377 replies to this topic

[Alesia_BH]

Are you new to the forums? Interested in the No Reload Challenge, but a little overwhelmed? Maybe a little shy about posting in the thread? This is the place for you. The purpose of this thread is to give prospective No Reloaders a chance to introduce themselves, ask questions, seek advice, and prepare for their adventure. Think of this thread as an orientation and cocktail lounge all wrapped up into one. It's a place to learn and a place to schmooze. A place to prepare: A place to begin.

 

This thread will also serve as a technical support supplement to the No Reload Challenge. Do you need install guidance before you start? Has your active character encountered a bug? This is the place to ask for help. This is the place to get help. 

 

This is the place.

 

Good hunting everyone!

 

Best,

 

A.

[Grimwald the Wise]

I don't know if this question should come under this thread or not, but this is the question, does anyone know if there are any issues regarding Windows 10?

 

I haven't installed it yet and have windows 7, I would like to know if there are any issues before doing so.

[Serg BlackStrider]

I don't know if this question should come under this thread or not, but this is the question, does anyone know if there are any issues regarding Windows 10?

 

I haven't installed it yet and have windows 7, I would like to know if there are any issues before doing so.

AFAIK there are plenty of issues at the moment. Starting with screwed update routine and finishing with drivers problems. Personally, I'm going to wait at least a half year before switching (if at all...). It offers too little worth switching from Win 8.1 for me and even less so compared to Win 7 you have, in my opinion.

[Alesia_BH]

Hey, Wise! 

 

 

I don't use Windows, so I can't comment on you technical issue. Hopefully others will help.

 

I'll reply to your comment below.

 

I don't know if this question should come under this thread or not

 

Absolutely. You're a No Reloader seeking the assistance of other No Reloaders. That's what this thread it for. Questions like this are welcome.

 

I hope Serg's comment helped!

 

Good hunting!

 

Best,

 

A.

[corey_russell]

Wise - I don't know whether windows 10 will work for BG games or not. However, I would suggest waiting a bit more - the first Microsoft releases are often fraught with issues, and are often better if install later, when they've worked out the big bugs. I personally am holding off on upgrading - I have a lot of old programs, which are working on windows 7, I use my computer for my apps, not the OS.

[Grimwald the Wise]

I have been trying to download Imoen as conjurer which I have used in the past and found it to be an excellent mod, not just for the obvious reasons.

 

Available at Sorceror's Place.

 

However Norton won't let me download it.

 

I get this message:

 

 

Firstly, is there a genuine problem?

 

I know that Norton is renowned for false positives.

 

Secondly, if there is not a problem, I presume that all I have to do is temporarily disable Norton?

[Grond0]

You should be able to ignore the advice and go to the site if you want - see the continue to site anyway message in your screenshot.  I have a vague memory of coming across this problem a few years ago and concluding that it was a false positive, but don't take that as gospel.

[corey_russell]

I agree with Grond0 - Norton is renowned for false positives - they just don't know what they are talking about with niche things like Baldur's Gate. My Software company I work for, our software also incorrectly gets flagged by Norton. You should be able to proceed just fine.

[Grimwald the Wise]

I thought as much. Norton kept on deleting Konalan's tweaks too,

 

I have stopped them doing that at last.

[GrimJim]

I've upgraded from Windows 8.1 to 10 and haven't really noticed much difference, for better or for worse. BG2 still runs just fine at least. I don't know if there's much reason to upgrade if you're happy with your current setup.

 

I'm going to put together a big post about the issues we've discovered with an Ascension + SCS v30 install. Which would be preferable: instructions on how to modify the SCS installer to avoid the bugs or a WeiDU mod that fixes the bugs after SCS is installed? I can include both, but which would you rather use?

[corey_russell]

I don't use SCS for various reasons that we don't need to go into (though I will probably try it again someday), but sounds like that's a great thing you're doing there Jim. Hopefully the regular SCS players will chime in soon.

 

On a different note, how is it the web site says you've only done two posts? You've done far more than that, you documented a run even... odd.

[Alesia_BH]

I've upgraded from Windows 8.1 to 10 and haven't really noticed much difference, for better or for worse. BG2 still runs just fine at least. I don't know if there's much reason to upgrade if you're happy with your current setup.

 

I'm going to put together a big post about the issues we've discovered with an Ascension + SCS v30 install. Which would be preferable: instructions on how to modify the SCS installer to avoid the bugs or a WeiDU mod that fixes the bugs after SCS is installed? I can include both, but which would you rather use?

 

It's great to hear from you Grim Jim!

 

I was hoping you'd show up in this thread (In fact, that's one of the reasons I created it  )

 

A post on debugging SCS v30/Ascension would be most welcome.

 

Assuming there aren't any practical technical reasons to prefer one approach over the other, a Weidu mod sounds more convenient. I trust your judgement though. You can share both, share one, share both and highlight one- do whatever makes the most sense to you.

 

Once again, It's great to hear from you!

 

Best,

 

A.

[Alesia_BH]

@Blackraven. We can continue the discussion of the balancing of ATweaks fiends here. Take a peak at the read me file. Note all the abilities, but note also the basic combat stats: THAC0, Hit Dice, HP, etc. They're just not tough enough -just not beefy enough- for BG2. They need SCS stats else they'll just be nixed before they can do anything interesting.

 

http://avenger981.gi...html#PnP_Fiends

 

Installing the SCS Fiends, installing ATweks, and then ATweakes fiend option 3 at install may work: that should basically give you ATweaks abilities with SCS stats.

 

 

Best,

 

A.

[Serg BlackStrider]

 Installing the SCS Fiends, and then using option 3 at install may work: that should basically give you ATweaks abilities with SCS stats.

I just looked through the readme more thoroughly and now I think you are right. I've thought before that option 3 will only change their scripts, i.e. behavior, while their abilities (combat and spell-like) will remain as SCS' ones. Seems I was wrong...

Than again, if their abilities will be aTweaks-like in that case then Balors will vorpal as in aTweaks (without save) and I've thought that was not you were looking for (or like in aTweaks Balors).

Am I misunderstand something? 

 

edit:

About straight ATweaks Fiends + Fiendish Gating. I like it so far. My warriors got DB/GDB not too early to be an issue during SoA. And I'm pretty fond of Fiendish Gating. It adds a thrill in combat. But now, if option 3 is working as you said, I think, I'll try it next time, i.e. SCS stats (THAC0, Hit Dice, HP, resistances, saving throws), aTweaks abilities (combat and spell-like) and Fiendish Gating, that's it.

[Alesia_BH]

I just looked through the readme more thoroughly and now I think you are right. I've thought before that option 3 will only change their scripts, i.e. behavior, while their abilities (combat and spell-like) will remain as SCS' ones. Seems I was wrong...

 

It's a little confusing. I believe your current understanding is correct. That's the impression that Aasim gives in his runs, at least, and it's also consistent with the Read Me.

 

 

Than again, if their abilities will be aTweaks-like in that case then Balors will vorpal as in aTweaks (without save) and I've thought that was not you were looking for (or like in aTweaks Balors).

 

Am I misunderstand something? 

 

I'm not fond of the vorpal without a save. But I don't see that as a reason to ditch ATweaks altogether. I could always tweak the balor weapon to offer a save v death at -4, if it bothered me.

 

I'd like to at least try SCS Fiends + ATweaks options 3. It has the potential to be interesting. I may get the rich details and beauty of the ATweaks fiends combined with the beefiness of SCS fiends. It may work out nicely- even if I have my doubts. We'll see. 

 

Best,

 

A.

[Alesia_BH]

 

About straight ATweaks Fiends + Fiendish Gating. I like it so far.

 

Noted. I may use the console to enable gating. I'm just concerned that it will make a mess of Watcher's Keep and the Throne.

 

It definitely would have been manageable thus far.

 

 

 But now, if option 3 is working as you said, I think, I'll try it next time, i.e. SCS stats (THAC0, Hit Dice, HP, resistances, saving throws), aTweaks abilities (combat and spell-like) and Fiendish Gating, that's it.

 

 

That's the combination that Aasim uses. It tends to give him grief, as I'm sure you've noticed, but that may be due to his use of IR/SR and the restrictions he employs. Maybe it isn't that bad?

 

Again, I'm just worried that it would wreck Watcher's Keep and the Throne.

 

Best,

 

A. 

[Serg BlackStrider]

That's the combination that Aasim uses. It tends to give him grief, as I'm sure you've noticed, but that may be due to his use of IR/SR and the restrictions he employs. Maybe it isn't that bad?

The one should try it himself, I presume, to gave a fair judgement - if you never try you'll never know. 

BTW, I have a question - am I right that SCS creatures are marked with DW# prefix in NearInfinity? I need to know so I can check what stats those Fiends have in SCS. 

[Alesia_BH]

The one should try it himself, I presume, to gave a fair judgement - if you never try you'll never know. 

 

 

Exactly. 

 

 

BTW, I have a question - am I right that SCS creatures are marked with DW# prefix in NearInfinity? I need to know so I can check what stats those Fiends have in SCS. 

 

 

Yes. I think they're almost all marked DW#.

 

Best,

 

A. 

[Alesia_BH]

@Grim Jim. What about Spell Shield in v30? Can we fix that?

 

The GoI/Spell Shield/Spell Thrust interaction? The Spell Protection/Spell Shield/Breach interaction? The Spell Shield/Wish/Spell Protection interaction? Mordy D failing to take down Spell Shield? And, of less significance, Imoen keeping her Spell Shield when she becomes the Slayer at the Throne?

 

Aasim made some progress, but there's still ground to cover.

 

Best,

 

A.

[GrimJim]

I don't use SCS for various reasons that we don't need to go into (though I will probably try it again someday), but sounds like that's a great thing you're doing there Jim. Hopefully the regular SCS players will chime in soon.

Thanks. I figured if I'm spending so much time debugging my own game, I may as well share the results.

On a different note, how is it the web site says you've only done two posts? You've done far more than that, you documented a run even... odd.

My old account had a, uh, accident. This is a new one.

@Grim Jim. What about Spell Shield in v30? Can we fix that?
 
The GoI/Spell Shield/Spell Thrust interaction? The Spell Protection/Spell Shield/Breach interaction? The Spell Shield/Wish/Spell Protection interaction? Mordy D failing to take down Spell Shield? And, of less significance, Imoen keeping her Spell Shield when she becomes the Slayer at the Throne?
 
Aasim made some progress, but there's still ground to cover.
 
Best,
 
A.

Those things are probably a bit beyond what I'm capable of right now. I only just started learning WeiDU modding and the fixes I have so far are relatively simple.

Anyway, my big post and WeiDU fixes will be coming soon. I just want to spend a little more time testing.

[Alesia_BH]

Anyway, my big post and WeiDU fixes will be coming soon. I just want to spend a little more time testing.

 

Awesome!

 

Best,

 

A.

[Jabberwock]

So another game ending bug. This time at least I have a better screenshot, although I'm not sure if it is the same bug as before (didn't get black portaits this time):

 

 

The combat log shows something with charname's name dying, but it's not charname (who can be seen to be fully healthy and buffed). It's some sort of invisible creature/bug that has the same name. I've seen it before, e.g. here:

 

 

The creature/bug is by the shadow dragon, and one can see the level drains hitting it (which are not hitting actual charname, as can be seen by the fact that he is negative plane protected and not drained). At the shadow dragon fight when I held tab it showed a nameless creature which was what seemed to be getting hit and showing up with charname's name in the combat log.

 

In the fight with Lavok, shortly after I saw the death message and screenshotted (i.e. few seconds) I was shown the gameover screen with charname at 0 hp. I don't believe charname was vulnerable (also I was looking at Lavok and watching his casting), and I would speculate that invisible/bug charname's death got transfered to charname. I'm kind of at a loss, and it makes me want to stop using EE for no-reload runs...

 

Ugh. I guess I'll probably continue but at best unhappily.

[Jabberwock]

Update: It's not the duplicate charname it's fireshield, reproducible. 

 

The duplicate charname thing is also reproducible, and occurs at least in some circumstances when I cast ruby ray against certain mages. For instance, if Edwin RR's Tolgerias fully buffed, I will shortly thereafter get a charname death message in the combat log from Tolgerias's fireshield. But charname is fine and this isn't the source of the death above. The death above almost certainly comes from a fireshield chain reaction which almost just killed charname while I was testing trying to reproduce the invisible duplicate charname bug.

 

Basically, when charname hits a fireshielded mage while fireshielded himself, it sometimes triggers charname's fireshield AGAINST the mage (i.e. the damage from the mage's fireshield is triggering charname's fireshield, which then hurts the mage). Sometimes, an endless loop occurs, dealing damage until someone dies. Here is an example against Tolgerias, where he lost the loop battle:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the above, charname escaped after losing ~ 100 hps. In the fight with Lavok, Lavok of course has infinite hp because he has min1hp (or possible charname just lost the dice rolls) and that was that.

 

I think I haven't run into this bug earlier because charname has only very recently regained his fighter levels, and prior to that had no mage levels. Anyhow, investigating further.

 

Edit:

 

Here is polytope describing the same bug earlier in the thread:

 

http://forum.bioware...9#entry15818267

[Alesia_BH]

Jabberwock, I'm sorry to hear about your issues.

 

The fire shield collision is fairly well understood. The duplicate Charname is bizarre though. I'd like to learn more about that. I don't really understand what's going on.

 

Can anyone else offer perspective on the duplicate phenomenon. This is unique to EE, I assume? Has anyone else seen this?

 

Best,

 

A.

[GrimJim]

Known Issues in an Ascension + SCS v30 Install and Some Known Fixes

This post contains two methods of fixing the listed bugs. First, you can modify the SCS installer. To benefit from the fix you will then have to reinstall the relevant SCS component. With the exception of the Reflection Shield bug, all of the relevant components are late in the SCS install order so reinstalling them should not take long. Doing things this way shouldn't negatively affect a game in progress, but to be safe you may wish to wait until you start a new game.

I've also created small WeiDU mod that fixes the majority of issues in this post and one vanilla bug related to the spell Sunfire. It can be found here. It should be installed after all of your chosen SCS components. The same warning for modifying the installer applies here as well, except that you do not have the reinstall any SCS components. You should either modify the installer or use my mod. Doing both should not cause any catastrophes, but it is not necessary either.

TobEx Issues
1. SCS intends to make it so that spells with an area of effect bypass Mirror Images. However, this functionality is broken in the version of TobEx that comes bundled with SCS. To fix this, you must manually install the latest version of TobEx. 

2. Even with the latest version of TobEx, there is a bug that can cause Blade Barrier or Globe of Blades to trigger extremely rapidly while the game is paused. To fix this, go to your BG2 folder and open up /Tobex_ini/TobExCore.ini in a text editor. Go to line 38, which should originally read

Cast Spell On Condition Mod=1

Replace with 1 with a 0.

3. TobEx is intended to allow you to place Spell Immunity into Contingencies and Triggers. However, this functionality is not enabled by default. To fix this, you can use NearInfinity to open up contingx.2da. Replace SPWI510 with **** .

Flame Arrows and the Reflection Shield
In vanilla, the Reflection Shield reflects the mage spell Flame Arrow. SCS mages are scripted to act as if this is the case. However, with the "Make Protection from Normal Missiles affect some magical projectiles" component, the Reflection Shield does not actually reflect Flame Arrow.

To fix the installer:
Go to your BG2 folder and open up /stratagems/spell/pro_normal_missiles.tpa in a text editor. After this line

LAF edit_spell STR_VAR spell=WIZARD_FLAME_ARROW editstring=~patch_ability_inline=>"projectile=>%dw#flam%"~ END

Add these lines

COPY_EXISTING ~shld24.itm~ ~override~
LPF ADD_ITEM_EQEFFECT INT_VAR opcode = 197 target = 1 parameter2 = (~%dw#flam%~ - 1) timing = 2 END
BUT_ONLY

Abazigal and Tamah
In previous versions of Ascension + SCS, when Abazigal turned in to a dragon he would also spawn a purple dragon named Tamah. In SCS v30, Tamah does not appear if you have installed the Smarter Abazigal component. Abazigal also has the wrong script which may make him unreasonably difficult to kill for some parties.

To fix the installer:

Go to your BG2 folder and open up /stratagems/ascension/abazigal_dragon.tpa in a text editor. Beginning at line 3, add these lines.

ACTION_IF FILE_EXISTS_IN_GAME ~abazdg02.cre~ BEGIN
OUTER_SPRINT ~sslvariables~ ~%sslvariables%~^~&IsAscension=True~
END

Then, after line 23, which should be inside a MAKE_PATCH block, add the following line.

swap_script=>~abazdrag=>dragblue~

Credit to Mad Mate on the Gibberlings 3 forum for this fix.

Irenicus at the Throne
A scripting glitch causes Irenicus to be completely harmless during the opening fight at the Throne of Bhaal if you have the component that adds SCS AI to him.

To fix the installer:

Go to your BG2 folder and open up /stratagems/ascension/ssl/finiren.ssl in a text editor. Go to line 82, which should initially be

ReallyForceSpell(Myself,WIZARD_MISLEAD)

Replace that line with

ReallyForceSpellRES("%WIZARD_MISLEAD_INSTANT%",Myself)

Credit to Aasim for this fix and credit to Alesia_BH for noticing the bug, along with the Sunfire bug.

Fallen Solar Entourage
In the original Ascension version of the first fight at the Throne of the Bhaal, you must fight two Fallen Solars. As of SCS v25, the Smarter Celesitals Component causes both of these Fallen Solars to additionally spawn with two Mariliths, a Succubus, and an Alu-fiend. While it has not been officially confirmed, there is significant evidence to suggest that these extra demons are unintentional.

To fix the installer:

Go to your BG2 folder and open up /stratagems/celestial/celestial.tpa in a text editor. On lines 96 and 97, you should see this:

LAF install STR_VAR file="finsol04.baf" location=resource END
LAF extend STR_VAR script=finsol04 bottom=dw#solar location=ssl ssl=yes END

Replace them with

ACTION_IF FILE_EXISTS_IN_GAME ~finsolar.cre~ THEN BEGIN
COPY_EXISTING ~dw#solar.bcs~ ~override/finsol04.bcs~
END
ELSE BEGIN
LAF install STR_VAR file="finsol04.baf" location=resource END
LAF extend STR_VAR script=finsol04 bottom=dw#solar location=ssl ssl=yes END
END

Edited by GrimJim, 24 February 2016 - 07:59 PM.