Solo Charrie Run?

First off...

Helloooo, Co8! It's good to be here. I'd like to thank you guys for turning a good game into an epic game. The bugs in ToEE were downright unbearable. :chainsaw:

I've managed to beat it once or twice with just the official patches, and now that I'm switching to Co8 mod, and need to start over, I was thinking of throwing down some self-imposed challenges. elvicthr The most obvious was to do it with less characters. I already have an inbred hatred for most of the NPCs who always end up taking the best stuff, so an NPCless run wouldn't be much of a challenge.

Purely for shits and giggles, then, I though about trying to beat the game using only a single character. I tried this before with a Paladin, but he always ended up getting eaten alive by the giant frogs in front of the moathouse. Now I'm thinking of trying again.

I was thinking maybe a monk or a bard, but now I'm not sure. Has anyone else done a one-character run, and have pointers for the easier class(es) to do this with?

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How-To Rout Zuggtmoy with One Character
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This is a guide on how to make a single-character run on Troika's Temple of Elemental Evil, with the Circle of Eight (www.co8.org) modpatch installed. As a clarification, this means only one PC and minimal-to-no NPCs (for example, while liberal use of the Summon Monster Spells is fine, as is joining up with Prince Thrommel to escort him out of the Temple (in order to get Scather) is fine, using him in combat while you do so kind of defeats the purpose of the run.) I will be mentioning some fairly advanced concepts without explaining them beyond what an experience D&D/ToEE player wouldn't already know, though I'm not sure why someone who has never beaten the game before would want such a humongous handicap on their first try...

Before We Begin
Before we load up the game, you're going to have to make some choices. The first, and most obvious, is the class of the character you are playing. The specifics will be explained later, but currently, only Cleric/Rogue and Bard/Rogue are covered.

Next, is how often you will be saving. This may seem like a trivial decision, but you will find it becoming extremely important, assuming you stick to it, (a completely optional affair).

Diary Saving
Represents saves as writing in a journal or something similar by only saving immediately after a successful rest. If you're making a log, or playing an RP-heavy game, this can be useful, but it can be rather difficult to save when your low resource character is being besieged by midnight encounters and goblin raiding parties as you attempt to get a rest in.

Take-a-breather Saving
No saving in combat. This is a middle-of-the-road choice, between the obscenity-spouting frustration that comes from Diary Saving, and the utter lack of challenge or sense of achievement that goes hand-in-hand with savescumming. This is my preferred method, especially for the more difficult runs such as this.

Savescumming
Essentially cheating, this is saving and reloading every few rounds, especially during difficult combat. This essentially removes any challenge from the game, and I refuse to acknowledge any run that succeeds by doing this. (If you need any more motivation, constant saving in the middle of combat can and will eventually cause a hang-up that will require you to start over again.)

Starting
Start up the Temple of Elemental Evil Front-End (from here-on referred to as the ToEEFE).

Turn on Clean Game Cache At Startup. There is no downside to this, your saves are in no danger from it, and it can help clean up some minor bugs. Also, turn the Max Level up to 20. Trust me when I say that it is rather near impossible to get anywhere in the temple with a single Level 10 character.

I suggest running in window mode, both so you can reference this guide, and to avert many graphical glitches, but if your computer can't handle it (to which I say GET A NEW COMPUTER) then there's no harm done.

The rest of the options are mostly there for boosts in case you need a bit more help (or you just want the pure unfiltered awesome of dual-wielding Fragrath AND Scather). Or use No Sound if you're going to be listening to music while you play, or whatever.

Save your setting, make sure you've got Co8-5.0.x selected, and Launch The Temple Of Elemental Evil

Character Creation
After you've watched or skipped the opening cutscene, start a new game on Normal Difficulty. Your party alignment will be Neutral Good . Why? It's a fairly simple Vignette which gives a modest amount of early XP, which is much more important at the start than in the late-game.

Once you start making the character itself, that's when the differences between Cleric and Bard become apparent. With stats, roll until you get 2 18s, with nothing below 12 if you can help it, or use the Point-Buy bug to give yourself such stats.

Bard: All of your stats need to be fairly high, though Charisma and Dexterity are the most important, for spellcasting and AC, respectively. If you must select a dump stat, it should probably be Wisdom. Strength and Constitution are useful for the inevitable melee fights, and Intelligence will give you your much-needed skill points, though it's probably unnecessary to have it any higher than about 14.

Cleric: Strength, Constitution and Wisdom. The first 18 should go into Wis, with the other in either Strength or Constitution, depending on if you want an offensive or defensive fighter, though both should be at LEAST 16. Intelligence, Dexterity, and Charisma are all about equally important, with Dexterity taking a backseat in lategame once you get a hold of some Fullplate. Intelligence will probably be fine at 12, and Charisma is OK at 14, as it'll only really be used for Turn Undead checks.

Your race for either class will most likely be human. While other classes offer some unique possibilities (Elves' Dex bonus and longsword proficiency for bards, Dwarves' bonus against poison, and indifference to heavy loads for clerics), they also come with stat penalties, stats which all need to be high if you want to survive, and in my opinion, none of the abilities quite match up to getting an extra feat.

Your gender is wholly your choice, the only difference being the inability to recruit a few NPCs if you're female, but that's not really an issue here, so the choice is irrelevant. Height and hair are also purely cosmetic choices with no effect on gameplay, rather than matching your portrait. (While both hair and height can be changed at any time during character creation, changing your gender will make you re-do every part of creation after it, so be sure you want to change before you do.)

Your class will be either Bard or Cleric. Each has a specific set of strength and weaknesses that will at times drastically affect how you play.

Bard: The bard is much more useful out-of-combat, getting all five "discussion" skills on their class list, as well as several others. It gets less healing spells, and can use them less often, but the bard's magic is more about hampering your opponent than helping yourself anyways. This class is better for intelligent players who prefer guile over Hulk Smash brutality, though you will rarely-if-ever get to use one of your main class features (Bardic Music).

Cleric: Much better in direct combat than the bard, as a cleric can wear heavy armor and heavy shields without penalty.You will get more healing spells, and better self-buffs, though your personal skills will lack at least until 3rd level. Turn Undead is monumentally useful throughout the entire game, and will save you a lot of trouble.

Since both classes will eventually be multi-classing in Rogue, starting out as one is a perfectly viable option, with almost no drawbacks, and you will get more skill points in the begining. This is in fact advisable for characters with low Int.

Your alignment WILL be Chaotic Good. Why? One word. Scather.

Deity for a bard is rather irrelevant, though a Cleric should pick Pelor, with the Healing Domain, as well as either Good or Sun. If you really, really, really hate undead, pick Sun, but for the most part, Good is a better choice, as it will give you Holy Smite, a prerequisite for crafting Holy weapons.

Feats are slightly more open than most of the character creation, though I highly suggest Combat Casting for both, Rapid Reload for bards, and either Improved Turning or Extra Turning for clerics. Other viable options include Toughness if you feel you don't have enough hit points, (though a measly 3 HP will become less and less useful as the game goes one), Combat Expertise if you prefer safety over sure hits, or Scribe Scroll if you like having a variety of spells on hand.

Your choice in skills is important, especially in early game. Concentration is a must, with Spellcraft close behind. Your conversational skills are somewhere between "extremely useful" and "essential", so don't skimp on the class-skills for that.

Bard: Get up your sneak skills, so more Rogue points can be invested in Disable Device and Open Lock. Search is a fine option, too, as are your personal skills, but leave Gather Information and Intimidate alone, they're basically useless. If you have any points left, Listen is very useful if you plan on sleeping in unsafe places, and Sleight of Hand can be rather helpful in certain situations. Tumble is decent for avoiding AoOs, though that really shouldn't come up much if you're careful. Perform doesn't really matter, though if you have the skill points, go ahead and put them in. Use Magic Device is optional, and more of a rogue skill, but, again, viable.

Cleric: Do not put points into Heal. It's a waste of points for a solo character. Diplomacy's necesarry for the Zealotry quest if you don't have ranks in Bluff or Intimidate, and Listen is just as useful for a Cleric as a Bard. Your remaining skill points are kind of up to you, though helping your Sneak or DD/OL skills is advisable.

Spells for a bard, I suggest Daze, Resistance, Open/Close, and Detect Magic, taking Read Magic when you hit level 2. You'll have all 6 by level 3, however, so there's not much difference.

Portrait, Voice, and Name are entirely up to you. I suggest you pick ones you like, as you're going to be experiencing them for the entirety of your game.

Equipment
Bard: Studded Leather or Chainshirt, your choice, though the game seems to think that a chainshirt is medium armor, and may hit you with the Spell Failure chance, though that may have just been a glitch on my end. You may pick up a crossbow and bolts, as well as a light shield, but these are unnecessary for now, the shield actually becoming a hinderance if you forget to remove it before casting or sneaking, or put it back on after.

Cleric: Your biggest imperative here is armor. Get either Scale Mail or a Breastplate depending on your Dex, and a Heavy Shield, Steel or Wooden. A Heavy Mace should be your weapon of choice. You'll get plenty of crossbows from the bandits, though buying the extra 200 bolts can help with the eventual ammo issues.

Cosmetics (hat, shoes, gloves, cape) will be handled in the moathouse, but if you really like the look of something, go ahead ang get it. Just be sure you have at least 50 gold when you're done, preferrably more.

Clerics, prepare your spells, though only your Domain spell should be Cure Light, the rest can be turned into it spontaneously. (I suggest Shield of Faith, Divine Favor, and either Entropic Shield or Protection from Evil.

Now, save (make sure to use a filename you can easily distinguish from the rest of your games), and tell the Jade Empress you're ready for an adventure. Let's begin!

The First Visit To Hommlett
You should know the drill for the beginning, head Northeast, beat the crap out of the bandit (it should only take a couple of attacks, but don't be afraid to heal if you need to), and head to Hommlet. If you haven't used the Co8 mods before, ask Kent (the village boy) about specific information to find out what's changed. Otherwise, head north to the Welcome Wench, dealing with Elmo however you see fit. Once inside, talk to Ostler Gundigoot, the innkeeper (the man to the west, behind the counter) and choose the first conversation choice every time to accept the quest, then head northwest and talk to Furnok (The lone guy holding a sword). Gamble with him. Every time you lose, (which, despite the innkeeper's complaints, seems to only happen about 50% of the time) you have a chance to notice that the cards are nicked or the dice are loaded. Call him on it, then go back to Ostler, tell him you caught Furnok cheating, and get your 420 XP and free-for-forever room. You'll be needing it later, especially for item creation.

Head out of the inn, make sure you have at least 20 gold left (12 if you have a good Bluff), and fast-travel to North Hommlet, heading East into the church. Talk to Calmert, the guy almost directly west of you. Tell him you need to see the Canon and he'll ask rather up-frontly for a "donation". Give him his 10 gold, (You can try to Intimidate him into telling you for free, but I don't know if this works, as I've never done it.) and head upstairs by the stairs to the Northwest. Once on the second floor, head southeast until you see a cleric. (He should have a purple ring around him from one of his spells) Break the news to Terjon however you please. Ask where the bandits are coming from, but don't travel to the moathouse just yet. From there, choose conversation options 1, 2, 1, 1, 1 and 3 (Asking about Religion, then the temple, then accepting his request to find an amulet before ending the conversation). Head back downstairs, and talk to Calmert again. Ask him about Saint Cuthbert, then retribution, and accept his request to go collect dues from a new convert.

Leave the church again, and head south down the main road, turning west on the second fork (the one after Black Jay's house). Follow this path south past the big tree, and go inside the large, two-doored building with a pair of smoking chimneys. Cavanaugh is to the west, hiding in the shadows between the brewing containers and the barrels. Tell him you're there on Calmert's behalf. If you made your Intimidate check, you can strongarm him into getting the money himself (which will cause him, for one reason or another, to end up jobless with one eye), but if you failed the check, or you don't want to, tell him it's not good news, and agree to work something out with Calmert. Head back to the Church, and talk to Calmert. If you made your Bluff check, you can give him two of your own gold, saying it's Cavanaughs, otherwise, you'll have to use Diplomacy and fork over (pardon, "donate") another 10 gold to the greedy hack. If you Intimidated him, just tell him the dues will be paid. No matter how you finish it, this quest should give you enough experience to level.

Take another level in whatever class you've chosen (or your first level in it, if you started as a Rogue) and bring up your skills, using the same general rules as before. Bards, take Cure Light Wounds and Sleep as your chosen spells, as they are both monumentally useful at this point. Clerics, Read Magic and Entropic Shield. Once that's done, leave the church, and fast-travel to South Hommlet to end up in front of the Welcome Wench. Head east-northeast until you come across a man (Brother Smyth) at an anvil. Introduce yourself, and ask if he's a monk or a cleric. He'll tell you he's of the Old Faith (a rival religion to that of St. Cuthberg) and that he can cast Cure Light Wounds. End the conversation, talk to him again, and ask about masterwork items. He'll ask for a giant's head, a daunting task. Agree (don't worry, you won't be doing it for a few levels), and head (no pun intended) back to the Welcome Wench to rest and save.

OutsidThe Moathouse
Open up your World Map, and fast-travel to the moathouse. If you come across a random encounter, try to fight, but you probably can't handle it at your level, so feel free to reload, and try again. Once you arrive at the moathouse unscathed, save again. (Unless you're doing diary saving. This is a terrible place to rest.) Now buff yourself up (if you're a cleric) and head West Northwest until you are attacked by a giant frog. Each round, it will either try to bite or grapple you. Rush in, and beat the crap out of it before it can. If it does grapple you, break free before it swallows you, or attempt to beat it up from the inside after it does. There seems to be an interesting bug, in that if you break free, the game will still think the frog's grappling, meaning it will make no further actions in combat. (In English, you may now turn it to pulp without any resistance.)

Heal and save, and head to the bottom of the pool to the northeast. Favor east over north, as going too far east can pull as many as 3 frogs onto you at once. Repeat the same strategy you used on the first, saving after each fight, and heading back to Hommlet if you need to rest for a day or two to be fully healed and spelled. Be careful with the next two frogs, as it is entirely possible to pull them both onto you at once which, while not impossible, is much more difficult than a single frog. There are a total of 5 giant frogs in the swamp, the one you killed on the left, three in the right pool, and one farther up in a small pool behind a swamp tree. Go back to Hommlet and rest before returning, as even if you by some miracle got through all five frogs without injury, you'll need all your HP and spells for the next fight. It's a doozy.

Once you're rested up, go northwest towards the castle, buff up and head inside the tower, where you will be immediately mugged (or, rather, webbed) by a giant spider. If you make two consecutive Reflex saves, you'll be able to charge in, and make the first attack, otherwise, you'll have to wait for the spider to come to you. Aside from its Strength-damaging poison, it's a pretty standard melee fight (don't try fighting it at range) that will leave you a couple hundred XP away from Level 3. Ignore the chest for now. Rest here (it's safe) until any Strength damage you took from the Spider's poison is gone, and the Filth Fever you likely inflicted has gone without stat damage for a day, save, buff, and prepare for the first really big fight.

Wait until night to leave the tower, and do so while sneaking, if you have the skill. Head to the East. If you're lucky, you'll be able to engage only two or three without the others noticing, but this is about as likely as winning the lottery, so you will likely be stuck in a massive battle. Bards, use sleep only if there are three or more enemies in range of it. Otherwise, stick to Cure Light. Clerics, depending on your luck, Entropic Shield will be either useless, or the best thing since sliced bread. After your first fight, head back into the tower (watch out, there are two bandits on the left, one who has a readied action to run in, and sneak attack you, which can do 10+ damage) and get your first level in Rogue. Sneak skills are only useful if you're a bard, as a cleric's Armor Check penalty will leave him/her clanking away as they try to sneak. Disable Device and Open Lock are musts, put 4 or 5 ranks in each. Search is important, but not critical. Bards, your feat is Weapon Finesse, unless your Strength and Dex are equal. In that case, take either Weapon Focus, or Martial Weapon Prof (Longsword). Clerics, your choice is much more open. Combat Expertise is good if you have the Int, Weapon Focus is also a dandy choice. Improved Initiative isn't as advisable as in a large part, and another Rest and heal for a couple days, then head back out, killing the last two bandits, and looting the ones that are already dead. Take as many trips back to Hommlet as you need, selling the crap you don't want to Brother Smyth.

Once that's done, Search and Disable Device on the Theives' Tools near the front door of the keep/moathouse. They're poisoned, but it's not too bad, as long as you can rest it off for a couple of days. Be sure to equip them. The chest is untouchable until you have a +9 to Open Lock (That's 5 ranks in OL, 18+ Dex, and thieves' tools, though there are spells you can use to lessen this.) If you don't have it, forget about the chest for now, you'll get it later. If you can open it, however, head in tower, and approach the chest. Search for the trap until you find it, and disable it. It might take a couple of tries, as it's a DC 18, but eventually, you'll get it. Rest and heal as needed. (Or, if you're feeling impatient, just skip to the next step, and suck up the trap's 2d4 slashing damage.) Open the lock. You'll take 20, and pop it open. Get the loot. The potions are neutralize Poison, which will be useful after the fight with the viper inside.

Regardless, head into the front door of the moathouse, and let us (re)discover that there is much more here than just bandits...

 

I have never tried a one character run, because it's just going to take 2 weeks of solid playing to get anywhere. Well actually, you will probably be level 5-6 by the time you clear moathouse. Well maybe. And if you can get a periapt, you should be ok. I don't expect you'll beat Z with 1 char though, everything else, why not?

As for what class? Uh probably cleric. Good base hp, works for melee. Can heal, can clear a room full of undead. Can do massive damage against evils. Can have sick saves, enlarge oneself to a supercleric. Etc.

Monk sucks. You will be fast, have good ac if you watch your wisdom, but you need to run around unarmed to get the most out of the skillset, and you don't do all that much damage that way. Plus as a healer, you suck badly compared to Paladin, Cleric, or Druid, or even Ranger. And every other melee class can wipe the floor with you.

Bard is good. Spells to cover weaknesses, haste, knock if you don't put much skillpoints into rogue stuff which as a talker you probably won't.

 

Well, I started a run with Lyric, a NG Human Female Bard. The moathouse is cleared out with the exception of Lareth, and the gnolls/bugbears. She's Level 6 now, and I have to admit, when you're only using one character, it becomes readily apparent how much the RNG hates you. When you cannot hit a 16 AC with a +8 to hit, while your 20 AC is hit every other attack, it becomes acceptable to savescum.

 

You mentioned hating the NPCs due to the looting bug. This has been fixed by Co8 Humble NPC patch. Some of their new in party banter is quite funny. At any rate, good luck going solo.

 

Update: Due to a bug that clipped Lyric inside of Lareth's dresser, unable to escape, I am forced to restart. I will be doing it with a cleric this time, and will record some of the happening. Also, because the bug was a direct result of my savescumming, I will only save when I rest.

Updated Update: Rather than just make a "how", and after seeing that GameFAQs lacks one, I'm going to make a how-to on solo charrie runs, starting next post. Once its done, I'll be transplanting the backup text document to GameFAQs, and make more.

 

Reupdated Update: First part of the how-to added to my first post, as it's a lot longer than I expected.

Rereupdated Update: Extended the how-to. It now includes up to entering the moathouse.

 

Re: Solo Charrie Run? SPOILERS!!!

The single-PC run has been covered before in more than one thread, you should probably take a look for those.

That said, here are a couple of pointers (WARNING: SPOILERS):

1) Druid is probably the best character class to start with (and concentrate on) for a single-character run. He's got good HPs, a slightly better weapons choice than a Cleric, good skill points, a superior class skill list to most spellcasters, and probably the best Battlefield Control spells at any level thru 9th, at least. Also, he has a personal meat-shiel ... uuuuhhhhh, pet.

MAKING Holy weapons isn't really that big a deal with a solo campaign. There are plenty of holy weapons available in the game, most of which a Druid can use just by taking a single level in a martial class (Fighter, Ranger).

2) While Bard may be a better choice for out-of-combat situations, his major strength (Bardic Music) is really most useful when used to buff a PARTY. Therefore, a Bard really isn't that good for true solo play. If you want a solo character leading a bunch of NPCs, though, it's a great choice.

2) Play a male. Play a CHARISMATIC male. Possibly the most profitable and/or important thing you can do before leaving Hommlet the first time is marrying Meleny and getting ahold of the Holy Sword her father gives as her dowry.

3) I've never GOTTEN TO the Moathouse without being at least 5th level in a solo play-through. You must be missing or ignoring a LOT of quests in Hommlet.

 

Playing a solo run through a LE game with a cleric of Nerull was one of the best ones I've ever done; I had so much fun playing my apbraturly named character 'DEATH' and advancing him all the way to a level 20 cleric. (I don't like multi-classing; and I picturaly for some reasion don't like rouges, I never play with one.) I never use any NPC anyway, not even in my 'normal' run throughs; I guess I rather play my my own characters than someone else's. Cleric is I think a good choice as he is naturally a second srting fighter and a great spellcaster; (and the army of commanded undead helped aswell)

Another solo I've done, though this is in KotB, was a straight elven Wizard. It was hard, though I didn't savescum i did cheat a little with saving so I can re-start combat if (when) I die. That was fun too, picturally at the high levels when he could just wipe out the entire map with a single spell. I defently suggest doing a solo; they are good.

 

It would be nice if the Ego record would include the NPCs.

Fruella rocks! She's great fun, including her demise! It would be interesting to hear her father's reaction to her death. Perhaps the antithesis of Meleny's dad's reaction when he gets the bad news.

 

A lot of NPCs actually do appear on the Ego list; it's one way to find out most of their alignments. A few, like the Bertrams, don't appear though.

 

I think he meant the NPC's numbers should show up on the Ego list, i.e. how many times Furnok disarmed a trap, or if Fruella has the most criticals with her (overpowered) Great Cleaver.

 

Hi Folks
One quick freebee. When you equip your character at the start, buy a "Black Dress". I know it sounds funny to buy a "Dress" for a male character, but the portrait will show it as a "suit". For something like 2 CP you get a +4 to your Diplomacy checks.
The Royal Canadian

 

So if you go evil cleric, or maybe LN and choose the ability to command undead, how long does it last? Do you bring them back to town like charmed monsters? What happens when you rest, do they go free then attack you again? If you rest in town, do they go crazy and attack the bar patrons after resting?

If not I would think this would be the way to go solo. Throw in some extra summons to supplement your formation every once and a while (really just extra meatless shields) and I could see you dominating the game once you reach a level where you can dominate some higher level undead (shadows) and take them with you. Even the early moathouse with a small group of skeletons and zombies vs bandits and gnolls would be a good fight. Head to the meadows, rest and reload your troops!

 

If you command the undead, they are yours to keep until destroyed. They use the 8 (iirc) slots allocated for familiars and summoned creatures. Ghouls and ghasts generally perform the best.

 

I hear that all the time, in bed.