MMVI: Gharik's Forge Strategy & Tactics

[Bandobras Took]

This is the furthest I've ever made it in a MM6 game without giving up in sheer boredom or disgust.

However, Gharik's Forge is worrying me.

About what level should my characters be before taking it on? Is this generally a quest that gets saved for very last?

How does one deal with the large groups of Warlocks? It seems to me that even at high level, they're going to be a pain.

[arturchix]

I usually take it around level 40 or 50, it's been a while since I got so far. Fighting against masses of warlocks - try to lure one after another from the big group and take them out one by one. Appear around the corner, some of them start running towards you, retreat and kill the first attackers. Repeat as much as needed, and then burst into the main group, if you feel strong enough. Fighting in open is not necessary, with exceptions that there is a small room filled with warlocks.

[Phobos]

If you have Fire Blast and Poison Spray, now it is a good time to use them. Walk right next to a Warlock, enter TBM and fire away, repeat as long as needed.

[Kristo]

The Warlock room in Gharik's Forge is a pain. There's no getting around it. I recall running (or Town Portal or Lloyd's Beacon) back and forth to New Sorpigal multiple times. IIRC, Warlocks make your party insane. It drains any mana your spellcasters have but I think it actually makes your fighter types stronger. Fire off a Poison Spray(s) immediately and then get up in their faces. Don't be afraid to back off and heal up. This is probably the toughest fight (in terms of raw firepower) you'll face for quite a while.

[Bandobras Took]

Well, thanks for the advice.

But I seem to have found yet another point in MM6 where I catch myself thinking: why bother?

It's somewhat depressing to think that the only thing I have to look forward to upon completing the high council quests is 18 more dungeons full of monsters that drain your HP in one hit.

Perhaps I should just make it a general question: what on earth motivated anybody to ever finish playing this game? The story (whatever it is) hasn't seemed that compelling so far, and while I enjoy a difficult dungeon every now and then, it seems that every dungeon has been twice the size it should have and has had eight times the monsters.

I've enjoyed MM7, MM8, and even a good deal of MM9, but I can't understand the appeal of 6. The occasional humor isn't making up for the sheer boredom and frustration of yet another 5-hour dungeon crawl.

[arturchix]

Actually I've never seen one who enjoyed MM7 but disliked MM6 as these two games are very similar.

5 hour dungeon crawl? Basically there are only two difficult (and large) dungeons in the game: Castle Darkmoor and Tomb of Varn. The rest of the dungeons have medium difficulty or less, unless you are too low on level and/or spent your skill points in not the best way.

BTW, I think you do not need to motivate yourself to finish the game, if it's not fun anymore. Just drop it and return later.

[Kristo]

I agree, don't play if it's not fun anymore. If you're interested in how the story ends, go download a Smacker player and watch the cutscenes.

[FalagarsFolly]

I think I was about 20th level to take this Gharik's forge. The big wizards
room is the worst part of that. Lloyd's Beacon and Town Portal help a little, but keep in mind that all of the Wizards and Sorcerers (opponents) heal back to 100% green whenever you teleport out and back in. With that in mind you might want to consider mixing up a few black potions of devine cure and devine magic so that you can finish off more of them on each trip.

As with any of the tougher monsters in the game you want to focus all your fire power on one opponent at a time and kill him off before teleporting out to the temple for a quick heal up.

The temple at New Scorpigal seems to be the cheapest one to heal at (other than the reputation ruiining temples of Baa).

Note that there are Fire Elementals in that room, too. They will hover up high, out of sight, and hit you repeatedly. I've mostly learned to just ignore insanity for a little while. It just cure it before you heal up at the temple or they're charge you alot more (10gp normally --- 40 or 50 if you're insane, or weak from being insane). So you have to cure insanity then cure weakness. You can sip a few times at the spell point fountain down in the town square before running up the hill to the temple.

I suggest heavy use of the acid burst and flying fist spells. Those seem to do the most damage. However, inferno can be good for one technique.

Sometimes you can peek around the corner of the door. Just face towards the right while standing outside the door (after you've killed all the opponents near the door). Then use "ctrl-left" arrow to edge sideways until only one character is exposed ... and so you can just see a couple of the foes. Most of their spells will bounce off the oblique wall surface beside the door ... and your left most character (a Paladin in my case) willl be the one to take the brunt of the damage. From that position the only useful damage dealing spell your other three characters can cast is Inferno. (Ring of Fire is great around corners and through doors --- but the other side of the lava canal is too far away for RoF to o any good).

Luckily Inferno does damage to all characters you can see, even if only one of your characters can see them.

When you've done enough damage you can charge across and take a few swipes at melee range against the weakest foes. You always one to kill at least one of them, preferably a couple, before you TP out to heal, even if it means taking alot more damage in the process!

Largely the same advice applies to the eyes in Castle Darkmoor. Do you best to killl as many on each trip as you can. They will keep shifting around with injured ones hiding behind their re-inforcements fairly often.

Acid burst seems to work better than any other spell on eyes, too -- and it seems to "blow them back" like a enchanted weapon "of force" which is handly when a green re-inforcement obscures you're line of fire at the one you're trying to take out.

I also like Incinerate, since master's of fire can do alot of damage with it.

(Keep in mind those black potions age you every time you quaff one. So you'll want to get access to the well of rejuvenation near Hermit's Isle as soon as you can after finishing Gharik's quest. My opinion is that using the Ironfist's yacht for this is silly. Just Town Portal over to the Blackshire and hike over to paradise valley and down and across to the short near Hermit's Isle. That only costs about 10 days (assuming you have a master at Town Portal and some sort of water walk spell.

For fighting dragons, and titans I recommend expert or master level fly spell, and use the PgUp and Ins to dodge breath and spell attacks between your group's volleys at them.

Having fly spell active seems to be the only way to dodge when you're in TBM (turn-based mode). Obviously that only works outdoors.

[Monte Cristo]

Gharik's Forge can be easily got through if you have Lloyd's Beacon,Town Portal+ Gate Master, Protect from Magic and all Elements, Have access to the the fountain that raise's you +30 levels and be around level 25-ish. Also, make sure that you are face to face with a Sorcerer/Warlock when you are attacking, and it really helps if you have a promoted Knight with Master sword skill in your party, who can do some serious damage. Day of the Gods and Hour of Power at Master level can even make that dungeon very easy.

[millionmilesaway]

I gotta agree with Monte Cristo - this laboratory is only as hard as you make it. There are many alternate ways of taking on the warlocks that thrive inside. It's definitely alot easier if you've got at least one archmage with lots of mana. My party consisted of one hero (I believe this is the highest promotion of the paladin) and three archmages. This way I had all the mana I needed, therefor I recall simply standing by the corner of the door casting loads of rock blast spells(/toxic clouds will work too, takes a higher level though). Why these? Well, since they have a bouncing effect - making them easy to aim with and second and foremost they are very swift. One can of course also be Ramboish and go in with resistance auras, a harring high held in the right hand and a shield in the left just as Monte Cristo claims, however by doing so you lose the perspective of the quite amusing AI of the monsters.

PS. The archmage promotion isn't really hard to get. It's definitely achievable before the 20th level as you only need the sparks spell to quite easily get the crystal that you need from the "undead place" and the fountain shouldn't really be a problem. The archmage promotion (early on) is simply a question of whether you can afford levelling up in the long run or not. DS.

[Kareeah Indaga]

Instead of teleporting out/resting, may I suggest items that regenerate HP/mana? (If you can find them, of course—but generally it isn’t too hard to end up with at least one of each if not more by mid-to-late game.) Then you can just wait and recuperate without letting the nasties heal, and it’s very useful fighting the Kreegan later on who zap all your cleric’s SP at once (*grumble grumble*).

IIRC for the room with lots of Warlocks I ran across and started attacking from that side after a bit, then just used the old fashioned RLH tactics most of the rest of the way through the forge.

[GrayFace]

With some cheating like using edges to avoid damage as FalagarsFolly suggests and save-loading each turn in some cases level 1 was enough to complete the game. I don't remember what level I had the last time I fighted it, but wasn't hard with party of 4 druids. (I guess, the party of 1 knight and 3 druids would be the best one)

Basically there are only two difficult (and large) dungeons in the game: Castle Darkmoor and Tomb of Varn

Castle Alamos is also a big one. And actually I don't recall any dungeons in MM7 as large as thos you stated.

[Chorus]

But I seem to have found yet another point in MM6 where I catch myself thinking: why bother?

...

I've enjoyed MM7, MM8, and even a good deal of MM9, but I can't understand the appeal of 6. The occasional humor isn't making up for the sheer boredom and frustration of yet another 5-hour dungeon crawl.

BT,

I had a similar opinion to yours when I first slogged through MM6; however, there are a few factors that can speed things up:

(a) Party Composition - Going at it with 3 sorcerors and one cleric/druid makes the game go much quicker because MM6 (and at least 7) values spellcasters more than fighters. Moreover, if you can get an expert in water along with Lloyd's Beacon, both real time and game time will be pretty much square-rooted.

(b) Order of Operations - Gharik's Forge is fudging hard, much too hard for lower level characters. Arturchix is correct that taking it on around level 40+ is a good move. In other words, MM6 doesn't do a good job of telling you what dungeons should be done when. There's an optimal order that will save you real time as opposed to just going where you please.

(c) Hireling use/exploitation - Knowing that a merchant and a duper lived across the street from each other in Freehaven saves pounds of money, which helps buy spells you really shouldn't yet have access to. One can hire the gatemaster there as well.

Check out the section on the Dream Team (and yes this means spoilers):
http://web.archive.org/web/200304040744 ... ljerk.html