GameBanshee Forums

*UPDATES*
-Yxunomei is dead at 10 days 0 hours ingame (8h rested so far), more in 4th post ↓

-Im now at the Lich in Dorn's Deep at 18d 19h (15d 8h travel, 8h rest)...its gotten a lot easier by now (my tanks at lvl 10, the dual/multi classers are at least lvl 8 in everything) so i spare you the details from now on. I still don't think i would have been able to take out Dragon's Eye without resting before though...at least not this year.

- Bronze Sentries were a joke, i let my halfling tank them with 95% slash resist...1-3dmg per hit, ouchy! Rember what kind of dmg the final boss deals...?

- After dashing through chapter 3-5 without much effort im now in lower dorns at 19d 6h (8h rest). Aquarium was cleared, some more info in new post ↓

- Weee! I'm now before the Sea of Moving Ice and just started TotL....some more info....er later maybe (34days 6hours, 26days travel, only resting because of quests (3days) and once to memorize contact other plane for vexing thoughts (i didnt buy the scroll from orrick in time, shame on my planning ...didnt use any spells except 1x PFE 10', 1 Emo:Courage, 1 Emo:Hope)

- It is done - all the Bad Guys are down after 45days 12 hours...2 effective rests...a bit explanation and a little nerdgasm down below ↓↓↓

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Hey there people,

I'm doing a run of Icewind Dale atm trying to go through with only the absolute mininum amount of resting. The difficulty is insane and every single enemy/quest will be taken out/on along the way. I will travel the least amount possible when completing ALL quests. I wont allow myself to grind by abusing rest, because i already get more xp from insane (+there are more enemies in most encounters) and i simply dont want to click that filthy button

- IWD Fix/Tweak pack

- Unfinished Business (restores some loot removed in how and cut quests, which means potential xp...another reason not to grind)

- Item Upgrade

I use the Tweakpack for higher missile/gem/potion stacks, buyable bags of holding and to give critters maximum hp for their level)

I will use the following party:

Paladin

Fighter/Druid (half-elf)

Fighter/Mage/Cleric (half-elf LG)

Fighter/Thief (halfling CE)

Bard (half-elf CN)

Fighter/Mage/Cleric (half-elf CE) - he's evil aligned just because i want to see the evil spells for once^^...i wont use high lvl heal spells but more shields of lathander could have been nice...oh well)

All of them have optimized stats and max hp at lvl up is turned on - everyone who can has 18/91+ and everything that could be of use is maxed...the paladin even has a (legit) 18/00 which im pretty happy about since he will be the only one to melee in the first stages of the game. So, i hope this isnt too long to read and probably nobody will care anyway, but i've already written a little log for my progress.

I initially intended to just write down how much ingame and real time the individual parts took and note any rests, but i started adding info about what i was doing pretty soon and now ....well ...i just hope its not too long or bothersome to read . I dont really expect any great interest in this but since its already written i can just as well share it^^. If any of you is interested let me know and i will organize this a bit better and add some info to the starting areas (im not a native speaker/writer btw so pls forgive me any grammar mistakes)

Another thing to note is that this will be a very power gamey run and therefore i will always try to get the best random loot possible for my party ...even if it takes a while

- 3h+1h: Party Creation + Easthaven (ingame 11h, starts at 7h)


- 1h: Kuldahar Pass (ingame 14h)

- 1,5h: First stop in Kuldahar doing all minor quests, talking, stealing everything i can and shopping (ingame 1day 1hour)
items bought: web/shield/friends scroll + bag of holding

- 1,5h Vale of Shadows...damn fishing the +1thac0 ring from Therik took longer than expected, well there is isn't anything too complicated here, everything ideally gets shot down by my 5 sling swinging, crossbowing or archering chars...ranged just rules the early game. Inside the crypts i triple use turn undead to send most of the skeletons running then shoot or smite them (ingame 1day 14hours)

- 4h(with pauses) Kresselack's Tomb and Lysan, no resting to memorize shield (as originally planned) despite each of the imbued wights shooting 3 magic missiles for 12-30 dmg on insane...thankfully didnt have to reload a lot for getting 12 from all...the bards luck song rly helps out), still have a good amount of healing potions left after anally taking of care of not losing any hp where possible, micro is realatively easy because most foes are slower than you, still a lot of q/l and ridiculous amounts of kiting involved but that will hopefully change after i take my first rest...(ingame 1day 23hours)

- 0,5h Kuldahar (taking my time as always): actually wanted to rest here (buying lyre of progression before to get extra webs for verbeegs who deal mad damage and have the bad habit of hitting my
-6 AC Paladin consistently (iirc enemies get something crazy like +9thac0 on insane, even more on HoF), but would have had to do so for a higher price since i cant use friends...so greedy and insane as i am (well i really need the money later to buy helmet of the trusted defender, rogues cowl, shimmering sash and some other stuff that makes life easier in one go) i reloaded the save right before the first rest after realizing that the verbeeg and Acolytes can be taken on without any spells (ingame 2days 8hours)

PS: I'm a dirty cheater - i sold back the lyre of progression as i had already bought it in the save and edited my gold to get back to normal...i really didnt want to go to an even earlier save

-1h45min Temple of the Forgotten God: Now, that went pretty smooth actually...not a single hp lost (can't touch this, verbeegs!) but a lot of time - about half of total - was spent fishing the awesome longbow +2: defender (-2AC, +2 saves vs spell), Flaming Bastard Sword for trolls and the badge of the brave, an item easily underestimated, as it grants you a nice buff once per day you wont normally have until the severed hand (Emotion: Courage; +3dmg +1thac0 +1 saves for 5 turns!!). It was actually the reason i decided doing the temple with nothing but elbow grease was possible - the feared fight at the end with 5 (or 6 dunno) verbeegs and 3 acolytes got pretty easy when all 3 of them started out with entangle, which allowed for a retreat with the idiots in tow, followed by laughing and shooting arrows/stones/bolts in their faces (4days 3hours)

-Kuldahar Interlude: selling off halberds and large shields (score!), talking to Arundel, asking myself whether to rest or not...i might be able to use necklace of missiles/flaming oils/potions and the like to cheese away Yxunomei but i guess it would take bazillions of reloads...and there's the tiny matter of getting to her in the first place^^ - well i was curious and tried testing out the waters by killing off all the monsters on lvl 1 and 2 of Dragon's Eye using cheats to heal so i could look at the enemy placement and know how much xp i would have in level 3...bottom line: level 1 "easy" (weak lizards, spiders get stuck), level 2 would be a real chore to take on and for level 3 ...let's just say i want to finish this before christmas.
So with that out of the way lets get some sleep (guess we earned it) and do some shopping

+ Clasp of Bron's Cloak: won't be available later and there's not much to put around your neck in this game...a minor boon but better than nothing (5% res. vs phys.dmg except crushing) ~3150g

+ The Lucky Scimitar: i have the bard song for luck already but its the best my fighter/druid can get for a long time and its pretty cheap for what it offers (+2; user under effect of luck) ~4300g

+ Lyre of Progression: Expensive at this stage but worth it and needed (me thinks) if i want to complete Dragon's Eye in one go - gives 2x2nd 1x3rd lvl spell (in other words 2 more webs a haste) to a bard, but must me carried as a shield meaning i can only use slings now until those are used up or i gain new slots...she's supposed to sing her lucky or regeneration song anyway but can actually attack and sing if you dont mind pausing to reactivate it after getting your attack off (i obviously dont) ~11800g

+ a scroll of the ever-mighty Mirror Image (no slots for it yet but buying it now will give me the chance for another one after Orrick swaps his stuff)


So...time to get that gem back leaving Kuldahar at a respectable 6days 4hours ingame

DRAGON'S EYE
Level 1 (45mins)

Lizard King Caves : Ah...something easy for a change. I get their attention with my paladin while the rest fires away killing 1-2 of them per round, when they get close my paladin runs/kites like the girl he always wanted to be, but a win is a win. Also,i try to interrupt spells when possible especially when shamans try to cast static charge/buffs evrything else is wasted on my free action ring bearing tank. Fishing for the boots of the fox (+1ac, faster movement...niiice) is done abusing the auto save when entering/exiting the cave, to avoid doing the initial fighting over and over. Thankfully i found it on my 2nd try this time! So on to the next level with our spell books and health bars untouched...if you dont count 6dmg by a spider (9days 8hours)

Level 2 (1h45m)

Troll Level : I start off with the big fight involving bombadier beetles/sword spiders and trolls aka the asspain-crew - i mean seriously they are already annoying on their own but all of them mixed? So, as expected this took a good bit longer, but still quite reasonable i think. After some futile attempts trying various things i decided it would be most "cost-effective" to use one of my three spiky growths and a single entangle. The trolls and bugs were held in place nicely but had to use a horror on 3 sword spiders breaking through and by some miracle all of them were affected (their saves arent too bad)...so after shooting off the evil,evil spiders i was left with kiting around a steady stream of trolls and bugs saving from entangle in the previously cleared area which is pretty uncomfortable seeing how there's not much room. My Paladin uses the 25% chance fire sword to finish them off while the rest takes care of taking down the ones getting back up or joining...
I only used 1 out of 14 flaming oils (sells pretty well) and a handful of fire arrows that way. In the end after a lot of microing and having every troll stand up again for probably 2 times on average, i got away with merely 35hp lost (2 hits).

The Talonite Priest + Troll battle didnt take as many tries and i only had to use 1 web...whats even better is that you dont need to worry about trolls getting back up if you kill them while webbed (other status effects work for this, too) my paladin basically just tries to keep the trolls away from my other guys and in the area of effect while not getting hit and only doing the occasional swing to kill off someone webbed. The rest focuses on cancelling bad spells and killing off webbed trolls from a distance. I circled around the pyramid once to avoid getting hit and give my ranged squad (who stay back in the tunnel) some time to "make room". Worked nicely, my fighter/druid got hit once for 24dmg by a loose troll but i can live with that seeing that my hp/heal spells/potions only have to last until my bard hits lvl 11 ,which im pretty sure will be before yxunomei....but conserving them now will give me an easier time in levels 3 to 5 which can be quite rough (if i dont hit lvl 11 befor yxu...well bad luck, there wont be any grinding).
Well apart from that there is only one more noteworthy battle consisting of more wraith spiders and trolls but they are slow and not numerous enough to force the use of spells save for a humble bless.

Side note:I used the paladins innate protection from evil before the first big fight as it lasts much much longer than the regular spell (its not written down anywhere ingame but i guess its 1h/lvl); this leaves my tank with -11ac to take on the next level(s)...ill need it - he has all the ac boosting items you can hope to have at this stage and uses battle axe +2 defender (2ac, 10 missile res.) or throwing axes ; ingame 9days 13hours)


Level 3 (~4h all in all, didnt say im good at this lol)

Wight Wipeout:
As you can see, i needed to try around a lot to get satisfying results. There are 4 big groups of cold wights (3 of them ~20, one is smaller with only 9).
Theses fuckers arent bothered by my ranged weapons and the only character who is (realatively) safe to engage them in melee is my paladin, boasting an ac of -11 so he puts on all thac0 enhancing gear too for this level bringing him to 6 thac0 unbuffed thanks to his hulking strength of 18/00 - only time i got this without iese/dalekeeper

Group 1:
The first fight entering the area is ended with bless (wasted...but well), entangle, web, followed by spiky growth, the wights' terrible saves+bottleneck make sure almost all of them die without any effort from my side. My paladin gets hit once though. I try to stay back as much as possible so i dont pull the skeleton archers who have very good thac0 and often magical arrows i dont want them to use up. After looting the skeletons I have ~20 fire arrows, ~30 arrows+1, 15 bolts+1 and 9 acid arrows (2d6 extra damage bam!)all in all but i inted to save them for later if possible.

Group 2:
Another big pack of them. Seeing as i have more room to move now i get by with just entangle,web. My Paladin takes them on alone hoping for failed saves and makes sure they stay where they belong - my fighter/druid helps out a little carrying the second ring of free action to smite webbed foes and i used about 10 arrows+1 when things got hairy. Couldnt use turn undead as it would have pulled the next group. Special attention had to go to any blast skeletons so i dont get hit by their snillocs snowball crap. That worked, but the wights struck my pala and druid both once.

Group 3: Okay this group only has 9 cold wights. To avoid getting hit altogether i hit them with the single holy smite (blinds if save failed -4thac0 -4ac) i have memorized after gathering them around the paladin. This time i can also use turn undead without pulling new foes with my 2 F/M/Cs, while my paladin smites them one after the other. Since most of them are running scared i can take them on almost one by one taking minor damage again.

Group 4 (the one south): Phew, this got me thinking for a while - i have 2 webs/entangles, 3greases and only 1 spiky growth left, which i would be really happy to have later and i cant take on 20 cold wight using just turn undead, but....theres still an ace up my sleeve. I saved the necklace of missiles (5 charges) which shoots out 6d6 fireballs with a HUGE area of effect; this is stolen from Oswald btw and isnt really worth selling for 800gold (in my case at least).
Well you can see where this is going...i use 1 entangle at the chokepoint to clog the works then use the necklace three times to kill all but 3 of the wights who get an arrow +1 each for dessert. The huge aoe makes sure i hit all the wights, plus i kill off the blast skeletons before they get into dangerous range

Now for the (ch)easy part: I go invisble with a FMCleric (lvl7) and turn/explode all the poison zombies near presio and her apprentice, who are both remarkably uninmpressed by all the meat flying around the place. Then im playing shephard and "guide" the imbued wights (you know those nasty guys shooting magic missiles when they see you) to my group waiting outside. Why? While they are fleeing they dont use their magics and they will only melee back once you engage them. That way i can save my single Shield spell for the yuan-ti mages on level 4 or 5. Mopping up Presio, "Warrior" (great name) and the eventually appearing apprentice is childs play and so we can finally move onward with another batch of nice loot in our packs. (9days 17hours)

This is how far i've gotten so far and i have to say its really quite straining but still fun. If you have any questions, suggestions, criticism whatsoever let me know...ill keep this updated anyway i guess.

Hey there here's a little update on my progress:

I've just smacked Yxunomei at exactly 10 days ingame (with 7d8h travel time, 8h sleeping...man these guys are amped

I didnt rest/grind but met quite a few enemies randomly respawning after reloading (they're always alone though, so its not that bad) which put me at ~255000xp per char before facing her. So here's how i got to her...


DRAGON'S EYE LVL4: Mendacious Monk Monastery (~5hours, maybe even more)

So...i made a few half-assed attempts over the weekend which ended up with wasting a lot of time on this level. This could well have been avoided if you remember one thing: every time you reload the "High Summoner" will cast some lizards or trolls....so reload/save/reload/save has to be avoided if you dont like being swarmed and raped....

The first fight with all the wimpy monks and a few yuan-tis and trolls was resolved by casting grease two times in the hallway where most of the monks (fast) get shot down after which i kite the rest till dead.

Now comes the annoying part: As soon as you get spotted by any of the yuan-ti elites, 4 yuan-ti mages will get spawned (at least on insane not sure about core) in different locations - all near the high summoner).
They have MR, good saves, cast stoneskin 1st round and protection from normal missiles (i hate you) in the second regardless of where you are in the map...after that they come for you, closely followed by trolls and more elites with extreme good hitting capabilities. Then theyll happily debilitate your party or just dire charm them after which they bomb you with magic missiles/melfs/vitriolic sphere --- needless to say this makes you dead very fast on insane.
On top of that they are followed some summons (or a lot if you save/reload) and pretty deadly archers with +1 arrows.
So my ranged attacks are useless, i barely have 10 arrows +1 left...its fucked.

But nevertheless i tried and tried and what worked for me was coming in from the southeast killing the first mage before he can get anything off, along with the archer.
Then i cast stinking cloud (not very effective because of their double protection - good saves and magic res. ...but they stay in there while casting so with luck - Tymora be with you... - its of use) and after all the mages showed up i beg to make my saves against dire charm or feeblemind and cast dispel magic.

Sounds easy but it took SO DAAMN LONG ILL NEVER DO IT AGAIN AAAAAAAHHHH.
So after an almost unbearable amount of tries everything works as planned and im even luckier than i could have hoped for....all of the remaining mages (3) get dispelled, my stinking cloud takes out 2 of them and most of the archers, while i just slaughter everything in a matter of a few rounds - hmm sounds just like what happened the 100 times before that

The High Summoner is force talked (gimme a break) so i can kill his goons before listening to his empty threats...the adventurers have a bad day too and are forced, or should i say force-talked, to hand over their shiny gear and gold.
I know its lame, but i was so annoyed by the mages i just wanted to go on without further interference.
Weeehhh now i really want to say Yxu thank you for all the fun

DRAGON'S LEVEL 5 : Yxunomei's Stronghold (1h50mins)

I guess i was lucky here with the time, but this really felt a lot easier than the last level. Also my bard hit 220000xp/turned into infinite healing machine right before the high archer room.
I didnt really use any special tactics here, i just let everybody use ranged weapons and was very lucky with killing off the archers all over the level...most of them only got off 1 shot...i had over 250 arrows +1 /65 arrows+2 before Y.

The fight with the many priests was resolved using the enthralling song of the bard and running away / shooting as usual. I usually forget about that ability and it could have been of use on the previous level (it makes enemies stand in place for few round unless attacked...gained at lvl9)

The last guards before Yxunomei are taken out by sneaking forward with a thief to disarm the many traps and give sight for a devastating horror (at least after a couple reloads which incapitates all archers, 1priest and 1 one of the melees.

The Boss Battle doesnt really make it that much harder. I cast 1 of my 2 remaining webs and the last entangle into the big archway. After Combat starts i immediately(!) let the rest off my group open fire on the 3 appearing yuan-ti mages so they wont pose any threat (you will likely get devastated if even one is left alive). During that, i let my fig/druid cast her last spiky growth into the death zone created in the doorway. Yxu will come into sight shortly thereafter to annoy you with some weak undead summons...which is good because she takes at least some damage during that. The Rest of her minions are likely to get stuck which gives you some rounds to smack her down....i just change everybody to melee while my fighter/thief starts firing +2 arrows...as soon as she tries to attack someone prone to die (everybody actually in this fight) i run away with that char to buy some precious time.
She dies fast as expected and it only took me 3 tries...which left me thinking whether i could have saved the web... but screw this, im going home guys!

Yxunomei dies at exactly 10days 0 hours ... i like round numbers

CHAPTER 6: Lower Dorn's 19days 6 hours (8h rest)

I dont know, everything after Dragon's Eye felt kind of easy...i didnt use a single spell or buff except the bards song for regen/+2ac/10%res which is on all the time. Using this and gear i can boost the slash res. of my fighter/thief to a whopping 95%. This effectively turn Giants, Sentries and many other strong enemies and even bosses in the game who would normally chunk you in 3-4 hits on insane into helpless wussies....it's possible to go over 100% percent, but i don't have the needed items yet. I'm pretty sure they start healing you then... thanks guys!

I dare say you could actually complete the whole game without resting if you're patient enough in the early parts and probably use an even more combat oriented party (single classed warrior types +bard)...i dont regret having casters though because i will probably do a slightly more normal playthrough in HoF mode ...after gaining the bard's song there is no battle you couldnt win, at least as far as i can think of.
I have to say though that i have never played TotL (i guess its supposed to be hard at any lvl?) so far and i can hardly remember HoW as its over ten years ago i played it (+ i was 12 or something back then)

But....seeing as my party is now awake for more than 2 days of raw game time (which means close to fatigue, i minimize game time by pausing a lot) and i will have to wait for three days to get the shield from Dirty Llew...i will probably rest soon but i could probably just collect all the badges and whoop Big B's red butt with quaffing a few potions at most and maybe a haste just to make sure (i still have 2 memorized from my first and only rest).
However, my completionist urges don't allow this ^^...so ill just go clearing out the rest of the badge bearers and then take a nap until that lazy dwarf is done. I also do the "Voice of Durdel Anatha" and "Markets Ring" (req. some waiting too for the ring to be duped) quests from Unfinished Business.

After being technically ready for Poquelin and the Endgame the plan will be as follows:

- take dirty llews shield with me
- finish the arboretum/ give evayne's journal to larrel in the severed hand (i walk from wyrms tooth to upper dorns to save travelling time
-from there i get teleported to kuldahar
-let orrick craft rhino shield (UB)
-collect reward for the voice of durdel anatha (UB)
-go to HoW without waiting for the shield to be finished

This has the disadvantage that i wont be able to get Singing Blade of Aihonen in this run and i wont have Pale Justice before finishing how+totl either because of the way its handled in UB (i will only get it when i travel to lower dorns again after kuldahar).
There are however two items you can get in HoW instead to have Conlan craft you a helmet and an armor after you return to the main game (item upgrade mod!)....so its a fair bargain if you plan on doing HoF after the 1st run or do HoW early.

FINISHED: 45 days 12 hours (30days travel, ~9 days waiting for items crafted, 2 "real" rests)

Weee I just finished TotL, Icasaracht and Belhifet all in one go and the rest of the game was a breeze really.
All in all I did 2 effective rests after which i used spells (1x before dragon's eye, 1x before going to how after gathering the badges) the rest was travelling or waiting for some crafted item to be finished.
I think there's no real need to explain anymore....so I'll just say that THIS GAME IS EPIC AND BEAUTIFUL even after all those years!!! ;D
Really liked the TotL maps too, they were a nice challenge, looked pretty nice and were simply something new...the only official IE content i havent played so far....
Damn...that was so awesome i think ill have to play all the others (bg,torment,iwd 2) too now...man these games are just the best and simply timeless. I mean, by now NWN1 is pretty fugly ....whereas those games have barely aged a day.

Greetings and have a nice Sunday