12 réponses à ce sujet

[Heals.like.Jesus]

I will be a Tactics Anti-Paladin. Ill be facing untold cheeses, so I might as well play a cheesy class.
The
biggest issue which has stopped me from starting the game for a whole
day now is: should i Go for a human AP and dual to either mage or thief,
or go Half orc pure class.

If I am to dual, it will be at level
13. I will be using a corrupted Soul Reaver+6 version of Carsomyr
courtesy of the item upgrade mod, so that this beautiful weapon's 50 MR
wouldnt go to waste.
Also, how does the dispel on hit on the sword
work with the AP's own dispel on hit? Does it dispel 2 buffs per attack,
or what is the deal with that?

The party will be valen,
solaufein, viconia as a fighter/cleric, whatever sorcerer i pick from
kelsey, tashia or adrian and the last spot will go to what I call
"debuff monkey" its a dual or multi classed wizard whose entire
spellbook is dedicated to breaching, piercing, dispeling,hasting and
staying alive. Normally that role is filled by jansen untill i get ahold
of Imoen.

Sequencers and continggencies are a big issue too. So
far i just stick 2 pierce magics in them + 1 breach (or similarily
themed anti-magic) and use them for exploding enemy mages before they
can figure out whats going on, which doesnt seem like an optimum way to
fill them.
I will be doing the tactics, chosen of Cyric and solaufein challenges, so thats something to plan around.

One
thing to mention is that i dont have Spell Revisions installed, as I
did not feel like getting to know and planning around an entirely
diferent magic system.

Normally at high level special encounters
what i do with my arcane spell casters is: blow all avaiable tiem stop+
dragon breaths, then proceed to focus on survival, as most mod scripted
Ai goes tooth and nail for the mages.

I really feel like i could be doing more with them.

So this is it. Id welcome any and all tips on how to handle this.

[polytope]

Heals.like.Jesus wrote...
Also, how does the dispel on hit on the sword
work with the AP's own dispel on hit? Does it dispel 2 buffs per attack,
or what is the deal with that?

It's been years since I played Tactics but the anti-paladin's dispel on hit ability removes all dispellable effects, so using a carsomyr like dispelling weapon is unnecessary - he might as well dual wield. Anti paladin's can even dispel the protections of a mage protected from magic weapons by hitting him with a normal weapon.

Honestly, if what you're looking for is a really challenging game I can't recommend playing an AP (especially an AP-> mage dual) and I'd think twice about using certain items Tactics introduces - the acid kensai's sword and the preserving boots from the ritual are both really gamebreaking.

In my experience this is the problem with a lot of "tactical" mods, they give such unbalancing items and/or kits as to spoil the supposed challenge of the tougher battles, a sort of vicious circle of cheese. This is why I prefer SCS, it adds very little new resources to the game world, it just forces you to be creative with what you have.

Heals.like.Jesus wrote...
Sequencers and continggencies are a big issue too. So
far i just stick 2 pierce magics in them + 1 breach (or similarily
themed anti-magic) and use them for exploding enemy mages before they
can figure out whats going on, which doesnt seem like an optimum way to
fill them.

...

Normally at high level special encounters
what i do with my arcane spell casters is: blow all avaiable tiem stop+
dragon breaths, then proceed to focus on survival, as most mod scripted
Ai goes tooth and nail for the mages.

I really feel like i could be doing more with them.So this is it. Id welcome any and all tips on how to handle this.

Yeah, that's how I use my mages and it's quite succesful with SCS2; mages are good for a brief burst of debuffing/nuking and apart from that most of their efforts go toward protecting themselves. The problem's not winning fights at high levels so much as surviving to high levels IMO.  

Modifié par polytope, 16 décembre 2013 - 12:35 .

[Heals.like.Jesus]

In my experience this is the problem with a lot of "tactical" mods, they give such unbalancing items and/or kits as to spoil the supposed challenge of the tougher battles, a sort of vicious circle of cheese. This is why I prefer SCS, it adds very little new resources to the game world, it just forces you to be creative with what you have.

I really get what you are saying. First time i played through "The Ritual" I ended with around 3 copies of aforementioned boots. It was obvious they were inserted to help you strategically deal with the very specific ritual challenge, but when all is said and done, you KEEP the powerful encounter-specific items you were given, which utterly destroys normal encounters of a similar nature. For example Chosen of Cyric couldnt do diddly-squat to me on account of the boots and thats supposed to be a tough fight.

Modifié par Heals.like.Jesus, 16 décembre 2013 - 03:05 .

[Matuse]

I've never understood why people like Tactics. It's an incredibly poor mod. The difficulty increases it applies are totally arbitrary (after the 20th time of having a giant ambush party of level 20 NPCs pop up on my party in the middle of the street, you'd think whoever was sending them would get the idea that they aren't working), and the new items it provides are completely game-breaking. It's just an exercise in frustration and annoyance rather than providing any real challenge or involving tactics.

I selectively install a tiny number of mods from it, but 90% adheres slavishly to Sturgeon's law and stays in the garbage can where it belongs.

[Heals.like.Jesus]

Matuse wrote...

I've never understood why people like Tactics. It's an incredibly poor mod. The difficulty increases it applies are totally arbitrary (after the 20th time of having a giant ambush party of level 20 NPCs pop up on my party in the middle of the street, you'd think whoever was sending them would get the idea that they aren't working), and the new items it provides are completely game-breaking. It's just an exercise in frustration and annoyance rather than providing any real challenge or involving tactics.

I selectively install a tiny number of mods from it, but 90% adheres slavishly to Sturgeon's law and stays in the garbage can where it belongs.

Thats not really fair. You get around 8 or so ambushes in the normal game. Would you preffer to keep getting ambushed by slavers with a leather armors and nonmagical shortswords even though at that point you look like you raided Tempus' personal armory, or that similar level party which actually has a slim chance of not getting slain in passing without as much as looking their way.

You can always make an arbitrary decision not to use the mods items outside their  intended enviroment, just as I decided not to use aformentioned boots in the chosen of Cyric encounter. Planning  around those challenges causes frustration, but you wont be frustrated, unless you are struggling and you struggle because those are fights you cant simply stampede over. Which equals a challenge.

On the topic;
I wonder: If i dual the antipaladin, will his dispel magic power  cease
to scale? Im afraid it wont be strong enough to purge tob level mages'
protections.

Modifié par Heals.like.Jesus, 18 décembre 2013 - 08:38 .

[AnonymousHero]

Heals.like.Jesus wrote...

Matuse wrote...

I've never understood why people like Tactics. It's an incredibly poor mod. The difficulty increases it applies are totally arbitrary (after the 20th time of having a giant ambush party of level 20 NPCs pop up on my party in the middle of the street, you'd think whoever was sending them would get the idea that they aren't working), and the new items it provides are completely game-breaking. It's just an exercise in frustration and annoyance rather than providing any real challenge or involving tactics.

I selectively install a tiny number of mods from it, but 90% adheres slavishly to Sturgeon's law and stays in the garbage can where it belongs.

Thats not really fair. You get around 8 or so ambushes in the normal game. Would you preffer to keep getting ambushed by slavers with a leather armors and nonmagical shortswords even though at that point you look like you raided Tempis' personal armory, or that similar level party which actually has a slim chance of not getting slain in passing without as much as looking their way.

This is a classic example of a false dichotomy. Once you're high-level enough you shouldn't get ambushed anymore, because, well, you're higher level than anyone you could encounter and -- thanks to your human intelligence -- you could wipe the floor with any ambush.

(I will respond to your question in a separate post.)

[AnonymousHero]

Heals.like.Jesus wrote...
I wonder: If i dual the antipaladin, will his dispel magic power  cease
to scale? Im afraid it wont be strong enough to purge tob level mages'
protections.

Yes, AFAIUI the "innate" skills of the primary class will cease to scale once you dual. (There are some exceptions such as Bounty Hunter traps, which apparently use the average of your class levels. This can be abused)

However... if you're thinking of dualing to Mage, how much time are you prepared to use rolling stats? Or how substandard stats are you going to accept? IME it's absurdly time-demanding to roll sufficient stats for AP->Mage. AP->Thief might be a little easier, but still...

There's also the issue of fun. The AP is so absurdly overpowered that it drains any potential challenge (aka fun) from the game.

Modifié par AnonymousHero, 17 décembre 2013 - 11:25 .

[Heals.like.Jesus]

AnonymousHero wrote...

 if you're thinking of dualing to Mage, how much time are you prepared to use rolling stats? Or how substandard stats are you going to accept? IME it's absurdly time-demanding to roll sufficient stats for AP->Mage. AP->Thief might be a little easier, but still...

Which is why i left Frabjous' Bg2Reroller running full time during the night and came back at a decent 99

which leaves me 3 points short of 18/18/18/18 in all neccesary stats. Im not big on compromising, but i suppose ill have to go with 15 str, as there are plenty ways to keep that stat up.
I stand by the topic title.

As for the fun factor - way i figure it Westley put that class there to match his mods' encounters in cheesiness, and since they all come from the same source, its fair game.
Also, SCS2.

Modifié par Heals.like.Jesus, 18 décembre 2013 - 12:09 .

[polytope]

AnonymousHero wrote...

Heals.like.Jesus wrote...
I wonder: If i dual the antipaladin, will his dispel magic power  cease
to scale? Im afraid it wont be strong enough to purge tob level mages'
protections.

Yes, AFAIUI the "innate" skills of the primary class will cease to scale once you dual. (There are some exceptions such as Bounty Hunter traps, which apparently use the average of your class levels. This can be abused)

I confess to not knowing the exact game mechanic, but I just tested one of my dual classed characters, a priest of Lathander 11 -> fighter 17 and his Boon of Lathander ability lasted for 17 rounds.

I suspect that whereas mage spells scale with your mage level and priest spells your priest level any "innate" ability simply checks your highest level in any class, which is presumably what makes a bounty hunter-> fighter a viable build (if the special snare was based on average level a dualed bounty hunter 10 -> fighter would need to get to level 32 fighter to use the maze traps!).

So OP's AP -> mage will be able to dispel any caster in the game by level 18 mage (I believe the highest level SCS wizards are about level 35), or he could just do it by hitting the wizard with plain sword or even fist if they use ProMW (or perhaps casting shocking grasp if they use Improved Mantle/Absolute Immunity - it will vary depending on install choice what weapons, if any, bypass AI). The only enemies this wouldn't work on would be liches, vampire mages and Irenicus in Hell (all immune to normal weapons). I suspect the most only difficult part of the game would be after dual classing and before reactivating your AP abilities, especially if you have Valen, Solaufein and a sorcerer. The final battle of Ascension with SCS AI might give you a run for your money though...

Modifié par polytope, 18 décembre 2013 - 02:40 .

[Heals.like.Jesus]

I suspect that whereas mage spells scale with your mage level and priest spells your priest level any "innate" ability simply checks your highest level in any class

From  Rogue Rebalancing's  revised thief kits

Poison Weapon:
Weapons deal an extra 1d3 points of poison damage upon contact. Unless a saving throw vs. poison is made, the poison will deal one additional point of damage per each level of the Assassin (up to a maximum of 20)

So unless im mistaken a 2 assassin/ 20 mage dual-class 's Poison Weapon will deal the max +20 damage?

The final battle of Ascension with SCS AI might give you a run for your money though...

Thats what all this is building up to. That final battle will be my payoff

Modifié par Heals.like.Jesus, 18 décembre 2013 - 03:05 .

[Matuse]

Thats not really fair.

It's entirely fair. Tactics is bad overall, and the street ambushes are among the worst of it. Well, except for Improved Illych, and the improved Sahuagin City, and...and...and...

There's only a tiny number of the changes in Tactics that are sensible. The improved crypt king. Being able to set randomized encounters to maximum difficulty. The docks lich with the cloak of balduran. These are reasonable modifications that (unlike many others) you have a choice in whether or not to participate during gameplay. If I don't feel like I can take out the docks lich, then I can not go into that room. It's a nonexistant room in the vanilla game; there's no quest that leads you there. If you don't want to deal with the ambushes, then your ONLY recourse is to simply not go outside at night. That's lame. The vampire ambushes can be avoided, talked through, and they stop coming. But not the tactics ambushes. There's this endless supply of uber-level assassins and casters who have nothing better to do than to endlessly die at the party's hands, while handing over giant piles of money, super-powered healing potions, and highly magical equipment. There's nothing tactical about it.

You get around 8 or so ambushes in the normal game. Would you preffer to keep getting ambushed by slavers with a leather armors and nonmagical shortswords even though at that point you look like you raided Tempis' personal armory

No, I'd prefer that I stop being ambushed. It's tedious and annoying. The Tactics ambushes aren't even clever or sensible. It's EVERY night if you go outdoors, and they pop up on some spot even if that spot is directly in the center of your party. They don't teleport in, you don't run across them, there's no tactics...they just appear out of thin air.

Planning around those challenges causes frustration,

No. Having to rest 5 times per dungeon because you have to expend all of your resources on yard trash is frustrating. Annoying as well. What it isn't is challenging. Completing a major dungeon without resting at all is challenging. That's how I like to play, even on no-reload characters. Tactics "enhanced" games don't let me do that, so I just rest-fight-rest-fight-rest-fight. Boring.

but you wont be frustrated, unless you are struggling and you struggle because those are fights you cant simply stampede over. Which equals a challenge.

It's not challenge. It's just pure cheese. Stacking up bizarre attributes on stuff to make them "difficult", because creating actual difficulty is beyond the ability of the mod designers. They just want to put in their little uber items and put in a "challenge" that compensates for it.

[Heals.like.Jesus]

Well so far mephits kick my ass around in The initial dungeon. I never knew they actually had this much magic. Another funny thing is that every mage ive met has an invisibility/SI:divination as a contingency on sight.

Still didnt stop me from claiming CF from the compound (whose mage used 2 time stops btw) straight out of chateau Irenicus, but still, its annoying. What i dont like about the current strategical situation in the game is that True Sight has been elevated to a vital neccesity. It indeed does imply that the AP has been planned to be played within this setting. There's also that gnome in the Docks who fires a meteor swarm spell at my 8 level party.

I was attacked with something whose spell level was higher than my party level.
...wow 

One thing that bothers me: This TobEx Console thing just spams the following message:

"DETOUR_CDderivedStats::DETOUR_GetStat(): n0pcode out of bounds (403; expected 1-400)"

Should I be worried?

Modifié par Heals.like.Jesus, 20 décembre 2013 - 12:12 .

[The Potty 1]

Worried? I suppose it depends how hot the wall is, and if it has any sort of creeper growing on it. Or thistles. Beware of thistles.