Well I finally did it...I finally whacked those pesky Twisted Rune guys with zero casualties. Thank god that's over...it took six reloads but it was worth it...that Staff of The Magi is one choice item, and since I did the quest in Chapter 2 I can use the staff's powers (especially Spell Trap) on all those pesky mage encounters lying ahead.

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"I am death come for thee. Surrender and thy passage shall be...swifter"

"Kneel before the cow god!"

you did it in chapter 2! WOW! http://www.tgeweb.com/cgi-bin/ubb/no...miles/eek2.gif what level where you at?

Chapter 2 and 0 casualties? Thats most fearsome. What kind of strategy did you use? What levels?

Where do you pick up the Twisted Rune Quest??

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Not all chemicals are bad. Without chemicals such as hydrogen and oxygen,
for example, there would be no way to make water, a vital ingredient in
beer.

- Dave Barry

SPOILER!!!!!!!!


If you have a rogue stone, take it to the bridge district.
By the lich which has Kangaxx's bones, there is a locked door. Pick the lock, or use a knock spell, and you will be teleported to a "secret" area. This battle have of won at chapter 2, is very hard to do.

Spoiler on enemies!

1 Lich, 1 Vampire, 1 Elder Orb, 1 Mage, 1 Thief.

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All your base are belong to us! [1diablo] [/1diablo]

Some people have posted asking me how I did Twisted Rune in Chap2 and the lvls/strategy that I used. First let me say that I beat them on Normal difficulty and that I have not cheated in any way during this game. The party I am using and their lvls (as best I remember) are:

PC Assassin 14th lvl
Korgan 12th lvl
Jahiera 10th lvl fighter/12druid
Anomen 13th lvl
Haer'Daelis 13th lvl (yes I find him useful)
Edwin 12th lvl

Here's the strategy that I used:
Before entering the doorway with the Rogue Stone I buffed up my characters with haste, draw upon holy might, righteous magic, blur, stoneskin, ironskin, mirror image, prot from evil, and bless. Anomen was equipped with the Shield of Balduran. No one in my group had Daystar, the Mace of Disruption, or Azuredge.
Anyway I entered and kept my characters near the far wall of the small antechamber, Jahiera summoned two fire elementals...I had these wait right in the entrance to the adjoining room. I then had Anomen walk into the room alone, which triggered the entrance of Shandalar and his lackeys. As soon as Shandalar had spewed his crap at Anomen I had him run back into the small room and take up posistion. Shandalar teleports into the midst of the party at this point. I had Haer'daelis shoot magic-missle at him and Edwin fire off his minor sequencer which was loaded with magic missles, everyone elso either shot at or melee'd him. This took Shandalar down to injured before his multiple contingincies fired off. Then while Haer'Daelis cast oracle and all the fighters pounded on Shandalars decoy image, Edwin threw a death fog into the next room...about this time Shandalars Time Stop went off...Shandalar and his buddies went crazy casting fear, domination, and wail of the banshee, Most of my party was immune to the fear and domination effects and luckily the wail didn't kill anyone. The time stop ended and Edwin Cast breach to lower all of Shandalar's physical protections then my other characters pounded on him until he went down. By this point the vamp and some fighter named Rayanek had entered the small chamber and the Beholder had killed itself by firing at Anomen who conveniently had the Shield of Balduran. The vamp and fighter went down fairly easy leaving only the female mage...By this time some of her protections had expired and by herself she was no match for my intact, and fairly healthy party.

Anyway that's how it went down...on the five previous attempts that I made the battle was always close. I'd kill a few of the Twisted Rune before losing a character or two and would hit reload. I probably could have won in fewer attempts had I been willing to accept casualties. Before doing the Rune I had completed most of the other main side-quests, including the Slave Lords and both Dragon fights. If anyone wants any more info on how I did this battle just post here and I will reply. It's worth doing in Chap2 so that you can use the Staff of the Magi throughout the bulk of the game.

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"I am death come for thee. Surrender and thy passage shall be...swifter"

"Kneel before the cow god!"

Well thats nice work. I don't really see how death fog would have been effective though. I'm pretty sure all of those guys have heavy magic resistance. Maybe not? And sneaking those magic missles in sounds near impossible.

Anyway, your levels are pretty high for chapter 2, so it isn't as amazing as it sounds at first. I hope your exp cap is off, or ToB is installed, or else you will hit a wall fairly soon...

I don't know about magic resistance working on Death Fog, but it did 8 damage a round to everyone in the room...not a lot but enough to disrupt some castings and every little bit helps in a fight like that. You can get those magic missles in, it just takes some well-timed pausing just as Shandalar teleports into the midst of your party.

Best tactic I've seen is to make full use of that first room you arrive in. Pick off the opponents one or two at a time by luring them back to that room. Placing traps right in the doorway works wonders, especially when the lich appears there. http://www.tgeweb.com/cgi-bin/ubb/no...iles/smile.gif Also, after each "gap" in the action, do a quick save. This will stop you from having to do the whole fight over if you mess up later in the fight.


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http://www.tc.umn.edu/~monax002/gh/head.jpg
Death is only the beginning...

I'd just like to add that I also did this quest in Chapter 2, and I was around the same level. I took some casulties, 'cause I'm more of a fighter guy, not using much magic except for Breach, lower resistance etc.

Anyways, I guess I lost about 4 characters...hehe...but I cast raise dead on 'em, so I didn't really care. Gotta hate those damn time stop spells!

Funny you should post this as I also just completed this in chapter 2 just last night. My strategy was a little different than yours. I read some advice recently saying to take out the vampire first cuz of the 4 level drains and someone else next etc and I tried that a few times with limited success. Then I decided to go back to my initial strategy to take out the main bad guy first (shangalar is his name?) anyways he went down in 1 run with this strategy so I was pretty amazed.
I buffed up of course and summoned 2 elementals,2 aerial servants and an invisible stalker.
I sent in someone to trigger him and when he teleported ran back in the room. I had my kensai/mage with the daystar trigger its sunray effect and at the same time I had anomen cast sunray. This coupled with the couple of melfs minute meteor shots my mages got off on him before his defenses were up killed him on that first round(I was using sunray to take out the vampire and when I saw shangalar damaged by it it occured to me that he must be a lich). Now my buffed party and group of 5 summoned creatures stormed the room. Shield of balduran like the poster said works awesome on the beholder and I sent alot of my elementals at the vamp to avoid the level drains on my chars. Then I proceded to take out the other mage since she is pretty damn nasty herself. Not so hard when you can take here without worrying about the beholder or shangalar.

pretty simply really 2 sunrays was the key for me. The other guys are not so hard really.

Just out of curiosity, how did you manage to save during this fight?...I was never able to.

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"I am death come for thee. Surrender and thy passage shall be...swifter"

"Kneel before the cow god!"

My paladin(L15)wipped out the intire twisted rune single handed and withoud taking much damage so its not that hard.
Then again my sorcerer(l12) and his party got slaughterd, luckily i was playing a multiplayer game so i exported my sorcerer, imported my pally etc.

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http://www.ranchoweb.com/images/bg2guy/drow2.gif

Those who watch their backs meet death from the front- Dreamer128 paladin of the order of the holy flame.

How nice! Well done. I always do the Twisted Rune in Chapter 2. But I use another strategy.

I take the whole party to the bottom right corner in the room with the big table. You know, where Shandalar is summoned. There the Beholder won't cast any rays on you, and the Pit Fiend which is always summoned always kills the beholder and also draws the attention of the female mage. So you just have to fight the Vamp. and the fighter in the beginning. Not to hard. Now, the Pit Fiend kills the beholder, but the Mage is not dead, so you have to kill her. Not to hard either since she is now alone. maybe you also have to kill the Fiend here. But fiends are like...I don't know. Something small and pathetic.
Anyway, with the mage and Fiend gone, you can now save, since Shandalar is in the room where you were summoned. Last time I was kind of lucky with Anomen killing him with one hit with Mace of Disrution +2. Ahh...collect the treasure and laugh hard at the enemy. Laugh even harder if you also have the cloak of non-detection.

Hmmm...I did it in chapter 2 with a relatively low level main character mage and party...well the mage was around level 14 or 15 or 16, but the REST of the party was low level. I don't really know how that happened...I guess from switching up NPCs, oh well. Anyway, I used the staff of fire elementals or something like that, and had a fighter with those boots of speed or whatever running around so I could see everything, and he hit stuff once in a while, and a bunch of casters with summon spells. Started with five asorted summoned creatures, and kept them coming by throwing out fire elementals whenever one died. I used up most of the staffs charges, but hey, I never used it again after I got the Staff of the Magi

question, where and how do you get the shield of Balduran?

Shield of balduran is for sale by someone in the back of the adventurers mart in waukeens promonade. you need download the bonus pack to get that item in the shop though.

I just did it last night, on my *first* serious attempt... http://www.tgeweb.com/cgi-bin/ubb/no...es/biggrin.gif
After I completed the fight (and saved, fortunately) I reloaded and tried twice more... and got my butt kicked, lol.
The funny thing is the first time I did it, I did not use many of the traditional protection spells like bless, chant, defensive harmony, etc. Just good ol' hack & slash, with liberal doses of magic missiles, dispel magic (esp on the lich) and assorted other spells. I *did* have good weapons though, namely Celestial Fury and the Holy Avenger.
The beholder too did not seem to have much affect on my party, and no, I did NOT use the Shield of Balduran.
Oh well, I suppose I was lucky with some of the dice rolls, lol.

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"Butt-kicking for goodness!" - Minsc
"Cities always teem with evil and decay. Let's give it a good shake and SEE WHAT FALLS OUT!!" - Minsc
http://www.dabros.net/images/tcampbell/hadb6copy.jpg

I think all of us who've done the Twisted Rune can agree that it's one hell of a good fight http://www.tgeweb.com/cgi-bin/ubb/no...iles/smile.gif

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"I am death come for thee. Surrender and thy passage shall be...swifter"

"Kneel before the cow god!"

Sounds like a good time. I'll try it tonight...

Yes the twisted rune is one of the coolest fights in the game. Took me two tries to beat and my characters were 3 levels from being maxed out. Here's how I did it. Power up all your characters with priest defense spells. Bless, Chant, defensive harmony, true sight, etc. Have your true sight character go in the room, and backstab the female mage. (She's the one with timestop, and can cast wail of the banshee.) Once she's down you can kill everyone else at your leisure. (Shangelar doesn't have timestop for some reason.) Oh yes the staff of the magi is cool. Who likes a lightning bolt fireball combo? And don't forget about spell trap!

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Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, I just don't have to listen.
http://train.missouri.org/~prestons/.../flamedrag.gif

My main character is pretty much SoA maxed- 9Kensai/17(?)mage... the rest of my party (Korgan, Minsc, Viconia, Jaheira) aside from Imoen are pretty well gassed up too...

I've got a couple level 9 scrolls I could burn (Spellstrike, Timestop) if the going get's too rough.

hmmm...when I fought him Shangalar DID have timestop and Wail of the Banshee, weird.

both he and the women sorcerer have it. It was a bitch but I made it through with my only casualty was jaheira getting petrified - easy to fix.

Thanks for the advice, sticking to the alcove room and letting the Pit Fiend do some of my work was pretty effective.