Baldur's Gate & Baldur's Gate II Mod Thread

[ghostdog]

My only problem now is that "detect illusion" doesn't work as it should. It's on 100% and it doesn't detect thieves with indivisibility potions neither does it remove a mage's improved invisibility. Any idea if that's from SCS?

 

[laclongquan]

If detect illusion doesnt work, try upping it by shadow keeper it to 150 for example. There MIGHT be a some messing around in the code in some mods.

Also wait for at least one full round. The code of DI might not kick in yet.

 

[Russia is over. The end.]

If detect illusion doesnt work, try upping it by shadow keeper it to 150 for example. There MIGHT be a some messing around in the code in some mods.

Also wait for at least one full round. The code of DI might not kick in yet.

I highly doubt that. I feel like this kind of stuff is hardcoded in the exe.

 

[hell bovine]

I finished BG1 EET with scs on hardcore and didn't have any of that crazy shit. Sarevok was pretty tough, but doable. My money is on spell revisions too.

EET with SCS is a different set of mods, it's not exactly comparable. Tattoo of power is vanilla, but death spell & the rest sound like BGT-Weidu, either base or one of the BGT tweaks components.

 

[ghostdog]

If detect illusion doesnt work, try upping it by shadow keeper it to 150 for example. There MIGHT be a some messing around in the code in some mods.

Also wait for at least one full round. The code of DI might not kick in yet.

I highly doubt that. I feel like this kind of stuff is hardcoded in the exe.

I tried everything, upping the skill with shadow keeper, increasing it to may main char (F/T/M) aside from Jan, disabling scripts and AI, nothing, the skill simply doesn't work.
I thought maybe it was because i had two thieves in the party... I removed Jan but it's the same.

Maybe it's an EET bug.

 

[Chippy]

I know nothing about mods, but you could try installing a mod that specifically changes thieving abilities and it might override the bug? I think there's one called Epic Thieving that adjusts thieving skills to become more powerful above 100 and alters detect illusions for all thieves so that they can passively detect them even when detect illusions is off. I think.

Question of my own: there still don't seem to be any decent UI mods for SOD? I would have thought that with the complaints levelled at it, at least 1 modder would have been motivated to redo original UI from BG1.
I suppose nobody is playing it.

 

[chuft]

I researched this by reading a number of forums where people doing no-reload runs ran into this and instantly had their game end, often with no message as to why (it was the no-save Death Spell or the Petrification). I am also looking at it in Near Infinity. It appears this was done to BGT around 2010, people posting in 2012 had already run into it 2 years before.

Angelo has 120 Arrows of Detonation instead of 8. He has magic items that make him immune to spell levels 1-3 as well as normal missiles, and a ring of invisibility. He has a script that auto-casts Remove Magic, Death Spell, and Flesh to Stone at the start of the battle. He has a necklace that makes him immune to Entangle, Silence, Stinking Cloud, Web, Call Lightning, Slow, Skull Trap. on and on. He has 25 character levels. He has a Haste ring. He has resist fire 90%. I could go on.

He is basically hitting you with four Arrows of Detonation per round the entire fight (after his initial spell barrage). His Thaco is 6, he has a 19 DEX and a +2 bow, so effectively his Thaco is 1.

The View and Edit screens of Near Infinity conflict so I can't tell if he has 120 arrows of detonation and 120 arrows of dispelling, or 240 arrows of detonation. In fairness (Ha!) I am using the convenience tweak that increases quiver size to 120, so it is possible he normally comes with "only" 40 arrows of detonation.

This is just Angelo. They all (except Sarevok) start invisible and they all have a pile of special powers and immunities not in the original game. I did this fight three or four times and never saw an enemy fail a saving throw (I was using two mages, a cleric, and a thief and two fighters who all used ammo that required saving throws with each hit).

It's definitely BGT doing it. Dudleyville gives you the original game item list

http://www.forgottenwars.com/bg1/ar0125.htm

Looks like Sarevok has 46 levels unless I am reading something wrong, all saves are 1, Thaco is 2, 285 hit points, 90% resistance to all non-melee damage except regular missiles is 50%, 4 attacks a round with ring of haste. Sarevok's effective Thaco with his strength and sword is -6.

Apparently, Arrows of Detonation have the same effect as a fireball, but don't count as a "spell," so Minor Globes and Protection from Magic scrolls do not protect against them. Only Fire Resistance can protect you, and of course Angelo's opening move includes Remove Magic.

So they are not breaking any rules here, other than basically making the enemies immune to anything you can do.

Except Ctrl-Y of course.

At least this means BG2 probably works, unless they decided to "juice up" some of their favorite encounters there as well. This doesn't appear to be a case of something not working, so much as ridiculous encounter design coupled with the enemies essentially being extremely advanced BG2 high level enemies (with unique artifacts) against your BG1 level party.

The old tricks of pulling individual henchmen (they are invisible), having tons of summons (you can only have 5 at a time, and the arrows of detonation wipe the slate) don't work. Maybe it is possible to use a detect invisibility type spell to see one of them without activating Sarevok, I don't know. It has very much become a cheese encounter.

 

[Kliwer]

I'm making BGT installations from years... and I have never had such a bug... Really strange.

 

[chuft]

It's not a bug. I am looking at the files.

See

http://blackstrider.net/Archive_For...o-reload-challenge/page-210.html#entry8177023

https://af.gog.com/forum/baldurs_gate_series/instakilled_by_sarevok?as=1649904300

and many others.

 

[Kliwer]

Heh, it is the penalty for not installing SCS

 

[octavius]

Excactly, installing SCS must make this fight much easier with BGT.

 

[Mr. Magniloquent]

Spoiler

I researched this by reading a number of forums where people doing no-reload runs ran into this and instantly had their game end, often with no message as to why (it was the no-save Death Spell or the Petrification). I am also looking at it in Near Infinity. It appears this was done to BGT around 2010, people posting in 2012 had already run into it 2 years before.

Angelo has 120 Arrows of Detonation instead of 8. He has magic items that make him immune to spell levels 1-3 as well as normal missiles, and a ring of invisibility. He has a script that auto-casts Remove Magic, Death Spell, and Flesh to Stone at the start of the battle. He has a necklace that makes him immune to Entangle, Silence, Stinking Cloud, Web, Call Lightning, Slow, Skull Trap. on and on. He has 25 character levels. He has a Haste ring. He has resist fire 90%. I could go on.

He is basically hitting you with four Arrows of Detonation per round the entire fight (after his initial spell barrage). His Thaco is 6, he has a 19 DEX and a +2 bow, so effectively his Thaco is 1.

The View and Edit screens of Near Infinity conflict so I can't tell if he has 120 arrows of detonation and 120 arrows of dispelling, or 240 arrows of detonation. In fairness (Ha!) I am using the convenience tweak that increases quiver size to 120, so it is possible he normally comes with "only" 40 arrows of detonation.

This is just Angelo. They all (except Sarevok) start invisible and they all have a pile of special powers and immunities not in the original game. I did this fight three or four times and never saw an enemy fail a saving throw (I was using two mages, a cleric, and a thief and two fighters who all used ammo that required saving throws with each hit).

It's definitely BGT doing it. Dudleyville gives you the original game item list

http://www.forgottenwars.com/bg1/ar0125.htm

Looks like Sarevok has 46 levels unless I am reading something wrong, all saves are 1, Thaco is 2, 285 hit points, 90% resistance to all non-melee damage except regular missiles is 50%, 4 attacks a round with ring of haste. Sarevok's effective Thaco with his strength and sword is -6.

Apparently, Arrows of Detonation have the same effect as a fireball, but don't count as a "spell," so Minor Globes and Protection from Magic scrolls do not protect against them. Only Fire Resistance can protect you, and of course Angelo's opening move includes Remove Magic.

So they are not breaking any rules here, other than basically making the enemies immune to anything you can do.

Except Ctrl-Y of course.

At least this means BG2 probably works, unless they decided to "juice up" some of their favorite encounters there as well. This doesn't appear to be a case of something not working, so much as ridiculous encounter design coupled with the enemies essentially being extremely advanced BG2 high level enemies (with unique artifacts) against your BG1 level party.

The old tricks of pulling individual henchmen (they are invisible), having tons of summons (you can only have 5 at a time, and the arrows of detonation wipe the slate) don't work. Maybe it is possible to use a detect invisibility type spell to see one of them without activating Sarevok, I don't know. It has very much become a cheese encounter.

I've done dozens of BGT runs, and none of this sounds familiar. Last time I did one was about 2014-2015. I don't remember any of those things. Sarevok should be a Level 17 fighter, like in Vanilla. Sarevok should easily be the highest level character. The rest should be around level 9 or so. Semaj should have Level 5 spells, but no higher. Sarevok has high magic resistance and (dispellable) haste, but none of his party should have any native spell immunity, nor items which grant any immunity. Death spells and petrifaction are also something I've never experienced. Angelo should have arrows of detonation, but like, 20, not 120. In BG, arrows of detonation function as a 6d6 fireball, which does not count as a spell. Arrows of Dispelling are generally regarded as the key to winning this fight cleanly for the PC. I don't recall Sarevok's party having them.

This encounter sounds really fucked up and wrong, or perhaps near infinity is not interacting with the EE engine properly. The G3 people who made SCS, BGT, etc. are much smarter than this. I would be skeptical that these are from them. This fucked up level of power bloat and cheese sounds far more like the Tactics mod, which I abhor for this kind of bullshit.

 

[octavius]

This fucked up level of power bloat and cheese sounds far more like the Tactics mod, which I abhor for this kind of bullshit.

Amen to that.

 

[chuft]

Not using the Tactics mod. I generally don't use anything to make things harder after my experience with SCS.

My mod install order was

- Games
- Tobex (21)
- Fixpack(23),
- BGT (31),
- Music setup (42)
- Spell Revisions (37)
- content mods - Unfinished Business BG1 (61) and Unfinished Business (152),
- Tweaks Anthology (234),
- Spell Revisions - Update NPC Spellbooks (238)
- Worldmap (284)
- Widescreen mod (288)

But that is academic. I looked at the timestamps for all the override files compared to the timestamps of the various mod files created during install. SAREVO.CRE and GALDOR.CRE (upgraded Angelo, to use the example I am looking at) and SEMAJ.BCS (script that fires Death Spell, Flesh to Stone etc.) were definitely installed by BGT. It is obvious from the file creation time.

This is well known to be a BGT thing, some more examples


https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/258273-baldurs-gate-ii-shadows-of-amn/67793181
post #7 ("BGT shenanigans")

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/258273-baldurs-gate-ii-shadows-of-amn/66570717
post #4 ("BGT dickery")

https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/7603/#Comment_7603
("Semaj will start the battle with death spell (killing everything you summoned), greater malision, flesh to stone...i played my last sarevok battle in BGT")


Not sure how some of you guys haven't run into this, unless you are using a pre-2011 version of BGT, or maybe you have the non-WeiDU version, or something.

 

[hell bovine]

Most people install scs, which will overwrite the bgt changes.

 

[d1r]

I checked my BGT install which is four years old, and I could not see any involvement of BGT with Semaj. SCS however changed him, but not in the way you described him. Very odd indeed.

 

[Russia is over. The end.]

But that is academic. I looked at the timestamps for all the override files compared to the timestamps of the various mod files created during install. SAREVO.CRE and GALDOR.CRE (upgraded Angelo, to use the example I am looking at) and SEMAJ.BCS (script that fires Death Spell, Flesh to Stone etc.) were definitely installed by BGT. It is obvious from the file creation time.

BGT may touch these files, but the overrides come on top of whatever came before, so it may also be any of the 3 mods that come before (wts is Games?).

Just a theoretical remark.

 

[chuft]

Games is BG1 and BG2, both of which have to be installed before you run BGT.

 

[chuft]

Most people install scs, which will overwrite the bgt changes.

That would indeed explain a lot, if most people here are doing that.

 

[oldmanpaco]

I have nothing to add but wanted to say again that Spell Revisions is garbage. Carry on.

 

[chuft]

I thought Spell Revisions was highly thought of. I don't approve of its nerf of Stinking Cloud though.

Anyway thought I'd provide a concrete example: Angelo's necklace

Version in BG1 folder

Version in BG2 override folder after BGT install

 

[Tigranes]

Spell Revisions generally has some good stuff, yes.

I seem to remember running into some absolutely bullshit Team Sarevok a few years ago, Ctrl+Y and moving on - but I've run so many BG games with so many mod loadouts I can't even remember. I do think it was also some BGT mix, but I've also run numerous other BGTs without a problem.

It really may be a BGT not overridden by SCS component problem. The NearInfinity data you describe does sounds like Tactics-style bullshit.

 

[hell bovine]

Most people install scs, which will overwrite the bgt changes.

That would indeed explain a lot, if most people here are doing that.

There is also the 'tougher sarevok and semaj' component of BGT tweaks, but I don't even remember what it did.

 

[chuft]

BGT Tweaks isn't maintained any more, so I have never used it, but I was looking at that as part of my investigation to see if they were rolled into BGT by default. That component was renamed as "Add Semaj's Cloak and Upgraded Koveras' Ring of Protection" in later versions. It does not seem to cover the extreme difficulty increase I am talking about.

 

[agris]

chuft if you want to do some forensic surgery on your install, you’ll want to run

weidu.exe —change-log FILE.EXT

through command prompt to see what has changed what. You’ll also get intermediate versions of all files you can check in Ni.

If it were me, i would target the obviously exploit-y BCS files, maybe .CRE. Your screenshot of the amulet just shows like a tweak type mod, maybe even SR, tightened up the immunities to avoid shit bypassing the expected spell immunity granted in the bg1 version. Maybe it’s a smoking gun, but you need to look at what those additional resistances are and then run the item through —change-log.