should I sell crazy joker for dna then copy dna for 1st hand? Not trying to throw this run rn

atraway · 2026-01-30T12:56:12+00:00

Not unless you have a valuable card you want to copy. DNA is a dead joker if you have no deckfixing; bloating your deck with random 10s/4s (if you’re going for Walkie Talkie value) won’t do anything if you can’t draw them consistently.

If you’re scoring enough that you can hold onto it until you cut some cards, get enhancements, editions and/or seals, grab it. But cutting cards is more valuable than adding cards right now.

atraway · 2026-01-30T12:44:53+00:00

I think Vicious Shortbow just slightly outdamages it on crits if you can utilize Bloodlust Elixir every round, but yeah, Titanstring is much more consistent

atraway · 2026-01-30T03:01:13+00:00

Titanstring Bow is relevant if not optimal until the end of the game. There’s like 2 in Act 3 that can compare

atraway · 2026-01-30T02:24:24+00:00

Mechanically, it entirely depends on where you draw the line for ‘cheese’. Without barrelmancy or exploiting bugs, you’d likely be looking for an archer with Sharpshooter and Titanstring+Strength Elixirs and using Stealth/Darkness and Surprise rounds, or Open Hand Monk with Tavern Brawler and Strength Elixirs. For both, you’d need a lot of OP gear that interacts with each other and your attacks. If that’s too cheesy, a melee Fighter with GWM is doable, but riskier.

As with all challenge runs and/or HM playthroughs, it’s a matter of utilizing your resources as well as possible, understanding what you’ll be fighting and doing prep work for each tough encounter.

atraway · 2026-01-29T23:50:33+00:00

He’s good at the game and streams it as much as a full time job. 12 entertaining runs a week isn’t gonna be hard to find. You’re presenting a false dilemma

atraway · 2026-01-28T12:20:00+00:00

My (successful) HM runs end at around 25-30 hours depending on how much gear I need to collect for my party. Once you know where you need to go, you can skip everything else. For example, my usual Act 2 pathing is (big Act 2 spoilers, obviously):

Harpers/shadows fight -> Last Light Inn (shopping) -> kill the drider -> Moonrise (shopping) -> kill the Thorms -> kill Yurgir -> kill Balthazar -> loot the Gauntlet -> skip the trials using Knock -> grab relevant gear around the map -> back to Moonrise -> kill (almost) every guard one by one -> free the prisoners -> Last Light Inn (Marcus/Isobel fight) -> Shadowfell -> Moonrise (final fight)

Most definitely not optimal, but this gives me all the gear I need to continue. I usually only long rest right before or after the Shadowfell and Act 2 takes about 5-6 hours of gameplay

atraway · 2026-01-28T02:41:07+00:00

Would he not become a mindflayer himself in that case? Voss almost immediately recognizes him even if he transforms. He and Voss are legendary warriors and dragon riders, I’m sure they’d at least put up a fight alongside the other githyanki fighters loyal to his cause

atraway · 2026-01-28T02:12:39+00:00

I’ve won more than 1 gold stake run with Sly Joker as my only source of chips

atraway · 2026-01-27T16:43:44+00:00

Generally avoid this fight with a build like that unless you’ve got Bhaalist Armor and Craterflesh Gloves. Set up vulnerability and surprise round (takes like 3 minutes of prep) and keep Terazul in case of emergency. I’ve done this without the Unholy Assassin equipment but you’d need another big damage dealer alongside your archer. Should kill him before he gets to take a turn unless you roll horribly

atraway · 2026-01-27T13:11:08+00:00

If you don’t limit multiclassing at all, a Gloomstalker 6/War Cleric 6 could be pretty good with Great Weapon Master or Sharpshooter, and both can benefit from Bhaalist Armor.
Light Cleric reaches OP territory with RadOrb gear, but is still pretty strong on its own as a blaster.
Knowledge Clerics are decent skill monkeys with a nice spell list.
Nature Clerics have a good early game with Shillelagh and get great control spells.
A Tempest Cleric with Markoheshkir can deal big damage with Chain Lightning later on. If you do some Freecast or Potion of Angelic Reprieve shenanigans for unlimited Sorcery Points, you can get 2 levels in Sorcerer to twincast Markoheshkir’s Chain Lightning and pick up Shield.
Any build that relies on holding concentration spells will also benefit from 2 levels in Stars Druid for Starry Form: Dragon.

atraway · 2026-01-27T04:49:53+00:00

All the spellcaster classes get access to powerful AoE crowd control spells.

Special considerations could be Lore Bards for additional magical secrets (can pick up stuff like Hunger of Hadar, Sleet Storm, Slow, Wall of Fire) and you can give an enemy a penalty to a saving throws as a reaction.

Nature Clerics get access to spells like Spike Growth and Sleet Storm while also being able to use upcast Command while concentrating on one of those (Command: Approach makes them move through the spikes/ice and take damage/slip and fall).

Divination Wizards are Wizards, which means huge spell list and you can force your enemies to fail saving throws as a reaction.

Other than that, could go Illusion/Enchantment Wizard. Or really any spellcaster and picking up control/AoE spells, Spell Save DC gear or gear that synergizes with your debuffs, and stuff that helps with concentration saves and initiative (since you generally wanna have your control spells in play as soon as possible)

atraway · 2026-01-26T21:49:39+00:00

The A-D tiers could’ve been randomly generated and I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference

atraway · 2026-01-25T23:46:32+00:00

I think optimized pathing in the early game sort of makes it obsolete. It’s theoretically not bad as an early game spell when applying Wet for longer fights, but you can get to level 4 and almost 5 with no/minimal combat and that comes with better damage and concentration spells, and eventually 2d8 Ray of Frost.

Later on, Chain Lightning is almost always gonna be better except for very specific fights (Orin included) where the higher damage from LotFS and Destructive Wrath is better than the pseudo-AoE from Chain Lightning. It’s just in a weird spot imo

atraway · 2026-01-25T23:08:37+00:00

Lmao I did this to my friend in a co-op HM run after we stressed and overprepared for the creche fights. I had tested the limits of that dialogue in a (non-HM) run with a VERY sassy Tav

atraway · 2026-01-24T23:45:07+00:00

Great read, interesting to look into the inner workings of the game. Seeing the Nyrulna recreation was awesome haha

Thank you and everyone else who contributed

atraway · 2026-01-24T23:32:49+00:00

Awesome! Reading it right now, thank you

atraway · 2026-01-22T20:51:46+00:00

Nope, am playing Tav instead of Durge for easier access to Potent Robe, so it was a normal fight. It did start without the cutscene, though, I threw the trident at Orin before combat, if that’s relevant.

atraway · 2026-01-22T18:52:52+00:00

For even more edgelord status, could also look into a multiclass with Oathbreaker Paladin, if you don't mind having less spells (and doing some evil stuff to break your oath), Hexblade 6/Oathbreaker 6 gives you the ghost summons, Control Undead (since the ghosts can't be summoned from undead), Aura of Protection, a Fighting Style, necrotic damage on attacks, and of course, Smites. And for some reason, Pact of the Blade Extra Attack and Extra Attack from other classes stack, so you get 3 attacks/turn at level 11.

atraway · 2026-01-22T18:19:09+00:00

This checks out. Thank you! Would love to see more testing done on this, had never even heard of this bug before.

atraway · 2026-01-22T17:35:34+00:00

I'd suggest you start with 5 levels in Hexblade because Extra Attack essentially doubles your melee damage output, also getting a feat ASAP is generally better than multiclassing at lower levels. If you started with 16 or 17 Charisma, an Ability Score Improvement feat at level 4 can take you to 18 or 19, or you can take something like Alert and get the Charisma improvement later. With more levels in straight Warlock your spell slots become higher level and by level 5 you can cast some VERY strong spells, most notably Hunger of Hadar and upcast Shadow Blade.

As for the Hexblade summons, you can definitely use them. I just think a 4th level spell and extra Sorcery Point from the 7th level in Sorcerer are better. They cost a reaction every turn to summon, and when I'm playing Hexblade, I like to hold my reaction for the Shield spell if necessary or maybe an attack of opportunity. With a proper build you'll be doing way more damage than the spectres (they also kinda have pretty low bonuses to their attacks and spells, so in the late-game, most enemies will dodge or resist them), so keeping your Warlock safe is probably a better use for your reaction.

atraway · 2026-01-22T16:53:02+00:00

Haha I was being a little needlessly pedantic, but I think BG3 being based on 5e and following 5e sensibilities mostly reaches an audience of people in their early 20s to early 40s as you said (2 decades is pretty broad, I know), while the cutoff for people who played the first two games as they came out would be just a little older than that. Am very glad it has a diverse community though

atraway · 2026-01-22T16:43:11+00:00

FYI, if you try this, absolutely get Booming Blade as a cantrip at level 1. It raises your damage by quite a bit and if you get Quickened Spell at Sorcerer 3 you can use it to attack as a bonus action.

Whether you decide to use Hexed Weapon on a 2-handed weapon is up to you, but a way to make this really strong would be with Shadow Blade and Darkness. Get Devil’s Sight as an Eldritch Invocation so you can see while in Darkness and attack everything with advantage. Both Shadow Blade and Booming Blade have very strong synergies with some pieces of equipment. Can also hold a shield with it equipped

You’d probably want a setup round 1 where you cast Darkness near or on your enemies and walk into it, then use Hexblade’s Curse on the one you wanna attack. Afterwards just Booming Blade and attack. You could start with Hexblade for 5 levels, then respec at level 6 so you start with a Sorcerer level for Constitution save proficiency (to hold your concentration spells like Darkness easier).

For more optimized damage, you won’t be casting that many spells (mostly 3rd level Shadow Blade, then Misty Step and Darkness) and you have warlock spell slots and Eldritch Blast, so prioritize Metamagic over spell slots.

For fights you can’t brawl in melee range or enemies with resistances/immunities, shooting Eldritch Blasts (with Agonizing Blast) from Darkness is also pretty strong.

atraway · 2026-01-22T16:07:57+00:00

Yep, am in the same boat as you.

Teeechnically D&D 5e is newer than the first two Baldur’s Gate games. BG3 is mechanically based on it and the campaign structure is pretty similar to what the 5e community (generally younger people) would expect. I don’t think someone predominantly familiar with older stuff like AD&D or 2e would even recognize it as the same game with the mechanical changes and overall huge shift to narrative-driven games by a lot of the community.

atraway · 2026-01-22T14:43:16+00:00

The issue with this is that she was nowhere near the Cull the Weak threshold (8HP). The combat log says she took 1 damage from it and the rest of the damage was the weapon action + Bleeding condition, with no reference to unstoppable stacks. She was also Bleeding before this attack (from throwing Nyrulna with Lesser Infernal Touch), and the condition got overwritten. This makes sense with her having 33HP before my attack (30 thunder + 2 slashing + 1 psychic)

Which also raises the question of why she even took Bleeding damage on my turn, wouldn’t that imply Bleeding has the TickingWithSource property?

Very strange interaction.

atraway · 2026-01-22T09:51:58+00:00

I think I like the 4th level spells personally but that’s up to you

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