Yet another run, this time starring a Necro, Max H2H Options

[pekkae]

As it's been relatively quiet for some time at the forum I though I'd do a post about a run I've been thinking about recently. I don't have the time to start this in the near future, but every now and then I find myself yet again tinkering with the crew composition. Any comments would be welcome.

Our last run with "double -5" worked extremely well for most parts of the game. While we has some difficulties, we managed to develop our crew to quite OP mid-game and break through the demofight.

This time instead of being insanely capable in spellcasting we thought we'd develop an extreme H2H crew, playing on insane. This is what is in the works:

The locks (edit: they turned out not to be locks ...)

PC: Necromancer. Shall get the Necro stuff thus with required buffs be a little bit competent in H2H as well. With 2 APR / Decent Thac0 through TPT & Giant Strength. We thinks she'll be ok.

Jaheira: Early game superpowers. Great 2H H2H. Skins & Critical Striking. She rocks.

Custom multiclass F/I: Early game ubertank. Will get fighter Thac0's & Critical Strikes. Worked amazingly well on the last run.

Riskbreaker (probably Imoen): Will get JD. Gets to amazing physical resistance though Hardiness + CBS + JD. Will be an amazing tank + damage dealer.

What we're thinking

A custom R/C multiclass. Shall get full access to druidic spells. So fighter Thac0's, Critical Strikes + skins. Oh and insanely low AC (effective should hover around -28 unbuffed mid game). The only character that can both tank + has about the best combat buffs available (Draw Upon Holy Might should work wonders + Righteous Magic). We think she'll be great.

And the last slot.

Valygar the Vagrant? Can probably tank a little bit with Vagrant bonuses + Defender of Easthaven + Greean leaves armour + Armor of Faith + Double Regen. And can summon. Gets ofc fighter thac0's & critical strikes.

But if not Vagrant, whom should we take? Regular fighters are out of question for physical resistance through only hardiness is rather useless on insane - the characters need something else to protect themselves or increased physical resistance though something else.

A custom made Swashbuckler/Fighter could work as a dual classed assassin->fighter.

What else?

This post has been edited by pekkae: Oct 4 2022, 06:50 PM

[SparrowJacek]

Good luck with your run! It will be an interesting read for me, if you decide to share your thoughts and I hope it will be even more interesting playthrough for you!

Shaman (Minsc) - Shamans should be the ultimate "stayin' alive" characters, I hope this will be visible. They should be able to wear most "druid-exclusive" items and at some point some items for Shamans will be introduced probably.

Swashbuckler (Hexxat) - with unnerfed cloak she will be insane! Late game she will be even better at dealing damage than Kensai and have far better protections. I don't remember, why do you need to cheat Swash armor? I think the only condition is that you have a Swashie in your party, though it might be restricted to a "good alligned" character...

(Kel-)Dorn - how can he get 9APR? He can't get Grandmastery and don't forget that evil characters can't use those Paladin bracers. Anyway Keldorn's new armor should be a nice addition for both survivability and packing a punch.

R/C Multiclss - it's a shame that there's no place for a pure Cleric kit in your team. Most kits should be able to survive and add survivability to the rest of the party, plus you have a Shaman when things get dire. At some point I hope I will add improved holy symbols to the kits to make their distinctive features even more apparent.

This post has been edited by SparrowJacek: Dec 7 2022, 10:22 AM

[pekkae]

Good luck with your run! It will be an interesting read for me, if you decide to share your thoughts and I hope it will be even more interesting playthrough for you!

Shaman (Minsc) - Shamans should be the ultimate "stayin' alive" characters, I hope this will be visible. They should be able to wear most "druid-exclusive" items and at some point some items for Shamans will be introduced probably.

Swashbuckler (Hexxat) - with unnerfed cloak she will be insane! Late game she will be even better at dealing damage than Kensai and have far better protections. I don't remember, why do you need to cheat Swash armor? I think the only condition is that you have a Swashie in your party, though it might be restricted to a "good alligned" character...

(Kel-)Dorn - how can he get 9APR? He can't get Grandmastery and don't forget that evil characters can't use those Paladin bracers. Anyway Keldorn's new armor should be a nice addition for both survivability and packing a punch.

R/C Multiclss - it's a shame that there's no place for a pure Cleric kit in your team. Most kits should be able to survive and add survivability to the rest of the party, plus you have a Shaman when things get dire. At some point I hope I will add improved holy symbols to the kits to make their distinctive features even more apparent.

Thanks! We'll see how it turns out. We're not looking that much facing the mundane stuff in the game (we'll skip some spider fights for example ), but we're mostly looking into developing the new & introduced equipment & spells & stuffs. I'll share thoughts as much as I can!

From my playtesting the Shaman is really nice & works very well. We'll use the spirit fire extensively in the early parts of the game but I have no idea how those abilities will work at 6MExp(+) levels. It's sort of a shame that we can't fit both Avenger & Shaman in the group. We'll give paws of the furious cat to the Shaman for him to be able to participate in the fights as well. And the Shaman will get the circlet of the woods/golden flowers.

I thought the Swashbuckler armour was a PC only - drop. But at least the description at readme/items doesn't say so. So maybe we don't have to cheat Nice! (just playtested and yes the armour it's usable by an evil character as well).

We'll change Dorn's alignment to good in order to get the blessed bracers. And we'll also fix his stats to match Keldorn. So we'll be playing a character that is 1:1 Keldorn fights-wise. Though we've never played with Dorn so we're hoping to make the dialogue a little bit more interesting and we're looking to do Dorn's quests, as we've never done em.

According to my calculations and tiny bits of playtesting, we're not sure if a kitted cleric has enough to protect itself in the fights. And since we have a Pally, who'll get the bracers, we're restricted in APR's without access to Critical Strikes. Those are the two major reasons we're inclined to take R/C instead. There's though oodles of nice new stuff to try out though - and it'll leave the kiteed Cleric's abilities for us to try out in possible future runs as well.

This post has been edited by pekkae: Dec 7 2022, 11:26 AM