[Not an issue] Strange L1NPC + BG2 interaction

[Elido]

This is a long post, if you have an issue with its length please don't read.

 

So, I've never played baldur's gate 1 or 2 before the last year, and having heard so much over the years, I finally bucked up and sat down to play it. Of course, I installed some of the most simple mods at the start of the experience (BGT, fixback, tweak back) in addition to very light edits with shadow keeper. The game and those mods were working just great and peachy after working my way around weidu and getting over some of it's clumsier aspects.

 

Mostly-useless story starts here

 

I started actually playing, but was pretty contented for a while, but of the eternal perfectionist, I noticed a variety of things irritated me, leading me to going back into my previously installed mods and readjusting settings. Higher HP on level up just felt power-gamey. Thieving in heavy armor, despite it's flaws, felt more appropriate to PnP intentions and added nice variety for my thief characters, and so on.

 

Then going further, I wanted more than to just alter the tweak pack, I wanted a general revamping to a large portion of the NPC characters I encountered. I don't care what people say, Minsc was only a ranger in the first game because they didn't have barbarian or berserker. His lore, attitude, and stats scream it to the heavens. Kivan needs that archer kit to feel right, he should definitely be better at range than Mr. Coran, who feels much more like a fighter/swashbuckler intended for some melee brusiery with added finesse, him being better at range than Kivan seemed strange from a lore perspective, and so on.

 

I had some issues when I was first installing level 1 NPCs, as some parts seemed a bit counter intuitive, but I mostly got through them just fine after a bit of trial and error. The first thing I noticed was just how many darn NPCs were in each game. Not being very familiar with them, this excited me in part (I love companions) but it also felt like a waste (I hadn't heavily looked into the game's characters or stories, and mostly wanted to discover most of it on my own), since you mostly won't be picking up the vast majority of companions in one given play-through.

 

I knew about the changes I wanted to make to Kivan, Montaron, Khalid, Minsc, Imoen, etc, so I skipped adding components for other NPCs I wasn't going to meet yet until I actually met them in game, and even then, if I was sure I wasn't going to be using them, then I surely wasn't going to install their components either. That's a decent amount of time spent into modding characters I haven't met, researched, or have a good feel for, and weidu seemed stable enough to go back and edit later with my experiences previously with BG2 Tweaks.

 

Meat of problem here

 

So, upon going back into level 1 NPCs (at this point, I had installed bg2 fix->BGT->UB1->UB2->Bg2 tweaks->lvl1NPCs), I skipped the optional components and any parts relating to baldur's gate 2, since I was still very early in BG1 portion of BGT. Upon saying "n," a couple of times, I got to Coran (my first changed character alphabetically) and it hadn't asked me if I wanted to change or uninstall the component, it just dropped me right into it as if I was installing or reinstalling. Luckily, I had been documenting all my changes and I reput the data, maybe thinking it didn't install quite right the first time and just reinstlaling the component would make weidu happy.

 

It proceeded to do this for every single NPC I had changed. I was forced into the screen without notification to alter the NPCs, which didn't seem like normal behavior. I just re-input the data, and moved on.

 

Later, I went back in (I had met an NPC I hadn't known much about before, and I was reverting to a save right before recruiting them because their stats felt inappropriate, (Garrick, 14 wisdom my *** you naive punk, among other things), and it kept rushing to different NPCs without prompting me to actually decide whether I wanted to alter it or not. This time, I just pressed "0," when the Khalid prompt came storming in, and it just completely exited Weidu after having apparently saving my progress up to that point, because Garrick was changed correctly. I shrugged and moved on, thinking it a decent bit more buggy than other mods I had been using but it hadn't created any problems (Yet).

 

My next journey into lvl1Npcs went a bit smoother, and for whatever reason, it was actually prompting me for evey BG1 NPC correctly and listening if I had told it :[N]o change," (it sometims forced me into it when saying "N," as well). It all went fast, I changed the few things I wanted, documented it in my .txt file, and then got to the end.

 

Strangely, I saw weidu doing a flurry of operations that seemed oddly familiar. It was running multiple parts of NPC tweaks at the end of lvl1NPCs. About half the mod. I waited a few dozen seconds, and it finally came to a close. Reading through it, it looked like no settings were actually changed from before, and it was uninstalling and re-installing a huge portion of the bs2 tweak back. I hoped it was fine, but upon entering the game, I noticed one thing right at the start: Helmets were visible. Checking a variety of things in game, most of anything related to the bg2 tweak pack seemed broken or missing.

 

I ran it again, trying to reinstall/fix whatever lvl1npcs did, and the first time I rank it, I went through the enormous list redoing every setting I had before after uninstalling all the files. Of course, at the end of this...it started running components and features from lvl1NPCs...

 

I just said screw it, exported and saved my character, and did a full uninstall/re-install, correctly this time. I didn't save any of the logs, and I chalked it up to installing something in the wrong order (I accidentally patched Bg2+throne of baal after I installed the fixpack), and went at it again. After going through all the mods again and redoing a new game, it all seemed to be going peachy for a while. I got a lot farther into the game, and going into lvl1NPCs, it generally seemed to respond well to the many changes I'd come and apply to it, seeing as how I was now meeting more NPCs and wanting to make them tweaked to whatever I saw was more appropriate for their character.

 

Over time, lvl1NPCs seemed to start to degrade. It started randomly getting me into editing a character again without asking me, though inputting "0," and telling it to not install the component seemed to work as intended and it would let me go on and keep editing as I saw fit. It occasionally then would, for whatever reason, bring up the last bits of the tweak pack (With me seeing options like "Kagain has a legal con of 19," and so on) but it didn't seem to be changing any of the tweak pack's actual files. I left it alone more, afraid to break it again because for whatever reason, lvl1NPC and my tweak pack seemed like it had a royal hard on for interacting with the bg2 tweak pack.

 

After a bit more modding, the integration between the two programs only got worse, so I decided to try out the Rogue Rebalancing at this point, seeing as how I was likely going to do a full reinstall anyway. This *really* made lvl1npcs unhappy. It basically reverted back to a lot of the same behavior as before, re running huge sections of bg2 tweaks for no apparent reason.

 

Now I'm on full re-install 6 total in the last week, and I'm starting to lose my patience. I'm trying another install where I am minimizing the amount of files that are touched by both mods (Not changing montoron to assassin with bg2 tweak pack, not changing any attributes of bg1+bg2 shared npcs, and so on).

 

What am I doing wrong? This doesn't seem like some excessive amount of mods, and from what I've seen, a lot of people run with far more than BG2 Fix+BGT+UB1+UB2+RR+BG2 Tweak+lvl1 NPC. I'm not going overboard, yet modifying lvl 1 NPCs much seems to make everything very unhappy. Is it not intended that you're able to go in and make many modifications to it? BG2 Tweak back, when it existed alone, never had issues even after quite a few edits to the settings (I was trying to play on Lan with friends and getting the settings exactly perfect and identical was important to avoid any potential syncing issues, we assumed). Is lvl 1 NPCs just intended that you more-or-less know exactly what you want every NPC to be ahead of time and designed so that you put that all in at once, and then don't touch it again? Due to the nature of the mod, and modding in general, i would have assumed not, but any repeated adjustments to the settings in faulty installations or not, seem to somehow corrupt it and its interaction with the BG2 Tweak back.

 

Modding is no unfamiliar territory for me, and I've been heavily modding and played modded versions of games for just about as long as PC games themselves have existed. It's not uncommon for me to mod more than actually play a game, especially at the start, but this is a frustrating amount of breakage considering how little I've changed and added. I didn't ever save the weidu logs, because I kept assuming the next go around, I'd somehow optimize my approach and avoid the conflict issues it's having with BG2 tweak pack, yet my last installation was straight to the letter by all measures I can think of.

 

This last attempt at minimizing all interactions and similar file changes is pretty much my last go around before I kinda drop the game. If it happens again, I'll snag the log of the next series of rewrites/conflicts/whatever, but for now..anyone have any insight? And again, sorry for the length, I wanted to be as thorough as possible describing the history and situation, and I'm sorry if I'm doing something really obviously wrong.

[Jarno Mikkola]

I noticed one thing right at the start: Helmets were visible. Checking a variety of things in game, most of anything related to the bg2 tweak pack seemed broken or missing.

Or you had installed a mod that later than the BG2 Tweakpacks that made all the helmets visible.

Yes, if you wish all the things you change, you need to practice a proper install order for you I suggest the BWS as you use the BGT, clean install practice, and after installing all the desirable mods, you of course need to start a new game, not load an old one.

 

The actual reason why you had the above problems is that the installation program weidu.exe actually needs to rebuild the data the game has every time you run it as you change change files you had changed before... had you installed the components in the proper order... you wouldn't have these problems...

Open the Weidu.log file with Notepad and see what kind of a mess you have made.

[Elido]

I noticed one thing right at the start: Helmets were visible. Checking a variety of things in game, most of anything related to the bg2 tweak pack seemed broken or missing.

Or you had installed a mod that later than the BG2 Tweakpacks that made all the helmets visible.

Yes, if you wish all the things you change, you need to practice a proper install order for you I suggest the BWS as you use the BGT, clean install practice, and after installing all the desirable mods, you of course need to start a new game, not load an old one.

 

The actual reason why you had the above problems is that the installation program weidu.exe actually needs to rebuild the data the game has every time you run it as you change change files you had changed before... had you installed the components in the proper order... you wouldn't have these problems...

Open the Weidu.log file with Notepad and see what kind of a mess you have made.

 

I'm unaware of the part where I installed them in the wrong order in my later attempts besides the first one, where I forgot to patch before installing the fixpack (I'm using discs+patch), which was me being distracted more than me being ignorant about the mod order, which is why I got it "Right," every other time I did it(unless you're counting the time I installed rogue rebalancing right before one of my reinstalls just to quickly look at some features in game, level 1 NPCs was already broken before that). According to the readme's of all the collective mods, and instructions from multiple sources, including the post on gog's site (which seems to be the main way people buy the game(s) anymore: http://www.gog.com/n...ate_from_gogcom), I installed them in the(a?) correct order.

Also, "Of course," I never used old save data for a clean install, I always successfully installed a clean new copy. Leftover files were never an issue, and on the issue of exporting, it was simplistic level 1 Paladin that I'd put in the characters folder every time I had a new install because I didn't wanna keep re rolling characters at the start, and I hate the default ones. That wouldn't get in the way at all, especially since no part of him was modded.

 

BG1->BG2->Latest Patch->BG2 Fixpack->BGT(So says the BGT readme here assuming no mega mods)->UB1->UB2->Rogue Rebalancing(instructed here at the RR compatibility guide)->BG2 Tweakpack(refer to RR compat. guide, it clearly says that the tweakpack should be installed after the rogue rebalancing)->Level 1 NPCs (Rouge rebalancing doesn't care about it's placement, and lvl 1 NPC's readme suggests putting it near or at the end of a mod installation order here).

 

Seeing as how that's what the collective of the readmes and forum posts I've read suggest, and I've not seen anything else anywhere to suggest me using a different order, you'd have to enlighten me further on what I did wrong. The only imaginable difference that's optional is swapping BG2 tweak packs and Level 1 NPCs, and neither of their readme's indicate some kind of pickyness regarding each other, and in two different installations I actually tried swapping the order and reached the same effect.

As far as the comment about the helmet animations go, I indicated the the only mod I installed after BG2 Tweak packs was level 1 NPCs. The helmets didn't immediately disappear after the installation, but only after I kept going back into level 1 NPCs to fiddle with my NPC selection and specifics, and no other mods that would conflict with the helmet animations were introduced when that big particularly happened. Unless somehow Level 1 NPCs messes with it, it certainly hasn't cropped up again in the other 2 times I installed level 1 NPCs after the Tweak back. I mentioned the Rogue Rebalancing pack a decent while later, which was the only other mod I added to the mod order later, in a complete different installation, and that never conflicted with the BG2 Tweak pack, I'm not sure why you'd assume I installed something after (besides level 1 NPCs) as that's clearly stated out...

 

I don't understand why I'd install BWS when I have no other mega mods present, and the BGT-weidu readme states that if you don't plan on using any mega mods, then you skip installing BWS.

 

So, thanks for your input and link, but in the future either 1) Please explain your reasoning behind a constructive criticism you have and provide some suggestions on how to fix it (Such as a list of a different mod install order that's more accurate) or 2) Please don't criticize. Someone just saying "You did it wrong," with no explanation as to what you did incorrectly is decently rude and doesn't really help, especially when I am using all the readme's from the mods I'm utilizing to guide my current order, with none of their instructions conflicting. You tossing a list of basic instructions I've been following all along, as evidenced with never complaining about any installation problems ... in addition to the criticism...ugh. =/ I admitted to any of my mistakes I made and detailed most of the steps I took to avoid any conclusion-jumping. Guess I failed.

[Jarno Mikkola]

BG1->BG2->Latest Patch->BG2 Fixpack->BGT(So says the BGT readme here assuming no mega mods)->UB1->UB2->Rogue Rebalancing(instructed here at the RR compatibility guide)->BG2 Tweakpack(refer to RR compat. guide, it clearly says that the tweakpack should be installed after the rogue rebalancing)->Level 1 NPCs (Rouge rebalancing doesn't care about it's placement, and lvl 1 NPC's readme suggests putting it near or at the end of a mod installation order here).

Hmm, when you installed the BG2 game; did you also first make sure the install folder didn't either exist & delete it if it did ? The reason for this is that when you use old mod installs and then uninstall the game, it leaves modified files to the game folder ... corrupting the clean install of the game.

 

The BWS is a good tool to give correct install order... not that you need it in this though.

But still you should show us your Weidu.log's content, as it can give clues on what happens during the installation phases ...

[Elido]

Hmm, when you installed the BG2 game; did you also first make sure the install folder didn't either exist & delete it if it did ? The reason for this is that when you use old mod installs and then uninstall the game, it leaves modified files to the game folder ... corrupting the clean install of the game.

 

The BWS is a good tool to give correct install order... not that you need it in this though.

But still you should show us your Weidu.log's content, as it can give clues on what happens during the installation phases ...

 

I've been modding for a while, and any files/folders left over can really hinder attempts to make a smooth playing experience. Since modding isn't part of the games literal install process, it's logical that it wouldn't actually delete the modded, additional files. It seems like that's more common in more modern games, but it's still not standard, so it's always something I'm checking out

 

I didn't ever save the weidu logs, because I kept assuming the next go around, I'd somehow optimize my approach and avoid the conflict issues it's having with BG2 tweak pack, yet my last installation was straight to the letter by all measures I can think of.

 

Like said above, I hadn't saved any of the logs, though rest assured I will this time. I was trying to rush through the modding process and whenever something broke, I just assumed I could somehow do it better again "Next time," it was only after the (apparently not) perfect installation. You can rest assured that when i I do it this next time, I'll save the log and post it here I've just never needed this much assistance on any modding project I've taken. And who knows, it'll probably be magically right and fine now that I'm looking to post stuff on it.