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Hol-

-Der(p)

[Stworca]

Is this the one I think it is? The really, really irritating one?

The one which you can not win even with cheating, if you don't know what to do. Braeudynael the drow.. or whatever his name was. The time-stop-immune, always-invisible, untouchable, unkillable mage with endless spells. A parody fight that you're not supposed to even try to win.
I've beaten it back in 0.91 version  We will have Sleep-O keep one of the items (outrage, i know, but it's the least cheesy one i'm after for him)

I'm interested to see how you'll handle the Pontifex quest

You mean the quest-quest? The ritual?
Or the combat during quest?
I actually wrote a guide on that one, my friend. There is a reason why i'm postponing it to AFTER underdark. I don't want to fight Ira'Kiou'Dneg as we have too many dragon fights ahead of us anyway. Besides, he is not affected by "More hp for dragons" SCSII element, and drops quite easily. Here you can see him dead even before the golems. With a bioware party (+ Amber) no less.
I may beef up his HP though, and show off the fight. He has some very nasty abilities after all, and is often considered to be the "Top" dragon. But we will see more dragons later.. Many, many more, at once, no less.

Right now i'm focused on Nalmissra though.

[Stworca]

I bet some observant viewers have already found the Nalmissra fight  Still i will 'officially' add it to the LP in a bit.

For now i am facing a rather serious problem. Mainly the end boss affects and scripting..
As it is the end boss is absolutely immune to all magic removing effects. From low rank dispel magic to level 9 spellstrike. This is a major problem, because the boss spams stoneskins and protections. Thus it's impossible to kill him without cheese.

If you want it in numbers : He casts PFMW (read : invulnerability) every 36 seconds. It lasts 24 seconds. In the 12 seconds left you have to take down 2 stoneskins (20 successful attacks against an AC of around -18) and after that drop his 400 hp. (another 15-20 successful attacks. All that in the 12 seconds) before he casts another PFMW. If you fail, he will regenerate. At the moment we don't even have enough attacks per round to be able to pull something like that off, even if we scored each and every one. In short : You are supposed to be able to dispel his protections.

There is one non-cheesy way to stop his damned unremovable I-WIN buff chain, it involves chain contingency, lot's of powerful spells unleashed at once. However.. it completely screws up his scripting, making him just go into melee and do nothing else.

This means that i'd have to either kill a pathetic boss that does nothing, or face a cheesy, retarded version of what he should be, that will not get damaged by the party for the entire duration of the fight.

To summ it up, if i will be unable to fix this problem we will SKIP Demogorgon, or at least delay him until late ToB. This is very unfortunate, but i despise cheesy, "fake" difficulty increase, and unremovable buffs do exactly that.

I'm sorry for not posting Nalmissra yet, but i have to know what to do with Demo before i do so.

Regards

[Stworca]

Edit : I managed to "fix" demogorgon enough for the fight to take place. Updates will be posted today! We're three steps away from chapter 4!

[Stworca]

Current Party

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Tech Info

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

A very, very fun fight that is all about positioning, control and target picking. When done correctly, this fight ends in a minute and you move on to the next boss. When done incorrectly, the fight ends in a minute and you have to reload.

The enemies in this fight are :

Nalmissra. Seducer. Access to nice protection spells, like Improved Invisibility, Stoneskin, Protection from Magical Weapons, Fireshield, Spell Turning. She casts some arcane spells, drains levels with each hit and can charm your characters, turning them hostile.
Y'Tossi. Marilith. Hits like truck, hits very fast, has TONS of protective abilities. Teleports around. Summons more enemies. He moves very, very, very, very? very. slowly. Deal with him as last, always.
Hive Mother. A beholder that can cast the entire mage spellbook WHILE firing rays at you and dispelling your spells. If a mage is focused by her, the mage will end up useless, and then dead. You must kill the Hive Mother as first, and fast.
She starts the fight with Improved Mantle. Carsomyr, Staff of Magi or Unholy Reaver will take it down in one hit. If i didnt have it, i'd have to use breach, waste time with my mage, endanger the entire fight and relo.. wait, it's an ironman run!

Xei is a regular fighter. He has some HLA's. Deals tons of damage, and moves very quickly. His magic resistance is the lowest. The only possible target for skull traps.
Priestess Zuaviir a regular end-ToB-level priestess. Drow, so she also packs insane magic resistance. She can cast mass heals and all HLA's in the world.
Huntress. A great archer and a great fighter. Has HLA's. Tons of health. Tons of healing potions.

CH3 Part 13a : Exorcise the demons : Nalmissra party BOSS FIGHT

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The party was very close to the bottom level of Watcher's Keep, the inner chambers where Imprisoned One has been sealed. First, however, they had to break the seal protecting the chamber, and fight the ancient guardians. Machine of Lum the Mad has opened the portal and Stworca.. blindly went inside, without any preparation. After all he has just lost a dear friend and ally. Loss of Monskine and 3 left a heavy burden on the party, but also sparked determination.

On the other side, they've found the great seal, and their reactions were full of surprise, amazement and fear..

Unbekannt : This is it? I expected something.. grander..
That's what SHE said!
Brunch : Who? There is no woman here.
(to himself) ..Damn! I forgot that Monskine died.

After carefully examining the seal, wise party members have decided to leave it for now, until they rest, heal and prepare for whatever hellish creatures the guardians may be..

..No one would be mad enough to challenge the most powerful foes they could imagine without resting first. Especially if they were bloody and battered from previous encounters, lost valuable allies in dragon flames, and..

..oh for the love of..

Nalmissra and her party. Positioning, awareness and target picking decide whether you live or die. 1:27 long video.

[Stworca]

Current Party

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Tech info

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Demogorgon was supposed to be the perfect ending to Watcher's keep, and a very challenging, yet classy boss. I know not why DavidW has made his protections undispellable, and his scripting possible to ruin in a thousand differend ways.

Demogorgon starts with a powerful pre-buff, and immediately starts casting unique, uber-summon spell that brings five protections-spamming 400hp demons (basically pain to kill) and keeps summoning new ones every XX rounds.
Taking down his protections too fast can result in his scripting to skip the summoning phase, and go to "buffing" phase. However, SCSII puts his entire scripting into "buffing" phase, and thus breaking his spells too early results in buggs.
So does interrupting his first summon spell.
So does a thousand other things.

I'm using Chain Contingency to take care of the timing for me, and managed to record this encounter bug-free.. We still can not take down his stoneskins in any way other than beating on him though, but all other spells behave normally.

We can not survive Demogorgons attacks for long. We can not defeat the adds. We can not survive the adds for long. We have to kill Demogorgon, and do it fast.

Asylum awaits.. Or does it?

CH3 Part 13b Exorcise the demons : Demogorgon the Pathetic, Bugged and Cheesy BOSS FIGHT

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Alaya : Before you go into that portal, know that you will have to defeat the Imprisoned one in order to open the portal to Brynnlaw

To where?

Alaya : To the island where Asylum is located.

Unbekannt : That was refreshing! Should we go through the portal now?
Brunch : Wait..
Unbekannt : What is it?
Brunch : Their items were powerful, and could aid us in our quest.
Good thinking! Nothing cheers me up more than some plundering after work!
Unbekannt : What about Monskine?
I know not what cheered her up.
Sleep-O : Sleep-O thinks w-
Enough with the jokes, Sleep-O!
Brunch : Is there nothing we can do to bring our fallen friends back? Ochita? 3? Monskine?
Let me think..
Is there, sweetie?

Alaya : You'd have to visit hell itself, and bring them back with you. *smirk*

I know nothing of such a magic. Unless we...
Sleep-O : Go to hell!
How do you know that?
Sleep-O : Sleep-O?
Brunch : Who are you anyway, my dwarven friend? Your knowledge answered all the difficult questions we faced so far, yet..
Sleep-O : Sleep-O touch portal, fight, not talk.
Unbekannt : What is the Imprisoned One, anyway?
Sleep-O : ..Demogorgon.. *portal sound*

Demogorgon the Bugged. Demogorgon the Cheesy. Demogorgon the "touch me, and my scripting falls apart". Demogorgon the 1:24 video length. (loud music, turn the volume down)

End of Chapter 3

[Stworca]

Before someone observant asks : Yes, we have taken all of Brunch equipment with us. No way i'm leaving all those flails, shields and maces behind! 

Chapter 4 will start in just a bit. I have to edit the intro video and create characters that will be joining us. One of them waits for quite a while, the other got lucky that people don't join our suicidal train too often and we had a vacant spot.

I've killed Firkraag and Kangaxx off screen. Firkraag is less powerful than Saladrex, so there is no need to fight him. Kangaxx is pathetic when compared to the WK lich, besides, demi-liches are boring, so there was no need to record it either. Firkraag and Kangaxx were two very important SoA enemies, but worry not, we;re not out of the woods yet.
As a matter of fact, things will only get worse and worse. The easy part is over.

Chapter 3 was very, VERY boss-heavy. Now things will change. Bosses will be more rare (expect none for quite a few updates), but each one of them will be very likely to end our adventure. There is a total of 5 major bosses on our way to ToB. One of them may appear multiple times, who knows..
And only one boss between us and Ust'Natha....

Heavens have mercy, because the drow city will show none.

Oi 

[Burnt Pies]

Is Brunch revivable? I noticed he died, but I'm not sure what happens with running away from fights with dead party members.

Still enjoying this, looking forward to seeing how well/badly we do in the next chapter.

[Stworca]

Yes, we can resurrect him with no problems. Then again, everyone is revivable.

Comments, both positive and negative, are as always welcome. I learn as i go, so to speak, but i can not improve  if i know not what to improve.

Intro video for chapter 4 should be ready soon.
There is a certain epic villain with amazing voice acting that we haven't seen in a while.

One quick info about the current poll : In the long run it does not matter how we get to the Asylum, but depending on which choice we pick, a few updates will be completely different.

Oi!

[Monks]

i refuse to make indepth comments before my new character is in the game!

[Stworca]

i refuse to make indepth comments before my new character is in the game!

In-depth comment from you? Ha! I swear, if i wasn't sleeping with your daughters you wouldn't even get on tha- wait, you didn't know?
Ummm.. yeah.. you cool with that?



Edit : Now what the three-legged table? Vote tied? Come on people, i'm waiting in anticipation for a result 'ere!
Arr!

[Monks]

if only i had a daughter

[marxistplot]

Mad? Nah, he's just misunderstood. On the other hand, I love Waltzing

[Ochita]

Oooh.

Make a female monk.

Name it Ochita.

Improved whirlwind.

[Stworca]

Oooh.

Make a female monk.

Name it Ochita.

Improved whirlwind.

I'd rather have you pick a different name, because who knows, the dead may come back at one point.
Once someone dies you're first in the Q.

I haven't played a monk since... Pen and paper! 

We will not be using HLA's in SoA, with the exception - maybe - of the end boss.

Mad? Nah, he's just misunderstood. On the other hand, I love Waltzing

If Stworca ever started a Waltzing band it'd be called "Handicapped children in a deathlock"

If someone hasn't voted yet - do so! You have time till the next update is posted.

[Ochita]

Its quite amazing really, my party of game characters is so.. mild compared to this.

Then again, having a monk was one of the strongest things in ToB.

I could kill a city full of mercenaries.
So much fun.