IATweaks 1.1 - IA Rebalance, New spells, enemies, items and many balancing changes Options

[SparrowJacek]

Hello,

Today I'd like to share the results of my ambitious project to rebalance Improved Anvil. What began as a loose collection of changes in a few separate areas kept growing month after month, as new ideas appeared and my experience with Near Infinity modding increased. What I present now is a project that touches many aspects of the game: new creatures, animations, spells, items and kits, as well as a number of changes to the graphical interface.

I took inspiration from many amazing mods, such as SCS and Spell Revisions. I went through the component lists of dozens of projects, trying to adapt the best solutions in a way that would still fit the spirit of Improved Anvil. At the same time, I implemented several completely unique elements that have never been used in any mod before (for example, a fully rewritten Hide in Shadows mechanic).

This was a very ambitious undertaking, especially for a single person. Despite hundreds of hours spent on development, the work is still not complete - many encounters remain untouched or only lightly adjusted, and I already have plans for future releases. Because of the sheer scope of the changes, I was not able to test everything exhaustively. I am certain there will be issues, particularly with the redesigned enemy AI, which in many cases was written from scratch. If you notice anything strange, please let me know and I will try to fix it as quickly as possible.

I tried to rebalance many aspects of the mod, toning down things I deemed too powerful and improving things that were unusable in Improved Anvil, however that was just one man's perspective, checked only with a single run and a specific party composition. I count on you for feedback regarding the changes, it will surely help to create a more fun and balanced mod, I'll be really grateful for any comments and suggestions for improvements.

Known issues (the list might change):
- You might see "Sequencer Active" icon on some characters that shouldn't have such abilities. Without going into details, there are some new abilities that internally rely on mechanics related to Sequencers, however the game automatically puts the icon if such effects are active on a creature and there is no way to remove it without breaking the mechanics, so please just ignore the icon.
- Hide in Shadows button works only for party members, using the button on any other creature (like a dominated Thief) will not work properly and might bear strange results. The game does not allow any modifications of real Hide in Shadow button, so in order to make reworked Hide in Shadows to work properly, I had to create some hacks and workarounds, which are sadly limited to party members.
- If Controversial Changes component is applied, then most rings and cloaks +X will apply their bonuses with a slight (1s) delay, so their effects won't be visible immediately.
- Single Weapon Style bonus to APR might also take around 1s to be applied

I would like to express my gratitude to everyone who helped - directly or indirectly - in the creation of this mod.

First and foremost, the amazing Improved Anvil team: Sikret, Critto, Bulian, Nicoper, HTRT.
To Pekkae, who volunteered to test parts of the mod while it was still in a very early state.
To Morpheus, for sharing the fantastic new animations you will see in this release.
To OlvynChuru, for the tool that allows seamless addition and removal of class- and kit-specific spells.
To the many modders whose work inspired me and showed how to implement the mechanics used here.
To Berzerkerzz, for his passion and tremendous work on his own vision of IA encounters.
And last but not least - to all the fans who keep the mod alive, for the hundreds of posts across IA threads and especially for your ideas on how to make Improved Anvil even better.

You can find the latest version of the mod here: https://github.com/SparrowJacek/ImprovedAnv...ee/IA_rebalance
To download, please press the green "Code" button and select "Download ZIP"
For more details, please check the readme file provided with the mod files.

The mod has only been tested on BG2EE version 2.6.6. and with IA v7

This post has been edited by SparrowJacek: Mar 6 2026, 04:07 PM

[SparrowJacek]

Thank you everyone for your kind words, I hope that this release will be a breath of fresh air, as it's been almost 2 years since IAv7 and Sibel Mod were published

perhaps debatable but the biggest change might have to be the huge nerf to Improved Haste. I do agree it was way too good for a level 6 spell though.

That's why I decided to put this change and some others to a separate component, so that players can still get most of the content without being forced to deal with some of more exotic and experimental ideas that I had for balance.

Having said that, I still highly encourage everyone to play with Controversial Changes component installed, as some of the abilities and items work best with it. And Improved Haste is still quite useful, it even works better than previously for non-warrior classes, that do not use two weapons, and warrior classes will still reach that 7-10 APR, just not at level 13, which is very early and makes further levels much less impactful.