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About this mod
This addin revises and imports all PC abilities from Awakening into Origins, aiming to unify and further improve the combat of the entire game, building upon the basis that is Combat Tweaks by kend7510. Requires Combat Tweaks.
- Requirements
- Permissions and credits
- Changelogs
============
INFORMATION
============
So I finally managed to gather enough determination to wrap up and finish this mod, after leaving it to gather dust for a long, long time. A lot of effort went into the making of this mod, and I tried to push the combat of the game mechanic-wise one step further. I really want other players to experience this mod and hopefully it will give them a fresh and fun new playthrough.
In the end, this mod tries to do a few things - maybe too many for its own good:
- revises and imports all PC abilities from Awakening into Origins, "unifying" the combat of the whole Origins and Awakening, eliminating most if not all of the disparity between Awakening and Origins abilities, with Combat Tweaks by kend7510 as foundation
- fixes as many of the remaining bugs as possible
- adds 4 new Mage spells
- tweaks/revises many abilities and mechanics, as well as introduces some new ones. The aim is to make combat more fun, nuanced, consistent, while maintaining overall balance
- minor tweaks here and there
------------------------------
NEW MAGE SPELLS
------------------------------
Dimensional Gateways: group teleport spell. Creates two portals at max 60m apart. Interacting with one portal teleports the character to the other. Portals last 10s. As usual, teleportation abilities have the tendency to break games or sequences, so there's that.
Arcane Shroud: group invisibility spell. Caster and allies within 2.5m become invisible for 20s. Invisibility cannot be broken by perception, but is broken by attacking or using abilities.
Shared Fate: legacy name of Curse of Mortality. Target of this spell takes damage whenever caster takes damage. If caster dies within the last 5s of this spell, target takes damage proportional to caster's health. Spell ends if distance between caster and target becomes greater than 10m.
Arcane Ascension: for as long as this modal is active, every spell successfully cast by caster increases caster's Spellpower by 5 and Fatigue by 4% for 40s.
---------------------------------------------------
SOME OF THE COOLER CHANGES (for promotional purpose)
---------------------------------------------------
- gives Dog access to the 12 Warrior talents (optional) and full approval bonus upon joining. Dog's passive talents - Fortitude, Combat Training, Nemesis - have been changed and should be much more useful now - both for Dog and enemy dogs
- "spell_ward", or "spell immunity" effect, has been reimplemented thoroughly and meticulously so that it works
- fixes +X% to healing effects received effect
- main character gets +3 base crit chance like everyone else in the game
- gives pets the same out-of-combat mana/stamina regen rate as regular party members
- imports rune crafting recipes and materials, along with the Manual of Focus, into the Wonders of Thedas shop in Origins (optional)
- enables "Level 1 NPCs" feature (name of a mod for the Baldur's Gate games) (optional) - prevents the game from autoleveling companions and allows player to freely assign attribute/skill/talent/specialization points to companions from level 1 as they first join the party. Combined with a tweaked XP table, this will allow all party members, including Sten, to acquire 3 specializations in Origins
- rework for Legionnaire Scout, big(ish) changes for Shadow, Templar, Reaver, Berserker
- Assassination (replaces Feast of the Fallen): the Assassin kit was still lacking that burst of damage that is the hallmark of the assassin. As Zevran puts it, "An assassin simply specializes in striking from stealth, and in maximizing that first attack to be as lethal as possible." With the new passive, any single-target melee attack made from stealth gains bonus damage proportional to the assassin's Cunning.
- Templar's Righteous Strike allows all melee attacks a chance to interrupt spellcasting and gain bonus damage against demons and undead
- Arcane Mastery has been heavily buffed, and now increases all spell duration including that of persistent aoe effects by 25%
- Elemental Mastery: increases all spell elemental damage by 15% multiplicatively beyond the +X% elemental damage cap
- Celerity (replaces Attunement): permanently reduces all spell cooldowns by 20%
\\============= Please refer to the documentation file for more details on what this mod does. ============= //
============
INSTALLATION
============
- install Combat Tweaks and the update v323 (you only really need the file itemprps_ct.gda)
- unzip the main archive containing the .dazip and the documentation
- install the .dazip using DAModder or DAO-Modmanager or DAUpdater
- go to Documents\BioWare\Dragon Age\packages\core\override\GXA ORG Combat\ and copy all files from CT OVERRIDE to denl_combattweaks in override folder and overwrite existing files (make sure to back up old files first)
- stuff in the subfolders can all be considered optional features. Simply delete the folder of the feature you don't want
*** NOTE: if you have the mod Shale Talents Reworked installed, don't use the files rules_core and player_core from that mod; use the ones from this mod instead. If you have Awakening Abilities for Origins, uninstall that mod completely first. ***
===============
UNINSTALLATION
===============
- uninstall with DAModder/DAO-Modmanager
- delete mod folder as well as any hot fixes/updates from override
=============
COMPATIBILITY
=============
- this mod digs deep into the combat system and HEAVILY modifies core scripts - no punches were held - in order to fix bugs at their core, make fundamental changes to the system, as well as introduce new mechanics. As such, it will conflict with any mod that modifies the same scripts, or the same aspects of combat or gameplay. In mild cases, same changes from different mods will simply overlap, or one mod's changes will simply override the other's. In worse cases, certain things will break or not work as intended.
- As for Dain's Fixes, more detailed compatibility document here. In general, the following changes from Dain's Fixes are not compatible:
+ direct changes to how spells and talents work (both player abilities and monster abilities); their passives, tooltips
+ Dual Striking animation changes
+ combat mechanics - attack resolution, ranged aim delay, on-hit effects
+ ability impact threat
+ DOT fixes
+ friendly abilities dropping stealth
+ rune, coating, and bomb changes
+ approval bonus for Dog
+ specialization point fixes
+ Stealing changes
+ Tactics slot number
+ module_core override
Fixes for Shale's talents are fine, unless you're using Shale Talents Reworked. Changes to equipment (armor, weapons), newly implemented item properties, are fine.
=============
KNOWN ISSUES
=============
- Due to the way the respec book Manual of Focus works, if the character is equipped with any item that grants extra ability, that ability will be counted and refunded as one extra "illegal" ability point. In vanilla game there is only one item that does this which is the Orlesian Purse-Cutter from Leliana's Song. The Grey Warden Scout Gloves from the mod Grey Wardens of Ferelden does this as well. So make sure to unequip such items before using Manual of Focus
============
OTHER NOTES
============
- in general, abilities are more powerful than in vanilla game, but it's more in the player's favor, so the game may feel easier on the same difficulty setting. High difficulty setting with custom scaling is recommended for fun challenge
- feedback/suggestions are welcome. I will attempt to accommodate individual requests, if they are possible - or at least, explain why they are not possible
- There still are some abilities (mostly Awakening ones, like Air of Insolence, Keeper tree, Repulsion Field tree) that I'd like to change somehow, but just couldn't come up with decent ideas. Again, suggestions would be welcome
- one optional feature that I wanted to implement was "skills for everyone", which would allow Dog and Shale to gain access to Skills, but this, while doable, turned out to be EXTREMELY troublesome to do
- this mod makes my Awakening Abilities for Origins mod rather redundant, unless you prefer to play with vanilla Awakening abilities
- the documentation only lists the most major changes; there are far too many other changes big and small here and there. I did make a note for 99% of the changes I made in the .nss source files, though. Feel free to browse through these files for even more details - undocumented changes, the reasoning, as well as formulas. Files for Origins talents start with talent_, for Origins spells start with spell_, for Origins monster abilities start with monster_, for Awakening abilities start with gxa_ab_. Search for // ab in these files to locate the comments I made.
- The following five modals in vanilla game deactivate automatically when combat ends or a GUI menu is opened: Blood Magic, Aura of Pain, Captivating Song, Berserk, and Feign Death. Now this can be enabled/disabled by adding and modifying the following lines to DragonAge.ini in Documents\BioWare\Dragon Age\Settings:
[NoAutoDeactivation]
BloodMagic=
AuraOfPain=
CaptivatingSong=
Berserk=
FeignDeath=
Adding a value of 0 means the corresponding ability will deactivate automatically (vanilla behavior). 1 means they won't. If these lines don't exist, Blood Magic and Berserk will not deactivate, but the other three will.
=======
CREDITS
=======
- BioWare/EA: the game, its resources, and the Toolset are their properties
- Huge thanks to kend7510 for his awesome mod Combat Tweaks, which inspired me to learn to mod this game
===========
CHANGE LOG
===========
=====
1.01a
=====
- Fixes Pandemonium not working correctly when used by enemy Shadows
- Fixes Reaving Storm not hitting targets at all
====
1.01
====
- Shadow Form cooldown reverted to 10s
- Shadow Striking reverted to passive
- new Mage spells have higher level requirements (1, 4, 7, 10 instead of all 1)
- removes some test code in sys_chargen_h (requires recompiling player_core)
- adds miscellaneous item tweaks to a number of underwhelming/uninteresting items in Origins (Gift of the Grey, Trian's Maul, Knight Commander's Shield, Spear-Thrower, Bow of the Golden Sun, Keening Blade, Lifedrinker, Asala)
====
1.00
====
- initial release
INFORMATION
============
So I finally managed to gather enough determination to wrap up and finish this mod, after leaving it to gather dust for a long, long time. A lot of effort went into the making of this mod, and I tried to push the combat of the game mechanic-wise one step further. I really want other players to experience this mod and hopefully it will give them a fresh and fun new playthrough.
In the end, this mod tries to do a few things - maybe too many for its own good:
- revises and imports all PC abilities from Awakening into Origins, "unifying" the combat of the whole Origins and Awakening, eliminating most if not all of the disparity between Awakening and Origins abilities, with Combat Tweaks by kend7510 as foundation
- fixes as many of the remaining bugs as possible
- adds 4 new Mage spells
- tweaks/revises many abilities and mechanics, as well as introduces some new ones. The aim is to make combat more fun, nuanced, consistent, while maintaining overall balance
- minor tweaks here and there
------------------------------
NEW MAGE SPELLS
------------------------------
Dimensional Gateways: group teleport spell. Creates two portals at max 60m apart. Interacting with one portal teleports the character to the other. Portals last 10s. As usual, teleportation abilities have the tendency to break games or sequences, so there's that.
Arcane Shroud: group invisibility spell. Caster and allies within 2.5m become invisible for 20s. Invisibility cannot be broken by perception, but is broken by attacking or using abilities.
Shared Fate: legacy name of Curse of Mortality. Target of this spell takes damage whenever caster takes damage. If caster dies within the last 5s of this spell, target takes damage proportional to caster's health. Spell ends if distance between caster and target becomes greater than 10m.
Arcane Ascension: for as long as this modal is active, every spell successfully cast by caster increases caster's Spellpower by 5 and Fatigue by 4% for 40s.
---------------------------------------------------
SOME OF THE COOLER CHANGES (for promotional purpose)
---------------------------------------------------
- gives Dog access to the 12 Warrior talents (optional) and full approval bonus upon joining. Dog's passive talents - Fortitude, Combat Training, Nemesis - have been changed and should be much more useful now - both for Dog and enemy dogs
- "spell_ward", or "spell immunity" effect, has been reimplemented thoroughly and meticulously so that it works
- fixes +X% to healing effects received effect
- main character gets +3 base crit chance like everyone else in the game
- gives pets the same out-of-combat mana/stamina regen rate as regular party members
- imports rune crafting recipes and materials, along with the Manual of Focus, into the Wonders of Thedas shop in Origins (optional)
- enables "Level 1 NPCs" feature (name of a mod for the Baldur's Gate games) (optional) - prevents the game from autoleveling companions and allows player to freely assign attribute/skill/talent/specialization points to companions from level 1 as they first join the party. Combined with a tweaked XP table, this will allow all party members, including Sten, to acquire 3 specializations in Origins
- rework for Legionnaire Scout, big(ish) changes for Shadow, Templar, Reaver, Berserker
- Assassination (replaces Feast of the Fallen): the Assassin kit was still lacking that burst of damage that is the hallmark of the assassin. As Zevran puts it, "An assassin simply specializes in striking from stealth, and in maximizing that first attack to be as lethal as possible." With the new passive, any single-target melee attack made from stealth gains bonus damage proportional to the assassin's Cunning.
- Templar's Righteous Strike allows all melee attacks a chance to interrupt spellcasting and gain bonus damage against demons and undead
- Arcane Mastery has been heavily buffed, and now increases all spell duration including that of persistent aoe effects by 25%
- Elemental Mastery: increases all spell elemental damage by 15% multiplicatively beyond the +X% elemental damage cap
- Celerity (replaces Attunement): permanently reduces all spell cooldowns by 20%
\\============= Please refer to the documentation file for more details on what this mod does. ============= //
============
INSTALLATION
============
- install Combat Tweaks and the update v323 (you only really need the file itemprps_ct.gda)
- unzip the main archive containing the .dazip and the documentation
- install the .dazip using DAModder or DAO-Modmanager or DAUpdater
- go to Documents\BioWare\Dragon Age\packages\core\override\GXA ORG Combat\ and copy all files from CT OVERRIDE to denl_combattweaks in override folder and overwrite existing files (make sure to back up old files first)
- stuff in the subfolders can all be considered optional features. Simply delete the folder of the feature you don't want
*** NOTE: if you have the mod Shale Talents Reworked installed, don't use the files rules_core and player_core from that mod; use the ones from this mod instead. If you have Awakening Abilities for Origins, uninstall that mod completely first. ***
===============
UNINSTALLATION
===============
- uninstall with DAModder/DAO-Modmanager
- delete mod folder as well as any hot fixes/updates from override
=============
COMPATIBILITY
=============
- this mod digs deep into the combat system and HEAVILY modifies core scripts - no punches were held - in order to fix bugs at their core, make fundamental changes to the system, as well as introduce new mechanics. As such, it will conflict with any mod that modifies the same scripts, or the same aspects of combat or gameplay. In mild cases, same changes from different mods will simply overlap, or one mod's changes will simply override the other's. In worse cases, certain things will break or not work as intended.
- As for Dain's Fixes, more detailed compatibility document here. In general, the following changes from Dain's Fixes are not compatible:
+ direct changes to how spells and talents work (both player abilities and monster abilities); their passives, tooltips
+ Dual Striking animation changes
+ combat mechanics - attack resolution, ranged aim delay, on-hit effects
+ ability impact threat
+ DOT fixes
+ friendly abilities dropping stealth
+ rune, coating, and bomb changes
+ approval bonus for Dog
+ specialization point fixes
+ Stealing changes
+ Tactics slot number
+ module_core override
Fixes for Shale's talents are fine, unless you're using Shale Talents Reworked. Changes to equipment (armor, weapons), newly implemented item properties, are fine.
=============
KNOWN ISSUES
=============
- Due to the way the respec book Manual of Focus works, if the character is equipped with any item that grants extra ability, that ability will be counted and refunded as one extra "illegal" ability point. In vanilla game there is only one item that does this which is the Orlesian Purse-Cutter from Leliana's Song. The Grey Warden Scout Gloves from the mod Grey Wardens of Ferelden does this as well. So make sure to unequip such items before using Manual of Focus
============
OTHER NOTES
============
- in general, abilities are more powerful than in vanilla game, but it's more in the player's favor, so the game may feel easier on the same difficulty setting. High difficulty setting with custom scaling is recommended for fun challenge
- feedback/suggestions are welcome. I will attempt to accommodate individual requests, if they are possible - or at least, explain why they are not possible
- There still are some abilities (mostly Awakening ones, like Air of Insolence, Keeper tree, Repulsion Field tree) that I'd like to change somehow, but just couldn't come up with decent ideas. Again, suggestions would be welcome
- one optional feature that I wanted to implement was "skills for everyone", which would allow Dog and Shale to gain access to Skills, but this, while doable, turned out to be EXTREMELY troublesome to do
- this mod makes my Awakening Abilities for Origins mod rather redundant, unless you prefer to play with vanilla Awakening abilities
- the documentation only lists the most major changes; there are far too many other changes big and small here and there. I did make a note for 99% of the changes I made in the .nss source files, though. Feel free to browse through these files for even more details - undocumented changes, the reasoning, as well as formulas. Files for Origins talents start with talent_, for Origins spells start with spell_, for Origins monster abilities start with monster_, for Awakening abilities start with gxa_ab_. Search for // ab in these files to locate the comments I made.
- The following five modals in vanilla game deactivate automatically when combat ends or a GUI menu is opened: Blood Magic, Aura of Pain, Captivating Song, Berserk, and Feign Death. Now this can be enabled/disabled by adding and modifying the following lines to DragonAge.ini in Documents\BioWare\Dragon Age\Settings:
[NoAutoDeactivation]
BloodMagic=
AuraOfPain=
CaptivatingSong=
Berserk=
FeignDeath=
Adding a value of 0 means the corresponding ability will deactivate automatically (vanilla behavior). 1 means they won't. If these lines don't exist, Blood Magic and Berserk will not deactivate, but the other three will.
=======
CREDITS
=======
- BioWare/EA: the game, its resources, and the Toolset are their properties
- Huge thanks to kend7510 for his awesome mod Combat Tweaks, which inspired me to learn to mod this game
===========
CHANGE LOG
===========
=====
1.01a
=====
- Fixes Pandemonium not working correctly when used by enemy Shadows
- Fixes Reaving Storm not hitting targets at all
====
1.01
====
- Shadow Form cooldown reverted to 10s
- Shadow Striking reverted to passive
- new Mage spells have higher level requirements (1, 4, 7, 10 instead of all 1)
- removes some test code in sys_chargen_h (requires recompiling player_core)
- adds miscellaneous item tweaks to a number of underwhelming/uninteresting items in Origins (Gift of the Grey, Trian's Maul, Knight Commander's Shield, Spear-Thrower, Bow of the Golden Sun, Keening Blade, Lifedrinker, Asala)
====
1.00
====
- initial release