The Hero's Guide to A Successful Adventure

Version 1.3 Febuary 15, 2003

or 500 ways to use cheese for decimating even the most powerful of foes

By Use R. Unfriendly

"This Guide is a must have for anyone too wimpy to stare those scary red dragons in the eye. Two thumbs up!"
Bill Bluster, Washington Toast.

"Even great super-heroes like myself need a little help from time to time with those extremely vicious and scary goblins, and this guide has saved my life in several fierce battles against them. I've even stopped crying every time I meet them!"
Anomen, Knight of Helm.

"This guide stink! Me lose arm and leg attacking Firkraag with Gorgonzola! Me want money back, or me smash skull!"
Anonymous Orc, Windspear Hills

"Boo says that great heroes who want to plant their bootprint firmly on the backside of evil need but two things; a big sword, and this guide! Evil, meet my cheese! CHEESE, MEET EVIL!!!"
Minsc and Boo, Brave Ranger and his miniature giant space hamster companion of Rashemen.

"Well, this guide is certainly of great use to any up-and-coming hero, but the price is a bit high for the average starting adventurer, considering all the other expenses one must take into consideration for the kind of undertaking a quest is. If you are interested, I can sell you a similar guide, and some equipment, for a much better price, I am sure you'll agree... Out of the goodness of my heart, of course!"
Saemon Havarian, Flamboyant Merchant.

Thank you for those kind words and encouragement, AG3....

One of the problems with writing guides like this, besides the fact I am not a good typist, is the fact that most of the cheese is not mine, and its just about impossible to assign the correct credit to the person or persons responsible for a true stinker...for example, the infamous ring of free action while hasted has been floating around for so long, I simply dont know who came up with that one...so quite frankly, I am going to assign credit only for my cheese, and cheese i know the author of, and if anyone knows they came up with a particular stinker, please private message me on the various forums I am a member of and I will be sure to give you the proper credit for all stinky bits in a later version....

Without further ado, here is the cheese, which is why you are reading this guide anyway.....please note, this guide covers advanced cheese only, omitting obvious and well known tactics like throwing in a cloud kill into a room and shutting the door.

The cheese is divided into various catagories, in an effort to organize something that is almost impossible to organize....

Special Thanks go to Michel of the Forgotten Wars Forum, who first got me into this mess, writing this guide, to AG3 and the gang of the Forgotten Wars Forums, and the crew of the imoen romance mod forum and of course the whacky and completely insane asylum inmates of the Game Banshee forum. Without any of these "wild and crazy guys", and their support and encouragement and their cheese idea posts, this guide could never have been released to a unsuspecting and defenseless world...Thanks to Xyx, Alson and Littiz, who's scholarly and informative spell guide is the foundation for all cheese everywhere...Another thanks goes to Wes Weimer, author of the sola mod and the tactics mod, mods which make many many tactical encounters much harder, thus more fun, and his mods nerf many many of the standard cheese tactics...which is GREAT, since i have much more fun figuring out ways to still cheese an encounter even after a particular trick no longer works...

Disclaimer: Baldur's Gate and Throne of Bhaal is the sole property of Bioware, blah, blah, blah...this is their game, and their intellectual property, and this is intended to be a informational only, and if one of the stuff in this document blows up your computer, all i will do is laugh my ass off....

How to get the most out of this guide

First of all, read Xyx's Spell guide at

http://members.chello.nl/~j.vanthull/BG2SR/Home.htm

All cheese is based in large part in their enourmously helpful and informative guide on the spell structure of the infinity engine. Without knowing the fundemental basics and the laws of the infinity engine, you are tinkering with a blindfold on if you try to use the cheese in this guide. Cheese is FIRST understanding the rules and logic of the game world, knowing it throughly and well enough to start bending the rules...without knowing the rules, how can you bend them???

This guide is the result of being a contributing cheese meister in the gamebanshee forums, contributing my own cheese, reading about exploits discovered by others, and refining their techniques, discussing and arguing finer points of cheese with Kovi, Two, Bruce Lee, and others who are too numerous to mention....and since the only organization is literally in my head, the style of writing is rambling and sometimes chaotic....because cheese is really an art form and not a science....what i hope you will get out of the guide is a sense of the fun and chuckles i get from sucessfully exploiting a bug or peculiarity of the game for my own benefits, "getting one over the game designers" that has kept me interested in this game for some years....and i hope to encourage you to find and discover your own cheese, and to share it with others.

Note:

this guide will spoil many encounters and tactics in the game, this is a cheese guide after all, and it is absolutely recommended you have played thru the game at least once before reading this guide...you were warned...

Cheat Mode:

Some of the cheese in this guide uses the cheat mode of the game, open up the install folder of the game, and look for a file called baldur.ini. Scroll down until you see the section called "[Program Options]".Start a new line in that section and in the line add this command

"Debug Mode=1".

Game Engine Exploits

Stacking Free Action with boots of speed, haste and improved haste!

Here is an oldie but goodie...if you equip the ring of free action, or cast the spell on a npc, they are immune to web and hold and stun effects, but you cannot improve haste them, or haste them for combat...but if you improve haste them, or haste them, THEN cast free action or have them equip the ring, they are free AND hasted....

The exact way this works is...if you haste a npc, and then improve haste them, their movement rate is increased (as per haste spell) and the improved haste doubles their attacks, and the movement rate increase(as per improved haste spell) is stacked, so while both spells are active, they can move faster than any enemy, and by then casting the free action spell, or equipping the ring, they are immune to web, hold, and stun effects...

Now some of you are wondering, can i wear boots of speed and still be free? Yes, but its annoying....equip the boots of speed and then the ring of free action, you are hasted, and free...but the next time you reload the game, you lose the haste icon on your portrait...however, if you unequip the ring of free action, put it in your inventory, then unequip and re-equip the boots of speed, you are once again hasted...then equip the ring of free action and you are once again hasted and free...now you must repeat this strip tease everytime you reload the game.

Tips

This trick allows you to send in fighters into a room full of stacked webs or in the sola mod, smack the drow spider priestess sent after sola after you get him....and in the tactics mod, is one of the ways to make yourself immune to the stun effects of stun bolts in the improved saughin city...or improve haste a summon, like mordenkainen swords, and free action them for great offense and defensive ability.

Image Exploits

This does not really belong in the spell cheese exploits section, since its far more fundemental....images and simuacrums and mislead clones are really evil things.. truly the must have spell for all cheesers....project image, simmy and mislead...

Project images and simmys lets you cast spells without using up your own pool of memorized spells, and use items without expending single use scrolls and devices, but not everyone knows their true abuse abilities..

Your image can summon more pets than the game allows you to, normally...like cast project image and your sorc can summon 20 planetars, or cleric mages can summon 20 devas or using the Vhailor's helm (bought at the adventure mart) summon multiple elemental princes using jahirea or cernd...also, jan or a custom thief mage can set more than 7 spike traps in a map...(but this is nerfed by wes weimer's tactics mod, but a image or simmy can still override the summon limit even with the mods installed)

Mislead clones, (yes you can cast the spell multiple times, each cast will produce another mislead decoy) can sing the enhanced bard song, and the bonuses stack, so haer'dalis can cast many misleads and each decoy can sing enhanced bard song, which affects the whole map! A chorus of mislead decoys singing enhanced bard song provides major bonuses to your party, since the song bonuses stack....(and the song affects the entire map, so stick the decoys in a safe spot and have them sing their lungs out! for example, stick your decoys in one of the rooms in the 5th level of watcher's keep, and do this little trick, once you shut the door, the decoys are safe.)

tips

Now i know images far better than simmys, both have their weaknesses and strengths..

Images can cast all the spells of the original, and chaining 3 images in chain contingency produces 3 images, but true sight, dispell magic(by a sufficiently high level mage) and deathspell will destroy them...they also cannot attack meelee without shapeshifting...

Simmys are level drained versions of the original, so they have less spells and power and duration of the spells is reduced, also you can only have one simmy at a time, (unless you have a image summon simmys) but a simmy is immune to dispell and true sight, but deathspell will kill them. They can attack without shapechange, and uses duplicates of the magical weapons you have looted so far...

...finally, mislead....send the decoy out of sight of the enemy, and the mage who is mislead cannot be true sighted....the decoy must be in sight of the enemy for them to true sight the mage....

another super ability of images, simmys and decoys is they dont trigger dialog or spawns, so sending in a simmy or image to pretrap, or cast many delay blast fireballs and skulltraps works really well...see the spawn points exploits below...

You may only have one simmy at a time, the game engine enforces this...how ever, your image can spawn a simmy and vice versa...for a truly authoritative explaination of multigenerational clones, please check out Xyx's spell guide.

Restoration and simmy...get your levels back...

As I mentioned before, i am a image expert, not simmy, since one of the things that irritate me about simmys is the fact they are essentially level drained clones of the sorc or mage...thus they come with less spells than the original(and cast them at lower levels)...or do they? This stinky bit relies on my evil exploit of Endless Spells, (by Xyx, Alson and Littiz, cheese masters extraordinare http://members.chello.nl/~j.vanthull/BG2SR/Home.htm) or the Wish spell, and a really sick and stinky trick...cast simmy, then have a cleric cast greater restoration(or lesser restoration), the simmy as it is a member of the party will regain all its levels, so instead of being a 16th level version of a 24th level sorceror, it is now 24th level, but without the extra spells a image will have, cause when you use restoration on a level drained mage, the spell will restore the level but only rest will restore the memorized spells....so after casting restoration, you may either use the wish spell, (9th level version) and try for a "as if party has rested and gotten all their spells back" or exploit Endless Spells(by Xyx and alson and littiz).

Have the simmy who is equipped with the staff of magi, or has the spell Spell Trap memorized cast the spell, and another mage who has power word kill (9th level spell) cast the spell with the simmy as target...the spell trap will "consume" the power word kill, then use the mana to restore the spells of the formerly level drained clone....

Thus you get a simmy with all or some (depending on how many power word kills or power word stun you have memorized, see Xyx's guide for details on Endless Spells) of its spells restored....this simmy has all the advantages of images and simmys....all the spells, immunity to dispell or remove magic, immunity to true sight, and unlike a image which has to shapechange to attack meelee, it can attack immediately...phew! Stinky!

Obviously the best or easiest version uses wish spell to get your spells back...its quicker, and does a better job, but luck is the major factor...

Oh, and if your fighter mage casts the spell, or a fighter equipped with the Vhailor's helm, which can cast the spell once a day (bought at the adventure mart), casting restoration on the simmy will restore thaco bonuses and to hit bonues of the simmy, to make it far more effective...thus a true duplication of a fighter, and not a level drained lesser clone....

Note:

Warning, the restoration and Wish or endless spells trick may only work with sorcerors...i got a post from littiz saying that this trick definately does NOT work with mages, but may work with sorcerors...this particular bit of cheese may not work at all to give you all spells back, i have yet to test it personally, but this is almost irrelevent...you can always cast more clones, so the actual number of spells a clone has is not that huge an issue...you see, i realized that the crucial point of this trick is the fact that the simmy will cast spells at the original mage or sorceror's LEVEL...so lets say a level 12 mage casts simmy via the helm or spell or scroll, the simmy is the same as a level 9 mage or sorceror...so it will cast spells like mordenkainen sword or skeleton warriors as a level 9 mage or sorceror...until you restore it, it will then cast spells at the same level as the original mage or sorceror...until you hit very high levels indeed, your simmy cannot cast the more powerful, long duration spells like the original could...but with this trick, the simmy has fewer spells, but can cast them at the more powerful level like the original...and still keep the natural advantages of the simmy over image, like invulnerability to true sight and dispell magic....

and a fighter mage simmy can attack with duplicates of the powerful weapons you should accumulate by the time you can cast this spell....whooo hoo....

Tricks with the "Ugly Stick"

Gotta love the rod of terror(you need to kill the lich in the hidden room in the inn at the city gates) ...you give it to a npc who annoys you, but you had them along for a specific quest or reward, like Cernd or anoweenie, once they have outlived their usefulness, and have them attack things...you see, the rod randomly drains charisma, (hence the ugly stick) and if they use it long enough, they eventually die horribly of self inflicted uglification(is there even such a word???) of attribute drain...this is always good for a laugh...but someone, came up with an even more evil and truly sick exploit for the rod....

give it to your pc....yes, you!!! and start attacking things, like goblins and other low level creatures, and wait until your charisma drops to around 2 or 1, then equipp the ring of human influence...this will SET your charisma to 18, keep using for a long time after, to make sure your charisma drops BELOW 0, then take off the ring, and the game engine which does not permit a negative attribute score, will wrap around the negative value of your charisma score, and you end up with a charisma of 25....is this evil or what????? yes, i know you can edit your attributes via shadow keeper, but it just warms up my heart in knowing i uglified (really, is there such a word???) my pc to godlike good looks.....

Potion Swap

this one is just too evil....you should already know about clicking on a potion in your inventory, (if you are not a magic user, and you still want a familiar), right clicking and drinking the potion, then swapping (in the same slot) a scroll of summon familiar and exiting the inventory screen, your non mage will cast the spell...but this is just the tip of the ice berg...

using potion swap, any npc, jahiera, minsc, keldorn and others can cast any mage scroll you got...thats already bad enough, but jahiera becomes a super npc when you have her potionswap spell trigger, spell sequencer and best of all chain contingency scrolls...imagine a chain contingency of summon elemental prince, storm of vengence and aura of flaming death, or a triple nature's beauty or a triple creeping doom...that alone will disable every mage on the screen in a single round...yes, kiddies, a chain contingency via potion swap can load up on druid spells...

Script Breaking, how it works

scripts are what a enemy runs that makes liches and other monsters so nasty...each enemy type, or unique enemy has a script written for it that makes them cast spells and attack using specific tactics...two spells break scripts, feeblemind and chaos, so if you can get in a chaos spell or feeblemind spell, that dragon will not be able to use wing buffet, or fire breath, and will generally stand around looking silly...chaos, however sometimes the behavior allows attacks via meelee using default weapons...but all the really nasty stuff, like timestop spells by high level mages, and summons, like demogorgon's summon the infernal host is scripted, so as long as a enemy is not immune to confusion or feeblemind (chaos is upgraded confusion, yes confusion breaks scripts too, but chaos is much better tactically with its save penalty), getting in the chaos attack or feeblemind spell will defang most of their arsenal...this is one reason why sorcs are so great, a timestop greater acuity combo allows you to hit a major monster with many many spells...

Healing Fire Trick

Befrore you install the baldurdash patch it is possible to stack protection spells on itself, thus you could cast protection from energy twice on a npc and have the effect doubled, after the patch is installed, you must cast both protection from energy AND elements or one of the mage or cleric fire protection spells,you must cast different spells to stack elemental protection after the patch...(but the patch is totally worth it, it fixes many many implementation bugs and flaws in the game, and while it keeps you from using certain cheese, think of it as making them harder to use, thus more fun to figure them out...)

Using items and spells, for example rings of fire resistance or stacking protection from energy and protection from elements spell on a npc, you can raise a character's fire resistance to above 100%, then that character is not only immune to fire, but standing in a flame source will actually regenerate that character...this is why fighter mages are such overpowered characters, they can cast both spells on themselves and chain contingency a incindiary cloud triple on themselves, and using stacked haste and improved haste run fast tword a group of enemies, like mind flayers or trolls, and while being healed by his or her own area effect damage over time spell, the spell will weaken, even kill the enemy group. And yes, if you are improved hasted, the healing fire regenerates you at double speed....

Improved haste and regeneration

When you have a regeneration item equipped, like the ring of gaxx or the spell regeneration cast by a cleric, if you cast improved haste on that character, the regeneration effect doubles in rate...the drawback is if you are in a area effect damage over time spell, like incindiary cloud or cloudkill, your damage from the spell is doubled too, but a improved hasted character with the cleric spell regeneration active is almost unkillable....this makes fighters super fighters, and allows you to protect your weaker spell casters allowing them to survive certain really nasty encounters, like eclipse, the heart seal and the wu jen poison challenge.

Recharging once a day items using bags of holding, recharging wands via shops

I love the staff of magi, and ring of ram items...they have unique abilites, the super long duration spell trap, fireball lightning attack spell, and the ring of ram attack can hurt just about anything...the long duration spell trap is in fact perfect for Endless Spells exploit, for recharging mages and sorcerors...but its annoying when your items, which can be only used once or few times a day is expended, and you must rest before you can use the item again...but if you stick the ring or staff into a bag of holding or a gem bag, and have more than 0 gold, the item can be used again...and those items you get in the game, by looting dungeons and monsters, like wands or staff of striking that have limited number of charges, can be sold to shops and bought back fully charged...

note:

the trick with bags of holding or gem bags does NOT work on items from wes weimer's item upgrade and various mods, for example you cannot recharge the improved daystar, even though the original daystar can be recharged via bag of holding....can make for some interesting tactical choices..

Melf and Energy Blades, attacking with off hand ranged...

This one is just too evil, but hey, this entire document is evil....equipp a weapon with special ability in your fighter mage's off hand, then cast energy blades or melf minute meteors, and for fun cast improved haste, now attack a enemy at RANGE, about every 4th or 5th hit by the energy blades or melf minute meteors, the off handed weapon will hit the enemy at RANGE...and using such fun things as the scarlet ninja to, if you are a mage thief, (use any item) you can make poison attacks, and it will also increase the number of attacks, use blackrazor for ranged level draining attacks, and other fun things...this is particularly perfect for weaker spell casting members of your party, like jan with blackrazor, or aerie with blackblood, the acid club you can buy in trademeet, or the flail of the ages, for slow effects....and sola can make ranged vorpal hits with the axe of unyielding, while still enjoying the regeneration benefits...

Ferret Familiar pickpocket exploit...rift device and drow stuff..(Blucher)

The rift device is one of the most ridiculously overpowering items in the game, it is a ranged harm(as per the cleric spell Harm) wand, unstoppable by magic resistance or saves, and it punches thru any spell protection, and it always drops the enemies hit points by 90%!!!!!!!!!!!! thus they only have 10% of their hit points left after being hit by it...and best of all, using project image or simmy spell, you can have your image or simmy use the item, thus never expend it, since it only has a single charge...too bad you can never take it out of the temple sewers, as the game will insta-kill you if you try....but you knew i knew of a way, right??? Make sure you choose lawful neutral alignment when the game starts, or edit via shadowkeeper, then summon a familiar via the spell...(can be found in Nalia's Keep near the forge for the flail of the ages) and you now have a ferret familiar....after you assemble the rod, and kill the unseeing eye by meelee or spells, have a npc remove all items on that npc, and only have the rod in the inventory.Release the ferret from your pc's inventory, and have the ferret pick pocket the npc with no items except the rift device,and after several tries, the ferret will pickpocket the npc....put the ferret back into your inventory, and finish up and leave the temple sewers...release the ferret again, and talk to it, and have it give you all the items it pickpocketed to you...you now have the most powerful wand in the game!!!! the "space" pickpocketed items inhabit on a familiar bypasses the game engine checks, and allows you to smuggle items out past game engine "checkpoints"...just be careful, make sure you do not have the rift device in inventory when you go back to the temple sewers, or you will be killed...this also works for drow items from the underdark, however the ferret is limited to smuggling 2 items only past the checks at the elven camp...and of course if you go back to the elven encampment with drow items in your inventory, they will crumble to dust....let your friendly ferret hold them until you get to the elven city...

Your Brain sucking army of clones...(Userunfriendly)

Images cannot attack meelee, the game guide says so, but thats just simply not true, they can if they are shapechanged!!! I discovered this by accident fooling around with images and the shapechange spell, and then i rememebered mind flayer is one of the forms you can choose...

You see, a mindflayer is one of the truly nasty evil creatures in the game, if they hit in meelee, (they hit as a +1 weapon) their physical meelee attacks can drain intelligence scores...and any time any attribute like intelligence, charisma, dexterity is drained to 0, the victim is instantly killed, no save...you can even kill some immortal creatures in the game, for example the riddle giving statue in the shade lord's dungeon, or Malchor Harpell who repossesses the loot you can pick up if you kill drizzt in chapter 6....

Sorcs can load up a chain contingency with 3 images, set on condition helpless,target SELF(this is important!!!), then cast project image(making yourself helpless, thus triggering the chain contingency), thus triggering spawning 4 images....each image can cast spell immunity divination, improved haste, shapechange and tensors transformation(in this order!!!)...this makes each image immune to true sight, doubles attacks and good thaco....shapechange to mindflayers, and send in 4 totally expendable brain sucking minions to kill dragons, demons and other really tough beasties(beats the army of one, eh??? add protection from magic weapons for sheer evil meaness) whats even more fun is this is also a game engine exploit, since images can not attack meelee, but shapechanged, they can.

Contrl-R...blatant cheating, but fun...

This one is based on pure cheating, edit the balder.ini file to allow cheat mode..now you can use "ctrl-r" which restores a npc or pc that the cursor is over(put the cursor over a npc and press ctrl-r)...it restores all lost hit points and levels and any other "bad thing" that happens to a character...nowcast the 9th level spell shapechange, the spell works by giving you in your special abilies button a bunch of new extra buttons that allow you to shapechange to mind flayer, iron golem, etc....now cast the spell, or even use potion swap to let a non mage cast the spell, then put the cursor over the character with the shapechange spell still active...then ctrl-r the character, and now this npc or pc can shapechange any time at all, the buttons are permanently added to the character's abilies...giving minsc the ability to change to iron golem to resist enemy magic or greater werewolf to regenerate...use with the Vhailor's helm or a fighter mage to make brainsucking clone armies....

NPC Ability Exploits

Greater Deathblow!(Userunfriendly)

Well, if I am writing this guide, you knew I would include this....this is my favorite cheese, and I invented it...once you get the high level ability greater deathblow, equipp an area effect weapon, and activate the ability and fire the area effect weapon into a room full of annoying fodder, like mind flayers and beholders, and every monster in the area of effect will die, dropping like poisoned roaches. You see, most of the "fodder" creatures in the game, are below level 12. And greater deathblow completely ignores saves and magic resistance, if a creature is below level 12, being hit with any weapon while greater deathblow is active will insta kill them, no saves, no resistance, only deathward will protect them (darned drow priestesses!!!). Area effect weapons like fire seeds, courtesy of any druids, like Jahiera or Cernd...also arrows of detonation works great, so does the frag grenade ammo used with the big metal rod...

Tips

Area effect nastiness includes the most useful ability, greater deathblow, but also includes smite, (blow all nearby enemies away from you like the wing buffect dragon ability) and power attack (a fighter version of power word stun, this is particularly nasty if you are using energy blades, you can stun almost anything with a volley of power attack energy blades) and poison weapon (poison a room full of goblins in one attack) and even if you dont have area effect weapons, its pretty awesome...try it with melf minute meteors or energy blades if you are a fighter mage, or have sola for quickly killing most of the enemies in a room fast....this ability kills mind flayers, beholders, trolls, vampires, umber hulks, drow, and some demons(tenari)...but certain individuals of these types are immune, since they are above level 12(does not work on named vampires, for example, and mindflayer liches, in the mindflayer lair in the underdark, and elder orbs or hive mothers...)....and vampires can be killed with greater deathblow, but you cannot hit them with +1 weapons, like frag grenade or arrows of detonation...use melf or energy blades to kill vampires fast...the usual rank and file fodder creatures that makes many "boss" encounters difficult can be slaughtered by this exploit, thus you can kill off the "support" enemies and concentrate your party attacks on the boss...who is feeling pretty lonely once its support creatures are dead.

Guard Button Super Cheese

Now here is one that is truly fiendish.....certain npcs, like Keldorn and Mazzy, have this button on their screen that resembles a shield... have Keldorn or Mazzy equipped with a ranged weapon, like long bow, then buff up a fighter, like Minsc or Saravok, (who can also do this trick) and send him into a room full of monsters, and close the door behind them...click on the guard button of the support ranged fighter, then click on the meelee fighter sent into the room alone, the ranged fighter is now "guarding" the meelee fighter, but he/she cannot be reached thru the closed door...so the ranged fighter will now FIRE THRU THE WALLS in support of the meelee fighter he/she has been assigned to guard...any enemies that the guarded npc attacks will be shot by the ranged fighter if it is within range of the ranged fighter...

tips

this is almost tailor made for abuse, like when you get solafein, you can dimention door him into a room full of nastys and guard him with minsc. activate greater deathblow by minsc, and the slaughter is disgusting....long bows are the best weapon for this, since the long bow range is the best in the game....also, and now we just get really evil, you can guard summons like mordenkainen swords, skeleton warriors, invisible stalkers and such...use wizard eye or farsight to keep control of your summons, send them into a room full of mind flayers, have minsc activate greater deathblow, and add up the experience points....any summons capable of attacking is a valid guardable target. now specific examples....remember gorf the squisher who duels mazzy when you get to the copper coronet?when the duel happens, mazzy is stripped of all her good equipment, but use the guard button with minsc or keldorn, and gorf dies fast...this is also good for the druid grove duel, with faldorn....making the guarded npc, invulnerable to attack, using protection from magic weapons and mislead, just adds to the fun....and you knew i love cheating on duels of honor.

Defensive spin and free action...improved haste and offensive spin

Bards, i dont like them much, i find them close to useless, i prefer fighter mages for magic and fighter thieves can disarm traps and unlock chests...but some of their abilites are cool, like the enhanced bard song which can be cast by mislead decoys, and defensive spin, and offensive spin are good abilities...defensive spin has a flaw, your bard must remain at one spot to have the spell active...but cast free action, or equip the ring, and they can move around....and offensive spin, even though the manual says cannot be stacked with other attacks per round modifiers, like improved haste, i found both will stack, giving a bard excellent attacks per round, and good thac0 bonuses...

Yoshimo and dual class abuse

Yoshimo is a interesting character, as the only true thief in the game, he has an interesting exploit that can be used by a pc if you decide to play a human true class...first, lay out some traps...like for doing the twisted rune, or kangaxx, lay out some traps, use them all up, and then go to the stats screen, click on the dual class button, this brings up the dual class selection screen, then choose a new class, and when you are taken to the confirmation screen, choose cancel, and this takes you out to the regular stats screen....close, and click on the special abilities button, and now Yoshimo has all his traps BACK...now you can put more traps in, more and more and more....(note, wes weimer's tactics and sola mods nerfs this too...his mods rigidly enforce the seven traps per map area rule, but that is seven high level traps AND seven regular traps...) while regular snares are not as fun or powerful as spike traps, hitting anything with 7 snares will most likely kill it...also, if your single class human fighter has used up his/her high level abilites, like greater deathblow or greater whirlwind attacks, this little trick, if your stats are high enough to dual class, will give them the abilities they have expended back without resting...are we having fun yet???

Slayer Change and the underdark

In the underdark, the mind flayer dungeon has some cool loot, but two of the doors require a mindflayer to open the doors, so the normal action for most players is to go to the mind flayer control circlet room, make the circlets, then charm a mind flayer and have your mind flayer open the doors...but if you read the item exploits for the mind control circlets, you know those circlets are too useful and powerful to use on trivial things....but the slayer change will open the doors! change into the slayer, and open the doors and you have saved two circlets...now here is a good time to tell you about some more fun with the slayer form...it allows you to control your reputation very closely, so if you have evil party members, and due to some quests you have done, your reputation is getting too high, simply hit slayer change to drop 2 reputation, and to raise it donate 1000 gold at any temple...also the slayer form is invulnerable to maze and imprison, so is a good way of whacking kangaxx...and finally, if you stay in slayer form too long, you start taking damage, cast protection from magic energy on yourself, or protection from energy, and these spells will allow you to stay in slayer form longer...however if you stay slayer too long, you will still die....

note:

ARcheR_S_ in the gamebanshee forum told me of an another exploit for getting those doors open in the underdark, it turns out the staff of domination, a piece of loot in the mind flayer lair, will also charm mind flayers...the domination spell may do the same, but i suspect the staff is much more reliable...so you can avoid the reputation loss, and still keep the wonderful mind flayer circlets...

Time trap...useful?? (or not??) (Stilgar)

I just saw this one today by stilgar, time trap doesnt seem all that useful to a thief mage, as it seems to takes a fighter thief to get the most out of it...you see, it freezes all the monsters and the party in the screen for about one round, and so if you had a fighter thief with good thac0, its good for a free round of attacks and no retaliation...so its not a good selection for jan, the multiclass thief in the game....but wait...stilgar noted that the duration of the time trap, about one round, is just enough time to cast timestop, so if you got a situation where you can lure the enemy into a trap, or a spawn situation, like twisted rune, simply place a time trap into a area, then let the enemy step on it, triggering it, and then you cast timestop and greater acuity, and unleash magic hell...the major disadvantages of the timestop spell has always been its long casting time, and the fact it cannot be chain contingencied, so if a meelee attack disrupted it, you were screwed...but this way, certain encounters where you know you are going to get a really bad enemy coming at you, a little timetrap will give you uninterruptable timestop casting...

Tactical Abuses

Fun with Azuredge(Userunfriendly)

I have, in my last run thru the game with wes weimer's tactics mod, of which i cannot praise enough, came up with some fun things to do with azuredge to make mincemeat out of some supposedly "tough" challenges...sorry wes,,,

the lich in the docks, near the thieves guild, has been considered a really tough enemy, due to uninterruptable timestop, cast via scroll and some nasty scripted spells...but simply cast improved haste on a fighter, save the game and send in the fighter solo...as soon as your fighter sees the lich, ignore everyone else, attack the lich...with specialization in axes, you have about a 40% chance of undead blasting the lich with the first 2-4 hits....you see, the lich puts up as its defenses protection from spells FIRST...so a straight ranged attack from a undead disrupting weapon will most likely kill it immediately...then have the fighter kill the other undead using azuredge, and you clean up...

tips

Most of the really nasty liches in SOA can be killed by a fast, ambush with azuredge...the lich in Ust Natha is vulnerable to attack by azuredge...the kangaxx guardians in the tactics mod is not quite vulnerable, there are two liches, one puts up physical protections first, the other spell protections, so send in a fighter with elemental protection, and protection from magic energy (their scripts run abu dahzims and firebased spells) and attack the lich with spell protections up first (high feedback, which you can set up in the options screen of the game helps in figuring out which is which) and kill it fast, kill off the other undead, and wait for the protection from magic weapons to wear off, or kill it by other anti-undead tactics... the shade lich and elemental lich can be attacked while still blue circle using azuredge, before they get physical protections up. Also, in tob almost all the liches are vulnerable to ranged azuredge attacks...and if you have the item upgrade mod installed, you are better off with upgrading azuredge rather than mace of disruption....the +5 version will destroy kangaxx fast...almost all the liches in the game puts up magical protection up first in their scripts, and this makes them very vulnerable to unsporting evil tricks like this...this trick is particularly nasty if you like stacking haste and improved haste, you can get into range fast, with the movement bonuses of both haste and improved haste, and the improved haste gives you enough attacks per round to really get the one hit you need to undead blast the lich or what ever undead is the most powerful in a group...

Spawn Tricks

Delay blast fireball is a very underappreciated spell, but used correctly, it solves certain tactical situations and is funny to boot....in the twisted rune(original) version, have a sorc or mage cast project image( a image will NOT trigger spawn or trigger dialog) and put 5 delay blast fireballs where the beholder and the mage with the staff of magi spawn, and all you have to really worry about is the lich, who is also vulnerable to ambush by azuredge....kill off the whimpy vampire and thief, and loot at leisure...you can use skulltraps or delay blast fireballs...but do not mix skulltraps and delay blast fireballs...the fireballs always trigger first, and the enemy usually moves out of range of the skulls after being hurt by the fireball...in the sola mod, the drow priestess of Lolth can be quick killed before she even initiates dialog using this, but be careful of range issues, dont fry solafein by accident...in the unseeing eye quest, the lich in the room full of ghouls is a spawn, so if you use protection from undead scroll, the lich will not spawn if you send some one over the trigger point(at the end of the little bridge), so have a fighter clean up all the small fry undead, then send in a projected image to load up the spawn point with 5 delay blast fireballs, and send the party over the spawn point...the lich dies instantly once it spawns...this can also be done with the lich in the asylum, the one who guards Dace Sontan....the spawn trigger is near the closed door...the demon knights in the underdark, the room of demon knights??? they are invulnerable to fire, but enough skull traps should hurt them, so they are easier to kill....the rule, as i have discovered with cheese experiments, is demons=skulltraps....undead=delayblast fireball.

note:

spawn exploits rely on having played the game, and preparing the party before hand with major nasty weapons, (including prepared or sequenced spells) and then CONTROLLING the situation or spawn...here are examples from the tactics and sola mods...

revenge spiders can be set up using this nasty trick...when you are ready to do the revenge spiders, go to a nice outside location, like the druid grove or dearnise stronghold, and force talk sola..each force talk will make him respond a few seconds later with a pre-canned dialog until all the pre canned dialogs for each of your party members run, then he will start flirting with the pc...when he stops flirting with the pc, or your pc told him to take a hike, rest, and after the rest revenge spiders will spawn, so using force talk, you control the timing of where and when the revenge spiders spawn, allowing you to set up traps, summon a deathspell immune summon, like demons, and generally prepare a warm reception....after squishing them, hopefully using some tactics from this guide, you save the game, and force talk him again, and you will get the dialog that precedes the spawning of the priestess of Lloth...as you can see, the trick is to know and control the summon, so you can prepare the killing ground, and prepare a warm, warm welcome for the scheduled nasty and then trigger the spawn....eclipse can be controlled by finishing up the sendai quest in tob, and then go outside sendai's lair, and going into the woodcutter's cottage, and saving the game and resting until dark, and stepping outside to spawn eclipse...knowing just when eclipse will spawn will allow you to cast on your party the short duration party buffing spells, like regeneration and improved haste, so you can survive eclipse...

cheesing a lot of battles is simply making the enemy come to you on YOUR own terms, controlling the spawn timing or the timing of triggering certain events so your party has already been prepared with the short duration(thus extremely powerful) party enhancer spells, picking the ground if possible, and thus setting up ambushes...yes, i play a lot of wargames...

Pushing Kangaxx around, ring of ram exploit

Now here is just a fun one, one that is just too funny....killing kangaxx is almost a chore, these days...the challenge, and the great loot is dropped by his guardians if you have the tactics mod installed, so killing kangy is rather a let down...simply protect the party with protection from undead scrolls, except one mage or sorceror, who uses spell immunity abjuration so you do not get the "unkillable kangaxx" bug from having all members of the party protected from undead, (until the protection wears off, kangaxx cannot see or initiate dialog, so his dialog will not initialize until the protection wears off, no dialog, he cannot be killed) then bash with a weapon until he croaks...but here is a really funny one...if you have jan in your party, and you decide to pick up the ring of gaxx late in the game, so jan has spike traps, do the quest, get all the pieces together, then have jan plant as many traps, spike and regular, in that little platform at the end of the path that goes up to his coffin...once done, have someone equipped with the ring of ram, and trigger kangaxx...after killing his first form, when he transforms into the skull form, have the npc with the ring of ram use the ring on kangaxx...he is damaged, but more importantly, he is pushed among all the traps, which all trigger, insta killing him....i included this fairly trivial bit of cheese for fun, and to illustrate a point...

do you remember the frag grenade exploits above?? remember how i told you smite can be made area effect with a fireseed or frag grenade or arrow of detonation? imagine this, you are fighting in the oasis, or some battle where you have to fight a lot of lower level enemies, you cast a incindiary cloud among a group of enemies, but some of the little buggers manage to escape...so you use the ring of the ram or fireseed with smite to push them back into the cloud....(evil evil, grin!!!)

Cast and attack...fun with melf

here is another oldie, cast and attack has been around for a while, but not everyone knows what it is....the game engine enforces one spell cast per round, but allows up to 10 attacks per round, so after you cast a spell, you can still attack with ranged weapons, or best of all, cast improved haste on the npc, and have them cast melf minute meteors or energy blades...so your weaker mages before nasty battles should have melf or energy blades loaded up, so after the beginning of each round, after the mage npc or cleric npc have cast their spell for that round, they can make themselves usefull attacking with ranged weapons, or melf or energy blades...and even more fun is if aerie has flail of the ages in the off hand, and sola blackrazor or axe of the unyielding upgraded in the off hand.

cast a spell for that round, start attacking with melf minute meteors, and attack every 4th minute meteor or energy blades with your off hand weapon ranged...

killing kuro with plain bolts and fire crossbows.(Userunfriendly)

one of the characters in the tactics mod people get frustrated with and post requests for help is Kurosian, the acid wu jen.....his many uninterruptable protection from magic weapons, (cast via scroll) and his cloak of mirrors makes him almost immune to spells and his katana of regeneration makes him very difficult to take down easily...NOT!!! all you need to do is control the spawning and get one piece of equipment...and he is a total pushover...first buy either the heavy crossbow of searing or firetooth crossbow from watchers keep and about 40 non magical plain bolts, finish the slave lord's quest, get celestial fury, and equipp it, now take a trip to some area of the map, like the umar hills, and rest there for a few days, or do a quest, so a few days of game time have passed...now go back to the temple or even the docks, kuro should spawn right away...after the dialog finishes, cast improved haste on the npc who has the heavy crossbow of searing or the firetooth crossbow, and load up with plain, unmagical bolts...then cast breach on kurosian, he immediately recasts the protection from magic weapons, but ignore this...start firing unmagical bolts at kuro and you will hurt him, and kill him in about 2 rounds...how???kuro has many protection from magical weapons scrolls, and he has stone skin, and his script will buff him with protection from energy, but his nasty trick is his protection from magic weapons...so firing plain unmagical bolts will punch thru the protection from magic weapons, and the heavy crossbow of searing or firetooth adds a few points of firedamage to any bolts fired thru them....the fire damage punches right thru the stoneskin, and you essentially burn him to death!!! his script will recast his stone skin and protection from magic weapons when you breach him, but his script will not recast his protection from energy, making him vulnerable to fire damage...pure evil dirty trick to play on kuro....

note:

Some one reminded me about the acid katana's ability to spit melf acid arrows at whoever is hurting the bearer...simply use spell immunity conjuration, or use two scrolls of acid protection on the designated killer, and the melf acid arrows are useless...also, noted kuro has spell immunity abjuration, but this does not protect kuro from breach, only spell shield protects from breach...or the boots of preservation from wes weimers tactics mod, the ritual..

Blocking doors with wiz eye...

Here is another oldie but goodie...if you need to pop into a room full of nastys like mind flayers or undead, you can place a wizard eye summons at the door, after opening it, then the enemies cannot pass past the wizard eye, and your range weapon equipped fighters can simply fire arrows or bolts until they die...wizard eyes got totally nerfed in TOB, it used to be unkillable by meelee, could only be dispelled with dispell magic, but the new tob version is killed after taking only a little damage...but delete from the override directory in the game directory the file "wizeye.cre" and you will now get the old version back, the one that cannot be killed....a variation of this trick is to turn off the ai, the lantern button at the lower right hand of your screen, then prop a fighter with invisibility or sanctury spell in front of the door, the monsters cannot get past it, so the rest of the party gets target practice...

Spell Exploits

Strength Spell(Userunfriendly)

Well, here is another one of mine...its not spectacularly useful, but it illustrates a point in the next cheese trick....cast str spell on enemies with major meelee skills, like the shapeshifting demon in watchers keep, or adamantium golems, or even the units in wes's ritual, and the thing about white spells...no magic resistance will stop it, and they cant save against it, and this will SET their strength to 18, regardless of their normal strength...so their mondo meelee attacks hurts less....those beasties have a strength of around 22-25, so setting it to 18 makes them much more survivable....now most white spells are designed to help the party, so magic resistance and saves are not built in, the strength spell is just about the only one that can be used offensively, and its evil, and sick, (thus i came up with this...hehehheh) to abuse the intent of the strength spell to use in combat...

Telly Field(Alson)

Another white spell, and as i mentioned, white spells cant be saved or magic resisted, and thanks to alson for discovering this, a telly field cast in a room full of meelee enemies gives your party protection from meelee attack for 3 rounds....wont protect from ranged attack or spells, but this was tailor made for eclipse, and improved irenicus....this gives your party breathing room to attack with spells or ranged attacks or heck, even bash them....your own party is immune of course...beam me up, scotty!!!!!!!! Oh yes, i found out spell immunity alteration will make a mage immune to the effects of a teleportation field, so if a smarter mage from the tactics mod is giving you grief from their scripted telly field, use spell immunity alteration.

Chain Contingency

Or better known as the cheese spell...the spell is almost designed for cheese with malice aforethought.....

Lets start off with my own little discovery....

First, the game engine will not allow you to target invisible or improved invisible creatures with spells, this is why knowledgable sorcerors use area effect spells almost exclusively.

But chain contingency will target improved invisible creatures!!!! liches in the tactics mod like to stack improved invisibility, and spell immunity divination, and spell immunity abjuration, making liches immune to true sight, and remove magic, and their improved invisibility makes them immune to magic defence breakers like spell strike which must be cast at a target, thus the canonical way of attacking them is to wait until their protection from magic weapons wear off, and attack with a protected fighter...but a fighter mage, with the spell chain contingency, can attack a lich, use sunfire via spell trigger to blast the mummies and skeleton warrior friends of the lich (isolating the target, you need to isolate him, since you cannot control the spell target), and chain a triple ruby ray of reversal .Set it to trigger at see enemy, cast at nearest enemy, hence why you have to kill off the liche's mummy and skelly friends.Ruby ray is alteration, so spell immunity abjuration is useless, this will dump its spell immunities then hit withremove magic (liches are immune to breach) and bash it to death with azuredge....this also works on undead sola, except i send in a hasted npc to trigger the dialog, and exit the room and close the door....sola follows you with dimention door, but once he is isolated, he can be chain hit with spell protection breakers and easily bashed to death....

the infamous 7 spells per round trick requires chain contingency....chain contingency ignores acuity, it casts instantly, ignoring the 1 spell per round the game engine enforces, so you can

face enemy, cast chain contingency, set to go off when facing enemy, load up with whatever spells you want, then cast contingency, which like its much more useful brother chain contingency also ignores acuity, and unleash a spell sequencer or spell trigger....3 spells via trigger or sequencer, 1 spell with contingency, 3 with chain contingency...7 spells...the chain contingency and contingency spells will go off in the same round....( a good kill combo is a triple sunfire via trigger, and sunfire or improved haste via contingency, and a triple sunfire via chain contingency or ruby ray, breach and slow in chain contingency...almost anything is good)

wildmages love this spell, (be warned, the tactics mod or sola mod nerfs this evil trick) you can load up a triple improved chaos shield, which STACKS 3 improved chaos shield, thus you can combat cast all your reckless dweomers almost without any worries you will get a bad wild surge...each improved chaos shield adds to the wild surge roll, so the way i understand wild surges, you get a 25 point bonus per improved chaos shield, and you add the level of the wildmage to the roll, so you end up rolling 100 on the wild surge almost every time....and a 100 on the wild surge table is "spell casts normally" so in combat, a wild mage can with preparation cast spells just like a sorceror, without any fears of a bad wild surge, while his/her nrd's lasts...

aerie can set up a triple summon deva target self for really nasty encounters...(wes weimers tactics mod or sola mod nerfs this too..sigh...) and using potion swap jahiera can do a triple summon elemental princes(once again, wes mods nerfs this...)..and if you do have tactics mod or sola installed, having sola or a fighter mage triple summon mordenkainen sword target self can be a lifesaver when your fighter mage is getting chopped to bits...or just hasted can race into a room full of beasties, the spell triggers, and you can race out and close the door behind you while the swords do their thing...

Note:

Wes Weimer's mods nerf the ability of chain contingency to stack certain spells, like a chain contingency triple improved chaos shield, and chain contingency triple summon deva( if you tried to simply cast the spells, like summon deva, or improved chaos shield more than once, the game simply tells you this is illegal, as you cannot stack certain spells)...as of writing this guide, chain contingency exploits to bypass summon limits or stacking limits is not allowed, however you can still override the summon limit using project image, and chain contingency triple project image is still valid, however there is no way of telling if or when wes weimer's mods will close this class of exploits...

Note: if your mage is silenced, you can still cast any spell with chain contingency and contingency..

Special note: Almost forgot, chain contingency and contingency ignores acuity, you can cast the spell even when paused, simply click on the spell button while paused and you immediately get into the chain contingency screen, this spell completely ignores the one spell per round rule.

Sequential Sunfires of Doom(Userunfriendly)

Now here is one of mine, a cheese i frankly think is pure elegance in concept...too bad it doesnt always work...you see, the spell sunfire when cast makes you immune to fire for about 3 seconds, then hits you with a powerful fireball spell...

First unequip each item in your party that decreases spell casting time, like the amulet of power and the robe of vecna, then have all your mages memorize 3 sunfires, and a spell trigger, then load up the spell trigger with 3 sunfires, and surround a blue circle enemy...like the shadow dragon, or the black dragon, or before eclipse triggers....then pause the game, and click on each mage, trigger the spell trigger on self, do this with ALL the mages, and after EACH mage triggers sunfire on self, unpause the game....now if you did this right, each mage is unloading a triple sunfire on the same instant (this is very important, and why you had to unequipp all items that decrease spell casting speed) so at the instant the game is unpaused, each mage is completely immune to fire, and thus cannot be hurt by the sunfire of the mage next to you...

3 sunfires, with a cap of 15d6 damage, with say 4 mages in a party, is

3x4x15d6, or a maximum of 1080 points of damage that completely ignores magic resistance(sunfire can be saved but not resisted)...i have crispy fried the black and shadow dragons instantly, and its just fun...

but on slower systems, sometimes one mage in certain locations is slower than the other mages, since the computer has a slight lag, and if one mage is slower or faster than the others, mages will fry too...but timed right, its a elegant way to inflict massive damage on magic resistant enemies, like dragons or demons..if you have slower systems, have each mage cast protion from elements and protection from energy on themselves, or just spell immunity evocation..due to ownership rules, you are completely protected by evocation area damage spells as long as the npc is not the one casting the spell, so it will protect a mage completely from its neighbor's evocation spell, sunfire...

Lich Killing Sunfire(UserUnfriendly)

Here is one of mine...now sunfire is a great spell, however one class of enemies immune to sunfire are liches, liches are immune to 6(? i think 6th level, cant remember exactly) level spells and below, so sunfire will spell disrupt the lich, but will not hurt him...so i came up with a alternate to sunfire, the lich killing sunfire...chain contingency a sunfire, delay blast fireball, delay blast fireball...the sunfire gives the character casting the spell about 3 seconds of total immunity to fire effects, so the delay blast fireball, which would hurt you, activates and detonates within the total immunity to fire period, and delay blast fireball, which a lich is not immune to, can kill the lich..this is not a spectacularly usefull exploit, but kinda fun, and it illustrates a important aspect of sunfire you need to understand to appreciate and understand the sequential sunfires of doom above.

Wish Spell Exploits

AAAAAHHH....the wish spell not quite as ripe as chain contingency, but certainly full of fun...the easy to abuse "rest" option, can be easily exploited by having images and simmys cast wish spell, thus doubling and tripling your chances to get the "rest" option.....( "rest" will give you the option of Make it as if the entire party has just rested a full night and re-memorized all their spells....) but thats not all, many of the other options are ripe and full of exploits...

Hardiness: unlike the high level ability hardiness which cannot be used twice on the same npc, (after the baldurdash patch) wish spell hardiness stacks with itself and stacks with armor of faith and the high level ability hardiness....get this option 2 times, and you can make your party immune to physical damage for a short time...

Breach: two options exist for breach, you can get breaching everyone in the area (including the party), and you could get the breach all enemies(both options breach everyone!!)...these options will breach even undead sola, who cannot be breached without removing his improved invisibility....

The magic resistance option SETS the magic resistance of everyone in the area to 40%, and does not make them hostile, so this is ideal for certain very magic resistant enemies, like the chromatic demon...

cast abi dahzim's horrid wilting on everyone in the area is a fun one...if you have a map with no friendly quest specific npcs(temple ruins, shadelord dungeon after rescuing mazzy) , try for this after protecting your party with protection from magic energy...think of this as the ultimate in armegeddon spells, you have just seriously hurt, or killed every single enemy on the map...

Contagion spell and ray of enfeeblement( hard to use, but fun)

Cast ray of enfeeblement on a monster, like a dragon, and hit with multiple contagion spells, and you can drain its attribute strength to 0, instantly killing it...this is the same principle as the mindflayer intelligence drain....the way it works is any attribute, like strength, charisma, etc when drained to 0 will kill anything, including some unkillable creatures in the game, like the temple ruins talking head who riddles you....

Hardiness and Armor of faith

Now you should all have the baldurdash patch installed, which prevents you from stacking spells like hardiness, or armor of faith...each cast of the spell makes you resistant to meelee damage, so you can literally make a cleric or fighter with high level abilites immune to weapons...but once you install the baldurdash patch, you can no longer repeat the same spell and get the bonuses stacked...but armor of faith and hardiness will stack, so you can make a cleric fighter or a paladin about 50% immune to meelee weapons...highly useful and this is yet another example of the most powerful buffing spells in the game being a short duration, so controlling the ground and timing is all important...this also illustrates an important point, to raise a protection to really useful levels, cast different spells that do the same thing on a single npc, like protection from energy and protection from elements, both raise fire resistance, so casting both on a npc will raise fire resistance beyond what a single spell can do.

Numinor of the game banshee forum has written a very nice breakdown of the bonuses and the items necessary to achieve them...here it is in verbatim..

Barbarian >lvl 20: +20%

Defender of Easthaven+2 (Bonus Merchant in the Copper Coronet): +20% (except missile)

David Gaider's Bhaalspawn powers (evil ability for the 4th challenge): +25%

Hardiness: +40%

Roranach's Horn: +50% vs blunt

Total 105% (85% vs missile, 127% vs blunt)

other similarly obscene bonuses are possible, a thief mage or fighter can use Use Any Item to wear jan's tunic which has a resistance to physical attacks bonus (if you can stand the turnip smell...phew...) and of course this will stack with hardiness...

Leonardo in the Gamebanshee forum also noted a important fact...even if you are immune to physical damage of the type being used against you, like if you have 100% resistance to missiles, ( Yellow dragon armor from the tactics ritual mod, and the belt of inertial barrier will almost make you immune to missile damage) attributes of the weapon will still hurt you, for example, poison from a bolt of biting should still get thru....or arrows of fire fire damage...in fact,my evil sneaky tricks for killing kurosian is based on unmagical bolts still pushing fire damage into him...

Your undead slaves, abusing limited wish spell

This one is literally a masterpiece of evil, and one that i have actually improved the implementation...someone posted if you cast the limited wish spell, and have a low, below 10 wisdom npc or pc talk to the djinn, and ask "i wish to be protected from the undead right now!!!" the limited wish spell will summon 6 hostile vampires, who will attack the party....so you have a evil cleric, like viconia turn undead, you now have 6 vampire slaves who can then go attack nasty monsters for you, like demogorgon or firkraag....they attack via level drain, and last all day, and they are possibly the best summons in the game, with regen, level drain and combat abilities, i mean vampires are hard to kill, right?

note:

my personal improvements to this cheese is using aerie and minsc...first, have minsc talk to the djinn when you summon it, he has a wisdom of 9, so will get the correct option, this allows you to have a mage or sorc pc with a wisdom higher than 9 to exploit this trick...aerie is a fun npc...the ability to spell trigger and chain contingency cleric spells makes her by far the most useful spell caster in the game....now use "CLUAConsole:CreateItem("helm02")" and you have cheated in the helm of opposite alignment...have aerie equip this cursed item, and now when aerie turns undead, instead of blasting them, she makes them her slaves...you can do this if you dont want viconia in your party, or simply have no room for her.....use the remove curse spell when you want the old aerie back....and to keep the party from being hurt by the vampires before your evil cleric can turn them properly, cast protection from undead scrolls using a simmy or image....(thus you still keep the scroll)

(Its really funny to put the helm on aerie's head, she becomes chaotic evil, and its funny to have her butcher the orphans on the streets of Athkatla and hear her say "i am so glad i met you, i never imagined we would be doing such good things!!!"yes, kiddies, i am sick...)

Familiar drop trick

simply summon a familiar and then put the familar in your backpack, after making sure the top left most slot in your inventory is open, the familiar will plop in there by default...take a quest, for example like the umar hills, helping the ogres, which gives you an item, most likely the familar will pop out of your backpack, and it should decompose naturally, like most items dropped on the ground in the game, thus later on, you can summon a new familar and you keep the bonus hit points granted by the first familiar...not a spectacularly useful trick, but fun..note: some people have said this trick did not work for them, so a patch or mod may have nerfed this trick...they were unable to summon a new familiar, because their old familar refused to decompose, and when they went back to the spot where they dropped it, they were able to pick it up again.

Web and Stinky cloud, thanks xyx!!!

Web is a wonderful spell, it has some truly cheesy properties, casting it at blue circle creatures will not make them hostile, and its far far more effective than either slow or hold family of spells, hold or slow if a enemy makes its save it is not affected, web, every round they stay in the area of effect they must make save or be held, thus this and stinky cloud are the area effect persistant disabler spells, like emotion helplessness...(but emotion is not a very good spell at higher levels,,,too many high level monsters are immune) tossing web spells into the fog of war and following up with a cloud kill or some other area effect damage spell is a easy way to win many battles...for example, in Nalia's hold, the main room in the first floor of the hold, is full of trolls, sending in a mage to toss in a couple of webs, and a couple of cloudkills is easy experience...improved torgal, in the tactics mod, the final encounter, go into the room, and near the door toss in some webs, and some cloudkills, and you can kill almost every troll and umber hulk in the room, except torgal, but without its support crew, torgal is much easier to take down...in the temple sewers, the toll keepers can be easily disposed of with web and cloud kills, and in the prominade, mencar pebblecrusher and company in the upper room of the seven vales inn, go up the stairs, and near the stairs, toss in webs, and cloudkills...this is the easy way to take out this fairly powerful group very early in the game...now some creatures who are resistant to web spells, you should toss in a stinky cloud, since almost no creature is resistant to both at the same time....like drow, for instance....

Resilient Sphere exploit, using free action...(kovi)

The resilient sphere... considered by most to be a pretty useless spell, it has no save penalties so its not as effective as chaos and slow, and its not area effect, like chaos and slow, and while it can be used to protect a weaker party member in combat, it immobilizes them, like maze, and unlike maze the npc's own save can block it...so what good is it??? (note, if you cast maze on target self, via chain contingency, your weaker spell casters will maze themselves, but the rest of the chain contingency will still fire, so you can get off an attack spell, and your weak spell caster is invulnerable from harm for the duration of the maze spell...thus for fights like eclipse where the enemy is close and will attack weaker members of your party first, you can protect and spell attack with your weaker members) cast free action on a npc, and cast resilient sphere on the npc...if the npc fails to save, they are almost invulnerable to magic and attack, and can attack and cast spells...kovi posted this true masterpiece, and its a doozy...the saves and magic resistance of the npc can prevent the spell from working, so lower resistance and dooming the npc actually HELPS in this spell....

Spook, wonderspell...

spook is a wonderful spell, it was designed for dragon hunting...its massive save penalty means that unless a creature is immune to fear, like certain undead and demons, etc...it will almost always fail the save and panicked..panicked creatures dont use their special abilities like wing buffet or spells, so you can then move in fighters and hack it to death fairly easily...and by using mutiple mages, with minor sequencers or spell sequencers loaded up with spook, you can hit a dragon with 3-9 spooks, insuring at least one gets past magic resistance and spook the dragon...this is all you really need to go big game hunting in baldurs gate 2....

Mislead and the shutter effect (Xyx)

Mislead is a wonderspell, first you already know about the cheese with enhanced bard song...now you get to find out the truly sick and cheesy nature of the spell....the spell makes you improved invisible AND invisible.. cast mislead, then attack a enemy...while you are attacking or spell casting, mislead will make you improved invisible, so during the attack duration, you are "shimmering" as per the spell discription for improved invisibility and can be targetted by ranged attacks and meelee attacks by monsters, but CANNOT be targetted by spells, and once the attack or spell casting is done, mislead snaps you back into true invisibility, so unless your enemies can see invisible, or dispells mislead or true sights it, they lose targetting lock, and act as if you are not even there, until you attack or cast another spell...what this means is you can use mislead, and walk up to monsters, and almost cast spells and attack with near total impunity...whew...as if this was not bad enough, sending the decoy out past the view range of the monster, like sending the decoy off to the fog of war makes you immune to true sight....unless the decoy is within sight of the monster casting true sight, true sight cannot dispell the mislead spell...this spell is nearly as evil as the staff of magi cheese, and requires less clicking of the mouse...

Feeblemind, drooling idiots

One unusual and evil spell is the feeblemind spell...if you do NOT have wes weimer's tactics mod or sola installed, casting feeblemind at a blue circle enemy will NOT turn it hostile, and you can do this all day, especially with a sorceror, using Endless Spells or wish spell to recharge, until it gets in and sticks..try this with a dragon, and you can then send in a weak party member, like aerie with a staff and bash it to death while the enemy just stands around, drooling..

Nature's Beauty, the wonderspell

Natures Beauty is a truly wonderful spell, it will permanently blind a bunch of enemies within meelee distances from the caster, allowing you to hit them with ranged attacks or use spells, and they will only be able to retaliate with meelee attacks only, and it cannot be saved against!!! However the 3 flaws are it can only be cast by druids, (jahiera or ick! Cernd), it has a fairly long cast time, and its stopped cold by magic resistance...but using the sick and twisted potion swap cheese, (see above) you can eliminate 2 out of the 3 draw backs, making it THE spell for really nasty encounters...once you get some chain contingency scrolls, have jahirea potion swap a scroll, and load up a chain contingency (note: you have to click on the priest spells selection in the chain contingency screen) with a triple nature's beauty set on self when you see a enemy, a triple natures beauty is a terrifying thing for most enemies, its chain contingencied, so it is not interruptable, and it triggers fast, and by using a triple, you have increased its chances of getting past magic resistance...for example, a dragon has about 60% resistance to magic, so most of the time a spell is stopped cold, until you manage to lower its resistance..but a triple natures beauty will force the game to roll 3 times for the spell attack, giving you a much higher chance to get in the successful blinding...this spell is a must for eclipse, and the heart seal in watchers keep...

note:

a truly evil exploit is to use this on large creatures, like dragons or demogorgon, using a triple via chain, or lower its resistance, then shapechange a fighter mage or jahiera, with greater elemental transformation into either a iron golem or earth elemental....due to the implementation of the viewing distances, the mage or druid can attack as a large creature, and will NOT be seen by demogorgon or the dragon....i think the way it works is this....the green circle of your npc or summon or pc must touch the red circle of the blinded enemy for the blinded enemy to see you if they are blinded, but a earth elemental or iron golem is also large and the meelee reach of your golem's arms allows you to attack a large enemy without ever needing for the green circle to touch the red circle of the enemy....invulnerable to spell and meelee attack in one!!

AI Exploits

Walking Cuisinart( fun with blade barrier and globe of blades)

Here is another oldie but a goodie...cast sanctuary, or equip the staff of magi, or cast invisibility on a cleric, turn off the AI, (its the little lantern button on the lower right side of your screen) and then cast blade barrier or globe of blades, walk up to a enemy that is not capable of seeing invisible creatures, like the greater werewolves in the windspear hills, and watch them get sliced and diced while they just stand around...it is NOT an attack, so you dont lose the invisibility, and it doesnt even make them hostile, and the enemy ai does not even recognize it as an attack....for even more evil fun, before you cast invisibility or sanctuary, improve haste the cleric, and the blade barrier or globe does DOUBLE damage, attacking twice per round...best of all, blade barriers and globes are not stopped by magic resistance...

Bunnies attack! limited wish spell (Xyx)

The limited wish spell option "i wish to summon a horde to overrun my enemies" summons about 20 cute, fuzzy rabbits, blue circle, that no monster can resist going after...this is the ultimate in decoys, allowing your party a few rounds of uninterrupted spell casting and ranged attacks...the enemy ai will almost ignore your party to go bunny hunting...

Item exploits

Potions...

There are 3 really useful potions in the game...blue potions, purple potions and potions of insight....the blue potion, has multiple uses...i noticed that it boosts not only intelligence, but also dexterity, so as a test i gave some to nalia, and when her dexterity hit 25, her thief skills improved dramatically, so it can serve as a emergency substitute for potions of master thievery....both blue and purple potions increase intelligence, so drinking them, and scribing scrolls is a way to make sure you can add to aerie or edwin's spell book that nice new shiny spell you killed some nasty monsters for( raise to 24 to make absolutely sure you can copy spells to their spell books....also setting the game on easy settings will automatically scribe scrolls)....potions of insight sets wisdom to 18, so you get the good options of limited wish spell and wish spell...and can be used in a mildly stinky cheese with minsc and cleerics...if your cleric pc is low in wisdom, and you are facing a nasty fight, simply drink the potion of insight, this will raise your wisdom to 18, and unlike mages, when your wisdom increases, you get more spell slots...now normally a few low level extra spell slots is not a big thing, but you can get an extra draw on holy might, clerics and minsc, and that spell is what makes clerics so awesome...but notice, the potion only gives you the extra slot, you still need to select the spell, and rest to get the spell usable...and rest uses 8 hours game time, and the potion only lasts 8 hours...but use the wish spell, and go for "make it as if i have rested and memorized all my spells"....fill up all the extra spell slots given to you by the potion of insight, and for the next 8 hours your clerics have a few extra spells, not that much, mind you, but its nice....and one more thing...unless your mage pc has 18 wisdom, you will not get the best options when casting the limited wish or wish spell, simply chug down a potion of insight, and you now have all the best options available when you talk to the djinn

Note:

the potion of insight works only on clerics, and druids, and minsc...player created rangers and paladins simply do not gain extra spell slots at all...zvijer pointed this out...

Rod of Resurrection, unlimited range....Greater Restoration has unlimited range

Healing potions are kinda useless...i mean the most powerful ones, the potions you get in watchers keep, will only heal a portion of your damage, so i tend to rely on regeneration items, and the rod of ressurection..even though its description says its for raising the dead party members, if you use it on a wounded party member, it heals them completely...and its got unlimited range...this allows for some interesting abilities...in watchers keep, when turning the heart, spirit and mind seal keys, i send off the weak members of my party, like aerie and jan into one of the rooms in that map, close the door, and they are nice and safe and snug...after they buff up the fighters in my group...and aerie has the rod, so when my fighters are attacking the monsters, if they are badly hurt, aerie, from all the way across the map, can use the rod to heal the fighter in trouble...why not give it to a fighter??? well, if that fighter gets killed, you have to have someone pick up the rod and use it...they must break off attacking what ever target they were attacking, and use up a round healing someone....having aerie safe and away in a locked room is also nice for another spell that is unlimited range...greater restoration, so if all my fighters are in trouble, aerie can cast the spell, and heal everyone from all the way across the map...while still nice and safe...one of the big problems with cleric support npcs like aerie is they tend to be pretty fragile, this is one battle where they can be completely safe, but still provide healing support...

Cloak of Sewers..invulnerable to physical damage or magic using rat and mustard jelly forms...

this one is kinda funny... the cloak of sewers allows a fighter to change into mustard jelly or rat form.. the mustard jelly form is completely immune to magic, so can be used as a decoy for magic using monsters like liches, they expend all their spells on a immune creature,,,,but it turns out the rat form is completely immune to meelee attacks...so you might be able to kill some tough monsters, like the chromatic demon as a rat...hehehhehhehh

Mind Flayer Control Circlets

mind flayer control circlets can dire charm just about anything, like dragons, and even demi liches...cast simmy or project image, so you dont use up the circlet, and dire charm dragons, so it will just stand there while your party hacks it to death, or direcharm kangaxx for easy ring of gaxx....these circlets wont work on boss type creatures, but gosh, once you get to the underdark, they are by far the best loot you bring out...

Hitting improved invisible enemies(wand of spell strike and ring of ram)

improved invisible creatures cannot be hit by spells, but items like ring of the ram and wands of spell striking can still hit them...this is why the wand of spell strike is the best wand in the game, it can breach improved invisible mages, and even liches, (it bypasses lich immunity) making them easy to kill...

Greenstone amulet???(UserUnfriendly)

the greenstone amulets dropped by kangaxx guardians, and the gnome illusionist in vaygar's house does not have the same itm files as the greenstone amulet you can pick up in the underdark in the beholder dungeon...these two greenstone amulets need only be equipped to protect the wearer fully from psionics, stun, fear, charm and the other protections that the amulet is suppose to give you if you use up a charge...note, the kangaxx guardians and gnome illusionist are both part of the tactics mod....

Staff of Magi, better known as the staff of cheese.

simply give the staff to a mage or sorceror, cast a spell at a bunch of monsters, this will break the true invisibility equipping the staff gives you, and the monsters will attack, click on the staff in your tactical view, this restores the invisibility so unless the monsters can see invisible, they will lose interest, then repeat until all monsters are dead...stinky, stinky, stinky...add in the 8 hour duration spell trap, which can be used for the endless spells exploit by xyx, and the fireball lightning bolt spell, both abilites are once a day and 3 times a day abilities, so they can be recharged via bag of holding, you now know why this is the best staff in the game...and the protection from evil and charm immunity and saving throw bonus...too cheesy...

New Cheese added for version 1.1

Imoen and Ascention(Userunfriendly)

If you are playing with ascention, and you are getting annoyed with having to avoid killing imoen because she was slayer changed by Mel, i found a way to turn her back to her normal at the very beginning of the battle....thus you need no longer have to run away from her, to avoid killing sis...edit the baldur.ini to allow cheat mode, and immediately after she is slayer changed, put the cursor on imoen and ctrl-y her...it does not kill her, it simply turns her normal...i think ctrl-r might do the same, but not sure...this really isnt cheese, but it is convienient....

Two rings of the Ram....and a ring of regeneration, and a flask of djinn summoning

Not everyone knows of these old exploits, so its worth mentioning them here....ribaud in the adventurer's mart has a ring of regeneration you can pickpocket off him very early in the game...and the djinn guard outside of the djinn tent at trademeet has an item you can pickpocket off him, a djinn bottle that summons an afreet once a day....and if you pickpocket Tolgaris, the guy in the government district that gives you the vaygar quest, you can get a ring of the ram, and he also drops another one when you kill him...

New Stuff added for version 1.2

Thanks to zvijer at the forgotten wars studio forum, i have proofread this document further...thanks!

The User's guide to understanding spell protection...with smarter mages

Lots of misunderstanding exists for breaking thru the spell protections of high level spell casting creatures...i am going to simplify everything for you...(note, this is specific to wes weimer's tactics mod and the component smarter mages)

What is spell protection??? Spell protection is in 3 catagories...spell protection to protect you from physical damage, like stoneskin, and protection from magic weapons.It is also elemental protection, like protection from cold, and protection from the elements.And last, protection from spells, like spell trap and spell shield.So, to be able to punch thru protection spells, you need in your arsenal spells that can destroy all 3 types of spell protection, right?Wrong!Now due to the way the game works, protection from spells is incredibly easy to get around...simply hit the target with area effect spells...like my favorite, incindiary cloud, or abi dahzim's horrid wiltings...since a protection from spells DEPENDS on the enemy casting a spell directly at you, like polymorph other, or magic missile, if your enemy hits you with a area effect spell, or just plain bashes you with this big hammer, all the protection from spells in the game wont help you at all...so this means that the spell turning, spell trap, globe of invulnerability and spell shield that enemy mages put up are completely useless...you hit the mage or spell casting monster with an area effect spell, or holy avenger, and all the protection from spells it casts does nothing...

So, as you can see, if your magical arsenal of attack spells is mostly area effect, and if your party has some good warriors, all you need to punch thru spell protections is to destroy your targets physical protections, like stoneskin or absolute immunity and your targets elemental protections, like protection from energy or fireshield red. It turns out every two spells will dump all elemental protections and physical protections....breach and remove (dispell) magic.Both spells will get rid of stoneskin, protection from magic weapons, mantle, and other physical protections.Both will destroy protection from energy, protection from fire, protection from acid and other elemental protection spells.This is why 90% of the time, if you have breach and remove magic, you can kill any mage or spell casting monster.Now, remove magic (or dispell magic) is an area effect spell, so you can hit multiple targets at once. But instead of always removing protections on the target, you are forced to roll for it, and your level and the target level will affect the roll, the higher in level you are, compared to the target, the better your chances.Breach on the other hand is a single target spell, so the rules apply...the target may not be improved invisible, a valid target, and you may only breach one monster per casting the spell.Both have their good points, breach always works, except on liches, and remove magic works on liches.

Breach will strip out any elemental and physical protection, and almost nothing stops it...spell trap will not stop breach, spell turning will not stop breach, only spell shield will stop breach, but only once, and the spell shield is consumed by stopping breach. However due to its nature as a single target spell, you can stop enemies from breaching you by being improved invisible.It is a single target spell, after all. Liches are immune to breach, since they are immune to spells below a certain level, and breach is one of the spells liches are immune to.So how do you strip off the protections of a lich???

Remove magic is an area effect spell, so it can get rid of a lot of enemies protections at once, but you roll for its effect, if you are much higher in level than the target, you are almost sure to destroy its spell protections, however the reverse is true, if your enemy is much higher in level than you, good luck...however, as usual in this guide, there is a way to stack the deck...spell sequencer spell allows you to triple your remove magic rolls, by casting the spell 3 times fast, so your chances of removing a enemy protections is tripled... and there is the nasty inquisitor dispell, which casts at twice the level of the inquisitor. Unfortunately, dispell magic will also dispell YOUR protections, so this is not good...however, spell immunity abjuration (which does NOT stop breach) will protect a mage or sorceror from an inquisitor's dispell magic, so your inquisitor can cast dispell magic all day long, and your protected mages and sorcs will not care.Remove magic does remove lich protections...you noticed it is a 3rd level spell, so liches should be immune to it, however remove and dispell magic are EXCEPTIONS to lich immunity... it will remove a lich protections if you make the roll.However it is stopped by spell immunity abjuration... sounds complicated?Actually its simple.Have both spells, and know when to use it. Use breach for everyone except liches, and use spell sequencer remove magic or inquisitor dispell after protecting your weaker party members with protection spells, and spell immunity abjuration.

Now we get to the cases and specifics of Wes Weimer's tactics mod. And why I had such a good time lich hunting with smarter mages installed...the smarter liches use a almost ubeatable defense against spell protection removal... almost, that is...it is a masterpiece of stacked mutally supporting defenses that is very very tough to crack.But i assure you it can be done with the right spell selection...smarter liches, cast improved invisibility, spell immunity abjuration, protection from energy, spell immunity divination and protection from magic weapons.Whew!thats a lot of spells, but you really have to understand why smarter liches cast so many spells...First, protection from magic weapons and protection from energy stops physical attacks and area effect spells cold.(since the smarter lich script casts and stacks protection from energy, it is completely immune to elemental spells and spells like abi dahzim's horrid wilting) Then spell immunity abjuration will stop remove magic(dispell magic, including inquisitor dispell) cold. So now you must remove the spell immunity so remove magic (or dispell) can work, right?Now the spells that remove spell immunity are spell strike, ruby ray of reversal, and khelbens warding whip...ALL spells that must be targetted on a single target.So now you understand why the lich casts improved invisibility and spell immunity divination...You may not target improved invisible creatures with single target spells. The game engine will not allow you to target improved invisible creatures with spells, until you get rid of the improved invisibility...and spell immunity divination will make the lich immune to true sight... a seemingly closed loop.

However, i have found out that Chain Contingency spell will target improved invisible creatures with single target spells!!!! (this is covered above in the Spell Cheeses section). So when killing smarter liches, (or smarmy liches) the procedure goes like this....

First, you must first isolate the target. Using a spell triggered triple sunfire will do a good job of blasting into paste the smarmy liches friends, the skeleton warriors and mummies smarter liches comes with.Then immediately after the sunfire fries its friends, move your mage or sorc close to the lich, and while paused, cast chain contingency, nearest enemy, a triple ruby ray of reversal.Ruby ray is an alteration spell, so it is not stopped by spell immunity abjuration, like khelbens warding whip and other anti-spell immunity spells.Why a triple?I have noticed a while back, that wes put spell shield in the script for undead sola, so you triple it to blast past the spell shield. (spell shield will automatically absorb and negate ONE spell protection removal spell, so the first ruby ray will break the spell shield, and the next two will break 2 spell immunities...spell immunity abjuration and divination.Now the lich has just lost spell immunity abjuration and divination, so a triple spell sequenced remove magic, or true sight will work.Why true sight?Once you true sight the lich, it loses its improved invisibility, so if for any reason it still has spell immunity abjuration up, you can now target it with ruby ray again.Once you remove magic and it succeeds, bash it to death with a weapon, or cast abi dazim's horrid wilting on it, since the remove magic will bring down protection from magic weapons, stoneskin and protection from energy.

Undead sola has spell shield, spell immunity abjuration, spell immunity divination, improved invisibility, and protection from magic weapons. The same tactics apply for undead sola as well.Now wes weimer likes to tinker with smarter mages and their scripts, so this section of the cheese guide is intended to give you tactics that work now, and enough understanding of how smarmy liches spell strategy is designed so you can counter them yourself in the future.

note:

devices are able to target improved invisible creatures, so wands of spell striking, easy to get at level 1 of watchers keep, should breach undead sola and should breach smarter liches.

Called Shot

Someone pointed out that once a archer reaches level 12 or higher, the ability called shot will drain 1 strength point per hit... use with ray of enfeeblement and high enchanted arrows(this cheese is only worth using on really nasty monsters, like adamantium golems and those types of monsters require +2,+3 arrows or bolts to hit) and improved haste to quickly and rapidly drain strength, resulting in an attribute drain kill.

Mislead and spell immunity(perfect spell defense)

Now after having read my guide on spell protection removal, you should be thinking, hmmm...turnabout is fair play....and you are right...cast spell immunity divination and abjuration on your mages, and mislead. Now enemy spell casters cannot target you with single target spells, like breach and feeblemind and other spells like that.Be warned, however that creatures that can see invisible, like liches, their SCRIPTS, like the chain contingency spell, can still target you with spells...and frankly, smarmy liches usually use area effect spells anyway.

Mislead and backstab

Here is another oldie but goodie...have a mage thief cast mislead spell, and for the duration of the mislead spell, your mage thief can backstab over and over again, due to the "shutter" effect of the mislead spell described in the spell cheese section....backstabbing requires true invisibility, or hide in shadows, and the mislead spell shutters between true and improved invisibility, thus the spell allows you to make multiple backstab attacks per round.

New to version l.3

Three Rings of Ram(Pitspawn)

This one I really like, since it involves sacrificing a npc i find annoying and a git...Vaygar! Note, this may not work, due to some mod or patch...

First, pickpocket Tolgerias BEFORE speaking to him in the goverment district..use potions of master thievery to boost your thief's skills...this will give you the first ring...then talk to him to get the planar sphere quest...go to the umar hills, pick up Vaygar, or kill him....(optional: if you have the weimer tactics mod installed, keep him alive until you kill the illusionist gnome in his home in the docks...read the readme file in the tactics mod for details, the gnome carries one of the greenstone amulets that need only be equipped to give you full psionic immunity) then with the body in your inventory, or vaygar in the party, go to the slums and OPEN the door to the planar sphere...now kill vaygar if he is not dead yet, then take the body to the government district, and sell it to Tolgerias for a second ring of ram, then go back to the sphere, and run the quest as usual and get a 3rd ring off Tolgerias's body...Thank you nitewulf for posting this one....

Hell test, Spell Immunity Divination! (Blucher)

This one is pure, unadulterated evil, i am just so impressed...Blucher discovered that if you cast spell immunity divination on yourself before you do the "good" path in hell for the selfish test, where you must choose between losing attribute points or sacrificing a party member, and you choose to sacrifice some of your attributes, the spell immunity divination will protect you completely against the attribute loss...evil, evil evil...hehehheh

This little trick also made me think, if you track down the correct .spl definitions in shadow keeper, you should be able to protect yourself from all the negative effects of certain choices you make in the game, by finding out the spell school of the spell that is cast at you at certain points in the game, and casting the correct spell immunity type at the right time...

for example, using potion swap you can make jahiera immune to the negative effects of the curse in the harper quest. Also, if you choose to keep blackrazor, or kill saverok in anger in hell, casting the correct spell immunity at the correct time should make you immune from the alignment change...Sojurner pointed out that the alignment change actually adds a line to your affects tab in shadowkeeper, so in actuality, simply deleting the line will restore the original alignment, so this is of limited real use, but is mighty fun to contemplate..do naughty things without consequences....

Familar drop trick revisited(Thesslian)

Similar to the drop trick but you don't have to wait for it to decay. If you have a mage and summon a familiar, then export and start a new game Irenicus will steal your familiar allowing you to summon a new one and keep the hit points from the original. Rinse and repeat until you are satisfied with the results

Imprison exploits Spawn point cheese....

Sounds funky, no? But quite simple in concept....cast timestop, then have the mage run up to a monster that is really nasty, like dragons, then cast imprison...the beastie is gone, along with the loot, then use Jan or a pc thief to put as many spike traps where the monster was as you can, then cast freedom...the dragon or demon or whatever is restored, and the traps trigger for a big surprise...you may use spike traps, or skulls or delay blast fireballs...the point is to get the monster out of the way so you can stack many killer traps or trap spells without getting bothered by fighting it, and then respawn the creature in the middle of the killzone...

Recharging wands on the cheap

Another oldie but goodie...you all know if you sell off a wand and buy it back again you get it fully recharged...simply steal it back, and use it...when you need to recharge it again, sell it to one of the "fences" in the game, like roger the fence in the temple sewers, since a normal merchant will refuse to buy stolen goods...note, this is one of the money pumps in the game, since a fully charged wand can be sold for many thousands of gold and by simply stealing it back and reselling it to the same fence will rapidly improve your funds.

Ok, if you have any suggestions and new cheese ideas, i can be reached preferably by private message in the forgotten wars forums, the game banshee forums, the imoen romance mod forum.

Andrew Park

Userunfriendly@Juno.com