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[Ardanis]

Acid Sheath

AI casts two FSs at once, so unless it is allowed to use a spell not available to players, it needs a substitute.

I don't think PnP FS and AS are really so identical - one is a defensive spell (with a slight damage bonus), with a total of 100% resistance bonus, while the other only inflicts heavy damage to attackers.

 

Know Opponent / Detect Alignment

In theory I'd obviously like such a feature for a Divination spell, but is it really possible? How?

ProFire - opcode=206, resource=immune

KO - 146, immune; 146, firedesc

immune - 206, firedesc

firedesc - 139, ~Protection from Fire~

 

I mean, in a world where a single Breach removes EVERYTHING what could possibly serve knowing which specific/combat protection is still up?

Thankfully, we no longer can pierce every spell protection with a Breach, so sometimes it's more useful to toss a heavy damaging spell instead which the enemy is not immune to via ProElements.

Also, I still keep a slight hope that removing specific protections will be moved to Pierce Magic

[phordicus]

i know it's magic and all, but the two fire shields should cancel each other out. sometimes you just gotta make a managerial decision and go with what makes sense.

[DrAzTiK]

Spell Know opponent :

 

Do you think it could be possible to have a similar spell (at a highter level) witch could give some informations (thanks to a dialogue box) about enemy. (like RM, resistance to elements, class, race, etc...).

Many rpg have these sort of spells. It could be usefull especially to know RM.

 

 

I have played a game recently. I would have some feedback. Surely you are already aware of some pb related to some spells.

I am not so versed into balancing. I just say my feeling about what seems powerfull or too much weak to me .

Obvisouly, my spell book is a lot diversified with spell revisions for each arcane/divine spell level.

 

 

Chant, level 2 priest : I personally find the one round casting time duration a bit too much.

 

Divine power level 4 priest : A perfect spell for Viconia of course but I wonder if it's not a bit too much powerfull for a level 4 spell. It seems there is no more need to be multiclassed or dual fighter with this spell. I don't use at all similar spells of level 5. (witch are surely more appropriate for dual or multiclassed but Imo divine power remain a bit too powerfull)

I think bonus to STR should be removed : so much others clerics spell give bonus to STR).

 

 

Sol's searing Orb,level 6 : In BG vanilla, this spell bypass protection from magical weapons. I think it could make this spell more appealing.

 

Aerial servant , level 6 is maybe good but not a very exciting creature to summon.

 

Bolt of glory : maybe this spell should bypass RM to be more appealing. (coz many undead and demonic have a good RM and this spell is suposed to be used againt them)

 

Finger of death : at least in ToB, many cre are immune to death magic. Feeblemind or flesh to stone is ofen a better choice .

Even on a succefull save, Finger of seath should provides serious damages or something lethal.

 

Sphere of chaos is obvisously a powerfull spell now. (large AoE, duration, differents effects) I find this spell a bit too much powerfull. I also don't like very much the teleport field animation (this animation provide slowdown Imo ) but it's a matter of taste.

 

 

Web : you already know the pb of the most powerfull spell of the game

 

Vampiric Touch : I am not sure about it but considering it is more usefull for F/M and not plain mage, I wonder if the max 30hp drain should be cap sooner that level 20.

I am not sure at all here but actually I don't use this spell very much and I play with a F/M (Solaufein^^)

 

Confusion/chaos : Imo keep vanilla duration (6 rounds + 1 every 6levels). I think duration of spell with a large AoE should deserve a debate.

 

 

Power word sleep, kill, stun and symbol of death :

Considering it is impossible to know how many HP have an enemy, I never use theses spell. Power word kill is so weak in comparaison to wail of the banshee O_o

And again, death magic is not the worst big deal for many enemy.

 

Contingençies : need a huge work to make them appealing Imo. (I think it would be cool to have contingençies working like in SCS but without allowing attack spells).

==> just a fast idea. Maybe crazy or overpowed but surely I don't like vanilla contingençies.

 

About triggers/sequencers and contingençies : do you think it could be possible to make the spell inate in order to not have to memorize it and sleep after to have a free slot ( I think you understand me) . I don't like to sleep after set my triggers /sequencer just to have a free slot so I have ofen my trigger spells still memorized and it is a waste.

SCS mages are ofen in advantage here. But the pb is more the tedious task to sleep (anti RP most of the time) and reassign spells etc..

Without counting that characters loose memorized triggers after death. Very boring lol (rememoriz,sleep, reassign, re sleep)

==> hum....

 

 

About summons : I ofen use Monster summoning III (very nice spell now) and mummies. Earth Elemental is powerfull (maybe a bit too much) and exciting.

 

But surely others summons are good. The fact is that I find them not exciting sometimes.(invisible Stalker, aerial servant and some others but again it's surely a matter of taste )

Of course Demons et Deva are surely the most excitig summons but actually for some reasons I have not tested them.

But I know a big work is in preparation about summons for SRv4

 

 

Thank you for this wonderdull mod ^^

Edited March 5, 2011 by DrAzTiK

[Ardanis]

Spell Know opponent :

 

Do you think it could be possible to have a similar spell (at a highter level) witch could give some informations (thanks to a dialogue box) about enemy. (like RM, resistance to elements, class, race, etc...).

Many rpg have these sort of spells. It could be usefull especially to know RM.

It's been suggested before. Reading creatures stats and reporting them should be possible for an invisible summon, but it will require an awful lot of script to account for every value possible (iirc stats can't be read into variables and displayed via token), which may result in delays. I.e. can be done if really needed, but I wouldn't vouch for stability.

 

Reading active spells is different, since it relies purely on a couple of SPLs to work.

 

About triggers/sequencers and contingençies : do you think it could be possible to make the spell inate in order to not have to memorize it and sleep after to have a free slot ( I think you understand me) . I don't like to sleep after set my triggers /sequencer just to have a free slot so I have ofen my trigger spells still memorized and it is a waste.

It may also attend to recasting them in the heat of battle. Not that I'm particularily bothered by it, but Demi iirc somewhat was.

[Wyrd]

A thought about summoning spells, i find them to be slightly too good, especially fiends ones.

 

Also, a suggestion, provided that in SR V4, HLAS would be innate and selectable only once, what about substitute summon planetar/dark planetar with summon solar/dark solar?

 

I know it may seem a bit excessive, but i find "summon planetar" weaker than "gate" (the pit fiend is a nearly unstoppable killing machine, while the planetar not so much, and if you have a divine caster in the party the planetars' spells are not so useful).

 

According to P&P a Balor or a Pit fiend should be more powerful than a planetar (while an epic spell should be more powerful than a 9th level one by definition).

 

Since you will choose the Solar stat i don't think it will become an overpowered spell, especially in a perspective of a slightly nerf of summoning spells.

 

A (nerfed) version of summon planetar could become a 9th level spell or the gate's summon if you are a good caster ? (safer than the balor/pit fiend but weaker).

Edited March 5, 2011 by Wyrd

[Demivrgvs]

Chant

I personally find the one round casting time duration a bit too much.

This spell is really powerful for its lvl, in fact it works as a higher lvl PnP spell, Prayer. It needs a proper drawback to balance its effectiveness: in PnP this spell requires concentration (BG's manual says the caster is slowed and cannot cast during Chant's duration, but I don't remeber anymore if vanilla's spell really did that) but I opted for a very high casting time, because it's way easier to implement and much more "player friendly".

 

 

Divine Power

A perfect spell for Viconia of course but I wonder if it's not a bit too much powerfull for a level 4 spell. It seems there is no more need to be multiclassed or dual fighter with this spell. I don't use at all similar spells of level 5. (witch are surely more appropriate for dual or multiclassed but Imo divine power remain a bit too powerfull)

I think bonus to STR should be removed : so much others clerics spell give bonus to STR).

I'm really sympathetic to this instead, though the whole "this spell works better on true clerics than multiclassed ones" is intentional, and I like it. I'll think about it.

 

 

Sol's searing Orb

In BG vanilla, this spell bypass protection from magical weapons. I think it could make this spell more appealing.

Actually its vanilla version doesn't bypass PfMW (the orb is considered a +6 weapon), but it bypasses Absolute Immunity (this spell really sucks in vanilla). That being said, I obviously agree it should bypass them but implementing it is kinda complicated (though doable).

 

Long story short, as long as we can do it without hurting the AI (afaik it never uses it) I'd actually remove the whole "create a weapon like item" part, and make it work much like a normal spell with a single target.

 

 

Aerial servant

is maybe good but not a very exciting creature to summon.

It's rellly hard to balance summons. In this case you have a Air Elemental with lowered combat abilities, but improved magical defences (its permanent II makes it non-targetable by spellcasters). On paper it seems fine to me, but I may be wrong.

 

 

Bolt of glory

maybe this spell should bypass RM to be more appealing. (coz many undead and demonic have a good RM and this spell is suposed to be used againt them)

Assuming you mean MR (aka magic resistance) this spell already bypasses it, though I just noticed the description doesn't mention it (which is strange, I was sure it did).

 

 

Finger of death

at least in ToB, many cre are immune to death magic. Feeblemind or flesh to stone is ofen a better choice .

Even on a succefull save, Finger of seath should provides serious damages or something lethal.

I'm sympathetic to this too, in fact I though about making its save penalty less severe, but increasing the damage dealt on a successful save.

 

 

Sphere of Chaos

is obvisously a powerfull spell now. (large AoE, duration, differents effects) I find this spell a bit too much powerfull. I also don't like very much the teleport field animation (this animation provide slowdown Imo ) but it's a matter of taste.

Well, the animation is a leftover of vanilla's spell, but if we prefer to remove it I'm not strictly attached to it. Regarding the spell's effectiveness, I know it's powerful, I wanted it to be, but at the same time I thought that allowing a save each round balanced it a little (mid-high lvl opponents more often than not shouldn't fail consecutive saves). Personally I think that lowering the save penalty is a simple way to balance it: I planned to lower it from -6 to -4 (because of the new cap), but if most of you think it needs a more drastical nerf let me know.

 

 

Web

you already know the pb of the most powerfull spell of the game

I know. I'm kinda pesuaded the whole "turn it into a sort an Improved Entangle" is unpractical (it involves too many patches to items, spells, and creatures imo), thus I planned to simply make it not stack with itself (stacking Web spells are really unbalancing) and perhaps removing the save penalty from it.

 

Note: some players were against me preventing it from stacking, but I really don't understand why I shouldn't make it non-stackable considering its most similar spell, Entagle, already is non-stackable. I actually think it should have been a default setting of this spell, without even the need to be mentioned in the spell's description (much like there's no such mention within Entangle's description).

 

 

Vampiric Touch

I am not sure about it but considering it is more usefull for F/M and not plain mage, I wonder if the max 30hp drain should be cap sooner that level 20.

I am not sure at all here but actually I don't use this spell very much and I play with a F/M (Solaufein^^)

I kinda like mid-low lvl spells to have an earlier cap, but in this case I don't know if say 30hp at 12th lvl would be balanced (probably not). Thus an earlier cap may actually need a lower hp value too.

 

 

Confusion/Chaos

Imo keep vanilla duration (6 rounds + 1 every 6levels). I think duration of spell with a large AoE should deserve a debate.

There's very little difference between 10 rounds and your suggested rate (which is 7 rounds by default). If a character is disabled for 7 rounds he/she is pretty much doomed or at least excluded from the entire fight, in fact there was a discussion about lowering the duration to 5 rounds.

 

It's somewhat unpractical to do, but I was thinking to suggest making Chaos more unique by adding thaco/AC penalties (considering it a more severe confusionary status than its lower lvl spell version). Does it make sense? I'm aware it would kinda overlap with SR's Emotion (though the latter could be tweaked too).

 

 

Power Word Sleep, Kill, stun and Symbol of Death

Considering it is impossible to know how many HP have an enemy, I never use theses spell. Power word kill is so weak in comparaison to wail of the banshee O_o

And again, death magic is not the worst big deal for many enemy.

Maybe you haven't noticed but I already addressed this for PW:Sleep, which already affects anyone (it now works even if hp>20, allowing a save), and I planned to do the same for PW:Kill (if hp <90 it kills without save, if hp >90 target must save or die).

 

For Symbol of Death I suggested to turn it into a sort of Improved (party friendly) Skull Trap, adding magic damage as secondary effect. I have no better idea, thus feel free to suggest one, but surely I cannot make its death effect affect anyone, because that would turn this spell into an Improved Wail of the Banshee (which would obviously be uber OP).

 

 

Contingencies and Triggers

On one hand I'm sympathetic to this, otoh turning them into innates usable at-will is both a drastical change to a well established PnP rule and a HUGE boost to mages, who already dominate the game!

 

I'd like to hear more opinions on this matter while I think about it myself a little more.

 

 

Summons

This is probably the aspect which we will try to improve the most for V4, as it seems we planned to add quite a few new summons, and refine the stats of many pre-existing ones (e.g. elementals are indeed amongst the most effective summons, probably too much, and they will be slightly nerfed, though the only noticeable change is going to be lowered hit points imo).

 

 

Celestials vs Fiends

I've already discussed this. The equivalent of Baalors and Pit Fiends are indeed Solars (and not Planetars), but the former are not "subjugated" to the caster, while (fallen) celestials are trusty allies (they never turn against you, and they never cast unfriendly spells, unlike demons who can cast a Meteor Swarm on your head even if they side with you), and fully controllable (you can select them and give any order to them yourself, which is a huge advantage).

 

Long story short, I might lower Fiends' power lvl, but surely I won't replace Planetars with Solar, because the former are already a tad too powerful!

Edited March 7, 2011 by Demivrgvs

[DavidW]

Sol's searing Orb

In BG vanilla, this spell bypass protection from magical weapons. I think it could make this spell more appealing.

Actually its vanilla version doesn't bypass PfMW (the orb is considered a +6 weapon), but it bypasses Absolute Immunity (this spell really sucks in vanilla). That being said, I obviously agree it should bypass them but implementing it is kinda complicated (though doable).

 

Long story short, as long as we can do it without hurting the AI (afaik it never uses it) I'd actually remove the whole "create a weapon like item" part, and make it work much like a normal spell with a single target.

It does use it if SR is installed (as of the latest version of SCS).

 

Sphere of Chaos

is obvisously a powerfull spell now. (large AoE, duration, differents effects) I find this spell a bit too much powerfull. I also don't like very much the teleport field animation (this animation provide slowdown Imo ) but it's a matter of taste.

Well, the animation is a leftover of vanilla's spell, but if we prefer to remove it I'm not strictly attached to it.

It's nice to know where it is, though.

 

Contingencies and Triggers

On one hand I'm sympathetic to this, otoh turning them into innates usable at-will is both a drastical change to a well established PnP rule and a HUGE boost to mages, who already dominate the game!

 

I'd like to hear more opinions on this matter while I think about it myelf a little more.

 

Does it actually boost mages? It only makes a difference in situations which are time-critical, i.e. where resting twice isn't an option. There are few or none of those in the game.

[Shaitan]

Chant

I think casting chant in IWD or was it IWD2 made your priest slow. That was a fine drawback to a good spell.

[Ardanis]

Web

My discontent with non-stacking is due to this restristion not extending to other area spells. Unless Entangle, Storms, Clouds, etc. aren't cumulative too, it will look weird. Also, AI is known to try and take advantage of stackability.

 

Contingencies and Triggers

I do not think it is a problem if wizards dominate the game. By definition, they should so. And altogether, it in no way suggests they can have an easy life without a fighter escort. That is, unless they rest around every corner. In my own vision, the escort drags itself through the dungeon, dispatching lesser foes, and the wizard makes an intelligent use of magic to help deal with tougher ones. Then everybody counts the loot, and goes to the nearest city to rest.

 

On the other side, nobody forces to rest after setting triggers ready. Hmm...

Edited March 7, 2011 by Ardanis

[Dakk]

Chant

I think casting chant in IWD or was it IWD2 made your priest slow. That was a fine drawback to a good spell.

It actually put me off using it at all (in IWD). Move slow and can't cast any other spell during the duration? No thanks.

[Demivrgvs]

Sol's searing Orb

Long story short, as long as we can do it without hurting the AI (afaik it never uses it) I'd actually remove the whole "create a weapon like item" part, and make it work much like a normal spell with a single target.

It does use it if SR is installed (as of the latest version of SCS).

Ohh, cool. Do you prefer it to remain untouched then?

 

Contingencies and Triggers

Does it actually boost mages? It only makes a difference in situations which are time-critical, i.e. where resting twice isn't an option. There are few or none of those in the game.

Ok, you're right, I'll re-formulate my statement: making them innates usable at will is a huge boost for roleplayers. For all other players such tweak simply removes the annoying routine of resting twice, and implementing it actually makes both roleplayers and power players on the same ground.

 

I guess this tweak would make no difference for SCS because you already doesn't count contingencies and triggers for AI controlled mages' spell per day limit right? Thus implementing it would actually be a plus for roleplayers in this case, because they wouldn't feel "cheated" by SCS relying so much and so easily on them. Correct me if I'm wrong.

 

@Ardanis, I'm not at home to check it right now, were you saying that making them innates prevents us from flagging contingencies and triggers as "not usable during combat"? I'd be pretty annoyed by this, though having them their long 1 round casting time partially makes up for it anyway.

 

Web

My discontent with non-stacking is due to this restristion not extending to other area spells. Unless Entangle, Storms, Clouds, etc. aren't cumulative too, it will look weird. Also, AI is known to try and take advantage of stackability.

Entangle is non-stacking because of its cumulative thac0/AC penalties, the other spells are not. You have a point, but we can assume that a single Web spell already fills the area with the maximum amount of webs, and casting another one doesn't add anything, it just replace the other webs with new ones. No?

 

AI takes advantage of multiple Web spells? Really?

 

That being said, what's you position with this spell then? Don't you agree it's OP in its current state?

 

What about removing its -2 (-1 within SR) save penalty but adding an unavoidable entangle-like effect? In PnP creatures successfully saving are still entangled, but we could limit it to a slow-like effect (a la SR's Entangle).

 

Chant

I think casting chant in IWD or was it IWD2 made your priest slow. That was a fine drawback to a good spell.

It actually put me off using it at all (in IWD). Move slow and can't cast any other spell during the duration? No thanks.

I agree with Dakk, if casting Chant effectively removes my cleric from combat for 1 turn (because no spellcasting + slow means he/she can do pretty much nothing) I'd never use that spell in my entire life (which is exactly why I never used it in IWD). Edited March 8, 2011 by Demivrgvs

[Raj]

roleplayers.

 

Join the club

 

AI takes advantage of multiple Web spells? Really?

 

SCS2 Elder Orbs: Minor sequencer 2x web.

 

 

Edit: Fwiw I changed chant casting time to 2 - mostly for standardization, spell level = casting time for almost all spells, with the notable exceptions everybody knows - and never regret it: with longer time priests always get interrupted or I felt that they were wasting their limited combat prowess. SCS AI casts prayer istantly during the prebuff routine, or tries to cast it during the battle effectively wasting a round so there is no middle ground.

 

Cool thing about SR is that it's heavily customizable w/o crippling the AI, that's why I have my 'own' SR and stopped posting feedback here, nonetheless I appreciate all your work.

 

 

 

Which of TB#Tweaks does SR include? Imprisonment/FtS/Nature's Beauty?[/]

Edited March 8, 2011 by Raj

[DavidW]

Sol's searing Orb

Long story short, as long as we can do it without hurting the AI (afaik it never uses it) I'd actually remove the whole "create a weapon like item" part, and make it work much like a normal spell with a single target.

It does use it if SR is installed (as of the latest version of SCS).

Ohh, cool. Do you prefer it to remain untouched then?

For preference, yes. (Otherwise high-level priests will cast it at themselves.)

 

Contingencies and Triggers

Does it actually boost mages? It only makes a difference in situations which are time-critical, i.e. where resting twice isn't an option. There are few or none of those in the game.

Ok, you're right, I'll re-formulate my statement: making them innates usable at will is a huge boost for roleplayers. For all other players such tweak simply removes the annoying routine of resting twice, and implementing it actually makes both roleplayers and power players on the same ground.

 

I guess this tweak would make no difference for SCS because you already doesn't count contingencies and triggers for AI controlled mages' spell per day limit right? Thus implementing it would actually be a plus for roleplayers in this case, because they wouldn't feel "cheated" by SCS relying so much and so easily on them. Correct me if I'm wrong.

That's correct (with the proviso that I'm not sure the roleplayers should feel cheated: for most wizards in BG2 there's little reason to think that they use their sequencers every day, so chances are they last refreshed them several rests ago.)

 

@Ardanis, I'm not at home to check it right now, were you saying that making them innates prevents us from flagging contingencies and triggers as "not usable during combat"? I'd be pretty annoyed by this, though having them their long 1 round casting time partially makes up for it anyway.

If you really want to, get the spell to summon an invisible creature that kills or otherwise inconveniences the player if it sees enemies. (But since it's fairly obviously an exploit, you could just put "cannot be cast in combat" in the description and rely on the honour system.)

 

 

AI takes advantage of multiple Web spells? Really?

The only time is beholders, yes (since they float above webs and so are immune to them). I'm not horrified by losing the ability to do it, though.

[Salk]

Contingencies and Triggers

 

I am not a fan (understatment) of Contingencies (and even less Sequencers). If it was my decision they would be swept away from the game. The proposed change does not seem to make much different to its present situation so I am rather neutral about it.

 

Web

 

Instead of removing the malus to the saving throw, I would keep things the way they are but allow for melee-only attacks with severe THAC0 penalty (-4 or -5).

Edited March 8, 2011 by Salk

[Ardanis]

Contingencies and Triggers

@Ardanis, I'm not at home to check it right now, were you saying that making them innates prevents us from flagging contingencies and triggers as "not usable during combat"? I'd be pretty annoyed by this, though having them their long 1 round casting time partially makes up for it anyway.

Nope, more like 1/day use.

 

Web

The web effect can be a drawback too, when fighting trolls. Bastards refuse to fall over when webbed and remain immortal.

 

For a nerf, I'd reduce duration to 6 rounds.

Instead of removing the malus to the saving throw, I would keep things the way they are but allow for melee-only attacks with severe THAC0 penalty (-4 or -5).

I'm unsure only how the resistance to missiles is justified. There're not huge bulging roots obstructing the shot line.

Imo 2-3 AC per Web should suffice.

 

Entangle

Either I have no hotfixes, or it's not there yet, but it seems to stack.

 

Chant

SCS AI casts prayer istantly during the prebuff routine, or tries to cast it during the battle effectively wasting a round so there is no middle ground.

With concentration check, they have far greater chance to succeed. Edited March 8, 2011 by Ardanis