Jarno's Insane Ramblings

[Jarno Mikkola]

On 8/9/2019 at 6:49 AM, chuft said:

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.

Yeah... must be really serious resistance to defend against level 1 characters with bows. News flash, the resistance they have is to not have just 1 hitpoint. That is the D&D standard minion.

Edited March 2, 2020 by Jarno Mikkola

[chuft]

You seem confused.  Skeletons elsewhere only take 1 damage from missile weapons.

EE fixed this bug apparently.

https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/5516/bug-skeletons-high-hedge

In the past when playing BG1 I used a Dudleyville fix, which also fixed it

http://www.forgottenwars.com/dudleyfix/bg1_creatures.htm

 

[Jarno Mikkola]

It's not me that's confused... the skeletons could take 1 hitpoint damage if they only had 1 hit point and still be destroyed. That's the whole point of the "minion" creatures... the point of those being that the player only needs to hit them once... as there would be more of them than the player characters, while the dungeon master doesn't need to keep count of how many hitpoint each minion has. It work on level 1 as well as on level 20.

The Dudleyfix doesn't add damage immunity, it adds the ring99.itm to the skeletons ring slot, which does affect immunities... but NO DAMAGE IMMUNITIES !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Damage immunities being the only how you could affect received damage.

[chuft]

You aren’t making any sense. The skeletons at High Hedge (and elsewhere) have more than 1 hit point, but unlike other skeletons in the game, the High Hedge skeletons are not resistant to arrow fire.  

[Jarno Mikkola]

That's right... now the reason why they don't have resistances like piercing damage is that you face them at extreamly low levels... unlike undead in, say the BG2SoA for example, that you face at much higher level. Yeah, the game is like that. The BG1 doesn't even feature a Dragon... and it's called Dungeons and Dragons game. Why would that be ?

Besided, the game doesn't have an effect that can block damage so that they would only take 1 hitpoint of damage anyways. Yeah, I can make a bow that hits for 200+ damage and defeat your definition that way.

[skellytz]

chuft, just launch NearInfinity and post screenshots  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.

Edited August 9, 2019 by skellytz

[Jarno Mikkola]

21 minutes ago, skellytz said:

 here's a proof.

1

Let's see; unmodified BG1/TotSC creature:

Missile/Piercing resistance = 0;

That's a NOPE×. You got some false proof you lazy bastard. This is the original intent. Nothing else matters.

[Mike1072]

7 hours ago, Jarno Mikkola said:

You got some false proof you lazy bastard.

If anyone wants to tell Jarno how they feel about this post, go ahead.

[Jarno Mikkola]

9 hours ago, skellytz said:

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.

1

I wouldn't be so sure. See, the skeletons don't need to get close, they have throwing knives... 2 to be exact. You forgot those... or you just looked at the .cre file without the items revealed in NI.

And just to get this correct... the likely level 1 character has the exact same AC as the skeleton. This is because the leather is a bad armor against piercing weapons and they have a shield(AC7-1). While the character has a Leather armor and a good Dex = AC6.

What you say Mike should be true for every post of mine and everyone else's post as well.

[rigidjelly]

Perpetual lurker reporting in.

 

Jarno I've seen countless posts by you that go on strange tangents but this is probably the best example of you living in upside-down land.

To be clear:

1. Chuft pointed out that in BGT the skeletons in high hedge ( SKELETS.cre ) DO NOT have the piercing/missile immunities that they should.

2. skellytz linked an image displaying the difference between the high hedge skeleton ( SKELETS.cre ) and the default skeleton ( SKELET.cre ). This was the "proof" that skeletons in general should have these resistances and the high hedge skeletons were bugged.

3. You said NOPE and embedded an image showing the very same SKELETS.cre data that skellytz did, somehow convincing yourself that you were correct, though I'm not sure what point you thought you were making.

Your line "This is the original intent. Nothing else matters." is perhaps the most bizarre as you are posting in a thread about a MOD, in reference to a post about an assumed error on the part of the original developers.

You brought up the skeletons HP, their weapons choice, that they have a shield, how their AC compares to low level characters', how leather armor is poor against piercing damage, that BG1 doesn't have a dragon in it despite being a D&D game and how you could make a bow that deals 200+ damage but none of that is relevant to the main point:

High Hedge skeletons are missing their proper resistances in the original, TotSC and BGT games.

[Jarno Mikkola]

38 minutes ago, rigidjelly said:

3. You said NOPE and embedded an image showing the very same SKELETS.cre data that skellytz did, somehow convincing yourself that you were correct, though I'm not sure what point you thought you were making.

4

4

The fact that it's unmodified BG1 game file. You can find the file structure info at the very bottom of my picture. Should you know how the files are structured, this does prove that it's legit. 

Now, the other fact that skellytz brought up was that maybe the developers used a template... but rather that the skelets.cre was very likely part of that template structure, the very worst one because the creature is very likely the very first skeleton the player runs into, because the area is right south from the BG1's free adventure start location. Never assume that the maker is wrong, while it can be the intent.

So that means Level 1 chars, and start items. Which leads to the items... and:

38 minutes ago, rigidjelly said:

2. skellytz linked an image displaying the difference between the high hedge skeleton ( SKELETS.cre ) and the default skeleton ( SKELET.cre ). This was the "proof" that skeletons in general should have these resistances and the high hedge skeletons were bugged. 

2

That might be correct for the other skeletons... but not the ( so called: challenge) level 1 skeleton. 

What the bow with 200 damage demonstrates was the LARGE false claim chuft made about the damage even with the resistance...

And that was of 50% as acclaimed to be appropriate, like in skellytz's picture of the other skeleton. Should you know, the game even accepts 100+ resistance where the hit character will then regenerate the extra amount of "taken" damage. So we can only set it to 99% to be able to try to keep the damage at 1 hitpoint... but the whole point is kinda off cause the chuft claim was so far off that my point wouldn't probably be easy to perceive.

 

1. But there's no "should" in the original game files, there is just IS, no resistances.

Edited August 10, 2019 by Jarno Mikkola

[rigidjelly]

No, again you're straying from the actual issue. None of your interpretations about anything anyone else has said is relevant.

Skeleton creatures EXCEPT the high hedge variant get slashing, piercing and missile resistances.

Chuft believes this to be an error. I assume skellytz agrees, and I do too.

Now you may believe that because you can go to high hedge early that whoever was in charge of setting up the .cre info for that area during development deliberately changed these specific skeletons to make it easier for low level characters if you wish, but it is a dubious position to hold since there are a myriad of ways a level 1 character can die in the begining areas that have a much larger gameplay impact than missing 50% slashing resist on a creature with 1 hit die.

You continue to bring up irrelevant trivia (as if it matters in this context that you can regen from >100% resistance) but seem unable to unaderstand the Chufts main point which again is:

High Hedge skeletons are missing the resistances that they should have for being a skeleton.

[Jarno Mikkola]

7 minutes ago, rigidjelly said:

No, again you're straying from the actual issue.

Skeleton creatures EXCEPT the high hedge variant get slashing, piercing and missile resistances.

Chuft believes this to be an error.

 

1

And I don't.

9 minutes ago, rigidjelly said:

I assume skellytz agrees, and I do too.

1

None of your interpretations about anything ... is relevant.

Those were your words.

[Almateria]

9 hours ago, Mike1072 said:

If anyone wants to tell Jarno how they feel about this post, go ahead.

Y'all ever thought about a restraining order? Like... just spitballing ideas here.

[DrAzTiK]

I always standardise undead resistances in my game. ( 100 % resistance to cold/ electricity), 50% resistance to slashing/piercing, 90% resitance missile + 10% magic resistance per level

Edited August 10, 2019 by DrAzTiK