Old RPGs and Old Computers + NWN Series Mods

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Because of the length of time and game play between strip and recovery, I have not rechecked to see if Valine ever changed the scripts for an Item strip in the underdark. Maybe I could keep one low grade bag or box as a test case next time, but this is a long way down the part 2 path so don't worry about it yet, and I saw no warning in the Wiki either so maybe that 2006 script got changed some year in between. Much much later even is a deal with the devil that has you leave your companions for a solo mission, can't leave all the best stuff with them as there are a few fights to come but deals with the devil are not "enchanting".

The best traps to sell are those gas traps which are not the best to use against the guards and priest anyway. The fortune teller does give more money for stuff not marked stolen than anyone else, but the difference is not so great at the 35-65 gold level so I stop at the docks store first and rid myself of the weight, Drago for the traps and then head North for you know what. When you perform the last step at the alter, those doors open and they set a path to your location so that is where the traps should lead, you can collect those missed later anyway. I never stay on the alter of course, run away from the priests door and back around to the fountain room and see who has been able to follow my "kite", sometimes I'll slow down if just one guard is still in trail.

I'll get back to BG2EE for now then, doing things in order Planescape Torment will be next though I really want to get into another run of ADWR ASAP. (then ADWS for good measure) The playlist is flexible after that, Enigma Island most likely, what other NWN modules do you rate highly?

 

Well, I’ve gotten some more play time in and am moving along, and (of course) I have a “few” things to mention…

You had mentioned about testing to see what bags Valine removes from you during an item strip in the Underdark in Part 2, testing by keeping a lesser bag or box. During my kidnapping strip, my Bags of Holding were all taken, but not my lesser bags nor my box for arrows (all empty, of course). I would assume that Valine is going to be consistent during that next strip, but you won’t know for sure unless you keep at least one of each container type, including a Bag of Holding.

I escaped from my kidnapping by that bearded jerk easily enough. I also got my level 8 while I was there. That gave me the one Open Lock skill point that I needed in order to open that chest with the nice-selling armor in it without needing even a single lockpick tool.

And then I was finally able to able to do some things with my Golden Chalice loot. Of which the “Damaged Armor” was the best surprise. I’d been wondering what to do about new armor as my increases in Dex have been taking my Dex Bonus to the limits of my armor (with a max Dex bonus of 6). But Igor solved that when he changed that damaged armor into a lovely armor with a max Dex bonus of 8. I have more to say about upgrading that new armor in a bit.

For storage spots that you thought were safe in S. Bet., you mentioned a couple spots that don’t have containers (Drago’s Warehouse & the home in the SW corner). Are you saying that you found it safe to keep stuff on the floor? In most NWN mods, stuff on the floor or ground eventually disappears. So I’m really curious how Valine has it scripted in this series.

In any case, I did use 3 containers that appear to be safe, at least with less than 50K gold amounts in 2 of them. But I did not use the chest in the Family Hideout, because I thought of another possible reason a bunch of my gold disappeared from it. The place is full of thieves, right? And at least some of them are not above shady dealings with their fellow thieves. After all, one of them sent me on a fake quest to have sex with sailors & dock workers. And another wants me to do some murders that result in evil alignment changes. So, might not someone decide to “borrow” some gold they happen to find in a chest? I doubt Valine scripted such a thing, but she’s been quite unpredictable in several ways, so I guess it’s possible.

So, the first container I picked is the only one on the whole Family Hideout map in the sewers, and is due north of the Hideout map pin (or the hideout itself; can't remember if I added that pin). That’s where I put all of my high-priced loot (but no gold) from the Golden Chalice quest. It was still all there after my kidnapping escape. That stuff sold for about 110,000 gold later (to Sanah). So even if there is a container gold limit of somewhere around 50K, apparently that same limit does not apply to the selling value of loot.

The other 2 containers I had picked are both in S. Bet. One was a chest in the abandoned home just south of the warehouse door. I stored 31K gold there, still there after my kidnapping escape. The other was a crate in The Wildcat. I put 40K gold there, also still there later.

I was in the process of collecting all that loot and gold, so that I’d have enough gold to do some tests with how Igor could upgrade my new armor, when Valine hit me with another of her surprises. Once again, it was that bearded jack*ss, this time with a blackmail threat. He appeared in S. Bet as soon as I stepped out of the warehouse to go collect my stashed gold there.

At first, I figured, okay, I better deal with this first since he gave me only 24 hours to deposit the gold he requested for his blackmail, so I didn’t pick up my gold stashes in S. Bet. I did have about 40K on me, but I let Nathan give me 5,000 gold to use instead for the blackmail drop off. So I went to drop it off, only to have Mr. bearded appear on-the-spot and take all the gold I had on me. So I had 40K stolen from me!

During my second try, I decided I may as well collect all my stashed gold, sell my loot, and do my armor upgrade tests with Igor first, just to make sure I got to use all that gold first, before it disappeared in some other way! I was able to do that in 2 or 3 hours, so I still had plenty of time to stash my remaining loot and have only 5K for Mr. bearded. He accepted it! Which makes me wonder if he would’ve accepted even a lesser amount. Like one gold piece? Zero gold pieces? Probably not. Valine probably scripted it to be 5K or more. But I may have to test that if I play another game.

By the way, I couldn’t find a single thing in the wikia about this blackmailing, even though it was added to my journal’s quest log as the “Blackmailed” quest. Did I somehow miss it among all those links in the wikia?

So, with my armor upgrade testing… My new armor included +3 AC Bonus already. So Igor could add 2 more of that, plus regeneration +1. My tests were to see what the total cost would be if I added those 3 things in different orders. I’m glad I did those tests, because it made a BIG difference. If I got my figuring right, the cheapest order cost about 157K, while the most expensive was about 214K. That’s about a 57K difference! The expensive tests were if I added the regen first or second. The cheapest was adding the 2 AC bonus points first, and then adding the regen +1.

Of course, if I added some of Nora’s skill point additions to the testing, it might turn out to change the cheapest sequence of additions, but I didn’t have the patience or gold for that whole ballgame, so someone else will have to test that. As it was, I had only 6,000 gold left over, so I couldn’t add even one more addition anyway. Also, my new armor is leather, which she won’t upgrade because it’s not cloth, so doing more tests with Nora additions is moot in this case.

So, with my new spiffy armor, I finally got back to my regular quests. I decided that the guard barracks quest was the next easiest one to do, so I’m doing that one now. I’ve just gotten past the cooks and into the first room of soldiers, pickpocketing all the way. A couple times my pickpocketing attempts have been less than perfect and I’ve gotten attacked. Fortunately, when I run away, only 1 or 2 of the soldiers follow me back towards the cooks. So I’ve gone ahead and battled them to see how it goes. They’ve been easy.

So that got me wondering if there’s some point where I’ll have to battle these very same soldiers. If so, I may as well kill them now, when I’ll be getting more XP from each kill and they’re still easy. But even if I’ll never be battling them later, I may kill them all now because I like grabbing every XP opportunity, especially if there aren’t any regens in the whole mod series.

Edit 2-14-19: I changed 2 places above about Igor's armor additions where I had said "attack bonus" to correctly read "AC bonus"

 

I’m sorry, ralebeau, but I can’t add a single NWN mod that I can remember. With so many mods available, I was in the habit of deleting those that I played once or twice, and then trying another mod. With so many mods to try out, I wasn’t patient enough to replay the same mod more than 1 or 2 times. And the only notes I kept were within each mod’s journal, so I don’t have those either.

Some of my favorites were online mods only. And with only the cheapest satellite package now, I don’t play those anymore and couldn’t tell you if any of them still exist since Game Spy quit hosting them.

All I can give you now is a new list of mods that I’ve started, listing mods that I’ve recently heard about that might be interesting to try. Most are for my interest in halfling builds, but I may be willing to try out an elf build or something else instead, here and there.

What I may play first are a couple of so-called “easier” mods: Cave of Songs, and Snow Hunt. I would rather play the “easier” mods that look to be enjoyable first, then move to more difficult ones, but not all of those that look like they might be interesting give any idea about their level of difficulty.

Next might be The Aielund Saga, which seems to be more of an intermediate level of difficulty and sounds quite interesting.

A couple others that look interesting are Swordflight 2 (possibly the whole series, of which I think there are 4 at the moment) and The Prophet. Both of those I think are quite a bit more difficult, so I’m not sure where I’d fit them in.

Another one that might be fun is Heart of Winter.

The rest of my new list are all NWN mods that you, yourself, suggested might work for halfling characters, but don’t ask me what their order would be in respect to level of difficulty. They are:

Enigma Island
Gladiatrix
Lords of Darkness
Runes of Blood
The Ravenloft pair: Return to Ravenloft; Beyond the Gate
Arandie (elf character here)

And then there are two totally different RPG games you mentioned:

Darklands by Microprose
Drakensang: The Dark Eye by THQ & Radon Labs

So, beyond the “A Dance with Rogues/Spies” series and “Planescape: Torment”, those are where my future interests are aimed at the moment.

 

I don't remember losing any bags/boxes with the first bearded imprisonment, but I think I didn't have as many and her script may have a limit. I did warn about the ransom, I try to spend down or leave some at home before telling Nathan, and then just have his to try and deposit. I know there is storage in the empty warehouse opposite Drago's, the one with the secret door, also the Wildcat, but I was talking about the sewers past Drago, and I might have been wrong about all the way west, maybe there was just a body there and nothing else in that house. Since I get all the stuff back I don't do more than sell the heavy stuff so I can move to get caught, poor princess does not know what is coming right? I think I have already tried keeping a small container for the big strip in the underdark, so I cheat for that one and leave EMPTY bags in a corner to pick up when we come back for our stuff.

In the barracks I will just sneak, and try to have enough open locks for the payroll room. When it is almost time to start part 2 I come back with a party and kill them all, but I have not seen much XP from them, did you get some for the cooks? They are not on the path later on anyway, but I take them out none the less. The only respawns I know of, though there are battles that do look that way (if they have numbers over their heads it will come to an end), are the Dhorn patrol, not sure if you can grind there because they may have zero XP, or so low as not to be worth it. I take out all the Dhorn on the way out of the prison but most give small XP.

Aielund was just redone by the builder, and is quite good, it was the first place horses could be used to advantage and even mounted combat. However those scripts wrecked the romance ones so the rebuild is back to walking I think, which is how it first came out. I wanted that romance so I would re-play the old pre-horse version. I have heard of Swordflight, and Heart of Winter but not tried them.

I still enjoy re-playing Gladiatrix but that one is CEP heavy, don't know if you have gone there, Lords of Darkness is a classic dungeon crawl and crawl and crawl but I still come back to it once or twice a year for the well written dialog and romance. Portraits are my other vice, over a thousand for NWN and hundreds for NWN2, even some for BG, both old and EE have better looking females.

 

Oh, I misunderstood you about the bags during a strip. I thought you were simply talking about which were taken from you when being stripped. For me, all 6 of my Bags of Holding were taken during my strip, but not my 4 lesser bags or my box (though they were emptied). The 6 Bags of Holding were among my gear when I found it later during my escape.

Yes, you had mentioned the word “ransom” back when we were talking about the kidnapping earlier. But you hadn’t given any explanation with the word, and so it just confused me. I know Nathan had to pay the bearded guy for info about my kidnapping, so I was wondering if that was what you were referring to by “ransom”. You had also mentioned to let Nathan pay it if he can, but that just confused me more. Also, I never found any mention in the wikia about a ransom or blackmailing, so I got no hints there. And your ransom comment was so long ago that it seems like ages ago! (Yes, only 9 days ago seems like ages! LOL) And with my short memory, I didn’t make the connection during the blackmailing.

No matter. It all came out in the wash.

Oh, you were calling the place opposite Drago’s door a “warehouse”. I thought you were referring to Drago’s Warehouse. Yeah, it’s the place with the secret door where I had stashed some of my gold. Hmm…not sure if I had checked the sewer’s map that’s through Drago’s cellar entrance. Have to take a look.

A +6 lockpick tool was all I needed in order to get into the barracks payroll room. Didn’t need a tool at all for any other lock. I killed every Dhorn in there, including the two cooks. Every one of them gave me 18 XP (at my level 8), including the cooks. If I got my count right, there were a total of 25, for a grand total of 440 XP. As easy as they were, I thought that was worthwhile, for 440 XP that I wouldn’t have otherwise.

I had mentioned that the first ones I had fought were easy, but they were using either fists or long swords. It wasn’t until later that I fought some with halberds. Those guys seemed to be harder to hit, and they were definitely causing me more damage. A few times I had fought sword wheelers or fisters 3 at once, and didn’t need to use a single health potion. But against only two guys with halberds, I had to eat health potions to stay alive, even with a total of +2 regeneration on me. My biggest frustration with them was missing so often!

Yeah, I’ve played with mods that required CEP, especially online mods, but I think a couple of my earlier off-line mods used it, too. I was on dial-up when I downloaded the first CEP and then its upgrade. Talk about all-night downloads! Unless they’ve continued to upgrade it, I think I still have the latest version.

How about those two “easier” mods, Cave of Songs, and Snow Hunt? Have you played those?

Okay, I think next for me are the quests “Dhorn Love” and “Dhorn Slayer” (Did I get that right? I’m not playing at the moment.) I haven’t gotten the missing Pia quest yet. Not sure what it takes to trigger it, but I think one or the other of the above two quests will do it.

 

Oh, a couple other tidbits that I forgot to mention…

1. I had wondered about how long stuff lasts when left on the ground or floor. Well, I don’t know about the ground yet, but I actually have an example that’s on the floor that I had forgotten about. In Sanah’s shop, I had left a partial pack of arrows and of bullets on the floor so that they wouldn’t take up space in my backpack. And if I ever entered Sanah’s with another partial, I could join them together. Well, I had dropped those on the floor there somewhere back around level 2 or 3. And they’re both still there now at level 8.

2. While in the Dhorn barracks doing my thief thing, I pickpocked one soldier until I got the message that he had “no more items or gold”. Then I fought him…and he healed himself with a critical health potion. I guess he had a secret hiding place that I missed. Maybe under his testicles, which I tend to stay away from when I pickpocket because they’re too sensitive.

 

I have not heard of those mods, Cave of Songs or Snow Hunt not been tried, will await your recommendation, I do look at any new mod posted to the vault, though that is slow these days. The old IGN vault had a better system for checking out top rated mods, too hard to pick the wheat from the chaff on the new.

Dhorn Love is related to Jero in Talds Tavern I believe, needed to get to see Simon for the Dhorn Slayer quest. If you pickpocketed a +2 sword in Talds, it was from him. When you talk to them Simon leaves and there is no way to see him again except through bedding Jero, some sexy skill helps so practice at home in bed (if not in the mood read Pia's dirty book which you should have taken from her room) Jero is also the man to see about the Dhorn who killed Caron, and have to bed him again or they will not appear again after the one time in the sewers. An added side note, items can be equipped during conversations so if you see a skill check coming put things on to help, you might be naked after sex after all. If Caron died in your arms down in the sewers those two were in the next room, you could take Caron's body back to Nathan.

If you are invited to Simon's house, killing the other nobles there is evil, I just do Simon, steal his and Jero's stuff, then leave. With the back door open now I can return with a party later and take the rest of the guards and dogs out. In their armor the Dhorn are hard to hit, boost STR if you have not taken weapon finesse, DEX if you have and are using the smaller weapons, pickpocket potential victims first even if they are sleeping since you may not get the quick kill. Time them so it is late at night for one to be naked in bed, another does not ever sleep down in his torture room (avoid hurting his victim or prisoners, release them too), and time will pass if you entertain the nobles so they and Simon will now be in bed.

Not all equipment is marked as available for pickpocket, another reason I like killing Dhorn before leaving is all the free healing potions we all will need later, the bigwigs have full heal potions so steal them first if you can, or kill them fast before they use them so they drop as loot. Things do stay safe on most floors, but there are times where area changes occur and then then they will be gone.

I think you mentioned the arena doors already, the gladiators under there will trigger Find Pia, so I do all the other missions offered first. After the gladiators are no more Nathan will mention the usual people for jobs, then Alfons will have the quest. The mage academy is central here, I just sneak there unless I can take out a monster or five, not sure what faction those guards are but I leave them be not looking so much like Dhorn. Be sure and keep saves from just before meeting that bearded guy both times, the third time has to run properly and has given trouble, a few have had trouble not getting the extortion/ransom meeting but you are past that just fine. Did you take your portrait back to show that mage, or did you refuse him? There is one more mage who will take sex for payment if you want, kind of a recurring theme here but still fun to try as you can never be sure how Valine will treat them.

 

Have you heard of a lady named Lilura1? She has her own web site that’s centered on “renaissance-era RPGs”, including their mods. She gives intelligent reviews on them, sometimes writes her own walkthroughs, & has long comment sections that she participates in constantly. It was in one of her comments section for a NWN mod where she recommended those two mods as “easier” ones for beginners.

Here’s the link to the starting page of her section on NWN & its mods:

https://lilura1.blogspot.com/p/nwn-utility-visual-mods.html

I never did steal, or even read Pia’s dirty book. She caught me by surprise while I was looking in her…dresser, I think. I don’t recall what was in it – maybe her book, maybe something else. In any case, I didn’t want to ruin our relationship by snooping around anymore, so I just left.

Well, I’ve finished the Dhorn Love & Dhorn Slayer quests and am about to go see if I can get into the Arena’s gladiator area without Sharita’s help.

Yes, I got invited into Simon’s house. For some reason, I had assumed that the nobleman I was left with was going to have me sleep with him, & then I would be able to go find Simon after the nobleman fell asleep. But all he wanted to do (besides stare at my breasts) was to have me escorted out of the building. So the only other option seemed to be to attack & kill him, which I did…for 5 more Evil alignment points that I hadn’t expected.

I’m not sure if, after the 2 ladies left, that last dialogue with him was automatic or not. If not, maybe I could’ve run away from him and avoid having to kill him. Even if he gave up the chase & called the guards after me, it would’ve be preferable to more Evil points. At least none of the guards give Evil points. If the dialogue was automatic & unavoidable, I could’ve tried breaking it & running away, but breaking dialogue can sometimes even ruin a quest, it seems. After that, I just assumed that killing Simon would give me more Evil points, so I didn’t even notice if it did when I killed him.

Which I wondered about later, because neither of the two generals in the Dhorn Slayer quest gave me any alignment change!

I killed all guards & dogs in all three places, but no civilians besides that nobleman in Simon’s home. Simon had a Heal potion (my 1st of the game), but each general had 2 Serious Wound potions instead.

Oh…when you said that Jero was the one to see to arrange a meeting with Simon, you had mentioned that Jero was also the one to see about the Dhorn who killed Caron, in order to get them to appear again. And the wikia said that the “A Death in the Family” quest should be finished before doing the Dhorn Slayer quest. So, after killing Simon but before killing the generals, I went back to Tald’s to talk to Jero again. Only to find he wasn’t there. So I went back into Simon’s house…and found Jero still sleeping…in the middle of the next day. And his name was still in the red-for-enemy format, so I didn’t bother waking him up to talk about Caron’s killers. So if I wanted to talk to Jero about Caron’s killers, obviously it had to be before the Dhorn Love quest, too.

I had told you that I had never gotten into Bognar’s cellar to find Caron, because Bognar left before I got his cellar key from him. So I wasn’t sure if you were telling me about an alternate way to get through the “Home” quest (so that maybe I could complete the “A Death in the Family” quest after all, even without Bognar’s key), or telling me about another tip-off for the “Uncover the Dhorn Spies” quest, or just giving me a tip for when I played the mod again. In any case, it looks like Jero’s out of the picture for the rest of this mod.

You asked if I took my portrait back to show “that mage”, or did I refuse him. I assume you’re talking about some mage in the Academy during the Pia-finding quest. I haven’t gotten that far yet. But I won’t be able to show him my portrait anyway, because when I talked with Nathan about that whole portrait fiasco way back then, I ended up giving it to him, mainly so that I wouldn’t be tempted to show it to anyone who might recognize who I really was.

Okay, I’m off to (hopefully) ruin the morale of some egotistical gladiators. Speaking of which, that part of this quest is a bit confusing. I read through the wikia in order to see what lock and trap skills I might need, but I didn’t catch anything about Dhorn spies. But I’m going anyway. I’ll just wing it and see what happens.

If I had mentioned the gladiators before, it was simply mentioning it as a future quest among my remaining quests. So far, the only time I’ve been in the Arena was for that early pickpocking quest.

 

I have tried to use Lilura's stuff but on the one mod I wanted she had not finished and it had been out for years so I have not been back. I did look at those two short mods on the vault but didn't generate any interest at my end. Of course back at square one with a new mod does not seem as much fun for me as replaying my favorites with all the foreknowledge I have in place, must be an old guy thing.

Pia's room at the Lionhead might still be open, doing Nightengale or Top Secret might give the sexy skill boost needed for solo play but still might roll the not in the mood dice or something. Maybe your stealth was too low for Pia? I almost never get caught in her bedroom where the book is, but she is scripted to talk to you after you take the "papers" from the living room, fun to read the song lyrics there too.

Rats, I should have mentioned how I deal with the noble in Simons house. You can't be nice or you get escorted outside, take the attack option, he will turn hostile but as a rule he will not hit first, so walk away, stealth and leave the room instead, he has not followed me, but now the whole house is hostile as you saw. You should never use ESC to end a conversation in ADWR, the OC said they had protections but it will break the scripts in almost every other mod built. There is the best shield for a bard in Simons room, good for Pia if you let her cast spells, matches up well with that armor the dwarf sells. Well you should have already pickpocketed a heal potion and the +2 sword from him in Talds, I thought he had another sword in his room but maybe my bad memory at work.

There is a change back at the mage who teleported you inside the Administration building, I'm bad with names, sorry, you might have told him the painting subject and then promised to let him see it. Hint: go in in stealth. Prwo uses lots of events like the painting theft in his ADWS, while your character is pretending to be a Dhorn here in the city, lots of things viewed from another angle.

You had mentioned the DC47 lock at the arena already, but you should be fine with that by now. I do save this for after no one has any more missions for me. If you bought the ring of invisibility as well as the ring of hiding from the jeweler, might be good things to have. I think I had mentioned that I leave the things inside the cages alone. I'm not even sure what XP is there, might be a lot, but I think the guards can see you in front of half of the cages, and a beholder battle, well tell me if you try. If he ever spots me sneaking I have to reload the princess. Just spy on this mission, you get to come back here with Vico and finish the job.

I think you have to see Caron die and listen to the two Dhorn who tortured him for the death in the family to trigger. The Wiki mentions not doing the Dhorn Slayer before working on A Death in the Family, not sure this is really a bug, it is simply that once you set up a meeting with Simon through Jero, Jero does not return to Talds Tavern so the two Dhorn can't be found. Killing them on the spot can be done but is quite hard at low levels, and you miss their other lovely dungeon and torture rooms. If you ask Jero about the two Dhorn after sex, he will be back in Talds for more later on.

 

By the way, SlickRCBD, if you're still reading this beginner's rant, you were right about there being a difference between game resolution and screen resolution, and that it might've had something to do with my Desktop icons getting scrambled.

I should have guessed during the times my game has frozen and I had to bring up task manager to close it. When task manager appears, the screen size is so huge that only a few (giant) icons fit onto the screen. That should have told me right there that they were different resolutions.

So that now seems to me to be the main reason my Desktop icons got scrambled. However, I still find it curious that it happened only this time, after I had used Debug Mode. It's never happened during other screen freezes.

 

Well, ralebeau, I’m an old guy, too. And I know that the foreknowledge from replays certainly helps to make replays easier and more enjoyable, especially in a mod like this one that requires that you be so precise in so many ways. But I still get a bigger satisfaction boost from the mysteries of playing a mod for my first time, preferably without having to read a walkthrough almost every step of the way.

For decades, I was a perfectionist at my job, and it translated into perfectionism in my game play, too. Then I got slapped in the face with a major health problem that suddenly left me feeling burned out. A lot of that feeling was stress-related from trying to be a perfectionist. So I soon gave up my perfectionist ways and began a more leisurely and relaxing life style, including in my game playing.

Yeah, I’ve already thought about returning to see if I could still get into Pia’s room. With your hint now that it may be possible, I may go do it before facing the gladiators. Oh, her dirty book was in the bedroom? Our bed session went fine, but I hadn’t gotten around to finding her book yet in my searching. She had “caught me” while I was reading the papers in the living room. After which I had left, so I never got to her book.

I was positive that I had pickpocketed everyone in Tald’s Tavern way back when. And I took special care to pickpocket all those back with Jero, because I knew that there would be a better chance of those guys having something special. Is there a chance that Simon wasn’t there then? Or that I couldn’t find his stuff on him because my pickpocket skill was too low? In any case, it wasn’t until Simon’s house that I got Simon’s sword and shield (and my very first Heal potion). And I have them in storage in case they come in handy for Pia or whoever.

Duh. You’re right about the dialogue with the nobleman ending before I attacked him. I should’ve run off then! I’m use to an “attack” option in a dialogue initiating a battle, although, come to think of it, it might have always been the enemy who threw the first blow. It didn’t dawn on me that, this time, Simon didn’t throw a blow, so I could’ve run away instead of hitting him.

Well, I’ve run out of too much steam to reload to a point before the Dhorn Love & Dhorn Slayer quests, just to see if Jero will give me that tip about Caron’s killers. Mainly because I suspect that he won’t give me the tip anyway, because without Bognar’s key, I never got to Caron’s body in the sewers and heard his killers nearby, and thus, I don’t even know yet that Caron is dead. That will probably lose me a bunch of XP, but I’ll live with it.

Well, I’ll have to see what the situation looks like with the gladiators before I decide whether or not to kill stuff while I’m there alone. My main concern is what the difference in XP will be between killing them while I’m alone vs. killing them with a bunch of companions. Won’t the XP be split between us if I have the companions along? I want all the XP I can get, especially since I’ve missed all the XP involved with Caron’s murder and the related quests. Of course, if I can’t handle them alone, I won’t have any choice.

About that mage “who teleported me inside the Administration building”… I assume you mean during the find-Pia quest in the Academy. If you are, I suspect that he’ll never ask me to see my painting, because I no longer have it anyway. (Yes, I’ve avoided absorbing every little detail of that quest in the wikia. I glanced at it long ago only to see what lock skills might be needed, so that I could decide whether to do it sooner or later.)

Oh…I had mentioned how the Dhorn soldiers and plain guards were easy, except that those carrying halberds were quite a challenge. Well, the so-called “Dhorn Bodyguards” were harder yet, both harder to hit and harder hitting! It took much longer to kill one of them than it had taken me to kill 3 of those halberd-wielding guards. So if I wasn’t hard up for XP, it would’ve been tempting to just sneak past them. But I feel as if I am hard up for XP, so I sliced-and-diced away (along with too many misses to count). At least they had +1 greatswords, which are above-average loot at this point. No, I haven’t bought a supply of Dex potions yet (I’m still in the habit of pinching my pennies…err, gold), but I did wear Dex +2 bracers, which did help.

Okay, I’m off to find Pia’s dirty book, if I can still get into her room. And then it’s off to the gladiators.

 

No, the mage was Shander, (had to look at the Wiki...) who teleported you into the admin. basement to recover your portrait. You can pay for the spell by offering sex with him, with a different ending than you might expect. By the way, which maid did you use to get back out of there? I never trust the laundry maid, the other one tells about how they never pay attention to maids, find clothes and dress up then everyone is non-hostile. Much easier now to collect all the locked doors and the chest, though I stay in stealth. Many mods do nothing if the invisible or stealthy PC bumps into a hostile, here with the ACAG hak they will see you now and attack if you moved into them, if you stay still and they move into you they may just ignore you. The very first thing that impressed me about that hak was that my princess had fingers, instead of the fist like everyone in the OC.

If you talked to Simon or Jero before the pickpocketing Simon leaves, Jero stays but has nothing on him.

If Pia's room is not open(able) you might be able to rent it too. Have you seen the option of playing with yourself when you use the bed in your apartment?

 

I got sidetracked, so haven’t gotten back to the game yet…and just found your new post.

Oh, THAT mage. The jerk. Yes, I slept with him in order to pay for the teleport. (Not sure if I had told him I’d show him the painting; maybe sleeping with him was an alternate option instead.) And then he teleports me without telling me how to get back out! When I did get out, I was ready to give him a piece of my mind, but when I got there, I found Dhorn around his dead body. Strangely, they didn’t seem to notice me even though I was caught by surprise and hadn’t been in stealth.

The maid who helped me…let’s see… When I was teleported in, I was in a room on the west edge of the map. I went north along that west edge of the map until I hit the north edge. Then I went east along the map’s north edge. I think the maid’s room was the last room, right up against the east edge of the map. I don’t recall her mentioning about using maid’s clothes, so I think I got the wrong maid. She did mention that she wanted ALL of the loot that I had found, and that her husband had told her that was how to negotiate in this kind of situation. I just wanted to get the heck out of there, because I figured that a lot of the Dhorn were capable of seeing me, just like the one who killed me when I tried to sneak into the main gate. The maid pissed me off, after all the trouble I went through to collect all my loot so far, but it turned out that she was nice about it after all, and took only one small, cheap item, like a dress or something worth only one gold. But I sure did miss a lot of the building that I’ll be sure not to miss the next time.

Oh, I had “visited” Jero several times by then (I think, I was about to do the Golden Chalice quest by the time you suggested practicing my pickpocking skills there). I began to visit Jero there in Tald’s Tavern long before I got good at the dice game, so I was sleeping with him in order to make some gold. Plus I was trying to improve my “love rating” so that it would help me more in the future. My rating has been at 5 now for quite a while (I read that it can get as high as 7 in Part 1). The wikia gave me the impression that only certain characters are capable of raising your rating, so I’m not sure Pia’s book or playing with myself at home will make any difference. But since there is that option at my bed, yes, I have been pleasuring myself, just in case it helps.

I didn’t know that all that happened only because the ACAG hak file was part of the ADWR download.

Yes, I’ve noticed that enemies can run into me & still not see me when I’m in stealth mode, as long as I’m not moving. Those characters that constantly move are the hard ones to get close enough to to pickpocket, especially when they move around to random locations. More than once, those guys have caught me on my way to my next click spot. So now I take shorter steps, and wait for them to stop very close to me, then if necessary, move in the final distance very quickly.

And, yes, it is nice to see fingers relaxed instead of clenched into fists.

 

P.S. The door to Pia’s room was still open and her book was still there. Got it but haven’t read it yet.

It was too early to go visit the gladiators, so I did some shopping for the Blackflame Cloak, Gloves of Discipline, etc., and ran out of money. So I decided to play some more dice, for my first time since my all-niter back before the Golden Chalice quest.

It won’t let me win at dice any more. Every time it’s my turn, my only two options are to (1) believe them or (2) pass & quit the game. I can never call their bluff any more. I reloaded 3 times, with no change.

I guess it was to be expected.

 

Hmm, you might have been so poor that you didn't have 150 to challenge, something to remember when you must play later and sell clothing to keep going, in those games you must be able to lose and win, undressing just the one you pass the dice to. I don't know if you saw Mayor MacCheese and I discussing ADWR part one on the vault, it was about playing with only one sex act for the princess. Clearly not what Valine had on her mind when she made this module but he had an interesting way of making money. The parts to craft electrical traps are cheap and they sell for a good amount, my memory can't say if that dockside craft merchant has always been there but some people love it, I don't like the NWN version since there is no enchanting. That said, when Valine added the Bank Robbery quest she put some creatures in the path that drop craftable hides. Since polymorphing to a mouse might leave a lot of gear behind I have since put a very small amount into crafting and buy the items needed to finish leather. Despite what you can make, the rest of the conversations treat the princess as naked, so I kind of wonder why she left that drop, though I have not tested what else a mouse might carry besides jewelry. While it comes to playstyle too, I know there are some regeneration items coming for free, I tend to save money and just get some of the standard health amulets for myself and maybe one or two more depending on what else I need, like that Blackflame cloak which will do the same job.

As for the book, the princess reads it and comments as it goes along, use it, it's an interactive read, if you select play with myself in your bed and she decides she is not in the mood to proceed, reading the book once or twice will put that option back on the table or bed.

 

Duh. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve said “duh” to myself in this mod. LOL It’s been a bit embarrassing. I had enough gold to start a game of dice, but not enough to call a bluff.

So I went and read Mayor MacCheese’s comments, then bought some quartz and tried my hand at making electrical traps. With only 1 point in “Craft Trap”, it took me a while, but I finally made one. That gave me enough to start winning at dice. I had 8 other quartz crystals left, so later I practiced some more. Four of them “wore out” and disappeared before they turned into a trap, but I made 5 traps total. It was slower than winning at dice though, and I don’t want to spend precious skill points in yet another skill just to speed it up. (Nor do I want to use a feat on skill points.) So I’ll just have to make sure I keep at least enough gold to play dice again.

After finishing my shopping, I began & finished my trip to the gladiators. And finally found out why I went there in the first place: I actually recognized one of the gladiators as one of the men in the “mysterious conversation” in the sewers. (Who woulda guessed? Obviously not me.)

I went in the front door, because doing it Sharita’s way would lose me some lock XP.

While in the lobby, I checked out the room with the payroll loot in the DC48 chest that was hidden behind the bookshelves. Only to discover that here was yet another battle with a red-named so-called “enemy” that gave me Evil alignment points. On top of that, when I reloaded to try just bashing the bookshelves without killing the guard first, I didn’t realize that the door to the room was now open. And when I took my first hit at the bookshelves, the nearby guard to the gate to the viewing stands also ran in and attacked me.

It shouldn't make any difference what a person's faction is, if he or she is going to attack me and won’t stop until he or she is dead. There are good and bad persons in every group. If they’re intent on killing me, I should be able to kill them back. (Strangely enough…while wandering around, trying to figure out how to get the payroll without a battle, I clicked on that gate to the viewing stands. The gate guard saw me immediately, even though I was in stealth. And, even though the gate guard’s name was also in red, all he did was say that I couldn’t get in without a ticket.)

Eventually, I figured out a way to get to the payroll without a battle. I had read somewhere that at some point I was going to need explosives. So I bought some ahead of time to get in some practice using them (way before this visit to the gladiators). During my first try, by a Stone Golem, I ran away to what I thought would be a safe distance, and still took about 21 HP damage. At least it didn’t kill me. And it took the Stone Golem down to seriously wounded. During my 2nd try, at a door, I was so close to the door that I got trapped in the doorway between it and the explosive. At least I still survived, with about 24 HP damage. During my 3rd try, I ran even farther away than during my 1st try and put a wall between me and the explosion…and took even more damage (26 HP).

Well, I could live with that, and figured that the guard by the chest probably could, too. During my try at bashing the bookshelves, I had found out that it didn’t take much to bash them and figured that they would disappear in one explosion. So I tried it, and was able to use “pause” to keep myself in stealth mode. It worked, with neither guard dying, or seeing or attacking me. I opened the chest (with the help of a +3 lock-pick tool) & got the payroll.

At the monster cages by the 3 sitting guards, I was able to kill the ones on the right, because there was a door that I could close between them and the guards. (I forget the XP, but it was decent for one or two of them.) There was no door before the monsters on the left, however, and the guards heard & attacked me even though I was out of sight of them. So I never did kill those 3 monsters and just picked their locks.

Well, I was going to try killing all the gladiators by myself so that I’d get all the XP, right? No. It was impossible to kill any of them. It was easy enough to get them all down to near death, but the mod stopped it right there and wouldn’t let me kill them. They weren’t killable until I reported back to Nathan and got returned with a group of helpers. Well, I got to kill all of them myself anyway. The gate to the gladiator room was locked again. So I left the gate locked and killed them all with arrows, while my helpers could only get their weapons out and glare at the gladiators through the gate bars. I don’t know if the XP was divided between us, but I suspect it wasn’t because it was a nice, even 100 for each kill.

Oh…when I had finished my arena exploration alone but before I went to Nathan, I went to Sharita, thinking that, now that I’ve gotten all the lock XP, I could use her to at least be able to battle the one gladiator and at least get all of his XP for myself before my helpers joined me in battle. Well, Sharita wouldn’t talk to me anymore, so scratch that idea.

So now I have the “Missing Pia” quest. And I got my level 9 while in the Arena. There’s a chance I might even finish the mod with level ten!

 

Quite a bit of destruction, the trick with the trapped chest in the arena office is that you can disarm and open it without doing anything to the bookcase. Just stand close and move the view more top down so the chest can be selected, the guards must not have to blow anything up to get inside that chest either. You could try access with Sharita some other playthrough, the princess used to be able to kill the first gladiator she meets right away, but that may have changed and this will not be fun like Top Secret as a result, I don't choose that way any more. The arena guards and mage academy guards are not Dhorn, so there can be penalties for killing them, the mage academy maids are not hostile same as the Dhorn administration ones, but work in plain view of the guards, save if you get a chance to talk to one. There is stuff worth fencing off in that locked and trapped chest in the gladiators room. To do both paths try stopping after unlocking (or not) that last portcullis and visit Sharita to see if she will still talk, I don't think this will add a lot of XP though. As you may have noticed, Vico will not pay attention to your commands for very long, while the others on this required mission will. While this does not affect much when he joins for good near the end of part one, when I try and kill all the Dhorn I want to back in town, it is much harder to kite a few guards back to the party when Vico is trying to follow me with his poor stealth. As for explosives, Jacia mentions them available for purchase like her poisons, but they are not needed here, and Valine hands them out for free before they are really required in game. By the way, poison is an option for one of the Generals, active ale barrels, but last time I tested it killing everyone in the building came with alignment issues, same as fireballing the other general and catching the prisoners alight does. Even hostile Dhorn maids (part 2) have the killing civilians alignment shifts. Most all my princesses are level 12 waiting to start ADWR part 2, I think it would take some serious grinding and killing to reach level 20 in part 2, I never have.

Unlike BG, XP is not divided up, unless there is some penalty for multi-class levels the PC will get all of the XP for each kill/quest. The companions will all level when the princess does, and is done through dialog with them, some even offer class options. I counted at least 19 different companions through this story, not counting the two extra guild members on that one required mission in the arena. The final battle can be with a party of 9.

I just polished off BG2EE and got re-started in Planescape Torment EE, might try for the bonuses in thief this time to get ready for ADWR coming up next, and more training with Annah is always fun.

 

Another “duh” moment. I’ve done that before, looking top down to reach something, and (as I’ve done so many times already) forgot about it.

Hmm…since the explosive worked with the guards there not discovering me, I wonder if it would work as well with the guards by the monsters. If I set it in front of the beholder, it might even kill it in one explosion, though it would be a good idea to have more than one, just in case, especially if one doesn’t kill all 3 monsters. And it might be handy to use in other cases, too, such as before a tough battle starts.

Yeah, I looted that chest in the gladiator’s room on my 1st visit. Can’t remember the DC, but I think a +1 lock-pick tool did the trick. Or was it another +3? Seems to me that I used a +3 twice and a +1 once.

I’m guessing that, if Sharita’s meeting with the gladiator can still be arranged at all after I get through the gladiator gate in the lobby, it will have to be before I recognize that one gladiator from a distance.

Since I left the gate locked when I killed all the gladiators with arrows, Vico was never able to show me that he ignored my commands. Although he still managed to be obnoxious during conversations. I’m not looking forward to having to put up with him in some future quest. And if he tries to force himself on me again, I may just kill him at least once even if I reload afterwards, just for the smile it will put on my face. In fact, there’s a good chance I’ll kill him even if he doesn’t try it.

When you kill all the Dhorn at the end, I take it you don’t get any Evil alignment shifts? Or do you simply save your character to the vault first, and then kill them all afterwards?

I never did use Jacia’s venom in the ale. I had read in the wikia about how that killed innocents. I still have the venom in case it can come in handy in the future. Although I don’t think it works on bows or arrows. The only times that I can think of that it might come in handy by using it on a blade are when (1) an enemy is immune or resistant to the piercing of arrows, or (2) poison works better than anything else, such as all the magic arrows that I now have to use with my Lesser Oathbow.

You reach level 12 by the end of part 1?!! And I thought I was doing good! I think my missing some quests has really lost me a lot of XP.

At least it’s good to know though that your XP doesn’t get shared with companions. I’ve been wondering about that ever since my first companion. That can save me from unnecessarily trying to do something alone for more XP, like that final battle.

Although I don’t have Planescape Torment EE, I’ve been playing my character there as a thief and been enjoying it.

 

You should get at least two or three chances to see Vico get what is coming to him, even romancing him (Ugh) there is still one.

There is no alignment shift for killing Dhorn soldiers and guards, Dhorn civilians yes as you saw, also no XP at all for most in town but my princess does it anyway just because... All the door guards, gate guards, even those outside north and south, hunting lodge, prison, Talds, Swordfish, those that killed Shander, I think you may have already wiped out the others that are inside. The ones on the prison roof are tricky, since I don't want to make the patrols hostile because moving around town would be so much harder now with Vico in tow. Vico is pretty funny on those that need ranged weapons since he won't use one. I have even attempted the mass battle, but the patrol always sees this and I just don't want to mess with them all over town.

There is still plenty left to do in part 1, I think you can still reach level 12, we'll see.

It is worth paying the rangers 20,000 for their trip, store prices not as good of course but with a lot of loot to sell, just don't spend it all away before hand, like I have done when I forget.

The chance to get the Pia romance going is soon after you are back together and free in a new town, and a couple of dialog choices to help things along before that, stay with her in the choices. Most of the other romances, if you like that sort of thing, will start getting serious in part 2, two guys you have met and two new ones. I think it is still possible to prevent Pia joining the group for part 2, but you must be very mean to her on the next missions, I never am so I can't be sure it has not changed over the versions (I would have to read the Wiki some more), used to have to have one of her ring versions to get her to join part 2. You can take up with a guy and halt the romance with her later if you want, but you must work fast or carefully depending on who.

 

Yes, I might just reach level 12 in part 1 after all. I’ve just recently reached the town. I haven’t even sold enough loot to pay the rangers yet. About all I’ve done is discover the conversation in the old Taylor shop and romance Pia. And I’ve already gotten my level 11. It happened when Pia and I climaxed…for a nice climax bonus. LOL

I wanted to turn down the outrageous price the rangers demanded. But after reading the wikia to see if there was another way to keep them in the picture, it looked like there was no other way, so I’ll do it. Initially, I didn’t want to sell that lovely Ice armor or that nice longsword, but I’ll probably never use them. So I’ll sell them, & that will get me the 20K for the rangers.

Here’s my current plan for Pia’s development. I had Pia pick Bard for her 2 level-ups, so that she got the special bonuses that come with Bard level 6. I’m thinking about her next level-up being a Rogue or Fighter. I’ll probably pick Rogue for a couple reasons.

I didn’t bring any money with me (that way, I can’t get robbed of it), so I pretty much have to sell the longsword in order to get the 20K needed. And I’ve sold all the other nice longswords I’ve found, so I wouldn’t have any for her to use as a Fighter. While I do have a couple of nice shortswords (on me now) that she can use.

I say “a couple” shortswords because I’m also undecided about how to have her melee. At the moment, I have her using one sword and a shield, because her AC is extremely low and she gets injured very easily. Unfortunately, even though she has a shield-using feat, using one increases her chance of spell failure.

On the other hand, she has the ambidexterity feats for good 2-weapon melee, so giving her 2 shortswords would get rid of the spell failure problem. But it wouldn’t help her low AC.

And she may be as bad as Vico when it comes to listening to me! When we got put into the pit with that ice wyrm, during our first try I had her stay in place by the ladder while I circled around to the other side of the wyrm to battle it by myself. While I was in battle, she came over anyway. The wyrm turned its attention to her and killed her faster than I could feed her health potions. Granted, I probably could have saved her anyway, but I was trying to use up a ton of minor health potions first and they weren’t healing her fast enough.

During our 2nd try, I had her stay by the ladder and I actually removed her from my party before I circled around. She came over anyway, and rejoined my party herself! LOL Fortunately, I managed to keep the wyrm’s attention on me that time, so Pia survived.

As for romances, I’ve pretty much decided to stick with Pia, rather than play romance games with more than one person, and maybe spoiling the good one I have going now. And she’s a good source for advancing my “sexy rating”. It went up to level 6 during our love session in the brothel. I do wish she was a male instead. That way, I can imagine I was the male, and she tells me in what ways she’s enjoying my love-making abilities. Which is always nice to know! **silly grin**

I almost missed that romance session though. After we had gotten into bed, I was tempted to let her rest, since we both seemed to be quite exhausted and tired after the long, freezing walk to town. Fortunately, I said “Pia” instead of “rest” in the dialogue options. Picking “rest” could have spoiled our romance right then and there, even though it would’ve been a reasonable…even compassionate…choice under the circumstances. Which is a good example of how picky decisions can be in this mod.