Sword Coast Stratagems v34 (edit: 34.3) now available

[Guest Diogenes]

@KainenMordenYou can play BG1:EE and TotSC and SoD with SCS, but you need to install the DLC-merger (or the modmerger) before SCS. Check the SCS Readme (and the discussion here in this thread a few days back).

And you can play BG2:EE and ToB with Ascension plus SCS.

[polytope]

On 10/26/2022 at 11:40 PM, KainenMorden said:

Just curious, does anyone here have extensive experience soloing on Insane?

I'd like to solo BG1EE and SOD with a fighter/mage and then solo BG2ee and TOB with a sorcerer. I have never played SCS before and never played Ascension either, is that compatible with these mods? Is it too difficult to get through Ascension on Insane?

Too difficult? Depends on the character. Ascension gets noticeably harder on the higher difficulty settings because you will not get a free rest + restoration from a pool at the very Throne of Bhaal before your final fight with Melissan and the Five. Also, Melissan will arrive sooner and her summoning will be much more frequent and aggressive. A dual or multiclassed fighter mage will in my experience have a better chance than a sorcerer, or anyway, fewer attempts. If you go with a sorc, make sure you pick Project Image as one of your spells, it's too easy to run out of firepower in the late stages and Wishing for rest is unreliable. It's difficult to use Project Image if solo though, because the battlefield is full of creatures that see through invisibility, you'll want a good number of summons for distraction, Djinni are better for this purpose than skeletons or Mordy swords because they aren't considered "summoned" but rather gated monsters with SCS and so aren't instakilled by things that slay summons, as well as even knowing Protection from Magic Weapons! However, this is about the only place where Djinni are more useful than Mordies, they're not good fighters, so it's hard to justify picking it as one of a sorc's few known 7th level spells, better to just keep the scrolls of Summon Djinni that you find.

[KainenMorden]

On 10/28/2022 at 2:11 AM, polytope said:

Too difficult? Depends on the character. Ascension gets noticeably harder on the higher difficulty settings because you will not get a free rest + restoration from a pool at the very Throne of Bhaal before your final fight with Melissan and the Five. Also, Melissan will arrive sooner and her summoning will be much more frequent and aggressive. A dual or multiclassed fighter mage will in my experience have a better chance than a sorcerer, or anyway, fewer attempts. If you go with a sorc, make sure you pick Project Image as one of your spells, it's too easy to run out of firepower in the late stages and Wishing for rest is unreliable. It's difficult to use Project Image if solo though, because the battlefield is full of creatures that see through invisibility, you'll want a good number of summons for distraction, Djinni are better for this purpose than skeletons or Mordy swords because they aren't considered "summoned" but rather gated monsters with SCS and so aren't instakilled by things that slay summons, as well as even knowing Protection from Magic Weapons! However, this is about the only place where Djinni are more useful than Mordies, they're not good fighters, so it's hard to justify picking it as one of a sorc's few known 7th level spells, better to just keep the scrolls of Summon Djinni that you find.

Thanks for the advice. I haven't done a run of BG2 in a few years but I've soloed the unmodded game with a fighter/illusionist, I actually thought sorc might be easier for scs in general but I'll keep this in mind. 

[morpheus562]

Question, is there any way to get your updated fight against Kahrk sooner? The problem I'm experiencing is this component adds a new weapon to the game which now forces mods to have to install after SCS installs if they wish to alter how this weapon behaves (i.e. modded mage kit can use katana, so it now has to be installed after this component to properly adjust useability). This really makes mod install order more difficult. Are there other net new items introduced in SCS that there player can use beyond the katana from the Kahrk fight?

 

[jmerry]

The component in question starts its item creation by cloning the standard +2 katana, a vanilla resource. The usability information gets copied with no change. I don't see how that's going to break your hypothetical case; that new kit will be able to use Kahrk's special katana because they could use the old +2 katana. Unless something really weird is going on with the other mod's coding.

Regarding install order, the Kahrk component does not depend on any of the AI stuff, and can safely be installed well before the rest of SCS. Or after, for that matter.

[morpheus562]

That is good to hear, I thought it was a net new resource instead of a cloned one.

[polytope]

8 hours ago, morpheus562 said:

This really makes mod install order more difficult. Are there other net new items introduced in SCS that there player can use beyond the katana from the Kahrk fight?

 

Spoiler

The yellow dragon Anadramitis in Improved Abazigal's lair, if killed his scales can be made into a powerful armor equiv to studded leather and granting piercing resistance, if spared he will give an amulet protecting from wing buffets - dragons only, not all sources of knockback - instead (note that due to an EE bug, any positive value of magic resistance protects against the repulsion opcode, so it is unnecessary compared to the Seldarine amulet or any other than grants MR). Item files are dw#abyds.itm, dw#abyda.itm and dw#abamu.itm.

That dragon's THAC0 is also borked and much too high in my game, don't know if anyone else reported this yet.

[Guest Diogenes]

On 10/30/2022 at 3:35 AM, morpheus562 said:

That is good to hear, I thought it was a net new resource instead of a cloned one.

In case it causes some problem with other mods, you can choose to disable it at the ini [No_Kahrk_Treasure(0) - set to 1 to remove Kahrk's new magic weapon] - or you could choose to not install the Improved Karkh component of SCS altogether. But it probably won't cause any problem, judging by what jmerry said.

[Guest Diogenes]

On 10/30/2022 at 2:01 AM, morpheus562 said:

Are there other net new items introduced in SCS that there player can use beyond the katana from the Kahrk fight?

 

[jmerry]

On 10/30/2022 at 12:29 AM, polytope said:

That dragon's THAC0 is also borked and much too high in my game, don't know if anyone else reported this yet.

Checking the relevant component ... stratagems/abazigal/abazigal-enclave.tpa

Anadramatis is cloned from DRAGYELL.cre, with the following edits made:

Spoiler

Name changed

Allegiance becomes neutral (until conversation)

HP become 250 (184 before)

Base THAC0 becomes 8 (-8 before)

Level becomes 28 (23 before)

Magic resistance becomes 65 (35 before)

Piercing and missile resist become 75 (25 before)

Fire resistance becomes 100 (100 before)

Items added: dragred1 for weapon (none before), minhp1 (immortality until removed by dialogue), dw#abyds (scales)

Animation becomes DRAGON_BROWN (DRAGON_RED before)

Dialogue, script, script name updated

Spells removed, new spells added

That THAC0 change looks like a flat out mistake. This dragon's base THAC0 should be -8 instead of 8. Or possibly even lower.

The armor and amulet are copied from stratagems/abazigal/resource. So that armor won't play well with other mods overhauling things.

[polytope]

9 hours ago, jmerry said:

That THAC0 change looks like a flat out mistake. This dragon's base THAC0 should be -8 instead of 8. Or possibly even lower.

The armor and amulet are copied from stratagems/abazigal/resource. So that armor won't play well with other mods overhauling things.

Maybe a typo, but IME Weidu doesn't accept negative numbers - unless enclosed in parentheses as a sum - for direct input into a creature file's stats. I.e for someone or something to be given THAC0 of -3 you'd need to code it as:

  WRITE_BYTE  0x52  (0 - 3)  // THAC0

A 28HD dragon should have a THAC0 of -7 before bonuses to the attack roll, going by the rule of uncapped THAC0 progression for monsters. At least, no character class has a base THAC0 of 8 at level 28 (priests are at 6, rogues 10), so it's obviously wrong.

Edited November 1, 2022 by polytope

[jmerry]

It's all filtered through David W's functions; none of those changes I noted are direct write operations. How does the function in question handle negative parameters? That, I don't know.

As for dragon THAC0 ... their base THAC0 numbers vary between slightly better than their level would indicate and slightly worse. Abazigal 30/-6, Draconis 25/-4, Fll'Yissetat 23/-6, Nizidramanii'yt 23/-3, Thaxll'ssylia 23/-3, Firkraag 23/-5, "Dragon" (final seal) 23/-5, Saladrex 23/-6, "Dragon" (hell evil) 23/0, Ylaxxia (BP2) 29/-7, Dolrassa 23/-6, Ixthezzys 23/-6, Yxtrazzal 20/-3, Adalon 23/-2.

SCS boosts some of those levels a bit in its "dragon" component. Most notably, Abazigal becomes level 32 and Draconis level 30, without changing either of their base THAC0 values. The base yellow dragon is actually at -4, and that's a reasonable number for Anadramatis to stay at.

[Edit - I was reading AC instead of THAC0. Numbers fixed.]

Edited November 1, 2022 by jmerry

[polytope]

1 hour ago, jmerry said:

As for dragon THAC0 ... they all get base THAC0 numbers that are better than their level would indicate in BG2EE. Abazigal 30/-12, Draconis 25/-10, Fll'Yissetat 23/-8, Nizidramanii'yt 23/-12, Thaxll'ssylia 23/-12, Firkraag 23/-11, "Dragon" (final seal) 23/-10, Saladrex 23/-12, "Dragon" (hell evil) 23/-12, Ylaxxia (BP2) 29/-15, Dolrassa 23/-12, Ixthezzys 23/-12, Yxtrazzal 20/-12, Adalon 23/-11.

I think you're reading their AC, rather than THAC0. Nizi and Thax are both 23HD, base THAC0 -3, AC-12; Firkraag is also 23HD with a THAC0 -5 which is indeed  bit better than it should be, the most likely reason is that his cre file was copied from one of theirs with THAC0 improved (since he was supposed to be tougher than the other SoA dragons) and level not updated. Dragons like many other creatures in this game appear to have been mostly cloned from a single original creature template, having some commonalities like most being 23HD and having the same memorized spells (before SCS changes their list).

[jmerry]

You're right on the numbers. I've edited that post.

[polytope]

On 11/1/2022 at 6:27 PM, jmerry said:

SCS boosts some of those levels a bit in its "dragon" component. Most notably, Abazigal becomes level 32 and Draconis level 30, without changing either of their base THAC0 values. The base yellow dragon is actually at -4, and that's a reasonable number for Anadramatis to stay at.

Yeah, a creature might have an intended caster level (for purposes of spell duration/damage/dispel checks) quite different from their actual hit dice for purposes of their THAC0 and hp, although I think saving throws for magic-using monsters like dragons should always be made as a spellcaster of equivalent level if better than the monster's base HD. I'm quite sure that was the rule in AD&D.