Jediphile

Didn't see Obi-Wan taking any DS points for doing it to Anakin, so I guess that settles that...

Probably because the number tries to go into the negative and can't, so it begins counting from the top again - the maximum of four hex digits (FFFF) translates to exactly 255 in the decimal system. Still, that's just scary - a smart Hanharr? Exile: "Oh there you are Hanharr. Glad to see you. Heard you had a disagreement with Disciple, but since you're sitting here all quiet now, I guess you sorted out your problems... What are you doing, anyway?" Hanharr [translated from Wookiee]: "Oh, I'm having an old friend for dinner...."

Shouldn't be a problem. Most players are level 23-27 once they reach Kreia, and since her power/vitality, etc. seems to be depending on your own, it really doesn't matter - Kreia is always tough because her power level is scaled to match your own. That said, there's no reason why you couldn't be higher leveled. It would give your more options and, especially, powers to use against her. Unless, of course, you've already reached Malachor V. Once you get there, there is no way off that rock, and there is no infinity xp to get there, meaning that the xp you can get on Malachor V are pretty fixed. If you want infinity xp, then it's either the Sith attack on the Mandalorian camp on Dxun or the respawning Hssiss at the jedi corpse in the tomb on Korriban (the latter is best if you're DS). I hear there's a level cap at level 50, but I've never actutally reached it myself - what would be the point?

Yes! In fact there should be a whole tree of de-limbing feats: Level 1 : Cuts off Hand - Moderate Damage, Moderate Reduction to attack & defense, Enemy forced in incur off-hand pernalties. High Diffucutly Count. Level 2 : Cuts off Leg - Heavy Damage, Heavy Reduction to attack and defense, Enemy immoblized and rooted to the spot. Very High Difficulty Count. Level 3: Cuts off Head - Instant Kill. Ludicrously High Difficulty Count. :cool: <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I can see it now... PC: "But you don't have any arms left!" Black Knight: "It's just a flesh wound - the Black Knight always wins!!"

Yes, I've run into that bug myself, though not for Hanharr. The last time I managed to fix it, though. When it happened, I cancelled (because my skill points were suffering, and that was actually important) and retried a few times with the same result. Then I tried cancelling out of advancement, saving the game, and then reloading it. That didn't help. But then I tried exiting the current game (but KotOR itself) and then reloading my quicksave. Worked like a charm. Try that if the problem persists. That is, if it happens, cancel out of level-up progression, then save, then exit the game, and finally reload your game.

Nods in agreement. It was a good game, though. I ran it on Windows XP without any trouble as I recall, though that was pre-Service Pack 2. I'm thinking of trying it again next week, and you're right - the story had some very nice touches. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I really liked the way it turned out... once you found the four rings (avoiding spoilers) - you've completed the quest, and then "WTF!! Boy, does that SUCK!!" That was really tense. The revelation of you being Revan was nothing next to that

I tend to agree, but Kreia wouldn't have seen it that way, since she would not like to think that her greatest student was a failure too. I like how they did in K2 - they just suggested that maybe, just maybe, Revan never failed, but instead made a sacrifice. What's good about is that it's up to the individual player - did Revan fall or did he sacrifice himself - your choice! It really doesn't make much difference either way, but in one he is a failure and in the other he is a martyr - you choose. Personally I tend to think that Revan made the same choice as Ulic did - he chose a sacrifice to conquer the darkness, but though he made that sacrifice willingly, he was still overpowered by the dark side and corrupted by it. As Yoda would say, "Once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny!" Or as Luke puts it at the end of the "Dark Empire I" comic books, "One Jedi cannot conquer the dark side alone. I made a big mistake... I thought I had to save the galaxy all by myself. But the Way of the Jedi is not a solitary path. Many have died defending the Truth... many are together in this great war... Together in the Force!"

Well, a bunch of others have mentioned Fallout 1 and 2, the KotOR games, Planescape: Torment, etc. All decent games. I also like The Summoner (the first one). Trouble is it doesn't seem to run on Windows XP, so I can't play it anymore It's rather simple, but there are some very nicely done suprises in the plot along the way, and some of the background info is really great - I love that they have tales in a village by the lake, that the lake will flood the village and drown everybody if the dragon that lives in the mountains is ever sad, and so they have a festival of fun each year to keep it amused. It's probably completely stolen from chinese mythology or some such, but they use of it was good. They do reuse some of the areas way too much, though, particularly Lenele (those who've played will nod in agreement here...) The Gothic games are also good. I only finished the first one, but they both have pretty good plot and try to be fairly open. No. 1 can easily be made unsolvable on that account on several points, so I'd advice playing with a guide and keeping many savegames... The combat system isn't exactly my favorite in either game, either... But they're still good games IMHO:

True. The only problem with Force Resistance/Immunity is that there are about two characters in the game who would make you use it - Nihilus and Kreia. You don't even really need it against Nihilus, since he goes down so fast once you poke him with your lightsaber a few times... Nobody else ever makes you need it, so the chances are good you didn't take it, and once you reach Kreia, it's too late... Otherwise I'd suggest you stay clear of her and keep some distance. When the floating lightsabers come, make sure to turn and run about a bit, so that they get scattered. Then you can pick them off one by one at leisure by luring them to the side caves. You want to explore those anyway, since there are some nice items stored there. Be sure to use your protective powers. Energy Resistance (and progressions), Force Enlightenment/Master Speed, and Force Resistance/Immunity are all excellent in the fight against Kreia. If you start to go down in vitality, retreat, heal your wounds, all your force points to recover, then activate all your protective powers and assault her in melee again with everything you have - Kreia is a force power-user, so she's not well equipped to withstand your physical attacks (though she does have a ton of vitality points...). Make sure to retreat when she summons the lightsabers.

I agree that this rumor looks quite bogus, but aren't you being a little overzealous? Bastilla only posted a link, and she even said "possible KotOR3 rumor", suggesting to me that she was herself doubtful about its veracity. I'd be skeptical too, if she (or anyone else) had posted the text itself here as a fake press release, but she can't even post a link? I mean, it's not as if there aren't a lot of peculiar links on these boards... As for the rumor itself, yes, it looks totally untrue. "Hi, this is the real KotOR3 news and I'll spill it. You won't see it confirmed or denied by the devs yet, because they're just redoing their site, but just take my word for it!" - Yeah right... The devs conveniently being unable to confirm or deny smells more than a little fishy to me. Still, I'm quite happy to read all the rediculous K3 rumors I can find. But until I see actual confirmation of one on the Lucasarts site, I'll take whatever I hear or read with several grains of salt, and I advice others to do the same... Speculation can fun, but it's still just speculation.

One thing I think we should discuss a bit more concerns the NPCs or companions you have in the KotOR games. In K1 you had nine companions, but to be perfectly honest, I used very few of them. I never used T3, at all. I took him from the droid shop to the Sith Base on Taris, so that he could unlock the door (since only he can do that) and then dropped him before entering - I never used him after that. Zaalbar was another forgettable character. It was cool to have your own wookiee pal, but as soon as you got real jedi in the group, he soon went into retirement on the Ebon Hawk. Same for Canderous and HK-47. HK-47 was only used in the sandpeople encounter on Tatooine, and after Taris, Carth was used only when the plot demanded it. But bad though that might be, you actually have more companions in K2 - 10 in all, and there are actually 12 potential companions depending on alignment and gender. Yet the problem persists - you use only very few of them. Though more of them can be jedi now, you still can use only two next to your PC, and building them is less significant, since the game forces you to be alone during major parts of the plot. So what's the use of having all these NPCs at all? I doubt anybody ever uses them all. Does anyone ever use Mandalore, except on the Ravager when you have no other choice? Does anybody ever use GOTO at all? How about HK-47 and T3 (after Peragus)? I usually just you Kreia (bonus xp) and whatever other jedi is more convenient (Disciple, if I play female, since he can restore force points for me). I think they should make a lot of NPCs more temporary in K3. If it's unlikely you'll use a certain character beyond a certain point, then that character might as well leave the group.

Personally, I don't think it's the same thing, but even if I did, I'd still like duality of the system. Besides, I wouldn't want only one stat to dictate how fast combat floats, since that's where I find AD&D combat to be too simplistic - it's always down to your Dexterity in D&D, and that makes Dexterity rather important in that system. And I've always felt that this in turn leads to other silly ideas in D&D placed there just for the sake of retaining game balance - there is no reason why Strength should influence your melee to-hit probability, for example. So that's one reason. If you want to be really fast in combat, they you'll have to be agile enough to perform your actions with perfect grace and have fast reactions as well.

The lightsaber battle between Vader and Obi-Wan was a major point in the original film, but neither of them were the protagonist of that story... I think they could do something like that if they wanted. For example, you could have a different main character, and yet establish that Revan or Exile has turned DS and that only the other can fight him/her.

Come on and admit it - you love to hate this topic If you didn't then why would you read it, let alone respond? It's not actually that hard to simply not click on it. And, of course, by responding to it, you're helping to keep it alive. So maybe I should thank you for your contribution

Hehe, well you know I'll accept that idea if you've read my K3 plot suggestions Only trouble with it is that the it was never established, so we still can't tell either way. It fits well with some of the Exile's other behaviour, which I find a bit odd at times. There definitely seems to be things he "forgets" rather conveniently...

A big part of the problem that they never say either way - we still have no idea why he is coming back. I truly doubt he came because the jedi masters summoned him. After all, they were all rumored to be dead, and the exile doesn't learn otherwise until he meets Atris. But he wasn't meeting Carth/Cede either, because if that was the idea there would be no need for Carth/Cede to give secret orders to the Harbinger's captain about what to do with the exile. The captain even mentions that the exile has diplomatic status, though he doesn't know it himself. There's little doubt that bumping into HK-50 and then being attacked by the Sith was never a part of the Exile's plan, though.

Thanks. I guess I just want the idea that you have to mentally comprehend what is happening around you before you can take action to be somehow represented in the game, even if it is in a rather minor way.

There's that too. Somehow I don't like the idea of a system where the guys with the high stats *always* go first no matter what on that basis. I mean, you really want a bit of uncertainty in there, even if the guys with high stats are still likely to go first, right? I know I do.

Because the actual time it takes to react to a situation is independent of the time it takes to swing a sword, or a dagger, or run towards your enemy. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Precisely. In fact, I might want my d6 initiative die to be open-ended in the sense that if you roll a 6, then you roll again and add that number to the 6. If you roll 6 again, then you roll a third time, etc. What would be the equivalent of someone who totally freezes during combat (separate from actual surprise or shock). Yes. That's why I want a mentally-based Reaction stat that modifies intiative as well as a physically-based Dexterity stat that modifies the Action Point cost of your action. Of course, these stats would also be relevant in other situations.

A late response to Hawk's lastest chapter for a K3 plot. Not sure about Falleen as a background, since the details don't seem important to the plot to me (not that I have a problem with it). I do like Kalan Tas, though. A Sith-hating Dark Jedi. That's not a character we see often in Star Wars - well done. I think in the strictly black/white universe of Star Wars, this character would forced to be a Sith, but I still think he works well as a character. It's probably more appropriate to say that will inescapably become Sith himself if continues to be fueled by his anger, hatred and vengeance (and so continues to use the dark side), even though he would never see it that way himself. But I digress... Never heard of the nighthunters before, but I assume you have some specific in mind for this one, since it otherwise doesn't seem to serve much purpose in the plot. I see you use Exile/Nihilus the same way I did. Not about to argue against that, obviously I'm not nearly as hot on the son/daughter of Revan idea, though. If Revan is your mother/father, then it certainly begs the question of who the other parent is. Besides, I don't get the impression that Revan is old enough to have a grown child (let alone the fact that jedi aren't supposed to have children at all). Also, you said that the plot began two years after K2. The problem with that is that this would be only 12 years after the Mandalorian wars, and Revan and Malak were both still pretty young at that time (remember, they were the young, rising heroes of the jedi, who defied the stuffy old ways of the masters). But even if that could be reconciled, I'm still not hot on the idea itself. In K1 my character was the fallen dark lord, who had a destiny to filful, whether I liked it or not. In K2 I'm the Exile who is returning the Republic as the last of the jedi. I'm really tired of the "chosen one" device, because it reduces my actions to being defined by my destiny instead of my choices. I'd rather play a jedi like any other who just make extraordinary choices and performs significant acts. I mean, Waddo even says it in your plot:

Kreia: "And do not mate with her. Whatever you may feel, whatever... urges consume you, do not let them control you. Such a union would breed... difficulties." Exile: "Oh, what a wonderful idea. I really hadn't thought of that - thanks for suggesting it. Wait here while I charge up her loading ramp..."

You could, of course, but I like to think that reaction time actually determines who gets to act first. Besides, I like the duality of one person acting sooner than another because he reacts quicker, while the other performs the action itself faster because he's more dextrous. Besides, even if you did the initiative roll with a d10, you'd still talk about only one second of delay at worst, and I'm actually considering using a d6 instead. I'm also considering a "delay" of 1d3 or 1d4 points upon each completed action before you can take the next to reflect how react to the changing situations around them in combat. Naturally your Reaction attribute would modify that "delay" as well. No, I don't agree there, sorry. But I did plan on highly skilled warriors to move more easily from one attack to another, sometimes taking one action upon another without delay or even chaining two or more attacks together as we see it in some computer games. The end effect would be similar, though. Indeed, a great warrior would likely get more attacks that way. Such a warrior would also be deadly, because even if his enemy blocks one attack, the warrior instinctively moves to the perfect countermove without hesitation.

Uhm, Ulic sacrificed himself to save the Republic from a great threat too... He may not have been a great strategist, but Revan certainly did things that were as bad as anything Ulic did - setting all the jedi who didn't blindly follow him up to be killed on Malachor ranks right up there with anything Ulic did, and note that Ulic's worst acts were mostly done in fits of rage, whereas Revan's were cold and calculated. Besides, Ulic was just apprentice to Exar Kun, so blame him for assaulting the Republic. As for Ulic's stupid death, well, we haven't seen how Revan dies yet... "

Yes, you've put your finger exactly on the problem with the K2 influence system. It's fine that the Handmaiden should act this way given her initial sense of ethics, but not once you've corrupted her and led her astray with your evil ways [insert optional evil MUHAHAAA here]. Yes, but only as long as you haven't corrupted her. Initially you may "pretend" to be good and take LS points. And you should take LS points in those situations, because you're doing good things - I don't care whether you're just "pretending to be good for the sake of proving how evil you really are". It's a characters actions and choices that define him, not he deludes himself into thinking. Besides, it should "cost" (i.e., give you LS points) to corrupt the good. Once you managed to do it, however, it makes no sense that the corrupted should continue to behave according the same sense of ethics. No, they won't have abandoned their principles completely, but they will have perverted and twisted them into something almost unrecognizable. After all, that's what happened to Anakin. He wanted to save his wife. That's not evil, is it? No, but Sidious used that goal and perverted it into something that corrupted Anakin.