Full Version: IAv5 experiences
Thanks Sikret. It seems it was easier to start again from a bit old save before elven city. it seems both bard and ranger SH quests continue flawlessly.
Ok, as for the money problem, I applied some changes (in v6) to help players earn a bit more money (but a bit less xp) after winning some particular battles.
I also made a few more items sellable. Having a bag of holding full of gray and unsellable items in the shops is indeed frustrating specially when you know that most of those items are not really critical quest-related items and they should not have been unsellable in the first place even in the vanilla game.
I hope you will find these changes helpful and satisfying in v6.
I also made a few more items sellable. Having a bag of holding full of gray and unsellable items in the shops is indeed frustrating specially when you know that most of those items are not really critical quest-related items and they should not have been unsellable in the first place even in the vanilla game.
I hope you will find these changes helpful and satisfying in v6.
Good news, thanks Sikret. I especially greet the XP lowering in certain battles.
As I see not too many new posts on this forum nowadays. It seems even Sikret are not playing or he just doesn't refresh his diary.
My reports is missing nowdays, since I had to stop BG2. I did all quests and 2 levels in WK. Orcus was a very very good fight. Only Twisted Rune left. I tried it several times, but failed, and nowadays I don't have time for so long battle... I managed to kill the 1st lich, the vampire and the warrior very fast, my protagonist can survive the double-length Time Stop, but I don't know what can I do with that beholder, he always dispel all of my spells and golems or the main lich always kill 1-2 of my chars. I cannot touch 2nd lich also till his protections run out since I cannot target him due to Invis. Dead character means game over for me. I hope I can do some tries later, when I will have more times. I could greet any hints about this fight, beholder or 2nd lich.
My reports is missing nowdays, since I had to stop BG2. I did all quests and 2 levels in WK. Orcus was a very very good fight. Only Twisted Rune left. I tried it several times, but failed, and nowadays I don't have time for so long battle... I managed to kill the 1st lich, the vampire and the warrior very fast, my protagonist can survive the double-length Time Stop, but I don't know what can I do with that beholder, he always dispel all of my spells and golems or the main lich always kill 1-2 of my chars. I cannot touch 2nd lich also till his protections run out since I cannot target him due to Invis. Dead character means game over for me. I hope I can do some tries later, when I will have more times. I could greet any hints about this fight, beholder or 2nd lich.
QUOTE(shadan @ Mar 31 2008, 09:12 AM) 
As I see not too many new posts on this forum nowadays. It seems even Sikret are not playing or he just doesn't refresh his diary.
He probably has not had time to play because he has been working on the newest version of the mod (which is in the process of being tested). I think he is very busy in RL at the moment too.
QUOTE
I cannot touch 2nd lich also till his protections run out since I cannot target him due to Invis. Dead character means game over for me. I hope I can do some tries later, when I will have more times. I could greet any hints about this fight, beholder or 2nd lich.
Layene is not a lich, she's a pretty ordinary human. The thing is that she is very high level, and she has the Staff of the Magi and is not afraid to use it! If you can take out Shangalar, the fighter and the vampire quickly, I would recommend next focussing all your fighters on the Beholder; it takes a long time to kill and its abilities are very dangerous as I'm sure you know. Layene will almost certainly be the last to fall. Are you using the powerful IA summons (Greater Djinni, Elite Berserker, Improved Spider Figurine)? They are very important in this sort of fight.
The berserek, 2 Greater Swanmays, Noble Spider and Efreeti was summoned at start, I don't have Greater Djinni yet. And yes, I supposed to kill beholder as next, just simply without buffs those golems or Layene's contringenced spells always kill someones, and I am not able to burn down beholder so fast... Anyway, I will try it again in some weeks, or maybe 1-2 months, when I will have more time. As far as I remember this fight was not easy in v4.2, but now much harder than it was before.
I finished Twisted Rune. It was hardest fight for me in SoA.
I did WK lvl 3 also, and haven't found the new quest Clash of powers. I followed the old rute. I am unsure if the new quest were the enmitz between Karashur and Tahazzar... The tanarri attacked me after I asked about Blood War. When I reached the baatezu, he accepted thei tanarri's heart, after this I attacked and killed him. Was this the new quest, or did I miss it?
I did WK lvl 3 also, and haven't found the new quest Clash of powers. I followed the old rute. I am unsure if the new quest were the enmitz between Karashur and Tahazzar... The tanarri attacked me after I asked about Blood War. When I reached the baatezu, he accepted thei tanarri's heart, after this I attacked and killed him. Was this the new quest, or did I miss it?
QUOTE(shadan @ May 1 2008, 12:15 PM)
I finished Twisted Rune. It was hardest fight for me in SoA.
I did WK lvl 3 also, and haven't found the new quest Clash of powers. I followed the old rute. I am unsure if the new quest were the enmitz between Karashur and Tahazzar... The tanarri attacked me after I asked about Blood War. When I reached the baatezu, he accepted thei tanarri's heart, after this I attacked and killed him. Was this the new quest, or did I miss it?
I did WK lvl 3 also, and haven't found the new quest Clash of powers. I followed the old rute. I am unsure if the new quest were the enmitz between Karashur and Tahazzar... The tanarri attacked me after I asked about Blood War. When I reached the baatezu, he accepted thei tanarri's heart, after this I attacked and killed him. Was this the new quest, or did I miss it?
You should run into the Clash of Powers fight in SPOILER!
Yakman's tent room. You don't get the golden scepter automatically anymore, you have to complete the new quest inorder to get it and progress to the next floor. You also have to be a minimum level to start the new quest.
The conflict between Karashur and Tahazzar is from vanilla TOB. If you're evil, I think you get a chance to side with one or the other. If you're good, you don't but you can still get quest XP if you bring one's heart to the other.
I know there is a bug regarding Spell Shield and RRR, but at Gromnir I tried to bring down SI: Abj. from those 2 mages, and sadly after more than 10 reloads, always at least 5-6 RRR casted on same mage (2 times I casted 12 of them), and no success. According to their spells, 3 RRR would be needed. Is it local problem at me, or someone else encountered it also.
Pretty sure that's the usual (unfixable) Spell Shield bug, I'm afraid. Sikret's away for a few days, hopefully he can confirm that this is the case. He's already changed most enemies so they don't cast it any more (many more did in previous versions of the mod). Possibly he meant to change Gromnir's mages too I'm not sure.
As Raven mentioned, It's related to the unfixable bug of Spell Shield in the vanilla game (i.e. it's not an IA bug). The bug reappears every now and then but not always. Reload the game and it may go on just fine.
Gromnir's mages don't use Spell Shield in v6. Even in v5, Spell Shield is used very very rarely by enemy mages. Dragons and demons may still use it, but since they don't use it in conjunction with SI:abjuration, you can remove it easily by "SpellStrike". Due to IA's changes to Spell Shield and SpellStrike spells, the unfixable vanilla bug never happens against "SpellStrike".
Gromnir's mages don't use Spell Shield in v6. Even in v5, Spell Shield is used very very rarely by enemy mages. Dragons and demons may still use it, but since they don't use it in conjunction with SI:abjuration, you can remove it easily by "SpellStrike". Due to IA's changes to Spell Shield and SpellStrike spells, the unfixable vanilla bug never happens against "SpellStrike".
Isn't it possible to make Spellshield react to all anti-magic spells this way or is the "fix" related to Spellstrike's dispell-all-properties?
QUOTE(Arkain @ May 10 2008, 06:35 AM)
Isn't it possible to make Spellshield react to all anti-magic spells this way or is the "fix" related to Spellstrike's dispell-all-properties?
Yes, it's somehow related to the dispel-all-properties functionality of spellstrike, but it's not that alone (i.e. the vanilla spellstrike also has the dispel-all-properties effect but it still can be the victim of spell shield's bug; the revised spellstrike spell in IA never fails against spell shield. Unfortunately, the same fix/revision can't be applied to Ruby Ray of Reversal or other similar spells).
Finding the solution/fix for Spellstrike was a great job by itself; it took us (Raven and me) several days of thinking, working and testing.
The other bug we successfully fixed for the Spell Shield spell (see the readme) is even more important.
I finished the game. Strongest killed enemies:
Vagrant: Supreme golem
Blade: Bodhi
Thief > Fighter: Demon Prince
Ranger > Cleric: Orcus
Sorcerer: Elemental Golem
Conjurer: Green Wyrm
EDE was hard as usual... I found some difference from 4.2 version, but I am not sure if I am right.
SPOILER!
Probably I won't play BG in this year, maybe I will try new version in next year. Thanks for this great work, Sikret!
Vagrant: Supreme golem
Blade: Bodhi
Thief > Fighter: Demon Prince
Ranger > Cleric: Orcus
Sorcerer: Elemental Golem
Conjurer: Green Wyrm
EDE was hard as usual... I found some difference from 4.2 version, but I am not sure if I am right.
SPOILER!
Rakshasa Prince summoned 2 noble and 2 horrid in 4.2, now he summons 2 noble and 4 horrid, but it seems he summons less frequently now. And I counted only 3 weaves, while in 4.2 I think there were more weaves.
Noble ones can dispel with your specific protection, in 4.2 they couldn't.
My resistances were interesting since either elemental and pshysical resistances changed over and over. Sometimes they went in negative from max... I am sure prince has an ablitity to lower it, but at least there should be some kind of debuff on character picture and sheet... Also it seemed there is a bug regarding physical resistances. My F/T had 80 % sometimes only with Hardiness. He didn't have any ph. res. item equipped and didn't drink barbarian essence. I think there werre 2 hardiness on him: 1 from himself, 1 from Wish.
I wonder if any player can do this fight without a Wish spell to rememorize spells, renewing HLAs and items.
Noble ones can dispel with your specific protection, in 4.2 they couldn't.
My resistances were interesting since either elemental and pshysical resistances changed over and over. Sometimes they went in negative from max... I am sure prince has an ablitity to lower it, but at least there should be some kind of debuff on character picture and sheet... Also it seemed there is a bug regarding physical resistances. My F/T had 80 % sometimes only with Hardiness. He didn't have any ph. res. item equipped and didn't drink barbarian essence. I think there werre 2 hardiness on him: 1 from himself, 1 from Wish.
I wonder if any player can do this fight without a Wish spell to rememorize spells, renewing HLAs and items.
Probably I won't play BG in this year, maybe I will try new version in next year. Thanks for this great work, Sikret!
Congrats Shadan. It's a mighty feat to beat IA.
I have only gotten as far as SoA chapter 6 due to a lack of time. I've been playing with a Vagrant, but I'm not really satisfied with its playstyle so I'm probably going to restart with something else (most likely I'll continue my Riskbreaker game who is only in chapter 2).
I have only gotten as far as SoA chapter 6 due to a lack of time. I've been playing with a Vagrant, but I'm not really satisfied with its playstyle so I'm probably going to restart with something else (most likely I'll continue my Riskbreaker game who is only in chapter 2).
Thanks, Iroumen. Imho vagrant is the strongest class in the game atm. Elemental resistance, great ranger only items, best summons, and a great new ranger HLA.
Yes, that's what I don't really like about it. I like my protagonist to require baby-sitting rather than powerhousing it and I prefer my NPCs to require less baby-sitting 
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