Dark Deity: Ash-Again

[Part of the Cursed story line]

Having beaten back the necromancer, its time to go on the offensive with the retaking of Redhill fortress and Canopy Bridge where Garrick suffers a cut tendon, nearly killing him. The team then goes after Sloane's father, the archmage, who uses the most useless form of mirror image ever (damage any to hurt him) and then King Varic himself!

Ford and Maeve are killed while opening the main gates and King Varic manages to cut Rose's hamstring, slice off one of Sloane's fingers, cut tendons from Sara and Caius and gives Iris a close call before Fenton the dwarf battleaxes through the King's codpiece, killing him! Alas, just as he does so the team is brought into the ether realm by the grand wizard who was previously interrupted in his tornado.

Here they face their resurrected ally Irving who manages to concuss Wren, throw Lincoln into an acid shower, cut tendons from Sloane and Sara, and knocks down Fenton and Monroe before Iris uses her firelord powers to turn him into ash... again.

Rolling Damage List:
Irving [DEAD]
Cia [4/5]: -1 Str, -0 Magic, -0 Magic
Benji [DEAD]
Elias [2/5]: -1 Dex, -2 Magic
Samara [DEAD]
Sophia [DEAD]
Lincoln [1/5]: -2 Str, *-2 Luck
Corvan [4/5]: -1 Mastery
Garrick [1/5]: -1 Mastery, -1 Dex, *-2 Str
Alden [DEAD]
Iris [3/5]: -1 Def. *-1 Fort
Liberty [2/5]: -3 Def
Rose [3/5]: -1 Luck, *-1 Spd
Ford [DEAD]: -2 Luck, -2 Luck, *-6 HP
Aurima [DEAD]
Maeve [DEAD]: -1 Luck, -2 Mastery, *-2 Mastery
Thae'lanel [4/5]: -1 Fort
*Sloane [1/5]: -3 Dex, -1 Str
*Sara [3/5]: -1 Str, -1 Str
*Caius [2/5]: -3 Str
*Wren [4/5]: -1 Magic
*Fenton [4/5]: -1 Fort
*Monroe [4/5]: -1 Fort

Dark Deity: One Finger Discount

[Part of the Cursed story line]

At a remote island fortress where they secure the god aspects, Vesta's superiors are hesitant to aid the mainland and instead order her and her allies to undertake the trial of soul to either kill them or make them stronger. WTF? Worse, they don't know the location of said trial and instead instruct the company to go into the forest and steal a magic compass from the "feral" tribal elves to guide them to this trial and are accompanied by less-tribal elves Maeve (archer), Thae'lanel (psycho spear guy) as well as Wren the murderer. The superiors also make it clear that they don't want to see the team again, under any circumstances because they're super friendly like that.

The tribal elves are a serious problem and harass the column the entire way to their death trap temple, which is complete with spike traps and poison gas. Brooke and her rapier win an epic duel against tribal spear living doll guardian Nao before snatching the device and getting out of there but there are some serious injuries sustained: Samara goes insane and throws herself on a spike trap, Benji has his soul burned away, and Garrick loses a finger. The compass points to a location at sea and sure enough they find a temple there that warns "the only foes you will face are the ones you bring" so Aurima goes alone to fight himself and wins / loses?

Rolling Damage List:
Irving [DEAD]
Cia [4/5]: -1 Str, -0 Magic
Benji [DEAD]: -2 Luck, -1 Mastery, *-2 Str
Elias [2/5]: -1 Dex, -2 Magic
Samara [DEAD]: -1 Fort, -1 Mastery, *-4 HP
Sophia [DEAD]
Lincoln [3/5]: -2 Str
Corvan [4/5]: -1 Mastery
Garrick [3/5]: -1 Mastery, *-1 Dex
Alden [4/5]: -1 Def

Dark Deity: Crossing Field

[Part of the Cursed story line]

After saving her, Vesta basically takes command of the team - ordering them to march to a harbor village to relocate the chest of aspects the undead nearly got their hands on. En route, they find a pitched battle of Aramorans against the forces of King Varic and just beyond a swirling tornado of magic being conjured by another evil looking wizard that said armies are oblivious to. The genius moron Garrick talks the team into rushing through the battlefield to stop the spell, because... what could go wrong with that plan?

Samara gets mind wiped, Corvan and Garrick get slices on their arms, Cia and Elias get concussed, Benji gets an embarrassing scar and Alden is weakened by a poisoned blade before Caius reaches the sorcerer to interrupt his spell. The annoyed wizard then teleports away while the rest of the unit, now an enemy to both sides despite saving them, flees to the docks where they hire the ship of the smuggler/thief Ford. Also on board are the mage Monroe and his spear bodyguard Iris who are handy companions when storm spirits, no doubt sent by the annoyed wizard, attack the vessel at sea but Aurima wipes them out.

Rolling Damage List:
Irving [DEAD]
Cia [4/5]: -1 Str, *-0 Magic
Benji [2/5]: -2 Luck, *-1 Mastery
Elias [2/5]: -1 Dex, *-2 Magic
Samara [3/5]: -1 Fort, *-1 Mastery
Sophia [DEAD]
Lincoln [3/5]: -2 Str
*Corvan [4/5]: -1 Mastery
*Garrick [4/5]: -1 Mastery
*Alden [4/5]: -1 Def

Dark Deity: Royal Bluff

[Part of the Cursed story line]

A trio of bandit hunting ladies arrive as the squad is cleaning up, and soon after an evil looking mage also arrives who asks if they found a particular gem in the bandit's possession. Garrick lies that they haven't so the evil mage, who turns out to be a necromancer, resurrects all the bandits and leaves - calling it a day. LOL. The "bandit hunters" Sara (mage), Samara (guardian) and Brooke (rogue) help clear out the undead bandits (who seem to be just bandits with white powdery make up) and reveal they too are after the gem but instead of taking it decide to leave Brooke with the squad to help defend it while the other two go off to see if they can find out more about the necromancer.

King Varic isn't pleased by the tardiness of their arrival at the capital but they earn his respect again by easily taking down a nearby camp of deserters led by the barbarianess Alexa, so he commands them to next march against the invading Aramoran army  whom they first encounter vandalizing an aqueduct and chase them off. It is here they gain the idiot knight Benji and the Aramoran archer deserter Caius, who doesn't want to slaughter innocents but is a-ok to slaughter his own people. At Redhill the team easily defeats the Aramoran invaders are captured by the Aramoran cavalry (via cutscene) only to be rescued by Sara and Samara, actual Aramor royalty, who bluff their way to getting the squad to safety.

How!? The town was cleared of enemies! Defeat by cut scene sucks.

Rolling Damage List:
Irving [4/5]: -1 Def
Cia [4/5]: -1 Str

Dark Deity: Spear Dancer

[Part of the Cursed story line]

Mage apprentice Alden, novitiate cleric Maren and rookies Garrick (archer) and Irving (warrior) are recruited into King Varic's army under battle group leader Lincoln (cleric) and his second, Bianca (spear girl). En route to reporting at the capital, they stop to help a village fight off some bandits where locals Elias (spear guy) and Cia (buxom rogue bartender) assist in routing the enemy, and then pursuing them all the way back to their base where they rescue the sorceress Sloane and her scout ally Sophia who were the bandits "guests" for two weeks. 

 

Based on how she's dressed, I can guess how they spent the time...

Lincoln is pretty happy with his teams performance as there were only two friendly injuries sustained: Irving getting the wind clubbed out of him and Cia getting manhandled by some lucky bandits when her impressive speed put her in an isolated spot. Said curs were put down like the dogs they were. On the flip side, Bianca is amazing and really knows her way around a pole spear - being the MVP in most of the skirmishes.

When a unit goes down this game places perma-debuffs on characters instead of letting them die, so I'll be keeping track of that below. Maybe I'll go with 5 worth of lost stats is "death". That should be nice and easy.

Rolling Damage List:
*Irving [4/5]: -1 Def
*Cia [4/5]: -1 Str

The Cursed: Stopping the Unstoppable

[Part of the Cursed story line]

Catharina gets quite a shock when her group reaches an area that is home to basilisks as the slow lizards manage to petrify Lu Lingqi, Sir Erland, Yuria, and Elisabeth - removing them from the party! Catharina and Party Girl flee for their lives all the way back to Beregost.

They can also be found in Neverwinter Online's Undermountain!

After a good wash of their soiled clothes they encountered Imoen at the tavern and meekly asked to join her team Xzar, Montaron, Garrick, and Kagain who is always looking for more female talent for his escort business.

Imoen accepts, and shows just how lousy her leadership is when the party heads to visit the nearby mage tower as both Xzar and Garrick are slain by knife throwing bags of bones (skeletons).

On the plus side, Catharina finally learns the identify spell from said mage and finds out that half the magic gear they are carrying is actually cursed.

Insight: For the more prepared, petrification is actually easy to get around with protection spells, mirrored eyes potions and stone to flesh scrolls but I didn't know of these at the time. When I finally did learn about them I decided to play this out as it was anyway so that I wouldn't curb stomp the game with six overleveled characters.

The Cursed: Baeloth's Return!?

[Part of the Cursed story line]

On the way to Nashkel the party enter the town of Beregost where they immediately kill an abusive drunk, save the wild mage Neera from some Thayans, and meet Kagain the dwarven proprietor of an "escort" business. They also put the bard Garrick out of work by killing his manipulative boss.

At this point Catharina doesn't really feel like heading to the mines so she and the others opt to "see the world" and start randomly walking through wilderness areas as adventurers do.

They are caught by surprise at a ruined tower late one night when a portal opens and out pops... Baeloth!? Apparently Najim honored his final wish which was "protection from death". Being on the surface certainly seems to make the drow suffer though, so Cath and co. decide to spare him, sending him to the Friendly Arms Inn to wallow in misery.

He does seem to be suffering. Good.

Insight: Inventory management in this game is a chore. Take only the items that you need or will sell well (gems) to speed things up. Weight is also a consideration. If you want to make things easier, be sure to buy a gem bag, a potion bag and a quiver/case/bag of plenty (infinite ammo) when you can.