Request/idea regarding DR kits

[Quester]

The way I see it, there is a severe lack of good cleric kits in BG2, including mod-added ones. The Divine Remix cleric kits, based on an expanded list of Faerun deities, are however very well designed, interesting and balanced. The only problem is that they are a part of DR, which is no longer being updated and is incompatible with several other mods, notably Spell Revisions.

 

My request to any interested modder is this: could you break these kits out into a new, separate mod that doesn't include the complex sphere system or other features of DR? Since the actual designing and implementation of said kits is already done, I would hope that this wouldn't be too complicated a work in the hands of a skilled modder. As it stands, these are pretty much the only well designed cleric mod kits available, and add a lot of flavour and customization to clerics.

 

The kits I'm talking about are:

 

Redesigned:

 

Morninglord of Lathander

Watcher of Helm

Stormlord of Talos

 

New:

 

Silverstar of Selûne

Nightcloak of Shar

Holy Strategist of the Red Knight

Battleguard of Tempus

Painbearer of Ilmater

Firewalker of Kossuth

Authlim of Iyachtu Xvim

Lorekeeper of Oghma

Heartwarder of Sune

Feywarden of Corellon

Strifeleader of Cyric

[Dakk]

Agreed, the kits in DR are well done (certainly the best Cleric kits available) - but sadly DR isn't compatible with the "mandatory" mods so it doesn't get used. I could imagine this would require some kind of permission from the original author of DR however, and that might provide a hurdle (I don't know if he's around)? I'd love for this idea to be realised however.

 

@Quester, you could take a gander at MegaModKits by Jarno; he's doing what you are requesting from other major mods (TDD, and the like). He didn't tackle DR however because of the aforementioned sphere-system.

[Quester]

As far as I know, none of the original authors of Divine Remix are really around anymore, which is a great shame. I actually love the whole concept of the sphere system and ideally I would like DR to be updated and made seamlessly compatible with SR and other mods. However, the chances of that happening seem slim, hence my request to any interested modder to simply (heh) make a separate mod that just offers these excellent kits in a generally compatible fashion. Of course, it would be great if permission from the original authors could be given for such a thing. If they haven't disappeared off the face of the earth, that is.

 

@Dakk, thank you for the link but I don't really care for any of those kits. I'm picky.

[Dakk]

I second both your sentiments. An updated DR would be ideal, but as that's not very likely (or rather, very unlikely) I'll settle for for just the actual kits to be plucked and converted to a separate mod. And with "settle for" I mean I'd be overjoyed.

 

Yeah, most of them are not my cup of tea either, just thought I'd give a heads up.

[silas]

I just dealt with this to my satisfaction, so I'll post the method here for others with this issue, if DR is in fact no longer being updated. Steps:

 

1) Install Divine Remix during your BG install.

2) Install Spell Revisions *after* DR

3) Later, go into Near Infinity and go through the priest spells: make sure they are all assigned to either druid, cleric, or both - not one of the funky values that DR applies. This sounds tedious but it should only take about 15 minutes.

4) Also in NI, go into all of the CLAB 2da files for priest kits - that's CLABPR02.2da, CLABDR02.2da, A#OGHMA.2da, CDSUNE.2da, etc. - and you'll see a bunch of priest spells being added as GA_ effects. This is how DR implemented the 'spell sphere' system. Simply delete all of the rows that contain this. Highlight from the 4th or 5th row down to, but not including, the bottom row, and delete it all. This should take another 15 minutes or so to do this for all of the cleric and druid and ranger and paladin kits.

 

Voila: now you have the DR kits, but the SR magic system, and no spell spheres.

 

 

[Ardanis]

The update to DR is pretty much ready, I just can't gather the will to land the finishing stroke to it.

[CamDawg]

Well, the sphere systems were built to be fully extensible for other kits, we simply didn't get the buy-in--especially since the early versions were... less than stable while we figured it all out.

[leania]

As a user of BGT, I've preferred to use SR rather than DR because DR barely consider about Druids, who are another side of Priests, even though the concepts of DR are quite great.

 

This might be out of scope of this discussion, I however had like to say that at least the spell systems of DR, aka sphere system, need to consider both Clerics' spells and Druids' spells even if the aspects of varieties/features of Druid kits are the next.

[Miloch]

The update to DR is pretty much ready, I just can't gather the will to land the finishing stroke to it.

Sure you can. Would a jedi mind-trick help?

[silas]

@leania: But, there aren't different ki D&D of druids, like there are priests of different faiths, are there? At least, not to nearly the same extent.

 

In my game I have overhauled the shapeshifting system, which I think fails in vanilla. E.g. base druids get increasingly powerful 'natural' forms - wolf, then bear, then lion, then spider, then troll, then shambling mound - adding one every few levels between 2 and 20. Avengers get increasingly unnatural forms - earth elemental, then water elemental, then air elemental, then fire elemental - adding one every few levels from 9 to 18.

 

I don't know how to make mods, so it's just a personal change. But I'm happy to give someone the resources so they can use them (and change them, if the like) in a proper mod.

[Jarno Mikkola]

In my game I have overhauled the shapeshifting system, which I think fails in vanilla. E.g. base druids get increasingly powerful 'natural' forms - wolf, then bear, then lion, then spider, then troll, then shambling mound - adding one every few levels between 2 and 20. Avengers get increasingly unnatural forms - earth elemental, then water elemental, then air elemental, then fire elemental - adding one every few levels from 9 to 18.

 

I don't know how to make mods, so it's just a personal change. But I'm happy to give someone the resources so they can use them (and change them, if the like) in a proper mod.

Well, if you have the resources, then I can add them as part of my collection of kits(MegaModKits) if you like. PM me the with the info& files/file addresses to download you wish to share and if you wish to, you can name the component name etc.

Yes, it could be something like "Silas base druids natural forms." and "Silas Avengers unnatural forms." And you have the control of the rest of the kit... except that I might want to color it a bit, like giving the spider form the ability to cast the users spells...