Holy robots!!!!!

[Legolas73]

Hey guys, I am currently playing a party of four (Lord, Fighter, Ranger, and Bishop), and although I am keeping them at charlevel 4, I made it to Arnika. Anyway, I encountered two groups of Savant suckers, one of them about half a dozen Gunners (lvl 8) mixed with some humanois of level 17, the other group 6 Androis of level 21!!! Holy smoke, has anyone ever encountered such tough opponents at such a low charlevel in Arnika? Anyway, after I rested several times they seem to be gone, replaced by the 'normal' Troopers of level 8, which I can handle, even at my low charlevels.

Cheers,

Legolas73

[Scatter]

Each Zone's level checker has a minimum, and if you go in below it you can get some real treats.

[xfactor]

Yep, did that once. Entered Arnika at level 4 and ended up cowering in He-Li's for fear of the level 20+ androids that were roaming around.

I believe that leaving Arnika and re-entering will solve the problem as long as you are level 5 or more when you re-enter. Of course, if you like a challenge you could always try killing the uber-monsters after stocking up at a merchant. The XP would be huge at such an early stage. Don't fancy your chances though...

xfactor

[Sinteuil]

At that level, those robots will wipe out the Higardi patrols and lay brothers in no time at all, and if you try to fight them on your own, you end up paralyzed the first round and dead the second round! Anyway, if I hold back levels after leaving the monastery, I always level up just before entering Arnika and it seems to keep the uber-robots from spoiling my day. [img]smile.gif[/img]

[seclists]

Originally posted by Legolas73: Holy smoke, has anyone ever encountered such tough opponents at such a low charlevel in Arnika?

Quoting from my earlier post from quite a while ago...

"Just a brief update. I don't think the Expert mode is even REAL...

Here's what happened during my first visit to Arnika. My characters were ~lvl 3-4 when they finally reached Arnika safely. They had XP for more advances but I wanted to do this in a "safe" location, Arnika. I went on to rescure Vi (btw, a funny thing happened the first time I rushed in - I ran into that room and ended up standing on top of her or inside her when the battle began; the androids could hit my characters but all my characters had their attack range blocked by Vi in all directions). All done, my characters, Myles and Vi exit the crashed spacecraft and head towards He'Li's place for some well-earned R&R.

Immediately when they exit the spacecraft they are ambushed by a group of 4 Savant Gunners and 3 "Androids". None of the 8 characters could identify the latter group. I click at them - they are level *21* - ouch! I remember such androids from the previous game, they would be the Slasher variant. Or Berserker or Destroyer, or whatever, but WHADDABL*DYHELL are they picking on my level 3-4 characters for? I run away towards the temple, meet some patrols & lay brothers on the way. The patrols & the gunners start fighting each other, two of the lvl 21 androids start butchering the lay brothers (each of them scoring approximately 1 kill per round). I run inside the temple, but one lvl 21 android is still following me. Lord Braffit, save me! The android descends the stairs. Lord Braffit casts an ineffective spell at the android. My party cowers in a corner, backs against the wall. The Android attacks Lord Braffit and paralyzes him immediately, then takes away about 50% of his hit points. Sheeeeet...

I had saved just after recruiting Vi, so I reload.

I camp inside the space ship for 8 hours. I take a peek outside now: the killer group is further away now, and I can sneak out unnoticed. However, I now notice another distressing group: a group of 8 "bulky" Androids (Henchmen/Minions IIRC, you know the ones that look totally different).

All right. That does it. My party is leaving Arnika, PRONTO. Gimme Arnika Road, Mountain Wilderness, Swamp, Bayjin, or Rapax Castle anyday. I'm not staying in this hellhole any longer!"

See the whole message in its context (spoilers) - http://www.ironworksforum.com/ubb/no...=003752#000001

[babar]

The only thing expert mode does is make your character easier to hit and the monsters harder to kill. i don't think it has any effect on level of encounters or quality of treasure.

[Wereboar]

Expert mode also makes auromatic skill increase much rarer (but this is partly offset by the fact that the fights last longer).

And i do believe that the monster groups are slightly larger and harder (very often monster level 1-2 above party level)

[Sinteuil]

I've been playing on expert lately, and only see a difference in the difficulty to hit or be hit by the monsters, as well as the issue of skill increases mentioned by Wereboar. This makes the early game much more of a challenge, particularly when it comes to Gregor. However, back when I played my first game on novice, I was getting some spawns that were just as bad, if not worse than the ones I've seen on expert, including large groups of Rapax at the entrance bridge to Trynton, Geomancers early on Arnika-Trynton road, and well before that, large groups of poison seekers in the upper monastery, which can be absolutely devastating to a young party without missile shield. From what I've seen, you can get exactly the same spawns on novice as on expert, but perhaps there's a slightly better chance of the spawns being excessive on expert, though I'm not fully convinced of this. On occasion I've even felt disappointed in how easy the spawns can be on expert, since there's no guarantee you'll get anything harder than what you'd see on novice at its easiest.

[ 09-09-2005, 05:23 PM: Message edited by: Sinteuil ]

[seclists]

Originally posted by babar: i don't think it has any effect on level of encounters or quality of treasure.

Yeah, I do think so too - now. The point was mentioned in a reply to my original post ( http://www.ironworksforum.com/ubb/no...=003752#000001 ), but keep in mind that when I posted that (Jan 2004), I had not completed the game in Expert mode yet. Now I am two Expert-mode completions wiser already... [img]smile.gif[/img]