Thieving Skill penalties should be 0% for leather(in PnP D&D leather is thought to be standard

Thanks for pointing this out, corrected.

Okay, this looks pretty good to me. The more I think about it, the more fair it seems

I'm glad you see things this way.

I'm not sure the damage % modifiers are actually going to make that much difference in practice. If you take 10 damage and your full plate takes 10% of it, that's not a whole lot a difference. Similarly, if Aerie takes 50 damage and her studded leather takes 5%, she's still (nearly) dead. The key factor is going to remain whether you take any damage at all, which is still determined by AC.

This is worth considering, I admit. The only problem with this is that we can only use %s when it comes to damage resistance. Fixed amounts (as seen in IWD2 for example) are not available in BG2. This way we are stuck with those %-s, and that means a much harder balancing part.

Have you considered simply upping the damage resistance to something far higher and dropping AC bonuses completely? Hence, armour would absorb damage, and AC would represent your ability to dodge. (That's what I tried.) That said, keeping the AC bonuses in does appear to make it better balanced-- I'd just be concerned that you're effectively making heavier armour much weaker than it currently is (potentially a decrease of 4 AC from the dexterity penalty of full plate) without a significant advantage to compensate.

To be honest, making heavy armors weaker than they currently are was one of my goals - or to be more precise, I wished to make it more useful to less dextrous characters, because these won't suffer any additional penalties from wearing them (aside the slight decrease in movement rate), since their DEX score is already low. On the other hand, agile characters with a DEX score of 17+ will benefit much less from these types of armor, just as they should. As a compensation, they'll find once again re-equip all those "useless" Studded Leathers, because most of their skills and ability score bonuses will remain untouched by them.
As for the damage resistance bonus, it is mostly there to compensate for the other losses (and of course to show the impact-reducing aspect of armors). As I said to Feanor a bit before, we are still open towards any balancing discussions, so I guess I can accept a slight increase in the bonuses of heavier armor types.

I don't believe THAC0 penalties should be implemented, because I'd imagine that's already represented sufficiently by the dexterity drop.

Absolutely.

Also, remember to implement minimum dexerity requirements to wear the armours, otherwise characters'll put on full plate mail and chunk because they only have 4 dex.

Heh, this is a good point, really..
Thanks for the note!

Finally, since it's been raised here, I'd be thrilled to see item requirements dropped and balanced properly. It'd be lovely to have AoE's Universal Weapons, my backstab tweaks, the armour revisions, and so on, combined into a well balanced sum which wouldn't have the stupid PnP usability restrictions.

Well, we have basically similar dreams then. We are already discussing the possibilities of a modification that would deal with item restrictions in a proper way - but that is for the future for now.

For the record, here are the basic AC modifiers of the various armor types. I'd be interested in the public opinion, weather we should change any of these bonuses/penalties for this component.

Armor Type

Leather Armor Base AC:8, S:0 P/M:+1, B:0
Studded leather Base AC:7, S:?1 , P/M:?1, B:0
Hide Armor Base AC:6, S:0, P/M:+1, B:0
Chain mail Base AC:5, S:?2, P/M:0, B:2
Banded mail Base AC:4, S:?2 , P/M:0, B:?1
Plate mail Base AC:3, S:?3, P/M:0, B:0
Field plate Base AC:2, S:?3, P/M:?1, B:0
Full Plate Base AC:1, S:?3, P/M:?1, B:0


My basic modifications would be to change the following:

Studded Leather: P/M:0
Hide Armor: B:-1
Plate Mail: P/M:-1
Field Plate: P/M:-2
Full Plate: P/M:-3

30% High resistance, TG ? That is for +6 armors. Sorry, TG, but a +6 armor, in my opinion, should be almost impenetrable for arrows.

Lets separate this question.
First, 30% can be most significant if you receive massive damage - the greater the blow that penetrates the armor (AC), the more damage the armor soaks up (Damage Resistance). If we take a devastating blow with 60 points of damage, that ~20 points of damage resistance sounds more than nice.
Second, don't forget that the "impenetrable" +5 armor is often attacked by "penetrating" +3 arrows for example. Also remember, that Full Plates get AC bonuses vs. missile weapons to further show their enhanced defense against projectiles.

Anyway, it seems a little bit strange that the slashing and missile resistance have the same value (not in all cases, but most of them)

Balancing the damage resistance types is another story, and we are fully open towards suggestions. Let me know if you think some of the values sound unrealistic.

For future reference, here are my proposed modifications for shields. As for my comment, I can only say that I intended to further emphasize the effect of shields against missile weapons ? larger shields received a bonus to their AC vs. missiles. I haven?t added DEX penalty (though I still consider it as a valid option), because it might become too much together with the penalties from heavier armors. The same goes for movement penalty, I haven?t included that either.

I?m undecided about Thieving Skills and Miscast penalties though ? while they are absolutely reasonable to be added, it would mean we should add such penalties to weapons as well, which is wrong, again. So I haven?t added them yet. Still, something should be done to show how cumbersome the greater shields are, and the higher STR requirement just won?t do. I heavily consider to add a light DEX penalty after all.

Also, one of the main differences between the Armor System and the shield modifications is that while the first get better stats at higher enchantment level, the latter don?t ? a Large Shield will receive the very same Missile AC bonuses at 0 or +5 EL, only it?s main AC bonus will increase.



Anyway, here are the stats:



Buckler: AC: -1,  Missile bonus: 0 (no change)

Small Shield: AC: -1, Missile bonus: 1

Medium Shield: AC: -1, Missile bonus: 2

Large Shield: AC: -1, Missile bonus: 3 (-1 DEX penalty planned)



Special shields:



Shield of the Falling Stars (SHLD07):

AC: -1, Missile bonus: 5



Fortress Shield (SHLD23)

AC: -4, Missile bonus: 8

@ Sim: these are basically good suggestions, and I can't say I'm against them, but there are a few complicated points.
First, if we add DEX penalties to armors and shields as well, it might become too much in some cases. For example an unenchanted Full Plate reduces DEX by 6 points, and if the character euips a Tower Shield (with 2 DEX penalty for example), it becomes 8 in total. Now, if our character isn't really high in DEX from start (he has 10 DEX for example), this combination effectively reduces it to 2. This brings up a few problems: first, we will have to include a min. DEX requirement for these modified armors to prevent chunking (when DEX reaches 0). Since these penalties have a considerable chance to reduce DEX below these minimum levels, it can easily result in the armor becoming "unuseable" by that character. Also, another problem with this greatly reduced DEX is that there are some rare occasions in the game where abilities and weapons drain DEX - and it would be most unfortunate if heavily armored fighters would fall after 1-2 hits by these weapons...

As for movement penalty, that wouldn't be that problematic as DEX modifiers - but it would result in a much more significant difference in movement rates than with the modified armors only. I'll try to experiment with it a bit though.

I also agree that Large shields should receive some bonus to base AC as well.

OTOH, we will never be able to make bucklers as useful as they were intended to be, since we cannot allow the character to use any 2-handed weapon while wearing a buckler...


Either way, I'll consider these further.

I can as well make it so that out of combat your movement speed is at least 10 (bg2's standard), if there is enough protest for this

Well, I suppose it goes without saying that I'd welcome this. I think it would give the best of both worlds (realism and convenience).

As I said before, I don't support this idea - nostly because it never made the game annoying in my playtests (not when compared to the already present "Boots-of-Speed-problem").
Yet, if there will be a serious need for such a modification to the system, I can live with it.

Reducing dex to certain percent instead of applying a fixed penalty would stop the armor from chunking its wearer

Hmm. As far as I know, you cannot reduce ability scores by percents, only fixed numbers - though I'll have to check.

Maybe using a percentage penalty would be the solution of this problem?

Ehm.. what do you mean? Be a bit more specific please.

First, there are no +6 plate and full plate armors in BG2. Maximum is +3, I think.

Don't forget mod items Feanor.

Second, the movement speed penalty should not rely on the armor's weight rather than the enchantment ?

I agree, but since there are countless exceptions on armor weights in BG2, that is a fairly unreliable factor to base these modifiers on. Enchantments level is simply much more easy to follow (and since it greatly affects weight, it is still a reliable source IMO).

I think additional ac bonus vs misslie weapons in the case of heavy armor is more realistic than damage resistance. Correct me if I'm wrong, but IMO there is no way an arrow could penetrate thick iron. And the way archers deal with heavily armoured enemies is to aim on weaker spots, such as maybe your neck, and things like that.

It is possible. If you ever tried to shoot with a professional bow (or simply seen someone else do it), you know that even these normal real-life weapons are capable to penetrate 1-2 cms of iron, if the hit is centered directly at right angles to it. Of course, this is only true for precision bows in RL. In a fantasy setting however, we have magic enchantments. And using the same RL logic, it is indeed possible to penetrate armors with an arrow - of course, it is very hard, and in most cases the arrow will break or simply bounce off the armor's surface (AC!), but on success, it can pierce through the material by losing some of it's impact power (Damage Resistance!).

Wouldn't an easy way to allow rings to stack with magical armor but not each other be to simply remove the flag classifying magical armors as magical? The armor works the same in all other respects whether the armors are flagged that way or not. I imagine this would save a lot of work. Also......most mod armors I've seen aren't actually flagged as magical anyway so you can already use rings of protection with them. Doing this would actually increase the consistency of most mods I've seen!

That would be allowing cheating openly, something that is definitely out of the scope of Refinements. One of the tweak mods already implemented this, but I never used it.
And the fact that mod armors aren't flagged as magical despite their crazy bonuses further shows how far they are from professional work. It is a rather sad tendency, one that I'd avoid to follow at all costs.

I would make the slashing resistance more similar in values with the blunt resistance.

I wouldn't accept this in case of every armor type. There is an important difference between the infilcted damage types of the edged and blunt weapons. While a blade can have a most difficult time to damage a plated armor for example, a mace/morning star can easily penetrate it and damage the wearer. In fact, blunt weapons were always efectively used against armored opponents in RL too.

Good points, that is basically why I dropped the idea.

Truth to be told, my main problem with those Wyrms (Small Dragons???) is that they are completely cheating, and mostly non-pnp creatures. Replacing them with Half-Dragons (humanoid Dragons) would solve this problem from the start, since we could assign powers for them much more easily and correctly. Also, since Abazigal is a halfbreed himself, it would make sense to have a few others like him around.

EDIT: old "Five Revision" topic merged with this new one. Since the new posts get to the top of the list, it won't cause any mess, and additional previous comments/suggestions can be found more easily this way.

Err... forcing all those 300 Mb of stuff isn't so nice both to the HD, the performance (for the bloated override) and the dial-up users, you know...

You're right, lets forget it then.

Awesome, but... who is gonna write the dialogue for that?

We don't need THAT many dialogues, and there are plenty of talented writers here at FW... also, we can do the basics ourselves easily.

Also, keep in mind that what you are asking for (interjecting inside a dialogue introduced by a mod) is something very difficult, since you don't know which state/response is the one you're interested in, as that is installation-dependant...

Yep, that would be the harder part of it. :closedeyes:

Now, let us keep on topic.

Here are a few additional ideas for the revision of the Five. These aren't really technical changes like most of the ideas listed above, they are meant to make these battles at least a bit more interesting. Note that some of them might have been listed above, I just cannot remember everything..!


1.: Illasera & the Black Reavers

- as discussed before (and mentioned in the quotes above), Illasera's unique bow will be changed, and will become equipable after you defeat her. You can read the description and stats of the bow itself above.
- you will meet with two of the Black Reavers in the Forests of Tethyr in the SoA part of the game, in the area where you can access Suldanesselar from. This meeting will happen at the point where you try to return to the elvel city with the Rhynn Lanthorn. They will recognize you (since they are already looking for you in that area) and have comments and maybe a few hints on the things to come, but nothing more than that - they'll teleport away without any combat.
- I plan to modify the non-improved version of the Illasera battle, where you fight her as a moronic mid-level mage. While this highly nerfed alteration was still necessary to make this encounter beatable by solo characters (starting in ToB), it was far too easy - and had nothing to do with the "Fallen-Ranger" concept. I think her nerfed solo-version should be changed to the Archer version as well, and should receive some of the abilities of the improved version (like Ethereal and her Black Bow). The most significant change from the improved counterpart of this encounter is that only 1 or two Black Reavers would appear (likely the dual-wielding warrior and the mage), the Orog and the half-eleven cleric would be dropped. Also, the stats and AI of these opponents (including Illasera) would be slightly reduced as well, to make this battle beatable. All the other changes we listed in the posts above would be included into thsi version as well though.


2.: Yaga-Shura

- instead of the greatly increases spawning rate of enemy troops, we should add a Fire Giant cleric to Yaga-Shura's party when he returns to join the combat. This opponent should mainly concentrate on summoning Fire Elementals, using the spells like the high-level Elemental Summoning (this modified version would always summon 2 Greater Fire Elementals) and all the lesser forms of it. This doesn't mean that the original spawning rate of his army won't be slightly increased, but not that much as it was intended first.


3.: Abazigal

- if we can somehow use the required resources, we could change the 4 lesser Wyrms in that battle to Half-Dragons. This naturally means that we should use the Bestial Animations mod as a prerequisite.


4.: Balthazar

- there would be a third option when you meet him in his sanctuary at the end. Instead of attacking him with your party or persuading him to join you at the Throne of Blood, you could have the option to fight him one-on-one with your main character (PC). He is an honorable fighter, and has nothing against your companions - it would offer most interesting tactical and roleplaying options to fight him in a duel. If the PC would choose this option, the other party members would be turned to non-controllable (like in the dream sequance for example) and couldn't affect the battle in any ways. Of course, the same would apply to Balthazar's personal apprentices as well. All these characters would be removed from the area until the battle's duration. Balthazar would initiate a banter when first beaten to Near Death (before he would use his Second Wind HLA), and the PC would have a last opportunity to persuade him into joining forces against Amelissan. Of course, evil players wouldn't be able to accomplish this. After this conversation, the battle would either end (as if he would have agreed to help you from the start), or he would activate his Second Wind, and this time the battle would only end when one of you dies.



Comments?

then TGM will want to get to that evil kit of his  I hope he'll decide to delay it after these components, despite my past promises

Heh, you can bet I was wondering weather or not you remembered that promise...!

The Armor Revision component is almost sure, too - and it'll raise the gaming experience quite a bit.

Right after I send the details to both of you in mail, I'll upload the plans here as well - in a new thread of course.

Large Scale Battles are fun, unless you have a slow computer. And that's why there are components in WeiDU.

My words exactly, though I admit that we should try to maintain useability for non-NASA computers too.

Note: I've been awake for around thirty consecutive hours and slept thirty hours in the last week - of which 15 consecutive. Insomnia is such a bad thing.

Yet it is so much useful when it comes to modding...!

Oh, I understand. As for the final abttle of Ascension, we will have to consider it a bit more. One thing I know is that we will leave it for the last, and once we managed to get the other parts work, we might get back to it and add something here and there. It would be fortunate to have some consistency IMO.

Hmm, weren't we concentrating on the "normal" fights instead of the Asc ones?

No, definitely the Ascension ones. The normal versions are all miserably nerfed.

It was a good idea to start a new thread for this.
I'll browse my PC to see what I've managed to implement back then for all these modifications.

We'll get to it anyway, it shouldn't be that long to do, with some careful choices...

Actually, the Paladin kit part won't be that easy (if doable at all) because of the Fallen status...
either way, let us get back to topic.

I am a capable writer, and would gladly do this part. The only problem is that my english is still far from perfect, so we definitely need someone who can translate/correct the lines I write.
Another option of course is to ask someone to write these for us. I'm positive we could find someone to help out.

Yep, we will return to this topic once we manage to get Armor Revisions up and running.

Truth to be told, the way that Yaga-Shura slowly loses his resistances in the final battle bothers me as well. I don't really see how this could be solved though.

Again Gal, is it possible if these two projects (WoRm's work and Bestial Animations) join hands? It would be for the better I think.