199 replies to this topic

[Strontium Dog]

And what about the setglobal command which allows me to get rid hrothgar and rejoin him? I suppose I could make him last through NEJ if I make him a fighter/mage/thief like the others but I don't want him around, if at all possible.

[Chevalier]

If you are playing though NeJ part 1 & 2 content you Need Hrothgar in your party! His dialog and other requirements for the plot line to move forward. So Don't go though the portal if you can't have Hrothgar in your party and if you wish to goto Halruaa you need him so just go there as fast as you can, then you can dump him.

[Strontium Dog]

Well, after a long hiatus, I decided to carry on with my bg2 megagame. But I've now encountered a BIG problem. I'm in the Vale of Shadows component of the NEJ mod and I am completely unable to rest my party- the game just stalls to a dead stop, if I use windows task manager to break out of it, I get a message stating that baldur.exe has stopped working. I've tried resting outside the Vale of Shadows main crypt, I've even tried resting back in the Kuldahar Inn, with no luck whatsoever.

I can only think of one thing I haven't tried yet. i have a recurrent screensaver-type software(from thinkrightnow company) which flashes subliminal messages onscreen, every so often. Normally, it doesn't interfere with my game to any extent. I will try 1 last time to play the game without the screensaver activated, but I have no real high hopes of this working. If anyone can suggest alternative methods which might work(such as perhaps an artificial cheat code which restores all used/cast spells and removes the party's fatigue without using the actual rest-function, I would be most grateful. Otherwise, it looks as though I'll have to laboriously download the game and play it all over again, a frightneing prospect.

Edited by Strontium Dog, 16 November 2009 - 07:08 AM.

[Jarno Mikkola]

If anyone can suggest alternative methods which might work(such as perhaps an artificial cheat code which restores all used/cast spells and removes the party's fatigue without using the actual rest-function, I would be most grateful. Otherwise, it looks as though I'll have to laboriously download the game and play it all over again, a frightneing prospect.

Well, you can remove the negative modifiers from the fatique, by copying everything after the line 'In BG2 ToB we have:' in this to a .txt file, and then modifying the negative numbers to zeroes( 0 ), and then saving it as fatigmod.2da, and putting it to the override folder.
The spells can be regained with this mod, just use a timer that's 200-255(seconds) so the enemy AI doesn't get stuck on casting infinite loops of Time Stops... yes, we will make a better edition of the mod...

Edited by Jarno Mikkola, 19 November 2009 - 04:11 PM.

[Strontium Dog]

I found a simple solution, I simply reloaded the most recent savegame before the last 2, and everything worked fine.Maybe the CTD was caused by the last 2 savegames being corruped by the subliminal messages appearing on the screen at the time). It's just as well that I save the game so often (and not just quick-save).

[Strontium Dog]

Well, I had the same problem with the game CTDing if I tried to rest but , fortunately, I always make sure to save(not just quick-save) before every level, so I saved my game without too much hassle. I suspect that the savegames are sometimes corrupted by that subliminal message software so I will make sure in future to turn it off before playing BG2.

So far, there've been 1 or 2 other minor issues. When going into the 3rd level of Dragon's Eye with Presio there etc., in the NEJ mod(part 1), the undead assistants Presio uses all have names/titles derived from some BG1 dialogue which mentions the Iron Throne, also the very first dialogue of Presio's 1st undead assistant was half-full of that Iron Throne speech, but the dialogue of the other undead assistants was fine. I'm surprised that there's no software that prevents unnecessary mixing of mods/components which are totally unrelated to each other.

Oh yes, and because I'd accidentally inserted a bracers of AC 3 defence into the armour section of Wulfgar's inventory, when I removed it, he still had an unnatural -8 AC in his profile which made no sense. Fortunately, I simply reloaded from the quick-save and tried removing the bracers and this problem didn't appear again.


I have 1 very crucial question:- In the NEJ readme, it suggested a way to get rid of Yoshimo/Kachiko temporarily without presumably cancelling the major pre-Spellhold quest that the TS mod has in it. It mentioned something about sending both Yoshimo?Kachiko to "SBT". What is "SBT"? What is it short for?

[Ranadiel]

Well, I had the same problem with the game CTDing if I tried to rest but , fortunately, I always make sure to save(not just quick-save) before every level, so I saved my game without too much hassle. I suspect that the savegames are sometimes corrupted by that subliminal message software so I will make sure in future to turn it off before playing BG2.

So far, there've been 1 or 2 other minor issues. When going into the 3rd level of Dragon's Eye with Presio there etc., in the NEJ mod(part 1), the undead assistants Presio uses all have names/titles derived from some BG1 dialogue which mentions the Iron Throne, also the very first dialogue of Presio's 1st undead assistant was half-full of that Iron Throne speech, but the dialogue of the other undead assistants was fine. I'm surprised that there's no software that prevents unnecessary mixing of mods/components which are totally unrelated to each other.

Oh yes, and because I'd accidentally inserted a bracers of AC 3 defence into the armour section of Wulfgar's inventory, when I removed it, he still had an unnatural -8 AC in his profile which made no sense. Fortunately, I simply reloaded from the quick-save and tried removing the bracers and this problem didn't appear again.


I have 1 very crucial question:- In the NEJ readme, it suggested a way to get rid of Yoshimo/Kachiko temporarily without presumably cancelling the major pre-Spellhold quest that the TS mod has in it. It mentioned something about sending both Yoshimo?Kachiko to "SBT". What is "SBT"? What is it short for?

The problem you are describing with the NEJ NPC names is a result of their CRE files pointing to an incorrect part of the dialog file. There really isn't anything that can be done to stop mixing of this kind(besides good coding) because if pieces of dialogue are moved around without taking into account all files referencing that dialogue then there is no way to tell what dialogue goes to what. I have no idea of what mod might have caused your specific problem though. *shrugs*

I'm assuming SBT is Sea Bounty Tavern as I think that is the name of tavern in the game, and I know they go to a tavern in the docks district if you kick them out of your party.

-=Edit: I just remembered that some NPC mods do have string fixers as part of them, so apparently it is possible to correct dialogue file mishaps, but I think it is a very cumbersome process. Also while reviewing this thread I noticed this is basically the secnd time that I answered the Yoshimo/Kachiko question(first time being 6 months ago). =-

Edited by Ranadiel, 11 December 2009 - 03:46 AM.

[Strontium Dog]

I was under the impression, though, that once I cut out Yoshimo and/or Kachiko that if they were abandoned in the city that they would leave after a while. So, presumably, I can't just leave them after exiting Chateau Irenicus and rejoin with them just for that big pre-spellhold adventure?

Ah, the TS-readme states:-

"NOTE: If joining Bodhi in Chapter 3, you must have Yoshimo in your party all the time from before choosing Bodhi till going for Spellhold, since otherwise he disappears and you can't do the main quest... "

Does that mean I have to have Yoshimo in the party the WHOle time from Chateau Irenicus to just before going to Spellhold if I choose to ally with Bodhi, or does it just mean that I must have Yoshimo in my party just before choosing to ally with Bodhi?

Edited by Strontium Dog, 11 December 2009 - 04:32 AM.

[Ranadiel]

I was under the impression, though, that once I cut out Yoshimo and/or Kachiko that if they were abandoned in the city that they would leave after a while. So, presumably, I can't just leave them after exiting Chateau Irenicus and rejoin with them just for that big pre-spellhold adventure?

Ah, the TS-readme states:-

"NOTE: If joining Bodhi in Chapter 3, you must have Yoshimo in your party all the time from before choosing Bodhi till going for Spellhold, since otherwise he disappears and you can't do the main quest... "

Does that mean I have to have Yoshimo in the party the WHOle time from Chateau Irenicus to just before going to Spellhold if I choose to ally with Bodhi, or does it just mean that I must have Yoshimo in my party just before choosing to ally with Bodhi?

I kicked them out as soon as Kachiko joined in Chateau Irenicus and they went straight to the tavern in the docks. I was able to later recruit them with no problems. The part of the TS readme that you quoted likely means that Yoshimo won't join you if you have already sided with Bodhi. You should still be able to recruit him prior to siding with Bodhi if you kick him out.

[Strontium Dog]

I was under the impression, though, that once I cut out Yoshimo and/or Kachiko that if they were abandoned in the city that they would leave after a while. So, presumably, I can't just leave them after exiting Chateau Irenicus and rejoin with them just for that big pre-spellhold adventure?

Ah, the TS-readme states:-

"NOTE: If joining Bodhi in Chapter 3, you must have Yoshimo in your party all the time from before choosing Bodhi till going for Spellhold, since otherwise he disappears and you can't do the main quest... "

Does that mean I have to have Yoshimo in the party the WHOle time from Chateau Irenicus to just before going to Spellhold if I choose to ally with Bodhi, or does it just mean that I must have Yoshimo in my party just before choosing to ally with Bodhi?

I kicked them out as soon as Kachiko joined in Chateau Irenicus and they went straight to the tavern in the docks. I was able to later recruit them with no problems. The part of the TS readme that you quoted likely means that Yoshimo won't join you if you have already sided with Bodhi. You should still be able to recruit him prior to siding with Bodhi if you kick him out.

The TS readme also stated that one had to kick out Yoshimo first before Kachiko as that would mean that they would both go to the Copper Coronet. It also warned that if one kicked out Kachiko first before Yoshimo, that they would both go to the Sea Bounty Tavern and would not rejoin if asked. Seems at odds with what you said.Ah well, I'll play safe and kick out Yoshimo first then Kachiko and I'll try to do all (feasible) pre-Spellhold quests in chapter 2, then do Bodhi's 3 missions last just before going to Spellhold and doing the TS main quest.

1 other question:- Has there been any other consistent attempt so far to award equal XP points(and alternative types of quests) to those preferring to follow an evil-aligned path all the way through? So far, all I've heard of is of 1 mod on the pocket plane download site which has some features such as an assassination mission-path etc., but not much else.It's just that, in my experience, AD&D games are usually really, really, bad at providing decent roleplayable games for evil-aligned PCs.

Edited by Strontium Dog, 12 December 2009 - 02:33 AM.

[Ranadiel]

The TS readme also stated that one had to kick out Yoshimo first before Kachiko as that would mean that they would both go to the Copper Coronet. It also warned that if one kicked out Kachiko first before Yoshimo, that they would both go to the Sea Bounty Tavern and would not rejoin if asked. Seems at odds with what you said.Ah well, I'll play safe and kick out Yoshimo first then Kachiko and I'll try to do all (feasible) pre-Spellhold quests in chapter 2, then do Bodhi's 3 missions last just before going to Spellhold and doing the TS main quest.

1 other question:- Has there been any other consistent attempt so far to award equal XP points(and alternative types of quests) to those preferring to follow an evil-aligned path all the way through? So far, all I've heard of is of 1 mod on the pocket plane download site which has some features such as an assassination mission-path etc., but not much else.It's just that, in my experience, AD&D games are usually really, really, bad at providing decent roleplayable games for evil-aligned PCs.

It has been a while since I played BG, so I don't remember all the detail regarding the TS quest. I do know that when I kicked them out in Irenicus's dungeon, I did find them again in the Sea Bounty Tavern. I don't remember who I kicked out or how, but I was able to recruit them later.

And only evil based mod that I can think of is the Mod for the Wicked(currently in development, with some parts released). Of course, I believe that a lot of mods have evil paths of some kind to them, but I don't play evil characters so I don't know how satisfying any of them are. *shrugs*

[Strontium Dog]

Further bugs/innaccuracies:-

In NEJ-dragon's eye 5th level, the Histachis have the figure normally given to wights in other mods(huge, green with black hair and wearing red rags). They ought to have the standard histachi shape which looks like a much smaller version of a lizard man. They're also unbelievably tough in NEJ and are, impossibly, immune to all magical arrows.

The previous bug (re CTDs while resting) hasn't appeared, I suspect because I've turned off that subliminal screen-saver.

The bit where Yxunomei started speaking to the party happened too early with the door at the opposite end to Yxunomei closing completely shut(and unopenable) so that I had to CLUAConsole my whole party to Yxunomei's room to fight her.

I just read that Exnem mod and am not sure if I have it in my install, hope not, but then again I've had excess amounts of +1 attribute potions and 1 or 2 clearly ueber-powerful items which I had to get rid of(eg:- 2 manuals giving a permanent +3 THACO and +3 to damage) and some of the DSTOSC items were too much. That said, I have to admit many of the items in the Item Upgrade mod seem not to violate gameplay too much(as long as one has really tough AI-enhancing mods like SCS2/Tactics or whatever installed), though, unfortunately, even there, there are 1 or 2 which are clearly too much)eg:- the Improved Daystar, +4, but +8(!) against all evil-aligned creatures.

[Strontium Dog]

1 other minor issue:- At the start of my BG2 BWP game, I decided that it would be most appropriate if I had my main PC Bhaalspawn being "The Kurgan" from the movie "Highlander" complete with images derived from that movie and the brilliant soundset(Kurgan gets all the best lines in that movie). Anyway, I recently thought it the images would look more "Bhaalspawn-like" if they had Sarevok's glowing golden eyes. Trouble is that microsoft's paint function has too limited a colur-range and I'm also not sure how to colour in the new eye-colour without crossing over into the wrong region on the image etc. Any ideas? Thanks.

[dabus]

Don't use a crap-program if you want a professional result?
Test the gimp or other free programs.

[Strontium Dog]

Thanks a lot re the GIMP mention.

1 other bug:- I occasionally check the data resulting from battles and saw that Wulfgar(from ROt mod, appearing in Chateau Irenicus) had inflicted 556 hit-points damage on one occasion, and 276 hit-points damage another time. Clearly this is some sort of bug presumably related to Wulfgar so I'm glad that I finally am able to get rid of him soon as I've finished the NEJ mod(which is rather too much like Tactics in its villains' immunity to damage, causing boredom rather than challenge). Still the SCS2 AI seems to have helped a bit.

Edited by Strontium Dog, 15 December 2009 - 03:14 AM.

[Strontium Dog]

During my BWP game, my romance with Shar-Teel never got off the ground despite my reputation and charisma scores fitting the NPC Shar-teel Romance mod's requirements. I now have the same problem(I think) with the Imoen Romance. The 1st dailogue which one gets at the start in Chateau Irenicus hasn't appeared yet and I'm wondering how to artificially kick-start it. I think the key is "ImoenRomanceActive" so I inserted that artificially into my character's global values section via using shadowkeeper, and have variously set it to 0,1 or 2, to see which works(I'm guessing "1" is probably the correct one. Any ideas on how to kick-start the Shar-Teel Romance even though I'm in BG2?

Oh, I should mention that I'd cleaned out most of level 1 of Chateau Irenicus(minus the air-pocket plane) and done the NEJ mod(part 1), without getting the Imoen dialogue I thought I'd gotten in past games.

[Strontium Dog]

2 other things:- The NPC Shar-Teel Romance never kicked off in my BG1 portion of the game despite the fact that I met all possible requirements for the romance to start. Anyone have any ideas on how to kick-start the romance in the Bg2 portion of the game? I guess I need to know the global affect/value for starting the romance.

Also, despite downloading the Imoen Romance mod(though I may have failed to download the music pack with it), I didn't get any special dialogue with Imoen on the first level of Chateau Irenicus(which I vaguely recalled from previous BG2 games). I've now scoured most of level 1 of Chateau Irenicus and done the NEJ mod part 1, and nothing's happened in that regard. I did finsd the correct global value/affect"ImoenRomanceActive" and have used shadowkeeper to set the value of it to 0,1 and 2, depending on the save. I suspect that the correct value is "1". Am I correct?

[Strontium Dog]

2 other things:- The NPC Shar-Teel Romance never kicked off in my BG1 portion of the game despite the fact that I met all possible requirements for the romance to start. Anyone have any ideas on how to kick-start the romance in the Bg2 portion of the game? I guess I need to know the global affect/value for starting the romance.

Also, despite downloading the Imoen Romance mod(though I may have failed to download the music pack with it), I didn't get any special dialogue with Imoen on the first level of Chateau Irenicus(which I vaguely recalled from previous BG2 games). I've now scoured most of level 1 of Chateau Irenicus and done the NEJ mod part 1, and nothing's happened in that regard. I did finsd the correct global value/affect"ImoenRomanceActive" and have used shadowkeeper to set the value of it to 0,1 and 2, depending on the save. I suspect that the correct value is "1". Am I correct?

[Jarno Mikkola]

1 other bug:- I occasionally check the data resulting from battles and saw that Wulfgar(from ROt mod, appearing in Chateau Irenicus) had inflicted 556 hit-points damage on one occasion, and 276 hit-points damage another time. Clearly this is some sort of bug presumably related to Wulfgar ...

That's clearly a minimum damage error, as you have items that reduce your effected damage all the way around the zero, so you'll be doing more, the 500+ comes from a critical, while the 200+ comes from normal hit, so you would need to remove some item that causes the damage reduction effects.

[Strontium Dog]

1 other bug:- I occasionally check the data resulting from battles and saw that Wulfgar(from ROt mod, appearing in Chateau Irenicus) had inflicted 556 hit-points damage on one occasion, and 276 hit-points damage another time. Clearly this is some sort of bug presumably related to Wulfgar ...

That's clearly a minimum damage error, as you have items that reduce your effected damage all the way around the zero, so you'll be doing more, the 500+ comes from a critical, while the 200+ comes from normal hit, so you would need to remove some item that causes the damage reduction effects.

Well, I solved things in a simpler way, I just got rid of Wulfgar from my party.


1 interesting solution:- 1 of the really annoying things about some NPC mods is that some of them leave permanently if you kick them out of the party. Callisto is one example, who I'd hoped to use to replace the godawful Drizz't NPC as soon as the party came out of the Underdark and have the empty Imoen slot filled until we reach Imoen in Spellhold. My solution was to keep Callisto and my Bhaalspawn PC far away from each other, kick her out of the party, and then when she goes up to the Bhaalpsawn PC amd asks to eb taken back, then cast the imprisonment spell on her(my Bhaalspawn PC has something like -4 to casting speed so it's really quick). Then all I have to do, presumably, at a later stage, is to return to the relevant area Callisto was imprisoned and use the "freedom" spell on her, and she can then get back into the party.