67 réponses à ce sujet

[WhiZard]

I find it quite stupid to force everyone...

The area is an option being a side area. Do you have problems with side areas and potentially side quests involving side areas?

[Shadooow]

 

I find it quite stupid to force everyone...

The area is an option being a side area. Do you have problems with side areas and potentially side quests involving side areas?

 

Stupid area design. Doesn't matter if its main area side area or idontknowhat area. Comparsion with the fire plane area where pc takes fire damage is completely off.

[BelgarathMTH]

More food for thought on this topic: I just defeated Klaus in my current cleric run. It was surprisingly easy, but it had little or nothing to do with my having disabled auto-fail.

 

I examined the transcript of my battle with Klaus very carefully. I was using a level 14 cleric with Animal (cat's grace one of many strategies to achieve my AC 38, and an air elemental cast as the level 8 version rather than the level 7 version) and Good (stoneskins on myself, Red Tiger, and air elemental) domains, (roleplayed as a cleric of Chauntea, just so that domain combo would be legal).

 

My henchman, as mentioned, was Red Tiger.

 

I had Red Tiger and myself buffed to the nines, of course, as all clerics do, and the shorter duration ones, such as Spell Resistance, Freedom, and True Sight, were cast using the Extend Spell feat.

 

One of the insights that I got from studying the transcript of the battle was that there seems to be kind of an arms race between dungeon masters and "clericzillas". I thought that the DC's of Klauth's spells and breath weapon were far too low for an ancient dragon.

 

He was scripted to do nothing much but use his breath weapon interspersed with spells. I had used the "dead dragon sphere" to start the battle with Klauth at "badly wounded", but I'm not sure that really made much difference in the outcome. I think he would have been far more dangerous if he'd been using his claw/claw/bite physical attacks instead of relying upon his spells and breath. That would have really put my AC 38 and healing potions and spells to the test.

 

During this battle, he cast his breath weapon (interpreted as "Fire Storm") repeatedly. Once I resisted it completely through the Spell Resistance spell. The other times, he quickly battered down my Elemental Resistance, but I still had my Ring of Helm ("elemental resistance") taking 15 of the damage every time. All of my saves are "through the roof" by way of a Ring of Resistance +3 and a Cloak of Fortification +3. The reflex saves against his breath were the lowest, such that I would have lost the save on rolls of 1-5 regardless of autofail on or off, but I was still making most of them.

 

I stopped swinging to cast a Heal on my air elemental once, healing 100 damage. The air elemental was taking the most damage. Red Tiger was taking a beating, but was holding up without needing me to heal him.

 

Near his end, Klauth cast two Power Word: Kills, presumably at me. I don't know if disabling autofail had anything to do with why I was still standing, but I doubt it. I had Death Ward active. The transcript didn't show that I had to make a save at all. I did take some negligible damage from those last two desperate spells before Klaus fell.

 

My point with all of this is twofold: First, Klauth's DC's for his magical attacks were far, far lower than they should have been. All of the save DC's were 15 or lower. I should think that an ancient dragon ought to have spell DC's of at least 35 or higher.

 

Second, Klauth's scripting was terrible. I probably ought to replay the OC with Tony K's AI at some point to see if he makes these super-boss encounters into what they ought to be.

 

Conclusion: Having autofail on is a very cheap and unrealistic way to create difficulty, and perhaps is a case of "DM cheese". If you want your computerized monster to be scary, give it a decent AI, and give it the save DC's that it deserves. Don't "cheat" against your players by exploiting the "automatically fail saves on a roll of one" rule. (And don't thereby encourage your players to "cheat" by exploiting the rule on their side.)

[Grani]

As far as I've checked in the toolset, Klauth is, for the most part, like regular ancient red dragons, but has AC of 30 instead of 39, increased HP by about 200 and different scripts attached. His spells and feats seem the same, though. Guess his weakness is mainly due to scripts, then. DC is not affected by them, however.

[BelgarathMTH]

Thanks, Grani. I guess part of my case here is that the game DM *should* be able to set DC's to anything desired for top-tier creatures like ancient red dragons.

 

Welp, I just had to fight the battle against Klauth *again*, because for some strange, bugged reason, his head and his key disappeared from my inventory when I left my game to make my last post.

 

The second time, I didn't get any lucky critical hits and confirmation rolls from Red Tiger, so I got to see more of Klauth's spell list.

 

I also noticed that I could not hit Klauth with a roll of 19. Only with a critical hit could I even scratch him. Thank goodness I had Red Tiger with me!

 

The main thing I noticed with the second battle with Klauth (forced by bugged saves - save often, and in multiple slots!) was that he started spamming multiple Mordenkainin's Disjunctions (which did nothing to me), and then, Greater Dispelling, followed by at least three regular Dispel Magic spells.

 

The Greater Dispelling took out my air elemental (didn't know Dispel could banish summons - apparently they count as a Dispellable buff in NWN), and an alarming number of my buffs, including Death Ward (!)

 

The next two Dispel Magic magic spells took out some more buffs, but not very relevant ones (some stat boosters, this and that that Klauth didn't need to Dispel).

 

Red Tiger had finished him by about that time.

 

All he needed to do to destroy me was to open with Greater Dispel (and maybe a regular Dispel Magic for good measure) to get rid of my Death Ward, Spell Resistance, my stat boosts, and my air elemental, attack me physically for a few rounds to get my hit points down, then use his two or more Power Word: Death spells.

 

If that didn't finish me through low dice rolls, he could have just started physically attacking Red Tiger. I myself obviously was no threat at all to him unless I got very, very lucky rolling 20's, and through my buffs and healing.

 

If he had opened with his Dispels and had then concentrated his physical attacks on Red Tiger, there is no way I could have healed Red Tiger fast enough, and after he killed Red Tiger, I would have been nearly helpless to even scratch him.

 

So, again, my conclusion from these experiences fighting Klauth is that the DM controls the true difficulty of encounters by means of scripting, smart AI, appropriate DC escalation, and control of what gear is available in his or her campaign, NOT by the rule of "automatic save failures on a roll of one."

[MrZork]

This is pretty much unrelated to the auto-fail issue, but I suspect that Klauth was mostly using monster special abilities instead of actual spells. That means that the maximum caster level is 15 (for the default system, Shadooow's CPP improves this, I think) and your Spell Resistance would block many such spells.  Still, even spells called as special abilities would mean that the DC for his Fire Storm should be 24, not 15. His fire breath DC should be 38, which is more than respectable, but it seems like he sometimes doesn't use that as much, preferring the spells he can use from a greater distance first. Your Death Ward would have protected you from his Power Word Kill spell (which doesn't have a save anyway).

 

TonyK's AI is generally an improvement for most situations, I don't recall if it helps bring Klaus up to snuff, though. I am a little dubious because TonyK often employs a strategy where casters (or NPCs with spell-like abilities) spend lots of time casting and, especially, casting dispels. That's a decent tactic when the caster is has several allies who are trying melee attacks, but it's a little iffy when the caster is by himself, like Klauth. However, it likely would have taken down some of your buffs, which would have been significant for a cleric.

[BelgarathMTH]

Mr. Zork, interesting. If the "Fire Storms" I was seeing were not an implementation of his breath weapon, then he never even once used it over the two times I fought him.

 

Some of his fire abilities may have had higher than 15 DC, but I was so well-protected against the elements, I barely even took notice of any of his fire abilities against me. I noticed the second time that instead of "Fire Storm", his fire-based attacks were showing on my transcript as "Flame Strike".

 

I wonder if his Dispelling of my elemental lowered our party CR and triggered some kind of scale-down in what he could do?

 

So, again, I think Klauth is a pushover for a cleric with Red Tiger due to some bad scripting and level scaling in the game design. And, as you say, the autofail, on or off, has little or nothing to do with the outcome of the battle.

 

I think that having autofail off is just a good idea so that a player can be unaffected by weak DC spells, and DM cheese such as placement of creatures like bodaks and basilisks in order to create "gotcha" situations. That sort of thing may be fun for some DM's (who probably have a very hard time getting players to play with them), but very much not fun for the players.

 

If a player can get those saves high enough through whatever means, then there should be a reward for that against weaker creatures. An opposing DM can still exercise control over the balance of the campaign by controlling availability of gear (no "Monty Haul" treasure), and the DC's of enemy monster and caster spell attacks. "Autofail on a roll of one" does nothing productive for the storytelling and play of the game at best, and at worst, it encourages cheese and exploitation from both players and DM's.

 

(This is all in my opinion only, and only affects my own gaming. )

[allen179gmail]

In Ch1 finale the Bodae's Death Gaze has a DC of 14. My Sorcerer Will save is 12 without buffs. Autofail has no bearing on this, but if I cast Protection from alignment my save is 14 and Autofail can kill me.

[BelgarathMTH]

Allen, are you saying rolling a one doesn't kill you *unless* you cast the Protection from Evil? Or do you just mean that without the buff you die on a 1-3, and with the buff you only die on a 1, unless autofail is turned off?

 

I guess you must mean the second thing. Well, in my thinking, your sorcerer shouldn't really have to worry about death by bodak stare (or is it a wail?) because of his high will saves, and the fact that he had the good sense to cast that Protection from Evil spell against the possibility of rolling a one.

 

I know bodaks are supposed to be very dangerous, scary creatures. But I think it would make more sense to just raise the DC of their instant death attack than to use the autofail rule to make them scary.

 

There's a higher grade of bodak - "Bodak Lord" or something like that. Do they get a higher DC on their death attack?

 

Is it in the monster manual that these kinds of monsters have low DC's for their special abilities? I don't guess most DM's would have players that would let them house-rule better DC's for the monsters in exchange for removing the autofail rule, and I don't know if the NWN toolset allows the DM to alter the DC's in mods, campaigns, and pw's.

 

At least I can turn off autofail in my single player game, though, since I don't believe in it any more.

[allen179gmail]

Without the buff I must roll a 2 or better to make my save. With the buff, if Autofail is on a 1 will fail my save even through 14+1=15 against a DC of 14. Autofail on 1 defeats the reason to cast Protection from Alignment.  

[MagicalMaster]

Roughly half of the base classes have access to a means of immunity to petrification. Whether it be UMDing a scroll, casting a spell, or using a class specific ability.

So a level 40 Rogue needs to carry around scrolls to polymorph so they don't risk dying to level 8 monsters?

The area is an option being a side area. Do you have problems with side areas and potentially side quests involving side areas?

I don't see how being a "side area" (which is a term I don't even agree with in the first place) matters.

Near his end, Klauth cast two Power Word: Kills, presumably at me. I don't know if disabling autofail had anything to do with why I was still standing, but I doubt it. I had Death Ward active. The transcript didn't show that I had to make a save at all. I did take some negligible damage from those last two desperate spells before Klaus fell.

PW:K just kills you if you're below 100 HP. It's a terribly designed spell (as in it's bad).
 

Second, Klauth's scripting was terrible. I probably ought to replay the OC with Tony K's AI at some point to see if he makes these super-boss encounters into what they ought to be.

Not really, the default creature design is still horrible with or without slightly better spellcasting AI.

If you like super-boss encounters I'd definitely suggest you play my Siege of the Heavens and A Peremptory Summons modules as they'd seem up your alley.

Without the buff I must roll a 2 or better to make my save. With the buff, if Autofail is on a 1 will fail my save even through 14+1=15 against a DC of 14. Autofail on 1 defeats the reason to cast Protection from Alignment.

Without the buff I must roll a 2 or better to make my save. With the buff, if Autofail is on a 1 will fail my save even through 14+1=15 against a DC of 14. Autofail on 1 defeats the reason to cast Protection from Alignment.

Indeed. It also defeats the reason to get many saving throw boosts outside of that -- immunity or bust if you're already risking a reload in the first place.

[BelgarathMTH]

I had a case in my current SoU run where this issue became prevalent. I decided to enter the secret room filled with basilisks in the temple ruins near the end of act two.

 

Their DC to petrify was DC-13, which all six basilisks spammed repeatedly. My actions window was scrolling fast, with saving throw after saving throw.

 

My character was a level 8 cleric with 14 CON, Endurance, and 2 rings of resistance +1. The second ring made all the difference, as it raised my fortitude save bonus from 11 to 12. I saw at least one roll of 1 scroll by during all those dozen or more saves. I was very glad to have had autofail disabled. I had made it a point to keep both of those rings, and not to sell either of them. I passed on the benefits of whatever other rings I could have been wearing.

 

This kind of strategy and planning would be useless with autofail. I'm not even sure what Bioware was thinking when they placed that many basilisks against level 7-8 characters. Maybe the player was supposed to either flee or reload over and over trying to kill them all before the main character rolled a 1.

 

I think there should be a way to plan ahead for that kind of encounter, and with autofail disabled, I had one. This is especially true in my opinion because there is no Protection from Petrification spell in NWN. (A mere level one spell in Baldur's Gate, that any arcane caster can cast.) I've also never seen any Mirrored Eye potions in NWN.

[Shadooow]

I had a case in my current SoU run where this issue became prevalent. I decided to enter the secret room filled with basilisks in the temple ruins near the end of act two.

 

Their DC to petrify was DC-13, which all six basilisks spammed repeatedly. My actions window was scrolling fast, with saving throw after saving throw.

 

My character was a level 8 cleric with 14 CON, Endurance, and 2 rings of resistance +1. The second ring made all the difference, as it raised my fortitude save bonus from 11 to 12. I saw at least one roll of 1 scroll by during all those dozen or more saves. I was very glad to have had autofail disabled. I had made it a point to keep both of those rings, and not to sell either of them. I passed on the benefits of whatever other rings I could have been wearing.

 

This kind of strategy and planning would be useless with autofail. I'm not even sure what Bioware was thinking when they placed that many basilisks against level 7-8 characters. Maybe the player was supposed to either flee or reload over and over trying to kill them all before the main character rolled a 1.

 

I think there should be a way to plan ahead for that kind of encounter, and with autofail disabled, I had one. This is especially true in my opinion because there is no Protection from Petrification spell in NWN. (A mere level one spell in Baldur's Gate, that any arcane caster can cast.) I've also never seen any Mirrored Eye potions in NWN.

There is no skill in that. You rolled 1 so you died. Period. GG well designed.

 

I was thinking about adding into petrify gaze the requirement to facing check, aka if the character is faced backwards to basilisk it wont work. That would add a skill there without doubt. Not so hard to implement either.

Problem is that they have limited use of those gazes, smart player could just stand turned around and let them cast out all uses. And AI is too stupid to change position.

[WhiZard]

I was thinking about adding into petrify gaze the requirement to facing check, aka if the character is faced backwards to basilisk it wont work. That would add a skill there without doubt. Not so hard to implement either.

The current implementation, of having the skill used at a greater radius than the scripted check, I thought, already does accomplish this. That is the player can stand perfectly still, and so long as he does not move into the creature's radius, he will not be hit with any gaze attack, and will be able to fight the creature in melee once its gazes have been exhausted (signaled by when the creature moves in to fight). This method, which some may call cheap, does accommodate the perspective of a player learning the head movement before rushing in (with eyes closed or head facing ground) and fighting without risking the chance of eye contact, due to knowing where the eyes will be.

In the SoU incident, in particular, I have gone through that area with many characters using the above tactics have usually done it so I was never hit by a single gaze.

[Shadooow]

The current implementation, of having the skill used at a greater radius than the scripted check, I thought, already does accomplish this. That is the player can stand perfectly still, and so long as he does not move into the creature's radius, he will not be hit with any gaze attack, and will be able to fight the creature in melee once its gazes have been exhausted (signaled by when the creature moves in to fight). This method, which some may call cheap, does accommodate the perspective of a player learning the head movement before rushing in (with eyes closed or head facing ground) and fighting without risking the chance of eye contact, due to knowing where the eyes will be.

In the SoU incident, in particular, I have gone through that area with many characters using the above tactics have usually done it so I was never hit by a single gaze.

Oh right, thats the missig 1.0 range I fixed in my patch. Yes in Vanilla many gazes/breaths are nonfuncional on the max range due to this bug.

 

I wouldn't call it an intented tactic though.

[MagicalMaster]

The current implementation, of having the skill used at a greater radius than the scripted check, I thought, already does accomplish this.

This is the first time I've ever heard of that, so no, I wouldn't say that accomplished the goal.

[allen179gmail]

I turned autofail on 1 off after I rolled 1 three times in a row.

[Grani]

I turned autofail on 1 off after I rolled 1 three times in a row.

 

About 0.01% chance of happening. You poor soul.