First replay in 15+ years. Some questions.

It's actually the sense motive skill that is required. >9. If you have the golden orb, you can use it to cast discern lies for the talker. Or if evil + evil party you get an option to kill her just because you are evil.

I believe that is a no.

As I mentioned, the dialog was a bit tricky. I assume you did not attack the tower and you need this dialog option reply by Lareth (I looked it up in the dialog files to be exact):

after which, you'll ask:

And then he tells you that he will be a vendor - which occurs after some time interval.

If you didn't have this particular conversation, he won't be a vendor.

So...iirc if you ask for gold, the conversation does not include this sequence and he is not a vendor.

 

Yeah, I meant Sense Motive. It's hard for me to tell those tiny icons apart.

Damn. I thought I read somewhere that she eventually returns there and has additional bugbear guards. I'm past that point now so I guess I missed my chance.

He did give me the "I have misjudged you" speech, but I'm pretty sure the option to ask him for gold was after that.

Also, I wiped out the brigands before bringing him there, but he made no mention of it.

 

I looks like you are correct.

So if you did get that particular dialog where he tells you he will be a shop now... then it is likely a bug where he doesn't stick around.

When I did it, I had not been to the tower yet. I had to try a few dialog paths (including one where he did try the ambush). However, looking through the dialog and map states, I can't find any indication that is an essential condition.

There are 2 apparent conditions: 1. he tricks you into a fight inside and surrenders again=merchant, and 2. leaves party with no incident=merchant.

If someone knew the easy way to summon/console Lareth with the appropriate dialog file, then you could try that. The global variables should be already set.

Otherwise, that's all I can tell you.

Edit: I would have said try the DM client, but the Lareth proto entry is corrupt according to the DM (ie, doesn't work).

 

Are any of the temple quests on Level 2 really worth doing? Do you get a signficant amount of XP from them?

I don't think I ever did any of them back when I originally played ToEE. I feel like maybe I'm missing out by not doing them, but on the other hand, my party is neutral-good so none of the quests really make sense from a role-playing standpoint. The only reason I'm even considering them is because the Water, Earth, and Fire temples are kicking my ass if I try to take them head on. The only one I managed to wipe out was the Air Temple.

 

I've never found the xp to be worth(to me at least) the time. For all the Temples I like to bait them into a prepared combat zone

 

Just an

Just an FYI. I discovered that Smigmal Redhand does return to that spot later if she escapes you the first time.

 

Good to know. Seems very unwise of her, though. Maybe it is to give the PC a second chance to get her nice loot.