Temple of Elemental Evil is my (our) party Epic or Epic Fail?

Discussion in 'The Temple of Elemental Evil' started by Failedlegend, Feb 13, 2013.

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  1. shapecharge

    shapecharge Established Member

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    yep its just an excell spread sheet and open office or MS office should work fine.

    Good luck with your group game don't get into any "I want to control the mouse" arguments!!

    let us know how it goes..and if this is your first play through of TOEE or at least first with NC or since the COE fixes I think you and your group are in for a real treat.
     
  2. Failedlegend

    Failedlegend Member

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    Thanks for all the help...it is our first playthrough but I figured MOAR CONTENT!!! is never a bad thing as for mouse control its my PC...no one touches my PC (partly because I'm paranoid and partly because my PC should have stopped working years ago and shuts down if certain conditions are not met :p) so I'm controlling the mouse but whats said in convo's etc. is a group decision and each player just says...I want to charge that guy or use fireball on those goblins...that kind of thing....that said here's what I'm starting the game with...anything past Lvl 10 we'll just make up as we go along



    1 Lawful Good Male Human Fighter - Gabriel Fireheart
    | -Weapon: Ranseur
    |
    | -Feats:
    | -Fighter 1: Power Attack/[Cleave]/Toughness
    | -Fighter 2: [Combat Expertise]
    | -Fighter 3: Weapon Focus (Ranseur)
    | -Fighter 4: [Weapon Specialization (Ranseur)]
    | -Fighter 6: Mobility/[Dodge]
    | -Fighter 8: [Improved Critical (Ranseur)]
    | -Fighter 9: Spring Attack
    | -Fighter 10: [Whirlwind Attack]


    2 Chaotic Good Male Half-Orc Barbarian - Baer
    | -Weapon: Spiked Chain
    |
    | -Feats:
    | -Barbarian 1: Spiked Chain Prof
    | -Barbarian 3: Power Attack
    | -Barbarian 6: Cleave
    | -Barbarian 9: Great Cleave


    3 Lawful Good Female Half-Elf Cleric - Keirla Tamsol
    | -Weapon: Heavy Mace+Shield
    |
    | -Feats:
    | -Cleric 1: Scribe Scroll/[Domain: Sun/Good]
    | -Cleric 3: Brew Potion
    | -Cleric 6: Craft Magic Arms and Armor
    | -Cleric 9: Craft Wondrous Item


    4 Lawful Good Male Dwarf Monk - Troi Lightfoot
    | -Weapon: Fists
    |
    | -Feats:
    | -Monk 1: [Stunning Fist]/Dodge
    | -Monk 2: [Combat Reflexes]
    | -Monk 3: Improved Initiative
    | -Monk 6: [Improved Trip]/Mobility
    | -Monk 9: Spring Attack


    5 Chaotic Good Male Human Rogue/Bard - Santhist (Lvl Order R,B,R,B,etc.)
    | -Weapon: Dual Bastard Swords
    |
    | -Feats:
    | -1: B-Sword Prof/TWF
    | -3: Power Attack
    | -6: Cleave
    | -9: Great Cleave


    6 Neutral Good Female Human Druid - Sylvanna Oakheart
    | -Weapon: Q-Staff or Sling
    |
    | -Feats:
    | -Druid 1: SF: Conj/Augment Summoning
    | -Druid 3: Natural Spell
    | -Druid 6: Craft W-Item
    | -Druid 9: Craft A/A


    7 Chaotic Good Male Gnome Wizard - Garr Magehammer
    | -Weapon: Light Crossbow
    |
    | -Feats:
    | -Wizard 1: Spell Penetration
    | -Wizard 3: Empower Spell
    | -Wizard 5: [Craft Magic Arms and Armor]
    | -Wizard 6: Craft Wondrous Item
    | -Wizard 9: Craft Wand
    | -Wizard 10: [Craft Rod]


    8 Neutral Good Female Elven Sorc - Mel Stormshroud
    | -Weapon: Longbow
    |
    | -Feats:
    | -Sorceress 1: Spell Penetration
    | -Sorceress 3: Spell Focus (Evocation)
    | -Sorceress 6: Greater Spell Penetration
    | -Sorceress 9: Greater Spell Focus (Evocation)
     
    Last edited: Feb 13, 2013
  3. Daryk

    Daryk Veteran Member

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    Sorry for dropping out last night... I had to sleep so I could be up now. I just noticed your polearm fighter doesn't have Great Cleave. You may want to pick that up. Given the fights in TOEE, I think it's more useful than Whirlwind Attack (and has far less onerous requirements).
     
  4. Number99

    Number99 kicking Iuz

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    I agree on the great cleave feat. You can't miss that with a fighter.
    With a party of 8 I ussually reach level 18 - 19 but I skip some of the side quests sometimes.
     
  5. Failedlegend

    Failedlegend Member

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    The player is set on getting whirlwind so GC will be taken right after WW since apparently were get far more levels than we thought (the player is set on getting whirlwind)
     
  6. zugschef

    zugschef Established Member

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    *** warning: if (for some strange reason) you feel offended by character optimization, don't read this. ***

    my advice

    * rogue/bard: you can totally ignore traps in toee. and as for locks and appraise, just let your human wizard with a raven familiar do it (you gave him 18 int, didn't you?). your druid (or cleric) can do the talking. as a bard you will feel so bad when you see what cleric, druid and wizard are doing at the same level (and this build loses even more spellcasting levels due to multi-classing); the buffs you are providing as a core bard are negligible at best anyway.

    * singleclass barbarian: the only relevant class feature is rage. you get this at level 1. thus, just make it a 1 level dip. look below for details.

    * singleclass fighter: why would you ever take more than four levels of fighter?
    instead do the following human barbarian1/fighter2/clericX -- until the cleric levels let you cast divine power you won't have noticed the 2 missing points of bab. this dude gets 9th level spells, two extra feats for melee and can enter a rage to lay the smackdown if necessary. the order you take the levels in is pretty flexible. barbarian at level 1 makes sense because he gets 4 instead of 2 skillpoints. spellcasting trumps everything of course, so you might want to level your cleric first before taking the fighter levels. on the flipside a barbarian1/fighter2 pretty much owns combat at his level.

    * singleclass monk: the single worst class of them all (*) and you use a small race, which means that your monk will deal a diestep less damage with his fists and won't be able to trip any creature larger than medium. drop the monk entirely and roll a druid instead. at level 18 you can take a single level of monk to increase your ac.

    * singleclass sorcerer: don't use the sorcerer class. it will make you cry looking at the wizard. play a conjurer, enchanter or transmuter. you have only one slot less, don't suffer delayed spellcasting, profit from int synergy (skillmonkey wizards) and have a vastly larger pool of spells despite sacrificing two schools.

    * half-elf race: don't ever use that race. it's just plain terrible.

    * halfling and gnome race: never use these races for melee (unless you want to enter melee shapeshifted).

    (*) why monk is the worst core class: flurry of blows really blows. you suffer a -2 penalty when using it and have only medium bab, which means that you either miss or do puny damage. as if that wasn't enough your high movement rate is pointless, too. since fob requires a full attack, you can't cash in on your mobility, and you are too squishy (d8 hd only and dependent on strength, dex and wis, which leaves only so much for con) to risk outrunning your party and engaging in battle without help. spring attack doesn't help. it's a trap. it only lets you attack once which rules out fob. nobody needs a character who doesn't do bonus damage (sneak attack) to run into and out of melee every round, because you don't do damage and you don't block/tank/engage enemies either. best thing you can do is trip an enemy and rob the barbarians, fighters, melee clerics and druids of their chance to trip, get a bonus attack and do real damage.
     
    Last edited: Feb 13, 2013
  7. J'allan UlDragos

    J'allan UlDragos Dragon Warrior

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    Bards make excellent conjurors/summoners if you take the requisite spells. also, I usually make my bards dip into the barbarian class for better fighting capabilities. Another good class to mix with bard (or rogue) in my experience is ranger - you get to choose either dual wield or bow specialist at 2nd level. 4th level gets your bard an animal companion.

    i play alot of bards. :) it's pretty much guaranteed ANY party i roll has a bard in it.

    Your group playing sessions sounds like an interesting way to approach this game in a fresh way! Do any of you watch "the Guild"?? lol

    One word of caution, and a minor general spoiler - if you play with a full party of Player generated characters, you will run into issues in some quests in the Temple, when you need to escort various characters imprisoned there back to town. you may want to leave one slot open for this, if possible... as rescued characters take a party or NPC slot.

    Good Luck!
     
  8. zugschef

    zugschef Established Member

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    excellent? human druid1 with augment summoning is an excellent summoner. bardX isn't. bards aren't even acceptable summoners because their spellcasting is behind so much that at the point they get summon monster X your cleric buddy is casting summon monster X+2.

    as for the ranger, this class is hosed in toee anyway. archery suffers from cover and 2wf is only viable if you deal bonus damage (sneak attack), otherwise you should just wield a 2-handed reach weapon. on top of that, the implemented ranger spells are either heavily dependent on caster level, pointless (in toee) or just plain terrible.
     
  9. J'allan UlDragos

    J'allan UlDragos Dragon Warrior

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    Well, my bard usually takes the Augment Conjuration and i think its Augment Summoned Creature (i forget the exact name of the feat) but they enhance the power of the summoned creatures. I usually make a fighting bard that has levels 12 bard/ 8 barbarian, with some variation. He's modeled on the concept of a Skald, or warrior bard. He has always been a more than competent party leader, wielding Iolo's Joy from the rear, or raging with the Silver Sword of Chaos from the frontlines, or with a 'sword and board' loadout... The spell list for bard is not amazing, i'll admit - but its got well rounded spells that serve to enhance the bards main objective - to make the entire party function better as a whole. we'll just have to agree to disagree on the quality of a bard. i won't leave Hommlett w/o one! it's my favorite character class. I guess i'm biased.

    end of rant. :)

    Yeah Druids are a good class. Like Cleric, they have very good natural spellcasting ability, and have more than decent character abilities. i often create a character that is a Half Orc Druid 17/ Barbarian 3 and he is a great raging beast in the frontline with obvious rear spellcasting support capability.

    the purpose of this game is to have fun, and play the characters you enjoy. but thanks for the optimization suggestions. I think we all have our own individual theories about what is the optimal character build(s) in this game. To each their own, i say.
     
  10. Daryk

    Daryk Veteran Member

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    Only if you let it. I generally only have one melee character, and he uses a reach weapon. Plus, he's usually the first one to get an invisibility item, and thus starts the battle on the other side of all the archery targets. From there, it's just a matter of shooting the guys in front first because corpses don't provide cover.
     
  11. Shiningted

    Shiningted I want my goat back Administrator

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    I took this as a reference to the lack of Improved Precise Shot. Not much we can do about it, alas.
     
  12. XGP

    XGP Member

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    I dont have any party advise for you, but this sounds like a ton of fun. I think you'll find ToEE will work perfectly with your group. There are so many more tactical options than the earlier infinity games.

    Lets us know how it goes!
     
  13. Hugh Manetee

    Hugh Manetee Established Member

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    I've been watching a lot of 1970's kung fu movies recently so I decided to go with a party of 4 monks.
    A class I never used much before.

    I haven't the slightest idea how to upgrade them, and you don't seem to be able to multi class them.

    But they hammer the undead.
    4 monks and Zaxis wiped out the moat house at level 3.

    Plus they have great animation.

    They took everyone out before Lareth was called out.
    A monk opened his door, Lareth says "you have earned my wrath."
    Monk pops him on the chin with a stunning fist and the beat down commences.

    So I would say "monks more fun than a barrel of monkeys."
     
  14. nyarlathotep

    nyarlathotep Merry Murder Maniac

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    My advice is to NOT take the "create rod" feat, and go for something else. Rods are pricey to make - both in gold & xp - plus there isn't a lot of choice, plus you need to have access to the right spells plus you need the right alignment. And to be honest, rods are just plain useless - taking this feat is like throwing away a precious feat. Even "create potion" would be better...

    And don't listen to what has been said about a singleclass sorceror. If carefully made, they can be almost called a gamebreaker. BUT you need at least 1 metamagic feat (so rather to take a human as an elf for that freebee feat) Either go for Empower or Heighten - the first will give you more bang for your buck, the second will make the dc's harder. Also, each metamagic feat potentially can double the sorcerors spellbook.
    Also, you do not need Spell penetration from the beginning, as those pesky magic resistant enemies do not appear early on. Your sorceror will be better of with her Spell focus (evo) -and if you choose Heighten spell, it will make dodging those magic missiles quite difficult as those 2 do stack.

    Why on the other hand the bard/rogue wants to dual-wield bastard swords is a mystery to me... He'll get major negatives on his attack bonus, ofsetting the efficiency this character potentially has. It would be wiser to put a dagger, light mace or a shortsword in his off-hand. And the path to Great cleave seems like an odd choice too... Since he will probably have a high dex score, I would rather go for Dodge/weapon finesse/ weapon focus.
     
    Last edited: Feb 17, 2013
  15. Shiningted

    Shiningted I want my goat back Administrator

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    There's a lot to be said for Great Cleavage...
     
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