Journal of 6.6, Max new stuffs Options

[pekkae]

Welcome. Again.

I decided to change the format of the journal, so that it would be as easy as possible to follow. That's why we are dismissing our previous journa-thread and moving all thoughts to this thread. We'll pretty much post all chapter as their own posts after the initial post (so this one). Then if there are comments / discussion, they are after the actual journal. I hope this makes following the journal a little bit easier.

***

We like our crews themed and the "theme" for the crew isn't to maximize H2H, it's to maximize new stuffs in the game. (there's new stuff in IA as well, right?) So we're going to try the new kits, new stuffs & some new adventures (for us at least).

So we'll take all of the NPC's we don't usually use along with some new kits we haven't played in order to maximize "freshness" (to an extent). We'll also install the Tower of Deception - mod, as it's supposed to work fine with IA. So we have a bunch of new things to try out. We'll do ToD before moving to Spellhold.

Then again, as our most fun thing to do is to develop absurdly OP crews and characters, certain choices rule out other choices, as we don't want to have two characters competing for the same stuffs. They play such a big part in what makes a character useful. Unfortunately some choices will rule out the most OP characters (we think), but we're hoping that we can develop our crew to extremely OP levels nonetheless.

We'll most likely end up with the following:


PC Necro,

As it's still the most OP character. We'll see how OP we can make our PC, as we'll balance the stuffs a little bit. Having a Necro though rules out Cernd. Once you've played with the -5 Cernd, the -4 version is just not going to cut it. We promise to exploit the Necro superpowers to the fullest extent.


Shaman (Minsc)

it's amazingly effective in the early parts of the game. Has unique superpowers from the early game on. Gets spirit shift for casual late fight whacking. But there's a "but". Having a shaman rules out Jaheira though, as in one of the most powerful NPC's out there. That is because we want to make the most diverse & competitive Shaman so it needs to use the most OP equipment. Unfortunately for us, that equipment is normally reserved for Jaheira (/Cernd). We're not sure how useful a Shaman is towards the end of the game. Though it's "competing" for the sport on the team with Jaheira/Cernd, both of whom are not that great in the most difficult fights in the game.

Minsc works nicely for this as the dialogues are exceptional and he's quite nuts. And carries around a guiding spirit animal of his own.

Stats: Str 19, Dex 18, Con 19, Int 9, Wis 15, Cha 7


Hexxat

From our tiny bits of playtesting she looks like she can be developed to "hilariously OP" - levels. Shall get Waters Edge +4 to maximize her potential. So that means we won't take a RB/Kensai with us, as they compete for the same equipment. Insanely effective and as a bonus she has what's like undispellable continuous berserking on steroids.

I can't believe I didn't figure this out before.

Though we'll cheat a little bit and and get her the cloak from v 6.5.

We should be able to drop her effective AC to around -40 after midpoint of the game. She should be quite safe. Not CERND-safe, but safe.


(Kel-)Dorn

The undead hunter. Gets undispellable useful bonuses and gets to cast clerical spells. Especially access to remove paralysis is very welcome addition. So Dorn who gets Keldorn's stats & equipment. Should be play-wise be ike playing with KelDorn 1:1.

So we'll turn Dorn into an undead hunter and give him Keldorn's stuffs. Why? Keldorn's new stuffs are amazing and we've never played with Dorn. So in principle we are playing Keldorn, but with an additional quest and perhaps a little more interesting dialogue. The reason we take a Pally is because we took Hexxat and they compliment each other very well. With this setup we can max our APR's quite effectively. Shall get JD for maximum OP strength later in the game. Pally is the only character that can reach 9 APR without Water's Edge (/Belm) or gauntlets of extraordinary specialization.

it's a little bit of a shame that there isn't an "off hander" weapon, that would compliment the main weapon extremely well. Oh, besides Water's Edge of course. And Belm. FoDW would be amazing, but we have forging restrictions in place. So there's an off-hander. Oh. Well. So. Never mind.


F/I

Custom made gnomish fighter/illusionist. We'll max the stats and use a NPC as a template. Might use Neera for this as we really like her quest in ToB. The one character that keeps us in the game in the early parts. Gets +1 spells per level. Gets fighter Thac0's. Gets fighter HLA's. Gets amazing equipment. Can prebuff & debuff. etc.

Amazing tank + damage disher. Has everything besides high hitpoints. Though we can probably circumvent that a little bit. Shall use the Hammer of Thor & Githzerai blade late game. Oh and most likely the 0.5APR gauntlets so shall have 8 APR under IH. And after midpoint in the game also has nice amount of Critical Strikes.

Stats: Str 18/95, Dex 18, Con 18, Int 18, Wis 11, Cha 9


Priest of Tempus (Rasaad most likely)

We have to calculated and balanced now that we get the actual descriptions, abilities, items & everything. We were pondering for quite the long time between a multiclassed ranger/cleric (with access to druidic spells) and a proper cleric kit.

Why Tempus? For the undispellable holy power & righteous magic. We should do quite well with this character because of them. Even though we're lacking CS's + APR's (we can reach 5 APR with IH). We can drop AC to quite low levels though and we're looking forward to trying out the new spells & etc.

We'll probably use Rasaad here as a Monk & a Cleric are like brothers (or at least distant cousins). Plus we want his extended quest in ToB, as we've never done it.

Stats: Str 18, Dex 18, Con 16, Int 9, Wis 18, Cha 12

Should hover around -26AC ... -29AC mid game with Ok'ish combat utility, though we're a little bit worries that he'll be lacking in power when compared to an R/C (nevermind the avenger). I'm quite unsure how a cleric is able to protect itself in the fights, but ... we'll see how it turns out, in actual action.

***

So our frontline should be quite safe, at least from mid-game onwards. We should have enough APR's (We'll end up with 26 APR // 3 characters + cleric & shaman). We'll be lacking a little bit in Critical Strikes, though F/M & (kel-)Dorn will probably only focus on CS's. Hexxat has 3. It's a little low. We could fix this easily by switching Shaman with Jaheira and Cleric with R/C multiclass or a F/C multiclass. Though we're not sure if the F/C multi has enough to cut it on insane.

***

Changes & The Rules

- Max HP's for NPC's
- We have 92 pts to divide between the custom characters we have
- Forging restrictions in place
- We have tomes from bg1 to spread among the cew
- Console in trinkets for items
- Hexxat's cloak is revered back to the 6.5 version (for the most op version)
- We'll get a club +5, which we otherwise wouldn't have (and possibly 1-2 other items, we'll decide later)
- All spells are learned automatically
- We'll make a few items available for a cleric at later stages. We're just not sure about which ones.
- We'll skip most of the mundane stuff as in spider-fights (etc.) if we've managed to beat a similar squad before. Ditto for some of the golem encounters, even though we have previously been much fond of em.
- Insane all the way

This post has been edited by pekkae: Jan 18 2023, 08:24 PM

[pekkae]

Chapter 7


Suldanesselar

We start using protective chant here. It seems to work very well against the Rakshashas. We either have Protection from Energy or protective chant.


Nizidramanii'yt

F/I walks in with sense of Limbo. Greater Djinn & Hexxat tank the golems. They seem to have hard time hitting Hexxat, who has 74% DR + -40AC against crushing. It's easily enough. We turn 2 golems into chickens (for we botched our chain contigency) and find out that apparently spell turning doesn't work on the insect plague the Wyrm is casting. The Wyrm itself is half-a-round whack with triple CS & 21 APR's (with 24/25 STR) after a succesful Breach.


House of the Harpist

Enter,F/I takes initial purge alone & triggers PFMW + PFMW + IH. Necro comet's Rakshahshas to interrupt. We leave rakshahas battling trolls, noble spider + greater djinn. A mistake, since while we're whacking the GEG they drop a remove magic (F/I had cast a few Protection from Energy's so they are dispellable with Rakshashas levels). Hexxat tanks, unfortunately her PfE gets dispelled so she gets whacked by an ADHW. Anyway, we whack GEG before it gets the 2nd dispel away. Then we whack the entourage.

Hexxat is back up again in full health after a while. She's sort of great in that sense as well, as we can take much more risks with her for the immunity to permanent death.


Assassin's at bridge district

Whack away. Necro at -4 dominates. We happily CS away and they are immediately toast. We prebuff with PfE (Protection from Energy) all the time, here as well. No RvE's cast here.



Golems (3x elemental + 3xbone golem) at Wk level 4

Breeze through. We are superbly overcompetent already.

We giant strength + ih + regen + pfe our Smilodon. It does real damage after buffs. This gives us ideas. I don' think our F/C gets hit even once, even though he's whacking away with a flail (= standing right next to the elementals)


Twisted Rune

A little bit boring even perhaps. We come badly prepared. Hexxat whacks Revanek (just herself) while most of the summons go for Shangalar, Shyressa is whacked by a troll & CS'ing F/I + kel-Dorn. Then we true sight and whack the mage. Cleric dispels Vaxxall and we drop a wharding whip on it (to keep it from renewing SI:Divination). We get badly miscast magic'ed but manage to breach still. We've PfE'd before so we can whack away. Shangalar takes a little bit of time but a few summons at frontline + kel-Dorn (who has 50% magic resistance + 60% magic damage resistance or so) is very safe, even from the triple ADHW. We play a little bit with RvE here as in we summon a skeleton lord to whack Shangalar. We double check the difficulty meter, yes it's on insane. hmh.

For some reason Vaxxaal kep casting "soften target" on Cleric? Shaman got initial grave silence, a good call from the enemies. We don't get the mage's scripting. She seems to stand pat mostly, waiting for us to dispel her so we can whack away. An erroneous script perhaps? It has always been like this.


Ancient mage

Haha. Hexxat drops to -40Ac against crushing (start with entrophy shield, but then continuous due to the on-hit effect).

Hexxat can tank 2 elemental golems easily and milk & whack all of the coin/gem spawns. By herself. Like ... no problem. We just need to make sure she's protected from elements & drop a healing ward / regen every once in a while (if you get hit 4 times in a row, which is highly unlikely) and that she has active IH & giant strength all the time. Support with blesses's, chants, protection from evil 10" and defensive harmonies.

It's a little bit ridiculous. Completely OP. We check the setting 2 times and yes it's on insane.


Guarded Compound

We were hoping that Usuno's blade was here, but no. Golems are a breeze, Hexxat needs to warm up a little bit and they are practically weaponless against her (with 74% DR & AC of -30...-40 vs crushing). We find the holy scabbard though. Ancient lich we kill accidentally, again. Geg we can control a little bit and Hexxat whacks the spawns (yamato, club +5 or spectral brand).


***
We sell some stuff, for we're looking to forge some stuff but we don't have the 48 sided garnet, as we were mostly looking to get the holy avenger. And ofc. we were looking for the holy avenger for it can dispel supreme leader, IIRC. And kel-dorn has oodles of critical strikes. Well, I guess we're off to have a date with some assassins next. Anyway, monies at 400k or so. That should be about enough for our needs in the near future (judgement day, the truth, girdle of lordly might, belt of cloud giant strength as the main things. if we have money still, we might also forge noble staff of air/fire as well).
***

Mystery of the shimmering light

For some reason the elite doppleganger just targets PFMW'd F/I. Well, it's options are cleric with -39AC or F/I. We CS and it's over in a round or so.


TheShal

We usually do this post-demogorgon (for maximum easyness), but since we need to kill some time before our keys are ready we decide to to go for a whack.

Cleric tanks the skellys with -40 vs slashing. Hexxat domintes. We don't have a Cernd to implosion the lich so it falls to Necro, luckily remove magic works and kel-Dorn + hexxat (under pfe) whack it. I don't think Cleric gets hit even once. We find the girdle of fortitude here, how nice. Now we can get the girdle of lordly might.

***
So to forging we go. We forge The Truth, Girdle of Lordly Might (hexxat),
***

Lavok's postmortem request

RRRAAAARRRGGGHHHH. We have tremendous difficulties here. It's a fight that is very, very difficult with our strengths and weaknesses. Here's where Tempus would be tremendously useful, with the non-dispellble buffs, but we don't have it. So Cleric is out, through the most intensive parts. The bone devils have great Thac0 so they'll dismantle kel-Dorn immediately if he gets targetted. And the lesser force destroys summons on hit (at least on some hits). We can't really CS with F/I, for she has to be ready to skin up when needed. Hexxat can take a punch though, but her hardiness keeps getting purge magic'ked. Necro has 2 IA's, we can use a little bit of timing to max effectiveness and if we can dodge a purge with greater djinn we have a chance to make it. This one took hours and hours, probably 30 tries or so. Missing one detail means we're screwed. We use potions of magic shielding for Hexxat, for she keeps getting stunned from hideous laughters. And we can't afford to lose her mid-fight. We use RvE:regen here throughout the fight. The only fight so far where we've needed it.


Assasins at Windpear Hills

Prebuff. WE 3xADHW on hit both F/I & Necro have ST 3xchain lightnig. So we enter, Necro IA, gm, launch trigger (with llarloch's minor drain) and launch both spell triggers. F/I CC's in 3 trolls & Necro has MS6 on contigenc. Then whack the rest. Hexxat hardiness + acobatic combat + evasion's,so she starts the fight at -36 vs crushing. it's enough not to get hit. In addition to normal buffs we 3 true sight before entering, to avoid backstabbing (the truth, book of infinite spells + F/I cotigency trigger).



Grandfather of Assasins

Use same stuffs as described up above. In addition we have noble spider + smilodon + 2x greater yuan ti's with IH. We finish all of them within a span of 2 rounds.

***
We sell some suff as in our excess scrolls (we have a lot), some weapons + potions (they were worth 100k!). We forge a ring + Necro's ioun stone. Time we can perhaps try the tenser's partial transformation a little bit. Monies at 400k. Next we're going to get stuffs for Carsomyr upgrade and after that it's time to have a date with the Supreme Leader.

From the start of this journal we promised to exploit the Necro superpowers to the fullest extent but here we are. We haven't even used wish anywhere. We gotta start wishing pre fight.
***

GBU

Well. Since Viper Queen wasn't there yet. So we kill some time and do GBU.

We don't like the ending of this. Keeping Auriel alive with a shaman isn't very difficult but positioning is horrible here, as in if Auriel moves it's an automatic realod, since kel-Dorn can't take a punch. At all. We prepare for the purge by mostly dodging the 1st one, it just get's F/I who's prepared. Then instant re-up of protections and everyone else follows.

We RvE:Regen, RvE:Rest + RvE:+50%HP here.


Viper Queen

Max prebuffs, max summons & whack away.


Supreme Leader

Goes very smoothly. One RvE:Regen used here. Run to the blacksmiths s fast as possible while PC + 5 trolls stay in the 2nd chamber and fight supreme leader + githyakis. Just IA away, then remove magic + gm + emotion + a few chain lightnings, slow's etc. Whack githyaki with (hasted) trolls. Everyone else with max buffs take out the golems + one blacksmith at a time. Supreme Leader part is quite fun. We surround it with a few swords and Shaman keeps healing them (Soothing fog is awesome here!). Then Cleric drops a regen on one of them, which looks like quite a permanent solution until they get death spelled. Doesn't matter at ll. We can protection from lightning quite well since Cleric is 4 levels ahead of supreme leader's dispelling capability already, so it can only breach. Plus Cleric has permanent 100+% resistance, kel-Dorn can takeimproved dragon hat + we have boots of grounding for hexxat. Plus potions & spells. Necro drains leader's RROR's in the start of the fight so F/I can just Protection from lightning + SI:Abjuration, and there's nothing the good'ol'leader can do. Inquisitors aren't a problem at all. I remember them being tough, but CS'ing kel-Dorn with Carsomyr just overpowers 'em together with F/I. We also have a double 3xhain lightnign trigger so when the inquisitors appear (netly 3 really close by), we remove magic x 2 (just to be sure) and relese 6x chain lightning. It's nice. It does some damage.

Good fun.


Saladdrex + demilich

We forget the triple ADHW. It whacks everyone else besides hexxat & kel-Dorn. Luckily not permanently so they whack Saladrex, use one raise dead scroll to raise shaman and he recalls the rest.

***
We prepare for the demilich by taking spirit link, but even with it Cleric is sort of useless here for after the dispel we start immediately renewing deat wards and cleric still gets imprisoned. I don't there's anything else we could have done here. This most likely means that this part isn't doable with a Cleric PC unless you have Cernd with really good casting time bonuses with you.

We whack rock & garrock and find a beljuril. We didn't count the trinkets but it might be that we're supposed to get kel-Dorn's armour only now? Anyway, we've had it for quite some time. Oops. Oh well. We've had a lot of fun.

We also find the -3 slahing girdle here. Superb. It's a great item for skellys, as Cleric then can have -30AC without buffs vs. slashing. With defensive harmony, duhm + SoA we can drop additional -8, so -38AC without a Shaman. That's pretty good.

Way count our wares a little bit and we will soon face a dilemma. Should we take the Royal Elemental Staff + treefolk's fist +4 + staff of strength +4, or should we take noble staff of fire +4, treefolk's fury +5 and adamantite staff of stregth +5. Hmh.
***

4x elemental + 2 bone devils at final seal level

Prebuff with elemental resistances (for F/I, Necro + Hexxat). Whack devils. Hexxat, with a little budge every now (occasional defensive harmony, bless, chant, protection from evil, entropy shield or so) and then, whacks 3 elementals by herself. And almost all of the spawns.

***
Out of all of the tanks I have played (so Barbarian, DD, Vagrant, Berserker, Fighter(9)/Druid, RB, Avenger, Cernd ...), Hexxat is easily and by far the best tank in the game. There isn't even any competition to it. We acrobatic combat every now and then (when we get unlucky and her innate abilities don't max AC) and Shaman drops a few entrophy shields. At one point she runs out of regen and we don't even notice, because she doesn't get hit. Her AC stays between -35 to -45 throughout the fight.

Necro tanks the last elemental. We start the fight with her having 80% DR + "long lasting regeneration from RvE". If we had the Necro amulet, we would be at 90%. With entropy shield at 100%. I think this is the way Necro was supposed to be played. We don't need skins in the beginning, we start using skins only after hardiness runs out
***

Globe Machine

We breeze through the purple ones, since cleric can dispel liches and we are overcompetent versus vampires. Then we breeze through the green ones (we don't get webbed even though we don't have free action). hmh. One IA and we're done with blue ones.

Then it's just the red ones. The double ice golem + elemental we just dodge dispel (F/I takes it with a trigger pfmw + ih + pfc). Then we attack with 5xgreater yan ti (ih'd), smilodon (ih'd + giant strength) + our max buffed crew critical striking. Necro goes IA and drops 18 rays of fragmentation on the first one and 4 hands of undoing on the 2nd one followed by 12 vampiric touches. Hexxat takes out the elemental, we don't even bother to cast elemental resistances on her, as it doesn't make a difference. We have to heal the elemental 3 times with mend body to maximise Since we don't have anything else for 2nd level spells for necro, we take luck so in addition to all else we cast luck on everyone. The ultra + geg encounter we again summon to the max + prebuff to the max + prebuff our summons. We dodge the initial purge with F/I, then full on assault on Ultra. We finish it just after it gets it's own purge away. We were trying to avoid the dispel, but no luck. We have spells still, thanks to IH'ing our crew with limited wish. Necro turns a few ambers into chickens but since we have a shaman we just storm shell hexxat who happily whacks away the Ambers. Hexxat can even tank the geg, with a little help. We summon 4 hordes of rabbits (or so), end up with having to take one magical rest (RvE:Rest) and have to run around a little bit since at some point geg decides it's not following a knocked back target and decides to go for shaman, who has skins but no elemental resistances. Anyway, we think we get all of the summons - besides ultras summons as we just whack it as fast as possible.

***
We find Usuno's blade. Perfect. We can soon forge numerous maximum op strength items!
***


Ancient Dragon

We comprehensively overpower the (once-a-)mighty wyrm. Whack entourage with acid damage from Necro, Nishruu with CS's. Initial silence on cleric. Our problem is that Shaman spirit shifts (to whack nishruu) and it lasts for ages after Nishruu is gone. We RvE:Rest, to re-up Necro but we get a skelly. Then the skelly almost whacks Shaman, for it can't skin up because of the spirit shift. Well, F/I rescues him.m Also, we cant whack with F/I for Shaman needs to drop sense of limbo on her. Anyway, it's over for NEcro drops her entire spellbook on the Wyrm with 6xbreaches (or so) and Hexxat, kel-Dorn + Cleric whack it into oblivion.


Demon Lord (JD Part 1)

We can dispel it so it's rather easy. We milk some spawns here.

***
Monies as 600k. Then we forge Great Wyrm plate (for cleric), JD for Pally and Hammer of Thor. Pally get his superpwers. We have 8 APR with weapons +5, very effective ones. We have just a few fights left in SoA, as in JD fight, "nasty orcsies", Demogorgon and Orcus. We'll probably do these in this order.
***

Demon Prince (JD Part 2)

It goes rather smoothly, after a rough start. We take one Wish:rest in the middle of the fight but we're not sure if it was needed, probably not. But since we get it, we don't complain. Cleric can already dispel the prince so it's immunity to breach doesn't matter that much. We use soothing fog here extensively, as we keep summons on prince and they are constantly fighting in the fog. It's a superb way of heling swords. Once it's out of spawns it really starts to doom / lower fire resistances, but we mostly keep to dispelling it and once it's out of absolute immunities (we miss on our first try and for a brief moment it looks like we lost as we get remove magic + lower fire resistances, which hits our whole frontline) we triple cs for 2 rounds, then double for 3 rounds or so and the prince falls. We're counting the corpses a little bit and there's 7 noble mariliths/abyssal escorts, 4 death lords, 3 gems, 3 coins and 4 elementals, or something like that. Not sure if we have all of the spawns, at least we're very far away from having all of the (elemental) golem's spawns. We didn't get a single "burn mortals" though. kel-Dorn gets whacked at some point by an elemental (pfmw & skins runs out and we don't get lucky enough), luckily not permanently so we raise him mid-fight (recall spirit from Shaman).

We start with Hexxat on the elemental and the rest of the crew whacks away together with summons. Swords are again pretty good here. Towards the end we're trying demon hunt but the prince falls before we can cast it.


Horde

Well, 1st time's the charm. This time it's not so bad. Low AC works tremendously well here as well. Cleric is very safe throughout the fight with almost no buffs. Hexxat needs a healing ward every now and then. We first summon the Smilodon (and ih + regen it), when it's out we summon the greater djinn (and IH + regen it) and when it's out we summon the noble spider (and IH + regen it), and when they are out we are done. We pick up almost 2600 arrows +3. Half of our crew takes a potion of magic protection pre fight + we have a death ward on Hexxat almost all the time.

Shaman is really good here as well. Whenever we get unlucky & get hit, Shaman is there to rescue us. We drop his AC to -15, (-25 vs missiles with paws of the cheetah + ox-tail belt) pre fight. We load up with dispels, web's, emotions, chaos's etc. Web + limited wish globes work really well here.

This fight took 5 hours in real time. Sheesh. We made it without RvE:regen, though we did take a RvE:rest since we got it.

***
Demo & Orcus to go. We can't forge lord of the underworld, for we are out of manuals of elaboration.
***

Demogorgon

Well, Cleric can dispel Rozvankee (!?), muah!

So we whack Nulango with Cleric + kel-Dorn (start wit magical end up with normal weapons), F/I with storm shell + a troll + 14 magic missiles take out Belcheresk, St. Kargoth we drop with AA's & flame arrows with a troll and a greater yuan-ti. Greater Djinn & Sunnis take Kazuyl who we breach, breach, breach and then take out with the crew once the first 3 are done.

Hexxat tanks demo throughout the fight. It's nice since she can actually wield weapons so necro dispels marilits & escorts and hexxat whacks. I think she whacks 5 demons by herself. Vargouilles we storm with summons & frontline. Once we have a clear moment we dispel rozvankee & whack it into oblivion with F/I, kel-Dorn & Hexxat.

Demo takes forever, as we forgot it's pfmw's. Luckily hexxat can also tank forever. In the end we cast a wish for a magical rest. If we had optimized spells better we wouldn't have needed it. Well, we don't complain.

This was nice. Hexxat and kel-Dorn become all the more powerful now. Also Shaman's blessings are nice. We use 5 barbarian essences here, hexxat takes all of em.

Cleric is really nice here as well. He starts with -31 undisppelable vs. slashing which we can drop to -35 / -37 with SoA & DUHM. He can tank demons for ages.


Orcus

Dodge the silences a little bit. Necro can dispel, so we remove magic and whack orcus after the 3rd wave. Since we can sense of limbo with Shaman we can just nullify silence pre vampire wave to Shield of Archons + Weaken Undead. No tactics needed that much, well, besides dodging the silences a little bit.


Irenicus

Necro soloes with -5, it takes a few tries though.


Hell

Meh. We are overcompetent (by far) already.

**
Next to ToB, which we'll leave for later
**

This post has been edited by pekkae: Jan 22 2023, 10:19 PM