Can anyone give me a few tactical hints for killing the Shade Dragon and Firkaalg? I've been getting slaughtered repeatedly. My party members are:

Yoshimo
Jaheira
Minsc
Aerie
Haer'Dalis

And I'm playin a Ranger

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http://www.members.home.com/femalk/NurikoChibi.jpg Playing the cutest li'l Chaotic characters since 1996.

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If you have a staff of cloudkill(and you don´t mind about the cheesy tactic), you can easily kill the beasts. Just approach until they nearly see you, then cloudkill ´em. They will not come closer and heal themselves 2 or 3 times, but after about 8-10 clouds, the battle is over. I know it´s a bithttp://www.ironworksforum.com/ubb/no...miles/puke.gif, but I never tried another way.

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-UCANTZEECALIFORNIAWITHOUTMARLONBRANDOSEYEZ-

There are lots of ways to kill dragons. Spoiler
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The 1st thing you need to do is lower their magic resistance. Do this before they becoming hostile. Cast the cleric spell magic resistance on them 1st with your lowest level cleric. This significantly reduces their magic resistance. It's normally a protection spell for non-enemies (until you attack or irritate them, they aren't enemies) to increase resistance, but the spell has a warning that if the spell target's resistance is normally higher than what the spell gives, then the target's resistance will actually be LOWERED to the value of that spell. The spell confers 2% per level. For instance, if your cleric is lvl 12, then you would confer 24% magic resistance on the dragon. I'm not sure, but I think they have >90% resistance normally. Because this is not a hostile spell, the dragon will have its resistance lowered but it still won't attack. You can follow up with the mage reduce magic, and the dragon's resistance will be virtually 0. At this point, any weapon or spell will damage it. Even magic missiles. **If you want the Dragons' magic weapons, DO NOT PETRIFY or DISINTEGRATE, you will not get 2 of the best weapons in the game.** So you can use any tactics you want, from spells to hack and slash to missiles to whatever. To give yourself a great edge, set all of Yoshimo's traps right in front of the dragon before you start attacking. Once he turns hostile, the traps go off. Also, remember to beef up with plenty of protections (magic, fear, energy, fire (Firkraag),acid (Shadow),etc and spread out so they can't take out your whole party with a wing buffet.

Spread your party members around, with your tanks and summoned creatures (which you will use as fodder) within melee range around the dragon. Don't have them all clustered together as one wing buffet will knock them all away. Lower-armored melee fighters should be behind the dragon. Ranged attackers and spellcasters should be well away from the dragon's breath weapon or buffeting attacks.

The first arcane spells you should cast should be: Lower Resistance (twice preferably), then Greater Malison, then a disabling spell like Remove Magic to get rid of his stoneskin. If you have a druid or ranger that can cast Summon Insects or Insect Swarm it will prevent him from casting spells. Just hammer away. Try casting a lot of instant kill spells after you've cast Greater Malison.

Good luck!

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Begin with cleric's Magic Resistance, then mage's Lower Resistance. Next, use Doom and Greater Malison while the tanks and some conjured fodder keep the dragon occupied in melee. Cast damaging spells that have either no saving throw or have disastrous effects for failing a saving throw. Jaheira's insect swarm does reasonably well.

On a side note, where did you get the name "Niamh" from? An ex-girlfriend of mine had a PnP character whose name was "Niamh". Now that I think about it, that was the same game where I first created Azred.

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An intelligent mind is the key to the universe.

The most distressing thing about practicing magic is the fact that even the most learned sorcerers cannot accurately describe what magic *is*....

Who are you? What do you want?

Thanks for all the aid folks. I ended up killing the two dragons off with the wand of wonder..petrified them both on the first shots.

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http://www.members.home.com/femalk/NurikoChibi.jpg Playing the cutest li'l Chaotic characters since 1996.

So did you still get all the items they carried? Otherwise you would be better off changing them back and killing them for real. If I'm not mistaken, a Stone to Flesh will make them normal again, but they'll have just one hitpoint, making them easy pickings. They will be neutral though, so you'll have to take the initiative.

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The last arrow of Legolas kindled in the air as it flew,
and plunged burning into the heart of a great wolf-chieftain.
All the others fled. -J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

I didn't get their scales or hide, but I did get all the money, scrolls, etc they had.

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http://www.members.home.com/femalk/NurikoChibi.jpg Playing the cutest li'l Chaotic characters since 1996.

Ugg. Umm the read dragon's hide probably makes one of the best (if not the best) suits of armor in the game and he has another item that that most consider a very powerful weapon (if you have a party member that can use it). I wouldn't recommend using petrification on any big kills like that since you never know what ya might lose.
The shadow dragon I find to be the easiest dragon (I am not sure why). I tend to summon a bunch of creatures,buff up with all the good buff spells (definatly gotta haste). Then spread out alot. This is important. spell casters should be far away AND far apart from each other. have everyone attack all together. you can probably take the shadow dragon down to injured before his spells kick in. as others have mentioned lowering his magic resistance is real good. an important thing to have ready though is a spell to take out his stoneskins(once it fires off). slapping an insect plague onto him at the start is also very effective. One thing you gotta watch is that you try to keep some melee guys on him. If he wing buffets all the melee guys away and the closest target is a spellcaster he will probably attack the mage. when he starts breathing at the mage casting spells is way hard and mages tend to drop real fast from breath attacks. Oh you might want to cast resist fear before the fight as well if you have problems with your party being feared.

a good tactic is to take 2 people w/ lots of hp arm one with Cloak of
Reflection and the other with Cloak of Mirrors and position on exactly
opposite sides of the dragon and have one launch a ligtning bolt at the
other because i've found alot of dragons are weak against lightning