Can't damage Act 1 Shadow Demon

[JackArmstrong]

Not sure if I'm encountering some bug or simply going about things incorrectly, but I seem to be unable to damage the basement cellar Shadow Demon in Act 1 after using my scroll of "reveal invisibility".

I have Camellia's "ghost touch" ability enabled (or at least I think I do, there's no icon for it next to her portrait, but the ability button is highlighted), my protagonist is using a +1 magical weapon, Seelah has a cold iron long sword, and Ember and Woljif keep casting scrolls of magic missile, plus Ember uses her scream ability, and as far as I can tell the only damage I'm dealing comes from lucky crits and one or two points from the spells. At the very least I'd expect the protagonist and Camellia to deal reasonable melee damage, but they're both almost useless, even with buffs.

Any idea what's going on here? I'm playing on a custom difficulty with the Core options + the one that allows characters to cheat death once.

[LArc7thHeaven]

check the rolls on right side tab first. Either your attack is miss or something. And ghost type usually had concealment bonus, check the tab first to see the combat log

[Bigsnack]

It sounds like you have selected the modal option for Camellia's Ghost Touch ability, but you still have to activate the buff itself with a separate hotkey. I believe it's called Spirit Weapon Enhancement and it has a number of uses visible on the icon. Once you use it, it should apply the buff for 1 minute. Later, she gets access to different types of weapon buffs that you can mix and match, hence the modal toggle.

[Voidseeker]

If you have Ember, then use Demoralize(persuation) and Slumber next turn, with debuff shadow demon has ~ 8 will save, when demon will fall asleep, pick Seelah and use Coup de Grace( Seelah has good DC of that skill). This tactic will also help to kill the Vrok in the square.

[JackArmstrong]

Originally posted by Bigsnack:

It sounds like you have selected the modal option for Camellia's Ghost Touch ability, but you still have to activate the buff itself with a separate hotkey. I believe it's called Spirit Weapon Enhancement and it has a number of uses visible on the icon. Once you use it, it should apply the buff for 1 minute. Later, she gets access to different types of weapon buffs that you can mix and match, hence the modal toggle.

Ah, thank you, I didn't realize the toggle was connected to a separate, limited-duration ability. Was able to cheese the fight by making Camellia giant so she could strike from the back row, while almost everyone else took turns face-tanking the demon. Also, for some reason Divine Zap did full damage (pathetic as it is), so Ember was able to chip 1-3 HP off every few seconds.

[PTL_Keckerz]

Originally posted by JackArmstrong:

Originally posted by Bigsnack:

It sounds like you have selected the modal option for Camellia's Ghost Touch ability, but you still have to activate the buff itself with a separate hotkey. I believe it's called Spirit Weapon Enhancement and it has a number of uses visible on the icon. Once you use it, it should apply the buff for 1 minute. Later, she gets access to different types of weapon buffs that you can mix and match, hence the modal toggle.

Ah, thank you, I didn't realize the toggle was connected to a separate, limited-duration ability. Was able to cheese the fight by making Camellia giant so she could strike from the back row, while almost everyone else took turns face-tanking the demon. Also, for some reason Divine Zap did full damage (pathetic as it is), so Ember was able to chip 1-3 HP off every few seconds.

Divine zap is great for hard to hit enemies. I was able to kill the water elemental in Act one with the help of that cantrip

[JackArmstrong]

Still no idea though why my magical and cold iron weapons were useless, even though the enemy was explicitly not immune to cold iron, and the tool tips kept insisting magical weapons would at least do half damage. Probably yet more bugs; I'm also starting to regret making my protagonist a cavalier, since as fun as it is to zip across the screen and one-shot random goons, most of the time the game either insists there's not a path to the enemy, or otherwise even if there is my character gets stuck on level geometry or other party members and ends up doing nothing.

[Aradon]

A simple cold-iron is not magical, so it probably was correctly fully-immune to that, but yes, a +1 should be doing half.

[Wlerin]

Originally posted by JackArmstrong:

Still no idea though why my magical and cold iron weapons were useless, even though the enemy was explicitly not immune to cold iron, and the tool tips kept insisting magical weapons would at least do half damage. Probably yet more bugs.

What you're missing is that the damage reduction and incorporeality are separate features. Your attacks need to get through both of them to deal damage. Cold iron only bypasses the damage reduction, so it's still immune to attacks from normal cold iron weapons. Conversely, magic weapons bypass incorporeal (or at least, do half damage), but they are still affected by damage reduction--and at half damage that likely means nothing is getting through outside of lucky crits.

Camellia's ghost touch modification for her Spirit Weapon Enhancement is your best option, assuming her rapier is still cold iron, or even better using Bless Weapon on your best fighter if you have access to it (e.g. from Seelah or a Glory domain Cleric).

[Omega13]

Helps to come back once you've found Finnean, as he has the Ghost Touch property at that point.

[JackArmstrong]

Originally posted by Wlerin:

What you're missing is that the damage reduction and incorporeality are separate features. Your attacks need to get through both of them to deal damage. Cold iron only bypasses the damage reduction, so it's still immune to attacks from normal cold iron weapons. Conversely, magic weapons bypass incorporeal (or at least, do half damage), but they are still affected by damage reduction--and at half damage that likely means nothing is getting through outside of lucky crits.

That explains it, thanks; I was bamboozled by separate tool tips telling me I needed to be using cold iron or magic weapons, not realizing it needed to be *both*.

I'll admit I'm also trying to clear areas as I move through them without resting too much, because in Kingmaker everything was on a timer and spending time camping was a sure way to get a game over, but perhaps that's not the case here.

[Wlerin]

I'm not sure about an overall timer, but there's definitely a number of things in the first act that will progress negatively if you don't get to them before the tavern is attacked. Because of that hard-but-optional encounters like that Shadow Demon or the Vrock should be left until later.