BG2:EE possibilities

[yarpen]

Hey Dem.

Many people ask for the compatibility, but I am not here to talk about that. By looking at what kind of power the developers of BG2: EE have and what kind of special effects they can enable for you to do your awesome work - I believe it could be worth it to migrate completely to BG2EE and create a list of opcodes/functionalities that could be really, really usefull.

 

For example BG2EE has Shadowdancer kit who can Hide in Plain Sight. New engine also allows to customize how many skill points exactly thief kits have to spend per level instead of it being strapped to usability lists.

 

Imagine implementing Dirty Tricks as Swashbuckler's ability which applies additional effects (Blindness, Slow, Deafness) on his Critical Strike.

Imagine implementing Combat Traps as Bounty Hunter's ability which allows him to set up traps during combat after reaching certain level.

Imagine implementing Hide in Plain Sight as Assassin's ability that allows him to hide even while being spotted.

 

You could also finally be able to implement proper Metamagic features. I believe developers could enable %-based damage increase on spells or maybe even make all the Wild Surge's effects externalized (doubling the duration of spells, increasing radius of AoE ones).

[kreso]

I was very reluctant to even try out EE (new kits I'd never download if they were released as stand-alone mods, new equipment isn't grand either). However, it does put the old BG to shame - it's faster, looks better, plays better, and, from what I've read, developers externalized many hardcoded things.....I guess this is the future, and there's little point in going back now. Once Revisions mods/Ascension/few other mods are made compatible with EE, I'll probably put the old BG to rest for good.

[Kalindor]

Yes, the new patch to BG:EE externalized a ton of things that will be useful to KR such as the bonuses from weapon styles as well as Monk fist progression, etc. Also, the new less-obtrusive bottom UI bar makes a big difference in the visual impact of the game. If only they'd let us wield an off-hand weapon and quick-swap to a bow...

[Demivrgvs]

Sorry, I don't know why I forgot about this topic.

 

I believe it could be worth it to migrate completely to BG2EE and create a list of opcodes/functionalities that could be really, really usefull.

I do want Revisions mods to work fine on both vanilla BG and BGEE, I'm not abandoning the old BGs. That being said, I don't think that's really a problem as right now I'm not aware of anything that BGEE offers (in terms of opcodes or externalized 2das) which we cannot achieve on old BGs with ToBEx - actually I discovered a few things that BGEE still don't allow while we can do them with ToBEx (e.g. the upcoming IR's Revised Backstabbing isn't fully implementable on BGEE because backstab flag isn't enabled there).

 

Rant:

On a side note, while I really appreciate the renewed interest BGEE has brought, I would have preferred if they only focused on the engine and technical things, because I actually don't like almost all the new stuff they added. I cannot judge the new NPCs because I did not played them (nice idea to pick a wild mage and a monk though), but I've read many reviews/comments and the general consensus seem to be that both them and the new areas feel more "mod added" than some of the best mod NPCs and surely not on par with Bioware stuff.

 

What I can comment on is the new kits and the new items, and while I admit I am probably biased because of my mods, I really cannot even give a 6/10 to them. New kits are poorly designed imo, with several balancing issues too (Blackguard and Dwarven Defender are really OP, Shadow Dancer was ridiculously exploitable SotM-style), and while BG2EE did a slightly better job when it comes to items I'm still not impressed, and I cannot forget how bad BGEE ones were (seriously: no lore, no icons, terrible balance).

 

All of this to say, that I will probably buy BG2EE to show support, but if it wasn't for new resolution settings and faster load times I would not even consider to install it.

End of rant.

 

For example BG2EE has Shadowdancer kit who can Hide in Plain Sight. New engine also allows to customize how many skill points exactly thief kits have to spend per level instead of it being strapped to usability lists.

...

Imagine implementing Combat Traps as Bounty Hunter's ability which allows him to set up traps during combat after reaching certain level.

Imagine implementing Hide in Plain Sight as Assassin's ability that allows him to hide even while being spotted.

Last time I asked Hide in Plain Sight was just a new hardcoded thing, and cannot be used by KR to say, give rangers a cool mid-high level ability. That being said, this feature is highly exploitable without proper balancing (e.g. hide penalties and/or cap to prevent invisibility spamming SoTM-style).

 

Imagine implementing Dirty Tricks as Swashbuckler's ability which applies additional effects (Blindness, Slow, Deafness) on his Critical Strike.

Afaik critical strikes are still not moddable.

 

You could also finally be able to implement proper Metamagic features. I believe developers could enable %-based damage increase on spells or maybe even make all the Wild Surge's effects externalized (doubling the duration of spells, increasing radius of AoE ones).

The former is already available via ToBEx and will be used by KR indeed (the Evoker will get it) and maybe IR too.

 

The latter would be utterly cool, but afaik it's not an option right now.

 

Yes, the new patch to BG:EE externalized a ton of things that will be useful to KR such as the bonuses from weapon styles as well as Monk fist progression, etc.

WAIT A SECOND: how could I miss it? Are you sure weapon styles have been externalized?!? I need to see this!

 

Monk's fist progression really wasn't such a huge pain to handle, I think the current KR's Monk is spot on. What they should have fixed is the broken hardcoded AC mechanic, and they did not.

 

If only they'd let us wield an off-hand weapon and quick-swap to a bow...

Now this would be a real Enhancement! Rangers in particular would feel like a new class entirely in terms of gameplay imo.

[yarpen]

WAIT A SECOND: how could I miss it? Are you sure weapon styles have been externalized?!? I need to see this!

Yes they did. And they allowed you to add proficiency additively. So you can give +1 to all proficiencies and if you have specialization it will turn into mastery.

 

Last time I asked Hide in Plain Sight was just a new hardcoded thing, and cannot be used by KR to say, give rangers a cool mid-high level ability. That being said, this feature is highly exploitable without proper balancing (e.g. hide penalties and/or cap to prevent invisibility spamming SoTM-style).

Same thought. But that'd be easy. Give EVERY creature -5% penalty to Hide in Shadows to all it's enemies in sight radius. And BAM, done. Or 10% even.

 

Now this would be a real Enhancement! Rangers in particular would feel like a new class entirely in terms of gameplay imo.

Drool.

 

Afaik critical strikes are still not moddable.

I think I've seen a mod with that feature for BGEE. One of the kitpacks.

[Demivrgvs]

WAIT A SECOND: how could I miss it? Are you sure weapon styles have been externalized?!? I need to see this!

Yes they did. And they allowed you to add proficiency additively. So you can give +1 to all proficiencies and if you have specialization it will turn into mastery.

Interesting, though I fear what they changed is also causing the current KR Fighter's Weapon Training to downgrade all proficiencies to 1 in case they are higher (can any beta tester confirm this compatibility issue with BGEE?).

 

Just noticed this, and it sounds like Weapon Styles can indeed be slightly tweaked. Cool. Now I have to discover if this is also doable outside of BGEE with ToBex...

 

Last time I asked Hide in Plain Sight was just a new hardcoded thing, and cannot be used by KR to say, give rangers a cool mid-high level ability. That being said, this feature is highly exploitable without proper balancing (e.g. hide penalties and/or cap to prevent invisibility spamming SoTM-style).

Same thought. But that'd be easy. Give EVERY creature -5% penalty to Hide in Shadows to all it's enemies in sight radius. And BAM, done. Or 10% even.

Kinda heavy engine wise because you have tons of aura-like spells triggering each round just for this feature, and still keeps the ability heavily exploitable when not fighting hordes of enemies. Regardless, the main problem is that afaik this is not an ability which can be gained by other kits at xth level.

 

Now this would be a real Enhancement! Rangers in particular would feel like a new class entirely in terms of gameplay imo.

Drool.

I'm not holding my breath for it. Maybe I'm too pessimistic, but after a brief search I found this report from a BGEE wannabe modder:

"I had an opportunity to play around with some of the new externalizations. "numwslot.2da" affects the number of weapon slots a class gets. This only affects the inventory screen, and not the UI. So you can up a Paladin's weapon slots from 3 to 4 and they'll be able to carry four weapons outside of the backpack, but only the first 3 will show up on the UI. Likewise, if you reduce the number of weapon slots, you will be able to carry fewer weapons equipped, but your UI will still show the default number of weapon slots; it won't remove or replace them.

Anyway, I'd be happy if they prove me wrong and give us cool new modding tool. Rest assured that if that happens we would surely take advantage of it for Revisions mods.

 

 

Afaik critical strikes are still not moddable.

I think I've seen a mod with that feature for BGEE. One of the kitpacks.

Within Cam's post I found no reference to moddable critical hits.

[Ardanis]

Monk's fist progression really wasn't such a huge pain to handle, I think the current KR's Monk is spot on. What they should have fixed is the broken hardcoded AC mechanic, and they did not.

Monk AC has been externalized too.

[kreso]

(can any beta tester confirm this compatibility issue with BGEE?).

Tested and confirmed.

 

Give EVERY creature -5% penalty to Hide in Shadows to all it's enemies in sight radius. And BAM, done.

It won't work as easy as you think.

 

"numwslot.2da" affects the number of weapon slots a class gets. This only affects the inventory screen, and not the UI.

ToBEx does this already afaik....but it's pretty useless. Who cares about that?

 

Monk's fist progression really wasn't such a huge pain to handle, I think the current KR's Monk is spot on. What they should have fixed is the broken hardcoded AC mechanic, and they did not.

Monk AC has been externalized too.

Now Monk benefits from wearing bracers of ACx, he can get both innate bonuses and those from bracers. Bracers AC6 had no effect on a Monk in ToB for example, since his AC was better. Now they stack, a Monk wearing bracers from Irenicus Dungeon (AC8) gains +2 AC even at level 40. NOT the best solution.....

From what I've witnessed, they broke more than they fixed.

Anyhow - my suggestion - keep it simple. If it can't work with the basic platform, don't bother using it.

[Ardanis]

Now Monk benefits from wearing bracers of ACx, he can get both innate bonuses and those from bracers. Bracers AC6 had no effect on a Monk in ToB for example, since his AC was better. Now they stack, a Monk wearing bracers from Irenicus Dungeon (AC8) gains +2 AC even at level 40. NOT the best solution.....

From what I've witnessed, they broke more than they fixed.

Imo it's more important to be able to edit it at last. Besides, the stacking AC issue will be fixed in the next patch.

[yarpen]

As overall, I'd say that even if BG:EE is not good enough yet.

It will.

I mean, you can actually talk to developers and ask them to implement some cool features. That's a huge difference.