The Candlekeep Annex: RPed Baldur’s Gate No and Low Reload Adventures

[WiseGrimwald]

We then took on the Cloakwood Mines successfully.

We swapped Sirene for Dorn and headed for Baldur's Gate. On the way we dealt with two ambushes. the Augathlas and Simmeon.

We then dropped off Dorn, picked up Kivan, and granted him revenge.

We will now pick up Sirene and bid him farewell, probably for good.

 

[WiseGrimwald]

We picked up Sirene, did a few quests in Baldur's Gate and are now at Candlekeep.

The only slight difficulty we had was fighting the Iron Throne.

Two party members were temporally out of action. Tenya was held and Indira had to flee due to injuries.

We healed her and Sirene cast dispel magic after which we went on the roof to rest. Indira memorised a lot of identify spells to make the loot usable.

 

[WiseGrimwald]

For a change I just ran a group of Tieflings headed up by a sorcerer. They were doing fine until an ankheg saved against command and killed the sorcerer, instakill.
Fun while it lasted. I may run a similar game next but have a different leader of the pack.

The theme will be that because they have suffered terrible discrimination because of their race they will have compassion on others who similarly have suffered discrimination, due to race, tieflings, half-orcs and drow. Sometimes those they feel compassion for may not deserve it.

That of course mirrors real life.

 

[WiseGrimwald]

At Candlekeep we made a mess of the battle with Prat. Prat was killed easilly enough with skeletons, but Sirene got held by our own web spell and as a result was killed.

The skeletons were useful against spiders, medusae and a basilisk. We didn't even need any potions.

Now at the FAI and Sirene is alive again. We dropped Tenya and picked up Jet' Laya before going in search of her sister. We discovered that her sister was now a banshee and of necessity killed her. Immediately afterwards Sirene cast remove magic as the banshee had cast some pretty deadly spells.

We returned to Beregost and were handsomely rewarded after which we set of to Nashkel to deal with a dragon, leaving Jet' Laya behind.

In Nashkel we enlisted a Cavalier who subsequently proved useful.

Near the dragon we exchanged Picky for Bardo Furfoot, a competent thief.

The dragon was relatively easy to kill, not so it's offspring which chunked Bardo.

We picked up Picky once more, and healed ourselves. The cavalier we left at the Carnival and investigated what the mayor's wife wants. Apparently, their daughter has been kidnapped.

We picked up CúChoinneach and a mace of disruption and are now at the gate of Castle Daerthmac where it seems the mayor's daughter has been taken.

 

[WiseGrimwald]

Castle Daerthmac is quite tricky particularly the vampiresses. We are having to take our time. At least it is fairly easy to rest without interruption. Slowly slowly catchee monkey!

Resting wasn't so easy when the entire party was either panicked (3 of them) or dominated (3 Of them). The only ones that I could control were summoned skeletons. There were not only Vampiresses but wights as well. Rather tough for BG1!

By the time we could rest, three of the party were dead. Only Jet, Magia and Indira still alive! Let's hope that I can find the dropped belongings!

To get some of the belongings, we had to cross nasty traps without a thief! I HAD thought that it was game over, but as somebody once said: "I'll be back!"

There is plenty of gold to raise dead party members.

A second visit rescued the son of the Mayor of Nashkel.

We killed Lord Daerthmac as well as a host of undead. In the battle with Lord Daerthmac, Jet' Laya was killed but we had by then saved enough gold to raise her.

We left CúChoinneach at the castle and Jet' Laya with Aerie.

These quests have not earned us much gold, but we have considerably better equipment.

We have a tome that will double a mage's experience. We will save it for later use, probably on Magia.

We sold a +4 cursed katana for over 4000gp. It could be quite a good sword for a solo berserker, particularly an evil one. It's a bit like Brage's sword but slightly more powerful.

We then completed Otho's quest. Not too difficult once you learned how to deal with skeleton lords. Get electrical resistance for one character then he can accompany a few skeleton warriors to attack. keep the rest of the party WELL clear of the battle.

One of the benefits of the quest was the recruitment of the dwarvenn Berserker Ferthgill Trollslayer. Stats fairly average, but he does have a +3 axe.

Savarok was defeated at the ducal palace. We are now selling surplus weapons and armour, rings and the like and buying wands and potions ready for SoD.

We have 720gp left. If someone is killed that should be enough for raising him/her as we should get some loot in the labyrinth.

 

[WiseGrimwald]

Having reached Tamoko, I realised that I have no arrows of dispelling. I will therefore exit the maze and buy some.

I think that I will also visit Durlag's Tower again, this time delving a bit deeper and perhaps even fighting the demonknight.

I won't bother with Baldur's Isle, but I may visit Ice Island.

I intend to come back to this game, but had an idea that I would like to try out first.

A Tiefling who has been so badly treated that he befriends all who have been similarly mistreated whether tiefling, orc, drow or duerger.

Their orientation is completely irrelevant.

 

[WiseGrimwald]

With reference to the above, a chaotic good tiefling dwarven berserker, accompanied by a lawful evil drow sorcerer.

We retuned the amulet to Mr. Colquetle, returned Perdue's sword, and helped Alanna's neighbour.

 

[WiseGrimwald]

I recruited Tanya and after doing her quest recruited the rest of my party. Viconia is the bottom portrait and Timor the Tiefling the top one created as a mini-mod by yours truly. I fighter/Thief. You won't be seeing it as it is not Weidu and no voice. I just wanted a Tiefling fighter/thief and didn't want to have to play her from the beginning every time. She joined at 32,000 experience. As you can see, all are either Tiefling or Drow. I was a bit disappointed that Viconia joined at level 2. I expected her to be 32,000 experience as well.
At least she is levelling up fairly quickly.

 

[WiseGrimwald]

We killed all the basilisks and Medusae and Timor picked a few pockets at Ulgoth's Beard. Whilst there we saw that we need about 50,000gp to buy all the equipment that we wanted. We therefore returned to the basilisk area and rescued a woman thus boosting our reputation back to heroic. 50,000gp is a lot of gold! Perhaps if we temporarily dumped our drow members things would be a little cheaper, but probably not by much.

 

[WiseGrimwald]

We have dumped Viconia and Baeloth and temporarily picked up Xan after defeating Mulahey easily. Now in Nashkel with rep of 19. The battle below being the most difficult. Mulahey was much easier. My sorcerer panicked and Viconia had used up her last remove fear spell. I waited in trepidation in case the sorcerer ran into enemies or traps. She didn't. That was pure luck as far as the traps were concerned! Enemies were quite a long way away so running into them was unlikely.

This is the first time that I have played with two sorcerers in my party and have decided that even if you are careful with spell choices, it is best to have a sorserer and a mage than two sorcerers and that a sorcerer and a mage is better than two mages since the two classes are complementary. The game is of course quite doable even without arcane magic.

Now heading for the bandit camp.

I quite enjoy playing a game with everyone being of a despised race: tiefling, half-orc, or drow! It makes for a different game. Having both lawful good and evil characters in the party also means that more micromanagement of the party is necessary to prevent party members leaving.

 

[Alesia_BH]

Glad to see you plugging away, Wise!

Sometime in the not-too-distant future I'll fire up Alena's save again. The poor girl is still in Suldanessellar waiting to face Irenicus.

Best,

A.

 

[WiseGrimwald]

I was a little disappointed when Tazok only recognised Viconia as drow and not Baeloth. I could well understand that he didn't recognise Bania as a drow as I created her, not the devs.

Viconia, Bania and Baeloth are all labelled as elves! Is there any way of labelling them as drow? It's easy enough to make characters tiefling, so why not drow?

I have just discovered how to change appearance to drow in EE Keeper! However, that doesn't change their description from elf to drow on the record page. A slight improvement as it DOES change the appearance considerably. It makes the game more immersive.

When I finish this run I am considering running a drow party. There are three drow NPCs that I can recruit and I could start with three of my own making.

It would make a change. Mind you, they might not get on with each other.

 

[Alesia_BH]

I have just discovered how to change appearance to drow in EE Keeper! However, that doesn't change their description from elf to drow on the record page. A slight improvement as it DOES change the appearance considerably. It makes the game more immersive.

Good find! And, yes, those are the available options. You can give a character a drow animation but you can't designate their race as drow. Drow are encompassed by the elf race.

 

[WiseGrimwald]

Good find! And, yes, those are the available options. You can give a character a drow animation but you can't designate their race as drow. Drow are encompassed by the elf race.

No doubt that's why he didn't recognise Baeloth as drow. He hasn’t been programmed to recognise him as such.

Party now entering Cloakwood. Battle at the bandit camp was trivial. Web + fireballs and skull traps were used against the more powerful enemies.

 

[Alesia_BH]

No doubt that's why he didn't recognise Baeloth as drow. He hasn’t been programmed to recognise him as such.

Makes sense. Tazok was probably programmed to response to Viconia specifically. Since she was the only drow in the original adventure that approach would have worked.

 

[WiseGrimwald]

We have progressed as far as the Cloakwoon mines where Timor was killed by Sirene a Tiefling Inquisitor who is a member of my party. Natasha had confused both Sirene and Timor so there was little that I could do. Sirene was unable to remove magic and my arcane users were unable to cast the spell.

We returned to the FAI to raise her and after doing so have only 13gp left!

We will go for the rewards for Bandit scalps and for the wyvern's tail. That should put our finances straight.

After that we can return to the mine.

EDIT

That is what we did. The mine was completed with ease, Davaeorn having his spells neutralised by a single skeleton.
We exchanged Sirine for Dorn and completed Dorn's quest. Afterwards we bade Dorn farewell.

We have arrived safely in Baldur's Gate and then gone to reunite with Sirene.

 

[Borco]

Hey there, hi there,

I mainly wanted to wish everyone a happy new year, however I’ll also use the opportunity to provide you with a brief update on my no-reloading activity in the past weeks and months. The truth is that the action has been far from intense and the bad news is that my latest character – Rissa - perished in the Shadow Temple on account of a protracted lich fight, whereby at one point I failed to properly patch an opening in her defenses against an incoming FoD, making her the fourth and final character of mine to become lost in the course of 2024. Nevertheless, I remain undeterred and I've recently started a new run with a thief kit - I should be able to post on its progress soon in case it gains some meaningful traction. Hop skip to it!

Regards,

B.

 

[Alesia_BH]

Happy New Year to you, Borco!

I’d say happy new year to Rissa too but she probably wouldn’t hear me, what with her being dead and all. Sorry for your loss. Or her loss. Or whatever sounds right. I’ve never been good at consoling.

Hopefully we’ll see another character from you soon, and hopefully I’ll get to congratulate you on that one. That would be nice, as a change of pace.

I did fire up Alena’s save recently, but I didn’t get far with that. I confirmed that she’s in the midst of an epic inventory management crisis. I then closed my laptop and went to the beach. Some rainy day I’ll fix what ails her. Until then she’ll remain in suspended animation while I drink fruity beverages.

I have been tempted to start playing my transmuter, Alastria. Part of me thinks that’s the best way to rehabilitate my interest in Alena’s game. Another part of me thinks it’s the best way to kill it. I’m not sure. What I do know is that Alastria calls to me more than Alena these days, so there’s that. No promises, but I may start posting semi-soon on one character or another. We’ll see what comes.

Cheers,

A.

 

[WiseGrimwald]

Happy New Year to all fellow no-reloaders.

Thraxt had no difficulty against the Iron Throne. Web and silence made the battle trivial.

About to plunder underneath Candlekeep

 

[Borco]

@WiseGrimwald Looking good there, Wise! Wishing you smooth sailing through Chapters 5 and 6 and onwards!

@Alesia_BH Thank you and likewise! On a separate note - when deciding between passion fruit margaritas and populating shield and belt slots, passion fruit margaritas are the safe option. Anyway, make sure you do what works best for you - in the meantime, we'll eagerly anticipate should you to decide continue playing/posting anytime in the future!