SCS : dealing with mage Invisibility

[saroumana]

I need your help.
I can't get by (well, I can bypass it, wasting a lot of time and frustration) with SCS+ spell revision.

Mages always cast invisibility (improved) and a ton of protection. Except that while SCS allows breach to have a small area of effect and therefore to be cast without seeing the target, spell revision does not.

Invisibility detection spells (low to medium level) don't work. True seeing becomes individual, you can't target any mage under invisibility, in short, the whole system is designed to piss off the player.

As a result, Edwin is no longer of any use, since it's imperative to break the mages' protection, and he can do absolutely nothing in this area.

But that's my biased view of things, since I'm doing pretty badly.
So my question is, how do you manage things with spell revision when you've got SCS installed (which is quite common)?

[InKal]

If a high level mage casts Immunity Divination, you can do literally nothig to dispel him (exepet probably old as carbon 3xRubyRayofReversal form Chain Contingency cheat) which makes the game to return to its vanilla state so we are modding the game like crazy for it to become a vanilla game again LOL. That is why I dont't use spell revisions for years now, if you have only SCS installed you can somewhat bypass his imminity. I would never use SCS and SR togheter because in my opinion they are incompatible mods and istalling them both is at least counterproductive.

lets go at it again in simple soldier words: first you install SCS which allows you to target invisible cheese

then you install SR which doesn't allow you to target invisible cheese.

BONKERS!

[Graion Dilach]

https://github.com/GraionDilach/RandomGraionMagic#component-115-add-back-vanilla-true-sight-as-a-level-higher-spell-against-spell-revisions-classspelltool is another option.

[subtledoctor]

In short, cast 2nd-level “Detect Invisible” or 6th-level “True Seeing” and you will be able to target anyone, end of story. 

Tome & Blood’s “Revised Invisibility” goes some way toward dealing with this. 

“SubtleDoctor’s Random Tweaks” has a component that makes True Seeing a party-wide effect, which can greatly simplify this stuff. (But it also works for enemies, so reduces the value of invisibility for players once you are in BG2.)

[saroumana]

Detect Invisible clearly doesn't work, at least not against the long list of SCS mage buffs.
But it's really important to be able to debuff them. Spell revision adds a lot of spells, but I find that ironically it makes the task more complicated and doesn't add any spells for this purpose.
Otherwise, I can see that my best option is to make true seeing party wide like on vanilla. I hope it'll work on a game I've already started.

[jmerry]

The way SR invisibility and detection works ...

- Nothing removes invisibility entirely, like old DI/IP/Oracle/TS. That capability simply isn't available anymore.

- Spells that formerly had this invisibility removal instead grant the caster the ability to see through invisibility. That caster can see the enemy, attack them, and target them with anything, but this is not shared with their allies. Nothing protects against the ability to see through invisibility.

- Spells that grant the ability to see through invisibility also emit pulses that reveal enemies, eliminating basic invisibility and turning improved invisibility into weak invisibility. This makes no difference for an AI-controlled caster, but their allies can now see the enemy to attack them, and that enemy is now visible so you can click on them if the caster is on your side. Non-detection blocks these pulses.

 

So ... yeah, if Edwin's your only mage, you can't spell-break an enemy with improved invisibility. A priest such as Viconia can use True Seeing and target them with spells, but they don't have stuff like Breach and Secret Word in their spell list.

[polytope]

8 hours ago, jmerry said:

So ... yeah, if Edwin's your only mage, you can't spell-break an enemy with improved invisibility. A priest such as Viconia can use True Seeing and target them with spells, but they don't have stuff like Breach and Secret Word in their spell list.

A balance problem indeed, not only Edwin but any PC conjurer is distinctly disadvantaged and it isn't obvious in the readme that you'll need a second arcane caster for functional antimagic.

Does the Book of Infinite Spells still grant True Sight with SR? You'd have to be lucky to get that option though, and make it past a lot of high level mages in the first place...

[InKal]

9 hours ago, jmerry said:

The way SR invisibility and detection works ...

- Nothing removes invisibility entirely, like old DI/IP/Oracle/TS. That capability simply isn't available anymore.

- Spells that formerly had this invisibility removal instead grant the caster the ability to see through invisibility. That caster can see the enemy, attack them, and target them with anything, but this is not shared with their allies. Nothing protects against the ability to see through invisibility.

- Spells that grant the ability to see through invisibility also emit pulses that reveal enemies, eliminating basic invisibility and turning improved invisibility into weak invisibility. This makes no difference for an AI-controlled caster, but their allies can now see the enemy to attack them, and that enemy is now visible so you can click on them if the caster is on your side. Non-detection blocks these pulses.

 

So ... yeah, if Edwin's your only mage, you can't spell-break an enemy with improved invisibility. A priest such as Viconia can use True Seeing and target them with spells, but they don't have stuff like Breach and Secret Word in their spell list.

ohh, a little confused. 

So, SR allows to target improved invisible characters but you must first cast true sight, right? After casting true sight, enemy mage is visible only by a dude/dudess who casted true sight and the problem with Edwin is that him beaing a conjurer and not being able to cast true sight he can do shit, oh LOOOOOL fecking useless red monkey of Nay give him a banana kick him out and take Nalia or Neera uffffff much MUCH better.

[InKal]

hmmm...still confused........

[subtledoctor]

On 7/24/2023 at 1:53 PM, saroumana said:

Detect Invisible clearly doesn't work, at least not against the long list of SCS mage buffs.

Lose the attitude - especially when you are wrong.

NO buffs protect against SR Detect Invisible. It allows you to target ANY enemy, regardless of their invisibility or sanctuary status. (It doesn’t make targeting circles appear - Tome & Blood adds that capability - but you spoke of Improved Invisibility so I presume you can see the enemy’s selection circle.)

[subtledoctor]

15 hours ago, polytope said:

A balance problem indeed, not only Edwin but any PC conjurer is distinctly disadvantaged and it isn't obvious in the readme that you'll need a second arcane caster for functional antimagic.

Given that Conjurers are the most powerful specialist, I’m not totally sure this needs a fix. I mean other specialists lose out on key spells. 

IR potions of Sight fix this. Demi probably designed it on the assumption that SR and IR would be paired. 

That said, I think I’ve been convinced that Spell Thrust et al. should be have the ‘target invisible’ flag. *OR* make Nondetection dispellable by something else (normal Dispel Magic, perhaps, or maybe Oracle - in the latter case it would be like a Spell Shield for invisibility - or even Glitterdust, which a Conjurer can cast)

[jmerry]

Huh. I checked SR Glitterdust, and I have to revise my previous statement: the capability to fully remove invisibility does exist. Glitterdust does it, and does it a lot better than the vanilla version - no save, no MR.

Nondetection blocks that effect, of course. And it's a spell protection in the SR system.

[polytope]

7 hours ago, subtledoctor said:

Given that Conjurers are the most powerful specialist, I’m not totally sure this needs a fix. I mean other specialists lose out on key spells.

Debatable, for instance SR improves Colour Spray and Grease (which is also bugged in current fixpack/EE anyway) to the extent that an Invoker missing Sleep at low levels doesn't seem quite so constrained.

The vanilla Transmuter was considered one of the worst mage kits because of their lack of anti-magic ability (tied with Abjurer, no Stoneskin is disastrous if solo, no (Improved)Haste is terrible with a party, no Time Stop is bad either way), Conjurers now share that problem against improved AI (Nondetection + Improved Invisibility).

7 hours ago, subtledoctor said:

IR potions of Sight fix this. Demi probably designed it on the assumption that SR and IR would be paired.

Are potion stores revised too? Because in BG2 it's a pretty rare random drop and only 20-something such potions are available prior to the underdark, being even rarer late game.

[subtledoctor]

You only really need one Potion of Sight per boss mage, so 20 might be more than enough. 

Also I’m still not sure why Conjurers need “fixing” in this regard but Transmuters don’t. Instead of saying it’s unfair Edwin can’t use the tools of a Diviner - let’s be honest, he made that choice knowingly - why not lean in more on the tools of a Conjurer? Spam summons. Throw nishruu (who I think have invisibility detection by script) at the enemy and then go invisible yourself and watch the show. 

Also I have advocated elsewhere for changing SR “Nondetection” into a properly-named “Protection from Divinations.” Not only would this make the spell’s description accord with its effects, it would also allow Glitterdust to bypass it - very convenient for Conjurers!

[polytope]

18 hours ago, subtledoctor said:

Also I’m still not sure why Conjurers need “fixing” in this regard but Transmuters don’t.

It's fine to leave an already broken/underpowered kit alone under the view that it's a job for another day, but not okay to break kits that were working well previously. Just like it wouldn't be good to weaken the other 2 ranger and druid kits to the level of the vanilla Beastmaster or Shapeshifter.

Honestly the best solution in my view for specialists and critically important spells would be to allow spells of the opposition school up to 3rd level, similar to how 2e handled "minor access" to priest spheres.

Thus:

• A Conjurer could cast Detect Invisibility (True Strike also, for SR games)
• A Transmuter could cast Remove Magic & Spell Thrust
• An Abjurer could cast Vocalize , Haste & Slow
• An Enchanter could cast Magic Missile & Web
• A Necromancer could cast Blur, Invisibility & Mirror Image (Reflected Image also, with SR), if that seems too strong remember they'll never get Improved Invisibility, Mass Invisibility or Project Image.

Edited July 27, 2023 by polytope