Improved Encounters Options

[Berzerkerzz]

These are things I can do if you want. I'm going through and adding many of the new golem animations into the game (e.g., flesh, clay, stone, iron, adamantine, mithral, and shield golems) right now that you are free to use once they are released as part of Tactics Remix. If you do want the new troll animations, it will likely be a couple weeks before I have the bandwidth to make them. Also, please let me know if there is anything else from NWN that you would also want to use.

That's great to hear. I am not familiar with other game animations but this Infinity mod has a lot of cool animations. Their Master release is 1.2GB so lots of models, just needs an executable to patch the main game file since the slots are hard coded from what I understood. I see a lot of potential here. Is there some instructions anywhere on how to insert these animations manually?

[morpheus562]

They don't have it setup to install, but there are a great number of animations present within Infinity Animations that are free game to use. If you know how to pull from their archive, its really easy to be able to include in Improved Anvil. They have some NWN animations ready to go, and I am pulling many more animations from NWN that are not included in Infinity Animations. For example, I combined the Demon (Balor) animation with a greatsword that now works in game.

EDIT: As with the Dracolich animation, the animations I am creating are free use and may be included in Improved Anvil, if desired.

EDIT2: Does Improved Anvil have a git or something? I am happy to do a pull request for the Dracolich I created and assign the animation to your version of it so you can use that as an example.

This post has been edited by morpheus562: May 17 2025, 04:19 AM

Attached File(s)

 Baldr020___Copy.png ( 120.73k ) Number of downloads: 14

 

[Berzerkerzz]

They don't have it setup to install, but there are a great number of animations present within Infinity Animations that are free game to use. If you know how to pull from their archive, its really easy to be able to include in Improved Anvil. They have some NWN animations ready to go, and I am pulling many more animations from NWN that are not included in Infinity Animations. For example, I combined the Demon (Balor) animation with a greatsword that now works in game.

EDIT: As with the Dracolich animation, the animations I am creating are free use and may be included in Improved Anvil, if desired.

EDIT2: Does Improved Anvil have a git or something? I am happy to do a pull request for the Dracolich I created and assign the animation to your version of it so you can use that as an example.

I'm looking forward to this, the Demon looks good as well.

[critto]

EDIT2: Does Improved Anvil have a git or something? I am happy to do a pull request for the Dracolich I created and assign the animation to your version of it so you can use that as an example.

Yes, it's here: https://github.com/critto-bg/ImprovedAnvil

Also, I don't think you need to do an EXE patch in the EE version anymore, but I might be mistaken.

These are things I can do if you want. I'm going through and adding many of the new golem animations into the game (e.g., flesh, clay, stone, iron, adamantine, mithral, and shield golems) right now that you are free to use once they are released as part of Tactics Remix. If you do want the new troll animations, it will likely be a couple weeks before I have the bandwidth to make them. Also, please let me know if there is anything else from NWN that you would also want to use.

Thanks, this is much appreciated. I don't have a specific wish list for animations, but we'd gladly take a look at your selection whenever we get around to do another release.

[morpheus562]

I just sent a big request over with a lot of animation files. After I sent my initial change request to you, I realized you have your own animations folder created. I went ahead and moved everything to that folder and then assigned your dracolich with the new animation.

[critto]

Thanks. I will take a look at some point in the near future. I see you added many other animations as well. Is there a catalogue somewhere where we can see them in action and understand what they look like?

[morpheus562]

Here is an assortment of the golems and animations I provided.

Attached File(s)

 A102_402.png ( 16.64k ) Number of downloads: 13
 A102_160.png ( 14.33k ) Number of downloads: 8
 A102_172.png ( 5.12k ) Number of downloads: 7
 A101_70.png ( 5.23k ) Number of downloads: 6
 A102_160.png ( 11.71k ) Number of downloads: 10
 A102_1050.png ( 16.28k ) Number of downloads: 11
 A102_250.png ( 12.4k ) Number of downloads: 7
 A102_160.png ( 13.19k ) Number of downloads: 10

 

[Berzerkerzz]

Here is an assortment of the golems and animations I provided.

They look a bit funky, what game are these from?

[morpheus562]

These are from NWN. These are post rendering and before conversion into bams where a few more adjustments are made.

[kilorew]

So whats with the changes? Are you working on an Improved Improved Anvil ?

Yes, I'm further improving some of the enemies and adding a few more here and there, besides that some cosmetic changes and visual effects.
Some other changes as well but they aren't actually in the game. For example no Breach or Remove Magic on enemy clerics or the Avenger with no Clan Hunter, Smilodon or Word of Wisdom.

Will you be compiling all your changes and sharing them?

[Berzerkerzz]

These are from NWN. These are post rendering and before conversion into bams where a few more adjustments are made.

I see, is there any guide somewhere on how to insert these animations into the game, I'm talking about the ones which are already converted into .BAM. I could use a few for the next encounters, Umber Hulk Elder for one especially since this one seems to have a slot dedicated already which should make assigning a new animation easier I assume, and a beefier Zombie animation for Theshal.

So whats with the changes? Are you working on an Improved Improved Anvil ?

Yes, I'm further improving some of the enemies and adding a few more here and there, besides that some cosmetic changes and visual effects.
Some other changes as well but they aren't actually in the game. For example no Breach or Remove Magic on enemy clerics or the Avenger with no Clan Hunter, Smilodon or Word of Wisdom.

Will you be compiling all your changes and sharing them?

I don't know, we'll see when it's all done I just hope I manage to finish them all. I only started mid way through the game and I'm still in Chapter 6.

[morpheus562]

I see, is there any guide somewhere on how to insert these animations into the game, I'm talking about the ones which are already converted into .BAM. I could use a few for the next encounters, Umber Hulk Elder for one especially since this one seems to have a slot dedicated already which should make assigning a new animation easier I assume, and a beefier Zombie animation for Theshal.

You can do something like this to add the Umber Hulk animations from IWD and assign it to the creature in BG2.

CODE

COPY ~ImprovedAnvil/resources/animations/umber_hulk_elder~ ~override~ // This is where the IWD Umber Hulk BAMs are located. This will import to the game

// Assign the animation to the elder umber hulk in the game.
COPY_EXISTING ~umbhul02.cre~ ~override~
    WRITE_LONG  0x28 IDS_OF_SYMBOL (animate UMBER_HULK_ELDER)

EDIT: Just submitted a pull request to add the IWD Elder Umber Hulk BAMS and assign them to the IA Elder Umber Hulks. If there are other animations in IWD that are not present in BG, you can go into IWD and export them to a folder, like the one I include for the Elder Umber Hulks, and you can just copy that over to your BG install to use the animations. Also, if the creature has unique sounds, be sure to copy those over too.

To know which files to grab:
- Find the animation you want to grab the bam files from. For our example, lets use UMBER_HULK_ELDER
- At the end of this animation name you will see 0xE0D0. Do a search for E0D0.ini to pull up the respective ini file.
- Here you will see "resref=MUMB". This means you are going to export all BAM files that start with "MUMB" to get all of the Elder Umber Hulk BAM files.
- Plop these BAM files in your game and now you have a fully working UMBER_HULK_ELDER animation set.

This post has been edited by morpheus562: May 25 2025, 12:55 AM

[Berzerkerzz]

I see, is there any guide somewhere on how to insert these animations into the game, I'm talking about the ones which are already converted into .BAM. I could use a few for the next encounters, Umber Hulk Elder for one especially since this one seems to have a slot dedicated already which should make assigning a new animation easier I assume, and a beefier Zombie animation for Theshal.

You can do something like this to add the Umber Hulk animations from IWD and assign it to the creature in BG2.

CODE

COPY ~ImprovedAnvil/resources/animations/umber_hulk_elder~ ~override~ // This is where the IWD Umber Hulk BAMs are located. This will import to the game

// Assign the animation to the elder umber hulk in the game.
COPY_EXISTING ~umbhul02.cre~ ~override~
    WRITE_LONG  0x28 IDS_OF_SYMBOL (animate UMBER_HULK_ELDER)

EDIT: Just submitted a pull request to add the IWD Elder Umber Hulk BAMS and assign them to the IA Elder Umber Hulks. If there are other animations in IWD that are not present in BG, you can go into IWD and export them to a folder, like the one I include for the Elder Umber Hulks, and you can just copy that over to your BG install to use the animations. Also, if the creature has unique sounds, be sure to copy those over too.

To know which files to grab:
- Find the animation you want to grab the bam files from. For our example, lets use UMBER_HULK_ELDER
- At the end of this animation name you will see 0xE0D0. Do a search for E0D0.ini to pull up the respective ini file.
- Here you will see "resref=MUMB". This means you are going to export all BAM files that start with "MUMB" to get all of the Elder Umber Hulk BAM files.
- Plop these BAM files in your game and now you have a fully working UMBER_HULK_ELDER animation set.

Alright thanks, I'll give that a try soon.

[Berzerkerzz]

I managed to add a few of them and will use them soon, the Treant and Spider King in Chapter 7, the Zombies and some Undead for the Theshal encounter. The barbarians look pretty good too (Barbarian Icasaracht was missing the attack animation though, the others were complete). These were mostly the IWD animations I guess which already have slots assigned.

[Berzerkerzz]

Ancient Lich:
I guess this one is done and I'll move on to the next encounter. Incendiary Cloud has a larger radius here, lower damage though and only 8 round duration. I'm playing without Sweet Air Zone and this spell is now actually pretty useful. The caster also gets protection from the spell for the duration so the Lich won't have his spells interrupted. It works ok so far, it adds another layer of difficulty for the player. Casting time is a bit too long at 8 so I lowered it to 7 here. I nerfed the Arvoreen Champion recently, removed the Level Drain immunity from Shield of Light, and lowered the bonuses of his prayer by 1, and only two Lay on Hands abilities. Then I lowered his Dexterity since I started with around 18 this run and he was over 21 with the bonuses which was a bit too much. It could do without the DEX bonus (or just +1) since he gets Armor Class from his prayer ability already. This is still a very strong and useful kit even with these adjustments, and fun to play as well. The Vampire Lord has triple the HP here and is immune to certain spell levels. I also dropped his "helmet" so Critical Strikes are a must against him now. He alternates between Critical Strike and Whirlwind Attacks. As for the Lich, I'm trying to make him a bit more dangerous and I did manage that somewhat. I changed some of Banshee's visual effects and I think it looks better now, she is also stronger here compared to what Kangaxx dropped. The Lich is back on SI: Abjuration and resistant to magic now. He has six PfMWs in total including the prebuff and contingency so he should stay for about 2.5 turns, his spellbook has a bit more life in it though. Energy Drain here takes 4 experience levels away and I think this is better suited for a level 9 spell. Overall I'm happy the way it came out, the timings are pretty tight throughout the battle and the area is also somewhat confined which works to the Lich's advantage. Things can go bad here fast though since the corridor is rather narrow. In it's final form this encounter would have some measures to prevent the player from weaseling his way out of the room.

https://odysee.com/@Githzerai:e/Ancient-Lich:d


Greater Elemental Golem:
Double the HP and lower thac0, he also lowers resistances around him. The spawns also have lower thac0 by about 8 and should have a better chance hitting the player at this stage of the game. All of them have a bit lower movement speed and I think this suits constructs better, they were a bit too fast before. Took about 15minutes, without these improvements the Elemental Golem would have gone down within four rounds and wouldn't have spawned more than 3 golems. They now give less experience as well. In the second part I have the lesser golems on AttackReevaluate since they idle if their target gets destroyed too quickly(summons usually), as it happened in the first part.

https://odysee.com/@Githzerai:e/Greater-Elemental-Golem:8


Rune Assassins Hideout:
Where to even start. All the enemies are tougher here starting with the low level assassins all the way up to the Guildmaster; lower thac0, higher resistances, better gear, more HP, higher levels and more efficient use of HLAs. The first few rounds are crucial here, player has to create enough space in order to tackle the two mages. I toned down the mages a little bit and reduced the reinforcements as well. Did not end up using barbarian potions after all, but this one was pretty hard I gotta say. The Guildmaster does quite a lot of damage under Assassination and has high APR as well, even after I reduced his backstab from x7 to x5. Overall it was a good fight, split in three acts (initial, the two mages and the Guildmaster plus reinforcements). I could have this play out differently like having the Guildmaster guard the two mages but then I'd have to do away with some of the reinforcements.

https://odysee.com/@Githzerai:e/Rune-Assassins-Hideout:3


Ancient Golem:
This construct has over triple the HP, lower thac0 and lowers resistances every few rounds. He now spawns Magic Golems, I used these in the Zallanora fight though they are a bit stronger here, which also have a chance to dispel specific protections. The Purge Magic stayed at five rounds in this latest attempt. The spawns are on AttackReevaluate and it works alright here, the Ancient Golem as well now. Took about 20 minutes, which is pretty good for a golem encounter I'd say.

https://odysee.com/@Githzerai:e/Ancient-Golem:6


Ancient Mage:
Everybody is tougher here. The mage now performed as expected unfortunately he is a bit too resilient as he needs almost 20 Ruby Rays to be taken down , I had a good laugh though. He uses two scrolls here, one is an Improved Alacrity scroll and the other is a Time Stop scroll so yeah he has access to those. The dimension door effects aren't quite right yet, I'll have to figure those out too. The latest attempt was pretty intense, it came out to about 50 minutes which is more than what I was aiming for. He still needed 16 Ruby Rays to be taken down. I'm happy the way it came out, it's been real fun. I might play this one just one more time and try a different approach. This encounter sets movements rate to 8 for everybody except the mage who has 10 and the Bone Golems have 6 I believe. The idea is to make the mage more dangerous and not so easy to evade though he might need 11 movement rate for that. I'll might use this movement rate setup again in the future.

https://odysee.com/@Githzerai:e/Ancient-Mage:2


Theshal:
I swapped some of the Skeletons here with a Greater Wight, a Drowned Dead and a Yochlol which have similar stats to the Warlords perhaps slightly stronger but their attacks are definitely more dangerous now. Theshal was turned into an Undead Orc Shaman and now he is a pretty formidable foe and gets very dangerous under Spirit Shift. He also mends some of the other undead creatures here. Lots of AoE spells are dropped so it's a bit hard to make out what is happening at times. The two Ghoul Lords are pretty dangerous as well now and the fighters take a temporary thac0 penalty from the various spells and abilities that are deployed here. The Lich goes under Alacrity after the first few rounds and he'll stay around for about 2 turns. Visual range was increased for both the Lich and Shaman by about 4 and it works well so far. The Bone Devils are being gated in pretty smoothly now I think too, iirc you could severely damage them before the dimension door effect was even finished, they are also closer to the Bone Golems in stats now. This is another ~30 minutes encounter, so about 2 turns. It's a bit more difficult than I wanted it to be but it's very fun to play. It took a lot of reloads to get this one right but it's done now and Theshal performed really well, he goes crazy under Spirit Shift which had four rounds of disabled castings in the latest attempt and I'm unsure if I should switch that to five. I might play this battle one more time to make sure everything goes smoothly again, it's really engaging and probably my best work yet.

https://odysee.com/@Githzerai:e/Theshal:1


Illithid Hideout Sewers:
This might turn out to be a bit too difficult at least for now, I haven't started Chapter 7 yet. I changed the setup here back to the original one with two Elven Archers which brought my Fighter down to less than 10 STR from 24, and the thac0 from -18 to around 9 at one point, that's with a 4 sec duration for the Called Shot effects. During tests the two Archers with Called Shot active wouldn't lower STR more than 13 or so, yet with lots of creatures and heavy pauses it behaves a bit differently and they can lower STR to less than 8. They carry Gesen like bows and fire Cold Arrows +3. The two Fighters are well equipped as well and quaff a Storm Giant Strength potion and Hardiness as a prebuff, they also get some other prebuffs from the Cleric. The Mage goes under Alacrity in the first round, he is a dualed Fighter 13 to a high level Mage and packs quite a punch. His Darts of Stunning are +5 and need a save at -4 now. The Assassin has Poison Weapon and quaffs a Potion of Magic Shielding as prebuff plus some of the Cleric's prebuffs including Aid and Regeneration, and then opens up with Greater Evasion. He's got pretty good thac0 around -16 and 3 APR. He is somewhat of a nuisance and very sneaky, he will not backstab characters under Barbarian potions. His backstab was reduced on the other hand to only x5. I like the way he behaves now, he can be very dangerous. The Mind Flayer also has decent thac0 now for this stage of the game and needs to be prioritized. The Cleric will heal his friends if they survive long enough, he's regenerates a lot the first turn. I made some adjustments in the end and I think I found a good balance for this encounter. It came out to around a bit less than half an hour which is not bad and that will be it I guess.

https://odysee.com/@Githzerai:e/Illithid-Hideout-Sewers:7

This post has been edited by Berzerkerzz: Aug 5 2025, 11:21 PM