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#1 -Ser Jaime Lannister-

-Ser Jaime Lannister-
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Posted 29 December 2016 - 05:06 PM

Evening all.  Jaime Lannister here, author of the recent thread "Crossbow bug".

 

Just a brief update, I did a few complete reinstalls and have gotten to the point of liking the crossbow "glitch" and have kept that hesitation as part of the game and actually enjoy the quicker fire, albeit one must be careful around hard hitters like Ogres and such.  The Rhialto spell weirdness appears to have been automatically fixed with the latest updates and really enjoyed the fight with him.

 

However,  still coming across bugs and issues that are too game breaking in my opinion to continue.  Once again, I always use Leonardo's "Tactics" selection, slightly modified, although I do not touch any of the AI default selections. 

 

One thing I have noticed is Leonardo's Tactics install has now incorporated "Big Picture" AI selections (combined with the SCS stuff). Not sure if this was always the case, but I thought this was a no-no to mix the two.  Have they now become compatible together?  Appears not to be compatible from my latest playthrough.

 

My first reinstall from my previous thread "Crossbow bug" yielded mixed results.  From simply letting BP update itself I got all the necessary BWP Fix + K4thos' EET compatibility changes I was missing.  As stated before Rhialto's AI appears to have been fixed.  No longer crashes the game and casts more normal looking spells, although I didn't quite get to see him change into a squirrel HEHE.  Some of the normal critters however are now dropping a lot of magical arrows and strange potions that I am unfamiliar with.  Hobgoblins were dropping stacks of 20 barbed arrows (and not using them against me).  Kobolds dropping arrows of silencing (in stacks of 20).  Gnolls were dropping 2-4 Potions of Critical Skill apiece.  Vocalize potions were getting dropped by something else (don't recall).  Something was dropping stacks of Arrows of Retention (essentially "roots" the target creature if it is hit and fails saving throw).  And I must stress again, from what I could see none of these items were being utilized by the creatures dropping them against my party, as well as being in excessive amounts.  Well except for one critter, Kobold Commandos were dropping an extra 20 fire arrows apiece (along with the standard '2') but they would actually use the extras against me.  Other new stuff I hadn't seen before "Potion of Refreshment", Potion of Necromantic healing, and a few others.  These items seem to be dispersed onto NPC's as well, Kivan had a stack of 20 Retention arrows in his inventory when I first picked him up for example.

 

Okay I don't know if all this is working as intended.  Seems VERY excessive in my opinion.   All the magical arrows alone can be sold for obscene amounts of gold, and are unbalancing in my opinion.  A handful randomly dropping would be one thing.  Stacks of 20 on every single critter is unbalancing.  And although none of the merchants buy potions they are pretty powerful, TOO powerful in my opinion.

 

Also came upon a bug with trolls.  They would simple not die, by either fire or acid.  They would still flop down on the ground upon getting low on health (as they should) but no amount of damage would finish them off.  So I reinstalled a second time at this point.  I took out ALL the changes made from the mod POLYTWEAKS, including the "Improved (less buggy) trolls" option.  First thing I did was make a quick character buff him up with a few levels and items with CLUAConsole and head to Ulcaster and test the new installations' trolls that now hang by the dungeon.  No problems.  Appears that the mod Polytweaks was indeed causing this issue.

 

Although Trolls were fixed I found another game breaking bug with the AI of Hobgoblin Elites.  They would not use their equipped bastard swords once engaged in melee.  This made them extremely easy pushovers where before they were fearsome in both ranged and melee.  One of the named Hobgoblins, Zargal, did not use any weapons whatsoever and just attacked with his fists.  I have a feeling this is because of the Tactical selection now intermixing BP and SCS.  Anyone want to comment or speculate here?  Should I remove one or the other?  Any help would be appreciated, thanks.



#2 agb1

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Posted 29 December 2016 - 05:47 PM

Best to avoid mixing BP AI with SCS AI.  The "tactical" selections are not, in any way, balanced.  So your findings are not "unintended" ... they are the consequence of enabling basically every mod/component that can be installed together into the game, and also choosing the more "tactical" choices whenever such install options are presented.  I don't know which particular components are responsible for the excessive arrows and potions, though.


BiG World Fixpack (community collection of mod fixes and compatibility patches, with user-friendly cross-platform script)

 

BiG World Setup (tool to automate best-practice installation of Infinity Engine mods on Windows, with conflict analysis)

Latest version:    https://bitbucket.or.../get/master.zip


#3 -Jaime Lannister-

-Jaime Lannister-
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Posted 29 December 2016 - 06:04 PM

Ahh, was under the impression these pre-arranged "selections" were somewhat tested and compatible, even the Tactical one.  I have used many of these selections in the past, and never have I seen the BP and SCS stuff interspersed together.  I figured maybe Leonardo had finally tested some of it out and combined together what was compatible.  Apparently not.  Not sure why the default tactical selection now mixes the two, as it never did in past (that I recall). Oh well back to the drawing board.  Any personal suggestion of what to use agb1, BP or SCSSCS seems to be the more polished and extensive of the two, also do you suggest using the Polytweaks changes in addition to one or the other (assuming this won't be a problem anymore).



#4 agb1

agb1
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Posted 29 December 2016 - 07:26 PM

BP had a brief resurgence in development when the Enhanced Editions came out, but has relapsed into quiescence.  Active development is currently happening with SCS + Spell Revisions (kreso and Demivrgvs).  Polytweaks - not sure about trolls, the rest is probably OK technically, and (as with all tweaks) a matter of taste.

 

The "tactical" pre-selection is tested to the extent of verifying that all of mods can install together without fatal errors, but not to the extent of applying any quality standards to the result.


Edited by agb1, 29 December 2016 - 07:28 PM.

BiG World Fixpack (community collection of mod fixes and compatibility patches, with user-friendly cross-platform script)

 

BiG World Setup (tool to automate best-practice installation of Infinity Engine mods on Windows, with conflict analysis)

Latest version:    https://bitbucket.or.../get/master.zip


#5 -Maximus-

-Maximus-
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Posted 30 December 2016 - 08:56 PM

All the special arrows and potions you mention are from the mod-

 

~IIITEMMOD/SETUP-IIITEMMOD.TP2~ #0 #1 // Items [version 5]

 

Arrows
------
  Arrows of Silencing
  Arrows of Slowing
  Arrows of Pacifism
  Arrows of Healing
  Barbed Arrows
  Arrows of Stone to Flesh
  Arrows of Fatigue
  Arrows of Restriction

 

Potions
-------
  Potion of Mirror Image
  Potion of Lesser Restoration [flavour item]
  Potion of Refreshment
  Potion of Elemental Stability
  Potion of Vocalize
  Potion of Necromantic Recuperation
  Potion of Critical Skill
  Umberhulk Blood [flavour item]
  Rocksalt
  Perfume

 

Check the readme for iiItemMod in your bg2 folder.  I think they are randomly assigned to creatures and shops on each installation.

 

Also the trolls you mention, especially around Firewine Bridge are usually yellow "desert trolls" and can only be killed by acid (arrows or melf acid arrow spell, etc.)  Sometimes it takes more than one hit with acid attack to finish them off.  IIRC they are from BG Spawn mod.