I got through it (Spoilers ahead!)

[Elhana]

Those that said it was easy should try it with Dave's patch. Dave is the Senior designer at Bioware. He has got two patches on the Baldusdash website for improved monsters. Spoilers ahead ....
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One for Demogorgan and one for Balthasor. It makes Demogorgon, an already tough monster to beat, a heck of a lot tougher! Demogorgon will straight away contingency time stop (You can't stop him), then summon in an infernal host of demons (include Cambions, Glabrezu and stuff), and you will have to deal with these plus the original 2 Meriliths. He gets higher hit points too.

For all the fighter crazy types that love to use greater whirlwind, then the upgraded Balthazar will definitely make you pull your hair out. The improved version has him teleporting much farther away so that he has time to buff himself up. He also has this "chant" ability that would make him receive very little damage from weapons. Keldorn hitting him with holy avenger was doing like 2-3 damage with each hit! He also uses his Solar stance and Lunar stances extremely frequently. The Solar stance especially is designed to stop you from crowding round him with fighter types. It blows everyone away from him except summoned Devas Planetars and Elemental Princes. Oh, don't rely on those to save you either, he makes extremely quick work out of any summoned monster, even a Deva or Planetar. He also goes invis at times with his Shadow stance. Just when I though I had him beat, he teleported away and used "second wind" whose effect was that he healed himself completely! I was like - oh my god, Deva down, Elemental prince down, my fighter types half dead, my mages useless, and all the last 10 minutes of wacking him all down the drain!

You will know when you are fighting the improved balthasor when you find that instead of monks as his followers, you face adberents (or something like that). These are his upgraded disciples that are pretty mean too.

So, for those that cannot get enough of a challenge, go and download the patch on the baldurdash website. But be warned, its not an official patch. It's really fun though and I promise that you would likely get creamed. A lot of reloads in order. And for those that can defeat the two improved monsters on insane difficulty, you have my respect cos even I didn't dare to try. (They were hair raising enough on core AD&D rules!)

[ScottG]

WOW! the new Balth. sounds like a real challenge. But hey, why should he get the ability to do anything extra (w/out magical accesories) that your own char. as a monk gets (relative to his level) - paticularly the ability to teleport.

[Elhana]

Err, cos he is a bhaalspawn ? You get to change into a slayer .... which is something he can't do.

[ScottG]

True, and I suppose you can teleport and heal (I never tried it during a battle - will it allow you to? - if so then it seems fair to me). BTW, several of the manuevers he was doing in the orginal version don't seem be listed for a monk class, are these also powers reserved to him (his bhaal spawn powers), or do you acctually get them if you were a highlevel monk? (I paticularly enjoyed/hated it when he pushed me accross the room the way dragon's do.)

[Draggor]

Yeah, i've got both the patches and balthazar is a whole different kettle of fish upgraded. Frankly I think I fluked beating him. Demogorgon I eventually got through strategy and a bit of luck but Balth was a miracle. Yeah melissan is a bit easy. Remember you have to fight all her stages in a row and you're trapped in that plane where you can't rest, unless you have wish and a high wisdom. It's probably a little bit easy so that people don't get frustrated by her if you go there under prepared or at a lowish level. I wouldn't say she's real easy though, I did have a character die, but then I also did go through all the stages in one go, without resting so by the final time I'd used up most of my healing and high damage spells. Not much survives against a strength 25 fighter, Minsc and Mazzy all with greater whirlwind on, which is what did her in.

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[Draggor]

In answer to the questions about endings, there are three of them. One is being of good alignment and becoming a god, one is being evil alignment and becoming a god and one is choosing to stay mortal whatever the alignment, though what evil guy wouldn't choose to become the new lord of murder.

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