Playing Heart of Fury.... With or Without Tactics?

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Whats the best way to play Heart of Fury mode? With or without the Tactics mod installed? Also, whats the ideal average starting level for a HOF party?

Im looking for a challenge, but not an insanely difficult one where I need to reload 10 times to defeat a bunch of goblins.

 

Tactics actually makes HOF mode easier by introducing a major level-based bonus to AC & HP and so on for your characters to 'counterbalance' the tougher monsters.

HOF is designed to be tackled by characters that have gone through Normal mode first, ie. level 15+ is fine. With a bit of tactics & cheese, you COULD start it at level 1 and get your first kills with summons.

AC matters absolutely nothing in HOF mode unless you can break into the 50's and 60's range, and for 'good AC' you need to shoot into the 70's. If you can't, don't even bother. HP matters very little, too, considering you're expecting to see 30-50 damage non-critical hits heading your way regularly. Therefore, many people use summons as their tanks instead. And instead of blasting your opposition to smithereens with large caliper AoE spells, you'll be better served by buffing your own and debuffing the enemies and hacking away.

 

I have a team that I imported from finishing the game in normal mode. They just arrived at the 1st area of the Shaengarn Bridge:

Aasimar F4/P12
Half Orc F4/B13
Human Lathander 17
Human Monk of the Old Order 17
Tiefling Rogue3/Necro13
Wild Elf Bard3/Sorc13

Sir Rechet is right. I had to use summons to get the team out of Targos as the goblins are alot tougher to kill, but their drops are still the pathetic few gold pieces and/or a dagger. That threw me off at the start as it made me think that I was not in HoF. Someone on the boards mentioned that some of the puchases you make at the Gallaway Trade Depot are higher quality and that proved true. In normal, you get the "Heart of (character name)" sword which doesn't offer much. In HoF, you get the "Golden Heart of (character name)" sword which is much improved! (I'm trying to figure out how I'll be able to afford it before finally leaving Targos).

Speaking of AoE spells, at the first battle of the palisade, I cast "grease" and "web" between the burnt out building and the wall, then "cloudkill" and "minute meteors" on top of them. I thought I was far enough away from goblins/guards skirmish, but 1 of the guards wandered into the area during the battle. The whole town went red on me.

I avoided Tactics because I heard that it made things much more difficult. I think things are difficult enough as they are.

 

I was lucky enough to get two drops of Tymora's Loop in Normal mode! I think with the loops plus the Rabbits Foot added by Tactics (Or Neds Lucky Knucky), my couple of warriors should be doing pretty damn good damage during their crits, enough at least to make them useful in HOF. Ill definitely be looking at summons though. What're the best summons spells in HOF mode?

 

I used Greater Boneguard and Zombie Lord. The Boneguard was awesome.
Someone else mentioned using upper level spells like "Wail of the Banshee". My casters aren't quite there yet. Almost. But the Boneguard and Zombie did fine.

 

Unless you're playing with mods that seriously tweak the summons - ALL of them. Your summons are buffed the same way your enemies are so they can both dish and endure a lot of punishment.

Long time favorites include the Animate Dead (practically permanent summons) and the Shades family of spells (Shadow Conjuration, Greater Shadow Conjuration and Shades) that let you get top quality summons with your low level spell slots once you reach higher levels.

Contrary to what one might expect, some of the top of the line summon spells such as Cacofiend and Gate are actually much WORSE. You'll end up with an uncontrollable beast that does everything *but* the thing you'd want them to, and they aren't really any better than your controllable summons would.

 

"What are the best summons in HOF mode?"

The answer to this isn't entirely straightforward ...

1. Be careful of very high level generic MONSTER summoning spells, since they can summon a physically very large monster at times. (That is, really huge monsters like remorrahz, frost giants, rhino beetles, etc.) If you're outside, it's generally not an issue. But if you're inside, these very large monsters may not be able to leave the room you're in within the area, which can be rather annoying. A flipside to very large summons is that they make great meatwalls, since they're so hard for enemies to get around (without killing first).

Sometimes, if you're facing a very tough battle, you may want to take the risk of summoning a huge monster. But frankly, I've found that mid to low-ish level summons can be more than adequate if all you're looking for is some cannon fodder for your party's melee wall.


2. As Rechet mentions, you need to be wary of uncontrollable high level demon or elemental summons. That said, I actually feel that even an uncontrollable summons can be very useful, as long as you use it for a purpose that it can do without being controlled. Uncontrollable summons work best when summoned behind enemy lines to wreak havoc, rather than as cannon fodder for your own melee wall. For example, a great use of a demon summoning is in the battle against Saablic Tan. Just drop a demon summons right in his face, and ol' Saablic Tan will have to turn his attentions from your party to the demon.



3. Be aware that high level druidic ANIMAL summoning spells will summon elementals which are uncontrollable.


4. If you're looking to summon a monster or 2 when you enter a new area just for a couple of additional warm bodies to walk with the party, Animate Dead summons are best due to their long duration... though as you get over level 20, even other summons will start having very impressive durations...

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Actually, I'd also suggest that rather than using AoE damaging spells, it's better to use spells that are Will Save based, like Symbol of Hopelessness, Greater Command, and Mass Dominate.

Movement impeding spells like Grease, Web, Entangle (only works outside) are nice, but I've found that it's often best to combine two of them for the best results. After you've slowed an enemy mob, you can start dumping either standard nuking spells on them, or use slower, but often equally effective, spells like Cloudkill, Firey Cloud, Acid Fog, and so forth that do smaller amounts of damage over a great number of rounds. This is a particularly useful strategy in somewhat constricted territory.

 

Any levels with unused sorcerer spells. I quite like Monster Summoning I, for instance. Even a lowly dog or goblin can guard the rear of the party quite effectively.

-Max

 

*sigh* I've probably played through this game 20 times, including maybe a half-dozen times through HoF, and I don't recall ever recieving a Tymora's Loop. Ever.

(Though I don't reload areas in an attempt to get a better "random drop." I just play through and go with what I get).

 

In my experience, summons are not all that good at dishing out damage. A monster that does 50 HP of damage when it hits a PC, if Dominated, will only do ~20 HP of damage to other monsters that it hits. (It will also only take ~20 HP of damage from other monsters.) This has two consequences:

1.) Although DR for PCs is very nearly pointless in HoF, DR for summons is still quite good. A Greater Boneguard with DR 10 vs. slashing weapons is negating 50% or more of all damage.

2.) Monsters cannot kill each other very effectively, so your PCs can and should be "eggshells armed with sledgehammers," preferably ranged sledgehammers. If you rely on Mass Domination, you cannot rely on letting monsters whale away at each other for 50 HP a pop because they won't do that much damage--you must concentrate your troops on a small number of targets to kill anyone at all in a reasonable time.

In HoF, ironically, monsters are the best PC-killers and PCs are the best monster-killers.

-Max

 

Will agree. Summons and dominated monsters do pathetic damage in HOF. They're only useful as shields.

I don't do that either, I just got really lucky. Tymora's loop is awesome. I have my ranger using one of the loops and the Lucky Nucky and using her bow she's responsible for almost 60% of the party kills. I'm thinking of giving her the other loop too to further increase her effectiveness.