Any advice for solo fighter going through Irenicus Dungeon on insane with tactics?

[drewal]

Help!
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I thought the improved Irenicus battle as a solo necromancer was tough!

This is the first time I've played Irenicus dungeon with the tactics mod - installed it post-ID last time.

Soloing a fighter with 5 in Katana and 1 in single weapon style on insane.

I am lawful neutral, so I have access to one of each of the appropriate Bhaal spawn powers (horror, holy might, larloch's, vampiric touch, cure minor wnds, slow poison).

Two groups of shadow thieves and war dogs spawn in the tunnel between the genie/ogre mage and the Tube room.

A lucky horror, and all but a few of the enemies will be panicked. I can trap a few war dogs at a time in the various rooms (tube room and the two golem rooms).

I can get rid of most of the war dogs, but generally get paralyzed and then sliced to death by backstabs.

[Rataxes]

Originally posted by drewal: Help! SPOILERS BELOW . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I thought the improved Irenicus battle as a solo necromancer was tough! This is the first time I've played Irenicus dungeon with the tactics mod - installed it post-ID last time. Soloing a fighter with 5 in Katana and 1 in single weapon style on insane. I am lawful neutral, so I have access to one of each of the appropriate Bhaal spawn powers (horror, holy might, larloch's, vampiric touch, cure minor wnds, slow poison). Two groups of shadow thieves and war dogs spawn in the tunnel between the genie/ogre mage and the Tube room. A lucky horror, and all but a few of the enemies will be panicked. I can trap a few war dogs at a time in the various rooms (tube room and the two golem rooms). I can get rid of most of the war dogs, but generally get paralyzed and then sliced to death by backstabs.

The kind of wand that the thief in each pack gets isn't decided until you're close to their spawning position (guess they don't spawn till then), so you could simply reload until you get a managable type, like Wand of Frost or Polymorph.
There's really no "fair" way to beat thieves with Paralyze wands for any soloist. If you get held you're doomed, and that wand has a pretty extreme negative modifier to your saves.
What sometimes work is to get as far away from the thief as possible when he uses the wand, I've noticed that I can sometimes escape it's effect completely if I get out of sight, or generally just moving away from him. I'm guessing this is because he can't target specific creatures with this particular wand, so it always effects the area he initially targetted. I think Ilyich's special ability has the same limitation, since I can often escape it's effect completely as well.

If you happen to get an Invisibility Potion from a killed Thief, consider it a free rest, or a free passage through any of the places guarded by thieves! Invisibility is invaluable in this dungeon.

If nothing of the above works, well then you can always lure the thief to an unimportant room with a door and shut him in as a last resort, the thief is both quicker and faster to react to your presence than the dogs, so seperating him from the rest of the pack shouldn't be a problem. I always do that with the pack outside that dying Imp's room - Go in, lure the pack with you, talk to the imp, pick up the healing pots and control stone, go out and quickly shut the door. You'll probably need a few empty rooms for shutting in the packs that surprise you when you go to sleep as well though, so don't do this with every thief pack you encounter [img]smile.gif[/img]

[Pyrenk]

Yea, ratty is right. I usually lure them into the room with the two mephits and staff +1. Lure them all the way to the bottom, then leave. I can get 10 in there no problem [img]smile.gif[/img]

[drewal]

Alright, with a little luck the spawned groups aren't so bad.

Has anyone actually beaten Improved Ilyich on insane as a solo fighter? Is it possible? Trying to figure out how.

The mephit portal room has gone from annoying to brutal. Taking out one portal at a time seems to work best.

[Rataxes]

The Ilyich team is very possible as a solo fighter if you divide them. Taking out the Golem and luring away the Demon are almost always essential things to take care of prior to battling the rest of the team. If you can keep the demon at bay while doing all of the below, until you get a weapon strong enough to kill him - then by all means do so. I'd just trap him behind a set of doors though, the Golem can so far only be killed by the Quarter Staff +1, but it's a very weak golem.

Luring Ilyich away from his gang is often easy since he's the by far quickest to react, and the 2nd quickest in the group. Ideally, you want to be able to go to the central Otuygh room and shut the door after Ilyich is in (just avoid his Land war in Asia ability) or keep going another set of doors till you're in the trapped room with the nymphs. It's Hit and Run tactics all the way from there since you will most certainly not be able to outlast Ilyich in a straight face-to-face fight (he's got 3 or 4 Potions of Extra healing as well). So just tap him once and get out of there, he's got an amazing speed factor and can basically swing at you the instant you enter his reach, but this is one of the few viable ways for a solo fighter. The other one would be to weaken him with arrows and then finish him off with Hit and Runs, but believe me, all the arrows in the entire dungeon wont be enough to damage him more than 2-3 normal swings from your katana would, and you'll probably run out of Oils of Speed (did I mention that you basically have to be hasted vs Ilyich? There are two Oils of speed on lvl 1 fortunately) before even getting past his healing potions.

Well, like I said - Hit him and then run away, hit him again and then keep on repeating the process, I made extreme use of the pause function during this battle to be able to time my swings and avoid his). When he's dead, you'll have some back-up in the form of his magical acorns (gives you a Moose and two Nymphs).

You have a few alternative ways of taking out his remaining gang (or you could just skip them since their death isn't required for any quest), you could either attempt to draw them out one by one and kill them like you killed Ilyich. They're all considerably weaker than him, but they also tend to stay closer together. You could also just try to break them by force, cast Hold Person with the nymphs and rush to interrupt Zhivago in his process to summon a Deva, then take out whoever saved from the dual Hold Persons (take out Karamazov first if both saved). The Moose can serve as a human shield but will most likely die in 3-4 hits, and he's really better at dealing damage (bring him out to attack the one who got Held).

About the Mephit Portals, I usually take out the one furthest away from the door, since those mephits can easily knock you unconscious, pretty much dooming you, one of those Invisibility potions really comes in handy in that battle.

[ 01-14-2003, 02:30 AM: Message edited by: Rataxes ]

[drewal]

I got the Mephit portals this way:

Run in bash the first one. Run out of room.

Run in bash the second one. Hide behind the bookshelf in the northwest corner.

Run back, bash the fourht one. Run behind bookshelf.

Run back bash the third.

Ilyich is not coming as easily - I will try your recos.

Seems like a barbarian would be the best fighter-type to solo ID, since he is immune to backstab.