Feedback for Version 11

[DavidW]

I got some buggs in my game. SOme of them are maybe not related to SCS II :

 

 

I am only at chapter 2

 

Gaius (the mage in sewers of temple distric) use a contengencie (stoneskin) as soon the fight start. (a waste considering all mage already have stoneskin)

Nevaziah (liche who got the nether scroll) cast stoneskin at the begining of the fight . (he's protected from magical weapons thanks to a trigger but it's surely a waste)

 

OK, looks like something may be wrong with stoneskin detection; will chase.

 

 

Re protection from fire: I'll see if it happens on my system; if not, it may be a compatibility problem.

 

Minicul meteor melf is never listed in the list of prebuff. (but this spell works, all mage I have meet shoot meteor)

It's not supposed to, as it's not a prebuff. It's got a 24-hour duration; wizards are assumed to have cast it on creation.

 

 

 

Conster in my game try to dispell my protection, then cast breach, then true sight : surely good for a mage in a team but not for a solo mage Imho, , solo mages can't offord the luxury of dispell ennemy defences at the start of the fight.

 

As always, it's hard to work these things out; half the time, they can't afford the luxury of not dispelling enemy defences!

[Demivrgvs]

I have a problem more important in my game : I wonder if some long time prebuffs protection from elements works correcly. I have do a test with conster and Gaius : Therey are supposed to have protection from fire (level3) memorized but these spell don't appears in prebuff list and after some test, in seems that both are not protected from fire at all . (and it's surely happen for others mage/priest). I wonder if it's not a pb of incompatibility with spell revisions. (these spell are supposed to be level5 with SR howerver SCS II have them memorized at level 3 in spellboook, in theory in surely should work but maybe it can coz some problem ?)

I say this coz Protection from magical energy always appears in prebuff list and works correctly .(level 6 as well in vanilla and SP. ( It seems protection from electricity/acid with are level 5 well in vanilla and SR also works correctly but I can't confirm)

Well, there's only one thing I can think of that may cause the issue... SR currently removes the school flag from the 3rd lvl version of these spells, but keeps them working for the AI making the 3rd lvl version cast the 5th lvl one. This is surely not a problem in normal circumstances, but if SCS re-write a mage's spellbook using the school as a parameter to assign them, it may skip/ignore these two spells. If something like that happens I can fix the compatibility issue on my side re-assigning the school to the "unused" spells, but then the optional "Remove Disabled Spells" exe patching component would be mandatory instead of optional.

[DavidW]

I have a problem more important in my game : I wonder if some long time prebuffs protection from elements works correcly. I have do a test with conster and Gaius : Therey are supposed to have protection from fire (level3) memorized but these spell don't appears in prebuff list and after some test, in seems that both are not protected from fire at all . (and it's surely happen for others mage/priest). I wonder if it's not a pb of incompatibility with spell revisions. (these spell are supposed to be level5 with SR howerver SCS II have them memorized at level 3 in spellboook, in theory in surely should work but maybe it can coz some problem ?)

I say this coz Protection from magical energy always appears in prebuff list and works correctly .(level 6 as well in vanilla and SP. ( It seems protection from electricity/acid with are level 5 well in vanilla and SR also works correctly but I can't confirm)

Well, there's only one thing I can think of that may cause the issue... SR currently removes the school flag from the 3rd lvl version of these spells, but keeps them working for the AI making the 3rd lvl version cast the 5th lvl one. This is surely not a problem in normal circumstances, but if SCS re-write a mage's spellbook using the school as a parameter to assign them, it may skip/ignore these two spells. If something like that happens I can fix the compatibility issue on my side re-assigning the school to the "unused" spells, but then the optional "Remove Disabled Spells" exe patching component would be mandatory instead of optional.

 

SCS assigns the spell by codename: i.e., it assigns the spell "spwi319" to the mage. It then casts it by IDS entry, i.e

 

IF

HaveSpell(WIZARD_PROTECTION_FROM_FIRE)

THEN

...

END

 

Will that cause problems?

[Demivrgvs]

SCS assigns the spell by codename: i.e., it assigns the spell "spwi319" to the mage. It then casts it by IDS entry, i.e

 

IF

HaveSpell(WIZARD_PROTECTION_FROM_FIRE)

THEN

...

END

 

Will that cause problems?

I really can't imagine any problem then. SR's spwi319 still works as intended even if disabled for players (the AI is slightly advantaged because it can memorize it in a 3rd lvl slot instead of 5th), and I haven't changed the IDS entry exactly because I wanted the AI to still be able to use it.

[DavidW]

SCS assigns the spell by codename: i.e., it assigns the spell "spwi319" to the mage. It then casts it by IDS entry, i.e

 

IF

HaveSpell(WIZARD_PROTECTION_FROM_FIRE)

THEN

...

END

 

Will that cause problems?

I really can't imagine any problem then. SR's spwi319 still works as intended even if disabled for players (the AI is slightly advantaged because it can memorize it in a 3rd lvl slot instead of 5th), and I haven't changed the IDS entry exactly because I wanted the AI to still be able to use it.

 

... in which case it's either an SCS problem or a local problem for the user. I'll chase it when I get a chance (for which read: once the Oxford admissions season is over)

[Guest Guest_Loz_*]

Another thing about the azuredge is that it does not actually function like this in the unmodded game. It is the G3 fixpack that changes it to act as per the description. While I do appreciate bug fixes, some things like this which drastically affect game balance I think might be better in optional components. Another annoying part of the fixpack in the free action "fix". Yes, its possible free action is supposed to stop haste, but the fact remains after installing the fixpack an item like the FoA +5 which was once everybodies most beloved weapon is now a weapon that has an effect which makes it too annoying to equip. Also interesting is that bioware DID do this with some free action items (such as the ring IIRC) so i'm not sure they intended the flail restrict haste like this. To me, they intended those late game ToB items to have obscene advantages without disadvantages and the FoA is an iconic weapon upgraded from SoA. Anyway i've gone a little off-topic here, but I thought i'd mention that its not entirely vanilla game behaviour we're seeing when some of these weapons are concerned, some of these weapons are not the same as the ones that were tested by the QA team when balancing the game(azuredge good example, I believe carsmomyrs dispel is also improved as to be more consistent). Planetars in SoA are another example of something bioware probably didn't think too much about.

 

P.S. I am absolutely sure someone is going to tell me I can go into the files and make changes to the fixpack myself - I know, i read the readme and i may do this at some point. However I do not know what every single fix is, nor do I wish to go through the entire document studying each one to see if I agree with it. I have accepted the package as a whole as it does fix a lot of things, and is required for other great mods such as this one.

[Demivrgvs]

Another thing about the azuredge is that it does not actually function like this in the unmodded game. It is the G3 fixpack that changes it to act as per the description. While I do appreciate bug fixes, some things like this which drastically affect game balance I think might be better in optional components. Another annoying part of the fixpack in the free action "fix". Yes, its possible free action is supposed to stop haste, but the fact remains after installing the fixpack an item like the FoA +5 which was once everybodies most beloved weapon is now a weapon that has an effect which makes it too annoying to equip. Also interesting is that bioware DID do this with some free action items (such as the ring IIRC) so i'm not sure they intended the flail restrict haste like this. To me, they intended those late game ToB items to have obscene advantages without disadvantages and the FoA is an iconic weapon upgraded from SoA. Anyway i've gone a little off-topic here, but I thought i'd mention that its not entirely vanilla game behaviour we're seeing when some of these weapons are concerned, some of these weapons are not the same as the ones that were tested by the QA team when balancing the game(azuredge good example, I believe carsmomyrs dispel is also improved as to be more consistent). Planetars in SoA are another example of something bioware probably didn't think too much about.

 

P.S. I am absolutely sure someone is going to tell me I can go into the files and make changes to the fixpack myself - I know, i read the readme and i may do this at some point. However I do not know what every single fix is, nor do I wish to go through the entire document studying each one to see if I agree with it. I have accepted the package as a whole as it does fix a lot of things, and is required for other great mods such as this one.

Well, I'm sorry to continue the off topic, but I'll be short (I can't refrain myself anymore from making some advertisement! ).

 

Vanilla's items and spells were by far not balanced at all (most were lame, some were ok, some were really overpowered), but it shouldn't be up to SCS to rectify this unless such items/spells completely ruin the AI. That's exactly what David did, tweaking only a limited amount of items/spells when he felt it was "necessary", and I'd like him to continue on such behaviour.

 

As other players suggested I think you should take a look at Item Revisions (or Spell Revisions for things like planetars), there you can suggest whatever you like about items (and spells) with a much higher chance to see your suggestions implemented in some way.

 

P.S You may also notice that the few tweaks to items and spells implemented by SCS are also implemented (and almost always in the same way) by IR and SR.

[Guest Guest_Loz_*]

I may well play the game with SR/IR at some point, I have tried IR a bit. The main problems I have with them is that they change so much that there is bound to be some things that grate with me as I am quite specific in what I like, and I am concerned how well they will play with scsii which is probably my favourite mod aside from ascension. The other factor to be considered is that replaying BG2 is also something of a nostalgic experience for me, and the more you change the less you get that nostalgic feel. They do look well made though, and many of the changes look solid. Maybe on my next run i'll try them.

 

P.S. I also want to commend whoever first came up with the idea for breach not going through spell protections. Awesome change that brings back about 10 spells into the game. Who would have known spells like Khelben's Warding Whip were so good? I always found it strange that there were so many spell protections/removals when they were kinda usless in the unmodded game. I would not be suprised to find this is how breach operated originally but was changed during development to make the game easier/simpler.

[DavidW]

P.S. I also want to commend whoever first came up with the idea for breach not going through spell protections.

 

Either me or Sikret, I think. I'm reasonably sure the first mods (or at least: the first reasonably-wide-distribution mods) that made the change were IA and SCS2. I don't know in what order (it was in v1 of SCS2, but I get lost as to what appeared in IA when). We were working independently in any case.

 

Awesome change that brings back about 10 spells into the game. Who would have known spells like Khelben's Warding Whip were so good? I always found it strange that there were so many spell protections/removals when they were kinda usless in the unmodded game. I would not be suprised to find this is how breach operated originally but was changed during development to make the game easier/simpler.

 

Actually, on my first two playthroughs I failed to notice that it didn't work this way! (Partly because Wands of Spell Striking confuse the issue.) I only found out when I started coding SCS2.

[Guest Guest_Loz_*]

Well, I went through ToB, completing my run through the epic saga with scs/scsii. Many thanks for these greats mods. Before I provide my feedback and bug reports I should mention I chickened out of both the improved lairs and the triple dragons hps and uninstalled those components before starting ToB.

 

Bugs:

- A fireball trap on the first level of kiser's home crashes the game. May or may not be scsii related.

- If you have the cold mistress in saradush from UB fighting her causes the whole town to go hostile.

- The descriptions for the mantle series of spells remain unchanged on scrolls.

- Beholders were stealing the shield of balduran from the bag of holding(or trying to).

- I had option 1 mages, but none of the five in the final ascension fight used any prebuffs - not even sendai. Irenicus used them though.

 

Feedback:

I defeated Gromnir and Illasera fairly comfortably. The yaga-shura fight was quite tough. The yaga-shura lieutenant mage seems to be a bit too high leveled. Even her simulacrum could cast time stop. I checked her level in near infinity and it was 35, the rest of the lieutenants were between 20 and 22. Yaga-shura himself is level 25. I found it a bit unrealistic she'd be ten levels higher than him and 15 higher than the other lieutenants. I imagine this is probably the raised levels part of the mage component coming in to play. Perhaps there should be a cap of level 25 or something for automatic raises - it seems the high end mages get too many more levels using the current system. I noticed all the lesser mages in this fight had wands of monster summoning, I think if they'd used them this fight may have been even harder.

 

Watchers keep was fun. I finally got to see what the dragon scripts were like as ToB dragons are immune to instant kill effects. Saladrex was pretty tough, and that is without the triple hp component. A good fight. The demi-lich was also pretty tough. I enjoyed the fight alot though, and I even quite like that i can't breach demi-liches, they are the ultimate undead in bg2 after all. Liches though, should definetly be breachable. The various liches in WK were easily handled with azuredge - even azamantes. They could also be turned by the high level cleric in my team, there was no challenge. The demon wraith got me reloading half a dozen times - I always seem to reload on that guy. Demogorgon himself was a dissapointment - much easier than the normal improved version. Without the free time stop he just falls very easily to triple pierce shield->breach-> wiltings+melee pile on tactic. The moved position of the robe of vecna and cloak of mirroring is very nice. If you do WK in ToB those items come at far more appropriate times.

 

The improved abazigal fight was really fun. Always has been one of my favourite fights in the game, and the fact that tamah only spawns after you kill abazigal's human form now makes it much tougher. The one problem is that it is very easy to avoid abazigal and kill the drakes if you don't go down. Sendai was ok, though she didn't seem to use her teleport ring as well as she does in vanilla.

 

The first part of the final fight was alot harder, mainly because the fallen solars seem to be alot smarter and harder to pin down in melee. I did have the problem that one of them teleported on to a platform that I couldn't reach at one point. Still they have some very nice scripting now. Bodhi was a bit immobile, and didn't have the same gaseous form escape she does in normal ascension. She seemed tougher though, and with better saves as she didn't get undead destroyed quite so fast(though did still get undead detroyed). The one thing that annoyed me a bit is that her bat swarm was not blocked by fire shield, which made no sense considering insect plague is. Irenicus was probably the most dissapointing part of this fight, he has better defenses than the ascension version, but his attack pattern is MUCH weaker. For a start he didn't have any improved alacritys rendering his robe of vecna rather worthless, and then theres the fact that the ascension version has a very specific alacrity script which is quite effective managing to pretty much empty his spell book like a pc mage would. I believe a big part of the reason why is that he uses time stop before alacrity, for a PC it may be easy to alacrity without time stop but for the ai I think its much easier to get the spells off if time is stopped. The ascension version also force casted some of his spells(it is the final fight after all). His spell book also seemed to be about half the size of the ascension versions, I can understand wanting to stick the game memorisation rules but I feel some enemies should break them, after all edwin breaks them by quite a bit. Jon should have a lot more spells than he does, both here and in SoA. He does debuff the party alot better than the ascnesion version though, but then that is one of the strongest points of scsii - they remove your buffs, and fast. I feel there was huge potential for this fight, Irenicus with 7 or 8 level 9 spells and taking some of the best elements of scsii mage scripts(debuffing, double time stop, gating in powerful allies) combined with the powerful alacrity script he has in ascension and possibly the 50% force cast he has would be an impressive opponent. Add to that those fallen solars and I think this fight would be one to remember. If you did give him a unique script you could even chuck in dimension door as its a fight in a specific area. The other thing that I wanted to mention is that in normal ascension he has some pretty powerful energy blades as a default weapon(item) but he didn't seem to use them here. Some may consider it cheesy but hey, the party gets a crossbow that fires skull traps. He also had wands of breach and pierce magic but I didn't see him use those either.

 

The second part was tough at first - all the five seem to have better scripting, they seem to realise when they are about to be massacred by an alacrity bomb or a melee pile on and move a bit. The only thing that seemed weaker was sendai's teleport ring, while she used it, she didn't seem to use it quite as effectively. I also didn't see her use her potion of full heal she has, maybe i missed it. Yaga-shura not being bugged was good. Melissan seemed weaker than usual though, first she seemed to get confused when she time stopped and be unable to decide what she wanted to do, only attacking in the last round of it. Then her demon summoning gate that she uses after all the five are dead was terrible. Usually it gates in a massive horde of demons(like 10-15), this time it gated in... one glabrezu. She died soon after. Could have been a very different fight if she'd gated a fallen solar, two balors and a bunch of other demons.

 

All in all I want to thank you for these amazing mods(scs/scsii) that have really made the game feel as hard as it did when you first play it, which is exactly what I want in a tactical mod. There were so many fun and challenging fights, Daevorn, Andris, Kangaxx, Irenicus in Spellhold and Irenicus in hell, many enemy parties you meet. I couldn't cover everything but suffice to say I had a lot of fun. The biggest hinderances I had when playing scsii a while back(mages all seemed the same, lots of lag) have both been cured and its now an all around awesome mod. Thanks DW!

[Guest Vaelyn]

I am playing through scsii for the first time, currently in chapter 6. I have a pretty lightly modded game: G3 fixpack, ascension, scsii, and selected features from the tweak pack, in that order. Log is available on request. I can agree with most of what Loz has said and I encountered many of the same bugs:

 

• - Gaal was not moved as usual to his position after the unseeing eye was killed, thus he was split from his group.
  
• - Morul and Nara, the apprentices in the planar sphere stronghold quest did not move to the golem creation room for their studies as usual, though Larz did.
  
• - There are alot of teleport fields in the fight at spellhold and several times people got teleported outside the room, unable to get back in.
  
• - Vithal quest in the underdark was incredibly annoying. He kept going invisible requiring me to rest a full day to be able to initiate dialogue with him again.
  
• - The mage in the slime worshipers quest in the underdark was blue and did not talk or go hostile. The rest of them were all hostile.
  
• - Liches seem to be immune to breach, despite the fact that I installed the component to make them vulnerable to it.
  

 

And like DrAzTiK, I was also unable to remove Firkraag's minor spell turning by any means I could think of other than waiting it out. I have been able to remove (minor) spell turning normally with antimagic from every other enemy so far.

 

I found a post on the Bioware forums describing what seems like the same thing, but unfortunately no solution.

 

On a similar note, I have noticed some very buggy behavior with all of the spell turnings, spell deflections, and spell trap. Sometimes it would seem that my spells weren't being subtracted from the protection's remaining spell levels (I couldn't brute force my way through them). Spell turning would not return spells to the caster, and spell trap would not rememorize spells. And then sometimes they would all work correctly. In all cases, the protected target was properly unaffected by the spells cast at him, it's just that sometimes the response wasn't being triggered. I did some testing on and off but it always seemed very random whether these spells worked properly. Even the same protection used by the same enemy would show different results on later attempts.

 

So today I did some more serious testing and was finally able to get some reproducible results. Here is what happened in the main case (I've reproduced this 10 times or so):

Load Game

Edwin immediately casts minor spell turning (4 spell levels of absorption).

PC immediately casts 3 Melf's acid arrows at Edwin at the normal rate of 1 per round.

After some time, usually around 30 seconds but sometimes much longer, 3 acid arrows are simultaneously launched from Edwin to the PC.

From this point on, all spell protections function promptly and correctly, even after party-required travel.

Edwin's minor spell turning has 2 spell levels left (!).

 

I then tried a few variations on this experiment to narrow things down a bit. I tried adding 10 seconds of wait time both before and after Edwin's spell turning cast, and this did seem to reduce the time between the last acid arrow cast and the reflected spells. I then tried loading the game and waiting several minutes before proceding. In this case the spell turning behaved properly, immediately reflecting the first acid arrow and expiring after reflecting the second. Finally I repeated the original experiment and created another save after the 3 acid arrows were returned. I cast a 4th acid arrow, which was promptly returned and ended the spell turning. Then I loaded this new save and cast an acid arrow which was returned about a minute later, ending the spell turning. This all proves that my game is in a bugged state for a variable amount of time (usually about one minute) after loading a save.

 

I also tried a few other combinations of spells. Acid arrow -> flame arrow -> magic missile causes all 3 to be reflected (all at once, when the bug ends) and the minor spell turning to end. Acid arrow -> acid arrow -> magic missile causes all 3 to be reflected and the spell turning remains with 1 spell level. So I can conclude that all spells cast while the game is in the bugged state are reflected, but spells cast multiple times are only counted once toward the protection's remaining spell levels.

 

I tried pausing the game for a few minutes after casting spells at Edwin, but still had to wait the 30-60 seconds after unpausing for the spells to reflect back.

 

Finally I repeated all of this with minor spell deflection and achieved analogous results. Just watch for the "Spell Ineffective" message instead of a spell reflection.

 

The more I think about it, this may not be mod-related. I don't have any mod-writing experience with bg2, but it almost seems more likely to be a hard-coded bug, maybe specific to certain operating systems. I run Vista 32. After I finish this play through I may do a clean install and do some more testing.

 

It hasn't really been a show-stopping bug, since I can just get rid of enemy spell turning with antimagic, except in the case of Firkraag who I found almost impossible in chapter 2. I ended up just tanking him with protection from fire, SI:Abj, and chaincasting PfMW until his minor spell turning wore off (he seems to have a fairly low caster level). Looking back now, I remember being surprised by some very damaging acid arrow volleys in several of my Firkraag attempts. I had thought he just had some weird kind of spell sequencer packed with them, but now I believe that what I was seeing was actually all of my test shots at him all reflecting back at once. This would be consistent with what I observed today. In fact it would probably be a much easier encounter now that I know some more about the nature of this bug.

 

A much more serious bug is probably breach not working on liches. I've installed this component and my observations are exactly the same as what Loz has written. Even after bombing liches with multiple spellstrikes, breach still won't work. I get a "Spell Ineffective" message. After testing the spell turning stuff I thought this might be related, but it doesn't seem to be; even after I get spell turning, etc. to start working, breach was still no good. The best tactic I've found so far is to power word blind them and shred them with ranged weapons once PfMW falls off. Melee works too, but it usually means the lich will continue to chaincast PfMW until he runs out of them. It could be considered a shortcoming of the AI that it won't continue to chain PfMW while blind unless there are adjacent party members.

 

I just finished off Kangaxx in chapter 6, using a few different methods. Kangaxx actually runs pretty light on protections in phase 2. He seems to rely a lot on his magic resistance and doesn't bother to cast protection from fire, protection from magic, etc. He is vulnerable to Dragon Breath which will end the fight instantly since it ignores magic resistance. Dragon Breath really trivializes phase 2 which reduces the encounter to a standard lich fight. It's a rather unsatisfying way to beat him, so I'd say at least a protection from fire would be in order. I was also able to beat him by lowering his resistance with a few pierce shields followed by horrid wilting, but unless I get lucky this usually means surviving a time stop or three. He's quite good at chaining them. Another strategy was to throw in a true sight after the pierce shields, and then a power word kill (it works on him at full health). Finally I managed a very long and difficult kill by tanking him with an enraged Korgan until Korgan got winded, then running away and chaining power word blind until I could enrage again... eventually outlasted all of his PfMW and beat through all the stoneskins.

 

None of my characters can use Azureedge, and I stuck my Mace of Disruption on Viconia (1 attack per round) so I can't really comment on those.

 

I have also noticed the strange pit fiend invisibility that's been posted in another thread. Some, but not all, pit fiends will stay invisible until the moment they attack, at which point they become visible for a split second and then disappear again, almost as if they had cast Mislead. The only spell it casts when it spawns is improved invisibility. When it "phases in" to attack it has the half-transparent appearance each time. I can cast true sight and it reports "Illusion Dispelled" but the pit fiend's behavior doesn't change; the transparent effect is gone when it phases in, but it still disappears quickly after attacking. There is a very brief window to attack it each time it phases in, and hitting it seems to stall its disappearance a little longer. I first noticed it when I had Viconia gate one into the Copper Coronet to slaughter innocents and the same thing happens every time I summon it there. I don't think it's limited to that location however.

 

Finally, I'm not sure the blunt damage from Implosion is working correctly. This spell should be able to hurt liches once they can be targeted by it (after a spellstrike and true sight) but I have yet to see it damage them. On the other hand, it seems to interract correctly with fire and crushing resistance when I cast it on my own party members. So I'm really just wondering why it's not hurting the liches I try it on, who I'm pretty sure are not immune to blunt weapons.

[Guest Michayel]

These are very interesting comments indeed. I also experienced a similar bug to the one described: ie straight after loading a save-game the spell protections do not function correctly. I didn't know that the 'bugged-state' would pass after a certain time, and in fact abandoned my last game through disappointment. I had been trying to use Spelltrap+Project Image to re-stock a mage's spellbook. I take it from your post that if I had reloaded then just waited for a minute or so the spelltrap would have worked correctly.

 

I remember using Infinity Explorer to examine 'Spelltrap'; after finding nothing amiss, I just gave up in disgust. This is something I will definitely bear in mind if I ever attempt another playthrough of this wonderful game (and potentially wonderful mod).

[Guest Vaelyn]

Out of curiosity, what OS do you run? I remember reading something in another forum about spell turning not working with Vista, but I can't find it for the life of me.

[Guest Incantatar]

-The Staff of Fire +2 has only one charge each for summon fire elemental and fire shield. W/o SCS2 it had 50. (quite useless)

[Guest Guest]

I think they are once a day effects now.