difficulty curve problem

[chuft]

Speaking of engine bugs, where is the best place to ask for help with a vexing problem that I do not believe is mod-related?

Have already asked at GOG with no success.

[skellytz]

I guess one solution to the waylaid encounter issues would be moving the spawns from the actors section to the area script using IF Time CreateCreature. These are always fixed spawns and all the creatures get flushed once you leave the area, so it should behave as intended.

[grodrigues]

On 8/6/2019 at 2:25 AM, chuft said:

What puzzles me is that people seemed amazed that I had encountered an ogre mage and ogrillons at the same time, as if that never happens, but if it's an engine bug, then it must have always have happened that way since the game was released.

I have played a fair bit of BGT lately and at least a couple of times in the not so distant past, in a relatively heavily modded setup (some quest mods like DC and ToD, SR, IR, SCS, Tweaks Anthology, Level 1 NPCs, etc. but nowhere near a megamod install) manually installed (that is, no BWS or some such, but making use of the BWS Fixpack), and I have never encountered what you describe, so I would not discard some weird mod interaction just yet.

[chuft]

Huh? skellytz replicated it in vanilla BG1 and posted a screenshot as proof, above. 

I get mixed groups of enemies in every Waylaid encounter. 

[skellytz]

I believe this is a confirmed bug. BGEE devs fixed it the same way I described above, but I think someone must have misinterpreted the Time trigger; the ambush spawns are offset by one hour compared to the original. For example, bit 20 of the area actor schedule is 20:30-21:29, but the IF check should be, e.g., Time(21) or TimeGT(20) instead of Time(20) or TimeGT(19). Whatever -- I hope I've fixed these encounters the proper way.

Edited August 9, 2019 by skellytz

[chuft]

This has nothing to do with SCS difficulty, but since Spellhold seems to be down (for several days) I want to post it where the same people will see it before I forget -

The skeletons at High Hedge do not possess their proper resistance to piercing weapons and are taking full damage from arrows. I remember this being an old problem that I thought one of the unofficial fixpacks for BG1 fixed, but it is present in BGT.

[Mike1072]

I've moved Jarno's off-topic derailment to this thread.

Here's the only relevant part:

8 hours ago, skellytz said:

You're absolutely right about the High Hedge skeletons (SKELETS.cre). They are unique to that area (the S possibly stands for the skull misc item they drop). The devs most likely used a CRE template and forgot to give them proper damage resistances like other skeletons: here's a proof. The screenshots are from the vanilla TotSC. The other skeleton random spawns (SKELET_A/B/C.cre) typically encountered early in the game have these damage resistances.

In the classic BG1, a level one party will encounter 1-2 of High Hedge skeletons per spawn point. Even with the resistances, they're easily dispatched; without the resistances, they die to arrows before you even get close. So, I doubt it was an attempt to reduce the difficulty for low level parties.

[chuft]

Since we are on the subject of skeletons, the "Bassilus Family" skeletons also are vulnerable to arrows in a very un-skeletal way.  They should have 90% missile resistance but are taking full damage.

Note they do not drop skulls, but drop heavy crossbows and two handed swords instead of the usual darts and shields.

[Blash2]

What difficulty level would you suggest for a no-reload game?

I tried tactical but found it not that hard (also thanks to some mod-introduced items) and was thinking about hardcore, but I read some frightening details..