"We found his Spoiler phylactery with a reasonable searching effort (there are actually not so many places that are somewhat hidden, yet accessible)." Ah, so it is possible to find the Spoiler you-know-what . I had a brief look and couldn't find it (my initial reaction to the threat of a lone baddie coming back to life to attack my party of 20th level spellcasters tends towards "splendid, XP farm ahead" rather than fear, so I didn't look very hard..).
***SPOILER ALERT*** After picking up Captain Asaph's quest to look out for the missing Ranger around the Kron Hills and finding her in the general area and accepting her order. I headed back to Verbobonc to gather my resources. I created a teleportation portal to Hickory Branch for Nighttime use, from the Castle of the Lords' Tower Portal Room. Now, the question I have is, when the party uses the teleportation portal, it transports the party immediately to the spot adjacent to the major combined mass force of bugbears, giants, gnolls, ogres & orc archers & spellcasters, is that the only spot it will teleport the party to or are there other random Hickory Branch locations? Why? I was expecting the party to be teleported outside Hickory Branch along the road leading up the Hill Giant Sergeant.
I got attacked by the invisible phantom on exiting Humungus's cave. I had a true seeing active and cast an invisibility purge but did not reveal anything. It only hit me once or twice then stopped.
I finally made it to Hickory branch in my 7.9 play through, and just finished scouting the map invisibly. Wow! Gaear, you really outdid yourself this time! I'm actually looking at all those troops and wondering if 18th level is high enough to take them all on. Bravo!
One thing that I meant to comment on. If you clear out Hungous and then use the world map once you have exited, you never see the lich bit of HC, which is a bit of a shame. Any way to make that more obvious?
I have walked around the map with true seeing and searched everywhere to find the box/phylactery. Do i have to see it myself or will my characters find it?
Are you absolutely sure about this? Highlight the text below to see what I experienced, possible spoiler ... Spoiler I cleared everyone but the Lich, (he was not there) and went back to report in at Verbobonc and was told someone was left. I went back and the only one there was the Lich and his gaurds.
In my last playthrough I had to see it myself. It is quite small but not as hard to see as the swamp lotus or the "child toy" at Imeryds Run. I used the walkthrough to see the possible places and it still took me 10-15 minutes to find it
Possibly you're right. I did it in 8.00 and I had the other bug where I had dual reps - one saying I had killed all 8 comanders, and the other saying I had killed only 1, so none of that dialogue was working for me properly - thus I did not go back.
From some of the posts in this thread the new hickory branch stuff seems awesome! I'm having a problem accessing it though. My party members are all lvl 14 and I don't want to level any more before I get to do it. So far, I've completed the white dragon and the slavers quests. Is there anything more I need to do to access the new HB?
Hickory Branch becomes accessible after you have completed the 'Season of the Witch' quest (i.e. the Moathouse Respawn). Read (use) Captain Asaph's note that you receive by checking the noticeboard at the Verbobonc sign post. Then while travelling on the world map, you will eventually get a random encounter with a Ranger who (upon talking to her) will add the location of Hickory Branch to your world map.