Initial Impressions

Well, I've cleared out the slums now. It was both harder and easier than I'd expected. Harder because I actually managed to lose one battle (teaches me to pay attention to tactics!) and easier because there are a bunch of tough critters in the slums, but they gave me little trouble.

Seems like it's not just the set-piece fights that have to be won, but also a few random encounters. At least I didn't get the reward for just clearing out the rooms but only after a couple of random battles after that. I think I've spent more time in the slums on previous times because this time I just ran straight to each set piece, but I also got pretty lucky in avoiding the random monsters.

The first few monster rooms gave me a false sense of security. The battles in the north part are all pretty easy and since I tackled those first, I thought the whole thing is going to be a walk in the park. Of course, in the next battle I didn't manage to neutralize the goblin leaders in time, and their arrows tore my party to shreds. Sleep spells are very useful here, even if you don't have time just then to eliminate the helpless enemies.

I tried both ways with Ohlo, completing his mission and fighting him, and fighting gives a lot more XP and a wand of magic missiles, so I say that's the better choice. The battle wasn't even that hard, since he had only two archers (but his magic missiles had a way-too-long range), so establishing a line at the doorway worked well; I didn't even have to run behind a wall to wait for the monsters to come one by one (which is how I first won in Sokal Keep). Again, sleep spells rock.

The troll fight, which I'd thought of as ridiculously difficult on some previous times, went without a hitch. Magic missiles from the magic-users and Ohlo's wand gave much-needed damage for the trolls and equipping fighters with two-handed swords was a good idea too. Just remember to go stand on the spots where trolls were killed to prevent them from getting back up.

I'm now having money troubles. Training costs 1000 gp for each level and I haven't been getting enough to train everyone as soon as they are ready. I have Ardhiel and Daenerys able to advance, but no money at all. I know the situation changes, and as I recall, there's treasure to be found in Sokal Keep, so I guess that's my next destination (well, I could also tackle Kuto's Well, which is maybe a bit easier).