skellytz

From Australia But in all seriousness, it's probably a matter of getting new HDDs and getting the support team to send a technician to replace them. If you're a busy managing director on a tight schedule, the last thing you want to do late in the evening, when you know you still need to do dozens of little annoying tasks like that, is open yet another control panel, check stuff, write even more emails, look for and order things, try to schedule an appointment with a technician, etc. All that for something that currently isn't even part of your career focus. One of my first goals as a new staff member was trying to convince the others that transferring mods to GitHub is something we can easily do together. This would greatly reduce the storage and bandwidth requirements, allow us to migrate to cloud hosting, maybe make things more affordable, so that one day the ownership could be passed to somebody who'd be willing to pay the reduced bills, but also have the time to manage everything. Well, it's not that easy. Many modders need individual encouragement and reassurance to even consider GitHub as a mod hosting option. We're working on it, though!

There are backups, of course. This is nothing new; we've had long downtimes due to HDD failures before. Even in the worst case scenario, when at some point multiple drives failed at the same time, it was possible to recover the website, though with the loss of some more recent content. SHS is currently on a cheap auctioned/reused dedicated server from Hetzner. I don't know the exact details as to the shape of the deal itself, but apparently to keep the costs down, it requires some busywork on the owner's part to replace the drives. Back in 2018, G3 migrated to a new host to remedy the long downtimes. Here's what the then-active server owner, SConrad, said about the issues:

In case jastey's explanation wasn't clear enough: SHS is on a dedicated server with HDD RAID. If there are any issues, the provider immediately notifies the owners, but any hardware failure must be dealt with by the owners themselves, eg making an appointment with the support team, purchasing and ordering new HDDs, getting them installed, etc. Liam "Kaeloree" Esler is the current active owner. He's been notified about the issues and confirmed that he'd received the reports. At the same time, as the managing director and co-founder of Summerfall Studios, Liam is currently extremely busy with the release of Stray Gods and will attempt to get the website back online only when his limited time allows, ie as soon as he can. We apologize for the prolonged downtime, but please understand: SHS is a hobby project. Stray Gods is a career milestone. Let's try to show our understanding and support

Just a heads-up: I've received a report about some missing animation files in the latest version. I'm going to look into it as soon as the website is back online.

The new team has done a lot since August last year. I'd go as far as saying that SHS, with all the current forum software limitations, it as well-maintained now as it was back in its heyday. We've had many internal discussions regarding the forums, hosted mods and our future. We've cleaned up a lot of dust accumulated under the rug, checked and reorganized the forums down to meticulously correcting broken links and the capitalization of subforum titles. Spambots have been kept in check. One of our big projects is moving SHS mods to GitHub; a slow process with many obstacles that so far haven't discouraged us. We actively support all attempts to update or resurrect many mods hosted at SHS. All this while we're working on our own projects. Of course, SHS forum members can help a lot by showing their interest, offering feedback, donating and otherwise encouraging the current staff and owners to continue I'm grateful for everything SHS modders have done over the years despite obvious setbacks. Thank you for staying on board with us! With active and well-maintained forums, dedicated staff members, a chunk of storage freed up by transferring mods to GitHub, as well as your support, we'll surely prove that SHS deserves hosting optimization and software upgrades.

The spell casting voices (or chants) can't be set for individual spells without game engine hacks. Check out BG2 Improved GUI (for the classic BG2). There is a component which restores BG1 casting voices and a few sound effects only for level 1-5 spells. On the other hand, it lacks the research, consistent spell patches and remastered audio files that we've used in Infinity Sounds to thoroughly restore BG1 sounds. The spell sound effects (ie spell sounds other than voices/chants) can be customized for each spell with the exception of several hardcoded ones. It isn't easy, though. Changing the spell sound effects requires good understanding of the SPL, VVC, and PRO file formats; how spell effects work; the differences between on-casting, post-casting, expiration, and projectile sounds; which existing audio files are reserved for which spells; etc. This is very time-consuming and one of the reasons why Infinity Sounds v2 has taken so much time to work on.

Please follow the updates on Infinity Sounds v2 We've spent dozens of hours restoring not only the BG1 spell casting voices/chants, but also all other spell sound effects. This wasn't as easy as simply replacing the audio files; all the individual spell files had to be compared and patched accordingly. Additionally, the affected audio files have been manually processed to remove the clipping and clicking noises that had been caused by lossy compression methods (Interplay ACM). Examples: Original (compression artifacts, heavy clipping) Remastered (clean, no clipping) I've recently returned to this project and the new release is coming soon.

Spellhold Studios Baldur's Gate Trilogy allows you to play the classic Baldur's Gate using the improved Baldur's Gate II engine with continuity between Tales of the Sword Coast, Shadows of Amn and Throne of Bhaal. Version 1.22 adds a new worldmap, fixes a number of issues, improves compatibility with Project Infinity, revises the BG1 game text updates, and restores many BG1 item icons and NPC sounds. Changelog Readme Forum Download

Infinity Animations was released in 2010 and patched new animation offsets into the game executable. Before that some older mods claimed offsets that already existed in the exe but weren't used as an available game resource.

If this is your first experience with animations, I'd suggest waiting for the next version of Infinity Animations and/or our new solution to dynamic animation slot allocation. It'll make the whole process much easier and save you a lot of headaches. We want to give Gwendolyne plenty of time to get involved in the latest developments. It goes without saying the catching-up time frame has been extended because of the crises. We'll get it done, eventually, but we need to stay respectful.

Personally, I think it's OK and seems to be an intentional workaround. By design Mislead is supposed to cause the mage to be affected by Improved Invisibility. This means the mage should become partially visible and make their presence known when attacking. The problem is that the image projected by Mislead is supposed to act as a decoy, ie the enemy AI shouldn't target the caster and should focus on the image instead. If it worked just like Improved Invisibility, the caster would still be too prone to AI targeting for Mislead to be useful enough in-game. The split-second visibility seems to be an attempt to stay true to Improved Invisibility design, while keeping the decoy image more useful: Of course, Mislead has traditionally been exploited by players. As the enemy AI doesn't have enough time to target the invisible caster, the player can simply hide the decoy image outside of the AI range and keep attacking with the caster for some cheesy backstabs. So, I'd consider either keeping the original behavior or making the Mislead caster affected by the same mechanics as Improved Invisibility.

In preparation for the upcoming INI and CRE soundset fixes, here are some engine issues related to sounds. These have already been passed on to Beamdog (thanks, Galactygon!). They will have to be addressed for the other fixes to have the best effect (research and further discussion). Insomniator single-handedly patched the engine in a matter of days for the classics (TobExAL). I've had some success getting audio-related engine bug reports across to Beamdog. These were fixed some time ago: * Animation INI middle-column sounds should be played * Animation INI slash, backslash and jab sounds should be played So, there's hope. 1. [BGEE, BG2EE] CRE soundset ATTACK2, ATTACK3 and ATTACK4 don't play Creatures have four attack sound slots in the CRE soundset: * ATTACK1 (0xdc) * ATTACK2 (0xe0) * ATTACK3 (0xe4) * ATTACK4 (0xe8) Only ATTACK1 plays its sound, the other attack soundset slots don't work. For example, in BGEE wolf.cre: * ATTACK1 -> StrRef: 5558 (wolff05.wav) always plays on every attack * ATTACK2 -> StrRef: 5559 (wolff06.wav) never plays on any attack All four ATTACK soundset slots should be enabled. Most creatures have separate audio files for different attack animations (slash, backslash, jab). These sounds were designed to be played on specific attack animations. Back to the wolf example: * wolff05.wav matches only the slash attack animation cycle (the wolf bites with its fangs) * wolff06.wav matches only the backslash attack animation cycle (the wolf leaps with its paws and bites) The attack sounds should be matched with the attack animations: * ATTACK1 should play only on the SLASH attack animation cycle * ATTACK2 should play only on the BACKSLASH attack animation cycle * ATTACK3 should play only on the JAB attack animation cycle * ATTACK4 should play only on the SHOOT attack animation cycle If these ATTACK sounds simply played at random on any attack, there would be lots of mismatches between the attack sounds and the attack animations. 2. [BGEE, BG2EE] INI sounds overlap with CRE sounds * INI.DAMAGE overlaps with CRE.DAMAGE (0xec) * INI.DIE overlaps with CRE.DYING (0xf0) * INI.ATTACK_SLASH overlaps with CRE.ATTACK (0xdc) * INI.ATTACK_BACKSLASH overlaps with CRE.ATTACK (0xdc) * INI.ATTACK_JAB overlaps with CRE.ATTACK (0xdc) These sounds play at the same time. For example, BGEE wolf: * dwolf08.wav in 7b00.INI.DAMAGE plays at the same time as wolff08.wav in WOLF.CRE.DAMAGE when the creature gets damaged * dwolf09.wav in 7b00.INI.DIE plays at the same time as wolff09.wav in WOLF.CRE.DYING when the creature dies * dwolf05.wav in 7b00.INI.ATTACK_SLASH plays at the same time as wolff05.wav in WOLF.CRE.ATTACK when the creature attacks with the slash animation * dwolf06.wav in 7b00.INI.ATTACK_BACKSLASH plays at the same time as wolff05.wav in WOLF.CRE.ATTACK when the creature attacks with the backslash animation * dwolf06.wav in 7b00.INI.ATTACK_JAB plays at the same time as wolff05.wav in WOLF.CRE.ATTACK when the creature attacks with the jab animation INI sounds should be disabled if a given creature has sounds in the corresponding CRE soundet: * INI.DAMAGE shouldn't play if a creature has CRE.DAMAGE sound * INI.DIE shouldn't play if a creature has CRE.DYING sound * INI.ATTACK_SLASH shouldn't play if a creature has CRE.ATTACK1 sound * INI.ATTACK_BACKSLASH shouldn't play if a creature has CRE.ATTACK2 sound * INI.ATTACK_JAB shouldn't play if a creature has CRE.ATTACK3 sound * INI.SHOOT shouldn't play if a creature has CRE.ATTACK4 sound The engine already properly disables: * INI.SELECTION if a creature has CRE.SELECT_COMMON * INI.BATTLE_CRY if a creature has CRE.BATTLE_CRY All this will allow for creatures with the same animation to have completely different soundsets. 3. [BGEE, BG2EE] Hardcoded ITM weapon sounds overlap with INI and/or CRE attack sounds The following weapon items are hardcoded to play sounds on attacks: * ANGHEG1.itm -> ANKHG06.wav * ANGHEG2.itm -> ANKHG05.wav * BASIL1.itm -> BASIL06.wav * BASIL2.itm -> BASIL05.wav * BASILG1.itm -> GBASI05.wav * BASILG2.itm -> GBASI06.wav * BASILG3.itm -> GBASI07.wav * ETTERC1.itm -> ETTER05.wav * ETTERC2.itm -> ETTER06.wav * WYVERN1.itm -> WYVER05.wav * WYVERN2.itm -> WYVER06.wav * WOLFWI1.itm -> WWOLF07.wav * WOLFWI2.itm -> WWOLF06.wav These hardcoded item sounds overlap with any attack sounds in the INI or CRE soundsets (they play at the same time). The hardcoded weapon item sounds should be disabled. They are leftovers from the legacy BG1 engine which didn't allow for setting different sounds for melee and ranged attacks. In the current engines we use INI and CRE soundsets to set sounds for attack animations. 4. [BGEE] Right-click INI.SELECTION sounds don't work This has been fixed only for BG2EE engine. From 2.6.6 patch notes: "Creature Sounds | Right-clicking on creatures will once again play their default sound" The same fix should be applied to the BGEE engine.

BGEE uses BG2 casting sounds. Check out Infinity Sounds for the remastered classic BG1 sounds.

A lot of processing is done in the transition area (aram00), including NPCs preparation, journal cleanup and BG1 items importation. The transition map script shouldn't be skipped by players.

sound_freq specifies the frequency of playing walking sounds to match them with walking animations. It is measured in ticks (1 tick = 1/15 sec). For example, "sound_freq=150" plays walking sounds every 10 sec, and "sound_freq=8" plays walking sounds every 0.5 sec. color_chunks accepts color gradient values 0-255, but contrary to the key name, it does not change the blood color of the chunked death animation. Instead, it currently works like a switch to enable or disable the chunking animation on death. Any value 0-254 enables the chunked death, and 255 disables it.

I've proofread all the keys and narrowed down the spelling discrepancies to: - [Classic BG2] Automated Disable Casting Glows set by BGConfig won't be recognized by the engine, because it's coded (misspelled) in the executable as Automated Diable Casting Glows (as you initially suspected, Sam). In any case, this is a negligible issue. - [Classic BG2] Disable Footsteps During Combat set by BGConfig won't be recognized by the engine, because it's coded in the executable as Disable Foot Steps During Combat (as explained above). BGEE inherited the key spelling. So with the footsteps bug and missing power user keys taken into account, I'd recommend adding the following to the EE config utility: Disable Movies - SetPrivateProfileString('Program Options','Disable Movies','1') UI Edit Mode - SetPrivateProfileString('Program Options','UI Edit Mode','1') Strref On (displays text string reference numbers) - SetPrivateProfileString('Program Options','Strref On','1') Disable Footsteps During Combat (the utility should add and set this to 0 by default to fix the bug) - SetPrivateProfileString('Game Options','Disable Foot Steps During Combat','1') Extra Combat Info (displays all hit roll and damage roll calculations in detail) - SetPrivateProfileString('Game Options','Extra Combat Info','1') Force Dialog Pause (causes non-pausing dialog to be deactivated) - SetPrivateProfileString('Game Options','Force Dialog Pause','1') Super Atomic Speed Fighting Action (enemies phase/teleport during combat) - SetPrivateProfileString('Game Options','Super Atomic Speed Fighting Action','1') Bored Timeout (time it takes a character to start complaining about no action [range: 1-65000]) - SetPrivateProfileString('Game Options','Bored Timeout','3000') Enhanced Path Search (improves calculating the search path) - SetPrivateProfileString('Game Options','Enhanced Path Search','1') Enable Fog - SetPrivateProfileString('Game Options','Enable Fog','1') Reverse Mouse Wheel Zoom - SetPrivateProfileString('Game Options','Reverse Mouse Wheel Zoom','1') Show Triggers On Tab (more info about interactive objects) - SetPrivateProfileString('Game Options','Show Triggers On Tab','1') Show Date On Pause - SetPrivateProfileString('Game Options','Show Date On Pause','1')

Took a quick look at your list. Turns out there are bugs related to key typos. I'd always assumed footsteps were hardcoded not to play during combat in the classic BG2 regardless of the settings. The key is spelled Disable Footsteps During Combat in baldur.ini, but bgmain.exe is looking for Disable Foot Steps During Combat and defaults to 1 if the key isn't present in the config. I've corrected the key manually and now I can hear footsteps during combat for the first time. Thanks! The same applies to BGEE. Adding SetPrivateProfileString('Game Options','Disable Foot Steps During Combat','0') allows you to hear footsteps during combat which otherwise defaults to disabled. The other keys need more investigation.

I've been out of the Windows loop for a while. So WeiDU + OCaml with UTF-8 support will display setup strings properly even if cmd is local code page by default? Won't this require Windows 10 1903 and up?

Tweaks Anthology -> Alter Weapon Proficiency System BGT doesn't add any items like that. You can also restore some BG1 item properties using BGT Tweaks -> Item BG1-ification

Looking at the contents of the example cross-platform package, the Mac version of WeiDU is used for the "setup-modexample" executable; however, the readmes and the script ("runs-on: ubuntu-latest") indicate that the cross-platform package works on Linux. Will the Mac WeiDU magically run on Linux or is the player currently still required to manually download and replace the installer?

Sure, I'd appreciate it.

chuft, just launch NearInfinity and post screenshots You're absolutely right about the High Hedge skeletons (SKELETS.cre). They are unique to that area (the S possibly stands for the skull misc item they drop). The devs most likely used a CRE template and forgot to give them proper damage resistances like other skeletons: here's a proof. The screenshots are from the vanilla TotSC. The other skeleton random spawns (SKELET_A/B/C.cre) typically encountered early in the game have these damage resistances. In the classic BG1, a level one party will encounter 1-2 of High Hedge skeletons per spawn point. Even with the resistances, they're easily dispatched; without the resistances, they die to arrows before you even get close. So, I doubt it was an attempt to reduce the difficulty for low level parties.

I believe this is a confirmed bug. BGEE devs fixed it the same way I described above, but I think someone must have misinterpreted the Time trigger; the ambush spawns are offset by one hour compared to the original. For example, bit 20 of the area actor schedule is 20:30-21:29, but the IF check should be, e.g., Time(21) or TimeGT(20) instead of Time(20) or TimeGT(19). Whatever -- I hope I've fixed these encounters the proper way.

I guess one solution to the waylaid encounter issues would be moving the spawns from the actors section to the area script using IF Time CreateCreature. These are always fixed spawns and all the creatures get flushed once you leave the area, so it should behave as intended.

Yeah, it's not the first engine bug that carried over to BG2 that seemingly nobody had noticed for 15 years. The area files clearly dictate these actors (creatures) should only appear at a specific time of the day.