Hey guys,
Before anything, this is my very first mod, it has gone through some technical testing but some bugs might have slipped in (e.g. a spell dealing incorrect damage at a certain level). Make sure to report them here.
I'll make a playthrough myself to check the balance of the mod, but it might very well be totally unbalanced, and I think it might be too strong, especially at higher levels. Drop your suggestions here, I'll take them into account.
I tried to make an effort concerning aesthetics but many spells, especially Eldritch Blast derivatives, might look similar or identical on screen. I'll change that soon.
Last, but not least, I am not a native, so my English is quite far from perfect. If some descriptions sound weird to you, it's normal, just tell me and I'll correct them.
Mod Features:
A brand new Rogue kit, with 32 unique spells and 13 unique HLAs, and hopefully more than that shortly. Features in the spoiler below. Quite the wall of text actually.
[spoiler]
For those who do not play a lot of D&D outside of BG, I'll drop a link to explain the concept of the class:
http://nwn2.wikia.com/wiki/Warlock
Basically it's a special kind of spellcaster that has a very restricted number of spells (4 spell levels, and up to 3-4 spells per level) but can use them at will.
It's rather unique and since we can't make new classes, just kits, I had to cope with that and find a class that'd fit in terms of GUI, item usability etc...
So here's what the kit looks ike:
Rogue Kit
0 points per level to share among rogue skills, 0 at level 1. The only points you get are those from Dex/Race/item/spells bonuses
Cannot set traps
Cannot backstab
Cannot dual-class
I will explain why below the rest of the features, but it's not to be played like a rogue
Has access to Eldritch blast: this ability has a casting time of 1, can be used at will, and deals1d3+1 damage per level on a single target, up to 15d3+15 magic damage.
Has access to special abilities called invocations. These are special abilities that can be used at will. Details in the spoiler. You'll also find HLAs in the spoiler.
[spoiler]
Spell progression: Same as in NWN2
http://nwn2.wikia.com/wiki/Warlock
Invocations implemented:
Note: Every Blast spell deals magic damage and are subject to Magic Resistance, unless specified otherwise. Their spell level is considered equal to the number of damage dice, up to level 9.
Besides, any damage/duration indicated here is purely indicative and might no make it as such in the mod once it(s released. It will go through balance testing first.
Eldritch Blast, and all that derives from it has been largely tuned down damage-wise, because the HP scaling is not the same in AD&D and 3E, and because it normally requires a touch-attack which cannot be implemented in BG2. Normally, Eldritch Blast derivatives deal as much damage as Eldritch Blast. I chose to tune down that as well so that a warlock will have to choose between trying to control his enemy and optimizing his damage output. Might not be balanced.
Least invocation:
Draining Blast: 1d3+1 per 2 levels on a single target, up to 8d3+8. Target must save vs Paralysation at -2 or it is slowed for 2 rounds
Frightful Blast: 1d3+1 per 2 levels on a single target, up to 8d3+8. Target must save vs Spells or be frightened for 3 rounds
Beguiling Influence: +6 to Charisma for 24hours
Dark One’s Own Luck: +1 to all saving throws per 5 levels and +1 to luck for 24 hours.
Leaps and Bounds: +4 to dexterity for 1 hour.
See the Unseen: grants Infravision for 1 turn per two levels. Also grant a bonus 10% per level up to 100 at level 10 to your Detect Illusion and Detect Traps skills.
Hideous Blow: Channels your Eldritch Blast into your weapon. Your next attack within 5 rounds will deal additional magic damage equal to that of your eldritch blast (still need to hit the target, if you don’t, the Hideous Blow is wasted).
Poisoning Blast: 1d3+1 per 2 levels on a single target, up to 8d3+8. Target must save vs Death or suffer 3 poison damage per round for 5 rounds.
Cloak of Shadow: +10 per level, up to 200 at level 20 to your HiS, your MS and your PP skills for 8hours.
Lesser invocations:
Beshadowed Blast: 1d3+1 per 2 levels on a single target, up to 8d3+8. Target must save vs Spells or be blinded for 1 turn.
Brimstone Blast: Deals fire damage. 1d3+1 per level on a single target, up to 15d3+15. Target must save vs Spells or suffer an additional 1d8 damage each round for one round per 4 levels, up to 5 rounds at level 20.
Truecold Blast: Deals cold damage. 1d3+1 per 2 levels on a single target, up to 8d3+8. Target must save vs Paralysation at -4 or suffer a -4 AC Penalty for 5 rounds
Curse of Despair: Target must save vs Spells or suffer a permanent -3 to all ability scores. This can be cured with a Remove Curse Spell.
The Dead Walk: Basically a copy of Animate Dead
Voracious Dispelling: Just like dispel Magic, and it deals 1 magic damage per level up to 10 to hit targets, allies included.
Walk Unseen: Permanent-duration invisibility, only on self, until any action that would normally break invisibility is used.
Flee the scene: As dimension door, and leaves a darkness spell from your casting point for 1 round
Greater invocations:
Eldrith Cone: 1d3+1 damage per level up to 15d3+15 in a cone.
Bewitching Blast: 2d3+2 damage per three levels, up to 10d3+10. Target must save vs Spells at -4 or be confused for 4 rounds
Stunning Blast: 2d3+2 damage per three levels, up to 10d3+10. Target must save vs Spells at -2 or be stunned for 4 rounds
Vitriolic Blast: 2d3+2 per three levels, up to 10d3+10,+2d6 acid damage. Ignores any magic resistance.
Chilling Tentacles: Creates a zone filled with tentacles. Any creature in the zone suffers 1d6 crushing damage and 2d6 cold damage per round, and must save vs Paralysation each round or be Held for one round.
Devour Magic: Replaces your weapon for one hit with a melee one that has no damage of its own, +10 to-hit, but dispels any effect on the target and heals you for 4hp per level, up to 80.
Tenacious Plague: Carbon Copy of Insect Plague
Repelling Blast: 2d3+2 per three levels, up to 10d3+10. Enemies must save vs Spells or be knocked back.
Eldritch Beam: 1d3+1 damage per level on all enemies between you and your target, up to 15d3+15, save vs spell for half.
Dark Invocations:
Eldritch doom: 1d3+1 damage per level up to 15d3+15 on a 30 foot radius, self-centered, save vs spells for half.
Utterdark Blast: 2d3+2 per three levels, up to 10d3+10 damage. Target must save vs spells at -2 or have two of her levels drained.
Binding Blast: 2d3+2 per three levels, up to 10d3+10 damage. Target is stunned for one round.
Dark Foresight: Protects the caster from any physical attacks for two rounds.
Retributive Invisibility: The caster becomes invisible and is granted immunity to divination for 3 rounds. When it ends, any nearby creature suffers 4d6 magical damage.
Crack the Weave: Removes one Spell protection, as well as all specific and combat protections.
High-level abilities:
Note on HLAs: unless specified otherwise, these HLAs can only be picked once, and only be used once a day.
Word of Changing: Demon: Allows the Warlock to assume the form of a Balor or a Marilith for 1 turn. It retains its warlock abilities while in this form. Excluded by Word of Changing: Devil. Can be picked multiple times.
Word of Changing: Devil: Allows the Warlock to assume the form of a Cornugon or a Pit Fiend for 1 turn. It retains its warlock abilities while in this form. Excluded by Word of Changing: Demon. Can be picked multiple times
Fiendfire Blast: 1d6+2 damage per level on a single target, up to 15d6+30. Half is fire damage, the other half is magic damage. The caster suffers a -3 Constitution penalty for 1 turn after using Fiendfire blast. Half the damage of each component ignores magic resistance. Once picked, this ability can be used at will.
Fiendfire Shield: Much like Fireshield(Red) , dealing 1d10+3 fire and 1d10+3 magic damage instead. This shield lasts 5 rounds and the caster suffers a -5 Constitution penalty for 1 turn after using Fiendfire Shield. Can be picked multiple times. Requires Fiendfire Blast
Hellball: Deals 8d6 fire, 8d6 cold, 8d6 acid, 8d6 magic and 8d6 electricity damage to all enemies in the area. Save vs Spells at -2 for half, ignores magic resistance (though not damage resistance). Requires Word of Changing: Devil
Summon the Infernal Host: Summons a Marilith.
Extra least invocation: Allows you to pick an extra least invocation.
Extra lesser invocation: Allows you to pick an extra lesser invocation. Requires Extra least invocation
Extra greater invocation: Allows you to pick an extra greater invocation. Requires Extra lesser invocation
Living Portal: This spell replaces its target with a Balor under the control of the caster, with no save. This spell is very exhausting and will incur instant fatigue as well as a -5 Constitution penalty for 24 hours. Requires Word of Changing: Demon.
Fiendish Constitution I: Gains +1 Constitution.
Fiendish Constitution II: Gains +1 Constitution. Requires Hellish Constitution I
Fiendish Constitution III: Gains +1 Constitution. Requires Hellish Constitution II
Use Any Item
Time Stop (as a one-cast-a-day special ability, pickable only once)
Fiendish Regeneration: Self-cast only. The caster heals for 5hp/second for 10 rounds. He then suffers a -4 penalty to Constitution for 2hours. Requires Fiendfire Shield
[/spoiler]
Now, why would I make it a rogue kit if it can hardly do anything a rogue does? Several points:
Hit die: rogue and warlock both have d6
Armor restriction: Both are restricted to medium armors
Weapon choice: More or less in line with what a Warlock gets in 3E.
2 Quick-weapon slots: That's what you have on most spellcasters.
Rogue skills: as you may have seen if you have been through that wall of text that was hidden in the spoiler, some invocations will buff your rogue skills. These are adapted from 3E invocations that boost the same skills, and aim to open a wider choice of ways for your character. Besides, any character in 3E may pick those rogue skills, except it will not be as effective as if a rogue were taking them.
No spellcasting except your special abilities.
Some "strange choices" you might have noticed:
Why would I give a warlock UAI as an HLA? Warlocks have the "use magic device" as a class skill in 3E, as well as the "deceive item" passive feat. So using items that are not made for them is in tune with the class.
Why would I give a warlock Time Stop as an HLA? Well, that's something I am not yet sure about. Basically, a high-level warlock is an immensely powerful caster, and as such I find it normal that he should have access to Time Stop. Making it an HLA that he can only use once a day is for balance reasons.
What's with all those CON-lowering HLAs? It aims to mirror the prestige class Hellfire Warlock in NWN2, which basically gives an immense offensive power in exchange for CON drain upon using its specific abilities.
Why make Word of Changing an HLA? Some of you might know it's supposed to be a dark invocation. The reason I moved it to an HLA is an balance matter which is related to an engine limitation. Polymorphing disables spellcasting, but not special abilities. I could make it disable special abilities as well but then you would not be able to transform back to human form or to another demon form. So basically Word of Changing would allow you to be in an alternate form while retaining all your warlock abilities. This deserves to be an HLA.
What's with the superlong duration spells? Well, it's a matter of conveniency, as well as a reflection of 3E behaviour. Since you have an unlimited amount of spells, casting them over and over would just be tedious. As you may have noticed, the very powerful spells when used in the thick of combat have a very short duration, much shorter than their arcane counterpart (retributive invisibility and Dark Foresight), to counterbalance the fact that they can be cast at will.
Most of the invocations are adapted from their NWN2 version, some are unimplemented 3E invocation, and there's one Dark Invocation (Crack the Weave) that is my own creation (or so I think). Most HLAs are brand new though some are derivatives from either existing invocations, 3E epic spells or 2E spells.
[/spoiler]
Current state: First version of the mod released. Writing the README. Mod attached to the post.
How to install: Much like most WeiDu mods, copy the zkwarlock folder and the setup-zkwarlock.exe file into your game folder, and execute the setup.
Changeplan: Pending for your feedback and my playthrough.
So far the kit appears to be quite balanced. Quite strong early and midgame, but the fact it doesn't have improved alacrity, stoneskin or a spell that protects from magic to some extend makes it a bit weak in ToB game. What I am looking to add is an additionnal invocation, probably a greater one, that will give some martial defense (kind of like stoneskin) and a dark one that will give some spell defense, like a spell deflection or something along those lines. I'm happy with not having improved alacrity (it would litterally mean instadeath of any enemy with robe of vecna since you'd have no cast time on most blasts), as mages must still have some advantage over warlock, as well as the fact the warlock's really good at duelling but not that good when it comes to AoEs. I am also happy with the number of invocations.
Changelog: 07/14/17: V0.1.1: First public release. EDIT: made a slight mistake, so the uploaded file will cause bug upon leveling up. Just fixed it and it should be fine. You may reinstall the mode midgame if you haven't experienced the bug yet. Besides I notice a few disappearing spells upon playing. I'm checking that out right now.. Partially solved, you shouldn't experiment the issue anymore but you'll have an extra cast of each of these spells everytime you cast them. This is purely cosmetic though, no gameplay influence since you have unlimited uses anyway.
28/10/17: V0.2.1: Various bugfixes. Buff spells (cloak of shadow and dark one's own luck) should no longer stack and are now dispellable. Eldritch Blasts were modified: They no longer have a flat damage component (except Fiendfire Blast). Additionnally their effective spell level now scales with the Warlock's level. Most spells should now have an adequate effect level.
25/10/17: V0.2.2: Various bugfixes and balance changes:
-Modified Leaps and Bounds so that it no longer stacks with itself.
-Nerfed Cloak of Shadows to 7 HiS, Pickpocket and Move Silently per level, up to 105 at level 15. It now properly gives the pickpocket bonus mentioned in the description.
-Edited the descriptions of the spells affected in this patch and the previous one.
-Corrected a bug which cause Imoen to be stuck trying to open your cell in the opening cinematic of BG2, if you didn't skip it. The result might look weird (In my game, Imoen's behaviour is kind of inconsistent and sometimes she walks above the cell to talk to you) but it should be functional.
-Living Portal will now display some fancy visuals and only affect creatures that are vulnerable to imprisonment. As opposed to the imprisonment spell however, the target will drop their inventory. The Balor that is summoned now lasts 5 minutes.
17/02/18: V0.2.3: Minor bugfixes:
-Cloak of Shadows now properly gives +2 AC at level 12, instead of +1
-Tenacious Plague and Devour Magic are no longer swapped in the spell selection dialog
3. At the command prompt type this:
(Source: http://www.shsforums.net/topic/53006-syvishtars-journal/ )
Is it true that these Content Modifications add new custom areas to The Original Baldur's Gate?
-Northern Tales of the Sword Coast
-The Fields of the Dead
-Secret of Bone Hill
-Drizzt Saga
(Source: https://baldurs-gate.eu/wiki/Kategorie:Modgruppen_(BG1_Quest_Mods) )
Any Help or Insights would do Wonders for my 'Content Creation Education'.