What was your singular favorite spell among the IE games?

[Ieo]

Just curious. It could be something rather mundane, or something less popular. If you were limited to only ONE spell out of all those available in an Infinity Engine game during your gameplay, what would it be? (Comment: Some spells and combos were definitely unbalanced and lent themselves to cheese, even sometimes exploits; that's not necessarily what I'm looking for, though I suppose knowing about exploits could be useful for the devs, maybe.)

 

Infinity Engine games:

 

Baldur's Gate (1998)

Baldur's Gate: Tales of the Sword Coast (1999)

Planescape: Torment (1999)

Icewind Dale (2000)

Icewind Dale: Heart of Winter (2001)

Icewind Dale: Heart of Winter: Trials of the Luremaster (2001)

Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn (2000)

Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal (2001)

Icewind Dale II (2002)

 

 

Mine would be from BG2: Summon Insects (druid), since it's level 3 and can lock down multiple casters and invisible targets in a single cast.

Edited October 9, 2012 by Ieo

[Superdeluxe]

Always loved fireball

[Gorth]

Single spell? Whatsitsname that lowers magic resistance. It meant that most other spells had a chance of working (like Chromatic Orb)

[LordCrash]

Finger of Death (or how it was called) - small change for instant death of every creature in the game (BG 2)

[bronzepoem]

Charm person!!!!!

[Director]

Most used - Abi-Dalzim's Horrid Wilting / Time-stop

 

My favourite was probably the one in PS:T that summons the giant laser cannon. Oh oh - or Skull Trap.

Edited October 9, 2012 by Director

[Tigranes]

BG2 Disintegrate always has a special place in my heart. The saves were balanced enough to never make it overpowered, but it just had such a satisfying projectile / animation combo. It packed a kind of 'punch' (of a giant green ball coming at your face).

 

In terms of mechanics, Lightning Bolt, as just about the only IE engine spell to make active use of geometry (besides AOE), was nice - I remember fighting Greywolf (name?) for Prism's emeralds as Level 2 in BG1 and using the recently found Lightning Bolt wand trying to not hit my party members. Aganazzar's Scorcher was OK too, since you could position your own party to line the enemies up and then have the mage hit them all.

 

Time Stop + Improved Alacrity + Multiple Disintegrates were also great, if only because you could finally replicate what you saw Irenicus doing at the start of BG2, after many hours of play (and waiting 6+ months for the expansion pack). Obviously, by that point in the game saves were so high you could only really do it to trivial opponents, but...

 

Finally, an honourable mention to Finger of Death, because this one time, possibly with mods that might have screwed with the spell save tables, I opened a battle with a contingency spell of 3 Lower Resistance, another character casting Greater Malison, while the PC wearing Robes of Vecna fired off a FoD... and it worked. Firkraag dead in half a round.

[Ieo]

Single spell? Whatsitsname that lowers magic resistance. It meant that most other spells had a chance of working (like Chromatic Orb)

 

You know what's sad, I could SEE the spell icon symbol thingie in my head before remembering the name (which is just Lower Resistance, unless you mean lower saving throws--Greater Malison).

[Gorth]

Finally, an honourable mention to Finger of Death, because this one time, possibly with mods that might have screwed with the spell save tables, I opened a battle with a contingency spell of 3 Lower Resistance, another character casting Greater Malison, while the PC wearing Robes of Vecna fired off a FoD... and it worked. Firkraag dead in half a round.

With a few Lower Resistance spells you can kill Firkraag with the humble Chromatic Orb

 

Edit to add:

 

You know what's sad, I could SEE the spell icon symbol thingie in my head before remembering the name (which is just Lower Resistance, unless you mean lower saving throws--Greater Malison).

 

Nope, that was exactly the one. A blessing against all the magic resistant critters you run across

 

[bronzepoem]

Most used - Abi-Dalzim's Horrid Wilting / Time-stop

 

My favourite was probably the one in PS:T that summons the giant laser cannon. Oh oh - or Skull Trap.

Yes,I love tha cannon, too,That summoning video is hell cool! But the damage data is a little poor,,,

[rjshae]

Haste or Mass Haste, then set the party to puree mode.

[Tamerlane]

Easily Aganazzar's Scorcher.

 

Fear my mastery of the straight line, kobolds.

[Lv99Wizard]

Web and/or Entangle. (Followed by the brutal cascade of Skull Traps/Glyphs of Warding/Fireballs.)

 

That was the beauty of that system, no singular spell was perfect alone but there were Earth shattering combinations.

[Sylvius the Mad]

BG - Hold Monster

 

This is based on a single event from the first time I ventured into Durlag's Tower. I didn't know I was near the end of the dungeon, and I decided to pop into the next room before resting. I had a mage-heavy party, and I was low on spells. Lo and behold, through the door I found the final encounter - the Demonknight - and I was pretty much out of tools. So, in desperation, I had Viconia cast Hold Monster at him. The Demonknight had 95% magic resistance, but on this occasion I got the roll I needed, and he was Held. A bit of hasted archery later and he was dead.

 

I stumbled into a major boss fight completely unprepared, and still won, because I rolled a 20, basically. It was awesome.

 

That's something AD&D did really well. The crazy outcomes that were always possible (but usually extremely unlikely) made for great stories.

Edited October 9, 2012 by Sylvius the Mad

[Naurgalen]

Time Stop is the best spell i can think. But finger of death, mirror image and even the most common magic missile are usefull spells that every good mage has to learn (?)

[Elerond]

Imprisonment, though in some encouters you it had bad habit to broke scripting especially in TOB.

[Director]

Yes,I love tha cannon, too,That summoning video is hell cool! But the damage data is a little poor,,,

 

That made all the ultra powerful spells in PS:T hilarious!, 2 min long animation - followed by "Save made: 0 damage".

[NerdBoner]

what makes the mages truly powerful is not the time-stop, the Wish, spell mantle or the absolute immunity spells...no my amigos, it is the spell sequencers and chain contingencies.

 

2nd edition mages were GODS because of these simple tricks.

[Enoch]

The most important spell was clearly Cure Light Wounds.

[Sensuki]

Stoneskin (BG2)

Edited October 9, 2012 by Sensuki

[Larkaloke]

I might end up choosing the humble Magic Missile. It is something you can rely on at lower levels, and still has at least some utility at higher levels (although significantly less once you stop gaining more missiles). Lightning Bolt and Fireball are also very useful at low levels and keeps their utility longer. Mirror Image is something I almost always end up using, but alone it wouldn't be very useful -- it won't keep you alive all that long if you can't back it up with killing things, after all.

 

Abi-Dalzim's Horrid Wilting, while much higher level, is something I tend to make a lot of use of once I get that high level. One of the best spells for damage, but of course, care must be taken to avoid unfortunate incidents with hitting party members or nearby civilians, so I don't think I'd want it for the only spell.

 

Dragon's Breath + Timestop is my favourite combination in Throne of Bhaal, because damaging and knocking back an area of opponents while not harming your own party members is always nice. I would probably choose one of those, except that being rather high level spells, that could mean I was limited to no spells for most of a game.

 

For clerics, Greater Restoration, for the maximum amount of healing; or Cure Serious Wounds for a lower level but still quite useful one.

 

Wail of the Banshee is also fairly useful, particularly in Icewind Dale II, but as useful as they may sometimes be I'm just not very fond of instant-death sorts of spells, so I wouldn't choose it for the only spell. Finger of Death also helped me scrape through a close battle or two the first time I was playing Baldur's Gate II, but I don't think I'd want it to be the only one.

 

Apparently the answer is that I wouldn't be able to decide, at least not in any remotely timely fashion.

[Zeckul]

I loooooooove the Death Spell. Upon utterance of the proper incantations, the very life force of every foe is instantly snuffed out and they fall lifeless to the ground. It's clean, it's efficient, no save, large area of effect, guaranteed death to everything that fits the description, and that's a large number of ennemies in SoA.

[Deraldin]

Lightning Bolt.

 

The only spell in the game that is probably more dangerous to your own party than the enemy you cast it at. I've lost track of the number of times I wiped out my own party, or the enemy wiped themselves out when a miscast lightning bolt goes off and reflects back and kills everyone except the people you meant to target. Lightning Bolt was the non Wild Mage equivalent of a Wild Surge.

[khango]

I loved skull trap. It was the perfect spell for a sorcerer. Screw fireball and keep back the party members, in fact, they can take a nap.

[lordgizka]

Wish from BG2 (ToB?) was loads of fun. Low WIS results especially,