IA v6 Final

[temujin]

apparently Taimon had just created this fix if I understand correctly. Sikret said "Exe patching is beyond my skills, Baronius knows this kind of stuff..." Baronius then wrote long WoT's about how dangerous .exe patching was, implying that he didn't really trust that it had been done right without seeing evidence of extensive testing.

 

Baro knows this kind of stuff?

 

Watching this döner kebab vendor from the streets of Budapest comment on something Taimon (a genuinely talented programmer who is proficient in a plethora of languages, who has a deep understanding of reverse engineering, who made contributions to the development of weidu, nearinfinity, iesdp, gemrb and various mods) had done must've been quite a sight. Mentioning Taimon in the same breath with this snake oil salesman alone is an insult to Taimon. I would've loved to see those WoTs.

 

This ".exe patching is dangerous" mantra is just a convenient scare tactic to try and dissuade players from using Taimon's work only because it was made available here in G3. If Taimon made all of his stuff available at BWL first, Fraudonius would be singing praises and whole-heartedly embrace him like a long-lost sibling. Also note that BWL's own mods, NeJ & TS, contain .exe modifying code. Why aren't there any WoTs for those?

 

On another note, I'm shocked the Distinguished One was able to admit when something was beyond his skill. :O Perhaps he learned a valuable lesson from the schoolings administered by DavidW & Ardanis?

 

Humility is always a good thing, Sikky. Well done!

 

 

So I've been playing v6 a bit and I just noticed that the spells "Remove Magic" and "Dispel Magic" have been tweaked (and nerfed) silently from v5 and there's no mention of this in the document "Fixes & Tweaks".

 

Nominar,

 

whenever Sikky does a silent tweak/nerf, it simply means he's obviously trying to hide something. Something embarassing about himself or someone who is responsible for that tweak/nerf but who he doesn't want to acknowledge. In this case, it must be because all that dispel magic stuff (how it works & how it is supposed to work with a possible fix) was all revealed here by Taimon. If Sikky mentioned 'fixing' the spell in his docs, he was probably afraid someone might confront him about this subject.

 

Another example of a silent fix was when Bigg pointed out a bug involving paladins in player2-6 slots, Sikky insisted it was not a bug, but an intentional feature... only to fix it quietly and silently hoping no one would notice. Apparently, pointing out even a single minor flaw in coding is damaging his ego.

[isleepwithfucking goats]

Does anybody have or know the Dracolich Labyrinth Map?

 

Also whats the XP limit before going to Spellhold? (not to trigger improved Spellhold)

[Ardanis]

Is that the maze in Underdark made of small caves with two exits each? I used X key to get the area'a resource name and wrote down on paper where each exit led. Good fun it was, btw.

 

Lol, I still have that paper! I think it's that, though some bits have burned out and I can't make them. Here it is, though I recommend to try and figure it out by yourself, either using X key to navigate or via marking visited areas with dropped items.

 

 

7(?) <- 1(?) -> 2

4 <- 2 -> 3

10 <- 3 -> 8

6 <- 4 -> 5

12 <- 5 -> 13

6(?) <- 6 -> 1

7 <- 7 -> 8

1 <- 8(?) -> 13(?)

11 <- 9(?) -> 4

1 <- 10 -> 9

9 <- 11 ->

15 <- 12 -> 14

7 <- 13 -> 1(?)

<- 14 ->

16 <- 15 -> 8

15 <- 16 ->

 

IIRC the dracolich was in the last area, east exit from 16th.

 

[Saros]

I think that the xp of the protagonist should be below 2500000.

 

As for the Deepdark caves, I have the map here written down:

 

 

 

 

Go South (Bone devils)-South(empty)-West(whisper spiders)-West(guardian spirit, fight for key) Don't forget to check the local pool after the fight has ended.

 

Then go back through the only one exit (West)- then South (empty room, Invisibility potion in pool) - West (multiple Deep Shades, fight for Mage Sigil).

 

Go back from this room to the previous one (again, one exit only), go South (Skeleton Lord here), and again South (Whisper Spider room), then West to the Neo-Otyughs, and the exit to the Dracolich is from this room South.

 

If you follow this road, it's the shortest one, yet you'll miss one room with multiple spiders where some xp can be accumulated. It's West from the Skeleton Lord chamber.

 

 

Navigating through the maze via leaving items is only possible if those are quest items that don't vanish, since there are monsters scattered around which will force the party to rest from time to time. Areas can be marked by leaving items in their respective pools though. If not anything, navigating in this area very annoying, similar to WK lvl 3.

[geh4th]

I think that the xp of the protagonist should be below 2500000.

 

It's less than that. I don't recall the exact number, but one thing to remember is that experience gained while in Brynnlaw counts towards the trigger of the cheesier tougher spellhold.

 

Until I can find the reference, I'd work under the assumption that you need to actually leave Athkatla by the time you have an even 2 million XP. Any later and you risk triggering it.

 

Interestingly, I don't recall anyone ever actually being asked to test the "tougher" version of spellhold (At least not during the last 2 years of v6 testing, while I was on the scene.) It seemed to be a "given" that nobody would be "dumb enough" to actually WANT to fight through the tougher version. I suspect it was made SO bad that the Lord of the Cheese thought it would be virtually impossible, but I don't know how he thought on it. His thinking can be so....alien...at times.

 

That might explain your weird encounters filling up the rooms with gazillions of enemies, Saros. Or that might just have been poor modding. Who knows...

[the bigg]

Perhaps the tougher version of Spellhold is another anti-Saros (or anti- XP farming) roadblock, hence kept secret to the testers (similar to the anti-solo and anti-multiclass measures I detected earlier). In fact, you lose access to some items if your level is too high (the list includes the Bag of Holding, a Laeral's Tear necklace, and a Barbarian Essence). A number of other areas and fights check against CHARNAME's level and/or XP

 

CHARNAME must have less than 2350000 XP and be level 14 or less when rescuing Imoen (advancing over that limit in that area is fine) and have less than 2975000 XP and be level 16 or higher when entering the next two areas.

[isleepwithfucking goats]

^ Confirmed.

 

Level 15 and under 2.35mil, I get Elemental Golem at the Portal and Whisper Spiders every time I rest. No Laeral Necklage.

Level 14 and under 2.35mil, I get coin/gem/bone golems only at Portal and can rest without problem. Laeral is there.

 

 

Thanks.

[Saros]

I think that the xp of the protagonist should be below 2500000.

 

It's less than that. I don't recall the exact number, but one thing to remember is that experience gained while in Brynnlaw counts towards the trigger of the cheesier tougher spellhold.

 

Until I can find the reference, I'd work under the assumption that you need to actually leave Athkatla by the time you have an even 2 million XP. Any later and you risk triggering it.

 

Interestingly, I don't recall anyone ever actually being asked to test the "tougher" version of spellhold (At least not during the last 2 years of v6 testing, while I was on the scene.) It seemed to be a "given" that nobody would be "dumb enough" to actually WANT to fight through the tougher version. I suspect it was made SO bad that the Lord of the Cheese thought it would be virtually impossible, but I don't know how he thought on it. His thinking can be so....alien...at times.

 

That might explain your weird encounters filling up the rooms with gazillions of enemies, Saros. Or that might just have been poor modding. Who knows...

 

I really don't know for certain if the Improved Spellhold is possible for a party that hasn't used any experience exploits. It surely was hard for my no-reload party, although all characters were almost at xp cap, but far from 'impossible'. And there is definitely at least one version of further Improved Spellhold, which I obviously encountered myself.

 

However, I was able to obtain both the Bag of Holding (Vampire Lord) and the Barbarian Essence potion (Book challenge), so maybe there are other conditions which must be met in order for the party to not receive these items. I never got a Laeral's tear neclklace in Spellhold either in v5.0, or in v6.0.

 

Again, we're looking at a very forced-linear play and narrow-minded style of thinking :"Either fulfill only the main plot in chapters 2&3 (and a few minor quests and fights) and go to Spellhold immediately, or die".

[the bigg]

There's just two versions of Improved Spellhold: one for parties under 2350000 XP and one for parties over that threshold (well, some spawn points might have more intermediate steps, but the rest interruptions you mentioned use only that single threshold).

 

A number of enemies/areas/spawn points check against the party's XP and/or level. Some get cheesier scripts or summons. The following items are only dropped if you're inexperienced enough:

 

 

Shadow dragon, Tarnor, Gaius, Ruhk Conjurer, Conster: diamond necklace (for everybody, only dropped under 2350000 XP and CH2-3)

In Spellhold: Laeral's Tear from the altar, and Protection From Level Drain from one of the challenge areas. The code to disable the BoH is there but will actually never trigger. The Barbarian Essence I'm talking about is another one: you'd get it after killing the golems where in vanilla you get Gesen's Bow String; however, if CHARNAME is a Vagrant you get the Cloak of Magic Shielding (or a Scroll of Memory Boosting if CHARNAME is a non-dual, non-multi Mage), so most parties will miss that anyhow.

Beholder cave in underdark: scrolls of Identify, Protection from Evil 10', and potion of Extra Healing if you were too high level in Spellhold

Planar Prison: ~4K gold pieces lost if at or over 2350000 XP

 

 

[Ardanis]

@

Beholder cave in underdark: scrolls of Identify, Protection from Evil 10', and potion of Extra Healing if you were too high level in Spellhold

 

Erhm, I wonder how could this possibly be a valuable treasure.

[the bigg]

I don't know - I simply report the facts.

 

Also: apparently they pushed a massive IA6 fixpack over at the Iron Curtain. I wonder how much of those fixes are aimed at Saros...

[isleepwithfucking goats]

I don't know - I simply report the facts.

 

Also: apparently they pushed a massive IA6 fixpack over at the Iron Curtain. I wonder how much of those fixes are aimed at Saros...

 

 

How do you know that?

[the bigg]

a post by Sikret in the (open) announcements forum.

[geh4th]

My bet is that it's a paper tiger designed specifically to enable the Lord of the Cheese to further claim that the v6 version released by us here is "bugged" and "obsolete".

 

If it actually "fixes" anything it probably is just stuff we've pointed out.

[lroumen]

Well, give the paying IA players also some credit. Even if we cannot look into their forums they may have reported bugs as well since they play with differeing parties than those who didn't pay for IAv6.