Game News Knights of the Chalice is Here

[Ashery]

I think I ended up just going head to head against the dragon with my two knights. Dropped spells as often as I could, but having my two knights flank the dragon ended up being the means by which the most damage was inflicted. I think I got lucky, though, as, if I recall correctly, he just kept taking five foot steps and dispelling every turn.

Which fight was this, exactly? The main fight in the final temple? I recall there being another dragon that was even more of a bitch than that...

I haven't done that optional fight, though...I quit playing once I officially beat the campaign...(At the very least, I need a bit of a break)

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

I think I ended up just going head to head against the dragon with my two knights. Dropped spells as often as I could, but having my two knights flank the dragon ended up being the means by which the most damage was inflicted. I think I got lucky, though, as, if I recall correctly, he just kept taking five foot steps and dispelling every turn.

Might have to try flanking him. I find it kinda tough though...you can't just use a 5-foot-move with such a huge bugger.

Which fight was this, exactly? The main fight in the final temple?

Yep.

I recall there being another dragon that was even more of a bitch than that...

The big green machine in the orc fort? He was a pain just because of how low level your characters were, and how pumped up he was. The Norglade Greenie was tough too, but nowhere near as much a juggernaut as Big Red.

 

[Fezzik]

Looking forward to this. Just how crazy is it?

Lots of very high level creatures -- 500 hp dragon, 400-500 hp vrock, 400 hp bhalor, a couple of tough iron golems and some others. It seemed like there were a lot of instant death spells being thrown around. I couldn't land many hits with my fighters and beyond retreating for a bit and taking whatever the opponents throw at you in the meantime, I don't think there's much room for maneuvering.

Which fight was this, exactly? The main fight in the final temple? I recall there being another dragon that was even more of a bitch than that...

Oh yes, that's right. There's one more dragon in the end temple, but I think that it didn't take too much for me to take him down just by using the same "web then spam Freezing Sphere" tactic I used on the main boss.

 

[Darth Roxor]

The big brawl with the red dragon and the multitudes of worshipers...how did you do it?

Don't bother with dragon-slaying arrows, since your chance to hit will be around 5 to 10%
Craft a lot of human slaying arrows, though. I had like 30 on my archer, and the first thing I did was reload as many times as needed to have the archer get higher initiative than the main cleric dude that casts mass death ward on the dragon. With him out of the way, I proceeded to shoot at the archers with human slaying arrows, then I was just shooting random people around. My fighter was pretty useless the whole fight, and all he did was take out random worshippers that approached my party. The dragon itself I dispatched with good old spamming of harm/harm scrolls and maximized/empowered cone of cold/freezing sphere/lightning bolt, and eventually he hit the dirt.

Luckily, you can leave the area and rest before you have to go at that fight.

REALLY?

So... I had to reload a save before fighting the red dragon (after beating him and two of the rooms after him) to gather supplies completely in vain?

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU...

And finally, there is an optional crazy fight if you go back to the knight's keep and check in with the head honcho there. I haven't beaten that one.

I haven't beaten that either. It's pretty impossible, to be honest, and I tip my monocle and top hat to anyone who manages to do it.

Looking forward to this. Just how crazy is it?

2 troll shamans, 1 vrock, 2 vampires, 2 iron golems, 2 balors, 1 giant spider wizard, 2 thri-keen fighters with human slaying arrows, 1 meduza wizard, 2 dragons and some murlocks and muls. All extremely high level with about 200-250 hp for the murlocks/muls/thri-keens and 400-500 on everything else.

 

[Ashery]

I think I had a 30-40% hit chance on big red...That might be why I didn't have as much of a problem with'em.

I think the tougher one for me was towards the end, a black dragon if I recall correctly, that had higher ac than big red...I was running a 5-10% hit rate on that bastard and ended up having to melee'em down with those terrible odds...

Or maybe I have other dragons mixed up...Memories have already blurred together...

I feel like starting an ironman run through...heh...

 

[getter77]

Patching is up to 1.09 with yet another font preview to weigh in on in the forum over there...mainly fixing, tweaks, and making stuff more intuitive.

Also, my memory is fuzzy, but if you can get Irresistable Dance to work on Big Red..well...

 

[Fezzik]

Also, my memory is fuzzy, but if you can get Irresistable Dance to work on Big Red..well...

HA! *slaps head*

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

Took down Big Red in a hell of a fight. It was much better after I knew going all-out was okay. I used slaying arrows and Dehydrate (used what experience I had to have my Cleric make slaying arrows and my mage scribe Dehydrate scrolls) liberally to off the clerics and mages, and had my mul knight get in the General's face with a speedy, destruction greatsword. Big Red took hits from Dehydrate during the opening rounds, and once he was alone, Irresistible Dance worked like a charm, allowing my buffed knights to actually hit him, and let my mage pound him with Lightning Bolt, Acid Burst, Freezing Sphere, Cone of Cold, Discharge, and the like.

The other fights in the place were jokes after that. I didn't even need to rest, though I did scribe up some more scrolls with the boatload of experience I got from downing Big Red and crew.

The bonus fight is insane though. I think I'll do that after I finish the review...if ever.

 

[kenney bounces]

Why speed and destruction?

Why not holy+axiomatic weapons for dragons? Axiomatic lets your weapon bypass their innate damage resistance.

I killed the big red without irresistable dance. I wacked him a few times, then casted power word blind. I'll try the dance with my next playthrough with two wizards.

 

[Ashery]

I used speed + destruction for my general purpose weapons but then swap out for holy + axiomatic weapons once I cleared out most of the mobs around the dragon.

Honestly, to be completely covered, you need to carry four different weapons for each of your knights...

 

[getter77]

1.10 is out and has the new font and several other bits. As always, check the updating thread over on the forum for the changelog. Still more patching in the works after this one.

 

[Gragt]

New font is pretty cool, and it also seems that fullscreen now uses 640x480, something I just wanted. The game got some nice improvements since it was released.

 

[Thrasher]

Obsidian and Atari should be ashamed for how poorly they support NWN2 compared to this guy.

 

[PrzeSzkoda]

Okay, I was sold after playing the demo and saving that dumb dwarf from 'em lizardmen. Paid 25 bucks for it, too, and given that 1$ = 3,3 PLN, it's the biggest amount of money I've paid for a game in a long time.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

Ok, I killed the red Dragon on 3rd try. Pretty badass fight, I mean this dragon is lvl41 Wizard, imagine he would actually use his spells to maximum effect...

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

So guys, who else did the final (after the game ends) fight at the castle of the Knights of the Chalice and prevailed? Cost me around 6-7 hours but i finally did it.

My last savegame says I clocked in at 50 hours. Not bad for a game at this price.
I'm going to start anew I think.

 

[Darth Roxor]

So guys, who else did the final (after the game ends) fight at the castle of the Knights of the Chalice and prevailed? Cost me around 6-7 hours but i finally did it.

The best I could do was reduce the enemy forces to 1 troll, the vrock and both golems, but got raepd after that. Generally, iron golems are too motherfucking overpowered in this game, same for undead. Pretty much the only thing you can do to golems is acid blast and lightning bolt, and like, all the cool anti-undead cleric spells are not included

 

[getter77]

Adamantine weaponry messes up Iron Golems pretty handily. Searing Light can also do decentish damage cleric wise if you can penetrate the Spell Resistance.

And, of course, starting/contributing to the party with a strong Rusting Grasp on the Wizard.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

This is what worked for me:

- have slaying arrows (dragon, humanoid, animal, undead, construct - both golems fell to construct slaying arrows - , monstrous humanoid etc)
- retreat in the yard, there is no tanking out there to protect the casters only death awaits, don't bother with the other 2 guys they act retarded and can't be saved
- both Balors have to be dominated asap which is the key point, a lot of stuff like the Vrock, a dragon, a Troll and a lot of minor stuff just killed themselves by attacking the Balors and suffering from the fire retaliation, I also dominated the spider wizard
- both vampires have to be dominated or killed asap with slaying arrows (but dominated is better because they drain the levels of the rest of the monsters...)
- other than that Mass Death ward at all times, and a lot of mass heal and true resurrection available
- if that all works out... the knights just use the appropriate slaying arrows on whatever approaches and wizard-guy uses Dominate Monster all the time (make 10 scrolls)

edit: also I swapped the Displacement cloaks with Resistance+5, it's more important in this fight

 

[Darth Roxor]

- have slaying arrows (dragon, humanoid, animal, undead, construct - both golems fell to construct slaying arrows - , monstrous humanoid etc)
- retreat in the yard, there is no tanking out there to protect the casters only death awaits, don't bother with the other 2 guys they act retarded and can't be saved
- both Balors have to be dominated asap which is the key point, a lot of stuff like the Vrock, a dragon, a Troll and a lot of minor stuff just killed themselves by attacking the Balors and suffering from the fire retaliation, I also dominated the spider wizard
- both vampires have to be dominated or killed asap with slaying arrows (but dominated is better because they drain the levels of the rest of the monsters...)
- other than that Mass Death ward at all times, and a lot of mass heal and true resurrection available
- if that all works out... the knights just use the appropriate slaying arrows on whatever approaches and wizard-guy uses Dominate Monster all the time (make 10 scrolls)

Well, I'm doing pretty much the same thing, with retreating + balor domination + mass death ward, but I don't bother with slaying arrows for anything except the giant spider at the start, because everything seems to have gazillions in fortitude saves, but I still get raepd, mainly by the fucking thri-keens with their fucking mindblast, the golems that steamroll the balors and the vrock that has 11 attacks per round, and even after it gets half its hp down on the balors, it instantly gets healed by the trolls.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

the golems don't have very high fort saves->use arrows
thri-keens will save is pathetic (only 6) -> dominate
dominate undead ! for the vampires if they are on your side things get easier

I reloaded until the right Balor had the initiative, he approaches. Then the Wizard must have initiative, don't retreat but step forward so that the balor+spider wizard are in range of Dominate Monster, dominate both (requires luck obv), when I then luckily dominated the first approaching Vamp things started turning in my favor
But you're right you also need luck that the Balors have good rolls and don't get killed (CON drained) too fast, try to include them in a mass death ward, also include them in mass heals

edit: point is avoid melee if possible, you only die, use appropriate arrows instead, they will fail the save eventually (except the dragons never worked with them but greater disintegrate was still there for the 1 that was not killed by the balor)

 

[getter77]

IN theory it is possible to save both allies in the fight, and I think it even changes a bit depending on what degree you manage it...but man would that take some serious luck on top of planning---maybe even a strange party specifically with it in mind.

 

[kenney bounces]

Both allies saved! Mwahahhaa.



Took me two hours or so.. should've won it three times but twice it hanged/crashed. (By web and some stupid weapon browsing thing)

Anyways.. here's how i did it:

1)I played two wizards, one cleric, one fighter.

2) Displacement cloaks for casters. Shields for casters. No weapons in mainhand.

3) Reload until you can dominate either the spider or the balron in the first turn.

4) Reload until you manage to cast death ward with your cleric on everyone.

5) Greater disintegrate the two golems as soon as you can.

6) Dominate undead on the vampires

7) Mass protection against evil, then heal with the cleric.

8) Kill/distract the medusa as soon as you can. She will dispel the dominate spells.

9) ???

10) profit.

 

[Dragon]

Took me two hours or so.. should've won it three times but twice it hanged/crashed. (By web and some stupid weapon browsing thing)

Nice. But you should update to 1.10 for the crashes.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

Nice kenney, yes I can imagine having 2 wizards is a big advantage in that fight.