It’s more like KOTOR with friendly fire and without any light side/dark side points but your actions have more scripted outcomes. Unfortunately, Grey Wardens aren’t as cool as Jedi
Does Grey Wardens get any special talents for being Grey Wardens besides the free 1 talent point?
I tried the thing with targeting through walls. As long as my rogue is up front scouting, it seems I can just have Morgaine Blizzard a whole area, and more often than not the suckers don’t even twig. I haven’t figured out under what circumstances people actually decide to run out and see who dropped the whammy on them, but I was gradually able to wear down a bunch of blood mages without ever giving anybody a chance to fireball my ass. Now that I’ve gotten used to Blizzarding distant archers, getting the party out of the way so Morgaine can Cone of Cold melee-types, and telekinetically scrootching anybody really bad-ass so I can deal with them later, I’m doing lots better in combat.
I’ve been doing something similar with my main character (“Fartbubble”) with Tempest and freezing them telekenetically.
I also found that in the Fade, when you’re shapeshifting, change to the fire guy and let everyone get close, then fireballing the floor right at your feet. You’re immune to fire, so everyone gets knocked back and they take buttloads of damage.
In Baldur’s Gate II there was a hairpin of Otiluke’s Resilient Sphere which I used to great effect in tough battles by sending a character wading into the middle of the fray, or right up to the dragon, what have you, and dropping the sphere on them. Having aggroed everybody in sight by then, the sucker drew useless fire while the rest of the party picked off the chumps with ranged fire and AoEs. I should see if that’ll work on my own party – drop the telekinetic shield and see if the chumps keep trying to get through it.
Yep, that got me through a lot of encounters. There are a few guys immune or resistant to fire in the fade however, for those, use the spirit form.
On hard, positioning is crucial. I was caught in a random encounter with a well armored boss and about 10 of his buddies in Denerim. Low on heal potions, I kept dying. No matter how efficient I was at triggering abilities and targeting opponents it always ended with my part dead and about 2 or three of the enemy still alive.
The problem was that I was caught in the open. There was locked gate behind me and an open field in front of me, with the enemy charging at me like an entire football team trying to sack the quarterback. No matter what I tried, fighitng them out in the open just wasn’t working. On my fourth attempt however, I took a closer look at the area and it hit me: There was one raised platform with a single archer BEHIND the enemy mobs. So it was Morrigan to the rescue! As soon as the enemy lines made contact, Morrigan used an AOE stun, and then I sent the party running PAST the mobs and up the platform where I’m sure the lone archer there was going all “Oh shit!”. From there I could control the battle as there was only one ramp, and I won the battle easily.
Going from three party kills to winning with minor wounds. Love it.
It certainly does. Wade in, Taunt for good measure, Teke on the tank, then you can fire all the Blizzards, Fireballs and assorted grenades you got at the crowd, while they bang on the impenetrable bubble all day. The nimrods hardly ever suss what’s going on before they die. And if you’re really dedicated to cheese tactics, fire a Crushing Prison at the tank just before the Teke ends for yet another AoE kaboom that stuns the last survivors.
Um. English, please?
In that case, I believe I’ve got a date with some Revenants.
Is there a impentrable bubble spell in DA:O?
Yep, in the telekinesis tree. Second spell, forget the name. Basically freezes the character ( hostile or friendly ) in place, immobile and invulnerable. Great for isolating uber-hostiles until you have finished with the small fry or drawing aggro - i.e. a warrior with “taunt” on. The bad guys will hack uselessly at him while you pick them off.
As noted it can also be used as a precursor for an AOE combo as well. Probably one of the most useful ( overpowered? ) second level spells.
Nothing in the Crushing Prison description suggests it turns into an AoE. Is this just a hidden spell synthesis that someone observed?
I am also wondering how it is possible for Lightning etc. to be friendly-fire possible. Maybe if you stand in the line of fire or some-such?
Yes, it’s one of the 10 spell combos. Crushing Prison on Force Field = kaboom. I figure it’s what happens when an unstoppable force meets an unbreakable shield 
FYI, the other combos are :
Grease + Fire spell = pool of fire (which can be extinguished with an ice spell)
Sleep + Horror = Nightmare (big damage)
Glyph of Repulsion + Glyph of Paralysis = paralyzing explosion
Blizzard + Tempest = Storm of the Century
Spell Might + Animate Dead = bigger, meaner skeleton
Vulnerability Hex + Mana/Life Drain = bigger drain
Cone of Cold/Petrify + Stonefist = Crush, which kills instantly, though bosses and lieutenants have high resistances to that.
Death Hex + Death Cloud = Big spirit damage
You send your tank in the midst of the enemy mob, and have him use the Taunt ability, which makes sure they’ll be whacking him, for a long time. Then you put that tank inside a Force Field*, which makes him invulnerable (though he himself can’t attack or move). But the stupid, Taunted gits will still whail on him, nice and clustered, where you can hit them with all you’ve got, be it a rain of arrows, or various AoE spells. Finally, as noted earlier, Force Field comboes with Crushing Prison, which causes an explosion and stuns the survivors, so it’s a good way to end the fireworks show (or just free the tank if you need him elsewhere, or if everyone’s already dead).
Sweet. I think I understand now.
Any fix for this yet? I tried to install this yesterday, no joy.
Yep. Extract the files by running the EXE. You’ll end up with a folder containing another folder with the data for the mod, a read me, and a manifest XML file. On windows vista or 7 just shift click the folder and the manifest file to select them both, then right click one of them and choose “Send to” then “zip file”.
Once you have a zip file of the data folder and the manifest, rename it to Orzamar.dazip. you can double click that file and open it with the installer which is a file called updater.exe (I believe) located in the bin folder of the game directory. Once the .dazip extension is associated with that program, every other mod should install just by double clicking.
Thanks, I’ll give that a try.
I just started playing and finished defending Redcliffe, but I really dont have a handle on tactics. Ive switched down to easy and feel like Im not getting the real game experience. What are some good, perhaps simple at first, tactics? Im playing a mage (heals, aoe, ranged) and currently play with Morrigan, Sten, and Allister. Im not playing Leliana in my group at all. Not sure if thats a bad idea.
You may want Leliana in your party as she’s the only rogue you’ll have for a little while and she’s useful for picking locks and spotting traps. There’s a handful of sidequests I’ve comes across that required a lockpicker. Two mages in your party seems a little unbalanced unless your intending to spec for Arcane Warrior later on for your MC.
Just my opinion, but having a rogue in my party has been indispensable. If I were you I’d consider swapping out Morrigan for Leliana temporarily. Either until you find the second rogue or until you upgrade to AW and then I’d sub in Morrigan for Allistair or Sten.
I second this. My party is my mage main character (Arcane Warrior), the mage woman from the tower that heals (also an Arcane Warrior now), Alistair, and Leliana.