Listen to the Rain

That was a wild ride. And in some ways, I don't have much to say because I said it all already.

Baldur's Gate II hasn't unseated Morrowind as my favorite game, but it came really close. Morrowind has its mythological exploration and interesting cultures, and Baldur's Gate II has the relationships between the PC and the other party members. This is where Bioware romances started, and while they were pretty basic in their original forms, with only four romanceable NPCs and only one for a female PC, the basic structure allowed a thousand mods to bloom. Some of them good, like Xan, some of them...less so.

I wish I had written down my time through Baldur's Gate as well, because that really would have provided a complete experience. That full zero-to-hero arc is part of what makes Baldur's Gate I and II so amazing to me. In the very beginning, 250 hours of gameplay ago , Chiyo was a sheltered orphan in Candlekeep and nearly died when an assassin set upon her in the stables of her home. Years later, she fought off a powerful elven wizard in hell for custody of her soul, and this isn't even the end of her story. The Throne of Bhaal awaits.

Eventually. I'm not diving into that quite yet.

In the end, I was mostly happy with my list of mods except for Sword Coast Stratagems. I had it set so that pre-buffing was only on NPCs that the designers thought would reasonably have buffed before engaging the PCs, but that was much more extensive than I would have expected. And there were egregious moments, like stripping all the party's buffs between phases in the final battle but still allowing Irenicus to autobuff. If I could go back, I'd keep the spell AI but turn off almost everything else, including the harder battles. Those are obviously designed for someone willing to use a lot of the exploits that I turned off, like allowing simulacrums and projected images to use quickslot items, or keeping Vhailor's Helm--which I modded out of the game--on the PC and then using simulacrum/time stop cheese to do a ton of damage to enemies during time stops. I said in my original post that I'm in favor of difficulty-increasing mods as long as it doesn't mean the AI cheats, and it fell down too much on the AI cheating for my taste. It was just annoying, reducing every battle to wizards stripping buffs from each other, as I mentioned in probably a dozen posts.

The stand-out mods for me were the banter pack, which increases the number of inter-party banters, and the Xan romance mod. I took so long in Chapters 2 and 3 that almost all of the non-Imoen banters were exhausted during the time, but without the banter mod I probably would have run out of banter in the first ten hours or so. And Xan's romance... It's cheesy in places, but I installed it as a parody of schoolpsychnerd and my relationship, with Chiyo as the eternally-chipper half and Xan as the doom and gloom half. I totally forgot the vampire dreams, which add a lot of context to Xan's eternal gloominess. It was mostly a well-written display of understated emotion, with Xan's love coming out in little gestures unless Chiyo was under threat. The most memorable part was probably when Chiyo picked a fight with a red dragon and Xan rushed over to her afterward.

If I could change anything, I'd go back and add more dialogue to the earlier sections. When I first started I would take notes while I played and do the write-ups later, so I had the gist of what was said rather than the specifics. Later on I would write the posts while I played, so I spent a lot of time transcribing dialogue. Some of that is because I was more interested in transcribing the text of plot-important dialogue rather than all the quests I was on, but part of it was wanting to more accurately preserve the experience. I might go back at some point and edit some earlier posts with the exact dialogue for more of the banter, since that's the best part.

The end of the game jumped right into Throne of Bhaal, but I'm not going to. I've been playing this game on and off for a year and a half, and the original reason I started, other than never having beaten it before, is I wanted to play the original before I played all the kickstarted isometric RPGs that were inspired by the old Infinity Engine games. And now I've done that, and I can go play Wasteland II and Pillars of Eternity with a clean conscience. Probably Wasteland II first. I need a break from fantasy worlds.

Forgotten Realms as a setting seems almost overwhelming, but Baldur's Gate II presents it in a very digestible format. It really dials into the world, with the extended period in a drow city, the random githyanki that show up wanting their silver sword, the society of the elves and their gods, and Irenicus's plan.

Now I can see why Irenicus is so well-loved as a villain. Some of it is David Warner's voice acting, spoiled extensively here, but some of it is that I have a soft spot for "become a god" plots. Also, it's the way that he plans ahead. Insinuating Yoshimo into the party--when I first played the game, I took Yoshimo willingly and I would have been caught completely be surprise by his betrayal--setting up Spellhold as a trap, making common cause with the drow, starting the guild war in Athkatla...while it seems that he's distant and not paying attention for much of the game, in retrospect it's obvious that all the major plots that aren't quests to go get money, like the aforementioned quest to deal with a dragon, are the results of his plots. There are so many RPGs where the villain doesn't seem to be doing much during the game, or where the "true villain" suddenly reveals itself at the end despite never previously showing up at all *cough*FFIV*cough* that seeing one where he's so well-integrated is a joy. And most of the time, when he talked, I wouldn't skip past his dialogue because I wanted to hear the voice acting.

What a fantastic game. It took me almost 150 hours, but it was time well spent and I'm looking forward to Throne of Bhaal...eventually.

I know I've said that I was out of other things to do several times before, but this time I really mean it. All that's left is to eliminate Irenicus's minions in Suldanessellar, free the elves, and take the fight to Irenicus. I have a high-level party, I have powerful weapons and armor, and I'm ready. Let's do this.

But first, Moon Prism Power Makeup!
( Read more... )

I've finished basically everything there is to do in the base game, unless there are some quests left added by mods that I don't know about. My quest log only has a few leftover bits from quests that weren't cleaned up because the triggers failed to fire or because I did things in the wrong order or because I jumped the gun and used the console to fix what I thought was broken and it turned out I was just in the wrong place, and only a couple of those. The next stop is Suldanessellar.

Except, well, since I have Throne of Bhaal installed, there's one place I can go first.
( Read more... )

I wish that Baldur's Gate II had been able to do more with lighting, because that would have made the transition from the Underdark a lot more dramatic. And this point, Chiyo and her companions have spent days underground in total blackness. It'd be a moment like when the Lone Wanderer leaves Vault 101. Most of the party are elves or half-elves and can see in the dark--low-light vision for elves wasn't implemented until D&D 3.x's, so here they still have infravision--but Minsc and Imoen are not. Minsc probably would take everything in stride, but I'm surprised that there were no scenes of Imoen panicking. Captured by a vengeance-obsessed(?) archmage, imprisoned at the moment she thought she was freed, had her soul ripped out, and when she was rescued, dumped into a city of shark people and then into total blackness filled with what she knows are one of the most unpleasant cultures on Faerun? That's a lot to take in.

But no, I just get a chapter transition.
( Read more... )

So Phaere wants me to meet her immediately after arguing with Solaufein, and in the Female Fighter's Society where he won't be able to enter. I think I know where this is going, but since she only gave me an hour, I don't have any choice but to go to meet her immediately. When I do, she confirms my suspicions--after offhandedly saying she was thinking of having Chiyo tortured, she says flat-out that she and Solaufein are not on the best of terms and that she's tired of his insolence and allowing it to continue would be risking her position in the priesthood, but she can't kill him herself without risking war between their Houses. So she has come to a solution!

Have Chiyo do it.
( Read more... )

As the party uses the magic infinitely-long rope to descend into the Underdark, I'm taken to another cutscene of Irenicus (spoilers after 18:25), this time talking to dark elves about a drow assault on the "temple of the false gods" before two surface elf prisoners who recognize Irenicus and address him as "Joneleth" are brought in. That's right, this whole thing is so he can get revenge on Suldanessellar. I'm not surprised that Irenicus would ally with the drow, since he's already allied with a vampire, but I am surprised the drow would ally with him, since he's a surface elf and a male at that. What is it that the Matron Mother is referring to that was so compelling?

After the cutscene, a new chapter begins:
( Read more... )

I walk up the stairs out of the maze and am immediately ambushed by kobolds with flaming arrows. This happened all the time in the first game and was probably the single larger source of my deaths in the first dozen hours of the game, but hasn't been much but an annoyance since then. Here, some of them are standing on pillars and should theoretically be inaccessible, but because Baldur's Gate II doesn't actually have a Z level Minsc and Chiyo are easily able to run over and splatter them. Aerie and Xan's spells take care of the rest, and as soon as they're all dead, a cloaked "apparition" appears and tells me that the Tests of Madness have begun:( Read more... )

Aran Linvail leads the party down to the docks and the waiting ship and introduces them to the captain, Saemon Havarian, and his ship the Galante:
( Read more... )

Alright, so of the tasks I have before I'm going to help the Shadow Thieves, I accomplished...one of them last time. I killed Kangaxx. Time to get to the others.

My first stop is the Temple District sewers, where the workers who have the spider-killing weapon are. Jaeggar and Hurg are in the western end of the sewers behind a pipe, which is why I missed them on my first run-through of the sewers. Chiyo approaches them and they demand to know what she wants, though in dimwitted minion sort of way:

Jaeggar: "Here then, what do you want? Don't be bothering my concentration, I've lots of work to get done after my nap."
Hurg: "Wadda you want here? Ain't nothing here for public to see. We just take care of cleanin' the sewers and such."
Chiyo: "I hear you might have a sword I seek. It should have spider-like patterns on it."
Hurg: "I don't know nothing about weapons, really. Trained a bit in hammers, but I don't keep none myself. Not sure what you want."
Jaeggar: "No, no, she wants that blade we was given by ol' Gaden. The one that he said we should pack with us when we go after them spiders in the old ducts."
Hurg: "Ohhhh, I know the one. Yeah, scares 'em good for some reason. Sure wish I knew how to swing it proper. Always end up on me arse when I take a whack with it."
Chiyo: "I'll pay you 1000 gold, no questions asked."

Their response is somewhat surprising:
( Read more... )

Before I go barging into people's houses unannounced in the traditional murderhobo fashion, I head back to my stronghold to check on Chiyo's apprentices. Morul hands over the scroll and says that now it's time for the final task--making a real magic item. They can either make the Robe of the Apprenti, a Ring of Wizardry, or a Staff of Power. When Morul mentions the staff, both Larz and Nara are aghast at Morul's suggestions, exclaiming how horribly dangerous they are. When Morul asks Chiyo what to do, Chiyo says...to make none of them, saying that one of the most important lessons for a wizard is when to back away. The three apprentices thank Chiyo for the opportunity to study under her and then dimension door out. I would have thought that spell was too high for an apprentice to cast--if they can cast that, they're at least 7th level wizards, which is hardly apprentice level. Maybe they have scrolls Teos gave them?
( Read more... )

Yoshimo back in the party, I head back to the Planar Sphere. Once inside, the leader of the Solamnic Knights greets me and asks that, as a wizard of great power, I return her and her companions to their home:

Reyna: "It seems you are now master here, oh wizard of great power. I ask you to turn your will towards getting my fellow knights and I back to where we belong."
Chiyo: "And just how do you expect me to do that?"
Reyna: "I don't know. I am not knowledgeable in magic, but there must be some way. If you do not know, at least make some inquiries. I beg of you, this is not our home."
Chiyo: "I will see what can be done. Now leave me."
Reyna: "That is all we can ask. We have little choice."

The dialogue responses here are kind of disappointing for Chiyo's disposition--that response is something that Chiyo as I envision her would never say, but that's a limit of CRPGs. That's the answer I give because it's the most positive one, and as the leader nods and leaves, the tell-tale circle of a teleportation spell appears and a Cowled Wizard materializes in the Planar Sphere. As is traditional for Cowled Wizards, he starts off by being a dick:
( Read more... )

I go back and hand the documents over to Edwin, who gets in one last insult before telling Chiyo that Mae'Var has a final task for her and she should report to him at once. In the basement, Mae'Var says that Edwin has told him we are:

"Fairly good at the sneaksman's trade, but a little hamfisted when you fight."

which sounds like exactly the opposite of my group composition, what with Yoshimo being the only person who's actually able to sneak around anywhere, but we'll see what task he wants.( Read more... )