A question about kit usability

[SixOfSpades]

I have been working on what I believe is technically termed a Good Idea, but I foresee it not being fully compatible with mods that add Bard kits.

 

Long story short: I am making a set of items only usable by Bards. These items will become more powerful as the Bard gains experience, as they use an EFF file to check their user's level. Now, not all Bards will be able to use all of these items: Blades in particular will be restricted from the greatest number of them, in order to offset the Blade's combat bonuses. (Use Any Item is circumvented by the same EFF file: If the user is of a kit that ordinarily would not be able to use the item, they can still use it, but only at its lowest power level.) So each of the 3 Bard kits will have certain items be off-limits to them, only pureclassed Bards will be able to use them all.

 

My problem is this: Due to BG's limited number of kit-usability flags, I cannot assign any of the items to be prohibited to Bard kits added via mods, which would (probably) result in them being bumped into the same usability as the pureclass Bard. For example, I have the Acolyte kit (a Bard who has sacrificed most of his Fighter and Thief abilities and concentrated on casting higher-level spells), and I would not want him to be able to use the items that are more in the spirit of Blades and Skalds.

 

So, could somebody who's really experienced at this kind of thing please answer this question: Can the EFF file be relied upon to essentially 'fake' having extra kit-usability flags on these items? Or should I simply abandon the kit-based aspect of this altogether, and just have all of the items usable by all Bards?

[CamDawg]

First, let me make sure I understand the problem. You're making new items for bards, which will be restricted from various kits. You're concerned that mod kits, which use the same flags as the original bard kits, will get restricted from items that they should probably use because they're sharing these flags. Alternatvely, they will be able to use items they shouldn't because they're using trueclass bard flags and no kit flags.

[the bigg]

it will be incompatible with the Sword Angel kit from Refinements, which uses the Jester flag as his 'special' flag.

[SixOfSpades]

First, let me make sure I understand the problem. You're making new items for bards, which will be restricted from various kits. You're concerned that mod kits, which use the same flags as the original bard kits, will get restricted from items that they should probably use because they're sharing these flags. Alternatvely, they will be able to use items they shouldn't because they're using trueclass bard flags and no kit flags.

Precisely.

 

 

it will be incompatible with the Sword Angel kit from Refinements, which uses the Jester flag as his 'special' flag.

Happily, I am only concerned with Bard kits, and I believe the Sword Angel is either a Fighter or a Paladin (sorry, never used it). Non-Bards that use Bard flags will be able to equip the item, but not actually use it, unless the user deliberately uses a funky AI to enable them to do so.

[the bigg]

it will be incompatible with the Sword Angel kit from Refinements, which uses the Jester flag as his 'special' flag.

Happily, I am only concerned with Bard kits, and I believe the Sword Angel is either a Fighter or a Paladin (sorry, never used it). Non-Bards that use Bard flags will be able to equip the item, but not actually use it, unless the user deliberately uses a funky AI to enable them to do so.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Well, keep in mind that, if Refinements is in use, then Jesters will actually be using the Skald flag. Which means that Jesters can equip a Skald-only flute, but not a Jester-only.

[CamDawg]

OK, so there are a couple of ways to try this out. There's no real satisfactory solution--in other words, pick your poison.

 

1) Borrow a (mainly) unused flag. I use this trick in SPC, and bigg uses it for Refinements. The paladin and cleric kit flags are, for the most part, free for use. The drawback is severe compatibility issues--Refinements and one of the SPC kits (Archer of Sylvanus?) are incompatible because they both try to use the same flag for their chicanery. The number of unused flags are limited--this method really only buys a bit of breathing space.

 

2) Redefine several existing flags. NiGHTMARE has been experimenting with a complete redefinition of the flags based on their functionality rather than being associated with a kit. So rather than a flag meaning 'unusable by kit x' the flag would mean something like 'bladed weapon'. Then all kits and classes that can't use bladed weapon (i.e. clerics) would use this flag. Other flags woud cover armor and other items. The drawback to this system is that, while in theory it will work, it requires a lot of buy-in from other modders. If this were simply to be introduced in one mod, it would definitely break any other kit and/or items because you're essentally re-defining flags. Long-term, I think this is probably a plausible solution. Whether it happens or not is another matter.

 

3) Abuse the "Can't Use Item (180)" opcode. Between regexps and INNER_PATCH, you can dynamically add effects to an item or spell that will restrict items. I put together something for Meira and Darios for Amber: the basic idea is that it searches through items and matches them--in this case, we're looking for halberds, 2H swords, and any armor or shield not usable by fighters but usable by fighter-thieves. On any match it adds a "Can't Use Item" effect to an item that will be worn by Amber, effectively restricting her from these items. The drawback to this approach: it won't catch items installed after your mod, and it differs from a 'proper' restricted item which can be immersion-breaking. An item disallowed by 'proper' flags will have a red background to show it's unusable; an item restricted by this technique will have no red background and will only indicate it's restricted when the player tries to equip it (with a warning message in the same place that Boo/Edwin's amulet display their messages on the inventory screen).

[SixOfSpades]

OK, so there are a couple of ways to try this out. There's no real satisfactory solution--in other words, pick your poison.

Aaaaaaaagh. I see what you mean. On the whole, I'd say Method #2 is the most logical--of course, it requires the most work, wheeeeee! But it's the only way to accomodate for the ever-increasing complexity of BG. (I wonder if it will be able to answer trickier usability questions, like an item that should be usable by Neutral Druids and Evil Thieves, but not Neutral Thieves.) Please pass some mega-kudos on to NiGHTMARE for me, and I just wish I understood the complexities of his task.

 

I think, for now, I'll just flag the items according to the existing Bard kits, and cater to the mod kits by just mentioning the usability in each item's Description: "This item is not supposed to be usable by Diresingers, so even though you can equip it, doing so would show that you are a very naughty person." If/when NiGHTMARE's project is finished, I will then edit the items to have the same usability as, for example, Chain Mail or Archmagi Robes, to show which ones are meant for Fighter-type Bards and which are for Mage-like Bards, etc. That would allow Barbarians and Sorcerers to equip the things, but, like I said, they wouldn't get any use out of them.