IR V3 - List of changes from V2 to V3

[Demivrgvs]

With little to do at work I'm again updating the Item Index. I've done axes, bastard swords, and bows/arrows, but I'm gonna do a little more this afternoon (Edit: in fact the index is now updated up to flails!). Btw, I'm updating them without my PC, thus I'm simply following my change-log on this topic's first post (and my memory). Long story short, the current Item Index may not be 100% accurate (probably 99% ), but I'll do a second round check up as soon as I get my connection back at home (hopefully within a week).

 

Amulet/Cloak of the Shield

I'm more inclined to vote for +2 bonus than for setting AC to 5.

In that case, should amulet and cloak effects not stuck? Balance-wise it shouldn't be a problem, +4 AC is indeed huge, but the character would give up 2 slots just for that instead of using much more powerful amulets/cloaks.

 

Nymph Cloak

it’s not a copy of NC now; NC is much more powerful!

IIRC I've already said it in the Item Upgrades thread. NC is probably overpowered for BG1, where you can obtain it almost as soon as you enter Baldur's Gate (Chapter 5). My suggestion was to tone it down a little, and then offer to upgrade NC to it's current v3's state.

It may be a good idea.

 

Dragon Armors

The CoC ability makes the White one a crow of the same color. Three other armors have no such abilities.

The +5 enchantment, lower encumbrance (thus even more AC), 50% resistance, usability by druids/beast masters - imo that's more than enough.

That's pretty much what I think (strange eh?).

 

Arrow of Fire/Ice +1

Don't like how they are identical now.

Fire - save vs breath or 1d4

Ice - 1d2, no save

Mmm...I have a point, but I'm not terribly bothered by this. I know we made Acid Arrows quite different, but fire-cold is the classic "opposite" element, and I kinda like having them keep the same "behaviour" with only opposite element. Is it just me?

 

EDIT

Damn, I've posted here, then followed by the link, then came back and edited the post. Guess what, I've edited Demi's one, not mine, because the page didn't update

ahahah

[Ardanis]

Amulet/Cloak of the Shield

They can be prohibited to be worn together (180th opcode, used on vanilla Ring of Wizardry).

 

Arrow of Fire/Ice +1

The abundance of fire resistance in game makes ice arrows slightly more useful. Only greater undead (mummies, vampires, liches) are generally resistant to cold. SCS' wizards also favor ProFire.

Other than that, I'd rather to keep a single stack of 40 arrows than two of 20, if they were to be identical.

[Quester]

I agree with Ardanis about the Arrows of Ice/Fire +1. It's more interesting if they're not exactly the same.

 

Just out of curiosity...what's actually left to do before packing up the final v3 and releasing it? It sort of seems like it's going to teeter at 99.5% indefinitely.

[Salk]

Just out of curiosity...what's actually left to do before packing up the final v3 and releasing it? It sort of seems like it's going to teeter at 99.5% indefinitely.

 

Well, for one thing I do wish IR will be refined in order to have better compatibility with BGT.

[aVENGER_(RR)]

A small suggestion for IR's Cloak of Mirroring. Through my work on aTweaks' Nereids I discovered that the 50% miss chance works better if you use param 2 = 7 for opcode #232. That way, a mirror image triggers when an attack is attempted (i.e. before the actual hit lands) which makes it especially potent against missile weapons.

 

BTW, aTweaks' Displacement implementation was directly inspired by IR's Cloak of Mirroring. Kudos for pioneering the approach, Demi.

[Demivrgvs]

Arrows of Ice/Fire +1

I agree with Ardanis about the Arrows of Ice/Fire +1. It's more interesting if they're not exactly the same.

Well I'm certainly not against variety, it's just that I don't see an easy way to handle it unless we want to seriously alter them.

 

Ardani's solution wouldn't be a good solution for me, because I'd surely always prefer a fixed 1d2 over 1d4 with an easy save to avoid all elemental damage, especially within BG2. A save for half damage could make the choice harder (e.g. fixed 1d3 vs halveable 2d2) but then I wouldn't see enough difference to matter. Am I wrong? Mmm...

 

If you ask me, if we really want them to be different, then we need to make them truly different, like making cold arrows less damaging but with a limited slow effect enbedded, or making fire arrow set target on fire (though the latter would make them too similar to V3's Acid Arrow imo). My doubt in this case would be that these arrows are considered relatively common, and thus shouldn't look too much "special".

 

Neither solutions truly convince me, but if I have to vote I'd surely opt for the "more drastic" solution. What do you think?

 

Cloak of Mirroring

A small suggestion for IR's Cloak of Mirroring. Through my work on aTweaks' Nereids I discovered that the 50% miss chance works better if you use param 2 = 7 for opcode #232. That way, a mirror image triggers when an attack is attempted (i.e. before the actual hit lands) which makes it especially potent against missile weapons.

Interesting. I'll surely test it to see if it ends up working better than my current solution. Thanks.

 

BTW, aTweaks' Displacement implementation was directly inspired by IR's Cloak of Mirroring. Kudos for pioneering the approach, Demi.

 

V3 Release

Just out of curiosity...what's actually left to do before packing up the final v3 and releasing it? It sort of seems like it's going to teeter at 99.5% indefinitely.

For what concerns items and components there's nothing left to do (except the always possible new changes like the ones discussed above), but I think we have still a bunch of thing that are not ready, like a more accurate compatibility with BGT (though afaik the current compatibility is far from bad), or an eventual inclusion of ToBEx.

 

Then, it also really doesn't help I have no internet connection on my home PC since a bunch of weeks, and that Ardanis had similar issues since even more! I'm sorry, but I cannot give you a precise release date, everything could be done in a relatively short time but it could be days as much as weeks.

[Ardanis]

Arrows

Fire arrows are more common than ice ones, so they shouldn't be stronger. The suggested save vs bonus damage is also not so much hindering in earlier parts of the game, BG1 in particular, and also further differentiates it from Acid arrows.

 

Ice ones - why not the slow indeed. In fact, arrows are the most numerous in types, and unlike bolts or darts there is not a single debilitating one (unless we count rare and expensive Dispelling).

[Salk]

I am with Demi here.

 

The current implementation of Fire and Ice arrows is fine to me. I'd keep them unchanged.

[Shaitan]

How about compatavility with EasyTutu?

[Demivrgvs]

Just wanted to say that I finished to update the Item Index which now finally covers all V3 weapons. Let me know if you see anything not 100% accurate, but I'll surely re-check everything asap starting from tomorrow when I'll finally have my connection back at home!!

[Ardanis]

You've mixed in Weapon Changes' stats. Not that it really matters, though.

 

How about compatavility with EasyTutu?

I'll try and see, but keep in mind that Tutu platform currently is way beyond my knowledge.

 

Revised Critical Hit Aversion

As we agreed, only helmets should keep the ability?

[Demivrgvs]

Item Index

You've mixed in Weapon Changes' stats. Not that it really matters, though.

Yep, I used revised stats for all weapons (e.g. greatswords deals 2D6 dmg instead of vanilla's 1D10). You know I consider that component mandatory in my mind. As you say it doesn't matter much, but between the two solutions I prefer to have online descriptions of how IR weapons are supposed to work.

 

Edit: Btw, I obviously used revised stats for shields too back then!

 

TuTu compatibility

How about compatavility with EasyTutu?

I'll try and see, but keep in mind that Tutu platform currently is way beyond my knowledge.

Didn't Mike sent you his work on TuTu and BGT compatibility? I don't remember anymore if he did it or not...

 

I still have part of the BGT compatibility work to do instead (e.g. overlapping items and BGT items using non-vanilla filenames), sorry.

 

Revised Critical Hit Aversion

As we agreed, only helmets should keep the ability?

Actually my dream was to remove it completely from pretty much everything because right now critical hits don't work on 90% of your opponents. That would also give us a shining new feature to assign to certain items (e.g. Endiku's Plate) and eventually even spells (e.g. SR's Ghost Form).

 

Assuming my vision is too drastical even removing critical hit immunity from Ioune Stones and similar non-helmet items would indeed be a great new feature within IR imo. That being said, we may have to check cases of NPCs which are using a non-helmet item but are supposed to be immune to critical hits.

[Ardanis]

Item Index

Btw, bows/xbows currently deal extra enchantment damage too, not just ammo. Or omit it from WC?

 

TuTu compatibility

Didn't Mike sent you his work on TuTu and BGT compatibility? I don't remember anymore if he did it or not...

He did, but it is not exactly IR-for-Tutu. Thus the issue stands.

 

Revised Critical Hit Aversion

Actually my dream was to remove it completely from pretty much everything because right now critical hits don't work on 90% of your opponents. That would also give us a shining new feature to assign to certain items (e.g. Endiku's Plate) and eventually even spells (e.g. SR's Ghost Form).

I know But since that involves some more work, a cheaper way to take advantage of this ToBEx feature is to bear with helmets only.

 

That being said, we may have to check cases of NPCs which are using a non-helmet item but are supposed to be immune to critical hits.

I was thinking to exclude unmovable items with no animation (HELMNOAN).

[Demivrgvs]

Item Index

Btw, bows/xbows currently deal extra enchantment damage too, not just ammo. Or omit it from WC?

I forgot to add those lines, will do asap now that I'm finally able to re-check the whole index from my PC.

 

TuTu compatibility

Didn't Mike sent you his work on TuTu and BGT compatibility? I don't remember anymore if he did it or not...

He did, but it is not exactly IR-for-Tutu. Thus the issue stands.

Ok, I just hope his code can help you to handle this matter without too much hassle.

 

Revised Critical Hit Aversion

That being said, we may have to check cases of NPCs which are using a non-helmet item but are supposed to be immune to critical hits.

I was thinking to exclude unmovable items with no animation (HELMNOAN).

It should be fine. We'll take a more in depth look into critical hit immunities for either an update of IR or if we'll ever really work on something like Creature Revisions (though aVENGER works and planned projects seem to make a CR mod relatively redundant).

[Demivrgvs]

Item Index

Btw, bows/xbows currently deal extra enchantment damage too, not just ammo. Or omit it from WC?

I forgot to add those lines, will do asap now that I'm finally able to re-check the whole index from my PC.

Done.

 

I've also added a new post dedicated to Potions within the Item Index topic (I forgot how many potions we have in BG, it took me ages to write down that huge post even using tons of copy/paste!). Now the whole item index should be pretty much fine.

 

@Ardanis, how things are going on your side?