Arelith

In Sorrow We Trust wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 13, 2023 1:41 pm

No EXP reward for this one.

Kuma wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 13, 2023 3:59 pm

In Sorrow We Trust wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 13, 2023 1:41 pm

No EXP reward for this one.

Checked the writ, doesn't look like there's an issue with it - are you sure you haven't completed this one before? Patrol writs are the only repeatable ones but they don't grant XP on repetition.

The ogre caves (sorry, I don't know the name of the writ off the top of my head), the second one. I think its giant matron? Anyways, the floor above the bottom floor literally never has the required 10 kills on it. I think it would even fall short if i did have open lock for that one pathway, and the "hidden" passages often don't have any. Yesterday I found a total of 3, and had to not only drag the boss for the first part and his cronies down (after they respawned since i just killed them), I had to run around that map to find two more to get to chase me halfway across the map and down to get to 10.

I realize this map is tricky because of the locked bypass and the hidden passages, so I would suggest not only upping the spawn rate a little but lowering the number of necessary kills to 5.

Babylon System is the Vampire wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 02, 2023 3:27 pm

The ogre caves (sorry, I don't know the name of the writ off the top of my head), the second one. I think its giant matron? Anyways, the floor above the bottom floor literally never has the required 10 kills on it. I think it would even fall short if i did have open lock for that one pathway, and the "hidden" passages often don't have any. Yesterday I found a total of 3, and had to not only drag the boss for the first part and his cronies down (after they respawned since i just killed them), I had to run around that map to find two more to get to chase me halfway across the map and down to get to 10.

I realize this map is tricky because of the locked bypass and the hidden passages, so I would suggest not only upping the spawn rate a little but lowering the number of necessary kills to 5.

or make sure the spawns are not stuck behind locked doors

Babylon System is the Vampire wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 02, 2023 3:27 pm

The ogre caves (sorry, I don't know the name of the writ off the top of my head), the second one. I think its giant matron? Anyways, the floor above the bottom floor literally never has the required 10 kills on it. I think it would even fall short if i did have open lock for that one pathway, and the "hidden" passages often don't have any. Yesterday I found a total of 3, and had to not only drag the boss for the first part and his cronies down (after they respawned since i just killed them), I had to run around that map to find two more to get to chase me halfway across the map and down to get to 10.

I realize this map is tricky because of the locked bypass and the hidden passages, so I would suggest not only upping the spawn rate a little but lowering the number of necessary kills to 5.

Giants of Minmir - The Giant Matriarch

Minor thing I know, but receiving stacks of ore as a writ reward seems as much an annoyance as a positive. Seems like most characters who aren't miners aren't going to have use for it, it can't be easily sold and in my case I'm always wondering why my pack is so heavy on a low-strength character because I wasn't paying attention when it was deposited.

I'm not reading all the replies to this so it may have been posted earlier but... the upper dark specific writs are abysmal for their level. They're 15-25 writs and the black orcs give 3000xp. They are quite difficult have huge pack size with ranged and spell casters. In comparison the writ where you have to kill the agent of loss that you can get at the hub writmaster is easy and quick to Do. On top of this it gives 5000xp iirc. To get to the orcs you basically have to complete this writ just to get there. I think it should be minimum 5000xp but probably makes more sense at 6000xp. The other writs in the upper dark I believe are 3000xp which is very low for 15-25 writs.

Breedmaster Spire: By far my least favorite so far. It's long, which isn't bad on its own, and the loot is pretty decent. BUT, the tileset for the Spire itself is a horrible mess of randomly shrinking your camera angle, enemies casting spells and throwing things at you through solid walls, summons get confused as all hell with the walkpaths, get stuck on corners, the larger trigger-area traps sink into the floor and only slivers are visible...and the bridge. I figured out an obvious (in hindsight, not when you're getting hammered from all sides and Slowed) solution but...wow.

It's also just kind of a long writ. The areas seem underutilized once you get past the ore veins. Big rooms, long halls, only enemies, some traps. No flavor until you see the Letter from the Sbiayad Breedmaster. Compare it to the Slime Temple which has some great lore in it and can also be hellish if you aren't expecting it, I'd rather do the Temple of Slime again.

Quiet the Ice Caves - minimum level 6 writ (I think it is max 10 or 12)

Mobs didn't seem to bad, I didn't really get a chance to give it my full go because this place could freeze hell over as you take more than five cold damage (so not even frost resist items can help you). every tick which seems to happens at least once a round.

Endure elements scroll would require you to recast every 2nd round and a protection from elements scrolls is 750 gold and would only last 40 damage. My Tier 3 summon, and 2 henchmen all died on our first encounter due to frost damage and they were freezing faster than I could feed healing potions.

This is literally harder than level 20 writs in my honest opinion.

Troglodyte Stronghold in the underdark.

The boss is a tad bit too strong.

I dont know if that was always the case since the dungeon was added or if this is a result of the undead summon stream's rework, but this boss is no where near level appropriate. By the time you can handle that boss you're getting close to 1s exp from the rest of the mobs. I understand that we dont want bosses to be pushovers and we'd like them to actually pose a real threat but in the point where the dungeon is no where near worth going by the time you actually have a realistic chance against the boss, I'd say it's not well balanced. I'd say the deputy boss before the final one is also very challenging, level-relative, and is manageable but not a pushover at all. Thanks for reading.

Someone touched the Shadow Plane writs, I noticed a few of them gave reduced experience.

Blah blah blah more writs aside, were any of the new introduced within the 24-30 range?

Shadovar writ nerfs are pretty harsh. Both surface and UD chars end up having to do them (and UD characters already didn't hit 30 from writs before, and now they definitely won't) and they're fairly difficult writs to tackle at the level range.

XP nerfs to them are pretty painful for both surface and UD chars.

This one is notorious as a quick Discord search will reveal: UD Writ - The Living Spells.

Really, there is only one problem with it and that is the Gemstone Golem (Greater). One of these would be bad enough, but two spawn. I recently tried the writ on a Hemomancer, and found this guy completely immune to magic. I went back to town, tried to recruit folks to go with me and NO ONE would go....but they all knew about it.

Being the stubborn sort, I went back and after about half an hour, managed to defeat one (not both). I did this through repeated casts of empowered wounding whispers and extended haste. I would take a hit or two, pray not to get KDed, run away, heal, and repeat.

I later took a low epic barbarian and found the Golems to be similarly difficult to melee. He was using a Steelbreaker Sledge, which is clearly outside the purview of the teen levels this writ is advertised to. Even he had to run away multiple times to heal. The Golem was hard to hit, always hit me, and dealt truly punishing damage (40+ before crits).

Everything else there is fine and level appropriate to the writ. Honestly, if you wanted to keep the thrilling danger of it, you could simply making the final writ requirement to kill the Crystalline Sentinel, of which there is only one, and who seems to be the intended boss by position and uniqueness anyhow. This guy casts spells and is not completely impervious to level-appropriate magic and melee, but is flanked by the behemoths who almost seem like his guards.

tl;dr : The Living Spells - Gemstone Golem (Greater) is almost impervious to magic and melee, make Crystalline Sentinel the end boss.

RedGiant wrote: ↑

Fri Nov 10, 2023 4:20 pm

This one is notorious as a quick Discord search will reveal: UD Writ - The Living Spells.

Really, there is only one problem with it and that is the Gemstone Golem (Greater). One of these would be bad enough, but two spawn. I recently tried the writ on a Hemomancer, and found this guy completely immune to magic. I went back to town, tried to recruit folks to go with me and NO ONE would go....but they all knew about it.

Being the stubborn sort, I went back and after about half an hour, managed to defeat one (not both). I did this through repeated casts of empowered wounding whispers and extended haste. I would take a hit or two, pray not to get KDed, run away, heal, and repeat.

I later took a low epic barbarian and found the Golems to be similarly difficult to melee. He was using a Steelbreaker Sledge, which is clearly outside the purview of the teen levels this writ is advertised to. Even he had to run away multiple times to heal. The Golem was hard to hit, always hit me, and dealt truly punishing damage (40+ before crits).

Everything else there is fine and level appropriate to the writ. Honestly, if you wanted to keep the thrilling danger of it, you could simply making the final writ requirement to kill the Crystalline Sentinel, of which there is only one, and who seems to be the intended boss by position and uniqueness anyhow. This guy casts spells and is not completely impervious to level-appropriate magic and melee, but is flanked by the behemoths who almost seem like his guards.

tl;dr : The Living Spells - Gemstone Golem (Greater) is almost impervious to magic and melee, make Crystalline Sentinel the end boss.

singing stones on Skal also has this Gemstone Golem (Greater)

it's harder than the boss.

I think it's called Trouble in the Ravine. Guldorand writ. I've been through it with 2 different characters. (rogue and an antiundead cleric inspired by how much difficult yI had with my rogue vs undead).

I've identified a few issues with this specific writ.

Firstly, I found trying to find the Helsi(?) the loud (forgot the name) was pretty hard as I simply didnt notice the transition on the ground into the fortress. Having found it I cant believe I missed it at all but I think it is worth sign posting it a bit better so n00bs like myself actually spot the transition at the fortress. Part of the reason you miss it is because of the panic induced by the cold damage per round mechanic and I'd probably have seen it in regular circumstances. Not saying to remove the cold damage just giving an explanation!

It's also just a very long writ and I'm inclined to think it should be split into 2.

The ancient mobs in the bonehole(?) (there's about 3 that spawn) are really really difficult if you arent build to deal with them. As a rogue I got absolutely destroyed by them and thought they were meant to be avoided but my cleric managed ok but still stuggled . I think I'm pretty good at nwn having played since it started so I think it would be at minimum signposting them at a bit! When I played with my cleric I found them no problem but when there were extra mobs spawning with it I was almost killed without warning because I hadn't noticed them in amongst the group of regular mobs.

If you go into the caves and use a lever you can go all the way into the the hag area but be blocked by an (you need a specific key to open this) thing and have to double back which was super punishing for no reason. You are forced to go down into the bonepit where the bear is to complete the quest. Why not at minimum make it a high DC open lock rather than a 100% locked off way in.

Otherwise I think this whole area is super cool and much kudos to the designer.

RedGiant wrote: ↑

Fri Nov 10, 2023 4:20 pm

tl;dr : The Living Spells - Gemstone Golem (Greater) is almost impervious to magic and melee, make Crystalline Sentinel the end boss.

As one of the only writs I didn't do on my latest effort, I finally bit the bullet and took The Living Spells writ. It still has all of the above mentioned problems.

The end boss is a Gemstone Golem [Greater] of which there are two. There is one Crystalline Sentinel which the writ warns you about, that is fairly easy to knock off. It almost seems like the writ was designed opposite its execution, where the slow-moving impervious Gemstone Golem [Greater] (s) are the guards and the single, weaker Sentinel should be the boss. The writ should thus warn you about the Golems rather than the Sentinel.

This being the case, however, you cannot complete the writ without killing the nigh unto impervious Gemstrone Golem [Greater], which you can neither magic nor melee at appropriate level.

Unless I am missing a trick (I have never tried it with a trapper for example...and maybe next I will try a gonne?), the only way I have been able to complete the writ is with reflexive damage. My recent completion was on a full-melee, above-level DD (lvl 20) who had to use the same trick of death-armor potions, massive amounts of heal kits, sprint away, heal, repeat. 1/2 hour, 92 heal kits, and approximately 10-15 death armor potions later, I was able to complete the writ for 599xp.

Still think this needs looked at.

RedGiant wrote: ↑

Sat Feb 24, 2024 5:43 pm

RedGiant wrote: ↑

Fri Nov 10, 2023 4:20 pm

tl;dr : The Living Spells - Gemstone Golem (Greater) is almost impervious to magic and melee, make Crystalline Sentinel the end boss.

As one of the only writs I didn't do on my latest effort, I finally bit the bullet and took The Living Spells writ. It still has all of the above mentioned problems.

The end boss is a Gemstone Golem [Greater] of which there are two. There is one Crystalline Sentinel which the writ warns you about, that is fairly easy to knock off. It almost seems like the writ was designed opposite its execution, where the slow-moving impervious Gemstone Golem [Greater] (s) are the guards and the single, weaker Sentinel should be the boss. The writ should thus warn you about the Golems rather than the Sentinel.

This being the case, however, you cannot complete the writ without killing the nigh unto impervious Gemstrone Golem [Greater], which you can neither magic nor melee at appropriate level.

Unless I am missing a trick (I have never tried it with a trapper for example...and maybe next I will try a gonne?), the only way I have been able to complete the writ is with reflexive damage. My recent completion was on a full-melee, above-level DD (lvl 20) who had to use the same trick of death-armor potions, massive amounts of heal kits, sprint away, heal, repeat. 1/2 hour, 92 heal kits, and approximately 10-15 death armor potions later, I was able to complete the writ for 599xp.

Still think this needs looked at.

I'll take a look at the creature (I have a feeling it may be highly vulnerable to sonic damage)

Irongron wrote: ↑

Sat Feb 24, 2024 7:54 pm

I'll take a look at the creature (I have a feeling it may be highly vulnerable to sonic damage)

I made this my Saturday hobby. I went back with a level-appropriate Druid and loaded every spell slot I could with "Crumble"...which does do sonic in vanilla...but does entropy in Arelith. "Crumble" does indeed work (no magic immunity hit on that spell) but even expending all slots I could only get him to injured. If this was one of the intended pathways to deal with them, might need to add the custom vulnerability?

We do like varied challenges, but I haven't found the ticket yet.

Thanks for checking!

RedGiant wrote: ↑

Sat Feb 24, 2024 8:02 pm

Irongron wrote: ↑

Sat Feb 24, 2024 7:54 pm

I'll take a look at the creature (I have a feeling it may be highly vulnerable to sonic damage)

I made this my Saturday hobby. I went back with a level-appropriate Druid and loaded every spell slot I could with "Crumble"...which does do sonic in vanilla...but does entropy in Arelith. "Crumble" does indeed work (no magic immunity hit on that spell) but even expending all slots I could only get him to injured. If this was one of the intended pathways to deal with them, might need to add the custom vulnerability?

We do like varied challenges, but I haven't found the ticket yet.

Thanks for checking!

UPDATE
Tried making a run at it as a gonne-user. While it does work, they also absorbs the first /50/ points of damage from a successful attack. My best guess is, at that rate, it would require dozens and dozens of successful shots.