Gargoyle cave battle at core difficulty rant

[sbudy]

WTF.
I didn't know that core Pathfinder roles included endless reinforcements and that every new enemy unit roles initiative 20. And of course every. single. one. of them targets my wizard KC, at the expanse of getting 5-6 attacks of opportunity to get to him, because why should they care? It's not like the useless hellknights have melee weapons that can actually damage them (the archers and Regill do some damage, at least).

How the hell I'm supposed to survive this battle? Invisible? Maybe I got here too soon? I'm level 6, almost 7, but the other opportunity is to do nameless ruin which is not much easier (besides the cave fight, that is). I'd try to do nameless ruin and come back.

[Dave]

Unfair """expert""" here to the rescue.
let's analyze all the points you made.

Core difficulty: Like all the other difficulties only affect how hard the game is in terms of singular enemies stats and abilities. It doesn't change the game mechanics. This game was built with RTWP as it's MAIN mechanic, meaning they had to bend/ignore/break a lot of the original game rules to make it work. The cave encounter is a clear example of that.

Targeting: When enemies spawn, they auto-target the MC because, by default, it is the one who started the encounter. You can verify this is happening after every ambush/cutscene. On top of this, Gargoyles target good guys, that is why having Ember is a liability in that cave, same for every other good character.

How to do it?...here's how.

1. Try to make a party of non-good companions. I went back to camp and left both Seelah and Ember, and picked up Daeran/Woljif after 2-3 hours of wipes. So if your MC is good, you know he will always be targeted and you can focus protecting him and you can ignore your other companions who will never get hit

2. Depends on what kind of MC you have. If you have a Tank, this fight is A LOT easier. But you wouldn't be here if that was the case. So buff it with every defensive thing you can think of ( armor, shield, deflection, natural blur, displacement, stone skin, reduce person, invisibility. false life, animal enhancement stats, maybe even a polymorph to pump it up even more) and put it on the right corner...VERY far away, so that when gargoyles will go for him, they will need 2 turns to kill. 1 to walk 1 to attack, giving your party time to kill them

3. If the strategy above didn't work (and it should work), you can buy a scroll of Dimension Door Mass, and teleport over the ravine on the left, leaving regill and yaker alone to kill the gargoyles. They will take around 10 minutes..less if you come back to help them after 3-4.


I had a huuuuuge problem when I tried doing this encounter with a Kineticist, with Seelah and Ember in party.......it was impossible to do it. After removing both Seelah and Ember for Daeran/Wojif, the fight became A LOT easier. Still I finished it with my MC unconscious, who managed to shoot a couple of bolts before getting taken down but i did it.

Remember Freedom of Movement scrolls and you should be fine

UPDATE:
On level. Everyone on higher difficulties reach this fight at level 7 usually, that is by clearing everything on Act 1 and (useful but not required), cheesing prologue with Active Companions exp. You're on core tho, meaning you as level 6 receive half damage compared to everyone doing that fight on Unfair, and hitting the enemies is a lot easier. So level 6 is good enough

[sbudy]

At the end Nameless Ruin meager experience was enough to allow me to level up at the beginning of Reliable Redoubt. I took Nenio instead of Seelah (with Ulbrig, Sosiel, Woljif and Lann), buffed everyone (reduce person, displacement and stoneskin to my KC) and managed somehow. Basically at some point all of the NPCs besides Regill and Yakker were slaughtered by the Gargoyles. Apparently web is useless against the Gargoyles.

So, a bit of your 1 and mostly 2.

[Dave]

Originally posted by sbudy:

At the end Nameless Ruin meager experience was enough to allow me to level up at the beginning of Reliable Redoubt. I took Nenio instead of Seelah (with Ulbrig, Sosiel, Woljif and Lann), buffed everyone (reduce person, displacement and stoneskin to my KC) and managed somehow. Basically at some point all of the NPCs besides Regill and Yakker were slaughtered by the Gargoyles. Apparently web is useless against the Gargoyles.

So, a bit of your 1 and mostly 2.

Ulbrig is still good, but he has enough HP to survive a lot of hits, especially on non-Unfair difficulties.

Just a warning for the future since it looks like you're missing an important info

Apparently web is useless against the Gargoyles.

Flying enemies ignore ground based effects. Usually everyone with wings. There are exceptions like Nabasu and Incubus, who have wings just for show. This is another reason why that fight is really hard.

[Baldurs_Gate_2]

Having a Wizard MC with Abundant casting, throwing fireballs over the ledge, resting in the corner, and repeat until all are dead.

[Dave]

Originally posted by Baldurs_Gate_2:

Having a Wizard MC with Abundant casting, throwing fireballs over the ledge, resting in the corner, and repeat until all are dead.

When cheesing going over the ledge is not enough...we shoot fireballs for Cheese^2

[Chunky]

This fight isn't mandatory. You can still recruit Regill if you skip it.

I would try to level up to 7. Mirror image, displacement, blur, and hp/ac/constitution buffs will help your mcs survivability. I believe boneshaker targets fortitude saves so buffing that save will help. Wilcer Garms also sells bracers that give 2 to ac attack and damage vs flying enemies.

If I recall correctly gargoyle will saves are low. Hideous laughter, glitterdust, and slumber target will saves. If you buff embers charisma before the fight you can add a few dc to her slumber hex.

[sbudy]

Unfortunately I choose illusion as a forbidden school, so the only way to get mirror image, displacement and blur is from Nenio (or Woljif). Anyway, I overcame this fight.. These advices should be carried over to the next difficult fight (somewhere below Leper's Smile, probably),

[Dave]

Originally posted by sbudy:

Unfortunately I choose illusion as a forbidden school, so the only way to get mirror image, displacement and blur is from Nenio (or Woljif). Anyway, I overcame this fight.. These advices should be carried over to the next difficult fight (somewhere below Leper's Smile, probably),

Have fun in leper's Smile

That is really...HELL

[sbudy]

Actually Leper's Smile was easier than the Gargoyles cave. Three reloads, mainly due to bad initiative rolls. The key is killing the enemies that can kill you on one round before they have a chance to hit you (i,e, vescavor queen, Harkel, retriever)), and since there was no cheating in the initiative rolls here it was manageable (Thanks Lann, you're so awesome Lann). Also, wights and retrievers are vulnerable to grease (no wonder with all these legs). Prone retriever is funny.

[sbudy]

Well, apparently the last Sarkorians also has an enemies-teleport-from-nowhere-in-several-waves-fight. Great fun. Not.
It's kind of sad that this is the mechanism to make the game difficult, cheating the RPG system. Any DM that would have done that shtick too many time would have found himself unemployed.

[Soul]

Originally posted by sbudy:

Well, apparently the last Sarkorians also has an enemies-teleport-from-nowhere-in-several-waves-fight. Great fun. Not.
It's kind of sad that this is the mechanism to make the game difficult, cheating the RPG system. Any DM that would have done that shtick too many time would have found himself unemployed.

I dont mind it... I actually like it a bit.... just finished call of memory quest with the whole wave thing actually... saw first wave with a succubus who spawned in and tried to dominate nenio but failed so I had sosiel use communal protection from evil his next turn.... defeated that wave and more showed up and half of em kept trying to dominate my characters who were immune lol...

also as for if a DM did something like that to me in tabletop... well... tables turn... ive had a DM one time rule that glitterdust blindness effect was permanent unless you had remove blindness or something... and I was a sorcerer so just said "you sure about that".... he doubled down so next level I picked that spell and used it heavily next time round... he was one of those that never liked spontaneous spellcasters and only really played as prepared casters... so the look on his face after asking me how many I had prepared and me telling him that I can turn all my spells from level 2 and up with heighten to glitterdust was just priceless... think that game I was also a mystic theurge and was just burning my divine slots for the spell first before using sorcerer slots...

he apologized not long after that session... :P

[Shahadem]

Basically this fight like so many others is total ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥.

it is not designed with roleplaying in mind. The enemies don't target based on roleplaying but based on out of character knowledge and metagaming and the player is expected to make metagame desicisions instead of roleplaying decisions.

[sbudy]

Originally posted by Shahadem:

the player is expected to make metagame desicisions instead of roleplaying decisions.

!!!
While I do enjoy the game and the challenging battles are part of that - the enormous satisfaction of conquering Drezen, for instance - too many battles could not be won without reading the enemies character sheet first. Even casual random encounters on the early game. You don't have access to their character sheets on tabletop RPG. The difficulty level should allow you some experimentation in most of the fights besides the boss fights. Here if you experiment you usually have to reload.

[Sexorcista]

go to the cave by yourself, then dimension door to the other side with the dark souls easter egg and then turn on the only active companion gets exp in the difficulty options, then just watch regill kill all the gargoyles since he is immortal in this section, and get a ♥♥♥♥ ton of exp