Yet another run - any wishes?

Remove all ads!

Oh, the shapeshifts! That's what I forgot about how I managed my druid diplomat during the early phases of my run-through.

Although it will be a MAJOR loss to AC.

 

Because of the damage resistances the boar should be even less vulnerable than the normal form. Casting cat's grace after shapeshifting will improve the AC. If druids still benefit from the deep gnome bonus to AC and a mage armor spell (do they ?) while shapeshifted there won't be an AC difference.

 

They lose the DG +4, and the mage armor, although you can recast mage armor after they shift. In fact, they even lose Haste effects. I'm not sure what else gets lost upon shapeshift, but Improved Haste gets lost for sure.

-Max

 

Pretty much EVERYTHING that has to do with AC gets lost during shapeshifts - racial AC bonus, feat bonuses (including Expertise), Armor/Shield/Deflection/Generic bonuses from items and/or spells. Dexterity bonus kinda remains but it's not your own DEX that matters but the one you get from the shapeshift. Monk AC bonus is the only one I know that stays.

You can rebuff the spells after shapeshifting and they'll take effect but you'll lose them again when you return to humanoid form.

Edit: Ready to begin Chapter Two now and I still have quite a bit remaining to level six. Although the gap is starting to narrow as I'm seeing much higher kill exp that I'm used to at this point.

 

It turns out Haste is removed when you shapeshift (not just the AC bonus, the extra speed is lost too) but Stoneskin stays. So perhaps other defensive buffs like Invis/Blink would stay too.

-Max

 

Any updates Sir Rechet? Chapter and character levels?

 

Nah, haven't been able to play during the week. So still at the end of Chapter One as above. Will resume during the weekend.

Edit: Ok, so now I'm a bit into Chapter Three.

I did a thorough test on the "delay cashing in quests in Chapter Two" idea I presented a few months ago. It works like a charm in giving a (small) boost to your exp.

The only ones you CANNOT delay are:
- Waking up Oswald
- ending the beetle infestation
- figuring a way to open doors in the glacier
- releasing prisoners
- quests you complete by talking to the three sisters within the temple

My party reached level eight just at the end of the killing spree, clearing just about all of the areas in the chapter. Cashing in the quests made me reach nine. Had I done stuff in the normal order, I'd have received quite a bit less kill exp due to leveling to eight while there still was monsters remaining.

At the very end of Chapter Two I was at 67,900 exp per character.

 

FYI:

I consolidated the findings of this playthrough into the JUPP discussion thread, as a majority of the things I tested this time were directly aimed at getting some hard evidence into the "maybe, then again maybe not" discussions in there.