How to kill drath?

[Azghouls]

Man - how do you knock this sucker out? I located the invulnerability pools that last I think 10 rounds however after it wears out, Drath decides to haste himself and blast his load twice, wiping out my warrior in the process - yep just like that. If not, my healer should be able to heal the warrior fully however Drath's ratio of blasting his load and wiping out my warrior straight away, well let's put it this way, I wouldn't bet against it.

I got my other chumps (archer / priest / mage) around the corner to avoid his undead goodness however once my warrior is down, it's pretty much game over. I even got my warrior to chug invulnerability potions (twice) however my warrior keeps slapping Drath with a wet fish (well he was designed to take damage as I maxed out that resistance skill - obviously that made no difference to Darth's spraying abilities).

Is this one of those things to come back later...say at level 500? At the moment my party is at level 24 and currently paying revenge / hatred on Sss-Thsss - and oddly enough, I'm wiping out his entire army with ease. Yet all I manage to do is knock Drath down to about half way.

Does Drath have any weakness? I was thinking about introducing him to a woman (you know - being undead for a long period of time as maybe he's just lonely) but I feel it won't help as he will blast her away too.

I really want that demonslayer sword.

[Azghouls]

Oh I'm playing this on hard difficulty. And Drath reminds me of that lich thingy when you do that Lost Bahssikava questline. The one that's guarding the boat as he too was hard to kill yet I managed to knock him out though.

[Darth Mopsy]

I think when I did him on hard I split the party. First cleaned up the undead on the floor in front of Drath (pull them to the side rooms without commencing the event), then I took everyone around to the secret room, drank the koolaid ;) and sent my 2 casters to the front of the room on the floor and my 2 melee up on the platform with Drath.

My 2 melee had extra invulnerability pots and I kept that up pretty much the whole fight (plus the other buffs), so did my casters but they didn't have to use them because they were safer away from Drath and they could also deal with spawning adds, because those free hits can do a lot of damage and get out of control.

(I used the Witch in Dharmon for a supply of Invuln pots. Budgetting on 1 or 2 for the long hard fights)

[Azghouls]

Ah ok. So Drath didn't say 'screw this' and blew his load on your mages? My warrior has that taunt skill and I think it's working (some say it's worthless however for what I have seen, he's doing a good job taunting the planet).

What I've done is started the attack via the secret door (the one to the right of Drath) - Drath looked at my warrior, had an orgasmic fit and chased him to that corridor (the one where the koolaid is located).

So it was my warrior with Drath in the corridor and the mages / archer around the corner. I didn't think of nuking those freakazoids from the dancefloor (as they never left it - too busy staring at the disco ball I presume) however I will do that.

Almost finishing off Sss-Thsss then tackle Drath again.

BTW - I cashed in my mandrake roots for invuln pots at Patrick's tower however I yet to locate a regen patch for Mandrake roots, so I'm a bit stingy chugging those potions (as I believe the final fights are pretty hard without them).

[Berahlen]

I did it on Torment. It was a long fight, but not one too difficult to keep under control as long as you were of a high enough level to handle the stuff leading up to him.

I fought him coming from the tunnel. Melee on the platform where he stands, casters next to the stairs. Tank maneuvers behind to keep his cone attacks pointed away. I forget if he has adds or summons up there with him, but the priority while the kool-aid is up is to clear the platform and take down any ghosts on the floor behind the barriers that have ranged attacks, and bring down more as they get summoned -- the melee ones will generally stay still, but if they don't you can bottleneck them in the secret tunnel to bring them down with minimal fuss.

Not much to say about surviving his bursts after the invulnerability wears off -- and on that difficulty it will before the fight is even that far in because lol huge HP bars. I forget if you can slow him to counter haste. The main point of the invulnerability thing is just to trim his backup and settle in stably for the long haul, because above all else it's an endurance match.

If you're getting hit for laughably huge damage you're probably just underleveled -- if you have a ludicrously low hit rate for no reason against him you certainly are. This game appears to use level discrepancy to affect most combat rolls and give a damage multiplier to enemies, and on difficulties above Normal that multiplier is huge for even small differences. It's not uncommon to see dudes smacking you for 3/4 of your HP, then come back two levels later and suddenly they're totally reasonable even though your stats have barely changed.

[Darth Mopsy]

Oh that's an interestng way to do it, I never tried bringing Drath himself into the side room - does he still spawn adds when you fight him there?

And this!
Waypoint>If you're getting hit for laughably huge damage you're probably just underleveled -- if you have a ludicrously low hit rate for no reason against him you certainly are.
I almost died to the lone Slith that wanders around near bandit keep in the lowbie zone - that was my intro to the crazy To Hit required on hard. Swish swish swish swish. (Me) Boom. (Him)

Re: Mandrake, there is a regenning patch by a pond as you go by land from Kyass' Stronghold to Bargha (directly south of the Giants fort/Pyrog).

[Azghouls]

@Waypoint - you done it on Torment? Congrats mate - I wish I could however playing it on hard is enough for me (as I want that achievement - Torment will literally kill me then feed me to Chuckles, the Gremlin).

@Darth Mopsy - yeah he spawns his BFF however his BFF is usually behind him therefore cannot attack. And that was my plan - to do the smackdown for both Drath and his BFF together. Note that I have to do this during the same round otherwise he will do that 'two shot glory' on the next (as I want his second attack to make him spawn another BFF).

At the moment, I literally made Sss and Chuckles relocate to another game (and scored an awesome sword therefore making my warrior dual wield - probably too late however so far so good), rock bottom the dragon near Fort Remote (that was a good fight though however this time my warrior survived his AoE attack each round) and visiting another dragon there (where the demon welcomed me with open claws).

After that, it's time for me to condom wrap Drath once and for all - I sure hope so or I never buy that brand again (as it suppose to be undead proof).

[Azghouls]

And funny enough, all those areas you talked about (Pyrog etc) I haven't been there yet (and makes me wonder what the hell was I doing all this time...probably killing way too many spiders). I think Waypoint's theory is correct - i.e. the multiplier effect. I assume the further west, the harder it gets.

[Darth Mopsy]

Heh, wd so far. My hard party came to a bit of a halt on L27 about a month ago (starting end game bits and pieces, currently doing Silver Circlet and the 3rd arena fight was a bit... challenging). I did everything on normal and loved it, so immed started a hard party - hmmm now I understand why only 1 in every 200 players completes the game in hard. Torment is even more mind boggling - 1 in 500 according to the global achieves.

I took a break and played Avadon (part 2 will be released soon) and it was slow to start, but took off after a few hrs. The genuine choice was quite immersive (it's not perfect, felt railroaded in a couple of bits).

This thread is encouraging me to give the A:EftP hardies another shot. :D

[Berahlen]

I almost died to the lone Slith that wanders around near bandit keep in the lowbie zone - that was my intro to the crazy To Hit required on hard. Swish swish swish swish. (Me) Boom. (Him)

There isn't really that much more To Hit required against things around your level. It just punishes you viciously for daring to fight anything even slightly over that by giving you a very rapidly-increasing penalty. Like I said, you can come back even just a couple levels later -- hell, not even bothering to put the skill points in and leaving your actual stats unchanged -- and suddenly the fight is completely reasonable.

It's pretty much identical to how in World of Warcraft, fighting things two levels above you is a nearly unobservable difference, three levels is difficult but totally doable despite a slightly reduced hit rate, but by four you're suddenly riddled with misses, parries, glancing blows, and getting crushed for double damage in return, and chances are five is right out no matter how good or well geared you are. The main effect of cranking up difficulty in Avernum (other than bloating enemy HP bars and forcing you to optimize damage output and pick up Adrenaline Rush for everyone) is to narrow that window and inflate what happens as you move out of it.

If you don't believe me, the monsters all cap out at 30. When you hit 30 a bit before the endgame quests, that brutal hit penalty you've been beating your head against the whole game vanishes very suddenly and you never see it again, and almost nothing in the game will hit you for more than 1/4 of your HP. As another example, there's a high-level trap guarding the treasure in Formello -- on Torment, setting it off the moment you see it hits you for like 600 damage or something utterly silly, but later on is a completely reasonable 80 or so even though most characters' resists haven't changed much.

Basically, on Normal the game is designed to open up the map along several questlines at once, and the gentler level curve lets you take one or two through the majority of the map. On higher difficulties, that's not mechanically possible. You're looking at the demo zone, up by Draco, and upper Mertis as early-game, and should spread your efforts and come back later if (read:when) you get stonewalled in any one place. Great Cave, early slith bits, lower Mertis, and the aranea as midgame. Abyss, Sss-thsss, and western edge are late-game. Endgame areas are obvious. A few places like Drath, the Tower haakai, and the Aranea Queen are considerably higher than their surrounding area.

The main exercise on harder difficulty is planning out a very specific and optimized build ahead of time, then keeping very good track of what areas and bosses are viable at your current level and which ones you had to leave behind earlier and you can backtrack for now. Also, don't do like I did and forget the first big chunk of Mertis Spiral is really low level and good to take on early.

[Azghouls]

Yo all - I just fed Drath to the dogs but the dogs were complaining there's no bone marrow. And he was begging for mercy...pfff.

The guys and gals were lvl 28 when they tackled him again however this time, even though it was a decent fight, his undead goodness was pretty stale. Heck, even my mage suvived his duo blasts. But I have to admit, we were better prepared though as we scored that elemental protection ward thingy and my warrior duo wielding.

I was under the impression that the further west, the harder it gets however that wasn't the case. Heck, I even steamrolled the dancefloor right after and not once chugged an invulnerability potion. Now it's time to propose to that witch in Dharmon.

@Waypoint - spot on mate.

@ Darth - go on, finish it on hard.

PS: I got screenies and the achievements to prove it :)

[J-Kitty]

You can actually be really cheap when it comes to Drath if you have enough energy potions/elixirs as well. Divine Fire is able to hit Drath outside his magic range so you can just lay him to waste and he'll never be able to touch you as he can't move off his area. Granted this way takes a long time and it drains a lot of magic but still it's great for higher difficulties. Just make sure to be outside the gate and have your placement so that you can take out the ghosts he spawns when he gets tot he halfway point.