GameBanshee Forums

Ok, for those of you who are very skilled and looking for a challenge, I would like to post a description of one battle that I faced in Improved Anvil (IA). Hopefully, this will help you decide whether you are up to the challenge. I think I did this when my party of 6 had approximately 3,595,500 XP, which equates to approximately level 20 in (IA).

The opposition (as best as I can judge with Near Infinity):

Monster 1: fighter 30/wizard 25; AC -7; 151 HP; THAC0 -9; str 19; resist fire, cold, electricity, and acid 100%; resist magic 60%; resist slashing, crushing, and piercing 55%; resist missiles 90%; immune to lower resistance, silence, and non-magical weapons (spams PfMW, if I recall correctly); increased casting speed

Monster 2 and 3: AC -9; 300 HP; THAC0 -4; str 25 (does apx 42 HP damage per hit; 12 of which can go through stoneskin); resist fire cold, electricity, acid, and missiles 100%; resist magic 80%; resist slashing, crushing, and piercing 90%; immune to many spells, stat kill, level drain, vorpal effects, lower resistance, timestop, and poison; hasted; will gate in Monster 4 or 5 and keep gating them in periodically as long as they survive; gated monsters appear immediately and attack in the same round

Monster 4+: AC 0; 120 HP; THAC0 1; str 25; resist fire, cold, electricity, acid, magic, and slashing 100%; resist crushing 90%; resist piercing and missile 75%

Monster 5+: AC -2; 150 HP; THAC0 1; resist fire, cold, electricity, acid, magic, and piercing 100%; resist slashing 90%; resist crushing 75%

Monster 6: fighter 17; 120 HP; str 18/86

Monster 7: fighter 11/mage 11; 80 HP; str 18/92

Monsters 8, 9, 10, and 11: conjurer 14; wizard 20; conjurer 17; conjurer 17

Monsters 12, 13, 14, and 15: mooks (like fighter 8/wizard 8) that will cause problems if you don’t protect yourself properly and may be targeted by your summons

Also you can expect the intelligent use of magic. Your mages will be killed by Power Word Kill if not protected. Triple Horrid Wiltings or Chain Lightnings are favorite contingencies. Sequences of nasty magic are also used. Additionally, even the melee is done intelligently. If the monster discovers his weapon is ineffective, he will switch targets. Sometimes, he will switch targets at random. So, the technique of baiting them with an invulnerable mage becomes difficult. Anyway, I was happy to survive this battle, but I bet some players could do it on Insane difficulty.

Incidentally, this is not reputed to be one of the most difficult battles in Improved Anvil…

Any of these monsters that can see through invisibility?

With that many mages on the field? Monster #1 responds with True Sight either as a prebattle buff or his first spell in the battle - I don't recall which. Monsters 2 and 3 can see through invisibility inherently.

Well, True Sight doesn't help against spell immunity divination. And Chain Contingencies doesn't break invisibility. But those biggies being able to see through invisibility kinda ruined that plan.

Or well, it depends on how they're standing. A few lower res followed by ~10 ADHD is nasty.

The intention of this thread was to spur interest in IA of the expert players and warn off those people who have never really experienced other tactical mods. Give IA a try Thrifalas.

The short answer is that your strategy will not work, but I am sure that you could develop a strategy that would. Spell Immunity divination will likely fall to the first Remove Magic that the F30/W25 casts - in IA you can have only one spell immunity active at a time. ADHD seldom works in IA as mages (through spell PfME) and many important monsters are immune. When ADHD works, it is usually against riff-raff. ADHD does not work well (or at all) vs Monsters 2 and 3, for instance. Also, you did notice that Monsters 2 and 3 are immune to Lower Resistance?

Nope, I misread it as that they do stat kill, time stop and such things against you. ^^

And no, I shouldn't give it a try. I don't play BG2 because I like fights that are hard for the sake of being hard, I like it because of the plethora of possibilities that is available due to things such as the amount of spells, the dual-class system, the HLA UAI and such things.

Needless to say, a fight that has monsters immune to everything you throw at them except for the exactly right combination isn't anything for me, unless I can somehow figure out a fun kind of way to take them out. Like 36 ADHD.

Thrifalas wrote:Nope, I misread it as that they do stat kill, time stop and such things against you. ^^

Fortunately not, those 42 HP whacks are enough to deal with.

My problem is that I have somewhat adapted to the difficulty of Improved Anvil. After that, other games seem too easy.

However, when I'm mentally dead or sick and just wanting some diversion, I sometimes wish for something in between in terms of difficulty. Something, a little less difficult than IA but perhaps a little more difficult than playing insane with some other tactical mods. Many IA battles are too much for me when I am not mentally focused.

Rough idea?

Excuse me for being totally noobish if you find so...

Never played IA either, although I did try reading up on what the mod does, of course that's hardly the same as having experienced it.

Heck, I don't even know what ADHD stand for... (Abi-Dalzim? But that'd be ADHW...)

Against #2 & 3. This seems to the main issue here? These guys are near invulnerable to almost everything and present themselves as being an obstacle to get to #1.

I do believe, reading from the description, it should not be immune to Harm? Although I do think that anyone going through the length to make this monster that uber might not have missed it, but if it is, having your clerics(s) throw 2 (to 4?) at them, that should ensure one hits, and then, it should be another tap by the cleric (or by area affecting HLA spells) before he goes down. Not sure how Harm works, if it might be considered and "instant kill" spell affect like so many it is immune to. Precasted with Hasted charge might be preferable. This gives up Heal, but then it might work better than to go on offense if it works. Requires at least 2 clerics (a lot of Harm) though.

Edit: Dumb question - Can they be Mazed/Polymorphed? Does "immune to lower resist" mean that Malison works?

Once down, should also settle #4 & 5?

#1... seems best to just throw multiple Finger of Deaths (or HLA spells I guess), anything that forces damage regardless of save. Halve of them should hit, while letting the melee guys pound him.

Summons, Malison, Wail of the Banshee, HLA spells for rest I guess...

While the offense portion is dealt with here, I do believe defense would be to raise protection against as many affects as possible I suppose.

Does this help? Sorry for the waste of a post if it doesn't.

shift244 wrote:Does this help? Sorry for the waste of a post if it doesn't.

Of course it helps, because it shows interest in this thread. I encourage everyone to try Improved Anvil if it peaks your interest. Do so now, because Sikret makes every new version harder than the previous one!

I have already beaten this encounter. I think I could beat it with consistency at easy and maybe core. My winning would probably be inconsistent (or never) at higher difficulty levels.

The posters have correctly identified the menace of Monsters 2 and 3. However, I don't think you really understand the depth of their menace. They are extremely hard to kill. Perhaps, they can be Harmed (not certain), but the cleric has to touch AC -9 and make it through 80% MR that can't be lowered. The monster is hasted and if it starts beating on the cleric, then the cleric will likely only have his single opportunity... Anyway, the big danger is that if they are not taken out soon, monsters 4 and 5 will start accumulating as Monsters 2 and 3 continuously gate them in every few rounds. That's real trouble!

At the same time, it's stupid to ignore a fighter 30/wizard 25. Even the lesser monsters will do things to prove to you they can't be forgotten either.

As I said, you have to be on your toes to play Improved Anvil and to continuously make optimal tactical decisions through long battles. Otherwise, you get to try the battle again...

PS: Harm spell is nerfed in IA. A save is allowed.