well, for the past day or two i've been at the battlesquare place in the icepalace, and i've decided to have a serious go at finishing it. At present i've completed the first 5 ranks, and level 3 on the 6th rank, and level 1 on the 7th,8th,9th & 10th ranks. I'm using my wizard, casting skull traps and cloudkills before the baddies spawn, and then holding em in the cloudkill with chromatic orb, or killing them with other spells. My ranger, theif, druid, bard and cleric all die within minutes if i send them in. Anyone have any strategy suggestions for me?

finish up to chapter 4 before you seriously try this, ok to try with a wizard maybe. but maybe you'd want some summons? animate dead is an all time favourite, try getting greater boneguards, they rock.

no summons in the battlesquare, but i just managed to get up to level 4 on rank 6.... used my priest to cast a few glyph of warding....

[ 02-02-2003, 10:38 AM: Message edited by: lethoso ]

Since my question is on battle squares, I'm going to use this thread to post.

I am using my Level 9 fighter for this, but am having some problems. I click on a square and all of a sudden, she leaves the room and goes running off to the room where the rest of the party is being held. The monster then appears and goes running out of the room to look for me.

What is happening? Why won't my character stay in the room?

Thank you.

you have party ai set to something which is making the fighter run to the rest of your party?

but i just got past rank 6 [img]smile.gif[/img]

It's best to complete battle square at chapter 4. I completed battle square in chapter 2 and I always reloaded 'til I get xp award. I gained lots of level but the xp I gain in chapter 3 & 4 was reduced because my level was high. Wish I had completed battle square when I was chapter 4. My party could be 1-2 level higher with that way :(

Whatever, here's how I played battle square. I cast buff spells to my fighter. Then he attacks. I reload when air elemental appears. Shadow creatures easy.

Zoltan, so you're saying it would be better to not do the battle squares in Chapter 2? That I should wait until Chapter 3 or 4? Since I'm having such a hard time anyway, that may be a better idea.

As for why my character keeps running to the rest of the party, I don't know why my character keeps running to be with the rest of the party. I don't think the AI is set to anything that would make her go running.

it's easy to try without ai, just click on ai button so the man in bottom right corner doesn't have lit eyes.

as for xp, yes, it's wiser, xp wise to do in chapter 4. Because the xp you get in BS is a set amount it won't be affected by what your lvls are, but you'll get much more xp from monsters in chapters 2-4 if you don't finish BS until just before exiting chap. 4

Thanks for the advice Dragonslayer. I have no problem just leaving it alone right now. I'll check out the ai button too. Appreciate it. Now I can go on exploring.

What weapons or items do you get at the end of battle square? Just wondering... i never actually finished it.

here you go, correct me if I'm wrong.

rank 1 = Warded Dragon's Belt
- +3 reflex saves
- 6/- cold resistance

rank 2 = Potion of Holy Transference
-permanantly +2 wis, -1 dex

rank 3 = Cornugan Hide Armor
-damage reduction 10/+2
-regenerate 1 hp per 10 rounds

rank 4 = Boots of Grounding
- 6/- electrical resistance

rank 5 = Throwing Axe of Shocking Burst
-return to user
- 1d6 electrical damage, 10% chance of extra 1d10 electrical damage
- +5 for hitting

rank 6 = Club of Disuption
-undead and outsiders must make fortitude save or destroy
- +5 for hitting

rank 7 = Ice Spear +4
-cast ice lance 1/day

rank 8 = Composite Longbow of Empowerment
- random +4 on str, dex, con, int, wis, cha for 5 rounds when damage by melee

rank 9 = Wand of dead
- cast animate undead

rank 10 = Brilliant short sword +5
- attack ignore shield or armor bonous

upon completion of all ranks = Bracers of Icelandic Pearl
- cast lesser planar binding : water element 1/day
- cast cone of cold 1/day
- cast horrid wilting 1/day

i got abishai hide after doing rank 3...

I'm stuck. I keep trying to defeat the battle square mainly because I can't think of anything else to get into the "embrace the shadow" room. I use the painting to get into the room then get blown away by the lightning glyph in the room. Anybody got a spoiler to share?

I have defeated level 5 of the battlesquare, I used a Ranger and loaded him up with different types of aid spells. Still, I didn't get the goodies you guys said you got. I got a pearl, a few potions and they cast a spell on me that doesn't last very long. What am I missing?

I thought maybe I had to defeat all the the levels and ranks to get into the room. I guess not by looking at what some of you have posted.

the embrace the shadow room, you have to walk onto the shadow (and get hurt by the trap), then the door will open, then bounce lightning into the room to open the adjoining room up...

as for the battlesquare, to get the good items you must win a difficulty setting by completing 3 consecutive squares, then 4 and so on up till 7 (a total of 25 battles per difficulty level)

but finishing the battlesquare was challenging, but not entirely impossible... just requires lots of reloads :(

Its not really that hard if you know how to do it correctly. Improved Invisibility rocks ;)
I casted them on my 2 sorcerers and put one of my sorcerer just outside the room at the north door. Than I started the battle and have twice the amount of spells. Plus the monsters won't attack my sorcerers since they are invisible.

Thanks Lethoso. Actually I looked up "embrace the shadow" last night after I found out you don't have to defeat all the battle squares. (thank god) Got the spoiler and I'm on way my in the haunted wood.

I was simply getting seven squares on each level (or rank), and then going to the next. I'll go back and play with the room later. I tried the last rank and got killed pretty quickly so it looks pretty tough.

It's really not that bad, you get an item which helps a lot on the later battlesquare levels after completing rank 6.... so if you can finish that rank, you can finish em all...