Severed Hand HoF

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Hi folks, i was wondering if anybody had any good tips for taking down the Hand in HoF mode. My party is around about lv28 and im getting creamed. Usually i can send in loads of summons first to act as buffers, but i am finding situations when i do not have time to get them up and running (it took 12 reloads to complete the initial battle in the Fields of Slaughter). Mass dominate and wail of the banshee are pretty well useless and malison + slow + chaos do not last long enough to make a diiference. I really appretiate any tips as i am starting to run out of patience and i know there are far harder battles ahead on the top layers of the hand. Cheers for any input.

[ April 14, 2007, 21:02: Message edited by: Taluntain ]

 

You're level 28, and you're losing? ALL the time? Wow that's different. Umm just a question, what characters does your party consist of?

 

Team B5:
G'Kar - Half orc fighter 19 / barbarian 9
Marcus - human monk 28
Sheridan - human cleric 22 / pally 7
Ivanova - assimar rouge 18 / mage 8
Londo - drow bard 17 / sorceror 8
Delen - elf evoker 28

 

I guess it's mostly the fact that you have more melee type characters than arcane types, which honestly make your job MUCH easier. To be honest I've never actually played a party with much of a melee focus, save my first try, WHICH I won't really get into considering that party didn't really last very long

In that regard I'd say you'd need the wisdom of some of the other IWDII veterans. All I can say is, make sure your summons are ALWAYS distracting your opponents long enough for you to hack and blast them to bits. Also, I'm guessing your monk's quivering palm ability doesn't really come in handy much anymore? Either way if one tactic doesn't work, try something new - HoF wasn't meant to be easy you know

 

Actually, Silvershield, his party has more arcane firepower than mine do, most of the time, and I've never had all that much trouble late in HOF with my rather melee oriented parties, as long as I used good tactics.

Silvershield, I've been able to get thru HOF with only 1 sorc, 1 cleric, and a ranger and pally for spellcasting. For the most part, the pally's spells were for buffing support and the ranger's spells were for summoning support.


I am rather shocked that Toker said that Mass Dominate didn't work. I can see that it might not work well in the Fields of Slaughter, since some of those battles involve undead creatures that may not be able to be dominated. However, MD is the ubergreat spell most of the time in HOF, since all HOF monsters have normal Will saves and most are quite vulnerable to domination.


As far as tactics... In the Fields of Slaughter, where things are a little more wide open than in the Hand, a GREAT tactic in HOF is the magical "Killing Zone". What you do is cast spells like Entangle, Web, and Grease and Symbol of Hopelessness to immobilize the incoming wave of monsters, then you cast multi-round damaging spells like Acid Fog, Cloudkill, Firey Cloud, Spike Stones, Spike Growth, and so on to slowly degrade all of the immobilized monsters. Of course, you can also nuke'em at the same time with high grade spells like Delayed Fireball and Horrid Wilting.

Also, dropping a Fire Elemental or a "Gate" Demon into the middle of the killing zone to act as a magnet is good too. These two are great because they're immune to the fire spells.

There are times whhen you don't have the time or space to set up a killing zone. Then you have to depend on spells like Greater Command, Symbol of Hopelessness and Mass Dominate. Holy Word also works well, if you have a 100% good party, but watch out if you have summons in existance cuz they'll get stunned as well. HW is best used at the start of a ambush where you have no summons in play and you need to get a quick stun to give your mage time to cast some spells.

Greater Command is a great spell. it's quick and Will based. But remember that it's just a glorified sleep spell and that any baddy that you knock out will wake up again if hit. It's not a good spell for knocking out a mob then nuking the mob. Use GC to knock out a mob, then either use the time to cast the further immobilizing spells for a kill zone, or attack one baddy at a time with your tanks. Dropping a fireball on top of a Greater Command knocked out mob in HOF is largely a waste. Either knock'em out then kill'em one at a time, or knock'em out then start casting the immobilizing spells like web/entangle or Symbol of Hopelessness, etc., prior to a serious nuking barrage.

Something else to consider about Mass Dominate and your other Will based spells, it really, REALLY helps if your mages (and clerics to a lesser extent) have taken SF: Enchantment and GSF: Ench. so that you've improved your chances of successfully affecting your enemies with Will save-based spells.

Wail of the Banshee isn't as powerful in HOF as in NM due to the fact that Fort saves are sooooo much higher in HOF. Still, it does work. And about the best time to use it is after you've stunned a large number of enemies with a spell like Greater Command, Holy Word, or Symbol of Hopelessness. As I recall, WOTB is a slow spell to cast, so in an ambush situation, it's really nice if you can get most or all of the attackers stunned for even a round to give your party time to get organized and give your mage time to cast WOTB without risk of being interrupted.


Back to summons... Toker, depending on the battle, using elementals or demon summons can be great summons. Yes, you can't control them and yes, you generally need to be protected from evil or they'll turn on you ... BUT!!!.. they only turn on you if you are the closest "enemy". if you summon a demon or elemental well behind enemy lines, they'll only see the enemy and not you.

In the battle in the Fields of Slaughter against Saablic Tan and his minions, drop a demon in Saablic Tan's face ASAP and you will be very happy with the results.

 

Seriously? Well my hats off to you good sir

Although I guess that's just me, as I prefer to have an arcane heavy sort of party

 

After you have thrown your initial spells (either mass domination, symbol of hopelessness, greater command or holy word for good aligned parties) a mass haste can be useful to make your characters able to run away if badly hurt.
Other than that I think crucis has said everything there is to say about though battles in HOF.

 

Cheers for the info guys. I must admit that i've forgotten about spells such as entangle and web and never used any of the greater command spells. HW is out of the question however because i have three evil charcters. i use Gate frequently but not the elemental summons, i will definately give that a try. If only there was a way to zap the slayer knights quickly as its them that are giving me the most grief...

 

Yeah they were a pain in normal mode and they aren't too nice this time around either. Just distract them the best you can and pound away.

 

Toker, there are a couple of ways to deal with Slayer Knights.

1. Use Holdfast Arrows to entangle them individually. When using HF arrows, be VERY careful not to waste them. You need to micromanage your archer so that once you've hit the target with a HF arrow, you switch to another target or switch ammo. After you've hit a Slayer Knight with a HF arrow, then start hitting it with ranged attacks or reach weapons that exceed the range of the slayer knight's greatswords (like the Twelve Paces spear).

2. Use Mass Dominate to get a lot of new allies and use those dominated allies to surround the slayer knights. The good news here is that it's a win-win situation. Whichever baddy takes damage, dominated ally or slayer knight, the real winner is you. Regardless, let your dominated allies fight the SK's in melee and let your tanks either use ranged weapons against the SK's or attack other non-SK targets.

 

Don't forget the shadow summon spells. At level 27+ in HoF you will be getting full-Glabrezu and Cornugons, and they will have full HP and be under your control.