cipher Posted September 6, 2015 Share Posted September 6, 2015 If you're using Spell Revisions don't use either Galac's file nor Subtledoctor's minimod. Spell works fine, and doesn't work vs Liches/Rakshasa by intent. I know, it's just what I have installed at the moment and I had to test those things somewhere. Thanks for the warning though. Btw "working fine" doesn't mean there's no room for improvement, so it's not a waste to know a solution's shortcomings. But I'm going to post that in the appropriate forum once I finish my current run. Damn thing it's going excruciating slow due to bad party and mods I'm using to test for incompatibilities... Link to comment
toxin Posted September 7, 2015 Share Posted September 7, 2015 If you're using Spell Revisions don't use either Galac's file nor Subtledoctor's minimod. Spell works fine, and doesn't work vs Liches/Rakshasa by intent. How do you dispel their combat protections then? Does SR offer an alternative? Link to comment
kreso Posted September 7, 2015 Share Posted September 7, 2015 If you're using Spell Revisions don't use either Galac's file nor Subtledoctor's minimod. Spell works fine, and doesn't work vs Liches/Rakshasa by intent. How do you dispel their combat protections then? Does SR offer an alternative? Pierce Shield (which is 8th level) dispels both combat and spell protections, while it looses it's MR lowering feature. Link to comment
subtledoctor Posted September 7, 2015 Share Posted September 7, 2015 ...Which is annoying, because it means there's no reasonable way to tackle Ihtafeer before going to Spellhold. But, as I've said elsewhere, that's a problem with the 2E rakshasa, not with SR. The crazy immunity (better than liches!!) was not there in 1E or 3E, and is not based in anything from the actual myth behind the creature. It was just something invented by a bad creature designer for no good reason, back in ~1988. So I say, just house-rule the immunity out of existence. Mod the .cre. Link to comment
cipher Posted September 7, 2015 Share Posted September 7, 2015 Although quite sensible to mod out the immunity, it will make any rakshasa encounter a complete joke. I would suggest to keep them immune up to 5th (since they use Cloudkill on top of themselves) and buff their fighting abilities considerably. Link to comment
subtledoctor Posted September 7, 2015 Share Posted September 7, 2015 Oh yeah you would replace that immunity with some other, more interesting advantage. Link to comment
toxin Posted September 7, 2015 Share Posted September 7, 2015 Not sure I follow your SR suggestion cipher - if they're still immune to lvl5 spells, don't we still have the breach issue? Unless you can cast 8 lvl spells which as subtledoctor mentioned forces you to wait for a long time (inconsistent with how and when that quest is presented). Link to comment
kreso Posted September 7, 2015 Share Posted September 7, 2015 Remove/Dispel magic works on them fairly reliably - they're very low-leveled (I think lvl 9) so a single class caster can remove all their buffs in a single casting with a decent probability. You don't need to wait until Spellhold - I usually do Trademeet & Rakashasa as 1st major quest. 2nd, you don't need to fight them anyway. Link to comment
subtledoctor Posted September 7, 2015 Share Posted September 7, 2015 How/why does level 3 Dispel affect them if level 5 Breach doesn't? Seems backwards. Link to comment
cipher Posted September 7, 2015 Share Posted September 7, 2015 Not sure I follow your SR suggestion cipher - if they're still immune to lvl5 spells, don't we still have the breach issue? Unless you can cast 8 lvl spells which as subtledoctor mentioned forces you to wait for a long time (inconsistent with how and when that quest is presented). Sorry, I wasn't very clear. I didn't actually suggest using SR. I'm testing out the beta, so that was what I had handy to tweak and confirm if the dummy effect method works as good as I was hoping. It turns out that there is a scenario that this method doesn't work, both in vanilla (+SCS of course) and in SR. It's just more apparent in the latter case, since Spell Deflection (SR) is used quite commonly, whereas the use of Minor Spell Deflection (vanilla) is so low in priority that you might never see it. So in the end SR or not, it is not relevant. The tweaked Breach works similarly in any case. Note that if you change the dummy effect to be level 7 *and* make Rakshasas vulnerable to 6th and above (as liches are), the tweak works without side effects. That leaves, I think, only Demogorgon unbreachable, but I could live with that. And to add to what subtledoctor wrote, I want to add that having Breach blocked by innate immunities is inconsistent with the whole spell protections/removals system. Link to comment
Demivrgvs Posted September 7, 2015 Share Posted September 7, 2015 I want to add that having Breach blocked by innate immunities is inconsistent with the whole spell protections/removals system. I have to disagree. Breach bypassing immunities is inconsistent, especially within SCS/SR. Let me explain: - vanilla's Breach bypassed spell protections (aka without SCS/SR the whole "protections vs removals" was very simple, just cast Breach and bash the mage to death with physical attacks) - DavidW (as well as SR) tweaked Breach to not bypass Spell Deflection/Turning to make them relevant. Breach is deflected/turned as having a proper power lvl 5. In both cases Breach does not affect liches and rakshasas. Bypassing immunities could be "consistent" in vanilla, but it's clearly odd with SCS/SR. DavidW added an optional tweak to make Breach ignore those immunities as a convenient tool for less hardcore players, not to improve consistency. How/why does level 3 Dispel affect them if level 5 Breach doesn't? Seems backwards. Because Dispel Magic always had power lvl 0, effectively ignoring/bypassing both spell protections and spell lvl immunities. That is indeed consistent. I actually don't like Dispel having such luxury and I never understood why old editions gave so much power to a 3rd lvl spell but changing it is out of question imo. If Dispel had a proper power lvl, SCS could simply use MGoI to stop it instead of SI:Abj - which could be a good thing imo - but that cannot be done without also touching SCS scripts as the AI would keep wasting spell slots on SI:Abj. Also note that such tweak would make Dispel not work anymore against liches/rakshasas (ironically, Dispel is your best tool against them right now as Kreso pointed out). As you see, everything is connected and it's hard to touch a thing without altering the entire system. Link to comment
Fiann of the Silver Hand Posted September 8, 2015 Share Posted September 8, 2015 I actually don't like Dispel having such luxury and I never understood why old editions gave so much power to a 3rd lvl spell It wasn't nearly the go-to debuffer back in OD&D/1e, and powerful mages were much, much rarer than in the Forgotten Realms. Greenwood and 2e really derped out magic, imo. Link to comment
cipher Posted September 8, 2015 Share Posted September 8, 2015 I wanted to post this on the SR forum, seems more relevant, but since the discussion keeps revolving around the subject I guess I'll blurt it out here. I see the system as a layered hierarchy of forces, each layer (somewhat) specialized in what they protect. In the centre is the character, with any relevant innate immunities (cold for undead, spells 1-5 for liches etc). On top of that goes the combat and specific protections (protection from elements, mantle, stoneskin etc). Next is the layer of spell protections (spell trap, GoI etc). And lastly comes the lonely spell shield, a layer on each own. Each layer protects the one(s) below it in the hierarchy, but never the one(s) above. So spell shield eats rubyray to keep spell trap intact, spell trap absorbs breach to keep stoneskin running and stoneskin neutralises bigbadclub from bashing the ugly skull of the lich in gazillion pieces. Now if you agree with this one-way protection scheme you can see why I think as inconsistent applying immunities/properties of the bottom layer to any above it. I.e. lich's stoneskin inheriting it's immunities. If you are not agree it's a one-way only, then why the innate properties don't apply to the rest of the layers? Why a level 4 secret word can remove shield/deflection and it's not blocked by lich's innate immunities? So I do like very much that breach does not bypass deflections, I think that's one of the best changes of SCS & SR. But I don't think breach ignoring innate immunities is just for convenience. It's one more step in improving the consistency. As an aside David names the relevant component "More consistent Breach". I think it speaks for itself. Joking of course. But I'm interested in hearing your opinion on the matter. Link to comment
subtledoctor Posted September 8, 2015 Share Posted September 8, 2015 I see the system as a layered hierarchy of forces, each layer (somewhat) specialized in what they protect. In the centre is the character, with any relevant innate immunities (cold for undead, spells 1-5 for liches etc). On top of that goes the combat and specific protections (protection from elements, mantle, stoneskin etc). Next is the layer of spell protections (spell trap, GoI etc). And lastly comes the lonely spell shield, a layer on each own. Each layer protects the one(s) below it in the hierarchy, but never the one(s) above. So spell shield eats rubyray to keep spell trap intact, spell trap absorbs breach to keep stoneskin running and stoneskin neutralises bigbadclub from bashing the ugly skull of the lich in gazillion pieces. That's a very elegant conception of how these spells could work. Certainly a lot more elegant than any existing, working version (vanilla, SCS, SRv3, SRv4) of how they DO work Unfortunately, I doubt you will see any mod successfully implement the system that elegantly. Demi, I disagree that your description of Dispel Magic is "consistent." In fact, per your description, it is a special snowflake of a spell that, for no good reason (other than Carsomyr spam, perhaps), circumvents all of the careful arranging of spellcaster protections. Unless you meant "consistent" with the vanilla game, but if we care about that, then why are we modding? Some people don't like the BG2 wizard duels being chess matches. For them, the older system of "DM/RM -> highest level wins" is preferable. But if the game is going to have the chess match, then DM ought to be incorporated into it, at its proper power level - i.e. the same power level as Spell Thrust. (At least I recognize the power difference and turn Spell Thrust into an at-will cantrip...) Or, at bottom, I guess "consistent" really just means "consistent with DavidW's AI scripts... and since David is rarely around anymore, those will likely never change. Meaning we are lashing ourselves to the mast of a ship that is ossifying, and will soon be completely set in stone... and we know what happens to stone ships. (Yes I violently mixed those metaphors. ) Link to comment
Fiann of the Silver Hand Posted September 8, 2015 Share Posted September 8, 2015 I don't even think it's 2e that did this; it was Bioware's efforts to shoehorn an aging and arbitrarily complex ruleset into an inadequately complex game engine. For any mod/modder to address this, there ought to be a declaration of intent. Onion layers? Rock, paper, scissors? Heirarchical matched pairs of counters? Bastardized hybrid of any/all of the above? Link to comment
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