Fire Giants

[OLAF TRYGGRYSON]

Ok Spoilers ahead.
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I just got TOB and spent the best part of yesterday working through the first City. I am now in the Fire Giant Mountains and I keep getting killed. I have no Idea how to wipe out 7-8 of these guys at once. My Fighter ( level 21-22 ) keeps getting stomped and my magic users cant caste spells fast enough. Any tips on this will be appreciated. My usual tactic is to focus fire on 1 enemy at a time with my spell casters pounding AOE spells to the rear.

[shamrock_uk]

Raise your fire resistance above 100% and stand in one of the fire pools - enjoy the regeneration

If your mages are high enough, project image abuse would probably be very good. I would imagine Mordy Swords are supreme here, think I remember clearing out the whole place with a couple when I had a solo mage.

[Scarab]

my assasin->mage (lvl17/22) did it solo by casting mislead repeatedly and backstabbing anything that moved with Celestial fury (that stun effect is nice in a crowd). Also used improved mantle/mantle to keep them off of me while I needed to cast. I can't remember if the giants use magic weapons or not.. can't remember if I used PFMW. Of course, imp haste helps speed things up. Oh, and don't forget protection from fire!

also, I found it very effective to use chain contingencies to fire multiple area effect spells at once (3xADHW is good). Memorize several CC's so that you can do this in battle. CC doesn't require ANY casting time, so you can pound out spells really fast like this.

One thing, maybe you should let them come to you. I'm assuming you mean inside yagasura's lair where there are so many fire giants. Don't go way up in there to excite ALL of the giants at once. try to only move in once you've taken out everything in the current screen. This way, you can return to the pocket plane and rest if you want inbetween battles to memorize more CCs and AOE spells.

hope that helps.. I'm sure others have good ideas.
S

[OLAF TRYGGRYSON]

Cool thanks for the Tips. I was getting real frustrated. Mordy's sword I did not think of or the improved mantle for my mage. I think I got so mechanical with my tactics for SOA that I've forgotten how to think. Thanks again

[shamrock_uk]

Played it one too many times huh? [img]smile.gif[/img] If you get to that stage, you might want to think about some mods, especially Tactics.

It forces you to think outside the box, or you die. Certainly adds a whole lot of depth to the game and has improved my tactical knowledge no end. Just run away from the liches

[OLAF TRYGGRYSON]

I have'nt down loaded any mods or patches. My old computer could'nt handle the game itself let alone an add on. I just got a new Dell though, so I could try one out. What is a good one to start with?

[SixOfSpades]

Tactics is good, provided you install the correct components. Many different modders contributed to the Tactics mod, and even when two components were written by the same person, they are often wildly different in terms of difficulty and quality. Go here and read the One-Minute Reviews (just scroll down) for my review on each component. That review is a little old, so some of the components, such as Improved Ilyich, have been made more balanced and believable.

The components that have been added since I wrote that Review are:
Improved Druid Grove: B+. Makes the Grove nicely challenging, but there are still some Weimerization issues, such as Druids with permanent, non-dispellable buffs. Plus there's the fact that Improved Faldorn is almost literally unkillable (just delete faldorn01.cre from your Override folder and you'll be ok).

Improved Fire Giants: F. In approximately 1.5 rounds, a single Fire Giant will cast Lower Fire Resistance (area of effect, of course) four times, Summon Fire Elemental, and Fire Storm. None of these spells impair the Giant's fighting ability, of course, so he'll be pounding away on you at Improved Haste speed the entire time.

[shamrock_uk]

Well, it really depends what you want - mods can do virtually anything. Some of my favourites:

Gameplay enhancing

Tactics - In many respects it is cheesy, with monsters pre-buffing instantly for example. Wes Weimer points out that its no more than the PC would tend to do, which I tend to agree with. Whatever you feel about the ways in which this is done, there is no doubt in my mind that the game is made much more challenging by it, and it certainly does force you to be inventive. I wouldn't install that now though - start a new game. Oh, and stay away from Improved Illyich unless you're feeling truly hardcore... Check out Six's great review somewhere on these forums.

NPC flirt pack - really really good - gives you tons of party banter if you like that sort of thing.

Ease of use - most of this I don't install because its too cheesy for my liking, but it does have a few gems like 'bottomless bag of holding' that make the gaming experience a bit smoother.

Mod NPC's

Now the standard of some of these is simply amazing, you can expect much more interaction than with the default bioware NPC's, optional in-depth romances and their own quests etc - if you ever wanted to feel like you're in a real party of adventurers, these are the best you'll get in BG2.

My favourite - Keto, the permanently drunk bard. Some of her dialogues have made me laugh out loud, intereractions with many Bioware NPC's are most amusing, Keldorn trying to rouse her with a hangover for drill practice in the morning being particularly memorable.

Valen - Bodhi's assistant gets to be recruitable, complete with vampiric powers. Some say overpowered, she's been toned down in the most recent version - if ever you want to play an evil party, or see how a chaotic evil really behaves and impacts on your party, she's the character for you.

Next up, Kelsey. A sorceror who has particularly noteworthy dialogue when it comes to dealing with his awakening powers - struck me as being very well done. Worth putting in a party with Keto as they have a couple of really great banters together.

Soulaufein from Ust Nutha can join also. Many regard him as very overpowered, but at the same time inexperienced players find him very weak. If you're an experienced player who knows the ins and outs of the BG2 combat system then he'll be a monster at higher levels. Lots of quests, really really intelligent dialogue makes him another great option IMO.

This is getting a bit too long, so just do a search for "NPC mod review" for an excellent in-depth look at them. Tashia, Chloe I also enjoyed having in my party.

Additional storytelling

Ascension and Redemption both add a lot onto the end of ToB and give you lots of roleplaying options, harder ToB bosses, an option to redeem a certain ToB NPC. If you haven't seen the original ending of ToB yet though, hold off on these.

More misc

Item upgrade springs to mind, allowing you to do something useful with gems, demon hearts etc that you find in your travels (well, they do normally have descriptions involving magical usage on them!) - just be careful what you choose, because some items are overpowered.

That's your lot for now. As you can see, I favour NPC mods because I love the depth of party interaction that occurs. I wouldn't have more than two mod NPC's in a party at once though, because generally they don't banter with each other, only with the Bioware NPC's.

Valen, Sola, Tactics, Ease of Use can all be found at www.weidu.org. You'll find most other things at www.pocketplane.net or in the forum FAQ.

[ 03-18-2005, 06:19 PM: Message edited by: shamrock_uk ]

[OLAF TRYGGRYSON]

Wow, Shamrock this list is very informative I'll check these out. I finally got through the Fire Giants and found it was'nt that hard with the suggestions on this post as well as I started " thinking outside the box ". I'm going to finish TOB as is then load a MOD or 2 and start a whole new game in SOA. Thanks again for all of your help.

[Harkoliar]

Originally posted by SixOfSpades: Tactics is good, provided you install the correct components. Many different modders contributed to the Tactics mod, and even when two components were written by the same person, they are often wildly different in terms of difficulty and quality. Go here and read the One-Minute Reviews (just scroll down) for my review on each component. That review is a little old, so some of the components, such as Improved Ilyich, have been made more balanced and believable. The components that have been added since I wrote that Review are: Improved Druid Grove: B+. Makes the Grove nicely challenging, but there are still some Weimerization issues, such as Druids with permanent, non-dispellable buffs. Plus there's the fact that Improved Faldorn is almost literally unkillable (just delete faldorn01.cre from your Override folder and you'll be ok). Improved Fire Giants: F. In approximately 1.5 rounds, a single Fire Giant will cast Lower Fire Resistance (area of effect, of course) four times, Summon Fire Elemental, and Fire Storm. None of these spells impair the Giant's fighting ability, of course, so he'll be pounding away on you at Improved Haste speed the entire time.

don forget regenerations for those giants