@ Kerkes:
Good reply; I might give a Dwarven F/T a go. Not sure why you'd mention Hendak though (he's the Copper Coronet slave leader, I think).

@matti:
SPOILER!

I pointed Haegan as an example: He does notice you while invisible, and you can still backstab him. I was talking about the guy in slaver's ship compound (Maybe his name wasn't Haegan, but he's the boss in Slaver's ship area. )
Do try f/t, they rock even with 17 dex, but that's not a big penalty anyway. and get +2 strenght in Hell trials, since you'll not find JD anyway. Just start as a no-evil aligment. (I was chaotic neutral). I still prefer a good old figh/illusionist (or sorcerer) for protagonist, but mainly because I like magic more than backstab. Or, take both!
"Blackrazor" sword is still an awsome weapon, and I doubt any Vagrant will take it from genie in Hell.

You're quite right, the leader of the slavers is Captain Haegan. However, in your post above you named Hendak, who is the leader of the slaves. But I get what you mean. Thanks for the tip, I wasn't aware of that!

Yep, he was there. That's right, he was.

ORCUS

SPOILER!

Congratulations! I gave up on that battle last time, so I'm particularly looking forward to it with my current game. It's one of the two hardest battles in SoA, in my opinion; since you won, Irenicus himself shouldn't be a problem to you now.

Grats Matti! Personally I found Twisted Rune harder than Orcus. Just did both fight in my 3rd Anvil run.
A suggestion against leveldrain:

SPOILER!

Thanks.

Irenicus who? My fighters wiped out his summons in like 15 sec. Then I summoned 3 swanmays and send them to fight the Slayer when all my party stand aside and giggling.




Yeah, I just forgot about it! I wasted one of my five prot. form lev. drain scrolls (I freaked out ;] ) and yeah, no Hesperus for me. But there was so much pressure in a killing zone... this fight is PURE MADNESS!

I completely agree about Orcus. One tough fight, in many ways harder than even Ancient Dragon, depending on your party composition. Too bad that Hespherus actually isn't worth the trouble and resources spent on Orcus. It's a challenge still, so I fight him regardless.

Hesperus is improved to a much stronger weapon in v6 (it has a chance per hit to unleash the new disrupt undead effect - similar to the new 7th level spell - on target). I mean, defeating orcus is now fairly rewarding.

Orcus is also improved a bit (don't panic! The improvements are mostly anti-cheese precautions; players who fight in a fair style won't notice any significant difference and shouldn't worry).

I'm glad for it (not Orcus, I didn't find cheese here., but Hespherus sword.)

I need a little opinion about my next party composition. I am currently planning;

Sorcerer PC
Fighter/Thief
Fighter/Mage
Ranger/Cleric
Blade

I want my 6th party member to be a single class fighter. Runners up include but not limited to;

-Kensai
-Riskbreaker
-Berseker
-Barbarian
-Cavalier
-Undead Hunter
-Vagrant
-Stalker (Possibly Valygar)

Any ideas about the 6th member or my party composition are welcome.

Dwarven barbarian!

Give him Poseidon's Wrath/Warlord's Blade (with regen or atrb. bonuses)/Staff of Rynn and he'll be a melee monster. Extremely useful against all IA foes, especially liches, rakshasas, high level mages, golems, skeleton lords, skeleton grandlords, high level thiefs (immune to backstab), high level fighters, dragons, demons, mind flyers, vampires, beholders, imp. spiders, high level clerics, trolls, high level druids, humans, elves, drows, dwarves, halfings, gnomes....etc.etc. ........ not to mention.. against ALL the bosses.

This is my absolutely favorite class in vanilla and every mods exept IA, where he's close second after/behind vagrant but only if vagrant is a protagonist in the party, when he's not, dwarven barb is still my fav.

Imho dwarven berserker is better than dwarven barbarian. I suggest vagrant, berserker or kensai. Save Valygar and riskbreaker to V6 run. Barbarian, cavalier, undead hunter, stalker is weaker and as I see your other 5 members you need a fighter with 2handed weapons.

I would suggest a Dwarven Kensai; the damage output is amazing from mid-levels onwards, the bonus to HP and ST helps a lot, and with a two-handed weapon you can stay away from the immediate frontline. Still, be prepared to spend some of your level 4 arcane slots on Spirit Armor. (Having a Sorcerer would help in this regard, but you should be okay).

Edit to clarify: Obviously, his actual damage/hit won't be much higher against foes with great physical resistances. The big difference is the consistency with which a Kensai can actually hit targets. You can get a permanent THAC0 of -10 before leaving the Underdark in a regular game, which is a very good chance to hit almost all enemies you'll encounter in those stages (compare: my Vagrant was at about -2 main hand THAC0 at that point).

Well, three different suggestions by now and all are actually tempting (this was actually why i couldn't decide in the first place). By the way I have some changes in my candidate list, since i definitely need someone to wield two handed weaponry. So off goes Riskbreaker and Stalker. Additionally I think Vagrant is too overpowered (one might argue this is a good thing) and don't want anyone to be turned by clerics so Undead Hunter is out and left are 4 choices. Note that i am looking for a class that would fit well in MY party so powers of these classes individually are rather irrelevant.

Berserker
Race: I will not dual class so humans are pointless, puny elves doesn't have much to offer too. To choose betwee Half-orcs and Dwarves i will definitely go for dwarf since +1 str is nothing compared to +5 to saves vs poison/magic.

As a class Berserkers are Ok but deep in my heart i don't have much love for them. Their rage is inferior to Barbarians but they can wear any armour (which is a very good thing) plus weapon grandmastery.

Barbarian (Dwarf of course)
Barbarians have much to offer such as backstab immunity, physical damage resistance, high HP etc. But they lack AC a little bit and restricted to specialization.

These two classes are all in all very similar to each other. For my party, including one of them means one less casting of Death Ward and this is important considering that i have only half a cleric.

Kensai (Again, dwarf)
I love Kensais. I really do. In my very first runthrough of BG2 i had a Kensai PC and he was awesome. They have great offensive abilities and that's all for them. Very poor AC, loss of all resistances offered by armours, useless Kai ability etc. However it was argued that in IA AC doesn't play a major role against tough enemies so that may compensate a little bit.

Cavalier
Cavaliers are very interestig. To hit/damage bonuses are pretty much useless, bu they positively assure that my party will never have a problem with morale failure* and fear. Resistance to elemental damage, immunity to poison and a little healing spells here and there are all good things. And i read somewhere that paladins get +2 to all saving throws but didn't test it yet.

For Role playing purposes Kensai is the best choice IMO while Cavalier is the worst. Paladins just doesn't fit anywhere if protagonist is not one.

So i still remain undecided but a little lean towards Dwarven Kensai.

*As far as i can tell custom made characters doesn't have a break morale limit while Bioware NPCs freak out quite easily. So that means even if i go for a Dwarven Berseker I'll make one instead of taking Korgan.

Don't forget that Half-Orcs can also get 18 DEX, hence an extra point of AC. It's neglegible, though.

Seeing as Cavaliers have to be Human, and the Holy Avenger is nowhere near as powerful as in vanilla, I'd discard that option.

Berserkers are, indeed, okay, but lack the flavour of Barbarians. It's a matter of taste more than anything else, I think, though I would suppose that Barbarian weapon resistances give them the edge in IA.

I'm very fond of Dwarven Barbarians; as tanks they are obviously superior to Kensais, and since you will want to switch between (and hence be at least proficient with) two-handed swords, halberds and staves in various fights, the limitation to normal specialization that big a deal. But you might want to consider the fact that your party already has three characters than can perform credibly as tanks, but no really powerful melee damage dealer (R/C can do quite well, but only when buffed). So, in your case, I'd say Kensai does make more sense.

The one thing I'd worry about is that Barbarians and Berserkers have a way of making themselves immune to many negative effects. A Kensai can't do that, and since your only Cleric is multiclassed, he won't exactly be able to churn out Chaotic Commands like there's no tomorrow. But I'd still say it's an acceptable trade-off, especially since Dwarves get that huge ST bonus.


By the way, I falsely implied in my last post that you didn't have a Sorcerer in your party (just overlooked it). Since you do, be sure to pick Spirit Armor if you go for a Kensai. Apart from Emotion and Stoneskin, fourth level isn't all that exciting anyway. It'll free up your F/M and Blade slots for Stoneskin, which enhances their tanking ability... see how it all fits together neatly?

Very well then Dwarven Kensai it is! I will just hope that his saves eliminates the necessity of casting Chaotic Commands and pray that he doesn't get imprisoned!

I hereby announce that we found the maximum of something without actually taking its derivative

I've often played with C(Lathander)->T and M (transmuter)->F and they're quite effective later on in the game. I have yet to try out something like this. What do you guys think?

A Human Cleric of X, dualled at 11, 12 or 14 to a fighter (dependant on the desired number of level 5 and level 6 spells)

Armor: No limitations
Weapons Cleric: Mace, Flail, Sword+Shield
Weapons Fighter: Hammer, Two-weapon fighting until it regains the clerical ones.

- Early game clerical spells to support a R/C, F/C, F/D, D or C/M until the latter one gains enough mid level spells.
- Change into a fighter when the emphasis on melee becomes more pressing.
- Expand the R/C, F/C, F/D, D, C/M until the C->F regains the levels at the time when more mid level spells are required.
- Quite enough castings of Armor of Faith, Draw upon Holy Might (if not good), Righteous Magic and other offensive and defensive Spells such as Chaotic Commands
- A liberal use of Slay Living and Harm + Critical Strikes or Smite late-game
- Pity, but not a good Animate Dead casting

Good: Boon of Lathander, Hold Undead.
Neutral: Seeking Sword (when blunt fails), True Seeing. CN -> Larloch, Vampiric Touch, Slow Poison?
Evil: Lightning Bolt, Stormshield. -> Horror, Larloch, Vampiric Touch?

Strangely enough I was thinking about this combination yesterday... I think Cleric of Lathander -> Fighter would be pretty good (Helm not as good because Seeking Sword stops spellcasting). Boon of Lathander + Righteous Might + Champion's Strength + Fighter HLA's... I'd forget the proficiency point(s) in Sword and Shield though.

Is there anything a Cleric -> Fighter can do that a Fighter -> Cleric can't do better, other than fighting unbuffed? Harm + Critical Strike sounds nice, but doesn't Harm force a Saving Throw? I'm just curious; if you're interested in it because of RP or novelty value, I understand.

I have an unrelated question of my own though: Kangaxx the Lich refuses to die. He has, in fact, refused four times so far. Sometimes his metamorphosis dialogue triggers but he doesn't change; sometimes there is not even a dialogue. I've tried Ctrl+R and Ctrl+Y already. Any ideas? It's a bit frustrating, since this is one of the very few SoA battles I haven't done yet.

Edit: Typo

Yes; fighter HLA's make a huge difference with or without buffs (Hardiness, CS etc.). Of course, Fighter -> Cleric (e.g Berserker -> Cleric) is a good choice as well, but has some weaknesses e.g. inability to gain damage resistance.


Hmm I had thought this problem was fully fixed in IA... try not dealing too much damage to Kangaxx too quickly when his lich form is getting low on health. I think sometimes being hit repeatedly can prevent his script working properly.

I've had the same problem with Kangaxx a few times, when he gets to "near death" just give him some breathing room (1 round or such) and then bash him again.
He always changes form when I do this.
I never experienced that his dialogue triggers but he does not change. Even the first thing happened very few times (about 10-15 % of the time)

He finally died for good. (I went easy on him when he reached Badly Injured. Thanks for the tip, Raven!)

Harm requires a 'to hit' roll or it fails, however, there is no saving throw involved. Adding Critical Strike or Smite when you've charged up your harm spell will trigger harm without problems, downing any foe to 1 hp no matter how high level they are. Therefore, it can be a very good combination.
As for resistances, a C->F has both Armor of Faith and Hardiness available, and whereas the F->C has only the first available.
Whirlwind and Greater Whirlwind are also nice abilities to pass up and sort of abolish the need for improved haste.

I was thinking about Boon of Lathander, but I think the +1 attack isn't that great if you're going to be dualwielding. You'll notice the difference of course, but with 3-4 attacks per round you'll be fine when you add improved haste. I think I would probably go for Talos' resistance bonuses from Stormshield. It's a quick buff to 100% if I'm correct so a nice way to negate certain spells. I forgot that Seeking Sword negated all casting abilities..... then again, as C->F you probably won't be casting much anyway.

Actually IA tweaks the spell so it does require a Save vs Spells. It would be rather too powerful otherwise.

EDIT: By 'require' I mean 'allow' of course...

Ah, I see. A save vs spells I'm guessing? That does complicate matters for IA.

Hi, any suggestions against the greater yuan-ti? I'm having a bit trouble defeating him. I killed the spider rather quickly with two characters with immunity to confusion (berserk and shield of harmony) and I've got a save between the fight with the spider and the yuan-ti (had Valygar delaying the coming of the yuan-ti). The yuan-ti is rather tough, most of the time I manage to survive until his spell protections run out but I can't kill him fast enough after that (some of my chars are unconscious, held etc.), the main reason being his regeneration. My characters are from levels 9-10 (valygar, nalia, berserker, F/M multi, R/C dual) and my protagonist is level 11 sorcerer. I have a save just before opening the gates (thanks to those lovely auto-saves!). Should I just wait with this battle?

You can try the almighty Emotion spell if all else fail.

3x Secret word, after that Larloch Drain for insta-spell disruption...

You could try something like True Sight/thief Detect Illusions (remove Blur and with it the save vs spell bonus), couple of Lower Resistance, Greater Malison, Emotion/Greater Command.

Hi, thanks for the suggestions. Won the fight by using 2 secret words and greater command. Anyway, that was like two weeks ago.

I have another question. I read somewhere here on this board that one should be able to forge Phosphorus before Spellhold. I was going to do that but I've only found one permanency scroll and you need three for it. I've done the Unseeing Eye except Ghoul Town and Ashideena, de'Arnise Keep, Druid Grove, Planar Sphere, Windspear Hills' dungeon except Samia, Conster and Firkraag. And I've only found one Morning Star +2 but you need two of them. I'd really like to forge this item before going to Spellhold.

If it's not ok to post such information here on the board I'd really appreciate if someone could just PM me.

For the Morningstar +2:

SPOILER!


For the Permanency Scrolls:

SPOILER!

Thanks! I'll try it.

Heya

Im new to IA and I'd like to try out some really hard battles since im tired of all that bs from other mods. Now I've carefully read some other topics and came up with some questions that might or might not be answered in the readme.

Im not that good player, but im willing to take a learning curve to get better.

1) Party:

I dont know what class is best for quests/item upgrades but sorceress has some, so I'll pick her as PC.
Kensai
Berzerker dualed to Cleric at 8
Blade
????
????

I need some help deciding classes for the last 2, improvements for the all of em) and races for everyone.

2) Random questions.

What kind of weapons should everyone be using (Since I cant install the BG1-style weapon classes from G3 tweakpack ) and what kind of spells should the casters learn? And how just does the "Wish" and "Limited Wish" spell work (A short description on when is it usefull and for what).

Ill try come up with some more once I wake up...

Hi, BimBam,

I would suggest dualling your berserker to cleric at level 9 rather than 8, for the extra hp and weapon proficiency.

Party composition:

Sorcerer
Kensai
Berserker/Cleric
Blade

I would think about Nalia for some elementary thieving skills and another magic user. Generally magic is harder to use in IA than in the vanilla game so I would suggest another single class fighter for the last slot. If you are concerned about the difficulty of the mod a Vagrant (ranger kit) would be a good choice, even better make him your pc rather than the sorceress.

Weapon choices: a mixture of weapon types (slashing, piercing and blunt) is useful because different enemies have different resistances to each. I'd be tempted to spread the points around for your kensai and other fighters. I generally try to have one guy specialising in two-handed weapons (e.g. two-handed sword, halberd, quarterstaff) and the others mostly dual-wielding. Missile weapons can be useful in a few battles but as you're new to the mod I wouldn't recommend picking them with your fighters.

Races aren't particularly important. You do get a handy saving throw bonuses as a dwarf, halfling or gnome so many players would probably recommend those where possible.

I'm sure there's been a topic or two about picking spells for sorcerers in the past, you might want to search the site to see if you can find them.

I suggest following the pinned quest order (written by me ) early on so you can build up some xp and equipment before taking on the more challenging IA battles.

As for Wish and Limited Wish, I suggest you try them out in a test game to see for yourself. There is some information here which may be worth reading. Bear in mind that many spells have been tweaked in IA so not everything on that page will apply. Having a high Wisdom is very useful for Wish, I'd definitely recommend Wis 18 for your sorceress (this is pretty easy to get because sorcerers don't really benefit from a high Int unlike mages).

Welcome, BimBam!

I, too, recommend to take a vagrant as your protagonist (main PC) and have the sorcerer as one of your custom NPCs. Replace the blade with a swashbuckler dualled to mage and add another single class warrior (ex: a berserker) to your party:

vagrant (pc)
sorcerer
berserker
kensai
berserker (9) -> cleric
swachbuckler (10) -> mage

This is one of the many possible solid party composition for beginners and those new to IA v5. Have fun!

This is your first run of IA I assume? Don't take kensai for your first run and take vagrant as a prot rather than sorc just like Raven suggested ( I don't ordering your anything of course it's my mad engrish skillz that are responsible for my bluntness ). Take berserker or barbarian, leave kensai for now for the IA ubermeisters like Kerkes. Check out Sikret's pinned thread - very helpful for begginers (hey, I'm still IA noob ).

i would recomnend party like
vagrant -protoganist
ranger dualed to cleric
dwarf fighter/thief since his UAI he becomes unstopable
blade because his dispel is very useful
sorcerer
and berserker or barbarian;]

i dont know why everyone likes berserker/cleric since for me at least ranger/cleric is so much more useful

Sikret taking swashbucler dualed to mage over blade seems to me rather strange decision in IA 5

Well, BimBam says that he is willing to take the learning curve approach to develop his skills for playing IA. I'm sure he doesn't merely mean it for v5, but for v6 as well. Since the bard class is rebalanced in IA v6, any attempt to develop tactical skills with bards in v5 will prove to be totally useless in v6. I recommended a bardless party to let BimBam draw his learning curve in a way that it can be useful to him in the future versions of the mod as well.

My party looks like this but I have a Berz/cleric instead of the ranger/cleric. So far i've only fight 1 fight in IA which was the beastmaster. Wasnt too hard but much more enjoyable than the vanilla. All of my party members are at 50% hp all the time since im still missing a cleric. 40k exp to go...

Im not sure if I'll try out IA v6, depends how this run ends and if I have the feeling to start again next summer or christmas.

Thx guys for the tips, I'll post some more when I've played some more.

EDITED to avoid double posting:

Happy new year!

After chatue Irenicus and Circus got my ass handed to me by the gang in promenade tavern. Beastmaster wasnt too hard (no reloads), but certainly more enjoyable than the vanilla. All of my melees on red hp' (I dont have a cleric yet), no potions used in the fight though.

Did some quests that werent changed, suna seni died to emotion, so I headed for the slaver compound. A few reloads before I managed to interrupt the greater command casting on the cleric, then focused down the captain and then the mage. The rest were almost too easy. Again though, everyone on red hp' and my cleric still needs 20k to get his berzerker abilities back.

I just realized this topic isnt for my random babbling about my playing

But I guess what im trying to say is that im really enjoying this mod so far, I can only hope the fights wont be _TOO_ difficult in the future.

EDIT2: I noticed a bug in the fight with "gang in promenade tavern". After triggering the fight and running back to the stairroom, all of em except the high level mage follow you.

I am planning to try one of these in my next game (not as protagonist), but i dont have the game installed right now. Could anyone tell me about the spell progression between cleric levels between 10 and 12? Besides, which alignment would you recommend? Right now i'm inclined to evil since stormshield really sounds good (unless IA changed it somehow), but neutral is also not bad; you can do slashing damage with 3 apr and TS casting may free some spell slots. So, what do you think?

I have played the game with a Cleric of Talos -> Fighter. Stormshield was a really powerful protection spell throughout the entire game.
I went for level 14 because it allows you to use level 7 spells. Only one however so if you prefer it may be better to dual earlier. Weapons were flail, mace, warhammer, club, dualwield. All 2 stars until I was able to max out a few that I was using the most (dualwield of course 3).

At times I wished that I had taken the Cleric of Helm instead because it allows you to do slashing damage and with improved haste cast upon you I imagine that it's quite good. Instead I was casting protective, buffing and healing spells whenever the foes turned out to be immune to crushing damage. Most of the time it doesn't matter much though.

A Cleric of Lathander -> Thief for the Boon and backstab attempts later on would be good too. You'll be able to use any item as well, but it takes better planning as you won't be extremely good in melee. Club and later on short sword, longsword I guess. Maybe singleweapon fighting, but probably dualwield. Still... maybe too many thac0 penalties for such a character in IA.


Note that these characters are good enough for vanilla, but in IA they can struggle.


The default TOB spell level table for clerics is as below. If I'm correct of course

Why do you say so? He will be a good high level fighter eventually which you need a lot in IA.



I don't remember actually much places where you need slashing damage instead of crushing. There are a lot of instances you need piercing weapons but crushing damage resistance is rather rare IIRC.

Thanks a lot for the table, i think i will dual at 10 or 11: 14 seems very late.

Assuming you installed the un-nerfed tables from Ease of Use (recommended in IA) the spell progression will be different from the one lroumen posted at high levels; at the levels you were interested in it's the same though.


I wouldn't go with Helm since Seeking Sword disables spellcasting, plus as you say there are not too many places where slashing damage is more useful than crushing. If I was to make a cleric -> fighter dual I'd go for Lathander.

Seeking sword disables spellcasting but i won't be castig much anyway. I'll have few spells which i will probably use for pre-buffing and if they get dispelled sword will be dispelled too (am i thinking wrong?). Lathander is also a 'good' choice since it adds 1 apr instead of setting to 3 which will probably be less than i originally have considering that i'll have grandmastery. Anyway at the end i'll eventually make a choice between offense and defense(stormshield).

Imo offensive cleric abilities doesn't matter much, coz what's really matters is clericals buffs/protections (don't dual before obtaining acces to at least chaotic commands) and fighter HLA's, especially the latter. I mean, gain as much defensive abilities as a cleric as you can, then dual to a fighter and start kick serious ass, correct?

Eventually is the correct word I fear.

It takes a while to get back to level 10 or 11 once you have dualled. I first went to Spellhold and dualled when I was picking up the easiest leftover quests in SoA (and I had a LOT of quests left).

If I had dualed before I went to Spellhold then my character would probably be rather useless there when she was regaining levels. She was not a cleric anymore and she was not even a reasonable fighter yet. Just imagine a level 9 fighter with some minor abilities, bad thac0 and cleric-hp taking on spellhold monsters.... it's okay for vanilla but in IA it is not easy. Good thing you can wear all the AC lowering gear that you want. Use many strength and thac0 improving potions and that clears up a little (but in IA you would normally use those potions too).
This is also why I dualled at level 14. I was simply level 14 when I was done with the most difficult parts of underdark.

Once you do pick up your cleric abilities then it's clear all the way to the high levels. You're basically back to a normal F/C though with just little access to high level spells. Normally you don't really need them either except that greater restoration is nice at times. Another reason why I'd rather take a true fighter or a true cleric instead of Anomen... I just don't clear out his spells very often if I'm keeping him fighting all the time.

Oooook, snakes. I hate snakes. Especially snakes that hide. Yeah, I'm on the Viper Queen quest. I've tried 'thinking' like a snake, like someone suggested. I've searched the whole dungeon and no luck. Please, just spoil me in a PM, I'm getting really annoyed here.

Thanks for the PMs. Got five of them, hehe It's good to see how helpful people are here.