Skills and Abilities Mod

[zuulforrest]

2 minutes ago, morpheus562 said:

When creating those kits, they may not update luabbr.2da file with the HLA table info. I would recommend checking to see if it is populated with information from those classes. If not, you can manually update the file for those kits with whatever hla tables you want.

Oh I see, that makes sense then.  There would be no reason to do so in IWD, normally.  I don't know how to edit .2da files and stuff so I'll do some research.

Thanks!

[Lurker]

[urge to communicate]

"Bard Songs Last 1 Turn" + "Bardic Wonders" kitpack = completely bonkers
 

[morpheus562]

16 minutes ago, Lurker said:

[urge to communicate]

"Bard Songs Last 1 Turn" + "Bardic Wonders" kitpack = completely bonkers
 

Yes, I use that combo in my playthrough. 

[Endarire]

Explain.

[Lurker]

On 4/24/2023 at 1:07 AM, morpheus562 said:

Yes, I use that combo in my playthrough. 

Do you mind to elaborate on this a bit further?

In my case, I'm currently a bit obsessed with combining tweaks of different mods to see what emerges. And also on mutilating mods to fit my special... urges.

So I merged the Templar from your kitpack into the Champion of the Silver Flame (by mod-modding), further pimped the paladin class with MESPELLS spellcasting,
combined some components from SKILLS-AND-ABILITIES with others from SCALES_OF_BALANCE (and some more other stuff), planning to support the CotSF++ with 5 different bard kits from Bardic Wonders and using the Back Pits to see what's the result. I picked party support kits (Skald/Troubadour/Dancer/Abettor of Mask/Strategist), and the CotSF++ was supposed to be a main "protagonist".

The bard kit auras mostly stack. And constantly re-apply their effects, I guess per round. Until (roughly simplified, didn't look too deep into it) the boosted things max out, which happens way before the end of 1 Turn.

All PCs end of with 5 APR, THAC0 between 2 and 5, 15-19 damage with a Longbow (if bard kit), 200+ Pick Pockets (if unrestricted bard kit), and -19 AC (without modifiers) in case of Dancer. At Level 1, 0 EXP.

I don't mind cheese and fun OP stuff, but that's a bit much even for me.

[subtledoctor]

On 4/23/2023 at 7:48 PM, Endarire said:

Explain.

I recall that some of the stuff in Bardic Wonders is kind of wildly OP. Like, IIRC there’s a kit with bard song that is like casting Chain Lightning every round? Now remove the requirement to be actively singing so you can do other stuff every round… like casting Chain Lightning? 

Yeah, sounds bonkers. 

[morpheus562]

Just now, subtledoctor said:

I recall that some of the stuff in Bardic Wonders is kind of wildly OP. Like, IIRC there’s a kit with bard song that is like casting Chain Lightning every round? Now remove the requirement to be actively singing so you can do other stuff every round… like casting Chain Lightning? 

Yeah, sounds bonkers. 

I use extended Bard Song with the enhanced skald to be able to sing, sling spells, and launch a few attacks before going back to singing. Everyone has a choice with how broken they want their game to be and what is acceptable to them. Personally, if I was going to play with that lightning bard kit, then I wouldn't use the extended Bard Song component from S&A.

[jmerry]

More worrying, this seems to be a case of the bard songs stacking with themselves over multiple rounds. Imagine that with even the most innocuous vanilla songs, like basic level 1 bard song. Stack ten instances of that, and you get +10 luck. An effective +10 to hit, every attack. Maximum damage, every hit. Perfect initiative. Minimum damage taken from spells, every time. And all of this for the entire party, with no limited resources used, for as long as the bard's on the same map as the others.

If nothing else, the songs should have 321 effects at the top of their effect stacks to prevent self-stacking; vanilla songs already have this.

[morpheus562]

6 minutes ago, jmerry said:

More worrying, this seems to be a case of the bard songs stacking with themselves over multiple rounds. Imagine that with even the most innocuous vanilla songs, like basic level 1 bard song. Stack ten instances of that, and you get +10 luck. An effective +10 to hit, every attack. Maximum damage, every hit. Perfect initiative. Minimum damage taken from spells, every time. And all of this for the entire party, with no limited resources used, for as long as the bard's on the same map as the others.

If nothing else, the songs should have 321 effects at the top of their effect stacks to prevent self-stacking; vanilla songs already have this.

Do you have any instances of mod added bard songs that do not use op321?

[Lurker]

8 minutes ago, jmerry said:

More worrying, this seems to be a case of the bard songs stacking with themselves over multiple rounds.

That's what I've described previously.

[jmerry]

44 minutes ago, morpheus562 said:

Do you have any instances of mod added bard songs that do not use op321?

I don't have any mod-added bard songs installed, so no. But the post that set this off used the "Bardic Wonders" kits; here's a link: http://www.shsforums.net/topic/60113-bardic-wonders-for-bgee-bg2ee-and-iwdee/. Go poke Artemius if you think that needs a fix.

I did check the song for one of that mod's kits, and it lacked the standard 321 effect.

Edited April 25, 2023 by jmerry

[morpheus562]

Any bard song that doesn't use op321 to cancel its effects before re-applying its effects is going to run into an issue with the Bardic Hat introduced in SoD. That allows bard songs to last multiple rounds and will cause bardic buffs to stack. @Lurker, please feel free to reach out to any mod author if you are seeing an issue with their songs stacking on themselves.

[subtledoctor]

2 hours ago, morpheus562 said:

Everyone has a choice with how broken they want their game to be and what is acceptable to them.

Of course. And I didn’t mean to suggest anything about this mod. Artemius makes kits that tend to be on their own level, power-wise. They seem to be balanced against each other but blow the vanilla kits and most other mod kits out of the water. In fact most mods carry their own assumptions about how they will or won’t be combined. 

Neither here nor there, but a proper PnP-inspired tweak would be interesting. I believe the original rule is, you play music for three rounds, and the effects then last for one turn. (Or was it one round per level?) Seems like it might be a reasonable compromise. 

[morpheus562]

3 minutes ago, subtledoctor said:

Of course. And I didn’t mean to suggest anything about this mod. Artemius makes kits that tend to be on their own level, power-wise. They seem to be balanced against each other but blow the vanilla kits and most other mod kits out of the water. In fact most mods carry their own assumptions about how they will or won’t be combined. 

Neither here nor there, but a proper PnP-inspired tweak would be interesting. I believe the original rule is, you play music for three rounds, and the effects then last for one turn. (Or was it one round per level?) Seems like it might be a reasonable compromise. 

I never took your comment as anything but how you clarified it. I was simply trying to say that combining multiple mods together from multiple different authors can drastically change the power scale from what it was originally intended. Artimius/Artisan makes some great stuff, so for clarity I really only have praise for what Artisan creates.

My goal with the component being discussed, was to allow bards to be a little more than just a song bot. I've done some testing with Artisans' skald update, and I've liked the results and the song does NOT stack on itself. Doing a P&P implementation is always preferred, but I'm not sure how to do the 3 round singing check.

[subtledoctor]

Hmm, good point. I’m sure it could be done… certainly with op233/326, but maybe with only op206? 

Something like:

Song casts SpellA, SpellB, SpellC, and SpellD

SpellA has op206 protection against itself for 20 seconds and against B/C/D for 2 seconds

SpellB has op206 protection against itself for 14 seconds and against C/D for 2 seconds

SpellC has op206 protection against itself for 8 seconds and against D for 2 seconds

SpellD cancels Bard Song* and maybe has op206 protection against the Bard Song and also applies the song effects for 60 seconds. Maybe also op144 to disable the bard song button while the effects are active.

* I did this once, I forget how, I think it involved casting a dummy spell with op146 and also applying op363 for redundancy.