Spellslot penalties

[SixOfSpades]

My custom Druid kit has the Disadvantage of sacrificing 2 spellslots per spell level. A nice, clean, simple idea, but of course the engine has to go bugger it up in the following way:

A normal Level 14 Druid has 6 Level 1 spells.

A Level 14 Huntsman of Silvanus has 4 Level 1 spells.

Having 16 WIS adds 2 bonus spells to that.

Problem: Each time the game is Reloaded, the computer applies the penalty before the bonus from WIS, doing this:

1) The character has 6 spellslots, all of which have memorized spells,

2) Implementing the penalty brings them down to 4 (say goodbye to the spells you had in slots 5 & 6),

3) Implementing the bonus takes them back up to 6 . . . the last 2 of which are empty.

 

The only thing that jumps out at me is the Timing Mode of the spell that applies the penalties. I experimented with all of them, and met with no success, except for that one-time intermittent fluke when the universe just wanted to rub my nose in it. So, since messing with the Timing doesn't work, does anyone have any leads that might just work?

 

Deep in the mists of time, I recall somebody on the Divine Remix forum stating that spellslot penalties tended to run into major bugs, as they could result in characters having a negative number of spells of certain levels. But as my penalties are applied gradually throughout the game, that can't happen to me--so can anybody point me at some research/results of those Divine Remix experiments with spellslot penalties, please? Thanks.

[Miloch]

can anybody point me at some research/results of those Divine Remix experiments with spellslot penalties, please? Thanks.

Google is your friend .

Six's thoughts from 2005

[Nythrun]

You'll need an ugly clab file for this, and to settle for modifying base spellcasting without the dynamic wisdom bonus.

 

At level one you'll want an AP_spell_that_lowers_level_one_priest_spells_by_one. And again at level two. And at level three something similar for spell level two. You might need to include as the last effect of these spells an Immunity to Spell: This Spell - I doubt it, but it wouldn't hurt to check.

 

Timing mode one doesn't behave normally (or sensibly) with this effect.

 

/edit

 

Or alternatively, if the engine really is parsing effects in a different order on some installs, you could just drop all entries > 0 in mxspldru.2da by two and then assign bonus spell slots to all other druid kits. Compatibility may become difficult to ensure.

[SixOfSpades]

Google is your friend .

Six's thoughts from 2005

Thanks! I'd searched the DR forums for that info, but didn't think to find the answer in a thread that I myself had started. Hey, where did this bag of irony come from?

 

 

You'll need an ugly clab file for this, and to settle for modifying base spellcasting without the dynamic wisdom bonus. At level one you'll want an AP_spell_that_lowers_level_one_priest_spells_by_one.

Precisely. The way the Huntsman of Silvanus is set up, the 3rd and 5th spellslots of each level get subtracted. For example, a Druid's number of Level 1 spells reaches 3 and 5 at Levels 4 and 11, respectively, so at Levels 4 and 11, the Huntsman's CLAB file subtracts a Level 1 spell. And yes, this system completely ignores bonus spells due to WIS, but it's not like the exact number of spells per level is important--what matters is that the penalty is significant enough to be appropriate, and the number of spellslots of each level can never be 0 or negative.

 

Timing mode one doesn't behave normally (or sensibly) with this effect.

Well, the appropriate mode, "Permanent after death," has been working just fine, except for this damn bonus/penalty incompatibility that only appears on Reloading a saved game. (It's the more vaguely named modes, like "Delayed Duration Absolute" and "Trigger" that I have difficulty understanding.)

 

Or alternatively, if the engine really is parsing effects in a different order on some installs, you could just drop all entries > 0 in mxspldru.2da by two and then assign bonus spell slots to all other druid kits. Compatibility may become difficult to ensure.

Yes, that would almost certainly work, and I would never do it. That kind of sweeping, global decision would better be left to a body of experienced modders, not to a single relative newbie like myself. If I can't actually fix the problem, I'll just force some workaround.

 

My Options:

1) Hope somebody out there has had some success with spellslot penalties in the past, and that they ride in & save the day.

2) Tell everybody who downloads the Huntsman of Silvanus only to Save immediately prior to Resting.

3) Give the Huntsman a new innate ability which never runs out; each use grants them 2 extra spellslots of each level, for a duration of 10 seconds. Use it immediately before every Save and Auto-Save, and none of your real spells will get un-memorized.

4) Say "screw it, I give up" and impose some other kind of Disadvantage on the kit.

[CamDawg]

The huge, huge problem with doing any manipulation via CLAB is that CLABs get rolled back when folks leave and re-applied when they rejoin the party. This leads to the infamous (and still open) DR issue where memorized spells get wiped when Jaheira goes on one of her 17 Harper side trips.

[Nythrun]

Well, the appropriate mode, "Permanent after death," has been working just fine, except for this damn bonus/penalty incompatibility that only appears on Reloading a saved game. (It's the more vaguely named modes, like "Delayed Duration Absolute" and "Trigger" that I have difficulty understanding.)

 

Timing mode nine might be better phrased "Permanent, attach as an embedded effect". If a timing mode one effect modifies an on-creature stat (such as, say hitpoints) it alters that value in the .cre file and disappears, leaving behind no residue to be removed with control-r or resurrection. Unfortunately, timing mode one attaches an effect to the creature file in this case, just like mode nine.

 

Timing mode ten is used only when a spell is directly called by the engine: outside of Bard Song, it's not really for modder use. Timing mode four is just timing mode one with a delay before the effect is applied.

[SixOfSpades]

Well, Galactygon has offered his possible workaround:

You could try and fool the engine into applying the penalty later by embedding the spellslot penalty into an .eff file. I have experienced this when I was implementing saving throw bonuses/penalties against particular effects (such as fire). This is the cleanest way it could work.

 

I'll try this, but not for a while yet--for now, I'm going to go with the rather slapdash but waaay easier alternative of reducing the Huntsman's spellslots by means of a hefty Wisdom penalty . . . -4 should be about right. Look for an update to the mod, sometime soonish. I'll let you know.

 

And since this forum is the only place that has helped me, you're the only ones I'm telling which kits I'm adding to the mod: At long last, my take on the Wizard Slayer hits the net, joined by its Ranger counterpart, the Hunter of the Occult. (You're welcome, Valygar!)

[SixOfSpades]

Well, long story short, they can't be done, at least not my any means that I can think of.

 

The spell (called in the CLAB file) originally applied a -1 spellslot penalty to the specified level, with a timing mode of Permanent After Death.

 

Now the spell does the following:

1) Applies a +1 spell bonus to that level, with a timing mode of Duration: 5 seconds (under the logic that if the game wants to eat a spell, throw it a decoy).

2) Waits 2 seconds, then casts a second spell on the Huntsman. This second spell uses an EFF file, which finally applies the -1 spellslot penalty, with a timing mode of Permanent After Death.

 

But even THAT doesn't work. No matter what, the engine wants to apply spellslot penalties before bonuses--and, 90% of the time, it will. (That 10%, where it makes me think that I've actually fixed the damn thing, is most annoying of all.)

 

So, screw it. I'll just reduce their spellslots by giving them a base Spellcasting Failure percentage.