Request for feedback (again)

[Lemernis]

I'm taking my second run through the saga with SCS installed with the following party

 

PC Fighter, human male

Imoen as Blade (via Level One NPCs)

Berserker 7/Stormlord of Talos, human male (will be dualed from kit to kit via SK)

Monk, human female

Assassin-Mage, half-elf male (multiclass via SK)

Kensai-Mage, elf female (multiclass via SK)

 

and what a blast it has been early in the game to have such nailbiting battles. In vanilla BG1 with a full party I would tear through the early enemies like they were tissue paper. But with SCS it took me over an hour to defeat Bassilus without a death in the party. Zordal was almost as tough, and if not for my Berserker's rage special ability I'm not sure I could have defeated him so early in the game. Even the vampiric and dread wolves in the Song of the Morning map gave me a real run for my money. It really is like a whole new game. Thanks again for making this wonderful mod!

[Guest erik]

Stock game vampiric wolves are bloody scary when you're a group of level 1 characters... ... don't even want to think about that with SCS.

[Lemernis]

I just chose to come back later to take on the adventuring party in the bassilisk map. The party is at level 4, and my custom party was having a very tough time with that bunch. My party is going to have several weak meleers throughout much of BG1. I mean, I might have won eventually, but damn. Anyway, I love that there are some battles in chapter 2 that may be too tough for the time being. Maybe after the Nashkel mines.

[Guest Guest_wanderer_*]

Hey, just got tutu going with your mod installed and, while I love the principle, a couple of things are really hurting it. The NPCs choose proficiencies component is bugged, sometimes giving npcs about 20hp more than they should have (i think this happens when i click to level up, then press esc out of the screen to reconsider)

 

Newly created sorcerers have thac0 of 0 rather than 20 too, this might not be a bug with scs but i thought i'd mention it...

 

Despite not having installed the components to make mages and priests pre-buff, they seem to (admittedly i've only seen bassilus and mulahey though, who are probably on different scripts). Not only that, but the buffs hit my party too, most erroneous.

 

Lastly- what's with the poison addiction? Every enemy i've faced of any note so far (the mines, larger hobgoblin groups outside, assassins etc) likes to use poison on all their attacks. Poison for 6 - 12hp, which will kill most of my level1 party and many of the level 2s as well. The fights aren't otherwise very difficult, but I often lose an NPC because we simply dont have enough antidotes.

 

Thanks for creating the mod though- smarter AI is always cool. I'd love to see this for bg2 like everyone else.... One other thing- Would it be possible to introduce more randomness to fights? Particularly with lesser-used spells. I'd love to see things like a mage with some archers, who realises that my PC has shield or minor globe up, so instead dumps a grease spell over the battlefield to stop me getting to his archers so soon. Or if under attack from long range, enemies might cast haste to get to me quicker. And if there are enemies that try to use polymorph other on you, i'll be a happy man. Thanks again...

[Lemernis]

And if there are enemies that try to use polymorph other on you, i'll be a happy man.

 

I'll second that request. It'll make Polymorph Self a useful spell (i.e., to fix having been turned into a squirrel).

[DavidW]

Thanks for the feedback. Quick replies:

 

Hey, just got tutu going with your mod installed and, while I love the principle, a couple of things are really hurting it. The NPCs choose proficiencies component is bugged, sometimes giving npcs about 20hp more than they should have (i think this happens when i click to level up, then press esc out of the screen to reconsider)

I'm not sure why that should be, but I'll see if it's fixable. (Obvious workaround for now: don't press esc )

 

Newly created sorcerers have thac0 of 0 rather than 20 too, this might not be a bug with scs but i thought i'd mention it...

 

I'm reasonably sure that can't be SCS.

 

Despite not having installed the components to make mages and priests pre-buff, they seem to (admittedly i've only seen bassilus and mulahey though, who are probably on different scripts).

 

Yes, there are a few opponents whose buffing is handled independently of the main scripts and so won't have been caught by the "don't pre-buff" choice you've made. Splitting pre-buffing off from the rest of "Smarter Mages/Priests" was something I did pretty late in the development cycle for SCS, so it's a bit imperfectly implemented. I'll see if it's possible to tighten it up.

 

Not only that, but the buffs hit my party too, most erroneous.

 

That's a known bug (not that that helps!) It's on the fix list when I have a chance to go through it (which will be next week with any luck).

 

Lastly- what's with the poison addiction? Every enemy i've faced of any note so far (the mines, larger hobgoblin groups outside, assassins etc) likes to use poison on all their attacks. Poison for 6 - 12hp, which will kill most of my level1 party and many of the level 2s as well. The fights aren't otherwise very difficult, but I often lose an NPC because we simply dont have enough antidotes.

 

Actually, very little of this is SCS. Offhand, I think the only poison I added was for the kobold guards and chieftains (inspired by the Dark Side of the Sword Coast). Hobgoblins with poisoned arrows is one of the major pains of the original game. My feeling is that it's not unbalancingly annoying in the kobold mines - provided you keep the kobold guards at arms length, which is usually doable.

 

Thanks for creating the mod though- smarter AI is always cool. I'd love to see this for bg2 like everyone else....

 

Beta version fairly soon I hope. Testers welcome (though don't bother chasing me about it, because I haven't the faintest idea how soon "fairly soon" will be!)

 

One other thing- Would it be possible to introduce more randomness to fights? Particularly with lesser-used spells. I'd love to see things like a mage with some archers, who realises that my PC has shield or minor globe up, so instead dumps a grease spell over the battlefield to stop me getting to his archers so soon.

 

This would be cool in the right encounter but it's very hard to do generically in the Infinity Engine. The scripting language has virtually no sense of spatial location - it's basically impossible to do things like "put a grease spell half way between me and the enemy".

 

Or if under attack from long range, enemies might cast haste to get to me quicker.

 

To be honest, if a mage has got haste he'd be mad not to cast it irrespective of whether he's under attack from long range. Remember that none of these guys are sorcerors - they can't select their spells on the fly according to what best fits the unfolding tactical situation.

 

And if there are enemies that try to use polymorph other on you, i'll be a happy man. Thanks again...

 

I tried to do this once. I actually don't think the spell works on PCs, though I'm happy to be corrected.

[Guest Guest_wanderer_*]

Thanks for the response...

 

This would be cool in the right encounter but it's very hard to do generically in the Infinity Engine. The scripting language has virtually no sense of spatial location - it's basically impossible to do things like "put a grease spell half way between me and the enemy".

 

Cast it on the archers then, they dont need to move anywhere. I'm teaching myself the scripting language to write some interparty combats for bg2, and from what i've seen already i know what you mean about locations, and spells that get cast on an area. But it should be possible to use a mages allies as a targeting aid, i believe.

 

To be honest, if a mage has got haste he'd be mad not to cast it irrespective of whether he's under attack from long range. Remember that none of these guys are sorcerors - they can't select their spells on the fly according to what best fits the unfolding tactical situation.

 

Even if he would be mad not to cast it, enemy casters (from the unmodded game, and briefly in scs) would still tend to cast offensive spells like horror, or self protections like invisibility instead. By the time they worry about their allies, they tend not to have any left.

That particular scenario was when i charged through the nashkel mines, using 6 missile-equipped PCs to take down the larger kobold groups. Their new calls for help were working, (having them all charge at once makes sense) but the shamans are useless, despite proving to have some handy spells once i charmed one.

 

I tried to do this once. I actually don't think the spell works on PCs, though I'm happy to be corrected.

 

Its one of the fun spells like flesh to stone, disintegrate etc which would all be nice to see...But enemies never use them, and if they hit the PC its game over. Hopefully not so with polymorph, but i will experiment.

 

thanks again...

[Lemernis]

Polymorph Other can still be fun to have in enemy mage's arsenal for other party members, even if the PC is immune.

 

I agree that Flesh to Stone would be great to see also.

 

One of the most devastating spell combos I've found for BG1 is Stinking Cloud and Animate Dead. Or along similar lines, Cloudkill and Fireball. Might be fun to see enemy mages using those cloud spells.

[Guest PetrusOctavianus]

Very nice mod - my favourite for EasyTutu along with the BG1 NPC Project.

 

The improved mage and cleric spells casting and the call for help makes the game much more challenging and realistic.

 

Minor niggle: The pre-buffing makes the two bounty hunter parties too strong. Turning off pre-makes the end-fight in the Bandit Camp and the Iron Throne fight too easy. I suggest the two bounty hunter parties arrive later (after Bandit Camp).

When I met them I had hardly any potions and not a single wand.

 

Most annoying thing about the whole mod: Andris the mage on the ice island is infuriatlingly annoying in his über-cheesiness.

When I silence him I don't accept that he can cast un-interruptable spells like nothing has happened. Not only is his spells scripted, but he can't be killed, due to his cheesy cheat item that makes sure his HPs never go below 1. Doing 100 points of damage on a character that is nearly dead, to no effect is not my idea of fun.

So I ended up deleting all the Andris ScS files and using the basic, non-cheating one instead.

Making things more challenging in one thing, but cheating is lame.

[Lemernis]

I just played the Ice Island encounter and it was such a departure from what I remember in vanilla Tales.

 

For once I tried keeping the party back by the entrance instead of the nook attached to the area the three mages are. As my thief scouted ahead, one of the mages detected my thief's stealth approach. So the thief scuttled back to the party (which was not buffed). Only Marcellus followed, and the party managed to kill him after casting a few of the most essential buffs during the fight (eg, Haste).

 

I then aproached again with my Assassin-Mage and Kensai-Mage and cast fireballs into the main room. Neither Andris nor Beyn (? or?) was killed in that attack. They evidently went hiding after that. Presumably they quaffed potions of invisibility and healing. After reloading a particular save I found Beyn further down in the maze. But I ended up using a different save in which I never found him, even after resting. Or I guess I should say he never found me. In any event, I did not encounter him again, i.e., I did not search the entire maze with Detect Invisibility cast. (I guess it's possible that the fireballs got him, but I'm almost certain the game never told me "Beyn: Death" and the XP gained.)

 

Andris was with Dezekiel. I did use every buff I had for that fight. (If Beyn had survived wouldn't he have shown up here as well?)

 

One thing that helped in this particular game was to have my Assassin-Mage cast Non-Detection on himself. I had him buffed with Strength and Haste, wielding the Dagger of Venom, and using his Poison special ability. The poison damage from that attack was visicous, it adds up very fast. And I had him carrying invisibility potions so that he was able to get two backstabs in on a target. That is, he'd gulp down an invisibility potion immediately after making the first backstab, thereby getting a second opportunity.

 

He did this to the dwarf mage in the long corridor at the end of the maze, and to Andris at the very end. It really helped.

[Salk]

Hello!

 

I have played this mod for some time and I found the encounter in the third level of the Nashkell mines way too hard. Not only there are two kobold shamans (?) that cast nasty spells (and gave almost very little experience points), a kobold chieftain, kobold commandos but they all are even hasted (how???).

 

For me, it's been unbalanced but thus far it was the only encounter I thought that had been over the top and since I realize that it's just an optional component, I happily remove it when I start my next game.

[DavidW]

@Guest:

 

Andris's weird behaviour is a bug actually, not intentional cheese. What he's supposed to do is have a contingency Dimension Door that whisks him away when he's at half hit-points, so he can heal and re-buff. In testing I found that often the contingency didn't fire quickly enough, so I gave him the min-hp ring to give it time to fire. But it looks as if that's creating problems of its own, so I'll look into it again.

 

I've no idea why he should be silence-proofed. Are you sure you actually affected him? (He probably has a Globe of Invulnerability, which will make him immune to a L2 spell like Silence).

 

Bounty hunters: I'll think about it. Whether people find them too easy or too hard seems to depend a lot on how much side-questing they do early in the game. I'm reluctant to just tie it directly to the party's level, but I might have to fall back on that.

 

@Salk: vive la difference. Some people seem to find the kobolds too hard; others, too easy. As you say, I think the only real answer is to play with the components you want and not install the others. As for the Haste spells, though: the kobold shamans are 6th level, they cast Haste at the start of the battle.

[Salk]

Hi again, David!

 

Just wanted to ask your opinion about one spell that is often used by your arcane caster: Sleep.

 

I checked the P&P and Sleep should be interrupted the moment the affected creature is attacked (and in Icewind Dale it works thus).

 

In fact, the way it is now, this Level 1 spell is way overpowered (the saving throw has even a consistent malus) and capable of annihilating a party of low level characters with ease.

 

Have you ever thought of integrating the original, P&P version of the spell?

 

As I mentioned, Icewind Dale does a better job with it by making it P&P.

 

However, great job on this mod, David!

 

Congratulations!

[DavidW]

I'm not actually sure that could be implemented in BG2 (and therefore in TUTU) - I probably agree that if it could, it would be preferable.

 

On the other hand, you could argue that if your enemies are all asleep, you could kill them with one blow. (Note that - I hope! - no SCS enemy will attack a sleeping opponent while there are still awake ones)

[Guest PetrusOctavianus]

@Guest:

 

Andris's weird behaviour is a bug actually, not intentional cheese. What he's supposed to do is have a contingency Dimension Door that whisks him away when he's at half hit-points, so he can heal and re-buff. In testing I found that often the contingency didn't fire quickly enough, so I gave him the min-hp ring to give it time to fire. But it looks as if that's creating problems of its own, so I'll look into it again.

 

OK, that makes sense as I'm experieng the same problem with Contingenies not firing off for my mages in BG2. Still, I think it's better to accept that magic is flakey and does not always work as planned?

 

 

I've no idea why he should be silence-proofed. Are you sure you actually affected him? (He probably has a Globe of Invulnerability, which will make him immune to a L2 spell like Silence).

 

I'm sure he's Silenced, since the feedback says so.

The problem is that some of his spells are *scripted* and thus uninterruptable and not affacted by silence.

I didn't use pre-buffing, so he was not affacted by a Globe.

 

BTW, I hope you will do a BG2 version as well.