Items re-allocation

[Ardanis]

The Sphere is pretty much the #1 place in the game that BG1 items absolutely cannot be, if we're to preserve any sense of continuity.

It already has Ogre Strength gauntlets. And iirc something else... The shield is already removed from there, though.

 

Although I definitely agree with the necessity of placing at least one +3 weapon in there, as I myself once made the mistake of heading in there without any . . .

Exactly. The Sphere is the only dungeon in game you can't neither exit without defeating the boss, nor reload from autosave to start anew (if second level was reached).

 

As far as Backbiter itself is concerned, have you considered the idea of Cromwell (or whoever) breaking the curse? As in, it still hurts you when you use it, but it no longer Super-Glues itself to your hand?

Agreed. Ditto for other cursed items.

 

I still vote the de'Arnise Keep as the biggest candy-store in the game, apart from Watcher's Keep of course. And considering its provenance, I'd say the Sphere is actually perfectly justified in holding a wealth of loot that is, as you say, magical.

You mean to dump unsorted low-enchanted weaponry into the Keep, and jewelry/utility items into the Sphere?

Taragarth the bastard sword appears to still remain absent in game (although UB handles it fine), but another acid weapon to accompany FoA?

[Demivrgvs]

Well, I have nothing against moving Backbiter in the Planar Sphere.

Well, I certainly do. The Sphere is pretty much the #1 place in the game that BG1 items absolutely cannot be, if we're to preserve any sense of continuity. Put Impaler there if you must, but not Backbiter. Although I definitely agree with the necessity of placing at least one +3 weapon in there, as I myself once made the mistake of heading in there without any . . . it was only by sheer luck that we happened to still be carrying the Cursed Sword of Berserking. C'mere, Keldorn, got a job for you.

It already has Ogre Strength gauntlets. And iirc something else... The shield is already removed from there, though.

Well, Backbiter's lore doesn't indicate uniqueness, it could easily not be the same cursed spear you find within BG1. The gauntlets instead do had a background which implied uniqueness, but I replaced its lore with NWN one which is instead stating many copies exist. I don't know which shield you're talking about instead.

 

As far as Backbiter itself is concerned, have you considered the idea of Cromwell (or whoever) breaking the curse? As in, it still hurts you when you use it, but it no longer Super-Glues itself to your hand?

Agreed. Ditto for other cursed items.

Not for V3 though.

 

I still vote the de'Arnise Keep as the biggest candy-store in the game, apart from Watcher's Keep of course. And considering its provenance, I'd say the Sphere is actually perfectly justified in holding a wealth of loot that is, as you say, magical.

You mean to dump unsorted low-enchanted weaponry into the Keep, and jewelry/utility items into the Sphere?

Taragarth the bastard sword appears to still remain absent in game (although UB handles it fine), but another acid weapon to accompany FoA?

Actually I think he was saying the Keep already has too much loot.

[SixOfSpades]

Backbiter / Gauntlets of Ogre Power

Well, Backbiter's lore doesn't indicate uniqueness, it could easily not be the same cursed spear you find within BG1. The gauntlets instead do had a background which implied uniqueness, but I replaced its lore with NWN one which is instead stating many copies exist.

Well, as it's the same type of weapon, with the same name, the same enchantment level, the same curse, and the same icons, I myself would interpret that as being intended to indicate that it's the exact same item. It's your mod, do the "it's a non-unique item" thing if you want, I just find it less satisfying than, as I suggested a while ago, simply swapping the starting locations of the GoOP and the Hammer of Thunderbolts. On the plus side, sticking a "generic" GoOP in the Planar Sphere leaves room for some modder to bring in the "real" Hands of Takkok that you obtained in BG1. And Backbiter. And the Cloak of Protection+2.

 

As far as Backbiter itself is concerned, have you considered the idea of Cromwell (or whoever) breaking the curse?

Not for V3 though.

Out of curiosity, why not? It's not like we're talking about a ton of items.

 

Actually I think he was saying the Keep already has too much loot.

Correct, especially when compared with the Sphere. The Keep has three +3 weapons, makes you fight 1 enemy (easily avoidable) that requires them, and you can leave at any time to come back later. The Sphere has zero +3 weapons, has 2 enemies (unavoidable if you let them spawn) that require them, and if you can't beat it, you're stuck. Granted, the Keep has more Fighter toys because it's the Fighter stronghold, but I don't recall a similar preponderance in favor of Wizard items in the Sphere. But I do seem to remember that there's a Staff+1 in there, which could easily be replaced with a +3. As could the Stiletto of Demarchess, another possible Mage tool.

[J Beau]

I always enjoy your view on things Six. I would still like to see SofW in the sphere but I could live with the cursed on I guess. Breaking the curse would be great. Let it cost 10K and some gems. Technically it wouldn't even be an upgrade, just a permanent remove curse effect.

[SixOfSpades]

Breaking the curse would be great. Let it cost 10K and some gems.

Oh! I wasn't even thinking of that, I was just figuring along the lines of Cromwell [or insert smith here] already having removed the bind-to-user effect during the year that the weapon was out of CHARNAME's hands. Now I see what Demi was talking about, a Cromwell dialogue would definitely not fit the current pattern of IR.

 

[ADD]And don't worry, the Sphere will definitely get a good Spear, no matter where we put the SoW.[/ADD]

[J Beau]

The bind-to-user effect is the worst part of the curse! If that's all that's removed, I'm happy.

[Demivrgvs]

Backbiter / Gauntlets of Ogre Power

Well, Backbiter's lore doesn't indicate uniqueness, it could easily not be the same cursed spear you find within BG1. The gauntlets instead do had a background which implied uniqueness, but I replaced its lore with NWN one which is instead stating many copies exist.

Well, as it's the same type of weapon, with the same name, the same enchantment level, the same curse, and the same icons, I myself would interpret that as being intended to indicate that it's the exact same item.

I was just saying it's not necessarily a unique item (much like there could be many Sword of Flames), but you're right, it indeed looks like one.

 

It's your mod, do the "it's a non-unique item" thing if you want, I just find it less satisfying than, as I suggested a while ago, simply swapping the starting locations of the GoOP and the Hammer of Thunderbolts. On the plus side, sticking a "generic" GoOP in the Planar Sphere leaves room for some modder to bring in the "real" Hands of Takkok that you obtained in BG1. And Backbiter. And the Cloak of Protection+2.

GoOP is a classic non-unique item within D&D lore, and within FR setting I'd dare to say it's actually relatively common. Furthermore, I also changed the lore because of consistency reasons. It made no sense for the Hands of Takkok to be used to creat Crom Faeyr considering Silverblade surely didn't forged the former but a generic pair of GoOP.

 

As far as Backbiter itself is concerned, have you considered the idea of Cromwell (or whoever) breaking the curse?

Not for V3 though.

Out of curiosity, why not? It's not like we're talking about a ton of items.

Breaking the curse would be great. Let it cost 10K and some gems.

Oh! I wasn't even thinking of that, I was just figuring along the lines of Cromwell [or insert smith here] already having removed the bind-to-user effect during the year that the weapon was out of CHARNAME's hands. Now I see what Demi was talking about, a Cromwell dialogue would definitely not fit the current pattern of IR.

You answered yourself. BG1 and BG2 share the same resource files, thus an uncursed version of Backbiter and/or Berserking Sword must use a different filename.

 

I'm not against it per se, I and Ardanis do thought about making our own Item Upgrade-like component but it's far from being a priority and we won't work on it for V3.

 

Nalia's Keep loot

Actually I think he was saying the Keep already has too much loot.

Correct, especially when compared with the Sphere. The Keep has three +3 weapons, makes you fight 1 enemy (easily avoidable) that requires them, and you can leave at any time to come back later.

Just so you know, both Frostreaver and the +3 hammer (now called Hammer of Corrosion) have +1 enchantment now. Frostreaver doesn't deal acid dmg anymore, but the hammer does, making its allocation relatively convenient as vanilla's Frostreaver was (is it a problem? ). Afaik if you have/want to fight the keep's golems you need to forge FoA, and I don't remember if Ardanis moved the third head (needed to forge the +3 version) from golems' room to Torgal or not.

 

Planar Sphere's loot

The Sphere has zero +3 weapons, has 2 enemies (unavoidable if you let them spawn) that require them, and if you can't beat it, you're stuck. Granted, the Keep has more Fighter toys because it's the Fighter stronghold, but I don't recall a similar preponderance in favor of Wizard items in the Sphere. But I do seem to remember that there's a Staff+1 in there, which could easily be replaced with a +3. As could the Stiletto of Demarchess, another possible Mage tool.

I'm really against "too much convenient allocations", but I'm sympathetic in this case because you cannot exit the sphere, that's why I'm fine with moving here a +3 item if we think it's necessary.

 

Considering I kinda agree Backbiter could be considered unique and moved somewhere else (still within early SoA imo), I could vote for replacing that staff +1 with a Staff of Striking, though in a SR game adding there a scroll of Enchanted Weapon fixes the issue in a much better way imo (assuming I don't care about soloers and every party should have at least one characters able to read the scroll).

[J Beau]

Consider, although you can do the Planar Sphere in the early chapters, it is not a low level quest.

[SixOfSpades]

Just as an alternative, for those who feel the Spear of Withering should remain in Drow hands, I'd like to suggest moving it to Raamilat, the Drow Mage (he may be a Fighter/Mage) in Suldenesselar. In vanilla, his only loot is . . . wait for it . . . a Staff+1.

[J Beau]

Just a thought about FoA, if you want to tone it down, just scatter one or two of the heads to other locations in the game. Then you haven't really nerfed it, you have just delayed its rise to full power.

[Demivrgvs]

Flail of Ages

Just a thought about FoA, if you want to tone it down, just scatter one or two of the heads to other locations in the game. Then you haven't really nerfed it, you have just delayed its rise to full power.

Well, this actually a pretty interesting idea, but I fear it involves way too much work imo. The keep isn't even accessible anymore after you finish the quest (unless it's your stronghold), we would have to modify the scripts and string references for the keep's forge (as I think they say something about +3 being the complete version or something like that - and they give you xp too, though this is arguable), and we would have to patch Cromwell in order to make the +3 version available there.

 

Let's see what Ardanis think about it.

[Ardanis]

Ardanis thinks that moving pieces of FoA to other place contradicts the backstory.

I know Lord Arnise is still alive, at least he was this morning.

 

He was trying to get the parts for his flail. He keeps it in pieces, and would never say why he left it like that. Wasn't my place to ask, really.

[J Beau]

You could always move 1 piece. There would still be 2. After all there are 5 total.

[Salk]

I think relocating the pieces of the FoA is a bad idea.

[Shaitan]

Count me against also.