Looking at olimikrig's The 'Misunderstood personalities'(tm) party (http://www.sorcerers.net/ubb/ultimatebb.php?/topic/10/4332.html), I got an idea for a party made up entirely of the little people (dwarves, gnomes, and halflings). In BGI, that means Alora, Kagain, Montaron, Quayle, Tiax, and Yeslick. With the "All NPCs in the Beginning" mod, you can get every one of them except Yeslick right away. The Quayle/Tiax fight would then become a problem throughout the game, so I would suggest one of them be replaced by the PC (likely Tiax). The Kagain/Yeslick fight is of lesser priority as even with the mod, you still can't get Yeslick until the mines.

The BG2 part is considerably harder to make. You have only three "little" NPCs: Jan, Korgan, and Mazzy. The Alora NPC mod will re-introduce you to the irrepressible little thief, but there's still an empty spot.

So I'm left with three questions:
1) How short are the Avariel? (Would Aerie qualify?)
2) How short are Tieflings? (Would Haer'Dalis qualify?)
3) Is there any other (besides Alora) mod out there with a dwarf/gnome/halfling NPC who would fit into the party?

In my opinion:
1) Too tall (though its your game and you may want the romance)
2) Too tall (but again your game)
3) I don't know of any mods so maybe make yourself 2 characters:
Alora: Theif
Korgan: Fighter
Mazzy: Fighter
Jan: T/M
So you're short on the divine magic. Maybe a PC F/C and a gnomish mage?

Fel, you could always generate the last character yourself... Or, you could play using only 4 NPC's and the protagonist.

... you may want the romance) :lol: A Tiax character trying to romance Aerie wouldn't last very long, and Quayle romancing Aerie would be downright creepy. I'm afraid I have to agree about the height issues, I was just hoping there was something in a D&D text somewhere that could prove me wrong. :( Oh well.

I do have good news, though. I just saved a bunch of money by switching to GEICO. :confused: No wait, that's not it . . . ah yes! After looking at pocketplane.net and finding nothing, I took another look and settled on Goo, the floating eyeball. He may have altitude, but when you measure top to bottom he's the shortest of them all. Plus he's got a banter with Jan; what more could you ask? :grin:

Btw Fel, keep us updated on your little folks party ;) chances are that it'll probably go a wee better than my misunderstood personalities party :lol: :lol: :lol:

@olimikrig:
That might be a while; I've got about a half-dozen parties lined up and waiting for their turn. I think these things up faster than I can play them. :o If anyone else would like to play my idea, you're more than welcome. To give you an idea of how booked up I am:

My BG1 archer party is stalling as I solo BG2 again with an F/M/T, and I've still got a couple semi-solo BG1 -> perfect-romance BG2 party characters to finish. I think I've pretty much given up on my BG1 stealth party for now, but you never know when I might get it into my head to tough it out a little more.

Ideas I've yet to start:
-BG1 Funny party {F/M/C PC, Alora, Minsc, Quayle, Tiax, Xan}
-BG1 Evil party {Improved Montaron PC, Edwin, Eldoth, Kagain, Tiax, Viconia} (This one gets continually bumped back in favor of more interesting ones; I think it's been about a year.)
-Little People Party
-A couple more that have waited so long I can't even remember them :(

Ah well... Hmm. Would your little folks party not somewhat fall under my misunderstood personalities party too (At least in bg1), as many of them ARE kind of weird characters. I might give it a shot, and have your little folks play it out melee instead :lol:

^Have the shorties use BIG weapons like Staves, Spears, Halberds, TwoHandedSwords etc. they look rather hilarious!!!

I'm playing out a multiplayer game of only gnomes.

I made once a party, "Shortfella's revenge". It consisted from 3 dwarven kensais, halfling thief and two gnomes. That's probably coolest thing i've used for a long time.
Seeing some 1 meter long people slaughter dragons made me smile. "it's no use, we'll burst your knees!" :D

I've been thinking for the longest time of playing with a party of thieves. 2 swashbucklers, 2 vanilla thieves, and 2 assassins, or maybe just drop it to a party of 4, and take out the vanilla thieves. I've been thinking on it for a while now, but still haven't made it around to playing that party yet.

I have finally decided on an Improved Quayle PC that I'll be taking through with this setup. He won't have Quayle's innate Invisibility, but the better stats and normal Bhaalpowers more than make up for that. Here's the character I'm using:

Quayle (with appropriate portrait & soundset)
Gnomish Illusionist/Cleric
STR: 13 (14)
DEX: 18 (19)
CON: 8
INT: 19 (20)
WIS: 17 (20)
CHA: 16 (17)

I'm not sure who I'll give the CON tome to, but it sure wouldn't do Quayle any good. :rolleyes: Now, I intend to take a couple ... liberties with the story, so I'll be posting it in CS instead. (I'll link the thread once I've started it.) For example, I'll be putting Goo in a more accessible location in BG2 than where he usually appears, though with a reasonable explanation for his appearance.

:bigeyes: Please start this way cool party ASAP!

And also remember to keep us updated, Fel!

[ October 10, 2005, 02:35: Message edited by: olimikrig ]

W00T This looks really cool Fel! I mean Short people are like gems; real short and cool, except short people doesn't shine.

Well, I started into it, and here it is! (http://www.sorcerers.net/ubb/ultimatebb.php?/topic/12/540.html) A little wordy for just the first half-hour of gameplay, but it just started flowing and I couldn't stop. :D

I'm gonna have a look at it ASAP... I see you've chosen a more "story-like" style compared to my more, "journal-like"..

Felinoid, that's some truly awesome writing! I love the expressions you have for the "little people's" point of view. I've often felt dwarves, gnomes, and halflings (with the exception of kender) get, um, short shrift - pun unintentional, I just can't think of a better way to say it - in the D&D games, and in fantasy in general. Dwarves especially are often the ones to die most heroically/needlessly in lots of the stories I've read, and they do deserve better. Good on you for this venture, and please, please, please keep writing! :)

(PS: Do you write professionally? If not, you ought to.)

(PS: Do you write professionally? If not, you ought to.) :jawdrop: Oh, good glaven, no! I consistently got D's in English class (once I even got 60% exactly) and I can't write a word without inspiration. You're just lucky enough to be getting the good stuff; this game and this site have been a great inspiration to me. Thanks for the compliments, though, and double thanks for putting them where I asked. :thumb:

And don't worry, I'll keep writing as I play. I hope to have Chapter One done within 24 hours from the time of this post. Look for it then. :)

I like the turn of events when monty (you gotta love monty) stabs Xzar as he was weaving his arcane arcanity (err, or something :p ).

I for one is looking forward to the update, good start "Feel annoyed" :hahaerr:

D's in English class? Phooey. Iirc (and it's back in my murky past, so please bear with me), English class had a lot more to do with dissecting works of great literature and regurgitating whatever one's prof felt one should feel about said works. There was very little space for creative composition (or creativity in general, as far as that goes)... so I don't regard D's in English class as indicative of much of anything. :nono:

And I don't take D's in English as meaning much of a much, especially in light of what I read from you, Fel! I'm notoriously finicky in my reading preferences (Col McCullough, Robin Hobb, Diana Gabaldon, Jacqueline Carey, and J.K. Rowling are among my current faves), and very short on free time (having a busy toddler will do that to a body), so I don't often have a lot of patience with reading something that's not really up to snuff. :coffee2:

That said, I'm avidly awaiting the next installment of your story (and checking back as often as my son permits!). Type on, anthro tiger, type on! :book: :thumb:

(I just found the BIG list of smileys... can you tell? :D )

Updated just for you, Rhyll. ;) And you need not check back so often; I've only got four windows per week when I can add to the story from my laptop (which is where I'm writing it). This is my Tuesday night window, but I've also got Monday, Wednesday, and Friday afternoon windows. (In case it's not blatantly obvious, that's my school schedule. :D )

I had to restrain myself from mentioning every detail (i.e. Killing Joia for insulting me, getting the spiders out of Landrin's basement, giving the splint mail that I bought for myself to Kagain so he could tank, etc.), but I think I left the most important stuff in. Not quite done with chapter one yet (hence the "part one"), but I hope to be by tomorrow. :hmm: Now why does that sound familiar?

D's in English class? Phooey. Iirc (and it's back in my murky past, so please bear with me), English class had a lot more to do with dissecting works of great literature and regurgitating whatever one's prof felt one should feel about said works. There was very little space for creative composition (or creativity in general, as far as that goes)... so I don't regard D's in English class as indicative of much of anything. :aaa: Ach! You haf seen srouh mine decepsion! As Minsc would say, "Ooooh, you are a smart one. You are as smart as Boo sometimes!" :shake: I don't really regard English grades as very telling either, because the big problem I had was inspiration. I'd sit in front of that blank piece of paper for hours trying to get in the right mindset to write about whatever it was, and more often than not just couldn't do it. The ones I did write got me through most semesters, though, and for the ones where it didn't ... well, there was always summer school. :heh:

[ October 12, 2005, 01:41: Message edited by: Felinoid ]

Good one, Fel. Though I would rather like if you updated more seldom, but instead gave us all the juice details (I'm sure Kagain and monty can be quite "naughty"), but you can't keep Rhyll loosing any sleep over this, now can you :shake:

I agree with Rhyll that D's in English tells nothing about the writing skills of the writer, but rather the grammatical skills.
And I guess you found just the right inspiration in BG1 :)

/me is anticipating the upcoming part two with great expectations, and withheld breath! :thumb:

Well, I do allude to a number of things that someone playing BG would be familiar with. For example: the cloak was obviously stolen from Algernon, Silke's staff is +1 (making it a good 'blunt weapon' for my PC), and the axe I bought for Kagain was the +1 that Feldepost sells. And of course I found the RoW near FAI when I headed up there. Monty's been picking everybody's pocket, too. Bjornin's +1 shield and Mirianne's +1 RoP were given to Kagain as soon as he joined. :lol:

Monty's AC is still disturbingly high, though. Even with studded leather and the RoP +1 from the crossroads area, he was still hit three times (for 1HP each) by two of the merchants when I foolishly thought he could take them out by himself. That mistake cost me an extra 4 gold when I rested at Feldepost's, but there's no real harm done, and I figured it was poetic justice that a couple of his victims managed to land a blow. :D

But if you want some spoilers for part two:
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Too bad. :p I'm not going to give away the juicy parts before the rest. I may add things in here that didn't make it into the story, but only after I post the appropriate section of the story. So you'll just have to wait. :p
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I agree with Rhyll that D's in English tells nothing about the writing skills of the writer, but rather the grammatical skills. On the contrary, my grammatical skills were second to none! Including the teacher on occasion. :grin:

But, you cannot get a 'D' for writting unimaginative stories, essay's, whatever, if your teacher couldn't land his/her finger on any faults beside the content's being uninspireing :hmm:

Too bad. :p I'm not going to give away the juicy parts before the rest. I may add things in here that didn't make it into the story, but only after I post the appropriate section of the story. So you'll just have to wait. :p
Meh, you :geezer: :shake:

But, you cannot get a 'D' for writting unimaginative stories, essay's, whatever, if your teacher couldn't land his/her finger on any faults beside the content's being uninspireing :hmm: Depends on the teacher. :shake: But I certainly got a lot of zeros when I couldn't even get started on an assignment and had to tell the teacher that they wouldn't be receiving one. :(

I'm thoroughly enjoying Quayle's autobio. :thumb:

@kuemper & the rest:
Then enjoy it some more. :D I just edited Part Two into the Chapter One post.

Let's see
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I actually had no idea that saying you would throw your weapons down would cause the FF guy just south of Beregost to attack you. It's not my style, so I've never used it, but I figured that it fit non-violent Quayle. You wouldn't believe how surprised I was when he called me unworthy to drag in. :rolleyes: Needless to say, I took great delight in chopping up that pr*ck. :evil: With no rep loss, I decided to just let him stay dead and take his plate mail and helmet. I guess it was just one of those things that turns out well.

I also did Mirianne's quest and grabbed the Boots from those wimpy hobs in the middle of that map, but I didn't think they were worth mentioning. I think everything else is in the story.

EDIT:
Chapter Two is kind of short, but not much happened between entering Nashkel and confronting Mulahey. I left out stuff about Prism and that gnome who you rescue from kobolds, as well as my short trip back to Beregost to sell the books from Nashkel and buy the +1 sling I forgot to get before I left. And of course Kagain's got the Ankheg Plate from "Monty's" little hidey-hole. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with Varscona, though. Do you think I should sell it?

[ October 14, 2005, 20:32: Message edited by: Felinoid ]

Chapter Three is now, erm, fixed. I decided to wait until the beginning of Chapter Four to explore the coast. Now I was going to leave this until the end of my story, but the lack of comments in the last week has me a tiny bit nervous, so here's just a few notes:

I'd like to make sure everyone knows that the arrogance that is (hopefully) coming through in the way the story is told is solely my attempt to emulate Quayle's character. Most things were not quite as stated, but I don't think Quayle would admit to his shortcomings. You may also have noticed the (by now) numerous instances of the "I and..." and the "me and..." grammatical mistakes. I have deliberately included them because I believe that Quayle is not only self-absorbed enough to put himself first, and he's also the type to make little mistakes like that.

I'd also like to point out that even I don't like how Quayle is progressing, but soon enough he'll have Yeslick and Alora to bolster him morally and help him choose a more balanced path than the one he's following now. Kagain and Monty are being rather bad influences on him at the moment.

Don't worry, mate! I'm really getting into the story. I don't pester you for more updates cuz I know you have a life and school and stuff.

Sounds to me that Quayle is more than frustrated with the Talls and pretty annoyed at Monty spending Q's gold and Kagain for demanding to kill things. I like how you played out Drizzt in your first meeting.

As the son of an English teacher, I can tell you that grades in English have nothing to do with the ability to weave a good tale, and you have proven it once again. You made me want to put my unfinished BG2 game on hold and play through BG again. Thanks for the good read!

Chapter Four (a three-parter) is now finished. :banana: Sorry for the delay, but I've had relatives visiting off and on for the past week, and even had to miss school twice.


Dynaheir is such a *****. I go through all that trouble to rescue her, but just because I killed Edwin back in Nashkel I can't get the 800XP for saving her? What a rip.

Centeol and her sword-suckers were hard. I've played this solo with no problems and with a party with few problems, but this time they just cut straight through Kagain's armor. We probably would have been slaughtered without the Gauntlets of Dexterity.

And to add insult to injury, Chelak's body weighs almost 200 lbs.!!! Normally I just have my PC (always at least 18 STR) carry it, but this time I had to pass it along a chain of me, Monty, and Kagain to get it back to get it back to that ungrateful *******, Tiber. We were even attacked at a spider spawn spot (say that three times fast) on the way.

The cook dying turned out to be a blessing in surprise, since I had forgotten that you get two rep points for freeing the slaves and saved after giving Rill the money. (I want my :money: back!) But now I have to listen to Yeslick complain about dark horizons and keep from dreaming ( :rolleyes: not a problem) until I get another rep point.

And contrary to Quayle's omission, Kagain had to put Davaeorn down after the Scorcher. And then in Chapter Five, [spoilers omitted, sorry oli ;) ]


Ahhhh, I feel better now; don't you? :D Hopefully Part One of Chapter Five (there's probably going to be several parts) will be out on Monday. 'Til then!
:wave:

I had pointed my hammer at Kagain during this exchange, and Yeslick remarked on its beauty. I told him he could have it (I still had the trusty walking stick we had "liberated" from Silke), and he was shocked by my generosity;I chortled over this bit, recalling the hammer Quayle was talking about. :lol: Good stuff, very good.

I finished the latest installment. Duelling Quayles - :lol: :lol:

Part two is up now, and it looks like Chapter Five will be shorter than I thought: only a three-parter. I guess that's what happens when you leave out most of the "extra" stuff.

I'm glad you liked the duelling Quayles. :) It didn't seem right that my companions help me, so I actually had Quayle fight Quayle all on his own. All in all, I got lucky that the hold spell hit half-a-dozen of the Xvarts as well as the other Quayle; I only had to deal with two, one of whom I recruited to help deal with his friends.

I finally kill the last Xvart (except for the recruit), and suddenly both spells expire! The Hold falls and my Xvart 'buddy' disappears, and now we're right back to square one with me and the other Quayle one-on-one. The rest is in the story.

My first thought from the start with Tiax was to get him that Staff-Spear for more sensible backstabbing, but somehow he's taken the secondary tank position from Yeslick! :eek: The reason: he only has one weapon slot, and that's taken up by the Staff-Spear. Add the GoOP and some heavy armor to that, and he's just a melee-heavy cleric who can disarm traps.

Alora makes a great archer for now (esp. with the Eagle Bow from Marek), and I'm trying not to let her backstab too much because she ends up as a swashbuckler in BG2. Thanks to her great stats, she can do everything except disarm traps, and I've already got Tiax for that.

Monty's just a combat thief now, so he's taking a little damage every now and then if I can't distract the enemy he backstabbed. And Slick is being much more of a ranged combatant lately, protecting the back row when necessary as a third line of defense after Kagain and Tiax. I'm not even bothering with having Kagain throw axes anymore; now that he's got the Boots of Speed, he just rushes 'em.

Though they're not all mentioned, I've done (or will do) every quest in the city, including the Helm of Balduran and the +2 battle axe for Kagain, and the Helm of Glory for my charming self. :D Gonna have to make a trip back down to Beregost to pick up my Ankheg Armor and grab the Dagger of Venom for one of the halflings, but otherwise it's right on track.

Damn, Chapter 5 ended rather pathetically. :nolike: I was expecting that bunch at the top of the Iron Throne to put up more of a fight and make a good scene, but they started dropping like flies after my Animate Dead despite the Silence spell being wholly ineffective. :rolleyes: The only one who got any blows in was that cleric farthest to the right, who got a surprising number of hits on Tiax with his mace.

Chapters 6 & 7 should be one-parters and I've already got Intermission mostly written up to help fill in what happens in the gap between BG1 & BG2. More soon.

Quick Question for y'all; Chapter 7 is not quite complete, :aww: so should I:
</font> Wait until Friday to post the whole thing Just post what I have now and edit the rest in on Friday Post now, and on Friday do both edit on Chapter 7 and post IntermissionWhat do you think? :hmm:

NOTE: Unless I get some votes in the next three hours (while I'm still at school and can still post), I'll default to option A and wait until Friday.

I'd say wait and post on Friday.

Well, I did. :D Chapter Seven got a bit long, so I split it into two parts but posted both today anyway. Intermission is ready for Monday, and I'm already playing through Chateau Irenicus now, writing as I go. Thank Baervan I at least got to keep (most of) my cleric spells memorized when I imported.

:hmm: Maybe I should add that into the story...
/me goes off to write some more of Chapter One :book:

Part two is up (hope you liked the cliffhanger ;) ) and I promise to have the final part of Chapter One by Monday.

A few bits of info I couldn't quite find a way to work into the story:
1. Deception refers to a power I arbitrarily gave Quayle during the Intermission adventures for RP purposes (i.e. disguising Goo so as not to freak out the populace). It doesn't affect anything gameplay-wise except for explaining a couple items I imported:
Robe of the Neutral Archmagi for Quayle (only available in one store, which was then cut out of the game) Ring of Holiness for Quayle (not doing the temple district quests for Goo-related reasons)Also imported: Gauntlets of Dexterity for Goo (not doing the temple district quests; I figured Goo could have easily found his way down there in the past and gobbled them up for the magic) The Cloak of Balduran will be making an appearance in Chapter Two The Dagger of Venom will be making an appearance in Chapter Two One other whose mention would spoil a bit of the plot
2. Personal changes:
Imoen's personality change is the effect of her failing her version of the Hell Trials (within her own mind) sometime during her torture; she is now NE instead of NG. I've made up an entire different backstory and personality for Goo, so watch for it. :) More happened in the Intermission than Quayle knew, so watch for the flashbacks / history lessons too. :D
3. Bugs fixed; I won't have to kill off Goo. :banana:
The throwing dagger (and axe) bug is not due to Goo but actually an EoU problem, which will not affect any of the magical ones. I recently remembered having similar problems on previous run-throughs. The Goo attacking bug seems to be dispel-related. I finally noticed the odd coincidence between Goo having a Dispel magic cast on him and the game crashing a few seconds later. I don't know what causes it, but it's connected to his "mouth" weapon, so any time he gets dispelled I just switch to bare-fist briefly and for some reason the game doesn't crash. *shrug* Not exactly a bug, but still strange: Goo is not actually a floating eye-ball. :nolike: He uses the gauth animation, but his "mouth" turns him reddish or purplish or something. Very peculiar, and it's a little odd having a monster on my side rather than the wizard eye I expected. :mommy: Those of you who do not know what a gauth looks like can take a look at Isshy's avatar (just search the directory for Isshy).
Phew, that's enough for one update; unless anyone has questions or comments?

Bum bum bummmmmm!!! (I'm getting rather good at cliffhangers, aren't I? ;) ) BTW, is anyone still reading this? I'm kinda wonderin' if Rhyll or kuemp or anyone is still paying attention to my rambling. *sigh*

Chapter One is finished, and the alternate Quayle subplot comes to a close...or does it? (Bum bum bummmmm! :grin: ) There's still at least one piece to the puzzle that hasn't yet been revealed, but that one will be a while in coming. In the meantime, Quayle will have to occasionally deal with something his alter ego did earlier; I'll decide what on a case-by-case basis.

P.S. Me lonely. Need feedback. :(

I'm reading it. /me pats you on head Haven't caught up on things tonight because the modem went pud again. Bad modem; no cookie for you!

EDIT: Finally got finished with chapter 1. I can't believe you iced Aerie like that. I guess that means Averial elves are too tall for your party. :lol: Goo sounds promising. I wasn't too hepped up on him as a mod NPC, but so far he sounds strange yet amusing.

[ November 22, 2005, 00:44: Message edited by: kuemper ]

i'm reading your story, too, fel, but just as a lurker, didn't comment on it yet, but here it goes: it's awesome! keep up the good work, i'll be reading it all, no doubt, and i'll enjoy every single line. wanna know why? because i'd like to do something like that one day, but i won't have to, as you're already doing it :D

I too find it quite amusing. You sure do some nice cliffhangers :D

I just read part 2 of the chapter 1. Great way to handle Korgan into the fold. :thumb:

Thanks all for the kind words, and keep 'em comin'! Part Three is now up, and Part Four nearly finished for Wednesday.

EDIT: Finally got finished with chapter 1. I can't believe you iced Aerie like that. I guess that means Averial elves are too tall for your party. :lol: :lol: Oh yeah, Aerie was doomed from the beginning. Her association with Quayle would probably have been enough for a Tiax PC to kill her, and being associated with the 'fake' Quayle was plenty for mine. :evil: This has gotten me to thinking, though, about what I'm going to do to the other romance NPCs; expect much diabolicalness. :shake:

Goo sounds promising. I wasn't too hepped up on him as a mod NPC, but so far he sounds strange yet amusing. That's all me, baby. :cool: Everything Goo says and does is stuff I made up, including his animal rights activist 'tude.

Goo is actually more like Kagain was in BG1, but with even less talking. 17 STR, 12 DEX, 20 CON, 15 INT, 9 WIS, and 4 CHA. He's only got one banter (completely unvoiced) with Jan which I used to help craft some of his lines in Chapter One (all that Grrgl stuff), and his soundset is all growls and gurgles with the occasional deep-voiced "Goo hears your words." It's a little buggy with Alora too, sometimes he'll give me an unvoiced line from a Korgan-Alora banter when I tell him to do something. :shake:

The profs are also pretty buggy, giving him ** in daggers at fifth level (the only way he can be when you join) and then ending up with zero when you level up, forcing you to put the * you get at sixth level into dagger just to have him proficient with his mouth. I naturally SK'd his profs back in. :grin: The only really cool thing about him (aside from the stat-based regen being quite handy) is his mouth, which has some funky effects:

+2 dagger with an enchantment value of +5 (could hit kangaxx :D )
15% chance of an extra 1d4 damage of type A
15% chance of an extra 2d4 damage of type A & B
30% chance of an extra 3d4 damage of type A, B, & C, plus stun (save vs. BW at +1 for only 2d4 damage A&B with no stun)
15% chance of an extra 2d4 damage of type B & C plus stun (save vs. BW at +1 for only 1d4 damage of type B and no stun)
15% chance of an extra 1d4 damage of type C plus stun (save vs. BW at +1 for no damage or stun)
8% chance of normal damage
2% chance of (what I believe is) save vs. death or render unconscious

The downside is that he doesn't get specialization bonuses for any other daggers; I tried the DoV when I "received it from Alora", and I got bupkiss. :nolike: I sincerely doubt he has any interjections, either.

Great way to handle Korgan into the fold. I'm just sayin' what everyone's thinkin' m'dear. ;)

Everything Goo says and does is stuff I made up, including his animal rights activist 'tude.:( And Goo sounded so promising...

This means you're a better writer than you think, Fel.

Part Four is up and someone else gets iced. :evil: We also see a burgeoning...something between a couple of the characters (haven't really decided what yet), not to mention a little more of what happened while Quayle was away.

Let's see:
-All of the "import" items are now in except for the 'mystery' item
-Ribald's Ring of Regeneration will be sticking to Korgan like glue, simply because I can't imagine Kagain without regen.
-Though I couldn't find a way to put it in, I gave Kagain's old Helm of Balduran (found in ID) back to Korgan so he'll have both Balduran artifacts.
-I've had Jan since Part Three, but he only shows up in the story at the end of Part Five (nearly finished).
-Rayic was surprisingly easy because Korgan's Stonefire axe managed to disrupt his spells with its elemental damage. I also tried fighting the Spectral Harpists, but those things are f***in' hard at that point in the game, so I just wussed out and grabbed the necklace.

More on Friday guaranteed. :banana:
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@Beren: Don't worry, I'm sure the Harpers can just recall her; it's not like I removed any organs or poisoned her or anything.

Part Five is up and there's yet more icing on the cake. :evil: It's not easy going after the shadows and such first to prevent level drain (especially when shadow fiends can paralyze/hold you), but I've managed to get through so far without a single level drain or even resting since the beginning of the game. Korgan and Goo take all the damage, and their regen and potions take care of that.

I stopped off at WK before heading to Umar Hills (Korgan actually complained that we should be going straight there :whoa: ) and grabbed Quiver, Case, Crimson Dart (Goo can spit now :grin: ), and other goodies from the first level. Managed to sneak past the Vampiric Mists (the ones who always know where you are and can see through any illusion or even stealth&Non-Detection via script) by leaving Quayle near the entryway. Apparently "Player1" is what they're gunning for when they can't see you, so they must have just been butting their misty heads up against that big door the whole time we were in there. :lol:

You can pretty much guess what Part Six will be ( :spin: ), and I hope to get Mazzy in Part Seven if something else doesn't come up first. The Sling of Everard is next on my buying list, and hopefully I'll have enough money & Stuff O' Selling by the end of Part Six that I can buy it and head straight to Mazzy.

P.S. Chapter Two looks to be getting long, but I think it'll be done late next week. And in Chapter Three, Anomen better watch out. :evil: :mommy:

Anomen better watch outWha-what are you planning? :mommy: Make it gruesome or have him fail a save, like in the game. More please. :book:

Can't wait for the next episode :D

Hey Fel, I really liked the entire story. Especially the part about giving the belt of genderbender to the gnome. Is this possible in the game? It would surely be good for a laugh...

Especially the part about giving the belt of genderbender to the gnome. Is this possible in the game? :shake: No, but it was something I always wanted to do. There are so many people you wish you could humiliate like this, but it only fit really well with Landrin. Besides, it gave me a reason to kill her for the rep loss, because I was getting up there and didn't want to lose Kagain and Monty.

I managed to get Part Six up before I left school, but I didn't have any time to post until I got home. Valygar is dead now, and despite the way it sounds in the story, I just iced him and opened the Sphere with his body. I tried giving the body to Tolgerias and then pickpocketing it back off of him before he disappeared, but it didn't work because apparently the dialog script destroys the body rather than transfers it. I had to reload and just snub him. :nolike:

I discovered an ally in the Sphere as well when I accidentally lured Lavok back to where the Guardian Golem was and watched it pound on him. :lol: I was just going to wait in the room until his spell defenses dropped and go back to fight, but after Lavok followed me I couldn't help laughing as the golem beat the Stoneskin off of him while he just stood there.

It looks like Chapter Two is going to be an eight-parter, and Anomen's fate will be revealed in Part One of Chapter Three (next Monday if I can keep up the pace, next Wednesday if I have to skip an update). I've already played past that point, so now I'm writing to catch up and not playing much, substituting my BoM party if I really feel the need. Mazzy's not quite what I expected, but hopefully she'll grow on me.

Sorry about missing Wednesday, but my muse has been quiet of late. :nolike: Part Seven is up now, but I'm having a little trouble with resolving the conflict started at the end of it as I try to get started on Part Eight. :help:

Inside info for this part is pretty basic. We did all the sidequests in Umar Hills on our trip to pick up Valygar's body, and just headed straight for the Temple Ruins from Athkatla after the Sphere. Goo's spitting is the Crimson Dart (an RP brainstorm, if I do say so myself). Between the Sling of Everard, the Quiver of Plenty, the Case of Plenty, and the Crimson Dart, I've got four archers able to hit 'immune' creatures; and Korgan is of course attacking first and axe-ing ( :hahaerr: ) questions later, as my main tank.

W00t! Chapter Two is finally finis! :banana:

Well, kind of. I'm considering asking Ghreyfain's permission to include the Jan/Goo banter in Part Seven because it's just so damn funny, but I wouldn't know how to get ahold of him. :( Anybody know who he is?

On a brighter note, the group is now complete; everyone's knees will be mine! (Especially Anomen's... :evil: )

Ghreyfain hangs out at the Pocket Plane Group (http://www.pocketplane.net). Alternatively, his e-mail and suchlike should be somewhere in the Goo readme.

rotflmao

*applause*

I love it! Glad to see those 2 coming to grips with themselves. :lol:

Hehe. A life with Nalia is a fate worse than death. :evil: Part Two is up now, and it looks like they'll be in Athkatla a while longer. I'll be doing the bridge district quests before I take out Bodhi, and I may even head to Trademeet too if I need some time to expire for my stronghold quest.

BTW, the items I picked off of Lavok's body back in Quayle 2:2:6 (that looks almost biblical :hahaerr: ) were the Ring of Acuity and the items I'll get from the stronghold: Wand of the Apprenti, ADHW scroll, and the Ring of Wizardy. The RoW is my final import item, and will go toward making Jan a more powerful wizard along with the RoA; in the game, I'll just tell my apprentices not to do anything for the final task to get the experience. :D

But fear not, as I have not spoiled all of Chapter Three's plot for you; expect a number of surprises, including one old face coming back to make a reappearance. (I just love making this stuff up; I don't think I'd be having nearly as much fun with this run-through if I weren't changing it to suit my needs. :grin: )

You sure know how to make it a christmas suspense worth waiting for :D

Part three is up, and the time has come to reveal the name...but I don't wanna. :p Besides, I decided not to go to Trademeet just yet, and Part Four (which I will be back to post sometime around 1/17) would end up being pretty boring without a little holiday suspense. :D

I did the Planar Prison quest, and now Mazzy is kicking some serious a$$ dual-wielding with Kundane and 18/00 strength thanks to the GoOP (gotten elsewhere). I'm using her a little like a kensai with the Boots of Speed, and she's slicing everyone up with 5 attacks a round while Korgan (or sometimes Goo) takes the damage as the tank. :evil:

Oh, and I hope you like how I included all the bit players of the skinner quest. Faraji the urchin is dead, as is Rampah the beggar, and Rose is the woman crying. And of course I portrayed the moronic Aegisfield how he truly is. (I mean, how much of a leap is it to connect the two things? :rolleyes: )

Felinoid, you're despicable! :skeptic: :p

:( felinoid !!! I'm gonna go crazy having to wait till 1/17 for the next update :eek:
hmm , i was gonna say i would pull my hair out waitng that long but i dont have any ! :D
dang , 27 days and counting :bang:

Is IWD hogging up your writing time? I'm concerned about your cliffhanger, so post something *soon*! :)

Hehehe, I'm suprised you haven't just figured it out; I did leave a clue. ;) And IWD has been taking up a bit of my writing time, but part four has been ready for weeks, and I'll post it Monday when I should be back at school. I've already played completely through Chapter 4 as well, so I just need to catch up on the writing of it this weekend. I'll probably drop IWD soon anyway (for a little while) since the relative lack of plot is getting to me.

But anyway, expect it in three days. And interestingly enough, it comes with its own semi-cliffhanger, as you'll see on Monday. :grin:

Bad news. It seems the building will be closed for MLK day tomorrow ( :doh: How could I have forgotten that?!), so part four will have to wait until Wednesday. Only 60.5 hours to go! :hahaerr: :o To make up for it, here's some dirt on the Twisted Rune, which I did just before leaving Athkatla.

It was surprisingly easy. I got lucky with traps, and Jan managed to successfully set two in the entryway while Alora managed all three of hers. The lich never did a thing, and while it was dying from the long-term effects of five trap hits, the berserker guy was getting slaughtered by the rest of us. When noone else came, I considered myself lucky and edged out a bit. Mazzy managed to catch the beholder's many eyes, and soon it was a missile battle between the six of us and the beholder. I had to take a moment to heal everyone, and then I charged the vampire to the right. He went down pretty quickly, but someone must have gotten the wizardress's attention, because pretty soon we were in a Timestop.

But nothing happened. The interface just sat there frozen for about twenty seconds, and I was about to roll my cursor over a portrait to check when everything came back to life and we finished killing the vampire. Now I froze, expecting to hear some chanting or something, but all I heard was Korgan's usual complaint about drowning; it turns out we were out of range of the wizardress by the time she finished casting her spell. With her being the only one left, we rushed her too, and a little True Sight gave her away easily. We wrested the Staff of the Magi from her hands with little difficulty and returned from whence we came.

Alright. Part Two of Chapter Four is now up after being reconstructed (note to self: ALWAYS remember to save before turning off laptop :doh: ), and it looks like the Chapter will be a three-parter. I went pretty nuts with the alterations to this chapter, and with a more yet to go, I can only imagine what my twisted mind will come up with. :nuts: ;) Hopefully you'll like it, though.

So, was anybody surprised about the tanner incident? :grin:

Anyway, dirt. Hmm, well I did everything in Brynnlaw except kill Perth. Nothing terribly hard. The SotM is pretty awesome for clay golem whacking, since you can just whack him and then re-invis., but I don't do that...much. I really hate the tight quarters of dungeons when you've got a full party to deal with and an equally numerous enemy, but it does provide some interesting tactical challenges.
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Um, see you Monday? :rolling:

I was sort of let down that the cliffhanger ended with Neb. I felt I was watching the FR version of Dallas: 'Oh Quayle, you're still alive!'

'Yes Alora, it was only a dream.' :p

All I can say about the latest installment is - Tiax will rule all! :lol:

After accidentally adding Part Three at the end of Chapter Three instead of Chapter Four ( :doh: ), it's now in its proper place. And it seems I was mistaken about just about everything I said in my preivous post. :shake: Thanks to the enormous amount of character interaction that's developing in Spellhold, our entry alone comprises Part Three and it looks like the Chapter will now have five or more parts to it as I keep getting more ideas. (Dammit all! ;) ) I tried trimming it down on Monday, but it didn't work and I nearly missed the bus after losing track of time. So now it's Wednesday and you've got the part, completely made up from my own noggin since the game doesn't show you entering. Enjoy!

Keep it coming then - it's pure fun Fel!

Well, have some more fun then. :D Part Four is up and ready to be read. It looks like I might be able to keep it down to five parts, but with the dream and the Slayer change and everything, I'm not sure. Either way, I should have Chapter Four finished by the end of next week. Naturally, Saemon won't show up (not that Quayle would have trusted him anyway), so we'll head straight to the Underdark. I've already got a bit planned (not to mention played; I just couldn't hold out), and it should be rather...interesting. :grin:

Damn it! It's going to be a six-parter now! :mad: All this writing is fun (for once in my life ;) ), but I want to get back to my game. :grin:

Sorry for the delay on this episode, but I've got a couple other projects going for SP too right now, so my time is a little stretched. Add to that some arrangements I'm helping make at home, and the story doesn't write itself like it used to. ;) But never fear, I will persevere. (Hey, that rhymes! :roll: )

Dirt's pretty slim, but there is some for the dream sequence. Bhaal was pretty hard, but I managed just fine with a haste spell and running for my life while flinging bullets from Everard's Sling and casting a couple other spells. The demon was a cr*p shoot, and I decided to leave that part of the story up to the game. So I rushed past him and told him I'd sacrifice health, wondering if I'd make it into the keep in time or not. The game gave me a rather firm NOT as my haste spell wore off right at the wrong moment. :lol: So Quayle's CON is down to 7, making no change in the game at all (there's no loss of HP until 6), but I figure I may sneak a cough or two into the story until he gets his soul back.

Hopefully more on Friday, but if not then you'll have to wait until Monday. (Feel my amazing power over you...go on, touch it! :shake: )

Ho...ly...****. This story is getting out of control. Part Six is up now, and Seven should be coming fairly soon. :xx: Not that it's a bad thing, since the words are flowing pretty well, but still this chapter is getting pretty long.

Not much to tell dirt-wise, but there's a nice surprise for you all in this one. I don't even know how that thing with Alora worked its way in there! :eek: (Seriously, I don't; it just happened. :whoa: ) I swear this thing is taking on a life of its own, and even I can't help but wonder which way it'll go next. :shake:

I'm kinda debating having Korgan die temporarily (he can always be raised) and having Quayle blame the death on the time he "wasted", but I'm not sure about it. What do you think?

Damn. Part Seven got so long I split it up, meaning that there are Parts Seven and Eight for you to read now. But if I were you I'd leave Part Eight for Friday, since I don't think I'll be at school that day (I have to take mom to a pre-op appointment that morning).

Still no dirt since this is just basic Spellhold with a lot more character interaction, but a question by one of my readers came up about the last part of the story, so I'll share the answer here in case anyone else is confused. :)

Her grimace twisted into a cruel smile. "But you did do one thing right: you brought people with you who don't know a thing about our kind of magic. They're my ticket out of here; I hope you all enjoy your stay in this nightmare." The contrast of attitudes from how she'd been in the dream delayed understanding, and I didn't absorb the meaning of her words until it was too late. Imoen finished her spell before I could react, and she vanished. WTF? I don't get it? What the heck happened? She teleported away how? How are the other people in your party her "ticket out of here"? She switched places: Translocation. Presumably it's either a Bhaalpower or a spell unique within the game, like Stoneshape in the Underdark. My companions were outside the maze (not important enough for Irenicus to deal with), so she pulled four in to pull herself out. The ultimate selfish act, underscoring her new NE alignment. Anyway...Yay! :banana: Chapter Four is finally done! Now I can...wait, no I can't. I've already played up to entering Ust Natha, so I've still got more writing to do to catch up. Curse all those ideas I came up with! :mad: ;)

P.S. More feedback please. This thread's getting a little lonely. :(

I've been saving up, you see, but if you want more compliments, I'll give 'em to you. :D

Alora and Quayle. Interesting. She must be over Monty then, poor soul.

What is the staff Quayle talks about? SotM?

Excellent as usual. :thumb:

Ah, Part Two of Chapter Five is up and Part Three is progressing nicely for Friday. And of course, our cliffhanger for the day is: "Did Quayle and company have to kill Adalon?" :grin: Sorry for the wait, but there were some family things (mom's operation et al.) that took precedence over writing time. And, horror of horrors, I've still not written up to the point I've played yet! (More curses on ideas and the sort...) :xx: But that should be taken care of once I've got Part Three done, and I can finally start playing again.
Yay! :banana:

Alora and Quayle. Interesting. She must be over Monty then, poor soul. Not quite, but she's getting there. I'm not sure quite yet if it'll turn out to be a rebound for Alora or a full-fledged romance, and I probably won't know until Alora tells me herself. :nuts:
What is the staff Quayle talks about? SotM? Erm, yes and no. He is using the SotM in the game, but in the story it's actually the staff he liberated from Silke, imbued with the powers he could on the trip to Brynnlaw, giving it much of the SotM's powers. And, as you may have noticed, he called it Eklis. (Silke reversed. It sounded good, with both a hard sound and a sibilant one, and it's kind of appropriate IMO.) Something I've been kind of hinting at is that it is actually a sentient weapon, like Lilarcor but not so ridiculously stupid :p . I haven't quite decided yet on stats for the staff, which is probably a good thing as I may need to make them up as I go along for RP purposes. :D

Again sorry for the lack of postage, but RL's being a b**** lately. Part Three went up...about a couple weeks ago, so if you haven't looked at it, go do that.

Quick question for all of you: Do you want Quayle to have to fend off Phaere, or should she just overlook him since Mazzy AKA Veldrin is in charge? I'm leaning toward the latter mostly because I don't know how Quayle would catch her attention. (I do have a nastily suggestive way for Quayle to evade her clutches, but getting there is the problem.)

More RL and a big mess with my laptop going kaput, but it seems to be back on track now. Goo was royally screwed up, though, and there was nothing I could do. The install kept saying it was fine, but Goo would have no name, no Bio, no soundset, and even no visible lines in dialogue when I CLUAed in another one to see if he had a name. I was about to just go with a silent, unnamed Goo and curse Ghreyfain for his crappy mod when I thought of a real last-ditch thing I could do. I overwrote the dialog.tlk file with the one from my old drive. :eek:

It seems to have worked and I can't find anything it might have screwed up, so I'm hopefully optimistic that I haven't just ruined my game to the point where I'd have to re-install everything from scratch. And all for Goo. :shake: (I did keep the 'clean' dialog.tlk in another folder just in case that might work to reverse it, though.)

Not much progress on the story, I'm afraid, what with the kaputness and all, and my 'quick question' from the previous post still stands unanswered. What say you?

Slower going than usual, but part four is up now. And I'm beginning to wonder if anyone is still reading this OoC because still noone has answered my question about Quayle and Phaere. I'll repeat it again so you won't have to tire yourself by searching for it at the very bottom of the last page. :p
Quick question for all of you: Do you want Quayle to have to fend off Phaere, or should she just overlook him since Mazzy AKA Veldrin is in charge? I'm leaning toward the latter mostly because I don't know how Quayle would catch her attention. (I do have a nastily suggestive way for Quayle to evade her clutches, but getting there is the problem.)

im reading it, i've just never made it through spellhold in my own game

@Gastong:
Then I daresay you ought to stop reading it for a while. The story is chock full of spoilers, and I wouldn't want to ruin the game for you. :bad:

oh, i already know the whole story, perhaps that's why i can't stick to a game.