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Neverwinter Nights isn't an infinity engine game but this is the closest thread about it. How many level 3 spell slots should a paladin have at level 14? Some sources say one, others say two. I swear I had two slots yesterday. I even put the new spell on a quickbar. edit: It was because I had a wisdom or charisma buff. Never mind me. Node fucked around with this message at 00:22 on Mar 21, 2023 |
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Mar 20, 2023 23:45
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sebzilla posted:Thalantyr is just upset that he (HE!) can't spring for a big city lair like those fancy bastards Ramazith and Ragefast. Instead he's out in the sticks with a bunch of stupid skeletons wandering about. But the whole point of Ramazith's and Ragefast's mansions are that you are supposed to loot them, and gently caress you wizard that's why. At least Ramazith's has some levels with mean creatures on it. Is there any sensible reason for trying to murder Thalantyr? His inventory is impressive, but his inventory goes into a magic place somewhere in Fallout 2 if you merk him and that's that as far as I can tell. And Thalantyr has those flesh golems hanging around. And artistically speaking, though I am not competent, High Hedge always seemed more impressive than a light house in the wrong district of a big city (what are you doing with your life?), and Ragefast just lives in a sort of big house. Thalantyr has a castle. With golems.
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Mar 20, 2023 23:55
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Building a castle is super easy with magic, especially in the wilderness where you don’t have to worry about land prices
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Mar 21, 2023 05:13
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Flight got delayed so now I'm daydreaming about a mod that adds a side plot where you have to find the entrance to the High Hedge mini Dungeon to fight/sneak by flesh golems in order to recover Thalantyr's deed and bring it to Kelddath Ormlyr to prove he built his Castle on communal land. Cutscene where they both duke it out and fling some spells. Charname can choose to side with either or stop the fight and give a speech about gentrification and ye real estate prices. Man I'm bored, should have downloaded BGEE on this phone.
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Mar 21, 2023 08:47
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Node posted:Neverwinter Nights isn't an infinity engine game but this is the closest thread about it. How many level 3 spell slots should a paladin have at level 14? Some sources say one, others say two. Neverwinter nights 1 is going to use specifically the 3.0 rules for everything. Most online D&D rules resources that aren’t NWN specific will use the 3.5 rules. Hence the disparities.
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Mar 21, 2023 09:16
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Node posted:Neverwinter Nights isn't an infinity engine game but this is the closest thread about it. How many level 3 spell slots should a paladin have at level 14? Some sources say one, others say two. the NWNWiki is your friend: https://nwn.fandom.com/wiki/Paladin although in situations like yours it can definitely be difficult to work out what rule is impacting your stats, lol. By the way, you can make the game look slightly less terrible via the official remaster patch - links to that and other graphics upgrades here if you're interested: https://www.reddit.com/r/neverwinternights/comments/tmof98/
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Mar 21, 2023 14:19
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Ulvino posted:Flight got delayed so now I'm daydreaming about a mod that adds a side plot where you have to find the entrance to the High Hedge mini Dungeon to fight/sneak by flesh golems in order to recover Thalantyr's deed and bring it to Kelddath Ormlyr to prove he built his Castle on communal land. Cutscene where they both duke it out and fling some spells. Charname can choose to side with either or stop the fight and give a speech about gentrification and ye real estate prices. Given how the Realms work, Thalantyr probably does "community service" every now and then by killing a beholder or some poo poo that shows up to murder the peasants. And he was an adventurer in his youth, and given how gold becomes pretty meaningless even for your own party as BG1 progresses, maybe he just bought the castle from Keldath? How much could a
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Mar 21, 2023 17:26
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I dunno if Thalantyr is gonna help anyone out. Wizards in the Forgotten Realms just sit in their towers researching poo poo and thumbing their nose at the peasants. Look at Jermien in bg2. You can ask him about the issues plaguing Imnesvale and he basically says he doesn't give a poo poo and won't unless the Cowled Wizards tell him to.
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Mar 21, 2023 18:43
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That's fair, I guess for narrative purposes there's always an adventuring party around to do the beholder killing. I guess BG1 paints Thalantyr as very reclusive, but then he does help Melicamp. But I guess Melicamp was kind of his own fault.
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Mar 21, 2023 18:56
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According to forgottenrealms.fandom.com Thalantyr is a level 17 Conjurer so could have personally taken care of Sarevok and his whole crew without too much bother. Kelddath Ormlyr himself is apparently a level 16 Cleric of Lathander so the pair of them really don't need to be asking for help from anyone for local concerns. High level characters just get lazy and like to subcontract, I suppose. *Bondari reloads*
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Mar 21, 2023 19:32
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It's like in those RPGs when you send hirelings on timer based missions to collect crafting materials, once you get high level enough you can't bring yourself to bother doing these petty tasks like killing 10 Gibberlings or toppling evil warlords taking over the region.
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Mar 21, 2023 21:21
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Thalantyr's whole thing seems to be "interfering in poo poo quite often goes bad for me personally so no thank you" so for him at least it makes sense.
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Mar 21, 2023 21:37
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Wish I could subcontract out for some of the bg2 companion quests
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Mar 21, 2023 21:56
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You do get to subcontract a quest to the newbie adventurers in Throne of Bhaal. It goes okay, but it takes forever because they abuse long rest. Then they try to attack you, realize they are outmatched, and reload the game and just hand over the macguffin they were sent to retrieve.
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Mar 21, 2023 22:45
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docbeard posted:Thalantyr's whole thing seems to be "interfering in poo poo quite often goes bad for me personally so no thank you" so for him at least it makes sense. It's a dangerous world for low-level wizards so it makes sense that the ones that make it to 17 would mostly be selfish and risk-averse. All the heroes (that weren't travelling with equally heroic parties) are lining ditches. Edit: on the other hand even level one mage spells would give anyone with a lick of sense godlike advantages over the rest of humanity, so as always it's best to just not think about wizards too hard.
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Mar 21, 2023 23:02
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Randallteal posted:It's a dangerous world for low-level wizards so it makes sense that the ones that make it to 17 would mostly be selfish and risk-averse. All the heroes (that weren't travelling with equally heroic parties) are lining ditches. Oh yeah, if I lived in 2 edition D&D Forgotten Realms and had access to the Friends spell once a day I'd live like a king and wouldn't even have to be too exploitative about it.
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Mar 21, 2023 23:16
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sebzilla posted:According to forgottenrealms.fandom.com Thalantyr is a level 17 Conjurer so could have personally taken care of Sarevok and his whole crew without too much bother. Kelddath Ormlyr himself is apparently a level 16 Cleric of Lathander so the pair of them really don't need to be asking for help from anyone for local concerns. For all you know, he's researching the solution to problems way above your pay grade. The thing about the Forgotten Realms is you can't throw a stone without it landing in the wake of an existential threat of one kind or another. There's other problems aside from the bhaalspawn crisis.
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Mar 22, 2023 02:00
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Mr. Lobe posted:For all you know, he's researching the solution to problems way above your pay grade. The thing about the Forgotten Realms is you can't throw a stone without it landing in the wake of an existential threat of one kind or another. There's other problems aside from the bhaalspawn crisis. So many interesting things happened around the Time of Troubles, then the transition to 4e was about as smooth as a clockwork bumfuck. I don't dislike 4e D&D, but the FR transition was so ham-fisted. Then the 5th edition un-transition was just a massive retcon in story for a massive retcon in gameplay. It was a real disappointment.
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Mar 22, 2023 02:48
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Oh god Durlags Tower is very stressful
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Mar 23, 2023 02:56
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The Shame Boy posted:Oh god Durlags Tower is very stressful Durlag's tower is why I didn't feel any shame in simply modding out traps when I got to BG2.
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Mar 23, 2023 03:04
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Durlags is my favorite dungeon in the series. The traps and the lore drops paint a vivid picture of Durlag's madness. It's the most atmospheric dungeon.
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Mar 23, 2023 03:16
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I wouldn't mind Durlag's if your party's pathfinding wasn't so bad. You have to lead them by hand most of the time. I guess it wouldn't be so bad if you were playing solo.
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Mar 23, 2023 03:59
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In trying to find something to save on my phone to read during down time at work, I found a ebook collection of video game novels, which included the Baldur's Gate novelizations. I don't know if it's ever been done in the thread (I know there's someone on YouTube who covered the first novel, maybe the others as well), but I thought I'd try and post some excerpts and commentary on what I read. I imagine a few people in thread have read the novels, so maybe this is all stuff you've already read. I've heard about how bad the books are over the years, and I know some of the stuff that happens in them, but actually reading the BG1 novel, it's ...  The first chapter starts out with the protagonist (Abdel) and Gorion getting ambushed outside Candlekeep, but not by Sarevok and company, but by a bunch of random mercenaries, one who shoots Gorion with a crossbow: quote:The crossbowman stepped out, dark eyes slitted against the midmorning sun, padded leather vest creaking with every movement. His long red hair fluttering greasily in the breeze. He aimed carefully at Gorion. It then goes into detail about Abdel's backstory. The novel has so he leaves Candlekeep and travels around the Sword Coast as a sellsword (the book frequently refers to him as 'the sellsword'). One of the things I remember hearing about the BG novels (the first two, at least) is that the author supposedly wrote them during commercial breaks when watching something, and I believe based off lines like these. quote:Abdel looked nothing like this man who was not truly his father, and it seemed to surprise no one who knew them well that they didn’t think much alike either. There's also this description, which I don't fully understand: quote:There was a sound as if someone had tossed a maidens-thigh melon from a guard tower, and Eagus’s halberd was free. A 'maiden's thigh melon'? I'm pretty sure that's not referring to what I think it is. Anyway, a dying Gorion tells Abdel to find Khalid and Jaheira, 'stop the war', in reference to the brewing tensions between Baldur's Gate and Amn. Chapter 2 switches the perspective to Tamoko, with Sarevok in his private chamber, so there's absolutely no mystery about who the true villain is. Some choice passages: quote:She sat with her legs folded on the wide, too-soft bed—a silk sack eight feet on a side stuffed with feathers—and tried to meditate. Something was prickling the back of her neck, though, and it was distracting her.  quote:“I have at least this one brother, yes,” Sarevok told her in that voice she often thought was—not seductive—maybe seductive…. The writing is filled with a lot of prose, and that second passage also made me realize that the dialog in this chapter, is very awkwardly written. quote:“My brother,” Sarevok said suddenly, so suddenly a lesser trained assassin might have flinched, but not Tamoko, “is on the path.” The 'shiny metal disks' thing is also confusing to me. At first, I thought maybe that was a tongue-in cheek reference to Dragonlance and the Disks of Mishakal, but then I wondered if maybe it was just meant to be referring to gold coins, which if so, why describe it like that? Anyway Chapter 2 ends with Sarevok makes reference to 'the two Zhentarim', so Xzar and Montaron are under his employ. Chapter 3 has Abdel reading a note Gorion had clutched in his hand, talking about the Bhaal prophecy, which he dismisses. He makes a grave for Gorion, and there's this bit: quote:Abdel, son of Gorion, adjusted his chain mail tunic, scuffed his hard leather boots on the gravel to clear away some of the mud, shifted his shoulders to center the weight of the big broadsword that hung from his back, found a stick, and set it upright in the disturbed earth. He hung on the wet wood the tiny silver gauntlet that his father had worn on a thin gold chain around his neck, knowing some anonymous traveler would be along soon enough to steal it.  I think he's talking about Gorion, and not the gauntlet, but the way it reads, it sound contradictory.There's an very long section where Abdel stops to sleep and gets menaced by some creatures, before Xzar and Montaron arrive and bail him out with magic light that chases the creatures away. Said creatures are Gibberlings, and I admit, I have not played BG1 in a while, but it seems like the book makes a big deal about one of the weakest enemies in the game. Xzar and Monty join up with Abdel to go up to the Friendly Arms, and then down to Nashkel. Chapter 4 starts with this bit, which I found legitimately funny: quote:After spending three days with Montaron and Xzar on the road to the Friendly Arms, Abdel had to admit he kind of liked the gruff halfling. The little guy was odd, to be sure. He would complain incessantly all day that the sunlight was too bright, even though the sky was overcast and dull gray most of the time. His aversion to light was sometimes silly, other times it was disturbing. Montaron seemed amused by his human companion, Xzar, and often teased him by tossing pebbles and twigs at the tall mage’s head as they walked. We also start getting a insight into Abdel's character, immediately following that paragraph, which is, well... quote:Abdel was ready to do more than tease Xzar. Abdel was beginning to think about killing him. As the halfling joked, and the mage pontificated, and the hours dragged on, Abdel would devise elaborate plans to murder Xzar, just to pass the time.  Immediately after that, Xzar tells Abdel that he knows that his father is Bhaal, but since it's Xzar being Xzar, Abdel dismisses it. They make it to the Friendly Arm in, and we get this description: quote:Abdel had visited the Friendly Arms over half a dozen times in the past several years, but the sight of it always surprised him. It had been a rather well-built fortress in its day, constructed by a cult of the now-dead god Bhaal. The story was that the band of gnomes who ran the place had run afoul of the cultists, and after years of fighting back and forth the gnomes drove the Bhaal-worshipers out. This seemed unlikely to Abdel, though, as he’d met a few gnomes in his day and found it difficult to believe that people who barely reached his knee could drive anyone out of anywhere. I don't know if that story about Friendly Arm Inn being a former Bhaal fortress is canon or not. What gets more more is Abdel's dismissive attitude on gnomes. However there is a follow-up to that on the next page when they enter the inn, and there's a minor fracas going on. quote:The three travelling companions followed the gnome guards to the door. Abdel stood behind the gnomes as one of them opened the door, and he was hit with the blast of sound from inside just a fraction of a second before the chair hit him in the face. Down the big sellsword went, never seeing the three little gnomes wade into the crowd. The guards’ fists were small, but when they brought them into play at their own eye level, taller men dropped like sacks of flour. Also: quote:Abdel noticed a sudden change in the tavern sounds. Montaron stopped too and held out a hand to gently block Xzar. There's a transition where Abdel is sitting at the bar, drinking. He's unable to remember the names Gorion told him, so he keeps on drinking. Lucky for him, Khalid happens to find him, and we get this, which I find very strange: quote:The Amman’s response to this was simply a puzzled stare. The man was obviously a half-elf. His long, thin face and ears just barely too round to be called pointed would have been proof enough of that, but the bright violet of his eyes was a sure sign of elf blood. The human part of him was surely Amnian; he had a large, long nose and dusky olive skin. He was dressed as if for battle, in dented armor that he was obviously uncomfortable in. He was wearing a helmet, which, considering the surroundings, seemed a wise idea. His lips curled and twitched. He was nervous. Both Khalid and Jaheira are described to be from Amn, and that does tie into the book putting more emphasis on the tensions between Amn and BG, but it just seems like an odd change. Khalid's demeanor in the book is not nervous and stuttering, but more just kind of smug.  He introduces Abdel to Jaheira, which goes as follows:quote:Abdel took a couple of deep breaths to try to calm himself, and when Khalid said, “Here she is,” Abdel looked up, and his breath caught. The three talk briefly about the potential war, only for things to get interrupted when the drunk patron from earlier returns and throws a glass which hits Abdel in the back of the head. Abdel handles the situation tactfully: quote:A glass bottle disintegrated against the back of Abdel’s head, and Jaheira had to flinch away from the shards of glass. Abdel didn’t bother to wipe the residual wine off the back of his head or pick the glass from his black hair. He stood up and turned, and the crowd parted as if they were puppets attached to his joints. At the door, a far throw away, was the man who’d been dragged out by the three gnome guards. The chair thrower. Luckily, Montaron is there and "discovers" that the drunk was pick-pocketing people (the next chapter reveals he planted the bags), and Khalid says it prevents Abdel from being labeled a murderer. I think even if you didn't know the plot of the Baldur's Gate game, you'd pick up pretty fast that the protagonist is a child of Bhaal, because a running trend is how often you read some iteration of the phrase, 'Abdel had the burning desire to kill <insert name here>'. With that issue settled, the five of them set off for Nashkel. That leads into Chapter 5, but I'll save that for another post (assuming anyone wants to read more of this). Max Wilco fucked around with this message at 04:51 on Mar 23, 2023 |
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Mar 23, 2023 04:32
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 Poor Xzar, though.
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Mar 23, 2023 04:56
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"noun-noun" used as an adjective is lazy writing that you see MUD players use a lot, normally because they're constrained on text limits and language in item description. Maiden-thigh in this case means the circumference of a maidens thigh, but the heavy lifting is left up to the reader here (again, lazy).
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Mar 23, 2023 06:35
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It’s been many years but I gave up on Durlag’s Tower cause I couldn’t figure out the thing where you open a door and another door closes
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Mar 23, 2023 07:51
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People give R.A. Salvatore poo poo, and deservedly so, but then you read something like the Baldur's Gate novelization and you realize that he really was one of the better Forgotten Realms writers. So much of it is extremely bad.
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Mar 23, 2023 15:48
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Max Wilco posted:That leads into Chapter 5, but I'll save that for another post (assuming anyone wants to read more of this). I've read the two books and done my best to erase them from my mind. I'm all in if you want to continue this though, because drat does it go to places
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Mar 23, 2023 16:12
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I'm excited to see where this goes! I've read the book several times (self hatred) and know precisely where it goes. Still very excited for thread reactions.
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Mar 23, 2023 16:24
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Maidens-thigh melon, not to be confused with maiden's thigh-melon.
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Mar 23, 2023 16:58
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sweet geek swag posted:People give R.A. Salvatore poo poo, and deservedly so, but then you read something like the Baldur's Gate novelization and you realize that he really was one of the better Forgotten Realms writers. So much of it is extremely bad. The Baldur’s Gate novels are considered to be almost, ALMOST the absolute bottom of the barrel by FR novel fans. (I’d also put the Double Diamond Saga and uh the novel about ripping off Star Wars in the same boat.)
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Mar 23, 2023 17:09
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I both read and enjoyed the BG novels when I was ten or however old after BG1 came out. This has been… interesting to reread
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Mar 23, 2023 18:18
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The game doesn't really support chaotic evil but I'm glad the book does
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Mar 23, 2023 18:36
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Arivia posted:The Baldur’s Gate novels are considered to be almost, ALMOST the absolute bottom of the barrel by FR novel fans. (I’d also put the Double Diamond Saga and uh the novel about ripping off Star Wars in the same boat.) Try Red Magic by Jean Rabe. Might be the worst novel I've ever read on any subject. It's book #3 in the Harpers series from the 2e days. Meanwhile, book $4 in that series frightened me so much I can't read it again and #5 is a personal favourite, so let's not paint them all with the same brush.
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Mar 23, 2023 21:10
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I like that the Azure Bonds book explicitly points out how dumb the armor the main character is wearing in the cover is,
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Mar 23, 2023 21:22
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sweet geek swag posted:People give R.A. Salvatore poo poo, and deservedly so, but then you read something like the Baldur's Gate novelization and you realize that he really was one of the better Forgotten Realms writers. So much of it is extremely bad. Arivia posted:The Baldur’s Gate novels are considered to be almost, ALMOST the absolute bottom of the barrel by FR novel fans. (I’d also put the Double Diamond Saga and uh the novel about ripping off Star Wars in the same boat.) I skimmed the rest, and then found a guy on Candlekeep forums who was a DM and had painstakingly gone through all the terrible novels and made detailed notes on all the info about the Moonshaes setting that he could glean, and put it all in a set of life-saving documents he gave to me. I assume he is some form of benign saviour from a higher plane.
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Mar 23, 2023 21:45
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I re-read the first three Salvatore Drizzt anthologies a couple years ago at the gym and thought they held up (I was having trouble following regular novels on the treadmill / elliptical / bike so I mostly stuck to young adult and genre stuff). They aren't high art but I'd put them a little above the Timothy Zahn Star Wars books and a little below the Dan Abnett 40K books as far as licensed fiction goes.
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Mar 23, 2023 21:53
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Randallteal posted:I re-read the first three Salvatore Drizzt anthologies a couple years ago at the gym and thought they held up (I was having trouble following regular novels on the treadmill / elliptical / bike so I mostly stuck to young adult and genre stuff). They aren't high art but I'd put them a little above the Timothy Zahn Star Wars books and a little below the Dan Abnett 40K books as far as licensed fiction goes. Salvatore knows how to write dynamic characters and fight scenes, which means that even if his prose and descriptions are a bit lacking, you at least have something fun to look forward to. Abdel in Baldur's Gate is just a complete void of Charisma. The only even remotely interesting character up to this point was Montaron.
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Mar 24, 2023 00:28
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El Grillo posted:I 'had' (also self-hatred) to read the Moonshae trilogy by Douglas Niles, and it's sequel series (Druidhome trilogy) as part of my research when building a Neverwinter Nights persistent world set in the Moonshae Isles. I basically couldn't do it. Read the first 'novel' (Darkwalker on Moonshae), it made my eyes bleed and I came close to madness. It's the earliest Forgotten realms novel, I think. I think it is in some way intended to be an ironic take on the fairytale hero Prince trope, but it's so bad that it fails at that to the extent that it really just reinforces that trope. Every facet of the writing is bad though. In many ways it's like a toddler's writing. I actually own both Moonshae and Druidhome. I thought that Moonshae was... okay, but Druidhome was awful. I honestly think that it was written by two people who have never met and then received zero editing. By the way, I wouldn't mind seeing those documents if you have a copy. sweet geek swag posted:Salvatore knows how to write dynamic characters and fight scenes, which means that even if his prose and descriptions are a bit lacking, you at least have something fun to look forward to.\ Exactly. He can do action but not drama. He's light entertainment and he's tiresome when he tries to be serious and insightful, like when Drizzt is pontificating. I just picked up the first 30 novels about Drizzt in French, so I'm going to read them all again. I should finish around 2028. I used to like Elaine Cunningham, but she retired from writing years ago. I really liked the character Danilo and the contrast between him and his sweetheart, Arilyn. It was nice to see genuine wit for once. Randallteal posted:I re-read the first three Salvatore Drizzt anthologies a couple years ago at the gym and thought they held up I agree. My favourite fantasy author is probably Feist, but Salvatore writes enjoyable, action-packed light fiction. My favourite novels of his are the three that centre around Jarlaxle and Artemis when they are still proper evil bastards. He did a very good job of writing suspense, intrigue, betrayal and politics.
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Mar 24, 2023 01:20
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I loved those Artemis and Jarlaxle novels. So good.
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Mar 24, 2023 01:39
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