Polytweak, initial release

[polytope]

@Jarno, vampiric mists are not the same thing as the mists vampires turn into... Counterintuitive as that may be.

 

Anyway, since this topic is active again, and I've played a little with my own mod I'll just note some bugs and things to add in the next version (a few days time), so that I don't forget.

 

-I can confirm Kreso's report that spectral/spirit trolls sometimes die without fire/acid, this will be fixed

-Spirit and spectral trolls may appear during daytime if you leave the area

-Yuan-Ti sometimes wouldn't notice if an opponent was immune to their weapons

-Darkness 15' Radius will work a bit differently

-There will be an option to remove the throwing ability from Azuredge (usually an annoyance for me, as it forbids offhand weapons)

-There will also be an option to move some powerful early game items like the Tuigan bow

-Improved creature components will have better compatability with v25 and later of Stratagems (which extensively edit creature stats).

-Mind flayers will get new scripts as they are helpless against stoneskinned characters (and don't realize this)

 

Oh, forgot to mention, the new bam for the mace of disruption was Moinesse's work originally, I just changed it a bit to look more like the other BG2 maces.

 

I'm not sure about the creature improvements - as in whether they're too weak - because buffs make a huge difference to the damage a creature can deal; ProEvil plus Defensive Harmony and Improved Invisibility gives an 8 point AC bonus effectively, so a creature that is hitting a buffed party member's AC on rolls of 17-20 would hit the same unbuffed character on 9-20 (dealing 3x as much damage per round on average) and that's before you even consider stoneskins and mirror images...

 

Then again, some players don't like to rest repeatedly in a dungeon and buff before each encounter, so toughening up random monsters a lot would just make their games more tedious. It'd be pretty easy to make separate components for enhancing creature stats versus giving them better AI and new abilities. Should I consider this for version 3.0?

Edited February 9, 2014 by polytope

[kreso]

@polytope

I wanted to play EE2 in "vanilla" form, but found some stuff too annoying to deal with, hence I made some tweaks of my own.

Some random toughts/ideas; take what you will if you find something interesting for the scope of your mod. I don't know Weidu so can't code this myself, I made this in

 

- Bless lasts 1 turn, not 6 rounds

- Pro Evil 10' radius looses "glow" and has a shorter duration (5 turns)

- Negative Plane protection and Free Action last for 2 turns (glow removed from Free Action)

- Chaotic Commands last 2 turns

- Ironskins has a casting time of 1 and is a combat protection (EE didn't fix this....), number of skins is capped at 6 (same for Stoneskin)

- all "cure" type spells have casting time equal to their level (Cure light wounds cs=1 up to Heal cs=6)

- Protection from Magic Weapons protects against all weapons, not only magical

- Apsolute Immunity protects against everything (fire, acid, weapons, resistances...., all saves are at -20)

- all elemental damage spells (aka Fireball, Cone of Cold etc.) force a save vs Breath to avoid full impact damage, not Spells

- Slow lasts shorter (3 rounds) and has a -2 penalty, not -4

- Blindness and PW:Blind last 3 rounds

- Armor of Faith last 2 turns, providing 10% resistance, and doesn't scale

- Mirror Images are 4 images max

- "Invisibility" and "invisibility 10' radius" last 2 rounds, have cs=1 and 2 for 10'version. No longer can one play this game safe from 90% of creatures, and stealth is a rather important feature. Impr.Invisibility is caster-only. 7th level version (Mass Invisibility) has a duration of 2 rounds. Potions of invisibilty, rings etc. are tweaked the same way.

- pearly white ioun stone regenerates 1hp/6 sec, same as ring

 

Items:

- Flail of Ages has a saving throw against it's slow effect (no penalty for +3, -1 for +4 versions, -2 for +5)

- Staff of Magi no longer glows, nor has casting time for Fireball-Lightning. It also no longer dispels magic when it hits someone.

- Soul Reaver THAC0 drain has a duration of 5 rounds, not 0 as latest fixpack, nor 120 as vanilla

- Carsomyr has only 10% to dispel on hit. No save is allowed. MR it provides is "increment" type, not "set", and is 30%, not 50., +6 version is +5 but gives 15% dispel chance and 50% MR

- Foebane lifesteal bonus HP last 3 rounds

- All +6 items are made of +5 enhancement

- +1/+3 type weapons like Bone Club, Daystar etc. use lower enhancement values as per vanilla

- two-handed sword found on Abazigal (forgot the name) no longer poisons it's victims with a 10% chance. It has a 10% (20 when upgraded) to inflict extra slashing damage

- armor provides a small amount of damage resistance (same as new IR, when it gets released) but doesn't allow for a full DEX bonus (studded leather -1 dex, 5% resistance, hide/chain -2 dex 10% resist, splint/plate -3 dex 15%, full plate -4dex 20% resist)

- Rochanar's Horn helmet is +10 to all physical resist, not +50 blunt (same as IR)

 

I also use KR tweak for Hardiness (20% all resistances), and other KR changes (kits, saves etc.)

Probably some more but I can't remeber as of now (including quite a bit of area scripts modified by fixpack implemented in EE, like Hell trials character chunk).

[polytope]

Okay, my thoughts on these:

 

- Pro Evil 10' radius looses "glow" and has a shorter duration (5 turns) ... (glow removed from Free Action)

 

It'd be easy enough to patch every spell with the "colour glow pulse" effect for those who don't like it - personally I only find Aid spell to be an eyesore.

 

- Negative Plane protection and Free Action last for 2 turns

 

I'd be against increasing NPP duration much longer than other Protection from Weapon type spells as it makes certain enemies almost irrelevant, I remember a pretty tense encounter (in my last game) with a Nabassu who kept becoming ethereal and returning to level drain my guys.

 

Free Action changed to 2 turns versus vanilla 1 turn + 1 round/level? I don't see much difference there.

 

- Chaotic Commands last 2 turns

 

It needs to be nerfed, yeah, I might make it work only versus mind influencing spells (not against knockout from s. cloud, earthquake, wing buffet - also earthquake knockdown should have a shorter duration)

 

- Ironskins has a casting time of 1 and is a combat protection (EE didn't fix this....), number of skins is capped at 6 (same for Stoneskin)

- Mirror Images are 4 images max

 

Bear in mind this also makes it easier for players to kill enemy mages, although SS and MI could be weakened (even justifiably) for multiclass mages versus single class and sorcerers. I also thought of making timestop last 3 rounds only for pureclass mages and 1-3 rounds for dual/multi/other (who also can use it for more powerful tricks like timestop-> harm or melee attacks).

 

- Slow lasts shorter (3 rounds) and has a -2 penalty, not -4

 

Web is more in need of a nerf imo, not least because most enemies bar lich/rakshasa can't use it, is plays into the player's hand.

 

- all "cure" type spells have casting time equal to their level (Cure light wounds cs=1 up to Heal cs=6)

 

Sounds okay, but am I the only player who doesn't use healing spells in BG2? (Except maybe an occasional heal at high levels) I don't run out of healing potions - neither in SCS or vanilla - and my cleric's are usually otherwise busy in combat. I just wait for the rings of regen (or whatever) to heal up between battles.

 

I was going to change goodberries though, the spell would only make a single use "handful" but it heals 1hp/round for 1 round/level, this would increase to 3hp/2 rounds at level 9 and 2hp/round at 17, rather than having to prompt your character's to eat them individually.

 

- all elemental damage spells (aka Fireball, Cone of Cold etc.) force a save vs Breath to avoid full impact damage, not Spells

 

This would penalize rogue classes quite a bit, I guess damage spells should use a different saving throw to mind affecting stuff - maybe the latter could use save vs wands (as some things like mind blast are already supposed to).

 

- "Invisibility" and "invisibility 10' radius" last 2 rounds, have cs=1 and 2 for 10'version. No longer can one play this game safe from 90% of creatures, and stealth is a rather important feature. Impr.Invisibility is caster-only. 7th level version (Mass Invisibility) has a duration of 2 rounds. Potions of invisibilty, rings etc. are tweaked the same way.

Haha, this one would really screw up my playing style. Two rounds sounds too short though, maybe five.

 

- Carsomyr has only 10% to dispel on hit. No save is allowed. MR it provides is "increment" type, not "set", and is 30%, not 50., +6 version is +5 but gives 15% dispel chance and 50% MR

I had in mind to make it useable by anyone (non-evil) but only grant MR and dispel on hit for paladins - triggering with every swing, but dispel checked against wielder's level.

 

- armor provides a small amount of damage resistance (same as new IR, when it gets released) but doesn't allow for a full DEX bonus (studded leather -1 dex, 5% resistance, hide/chain -2 dex 10% resist, splint/plate -3 dex 15%, full plate -4dex 20% resist)

I don't like this idea, I could go into detail why.

Edited February 9, 2014 by polytope

[kreso]

NPP

SCS vampires cause constitution drain, so remain dangerous in melee. I like NPP with such duration since it makes NPP items far less "core" items, and 30 seconds is useless against SCS vampires.

 

Chaotic Commands

- I'd remove certain features from it as well, but AI probably wouldn't account for it. It's absurdly powerful, and the duration (1 turn/level I think is really too much.)

 

Stoneskin/Ironskin

- I find mages more annoying then difficult, tbh. Every SCS mage of decent level has an absurd number of Stoneskins/images anyway.

 

Web

I don't use this spell, but it's vanilla incarnation is one of the most powerful disables in the game.

 

Cure Spells

The fact that they're mostly unusable in combat (and potions are both cheap and widely available, they should probably "block" attacks for 1 round, but it would mess up AI) is the exact reason why I reduce casting times. SR does the same.

 

Energy attacks breath save tweak

I play with KR, which implements a more sensible saving throw table (rogues excell at breath saves, as they should).

SR already implemented this, i.e. - mind effects are spells save, energy breath, necromancy death etc.

 

Damage resistance armor

It's not a new idea (Refinements, Full Plate&packing steel implement this) but it plays out nicely with Hardiness tweak. It actually makes shields a nice alternative to the all-powerful dual-wielders.

[Jarno Mikkola]

@Jarno, vampiric mists are not the same thing as the mists vampires turn into... Counterintuitive as that may be.

A little game logic here... it might be mod added, but I would wish you would consider it hard before going ahead and adding it into the game... as we already have almost the same thing doing it's own thing !

[polytope]

Energy attacks breath save tweak

I play with KR, which implements a more sensible saving throw table (rogues excell at breath saves, as they should).

SR already implemented this, i.e. - mind effects are spells save, energy breath, necromancy death etc.

 

NPC rogues/monks would have the same bad saving throws vs energy damage spells, barring regexp search and patch of every such character in the game... And this is likely to mess something up, i.e. a creature might intentionally have a saving throw of 20 so as to be killed during a cutscene, and the game might hang in cutscene mode if this fails to execute.

 

Also, I'm not about to copy my own mod from SR/KR or anyone else's work, what would be the point of that?

 

Damage resistance armor

It's not a new idea (Refinements, Full Plate&packing steel implement this) but it plays out nicely with Hardiness tweak. It actually makes shields a nice alternative to the all-powerful dual-wielders.

 

Again, if it's not a new idea, I'm reluctant to include it in my own work, but damage resistance added to armor creates game balance problems in any case, without the Hardiness HLA tweak from Kit Revisions it means a warrior's DR can be way too high once the party is epic level (+20% physical resistance on full plate might seem small, but a fighter with 80% DR can effectively take twice the beating that he could with 60% DR).

 

Besides I think armor boosting DR is conceptually wrong, armor is basically a thin brittle shell covering a person's vulnerable body, you would expect it to entirely negate weak blows from puny attackers - such as goblins - (unless they find a chink in your armor i.e. a critical hit) and be more likely to fail against the powerful strikes of very strong enemies - like fire giants and golems. Armor class does this in a roundabout way in AD&D and the vanilla game, since creatures with high damage output typically have higher HD with good THAC0.

 

Physical damage resistance on the other hand is equally useful vs the goblins and the firegiants (better vs firegiants actually, because of the way the game rounds it off...). Also DR implies an innate toughness versus a certain attack form (such as a mummy might have) and is not fitting for non-magical armor or shields.

 

As for Dex penalties for armor, because 2nd edition stats give neither bonus nor penalty in the 7-14 range (usually), it means a highly dexterous character is equally easy to strike as a clumsy one when wearing the same plate armor... the more agile character should still receive some defensive bonus imo.

Edited February 10, 2014 by polytope

[kreso]

Energy attacks breath save tweak

I play with KR, which implements a more sensible saving throw table (rogues excell at breath saves, as they should).

SR already implemented this, i.e. - mind effects are spells save, energy breath, necromancy death etc.

 

NPC rogues/monks would have the same bad saving throws vs energy damage spells, barring regexp search and patch of every such character in the game... And this is likely to mess something up, i.e. a creature might intentionally have a saving throw of 20 so as to be killed during a cutscene, and the game might hang in cutscene mode if this fails to execute.

SCS (from v25 or so) takes any modified tables and patches cre files, apart those which cheat (i.e. Davaeorn is a mage with Death save of 4, and SCS doesn't change that). Luckily, game designers were obiviously concerned about cutscenes so afaik any spell used there (think Rapture of the Father) is a no-save .

 

Also, I'm not about to copy my own mod from SR/KR or anyone else's work, what would be the point of that?

Fair point. The above post is basically my hand-made modification to game, with other mods like some IR global changes which work on EE and others like Refinements etc.

 

damage resistance added to armor creates game balance problems in any case, without the Hardiness HLA tweak from Kit Revisions it means a warrior's DR can be way too high once the party is epic level (+20% physical resistance on full plate might seem small, but a fighter with 80% DR can effectively take twice the beating that he could with 60% DR).

Believe it or not, I find 60% (even 80%) actually more balanced than a stoneskined mage.

 

Besides I think armor boosting DR is conceptually wrong, armor is basically a thin brittle shell covering a person's vulnerable body, you would expect it to entirely negate weak blows from puny attackers - such as goblins - (unless they find a chink in your armor i.e. a critical hit) and be more likely to fail against the powerful strikes of very strong enemies - like fire giants and golems. Armor class does this in a roundabout way in AD&D and the vanilla game, since creatures with high damage output typically have higher HD with good THAC0.

The armor is imo "bad" regardless of what you do with it. I usually play BGT. Allowing AC to indefinitely stack with DEX allows you to have a character with -10 or lower AC in BG1. The only way he can be hit is a critical, Drizzt or Sarevok. Missiles will never hit him apart a roll of 20, so the only way he can be hit is simultaneous attack by 20 or so oponents.

Problem is worse in BG2 actually, where one gets to values of about -17 (toss in Pro Evil, imo.invis etc.) and can't get hit by virtually anything apart epic oponnents where that (very same) character becomes the same as if he wore no armor at all.

[polytope]

The armor is imo "bad" regardless of what you do with it. I usually play BGT. Allowing AC to indefinitely stack with DEX allows you to have a character with -10 or lower AC in BG1. The only way he can be hit is a critical, Drizzt or Sarevok. Missiles will never hit him apart a roll of 20, so the only way he can be hit is simultaneous attack by 20 or so oponents.

Problem is worse in BG2 actually, where one gets to values of about -17 (toss in Pro Evil, imo.invis etc.) and can't get hit by virtually anything apart epic oponnents where that (very same) character becomes the same as if he wore no armor at all.

 

True, but then again a -3 dex penalty on armor means that the fighter/cleric or ranger/cleric with DUHM can easily work around that AC penalty... and those two classes are definitely not in need of a boost relative to other warriors.

 

It's difficult to design opponents that can hit such a low AC tank regularly, without ensuring that the same creature will also hit an unbuffed character, or one wearing inferior armor (like a stalker or barbarian) with every swing, leading to frustration for the player who went with the latter, lightly armored build or didn't stack a bunch of AC buffing spells before the fight.

 

A possible solution would be to give melee monsters an increased chance to score critical hits, after all a group of enemies hitting you on 17-20 is actually doing 4x as much as damage as if they all needed a 20 to hit you. Since PCs either wear helmets or are stoneskinned (or both) the crits wouldn't increase damage dealt to characters with poor AC, but would at least solve the problem of enemies being 95% unable to hit your buffed tank.

 

(IMO Kensai should be allowed to wear helmets, no armor, shields or ranged weapons is enough of a hindrance and it just encourages the cheese of wearing Ioun stones for crit protection)

 

Anyway, since - unusually for me - I'm playing a team of six in SoA for my current game I realized it's frustrating to spend time buffing everyone with single target spells (and buffs are needed, playing no-reload).

 

I decided to change most single target protective spells to work on multiple creatures, much like the wand of lightning. Initially (at the level you can first cast them) they're single target, then affect one more target for every three levels (for wizards) or two levels (for priests) thereafter, simulating the rate at which new spell slots are gained.

 

 

Also I changed the graphics, as it struck me as strange that everything from ProFire to Chaotic Commands has the same visual effect when cast.

 

To compensate, most buffs are much shorter duration: 2 rounds/level for wizard elemental protection spells and 1/level for the priest version (this was already the case with priest ProFire). Chaotic Commands, Death Ward and Free Action each last 2 turns. I also increased the casting times, as it struck me as OP to be able to instantly protect your whole party.

 

I won't use this for my current game, but will do a playthrough to test it for balance shortly. AI opponents only are able to cast the buffs on one target, but then again even with SCS they only ever buff themselves. Actually with the exception of Remove Paralysis, Remove Fear and Heal I've never seen an enemy priest cast something on an enemy fighter.

 

Testing also reveals that placing one of these multi target spells in a sequencer causes it to only work on the initial target of the sequencer, this is fine for me, sequencers are powerful enough already.

Edited March 10, 2014 by polytope

[kreso]

Looks.....flashy. Shouldn't SCS use whatever you use if you install your tweak prior to SCS, or is it impossible to tweak spells in this manner so that AI benefits from those tweaks?

As for pre-buff, it is tedious work, I agree. Old Weimer's Solaufein mod used generated scripts to speed things up. What you could do is select the script, press "s" (or another key, can't recall now) and voila your mage gets stoneskins, pro fire/magic energy and whatever long-lasting buff he has memorized. Pressing "f" used short-term buffs like Fireshields. You could easilly fire off 20+buffs with those scripts (one was "caster-only" and another for buffing the party).

[Jarno Mikkola]

Shouldn't SCS use whatever you use if you install your tweak prior to SCS, or is it impossible to tweak spells in this manner so that AI benefits from those tweaks?

It won't be impossible but the spells structure needs to be changed a bit... as you need to make the spell target to be area of effect, which then casts the actual effect to the targets inside the area... the effected creatures can be all of the creatures (also with specific alignment if needed) or a set amount of them but they won't get to be specifically targeted. The last fact ensures that the enemy mage gets the same effect as the player.... of course then AI also then needs to be using the spell... but that's a different problem.

 

By the by, the colors are great and I like it a lots...

Edited March 10, 2014 by Jarno Mikkola

[polytope]

Looks.....flashy. Shouldn't SCS use whatever you use if you install your tweak prior to SCS, or is it impossible to tweak spells in this manner so that AI benefits from those tweaks?

 

The latter, I'm afraid.

 

Alright this is going to be a kind of long and rambling post, me brainstorming various gameplay changes.

 

Mind flayer psionic blast will no longer cause stun, but feeblemindedness for the duration (a ulitharid's mind blast is supposed work like this), which also makes it possible to survive being incapacitated by a flayer for at least a couple of rounds, since they must roll to hit your AC, per 2ed rules stunned creatures shouldn't be autohit either, only paralyzed ones.

 

To deal with stoneskin/mirror image etc. (since their attacks are now blocked by it) Mind flayers will get a new psionic power called Suppress Magic. This blocks use of their other psionics for two rounds and dispels combat protections and illusions (since these are usually short duration anyway - except stoneksin ofc., unfortunately temporary suppression of spell effects isn't really possible in the Infinity engine). They will use it only if presented with a target with magical protections (I didn't want to give flayers the same frustrating behaviour as beholders). Among other things they also get Psionic Displacement (50% miss chance for attackers not under True Sight).

 

 

Regarding other creature improvements, to make them a bit better in melee combat those with only 1 apr (golems or elementals) will crit on 16-20, those with 2-3 apr (like the minotaurs, umberhulks and most Yuan-Ti) on 17-20, those with 4 or more apr on 18-20, except Mind Flayers who will still need a 20 (because 4 hits from a flayer will kill anyone). Also exempt are most low HD creatures such as encountered in BG1, because a string of criticals in BG1 is already dangerous enough.

 

Chaotic Commands: Will no longer block "physical" stun (warrior power attack, monk fists, Kuo Toa bolts etc.) but will block stunning spells and will still block mind flayer psionics.

 

Free action: will block all sorts of stun, but will no longer block either Slow or Haste, or be useful vs flayers. Slow and Haste always interacted badly with FA anyway, if it worked as intended they would be removed once it was cast, also the slow effect from certain diseases already bypasses FA. Only (Minor) Globes of Invulnerability or sufficiently good saves will prevent Slow. The movement rate advantage players tend to have over enemies is really imbalancing, so making Slow harder to defend against is good IMO.

 

Slow and Haste: will now genuinely negate each other, Slow applies a -2 penalty to dex rather than vanilla game AC/THAC0 penalties whereas Haste gives a +2 dexterity bonus, a -2 dex is usually (for most PC's) more of a debuff than +2 is a bonus as there is no AC bonus for 19-20 dex.

 

Improved Invisibility: I actually think it's silly for this spell to grant save bonuses vs spells. Single target spells can't be aimed at you anyway, and I can't imagine how being invisible would help to prevent getting stuck in a Web. II at lvl 4 and Shadow Door at lvl 5 should be swapped around, the former is actually better because it can be used to buff an ally.

 

Blur: will keep the save bonus, but duration reduced, also it will be changed to alteration school (the blanket AC + save bonus is useful even against creatures who see through illusions, unlike II where attackers who detect the invisible don't suffer a penalty to hit, so it makes no sense for blur to be an illusion).

 

Greater Malison: This spell annoys me because it lasts for a long time (forcing much waiting around between mage battles, i.e. in the planar prison), since it applies twice the save penalty it really should (-4 instead -2) it should last only half the duration (or maybe just one turn). I also think it should apply a 20% penalty to elemental/magic damage resistance (going off the 20% die roll penalty to saves), making it useful for wizards who rely on damaging spells instead of save-or-else (not that invokers can learn GM anyway).

 

Cone of cold/Prismatic Spray: Casting time reduced to 1, but will hold the caster in place for a couple of seconds like Burning Hands and Color Spray, reason is obvious; it's impossible for the player to aim these properly (though AI opponents can).

 

Doom: Revert the casting time back to 1 segment instead of 1 round. Even high level enemy clerics with SCS show a willingness to open a battle with it, so the one round casting time really screws up the AI IMO.

 

Chant: The bonuses or penalties end one round after you move more than 30 ft from the chanting cleric (or if the cleric dies). It irritates me when I'm debuffed by an enemy cleric's chant long after he's ceased to be capable of chanting...

 

Cleric dispel magic: Made single target, thus maybe actually usable. Mage Remove Magic will stay AoE since Protective Spells are now multi target.

 

Holy Word/Smite: Neutral clerics are currently overpowered, they can cast Holy Word/Smite while being immune to Unholy Word/Blight. The latter will now affect all non-evil creatures except the caster and party (SCS scripts may have clerics w. neutral allies cast this), Holy Word/Smite will remain effective only against evil. Also, these spells now do 1d8/2 levels (max 6d8), they were far too damaging in vanilla. I consider reducing the duration of Holy/Unholy Word inflicted deafness because it ruins spellcasters with no saving throw, but I might add a secondary effect like a penalty to movement rate and attack rolls so it would be useful even against non spellcasters of high level.

 

Class and kit changes: I'm currently playing with a blade PC (with Rogue Rebalancing mod). It's a good mod, but I don't like the Offensive/Defensive Spin abilities as they are now.

 

In unmodded BG2, Offensive Spin hastes the blade, which does not stack with regular Haste and negates Improved Haste. With the fixpack it gives +1 apr and double movement rate which CAN be stacked with haste and IH if they're cast beforehand, quite overpowered.

 

On the other hand, Offensive Spin's very short duration feels awkward for a caster whose aura is often tied up in battle with Remove Magic and suchlike.

 

Rogue Rebalancing gives blades a "Weapons Display" skill which is basically slow casting Horror but also grants the party a THAC0 bonus, up to a +3 bonus at 20th level (Together with offensive spin that puts a blades THAC0 on par with Kensai 9->mage, and damage output almost on par, which is a bit much).

 

I had in mind to combine those two abilities in a nerfed form, Offensive Spin will now be gained at 1st level and once per 10 levels thereafter. It will last 3 rounds + 1 round/level and still give +2 melee THAC0 and max damage per hit. However it no longer grants haste or extra attacks, and works with (Improved) Haste. for the first two rounds ranged attacks made by the blade will panic creatures of lower level if they fail their save (fear is a bad ability for a melee effect).

 

As for defensive spin, I think inability to attack rather than inability to move is much more appropriate. AC bonus reduced to 2 + 1/2 levels (maximum 7), but anyone trying to hit the blade in melee must save vs death or take 4 + 1/level slashing damage (maximum 20) representing the blade's riposte, the saving throw penalty would increase by 1/4 levels up to -5. Defensive Spin would last 3 rounds and be gained at the same rate as vanilla, it could be used during an Offensive Spin, but negates that ability because no attacks can be made.

 

Swashbucklers, sort of the thief counterpart to a blade. In vanilla they would eventually do more damage per strike than a fighter, albeit with less apr and worse THAC0, but they could surpass a fighter in burst damage using whirlwind, and their AC got ridiculous at epic levels. I'd tone down their AC, and rather than a flat damage bonus increasing with levels give them Insightful Strike (at levels 1, 5, 9, 13, 17 and 21 - the same levels as an assasin's backstab improves), providing an extra damage bonus versus humanoid creatures (including vampires), along with disarm maneuver which prevents a humanoid opponent to attack for one round (except monks) on a failed save, but has no effect on creatures relying on natural attacks, the latter ability would be "passive", i.e. always having a chance to trigger on melee hits (though improving with level). The swashbuckler should shine against enemy fighters and be less effective against monsters compared to other warriors. I also thought about removing swash hide in shadows ability (doesn't suit the character) and giving a hp bonus at low levels.

[kreso]

Whoa Polytope! My ramblings about these:

 

Mind Flayers - t-up. Sounds nice.

Other creature improvements - t-up.

 

Chaotic Commands vs Free Action Stun interraction

Fine by me CC not stopping Stun effects. But do tone down stun duration. I'm not sure if Free Action should provide stun immunity. In my current run Slow & Haste correctly negate each other (I use Spellpack's versions). Slow is one of the most OP spells in the game as it is (-4 penalty). I'd vote to remove AC and THAC0 penalty from it. Being slowed is a huge tactical disadvantage per se. I'm not sure about -2 dex (or +2 dex from Haste). If anything, being hasted should imo drop your dex as well (I work with hyperactive children, they are clumsy, if you can compare that). Haste is utterly disbalancing for many reasons; PnP handled this spell much better (It had a real disadvantage, not fatigue, but aging).

 

Imp.Invisibility

Any nerf here is good. I don't like SCS reliance on it, nor do I like to use it. I personaly made this "caster-only".

SCS doesn't use it for other purposes apart self-buff, so it doesn't screw up the AI.

 

Blur

Sounds good.

 

Greater Malison

Again, I currently use Spellpack version which gives -2 saves and -2 Luck, and is removable via Remove Curse spell. It's very powerful, duration should be lower, agreed. Imo, the "perfect malison" would apply huge penalties only for the next save made. I'm not sure if this is implementable (maybe via adding custom sec type to all save-or-x spells)

 

Cone spells

Fine.

 

Doom

This spell is, in essence, Energy Drain. Without a save. While I hate "casting time fix" introduced by fixpack, this spell is insane for it's level and effect. It needs a saving throw, regardless of how you tweak it.

 

Chant

Priest should be able to chant all day (similar to bard's song) but it would screw up the AI use of this spell.

 

Cleric Dispel

T-down for single target....with their level-up rates, I don't really like this. In many cases, it would be a boon, in others, it would be a nerf.

 

Holy Smite

Imo, Spellpack's changes are great here - Holy Smite causes blindness, while Unholy Blight curses (-1 luck, resulting in extra damage). Both allow a save, and take effect regardless of alignment.

 

Class/Kits

 

Blade is op, RR or not. RR version is probably even more powerful than vanilla. This kit is broken in many aspects, the worst being that he, even tough a bard kit, is in effect a fighter/mage with huge advantages over his multiclassed counterpart for 90% of the game. Even then (HLA levels) he is a powerhouse. One thing I'd do is tone down their level up rate. Having a bard with 5 levels advantage over a mage is silly.

Like the swashbuckler changes, even if I'd rather remove traps then stealth from them.

 

Some food for your tought, these are spell changes I made to my (relatively vanilla) game.

Spells:

- pro fire/cold - duration set at 120 seconds

- Call Lightning - damage capped at level 10, usable indoors

- Free Action - lasts 3 turns, allows haste

- Def.harmony - 2 turns duration, cleric needs to remain close to party for it to have effect

- NPP - 1 turn duration

- Chaotic Commands - 5 turns duration (probably too much)

- Finger of Death - even if save is succesfull, it deals 30 flat magic damage

- Blindness - lasts 4 rounds, not an eternity.

- protection from fire/cold/electricity/mag.energy/acid - 5 turns flat duration, both cleric and wizard versions

- Emotion - lasts 4 rounds (one of the most imbalanced spells in the game probably)

- True Sight - a la KR Inquisitor - only affects the caster (making him see like a Lich does), does not dispel Imp.Inisibility, but allows targeting of imp.invis. creatures. This tones down Conjurers since they can't target imp.invisible enemies with anti-magic, which is great imo.

- Armor of Faith - lasts 3 turns, gives 10% damage reduction, does not scale, since damage reduction scales itself as monsters do more damage.

 

Items:

 

- arrows of dispelling have a 10% chance to dispel

- belt of inertial barrier - 25% magic damage resistance (SCS won't cast magic damage spells against 50% reduction apperantly)

- Flail of ages - save is allowed against slow, with no penaltly for +3 version, -2 for +4 version, -4 for +5 version.

- Ravager +6 - made into a +5 weapon, save against vorpal at -4

- Ixil's +6 - +5 enchanted

- Ram +6 - +5, no knockback

- Answerer - -1 AC, -10% MR, for 2 rounds.

- Soul Reaver - THAC0 drain lasts for only 3 rounds, not 2 turns (fixpack ruins this weapon btw). Each point of THAC0 drained gives a +1 damage bonus for the duration. It can only be used by fallen paladins or rangers. I'd love to make this usable by Sarevok as well, but am not sure how to do it flawlessly.

- Carsomyr +5 - 10% chance to dispel

- Carsomyr +6 - 15% dispel, +5 enchanted

- Defender of Easthaven - 10% damage resistance, no AC bonus

Few others I can't think off...

Edited March 18, 2014 by kreso

[Jarno Mikkola]

...

What ever he said... except that, hmm, the Chant... the Turn Undead could be turned into Chant... with the additional effect of turning of the undead similar like the bards song. This is of course kit and alignment subjective ... so. Whatever.

[polytope]

Update: progress is unexpectedly slow because the components are becoming increasingly inter-dependent, i.e. if you want to redesign the mechanics of level-draining monsters you need to account for every item and spell that gives level drain immunity.

 

Speaking of which, I have redesigned most level-drainers for the next release: Unless you have NPP, Improved Mantle spell or equivalent they will always inflict the penalties of level drain on your characters with each hit (i.e. to THAC0, saves and hp) but if a save vs death is successful then the character won't actually be level drained and the debuffing effects will only last for one turn (i.e. no restoration spell required, no spell slots lost for casters). Although the "real" level drain allows a save vs death the cumulative penalty to saves on hit should make it threatening even to dwarf fighters.

 

My reasoning is that vanilla level drain is horribly annoying to deal with, pressing the player to avoid it entirely, but items that provide equipped protection from level drain totally spoil the challenge of those undead.

 

The improved mace of disruption will instead give +2 AC vs undead and increased base damage dice and magic damage to undead on hit (1d8 instead of 1d6), the amulet of power OTOH will now provide immunity to feeblemindedness and spell drain effect (from Nishruus, Hive Mothers etc.).

 

I also decided that all vampires (except Bodhi) will drain a fixed 2 levels per hit, but have varying apr. I.e. in vanilla an "eminent" vampire (VAMEMI01.cre) has 2 apr and drains 4 levels per hit, revised they will have 4 apr for 2 levels each, but the base damage of their attack is increased from 1d6 to 2d8 (+8 for strength) so it will not be trivial to just send in one character immune to level drain to take out a room of vampires.

 

Lately I reworked the Turn Undead ability (it's pointless trying to design challenging undead with this imbalanced vanilla ability). It's now a spell like ability useable once per turn (should be once/encounter), and located under special abilities bar:

 

 

Turning Undead now uses a proper "die roll", even the highest level priest needs a roll of 13+ to turn a "special" undead creature of 15HD or more, it also breaks invisibility/sanctuary (ridiculous to turn undead if they can't see the crucifix or whatever you're brandishing at them).

 

The "Turn Undead" button now just shows whether a character is ready to turn undead (darkened if not, lit up when the ability returns):

 

 

Making undead flee in fear from a spell was giving me problems as they're immune to fear, then in my last playthrough I noticed that opcode 283 - Use eff file as a curse - bypasses normal immunities to the specified effect (a character who draws Fool from the Deck of Many Things gets confused even with Chaotic Commands/Shield of Harmony).

 

Incidentally, I'm thinking that a major factor in imbalancing fighter/mage types is that they can have all the item-based immunities of a regular fighter (since these are tied to things like Shield of Harmony, Equalizer or Dragonslayer), if the immunities were inherent to armors rather than weapons or shields then the pure class warriors would have a lot more going for them.

Edited May 18, 2014 by polytope

[kreso]

I like the changes to Vampires. Otoh, I think that granting immunities a la Harmony shield to armor may actually nerf single classed fighters even more. This way, a single classed fighter can still stack them if he wants, but if you remove immunites from hand-held items it will nerf them even more in comparison to multiclasses. Also, it may cause AI issues.