Maria Caliban

I'm a huge fan of BioWare.

Llyranor: " Heh. I've found that creativity in and of itself is much more crucial for modding than technical skill itself. At worst, you can hire a scripting monkey or whatever to do the scut for you, but you can't buy creativity. You can, however, learn technical skills. " Heh, you can't buy creativity but many people are willing to give it away for free. A slightly related story: I also post on the BioBoards and have a thread dedicated to tutorials for modding .2da files for class creation, custom deities, adding music files, etc. I've received several PMs from people wanting help with this or that problem they'd encountered or just asking for a tutorial on a specific subject. The other day, I got a PM from a gentleman who'd started a thread on the mod creating board, in which I'd offered to help him with any custom classes he'd been working on. In the PM was a list of what he need from me: o A group of powerful spells that did "2D10 damage per caster lvl with a 100 foot radius " and "1D10 per caster lvl and 2D4 lvl loss for the opponent." o A group of classes, all of which had access to all spells of level three or lower an infinite amount of times per day. o A new warlock class that works on a fatigue system, which I'd come up with and script. o And since these classes and spells were "already done for us" the real work would be my coming up with all the new models he'd need for his module. His contribution: cool ideas.

Darque: "Hey, that's a cool idea. You could even do 1/2 races that way.. like the Half Fiends, Celestials, Ogres, trolls, etc.... in theory. " Half-Fiends and Celestials would be a good test. Lokey is correct that implementing them would be a struggle but there's much less hard coding when it comes to classes as opposed to races. You know Darque, between this idea and the exterior caves, I've decided you're a modding genius but you just don't know it. You're pretty good at coming up with solutions to my problems.

Krookie: "He said something about how he needed to do it to get to some other thing so he could complete some other quest so he could get some other item to help him get more hitpoints or something. " I think you've hit on a great point here and it's one of the reasons why some RPGs resonate with me and others don't. MMORPGs are often metagamey. I don't go out and kill goblins because they're threatening the town; I go out and kill goblins because that raises my 'kill goblin' skill. I feel the same way about the Elder Scrolls. It's not that learn by doing is bad, it's that I'm killing things and jumping up and down a hundred times to increase a skill, not because my character has any motivation to kill things or jump up and down.

No problem, the artist's name is Brom.

Racial Prestige classes are definitely doable and something I've been considering myself. If Obsidian ever patches Dragon Disciple so they get their wings, I could mimic that function with other races. In fact, racial prestige classes might be a way of allowing even more races into the game than I can currently. I haven't figured out how to unlock genasi but perhaps I could create a 'elemental touched' racial prestige for humans that's only available before level three.

I consistantly buy BioWare games. I picked up a X-Box when Jade Empire came out, I intend to get a X-Box 360 when Mass Effect is released, and I've followed Dragon Age for several years now. That said, the chances of me picking up this title are extremely low. I'm willing to pay for a game once and maybe pick up expansion packs. I won't pay a monthly fee because I won't be playing any game for months on end.

Darque, If the files are still in your override folder then that's what the .2da editor will open up. Are you doing the erinyes or dryad? My first thought is that you haven't correctly set the AppearanceIndex in racialsubtypes.2da. In both racialtypes and racialsubtypes there's a column called Appearance. Don't use that column; use ApperanceIndex. If that's not the problem, post the rows from racialtypes and racialsubtypes, along with their row numbers and I'll figure out where the bug is.

Tigranes, Eh, I here I was hoping it was part of that memory leak they were talking about in the patch notes. I'm not fond of the static camera but have had to use it when a PC 'talks' to an object as a random camera will sometimes appear inside the object. Charcoal, Duel monitors are a great idea. I'll have to make that my next upgrade. Kaftan, Nice snow pictures. I was using one of the snow textures available on the vault but decided that I didn't want users to download a hak for my first module, if and when I ever release it. What mod team are you part of? What's your project? Wistrick, What? You don't want to play a blue skinned woman with needles stuck through her thighs? The erinyes row in appearance.2da has the skeleton as that of a human female. I think you're right and there's some way of causing the armor to show. Supposedly, there are male erinyes though I've never seen one in a game or monster manual. There's no way, as far as I can see, to force a race to take a certain alignment. Erinyes are supposed to all be LE. They'd be an interesting 'divine' champion.

I've stepped away from playing with the 2da files, now that I feel I have a handle on them and have moved to journal entries/conversations in a module. I altered the set up of my toolset so that the side menus slide into view, allowing me to have the entirety of the window for areas or conversations. This helped immensely as I realized there were functions that I hadn't seen before; the animation buttons, for instance, were completely hidden until I stretched the conversation editor over the entire screen. I created a simple quest with three states. The first when it's given, the second when you've killed eight bladelings, and the third when you've returned to the quest giver with the bladeling's horn. I only had to use one script (GroupOnDeathSetJournalEntry) to update the journal when you killed the eight bladelings. Yet I was able to create conversational conditionals when he gives you the quest, when you talk to him and you haven

I have to disagree with this hypothetical. The majority of adults I know that don't play RPGs do so because they either are uninterested in computer games or do play computer games but are uninterested in cRPGs. If I were to place them infront of a computer with Oblivion or Neverwinter Nights 2, they would be uninterested and/or frustrated. They would enjoy neither.

Riftworm: "Seriously I did spend nearly 2 grand on new computer in anticipation for this game." This, more than anything else, frames your reaction to this game for me. For me, Neverwinter Nights 2 needed to be only $46 worth of game. On the other hand, you anticipated that Neverwinter Nights 2 would be over two-thousand dollars worth of game. I can only imagine how terribly disappointing it would be to invest so much into a product and be let down. I am going to guess that the original Neverwinter Nights never let you down. You came into it fresh, found a worthwhile OC, and discovered a moding network/community that has provided you with four years worth of entertainment. Perhaps that should be complaint 0 on your list since it appears to me that it's the source of many of your other complaints.

Oerwinde: " Its "moot point" dammit." Thank you. Bokishi: " Did medieval people even wear underwear?" The cooler it got, the more layers they wore. Is some places, hosen (sort of like pants that fit like socks) were used, in others long tunics that reached to the knees. Depending in the time and place, it's difficult to know what average people wore under their clothing as tailors didn't have patterns - they learned by rote - and depictions of people were often limited to nobility/religious figures. They're not the type of people you want to paint in their skivvies Sand I will never understand the prudishness of people not wanting to see nudity. For godsakes people, do you wear clothes in the shower? I have nothing against nudity. I may tease but asking for scantily clad/naked models doesn't seem that odd. It's interesting the different policies that WotC has for the PC as opposed to monsters.

You know, NWN was at least six years ago and it had jiggly mesh. By now, I expect all the female models and the man-ho models to have it. NWN Jiggle > NWN2

You don't have to back up anything. The toolset will automatically create copies in your override folder. If you want to manipulate them open your toolset. Click on VIEW->2DA FILES... a list will appear. You'll want apperence.2da, racialtypes.2da, and racialsubtypes.2da. You can open them all at once and tab back and forth between them.

Oh, sorry. I had already seen your reply. Well, instead of Erinyes, use Dryads and tell us how you do.

I'll just pull a random creature out then. First, I open up apperences.2da in the tool editor. Oh cool, horses! Oh wait... they don't have a string reference number. No string reference number = no model. Hmm, okay, how about Erinyes? Fluffy wings, washboard abs, and a BDSM outfit, who wouldn't want to play one of those? Their label in apperence.2da is 514 and their string reference is 110712. In Greek mythology, Erinyes were the Furies, chthonic goddesses charged with punishing those who swore false oaths and those who broke "natural" laws. Unlike Nemesis, a personification of *just* punishment, Erinyes were often portrayed as vengeful and cruel. They tormented those who had transgressed heaven's laws without ceaselessly, often compelling the mortal to insanity and suicide so they might torture his damned soul eternally. I find this a far more compelling vision of Lawful Evil than D&D's "their so hawt you sell you're sole for da nookie!" version of Erinyes. Besides, Erinyes as is have a +7 Level adjustment so I'm going to change their stats to: +2 Charisma, +2 Intelligence, +2 Constitution, -2 Charisma Darkvision 60 ft + 2 Natural Armor Spell Resistance Infernal Resistance Level Adjustment: +2 Race: Outsider. Time to open up racialtypes.2da and racialsubtypes.2da. Now, here's the problem, you can't create new base races or subraces. However, you can overwrite existing ones that aren't being used for PCs and it won't have a negative effect on the game (that I know of). Moreover, you have to find a base race with only one subrace or the game will crash. Erinyes are Outsiders. In racialtypes.2da, Outsiders are on line 20, if you now open racialsubtypes.2da, you'll see that the first column is the name of the subrace and the second is the number of the base race they belong to. Outsiders have seven subraces attached to them (the genasi, the githzeri, and general outsiders subrace). On the other hand, the base race Humanoid_Goblinoid only has one attached to it In racialtypes.2da, click on the number 20, this should highlight the entire row. Hit ctrl+c to copy the row, click on number 12 for Goblinoid, and then hit ctrl+p. This should overwrite that row. Go back to racialsubtypes.2da, click on 33/Outsiders and copy and paste it over 26/Huminoid Goblinoid. Go back to racialtypes.2da, the first column says Outsiders, which is correct. The next few columns are links to dialog.tlk and influence what words appear in the game when this row is referenced. Keep on going to column after column until you reach the ones that say StrAdjust, DexAdjust, etc. Place a 2 in Dex, Int, and Con and a -2 in Cha. Endurance is base land speed, which is 30 for a medium size creature. The next is column of interest is 'favored.' That stands for favored class, I'm putting 2 for cleric as I've created my Erinyes as an instrument of 'divine' vengeance. For feats, enter RACE_FEAT_HUMAN. That will give Outsiders the human racial feats until we create RACE_FEAT_ERINYES. I'm giving the Outsiders the human biography of 8163, again we can change that later if you desire. Player Race should equal 1 to make this appear on the character creation screen. Keep on going until you hit 'DefaultSubrace." Right now, it points to 33, which is the original Outsider subrace but we want it to point to the one we'll be manipulating, which is 26. That's it for racialtypes.2da. Hit 'save' for that file and close. Now back to racialsubtypes.2da, 26/Outsiders. Change the name from Outsiders to Erinyes and the base race to 12. Next is the ECL, the level adjustment. We'll change that to 2 and the 'Abbreviation' to Er. The rest of this should be familiar. For now, we're going to leave the names and descriptions alone and continue to the StrAdjust, DexAdjust, etc columns again. As before, add 2 to Dex, Int, and Con and -2 to Cha. Endurance is, again, 30. Favored is class 2, clerics. And yes, they have a favored class so put a 1 in the next column. RACE_FEAT_HUMAN in the Feat column and 8163 in Biography. Change Player Race from 0 to 1 to make this available. Racial subtype is Erinyes. Age is 300. For color, I'm using color_moonelf. You can use any pre-existing color scheme you want right now and if you want to, I'll show you how to create your own color scheme in the future. Appearance Index is the number we took from the apperence.2da file: 514. Stick the ira_ge_raceicon in the female icon column. Hit save again. Open up your game and create a new character. You should have Erinyes available. Now, if at any time you made an error during this process, your game will crash before you're finished with character creation. If not, enjoy! Tell me when you're finished with this first part of race creation and then we can move onto any other aspects you're interested in.

Ahh, there's my favorite crippled, beheaded, murdering, raping, and pillaging lady! I saw someone made a sword for you at the vault?

Pop: " "We can never tell the future" is an anti-consequentialist argument precisely because it precludes any consideration of consequences. " Not at all. It's as consiquentalist as you can get. I'm not saying you shouldn't act because you don't know the future. I'm saying that you shouldn't act as though you are certain of the future. For instance, if I can create a container for toxic waste that won't wear down for a million years and blocks all radiation, I shouldn't proceed as though I'm certain that any toxic waste I put in it will never enter the surrounding area. It could be opened on accident, an earthquake might split it open, or I might just be wrong about how long the material I've created will last. I have to consider the consequences if the situation is that which I think it is and the consequences if the situation is not what I think it is. " You can never be assured of the consequences of any action, thus you shouldn't seriously consider consequences when making moral judgements. Classic Kantian position. It's a pretty weak one, too." I find that when people feel the need to tell me something I've said is "weak" they're not actually interested in what I have to say but in judging my statements. Why should I care if what I say is "weak"? Am I going to be arm wrestling with it? Do I win a prize if what I say is "strong"? That said, you haven't actually shown that what I've said is incorrect. You've agreed with me what no one can know the future. Are you suggesting that in that situation, I ought to kill Dark Raven? If so, why? " When considering moral matters, perfection is too much to ask. Sound reason and consistency are acceptable alternatives." Perfection is too much to ask. When faced with a masked man with a bloody chainsaw, sound reason and consistency might even be too much to ask. " The problem isn't that we don't have a viable option, the problem is that the best option (lying, in this case) is denied us because that option is prima facae wrong." I disagree. I don't consider lying to be the best option, if a said bloody man appears, my best option is to run away before ever entering into a conversation with him. If I do start talking and he asks me, lying may be morally wrong but telling the truth is also morally wrong. I then need to ask myself which is more wrong. In this case, I would lie because the consequences of my telling he truth seem far more compelling. If I'm wrong about the situation, I can undo the consequences of my lie. I can't undo the consequences of Dark Raven being chopped to bloody bits.

I altered the Humanoid_Reptilian line in racialsubtypes.2da to reflect the Kobold's stats, took the number from apperence.2da that kobold appears under (535, I think) and placed that in its apperence index, then I made the Humanoid Reptilian race and subrace available for players. It's not that difficult to just kick a race into the game. I also changed the dialog.tlk file so the race would be listed as a kobold and created racial_feat_kobold so they could have their own set of feats. Is there a race you're interested in playing? I could create the same for you or just walk through what you'd need to change in the .2da files.

Pop: " Since we're going down an anti-consequentialist path

It baffled me when Kheldorn attacked Viconia as they had spent months together in game, fighting hordes evil hordes side by side. Yeah, she said a few nasty things but in *my* game, she never actually does anything evil. Kheldorn comes off as being a bit psychotic.

Tigranes: " I think there's always been an implication with many plots that to be Good involves a certain level of unrealistic idealisation, and to be ruthlessly pragmatic is to be Evil. I killed Yaisog Bonegnasher because I knew that the chance of him reporting his findings to his superiors could not be taken (not in terms of the game, in terms of roleplaying). In a way that's my gripe with being Good in D&D - you are expected to do the Greater Good while saving puppies and children, and pardoning villains and rebuilding collapsed toilets on the way. Then when your good actions push yourself into an inescapable situation, you either heroically pull something out of your arse or die heroically and tragically. Which is why I nearly always end up just playing CG and bend the rules a bit." In the real world, holding to idealism can be just as harmful as selfishness. I think that D&D is simply a product of it's genre. In the majority of fantasy novels, and in fact most popular fiction, people who act in whatever way is defined as morally correct are rarely punished for it. And if they are, it's nothing but another obstacle to overcome before the climax in which good conquers all. I think another problem is that you're rarely allowed to be truly evil in WotC games. Evil isn't being pragmatic, it's being hurtful and selfish to the point where others cease to matter to you - they stop being an end in themselves. The majority of evil options available are merely rude or greedy, which is one of the reasons being neutral usually means switching back and forth between good and evil options. Gorth: " If Dark Raven is a know menace to the innocent and you know based on her nature that she will kill innocents if she manages to get up and move around again, is the choice then really that simple. Buy not acting, don't you become an accomplice to a possible future evil act by not preventing it (and chopping of Dark Ravens head given half the chance, never mind the nature of the chance) ?" I was objecting to calling the killing of the orcs a mercy killing. If you're killing them because they're a danger to society, it's no longer a mercy killing. As for the situation you present, I wouldn't agree that I'm an accomplice. That would mean I'm morally responsible for another actions, something I'm never going to agree with unless you're talking about a child I'm raising. I will agree, however, that I may have an obligation to my society, especially if we're in a time and place like the Forgotten Realms where there are large areas of lawless wilderness. This band of orcs is at war with a city-state I represent so I may have a duty to kill them whether they are well at this moment or not. Also, if I happen to come upon a known murderer or rapist, I might also have a duty to kill them given the chance. In D&D terms, however, I see both of these as being lawful actions, not good ones. I can agree that killing the orcs would be a lawful neutral act but not a lawful good one. As for Dark Raven, I would simply take her to a hospital and inform the police. As her back is broken, it's unlikely she'll be harming anyone for some time and as a citizen of a modern country, I have the luxury of not having to be judge, jury, and executioner.

Well... I made a cave out of an exterior last night.

Walsingham: " If I can condense Pop's post a little, I think he's saying that in an absolutist 'I wear my alignment on my head like amotel sign' universe (D&D) you should be whacking the evil people, no matter what state they're in. Otherwise, what happens when you are in the process of beating a bad guy and just before he is going to die he surrenders?" I don't think that's what he was saying. Besides, in NWN, if someone surrenders while you're beating them up and you kill them then you get evil points. Remember the fight with the orc?