My playthru of TOEE/Co8

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I wouldn't recommend it, wizards get the feat for free IIRC. You could just hire an NPC wizard to do that for you.

 

Hmmmm, perhaps having Zaxis take scribe scroll to generate gold would work. I could burn his XP down to closer to everybody else and then pay for Meleny's crafting that way. I'll test if I can make gold that way.


That turned out to be a bust too. Cure Mod cost 75 and sold for slightly more than 50.

 

Your appraise needs to be maxed (at your level) to pull that off, and some scrolls are more expensive than others. Don't forget that Appraise is also an INT skill, not CHA.

 

Well my rogue is my appraise spec, she maxes it and her Int is her second highest ability. It just wasn't benefiting me to bother trying to sell any crafted items.

 

Try crafting a wizard spell scroll instead and selling them to Burne. You actually get selling higher prices from certain NPCs, usually the ones who would be interested in the item you're trying to sell.

 

Inspire Competence improved the sale value of Cure Mod to 54 of the 75 it cost to create.

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Ah ha, that worked. Got about 109 for a 75 gp Invisibility scroll from Burne's vender, good call. So that plan could work, and it would let me toss out some cure scrolls for a few key fights too.

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This makes me wonder if there isn't a vendor who would buy the stat enhancement items at a better price. But this is a good go.

And while I'm at it, thanks for taking the time to explain it to me until it sunk in.

 

Nah you're doing a lot of this stuff on your own while I offer admittedly vague advice.
It's been years since a did a full playthrough of ToEE.

 

Well I had a weird idea for a group that I wanted to try based on my own strangenesses and it completely broke the standard doctrine of Fighter/Cleric/Wizard/Rogue + what-ever support character seems interesting + companions that seem interesting. I think I'll try it like this, with Zaxis crafting scrolls for fun and profit and Meleny adding Craft AnA so she can turn all the Masterwork Weapons I've been finding into elemental weapons for a bit - THEN taking Craft Wondrous for the rest of the stuff. I'm still going to have to cheat completely and console command a +2 cha cloak for Zaxis unless I decide to just adjust his charisma upwards a little bit. Either way it needs to be at least 16 before he reaches L7 and gains his 4th level spells because he doesn't gain a caster slot without it until L8. But with turning him into a scroll whore his advancement will slow down for a while. I am guessing that there's some items to be found inside the temple, but I'm trying to get as many of the peripheral quests like Grud's Fish Story done so that Ah Fong opens his masterwork Monk weapons up. I have played PnP for a long time and I'm more used to the idea of purchasing a few items like the Gauntlets of Ogre Power and so on fairly early on. Going for what is normally very expensive elemental weaponry as crafted items runs a bit counter to what I'm used to. But I could see for instance how very useful the +1 Holy Sword I got from marrying Meleny was in it's damage output - so that proved your concept of elemental weapons coming up early. Especially when they start throwing groups of four trolls and 3 willowwhisps and so on as random outdoor encounters. One part of me STILL wonders what I'd have found on those other adventurers I ran into just out of Nulb.

The wandering monsters tend to have trash for loot - if I'm lucky enough to find that even, so the adventurer's probably had the best loot to gain in the game for a wandering encounter.

I always find it amusing when they run you into a fellow adventuring group with the potential to fight them and loot them or play to your GOOD alignment and let them go.

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Ok so here's my current self-debate: I found out that Serena's sister Riana can be recruited at the whorehouse IF you have Serena in your party and you pay for her freedom. She starts out as an L2 rogue but her charisma is higher than Zaxis so it would be feasable to multiclass her into bard. I'm trying to use the console commands to cheat as little as possible, but it might make a bit of sense to give her XP so she can level up a couple times to keep up with the rest of the group and give her 2 levels of bard right away. It will take a bit, but eventually she should end up as a better bard than Zaxis because of the higher Cha despite starting out as rogue2 and several levels behind him. I picked him up to help with the moathouse and with everything that's happened he's barely L6 at my last major save point.

Although I found a good usage of Zaxis as a scroll crafter I'm getting a bit tired of his voice and wondering if it wouldn't be a good time to off-load him. In fact I'm considering backing up all the way to when I completed the moathouse so I can collect Serena and Riana almost as soon as I get to Nulb. If I did that Riana should be well on her way to catching up to Zaxis by the time I get back to around where I am currently - exploring the Earth node level of the temple.

I am also debating if I want to dump Elmo from the party, but I'm wondering what I'd replace him with. I don't have an extra Male PC to marry Fruella and her throwing cleaver.

 

You can simply create a level 1 PC from the inn to marry Fruella and then dump him after you get the weapon (D&D version of a greencard/cleaver wedding).

If you're going to get rid of Zaxis you might as well use up all his XP for crafting stuff.

 

I figured that if I went directly from finishing off the moathouse to Nulb and got Serena and Riana then most of my party would be L4 and those two would be L3 and L2 respectively, so they'd only be slightly behind the curve. And at that point Zaxis didn't have craft scrolls yet since he was still L5. Having him burn xp on craft scrolls tho was about the only good reason to keep him. Eventually I can have Riana take Craft Scrolls though. I wonder if you can make out good on craft wands though? But Burne's apprentice only takes scrolls I presume. And the small problem with trading out a toon would be that I'd have to remove one of my current PCs to do it. It would only be a small XP loss though. I wonder tho if she's actually worth having? Or am I better off keeping Elmo and his magic gear and cleave feats?

From what I've seen is that you can't swap starting gear on the companions so that for instance you can have your Craft AnA person enchant stuff. I'd have to find another battle axe and enchant that for Elmo, and with Fruella's "Cleaver" being a unique weapon you are kinda stuck with it right? She won't trade it to you so you can enchant it correct?

 

If you can work with her personality Fruella's actually almost as good as Elmo (minus the magical gear).

Wands can be pretty expensive so that could work. Burne also accepts magical items.

 

Does he give as good a prices as for scrolls?

 

Ok, thanks for that link, it helps a lot to see who is who and what they can do and stuff. It also leaves me wondering how to arrange my next party so I can pick up some of the other interesting companions like Pishella.

So, I decided to backtrack all the way to when I finished the Moathouse, then make a run out to Nulb and grab Serena and replace Zaxis with Serena's sister Riana, who I am turning into a Rogue2/Bard2+. I figure that with her higher charisma ultimately she'll make a better bard than Zaxis once she has a few more levels under her belt. I may have her pick up craft scrolls, or maybe wands, and turn her into the party money-maker, which might sound a bit odd considering her previous career was whore. Then when Meleny reaches L6 I'll have her get Craft Arms and Armor and enchant all the Masterwork Weapons everybody is carrying.

I did have one thought. If monks can flurry with clubs, then having a monk flurry with Lareth's Club of Striking should work. I might have to try that out. But I'm not entirely sure how to tell if it's working or not.

So I managed to cajole the two frontmen for the Earth and Fire priests in Nulb into hooking me up and currently I'm running around the Earth level cleaning house of junk while working up the nerve to do the last two quests in Emrydy Meadows and the one in Imeryds Run. I'm probably close enough now to pull them off, but I'm inclined to wait another level. But completing those will get me about back to where I was. That is after I mop up the two Temple recruiters and their thieving GF. AND LOOT THEM.

And interesting bit. I ran into a fight and because Riana seemed to be having too much fun chatting with some frienemies she didn't bother to follow us to the fight, and then she couldn't get around the frienemies to join us AT the fight.

So I finally went on a rampage and killed all the frienemies on the Earth Temple level: all the bugbears and gnolls and human troops, just for the heck of it. Hopefully that doesn't come back to haunt me, but on a previous run the fights to free the prisoners got several of those mobs to attack me afterwards so I figured I'd try that again. Everybody but Elmo and Serena went up a level. Meleny made L6 and got Craft AnA and converted a bunch of masterwork weapons into +1 weapons so nearly everybody has at least one. I also did a level shift and figured out that some areas are just beyond my poor little party - right now.

Bit of confusion between these two paragraphs, they basically describe the same thing, but each has some elements the other does not and I'm not quite sure how to edit them to make better sense right now.

Edit: So just to resolve that issue and clear the area of undesirables I mopped up all the generic mobs in the Earth Temple, leaving the Earth Priest and his people at the center. Everybody except Elmo and Serena went up a level - which means I now have Meleny crafting arms and armor - converting all the Masterwork items in the party to +1 magic as I can afford it. I still might have to have somebody figure out Wondrous Items, but I suppose that this will have to wait until Meleny is L9. I'd hate to have HER expending all sorts of XP on crafting and end up seriously gimped though, but I don't really have much choice for anybody else as a replacement who could craft as much useful stuff. On the other hand I need a way to get THREE charisma cloaks with having two Sorcs and a Bard in the party.

After the massive level-up from cleaning house on the Earth Node level of the temple I went out and cleared the three main quest battles starting with the one against the undead priest and his bodyguards at the colorful rock at Emrydy Meadows. I set up with several defensive spells after positioning my team with main fighters near where the priest usually shows, secondary fighters to the south and sides and casters outwards a decent distance, then had Meleny use all of her summons, placing a large dire wolf in the middle of the area the skele's show up in and the others near that. Finally I had Riana start singing her song of courage and I had my ranger main trigger the encounter by snatching the stuff under the rock. The plan worked pretty much like a charm. When the priest showed up the dire wolf started mauling him, which got his bodyguards angry at the summoned dire wolf. Garret and Elmo came in at the priest from slightly north and put the hurt on him, and the rest of my party and the summons and animal companions focused on tearing the skeles up. The fight lasted perhaps all of four rounds. I then returned Terjon's artifact for a bit of XP and a promise to cut prices at the church, which might come in handy if I suffer a char death. Also, I realized that the evil Zugg Icon was under the rock, not in the pocket of Lareth as I'd thought. So that too goes into the Extraplanar Box on the theory that it just might prove to be more useful than the 28 gold selling it un-Identified earns.

While in town I took a rest-break to replenish all the spells I used, then headed out to Imeryds Run to catch Grud's Gar. I couldn't pre-prep for that one, but I followed the tactics that worked last time: Had Meleny back away from the big frogs and throw out summons starting with her largest. My Sorceress has Fireball now so when the Sea Hag and Lizardman friends started showing I dropped a fireball into their midst and that pretty well settled that problem. Elmo made short work of the Sea Hag, and Serena managed to charm one of the Lizzi's who helped finish off the Hag. The King Frog managed to swallow Meleny, but he died almost immediately after and Meleny was rescued. Then we looted the fine fine stuff inside the King Frog and moved to find the Gar. Oddly enough again there was a lone Lizardman off to the side, but all alone he wasn't much of a threat. The Giant Gar on the other hand was determined to eat Elmo and my party somehow got itself in a spot where we could trigger the fight but had to do a massive run around the terrain to get anywhere near the fight were we could support it at all. Elmo nearly died before I could get a healer anywhere near him but in his final burst Elmo finished the gar off and we returned to Nulb to rest and identify the magic gear from the King Frog - I had spent so much gold on enchanting I couldn't even identify it all right away because of the nominal cost to use the Identify spell. And of course to return the Gar head to Grud. Entertainingly enough the charmed Lizzie followed me back to my home in Nulb, and after the rest he got scared and attacked us and we had to put him down. I wonder if Lizardman legs taste at all like frog legs?

With that I made sure all of my folks and pets were fully recovered and went back to Emrydy Meadows to ambush the giant and bear. First I had my whole team switch to ranged weapons, then had my halfling rogue stealth in until she could see the bear. Then my ranger stealthed in and threw entangle into the area in the hopes of slowing the enemies down. Next Meleny threw her Dire Wolf summoning right next to the bear so they could tear at each other and began following up wit her other summons as possible. Finally I moved in and pelted the bear to death. The Giant jumped out just as the bear died, he ran right through the entangle, which I kind of expected since it's a strength test to break out and he has massive strength. The various summons all jumped him and somehow he became fixated on running a tag match with Kaunyin - who with her four levels of monk and fairly high tumble just ran away though he gave her a pretty good wack, there was just no way he was ever going to get close enough to her to finish the job. And we finished him off by turning him into a pointy squirrel. Then we returned the head to Smythe for a chance to see HIS really good stuff.

Now I'm wondering on some follow up. I explored one of the other floors of the temple but it was all squads of Ogres with an Ogre Shaman and lots of Trolls, all just a tad much for my party atm. So I need to find access to a level with easier prey. And earn enough XP and gold for more enchanting. I figure that once Riana has reached L6 I'll have her take up either scroll or wand crafting depending on if the wands sell well to Rufus' dealer. I might have to console cheat tho to give both crafters enough XP to be ABLE to craft without falling too far behind the rest of the party. But Meleny and Serena and Riana are all combat support, not frontline combat troops like Elmo, so if they lag a level or two it might not hurt too much. We'll see how that goes.

Ok, so Riana just made L6: Rogue2/Bard4 and I got her scribe scrolls so she can toss out arcane scrolls to Burne's Vendor-girl to make us some money, she turned her spare XP into about 1.5k gold so not too bad to start with. I need a LOT more though before I can start adding elemental damage to my weapons. And the Holy Sword +1 has a monster cost to improve it. Not going to afford that for a very long time.

So I'm thinking my next step is picking a fight at the hotel where Wat and Rentsch work so I can kill them off for their loot.

 

Well after a lot of running around the inside of the temple and doing a few quests here and there for the priests I found the prisons on the south-west side of the temple and started freeing prisoners, this required fighting the guards and caused many other formerly passive guard forces in the area to become unfriendly. Additionally it seems to have put the Earth Priest on high alert and he moved inside the Earth Temple proper and locked up. I decided that if guards were going to start attacking me I was going to just mop them all up for XP and loot and be done with them all. But with the temple on lockdown I can't complete a lot of the other quests without fighting the Earth Temple main forces. Not really sure I'm up to that if I can't handle the guard house. So I'm debating backing up to an earlier save and leaving the prisoners un-rescued until I clean house on the Earth Temple after completing every mission I can find that takes me there, or do I just bull through and not worry about the quests that might be left unfinished. Most of my party is now 8th level. I might go back to the guardhouse and try a few more tricks and see if I can't win it. I am thinking that if I can get my bard and sound burts along with my sorc and fireballs and a few invisibility scrolls between them I can pour enough area damage into the north end of the room to massacre the dratted archers in a few turns and then the fight should be mine. Maybe an invisibility on Meleny so she can drop her biggest summon behind the eastern group. Try to create as much chaos as possible in the first turn or two and then just have all my ranged casters use their bows to attempt to supress the witches and wizard while my melee team cleans up.

 

Yeah I do have a bit of a competitionist obsession. So I was trying to take that into account as to whether I should worry about completing many more Temple Priest quests. I've got a variety of items with "so and so's item" names tagged to them, I'm guessing those are quest-related so I've been hanging on to them until I can figure them out. A light mace is one for instance though I've forgotten the name associated.

Rofl, I was just thinking how your tagline fits The Major's boss in the Ghost in the Shell movie. During most of the movie he's very quiet-spoken, but during a big fight scene involving him he uses an armored briefcase as a shield to absorb incoming fire.

 

You are correct: Antonio's Mace, haven't found the quest it relates to yet but I figured it would probably come up during play if I wandered around enough.

I also kind of figured you were a lawyer or in a profession that "required" a large briefcase.

I had been advised to combine all of my posts that followed each other into one big post via edit, but I was curious about what other TOEE fans had to say about my run - though I'm doing a crappy job of making the story exciting - so I'm not sure how the advisement should work with a thread like this.

I'm also considering starting a different run with a Druid and Bard for MCs and picking up six followers: converting Fruella into a fighter/cleric since she as a pretty good wisdom, Elmo for main tank, Meleny for support and the Holy Sword, Pishella the mage apprentice for magical support. And then picking up Serena and her sister Riana from Nulb to round out with keeping Serena as main rogue and converting her sister into a Rogue/Sorc as arcane support. I am wondering if perhaps having Meleny take some multi-class levels in cleric so she would wear say the marauder armor to lighten her armor load (and still wear something cuter than plain old leather) - I was actually thinking of trying Monk with her but realized that she's have to be LN and she probably isn't.


Ok, so part of the idea with the new group is that my Druid MC could take craft arms and armor, the bard could get scribe scrolls for money making, Fruella possibly could take craft AnA to add Holy to a few things, Meleny could Craft Wondrous Items, Pishella could craft Wondrous Items to craft the things Meleny can't along with her native scribe scrolls. That way I'd be able to produce a LOT of magic items that feel like they are lacking in the game. Like all the attribute boosters except dex gloves.

 

Ok, so my final run at the guard-house. I started off before going in with a small number of buffs. Meleny cast Barkskin on my Garret - my ranger, my Tylwyth my sorc cast Mage Armor on Serena and herself then followed it up with Mirror Image on herself. Riana cast Invisibility on Meleny and Tylwyth, then started her song of Courage. Then I went in.

Instead of letting the captain banter while his guys cast buffs I interrupted and started the fight right away. Garret went first and destroyed one of the forward guards. Then Meleny summoned a grizzly right next to the right-side witch, and the bear more or less immediately ate her then proceeded to go after the crossbowmen. Tylwyth got off a fireball to the north that wiped out the bowmen and crossbowmen and heavily damaged the mage and some others. My ranger's hound went after the guy to the right side of the door and was doing poorly until Riana managed to charm the guard, who turned around and ran to help the grizz kill crossbowman and the hound followed to help. The three of them proceeded to destroy the east side group without needing any further support. Elmo went after the guard in the south-west corner and demolished him. Eshu my halfling rogue ran around and took on the northern witch solo until Elmo came around to help her with flanking and that witch went down after casting silence and raising one dead guard as a zombie before Eshu backstabbed her and Elmo finished her off. Kuanyin my cleric/monk closed in on the mage who was protected by mirror image and quickly reduced his images and pummeled him some - he'd been caught in the fireball but survived if just barely and she was keeping him really occupied. Meleny managed to summon a dire wolf right behind the mage flanking with Kuanyin. The Mage got so scared of the grizz that he wasted his fireball on the grizz which just made the grizz mad and it came after him and finished off his images, and then him. The guard-captain couldn't make up his mind who he needed to go after so he kept running around the room trying to reach somebody and then not getting a chance to actually swing at anyone. Eventually he ran over and tried to rescue the mage but he was too late and all the critters that were on the mage turned on him and finished him. None of my PCs or companions ever got a hit on him, it was all the grizz and the dire wolf and animal companions.

Garret took around 20 damage - about 1/3 of his HP and pretty much everybody else got through completely unscathed. So, yeah. Wow. After all the times I tried to fight this battle a level earlier and kept getting demolished this was a major change.

Of course the reward for this battle was: a +1 longsword, a +1 chainshirt, and a +2 large shield and a lot of trash gear. Boss chest had three potions that were barely worth the effort - and why you lock your three best combat-helping potions in a darned trapped chest I do not understand. I had real hopes for better than this, but oh well. It does seem like all of the gear that should be in the game has to be self-created, which is pretty bad. I have yet to see one item in the game that boosts an ability other than dexterity.