Mongoose

not really. it had more to do with wanting to use the characters in my party more often that, otherwise, would have just sat on the ebon hawk. i rarely ever used bao-dur or t3 off the ebon hawk, but because their skill came in handy, i actually brought them along on a couple of missions. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I agree. This is an issue of PC skill use versus party use. If you "fix" the workbench and lab station to use only the PC's skills, you make the PC's skill points more valuable and the Sentinel more powerful. However, this also makes some party members who have skills as one of their strengths, like Bao Dur, less useful. The more you focus on the PC's skills, the more party members with good skills get marginalized. It's a Me vs. We issue, PC class differentiation vs. party member usefulness.

was that a joke? we has a hard time telling with some folks. akari seemed to be telling us that he not know how we got what we got, but that he wanted it one way, and the developer in charge of workbench wanted another... and we got something else entirely... so we still not know if final workbench were bug or purposeful. go figure. HA! Good Fun! <{POST_SNAPBACK}> The first sentence of my post explains which part of that is probably the bug. The rest of my post was just useless exposition. -Akari <{POST_SNAPBACK}> So the way it was intended to work was you only used the PC's skills at creation as well? Not that it makes a big difference; because you can't get much in the way of components without a good breakdown rate from high Repair, you can't build anything at a high level anyway due to not having enough parts around, regardless of whose character's skills the workbench is using. If the workbench is really intended to reflect only the PC's skills, however, then its item creation is bugged, as well as the item creation and breakdown for the lab station, which depends on the using character's skills and not the PC's. (Which would royally screw my current character over, as Repair and Treat Injury are the only two skills he doesn't have.) <_<

Yeah, discovered that one to my dismay a while back. All those skill points as a Sentinel, and what happens when I don't put points into one of my few cross-class skills? Can't regularly use item creation at all.

Don't follow. If you have a rapier (18-20) that is keen (15-20) and improved critical the threat is 12-20. Do you mean critical damage multipliers stack like that? Sure, but that has nothing to do with keen. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I believe he's talking about threat range multipliers, which is how Keen works. In your example, Keen is a x2 multiplier, and Improved Critical from NWN is also a x2 multiplier, so it comes out to a x3 multiplier using D20 rules (add together, then subtract 1). The rapier has a base threat range size of 3, and after using both Keen and Improved Critical the range size is 3 * 3 = 9, or 12-20.

Okay, here's a simplified explanation: Say you have a weapon that has 19-20, x2 listed in the description. The 19-20 is your threat range, and the x2 is your critical hit multiplier. The game creates a random number from 1-20 when you attack. The threat range represents the chance that you might score a critical hit, which does double (and sometimes more) your normal damage. The size of the threat range is your chances out of 20, so a 19-20 threat range means you have a 2/20 = 10% chance of a crit, because you will possibly get one on either a 19 or a 20. (Your chances are actually less than that, but that's a good estimate.) The bigger the range, the bigger your chances at a critical. When you use a Keen weapon, or use Critical Strike or Sniper Shot, you're increasing the chance that you score a critical. All of these multiply the base threat range by a number, so a weapon that has a bigger threat range works much better than one with a small threat range. A weapon with a 19-20 threat range works much better with Critical Strike/Sniper Shot than one with a 20-20 threat range, and a weapon with a 17-20 range would work better still. When you score a critical, your normal weapon damage is multiplied by the critical hit multiplier. In the example above, it's x2, so you'd do double damage on a critical hit. If the weapon had x3 as its critical hit multiplier, it'd do triple damage. If the weapon has massive critical damage, that damage gets added to your total damage on a critical hit (but not on a normal attack).

Look, regardless of how important you consider combat as part of the game, the fact remains that combat (and skills, and Force powers, for that matter) is buggy for the implemented system. These aren't just spelling errors or anything; these are bugs that have major effects on a number of feats and powers in the game. No one should get a pass just because the bugginess doesn't totally ruin the game as a whole. They're still glaring flaws, and they're still something that should easily have been caught during the testing of the game.

* Sometimes when there's a hologram during character conversations, that hologram stays around afterwards. I've had this happen both with T3-M4 and G0-T0, where the hologram shown as part of the conversation was still around on the Ebon Hawk after the conversation, standing near the entrance. These holograms will move, too; I had one attack Visas Marr when she appeared on the ship, and they persist between level loads. It seems to happen when during the dialogue when you trigger the same dialogue tree that shows the hologram more than once in the same conversation.

A critical hit threat range is the range where the attack roll threatens for critical hit damage. Attacks rolls are from 1-20, so a threat range of 19-20 means that if the attack roll is either a 19 or a 20, you make a second "threat" roll, and if that roll hits the target, you do critical hit damage. (If you miss the threat roll, you just do normal damage.) Most of the time a critical hit is double damage (the weapon will have xN after the range, where N is the damage multiplier), but some weapons or modifications allow you to do more. Keen adds a 2x multiplier on the critical hit threat range of a weapon. If you have a 20-20 threat range (i.e. a threat range of 1), with Keen the threat range is now 19-20, or a range of 2. If the original threat range was 19-20 (range 2), with Keen it would be 17-20 (range 4). When stacking with things such as the Critical Strike or Sniper Shot feats that also add critical hit multipliers, Keen adds 1 to the other multiplier. So, if you have a base threat range of 19-20 (range 2) on a melee weapon and you use Master Critical Strike for a 4x multiplier, the threat range for the attack would be 13-20 (range . If the weapon was also Keen, you'd add 1 to the multiplier, so it'd be 5x for a threat range of 11-20 (range 10). As a side note, the weapon you're wielding makes a huge difference when using Critical Strike/Sniper Shot. If it's not Keen and/or doesn't have a base threat range of at least 19-20, it's not going to hit for a critical all that often.

* I've also had the game freeze on me a couple of times while trying to access the shopping screen for Kodin, the droid parts merchant on Nar Shadaa. * The Twin Suns drop their swords every time after being defeated, so since you fight them twice, you can get two copies of each of their swords (four swords total) if you go back to the cantina on Nar Shadaa.

It's bugs. <_< He's supposed to be sitting close enough to the ship controls to look like he's pressing on the buttons, and he's supposed to remain seated at all times while at the controls.

It's pretty simple to find. The game has combat message logs that detail the actual attack rolls, just like the first KotOR. All you have to do is analyze the combat logs to notice that when enemies attack someone with a Speed or Armor power on, the defense bonus is not being added to the Jedi's defense numbers for the ToHit calculations. Same way players found the double-bladed weapon bug in KotOR 1, I imagine. Oh, and besides the big defense bug for Force powers, the Power Attack series has no knockback calculations, and the Master Flurry still gives you a -1 penalty to attack like the KotOR 1 version. Both of those are, again, disagreements with the power descriptions. And for all those that are gloating because the PC version will likely have less bugs, think: if Obisidian had managed to finish the Xbox version with no bugs, perhaps they would have had time to add new content or features to the later versions, rather than spending time tracking down bugs. A buggy game helps no one.

* Cutscenes consistently show another scene before loading the fade-in or fade-out. When loading cutscenes, it needs to stay black completely before the scene is loaded. * Any time you get too close to someone and start a dialog, the camera ends up clipping into one of the characters, so you end up seeing half a face or some other glitch. * Cutscenes need to place characters before they start. Sometimes you can get characters still moving or facing in a different direction than the devs seemed to want, which screws up the camera angles and causes animations to snap, where the character does the scripted animation and then snaps back into their previous position between animations. * For the two escaped fugitives on Telos, I told Grenn that I'd seen them, but he needed harder evidence than my word. However, they never showed up on the planet surface like I know they're supposed to, before you get to Atris, and Grenn never has anything else to say about them. * I've also had the mentioned problem where the Twi'lek in the Czerka surface base won't follow my party past some obstacles, so I couldn't save him because of the pathing. * The Ithorian you can save from the Exchange base didn't give me any Light Side points. * I've had one save game with Mira where she was not wearing the environment suit when she visits Visquis, which makes the game totally confusing when everyone is surprised it's Mira instead of my Jedi. * For the quest involving a dancing girl for Vogga, if you wait until after picking Mira up to do it, then have both her and the Handmaiden in your party and ask Mira to be the dance girl, she'll agree, but when you get to Vogga's lair, the Handmaiden will step forward instead. When the cutscene switches to the part where Mira is supposed to be dancing, no one is there.

According to the combat logs, Master Flurry still has a -1 penalty to all attacks when used, just like the original KotOR. It does not allow an extra attack with no penalty as stated in its description. I couldn't tell whether it was also applying a -1 to defense or not, however. Also, Power Attack at all levels is not making any checks whatsoever for knockback. I'd have to check, but I'd assume that the ranged equivalents of Rapid Shot and Power Blast have the same bugs.

Er, you do realize that the artists who make board avatars are not the same people responsible for tracking down bugs? Not every Obsidian employee is a programmer, y'know...

Well, this deserves to be in the spoilers section (use the spoiler tags otherwise), but...

I'm confused. Don't you all read the descriptions of the powers in a line before you pick them? The effects of Battle Meditation at all levels are all there to see when you choose your powers at level up. All you have to do is move your cursor over them... Anyway, for those who haven't read it, the power gives your entire party +2 attack, +2 damage, +2 Will saves to start and lasts 20 seconds. The second level adds a debuff of -2 attack/damage/Will to any nearby enemies if they fail a Will save. The third level ups all the bonuses/penalties to a whopping +4/-4. The first two levels are just decent, but the third level is an enormous boost. +4 attack/damage in melee is equivalent to boosting your Strength by 8 points.

Yeah, you're right, I was able to go back to a previous save with and still advance the story, so what I said before isn't the problem. Unfortunately, it looks like the problem is a deep-rooted issue with perhaps global settings and variables. Somehow the game just doesn't keep track of events properly and screws up, and it's incredibly annoying because it's not consistent. Besides the story grinding to a halt, I've had temporary characters in cutscenes stay around after the scenes, issues with the wrong costume being worn in cutscenes, and other issues that come and go. It's frustrating from a testing standpoint to not only have bugs, but not be able to reproduce them later (not that I mind so much as a player, given how serious some of these are)... Maybe doing the memory wipe procedure using three other games did the trick?

As these powers have the exact same description as they did in the previous KotOR (where they worked correctly), I'd assume that they're bugged.

So I ran into a situation on Nar Shadaa where I couldn't advance the plot even after completing every available quest (spoilers follow):

Fiddled with the game a bit, and I possibly have found the problem. To recap, I originally landed on Nar Shadaa, picked up Visas Marr by returning to the Ebon Hawk, then went and did all the available quests on the planet to try to attract the exchange. However, the Red Eclipse slavers never boarded my ship, and the Exchange never came for me. So, I went all the way back to a save before I landed on Nar Shadaa, and after I left the ship I went straight into questing, starting with the refugees. This time I got the slavers as soon as I finished off the Exchange and Serocco sides in the refugee section, and I got Visas right after finishing off the slavers. The Exchange contacted me later after finishing off some of the dock quests. So, it would seem that picking up Visas before the slavers would be the point where the game broke.

In terms of pure damage I believe the double-bladed lightsaber wins. On the other hand, you can get a larger variety of effects by wielding two lightsabers with different customizations on them. Dueling was more of a factor on KotOR 1 because the base attacks for characters were different (in KotOR 2 all the base attacks are the same), but it's useful for the defense bonus for anyone who doesn't focus on melee. Also, you end up doing more damage against high defense characters where the extra attack bonus comes into play, although there doesn't seem to be too many instances where that's a issue. It's sorta a shame the game doesn't use two-handed weapon rules from standard D&D, where using a lightsaber with two hands would give you a bigger increase in damage from your strength bonus.

Well, I can't find a single thing to do on Nar Shadaa anymore, and the Exchange still won't contact me. Think I'm going to put down the game for a while before restarting, because I'm not having fun anymore...

Hmm, from my calculations I should be getting the light side CON bonus. I have 18 CON with the bonus, and I have 207 VP at level 14. After subtracting 25 for War Veteran and 14 for Toughness, that comes out to 168 VP, or 12 VP per level. As a Sentinel I get 8 VP/level base, so with 18 CON that's an additional +4 VP/level, which matches the amount I have. It could be that once you get the bonus once it doesn't leave you, which would explain why the VP doesn't change if you get some Dark Side points.

Uh oh. I have a sneaking suspicion my game is toast, because I did all ten of those quests already and haven't gotten any Exchange contact... I did get Visas early (right after I got on Nar Shadaa, which is my first planet after Telos). I hope she's not the game breaker, because it'll be really painful going back before I got her in the party...

Sorta makes sense with Kreia..who wants to look at her freaky eyes anyways? " <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Freaky eyes? What about the player's eyes if they ever forgot to give Kreia clothing?