How to start IWD in EET

[Endarire]

@the_sextein
Thankee!  Alleluia!

[the_sextein]

I've been thinking about game balance and I've come to the conclusion that "Heart Of Winter" is better off left out.  You can only reduce the XP so much before you are too nerfed to progress through Baldu'rs gate 1 and if you don 't nerf it enough then you will be so overpowered for Siege of Dragonspear that it will ruin it.

I've decided to reduce enemy XP and Quest XP by 60% and skip Heart Of Winter.  By doing this and using a full party of 6 I should be within 2 levels of the norm at any given point with the only exception being the start of Icewind Dale 1 and 2 where they were designed to be started with a level one party and you are going to be OP for a little bit. 

With this setup I should be:

1 level below normal when I finish BG1 and TOTSC. 

2 or 3 levels below norm at the end of Icewind Dale 1.

1 level too high when I start SOD

Right where I would normally be when I end SOD and start SOA.

2 levels short and the end of Icewind Dale 2

Right where I would normally be when I end BG2 and start TOB.

At this point I would either need to disable the XP nerf when I start TOB and play it normally and end it at the same level I always do or just leave The XP nerf installed and end the game 6 levels lower than normal which would make it more challenging and would provide a "set it and forget it" XP nerf.  Not sure what I'm going to do but I'll figure it out when I get there.  Since this is my first time playing all of this and I figure it's not going to be perfectly balanced, I've decided to play through it on Insane with double damage and SCS.  Once I get a feel for how hard the difficulty spikes are, I can add or subtract difficulty from there.

Edited December 16, 2022 by the_sextein

[subtledoctor]

On 12/12/2022 at 5:17 PM, the_sextein said:

been thinking about game balance and I've come to the conclusion that "Heart Of Winter" is better off left out.  You can only reduce the XP so much before you are too nerfed to progress through Baldu'rs gate 1 and if you don 't nerf it enough then you will be so overpowered for Siege of Dragonspear that it will ruin it.

I just played tipun’s (now obsolete?) HoW-in-EET at the end of the BG1 campaign, without changing the HoW XP but using my own mod that cuts creature XP by 50%. I didn’t calculate exactly, but I estimate it gave me about 60K XP for each party member. That is way too much for something that occurs before SoD… but it would be just about perfect as a prestige dungeon or area questline in chapter 2 of SoA. I think it’s about on par with what you get from De’Arnise Keep or the Cult of the Eyeless etc. Bonus, it would actually be more of a challenge for a party in early SoA, because even 2-3 levels lower, the end-BG1 party is far better equipped than an early SoA party. Only other issue is that loot in HoW is super OP… there is stuff like Svian’s Club, Blood Iron, Vexing Thoughts, etc. which are comparable to end-stage BG2/early ToB equipment.

But yeah my takeaway was that HoW can serve nicely as its own thing, separate from IWD1. Simple solution, if you have tipun’s whole IWD mod installed, just remove Hjollder from Kuldahar and insert him into Imnesvale or Trademeet, or something.

[the_sextein]

Unfortunately I don't know how to do that.  Thats why I was hoping IWD in EET was going to come out eventually.  If someone could move him to Baldur's Gate two and give options to nerf the weapons like TOTLM it would be perfect.

[subtledoctor]

On 1/7/2023 at 5:31 PM, the_sextein said:

Unfortunately I don't know how to do that.  Thats why I was hoping IWD in EET was going to come out eventually.  If someone could move him to Baldur's Gate two and give options to nerf the weapons like TOTLM it would be perfect.

I threw this together pretty quickly. What it does:

• Only works with tipun's HoW-in-EET mod (not the bigger all-IWD-in-EET)
• Adds Hjollder to the Bridge District in the BG2 campaign
• If you talk to Hjollder in Ulgoth's Beard and play HoW during BG1, he will disappear from the Bridge District
• If you ignore/avoid Hjollder in BG1 then you can talk to him in the Bridge District and play HoW in BG2
• This does NOT nerf any items... honestly I think it's mostly okay as long as you don't loot any weapons from the cave under Burial Isle. Exercise self-control!

EDIT - okay I made this one which will work with either the standalone HoW-in-EET or the full IWD1_EET mod. It puts Hjollder in Athkatla so you can do HoW in the pre-Spellhold portion of SoA, and it also adds a bit of easter egg content, letting you see some of the IWD1 areas from Amn, only if your party doesn't go through the full IWD1 campaign.

Edited February 17, 2023 by subtledoctor

[Endarire]

To clarify, does tipun's IWD in EET already include the Heart of Winter content?  If so, why is there a separate HoW download?

Thankee!

[subtledoctor]

1 hour ago, Endarire said:

To clarify, does tipun's IWD in EET already include the Heart of Winter content?  If so, why is there a separate HoW download?

Thankee!

Yes, I believe the bigger IWD1-in-EET project includes all IWD1 content including HoW. My assumption is that he started with a small mod, only adding HoW to the game. And then maybe he got ambitious and decided to expand it to all of IWD1, and then even IWD2? Maybe? I don't know, and I don't read Russian.

Regardless, the standalone HoW-in-EET exists, and I like it better since 1) in this context it's preferable for that adventure to be distinct from IWD, and 2) we already have a standalone TotLM-in-EET mod to go along with it. So I can get 2 of the 3 adventures, in the form I prefer. IMO the IWD1 campaign is anyway to big and has too much loot and XP to fit in an EET game. Both HoW and TotLM make perfect little side-adventures for chapter 2 or chapter 6 of BG2.

[the_sextein]

Thanks subtledoctor, I remember you from back at the Beamdog forums.  You're alright, I'll have to do a new install.  I'm still waiting on SCS to get an update because I have some kind of bug where enemies don't use their magic abilities anymore.  Hopefully David will find the time in 2023.  It is exciting to get a chance to play all of this Icewind dale content in EET at last.

Edited January 13, 2023 by the_sextein

[Endarire]

Thankee for clarifying that.

[zelazko]

Spoiler

On 11/19/2022 at 4:59 PM, JohnBob said:

Hello,

Good to see you find you way to Targos !

(Tipun mentions that IWD_EET is relatively independent from the rest of the game and should not be a problem with other mods)

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As the screenshots are already made I post them with indications !

1. Hulgoth Beard !

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2. IWD1 Easthaven !

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3. Copper Coronet ! (Horribly Ctrl-Y Nalia before she could ask for help.)

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4. IWD2 Targos Clua console arrival... 

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When you got here better do a quick Ctrl-J to the location in the screenshot below and talk to Hedron Kerdos on the boat to start the game normally...

True 4. IWD2 True Targos !

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Welcome to The Spine of the World !!!

Let's hope the adventure doesn't crash...

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If I will start first IWD1 Easthaven adventure earlier by changing chapter requirement from 7 to 6 will it mess something up in the dialogues of the IDW1 since I will not be in chapter 7?

[Guest]

11 hours ago, zelazko said:

If I will start first IWD1 Easthaven adventure earlier by changing chapter requirement from 7 to 6 will it mess something up in the dialogues of the IDW1 since I will not be in chapter 7?

I can't be 100 % sure, but it should not be a problem.

IWD chapters are independant and I think others instance where BG chapters could be used is not implemented yet. (Tipun was plannig to create a quest that lead to IWD, but it's very much on hold for now...)

[subtledoctor]

Ya, can confirm, having just played 95% of IWD this way, it is completely independent of chapters. 

[zelazko]

Do I have to do Hjoldder expansion that takes place in Lonelywood before going to Dorn's Deep? In vanilla IWD player would get locked out from completing the expansion if they progress too far. I find that my party has too low levels as I can't defeat burrow weights without extreme buffing.

///EDIT: Should be safe as I can see when I started BG2 new game Hjollder appears in Bridge District.

Spoiler

 

Edited November 27, 2023 by zelazko

[subtledoctor]

Let me know if everything works as expected, as it was slightly difficult to nail down all the various way players can come at this content and not every method has been fully tested. 

The Dragon’s Eye content should not appear in SoA if you have been to Easthaven. There is a similar trigger in the Bridge District to make Hjollder appear or disappear depending on what you have done so far. I think he should be there as long as you have not traveled to Lonelywood yet. 

[zelazko]

I dunno why but story mode don't work when I am in Icewind dale. It works if I move to other non-IWD locations.