DS1 Legendary Mod for DS2 Beta Thread

The mod looks really good Iryan. Tried it with various DS2 Character Creation Mods and seems to work just fine I think because no one ever made a DS2 Playable Dwarf.

I should point out that this mod will mess up the Broken World playable dwarf character creation and also the BW Adepts playable dwarf (tested both to make sure) I would expect this to happen since Broken World and the Broken World based Adepts already have dwarves. If you have this mod installed you can not change the Dwarf head as it conflicts with the broken world dwarf heads.

THIS IS A GREAT MOD FOR PEOPLE WHO PLAY DS2 AND WANT A DWARF AS THEIR MAIN CHARACTER> Great Job Iryan.

:thumbup: :thumbup:

Yes you're quite correct that this mod isn't meant to be used in Broken World, mainly because the Dwarf already exists in Broken World. Also because of the way Broken World handles character creation, it will mess up the other characters as well if used in Broken World. A readme is yet to be made to explain all of this.

All I did for compatibility with other character creation mods is to include their entries in the faces.gas, hair.gas, hairtoheads.gas and heads.gas files found in world/global/skins folder. As I gave this mod a higher priority level, it should work seamlessly with the Cat Mansion Mods (Not Adepts yet), Utraean Race, my test DS2 character pack (Skeleton, Gargoyle, Naja, Goblin & Elfgirl), DS2 Succubus Mod and Giants & Gnomes. In a subsequent version I can also add Ghastley's Succubus Queen as well.

Good observation and it would explain the discrepancy. I'm actually testing the Alpine Caverns now and have noticed that each individual hit does a reasonable amount of damage but because of the slow attack speed the damage isn't as great over a certain amount of time compared to melee fighters or mages. This would also explain the wraith archers as well (and probably most monster archers including such critters as spiked maws and skrubbs which are really ranged attackers and not magic users).

So quite a bit of balancing is still required and this can go hand in hand with the rebalancing of levels I'm implementing (for those players who don't want to use the MLA). With the Ice Mages they also use the frozen skill like the hero but for some reason it triggers much more often than with your party members. This also occurs with the ignite skill some monsters have though that's not as obvious and the damage is very low.

#EDIT#
After investigating the templates we can safely exclude weapon speed from all calculations pertaining to the amount of damage inflicted by monsters as all of their weapons have a reload delay of 0.0!

So in contrast to party members, monster's animations seem to effect their weapon speed and thus damage inflicted over x amount of time. For example, Ice Warriors have an animation speed of 1.33 for their one handed ice swords (2.00 for Wraiths wielding 2 handed axes). Ice Archers in contrast have an animation speed of 1.66 for using bows. That's 20% slower.

Another aspect which I'm wondering if it effects the weapon speed is that Ice Archers have a component inherited from KillerGremal's original version, called monster_preload_ammo_tuned which has an equip delay of 0.5. I'm wondering if this effects the weapon speed, yet Wraith Archers don't have this component and Bare_elf believes that they too aren't dangerous enough.

A matter for further investigation and tweaking.

Why it trigger (so) often I can't say.
Concerning ignite, when rethink it - could it be that there is a double-missing STR/DEX/INT support?
Ignite damage depends on intelligence. So does the monster have any intelligence at all?
However Level Adjustment mod doesn't treat this (it's not only about assigning a new number, also the influence on life points had to respected then).

 

By default for all/most DS2 monsters GPG designed the attack interval is given by the duration of the attack/cast animation (and if you would add a reload-delayed weapon, the monster would become even slower).
There are pros and cons for this implementation, but it's probably not the most flexible setup. The attack-speed scalar of the attack jobs sometimes can help though, it's easier to change but the result won't be exactly the same (time-compressed animation instead of waiting less to attack again).

However, assumed the Ice Archer are (still) based on those of my Content Pack (where will be a new release within the next days), it's no problem to make them 10%-20% faster/stronger (below 1.5s the Siege Editor will start to complain that this monster is too fast for its sight range. There's nothing I can do against, so 'click it away' with the speed warning casted because of the Ice Warriors already...)
Remind maybe that the average attack interval of archers in DS2 is about 2 seconds - which is terribly slow of course. :o

 

This component forces the new ammo to appear 0.5s after the previous has been launched, and not to wait until the animation is over. Otherwise the Ice Archer would stand almost 1s without arrow - that doesn't look good. So it's just cosmetic, since the animation used is one of these 'draw/aim/shoot quickly and wait long' animations (for example also Harpies have by the way).
 

The playable dwarf, rebalancing of monster levels for KoE, and then there are your other testers now in the Utraean Peninsular.

You may have gathered that I like to play slowly and thoughtfully, and to explore the game. After completing KoE the first time in DS1 I actually went through again drawing up my own detailed walkthrough - without the benefit of Siege Editor or even Tank Viewer. So while I remember how certain encounters play out, the only monster stat I saw and recorded was health.

My big disadvantage in assessing the monsters in your DS2 edition is not having a feel for what DS2 players expect, other than that everything happens faster than in DS1. Since this IS a DS2 edition there is no need to precisely match the relative stats of every monster type.

DS1 obviously had monsters that were small, soft and weak (I mean lacking in health not in physical size, easily hurt, and doing little damage), others that were big, tough and dangerous, and many that were somewhere in between. All relative to the hero's level. A few did stand out as not fitting the pattern - swamp creatures big but soft for example (which in DS2 might be emulated by making them weak-to-melee), a Cyclops with a club far more dangerous than one without, wraiths with axes "smaller" but a nastier melee attack than the battle wraiths that use their flaming heads as clubs.

WRAITHS - in 31c I seem to remember using my archer's longer range (Naidi in that party) to draw out individuals in the Fury tunnels, and found then that with the advantage of shooting first she was a match for two wraith archers at once, but wraith mages were more dangerous.

(That party is the only one I've been all the way through with. The only other one to have got as far as Kroth is the 31j party I was trying to get there as quickly as I could, so I didn't care how easy the wraiths were.)

Bandit archers seemed reasonably matched to mine - unlike in DS1 where I thought them too dangerous, more so than the melee bandits, though that might have been because they concentrated their attacks. As for the slow-shooting spiked maws I've just faced in the Subterranean River and the Dark Forest, it is the way one meets large groups of them that should and does pose a challenge.

FUROKs: I've looked more closely at GPG's base_actor_evil templates and see that my earlier suggestion (make the Furok slashers strong_tank) was a stupid one because the tank's extra health goes with a less damaging attack. In DS1, once I got used to Furoks, the slashers did come as a shock, for the strength of their attack as well as for extra health. If you stick to GPG's base templates then starting with strong_rogue Klaws leaves too little room to match DS1's progression: normal_rogue Klaws, normal Furoks and strong Furok slashers would be closer. Or how about normal Klaws, normal_tank Furoks and strong_rogue slashers? The slashers do have those claws on their hands.

SHARDs: not as much difference between them as there could be. There is a case for the two purples to be miniboss, blue strong, green normal, teal weak (or KillerGremal's new minor). Or one level lower for each?

The Syrrus that comes immediately before the two purple shards can be destroyed with impunity by an archer with a longer-ranged bow or with Far Shot. (Likewise the earlier Syrrus that is to the side of the route.) In my opinion this is good, a reward for having an archer in the party - unlike with Scorch the dragon, who players should not be able to dispose of so easily.

A little bit premature as there's a major flaw with the mod. When you equip helmets, the beard colour reverts to the default red colour existing in the helmet and not what your character is designed with. This occurs both with your hero character and recruitable dwarves. For example Lorun, who is now a recruitable character, changes hair colour to red as soon as you equip a helmet on him.

This bug doesn't seem to exist in Broken World as Lorun correctly displays his correct hair colour when you equip a helmet on him. This hasn't been extensively checked of course and may be hard to check as there's a special requirement needed to recruit the 3 extra dwarves in KOE in the Legendary Mod, namely the hero has to be a dwarf himself. Otherwise you'll just get their standard conversation when you talk to them and they won't offer to join your party.

So unless someone has an idea on how to get hairs working properly for the dwarf model in vanilla DS2, the mini-mod will never be released. However the recruitable dwarves can still remain in the map as the player will never be able to recruit them in DS2, the option will only be available in Broken World if you play as a dwarf yourself.

I did not notice the problems with the helmets as I never use them except when playing Adepts so I can get the Cat Ears and head bands. There is another solution to the mod also Iryan... Do not wear a helmet, because what is the point of picking out a hair style and hair color when it is covered by a helmet?

Broken World 2.3, DS1_Map_Utraean_Peninsula_Beta31, Mod-Erthos-MonsterLevelAdjust-Beta5m and all other Legendary Mod files are current.

Things have bee working just fine up until I exited the Crystal Caverns onto the Merin Coast. The Pirates NIS ran, however no quest activated. Thinking there might be a trigger in Merin I went around the pirates and down the elevator into town. The only quests I found where the TownStone Quest, and the Bandits Quest. The Journey to Merin completed as soon as I was off the elevator. So I went back after the pirates thinking that maybe if I killed all of them and their captain the quest might complete. Now I know you made some changes to secondary quests so maybe it is the case that there is no pirate quest anymore. Not sure about this Iryan. Is there a quest that is not working or is there no quest and I should not worry?

I've yet to start work on the Utraean Peninsula, tidying up KOE first.

There's currently no quest associated with the Pirates in Meren but probably one could be triggered at the NIS along the lines of saving Meren from the Pirates and the Pirate Captain dropping a key which you could use to open a chest.

Well the monsters only have a base assignment of 1 for intelligence as per all of the DS2/Broken World and Mod Content monsters in the skills block. I always assumed that since this number was the same for all skills (strength, dexterity, intelligence, melee, combat_magic, etc) that the monster_level adjusted them accordingly along the lines as the hero. So that isn't true then for monsters?

I do see your point that the monster's overall life can be effected by these skills but again I assumed that was happening with the MLA mod as when I was attempting to balance the life points for the starting monsters in KOE to match more the ones from DS1, the calculations didn't add up (I had to guess-estimate the calculations required). I also noticed that monsters adjusted their life points as the hero gained experience so while level 1 scavengers might have 8 hit-points at the beginning, they may have 9 or 10 before the hero reached level 1 himself (or herself).

Still the ignite skill was never meant to be used by monsters and I only wanted to give them more variety. So even if it does negligible damage, the effect is quite cool. Plus if it caused too much damage, players would undoubtable be upset by it.

While on player skills that monsters can use, have you any idea on how the smite skill may be applied by monsters? I tried applying it like freezing and ignite but doesn't seem to work (maybe weapon based?). I did get such an effect working in DS2_BW_Adepts by using ALTER_ATTACK_CHANCE_TO_CAST_TEMPLATE to cast spell_proc_armor_stun from a monster's weapon but this approach won't work in vanilla DS2 and may even cause crashes. I even got monsters not equipped with a weapon (like the Boarbeast) to use this method by giving them an invisible weapon.

Actually the adjustment of STR/DEX/INT doesn't exist yet, simply for the reason that monsters usually don't have it. It's rather useless for them, it doesn't affect their damage, also I have to rethink if in particular STR+DEX really have an influence on the life points of monsters.
So why custom monsters may have 1 STR/DEX/INT or 1 level in each class I can't say/remember currently... :o

 

To support Smite monsters would need the [skill_manager] component, however this is some kind of V.I.P. component (can be a very efficient method to detect actors to hire), so I strongly recommend to copy and rename it before you attach it to a monster's template.
 

Crystwind mines work well, but the exploding barrels do not breach the barriers to side rooms. There are, of course, the phantom Incatation Shrines on the Radar Map but as I have already posted them and what I think is happening for most of them I won't repeat unless needed(I have the marked screenshots saved)

Three Dwarven Fists of Stone using there Poweres in series make for unhappy Duergar, scorpions and Venom fiends :twisted:

DS1_Map_Utraean_Peninsula_Beta31 -- Things working well up to Lang. On reaching Lang I attempted to hire Sheba, but could not. When I click on her she says: "Really? I mean... you've made an excellent choice! What a team we'll make!" I am not given the choice to pick her, reject her or look at her stats. I compared her conversation with that of Mia and could find no differences other than name of the character or the character the party member is emulating. (mia = deru). Therefore the error must be within the flick that is being called.

You are quite correct in that the error is in the actual flick, specifically the conversation called by the flick was incorrect. In this case the game chooses the first conversation in the actor's conversation block, which happens to be the one you received.

Should be fixed now but I won't release an update to the map until I start working on it and have a bit to show.

It will be interesting to see how players react to the next version of KOE as there will be 16 characters potentially available to hire but except for the "Free" characters like Gyorn or Ulora, there will be restrictions on who can recruit them. For instance Lorun will only join if the hero character is a dwarf while Zed will only join if the main hero isn't a nature mage and Naidi will only offer to join if the main hero isn't a ranger.

just arrived there, as well..

I came down the lift into Meren, by fighting along the edge of the forest
above the beach - no trigger found re. the bandits who inhabit the town environs..

- the side-quest to find the hidden treasure behind the store isn't there either..
- mind you, the treasure chest isn't there anyway..

- so far, the Peninsula map plays very smoothly - and looks excellent!!

DS1_Map_Utraean_Peninsula_Beta31 -- The Pit of Despair -- Iryan it is Great, Wonderful and Super Fun, Just like I always dreamed it would be. Have journeyed as far as the flooded sanctuary and spoke with the keeper. The conversation for the person that gives you the quest for the Goblin's Secret Plans asks you to find them and return them, but the quest does not have that step. The easiest fix would be to modify her conversation so that she says something like "Find the Goblin's Secret Plans and destroy them." or "Find the Goblin's Secret Plans and prevent them from using them."
The pirates of Merin I do not think it would be necessary to turn it into a quest, Maybe someone in town that you would normally speak to could thank you for killing the pirates or something along those lines. Now it is off to find the plug so that I can drain the flooded Sanctuary.

In DS1, bows are powerful but "slower" or "slowest" (for those of size 4x1 cells, which is most of them) but crossbows are fast; in DS2 it is the other way round. That is for bows used by characters, but are evil archers' animations designed so their rates of fire approximate to ranger characters'? If so then rather than try to speed up the animations for converted archers, how about some new templates, base_actor_evil_ranged_ds1..., with more damage to compensate for slow shooting?

Also, looking at GPG's templates, I think they messed up on the _rogue and _tank variants of base_actor_evil_ranged_normal and base_actor_evil_ranged_strong. From the comments, and from what they did for _melee_ and _magic_, _rogue should do more damage but have less life than standard and _tank the opposite; but _rogue's numbers are less for both and _tank's more for both, viz:

normal_rogue life 5.8 damage 1.4
normal life 7.2 damage 1.7
normal_tank life 9 damage 2

So far (in Logic 31m) I've spotted base_bandit_ranged_ds1 and base_skeleton_ranged_ds1 specializing base_actor_evil_ranged_normal_rogue.

By the way, about Utraean Apocalypse:

Andiemus? He is a nature mage.
Weren't the Zaurasks (and the lorebook about them) one of the "Legends of Utrae" mod's changes from GPG's MP original?

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UPDATE
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Watch out for banter, for example when leaving Stonebridge without Naidi someone suggests she would have been worth bringing along.

I've always thought, with all the "free" characters then why any of the others? (apart from a fourth person through Wesrin Cross, to fill out the skill set and to end up with eight).

You're right. Recently I also noticed that the melee+ranged 'rogues' variants have similar stats like the 'minor' variant I've created for the last content pack release (minor: intended to be ~20% weaker than normal to close the 'gap' between normal and weak), in particular I wondered about the very similar damage the rogues and the minors had...

Because according to GPG's comments all rogues should have some less life but some more damage compared to the normal variant - and for the magic rogues that's actually true (although the comments are not completely in sync with the numbers/formulas used). For melee+ranged however there are bigger/unexplainable discrepancies, it seems they tuned the damage in the wrong direction!?
So I already prepared a (soft) revision. Tanks are less a problem, but suddenly (much) stronger rogues could disturb the existing monster placement resp. the balancing here and there possibly.

I've sped up the Ice Archer's animations so they shoot faster and now should be more deadly. In testing I noticed that the Bandit Archers already shoot faster so that they were already balanced in that regard (not surprising since they basically use the hero's animations).

Also in testing I noticed that the game, not Siege Editor, can throw a wobbly if you mess with the base templates. For example I made the Teal Shards inherit from base_actor_evil_magic_weak template and while it was fine in Siege Editor, they crashed the game as soon as one of them entered the frustrum. So I made them inherit from KillerGremal's base_actor_evil_magic_frail and the game was fine with that.

So for minor tunings I'd stick with making adjustments in the actor's template as I tend to do with the major bosses and some other critters like the Rock Beast and Mine Worms.

Yes I know of this discrepancy but originally I didn't when I created the original templates about 3 years ago now.

As KillerGremal noted, the whole system needs an overhaul more inline with what you'd expect from each particular monster.

The recruitable characters in the Utraean Peninsula are in for an overhaul in-line with what's been done in KOE.

So Drevin will be replaced and possibly his sister too. There's still alternatives plus its easy enough to create new distinctive skins. Rusk, Boryev and Lord Bolingar for example now have new custom skins made just for them which I don't think are too bad (similar to Gyorn's skin). There's a lot of nice portraits available which just need matching skins, GPG did a particularly bad job in this regard considering they don't take that much time to create and GPG had good artists and software available to them.

You're right that the Zaurask lorebook is a byproduct from Legends of Utraea which was ported over to this version. Since you can now play Legends of Aranna with your party and aren't restricted to just one map, I left the LOA monsters out of this map. So that lorebook will probably be scrapped or replaced.

I think GPG ended up thinking like you which is why we now have the Inn system.

In any regards you are right of course about the banters. While it would be possible to create flicks to check the hero for their race or predominant skillset before selecting what banters can be played, it just adds another layer of complexity and corresponding risk that something will go wrong as well as taking time to do and test. It's easier to just change the dialog.

Which reminds me that adding extra characters means in time updating the voiceset pack to support the extra party voices. One thing leads to another and another.

Update 10:03 - this is not a reply to Iryan, I had typed it all out before seeing his latest.

They got melee wrong too - how did I miss that? What the comments said they were doing made sense, but what we have makes tank normals and rogue strongs practically the same, which seems silly.

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2.2, Logic 31m, World 31m, Mod-DS1Content-Alpha10x, MLA 5m

I've had a closer look at how the various types of bandit fight compared to my characters:
- raider (dual wield) who has the best stats is the biggest challenge and defeats Gyorn my melee guy (who I have as sword-and-shield with skill points spent accordingly) if I don't use healing
- the one actually called "bandit" matches Gyorn blow for blow making for a good fight (he wins; but maybe if I hadn't found him such a good weapon, he wouldn't)
- all the other melee types hit less often so the brigand, robber, thug and rogue all with the same stats as the "bandit" are much less effective, with the female thief (who has better stats) in between
- of the four ranger types, all with similar stats, the one with crossbow ("turncoat") looks to be shooting faster than the others (the DS1 way round) but my archer still wins a shoot-out comfortably. The other three (poacher, outlaw and assassin) are less effective but not negligible.

Mixed together, the various bandits are dangerous enough in their numbers. I prefer it that their rangers are not over-balanced to the melee ones (which is what I thought they were in DS1).

Why do the two bosses have no resistances?

The female ranger "assassins" in blue-coated armour stand out in the forest like a sore thumb; they don't have to look especially evil but any chance of putting them into something darker or greener to blend in with the rest?

When I go into the cave, or into the secret stronghold, I find some of the bandits I killed in the camp along the path and at the crossroads have re-spawned when I come out; in my opinion this is too soon.

E31m#095 When restarting at the Traveler Camp, or returning by portal to shop, the innkeeper plays scarecrow (stands there rigidly with outstretched arms). The pet seller did the same once.

E31m#096 Stepping forward from the Eastern Swamp DC, the radar blanks. The Azunite Scholar quest-giver immediately ahead is not marked with an orange ! icon. The NIS that plays, giving you the quest, tells you that a temple must be purified but "what temple"? The journal button flashes on the screen; press it and you see an item (chapel key) he has given you. Unfortunately this is at the bottom of page 2 so there is nothing to show you have another new item (the Azunite Artifact - misspelling of Artefact) at the top of page 3. Press J again and you get the Quest Log - it has the details that the temple is ahead (in the swamp) and that there is an evil guardian to destroy, before you hear that from the Quest-giver - which you do only if you talk to him after the NIS.

The banner on the pole besides the Scholar outlines in blue as "check point" if you point at it, but cannot be clicked - yet is blue-dotted on radar (when the radar works). (I noticed that all the way from Traveler Camp to there, including all the side areas, none of the open-able treasure chests show on radar. Why should they, when breakables never do?)

No idea why custom 'frail' works but the native 'weak' not... :o

 
Basically there is no real need to specialize these custom base templates. Nonetheless it makes sense to specialize the closest (difficulty-wise) base template available.

Assumed life and damage will be chanced with a final influence on the monster's difficulty, then also the other difficulty-depending stats had to be refined, experience, loot drop and moving speed or gibbig possibly too - this can be quite laborious.
The additional base templates can help here perhaps to speed up the creation of monster templates, providing more appropriate stats (compared to the native base templates) as long as no further tuning is done.

The reason the raider is so dangerous isn't because he dual wields two axes but because he has a higher attack value than the others as he is KillerGremal's original bandit. He actually has a lower animation speed than the other bandits.

The other bandits are variants I made because I believe its too unnatural to have all bandits identical clones of each other. This was done about 3 years ago and is different to the approach I take with the skeletons and krug in revisions from the last 12 months.

The bandit's weapons, like all (most?) monster weapons has no damage output or reload delay. Their damage potential depends on the animation speed of the bandit which is linked to the type of weapon they are using. This is true of all the bandits except for KillerGremals' version. The base damage at level 1 of a base_actor_evil_melee_normal_rogue is 6-10 while for KillerGremal's Raider it's 11-17.

The reason the bandit's crossbow is faster than normal DS2 crossbows is that the bandits I use actually use the DS1 animation durations and not the DS2 animation durations that KillerGremal uses for the Raider. Lucky that, as the Raider's fs9 animation duration is 2.00 while a single handed sword bandit's fs1 is 0.75.

The Bandit's crossbow animation is actually 0.125 while the bow is 1.00. That explains that discrepancy.

However the melee bandits all use the same fs1 animation so should be equivalent to each other.

So overall some tweaking of the bandits is called for.

These can be tweaked as well except for the respawning speed. There's no provision in the level_adjustment_config.gas configuration file for adjusting that, only for adjusting the chance of respawning which is set at 30% and actually the file comments that the respawn chance is for when the region reloads which is obviously incorrect as there seems to be a frustrum and time related correlation if monsters are respawning within a game session. Maybe KillerGremal could comment further and maybe make a further tweak to the length of time that has to elapse before respawning?

Should be fixed now. The problem with setting animation stances in the instance is that Siege Editor dislikes it and will wipe it out if you save such a region with such an instance in it.

It's better to put it into the actor's template (which GPG does) so that it can't be wiped.

All can be tweaked. I've already tweaked the actual encounter at the Temple and I believe it plays a lot better.

I believe there are some custom monsters that use the weak variants without issue but not when I add it to an existing set.

As most monsters are set out already, I don't think additional base templates are really necessary for the mod as tunings can be done in the actor templates to fix discrepancies that exist such as the bandits. This can be done on a case by case basis. No need to change something that's not broken.

Hi All -- I have made it to Quillrabe while playing DS1_Map_Utraean_Peninsula_Beta31 and it seems that I missed something. In Act II there is a quest between the Flooded Sanctuary and Slay the Dragon Queen. I have been up and down between Lang and Quillrabe, Crystwind and Quillrabe both through the mines and be the back way and can not find a quest I missed. My mind has not been working as it should of late, because in the past I would have remembered the placement of the quests. Help me Mr. Wizard and tell me the name of the quest I do not have. From the name I should be able to locate it.

Actually you have missed nothing! It's more of a product of the current way the questbook is laid out, which obviously needs to be revised.

If you noticed from the main quest, as soon as you obtain a town stone, you get a secondary quest prompting you to travel to where the next one can be located. Now this could easily be incorporated into the main quest and possibly will, depending on feedback and comments.

So in this case you don't have the Quillrabe Stone, which I know since the Slay the Dragon Queen is still incomplete. You obtain the Quillrabe Stone from a chest guarded by the Dragon.

Therefore you can't unlock the Go To Hiroth secondary quest until you complete the Slay the Dragon Queen Quest.

As I said I plan on revising the Utraean Peninsula Quests, most likely scrapping the secondary Go To quests and adding some brand new secondary quests like maybe one associated with the Pirates around Meren. Ideas and suggestions are welcome.

Thank you I forgot that some of the secondary quests in the journal where out of sequence. I noticed that the last time I played the utraean peninsula, I just did not dig far enough back in my notes. I am glad that one of our brains is still functional. The secondary go to the next town quests could be incorporated into the Main Quests to find the town stones if you wanted to, but that has always been a part of the quest cycle as far back as legends of Utrae (still my favorite). However if you where to remove them to give room for additional secondary quests that would be okay also.
As for quests you might add or put back in would be for sure the pirates of Merin like it was in the legends of utrae, but this time hide the treasure somewhere out of town, like near the bandits or in the cloud forest. Another possible secondary quest might be to find a lost person or child in the Lang Swamp and bring them safely to Lang. The quest could be given by someone in Lang. People just do not spend enough time mucking about in the mire. Its get to Lang as fast as you can then down in the goblin warrens. Could be done along the lines of the rescue mission in DS Abstraction where the character you save has no weapons, spells or armor and is a bit weak so every monster tends to go for them and you have to do everything in your power to save them from the monsters and themselves. The reward could be a nice unique weapon or spell. Another possible secondary quest might be to find a source of water for the people of Grescal other than the stupid little pond that has almost dried up. It might work like the quest in Dungeon Siege 2 called Restore Kalrathia's Water. A valve somewhere maybe near the pyramids in the endless desert.

2.2, Logic 31m, World 31m, Mod-DS1Content-Alpha10x, MLA 5m

I've been having fun in the goblin caves (blowing barrels to make pipes spurt gas over bots that I've lured to stand there - thank you Iryan for getting all that working so well) and stayed up late to get through to and finish the robo suit.

Yes, it is good the bandits aren't all identical clones visually so no need for them all to be identical clones in terms of attack and life values. Learning which are the easy hero fodder and which the more dangerous can be fun. OK the monster-adjust-declare option did help me there but the raider is a good example - high attack value going with dual axes for players to recognise him by and to "explain" the high attack.
apologies (to GPG?), my dictionary allows Artifact, it is only the spell-checker here that complains.

E31m#097 The swamp chapel's new “closed door” that the quest key is meant to open is an illusion – monsters and party members can all move through it freely, and the monsters do, starting with a gargoyle.

E31m#098 I never had a chance against the swamp troll miniboss (“Rotten Troll”) - it and all its gang had already been gassed to death where they lived by the time I got there (DS_R2 -3.596/0.811/2.554/ 0x0411C7B8). My own character collapsed in the time it took me to place the potion showing those co-ordinates.

In the peninsular around the goblins' porch, there were other places where trolls, witches or slingers walked through gas emissions to attack, dying from the gas if already injured by my party's spells and arrows – you'd have thought they'd be familiar with the natural hazards of their own environment. (Unlike goblin bots, which you can understand being caught out because they are only machines.)

(Also, my archer out-ranged so could back off from and kill every hydrack with impunity, even the mini-boss one.)

E31m#099 The war pedestal in the goblins' kitchen (GI_R4 0.274/0.000/2.477/ 0x909947A2) blocks access to the treasure dropped from the crates next to it on the left (my archer had broken them from a distance).

E31m#100 P.S. Back in an ice dungeon on the way to the Alpine Caverns (not the homeless blacksmith's cellar but the next one) there were frosted-up treasure crates and barrels some of which I could break normally but others that arrows got stuck in the side of with no effect. Examples at ID_R2 -1.114/-1.500/-0.871 0x9978DD81 and ID_R2 0.609/-1.500/-1.957/ 0x49195F42. Single-target spells aimed at them had no effect either. Melee attacks do work so this is a very minor issue.

(I don't remember a problem in earlier play-throughs but I was using the area-effect spell ripple then to break lots of containers at once.)

E31m#101 Attack one of the large crates containing a concealed bot (example: GI_R5 0.811/0.000/-0.521/ 0x1850516F – I'm sure I remembered this being just such an ambush), either deliberately or as collateral damage, and the bot inside is obliterated, I guess without awarding you any experience.

E31m#102 GI_R11 1.952/0.000/2.784/ 0xE4417693 a door does not open on an alcove containing a proxo (radar shows a red dot and the pointer identifies the enemy which I was allowed to destroy with spells). This is the south side of a south-west corner, I cannot remember quite where but from my screenshot could be immediately after the sideways travelator. Trigger either not working or can be missed.

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UPDATE - respawning
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This is typical: I've gone back to the first save I took yesterday, at the DC before the swamp graveyard, that is west of it. I sent my party south into the water then anti-clockwise round but off-shore from the island, killing every monster in the water (and a few on the shore). This included the witches and the big blue flies ("swamp stingers") on the boardwalk (which my party crossed underneath) which is the way off the island at the south-east corner. Eventually, after a detour to a side island in the north with trolls, stingers and two tretches, they came back to the DC from the north shore. So then I sent them round again and started seeing a few manglers where I'm sure all had been killed first time. When the party came to that boardwalk, witches and stingers were there again - there can be no mistake about it, they must have respawned.

Obviously the party, first time underneath the boardwalk, soon left it beyond visual range (I always have SeeFar Hack off) if that is the "frustrum", but the boardwalk once spotted never left the big radar picture - the party never got far enough away for that - yet the monsters respawned. Big radar started showing them there when I came close to visual range the second time.

Thank for the detailed reports, it really helps in fine tuning the mod and making it more fun for everyone. All of those points raised will be examined and tweaked. For the bandits I've tweaked them a bit but left them mostly as they are because any additional damage added to them at low levels get magnified to the point where my level 55 party (the highest I have) had an extremely tough time surviving.

With the respawning I'm sure the behaviour you're describing isn't meant to be happening. The swamps probably highlight it as they are quite open and it takes time if you explore them thoroughly. The phenomenon has also been reported before in the Great Hall in Wesrin Cross. I agree that its unlikely that players are simply missing these monsters as the big radar shows their presence.

I'm actually fine with this behaviour to a degree, for instance the Manglers reappearing. The game is suppose to be a representation of a world - albeit a fantasy one but in the real world when you go fishing you would never run out of fish in anything other than a tank. If you were hunting in a forest you would never run out of game. So this behaviour in the swamps probably enhances the simulation of a real world where critters/monsters move about naturally.

Maybe Wesrin Cross is different. Does everyone think this is a big issue that needs fixing?

The Level Adjustment mod should care about a soft stats varinace. Besides of this bandits have masks (one for melee and one for ranged) and the (uniformed) dungeon riders helmets.

Concerning damage, basicially two axes/swords should underline that they are probably a bit more harmful. It would be strange if such a dangerous looking enemy would cause soft damage.
However bandits and raider still maintain the (formerly) intended strong (1h) damage (as in DS1, with 1 attack in 2s) also for dual-wield (now in DS2), which can leave an unbalanced impression since they attack twice in 2 seconds.
It's no problem to fix this. There's anyway a little updated pending for the fun component throwing their weapons around when killed.

 

Assumed these bandits are not created with generators (many a quite intransparent), this could be tuned for each monster individually with monster_respawn_custom:idle_duration which is 900 seconds minutes by default.
That means that this component is blocked for 15 minutes generally and unlocked after 30 minutes to re-evaluate the respawn chance again. In the time between the respawn chance is lowered depending on the time passed.

Technically however there is a known vulnerability in this component. If there other components used using the SetScidBits command can cause troubles (depending on how SetScidBits is used). But it's rather inprobable that the components able to do this exist on a monster.

Enjoying roast Hydra in Merin, Nothing new since my last run thru. Just the breakable Ice Fly hive, box on a pedastle needing AOE to break and the glowing body in the Quarry that shows as clik-able but nothing happens all of which I noted previously, I still have locations if needed.

Altan's Leather gotten from an easy to kill bear, Arhok's Armor at start of LoA, and Olaf's Leather are nice and the best available early for non-fighters until around level 10 and fighters around level 20. To bad Olof's armor is not found until I usually have much better. Same for the Yesterhaven items. I am still using Orlof's Hammer as a level35 Fist of Stone

The Broken World recipe items are nice but underpowered for their level which is exasperated by the DS1 and other new items which are better then the stock DS2/Bw items

Hmmm one day there are 7 guests and 100 the next :woot: