SpellPack 9-14-04-BETA Released!, with a week's delay Options

[Galactygon]

To keep the interest in this mod here, I put together a spellpack of 12 altered/new priest spells in a nice WeiDU-format. They are either new spells brought from other games (and converted to their proper PnP incarnations, if possible), spells modified to fit their PnP incarnations, or new PnP spells.

http://galactygon.blackwyrmlair.net/SpellPack_9-14-04.zip (13MB download)

To install, simply unzip the .zip file, and run the Setup-SpellPack.exe. Make sure when you run it, you have the following three files/folders in your BG2 directory:

- SpellPack_9-14-04_Files
- Setup-SpellPack.exe
- Setup-SpellPack.tp2

Here is a list of components:
- Required Files (this component is required to be installed to install the other ones)
- Entropy Shield (new lvl 6 spell; overrides TDD version)
- Entangle (modified lvl 1 spell)
- Alicorn Lance (new lvl 2 spell; overrides TDD heat metal)
- Chant (new lvl 6 spell; overrides TDD version)
- Call Lightning (modified lvl 3 spell)
- Static Charge (new lvl 4 spell; overrides TDD version)
- Storm Shell (new lvl 3 spell; overrides TDD version)
- Thorn Spray (new lvl 6 spell; overrides TDD air pocket)
- Prayer (new lvl 3 spell; overrides TDD version)
- Flamestrike (modified lvl 5 spell)
- Elysium's Tears (new lvl 3 spell available to good-aligned priests)
- Sunscorch (new lvl 1 spell; overrides TDD version)

NOTE: You must install this *before* Refinements, or else you will have several Refinements HLAs that go awry...

NOTE #2: It is important to have brightening enabled. This will make spell effects blend in nicely with the background. To enable mid/high-level brighten, go to BGConfig.exe, go to 'Gameplay -> Visual', and enable the appropriate checkboxes.

Otherwise, the spells will not let you down if you compare them with the screenshots I posted.

The only disclaimers I know of is the new spells' icons will not match the old ones. They are full 256-coloured ones, while the old ones are red/white/blue. Also, I am the only person who tested these spells, so there might be an occasional bug or two I didn't catch (but then again, my mods never have any bugs; they are just random, undocumented features).

-Galactygon

This post has been edited by Galactygon: Sep 25 2004, 11:37 PM

[CamDawg]

This was a first pass, not rigorous testing. First, the big must-fix problems:

• Please clean out your backup folder before distributing a mod. It will, at best, prevent a clean uninstall or, at worst, fubar someone's game.
• Many game files are being overwritten unnecessarily--use APPEND, SET_2DA_ENTRY, or READ_2DA_ENTRY as appropriate. Overwriting STATE.2da will make this incompatible with multiple mods, including just about any content mod I've made. Overwriting TRIGGER.ids is a poor idea.

And the minor ones:

• ReadMes are nice. You may want to mention somewhere that ToB is required, for example.
• Sunscorch has the wrong strings assigned.
• Elysium's Tears has no spellbook BAMs.
• Chant does not hinder the spellcaster in any fashion, contrary to the description.
• The various spells that grant weapon or missile immunities have no feedback (i.e. ineffective weapon).
• Call Lightning says it will affect all creatures but ignores neutrals.
• The sphere of Alicorn Lance's animation makes it difficult to see the lance at all. The glow effect of the target only lasts for one round and the armor penalty stacks.
• A quick NI resource check shows that the Entropy Shield spell file is referring to LCF_P03.wav, which is not present.

edit: Wav files comprise over 5 MB of the mod. Compressing them to ogg format would likely result in less than 1 MB of audio files. Eliminating the backup folder should also save about half the size of the present download.

This post has been edited by CamDawg: Sep 29 2004, 12:53 PM