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Critical hit aversion


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Long story short - which items will have this ability?

 

In my BGT install, I've granted it to several items :

 

Fortress Shield . I removed 10% resistance, and added critical hit aversion instead. Seems fitting imo.
- Pride of the Order - reward for Paladin Stronghold quests, only obtanaible by Paladins. They're tanky, and this allows for more tankiness.
- Bands of Focus - on Draconis. Usable by Monks and Kensais, and it's the only item which allows them to evade critical hits.
- Death Knight Armor - Demon Knights in Underdark. With IR, it's cursed and it does not allow Necromancy spells to be used on wearer, including beneficial spells. Usable by evil only.
- Enkidu's Plate - self-explenatory, this is the "ultimate" defensive armor in game. Saradush merchants.
- Thieves' hood (upgraded) - the only item which gives thieves this immunity.
- Horned Helm of the Rock (upgraded) - available at level 2 WK. Just so Barbarians can get this immunity as well.
None of these are available in BG1, and only Fortress Shield is available right off the bat. Toughts? Too little, too much, wrong item selection?
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Long story short - which items will have this ability?

 

In my BGT install, I've granted it to several items :

 

Fortress Shield . I removed 10% resistance, and added critical hit aversion instead. Seems fitting imo.
- Pride of the Order - reward for Paladin Stronghold quests, only obtanaible by Paladins. They're tanky, and this allows for more tankiness.
- Bands of Focus - on Draconis. Usable by Monks and Kensais, and it's the only item which allows them to evade critical hits.
- Death Knight Armor - Demon Knights in Underdark. With IR, it's cursed and it does not allow Necromancy spells to be used on wearer, including beneficial spells. Usable by evil only.
- Enkidu's Plate - self-explenatory, this is the "ultimate" defensive armor in game. Saradush merchants.
- Thieves' hood (upgraded) - the only item which gives thieves this immunity.
- Horned Helm of the Rock (upgraded) - available at level 2 WK. Just so Barbarians can get this immunity as well.
None of these are available in BG1, and only Fortress Shield is available right off the bat. Toughts? Too little, too much, wrong item selection?

 

It's not set in stone yet and we are facing a terrible dilemma, BG2EE does not support it. :( I was hoping to give it for granted and design a bunch of weapons around it, now I have instead to make sure those items are fine even without it (aka provide two different versions of those items).

 

Anyway the plan was to start with very few items:

- Enkidu's Armor

- Horned Helm of the Rock

- either Adventurer's Robe or Battlemage's one

 

We may extend it a little bit yes, but for some reason I would not give such feature to a shield. Anyway, have you already played a game with this new feature? I expect it to be a real game-changer, and I'd like to get some feedback on it.

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We may extend it a little bit yes, but for some reason I would not give such feature to a shield. Anyway, have you already played a game with this new feature? I expect it to be a real game-changer, and I'd like to get some feedback on it.

 

 

Yes, I'm at No-Reload thread (Aasim), so I post my (un)succesfull exploits there. What in game happens (especially BG1 portion) is that melee is unusable in some instances (Sarevok being the prime example), start of the game is significantly harder (Hobgoblins & Gnolls have extended crit range 19-20 and come in massess), Ankhegs can easilly kill even a >25 HP character dressed in full plate on a luckly critical. Ogre berserkers also have points in single-weapon style. Since in my install I granted berserkers +4 damage, -2 AC, THAC0 and breath saves automatically from level 2 (as opposed to use at will ability) you can imagine the pain these creatures bring in melee combat.

What this change does is also make mages or thieves an indispensable asset due to disables like Web and Fireball castings, to minimalize the threat of few connected criticals in a row. Summons are very valuable as well. Combat against 20 or so oponnents (which does happen in BG1) can get very ugly very quickly.

SoA is a bit easier, due to much higher HP pools so one can get critted and not get into a "near-death" territory. Dragons are forbidden until one gets some protection from criticals - too risky to tackle them.

ToB is undoable without CS aversion on front-liners (I only play single-classed warriors + vanilla NPCs), due to enemy use of CS HLA.

Personally, I'd grant aversion to one single BG1 item - Helm of Defense, since it's rather unused with IR (generic +1 to saves is much better in BG2 then in BG1, where saves are bad by default, and even in BG2, much better alternatives exist).

It would allow for meleeing Sarevok (he does approx 50 damage on crit, enough to kill in two hits), which would imo be a nice alternative to what I use now (mass summons + magic missiles + arrows of Acid).

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It's not set in stone yet and we are facing a terrible dilemma, BG2EE does not support it. :( I was hoping to give it for granted and design a bunch of weapons around it, now I have instead to make sure those items are fine even without it (aka provide two different versions of those items).

Say what!? :O I thought the engine was only improved and allowing more things to be externalised? This is a bit disheartening. I suppose BG1EE doesn't support it either?

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It's not set in stone yet and we are facing a terrible dilemma, BG2EE does not support it. :( I was hoping to give it for granted and design a bunch of weapons around it, now I have instead to make sure those items are fine even without it (aka provide two different versions of those items).

Say what!? :O I thought the engine was only improved and allowing more things to be externalised? This is a bit disheartening. I suppose BG1EE doesn't support it either?

 

Frankly, I have both EE1 and EE2 and still play the original, fwiw - I couldn't care less about EE,1 or 2. TobEx grants more customization than EE ever will.

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Kreso I know you don't value EE's much, but please don't discourage Demi to put a proper attention to both BGEE and BG2EE. There are, not so many, players (myself included) who will probably won't go back to vanilla, but would like to play IR/SR/KR VERY much:) Demi values your opinion very much, obviously, and I'm worried that it may affect his focus on EE conversion at some point. I usually don't stick my nose on something like this, but this only proves my anticipation for these mods. And no offence of course:)

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@Kreso, read your run. Nice! I'll try to follow it but as always if you want to catch my attention on something (e.g. MoD still performing too well, KR's Cavalier needing some refinements, etc.) it's best if you post your usual feedback in these forums. ;)

 

@Cahir, despite my dislike (actually it's outright hate) of what they did when it comes to new items, even the current IRv4 beta (the one Kreso is using) is already fully compatible with BGEE, and I will even do my best to redeem those terrible no-lore items they added.

 

On topic.

By "re-enabling criticals" I was indeed expecting players to be affected slightly more than AI, in particular against large hordes of mid-low lvl enemies, but I did not expected it to play a major role against single boss-like melee monsters (e.g. Sarevok, dragons, etc.). I thought the latter were a huge threat regardless of it, and that 5% chance to deal 2x dmg was just an additional but acceptable boost - game changing yes, but not game breaking.

 

Am I right assuming your first impression is that "re-enabling criticals" makes the game a bit too much hard without proper attention (e.g a good amount of items to protect crucial party members)?

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@Kreso, read your run. Nice! I'll try to follow it but as always if you want to catch my attention on something (e.g. MoD still performing too well, KR's Cavalier needing some refinements, etc.) it's best if you post your usual feedback in these forums. ;)

 

Ty. I don't know what run you've read (I've had a berserker in ToB, but he died as well, and a Cavalier, died yesterday.)

I'll post some feedback, including tweaks I made to balance/improve things out a bit in respective forums (IR/SR/KR) later today.

 

 

On topic.

By "re-enabling criticals" I was indeed expecting players to be affected slightly more than AI, in particular against large hordes of mid-low lvl enemies, but I did not expected it to play a major role against single boss-like melee monsters (e.g. Sarevok, dragons, etc.). I thought the latter were a huge threat regardless of it, and that 5% chance to deal 2x dmg was just an additional but acceptable boost - game changing yes, but not game breaking.

 

Am I right assuming your first impression is that "re-enabling criticals" makes the game a bit too much hard without proper attention (e.g a good amount of items to protect crucial party members)?

Well, come BG1, most numerous enemies have 10% crit chance, which is huge. If two connect in a round, it's usually over, and they indeed come in large packs (think Gnolls wielding halberds). Sarevok is a pain by itself, as are dragons, but seeing your HP drop by 30-50% in a single hit is a whole new level of anti-boss fighting.

What I don't really like about "cs aversion" in BG1 is that it makes melee combat (which I prefer for some unknown reason) very inconvinient in BG1 - you'll want bows, darts etc. on everyone even more than usual - BG1 favours ranged weapons anyway, and this tweak adds more incentive to use them.

Does it make the game too hard - I think that having cs aversion makes aquiring items granting it a "priority". For example, in my game I was "forced" to buy Fortress shield with first decent amount of money I had. I'm all in favour of removing cs aversion from Ioun stones, even most of the helmets, but I wouldn't take this overboard.

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Ty. I don't know what run you've read (I've had a berserker in ToB, but he died as well, and a Cavalier, died yesterday.)

I read the Cavalier run, I'll go back for the Berserker too as we do have unfinished business with that wonderful kit. ;)

 

I'll post some feedback, including tweaks I made to balance/improve things out a bit in respective forums (IR/SR/KR) later today.

Cool! I have almost no time today, and tonight I have guests at home too, but I swear to gods that tomorrow I will dedicate the entire day to Revisions mods (hoping to catch Arda and Mike online too).

 

CS Aversion

Got it. Making ranged combat even more prominent for BG1 doesn't sound good. :( Maybe the solution is somewhat between vanilla's "everyone is immune to CS" and this beta's "no one is safe". I'll discuss this with Arda and see how to handle the component, but I think we do suggested to have an option where we simply remove the immunity from ioun stones and stuff like that. The more radical option can be refined later after the release, with more playtesting (especially if there are players like you willing to try it out despite the current flaws). We'll simply have to decide which and how many items will protect from it.

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Ty. I don't know what run you've read (I've had a berserker in ToB, but he died as well, and a Cavalier, died yesterday.)

I read the Cavalier run, I'll go back for the Berserker too as we do have unfinished business with that wonderful kit. ;)

 

Unfortunately, all my Photobucket screenshots are blanked until 12th of June...so if you do want to read it, there are no photos to be seen - but I'll try another berserker soon.

 

 

CS Aversion

Got it. Making ranged combat even more prominent for BG1 doesn't sound good. :( Maybe the solution is somewhat between vanilla's "everyone is immune to CS" and this beta's "no one is safe". I'll discuss this with Arda and see how to handle the component, but I think we do suggested to have an option where we simply remove the immunity from ioun stones and stuff like that. The more radical option can be refined later after the release, with more playtesting (especially if there are players like you willing to try it out despite the current flaws). We'll simply have to decide which and how many items will protect from it.

 

BG2 works out nicely even with the few items I tweaked myself - nothing too early apart Fortress Shield (which must be bought and can't be used by all classes/kits); so criticals remain a danger for a quite long time.

Ioun stones should really go, afaik these float over head, they're not even "worn" in a strict sense. T-up for the "more radical option", but I'd definitely make each kit/class have at least one option apart mages, they really should have some kind of vulnerability throughut the game.

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What about my old suggestions - to make Full Plate Mail loose the +2 AC over Plate Mail, but provide immunity to Critical Hits (and even maybe Backstab)?

 

I can certainly add it as an ini option, albeit I'm skeptical about tp2.

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