IWD2: stealth play?

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I was wondering if the game could be played Solid Snake style. To be clear:

- vanilla game, no mods (sorry admins...)
- skip enemy contact, but you're not above making a ruckus while escaping
- avoid killings
- unless there's innocents to save rapidly
- stunning or snaring are ok, being non-lethal

Especially starting at lvl 1 would be problematic, but even the roads in the game sometimes can't be passed through without killing. And not cashing xp from killings is the 10T elephant in the room.

 

There's too little sneaking options in the game really to make it a viable style. Whilst stealth can be useful for choosing when to initiate combat the triggers in the game aren't suited to maintaining that style (a lot of enemies that initiate dialogue for example will break stealth and some monsters will spawn when you pass the areas they 'watch' whether you are visible or not)

Non lethal combat is also pretty much impossible, with the non lethal spells affecting low level only generally and weapons not really following the same lead.

Why sorry to the admins?

 

While a lot of stuff can be skipped by sneaking past there are quite some quests in the game which require all monsters to be dead in order to proceed with the game, in the prologue you have to kill all goblins for example.

 

the killing joke

"No mods"... moderators.

If only the triggered events like Torak and Harshom could be tricked with invisibility or targeted killings. Dealing with the few stealth options... is superhuman if one starts at lvl 1, I guess a deal could be reaching the end of the chapter and then backtrack to harvest xp.

Still, by the rules above Torak would definitely die - Metal Gear has its bosses. Can't remember if Harshom was necessary to get a key and advance.

 

XP are no problem because of the dynamic combat XP calculation and all the quest XP you'll get with your solo character.

 

I just tried and once the AI spotted me, no matter if stealthed\invisible\nondetectionnvisible they kept following me. I remember from playing the campaign that if you go stealth on the rogue, mobs go after the party even if miles away, maybe it's something like that.

Anyway this kind of nails it dead.

Edit
Although the rule is this: npcs must never, ever see you.
Because if they do, you won't evade them. "Game over on detection".

Scaling back anspirations, I'm still interested in a walkthrough "as much stealthy as permitted". Guess I'll make duergars for starters.

Edit
Alright, I was able to reach the bridge battle at Shaengarne without killings. First map was the real ***** here, full of odd AI behaviour. Key was using invisibility from a sorcerer, rather than stealth. The other maps were hilarious: the woman druid wiped the ambushing orcs in 2nd map without them reacting, the third lasted like 20 secs, the dam one required some distractions and a quick escape.