Jump to content

Arkan

Members
  • Posts

    2271
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Posts posted by Arkan

  1. Why does the title state: "Edlington horror: boys aged 10 and 12 admit torturing children?"

     

    Should it just be: "Edlington horror: boys aged 10 and 12 admit torturing peers?" It's not like they were torturing 4-6 year olds. These kids were roughly the same age.

  2. Who doesn't actually own most of this pack? Someone who just came out of their cave?

     

    I actually just bought the Episode Pack (for less than $7) after seeing this thread. I planned on waiting until all 3 episode were released, but I figured I couldn't pass up the cheap goodness.

     

    My question is, now that I have HL2, Ep1 and Ep2, do the (minute) graphical enhancements of the Ep 1 and 2 affect OG HL2 at all? Would I have to have all three games on the same steam account (they aren't)?

     

    Nope, they are pretty much stand alone. The graphical updates come in naturally with each episode so you don't really feel like you miss out. HL2 still looks pretty nice, though.

     

    Ok, thanks. Just wondering, because I didn't know if I should hold off until I found out or just dive in and run through HL2 again.

  3. Who doesn't actually own most of this pack? Someone who just came out of their cave?

     

    I actually just bought the Episode Pack (for less than $7) after seeing this thread. I planned on waiting until all 3 episode were released, but I figured I couldn't pass up the cheap goodness.

     

    My question is, now that I have HL2, Ep1 and Ep2, do the (minute) graphical enhancements of the Ep 1 and 2 affect OG HL2 at all? Would I have to have all three games on the same steam account (they aren't)?

  4. I've said it before and I'll say it again: Fighter 2/Sorcerer 6/Eldridge Knight 10 (then fill in with either fighter or sorcerer levels, per your play style). You'll get a kick-ass melee fighter who can self-buff (plus buff her party with stone skin, etc!) and take out multiple mobs with powerful AOE spells. The best of both worlds. I love my EK! Don't think I could ever play NWN 2 with any other class now. I'm spoiled!

     

    PS: Take Able Learner, and stuff as many points as possible into diplomacy. Then she will really rock!

     

     

    I did this with a 10/10/10, and the character was awesome.

  5. What about not-so-new games? Wasn't there some Fantasy FPS RPG type deal recently? Not Oblivion. Was it Gothic 3? A Might and Magic game? How were they?

     

    Speaking of Oblivion, I heard the expansions for that were pretty good. Thoughts?

    Dark Messiah of Might & Magic is a Fantasy FPS that use the Source engine and came out in the same year in Oblivion I believe. The combat & levels are great, the story is kind of a follow-up to the one of Heroes of Might & Magic V.

     

    Gothic 3 is a open-world RPG like Oblivion. The game works with several factions one does quests for and there's a reputation system that determines how the factions react to you. I was playing it until a couple of weeks back, but I put it on hold since I got a bit bored with the quests which are all of the same 'fetch/kill' type (even the main quests).

     

    Well, I played the first two Gothics and enjoyed them a lot. Is it a continuation of the same "story"? I'm not about giving it a shot. I heard it looks pretty good, at least.

     

    Oh, yeah, I just got Street Fighter 4 on the cheap. Awesome. I just wish they had multiple "super" technique moves. The game looks and plays great.

  6. Yeah, I have played FO3 to death a lot. I'll probably get all the expansions when they're bundle released. I've played all those old games mentioned to death as well, hehe.

     

    I've heard good things about both Mass Effect and The Witcher, so that's why I asked. I've never played a BIO game that I didn't like, other than NWN overall. I'm not really into fan made stuff, so NWN2 is pretty much out, as the latest expansion didn't sound interesting at all.

     

    I saw Prototype in the store for PC today, would that be worth picking up? I know it's not an RPG, but still. How about that new Ghostbusters game? :D

     

    What about not-so-new games? Wasn't there some Fantasy FPS RPG type deal recently? Not Oblivion. Was it Gothic 3? A Might and Magic game? How were they?

     

    Speaking of Oblivion, I heard the expansions for that were pretty good. Thoughts?

  7. Well, I made a very out of left field character on my second playthrough, and I had a blast.

     

    It was a strength focused armored monk! It was a pure roleplaying choice, as I wanted an armored melee character that didn't use any weapons, and just pounded things with his fists.

     

    I don't remember too many of the specifics like strength or level progression, as it was kind of an awkward process, but he was a legit character that used all the rules (and maybe some bug exploits) available in the game. For example, armor had no effect of flurry of blows, so I always had an extra attack. I have no idea if this has been patched since I played through. My character carried a shield for extra defense, and it turned into a weapon (roleplaying-wise) due to the animations of the monk. It actually looked really cool, too.

     

    Here's what I can remember, other than what's stated above:

     

    Race: Aasimar

     

    Classes (level distribution is fuzzy, but I used levels necessary to get the most out of each class):

     

    Sorceror (only one level for RDD)

    Red Dragon Disciple (I don't remember maxing him out at 10 levels, but maybe I did)

    Monk

    Fighter (One level - I don't remember if I used any fighter levels for heavy armor and shield proficiencies, or if I took them through monk level-ups. )

     

    Feats were mostly combat oriented. Sure he suffered from multi-class experience penalties, but there was more than enough to make up for during the course of play. He was a beast that could go toe-to-toe with any creature in the game quite handily, even the final boss.

     

    ---------------------

     

    Second Character:

     

     

     

    Was actually my first character through MotB that I took all the way through the original campaign.

     

    She was a human (I believe) fighter10/sorcerer10/eldritch knight10. Stats were pretty evenly spread, and nearly all spells were melee combat oriented (defensive and offensive), other spells were used as enemy disablers (Bigby's, et al).

     

    She wielded a katana, and it was a really fun character to play.

  8. When I read it with the an I found myself naturally reading it as "an Oooniversity" hahaha

    Hmm, so there are exceptions. Wondered me why people also say "an RPG". It's because it's spelled AAaaaaarrrr Peeee Geee. Interesting. So, "a" Youniversity, then. >_<

    It depends on pronounciation, not spelling:

    With the indefinite article, the choice of a or an depends on the sound of the word it precedes. A comes before words with a consonant sound, including /y/, /h/, and /w/, no matter how the word is spelled {a eulogy} {a hotel suite} {a Ouachita tribe member}. An comes before words with a vowel sound {an LSAT exam room} {an X-Files episode} {an hour ago}.

     

    "RPG" gets an "an" because it is an initialism rather than an acronym, and the letter "R" is, as you note, pronounced "arr".

    When an abbreviation follows an indefinite article, the choice of a or an is determined by the way the abbreviation would be read aloud. Acronyms are read as words and, except when used adjectivally, are rarely preceded by a, an, or the (
  9. Hey, guess what, going into a thread where people are discussing the life and death of a public figure and pointing out that people die all the time doesn't make you morally superior, it makes you an insensitive douche.

     

    The point of celebrity is that many people connect with them, trying to make people feel bad about that connection isn't necessary.

    Every death is a tragedy, but the death of a bourgeoisie clown whose sole purpose in life is to distract the proles from the US' imperialism is not as bad as that of the African child whose father died mining Coltan so you could watch low-quality Youtube videos of Michael Jackson's song on your own computer.

     

     

    Hey, Christopher Reeves! Get off your high horse!

  10. It's funny when people try to modify a horribly outdated game with miniscule "better" animations that still look outright ugly.

     

    Maybe it's like self delusion: if you are always trying to improve something, even if it doesn't really improve, you don't notice how horribly outdated and crappy it looks.

     

    Sometimes you just have to let is go.

     

    Right.

  11. KREZACK:

     

    A funny thing happened while I was playing around with the animations. I redid the override trick like you mentioned, and while the character avatars were the updated BG2 avatars, the animations were that of the original BG/IWD; spellcasting and attack animations, that is. The idle and walking animations were the ones from BG2. What wasn't changed was the weapon animations, therefore the weapons had the updated animations, and the avatars had the classic animations which, of course, looked extremely awkward together. So, in a sense, I'm halfway there, haha!

  12. Now I have a new problem. The stealth button for my fighter/thief is wonky. I will click it, and it become highlighted in red, but nothing happens. If I click it again, it says I'm leaving the shadows. The only way I can get it to stop doing this is to quicksave+quickload. Even then, I can only use stealth once before I have to quickload again, which is getting pretty tiresome.

     

     

    Wasn't stealth a little bugged in IWD? Haven't played it in a long time, but I seem to remember that.

     

    Well that sucks. There goes my fighter thief character.

  13. Now I have a new problem. The stealth button for my fighter/thief is wonky. I will click it, and it become highlighted in red, but nothing happens. If I click it again, it says I'm leaving the shadows. The only way I can get it to stop doing this is to quicksave+quickload. Even then, I can only use stealth once before I have to quickload again, which is getting pretty tiresome.

  14. Just CHRAnim.bif I think (so all the character avatars, hopefully). The whole idea is to (hopefully) break your IWD install so we know for sure that those are the correct files to edit. So do a backup, if you don't want to reinstall from scratch.

     

    I might reinstall IWD1 sometimes soon myself and play a solo or duo squad, as I haven't done that before. I recall it being frustrating at first when I last tried, but I imagine I'll become overpowered eventually from all the extra XP.

     

    Ok, just removed CHRAnim.bif from chitin.key using WinBiff. I supposed I also could have just deleted the bif from the data directory? Anyway, I went to load my game and it just booted me to desktop saying the program has encountered an error, but nothing specific.

  15. ...so I decided to finally play IWD with all the add-ons.

     

    My only question: Is there any way to restore the original avatar animations (Ala BG1?) that were changed to the crappy BG2 avatars? I thought the reason for "upgrading" them was to make use of dual-wielding, but I see no option to dual-wield. I would much rather have the classic BG avatars.

     

    I agree - I much prefer the old avatars. Seems like the only way is to not install HoW. You could maybe replace the bifs in your override directory but I'm not sure if that'd make the game crash or not (probably not, since there's no dual-wielding?)

     

    Do you know which files those would be? I could try by installing vanilla IWD to a different directory and copying them over. Worth a shot, since it would make the game much more enjoyable. Hell, if i worked for IWD, it could probably work for BG2, but then you have the dual-wielding problem.

     

    Hmm. I don't have IWD1 installed, sorry. But I think they'd be easy to find because I recall they had intuitive filenames. What's the TeamBG programme that unpacks the chitin.key file and lets you extract the spell/avatar/weapon/etc bif/bam files (animation files)? Let me check...

     

    OK, it's called WinBIFF, download it here: http://www.sorcerers.net/Games/IEmodding/index.php

     

    Edit: download Bamworkshop on the same page to view the animations to confirm they are what you want.

     

    Edit 2: I just checked and I do have IWD1 installed. I can see the bams for Arundel and bats and stuff but character avatars aren't immediately obvious...

     

    Edit 3: OK, found them. They're under data\CHRAnim.bif in the chitin.key file. I guess you'd just extract that entire part of the chitin.key file to your override directory once you've installed HoW? No guarentees. There could be hard-coded animation frame count differences between IWD1 and HoW.

     

    Edit 3: Supposing you get bored and want to make your own spells or items, the IEEP tool on that page is a gem for that. DaleKeeper can detect any items/spell you make and add to the Override directory, too, if you can't be bothered using the console in game (I couldn't!).

     

     

    Thanks Krez!

     

    I'll give it a try after uninstalling IWD+HOW+TotL and report back.

     

    Edit 1: Ok, I extracted ALL the files from CHRAnim.bif into the override directory. I didn't really want to fuss with searching for each individual one because there are so damn many. Here goes nothing.

     

    Edit 2: Well, that didn't work. I didn't get any error messages or anything, just that nothing was changed :(

     

    WTF. That's exactly what's NOT meant to happen. Try this: delete that entire directory from the chitin.key file using WinBiff (also delete those override files you extracted( and see if anything changes (hopefully it should crash because there's no animation files - if not, we've got the wrong suspect).

     

    Report back here with what your findings, soldier!

     

     

    What do you mean when you say "delete that entire directory from the chitin.key file"? Do you mean delete all of the .bams or just delete the CHRAnim.bif?

×
×
  • Create New...