Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Killing Commander Zhalk and friends

Most of you know by now that killing the devil commander on the Nautiloid nets you a grand total of .

However, killing one of the cambion lieutenants who come in to support him* earns you 120XP, so if you want to reach level 2 before you take on the beach Intellect Devourers and level 3 before you try the Druid Grove, give it a shot!

*Requires a good showing from the Mind Flayer, lots of luck, and perfect timing. My fighter was standing by the transponder with 1HP with the last remaining cambion (27HP) about 10 feet away at this point, and everything behind him was on fire, so I couldn't pop back and see what loot, if any, his buddy dropped.

I did a whole writeup on this:

https://forums.larian.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=754044

And then felt foolish because, if you get up the ramps early enough and far enough, there's a good chance Zhalk and the cambions won't follow you, but will instead rage at you from the ground floor while you plink them full of arrows/cantrips. So I had several grand techniques, but 'the combat AI won't path right' is more than enough most times.

If you do everything right on the ship, and get every scrap of xp possible, you can hit level 2 before you touch the transponder. Taking a save at this point makes a good base plate for testing different aspects of each class.

Given the poor AI, it's not difficult or requiring of any luck, it's just time consuming if you don't have a reliable way to damage them from up on the ramps.

Also, nautiloid tanks. Kinda sucks that what could have been a hard but doable fight with a cool reward at the end turns to average cheese due to the game's own mechanics.

I still hope he'll end up dropping his greatsword, but eh.

We demand a worthy reward for defeating Commander Zhalk!

I'm fairly sure they didn't give XP or fun loot for these two because they essentially fight each other whilst we watch on, and if they die it's because we nautiloid nuked them or they just beat each other into the ground and we plinked off their last HP. Killing the 2 later cambions does give XP though, and that is actually pretty valuable because it let's you get Level 2 in the tutorial and Level 3 before the first Goblin fight.

I'm surprised they haven't removed the much worse cheese yet, while you punch the cambions to death.

The only benefit is early lvl 2. Did this long before it was posted through stealth cheese also.

You can kill all 4 rather easily using a 3 character party with multiplayer getting laezal and the brain. Even without cheesing just by throwing the oil cans and blowing them up repeatedly on the mindflyer and devil commander you cna kill both taking little to no damage then kill the cambions as they show up 1v1 with 1 character picking up the fallen character if they drop. Easy to reach level 2 before leaving the ship. Not really cheese required since they only attack 1 character per round its just an actual valid way of doing it.

I just did this solo. Shield Dwarf Fighter, Outlander. For some reason I couldn't carry more than 6 barrels with a 17 Strength? I couldn't move. So I dumped 4 barrels near the entrance, and went back for a couple. The Cambions came in separate, both of them were never in the kill box together. When I used scroll of Firebolt, it left one with 4 hp, the other with 7. Commander Zhalk then killed the Mind Flayer, I figured I was in big trouble. So I started firing with a light crossbow I found on an Imp I killed early on. They didn't see me this time, they have seen other characters I've tried this strategy with. Got lucky and rolled a 20, no loaded dice killed the one with 7 hp. The last 3 Imps appeared, and I started shooting at them, the others were out of range. I hit an Imp and maintained stealth (wearing heavy armor). Then I killed that Imp, and the other Imps saw me. Shot another before it reached me, had to kill the last one with my main hand weapon. The other cambion saw me do it, and starting heading to the ramp. Shot him for 2 damage, then missed. Had to finish him with an Acid Bulb. Now Commander Zhalk saw me, and made a bee line for me. I waited until he got close, jumped down used Dash and got to the console. No XP for killing Zhalk, though the greatsword would of been nice.

By the way I killed Lae'zel, but didn't loot her yet.

Zhalk and the Mindflayer give no xp, only the 2 cambions. Either way, totally unnecessary cheese as you'll reach the lv4 cap long before eating through EA.

It would be unnecessary, but I use the Level Up mod. I usually start a new game after reaching level 6 though. There are only 2 times in ea that I use barrelmancy. After my party jumps down the hole, into the ruins of the Chapel; I Firebolt the oil barrel, when I open the door. The 2nd is the cambions. I gain 3rd level before I leave the ruins. Not always though. I have a duel wielding strength based Hunter Ranger, that I'm not using the Level Up for. It messes up Gale's Flaming Sphere. The spell just set the ground on fire, no sphere. So 4th level will be enough on that playthrough.

It would be cool to have something like 100 gold on its body. It's not a lot but it looks like a great reward right at the beginning.