Unearthed Arcana presents Faiths & Powers: Gods of the Realms

[Caedwyr]

I am glad it helped.

[subtledoctor]

A note about item usability with this mod:

It is very customizable, but you have to know where to look.  In /faths_and_powers/lib/ there are .tpa files for each class - like "add_druid_kits.tpa" and "add_cleric_kits.tpa." If you look at about line 350 of the cleric .tpa file, it shows the armor and weapons usable by a cleric of Azuth.  Every kit in the mod has a table like this.  You can change which weapons can be used by changing 0 to 1, and you can also allow a kit to specialize or more by changing the 0 to a 2, 3, 4, or 5.

In my current game, my Light Mystic could use scimitars but not katanas.  This was kind of annoying  because Scales of Balance puts them both under the same proficiency; and especially frustrating because I found several magical katanas but no magical scimitars.  Changing this sort of thing mid-game is a horse of a different color. 

Each kit has a kit ability table; in my case the Light Mystic's is "d5mlig.2da."  It contains a line that looks like this:

D5_USABLE   AP_D5_U127   ****        ****        ****     ...

That spell - D5_U127.SPL - controls which item types the kit can use.  (The number matched the row number of the kit in kitlist.2da - in my install the Light Mystic is on the 127th row of the file.)  In Near Infinity or DLTCEP, you want to do eight steps:

1. Edit WEAPPROF.2DA to allow your kit to be proficient with the desired weapon.
2. Find out which "item type" corresponds to the items you want to use.  (It may not be what you think!  We had to rearrange them a bit to make this work.  So katanas might have the "29 - spear" item type, or something like that.)
3. Open the D5_U###.SPL spell you found in your kit's kit ability table.
4. Remove the opcode 181 effect corresponding to the weapon's item type.
5. Add a new effect to the spell, with opcode 321, permanent timing (9), and with the spell itself in the 'resource' field.  Save it.
6. Create a method to apply the spell to your character.  For instance, add an opcode 146 effect to a healing potion, which casts the D5_U### spell.
7. Go into the game and drink that potion (or however you want to apply it).  Save the game.
8. Go back to NOI/DLTCEP, remove the 146 effect from the potion or whatever you did to apply the spell.

No you can play that savegame and you will be able to use the item.

@Grammarsalad this is for ThacoBell.

Thinking out loud... I know we  once debated whether to do a system like this, or to just let all priests use all weapons and let proficiency be the thing that differentiates them.  It would be pretty easy to add an .ini setting to do it the latter way.  Just something like, if the variable is set, then skip the part where those D5_U### spells are added to kit tables.

Edited June 2, 2020 by subtledoctor

[Caedwyr]

I think a simple approach would be to let everyone pick up and use a weapon, but only certain kits/classes are able to put any pips into proficiency.  It would simplify a lot of things and I don't know that the individual enchantments on certain pieces of gear would make it worthwhile to use one item over another one that the character was actually proficient with.  You'd want to look at what the "held" versus "on use" abilities are.  Items like staff of the magi stand out as potential problems, though that one tends to get nerfed by a number of mods.

[subtledoctor]

6 minutes ago, Caedwyr said:

I think a simple approach would be to let everyone pick up and use a weapon, but only certain kits/classes are able to put any pips into proficiency.  It would simplify a lot of things and I don't know that the individual enchantments on certain pieces of gear would make it worthwhile to use one item over another one that the character was actually proficient with.  You'd want to look at what the "held" versus "on use" abilities are.  Items like staff of the magi stand out as potential problems, though that one tends to get nerfed by a number of mods.

I like that idea... and I'm saying I will very likely include that as an .ini option in the near future. 

However, this mod only affects divine-caster classes (cleric, druid, paladin, ranger).  It would be weird if these classes could equip any weapon but only  be proficient in some; whereas, all the thieves and mages in the game can only equip weapons that they can be proficient in.  That would just be kind of jarring.  And it's outside the scope of  this mod to modify thieves' and mages' weapon usability...

Edited June 2, 2020 by subtledoctor

[4udr4n]

I'm in favour of universal usability with restricted proficiencies, it's much more realistic and simpler.

[4udr4n]

Just now, subtledoctor said:

I like that idea... but this mod only affects divine-caster classes (cleric, druid, paladin, ranger).  It would be weird if these classes could equip any weapon but only  be proficient in some; whereas, all the thieves and mages in the game can only equip weapons that they can be proficient in.  That would just be kind of jarring.  And it's outside the scope of  this mod to modify thieves' and mages' weapon usability...

Stick it in SoB?

[subtledoctor]

Just now, 4udr4n said:

Stick it in SoB?

Probably the right move.

[Caedwyr]

Yeah, that was my thought.  It doesn't completely address how Faiths & Powers handles things, but you can always just point people to use Scales of Balance for this component and make sure Scales of Balance takes any changes wrought by Faiths & Powers if they need to be handled in a special way.

[Caedwyr]

Possible interactions to keep in mind.

1. Weapons that have good abilities that they grant while held.
2. Weapons that have castable abilities that can be used while held.
3. Interaction and devaluaing of the Rogue Use Any item HLA.

For #1, the staff of the magi is the main culprit, though I'm sure there's some modded weapons that give improved alacrity when held, not that you should really care about unbalanced modded items.

For #2, I don't recall these cases all that well, but I don't think there's really a case where a player can't find at least one party member who can carry all the good items like this and cast whenever they want, so I don't see how more people being able to do this really changes the overall balance of the game in any way.  Maybe it will affect solo runs.

For #3, Use Any Item is mostly used to break the game with respect to scroll and wand use, and much less so item use.  I think it is a commonly modded ability as well.  More investigation by someone familiar with the ability for possible interactions may be warranted.

[Grammarsalad]

On 5/30/2020 at 3:10 PM, subtledoctor said:

Grammarsalad has been working on that, I believe.  It is a very long and difficult process, because this mod does a LOT of stuff.  But I got a sneak peek at the work-in-progress, and it is astoundingly good.

Huh, @Grammarsalad I wonder if it would make sense to release the readme even in an unfinished state.  Still might be useful for players.

...

That would totally make sense. On my Android, but I'll see If I can access it.

Edit: Homebrewery doesn't like Androids for whatever reason. I'll attach it and/or link it in a few hours (well, it could be like 10 hours)

Edited June 3, 2020 by Grammarsalad

[Grammarsalad]

Er, it turns out that I need to plug in a lot of stuff into the Homebrewery version, so I don't have a nice pdf.  But here is the (mostly completed) readme:

 

https://github.com/UnearthedArcana/Faiths_and_Powers/issues/136

[subtledoctor]

That document is redonkulous. 

[Caedwyr]

That is a very nice readme, even if it is still a work in progress.

At first glance one thing stood out to me.

Might & Guile recommends installing FnP before MnG, however the Faiths & Powers readme suggests installing MnG before FnG.  There's obviously lots of WiP stuff in there, but the install order is one that seems more likely to trip people up.

Edited June 4, 2020 by Caedwyr

[subtledoctor]

14 hours ago, Caedwyr said:

Might & Guile recommends installing FnP before MnG, however the Faiths & Powers readme suggests installing MnG before FnG. 

No - I think you misread it.  Both suggest installing FnP before MnG.  The newer FnP readme only distinguishes and suggests installing FnP Multiclass after MnG.

(FnP has two mod installers in the one mod download: FnP, and FnP_Multiclass.  They should be like the bread of an MnG sandwich.

[Caedwyr]

So it is!  I'll have to make a slight modification to my massive install order document.