Countering mind-affecting spells

[Tonton Fred]

Hi,

 

loving the mod, really provides a new challenge to the game and makes you think and sweat about most encounters, great work. I do however get the feeling that mages are a bit over-the-top sometimes, not so much in terms of tactics, but of power level... MGoI is a nightmare for low-level parties, but you're still able to get Spell Thrust quite early, so that's just a few nasty encounters. I'm now in the late game, and every mage is dumping mind-affecting spells on my party, it's like Confusion and Chaos are the new Fireball. I'm up against Mendas / Baresh, and after getting my ass handed over to me more than a few times, I decided to slightly cheese the fight and bait Mendas out of his house, which allowed me to spread my party a bit more so I'd have at least a couple guys not drooling over themselves after 2 rounds. So he unloaded 3 (THREE) Chaos on my party.

 

In fact, Chaos is pretty much the only spell he casts that is trouble for me, the rest is mostly defensive. The thing is, I have absolutely no way of defending against it. If cast on enemies that are 5 levels lower, the spell does not even allow a save. My party is level 7, he's supposed to be 12, so that's it. I'm using SCS + SR + IR, so here's my take on my options :

 

Immunity : only 2 items give immunity while equipped : 1) the bastard sword Lawgiver (from IR). CHARNAME is a monk, can't use it. Minsc is chaotic, can't use it. Kivan needs to keep its bow in hand and pelt the bastard, Dynaheir and Imoen are mages, maybe I could give it to Branwen, who will be far back anyway. 2) Kiel's Morningstar, which is a cursed berserking item and it's in Durlag's Tower, which I haven't cleared yet. Not much help for me. On the bright side, Minsc can berserk on its own.

 

Potions : Potion of clarity. As far as I have seen, there is only one Potion of Clarity available for sale in the whole game. Yikes. Since I don't even get a save, magic shielding and other save-improving potions are useless (and the save would be at -3!).

 

Spells : Chaotic Commands is Divine 5, so that's out for me. Break Enchantment (Divine 3 and Wizard 4) can only remove the effect, and on 1 creature only.

 

Scrolls : Got 1 scroll of Chaotic Commands.

 

The potion and scroll are one-time use, after that, every mage with Chaos is going to have us running around like headless chickens. How do you guys deal with these spells ?

 

Cheers,

 

Fred

 

EDIT : on a slightly related note, the doppelgangers I have seen until now (Seven Suns, Merchant League) have failed to display any illusion / mind-affecting power and behave just like before, even though I installed the Improved Doppelgangers component. Is it a bug or are only the ones in Candlekeep supposed to be harder ?

[DavidW]

The most effective way of handling Chaos (and area effect spells in general) is often to scatter: don't let the whole party be vulnerable.

 

If you find it too annoying, you could lower the level of the wizards: edit scs.ini (change mage_level_add to -4, say, or mage_level_multiply to 75), then reinstall Smarter Mages.

 

Doppelgangers: it's a bug, I'll look into it.

[Tonton Fred]

The problem is it's impossible to scatter inside Mendas house... I had him follow me outside for that purpose, which seemed like a good idea until a panicked peasant decided to run across a lucky Aghanazzar's Scorcher that injured Mendas... The whole of Ulgoth Beard turned hostile, including a couple spellcasters, which, thanks to Smarter Mages, put a quick end to that try. Once you get outside, collateral damage is hard to avoid, even more when your confused archer with Grandmastery + Long Bow of Marksmanship decides the village elder looks suspiciously like a werewolf... I finally got lucky by scattering really wide and having Dynaheir drop all her weapons and run away from the villagers just before she became confused. She just managed to knock a passing chicken unconscious before we beat up that pesky mage.

 

A few notes on the fight :

 

1) Baresh did not follow Mendas outside, allowing me to take them on one by one, well, almost, see below.

2) When Baresh switches from human to werewolf, he is cloned, ie there are 2 of them. Most of the time, they stand in the same spot, so you only realize it when you kill him, and there is another, identical sprite standing in his place, but sometimes, the clone chooses a different target and moves away from the original.

3) Doppelgangers : belay that, I just got raped by a gang of Greater Doppelgangers on the roof of Durlag's tower, where I had foolishly sent a lone character with Protection from Petrification to mop up what I thought were just a couple Basilisks... I don't think GD were casting Mirror Image and Dire Charm in vanilla ? It's just that Seven Suns and Merchant League only had standard Doppelgangers.

 

Cheers,

Fred

 

PS : ok, I just met our friendly ghost Daitel in Durlag's Tower. Full Globe of Invuln + Fireshield + PfMW + Mirror Image + Shield, followed by Cone of Cold and Chain Lightning ? Seriously ? And I'm not even in the underground levels yet. I'll be back... with a couple levels more...