What.

[dragonsamurai77]

Temple of Elemental Evil: Trying to beat Zuggtmoy without Scather. Still have the Orb of Golden Death, so summoned a Balor. Then:

Casting spell: Slay Living
Spell Resistance failed!
Saving throw failed!

Zuggtmoy
DEAD!

...

...

:smallbiggrin:

[Calemyr]

Temple of Elemental Evil: Trying to beat Zuggtmoy without Scather. Still have the Orb of Golden Death, so summoned a Balor. Then:

Casting spell: Slay Living
Spell Resistance failed!
Saving throw failed!

Zuggtmoy
DEAD!

...

...

:smallbiggrin:

That is gorgeous. It sounds like something out of Monty Python.
"And then the DM/Programmer had a fatal hear attack... and the opponent was no more."

Try explaining that at the tavern later:
"So how'd you do it?"
"Er... got lucky? Really, really, really lucky?"

[Cespenar]

A similar thing had occurred to me as well, though in Icewind Dale II instead. There was this huge black dragon called The Guardian or something similar, which was supposed to be a pretty big boss fight, and my mage threw a Disintegrate spell. Dragon failed magic resistance, rolled a natural 1 on the save, which was the only way he would fail that roll, and simply vanished.

So I saved, reloaded the fight to take it down "fairly", failed twice, shrugged and loaded the winning save to continue from there.

[Fri]

A similar thing had occurred to me as well, though in Icewind Dale II instead. There was this huge black dragon called The Guardian or something similar, which was supposed to be a pretty big boss fight, and my mage threw a Disintegrate spell. Dragon failed magic resistance, rolled a natural 1 on the save, which was the only way he would fail that roll, and simply vanished.

So I saved, reloaded the fight to take it down "fairly", failed twice, shrugged and loaded the winning save to continue from there.

I think that's actually the 'easy' way to fight a lot of supposedly hard bosses, like that dragon, and the guys who have to beat to get the holy avenger. First time I played, those are such hard bosses that I have to beat with save and load. Second time, I now know that I can just spam disintegrate.

[DiscipleofBob]

In the first session of a 4th ed game, I managed to bull rush the solo boss off a cliff on my first turn.

[Cespenar]

I think that's actually the 'easy' way to fight a lot of supposedly hard bosses, like that dragon, and the guys who have to beat to get the holy avenger. First time I played, those are such hard bosses that I have to beat with save and load. Second time, I now know that I can just spam disintegrate.

Spamming disintegrate is actually not that good of a tactic in such a case. Considering the dragon has both a high SR and saves, and you need a 1/20 chance to pass only the save part itself, even spamming 10 disintegrates would give you a very low chance to succeed.

If the target had either of his defenses low or lacking, it could become a valid tactic.

[Wraith]

A similar thing had occurred to me as well, though in Icewind Dale II instead. There was this huge black dragon called The Guardian or something similar, which was supposed to be a pretty big boss fight, and my mage threw a Disintegrate spell. Dragon failed magic resistance, rolled a natural 1 on the save, which was the only way he would fail that roll, and simply vanished.

So I saved, reloaded the fight to take it down "fairly", failed twice, shrugged and loaded the winning save to continue from there.

I managed exactly the same thing in Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal. It was the fight against Abazighaal who, for those of you who don't know, is an epic level Half-Blue Dragon, Half-God....

The funny part was that I never usually have Disintegrate memorised nor do I leave the AI option active, so it all happened by accident. My character started to cast a spell automatically and *poof*! No more Dragon. It took me a surprisingly long time to figure out what happened.... And why I couldn't find the blue scales I wanted for my Blue Dragon-skin Armour..... *grumble*

[Cespenar]

I managed exactly the same thing in Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal. It was the fight against Abazighaal who, for those of you who don't know, is an epic level Half-Blue Dragon, Half-God....

The funny part was that I never usually have Disintegrate memorised nor do I leave the AI option active, so it all happened by accident. My character started to cast a spell automatically and *poof*! No more Dragon. It took me a surprisingly long time to figure out what happened.... And why I couldn't find the blue scales I wanted for my Blue Dragon-skin Armour..... *grumble*

Heh. It was probably Edwin then, who got up to here with all these dragons and stuff stealing his spotlight, and decided to do something about it.

[Wraith]

It was my Sorceror Protagonist, actually. I thought at first he was Contingency-casting his 9th level Magic Disks spell, as he usually did, but that day he decided that he was going to do it 'the easy way'!

[Fri]

Spamming disintegrate is actually not that good of a tactic in such a case. Considering the dragon has both a high SR and saves, and you need a 1/20 chance to pass only the save part itself, even spamming 10 disintegrates would give you a very low chance to succeed.

If the target had either of his defenses low or lacking, it could become a valid tactic.

Maybe... throw some finger of deaths as well :smallbiggrin:?

[Cespenar]

Maybe... throw some finger of deaths as well :smallbiggrin:?

In BG2, where you have spells that could lower spell resistance and such, it could have been viable. Actually, it is viable there, to lob a few of those and finish off the dragon with focused fire Magic Missiles (ideally from ~3 mages at once). :smallbiggrin:

But in IWD2, it's pretty much lottery.

[Starbuck_II]

Temple of Elemental Evil: Trying to beat Zuggtmoy without Scather. Still have the Orb of Golden Death, so summoned a Balor. Then:

Casting spell: Slay Living
Spell Resistance failed!
Saving throw failed!

Zuggtmoy
DEAD!

...

...

:smallbiggrin:

Bah, never used Scather.
I beat her the old fashioned way: Brutally (couldn't find a masterwork maul to break orb)!
I've never tried save or dies.

Against dragons in BG 2 I shapechange into a Mindflayer and eat their brains: kills everything.

[Cespenar]

Against dragons in BG 2 I shapechange into a Mindflayer and eat their brains: kills everything.

Mindflayer + Time Stop guarantees a win almost anytime, I think.

Though if 9ths are in question, my favorite is Time Stop x3 into Abi Dalzim x7. Hundred-some d8 damage in "one round".

[Douglas]

Reminds me of the time I was fighting Mephistopheles, end boss of the Neverwinter Nights expansion Hordes of the Underdark, and he failed a save against the dinky little DC 14 or so on-hit fear effect of my sword. I just sat there staring for a moment, going "wait, fear isn't on his immunities list?!?!?!", while the ridiculously powerful extreme-trash-talking Archdevil lord of the 8th level of Hell ran away from me for two rounds because he was scared.

[Closet_Skeleton]

I managed exactly the same thing in Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal. It was the fight against Abazighaal who, for those of you who don't know, is an epic level Half-Blue Dragon, Half-God....


Abasighaal is a wuss compared to his son Draconis who stands outside the dungeon and just spams that stupid annoying wing flap and knock everyone away move. I ended up killing Draconis with a cheat but beat Abazighaal normally.

[Cespenar]

Abasighaal is a wuss compared to his son Draconis who stands outside the dungeon and just spams that stupid annoying wing flap and knock everyone away move. I ended up killing Draconis with a cheat but beat Abazighaal normally.

True. My first time around, I quit the damn game on Draconis. Since then I learned stuff, but still.

[Wraith]

True. But hes also only one-quarter God, rather than a half-God: his father, if nothing else, gets you more bragging points. :smallbiggrin:

[Cespenar]

True. But hes also only one-quarter God, rather than a half-God: his father, if nothing else, gets you more bragging points. :smallbiggrin:

We don't know who Abazigal did it with, though. Draconis could be as much as 3/4-god for all we know. :smallbiggrin:

[Othesemo]

A similar thing had occurred to me as well, though in Icewind Dale II instead. There was this huge black dragon called The Guardian or something similar, which was supposed to be a pretty big boss fight, and my mage threw a Disintegrate spell. Dragon failed magic resistance, rolled a natural 1 on the save, which was the only way he would fail that roll, and simply vanished.

So I saved, reloaded the fight to take it down "fairly", failed twice, shrugged and loaded the winning save to continue from there.

Funny. That exact same thing happened to me. Eventually, I just started spamming disintegrate on every single boss in the game. Worked pretty well, all things considered.

[Cespenar]

Funny. That exact same thing happened to me. Eventually, I just started spamming disintegrate on every single boss in the game. Worked pretty well, all things considered.

Doesn't disintegrate erase all the loot, though?

[Othesemo]

Doesn't disintegrate erase all the loot, though?

Maybe- I don't remember. Loot never seemed like too prominent a focus in that game, though it has been a year or two since I played it.

[Eloel]

Temple of Elemental Evil: Trying to beat Zuggtmoy without Scather. Still have the Orb of Golden Death, so summoned a Balor. Then:

Casting spell: Slay Living
Spell Resistance failed!
Saving throw failed!

Zuggtmoy
DEAD!

...

...

:smallbiggrin:

I Phantasmal Killer'd Iuz in there. Yeah, fun times :smallsmile:

[Wraith]

Doesn't disintegrate erase all the loot, though?

If I remember 2nd Edition correctly, I *think* there's a percentile chance for each item (a pile of gold is one item, rather than 500+ individual coins) so you'd have to be really unlucky to get no items at all.

Murphy's Law dictates that the most valuable and/or useful items have a far more likely chance of being affected, however. :smallbiggrin:

[Cespenar]

If I remember 2nd Edition correctly, I *think* there's a percentile chance for each item (a pile of gold is one item, rather than 500+ individual coins) so you'd have to be really unlucky to get no items at all.

Murphy's Law dictates that the most valuable and/or useful items have a far more likely chance of being affected, however. :smallbiggrin:

My example was in IWD2, though. 3rd edition. If I'm not mistaken, the whole body simply disappeared, leaving no loot at all.