what is your group make up?
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His Mighty Tentacle
Member # 627
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written Sunday, November 27 2005 11:57
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Yeah, that is a good piece of advice. RUN LIGHT. Being encumbered is positively lethal. There are some fights that you simply must run from. Fast on Feet is good to have, because you don't need to outrun the monsters, just your fellow party members. Always, always make sure that your priest can run the fastest is the most sound piece of advice that I can offer. Death can be quite sudden and swift. There are, well, with out giving away what, things that will chew you up and spit you out. There are enemies that will lay the smack down on you. And when your front line goes, if your mages and such are encumbered with wands and reagents and such, they WILL die. Jeff really did a good job at making tactics important. Some times, it's better to send one character forward to wake up a foe or two and lead them back to a waiting ambush. The alternative is stumbling in to a massive battle you are not prepared for and say, walking in to a mob of 20 or 30 giants all of whom are bored and looking for somebody to crush with rocks. Not only is AVIV epic in size and scope, but some of the battles in game are absolutely astounding in scale. Running shoes are required. -------------------- If I could make just one wish, I would want a tasty vlish. Geneforge IV. Still no tasty vlish. Posts: 1104 | Registered: Tuesday, February 12 2002 08:00 |
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Off With Their Heads
Member # 4045
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written Sunday, November 27 2005 12:04
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I've nearly beaten A4 and I've never run from a fight. I've never been encumbered for long, but I've always used those AP for attack, not retreat. And none of the fights in A4 (at least so far) have been as monumental in scope as the assault on the ziggurat in A2, which still stands out in my mind as my favorite fight of the Avernum Series. Well, it remains to be seen if I like any of the climactic moments of A4. [ Sunday, November 27, 2005 12:06: Message edited by: Kelandon ] -------------------- Arancaytar: Every time you ask people to compare TM and Kel, you endanger the poor, fluffy kittens. Smoo: Get ready to face the walls! Ephesos: In conclusion, yarr. Kelandon's Pink and Pretty Page!!: the authorized location for all things by me The Archive of all released BoE scenarios ever Posts: 7968 | Registered: Saturday, February 28 2004 08:00 |
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His Mighty Tentacle
Member # 627
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written Sunday, November 27 2005 12:19
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I can think of at least one fight that you must run from in order to complete a quest. I have beat the game twice so far. There are optional fights involving artifacts... And one of these fights involves a whole lot of HARD hitting enemies. Nuts, I really want to discuss strategy. And I don't think I can with out violating the NDA. Oh I hate this. -------------------- If I could make just one wish, I would want a tasty vlish. Geneforge IV. Still no tasty vlish. Posts: 1104 | Registered: Tuesday, February 12 2002 08:00 |
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Law Bringer
Member # 4153
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written Sunday, November 27 2005 12:36
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quote:This is why email addresses and AIM IDs are in our profiles. -------------------- Gamble with Gaea, and she eats your dice. I hate undead. I really, really, really, really hate undead. With a passion. Posts: 4130 | Registered: Friday, March 26 2004 08:00 |
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His Mighty Tentacle
Member # 627
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written Sunday, November 27 2005 14:13
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My latest party design is different. Up front, human female. Priestess. With Natural Warrior trait. There is one spell... One spell that you want to cast when you are surrounded by enemies. I can't say what it is, but needless to say, this spell is best cast from the center of a mob. So I created a character designed to be a monster chew toy. Lots of defense, priest skills, defensive skills, and the bonuses from the warrior trait. She can really take a beating. Monsters really do not like her. (Monsters tend to beeline for spellcasters now) One day, she will be my religious suicide bomber. Run in to a mob and cast that spell. And then every monster on screen that manages to survive will be drawn to her like flies to honey. The survivors are going to be super pissed. I am going to give her just enough melee skill and dexterity to get Quick Strike. I'll buy a couple of levels of this to make sure that she always goes first. I want monsters focused on her. Up second, a Nephil. Archer and thief. Bow user. Sniper. Pretty straight forward here. His job will be to make the monsters gathered around the priestess look like pincushions and to open stuff. A Slith. Lancer. Exclusive use of spears of both types. For up close pigsticking and long distance puncturing with javelins. He will have enough strength to carry his missiles, will be lightly armored to allow for more missile payload, and a vast majority of his skill points will wind up in the Sharpshooter skill and dexterity. His specialty will be death. Plain and simple. Long distance damage. Mage slayer. His sole purpose will be to achieve the highest damage possible with thrown weapons. And in the last slot, a mage priest. Glass cannon. All offensive geared. Nothing but spell energy and skills. Walking death. Portable nuclear device. The Vapouriser. No strength, no dex, no endurance, nothing but skills that contribute to damage, and lots of it. After the first character runs in to battle and casts that spell, and the missile launchers do their work, this person is clean up. POOF. Enemies all go bye bye. At least, that is how it should work. I hope. -------------------- If I could make just one wish, I would want a tasty vlish. Geneforge IV. Still no tasty vlish. Posts: 1104 | Registered: Tuesday, February 12 2002 08:00 |
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Shaper
Member # 247
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written Sunday, November 27 2005 14:44
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I like having both my priest and mage capable of using crossbows. So that when spell energy runs low they aren't completely useless. Oh, and I carry no extra gear. Usually I sell anything extra. -------------------- The Knight Between Posts. Posts: 2395 | Registered: Friday, November 2 2001 08:00 |
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
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written Sunday, November 27 2005 16:07
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In A4 I found myself generally carrying a pair of weapons for my fighters, a ton of potions on my lead character, worn and wielded gear, and some very light rings for emergency resistances on my casters. That's it. It left plenty of room for loot, which is important, and I just didn't have much else I wanted to carry. Wands and scrolls were always worth more as cash than as weapons. The battle in front of the Ornotha Ziggurat is definitely large, but there are battles that struck me as far more interesting in A4. A certain place that shall not be named with many monsters of unspecified characters, which must be defeated for Quest X comes to mind. Yes, this is very specific. [Edit: I've also found several encumberance tricks to work through. The system is like Geneforge's, but having four party members makes it an interesting load distribution problem. Even distribution is only optimal to a certain point, and then it becomes a question of scapegoats.] —Alorael, who now realizes that his party's two casters are a pair of glass cannons by DV's definition, except they're not exceptionally glass. They have a decent chance of surviving a round of surprise attack when properly buffed by maybe a quarter of the way through the game, and that one round means that anything attacking them is dead. [ Sunday, November 27, 2005 16:09: Message edited by: Line Left ] Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00 |
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Shaper
Member # 6292
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written Sunday, November 27 2005 18:27
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Specializing skills is definitely more necessary in A4. It seems like eventually I could wind up with a priest with strength 10 by late in the game for the previous Avernums. It's just not possible here. Level-up points need to be spent very efficiently. You're simply not going to have an effective spell caster who can also carry a lot. So, that makes for glass cannons. I keep maxing out my priest's carrying capacity just carrying his outfit and herbs. Archery is curiously modified—I find it useful for every party member. -------------------- A4 Items • A4 Singleton • G4 Items • G4 Forging • G4 Infiltrator • NR Items • The Lonely Celt Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00 |
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His Mighty Tentacle
Member # 627
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written Sunday, November 27 2005 18:42
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Glass cannons, paper tigers, whatever you wish to call them, as much as it was true for the Agent in Geneforge, it is also true for the spellcasters in AVIV. Do not waste a point. Those five points you spent raising endurance could cost you big time later, when you could have raised Spellcraft or Magery. And didn't because you spent those points on Endurance. And yes, it's a big deal. -------------------- If I could make just one wish, I would want a tasty vlish. Geneforge IV. Still no tasty vlish. Posts: 1104 | Registered: Tuesday, February 12 2002 08:00 |
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Shaper
Member # 247
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written Sunday, November 27 2005 22:40
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I'd rather have a mage that can handle themselves without spells on occasion. Edit quote:Oh hell yea! Quest X yo. [ Sunday, November 27, 2005 23:05: Message edited by: VCH ] -------------------- The Knight Between Posts. Posts: 2395 | Registered: Friday, November 2 2001 08:00 |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Monday, November 28 2005 00:38
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Hmmm, maybe it's just that I never played the previous Averna, but I've been doing fine with what seemed to me to be the obvious default party: a slith spearer, a human swordsman with a half-hearted sideline in archery, a pure human priest, and a nephil mage with decent tool use. I had to run, sometimes with a single surviving party member, from a couple of fights in the first half of the game; but since then, my team has pretty much been collectively the meanest so-and-so in the valley. I am just heading into what should be the second-last big fight. This boring, standard party seems to benefit, almost disappointingly well, from balance. I conserve spell energy by letting the fighters gradually chop things up whenever this seems safe to do, but I can go Hadoken at need. I'm starting out again with a couple of singleton campaigns, one with a Divinely Blessed warrior/priest, and the other with a nephil mage who will try to play like an Agent. So far the lone mage is totally storming the very beginning of the game, but I seriously wonder how viable he will be for the long haul. The warrior priest has a nice sort of mixture of skills, but I'm a bit worried how he'll do without some of the mage spells. I have only played on Normal difficulty. -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
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written Monday, November 28 2005 08:37
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Summoning has become a far more palatable option in A4 from what I've seen. All you need is a wall of bodies to keep your singleton from being gnawed, and a few summons and buffs can probably take care of that. It's a little extra magic spent in each fight, but you'll probably have enough extra skill points to toss into intelligence to handle it. —Alorael, who is tempted to attempt a party with absolutely no melee skill. A bunch of archers would be a challenge, but two archers and two casters or archer/casters might be even more effective than standard setups. The beginning would be tough, and traits would be more problematic, but by the endgame those archers would mangle many supposedly difficult enemies. Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00 |
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His Mighty Tentacle
Member # 627
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written Monday, November 28 2005 08:51
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Actually, the two archers and two mages is a winning combo. Summons. You are going to need lots of summons. With erm, certain enemies, yeah, that's it, you know, those enemies that have spines, gush acid, and scramble your brains if you touch them, missiles are quite effective. Both missile launchers should be trained in bows with some training in thrown missiles. Because some thrown missiles are just that good. Having two Nephils in the party would be ideal actually because they get free skills. With the party I first beat the game with, my front line fighter became an archer out of sheer need because I didn't know what I was doing and the final enemy has all those, well, er, if you play the game you know that you shouldn't just go up and whack those things with a sword because you will die. -------------------- If I could make just one wish, I would want a tasty vlish. Geneforge IV. Still no tasty vlish. Posts: 1104 | Registered: Tuesday, February 12 2002 08:00 |
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Law Bringer
Member # 6489
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written Monday, November 28 2005 10:51
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Call me old-fashioned and racist, but my parties are always entirely human. I have one pole weapons fighter with skill in tool use, one ranged waepons specialist (I always try to get the Vahnatai razorblades as soon as I can. Those things rock!) with first aid, a mage with nature/cave lore and a backup specialty in melee weapons, and a priest with arcane lore and potion-making. This party configuration has gotten me through A1, A2, A3, and BoA (not to mention Nethergate) just fine. -------------------- "You're drinking liquor because you're thirsty? How nasty is your freaking water?" —Lazarus Spiderweb Chat Room Avernum RP • Summaries • OoC • Roster Shadow Vale - My site, home of the Spiderweb Chat Database, BoA Scenario Database, & the A1 Quest List, among other things. Posts: 1556 | Registered: Sunday, November 20 2005 08:00 |
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
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written Monday, November 28 2005 13:32
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Hitting things in melee is also just more difficult, because, well, there's that thing that happens when you hit even ordinary enemies in melee that doesn't happen when you shoot them. By the end of the game, even my pure casters did reasonable damage with bows and hit more than half the time. No, I don't really know why. My fighters were actually less accurate because of low bow skill and very heavy armor. —Alorael, who developed elaborate strategies to defeat the enemies that you don't want to touch in melee, then usually ended up blowing them away with really excessively damaging spells because, well, they were frustrating. Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00 |
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His Mighty Tentacle
Member # 627
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written Monday, November 28 2005 13:58
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I found that a couple of those No Touchie Touchie Enemies were highly magic resistant though. Even spells like Arcane Blow only did like 20 damage to them. Missiles did the trick though. I am finding, when all else fails in AVIV, pumping something full of arrows usually takes care of it. Of course, I learned this the hard way, with one of my first parties, when my fast on feet fighter with way to many action points with items and haste went and stabbed something that charmed him after he stabbed it. On the next round, he killed two party members outright, with one stab for each, and on the next turn, the last surviving member, a mage, found he could not outrun the fighter with the legs of a long distance sprinter. Or course, a charmed archer is no better. You can't outrun those either. -------------------- If I could make just one wish, I would want a tasty vlish. Geneforge IV. Still no tasty vlish. Posts: 1104 | Registered: Tuesday, February 12 2002 08:00 |
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Shock Trooper
Member # 3513
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written Monday, November 28 2005 14:43
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Enemies that charm when you stab em? Wow. Sounds nasty. Those are late-game, right? -------------------- Nobody appreciates me. It's all "Igor! Fetch some wine!" "Igor! Clean up this experiment!" or "Igor! Bury this in the garden, we're leaving town in 10 minutes!" —Alorael, who tried to become a deivore once. The priest gave him a funny look after the third wafer. Posts: 301 | Registered: Thursday, October 2 2003 07:00 |
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Off With Their Heads
Member # 4045
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written Monday, November 28 2005 14:47
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They're mid-game enough that they're appropriate. One new touch that I really did like — now that the cat's out of the bag, I guess — is that enemies can now riposte often or render effects when hit, effects such as curse, charm, etc. Getting initiative on something to strike first isn't universally effective anymore. It also makes missile weapons and spells that much more useful. I really think that anyone who uses more than one melee fighter for A4 will be at a disadvantage without great caution. -------------------- Arancaytar: Every time you ask people to compare TM and Kel, you endanger the poor, fluffy kittens. Smoo: Get ready to face the walls! Ephesos: In conclusion, yarr. Kelandon's Pink and Pretty Page!!: the authorized location for all things by me The Archive of all released BoE scenarios ever Posts: 7968 | Registered: Saturday, February 28 2004 08:00 |
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Warrior
Member # 5550
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written Monday, November 28 2005 16:17
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Tell me, how would this party fair? First, Human Sword Warrior, pretty standard, not much else besides maybe a little cave lore and Warrior trait. Next, Nephil with nimble fingers, bows and lockpicking. Third, Human Preist with Tough Skin, and Potion Making. Fourth, Human Mage with Natural Mage, and nothing else. -------------------- Q: What is the sound of one hand clapping? A: The sound of someone getting smacked upside the head. Duct tape is like the force. It has a good side and a dark side and it binds the universe together. Don't worry Alorael, custom titles are overrated. Posts: 154 | Registered: Saturday, February 26 2005 08:00 |
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Off With Their Heads
Member # 4045
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written Monday, November 28 2005 16:24
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That's more or less what I've been using, and I've had few problems that the occasional invulnerability potion wouldn't cure. -------------------- Arancaytar: Every time you ask people to compare TM and Kel, you endanger the poor, fluffy kittens. Smoo: Get ready to face the walls! Ephesos: In conclusion, yarr. Kelandon's Pink and Pretty Page!!: the authorized location for all things by me The Archive of all released BoE scenarios ever Posts: 7968 | Registered: Saturday, February 28 2004 08:00 |
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Law Bringer
Member # 335
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written Monday, November 28 2005 18:47
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That's the cat I was talking about. It's often better to shoot something than to stab it. There were several battles in which my fighters did more damage to themselves than to enemies thanks to ripose, but arrows can't be riposted. I generally accepted charm, terror, and poison and had a caster cure the problem, but with fewer priests or more caution archery is the better solution. A4 did teach me not to haste any fighters until after the first blow has been landed. Never let anyone attack an unknown critter with enough AP to attack again, possibly taking out the priest who can cure charm! —Alorael, who is strongly convinced that not having at least two of eaech caster type (overlapping works) is a mistake. You'll definitely want to have two priests quite often, and two mages can save the day. Fighters really only have to be able to supply interposing bodies and occasional hits with sword, spear, bow, hurled rock, or spider on a string. Posts: 14579 | Registered: Saturday, December 1 2001 08:00 |
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Law Bringer
Member # 4153
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written Monday, November 28 2005 19:33
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quote:Ah, but arrows don't always work... I can't believe this happens in A4. And they're pathetically weak until you upgrade to something like a blessed longbow. And even then, they still do half the damage that good melee fighters can do. Still, little is more annoying than to haste/bless/shield your fighter, send them charging at a strange enemy, and have them run back and attack you after landing one blow. (Haven't had a priest taken out in such an encounter yet) I'm just thrilled to have my fighters (one who's mostly an archer) wielding some classic über-weapons which are finally usable again. After the downgrades they suffered in A3 and BoA (when you can find them), it was nice to see these two sharp things back in the hands of my party. Pointy-side up, of course. -------------------- Gamble with Gaea, and she eats your dice. I hate undead. I really, really, really, really hate undead. With a passion. Posts: 4130 | Registered: Friday, March 26 2004 08:00 |
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Shaper
Member # 247
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written Monday, November 28 2005 23:47
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I think I'll still rush straight into fights swords out. Arrows are for cute little kitties, not true adventurers. -------------------- The Knight Between Posts. Posts: 2395 | Registered: Friday, November 2 2001 08:00 |
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Electric Sheep One
Member # 3431
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written Tuesday, November 29 2005 00:57
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Well, I still have a few big fights left to go, but so far I've been very happy with two melee fighters, and missiles really only used for preliminary softening up or as an alternative to doing nothing for casters conserving spell points. I've had a few episodes of challenging group dynamics, but nothing hard to deal with. My two cents are: Don't try to fight in a compact bunch. Let the infantry do its job of closing with the enemy, even if they waste a round just getting there, while the supporting fire stays at extreme range. [ Tuesday, November 29, 2005 00:57: Message edited by: Student of Trinity ] -------------------- We're not doing cool. We're doing pretty. Posts: 3335 | Registered: Thursday, September 4 2003 07:00 |
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His Mighty Tentacle
Member # 627
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written Tuesday, November 29 2005 01:40
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A bow backed with a high level of the Sharpshooter skill is not poor secondary to melee. You must pump your missile skill, add to Sharpshooter whenever you get the chance, and pump dexterity a bit. With very little effort, you too can start lobbing off 100+ damage arrows or 150+ thrown missiles. In fact, I have found it was easier to scale up bow damage than it was melee damage. For melee, you must pump dex for to hit, strength for damage, your weapon skill, quick action, and your another weapon skill to unlock the Blademaster skill so you can pump that. And that, well, that is a lot of skill points for not much in return. Meanwhile, a Mage or a Priest that buys two levels in bows and two levels in Sharpshooter from a trainer suddenly has a viable form of secondary damage. Especially if you get one of those bows not designed to do much in the way of physical damage, but other kinds of damage. -------------------- If I could make just one wish, I would want a tasty vlish. Geneforge IV. Still no tasty vlish. Posts: 1104 | Registered: Tuesday, February 12 2002 08:00 |