VII. [GMPLYS] Gameplay Strategies and Tricks

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Increase the Brightness Setting:

--------------------------------

The "normal" brightness setting is so dark that at times you can't see things

that should be quite obvious. So go into the Graphics options and move up

the Brightness and Contrast settings!

Save a Lot:

-----------

The most important strategy in the game: Save often!

There are 3 times when you should definitely save the game. When you win a

battle, before you go to sleep, and everywhere else. You never know when you

will go to a new area, have your best warrior charmed, and have half your

party killed. So save often. Also don't just save over the same slot over

and over, use at least 10 slots. This also means you should probably avoid

the Quick Save. Well... not avoid, just don't use it exclusively.

What I would do is to create an "Archive Save" whenever you enter a new major

area. So when you get to the beginning of a new area save it as "Starting

out in..." and so forth.

Start with All your Old Items:

------------------------------

[from Dranyth]

When importing a character from BG, or even re-importing a character from BG2

to go through again, you can retain your character's equipment in the

beginning of the game (I imagine this would work in multiplayer as well as

single player, but I've only tried it in single player). First, give your

character all the great stuff you want to start with and then Export him to a

character file, then start BG2 and start a single player game, importing your

freshly exported character with all his goodies as your new character. Then

when you finish your character creation it begins loading the first area, as

soon as the loading screen completes but before it actually starts the game,

hit the Spacebar once, now when the game starts you should be on a black

screen and paused.

If the game isn't paused, you'll have to start over after the whole in-game

sequence is over, but if the game is paused you should have your sidebars up

and everything (if it's a completely black screen you'll need to hit H to

reveal the hidden sidebars), and you can go into your character's inventory.

Immediately put all of your character's stuff on the ground, then exit his

inventory and unpause the game, that first cry you give is where you lose

everything that is on your character. Now, after the sequence is over and

you're finished talking with Imoen (when you first have control over

yourself), go back into your inventory and you'll see that all of your stuff

is on the ground right where you left it, actually sitting on the floor of

your cage. Take your advanced equipment and go forth to kick evil butt!

(hey, if Minsc can hide Boo...)

Editor's Note: Another way to do this would be to start a new Multiplayer

Game with a new character. As soon as the game starts, then

delete this character and import your old one.

Magic Items and the Monsters who Require that you Have One to even Hit Them

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Moderate SPOILERS

At some point in the game, you'll get the "weapon ineffective" message.

This usually means that you need a MORE magical weapon than the one you are

using in order to hit that monster. For example, Iron Golems require that

you hit them with a +3 weapon or better. Kangaxx the Lich requires +3

weapons or better, but his Demi-Lich form takes a +4 or better to hit.

Generally you can tell what "enchantment" a weapon is by looking at its

bonus to damage or THAC0. If a sword grants +5 to THAC0, it is probably

considered a +5 weapon.

Some weapons, however, have an "enchantment" far beyond their bonuses. Here

is a small list of weapons that do more than advertised:

Staff of the Magi, +1 THAC0, hits as a +5

Melf's Minute Meteors, hit as a +5 (and ignore magic resistance)

Mace of Disruption +1, hit as a +4

Mace of Disruption +2, hit as a +5

Daystar +2/+4 vs. Undead, hits as a +2 (boo!)

Flametongue +1, hits as a +4

Hammer +1/+4 vs. Giants, hits as a +4

Familiars:

----------

Alignment Familiar AC HP Abilities

--------------- ------------- -- -- ----------------------------------

Lawful Good Pseudo Dragon -2 24 50% magic resistance, renders

victims unconscious, casts Blur

Neutral Good Pseudo Dragon -2 24 (same as above)

Chaotic Good Fairy Dragon 4 24 32% magic res., casts Invisibility

10' Radius & Mirror Image 1/day

Lawful Neutral Ferret 0 24 50% magic res., 75% Pickpocket,

40% Stealth, 20% Detect Traps

True Neutral Rabbit -4 16 50% Detect Traps, 30% Stealth,

75% resistance to fire, cold, elec

Chaotic Neutral Cat 0 24 20% Pickpocket, 99% Stealth,

50% magic res.

Lawful Evil Imp 2 18 Polymorphs, 25% magic res.

Neutral Evil Dust Mephit 6 24 Casts Glitterdust 2/day, 10% magic

res.

Chaotic Evil Quasit 2 24 Casts Horror, 25% magic resist.

Note: To get items that were pickpocketed by a Familiar, talk to the

Familiar and ask for any items they have.

Also, familiars get upgraded in Throne of Bhaal, see that section

above for more information.

Familiars are great. Sure, only the Main Character can have a familiar

(which means that if your Main Character can't cast Magic, you won't get one)

and sure if they die then you permanently lose one point of Constitution.

But Familiars make the best spies. They move faster than anyone else. Cast

invisibility on a Familiar and you can scout out an entire area. (too bad

they can't check for traps)

The best feature of Familiars? They add HP to their mages! Say you summon

a 24 HP Pseudodragon (size-wise think of that little dragon Eddie Murphy

voiced in "Mulan"). Then your mage gets a bonus of half that dragon's HP

added to himself, or a bonus of +12 HP.

Familiars are NOT fighters. Never use them as such. At best they have

special attacks that can render opponents helpless. In fact, unless you have

a specific task you should keep your familiar in your Backpack. To put them

there, talk to the Familiar (you have to click the Talk icon) and ask them

to go in your pack. They are completely safe in the pack. To get them back

out again, simply right-click the Familiar.

Note: If you are a Sorcerer, DO NOT LEARN THE SPELL FIND FAMILIAR!! You

can only learn a maximum of 5 spells per level and you don't want

to waste it on a spell that you cast ONCE. Buy a scroll and cast it

from the Scroll. (Put it in the Quick Item slot, then at the main

screen click that scroll) You will also find this scroll in the

De'Arnise Hold if you are having trouble finding it.

Warning: Familiars can be LOST during transitions to and from various

areas. Some that I know of are the Planar Prison and Jarlaxle's

pocket dimension. What happens is your party is automatically

teleported to a new area, but the Familiar is left behind. That

familiar is then lost for good.

Trick: The easiest way for a non-mage character to gain a Familiar is to

use Alex Malano's "Anyone can cast Mage Scrolls" strategy. Just

pause the game, go to your inventory, right-click a potion in the

backpack to drink it, then swap slots with the Find Familiar scroll

and the potion. Leave the inventory and unpause. You will cast

the spell and get a Familiar.

Trick: Using familiars as a bag of holding: Certain familiars can

pickpocket people, including party members. There seems to be no

limit to the amount of stuff they can keep on them. Drop all the

stuff except what you want to get store in your familiar. Have him

pickpocket you until he gets all of it. Interesting way for a solo

mage to get all the loot in a dungeon out in one go.

[from Xander77]

Trick: You can, of course, export a character after they got the HP from

the familiar. Then when you start a new game, you'll still have

the extra HP and can then summon a new familiar. Repeat as

desired. However, at that point, you're better off just getting

ShadowKeeper (http://www.mud-master.com/shadowkeeper/) and setting

your HP as high as you want.

Keeping Summoned Monsters

-------------------------

[from Xander77]

The take away monster: The trick for taking a group of summoned creatures

through a doorway and into another area is fairly simple. Concentrate your

party near the doorway. Concentrate the monster group farther away from the

doorway. Pause your game. Have the monster group attack a character in the

party. Select the entire party (NOT including the summoned monsters). Click

on the doorway to enter it. Voila! You are now in the new area and your

summoned monsters have followed you there. At this point, they are colored

green, but are not under your command - the talk icon is shown when you click

on them (they have nothing to say, if you wonder). They will attack any

enemies they see, though. But this is not quite over. Save your game. Load

it. The summoned creatures are now under your command.

This works with 80% of the doors that only have a "Loading" screen when you

enter them, and 40% of the doors that have both "Saving" and "Loading" screen

when you enter them.

Duplicating items via Simulacrum

--------------------------------

[from Xander77]

Have the book of many spells in your quick item slot. Summon a Simulacrum.

Make him turn the page in the book. The book should disappear from his quick

item slot. Kill the Simulacrum. The book is amongst his remains. This works

ONLY with the book of many spells and ONLY in SoA.

Full strength Simulacrum

------------------------

[from Xander77]

The mechanic which the game uses for creating a Simulacrum is fairly

simple -- create a duplicate of the caster and afflict him with level drain.

If you cast a Simulacrum then cast restoration on him, you will get a full

strength duplicate of the caster. This obviously works best with a fighter

using Vhailor's helm. Make sure the Simulacrum has a couple of healing

potions in his quick item slot.

Weapon Effects While Shapeshifted:

----------------------------------

[from K.C.]

When a character shapeshifts the effects and equipped abilities from whatever

weapons were equipped will still be in effect. I found this out when my main

character turned into the Slayer and his claws still had the stunning effect

of the Celestial Fury. Later I gave Cernd the Staff of the Ram and sure

enough when he turned into a werewolf he was still able to knock opponents

back.

Cromwell the Smithy:

--------------------

Throughout the game you will get spiffy little pieces of great items. These

pieces can then be put together by Cromwell the Smithy. His average price

is 5,000 gold and it takes a day or two to make. Oh, and you have to stay

and help him (so, I hope you weren't already late for something).

Here is a list of things he can make:

Item Needs (where it is)

The Equalizer Sword -- Pommel Jewel of the Equalizer (Irenicus' Dungeon)

Hilt of the Equalizer (Mind Flayer City, Underdark)

Blade of the Equalizer (Beholder City, Underdark)

The Wave Halberd -- Wave Blade (Sahuagin City)

Wave Shaft (Planar Prison)

Gesen Short Bow -- Gesen Shaft (Tanner's House, Bridge)

Gesen String (Spellhold)

The Crom Faeyr -- Scroll of Crom Faeyr (Shadow Dragon)

Hammer of Thunderbolts (Illithid Lair, Sewers)

Gauntlets of Ogre Power (Planar Sphere)

Girdle of Frost Giant Strength (Underdark)

Mace of Disruption +2 - Mace of Disruption +1 (Bodhi's Lair)

Illithium Ore (Athkatla, Bridge District)

Vorpal Sword -- Silver Hilt (On a Githyanki, Slums, Chapter 6)

Silver Blade (Saemon Havarian, Spellhold)

Ankheg Plate Mail -- Ankheg Shell (Windspear Hills)

Shadow Dragon Leat. -- Shadow Dragon Scales (Abandoned Temple)

Red Dragon Plate -- Red Dragon Scales (Windspear Hills)

These are without a doubt the most powerful artifacts in the game. The Crom

Faeyr is probably the best of these, since it sets one's strength to 25.

(it's a War Hammer with +5 to hit)

The Wave Halberd should be kept for ToB as it kills elementals in one hit.

Cromwell Trick, Don't Lose your Ingredients!

--------------------------------------------

[from Alessio Ronchi]

Cromwell takes your scales away only after he finishes his work and not when

he begins.

Of course this method works with EVERY artifacts Cromwell can forge. So if

you are disappointed because you have to give up the girdle of frost giants

to make the Crom Fayer, just kill and resurrect your player who carries the

artifacts and that's it! (I used Harper's call because it costs nothing and

doesn't make you lose 1 point of CON). Oh, you should attack someone who has

few HP, otherwise you just risk to injure him and nothing else... and your

stuff is are gone.

So this is my procedure:

1 - make someone attack your "carrier" before talking to Cromwell

2 - talk to Cromwell and have him forge your artifact

3 - watch...

4 - resurrect and recollect!

Editor's Note: I hear you can also just pause the game and remove the item.

Other Assembled Items:

----------------------

These have nothing to do with Cromwell, but are assembled nonetheless.

SPOILERS

Flail of the Ages -- Flail Head (Cold) (De'Arnise Hold)

Flail Head (Fire)

Flail Head (Acid)

Bronze Horn of Valhalla -- Silver Horn of Valhalla ("Fish" House, Bridge)

Diamond (anywhere)

Iron Horn of Valhalla -- Bronze Horn of Valhalla (Maheer, Promenade)

Beljuril (In a Chicken, Umar's Hills)

Human Flesh Armor -- Human Flesh (Tanner's House, Bridge)

Silver Dragon Blood (Underdark)

The Horns of Valhalla are made by Maheer in the Waukeen's Promenade. See

that section for more details.

Mordenkainen's Sword has a Greenstone Amulet:

---------------------------------------------

[from Dranyth]

I was in Firkraag's Temple in the area just past the Orcish-Archers-behind-

the-walls ambush, in the hall where you get attacked by the various golems.

I happened to get attacked by an adamantite golem and two stone golems and

backed off to let the stone golems into the room to take them out first, then

went back up to see what I could do about the adamantite golem. I cast

Mordenkainen's Sword and sent the sword after it while I sat back and

watched. The golem had just coughed up one of his mini-Cloudkills and after

a round or two my sword somehow got poisoned by it and began taking 1 damage

a second. After it took 36 damage, the sword died. On the sword's body was

a Greenstone Amulet!

While I was writing this it occurred to me that if it had it when it died,

perhaps you could pick pocket it... so I just summoned a Mordenkainen's

Sword, had Yoshimo quaff a potion of Master Thievery to ensure success, and

sure enough, when I pick pocketed the sword it gave me a Greenstone Amulet!

I believe this is a very regular occurrence then, I hope it will be useful.

As I haven't fought Illithids yet, I'm not sure if these Amulets are that

useful against them or not, but from their description I'd imagine so...

ToB Note: This was removed for Throne of Bhaal.

Healing Flame Trick:

--------------------

[from Mike O]

Slight SPOILER

It turns out that raising a character's resistance to something above 100 not

only blocks all damage by that kind of element, but actually heals the

character by a small amount relative to the amount of damage that should have

been done. The place I discovered this is also probably the best place to

take advantage of it - in the Temple Ruins. If you stand on the incorrect

letter of the room where you are supposed to spell out Amaunator's name you

will get nailed repeatedly by a Flame Strike spell. But when I used the Red

Dragon Scale in conjunction with a Fire Resistance ring and one other item I

can't remember to raise different character's resistances to fire above 100,

I could just sit them there and watch their health bars quickly raise. If you

are evil in alignment you also get to enjoy their screaming in pain as they

roast :) Any trap that causes damage of a certain type repeatedly will work,

though fire traps are probably the most useful since items that provide fire

resistance are more common than any other kind.

Editor's Note: There are also Fire resistant spells. Further, this works

with any Resistance over 100%, including weapon resistances!

Reputation:

-----------

You really want a high reputation. The higher the better. Even if you have

an evil party you want a high reputation. If you have a good or neutral

party, try for a reputation of 20, if you have an evil party, you still want

a reputation of 18 (the highest you can go before all the evil people start

leaving). Because of these various things, I would not recommend having a

mixed alignment party. By mixed I mean good and evil combined. The best

part about a good reputation is that everything is given the "hero discount",

up to 50% off of items in stores!

Note: If you get an Evil person to join and your reputation is ALREADY

above 18, then they will stay. Unless your reputation changes

again. If you start at 20, get someone to join, then go down to 19

they might leave anyway. [from Moby]

Trick: You know how if your reputation hits 19, evil people will leave the

party? You can prevent this if you have Viconia. Whenever Viconia

joins you, you lose 2 Rep. Whenever you dump her, you gain 2 Rep.

So, whenever I found a quest where I would get a reputation point

reward (after my reputation had reached 18), I would just load the

game to a saved game before getting the reward, dismiss Viconia

(and ask her to wait right there). My reputation would become 20.

Then getting the reward would not change the reputation (since max

rep is 20). Then get back Viconia, and rep falls to 18 again. This

means that rep will always be 18 (you can always dump her to buy

and sell stuff, then get her back). I don't know if you need to

remove Edwin and Korgan too, but I believe they should be removed

before your rep hits 20 when Viconia is removed. They may not gain

some of the quest xp. Still, Viconia's level was good enough for

turn undead [from Jafar Sadeq, [email protected]].

Level/Ability Drain:

--------------------

One of the more annoying abilities of Undead creatures (Shadows, Wraiths,

Vampires) is their ability to drain your characters stats or levels. First,

it should be noted that Stat drains are TEMPORARY and given some time your

stats will return to normal. No special action need be taken.

However, LEVEL drains are NOT temporary. They must be reversed with a

Restoration spell. Priests get the spell "Lesser Restoration" with their

4th level spells (A Priest must be on level 7 to cast 4th level spells).

There are also Restoration scrolls and temples offer that service as well.

Until they are restored, your people will be operating as though they were on

a lower level, however they still accrue experience as normal; so once

restored they will be fine.

Romances:

---------

The main character can have a bit of a romantic subplot with certain

companions who join you.

Male Character -- Viconia, Jaheira or Aerie

Female Character -- Anomen

Romances can only start in the city, or outside, NOT in a dank dungeon.

(usually, there are exceptions) I'm not entirely sure how these work and

assume that they just "happen". There is a slight consequence to having a

romance with someone, but it doesn't come up until Chapter 6.

Romances are essentially just the NPC and your character chatting.

Relationships develop depending on your reactions to what they say. For

example, Viconia respects strength, Jaheira honesty and Aerie niceness.

Also, Romances have various subplots related to them:

SPOILERS

Viconia: attacked by a Drow and a Yochlol

Jaheira: attacked by Bandits*

Aerie: no subplot

Anomen: Seeks revenge for the death of his father

* I'd recommend downloading the Jaheira Improved Romance file, which you

can find here:

http://www.baldurdash.org/

BIG SPOILER

The Viconia romance has a "bad" ending no matter what you do. That is, you

sleep with her, and she then decides to break up with you. Nothing you can

do about it, really. It should also be noted that Viconia sleeps with you

really fast, then treats you bad before giving in to you once more.

In order to get a positive ending with Aerie, you must choose to NOT sleep

with her. This still ends the romance (completes it, you could say), but

on a more positive note.

Haer'Dalis and Aerie can even have a little "fling." (I've heard on the

official boards that Haer'Dalis was originally meant to be the second male

romance, but that it was taken out due to time constraints. That is, in fact

why he has a fling with Aerie, it was meant to be a Love Triangle, where he

eventually chooses your character)

Some things to keep in mind about romances:

The gender of the main character for romance purposes is fixed at the

very beginning of the game. This means that the girdle of gender bender

will not have any effect on romances, and that you can start a multiplayer

game with a male character, then switch to a female character and pursue a

lesbian romance with Jaheira, Aerie or Viconia (or vice versa with

Anomen - perish the thought). (Per Jorner)

Dropping a love interest from the party will terminate the romance, so

don't start one with someone you aren't willing to keep around permanently.

This means that you won't be able to juggle Viconia for the reputation

shifts if you're seeing her. (Alan Cherry)

Also, a bug in Jaheira's script will break the romance off if she gets

petrified after you're been summoned to the Harper Hold. After you de-stone

her, Jaheira immediately takes off for the Harper Hold when you try to have

her rejoin the party, even if you've already gone there. You can pick her

up at the Docks, but the romance is still over. (I didn't know this had

happened until Aerie started flirting again). You'll have to reactivate the

romance from the console to proceed with it. (Alan Cherry)

Editor's Note: You could reactivate it with the console:

CLUAConsole:SetGlobal("JaheiraRomanceActive","GLOBALS",2)

CLUAConsole:SetGlobal("JaheiraRomanceActive","GLOBALS",1)

or you could just download the program Shadowkeeper.

http://www.mud-master.com/shadowkeeper/

The romance talks work on real time not game time, for instance if your

having a romance with Aerie and she talks to you on day 10 you couldn't

rest in an inn for 10 days and then she'd speak to you. Rather it seems

you have to wait about 30 min to 1 hour of your time before she speaks to

you again. Unfortunately this doesn't mean your romantic NPC is going to

speak to you every time sometimes you have to do something else before they

talk to you again e.g. Jaheira won't talk to you after a while if you

haven't done the bandit quest. (Miguel)

Jaheira Note: Firstly if you buy Jaheira a necklace from a merchant in the

docks area (next to the temple) and then tell her you have

feelings for her this will start a romance with her, however

you will not get summoned to the Harper hold (after the Xzar

quest) until you have done the bandit Quest. Then After

being summoned to the hold and completing that section the

entire Harper quest is then tied up with Jaheira's romance

talks, after 2 or 3 chats the next part of the Harper quest

continues. (Miguel)

Romances will be continued in Throne of Bhaal.

Also, you might want to visit the BG2 page at:

http://www.sorcerers.net/

To find some interesting utilities dealing with romances.

Limited Wish:

-------------

The limited Wish spell can be very powerful... however it can also have some

pretty dire consequences. When cast it summons a Genie who will grant two

types of wishes: repeatable and one-time wishes. By repeatable it means that

you can wish for that again (such as healing your party), a one-time wish

disappears after it is cast once. Whether you can wish for something at ALL

is determined by how much WISDOM the caster has. Then whether the wish

is successful is also based on WISDOM.

Andrea Nicoli has this tip:

I experimented them with Nalia (little dumb girl with only WIS 9) and

lost all my spells. Then I discovered that, if you do not wait

for the Dao to speak with you, but talk to him yourself quick with

another character (I used Aerie who has WIS 17) you can get the whole

list! (I think that in this way you can get your big fighter to receive

the shapechanging ability, but I could not try because I had already used

the one time wish). In this way you do not need a high WIS mage to cast

this spell.

Repeatable Wishes: Wisdom Result

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

I wish for my entire party to be healed. (WIS 10+) -- Heals the party

I wish that none of my party would die (WIS 9-) -- poisons the party

of their wounds.

I wish that spells I have cast would be (WIS 16+) -- get Spells back

restored, that I might cast them again!

I wish for my spells to be restored! (WIS 15-) -- lose Spells already

memorized

I wish to make my party invulnerable. (WIS 12+) -- casts Globes of

Invulnerability for

the party

I wish that magic would fail to affect (WIS 11-) -- Party can't cast

me or my party. spells

I wish to summon a horde to overrun my enemies. -- Summons a rabbit

I wish to be protected from the undead. (WIS 10+) -- Negative Plane

Protection, Party

I wish to be protected from undead (WIS 9-) -- Summons Vampires

right now.

One Time Wishes:

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

I wish to be rich. (WIS 10+) -- gives 2000 gold and

several gems

I wish for a powerful magical item. (WIS 11+) -- Full Plate +2

I wish to be more experienced. (WIS 3+) -- summons several

Golems to fight

I wish to see all as it really is. (WIS 12+) -- Glasses of

Identification

I wish for an adventure like none (WIS 10+) -- starts the "gong"

I've ever experienced before. quest, and gives

you a scroll

I wish for control over time. (WIS 14+) -- casts Time Stop

I wish to be anything I desire. (WIS 6+) -- Allows you limited

Polymorphs

I wish to be prepared for anything. (WIS 10+) -- casts Chain

Contingency

I wish that all my enemies will die. (WIS 11+) -- casts Wail of the

Banshee

Dual Wield Meteors:

-------------------

[from Lani Weaver]

Here's a great tip for those dual or multi-classed fighter-mages: Put all

the slots you can into dual-wield, dual wield your best weapon in your off

hand, then cast Melf's Minute Meteors. You will throw the meteor, then

attack with the weapon in your off hand, from any distance!

Lockpicking for fun and Profit:

-------------------------------

[from George Adam III]

Since your party gains experience for doing simple things, such as detrapping

and unlocking, there are naturally a few tricks to maximize this.

If you want to behave yourself and not steal from the shopkeepers, you

can still gain the experience from lockpicking their chests. There are no

consequences (rep. decrease, guards summoned, etc.) as long as you don't

actually open the chest.

Pickpocketing Strategies:

-------------------------

[from Henning Roes]

I spent some hours and pick-pocketed nearly everybody in the game who was not

hostile. It's easy even in the beginning with Jan and a potion.

Commoners and Peasants: Nothing, 1-10 gold and minor spells

Amnish Soldiers: 20-40 gold and a 30% to get a scroll (up to level 8)

Nobleman/Noblewoman: jewels and gold

It's worthy to take several trials on the last two categories if you need

money and spells in the beginning.

Special items:

Ribald in the Adventurer's Mart, Waukeen's Promenade: Ring of Regeneration

Guardian Telwyn in the Temple of Helm, Temple District: Helm of Glory*

Tolgerias in the Council of Six Building, Government District: Ring of Ram**

Taquee the Djinn in Trademeet: Bottle of Efreeti

Lord Feveron, in the Bridge district: Scroll of Simulacrum

Lady of the Keep, de'Arnise hold: Scroll of Protection from Normal Weapons

* Quest reward, if you want to have it before completing the quest

** He will drop another one after defeating him in the Planar Sphere

Regardless of how high the thieving skills are, there's always a 1% of

failure. Quicksave is a must. It's possible to steal from everybody who has

a cyan circlet. So you can steal the Ring of Gaxx and get another one by

killing him (but this seems to be cheating). Charming the creature increases

the chances of pick-pocketing, but don't do this to important NPCs.

A Stealing Trick:

-----------------

[from David Weldon]

Here is a strategy that I used to great effect once I got the thieves

guild stronghold. It actually only requires that you find a merchant

who will buy stolen goods.

First, save up 20K or so to buy the most expensive item you can find in

Athkatla. Buy that item, then go sell it to the merchant who will buy stolen

goods. (for example, Jayes in the right part of Waukeen's Promenade)

Have a thief drink 5 or 6 potions of master thievery (you won't need any

more after this, so use all of them that you can buy from local

merchants if you want. I generally stopped at around 250 or so Pick

Pockets).

Proceed to steal and sell back the same item over and over to the

merchant. You can rack up any amount of gold that you would want, and

then never have to worry about stealing anything again.

I actually bought and sold 4 items at a time, because that's what you

can click on the interface screen without moving the slider. I netted

about 30000 from the four items each time, and in less than 5 minutes I

had more gold than I will ever need.

It's a lot more rewarding to rip off the thieves' guild and laugh at how

stupid their merchants are than it is to just edit your gold amount with

a cheat or editor. At least, I felt so!

"Shopthrifting"

---------------

[from Clayton a.k.a. Lord Nazgul, Monk Savant]

What you need:

- some gold (the more the merrier)

- a store selling high quantities of the items you want (i.e., selling 5

fireball spells as opposed to selling 5 single different spells)

- something to sell (that short sword the goblin had works well)

- a buyer with lots of room for the purchase

What you do:

- Select the items you wish to purchase (taking multiple copies where

available). The cost will go up as normal, but don't worry about the cost

yet. Notice the cost though.

- BEFORE purchasing, sell the short sword (or whatever else). Upon

completing the sale, you'll notice the cost will drop to the price as if you

only selected a single copy of each item.

- Complete the purchase. You will be allowed to make the purchase as long

as you have enough money to cover the "cost" that is displayed. The game

however still tries to charge you what it should cost. However, it will not

leave you with a negative gold value.

I've tried this in a number of stores now, and it has worked well. Works

especially well with the merchant at the city gate. He had some nice

scrolls, but I didn't have enough to purchase for all my mages. I figure

he's owes me one after I stopped him from getting killed.

Leveling up a Dual-Classed Mage Quickly:

-----------------------------------------

If your main character was one class, and is now being dual classed to a

mage, you will be at quite the disadvantage until your old class abilities

resurface. (which happens when your current level, exceeds your old class'

level) To speed things up, we take advantage of the Experience for Spells

Memorized.

First, save it. Then kick everyone out of the party. Now buy every spell

you can, and learn every possible spell. Not only are you gaining

experience, but you will be quickly gaining whole levels. This probably

won't get you above your Dual Class requirement, but it will help a lot.

Learning more Mage Spells than Normal:

--------------------------------------

Normally mages are limited by their Intelligence as to how many spells they

can learn per level. For example, someone with 17 INT can learn only 14

spells per level. To get around this, simply drink a Potion of Genius (or

other INT raising potion) and learn all the spells you want. This also works

to increase the ODDS that you successfully learn the spell.

Although an easier way to increase the odds that you learn a spell is to

temporarily drop the difficulty of the game to 'normal' where all spells are

memorized.

Anyone can cast Mage Scrolls:

-----------------------------

[from Alex Malano]

First, go into the inventory screen and drink, use a potion (may work with

other use items, however I have not tested this). If you're playing in

multiplayer you'll need to pause first.

Then, replace the location of the "drunken" potion with any scroll of your

choice, and exit the inventory screen.

If done correctly, the character should start to cast the spell, and the

potion is not used up.

Editor's Note: Also an interesting way to get a non-mage main character a

Familiar.

Gem Replication Trick

---------------------

[from K.C.]

Remember that bug cheat in BGI that let you replicate gems? You would place

a potion in your quick item slot, replace it with a gem, and then "use" the

gem twice to change the number amount. It still works in BGII. Just R-click

on a potion in your inventory to drink it and swap it for a rogue stone, for

example. The number will disappear. Now do it again and the number changes

to 65535, which is FFFF in hexadecimal notation. This is more than enough

gold to finance your entire game all the way through ToB.

Editor's Note: If you're in multiplayer, make sure that game is PAUSED

before doing this trick.

"Fake Talk" as Applied to Stealing from Shopkeepers:

----------------------------------------------------

[from Aleph]

Kudos to your "talk-fight" strategy. I have expanded on this a bit, and

would like to give you another way to use it beyond dragonslaying...

it's called the "Absent-Minded Shopkeeper".

Steps.

1) Enter store.

2) Save game.

3) Ask to see goods and start stealing away from the Steal screen.

4) The second you are caught and the steal screen disappears, hit space

bar. Don't even wait for the normal screen to come back.

5) While paused, click on the storekeeper again (talk function) and

unpause. If timed right, you will be able to talk to them again, and

thus continue stealing. You can also quicksave while paused if you

doubt your reflexes.

6) At the end, talk to the shopkeeper without getting caught and you

should be able to walk away without their turning red, rep loss, etc.

Great places to steal are the armorer in Waukeen's Promenade, the mage at

the back of Ribald's, the scroll guy in the Promenade, Gareth's contact

(for glasses of ID), Trademeet (for acid club, inertia belt, others),

and Underdark. Also note that while you can't steal from Ribald's

goods, you can pickpocket him for a ring of regeneration.

Note: There are times when this strategy will fail, causing the people to

go hostile anyway.

Stolen items can then be sold at any shopkeep whose goods are "stolen".

(Roger the Fence, the Thieves Guild, etc.)

Manipulating Things, without anyone Noticing:

---------------------------------------------

[from Rolander]

For some reason, if you are stealthed or invisible and you manipulate those

objects, you do NOT come out of stealth/invisible mode and enemies (if

present) will remain ignorant of your presence. Dunno if it's a bug, but

it can avoid some unnecessary battle if you use a stealthed/invisible

character to go in, activate and get out. (e.g. in the Shade Lord quest, I

used a stealthed character to grab the 1st sun gem and snuck him past the

gathered shadows without a fight)

Getting an object from someone without killing him:

---------------------------------------------------

[from Nathaniel Ragatz]

Not wanting to kill off the fellow captive clonewoman who mistakes you

for Irenicus I charmed and then used pickpocket on her to get the key

needed to remove one of the wands in the later wand-trap room. I used

the same trick on Mook (the only Shadow Thief that detected as good)

in order to steal the shipment from her for Bodhi. It may help to

cast doom or greater malison on the target to make sure the charm

spell works. Keep in mind that you may need a high (potion enhanced)

pickpocket skill to do this and Mook's shipment weighs 50 pounds.

Getting hostile people out of the way without fighting:

-------------------------------------------------------

[from Nathaniel Ragatz]

After I pickpocketed Mook I wanted to put her someplace she wouldn't

attack me when the charm spell ended. I brought us over to Mae Var's

guild (which I had already cleared out) used the trick where I told

her to attack a party member just before we went through the door.

Once inside I left Mook and hand the party leave. Mook stayed inside

and wasn't around to attack my party when the spell wore off, this can

be used on other hostiles as well.

Another way to get rid of people without losing Rep:

----------------------------------------------------

[from Nathaniel Ragatz]

Use a charm person or dominate spell on someone you want to get rid of

(this turns their circle green and makes them an ally under your

control). Then send them to fight the nearest monster without a good

weapon in hand. If there is no nearby monster just cast summon

monster spell and shoot one is a ranged weapon this turns summoned

monsters (except dire wolves) hostile (shown by their circle turning

red). The monster usually attacks party member or ally that is

closest to it (which will be the individual you want to get rid of if

you position them right).

Why do this? You don't get any exp but you get rid of bad people that

hide behind the rest of society. One example is the merchant that

tries to blackmail you into paying for his caravan in one of the

fighter stronghold subquests. People you sometimes give items or gold

to, such as this merchant may drop it if they die-thus you can give in

to the merchants demands and then get your money back (don't think of

trying this on shopkeepers as this will not work and you will not be

able to shop there again). Note: If you get rid of people important

for later subquests (like the Roenalls) before you do them then you

loose the chance to do that particular subquest (which can mess up

some of the fighter stronghold subquests as well as freeing Nalia when

she gets arrested).

Monks can wear Keldorn's Armor:

-------------------------------

[from ROB]

If you read the description for Keldorn's Armor it mentions that "few others

than" he can wear it. Interesting. Turns out that Monks can wear it, if

they have these stats:

15 STR

17 CON

12 INT

18 CHA

You can, of course, improve your stats via items. Say you have only 14 STR

and 3 CHA. So, if you put on the Girdle of Hill Giant Strength and the Ring

of Human Influence, you will raise your stats and could then wear the armor.

This is the ONLY armor that Monks can wear! It has an AC of 0, +1 to Saving

Throws and Free Action on its wearer. Of course, when your Monk hits level

18 his natural AC is just as good as the armor, making it almost pointless.

(You still get the Free Action and Saving Throw bonus, of course)

So, if you have a Monk, go find Keldorn and swipe his armor. If you want

Keldorn in your party and feel bad about this, just remember that he can wear

any armor he wants, while your Monk can only wear Keldorn's.

Fighter/Mages and the Corthala Family Armor:

--------------------------------------------

[from Henning Roes]

The Corthala Family Armor can be equipped by your main char if you can wear

leather. But you cannot wear it if your WIS is too low. Drink a potion of

insight, equip the armor. Then try a dispel magic on him and the additional

WIS is gone but the armor is still equipped. Good armor for a fighter/mage

early in the game since you can cast spells while wearing it, and it doesn't

evaporate in the sun like Drow armor.

Editor's Note: The minimum requirements for wearing the armor are:

6 STR, 18 DEX and 11 WIS

Also, this only seems to work on dual classed Fighter/mages.

(Multi-Classed Elves and Half-Elves can't wear it)

Fighter/Clerics with the above stats can also weaer the

armor.

Special Abilities:

------------------

Your main character (Protagonist) starts the game with the special abilities

that he/she had in Baldur's Gate. THESE ARE NOT SET IN STONE. If you

created a new character from scratch these will be: (based on main

character's Alignment)

Lawful Good: Neutral Good: Chaotic Good:

----------------------- ----------------------- -----------------------

Cure Light Wounds 2 Cure Light Wounds 2 Cure Light Wounds 2

Slow Poison 2 Slow Poison 2 Slow Poison 2

Draw Upon Holy Might 2 Draw Upon Holy Might 2 Draw Upon Holy Might 1

Vampiric Touch 1

Lawful Neutral: (True) Neutral: Chaotic Neutral:

------------------------ ---------------------- -----------------------

Larloch's Minor Drain 2 Cure Light Wounds 2 Cure Light Wounds 2

Horror 1 Horror 1 Horror 2

Slow Poison 1 Slow Poison 1 Draw Upon Holy Might 1

Draw Upon Holy Might 1 Draw Upon Holy Might 2 Vampiric Touch 1

Vampiric Touch 1

Lawful Evil: Neutral Evil: Chaotic Evil:

------------------------ ------------------------ ---------------------

Cure Light Wounds 1 Larloch's Minor Drain 2 Larloch's Minor... 2

Larloch's Minor Drain 1 Horror 1 Horror 2

Horror 1 Slow Poison 1 Vampiric Touch 2

Slow Poison 1 Draw Upon Holy Might 1

Draw Upon Holy Might 1 Vampiric Touch 1

Vampiric Touch 1 (new charts from Death Crow)

Souma has an interesting Evil Abilities strategy:

I have to say, I was pleasantly surprised by how useful some of those evil

powers are. Well, it is when you use the Call Woodland Beings spell (with

Jaheira natch). Not only do you get to cast Mass Cure as a Level 4 spell

instead of a Level 5 (sort of), but if you don't need the Nymph getting in

your way afterwards, you can use those evil Larloch's Minor Drain and

Vampiric Touches on it and gain big hit points temporarily.

BIG SPOILER:

Eventually you will lose these special abilities when Irenicus finishes

what he began at the beginning of the game. Soon after you will gain a

new ability, to become the Avatar of Bhaal, the Slayer. The Slayer is

immensely powerful, and immune to just about everything. However...

There are a couple things to keep in mind about the Slayer. First, you

lose 2 reputation points every time you become the Slayer. Not much, but

it can add up if you use it too often. Second, if you stay the Slayer for

too long at one time, you will die and the game will end.

END SPOILER

Larloch's Minor Drain Trick

---------------------------

Casting Larloch's Minor Drain on yourself has some wonderful effects. You'd

think that you would lose Hit points, but you gain it back from the spell...

and more! You can actually heal yourself with an offensive spell.

Gain More Hit Points at Level Up

--------------------------------

Casting Draw Upon Holy Might before going up a level (until level 10, after

which this becomes pointless). This increases your CON, which for most

characters, will give them bonus Hit points. Because your CON is higher

when you gain a level, you will actually gain more hit points than normal.

These hit points even stay with you when the Holy Might goes away. Very

useful way to use the main character's special abilities. This is especially

useful for fighter type main characters as they gain the full bonus from

having a high CON.

Dual Classing Restores Traps

----------------------------

[with generous assistance from the Lord of Fire]

One way to get Yoshimo's (or anyone's) Set Traps ability back (after having

set a trap) is to dual class, then cancel that dual. When that is done your

old abilities are restored to you, including your set traps.

Note: Kicking a thief out of the party will reset their traps as well,

however, any monster killed with the trap will NOT give you

Experience.

"Sandman's Ring" and the Solo Thief

-----------------------------------

[from Xander77]

Most people I know, sort of disregard the "Sandman's rings" (the ones that

allow you to become invisible once per day). I found the invaluable for a

soloing thief char. You can hide in the shadows, walk into a battle, backstab

someone, turn the ring on, and then either walk out of the screen (if

somebody starts casting a True Sight spell or some such, or if you want to

let their defenses drop) then walk into the battle and backstab again. There

are 6+ such rings throughout the game, so you can make 6+ backstabs per

battle. And you don't have to use up potions or spells. (I really love

once-per-day use items, because I don't feel that I "wasted" something when I

use them)

Raid Watcher's Keep Early

-------------------------

[from zambkptkn]

Because Watcher's Keep is a high level dungeon, most people avoid it entirely

until late SoA or sometime in ToB. This is a mistake. Hit the first level

of Watcher's Keep early in Chapter 2. You probably won't be powerful enough

to take out the level's final guardians, but that can wait until later. All

you want to do at first is snag some of the fairly lightly guarded items on

the first level that will make your adventuring life much easier.

Specifically: The Golem Manual, the Case of Plenty +1, the Quiver of Plenty

+1, and the Ammo Belt. All can be acquired by a party of even 8-10th level

if properly equiped and played. At the very least, buy the Potion Bag from

Sister Garlena. You don't have to fight anyone for this and it is more than

worth the trip! The only downside to this strategy is having to keep track

of the Ritual Scroll and the Vigil Stone so you can have them when you are

ready to clean out the rest of the keep.

Project Simulacrum Images

-------------------------

[from Timy Gadeholt]

I discovered a neat little trick while playing BG2. If you have a sorcerer or

mage cast Simulacrum, both the caster and the simulacrum can cast Project

Image. Even better, the images can then cast Simulacrum on themselves (so

you now have 4 duplicates), which in turn can cast Project Image on

themselves. You can keep going on like that to get a huge army of simulacrums

and images, all of which can cast spells individually. So you could have one

group of copies casting insta-death spells on enemies, another group casting

spells like Greater Malison and Breach, and another group casting summoning

spells.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

VIII. [GNRLMN] General Monster Fighting Strategies

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Basic monster fighting strategies (ones that tend to work well against all

monsters) are in this section. The following sections have specific advice

for dealing with the tougher monsters.

Basic strategies

----------------

[from Xander77]

Backstab from someone powerful is always good.

Melf's Minute Meteors/Bolt of Glory/Ram's ring ignore magic resistance.

The Inquisitor's Dispel makes every mage battle a lot easier.

Greater Malison + Doom + Instant death spell (Finger of Death, Polymorph

other, heck - even Chromatic Orb) = (usually) instant death.

Slayer kills everything.

The Invisible Door Blocker Strategy:

------------------------------------

[from Phobia]

What you do is make a guy invisible with a ring, potion, stealth, etc. and

have him stand in a doorway (if the doorway is too big, you can have two

people standing there side by side, this only works in doorways that you

can stand in, the HUGE ones don't count). Then you send someone into the

room, the invisi-guys will move to let him through, then go back into

place, when the enemies see you, run back through the doorway. The enemies

will run into your invisible characters and not attack them because they

can't see them, then you can take the enemies out with spells and ranged

weapons.

Editor's Note: I would turn the Party AI off for this strategy. You need

to prevent your invisi-guys from attacking and becoming

visible.

A Defensive Spin Trick:

-----------------------

[from Tim Marshal]

Blades can move while in defensive spin. All that is needed is to have the

free action effect on the Blade before or during the spin (i.e. potion,

spell, ring). Haer'Dalis has become one of my best lure characters. Equip

him with Stoneskin, several items that grant magical resistance, and the

ring of free action. Have him go into defensive spin and you are nearly

untouchable.

The "Fake Talk to the Enemy" Strategy:

--------------------------------------

This is one of the bigger exploits in the game, and it is incredibly

simple to pull off. Many enemies start out with the Light Blue circles

around them indicating that they are neutral, which means you talk to them

and they become hostile later. (Or sometimes they talk to you)

What you do is this. First make any normal battle preparations (cast

protective spells, haste and whatnot), then PAUSE the game. Now click on

every enemy as though you were going to TALK to them. Then switch over to

attack mode and Force-Attack your enemies. When you unpause the game they

won't attack you. And if there are more than one enemy, the others will

wait a while before attacking, watching you take out their comrades! This

can be repeated as often as desired, and if you want to keep doing it, be

sure to pause about every 5 seconds and continue it. (they will become

hostile after 6 seconds -- one round -- and attack you)

Where is this strategy MOST useful? Dragonslaying, of course! The three

dragons in the game all start out with Light Blue circles around them. So,

do the fake-talk to them, and start attacking. You will get quite a lot of

time before they raise their defenses, time that you can use to do some

damage.

Note: There are times when you absolutely should NOT use this strategy.

Some monsters don't die, instead they start talking when they

get close to death. With the Fake Talk, you won't reach this

point and the monsters will never die. Don't use it on Lassal,

Kangaxx, Lavok, Irenicus and anyone who is particularly crucial to

the plot.

Tough Battle Tips:

------------------

[from Adar]

Some basic strategies that I have heard of to kill tough monsters:

- Back away from the monster so that you can't see it anymore, then cast

Cloudkill. If you're a sorcerer or have the wand, drop as many

Cloudkills as you can. Their effects stack.

- Use a Monk's "Quivering Palm" attack to kill it.

- Have a Kensai/Thief backstab it.

- Have a Cleric cast Thac0 modifying spells on self, then cast Slay

Living on target. (Adar)

- Summon forth a Pit Fiend, then keep the party out of the battle.

Jan's Bruiser Mates in Overdrive!

---------------------------------

[from Nolan Wright]

Jan's Flasher Master Bruiser Mate work exactly likes glyphs or skull traps.

One way to take advantage of this -- in battles with most liches or dragons

when you have to speak to activate the fight -- one can fire his amunition at

your own party. They will hover next to where the party member was but won't

explode because they aren't hostile. I've found that if you make a stock of

these it can make some of the hardest battles easier.

Project Image and Cloudkill:

----------------------------

[from Jafar Sadeq, [email protected]]

I rested once before killing the black dragon. I used the cloudkill

strategy, had Nalia memorize 3 project images and 6 cloudkills (using a

ring of wizardry). Then just project image, hit 6 cloudkills in general

direction of dragon, quickly kill the image with the best fighter (my

beastmaster dual-wielding the bone club and gnasher) so I could get another

image and set off more cloudkills as soon as possible. It took all three

images' cloudkills, otherwise the damage would be so slow that it would

cast heal before it could be killed. (I once managed to get an image to

project another image, but wasn't been able to repeat it.) I did not rest

once after this and finished the game without using any spell other than

one Protection from Evil 10'.

Editor's Note: Project Image is probably the most useful spell in the game,

and the easiest one to abuse as well. Using Project Image

you can have the image cast every spell you have, and when

the Image disappears, you will still have all those spells.

Also, the Image has no summon limit, it can summon as many

monsters as it wants. Very useful to summon up a dozen

Skeletal Warriors (or in ToB, a half dozen Planetars).

Infinite Lightning Bolts:

-------------------------

[from Brawny Lam]

I was fighting Kuo-Toa in the underdark exit: In the heat of battle, I

accidentally got Imoen to cast lightning bolt on my ranger PC. Luckily

enough my ranger was wearing the Cloak of Mirroring, so the lightning bolt

got reflected back to Imoen, who was wearing the Cloak of Reflection, so

the lightning bolt kept being reflected back and forth from my ranger to

Imoen and vice-versa.

Now here's where it gets interesting. Every time a lightning bolt got

reflected, the original lightning bolt would continue to bounce around the

room. So after a couple of reflections, I had about 4 to 5 lightning bolts

bouncing all over the place vaporizing everything in their path. I was

quite happy that the Kuo-Toa were being turned into ash before my eyes, but

not quite so happy when it killed my entire party as well, except for my

ranger and Imoen, who were still reflecting lightning bolts back and forth.

Not sure how useful this trick is, but I thought I'd mention it since its

cool looking at all those lightning bolts flying all over the place. It'll

probably be more useful if the party was protected from electricity.

Editor's Note: This doesn't work with a fully patched ToB game, where the

cloaks no longer bounce the lightning bolts.

Set Snare Tricks:

------------------

Strategy tip for dragons and other tough battles: I went to the

Windspear Hills right after doing Nalia's Keep on my first run-through,

and when I reached the Red Dragon. I was still quite low level, as I hadn't

done any of the town quests except Aerie's circus and the slaving ring in

the Copper Coronet. I figured, oh what the hell, I'll give it a go anyway,

and proceeded to prep for battle. By chance, I remembered Yoshimo's set

snares ability, and strung snares all around the big lizard before

attacking. They must have accounted for at least half the damage I did to

it, and I managed to kill it without any severe injuries to my party. And

there I was with a +5 Holy Avenger and no freaking paladin to wield it!

Anyway, I thought I should mention this as it seems many people have

overlooked this ability on the BBs I've looked at, and it can prove

invaluable in any number of combats (especially those you can prep for).

IMHO it makes the bounty hunter far superior to the other thief kits.

[from Geoff Ulreich]

To expand on that tip, lets consider this: with not only Bounty Hunter

kit's Set Special Snare ability, even a regular snare cannot be stopped by

any creature's resistance stats or saving throws. What that means is

thieves' snares are, in actuality, the best weapons in the game for

defeating just about every boss and mini-boss. What I usually do is to set

traps around dragons (they never initiate attack), rest, set some more,

rest, and set more.... Since snares do not 'expire' when you rest, you can

essentially blanket an entire area with snares. Not only can you do this

around tough enemies such as the dragons (Yoshimo killed the first two

dragons for me without a single member of my party having to go on attack),

but also such as the Mind Flayers, Beholders, and other tough(er) enemies

in this game, some of which you can not even go near without layers and

layers of protective spells. Just lure them to an area FILLED with traps

and Voila! [from Willis Su]

As you can see, this is so unfair it runs into game-balance issues --

another reason I was reluctant to share the tip. One warning to anyone

trying such a tactic: be diligent in removing snare notations on area

maps, or the map WILL cause the game to crash, since it's NOT designed

to handle so many snare notations.

Juky & 649 of 711 have a better Snares Strategy:

My cousin and I have found a really neat trick. With any thief or bounty

hunter, you can set infinite traps. Have the thief set all his/her traps,

and then reform your party. Remove the thief from the party. The thief

will then move to talk to your main character. He/she will ask your main

character if his/her services are still needed. Say yes. The character

will rejoin the party, and all his/her traps skills are refreshed.

I have tried this many times with Yoshimo, and it has made certain tough

battles a lot easier.

Note: You can also just click Dual Class, then Cancel to get your Snares

back. [from SMShadow]

This method is actually preferred, as the traps of a kicked-out party

member (even if they return) won't net you any experience.

How to Kill Civilians (without really trying):

----------------------------------------------

[from Willis Su]

For those that are able, cast the necessary protection spells (Protection

from Evil), and summon forth a demon (Cacofiend, Gate, etc.). The demon

that you summoned will tear everyone in the vicinity to shreds without

affecting your reputation. Just make sure your party can contain the demon

so it kills whom you wanted it to kill, or else you may start to lose

quest-vital NPCs. This is in response to those neutral

characters/townsfolks that sometimes turn hostile either through thievery

on your part, or due to some other scripting bug. Use it cautiously.

The Death Spell

---------------

The Death Spell kills all monsters with 8 or fewer hit dice. (A "Hit Die" is

roughly the equivalent of a level) There are a great MANY monsters in the

game that fit this bill, including, but not limited to:

Trolls (although they'll still need to be hit with Fire or Acid, but you

get double experience for killing them twice)

Umber Hulks

Mind Flayers

The Death spell will instantly kill these bad guys. However, Mind Flayers

have Spell Resistance at 90%... which does limit its usefulness against them.

(Although the Flayers guarding Phaere are considered "summoned" and will die

instantly against this spell)

RCL has many battle tips and strategies:

----------------------------------------

"Um, seeya" strategy

I just wanted to emphasize that many groups of enemies (especially ones

with mages, such as the Slum Slavers or the second-floor enemies in the

Guarded Compound) will be much easier to kill if you move immediately back

downstairs/out the door, etc. (into another game area map) after they

decide to attack you. Some will follow you and some will not, and even if

they do, they do it one at a time instead of moving as a group like yours,

giving you windows to take them out one at a time. Also, if the

spellcasters do not follow you out, that gives you an opportunity to wait

until their protective spells expire before you go back in.

"Not another summoned creature!" strategy

For some of those monsters that have special attacks or cast spells, send

in a lot of little summoned creatures (one at a time) to bamboozle them

into wasting their memorized spells and special attacks (such as Dragon

breath), which I believe are limited in number. If you can control the

creatures, make them walk around the monsters a bit to induce the monsters

to cast spells instead of using physical attacks.

Marking enemies' location with junk

There are times when you want to move out of the enemy's sight and use

spells like cloudkills, etc. to kill him. An easier way to remember where

they are so that you can cast those spells is to drop some junk as markers.

Even with the fog o' war you will still be able to see the junk from far

away.

For example, I killed the red dragon while virtually no one was severely

hurt by:

1. Walked right next to him and dropped some junk and set some snares.

2. Made him hostile, by sending in one character to talk to him.

3. The character then got out of the dragon's sight immediately.

4. Summoned any creature at spots where you know the dragon can see them

rising but cannot touch them without walking up to them. The dragon

naturally chose to use his breath on that creature, usually killing it

before it even started to walk.

5. Repeated with summoning creatures large and small, until the dragon

stopped using his special attacks...

6. Cast some area-attack spells where the dragon was, and then

7. Haste -> breach -> group charge -> dead dragon -> holy avenger and

dragon scales.

The 3 basic high level insta-kills

----------------------------------

[from Xander77]

1) Chain Contingency + 3 Horrid Wiltings. Basic for killing groups of

enemies. If used to kill a single tough enemy, a spell sequencer - 3

pierce shield or 3 lower resistances is good beforehand. Also - Set the

contingency, rest, trigger the contingency in battle, then immediately

set the same contingency again.

2) Timestop + Improve Alacracity. Make sure your PC auto pauses after a

spell is cast. Lower Resistance, Pierce shield, then go Whacko. With a

Robe of Vecna + Amulet of power, your level 1 spells Magic Missile and

Chromatic Orb will have a casting time of zero, so cast the whole lot of

the first, then go with any kind of (overkill at this point) spell you

feel like.

3) Shapeshift + Timestop. Once Timestop kicks in, Shapeshift into the

Mindflayer. During Timestop, all your attacks are auto-hits. So once

timestop ends, your enemy is dead.

A stat drain will kill most of the unkillable "vital to game progress"

NPC's - even the ones immune to the CTRL-Y insta-death cheat. So,

Shapechange - Mindflayer kills all.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

VIII.1 [GLMSVI] Golems

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Golem Trick:

------------

[from Greymane]

There is a great little trick for defeating any Golems you might run into.

Simply take the Ring of Earth Control and use it's Control/Charm Earth

Elemental ability on the biggest Golem around. Despite the description of

the spell, it actually works on the golems too! It might take a couple of

tries, but you can rest in the same room as the golems and try again. After

you've gotten the biggest on there charmed, let him kill off the others and

then loot the treasures before the spell wears off.

Clay Golems:

------------

Clay Golems MUST be hit by BLUNT weaponry to score effective hits. Sample

blunt weapons are: Clubs, Maces, Morningstars, Fists and Staves. Hit them

with anything else and you will get the "weapon not effective" shtick.

One exception to this are weapons that have bonus damage, such as +1 fire

damage. The weapon itself won't hit, but it will still do its fire damage.

Iron/Adamantium Golems butchering

---------------------------------

[from Xander77]

You can just engage the golem in hand-to-hand with +3 weapons, of course, but

I wouldn't recommend it - they deal massive damage and are usually contained

in rooms with exits through which they can't fit. The only place where they

run free is Suldanessalar, and there you can use the invisible door blocker

to keep them at bay - just have her move away a meter or 2 when the golem

uses the gas attack. A character wielding a +3 two-handed sword can

reach the golem and hurt him, while the golem can't hurt him. The gas attack

is sometimes capable of hurting him and sometimes not - haven't quite worked

it out. If it does hurt, just move the character away until stops. Go back

to hacking away at the golem.

- Personally I don't care for this one, but if you're desperate for the

experience and don't have any other means of handling the golem, you can

lower his MR once or twice then magic missile him to death. The golem only

has 80 hp or so - not too tough a task.

- Melf's minute meteors - ignore magic resistance. One casting is enough to

kill a golem (some kind of ThacO spell is preferable beforehand, though).

Great for killing magic resistant creatures.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

VIII.2 [DMNSV2] Demons

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Demon Fighting:

---------------

Find yourself fighting some mighty demon? Pit Fiend? Glabrezu? Well fear

no more! Simply cast Protection from Evil on your party and they will

ignore you! This is not a guaranteed strategy, some demons will attack

you anyway.

Demons killing

--------------

[from Xander77]

- As this FAQ mentions, protection from evil 10 feet radius works wonders.

Most random (non quest related) demons won't see you, thus giving plenty of

time to ambush them.

- Going hand to hand. Actually not that bad of an idea. By the time you start

running into demons, you should have several +2/+3 weapons in you party (if

you don't, you probably won't manage to get through the area where the demon

is) so you're capable of hurting him. There are often several annoying

distraction - quasits, genies, and such - around the demon. Get rid of them

using some are destruction spells. Then your buffed up (haste, chant, chaotic

commands on the main char [hold and stun protection] etc) party charges the

demon. A few ruffled feathers later, he should be dead.

- Bolt of Glory - 2 of those should handle most any demon. Possibly an extra

shot from the Rams ring and/or Melf's minute meteors. The reason all the

aforementioned work is because they ignore magic resistance (which the demon

has a plenty).

- Desperate measures (if you have to rely on this, then you aren't quite

ready to face demons yet) surround the demon with aerial servants and fire

elementals. They get stunned and slaughtered, but they have plenty of hp, so

you'll have some time before he turns to you. Now lower his resistance and

magic missile him to death (damn, this game would be a lot harder is some

monsters just bothered learning Shield)

- Slayer change. Also counts as desperate measures for handling one measly

demon, but it does the job quite effectively.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

VIII.3 [NDDSV3] Undead

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Turning Undead Strategies:

--------------------------

[from Xander77]

Cleric undead turning is really awesome - much easier killing them off with

tanks. One turning - and the undead explode. What's even better then is an

evil clerics (I.E - Viconia) undead turning - you don't blow up undead, you

turn them to your side. Generically speaking, your cleric level is usually

more then enough to turn the weaker undead you're facing to your side.

Beginning with level 20 you can turn Liches to your side.

Now to my point. Turning undead DOES NOT interrupt invisibility. So you can

cast one level 2 spell (which lasts 24 hours) on Vicky, and have her run

around turning undead. Its really fun walking around with 20-30 undead

allies following you. No risk involved.

Vampire Fighting:

-----------------

[from Jeremy Treanor]

I found that having two clerics (Viconia + Aerie, my first time through)

does absolute wonders in the vampire dens and other places where there are

undead creatures affected by sunlight. Two simultaneous castings of false

dawn knocked out every vampire that swarms around you. If they should

survive, they're still confused and more than a little vulnerable.

The Mace of Disruption and Vampires:

------------------------------------

[from Xar]

In Chapter 3, get into the lair, get the Mace of Disruption and pull back.

Upgrade it with the Illithium. With the Mace +2 and a Helm of Charm

Protection (or similar), one character can clear the entire nest. (The

vampires will obligingly leave their door open while you spend a day or so

with Cromwell.)

Editor's Note: You get the Illithium as part of the "Sir Sarles" quest that

the Temple gives you.

Fighting Monsters who Level Drain:

----------------------------------

[mostly from Travis Archer]

There are many types of undead that will "drain" your levels when they

attack. You may be a level 12 fighter, but that vampire just made you

into a level 10 fighter. This is easily fixed with a Restoration spell,

but there are some other consequences of level drain as well. When a

spellcaster is drained, they lose their higher level spells.

So, to protect against this: Memorize your most important spells first. That

way, they're the last spells to get level-drained. Examples of Important

Spells: Lesser Restoration, Raise Dead, Heal. This makes mopping up after

vampire encounters a lot less annoying. When you restore levels, spells are

not re-memorized, so don't forget to do this before you rest.

Negative plane protection, which protects from level drain, has a

disappointingly short duration, and having to memorize and cast it 6 times

before a fight is obnoxious, so I recommend that you do one of the

following:

1) Cast it only on your spellcasters (re-memorizing spells is annoying)

2) Keep your casters in the rear and don't cast it at all

3) Use limited wish instead to protect your whole party with one spell.

(best choice)

Lich hacking

------------

[from Xander77]

- Sunfire. It's a shame that you can't have 2 daystars, since that option

doesn't hurt party members. Move your entire party except for the mage and

the guy with the daystar into the corner. Make sure that the guy with the

daystar won't be hurt with the mages sunfire. If possible, try to make sure

that both sunray and sunfire go of just as the lich appears. That usually

does the trick. If extra assurance is needed, then use ring of the ram before

the sunfire/sunray combo.

- Turn undead. If your cleric is level 20+ you can either blow up or control

the lich. This goes through all his protections. If you control him, either

use his spells against another enemy, or have him waste them into thin air,

then attack him.

- Annoying long way - have a bunch of summoned creatures mob the lich where

he first appears. If he manages to kill them all, summon a few new ones,

(better waste summon spells then to have him sling instant death spells at

the party). Now take your time while dispelling his protection. Ruby ray of

reversal, Khelban's warding whip (though if you have access to those, you

probably can just turn him with your cleric) breach, etc. Eventually he runs

out of protection spells and you can just pepper him full of bolts and

arrows. Cast a true sight before the lich appears, to dispel the

invisibility/mislead that he is sure to cast.

- Summoned creatures. Already outlined in this FAQ and my favorite strategy

for dealing with mages. Move your entire party, except for one guy, into the

corner. Put a summoned monster or 2 where the lich is supposed to appear.

Have the lich appear, talk to the char and turn hostile. Now have the char

run to the corner. The lich should turn up a few defenses, then fry the

summoned creatures. Then. it just sits there, waiting for its protections to

go out, because it sees no enemies on the screen. Wait a minute or 2, and

send another summoned creature in. If the lich's defenses have run out, he

should cast some new ones. Just keep doing this until he runs of out defense

spells (or, if you're extra cautious, until he runs out of major attack

spells) then charge him with your entire party. PS - Using a wizard eye or

farsight to supervise, make sure that the creatures gradually move him

towards the party. This strategy depends on the lich not seeing the party.

Note: The above works only if your summoned monsters keep the enemy well

away from the party.

- Stoneskin + Protection from evil + Polymorph self. Turn into a jelly and

just sit there. The lich's pit fiend can't hurt the jelly and the lich should

take care of him himself. The efreet's first few opening numbers are spells,

so you don't have to worry about that. If he hangs around long enough to run

out of spells and start attacking you physically (unlikely) just have your

party take him out. Your Stoneskin should absorb a few blows anyway. By the

time you Polymorph ends, the lich should run out of defenses and use up most

of his spells. Now go and kill him.

- Protection from undead - the lich doesn't even see you. Wait until his

protection from magical weapons runs out, and just wallop on him. The only

drawback is having to refresh the spell. If you have the protection from

undead amulet, then it's just unfair.

- Mace of disruption +2. Ignores all protections (even protection from

magical weapons) on a critical. Also known as BOOM.

- Lich in the in at the town gates - door skipping cheat. Run through the

door whenever he begins to cast a spell. The spell is wasted. Run back in.

Wash-rinse-repeat until he runs out of spells. Doesn't work in ToB.

Fighting against liches and especially against time stop. Use fog of war to

your advantage, hide in the "fog" and summon creatures to attack the lich

(don't follow yourself, only send your new minions). You won't be able to

see anything but you will get message at the bottom to know what's going on.

The Lich will waste some of its spells, usually wasting its Time Stop as

well. Don't cast all your summoning spells at once, Death Spell will get

rid of them all. [from Max Chen]

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

VIII.4 [DRGNSS] Dragons

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dragon slaying

--------------

[from Xander77]

Luckily enough, most dragons in the game allow you to surround them and buff

up before taking them on, except for the lame black dragon and the even lamer

abyss dragon. They still alert you to their presence and give you time to

buff up, though.

Buff up and surround him is actually all you need, but here is a more

detailed game plan:

Note where the dragon is, and do the following just outside his sight (for

the shadow dragon specifically). Drink any potions you feel like drinking

(some stuff to raise your resistance to his breath weapon is good). Summon up

5 long-term monsters. Fire elementals (druid) invisible stalker, skeletons,

Killthix (the spider figurine). Cast protection vs evil 10 feet (most dragons

are evil, it will protect both you and your summons, and should last you

until the end of the battle and then some). Now get your personal buff spells

up: Stoneskin, Blur, Mirror image, Fireshield for mages. Ironskin, Barkskin,

Armor of Faith and maybe celestial protection for druids/clerics. You can

also do draw upon holy might/ strength of one, but I usually don't bother -

it does little good, and wastes one round of protection spells. Maybe a

Simulacrum from Vhailor's helm and a lesser restoration on it now. Now for

group buffing spells: Bless, Chant, Defensive Harmony for druid's clerics

(you should have 2 clerics/druids and 2 mages/sorcerers in the party). Haste

for the mages and maybe mass invisibility (level 6), and. that's it. The

preparations are over. (You should start casting the next spell as soon as

you're done with the previous, except from Bless Chant and Defensive

Harmony - those should be cast just before you run into combat)

Run up to the dragon and make 2 circles around him. One circle, which touches

the dragon - summoned creatures. One circle, which uses ranged weapons - the

party members. The point of this arrangement is to make sure that if the

dragon uses his breath weapon, he can't hurt more then 2 summoned creatures/

1 party member at the same time and to make sure that if the dragon uses wing

buffet on the summoned creatures he doesn't hurt your party members. Note:

The shadow dragon will cast a death spell on summoned creatures if he sees

them, so its best that they go into the 4 corners of the room while hugging

the walls, and converge on his location when you're ready to begin the

battle.

Now issue a formal challenge to the dragon (or not. Doesn't make much of

difference). Personally I prefer to challenge him when everyone has just

began casting their spells. Have everyone attack. The Dragon should go

Stoneskin + haste + greater malison + lower resistance to breath weapon

(btw - if your resistance if equipment based, you can get it back up by

taking your stuff off and re-equipping it) + (maybe) immunity from magic

weapons. You go: remove magic to handle the haste and the immunity to magic

weapons. Pierce magic to handle to Stoneskin and take his magic resistance

down. 2-3 Lower magic resistance. Now just magic missile him to death. (Did I

say that this game would be a LOT harder if monsters bothered learning

Shield?) You can add smite evil/silence/bolt of glory/lighting bolt and other

damage spells to the mix just for the hell of it, but magic missile is the

greatest dragon killer of them all (fireball happy guys - ice storms aren't

that bad of an idea. Especially since summoned creatures that get caught up

in the damage don't seem to turn hostile). When and if he manages to kill

some of your summoned creatures, take a moment to summon a few more. Make

sure that he's always boxed in between at least 3 monsters, and is therefore

unable to move up to one of your characters and attack her.

Note: You can, of course, have you fighters attack the dragon in hand to

hand. Makes it a bit more exciting and a lot more dangerous. Magic

missile-ing him to death is a lot easier. If you do go for the hand to

hand - good resistance to breath weapon is nice. So is improved haste

on your main dragon slayer. Make sure to surround him from several

sides, so that he won't be able to breath on 2 or 3 characters at

once. And when he blows you off the screen with the wing buffet,

consider it as a break in the action and take a round or 2 to fully

heal up.

That should handle any dragons in your path. The black dragon and the hell

dragon give you time to buff up and summon, but you can only form a

half-circle around them (try to get the summons to circle them, though).

PS - The greatest Dragon slaying tip I ever got, from Charlie Yeah Charlie:

Polymorph him. Ok, so it's the toughest squirrel you'll ever have to fight,

but at least he don't look so tough.

3 of the 4 Dragons (in SoA) have no resistance to electricity and even the

4th one is weak against it. This is where lighting bolt come in. Bounce it

off the wall a few times and watch their HPs go down. [from Max Chen]

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

VIII.5 [NMYSPL] Enemy Spellcasters

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Mages

-----

Mages have increased in power by LEAPS and BOUNDS since Baldur's Gate.

They're much more annoying now. Two spells in particular make them tough

to fight: Contingency and Sequencer. These allow mages to cast spells

almost INSTANTLY at almost any time. Then add in their new protective

magics -- Protection from Normal Weapons springs to mind -- and defeating

mages in Baldur's Gate II becomes much more difficult.

Mage does: Protection from Normal/Magical Weapons

Counter with: Breach (lvl 5)

Mage does: Shadow Door/ Invisibility AND Protection from Normal Weapons

Counter with: Purge Invisibility or Glitterdust or Remove Magic

THEN Breach

You cannot Breach anything that is invisible, so you have to get them

to be seen first.

Note: True Sight dispels any and ALL protections from the illusion school.

That's right, no more Mirror Images, Simulacrums or Invisibility!

(or thieves hiding in the shadows, for that matter)

Dispel Magic is more of a "clean up" dispeller to be used in sequence

with Breach. It usually takes care of whatever Breach doesn't,

leaving your enemy mage wide open. I like this spell for its

versatility (removing negative and positive status) but you're

better of using Remove Magic in sequence with Breach as you won't

end up removing your own protections, plus you'll want to save your

Dispel Magics when baddies start throwing out Maze spells.

Generally, Ruby Ray of Reversal gets rid of everything that protects

from spells while Breach takes care of anything that protects from

weapons and elements. [entire NOTE from John Winkleman]

I let my archers take care of mages most often, so countering their Globes

of Invulnerability is not a priority. A Spell Thrust could be used to cut

a Minor Globe out, however.

Two spells that work wonders against mages are Abi Dalzim's Horrid Wilting

and Skull Trap. Don't target the mage directly, but drop the spell just

off to the side, this bypasses their direct protections, and can hurt

them pretty severely.

Summon Nishruu/Hakeashar

------------------------

Leo Wang recommends summoning Nishruu (and their higher level counterparts,

Hekaeshars) to deal with mages. Nishruu are mage-eaters for the most part,

as they are drawn to mages like bees to pollen. Magic attacks heal the

Nishruu and best of all, Nishruu cause mages to forget spells. Summoning

up these bad boys make the end game mages (such as Irenicus) pretty easy.

Nishruu are a 6th level spell, and Hakeashars are 7th.

Cyrille Artho doesn't think too highly of Nishruu's:

Just a comment about the usefulness of Nishruus and their "relatives": I

used them now and again vs. wizards, but did not like it very much when

one of my Imoen was charmed and turned against me (incidentally she had

summoned the Nishruu herself). What would the Nishruu do? After I killed

the enemy mage, it would "home" on Imoen. Until I had realized that and

disposed myself of the Nishruu, it had already eaten some magical items

(among them the Bracers of Protection!). That really pissed me off, and

I didn't use Nishruus anymore. Not to mention that they might also

degrade items that you would otherwise pick up after the battle.

Henning Roes has an interesting tip for fighting mages:

Normally the high-level mage casts heavy protections on himself and it

takes some time to take them down. In my second game I found a new

strategy to get rid of their protection-from-magical-weapons like mantle

etc: I used normal weapons in that case. I didn't do that in my first

game because I wanted enchanted weapons as much as anyone. So I never

thought about how useful non-magical weapons are.

Fighting the Cowled Wizards for Fun and Profit:

-----------------------------------------------

[from JP]

You can't cast spells in Athkatla unless you want to face the Cowled Wizards.

And if you want to get them off your back you must pay Corneil at the Council

of Six building. I finished the game as a paladin (I imported my character

from Baldur's Gate) and then played it again as an Invoker. I didn't want to

pay Corneil the 5,000 gp because I saw the cowled wizards as a potential

source of both gold and exp. If you want to face off with the Cowled

Wizards, here's what I recommend:

1. Isolate your mage from the rest of your party.

2. Go to a spot anywhere in Athkatla (I did this near the archway in the

bridge district) where there are only a few people, lessening the risk

of killing someone accidentally.

2B. Drop a bit of Junk on the ground to mark this spot.

3. Cast a summoning spell, preferably summon nishruu. The "spokesperson"

for the cowled wizard should appear shortly after the nishruu

materializes. Don't expect the nishruu to do heavy damage. His only

purpose is to distract the cowled wizards from attacking you.

4. Don't wait for him to appear! Quickly walk away from him and then

attack him using your nishruu.

5. He'll say something short and three or four other cowled wizards will

appear to attack you.

6. Walk away until you don't see them anymore (or until they're covered

by the fog of war). Your nishruu will attack them and they'll attack

your nishruu.

7. Look for your Junk. It marks their position.

8. Wait for a few moments to let some of their protective spells expire.

You don't have to wait that long anyway. Cast shadow door.

9. Cast area effect spells like death fog, cloudkill, web, ice storm,

skull trap, etc. On the ground near where you last saw them. You can't

see them and they can't see you, but you know where they are, so use

that to your advantage.

10. Use multiple web spells if you have to so that they don't approach

you. In time, they'll all die and you get around 14000 exp. Search

their corpses for potions, scrolls and gems.

I did this a lot times and it paid off rather well. It's not infinite.

You'll eventually face a high level wizard, who will cast time stop and

summon a pit fiend. Before I could beat him he cast dimension door and

vanished.

The final fight with the cowled wizards will occur when their spokesperson

tells you that the highest members of their order have come to fight you.

To beat them, simply repeat the process I said about defeating them. But be

careful! One of them (her name's Zalladora, I think) can (and probably

will) cast two time stop spells at the beginning of the battle! Keep your

distance from them. When Zalladora is near death, she'll attempt to cast

her third time stop spell. If she does, she'll cast gate and summon a pit

fiend and cast dimension gate to get out. It's up to you if you want to

prevent her from escaping or if you want to fight the pit fiend instead.

Either way, if you survive, the cowled wizards will never bother your

spellcasting in Athkatla again.

Matt Warner has an easier way to cast spells in Athkatla:

I've just found a neat little way to rid yourselves of the

interference of the Cowled Wizards without paying the hefty 5000

gold bribe, or going through the effort of killing wave after wave of

wizards until they give up on you, though that will probably yield a

bit more treasure than my method. If you just want to be done with

them quick and easy, do this:

Have a mage cast any spell that will attract the attention of the

wizards, stoneskin or mirror image work well. Of course, so does

everything else but those spells are nice and non-offense.

A lone wizard will dimension door in to yell at you before bringing in

several more wizards to kill you. He'll have some kind of hefty

enchantment up (stoneskin?).

The *instant* he actually shows up (i.e. has the blue ring around

him), pause. Employ the fake talk strategy: Have someone talk to him

and unpause. Pause again (before anyone actually walks over and

starts talking to him) and force-attack him while he still has the

blue circle around him. You probably won't be able to hit him due to

his powerful protection spells, but this doesn't matter. Every 5

seconds or so, back off and fake-talk him again. As long as you keep

doing this, he won't go hostile and his friends won't gate in.

Within a short period of time, his spell wears off and he returns to

a more normal-looking color. He will now fall easily.

After this, no more wizards will show up and attack you for

spellcasting. Apparently, since he never gets to speak, the game

never triggers any more attacks since the first attack was never

completed. Since more wizards won't show up in the middle of a wizard

attack if you cast spells, this catch gets applied for the rest of

the game. This doesn't appear to screw anything up (it's just a flag

not getting set to "true", shouldn't affect anything else. Hasn't yet

in my game, anyway.)

Protection from Magic Scrolls

-----------------------------

Protection from Magic scrolls make whoever they are used on immune to magic,

but also removes any buffs from the target, and makes it impossible for

them to cast spells. So, instead of using them on yourself, you can also

use them on an enemy mage and completely shut them down.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

VIII.6 [BHLDRS] Beholders

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Beholder Tactics:

-----------------

[from Paul Dickinson]

Beholders have interesting behavior patterns. If any party member

is visible (and hostile), a beholder will immediately start pelting them

with gaze attacks, cause wounds, slow, paralyze, petrify, or whatever.

If not too busy pelting party members with nasty magic, they will move

towards the nearest foe and chew on them. Note the distinction between

foe and party member. Beholders don't seem to want to waste their gaze

attacks on summoned creatures. This means that one can have a stealthy

or invisible party member observing (and thus allowing control of the

battle), while one or more summoned creatures trash the beholders, who

have really pathetic physical attacks. The moon dog figurine works

quite well here. It moves fast, can heal itself, and stays around for

long enough to kill quite a few beholders.

Berserkers:

-----------

[from Xar]

Give the Cloak of Reflection or Balduran Shield to a berserker and then sit

back and watch. Why a berserker? Elder Orbs have Imprisonment and

Berserkers are immune while berserk. (Managed to complete the Underdark

Beholder zone with one character – Korgan)

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

VIII.7 [MNDFLY] Mind Flayers

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Invisible Stalker Strategy:

---------------------------

[from Mishael]

An easy way to kill Mind Flayers is to summon a bunch of Invisible

Stalkers, then cast Haste on them. Invisible Stalkers are immune to all

sorts of Mind control spells including charm, domination and confusion. As

far as I know, they cannot be mind devoured. You may see some marks of

confusion on their head, but they are not confused. You can control them

as long as they are alive. :)

Archery Strategy:

-----------------

[from Jonathan Zimmerman]

I wanted to share my battle strategy for the mind flayers in the Underdark.

I use both pairs of boots of speed on my two best bowmen, and cast chaotic

commands on them. I move the rest of my party off in a corner. The bowmen

pop into a room with the flayers and start shooting arrows. While the

flayers take time using their psionics, my fighters are pumping them full

of arrows. Once they try to close and drain your intelligence, just back

up and start firing again. They will never catch you. This works best if

you've cleaned out the entire city, up to the first door you need a flayer

to open. That way, you have plenty of room to run around. This strategy

does use a lot of arrows, though.

Editor's Note: Not if you have the Tansheron's Bow (from one of the

Merchants in Trademeet).

Bottleneck Fighting Strategy:

-----------------------------

[from Henning Roes]

Only one spell (chaotic command) and one fighter are involved. Cast it on

your best melee fighter and he's protected from psionic blasts. This spell

lasts for a long time. Then give him the best AC (-11 does it). Since Mind

flayers have to hit your Fighter in melee they have to make a critical hit

to drain the fighters brain. Just slaughter them while standing in the door

so only one or two of them are able to attack. The INT-lowerance disappears

after a short time so there's no need for a restoration-spell. Ullithids

drain 4 or 5 levels (better than the usual Mind Flayer) - INT 5-6 is a

must. Don't care about the Umber Hulks in the Under Dark. Use them as a

shield while fighting and healthy. I finished the Mind Flayer City with

only 1 spell and some healing potions. Even in the sewers in the Temple

District it's very easy. Equip a shield to get a low AC. My fighter wasn't

hasted or othwerwise improved.

Kill Mind Flayers with Undead:

------------------------------

[from James Victor]

Let someone cast Wizard's Eye and have it position itself wherever the

mind flayers are situated. Have your mages/clerics cast animate dead and

let the wizard eye guide them the way. Since animated skeletons have no

brain, flayer's psionics are useless and since mindflayers have weak stats,

they are easy to slaughter. For better results, have a cleric cast

Strength of One and another spellcaster cast Haste for better results. A

couple of batches of "enhanced" skeletons would do the trick.

Editor's Note: The Wizard's Eye doesn't do anything itself, it is simply

used so you can see where the skeletons are going. This

way you can keep your party well away from the battle.

Skeletons and Skeletal Warriors will still fall to Mind

Flayers, so send in as many as you can. Use the Project

Image trick if you need to. (Project Image, Animate Dead,

Animate Dead, etc., repeat

Mind Flayer Mind Control Collars:

---------------------------------

[from Travis Archer]

Some SPOILERS ahead.

These devices are one-shot mind control items which never fail. Only 1 is

necessary to get to the Elder brain, maybe 2 if you're unlucky. Which

leaves 2 or 3 extra. These come in very handy in tough fights. These

devices make the most impossible combats _easy_. The mob stays under your

control until attacked. It won't leave the map, but it's still your pet

when you come back.

I used one on the Demilich, and one on Shangalar, because: The Demilich is

probably the single hardest opponent because he Imprisons at will. He's

immune to almost every spell, and he's beefy like an Adamantite Golem.

(Weapons do 1-5 damage depending on enchantment) With one of these devices

I made him my pet! On a funny note, you can make him Imprison himself, but

then you don't get his loot or experience. :( So, I used Freedom and then

just ambushed him while he was still "green". By the time he turned red he

was dead.

I used this on Shangalar and he wasted his buddies while I watched, then I

finished him off. (Wait until he gets all his defenses up before you use it

on him)

This can be used on Dragons as well, which is amusing as hell, but not the

Avatar of Rillifane who is immune to everything. :(

ToB Note: This strategy doesn't work in ToB.

Note: If you give the collars to your mage, then cast Project Image, you

can use the image's collars and keep the real ones forever.

Ring of Free Action:

--------------------

[from John Welch]

As I was going through the Illithid city in the underdark, I discovered

something interesting that you have not mentioned. The ring of free action

grants the wearer complete immunity to the flayer's psionic blasts. I realize

that when you think about what psionic blast does (holds the person, to be

killed), it makes perfect sense, but I thought it should be pointed out for

those who may have more rings than they do fingers.

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VIII.8 [WRWLVS] Werewolves

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Regenerating Monster Fighting:

------------------------------

[from Jeremy Treanor]

I've found a lot of the battles with the monsters that regenerate quickly

(greater werewolf, the prince in underdark, etc.) rather annoying when you

can't seem to do enough damage to hurt him to 'barely injured', but I did

find one trick that seems to work consistently. Firstly, you need to knock

down some of its magic resistance. Cast harm and hope that your priest/druid

is good enough to make contact. (Having autopause when a weapon becomes

unusable helps too.) If you make contact, the creature should be down to

about 1 point, so you hit him with a magic missile. Since his resistance

should still be down, he should die.