First IA experience, Thoughts from a new player, and some (hopefully) constructive criticis Options

[Zarion]

I just found this mod a few weeks ago, and I've been playing this mod for about a week. In my current game I've just left the Underdark with my Evil Party (m/f, Korgan, Edwin, Viconia and Valen(without her lvldrain)) everyone have at least 4-5 high-level abilities and so far I've enjoyed the mod. The scripts are well done and make most battles more challenging. The upgrades are really cool, and the components from “harder” enemies makes them seem deserved.

But even though I like the mod I won't be using it after I'm done with this run-through. This is mainly due to the way you have made the enemies more challenging. You seem to have taken the use of resistances to the hearth, and that is ofcause one way of making the game harder, but I must admit I dislike it. At the moment the only spells Edwin and Viconia gets to cast are “pre-battle-buffs” and dispel effects since almost every (challenging) enemy I'm meeting are very resistant, not only to magic, but to most elemental and magical damage as well. For me that drastically cuts down on the “fun”, since it takes away the “group feel” where every class is needed to win a battle and have something to do during the battle... other then standing in a corner hiding so they won't die.

My suggestions to improve the feeling of the mod is to cut down on some of the 100% resistances this mod adds especially on “none-boss-fights” (ie insane dwarf, Firkraag-party ect.) and give them 75% resistances if you still want them to be “hard” or perhaps 50% with one or two 100% so the player have to try a bit before finding the right type of magic. Another way to do it could be to build up the resistances though the use of “forcecast” scripts on certain hp percentages. Ie; the opponent starts with 25% resistances to none melee damage, and then builds up to 50% at 75% hp and so forth.

The constant use of regeneration also bugs me a bit, especially in groupbattles where you it foceres you to focus on one target at a time, but it keeps the pressure on the player, since it means no more running out of combat to get healed, and that is a good thing .

Well, I think that is about all I have to say, unless I find anything to add at a later time , thanks for the mod, and all the hard work put into it.

[Sikret]

My suggestions to improve the feeling of the mod is to cut down on some of the 100% resistances this mod adds especially on “none-boss-fights” (ie insane dwarf, Firkraag-party ect.) and give them 75% resistances if you still want them to be “hard” or perhaps 50% with one or two 100% so the player have to try a bit before finding the right type of magic.

Most difficult enemies are already such. Very very few enemies have 100% resistance to all types of elemental damage. Samia's party (which you mentioned) is a good example of what I say. You have just failed to find the right type of attack. It doesn't mean that they had 100% resistance to everything. They don't!

The types of resistances each enemy has are all well-thought and they have reasons.

Another player had recently written that some particular enemies (he had mentioned which enemies) could see invisible and could cast spells on invisible targets, which was not true either. Players should note that their impressions about the enemies abilities during the battle don't necessarily correspond with facts.

If you don't enjoy this level of difficult, then don't play the mod, please (as you said that you wouldn't). IA is not for every type of player. Also, playing the mod with an evil party is not really recommended, because you will lose some of the new quests.

This post has been edited by Sikret: May 7 2007, 09:20 AM

[rbeverjr]

I’ll just park some of my initial impressions in this appropriately titled thread. (I’ve dabbled in IA3 without doing a complete game.)

I used a dwarf kensai protagonist (Lawful Good who will be corrupted by the darkside as the evil Bhaal powers fit a fighter much better – yep, strict power gaming for better survivability in this game), human ranger 7-cleric dual class (Jaheira), human sorcerer (Nalia), human fighter 7-wizard (Tashia), gnome fighter-illusionist multiclass (Jan), and human swashbuckler (Minsc, Imoen, and Sarevok after LG protagonist becomes NE). (I take the stats from one of the NPCs and arrange the values as I see fit; so, basically these are custom characters with programmed dialogue.) I believe this probably makes for the easiest game – at least for me. Because quest XP is a reward/character, a 6 person team is probably most efficient. The arcane is still extremely powerful and necessary in IA, in my opinion. Scrolls cost a bundle, and you can’t always depend on getting what you want; so, a sorcerer is desired. I thought the fighter 7-wizard would be more beneficial than a second sorcerer, but am not certain that this is so. At least the saving throws are better for early fights, and the fighter-wizard has a few more HP. FM have always been powerful, but IA has made them even more powerful. The fighter-illusionist is the best FM in my opinion. The kensai generally hits what he swings at – that’s pretty important. The ranger 7-cleric is much better than the multiclass RC or auramaster in my opinion. I have trouble surviving the Sikret battles unless I buff, and Holy Power is a great buff. The mix of cleric and druid spells is very nice; a cleric is extremely beneficial. I chose the swashbuckler simply because I saw the need for a tank and wanted a thief. I found that backstabbing often didn’t work when needed anyway in IA 3. One comment here: AC-18 is often not enough. Get to AC-26 as quick as you can.

I played on Core difficulty, reduced difficulty to Easy after a few reloads, and quit a particular encounter (to be returned to later) if I couldn’t succeed on Easy. Almost everything is completed on Core. Early in IA, I found spell casters, particularly arcane casters, to be royal pains – even more so than golems, though the special spiders could be almost as bad. I had decent saves on my front line dwarf fighter and gnome FI, but they still sometimes fail early in the game. There is no way for early parties to strip Immunity Abjuration; so, other tactics must be used. Having learned some new techniques for IA, my second time through should require less reloads, thankfully.

In general, I avoided the Sikret encounters and followed the suggested (by Sikret and thetruth) quest path. I did do a few of the improved quests and headed for the underdark at apx. level 13. I was told that this was too early, but I disagree. It worked out fine. In the underdark, things got easier. I made it through with a few reloads.

After leaving the Underdark, I headed to Watcher’s Keep. I didn’t think it would be too problematic as it wasn’t in IA3. Big mistake. Sikret has cranked up the difficulty there in IA 4.2. A certain monster showed up on the first level demanding I give it something. After having my butt kick repeatedly, I decided to hand it over. I possibly could have beat this encounter, if I rested to gain spells needed and buffed/prepared specifically for this encounter before triggering it. That’s a lot of metagaming for what’s supposed to be a surprise! (I’m anxious to hear the tactics used to defeat that encounter.) On the second level, I proceeded right through until it was time to go to the third level. That was really tough too, with the constant gating of more foes. (Last night I thought of some tactics which may have allowed my success, but I just left it for now.)

The lack of money (coupled with no stealing from shops) really cranks the difficulty. Scrolls, potions, items, and especially Sikret upgrades cost a lot. When you sell stuff, the shop keepers will let your children starve (give you little pay). I am hopeful that things will improve, but so far I don’t think I will have too many Sikret upgrades – I currently have none… Bummer, I love items and would love to try out more of them.

I think there should be more ways to bring down protections when Immunity Abjuration is up than Ruby Ray. Heck, at least allow Spell Strike to work, as it is of 2 schools (Abjuration and Alteration). (I assume Spell Strike doesn’t work.) I hope that more Immunity Divination and less Immunity Abjuration shows up in the encounters that an early party may face.

I would like it if thieves could successfully backstab more of the new (or improved) monsters. After all, my crew gets backstabbed enough. It would also be nice if they could steal *something* from shops. After all, that’s one of the things that thieves do.

Although I have reservations concerning some of the ways that the difficulty was enhanced (proliferation of monsters with very high resistances and strength, for instance), I am enjoying my play, and my tactical ability is improving. I doubt that I could enjoy the regular game any more, because it would be far too easy.

To be continued…. I’m sure that I will have more to say once I’ve completed more of the mod.

[leonidas]

The problem with stealing from shops is that there is then no way to control the amount of money the player receives (as it effectively becomes infinite due to stealing and reselling, judgement day sells for 90,000 gp, for example). And monetary rewards become meaningless.

As for the spider queen, you basically need a decoy to absorb the brunt of the attacks; I had haer'dalis with pomw up. You also need chaotic commands up on everyone or they'll just run around like idiots after the barrage of vexing whispers.

I killed the ghost spiders first, because left alive they spawned more spiders than I could handle.

Aside from that, it's just a case of having enough melee strength to kill the spiders quickly.

[Razfallow]

The problem with stealing from shops is that there is then no way to control the amount of money the player receives (as it effectively becomes infinite due to stealing and reselling, judgement day sells for 90,000 gp, for example). And monetary rewards become meaningless.

But what's the reason to disable both stealing and selling stolen goods? Why don't just disable option for selling stolen goods? You could steal it, but couldn't sell it back.

[Baronius]

I know this isn't the reason (or at least not the primary reason) why it's disabled in IA, but to tell the truth, do you see even a minimal level of realism in the following. Let's assume the shopkeeper stores his goods in a safe place. In this case, there are two explanations of how you purchase items:
1. He shows his items only when you are browsing and purchasing. In this case, stealing is possible but since the goods are there locally, why can't you just kill him and take all items?
2. He stores the items "far" away (or not, but he doesn't show them, they remain in their safe location). He actually shows only a list (and perhaps pictures about the items). In this case, neither stealing nor killing is possible to take items.

I'm aware of the fact that a good CRPG such as BG2 can't be totally realistic in many cases, or it would decrease the gaming experience. However, where it's possible, it's important to remain realistic.

[thetruth]

I believe that Sikret disabled stealing from shops both for realism reasons and challenge (lack of easy and unlimited amounts of gold).

IMO the ideal would be if the player could steal only a few items and only from a few lesser merchants (not from Ribald whose shop is guarded), but since the player has the reload option even this could be exploited.

Also keep in mind that some of IA's items are very powerful and forging them should not be so easy.

[rbeverjr]

Of course, shop-lifting is realistic. It happens all the time, and many times the thief gets away with it. Putting up a rule of NO stealing certainly makes things harder, but at the expense of realism. People have stolen prized paintings recently among other "fabulous" heists. Yes, it is possible. I don't really like the no stealing rule (but I can live with it). I would like the Prized possessions to not be available for theft, but stealing from some of the lesser merchants - a few nice (but not too nice) scrolls, potions, and lesser items, which could be sold back only to fences and only for a tenth or twentieth of their price (not making it worthwhile to try to earn money that way).

I don't think we need to be so concerned in Improved Anvil about cheating. People load up IA for the challenge. If they cheat or seek exploits, then they are just cheating themselves. Some players may need some avenue to "cheat" to bridge the gap in difficulty between Improved Anvil and other BG2 games. After all, Improved Anvil is much harder than anything else that I've found. As far as I'm concerned, if someone wants to cheat, he usually will and as it is his game rather than mine, I don't care. My personal ambition is to beat IA on Insane (no cheating, of course) some day... or maybe some year.

As far as forging IA items, well, it's a matter of opinion how easy it should be to make the items. Thetruth could beat IA with a fighter armed with a broom stick. I'm not there yet. I would like a little more money personally (in IA 5, maybe?). I personally think some of the new items should be more easily forged (money is usually the limiting factor) - those items that make the game a little easier rather than a lot easier. Of course, it should be very, very difficult to forge the Judgment Day sword and uber items. Regardless whether I can get these items, I'll improve my own tactical play, and it is improving already.

[leonidas]

Hell, it's not even just a matter of realism.

IA 4 is the only game of BG 2 I've played were I haven't been able to go hog-wild stealing scrolls and potions from shops, and rather, have had to consider carefully which items and upgrades to buy.

Even if you just disable stealing on the fences, to eliminate the infinite gold exploit, there are still plenty of lesser merchants with massive stocks of items you can filch.

For instance, Mrs. Cragmoon has about 100 potions you can steal, if you're so inclined (not very balanced to have so many potions from the get-go).

[thetruth]

After leaving the Underdark, I headed to Watcher’s Keep. I didn’t think it would be too problematic as it wasn’t in IA3. Big mistake. Sikret has cranked up the difficulty there in IA 4.2. A certain monster showed up on the first level demanding I give it something. After having my butt kick repeatedly, I decided to hand it over. I possibly could have beat this encounter, if I rested to gain spells needed and buffed/prepared specifically for this encounter before triggering it. That’s a lot of metagaming for what’s supposed to be a surprise! (I’m anxious to hear the tactics used to defeat that encounter.)

IMO it's extremely difficult to avoid metagaming especially if you are playing with a so difficult tactical mod like IA.

If you still want to limit your metagaming, have a character with some buffs (mage+cleric) and even better with some thieving skills (Jan would be the ideal) to scout ahead in every new area you enter (especially dungeons like W.Keep).

This way you could be prepared even for this encounter.
It would limit your metagaming a lot and it is realistic, but not practical at all since it's very time-consuming and tedious after a while.

As about the battle itself, leonidas gave very good suggestions. Add Free Action and you are OK (Clerics are a must in IA).

[thetruth]

Of course, shop-lifting is realistic. It happens all the time, and many times the thief gets away with it. Putting up a rule of NO stealing certainly makes things harder, but at the expense of realism. People have stolen prized paintings recently among other "fabulous" heists. Yes, it is possible. I don't really like the no stealing rule (but I can live with it). I would like the Prized possessions to not be available for theft, but stealing from some of the lesser merchants - a few nice (but not too nice) scrolls, potions, and lesser items, which could be sold back only to fences and only for a tenth or twentieth of their price (not making it worthwhile to try to earn money that way).

I understand what you are saying but how can this "steal a few nice (but not too nice) scrolls, potions, and lesser items" be implemented ?

And since you could sell these few lesser items at fences, it could still be exploited for easy money ((re)steal-(re)sell).

No, banning stealing totally from shops is not realistic. But reloading is not realistic as well
IMO Sikret has found the best solution in this case.

I don't think we need to be so concerned in Improved Anvil about cheating. People load up IA for the challenge. If they cheat or seek exploits, then they are just cheating themselves. Some players may need some avenue to "cheat" to bridge the gap in difficulty between Improved Anvil and other BG2 games. After all, Improved Anvil is much harder than anything else that I've found. As far as I'm concerned, if someone wants to cheat, he usually will and as it is his game rather than mine, I don't care.

If you want to cheat you can still do it.
CTRL-Y, CTRL-R and SK still work as far as I know

But Sikret's concern in this case is that having unlimited amounts of gold right out of Irenicus Dungeon would break the balance of the mod.

Still though don't worry, with good planning you will be able to forge the "good" weapons of IA when you will need them

[thetruth]

@Zarion

But even though I like the mod I won't be using it after I'm done with this run-through. This is mainly due to the way you have made the enemies more challenging. You seem to have taken the use of resistances to the hearth, and that is ofcause one way of making the game harder, but I must admit I dislike it. At the moment the only spells Edwin and Viconia gets to cast are “pre-battle-buffs” and dispel effects since almost every (challenging) enemy I'm meeting are very resistant, not only to magic, but to most elemental and magical damage as well. For me that drastically cuts down on the “fun”, since it takes away the “group feel” where every class is needed to win a battle and have something to do during the battle... other then standing in a corner hiding so they won't die.

But without these resistances some of the most difficult battles of IA would become too easy.
I know the offensive power of Mages has been limited, but keep in mind that without the res. to Magical Dmg f.e. a Sorcerer could defeat by himself all the powerful enemies of IA.

I can't see the "group feel" here.

Instead in IA, as it is now Mages and Clerics are still important.
Improved Haste, PfMEnergy, C.Commands and Free Action are just a few examples.

Limited offensively yes, but useless no way.

This post has been edited by thetruth: May 7 2007, 07:55 PM

[Romulas]

So if I might chime in here on the resistance issue.

From the old days of playing dungeons and dragons if you killed a tough enemy you got what made him tough, even more so if the enemy was another NPC. How many times do you face enemies where you have good THAC0 scores and hit very few times, yet when the battle is over the only thing that is yielded is a full set of plate mail, or when you do hit and do 3 or 4 points of damage and the battle is ended and the same thing occurs.

I think this is where most of the issues come from, if I am getting pounded by an insane dwarf then I should get more than full platemail and a warhammer +2 or 3.

Experience points are good and you defineately get a bunch when you complete the enhanced encounters but that only goes so far at the lower levels of the game, the bottom line is you need attacks and defense, i.e items of some power.

IMHO.

Romulas

[Sikret]

I don't think we need to be so concerned in Improved Anvil about cheating. People load up IA for the challenge. If they cheat or seek exploits, then they are just cheating themselves.

I agree, but to be honest with you, one reason I disabled cheating of some items in IA was to save my own time. Some players used to cheat critical items into their games which would cause bugs if they were not gained normally during the game. Then they used to appear in forums to report bugs about IA. They were not honest enough to admit that they had cheated and then I needed to spend several hours investigating to know whether the reported bug was a genuine one or just one occurred because of the player's cheats.

[rbeverjr]

I don't think we need to be so concerned in Improved Anvil about cheating. People load up IA for the challenge. If they cheat or seek exploits, then they are just cheating themselves.

I agree, but to be honest with you, one reason I disabled cheating of some items in IA was to save my own time. Some players used to cheat critical items into their games which would cause bugs if they were not gained normally during the game. Then they used to appear in forums to report bugs about IA. They were not honest enough to admit that they had cheated and then I needed to spend several hours investigating to know whether the reported bug was a genuine one or just one occurred because of the player's cheats.

Well, I appreciate you doing what you must to keep the bugs out of my game. Now if I could just get control of the spiders.

P.S. I just noticed that this could be read that I'm a big cheater (more like a little cheater, at least I would consider some of the mods and what I do to be cheats in the regular game). So, what you are doing may not be specifically protecting me, but I do appreciate all efforts to keep the game bug-free. Actually, I just now received my first Improved Anvil upgrade, at level 21. Hopefully, there will be more to come!

Now, having gone through Nalia's keep already in version 4.1, if I knew of some way to "cheat" FoA +3, I would. Is the poison head no longer found where it used to be in Watcher's Keep level 2? It wasn't there when I looked. I'm hoping I can somehow get the +4 weapon forged even if I am having problems forging the +3 weapon. I have a +2 FoA and the other appropriate (and found) head in my bottomless bag in hopes that somehow I can do something with it. If not, I'll get the real FoA in my next game.

This post has been edited by rbeverjr: May 8 2007, 02:58 PM

[luan]

Really enjoying my first experience with IA so far, love the challenge! I've recruited all the NPC's that never really saw use in my previous games so I can experience their storyline and character. Kinda amazing how much of a fresh experience it can be with a new cast!

Decided to go with:
Swashbuckler PC
Keldorn
Jan
Aerie (looking to swap out with Valygar when I meet him)
Anomen (jeezus christ, so annoying...)
Edwin

One point of criticism though is that there seems to be a lot of dissonance between the unmodified and modified encounters. Unmodified is.... so easy it throws you off for the wonderfully scripted IA encounters. It almost makes you paranoid as to which quests you should or shouldn't partake in initially. But this is probably how it should be, dangerous quests *should* be dangerous after all.

However, it just feels that the gap is detractively large at times. Perhaps down the road after Sikret's IA major milestones are accomplished, the earlier unmodified quests could see a moderate boost in difficulty.

The Copper Coronet was awesome; the Beastmaster was really exciting. Unfortunately, I found out really quickly that the Slaver Ship as an immediate successive quest was too much for my party. I liked how Sikret blocks off the exits so that you HAVE to finish "boss areas" in 1 go. Masochistic, but realistic and rewarding.

Random notes:
The sewer party raped me something fierce lol. I'm just wondering what a powerful party is doing tramping through the sewers. They'd be better off storming the government district.
The Raksasha was an epic battle, especially when half my party can only stand around and buff! That was probably the most difficult cloak of the sewers I've ever earned.

Edit: Finally managed to kill the sewer party. Wondering why Gaius (or perhaps all of them rather) seem to have troll-like regeneration. I'm relatively sure that I stripped their protections before I could even dent them, and the fast regeneration made it extraordinarily more difficult. Is this an anti-cheese measure? It also seemed that Gaius had perma-haste?

Edit2: The Mencar Pebblecrushers party also has troll-like regeneration. I spent about 30 minutes watching my PC + Keldorn swing on Sorcerous Amon finally slaying him. All the while paranoid that he will contingency: chain lightning me. I'll just pretend everyone has potions of regeneration... lots of em!

This post has been edited by luan: May 10 2007, 02:19 AM

[amendara]

Well I joined the forums just to offer my thanks for this great mod. So much to it and so much polish, it definately is one of the best mods out there. Some of the encounters were the most fun I've had in this game, especially the hilarious "snake gauntlet" which was just wild (and hard too).

Generally I agree with Luan. I'm not an "ultimate challenge" type of player, but I like challenge balanced with realism/immersion. That makes the contrast between nonIA encounters and IA ones rather disturbing. To have a team even remotely capable of defeating anyone improved, you just melt through everything else like butter. Also, the insane resistances and regeneration every enemy has mixed with the massive number of golems really breaks my immersion meter. Its a shame there is not a way to make the game more challenging without jacking up these supposedly rare abilities/creatures, but I do not think its possible. With its aim of making ultimate tactical puzzles and encounters, IA succeeds very well.

The quests were very finely done and interesting too and what is particularly nice after playing other tactical mods (such as BP) is the low amount of bugs. Very professionally made.

One last request I might offer is if its possible to reduce the melee dependency a bit? High magic, missle, poison, and backstab resistances pretty much streamlines combat variety of IA into two "super fighters" with 10 attacks per round and protection from magic weapons. The other character sort of play support for the meleers. I would like to see many more creatures vulnerable to poison, traps, backstabs, death magic, and missle weapons, and the melee resistances raised by these creatures to balance the challenge. Some battles would then require melee, some missle, some poison, some death magic, some backstab/traps. As it is I would say 95% of the damage done through IA was with my two main melee fighters and this starts to get monotonous after a while. Or maybe this is not possible as evertying except melee damage becomes too cheesy after a while for ultimate challenge?

Anyway, thanks again Sikret and testers. A really wonderful addition to a wonderful game you have made.

Kudos

[Sikret]

Welcome to BWL, Kudos/amendara!

Well I joined the forums just to offer my thanks for this great mod. So much to it and so much polish, it definately is one of the best mods out there.

I'm really glad to hear that you have enjoyed playing the mod.

That makes the contrast between nonIA encounters and IA ones rather disturbing. To have a team even remotely capable of defeating anyone improved, you just melt through everything else like butter

Yes, luan also made this point. What you (and luan) say is actually a request for improving every enemy in the game (to fill the gap between Improved and Unimproved enemies). With every new release we add more tactical content to the mod. Even now, IA has the largest tactical content compared to any other tactical mod you may find around (even perhaps more than the total sum of them together). We will surely add more tactical content to the mod in future releases if this is what you have in mind.

The quests were very finely done and interesting too and what is particularly nice after playing other tactical mods (such as BP) is the low amount of bugs. Very professionally made.

I owe this to the excellent testers who worked with me: thetruth (at the top of the list), Mordokai, Lionheart and Methusalar.

This post has been edited by Sikret: May 10 2007, 04:02 PM

[Sikret]

Decided to go with:
Swashbuckler PC

Don't you want to play any of the two expanded strongholds?

[luan]

Don't you want to play any of the two expanded strongholds?

Yes I do! But first I just wanted to try a class I've never had any experience with. I'll most likely make a branching savegame after I hit around level 14 and SK my main into the appropriate classes to experience the new content. After which I'll continue on with my original game.

This post has been edited by luan: May 10 2007, 05:47 PM