Improved (Current Version Tactics) Bodhi (Spoilers)

[Neo the Warrior Cat]

Main ones that would bug me.
Cloud of Bats-Schoolless? You should be able to protect against this one.
Bhodi HEAling self- Where did they come up with this one?

[Dundee Slaytern]

Well... the reasons are simple enough, and valid, but the execution of her improvement is a tad overdone. Again, IMHO.

Bodhi is worth 91,000XP and has *erm-hrm* absorbed someone else's powers.

It begs the question of course, of why can't they just lower her XPVALUE anyway?

[Feral]

School-less! I'll try to minor globe defence. At least she casts the cloud only once and you can send in a summons (even a Mordy's sword) to absorb it.

I'm still seething about Bodhi being immune to ALL undead-harming effects - including Sunray! Everyone is harmed by Sunray!

[Assassin]

...

I've never actually done the most recent version of Tactics chapter 6 Bodhi, but here are some suggestions:

1] Take out those Mages early on with an Insect Plague to a hasted friendly character. Run to the back, let it hit your guy, and it'll spread to cover the group.

2] Improved Haste every single bloody one of your guys. It seriously is very necessary, even before the 2 mages were added in.

3] Time Stop can be casted from a scroll. Use it if you have to.

4] Try to get a summons to take on the Cloud of Bats. I used a Planetar because I was a high enough level. Use Mislead or Project Image or something to absorb it.

5] Protection from Magical Energy, Protection from Cold, you know the drill...

6] People with Stoneskin/Ironskin and Negative Plane Protection out in front. Don't depend on Minsc taking her out one-on-one. #1 objective for the guy out in front with Stoneskin; keep it up.

7] Don't expect to damage her with hordes of Chain Lightning or Cone of Colds; she's immune to them. Pour on the acid and fire, however. With 75% magic resistance, also expect to have to fire a good few Lower Resistances to get those Flame Arrows (Spell Sequencer + level 15 Flame Arrows are deadly).

8] Don't expect to hold her or anything similar. Her ring makes her invulnerable to poison as well.

9] She's immune to Slow because of the !@$^%@^'ing Free Action Ring she has. Don't expect that to slow her down any.

10] Smack her upside the head with everything. MMM with the Mages. Clerics go with their mega-strength-buffs and Slings. Archers fire Tansheron's Bow. Don't expect to have 3 Mages standing around picking their noses and have the fighters do all of the work.

11] She's immune to casting failure. Protection from Magic scrolls will do more harm than good.

Well, I probably forgot a lot of things, but those are the basic tenets I held to when I battled her before. Good luck!

ADD] BTW, what spells does she use? I'm looking inf explorer, and I don't know which ones are the ones taht she uses...

[ 08-12-2004, 12:03 PM: Message edited by: Assassin ]

[Leslie]

Originally posted by Neo the Warrior Cat: Main ones that would bug me. Cloud of Bats-Schoolless? You should be able to protect against this one. Bhodi HEAling self- Where did they come up with this one?

IMHO - I am on Weimer's side on this one. Firstly, how many mages in the game cast SI:Conj when a druid (PC, Jaheira or Cernd) casts Insect Plague? NONE! Even Improved Irenicus falls to it. So basicly only someone with very high MR can resist the spell. And an average party surely has 1-3 Lower Resistances flying in the first rounds, not to mention the powergaming parties. (Spell Triggers and such)
So it's only fair to me that her Cloud of Bats does the same as our Insect Plague does to others. It disrupts and annoys - and you probably still have 4 or 5 party members who can attack while she is still alone.

Secondly, an average party has a cleric (not to mention powergaming parties again), who can use the level 7 spell (which a cleric can reach pretty fast) Greater Restoration which heals ALL party members! And is cast very fast - casting time 3! And from a distance! What an unfair advantage the player has. Imagine being in Bodhi's skin: you attack, hurt many attackers, use AOE spells to hurt them even more and then some distant safe cleric casts Greater Restoration and everything was in vain. That sucks big time for Bodhi. She can't use Dispel magic, she has no Breach, no RRoR not even PFMW and you call that difficult opponent? Bah.

There is one fight that gives you the FEEL how the reality is for the opponents: it's the Cyric's encounter - part of the Rogue Rebalancing Mod. Try that one - that's close to how the OTHER side looks like. Very good AI, mostly medium level spells (Greater Malison, Emotion, Greater Command, ...) and a full party. Very, very difficult encounter. I like it.

[JayS]

I haven't actually faced Ch6 Bodhi yet, but I have defeated Ch3 Bodhi (Core) with Anomen, rather easily in fact (Anomen's hit points never dropped below 100).

Use Limited Wish to give everyone in your party NPP, then send all your buffed fighters after her.
Her Vampire Mages should not be immune to undead killing tactics. Bodhi auto. charms undead so you shouldn't turn them, but you could try something else.

Potions helped me a lot, more than spell buffs in fact (i didn't have access to Im. Haste and powerful buffs like that), to defeat Bodhi. Look at your potions.

I am unclear on how summons can help. In Ch3 Bodhi Death spells any summons I bring to help.

What special abilities does Bodhi gain in Ch6? In Ch3 on core, she only has her fireshield, touch of death (animation like vampiric touch), sleep spell, and death spell.

Also, when fighting Anomen I noticed she missed on rolls of 17 and lower (!?!) even though her thaco is -8 and anomen ac is -15. The only explanation I could think of for this is that her claws do crushing damage for some reason, and when I tested this it was correct. So, have your tank drink 2 potions of absorption (which last for 10 turns) and Bodhi will need to roll a natural 20 to hit him.

Also, I noticed her touch of death was blocked by my MR, so maybe MR does affect her special abilities. Two potions you can use to build up your resistance are the potions of magic protection (+MR) and magic shielding(+M Damage R, and you auto roll saving throws).

[Neo the Warrior Cat]

Sorry 'bout my random outburst. I had just finished typing up a post dealing with, amongst other things, Super Cheese pulled by a Tactics Opponent.(Faldorn)I probably wasn't fair enough to this one.

EDIT: I seem to be plauged by the strange illness called Typer's Typo...

[ 08-13-2004, 04:42 PM: Message edited by: Neo the Warrior Cat ]

[Hank Parsons]

Originally posted by Link: What I would want to know is why, storywise, Bodhi should be so darn hard. Or is it just "Tactics is about creating tougher opponents, so let's grant Bodhi some special abilities to deal out"?

Storywise, it makes perfect sense. Making ANY standard BG2 monster harder makes sense to me. Since when did you ever meet a Vampire, Gibberling, Dragon, or other monster in real life who was as easy to kill as the ones in unmodded BG2? If you need a deeper explanation than the radical concept that monsters should actually be scarey and dangerous -- try this description of proper powers for a Vampiric boss:

Originally posted The Tactics README: As a vampire matriarch, Bodhi now has traditional mythological vampire powers. She can: * summon bats (cf. insect plague), * create darkness (cf.blindness), * move the earth to bury you alive (cf. slow, grease), * drain your life force (cf. vampiric touch), * summon chill winds (cf. horrid wilting) * and put you to sleep. These spell-like abilities are not arcane magic spells in the traditional sense, so your magic defenses may not work against them. Some of them do count as Necromancy, however. In addition, * her chilling flesh radiates a deathly cold aura (cf. fireshield: blue) that makes melee combat ... inconvenient.

The "cf" is telling you that Bodhi's vampire powers were REPRESENTED in game-terms using in-game abilities. But it is just supposed to be a way to implement her actual powers as a vampire boss (summon bats, create darkness, move the earth, bury you alive, drain your life force, summon chill winds, put you to sleep), using the code/appearance of regular powers that the PC's and other monsters have (insect plaugue, blindness, slow, grease, vampiric touch, ADHW, fireshield).

From a storytelling perspective, this is well-explained.

[ 08-13-2004, 05:48 PM: Message edited by: Hank Parsons ]

[Feral]

Potion of absorption, eh? Thanks, I'll give that a shot. Haven't made any progress, but I've given myself a couple of days off (to seethe quietly).

Bodhi gains the cloud of bats ability in ch. 6 (like insect plague, except it does more damage). It's her opener - can't dispel it. Also, ADHW. Instead of deathspelling summons, she just drains them through the multi-vampiric touch ability. She also bypasses anyone protected with NPP in favour of those without it and can see/attack right through sanctuary. There is probably other stuff, but it doesn't come to mind right now.

[Dundee Slaytern]

I repeat, Cloud of Bats is a revised form of Creeping Doom, not Insect Plague. If you have Near Infinity or any other similar tools, you can check it up.

If my theory is correct though, (Minor)Globe of Invulnerability should be able to block it, due to a edit in its' spell level.

Not sure whether it was deliberate or an oversight.