Chapter 1

Circus tent (but skip the reputation point)
Join Aerie the Shaman
loot everything

Chapter 2

We are with Vagrant, Jaheira, Aerie the Shaman, Custom DD + Custom thief.
loot everything we can @ slums
docks
loot shadow thieves & mae'var's
loot everything else we can
pick up axes +2 from minotaurs
whack the slaver at pirate bar & pick up full plate
to government district
save viccy
join jan, drop thief
to bridge district
loot faerk estate (we are almost at 30k gold)
once we're here we give a shot to the skinner murders. and what do you know, we solve it on the 1st go. proper buffs, jan flame arrows and shaman dominates as she can both heal & cause serious wounds
donate 7k (or so) to temple, for 4 reputation points. ole!
meet neera on way out and from the temporary meet between areas
go to temple district & loot everything lootable
buy belt from Talos temple
do fallen paladins
go to city gates and turn around
to docks and do entire thief questline
refuse stronghold

***
If Suna Seni blocks our way, go to gates and then to the area we wanted to. Tomes are spread, Vagrant takes str + con + cha, DD takes dex, int + wis (x3) are to be used later.
***

visit waukeens to get a few scrolls (protection from acid, emotion, breach - monies at 42k) and head to slums. Jan learns the latter two.
investigate activities in CC's back room, we summon a nymph, a fire elemental + clan spirit. max prebuffs and make it on the first go. yay.
Sir Sarles, return Neb's head.
seriously at this point Suna Seni is easily doable, but we don't do it, instead
we go to UImar Hills and do all of the basic stuffs
trademeet
jon cernd
druid grove, triple fire elemental + hastes + blesses + defensive harmonies + strength of one. just storm through all of it.
faldorn (charm the bears)
adratha (very easy with proper buffs) & the genies
helping Tiris in trademeet (but skip the reputation point)
graveyerd, meet with bodhi, side with thieves
clear graveyard on the back of buffs + haste and rest

Suna Seni, DD overpowers (we AC maxed so it has about -16AC effective). DD takes everyone's aggro & DD doesn't even get hit in the fight. Everyone else moves back, and then we emotion/spell thrust/insect plague or so. DD takes chaos but it already has ridiculous saves, especially with defensive stance.

kidnappers & tirdir
poisoned man
harpers
cernd's child (let go of Cernd)
free hexxat (DD soloes dragomir)
wellyn
and to Windspear Hills we march!

***
The idea here has been to micro-optimize our xp by playing with 5 members through these parts. So exp gained is shared by 5 members, instead of 6. It should help a little. The only place that required reloads was the druid fight in the grove, as the timing is difficult with a Vagrant and the fight (at least my tactic) relies a lot on timing (interrupting the skins / CD in the beginning). And of course we reloaded in the begining a few times for we had no idea where Suna Seni would be & we won't spend energy in trying to memorize where suna seni was and which route works.
***

Join rasaad and go after his quests (but realize that we can't free wilson before we've met Neera's wild mage friend. This causes some troubles)

Rasaad's quests
Drop Jan, join wilson at Heretic Temple
Neera's hidden refuge & all quests (except Kirik Khan, which doesn't trigger), drop Wilson
Pick up Jan from Slums, pick up hairband
Back to heretic temple to open locks & disarm traps (we didn't have a thief before)
realize we can whack the dark moon heretics left.
whack dark moon heretics, it doesn't trigger Rasaad or Master of Combat
talisman of hearthfire
Neera's quest
pay gaelan bayle an hop to


Chapter 3

**
Neera is 60k of exp away from IH.
**

Ployer
Mook
Guld Contacts (3 vampire brides slain)

***
And Neera gets a level thus we get IH and access to rest of the quests. Yay! (edit: well, actually the difference isn't even that big ...)
***

Cult of the eyeless (pretty easy with mirror images, emotions and some healing from Shaman. Unseeing Eye goes down before it gets ADHW's away. Yay!).
PC almost at 1Mexp. And we haven't even started the actual quests yet.
Mencar Pebblecrusher
Slaver Stockade, goes very smoothly with 2xweb minor sequencer as always

***
Forge paws of the furious cat & Ring of protection +2.
***

back to druid grove to launch last druid stronghold quest
belm and then to trademeet
whack Hayes in the pub
founder of trademeet (no Rhynn, that's a big, big shame...)
since we're here we do chaos / heeding the spirit of the grove pt 2 (Shaman has Call Lightning). Neera gets whacked by insects though. Nymphs are nice here. They can both summon and heal. Haha.
de'arnise keep, mostly just storm through though rest before library/viper/tor'gal. Tor'gal we summon, max prebuffs and storm -> everyone aggro tor'gal and shaman takes gem.
solve the riddle in the sewer, goes very smoothly even though we forgot we had IH.

***
we've used cloak of atonement in almost all of the fights. mostly it just gives us AoF. We got chant once. Cleric stronghold quests are done every now and then.
***

sewer gang (we get SoA from CoA)
rescue haer'dalis but we don't have enough RRoR scrolls. So we go to Windspear hills to get some.
Rescua Garren's Child (milk all Skellys from Conster). RRoR wares up to 6 scrolls now! Neera is 260k or so away from RRoR (or mordenkainen's sword.... hmh). We get a manual of elaboration so we forge the chaos potion. It goes to Jaheira.
Planar Prison. We attack the warden instead of breaking the gem and end up with more than +100k more in exp. So attack warden, whack everything, then break up the gem and whack some hounds. Not sure if we could have milked some planar hounds here from the Warden, as they are super simple with out permanent confusion immunities, thank you Chaos & DD's saving throws.
Paladin stronghold quest #1, rest @ umar hills, Jaheira leaves and we pick up valygar to open the sphere, drop valygar in the sphere
finalize both clerc & paladin strongholds
start jan's quest
take hexxat (console her quests instead of waiting)
black leopard thingy
shroud of the unproven and hexxat leaves to meet Cabrina
finalize jan's quest
pick up custom Swashbuckler/Mage. We're swapping her for Imoen in Spellhold.

**
pc gets about 46k of exp for completing both of the hexxat quests. Jaheira is 160k away from getting level 7 spells and thus SoA, which we'll need vs vampires since we can't rely on Cloak of Atonement.
**

The Crew:

Vagrant 1,68 Mxp, AC -10, 147HP, frostreaver/staff +3/shield of harmony, MPV: Coin Golem
DD 1,66 Mxp, AC -19 , Dwarven Thrower/fortress shield, MPV: Gem Golem
Jaheira 1,66 Mxp, AC -1 , staff +3/Spear +3 (spiritual weapons from shaman), MPV: Tor'Gal
Neera 1,65 Mxp, AC 9, Neera's staff +1, MPV: Yuan-Ti
S/M 1,62 Mxp, AC -2, Dak'kon Zerth blade / Belm, MPV: Conster
Aerie the Shaman 1,67 Mxp, AC -1, staff +2/sling +1, MPV: Chaos

**
pai'na (get all spawns, bala's axe keeps her from casting nasty stuffs + shaman keeps healing pai'na...)
lower tombs
to planar sphere
Engine room - We regen a sword vs golems, they have no chance. For Lae'lyn we just summon an army and whack. S/M re-ups haste a few times. Lavok isn't a problem, as it's spell repertoire is very limited and we can already summon very effectively.
Lavok dodge breaches a little bit, summon army & whack away. Neera takes golems at the start of the fight.

***
We make levels at the time machine room. Neera takes mordenkainen's sword, as S/M can soon cast RRoR. Shaman makes a level and takes regen. With those spells, we are quite OP for this already. We get a scroll of memory boosting which we immediately use to forge Jaheira's amulet, which solves problems with her spell slots. How convenient. We have numerous loose ends to cover, like king & queen, pirates, Bodhi, Samia, King Strohm's quardians, limited wish Quest, de'arnise keep, mage stronghold, Borinali etc. And our roof is 300k more exp for PC. I think Bodhi by herself will cover almost 100k of that. we are trying to make it through without solving shade lord. let's see.
***

pirates, whack coordinator before it uses a single AI scroll. we take the version of the book of infinite with spell turning.
limited wish quest + we take exp & monies from limited wish
king & queen @ graveyeard
bodhi (2 character with perma npp is easily enough)
horrid rakshaha in the sewers
screaming statue, (PC at 2.08Mexp, need about 50-75k more)
borinali
samia (we take Vecna here!)
king sthrom's guardians
finalize mage stronghold + all possible playhouse + de'arnise keep quests. We could wait for the turnish here but we decide to leave it post spellhold.

**
PC is at 2.17Mexp. Time to take Yoshimo along and go for Brynnlaw. Bodhi with 6.6 changes is overly simple. Since we can get 7th level spells we can just Shield of Archons for Jaheira and storm. We have numerous lose ends to cover as in we haven't even visited Temple Ruins, Watcher's keep, Ashideena Guardians nor have we started the Squirreled away questline.
***

Chapter 4

Minor things
Lady Galvena (priotize getting all guards)
Perth with 3 coins (seriously the hardest fight so far, we have just one arcane caster - luckily our bhaal powers are great at interrupting)
Visit spellhold to whack mists, sleep, visit again for noble trolls
Desharik sends us to asylum
We wake up at spellhold maze and PC is at 2.315Mexp. So about 35k below the limit.
We join Imoen the Swashbuckler(9)/Mage, who immediately eats reaching ring for extra spell slots.

Vampires + liches
Ancient Tome (pretty tight this one even with our capabilities, we get all 6 spawns without resorting to cheesy tactics, just pure power (dd tanks obviously)).
Kobolds, the key here is turning off AI !
Spider Ambush
Golem Ambush

***
Golem Ambush is probably one the most difficult fights in the entire game. Or at least for us it. We always have immense difficulties with milking the golems.
***

Mithril golem is man-handled by Shaman supporting tanking DD. This is also the only fight where green dragon potions are useful (ih+fa, then the slow doesn't matter)
whack lonk
irenicus, low ac DD dominates with shaman's regen. pc at 2,77mexp
take saemon's offer, get out, whack desharik, sleep, take horn, whack pirates and prebuff before talking to saemon. then whack pirate lord again, then whack saemon.
sahuagin, just whack. for prince we summon 3 earth elementals, 2 swanmay and cs. and dominate. we try to whack the king but he escapes. whack the rest of the sahuagin. I think this approach is supposed to generate a permanency scroll with the surface party, but we've never gotten it.
to underdark

Chapter 5

1st drow ambush, summon an army, prebuff, DD runs from the right side as it doens't need fa potions or anything to bypass improved web's. the rest move in from the south. Requires a few reloads, as we botch our approach several times, for various reasons (mostly due being ill-prepared. Low ac DD overpowers the fight.
immediately to kua-toan groups near the beholder lair & mindflayer entrances
rest and do demon, then to eastern tunnels, clear everything except Kua'Toa prince & demon knights.
rest and head to beholder lair. the elder orb at the entrance is troublesome, we solve it with a few potions of magic shielding (barely). rest and re-enter, mirror images for cause serious wounds and triggers full of gm+emotion combinations. goes quite smoothly.
Dracolich, DD + Shaman overpowers. Keep up death wards / SI:Necromancies.
2nd drow ambus: DD runs north of the bridge with a troll. the crew + summons whack the rest. Prebuff with summons, Soul Armour (S/M), GS (DD, Vagrant, CS) and SoA (CS + Jaheira)
turn into a drow, buy potions + freedom scroll + GOI scroll from the duergar merchant, monies at 120k.
enter ust'natha, whack everything in the tavern
rescue phaere
return brain
patrol leaders helmet
whack elder tolb
taso kala thing
deirex, st+goi+si:abjuration + buffs for S/M. wait 4 rounds. cast mirror image. when deirex starts TS, whack with buffed dd+vagrant+jaheira
house jael'lat
mage's proposal
kua'toa prince
and Neera reaches 3,4m giving her IA. We take RvE as the first 9th level spell. Ole! (we don't really use RvE for anything though for a ling time, might as well taken CC or Wish).
noble efreeti (7 x CO & 9x AA is easily enough).
buy stuffs from merchants (potions, a few scrolls, darkened glory, spear +4 and Belt of Skillfull Blade!! (<= it goes to S/M). free dola fadoon & slaves
lesser demon (summoning ritual, RROR doesn't work on spell shield here?!?. 2 blackmistst appear and the door doesn't open after whacking the demon)
whack everything in Ust'Natha on the way out
meet dragon, clear the drow near the entrance and head back to underdark.

**
We have the mind flayer estate to do as well as ancient golem & death knights. I'm thinking we'll pick up dragon helm + supreme shelter before Ancient Golem (for elemental resistances). Also Shade Lord is waiting for us as well as the ranger quests. So at least some easy stuff to do before Kruin.
**

Master Brain (with careful positioning it's quite straightforward, DD tanks throughout with ih+refen+defensive stance+entropy shield), get all spawns. One mistake and we're dispelled though.
Death Knights, this is such a fun fight. We summon an army & storm, as usual. I always wanted to use the soul reaver for a character ... but no, not this time.

***
This is where we start to be able to supercharge the shaman. You see, Shaman has a very effective use of all of the spell levels, even the levels 1-4 are tremendously useful in almost all of the fights. We already have 10 level 7 arcane spell slots. So Shaman has 6 spells per level 1-4 + we can recharge via limited wish to a total of 16. For 5th level spells slots the Shaman has 7, and we can wonderous recall 14 more, for a total of 21 (for Shaman has 7 level 6 spell slots as well). Then we could double that with Wish. It should be easily enough and we're just starting.

If your party is made out of casters (even rangers/pallys are considered casters here for they have very useful spells), the limited wish recharging becomes stupendously useful. Especially in fightes where swords are rather useless. So, hello to unlimited skins for example. And the more effective use of those spell slots / levels you have (so Auramasters, arcane casters with ia or a shaman), the more fun the ride.
***

This post has been edited by pekkae: Mar 22 2024, 05:53 PM

[pekkae]

Journal, part 2.

Chapter 6

Clear small areas
Activate Ruling De'Arnise keep and lands (with c:createcreature ("kpprun01"))
Temple Ruins, this time liches are easy. However, they are accompanied by Skelton Warlords and we don't have any +4 weapons, besides Jaheira's Spear. So trolls & smilodon's take care of 'em.
breeze past thaxssillya

Shade Lord: There's a potential unlimited xp "cheat" here, as shadows from the altar generate 420exp/per shadow. So we whack the entourage, feeblemind shade lord and leave dd whacking some shadows, and physically go to the local coffee shop for coffee pick up and come back to find dd still whacking shadows. not sure how many we get but maybe some 150 or so. it evens out nicely as DD with ring of regenration & hammer +1 will whack a shadow just when the next one appears and their damage is mitigated by the ring of regen. This generates about 10k of exp per character, so we don't exploit it that much. still, it's a nice bonus.

Firkraag, summon an army - dodge the death spells a little bit. so 2x earth elemental, 2xtrolls, 2xswanmay, 2xsmilodon + clan hunter.
enter watcher's keep and clear the 1st floor, so everything besides spider queen.

***
Hmh. Jaherira makes a level. CS has a weapon +4, so do trolls + Smilodons. And swords work as +4 weapons. In addition, Jaheira has a spear +4. Is that enough to whack the spider queen?
***

Spider Queen, I think we get all of the spawns. Towards the end it is just summoning a single killer/whisperer spider or so, and then nothing. Spider Queen is whacked mostly by a supercharged (so under GS+IH) Clan Spirit + double smilodon + 4 x trolls and a greater swanmay (I think it can hit the queen). Swords are amazing here, especially in a cloud of soothing fog / under regen, the spiders are really weaponless against them. Some troubles with webs, but Shaman has FA + we have really good limited wish capabilities for re-charging spell slots, as both Neera + S/M has LW.
Statues & the rest of WK level 1

***
And almost everyone makes a level, besides Jaheira (S/M is about 30k from next level as well). PC at 4,3 mexp and we have at least wk level 2 to go, and since we get the flail head from wk level 2 we would have another nice weapon +4. As in we have Smilodon, Trolls, Jaheira, CS + Vagrant + Greater Swanmay which can hit the Troll King. Hmh. Shaman is 390k away from next level, with it we would have a fighting chance to dispel Kruin. (edit: oh, Shaman doesn't have dispel....). We have 12 6th level spell slots, which gives us a nice room to buff our crew + the most important summons.

Stuff to do, Wk level 2, troll mound, de'arnise keep, ranger quests and Bodhi. We won't jump to Chapter 7 because of Anciet Priest though. We are 1 scroll away from having three scrolls of "ray of fragmentation", which we'll need to get the Golem Slayer for Jaheira, solving her problem with missing weapons +4 immediately. We also have numerous super items to forge in Githzerai Blade, Ioun Stone, Supreme Shelter etc. We are much looking forward to getting all of them. Perhaps we should also do Huskar Lord's armour, hmh.
***

ranger protector of umar hills, pt 1 - whack tombehelten
ruling the de'arnise keep (maid)
ranger protector of umar hills, pt 2
de'arnise keep (moneylenders)
ranger protector pt 3, the umar thing (activated, we don't do it yet)
de'arnise keep (flood)
wk level 2, neera soloes chromatic demon (turn into a chicken) and efg (whack using acid damage).

Troll King & Queen, goes very smoothly. we think we get all of the vengeance trolls, which fall to 3xsunfire + dragon's breath + cone's of cold. Ac maxing DD is surrounded by 12 or so trolls, luckily we were smart enough to drop pff & pfc on him before, so S/M keep dropping sunfires from one side & neera Cones of Cold from the other side,

Pink up dragon hat from Wind Master

***
if we go to graveyard, the turnish encounter activates at playhouse and Kruin is blocking our way to the city. This is unintentional. Party at the moment, we could up levels a little bit still or we could faec Kruin now. Hmh. Then again, our remove magic capabilities are currently non-existant, but if we make a level to 21, the difference in levels is only 4 - as in Neera has a 10% chance of dispelling Kruin. A 10% chance per remove magic, 3xtrigger and 7xunder alacrity (all 3rd levels slots) gives us 100% chance. This is enough for our non-reload approach.

The Crew:

Vagrant 4,6 Mxp, AC -15, 171HP, frostreaver / FoA+4,staff +3 / shield of harmony, MPV: Firkraag, Total exp. 27%
DD 4,5 Mxp, AC -21 , Dwarven Thrower / Kneecapper / Stonefire / Darksteel Shield, MPV: Elemental Golem, Total exp. 25%
Jaheira 4,5 Mxp, AC -6 , staff +3 / Spear +4, MPV: Dracolich, Total exp. 34%
Neera 4,5 Mxp, AC 0, Cleric's staff +3 / Sling of Everad, MPV: Chromatic Demon, Total exp.4% (chapter 12%)
S/M 4,5 Mxp, AC -8, Solemn Duty / Club +3 / Belm, MPV: Cat'o'nine lives, Total exp. 5%
Aerie the Shaman 4,5 Mxp, AC 1, staff of arundel +3 / sling +4, MPV: Chaod, Total exp. 3%

Spells:

Neera
1st: Armor, Chromatic Orb, Magic Missile, Nahal's Reckless Dweomer, Shield
2nd: Agannazar's Scorcher, Blur, Melf's Acid Arrow, Mirror Image, Resist Fear
3rd: Flame Arrow, Remove Magic, Slow, Vampiric Touch
4th: Emotion, Greater Malison, Polymorph Other, Stoneskin
5th: Breach, Cone of Cold, Lower Resistance, Spell Immunity
6th: Chain Lightning, Improved Haste, Protection from Magic Weapons
7th: Limited Wish, Mordenkainen's Sword, Ruby Ray of Reversal
8th: Foreknowledge, Monster Summoning 8, Spell Trigger
9th: Chain Contingency, Dragon's Breath, Improved Alacrity, Recast Vital Energy, Wish

Shaman:
1st: Armor of Faith, Bless, Doom, Mend Light Wounds, Spirit Ward
2nd: Alicorn Lance, Barkskin, Charm Person or Mammal, Resist Fear, Resist Fire & Cold, Slow Poison, Soothing Fog
3rd: Call Lightning, Men Medium Wounds, Protection from Fire, Protection from Cold, Spiritual Clarity, Zone of Sweet Air
4th: Cause Serious Wounds, Free Action, Mend Serious Wounds, Protection from Lightning, Spirit Fire, Spiritual Weapon
5th: Chaotic Commands, Entropy Shield, Insect Plague, Iron Skins, Mend Group, Recall Spirit,
6th: Harm, Impervious Sanctity of the Mind, Mend Body, Primal Ward, Wonderous Recall
7th: Animal Summoning IV, Creeping Doom, Elemental Summoning, Ethereal Retribution, Healing Ward, Implosion, Sense of Limbo, Storm Shell
***

Bodhi Doesn't go smoothly at all. The first time we almost make it, but we are not sure what happens to our summoning CS? it doesn't appear (most likely summoning limit) then numerous tries because a positioning. Skellys are troublesome, for we are much lacking blunt weapons +4. Luckily we have swords, which are good at tanking Skellys + shaman to heal them. And we have limited wishes to re-up the Shaman. In the end Skellys are handled by Vagrant, trolls, smilodon + CS (while S/M + Jaheira tank). DD tanks Bodhi throughout, of course. Jaheira, Neera + Shaman make levels.

Surface Party
Return Lanthorn and we make levels again.

Kruin Since we are in the vicinity, we give Kruin a little bit of a shot and WE CAN DISPEL KRUIN NOW! Olé! So we prebuff extensively, start the fight with 2xswanmay, 2xsmilodon and triple fire elementals. Dispel Kruin and whack (Jaheira), milk all golems. DD tanks all the way. PC at 4.8Mexp points.

***
Sell some stuffs, monies at 550k. Forge: supreme shelter, huskar lord's armour, silver sword/githzerai blade, shadow dragon scale & red coral armour. pick up amulet of master harper from Ribald. oh and water's edge +4.

A note about the S/M.

With soul armour, ring +4, ring +2, cloak +2, githzerai blade and amulet of master harper it reaches base -20 AC. Then we can further lower effective ac by -3 via armor/shield (1st level arcane spells), girdle of bluntness (-4 vs crushing) and THE -20 AC base with any combination of TT/Foreknowledge/Blur/Defensive harmony/Improved Insivibility (<= which probably gives a +4 AC bonus, but it just isn't stated anywhere (at least it used to)). Those, together with skins + swashie bonuses *should* make for one hell of a tank. Starting a fight vs golems at -31AC which we can further lower with entrophy shield (by -6) and Swashbuckler bonuses for -3 ... to -9 means our effective vs crushing should be at -34 to -40 without entropy shield, with entrophy shield we should be able to reach the maximum of -20 vs damage type, meaning we'll have a maxed out AC of -44. The problem is though, that the bonuses require long casting times (like foreknowledge) or do not work against golems (like blur). But I think we'll try this character vs golems so that we'll start with Foreknowledge/TPT, and when they run out we'll use a trigger to re-up skins, GS and Tenser's transformation (as it gives -4 to ac) + great Thac0. So the S/M should be safe.

The end result should be -15 Thac0, effective ac that is from -30 to -39 (depending on weapon type & bonuses), backed up by skins (a lot of skins, since it's a full mage). Without bonuses from Shaman. And with TT S/M has about 200f HP's. It should be enough.

Maximising tanking:

So quite soon we should have in addition to DD with -30 effective non dispellable AC & 45% non dispellable DR, a Vagrant that reaches 85% DR, has almost 300 hp and can do real damage via H2H a S/M, that hovers around the same Thac0, with 200hp, but is blessed with effective -35 ... to -40 ac or so with mirror images, skins, fireshields and and the whole shabang. Oh, and belt of the skillfull blade giving it +10% damage to attacks with both water's edge & githzerai blade. Main hand damage should be from 26-37 pts per hit.
***

return yoshimo's heart (+200k exp, wohoo!)
lord roenall at de'arnise keep
pick up scrolls from messenger
last part of playhouse, sell the playhouse to higgold
talk to squirrel (so start squirreled away)
whack shadow thieves at shadow thieves hq
forge golden spider figurine (it's such a great tank with Shaman!)
Ancient Priest, for we need the staff +3
Whack the steam elemental prince
forge golem slayer
shade lich (prekangaxx)
ashideena guardians
while we're here, we do theshal (Neera rror's protections + dispels pfmw, dd tanks theshal + spawns etc. throughout. dd has -39 or so vs slashing start of the fight. they have no chance. 4 bone devils spawned.

***
I don't think we are swapping the DD, like our original plan was. The DD is immensily powerful. While it will lack, in dps/apr's, it is like a cheatcode in so many different encounters. We would need to swap the Vagrant, but we don't want to do that either for Swanmays are just ridiculously effective
**

shade lich @ bridge district
kangaxx (S/M + Vagrant + Jaheira + CS whack it, a little bit of troubles here since we can't dispel the lich form.). we get the ring, how nice!
to umar hillls, pick up scrolls, talk to squirrel
to trademeet and pick jewel casket
to bridge district, talk to squirrel
squirreled away assasin's, part 1
mystery of the jewel casket fight

assassin's hideout at bridge district (just fight in the storm)

umar witch, I think we get all of the spawns. ac maxing dd is yet again superb here, as we can just drop him in the fight with a few potions and it will basicly whack them skellys by himself. It has -30 something vs slashing + nondispellable 45% DR. this fight all in all totalled about 75k exp / character. That's quite good.

ancient mage, whack it first, then dd takes the aggro of the elementals, as always and the rest move in to whack when spawns appear. get all 12 spawns.

ancient golem, get 10 spawns (should be all), DD tanks ofc. DD starts the fight with -29 and we can further lower it to -36 (via defensive harmony + entropy shield)

***
sell some stuffs and monies at 350k. we go forging and come back with ring of greater djinn summoning, rings +2, ring +3, cloak +2 and so. and 3 pairs of boots of speed. monies at 5k. Maybe it's time to give Aerie her personal item, when we have the required gold.

We are thinking that she shall get an armour.

AC 1
+2 spells per level
-3 to saves vs death.

That's it. We use studded leather of thorns as a template. Cost is a scroll of memory boosting, scroll of fireshield (red) permanency scroll and 75k in gold. So much alike Aerie's hammer, but not as powerful. Should be in line with other personal equipment of the mod. And should make Aerie a very powerful Shaman.
***

activate mystery of the shimmering light
finalize paladin stronghold (talk to the chap at order of radiant heart, it gives 35k exp or so) & activate assassin's (so talk to Vanya)
enchanter at druid grove
illusionist at temple district
elite doppleganger
free roshan, get protector of the woods

guarded compound, enter with alacricities + gs's + foreknowledges, dd has defensive stance. bombard with spells until we get dispelled, then apply protections. dd moves in and takes the aggro of everyone, for half a round or so, or so until 5 trolls are spawned and they go to help the dd. We stun stralman (power word stun). since Neera has casting time bonuses S/M is still great with a assortment of spells that have very low casting time (mm's, aa's, images & blur's, remove fear, luck's, remove magic's, skins, pfmw's, ih's, power words, absolute immunities etc.). and can of course launch the all triggers.
ancient lich

***
We go and "forge" the armour for Aerie the Shaman (so we dump the stuffs needed for the armour). Our creq is coming together nicely and we keep improving our already formidable capabilities. Ole!

The S/M is quite nice, we are in dire need of 6th level spell slots so her 9th level slots are usually filled with absolute immunities, hence we prefer IH's & GS's over PFMW. We are beginning to be truly scary. DD is awesome. We also get Nature's Gift for Jaheira. We are already much looking forward to getting the Crom Fayer, even though it will cost us some utility.
***

geg at guarded compound - dd blocks a doorway (with a gem & an amber on it). defensive stance is non-dispellable & the dd has effective -30vs crushing, also non-dispellable. which we can further lower to -37vs crushing (defensive harmony + entropy shield) he can tank for ages. we wait until all spawns are out and then have ourselves a proper all-out brawl. geg + 9 golems vs dd, vagrant, jaheira, s/m, 2xgreater swanmay, 2xswanmay, noble spider, greater djinn, 2x smilodon and the clan spirit. oh and 3 troll & 2 greater yuan-ti's (all properly buffed up of course). Shaman absolutely dominates with -1 in casting time (foreknowledge). they have no chance. When the brawl is over everything besides greater yuan-ti's & a troll survive. Neera turns 3 ambers into chickens. Since we're not really RROR'ing or summoning swords in this fight, we can recharge immensily through limited wish. Shaman is especially the beneficiary here.

treasure in the ice. prebuff upstairs, summon army downstair and everyone whack icegolem. it's gone in 1,5 rounds or so. Neera takes initial purge & pfmw's. the most difficult thing is keeping the elemental alive until we get all of the spawns. dd tanks yet again. Shaman (-1) provides support to summons & the elemental . get all 6 spawns, easily.

Marvella finale. Summon an army, dodge the initial ADHW's and towards the end shaman keeps both Pasha & Elemental Golem alive. I think we get all of the spawns, unfortunately Pasha gets the kill for the last gem, so we lose out 24k of exp. We get the elemental though. Should have whacked them in the opposite order.

Assasin's at windspear hills. regenerating swords in soothing fog while entropy shielded. they have zero chance. Dd runs in the beginnig head first into the crowd, Shaman follows with regen + entropy shields. Swords from CC's. Neera (IA) + Vagrant move in from the south side, Neera remove magic's Coordinator's invisibilities and Vagrant + 2xSmilodon whack them into oblivion. Then we tank with swords under /regen / soothing fog/ entrophy shield. IT's not even particularly close. We get maybe 8 golems. we make about 150k exp/character here. and 120k in gold, without selling stuffs.

Limak, we khelben's wharding whip & turn golems into chickens. DD with ac maxed (-35 effective or so) crushing tanks throughout.

***
We sell some stuffs and forge amulet +2, buckler +3 and ring of protection +4. monies at 45k. We are a little bit frustrated for we through Neera's Robe requires the robe of the neural archmagi, but it doesn't. We could have already gotten Neera's Robe. Instead, we forged Githzerai blade + some other stuffs. Dammit. Well, luckily we know the location of an additional scroll of memory boosting and have resources & monies.
***

pick up note from table
Suldanesselar, we need a few levels (Jaheira is just 25k away from next one, then we can dispel Shangalar or should be able to at least)
we do some testing here and find out that free action protects from Stun. Ole.
Suldanesselar, summon army, whack. Rest, whack the drow + spider + nabassus. Suneer gives no exp?
Go for black drake, enter, summon an army. DD goes to face golems, S/M goes for drake (secret word deoesn't work vs spell shield, even through it should - so S/M get sense of limbo, she RROR's and then pierce shield's the drake). Turn Amber golems into chickens (6xLR triggers from both Neera + Imoen). Since we can breach it, it's not a problem. 3 regen solves creeping doom, or the insect spell (S/M takes it).
And we need a scroll of memory boosting so we're headed to twisted rune.

Twisted rune, summon an army & prebuff. whack vampire, dd takes care of the fighter, neera takes layenne and shangalar gets killed by remove magic's & regenerating pff'd Swanmays & some other summons. Then we just wait out Vaxall. done and done. pick up loot & scroll of memory boosting,

***
fix Neera's Robe! Yay!
***

whack cowled wizards
pick up scrolls from messenger of the light
start the good the bad and the ugly
whack cowled wizards (2nd batch)

illithid hideout, enter with active ia's + 6xadhw triggers & minor army (cs, smildon, noble spider etc.) and anhilate. For geg+alhoon, open the door and draw out the regular illithid. rest. enter again. s/m takes initial purge + adhw with ih+pfmw+pfme trigger. geg goes for maxed out dd (with non-dispellable -34ac vs crushing). swanmays go for alhoon. Neera de-buffs alhoon, who is quickly whacked by swanmays. dd makes a little bit of sweep and is attacked by geg. we run to the other room, dd blocks a doorway and we wait until all spwns are out. Then we have proper brawl, our crew + army vs. 10 golems. They don't have a chance. Shaman heals, Neera turns golems (maybe or so 3) into chickens and we whack Geg with CS's (from Vagrant + Jaheira).

forge crom fayer, yay!
whack viper queen
pick 48 sided garnet
say goodbyes to vanya
whack another batch of cowled wizards (3rd), we improved invisibility Neera + SI:Divination Neera, and they can still target her. hmh.

Grandfather of Assassins. This is such a fun fight. Enter Neera debuffs coordinator #1, which is whacked by a troll & DD. DD gets a little bit stuck but luckily there's smite / comet's to clear the way. Regenerating swords in soothing fog are tremendous here, they tank throughout. We whack assassins & elite assassins with h2h & call lightnings (from Jaheira, Shaman + Vagrant). A very effective way of getting rid of the swarm, as a single limited wish recharges 3 call lightnings, among other spells. In the end it's just a few swords, a few rune assassins, 9 master assassins and the grandfather. Short sword of Mask here. How nice! Crew makes about 200k in exp / character from the fight and almost 200k in gold (without selling the loot).

report the demise if the assassins @ order of radiant heart
green wyrm, neera pretty much soloes, but dd gets the killing blow.

Supreme Glem, AC maxed dd tanks with -39vs crushing (take SoA + entropy shield for DD) . it's "easily" enough. we milk 2 elementals out of the supreme golem. we just don't know how we can protect properly from elemental backlashes to prolong this and SoA from CoA runs out in 1 turn, which limits our tanking quite a lot. But the tactic of summon an army while dd tanks and shaman heals reigns supreme here as well. Though DD takes so much elemental damage that when we whack the supreme golem, Shaman triple regens him and still the DD needs additional mending. Mend group is just brutally effective here, our original plan was to spirit shift the Shaman so it could participate in the final whack but without Shaman's "mend group" 's our entourage would have been wiped out. 235k of extra exp from this, no resources consumed at all. We are a little bit pissed off, since we were supposed to milk everything from all ecounters, but we just don't know how to do it with this. Ditto for GBU. hmh.

We take back the lost reputation (trademeet + tent) and continue happily on our way.
forge boots of the ranger lord, ole!!
where is the belt of the inertial barrier?!?
wk level 3, the teleports - hybrid tiefling (BoiB here, haha) causes some troubles, for we are ill prepared but otherwise no troubles with our advanced capabilities (PC at 6,6Mexp).
Slave Wraith, wait for the summons and whack. Also note to self: always whack the slave wraiths, more exp that way.
gamble with gambion for spectral brand & wish from gambion
whack gambion
wk level 4, whack mindflayers & clear level besides golem ambush & githyaki
deck of many things, Vagrant takes STR and S/M takes hitpoints.
forge rimed club +4
time to try our tanking, I think

***
We want the Noble Staff of Earth for the following encounters, especially GBU finale. But, we don't know where the staff of earth +2 is? We were a bit vexed about the HP gains from the deck of many things, as Neera would have needed them and of course that would have been a nice been for Vagrant as well, whom we are planning to max out. The reason we've been so much of the content before WK is the Supreme Golem fight..
***

Geg @ Suldanesselar. Requires numerous reloads to get the sequencing right. S/M takes initial purge + adhw's, DD tanks geg. We just get 7 spawns here? I though there was supposed to be 9. Towards the end there's a purge and we've summoned an army. Then we just move in to whack. The -40DD is quite difficult to hit.

Supreme Leader. So many reloads, for initially we botch the start, then the next phases (as limited wish glabes are broken). Then a few times because something completely random, like PC gettting hit with a critical 3 times a row. Anyway, it's much fun, this fight. Our final case has Neera almost dropping as SUpreme Leader psionic mind blasts her, then breaches, then comets and Neera has literally 1 hitpoint left. Jaheira comes in and dispels and Shaman heals her. Inquisitors are handled by regenerating Smilodons + DD + Swanmays + CS. In the end Swanmay queen & noble spider (under 2xregen+ih) tank the leader all the way. PC comes and gives the final blow. It's nice, we can dispel the leaders mage spells quite effectively & recharge through limited wish. Anti-inquisitors fall to critical striking DD / PC mostly.

Demi lich; it tries to impronment Shaman who has an active rite. Turn golems into chickens. Then whack demi-lich. Usuno's blade here, ole! Now we can forge Hammer of Thor!

***
Maybe it's time for a little bit of a break now. Our team, pre-break:

Vagrant 7,07 Mxp, AC -12, 199HP, K'logarath + & FoA+4,staff +3 / Staff of Rynn, MPV: Greater Elemental Golem, Total exp. 26%
DD 7,04 Mxp, AC -26 , 221HP, Crom Fayer & Supreme Shelter (Belm/SSoM - off hand), MPV: Green Wyrm, Total exp. 22%
Jaheira 7,26 Mxp, AC -8 , Golem Slayer / Spectral Brand + Yamato, MPV: Limak, Total exp. 32% (chapter 20%)
Neera 7,0 Mxp, AC 0, Cleric's staff +3 / Sling of Everad, MPV: Chromatic Demon, Total exp.6% (chapter 10%)
S/M 7,02 Mxp, AC -18, Githzerai Blade & Water's Edge, MPV: Supreme Golem, Total exp. 10% (chapter 20%!!)
Aerie the Shaman 7,03 Mxp, AC -10, Staff of arundel +3 / sling +4, MPV: Xiper Queen, Total exp. 2% (chapter 3%)

Stuffs to do:

Rest of WK ... (there's a lot left!)
Demon Lord's Messenger
Judgement Day - fight (we don't have anyone who can use the sword through)
GBU finalle (planning to do this when I get agreat wyrm scale)
Lord Wetlander Quests @ Suldanesselar
Spirit at Underdark
Lich @ City Gates
Orcus
Zallanota
***

This post has been edited by pekkae: Mar 26 2024, 09:27 PM

[pekkae]

Journal, part 3

So, our break didn't last ... oh well, maybe next time.

Saladrex, falls to prebuffed creq whacking with non-magical weapons. it doesn't even get adhw away. We have active 3-4xregen per attacking character though. And we use a potion of magic shielding, for sladrex maanges to breach S/M. Ooh! Staff of the ram here, defender of easthaven and girdle of fortitude!!

Forge : Noble Staff of Earth (ole!), Flail of Defending & Wounding, Girdle of Lordly Might
Golem ambush at Machine of Lum the Mad, muah. DD + S/M tank throughout. no problem, none.
Rock & Garrock, meh - just whack away.
Machine of lum the mad, mr for neera, vagrant takes str, dex + con + cha. we don't touch int+wis, as we don't really have a use for those.
Demon Messenger. They literally have 0 chance vs our tanking capabilities. Some troublesome breaches though. Neera doesn't get breached, she's under SI:Div+II, that's nice!

GBU finale, we prepare immensily. send in wizard eye to scout the area. Summons block the spot where ultra is desingned to spawn, pushing it a bit south - so more surface to attack. Whack ultra before it gets dispel away. Separate elementals while we're whacking the ultra & lure 2 away from Auriel. Auriel tanks just one. Buff Auriel (protection from fire/cold/electricity/acid) + ih + triple/quadruple regen + entrophy shield. Milk all golems from the 3 elementals. Take wish:rest half-way through. Would have probably made it without the wish:rest as well, but it brings certainty. The S/M is such an amazing tank, it needs maybe 2 skins during the whole fight and it tanks an elemental almost throughout. at a very late point we opt to healing ward + entropy shield dd, then cast absolute immunity on S/M and the elemental she was tanking goes for dd & S/M re-ups TPT + foreknowledge etc.

pick up jewel
pick up old stone from squirrel, since we forgot before
get axe, ole! (PC now has 270hp)
final seal level @ wk, the first ambush - just whack the lich & skellys, dodge silence a little bit (S/M takes it under pfmw/skins/max buffs & protections)

Ancient Dragon, s/m takes nishruu, whack noble efreeti first (with acid damage), then nishruu with h2h (Vagrant, Jaheira, S/M, DD, Swanmay Queen, Clan Spirit + Noble Spider). Then Salamander, then just breach dragon and whack away. Dragon silences Neera, which we mitigate with Sense of Limbo. The problem is that even with silence removed Neera can't use quick items, and we run out of breaches a little bit. Luckily S/M has a few, so she takes the 2nd sense of limbo and olé, Dragon is no more. Half of the creq gets whacked by the 3xadhw though, luckily not permanently. So Shaman just raises them and off we go.

Golem ambush at final seal - level (4x elementals + 2 bone devils). Well, DD tanks throughout with double regen + protection from acid, ih and entropy shield. it's not even particularly close.
then directly to globe machine & do everything besides grave liches & geg+ultra.
maybe it's time to supercharge Vagrant, as in get Vagrant's axe? And should we forge great wyrm scale...?
Sell stuffs and forge improved cat figurine, monies at 355k
Whack cowled wizards, part 4 I think (IA, Foreknowledge and then 10xsunfires)
whack lich & city gates
whack spirit @ underdark (for magical pull)

Orcus, well, since we are quite vulnerable to silence, it takes a little bit of time. We maximize vampire summons, though we are not that well capabable of dodging level drains. Still, with the help of 5 restoration scrolls, we make it. Wouldn't have needed 'em, had we understood the pace of the summons better but, here we are. almost 140k of exp per character here. So summons fight orcus "north" while the rest of the crew hang at "south", causing numerous vampire spawns. Whack Orcus once it's out of PFMW's. We could have dispelled those, since our mages have more levels than Orcus but more fun this way. Forgot that a planetar could have restored us during the fight. dammit.

whack more cowled wizards, hmh, part 5
start the "ancient secret of suldanesselar"
mirrored vipers, swords in soothing fog reigns supreme
fight monsters in the mirror, whack an elemental pre mirrored windmasterf

Anti-Ranger, 4 barbarian essences used here for maximal straightforwardness. we try this a couple of times without them be's, but it's just so much easier with a straight whack. Note to self, get gauntlets for this fight. They would help quite a lot here.

** Status**

Vagrant (PC): Level 29, 274 HP, AC -16 (-23 with shield), Thac0 -15 / -12, (can reach 85%D DR)
STR 24, DEX 19, CON 21, INT 9, WIS 14, CHA 22
Stuff: Red Coral Armour, Gauntlets of Weapon Expertise, Indigo Ioun Stone, Wooden Horse Necklace, cloak +2, Protector of Woods, RoP +2, Girdle of Lordly Might, Boots of the Ranger Lord
Weapons: Mostly Axe of the Lakesider +4 / Flail of Ages & FoDW
MPV: Greater Elemental Golem
total exp value 21% / 24%
percentage of total kill 22% / 26%

Minsc (Dwarven Defender): Level 33, 230HP, AC -26, Thac0 -17
STR 25, DEX 18, CON 19, INT 9, WIS 9, CHA 9
Stuff: Huskar Lord's Armour, Helm of Balduran,, Talisman +2, cloak +2, Ring of Gaxx, RoP +2, Girdle of Bluntness, paws of the cheetah
Weapons: Hammer of Thor / K'logarath mostly
MVP: Green Wyrm
total exp value 22% / 22%
percentage of total kill 23% / 29%

Jaheira: Level 33, 138HP, AC -8, Thac0 -3 (can reach -16 buffed)
STR 17, DEX 18, CON 16, INT 10, WIS 22, CHA 11
Stuff: Shadow Dragon Scale, Paws of the Furious Cat, Circlet of the Woods, Harper's Ward, cloak +2, 2xRoP +2, Girdle of Bluntness, Paws of Cheetah
Weapons: Golem Slayer or Yamato + Spectral Brand
MVP: Ancient Dragon
total exp value 29% / 33%
percentage of total kill 25% / 23%

Imoen (Swashbuckler/Mage): Level 9/28, 116HP (reaches 270 or so with RvE:+50% & TT), AC -18 (reaches -24+bonuses), Thac0 -4/0 (reaches -16)
STR 23, DEX 18, CON 16, INT 18, WIS 18, CHA 6
Stuff: Vecna, Hood of the honorless, Amulet of Master Harper, Indigo RoP +2, Rop +4, Cloak +2, Cloud giant girdle, Paws of cheetah
Weapons: Githzerai Blade / Rimed Club +4 & Waters Edge
MPV: Supreme Golem
total exp value 17% / 11%
percentage of total kill 16% / 10%

Neera: Level 29, 89HP, AC 0 (30% resistance to magic / fire / cold / electricity / acid)
STR 11, DEX 14, CON 16, INT 10, WIS 18, CHA 11
Stuff: Greater Robe of Invocation, Bracers of defense AC4, Obsidian Ioun Stone, AoP, Rop +2, Cloak +2, Ring of Acuity, BoIB, paws of the cheetah
Weapons: Staff +3, Sling of Everad
MVP: Chromatic Demon
total exp value 6% / 5%
percentage of total kill 8% / 6%

Aerie (Shaman): Level 29, 130HP, AC -16, Thac0 -1
STR 20, DEX 18, CON 16, INT 16, WIS 16, CHA 14
Stuff: Aeries personal item (AC 1, +2spells per level, -3 save vs death), the brawling hands, crimson ioun stone, heart of mountain, 2x RoP +2, Cloak +2, Stone giant str girdle
Weapons: Noble Staff of Earth
MPV: Viper Queen
total exp value 2% / 2%
percentage of total kill 2% / 3%

**

Neera
1st: Armor, Chromatic Orb, Magic Missile, Nahal's Reckless Dweomer, Shield
2nd: Agannazar's Scorcher, Blur, Melf's Acid Arrow, Mirror Image, Resist Fear
3rd: Flame Arrow, Remove Magic, Slow, Vampiric Touch, lightning bolt
4th: Emotion, Greater Malison, Polymorph Other, Stoneskin, improved invisibility
5th: Breach, Cone of Cold, Lower Resistance, Spell Immunity, sunfire
6th: Chain Lightning, Improved Haste, Protection from Magic Weapons
7th: Limited Wish, Mordenkainen's Sword, Ruby Ray of Reversal, prismatic spray
8th: Foreknowledge, Monster Summoning 8, Spell Trigger
9th: Chain Contingency, Comet, Dragon's Breath, Energy Blades, Improved Alacrity, MS9, Recast Vital Energy, Summon Planetar, Wish

*the most useless spels have been lightning bolt, armor, aganazzar's scorcher, improved invisibility & prismatic spray. would definitely consider replacing those with

armor => protection from evil
scorcher => horror
lightning bolt => protection from fire
improved invisibility => ray of fragmentation / fire shield red / minor disruptor
prismatic spray => spell sequencer

Shaman:
1st: Armor of Faith, Bless, Doom, Mend Light Wounds, Spirit Ward
2nd: Alicorn Lance, Barkskin, Charm Person or Mammal, Resist Fear, Resist Fire & Cold, Slow Poison, Soothing Fog
3rd: Call Lightning, Dispel Magic, Mend Medium Wounds, Protection from Fire, Protection from Cold, Spiritual Clarity, Zone of Sweet Air
4th: Cause Serious Wounds, Defensive Harmony, Free Action, Mend Serious Wounds, Protection from Lightning, Spirit Fire, Spiritual Weapon
5th: Chaotic Commands, Entropy Shield, Insect Plague, Iron Skins, Mend Group, Recall Spirit, True Seeing
6th: Fire Seeds, Harm, Impervious Sanctity of the Mind, Mend Body, Primal Ward, Wonderous Recall
7th: Animal Summoning IV, Creeping Doom, Elemental Summoning, Greater Elemental Summoning, Ethereal Retribution, Fire Storm, Foreknowledge, Globe of Blades, Healing Ward, Implosion, Sense of Limbo, Storm Shell, Storm of Vengeance

Have not cast "fire seeds" not even once.

***
Stuffs left to do:

Mirror monsters at Ancien Secret of Suldanesselar (gauntlets + judgement day would help here quite a lot, especially since we are playing through this for the first time & on insane)
globe machine fights: Geg + Ultra & 4 x liches
Nasty Orcsies
Judgemenet Day fights11
Demogorgon
Zallanora
***

Drowned Soul, real troubles here for we try this numerous times with ill preparations. Anyway, then we fix preparations (shield of harmony for vagrant, soa for dd, cc's & spirit wards for Shaman + DD (just to be safe). And other normal buffs, gs, ih's, pff's + blurs / images / ii / si:div for mages. Start, IA, 20x sunfires + 20x vampiric touches whack whispers while fighters whack ghosts. Summon Swanmay Queen "down" (west), drop ih + double regen + free action on to the queen. Jaheira whacks the elemental and then we whack the drowned soul, who is tanked by 3-4 swords + noble spider. If there was supposed to be a 2nd wave of spiders, we don't get to it.

Vagrant is 1500exp points away from reaching next level. Well, maybe we have the level then for the finale.

Mirrored Golem. Very simple and straightd forward this one. Jaheira dodges initial purge and DD takes golem's aggro, it doesn't stand a chance. With only those things, we're like half way there . CC in a few swords, DD tanks of course while we summon a queen and Jaheira + Vagrant take care of the elemental (,maybe 2 rounds or so, one CS from Jaheira). Then wait for the 2nd dispel and everyone moves in. Shaman with -2 (AoP + Foreknowledge) drops wards on everyone, Neera gives her IH and she spirit shifts. That's (8 Vagrant, 6 Jaheira, 9 DD, 6 S/M + 8 Shaman) about 37 APR with figher thac0s & damage on the golem each round. It doesn't get the 3rd dispel away. Ole!

Vagrant makes a level, Ole^2! And what do you know, it's elemental resistances are up to 75%. Which means that with dragon hat, we are at 100% (fire, cold + electricity). This is ooh!

Master of Mirrors.Jaheira can dispel it. And we can fry the mirrored whisperer spiders. Haha. This is going to be interesting. So we bring in a few swords, we have troubles here for we don't know the correct sequence to whack the enemy. Anyway, enter & mages go ia + si:necromancy, they are with CC's of goi+swords/trolls. DD goes to tank them spiders, with, no cast buffs as it doesn't really need em (DD has -11 to saving throws with defensive stance). S/M goes to buff Jaheira with PfC+PfF+PfA+PfL, then buffs herself. Jaheira powers up with holy power+skins. Vagrant summons the Swanmay Queen and the following elemental is whacked by Vagrant + Jaheira + the queen. Neera takes a few swords along and meets DD at the edge of the improved web's, where she first IH's jaheira + swanmay queen, then she 15xsunfire them spiders + finish whisper spiders with vampiric touches. Ghost's are finished with critical strikes from the DD. Then we 10xdispel the Master (Jaheira has 20% chance to dispel) but it doesn't work while Mirror Master tries it's best to do damage to the DD, who with BoiB+Batalistas passport+shield+helm is near invulnerable to Master's tricks. Then we whack the master and the last enemy spawns. We take Wish:rest here (the 5th try), Jaheira can dispel again and ole, now it works. Then we just summon another Swanmay, whack the elemental and the master. Done and done. We upgrade the axe. Vagrant now has almost 290HP's. óle!

***
We've played anti-ranger & mirrored golem maybe once before, but not the other encounters, they are new. Oh and RvE:Regen used extensively here as a prebuff with these. It helps, though since we have Shaman we would have made it without as well.
*''
Nasty Orcsies.

Run #1. Prepare immensily. We don't exactly rock this for our pacing is off and we leave some abilities unused while straining others. Summons near the entrance with Shaman & Neera (so CS,Noble Spider in the start, then Greater Djinn, Swanmay Queen & Greater Swanmay). PC + DD + Jaheira + S/M whack enemies in pairs. Remove magic mages and then whack, priotize mages, then archers as the regular orcs are not a threat. Jaheira takes ox-tail belt + boots of avoidance (though she has protetion from missiles). Shaman takes cloak of the shield (in the start, the we forgot we had it). We make it on the first go but after 3/4 we are in desparation mode and pretty much out of resources, we try to get wish:rest (7 tries) but no. I think after we're out of remove magic's / limited wishes we try to PfC fighters and just wither whack the mages without dispelling them that much. At this point S/M gets whacked(luckily not permanenetly), she has -28 or so effective AC so it looks like the orcs get really lucky. We make it still by using almost everything in the repertoire. At the end, Shaman doesn't have a single spell left. Neera has only 5th level spells left, she's casting dispel's from scrolls. Jaheira though has pretty much all spells left. Thieves alchemy / potions of regen are really good here (which we don't have), as is Huskar Lord's armour, which basicly makes it possible for DD to focus only on damage dealing instead of AC maxing,

Run #2. Prepare immensily. Protection from petrification to everyone, potions of agility, potions of defence. DD takes belm off-hand. We switch contigencies, so both Neera + S/M have contigency on 50% HP left (stoneskin/pfmw). S/M also takes triple adhw on nearest enemy on 50% hp. Enter, Neera goes IA, S/M remove magic's, Vagrant + DD go to whack away Jaheira summons CS & Shaman summons the Smilodon. Mages are dispelled immediately via Remove Magic's and Jaheira/DD/PC move in to whack em. Sometimes S/M joins as well. We usually take mages down with a pair of fighters. Summons are near the entrance, we start with Clan Hunter + a few trolls (they get death spelled easily) + Smilodon, then include the Noble Spider + Swanmays, and after the first batch is out we take the greatr djinn alonf with Sunnis and ordinary Swanmays. Ar half-point S/M almost gets whacked, she is saved by the contigencies though. We absolutely dominate this throughout this time, though near the end we are very, very thin on resources. We try to get Wish:Rest here but no, we don't get it this time either. Still, we make it without anyone needing "recall spirit" but towards the end we are again much, much out of all resources.

Globe machine liches, they don't stand a chance.

Globe machine Geg + ice golem. S/M takes initial purge and PFMW's. Golems target her. Everyone else is in the next room. Wait for 2 rounds or so (until next purge) and start summoning an army - it takes about 6 rounds or so. An army, as in a planetar, noble spider, greater djinn, clan hunter, sunnis, 3x earth elementals (summoned before S/M faced golems), Swanmays (2x normal, 2x greater + queen) Smilodons and a troll or two. Buff everything with as much as we can (GS's, some elemental protections, IH's, regen for swanmay queen + greater swanmays etc.). After the 3rd purge or so spawns start racing towards our army, where they are whacked. Neera turns a few ambers into chickens. Then DD goes in, GEG aggros DD (at this point the fight is won), DD lures Geg (+ a gem) away from Ultra and after the next purge our army goes for the ultra, which falls within 2 rounds or so, in the meanwhile DD has finished the gem. Then it's just 5 ambers + coin + gem remaining (and the GEG, which is on DD), Neera turns 2 ambers into chickens and swanmays whack one while the rest of the crew whack the rest. Then we get conveniently immediate purge to DD and we just move in and whack the Geg. It has 0 chance. 12 spawns, I think that's pretty good.. Not sure of there was more, probably not - they came out quite fast at the start. Mend Group yet again comprehensively overblownly effective here.

This was intense.

***
Remaining actual fights:

Judgement Day
Zallanora
Demogorgon
***

We use the keys and get some level ups
Defeat the holder of the club of detonation
Hive Mother crew ( this used to be one of the toughest fights in the game .... not so much anymore )
Forge Noble Staff of Fire + Great Wyrm Scale
Defeat Azamantis (we forgot we had impervious sancity of the mind, which we should have tried here - not sure if we get all of the spawns as our summons accidentally whack azamantis)
Enter demo's lair, have a chat, guide vigil knights to Demo and make levels again.

Judgemenet Day fight

S/M fully buffed with -31AC vs crushing (& skins & all elemental protections) starts vs the elemental, the rest go after demon prince's summons. It takes a few tries before we find the correct rhytm. the S/M is an amazing tank, it can easily affor to re-up foreknowledges while tanking an elemtal. Half-way through we get another elemental, who we lead to fight the S/M. It's quite nice, elemental spawns coin/gem, we whack it, re-up, whack demon prince's summons, summon, whack spawned cin/gem. in a pinch the S/M can easily tank 2 elementals + a spawn or two. We re-up spells continuously through limited wish (it recharges remove magic's & skins). We get 10 spawns or so.

Zallanora

Debuff + fry em with sunfires. We don't bother milking golems as we don't get anything from them.

**
Crew around 9 Mexp (+/- 150kexp). From level 30 (sorceror) to level 35 (Jaheira). We should be ready for the demofght.
***

Demo

Max prebuffs, max summons. So we start the fight with 2xearth elementals, 2xTrolls, 2xSmilodon, Noble Spider, Greater Djinn, Sunnis (staff of earth), 5x Swanmays, planetar and CS (max buffed + PFF). In addition to normal buffs we Take RvE:Regen + mental agility for Neera + Wish:IH's for everyone. Random buffs GS's (Neera has it), PFF's, RFaC etc for summons. Aerie the Shaman starts with Spirit form + favored of the spirits (but they just get breached).

Elementals go for Kazuuyl / Belcheresk, trolls for st kargoth, the rest stay back. CS (with all innate buffs (SoA is amazing here) + pff + regen + Shaman's healing ) takes Demo. Both Mages go IA, Jaheira dispels Rozvankee (and a smilodon + Swanmay, which are on Rozvankee), DD takes remove magic alone. Debuff Nulonga (and whack with magic+non-magic weapons), st kargoth with debuff+4xLR+ (spell triggera+LR) acid damage (minor sequencer + sequqncers), debuff belcheresk + lower resistances (trigger 3xLR + LR) and whack with rest of AA's + MM's. Then breach + secret word Rozvankee, and our "swarm" (PC, DD, Jaheira, S/M + smildoons and swanmays) whacks it onto oblivion. Re-up IA for Neera, debuff/LR/breach kazuyl. Summon a plantar, who start immediately healing Sunnis/CS/Smilodons. After Kazuyl is down, it's just demo left. And we still have CS, Greater Djinn, noble spider, both greater swanmays + swanmay queen and both smilodons and a few trolls and the planetar (#2) left(we summoned when we had the chance), . Demo gets one wave of abyssal escorts / noble mariliths away. Shaman is tremendous as she is healing almost entirely throughout the fight. She gets breached in the beginning but we don't even have time to re-up skins. At the end mend group is amazing.

No barbarian essences used. I don't recall the crew using a single barbarian essence throughout the mod so far (edit: we did use em for anti-ranger). Also no need to wish:rest.

They had no chance.


Tree of life Irenicus

Well. Since Neera can now -5 we just turn the golems into chickens and whacl Jon. DD tanks ofc.


Hell

We don't bother to milk golems any more. Just summon an army, prebuff a little and whack away. Neera, even with -4, is just do effectice she's a little nuts. And ofc. Shaman is now -2 (or -3) (-1 + circlet + we can foreknowledge). (Edit: we play through it again and milk all golems).

This post has been edited by pekkae: May 20 2024, 11:04 AM

[pekkae]

Journal, part 4.

So we hop on to ToB.

Illasera

Meh. Just whack. Get all spawns.


Gromnir

Jaheira takes spell turning + minor globe, spirit form for Shaman. And normal buffs. It's rather fun. Though Karun the Black is cheating, since we can't dispel it. Karun causes some troubles but our -2 Shaman handles them easily.

***
Rornach's horn is here. Now DD can reach -33 vs Crushing unbuffed & non dispellable.
***

Berenn

The fire giant enclave has no answer for our double mage (with acid arrows & co's & cone's of cold etc.). DD takes elemental, it's becoming increasingly straightforward those ones with -33 effecgtive AC + all elemental protections.


Nyalee

Well, there's barbarian essences here. DD clocks the doorway at the entrance together with Shaman and the rest whack spiders. We get maybe 5-10 rounds after grandlords are spawned.


Yaga-Shura

Summon an army tactic rules supreme here as well. Keep the bodyguards at a distance. EFG's get remove magic's & acid / lightning / cold damage from mages. The double-caster setup works wonderfully here. For Yaga Shura we 3xpierce shield, gm + doom + try to stun but were not succesfull, though Yaga Shura falls to our army & H2H. Shaman drops a few call lightnings though, which is nice.


Oasis

CC in a few swords. Shaman regens everything & keeps healing throughout the fight. DD with -33AC vs crushing makes it through with little help while taking on 2-3 gems almost throughout the fight.


Amkerthran

Do all if the minor things + forge heartwood ring + montolio's cloak. Ring goes to Shaman and cloak to PC.


Sendai's Enclave

Mid way through Sendai's enclave we are at 400k in monies and we don't have a single thing to forge. We are not even relying on summons anymore, just whack away. I think we get a decent amount of Skellys from the lich. The mano-a-mano fight is the most troublesome here. We manage with AC maxing and a few potions though (+ start the fight with 2xRvE:Regen (we're still not sure if it works like that). Sendai herself is very straightforward, Neera in the middle controls everything, debuffs, damages & buffs our crew. When golems appear she is under IA and just 8xLR + GM + 5-7x PO them into chickens. Sendai's Pet takes a little bit of time but with 4 capable fighters + CS + 2xSwanmays is just a breeze.


**
The crew is so powerful we can just whack away most of the encounters without tactics or "max summons & max prebuffs".

Status

Vagrant (PC): Level 36, 305 HP, AC -16 (-23 with shield), Thac0 -16 / -12, (can reach 85%D DR)
STR 24, DEX 19, CON 21, INT 9, WIS 14, CHA 22
Stuff: Red Coral Armour, Gauntlets of Weapon Expertise, Indigo Ioun Stone, Wooden Horse Necklace, cloak +2, Protector of Woods, RoP +2, Girdle of Lordly Might, Boots of the Ranger Lord
Weapons: Mostly Axe of the Lakesider +5 / Flail of Ages & FoDW off-hand
MPV: Demon Prince
total exp value 26% / 26%
percentage of total kill 26% / 26%

Minsc (Dwarven Defender): Level 39, 243HP, AC -26 (effective AC is between -29 and -33) Thac0 -17 (has +100 resistances in fire & electricity)
STR 25, DEX 18, CON 19, INT 9, WIS 9, CHA 9
Stuff: Great Wyrm Scale, Rornach's Horn, Gauntlets of extraordinary specialization, Talisman +2, cloak +2, Ring of Gaxx +3, RoP +2, Girdle of Bluntness, paws of the cheetah
Weapons: Hammer of Thor / K'logarath / SSoM + supreme shelter off-hand
MVP: Green Wyrm
total exp value 23% / 23%
percentage of total kill 27% / 29%

Jaheira: Level 39, 155HP, AC -10, Thac0 -5 / 0 (can reach -17 buffed)
STR 17, DEX 18, CON 16, INT 10, WIS 22, CHA 11
Stuff: Shadow Dragon Scale, Paws of the Furious Cat, Helm of Balduran, Harper's Ward, cloak +2, 2xRoP +2, Girdle of Fire Giant Strength, Paws of Cheetah
Weapons: Golem Slayer / Ixil's Spike or Spectral brand + Yamato off-hand
MVP: Ancient Dragon
total exp value 23% / 29%
percentage of total kill 19% / 21%

Imoen (Swashbuckler/Mage): Level 9/37, 125HP (reaches 270 or so with RvE:+50% & TT), AC -18 (reaches -24+bonuses), Thac0 -4/0 (reaches -16)
STR 23, DEX 18, CON 16, INT 18, WIS 18, CHA 6
Stuff: Vecna, Hood of the honorless, Amulet of Master Harper, Indigo Ioun Stone, RoP +2, Rop +4, Cloak +2, Cloud giant girdle, Paws of cheetah
Weapons: Githzerai Blade / Rimed Club +4 & Waters Edge off-hand
MPV: Supreme Golem
total exp value 15% / 11%
percentage of total kill 15% / 11%

Neera: Level 35, 95HP, AC -2 (30% resistance to magic / fire / cold / electricity / acid)
STR 11, DEX 14, CON 16, INT 10, WIS 18, CHA 11
Stuff: Greater Robe of Invocation, Bracers of defense AC4, Circlet of Netheril, AoP, Rop +2, Cloak +2, Ring of Acuity, BoIB, paws of the cheetah
Weapons: Royal Elemental Staff
MVP: Chromatic Demon
total exp value 8% / 6%
percentage of total kill 8% / 6%

Aerie (Shaman): Level 35, 142HP, AC -12, Thac0 -1
STR 20, DEX 18, CON 16, INT 16, WIS 16, CHA 14
Stuff: Aeries personal item (AC 1, +2spells per level, -3 save vs death), the brawling hands, Circlet of Golden Flowers, heart of mountain, RoP +2, Heartwood Ring, Cloak +2, Stone giant str girdle, paws of cheetah
Weapons: Noble Staff of Earth
MPV: Viper Queen
total exp value 2% / 2%
percentage of total kill 3% / 3%

**

Neera
1st: Armor, Chromatic Orb, Magic Missile, Nahal's Reckless Dweomer, Shield
2nd: Agannazar's Scorcher, Blur, Melf's Acid Arrow, Mirror Image, Resist Fear
3rd: Flame Arrow, Remove Magic, Slow, Vampiric Touch, lightning bolt
4th: Emotion, Greater Malison, Polymorph Other, Stoneskin, improved invisibility
5th: Breach, Cone of Cold, Lower Resistance, Spell Immunity, sunfire
6th: Chain Lightning, Improved Haste, Protection from Magic Weapons, Goi, Giant Strength
7th: Limited Wish, Mordenkainen's Sword, Ruby Ray of Reversal, prismatic spray, Spell Sequencer
8th: Foreknowledge, Monster Summoning 8, Spell Trigger, ADHW, Pritection from Energy
9th: Chain Contingency, Comet, Dragon's Breath, Energy Blades, Improved Alacrity, MS9, Recast Vital Energy, Summon Planetar, Wish


Shaman:
1st: Armor of Faith, Bless, Doom, Mend Light Wounds, Spirit Ward
2nd: Alicorn Lance, Barkskin, Charm Person or Mammal, Resist Fear, Resist Fire & Cold, Slow Poison, Soothing Fog
3rd: Call Lightning, Dispel Magic, Mend Medium Wounds, Protection from Fire, Protection from Cold, Spiritual Clarity, Zone of Sweet Air
4th: Cause Serious Wounds, Defensive Harmony, Free Action, Mend Serious Wounds, Protection from Lightning, Spirit Fire, Spiritual Weapon
5th: Chaotic Commands, Entropy Shield, Insect Plague, Iron Skins, Mend Group, Recall Spirit, True Seeing
6th: Conjure Animals, Fire Seeds, Harm, Impervious Sanctity of the Mind, Mend Body, Primal Ward, Wonderous Recall
7th: Animal Summoning IV, Creeping Doom, Elemental Summoning, Greater Elemental Summoning, Ethereal Retribution, Fire Storm, Foreknowledge, Globe of Blades, Healing Ward, Implosion, Sense of Limbo, SoA, Storm Shell, Storm of Vengeance
***


Abazigail

We exp max throughout Abazigails lair. This is such a fun fight. Double mages with MM's, AA's & Flame Arrows pretty much handle business here. Whack initial form, Neera does ia, Shaman drops sense of limbo on her, Neera moves in, removes protections, breaches, 4xLR and then mirror images. Once Abaxigail starts casting true sight Imoen (the S/M) moves in and then they release 28xflame arrows and some 20 MM's and that's pretty much it. We also drop some 20 AA's but we're bot sure how many hit in the end.

***
Stuffs left to do: Balthazar & Ede (if we do it). We get the flail head so we can now forge FoA +5, which we won't need in the remaining fights. Our wares are massive.

We have

500k in monies
10 manuals of elaboration(!)
8 permanency scrolls
2 scroll of memory boosting
36 barbarian essences
50 vials of oil of resurgerence
40 scrolls of pfme
80 scrolls of pfmw
50 scrolls of rror
50 scrolls of breach
19 potions of invulnerability
2 full containers of scrolls
2 full containers of other potions (strenght, absorption, insulation)
40 potions of fire resistance (didn't need em in the demofight)
40 potions of acid resistance
etc.

***

Balthazar

Walk in, ih & smite the monks and balthazar.


Ede

Haha. Well, we would haven been overcompetent even without help. But with additional destruction at our side, it should be a breeze though. Won't spoil it.

(edit: it wasn't a breeze through, it was really difficult. we have to adjust immensily. here's where no necro really hurts, as we need to use S/M for buffing (Shaman is too slow and Neera doesn't have the necessary buffs). Which hurts the overall performance as the S/M's damage is away from H2H)


*** a few end notes ***

S/M reached level 37 while Neera reached level 36. We took AI as our last 9th level spell. We "gave up" about 200k of exp in the demofight and some 200k exp (per character) in the supreme golem fight, there was no way we could have made it while getting all spawns. At least I don't think so.

Maximising exp is a lot of fun and Shaman brings some incredibly powerful abilities for this specific strategy. Shaman, combined with a DD or a Berserker/Cleric makes for an ultimate AC tank, which is superbly useful and viable strategy for a play-through. Also, the "max summons, max prebuffs" technique works wonders once you start getting some more powerful summons. It's a little bit different attacking a particular area / enemy with 5x Swanmays, CS, 2xSmilodons, Noble Spider, Greater Djinn, Sunnis and a planetar than + maybe 4-5 trolls/greater yuan-ti's, than only the trolls / greater yuan ti's. Cheating with wish (ih on everyone) becomes insanely powerful then, as well as Shaman's "mend group", which in practice keeps your crew from getting wiped away.

This was much fun and it's a great time to close the journal as the summer is here, and the terraces are open. Wohoo!

Thanks again for all of the work you've put into this.

This post has been edited by pekkae: May 28 2024, 11:16 PM

[SparrowJacek]

Looks like we'll have another great journal to read, thank you pekkae for your interest in the mod! <3

The only place that required reloads was the druid fight in the grove, as the timing is difficult with a Vagrant and the fight (at least my tactic) relies a lot on timing (interrupting the skins / CD in the beginning)

From what I remember, the animals Faldorn summons are susceptible to Ranger's Charm Animal and you can take control of all her summons if you're lucky but I think my previous run with Vagrant was even before we introduced Acid Shield, so some things might have changed...

[pekkae]

Looks like we'll have another great journal to read, thank you pekkae for your interest in the mod! <3

The only place that required reloads was the druid fight in the grove, as the timing is difficult with a Vagrant and the fight (at least my tactic) relies a lot on timing (interrupting the skins / CD in the beginning)

From what I remember, the animals Faldorn summons are susceptible to Ranger's Charm Animal and you can take control of all her summons if you're lucky but I think my previous run with Vagrant was even before we introduced Acid Shield, so some things might have changed...

Yup, charmed the bears! I was trying to (unsuccesfully) disrupt the skins, which doesn't make a difference in the end though.

[pekkae]

Time to take a break from this. But it has been tremendously fun yet again!

I'll be back for the final encounters, we have such nice encounters to look forward to and we need to try out our golem tanking superpowers (Vagrant is just about to get FoDW meaning he can reach 85%DR!)

DD is such an amazing character, it's a little bit of a cheat code that one. Why no-neo else is using it is a little bit beyond me?

[pekkae]

Haha.

After 4 years (or so) with 10 different crews I think I finally figured out something important about the mod.

Even with this crew, we are optimizing the wrong things.

Vagrant is great, but we've never needed to tank with it. Which is important for the flow of the game, for Vagrant isn't that good of a tank really, as it's relying heavily on buffs to keep it safe and they tend to run out. Pure power wise the DD just is a superb character compared to the Vagrant. Vagrant is great though, as it can dish out massive amounts of damage, has really effective summons and a late game Vagrant can take in massive amounts of damage as well (my version now has almost 300 HP) + those innate resistences are really nice as well. But that is very late game, when those elements come into play.

Jaheira is great, probably one of the most OP characters in the game (after a well developed CERND in my books), but I still think that with numerous different crew compositions she actually hurts the overall performance. And nowhere is it in more plain sight, than with the Orc-horde fight. Let me explain. The most effective way to play the game is to achieve a crew where *every* character you have has a role to play in each of the fights, throughout the fights, including H2H. The big minus about Jaheira is that she is "competing" with some of the items, that are absolutely essential to achieve almost any kind of results with H2H from the non-fighter classes in the game.

A Shaman for example, is in dire need of paws of the furious cat, which make the Shaman a much more effective fighter. Without them, the continuous outlook is rather bleak. Ditto for Necro, it absolutely needs the Golem Slayer to properly function in golem fights, but if you have Jaheira, the GS most likely goes to her. So essentially Jaheira quite effectively handicaps a Necro, in many fights. I would be willing to bet, that a crew with Necro protagonist that includes a Shaman (or Cernd) is better off dividing said equipment to other members and leaving Jaheira's spot for someone else.

So to optimizing for a run, I'd probably be better off with about this kind of crew described below. The only place where I see problems is the GBU, where we were relying somewhat to Jaheira's regen's as well. But other than that, this kind of crew can easily handle the prebuffing needs (it's actually better because Necro can buff under alacricity & has the full range of buffs available), has extreme tanking capabilities (all three of DD, Pally + Vagrant can tank!) and it has extreme spellcasting capability. And effective use of the most OP equipment in the game.

Vagrant (PC) => Vagrant (Valygar)
DD => DD
Jaheira => Undead Hunter (personally I would like to try the Half-Orc Blackguard with access to Paladin's gear!)*
S/M => F/M/T (or F/M or F/I)
Shaman => Shaman, but with paws
Neera => Necro (PC) with full Necro gear

With this setup we've managed to optimize APR's extremely well. Vagrant reaches 9 APR (gauntlets, axe main hand, uber-club off-hand), DD gets to 9 (with belm off-hand), Undead Hunter 9 APR, F/M with water's edge reaches 9, Shaman reaches 4 and Necro reaches 2 (with 6 vs. golems for the "triple damage effect). You can only improve DPS by replacing the Shaman.

*Why the pally and not something else? Simple, it can cast clerical spells. And it is the onlly character that reaches 9 APR without the fighter gauntlets/off-hand scimitar, leaving those to other memebers of the crew. Also, it has amazing equipment, reaches 24-25 STR/DEX/CON, 85% Magic Resistance and because of the setup, has access to numerous different weapons - so you can effectively wield say flails/war hammers/bastard swords/long swords or so, as it can't specialize that much but the gear completely offsets this. And to top it off, the clerical buffs with the 6.6. changes are amazing.

This post has been edited by pekkae: Apr 2 2024, 09:56 PM

[pekkae]

Oooh!!!

Whacked Demogorgon.

No barbarian essences used.

[SparrowJacek]

Congrats! Very impressive! In my very recent playthrough I waited till the end of the game to beat Demo and even then used 1 Barb Essence per character to ensure survival of my characters

[pekkae]

Congrats! Very impressive! In my very recent playthrough I waited till the end of the game to beat Demo and even then used 1 Barb Essence per character to ensure survival of my characters

Thanks! Well, the crew was created with that particular fight in mind + the "max summons" strategy seems to be just overblownly effective, especially with s Shaman (+ 2 full mages to recharge the Shaman).

This post has been edited by pekkae: May 18 2024, 01:04 PM

[pekkae]

Item Suggestions

Since we are still toying with wooden horse necklace / amulet of seldarine...

Sensate Amulet
Amulet of Seldarine
Wooden Horse Necklace
Periapt of life proctection
Amulet of Spell Warding
Necklace of form stability
Amulet of Whispers
Starfall ore
Manual of elaboration
Amulet of protection +1
Scroll of Wish
5 Scroll of limited wish
Demogorgon's Tooth
200.000GP

Improved Wooden Horse Necklace
AC +1
Saves +2
Hit points +10
Charisma +2
Magic Resistance +10%
Resistances fire/cold/electricity +5%
Protection from evil
Immunity to silence (regular silence)

[SparrowJacek]

"Suggestions for the coming release" is probably a better place to post ideas like that, there's a greater chance it won't be burried under other messages

As for the item... What exactly is the purpose of it? I assume you can forge it after Demogorgon and it's one of the most expensive items in the game, but I see no spectacular bonuses, since it doesn't protect against Greater/Grave Silence.

[pekkae]

Right! I'll post it there.

It feels a little bit silly being a level 35 Vagrant and still equipping the wooden horse necklace .

When pretty much everything else is turbo-charged and fantastically powerful.