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[twillight]

Where were we...:

- you don't have to do anything in the Promenade, go straight into the Slums. There you don't have to buy anything, but you might still consider the glasses of identification (for safety reasons), the wand of frost (although wands are hardy as useful as they were before), and investing the rest of the coins into piercing arrows (for THACO).
- avoid to deal with the two ruffians at the Copper Coronet until later. Much later.
- when you go to pick up the Mae Var's guild quest (the only quest only available in Chapter 2 - buy the nymph cloak before giving the documents) enter the Sea Bounty Inn to make Jaheira cursed. You'll have to enter here anyway once Edwin sends you for the documents of Marcus. Then hop to the Government district not just because of the particular quest, but also to buy the magic licence. Takes 5K gold for the paper and 2K for the quest, but as it was mentioned gold is no issue for bard.
After this things settles until you get the special random encounter with the dying harper. Still, I say roll the Mae Var quest a bit - stealing even from a priest is a quick thing to do, and we can check the prayer-men's shops (Lathender has a boots of grounding, what is pretty ok, also Staff of Striking with its astonishing +9 thaco).
Killing the mage for Edwin is no small task. The mephits are ok to deal with, mayor problem is actually moving Jaheira from harm's way. Then I casted improved invisibility + blur, and went up with 1 offensive spin. The game is really unfair, as even w/o it I hit the golems (stone variant) rolling a 6, still they killed me more often than not despite after the initial offensiveness I changed to defensive, what ment they can only hit me with a 20.
Now remove your armor, and prepare the mage. Start with a Magic Missile AS SOON AS YOU APPEAR and say you're leaving. If you do it right you'll have time to cast another spell. The guy is dangerous and higher level than you, so make it a summon. Now the fear/stun spells will go that way. Trick comes: go down a floor and wait 30 ticks (watch the pendulum in the corner). Go back up. Thanks this being a program, the fight did not continue, and the protection-globe has expired. Cast Aganzanar's Scorcher for more damage, while start impaling him with piercing arrows (sometimes it hurts him, sometimes it does not). When your summons start die and your scorcher expire launch a fireball to finish this fight.
The rest of Mae Var is talk, so let's skip to the end: you only have to kill Mae Var for the goodies. So leave Jaheira outside the building, turn invisible, and go in then down. There watch out for the prisoner in the cell on the left (the tortured guy doesn't matter) and launch 2 fireballs. Hopefully this kills everyone but the priest (who you have to deal personally, but easy as he won't attack as he can only cast, and that won't happen until the invisibility completely expires - use the improved version), and even if not they'll all be near death, so kill them with arrows or something (but try to keep the prisoner alive, he'd cost reputation, and even though you can easily buy it back be a bit humane). After the dust settles cast invisibility again and walk out.

EDIT: I went spending the thief-given money in the Adventurer's Mart buying the harp from the special merchant in it before turning it off for the day, when encountered the first special random/inbetween encounter. Panicing shot a fireball what killed everyone except me and Jaheira (my aim is quit good I have to say). Good for me, but now I'm stuck(?) as the next move will be the Xar/Montaron quest, where a simple fireball I assume won't work. I'll come up with something though I suppose.