I was just wondering what everyone's toughest battles were. I've found nothing more challenging than fighting 3 ArmaGazers simultaneously at ascension peak. With a couple unlucky rolls on my part, they wiped out half my level 40 super-party the first time around. They cast insanity at such a high level that it beats out our high resistances, and lets my PC's kill each other with their critical strike abilities. You spend each round trying to cast sane mind or restoration, and they just do it again the next round. The ArmaGazers are so high level that I'd met them 3 or 4 times before my party of all 100%-mythology characters could even identify them! On the plus side, their worth over 2.5megs exp each!

I only met ArmeGazers once. Didn't do any harm to my fighter/bishop duo.
I defended for ~12 rounds, then my characters were able to identify them.

What are tough battles seem to greatly depend on your party. Soul-Eater, for example. His ability to make your whole party insane is very dangerous for parties with very good weapons and high melee damage. But for my pure spellcaster party, he was a piece of cake.

In my experience, most dangerous place is the swamp. I usually play expert ironman, and 3 of my 4 unsuccessful parties were killed there (not counting the 2-3 parties where i lost a character before the King Crab, and started all over)

The closest non-lethal battle i ever had was in the Southern Wilderness Temple. Just had sold a lot of my ressurrection powders, to buy nice items.
At least the elementals and cultists died early, thanks to eye for an eye. But somehow, the toxic clouds and death clouds worked very well. In several rounds, none of my characters was able to do anything. At one point, for about 5 rounds, only the priest was alive, but he was ko. I needed 13 (of my remaining 15) ressurrection powders.

It certainly depends on your level. With my Lord Dracon, Ninja Faerie and Android Monk I no longer have difficult battles. But I haven't made it to Ascension Peak with this party yet. I consider the Sorceress battle one of the hardest, but I won it on first try with this party. I still needed strategy, but not much. Straight at 'em. Nessie? No problem. Making it to Ferro's can be difficult, but not with this trio. I cleared out the area and had alot left to fight with. Same with the Rapax Away Camp. Of course, it helps to be at level 22 or so when you do these things!! I think I was at 18 when I tackled Nessie, higher levs for later battles. I think I will go back to all six player characters after this game for the banter and to use weapons I never used before, like Zatoichi staff. It looks really good, but it would hold back my bare-handed monk now.

Hello, I have never met ArmaGazers, the highest monsters I got, were Trydras.
It really depends on your party, which enemies are strong. I'm currently running a 3 men, ranger, alchemist, samurai party without Soul shield and so all Gazers are really hard for me.
Well, scorchers are always nice to meet, easy to kill and many XP By the way, is Magma Scorcher the highest one ?
I think I will continue my best party being about LvL 37, to meet some of the ArmaGazers. Must be fun.
I once met a LVL 39 wood spirit, was piece of cake, dont remember his name.

Niob

Rynjins always cause problem for me in every game I met them. they always strike first and bombard me with their spells. I always had to reload this one.

The battle with you love child also is a problem. I remember I had to retreat to a better position, only to encounter another group of monsters. I fought tooth and nail in this one.

Niob, are your chars pure? By that I mean did you start them as ranger, samurai and alchemist? A strange party. Some healing and protection gaps there.

Well, all battles are easy when youre high enough level, hard when you are low enough level.

The battles in the game get easier as the game progresses. I probably reloaded 90% before level 8, and 10% after.

The biggest exception is the sorceress heart battle. It was the only one too difficult regardless of what I tried in the whole game. I went back after a few levels with a plan and worked it out. Just taking that on head on I probably couldnt do before I finished the game though actually at around level 22.

Nessie took one reload. Soulreaver is the toughest single monster it took a few reloads, just to change the encounter so I didnt have to fight something else with him.

Sorceress battle USED TO be my toughest battle, until I met the ArmeGazers. Even Nessie I didn't find too hard, just long and much hacking. But the Armegazers are actually tougher to kill the better you are, because their main attack is a nearly irresistable insanity spell; so when your party is advanced and most or all of them have critical strike ability, and sometimes 12 hits each per round (for the fighte types), then the ArmeGazers just make you kill yourselves!

I have a party where all the pc's are 39-40 lvl. I play around in this every now and again when I feel like hacking away. Nothing else poses any challenge whatsoever, just the ArmeGazers.

and, yes I believe the magma schorchers are the highest exp. My highest exp encounter was 2 ArmeGazers, 2 Magma Scorchers, a gaggle of lesser scorchers, and waiting off in the distance 5 Ironwood Guardians with 6 Craig Sprites (came in range several rounds later). In all I think my party of 7 got something like 3 million exp each!

[ 04-30-2003, 10:14 AM: Message edited by: jsalsb ]

Not having ever taken a party to those insane levels, I haven't met the armegazers on AP yet. So I have a question for those who have -- what happens if you have an eye for an eye spell up? Is the insanity just a side effect of their attack that doesn't reflect back? Or does it reflect back and simply not affect them?

I thought the answer might shed some light on how they can affect you despite the high level of mental resistance you might have.