Let’s ki- I mean, change! Throne of Bhaal

[Gorionar]

Do not forget about the magician Elminster and the guild of magicians who monitors the events in TOB.

To make TOB more playable, we need to expand the history of the emerging war in those parts. So that the main character could understand why it was at this time that the offspring of the god of death came together in war. Mellisan is not the only one who has plans for the blood of the gods.

[Morgoth]

This is the best topic on reddit about how to improve Throne of Bhaal, if anyone is curious.

[InKal]

well, ToB was planned as BG3, right? but instead was totally gutted and actually kinda killed by Bioware, realesed as ToB and later was partially galvanized by Ascension. 

but I agree, lets kill ToB again and this time for good. Implementing into SoA is probably impossible but can we just remove that annoying Solar (why you not intervene when she is about to kill me, ehh?) and let us kill that FUCKING Mellisan excuse for a villain with extra chunk effect. Please................

ofcourse, don't remove extra levels and HLAs. ;ppppp

[Lurker]

I can see this ending up in a megamod-like situation, making it challenging for mod compatibility. But as long as it's properly communicated upfront, I'd be certainly willing to offer this a dedicated installation. Perhaps with only BG2:EE support, at least in the beginning, to make it more manageable?

And to shift the epic stages more into the planes is a very sensible approach.

One concept I generally would like to see handled better in a setup that is supposed to be primarily about "a charname", is to also address this at game mechanics, not only by story.

Same as the thing of having no soul is of absolutely no consequence in the game, charname should really stand out power-wise the more the story progresses. The few pitiful minor abilities are fitting for the BG1 phase, but even then more from a story point of view, because charname is still in the infant stage of evolving. In BG2:SoA, those "pitifuls" are meaningless. Well, I stand corrected, there is a consequence of losing the soul: the loss of those abilities, which only occurred to me right now, which might help to see how painful this loss really is...

And the slayer change? Well, at least it is something... For evil charnames. They get a gameplay gimmick as an apology for so few options to play their alignment more convincingly.

The power-boost from the platforms in Ascension comes far too late, while the choice of giving this boost to another bhaalspawn is a nice roleplaying opportunity; preferable with strings attached.

Long story short, wishful thinking: Even the most underwhelming class with the lousiest ability scores should have the opportunity to outclass any companion, if he/she manages to survive long enough. And the player should have time to actually enjoy using that power, so no to a huge power-boost that happens 2 minutes before the endgame credits roll.

Too keep this rant going on just a bit longer, two examples:

KotOR1: BAD. Especially with the "DLC" for PC gamers. With higher experience levels, choices less and less matter, because every character is maximized, and the munchkin items only emphasize this. And whoever thought that sitting around in the Ebon Hawk should give XP for idle companions, shame on you.

KotOR2: better (all-lower-case is intentional). While all of the example above still applies, the main character gets a power boost (even if it's almost meaningless, because the game is so easy), and some unique abilities. While this may sound just like what I complained about above regarding BG, the execution just felt better. And again, in all-lower-case. But I hope my position is relatable.

[Lurker]

Oh yes, in addition to InKal: Level 40+ has to stay!

(At least for bhaalspawns...)

[subtledoctor]

4 hours ago, megrimlock said:

I would absolutely play subtledoctor's TOB-in-SOA-and-then-PST

Oh don’t worry, that’s never going to happen. @Aquadrizzt was once working on converting PST to the EE v2.x engine, but Beamdog waved him off. Then they released PSTEE in its incompatible v3.x engine… which is nice and all, but doesn’t do much for modders. 

Would be a nice idea though. Remove the option to ascend and keep Charname as Irenicus left him: a literal broken soul, having tasted the divine but now forever being denied it, his very destiny having been ripped away, cursed with immortality but lacking the divinity to go with it, with an unquenchable urge to fill a part of him that can never be filled, an unending drive to seek out… transcendence. That would be an amazing, tragic story. 

But not something I can realistically do in the infinity engine. Although… hmmm…

[moggadeet]

I have to admit that the mystique of TNO's history is part of the draw of Torment for me. Connecting him to another character with a known history would undermine that. Torment uses blank spaces better than a lot of games, which imo are often prone to giving way too much information. Sometimes less is more.

I do like the idea of ToB incorporating the Planes to a greater extent. I've never used Dorn for long, but I feel like the Lunia area used for his ToB quest could be reused as an original quest for non-evil characters: instead of slaughtering your way through to erase your names, it might be a chance for a good-aligned Charname to subject themselves to a trial of character to demonstrate that they truly don't intend to take their father's place - preferably a challenge that you can't kill your way out of, since all that proves is that you're good at killing. But it'd need to be different from the Hell trials... hmm. What I'm vaguely envisioning here is a sort of trial sequence (think Neverwinter Nights 2) where the player is called upon to justify morally iffy actions: working with the shadow thieves, for example, such that a "Best" outcome would demonstrate both an understanding of the possible harm you caused and a weighing of relative evils, such that you made the best decision you reasonably could.

my other thought: it'd be neat if you could revisit some SoA areas in ToB and use them to begin forming... hmm. I don't want to call it an army, but imagine if you could head over to the Druid Grove or De'Arnise Keep for allies. Not with the intention of conquering areas, but as a force to safeguard and heal the innocents who would otherwise die in a stupid, pointless war. Jamis Tombelthen's not wrong - Charname wasn't responsible for what happened to Saradush, and that's the problem. It's just a random casualty in an already-unstable kingdom that really, really can't afford to have a bunch of demigods smacking each other around. It's not about Charname, it's about the inherent danger of this ridiculous superpowered slugfest, and I can't really judge him too harshly for that (really, the EEs changing his alignment to lawful evil seems a bit uncharitable). "Hello, I own a literal castle and will provide refuge to many people as I can reasonably fit" is far more convincing as a show of good intentions than "no, I'm totally different than my equally-destructive half-siblings, really," though credit to the Quest Pack for at least letting Charname argue their case. Someone on reddit pointed out that ToB is essentially an evil campaign, in that you spend most of it killing people and then retreating to your inaccessible villain-lair, and I haven't been able to get that thought out of my head since.

On which note, I like the idea of using the Pocket Plane to smuggle some of the Bhaalspawn (and the other innocents, for that matter) out of Saradush. Given that Lazarus reappears in Amkethran, it might be interesting to have some of the other Bhaalspawn find sanctuary there - I could see Balthazar perhaps keeping them as prisoners, if he was convinced they had neither the will nor the power to take advantage of their heritage.

An improved ToB would, for me, involve two plot elements: 1) knowing that you can remain mortal or become a non-evil god, and being able to act towards that end outside of the Solar dialogues and the very very end and 2) not being forced to be Melissan's cat's paw.

This second branch could perhaps involve trying to investigate Melissan herself. Gromnir and his allies are the obvious one here - yeah, he's completely paranoid, but maybe Charname immediately shouting that Melissan is up to something might make him pause before attacking. Nyalee, as a former Deathstalker herself, might know something. I also like the idea of expanding the scene with Gorion and Alianna's spirits - Alianna fascinates me, and limiting her to a single cutscene was disappointing. She'd want to ensure Bhaal's resurrection, so Melissan working against that might cause her to reveal information to Charname (and hey, maybe she's proud of her murderous offspring - I actually love her characterization in the Reunion mod for this reason, where, yes, she's definitely committed to Bhaal, but she's not without affection for Charname).

BG1 is about figuring about who you are, about being shaped into your antagonist's foil. Ironically, Sarevok's hired killers help to shape Charname into someone capable of defeating him. SoD is about learning to deal with the consequences of that knowledge. SoA is about learning that you really, really didn't know what it meant to be a child of Bhaal, and if you can't control yourself, someone else is going to take advantage of you. So, to me, ToB should be about using that self-mastery and pitting yourself against your equals - without just doing Melissan's dirty work for her.

[megrimlock]

6 minutes ago, moggadeet said:

This second branch could perhaps involve trying to investigate Melissan herself. Gromnir and his allies are the obvious one here - yeah, he's completely paranoid, but maybe Charname immediately shouting that Melissan is up to something might make him pause before attacking.

This is basically what happens in the Throne of Bhaal Revisited mod - you make Gromnir pause long enough to offer an alliance against Yaga Shura. But the mod has significant compatibility issues with Longer Road and I think also Ascension. Definitely has some interesting stuff in it though.

[moggadeet]

I've never played it - was it ever converted to EE? An interesting premise for sure. I admit that I was never that attached to Longer Road/Ascension, myself (I don't enjoy the Ascension final battle, the "surprise, look who's back" kills any pretense of immersion for me ).

[Lurker]

7 minutes ago, megrimlock said:

This is basically what happens in the Throne of Bhaal Revisited mod - you make Gromnir pause long enough to offer an alliance against Yaga Shura. But the mod has significant compatibility issues with Longer Road and I think also Ascension. Definitely has some interesting stuff in it though.

And this is how this topic happened:

On 10/27/2023 at 6:22 PM, subtledoctor said:

As far as your recent travails: I will only say that I have personally stopped using any ToB mods. Ascension, Wheels, Longer Road, Turnabout, Reunion… not to say these are bad mods, but they are script-heavy mods. Lately I have been feeling that 1) ToB itself is just not good enough to justify the effort; and 2) bugs that trip up a game 100 hours in are exponentially more frustrating than those that trip up a game 20 hours in. At that point I just want to finish out the game. (In fact I am contemplating making a mod to remove ToB altogether.)

Seriously, is there any mod for ToB that that doesn't break ToB(+Ascension(+EET))?

Asking for a friend...

[megrimlock]

9 minutes ago, moggadeet said:

I've never played it - was it ever converted to EE?

Yes by Austin over on arcanecoast - though I'm ashamed to say I downloaded it from (whisper) endarire's github. I know, I know.

[Granger77]

38 minutes ago, moggadeet said:

An improved ToB would, for me, involve two plot elements: 1) knowing that you can remain mortal or become a non-evil god, and being able to act towards that end outside of the Solar dialogues and the very very end and 2) not being forced to be Melissan's cat's paw.

Yep, agreed.

I really enjoy ToB, but I do wish that we could attempt to undermine Melissan when her plan becomes more apparent.

Knowing about our heritage and acting accordingly also sounds neat, and could afford some good RP at the very end of the saga.

[megrimlock]

10 minutes ago, Granger77 said:

I really enjoy ToB, but I do wish that we could attempt to undermine Melissan when her plan becomes more apparent.

Isn't this what Wheels does if you go to the monastery early?

If Ascension, Wheels and TOBR could all be made to play nice, plus what morpheus has in the pipeline, I for one would be happy.

[Granger77]

12 minutes ago, megrimlock said:

Isn't this what Wheels does if you go to the monastery early?

If Ascension, Wheels and TOBR could all be made to play nice, plus what morpheus has in the pipeline, I for one would be happy.

I think you're right, yea.

I'd be happy with those as well.

[Bartimaeus]

Godhood just isn't very interesting to me, and I honestly just don't much care for it as the 'end' of the Bhaalspawn Saga. Well, maybe it could be interesting, but to me, stories should be driven by characters, and SoA's Irenicus and Bodhi are great characters, I love both of them and the game is fundamentally more about them rather than CHARNAME and I am perfectly fine with that (heck, I find it pretty difficult not to cheer for them over Ellesime and all those cruddy elves!), while with ToB...what seemed to be the most interesting character of the whole lot, Gromnir, is done pretty dirty in terms of his relations to the player, not to mention he's killed off quickly. Though not as quickly as...uh, you know, Illasera the Quick - it never occurred to me that that silly moniker was probably a joke by BioWare relating to her immediately showing up and getting killed by the player until just now.

Anyways, point is, ToB has always failed to make a convincing case in terms of its story and characters for me, so it's hard to much care about it, especially as the game starts to unravel mechanically as you get such a ridiculous glut of spells and powers that open up way too many broken tactics. I have thus traditionally considered the fight against Irenicus to be the end of the game, with Watcher's Keep as an optional "let's go kill Demogorgon" final challenge. I always think I'm going to really actually go through ToB leading up to Irenicus, but then I axe him and get into the elf grove and pretty much immediately lose all inertia. I don't really know what, if anything, I'd want to 'save' from ToB and put into SoA...there's probably something, but I'm hard-pressed to immediately name what.

Edited October 29, 2023 by Bartimaeus