Sword Coast Stratagems v34 (edit: 34.3) now available

[pochesun]

Just a note, i found Bassilus a much easier opponent with precasted spells than without, ironically. The thing is that he precasts Blade Barrier which seems to completely nullifies his Sanctuary spell: when in non precast mode he can instantly pops Sanctuary to heal himself with spells or potions and then cast Flame strike, confusion or some other nasty thing out of nowhere. But in precast mode he has Blade Barier around him and every time he cast Sanctuary it dissapears in 2 seconds automatically.

[DavidW]

Those spell choices are randomized - they’ll be different on different installs.

[pochesun]

22 minutes ago, DavidW said:

Those spell choices are randomized - they’ll be different on different installs.

yeah makes sense. I just browsed Fandom a bit and saw people were talking about cheesy tactics Sanctuarry+Balde Barrier, it seems like it should work together if you cast Blade Barrier first and then Sanctuary second. Maybe something else could cancel Sanctuary from Bassilus fight but i did not notice anything specific. Weird. Maybe SRR has somethign to do with it (i got SRR installed).

[Palanthis]

I'm not sure if it has been reported : in my install of SCS on BG1EE (more specifically SOD, where i got these spells) the text of the new spells of "conjuring lesser elementals" are bugged. The text is very short, seems to be a fragment of dialog, is the same for all the 4 spells, and isn't even related to magic at all.
Apart from SCS 34.3 i had two components of Tome and Blood, NPC project, and Tweaks v 9 installed.

Edited July 20, 2022 by Palanthis

[Palanthis]

To be more precise, i've found out that the text is that of the eye of stone from the new "seven eyes" spell. It describes only that eye, and is obviously misplaced here for the new conjuring elementals spells.
I've also tested it on a new, clean install of BG2EE (in french) and the same happens (in french). So it appears to be a bug of SCS.

Finally, these conjuring spells seem to be working fine : only the text is buggy (in all languages i guess).

Edited July 20, 2022 by Palanthis

[Moonboy187]

13 hours ago, jmerry said:

LoB is the same as Insane for this purpose, so it's only one point to bring in Mel on that difficulty. Which means that killing any one of the enemies does it.

As I said, the logic for this is all in the area script. That's pretty easy to edit. As for where in the mod it comes from ... not SCS. Ascension, /ascensionmain/baf/plot/ar6200.baf

Sorry, I had misread the previous post. Thank you for posting the file location.

Is it possible to add in IWD creature models into BGEE using NI without having installed the component for it? For my current installation I did not include it as I wanted a more focused BG experience. However as I am modding a bunch of things, I do wonder if it is possible for me to include it?

Edited July 21, 2022 by Moonboy187

[Graion Dilach]

That has nothing to do with SCS....

But yes, BG(2)EE ANIMATE.IDS includes entries for IWD(2) artworks, and the INIs are also included in the game (there are a few index differences between the BG EEs and IWDEE though). Open the INI file of the art you want with NearInfinity, note down the resref value as the BAM prefix and look up all filenames in the sounds section as well. If you collected all these files from IWDEE/IWD2 and threw it to override, you can set the creature's Animation ID @ 0x28 to the INI name you used. Note that Icewind Dale animations have different action sets, so depending on the art you replace, some visual bugs may occur.

Also, SoD (and EET due to it) already does a fair amount of import, so you should check if the files already exist in the game.

Edited July 21, 2022 by Graion Dilach

[Moonboy187]

On 7/21/2022 at 9:03 AM, Graion Dilach said:

That has nothing to do with SCS....

But yes, BG(2)EE ANIMATE.IDS includes entries for IWD(2) artworks, and the INIs are also included in the game (there are a few index differences between the BG EEs and IWDEE though). Open the INI file of the art you want with NearInfinity, note down the resref value as the BAM prefix and look up all filenames in the sounds section as well. If you collected all these files from IWDEE/IWD2 and threw it to override, you can set the creature's Animation ID @ 0x28 to the INI name you used. Note that Icewind Dale animations have different action sets, so depending on the art you replace, some visual bugs may occur.

Also, SoD (and EET due to it) already does a fair amount of import, so you should check if the files already exist in the game.

Thank you for the help, I know it doesn't have anything to do it, however I am extremely grateful for the help.

[jmerry]

On 7/20/2022 at 1:55 PM, pochesun said:

yeah makes sense. I just browsed Fandom a bit and saw people were talking about cheesy tactics Sanctuarry+Balde Barrier, it seems like it should work together if you cast Blade Barrier first and then Sanctuary second. Maybe something else could cancel Sanctuary from Bassilus fight but i did not notice anything specific. Weird. Maybe SRR has somethign to do with it (i got SRR installed).

Both Blade Barrier and the subspell it casts to deal damage have the "Break Sanctuary" flag in the EE.

However, this flag does not work on spells cast through the "cast spell on condition" opcode or the instant modes of the "cast spell" opcodes (In this case, Blade Barrier uses an EFF with a "cast spell on condition" opcode). It works when you cast normally, or when the non-instant mode of "cast spell" is in play (i.e. scrolls).

So, in practice, this means that casting Blade Barrier will end a Sanctuary, but a Sanctuary cast before the Blade Barrier becomes active will remain unless you do something else to cancel it. Same for the HLA version Globe of Blades.

When SCS gets involved ... a cleric of Bassilus' level is 50/50 to get either Blade Barrier or Physical Mirror. Either of those will be precast on Insane difficulty. The tactics recommended to fight against him therefore depend heavily on which spell he gets - you want to stay at range if he's using Blade Barrier and to close into melee if he's using Physical Mirror. Higher-level clerics can get both, but by then you're in BG2 and have more options for breaking down defenses.

I don't know what SRR does to the spells in question.

[pochesun]

13 hours ago, jmerry said:

Both Blade Barrier and the subspell it casts to deal damage have the "Break Sanctuary" flag in the EE.

However, this flag does not work on spells cast through the "cast spell on condition" opcode or the instant modes of the "cast spell" opcodes (In this case, Blade Barrier uses an EFF with a "cast spell on condition" opcode). It works when you cast normally, or when the non-instant mode of "cast spell" is in play (i.e. scrolls).

So, in practice, this means that casting Blade Barrier will end a Sanctuary, but a Sanctuary cast before the Blade Barrier becomes active will remain unless you do something else to cancel it. Same for the HLA version Globe of Blades.

When SCS gets involved ... a cleric of Bassilus' level is 50/50 to get either Blade Barrier or Physical Mirror. Either of those will be precast on Insane difficulty. The tactics recommended to fight against him therefore depend heavily on which spell he gets - you want to stay at range if he's using Blade Barrier and to close into melee if he's using Physical Mirror. Higher-level clerics can get both, but by then you're in BG2 and have more options for breaking down defenses.

I don't know what SRR does to the spells in question.

Sorry for being obtuse but i dont fully understand what you mean. If Sanctuary cast after Blade Barrier it should still dissapear immediately since Blade Barrier '"continues" to be active and deal damage. Also i dont quite understand what "Sanctuary cast before the Blade Barrier becomes active will remain" means. How can i postpone Blade Barrier becoming active?

If you mean that precast spells with SCS is a condition met both Blade Barrier and Sanctuary remain active its also not correct in case of Bassilus fight: Blade Barrier is precast spell and Sanctuary is spell Bassilus tries to cast AFTER so by no means it explains "cast spell and on condition" opcode. 

Again, sorry for not fully comprehending your explanation, i am not a programmer or something  

As far as i understood you, basically there is no way in EE to combine Blade Barrier and Sanctuary if i dont use precast with SCS, right? 

[jmerry]

No. I'm saying that despite having the "Break Sanctuary" flag, the damage-dealing subspell doesn't break Sanctuary because of how it's cast. If you cast the Blade Barrier first and the Sanctuary second, the Sanctuary will remain active even as the blades shred your opponents. Only the initial casting of the blade barrier will actually break Sanctuary.

[Bartimaeus]

Both SR and SRR's sppr603.spl (Blade Barrier) casts a subspell (sppr603e.spl) that cures invisibility (opcode 47) and breaks sanctuary (opcode 160) every three seconds for the duration of the spell. My memory suggests that the HLA version of the spell with the same function, whose name escapes me at the moment, does the same.

[subtledoctor]

On 7/26/2022 at 2:03 PM, pochesun said:

As far as i understood you, basically there is no way in EE to combine Blade Barrier and Sanctuary if i dont use precast with SCS, right? 

Don't you have SR installed? I thought it was already established somewhere that Blade Barrier breaking Sanctuary was a result of SR's changes - nothing to do with SCS. Why is that in my head?

EDIT - ninja'd by Bart

[pochesun]

1 hour ago, subtledoctor said:

Don't you have SR installed? I thought it was already established somewhere that Blade Barrier breaking Sanctuary was a result of SR's changes - nothing to do with SCS. Why is that in my head?

EDIT - ninja'd by Bart

Sorry if i was not clear but it was hypothetical assumption for EE+SCS (no other mods). Basically i was trying to clarify for myself the opcode "interraction" as it is presented in EE version and also i compared it with Vanilla (Old BG) version. @jmerry explained it well and @Bartimaeus indeed already pointed out that in SRR Barrier and Sanctuary interraction is different.

[pochesun]

2 hours ago, jmerry said:

No. I'm saying that despite having the "Break Sanctuary" flag, the damage-dealing subspell doesn't break Sanctuary because of how it's cast. If you cast the Blade Barrier first and the Sanctuary second, the Sanctuary will remain active even as the blades shred your opponents. Only the initial casting of the blade barrier will actually break Sanctuary.

thank you