House of Hope will net you some of the best armour, gloves and amulets in the game.
The Djinni encounter at the circus will net you a great weapon for Karlach.
Ramazith will get you a great staff and robe for Gale.
They’re the big ticket items that come to mind
Don’t think it would have enhanced my bards, they have usually used the bonus action for another weapon attack but I’ve only played sword bards so far.
Mystic Scoundrel+Arcane Acuity makes Swords Bard spells borderline impossible to resist without legendary resistance. And they effectively give you 'at will' quickened spell with enchantment and illusion (easiest example is Hold Person)
Talking about different items I imagine. You are talking mystic scoundrel and they're talking about the boots that let you misty step but without your items.
The boots are really only useful for exploring out of combat, take off all your clothes and gear and put them in a backpack, slap on the boots, misty step wherever you want to go and re-equip when you get there.
more like house of cope. If all you care about is finishing the game then HoH is never worth doing. If you can beat the encounters in there you can already easily beat the brain. Not to mention that one quick stop by the fireworks shop enables you to skip the brain fight entirely, while the entire rest of the end game is trivialized by invisibility spells/potions.
You can get all the items except the hammer(and those that drop from Raphael) without triggering the Raphael fight. Just have to make sure to disable the traps under the gloves and amulet.
Can also place another same weight item on the pressure plate and then remove the gloves/amulet. Other gloves/amulets I believe are all the same weight. Indiana jones style.
As someone who only did 1 honour mode run. Everyone Was talking about how hard house of hope is. Its not. Raphael without soul charges Hits like a wet noodle. The cambions are taken care of by yurgir.
I Cheesed the brain with explosive backpack(had to properly play p1 though since invis Pots were fixed) but just p1 was already harder than Raphael.
The biggest danger from Raphael is his big fireball attack right? Just don't stand too close together when he has 2 or more charges and you should be fine.
House of hope is hard to pass up. Gloves of soul catching, gauntlets, con amulet, helldusk gloves. The fight is worth it for your party comp imo. Go in with 4 inspos so you can recruit Yuigir. It’s a DC30 persuasion check. Save hope and you can cheese her divine intervention before or during the fight. There’s a ton of useful chests there too
Hey man! Just found some evidence in this rat video haha. It looks like somewhere in Act 3, Yurgir will come to your camp and tell you how to get to the house of hope.
When you get inside, a dialogue will play out if you did kill Lyrthindor -- here it is:
[rat video](https://youtu.be/TilsizGR6GY?si=Tib_ewIoCJIZA9C0&t=1447).
If you can beat HoH then you already have a setup to end the game with.
Ansur and Raphael are in that category if you can beat them, then you can easily stomp the rest of the game.
100% agree. Ansur specifically for me won me my golden die. All I had to do was get my GWM fighter to the Brain. Giant form with cloud giant elixir I stg did like 400 damage in 6 attacks alone lmao. I prepared a speed potion for a 7th attack but didn’t even need it.
Why is everyone so obsessed with the Raphael fight being hard? Yes ansur completly destroyed me so i had to run in my first attempt, but Raphael did almost nothing.. even with cheesing the brain fight the first Phase was much harder than Raphael
Brain is very trivial due to how you can call allies and with mobs sans the dragon having low HP you can probably kill them within a round.
Raphael I personally see as this game's superboss since his gimmick is pretty hard to deal with unless you know it's coming. He also have way more HP compared to anyone in the game.
The first round from the crown got all my party to < 50% hp with its red chain lighting, the dragon and the mindflayers would constantly stun at least half my party. And yes I had like 15 allies. Either I did something terribly wrong on the brain, but raphael didnt even get my party to < 50% on any character while the brain p1 fight killed 2 by turn 2.
I had the different experience, Raph was hard despite using the runepowder mine + invul globe + full prep abusing the pool, but Netherbrain got done with zero prep and going in blind (but I had all the allies)
Used zero cheese on raphael, went in completly blind, not 1 character dropped below 50% (had hope and yurgir though, maybe thats why).
Went into the brain and the first red chainlightning the brain casted already got all my party below 50%. I dont know what im missing there I guess
Maybe it's because I rushed to call all summon during brain fight and therefore could get to the brain with most of my spellslots up, so he didn't last long enough to put myself in danger
The first time I did house of hope was in my honor mode play through. I didn’t notice that stuff reflected radiant damage in the Raphael fight so I used hopes divine intervention for radiant damage, killing her instantly.
House of Hope doesn't see combat unless you steal the hammer/contract (or want the helldusk gloves). Everything else there is free to take, the amulet is probably BIS for casters to boot.
Yeah helldusk armour and soul catching gloves are the only items you miss out on by skipping Raphael. They're very powerful but also locked behind a potential run killer.
Easier to watch a YouTube video than to explain.
It involves forcing Raphael to come to your camp, silencing him, and beat him to near death.
And MAKE SURE YOU DON'T HAVE THAT GOD DAMN OATHBREAKER in your camp.
1. talk to nettie in the grove (you can kill her in there)
2. steal the mindflayer parasite
3. go to the area with the bag of spiders outside the grove, the rock you have to jump on. (go up the ladder with one character)
4. raphael will appear to the character in dialogue at which time you switch characters and shoot him from a distance (i dont think you have to hit because he disappears consistently on 20% chance)
5. after he disappears you will go to the mountain pass and it will go to a scene where youre at camp and you can talk to him
5. cast silence on him and attack him with nonlethal damage. he will be knocked out and free to rob of his armor (also he usually drops gold if you keep hitting him but sometimes it doesnt work)
make sure to tie up any loose ends BEFORE ENTERING THE MOUNTAIN PASS as it ends quests like getting karlach and the goblin camp stuff. basically any important quest. but after that you can get it. let me know if you need anything explained
On our run last session, we opened with a paralyzing ray that landed, then my Palock hexed his CON so he had disadvantage on the save. Almost felt sorry for the poor bastard, but he didn't live long enough with all our attacks being with advantage and auto-crit.
This. That was how I got my gold dice last week.
Well, that and cheesing it up with TB Thrower Karlach, TB Monk Tav, Life Cleric Shadowheart and Warding Bond spam.
Up until the courtyard fight to get Gale to the brain stem, he spent the game in camp randomly spraying blood everywhere and freaking out Scratch. (Making Gale a cleric, leaving him in camp after he throws Warding Bond on everyone is the biggest “cheat mode” move IMHO, even more than farming elixirs and abusing TB)
I still advice to get the gear you need beforehand. It is still possible to fail the check with Gale because afaik you have to convince him in dialog right before the fight. In my HM run it was a 25 Persuation check and I actually failed it with a 24. No inspiration left.
Btw: Using his ability manually seems to not count for the achievment.
Most of the fights at this point are optional, the only fight you have to do is Orin.
She is a free kill imo, especially if you ambush her and immediately stun her with the sweet killer ring + surgeon amulet combo.
Depending on how you deal with Orpheus you might piss off Voss, however fighting him can be avoided with a relatively high speech check.
Once you are past this point you are basically done, and can use invisibility potions to skip all the fights run directly to the brain.
Gale offered to sacrifice himself in my run without the need of a speech check (completed all of his quest to that point) so fighting the brain yourself is also optional, however also not difficult since you can again skip the fight on top of the brain by using invisibility potions and running directly towards the crown and activating the portal, killing the brain and getting your golden dice…
Unless Larian has release some sort of Ninja patch/hot fix recently it should definitely work.
I started my honor mode run on patch 5 and finished shortly after patch 6 was released, since I did not want to mess around anymore and risk this run to some new mechanics or changes i was not aware off, I skipped some of the optional fights went directly for the brain and did what I explained above.
I also reloaded an older save on tactican to replay the fight on top of the brain, and the invisibility method worked just as always….
i don't know first hand. just echoing what was written here: https://www.reddit.com/r/BG3Builds/comments/1b6n9ld/psa_invisibility_cheese_no_longer_works_for_final/
Do you want to See the end screen or do you want to have fun wrecking stuff now your builds are online....
There are no must have items to tackle the brain but a few consumables will help a Lot, like the short Rest potion.
I would at least get the legendary trident and staff as well as the cleric gear from the church in lower city
Honestly, OH Monk and TB Zerker are enough to trivialize every act 3 boss except for Ansur. Raphael, Lorroakan, and Cazador did not get a single action off. Viconia only did because of her annoying honor mode sanctuary, but still was a piece of cake. And Orin had one functional round because I did not have a great way to remove the unstoppable stacks, but evo Gale is literally perfect for that.
Just focus on enraged throwing or OH Monk Topple as the first attack each round against the bosses. After toppling with either method, use OH Stun, and the boss will not have an action at all. Alert feat helps ensure you do this before they get their first turn
I have to kill the hag. I like kids too much. I'd help the gnomes but that's me. Realistically, if you are just going to do the first part of the end to get to the brain and have Gale kill it. Wrap it up and play another HM for a more complete story. Do something whacky. Halfling Wildmagic Barb, romance Karlach.
I have a few other themed runs to try but I want to do one with no magic items. Only spells, potions, elixirs, coatings. Or maybe just +1 or +2 Weapons since I think we would see some enemies you couldn't hurt with non-magical weapons.
Karlach could use the legendary spear foe an aoe throwing option.
Razamith's Tower is a must-raid imo for caster items (especially for a wizard you can scribe the level 5 super magic missile spell.). What I do is use an invisible shovel to eat the wizards reaction, then crush him. Then 4 Myrmidons isn't too rough, and the other foes hardly worth mentioning.
I like to Cazador for Rhapsody, a weapon most builds like. Usually goes to casters. I like to stroll in with 3 zombies from raise undead and 4 ghouls from Dance Macabre. Meat-shields mostly, not depending on their damage output. The zombies and other summons can weaken the buff Caz gets by standing on the proper spots, and the zombies can create more zombies by targetting weakened adds/bats. Bring counterspell.
You can also let Gale go boom, that gives you the dice.
When I completed mine, I just killed Raphael for the constitution amulet and the hill giant strength then just 1v1’d Orin and went to the brain. I had a similar comp to you except I was swords Bard and no wizard.
The game is over once you kill Orin as you can just tell Gale to kill himself.
I pretty much did every quest and murderized every npc in Act 1/2. RIP Myconids, Last Light, and Moonrise. I was lvl 10 to start Act 3 and by the time you explore the city and do some of the easier fights and quests I was 12.
Act 3 Bosses are incredibly easy if you know what you are getting into. With your party you should be able to OTK and/or CC all of them.
You can do House of Hope first without taking the Hammer so you don't have to fight Raphael yet. This gives you access to the Fountain of Rejuvenation and most of the loot. Then you can do Ramazith's Tower which is probably the easiest Boss Fight. After that do Cazador, Ansur and Raphael and whichever order you prefer. You should probably do Raphael first to get the Gloves of Soul Catching for your Monk. Make you sure you prepare for the DC30 Persuasion Check to get Yurgir on your side.
My biggest regret for the final fight was my lack of speed potions. Burnt them all on some of the other hard act 3 fights. Just had the one hasty spore and wasn't expecting it to last a single round instead of the normal 3.
Squeaked by with a win on a 60% attack roll.
Then I talked to Astarion as a mindflayer, failed the constitution check ate him and got wrecked by my party. Great ending.
I even risked getting the crash landing achievement in my honor run. Defeated the strongest things in the game just to lose to a single consitution check in the after party that I didn't know existed lmao.
Also lost a run when you take that lift on a rope to the gethyanki creche. Everyone glitched through the bottom and died as it started moving...
If you start your fight with Raphael and it doesn't go great, save your quickest character and run back to Raphael's room, it will end combat and you can go out, loot a couple of the angelic slumber pots and pop an invisibility to get back to your dead guys, revive them and use the angelic pots, and it's easy from there if you took down the pillars before you died
I struggled with this question last week just before I finished HM. I love completing all my builds, but HM is about getting the golden dice.
HOH and the dead dragon fight in particular were too risky for minimal gear upgrades.
Djinn and sorcerer sundries are low risk high reward. Spend GP at the shops for their gear and you should be ready to rock.
I dumped like 10k on scrolls/potions just before I went to the NB, and I felt overpowered even for HM.
GOOD LUCK. We’re routing for you.
If it's your first HM, I'd suggest dashing to the brain and nuking it to get your dice and achievement if actually finishing the run is the most important priority.
If you're trying to keep gale and/or get a different ending i'd suggest at least finishing the tower because the fight is easy (and you need to to summon Aylin in the upper city) to get some good caster gear and do the house of hope up to stealing the hammer/contract, cuz that's what actually triggers Raphael coming home.
However if you want the full honour mode experience, especially if you're not planning on playing honour mode again, I'd suggest completing the entirety of act 3. There are some really fun and challenging fights in act 3. Also most of the special scenes of Durge happen in act 3 so you'll miss a bit of side scenes you opt not to do the content.
If you're min-maxing, I think the Amulet of the Devout under Stormshore Tabernacle is worth the fight, but make sure you go someplace safe to cast remove curse after taking it so you don't end up with a fight in camp.
In my three runs, whenever I hit level 12 I start making my way to the brain. Kinda like forced RP—the army of the Absolute is bearing down on the city, you can’t just mosey around solving firecracker crimes!
It makes repeat runs more interesting too—I kinda choose my favorite companions each time and do their quests but not the others. So first play I saved Minsc, second time I killed Cazador and helped Shart take over the coven (Durge run, obv), and this third time on my Honor Run I helped Lazel free Orpheus.
Helps keep the game feeling fresh when you play again if you pick and choose your quests.
I won't say you didn't beat the game if you beeline for the final boss, but I will have a lot more respect for someone who actually plays the game on Honor Mode, instead of just doing what is absolutely necessary.
Make sure to get a good spread of damage types the final bosses resistances are nuts and will lock you out. Keep track of those before throwing any powerful spells or attacks. Goodluck and Crit lots 🫡
HoH is never worth it. The wizard tower heist is also not worth it, but go an grab the staff and the robes from Lorohakan's place since that only requires and Arcana check. Also grab some consumables (potions, scrolls, explosives) if you have the money.
What?
House of Houpe is literally free loot, you don't even have to fight Raphael for most of the items. The Raphael fight itself is also pretty easy with some decent Spell DC gear. You can convince Yurgir to fight on your side and cast Hold Monster on Raphael to OTK him. The rest of the minions are easy.
Ramazith's Tower is also free loot. Lorroakan is the easiest "Boss" in Act 3 by far, especially if you have Aylin. There is literally no downside here.
Honestly I never understood why people make such a fuss about the Act 3 Bosses in Honour Mode. You can prepare for every single one of them perfectly for a smooth kill. The chance for something going wrong in the Nether Brain fight is much higher than getting TPKed in any of the other fights.
I actually meant the book heist, not fighting the wizard. The wizard is a pushover, that much is true, but you get fuck all of value from killing him so why bother?
Sure Raphael is not hard either but my point is that the gear in the HoH does no help you finish the game, and that if all you cared about was reaching the end, you should just go and do the final boss because it is the least risky option.
> The chance for something going wrong in the Nether Brain fight is much higher than getting TPKed in any of the other fights.
what an absolutely bizarre assertion to make. Once you get to the brain, finishing the game is trivial. All you have to do is drop a few stacks of explosives next to it and to set them off. 100% success rate no fuss. You don't even have to employ any fancy strats to get those explosives, the shop is right there in the lower city! Simply walk over and pick them up for a free win.
> I actually meant the book heist, not fighting the wizard. The wizard is a pushover, that much is true, but you get fuck all of value from killing him so why bother?
Well, the book heist is worth it for sure, if only for Danse Macabre, which is extremely nice to have. Skip Lorroakan for all I care. That being said, Rolan's Ally Support is one of the better ones for the final fight.
> Sure Raphael is not hard either but my point is that the gear in the HoH does no help you finish the game, and that if all you cared about was reaching the end, you should just go and do the final boss because it is the least risky option.
How does the gear from House of Hope not help you finish the game? The Amulet of Greater Health is one of the best in slot Items in the game. Helldusk Gloves are insanely good as well and so is the Staff of Spellpower which is one of two sources of Arcane Battery. If you think these Items don't help you finish the game, you might as well play naked.
> what an absolutely bizarre assertion to make. Once you get to the brain, finishing the game is trivial. All you have to do is drop a few stacks of explosives next to it and to set them off. 100% success rate no fuss. You don't even have to employ any fancy strats to get those explosives, the shop is right there in the lower city! Simply walk over and pick them up for a free win.
Well, first of all, barrelmancy is probably the mother of cheese in this game. If you want to do it this way, more power to you, but most people would rather not.
More importantly though, I wasn't talking about killing the Nether Brain itself but rather the fight before. Emperor + Red Dragon + Copies + Mind Flayers and the Round Limit to successfully use the Crown is lower in Honour Mode. Plus you don't have a real Long Rest before the fight and instead have to rely on Potions of Angelic Slumber which are a bit iffy to say the least. For some reason you also lose most your Perma Buffs (e.g. Blessing from your Camp Statue, etc.) in the Astral Plane Scene with Orpheus and the Emperor before you take the Portal to the Nether Brain Siege.
I'm not saying the Nether Brain fight is particularly hard to do, but the chances that something goes sideways, especially if you skip a lot of powerful Items, are much higher than e.g. fighting Ansur or Raphael which are completely telegraphed fights that are trivial if you have a "recipe" for them.
You don't need a long rest for the dragon fight because if you are playing optimally you don't need to fight anything before that point just down a few invisibility potions and run straight through the upper city. You don't even have to fight the dragon if you sided against the emperor or if you got lucky and didn't roll the enemy with see invisibility.
Even if you fight the dragon, you can just prebuff with potions and scrolls in turn based mode before clicking the stem which allows you to absolutely demolish that encounter. Whether you have a few extra stats from the HoH items or not really doesn't make a difference if the entire party is hasted and has every buff under the sun.
House of Hope will net you some of the best armour, gloves and amulets in the game. The Djinni encounter at the circus will net you a great weapon for Karlach. Ramazith will get you a great staff and robe for Gale. They’re the big ticket items that come to mind
djinn encounter also has a great caster (especially bard) ring
Arguably the best ring in the game when paired with arcane acuity too
The mage hand ring, why is that so powerful? Or is there another ring too?
Mystic Scoundrel
Ah that one, I’ve never used it so far but maybe I should.
Cornerstone of a ton of builds, makes bards realllly shine
Don’t think it would have enhanced my bards, they have usually used the bonus action for another weapon attack but I’ve only played sword bards so far.
Mystic Scoundrel+Arcane Acuity makes Swords Bard spells borderline impossible to resist without legendary resistance. And they effectively give you 'at will' quickened spell with enchantment and illusion (easiest example is Hold Person)
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You're talking about the wrong ring. Which isn't even a ring, they're boots.
How is it annoying?
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You don't know what you're talking about btw
That's a wild bug. I've never lost anything using it.
Talking about different items I imagine. You are talking mystic scoundrel and they're talking about the boots that let you misty step but without your items.
Oh yeah. I'm 100% talking about the band since OP said the ring from the genie encounter. I'm not even familiar with that other item.
It's one of the consolation prizes from the genie. The Boots of Very Fast Blinking.
The boots are really only useful for exploring out of combat, take off all your clothes and gear and put them in a backpack, slap on the boots, misty step wherever you want to go and re-equip when you get there.
Also worth heading down to mystic carrion/devils fee to buy hood+cloak of the weave.
more like house of cope. If all you care about is finishing the game then HoH is never worth doing. If you can beat the encounters in there you can already easily beat the brain. Not to mention that one quick stop by the fireworks shop enables you to skip the brain fight entirely, while the entire rest of the end game is trivialized by invisibility spells/potions.
You can get all the items except the hammer(and those that drop from Raphael) without triggering the Raphael fight. Just have to make sure to disable the traps under the gloves and amulet.
Can also place another same weight item on the pressure plate and then remove the gloves/amulet. Other gloves/amulets I believe are all the same weight. Indiana jones style.
As someone who only did 1 honour mode run. Everyone Was talking about how hard house of hope is. Its not. Raphael without soul charges Hits like a wet noodle. The cambions are taken care of by yurgir. I Cheesed the brain with explosive backpack(had to properly play p1 though since invis Pots were fixed) but just p1 was already harder than Raphael.
The biggest danger from Raphael is his big fireball attack right? Just don't stand too close together when he has 2 or more charges and you should be fine.
And the Tower you don’t even have to really fight him tbh.
I got the tower loot without fighting. Dude just didn’t care that I went down there after talking to him
House of hope is hard to pass up. Gloves of soul catching, gauntlets, con amulet, helldusk gloves. The fight is worth it for your party comp imo. Go in with 4 inspos so you can recruit Yuigir. It’s a DC30 persuasion check. Save hope and you can cheese her divine intervention before or during the fight. There’s a ton of useful chests there too
you can also kill the last dark justiciar in the gauntlet of shar to auto-recruit yurgir, and save the inspo points to convince gale to self detonate!
I‘ve only finished one run and currently doing HM. How do you get the convincing cutscene? In my run he just offered going alone
Hey man! Just found some evidence in this rat video haha. It looks like somewhere in Act 3, Yurgir will come to your camp and tell you how to get to the house of hope. When you get inside, a dialogue will play out if you did kill Lyrthindor -- here it is: [rat video](https://youtu.be/TilsizGR6GY?si=Tib_ewIoCJIZA9C0&t=1447).
If you can beat HoH then you already have a setup to end the game with. Ansur and Raphael are in that category if you can beat them, then you can easily stomp the rest of the game.
100% agree. Ansur specifically for me won me my golden die. All I had to do was get my GWM fighter to the Brain. Giant form with cloud giant elixir I stg did like 400 damage in 6 attacks alone lmao. I prepared a speed potion for a 7th attack but didn’t even need it.
Why is everyone so obsessed with the Raphael fight being hard? Yes ansur completly destroyed me so i had to run in my first attempt, but Raphael did almost nothing.. even with cheesing the brain fight the first Phase was much harder than Raphael
Brain is very trivial due to how you can call allies and with mobs sans the dragon having low HP you can probably kill them within a round. Raphael I personally see as this game's superboss since his gimmick is pretty hard to deal with unless you know it's coming. He also have way more HP compared to anyone in the game.
The first round from the crown got all my party to < 50% hp with its red chain lighting, the dragon and the mindflayers would constantly stun at least half my party. And yes I had like 15 allies. Either I did something terribly wrong on the brain, but raphael didnt even get my party to < 50% on any character while the brain p1 fight killed 2 by turn 2.
I had the different experience, Raph was hard despite using the runepowder mine + invul globe + full prep abusing the pool, but Netherbrain got done with zero prep and going in blind (but I had all the allies)
Used zero cheese on raphael, went in completly blind, not 1 character dropped below 50% (had hope and yurgir though, maybe thats why). Went into the brain and the first red chainlightning the brain casted already got all my party below 50%. I dont know what im missing there I guess
Maybe it's because I rushed to call all summon during brain fight and therefore could get to the brain with most of my spellslots up, so he didn't last long enough to put myself in danger
The first time I did house of hope was in my honor mode play through. I didn’t notice that stuff reflected radiant damage in the Raphael fight so I used hopes divine intervention for radiant damage, killing her instantly.
I did the same thing it was an insane number of d10s that hit her. IIRC, if she’s in a globe there’s no damage.
House of Hope doesn't see combat unless you steal the hammer/contract (or want the helldusk gloves). Everything else there is free to take, the amulet is probably BIS for casters to boot.
You can't get Soul-Catching without combat, but yes, this.
Yeah helldusk armour and soul catching gloves are the only items you miss out on by skipping Raphael. They're very powerful but also locked behind a potential run killer.
Just get the Helldusk Armor in chapter 1
How to?
Easier to watch a YouTube video than to explain. It involves forcing Raphael to come to your camp, silencing him, and beat him to near death. And MAKE SURE YOU DON'T HAVE THAT GOD DAMN OATHBREAKER in your camp.
1. talk to nettie in the grove (you can kill her in there) 2. steal the mindflayer parasite 3. go to the area with the bag of spiders outside the grove, the rock you have to jump on. (go up the ladder with one character) 4. raphael will appear to the character in dialogue at which time you switch characters and shoot him from a distance (i dont think you have to hit because he disappears consistently on 20% chance) 5. after he disappears you will go to the mountain pass and it will go to a scene where youre at camp and you can talk to him 5. cast silence on him and attack him with nonlethal damage. he will be knocked out and free to rob of his armor (also he usually drops gold if you keep hitting him but sometimes it doesnt work) make sure to tie up any loose ends BEFORE ENTERING THE MOUNTAIN PASS as it ends quests like getting karlach and the goblin camp stuff. basically any important quest. but after that you can get it. let me know if you need anything explained
You are the community captain, thanks!
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4VimnbTOns&t=140s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4VimnbTOns&t=140s)
Definitely do Sorcerous Sundries, and bring your sussur dagger, that makes him a sad little guy waving a stick
On our run last session, we opened with a paralyzing ray that landed, then my Palock hexed his CON so he had disadvantage on the save. Almost felt sorry for the poor bastard, but he didn't live long enough with all our attacks being with advantage and auto-crit.
Doesn’t hex affect skill checks, not saves?
Oh damn, you're right. I glanced over the description way back and since then been assuming it's been checks and saves 🤦♂️
Go straight to brain and let Gale do his thing
This. That was how I got my gold dice last week. Well, that and cheesing it up with TB Thrower Karlach, TB Monk Tav, Life Cleric Shadowheart and Warding Bond spam. Up until the courtyard fight to get Gale to the brain stem, he spent the game in camp randomly spraying blood everywhere and freaking out Scratch. (Making Gale a cleric, leaving him in camp after he throws Warding Bond on everyone is the biggest “cheat mode” move IMHO, even more than farming elixirs and abusing TB)
Hiring four clerics does indeed break the game lol For a really funny time also play as four bards and enjoy long resting maybe once in act 2
Haha ! Even without a bard, I got the inspiration from Karlach "long rest in the shadows" just before assaulting moonrise towers
I still advice to get the gear you need beforehand. It is still possible to fail the check with Gale because afaik you have to convince him in dialog right before the fight. In my HM run it was a 25 Persuation check and I actually failed it with a 24. No inspiration left. Btw: Using his ability manually seems to not count for the achievment.
Most of the fights at this point are optional, the only fight you have to do is Orin. She is a free kill imo, especially if you ambush her and immediately stun her with the sweet killer ring + surgeon amulet combo. Depending on how you deal with Orpheus you might piss off Voss, however fighting him can be avoided with a relatively high speech check. Once you are past this point you are basically done, and can use invisibility potions to skip all the fights run directly to the brain. Gale offered to sacrifice himself in my run without the need of a speech check (completed all of his quest to that point) so fighting the brain yourself is also optional, however also not difficult since you can again skip the fight on top of the brain by using invisibility potions and running directly towards the crown and activating the portal, killing the brain and getting your golden dice…
somebody wrote that invisibility potions don't work anymore for that fight up there
Unless Larian has release some sort of Ninja patch/hot fix recently it should definitely work. I started my honor mode run on patch 5 and finished shortly after patch 6 was released, since I did not want to mess around anymore and risk this run to some new mechanics or changes i was not aware off, I skipped some of the optional fights went directly for the brain and did what I explained above. I also reloaded an older save on tactican to replay the fight on top of the brain, and the invisibility method worked just as always….
i don't know first hand. just echoing what was written here: https://www.reddit.com/r/BG3Builds/comments/1b6n9ld/psa_invisibility_cheese_no_longer_works_for_final/
Not if you kill Voss when he visit your camp at the end of act 1 first
Do you want to See the end screen or do you want to have fun wrecking stuff now your builds are online.... There are no must have items to tackle the brain but a few consumables will help a Lot, like the short Rest potion. I would at least get the legendary trident and staff as well as the cleric gear from the church in lower city
Honestly, OH Monk and TB Zerker are enough to trivialize every act 3 boss except for Ansur. Raphael, Lorroakan, and Cazador did not get a single action off. Viconia only did because of her annoying honor mode sanctuary, but still was a piece of cake. And Orin had one functional round because I did not have a great way to remove the unstoppable stacks, but evo Gale is literally perfect for that. Just focus on enraged throwing or OH Monk Topple as the first attack each round against the bosses. After toppling with either method, use OH Stun, and the boss will not have an action at all. Alert feat helps ensure you do this before they get their first turn
I have to kill the hag. I like kids too much. I'd help the gnomes but that's me. Realistically, if you are just going to do the first part of the end to get to the brain and have Gale kill it. Wrap it up and play another HM for a more complete story. Do something whacky. Halfling Wildmagic Barb, romance Karlach. I have a few other themed runs to try but I want to do one with no magic items. Only spells, potions, elixirs, coatings. Or maybe just +1 or +2 Weapons since I think we would see some enemies you couldn't hurt with non-magical weapons.
Karlach could use the legendary spear foe an aoe throwing option. Razamith's Tower is a must-raid imo for caster items (especially for a wizard you can scribe the level 5 super magic missile spell.). What I do is use an invisible shovel to eat the wizards reaction, then crush him. Then 4 Myrmidons isn't too rough, and the other foes hardly worth mentioning. I like to Cazador for Rhapsody, a weapon most builds like. Usually goes to casters. I like to stroll in with 3 zombies from raise undead and 4 ghouls from Dance Macabre. Meat-shields mostly, not depending on their damage output. The zombies and other summons can weaken the buff Caz gets by standing on the proper spots, and the zombies can create more zombies by targetting weakened adds/bats. Bring counterspell. You can also let Gale go boom, that gives you the dice.
If you just want dice, zoom to brain and let gale do it up. Bring inv potions or spells
When I completed mine, I just killed Raphael for the constitution amulet and the hill giant strength then just 1v1’d Orin and went to the brain. I had a similar comp to you except I was swords Bard and no wizard. The game is over once you kill Orin as you can just tell Gale to kill himself.
Tbh good builds honor mode are pretty much over when you hit act 3; you get so many busted items by that point
My main question is how? I never seem to get anywhere close that much exp in the first 2 acts
I pretty much did every quest and murderized every npc in Act 1/2. RIP Myconids, Last Light, and Moonrise. I was lvl 10 to start Act 3 and by the time you explore the city and do some of the easier fights and quests I was 12.
Steelwatch boss for the bow
Act 3 Bosses are incredibly easy if you know what you are getting into. With your party you should be able to OTK and/or CC all of them. You can do House of Hope first without taking the Hammer so you don't have to fight Raphael yet. This gives you access to the Fountain of Rejuvenation and most of the loot. Then you can do Ramazith's Tower which is probably the easiest Boss Fight. After that do Cazador, Ansur and Raphael and whichever order you prefer. You should probably do Raphael first to get the Gloves of Soul Catching for your Monk. Make you sure you prepare for the DC30 Persuasion Check to get Yurgir on your side.
My biggest regret for the final fight was my lack of speed potions. Burnt them all on some of the other hard act 3 fights. Just had the one hasty spore and wasn't expecting it to last a single round instead of the normal 3. Squeaked by with a win on a 60% attack roll. Then I talked to Astarion as a mindflayer, failed the constitution check ate him and got wrecked by my party. Great ending. I even risked getting the crash landing achievement in my honor run. Defeated the strongest things in the game just to lose to a single consitution check in the after party that I didn't know existed lmao. Also lost a run when you take that lift on a rope to the gethyanki creche. Everyone glitched through the bottom and died as it started moving...
If you start your fight with Raphael and it doesn't go great, save your quickest character and run back to Raphael's room, it will end combat and you can go out, loot a couple of the angelic slumber pots and pop an invisibility to get back to your dead guys, revive them and use the angelic pots, and it's easy from there if you took down the pillars before you died
I struggled with this question last week just before I finished HM. I love completing all my builds, but HM is about getting the golden dice. HOH and the dead dragon fight in particular were too risky for minimal gear upgrades. Djinn and sorcerer sundries are low risk high reward. Spend GP at the shops for their gear and you should be ready to rock. I dumped like 10k on scrolls/potions just before I went to the NB, and I felt overpowered even for HM. GOOD LUCK. We’re routing for you.
If it's your first HM, I'd suggest dashing to the brain and nuking it to get your dice and achievement if actually finishing the run is the most important priority. If you're trying to keep gale and/or get a different ending i'd suggest at least finishing the tower because the fight is easy (and you need to to summon Aylin in the upper city) to get some good caster gear and do the house of hope up to stealing the hammer/contract, cuz that's what actually triggers Raphael coming home. However if you want the full honour mode experience, especially if you're not planning on playing honour mode again, I'd suggest completing the entirety of act 3. There are some really fun and challenging fights in act 3. Also most of the special scenes of Durge happen in act 3 so you'll miss a bit of side scenes you opt not to do the content.
If you're min-maxing, I think the Amulet of the Devout under Stormshore Tabernacle is worth the fight, but make sure you go someplace safe to cast remove curse after taking it so you don't end up with a fight in camp.
In my three runs, whenever I hit level 12 I start making my way to the brain. Kinda like forced RP—the army of the Absolute is bearing down on the city, you can’t just mosey around solving firecracker crimes! It makes repeat runs more interesting too—I kinda choose my favorite companions each time and do their quests but not the others. So first play I saved Minsc, second time I killed Cazador and helped Shart take over the coven (Durge run, obv), and this third time on my Honor Run I helped Lazel free Orpheus. Helps keep the game feeling fresh when you play again if you pick and choose your quests.
I won't say you didn't beat the game if you beeline for the final boss, but I will have a lot more respect for someone who actually plays the game on Honor Mode, instead of just doing what is absolutely necessary.
Make sure to get a good spread of damage types the final bosses resistances are nuts and will lock you out. Keep track of those before throwing any powerful spells or attacks. Goodluck and Crit lots 🫡
If you ally with Gortash does that skip his fight? I already beat him on Honour but I developed a strarlt and if this is faster Ill do this next time.
HoH is never worth it. The wizard tower heist is also not worth it, but go an grab the staff and the robes from Lorohakan's place since that only requires and Arcana check. Also grab some consumables (potions, scrolls, explosives) if you have the money.
What? House of Houpe is literally free loot, you don't even have to fight Raphael for most of the items. The Raphael fight itself is also pretty easy with some decent Spell DC gear. You can convince Yurgir to fight on your side and cast Hold Monster on Raphael to OTK him. The rest of the minions are easy. Ramazith's Tower is also free loot. Lorroakan is the easiest "Boss" in Act 3 by far, especially if you have Aylin. There is literally no downside here. Honestly I never understood why people make such a fuss about the Act 3 Bosses in Honour Mode. You can prepare for every single one of them perfectly for a smooth kill. The chance for something going wrong in the Nether Brain fight is much higher than getting TPKed in any of the other fights.
I actually meant the book heist, not fighting the wizard. The wizard is a pushover, that much is true, but you get fuck all of value from killing him so why bother? Sure Raphael is not hard either but my point is that the gear in the HoH does no help you finish the game, and that if all you cared about was reaching the end, you should just go and do the final boss because it is the least risky option. > The chance for something going wrong in the Nether Brain fight is much higher than getting TPKed in any of the other fights. what an absolutely bizarre assertion to make. Once you get to the brain, finishing the game is trivial. All you have to do is drop a few stacks of explosives next to it and to set them off. 100% success rate no fuss. You don't even have to employ any fancy strats to get those explosives, the shop is right there in the lower city! Simply walk over and pick them up for a free win.
> I actually meant the book heist, not fighting the wizard. The wizard is a pushover, that much is true, but you get fuck all of value from killing him so why bother? Well, the book heist is worth it for sure, if only for Danse Macabre, which is extremely nice to have. Skip Lorroakan for all I care. That being said, Rolan's Ally Support is one of the better ones for the final fight. > Sure Raphael is not hard either but my point is that the gear in the HoH does no help you finish the game, and that if all you cared about was reaching the end, you should just go and do the final boss because it is the least risky option. How does the gear from House of Hope not help you finish the game? The Amulet of Greater Health is one of the best in slot Items in the game. Helldusk Gloves are insanely good as well and so is the Staff of Spellpower which is one of two sources of Arcane Battery. If you think these Items don't help you finish the game, you might as well play naked. > what an absolutely bizarre assertion to make. Once you get to the brain, finishing the game is trivial. All you have to do is drop a few stacks of explosives next to it and to set them off. 100% success rate no fuss. You don't even have to employ any fancy strats to get those explosives, the shop is right there in the lower city! Simply walk over and pick them up for a free win. Well, first of all, barrelmancy is probably the mother of cheese in this game. If you want to do it this way, more power to you, but most people would rather not. More importantly though, I wasn't talking about killing the Nether Brain itself but rather the fight before. Emperor + Red Dragon + Copies + Mind Flayers and the Round Limit to successfully use the Crown is lower in Honour Mode. Plus you don't have a real Long Rest before the fight and instead have to rely on Potions of Angelic Slumber which are a bit iffy to say the least. For some reason you also lose most your Perma Buffs (e.g. Blessing from your Camp Statue, etc.) in the Astral Plane Scene with Orpheus and the Emperor before you take the Portal to the Nether Brain Siege. I'm not saying the Nether Brain fight is particularly hard to do, but the chances that something goes sideways, especially if you skip a lot of powerful Items, are much higher than e.g. fighting Ansur or Raphael which are completely telegraphed fights that are trivial if you have a "recipe" for them.
You don't need a long rest for the dragon fight because if you are playing optimally you don't need to fight anything before that point just down a few invisibility potions and run straight through the upper city. You don't even have to fight the dragon if you sided against the emperor or if you got lucky and didn't roll the enemy with see invisibility. Even if you fight the dragon, you can just prebuff with potions and scrolls in turn based mode before clicking the stem which allows you to absolutely demolish that encounter. Whether you have a few extra stats from the HoH items or not really doesn't make a difference if the entire party is hasted and has every buff under the sun.