Hello, everyone.

I've made a few tweaks to the original IAv6 in order to make it compatible with the BG2EE. I haven't tested the game at all yet, so use it at your own risk. The EE version didn't pass an excruciating amount of testing as it'd happened usually in the past.

Attached to the topic is a small archive with the files that you need to unpack into your EE directory on top of IA prior to installing. I haven't tested the compatibility with the other mods, but IA doesn't play well with them anyway. I did test the installation of Ease-of-Use (recommended components) and Dungeon-be-Gone, both latest versions. Also, make sure you download the latest WeiDU executable and use it instead of those that might be packaged with the mods. It is required for the installation to work properly.

These files would probably cause IA installation to crash on vanilla BG (non-EE), but there is nothing new anyway with the exception of compatibility patches. I haven't made the setup script cross-platform. Perhaps, I'll do this in the future when there is proof that IA plays nice with EE.

Once again, I repeat, there was no extensive testing. I have no idea how powerful or not are the new EE kits or new joinable NPCs in the context of IA. I have no idea what happens with the new content that is added by EE.

If you do play this and find some sort of a bug, let me know here. I will try to fix it and attach the patches in this post. I would've loved to push out a stable version for you guys but there is not timetable at all for how much it'll take me to do my own run of the game.

Enjoy!

EDIT: this archive is outdated! Please, download the latest version of the mod from the BWL's download section.

[attachment=4105:Archive.zip]

Hey Critto.

Nice work.
It should not be any different on Windows right? Does it still require/assume fixpack to be installed... because I think BG2EE fixed all that stuff.

I am not sure when I will have the time to try it out because among other things, my family expansion is keeping me very busy.

Hi!

It should work with any version of BG2EE that you have. I tested it on a Steam version for Mac OS X personally, but I do not see any difference whatsoever with Windows, using a version from GoG, Steam or Beamdog.

As for the fixpack, if you mean an official one released for BG2:ToB then no, it's not needed. Just use the latest version of BG2EE (patch 1.3, as of now, I think) and start installing the mods in a recommended fashion.

Cheers

Sorry for the late response.

I am going to try to install it on my windows steam version and see how far I get. I have no experience with the steam one for installing mods so I will see how it goes.

About the fixpack...I meant the baldurdash fixpack, that seems rather obsolete for bg2ee.

I can confirm this, I am currently experimenting IA V6 on BG2EE


Install was:
BG2EE
Edit: Weidu 238 (or later) most important, otherwise bug with install
EoU as recommended in install
V6 (current available download on BWL)
Patch put by Critto

No problem so far (mid chapter 3)

Side note: Party is Necro, riskbreaker, dwarven defender (new EE kit), Neera (BG1&2 EE NPC), Hexxat (BG2EE NPC) and Cernd

Hi nicoper

That's good news. You did put crittos files before installing IA right?

> That's good news. You did put crittos files before installing IA right?
Yes, otherwise the mod wouldn't install, there would be errors.

Btw I was thinking

Necromancer
Dorn (blackguard), 2handed weapon user
Riskbreaker, dual wield
Valygar or fighter/cleric, dual wield or elemental/ac tank
Dwarven defender, dual wield or 2handed weapon user
Nalia/imoen

Or I skip dorn, use only my Dwarven defender as 2handed weapon user and i go for some other kit that would be nice to have.... Not sure what yet. The tweaking of the party is still difficult sometimes.

Fixed

Well, this is the error you get when you use the wrong weidu download....

> WeiDU v 185 Log
This is the problem. I specified in the first post that you need the most modern version of WeiDU available (v237 or something). Weimer's old school implementation has no way of interpreting the modern weidu code.

Oh crap. I downloaded the new version from the weidu site but apparently that goes to this really old one. /feeling stupid


Edit: Yep. that did the trick. I downloaded from the pocketplane forum instead of weidu.org.

At install of IA, only the readme at the end did not pop up and it went to a cmd window instead. However, that has nothing to do with the playable mod content itself. I will try to set up a party tonight. If I encounter anything I will gather the observations and report back.

Sorry weidu 238 fIrst
Will edit previous post

So far so good. The install went fine. Character creation no problem.
I am currently running the following party. Still in chateau irenicus but that will change soon.
Necromancer
Riskbreaker (axe)
Dwarven defender (2handed sword, staff, halberd
swashbuckler (longsword) -> jan
Jaheira -> Ployer -> Anomen (hammer)
Imoen -> Valygar (katana, flail)

Anybody has any feedback on BG2EE?

As of now, we found out a couple of issues that are being fixed. I am also making a couple of additions and a ToB-compatible installer. Basically, in the end of it there will be a IAv6.1

Next, we'll see what happens.

Cheers, everybody.

I'm still in chapter two and did notice anything yet. Then again i never played v6 very far so i am not certain what to expect to go wrong

Just a bit of a progress report for anybody who's interested:
- all bugs except for one that we've found in IA for BG2EE are fixed (many thanks to nicoper for a play test and reports)
- the monk class was revised so that players can now enjoy playing it with a custom party member or Rasaad, the BG2EE NPC
- Neera, another bg2ee npc, was also revised slightly, but in a significant manner; she's now too a viable choice of companion when it comes to spellcasters (on par with Imoen and Nalia)
- back when we were working on IAv7, we've fixed a couple bugs and made a few tweaks here and there; all these patches were back-merged into the current development branch
- there's a new 4th level spell for wizards that should be quite useful (this too is from IAv7 branch)
- some new stuff was added for swashbucklers and rogues in general; it doesn't make them truly effective in IA but a nice extra for those who want to experiment (ex-IAv7 as well)

We're in progress of applying tweaks to the new content added by BG2EE in order to bring it closer to the reality of IA. Once this work is done, IAv6.1 should be out. I'd say ETA is the end of May. There won't be any improved encounters in these new quests, that is something to be considered for the future if there is to be one for the mod.

Is this "latest" version with EE NPCs revision downloadable or is it still WiP?
And where is Sikret??

WiP. You can download the beta patch that provides compatibility in the first post, but it's very raw, just the basic porting done.


RL issues does not allow him visit BWL and take active part in development and discussions. That is one of the reasons why work on IAv7 was halted.

Got it, thanks.

We've prepared everything that we'd wanted for this release, but encountered some serious bugs of BG2EE itself. Right now I am thinking of a way to work around these issues until Beamdog releases an official patch.

Hi critto,

i didnt play BG2 for a long time (finished once SOA with IA v4 or v5, cant remember...) but stumbled recently upon bg2ee in itunes store, bought it, played a bit on ipad but its somehow no fun without IA no more ...so i wanna give it a try again with IA v6 :-)
Did some research about jailbreaking, but unfortunately already updated to iOS 8.3 and there are some doubts if ipad control with clumsy thumbs is accurate enough for IA. So, back to good old notebook. Damn but i cannot find my original CDs anymore, lol dont know how many times i bought the game so far, 3 or 4 times ?!? But whatever. im a bit undecided now whether i should get my hands on bg2ee or bg2 + tob. Any advice? How serious is the bug you are speaking of and how long to be fixed?
Im planning a lightly modded game, Tower of Deception and The Four would be nice. There is a ToD v4 out which works apparently for bg2ee but is it based on the compatible one for IA, any ideas? What about The Four?

Cheers

Hi, Azoth.

They are kind of serious in a general sense, but I've found ways to work around them for the current build of IA. So it should be safe. In fact, we already have a release prepared, I hope it'll go live until the end of the week.


Personally, I like the bg2ee more (works on my mac, modernized interface, etc.). However, there are many issues that came up in EE specifically and devs are working on fixing it, but it's work in progress. ToB with relevant patches and a fixpack is much more bug-free experience. So, depends on what do you prefer. Modern version with some new content (which is unmodded at this point except for some tuning of overpowered treasures and such) or stability? We did a test run on BG2EE and fixed some issues, but I pretty sure we didn't catch everything so something may come up in your playthrough.


I have no knowledge whether ToD or The Four are compatible with BG2EE. We've never tried or tested it in any way. To my knowledge, The Four wasn't really compatible with IAv6 even in ToB, although I may be wrong. Hopefully, somebody will correct me if I am.

Overall, if you haven't played IAv6 at all, I'd go with ToB for better stability and, therefore, experience.

The Four is compatible with IA v6. The only issue is that the Guardian of the Ring somehow becomes immune to all damage types (compared to v5). Can still be killed via Energy drain though (BBoD).

Maybe I'll take a look at it for the next release.

Thanks critto.

Out of the Document IV-Installation.txt file:


I guess i will go for original BG2+TOB. Just found it at gog.com.

Hopefully there will be IA v7 at some point :-) Do u think v7 will be compatible with bg2ee and TOB?

I intend to release it sooner or later, since it's been promised for so long. There's plenty that's done already. I've picked up the development after a long hiatus and working on it steadily. Many things that were originally made for IAv7 are back-merged into IAv6.1 (practically everything that is not related to the new stronghold). I want to do a bunch of minor releases that'll bring us closer to IAv7. Shorter development cycles are easier to perform. And it'll help to find and fix more bugs so that a major release will be as bug-free as possible.


Yes, I intend to support compatibility for both versions of the game.

@ critto:

I have noticed a lot of double standard issues in this mod which you may want to somehow fix. Double standard meaning - monsters can do it while players cannot. Examples:

Invisibility or Improved Invisibility:
If a player attempts to cast a targeted spell on an enemy who suddenly becomes invisible in the midst of casting, spellcasting stopps, spell fails.
If an enemy attempts the same, the targeted character still becomes invisible, but the enemy successfully finishes and casts the spell.

Targeted special abilities and/or spells:
A player cannot cast Chain Lightning without a legal enemy target. A player cannot cast Doom on an Invisible or Improved Invisible enemy. Both of these spells will deflect off an enemy's Spell Turning.
An enemy (Guardian Spirit, Spellhold level, Kobold encounter) can cast (improved) Chain Lightning disregarding a player's Improved Invisibility and Spell Turning.
An enemy (random improved Dragon or Balor) can cast Greater Doom, disregarding a player's Spell Turning and Improved Invisibility.

Time Stop:
All enemies become immune to all weapons under Time Stop.
All players are still vulnerable under Time Stop and enemies who are immune to the TS effect can harm a party member physically.

(Normal) summons:
Players - 5 summon limit (except for Sikret's special summons from powerful items like Noble Spider etc).
Enemies - unlimited summon limit. At least the 5-deva issue was fixed in v6, but for example I noticed the Kuo-Toan prince summon 7 monsters.

After all, Sikret stated a long time ago that his improved monsters don't cheat, by which he meant "monsters can't do anything which a player cannot".

There are many things that players can do and monsters can't. The most important of those would be possessing a real brain and an ability to think. Keep that in mind, this is a two-way street.


Many of the AI's scripts check for II prior to casting. If there are opposite cases, I'll investigate those and decide whether it's a bug or Sikret's judgement. If it's the latter, I'll leave it untouched.

Same thing as above.


This is an anti-cheese feature of Sikret's. His vision of the mod was to enforce as mush as possible a way of playing that he judges to be fair and relies on tactical thinking rather than butchering helpless enemies. That's his right to do so and I seriously doubt that I'll ever remove that feature from the mod. You and everybody else should just take it or leave it.

I do intend though to make the internal structure and composition of AI more modular and flexible, simply as a way to enforce a better engineering practice. This will allow players to tune and tweak it privately if they desire to do so, but this won't be an IA experience anymore as Sikret intended it to be.

My main goal right now is to extend the mod in a way that doesn't break Sikret's view on IA design and provide players with possibilities. For instance, make more NPCs to be viable and playable choices. Two good-aligned NPCs from BG2EE are already made to be so, and two vanilla NPCs will be in IAv6.2 which I am working on right now.

Dragons, Demons and similar creatues don't obey rules on invisibility. This isn't new to BG, it has always been so. Very powerful creatures don't even suffer -4 THAC0 when attacking II enemy.
Summon limit for enemies has an ugly workaround with Globals, maybe. Not really something clean.
Going invisible while enemy is casting the spell should prevent succesfull spellcasting unless the creature can see invisible creatures by default. Or the script is intentionally doing so. I haven't really played Anvil in few years or used invisibility much even when I did, so can't report on such cases.

They do, that's not the case here. The case is going invisible in the midst of a spell. Plain human mages (who definitely shouldn't and cannot see through invisibility or improved invisibility) have no trouble finishing their Ruby Ray of Reversal or Breach casting if the targeted character suddenly goes invisible or improved invisible in the middle of the spellcasting. Opposing to that, if a party mage starts chanting for Breach at an enemy who then decides to become invisible (potion, minor sequencer, etc), the spell is cancelled.



Wrong expression, allow me to correct that. Double-standard meaning - monsters can do it while party members or PC cannot (even though the latter are guided by a player with a real mind).




Well aware of that. Was not suggesting of removing the Time Stop immunity feature. A logical suggestion however will be giving party members an Absolute Immunity effect, equal to those which enemies have while a Time Stop is active.

Otherwise, I commend you on your efforts working on the IA mod.




In Improved Anvil v5, everyone obeyed the rules of Invisibility. Demon, dragon - didn't matter. If you're talking about the vanilla game and unmodded monsters, I could accept that. However, tweaking honest IA v5 monsters with cheating abilities which can be targeted under Improved Invisibility is...well...not in the spirit of the IA mod at all.

As stated above, a party member going invisible doesn't prevent any enemy's successful spellcasting. An enemy going invisible while a party member is casting a spell at them results in the "spell cancelled" message. One action, one situation - different results for party mages and enemy mages. Either in both cases spellcasting on enemies-went-invisible-during-casting should be successful, or in both cases the casting should fail with the "spell cancelled:" message.

It may be a limitation of the engine in how the game handles casting (there are various ways to cast a spell programmatically, see iesdp for that) but I might be wrong. This needs to be tested first.


Party members can do things and use items that a monster cannot. The original thought still applies.

I don't see any practical sense in doing so. There's only one instance of the AI using Time Stop: Layenne in Twisted Rune battle. And even there it is used more for dramatic effect and a unique extra challenge to overcome in a fight which I back in the day when I played it found to be quite enjoyable. Intelligent behavior during time stop is challenging to program well which is why none of the enemies use it. No enemy employs TS to run around and hit frozen foes.


Cheers

When a party member casts Timestop, the first action of enemies who are not frozen in time is to engage party members who are frozen in time. This renders both the Timestop spell and the Wish option of the Timestop + IA spell a bad choice to cast/pick. Which is senseless for a hard to obtain 9th level spell. If not Absolute Immunity to characters, then perhaps monsters can be scripted not to engage in melee while under time stop. The TS double-standard has little or no practical effect for a soloer. However for a party with a couple of pure arcane casters that change can do a lot, making the Time Stop choice actually viable once again for sorcerers for example.

While a curious idea, it is hard and impractical to implement, at least at this stage. I'd rather remove the spell altogether and replace with something powerful, but useful in context of IA.

My 2 cents about timestop:

- Disabling possibility to butcher enemy frozen in time should never be touched. Only slight complain I would make is that enemy immunity to physical damage is not instantly removed at the end of timestop (lasts a couple of seconds)

- Timestop remains a tremendous (even more double TS+alacrity through wish) weapon against many enemies (destroying them with spells, wasting their protection duration, rebuffing party, refreshing summons and buffing those,...)

- Let's not forget that IA is made to be challenging, not impossible. This to say that player is allowed a lot of things creature don't do (while they obviously could) to overcome them; comes to (my) mind: greater restoration seldom (just once) used, High level mages not using TS nor alacrity (imagine 4 grave lich on globe machine starting with TS+ alacrity, or graves in old one fight using alacrity, ancient dragon using TS to debuff/doom/breath party a couple of times in a row or using GR on itself and Nishruu, Sendai GR on golems, ...)

Side note: Layene can "legally" (no exploit, cheat, ultra high level party...) be turned to use her Wish for party rest instead of double TS+ alacrity, just depends of how you handle encounter....

This is a very good suggestion, and I think many other than me would approve it.

Edit:



Karun the Black uses multiple chaining alacrities. Dragons and DemiLiches have permanent alacrity. Grave Liches are explained to be high-level Fighter/Mages upon death (check the Old One quest for reference) so they (abiding IA v6 rules) cannot have Alacrity at all. Elite Nishruu should not be considered a party member of the Ancient Dragon but rather a powerful gated summon, so it shouldn't get anything even if the dragon casts Greater Restoration. About Layene, I think it's a well-known fact, and I wasn't really talking about her when pointing out the Time Stop inconsistency - after all, she's the only one who follows the timestop rules and actually releases a bunch of spells instead of engaging frozen in time party members in melee.

In fact, at least one other enemy does. The Grave Lich who guards Daystar used Time Stop and hit me a couple of times during it. I would suggest making player parties immune to physical damage during time stops if possible, for fairness and thematic purposes.

In terms of "countering" a spell by going invisible during the casting, I am not sure that is something easily modified. It might require a patch to .exe, or a very complex script to be added to basically every spellcaster. I think there are a handful of things like "Chain Contingencies" and "Spell Triggers" that could have invisibility checks added to them though. Dragons, liches, and demons, should ignore invisibility IMO, as was the case in vanilla BG2.

The summon limit seems like a very easy fix, given that it only appears for perhaps a few enemies. But I don't understand why it is acceptable that the 5-summon limit should be waived for things like Noble Spider figurine and Swanmays, but it is objectionable if it is waived for the Kuo-Toa Prince's summons. Beyond the mechanical "fairness" of this working for both players and enemies, aren't the Kuo-Toa's "summons" just more Kuo-Toas (Dukes)? Or are you talking about Invisible Stalkers and such? If he's summoning more than 5 Dukes, I think that's perfectly fair given that it's intended to be less of a magical summoning and more of him just sounding alarms and his guards physically moving to the location to help battle an intruder :-)

Speaking of summons actually, I'd suggest a duration increase for a handful of them. There's a number of them that have durations of 10 rounds (Berserker, Elemental Prince) which is very short in the battle preparation process. I'd also suggest allowing Cerebus and Joolon to be usable by any character, since this mod advises and assumes the players are using the all-stronghold tweak.

The summon limit question was raised because as I understood, in IA v6.1 the player summon limit would be fixed to 5, including gated summons like Swanmays and Greater Djinnis. As for the Kuo-Toan prince, I don't mind him getting gazilion weak summons, but I watched him curiously as he gated two Aerial servants, three Skeleton Warriors and a couple Mountain bears (a total of 7) plus his Fallen Deva was still present (so 8) when I finally decided to whack at him. Pointed this out just for the mechanical "fairness". BTW I don't see the reason of "gated" summons like Swanmays, Greater Djinni, Noble Spider or Skely Lord to fall under the 5-summon limit rule since enemies definitely go easy over that limit with their gated summons - like a Greater Elemental Golem being able to gate in nine minor golems at a time or a single Ghost spider gating in more than 12 additional minor spiders if left alive long enough.

No, it was fixed only for the usual, over-the-counter summons. It's a bug of vanilla game. The behavior of advanced, powerful summons left untouched.

Joolon can be used by anyone. Cerebus will remain only for ranger protagonists. Duration for Berserker will be increased to 30 rounds as it is for the rest of IA's summoning items.

Need some help again, please.

I played a bit BG2+TOB+IAv6. Killed Suna and did some other minor stuff but then i noticed that for the full necro quest line a good aligned necro is mandatory. Why the heck do i have an evil one
Ok, decided to start again but this time with BG2EE. Bought BG2 the 5th time...hopefully it does some good for the developers

So tried to install EoU v33, doesnt find the Dialog.tlk. The folder structure is a bit different to good old BG2 and there are three languages, de, us, es. Ok most probably first Weidu238 (http://www.weidu.org/~thebigg/) but how to install? There is a Weidu.exe with a lot of different arguments and a tolower.exe. Ive read something about Weidu and problems with lower chars. Can someone please give the foolish me a hint how to set up things properly?

Cheers

Run the game in vanilla mod first and check the language setup, etc. For EoU, you need to rename the new weidu.exe into Setup-Ease.exe and replace with it the original one. Then try again and see if it works.

Thanks critto.

Did the trick

In Sikret's pinned v5 walkthrough, he also installed the following EoU components
-XP Cap Remover
-Wear Magical Armor AND Magic Rings

These components are not mentioned in IAv6.1 Document IV-Installation.txt. Is there any need of these?

> -XP Cap Remover
No, IAv6 introduces it's own new level cap and level progression tables. See record 244 of Fixes & Tweaks document for more details.

> -Wear Magical Armor AND Magic Rings
Same here. No need, IA has its own system implemented. See 253 of the same document for more details.

Thanks again critto.

Just for the records:
BG2ee
Patch 1.3
Updated to weidu 238
EoU v33 only components which are listed in Document IV-Installation.txt
Dungeon be gone v17
ToD v4.0 couldnt resist...
IA 6.1


Note:
The Four v4.0 could not be installed because of failed TOB check

This could be overcome easily, if you want to. Give me the link for The Four please, I'll check it out.

Just note that the mod was not tested in any way with IAv6.1 and BG2EE, so I can't promise everything will be 100% stable.

The Four v4:
http://www.sorcerers.net/Games/dl.php?s=BG...BG2/TheFour.rar

Yes, i can try to play with this mod if you do the needed modifications.

Can i still install after IA 6.1?
Do i need to start a new game?

I might not be able to trigger the Robe Guardians because of wrong alignment:



But lets see...

Open up Setup-TheFour.tp2 in any text editor, remove the line "REQUIRE_FILE ~Data/25Dialog.bif~ @3 // ~Please install TOB and return!~", save the file and install the mod.

There is no need to start a new game, unless you've already been to the areas that are affected by the install (which I seriously doubt).

I will check out the mod in greater detail and, perhaps, include some or all encounters into the main distribution. We'll see.

Successfully installed The Four v4

The items are balanced well enough except for the Robe of Eloquence. Permanent alacrity is too powerful IMO. I like playing with The Four though, and many people play it only because of the robe.

The other three items are really powerful only on a fighter-thief or mage-thief dual with Use Any Item. Since making such a character is extremely difficult in a non-exploit game, I think they're OK if you decide to install them permanently into the BG2EE. The ring won't make bards playable, the gloves will expose the bearer to triple FoD CC often (no one of importance casts Creeping Doom late game anyways so the gloves are only good for the bonus to casting speed) and the helmet won't make Cernd a Warrior, although it could make Jaheira a bit more playable.