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[yarpen]

There has been some discussion about SI being "over powered" or "cheesy." I'd suggest that SI is simply "inelegant" in the way that a solution to a math or engineering problem can be inelegant. This might explain the difficulty in defining exactly why SI is "bad" - it is, in part, a matter of taste. That said, SI is inelegant because it presents a blunt solution to problems (Dispel Magic, Divination Spells) that might be addressed by a more subtle approach.

Well, that's probably the best description of that why people dislike SI. We tried to use words 'cheesy' 'op' but yeah, inelegant is the most accurate one. Call it fancy, but it's alternative versions (Non-detection, True Seeing etc.) just looks better. Also it improves spell selection of other than Abjurers Speciality Priests.

 

The point is - "absurd" or not - that lone wizards are a major feature of BG2, and (contra your comment) they weren't "meant to be weak" in BG2. (Exhibit A: Irenicus. Exhibit B: Vongoethe. Exhibit C: Kangaxx. Etc.). So insofar as it isn't possible to protect them adequately in a given set of modifications, that's a problem. (The combat and movement system in BG2 makes meatshields all but useless as a way of protecting casters, and the chance of hitting a wizard with your axe isn't "very very low": as I've demonstrated, it's actually pretty high in mid SoA and later.)

You forgot about a) most of protection spells will make wizard invincible for few rounds b) during which he can cast sh*tstorm of disabling/damaging/slaying spells. Also, he can use AoE spells which allows him to easily deal with many creatures at once. I just say as always: I don't like the fact that game favorizes wizards. Well, I'm gonna live with that. And still, you're right about weakness of 'meatshield' system in BG2. Still, I think that without all of those fancy magical defences game would turn back into original state where warriors were fighting each other and wizards were at first trying to make their warriors chances of win greater and to disable enemy wizard. Meh. They weren't arogants who were sitting, drinking tea and saying "silly b****, your weapons cannot harm me".

 

Well, after release of IR3 I will try to make solo fighter game with IR + SR + some of Kit Revision changes and maybe custom item.

Edited January 6, 2011 by yarpen

[Ardanis]

I don't really need it to be able to take down fire shields, blade barriers, or Armour spells. (Indeed, from the perspective of defending spellcasters against the PCs, it would be helpful if it didn't take those down.) That cuts across sectypes, of course, so one would need to think about in-game justification.

FS/BB's main purpose is to inflict damage, their protective abilities come as a free bonus. Like Tenser, which increases AC/hp, but isn't counted as defense.

 

Armor spells - they don't grant immunity like anti-weapon or anti-elemental magic. Same can also be said about FS/BB.

 

Can you remind me why Breach can't take down (say) 4 defences? Isn't there an opcode that strips one defence of a given type, and if so, can't one just do a shell spell trick and apply 4 copies of the spell?

I have brought it up too in the past. But it is possible to build up lots of protections, so that it would take several Breaches to bring down the most annoying one. Only ProElements/Energy are higher level than PFMW, but Stoneskin (and PFM) can be hidden beneath layers of other defenses.

 

Yes, I use it quite a bit that way. Pro/ME, in particular, is heavily prioritised for Breaching, because it protects from Horrid Wilting.

You do, though from my playing experience I have an impression left that it doesn't help as much as it probably was intended. Plus iirc it prioritizes Breach over Abi-Dalzim, which imo is doubtful as there may be other targets susceptible to the latter.

 

 

You forgot about a) most of protection spells will make wizard invincible for few rounds b) during which he can cast sh*tstorm of disabling/damaging/slaying spells.

Not quite. It's been awhile since I've played the time before the last one, but eventually I've re-developed my tactical skill and started bringing enemy wizards down in a very short time.

First thing first, having 2-3 arcane users really helps at speeding up the process of eliminating spell protections. And if you have only one, then really it's a fair duel, where you may lose only because an enemy is higher in level than your mage - even then, staying on the edge of visible range and using fighters as a meatshield helps to keep that lone wizard safe and dangerous.

And later on, you don't even need 2. I had Imoen to cast Timestop, Spellstrike the target during it, cast TS if it's not there yet, possibly toss some AoE the enemy (or it's simulacra) is vulnerable to, hit them with Staff of Magi, ready a Breach - voila. I had easy time defeating Yaga-Shura's mage leutenant and Gromnir's duo, despite the rather unsafe and chaotic situation on the battlefield.

 

 

PS

Well, after release of IR3 I will try to make solo fighter game with IR + SR + some of Kit Revision changes and maybe custom item.

That custom item is gonna have 'fighters rule' effect while equipped, isn't it? Edited January 6, 2011 by Ardanis

[amanasleep]

Sanctuary isn't terrible (and I probably underuse it). But the thing is, priests only have about one (at most) really good defensive buff they can put up anyway. They don't have the layered defences available to mages.

 

Maybe we could make a rule that enemy priests always come prebuffed with some of the longest lasting protections, particularly Shield of the Archons, Death Ward, Remove Fear, and Chaotic Commands (maybe even Skeleton Warriors, since they last for hours--I know I'd cast one every morning if I thought there was even the slightest chance I'd meet danger that day!). If their first move was Sanctuary followed by Blade Barrier and Physical Mirror, they could end up pretty well protected when they cast Gate or whatever. I also believe that UnHoly Word doesn't break Sanctuary. In any event, I might suggest that normally prebuffed clerics start with Regeneration active, which could dramatically increase survivability and reduce the necessity for potions (and more importantly, spell actions) during combat.

[Guest Guest]

Well, I personally have no problem if enemy wizards receive few more memorized spells than their level permits. This way their 'scroll' spells can also be interrupted as they should be, and the lack of extra loot is easily explained by items' fragility, like in the case with potions.

shame on you, Ardanis. cheating is a bad thing:)

[yarpen]

That custom item is gonna have 'fighters rule' effect while equipped, isn't it?

Hey! I'm not that bad at modding kits to need to do such a thing. I was mainly thinking about '1 point of proficiency in any weapon at 10th level and specialisation at 18th', because that would be really helpfull in using weapons special abilities against enemies.

 

Not quite.

We were talking about theoretical situation of fight between wizard and warrior. In IWD that'd be fair duel (wizard can make himself invisible, teleport and stuff to evade fighter's blow) - but in BG2 it's very one-sided.

[Ardanis]

shame on you, Ardanis. cheating is a bad thing:)

Show you face, cowardly guest, so that I can slap it!

Cheating there is purely technical, since what I've offered for explanamation of the phenomena strikes me as fair and reasonable.

 

We were talking about theoretical situation of fight between wizard and warrior. In IWD that'd be fair duel (wizard can make himself invisible, teleport and stuff to evade fighter's blow) - but in BG2 it's very one-sided.

Personally, I prefer BG version. Going invisible and buffing up imo is cheap and at the very least less fair than PFMW.

I've played NWN2 and my FM had two duels with fighters. Quite disappointing it was, as it looked beyond silly, because I'm supposed to fight a duel, yet I have to run away like a coward instead of doing what FM is supposed to do - laugh at their feeble attacks while wasting their lives.

Edited January 7, 2011 by Ardanis

[yarpen]

I've played NWN2 and my FM had two duels with fighters. Quite disappointing it was, as it looked beyond silly, because I'm supposed to fight a duel, yet I have to run away like a coward instead of doing what FM is supposed to do - laugh at their feeble attacks while wasting their lives.

That's why we NEED cheap teleportation spell.

[D1Nonly]

Well, I personally have no problem if enemy wizards receive few more memorized spells than their level permits. This way their 'scroll' spells can also be interrupted as they should be, and the lack of extra loot is easily explained by items' fragility, like in the case with potions.

technicaly its not cheating as BG2 uses a nerfed memorizing table, or a hybrid between 2ed and 3rd ed?

[Demivrgvs]

Clerics

I have trouble keeping them alive long enough to use it - more precisely, I have trouble keeping them alive and their spells undisrupted long enough to use it. The long casting times for cleric spells just make things worse. ...

I don't think their spells casting time is the real issue, as they aren't much different from arcane's spells, but rather that mages under PfMW can cast undisturbed for a bunch of rounds, whereas cleric's spells can be easily disrupted. As I was suggesting before the lack of any "concentration check" is a serious problem.

 

What about asking A64 if it's possible to make spellcasting uninterruptable? (there's a flag for it in theory, but it's doesn't work) If it's doable, then we could easily re-introduce a more balanced and less random spell failure on hit (as per Wizard Slayer's attack).

 

On a side note, I can second the suggested use of Sanctuary, and I may add that I should have found a way to finally fix this spell too within SR V4 (though it requires some heavy lifting code), greatly enhancing its appeal/effectiveness.

 

 

PnP Non-detection

Something tells me you don't like "saves" and you prefer things to work as a "scissor, paper, rock game", am I wrong?

Guilty as charged, at least where the antimagic system is concerned. (I'm very unkeen on saves for a spell like Breach, because you end up having to carry silly numbers of them; this is less of an issue with non-detection.) I could try to offer a defences of the scissor-paper-rock debuff system, but ultimately I just see it as quite core to the way BG2 antimagic works, so I don't really want to mess with that within SCS.

Yep, but we're not speaking of antimagic attacks here but divination attacks, and Non-detection isn't a spell protection.

 

If you want something that temporary shields II but goes down in a single hit you could make Non-detection go down against the first divination attack without a save. That would make it a sort of anti-divination version of Spell Shield.

 

 

Breach

Hmm. Let me come at this from a game-balance perspective and from SCS mages' viewpoints. I use breach to drop PMW (etc) and Stoneskin, but I also use it to get rid of Chaotic Commands, Protection from Magic Energy, elemental protections, and Death Ward. It would be quite inconvenient to do without these effects. I don't really need it to be able to take down fire shields, blade barriers, or Armour spells. (Indeed, from the perspective of defending spellcasters against the PCs, it would be helpful if it didn't take those down.) That cuts across sectypes, of course, so one would need to think about in-game justification.

Eh, as I said I'd be quite against Breach affect "random" spells (aka cutting across sectypes) instead of following a well established concept.

 

As Ardanis says Pro Energy is a single target spell, are you sure that prioritizing Breach vs Pro Energy is the best thing to do when the other five party members (without counting summons) could still be vulnerable? The same can be said for CC and Death Ward.

 

What about the suggested tweak to make Pierce Magic (which is currently very underused) remove specific protections instead?

 

Can you remind me why Breach can't take down (say) 4 defences? Isn't there an opcode that strips one defence of a given type, and if so, can't one just do a shell spell trick and apply 4 copies of the spell?

Well, the original opcode 221 cannot be used to take down only a limited amount of spells, but in theory we might be able to find a workaround if we really think such solution would be better than any other one.

 

 

Spell Immunity

I second guest's definition of SI, "an inelegant solution". I have a "controversial", invented spell on one side, and various PnP, cool spells on the other. I know such things are irrelevant for SCS, but they are for SR imo.

 

 

Fighters vs mages

Can I remind you that this topic is supposed to be used for feedback and suggestions on spells rather than "class fights"? Anyway, the point is that BG is not PnP. Wizards unfortunately go from almost invincible under buffs, to as good as dead as soon as unbuffed. In PnP you could have fighters protect them (e.g. attacks of opportunity are really nasty) but within BG this is not a doable tactic.

 

That being said, both as a player and a modder I obviously don't want mages or fighter-mages to be "better" than true fighters, but this is another story, for another topic.

Edited January 7, 2011 by Demivrgvs

[Salk]

What about asking A64 if it's possible to make spellcasting uninterruptable? (there's a flag for it in theory, but it's doesn't work) If it's doable, then we could easily re-introduce a more balanced and less random spell failure on hit (as per Wizard Slayer's attack).

 

You realize that this would be a solution offered as part of ToBEx, right?

 

This is exactly why I was trying and promote ToBEx. It has the potential (and it has proved it already) to overcome engine limitations and engine bugs.

 

I realize also that I should have brought the discussion to where it maybe belongs: the Fixpack Forum. The only thing that held me from doing it was that ToBEx offers a very wide arrange of tweaks that have nothing to do with the concept of Fixpack.

[DavidW]

Still, I think that without all of those fancy magical defences game would turn back into original state where warriors were fighting each other and wizards were at first trying to make their warriors chances of win greater and to disable enemy wizard. Meh.

That's not the original state of BG2.

They weren't arogants who were sitting, drinking tea and saying "silly b****, your weapons cannot harm me".

 

"Indeed, my friends, none of you have any weapon that could hurt me" - Gandalf.

 

Sanctuary isn't terrible (and I probably underuse it). But the thing is, priests only have about one (at most) really good defensive buff they can put up anyway. They don't have the layered defences available to mages.

 

Maybe we could make a rule that enemy priests always come prebuffed with some of the longest lasting protections, particularly Shield of the Archons, Death Ward, Remove Fear, and Chaotic Commands (maybe even Skeleton Warriors, since they last for hours--I know I'd cast one every morning if I thought there was even the slightest chance I'd meet danger that day!). If their first move was Sanctuary followed by Blade Barrier and Physical Mirror, they could end up pretty well protected when they cast Gate or whatever. I also believe that UnHoly Word doesn't break Sanctuary. In any event, I might suggest that normally prebuffed clerics start with Regeneration active, which could dramatically increase survivability and reduce the necessity for potions (and more importantly, spell actions) during combat.

I use most of these, but ultimately it's still the case that one antimagic attack plus breach takes nearly all of it all down.

... I'm not theorising here: it's an experimental observation that enemy clerics (especially solo ones) go down very quickly in SCS, quicker than I'd like. (Though this isn't disastrous.)

 

 

Clerics

I have trouble keeping them alive long enough to use it - more precisely, I have trouble keeping them alive and their spells undisrupted long enough to use it. The long casting times for cleric spells just make things worse. ...

I don't think their spells casting time is the real issue, as they aren't much different from arcane's spells,

 

My observations are that it matters (again, this is behaviour noted in playthroughs and testing - I'm not theorising). In two ways, in fact: (i) at lower levels, the difference is pretty key: 2 seconds for a wizard's 2nd level attack spell, vs. most of the round for a cleric's; (ii) wizards have certain instant-cast moves (stoneskin, sequencers, contingency) unavailable to clerics.

 

What about asking A64 if it's possible to make spellcasting uninterruptable? (there's a flag for it in theory, but it's doesn't work) If it's doable, then we could easily re-introduce a more balanced and less random spell failure on hit (as per Wizard Slayer's attack).

Not for me: it's much too radical a change to the BG2 rule system. (And my comments about clerics are meant to illuminate certain aspects of the system, and also to invite suggestions as to how to use them better; they're not a crie de coeur and I don't feel something game-mechanical needs to change to work around this. In practice I'm resigned to not being able to use clerics solo without special arrangements; I can use them effectively as parts of groups.)

 

PnP Non-detection

Something tells me you don't like "saves" and you prefer things to work as a "scissor, paper, rock game", am I wrong?

Guilty as charged, at least where the antimagic system is concerned. (I'm very unkeen on saves for a spell like Breach, because you end up having to carry silly numbers of them; this is less of an issue with non-detection.) I could try to offer a defences of the scissor-paper-rock debuff system, but ultimately I just see it as quite core to the way BG2 antimagic works, so I don't really want to mess with that within SCS.

Yep, but we're not speaking of antimagic attacks here but divination attacks, and Non-detection isn't a spell protection.

 

If you want something that temporary shields II but goes down in a single hit you could make Non-detection go down against the first divination attack without a save. That would make it a sort of anti-divination version of Spell Shield.

 

Perhaps it's worth getting the parameters clearer here. Remember that SCS, unlike SR (legitimately) put's a high value on minimalism: I don't want to change the spell system more than I absolutely have to. (I'm in general amenable to incorporating other people's spell systems, but - as discussed before - mage buffing and debuffing is a special case.) The change I've felt forced to make is the AoE for antimagic, which in turn is a workaround for antimagic spells actually allowing targetting of invisible creatures, which was my ideal. At the time I couldn't see how to do it (actually I think now I might, which changes things, but I haven't had a chance to run tests). Other changes have to be measured against that baseline. (As always I'm perfectly happy to try to play nice, e.g. with SR's proposed silent overwrite of SI, where it doesn't mess with my scripts.)

 

As Ardanis says Pro Energy is a single target spell, are you sure that prioritizing Breach vs Pro Energy is the best thing to do when the other five party members (without counting summons) could still be vulnerable? The same can be said for CC and Death Ward.

Reasonably sure, yes. The balance between debuffing and attacking got tweaked many, many times in SCS testing; where it is now is largely a function of what seems to work in practice rather than of theory. It's doubtless not perfect (especially as the right level of debuffing is very situation-dependent), is probably a bit skewed towards high-level fights where most PCs will be heavily buffed, and could no doubt be refined. But I'm pretty sure I need access to a single-target buff-remover. (In late-game anti-mage fights, in earlier versions I wasn't using Breach enough, with the result that nearly all the party were immune to nearly all the enemy's attacks.)

 

What about the suggested tweak to make Pierce Magic (which is currently very underused) remove specific protections instead?

 

Pierce magic in particular is underused, but 6th level spell slots aren't (Death, PMW, Truesight, etc). 5th level is quite a convenient place for the relevant breaching spell to be: I think it makes really quite a big difference to have it at 6th level. I'm also reluctant to have to load up with two different lots of spells where previously I only needed one.

 

(& yes, I could get around this by using scrolls. But to do that for this one situation seems - to borrow a term from earlier - inelegant, and also to load the PC up with useful antimagic scrolls.)

 

On exploration of the issue, I'm starting to feel less confident that we really need to weaken Breach. Having said that, if you're really sold on breaking specific protections into Pierce Magic and leaving Breach for combat protections only, I can probably semi-incorporate that into SCS ("semi" because I'd cheat, and hot-swap Breach for Pierce Magic at casting time.) It would cost me two or three blocks, but that's tolerable.

 

Can you remind me why Breach can't take down (say) 4 defences? Isn't there an opcode that strips one defence of a given type, and if so, can't one just do a shell spell trick and apply 4 copies of the spell?

Well, the original opcode 221 cannot be used to take down only a limited amount of spells, but in theory we might be able to find a workaround if we really think such solution would be better than any other one.

I'm persuaded by Ardanis's objection.

 

Spell Immunity

I second guest's definition of SI, "an inelegant solution". I have a "controversial", invented spell on one side, and various PnP, cool spells on the other. I know such things are irrelevant for SCS, but they are for SR imo.

Also, elegance can be subjective...

[Demivrgvs]

PnP Non-detection

Perhaps it's worth getting the parameters clearer here. Remember that SCS, unlike SR (legitimately) put's a high value on minimalism: I don't want to change the spell system more than I absolutely have to. (I'm in general amenable to incorporating other people's spell systems, but - as discussed before - mage buffing and debuffing is a special case.) The change I've felt forced to make is the AoE for antimagic, which in turn is a workaround for antimagic spells actually allowing targetting of invisible creatures, which was my ideal. At the time I couldn't see how to do it (actually I think now I might, which changes things, but I haven't had a chance to run tests). Other changes have to be measured against that baseline. (As always I'm perfectly happy to try to play nice, e.g. with SR's proposed silent overwrite of SI, where it doesn't mess with my scripts.)

Do you really think that adding an AoE to many anti-magic spells is more minimalist than simply fixing Non-detection to work as per PnP?

 

I'm kinda curious about your possible workaround to make II creatures targetable, but on the other hand I'd dare to say that such tweak would be far from minimalist too. There's a reason you cannot directly target II creatures: you cannot see them. I know within BG you can, but within PnP you'd be able to spot them only for a split second when he/she attacks (much like what happens with BG's misleaded characters).

 

Perhaps I missed it, but what do you think about adding "invisible detection by script" to an existing divination spell (Ardanis suggested TS)? I personally am not so convinced about it, but it could work for you.

 

 

Breach

On exploration of the issue, I'm starting to feel less confident that we really need to weaken Breach. Having said that, if you're really sold on breaking specific protections into Pierce Magic and leaving Breach for combat protections only, I can probably semi-incorporate that into SCS ("semi" because I'd cheat, and hot-swap Breach for Pierce Magic at casting time.) It would cost me two or three blocks, but that's tolerable.

Well, I prefer to reach a consensus rather than creating this mess, thus if you don't want to alter Breach anymore I'm pretty sure I'd drop it too.

 

One thing I'd personally do anyway (whatever you decide) is to make Fireshields and Blade Barriers not affected by it (it seems right, and it doesn't affect your AI scripts judging by what you said). It would be great to remove "armor spells" from this list too (you seemed to agree), but I really cannot see how we could justify it if we keep the current "concept", thus they'd have to stay.

 

What about the suggested tweak to make Pierce Magic (which is currently very underused) remove specific protections instead?

Pierce Magic in particular is underused, but 6th level spell slots aren't (Death, PMW, Truesight, etc). 5th level is quite a convenient place for the relevant breaching spell to be: I think it makes really quite a big difference to have it at 6th level. I'm also reluctant to have to load up with two different lots of spells where previously I only needed one.

One more reason to use Mantles instead of PfMW! Jokes aside, point taken. I would still prefer it, as it makes an underused antimagic-attack much much more appealing, and at the same time makes Breach less overkill.

 

I think all of us more or less agree that right now a succesfull Breach is a death sentence for any mage (that's why making it not bypass Spell Deflection/Turning was great), as it removes tons of buffs at once (even high level ones). I'd love to make it work as per PnP (you know that Breach too is a 6th lvl spell there? ) and affect only ProWeapons spells but if you absolutely need it to counter specific protections, and another spell doing it is not enough for you, than I guess I have to keep it more or less as it is.

 

On a side note, Breach is an Alteration spell in PnP and I would actually like to have a second 5th lvl spell for that school (right now I have only Lower Resistance, which I had to add myself because for unknown reasons it was considered an Abjuration spell by BG! ), but it kinda interferes with the tweak that makes it not bypass SD/ST. Such tweak also make Breach unable to bypass SI:Abj (which is not bad considering 99% of Abjuration spells bypassed it), and making Brach an Alteration spell would restore vanilla's status (sort of). I suppose you like SI:Abj to stop Breach, am I wrong? Not to mention that without its other PnP feature (removing any PfMW-like natural ability from creatures such as liches, golems, vampires, etc.) the current concept is fine as an Abjuration.

 

@Yarpen, it would be quite interesting to make Breach work exactly as per PnP, but a) I fear it's almost impossible to do and b) it would drastically affect gameplay, with potentially disastrous consequences. For example allowing it to make liches vulnerable to normal weapons would almost surely break SCS AI that heavily relies in the trick of "exploiting" such innate feature in combo with PfMW.

 

 

Anti-Spell Immunity attack

@Guest_suttree_*, we don't need to add a new spell to work like that, vanilla's Spell Thrust with SCS added AoE already works like the perfect anti-SI spell, because a single use of ST wipes out each and every SI together with a bunch of other spell protections.

 

SR slightly nerf this by making ST remove a single spell protection at once (as any other-anti magic attack) but it still remains a great anti-SI tool, because ST ignores spell protections of 6th lvl or higher, and if there's any Spell Immunity on the target that's always the first thing ST is going to remove (unless there's ProNormal Weapons, but who the hell uses it?!?).

Edited January 7, 2011 by Demivrgvs

[yarpen]

@Yarpen, it would be quite interesting to make Breach work exactly as per PnP, but a) I fear it's almost impossible to do and b) it would drastically affect gameplay, with potentially disastrous consequences. For example allowing it to make liches vulnerable to normal weapons would almost surely break SCS AI that heavily relies in the trick of "exploiting" such innate feature in combo with PfMW.

Well... that'd need to move all of the weapon protections into other item which would be removed for certain time. We could even add SPECIFIC.ids entries to make it fully detectable by AI. But that'd need a lot of overhaul with creatures. But I still don't know how to balance it to not make it game-breaking. Maybe it shouldn't go trough Deflect/Turn Spells (it's not magic-protection affecting spell anymore, so why not?). Also, time when enemy's defences are breached should be very limited: 3 rounds?

 

Second way is I think more extreme. What about making weapon immunities detectable by SPECIFIC.ids and then... removing it via Secondary Types. And granting them back after 3 rounds? That'd be sick - I know.

Edited January 7, 2011 by yarpen

[DavidW]

PnP Non-detection

Do you really think that adding an AoE to many anti-magic spells is more minimalist than simply fixing Non-detection to work as per PnP?

 

I'm kinda curious about your possible workaround to make II creatures targetable, but on the other hand I'd dare to say that such tweak would be far from minimalist too. There's a reason you cannot directly target II creatures: you cannot see them. I know within BG you can, but within PnP you'd be able to spot them only for a split second when he/she attacks (much like what happens with BG's misleaded characters).

 

The general point is that minimalism is defined - for me - relative to BG2 itself. I'm not particularly bothered by fidelity or lack of fidelity to PnP. And in BG2 you can see II characters.

 

Perhaps I missed it, but what do you think about adding "invisible detection by script" to an existing divination spell (Ardanis suggested TS)? I personally am not so convinced about it, but it could work for you.

I think I'm with you on balance, though it's a neat idea.

 

Breach

One thing I'd personally do anyway (whatever you decide) is to make Fireshields and Blade Barriers not affected by it (it seems right, and it doesn't affect your AI scripts judging by what you said).

I think that's a good idea, sufficiently good that I might consider stealing it. (It does affect my AI scripts a little bit, but I can work around that.)

 

 

I think all of us more or less agree that right now a succesfull Breach is a death sentence for any mage (that's why making it not bypass Spell Deflection/Turning was great), as it removes tons of buffs at once (even high level ones).

I don't agree, actually. Of course it's seriously bad news for a wizard to be Breached, but contingencies and sequencers let the wizard get his defences back up quickly and keep attacking.

 

I suppose you like SI:Abj to stop Breach, am I wrong?

No, you're right.

 

For example allowing [breach] to make liches vulnerable to normal weapons would almost surely break SCS AI that heavily relies in the trick of "exploiting" such innate feature in combo with PfMW.

Absolutely.

[Demivrgvs]

PnP Non-detection

Do you really think that adding an AoE to many anti-magic spells is more minimalist than simply fixing Non-detection to work as per PnP?

 

I'm kinda curious about your possible workaround to make II creatures targetable, but on the other hand I'd dare to say that such tweak would be far from minimalist too. There's a reason you cannot directly target II creatures: you cannot see them. I know within BG you can, but within PnP you'd be able to spot them only for a split second when he/she attacks (much like what happens with BG's misleaded characters).

The general point is that minimalism is defined - for me - relative to BG2 itself. I'm not particularly bothered by fidelity or lack of fidelity to PnP. And in BG2 you can see II characters.

Fine with me, but even leaving aside PnP I don't see how altering many anti-magic spells is more minimalist than altering one spell (not to mention the latter is almost a fix).

 

True, you can see II creatures within BG, but you have text messages everywhere proving that not being able to directly target spells at them is still the intended behaviour as per PnP. How can removing such feature be a minimalist change?

 

 

Breach

One thing I'd personally do anyway (whatever you decide) is to make Fireshields and Blade Barriers not affected by it (it seems right, and it doesn't affect your AI scripts judging by what you said).

I think that's a good idea, sufficiently good that I might consider stealing it. (It does affect my AI scripts a little bit, but I can work around that.)

Cool.

 

Thinking about other reasons to justify why Fireshields and Blade Barrier shouldn't be affected by Breach (they are Invocations spells, meant to inflict damage) I may have found a way to justify "armor spells" and a bunch of other spells to not be affected by Breach even if you can't give up on ProEnergy and accept a more PnP Breach. What about making Breach remove only Abjuration spells? CC and Death Ward wouldn't be affected anymore though, do you need Breach to work against them too?

 

I'll try to think about other alternative solutions...though the more I think about it the more I'd like Breach to work only against PreWeapons spells a la PnP.