How to Beat Commander Zhalk and the Cambions in Honour Mode, Baldur's Gate 3

[@Marspaw-1]

One thing that never changes, Shadowheart can't hit with Sacred Flame to save her life

[@Melth]

Accuracy is painful in this fight in general, but Shadowheart always manages to be the worst!

[@HouseRavensong]

In one of the patches, they've seemed to tweak the Cantrip to have a SLIGHTLY better chance to hit.

[@Melth]

@@HouseRavensong hm. I'm not aware of any change. It seems to use the standard formula of enemies making a Dexterity save vs the caster's spell save DC. And as far as I know (other than karmic dice) the game doesn't manipulate the results of a d20 for different abilities

[@VikCachat]

With save or suck spells you need to consider what type of enemy you are targeting. Sacred flame misses more often than not at the start of the game due to goblins (high dex) being the most common opponent. I have started running bg3 now with 5e spells mod so I get access to toll the dead which targets con saves. So with both sacred flame and toll the dead I can usually hav a decent chance on any opponent.

[@Melth]

@@VikCachat that's certainly part of it, but another factor is that there are very few ways to boost your save DC compared to your attack accuracy. In this fight for example Zhalk's massive dexterity makes him hard to hit with either attacks OR sacred flame, but attacks still usually end up being more accurate because you can boost them with high ground, bless, faerie fire, daze, and so on. Pretty much the only way to improve Sacred Flame's accuracy is that it auto hits if Zhalk is stunned

[@kwdblade4683]

"Thrall, get to the helm!" Shoves mind flayer "Oh Thrall, I can't stay mad at you."

[@Melth]

@@kwdblade4683 the mindflayer's behavior in this fight is so silly! And it becomes even sillier once you get to the 'plot twist' at the end of the game that should make you re-evaluate how mindflayers have behaved throughout the story

[@kylewelch552]

The initiative order on the fight is incredible, a command character beating zhalk and then the rest of the party right after the mindflayer. I don't think you could ask for better init.

[@Melth]

Yeah, though I just checked the math and the important parts are more probable than I thought. With 16 Dex on the main Command user, he has about 40% to beat Zhalk in initiative. Shadowheart has about a 6% chance. So between the two of them, you're actually near 50-50 that someone with Command goes before Zhalk. The odds that SOMEONE with shove goes after the mindflayer, either a mage hand or Lae'Zel, is almost 100%. And that's all we need for this shove strategy to be operational. Anyone with Shove can do it since shoving the mindflayer is guaranteed to work

[@Styx1980]

@@Melth it's pretty much impossible if you dont get the opportunity attacks from the shove.. i've tried a few times now, when cambians spawn, Zhalk is still 100+ life

[@Melth]

@@Styx1980 I wouldn't say it's impossible; I did it my first time without opportunity attacks before I thought of the whole Shove thing. It does probably require spending more resources and time on Zhalk rather than moving on early to the second wave of imps and whatnot of course. Regardless, it's really easy to get Shove to work since all you need is any party member or a mage hand to go either after the mindflayer or before Zhalk. It's almost certain that one of your people will be in one of those initiative positions since Shadowheart and Lae'Zel and Mage Hand all have trash initiative

[@daviouscram2101]

@@Styx1980 I use bard for mage hand + fairer fire. everyone gets advantage for 10 turns it's a insane damage buff. but hella rng with ff and command.

[@davisparkour]

@@daviouscram2101 i use bard to also inspire the mindflyer

[@vixevinweria8400]

The best result I got in that fight on honor mode was killing everything but the last cambion, who was still over half health, and I was on the last turn with no resources, Lae'zel was down, and us was nearly dead. Can't believe I didn't think to bless before the fight, but I'm not surprised that I didn't think to use mage hand because I always underestimate the usefulness of that spell.

[@Melth]

That sounds like a very strong start! I bet with mage hand and bless you can do it

[@RobCrowley85]

"Triple miss, that's a new record" Lae'zel: Oh, please. Hold my inaccuracy 😂

[@Melth]

@@RobCrowley85 I don't have enough strength to carry her inaccuracy! There's so much of it that I'm now encumbered

[@DJET723]

Shadowheart : Y’all hear something

[@Karomix3]

Shadowheart: Hold my crown of missing Sacred Flame XD

[@Peatingtune]

I once ragequit a paladin run after missing pretty much every single smite attempt (while blessed) up until the grove. Really took the wind out of my sails. "Ohhhh this is going to be perfect - you're going to die you little bastard!" *miss*

[@Melth]

@@Peatingtune at least smites don't get wasted on a miss so you still have the spell slot, but yeah it's annoying how luck based early game d&d can be

[@DiabeticNecromancer]

I like the plop sounds the imps make when you throw them, satisfying.

[@Melth]

Me too! Throwing enemies in general is so fun that I often do it even when it's not the most efficient way to damage them

[@SillyGirlKisser74]

this videos is fantastic because, even though I spent 800 hours on BG3, OF COURSE I'M GONNA START AGAIN

[@Melth]

I certainly keep starting new runs too!

[@HikingFeral]

At 800hrs you are probably just starting to scratch the surface.

[@XSR_RUGGER]

I haven’t even made it to act 2! Nor the Creche and anything up that way 😂.

[@Sangheillioz]

I can't believe I never thought to use shove this way to get opportunity attacks on Zhalk, genius! In my latest honor mode run I had to cut and run while Zhalk was still alive, but this is a big game changer. Also didn't know about the caustic and void bulbs on the upper level when you first come in. Good stuff!

[@Melth]

Thanks! I hope these ideas help on your next run

[@356z]

On my second run I set the explosives up around him, but beat him so I didn't need them. But I forgot to grab the sword so I had to reload..... it took a really long time for the same result lol

[@leila13dnd]

I love how the mo here is just shoving the Mindflayer around like a nerd getting bullied in highschool.

[@Melth]

And the imp too!

[@elden_lord22]

Your BG3 content is so good learning a lot from your honor run looking forward to more from ya 🙂

[@Melth]

Thank you!

[@darkphoenix2]

I don't imagine I'll ever try to do this on Honor Mode. I've done it multiple times on Tactician and I know full well how much your success is dependent on the dice rolls. So I save scum, and really it's just a matter of remembering the right steps and how patient you're willing to be with reloading when you get a bad roll. My strategy, to put it as simply as possible: 1. Move Shadowheart as far as possible, Command drop. Lae'zel jumps and dashes to pick up the Everburn Blade immediately. My character does damage to the hellboar and then moves as close to Zhalk as possible. Us finishes off the hellboar then jumps to the crossbow Imp. Mage Hand starts moving the barrels towards the hallway. 2. From here, it's just a matter of getting to Zhalk ASAP and doing as much damage to him as possible through the Mind Flayer and opportunity attacks. The Mage Hand keeps moving the barrels turn by turn into the room where the Cambions actually spawn and will have time to position itself behind the further one to shove it closer to the barrels. At this point I just Fly it back into the room and drop the barrel on a part of the floor that's on fire (btw, I don't think I've ever seen that explosion at 10:55, that part of the floor in the Cambion spawn room is never on fire for me which is actually helpful for positioning the barrels). 3. Hopefully I've got Zhalk very nearly dead before the Cambions are able to make it down the hallway and into the room. I've left one imp from the start alive, so that the Mind Flayer moves towards that one and, therefore, towards the Cambions. I start moving my party ahead, trigger the extra enemies, and fight from on top of the stairs to kill those and chip away at the Cambions as the Mind Flayer goes to work on them thanks to a Speed potion. I have to get big damage with Shadowheart's Guiding Bolt, but the 20+ damage there, the 20+ from a Mind Blast, 20+ from Tentacle Lash, and 20+ from the barrel explosions is going to make the Cambions not nearly as hard to take down as it would seem. It's mainly just a matter of praying the Mind Flayer actually uses Mind Blast and hits both of them, though. That's about it. I get that Honor Mode changes some things but I feel like I've got this down to a science and I'm actually pretty proud of myself for figuring out how to do it. There's probably a very small percentage of people who have actually done this on the highest difficulties. But I completely understand why 😅

[@Melth]

Sounds like a solid approach there! And fairly similar except for using the mage hands to move the barrels to the cambions. That's effective, but it feels a bit too silly to me. After the initial Command: Drop there usually isn't all that much luck with my plan. I'd say after that point I'm at around 70% to win as a druid, and maybe 60% as a warlock. Of course it's frustrating needing to restart entirely on honour mode if Command: Drop fails, but it doesn't really take more than a few minutes anyway.

[@HouseRavensong]

This is a great video on how to learn the combat system early in the game. I wonder, is the XP for the 2 Cambion worth it?

[@Melth]

@@HouseRavensong ultimately the two cambions together are only worth 150 XP, with Zhalk and the Mindflayer bringing the total up to 300. That's nice, and will get you to level 3 super fast, but it's not a big deal beyond that. Most creatures other than goblins give enough XP that a lot of random battles will provide you more XP than the cambions. XP in BG3 is very much about quantity rather than quality of enemies. Huge bosses are often worth barely anything, while a tiny kobold can be worth 75 and come in packs

[@darkphoenix2]

@@HouseRavensong Well, I actually think of it as the 2 Cambions and the Mind Flayer, since if you're only going as far as killing Zhalk, you'll leave the Mind Flayer alive too. So that's another 75 XP. You'll be level 2 before you even get off the ship, and you can hit level 3 as early as after killing Gimblebok's crew in the ruins. I also don't look at it as just the XP, but the loot too. Good chunk of gold and a decent chance at useful items.

[@HouseRavensong]

@@darkphoenix2 I've been using the nautiloid tanks to kill Zalk and the Mind Flayer together, not worrying about the Cambions. I go to the Grove Battle before the Ruins so that I'm at least Lvl 3 before Gimblebok.

[@konferansjer]

i am truly impressed with the level of creativity you presented here. Definitely gave me a few ideas for my next playthrough (8th that would be). Congratulations!

[@Melth]

Thank you, and good luck with your playthrough!

[@Alirion144-jx4uj]

Great guide! I guess with the "surviving" imp, each class can do it on honour mode :) I also have two minor suggestions for optimization: - 2 rounds for preparations outside the helm door can be used even more efficiently, as US can use the pod in the first prep round after the buffs/hands. So everyone can use dash in the second prep round. You can also set your least important weapon (melee for shadowheart, bow on lae'zel) on fire in the first prep round und the more important one in the second prep round. Usually, I also switch Lae'zel to 2 scimitars. So you can do a fire offhand attack on Zhalk before equiping the Hellsword with the action and have higher chances to kill the hellboar with her. - You can prep the nautiloid tanks without the explosion to happen and can only trigger it after the cambions are there. This explosion does good damage on one of them too. I managed to get away with shadowheart afterwards too (hiding, jumping away and next round shooting the barrels). Please keep up your good stuff :)

[@Melth]

Some interesting ideas! I don't think I'd like to do double scimitars on Lae'Zel for this fight though. Her ability to reroll both weapon damage and fire damage on her longsword if she 2 hands it+ her bonus action pommel attack that can daze Zhalk if you're lucky are more useful in my opinion. Especially since she can't add her strength to her offhand attack, so it's just 1d6+1d4 fire Good idea about triggering the hallway explosion when the cambions are actually in it. I would be comfortable trying that in runs where I have a druid or a bard, so that I can either guaranteed long jump to safety or can use the Bard's hand crossbow weapon action to shoot the barrels while dashing away

[@Alirion144-jx4uj]

Okay, Not in every run there are good odds to succeed… in a Shadowheart run it is Nearly impossible due to the missing third party member…

[@Melth]

@@Alirion144-jx4uj yeah, a Shadowheart run might be the very worst for this. At least Lae'Zel gets a spare githyanki ally. It might still be possible with extreme luck, but it'd be rough

[@Alirion144-jx4uj]

At last, succeeded with shadow heart… but I think it was at least the tenth try! :) What u most of all need: some misses from the cambions… you also have 2 heal potions less in comparison! Thx again for the great guide! Hard to wait for your next hell run vids…. looking forward to them :)

[@Melth]

@@Alirion144-jx4uj nice job winning as Shadowheart

[@FluffiestWalrus]

Fantastic video! It’s great to see you dabble in making guides that don’t use your specific ruleset. As much as I enjoy that run, I doubt it will be very relatable as a guide - so something like this is perfect!!

[@Melth]

Thank you, I thought similarly about my run being fun for me but not the kind of challenge many people would want to do

[@ShandrensCorner]

Nice one! Thanks for the shout-out as well!

[@Melth]

Any time!

[@mrfamilyfriendly4370]

28:20 Sacred Flame hits the first time, the crowd goes wild

[@Melth]

An amazing rarity. Like finding a shiny pokemon!

[@RevanLegend]

Cambions loot was nerfed in patch 6, can't provide link since yt is deleting my comment when I do that 🤣 Anyway in "Level Design" part there is a "Tweaked the loot dropped by the cambions who join in on the fight on the nautiloid." line if someone wants to check by themself. Anyway I have no clue why they did that since pre nerf loot (300+ gold per Cambion + some more or less useful mixtures) was super nice to have at the start of the game but still nothing too crazy or game breaking. And I like the idea of rewarding players greatly when they beat great challenges and that's how killing these 2 guys should be seen.

[@Melth]

What an annoying and silly change! There certainly should be a decent reward for killing these guys, and it's not like getting 300 gold and a couple of random elixirs was OP. Especially given that most elixirs are trash and most of the good ones are either purchasable or stealable or both as soon as you get to the Emerald Grove

[@jamesrank9611]

Did they patch the chest blocking the enterence?

[@bambo3631]

@@jamesrank9611 No

[@XSR_RUGGER]

@@jamesrank9611nope. I just did that on two new runs last week and this week.

[@jamesrank9611]

@XSR_RUGGER yeah i guess I miss remembered what door to block

[@socalminstrel]

This is a great video. You think very tactically and are great about exploiting every resource available to you. I subscribed and plan to watch more of your BG3 content!

[@Melth]

Thank you, I'm glad you enjoyed the video so much!

[@rialblabla]

The guide was amazing, very fun and nice playthrough found some new tricks even after 600 hours on the game keep at it!

[@Melth]

Thank you, I'm glad you liked it!

[@cannyvalley8522]

My mind flayer sucked so badly, it missed a lot and never attempted mind blast, I had to settle with picking up Everburn blade and dealing finishing blow to mind flayer, and running away with my life, Zhalk I could barely scratch. (I'm on tactician if it matters, don't @ at me)

[@Melth]

The Mindflayer randomly choosing whether to mind blast or attack, and whether it hits, is certainly a major luck factor in the fight. Sometimes you'll be really lucky and he'll intelligently blast both Cambions or something. Sometimes he forgets he even has the move and never uses it after the first turn (when I think he's scripted to)

[@Ninjasoulz]

Never seen mage hand used so... Usefully. Lol Ill definitely keep its uses in mind now for sure, because the mage hands easily played a crucial role in the fight.

[@Melth]

@@Ninjasoulz they're quite handy! Well worth bringing to any fight which is likely to be many rounds long

[@dakotasherlin6527]

Saw one guy stack the three chitinous chests on top one another before the sphincter before the fight. Causing the spawned in cambions to waste their turns trying to break the chests. Good thing those chests have the sturdy condition. Used that on my game and worked suprisingly well, giving me a chance to defeat Zhalk. Also, I don't know if I'm very lucky or it's deceptively programmed to fail because of player creativity on Command Drop. Cuz, I always succeed them.

[@Melth]

There are several ways you can block the cambions or even kill them without a fight, like having one of your characters not enter the fight and be waiting in sneak mode in the shadowheart room. Then when the cambions spawn and get into turn mode, you can endlessly shoot them from long range while they're in turn based mode and you're not. But I wanted this to be a guide about how to battle them fair and square for a challenge. As for the command drop, you're getting lucky. I've certainly failed command drops against him quite often and had to restart as a result

[@MrScotty5168]

"you're a very articulate boar I must say" had me DYING!

[@Melth]

Just like the boar a few seconds later!

[@alanlinforth8418]

I'm coming towards the end of my first playthrough now, new to DnD so finding it hard - currently on explorer. I learned so much from this video and looking forward to instantly starting again, upping the difficulty and trying to utilise some on the stuff shown here (hands, throw, shove and the environment) - awesome!

[@Melth]

@@alanlinforth8418 good luck! This is one of the hardest things to do in the entire game though, so don't worry if you can't jump up from explorer to killing the cambions

[@TheNemesis442]

you don't have to kill the cambions, you can just kill the commander and take his sword. if you bring the 2 chests you loot before this encounter, you can drop them in the center of the door where Melth put the explosive "barrels", and that will keep the cambions blocked. the cambions will just attack the chests doing 0 dmg on them.

[@xdgamesCoUk]

This was so good, made the team based / turn based combat look so much more interesting than it actually is lol!

[@Melth]

Glad you liked it! I generally enjoy the game's combat except that it gets too easy

[@abrahamlewizard3627]

seeing your action economy is beautiful

[@Melth]

@@abrahamlewizard3627 thank you! I'm certainly proud of my tactics in this (and most other) battle, making use of all my actions as often as possible

[@brokenmeats5928]

I love ALL Melth videos!

[@Melth]

Thank you, as ever!

[@RPGFan253]

I don't know how you do it. I use the same strategies but my allies can't hit anything and my enemies can't miss. I use all of my health potions on the mind flatrr, but he still goes down with Zhalk still having a healthy chunk of HP. And Lae'zel misses literally all of her opportunity attacks. After so much frustration, it's really great to watch someone clear this room :)

[@Melth]

It definitely takes a bit of luck, but if you're having trouble killing Zhalk before the mindflayer dies, something is wrong. Once you equip his sword, Zhalk should be the easy part. If you miss a few attacks, then spend more time attacking him before moving on to trigger the appearance of the next group of enemies.

[@RPGFan253]

@@MelthThanks, I'll try that. Maybe I'm triggering the ads too soon. A bigger problem is how do I keep the cambipns from one shotting my party. They seem to ignore the mind flayer

[@Melth]

@@RPGFan253 the cambions will definitely try to ignore the mindflayer whenever possible, which makes them very dangerous. The best strategy, when possible, is to make sure the mindflayer is constantly in melee with both of them. You can use Void Bulbs to pull them together (I think I showed that pretty well in my other video of this battle). Or Shove or things like that. The cambions will not *usually* fly away from melee with the mindflayer because they don't want to give the mindflayer a free attack of opportunity against them. That's not to say they *never* choose to fly away from the mindflayer though, it does remain a danger.

[@Zarosu123]

On my best attempt, with Zhalk nearly dead, one of the cambions spawning decided to blast the nautiloid tanks right after turning the corner.

[@Melth]

@@Zarosu123 yeah they sometimes blow themselves up or blow the tanks up randomly! If one is willing to be cheesy, it IS possible to use a mage hand and magic pockets to drop the barrels around them without them ever having a chance to attack first. But I don't usually want to abuse tricks like that

[@insomniac0095]

I love how you play the game in a way that utilizes all the mechanics. I've been perfecting soloing honor mode as gloomstalker-assassin (without barrelmancy or skipping any fights). But this makes me want to go back to having a full party again and not relying on stealth ambushing as much. I should pick up a wall of fire scroll at least, since soloing this fight is pretty hard due to not being able to avoid taking hits even if you clear the field every turn.

[@PalleRasmussen]

I did not know Potion of Speed could affect more than one person. Thank you.

[@Melth]

It's a valuable trick with almost any potion in this game. You can use it to heal multiple people, haste multiple people, invisibility multiple people, and so on. One catch to watch out for: the AoE healing/speed/other effect works as a cloud. You'll never see the cloud if someone is in it to trigger it immediately, but you can see it if you throw a potion at an empty location to then walk through later or something. Anyway, the reason this matters is that the game only allows 1 cloud effect at a given location at a given time. So if there is, for example, a fog cloud in an area then throwing potions in that area will just waste the potion with no effect because the fog cloud will override the potion cloud. Likewise if there's Darkness in an area because that counts as a cloud, and so on.

[@PalleRasmussen]

@@Melth I come from the TTRPG where such does not work. And from real life reenactment fighting and military. I suspect that limits my fantasy somewhat. Does it work with Elixirs also?

[@Melth]

@@PalleRasmussen elixirs are different. A few elixirs can be thrown, but most can't be

[@PalleRasmussen]

@@Melth I see. Have you tested any of Colby's builds?

[@Melth]

@@PalleRasmussen no, I haven't heard of him. I like making my own builds anyway

[@HouseRavensong]

Thanks - interesting insight on how to use Opportunity Attacks. Devils arrive in Round 10. I use the cartilaginous chests to block the tunnel - that leaves devils with fire damage, and takes them a few rounds before they figure out the fly over. I let Lae Zel die on the Nautiloid. I can then rez her on the beach which gets you quick Inspiration from Shadow Heart.

[@Melth]

One can definitely have an easier battle by blocking the devils with a chest. For me though, that would diminish the fun of having one really big battle, and would make it feel more like 2 separate ones. (Not to mention it feels very silly in character to just watch the flying creatures get blocked by a waist-high fence)

[@HouseRavensong]

@@Melth Not waist-high. There are three chests available. put two on the ground in the narrowest part of the tunnel, and then put the third on top of them. ;o) But I get your point. I wonder if Larian expected players to get through this encounter as fast as possible (timer). How the player community has approached this battle shows the great innovation and imagination of the player base.

[@admontblanc]

@@HouseRavensong given that they gave us enough time to dilly dally about this section I'd say they made it easy enough for any level of skill player to easily advance through this section, while also leaving enough wiggle room for anyone wanting to take on the challenge.

[@HouseRavensong]

@@admontblanc "Dilly Dally". Now that is a colloquialism I haven't heard in a long time. I believe the developers / designers gave us the long stretch because it is part of the 'tutorial' phase of the game.

[@RovingPunster]

1:39 Uh, Command seems to have been replaced with Tasha's Laughter in the initial level 1 spell choices for warlock.

[@Melth]

@@RovingPunster Command is a spell for FIEND warlocks only. That's why I pick Fiend here 👍

[@RovingPunster]

@Melth Ah, ty. +1 👍

[@RovingPunster]

​​​@@MelthNEW PROBLEM: Mage Hand is disabled and a red popup says "cant be cast while your new parasite adjusts". Is that a patch 7 tweak to prevent mage hand abuse in the opening scenes on the nautiloid ?😖 No mage hand moves the fight you depict from 50:50 to nearly impossible.

[@Melth]

@RovingPunster mage hand is only disabled in the first part of the nautiloid

[@RovingPunster]

@Melth Thx again.

[@Frazec_Atsjenkov]

On my last honor run, I got the last Cambian to 12hp and the Mindflayer to 3hp... It was the first time I was close to succeeding. I was pretty unlucky as well. Your video was helpful, and I learned some things that will be useful in the rest of the game.

[@Melth]

Thanks, I hope it helps with your next run

[@Dyne191]

Awesome, I usually cheese this fight with a fighter and the archery bonus using out of combat shenanigans. Don't like to do it but too many things can go wrong in this fight

[@Melth]

Yeah, there are some reliable but cheesy ways to beat these guys without a fight. But having tough battles is half the fun in this game I'd say, so I wouldn't want to skip one like this

[@DrXtoph]

Really excellent! When I saw your last, there was some bad luck and the cambions didn't go down, so this made me hopeful that I could do it too!

[@Melth]

Good luck!

[@ssheeessh]

Nice!! My personal best without guides was zhalk, a cambion, and the mind flayer. I love your use of mage hand! Also I didn't know you could throw imps haha.

[@Melth]

That's a good start! I bet you'll be able to take out both Cambions now. Throwing enemies is sometimes useful in this game as a way to move them in places where you can't get a Shove angle lined up. It's a decent control option for very high strength characters or when fighting small foes like goblins!

[@nepereta3]

Thanks for the strats: Almost got it.. left a mindflayer with about 20hp and a battered imp on the final round. I think a pot of speed would of been great for this but didn't roll one though. Good to loot the big demons though.

[@Melth]

@@nepereta3 very well done! Sounds like a potion of speed would have tipped the scales for you mostly likely

[@Synthia17]

I started my first honor run today with a dragonblood fire sorcerer and I wish I've seen this video, all I managed to do was to get the sword but I guess it's something. When I fail, I'll know what to do at least. One thing I seem to have issues is to properly manage action economy, I always waste my bonus actions on the mage hands. Thanks for the imp/flayer tip, I always wondered why he never turns on other people and does on me when I kill the commander, I learned a lot!

[@Melth]

Good luck with your run! Mastering action economy and getting good at finding a use for every action of every character every turn is certainly one of the most important steps of getting good at this game (or 5E in general)

[@alexg3911]

I did Monk when I played honour mode. Just finished a draconic bloodline fire sorcerer playthrough (not honour) and found it to be a bit underwhelming due to the lack of single target spells and cool fire spells in general at higher levels, had to stick to hold person + scorching ray for most of the game. While it works pretty good it got a bit boring after a while

[@nergal9668]

13:33 in the same way that they prefer to attack each other, I think they prefer to fight where they were originally standing, resulting in him taking this opportunity attack

[@Melth]

Yes, that's part of it. But whereas fighting each other appears to be their top priority, moving to somewhere close to their original positions only sometimes happens. Not sure why, because they're sometimes content to battle quite far from their original area

[@honeybane3743]

Nicely done! Thanks for sharing.

[@Melth]

Glad you liked it! Good luck if you try something like this

[@TheGreendaleHumanBeing]

A 40 minute tutorial on the 10 minute intro is wild

[@Melth]

@@TheGreendaleHumanBeing without a tutorial, winning this battle can easily take hours!

[@TheGreendaleHumanBeing]

@@Melth no I get it. It just shows how difficult honor mode is.

[@Dorumin]

2:00 14 dex on everyone but the rogue, take it or leave it lol

[@Melth]

Leave it! Nothing but 16 and up will do until one gets the gloves of dexterity

[@Marianojoey]

For me, it was very educational to understand how to use the mage hand and the healing thingies around the Nautiloid. I thought they were only for healing, never occured to me that they worked as long rests. :D Anyway, cool fight. :D

[@Melth]

@@Marianojoey thanks, I'm glad to hear it was helpful!

[@sbattepac]

Nice one. I think that once the cambions engage with the mind flayer, you can safely remove the last imp - worked when I did a few months ago and was useful in terms of action economy with potions throwing as my damage was a bit worse than this.

[@Melth]

In my experience, that is *usually* safe but not always. Once in a while the mindflayer may suddenly decide it wants to provoke attacks from both cambions to fly over and mind blast your whole team, for example.

[@RazielTheUnborn]

​@@MelthI have experienced this multiple times. Once Zhalk died all three would rush the party.

[@Melth]

@@RazielTheUnborn it's definitely possible to get it to work though if you use plenty of things like Void Bulbs to keep them together, and make sure not to make your party members be tempting targets. I made it work on my 9 Hells Run

[@RazielTheUnborn]

@@Melth Was watching this while starting up an origin run. Not gonna attempt it this time but good info to know in the future

[@Melth]

@@RazielTheUnborn good luck with your run!

[@pixelgriefer1880]

tip, to block the doorway the one big chest beside the body holding the rune for Shart is more then enough and can't be destroyed by them, if you want more safety you can also put the small gold chest beside it

[@SIGP226]

The way you said lacerate made me giggle 😅

[@mcmendez03]

Thanks for demonstrating how to use mage hand, I wasn't utilizing it at all 😂 mindblowing what these hands can do

[@Melth]

@@mcmendez03 they're REALLY good in the early game in particular. In any fight that will take numerous rounds, they can contribute a lot by throwing javelins from high ledges, throwing bombs, pushing weak enemies off cliffs, etc.

[@Leongon]

I imagine when you don't have anything for the hands to do you could simple drop some daggers or axes for them to add more damage. But thanks for the tips, I never thought of using shove to separate them and get reaction attacks in, that's smart.

[@Melth]

I used to drop throwing axes for the hands to use, but ultimately decided that's only worth it when fighting imps or hellboars. Against Zhalk or the Cambions, the mage hands have a tiny chance to hit, and their 1d6 damage is halved too, resulting in an average damage of less than 1 per throw. So throwing random axes at Zhalk/Cambions doesn't seem worth the time

[@onedreh]

NEAATT videoo, i learn so much here

[@Melth]

I'm glad to hear it helped!

[@johnprater3729]

Keeping the imp alive is a great tip. What about casting Protection G/E on the flayer to tank the cambiens? I would also hex whatever saving throw they make against mindblast.

[@Melth]

So Protection from G/E OR Shield of Faith can both be decent buffs on the mindflayer and are roughly equal in this situation. The trouble though is that they require concentration, which would mean no Bless in this case. And that's definitely not worth it. Bless is really important so we actually hit Zhalk and the Cambions. If your main character is a cleric or something then you can certainly have him do Bless while Shadowheart does Protection from Good and Evil or something. As for Hex, that's a common misconception about how it works. Hex doesn't affect saving throws. It only affects skill checks basically. And no skill checks ever matter in combat except Athletics (STR) and Acrobatics (Dex) to resist shove. So basically the only thing you should ever is hex Str on high Strength enemies or Dex on high Dexterity enemies

[@JohnVanderbeck]

Learned a lot from watching this even if I'm not up to playing on the higher levels yet. Question: Why did you jump/fly around a lot instead of just walking?

[@Melth]

So you should *always* fly if you can. Flying always goes at minimum twice as far as walking with the same amount of movement speed. I wish the game just defaulted to flying for any character that can do it, because it's *always* better than walking. Jumping is a bit less consistent. Generally speaking, you can gain a small amount of total movement distance in a round if you jump. You get a LOT of extra total movement if you jump with good strength, but even for low Strength characters, jumping makes you slightly faster. Later on in the game, of course, you don't want to spend your bonus action on jumping. You want to spend it on attacking or casting spells. But right now at the beginning of the game, jumping is usually the best bonus action available to me

[@JohnVanderbeck]

@@Melth interesting. My only real experience with flying has been with spiritual weapon, and I mostly just stopped doing it because it often seemed to give me LESS movement range in most cases. I guess I need to pay attention to both of these more often while playing to see how they work.

[@dylanh8163]

Two things: one, this is exactly the kind of content I’m looking for, I just beat my honor mode run and now I need to consume people playing it the hard way, and two are your fans called Melth addicts?

[@Melth]

Thanks, glad you're enjoying this! A few fans over the years have called themselves Melthheads, so I guess that's the term to use!

[@felipekiritschenko]

I'm revisiting this video and I was wondering, does it matter if I use the astral knowledge strength in lae'zel/giths for better shoving probability in honour mode or it kinda doesn't?

[@Melth]

@@felipekiritschenko good question. That won't help LaeZel because LaeZel already HAS proficiency with Athletics (the shoving skill). It could indeed help a githyanki character who DOESN'T already have proficiency in Athletics. On the other hand, since shove success is guaranteed against the mindflayer, it might not matter much

[@felipekiritschenko]

@@Melth thank you! I'm loving to learn bg3 and D&D mechanics as I'm kinda new to RPG as a whole :)

[@Melth]

@@felipekiritschenko enjoy! I think BG3 makes some good improvements to the 5E rules

[@donnycharles7697]

I looked at a few of the comments and no one said it as far as I can tell, but you only need to pass that initial Dex check for Us. You don't have to do any of the second checks to get Us as a companion.

[@Melth]

However, if you fail the Dex check you can't try anything else with that character. And Shadowheart and Lae'Zel both have trash dexterity so they're not good backups if your main character fails. On the other hand, there's no risk to trying to investigate. If you succeed you can do a medicine check with advantage. If you fail, you can still try the Dex check. So it's simply better to at least try and unlock the medicine check if you want to maximize your chances.

[@autumn50475]

btw, im pretty sure hex only applied to ability checks and not attack rolls / saving throws, which means it doesnt really matter whst version of hex you use

[@Melth]

@@autumn50475 that's exactly why it DOES matter here! The only thing Hex affects is ability checks. And the only ability checks that come up in battle ever in this game are Strength (athletics) to shove/resist being shoved and Dexterity (Acrobatics) to resist being shoved. You want to hex whichever one of those stats they are better at, so as to make shoving them easier.

[@TheOneAndOnlyJell_O]

27:59 I just want to point out that he had a 50% to hit each attack and he missed 3 times. Classic Baldur's Gate

[@ndorfinz]

Something to note, you might get more reliable damage from Shadowheart if you walk her up to the top of the stairs for that amazing +10% range attack high-ground bonus.

[@Melth]

That brings her accuracy from a terrible 30% to a still bad 40%, dealing (1d8+1)/2 = 2.5 average damage on a hit. Regardless of high ground, with sacred flame she has a 40% chance to hit for 1d6 = 3.5 average damage So, unless I can do something to boost her weapon damage (dipping in fire only makes it a tie), it's better to just do sacred flame, and high ground doesn't matter for sacred flame

[@ndorfinz]

@@Melth Dang, I forgot about the resistance - ignore me :P

[@HellishSpoon]

Getting such huge milage out of mage hand is awesome

[@Melth]

It's a great spell! I certainly get a lot of use out of it in major early game fights like battling the hag (having mage hands throw void bulbs in a great way to guaranteed kill 2-3 illusions) or throwing objects down at the ogres

[@kev_sen]

Have you tried heroism + bless on the mindflayer?

[@Melth]

Bless yes, you can see me do that in this very video. Heroism no. If I had more spell slots I'd definitely consider it because that +5 temp HP per round can certainly help the mindflayer survive. But I think I'd usually rather use my spell slots for offense essentially, with things like restoring Bless if it's lost or Faerie Fire if I have an appropriate class or maybe a Command to make a cambion provoke multiple AoOs Usually the way one 'loses' this fight is failing to do enough damage to kill the Cambions in time, rather than failing to keep the mindflayer alive

[@Raizun]

I usually use bard and cast Faerie Fire on Zhalk to give everyone advantage on attack rolls, it makes so easy to kill him.

[@Melth]

Yeah, Druids and Light Clerics can do that too. I did it with a bard at the start of my challenge run But killing Zhalk is the easy part. The hard part is getting the 2 cambions. Faerie Fire is great for them too, but they have a decent chance to make their saving throws and resist it.

[@Daggroth]

If you like mage hands you can save some effort of drag and dropping with the arcane trickster permanent mage hand. You can pickpocket items into his inventory

[@Melth]

@@Daggroth fun, but if I'm taking levels in rogue I definitely want to go Thief rogue instead for the bonus actions

[@Shamnolya]

That was very impressive. I play like a monkey so it's great to see advanced player like you in action.

[@Melth]

I hope my tips are helpful!

[@wayyytoomuch]

so is it even worth killing everything else or should i just go for the sword? and can you just make zhalk drop the sword and take it or do you havew to kill him to take it? im new to this game

[@Melth]

@@wayyytoomuch so the main point of killing all of them is for glory. It's a really tough and challenging fight, and therefore fun if you're trying to challenge yourself. The reward isn't that good. You can just make Zhalk drop the sword, grab it, and run. There's no need to kill him However, the sword is massively overrated. A lot of beginners think it's great, but it's pretty useless after this one fight. The sword is only really, really good here because we need a magic weapon to damage Zhalk, and the sword is the only magic weapon available

[@dylanspohler8292]

How do you carry over the concentration for Hex? Im on console, is that only doable on pc?

[@Melth]

I'm not aware of any difference in concentration between PC and console. What happens when you use the nautiloid restoration pods?

[@StrifeA217]

You can also shoot the red bulbs on the celing that fall and explode.

[@Melth]

True, but iirc they spatter caustic brine everywhere. And caustic brine can cause more problems for me than the enemy by blowing up and throwing cambions/the mindflayer into new positions

[@Minecraftxpo]

I think a better use of shadow heart would be her crossbow over sacred flame. I think its a 65% chance to hit with the bow over the 45% with the cantrip and those odds + dipped weapon are better than a cambion with 18 dex doing a saving throw.

[@Melth]

@@Minecraftxpo unfortunately, her hit chance isn't even close to 65% with the bow. Shadowheart starts with a godawful 13 dexterity, so she only has +3 to hit against his 18 AC. That's a 30% chance to hit. You can boost that with Bless or high ground, but blessing her means NOT blessing someone more valuable, so it's not worth it. High ground helps a bit toward the end of the battle but isn't really available at the beginning since she needs to stay near the entrance to set up barrels Plus of course Zhalk resists crossbow damage and fire damage but doesn't resist radiant damage

[@Fudge55]

great vid! made it easy! but how did u unarmed Zhalk? how did he drop the everburning blade

[@Melth]

I cast Command: Drop on him Getting access to that spell is one reason I went Fiend Warlock (Shadowheart can get it too, but it's good to have extras)

[@DavidPan]

I have a curiousity question. Do you think you can do this using the Shadowheart origin character when you're one NPC short?

[@Melth]

Yes, but it would require a lot more luck and be very annoying!

[@fernandollanos4756]

You really are a tactician master in this game.

[@Melth]

@@fernandollanos4756 thank you, I hope some of my tips are helpful for refining your own strategies

[@Chonus]

A good way to make the mind flayers mind blast more consistent is to use faerie fire, it adds allot of dmg over the fight.

[@Melth]

Faerie Fire (and Bless) both help a lot with making the Mindflayer's tentacle attack hit! So I agree Faerie Fire is very good here. That's one reason I said Druid is a great class for this fight. However, neither of them help with Mind Blast. Mind Blast doesn't actually do an attack roll to hit. Instead the enemy makes an Intelligence saving throw to negate the damage.

[@Chonus]

@@Melth Interesting, I wonder if hexing int would work.

[@Melth]

@@Chonus sadly no, that's something people get confused about a lot. Hex does NOT give disadvantage on saving throws with the chosen ability. Hex gives disadvantage with CHECKS using the chosen ability. In 5E/BG3 'checks' basically means 'skill rolls'. So hexing someone's intelligence would make them bad at rolling Arcana... but that doesn't really matter in a fight. Pretty much the only skills that matter in fights in this game are Athletics and Acrobatics to shove or avoid getting shoved. So it's usually best to Hex Strength or Dexterity to target those.

[@RevanLegend]

When I saw that we are fighting Zhalk (which is IMO one of the best fights if not the best fight in the game) for a moment I was worried that something bad went to 9 hells run and we are starting again xD

[@Melth]

It's certainly one of the best fights because of the difficulty! Though OTOH it's also one of the most frustrating, because there aren't many ways to make it less luck based.

[@Jayboyd1260]

Is this possible as Vengeance Paladin Durge? I keep trying and I can't get the two cambions... I feel it must be possible but I just don't know

[@Melth]

@@Jayboyd1260 paladin is one of the worst classes for this, with no useful features or abilities for this fight. So it's possible but it's pure luck. You'd be better off starting as a class which is actually good at this fight and then re-speccing to paladin when you meet Withers

[@punkypony5165]

Great build!

[@Melth]

Thank you!

[@SimonGrandell]

I found one more way to get more damage have the warlock dual wield (I think you can always loot a shortsword). For bonus action attack triggers hex and if stupid mode is toggled ON another attack of opportunity for more hex dmg.

[@Melth]

@@SimonGrandell that kind of works, though a warlock isn't proficient with the short sword by default, so you'd end up with a quite inaccurate attack. I think to optimize it, one could play as a wood elf to get proficiency and a speed bonus.

[@SimonGrandell]

@@Melth Yes wood elf is exactly what i played. With races that aren't proficent with short swords you put the shortsword in the main hand and the dagger in the off hand.

[@BladieBlaat-j8g]

I did this once, during the beta of Act 1 years ago (not on the hardest difficulty). But I'm currently wondering, what the point is of killing everything besides the XP you get and the challenge it brings? For example, will it affect the story or some side stories later on? I recently bought the game and I'm currently almost done in Act 1, so would like to know for when I finish the game and start a new run.

[@Melth]

@@BladieBlaat-j8g it's all about the glory and challenge for me. The XP reward may feel big at level 1 but it's the same as fighting a few kobolds by the time you get to the mountain pass. There used to be a decent gold reward, but for some reason they recently patched it so they drop only a small amount now

[@ForeverGoth]

1:40 "Any good character without exception must always have at least 16 dexterity if you don't it's just not a well-built character"

[@Melth]

@@ForeverGoth yep, because in this game initiative rolls are a d4 instead of a d20, which means every single +1 makes a massive difference in going first or not. Going first consistently is the single biggest advantage you can possibly have, and will auto-win most battles for you as long as your team has even mediocre damage or control. So pumping up those initiative rolls with high dexterity, with Alert, with initiative boosting items, etc. must be a top priority on every single character. Nothing else is as important or as easy as going first

[@haywoco2]

What do you mean any character needs 16 dexterity? What about heavy armor users?

[@Melth]

In this game, even for heavy armor users, Dexterity is tremendously important. Initiative in this game is a d4, not a d20. That means every single +1 to initiative from Dexterity makes a huge difference in whether you go first. And going first consistently is the biggest and most important advantage you can possibly have. If you go first consistently and have good tactics you can win almost every fight without the enemy even getting a chance to attack. And then of course Dexterity also does a lot of other very good but less important things. There are multiple medium armors in this game that outclass the best heavy armors by letting you add your full Dexterity to AC. And Dexterity is of course also good for ranged attacks, in a game where ranged combat is usually better than melee. And it's an important saving throw. And it boosts some of the most important skills.

[@adrianlayman892]

25:11 THIS triple buff off of one potion just BLEW my mind! God Bless you ALL!

[@Melth]

It's very useful! You can also do it by throwing potions at a target area, but I find that that is unreliable. Sometimes a throw will land a foot away from where you aimed and ruin everything. Placing the potion on the ground between people and then popping it always works though. With VERY careful positioning you can even get 4 people buffed/healed with a single potion. I find that to be unreliable though, so I tend to go for the consistent 3 people instead.

[@erin1569]

That's great, but I think you might've used astral knowledge on Lae'zel to get better chances at shoving, but I'm not sure how that works tho

[@Melth]

In this case it wouldn't work. Astral Knowledge: Strength would grant proficiency in Athletics, which does normally help with shoving... but Lae'Zel already HAS proficiency in Athletics so it wouldn't help her at all

[@erin1569]

@@Melth oh, I get. Thanks

[@backstabba]

Interesting. I was satisfied with getting Zhalk's blade using command.

[@Melth]

It's a fun sword! Though I wish it was stronger than just dipping a regular greatsword in a candle

[@dmitriydevyatykh7246]

This is realy luck dependant, but the idea and performance is top notch, very educational. 1) Initiative order has to be perfect for attacks of opportunity 2) Zhalk sometimes prefer to attacks my party instead of chasing illythid who was pushed looks like bot Zhalk and illithid dont want to step in center of this "arena", so AI acts weird if Zhalk has to move to place it is not intented to be 3) I used bard, so fey + command + bard inspirations on illithid for dmg works fine

[@Melth]

@@dmitriydevyatykh7246 initiative isn't really all that luck based as long as you summon at least one mage hand The mindflayer has better initiative than the mage hand, so the chance of it going before the hand is extremely high With 2 mage hands you're almost guaranteed to succeed on losing initiative And that's all you need. As long as 1 hand (or any party member) is after the mindflayer, you can guarantee shove the mindflayer and thereby get AoOs

[@lubosmicuda1159]

I am trying really hard and can’t believe how much about dice rolls and not actual strategy the early levels are. I have already spent two evenings on this. Since I started trying, Us can’t one shot the first imp, best they could do was 5 dmg, and Mage hands fail both shove and throw on imps 8/10 times. Also most of the time I failed warlock’s and both of Shadowheart’s Commands. So I didn’t even get to the part where the Mage Hands fail their shoves 😂 But I still love your video. It just seems like the RNG Gods don’t want me to actually experience this 😁

[@Melth]

RNG is really painful in low level d&d in general and this game in particular. No amount of strategy can ever make up for bad rolls in this fight. This strategy is the best one I've found because it gives you so many tries, so one bad roll doesn't ruin everything. You get 3 tries on Command, you get 2 tries on mage hands doing most things, you get 2 attacks per person per round because of the Shove + AoO strategy, etc. But especially in the last few rounds against the cambions, it's very possible to just miss 4 times in a row and therefore lose on the last turn or some such garbage!

[@KungFuHustling]

In honor mode, everyone makes build guides. Builds are pretty easy imo. Combat is pretty easy. Getting enough gold to get started and being able to pass checks without the insane amounts of save scumming I do on tactician is what I think takes the most knowledge

[@Melth]

@@KungFuHustling well, hopefully the gold boost from killing these Cambions will solve your early game gold problem. As for passing checks, I think that's mostly a matter of having the right party build. It's pretty much always optimal to have a bard in the party (and usually as the main character), because they're the absolute best at passing all kinds of checks. Then you just need to grab a few boosts like guidance, resistance, bless (from throwing heal potions with the ring you can buy from Volo if need be), and the disguise ring from the strange ox and you should be able to reliably pass almost any check or saving throw the game throws at you

[@Brockxz]

Wait, why does the pommel strike shoved them across the room? Never have seen pommel strike do that.

[@Melth]

@@Brockxz it's because he was standing on Caustic Brine and the pommel strike did fire damage because I had dipped the sword in fire. Caustic Brine explodes and throws people a huge distance in sometimes illogical directions if anyone takes fire damage

[@Brockxz]

@@Melth thanks for reply, yeah, didn't noticed that caustic brine there. Love this game, been playing since early access and every time I see how someone else do some things I always learn more and more ways how to beat things up.

[@orenmontgomery8250]

1:37 I had to listen to this 5 times and finally slowed the video to .25 speed and zoomed in to figure out that he said "hex" as the second spell.

[@heisenberg9236]

With patch 7 they patched the cambions kill cheese without entering in combat in the shadowheart room making almost impossible kill all enemies in honour mode as showed in this video without the warlock and a lot of luck, however the chest trick to stop the cambions still works.

[@Melth]

@@heisenberg9236 I just battled them again on a new patch 7 run and wrecked them. My strategies here all still work! You can also do it with a druid or bard pretty well. It's kind of a tradeoff that with druid you need more luck on turn 1 to get Command to work from Shadowheart, but then you need less luck after that because Faerie Fire and Longstrider and Long Jump and Shillelagh make your party outperform a warlock one

[@heisenberg9236]

​@@Melth I am trying to do a "solo tempest cleric sorcerer no respec run", of course solo starts after the nautiloid, do you think this strategy works as cleric or do you have any advise to kill commander zhalk and the cambions as cleric starting class?

[@Melth]

@@heisenberg9236 it's workable, but you'll struggle to do enough damage. SOME clerics can do a good job of it (Light cleric gets Faerie Fire, Nature Cleric gets shillelagh, etc.). Tempest cleric will be a bad kind of cleric for the job though. On the plus side you'll have plenty of Command slots and plenty of Bless slots. You can probably spare a spell slot for something like Protection From Evil or Shield of Faith on the mindflayer. Or alternatively you can use 2 blesses at once to have the whole party and the mindflayer do boosted damage that way. You might also want to restart until you get a speed potion. You'll be desperate for damage, and a speed potion boosting the mindflayer + 2 teammates will help

[@heisenberg9236]

@@Melth ok, thank you.

[@RoryDavidWatts]

Great idea Melth!

[@Melth]

Thank you!

[@aaronsmith8699]

the cambions will now set off the nautoloid tanks with fire blast if you put them down

[@Melth]

They've always done that, but it's never been consistent. Sometimes one will run up and attack one in melee and blow himself up for no reason!

[@Abc123z1000]

I never thought to use mage hand like that! I didn’t know they were that useful to be honest! I’m near finishing the game at this point too😂 but some friends and I are going to try and beat the game this summer on Honor mode. Do you think this combo would work with a tempest cleric and a war cleric (not including shadowheart or Lazael)?

[@Melth]

I think those are two of the least good kinds of clerics for this fight. Light Cleric (Command, Bless, Faerie Fire) and Nature Cleric (Command, Bless, Shillelagh) are much better for this fight. If you're playing in multiplayer, it gets substantially easier though since you have more total damage and more actions per turn to handle things.

[@kittydaddy2023]

Oooo, this looks exactly like something I want to try! (watches video) ok, well, in reality, I just spent my last 3 starts ignoring Shadowheart. Maybe it's too late for me

[@Melth]

Doing this without Shadowheart would certainly be tougher. She's the last valuable team member here, but you do benefit a lot from Bless's +12.5% or so hit chance on the main attackers.

[@kittydaddy2023]

@@Melth No, I mean like in true dnd fashion I have begun skipping all the adventure hooks. I think I have Act 1 & 2 burnout

[@Melth]

@@kittydaddy2023 ah, I see. I'm pretty burned out on the *beginning* of each act. It just feels tedious to make the rounds buttering up shopkeepers, unlocking Withers so I can have non-horrible stats, and so forth. After that things get fun again.

[@Tytan-Enactor]

Hey Melth, I love your set up/execution. You’re easy to listen to, positive, knowledgeable… on point my friend. You earned a Sub!

[@Melth]

Thank you, it's always nice to hear people enjoy these videos!

[@Tytan-Enactor]

@@Melth heck yeah

[@DarkRubicant]

One thing that should be mentioned right off the bat, this comes down to rng, it's not always possible to take out the cambions and zhalk.

[@Melth]

Yeah, I think I said that twice. If Zhalk resists all 3 Commands (highly unlikely but possible) you're usually out of luck. And it's possible to just endlessly miss the last cambion or something

[@leon--mwn1650]

How much easier would this fight be with a coop partner giving you an additional custom character

[@Melth]

It makes a big difference! With 4 people it's outright easy since you have potentially 4 custom characters+ Lae'Zel + Shadowheart + Us for a massive army

[@ReadyDaddy]

no long rest? how do you recover spell slots lol

[@Melth]

I don't recover them; that's part of the challenge. I have to budget my limited number of spell slots over the course of the entire act

[@ReadyDaddy]

@@Melth oh ye i only realized later that tahts another level of hardcore. playing on such hard difficulty never crossed my mind lol

[@emrysmyridden]

can you do this fight playing as shadowheart?

[@Melth]

@@emrysmyridden it's extremely difficult and requires a lot of luck, but it's technically doable

[@kawgrath1876]

Do you start at level three after the nautiloid with all that XP?

[@Melth]

No, but extremely close to it. You'll hit level 3 before reaching the emerald grove

[@wargriz8213]

“Normally they ignore your hands” well normally Mage Hand isn’t shoving and throwing creatures around.

[@Melth]

Well yes, but you'll note for example that the imp continues to ignore the mage hand that it shoving and throwing it around. In most fights in this game, the AI will eagerly attack mage hands. This fight is a weird exception where enemies mostly ignore them for some reason

[@RoryDavidWatts]

Melth, in your nine hells run, you apply hex strength a lot. Is that purely to reduce chances that enemies will resist being shoved, or are there other uses? I never used it in my playthrough.

[@Melth]

That's exactly right! Hex imposes disadvantage on ability checks (but NOT saving throws or attack rolls) for the specified ability. However, most ability checks never come up in combat. The only ability checks that DO come up in combat are Strength or Dexterity to avoid getting shoved or thrown. So it's a good habit to always hex one of those two stats. Almost always, you want to hex whichever is higher for the enemy, Strength or Dexterity. There can be exceptions in theory, but I don't think they're common enough to worry about.

[@RoryDavidWatts]

@@Melth That's really interesting, thanks for the explanation!

[@gabbodj95]

"Hi guys, today I will teach you how to bully Avernus."

[@Melth]

Let's shove this imp into some lockers and then throw their corpses in the Styx!