IA v6 Final

[isleepwithfucking goats]

wow...pretty impresive Ancient Dragon fight! You bypassed that cheesy silence so nicely (your own "sister" as a bait, reputaton 20!! lol) and made that annoying nishru a total moron. good stuff.

 

hmm...entire fight is based on the assumption that prot is a necromancer with immunity to silence. IA6:Necro Edition ;]

 

as for vagrant playing this "normally" - I dunno? kill minions outright (I will repeat myself but that fukking nishru is a real pain), spam him with swanmays and "wish" like a little kiddo in christmass?

 

also that spell shield inconsistency (if this spell is oh, so baaad why dragons are using it? only for spellstrike not being completely useless?? dragons with imunity:abjuration too hard?) and spellstrike usefullness (or the lack of it) slowly become a major flaws in the mod. hehe, so I heard that spell shield bug is already fixed by G3 lads..so, just "borrow" spellshield from fixpack/scs2, Sikret! they borrowed your item randomiser, make them pay!! or just ask your fellow modders for a piece of advice /trollface/

 

 

He was level 31 Mage at Orcus in SoA, where a normal party is level 24 Mage in late SoA.

 

He did Ancient Dragon in mid ToB. Probably level 33-35 Mage.

 

Ancient Dragon is Level 32 Mage.

 

Try staying out of his LoS when you have to Breach instead of Remove Magic.

 

 

Regardless, I have always ( except 1-2 times ) killed Ancient Dragon in pure Meele. Never removed his PFMW, Stoneskins, Spell Shield. Never Breached. Never Dispelled. Not a single spell on him. Waited all rounds to the end. All 3 Fighters + 1 Mage in his LoS 95% of the time. Late SoA, not ToB.

 

With 2 Riskbreakers, Vagrant, R/C and Level 32+ Mages, Ancient Dragon can fall in a few rounds.

[isleepwithfucking goats]

Many enemies are immune to all kinds of stats modifications. Tweakable, ofc, but the amount of work via NI is huge. I once modified enemies' THAC0 scores (if you're a f/m multiclass you don't have a THAC0 which bypasses -24 AC, sorry. Rules are rules, and cheating is cheating), damage they do (6D10 + strenght bonus is hilarious), and resistances (you don't go around immune to missiles if you're human, and you don't regenerate 3HP/sec under permanent imp.haste. Fair is fair.)

Took almost whole afternoon.

 

Actually I found the work around. Thanks for the suggestion. I was ready to give up, but then I figured it out when you mentioned this. They have native 50 Magic Damage Resistance, however when paired with another 50 from their items, it becomes "un-lowreable". The trick was bring it down to 49 to those items. This way they have 99. Once it's 99 it's easily "lowerable" as it should be. I'd say an Engine bug/limitation. Also if its 127, it can be lowered just not 100.

 

Only 2-3 items needed to be tweaked. Most enemies wear the same Dragon Ring (lol).

 

 

 

I found this spell to be very effective somehow.

 

 

How is it effective, when it doesn't bypass magic resistance. Yes it's effective vs. lesser monsters/mages who have no or little magic resistance. But those are easily dispatched with Fighters. Or other AoE Spells ( Chain Lightning, ADHW ).

 

 

 

 

 

 

Anyway, here is what I'm thinking now. And I'll probably go with this.

 

New Spell: Mass Lower Magic Resistance. Level 6. Keeping the AoE Damage spells as they are right now (don't bypass magic resistance). Basically useful vs groups. Vs single enemies ( Dragons, liches, other single bosses that are left alone, etc. ) no relevance. Kept the same as the Level 5 Spell, but with AoE.

 

Level 6-7: Improved Fire/Acid/Magic Arrows. Slightly higher damage, except Flame Arrow. Bypass magic resistance. Single target.

 

Level 8: Lower Magic Damage Resistance by 15% I'm thinking. What do you think? Single target of course. This vs. bosses.

 

And as kreso suggested, saving throw to Greater/Grave Silence. -2 , -4, -6 ? Which would be adequate?

[Saros]

 

 

He did Ancient Dragon in mid ToB. Probably level 33-35 Mage.

 

Ancient Dragon is Level 32 Mage.

 

Try staying out of his LoS when you have to Breach instead of Remove Magic.

 

 

On Insane, if you don't keep the dragon busy on defense rather than offense and if you allow your buffs to be dispelled by his Remove Magic (being lower-leveled mage than he is), you're looking at a Remove Magic+Lower Fire Res+Breath, and then you pick up your chunked fighters and reload. No thanks.

 

Staying out of a dragon's LoS is not that hard if you're forced to use Breaches - just requires some practice. You have to refresh Spell Triggers with Breach, since those can be shot at an instant speed, and the dragon can be easily distracted for the moment you need to approach with a mage, shoot a trigger and run away from his sight before he has any chance to cast Grave Silence. It's best done if you approach from the dragon's tail. It's not so hard to make him turn around by moving his designated melee target a bit. Even if a mage is Silenced, that mage still has 2 Breaches - one in a day-ago prepared Chain Contingency (trigger on Hit), one in a refreshed CC (you can do that under Silence, it's pretty much the only spell you can cast).

 

 

 

I found this spell to be very effective somehow.

 

 

How is it effective, when it doesn't bypass magic resistance. Yes it's effective vs. lesser monsters/mages who have no or little magic resistance. But those are easily dispatched with Fighters. Or other AoE Spells ( Chain Lightning, ADHW ).

 

....

 

And as kreso suggested, saving throw to Greater/Grave Silence. -2 , -4, -6 ? Which would be adequate?

 

Creeping Doom has its uses, it shines mostly vs enemies like Kuo-Toan or Sahuagin mages (and even their fighters), vs Saladrex (or so I heard, you should probably have Cernd spamming these under Alacrity for any to be able to penetrate the dragon's MR) and vs the Drowned Soul in the useless Ancient Secret of Suldanesselar quest.

 

In IA v5, the saving throw vs Greater Silence was -9. Makes sense, since the save vs Silence radius 15 is -5.

[InKal]

wow...pretty impresive Ancient Dragon fight! You bypassed that cheesy silence so nicely (your own "sister" as a bait, reputaton 20!! lol) and made that annoying nishru a total moron. good stuff.

 

hmm...entire fight is based on the assumption that prot is a necromancer with immunity to silence. IA6:Necro Edition ;]

 

as for vagrant playing this "normally" - I dunno? kill minions outright (I will repeat myself but that fukking nishru is a real pain), spam him with swanmays and "wish" like a little kiddo in christmass?

 

also that spell shield inconsistency (if this spell is oh, so baaad why dragons are using it? only for spellstrike not being completely useless?? dragons with imunity:abjuration too hard?) and spellstrike usefullness (or the lack of it) slowly become a major flaws in the mod. hehe, so I heard that spell shield bug is already fixed by G3 lads..so, just "borrow" spellshield from fixpack/scs2, Sikret! they borrowed your item randomiser, make them pay!! or just ask your fellow modders for a piece of advice /trollface/

 

 

He was level 31 Mage at Orcus in SoA, where a normal party is level 24 Mage in late SoA.

 

He did Ancient Dragon in mid ToB. Probably level 33-35 Mage.

 

Ancient Dragon is Level 32 Mage.

 

Try staying out of his LoS when you have to Breach instead of Remove Magic.

 

 

Regardless, I have always ( except 1-2 times ) killed Ancient Dragon in pure Meele. Never removed his PFMW, Stoneskins, Spell Shield. Never Breached. Never Dispelled. Not a single spell on him. Waited all rounds to the end. All 3 Fighters + 1 Mage in his LoS 95% of the time. Late SoA, not ToB.

 

With 2 Riskbreakers, Vagrant, R/C and Level 32+ Mages, Ancient Dragon can fall in a few rounds.

 

He's playing on "insane". It makes a BIG difference. That's the point.

"Never removed his PFMW, Stoneskins, Spell Shield. Never Breached. Never Dispelled. Not a single spell on him" - You must be very good at quaffing those fire res potions then. You mean you killed him with normal weapons? waited his pfmw? so you actually removed his stoneskins via melee attacks. I heard that he's weak to melee and very strong against spells, thats nearly impossible to kill him with mages and I mean ver.5 Ancient Dragon. He was exceptionally weak against Poseidon and that improved club but Poseidon was real killer against him. Also Hammer of Thor. According to Saros report, in IA6 he has something like 80% res. to cold and electricity. considering the fact that all elemental dealing damage weapons are seriously nerfed, Ancient Dragon in IA6 is ridiculously hard. In my "casual" opinion. Dunno, not an expert lol, but I think that in IA6 you must properly breach him first in order to even actually hit him. You may of course try to wait him out but then he will just scorch you, right?

 

 

On Insane, if you don't keep the dragon busy on defense rather than offense and if you allow your buffs to be dispelled by his Remove Magic (being lower-leveled mage than he is), you're looking at a Remove Magic+Lower Fire Res+Breath, and then you pick up your chunked fighters and reload. No thanks.

 

 

yep, pretty much this.

 

 

 

Anyway, here is what I'm thinking now. And I'll probably go with this.

 

New Spell: Mass Lower Magic Resistance. Level 6. Keeping the AoE Damage spells as they are right now (don't bypass magic resistance). Basically useful vs groups. Vs single enemies ( Dragons, liches, other single bosses that are left alone, etc. ) no relevance. Kept the same as the Level 5 Spell, but with AoE.

 

Level 6-7: Improved Fire/Acid/Magic Arrows. Slightly higher damage, except Flame Arrow. Bypass magic resistance. Single target.

 

Level 8: Lower Magic Damage Resistance by 15% I'm thinking. What do you think? Single target of course. This vs. bosses.

 

And as kreso suggested, saving throw to Greater/Grave Silence. -2 , -4, -6 ? Which would be adequate?

 

yeah, with all these tweaks you may actually beat the mod with 6 sorcerers. :]

 

Dunno, I myself found imp. silence not allowing saving throw cheesy but...

let rages, aura of flaming death and absolute immunity (or immunity entchantment better) block it

and

let the player deicide: will open with immunity entchantmet or abjuration (slightly more tactical options imo)

 

 

yeah I know dragon will dispel (not you Saros ;] )and silence you (he's under imp. aclarity all the time) and kill you LOL

 

heh, you know... in this case he dont even need silencing you, just kill you outright, thank God I'm not a modder ehhehe

[isleepwithfucking goats]

Hard -> Insane not that big of difference I'd say. You wait him out just as you do Dracolich. Remove Magic is the least of the problem. He throws few of those and rarely. Problem is Wing Buffet + Getting Thrown in the Corner, that's where it gets tricky, you have to grab his focus with other stuff. And of course the Dragon Breath and Malison combo.

Nevertheless it's doable in late SoA this way. Did that many times. I'll say this again, weapons don't make the game. Even Judgement Day is not overpowered in the sense that it does a lot of damage, but in the sense that it provides a bunch of protections/buffs/stats. Against an Elemental Golem and up all weapons will pretty much do the same damage, this is valid vs. most bosses as well.

 

 

 

I scrapped that party btw, as it's still not enough to make game fun. I did have a Riskbreaker and 2 B/M's and a R/C. So it' wasn't "full" arcane. Fun seems to be a balanced party with 2-3 fighters included. ADHW bypass Magic Resistance is pretty cool btw and gives some offensive spells in late game. This will not work on bosses again in late game, as they have plenty of Magic Damage Resistance. It will work on lesser foes, even lesser and medium golems. Not so much on Skeleton Lords and up, those have high Magic Damage resistance as well. Still it's pretty cool with 3xADHW in contigency from 2-3 mages. This also requires PFME to be up on your party, otherwise Magic Resistance will not save you. So double edged sword.

 

Made it to late chapter 3 with that party, and did kill Torgal, Shade Lord and Steam Elemental Prince ( + Phosphorus of course on the Prince ) with Magic only. No Meele at all ( except Elemental Prince). No new spells were used, as those were levels 6 and up. Still it's significantly easier and more efficient to meele them. Fun would be a combination of Meele + Magic, however lowering magic resistance, magic damage resistance and elemental resistances is too much hassle, as it proved in late Chapter 3. May be be easier with 3-4 Sorcerers, since B/Ms have few spells slots early on.

 

Lower Elemental Resistances was Level 6 and amount was 5%.

 

Lower Magic Damage Resistance was Level 6 and amount was 10%.

 

 

^ It was too low imo, you have to cast quite a few of those, lots of rounds lost without Improved Alacrity. However once you have Alacrity and Triggers you can shoot a bunch hence even 5% might be overpowered. What is the limit ? The more shoot you, the more damage your spells will do afterwards. I don't think there is a perfect way to make it balanced and fun. If the retard didn't give most enemies such complete immunities to elemental and magic damage, the game would be a lot more fun with arcane. There would be one more option which I think is worth mentioning. Cast Elemental Damage Spell and at the same time it sets elemental resistance to a certain percentage ( 60-70% ). This would make it more consistent across all enemies. It also removes the need to lower their resistances first. However I'm not sure if the lowering of the elemental resistance will kick in right away or properly, to make the Damage part of the Spell actually do the damage. I am assuming it will, but needs testing. Might try this next time, depends how the tests pan out.

 

Fact is offensive arcane needs to be efficient and worthwhile in battles. Remember you also need to PFWM, and maybe keep a few buffs up in the battle, also probably summon some stuff. That's why it needs to be efficient and quick.

 

 

 

 

As for Silence, set it at -6, still fail the save fairly often unless fully buffed. The only difference is, enemies have limited number of those silences ( I believe ), so 1-2 may get wasted but the 3rd will hit. So you may end up with Mage who can actually be in the midst of combat, since the enemy may have run out on silences on your other chars. Will definitely keep it like this at -6 for all my future runs. The other option is to make Vocalize remove it and make it an AOE spell. Of course there would have been other ways to make it more tactical challenging as you say "SI:E", but some many things could have been made more tactical but they weren't.

There is one more thing I despise about Silence, is it's AoE. Orcus comes to mind and my Fighters. Have to keep the R/C and Mages spread away from Riskbreakers, otherwise you have dead RB's very shortly. Will see how it goes at -6 in this current run, I'm right before Orcus ( changed party a bit from lots of arcane to a few only and ditched the new spells, basically a normal part again. 2 Mage, 2 RB's, 1 R/C and 1 B/M ). Playing on Insane as well in this run since Saros keeps babbling about Insane xD, also because it's been (v5) since I played Insane. Not that big of a difference from Hard as I said earlier. Positioning needs be prioritized one notch higher that's all.

 

 

 

Here's some stuff I will permanently have in all my runs:

 

Silence at -6 save

 

Dwarven Thrower: No short race restriction, remove ranged ability. Well spent 33.000 GP on this. Does about 8 Damage to Gem Golems, while Treefolk does 6 and Phosphorus does about 7. To Coin Golems, Undead, Skeletons and others it makes no difference. Golems are "GiantHumanoid" that's why and Gem are partial to Crushing . Really awesome Hammer in early-mid game vs Gems.

 

Another +3 Club before Spell Hold, since Treefolks Arm is Ranger or R/C only. This run I made Wyerns Tail ( Temple Sewer Party - Late Chapter 3 ) to +3 and changed it to Club from Morning Star. Weak item but interesting nevertheless, does 5 Poison Damage if they fail the save ( don't think it ever did vs. anybody that counts ). The other option is Gnasher or Bone Club. The latter comes a bit late ( late Spell Hold ). Possibly Stonefire Axe +3 changed to a Club +3.

 

Rimed Club: Remove White Dragon Scale component. This way available shortly after Underdark, assuming you go to Watchers Keep Level 2. Otherwise this Club comes too late.

 

B/M: With Hammers instead of the usual Staff or Halberd. Once you get Crom you have permanent 25 STR that means permanent -5 Thac0. Without Tensers and other stuff. With buffs he has same Thac0 as a RB. Belm off-hand for 10 attacks ( 8 with Crom/Thor ). Doesn't get any better really. With Staff or Halberd the B/M would have -1 Thac0 or so without buffs. I'm looking at the party kills and he has the same kills as Riskbreaker almost, which is usually half when using Staves/Halberds.

 

Robe of Eloquence after Underdark only, even thou it's doable before.

 

Edwin the Evil Sorcerer. My God what a monster he is. Abundance of spells with his amulet. Just perfect with Eloquence after Underdark.

 

Make Clerics "Dispel Magic" party friendly ( as Remove Magic ). Not much to say here, Remove Magic worthless in IA on Mages since they are low Level. The R/C is generally a bit higher level and has a chance for example to dispel Noble Rakshasas in the Eleven City ( if you delay going there a bit ). Also the Shade Lich in Teshals Lair if you delay as well. He will still not dispel any boss in a normal game ( with normal levels and party of 6 ). Nice tweak I'd say, will definitely keep this in all runs.

 

Ice Storm and Cone of Cold party friendly. Used once only in this game, Ice Storm has so bad damage. Bypass Magic Resistance.

 

Aid ( cleric spell ). Make it AoE from Level 14 and up. Basically becomes tedious after a while casting it on each member. Usually cast at the begining of the fight only, not in the midst.

 

Once Cleric gets access to Aura of Flaming Death, Shield of Archons, Globe of Blades copy them to Level 6. This way you can actually use them. Never really used them at Level 7 except mid ToB or so. Restoration is too precious in late SoA and few level 7 slots are available, while level 6 are abundant. Besides theres nothing good at Level 6.

 

Blade Barrier ( Cleric Level 6 ) make it party friendly like Globe of Blades. Unchanged otherwise. Useful now, almost never does damage tho as they all save xD So rather worthless actually xD. But there is nothing good at level 6 early on.

 

Smite: Remove Wing Buffet Effect.

 

Boots of Woodland: Useable by Neutral as well, not just Good.

 

 

 

 

 

Few some other good tweaks I might try in the next runs:

 

 

Make Carsomyr a Bastard Sword, useable by all.

 

Make Celestial Fury Bastard, change it to +4. Good weapon in late SoA part of the game. Get's consumed later on, but might provide some nice +4 enchantment in late SoA for the time it's available.

 

Poseidon Wrath changed to Two Handed Sword or Hammer. Hammer to have two good Hammers in late SoA. Depends on party proficiencies really. Could be changed to anything. There are already some other good halberds anyway.

 

Or Adamantine Staff of Strenght changed to Hammer, Club or Flail.

 

Stonefire Axe +3, possibly changed to a +3 Club. Think this would be perfect, comes after Chapter 3, but before Underdark. Just perfect I say. Gnasher may come too early and Bone Club comes a bit too late.

 

 

BTW, when I do these changes, I change everything, from proficiency, to icons, to animations, to speed factors to damage to range, basically everything.

[Saros]

Hard -&--#62; Insane not that big of difference I'd say. You wait him out just as you do Dracolich. Remove Magic is the least of the problem. He throws few of those and rarely. Problem is Wing Buffet + Getting Thrown in the Corner, that's where it gets tricky, you have to grab his focus with other stuff. And of course the Dragon Breath and Malison combo.

Nevertheless it's doable in late SoA this way. Did that many times. I'll say this again, weapons don't make the game. Even Judgement Day is not overpowered in the sense that it does a lot of damage, but in the sense that it provides a bunch of protections/buffs/stats. Against an Elemental Golem and up all weapons will pretty much do the same damage, this is valid vs. most bosses as well.

 

 

Waiting out the Dracolich is possible because he practically cannot kill the more powerful summons, has especially hard time with Skeleton Warriors.

 

The Ancient Dragon has no such problems and can wipe out any bunch of summons in several rounds, not to mention that he uses Wing Buffet much more often. Anyway, winning vs him in late SoA on Insane may be possible, but hardly on every attempt - meaning, a tactic like that has no value to me since it's not a no-reload one.

 

Weapons don't make the game, but crucial quantity of +4 ones and often specific weapons and equipment are required to attempt a certain fight. For example, for my current party of Vagrant, B-M, R-C, Sorc, RB to attempt the fight vs Orcus, the Flail of Defending and Wounding is required in order not to waste too many Barbarian Essences, which are important in the last fight.

 

About the JD sword, I have my own observations:

Immunity to Fear - good

Immunity to Charm - kinda obsolete at that point when the weapon is forged

Immunity to Confusion - good

Immunity to Backstab - pointless. There are almost no backstabbing enemies after the Ancient Dragon is defeated

+2 Str - very good

+20% resistance to physical damage - maybe the best quality of the sword

+30 to max HP - OK, but at the same time - doesn't feel very good when it's needed to switch to another main-hand weapon or to transfer the sword to another fighter

From the spells the blade could cast:

First of all, they' re really low-leveled. I don't think that the wielder's level is considered when the sword triggers a spell. Any enemy can dispel these effects with a Remove Magic, which is stupid.

PFMW is useless most of the time when triggering. I mean, usually the character wielding the JD is highly damage resistant and tries to attract as many enemy hits as possible. Now what's the point of this character suddenly becoming impervious to weapons and all enemies surrounding him immediately switch targets?

Wish is almost useless too, since usually the wielder of the sword doesn't have a very high Wisdom score. Plus, you cannot Wish for Rest from the sword.

Haven't seen much use from LR on target or from Oracle.

Other spell effects are decent. It's good to prebuff the pure fighters with Stoneskins.

 

There is one more thing I despise about Silence, is it's AoE. Orcus comes to mind and my Fighters. Have to keep the R/C and Mages spread away from Riskbreakers, otherwise you have dead RB's very shortly. Will see how it goes at -6 in this current run, I'm right before Orcus ( changed party a bit from lots of arcane to a few only and ditched the new spells, basically a normal part again. 2 Mage, 2 RB's, 1 R/C and 1 B/M ). Playing on Insane as well in this run since Saros keeps babbling about Insane xD, also because it's been (v5) since I played Insane. Not that big of a difference from Hard as I said earlier. Positioning needs be prioritized one notch higher that's all.

 

....

 

Once Cleric gets access to Aura of Flaming Death, Shield of Archons, Globe of Blades copy them to Level 6. This way you can actually use them. Never really used them at Level 7 except mid ToB or so. Restoration is too precious in late SoA and few level 7 slots are available, while level 6 are abundant. Besides theres nothing good at Level 6.

 

Blade Barrier ( Cleric Level 6 ) make it party friendly like Globe of Blades. Unchanged otherwise. Useful now, almost never does damage tho as they all save xD So rather worthless actually xD. But there is nothing good at level 6 early on.

 

Smite: Remove Wing Buffet Effect.

 

 

In my video of the Orcus fight it's clearly shown that he uses a non-AoE silence ability called "Silence of the Dead", which unlike "Greater Silence" or "Grave Silence" isn't AoE. He uses Silence of the Dead multiple times. However I heard that vs other players he uses Grave Silence (only once). It's probably party level-dependant. Or it's possible I got a misleading info about him using "Grave Silence" in the first place.

 

Winning the game on Insane is not something particularly hard. Especially with a heavy-arcane party in which 4 members can erect Stoneskins and 3 can cast PFMW. However it's quite hard to actually develop and implement one after another 100% working no-reload tactics. One unaccounted for enemy powerful spell or ability on Insane can very well end a no-reload insane run by chunking someone.

 

In addition, besides reloading, you made serious changes to your game which make it a lot easier to play, even on Insane difficulty. Having more powerful weapons early and tweaked powerful spells, not to mention evading dangerous effects like Greater Silence are all very good examples of what I mean.

 

...

 

You really should have no trouble memorizing the needed Greater Restoration quantity and still have slots for Aura of Flaming Death, Shield of the Archons and Foreknowledge. I am not certain that Globe of Blades is very useful.

Basically, Aura of Flaming Death, Shield of the Archons and Foreknowledge are hard to use all together at the same time not because they're 7-level spells, but because they last only 1 turn each. I usually use only Foreknowledge, with Shield of the Archons added for fights when initial party buffs are dispelled. Aura of Flaming Death doesn't really help much with the AC bonus (at that time, it's already at max by other buffs/equipment), it just grants 90% fire res (which is good, but coped by other spells and items - not necessary in any way) and immunity to normal weapons. I usually consider only the last when casting Aura of FD, that's why I use it only vs enemies like Hardwood golems who have powerful normal-weapon attack.

 

I agree about Blade Barrier being useless, since it turns your own summons hostile even if they manage to save.

 

However I disagree that there is nothing good at level 6. Aerial Servant is one of the most powerful summons. Many HP, heavy crushing hit, comes Invisible, lasts for a very long time. Wondrous Recall supplies with enough 5-level buffs which are never sufficient. And finally, Heal and Protection from Missiles have some good uses, but that's for the later game. I even used Dolorous Decay, but mostly for slowing down neutral NPCs who attempted to run away before killing them like Sergeant Natula - it has a very short casting time, 0 with AoP.

 

Edit: When I look at my previous party, after beating the Rakshasa Prince the B-M had more than 40% of the party kills, while the RB had only 25%. BTW I never used Tenser's with the B-M - never could afford it, always wanted to keep his spellcasting ability active. Used only Tenser's partial. If you're looking for a solid THAC0 boost for the B-M, have Mazzy prebuff them with 4-6 Invoke Courages (works only for a 5-person party or a 6-person with a custom NPC whom you can disband temporarily). A Riskbreaker cannot protect those Invoke Courages from being dispelled by a Remove or Dispel magic, however the B-M can - with Spell Immunity Abjuration.

[isleepwithfucking goats]

^

Why are you so stiff about no-reload. It's not like anybody can verify or conclude whether you actually reloaded or not. I find it rather moot to keep mentioning "No-reload". I can't even remember what I did yesterday, never mind remember the different "tactics" and positioning in several dozen fights in this game. You must have good memory? if you manage that, I guess... r you look at previous notes/videos. I don't know, seems silly to claim no-reload, unless it's your first time with the mod, in which case it would be close to impossible not to reload. Anyway..

 

That was exactly my point about JD Sword.

 

Orcus uses Grave Silence at least two times. Fight with him, save -6 Silence, was more manageable, yet slightly more fun. Still encounter is quite bland compared to others.

 

I already ditched the "serious" changes I had intended for this run in Chapter 3. It's back to a normal game and a normal pretty much, except the Cleric Spell Changes I mentioned earlier. Not sure why you think my game is easier than yours ( 7 levels above normal, 2 Greater Djinnis, etc. ). Having another +3 Club in Chapter 3 is nothing special. Or why is there an extremely powerful +4 Falil in Chapters 2/3 that's good all the way to EDE? Why should you have two good +3 Axes in early game ( Stonefire comes a bit later, but still well before Asylum/Underdark ), yet only one plain +3 club ( Treefolk is Ranger/Druid only ), or no +3 Hammer / +3 Longsword. Yes you can forge Sikrets plain/penis +3 Hammer, it's also more than half the price of the Dwarven Thrower +3 (30.000 GP+). The loss of permanency scroll is not a big deal, as those are abundant after Underdark. For example in this run, after forging Treefolks and Phosphorus, I had a spare Permanency Scroll since I didn't want to forge Amulet of Hades before Spellhold. I could have easily used that Permanency scroll to forge Sikrets Hammer, but I didn't, because the Dwarven Thrower +3 adds "emotional" value and some nice feats ( great vs. Gem Golems ), as opposed to a plain +3 Sikret Hammer. Making Celestial Fury +4 is also nothing special. By the time I did Guarded Compound I already had a +4 Bastard Sword ( albeit Paladins only ) in my bag of holding. So Celestial Fury +4 was used briefly in off-hand before it was consumed. I already had a +4 Weapon in main hand during that time. Big deal...

 

 

I'll try to record a video of the Ancient Dragon fight for you, if I manage to record without issues at 1600p. You'll see I have no tweaked weapons at that point, yet the Dragon will probably fall relatively easy (standard fight, not waiting him out) on Insane in late SoA. Party around mage level 24, not 33. Save Silence will most likely be irrelevant in this fight, as I will keep my Mages ( except Necro ) and the R/C out of the Dragons LoS at all times.

This so you can understand, that the game is already "no so difficult" for me personally, after having it played a few times. Tweaking certain items ( in a balanced matter, and I try and test here to make sure they are ) adds replay value and diversity to the game, also makes things more refreshing. The purpose is not to make it more easy but more fun. Again 7 Levels above normal, possibly more gold ( not that big of a deal ), and for example using 2 Greater Djinnis in a fight, and other such things, I find that significantly easier than having a few items tweaked here and there. If you wanted to bring more challenge to your game, you do a party of 6 and progress normally ( level wise ), you could also not forge certain items like Phosphorus/Judgement Day or tone them down...

 

 

Ok Aerial Servant is good, but I have mages doing the Summoning job. And by the time Aura, Shield and Globes become available ( post Underdark ), I will have no need for Aerial Servant due to better and more abundant Mage Summons, therefore a lot of room at Level 6. While at Level 7 I will 2-4 slots for quite a while after Underdark.

 

You may use the B/M differently, probably because yours is several levels higher during the most part of the game, and may have more spells slots for offensive damage. You also have a party of 5, which makes the party kills higher for a single character. I mostly pre-buff then he fights pretty much. Of course I was referring to Tensers Partial. May try out Mazzy as a R/B or R/C or even B/M in my next run, you thing the Invoke Courages are imbalanced ( considering they stack )?

 

 

 

I'm also thinking about a Thief for my next run. Someone that can backstab to be more exact. After removing the immunity to backstab from a few enemy items, Backstabbing should be possible again for the most part ( I'd say 80% from a quick glance, but could be different upon further research ), except for Dragons and Certain Bosses, also few other IA creatures as well ( example: Master Assassin, Vaxall, GuildMaster, Coordinators are all immune to backstab natively ). I haven't used Thieves tho since maybe over 10 year ago, when BG2 was released, therefore I have no clue how to use them properly or how the backstabbing works. So I'm not sure if Backstabbing is imbalanced, or more exactly would be imbalanced in this mod. What do you think about Backstabbing in IA ?

[Saros]

^

Why are you so stiff about no-reload. It's not like anybody can verify or conclude whether you actually reloaded or not. I find it rather moot to keep mentioning "No-reload". I can't even remember what I did yesterday, never mind remember the different "tactics" and positioning in several dozen fights in this game. You must have good memory? if you manage that, I guess... r you look at previous notes/videos. I don't know, seems silly to claim no-reload, unless it's your first time with the mod, in which case it would be close to impossible not to reload. Anyway..

 

 

I do keep notes and re-watch my videos naturally. For previous no-reload runs, i just keep notes on occasional pitfalls and major mistakes, which I tend to forget. That makes it possible.At least for v6 that is. V5 simply needed adjusting my solo style a bit to the IA requirements and presto.

 

 

Orcus uses Grave Silence at least two times. Fight with him, save -6 Silence, was more manageable, yet slightly more fun. Still encounter is quite bland compared to others.

 

 

Then I suppose it's really level dependant. In my fights Orcus shoots Silence of the Dead on each arcane caster he sees. I fight him with characters above 9 000 000 xp each. Except for Mazzy but she's dead...This is the last fight I do in SoA because there's nothing to be gained from it with immediate impact on the game, unless your PC is a Necromancer naturally.

 

 

I'll try to record a video of the Ancient Dragon fight for you, if I manage to record without issues at 1600p. You'll see I have no tweaked weapons at that point, yet the Dragon will probably fall relatively easy (standard fight, not waiting him out) on Insane in late SoA. Party around mage level 24, not 33. Save Silence will most likely be irrelevant in this fight, as I will keep my Mages ( except Necro ) and the R/C out of the Dragons LoS at all times.

 

 

With a Necro PC, this fight is *always* too easy for me. The Necro can easily restore removed or breached ProFire and other important buffs. Without a Necro PC, you can't have a 100% chance probability of success vs him with a low-leveled party. And by that I mean mages of level below 32.

OK probably there is a way to develop a 100% working strategy even for such a low-level party, but it's so bothersome to even begin developing one. Sure, I'd like to see if you have a video on such an attempt, it may spark a few ideas and try to create such a strategy together.

 

 

Ok Aerial Servant is good, but I have mages doing the Summoning job. And by the time Aura, Shield and Globes become available ( post Underdark ), I will have no need for Aerial Servant due to better and more abundant Mage Summons, therefore a lot of room at Level 6. While at Level 7 I will 2-4 slots for quite a while after Underdark.

 

You may use the B/M differently, probably because yours is several levels higher during the most part of the game, and may have more spells slots for offensive damage. You also have a party of 5, which makes the party kills higher for a single character. I mostly pre-buff then he fights pretty much. Of course I was referring to Tensers Partial. May try out Mazzy as a R/B or R/C or even B/M in my next run, you thing the Invoke Courages are imbalanced ( considering they stack )?

 

 

I agree about Aerial Servants, but Wondrous Recall is never useless. Unfortunately it has a long casting time.

 

It's not very hard to make even a lower-level B-M invulnerable. I've already found out that PFMW scrolls are useless to hoard, so seeing one can obtain roughly 80 of those without having to buy any, you should have enough copies for even the toughest fights. But yeah I use him alone vs enemies that have no way of harming him - like Elemental Golems and their minions, and not only. Since the B-M is the supreme tank, it's logical he'll score most kills. You obviously use him more like a mage than a fighter. I deploy him as any fighter/mage should be deployed: as an invulnerable fighter. There is nothing bad in finishing an opponent with a spell, but in IA, brute force is much more effective almost on all occasions. For example, try to cast Hand of Undoing with the B-M at an Elemental golem, then attempt 4 hits with Poseidon's wrath. The latter will always be more damaging (if you buffed properly, that is).

 

I don't find Mazzy's Invoke Courages to be imbalanced. OK they stack, so do many other things. Like dragons' Greater Doom for example, and that's not imbalanced But the Invoke Courages have a serious weakness in addition to the advantage - can be easily dispelled. The thing that keeps Mazzy in check is that she's notoriously weak on Insane - not too many HP, crappy stats, the fact that she has to be a frontliner to do any damage...If you make her a R/C, that would be completely imbalanced. The thing you could do however if you want her in your party and wanna try an insane run is make her sword upgrade give her some stat boost (Str set to 18/00, +25 max HP) and probably some innate resistance to physical damage (15% should do it)

 

 

I'm also thinking about a Thief for my next run. Someone that can backstab to be more exact. After removing the immunity to backstab from a few enemy items, Backstabbing should be possible again for the most part ( I'd say 80% from a quick glance, but could be different upon further research ), except for Dragons and Certain Bosses, also few other IA creatures as well ( example: Master Assassin, Vaxall, GuildMaster, Coordinators are all immune to backstab natively ). I haven't used Thieves tho since maybe over 10 year ago, when BG2 was released, therefore I have no clue how to use them properly or how the backstabbing works. So I'm not sure if Backstabbing is imbalanced, or more exactly would be imbalanced in this mod. What do you think about Backstabbing in IA ?

 

If you're looking for a thief, an Assassin dualled to Fighter at level 23 is the perfect one. He can backstab extremely effective, but that's not his main strength, because with UAI, this may very well be your best tank. Also, the feat of keeping such a character alive throughout most of the game is not a small one. Don't worry that you'll actually have a useless fighter throughout most of the game. Once activated, the Use Any Item ability remains active even after dualclassing.

 

Another good and very simple idea is a minor tweak - making a Swashbuckler be able to obtain Use Any Item. There is your thief. He won't be able to backstab for more than *2, but will be extremely resistant to damage and thus a perfect tank. Not to mention great AC.

 

About backstabbing in IA - yeah, you might call it imbalanced. I remember eliminating a large group of improved Spiders in IA v5 with my F/M/T after activating Assassinate and backstabbing with the Treefolk's Arm +4. Any other good club or staff will do. Not to mention things like Iron Golem's fists or the Black Blade of Disaster...so IMO removing that backstab immunity from most enemies can spoil some very hard fights. Still if you use a pure backstabbing thief, he can never have that amount of APR so maybe backstabbing won't be so unbalanced.

 

I thought about a pure thief only because of the fact that he could cast scrolls at much higher level than any mage. But since Remove magic, PFME, PFE, Improved Haste, Wish and other important scrolls are severely limited, and there are enemies who are actually immune to Remove/Dispel magic, I considered not worth it at all.

 

Anyway, use a thief only if PC is a necro. Because the Scarlet Ioun Stone is wasted on a necro. Only a character with UAI can make most of that item.

[kreso]

I thought about a pure thief only because of the fact that he could cast scrolls at much higher level than any mage.

Scrolls are cast at level 10, unless you change that with BG2 Tweaks.

[Saros]

I thought about a pure thief only because of the fact that he could cast scrolls at much higher level than any mage.

Scrolls are cast at level 10, unless you change that with BG2 Tweaks.

 

Actually, I don't know if IA v6 changes that in any way, or the Fixpack changes it, but I've noticed that mage scrolls are cast at caster's level. Valid both for enemies, NPCs and PC. Otherwise it would be too easy dispelling for example the Pirate Coordinator's Absolute Immunity cast from scrolls.

 

The inconvenience is that dualclasses like a Berserker(9)-Mage(36) cast their scrolls not at their mage level but at something which is a mix of (formula of) both classes, I think in this example at either level 24 or 25. Same valid for multiclasses.

[isleepwithfucking goats]

^

Why are you so stiff about no-reload. It's not like anybody can verify or conclude whether you actually reloaded or not. I find it rather moot to keep mentioning "No-reload". I can't even remember what I did yesterday, never mind remember the different "tactics" and positioning in several dozen fights in this game. You must have good memory? if you manage that, I guess... r you look at previous notes/videos. I don't know, seems silly to claim no-reload, unless it's your first time with the mod, in which case it would be close to impossible not to reload. Anyway..

 

 

I do keep notes and re-watch my videos naturally. For previous no-reload runs, i just keep notes on occasional pitfalls and major mistakes, which I tend to forget. That makes it possible.At least for v6 that is. V5 simply needed adjusting my solo style a bit to the IA requirements and presto.

 

Orcus uses Grave Silence at least two times. Fight with him, save -6 Silence, was more manageable, yet slightly more fun. Still encounter is quite bland compared to others.

 

 

Then I suppose it's really level dependant. In my fights Orcus shoots Silence of the Dead on each arcane caster he sees. I fight him with characters above 9 000 000 xp each. Except for Mazzy but she's dead...This is the last fight I do in SoA because there's nothing to be gained from it with immediate impact on the game, unless your PC is a Necromancer naturally.

 

I'll try to record a video of the Ancient Dragon fight for you, if I manage to record without issues at 1600p. You'll see I have no tweaked weapons at that point, yet the Dragon will probably fall relatively easy (standard fight, not waiting him out) on Insane in late SoA. Party around mage level 24, not 33. Save Silence will most likely be irrelevant in this fight, as I will keep my Mages ( except Necro ) and the R/C out of the Dragons LoS at all times.

 

 

With a Necro PC, this fight is *always* too easy for me. The Necro can easily restore removed or breached ProFire and other important buffs. Without a Necro PC, you can't have a 100% chance probability of success vs him with a low-leveled party. And by that I mean mages of level below 32.

OK probably there is a way to develop a 100% working strategy even for such a low-level party, but it's so bothersome to even begin developing one. Sure, I'd like to see if you have a video on such an attempt, it may spark a few ideas and try to create such a strategy together.

 

Ok Aerial Servant is good, but I have mages doing the Summoning job. And by the time Aura, Shield and Globes become available ( post Underdark ), I will have no need for Aerial Servant due to better and more abundant Mage Summons, therefore a lot of room at Level 6. While at Level 7 I will 2-4 slots for quite a while after Underdark.

 

You may use the B/M differently, probably because yours is several levels higher during the most part of the game, and may have more spells slots for offensive damage. You also have a party of 5, which makes the party kills higher for a single character. I mostly pre-buff then he fights pretty much. Of course I was referring to Tensers Partial. May try out Mazzy as a R/B or R/C or even B/M in my next run, you thing the Invoke Courages are imbalanced ( considering they stack )?

 

 

I agree about Aerial Servants, but Wondrous Recall is never useless. Unfortunately it has a long casting time.

 

It's not very hard to make even a lower-level B-M invulnerable. I've already found out that PFMW scrolls are useless to hoard, so seeing one can obtain roughly 80 of those without having to buy any, you should have enough copies for even the toughest fights. But yeah I use him alone vs enemies that have no way of harming him - like Elemental Golems and their minions, and not only. Since the B-M is the supreme tank, it's logical he'll score most kills. You obviously use him more like a mage than a fighter. I deploy him as any fighter/mage should be deployed: as an invulnerable fighter. There is nothing bad in finishing an opponent with a spell, but in IA, brute force is much more effective almost on all occasions. For example, try to cast Hand of Undoing with the B-M at an Elemental golem, then attempt 4 hits with Poseidon's wrath. The latter will always be more damaging (if you buffed properly, that is).

 

I don't find Mazzy's Invoke Courages to be imbalanced. OK they stack, so do many other things. Like dragons' Greater Doom for example, and that's not imbalanced But the Invoke Courages have a serious weakness in addition to the advantage - can be easily dispelled. The thing that keeps Mazzy in check is that she's notoriously weak on Insane - not too many HP, crappy stats, the fact that she has to be a frontliner to do any damage...If you make her a R/C, that would be completely imbalanced. The thing you could do however if you want her in your party and wanna try an insane run is make her sword upgrade give her some stat boost (Str set to 18/00, +25 max HP) and probably some innate resistance to physical damage (15% should do it)

 

I'm also thinking about a Thief for my next run. Someone that can backstab to be more exact. After removing the immunity to backstab from a few enemy items, Backstabbing should be possible again for the most part ( I'd say 80% from a quick glance, but could be different upon further research ), except for Dragons and Certain Bosses, also few other IA creatures as well ( example: Master Assassin, Vaxall, GuildMaster, Coordinators are all immune to backstab natively ). I haven't used Thieves tho since maybe over 10 year ago, when BG2 was released, therefore I have no clue how to use them properly or how the backstabbing works. So I'm not sure if Backstabbing is imbalanced, or more exactly would be imbalanced in this mod. What do you think about Backstabbing in IA ?

 

If you're looking for a thief, an Assassin dualled to Fighter at level 23 is the perfect one. He can backstab extremely effective, but that's not his main strength, because with UAI, this may very well be your best tank. Also, the feat of keeping such a character alive throughout most of the game is not a small one. Don't worry that you'll actually have a useless fighter throughout most of the game. Once activated, the Use Any Item ability remains active even after dualclassing.

 

Another good and very simple idea is a minor tweak - making a Swashbuckler be able to obtain Use Any Item. There is your thief. He won't be able to backstab for more than *2, but will be extremely resistant to damage and thus a perfect tank. Not to mention great AC.

 

About backstabbing in IA - yeah, you might call it imbalanced. I remember eliminating a large group of improved Spiders in IA v5 with my F/M/T after activating Assassinate and backstabbing with the Treefolk's Arm +4. Any other good club or staff will do. Not to mention things like Iron Golem's fists or the Black Blade of Disaster...so IMO removing that backstab immunity from most enemies can spoil some very hard fights. Still if you use a pure backstabbing thief, he can never have that amount of APR so maybe backstabbing won't be so unbalanced.

 

I thought about a pure thief only because of the fact that he could cast scrolls at much higher level than any mage. But since Remove magic, PFME, PFE, Improved Haste, Wish and other important scrolls are severely limited, and there are enemies who are actually immune to Remove/Dispel magic, I considered not worth it at all.

 

Anyway, use a thief only if PC is a necro. Because the Scarlet Ioun Stone is wasted on a necro. Only a character with UAI can make most of that item.

 

I'd rather reload a few times times than check notes or watch videos. To each his own.

 

For Orcus, he uses both I think, but starts with Grave from what I see in this run. I really can't remember about the previous runs, even though my previous run was a few weeks ago.

 

I have 0 incentive to play anything else than a Necro PC. Items, quests, spells, and immunity to silence makes this kit as a PC gold. Even with Save Silence, I would still go with a Necro PC. He is fun to play too.

 

Wondorous recall, I used that vs. Dracolich only in this run and maybe vs. Lavok. To refresh death wards. Definitely didn't use that after Underdark, don't think I ever did.

 

I use the B/M as a fighter of course, since he can barely cast 3 Stoneskins and 2 Fireshields at level 24. Almost never under PFMW, so that he can absorb hits. Always stays with the Group, never alone.

 

Why would Mazzy as R/C be imbalanced? Besides the fact that she is hard to get her early on, I would never play a plain Fighter, and especially not with her proficiencies. So she would have to be a R/C, RB, B/M or maybe a Vagrant worst case. The other option is her to be Paladin with Grandmastery amd Immunity to Fear.

 

Regarding the Thief, it would definitely be a Fighter dual to a Thief at 9 probably. But the problem is many have immunities to backstab natively especially in ToB, that is even after removing the immunity to backstab from the select few items IA monsters wear (Backstab multiplier of 5, if found to be imbalanced indeed, could be nerfed to 2-3, might be a bit difficult to do but it's theoretically possible ), I'm still not convinced for now. Riskbreakers passive damage works on all, his Risk Decrement works on all except Greater Bone Golems. Spiders are only a slight problem in Chapters 2-3 and maybe the Drow Ambush to some extent. Even Spider Queen encounter is not hard ( With 3 Mages you can unleash instant 18 ADHW and 9 Chain Lightnings, that takes care of minions and leaves a few Ghosts and then the Queen herself ). Anyway... the Thief needs to do damage in the important fights, I have no need to backstab in the easy or average fights, as fighters chop off things quickly there.

 

 

Ancient Dragon video: Well that was painful to record at 1600p, even with an i7@4.5Ghz. Tried both to HDD and SSD, made no difference. Barely got 24 FPS, but the lag/jitter was the worst of all. As you can see fight is not very interesting the regular way, didn't even use Auto-Pause. The B/M was idle most of the time and only went in for the final blow. Not even sure the Dragon tried to silence him, even if he did and didn't get silenced due to the save, it doesn't matter as he was already buffed and basically only needed to attack for the few remaining rounds. Viconia, one of the Riskbreakers, got Breached at the end just before the 3x ADHW hit. I paused right when the ADHW got triggered, but instead of retreating her ( which she could easily do as the Trigger went towards the other Riskbreaker ) or quaff a magic shielding potion, instead I activated her Critical Strike, as I figured it's best if the bitch dies, as she was already dead during the Graveyard/Bodhi Quest in Chapter 6, so she missed out on a bunch of XP and is now quite a bit behind the other Riskbreaker. I figured I make the gap wider, lol. All in all, I'm probably 1 Level above normal with my party as I did all the Four encounters, Jaheiras Encounters and Romance, and some minor XP rewarding encounters from Edwin/Viconia.

 

As you can see items are standard, Staff of Fire is 1-handed ( this so you don't have to remove off-hand weapon to erect the Fire Shield ), Ring of Greater Djinni Summoning is Quick Item instead of Ring ( this also to avoid the hassle of removing rings, besides Efreeti Bottle is quick item, I simply forget to change the icon to the Efreeti Bottle as I just forged Greater Djinni not long ago ).

 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFihuynFKJ0

 

Best viewed in Original and on a 1600p display. Watching it on anything else will be fuzzy.

[Saros]

I have no objection of playing a PC Necro, in fact my only successful IA v6 no-reload so far was with such a PC. Still, this mod forcing the Lawful Good Necromancer PC as the best choice is not something I can accept (first of all, there is no such thing as a LG Necromancer). That isn't the question here. I myself have beaten the Ancient Dragon with a Necro PC much faster than you did in your own video (naturally I had more powerful fighters at the time). Still, about your video:

 

It's nice but the details are really small. I can't tell what you're doing most of the time despite having lots of experience with this mod and that particular fight. I can't even tell what spell you're casting most of the time.

 

You left your Necro PC unprotected for a couple of rounds, which in my opinion is very bad since you' re relying on a pure luck for the dragon not to turn and Breathe on him, for example (I saw no fire protective gear on PC), but there was even the time when your PC hasn't finished Alacrity casting and the Dragon was right next to him. If I do such a thing in my fights, I'd consider starting anew even if by some miracle I manage to win.

 

Keeping a Necro PC alive in that fight is much easier than keeping a fighter PC alive. Despite the Vagrant being innately immune to fire, several melee hits and 3*ADHW CC triggering at the wrong moment can quickly bring defeat.

 

Having a Necro in the front lines bought you lots of time, which cannot be done easily with any other PC.

 

To summarize it: Your video shows a good, but not in any way 100% effective no-reload tactic (mainly because of that close call with your PC's defences being stripped)vs the Ancient Dragon, but any low-leveled party with a Necro PC at the helm can execute an equally good or even better (100% working) no-reload tactic vs the Dragon. The big issue is when you have to face that no-save Greater Silence without an unsilenceable arcane caster. That's where the real problems with developing a no-reload tactic begin. At least for me.

 

I understand you want to "stick to the rules" i.e. keep the B-M inside the group, which is strange, since you bent the IA rules on so many occasions (tweaking items, spells, etc). It's common sense to try and take advantage of all your characters in the best possible way. For example, pure class fighters and mages have to work together most of the time because they need each other's help (mages cannot kill almost anyone after debuffing, fighters need to be buffed/rebuffed or have enemies debuffed in order to hit them). The greatest strength of characters like the B-M is their solo performance most of the time, which is their strongest tactical advantage.

 

Even if you choose to keep the B-M in the midst of your party, absorbing damage via Skins, you could easily increase those Skins to 7 or even 8 (1 prebuffed, 1 in Sequencer, 1 in Trigger, 5 memorized). You don't need to memorize fireshields - there is a Contingency for that or in worst case scenario (if you need to refresh it fast) - sequencer, trigger or the Staff of Fire. Also you can use the Ring of Acuity and Dak'Kon Zerth blade (only 20 000 gp) for an additional 4-level slot. But this use of a B-M is extremely inefficient IMO. To each his own.

[isleepwithfucking goats]

^

 

What could you not tell, lol, pause the video. Should still make out the text and everything else if quality is set at 1080p. It will be a bit fuzzy, but still ok. I just watched it on my 60" TV from several feet away. On a 1600p Display in Original quality it looks like in-game, text and graphics are sharp as I recorded at high quality.

 

Necro: Turning, SI when remove magic came, then Spell Strike and Breach from scrolls, then Alacrity, then rebuff and breach at the same time, Resist Fear, Fire Potion when Fireball landed, and Prot from Energy on a RB.

 

Sorcer: Trigger, and summons, at the end he Prot from Energy a RB.

 

B/M: Trigger ( failed due to Efreeti fireshield I think ), at the end, SI, GoI, Turning, and lastly CC ( Tenser, Prot from Energy, Foreknowledge ).

 

R/C: tried to summon a viper, but was at max. summons already.

 

 

I agree my fight wasn't very well executed. Didn't have Spellstrike or enough Breach memorized, as I didn't re-arrange spellbook before fight on Necro. Hence why he was naked for a few rounds as he had to cast from scrolls. If I had those two memorized, I would have started Alacrity earlier and kept buffs up at all times. The fight would have lasted less too. However it's still not a problem for a few rounds, as long as you put pressure on the dragon ( besides I didn't let him cast Lower Resistance and Fireball until that point, so there was no danger for Dragon Breath ). Dragon only did a Lower Resistance and Fireball in this fight, that's all he could.

 

 

I just don't use the B/M alone with PFMW, don't find it necessary, maybe Oasis fight.

 

 

 

Found an unlimited xp/gold exploit in ToB accidentally. Will not post which, as the "vultures" are probably watching and it's better to let their "testers" figure it out. Besides you probably are well familiar with them Saros, so no point mentioning them anyway

There was one more unlimited xp (not sure if gold too, can't remember ) in ToB, that I noticed in my previous runs. I guess they didn't bother blocking those, since they figured you won't be able to solo SoA if they block those.

 

 

In of my previous posts, I mentioned making the Archer do Crushing or Slashing damage from Bows. However recently I looked up one of the enemy items I think, the "Dragon" ring most IA enemies like to wear, and I noticed it has a bunch of immunities to Projectiles ( Arrows/ Bolts / Axes / Daggers etc. ), besides the fact that they are 100% resistant to missile damage. I lol.

[isleepwithfucking goats]

Finished EDE with that party on Insane. Standard items to the end pretty much. The only difference compared to Hard was Elemental Backslash did a bit more damage ( while working on the Supreme Golem ). Made no difference otherwise. Had all barbarian essence potions and probably used up half of them in EDE. As long as the Prince is constantly surrounded by summons, little damage is done to fighters anyway.

 

Did a bit of testing with the thief after EDE. Assassin with Grandfather Dagger +5 ( removed the +1 backstab multiplier ), does exactly 8 Damage to an Elemental Golem under Assassinate. Lmao. The B/M with Thor does 4 damage. But the Thiefs Thac0 is so poor he barely hits, not to mention his APR.

The Stalker with his quadruple backstab multiplier, does about 6-7 damage with Grandfather Dagger +5 to the Elemental Golem.

Stalker has Racial Enemy Golem so +4 to Hit.

 

vs. a Skeleton Warlord, the B/M does 30 damage with Thor. The Stalker does 9 without backstab and with backstab does about 20, with Grandfather +5 dagger which is piercing. The Assassin does approx. 25 damage with septuple damage to the Warlord with Grandfather +5.

 

So even with backstab immunity removed from the certain items, the Thief is still worthless. I was thinking to make a F dual to Thief and give him Jans Armor, but after these tests I won't bother. The Stalker could be a bit more appealing with Grandmastery in a Thief weapon, possibly a few more "Assassinations" and maybe Jans armor, since he would also get Hardiness, Contact with Nature, Critical Strike, Good HP, Good Thac0, Good APR ( with Thief weapon that is ). But even than I'd rate him subpar compared to a Vagrant or Riskbreaker.

 

Since Critical Strike rarely does double damage, since most IA monsters wear helmets, I thought Assassinate might bring in a boost. But with a Thief it's just not worth it. With a Stalker it could be viable, but even then only the in certain SoA fights and very little in ToB, and the reason is because Beholders, Marilithis, Dragons, ToB bosses have native immunity to backstab and I don't feel like going through and removing those ( besides it makes sense that Beholders be immune to backstab ). All in all, the thief looks to be a big pass.

 

 

 

Now on to the Archer. Did a bit of testing with Gesen Bow ( piercing damage ). The Archers can get Grandmastery with Bows.

vs. Elemental Golem does about 2 damage, the B/M with Thor does 4 damage.

vs, Warlord does 5 damage, the B/M does 30 damage.

vs. Grave Lich does 8 damage, the B/M does 18 damage.

 

The immunity to projectiles from the Dragon Ring, is for non-enchanted arrows, surprisingly.

Gesen Bow since it does piercing it will do damage to all ( that are not 100% to piercing ) and does electrical damage on every hit ( sort of imbalanced, considering most meele items have been nerfed to 5% ). Assuming you have somebody with Grandmastery in Bows, Gesen Bow should still be viable ( especially vs liches/mages ) in the vanilla IA game.

With Gesen Bow at least damage seems to be ok, would probably nerf the Electric hit of 100% to probably 15% or so ( to be in harmony with the other elemental nerfs in v6 ).

 

Basically to make the Archer viable I have to change some Arrows from Missile to Piercing. Definitely will change arrows of Piercing +4, however I'm not sure there are enough arrows of Piercing in Chapters 2-3. Will probably make bigger stacks of them in the places where they are already available right now. Plus they will also get a slight nerf to damage I think. As they are right now they do a bit more damage than Gesen Bow for example.

[Saros]

A Stalker needs to have the UAI HLA to be on equal ground with the F/T multi. And the only advantage after getting it will be the ability to cast Armor of Faith for 10% additional physical damage resistance. This is no small bonus, definitely, still a F/T multi will have a better backstab multiplier.

 

Backstabbing with the Grandfather main-hand is ill-advised. It's better to backstab with a good crushing weapon. Clubs or staves. Then the damage dealt to a Skeleton Grandlord will significantly increase. Probably if you were to activate Assassinate in the beginning of the Orcus fight with a F/T multi with MultiClass Grandmastery tweak active, grandmastery in quarterstaves, str 24 or 25 (use a Holy Symbol) and the staff of the ram +4 equipped, you'll do something like 80 average dmg per hit to a grandlord, probably even more. That's unbalanced. Or you could kill 3 Gem Golems in just 1 Assassination attack in the Oasis fight.

 

Critical Backstabs are even more unbalanced, those are completely possible with a F/T who has the Robe of Eloquence equipped. Of course, you won't be able to wear both it and Jan's armor. And you'll have small problems healing the F/T afterwards. Thing is, Assassinate doesn't guarantee that all 7 or 8 attacks will hit, while CS added to it does. But yes, most of the time the extra damage will come only from the backstab multiplier.

 

The main drawback for a F/T is the multiple items he requires as equipment, so I'd not consider him unless applying some gold exploits.

 

Considering an Archer: Fun, but not strong. There are enough Arrows of Piercing in the starting chapters, both Aledrian and the Genies sell 360 each, and I think that the fletcher in the promenade also has some (200?). Naturally they're expensive, another reason why an Archer is not worth it.