Shaman run 6.6 Options

[Badgerlad]

Summary
Feel free to ctrl+f, simpler that way.
Do I even need to specify, "spoilers, spoilers everywhere", especially in the review part ; )

Setup & (Evolutive) Party Composition
Chapters 1, 2 & 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Throne of Bhaal
Subjective review of the new stuff
Updated observations/random thoughts/inconsistencies/bugs : > this one I need to update after another reading



Setup & (Evolutive) Party Composition

Playing on Core. We use IA 6.6 and IATweaks most content (but enable hardest encounters chap 2&3), Dungeon-Be-Gone, Tower of Deception and romance accelerator & multiple romances from Tweaks Anthology.
House rules include max HP on level up (and for recruitable NPC on joining party), 100% scroll scribing.

The early game party up to Spellhold consisted of :

Skärn, protagonist, Shaman 10 18 18 12 18 18 (got an extremely 92 pts roll right on character creation, using it as such without bg1 tomes)
Minsc, tweaked to Berserker, two-handed user (might be a mistake to not dual-wield, but nvm)
Anomen, tweaked to Ranger8/Priest of Helm
Neera
Jaheira
Korgan as a dwarven defender.

Korgan gave his spot to Kensaï Imoen once we reached Spellhold.
Once we got the ingredients for the new barbarian chainmail, Minsc went back to barbarian. Didn't know about this item when I started the run, wanted to try it.
Around lvl 21, Jaheira gave her spot to Keldorn, and Anomen to Aerie (she was kitted cheatily and given the new cleric HLAs the same ways at a relevant time in her level progression).
Post Yaga-Shura, we forged Sarevok sword and he took Keldorn spot. He was given Keldorn's XP with the console.



Chapters 1, 2 & 3

Early game
Let's roughly skip our journey through the unmodded content, I'd rather focus on the main harsh battles. Dungeon-Be-Gone, Circus, Slums, Docks (kill minotaurs at Kangaxx's for +2 axes), Jaheira & Ployer plotline, Umar Hills, Trademeet, Druid's Grove, Djinni's Hunt, Mae'var questline and so on.

The first truly IA content we tackled was a pretty early encounter with Suna Seni and party. Party got the usual chaos/command full CC right into their face, but Minsc had time to berserk, and shaman to run away from the the enemies spell. Even though Anomen resisted most harmful effects thanks to his shield of harmony, the fight was pretty much Minsc quaffing potions as needed (oil of speed/healing) and soloing it all while shaman healed him from safe distance. First time I felt like "this guy can heal !".

We bought the spear of kuldahar for Jaheira, and with the club+3 from the beastmaster and Arbane's sword from suna seni, Valygar could facetank both Quallo's friend and the Lover while Shaman threw healing at him. Got Lilarcor for Minsc and decided to head for De'Arnise Keep.

That new AoE dmg/doom spell from shaman worked wonder against Yuan-Ti mages (it interupts casting very well with that !), adding a greater malison on top of that to land emotion and make these fights trivial. Cleaned most of the castle, looted Frostreaver and forged FoA, we were set up with a decent bunch of +3 weapon, but didnt have the experience to use IH yet. Left TorGal for later, and instead went cleaning the shadow temple before we would be too experienced and get liches pop.
Did Rasaad quest real fast, last fight was dealt with malison and AoE doom shaman spell, followed by emotion. Plain and simple.

We hit the 800K xp cap, so join Neera who can learn IH right away. We're set for some harder fights now. We go for Neera's questline real fast, Spirit Fire, Malison Emotion does wonder here again.
Since we want to take down some Slavers, we head down to the slums, open the sphere with Valygar and join Korgan instead of him. He's a dwarven defender for this run, and all these stacking damage resistance coupled with a Shaman is something to not be underestimated ! Korgan gets the dwarven thrower, it's an easily acquired +3 crushing weapon if used melee.

Slavers' Ship
With access to IH, everything went real smooth, and shaman class made me try spells I usually ignore. Dolorous Decay was cast right away onto Captain Haegan who litteraly fell in the first round to an assault from heavily buffed Anomen, Jaheira, Minsc and Korgan. He never died that fast, but I don't usually delay this fight for so long. Meanwhile, Neera and Shaman made sure the evil cleric wouldn't do anything nasty, and a breach/spirit fire/insect doom made sure of that before our fighters went back for him. Rest of the slavers was easily dispatched, we even had time to rebuff a little and set up the arrival of the mage. Spirit fire to interupt and doom, malison emotion again, and he was helpless.
We quickly cleaned the rest of the ship, making sure to loot the permancy scroll in the chest.

Pirates Hideout
After we paid a visit to Gaelan Bayle, and paid him at all what he had asked for, we headed for the docks. There, we spent the night at the Sea's Bounty and found some pirates hiding there. We killed them all real fast and scattered the team while Clan Hunter kept the coordinator busy. Shaman rebuffed fire prot. for comets and healed a few times as needed. Mostly Minsc, has he often got the Coordinator attention. Once his SI : Divination wears off, Neera breaches him and we just pounded him. 3xCL was not that scary. Finally a bag ! Inventory was getting real full.

Shadow Thieves Tasks
Met Aran and went for Mook quest real fast. Guild contact was crushed so fast he hardly had time to pop a vampire bride helper.
Pretty much all of the vampires lair was dealt with thanks to Minsc raging and Anomen equipped with shield of harmony and amulet of power. The no friendly fire blade barrier was a great asset here. Anomen fell to Tanova due to a acid shield vs. fire shield damage loop, but Minsc single handedly took her down - for some reason she didn't cast PFMW.

TorGal
We went back for our troll friend, pretty comfident that he wouldn't be much of a problem. Indeed he wasn't. Jaheira, Anomen, Minsc, Korgan and Clan Hunter all heavily buffed rushed for him after a breach from Neera. Shaman stood out of the vengeful storm so he could spam heal to anyone in need. TorGal fell so fast he didnt even had time to start casting a dispel magic.
To be honest we just brute-forced the fight thanks to our Shaman who could simply heal at will anyone taking (too much) damage. Jaheira Anomen and Clan Hunter being under stoneskin and Korgan using defensive stance, the only positioning we cared about golemwise was Minsc. Giant Troll were out a round after TorGal, and we just surrounded the gem golem without care. Shaman got your back guys ! Vengeful Storm damage was mitigated through the use of a few healing potions.

Windspear Dungeon
I don't usually play with that many characters able to skin themselves up, so both golem encounters (1 gem 1 coin 1 clay 1 bone each) seemed real easy. We hardly took a single point of damage and we basically had 5 skinned guys taking their aggro, while Minsc and Korgan were a little away waiting for the bone and clay golems (who are a little slower) to come and crush them down. Korgan might've taken the aggro a little, but with -20AC and 35% damage resistance, he was in no trouble, shaman could heal him from a distance anytime anyway.
Minsc raging, Anomen fully buffed with Blade Barrier destroyed both vampires encounter without breaking a sweat.
Conster rushed at, didn't cast PFMW as usual. We almost had a spare round before skeleton lords popped. So much ironskins and high AC fighters made short work of them, shaman staying away as usual ready to cast some healing if need be.

Mencar & Sewer Party aka free RRoR scrolls
Needed a decent bunch of RRoR scrolls before we could consider trying one of the 3 big dungeons (Planar Prison, Sphere and Shade Lord). Since we had forgotten to take care of Mencar earlier, we payed him a visit. Needless to say Spirit Fire/Malison/Emotion worked like a charm there. Mage and familiar fell to a couple emotions, so we were safe to disposed of their melees. We did that fight fairly late so it wasn't meant to be a challenge anyway.
Same tactic for the sewer party, but their mage (Renghaard I believe) didn't fall for it. Insect Plague prevented their clerics from doing nasty stuff though. Eventually, we got impatient so a couple RRoR scrolls were used, a good breach or two while Korgan and Clan Hunter pound the mage so he procs his 3xCL away from the rest of the party and... he didn't have any RRoR scroll on him IIRC. Nevermind, we have enough (I think we had 9 at this point, including some from Conster, 1 from Bernard's shop and those from Mencar's party) for the Planar Prison anyway, so we pay a visit to the nearby mage, kill the imp, kill the mage too because we can, and free Haer-Dalis before we head to the Planar Prison.

Planar Prison
Took a couple RRoR scrolls to manage the fight including the Elite Bounty Hunter, but it was by no means difficult. As for the rest of the prison, once again, the infamous Spirit Fire/Malison/Emotion did wonder here against the packs of Yuan-Tis & Minotaurs. We had many chaotic commands at our disposal anyway to be safe thanks to our 3 divine casters.
Warden fight was a chance to make good use of Primal Ward from shaman, as the boss would probably try to finger (of death) Neera at the start of the fight. Which he did, but +6 to saves was enough for her to ignore it. It took 4 RRoR scrolls to take him down, the guy loves to rebuff, but again, taking damage was not a problem with our Shaman able to heal from a safe distance. Anomen got close to death once, but had time to ironskin back before shaman would heal him back to full health. Doggies were taken down as soon as they popped, we needed time for Neera to fully debuff the warden. Fight was done before we ever wondered if we would make it.

Thax & Shade Lord
Now, that's two fights I've been expecting much from ! We had cleaned the dungeon earlier on to avoid liches from spawning, so we were left with our shadow dragon friend, and the shade lord.
When it comes to Thax, I was really worried about the lack of ways to prevent him from silencing us. We had given it a shot on our first visit to the shadow temple (we were around lvl 11) and it was a slaughter. Now that we were around lvl 13, with better equipments, it was time to try it again.
Fully buffed party with Clan Hunter and 4 bears start pounding him, Shaman and Neera stay away for now, we want the first silence to go for Anomen and Jaheira. Once his first silence is launched, Neera - under Primal Ward to survive the triple FoD - RRoR twice and breaches. We manage to take him really low, but Thax heals back up to full health at the last moment. Meanwhile, Minsc and Korgan were the only ones switching from magic to normal weapons to keep the dps up : I was too lazy to go back to town and buy some for Anomen and Jaheira. Fight was messy 'cause poorly prepared, but above all, it was VERY long. Neera breached a lot but was silenced eventually, so only Korgan and Minsc were relyably dealing damage through normal weapons. For some reason, the party didnt take too much damage overall, even though shaman saved the day a couple of times sending a heal from safe distance.
Thax healed up 3 times in total (hence the LONG fight), and at the end, Jaheira fell, Anomen fell while Minsc and Korgan took the full debuff, notably malison/slow. I believe we managed to keep our dps constant enough for Thax to hold off casting his sequencer that long. Anyway, slowed and debuffed Minsc and Korgan started to sound like a wipe, even though Thax was nearly dead. That's when Shaman thought "f*** it, I'll spirit shift and kill that lizard myself !". Well... it worked ! Shaman solo-handedly finished Thax after three of four blows.
Spirit Shift is extremely situational and its duration is extremely short, yet as I mentioned in another thread, having someone able to fully buff himself in an instant while being able to stay out of any debuff for the duration of a fight can be life-saver.

Shade Lord was next, and I had high hope to try Protective Chant for this fight, as it would allow us not to worry too much about magic damage protection.
Full buffs ofc, melees go for Shadow Patrick, Neera goes RRoR right away on Shade Lord, Shaman find a safe spot to heal at will. Everyone has a +3 crushing weapon so skeletons lords are easily disposed of, right on time for Neera to be able to breach the Shade Lord.
That's when things got nasty : Protective Chant sure is great, but is far from easy to use reliably as it lasts a single round. Took us 2 reloads to pull that off properly, since Anomen wasted his Protective Chant when Shade Lord would PFMW himself back instead of procing his contengency 3ADHW.
On the winning try, Jaheira still fell to the ADHW, but a decently timed heal from shaman managed to put Korgan (who was tanking) to full HP after ADHW, and Minsc/Anomen both quaffed a big healing potion just to be safe. Shade Lord fell, all good, raise Jaheira.

Protective Chant is a GREAT spell. Not too OP (ADHW still hurts A LOT), the scaling thing seems all right and it's not absolutely reliable due to its relevant duration. It makes total sense that a Cleric can offer this kind of emergency protection. I wouldn't find it absurd to make it a level 6 spell instead of 5, but it hardly matters.

We're short on RRoR Scrolls, only 4 left, but Neera is about to hit 14, so she'll be able to learn it. To the sphere we go ! Actually, there is an Amber Golem we wanna try on the way, to the top of the slums it is.

Borinall's Amber Golem
We buffed inside, and he preventedly went True Sight. We take the assassins down first, then Borinall (1 breach used). While the Amber golem is usually impressive, we just mindlessly surrounded him and took him down. Someone is hurt ? No problem, shaman heals. Never went that full retard on that amber golem before, but there it was just stupid.
We didn't even cast protection from lightning ! Ever.

Lavok & the Sphere
I might have delayed it a bit too much, but Planar Sphere felt extremely easy. No reload was needed. Both Neera and Shaman hit lvl 14 at the halflings encounter, so we got RRoR at will and shaman chooses Regeneration for his first lvl 7 spell.
The big golem group (2 coin 2 gem 1 bone) was easily dispatched, pretty much like the ones at Windspears. Jaheira takes one all by herself (and soloes it, because she can), Anomen and Neera tank one or two on the side, Korgan and Minsc take care of the bone asap and jump back to whichever was closest to death. Korgan under regeneration and 35% damage mitigation tanks whatever he wishes without the slightiest care. Shaman might have tanked one too (i don't remember exactly), but thanks to black dragonscale, destroyer of the hill belt and a shield, he has around - 17 AC against crushing, so his ironskins last forever and he can heal while tanking.

Lavok was strangely easy too. Clan Hunter goes for him right away while party destroys 2 gems and 3 skeletons lords with their +3 crushing. Regeneration makes Korgie and Minsc safe, even though I tend to micro manage Minsc a bit, but his positioning is easy as he used two-handers. Shaman stays a little on the left so that Lavok has him in sight and try to breach him instead of dispelling magic on the whole party too soon. A safety heal was cast by shaman onto Clan Hunter who got a bit enthusiastic getting burnt by Lavok's fireshield. Dispatching the trash took about 3 rounds, enough for Neera to cast 3 RRoR on Lavok and have a breach ready. Everyone scatters, Korgan goes with Clan Hunter on Lavok and puts a couple of magic shielding potions in his quickbar. He soaks up the 3ADHW without any problem, and Lavok fell right after a crit from Frostreaver.

Went out in search of a couple demon's hearts. Lea'lliyl was made really easy thanks to shaman being able to heal from a distance while being unsilencable thanks to Sense of Limbo. We open the fight with Demon's Hunt from Anomen, Skeletons Lord first, Maurhezi next then demon. Neera stood a bit out so she could renew haste at will without being silenced. Don't know how much Demon's Hunt helped to make this easy, rather felt like the perma heal from Shaman was the main factor.

Tolgerias was taken care of in a similar way we did Lavok. Fully buffed, we take the Planetar out, then his helper whom we could see since she tried to cast something. No PFMW so she fell fast. We then sent Korgan + Clan Hunter on Tolgerias while party backs off, Neera debuffs, breaches, and I don't even remember Tolgerias ever launching his 3ADHW.

I usually hate the engine room, mostly because I run IA with 3 skinned characters max, but for once, it felt like golems were trapped with us there !!
We took the right group down first, Korgan blocking them 300's style under defensive stance and regeneration, Jaheira and Minsc going full two-handed madness from behind.
Same tactic for the second group : Korgan under defensive stance and regeneration blocks 1 way, Anomen or Jaheira another, and we litterally sandwiched them to death.
As always, we got shaman ready to throw a heal anytime it was needed, but since its from a distance, no risk of effing up our positioning setup.
I usually take a few sleeps outside the room between golem groups, we did it in one shot this time !


Friend of Squirels
Went on some nutty duties for squirrels. We prebuffed in a nearby house before the assassins though. Here again, the ability to throw a heal anytime I wish really made it trivial. Not that it's a very hard fight, but the amount of time saved from not having to run up to whoever I want to heal, and that casting heal "preventingly" (before it's actually needed at least) knowing I can throw another right after if I want to feels extremely safe.

Samia & Party
Another fight I was impatient to try ! And we made it on the first shot !
We obviously prebuffed with all we had, and we opened the fight with Spirit Fire (Shaman)/Malison(Neera)/Creeping Doom (Jaheira). (To be real honest, we cheese-blocked the Skeletons Grandlords with a PFMWed Neera in the doorway). With such an opening, everyone but Kaol and the Cleric were under Creeping Doom, and Akae even got feared. Unabled to cast, we hack n slash them real fast, hardly taking any damage, and shaman had our back anyway. None of them could even proc hardiness. We ignore Kaol for now, we didn't get remotely debuffed in any way, and we just brute-forced our way through the 3 Grandlords.
Kaol remains, we send Korgan (with magic shielding potions in his quickbar) and Clan Hunter at him while party retreats in the corridor.
Intended to debuff him with Neera to fasten the process a little bit, but his SI : Abjuration is undispellable. Dunno if it is intended, by no matter how many RRoR I would throw at him, it wouldn't dispel anything. Nor would breach do anything (in case it was a SI : Alteration canceling my RRoR).
I wonder if this is intended, seems quite unfair not to be able to dispel him in any way and to be honnest, this might be a call to make a good use of protective chant and take Kaol out with a cheesy brutal assault when he pops.
Anyway, Korgan quaffed any potion he needed while Kaol protections were wearing off, Shaman healed from safe distance as needed... Bye Kaol !


Crafting Time !
We didn't craft much this run, if at all. All we made was that new potion brewed from Chaos Essence (I can tell you that with Shaman, Jaheira and Anomen able to cast Call Lightning, he didn't last long !). Shaman drank it as it prevents confusion and sleep permanently IIRC, and Shaman has so much ways to dispel that on the rest of the team, seemed just right to have him immune.
As no one would make real good use of it, (maybe Imoen as a kensaï if we get her, but nvm) we didn't make Phosphorus. It might be a mistake, but I'm sure we can do without it.
Instead, we use several hundred k gold to make :
- Circlet of Golden Flowers goes to Shaman
- Water's Edge + 4 goes to Jaheira in case she needs a slashing weapon, but any dual-wielder makes good use of +1 Att/rnd and a +4 weapon !
- Treefolks Arm +3 goes to Anomen
We also made the druidic XP potion, but it can't be used by shaman (intended ?). As I don't know if Jaheira will tag along much longer, I don't know if we gonna use it, so we reload.

Screaming Statue
Another encounter I tend to do at the very end of chapter 3. Well, with 3 divine casters, it has never been that easy.
First wave is simply Minsc and Anomen slightly buffed with 5 skeletons warriors. Minsc rages, Anomen has AoP and Shield of Harmony : np
Second wave we give Minsc and Anomen IH, it's still easily dispatched.
Third wave, we got Jaheira and Clan Hunter joining, both under Shield of the Archons. Minsc rage unfortunatly runs out so he's winded and we wanna make good use of our prebuffs.
Instead, hell go for his innate rashemi berserker rage, even though it turns him berserk. Jaheira and Anomen went for their usual max divine buffs (holy power, DUHW, Righteous Magic and so on). Well, it looked messy especially since I didnt have control of Minsc, and Jaheira got confused, but Shaman had her back. She promptly was sent a spiritual clarity and soon joined in Anomen who was soloing the master vampire (oh, he almost did solo him). I wasn't paying attention to Minsc but he certainly took down half of the enemies by himself, realized at some point that every vampire was down. I really didn't see the fight go but it went smoother than ever. 4 improved hasted fighters with PFNE really makes it trivial though.
Aaaand, we got our first barbarian essence. That's some precious stuff we wanna keep for our friend the dracolich.

Trademeet Founder
Had forgotten that guy, we went back and said hello. Another fight where shaman being able to heal from range made it... simply easy. Fighters drank an oil of speed at start, thats about it.
We got lucky there, staff of Rhynn ! Goes to Jaheira for now

Preparing our journey to Spellhold & Party Composition matters
Now that we got pretty much everything decently doable done for chapter 2&3, it's time we head to Spellhold.
As I mentioned in the introduction, I tweaked Imoen into a kensaï and intend to use her. Who will I kick for her, that is a question I didn't answer yet.
I feel like keeping Jaheira is overkill, we got enough divine power in team but... I find her so strong... and I got Rhynn for her, and I might as well make her gloves since we got so much money and crafting components we didn't use. That being said, she competes with shaman for many druid goodies.
On the other hand, Korgan as a dwarven defender is really, really useful right now (even though his utility will wear off once our fighters get hardiness).
Another way to do that would be to kick'em both, grab Valygar and call it a day. Or Keldorn, this new armor of his looks shiny. Imoen would have a room this way

A choice was made : Jaheira will stay !
So we forge Paws of Furious Cat and Harper's Ward.
Under IH she has 8 attacks per round with Water's Edge, 90% natural resistance to electricity... add Storm Shell to that bunch and Amber golems beware !! I'm pretty comfident she can solo one or two all by herself now.
Korgan will leave for Imoen to join in time. Dunno what the lass will equip as a kensai, but she definitely is a candidate for Crom Fayer !

To Brynlaw we go then !


Chapter 4

Nothing worth mentioning in Brynlaw, apart from the fact we didnt wait for extra coin golems to spawn with Perth, we just killed him asap. Bought a batch of oil of resurgence too, they always come in handy.
Pretty much everyone levels up once we reach Spellhold. Noticed there that when I get to choose new spells for my shaman, those he already chosen at previous levels are still selectable in the list. I don't think that's intended, as you can select a spell you already have and get nothing.
We dream real fast, and end up in the SpellHold Maze. Join Imoen, bye Korgan.

Spellhold Maze

Golems and Ruhk encounter
As most of the golems encounters so far, it was fairly easy. We didn't bother blocking the corridor the spartan way, it's much easier to simply let them come and have skinned characters tanking them. Even though Imoen and Minsc got aggro at some point, we had too much healing and dmg for it to be a problem. As usual, as soon as we can take bone down, we do.
We clean the rest of the floor and head for the infamous ambers & friends encounters at the kobold crystal.

Ambers trio with Storm Shell
As I expected, Shaman Storm Shell is strong. Probably too strong.
Apart from the usual buffs and prot. from electricity, Imoen, Minsc and Jaheira had Storm Shell up, and they didnt get a single damage from the usual electric backlash, as could be expected.
Shaman tanked 1 amber, Neera another and Jaheira the last one. Kobold caster was killed on the spot, Minsc Anomen and Imoen took down a kobold spirit each (they do eat stoneskins fast, might as well have them out asap) and well, it was fairly straightforward from this point.
Party went for top amber, the one shaman was tanking, took it down fairly fast, then headed down to the right one Neera was tanking. Second amber fell fast too. Meanwhile, Jaheira had soloed the bottom amber she was tanking. No healing spell or potions were used in this fight.
Heh, Storm Shell is a bit too much to my taste, it totally cancels those golems which I see like an IA signature enemy.

Random idea to tone it down a bit : instead of removing any way to lower elemental resistance, it could prevent it to go below 0. That would already be strong enough to my taste, and to add some flavour it could be undispellable. Or it could reduce the rate at which elemental resistance is lowered overall.

Anyway, we got some reading ahead of us.

Book of Summoning
A simple haste was used to deal with waves up to the spiders spawn, including the two golems.
IH for all followed by free action for the spiders. The Whisper one fell so fast she couldnt cast web. The point was to follow right up with the elemental golem while our IH were running.
We took a few hard hits, an extra coin spawned but as usual, shaman healing was enough to deal with it without too much troubles.

Librarian
Anomen tanked the cat with shield of harmony while party took down the coin golem.
Once cat is around life 7, we start buffing up big time.
Librarian appears, everyone equips crushing weapon, we take lords and werewolves out asap, and run away letting Clan Hunter deal with the librarian, with shaman buffing and healing him from a distance. Nothing too difficult.

Vampire Grandlord encounter
Jaheira and Anomen shield of the Archon, Minsc raging, all IH, what did you expect ?
Somehow I wouldn't mind this encounter to be a little improved, even though it seems real easy tanks to the party composition here. What about a couple skeleton grandlords ?

Went down to lvl 2, cleaning everything on the way.
Found an annoying bug in the room with the little chest guarded by 3 coin golems. Once they're all dead, I get the vagrant cloak and a scroll of memory boosting. However, I was getting a seemingly infinite amount of memory boosting scrolls instead, slowly filling my inventory up.
Went around that by killing 2 golems, CLUAed the party out and CLUAed these items I should have had.
Another thingie - not a bug - I noticed is that when SHaman uses Spiritual Clarity to purge some kind of confusion (dunno which one), purge is effective but the little animation above the head of said confused character remains. I've seen that before, not game breaking at all.
Anyway time for Mithril Golem. I feel comfident with our healing power !

Mithril Golem
We full buffed as usual, everyone quaffs 2 oils of resurgence, gets regeneration from shaman right when the fight starts (mending rules) and well... Minsc tanked the whole fight 'cause shaman chain healed him every step of the way. Simple as that. All summons survived, no one died, no reload needed.

Irenicus and Asylum Golems
Heeh, it wasn't too bad. Loads of skins to tank, and even when we got a little bit surrounded, shaman healed through. The mass mending is quite efficient, really feels like Cernd raining mass heal under alacrity. Neera got PW : killed at some point, Imoen too but at this point only 1 golem remained so, not really a problem.
Sent Minsc and Clan Hunter on Irenicus, made sure to give them regeneration (by the way, the mending version is real fast to cast. Maybe too fast, u can really give regen to the whole party during a fight, in half a round total). SI : Abjuration on Irenicus couldnt be dispelled, so we got patient and he was breached as soon as possible. Didnt cast 3ADHW for some reason (he really had time to though), nor his 3CL. Anyway, was waaaaay smoother than my usual time here.

Went out thanks to Saemon, headed to Sahuagin city, cleaned it real fast but Prince was a little harder than those last fights.

Sahuagin Prince
We did it the "legit" way, as in where we meet him. Prebuffed of course. Fight itself was not too harsh, and no one got ever poisoned because of vipers. Just had to reload twice cause I was a bit messy when it came to take the casters out, and Shaman got stunned with a PW. Again like I'm getting use to, Shaman heals made it like we didn't have to care much. On a safe spot, it's still like he's under permanent alacrity as long as he doesnt stop healing. It overall seems like you can be very sloppy with positioning and such, and still get out without much harm. Strong shaman strong.

Underdark time !

Chapter 5

Met some duergars, killed some kuo-toans, and fred the emprisoned mage before heading for the first drow ambush, the one near the emprisoning machine.

1st Drow Ambush
This one was very hard. Several reloads because I forgot that both Anomen and Jaheira could cast firestorm. Once we changed our setup a bit, it went much better (but not smooth by any way). We have Clan Hunter and 4 Fire Elementals. We open with firestorm x 2, Spirit Fire, Malison/Emotionx2 Sequencer from Neera. We start the fight in the little gullet (narrow passage) just south of the drow party. Fully buffed party kills as many spawning spiders as possible, and while enemies are getting fried with the firestorm, we move a little to the right so we don't fight in the spider webs. We kill stuff as it comes while summons keep some of the drows busy in the firestorms. It wasn't too bad, even though shaman got commanded at some point, a mage came and we had Neera debuffing him before a good pounding, all this while trying to remove the whispers spiders coming for us, and eventually the drow priestess. Firestorms actually killed a bunch of stuff out of our sight (1 drow mage, several++ minor spiders and 1 or 2 drow warriors), and the - 6 to saves with spirit fire/malison must have helped tremendously.
Was harsh, but we are victorious !

Balor in the pit
Since this fight is not supposedly difficult, but still implies a strong opponent, was a good time to try Demon's Hunt once again. Hard to say if it was all due to the spell, but the balor never fell so fast. In a round he was out, didnt cast anything but a dispel at start that Shaman had taken solo. Can't wait to try Demon's Hunt against harder fights (Judgement Day thingies for instance !).

We did the portals and imprisonned mage thing, then didnt really know what to do so we headed to the beholder's lair. Elder Orb wasn't too bad, Anomen could time his protective chant well so we all survived without problem. Elder Orb wasn't overly agressive as I use to remember it to be, so both Neera and Shaman could cast at will.
We then ran into Ancient Golem, reloaded because we werent ready and figured we could give it a shot.

Ancient Golem
Full Prebuff, Neera goes in first to take initial purge. Dps is good, very good ! Minsc dies when Golem is around badly hurt, so we keep going, thinking it might work out. 1 gem 1 coin spawn at once, and Ancient Golem dies to Jaheira right when his second purge was going off. That went better than expected.
Shaman levels up and... gets HLAs... crap. The original plan was to go into the Maze, but we won't, might as well postpone it, we don't want improved dracolich right now.
Shaman HLAs come at 2,9 millions XP, earlier than other characters, wasnt expecting it so soon.

Since Drow City is fairly easy, might as well go for it now, we will do Illithid compound and Kuo-Toan caverns once we get a couple more levels.

2nd Drow Ambush
I usually tank spiders away from party with Vagrant or Necro, but there with Shaman, it couldn't be done, we had to change tactic after a couple tries.
We summon Smilodon, Clan Hunter, 2 Fire Elementals and we send Joloon to proc the cutscene. Shaman stands a bit away from party on the left. As soon as enemies pop, shaman drinks potion of magic shielding, Neera hastes and everyone goes either rage of quaff a clarity potion. Once a web has been cast, Shaman drags spiders to the party and we kill everything we can at range. Shaman mass mending did wonder here when things started to look awful, and he sent a few Spirituel Clarities when needed to keep control of the party. It wasn't easy, but things remained in control and when only mage was left, we could pound it without debuff, he didnt bother going PFMW.

Meet Adalon, to the drow city !

Ust Nasha
Doing drow errands, we met Amariel the runaway slave but in her elf sprite (which means not IA's Amariel). We didn't properly "meet" her, it was just as if she'd been caught, and killed, we didnt get a chance to missguide her pursuer. Maybe I ran too fast through that at some point and didnt notice, but I don't think so. Maybe is it Vagrant/Necro only ?
Anyway, I CLUAed IA Amariel so I could save her brother at Deirex's later on.
Deirex was no problem with Clan Hunter/Smilodon, save the little brother. Noble Djinni we go normal weapons, House Jaellat wasn't really difficult either.
I believe there is a nice addition you guys did to the ending of Ust Nasha stuff. It drops blackmist twice by the way.
We kinda clean the city of drow, that's some decent xp and gold with simplified economy.
Time to clean some lairs.

Kuo-Toan Prince
Kuo-Toan groups were mostly dealt with starting with double firestorm, into a creeping doom. Mages are no problem this way.
Prince group was a little different as we just went creeping doom and just forced the fight shaman healing through. Made good use of primal ward to make sure our casters wouldnt fall to some emotion or confusion spell. No real difficulty here.

Demogorgon Demon Knights
Those guys are harder ! I usually use Cernd mass healing in the middle, while separating party on 2 or 3 knights. We did that here, but with shaman : even better ! That new animation for the knights firestorm was kinda impressive. We pounded one down real fast (the right one), then headed south while a few summons kept the 2 north knights busy. Anomen threw a very well-timed protective chant right before an ADHW hit us. Shaman mass mend x2 (instant, he has foreknowledge) and we're all back to full hp. Then it was a matter of everyone going for another knight, heal through, repeat. During the whole process we had to try to find safe spots, for the room was litteraly filled with this new firestorm spell. Imoen died to an ADHW at some point but nvm. For some reason the last knight (not even the "chief", as in the one with items, but one that has a contengency ADHW) was hard to take down. Both Jaheira and Anomen had to retreat south where the fire cloud wouldnt hit them (a VERY tight spot), and Minsc face tanked (under shaman heals) the knight while shaman takes his time to heal everyone up, throws a couple regenerations and the final knight falls. This fight is always so intense and we didnt have any PFME at our disposal, just Protective Chant.

Master Brain
We're quite high level for this, wasn't much of a challenge even though purge can make it messy.
We spread party around while waiting for the purge, Minsc and Anomen take it, Jaheira and Imoen start the elemental golem while we rebuff the boys (not much, simple IH).
Even though we had 4 Brain Golems on us (and a spawned gem at some point), shaman just healed through damage as usual. Once Elemental is down, to the Master Brain we go, and it's just a matter of cleaning up the remaining golems.

Dracolich we'll do later, for now let's head out of Underdark

Chapter 6

Figured WK1&2 would be the easiest way to grind some XP before Kruin.

Watcher's Keep 1st floor
As we enter, we're greeted by Spider Queen since we had pretty much cleared the level earlier on.
The thing being, we only have Rhynn as a +4 crushing. And just Water's Edge and Dragon Breath as +4. After some huge buffing, we give it a shot and eventually she falls. Was a bit slow of course, but party had regeneration, shaman healing ofc, and every single AC buff we could get for everyone.
Golem & Vampire room were not too hard either. Tried that new weaken undead and a false dawn for opening. Worked kinda good but this fight wasn't much of a challenge anyway at this point. Jaheira died to 4 golems deciding to aggro her at once, but apart from that they were easily dispatched. Shaman raining heals ofc.

Watcher's Keep 2nd floor
We just cleaned it, apart from Chromatic Demon, this one is a bit too much for now. Decent xp and loot. We'll be back later for you demon ! (Imoen really want the Truth with that !)

Umar Witch
Imp was pounded before he could cast PFMW. We toyed a bit with minotaurs and skelies before Neera debuffed the witch with alacrity on.
Anomen got confused so we spiritual clarity him, and we all head in for the final pounding, Anomen goes protective chant and... she doesnt cast her 3ADHW. Nvm.

Firkraag with Sense of Limbo
He wasn't too bad, and it was a great time to try out Sense of Limbo. Great spell ! its duration doesn't make it OP at all, it almost feels a bit short to be honnest.
The fight went the usual way, with shaman and Neera staying away just in case. When it was needed, shaman would Sense of Limbo himself and mass mend everyone to full HP.
We all had crushing +3 for the skelies, and all switched to normal weapon for Firkraag. Nothing we couldn't do.
Since we were at Windspear, we went by he well and got a helmet.

Even though no one has critical strike yet, our inventory is so full we need to take on Kruin. We head for Tethyr forest, my favourite spot to fight him.
Note : from this point on, Neera has access to RvE, so most fights include a regeneration for all prebuff.

Kruin
Took me 2 reloads to realize that if my dps seemed so bad, I should probably use IH on my fighters !
Anyway, the plan was to malison/creeping doom Kruin to have him unable to cast while we take care of the 2 elementals. Once 1st is down, Imoen levels up and takes critical hit.
Creeping Doom eventually landed (shaman casted 4 or 5), and even one of the elemental golem got hit. We had to run after it, he got spooked. Creeping Doom dealt a bit too much, so Anomen was loaded with protective chants that he kept casting around that crucial moment. Purify Aura came in VERY handy for this. This HLA is golden, it's extremely well-thought !
Anomen died to the 3ADHW but we weren't in bad shape. We stalled Kruin a bit waiting for his SI to run out, then debuff for him, rebuff for us and he was down.
Needless to say : shaman had all his mendings depleted by the end of the fight.

Cromwell finally !
When it comes to our friend Cromwell, I often had my game crashing at his place this run, right when I ask him about his recipes, as if I had clicked too fast.
No problem, I tend to save when I get at his place.
We forge :
- Ring of Greater Djinni Summoning
- Golden Spider Figurine
- Indigo Ioun Stone => goes to Imoen
- The Equalizer => Imoen
- Red Dragon Plate
- The Wave

Undead Town w/ and w/o Weaken Undead
On my first try, we got wiped surrounded by skely lords because I didn't take the fight seriously. Tried it next with Weaken Undead and the damage mitigation could be felt.
We fought on platform mostly, taking cleric out first and standing our ground against the waves of enemies. Between Anomen and Shaman healing was no problem.
Lich was taken care of mostly by summons, sent Imoen with a potion of magic shielding to finish it off.

Back to WK2 : Chromatic Demon
Heh, I feel like we can do it, and it would allow us to forge FoA+4 and the Truth for Imoen. After we used all our buffs, we started the fight. Anomen opens with Demon's Hunt. We didnt bother taking adds down, we're not strong enough atm to allow that. So we just focus the demon, and he seems to be vulnerable to Power Attack, it helped a lot to have him stunned !
Shaman heals strong as ever, and Neera goes with a preventive alacrity to rebuff everyone once Demon has dispelled us. It was pretty straightforward, if not surprisingly doable.

Forge FoA+4 for Anomen, The Truth +5 for Imoen. She has -21 THACO Main Hand unbuffed !

Troll Mound
With our bunch of +4 weapon, it should be no problem.
We open with alacrity on Neera for a debuff on the Queen. We're lucky, King goes on Noble Djinni, propels it and kinda goes away. Once the Queen is ready for a breach, Anomen gets ready to protective chant for her final pounding. Works like a charm.
We True Sight and deal with those pesky vengeance trolls as they come. ADHW works wonder on them, so does Creeping Doom but shaman can't cast it much, he has to run away from King a bit.
Once vengeances are out, King is not a problem by himself. +4 weapons, surround him, breach a few times and he's out.

Did the Great Druid Challenge while at it. Shaman Spirit Shifts and poof ! He done. Can't wait for the Enhanced Stronghold !

Illithids Sewers
Alhoon was much more annoying than GEG who died before second purge. We tempo a bit when someone got the mind flaying mark so he doesn't go melee him. Shaman Mass Mending real good during the GEG pounding phase.
Forge Crom Fayer > Imoen

Diviner's Sphere Treasures
First two tasks we're vastly ahead in level so easy peasy. Ice room we prebuff with improved cat figurine, Shaman takes purge, Ice tanked by Minsc, shaman heals him from far away.

The Shimmering Light
Didnt know the illusory monsters could be dispelled. Keldorn had joined at this point, he could dispel illusionist. Phantasmal Killer rushed by team asap at start, neera goes dispel on illusory monsters.

Twisted Rune part 2
IIRC, we had Neera precast Alacrity as before we enter. Rush Assassin to proc GR, then rush Cleric. Summons on archer to keep her busy. Clean melees while Neera moves out of Vengeful Storm, debuffs mage, protective chant and pound her.

Guarded Compound
We mostly could stand our ground by the stairs, shaman just Mending while Neera buffs everyone under alacrity. Imoen kinda soloes their melees, she hits so hard with Crom Fayer. At some point, Neera moves a bit out to start debuffing Sion. I think we had an emergency Divine Intervention from Anomen at some point, who had retreated to a safe spot for this purpose.
However, as enemies grow in power, we end up more and more on spots where we get cyclic damage (as in cloud/vengeful storm), and shaman has sometimes a hard time finding a spot to mend at his leisure while not being interrupted. I tend to use Mend Regen & Heal much more than mass mending now, as their range is bigger.
Could make that new barbarian chainmail, so I turned Minsc back to a barbarian and he equips it.

Green Wyrm
Sense of Limbo obviously very handy. The fight itself is not too long so a single refresh on Neera was enough for Green Wyrm to run out of PFMW.

Kangaxx
Forgot him until now, we're pretty high level so no problem. Shaman can refresh deathward at will and has favored of spirit for himself which can't be dispelled.

The Mighty One
Even though he had 7 PFMW or so, shaman being able to rebuff Minsc tanking from a distance (2 barbarian essence, 1 was enough) made it kinda easy. And we had so much deathwards at our disposal anyway. With that, having critical hits for the final pounding makes it real safe.
We get Flame of the North, last thing we needed for Minsc IA sword of the rashemi, we forge it.
Forged Neera's robe too.
We also get Aerie instead of Anomen, we could make Might of the Avariel, and wanted to try her in IA for a long time.

Bodhi final
We had so many means of undispellable PFNE that it was a piece of cake.
Minsc kinda cleaned the first floor solo with shaman supporting him. Neera dispelled the guard from a distance, apart from that, Minsc and shaman did it all.
For the final confrontation, we had 3 characters able to Archon themselves, 1 Amulet of Power and 1 under PFMW. Only Imoen stayed a bit behind, and joined in when the sheer number of enemies in such a little room would make a meat(bone?)wall between her and Bodhi. Shaman had a fairly safe spot from which he could heal anyone in need. Was real straightforward (we're kinda high level with that).
Forge Pendant of Recovered Light

WK3 Maze
Nothing worth mentionning. Maybe tiefling party... rushed mage after she casted something so she wouldn't be an annoyance. Improved Cat figurine was used after her 3ADHW. Cleaned the rest no problem.

Windspear Guildmaster & friends
A good fight to make use of that new shaman spell Ethereal Retribution, even though I'm not even sure we 5 rounds of debuff had time to apply anyhow. We open with that, and 3ADHW contengency on sight from Neera, Malison++ sequencer, 3CL on Spell Trigger, and while under alacrity she unleashes her spellbook of AoE high level spells. Way is clear for our fighter to pound Guildmaster, not sure if he lasted a round as Neera could debuff him real fast under alacrity. Once he's dead, Keldorn dispels mage, both hit, we pound them in a round with crit.

Marvella's last quest
Shaman fine her, to save Pasha from a distance. Nothing Cernd or Jaheira wouldn't do with a restoral, but at least I could give him regen from a safe place.
Raskshassas first once they casted ADHW each, we have Aerie thrownig a protective chant to soak some damage there (made her kited, cheaty but I wanna try the new spells), we crit them 3 to death in a round. Meanwhile Neera and Aerie (mostly Neera tbh : p ) rain RRoR on Marilith, we pound them next. Always a bit tricky as they renew PFMW fast, but we got breaches.
Elemental next, he just had time to spawn a coin IIRC.

Zallanora & friends
Keldorn couldn't dispel her properly so we endured her. Shaman has so much healing it's not a problem.

The Twisted Rune
We did Viper Queen before that so Keldorn would have Holy Avenger.
For some reason, Vaxall remained unseen until his SI ran out. I usually see him but just can't target him.
Anyway, it went kinda smooth, even if its a long fight. Imoen/Minsc on Vampire, Keldorn on Mage, Aerie and Shaman far right side, Neera a bit north of them, bunch of summons by Shangalar and Vaxall. Vampire down fast thanks to Aerie breaching. Neera under alacrity debuffs Mage. Keldorn pounds her. She wishes real fast, and somehow our timing in debuff was lucky, as right after it Keldorn landed a Holy Avenger dispelling hit, and killed her a second after said Wish. Imoen Minsc on the enemy fighter busy on our summons, down fast too.
We tried unsuccessfuly to dispel Vaxall with Keldorn, he just ended up standing next to the beholder so he would keep its aggro as he had the best magic resistance. Summon and Minsc on Shangalar, Shaman throws regen/heal as needed (the range of mending really helps here, he didn't get any silence nor spell failure for the whole fight). Once Vaxall appears, we pound him hard, Minsc falls to 3 ADHW though, all saves failed, 80 dmg each or so. Imoen and Keldorn soaked it real well though.
Summons being somehow still alive, we carefuly endure the last PFMWs of Shangalar, and make sure this time to finish him with a Protective Chant on.

Chapter 7

Suldanessalar

GEG & Rakshassas
Shaman rushes in to take purge solo. We manage to take 2 Rakshassas down before last one refresh PFMW. The propelling strikes from GEG are annoying as ever, but we only take 1 extra purge, which was planned enough for Neera to be under alacrity for a rebuff at this point. 3 coin 1 amber spawn IIRC.

Nizi & Hardwoods
Sense of Limbo + alacrity Neera. Didnt take 5 rounds to take him down while she rained breaches.
Hardwood were not a problem at all with shaman, as once again, the range from his heal really makes it safe to keep melees up to full HP on a much more regular basis than with Restoral.

WK4

Supreme Leader
Made it on our first try, while I usually struggle BIG TIME here ! We rush to the conjurer room with a comet on the doorway to make us a path, Djinni summoned right there too to keep whoever is interested in him busy.
Melees focus down 1 conjurer at a time, and welcome the Anti-Inquisitors with a dispel and ST:3CL from Neera and Aerie. Put them all to badly hurt or so. Meanwhile, melees clean the remaining golems (tbh, clay ones are much more annoying due to the slow effect, so we made sure to use cat figurine when we reached the conjurers). Only 6 golems or so were summoned, so we didnt get too overwhelmed. IIRC, Djinni who didnt kept anyone at the doorway was keeping Supreme Leader busy southeast of the conjurers, so we could relatively safely dispose of the Anti-Inquisitors.
As for last phase (aka 20 min of micromanagement while Supreme Leader uses all his buffs), 3 main factors changed the way it went, compared to my usual runs.
1) While I usually run with a lot of hardiness on my melees, shaman made me feel safe enough to go almost full critical hit in their HLAs (this fight in mind tbh)
2) A Kensaï (Imoen here) THACO hits the Supreme Leader reliably, making him use his buffs faster (notably since he won't use PFMW if his stoneskin is up I believe).
3) Minsc with Stained in Blood + his new sword tanks A LOT (45% DR standing, 85 under hardiness). He was on Supreme this whole phase (+ easy to keep alive thx to Shaman)
As a matter of fact, it makes Minsc such a tank he starts to look like a must have for most parties. 10% instead of 15% of enemy damage reduction on stained in blood would be acceptable to me. 15% seems like a lot.

Anyway, we had saved a couple critical hits for the end pounding, so he eventually fell. No one died, no one was ever in danger, no Wish for rest was used. And Shaman still had a lot of heals to go.

Demilich
Demilich tried to imprison shaman a couple of times, but as he was under Favored of the Spirits, so he (the DL, or is he a she ? Lich is feminine in french so dunno) couldn't do sh**. Made the fight real easy as Demilich hardly tried to imprison anyone else (and he couldn't anyway. Fight was fast and shaman could deathward just as fast).

Saladrex
Normal weapons, shaman takes initial dispel because fighters with IH are better than fighters without IH.

WK5

Horde
This one wasn't so easy, took several try. I didn't remember the mages to be so annoying with their weapons, not their spells. Well, we won thanks to a load of malison, webs, emotion, spirit fire, and even more Creeping Doom. Even though shaman could heal, the sheer number of them and their ranged attacks made it hard, to say the least, to rely on his healing.

Ancient Dragon w/ Sense of Limbo
This one fight was something ! I took me a handful of tries to finally find a tactic that would allow us to use Sense of Limbo to its full extent.
Its duration is 5 rounds only, it's really, really short (as in a PFMW for instance). In addition to that, we didn't have Vecna as Ancient Dragon had it. Hence no -5 casting time.
We enter fully buffed, but with Sense of Limbo that shaman goes for right as we enter in that order : Aerie, himself (dragon joins us) Neera right before a silence flies for her. No time to summon anything we need all our auras cleansed.
Minsc, Imoen, Keldorn destroy Salamander in a round and jump onto the Nishruu asap, took a few rounds to take it down though, usual. Aerie serves as a decoy for the Nishruu anti-casting attacks. Meanwhile, Neera goes RRoR, ST:3Lower Resistance + a bunch of AA into Noble Djinni. Then she basically spams breach on Ancient Dragon after a couple RRoR, refreshing alacrity as she can (in the end she just couldn't, so she went breach from scrolls). Shaman spent all fight refreshing her Sense of Limbo (SoL), then refreshing his.
Ancient Dragon was so busy refreshing his own buff that he didn't bother debuffing us much. Imoen, Minsc and Keldorn spent the fight on him, throwing all they had.
Ancient Dragon healed, we had no more CS but our THACO was so good (Imoen's especially) that dps remained decent.
Finally he fell, Sense of Limbo is a great spell, duration balances it perfectly, as in if shaman intends to use it, its his job for the whole fight.
Noticed that if Neera had spell turning up, shaman couldn't SoL her, as it would bounce back to him even though it's not an offensive spell.

Demon Lord & Friends
Didnt feel like a hard fight. Being able to heal from safe distance on a regular basis is golden for this fight. Damage didnt even feel like overwhelming, we just kept hitting. Didnt even use critical strike for any of the Demon Knight, as I was always expecting a hard wave.

Sphere Machine Golems
2 Ice, 1 Elemental
Shaman takes purge, melees and summons under IH and FoA go for first Ice. We keep Improved Cat Figurine just in case. We didn't need it. 3-4 coin/gem spawned, but again not a problem with shaman healing from a distance, even though his positioning sucked as the room is small, and he had to move several times, breaking the mend cleansed aura.

Ultra & GEG
This one was harder. For some reason, Ultra took forever (2+ purges to take down), and the propelling strikes from GEG made no place safe for our shaman to mend, as he could anytime be surrounded by a litteral army of amber/coin/gem. Aerie was (cheatily) given kited cleric HLAs when she reached the proper level, so a Divine Intervention saved the day more than once. So did Neera goin alacrity for rebuff with great timing several times.
To be honest though, not being able to mend reliably was the main factor of difficulty here. Unlike a Cernd whom you can kinda control when you want him going on heavy duty (as in alacrity mass heal/restorals). Once we got GEG close to death (Ultra down first), shaman got sandwiched by 4 golems, thought id wipe as he wasn't hasted. He managed to escape and ran like a chicken in the whole 5th floor of WK with 4 golems behind him. Well, it gave us room to end GEG and the 3 adds he had.
Including the 2 ambers that Neera & Aerie nuked down with spellbooks full of rays of fragmention, that makes 9 spawn, from which 2 ambers (or was it 3 ?).

Orcus
Sense of Limbo was hard - impossible - to keep refreshed on Shaman, Neera AND Aerie. And a shaman busy keeping Sense of Limbo up can hardly mend. Hence Aerie being chosen to be the favored target of our Sense of Limbo. Remember, it lasts 5 rounds, so anytime shaman refreshes it on someone, it's probably time he refreshes his too. Add to that the sheer number of enemies able to cancel their casting (especially the vampires). It wasn't really intended, but Minsc was supposed to rage on the vampire wave, but being silenced he couldn't. He actually was a great decoy to aggro them instead of our casters. To be honest though, a silence eventually landed on everyone because shaman had to emergency mend at some point, but we were at the end of the vampire wave at this point, so it was ok. Once all waves are done, Minsc under regeneration from shaman go tank Orcus, he quaffs a lot of oils of resurgences in the process.
That being said, given that Orcus was going for Greater Silence a lot as he could silence just 1 caster at a time, he had ran out of it a couple of rounds after Minsc had started tanking him.
With a team unsilencable, we just surrounded him with summons, even though Minsc could've tanked him tbh.

Good, Bad and Ugly
Shaman perfect here, we made it on first try no problem. I usually always do this fight with Cernd for aura cleansing/mass healing (Auriel needs it big time as she spawns on Ultra+Elemental, so close you can't get aggro off her.). That's what shaman does. He doesn't do it better, he doesn't... but he does it for like ever !
We start with a bunch of summons to keep the 2 elemental golems that are not close to Auriel busy, Shaman positions himself on the far left close to Auriel and doesn't move.
Melees go for Ultra, takes 4 rounds + to take him down (I remember 1 purge, maybe a second, but they just had IH tbh). Being able to give regeneration, heal or whatever we wanted so fast to Auriel really made a difference. She got real close to death after 1st purge, as an amber spawned on her, and she decided to hit it (smart girl), but Neera having planned her alacrity to rebuff party just nuked it down with sequencers of rays. Was probably a close call but Shaman managed to land a heal in time.
Once Ultra is dead, no problem. Just a matter of cleaning 3 elemental golems and their trash.

With Good, Bad, Ugly reward and some bag cleaning, we're up to 500k.
Forge Girdle of Cloud Giant Strength, Hammer of Thor, Judgment Day.

JD Demon Prince
Oh gosh this was hard. Tried at first to ignore helpers, kinda worked but once near death, Demon Prince would go AI... I guess a way to do that is to have +6 weapons. Then tried several times to take helpers out first, but every single time, I was strugglin on the Abyssal Consort debuff. How much RRoR does it take for them to be breachable ??? Went for 3, then 4, was never enough and I was wasting my breaches. And anyway, they repoped too fast.
For once, Shaman couldn't really out heal anything. The propelling strike really was making the battlefield messy, and shaman doesn't like having to move. In addition to that, none of my fighters got a great AC (-15 at best, as in almost nothing at this point in the game), so they were getting hit all the time. And they couldn't be all immune to poison (only 2/3, no vagrant). Used bunch of summons to soak up as much damage as possible, but they are destroyed fairly fast.
Relied a lot on Wish for Rest so fighters could renew their CS, but none ever came in countless tries (really, like 40ish Wish cast, no wish for rest ever).
Kept going with the "let's try to take him to near death and see if we can get a lucky wish". We got lucky, but not with Wish. For no reason, on one of our tries, he didn't cast AI, and we just finished him. Sheer luck, I don't even know if intended, but was so glad to see him dead I kept it this way.

Used this frustration on the 4 Grave Liches at the sphere machine WK5. We open with an alacrity Neera - 5 cast time, she goes RRoR x10, Keldorn dispels, fighters rush in, CS down 2 of them. 2 remain, another dispel, CS down, repeat process for the last one. For some reason, only the last one threw a ADHW at us. Nvm, you earned it you undeads.
Open gate to Demogorgon, prepare for some more frustration.

Demogorgon
I dunno if I can make it without a Vagrant (immune to poison/disease to tank him) or a Necro (uber powerful RvE abuse, for the -5 cast time, we got that. Less spells by far though) protagonist, but wanna give it a shot. Honestly, I don't think that's possible, but let's give it a few shots.

Gosh... we made it ! And on the first try ! Okay, it's not done yet, still a lot of abyssal escorts surrounding Minsc. Getting back to my game to count them... 26.
Went crazy on barbarian essence for melees (4 each) and it seems to pay off. Well I still got some escorts to kill, hopefully we make it.

(30 min later..., the whole thing took over 90min real time)
We made it ! Barbarian essence still running.
There is but one way to do this fight anyway. Let it be said each melee drank 4 barb essence, making DR 100% for Imoen (JD) and Minsc (Barb), 80% for Keldorn (I do not intend to go EDE this run).
Shaman and Aerie retreat near entry point. Neera has - 5 casting speed, she opens alacrity, goes RRoRx3 on Kargoth, Archpriest, Belsheresk. Melees run for Archpriest (Neera rebuffs them they got dispelled, as in IH), she launches SS:3LR on Kargoth, burst him with Acid Arrows while breaching a couple of time archpriest melees are taking down.
Melee then go on Belsheresk, take him down, switch to exarch that Neera breaches a couple of time, he's dead fast, she wasn't greedy with her breaches, can't let exarch smite us away.
Rozvankhee and Demogorgon remain. Minsc got aggro from Demo at some point, so he would be our tank for the day. Keldorn gives him his amulet of greater protection, tank needs resist against poison. Neera died in the process, can't remember why, but there are so many ways to die in this fight
Keldorn and Imoen are on Vargouille duty. I made a huge mistake though not going for Rozvankhee earlier with them, as she wouldve burnt her PFMWs faster, but there was so much going on I didn't keep track of that, just waited for her not to have her SI on. Keldorn eventually died in the process, due to Rozvankhee cold damage. Shaman really wanted to refresh Keldorn prot. from cold, but it was such a tight spot he could get locked in with the escort and the vargouille following him since about 10 min due to Imoen procing PFMW with JD and loosing aggro. So, 10ish vargouille spawns and 20ish escort spawns later... Imoen virtually immortal (JD) eventually downed Rozvankhee all by herself, while shaman ran, ran, rang across the room.
Even though he ran, he still could cast emergency heals and regen from a distance, as some damage was still ticking on Minsc (disease and some backshield from Escort/Demo and spells).
By emergency heals, I kinda mean a full spellbook, so no other class could do that knowing that Minsc was unreachable due to 20+ escorts on him.
When Rozvankhee felled, didn't know how Imoen would reach Demogorgon with this huge meatshied of escort protecting him. That's where I realized Minsc had almost soloed him ! Didn't notice with 20 hp bars mixed up ! So, let's go Minsc ! As the fight lasted forever, Demo was eventually out of everything and Minsc got that killing blow !

As for the cleaning escort part, we took our time, resurected Neera and Keldorn safely, went into our bags to find 2 extra scrolls of Wish + 1 on the ground, used them all, third gave us wish for rest. With Holy Avenger, Immortal JD Imoen, and a tremendous amount of rounds, we could eventually hack'n slash through all the escorts without risk.

Sooo... we made it ! Gonna loot now. Oh and btw, cheaty kited Aerie used Divine Intervention a couple of times ofc.
I felt the difference between the ToB version of the fight I did on my last run. Or did you guys toned it down a bit overall ? I'm thinking vargouille spawn mostly, didnt feel too overhelming, just extremely annoying.

Soa Ending

Needless to say, everything looked easy after Demo fight. Dealt with Lord Roenall real fast, went back to Sulda. Shaman shines at healing our melees tanking hardwoods.
Irenicus final fight... well, it's a tutorial version of the JD Demon Prince fight. I'd love to see this fight pumped up a bit.


Throne of Bhaal
Unsure I'll play it all. Well, at least I won't do EDE. We shall see.

Gromnir
Meh, we're too strong for him and his friends. No tactic here, we just overpowered every single one of them.

Yaga-Shura
Now, that's still an epic fight ! EFG annoying as ever. We run full west asap to find a tight spot for the fight (right under the little hut, and left of the "kitchen" thing) : we can't get propelled away too much.
Aerie MVP, by far. I dunno how she managed it, but she tanked 4 lieutenants, 2 Elite Bodyguards and Yaga-Shura by herself while we took care of 3EFG, 1 Elite Bodyguard, bunch of trash and 3 clerics. She had a contengency 50% HP with GR, Archon and another AC boosting thing (she has -20ish standing unbuffed). Honestly when I saw her there locked in by so many foes, I was like ok... I'm good for a reload here. But she stood her ground ! With Vecna and Foreknowledge, she could insta GR herself anytime (and she was anyway lasting 1 or 2 rounds each time before she needed it). What actually killed her is when party came in to clean enemies on her, an Elite Bodyguard managed to throw 3ADHW, she died there.
Yaga Shura remaining, Minsc tanks him for the fight in such a spot he wouldnt be propelled by his smites (using the little "hut" for that). Neera made sure to LR Yaga-Shura a few times so we could proc entangle from short sword of Mask, and avoid Yaga to run around. Imoen with JD is virtually immortal but also ignored as she is perma under PFMW. Keldorn had a hard time positioning himself, often takin aggro off Minsc, so he mostly was there to clean trash coming for us (he even drank a potion of barbarian essence at some point. Panic moment, thought he'd tank it all).
Shaman throws heal and regen the whole fight from safe distance, and goes Spirit Shift by the end to help Keldorn clean incoming trash soldiers.
Yaga falls finally. A good fighting spot and LR + Short Sword of Mask really makes this fight much more controlable !
Forged Sarevok Sword, join Sarevok (he's a Kensaï) he's given Keldorn XP and takes his spot. If I feel like I need a lvl 40 dispel at some point I'll take Keldorn back. Just wanna try out Sarevok.
Onto the Oasis we go !

Oasis
Neera and Aerie open alacrity and buff fighters, they each drink 1 barb essence. Minsc goes in first as he's the tankiest, many golems are interested in him. Jamis Tombelthen taken down in first round by Sarevok and Imoen. Imoen propelled away in the process but she keeps busy 5ish gems with JD, far enough for them not to switch aggro.
Shaman on healing duty on Minsc. Sarevok tries to find safe spots to dps, but he can't tank shit (nor could Keldorn, that is).
1 wish for rest used, 4 divine interventions used for emergency when shaman wasn't enough. Was a pretty stupid of a fight, just tank through and endure. Didnt bother debuffing mages, we took them down in the end only.

Draconis
Had to refresh Sense of Limbo a lot, so Aerie was the healer here. Neera opens alacrity and debuffs. Fighters pound, Aerie times a protective chant for 3ADHW, dragon phase.
Neera alacrities again, RRoR x3 or x4 then spams breaches (he has a contengency or a reset of some kind when he's badly hurt, where it requires another couple RRoR), melees pound, Shaman refreshes Sense of Limbo. Straightforward, even though keeping Sense of Limbo up really puts shaman out of any other duty.

Abazigal
Neera -5 casting speed does the trick, even though with Vecna, she doesn't have enough spells (only 8MAA for instance, + sequencers).
She opens alacrity, goes dispel several times to make sure it applies on Abazigal human form (Keldorn wouldve helped here, nvm), then RRoRx3, breach and pound.
Dragon form pops, she starts another alacrity while first one is still running, goes full protection (notably vs. elemental dmg), RRoRx3, ST:3xLR, MAA and LMD fest. She throws all of our wishes to get a Rest, her spell pool is small. Meanwhile melees pound too while she perma breaches between her nukefest. Lasted a round at best, Abazigal falls.


Sendaï's Enclave

Drow Barracks
Improved Cat Figurine FoA for all, then we go stupid with Minsc, Imoen, Sarevok slashing through. Neera alacrity debuffs and spam some damage spell (low effect). Good place to throw an Ethereal Retribution from shaman, probably helped a bit.
Not too difficult, we're strong.

Funny, during the spider path fight, Sarevok went up to 500+ HP thanks to his sword, using greater whirlwind.

Odamaron
Was just a matter of keeping Sense of Limbo up. Once spawns are defeated, Neera alacrity debuffs the lich, 2 dispel work, we pound, preventive protective chant but no ADHW, we killed it too fast.

Did the duel with guard captain. Summon items on shaman, he runs a bit (he's a shaman after all). Once Captain has no protection, spirit shift and boom !

Sendaï
Well, we got it on the first try, no Wish for Rest nor Divine Intervention used !
Fighters all drank 3 barb essences though, 14 remains. Would be a little short for EDE, but we won't do it so... Shaman healing shined big time here again.
We go in lightly buffed, Imoen and Sarevok take care of statues, rest of the team with summons clean entrance as drows come in.
At last statue, we tempo a bit, Neera goes RvE, we want regeneration. 2xGrandlords summoned, third RvE is regen, let's go ! Shaman retreats in a safe spot south, we want him able to heal through anything.
Imoen and Sarevok on spiders, Aerie goes cat figurine for FoA, Minsc tries to get aggro from Web Golems but fails as Neera and Djinni got it. Spiders easily dispatched, Ravager for Sarevok, SS of Mask for Imoen, Dragon Halberd for Minsc onto the big cat. Neera had a contengency PFMW in case she'd get aggro, it didn't help her much as she got it dispelled. Dunno if breached by Sendaï, or if web golem dispel it on hit. Anyway, she dies, but as all summons are on web golems, they keep aggro long enough for Minsc, Imoen and Sarevok to take cat down.
Then, they all fall back on golems. Barb potions, shaman healing and great dps did the trick. They fell fast, we were in no danger at all. Sendaï tried her best to bother us with comets and dragon breath, but anytime it came to that, shaman would mass mend right away, and keep everyone full hp. Neera got raised at some point, stunned with PW right away. It wore off roughly as Sendaï SI wore off, so she could breach her, pound, protective chant, ADHW, dead.
We used so little resources this fight thanks to shaman, was my best time ever here.

We gonna do Balthazar and PP challenges for the lulz, but this calls for this end of this run as we won't do EDE.

Balthazar nor Ravager did last a round.
Calling it a day, no EDE : ) Did Demogorgon already



Subjective review of the new stuff

Needless to say, everything I write here is highly subjective and meant to be discussed with those willing : )

Shaman

Overall feeling : « range & emergency »
First of all, great job guys ! It was a blast to play something that felt so new to IA and BG2 in general. This class sure is a work in progress, but you got most of it just right on the first shot.
I'd say shaman feels a bit OP at times, especially in the early game thanks to mending, but as the game goes, its OPness ends up being really situational, even though the healing power it brings to a party is something no other class comes close to. I mentionned it early on in this run, shaman plays kinda like a late-game Cernd, but it definitely lacks the flexibility of the Auramaster.
What I mean by that is mostly regarding healing. While Cernd may be able to heal just as much under alacrity, if not more, he does it for 2 rounds. Where Shaman shines is in its full-time healing reliability. The Good, Bad and Ugly golem fight is a great example of that. I couldn't foresee it doable without Cernd, Shaman trivializes it. On the other hand, you can't expect a shaman to tank like Cernd, to dish out the same kind of damage as Cernd, or to be as generaly useful and reliant.
That's where the supportive style of play of the shaman feels like something really new, it's really a full-time support class. Notably regarding his (very) strong buffs, with such a short duration. Mentionned it a lot of times in my journal, especially in silence intensive fights, if shaman is needed to buff during a fight, he must focus on it, and even if mending allows you to cast a healing spell too during said round, you have to forget spamming said heals, making it less of a healer than a aura cleansed Cernd. Shaman buffs are not pre-buffs (ofc some are, but they can be dispelled), they're best used very situationnaly during a fight.

To put it in a nutshell, from this playthrough, two things defined the shaman class for me : Range & Emergency. More than any other character, the short duration of his buffs, the range his healing offer really make the shaman shine in emergency situation. I somehow think that keeping these 2 aspects as a core of the class might help it to differentiate itself better from druids. I'd even go as far as making most of his spells ranged to keep on that track, even if it takes to nerf them a bit. I made some suggestion in the spell review section. They're simplistic and meant to be discussed ofc.

Besides all that, I don't think druid & shaman should absolutely be mutually exclusive in a party, so having some shaman dedicated items instead of having to share with the druid ones would be most welcome in future updates ! But I guess you guys got that in store !
Gotta be careful though not to give shaman too many means of reducing his casting speed, as his heal spamming power would get too strong. Maybe introducing casting speed reduction that doesn't apply to heals in some ways ?

Regarding shaman offensive abilities and spells, as he has some of course, I usually found them so marginal in their utility that I didn't see the point of overly using them but on easier fights. On hard fights, shaman is IMO better support focused. I don't know which route you guys intended the shaman class to go, but I wouldn't mind having it even more specialized in supporting, loosing on some offensive abilities.
Overall, I used offensive druid spell only in the early game. By the time we got to underdark, shaman hardly used them.

Time for a more specific review of the new spells.

Spells

Spirit Ward
A great early game tool for those emotions early mages love to cast. 1 cast time, emergency use. I'd even think it'd be fitting for the shaman to be able to cast it from range (as Spiritual Clarity). Excellent spell anyway.

Soothing Fog
I used this one a few times early on, it hardly heals, and by the time it's supposed to heal a bit more you have access to regeneration. I don't really see the point of it as of now. Would it heal more, sure, but it really felt useless this run.

Spiritual Clarity
Great spell again, much like Protector's Mental Equilibrium, has range, always comes in handy, saved many fights from confusion chaos. Can't ask for more, perfect as it is.

Spirit Fire
Another great spell for the early game, kinda forgot about it by mid/late game even though it couldve been real useful. Interupts too IIRC. This is the kind of offensive spells I wish shaman had more of.

Spiritual Weapon
+3 weapon for free, why not, but shaman doesn't fight well, and if he wants to, he spirit shifts and his weapon is replaced. I don't really see the point of that spell, but why not.

Entropy Shield
This one's great ! Even though I'd have loved to be able to use it as a prebuff with a longer duration, it's still very strong as it is, and the short duration fits the shaman playstyle. Extremely strong early game, Korgan DD could face tank 3 golems and laugh at them. I really really like the idea behind this spell, and would love to see more of it. What about a Mass one as level 7 spell ?

Recall Spirit
Useful and straightforward, nothing to change here.

Impervious Sanctity of Mind
Nice if you got a paladin, kinda useful to have it targeted (thats the best part) as trying to cast remove fear on a party running like headless chicken is often a pain, but a level 6 spell, with a 6 casting time ? I might be missing something but it seems quite a lot for an emergency spell. I mean, it's a single target remove fear for paladin AFAIK.

Primal Ward
Very situationnal as it's not really a prebuff, but awesome to avoid insta death when those bosses target your mage with triple FoD. Since they often open the fight with it, it's reliable, but it's kinda hard to know when to use it, and reducing its casting time might make it too strong. I wouldn't mind having it a casting time of 3, but that's just me.

Storm Shell
I was extremely disapointed with that spell. It's both too strong and useless. The only time I used it was against the amber trio in Spellhold, made the fight trivial, but by the time I met other instances where it could have been needed, I could heal through/soak it by so many other means I didn't bother wasting my lvl 7 spells with it. One way to make it more meaningful could be to have it act as a « restoral » of resistances if that's possible codingwise. Would fit the shaman « emergency-style » better IMO. Id make it faster to cast too, maybe a 4 casting time. Or, it could prevent a resistance to go below 0%.

Sense of Limbo
Now, that's something ! I believe it's the first time a way to prevent silence for others is introduced in IA. I found it perfect. The casting time is fair, the duration is fair and makes it a real duty for shaman to keep it up on needed characters. I feel like it's not OP at all, as the only other ways of preventing silences are from uber strong items and classes which have it for extremely long durations in comparison. This spell only allows not to be forced to play a Necro or Cernd, and I find it perfectly balanced. Once again, I wouldn't find it to much if you could cast if from range instead of touch, but it ain't like it's absolutely needed.

High Level Abilities

Ethereal Retribution
I can't really tell if this spell is great or not, as its difficult to measure its effect. The damage is marginal for a high level ability, but it sure is great against armies fights (Guildmaster and such). It's not bad, I often used it but I really can't tell if it made any kind of difference. Though, to be honest, I had no one really relying on AC, so I'm unsure I was able to notice a THACO debuff anyway.
I would maybe make it a level 7 spell, for it might have a much stronger (too much?) effect on the start of mid game. I can't tell, really. I used it for sure, wouldn't mind having it remain as it is.

Spirit Form
This is a nice goodie, well fitting the emergency of the shaman getting aggro. That being said, shaman was like always far away from the fray in pretty much any fight, so I hardly used this ability even though it's kinda cool. But if the shaman is getting hit, he won't be able to do his job, so it's really a « OMG let's run away » ability I think. It's still cool, don't get me wrong, and the untargetable thingie is noice too. Just, it feels weird on a character that is not supposed to get hit. In other words, you don't need to use it if you position correctly.

Favored of Spirits
Honestly, this one is cool. It's just strong, it does what it says, and sure won't make your shaman a tank. It does IMO what spirit form does, but better : gives you a mean of escape if you get in a bad situation, in addition to that very useful deathward. I wouldn't change it, it's fine as it is.

About Mending
Now, this is what defines the uniqueness of the shaman, and what makes him feels so new to play. Making all healing spells ranged is a great call, I wouldn't change that, it litteraly defined the shaman role for my run (unlike 3 natural restoral max from druids), and I believe shaman could really be defined even harder by his ability to do everything from a distance (regarding the « emergency kind of play I mentionned earlier).
As for the aura cleansing thing, it's too strong early on I believe, plain too strong once coupled with ranged healing. I wonder if somehow, having ranged heals is not enough for the shaman to still stand out for early/mid game, while mending could become an HLAs. It would make the progression smoother I believe, with a real powerspike when high levels kick in.

TLDR : Loved the experience of playing a shaman, is defined �“ according to me �“ by his ranged emergency supporting playstyle. Would go even harder on this path to differenciate it from druid. As in more range, more support spell, less offensive abilities.
Oh, and shamanic dance sucks (what did you expect, beamdog : p) Can't wait to see it reworked in some ways !

About Cleric Update

The clerics I used this run (Anomen and Aerie) were given a kit through cheaty ways, so I can't tell much about how a pure cleric would perform. For sure though, my point was to have access to their new spells and try them out. I still wonder if a pure class cleric is worth his or her slot, as I tend to foresee them wearing off in utility by mid/endgame as no warrior HLAs to hit nor the needed APR, and no real way to reliably tank anything, especially if they need to cast. But Pekkae might prove me wrong, can't wait to read about his endgame cleric !

Spells

Protective Chant
This is an excellent call. 1 casting time, allows not to rely on PFME (was awesome for early fights like shade lord!), the duration makes it totally fair as it needs to be carefuly timed. It seems perfect to me and should remain as such.

Demon's Hunt
I don't know how much it helped on some fights, but seeing its effects on a regular basis in combat log is satisfying. It sure helps a bit on some fights, wouldn't mind seeing it scale with level, as in higher damage on critical miss, higher critical miss chance... or simply higher THACO scaling against demons, we can't have a kensaï in every run : p
By the way, does it apply on demons only, or devils are counted as demons ?

Weaken Undead
Extremely well put spell, efficient, straightforward and I could really notice its effect, notably in Undead Town which I tried with and without, and in some other instances too.
As for Demon Hunt, I wouldn't mind a scaling with levels.

Guardian Angel
Used it a bit early on with Anomen, can't say I noticed much of a difference as the damage is so huge in IA that the amount of restored HP seems marginal. I might be wrong, but it seems so little in comparison to the kind of damage IA dishes out.

Heavenly Shield
Kinda the same as Guardian Angel. I LOVE the idea of making sword & shield relevant for clerics, yet, the amount of damage is so small for a character that won't deal much anyway. Used it almost every fight until late Underdark, and I can't say I felt like it made any difference.

Spiritual Link
I missed the point of this spell I guess, the idea behind it looks awesome, but I really don't see any spell I tend to use (but Heal) that would really benefit from it. To be honest, I'd go as far as making it a passive HLA, thus making cleric scale harder into late game. But again, I feel like I'm missing a point there with this spell.

Spare the Dying
Another great idea, but in practice I didn't see much of a difference while using it in a lot of fights. It certainly saved my arse a couple of time, but it doesn't look IMO strong enough for a level 7 spell. I mean, in harder fights, so much attacks are going through that well, just resisting 1 is not reliable. What about a 1 casting time spell that prevents death for a round ? Kind of a BIG protective chant. And like CC, can be cast only once a day.

As for False Dawn, Bolt of Glory and Sunray updates, I used them a bit but the damage is sooo marginal compared to the damage we deal by other means I felt like keeping my cleric aura clean for an emergency heal or anything. Loved the no friendly-fire Blade Barrier though, a real quality of life thing.
Didn't really use any kitted god-specific ability, noice goodies for early game but hardly noticed an interest once we reached late game. Talos specific early access to Purify Aura seems golden though ! So does the undispellable combat buffs from Tempus, but does that make him a viable fighter in later stages of the game ?

I feel like all these new spells are GREAT idea, but I find their application kinda shy when it comes to give cleric some power to be on par with other classes. But again, I might be totally missing the point, and not realize how strong that is if well-used.
On the other hand, I find the new HLAs perfectly fitting !

High Level Abilities

Divine Intervention
Good ol' GR, but as HLAs, 2 max ? I'll take it ! Now that's some emergency power there, but I think you balanced it well. Wouldn't have made Demogorgon fight without it.

Purify Aura
This.Is.Awesome !!! This is just a perfect way to go around alacrity for clerics. It's ALWAYS handy, you balanced it well with that 3 max and limited use per round getting better with levels. I can't remember how many times it was just that little extra thing we needed to turn a fight. Don't change a thing on this one if I may, that is a great call !

TLDR : Some awesome and well-needed update to clerics (notably purify aura, protective chant), kinda shy overall though when it comes to give cleric real power. A lot of the new spells rely on excellent ideas, but the numbers they imply are to low to matter in IA for most of it I think.

General opinion on clerics 
I think that the early access to purify aura from Talos', and undispellable buffs from Tempus do not need to be kit-specific. Every cleric and every kit could have them and still not go over the OP bar IMO. Same goes for Tyr's friendliness to the S&S style, I love the idea of S&S being linked deeply to the cleric class, and more spells could rely on it to be strong (that could be a divine thing and apply to paladin to some extend). A cleric-specific shield would be most welcome too, something crossing Anomen's and Mazzy's (immunities, perma AoF, some shield bash thingie). Then, with proper limitations around dual/multi classed clerics, pure class cleric could have a chance to shine too.
Also had in mind an HLA thing that would allow some cleric-specific buffs (something that applies only to him, as Holy Power, Shield of the Archon and so on) to be applied on someone else. It needs to be a bit more specific, but maybe there is something to do with that.
I wonder too if there is something to do with making some single target spells a mass spell as a lvl 7 or HLA (PFNE for instance).

I mean, by ToB and even a bit before, Anomen and Aerie were both on the « stay out of fight and simply be there for an emergency Divine Intervention if need be ». Clerics need more incentives to either go to ham, or to be able to rain spells in some ways.


New Items Testing

Stained in Blood
Even though I never used the rage clickie (no info on HP was too scary), it's still an extremely well-put item ! Made Minsc tank harder than ever. As I mentionned in the journal, 15% DR seems like a lot, 10% might be enough. Good job on that, barbs are top tier more than ever. Makes me wanna try Korgie barb on an evil run. Besides, I believe it comes at the right time (regarding the necessary blood components).

Improved Firecam Armor
Kinda cool, the 20% additionnal slashing damage is welcome. I'd do something about the Beljurils though. The last one comes in really late (post Supreme Leader), and I don't think the item is powerful enough to justify it to come so late. No matter how low its AC is, Keldorn will never tank reliably, so as a second line hitter, armor matters only remotely. That is, if justifying it to come in so late is important, I'd add a +1 or +2 lvl to his dispel magic cast on it, just to make Keldorn stronger at what he does best. Otherwise it's mostly a cool item, but another heavy armor would do just as fine.

Sword of the Rashemi (not 6.6 but first time for me).
This one is really really good ! Coupled with stained in Blood, Minsc seemed even a bit too strong of a tank, AND, the extra critical range on the weapon makes him hit even more reliably.
Good stuff there anyway. Might make the 10% DR a 5% so that improved warblade still has an edge, or a reason to be at all.

Reforged Sword of Chaos (not 6.6 but same)
Comes so late that at this point the overpowerness of it doesn't really matter, still made Sarevok reach INSANE amounts of HP on some (easier) fights. Also makes him the only character finding whirlwind more attractive than critical hit in some situations. It's fine, I was glad to try it out.

Potion of clear thinking
Very nice one, fitted shaman perfectly as he was the one able to remove such effects from the party.


Updated observations/random thoughts/inconsistencies/bugs :

When Cespenar is asked about making Delryn Family Shield he answers with Improved Dragon Helmet dialog (it's a can't make/missing ingredient answer).
Edit : Actually, a lot of the dialogs for "can't make/missing ingredient" are fully messed up. "Can make" works fine for all.
When asked about making Improved Sword of Chaos, if can't make, goes for his vanilla (looong) recipe list dialog instead of IA upgrade list - had noticed this one on a previous run
Can't make ring of Protection +4 even though I have the ingredients for it, Cespenar offers to make cloak +2 instead. Edit : Actually, when I asked him about his regular upgrade later on, I got all those items he couldn't make at once (2x+3 ring, 1x+4 ring). That's weird. It needs to be double checked.

Seems like JD is detected as Angurvadal by Cespenar

Drow city : We met Amariel the runaway slave but in her elf sprite (which means not IA's Amariel). We didn't properly "meet" her, it was just as if she'd been caught, and killed, we didnt get a chance to missguide her pursuer. Maybe I ran too fast through that at some point and didnt notice, but I don't think so. Maybe is it Vagrant/Necro only ?

Samia's party : RRoR didn't work on Kaol's SI, he has to be endured. Might be intended. If he had an SI:Divination though, he could be targeted by said RRoR

Found an annoying bug in the room with the little chest guarded by 3 coin golems in Spellhold. Once they're all dead, I get the vagrant cloak and a scroll of memory boosting. However, I was getting a seemingly infinite amount of memory boosting scrolls instead, slowly filling my inventory up. > I believe I read about that somewhere else, as a IATweaks matter.

Twisted rune fight : For some reason, Vaxall remained unseen until his SI ran out. I usually see him but just can't target him.

Jan was a multi-classed T/I in my run, thought he had been turned into dual-classed a few versions earlier.

A few suggestions, for IA tweaks or vanilla

Aerie would make an ok shaman lorewise, as she's from a wildnerness tribe originaly. Stats wouldnt need too much of an update, she'd just loose on her improved hammer.

Priest of Talos seems very attractive for Viconia. Could rename it "Priestess of Shar" and keep the class template for the most part. Some access to illusion (instead of elemental things) spells here and there, just like dark moon monks and its a lore-fitting kit. To some extend, could allow her to AC tank reliably, or to act as a part-time/low-tier illusionist for the party.

+1 or +2 to dispel magic level wouldn't hurt on Keldorn armor, mentioned it in the new items section

This is an IATweaks matter, but I'd love to see simplified economy applied to Yaga/Oasis fights, loads of loot to be turned into gold there. Simplified economy prolly doesn't get applied in ToB

Electrical head of FoA comes soooo late into the game. What about it putting it in SoA, on some Rakshassa in Suldanessalar for example ? Or Nizidramanty'x ? It's highly unlikely that team doens't have +5 crushing by this point

This post has been edited by Badgerlad: Dec 24 2022, 01:19 PM

[kilorew]

How do you think the Shaman will scale later into the game?

[Badgerlad]

How do you think the Shaman will scale later into the game?

Since I do not know yet what kind of HLAs he'll get, I can't tell. And I want to keep it a suprise so I won't look it up.
So far, it feels like a late-game Cernd made for the early game. His scaling will probably be reliant on how well he can spam spells later on, as I do not know if he'll get access to some form of alacrity.
Both of his exclusive lvl 7 spells seem EXTREMELY powerful SPOILER!

one of them is a 1 target protective buff that prevent elemental resistance reduction. As in Amber Golems (electricity), Ancient Dragon (fire)... it might make some well-known hard fights rather doable, if not trivial. The other lvl 7 spell is kinda like Vocalize, but against Greater Silences

and party-oriented, so even if he doesn't end up as godlike as a necro or a vagrant, what he brings to the party as a whole looks powerful enough.

With enough casting time reduction, no one can probably compete with a shaman in terms of healing.
And I was dumb enough not to take Mass Cure yet, but I bet mending applies to it too : p

[SparrowJacek]

Thank you for that detailed info on the fights, reading it is a real pleasure

From what I see, you and pekkae make the Shaman class sound like a real powerhouse, when it comes to most encounters, even trivializing some of them. Good to hear that our rebalance brought some freshness into the class, making it useful and unique!

And it's also nice to see that some new clerical skills are useful, though I see that they're mostly outshined by Shaman

Pretty much everyone levels up once we reach Spellhold. Noticed there that when I get to choose new spells for my shaman, those he already chosen at previous levels are still selectable in the list. I don't think that's intended, as you can select a spell you already have and get nothing.

This issue is visible only for Heal/Mend spells, right? Others behave normally? It's almost impossible to exclude a spell for a single kit, enabling it to pick different spells instead, so that's the current implementation.

EDIT: Also Ranger/Helm seems a bit broken, Clerics shouldn't get Iron Skins and other druidic spells, so I assume that your Anomen will be far more powerful than even a F/Helm

This post has been edited by SparrowJacek: Dec 15 2022, 10:14 PM

[Badgerlad]

From what I see, you and pekkae make the Shaman class sound like a real powerhouse, when it comes to most encounters, even trivializing some of them. Good to hear that our rebalance brought some freshness into the class, making it useful and unique!
And it's also nice to see that some new clerical skills are useful, though I see that they're mostly outshined by Shaman

Yeah, awesome job on the cleric rebalancing, can't wait to try their new HLAs. So far what you did with clerics is perfect, I could only ask for more ! A spirit fire like spell, which would AoE doom enemies only would comes to my mind (why not a Viconia-only spell ? I'd love to see her shine in IA). Shaman gets it with damage, it would be the divine version of malison.

As for shaman, it's extremely smooth to play, it does exactly what you expect, just maybe a bit too well. Still, he's just a supprot character, well, mostly, so eventually I expect him to be balanced in comparison to a Vagrant or Necro protagonist. But a NPC shaman with either of these protagonist... that must be something !

Pretty much everyone levels up once we reach Spellhold. Noticed there that when I get to choose new spells for my shaman, those he already chosen at previous levels are still selectable in the list. I don't think that's intended, as you can select a spell you already have and get nothing.

This issue is visible only for Heal/Mend spells, right? Others behave normally? It's almost impossible to exclude a spell for a single kit, enabling it to pick different spells instead, so that's the current implementation.

EDIT: Also Ranger/Helm seems a bit broken, Clerics shouldn't get Iron Skins and other druidic spells, so I assume that your Anomen will be far more powerful than even a F/Helm

I'll check that out on my next level, it might be the case indeed (only mending spells). Would make sense.
As for Ranger/Helm, it sure is stronger than a vanilla Anomen, but he's not as strong imo as per say, Jaheira Avenger. For access to druidic spell I just modified that line in baldur.ini, but yeah it's not standard. I expect Anomen efficiency as a melee to wear off once my fighers get their HLAs. So he can still skintank AND will have his improved shield, but I really don't expect him to remain the powerhouse he is atm.

[critto]

Pretty much everyone levels up once we reach Spellhold. Noticed there that when I get to choose new spells for my shaman, those he already chosen at previous levels are still selectable in the list. I don't think that's intended, as you can select a spell you already have and get nothing.

This only happens with mend spells, because they replace a chosen healing spell inside the spell book. This is an engine limitation, so a healing spell will pop up again on spell selection screen, because it was removed from spell book earlier.

[SparrowJacek]

Since this fight is not supposedly difficult, but still implies a strong opponent, was a good time to try Demon's Hunt once again. Hard to say if it was all due to the spell, but the balor never fell so fast. In a round he was out, didnt cast anything but a dispel at start that Shaman had taken solo. Can't wait to try Demon's Hunt against harder fights (Judgement Day thingies for instance !)

Do you see the demons missing more often and getting hit because of that? Actually, from what I read, it didn't really have many changes to miss It's a 5th level spell, I didn't want it to be too powerful, but its effects should be noticeable. Also did you use Weaken Undead?

This post has been edited by SparrowJacek: Dec 16 2022, 12:32 PM

[Badgerlad]

[Do you see the demons missing more often and getting hit because of that? Actually, from what I read, it didn't really have many changes to miss It's a 5th level spell, I didn't want it to be too powerful, but its effects should be noticeable. Also did you use Weaken Undead?

He died too fast for me to notice anything. For some reason, he seemed to be taking more damage than usual. When he had 2 HP "bars" left, a single crit for Minsc put him to rest.
Can't say I noticed anything apart from him dying faster than usual. Maybe he took several of those 10dmg on critical miss, but my bad, I forgot to check combat log.

As for weaken Undead, I'll be sure to try it in Undead Town, but didn't think of it in Spellhold against Librarian or such (or at Screaming Statue).

[pekkae]

Nice run! Having 4 capable fighters on core really makes some of the fights quite straightforward (especially if one has both Kensai and a RB in the crew!).

Would imagine the DD will really shine throughout the run, especially with Shaman's healing + special abilities. The character can start tanking in chapter 2 !

btw. DD's defensive stance is can't be dispelled so it has an edge over hardiness that way.

This post has been edited by pekkae: Dec 17 2022, 11:48 AM

[Badgerlad]

Would imagine the DD will really shine throughout the run, especially with Shaman's healing + special abilities. The character can start tanking in chapter 2 !

btw. DD's defensive stance is can't be dispelled so it has an edge over hardiness that way.

Yeah, with shaman Korgan was a monster tank, but Imoen THACO really brings that extra damage I needed.
I kinda regret having kept Jaheira. She's awesome ofc, but shaman really allows fighters to shine with his healing, I wouldn't have minded Keldorn, Mazzy or Korgie instead of her.
Next run I'll probably go with a Vagrant run, with a shaman solo divine caster.

Didnt know about the Defensive Stance, that's indeed pretty good !

This post has been edited by Badgerlad: Dec 17 2022, 01:28 PM

[Badgerlad]

A little list of stuff I found/tested so far :

Note about Stained in Blood + 6. If activated, removes barbarian rage if up, hence looses its immunities (notably from level drain) - might be intended.

Improved Firecam armor +20% slashing damage seems to be working as intended, tested it out a few times.

Hallowed Redeemer +2 did not disapear from inventory when Crowell made the Improved Firecam armor.

Gauntlets of Blessed Might clickie only works on the wearer, it won't cast if applied to another target.

For some reason, during the GOA fight, Assassin Coordinator was immune to our damage, no matter how debuffed he was. He wasn't immune to summons damage though.

WK4 Demilich tries to imprison Shaman under Favored of the Spirits (Shaman HLA, gives a deathward effects).

It seems like Sense of Limbo is turned by Spell Turning. During Ancient Dragon fight, Neera who had ST can't be Sense of Limbo-ed and Shaman gets it instead.

When a caster gets (greater) silenced, and then is given Sense of Limbo, his hotbar items and other clickies remain unavailable. Might be intended as it's not necesseraly "verbal" component, but if it isn't, why would it be unavailable after a silence in the first place ?

[critto]

Note about Stained in Blood + 6. If activated, removes barbarian rage if up, hence looses its immunities (notably from level drain) - might be intended.

Yes, it is intended. I will check and comment on the rest later today.

[critto]

Hallowed Redeemer +2 did not disapear from inventory when Crowell made the Improved Firecam armor.

No idea here. Everything looks ok in v7 branch. Is it reproducible every time?

Gauntlets of Blessed Might clickie only works on the wearer, it won't cast if applied to another target.

This might be v6.6-beta issue, Jacek, could please check?

For some reason, during the GOA fight, Assassin Coordinator was immune to our damage, no matter how debuffed he was. He wasn't immune to summons damage though.

Any type of damage at all? Definitely strange, nothing has been done to this fight for years.

WK4 Demilich tries to imprison Shaman under Favored of the Spirits (Shaman HLA, gives a deathward effects).

Once again, kinda clueless here. Demilich's AI is properly set up to take these things into account. Did you trigger the 10% discharge on the spell by any chance? It removes the spell's effects.

It seems like Sense of Limbo is turned by Spell Turning. During Ancient Dragon fight, Neera who had ST can't be Sense of Limbo-ed and Shaman gets it instead.

This is kind of a feature, in a sense that the spell has a particular secondary type shared with other non-offensive buffs and supportive spells such as various heals. Are those reflected by ST as well?

When a caster gets (greater) silenced, and then is given Sense of Limbo, his hotbar items and other clickies remain unavailable. Might be intended as it's not necesseraly "verbal" component, but if it isn't, why would it be unavailable after a silence in the first place ?

Definitely unintended. Which kind of silence specifically is at fault here? Does the hotbar become active again ever? All of the hotbar stuff is engine-level, built into the silence effect. Its removal should bring the buttons back to the active state. So either SoL does not remove effects of a specific brand of silence that I might have overlooked, or the way it removes them causes this effect (which might be an engine bug).

[SparrowJacek]

QUOTE
Gauntlets of Blessed Might clickie only works on the wearer, it won't cast if applied to another target.
This might be v6.6-beta issue, Jacek, could please check?

The issue here is that the item's ability has range of 0. That means that you need to be VERY close to your target. I had to walk around the caster for a bit for it to take effect. Increasing range from 0 to 1 fixes this.

QUOTE
Note about Stained in Blood + 6. If activated, removes barbarian rage if up, hence looses its immunities (notably from level drain) - might be intended.
Yes, it is intended. I will check and comment on the rest later today.

It removes the effect but I don't think it protects from normal Barbarian Rage, so you can use Blood Rage and then Barbarian Rage.

[critto]

The issue here is that the item's ability has range of 0. That means that you need to be VERY close to your target. I had to walk around the caster for a bit for it to take effect. Increasing range from 0 to 1 fixes this.

Understood.

It removes the effect but I don't think it protects from normal Barbarian Rage, so you can use Blood Rage and then Barbarian Rage.

Yes, I've added it to the todo list.

[Badgerlad]

@Critto

Regarding Hallowed Redeemer not taken into recipe :
Unfortunately, I don't know. I might have a save somewhere to try again.

GAO immune to dmg from party :
Only from physical damage, didn't try to cast dmg spell on him. Summons did dmg to him though, and it was physical.

WK4 Demilich and favored of spirits :
It didn't trigger during the fight as we shaman didn't take damage. As for the trigger effect, it worked properly in other instances (heal and remove spell).

ST reflecting other spells than Sense of Limbo :
Don't know, will try.

Silence, Sense of Limbo and item usage:
I think it was Grave Silence from Lich in Gate District. Happened against Orcus too.
Edit : Draconis Silence applied the same effect regarding items.

This post has been edited by Badgerlad: Dec 23 2022, 04:56 PM

[SparrowJacek]

Thank you very much for that journal and for finding so many bugs or problematic things!

I hope that playthrough was entertaining to you and new stuff added more strategic depth to it.

Could you please share your thoughts on that new content and its usefulness now, that you passed the game?

[Badgerlad]

Thank you very much for that journal and for finding so many bugs or problematic things!

I hope that playthrough was entertaining to you and new stuff added more strategic depth to it.

Could you please share your thoughts on that new content and its usefulness now, that you passed the game?

Don't worry I'm on it ; ) Not done just yet, but soon.
I had a blast with this new stuff guys, great job ! Can't wait to see more

[Badgerlad]

We're done with this run !

Included my review on the new stuff to my main original post. Once again, thanks for your great work guys !

[lroumen]

I am amazed at how fast you can play improved anvil. It takes me longer than a quarter o.o

I like reading how you approached the fights with the new spells and abilities. I have learned a lot already before even installing anything.

This post has been edited by lroumen: Dec 24 2022, 08:35 AM