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Posted by: Sikret May 14 2007, 09:16 AM

Hi,

If you happen to find any new bugs in the original game which are not yet fixed by IA, please report them to me either via PMs or by sending them here in this thread.

Before sending any reports, make sure that you have already installed Baldurdash TOB Fixpack v1.12 (no other fixpacks) as well as the newest version of Improved Anvil. Also, make sure that you have followed IA's installation instructions very precisely.

Thanks in advance

Posted by: Raven May 20 2007, 02:37 PM

Enemy mages cast Globe of Invulnerability then Spider Swarm targeted on themselves, which fails because of the Globe. Rayic Gethras is one mage who does this (if he lasts long enough )

Posted by: Sikret May 20 2007, 02:59 PM

Just fixed the problem in Rayic's script.

By the way, thanks for sending this report here in this thread (rather than the IA bug thread), because none of IA's improved mages have such a problem in their scripts.

Posted by: devSin May 20 2007, 03:12 PM

These will always fail. The problem is with the way the engine handles external targets run on the caster -- the ability and effect are set to target elsewhere, but the actual summoning effects "link" back to the caster (out of necessity; the engine needs to target the caster to determine the allegiance of the summoned character). Normally, effects that target self bypass these sorts of resistances, but trying to affect the caster when the caster isn't the target doesn't correctly bypass the immunities (even though the script has it cast on the caster, the engine still treats it differently).

In short, the spell will fail even if the target is an enemy or a point on the ground. You'll see this behavior if you have Imoen cast Minor Globe and then try to cast Monster Summoning (you should get the "Spell Ineffective" message). The solution is to set the power level for these types of effects to 0 (thereby allowing them to bypass the immunity to spell level effects of the globe). This won't resolve the problem when the protection is a Spell Immunity or other spell that doesn't protect by spell level, but it should fix the Globe of Invulnerability funk.

I believe the fixpack fixes this (along with some other power issues that can cause problems).

Posted by: Sikret May 20 2007, 03:34 PM

I know this. I fixed it but not by changing the spell's target.

Posted by: Raven May 20 2007, 03:38 PM

No problem. I realized that was the case.

Something else: I'm not sure this is a bug but Barbarian Rage imposes a penalty of 2 points on save vs. spell. IMHO this should be a 2 point bonus on saves vs. spells (i.e. reduce save by 2 points). I don't believe the Barbarian's enraged state should make him/her more vulnerable to magic.

I wanted to post this here so it could be discussed, since I'm not sure I'm right...

Posted by: Sikret May 20 2007, 03:53 PM

Barbarian rage's description in the game is ambiguous. It says:

"Gives a 2 point Armor Class penalty and a +2 to saves vs. Magic".

It seems that it should be interpreted it as "a +2 penalty to saves vs. Magic" unless we find other evidence to believe in the opposite. The ability actually gives 2 points of penalty to saves vs. magic in the game, which confirms the interpretation that it meant to be a penalty.

Posted by: leonidas May 20 2007, 06:01 PM

NEVAZIAH.CRE (the lich you fight in edwin's nether scroll quest) is bugged atm. It's actually a combination of IA and his vanilla bg2 script. But it felt on-topic, so I'll post it here.

He has a similar issue to rayic gethras; he will cast monster summoning 3 and animate dead, but neither work because he is immune to level 5 spells. Also (and I will double-check this) when IA is installed, he gains massive innate damage resistances (and regeneration) that make him immune to all but crushing damage (and he is still about 75% resistant to that). So he becomes ridiculously tough to kill for a mob worth 8k xp.

Posted by: Sikret May 21 2007, 08:41 AM

He actually doesn't use any of the IA scripts. It's just his own script of the vanilla game.


I'll fix his script.



Yes, unlike other liches, he already had damage resistance in the vanilla game and it stacks with the resistance IA gives to all liches. I will fix this too. Thanks for the report.

Posted by: thetruth May 21 2007, 01:45 PM

I don't think that it can be misinterpreted Sikret. The penalty refers only to the AC. IMO you should fix it. (makes more sense either if it's a bonus to the save vs. Magic).

Posted by: leonidas May 21 2007, 02:44 PM

I concur, if you look at rings of protection for example, they also say +1 bonus to saves, when in actual fact they reduce them (make them better).

Don't think there is much ambiguity, rather just an out-and-out bug.

Posted by: Sikret May 21 2007, 03:47 PM

The problem is that in other cases (such as Improved Invisibility) AC and saves move in the same direction. You get bonus to AC, you get bonus to saves. I don't see what kind of change in a character's conditions may cause penalty to AC but bonus to saving throws. You either become angry and careless about your defence or you become more focused and more careful about your defence. In either case, the AC and saves should be modified in the same direction. Hence, I still have reservations/hesitation to accept that it is a bug. I'm open to more arguments, of course.

Posted by: Raven May 21 2007, 04:16 PM

My idea of Barbarian rage is that the character psyches themselves up into a frenzy. While physically they are easier to hit their heightened mental state allows them to shrug off the effects of harmful magic with greater ease. This is represented by the immunities granted and, I believe, by a save bonus.

I personally don't think it makes sense to have immunity to many spells/effects - hold, charm and so on - but yet a penalty against other spells!

But Sikret I can see where you are coming from on this and I understand completely if you don't want to make any change.

Posted by: thetruth May 21 2007, 04:20 PM

Yes and in this case it is stated clearly in the description, that it's a bonus to AC and the saving throws, like clear is IMO the + (=bonus) to the s.throws of the Barbarian's Rage ability.





What makes me wondering is if it's correct the +2 AC penalty.
For Berserkers there is a bonus (-2) to AC while enraged so it doesn't make much sense.

But for the saving throw I am sure that it's a bonus, since an enraged character can avoid the effects of many spells (mainly mind-affecting spells).
(as stated also in 2ed books)

Posted by: Arkain May 21 2007, 04:37 PM

Although it's another set of rules the Barbarian Rage's explanation of D&D 3.X clearly states that the raging character gains a bonus to some saving throws and a penalty to his AC: http://www.d20srd.org/srd/classes/barbarian.htm#rage

My idea of a rage is the same as Raven's: the character enters a stage of frenzy, attacking with more strength and brutally. As he is so enraged and focused on... whatever... he is able to withstand the negative effects of certain spells or other magical effects. Due to this the AC penalty occurs: the barbarian attacks with more brutality (strength), has a higher threshold of pain (more con -> HP) etc.. As he ignores most other things than combat and killing he also tends to ignore his defense a bit more, so he may get hit by an attack he might have been able to avoid before (for example: he would have backed off a bit then charged again at the foe, but in this case he simply charged and charged some more so he got hit while relentlessly attacking the opponent).

Posted by: luan May 22 2007, 03:51 AM

Unrelated to the Barbarian rage discussion:

You can sell equipment to Sister Farielle in the temple Waukeen, Saradush for extremely high prices. Her rates feel like 3x/4x more than any SoA counterpart stores.

I'll post more if I find other instances of shopkeepers with this quirk.

Posted by: Sikret May 22 2007, 05:46 AM

If anyone can present a related quote from a 2nd edition text, it can help us to decide.

Posted by: Sikret May 22 2007, 05:51 AM

Thanks, luan!

Please compare these three stores for me regarding their buying prices:

1- Sister Farielle

2- Temple of Sekolah

3- Ribald's special store (not his ordinary one)

For example tell me how much each of them buy a diamond if your reputation is 20.

Posted by: luan May 22 2007, 06:57 AM

Will do, however... where is the Temple of Sekolah?

Posted by: Sikret May 22 2007, 07:05 AM

It's in the city of caverns (the underwater city).

Posted by: thetruth May 22 2007, 07:46 AM

I don't think that the Barbarian had a rage ability in 2nd ed. (at least I didn't find anything in his kit description in the Complete Fighter's Handbook)

But (from the same book) the Berserker's rage ability grants immunity/bonuses to some spells:



And no penalties to his s.throws are mentioned in the hindrances of the ability.

Also there is no mention at all about bonuses or penalties to his AC.

Posted by: luan May 22 2007, 07:46 AM

Diamond (1)

With a newly created character, charisma 12, reputation 20,
from SOA using console to warp around

1) Sister Farielle:
Sell 550gp
Buy 1080gp

2) Priestess of Sekolah
Sell 500gp
Buy 840gp

3) Ribald's special store
Don't know variable to access

Using my TOB character, charisma 15, reputation 20
1) Sister Farielle
Sell 550gp
Buy 930gp

2) Priestess of Sekolah
Dead!

3) Ribald's special store
Sell 550gp
Buy 990gp

The numbers generally look pretty consistent.

I think I've determined what made the prices so inflated in my game. For the entire play through I've been using one particular vendor (thieves stronghold) exclusively.

Guess the game takes into accounts for prices relative to how many items are in stock.

So... I was originally selling Full Plates at 1200gp, so it was quite a shock to see it a possibility to sell for 3k+!
I just checked Ribald for Full Plates and was able to catch a deal of 3300gp... with some in stock.

This was player oversight, I apologize.
Guess next time around I'll have much more gold to use for upgrades... hah!

Posted by: thetruth May 22 2007, 07:57 AM

Yes the priestess in the Sahuagin city has the best prices in the game.

From D.Simpson's walkthrough:



Another merchant who has much better prices than the others is the smuggler in the cave in Amkethran (the one that sells the Gargoyle's boots and other items).

Posted by: Sikret May 22 2007, 08:09 AM

No, no! On the contrary, I think that you made a good point. I knew that those three stores would offer more or less similar or consistent prices, but that's because those three stores have unreasonable prices. It doesn't mean that you were wrong.

Please test the price of diamond (with the same parties) in Ribald's ordinary store as well. Tell me the result and we can compare the stores together.

Posted by: Sikret May 22 2007, 08:20 AM

So, it seems that pnp texts can't help us much in this particular case.

I can change the penalty to saves to a bonus, but I'm not sure what to do with the penalty to AC. As you said, it doesn't make sense that the Berserker version grants bonus while the Barbarian version gives penalty.

Posted by: thetruth May 22 2007, 08:44 AM

Yes I don't know either.
But I think that both Raven and Arkain made good points that it should be a penalty to the AC and not a bonus.
(As mentioned also in the link Arkain gave).

The only thing that can be connected to the AC of an enraged Berserker is maybe this (from the Fighter's Handbook):

Posted by: Sikret May 22 2007, 10:45 AM

Well, his prices become good only after he offers you his discount. Similar to Ribald, he has two stores. He shows you the store with good prices only after you help them. It's almost the end of the game, but I can modify his discount rate if you think that it can be exploited.

Posted by: thetruth May 22 2007, 11:45 AM

No it's OK I think now. It's near the end of the game as you said.

Posted by: leonidas May 22 2007, 03:18 PM

Just a quickie: Jahiera gets stuck in a dialogue loop when she finds khalid's carcass if yoshimo is incapacitated when he is supposed to chip-in (e.g. by the radiant mephit's colour spray).

Basically she will say her initial dialogue over and over again until yoshimo is close enough to activate his own dialogue.

Posted by: luan May 22 2007, 10:06 PM

Diamond (1)
Charisma 15
Reputation 20

Ribald normal store:
Sell 300gp
Buy 1150gp

Ribald special store:
Sell 550gp
Buy 1150gp

It seems the prices are different depending on which interface I load the game from (TOB vs SOA)... Odd how they don't match up from yesterday's numbers.

Posted by: Sikret May 23 2007, 07:11 AM

Thanks, luan! I surveyed all of the game's stores one more time and fixed all unreasonable sell/buy prices.

Posted by: luan May 24 2007, 09:44 PM

Just noticed that the Defender of Easthaven +2 text discription reads as "Defender of Easthaven +3"!

Posted by: leonidas May 24 2007, 11:02 PM

There's a defender of easthaven +2!?

Posted by: Noelle May 25 2007, 06:24 AM

Pretty sure there's at least one out there, althought I think the quickest way is to install the bonus merchants mod. If I don't remember wrongly, the guy in CC sells the defender. Can't remember his name offhand

Posted by: luan May 25 2007, 06:43 AM

??

Posted by: Sikret May 25 2007, 12:34 PM

The posts about Defender of Easthaven were sent to the wrong topic. It's a bug of the vanilla game and should have been sent here rather than the IA bug thread. I moved the posts here to the right topic.

Yes, the flail is +3. It's name is incorrect. Will fix it.

Posted by: leonidas May 28 2007, 03:38 PM

There's an issue with the joinable npcs atm. Most of them have at least two versions, and depending on the character level of the party leader, you get either a high or low level one.

The thing is, atm, this is easy to exploit. You can just stick yoshimo in charge of your party, and because thieves get levels at the higher rate than usual, you get npcs joining with a disproportionate amount of xp.

For example, you can stick yoshimo in charge of your party (or you might be playing a thief as the protagonist) and go save the circus. Seeing as yoshimo will be level 10 or 11, you will get the version of aerie with 400k xp.

Same with keldorn and anomen, you can get version of their characters with almost a million xp, by having a thief in charge of your party with 440000 xp (or something).

I was thinking about it, and it seems to me, characters you can get immediately such as keldorn or anomen shouldn't have high level versions. Or alternatively the joining level of npcs should be based on total xp rather than character level. But bear in mind it is also possible to exploit this by playing in single player and doing all the easy quests to get your character level up (and then getting all the higher-xp versions on the joinable npcs).

Anyway, tell me what you think.

Posted by: Romulas May 28 2007, 04:26 PM

I disagree for the following reasons. In my last IA V4 game I got pretty high before I bailed. In this game I attacked the grave lich on core rules and finally won. That was the first time I ever beat that critter so was pretty happy with it. The bad thing was I lost a custom dwarf of over 20th level, permanently.

So, I recruited keldorn and the disparity between his level and average party level would have made him a serious handicap. I think he joined the party and was level 12. So, in order to play down using shadowkeeper to make him an asset instead of a handicap some better way should be implemented.

As for doing all the easy quests first with 4 or fewer people, I thought that was mentioned as a viable tactic to combat the increased difficulty at the lower levels that IA puts in, I could be wrong on this.

Romulas

Posted by: Raven Jun 2 2007, 03:26 PM

Re: electrical resistance of Shadow Fiends


Shadow fiends have an electrical resistance of 128% (checked using Shadow Keeper). The maximum resistance is 127% - beyond this point the resistances wrap round so that a resistance of 128% is actually -127%, meaning Shadow Fiends take over double damage from electrical attacks. I found this out whilst bashing one with the Hammer of Thor .

Can't think of any reason why Shadow Fiends should be so vulnerable to electricity, so I guess this is just a bug. There may be other monsters with similar problems but this was the only one I've noticed so far.

Posted by: Baronius Jun 2 2007, 04:27 PM

Did you experience or test the problem in practice as well?

BG2 isn't available to me at the moment, so I can't check how ShadowKeeper displays what you say or if it has any bug. Resistance is represented in a signed byte, so it's -128 (and not -127) if its absolute value is 128.

Posted by: Raven Jun 2 2007, 04:31 PM

Yes, as mentioned I fought a Shadow Fiend using the item 'Hammer of Thor' which inflicts 6 points of electrical damage with each hit. The Shadow Fiends took 13 from each hit.

Posted by: Baronius Jun 2 2007, 04:33 PM

I see, thanks for the reply. I was looking for your earlier post, but didn't find it.

[EDIT] Sorry, I had overlooked it in your previous post. Now I see it.

Posted by: Sikret Jun 5 2007, 04:31 PM

Baronius is right. Their resistance to electricity is actually -128% (not 128%) which is not a valid number, of course. Will do something about it. Thanks for the report, Raven!

EDIT: Just checked and Devil Shades have the same issue as well.

Posted by: Mongerman Jun 6 2007, 11:53 PM

Planetar spam with project image still works as well. Not even the demon prince can take on 20 planetars at once.

Posted by: thetruth Jun 7 2007, 12:03 AM

Yes unfortunately it is one of the few "bugs" that cannot be fixed.
But at that point someone could also use CTRL-Y - it's also faster

Posted by: Sikret Jun 7 2007, 06:55 AM

Now, only sorcerers can cast "Project Image" and "Simulacrum". Other mages cannot learn the spells because all scrolls of those two spells are removed from the game (unless you cheat and give the spell to your mage by SK). The spells are also erased from the spell book of Jan and Nalia. This was all I could think to do for now, but as thetruth indirectly said, it's the player (himself) who should be his own policeman to avoid cheesy methods.

Posted by: Clown Jun 7 2007, 07:52 AM

Don't think this is a bug as such but realised on my last run through it can be horridly exploited, tensers transformation still allows casting of spells from scrolls and with the far larger numbers of useful spell scrolls in IA its easier to exploit.

Posted by: Sikret Jun 7 2007, 08:10 AM

thetruth had reported this to me a good while ago and I fixed it at that time. Just can't remember if it was before v4.2 or not, but I'm sure it is fixed in v4.3.

Posted by: thetruth Jun 7 2007, 11:38 AM

No Clown says that a Mage under TT can still cast spells from scrolls (not a second and cumulative TT which is fixed now).

But in this case I don't think of it as bug, since scrolls are considered items and they can use them like thieves with UAI can.

I am not sure if this is a good idea.
For sure it is a solution, but still I would prefer a different one, even if I am not sure know if there is.
Besides it makes Sorcerers even more powerful than the other Mages.

Posted by: Sikret Jun 7 2007, 03:09 PM

Ah, yes. I had misread Clown's post. Thanks.


I agree.


I'm open to suggestions.



But sorcerers are not that much powerful in IA. They are now far beneath the authority they had in the vanilla game. Don't you agree?

As a side note, sorcerers now have less chance to forge the Robe of the Apprenti than pure mages, which means that a pure mage has more chance to forge "Memory of the Apprenti" (= a great item). And the robe is not even cheatable.

Posted by: Clown Jun 7 2007, 03:35 PM

Now, only sorcerers can cast "Project Image" and "Simulacrum". Other mages cannot learn the spells because all scrolls of those two spells are removed from the game (unless you cheat and give the spell to your mage by SK). The spells are also erased from the spell book of Jan and Nalia. This was all I could think to do for now, but as thetruth indirectly said, it's the player (himself) who should be his own policeman to avoid cheesy methods.

I am not sure if this is a good idea.
For sure it is a solution, but still I would prefer a different one, even if I am not sure know if there is.

I personally would see this as an unnecesary restiriction, the spells are good characterful spells which I like. Sure they can be abused but this is a case where it would be probably be best to allow people to police themselves rather than removing the spells from the game.

Posted by: coaster Jun 7 2007, 04:01 PM

I presume the main problem is the player spamming huge numbers of planetars. In which case could Project Image/Simulcrum be nerfed somehow so that;

a/ the images/simulcrums cannot cast summoning spells

or;

b/ the images/simulcrums cannot cast level 9 spells.

Perhaps one way of doing b/ would be to "cap" project image at a certain caster level?

I agree with Clown though - I'd prefer to keep them in for all mage/sorc classes if at all possible.

Posted by: Arkain Jun 7 2007, 05:28 PM

I agree with thetruth, coaster and Clown: it's not quite the best solution. You should allow players to decide on their own whether they use this or not. If not, then is it possible to make the summoning limit work for PI/Simulacrum as well? If so, one couldn't have 10 Mordys, Planetars or whatever. Or is it not possible due to the engine?

Posted by: thetruth Jun 7 2007, 08:35 PM

Yes the problem is not only the Planetars. PI and Simulacrum ignore generally the summon limit of 5. I guess it happens because the clones are not party members.
Though I am not sure if there is a solution to this.

Also PI can be abused more than the Simulacrum since the second is a "level-drained" image of the caster and cannot cast 9 level spells (don't know what happens without the XP CAP though).

And of course both can use items/scrolls from the quick-slot. I don't know if it would be possible to make them unable to use the quick-slots like it happens with the Mislead clones.
Or if it is doable to make impossible for a Mage to put PIs in a C.Contigency.

IMO it is the PI the most cheesy spell since you can make it also to attack physically if you shapechange it.
So if you decide to remove something for me it should be only the PI.

If we were talking about the original game I wouldn't have any problems at all if you removed both spells from the game, since pure Arcane spell-casters were already too powerful. But in IA these spells cannot be abused so much like before and arcane spell-casters would become even "weaker" without these spells.

Yes but this is true for the other spell-casters as well. Sorcerers would be even more powerful compared to the other Mages if you remove these spells.

And since Sorcerers can use these spells the problem remains for those who want to cheat (mod-NPCs or multi-player created Sorcerers).

In conclusion Sikret, I believe that if none of the above solutions is possible maybe you should leave the spells (at least the Simulacrum) in the game. Besides the player who wants to cheat will do it anyway.

Posted by: leonidas Jun 7 2007, 10:35 PM

Disabling the ability to stick project image in a chain contingency and disabling projected images' ability to cast level 9 spells would be the best solution, if it's possible.

As for removing them from the game? I think it's a mistake. There is a limited amount of spells that mages can cast in the late game of IA and actually be useful. Reducing that amount of spells by 2 serves to make the game less interesting.

If it cannot be fixed, so be it. Players will have to resist the temptation to cheat in this one instance.

Posted by: rbeverjr Jun 8 2007, 02:33 AM

Concerning spamming planetars: I defeated the demon prince without spamming summons (pardon my elation). With that success, I have no intention of spamming summons. And from the comments of others, I can tell that this tactic is unnecessary to win. My opinion remains that this game is personal; so, let a person do what pleases him (even planetar spamming) - it won't affect my game at all.

On the other hand, if you are able to take away summon spamming -without taking away the spells- that won't affect my game either. So, I don't mind.

Posted by: Sikret Jun 8 2007, 12:56 PM

Even worse, when a projected image uses a scroll, the scroll is not consumed and does not disappear the original caster's inventory (the illusionary copy of the scroll disappears from the clone's inventory but the main scroll remains).

Posted by: Sikret Jun 8 2007, 01:09 PM

What if I leave "Simulacrum" as it is, but replace "Project Image" with an entirely new custom spell? (the drawback of this solution is that if any other creature--perhaps from some other mod-- is coded to cast project image, he will cast that new spell on himself instead. This is the main reason I didn't go for this solution in the first place.)

Posted by: Demivrgvs Jun 8 2007, 01:17 PM

Is it possible to make quick item slots unusable for PI and Simulacrums?

Posted by: leonidas Jun 8 2007, 02:14 PM

I don't see the problem; in the vanilla game, IA, and all the other mods I've played, I've never seen a hostile creature that was actually scripted to cast project image.

Also, as IA becomes even more extensive, it will preclude the use of other mods anyway.

Posted by: Arkain Jun 8 2007, 02:23 PM

Well, afaik the improved Sendai included in Oversight uses PIs, apart from other cheesy methods - varies in that you determine the difficulty of the battle via the actual difficulty of the game.
But that's a moot point anyway, as IA uses it's own component. I think so at least. Didn't get there yet.

Now, what would this new spell look like?

Posted by: rbeverjr Jun 8 2007, 02:39 PM

Personally, I horded the 2 green protect from magic scrolls and resisted the urge to use them through PI. I may try out that improved ring of gaxx someday.

Simulacrum may not be so much less powerful than PI. Imagine the maxxed out FMC that casts simulacrum followed by restoration on the simulacrum. Now we have 2 maxxed out FMC ready to do battle!

I've not used Simulacrum at all yet and have used PI rarely. I wonder if I will need them later in the game though.

Posted by: Sikret Jun 8 2007, 04:05 PM

If we eventually agree on the main idea of replacing the spell with a new one, I think the new spell can be a near spell of the same school. For example, an improved version of the mislead spell comes to mind. It can be names "Greater Mislead" or "Improved Mislead" or something like that (we can decide its differences with the 6th level spell). Another idea can be the Auramaster's "Perfect Camouflage" spell. I can make a mage version of the spell. A third idea can be a spell which is a mixture of "Imp. Invisiblity + Blur + Mirror Image" all in one package.

All that said, I think our main problem for now is to decide whether we want to replace the spell or not. If we decide that we want, we can think more about the exact features of the new spell. I'm still leaned towards omitting the scrolls rather than replacing the spell, but it's only a slight preferance. I'm open to suggestions.

Posted by: rbeverjr Jun 8 2007, 04:30 PM

I'm not the tactical expert that others are, but so far I've used PI mostly to conserve spells. Let the PI do any prebuffing and pre-summoning to the limit. For sure, the enemy will cast True Sight and destroy the image as soon as the battle has begun. Personally, I haven't felt the need for more defense with my mages. I've always been wanting more offense than just summon and buff. Further, Perfect Camouflage (a very nice spell, by the way) and Immunity Abjuration (I'd never trade the later spell for the former) used together would allow 2 school immunities. I still lean toward leaving things alone.

Posted by: thetruth Jun 8 2007, 04:36 PM

Yes I agree with leonidas. IA has already modified the tough enemies other mods change and since in the next versions almost all of the original game's enemies will be modified I don't think it's a problem to make a new version of the PI.

Yes having as a base the Mislead clone is good.
The name can be again Project Image I don't think that you need to change that (even if it will be an entirely new spell). Or isn't it possible to give an existing name to a new spell?

So on this new clone someone will not be able to use the quick-slots, right?

Also can you make it impossible to put in a Chain Contigency?
Maybe with a similar "mechanism" to that of the SI spell (can't put it in a CC)?

But I like also the idea of a spell similar to the "Perfect Camouflage" of the Auramaster.

Posted by: Sikret Jun 8 2007, 04:38 PM

Very good observation, rbeverjr!

So, the mage version of Perfect Camouflage is omitted from the list of options (if we decide to replace the spell). Let's wait to see what others will suggest.

Posted by: thetruth Jun 8 2007, 04:51 PM

The main difference is that the PI can cast the exact numbers of spells of the caster (9-level spells included which can be abused most).
Even if you cast Restoration on the Simulacrum you cannot have more spells than the level-drained clone had.

And yes F/M types (and not only) can use them in melee with a better THACO if you cast Restoration on them, but you can anyway cast T.Transformation on the clone and then use scrolls of PfMWs (since you don't use the real ones) and the result will be the same (Restoration or not).

Maybe later we can find a solution for the Simulacrum spell as well.

Posted by: thetruth Jun 8 2007, 04:54 PM

But if you wanted you could always make the Mage version of the spell to belong to the Illusion school. Fits nicely with the idea of the spell IMO.

Posted by: Sikret Jun 8 2007, 05:00 PM

The problem rbeverjr noted is that Perfect camouflage includes SI:Divination as one of its effects. Now if we make a mage version of it, the mage will cast it together with SI:Abjuration and he rule of "Multiple SIs don't stack" will be violated. Of course, there are solutions for the problem. For example, I can add immunity to SI to the new spell and immunity to the new spell to all types of SI. I will keep this possibility as a final resort if we don't find a good mislead-type alternative.

Posted by: leonidas Jun 8 2007, 05:47 PM

My favourite solution thus far is the new mislead spell.

I say, give the mislead clone the ability to cast certain spells (instead of a direct copy of the player's spell book), based on the level of the caster, and the inability to cast certain lvl 9 spells and HLAs.

That will retain the spell's functionality as a spell-sparing device and circumvent the major exploits.

Posted by: Sikret Jun 9 2007, 02:46 PM

If noone has any particular reason to disagree, I prefer the "Perfect Camouflage" spell as a replacement for "Project Image". Of course, I will make sure that the spell will not stack with SI. The spell grants Improved Invisibility + Protection from divination spells simultaneously (for 20 rounds) though it won't grant the AC and save bonuses of the oridinary Imp. Invisibility (so there is no need to worry about exploits of casting the new spell together with Imp. Invisibility or with itself cumulatively to have absurdly high AC and save bonuses). A successful remove magic can dispel the effects of the spell as you can't have this spell together with SI:Abjuration. What's everyone's opinion? Any objections or suggestions before I implement the idea and add it to V4.3?

@leonidas

I decided to give up the idea of an Improved Mislead spell as it was really problematic.

Posted by: rbeverjr Jun 9 2007, 03:37 PM

As I pointed out in my previous post, I don't like that idea because I will not give up SI:Abjuration for Perfect Camouflage. For me, this change will be the same as just taking away Project Image and simply serves to further weaken pure mages. I like PI simply because it supplies extra spell power, which means I can have more spells for the very long battles of IA. Even though I have used PI rarely, I hope it's not done away with.

Posted by: thetruth Jun 9 2007, 04:37 PM

No if the spell has only these abilities it's just like the common SI: Divination (+ you add I.Invisibility later).
So why should anyone prefer it to a 5 level spell?

Maybe if you added some more abilities/immunities to the spell it would become more useful. But I can't think of anything good right now.

Posted by: Raven Jun 9 2007, 04:42 PM

SI: abjuration is not needed in all battles; there are enough enemies I came across who did not use remove magic very much but would make use of True Sight whenever I cast improved invisibility that SI divination was useful. Although I guess only after fighting a particular mage do you discover whether (s)he uses remove magic much or not - on the first runthrough of a particular battle I would stick to SI abjuration.

So I think a spell combining invisibility and SI: div. like this would be useful. Also, Sikret, will you be scripting opponents to cast this new spell (seems like a good idea)?

EDIT: I agree though with thetruth's comments in the post below that the spell is a little weak for a level 7.

Posted by: Sikret Jun 9 2007, 05:20 PM

The spell is also a 7th level spell in Auramaster's spell collection. I don't think that it is weak as a 7th level spell, because it practically casts two spells simultaneously (not only opens two free slots of 4th and 5th level spells for other choices, but also saves one round of casting time, because if you wanted to cast those two spells normally you needed to wate two rounds which can be very important in the middle of fight.)

Also remember the 6th level clerical spell "Wondrous Recall" which can only bring back to memeory one single spell of lower levels. Compare them together.

Nonetheless, if you can think of an additional effect to be added to the spell (which suits well with its spirit), let me know. The spell's name doesn't need to be identical with the druidic version. So, if you can think of a good effect to be added to it we may change the spell and its name as well. I also suggested other spell effects in my previous posts. For example, we can drop immunity to divination and add other effects instead or we can keep these two effects and add mirro image to it as well (though in this case the name should be changed perhaps).

Posted by: Arkain Jun 9 2007, 05:49 PM

Mhm... anyone here played IWD?

In D&D 3.X (I've got mostly no clue of the former D&D versions) there are spells which can be used to summon quasi-real creatures. Shadow Conjuration spells. The creature could be likely anything but must be within the spells limits. Such as having only 80% of the real things power. These spells were implented in IWD (mabye only in IWD2, I don't really remember). So one could have "yet another" summoning spell on level 7, but in fact a rather useful one. Instead of only relying on mordys. One could summon weaker versions of strong creatures, controllable demons and the like for example.
What about this idea? As most summons aren't really worth it in IA (or rather in general...) this could maybe actually make a change, as to not only have cannon fodder but creatures which are somewhat powerful, other than a planetar, elemental prince, noble djinn or whatever.

The original spell can be found here: http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/shadowConjurationGreater.htm

[edit] On the other hand: Why not take a general look at spells found in other IE games? Protective spells such as Seven Eyes could prove to be a useful replacement for PI, which is a powerful spell if one uses it accordingly. [/edit]

Posted by: thetruth Jun 9 2007, 06:19 PM

What about adding to the SI:Div. and I.Invisibility (actually it's not I.Inv. since you don't get the bonuses to AC and s.throws) also Blur + Mirror Image?

Still against enemies who cast R.Magic it will not be very effective (unless if you make the enemies to waste it on other party members).

Can you add also another ability to the spell, like immunity to spell casting failure + undispelable for the duration of the spell? (similar to a Force spells ability)
If yes then it would made the spell much more useful in some situations IMO.

Posted by: Sikret Jun 10 2007, 12:20 PM

With the XP cap remover Simulacrum spell is as cheesy as Project Image, because the clone can cast 9th level spells. So, we need to replace Simulacrum with a new spell too. Since, there are very few good 8th level spells in the game, I think repacing it with a powerful summoning spell won't be a bad idea. Another good idea can be a necromantic regeneration spell, though the current best 8th level spell in the game (ADHW) is already a necromantic one, so perhaps the summoning spell idea may be better. The difficult thing about creating a summoning 8th level spell is to decide what it should summon to be more powerful than lower level summoned creatures but less powerful than a planetar. What do you think?

Some ideas:
1- "Construct Golem" spell. Summons Flesh Golems when the caster's level is 16-19 and summons Stone Golems when the caster's level is 20 or above. (Needless to add that summoning Clay golems is not a good idea because they are immune to all weapon types except the blunt and the spell can then be exploited).
2- An "Improved Spider Spawn" spell which summons the new types of spiders Improved Anvil adds to the game (the type of spider can vary with the caster's level)
3- "Improved Conjure Elemental": A mage version of the druidic spell in which the mage won't need to have any mental combat with the elemental. The elemental can also be 24HD.
5- "Summon Elite Djinni" (summons a more powerful djinni than what the 7th level spellsummons, though not as powerful as what the Ring of Greater Djinni Summoning can conjure)

For now, I slightly lean towards option 3.

Posted by: Clown Jun 10 2007, 02:16 PM

Quite like the second option(No Ghost Spiders) there for the summoning spell if we have to lose both PI and simul but would really prefer if at least simul could stay.
The opportunity for exploitation of simul is very limited as you need some seriously high levels to be able to pull that off. It will be a very small minority of people who choose to abuse it and probabaly not the people improved anvil is aimed at, seems to me removing it is a bit uneccesary plus i like the spell.

Posted by: coaster Jun 10 2007, 03:26 PM

The trouble with most summons in IA are that they generally last about 5 seconds against the new enemies. Mages just Death Spell them, melee fighters chunk them with one hit. The vanilla golems won't really cut it I don't think, it would have to be gem or coin golems I think for such a spell to be worthwhile. Otherwise the spiders or djinni are OK I guess. Alternatively what about summon Skeleton Lord? (although I suppose this would be necromantic also).

Will these summons be gated in and so immune to death spell?

Posted by: thetruth Jun 10 2007, 05:26 PM

Sikret if you remove both PI and Simulacrum from the game pure Arcane spell-casters are penalized too much.

If you decide to implement a summoning spell then IMO:

a) It should be "gated".

b ) It should have high physical resistances (at least 50% but no MR since Nishruu and Hakeashar are enough).

c) Good THACO,AC and at least 2 ApR.

Giving the above abilities to the Elite Djinni seems a good idea to me.

Another idea maybe could be to make an improved version of the Tenser's Transformation spell. The same abilities of TT+ the ability for the Mage to cast 1-4 level spells. This could be a spell useful to pure Mages and not overpowered for a 8 level spell. Besides it replaces better the Simulacrum spell.

Posted by: leonidas Jun 10 2007, 10:33 PM

Thetruth speaks the truth, whereas project image is cheesy and bugged for a large percentage of the game, simlacrum only really becomes an issue right at the end. I wouldn't recommend changing it.

However, if we are going to change it, improved tenser's transformation would be a nice thing for mages to play around with (after all, they already have a plethora of summoning spells). That way pure mages can retain some power despite losing one of their better spells.

Also, there is already a much underused summoning spell in the 8th spell circle: summon cacofiend. It is my belief the demon summoning spells should be improved before adding another summoning spell (I can't think of a reason anyone would cast them atm).

Posted by: Sikret Jun 11 2007, 08:40 AM

I'm persuaded. I will not replace Simulacrum with a new spell.

Posted by: Roy Jun 11 2007, 01:29 PM

It seems to me that removing the PI and simulcrum will make socerers and
mages a lot less usful.I always use PI for before and after battles with
buffing and later rod of ressuraction and than destroy them.

Since all the monsters have more resistences and to get any sorcerer
or mage actually hit something with spells requires few ruby rays,than
removing magical defences and than lowering resistence and than
hoping that they are not immune to fire/acid/whatever you use.

Not sure about the summons instead of simulcrum.The elementals and
djinni can be used with the ring or druid.

Posted by: leonidas Jun 11 2007, 02:20 PM

Hrm yes, losing project image is a big hit for mages, but frankly I'm against mages having infinite amounts of spells.

It will encourage better spell management this way.

Imp. tenser's transformation would be cool for bridging the power gap between mages and other classes though. If mages are really crippled by this lastest change, that's the idea I like the best.

Posted by: Roy Jun 11 2007, 03:21 PM

It's that with all the changes mages(single classed) and sorcerers are
not really usful.I'm using Kelsey as a 12 level sorcerer and he is
used for buffing,breaching(I have Keldorn too,and F/M/T and a F/T to
help with that too because he can't remove defences fast enough).
And than mages also have numerous scrolls for back up and contigencies.
I'm in chaper 2 and Kelsey hardly helps.

Maybe Sikret could make this an optional component or put the new
spells in and make it as a matter of a choice to the player
if he wants to or not.

And that would have to be some serios improved TT since it's a bit hard
to imagine casting it and sending him to melee Firkrag,Mellisan
or any other boss.

About the simulcrum compared to other summons with F/M it gives summon
that grows in power with levels and is usful in contrast
to Sikret suggestions that will compared to enemies will get weaker
and weaker.

Posted by: rbeverjr Jun 11 2007, 03:26 PM

I generally prefer my mage to be able to cast spells. I have fighters to do the fighting. I also think that the mage would soon die in many battles without the ability to cast PfMW. Even though he could use scrolls, scrolls are in limited supply.

Concerning spell management: I generally don't use PI even now, and only if I think I need to. Still, some of the battles are soooo long (due to resistances, spamming of PfMW, etc.) that any thing to extend the number of spells is useful. As reported, I went through several wish spells (maybe 5) during the JD finale trying to get "rest and restore spells" to no avail.

Posted by: Clown Jun 11 2007, 05:14 PM

I think we now have a good balance, replacing PI but keeping Simul. Should remove most of the scope for cheating while not nerfing mages to any great degree for the average palyer.

@Roy:
A pure class mage in IA is certainly not useless, they just need to be used slightly differently than in the vanilla game. Both times I've played through i've had a single class mage(Kelsey,Edwin) and they've each been key players. In early game they tend to be good for disabling type spells as well as early acess to improved haste, PfMW, ruby ray and several other key spells. However its later in the game in a few of the improved encounters that you'll be really glad you've got a powerful spell slinger on board, promise. Mages are still very useful in IA just not able to take on the whole world single handed the way they used to be able to.

Posted by: leonidas Jun 11 2007, 06:04 PM

Atm sikret is striking up the best balance between preventing cheesiness and mage's effectiveness.

I was merely chiming in my support for imp tenser's transformation, if something happens in the future regarding mages and their much-reduced power.

As for mages being kept pure spell casters? Well for a start tenser's is already in the game, it's just a worthless spell, and there are plenty of examples of melee-damage spells in infinity engine games and D&D. Mages should have something to do when spells run out.

Posted by: Vardaman Jun 21 2007, 03:05 PM

This isn't a bug but it does annoy me. Could you switch the Mace of Disruption +2's display icon back to the MoD +1's icon? As in the vanilla game, it switches to the icon for a regular Mace +1 after upgrading it. I just hate it because I get paranoid I'll accidentally sell the MoD +2 and not realize it until way later.

Actually, it'd be sweet to add an option to upgrade the mace again to a +3 weapon. It's a fun weapon but sees very little use after the middle game besides to bestow neg plane protection.

I think this display problem was fixed by the Improved Items mod so it should be a pretty easy fix.

Thanks for all the great work, Sikret. I'm on my first play-through (v.4.2) and the mod has been a blast so far.

Posted by: leonidas Jun 21 2007, 03:32 PM

I agree with this, there are no good maces available before TOB, and about it being ugly when you upgrade.

Posted by: thetruth Jun 21 2007, 11:57 PM

Btw the MoD+1 is +3 enhanced and the MoD+2 is +5 enhanced.
I think an update in their descriptions is needed.

Posted by: Arkain Jul 6 2007, 11:05 PM

Is it possible to do something about the effects of Haste described here?

http://members.chello.nl/~j.vanthull/BG2SR/Main.htm

Posted by: Sikret Jul 8 2007, 06:42 AM

My browser fails to open the link, Arkain!

I'll appreciate if you explain the problem. Chances are that I may have already fixed them in v4.3 however, because I have implemented some fixes regarding haste effects.

Posted by: muddymissfit Jul 8 2007, 08:43 AM

these effects ?

Posted by: Sikret Jul 8 2007, 09:29 AM

No, they are not fixable.

What I have fixed are two other things:

1- A hasted characters' doubled movement speed would still stack with the movement bonus of Boots of Speed. I have fixed the boots to make sure that they will not stack and won't result in a character with quadruple speed.

2- Moreover, Improved Haste could still be blocked by Globe of Invulnerability in the vanilla game. I have fixed it. The globe should not block a 6th level spell.

Posted by: thetruth Jul 8 2007, 06:52 PM

If you refer to this:



then unfortunately it cannot be fixed.

Posted by: Arkain Jul 8 2007, 07:18 PM

Hmm... strange that your browser won't open it. Bah, the link doesn't work as intented anyway... -.- (and now we've learnt: always test links beforehand)


What I was referring to is listed in the "General Spell Info" part:

[edit] So these issues are not fixable? Mhm... oh well.
On the other hand I remembered something else I read in the spells reference: The original game's GoI blocked Improved Haste... which is interesting as according to the Spells Reference (which is the website to which the link should lead you) Improved Haste is handled differently than a normal 6th level spell:



I don't know what you changed, but you might take a look at this issue as well, Sikret. [/edit]

Posted by: Ice Jul 9 2007, 07:53 PM

Mages seem to use their sequencers/triggers even when unconscious/stunned/etc.

Posted by: Stu Jul 10 2007, 05:24 AM

...Or when they have a protection from magic scroll on them (this one is probably a bit of a cheese tactic...I haven't saved after doing this one)

Posted by: Sikret Jul 10 2007, 06:47 AM

This is a bug of the vanilla game which is already fixed in IA v4.3. It's not just mages; many monsters including umberhulks, Myconid,...et al, have this problem in the vanilla game (Umberhulks fire their confusion even when unconscious). The bug was discovered and fixed a while ago.

The three posts about this bug are moved to the right thread (= bugs of vanilla game).

@Stu
None of the enemies in the vanilla game or in IA have or use scrolls of Protection from Magic.

Posted by: Stu Jul 10 2007, 06:59 AM

The player has access to them from the adventurers mart (iirc). Prot. from Magic makes the target immune to the effects of all spells and is supposed to make them unable to cast any spells. It can be cast on enemies making them unable to cast spells (as per the scrolls description). However they can still launch their contingencies when under the effects of the scroll (so my tactic/cheese of getting Daystar early fell right through as soon as he launched his Chain Lightening/Abi Dalzims contingencies on my low level pc)

Posted by: Sikret Jul 10 2007, 07:27 AM

I can tweak those scrolls so that the character who has scroll can only use them on himself (not on other creatures). In this way you can't cast them on enemies.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 10 2007, 07:52 AM

Just checked the scroll again and saw nowehere in its description that it will disable contingencies and triggers; nonetheless, casting them on enemies is cheesy for sure and it's not a bad idea to apply the tweak I mentioned above.

Posted by: Roy Jul 10 2007, 01:58 PM

Could you do something about the apprentices.Role playingly in the original
game when playing good charecter I always told them to not forge the
robe or staff of power as it kills them.

In IA the robe is a must for forging the memory of the apprenti.Perheps
something can be done to protect them,maybe going on a quest to get them
a defensive equipment or upgrading the lab so they will have better chances
to survive or maybe the protagonist could stay for a few days and actually
guide them.

It can even start new quests in the sphere.

Posted by: rbeverjr Jul 10 2007, 02:18 PM

Emphasis added by me: I always thought it was cheesy to use the scroll offensively, but it is a favorite tactic of some people. They didn't like me calling that use cheesy. Of course, using the scroll offensively is the easiest way to kill the acid kensai in the normal game if you get Celestial Fury at level 8, and the acid kensai comes looking for it.

Edit: I no longer install the acid kensai. In my opinion, it is cheese and counter cheese (although there are good ways to win other than the scrolls of prot vs magic). And if I'm not going to use the katana, why bother.

Posted by: Ice Jul 14 2007, 03:26 PM

I'm not sure this is a bug, but anyway: after turning the pages in the book in the Spellhold maze and killing all the monsters I left the area, but when I came back the book started spawning them all again, and at the end it only created a few items, like I rested inbetween (which I didn't).

Edit: it happened again after I quicksaved, this time I didn't even leave. Weird.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 15 2007, 01:44 PM

This is how it's supposed to work:

When you start clicking on the tome for the first time, you will have 2 hours (in-game time) to finish all battles and take the tome's treasure. If you waste more time than 2 hours, you won't receive full treasure, no matter if you have actually rested or have spent the time in any other way. Let me know if there is any problem or if it doean't work exactly in the way I just described.

Posted by: nataben1314 Jul 22 2007, 08:11 PM

I'm not entirely sure if this is a bug or what, but I noticed that often when I cast "friends" on my half-elf blade to try and get a store discount, the spell registers (and I get the icon on my portrait) but on my character screen there is no listed Charisma increase. I only get the actual charisma increase maybe 1/4 times casting the spell. My guess is maybe this has to do with half-elf's innate resistance to charm type spells, so I guess it is debatable whether this is an actual bug or not. Just thought I'd throw that out there.

Posted by: aVENGER Jul 23 2007, 07:40 AM

Are you, per chance, using the G3 BG2 Fixpack? I encountered the http://forums.gibberlings3.net/index.php?showtopic=10728 but somehow the fixpackers were unable to reproduce it locally. Since I was using a clean BG2 + fixpack v3 install at that time, I figured that it must be related to specific system setups i.e. AMD vs Intel or WindowsXP vs Vista, though this was just a guess. However, without the G3 BG2 fixpack the Friends spell always worked properly for me.



I can assure you that this is not the case, and I should know since I wrote that fix.

Posted by: lroumen Jul 23 2007, 08:22 AM

HAve you tried removing (create a back up though) the Friends spell from your override and try it again? Maybe the spl file is bugged or something. This is one of the tests I usually do when something goes awry.

It's SPWI107.SPL

Posted by: aVENGER Jul 23 2007, 11:31 AM

I've commented out the code which deals with the Friends spell from the fixpack .tp2 right after I've first noticed the bug so it's not an issue for me anymore, but yeah, nataben1314 should probably just delete the spell file from his override folder first.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 23 2007, 12:59 PM

I'm almost sure that nataben is not currently using the G3's BG2 Fixpack (because he knows that I have strongly warned players against using that fixpack); however, it's possible that he had once installed that fixpack and some files have remained in his override folder after uninstalling it. In that case, the only way to solve the problem is doing a clean installation of the game plus TOB official patch plus Baldurdash TOB fixpack v1.12 plus other mods plus IA.

Don't delete the spell's file from your override folder. Baldurdash Fixpack also puts it in your override folder and if you delete it, you will return to the game without Baldurdash in which the spell's charisma bonus stacks with itself.

The general advice is not to delete any file from your override folder unless you are completely certain that you have already uninstalled all and every mod which modifies that specific file. For example, if you delete a file from your override which is modified by Improved Anvil you will create bugs in your game.

Edited for typos.

Posted by: aVENGER Jul 23 2007, 01:24 PM

That is true for files which are not already contained within the game's BIFs (i.e. any new files which are introduced by mods).

OTOH, deleting the Friends spell from the override folder would merely restore the spell to its default, unmodded version since it already existed in the original game. Anyhow, you could also just overwrite it with the Baldurdash version.

Posted by: lroumen Jul 23 2007, 01:27 PM

Maybe the original poster prefers it when it stacks charisma

Posted by: Sikret Jul 23 2007, 01:39 PM

Yes, if nataben is careful not to abuse the spell's bug in the vanilla game (which stacks charisma bonus), he can delete it from the override. However, my general advice against deleting files from override folder still stands. If, for example, it was not the "Friends" spell, but was "Iron Skins" spell, then deleting it from the override folder would create serious bugs, because IA patches that spell. If you delete a spell which is patched by IA, you will cause IA's scripts to break. It's true that the spell is in the game's BIFs, but by deleting it from the override folder you will undo my changes and modifications to the spell and will return to the status the spell had in the vanilla game. At least ask me about any particular file before touching it.

Posted by: lroumen Jul 23 2007, 01:44 PM

Very true. You are completely correct.

Posted by: Baronius Jul 23 2007, 03:32 PM

So did the anomaly disappear when you've commented it out from the G3 Fixpack code?


FYI, this is absolutely impossible, especially the assumption about processors. As for the operating system, I doubt the control logic of BG2 uses some "special" system calls (apart from the usual stuff, of course; such as accessing files etc.).

Posted by: aVENGER Jul 23 2007, 04:42 PM

Yes. BTW, this also applies to fixpack v4 since the Friends code block is the same there.



Well, I just thought that there might be an issue that causes a WeiDU to compile the same code differently on an AMD CPU or something. As I've said, it's just a wild guess, since two other people were strangely unable to reproduce the bug on their systems yet, at the same time, 3 other (different) people including myself were repeatedly able to do so. I really have no idea how that could happen.

Posted by: Baronius Jul 23 2007, 04:49 PM

WeiDU doesn't actually compile the TP2. It interprets it (it's not the same). Anyway just wanted to assure you that CPUs can't influence these things.

Posted by: nataben1314 Jul 23 2007, 06:26 PM

I did have an old installation of the fixpack on my game that I uninstalled, so I guess that's probably the issue. So exactly what file ought I delete from the overrides folder? Abusing stacking friends wont be a problem with me because one casting gets me high enough charisma for my purposes. Plus I hate cheese!

Posted by: Ice Jul 23 2007, 08:35 PM

I just noticed that Holy Smite turns summons hostile.

Posted by: nataben1314 Jul 23 2007, 11:22 PM

Does it turn all summons hostile or just evil summons? If its the latter than its not a bug, just a side affect of holy smite.

Posted by: Ice Jul 23 2007, 11:44 PM

Nope, I mean summons that shouldn't be affected, like Devas and Planetars.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 24 2007, 08:42 AM

It's SPWI107.spl; but I have an alternate suggestion: If you want I can attach the file from my own override folder to a PM and send it to you so that you can paste it into your override folder and overwrite the corrupted file with a healthy one.

EDIT: I actually just sent the PM.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 24 2007, 09:07 AM

As for Holy Smite, it seems that we have a dilemma to choose the less worse situation. In the vanilla game, Holy Smite was not flagged as "Hostile Spell" and didn't have the problem you mentioned, but it had other problems. You could cast it without breaking your invisibility and you could cast it on "blue circled" evil creatures without turning them hostile. thetruth suggested to fix it and I changed it to a "Hostile Spell" (see the readme). As a result, those previous problems are solved, but now that I read your report, I see that we have this new problem. My vote is still to keep the change and have it as a hostile spell (as the previous bugs seem more serious to me than the one your reported). Any ideas?

Posted by: Ice Jul 24 2007, 10:34 AM

I think it would be better to revert it to non hostile: not breaking invisibility and not making evil neutral creatures hostile aren't really exploitable holes, since tough monsters have invisible detection by script and with MR and all even unleashing all the party's Holy Smites before a battle wouldn't make any difference, but turning your summons hostile in the middle of a fight (or being barred from using one of the few good party-friendly AoE spells) can really turn the tide of a confrontation, especially with things like Mordenkainen's Swords, Skeleton Warriors, Devas and Planetars.

EDIT: maybe it would be possible to tweak summons so they don't turn hostile even when damaged?

Posted by: Sikret Jul 24 2007, 12:04 PM

The non-evil summons don't actually take any damage. I guess I found the best way to fix the problem. Don't worry. I will ask one of the testers to test it and will let you know the result.

Posted by: Ymarsakar Jul 31 2007, 03:34 PM

I'm late to the talks over PI but I'm wondering at why these solutions wouldn't be better than replacing the spell.

How about people make the Pimage spell last 1/2 or 1/4 as long, while increasing the time it requires to cast, as well as making it so that it can't be re-cast until a certan time trigger?

The Perfect Camouflage spell is stated to be a benefit because it reduces the time it takes to cast by 1 round/spell. Instead of removing PI, why shouldn't PI just be made to be harder to cast given its benefits? A lot of the scroll usage and what not takes time. A lot of the summoning more than 5 stuff takes time as well. Which leaves only the improved alacrity and time stop, but in point of fact time stop doesn't stop the projected image's duration from running out. Haste might have an additional effect there, not sure. If the PI spell can be coded to end somewhere around the first time stop or second time stop duration, it can nerf both the endless summoning, the endless spells, and the endless scroll usage. The player would have to choose within a limited time, what he wants to do, since he has to have cast multiple level 7 spells to do all three. The less powerful Simulacrum has a wait sequence that could be a good base template, although the 7th level one should have a shorter cooldown time.

In short, I'm looking at a PI that only lasts around 4-8 rounds, ever. With a cooldown time between 4-8 rounds before it could be cast again. When the PI casts Time Stop, a script could be activated to destroy the P image within 5-8 rounds. Perhaps shorter with improved alacrity. From uscript's rar file, I know that you can change the mislead/simu/PI spells to be able to use custom scripts other than the creature/default ones. What I don't know is whether the scripting language can adequately code for a "kill myself as image" scenario when a specific spell has been cast by the image.

There's also no reason why you can't shift it to a 8th or 9th level spell, given the rather lack of useful 9th level spells from the vanilla game. Other than Black Blade for F/Ms and time stop, most people only use the new ToB spells, comet, dragon, improved alacrity. I really would like to see some changes to the vanilla level 9 spells, such as Energy Drain, Meteor Swarm, and Absolute Immunity just because I never use them.

As another alternative, you can script enemy mages to cast PI, requiring the party members to dispel it or true sight it. This goes along with enemy mages casting true sight and remove magic. One is easy to defend against, in time, but both will destroy the PI.

Sendai's casting of PI along with immunity diviation, mislead, improved invisibility, essentially makes it into a magic duel. At higher levels, this can make PI a tactically challenging tool for both sides; it just would require increasing the difficulty and more scripts.

Posted by: Raven Jul 31 2007, 05:08 PM

I'm not going to enter an argument about PI but there are a couple of things you might like to know:

In 4.3 PI is replaced with a different (anti-golem) spell, not Perfect Camouflage as had originally been planned.



Absolute Immunity is already more useful and powerful in IA, not because the spell has been tweaked, but because weapons of +6 enchantment have been altered to only strike as a +5 weapon (while retaining the THAC0 and damage bonus of +6). Hence Absolute Immunity does actually grant immunity to all weapons.

EDIT: Actually, thinking about it, ignore what I said about Absolute Immunity being more 'useful' since the change in +6 weapons actually only helps enemies...

Posted by: Raven Aug 2 2007, 01:34 PM

Sikret, is it possible to change the summoned Efreet and Djinn so they can make more than one magic missile per casting? It just seems a bit silly that considering they can cast more powerful spells (lightning bolt/fireball etc.) the number of missiles is not higher (4 or 5 maybe).

Posted by: Sikret Aug 2 2007, 02:34 PM

They are not scripted to cast magic missile at all. I just removed magic missile from the list of their memorized spells. Thanks for the report.

Posted by: Shaitan Aug 14 2007, 09:48 AM

This isn't really important, but still: I always felt, that it was strange that the Portal Key in the starting dungeon couldn't be moved. Can this be fixed eventually?

Regards

Posted by: Shaitan Aug 14 2007, 11:07 AM

The immunity to charm from Valygar's initial armour isn't display with an icon on the side-picture.

Regards

Posted by: jebu Sep 21 2007, 10:14 PM

I recently started my first IA (v4.2) game, and one weird bug showed up again. I cast a mage spell on purpose to get the Cowled wizards to attack me (didn't want to pay 5000gp, might get some scrolls from the corpses, and wanted to see if they were harder with IA). It was just the second group that had attacked me and they went down, but someone was still invisible, casting spells at me without becoming even partially visible, and I was unable to dispel the invisibility or to damage him with area effect spells.

I reloaded a dozen times or so, and managed to get the same bug again, but can't duplicate it reliably. I think it happened when a Cowled cast Simulacrum (triggered?) and died instantly. Anyway, Inquisitor's True Sight or Dispel Magic wouldn't work, though Dispel reported hitting a 'Cowled Enforcer', and there was a swirling piece of something (part of the dead mage's corpse?) floating in the air at the spot.

It shouldn't be caused by any mods. It's been quite a while since I've played an un-modded BG2 game, but I recall the same thing happening back then in Brynnlaw, when I killed the Cowled to get the wardstone.

P.S. Nice job with the mod! I'm not very far yet, so haven't fought any of the BIG enemies, but there's been several surprises with the easier places already. Suna Seni ambush was nasty, but I had already been to Trademeet and had some exp. Then at Seven Vales, after fighting with the party upstairs, I had to raise three members in a temple (in a desperate move, I released my familiar to help finish the remaining mage after the melee fighters went down, and both the enemy mage and my F/M were very low on spells).

Posted by: Sikret Sep 22 2007, 11:25 AM

Welcome to BWL, jebu!

Yes, it's not caused by any mod. Enemy mages actually never cast the Simulacrum spell in the game. The way it works in the vanilla game is that they just pretend to cast the spell and then a new creature, which is supposedly their clone, appears in the area. During the game, it looks as if they have cast the simulacrum spell. There are very few instances of this incident in the entire (vanilla) game all of which have been removed from the scripts and fixed by IA v4.3. (The main simulacrum spell is also replaced with a new spell; so you will never see the spell being cast in the entire game, neither by enemies nor by your own characters).



Thank you. Just keep practicing with 4.2 and start a new game once v4.3 is released.

Cheers

Posted by: jebu Sep 25 2007, 07:55 PM

Any new info on Holy Smite? I realized the change when I turned Sime hostile after arriving to Brynnlaw, smited the vampires ambushing my party and Sime was close enough to be hit also. I've always liked Holy Smite in the earlier parts of BG2, when mages don't yet have even Chain Lightning, and can only dream about Horrid Wilting. Fighting near neutral NPC's isn't common, but I'm more concerned about turning my summons hostile.

Is it possible to have Holy Smite grant temporary magic resistance to any non-evil targets in its area of effect? It can already check the target's alignment, and somehow makes non-evil targets automatically make a saving throw and receive no damage. Can this be changed a bit, so when a target is not evil, the effects would be "set magic resistance to 100% >> hit target with spell normally >> remove the temporary magic resistance buff"?

Posted by: jebu Sep 25 2007, 10:39 PM

Sahuagin city has some duplicate items:
- Treasury key: can be pickpocketed from the mad king, then looted from the king's corpse when allying with the rebel prince. After killing the king, the prince will give you the key again (dialog says he gives it from the king's corpse but I already looted the corpse during the fight).
- Magical rope: can be pickpocketed from king, you also get it from treasury, and when allying with prince he gives you the rope (again, dialog says from the king's corpse).
- [Edited] Rebel orb: seems I ended up with 3x Rebel orb also, guess they're all from pickpocketing the priestess who gave it, then the prince's companion, and probably one of them again after coming back to kill king. Not that the orbs have any effect after you first talked to prince, but the game just seems to reload them back to their inventory too many times.

The rope in treasury is redundant and could be removed totally. The king's rope should be made non-stealable. No matter which one you ally with, you get the rope from the king or his corpse. I don't mind the key being stealable, but you end up with the key anyway, so it might as well be non-stealable if it's easier to prevent one duplicate that way. Preventing the duplicate rope + key (looting the king's corpse + getting them from the prince) might require that the prince's dialog be modified. The prince can say you're free to loot the items from the dead king, instead of him giving the items.

The Rod of Lordly Might (from treasury) has some problems:
- When it's changed into a weapon, the effect that changes it back to rod has just one charge. If you change it into a weapon another time and try to change it back to rod, you get 'Item drained' message. I don't see why it couldn't have unlimited charges, so it could be changed back and forth to different types of weapons.
- You can only see the special abilities of each weapon when it's a rod. When it's changed into a weapon, the weapon's description doesn't have its special ability listed.
- The spear is named 'Spear', it should be 'Spear +3' judging from the other weapons.
- The rod's description says 'Flaming long sword +1' but the sword is actually named 'Long sword +1', and true enough, its special ability has nothing to do with flames.
- Not a bug, but I can't recall ever actually using the rod in any of the weapon forms. The best enchant is the +3 spear, but you get Impaler (+3 enchant, +10 piercing damage) from the king's corpse. How about lowering the saving throw bonuses the rod's special abilities give to the target? Raising all the weapons to +3?

A couple more things now that I got started:
- Prismatic spray's description says "Any creature that is caught within the area of effect will be touched by one or two of the rays." However, the spell is party-friendly, which is not mentioned.
- If you have both the fake illithium alloy and the real illithium, there should be a dialogue option to give the fake one to Sir Sarles. Currently he just takes the real one. I bet Cromwell is not fooled by the fake one, though it might be interesting to see how the Mace of Disruption upgrade turns out to be in that case. ("Weird, I smashed Kangaxx with it and the head just fell off. No, not Kangaxx's head, the mace's...")

Posted by: Sikret Sep 26 2007, 06:38 AM

Yes, it's fixed.

Posted by: Marceror Nov 27 2007, 07:39 PM

This is an odd one related Yoshimo. Apparently his sword grants a "shield bonus" of 1, that doesn't stack with the shield bonus provided by a buckler.

I found it odd that when I gave Yoshi a buckler, his AC didn't change. I noted that there was an AC improvement for other characters with that same buckler. When I unequipped Yoshi's sword and then equipped the buckler, their was indeed a bonus to his AC. Perhaps this one has been around for a while, but I just noticed it, and thought it was worth passing along.

Posted by: Razfallow Nov 27 2007, 08:10 PM

Does Yoshi have proficiency in One-handed weapon style? It grants bonus to AC.

Characters who specialize in this style gain a special AC bonus of +1 while fighting with a one-handed weapon and no shield or off-hand weapon. By spending an additional proficiency slot, the character can increase his AC bonus to +2, but that's the maximum benefit for style specialization. This style increases the chance of a critical hit.

Posted by: luan Nov 27 2007, 09:08 PM

According to vanilla bg2, Yoshimo does have a proficiency point with single weapon style. Though, i'm a little confused why you simply didn't check his character record sheet yourself =P

Posted by: Marceror Nov 27 2007, 11:04 PM

Well golly. I sure feel like a n00b all of the sudden. No need to spend countless hours tracking this one down Sikret.

Posted by: luan Nov 28 2007, 03:55 AM

Haha i'm just joking. No worries, I think being able to survive IA excuses you from the noob group!

Posted by: Sikret Nov 28 2007, 08:19 AM

Posts related to Yoshimo are moved from IA v5 bug thread to this topic as it had nothing to do with IA (it wasn't even a vanilla game's bug but where else could I move the posts?).

Posted by: Shaitan Dec 11 2007, 09:02 PM

I got this strange bug: When fighting the "shadow Lover" at the CC sewers Keldorn threw a dispel magic, and in the pool next to the four pipes a blue-circled man named "Glowing Pool" became visible...

Posted by: Sikret Dec 11 2007, 09:17 PM

It's the invisible creature which has dialogue with you when you approach the pipes for the first time. His invisibility should not be dispellable, but it is. It's vanilla game minor issue. I can fix it.

Since the bug was not related to IA (but rather a vanilla game issue), I moved the posts to the appropriate thread.

Posted by: Ice Dec 14 2007, 03:08 PM

The Guardians in Firkraag's lair keep casting their spells (Fireball, Mirror Image, Stoneskin) even when unconscious.

Posted by: Sikret Dec 15 2007, 12:05 PM

Yes, this is a general issue in the vanilla game which re-appears every now and then. I have fixed it for many creatures. Will fix it for those guardians too. Thanks.

Posted by: lroumen Dec 18 2007, 09:03 AM

I have an issue with the Sir Sarles quest. It goes as follows.

1. I go to the Temple of Helm to receive the quest.
2. I go to Jystev Estate to talk to Sir Sarles and he says I need to get the Illithium Ore.
3. I go to Jerlia to buy the Ore.
4a. I talk to Unger who points me to Neb. I kill Neb.
4b. I talk to Jerlia to get the Alloy as well.
5. I go to Sir Sarles and I decide to give him the Alloy. He becomes mad and leaves
6. I go to the Temple of Helm and noone responds. Apparently the quest remains unfinished.

Normally I should be receiving the quest reward with the note that the Alloy looks better than normal Illithium and that the Temple will fashion their own statue from it. Also, normally there are 2 priests in the Temple, but this time there was only the questgiver (not sure what the other priests name is).


Could this be related to my installation? Maybe I overlooked an incompatibility. Regardless, I have no reason to believe that any of the mods installed change the Cleric quests other than IA (but that only improves Borinall).... maybe the multiple strongholds puts something odd in my path?

Is it possible to CLUA in the other priest?

Posted by: Sikret Dec 18 2007, 09:54 AM

Iroumen,

I moved your post to this thread because it has nothing to do with IA for sure. I don't know if it's even a vanilla game issue or not (as I never play the alloy path myself). Others may have some more information about the case.

Posted by: lroumen Dec 18 2007, 10:05 AM

It's not a Vanilla bug since I always take this route and use the Illithium to upgrade the Mace of Disruption at Cromwell (it's a Vanilla upgrade). It could be related to one of the other mods, but they don't alter these Cleric quests either so I'm a bit at a loss. Any of the installed mods and components could be the culprit.

I can try to rule out IA with the following method. I have a savegame from before the acceptance of the quest (and before entering the Temple altogether):

1. I will rerun the quest and hand over the illithium to Sir Sarles.
2. I will rerun the quest and hand over the alloy to Sir Sarles.
3. I will rerun the quest with both paths and hand over the illithium to sir Sarles.
4. I will rerun the quest with both paths and hand over the alloy to sir Sarles.

I can try to uninstall IA and do the same 4 tests to see if the problem persists.

If I can play on after having given the Illithium, then I guess I will since it's not required for any IA upgrade.

I'm still curious as to why the quest suddenly fails. I'll report back sometime this week.

Posted by: Spike Dec 18 2007, 01:51 PM

I did the quest in the same order as you and everything was fine.

Here are the components which are not in my install. Maybe it helps.
Infinite Weapon, Potion and Ring/Amulet Stacking
Multiple Strongholds (Baldurdash)
Female Edwina
Romance: PC can romance one NPC (regardless of race/gender).
Low Reputation Store Discount (Sabre)
Underrepresented Items From Icewind Dale 2

Posted by: lroumen Dec 20 2007, 09:24 AM

Concerning the Sir Sarles Quest.

I was able to complete the quest by handing in the Illithium but I was unable to complete it if I made the alloy. I think there is something with the global variable that isn't properly set when Sir Sarles goes mad. Since Spike noted that in his IA installation everything went fine I can only attribute it to one of the abovementioned modcomponents but so far I have been unable to pinpoint the culprit.

Posted by: leonidas Dec 24 2007, 08:35 AM

Just noticed you don't actually need the rogue stone from koshi to enter the twisted rune (you get the "rogue stone has disappeared dialogue and everything").

It's inconsequential ofc, because it would be ridiculous to attempt the twisted rune before the slaver compound.

But, a bug's a bug.

Posted by: aVENGER Dec 24 2007, 01:18 PM

You can use any Rogue Stone to access the Twisted Rune chamber, not merely the one from the Guarded Compound. Is it possible that you had one inside a gem bag before you entered?

Posted by: LZJ Dec 25 2007, 10:16 AM

I spotted a possible script bug.

In TOB, in the house next to Marlowe, there are two adventurers/people who keep casting Hold Person spells. Can anyone confirm this?

Note: I had not installed Sikret's fix for the Vigil Knights bug, so I'm not sure if that would fix this as well.

Posted by: Sikret Dec 25 2007, 10:33 AM

@LZJ

heh, you keep editing your posts too fast .

The post was originally a bug report about Cernd. You didn't need to erase it, LZJ! The bug indeed exists, but it is a vanilla game bug. will fix it.

The fact that the bug didn't happen in your second test might have been for some other reason (for example, Cernd might have been run out of those spells).

Please do install the fix for Vigil Knights and test these two adventurers again. It's probable that it will fix this issue as well.

Posted by: Sikret Dec 25 2007, 12:03 PM

Well, Cernd's script (only when he is not in party and is just waiting somewhere) had several bugs in the vanilla game. I fixed it completely. Thanks, LZJ!

Posted by: LZJ Dec 25 2007, 03:13 PM

@Sikret

Heh, I wasn't sure if Cernd's script was a bug, and I didn't want to embarass myself by posting it without more testing.

My report on the TOB issue involving the two adventurers next to Marlowe's house casting Hold Persons: the fix for the Vigil Knights solves this problem as well. I don't think any additional fix is necessary.

Posted by: leonidas Dec 26 2007, 02:40 AM

Yeah, checked my game and this is definitely the case.

However, it still seems amiss to me, if you can use any rogue stone to enter the twisted rune what's the point of koshi guarding a unique one?

Posted by: aVENGER Dec 26 2007, 06:54 AM

This is not default game behaviour, the special Rogue Stone is something that Kevin added to Koshi via Baldurdash. Check the BD readme:

Posted by: leonidas Dec 26 2007, 09:52 AM

Heh, been so goddamn long since I played the unmodded game I forgot the slave lords wasn't originally included. Ah well thanks for pointing out my error.

Posted by: aVENGER Jan 1 2008, 01:28 PM

Hi Sikret,

I just noticed http://www.shsforums.net/index.php?showtopic=31068&view=findpost&p=368673 from the original (unmodded) game which is not fixed by Baldurdash. Since IA players generally use Baldurdash, I thought you might be interested in this. The exact nature of the bug is described http://forums.gibberlings3.net/index.php?showtopic=2809&hl=ar0800 on G3.

Essentially, a misplaced script block in AR0800.BCS can prevent any subsequent script blocks from triggering under certain conditions. This is particularly dangerous for any mods that use EXTENED_BOTTOM on AR0800.BCS. Therefore, I'm going to mirror the G3 fix in Rogue Rebalancing as of the next version since this bug can prevent my Chosen of Cyric encounter from starting. For consistency's sake, it would be great if you could fix the bug in the same way for IA. Here's the relevant code:

As you can see, this code will only fix the bug if another mod has not already done so, and I think that is the best way to deal with it.

Cheers!

Posted by: Sikret Jan 2 2008, 09:30 AM

Thanks, aVENGER!

Although the bug doesn't directly affect IA (IA doesn't EXTEND AR0800.bcs), I will see to fix it.

Cheers

Posted by: aVENGER Jan 2 2008, 11:22 AM

Actually, this bug can cause problems even in the unmodded game. Most importantly, it can prevent Bodhi from appearing in Chapter 2 (if the player chooses to side with her) since the script block which spawns her is placed below the bugged block and therefore it can not properly trigger as long as the bugged block returns true.

Anyway, glad to hear that you're going to fix this as well.

Posted by: Ryel ril Ers Jan 2 2008, 02:50 PM

Ribald sells unlimited amount ring of animal friendship , that means the patient players can make unlimited money with the sell-buy bug (if you choose an item in the shop, and want to buy more then one and before push the buy bottun sell somethink the items price lowered to the price of one item, if you push the buy button you pay the original price except if you have enough money to buy one item but less to buy all the item, in that case all of your money lost but you gain all of the items). With 15 rep and 18 charisma, empty inventory, a silver ring and with 450 gold you can buy 16 ring of animal friendship for 450 gold, after every time you can sell 5 ring for 500 gold and after you buy 16 ring. If you fill all the 6 inventory, you can sell that ring ~15k gold to an other merchant, or ~10k to Ribald.

There are more other items with work the sell-buy:
Arrow of Acid/Fire from Copper Coronet: you can buy 10 for ~750 gold and after sell it 1800 gold
Arrow of Piercing from Galean Bayle's house: do 5-6k gold from ~2700

And the nastiest trick:
if you want lot of healing potion search a shop where sell at least 10 amount, sell something for 600 gold and you can buy all of potion.

I think only the first trick is serious because it can generate unlimited money the others are too slow and limited.

Posted by: Sikret Jan 2 2008, 02:58 PM

Thanks, Ryel!

The first one was very interesting. I will test and fix it.

By the way, have you tested all of these (specially the copper coronet one) in your current game with IA v5? I ask because in v5 all stores are tweaked in respect to their sell/buy prices. If the exploit works, it should be for the trick you explained about how to use bottons. Direct buying and selling doesn't give benefit in any store. Am I right?

Posted by: Ryel ril Ers Jan 2 2008, 05:09 PM

I started a new game, yesterday. I install only ToB patch, the suggested parts of ease of use. and the IA 5.0.
All of the tricks are tested. I think there are more.
Try it 15 reputation or more and with a character with 18 or more charisma.
If tha condition true than the trick work with lots of item with 4+ amount.

I'm glad if i can help.
(The new donation sums are very good. Thanks.)

In the future i try some more merchant (of course after i save the game, i don't want broke my joy so i play without cheese, but i keep one ring because of memory ).

Posted by: Shaitan Jan 4 2008, 08:50 PM

An unimportant one: It takes 20 hours to travel to Imnisvale from the docks and 1 day and four hours the other way. There's probably more of such inconsistencies.

Posted by: Ryel ril Ers Jan 4 2008, 11:51 PM

Another unimportant:
I you rest with a berserker in rage the rage still active all night, and only end after awaken.


So the berserker after kill everybody in his dream awake with left leg. (is suppose this is a common say non only hungarian)

Posted by: Baronius Jan 5 2008, 01:05 AM

The English version of that saying is "he got out of bed on the wrong side".

Posted by: Ryel ril Ers Jan 5 2008, 02:21 AM

Thank you Baronius.

Posted by: Ryel ril Ers Jan 5 2008, 02:25 AM

Ihtafeer does nothing if you attack he in his human form, he only stand and wait to slay him. (i don't speak with the djinnies because i want buy some potion from the rakshasa).

Posted by: Sikret Jan 5 2008, 02:34 AM

Moved the post here as I have not touched Ihtafeer in IA at all.

Posted by: shadan Jan 5 2008, 02:25 PM

When I cast Melfs MM with my blade, my attack/round on charactersheet is 6. If I turn offensive spin on, attack is decreased to 2 on charactersheet. My installed mods exactly same as Sikret's ones except I have ToD installed also. I think attack number is decreased in game also, but I am not sure.

Posted by: Vardaman Jan 6 2008, 12:41 AM

Argh, what is wrong with Jan's kick-out script? Every time he gets Imprisoned and I free him, he 'has nothing to say to you'. I have the latest ToB patch so it's not the generic problem with 'nothing to say to you'. Is there any way this can be fixed?

Posted by: Sikret Jan 6 2008, 08:07 AM

Does it happen only for Jan or does it happen for other Bioware NPCs as well (I'm not asking about custom NPCs)?

Posted by: Vardaman Jan 6 2008, 03:12 PM

It's only been Jan but this is the first time I've ever had him in my party. I've had other Bioware NPC's get Imprisoned but they rejoin me without a problem (Misc, Jaheira and Viconia in this play-through).

Posted by: Romulas Jan 12 2008, 05:22 PM

Just in case no one has mentioned this, as there are 10 pages to this topic. But there is a rather nasty bug dealing with custom character generated kickouts. Meaning, that when you kickout a custom character (generated in multiplayer mode) they can no longer talk with the PC and have a chance to rejoin. Well, this goes one step further, lets say a custom character gets imprisoned and you free him with freedom spell, you then have to talk with him to get him to rejoin the party, and due to this bug its not possible. When this happened recently I lost the fight anyway but it would have sucked to win and still lose a character.

I know the tweakpack deals with this but that has been deemed incompatable with IA.

Thanks,

Romulas

Posted by: Romulas Jan 12 2008, 05:23 PM

I see if I had read just a few posts back, so yes it happens to others besides jan.

Romulas

Posted by: Ryel ril Ers Jan 12 2008, 05:26 PM

You can solve this problem. Save often and when it is happaned save and load it as multiplayer game and import the custom character from the previous save.
This is very unconfortable so i hope in the future Sikret will fix it.

Posted by: Sikret Jan 12 2008, 11:47 PM

The fix can be found http://forums.blackwyrmlair.net/index.php?s=&showtopic=3148&view=findpost&p=27846. I strongly recommend installing it for players who use custom NPCs. Those who don't use custom NPCs won't need it.

Posted by: shadan Jan 13 2008, 01:27 PM

I found some bugs or cheese regarding beholders and gauths. Firs of all since I didn't find any usefull defensife spell against them when I first encountered 3 gauths at broken bridge near to lost temple, and 25x3 dmg from 3 Cause Serious was an instant kill for most of my characters, I decided to move my vagrant in sneak to discover their location. Then I tried an Emotion on them from far. I have managed 2 of them down from 3, so I charged with my chars. I was surprised when sleeping gauths continued their gaze attacks on my characters, which was a short cut for my party. After a reload, I sent my vagrant to scout again, and I sent in some hasted summoned monsters, and gauths didn't use their gaze attacks on them. When one party member showed up, they used gaze attack on him, but when there was no character in their sight, they didn't do anything. Or they attacked my summons but very strange if they are not able to kill even a simple war dog... Anyway I started to use Mirror Image as defense, and it worked well. So I continued to beholder lair, and my vagrant was on scouting duty in whole lair. Third interesting thing occurred when my vagrant spot 3 gauths again, so I moved my chars behind the wall near to them, and I started to lay down some Skull Traps. My intend was to lure gauths in them with my vagrant. But it seemed trap were near to the gauths and it exploded immidiately, damaged all 3 of them, but they remained at their spots. Killed all 3 of them with Skull Traps, then reloaded the game, put MI up and did frontal charge.

Last bug: I've got the reward from avatar in lost temple twice. I did nothing, but after I've got XP and the shield, conversation came up again, and after correct answers, I've got XP and shield again. I reloaded, sadly my last save was in beholder lair, so it took a bit time to get back to the temple, and finished quest on more time, but rewards were not duplicated at this time.

Posted by: Sikret Jan 13 2008, 01:34 PM

I have not improved or touched Gauths' combat system in IA. Any problem with gauths is a vanilla game issue (hence, I move the post to this thread). I will see to fix them though.



The same here. The problem is related to vanilla game.

Posted by: lroumen Jan 14 2008, 09:10 AM

Perhaps you want to move my following post to the Vanilla Bugs thread since I'm only 50% certain that this is an IA issue.

I post it here mainly to draw attention to my previous report since I did not see this issue fixed in the fixlist for v5.1. Hence I'm wondering whether you had already addressed this issue or whether it had slipped your mind.



A while ago I mentioned that polymorphed enemy casters still cast spells and sequences and still trigger contingencies. I am not certain whether this applies to all mages or only IA improved mages, but I can say that I've regularly used Polymorph Other in other games and I've never really noticed this problem before.

It is inconsistent with the rules that the party has to abide by. Polymorphed NPCs can not cast spells and they cannot even initiate a dialogue. This is all quite logical because if they cannot speak they cannot cast spells or they would need vocalise, but then they would speak the language of the creature so they will not utter the correct words, hence spells would simply fail.

I think it's okay if present contingencies are triggered, but spells and sequences would have to be disabled. I'm not sure how this could be fixed. There currently isn't a STATE_POLYMORPHED, but you can maybe use STATE_SILENCED. I'm guessing that you only need to fix the Squirrel form though.
Are the mage scripts perhaps using the Forcespell() command which overrides things like Silenced?


All spells/abilities that fall into the polymorphing category.
druid: wolf, black bear, brown bear
avenger: sword spider, baby wyvern, fire salamander
shapeshifter: werewolf, greater werewolf
polymorph self (mage spell): flind, brown bear, black bear, mustard jelly, wolf, sword spider
polymorph other (mage spell): squirrel
shapechange (mage spell): mind flayer, iron golem, greater wolfwere, earth elemental, fire elemental, giant troll
protagonist: slayer change
cloak of the sewers: rat, troll, mustard jelly

Related: Since you mention not to use the Shapeshifter: the Werewolf and Greater Werewolf forms of the shapeshifter are not currently fixed by IA are they?

Posted by: Sikret Jan 14 2008, 10:21 AM

@Iroumen

This is surely a vanilla game issue. I will see what is best to do about it. Thanks for reminding it to me again.

Posted by: lroumen Jan 14 2008, 10:55 AM

Ah, it was vanilla after all.

One option could always be to remove Polymorph Other from the game .

Posted by: Sikret Jan 14 2008, 12:24 PM

Yes, it's certainly a vanilla issue. You see it more frequently now simply because enemy mages use sequencers and triggers more frequently than in the vanilla.



hehe, yes, it's an option, though I didn't wait for this suggestion from one of the spell's fans.

There are a few more possible ways to fix the spell though. I will think about it.

Posted by: Clown Jan 15 2008, 04:31 PM

I have been using Jaheira as a Ranger/Cleric and she is able to select contact with nature HLA multiple times.

Posted by: Sikret Jan 15 2008, 08:57 PM

Thank you very much for reporting this case. As you know, "Contact with Nature" is the replacement for "Tracking". The "Tracking" HLA was supposed to be choosable only once and it is in fact so for single-class rangers; however, after reading your report, I checked and noticed that Cleric/Rangers' HLA tableis bugged in the vanilla game and allows multiple Tracking HLAs. I fixed it for the next version.

Posted by: Romulas Jan 17 2008, 07:39 PM

I just downloaded the two files, this time the kicked out character says it was nice and farewell. There was no option to rejoin the party. So the question is will the same occur when the character is freed from the imprisonment, will there be an option to rejoin the party. I cannot test this as my high level party is no where near a lich or demi-lich and the low level party doesn't really want to meet one yet.

Thanks for making the files available and trying to fix this.

Romulas

Posted by: Sikret Jan 17 2008, 07:44 PM

Yes, Romulas! I have tested it myself and it works seamlessly. If you kick out the character, he will say his farewell and will leave without giving you a rejoin option (this is intentional in order to block a cheesy exploit reported by one of the testers). However, if the character was imprisoned and freed, he will give you the 'rejoin' option.

Posted by: Clown Jan 17 2008, 10:25 PM

Another issue with imprisonment, when anomen gets imprisoned and freed after lvl 25 the game creates a duplicate holy symbol in his inventory. This will occur every time this happens and it is possible to end up with multiple holy symbols. These symbols are usable by any other good aligned clerics in the party including multi-class and can be sold for 1500 gold.

Edit: Just tested it and infact this will happen even if you kick him out and have him rejoin meaning it could quite easily be exploited for extra holy symbols for your clerics or more usefully infinite gold.

Posted by: lroumen Jan 18 2008, 10:01 AM

It sounds like the holy symbol bonuses need a global variable to keep that from happening.

Posted by: Sikret Jan 20 2008, 10:13 AM

Thanks Clown. I propose that I just reduce the symbol's price to zero. It's not such a fantastic item after all to deserve much work to block its related exploits. It occupies one valuable ring slot and I don't see why even a cheater may want to prefer it to other powerful rings. Not to mentioned that such a player can CLUA the symbol if he insists on cheating and the symbol is not on par with powerful items to encourage me to add anti-cheat protections to make it uncheatable even by CLUAConsole (similar to what I have done for some powerful items).

Posted by: shadan Jan 23 2008, 08:24 AM

I don't know if these Vanilla bugs or IA, so I write them down here.

1. Liches in Temple Ruins took down 2 of my defensive spells with 1 Ruby Ray. Both SI: Abj. and Minor Spell Deflection disappeared. This happened at least 3 times on my blade and mage. SI: Abj. surely was dispelled, and I didn't see spell turning animation either. I was not able to check if ST is still up, just animation lost or it is dispelled. (Would it be possible to change these graphic type spells (like spell turning, SI, globe of inv., Mirror Image, Blur) to be visible in character sheet where other buffs are mentioned?)
2. If I cast Melf's Minute Meteor with 2 weapons in my hands, my attack per round is 6. If I equip Belm to left hand (either before or after), my attack per round goes down to 3/2. I checked it, attacked my character and attack rate on char sheet was valid. If I press Offensive Spin with Melf's Minute Meteor, my attack per round decreased also. With Haste and Impr. haste, it works well. Very annoying bug, since I can't use Offensive Spin and always have to change offhandweapon, when I want to use MMM. Imho MMM should give 5 attack per round, with Belm, Offensive Spin and Haste it should be 6, with Impr. Haste it is correctly 10 now.

Posted by: Sikret Jan 23 2008, 09:19 AM

I am 99.99% sure that there is no such bug in the game.

First of all, note that Spell Turning (which is a 7th level spell) always gets removed before SI. Ruby Ray always removes higher level protections first (with the sole exception of Spell Shield which always takes precedence). So, your Spell Turning had surely removed prior to the SI with the lich's previous Ruby Ray. That much is about Spell Turning.

As for Minior Spell Deflection (which is a 3rd level spell), it will be removed after SI. I can make two wild guesses about what might have happened in your game:

1- One possibility is that the Minor Spell Deflection's duration had just accidentally expired at that time.

Befor reading the second guess, just tell me, shadan: You didn't possibly installed the "Invisible Cloak of Mirroring Animation" component of Ease-of-Use, did you? It's not recommended and it can have very bad effects on spells' animations. The second guess will lose its point if you have installed that unrecommended component.

2- My second guess (which is a wild one and needs testing) is that since SI and Minor Spell Deflection use the same animation on the character's avatar (the same kindof shimmering globe), perhaps when you cast these two spells together only one of the two animations shows up. If this wild guess is true, then removing SI will remove the animaton while Minor Spell Deflection is actually active on your character.



Yes, this is a well-know issue in the vanilla game. (Not to mention that using an off-hand weapon while also using MMM is cheesy. )

Posted by: shadan Jan 23 2008, 10:01 AM

Sorry, Sikret, I am writing from my work, so I wrote these bugs from memory,and missed the spell name. Spell in question was Minor Spell Turning, lvl 5 spell, same level as SI.
I didn't instealled invisble cloak of mirroring. I installed exactly same mods, as you did according to your playing diary. I installed 2 bonus mod: ToD and The Four.
As I said, maybe only animation was wrong. Sadly these spells are not mentioned on character sheet (which would be fine to be changed ).

Posted by: Raven Jan 23 2008, 10:17 AM

And you're saying that RR removed both MST and SI together?

This is very odd because I specifically tested spell defences for v5 at great length and I never observed this problem.

This is how it's supposed to work:

Since the spell protections are the same level (5), the order in which they are removed by RR is determined by the order in which they were cast. If SI was cast first, it should be removed first. If MST was cast first, it should be removed first. In neither case should multiple protections be removed by RR.

I am also confused when you ask that buff icons for spell turning etc. are displayed on the character sheet, since they already are. Spell Deflection, Spell Turning and SI (and minor versions of the first two) do indeed have icons which appear on the character's portrait, and which correctly disappear when removed.

Posted by: shadan Jan 23 2008, 10:33 AM

Raven, MST was casted first and SI as 2nd. I thought RRR choses random from same lvl spells btw.
English is not my native language, so maybe I am not as clear as I want. I didnt mean charecter portrait, I meant on character sheet, where all of your active spell is written with your savint throws, weapon skills etc. I am pretty sure that visible animation of both MST and SI is lost after 1 and ONLY ONE RRR. I forgot that there is icon on portrait for these spells, so I will check them again today evening, happily I have saved game before those liches. But I had to reload those fights 2 times, and visible animation was lost all time.

Posted by: shadan Jan 24 2008, 08:06 AM

OK, I checked it again yesterday evening 4 times. It seems it is only graphic problem. According to icons on char portrait only one of them are dispelled. Sorry for false report. I had at least 8-10 icons on my char portrait and I thought that those spells which has graphic animation, doesn't appear as icon (like Mirror Image and Blur).

Posted by: Mongerman Jan 28 2008, 03:28 PM

Its possible to get XP multiple times from Jermein in the juggernaut quest. If the party leaves his house before him (after he speaks), they can re-enter, upon which jermein will speak to you and give the xp points again

Posted by: Ryel ril Ers Jan 31 2008, 03:01 PM

A strange cheat!!!
If you configure a short key to Nahal Dweomer you can use it without limitation. Select an arcane caster press the shortkey and voila he/she can use it, their contents of spellbook appaer and they can cast any of their spell with a wild surge!!!

Another bug:
With dweomer the contigencies, triggers and sequencers never create wild surges. You can creater a minor seqencer, seqencer and a spell trigger in the same time. But if you do it possible the appaer a bug (every spell you cast come with a wild surge). if i remember correctly only one seqencer/trigger type spell can active the others are failed? Or this isn't bug and you rack your spell in these 3 spells.

A new endless spell circle in chapter 2:
With wild mage you buffing ability only depends your patient and the spell durations, because after you collect ~10k gold you can buy the limited wish scroll from the adventurer marts, so you get some gems, a +2 full plate and an endless spell circle from the beginning of the game. I think must be remove the scroll from the store or raise it value to 30-50k gold because it is powerful if you feel lucky. My favorite moment was when in a hard battle i must cast limited wish with dweomer and the wild surge rolled to area effect so every character of mine summuned a djinni so my badly injured and exhausted party completely healed their spells from level 1-4 are returnd and my not too wise characters summoned lots of rabbit to disract the enemy. With limited wish your party never must rest and you can variate all of your casters spell repertoire before a hard battle!

The evil wild mages rocks in the beginning of IA.

Posted by: Gorwath Feb 1 2008, 12:12 PM

I think i found a Typo in the beholder lair in the Underdark. THe Elder Orb is referred as a Beholder in the Log but if you Tab him he's a Elder Orb

Posted by: Sikret Feb 1 2008, 12:47 PM

Yes, I had noticed this in my own game too. It's a vanilla game issue. I'll fix it for the next release.

Posted by: Gorwath Feb 1 2008, 08:11 PM

One more thing shouldn't that Eyestalk belong to a Hive Mother?
I just killed another Elder Orb and that one was much easier than the first Beholder/Elder Orb/Hive Mother?

Gorwath

Posted by: shadan May 6 2008, 01:52 PM

I don't know if this is IA bug or original Vanilla... Nowadays I use Wish spell frequently, and I found very irritating if I don't get really good choses I have to pick an indifferent one. When it is the one which affects party and enemies together most of my summons change to hostile... Even if that was a heal everyone, or intoxicated everyone etc. I can accept, although not fully understand when Breach on everyone makes them hostile, but heal, intoxicate, magic resistance etc. why?

Posted by: Sikret May 6 2008, 02:27 PM

@shadan

The "Intoxicate everyone" is a hostile spell which makes your summoned creatures hostile. That's (arguably) correct.

"Heal" and "Magic Resistance" options of Wish spell don't make them hostile and there is no such bug in the game. (unless you have a local problem in your game). I have tested them myself and I'm pretty sure that no such bugs exist in regard to the heal and magic resistance options of wish spell, but please test them again in your game and let me know the result.

"Breach on all enemies" was bugged in the vanilla game and would make your summoned creature hostile. I have already fixed it in IA v6. See the http://forums.blackwyrmlair.net/index.php?showtopic=3294.

Posted by: Ymarsakar May 6 2008, 03:05 PM

The same applies to contingencies I recall, like chain contingency.

Posted by: shadan May 6 2008, 05:27 PM

Tried it, you are right, Sikret, my memories were too cloudy... Only breach and intoxicate made them hostile. and my english is not perfect, I thought intoxicate means cure poison, so I wondered why is that hostile...

Posted by: Vuki Jun 15 2008, 01:23 PM

There are several areas in the game where you might be attacked when you try to sleep. In some of these places you really can make a lot of XPs for almost free. For example in the basement before you enter Tol'Gar you can meet with 4 Yuan'tis. In sum they give you 6k XP and they are really easy to kill. And you can do it several - I think unlimited - times. For those who want to "cheat" it is an easy place to do. Solution could be either that they appear only limited times or they do not give you XP after some battles. Or alternatively a DemiGod of Yuan'tis appears after some battles.

Posted by: Shaitan Jun 15 2008, 06:32 PM

I find it quiet logical to meet common foot soldiers when sleeping so close to Tor'gal. I too normally sleep there, but I use to succeed after two or three times It's a bit annoying when they pops up just around your spellcasters though.

Posted by: Vuki Jun 15 2008, 06:42 PM

You misunderstood me. It is absolut logical to meet with these guys there. The problem is that I had no difficulties to beat them; my party did not damaged or they were damaged only really a bit. I did not use it to get extra XP but it is possible and any player could do the trick to stay there for a long time, beat them for example 100 times (easily can be done) and make 600k XP.

Posted by: shadan Jun 16 2008, 09:41 AM

If you want to cheat, you edit your character. If you don't want to cheat, don't try to sleep more times, try only until you succeed and no enemy comes. Imho it doesn't worth to spend efforts to prevent this, there are a lot of places where you can do this sleep thing.

Posted by: Vuki Jun 29 2008, 04:28 PM

If you killed Valygar and then open the Planar Sphere and before you enter you speak with Tolgerias then you have the possibility to get two Rings of Ram. If you told him that you tell him where the corpse of Valygar is if he give you more then he give you the ring of ram and some coins. You will get also the ring when you kill him. Ok, it is not a big deal (ring of ram is not a very good item), so, it is not really important to remove it.

Posted by: Sikret Jun 29 2008, 05:38 PM

I will block this exploit. Thanks, Vuki!

Posted by: Vuki Jul 15 2008, 08:22 PM

During the mage stronghold quest when the apprentices made all of your items then two days later you are called to go to the sphere by a messenger. My problem is that sometimes this messenger does not initiate the conversation and therefore it is really easy to miss him. The reason might be that I left the area before he was able to start the conversation and when I come back he did not react again. Can it be fixed somehow?

In the V5 bug thread I mentioned the following:

You told me that you would fix it in V6. That is ok but I realize something strange with the Globe spells (minor and major). Major version protects against all 4th or lower spell and it gives you immunity against dispel magic as well. Minor version protects against all 3rd or lower spell but it does not give immunity against dispel however the minor globe is not dispellable. I think it is absolutely not logical. I see some possible solutions:

1. Most logical: Both globes give protection against dispel and none of them is dispellable.

2. Little bit less logical but gives the most interesting gameplay: Both globes give protection against dispel but both of them are dispellable. So, succesfull dispel magic remove the globe but nothing else.

3. Well balanced (IMO): Minor is dispellable and do not give protection against dispel. 6th level Globe remains as it is.

4. Another balanced version: Minor is dispellable but it gives protection against dispel (it is like the 2nd version). 6th level Globe remains as it is.

The problem with the 1st version is that it makes the two spells very similar and there will be no real reason to use the major version (protection against 4th level spell is not a big advantage). 2nd version means that it makes the current Impr. Inv. + Spell Immunity: Illusion + Globe of Invulnerabilty combó - which is extremely powerful because there is no way to remove any spells from the caster - less brutal because 2 succesfull dispel magic spells remove Spell Immunity (and the Globe).

Posted by: Sikret Jul 15 2008, 08:40 PM

I don't think that such a bug exists in the game. Neither the 6th level spell, Globe of Invulnerability, nor the 4th level minor globe protect against dispel magic.

Raven also mentioned this http://forums.blackwyrmlair.net/index.php?s=&showtopic=2867&view=findpost&p=33206 (see especially the 2nd paragraph).

Test it again with your own chracters (let one of them cast the globe and another spell which is dispellable; then with one of your other characters who is high level enough cast dispel magic on the first one), you will see that dispel magic works despite the globe. Let me know the result.

I will investigate the problem with the messenger.

Posted by: Vuki Jul 15 2008, 09:04 PM

Sikret, I have already tested it and my previous post was based on this investigation. My 12th level cleric/mage casted chant on the party then a mirror image and then a globe of invulnerabilty on herself. Chant of course affected all party members. My 18th level blade casted mirror image and minor globe of invulnerability. Then he casted a dispel magic. It removed the chant from all characters including himself but excluding the C/M. All mirror images were removed but none of the globes were removed. So, minor globe does not protect against dispel while globe of invulnerability protects against it. Mirorr image was removed, so the globe did not protect it.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 15 2008, 09:11 PM

I'm pretty sure that Globe of Invulnerability doesn't protect against dispel magic. The fact that the mirror image on your C/M was removed despite having the globe is a good evidence as well.

Test again and test more than once; the dispel magic spell has always 1% chance to fail despite the difference in levels; perhaps that had been the case with the chant effect on your C/M.

Posted by: Raven Jul 15 2008, 09:24 PM

I have tested this in my game just now and did not find that the Globe of Invulnerability made any difference to the effectiveness of the Dispel - other buffs were removed from the character with the globe while the globe itself stayed.

Posted by: Vuki Jul 15 2008, 09:49 PM

Ohh, I was really stupid. I tested it only once and it was an unfortunate test. Every spell was removed except the spells on my C/M. I should have tested it more than once. I tried now several times and I got different results every time. Next time I will be more precise and I will make more tests. Sorry to bother you with these stupid comments.

However it was not without any reason because finally I was able to find a small bug. First problem is that my monk resisted the spell, so there was one line which says "Dispel effects" and one line which says that "Magic resistance". I think it is a bit confusing. Similar effect happens with globe of invulnerability, the second text line for my C/M says that "Spell Ineffective". It is also confusing. Last issue is that it would be nice to separate when dispel was succesful and not succesfull. Even when it is not successfull the text is "Dispel effects", I think it should show somehow that it was not successfull.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 15 2008, 10:01 PM

No problem, Vuki!

The animation effect (not the "dispel effects" message effect) has a wrong power number in the vanilla game and also checks magic resistance. if you cast remove magic on a rakshasa or lich, the spell will work, but you will still read the "Spell Ineffective" mesage which relates to the animation only. The same will happen if you cast the spell on a creature with high MR; you will read the "magic resistance" message, but again it's only related to the animation which was supposed to be played above the target's head. I noticed this bug when I was playing the game a few weeks ago and fixed them, but just didn't write about them in the "progress report" thread, because I thought they were minor things.

Posted by: Kerkes Jul 19 2008, 01:42 PM

Don't know if this a bug, but I happens sometimes - I finish Shade Lord with a Vagrant, go to meet mayor who gives me my stronghold. I rest there so that wood spirit Mairliyn or somethiong would show up. Ok, she does, gives me a quest to get rid of some people digging in the wood, I do that, report to her, she goes away. I rest again to trigger Delon again. Sure, he shows up with "I have an offer for you if you wish to hear it". I go to mayor and find out I lost my stronghold and am no longer welcome. What's up with that? This does't happen in all my games, but it does quite often. It used to happen in the vanilla game also, so it is not IA's fault.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 19 2008, 02:06 PM

It's not related to IA for sure.

I will investigate the case. In my own games, I always talk to the mayor (as well) after completing each quest. I'm not sure if this is the source of your problem, but you wrote that after doing the quest, you only talked to the spirit, yes?

If you have a saved game, reload the game, and after doing that quest, talk to the mayor as well as the spirit and let me know if the bug happens again.

Since you said that the bug only sometimes happens, you may want to test it several times (a few times without talking to Mayor and a few times with talking to mayor and count the number of times the bug happens in either case). Let me know the result.

Posted by: Kerkes Jul 21 2008, 12:32 AM

I think it could be the fact I usually don't bother with those ogres up there. What I usually do is this - talk to them 1.st time, then talk to major, sleep, talk to major to get exp. But I don't talk to ogres again to get the shield. After reloading, I'm pretty sure that's the problem. In my latest run with a Vagrant, I did everything "as it should be done" (talk in correct order with major, ogres, got shield etc) and it worked just fine. God bless Anomen's shield.

Posted by: saros Jul 21 2008, 09:36 AM

Hello, I am a newbie to IA mod and am currently researching it, yet I was able to achieve about 10-15 million xp in Irenicus' dungeon due to a lot of patience and spawning mephits. This is, most obviously, an exploit which I resorted to since I love playing solo and I don't know the mod. But I think that it's good to be fixed, by either fixing the number of mephits spawning from portals, or not giving xp for killing such mephits.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 21 2008, 09:56 AM

While this is indeed an exploit of the vanilla game which is better to be fixed than left, in a game with IA installed it's not an exploit, it's rather a suicide!

Starting the game with high xp will make the game very hard because you will keep encountering the toughest possible enemies in every dungeon. with high level characters who lacks equivalently decent equipment, defeating those enemies will be too hard specially because some of them may require +3 or +4 weapons to hit which your paty don't have at the start of the game right after Irenicus' dungeon. With inflated xp, spellhold will also turn to be a hell for you.

So, in general, while I agree that this is an exploit in the vanilla game, I don't think that blocking it has priority for IA. As I said, using such xp exploits early in the game will only backbite you.

Also, IA is not a mod for solo-running. No solo character can survive IA without lots of cheating. I strongly recommend to start the game again and play with a party of 5 or 6.

Posted by: Kerkes Jul 21 2008, 12:33 PM

There is a thing in the game which is easilly exploitable, due to the fact that NPCs usually join you at similar levels. The thing is, if you know a certain "quest order" you can easilly gain about 800 - 900 000 exp almost without doing any hard fights (circus, bridge killer, umar hills, thieves whitout picking up quest exp, fwindspear acrons and some fights, even unseeing eye if youre lucky enough) then pick up npcs you want and get high levels very quickly.. Think that could/should be fixed by having npcs always join at a certain level (9 or so).

Posted by: Kerkes Jul 21 2008, 01:14 PM

one other thing, not sure if this is fixable tough.. potion swapping to cast scrolls, very old but probably the ultimate cheese ever

Posted by: saros Jul 21 2008, 04:01 PM

Another thing.

I think that those 'xp gain exploits' just multiplied. I've discovered that for a low reputation, the same old Amnish Guards and Cowled Wizards appear. They are vulnerable to trap damage(in fact, they die in a second), give quite decent xp(30 000 regular guards, Paladins of the Radiant Heart twice as much), and a LOT of gold(each group has five full plate mail suits, and 11 random item slots, which may contain items from the cheapest gem to powerful spell scrolls,including Spell Trap, Ruby Ray, Spell Trigger, Projected Image and the 'rare' Immunity to Level Drain scrolls). This, of course, means, that even if no merchant is lootable anymore, their stuff can all be bought via killing a lot of Amnish Guards. Not to mention the fact that this way all of the party members will become demigods.

This was present in the original game, however I thought that this was fixed. By setting traps, the whole system works clean, fast and without arcane spell casting, meaning that Zallanora is left for later(she carries a bunch of Spellstrike scrolls, and her goons carry a lot of other valuable rare scrolls like Improved Haste). And as for the weapons, weapons +3 can be created by the Enchant Weapon spell, Phosphorous can easily be forged with a lot of money(there are enough weapons and Permanency scrolls around), and Energy Blades are considered to be of +10 enchantment. Not to mention that the most powerful party members will wear a cloak of protection +2 or +3 and a similar ring, plus everyone will have a recharged Wand of something in their arsenal.

BTW, are there enough Permanency scrolls for everything? How many of those are there? I've found three for now, all of them in the Docks district, and I'm uncertain if I'd have enough for all item upgrades.

Posted by: Kerkes Jul 21 2008, 04:37 PM

I think energy blades are "only" +5 and are not that hot in IA anymore, for weapons you'll need far more than only phosporus with +4 enhancement with your exp levels, it makes the game a lot harder if you are very high level couse despite your levels, you won't have the needed equipment.
There are plenty of permanency scrolls, check containers and such also
Btw, you can not find project image in IA, that spell is replaced.
Who is Zallanora?

Posted by: saros Jul 22 2008, 06:02 AM

Well, I will anyway try out the game with a lot of xp, gold, and solo(for now). If soloing is not enough, then I will collect a team of six HLA-heavy characters, and I doubt that I will have any trouble.

Zallanora is the head of the Cowled Wizards. They will tolerate the first arcane casting violence, and afterwards, on five subsequent violations, they will send squads of 4 Cowled wizards to stop you.

SPOILER!

After the fifth group is defeated and another arcane casting violation ensues, then will appear 'the highest order' of the Cowled wizards. They include Zallanora, which is the head of the Cowled ones, 2 regular Cowled wizards and Kollynic Paac(which later helps you send the Solamnic Knights home, and will still do so even if killed in this encounter - a bug?). Zallanora is an ancient lich which has stolen the body of an elf female wizard and runs the Cowled Wizards in Athkatla. This encounter has been made very hard indeed, since in 3 second intervals more Cowled wizards gate in, accompanied by Coin Golems(now all can stop wondering what on earth do Cowled wizards with their Spell License taxes - they make golems, of course).

SPOILER!

Posted by: Sikret Jul 22 2008, 10:15 AM

Yes, with cheating you won't have any trouble.

We have another forum here at BWL, namely http://forums.blackwyrmlair.net/index.php?showforum=22. Players who are not shy to use cheat or cheese during the game and those who insist on playing the game with fewer than 5 characters in the party should post in that forum (rather than IA's main forum). Of course, I won't read those posts and will not offer technical support to those who ingnore my recommendations.

Good luck!

Posted by: saros Jul 22 2008, 11:48 AM

I haven't posted here in order to make people cheat or cheese. I simply referred to the fact that although this mod tries to strip all cheese from the game, there is still some. I, personally, will try the game this way for now, because I'm unfamiliar with the mod and the fights. Again, this is no cheating IMO, just a cheesy method to acquire a lot of money and xp. But I think that these exploits should be fixed, if possible, something like spawning Amnish guards should carry undroppable plate mails or even undroppable enchanted weapons, no xp gained from such fights, etc.

Just a little suggestion. Since I'm unfamiliar with the mod, I don't know if there is a fixed Spell Trigger scroll in SoA. If not, I think it should be added somewhere, since this is the main reason that I fought Amnish guards in the first place.

Posted by: Kerkes Jul 22 2008, 10:01 PM

Shade lord - did it with a 5 person party. He killed one, and put the other 4 to sleep (emotion I believe). Then he aproached my protagonist (who wes sleeping) and stood by him, not attacking, not casting..nothing until ber/cleric woke up, then shade went after him.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 23 2008, 05:47 AM

@saros

1- By cheating, I was referring to your intention to add HLA-heavy characters to your party later on. How else newly added NPCs can be HLA-heavy?

2- By ignoring my recommendations, I was referring to your persistence on playing solo.

@Kerkes

This has been discussed before (though I can't find the posts to give a link right now). It's an unfixable bug of the vanilla game which sometimes (not always) happens. Enemies sometimes just fail to see unconscious characters.

Posted by: saros Jul 23 2008, 10:22 AM

1 - I was referring to raising additional NPC's experience to HLA levels by killing a lot of Amnish guards. No cheating. Besides, I need money and certain high-level scrolls.

2 - I like to play solo. On Insane. Otherwise, I admire your reports in your 6-person party run so far. Unfortunately, I hate to rely on luck, and in your reports, while the tactics are great, there is a bit of luck involved. But I will most certainly try the mod with a full party(or solo F/M/C) and no xp exploits, once I'm familiar with the mod.

P.S. I know that you made all NPCs to receive quest xp rewards at joining according to PC levels of experience, but I think that you missed Aerie...she always joins at 161 000 xp no matter how high a level my PC is.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 23 2008, 10:43 AM

I will block this exploit in IA v6, but as long as it is available, using it is not much different from cheating.

Even if we show some tolerance and call it "cheese" rather than "cheat", it won't make any difference in the main point that players who use "cheat or cheese" should post to the other forum (which I gave the link to).

Reporting an exploit is something, using it is something quite different. Other players have also reported xp exploits to me, but they don't actually use it. When they find an exploit and accidentally gain extra xp, they reload the game and try to avoid it.



That's good news! If you decide to play a full party, you are welcome to send your gaming experience and reports to the mod's main forum; if you decide to solo, send your posts to the other forum.

Posted by: Vuki Jul 23 2008, 10:47 AM

I really like to play in solo mod as well. However I am sure that you cannot win the game in solo mod. There are a lot of effects that you cannot resist when you are alone and there are a lot of enemies which you cannot kill because you are not able to damage enough to kill. But still I would like to try it after I finish my current 6 characters game and see how far I can get. It will be a fun.

Posted by: saros Jul 23 2008, 11:38 AM

Thanx, that was what I wanted.



I have some reports of people who have won the IA 4.3 with a solo F/M/C, with no reloads on insane until the final battle.

P.S. I will try to report more such exploits if I find any.

P.P.S. @Sikret: Please consider adding a fixed Spell Trigger scroll in SoA somewhere.

As far as I remember, random spawns in Firkraag dungeon level 2(rest interruptions) include Skeleton warriors, carrying sometimes valuable spell scrolls. You may consider fixing this also (if it hasn't been already done).

Posted by: DavidW Jul 23 2008, 03:17 PM

If it's the bug I'm thinking of, you can work around it. If Player1 is unconscious, then Attack(Player1) will work even when Attack(NearestEnemyOfBlah) doesn't. Most of my scripts have a "if you get this far, there are no targets, so just attack Player1 through Player6 in order" block.

Posted by: Raven Jul 23 2008, 04:21 PM

IIRC, IA already adds a fixed Spell Trigger scroll *somewhere* in SoA.

Posted by: Kerkes Jul 24 2008, 11:25 PM

I'm not sure if this a vanilla game bug or IA bug. I'm sure that's extremly annoying. Cerd is very oft loosing all his 4th level memorized spells so I have to set up page four of his spelbook a lot. This proved very deadly a few times because he usually memorizes death ward, and that's not funny when you're fighting mages who are so keen on castin power word kill on poor Imoen or demiliches who will imprison anybody who is vulnerable to it ASAP. Funny thing, all other spells are normaly memorized, only level4 are deleted. This wasn't happening until he got his upgraded staff and hit very high levels (24, 25 or so), and only in TOB.
Same thing happens with my ber/cler dual (levels 9/ 27,28 or so). He usually looses his 5th or 6th level spells without castin any. Any help? I have baldurdash, IA5, unnerfed spell progresion for mages/clerics/druids from bgtweaks installed with no other mods, NPCs or such.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 25 2008, 07:22 AM

I know, but as I said, reporting an exploit is one thing, using it in practice is something quite different. My complaint was that you kept using that exploit in your game.



Yes, someone did most of IA v4.2 in a solo game, but she did it with many "cheesy" and "cheap" methods and tricks (I have read that report as well and didn't find it interesting from a tactical point of view). Cheesy players are not welcome here in IA's forum.

It's a lot harder in v5. Actually, I'm pretty sure that IA v5 is not soloable without cheating. This is exactly why we don't accept reports from solo-runners in IA's forum. A solo runner will certainly cheat during the game (even though he or she won't be honest enough to admit it). Eventually, the forum will be filled with forged, artificial, and false reports; and that's what we don't want to happen.

Reports are welcome, but if you keep using them in practice, you are not welcome to post in IA's main forum. Start a new game without using such exploits; otherwise you should post to the other forum I gave the link to (this is the last warning).



How do you know that I haven't? So far, you have not played the mod's actual content at all and wasted your time cheating xp, gold and items by killing amnish guards and cowled wizards. As Raven mentioned, there are such fixed scrolls inside the game, you just need to play the mod as intended.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 25 2008, 10:32 AM

I'm not sure if this is the source of your problem or not, perhaps not; but it shows that you haven't followed the installation instructions accurately. It is strictly and clearly mentioned in IA's readme file that you shouldn't use BG2 Tweakpack.

The problem you reported sometimes (quite rarely though) occurs in the vanilla game, rarely when a character is dead and raised or (more frequently) when a character wields a weapon which grants additional spell slots (it has been seen only for weapons, not for other type of equipment). It doesn't look to be fixable.

Posted by: saros Jul 27 2008, 11:01 PM

I've seen this bug most often with the Ring of Acuity.

BTW I've started a normal multiplayer game, and I will post the more interesting battles. But here are some additional bugs I've noticed when playing:

Amnish Guard loot: when sleeping in the streets of Athkatla, a random Amnish guard may appear to disturb the party to find an inn. Those frequently carry valuable magical scrolls, which may be looted by a quick(hasted) and averagely skilled thief without any penalty.

If a character talks quickly to Cromwell after an item upgrade, some of the ingredients may be preserved and the upgraded item can be still received. However, some times the opposite bug appears: ingredients are all consumed, while the upgraded item is lost.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 28 2008, 08:35 AM

Thank you. You are playing with a full 6-men party, right?

I'd also like to see the content of your WeiDu.log file. It's a text document in your main BG2 folder. Copy and paste its content into your next post.



Will block this as well in v6. Thanks for the report. But, don't use the exploit in your game. Discover the possible exploits and report them to me, but then reload the game and avoid using them.

Posted by: saros Jul 29 2008, 04:58 AM

I will post the content of my WeiDU file as soon as I'm home. Since I'm usually writing from my working place, I cannot do it now.

I haven't given up the solo, but I will post here only things concerning my party adventure. I have two parralel games running.

BTW, here is another strange bug - if a party's reputation is lowered, and a party manages to defeat several Amnish guard patrols, then afterwards Cowled Wizard patrols do not appear at spellcasting violation on Athkatlan streets.

Posted by: lroumen Jul 29 2008, 08:30 AM

A solo in most other mods is doable because you can use clones of yourself to preserve spells and to extend the summoning cap. Since these spells are altered in IA and because fights later in the game involve many fighters, you can be completely overwhelmed.

I've gotten through half of chapter 2 and saved a few tough encounters for later, but it just became too much of a problem when foes start to summon multiple skeleton lords or devas. That was with a FMT though.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 29 2008, 08:58 AM

Are you still using that exploit and fight with Amnish guards? I thought we had agreed that you shouldn't do it in your new game. You reported the xp/item exploit related to amnish guards and I said that I will fix it; but then we agreed that you will start a new game and will play "normally" without using those exploits.

Why on earth should your reputation drop to such low numbers unless you do it deliberately to fight amnish guards and use those cheesy exloits? What kind of cheap playing style is this?

Start a new game again and play normally. Don't let your reputation drop. Don't use any xp/item/gold exploits.

Posted by: Vuki Jul 29 2008, 09:10 AM

I think the best general solution for this problem (and to other similar problems as well) that the gurds that arrives became stronger and stronger every time (like the Corwled Wizards in the vanilla game). When you defeat the final - very-very tough - group then they will not appear again. That solution satisfies both the tactical point of view and the role-play game point. And it could also give a new interesting point (adventure is too strong word here) to the game.

I do not agree with it. Lowering the reputation is not cheesy. Lowering it by using a bug is what makes it cheesy.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 29 2008, 09:15 AM

Which bug? There is no bug in the game to decrease his reputation. He is decreasing his reputation on purpose and deliberately exactly to abuse that possible exploit with amnish guards.

Posted by: lroumen Jul 29 2008, 09:20 AM

If you're an evil protagonist playing with an evil party, then I would drop my reputation to very low amounts. Sure it adds a battle each time you zone, but that's roleplaying for you. That also means that I wouldn't finish many quests either, because a lot of them are just goody-goody with no evil counterpart, so the XP has to come from somewhere.

In such a case the summoned party that comes to kill you should simple be bereft of the overload of droppable items. I wouldn't make the party summoning end though.

Posted by: Vuki Jul 29 2008, 09:29 AM

Oops, I thought he reducing his reputation by using a bug. Sorry.

However it is then absolutely no cheesy in my opinion. Of course if he/she install the "Low Reputation Store Discount" then it is cheating. But I think this modification is itself a cheating.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 29 2008, 09:35 AM

What if he is not even playing an evil protagonist and plans to increase his reputation later by donating to temples and doing some quests to reach the level of reputation to play all those goody-goody quests as well (I smell very well and almost without error when a cheesy player is around).

We should wait to see his WeiDu.log file as well; I'm also pretty sure that he has not followed the mod's installation instructions. I even accidentally happened to read one of his posts about his current IA game in another forum in which he was more honest in reporting the events and I noticed that he has installed at least two mods which are incompatible with IA and is using a lot worse cheesy tricks as well.

Ridiculously enough, his protagonist has around 6 million xp (or more) without doing any of the game's major quests. Do you need to hear more?

Of course, he is free to play the mod in any way he wants in private and inside the boundaries of his house. What I don't tolerate is the way he is wasting our time here. I could use the time I wasted here replying to him to add some more new content to the mod.

I will tolerate him only for a little more time to see if he will see the point of playing IA and will amend his playing style or not.



What? Abusing xp exploits is not cheesy?! Well, one can say that it's even wore than cheesy and is plain cheat, because instead of using that exploit, he could equally use CLUAConsole and add the same amount of xp and items he gains from amnish guards directly to his game.

Posted by: Vuki Jul 29 2008, 09:42 AM

I agree with you, it is absolutley cheesy. However I think this way he lost much more in IA then what he gets. He will be on higher level and that makes quests tougher for him. He could spend a lot of money to restore his reputation and money is very-very important in IA. He will be also not able to restore it to 20 because he cannot raise it in temples as much as in the vanilla game.

Posted by: Vuki Jul 29 2008, 09:46 AM

If he changes area, he fights with them and then change again and again just to produce XP then it is cheesy. If he makes his normal movements play as ususal and as a sideeffect he has to fight with soldiers then it is not cheesy imho. Also, please be aware that there are a lot of drawbacks (for example he simple cannot sell anything in shops!).

There are other similar places in the game and they are much more rewarding to use. For example in Firkraag dungeon if you rest you can fight against unlimited undead party. And for this you do not need to lower you reputation, so there is no drawback using it.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 29 2008, 10:10 AM

If you intentionally rest in a dungoen when you don't really need resting just to fight those creatures to gain xp, it's also equally cheesy (almost cheating).

Posted by: Vuki Jul 29 2008, 10:14 AM

Yes, I agree with you. But when you try to sleep sometimes it requires 4-5 tries to finally not be interrupted.

Posted by: lroumen Jul 29 2008, 10:14 AM

If that is the case, then I agree that it's rather lame.

However, roleplaying-wise there is enough justification to go to low reputation. Also, just because one person performs these actions does not mean that every other player will do the same. Especially in the light that you are planning to add quests for evil (thus low reputation) parties, should you think carefully about these battles. I'm certain that you've already done so but have not made it clear to the public just yet.


I think a good solution would be as following.
- Once the reputation drops, the amount of parties becomes more frequent and more difficult.
- Then, when the difficulty has escalated and a very tough party of adventurers has been destroyed, you decrease the chance and difficulty again, such that only muggers and low level amnish guards or paladins spawn that carry very few droppable items and give low XP (but are still a decent challenge such as the Suna Seni encounter).

Related to the subject... the Cowled Wizards stop spawning, do you ever really know why that happens? Perhaps you could create a simple messenger who brings a letter saying that the Cowled Wizards have humbly decided to leave the party in peace and that the party has permission to use magic inside of town. That would be a nice and clear closure of that sequence if none is present already.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 29 2008, 10:26 AM

Honestly, I don't think that such a bug exists at all. saros has a corrupted game due to installing incompatible mods with IA and doing lots of unusual things during his game. Bug reports can only be taken seriously if reported by a player who has followed the installation instructions accurately and we have not received any such reports about Cowled wizards in the past.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 29 2008, 12:13 PM

For now (for v6), I have just blocked the exploits (xp, items, gold, etc) which can be gained from fighting amnish guards and similar battles resulting from low reputation. When I decide to practically add new content for evil protagonists, I will think about these battles again and may improve them. However, as I've said before, adding new content for evil parties doesn't have a high priority for me.

Moreover (and this is very important), from my point of view, even an evil party should play without cheesy methods. Being evil doesn't justify and shouldn't mean being cheap. Hence, even when I add new content for evil parties, I will still set some particular requirements for some of those quests. Even an evil character should behave like a man rather than a jerk and should play fair (if he wants to see some of those new quests).

Finding the right requiements is admittedly a bit difficult for evil parties, of course. Some players have a different understanding (than mine) of how to role-play an evil character. They believe that being evil is equivalent to being a disgusting dirty character for whom every kind of action is justified; while I believe that there are different types of evil characters, some of whom are still bound with honor, behave fair during battles, do not attack the enemy when he is unprepared and unguarded, do not attack the innocent and the commoner, when they give a word they don't break it and don't betray, etc etc... My new evil quests will be designed only for this latter type of evil characters, not for the cheap type who think that since they are evil every action is justified for them.

Posted by: Vuki Jul 29 2008, 12:31 PM

I think you missed here the player and the character. Character is living in the game world and he is not aware of bugs or exploits. When a bug is used to create XP then it is the player who insist it and not the character. Character and his alignment and background (family, history, class, ...) should determine how the player should behave.


I agree that the AD&D standard description and idea about evil is too simplified. An evil is not someone who go and kill everybody he/she sees. But I think your description is about a paladin and not about an evil character. Yes, it could happen that such an evil character has such a behavior but it is mostly true only for lawful evil characters (based on the very simple AD&D definition).

I think you know history: in a lot of cases the surrenders were killed after the battles, they killed a lot of children and women during wars (or even without wars). In lot of battles they attacked from a hiden post and not only evil people but normal "good" people. Did you here about the guy (called Pandi) in Belgium who killed 50 or something people in at home? Or the director and his people who killed a lot of children in the Grand Canaries 20 years ago? News are full with such a people. So, this type of behavior exist also. I think the most important think that people often miss when playing with evil characters is that they miss the target of the character. Every character has a target (or more targets) and the differnece is usually not the target itself but the way how they reach it. A "good" characters try to not cause unnecessery suffering and pain, for an evil character such a thing does not matter.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 29 2008, 12:48 PM

I was also primarily talking about the character (not the player). An evil character may be cheap and kill amnish guards to loot them. This was what I was referring to.

Of course, how the character behaves in the game is directly related to how the player thinks (it's the player who is roleplaying the character after all), but I was not primarily talking about the character.

No, as I said, there are different types of evil characters. One doesn't need to be paladin to avoid hurting innocent people.

The difference between a "good character" and the "bound with honor evil character" lies in their long-term goals about how the world should be governed (this is the first and main difference, and see two paragraphs below this one for the second difference).

As I said, there is also another type of evil characters, to whom I referred as "cheap" ones; they are those who may kill a child for a gold piece he has. My point was that my new quests will be designed for that other type of evil characters not for this cheap type.



Yes, now you are getting close to understanding what I was trying to say. An honorable evil character has a long-term goal. If killing someone can help reaching that goal, he will kill him. A good character won't do this. For a good character goals don't justify means (this is the second difference, but it's secondary to the one I mentioned as the first and main difference in two paragraphs above this one, because I can even imagine honorable evil characters who may hesitate to use all types of means to reach their goals).

A cheap evil character, on the other hand, may kill that person for a few coins. This is different than what the "honorable" evil character will do for his long-term goal and even then he will probably invite his victim to a one-on-one fair duel rather than pouring poison into the victim's meal or just killing him in sleep.

My main point is that one can be evil without being cheap.

Posted by: Vuki Jul 29 2008, 01:31 PM

Hmm, ok, I understand it now. I was a bit confused because you usually use the cheap word for cheating. I know the meaning of this word but I use from you only this way. And I think that the way you use it (I mean when speaking about evil characters) is wrong.

I think the "cheap" characters have a goal as well (hmm, I used target in my prev. post, but goal is the right word). Just think about this example: a guy who has to take care of his mom, wife and 3 children; to do it he kills people during night and take their money. He is definitely evil, he is cheap (in the way you use it) but he has a goal and even this goal is really honest and nice. The way how he reached his goal is evil. I think in real life such situations are much more common then the "evil goal" situation. The judgment of a goal really depends on where do you see it from. It can be evil from one point of view and can be non-evil from other point of view. Usually people have no evil goal but very often they use evil practices and evil think to archive their - normal - goal.

But this is philosophy of the game (and life) and should not be discussed here. This is not a bug. Would you like to create a topic for it and copy the last couple of posts to there? Name should be a bit general - like "Discussion about game philosophy" or similar - because I have other topics in my mind that I would like to discuss and they are related to IA (but could be fit to that new topic).

Posted by: Sikret Jul 29 2008, 01:52 PM

Yes, the term is somewhat ambiguous here, but its two meanings are interrelated:

A cheap player (the one who cheats) usually roleplays a cheap character (the one who for example, kills amnish guards for coin or attacks innocent and unprepared people or breaks promises, etc,etc...).

In its first instance, it is cheap1 which refers to a cheating player; in its second occurrence, it is cheap2 which refers to a character with low prestige and behavior inside the game.

Be careful not to confuse the game's world with real world. We are talking about an adventurer (protagonist). Think on the example of whether you will invite your opponent to a one-on-one duel or will kill him in sleep to see what I mean by honorable and cheap approaches.



Just please don't start a discussion about philosophy of ethics here. We are talking about the game's world in which such controversies don't exist as they do in our world.



I prefer to keep all posts here for now as they are all somewhat related to saros's posts and playing style. They don't do any harm.

If you want to discuss other issues feel free to start a new topic; I just hope they won't be related to real life, moral relativism and such things .

Posted by: Vuki Jul 29 2008, 02:30 PM

Ok, I will not do it.

I think here your way of thinking is too black and white, instead of let's take an example from the game. You - using your thief or monk or mage - first scout the enemy area and then you move your spellcasters close to it and attack the enemy that cannot see you with magic from distance. Is this a cheap1 method (cheeting or cheesy)? Is this tactical? Is this the evil way? Can "good" characters do it? It all depends on the situation. For example if you are in the sewer area and you attack the party there using this way then I can call it cheating or at least cheesy method. If you do it in the beholder cave with beholders then it is not cheesy. First method is also evil because you attack someone without a reason, second case is not even evil. If you are with an evil party and you make the decision to kill the Silver Dragon in Underdark and attack it using this tactics then it is evil but not cheesy.

Posted by: saros Jul 29 2008, 02:40 PM

This was a report from my old game. It has nothing to do with the present. I just thought that it is good to be noted, because if unfixed, it may still occur in version six of IA.

Otherwise, I've installed just the components of the Ease of Use mod which you use in your own game. With one exception, and I've already uninstalled it: the Shapeshifter rebalancing. Otherwise, my install is only: SoA, ToB, official patch, IA and several EoU components which I see that you also use in your game.

Ops I just saw that I use multiclass grandmastery and you don't have it in your install. Since this is my major fault I will start anew my install and afterwards, in my new game, will report any new cheesy exploits.

@Sikret: BTW, I'm NOT wasting your time here. I've just pointed out at least three cheesy methods of xp&gold gain, which are not fixed. I may find more such things which went unnoticed so far. I'm working for the good of the IA mod, since this way the exploits will be blocked in the next version. And consider the fact that I may have played the mod with this knowledge kept to myself.
Each of us can play however he/she wants. I will immediately implement my WeiDU file contents here after the reinstall and you may tell me if it is normal already. For instance, you consider xp&gold gain exploits cheating. Or playing solo inappropriate. I, however, consider multiple reloadings of one and the same battle cheating, until luck helps the party and they win. Also, I think that this mod may prove much more challenging to a solo character than to a party.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 29 2008, 02:44 PM

Casting spells from distance (offscreen) on enemies who can't see you is always a cheap and cheesy method regardless of the situation; but even this, is not the main point I was trying to say.

I was trying to explain for which type of evil characters I will add new quests to the mod. We don't need to argue about titles.

The fact that you don't agree with me is a different matter. I just hope you got that which type of evil characters with which playing style can wait for new content and quests in the mod's future versions.

If no, we seem to be failing in constructively converse with each other. If yes, then it's good. In either case, let's end the discussion at this point.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 29 2008, 02:50 PM

According to your own report in Bioware's forum, even in your new game, you are using xp exploits. You character has not completed any of the game's major quests and you already have HLAs with your multi-class character which means you have too much xp to be normally possible at that stage of the game.



You have items from the incompatible "Item Upgrade" mod. Daystar +4 is an item from that mod. The vanilla sword has +2 enchantment (while your version of the sword has +4 enchantment because according to your own report, you can hit Kangaxx with it).

Copy and paste the content of your WeiDu.log file and we will see which mods you have installed.

Posted by: Vuki Jul 29 2008, 02:53 PM

Ok, postpone it for the moment. I will create later a topic for such things and other issues.


No, I have no problem with this. I just would like to show you that this type of evil behavior is very rear in real world. It is also very rear in most not so simple fantasy world, one example is DragonLance in the later series (in early books to be good and evil is very simple question). Do you know David Gemmel? I like his books very much and in his novels you can see really good examples. But this is too general, so I agree with you: we should stop it.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 29 2008, 03:14 PM

This is going to be repetitive and tedious. As I told you, reporting exploits is fine, using them isn't!

If you want those exploits for be fixed and blocked why you keep using them (even in your new game)?

You reported the exploits and I said that I will block them, then I asked you not to use them in your game; you didn't listen; you are still using them but again lie to me here and say that it was from an old game, while you are still using them even in your new game.

You have Item Upgrade mod (or some other incompatible mod which has increased Daystar's enchantment to +4) installed and yet you keep repeating that you don't have any other mods except those I have in my game.

Yes, you could play the game for yourself without telling me anything. That would have been much better than coming here to tell me lies at every stage.

Posted by: saros Jul 29 2008, 03:20 PM

// Log of Currently Installed WeiDU Mods
// The top of the file is the 'oldest' mod
// ~TP2_File~ #language_number #component_number // [Subcomponent Name -> ] Component Name
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #0 // BG2 Fixpack - Core Fixes
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #1 // BG2 Fixpack - Game Text Update
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #2 // Super Happy Fun Lucky Modder Pack
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #3 // BETA Core Fixes (please check the readme!)
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #100 // Party Gets XP for Sending Keldorn to Reconcile With Maria
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #101 // Improved Spell Animations
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #102 // Cromwell's Forging Actually Takes a Day
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #103 // Mixed-Use Dagger Fixes
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #104 // Ghreyfain's Holy Symbol Fixes
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #106 // Giants Receive Penalties When Attacking Halflings, Dwarves, and Gnomes
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #107 // Remove Dual-Classing Restriction from Archers and Stalkers
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #108 // Remove Second Attribute Bonus for Evil Path in Wrath Hell Trial
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #109 // Corrected Summoned Demon Behavior
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #110 // Additional Script Fixes
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #111 // Bard Song Fixes
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #112 // Wizard Slayers Cause Miscast Magic on Ranged Attacks
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #113 // Additional Alignment Fixes
~BG2FIXPACK/SETUP-BG2FIXPACK.TP2~ #0 #114 // Change Free Action to Protect Against Stun
~SETUP-IMPROVEDANVIL.TP2~ #0 #0 // Improved Anvil for SOA & TOBHere I wasn't going to discuss any details about
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #0 // Infinite Weapon, Potion and Ring/Amulet Stacking
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #3 // True Grand Mastery (extra half-attack, etc.) (Baldurdash)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #4 // Shut Up "You Must Gather Your Party Before Venturing Forth"
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #5 // Faster Chapter 1&2 Cut-Scenes and Dreams (Karzak, Blucher) (SEE WARNINGS)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #6 // Wear Magical Armor AND Magic Rings (etc.)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #9 // Un-Nerfed THAC0 Table, Saving Throws, Grand-Mastery, and Arcane, Divine Spell Progression (Blucher)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #10 // XP Cap Remover
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #14 // Multiple Strongholds (Baldurdash)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #15 // Bonus Merchants (Baldurdash)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #21 // Romance: Bug Fixes (required for later components).
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #25 // Happy: NPCs won't fight with each other or leave the group.

I certainly want to play the game according to the IA 5.0 rules and installation. By this I certainly do *not* mean that I will not use xp exploits since they are currently present in the mod, and I am in no violation by the mod's rules by doing so. But I am not going to describe any part of such a game in which I used xp exploits on *this* forum. Here I will report only exploits like the ones I already have. @ Sikret: 1. I would most certainly appreciate if you tell me if my installation is correct this time. 2. If you don't want me to report such exploits as I already have, then by all means, it's your forum, and I will not. BTW, if you want to check this bug I've mentioned(Cowled wizards do not persecute the party after lowering reputation&killing several amnish groups, say 10) then you may want to try it and see for yourself.

BTW, I very much like the idea of only several Amnish guard patrols appearing for low reputation, with increasing difficulty.

Posted by: Sikret Jul 29 2008, 03:28 PM

So, I was right that you didn't read the mod's readme file accurately.

Your installation is wrong and your game is corrupted:

1- BG2 fixpack is incompatible with IA as you could read in IA's readme file (which you didn't). This is probably responsible for your +4 Daystar and many other bugs you will see in your game.

2- IA should be installed as your last mod. You have installed EoU after IA which is wrong.

You need to uninstall all of your mods. Install according to IA's installation document:

1- BG2
2- TOB
3- TOB official patch
4- Baldurdash Fixpack version 1.12
5- Recommnded components of Ease-of-Use
6- IA

You will have to start a new game after amending your installation.

And yes, as long as you think that you are not doing anything wrong by using xp exploits, I don't want to see any other posts from you.

Posted by: saros Jul 29 2008, 04:24 PM

I've read the readme. But I thought that BG2 fixpack was actually the Baldurdash fixpack, which was my major mistake in my install, it seems.




OK. Just if you may check my latest install and see if it is right this time?

// Log of Currently Installed WeiDU Mods
// The top of the file is the 'oldest' mod
// ~TP2_File~ #language_number #component_number // [Subcomponent Name -> ] Component Name
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #0 // Infinite Weapon, Potion and Ring/Amulet Stacking
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #3 // True Grand Mastery (extra half-attack, etc.) (Baldurdash)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #4 // Shut Up "You Must Gather Your Party Before Venturing Forth"
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #5 // Faster Chapter 1&2 Cut-Scenes and Dreams (Karzak, Blucher) (SEE WARNINGS)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #6 // Wear Magical Armor AND Magic Rings (etc.)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #9 // Un-Nerfed THAC0 Table, Saving Throws, Grand-Mastery, and Arcane, Divine Spell Progression (Blucher)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #10 // XP Cap Remover
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #14 // Multiple Strongholds (Baldurdash)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #15 // Bonus Merchants (Baldurdash)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #21 // Romance: Bug Fixes (required for later components).
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #25 // Happy: NPCs won't fight with each other or leave the group.
~SETUP-IMPROVEDANVIL.TP2~ #0 #0 // Improved Anvil for SOA & TOB

Posted by: Vuki Jul 29 2008, 06:18 PM

Sikret, is my installation ok? It seems really short to me. Did I install everything that is needed?

// Log of Currently Installed WeiDU Mods
// The top of the file is the 'oldest' mod
// ~TP2_File~ #language_number #component_number // Component Name
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #3 // True Grand Mastery (extra half-attack, etc.) (Baldurdash)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #4 // Shut Up "You Must Gather Your Party Before Venturing Forth"
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #5 // Faster Chapter 1&2 Cut-Scenes and Dreams (Karzak, Blucher) (SEE WARNINGS)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #6 // Wear Magical Armor AND Magic Rings (etc.)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #9 // Un-Nerfed THAC0 Table, Saving Throws, Grand-Mastery, and Arcane, Divine Spell Progression (Blucher)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #10 // XP Cap Remover
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #14 // Multiple Strongholds (Baldurdash)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #15 // Bonus Merchants (Baldurdash)
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #18 // Imoen ToB Dialogue Fix
~SETUP-EASE.TP2~ #0 #21 // Romance: Bug Fixes (required for later components).
~SETUP-IMPROVEDANVIL.TP2~ #0 #0 // Improved Anvil for SOA & TOB

Posted by: Sikret Jul 30 2008, 07:10 AM

@Vuki

Your installation is perfect.

@saros

This time your installation is almost fine. You have still installed the "Happy NPC" component of EoU which is not in the list of recommended components; it was better not to install it, but it's not a big problem. I will add it to the list of "don't install components" in the readme of the mod's next version.

Please, don't send any other post in these forums.

@Raven & Baronius

Please delete any future post from saros if I happen to be offline when he sends it.

Cheaters can send their posts to the other forum I have given the link. However, other players and readers should be aware that things they will read in the other forum (specially in posts of people like saros) will contain lots of false and misleading statements. When someone is a cheater, there is no reason to believe that other things he will say or write will be true (in saros's case, we already know that he has a strong tendency to tell lies).

Posted by: Baronius Jul 30 2008, 04:09 PM

Just to make sure it's clear for everyone, Sikret referred to the Improved Anvil forum in the quoted request. Our Gaming Forums (in this particular case, our BG2 SoA/ToB general gaming forum) are still open for discussion of cheesy or partially unsupported games (between reasonable limits). Of course, this doesn't mean we encourage cheesy playing.

Posted by: Kerkes Aug 6 2008, 09:16 PM

I've just read this long discussion about what's cheesy, chaeting, what is not... Personaly, I didn't even know that you can cast spells from off-screen..Ah well.
I don't actually understand some points here:
- why would anyone use some inf.exp exploit? You're wasting time. If you want exp, cheat via SK or something
- why cheat at all? Cheating and exploiting game engine are really the best ways to ruin your satisfacton of playing, even more in IA then vanilla
- why cast spells from off screen? imagine enemies doing that to you. Something like this: Your party of six lvl 11-12 characters are slowly descending down the slimy ladder to the sewers of Alkathla. Suddenly, you hear some spellcating in distance. NOOOOOO! you start screaming. It's the greater malison+slow+emotion combo, soon followed by a spell triger 3xchaos. Now you can't control any of your party members. So you're dead. In IA, you can always buff before main fights. So it is fair (IMO) that you let your enemies do the same.

Posted by: lroumen Aug 7 2008, 09:31 AM

I think that they don't mean off-screen, but rather casting area spells on the edge of the fog of war, when a foe (maybe even not hostile yet) is standing just in the fog of war, thereby getting in some free damage since they are generally unprotected.

From an roleplaying point of view you can spy out the area, figure out where the foes are and what type of foes, cast detect evil to see whether they're likely to turn hostile on you, prebuff a little and go in to talk and be prepared for the worst. If they're hostile, why not cast a spell from offscreen to surprise them? When you spy out an area without them knowing, then I see no reason why a foes is allowed to buff and to forcespell 5-10 protections. If I decide not to spy out the area and prebuff, then they're at an undeserved advantage by force buffing. Anyway, just another little something that I have to handle in IA I guess.
Now if there is a hidden foe in the area somewhere (not zoned in when they are attacked) to alert them, then okay, you can script that they begin buffing when you get close to them.

Posted by: Ryel ril Ers Aug 7 2008, 11:28 AM

You forgot something.
1) You can prebuff yourself so the starting buff of the enemy is fair.
2) The foes are always at home so they must be surprise him. I don't know what the people say when the enter the dungeon a hidden trap activated some sensors tell them where are you, they buff yourselves, start search after you and start to throw spells offscreen from secret areas.

I think the prebuff is okey, because the enemy use them too in the beginning of the battle, but don't use offscreen spell because the enemy doesn't use it neither. This is fair play.

Posted by: lroumen Aug 7 2008, 04:30 PM

It's what each player prefers I guess. It's an ancient point of argument so I won't expand it any further.

Posted by: Vuki Aug 11 2008, 08:17 PM

I come back! So, endless (and pointless) disputes start again.

I read several topics (not only here in BWL) and realized that when I started to comment here I jumped into a middle of politics debate. I now realized that there are cliques in the BG modding scene and most of the disputes are heavily political. I think it is really bad but of course I am not able to change it.

So, I would like to really ask everybody to take my words as they are: there is no hidden intention in my text and I do not want to attack anybody or any factions. I just want to express my opinion about the current topic and nothing else.

Posted by: leonidas Aug 15 2008, 02:47 AM

I have a feeling that this may have been reported before and is one of those unfixable issues with the vanilla game.

However......has anyone else noticed that domination/charm breaks characters scripts? When they recover from it they just stand there waiting to be hacked to bits instead of resuming normal behaviour.

Posted by: lroumen Aug 15 2008, 08:17 AM

No, not really. In my current game, uncharmed fighters resume hacking up my characters and mages keep casting their spells.

Posted by: leonidas Aug 15 2008, 06:17 PM

Yeah vista seems to mess up a few things in-game; it's not a bug.

Posted by: leonidas Aug 19 2008, 03:54 PM

Alright, now for a legitimate issue.

If you rest with the spell "draw on holy might" enabled and it raises your constitution to a level were you gain regenerative capabilities (over 20 I believe?), then the game engine treats you as a regenerating being for the whole duration of the 8 hour rest period and you awake fully healed.

Posted by: Sikret Aug 19 2008, 04:10 PM

Yes, don't do it. It's a known but unfixable exploit.

Posted by: Kerkes Aug 21 2008, 12:11 PM

A note on Viconia: how come she can cast "holy smite"? She should be limited to "unholy blight" I believe.

Posted by: Kerkes Aug 22 2008, 02:39 PM

Just noticed - if a cleric with his holy simbol (lvl25) gets imprisoned, you cast freedom, he gets another one in his inventory

Posted by: Sikret Aug 22 2008, 02:48 PM

Known issue reported by Clown last year. See the http://forums.blackwyrmlair.net/index.php?showtopic=3294topic for the solution we chose to at least prevent it from being an infinite resource of gold.

Posted by: leonidas Aug 22 2008, 06:10 PM

You can have an encounter with tanova in athkatla at night even after you've murdered her in bodhi's lair. Another odd thing is that she's not a mage went you meet her in the streets AND her physical immunity is different (+3 rather than +2 weapon req).

Yeah, contentious as to whether this is an issue or not, but it bothered me enough to post it.

Posted by: Sikret Aug 23 2008, 06:46 AM

She seems to be a different vampire with the same name (homonyms). There are other similar cases in the game as well. For example, the mage who comes to send solamnic knighs to their own plane has the same name of one of the cowled wizards who will appear to fight if you cast illegal magic in the city. They are different characters with the same name.

Posted by: Kerkes Aug 24 2008, 05:46 PM

There's an item called "obsidian ioun stone" you can buy in TOB. Just like the axe of unyielding (before it was tweaked) it raises con, so it can be used to heal characters by equiping it on-off

Posted by: Marceror Aug 24 2008, 09:04 PM

That would be a pretty twisted person who would repeatedly imprison and free their cleric, just for some extra gold. But I guess we've got all types out there, don't we.

Posted by: Kerkes Aug 24 2008, 09:33 PM

Riiight... It never occured to me to sell it (I like holy simbols). But you can wear the thing to get +1 spell and STR 2 times.

Posted by: Arkain Aug 24 2008, 09:35 PM

Since you already made Spirit Armor unstackable you might want to do the same for Potion(s) of Invulnerability. One could stack the +5 to all saves bonus if he wants to which would result in godly saving throws. Or is there already a fix for it?

Posted by: geh4th Aug 24 2008, 10:54 PM

Nalia appears to be missing a weapon proficiency.

She should have started out with 2 as a thief, then gained one at 4th level before she dualled (total = 3 at this point)
She then gains one as a 1st level mage, and another at 6th level. Total 5.

As she joins the the party, she has:

Short Sword
Dagger
Quarterstaff
Short Bow

I'm thinking that one gained as a thief is missing.