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#1 -Wolfie-

-Wolfie-
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Posted 04 April 2004 - 04:41 AM

Requested thread repost



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Icelus

Once you enter ToB, it kinda sucks that you can't revisit any of the areas of SoA. Is it possible to workaround this fact with scripts and hacking and such, or is another one of those blasted HARDCODED? aspects of the game?

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Hendryk

It is strictly due to the properties of the world map. You can CLUA from one AMN area to another with no problem in ToB. You can also try starting the game with Harden Cooner's world map which includes all of Baldur's Gate, Amn and Tethyr. I haven't tried it for BG2 but it works fine for BG1 so it would be worth a shot.

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Sim

There are more problems than the worldmap, like baldur.bcs being swapped for baldur25.bcs in the ToB transition.

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Hendryk

True. As near as I can tell though, the only things that wouldn't get reset would be the stronghold timers. The basic quests from SoA and the romances for the ToB stage should play normally.

It also should be possible to concatenate the two BCS files in text, edit out the duplicate familiar and Lilarcor lines and compile it for both names.

Of course, SoA scripts might have chapter-specific variables that wouldn't get set in ToB. Is there a way to find all IF...Chapter() variables for all scripts?

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Bryad22

Yeah, it was a real downer when I start an new game in TOB, and i dont have carsoymer. It would be great to have this mod :D

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Hendryk

Started a ToB game with HC's expanded map. Movement from Tethyr to Amn is fine. The big problem is that NPCs get new dialog sets in ToB. Take them back to SoA and every conversation that one of them should take part in won't complete. This unfortunately isn't trivial. I had ToB-Korgan in my party when I went to pick up SoA-Nalia. Because Korgan is supposed to have a very minor interjection in Nalia's join banter, the whole keep quest got messed up. So did Nalia's avatar. It stuttered, stopped actions, etc. And Nalia couldn't get any more lines out because the game had her stuck somehow in the original dialogue.

Otoh, Firkrag's quest went fine, including PC dialogues. So you could go back to Amn in ToB but you'd be better off leaving your other party members stashed in the pocket plane while you do it.

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Sim

Started a ToB game with HC's expanded map.  Movement from Tethyr to Amn is fine.  The big problem is that NPCs get new dialog sets in ToB.  Take them back to SoA and every conversation that one of them should take part in won't complete.  This unfortunately isn't trivial.  I had ToB-Korgan in my party when I went to pick up SoA-Nalia.  Because Korgan is supposed to have a very minor interjection in Nalia's join banter, the whole keep quest got messed up.  So did Nalia's avatar.  It stuttered, stopped actions, etc.  And Nalia couldn't get any more lines out because the game had her stuck somehow in the original dialogue.

Otoh, Firkrag's quest went fine, including PC dialogues.  So you could go back to Amn in ToB but you'd be better off leaving your other party members stashed in the pocket plane while you do it.


ToB NPCs have the same death variable but not dialog file as their SoA counterparts, so IsValidForPartyDialog or InParty return true, but then the transition fails.

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Rastor

It would be possible to work around that by combining the ToB and SoA dialogues. We'd have to do some state renaming though.

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Andyr

You could maybe do some sort of area check, and use whether it is a SoA or ToB area to use the SetDialog (or whatever) action for people in the party.

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Grim Squeaker

You could maybe do some sort of area check, and use whether it is a SoA or ToB area to use the SetDialog (or whatever) action for people in the party.


Yeah that would work:
e.g.

ActionOverride("Korgan",SetDialog("KORGANJ"))

for a SoA location

and

ActionOverride("Korgan",SetDialog("KORGA25J"))

for a ToB location

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Hendryk

I think it might be better to use Rastor's idea and combine the files. If you just switched back and forth, what would happen if a ToB romance timer went off while you're in an SoA area?

Also, the pocket plane would need some thought/testing. Probably, you wouldn't want it to script dialog switches but I don't know all of what might go wrong in ToB if you did that.

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Grim Squeaker

Combining files is a really messy way of doing it.

We can modify the romance activation code so it sets the correct dialog file just before starting the dialogue. That shouldn't be a problem.

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NiGHTMARE

Any mod which allows you return to Amn in ToB should probably not let you go to Trademeet, since by then it's supposed to have been destroyed by the Sythillisians :)

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Hendryk

OK. Saving the game and then restarting it makes it check the PDIALOG.2DA file which restores Korgan's KORGA25J.DLG. Scripting an area to change it back to KORGANJ.DLG continuously results in hideous movement problems. Unless there's a way to check what his dialog file is when an area is entered, I don't see how you could set a variable to change it just once, only if and when it's necessary.

Any thoughts out there?

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Sim

You could maybe do some sort of area check, and use whether it is a SoA or ToB area to use the SetDialog (or whatever) action for people in the party.


What about the B***** dialogs?

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Rastor

Frankly, the B* dialogues aren't anywhere near as important regarding party dialogue (only banters).

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Andyr


You could maybe do some sort of area check, and use whether it is a SoA or ToB area to use the SetDialog (or whatever) action for people in the party.

What about the B***** dialogs?



I said maybe, I had not thought the whole thing through. :)

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Lord Kain

I think it would be fun to see how Quayle responds to the PC and Aerie's son Quayle he was ok with them being more then friends but that might set the gnome off.

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Lord Kain

Where do you get Trademeet being destoryed by Sythillisian.
That ONE guy says someone worrys the Sythillisian's would be in the trademeet's town square next spring or something.
Throne of Bhaal starts less then a week after the start Shadows of Amn. So explain how Trademeet is destoryed.

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NiGHTMARE

A week is more than enough time.

The final piece of news the town criers in SoA give you is this: "Hear ye! More news of the scurrilous Sythillisian's Empire! Horrors abound as the legions of evil march on Imnescar!".

According to Lands of Intrigue, Imnescar fell on the 16th of Eleasias (July). Trademeet is burned to the ground only three days later, on the 19th of Eleasias.

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Lord Kain

thank you nightmare thats what I wanted to know.

However I'm sure someone could find places in Baldurs Gate that conflict with Forgotten Realms books story lines.

Now the town Imnscar? is that connected to Imnesvale which is attacked by the Sythilisians if your a paladin or a ranger? Or our they two towns that start with Imn.

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NiGHTMARE

Yes, there's quite a few conflicts. For instance, throughout the entire duration of BG1, BG2 and ToB, much of the Sword Coast is supposed be under attack by the Sahuagin. You'd have thought the inhabitants of Baldur's Gate, Nashkel, Athkatla would be quite concerned about this, but there isn't even a single mention of it

There's also a town only a few miles south of Saradush which was recently (when ToB begins) occupied by a group called the Knights of the Black Gauntlet, which again isn't even mentioned... though the inhabitants of Saradush obviously have more pressing concerns on their mind

As for Imnescar and Imnesvale, in roleplaying terms the third king of Amn was called Imnel, and the site of a battle he fought in the Smallteeth region came to be called Imnel's Scar, later Imnescar. The nearby river Imnescourse is presumably also named after him.

Imnesvale only seems to exist in BG2, i.e. Bioware made it up. They probably named it after either the king or the river (so in role-playing terms the founders of the village did the same ). Of course Bio are entirely in their rights to invent villages; the various Amn-related source books (e.g. Lands of Intrigue & Empires of Sand) say that there are dozens upon dozens of small villages in the country.

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