Unearthed Arcana presents Scales of Balance: a post-hac tweak pack

[subtledoctor]

2 hours ago, Guest Juan Lopez said:

wanted to change the penalty to casting time to casting failiure for wearing armor, but it seems to have some complex interactions with other mods like FnP, so instead I added it on top of the speed penalty

Yes, and: edit YARAS.ini before installing SoB and set all speed penalties to 0. Then you’ll only have the casting failure. 

2 hours ago, Guest Juan Lopez said:

wanted to merge short sword proficiency with ninjatos

Just install Item Revisions “weapon changes” component before this. 

2 hours ago, Guest Juan Lopez said:

and wakizashis

This is harder. Off the top of my head I can’t think of an easy way to do this. 

2 hours ago, Guest Juan Lopez said:

and make them small size type so that they can be used as daggers when dual wielding, but this has been more difficult

After doing the above, change “medium” to “small” at line 580 of /scales_of_balance/components/124_wpo_styles.tpa. Then short swords and ninja-to will be small. 

(Mind you, I’m not sure this is necessary. I have short swords as medium in my game, and Kivan is a beast when dual-wielding them.)

[Guest Juan Lopez]

Thanks for the help, How about changing Wakizashi prof using the same component used in IR for ninjatos? Would that work or would break something in SoB or in any of your other mods?

Also, Is it posible to make scimatars medium size but keep katanas big size?

1 hour ago, subtledoctor said:

Yes, and: edit YARAS.ini before installing SoB and set all speed penalties to 0. Then you’ll only have the casting failure. 

But text will still show in the description like, casting speed penalty = +0, right? so I should also delete that part. How does it work with FnP, is it because some kits gain bonus to casting time or is it to make a distintion between mages and clerics spells?

[subtledoctor]

2 hours ago, Guest Juan Lopez said:

How about changing Wakizashi prof using the same component used in IR for ninjatos? Would that work or would break something in SoB or in any of your other mods?

This stuff is complicated. If I'm reading this right, wakizashi are already converted to type=19, which means they will get the same treatment as short swords. But caution, wakizashi are by default a d8 weapon, and setting them to the "small" category with this version of dual-wielding would be massively overpowered. Like, all other d8 weapons get a relative 4-point thac0 penalty and 2-point AC penalty compared to small weapons, and most d6 weapons would be substantially worse as well. It would just be crazy. Even setting short swords as "small" is unbalancing - like, there needs to be a reason to put a dagger in your off-hand. "Small" is really supposed to represent a "just daggers" category. Everything else is just either small or large (i.e. "medium" or "large").

But to each his own!

2 hours ago, Guest Juan Lopez said:

Also, Is it posible to make scimatars medium size but keep katanas big size?

See this stuff is hard. In the vanilla game scimitars share a category code with long swords, bastard swords, and katanas. So there's not an easy way to break them out separately. But with FnP's revised cleric weapon usability, scimitars have their own category code, so then it is easy - just change "large" to "medium" at line 626.

2 hours ago, Guest Juan Lopez said:

But text will still show in the description like, casting speed penalty = +0, right?

I guess.

2 hours ago, Guest Juan Lopez said:

How does it work with FnP, is it because some kits gain bonus to casting time or is it to make a distintion between mages and clerics spells?

I don't think there is any specific interaction with FnP.

[Guest Juan Lopez]

46 minutes ago, subtledoctor said:

wakizashi are by default a d8 weapon, and setting them to the "small" category with this version of dual-wielding would be massively overpowered.

Well, my intention was to make them 1d6 just like short swords with the difference that they make slashing damage instead of piercing. It just that it bothers me that they are described as not being more than 2 feet long but have the same damage than as a long sword. Also, the daggers used in duels alongside swords are usually 2 feet long too or a little shorter. As for the scimatars it is more for flavor, because in fantasy settings they are frecuently dual wielded (Drizzt for example), however they would only make 1d7 damage to compensate and make them a little more unique.

[Guest Juan Lopez]

I forgot to ask another thing, how did you manage to make weapons like bastard swords and katanas main hand only? I want to aply that to flails (which are hard to handle) and weapons with apr bonus. Is it posible to make off-hand only meele weapons too? For me flags like off-handed or left-handed don't seem to work.

[subtledoctor]

Demivrgvs had a nice idea to have scimitars do d6 damage, but crit on 19 instead of 20. 

As far as dual-wielding, the intent here is that you can totally dual-wield two large weapons... you need to have a good thac0 to do it effectively. A 20th-level warrior with 18 STR and two longswords +4 and mastery in the weapon would have a thac0 of -4, with an extra attack each round and doing d8+13 per hit. The penalty for dual-wielding is counteracted by their class features and weapon expertise. Contrarily, an Archer or rogue would have a worse thac0, so they would not want the penalty, and would instead want to go all Legolas with a pair of knives. 

Admittedly, the late-game damage bonuses really outweigh base weapon damage differences. There should probably be a cap on the STR damage bonus for small weapons. And I’m contemplating a mod to remove the damage bonus from weapon enchantment...

[subtledoctor]

45 minutes ago, Guest Juan Lopez said:

I forgot to ask another thing, how did you manage to make weapons like bastard swords and katanas main hand only? I want to aply that to flails (which are hard to handle) and weapons with apr bonus.

It’s a consequence of having an item type code higher than 30. Flails could be assigned a higher code if you find a free one... but it would affect stuff like FnP and other things that deal with item types. Would have to be coded carefully. (See how I moved a couple 2-handed weapons below 30 since they don’t matter for dusl-wielding, snd then modified FnP’s “d5_u...” spells, in lines 524-539 of 124_wpo_styles.tpa.)

Edited August 19, 2021 by subtledoctor

[Guest Juan Lopez]

1 hour ago, subtledoctor said:

Admittedly, the late-game damage bonuses really outweigh base weapon damage differences. There should probably be a cap on the STR damage bonus for small weapons. And I’m contemplating a mod to remove the damage bonus from weapon enchantment...

Yeah reducing the bonus strenght for small weapons and increasing it for two handed weapons would be great, but it your options with the game engine are limited.

[subtledoctor]

I mean, I could figure it out. It's just a question of, how much of a difference will it make, how much of an improvement will it be, and how much effort will be needed to make it happen, and how much time do I have to put in that effort? The game is pretty fun as it is, this has not been something calling out to me for change... but, maybe...

[Guest Juan Lopez]

Well, I think it makes sense, it would make fighters with high strenght choose two-handed over dual-wealding, while other classes with less investment on strenght (like rogues) would be better off using weapons in both hands since they don't gain bonuses on apr upon leveling up. Of course, you would also have to tweak the weapon styles bonuses to compensate for these changes.

[Guest Juan Lopez]

On 8/18/2021 at 4:42 PM, subtledoctor said:

On 8/18/2021 at 2:13 PM, Guest Juan Lopez said:

How does it work with FnP, is it because some kits gain bonus to casting time or is it to make a distintion between mages and clerics spells?

I don't think there is any specific interaction with FnP.

Sorry, I forgot that the component that interacts with FnP is the weapon overhaul (the new wepon categories that you mentioned). The part I don't understand in the armor component is for example, the following lines of the code:

            PATCH_IF FILE_EXISTS_IN_GAME ~qdmagus.2da~ BEGIN
              LPF CLONE_EFFECT INT_VAR silent = 1 match_opcode = 177 multi_match = 1 parameter1 = %magus_code% parameter2 = 9 STR_VAR match_resource = EVAL ~d5_cstp%leather_cast%~ resource = EVAL ~d5_cstb%leather_cast%~ END
            END
            PATCH_FOR_EACH class IN 5 7 10 13 14 17 BEGIN
              LPF CLONE_EFFECT INT_VAR silent = 1 match_opcode = 177 multi_match = 1 parameter1 = %class% STR_VAR match_resource = EVAL ~d5_cstp%leather_cast%~ END
            END

[subtledoctor]

On 8/20/2021 at 9:24 AM, Guest Juan Lopez said:

the component that interacts with FnP is the weapon overhaul (the new wepon categories that you mentioned)

So, as I said, any item category code above 30 cannot be dual-wielded; FnP has to separate various items that are lumped together in vanilla, so that there is a distinct item code for each proficiency code. This way proficiency and usability can be matched together. (Which is how the vanilla game usually works.) This lets FnP have hundreds of different unique kit-based usability restrictions, where the normal game can only support usability restrictions for 3 kits in each class.

Now, FnP want to otherwise conform to the vanailla rules, in which e.g. bastard swords and katanas can be dual-wielded. This means FnP has to move some 2-handed weapons from item codes below 30 to item codes above 30, so that bastard swords and katanas can have item codes below 30.

But SoB comes along and wants you to be unable to dual-wield bastard swords and katanas, so it wants top shift them back to item codes above 30. (Remember, in the vanilla game these do not have item codes at all, they are lumped in with long swords.) So SoB has to account for FnP: it says, if FnP is not installed, then bastard swords and katanas have no item codes, so we have to assign them new ones and those new ones have to be above 30. But if FnP has been installed, then bastard swords and katanas already have item codes, and the item codes above 30 that we want to give them are already occupied by 2-handed weapons. So in this case we have to do a bit of a switcheroo.

On 8/20/2021 at 9:24 AM, Guest Juan Lopez said:

The part I don't understand in the armor component is for example, the following lines of the code:

            PATCH_IF FILE_EXISTS_IN_GAME ~qdmagus.2da~ BEGIN
              LPF CLONE_EFFECT INT_VAR silent = 1 match_opcode = 177 multi_match = 1 parameter1 = %magus_code% parameter2 = 9 STR_VAR match_resource = EVAL ~d5_cstp%leather_cast%~ resource = EVAL ~d5_cstb%leather_cast%~ END
            END
            PATCH_FOR_EACH class IN 5 7 10 13 14 17 BEGIN
              LPF CLONE_EFFECT INT_VAR silent = 1 match_opcode = 177 multi_match = 1 parameter1 = %class% STR_VAR match_resource = EVAL ~d5_cstp%leather_cast%~ END
            END

That part is patching in casting speed penalties for members of certain classes wearing armor; but also adding a corresponding casting speed bonus for the Magus kit, so that the special kit bonus ("can cast in armor") is preserved in some way in a mod that lets everyone cast in armor.

[Guest Juan Lopez]

Thanks again for resolving my doubt. While installing various components of IR and SoB to see how they behave with each other after making some changes (I managed to change the wakizashi´s proficiency to shortswords!) I found that the changes made to weapons in the 102, 121 and 122 components don´t seem to work as intended. Especifically the APR changes. I made sure to uninstall all mods, and install only these components with the most resent version of SoB. At first I thought it was IR fault, but that wasn´t the case. Depending on the components installed darts and shortbows only get 1.5 APR. I reported it on Github, but I find it weird no one had mentioned it already.

[Graion Dilach]

Why does WPO - Fighting Style Changes edits bastard sword category from 20 to 69? This change prevents them sold in shops. Tested on IWDEE and EET as well.

EDIT: Okay, I see, it's for preventing them to be used offhand. Still it breaks the shops. What mod/tweak do you use to resolve that?

Edited August 29, 2021 by Graion Dilach

[Guest Bigby's Bitchslap]

@Graion Dilach

cdtweaks component two-handed Bastard Swords and Katanas would probably fix it so the player could sell the two-handed version.