A thought on the Gyth' fort sneak option. It isn't very satisfying now because the party's stealth skills don't actually matter and the idea of two characters in full plate 'sneaking' across all that ground isn't that credible. Here are a couple of ideas in order of increasing work
Give the NPC companion an Etherealness scroll or potion (single use)
Have the NPC create a diversion (cast elemental swarm for example)
Allow high stealth PCs to proceed solo and meet back at a prearranged location.
Introduce an NPC in the area who's considering an attack or intrusion for reasons of their own.
Agreed, the stealth assault on Fort Tendar is awkward and lacks believability. However, it was designed this way for a number of reasons.
The overriding concern was that it is a critical path quest and so it has to be doable by all character types, regardless of stealth abilities or equipment. Realistically, only Rogues should be able to successfully complete the quest, but as that is not acceptable, it means that the actual stealth skill could not be a requirement. As such we set it up for line-of-sight detection.
The second concern, though, was that the quest had to be at least moderately challenging and have some elements of believability. Thus, getting over the wall, and getting into position became the critical features of the quest, and these require timing and paying attention to the line-of-sight of the guards. This also implies that a high stealth skill should not render the quest trivial, nor should it be able to be circumvented by invisibility. As such, while somewhat effective, these only reduce the vision of the guards.
And as you note, there is also the companion, and the guards check for them as well. Given the overall design parameters, though, all the companion means is that you have to make sure that the companion sticks closely to the path of the main character.
So, to your points, etherialness, invisibility, etc. would not, by design, allow you to circumvent the stealth part of the quest.
Leaving the companion behind wasn't even considered because it didn't make sense from a gameplay point of view. The main character and the companion are a team, after all, and you don't leave half of it behind, especially as the combat in the dungeon is significant, and would be quite difficult solo. Having the companion miraculously appear after stealthing seems a bit ad hoc too. Lastly, getting the companion through the 'stealth' part just requires keeping you path straight, anyway, so its not a major problem.
Your diversion idea, though, is an interesting one, and perhaps the most plausible approach, but it has the problem of rendering the quest trivial. Clearly, it could just reduce the number of guards, but in actuality, there are only five guards that the player has to worry about anyway, because the rest are looking outward. As such, it either wouldn't help much or would not fit the design requirements of the quest.
Lastly, I will point out that this stealth assault on Fort Trendar can be bypassed if you do the Hag's quest, exactly so that our fake stealth fiddle wasn't forced on people. We figured that the over-the-wall assault on Fort Trendar had to be there to make the story plausible, but as the mechanics were clumsy we gave a much more straightforward alternative.
Our Module was designed to be challenging but there are a number of things that you can do to make it easier.
The first thing is that the higher the armor class your team has the better. Among other things, that means that all team members should use a shield or have good double-weapon defense. Proper gear can also prevent mind spells, instant death attacks and knock-down.
During combat you should make sure that your team members keep their health up through the use of potions and use lesser restoration to clear debilities. You can also use speed potions to give your team an edge. Even more effective is for Clerics or Mages to use stun or confuse over groups of enemies.
Lastly, in general, your character should be competent in the use of melee or ranged because groups of enemies in close proximity can disrupt spell casting and a number have spell resist. Using an Eldrich Knight rather than a straight Mage, for example, would be a good idea. Also, Fighters will be more effective than Rogues because you character is most often tanking and so a sneak attack will not be able to be used effectively.
? I've never said it's difficult? I've said it's a gauntlet, which -at least i think- should mean that is a huge dungeon filled with various monsters -and mostly- respawning. Never said anything about difficulty. I cheat, so difficulty it's never an issue for me.
I see. I took your meaning to be a set of challenges rather than a respawning dungeon.
To your point, though, there is some respawning of monsters in the prison Hub simply to keep the place from becoming empty as you pass through to the different Faction sections, but that is about it. Every other area within the game bar one stays clear once you'd killed all the defenders simply because there is little point returning to those areas anyway.
The single exception is Colothys Fortress that becomes a Hub once you've captured it. It has a portal through which you to pass into the other main areas of the game as well as a merchant area that allows you sell your loot, buy supplies, and upgrade your weapons and armor. You can also get trained in new skills there. Once you have cleared out the initial defenders of Colothys Fortress, though, there is a counter attack, so there is some respawning in that regard. However, once you successfully defended against that counter attack Colothys Fortress is never assaulted again.
Currently playing through this and really promising so far!
However, I think you could improve the start by having the auto level-ups give an appropriate amount of gold for buying stuff (instead of getting 10k from the NPC or getting gold through the console) since everything in the market is so expensive.
Also, is crafting not supporting in this? I see a lot of crafting materials sold in the market stores but there's no crafting tables anywhere from what I've seen, which is a bit annoying since your starting henchman has ranks in craft weapons.
Ah nevermind, I realise why now. But what is the Good Underwear for? It keeps duplicating itself every single time I equip new armor, causing my inventory to bloat and in NWN2 even clothing weighs 10 units.
The Good Underwear is an attempt to be a little bit better than the default full-body Victorian-era underwear that NWN2 provides. We find the NWN2 default absurd and provide this instead. However, it should never end up in your inventory, and if it does, that is a bug.
What should happen is that when the PC removes or loses their body armor they get this underwear. But when body armor is put on over top, this underwear should be automatically destroyed. It can also be manually removed to return the character to the NWN2 default. But again, when you remove it, it should be destroyed. Under these conditions its weight is not relevant. If it does end up in your inventory, though, something weird has happened, and I am wondering if there is something special about your NWN2 system.
I will also point out that this underwear works (or should work) with Nude Mods that change the NWN2 default underwear to nudity. Here, when the PC strips off they get some underwear by default but it can still be manually removed to reveal the nude model underneath.
As to crafting, there are Alchemy and Magic workbenches by the merchant in the Hub, and the Duergar sector has a Blacksmith crafting bench. However, not all ingredients are available in the Hub, and so these are only useful for basic things. Later in the Mod a fuller selection of ingredients become available, but by then skilled weapon and armor enhancers are present and they will probably do a better job. It will cost you, though.
That's exactly what's happening. It keeps duplicating itself, not sure why.
I've played till the Githyanki base where you rescue the researcher and here's some issues I found so far:
[SPOILERS]
In the Hub near the Tiefling Sector, there's a Tiefling mage on a Lily Pad. There's no indication that you can climb onto it when you can actually do so at one specific ledge. It should be made more obvious.
Journal Entry for companion death is wrong. When I chose not to kill Striele, the journal entry still says I "killed her in cold blood". The actual state of the quest is fine though.
Not much weapon type variety in terms of unique weapons. So far I've been using the Silver Slayer and for Striele the dagger then afterwards the katana, but every other weapon type only has +3 variants dropped or purchasable, nothing close to those.
Hill Giants boss can disappear when reloading save game near the group, which completely breaks progression because he drops the key needed to access his crystal. (Potentially Game-Breaking)
Tiefling Captain is unresponsive in combat. He seems unable to attack, but can still make Attack of Opportunities and heal himself.
Added Poison to the weapon after completing the Blocks puzzle is too weak. Poison DC14 1d2 CON damage is quite bad honestly for level 12-14.
Reskins for the various demon enemies are unsightly due to the model UV textures and new textures not matching. I assume this is intentional due to the descriptions of the demons, but still...
When addressing the Tiefling volunteers, the PC speaks one of their nodes.
Golems will disappear PERMANENTLY if you ask one to follow when one another is already following you since they are treated as summons. (Potentially Game-Breaking)
Golems don't help in the fight if not specifically set to defend at a location. I told them to follow and stop at the location I want, started the fight, only to have them do nothing.
Clicking Portal Control for the first time and saying "No" causes the state to get bugged. The counterattack can never be triggered afterwards as the dialogue moves on to post-counterattack portal function. (Potentially Game-Breaking)
Triggers for the Researcher Cell Wardstones are too small. I tried clicking onto the orbs thinking I had to activate them but no I merely had to walk really close to the cell door.
Lever to free the Researcher is bugged. It is set to locked but unlocking it removes the key required to actually USE it. I found the solution is to force the PC to right-click then "Use" on the lever while having my companion hold the key. It worked then. (Potentially Game-Breaking)
Githyanki Base performance slows to 1-2 FPS when stepping outside during the rescue. I guess you're not meant to try and fight them? I really want those locked chests in their officer quarters.
First, thank you very much for the detailed feedback, and we appreciate the time you spent putting it together. Our testing was not as thorough as it should have been and I apologize for that.
We will give a detailed response to each one of your points, but it will take some time to investigate. This note is just to acknowledge that we've seen your comments and that we're working on a reply. We are also currently working on a 1.3 release and our resolution to your issues will be in it.
We have now fully reviewed your comments. The bugs we've got solutions for and we've also addressed some of the QoL issues. In addition we've added some discussion about some of the other issues.
1. We need more info on the underwear problem. Does the underwear enter your inventory when you take your armor off? When you put your armor on? Or some other time?
2. We've added a pulsing beacon to mark environment jump triggers when they become active.
3. Striel being declared as killed even through you saved him/her is a Journal bug. It has been fixed.
4. As to good weapons, they are meant to be scarce in the Hub. It is a prison after all. You start off with a good melee weapon and a bow. If you do the right quests, you can get an improved katana (+5, 1d4 slashing + 2d4 acid) and you can get a +5 Astral longsword (+5, 2d8 sonic).
After you bring Iolethys back from the Githyanki fort, though, Colothys Fortress' merchant area activates and enhancers can improve any weapon up to +6, 4d6 in most elements. This can be improved to +7 with the appropriate skill book. They can also add special features (stun, strength poison, massive criticals, etc) but most of these specials also require that you have given the enhancers the associated skill book. These skill books can be obtained from normal quests, from drops by Boss NPCs, and some are just sitting out in the open on tables.
Under the right conditions, some NPCs improve your weapon as well, and near the end, a Boss drops a devastating, slayer of a weapon. You don't need this weapon to finish, and indeed, most often I give it to my companion or put it in a bag because by then my primary weapon is even more devastating.
I'll also mention that all faction Champions but Servants of Laestrael get enhanced weapons to start, and that there is a merchant that sells high-end weapons, albeit for a stiff price.
5. The Hill Giant Boss disappearing after a reload from save is a bug caused by the OnClientEnter for that area not being once-only, and the OnClientEnter scripthides the boss and his team. So on a reload he would disappear because a reload runs the OnClientEnter. It has been fixed.
6. In regards to Dzarr being passive when the PC enters the Tiefling inner area, we have not been able to reproduce this. In our tests he always immediately attacks the PC as he should. At the moment, then, we'll just flag it as something to watch.
7. Constitution 1d2 damage is the most potent ability poison that we can add to a weapon, so we can't do anything about that. The DC 14, on the other hand, is at the very bottom of the scale, and we agree that that is low. We upped it to DC 20.
8. Its far too late to start fiddling with cosmetics, so we're going to live with the ugly demon reskins as they stand. Sorry.
9. In the conversation with the Tiefling volunteers, we were unable to find the node that the PC speaks that belongs to the Tieflings. What would be really helpful would be what was said.
10. Losing a Golem through multiple follow requests has been fixed. The follow command will now abort if another Golem is already following. I will mention that, outside of combat, lost golems would eventually be recreated back in their storage area, so you wouldn't lose them permanently, but it is definitely a bug that they got lost in this manner.
11. Golems not defending if not explicitly asked to is how it is supposed to work. They tell you that their targetting and defensive systems are on standby when they stop following. When they are set to defend, they tell you that these systems are now active. These are strong weapon platforms, and you don't want them to become active without explicit orders. That's the idea, anyway.
12. Portal Control becoming unable to initiate the counter-attack if not activated right away has been fixed. The first statement was once-only and it has been that way since it was written. So much for our testing coverage.
13. The wardstone activation distance in the Githyanki Dungeon was 3.5 meters (10 feet). This was chosen to ensure that the PC was in proximity and so could see the door open. But to reduce confusion we've upped it to 4.5 meters (13 feet), which is the distance to the center of the hallway outside of the cell. Any further away and the door could be opened without the PC even noticing it as they could be too far down the hall.
14. The lever to free the researcher had its auto-remove key set, and so the key was removed before the on-used script was run, and the on-use script also checks for the key. As a result you needed two keys to open the door. The auto-remove key check has now been disabled.
15. There are two ways that you can enter the Githyanki dungeon. One by being teleported in by the Hag Sethress, and the other by assaulting the fort over the wall and breaking in. When you assault over the wall you have to be very careful not to be seen by the guards because if you are, the entire fort defense will attack at once, which is some 50 guys: 30 crossbow men and 20 melee attackers, some of which are being spawned on the spot. This is why the system lags when you walk out the door.
And yes, being seen is meant to result in a PC death.
Once you enter Fort HQ you should never come back outside because you don't know where the patrollers are, and the chances of them seeing you is high. Also, if you haven't taken down the two guards on HQ, you will necessarily be seen. Looting the other buildings can be done if you assault the fort over the wall and slip in behind the patroller, but you might run into him on the way out, so its still a bit risky.
In sum, I wouldn't bother, but if you're an obsessive collector and don't mind the risk (that is, a reload), it can be done.
You should also know that this scenario does not operate under normal stealth mechanics, so you can't guarantee not being seen by being invisible or having a high stealth ability. These merely reduce the visibility of the guards. What matters is the direction in which the guards are looking.
It is set up this way because it is a critical path and so it must be able to be done by all classes, including those with zero stealth ability. We also didn't want it to be a cake-walk for Rogues and a death-trap for everyone else, so while the Rogues can get a bit of an advantage through reduced visibility of the guards, they still have to be careful.
Note too that the guards check for the companion as well and if you don't control their path properly they will get you killed.
About the weapons, yup I've played further till pretty much the end game area now and I found many options to upgrade weapons. I really like how much the hub has to offer! Also, I sided with the Dragon faction and got the Bastard Sword in addition to an Adamantine Greatsword and Mithril Plate that I've upgraded using the Blacksmith and Enchanter.
As for the underwear issue, it happens when I directly swap armors as well unequipping armors. I noticed that the script to remove the Good Underwear runs fine sometimes and it gets automatically removed but not all the time.
I've found some more issues since then:
Attempting to talk to Striel in areas after The Red Prison results in ERROR Conditional Scripts.
Conversation that is supposed to spawn Apterodaxis fails to fire on entering the trigger with Striel as a companion.I had to use runscript 430_apterodaxis_enters to spawn him, then everything else worked fine.
Tysamere's conversation as a companion doesn't work, it ends immediately after him saying "How can I help you?".
Ruby Heart has no conversation as a companion at all.
If you work for Apterodaxis as a mercenary, the conversation/cutscene where you get betrayed still starts but since a certain person isn't alive anymore it can't proceed. Tysamere also leaves the party leaving the PC solo.
Gallery Battles hugely favor the Angel side. Most of the time the Demons get nuked in the first few rounds.
Button to start the light beam bridge puzzle is so difficult to notice even when highlighted I thought I couldn't proceed anymore. I searched almost 30 minutes! See this picture for reference:
No visible transition into the mines. Stepping into the trigger at entrance is fine but there's no area transition icon.
I couldn't find the Bugbears that I was supposed to rescue but at least I found the levers to reveal the secret entrance anyway.
Some of the levers are almost completely blocked by statues unless you push them out of the way.
Conversation with Iolethys for crossing the lava in the fortress didn't fire properly. Thankfully I could proceed by speaking to him manually.
In the area leading up the Hell Forge, there's a giant door that leads nowhere:
Hell Forge holdout fight can be completely skipped by immediately talking to Iolethys again.
Currently, I'm in the end game area but I have no idea how to proceed. Two statues that are activated by something... but there's nothing else? I see a mini statue and two paintings but nothing happened when I activated any of them.
Ouch Another stack of bugs that we somehow manged to miss!
Thank you very much for you efforts. You have done a very good job of bug-testing for us and we totally appreciate it. Again, it will take some time to investigate these problem and we'll give a full report when we've finished.
I wanted to give a quick reply, though, to get you unstuck. The two large statues respond to your presence, and its not because you are especially charismatic but because you are carrying something that they're attuned to: Mantaguaal's Nullifier Rod. It is the master key that unlocks everything in the Artifact (even the little statue upstairs). So use it.
You did say that you already tried to activate those statues but you didn't say what you used. If you already tried the Nullifer Rod on them and they failed to respond, then that is a critical game-breaking bug. There not a whole lot of debug statements in the code but the Rod will report an invalid target if it is not used on an item attuned to it, so check that first. If it acknowledges the target but nothing happens, then that is a priority one issue that we will look at immediately.
We have finished our review of your new list of bugs and issues. The bugs have been fixed and some QoL issues have been addressed as well. All are in our 1.3 release that is currently in QA. Thank you very much for your helpful input.
1. There was a time-sensitive check in the Underwear code that seems to have been part of a development debugging sequence that was only partially removed. Such things are good candidates for intermittent problems, and hopefully its removal will clear up your issues.
2. Striel not responding to conversations after leaving the Hub was a result of a change in how we checked for the active companion. That change did not get propagated to Striel's conversation. It now has been.
3. We haven't been able to reproduce your problem with Apterodaxis' conversation not triggering, and we've tried with Striel, Champions and other mercenaries. Unfortunately, triggers are not entirely reliable in NWN2 and sometimes they fail for no obvious reason. That seems to be what has happened here, so at the moment we'll just mark it as something to watch.
4. Tysamere's vestigial conversation is not a bug per se, but rather all that there is. He has a conversation that is initiated on exit from the Dragon Lair, but he doesn't have anything to say when engaged directly. This reflects an explicit project decision that we made in August to chop incomplete secondary features and focus on finishing. We initially had more extensive plans for companions and companion interaction but we simply ran out of time.
5. The same thing for Ruby Heart.
6. The check for Tysamere in the betrayal cutscene was mistakenly set as a check for Natheron. As none of the companions checked could be found the betrayal aborted. A classic copy-paste bug that has now been fixed.
7. The Battle at Narentia simulation is not a balanced exchange. It is simply meant as a fun diversion. The Celestials have strong Area-of-Effect attacks and stuns so they definitely have the advantage but the Demons tend to win the Jaslyn Amar and Loren Valley assaults nonetheless.
8. We have added a pulsing beacon over the gun panel switch when it is ethereal (active) to help people spot it.
9. We've added a door to the entrance to the Northern Mine. There was one there originally that matched the entrance but we dropped it because it wasn't working properly. This new one is a standard, unmodified door and so shouldn't have any problems.
10. The trapped Bugbears are in the Southern Mine which is directly behind the PC as they talk to Morog. It is marked with a green mapnote once Morog mentions it, and if you didn't get the green mapnote let us know.
11. The levers in the Northern Mine are not meant to be seen or accessed from the front. They're supposed to be secret after all. They are easily seen and accessed from the right side, though, as they have red/green markers behind them from that angle.
12. Again, Iolethys' conversation trigger at the lava incursion works fine for us, and it uses a standard script, so if you've gotten the one on entering the Fortress from the Mine and one highlighting the Hell Forge, there is no clear reason you shouldn't get this one as well, especially as the trigger is huge and cannot be missed. Again, we'll flag it as something to watch but right now there's nothing we can really do about it.
13. The front door into the Fortress was supposed to be linked to an interior Fortress door but it was not. That has been fixed.
14. Talking to Iolethys immediately after capturing the Hell Forge will no longer initiate the Forge exit sequence. The Forge defense scenario must now be completed before that conversation can be run.
Oh so that's what the green marker was for, I thought it was referring to the same mine.
One more thing, I noticed that PCs that become a champion of any faction get all effects removed on client enter. I understand this was to reset the visual effects of each faction transformation but this can be quite a hassle to builds who rely on buffs to excel.
Other than that, all these sound good! Thanks!
Edit: Completed the mod with a Bard/Fighter/RDD build, ending at Level 20! I can safely say I give a 8.25/10 for this and it'll be higher once the new version is out. Thanks to the whole team for all the effort put into this!
I think I've found a bug in Avernus mines. I could pull fifth lever before I could pull 4 standard ones and if done so, fourth light pillar will not go green.
EDIT: Hmm... It seems that it is sixth lever that can be pulled.
There are four levers behind statues that prime the appearance of a fifth that when pulled opens a passage into the Fortress. However, sometimes the orange pillars do not turn green when their associated lever is pulled so it appears that there are other levers to pull. As far as we can tell this is a system bug that simply fails to turn the pillars green when asked, even though the underlying state remains correct. In other words, the internal state of which levers have been pulled is correct but the appearance can be misleading.
What matters is the appearance of the fifth lever. Regardless of the colors of the pillars, if you get a lever in front of the pillars that has a pulsing green light over it, just pull that lever and a passage will open for you into the Fortress. The quest will then advance. If you don't get a fifth lever after pulling all four behind the statues though, let us know as that would be a game-breaking bug.
We have put a failsafe on the pillar color change code that, every time a lever is pulled, will try to change all pillar colors to match their state if they don't already, so if a pillar turned green unexpectedly it was probably that failsafe code that re-made the request to change the color from orange to green on one that failed to do it on the first request.
EDIT: We have updated the failsafe on this to recheck after 3 seconds instead of waiting for the next lever pull. Hopefully, this will better avoid the confusion of a mis-stated state. It will be in the 1.3 release which we are currently running QA on. That release also has the fix for the Cathrys Fort auto-remove key problem.
I'm stuck now in Githyanki prison trying to free researcher. I've eliminated githyankis and when I try to pull ground lever I'm getting message "only subcommander Kamduta is authorized to open this containment". Key was removed from inventory when I first interacted with lever.
EDIT: I've located where is issue. Autoremove key option is toggled and it will remove key before OnUsed script is executed. spawning keys using GiveItem resolved issue.
I apologize for the trouble. I recall that we had this problem in testing but it was nominally fixed. However, I checked the lever in the 1.2 release and it is indeed still toggled for auto-remove on the key and it sure looks like it shouldn't be. I ran a test and the on-use runs as it should but perhaps I just lucked out on the timing, that is, the on-use was executed while the deletion was still pending on the key.
Regardless, I'll red-flag the issue. And thanks for the heads-up on the auto-remove.
Minor bug: The hidden portal near the Gith entrance will not appear if the PC touches the shield before finding and using the scroll.
Beginning of part II: Whatever you did to adjust the PC's stats, the level up routine does not recognize the change. In particular, the INT score is not reflected correctly. My PC was actually getting fewer skill points than before the adjustments even though the character sheet displays a two point increase in INT. Did not get the correct new spells per level either.
Not sure what I'm going to do with my Wood Elf-Asimar Hybrid at this point. He was an Arcane Archer. If you are playing a chaotic PC with an 8 charisma, the feats you get for taking the "good" path are not as useful as you probably expected.
Unfortunately, I have not been able to reproduce your problem with the Stockman shield, rather when I touch the shield before the portal is present I get the intended message, 'Nothing seems to happen ... '. I have tried this both before and after I picked up the scroll. I have also checked the code and there are no other special conditions, so at the moment all I can do is flag it as an issue to be watched.
As to how we adjusted the PC stats ... you are correct. NWN2 does not actually allow modifying the underlying PC abilities through the API, and so we fake it with a skin. This is exactly the same as putting on a ring or other item with enhanced abilities so it does not affect skill points or spell per level. We tried a number of things to get around this but we came up empty and resorted to the skin. We apologize but that is how things are.
In terms of the feats provided for the Champion of Torm, they are indeed biased for melee. This is primarily because we see them as Knights of Virtue in gleaming Heavy Armor, and Heavy Armor significantly restricts the Dexterity bonus. That said, it would have been sensible anyway to provide a Longbow in the default equipment and give a Longbow focus feat, but that won't help much for a ranged-oriented player, and we'll have to give some thought as to how we might be able to accommodate ranged while still keeping the Knight focus. Suggestions are welcome.
Thanks for the reply. So far I'm making it work. Good thing I didn't play a Halfling!
One solution might be to replace the weapon chest with a menu to allow Players to pick something that matches their style, then apply the same stats to the created weapon that you have on the Champion Sword. It was a bit amusing to meet the merchant Djinn and see all the ammo he sells but no ranged weapons.
Ramaja's store is special. Outside of Katama's apartment, Ramaja is summoned by the player, and his primary role is to buy items and to sell the basics like ammo and potions.
Each time you summon Ramaja, though, his inventory is enhanced by random specialty scrolls and potions, as well as random unique weapons. These weapons have very nice stats but are very expensive. That being said, not one of those specialty weapons is ranged, and we'll add one or two, but as noted, the selection is random so you won't see them all the time.
Note that Barson Stonehand is the main equipment dealer in Colothys Fortress, and he sells both ranged and melee weapons up to +3. You can also get your weapons enhanced through Master Niu with elemental damage, massive criticals and the like, as well as with enhancements of up to +6, or to +7 if you've provided him with the skillbook.
Stonehand not only sells armor but enhances it as well. Up to +6 or +7 along with specialty immunities, arcane spell failure reduction and weight reduction as well as other things once he has acquired their skillbook.
Note though, that armor and weapon enhancements won't be available until you get back from Minethys.
In terms of accommodating ranged players, I'll have to get back to you on that as we need to have a meeting to review what we can do for all of the Faction Champions. That meeting will take place early next week.
Ramaja's store does have some sweet gear. I'm hoping a couple of those really nice daggers come back around when I have more gold. I've been getting by with the +5 Throwing Axes he sells for limited ranged combat but then ... I got lucky in Minethys and found the +4 Longbow Taralash in a chest so I'm back in the Arcane Archer business.
New problem, I'm trying to rescue the researcher and the entire Cathrys Gith fort is non-hostile. It's as if I'm still under the Astral Projection effect from the Hag's quest. I can't attack anything including the Golems so I can't get the ward stones.
I can try fiddling with the scripts but I'm more likely to break the game than fix it. Any ideas?
This doesn't sound good, and I'm going to need some details.
** SPOILERS **
This is how the quest should work under Astral Projection:
1. You get into Sethress' Astral Station and Astral Project into Cathrys. In Astral Form you are semi-invisible and the Githyanki are friendly. 2. Teleport through the Cathrys Fort gate and enter Base HQ by teleporting through the front door 3. Move through the fort interior and teleport into the confinement area in the basement 4. Teleport through the various internal doors and find Iolethys in a cell. The quest will update. 5. Find a safe spot and use the Portal Marker that Sethress gave you. It will return you to Sethress and you will be back in physical form. 6. Sethress opens a portal from the Hag's area to the spot you marked in the Githyanki fort. 7. You pass through Sethress' portal and enter the Githyanki dungeon in physical form. The Githyanki are now hostile. 8. You clear the area, get the wards and the keys and free Iolethys.
To your particular problem, Astral Mode is turned off in the conversation with Sethress upon return. You will know if the code has been run because you are no longer semi-invisible and your companion rejoins the team. Also, when you return to the Githyanki fort, the doors into the prisoner area from upstairs are now unlocked whereas they were locked under Astral Mode. These are unlocked in the dungeon onClientEnter() and the same code sets the Githyanki hostile. The Githyanki Golems, however, only become hostile when you enter their cellblock.
In your particular run-through, in terms of the key points, what are the variances from what is listed here and what you experienced?
Hmm, I was okay up to item 6. After locating the Researcher, I returned to the Hags. Sethress made a comment about how great astral travel was and that was it. No other conversation. It looked like I was done with her, I had the info I needed and went to Ossian/Minethys Crypt.
Edit: I don't remember the quest updating during my initial visit to the confinement area (your item #4). Perhaps I did not get close enough to the cell? Would that have thrown things off track?
I entered Ossian, cleared it, and found a Portal to Cathrys in the room with all the Gautier casualties. I defeated the Gith defending the portal. Rebecca made a redundant speech about the Gith having captured the researcher but we already knew that. We used that portal to travel to Cathrys. Once I got there the situation is as I described. However, I was able to use the console to change the Golems to Hostile and get the ward stones. I've spoken to the Researcher and have the tablet for my next destination. But since I'm off track, there is no place in Cathrys where I can use my personal portal rod. I've gone all the way back to the initial entry point by the ruins and I still get an Interference message.
It's 12:30 am here so I'm going to get some sleep.
To recap then, when you got back from Astral Travelling, Sethress greeted you but didn't open a portal. That is, her conversation aborted part way through (Red Flag 1). Rebecca, however, rejoined the team (Red Flag 2), and you and she took the long way around back to Cathrys through Ossian. When you got there, the system still thought that you were in Astral mode (Red Flag 3), and the Githyanki were friendly. You then entered the Githyanki dungeon and freed Iolethys by turning the Golems hostile through some fiddle to get their ward stones.
You then spoke to Iolethys and got the Portal Tablet to the Celestial Academy but you can't use it because you are still stuck in the Githyanki dungeon/Cathrys. Note that the conversation with Iolethys should have automatically teleported you back to Colothys Fortress, but it too seems to have aborted (Red Flag 4).
And no, that you didn't update the quest by moving closer to Iolethys has nothing to do with your problems as it is just an informational update to tell you how to free Iolelthys.
There are at least four bizarre, inexplicable problems in this scenario, but the important thing for you is to get back to Colothys Fortress so you can move on. You've already indicated that you know how to use the console, so what you need to do is to run the script '310_onentry_setup' (without the quotes) to re-activate the personal portal. You should then be able to teleport back into the Fortress and move on from there.
I should mention, however, that none of these Red Flagged problems should ever happen, and that you got four of them means that the system is probably in some unstable state, likely by reading in a corrupted save file. How it got corrupted is anybody's guess, but while you might be able to continue on without a problem, if it failed this badly chances are it will fail again.
I apologize for this mess, but your best bet is to start again. Note that you seem to be using version 1.0, and if you're up to starting again I recommend that you use 1.1. The corruption has nothing to do with the verions, but 1.1 has some fixes to make the later areas easier to follow and to avoid some issues. The Changelog has the full details.
P.S. If you opened the Module in the Toolset and saved it, that would be one way that your save files could get corrupted, because changing a Module breaks saves.
You have all four Red Flags correct as near as I can tell. I did not look at it in the toolset but I do have autosave turned off so if I need to look at something later for troubleshooting purposes, that should not be a problem.
I only downloaded the file last weekend so it should be the current version.
As to the source of the corruption, I strongly suspect Micro$oft, Windows has been trying to get me to upgrade to Win 11, and it seems to be using a lot of system resources downloading crap and getting ready for the install. Logitech tried to start an install over the last day or two however so that might also be to blame.
I did use your in-game altar to "the Creator God' (nice touch there) to enable Debug mode. I'm seeing a couple second lag in each script reporting completion. It's possible I clicked on something too soon, and interrupted a running script by hitting another trigger. Does that make sense?
I just played Red Prison last month so I'm not keen to go through the whole Hub yet again. I've had pretty good luck running updates from the console in other games, incl the OC so I'll give this a shot before I consider anything drastic. I'll let you know in a hour or so if it worked.
Update: The game engine reported successful execution of the script but it failed to fix the issue. Attempting to use the rod still returned the "interference" message.
However, based on your detailed explanation, I found a save game from shortly before the astral projection trip. I replayed from that point and got within a few feet of the Researcher's cell. This time I got a journal update, "Artifact entry 80, In Pursuit of the Artifact." That did not happen last time. When I returned to the Hags, I waited until her reply cleared from the screen on it's own. I might have rushed it last time. I got the portal, freed the celestial and was teleported back to the fortress. The fortress now seems to be updated with merchants and NPCs that weren't there before so it looks good at this point.
I'll let you know if anything else weird happens, hope you had a great weekend.
Ok! It sounds like you're back on track and things are working correctly. This is very good news.
I don't understand why the script didn't activate the personal portal, but I admit I've never run it through the console before so maybe something weird went on. I'll check it out. I will also red-flag rushing Sethress' conversation and see if we can prevent another catastrophe.
Anyway, I hope things stay sane and that you enjoy our Module.
I made it! Had to buy a lot of scrolls but my Wood Elf/Asimar Arcane Archer/Divine Champion got the job done. Notes:
Once you leave the Hub, potions of Cure Critical Wounds are nearly useless. The armor provided is good enough to get you though five out of six fights without needing a potion break. That sixth one however will require a Heal spell or potion. Otherwise you just stand there drinking potions and not doing any damage.
Having most enemies spawn on top of you gets a little old. Having undead rise out of the ground and spirits materialize out of thin air is one thing. Grey Dwarves? Not so much. Consider moving some of the triggers a bit farther from the spawn points.
Striel was a good source of background info while in the Hub. The other companions could use a little more dialog along the same lines, especially considering the PC is new at this and they are supposed to be assisting.
Have a few more stealth options for problem solving. Rogues, Arcane Casters, and Rangers all have Invisibility, stealth, or Etherealness as options. Even a heavy Fighter/Paladin might be willing to use the back door if it gets them closer to accomplishing their mission.
You have a great many moving parts in some areas such as the Lab. In particular, if you open the console after completing the Path of Virtue segment, you'll see a string of error messages reporting, "Effect List Overflow." That's usually not too serious but it can contribute to buggy behavior. FYI
The PC needs the somewhat overpowered gear because of the difficulty level of boss fights. The game could be played just as well with more modest equipment and a higher level PC and companions. Food for thought.
The Celestial Academy Golem Control. You probably play in first person mode. I play in Exploration/Strategy nearly all the time. On leaving the Admin building my view was blocked by the roof. I rotated the view until I could see something to click on, and ran smack into the welcoming committee. The fight started immediately and I spent the next hour wandering the grounds with another mob of Demons popping up every few minutes, the Control Panel refusing to accept my input during an emergency, and that damn alarm gong. I finally found an earlier save, got the correct convo, and three fights later, I had that task complete. Try to look at the encounter from more than one angle.
General:
You had a pretty good mix of easy, moderate, and hard fights so well done on that score.
Tons of eye candy! The areas looked better than I remembered from playing Red Prison. The interiors in particular were very well done. Aesthetically you couldn't ask for much more from a game this old.
Rational Setting, In particular I liked the Gith Fort. It had the look and feel of a Roman Legion base. It was an appropriate size and layout and contained the sort of things you'd expect to see in a military installation.
It was an entirely linear plot but you were up front about that and apparently "Order" is your thing. Everything was pretty consistent with the basic plot line and fit together quite well into an engaging story.
Overall: I had fun. Bugs aside, there was plenty to keep the player occupied, the story was interesting, plot twists happened at surprising points. That all added up to an interesting couple of days.
Thank you very much for the review. Your feedback is much appreciated.
Camera issues is our bane it seems. We fixed some in Version 1.1, you've mentioned we have serious ones in the Academy, and we've at least got two others! These will be fixed in 1.2.
We will also provide a ranged-friendly armor alternative for the Champion of Torm and the Dragon Knight. Both of these Factions use very specific ranged weapons, though, and we will provide that along with the other equipment. It may not be the ideal weapon for the player, but it makes the most sense for Faction-supplied equipment. Of course, the player is free to build their own bow/crossbow through Stonehand and Niu, the same as if they prefer something other than the Faction-supplied melee weapon.
Your point about Critical Heals being near useless beyond the Hub is well taken, and the player should pick up any full Heals when they seem them as they are intentionally rare. You won't find any sold in Colothys but other merchants have a few, and there are a couple of caches of them if you look around.
One of the harsh realities of software development is that invariably the design exceeds the time you have to complete it and things get cut. Companion interaction was one of the things that got cut in our case, and as you noted, rather brutally. Of course, in a commercial product it would be added back in through a DLC, but not here. Our intent at this point is to get the Module fully functional and useable, but no new features or capabilities will be added.
Out of curiosity, I started a new game directly in Module 2.1.
I'm using the PC I exported from last month's run through Red Prison so he's about half way through level 15. Other than needing better armor as a solo adventurer, he's doing well so far. All his gear was either purchased or crafted in Red Prison or Character Creator 3.0.
So far I don't see any reason you can't add a convo to the player asking if they played module 1 or are starting mod 2 independently. The only other thing it would need is Journal update and a place to pick up optional companions. So far, so good.
One stray idea - I've gotten used to the IM bags. You should consider adding one for Potions since the loot drops so many. Also I think these would be popular enough to bundle them in a stand alone utility that players could place in Override.
We actually thought about adding a Module 2 start option to Eislyn on the Scornubel docks but it seemed a bit premature until there was significant demand so we didn't bother. Given our usage numbers that was probably the right answer. If the demand picks up, though, it would be something that we could easily do as everything that is needed is already available in the Module. Indeed, we currently run most of our Module 2 testing directly from a Module 2 start and simply add needed items and link in the desired companion. The testing interface is not quite ready for normal playthoughs, but it wouldn't take much.
In terms of exporting the IMS for general use, it wouldn't be that hard to link into the default Module on-acquire rather than simply overriding it, but any module that uses that on-acquire would break and it wouldn't work with any Module that overrode it. Adding a console interface to turn it on and off could be easily done, but we couldn't shut the IMS off on opening stores so bought items would get eaten rather than normally dropped into the inventory and that can get confusing/aggravating. Nevertheless, I'll run it by the team and see if anyone wants to do it, but its not something I'd personally be interested in doing.
Adding Potions to the set would be as simple as creating another bag blueprint, adding BASE_ITEM_POTIONS to the switch in the on-acquire and copying and modifying one of the other entries appropriately. The IMS cleanup would also need to be augmented. The real question is whether it would be more aggravating than useful to have all potions you pick up automatically bagged. We thought it would be because potions are regularly used, and even if we excluded critical and full heals I remain skeptical. Regardless, its not something that we're going to fiddle with at this point given that it already works fine and that sort of change would have to be thoroughly tested over many situations.
Is this mod a beta? I ask because there are a few problems you might want to fix: there's a place in town that looks like you should be able to enter, but you can't. There's also a problem where you can't get out of the room with the coffins where you have to put the sword into one of them. I had to teleport out of the chamber using a cheat.
I should also mention that I'm not a big fan of having my char stripped of everything, but I can deal with that. What was really frustrating was that the first few fights were virtually impossible and none of the enemies we killed had any heals, weapons, or armor!
That said, it's always good to find a new mod to play! I'm enjoying the hack and slash and hope you'll be able to fix the above problems. I should also mention that I'm on a Mac, but I really don't think that has anything to do with what happened.
I am not certain what room in town you're referring to that can't be entered. There are two open rooms in the Fortress that are initially blocked. One is the Creator God temple, and the other is the Master Niu's Enhancement area. The former becomes available once the Fortress is fully under your control, and the latter once you've come back from Minethys. If you mean some other room, then I need more details.
The room with the coffins is a trap, and it sounds like you figured how to get out except for the last step. The quest is not complete until you give Marendan (the ethereal guy behind the coffin) the staff dropped by the Sorceress. He is the quest-giver and teleports you out and gives you a prize once he has the staff. The journal tells you to talk to him once the Sorceress is killed. If it doesn't, or if Marendan doesn't teleport you out, then that's a problem that needs to be fixed.
The initial setup is intended to reflect that you've been dumped with the intent of disposing with you. They put you there to die, but they underestimated you, and not only do you survive, but you come back to become a threat that looms increasingly larger over time. Granted, the initial setup can be tough, but how tough varies widely with your character class and that of the companion. Some setups breeze through while others struggle and can only survive with hit-and-run tactics.
That, however, is an issue with Dungeons and Dragons combat in general and cannot really be addressed though game balancing. The initial setup was designed to be tough but doable for a Rogue and a Fighter pair. A Cleric or a Sorcerer, though, will probably find that balancing too easy. That said, once both are fully equipped, neither one should have a problem.
As to enemies dropping heals and equipment at the beginning, they actually do. Indeed, the intent is that you collect better equipment and more money to buy the potions and the equipment that you need. What drops and how often, however, is probability-based and it sounds like you got some bad breaks. The different factions drop different thing too.
It was a building near the warehouse that we couldn't enter, I'm not sure which one.
During the first fights we encountered after being dumped and stripped nothing was dropped except some gold - no equipment at all - not until much later which made the early fights extremely difficult. If it's any help, my char is a Paladin and my companion a cleric so we certainly can fight, but it's not easy with just fists and kicks lol!
As to the big problem - something definitely went wrong with the quest. We put the sword and the staff in the coffin and talked to Marendanthe. He did not say anything after asking us for staff and never gave us a quest nor did he teleport us out.
And please, what fortress????
Btw, is there any reward if we do the puzzle correctly?
By the sounds of it, the building you couldn't get into was in Scornubel, and yes, there are only a few buildings there that you can get into as this area is primarily a transition stage to get you ready to enter the Hub. You can get some low-level equipment, potions and the like but not much else. That being said, I checked the area and, guess what? There were two doors that were transitionable but led nowhere, and there were also some obsolete maps notes nearby. Oops. When we release a new version, those doors will be static and the map notes will be gone. Thanks for the heads-up.
To your current situation, if you're using unarmed combat in the Hub, I'd guess that you missed the weapon cache just as you enter the area. Those two skeletons that attack you as you come in the door are guarding it, and when you take them down their remains allows you to open the cache hidden behind a secret door. It gives you some nice initial weapons (e.g. +5 Longsword, 2d4 acid, keen) and armor, and some potions to get you started. Without those, that area would be extraordinarily difficult, and that you made it through is astonishing. BTW, if you haven't actually been inside that cache yet it should still be available, and I suggest you get that equipment as they will last you well beyond the Hub area.
Let me run through the coffin quest: 1. Snuff out the candles revealing Marendan and his sarcophagus. 2. Kill Carmag and put his sword in Marendan's sarcophagus. 3. Vastrassian (the Sorceress) now jumps off her ledge and attacks 4. You kill Vastrassian and give Marendan her staff (you give it to him in a conversation when he asks for it. You don't put it in his sarcophagus with the sword) 5. Marendan teleports you out after giving you a prize. (Quest complete)
If you did those things as specified in that order and you don't get to step 5, then we have a problem with that quest and we'll check it out.
In regards to the Fortress, it is the central area of the game and you get to it once you've gotten out of the initial Hub. It has merchants and enhancers and the like. It is a central location in so far as many key conversations and actions take place there. You also get to the next areas through its portal.
Thank you! I put the staff in the coffin with the sword so it was my fault. I'll go back, take the staff it out and hand it to Maredan and see if I can get the quest, etc. If not, I'll just soldier on lol!
As to the cache, I must have missed it which is strange since I usually have my finger on the z key while exploring. But that explains why we had nothing to protect ourselves. I'll definitely go back and check it out.
I went back to the casket room and gave the staff to Maredan and got the gift and was teleported out so that worked out fine. As to the hidden cache, all I found was a shorbow and 8 critical heals plus a bunch of empty chests. Maybe it's a mac thing?
The missing equipment is a serious problem, but unfortunately, not one I can reproduce. I ran through with a Paladin and a Cleric companion, and the intended equipment was present in the cache. Granted, I didn't go through half the area before I checked, and there may be some bizarre interaction, but for the moment all I can do is red-flag it.
As to the possibility that it has something to do with you running on a Mac, I sincerely hope it isn't as it would indicate a NWN2 system bug, and there is absolutely nothing we could do about that.
So at the moment, I apologize for the mess, and hope that nothing else goes wrong for you.
Thanks again! It's not really a problem - I'm used to weird Mac glitches and at least I can play your mod unlike some others! And now I'm with the Celestials!
Hi Kat123, DarkRichard here. I wrote the cache code. *ducks*. Sorry about it not working for you.
I've done some more testing since Mad had a look at it, and I have no idea why it failed for you either. But that doesn't mean I can't fix it! Well, maybe I can't really fix it but I put a failsafe on it so when you enter the cache room the system checks whether the equipment has been created, and if it hasn't it will create it again.
I know it sounds pretty dumb but we do this kind of thing fairly regularly for situations we consider to be critical: we ask the system to do something and then wait a bit and check whether it was really done, and if it wasn't, we shout louder. It actually works pretty well.
Sadly NWN2 doesn't support module patching so this fix will go in our next version. I just thought I'd let you know that we're doing something about your problem.
Thanks DarkRichard! I know the game doesn't always work the way it's supposed to ! I'll let you know if I encounter any other glitches.
Not a glitch, but I'm back to ask for some help. I'm in the Colotjys Fortress, but I can't find any tablets to use on the portal. We defeated the first wave and nothing is happening so please, how do I get someplace other than the lower level?
If you've been through the counter-attack, you've cleared out the lower level of the Fortress, and when you clear out the last section behind the warded door, a new quest comes up, telling you to investigate that section for more information. On a table in the office at the back is a Portal Tablet and a note. That Portal Tablet allows you to teleport into Minethys, and the note tells you what you are looking for there. It also updates the quest. That is your next step.
Note however, that you will only be able to use that Portal Tablet into Minethys once the counter-attack is fully complete. You indicated that you defeated the first wave, but there are *three* waves. And if the counter-attack aborts after the first wave, that is a serious, game-breaking bug. I truly hope that is not what happened.
Try the Portal Tablet, and if it works, then good, carry on.
If it doesn't, you can try to restart from a save before the counter-attack and hope that you've run afoul of some sort of transient problem.
Yes, the warded section is in the lower level, and the commander of the sub-level drops a wardstone allowing you to enter. Just approach the warded door with the wardstone in your inventory and it will open.
If you haven't been in that warded section, though, you can't have been through the counter-attack as both Portal Conduits are needed to start the Fortress Portal and the second one is dropped in that warded section.
Regardless, go to the warded section, defeat its defenders and then pick up the Portal Tablet to Minethys in the office at the back. To get to Minetheys, though, you will need to activate the Fortress Portal, and you will need to install those two Portal Conduits to do that. You do that through the Conduit stubs at the back of Portal Control.
Note that there will be a counter-attack through the Portal once its been activated. After defeating that counter-attack, you just install the Portal Tablet to Minethys, make it the active location through Portal Control, and then enter the Portal to get there. As an aside, the counter-attack is a formal battle, and you can enlist some of the Fortress personnel to assist you in defeating it. Different people can help in different ways, though not all have anything to offer here.
Sorry, I realized I had been in the warded section - I somehow missed the tablet. I found it and went through the portal, but I'm sorry to say I need more help. I'm missing something. l can't free Leandra until I kill Rancoshe, but I cant kill him. How do I remove the barrier? It just occurred to me that remove magic might work, but I turned off the game and will try it tomorrow unless I hear from you first. Thanks again for all the help!
Well, I am hugely relieved to hear that you got through the counter-attack without a problem.
As to Master Rancoshe, he is protected by three Astral Statues and each statue is deactivated by an Astral key. Each of the three rooms on the lower level has one of those keys. They are initially protected by a blue shield but that shield is deactivated when all of the surrounding monks have been defeated. When their blue shield is deactivated the keys look like white glowing blobs floating over an open well, and should be easy to spot.
You take those keys and give one to each of the Astral Statues to clear the shield blocking Master Rancoshe's door to open his inner sanctum.
One detail is that the Silver Sword severs the Astral Cord of Astral Travellers but you must strike them with the sword before they are aware of you. PVP settings disallow attacking friendly NPCs so we were forced to improvise and used a proximity trigger. If you approach an Astral Travelling NPC within striking distance while wielding the Silver Sword you will kill them with it instantly. If you approach them wielding anything else, they will become aware of you, jump out of their Astral station and attack. The active striking distance is very close so get as close as you can. Also, their Astral Station protects them from the back so attack them from the front.
Thank you once again for your help! I guess I just wasn't standing close enough, but that quest is finished.
I'm now in the Cathrys Fort and have three ward stones, but I can't open loleths' cell. I might have messed up - when nothing worked I broke the ground switch and I'm not sure if that's part of the problem. If it isn't asking too much, can you tell me how to open the cell and get him out of the magic cone - or give me a code to do it if the broken switch is a big problem?
Iolethys' cell needs four wardstones, and each of the blade golems has one. There are three on his side of the cellblock and one on the other. Clearly, that setup is a cause of confusion and we're going to have to come up with something to make it clearer.
The broken switch could be a problem for you need to pull it after you open Iolethys' door. I guess it depends on what you mean by 'broken'. If its simply not there any longer then you're going to have to go back to an earlier save because the code it runs checks a local variable, and if the object isn't there then the variable will always return FALSE and the code will just immediately exit. Some other form of broken might still work, though.
Obviously, that switch should not be destroyable and I will red-flag it to make it plot, but as it stands there is no way to work around a destroyed switch because, as noted, the code it runs checks local state while the code after that check must be run to free Iolethys.
I apologize for this problem.
If the switch is still there, though, get the fourth wardstone and open the door. Pulling the switch should then free Iolethys.
My bad - I bashed the switch and it is gone. I have to check to see if I have a save from before - fingers crossed.
I restarted from an earlier save and it worked. I should mention that when looking at the magic lock it seems like there are 3 lights rather than 4.
And I'm sorry to say I'm at another impasse. I'm in the Celestial Labs, and killed the enemies, but the door is locked and there is a magical barrier blocking the exit. I'd appreciate some help please - or a code to open the door if necessary.
I'm glad to hear that you found a save and were able to free Iolethys.
The Celestial Labs is opened one piece at a time and the lights on the floor and the statues before the passages mark where you can currently go. When a passage is available the floor lights are blue and the statues have a blue aura.
The very first section available is the Chess Challenge. Follow the passage leading to the left all the way to the end, go down the stairs and interact with the console in front of the big chess board. I should mention that, by design, the Celestial Labs can be a bit tricky and you need to pay attention to the details because there are alternate ways to solve some problems, and some ways are easier than others.
BTW, the passage with the magical barrier is where you go last.
I did the chess puzzle which led to a fight and now I'm stuck in an area with stairs and a large door which I can't open (the one where a big fight took place). There is no place I can go - the bottom of the stairs is blocked with a magic wall.
I'd guess that the fight you had involved some big bugs and that you're now stuck in the bug's lair. This is one way in which the Labs gets tricky. The monster bug drops something called the 'Goggles of Miraculous Seeing'. These goggle are 'used by the wise to advance along the Paths of Wisdom,' and the paths of wisdom are what you must follow to get through the Labs.
When you put these goggles on they allow you to see and manipulate some ethereal things that you wouldn't ordinarily see. But you can't keep them on all the time because they also obscure some things that you would normally see. So moving through the Labs involves putting the Goggles on and taking them off in order to see all the things that you need to progress.
So, if you're stuck, chances are you either need to put the Goggles on or take them off.
If that doesn't give you a path out, I'll need some more details, like who you fought and how you got there.
After clearing out the Academy grounds I was give permission to visit the labs and was give a ward stone. We fought the attackers and entered the building. I started from the bottom and found the chess game. After the fight we explored the area around it and then went upstairs. There was a large group in front of the door at the top of the stairs (between 2 statues). We killed them, but no goggles were dropped and the door can't be opened. Now I'm stuck on the top landing. If one of the attackers in front the door were supposed to drop the goggles can you give me a chest code to get them - or did I miss something?
There are only two ways that you can get the Goggles of Miraculous Seeing. They are mutually exclusive but you must take one or the other.
The first is if you successfully pass the Chess Challenge, that is, demonstrate checkmate in two or three moves. They are given to you as a reward. You then use them to navigate over the chasm that is up the stairs and to the right. The statues in front of that chasm will have changed from red to blue to mark that that is you next pathway.
The second is if you either fail to pass the Chess Challenge or select 'How about something else?' In that case a group of big bugs breaks through the wall and attacks. When you defeat those bugs you must take the alternate path of wisdom through the sewer, and that means entering the breach in the wall where the bugs came out of. You will eventually go up a ladder into the bug's lair. At the top of the ladder you are attacked by another group of bugs and eventually the boss bug arrives and attacks. When the boss bug is defeated you get a prize box but, most importantly, the boss bug drops the Goggles of Miraculous Seeing.
From your description, though, it sounds like you defeated the group of bugs around the chess board but then went back upstairs rather then follow the bugs into the sewer. It also sounds like when you did that you encountered a group of Githyanki by the initial entrance. Those Githyanki should have attacked you when you initially arrived in the Labs but it seems that the trigger failed on-entry but was triggered when you entered it the second time. Their death just updates the Labs quest.
If that sound like your situation, go back to the chess board and enter the breach in the wall that the bugs came out of. You then follow the path around to the bug's lair. Kill the boss bug, get the Goggles and put them on. You will then see the way out.
If that is *not* your situation, then I need to know how you handled the Chess Challenge because that is the determinator of how you get the Goggles.
We did fight after not winning the chess game, but I don't remember seeing a passage to the sewers - we just got something, but I don't remember what it was - not goggles though. And a door opened to the right and we went through some dark rooms, ending up going upstairs. The problem is that I can't go anywhere - I'm stuck at the top landing and the only way down is blocked by a magic wall. I'll try to find a save from the chess game, but I'm not sure if I still have one.
Btw, we were attacked by a group of Githyanki by the initial entrance and then again in front of the door where I'm stuck.
Have you considered writing a hint guide - it would be very helpful?
Hello Kat, this is CheshireKat7 and I'm going to try and figure out what happened for it doesn't sound like you're in any place you ought to be. This can take a bit of time, and if you can find a save and just follow what Mad laid out for you earlier, it'll be easier for you. You can also just try to click around on the outside because you probably got to where you are by following a path that shouldn't actually be there, and maybe you can get back to where you came from.
The first thing I'll need is a screenshot of where you currently are, and you should be able to upload one into the image section of this Mod. Once I have a look at it, we'll go from there.
Thanks CheshireKat7, but it's no longer necessary. I had a save from right after the bug fight and the goggles were there. I just didn't see them because they were hidden behind a rock! I must admit that I got frustrated running around in circles after some time and resorted to cheating. I teleported over a magic barrier and was able to finish the quest. I am now in hell, thank you very much lol!
Its good you're moving forward and no longer stuck.
I'm going to do some more checking off-line, tho' cause its pretty clear that there's a pathing bug in the Labs someplace and we'd don't want anyone else getting lost on account of it. Sorry it messed you around.
I think the problem is that what you intend to happen isn't that obvious. Btw, I never was able to open the door upstairs - the red lights in front never turned blue. But then, I'm not sure you were supposed to open them. I should also mention that when I re-started from the chess game there were no enemies to fight in front of that door.
We're taking your experience seriously and have made changes to make things clearer. The fourth Blade Golem in the Cathrys Fort will now attack when you enter either cellblock, for example. We've made the proximity triggers for Astral Travellers larger and we've moved the Goggles of Miraculous Seeing into the prize box so they won't get lost. Hopefully, these things will make going through our Mod less frustrating and we appreciate that you've kept going despite having to fight your way through them.
As to the pathing problems in the Labs, CheshireKat is still working on that, but if you managed to get someplace you shouldn't have been, then its not surprising that things weren't in the right state. As I said, we don't actually know what happened yet, though, so that is just idle talk.
I'm happy to help - I've done quite a few beta tests so I'm used to things not going quite the way they were meant to. I'll let you know if I run into any other situations in hell and beyond.
I really didn't expect to be back so soon, but I would appreciate more help! I got the quest from the Bugbears and am in the cave. I found a barrel of explosives, but there doesn't seem to be anything I can interact with. Should there be? How do I save the bugbears?
The Bugbear puzzle is meant to be solved as you would a problem in the everyday world. There's no marker, rather you need to assess the situation to determine where to put the exploding barrel so it will free the Bugbears. That means that you either use it to blow something up or to blast something down. The area was designed so that there is only one plausible answer and one plausible location. If you can make a case for multiple possible answers, then that's a bug that needs to be fixed.
If you're in a hurry, the answer is below ...
**SPOILER**
Position the barrel to blast down the wall on the left to create a passage over the lava. The active trigger is 5m wide so there is some leeway in positioning.
Thanks again! I was trying to explode the stalagmites hoping to make a bridge, but it didn't work. I really didn't think of blowing up a wall! I never encountered anything like this is real life lol!
I must admit to becoming somewhat frustrated. I took down the wall and saved the bugbears and entered the North mine. I have been through the whole mine several times, found 2 or 3 ground switches, but I can't find the entrance to the forge. Nothing was mentioned about the switches or what they did when used. Btw, you might want to make the switches a little more noticeable - the only way I found one of them was by just moving my cursor around the bottom of one of the statues while holding the "z" key. If there are more, I couldn't find them and have just running around in circles.
I apologize that you're getting frustrated as this area was meant to be easy. You do have to be thorough, however.
Clearly, though, the statue switches can be better marked, and we've added some markers behind them. They are initially red but turn green once the switch has been pulled. This both marks the position of the switch and indicates its current state.
Here's how the system works ....
** SPOILER **
Statues and Switches
There are five statues and four switches. There are also four orange streaming pillars in front of the statue without a switch. Those pillars mark that area as a control area.
When you pull a switch, one of those pillars turns from orange to green. That is, those pillars mark how many switches there are and how many have been pulled so far.
When you have pulled all four switches behind the statues, a fifth switch appears between those four pillars. It is marked with a pulsing beacon so it is easily seen. Pulling that fifth switch opens a passage behind the statue just in front. Entering that passage leads into a room with a big door behind a pool of lava. In front of that pool of lava are two braziers. Light them and a bridge is created over the lava and the big doors open.
Walking over the bridge leads to another room with a set of stairs leading up and a door at the top. Go up the stairs and through the door and you're now in the Fortress.
You have to navigate through the Fortress to get to the Forge. Don't forget that the Fortress is the home of the Demon Lord Adrishaan and there will be strong defenders around. The area might be worth exploring too but don't forget where you are, and always keep in mind that your objective is to get to the Hell Forge, and a side exit is to be preferred because the front door is going to be well-defended.
Statue Locations
#1. Statue #1 is on the right as you come in the mine.
Going left is another room but no statue, so follow the passage to the right up to the door. Pass through and there are passages to the left, right and center.
#2. Statue #2 is down the passage to the left.
Following the center passage leads to another door. Pass through and there are passages to the left and right. The passage to the left leads to a runed door which you can explore.
#3. Statue #3 is down the passage to the right. It is the statue without a switch and with four streaming pillars in front. That is, this is the control area.
Continuing down that passage leads to a fork in the road with a door on the right.
#4. Statue #4 is to the left.
Opening the door to the right is a long passage, and halfway down is a large open area but no statues, so continue to the end.
#5. Statue #5 is at the end.
Taking the passage to the right after the first door is a long passage with a door at the end. Passing through this door lead you to the large area in the middle of the other long passage. Clearly, Statue #4 is to the left and Statue #5 is to the right.
Thanks so much for the info! It sounds as if you've made the whole process easier which is great! I don't think the pillars changed colors after I pulled the switches, but I'll double check. It also seems that I missed one of them so I'll have to find it. Will you be uploading an update or would I have to start all over?
Well. if you pulled the switches but the pillars didn't change color that is bad but not necessarily critical for it is unclear what state they're in as we can't differentiate a wrong state from a mis-reported state by the color of the pillar. What really matters, is if you get the fifth switch because that is what allows you to open the panel in the wall.
What I recommend is that you check each switch and make certain that they are all pulled, and then go the control area with the pillars and see if there's a fifth switch. It'll be in the middle of the pillars and have a green pulsing beacon on it. If its there, then just pull it and carry on. If it is not there and all the switches have been pulled, then you've got a irremediable problem.
Assuming that the pillars are still working properly, you can find the unpulled switches by looking at which pillars are orange. In terms of the statue numbers I gave you earlier, when you face the pillars, the corresponding statue is, from left to right, 1, 2, 4, 5.
Lastly, in terms of updating the MOD so you can use the new markers and other fixes, unfortunately, changing a NWN2 module breaks saves, so you cannot use a save file from a previous version with an updated module. When we release an update it will have a different module name reflecting the version exactly so it won't break saves. We have enough fixes to warrant a new version at the moment, but we are still testing it, so it won't be out at least for several days.
Thanks! I'll check the pillars first and see which columns aren't working. It should be rather easy to determine with the instructions you left!
Strange, two of the columns were green but when I returned after finding the 4th switch, all of them were green and the 5th switch was there. Maybe I clicked on one of the other switches while running around, but I'm pretty sure I just clicked on one of them.
In any case, I've been to hell and back thanks to all of your help! I also wanted to mention that some of the doors and portals can only be accessed by using the the "W" key, not by clicking on them. I'm not sure if they were supposed to be that way so I thought I'd mention it.
I'm glad you got all the way through Hell, perhaps a bit more literally than intended. Hopefully adding those markers will improve the overall experience and I appreciate your patience.
It sounds like there was a glitch in turning one of the pillars from orange to green but because the code checks them all every time one is changed, it was able to recover. Chalk up one for our fault-recovery programming!
I am not certain what you mean by using the 'W' key aside from the normal WASD control. Sometimes NWN2 glitches out, though, and the mouse interface ceases to respond properly, and perhaps that's what happened in your case. As far as I'm aware, we don't have direct access through the API to the keyboard, to change or to even read, so whatever happened it wasn't by our design.
I'm sorry, maybe I wasn't clear enough. In order to go through the portals I had to use the WASD control and walk into them - there was no icon to click on that's usually there when you open a door. The same thing happened with the doors to both mines in hell. I just wasn't sure if you meant it to be that way.
I'm back, hopefully for the last time! I'm in the artifact, killed everybody there, and am stuck for a change. There are only 3 things I can interact with and I can't seem to do anything with any of them (2 large statues and the small one upstairs). I have no idea where the control panel is that I have to use so any help you can give would be greatly appreciated! I would dearly love to finish the game after all of this lol!
I see, yes, by design, you always just walk through our portals. Door are different, and as is the norm in NWN2, you click to open and then click to pass through. That being said, there are exceptions. The one leading into the Northern Mine is one of them, and it operates like a portal. It was done this way because we couldn't get it to work properly. I won't bore you with the details but after some hours of trial and error we eventually gave up and used a portal interface. The Southern Mine, however, even though it looks like cave should have a normal door interface. It does in the run-throughs I've done and nobody else has reported differently, so it sounds like a glitch. As long as its functional, its not a high priority, so I'll mark it as something to be explicitly looked at in the course of normal testing.
Your primary control tool in the Artifact is the Nullifier Rod. It is the key that unlocks everything, so if you're stuck, use it.
I'm in area #2 and killed the skells, but something strange is happening during the fight in the small building. The first time I was dumped to the desktop during the fight, but what was really strange was the second time I was dumped to the load menu! I have never had that happen in all the years I have been playing! This might be a mac problem, but I'm not sure. I will try again tomorrow night.
That sounds bad, and not something that has been reported before although there are known camera issues. It is a tight space and the camera gets pushed up against the wall unless you're looking at it directly from above. The Mac may be having problems with that and I will red-flag it, but know that you don't have to go into that building, anyway.
The statues that you need are in the opposite direction, under the water. There is some water-breathing gear at the dock. That zone has some camera issues too because NWN2 treats the water surface strangely. You can't see through the water unless the camera is underneath it even though you can see the lights underneath when the camera is above it. That means that you can navigate by the lights when the camera is above the surface but you can't see to fight or manipulate the statues unless the camera is beneath the surface. The zone is deep enough that you can bring the camera down to see when you need to but the transition is a bit wonky.
Addendum. I've made that small building (this is one of my areas) into an Environment Object so the camera shouldn't be fighting with it any more. Hopefully, that will clear up the issues with your Mac. That involved redoing the walkmesh so it'll push back the release of our next version a bit.
Thanks for letting me know. I'll skip that building and just go for a swim!
I'm sorry, but the underwater area is virtually impossible to navigate. Walking is very difficult and it's extremely jumpy. I just don't know how to describe it any better. To make matters worse the view keeps changing from under the water to above. I'm afraid I'm done - it's just not much fun when it's so much work.
I've enjoyed the game, but it looks like I'm not going to be able to finish. Thanks again for the all the fun and all the help!
The game has been improved by your efforts, and we appreciate your time and your patience. If you're willing to give us another shot sometime, know that we've added the option to turn the water off for the underwater quest. Just choose that option from the console at the dock. It'll be in our next update.
Thanks for letting me know - it should be a great help! I might give it one more try and see if I can finish.
I bit the bullet and went back into the game - and was able to navigate the underwater adventure. Unfortunately, the third area is even worse for me than the water was! It must be a real memory hog because my computer had a lot of trouble with it. It was hard to get my char to walk - very sticky, and I got dumped to the desktop during one of the fights with the veterans. I tried again, but it's very hard to see anything, especially where you can move, and my char kept getting stuck in walls. I'm giving up, but will most probably try the updated version some time in the future.
It is truly a pity that you're having such trouble!
The Artifact area in general gets bogged down. As far as we can tell it is due to NWN2 not releasing graphics resources (rather than system RAM), so the more limited the RAM on your graphics card the sooner the game will start to bog down. Unfortunately, there is no virtual memory for graphics, and so when the graphics memory is used up the system will crash. That's my guess as to what happened.
After some experimentation, we've discovered that the electrical discharge effects that continually run in the Artifact are leading to the slow downs, and by eliminating them the problem disappears. That is the fix that we will apply, and it will be part of our next release. We expect to release a new version in a day or so.
81 comments
The overriding concern was that it is a critical path quest and so it has to be doable by all character types, regardless of stealth abilities or equipment. Realistically, only Rogues should be able to successfully complete the quest, but as that is not acceptable, it means that the actual stealth skill could not be a requirement. As such we set it up for line-of-sight detection.
The second concern, though, was that the quest had to be at least moderately challenging and have some elements of believability. Thus, getting over the wall, and getting into position became the critical features of the quest, and these require timing and paying attention to the line-of-sight of the guards. This also implies that a high stealth skill should not render the quest trivial, nor should it be able to be circumvented by invisibility. As such, while somewhat effective, these only reduce the vision of the guards.
And as you note, there is also the companion, and the guards check for them as well. Given the overall design parameters, though, all the companion means is that you have to make sure that the companion sticks closely to the path of the main character.
So, to your points, etherialness, invisibility, etc. would not, by design, allow you to circumvent the stealth part of the quest.
Leaving the companion behind wasn't even considered because it didn't make sense from a gameplay point of view. The main character and the companion are a team, after all, and you don't leave half of it behind, especially as the combat in the dungeon is significant, and would be quite difficult solo. Having the companion miraculously appear after stealthing seems a bit ad hoc too. Lastly, getting the companion through the 'stealth' part just requires keeping you path straight, anyway, so its not a major problem.
Your diversion idea, though, is an interesting one, and perhaps the most plausible approach, but it has the problem of rendering the quest trivial. Clearly, it could just reduce the number of guards, but in actuality, there are only five guards that the player has to worry about anyway, because the rest are looking outward. As such, it either wouldn't help much or would not fit the design requirements of the quest.
Lastly, I will point out that this stealth assault on Fort Trendar can be bypassed if you do the Hag's quest, exactly so that our fake stealth fiddle wasn't forced on people. We figured that the over-the-wall assault on Fort Trendar had to be there to make the story plausible, but as the mechanics were clumsy we gave a much more straightforward alternative.
MadHatter101
The first thing is that the higher the armor class your team has the better. Among other things, that means that all team members should use a shield or have good double-weapon defense. Proper gear can also prevent mind spells, instant death attacks and knock-down.
During combat you should make sure that your team members keep their health up through the use of potions and use lesser restoration to clear debilities. You can also use speed potions to give your team an edge. Even more effective is for Clerics or Mages to use stun or confuse over groups of enemies.
Lastly, in general, your character should be competent in the use of melee or ranged because groups of enemies in close proximity can disrupt spell casting and a number have spell resist. Using an Eldrich Knight rather than a straight Mage, for example, would be a good idea. Also, Fighters will be more effective than Rogues because you character is most often tanking and so a sneak attack will not be able to be used effectively.
MadHatter101
I've never said it's difficult? I've said it's a gauntlet, which -at least i think- should mean that is a huge dungeon filled with various monsters -and mostly- respawning. Never said anything about difficulty. I cheat, so difficulty it's never an issue for me.
To your point, though, there is some respawning of monsters in the prison Hub simply to keep the place from becoming empty as you pass through to the different Faction sections, but that is about it. Every other area within the game bar one stays clear once you'd killed all the defenders simply because there is little point returning to those areas anyway.
The single exception is Colothys Fortress that becomes a Hub once you've captured it. It has a portal through which you to pass into the other main areas of the game as well as a merchant area that allows you sell your loot, buy supplies, and upgrade your weapons and armor. You can also get trained in new skills there. Once you have cleared out the initial defenders of Colothys Fortress, though, there is a counter attack, so there is some respawning in that regard. However, once you successfully defended against that counter attack Colothys Fortress is never assaulted again.
However, I think you could improve the start by having the auto level-ups give an appropriate amount of gold for buying stuff (instead of getting 10k from the NPC or getting gold through the console) since everything in the market is so expensive.
Ah nevermind, I realise why now. But what is the Good Underwear for? It keeps duplicating itself every single time I equip new armor, causing my inventory to bloat and in NWN2 even clothing weighs 10 units.Also, is crafting not supporting in this? I see a lot of crafting materials sold in the market stores but there's no crafting tables anywhere from what I've seen, which is a bit annoying since your starting henchman has ranks in craft weapons.
The Good Underwear is an attempt to be a little bit better than the default full-body Victorian-era underwear that NWN2 provides. We find the NWN2 default absurd and provide this instead. However, it should never end up in your inventory, and if it does, that is a bug.
What should happen is that when the PC removes or loses their body armor they get this underwear. But when body armor is put on over top, this underwear should be automatically destroyed. It can also be manually removed to return the character to the NWN2 default. But again, when you remove it, it should be destroyed. Under these conditions its weight is not relevant. If it does end up in your inventory, though, something weird has happened, and I am wondering if there is something special about your NWN2 system.
I will also point out that this underwear works (or should work) with Nude Mods that change the NWN2 default underwear to nudity. Here, when the PC strips off they get some underwear by default but it can still be manually removed to reveal the nude model underneath.
As to crafting, there are Alchemy and Magic workbenches by the merchant in the Hub, and the Duergar sector has a Blacksmith crafting bench. However, not all ingredients are available in the Hub, and so these are only useful for basic things. Later in the Mod a fuller selection of ingredients become available, but by then skilled weapon and armor enhancers are present and they will probably do a better job. It will cost you, though.
MadHatter101
I've played till the Githyanki base where you rescue the researcher and here's some issues I found so far:
[SPOILERS]
We will give a detailed response to each one of your points, but it will take some time to investigate. This note is just to acknowledge that we've seen your comments and that we're working on a reply. We are also currently working on a 1.3 release and our resolution to your issues will be in it.
MadHatter101
1. We need more info on the underwear problem. Does the underwear enter your inventory when you take your armor off? When you put your armor on? Or some other time?
2. We've added a pulsing beacon to mark environment jump triggers when they become active.
3. Striel being declared as killed even through you saved him/her is a Journal bug. It has been fixed.
4. As to good weapons, they are meant to be scarce in the Hub. It is a prison after all. You start off with a good melee weapon and a bow. If you do the right quests, you can get an improved katana (+5, 1d4 slashing + 2d4 acid) and you can get a +5 Astral longsword (+5, 2d8 sonic).
After you bring Iolethys back from the Githyanki fort, though, Colothys Fortress' merchant area activates and enhancers can improve any weapon up to +6, 4d6 in most elements. This can be improved to +7 with the appropriate skill book. They can also add special features (stun, strength poison, massive criticals, etc) but most of these specials also require that you have given the enhancers the associated skill book. These skill books can be obtained from normal quests, from drops by Boss NPCs, and some are just sitting out in the open on tables.
Under the right conditions, some NPCs improve your weapon as well, and near the end, a Boss drops a devastating, slayer of a weapon. You don't need this weapon to finish, and indeed, most often I give it to my companion or put it in a bag because by then my primary weapon is even more devastating.
I'll also mention that all faction Champions but Servants of Laestrael get enhanced weapons to start, and that there is a merchant that sells high-end weapons, albeit for a stiff price.
5. The Hill Giant Boss disappearing after a reload from save is a bug caused by the OnClientEnter for that area not being once-only, and the OnClientEnter scripthides the boss and his team. So on a reload he would disappear because a reload runs the OnClientEnter. It has been fixed.
6. In regards to Dzarr being passive when the PC enters the Tiefling inner area, we have not been able to reproduce this. In our tests he always immediately attacks the PC as he should. At the moment, then, we'll just flag it as something to watch.
7. Constitution 1d2 damage is the most potent ability poison that we can add to a weapon, so we can't do anything about that. The DC 14, on the other hand, is at the very bottom of the scale, and we agree that that is low. We upped it to DC 20.
8. Its far too late to start fiddling with cosmetics, so we're going to live with the ugly demon reskins as they stand. Sorry.
9. In the conversation with the Tiefling volunteers, we were unable to find the node that the PC speaks that belongs to the Tieflings. What would be really helpful would be what was said.
10. Losing a Golem through multiple follow requests has been fixed. The follow command will now abort if another Golem is already following. I will mention that, outside of combat, lost golems would eventually be recreated back in their storage area, so you wouldn't lose them permanently, but it is definitely a bug that they got lost in this manner.
11. Golems not defending if not explicitly asked to is how it is supposed to work. They tell you that their targetting and defensive systems are on standby when they stop following. When they are set to defend, they tell you that these systems are now active. These are strong weapon platforms, and you don't want them to become active without explicit orders. That's the idea, anyway.
12. Portal Control becoming unable to initiate the counter-attack if not activated right away has been fixed. The first statement was once-only and it has been that way since it was written. So much for our testing coverage.
13. The wardstone activation distance in the Githyanki Dungeon was 3.5 meters (10 feet). This was chosen to ensure that the PC was in proximity and so could see the door open. But to reduce confusion we've upped it to 4.5 meters (13 feet), which is the distance to the center of the hallway outside of the cell. Any further away and the door could be opened without the PC even noticing it as they could be too far down the hall.
14. The lever to free the researcher had its auto-remove key set, and so the key was removed before the on-used script was run, and the on-use script also checks for the key. As a result you needed two keys to open the door. The auto-remove key check has now been disabled.
15. There are two ways that you can enter the Githyanki dungeon. One by being teleported in by the Hag Sethress, and the other by assaulting the fort over the wall and breaking in. When you assault over the wall you have to be very careful not to be seen by the guards because if you are, the entire fort defense will attack at once, which is some 50 guys: 30 crossbow men and 20 melee attackers, some of which are being spawned on the spot. This is why the system lags when you walk out the door.
And yes, being seen is meant to result in a PC death.
Once you enter Fort HQ you should never come back outside because you don't know where the patrollers are, and the chances of them seeing you is high. Also, if you haven't taken down the two guards on HQ, you will necessarily be seen. Looting the other buildings can be done if you assault the fort over the wall and slip in behind the patroller, but you might run into him on the way out, so its still a bit risky.
In sum, I wouldn't bother, but if you're an obsessive collector and don't mind the risk (that is, a reload), it can be done.
You should also know that this scenario does not operate under normal stealth mechanics, so you can't guarantee not being seen by being invisible or having a high stealth ability. These merely reduce the visibility of the guards. What matters is the direction in which the guards are looking.
It is set up this way because it is a critical path and so it must be able to be done by all classes, including those with zero stealth ability. We also didn't want it to be a cake-walk for Rogues and a death-trap for everyone else, so while the Rogues can get a bit of an advantage through reduced visibility of the guards, they still have to be careful.
Note too that the guards check for the companion as well and if you don't control their path properly they will get you killed.
About the weapons, yup I've played further till pretty much the end game area now and I found many options to upgrade weapons. I really like how much the hub has to offer! Also, I sided with the Dragon faction and got the Bastard Sword in addition to an Adamantine Greatsword and Mithril Plate that I've upgraded using the Blacksmith and Enchanter.
As for the underwear issue, it happens when I directly swap armors as well unequipping armors. I noticed that the script to remove the Good Underwear runs fine sometimes and it gets automatically removed but not all the time.
I've found some more issues since then:
Currently, I'm in the end game area but I have no idea how to proceed. Two statues that are activated by something... but there's nothing else? I see a mini statue and two paintings but nothing happened when I activated any of them.
Thank you very much for you efforts. You have done a very good job of bug-testing for us and we totally appreciate it. Again, it will take some time to investigate these problem and we'll give a full report when we've finished.
I wanted to give a quick reply, though, to get you unstuck. The two large statues respond to your presence, and its not because you are especially charismatic but because you are carrying something that they're attuned to: Mantaguaal's Nullifier Rod. It is the master key that unlocks everything in the Artifact (even the little statue upstairs). So use it.
You did say that you already tried to activate those statues but you didn't say what you used. If you already tried the Nullifer Rod on them and they failed to respond, then that is a critical game-breaking bug. There not a whole lot of debug statements in the code but the Rod will report an invalid target if it is not used on an item attuned to it, so check that first. If it acknowledges the target but nothing happens, then that is a priority one issue that we will look at immediately.
1. There was a time-sensitive check in the Underwear code that seems to have been part of a development debugging sequence that was only partially removed. Such things are good candidates for intermittent problems, and hopefully its removal will clear up your issues.
2. Striel not responding to conversations after leaving the Hub was a result of a change in how we checked for the active companion. That change did not get propagated to Striel's conversation. It now has been.
3. We haven't been able to reproduce your problem with Apterodaxis' conversation not triggering, and we've tried with Striel, Champions and other mercenaries. Unfortunately, triggers are not entirely reliable in NWN2 and sometimes they fail for no obvious reason. That seems to be what has happened here, so at the moment we'll just mark it as something to watch.
4. Tysamere's vestigial conversation is not a bug per se, but rather all that there is. He has a conversation that is initiated on exit from the Dragon Lair, but he doesn't have anything to say when engaged directly. This reflects an explicit project decision that we made in August to chop incomplete secondary features and focus on finishing. We initially had more extensive plans for companions and companion interaction but we simply ran out of time.
5. The same thing for Ruby Heart.
6. The check for Tysamere in the betrayal cutscene was mistakenly set as a check for Natheron. As none of the companions checked could be found the betrayal aborted. A classic copy-paste bug that has now been fixed.
7. The Battle at Narentia simulation is not a balanced exchange. It is simply meant as a fun diversion. The Celestials have strong Area-of-Effect attacks and stuns so they definitely have the advantage but the Demons tend to win the Jaslyn Amar and Loren Valley assaults nonetheless.
8. We have added a pulsing beacon over the gun panel switch when it is ethereal (active) to help people spot it.
9. We've added a door to the entrance to the Northern Mine. There was one there originally that matched the entrance but we dropped it because it wasn't working properly. This new one is a standard, unmodified door and so shouldn't have any problems.
10. The trapped Bugbears are in the Southern Mine which is directly behind the PC as they talk to Morog. It is marked with a green mapnote once Morog mentions it, and if you didn't get the green mapnote let us know.
11. The levers in the Northern Mine are not meant to be seen or accessed from the front. They're supposed to be secret after all. They are easily seen and accessed from the right side, though, as they have red/green markers behind them from that angle.
12. Again, Iolethys' conversation trigger at the lava incursion works fine for us, and it uses a standard script, so if you've gotten the one on entering the Fortress from the Mine and one highlighting the Hell Forge, there is no clear reason you shouldn't get this one as well, especially as the trigger is huge and cannot be missed. Again, we'll flag it as something to watch but right now there's nothing we can really do about it.
13. The front door into the Fortress was supposed to be linked to an interior Fortress door but it was not. That has been fixed.
14. Talking to Iolethys immediately after capturing the Hell Forge will no longer initiate the Forge exit sequence. The Forge defense scenario must now be completed before that conversation can be run.
MadHatter101
One more thing, I noticed that PCs that become a champion of any faction get all effects removed on client enter. I understand this was to reset the visual effects of each faction transformation but this can be quite a hassle to builds who rely on buffs to excel.
Other than that, all these sound good! Thanks!
Edit: Completed the mod with a Bard/Fighter/RDD build, ending at Level 20! I can safely say I give a 8.25/10 for this and it'll be higher once the new version is out. Thanks to the whole team for all the effort put into this!
EDIT: Hmm... It seems that it is sixth lever that can be pulled.
What matters is the appearance of the fifth lever. Regardless of the colors of the pillars, if you get a lever in front of the pillars that has a pulsing green light over it, just pull that lever and a passage will open for you into the Fortress. The quest will then advance. If you don't get a fifth lever after pulling all four behind the statues though, let us know as that would be a game-breaking bug.
We have put a failsafe on the pillar color change code that, every time a lever is pulled, will try to change all pillar colors to match their state if they don't already, so if a pillar turned green unexpectedly it was probably that failsafe code that re-made the request to change the color from orange to green on one that failed to do it on the first request.
EDIT: We have updated the failsafe on this to recheck after 3 seconds instead of waiting for the next lever pull. Hopefully, this will better avoid the confusion of a mis-stated state. It will be in the 1.3 release which we are currently running QA on. That release also has the fix for the Cathrys Fort auto-remove key problem.
MadHatter101
I'm stuck now in Githyanki prison trying to free researcher. I've eliminated githyankis and when I try to pull ground lever I'm getting message "only subcommander Kamduta is authorized to open this containment". Key was removed from inventory when I first interacted with lever.
EDIT: I've located where is issue. Autoremove key option is toggled and it will remove key before OnUsed script is executed. spawning keys using GiveItem resolved issue.
Regardless, I'll red-flag the issue. And thanks for the heads-up on the auto-remove.
MadHatter101
Minor bug: The hidden portal near the Gith entrance will not appear if the PC touches the shield before finding and using the scroll.
Beginning of part II: Whatever you did to adjust the PC's stats, the level up routine does not recognize the change. In particular, the INT score is not reflected correctly. My PC was actually getting fewer skill points than before the adjustments even though the character sheet displays a two point increase in INT. Did not get the correct new spells per level either.
Not sure what I'm going to do with my Wood Elf-Asimar Hybrid at this point. He was an Arcane Archer. If you are playing a chaotic PC with an 8 charisma, the feats you get for taking the "good" path are not as useful as you probably expected.
I'll figure something out.
Onward!
As to how we adjusted the PC stats ... you are correct. NWN2 does not actually allow modifying the underlying PC abilities through the API, and so we fake it with a skin. This is exactly the same as putting on a ring or other item with enhanced abilities so it does not affect skill points or spell per level. We tried a number of things to get around this but we came up empty and resorted to the skin. We apologize but that is how things are.
In terms of the feats provided for the Champion of Torm, they are indeed biased for melee. This is primarily because we see them as Knights of Virtue in gleaming Heavy Armor, and Heavy Armor significantly restricts the Dexterity bonus. That said, it would have been sensible anyway to provide a Longbow in the default equipment and give a Longbow focus feat, but that won't help much for a ranged-oriented player, and we'll have to give some thought as to how we might be able to accommodate ranged while still keeping the Knight focus. Suggestions are welcome.
MadHatter101
One solution might be to replace the weapon chest with a menu to allow Players to pick something that matches their style, then apply the same stats to the created weapon that you have on the Champion Sword. It was a bit amusing to meet the merchant Djinn and see all the ammo he sells but no ranged weapons.
Each time you summon Ramaja, though, his inventory is enhanced by random specialty scrolls and potions, as well as random unique weapons. These weapons have very nice stats but are very expensive. That being said, not one of those specialty weapons is ranged, and we'll add one or two, but as noted, the selection is random so you won't see them all the time.
Note that Barson Stonehand is the main equipment dealer in Colothys Fortress, and he sells both ranged and melee weapons up to +3. You can also get your weapons enhanced through Master Niu with elemental damage, massive criticals and the like, as well as with enhancements of up to +6, or to +7 if you've provided him with the skillbook.
Stonehand not only sells armor but enhances it as well. Up to +6 or +7 along with specialty immunities, arcane spell failure reduction and weight reduction as well as other things once he has acquired their skillbook.
Note though, that armor and weapon enhancements won't be available until you get back from Minethys.
In terms of accommodating ranged players, I'll have to get back to you on that as we need to have a meeting to review what we can do for all of the Faction Champions. That meeting will take place early next week.
MadHatter101
I've been getting by with the +5 Throwing Axes he sells for limited ranged combat but then ... I got lucky in Minethys and found the +4 Longbow Taralash in a chest so I'm back in the Arcane Archer business.
New problem, I'm trying to rescue the researcher and the entire Cathrys Gith fort is non-hostile. It's as if I'm still under the Astral Projection effect from the Hag's quest. I can't attack anything including the Golems so I can't get the ward stones.
I can try fiddling with the scripts but I'm more likely to break the game than fix it. Any ideas?
** SPOILERS **
This is how the quest should work under Astral Projection:
1. You get into Sethress' Astral Station and Astral Project into Cathrys. In Astral Form you are semi-invisible and the Githyanki are friendly.
2. Teleport through the Cathrys Fort gate and enter Base HQ by teleporting through the front door
3. Move through the fort interior and teleport into the confinement area in the basement
4. Teleport through the various internal doors and find Iolethys in a cell. The quest will update.
5. Find a safe spot and use the Portal Marker that Sethress gave you. It will return you to Sethress and you will be back in physical form.
6. Sethress opens a portal from the Hag's area to the spot you marked in the Githyanki fort.
7. You pass through Sethress' portal and enter the Githyanki dungeon in physical form. The Githyanki are now hostile.
8. You clear the area, get the wards and the keys and free Iolethys.
To your particular problem, Astral Mode is turned off in the conversation with Sethress upon return. You will know if the code has been run because you are no longer semi-invisible and your companion rejoins the team. Also, when you return to the Githyanki fort, the doors into the prisoner area from upstairs are now unlocked whereas they were locked under Astral Mode. These are unlocked in the dungeon onClientEnter() and the same code sets the Githyanki hostile. The Githyanki Golems, however, only become hostile when you enter their cellblock.
In your particular run-through, in terms of the key points, what are the variances from what is listed here and what you experienced?
Edit: I don't remember the quest updating during my initial visit to the confinement area (your item #4). Perhaps I did not get close enough to the cell? Would that have thrown things off track?
I entered Ossian, cleared it, and found a Portal to Cathrys in the room with all the Gautier casualties. I defeated the Gith defending the portal. Rebecca made a redundant speech about the Gith having captured the researcher but we already knew that. We used that portal to travel to Cathrys. Once I got there the situation is as I described. However, I was able to use the console to change the Golems to Hostile and get the ward stones. I've spoken to the Researcher and have the tablet for my next destination. But since I'm off track, there is no place in Cathrys where I can use my personal portal rod. I've gone all the way back to the initial entry point by the ruins and I still get an Interference message.
It's 12:30 am here so I'm going to get some sleep.
You then spoke to Iolethys and got the Portal Tablet to the Celestial Academy but you can't use it because you are still stuck in the Githyanki dungeon/Cathrys. Note that the conversation with Iolethys should have automatically teleported you back to Colothys Fortress, but it too seems to have aborted (Red Flag 4).
And no, that you didn't update the quest by moving closer to Iolethys has nothing to do with your problems as it is just an informational update to tell you how to free Iolelthys.
There are at least four bizarre, inexplicable problems in this scenario, but the important thing for you is to get back to Colothys Fortress so you can move on. You've already indicated that you know how to use the console, so what you need to do is to run the script '310_onentry_setup' (without the quotes) to re-activate the personal portal. You should then be able to teleport back into the Fortress and move on from there.
I should mention, however, that none of these Red Flagged problems should ever happen, and that you got four of them means that the system is probably in some unstable state, likely by reading in a corrupted save file. How it got corrupted is anybody's guess, but while you might be able to continue on without a problem, if it failed this badly chances are it will fail again.
I apologize for this mess, but your best bet is to start again. Note that you seem to be using version 1.0, and if you're up to starting again I recommend that you use 1.1. The corruption has nothing to do with the verions, but 1.1 has some fixes to make the later areas easier to follow and to avoid some issues. The Changelog has the full details.
P.S. If you opened the Module in the Toolset and saved it, that would be one way that your save files could get corrupted, because changing a Module breaks saves.
MadHatter101
I only downloaded the file last weekend so it should be the current version.
As to the source of the corruption, I strongly suspect Micro$oft, Windows has been trying to get me to upgrade to Win 11, and it seems to be using a lot of system resources downloading crap and getting ready for the install. Logitech tried to start an install over the last day or two however so that might also be to blame.
I did use your in-game altar to "the Creator God' (nice touch there) to enable Debug mode. I'm seeing a couple second lag in each script reporting completion. It's possible I clicked on something too soon, and interrupted a running script by hitting another trigger. Does that make sense?
I just played Red Prison last month so I'm not keen to go through the whole Hub yet again. I've had pretty good luck running updates from the console in other games, incl the OC so I'll give this a shot before I consider anything drastic. I'll let you know in a hour or so if it worked.
Thanks so much for your patience and assistance.
However, based on your detailed explanation, I found a save game from shortly before the astral projection trip. I replayed from that point and got within a few feet of the Researcher's cell. This time I got a journal update, "Artifact entry 80, In Pursuit of the Artifact." That did not happen last time. When I returned to the Hags, I waited until her reply cleared from the screen on it's own. I might have rushed it last time. I got the portal, freed the celestial and was teleported back to the fortress. The fortress now seems to be updated with merchants and NPCs that weren't there before so it looks good at this point.
I'll let you know if anything else weird happens, hope you had a great weekend.
I don't understand why the script didn't activate the personal portal, but I admit I've never run it through the console before so maybe something weird went on. I'll check it out. I will also red-flag rushing Sethress' conversation and see if we can prevent another catastrophe.
Anyway, I hope things stay sane and that you enjoy our Module.
MadHatter101
Notes:
General:
Overall: I had fun. Bugs aside, there was plenty to keep the player occupied, the story was interesting, plot twists happened at surprising points. That all added up to an interesting couple of days.
My rating: 8.5
Camera issues is our bane it seems. We fixed some in Version 1.1, you've mentioned we have serious ones in the Academy, and we've at least got two others! These will be fixed in 1.2.
We will also provide a ranged-friendly armor alternative for the Champion of Torm and the Dragon Knight. Both of these Factions use very specific ranged weapons, though, and we will provide that along with the other equipment. It may not be the ideal weapon for the player, but it makes the most sense for Faction-supplied equipment. Of course, the player is free to build their own bow/crossbow through Stonehand and Niu, the same as if they prefer something other than the Faction-supplied melee weapon.
Your point about Critical Heals being near useless beyond the Hub is well taken, and the player should pick up any full Heals when they seem them as they are intentionally rare. You won't find any sold in Colothys but other merchants have a few, and there are a couple of caches of them if you look around.
One of the harsh realities of software development is that invariably the design exceeds the time you have to complete it and things get cut. Companion interaction was one of the things that got cut in our case, and as you noted, rather brutally. Of course, in a commercial product it would be added back in through a DLC, but not here. Our intent at this point is to get the Module fully functional and useable, but no new features or capabilities will be added.
MadHatter101
I'm using the PC I exported from last month's run through Red Prison so he's about half way through level 15. Other than needing better armor as a solo adventurer, he's doing well so far. All his gear was either purchased or crafted in Red Prison or Character Creator 3.0.
So far I don't see any reason you can't add a convo to the player asking if they played module 1 or are starting mod 2 independently. The only other thing it would need is Journal update and a place to pick up optional companions. So far, so good.
One stray idea - I've gotten used to the IM bags. You should consider adding one for Potions since the loot drops so many. Also I think these would be popular enough to bundle them in a stand alone utility that players could place in Override.
In terms of exporting the IMS for general use, it wouldn't be that hard to link into the default Module on-acquire rather than simply overriding it, but any module that uses that on-acquire would break and it wouldn't work with any Module that overrode it. Adding a console interface to turn it on and off could be easily done, but we couldn't shut the IMS off on opening stores so bought items would get eaten rather than normally dropped into the inventory and that can get confusing/aggravating. Nevertheless, I'll run it by the team and see if anyone wants to do it, but its not something I'd personally be interested in doing.
Adding Potions to the set would be as simple as creating another bag blueprint, adding BASE_ITEM_POTIONS to the switch in the on-acquire and copying and modifying one of the other entries appropriately. The IMS cleanup would also need to be augmented. The real question is whether it would be more aggravating than useful to have all potions you pick up automatically bagged. We thought it would be because potions are regularly used, and even if we excluded critical and full heals I remain skeptical. Regardless, its not something that we're going to fiddle with at this point given that it already works fine and that sort of change would have to be thoroughly tested over many situations.
MadHatter101
I should also mention that I'm not a big fan of having my char stripped of everything, but I can deal with that. What was really frustrating was that the first few fights were virtually impossible and none of the enemies we killed had any heals, weapons, or armor!
That said, it's always good to find a new mod to play! I'm enjoying the hack and slash and hope you'll be able to fix the above problems. I should also mention that I'm on a Mac, but I really don't think that has anything to do with what happened.
The room with the coffins is a trap, and it sounds like you figured how to get out except for the last step. The quest is not complete until you give Marendan (the ethereal guy behind the coffin) the staff dropped by the Sorceress. He is the quest-giver and teleports you out and gives you a prize once he has the staff. The journal tells you to talk to him once the Sorceress is killed. If it doesn't, or if Marendan doesn't teleport you out, then that's a problem that needs to be fixed.
The initial setup is intended to reflect that you've been dumped with the intent of disposing with you. They put you there to die, but they underestimated you, and not only do you survive, but you come back to become a threat that looms increasingly larger over time. Granted, the initial setup can be tough, but how tough varies widely with your character class and that of the companion. Some setups breeze through while others struggle and can only survive with hit-and-run tactics.
That, however, is an issue with Dungeons and Dragons combat in general and cannot really be addressed though game balancing. The initial setup was designed to be tough but doable for a Rogue and a Fighter pair. A Cleric or a Sorcerer, though, will probably find that balancing too easy. That said, once both are fully equipped, neither one should have a problem.
As to enemies dropping heals and equipment at the beginning, they actually do. Indeed, the intent is that you collect better equipment and more money to buy the potions and the equipment that you need. What drops and how often, however, is probability-based and it sounds like you got some bad breaks. The different factions drop different thing too.
MadHatter101
It was a building near the warehouse that we couldn't enter, I'm not sure which one.
During the first fights we encountered after being dumped and stripped nothing was dropped except some gold - no equipment at all - not until much later which made the early fights extremely difficult. If it's any help, my char is a Paladin and my companion a cleric so we certainly can fight, but it's not easy with just fists and kicks lol!
As to the big problem - something definitely went wrong with the quest. We put the sword and the staff in the coffin and talked to Marendanthe. He did not say anything after asking us for staff and never gave us a quest nor did he teleport us out.
And please, what fortress????
Btw, is there any reward if we do the puzzle correctly?
To your current situation, if you're using unarmed combat in the Hub, I'd guess that you missed the weapon cache just as you enter the area. Those two skeletons that attack you as you come in the door are guarding it, and when you take them down their remains allows you to open the cache hidden behind a secret door. It gives you some nice initial weapons (e.g. +5 Longsword, 2d4 acid, keen) and armor, and some potions to get you started. Without those, that area would be extraordinarily difficult, and that you made it through is astonishing. BTW, if you haven't actually been inside that cache yet it should still be available, and I suggest you get that equipment as they will last you well beyond the Hub area.
Let me run through the coffin quest:
1. Snuff out the candles revealing Marendan and his sarcophagus.
2. Kill Carmag and put his sword in Marendan's sarcophagus.
3. Vastrassian (the Sorceress) now jumps off her ledge and attacks
4. You kill Vastrassian and give Marendan her staff (you give it to him in a conversation when he asks for it. You don't put it in his sarcophagus with the sword)
5. Marendan teleports you out after giving you a prize. (Quest complete)
If you did those things as specified in that order and you don't get to step 5, then we have a problem with that quest and we'll check it out.
In regards to the Fortress, it is the central area of the game and you get to it once you've gotten out of the initial Hub. It has merchants and enhancers and the like. It is a central location in so far as many key conversations and actions take place there. You also get to the next areas through its portal.
As to the cache, I must have missed it which is strange since I usually have my finger on the z key while exploring. But that explains why we had nothing to protect ourselves. I'll definitely go back and check it out.
I went back to the casket room and gave the staff to Maredan and got the gift and was teleported out so that worked out fine. As to the hidden cache, all I found was a shorbow and 8 critical heals plus a bunch of empty chests. Maybe it's a mac thing?
Thanks again!
As to the possibility that it has something to do with you running on a Mac, I sincerely hope it isn't as it would indicate a NWN2 system bug, and there is absolutely nothing we could do about that.
So at the moment, I apologize for the mess, and hope that nothing else goes wrong for you.
MadHatter101
I've done some more testing since Mad had a look at it, and I have no idea why it failed for you either. But that doesn't mean I can't fix it! Well, maybe I can't really fix it but I put a failsafe on it so when you enter the cache room the system checks whether the equipment has been created, and if it hasn't it will create it again.
I know it sounds pretty dumb but we do this kind of thing fairly regularly for situations we consider to be critical: we ask the system to do something and then wait a bit and check whether it was really done, and if it wasn't, we shout louder. It actually works pretty well.
Sadly NWN2 doesn't support module patching so this fix will go in our next version. I just thought I'd let you know that we're doing something about your problem.
I know the game doesn't always work the way it's supposed to ! I'll let you know if I encounter any other glitches.
Not a glitch, but I'm back to ask for some help. I'm in the Colotjys Fortress, but I can't find any tablets to use on the portal. We defeated the first wave and nothing is happening so please, how do I get someplace other than the lower level?
If you've been through the counter-attack, you've cleared out the lower level of the Fortress, and when you clear out the last section behind the warded door, a new quest comes up, telling you to investigate that section for more information. On a table in the office at the back is a Portal Tablet and a note. That Portal Tablet allows you to teleport into Minethys, and the note tells you what you are looking for there. It also updates the quest. That is your next step.
Note however, that you will only be able to use that Portal Tablet into Minethys once the counter-attack is fully complete. You indicated that you defeated the first wave, but there are *three* waves. And if the counter-attack aborts after the first wave, that is a serious, game-breaking bug. I truly hope that is not what happened.
Try the Portal Tablet, and if it works, then good, carry on.
If it doesn't, you can try to restart from a save before the counter-attack and hope that you've run afoul of some sort of transient problem.
MadHatter101
Yes, the warded section is in the lower level, and the commander of the sub-level drops a wardstone allowing you to enter. Just approach the warded door with the wardstone in your inventory and it will open.
If you haven't been in that warded section, though, you can't have been through the counter-attack as both Portal Conduits are needed to start the Fortress Portal and the second one is dropped in that warded section.
Regardless, go to the warded section, defeat its defenders and then pick up the Portal Tablet to Minethys in the office at the back. To get to Minetheys, though, you will need to activate the Fortress Portal, and you will need to install those two Portal Conduits to do that. You do that through the Conduit stubs at the back of Portal Control.
Note that there will be a counter-attack through the Portal once its been activated. After defeating that counter-attack, you just install the Portal Tablet to Minethys, make it the active location through Portal Control, and then enter the Portal to get there. As an aside, the counter-attack is a formal battle, and you can enlist some of the Fortress personnel to assist you in defeating it. Different people can help in different ways, though not all have anything to offer here.
Thanks again for all the help!
As to Master Rancoshe, he is protected by three Astral Statues and each statue is deactivated by an Astral key. Each of the three rooms on the lower level has one of those keys. They are initially protected by a blue shield but that shield is deactivated when all of the surrounding monks have been defeated. When their blue shield is deactivated the keys look like white glowing blobs floating over an open well, and should be easy to spot.
You take those keys and give one to each of the Astral Statues to clear the shield blocking Master Rancoshe's door to open his inner sanctum.
One detail is that the Silver Sword severs the Astral Cord of Astral Travellers but you must strike them with the sword before they are aware of you. PVP settings disallow attacking friendly NPCs so we were forced to improvise and used a proximity trigger. If you approach an Astral Travelling NPC within striking distance while wielding the Silver Sword you will kill them with it instantly. If you approach them wielding anything else, they will become aware of you, jump out of their Astral station and attack. The active striking distance is very close so get as close as you can. Also, their Astral Station protects them from the back so attack them from the front.
I'm now in the Cathrys Fort and have three ward stones, but I can't open loleths' cell. I might have messed up - when nothing worked I broke the ground switch and I'm not sure if that's part of the problem. If it isn't asking too much, can you tell me how to open the cell and get him out of the magic cone - or give me a code to do it if the broken switch is a big problem?
Thanks in advance!
The broken switch could be a problem for you need to pull it after you open Iolethys' door. I guess it depends on what you mean by 'broken'. If its simply not there any longer then you're going to have to go back to an earlier save because the code it runs checks a local variable, and if the object isn't there then the variable will always return FALSE and the code will just immediately exit. Some other form of broken might still work, though.
Obviously, that switch should not be destroyable and I will red-flag it to make it plot, but as it stands there is no way to work around a destroyed switch because, as noted, the code it runs checks local state while the code after that check must be run to free Iolethys.
I apologize for this problem.
If the switch is still there, though, get the fourth wardstone and open the door. Pulling the switch should then free Iolethys.
MadHatter101
My bad - I bashed the switch and it is gone. I have to check to see if I have a save from before - fingers crossed.
I restarted from an earlier save and it worked. I should mention that when looking at the magic lock it seems like there are 3 lights rather than 4.
And I'm sorry to say I'm at another impasse. I'm in the Celestial Labs, and killed the enemies, but the door is locked and there is a magical barrier blocking the exit. I'd appreciate some help please - or a code to open the door if necessary.
Thank you!
The Celestial Labs is opened one piece at a time and the lights on the floor and the statues before the passages mark where you can currently go. When a passage is available the floor lights are blue and the statues have a blue aura.
The very first section available is the Chess Challenge. Follow the passage leading to the left all the way to the end, go down the stairs and interact with the console in front of the big chess board. I should mention that, by design, the Celestial Labs can be a bit tricky and you need to pay attention to the details because there are alternate ways to solve some problems, and some ways are easier than others.
BTW, the passage with the magical barrier is where you go last.
MadHatter101
I did the chess puzzle which led to a fight and now I'm stuck in an area with stairs and a large door which I can't open (the one where a big fight took place). There is no place I can go - the bottom of the stairs is blocked with a magic wall.
When you put these goggles on they allow you to see and manipulate some ethereal things that you wouldn't ordinarily see. But you can't keep them on all the time because they also obscure some things that you would normally see. So moving through the Labs involves putting the Goggles on and taking them off in order to see all the things that you need to progress.
So, if you're stuck, chances are you either need to put the Goggles on or take them off.
If that doesn't give you a path out, I'll need some more details, like who you fought and how you got there.
After clearing out the Academy grounds I was give permission to visit the labs and was give a ward stone. We fought the attackers and entered the building. I started from the bottom and found the chess game. After the fight we explored the area around it and then went upstairs. There was a large group in front of the door at the top of the stairs (between 2 statues). We killed them, but no goggles were dropped and the door can't be opened. Now I'm stuck on the top landing. If one of the attackers in front the door were supposed to drop the goggles can you give me a chest code to get them - or did I miss something?
The first is if you successfully pass the Chess Challenge, that is, demonstrate checkmate in two or three moves. They are given to you as a reward. You then use them to navigate over the chasm that is up the stairs and to the right. The statues in front of that chasm will have changed from red to blue to mark that that is you next pathway.
The second is if you either fail to pass the Chess Challenge or select 'How about something else?' In that case a group of big bugs breaks through the wall and attacks. When you defeat those bugs you must take the alternate path of wisdom through the sewer, and that means entering the breach in the wall where the bugs came out of. You will eventually go up a ladder into the bug's lair. At the top of the ladder you are attacked by another group of bugs and eventually the boss bug arrives and attacks. When the boss bug is defeated you get a prize box but, most importantly, the boss bug drops the Goggles of Miraculous Seeing.
From your description, though, it sounds like you defeated the group of bugs around the chess board but then went back upstairs rather then follow the bugs into the sewer. It also sounds like when you did that you encountered a group of Githyanki by the initial entrance. Those Githyanki should have attacked you when you initially arrived in the Labs but it seems that the trigger failed on-entry but was triggered when you entered it the second time. Their death just updates the Labs quest.
If that sound like your situation, go back to the chess board and enter the breach in the wall that the bugs came out of. You then follow the path around to the bug's lair. Kill the boss bug, get the Goggles and put them on. You will then see the way out.
If that is *not* your situation, then I need to know how you handled the Chess Challenge because that is the determinator of how you get the Goggles.
Btw, we were attacked by a group of Githyanki by the initial entrance and then again in front of the door where I'm stuck.
Have you considered writing a hint guide - it would be very helpful?
Thanks again for the quick answer!
The first thing I'll need is a screenshot of where you currently are, and you should be able to upload one into the image section of this Mod. Once I have a look at it, we'll go from there.
I'm going to do some more checking off-line, tho' cause its pretty clear that there's a pathing bug in the Labs someplace and we'd don't want anyone else getting lost on account of it. Sorry it messed you around.
CheshireCat7
I hope some of this is helpful.
As to the pathing problems in the Labs, CheshireKat is still working on that, but if you managed to get someplace you shouldn't have been, then its not surprising that things weren't in the right state. As I said, we don't actually know what happened yet, though, so that is just idle talk.
MadHatter101
I really didn't expect to be back so soon, but I would appreciate more help! I got the quest from the Bugbears and am in the cave. I found a barrel of explosives, but there doesn't seem to be anything I can interact with. Should there be? How do I save the bugbears?
If you're in a hurry, the answer is below ...
**SPOILER**
Position the barrel to blast down the wall on the left to create a passage over the lava. The active trigger is 5m wide so there is some leeway in positioning.
I must admit to becoming somewhat frustrated. I took down the wall and saved the bugbears and entered the North mine. I have been through the whole mine several times, found 2 or 3 ground switches, but I can't find the entrance to the forge. Nothing was mentioned about the switches or what they did when used. Btw, you might want to make the switches a little more noticeable - the only way I found one of them was by just moving my cursor around the bottom of one of the statues while holding the "z" key. If there are more, I couldn't find them and have just running around in circles.
Clearly, though, the statue switches can be better marked, and we've added some markers behind them. They are initially red but turn green once the switch has been pulled. This both marks the position of the switch and indicates its current state.
Here's how the system works ....
** SPOILER **
Statues and Switches
There are five statues and four switches. There are also four orange streaming pillars in front of the statue without a switch. Those pillars mark that area as a control area.
When you pull a switch, one of those pillars turns from orange to green. That is, those pillars mark how many switches there are and how many have been pulled so far.
When you have pulled all four switches behind the statues, a fifth switch appears between those four pillars. It is marked with a pulsing beacon so it is easily seen. Pulling that fifth switch opens a passage behind the statue just in front. Entering that passage leads into a room with a big door behind a pool of lava. In front of that pool of lava are two braziers. Light them and a bridge is created over the lava and the big doors open.
Walking over the bridge leads to another room with a set of stairs leading up and a door at the top. Go up the stairs and through the door and you're now in the Fortress.
You have to navigate through the Fortress to get to the Forge. Don't forget that the Fortress is the home of the Demon Lord Adrishaan and there will be strong defenders around. The area might be worth exploring too but don't forget where you are, and always keep in mind that your objective is to get to the Hell Forge, and a side exit is to be preferred because the front door is going to be well-defended.
Statue Locations
#1. Statue #1 is on the right as you come in the mine.
Going left is another room but no statue, so follow the passage to the right up to the door. Pass through and there are passages to the left, right and center.
#2. Statue #2 is down the passage to the left.
Following the center passage leads to another door. Pass through and there are passages to the left and right. The passage to the left leads to a runed door which you can explore.
#3. Statue #3 is down the passage to the right. It is the statue without a switch and with four streaming pillars in front. That is, this is the control area.
Continuing down that passage leads to a fork in the road with a door on the right.
#4. Statue #4 is to the left.
Opening the door to the right is a long passage, and halfway down is a large open area but no statues, so continue to the end.
#5. Statue #5 is at the end.
Taking the passage to the right after the first door is a long passage with a door at the end. Passing through this door lead you to the large area in the middle of the other long passage. Clearly, Statue #4 is to the left and Statue #5 is to the right.
What I recommend is that you check each switch and make certain that they are all pulled, and then go the control area with the pillars and see if there's a fifth switch. It'll be in the middle of the pillars and have a green pulsing beacon on it. If its there, then just pull it and carry on. If it is not there and all the switches have been pulled, then you've got a irremediable problem.
Assuming that the pillars are still working properly, you can find the unpulled switches by looking at which pillars are orange. In terms of the statue numbers I gave you earlier, when you face the pillars, the corresponding statue is, from left to right, 1, 2, 4, 5.
Lastly, in terms of updating the MOD so you can use the new markers and other fixes, unfortunately, changing a NWN2 module breaks saves, so you cannot use a save file from a previous version with an updated module. When we release an update it will have a different module name reflecting the version exactly so it won't break saves. We have enough fixes to warrant a new version at the moment, but we are still testing it, so it won't be out at least for several days.
Strange, two of the columns were green but when I returned after finding the 4th switch, all of them were green and the 5th switch was there. Maybe I clicked on one of the other switches while running around, but I'm pretty sure I just clicked on one of them.
In any case, I've been to hell and back thanks to all of your help! I also wanted to mention that some of the doors and portals can only be accessed by using the the "W" key, not by clicking on them. I'm not sure if they were supposed to be that way so I thought I'd mention it.
Love the weapon enhancements!
It sounds like there was a glitch in turning one of the pillars from orange to green but because the code checks them all every time one is changed, it was able to recover. Chalk up one for our fault-recovery programming!
I am not certain what you mean by using the 'W' key aside from the normal WASD control. Sometimes NWN2 glitches out, though, and the mouse interface ceases to respond properly, and perhaps that's what happened in your case. As far as I'm aware, we don't have direct access through the API to the keyboard, to change or to even read, so whatever happened it wasn't by our design.
I'm back, hopefully for the last time! I'm in the artifact, killed everybody there, and am stuck for a change. There are only 3 things I can interact with and I can't seem to do anything with any of them (2 large statues and the small one upstairs). I have no idea where the control panel is that I have to use so any help you can give would be greatly appreciated! I would dearly love to finish the game after all of this lol!
Your primary control tool in the Artifact is the Nullifier Rod. It is the key that unlocks everything, so if you're stuck, use it.
The statues that you need are in the opposite direction, under the water. There is some water-breathing gear at the dock. That zone has some camera issues too because NWN2 treats the water surface strangely. You can't see through the water unless the camera is underneath it even though you can see the lights underneath when the camera is above it. That means that you can navigate by the lights when the camera is above the surface but you can't see to fight or manipulate the statues unless the camera is beneath the surface. The zone is deep enough that you can bring the camera down to see when you need to but the transition is a bit wonky.
Addendum. I've made that small building (this is one of my areas) into an Environment Object so the camera shouldn't be fighting with it any more. Hopefully, that will clear up the issues with your Mac. That involved redoing the walkmesh so it'll push back the release of our next version a bit.
I'm sorry, but the underwater area is virtually impossible to navigate. Walking is very difficult and it's extremely jumpy. I just don't know how to describe it any better. To make matters worse the view keeps changing from under the water to above. I'm afraid I'm done - it's just not much fun when it's so much work.
I've enjoyed the game, but it looks like I'm not going to be able to finish. Thanks again for the all the fun and all the help!
Regards,
MadHatter101
I bit the bullet and went back into the game - and was able to navigate the underwater adventure. Unfortunately, the third area is even worse for me than the water was! It must be a real memory hog because my computer had a lot of trouble with it. It was hard to get my char to walk - very sticky, and I got dumped to the desktop during one of the fights with the veterans. I tried again, but it's very hard to see anything, especially where you can move, and my char kept getting stuck in walls. I'm giving up, but will most probably try the updated version some time in the future.
Thanks again for the fun and the help!
The Artifact area in general gets bogged down. As far as we can tell it is due to NWN2 not releasing graphics resources (rather than system RAM), so the more limited the RAM on your graphics card the sooner the game will start to bog down. Unfortunately, there is no virtual memory for graphics, and so when the graphics memory is used up the system will crash. That's my guess as to what happened.
After some experimentation, we've discovered that the electrical discharge effects that continually run in the Artifact are leading to the slow downs, and by eliminating them the problem disappears. That is the fix that we will apply, and it will be part of our next release. We expect to release a new version in a day or so.
MadHatter101