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[spoilers] [closed] EET Fixpack not needed


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Questions to your fixes:

- Drake, would not that be better fixed by the mod instead external?

- kidnapping scene, where do you restore that from?

Drake

In principle, yes. This was a special case because the mod appears in part1 of the EET Compatibility list,i.e. it is a mod without native EET compatibility installed in BGEE and imported and made compliant by EET itself.

 

Anyway, I re-checked the mod download and current version now includes the missing code. It is removed.

Thanks for the reminder.

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Questions to your fixes:

- Drake, would not that be better fixed by the mod instead external?

- kidnapping scene, where do you restore that from?

 

Mae'Var

Short answer "From BGT"

 

If you never played classic game this way, then you may need the long answer:

 

 

The kidnapping scene did not exist in the original game BG1 or BG2. One ended with Sarevok's death and the movie where his body dissolves and the *essence* goes down into the abyss. Player then would eject the game CD and insert the BG2 CD into their drive and start a second game. It starts with a movie you can still watch today.

With console do:

C:Eval('StartMovie("Intro15f")')

Halfway through you see shadowy creatures kidnap the player who then wakes up in the initial dungeon known today as Chateau Irenicus.

That is all that classic vanilla game provided.

 

BGT (Baldurs Gate Trilogy) was something like EET is today for the new generation.

BGT allowed you to transition from BG1 to BG2 without all the above operations. For this purpose, after the Sarevok death movie you walked back too the Ducal Palace (or you did some other BG1 stuff (see this post http://gibberlings3.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=29338&hl=) and talked to Duke Belt who would send you to Amn.

You were now teleported to a transition area (famous ARAM000.are) where a long technical operation transferred your party and some equipment to Amn, cleaned up your diary and similar.

Finally you saw a cutscene with six party members being unconscious and some shadow thieves appearing to pick you up.

They exchanged those lines:

Q: We have incapacitated them all, Mae'Var. What should be done now?

A: Take them all back to Amn. Our client awaits.

 

Now, with BGEE and the addition of SoD, the original game was extended, Famous ARAM000.are became BD6100,are and the BGT cutscene was adopted. You see a shortened version of above movie

C:Eval('StartMovie("sodcin05")')

 

Afterwards the ambush of the shadow thieves is shown (EET restores the full planned scene for SoD, see the EET readme by K4thos https://rawgit.com/K4thos/EET/master/EET/readme-EET.html).

 

BUT the dialogue was changed

- Does the child of Bhaal still live?

- They all do. For the moment.

- Load them onto the cart, quickly. I want us on the road south in no more than five minutes. Our client is anxious to have his prize.

 

The *restoration* takes both versions into account by changing the second line of the NEW dialogue to

"They all do, Mae'Var. For the moment."

 

This is in line with what players know since more than a decade from BGT and what is fully consistent with the BG2 content, e.g. the dialogues with Aran, Mae'Var and Renal. In addition, it has been used in a number of mod events in BG2 part of EET.

 

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Thanks @Roxanne for that trip into history.

I played BGT some times and I remember those events. I always thought Mae'Var was the kidnapper and always was afraid he would remember that during the Aran quest. It made me feel good to kill him in the end.

I did not notice that in the new game the thieves had different lines. Maybe with old memory you still think the boss there is Mae'Var.

 

 

Edited by Lem Icebear
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Thanks @Roxanne for that trip into history.

I played BGT some times and I remember those events. I always thought Mae'Var was the kidnapper and always was afraid he would remember that during the Aran quest. It made me feel good to kill him in the end.

I did not notice that in the new game the thieves had different lines. Maybe with old memory you still think the boss there is Mae'Var.

 

 

It was interesting for me as well when I did that research for the fix.

Until I started searching for the original line to restore it and not finding it in EE, I was thinking it was original game stuff, it just fit in perfectly.

I had to unearth the old game with BGT install (only version I still have since I lost the CDs) to finally find it. When the only source appeared to be ARAM000.bcs, i.e. the big BGT transition script, it finally dawned on me.

 

I was still considering whether a line introduced by a mod would justify that status, but my argument is that the EE game itself (or its SoD team) made this reference by adopting the BGT ambush scene.

Edited by Roxanne
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But wait, then why doesn't Maevar remember you? I mean I kind of get why the BGT modders chose him, he's a bad dude and it gives you a little tickle of foreshadowing.

 

But 1) he doesn't acknowledge it at all when you meet him; and 2) he's a shadow thief, and not long after you are kidnapped, the shadow thieves are at war with Irenicus.

 

Frankly I kind of think it would work better if it was implied that Saemon Havarian did it...

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But wait, then why doesn't Maevar remember you? I mean I kind of get why the BGT modders chose him, he's a bad dude and it gives you a little tickle of foreshadowing.

 

But 1) he doesn't acknowledge it at all when you meet him; and 2) he's a shadow thief, and not long after you are kidnapped, the shadow thieves are at war with Irenicus.

 

Frankly I kind of think it would work better if it was implied that Saemon Havarian did it...

The shadow thieves under Aran and Renal are at war with Irenicus and Bodhi - not those of Mae'Var who decided to play his own game while his masters are in trouble.Did you notice that Bodhi and her vampires (former shadow thieves from Aran) only attack that guild but not Mae'Var's (and later yours if you take over the guild).?

 

Iamgine the scene: Mae'Var makes a deal with a hooded man, *Get me those six people you find in the clearing west of Baldur's Gate. Deliver them to Athkatla within a day. Here's 4000GP. Another 6000GP when I have my prey.". No names given, no questions asked, like in a Gangster movie.

They nauseate you with some spells in the dark, they put you into large sacks and carry you to Amn. You are nothing but cargo, your identity and why Irenicus wants you are of no interest. Nobody takes a portrait with his mobile phone and posts it on the Shadow Thieves' website. Most likely Mae'Var never saw your face.He appears on the scene to co-ordinate the operation after his men already captured you.

But even if he saw you, why should he care when you turn up in Amn. You were capable of escaping that mage, fine. Why bother. It the mage wants you back he needs to pay a second time. As long as YOU do not confront Mae'Var with the fact that you may know, why should he tell you. He has no personal issues with you, and his deal with Irenicus is history, he has no obligation to bring you back to him.

 

Saemon does not have Shadow Thieves in his service. He is far too clever to interfere with Renal&Co. The only other potential thieves are those from Baldur's Gate, but unlikely they are still capable to act after the events in their town, and more unlikely that they would bring you to Amn. And Irenicus by that time is located in Athkatla, so he would hire the locals.

 

So it is a logical choice. But what is more important is the fact that a whole generation of players who used BGT are aware of that version. Bringing in some new name makes little sense.

Edited by Roxanne
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I mean yeah, of course you can tell a story to explain it; not suggesting otherwise. It's just a bit too coincidental, and I don't see what the story gains from that coincidence. Whereas, if it takes me out of the game later when I meet Maevar, giving me a moment wondering "hey, why doesn't this guy remember me? Hmm, I guess I'll explain it to myself that he somehow never saw my face when he abducted me..." then there is a definite cost for adding that coincidence.

 

Whether that cost is worth it, people will decide for themselves. Just not sure I see it as a "fix." It seems like the Unfinished Business mods, where editorial deletions are restored while still acknowkedging that the content was originally deleted intentionally.

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I mean yeah, of course you can tell a story to explain it; not suggesting otherwise. It's just a bit too coincidental, and I don't see what the story gains from that coincidence. Whereas, if it takes me out of the game later when I meet Maevar, giving me a moment wondering "hey, why doesn't this guy remember me? Hmm, I guess I'll explain it to myself that he somehow never saw my face when he abducted me..." then there is a definite cost for adding that coincidence.

 

Whether that cost is worth it, people will decide for themselves. Just not sure I see it as a "fix." It seems like the Unfinished Business mods, where editorial deletions are restored while still acknowkedging that the content was originally deleted intentionally.

The only one to answer this would be K4thos. As the readme for EET explains, he tried to restore as much as possible from the originally planned transition scene for SoD which by itself was based on the BGT transition. At which step which line was lost or revised only those involved would know since these files are not somewhere in the game vaults, we cannot unearth them in UB fashion.

I treated it as a fix, because it is something that was there before but now is missing - so different from the things that were never released.

Edited by Roxanne
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It's still not a fix but a tweak.

 

Don't get me wrong, I am all for the "Mae'Var did it" version and am working with it in my private mods, but it's not a fix if it's not restored from broken game content. Saying that the SoD transition scene is based in the BGT one is also only an assumption considering it's both more or less a direct visualisation of what is described in the BGII intro - if it's an ambush of hooded figures who make the group unconscious and bring them to Athkatla there is not so many ways this could play out in detail.

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It's still not a fix but a tweak.

 

Don't get me wrong, I am all for the "Mae'Var did it" version and am working with it in my private mods, but it's not a fix if it's not restored from broken game content. Saying that the SoD transition scene is based in the BGT one is also only an assumption considering it's both more or less a direct visualisation of what is described in the BGII intro - if it's an ambush of hooded figures who make the group unconscious and bring them to Athkatla there is not so many ways this could play out in detail.

I would agree to you if we talk about vanilla content. But we talk here specifically about EET, i.e. a mod in itself.

To be even more precise, we talk about bd6100.bcs. as used by EET. The creatures in the cutscene are clearly identified as "Shadow Thief" BDfinal1....5.cre and one of them is the one referred to as Mae'Var

 

And I am saying that the EET transition owes to BGT in many ways, as it was that scene in ARAM000.bcs that introduced the concept of the final transition party that makes it into Irenicus Dungeon regard less of who was in your final party while you still had active control of the game yourself. This is more than just a *visualisation of the movie*. For me this stands as an influential factor of how players have perceived the game for a long time The impact is so strong that the new official version of the game picked it up and reunites you with that transition party. It is a development that has gone beyond the classic game and it is also some credit the developers pay to the modders who kept the game alive for so long. It should not be watered down now but honored.

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All fine and well, but EET is a continuous way to play BG1-SoD-BGII. The abduction scene at the end is activated hidden content of SoD (sort of SoD ub which makes more sense for EET where there actually is a transition).

 

Adding lines to it is a tweak, not a fix, no matter how much you think the reference should be in there.

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I think it's a perfectly fine idea, as a mod. It just seems out of place for something included in EET proper. (As was implied in an earlier post, I think.)

 

Unless k4thos wants to do that kind of editorializing, in which case, it's his project so I would defer to his preferences. This is just my 2 cents on the matter.

 

As for what Roxanne wants to do in a mod she makes: that's entirely up to her.

Edited by subtledoctor
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