DS1 Legendary Mod for DS2 Beta Thread

I have recently updated all the unique chests, bookcases and other containers to send a message to themselves to deactivate the "sparkle effect" which is actually effect = scalable_interest_point_ffx.

Previously when an user opened one of these quest containers, the effect would only be turned off during the current session, it would reappear whenever the container was loaded back into the world. I added a maintain_state = true; line to efct_emitter in beta33a so that the container should remember its state when reloaded but it didn't work as advertised. So now the container deactivates itself when opened by the player and maintain_state = true; now correctly makes it remember that its deactivated when reloaded into the world again.

One thing I have noticed is that I've set create_pcontent_on_drop = false; and drop_at_use_point = true; for all the quest containers while in DS2 there seems to be a mixture, some are create_pcontent_on_drop = false; and others are create_pcontent_on_drop = true;

I suspect it was just chance I choose to use create_pcontent_on_drop = false;, simply because it was how the template I used for cloning the containers was setup. Is there a difference between false and true?

 
maintain_state = true will not work reliably on respawning breakable containers - they have no valid Scid, but this is required to store the effect state.

I kind of broke the end of Act III in Yesterhaven. When going up the first elevator and standing there my ranged shot thru the ceiling and eventually killed the Fire King :jawdrop:
before going to the next Elevator and going up to the roof.

The locker should function like a chest. 4 things should happen when it is clicked

1. doors open (and should stay that way for the rest ot the game, though it is unlikely the hero will ever return there)
2. map activates in journal (and player gets message)
3. pcontent appears on floor (typically three pieces one a pile of gold, one either gold or potion, and the other spell, reagent or equipment)
   
4. sparkle should go out (and stay out). THIS IS NOT HAPPENING even when the other three do.

Bug report in the crypts, I hired Ulora and quit the game immediately, on restart we got back to where Ulora was and those 3 krug had re-spawned but weren't attackable.

So a simple fix is called for - making him neutral at the start and adding a switch to turn him hostile after viewing his introductory NIS. Of course this also adds something else that can go wrong in the scripting and potentially break the map. Yet more chances for the beta testers to stress test the mod.

I agree with your summary and also 20% potential failure rate is too high - anything over 0% is unacceptable.

The question is why is it happening in the times it fails? There's no drop points defined here because the item never actually physically appears - its goes straight into the journal (when it works). But perhaps there's a micro-second that the item actually appears in the world before its converted into a journal entry. What if this randomly occurs in the void? Perhaps it just disappears instead of appearing in the journal? Perhaps there's conflicting world messages that interfere with the pcontent drop call?

Sorry I'm just grasping at straws, I'd like some suggestions of what to do to try to prevent it happening. The fact that it just appears randomly makes it difficult to fix.

The entire game engine and editor makes me incredibly frustrated at times. Quite frequently I'd place triggers and gizmos into the map only to find they won't work. Yet if I just move them or make them in just a slightly different position they work. Maybe many of you would remember the dynamic battle music I put in for boss and mini-boss encounters a couple of years ago? I had to abandon the whole concept because of this phenomenon. Perhaps its no wonder GPG eventually gave up on complex rpgs and went back to work on simple RTS (Real Time Strategy) Games. Though they did release Space Siege (a lot simpler rpg with completely reworked engine and background scripting system) and were working on that action RPG when they run out of money.

Those Krug are actually spawned through a generator. They start off as neutral and initially turn hostile when your hero enters the room where Ulora is and they immediately turn on her.

The trigger turning them hostile only occurs once but the trigger causing them to reappear obviously can be triggered multiple times.

I'll add it to the bug list, thanks.

Utraean Peninsula 33A

Monster Level Adjust Beta 5S ALL Mode

Broken World AllSaves See Far Hack set to off
I did not convert this computer to the version 1 of AllSaves

Save Location

Town of Elddim

Quest Log

Primary Quests – Elddim Town Stone

Secondary Quests – A Farmer's Scythe, A New Way to Travel, Orchard Cellar, Hovart's Folly

Comment Log

1. Quests Completing correctly.
2. Monsters appear to be leveling correctly – between level 13 to 17 right now.
3. Radar looks good so far.
4. Quest arrows to this point seem to be working correctly.
5. No problems hiring people.

Party Members

Dryad 33A Level 14 Sharpshooter

Tiahna Level 14 Sharpshooter (Dryad)

Arisu Level 14 Wizard (Dryad)

I just started looking at why the monsters tend to be below my high level party. I started a character in Ehb who is A level 50 ranger and level 8 in both combat and nature magic. The average between the three classes is 22 and all the monsters appear to be between 17 and 23. I will track this through the map. MLA is set to all.

:ELF:
UPDATE 1
With my primary character at level 39 ranged and 22 nature magic, I played from the broken bridge half way to the Crypts of the Sacred Blood. All the monsters where Yellow and where tracking my character's Ranged level. Next I added combat magic to level 23 and played from the broken bridge to Ulora. By this time my ranger level was 41 and the characters where tracking this. However there was a difference, other than the Mini Bosses who where yellow all other monsters where blue. I do not understand the significance of the color change, could someone enlighten me.

UPDATE 2 With Ulora operating as a Nature Mage (level 1 to start) and Sasha as a ranger level 40 we went through the crypts and on to Stonebridge. The majority of monsters where the level of Sasha. We where operating in Rampage mode. All the monsters remained blue. Picked up the beach quest and went to the beach. The First Skrubb was blue. We exited the beach prior to snuffing anymore skrubbs. Hired Naidi (Level 41 Sharpshooter) Equipped her with some items in the Stash went back to the beach all the skrubbs where now yellow and at level 40. Characters are as follows:

Sasha Level 43 Evoker ranged 40, nature magic 22, combat magic 23
Ulora Level 42 Sorceress nature magic 14, combat magic 41
Naidi Level 41 Sharpshooter ranged 41

Moving on to the next town leaving character equipped as they where in Stone Bridge and not giving Naidi any magic skills.

UPDATE 3
After exiting Stonebridge all monsters where blue except mini bosses where yellow. We played until we reached Wesrin Cross Great Hall DC. By that point all monsters where Level 41/42 and still blue. The monsters do not seem to be tracking Sasha's Level 44 Evoker but her ranged level of 42. So I am not sure which level is supposed to be tracked at the overall level (44 Evoker) or the primary skill (ranged 42) on the Ehb map with MLA set to ALL. I would think it would be the overall level of the party and not just the primary skill of the primary character. So I would think the monsters should be level 43/44 to be tracking my party average of 43.

That's what happens in DS2/BW. They are a very messy lot with all of those books lying carelessly around everywhere for the player to find. None of them actually drop as such, they have been placed into the map.

I could certainly place all, or least the troublesome quest items into the map directly and I'll probably resort to that if a simpler solution doesn't appear.

So far Magni is still doing well. Party level 38 at Ehb Moat, Scorch died appropriately(at the hands of 4 dwarves and a couple of others :twisted: ). Magni now has Dragon Wing equipped :bat:

Monsters are level 39-40 average now.

I've been testing the locker again, from my save at the ruined bridge after the one time I've had it fail. By changing its template I can remove the sparkle but changing anything else about it either makes no difference or else makes the save file incompatible, crashing the game. So it is still anyone's guess what is wrong. My guess is that the map itself is innocent victim and the problem is in macro = fh_r1_edgaar_macro; (which I don't know where to look for). I'd also suggest (from what KillerGremal wrote) that create_pcontent_on_drop = true; might be the better option to go with the macro so you could just set that and wait for fresh reports.

By the way, I wrote that the locker should do four things, it is actually five, because clicking it moves the character to the locker's use point. This worked for me even when the others failed.

As for leaving the map on the ground, remember there is already a spell sitting on a shelf across the room.

From the game handbook: "Blue - the enemy is between four and two levels lower than you. Yellow - the enemy is between one level lower than you and one level higher than you." I reckon this is a simplified explanation. First, it works off the selected character. So if Sasha is level 43, Ulora 42 and Naidi 41, then you can change a level 41 monster's legend from blue to yellow by switching from Sasha to Naidi. (This I'm sure of.)

Secondly, the levels you see are rounded down. Look at Sasha's progress bar to estimate where she is between 43.0 and 43.99. So if -1 level is yellow but -2 levels is blue, what about -1.3 or -1.7? GPG didn't say. Furthermore, though templates usually set monster levels to whole numbers, I'm pretty certain MLA sets them in between too. So Sasha could see two monsters both "level 42" but one could be blue (42.01, say) and the other yellow (42.90 maybe).

As for MLA, this is where we need to understand its config file. Monsters should be lower level (than whatever level MLA is tracking) because the config iryan has in the KoE map's info specifies that at level 30 monsters should vary randomly between -1.5 and -0.5 (i.e. 28.5 to 29.5) while at level 90 the range is -2.5 to -1.0 (equals 87.5 to 89.0). Then according to a comment further down boss monsters (including mini-bosses I presume) vary less but have a bonus of + 1 to 2 levels over the common mobs. Which must be why the mini-bosses can be yellow-level when the others are blue-level.

Finally if I understand KillerGremal's recent posts, MLA doesn't track the actual party (average?) level any more, but (to borrow an analogy from golf) tracks "par" for the level the (lead hero? party average?) started at and the course taken since (with the side trip to MyTestWorld complicating the issue still further).

Could this mean that if you get a long way through Ehb (to when you recruit Sikra, say) building up an 8-level advantage, go to shop in MyTestWorld then come back, your advantage will be halved twice to just 2? - for a 6 levels jump between the monsters before and after?

Utraean Peninsula 33A

Monster Level Adjust Beta 5S ALL Mode

Broken World AllSaves See Far Hack set to off
I did not convert this computer to the version 1 of AllSaves

Save Location

Exit of Crystwind Old Mines

Quest Log

Primary Quests – Elddim Town Stone, Crystwind Town Stone

Secondary Quests – A Farmer's Scythe, A New Way to Travel, Orchard Cellar, Hovart's Folly, Travel to Crystwind

Comment Log

1. Quests Completing correctly.
2. Monsters are leveling correctly.
3. Radar looks good so far.
4. Quest arrows to this point working correctly.
5. No problems hiring people.

Party Members

Dryad 33A Level 19 Marksman

Tiahna Level 19 Marksman (Dryad)

Arisu Level 19 Scholar (Dryad)

Stonepicker Level 18 Dragoon (Dwarf)

Party level 41, no problems, except the archer shooting thru the roof at upper floor monsters in the Castle.

It must be a difference between DS1 and DS2

Frey being a little tired from killing Whiskers an a bunch of tough chickens is going to try setling down on a nice Mountain farm near her old friend Norik (cue ominous music :silly:)

Thanks to Bare_Elf, time to play some of the female characters in my que.

Proceeding to another map to stay/play there is considered. The (various) impacts of frequent 'map hopping' however is not respected nor tested.
And concerning the map quality, rather contact the mapper to add more shops or NPC than changing the map just for shopping belongs - in particular as unbalanced some of these test map are.

My hero who couldn't open the locker in Edgaar's basement has the same problem with two chests - in the second ice dungeon (lore book about Fortress Kroth) and in the scorpions' cave back of the side area before the main ice caverns (map of the ice caverns).

Each of these containers has its own template in the Logic tank (ehb_quest_containers.gas) so, restarting from Glacern, I saved before entering the side dungeon. With this save I can keep changing and testing the chest within the dungeon. If I change nothing the chest fails consistently.

The short answer is that nothing I tried got it to work - not even completely replacing the template with a copy of the farmhouse chest that I know works (minus the old dagger and without adding the lorebook in its place). Finally I changed the template to an ordinary breakable crate and that does work - I've put the book in too.

Utraean Peninsula 33A

Monster Level Adjust Beta 5S ALL Mode

Broken World AllSaves See Far Hack set to off
I did not convert this computer to the version 1 of AllSaves

Save Location

Mount Elspen Forest – after speaking to Dornek Firehammer

Quest Log

Primary Quests – Elddim Town Stone, Crystwind Town Stone, Fallraen Town Stone.

Secondary Quests – A Farmer's Scythe, A New Way to Travel, Orchard Cellar, Hovart's Folly, Travel to Crystwind, Dwarven Secrets, Fallraen Barracks, Travel to Fallraen

Comment Log

1. Quests Completing correctly.
2. Monsters are leveling correctly.
3. Radar looks good so far.
4. Quest arrows to this point working correctly.
5. No problems hiring people.

Party Members

Dryad 33A Level 23 Sharpshooter

Tiahna Level 23 Sharpshooter

Xavier Level 23 Sharpshooter

Arisu Level 23 Sorceress

Stonepicker Level 23 Sorcerer (decided to use Stonepicker as a combat mage)

I decided to abandon the high level party in Ehb for many reasons and start over with a new character. More on this tomorrow.

Kingdom of Ehb 33A

Broken World AllSaves Version 1.0

Monster Level Adjust Status All

Save Location

Town of Stonebridge

Quest Log

Primary Quests – Seek Gyron in Stonebridge

Secondary Quests – Clear Edgaar's Basement, Skrubb the Beach Clean

Comments, Fixes That Work, Errors, Problems

1. I abandoned the high level party lead by Elf 33A because the monsters where not leveling as I expected. It was explained to me by KillerGremal and Richard that jumping between maps and a few other things I was doing might be effecting the way MLA was tracking monster levels.

2. Other than at the broken bridge the radar looks good.

3. Quests completing correctly.

4. No Hiring problems – everyone that could be hired was hired and sent to the inn. Then re-added to the party to make sure things where working. Then returned to the inn.

5. Spoke with everyone in Stonebridge, and the only person that would not speak to me was Lavasia Torgelle when she is standing at the stairs to the mill, at other times I spoke with her without issue.

Party Members

Elf 33A Level 6 Archer
Naidi Level 5 Archer
Ulora Level 6 Hedge Wizard

I have a little Problem with an steam save game. The Mod and some other Mods works without fails, but my steam save game (created before i used any mods) will Not appear in the menu if i Start with the steamDSAllsave launcher. I don't know what i have to Do (notes in the readme File of the steamDSAlsave wasn't helpful).

I don't know how I missed this before?
The quest item "worn dagger", the book on the left side says "sentimental" but on the right side it says "snetimental", oh and one other thing, on the same worn dagger book text it says "usefull" when it should be "useful".
Is this a 1 or 2 handed weapon?

Does your save game appear if you don't use the launcher? If so, make a backup of your save game folder as recommended in the Setting Up and System Requirements notes distributed with the mod. These are located in Documents or My Documents\My Games\Dungeon Siege 2\Save\SinglePlayer. Or Dungeon Siege 2 Broken World if you're using Killah's fix.

That way you can always restore your save game to its previous state by moving all mods from the resources folder. If you use a save game with any mods, you'll need to use those mods forever if you want to keep the save game. Otherwise your save game will disappear from the menu like it is doing now.

Now to why your save game is disappearing when using the launcher, I can only surmise that there's information stored in the save game linked to the version of the game exe used to play the game. AllSaves won't work with the exe from the Steam version of DS2, it can't recognise the file version.

So I distributed a version of the DS2 exe that is compatible with AllSaves and if you use the AllSaves Launcher it will automatically use this version of the DS2 exe. However the original Steam exe is still there and you should be able to use that to play the game and see your old save game if you use the Steam shortcut to play DS2.

So I believe that ALLSaves can't see save games using a different version of the DS2 than what it is designed to work with.

I hope everything I said here is clear enough to understand. I do apologise as I didn't foresee this eventuality but that's part of what the beta testing program is all about. I do hope your save games are still unaffected but sadly you won't be able to use them with AllSaves. You have a couple of options, none ideal.

The first one is to use the Launcher and start with a new character. Saves made using the launcher should be compatible with any future updates to the mod.

The second option is to make a backup of your save game folder and so use your existing saves with the mod but by using the Steam DS2 shortcut and not the launcher. Unfortunately you won't be able to update your mods or even remove them once you play with them. This is part of the CRC check put in by Gas Powered Games to prevent exploitation in multiplayer games by using mods.

You can also wait unless the release version of the mod is released but that may be still be a long time in the future.

I also adjusted the positioning of the other two chests and verified that I was able to obtain the journal items from them.

Note that I'm using Broken World to play the game and perhaps GPG made some slight adjustments in the way it handles positioning of items in the world?