Tactics mod beta test

Hello,
As agreed by some of us on another thread, here is a first post / placeholder for a discussion on Westley Weimer's Tactics2 components and their compatibility with BG2EE.


@Gotural , @Blackraven ,
As announced, please find attached a first package for your beta test expertise.

As this mod is not mine, I decided to encapsulate the old mod without premodifying anything. All modifications are done at install time. Moreover the paradigm is to patch rather than overwrite. The weidu code is entirely rewritten.
The focus is on the compatibility and bugs. I have no intent/talent to work on the AI itself.
Therefore all dialogs and translations come from the original files. (I just experienced a little psycho-rigid moment with the translation of Pushkin's work but this is ultra minor - more in the Iliych tpa file itself)
The various objects are, by order of priority,
- a patched version of an EE file
- a copy of the original mod if totally new and acceptable
- a copy and patched version of the original mod (because this is often required)
Sometimes I used a modified inlined script rather than the original mod bcs/baf though.

With some components I was also eager to not interfer with the new EE content (basically all the oh* files from the BP2 and new areas/npcs/adventures).
That gives me extra work but I have two reasons to do so: lack of solid knowledge of the new content and, more importantly, there is an enhanced AI work associated to those files - it would be silly to alter those things.

Thanks to the handle_charset function now available in weidu (with a better logic), the original tra files are translated into UTF-8 required by the EE version. However my implementation really stinks at the moment, it just works but I will change it. The ideal solution would be to pretranslate and distribute the final files but I don't want to distribute a modified file without the proper consent of the author(s).
Btw, the original mod is to be unzipped under a directory of my own tree. For this early test (and I saw nothing preventing a redistribution, let me know) I already included the unzipped original mod.

I don't know how much free time I will have this weekend and I am sure to be unavailable next week. Hence this early drop.

For this alpha20 for BG2EE only, you get
- the UTF-8 translation stuff that (poorly) triggers when you install your first component (no matter which one).
- As announced Improved Ilyich (a lot of work - more on this below)
- Kuroisan per Gotural's suggestion (so far basically no work beyond the charset transfo)
- a list of low hanging fruits and other smarter creatures components. Clearly not what you requested guys but I already wrote them back in March to learn and practise the weidu language and also to learn more about the BG2 setup, typically which creature uses which script. A couple of implementations are now much more selective (undead, golems, etc...)
- the archer kit. I thought it would take a few minutes to write the code for the two kits. Well, for the archer that was the case but the anti-paladin gave me a little headache, we will have to discuss this kit if someone is still interested.

I had the time to test almost... nothing.
I verified the kit and I tested the Improved Ilyich which is the largest piece.
I do not suggest testing/using the improved creatures yet but I inserted a little group of questions at Ilyich install time: please see it, I think it's self-explanatory (despite my English) and it offers the options to test Ilyich as if other components were also deployed (choice #1). It would also be nice to get a feedback on the mod behaviour once combined with SCS and/or aTweaks (choice #2 for all questions but the last one).
I would appreciate if you could test
1) dropping Imoen/Jaheira/Minsc/Yoshimo out of the party I know it used to crash some games in the original versions.
2) dialog with Ilyich (I did test it but a confirmation would be nice)
3) Spawn points on the first level. I kept using the spawn point mechanics on the first floor. Apparently the author and I share some problems to fully understand the black magic behind those (i.e. control the number of creatures). W.Weimer used a trick on the first map and apparently failed to implement what he wanted on the second map (I failed too and decided to deactivate the 2nd level spawn points and used a couple of triggers/traps instead)
4) Beyond the first 12 hours, a group of duergars will appear "offscreen" every 6 hours. IIRC those guys used to appear just out of sight, now in EE they can appear far away. Let me know (I am clueless).

Ah yes, adding a few ammunitions to the jailkeep table was performed though a script after the game start. I prefered to modify the area container instead. Apparently it takes time to complete when you install the mod but that's ok.

Comments, Insults, Suggestions: your turn.