[Bug report] Bonus spells due to wisdom

[Angel]

Alright, this may actually be seen as a feature and not a bug, but I'm tossing it out here anyway.  This is an old one dating back to BG1: mxsplwis.2da gives too many 4th and 5th level spells and too few 3rd level spells.

Currently the table looks like this:
 

2DA V1.0
0
        1   2   3   4   5   6   7
13      1   0   0   0   0   0   0
14      2   0   0   0   0   0   0
15      2   1   0   0   0   0   0
16      2   2   0   0   0   0   0
17      2   2   1   0   0   0   0
18      2   2   1   1   0   0   0
19      3   2   1   2   0   0   0
20      3   3   1   3   0   0   0
21      3   3   2   3   1   0   0
22      3   3   2   4   2   0   0
23      3   3   2   4   4   0   0
24      3   3   2   4   4   2   0
25      3   3   2   4   4   3   1
~

As you can see there is quite a discrepancy between third level spells fourth and fifth level spells.

Checking with the source material, the table should look like this:

2DA V1.0
0
        1   2   3   4   5   6   7
13      1   0   0   0   0   0   0
14      2   0   0   0   0   0   0
15      2   1   0   0   0   0   0
16      2   2   0   0   0   0   0
17      2   2   1   0   0   0   0
18      2   2   1   1   0   0   0
19      3   2   2   1   0   0   0
20      3   3   2   2   0   0   0
21      3   3   3   2   1   0   0
22      3   3   3   3   2   0   0
23      4   3   3   3   2   1   0
24      4   3   3   3   3   2   0
25      4   3   3   3   3   3   1

Which looks much more consistent to me.  However, the BG1 and BG2 manuals reflect the table as it is in game.  Developer intend, or an invasive bug?  I really can't think of a reason why the devs would want the faulty table.

If we don't do this as a core fix, maybe it could be an "optional but cool" one?

[suy]

On 3/25/2022 at 11:28 PM, Angel said:

Which looks much more consistent to me.  However, the BG1 and BG2 manuals reflect the table as it is in game.  Developer intend, or an invasive bug?  I really can't think of a reason why the devs would want the faulty table.

Good point Angel. I always knew this table was suspicious, but I never bothered checking with the PnP manuals. The way the table it's specified there is a bit weird, and it's the only table I know of that it's not specified in full detail (like in the 2DA or the BG/IWD manuals), but instead it's just one column saying how much to change from one level to the next. So you need to build the table yourself, carrying from the previous result. I think it's obvious that someone was confused when understanding that description of the bonus spells per score level, or that just read a wrong row by accident. There seems that the mistake is only when reading scores 19, 23 and 24. Since the result carries to the next row, the table gets more and more borked at the end.

PS: I'm not sure if this is EE specific content. Are we in the right thread?

[Angel]

13 hours ago, suy said:

Good point Angel. I always knew this table was suspicious, but I never bothered checking with the PnP manuals. The way the table it's specified there is a bit weird, and it's the only table I know of that it's not specified in full detail (like in the 2DA or the BG/IWD manuals), but instead it's just one column saying how much to change from one level to the next. So you need to build the table yourself, carrying from the previous result. I think it's obvious that someone was confused when understanding that description of the bonus spells per score level, or that just read a wrong row by accident. There seems that the mistake is only when reading scores 19, 23 and 24. Since the result carries to the next row, the table gets more and more borked at the end.

Yeah, the 2e PHP does give it in a similar format, but it seems someone made a few typos or copy/paste errors when putting it into the BG manual.  As you say, when one line of the table is borked the others follow.

13 hours ago, suy said:

PS: I'm not sure if this is EE specific content. Are we in the right thread?

Yeah, I wasn't very awake when I posted this.  All the bugs I noticed are *not* EE specific and are also present in the original games.  Mea culpa.  The mxsplwis.2da one goes all the way back to BG1 in fact and is also present in IWD, which generally does a better job of sticking to P&P than BG did.  I can't do it, but if a mod wants to split it off to a proper thread, please feel free.

[CamDawg]

I've split this from the general EE bug thread to give it a little more visibility.

On 3/25/2022 at 3:28 PM, Angel said:

Alright, this may actually be seen as a feature and not a bug, but I'm tossing it out here anyway.  This is an old one dating back to BG1: mxsplwis.2da gives too many 4th and 5th level spells and too few 3rd level spells.

My initial inclination is that this seems to be intended: the manuals and table match going all the way back to oBG. Even oIWD, which was a lot more PnP-accurate, uses the same progression. However, I definitely think this is worth more discussion.

[Andrea C.]

My .02: as @CamDawg and others have stated in the past, these games are not P&P. I agree that present behavior appears to be intentional; as such, this change would fall outside the scope of the EEFP.

However I also agree that the P&P table is more consistent and I would welcome a component in, say, Tweaks Anthology to implement it. I know I would use it.

[suy]

I think the table in P&P, if you expand it from the succinct form to the usual way, makes sense and follows the usual "pyramid progression" (you get more at the low levels than at the highers) that all other tables of this kind have. The table on the manuals and the table on the game match, because very likely one was built from the other, and whoever built it did a mistake when transcribing it. As I mentioned on the other comment, I think someone misread the row on the P&P manual, and started carrying the mistake to the following rows of the game table. I think the fact that all the tables of the game have a certain pattern except this (which doesn't seem to follow any other pattern, AFAIK), is some argument towards what could have been the developer intent.

[Bartimaeus]

Not a bug, but it would be great if the P&P tables were a part of Tweaks Anthology. For some reason, I didn't think to investigate P&P when I made my own rebalanced wisdom bonus spell table.

Edited May 27, 2022 by Bartimaeus

[CamDawg]

Following up on this: the PnP table cited by Angel is used in PsT and PsTEE.

[Graion Dilach]

I consider this as a bug, but I can also see that this might be hard to explain for the general playerbase, even if the inconsistencies are pointed out. I also vote for a mod - might even opt for my own as a best-of-both-worlds mix. Because I'm a munchkin. 

[CamDawg]

I noticed this while prepping a new Tweaks component, so...