NWN 2 has arrived...

[Domi]

I hadn't noticed eyelashes. Do any of the characters have eyelashes?

 

I'm not sure, my avatar definetly does not (brows are cute though) and I've only met 1 other female, Amie, in a close-up, and it did irritate me that she loked prettier than my sun elf, when I should have really left a human in the dust. Well, the men of NWN2 will have to love my elf for her soul, I suppose.

[Miloch]

Really now. Is that your biggest worry about this game?

[Belladonna]

Elves are suppose to be beautiful looking races, not horrendous. For some reason the humans look better looking.

[Domi]

Really now. Is that your biggest worry about this game?

 

The rest is pretty good so far!

[Lord Ernie]

A few mods that really helped my gaming experience:

 

Rod of party buffing: This is a major one, especially late-game. If you (like me) like to enter battle prepared, and don't like recasting all those buffs all the time, this is your mod. The rod remembers buffs cast on specific partymembers, and can recast them instantaneously.

 

Spellfixed compilation: Fixes numerous bugs with spells not yet fixed by Obsidian. Sadly doesn't combine well with one of my favourite mods, but still a great one if you don't install that one.

 

Less obtrusive spell buffs: For those of you that don't like the rather overdone effects of Mage Armor, Shield, Protection From Evil etc. This is your mod. Makes buffed-up mages look less like a running light show.

 

The complete craftsman: For those of you that like crafting items a lot, this is your mod. Sadly, some of the changes allow for vastly overpowered items (in the range of Adamantine Full Plate +5 that gives +8 bonuses to 3 stats, regeneration +5 and +5 to saves), so it's not recommended for everyone.

 

Even's AI: This mod makes an enormous improvement on the AI system. I still micromanage my spellcasters since I've never, ever trusted the AI to make decent decisions in that department, but given the crap AI of the original, this one is a welcome improvement.

 

Spell Points System: I've personally always had a bit of a gripe with the logic behind D&D's memorized based casting system. This mod overhauls that one, and replaces it with point-based casting, which sort of works like mana (or the psionics system, for the ones familiar with it). The system used here isn't perfect (at times overpowered), but it's a nice change nevertheless. Also, it installs Even's henchman AI, so you don't have to do that yourself.

[Smoketest]

Supposedly they made some improvments to tree textures in Patch v1.04. I can't tell that much of a difference, but maybe that is because they disappear as soon as you get near them. The fading away of certain terrain obstacles is nice for sightlines, but kind of sucks if you want to be a sneaky thief and hide behind things.

You can disable object fading in the options menus. That option's been there since day 1.

 

I agree on the points made regarding player character ugliness. Nearly every other NPC in the game looks better than what I could put together in the character generator. It's just not fair. The eyelids are downright ugly on many models, especially on female faces. They look like they haven't slept in months. I've never seen such ugly faces before in a game, at least not in the character generator portion. Some of them are scary.

 

I thought about trying the improved AI, but I'll wait for patch 1.05 instead. Rob McGinnis has indicated there will be a major overhaul of the game's AI. For now, it works better to park my party somewhere with the "Stand your ground" command, and then solo the rest of the area. They always chime in for conversations no matter where they are, and I survive better when they aren't pulling a

all the time.

[Domi]

Do you know if there was at least a tentative promise of more beatiful faces?

[Smoketest]

Do you know if there was at least a tentative promise of more beautiful faces?

No, I don't. You could always ask the community representatives or the developers though.

 

I'll quote this Obsidian forum post by Rob McGinnis (in response to my complaint about submitting bugs through filtered email) on ways you can provide feedback, in case you're interested:

If there's something really important that you would like to see fixed in NWN2, or you think it is not being addressed, you are free to send me a PM on the Bioware forums to let me know about it. Alternatively, we have the Community Representatives that do a great job of letting me know what issues people have. Also, I am in the Community Representative IRC channel throughout most of the day (IRC: irc.neverwinterconnections.com, Public Channel: NWN2CR) and we get programmers and such stopping by as well.

Searching the forums is a huge task, but I did find this interesting mod in the first result: Whatbrick's NWN2 Character Customization mod last updated 2/4/2007. It provides some interesting options. There is a hakpack version and an override version. Use the override version for just playing the game. I'm going to download it and check it out myself.

[Domi]

Thank you, got it. Will see if the female elven heads are any better

[Smoketest]

Note on installing it, in case you run into trouble. UnRAR it into your NWN2 override folder (in My Documents), then copy the files you want to use from the subfolders into the override folder so the game can see them. I copied everything except the skull.

 

If you use United Colors, that will help immensely with setting up the character's final appearance.

 

The faces and hair offer decent alternatives. I was able to create a convincing drow female using the new elven female face, Obsidian's short hair style, stark-white hair and eyebrows, 'facial hair' for the spider headband (the red gem color can't be changed in-game), and lavender eyes. I used very dark skin, just light enough to make out her features and red lips. With united colors you can go stark black, but then no facial features are visible.

 

Hopefully Obsidian will increase/improve the face/hair library for us in a future patch, but as with NWN1 there likely won't be a shortage of custom content to help us out. It'll just take some time. After all, NWN's been out for years, but NWN2's only been out for a few months.

[Domi]

Oh, thank you! I actually just put *subfolders* in the override, funny woman I am. I think I will just going with the campaign (can't wait to see what happens in the next play-session), and use it when I start building my own adventure.

[Lord Ernie]

You can put subfolders in the override no problem. That's how I keep my mods in order. And I agree on the female faces; the male ones mostly look just fine, but the female ones I've seen look either terribly hung over, or downright ugly. And what's with the darn flower on the long-haired female, too?

 

Oh, and the in-game AI isn't that terrible that you should solo everything. Just hand a Greatsword or Greataxe to Khelgar (he can hold his own), give your spellcasters a bow to keep 'em out of close combat, and micromanage where necessary. You won't be able to win the last fights with only your main character, anyway (and honestly, I wouldn't want to try and do the mass rogue fights early on with only one character. That's more sneak attacks than anyone can take).

[Smoketest]

Oh, and the in-game AI isn't that terrible that you should solo everything. Just hand a Greatsword or Greataxe to Khelgar (he can hold his own), give your spellcasters a bow to keep 'em out of close combat, and micromanage where necessary. You won't be able to win the last fights with only your main character, anyway (and honestly, I wouldn't want to try and do the mass rogue fights early on with only one character. That's more sneak attacks than anyone can take).

Alright let me clarify: I park the party to disarm traps, then if I need them for combat I call them back. I usually play a somewhat stealthy game, and the AI good at blowing my cover and/or waking up the neighborhood. Once combat is joined, sure, the AI does alright for the most part. I've played the game four times now (having acquired a copy in November; see the third post of this thread), so I'm well aware of what I can solo and what I can't.

[BigRob]

Oh, and the in-game AI isn't that terrible that you should solo everything. Just hand a Greatsword or Greataxe to Khelgar (he can hold his own), give your spellcasters a bow to keep 'em out of close combat, and micromanage where necessary. You won't be able to win the last fights with only your main character, anyway (and honestly, I wouldn't want to try and do the mass rogue fights early on with only one character. That's more sneak attacks than anyone can take).

 

Indeed, those tons-of-rogue fights were some of the hardest in the game for me. The only times I ever lost the entire party in the game were those and the final fights. Even Khelgar can't take four or so of those rogues on him at once.

 

I've found that the melee AI is pretty good, the characters will use knockdown and similar feats (though monks seem totally averse to using Flurry of Blows), the only real issue with it is the charging blindly down corridors to assault distant enemies.

[Domi]

I just found the best cheat ever - increase party limit to 6, and I am so hoping my game can handle it! Woo-hoo! No more worries about 'only 3 chars in the party!'