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Errh... I admit to never have used the druids capabilites and spells that often in the game, in spite of actually having gone trough the whole thing with an avenger, but last night I was forced to reload quite often when faced with the "Greatest of the cowled wizards".

Having triggered the encounter accidently I decided to use Jaheiras infrequently used spells.

First round. Jaheira¨casts insect plauge on the lead mage.

Second round. Jaheria summons 3 panthers.

Third round. First mage dead, in spite of having all kinds of protection spells activated. Ripped to pieces by panthers. Jaheira summons a fire elemntar.

Fourth round. Jaheira walks into the now desperate crowd of mages and casts dispel magic wich brings down most of their protective spells but also the insect plauge.

Fifth round. Mages tries cast spell but one is stomped by the fire elementar and the other killed by panthers. Jaheira casts insect plauge at the remaining and highest level mage who spent the round summoning new protective spells.

Sixth round. Jaheira casts dolorous decay at remaining mage who's starting to run around in panic. Slowed by the spell and heavily poisoned she doesn't last long against the panther and the massive elemntar.

And people think druids are no good. I agree that she was high level and all but I was completely unprepared for the fight and had died two times against the same encounter with my whole party. And Jaheira managed to kill the whole lot of them by herself. That's plain scary.

You should notice this earlier. Insect plague is one of the best mage-disable spell in the game. That spell is the only reason I kept Jaheira. Even drows (high magic resistance) and Ironecus can't resist this spell. USe it often and the whole game becomes way easy when you face mages.

As i wrote in a post for Cernd,druid offensive spells are powerful-i liked them a lot.Insect plague is one of the best spells.Even Firkraag had a bad time when he got affected by it (actually it killed him-Jaheira got the red dragon as the most powerful enemy she vanquished).

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"ÃçñÜóêù áåß äéäáóêüìåíïò"

Bill: You mean to say that the MIGHTY DRAGON was actually slain by a TINY INSECT?? Speaking about David and Goliath here ...

Wow, that oughta show me to be careful next time I smash a mosquito ...

[This message has been edited by Maurice (edited 12-18-2000).]

No Maurice,you needn't be careful! We are the heroes of the game and are therefore much smarter (i.e. smashing insects); if Firkraag was as smart, he would have fried those insects with one dragon breath! But then again, that would have made summon insects quite useless!

Phew ... thanks, Omar, for pointing that out. Yes, I'm smart, with my IQ of 200+ (oops, typo there ... ).

By the way, I forgot to see that Firkraag got SWARMED, while I will deal with at most one or two at a time ... I hope so anyway.

I did not realize that druids could be such BMFs. I now have to reconsider my views of them being a weak and pretty much useless class. Maybe next time through I will keep one around instead of letting them be killled and looting their bodies

Now all I need is someone to convince me that Bards are worth a damn....

Hex92

bards are evil spell up to enuf to summon stuff armor capablitys nice fightin is good blade nice choice

In defence of bards.
1/Early in the game what is the most annoying feature? That you can't identify everything you pick up IMO. Get a bard and you need never carry another identify spell (and Edwin can't).
2/Not enough money at the start? Bards out pickpocket ALL the NPC theives and so you have essentially unlimited wealth AND it is amazing what you can pickpocket early on.
3/Jester kit. Invisible bard plays bard song and enemies start attacking each other and does not dispell invisibility.
4/Magic Items. There are 4 bard only items and two of them are very powerful. No bard - no use.
5/Level 23 (with exp cap) even counting the lower hit dice with +2 H.P per level from 10 that's 26 H.P. Only fighters can better that with 30 H.P. from 9. Bard H.P at lvl 23 - 36 min to 106 max.
6/Sixth level mage spells. Mages need 750,000 exp to get them, bards need 1,320,000 and if you are a multi-classed mage (bard wannabee) you finish with 2 less sixth level spells than a bard! - Curdis

i agree with Curdis. bards definitly have ther uses. i myself like the blade kit. at high level my blade can shred up enemys pretty good for not being a fighter.

My blade kicks serious butt - duel wielding Daystar and Flame Tongue. With his affensive spin special he is like a wirlwind. Back that up with spells like stoneskin, mirror image, spirit armor and haste and he hardly gets scratched in combat.

I think a blade, used right, can sometimes go toe-to-toe with an equal level fighter. Sometimes.

for those of you attempting to believe a bard can face up to a fighter i refer you to this.

Scimitar +1 Shazzelim
STATISTICS:
Combat Abilities:
Any bard hit must make a saving throw vs. spells with a -4 penalty or die.

now what was that about blades?