Spider

What recipe are you trying exactly?

Is her caster level high enough for the effect you're trying to add?

Or it could just be my memory failing me. I can't reproduce it anyway. I was so sure because I remembered thinking it annoying as well, until I found that scroll mechanism. But I guess it was just wishful thinking. (outside of dialogue, the mousewheel works just fine though, as long as the pointer hovers above the text area)

I'm fairly sure you can. Not when you are in movie-style dialogue of course, but otherwise the scroll wheel on the mouse works just fine iirc.

I wasn't trying to evoke sympathy with the last part. I liked the Spirit Eater mechanic and since I would like it more if Eternal Rest didn't exist, not using that particular ability didn't lessen my enjoyment of the game one bit. I typically do read feat descriptions as soon as I get a new one, it was just that I couldn't. It's just that I liked playing with the UI mod so I didn't really want to remove it. But in the need I had to when I picked up other feats I wanted to drag to the hotbar (basically no non-general feats would show up for any character).

This is kinda my point. Devour Spirit/Eternal Rest both fill up your Spirit Meter a lot faster than suppressing (and suppressing is not a net gain if your craving is high enough, although I don't know what the cut off point is). Both Devour Spirit and Eternal Rest give you an additional bonus in the shape of Spirit Essence. But while Devour Spirit does so at a cost (increased craving), Eternal Rest is basically free. I just think that the conflict should be between Suppressing - which is inefficient but lets you keep control, and Devour Spirit - which is a higher increase, but comes at the cost of increased craving. I also like that Devouring is necessary to get Spirit Essences that are needed for (some) crafting. But then comes Eternal Rest and lets you do all the things Devour does, but without the drawbacks. It just removes the tension for me. Or to put it another way, I don't like it when there are clearly "best" options. So to me, Eternal Rest almost felt like cheating, at least outside of dialogue. But that's me. (of course, I didn't use Eternal Rest much outside of dialogue. I used an old interface mod that stopped a lot of feats from being displayed once I installed the expansion, so I didn't see what Eternal Rest did until way after I had cleared the Shadow Realm. And for me there were not many respawns either, so once I learned what Eternal Rest was, there weren't many chances to use it).

By the way, does anyone else feel that Eternal Rest is something of a cop out? It does exactly the same thing as Devour Spirit, but without the drawback. So not only can you chose not to eat spirits, but when you have to you can do it without increasing craving as well (as long as there are a few undead in the vicinity). But given that some people really hate the Spirit Eater mechanic, I suppose having it as it is makes sense.

I started out in MotB as Chaotic Good and I ended it as chaotic good. I used suppress every now and then and Devour at times as well. But there are many, many, many opportunities in the game to gain a fairly significant amount of chaotic points. For reference, I went through the game having my alignment shift exactly four points toward lawful (right before the end fight). As far as the wider suggestion at hand, yes the alignment system does suck. But if it's used suppress is definitely a lawful act. I don't think it needs to shift your alignment two points towards lawful though, one would have been enough.

? I meant Gann. Afaik, clerics don't get to cast Heal with spontaneous casting? They get mass cures instead when they reach that level, right? If Gann gets Heal it's pretty much like spontaneous casting for him (and he had it when I picked him up). @Eldar: It's quite possible I overreacted a bit as well. I just tend to get a bit mad when anyone tells me to shut up. So we both got to blow of a little steam. No harm, no foul, let's do it again tomorrow (or maybe not). And I know that increasing a game's difficultu will cause nightmares for less experienced players. And I have pointed out in the past that I think me having played too many D&D crpgs have affected how I view games. But there needs to be some way to accomodate that in difficulty settings. Make the core difficulty as it is, but when you play at the hardest I expect a fair challenge. For example, I just started replaying Fallout Tactics. Feeling a bit ****y I figured I could play it on insane difficulty (and on tough guy, I just can't stay away from those extra XP). I couldn't get past the first mission. Hell, I could hardly get past the first encounter. It was so bad that I actually had to lower the difficulty just to be able to keep playing. And the difference is noticable. It's still quite difficult at times, but at least now it can be done. I just want the difficulty sliders to matter more. In MotB the damage doubles, but there's still enough HPs to go around. The main problem is that there aren't enough casters and the ones who are there have a pretty underpowered spell-selection. I simply wish THAT would have been something the difficulty slider could adjust. I was only advocating higher standard difficulty if some means for the less experienced player to "auto-win" tougher fights, like apparently Vampiric Feast, was included. But allowing for higher impact from difficulty sliders is a better solution. I'm bitching about difficulty because it's starting to be a problem with crpgs for me. I like the character building aspects and I like to replay trying out different characters. When replaying I also like to try out power builds. But with the lack of difficulty (for me) that has been the trend in later crpgs, that part of replaying a game is lost to me. And if a game isn't challenging the first time even, I get less enjoyment from it. Now MotB excelled in other areas, so it was still a great playthrough, but I have yet to replay it. With other crpgs I really liked, I typically started a new character right away. Now it's been two weeks and I still haven't felt the inclination. So yes, this does mean that my enjoyment of the genre as a whole is lessening. And I don't like that at all.

I had no intentions of bragging. Sorry if it came across that way. I was joking about the superior play skills. Just because I'm serious most of the time, it doesn't mean I'm serious all of the time. I really have no need to brag about anything. I was talking about the epic spells and the limited experience I had with them. I wish I could talk about how overpowered they were (I'm sure they are), but I just never tried them and felt like sharing that. If you note, the post where I entered this particular discussion I actually adressed two other topics and mostly mentioned the Epic spells in passing. You picked up on that though in a joking matter (at least the immediate response). So I tried to joke back and then elaborated as to why I never felt the need to use them. Again, not with the intention of bragging. *shrugs* Also, how you can find my post detracting more from the thread than the three obvious spam posts (one of which is yours) directly above mine is above me. I could actually keep going a bit, but I think this is enough. I'm actually starting to get upset for real with the thinly veiled insults you spread out in that post. No need to make matters worse, I suppose. After reviewing my posts I can see your pint somewhat. The first couple of days I guess I pointed out I felt the game was easy a bit too much. But I haven't after October 16, until these posts. And I certainly don't think I've bitched enough about it to be told to shut up. I suppose I should have caught on to your annoyance after your first reply to me. But I didn't. That's my bad I guess. I've also got a reflection about effects like Vampiric Feast in general. And this is concerning game design in general and not how it's applied in MotB (although it's a lessone learned from MotB, at least from my perspective). I would actually prefer it if games included some sort of "I win" effect in exchange for a general higher difficulty. Now I suppose you're going to accuse me of bragging again, but whatever. Up the difficulty so veterans find it challenging, but give the other players a way to compensate. This way advanced players can chose not to use the "I win" effect, but other players don't have to resort to console commands (since there are those who thinks "cheating" in a single player game is wrong). I'm guessing that's why the spell is in the game in the first place. To give even hideously nerfed characters a way to beat it. Every character has to be able to beat every game and all that. (on a side note, my definition of a panic button is not a spell that will automatically win me any fight. Instead it's what I use when I get the "Oh ****, I need breathing room NOW!" feeling. Vampiric Feast and the poultry spell both fit that bill. Best example though is Dragon's Breath from Throne of Bhaal though)

Hardly

As you lose spirit energy, you take penalties to your physical stats, and I think that's what Gorgon was referring to. Spellcasters shouldn't concievably be hit as hard by that. Yeah, of course. Didn't think about that.

Mass Heal actually took care of the Vampires on fairly low levels. So there's that anyway. When was the Mask encounter? I'm not sure I remember it. I have vague recollections of meeting one group of some religious people, I just thought they belonged to someone else (like Myrkul). But maybe I just wasn't paying attention. (btw, wouldn't meteor swarm be kinda bad against a bunch of high level rogues? Evasion and all? I used that tactic frequently in the OC, a rogue engages the enemies while a mage throws fireballs into the fray. Meteor Swarms would serve a similar function no? It just sucks if you miss the reflex save...) I never actually cast Vampiric Feast the entire game. I think I picked it on someone, just never really needed it. I think I only cast one Epic Spell and that was the improved Meteor Swarm that didn't allow any save of any sort. But I only really had one opportunity to cast it without it taking out most of my party as well, so it stopped at once.

Wait... what... how? How is a melee character more hampered by the spirit meter than a caster? When I played, it was the casters who were taking a beating because I didn't want to rest unless I had to (because resting would usually mean losing more points than satiate would regain). But keeping it full wasn't really that difficult most of the time (and had I bothered to read on Eternal Rest earlier, I don't think it would have been difficult at all). So out of honest curiousity, can anyone explain to me how the Spirit Meter system punishes meleers? I was playing a melee-character by the way. (also for the record, I really liked the Spirit Meter, I think it was a good way to keep resting in check. Now I typically dislike how resting works in D&D games and tend to not rest for as long as I can. Typically I only rest when my casters run out of spells, which in MotB was quite rare since I didn't need to use them much. All in all, I honestly think I rested fewer than 10 times in the game, not counting map travels. Which to me is a good thing)

A small point of observation. You said in your first post that Flopsy annoys you because it takes up a party slot. But you've only got four slots in MotB and it seems you've got all those filled in the screenshot (your character occupying one of them). So Flopsy is just a bonus.

In the OC, the highest you can get is +8 and only through crafting afaik.

When I did that battle, it was actually Gann who did all the fighting. My character got killed really quickly (basically the only time in the game). Then resurrected and killed almost immediately again. So Gann had to take down the big bad all by his lonesome. But whatever attacks killed my character, never landed on him. He had to heal himself a lot, but eventually he got the job done. What I'm saying is that if Gann can do it by himself, a bard and any partner except Safiya (because she will run out of offensive spells before the big bad runs out of heals) should be able to do it.

Have Safiya memorize greater heroism and cast it on him?

Actually, there are a few INT-based options. I had almost no Wis-based ones, but that's hardly surprising given how low my Wisdom was.

Although to be fair, a lot of the time science and knowledge is what's the cause of the problem as well.

Same here. Or I missed the only one I really wanted. The one that allows you to Sneak Attack everything (I should have taken Crippling Strike instead of Slippery Mind during the OC). On the other hand, given that I thought combat was fairly easy anyway, not having it may have turned out for the best.

Empower amd maximize are pretty nice though. Although much better for a sorcerer than a Wizard. Persistent Spell (that Safiya has) is fantastic on the other hand. Persistent Haste is aways nice. Is Extend Spell a prereq for Persistent Spell? That's the only reason I see to ever pick the former. I'd never bother with Quicken or Silent.

Yeah, they're time-based. All the non-special quests have a 24 hour limit on them.

Yeah, you'll get to go back. And I agree with you about the difficulty. Except getting hit for 175+ points of damage every now and then, there was nothing that really scared me.