NWN Neverwinter Nights (NWN & NWN2) Modules Thread

[notpl]

Do you speak French? I found the English version unplayable.

 

[luj1]

Any good PWs where you don't have to roleplay and can just play?

 

[hkt]

NWN has spoiled me, I tried similar games but it's incredible how bad the combat is in games released decades after NWN.

Some didn't even have a skill queue, pressing buffs 1 at a time waiting for the animation to finish before you can press the next one.

Any good PWs where you don't have to roleplay and can just play?

I found World of Greyhawk pretty fun, spicy server though it's Swordflight on crack difficulty wise.

Can anyone suggest any modules that are text and dialogue heavy? I'm spent in trying to look on my own. To this day, I believe that the Bastard of Kosigan was the best module series I've played.

The Prophet series is quite text/story heavy but not as much as le bâtard du Kosigan.

 

[Gahbreeil]

Do you speak French? I found the English version unplayable.

English was just fine for me. I was there before episode 4 was even translated.

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

Are there any modules for

 

[Poseidon00]

Good vs Evil and Endless Nights are fun ways to experiment with a new character.

Good vs Evil lets you take part in a series of large battles, simulating a war between factions of your choosing. You can either act as a commander or as a soldier, leading nobody but yourself. With a decent AI pack you can have some very memorable moments.

Endless Nights is another one of those randomly generated open world adventures, somewhat similar to Infinite Dungeons. There are several versions of this mod now iirc.

 

[Eisen]

Best hack & slash modules?

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Best hack & slash modules?

Army of one. The aielund saga is effectively hack and slash with plot.

 

[deama]

I started the Prophet module, but do you need to play any other module before? Cause you start at lvl 5 and I always have trouble with modules where I start at lvl 5 because I can't quite figure out a good enough backstory for my character, especially for a complicated story module.

Is there a type of "prologue" module I can play beforehand or are you just meant to fill it out yourself?

 

[Sabotin]

Beamdog's actually still kicking, they put out a new (beta) patch after more than a year since the previous one.

Highlights​

• Spells and spell-like abilities now display a targeting indicator displaying their range and, if appropriate, their AOE shape and size.
• Added support for up to 8 multiclasses, configurable per-module.
• Improved area load times by up to 100x!
• Added an in-game News UI that shows upcoming patches and community news.
• NUI windows will no longer break input to the game (WASD, drag&drop).
• Added a new "Toon" postprocessing shader.
• Hundreds of new functions and goodies for module builders.
• Hundreds of bugfixes and optimizations.

And the full notes: https://nwn.beamdog.net/docs/#changelog

- The targeting looks neat, color coded red or blue for friendly fire and a dotted line if your character needs to move to get in range:

- The class number seem to just be unhardcoded, you're still limited to 3 by default.
- Loading times I can't really say since it's like 2 seconds on HDD already... Maybe it doesn't hitch for a second when the bar gets to 3/4? Whatever.
- The news thing is just like an extra menu button, but there's a janky looking black square with text that appears on the main menu when there's new things. Anyway was it worth the effort to make for it to be used maybe once per year? Maybe it's mean for PW owners to hack it and put in their own news?
- Toon shader also seems pointless, looks like borderlands smeared with vaseline. Maybe it's meant as a demo for the actual good function: custom shaders can be applied even without the new lighting turned on (which actually also seems to look just slightly better?).
- Support for dynamic area lighting also sounds like a great feature imo.

 

[Gargaune]

Beamdog's actually still kicking, they put out a new (beta) patch after more than a year since the previous one.

Highlights​

• Spells and spell-like abilities now display a targeting indicator displaying their range and, if appropriate, their AOE shape and size.
• Added support for up to 8 multiclasses, configurable per-module.
• Improved area load times by up to 100x!
• Added an in-game News UI that shows upcoming patches and community news.
• NUI windows will no longer break input to the game (WASD, drag&drop).
• Added a new "Toon" postprocessing shader.
• Hundreds of new functions and goodies for module builders.
• Hundreds of bugfixes and optimizations.

And the full notes: https://nwn.beamdog.net/docs/#changelog

All sounds like healthy Incline to me (less so the news UI), but I just hope they fixed the bloody POST_ waypoints. EDIT: "Fixed creatures facing east when standing on _POST waypoints." Thank you!

As for area loads, if it really is "up to 100x" faster that'd be quite nice. It wasn't a problem before, the big part of a savegame load was unpacking the module, but I wouldn't say no to a practically seamless area transition like they did for the Infinity Engine EEs.


P.S. Are you in the Beta, can you share a screenshot of this "Toon" shader? I imagine it's some sort of cel-shaded look, right?

 

[rogueknight333]

Best hack & slash modules?

The Blackguard series is good for those who just want to kill stuff.

I started the Prophet module... Is there a type of "prologue" module I can play beforehand or are you just meant to fill it out yourself?

I would suggest playing Baldecaran's earlier module The Cave of Songs first. You can expect to finish that at about lvl 5, and being by the same author it has a similar atmosphere and fits in well thematically with the Prophet series.

... - The class number seem to just be unhardcoded, you're still limited to 3 by default...

From the notes, it seems likely that all one would need to do to enable extra classes by default is to put a modified ruleset.2da in the override. And then you will need to add a level of Monk and Shadowdancer to almost every single build to optimize them.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

because I can't quite figure out a good enough backstory for my character, especially for a complicated story module

Uh why bother? No backstory you make up will have any effect on the the plot you're running now.

 

[KainenMorden]

because I can't quite figure out a good enough backstory for my character, especially for a complicated story module

Uh why bother? No backstory you make up will have any effect on the the plot you're running now.

Wouldn't make any difference to me personally but I understand why it could be important to players that really immerse themselves in roleplaying.

Also, a combination of 8 classes in NWN wouldn't be a build, it would be an abomination imho.

Not sure if any module creators would bother trying to balance against that and not sure if it would make any sense to have an enemy with that many classes either. I'm curious if this was something influenced by Pathfinder/5e? I think that in both systems you could hypothetically take an unlimited amount of classes but virtually no one plays that way.

Did the community ask for this?

 

[deama]

because I can't quite figure out a good enough backstory for my character, especially for a complicated story module

Uh why bother? No backstory you make up will have any effect on the the plot you're running now.

Roleplaying.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

because I can't quite figure out a good enough backstory for my character, especially for a complicated story module

Uh why bother? No backstory you make up will have any effect on the the plot you're running now.

Roleplaying.

I don't want to stomp all over your sandcastle*, so to speak, but veering more towards LARPing innit? I don't see that having anything more than a character concept that informs decisions you take ingame is required.

*

Assuming it's a sandcastle and not some sand-wizard tower. Then I am stomping all over it.

 

[KainenMorden]

because I can't quite figure out a good enough backstory for my character, especially for a complicated story module

Uh why bother? No backstory you make up will have any effect on the the plot you're running now.

Roleplaying.

I don't want to stomp all over your sandcastle*, so to speak, but veering more towards LARPing innit? I don't see that having anything more than a character concept that informs decisions you take ingame is required.

*

Assuming it's a sandcastle and not some sand-wizard tower. Then I am stomping all over it.

I mean, its a video game. You can probably make arguments that its all veering towards larping. Also, your background often ties in with the character's alignment/decision making process.

Oh and thanks for backing Solasta.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

I mean, its a video game. You can probably make arguments that its all veering towards larping. Also, your background often ties in with the character's alignment/decision making process.

Oh, I don't disagree, just thought why bother with it if it makes things needlessly complicated.

Oh and thanks for backing Solasta.

Where'd you get that from?

 

[KainenMorden]

I mean, its a video game. You can probably make arguments that its all veering towards larping. Also, your background often ties in with the character's alignment/decision making process.

Oh, I don't disagree, just thought why bother with it if it makes things needlessly complicated.

I see what you mean but to each their own. In my view, in many crpgs, the amount of choices you have is limited either way and its needlessly complicated to not take the option that is most conducive to power gaming but rping a bit can be fun.

Oh and thanks for backing Solasta.

Where'd you get that from?

I beat Solasta and they showed your name during the credits.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

I beat Solasta and they showed your name during the credits.

Goddamn snitches

 

[Gargaune]

Oh and thanks for backing Solasta.

Where'd you get that from?

I beat Solasta and they showed your name during the credits.

Watch out, Roguey, there's a new player in town.

 

[rogueknight333]

... Also, a combination of 8 classes in NWN wouldn't be a build, it would be an abomination imho.

Not sure if any module creators would bother trying to balance against that and not sure if it would make any sense to have an enemy with that many classes either. I'm curious if this was something influenced by Pathfinder/5e? I think that in both systems you could hypothetically take an unlimited amount of classes but virtually no one plays that way.

Did the community ask for this?

There were many people who very much wanted the class limit raised to 4, as it is in NWN2. I do not know if anyone wanted the limit raised to 8, or even thought that was possible. To be sure, the 3 class limit was always artificial and not in line with PnP rules, but it does make balancing combat for NWN vastly easier. Just raising it to 4 in NWN2 was a contributor to making combat for that game much worse. And of course if allowing more classes becomes standard then it threatens to retroactively unbalance any module made before that change was introduced.

 

[KainenMorden]

... Also, a combination of 8 classes in NWN wouldn't be a build, it would be an abomination imho.

Not sure if any module creators would bother trying to balance against that and not sure if it would make any sense to have an enemy with that many classes either. I'm curious if this was something influenced by Pathfinder/5e? I think that in both systems you could hypothetically take an unlimited amount of classes but virtually no one plays that way.

Did the community ask for this?

There were many people who very much wanted the class limit raised to 4, as it is in NWN2. I do not know if anyone wanted the limit raised to 8, or even thought that was possible. To be sure, the 3 class limit was always artificial and not in line with PnP rules, but it does make balancing combat for NWN vastly easier. Just raising it to 4 in NWN2 was a contributor to making combat for that game much worse. And of course if allowing more classes becomes standard then it threatens to retroactively unbalance any module made before that change was introduced.

I suppose if it was made the default, even if the player chooses to stick to the 3 class limit, the rules regarding xp penalty would still be different. Well, I don't think they would make this a default moving forward, I think the majority of the community that plays SP modules wouldn't want that. Maybe this is something the PW players want for whatever reason since many servers have modified rulesets.

I can't see any reason to do this. I know there is that crowd that wants to be true to pnp but it's a video game, not everything from pnp can be expected to translate well. I'm sure it's quite a bit of work to balance and playtest a module with the 3 class limit, 8 classes seems absurd either for a PC or an enemy.

Then again, I've seen players use PRC and enable other features of EE while playing modules that are not balanced for those things so to each their own. If it ever becomes the default, there's always DE.

 

[Gargaune]

And of course if allowing more classes becomes standard then it threatens to retroactively unbalance any module made before that change was introduced.

It won't, Beamdog wouldn't have billed it as "configurable per-module" in the current patch otherwise. This has been their approach in general, even back when they were talking about the possibility of adding KotOR-style party controls, Trent said it would be an option for module-builders rather than a general feature (and I maintain it would've been the wrong approach not to make it a general feature in that case, but that's a separate discussion).

If it ever becomes the default, there's always DE.

Or... just choosing not to take a 4th class.

But that's just a hypothetical, they won't make it default.

 

[KainenMorden]

Well, that's what I was thinking about in the beginning of my post. I imagine the multi class xp penalty rules are different with 8 classes enabled. Let's say you choose 3 and have taken lvls that would cause an xp penalty under vanilla rules. Do you still take the penalty as you normally would? Not sure if this is explained anywhere.