Since you've already made an Ordinator patch, would it be possible to do similar as Shadow Spell Package - Ordinator Patch has done? I'd very much like to use your balancing changes with the more extensive Ordinator compatibility.
I believe the main version of my mod will already do this, as all Ordinator does is check to see if a spell is flagged as novice or apprentice (which this mod does to the SSP spells).
Hello, you have the opportunity to make the same fix on the LE edition with bug fixes, but do not touch the balance of spells except for the power of atronach.
Unfortunately, I don't even have LE to be able to port this. However, if someone wants to backport my mod to LE, they're more than welcome to do so! All I ask is they include a link to my mod in their description page.
Second: While exploring the mod plugin in xEdit, I found the Shadow Spell Package - Tweaks and Bug Fixes does not overwrite any data from ShadowSpellPackage.esp, in fact, there are errors reported when checking.
I downloaded several versions of Shadow Spell Package Tweaks, and checked the plugins in xEdit...and found the same issue, which was interesting.
I downloaded an earlier version of the Shadow Spell Package (5.01SE) and found your mod overwrote the plugin data correctly. So other users may want to know this information...otherwise your plugin data will have no impact on their game. (And would explain the bug report.)
Is your mod applicable for the 5.02SE version of Shadow Spell Package?
This seems strange. The mod itself depends on Shadow Spell Package as master plugin; if it weren't overwriting any changes, the game would crash on startup. SSEEdit wouldn't even be able to load it. I just checked and the plugin does indeed override values in the original SSP .esp, as shown in the image above. My thought is, for some reason, when you downloaded my mod, it either a) wasn't downloading correctly, or b) wasn't being loaded correctly by the game engine/SSEEdit itself.
Hi! I missed your patch when making a new list, the hamster came first in the list and hypnotized me =o Thanks for the fix and the balance!
Of course feel free to ignore the stuff below/not answer, you already did a lot and i don't mean to come across as rude or disrespectful with my opinions/tinkering (balance opinion in the last two parts)
I'm glad to have seen your patch, it took me a lot of thought to understand your balance choices and i had not realized how broken those spells were, there is a lot going on. I really feel like your approach made sense but there were two things that grabbed my attention and so i got into sseedit pretty much for the first time to see if i could personalize a few values:
I changed the magnitude column in your tweak patch's column on the spell pages exclusively, orienting myself thanks to the values and obvious names (i also modified the values related to shadowform accordingly), it seems to work for now but if you want i would appreciate to know if i did well.
Anyway, here are the changes i made and the logic (ordinator on):
I feel like vanilla spells should be pretty comparable to shadowspells:
-The bonus effects higher in the tree are often very potent and the magicka/stamina drain are not to underestimate
-Even though some npcs do have resistances to specific elements, there are partial countermeasures to those backed in ordinator. Additionaly, not many enemies resist fire but many have a weakness to it, frost has the hardest time but includes elements of cc without dealing much less damage and thunder is very very rarely resisted. -> Comparing thunder to shadow wouldn't be too hard and the vanilla elements seem to have similar numbers.
->If thunder=shadow and thunder=fire=frost i think i can trust this point of view
An additional note is that since the ordinator non-elemental damage perk was meant for triumvirate (is it base ordinator or the trium patch? i don't remember) and the dark arts tome +25% fill the same role, it would be op to combine both. I like to have to invest the points so i won't use the tome for my playthrough. Taking its existence into account to nerf the shadowspell by/1.25 would make going for it a prerequisite to using the spells which i wouldn't consider really fun. Of course it's good to make it so the shadow spell don't overshadow the vanilla ones, but the opposite should be true as well in my opinion.
The "real" change is Shadowbolt:
I feel like the nerf on shadowbolt is too intense. Since the randomness of the bonus seems to be an issue, i thought dividing vanilla values by 1.3 would be honest (one time you're bothered by light, one time you fight in the dark). Even though characters can play at night or summon darkness they will sometimes be surprised in the day when shopping and such or have to go through extra steps to get their damage.
Nerfing the damage too hard can make the spell tedious to use (the full on half damage seems very bad without the perk and darkness) not accounting for the hidden nerf through shadow form's interaction.
I pretty much ignored the existence of the fear effect but maybe i'm underestimating it. If we factor it in, i would probably just replace the /1.3 by /1.5 to avoid the main use of the spell as the base long range spammable straying too far from that use
Apprentice: fire bolt /1.3 = 19 damage At worse .3 bonus damage at this level doesn't really represent a terrible balancing issue and fire bolt would be too superior otherwise.
Adept: Fireball&co have 40 damage and AoE, vanilla shadowbolt is only 35, i restored it if it is too strong i missed something
Expert: incinerate/1.3 = 46 damage This one i'm not perfectly sure about but at this level you probably benefit from the very potent higher perks and the elemental bonus effects. Maybe it should be a bit lower still... Would be just a few units down because of the multipliers, 40 would already be too low, but I'd be curious to hear another opinion.
The "variety" change is Drain Soul:
I liked a lot that drain soul dealt more damage than it drained, it has personality compared to fixed versions of vampiric drain and other things in the theme, plus it creates an interesting synamic with the choice to use shadow form or not. Plus it tickles my final fantasy dark knight soft spot which oscillates between a glass canon that sacrifices health for damage and a tank that drains a bit of life and mana to fuel itself
Considering 1 heal = 1 damage to a certain extent (especially when we buff the damage, more burst against an enemy can be more powerful by itself) i exchanged 1 drain against 2 pure damage while respecting your values:
Novice: 4 damage 2 drain This is an exception. Considering it has a magnitude of 6 (4 damage and 2 heal since the drain does both) i thought it should join the usual 8
Hello! I'm glad you were able to tweak the values to your liking!
I don't plan on changing my mod's values at anytime soon, as I feel it's in a pretty good place. However, I will continue to play around with the mod and, if I feel something needs to be tweaked, will certainly upload it to the Nexus. Thank you for your feedback!
Would it be much to ask for shadowbolt to get an upgrade to somewhere in the 30s damage instead of 26? The 1.6x multiplier is very situational and isn't going to happen all the time. I prefer something I can rely on generally instead of something that's "Useful only in the right situations".
Personally, I'd try doing it myself, but every time I try opening the file with notepad, I get a a bunch of symbols vomited all over the screen and I can't tell what I'm supposed to touch. Creation Kit is of no use either, telling me it failed "because of multiple masters being loaded" anytime I try to touch the shadow spell mods.
I've actually looked into doing something like this before. I've wanted to increase the flat damage of Shadowbolt and decrease its "random" damage; however, I have the same problem as you. Looking at the scripts doesn't prove very helpful. I'd have to dig more into this to try to find out exactly what line controls Shadowbolt's variable damage.
I always felt like it was an oversight that Dark Sun doesn't make it so vampires can exist in the daylight, akin to using Auriel's Bow. I do feel like that should be added, whether it's supposed to and isn't (as a bug) or just hasn't been added and should be altered
Crushing Darkness spell Expert level is still marked as Adept in my magic menu, even if it scaled properly to Expert level in terms of its effects. This is the only spell I am having trouble with, all the others are marked correctly in the magic menu. How can I change the tag from Adept to Expert in SSEEdit ? Or can you upload a fix that properly displays that the spell is Expert ?
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the textures of the rune installed on the surface are not displayed
Second: While exploring the mod plugin in xEdit, I found the Shadow Spell Package - Tweaks and Bug Fixes does not overwrite any data from
ShadowSpellPackage.esp, in fact, there are errors reported when checking.
I downloaded several versions of Shadow Spell Package Tweaks, and checked the plugins in xEdit...and found the same issue, which was interesting.
I downloaded an earlier version of the Shadow Spell Package (5.01SE) and found your mod overwrote the plugin data correctly. So other users may want to know this information...otherwise your plugin data will have no impact on their game. (And would explain the bug report.)
Is your mod applicable for the 5.02SE version of Shadow Spell Package?
This seems strange. The mod itself depends on Shadow Spell Package as master plugin; if it weren't overwriting any changes, the game would crash on startup. SSEEdit wouldn't even be able to load it. I just checked and the plugin does indeed override values in the original SSP .esp, as shown in the image above. My thought is, for some reason, when you downloaded my mod, it either a) wasn't downloading correctly, or b) wasn't being loaded correctly by the game engine/SSEEdit itself.
Of course feel free to ignore the stuff below/not answer, you already did a lot and i don't mean to come across as rude or disrespectful with my opinions/tinkering (balance opinion in the last two parts)
I'm glad to have seen your patch, it took me a lot of thought to understand your balance choices and i had not realized how broken those spells were, there is a lot going on. I really feel like your approach made sense but there were two things that grabbed my attention and so i got into sseedit pretty much for the first time to see if i could personalize a few values:
I changed the magnitude column in your tweak patch's column on the spell pages exclusively, orienting myself thanks to the values and obvious names (i also modified the values related to shadowform accordingly), it seems to work for now but if you want i would appreciate to know if i did well.
Anyway, here are the changes i made and the logic (ordinator on):
I feel like vanilla spells should be pretty comparable to shadowspells:
-The bonus effects higher in the tree are often very potent and the magicka/stamina drain are not to underestimate
-Even though some npcs do have resistances to specific elements, there are partial countermeasures to those backed in ordinator.
Additionaly, not many enemies resist fire but many have a weakness to it, frost has the hardest time but includes elements of cc without dealing much less damage and thunder is very very rarely resisted. -> Comparing thunder to shadow wouldn't be too hard and the vanilla elements seem to have similar numbers.
->If thunder=shadow and thunder=fire=frost i think i can trust this point of view
An additional note is that since the ordinator non-elemental damage perk was meant for triumvirate (is it base ordinator or the trium patch? i
don't remember) and the dark arts tome +25% fill the same role, it would be op to combine both. I like to have to invest the points so i won't use the tome for my playthrough. Taking its existence into account to nerf the shadowspell by/1.25 would make going for it a prerequisite to using the spells which i wouldn't consider really fun. Of course it's good to make it so the shadow spell don't overshadow the vanilla ones, but the opposite should be true as well in my opinion.
The "real" change is Shadowbolt:
I feel like the nerf on shadowbolt is too intense. Since the randomness of the bonus seems to be an issue, i thought dividing vanilla values by 1.3 would be honest (one time you're bothered by light, one time you fight in the dark). Even though characters can play at night or summon darkness they will sometimes be surprised in the day when shopping and such or have to go through extra steps to get their damage.
Nerfing the damage too hard can make the spell tedious to use (the full on half damage seems very bad without the perk and darkness) not accounting for the hidden nerf through shadow form's interaction.
I pretty much ignored the existence of the fear effect but maybe i'm underestimating it. If we factor it in, i would probably just replace the /1.3 by /1.5 to avoid the main use of the spell as the base long range spammable straying too far from that use
Apprentice: fire bolt /1.3 = 19 damage
At worse .3 bonus damage at this level doesn't really represent a terrible balancing issue and fire bolt would be too superior otherwise.
Adept: Fireball&co have 40 damage and AoE, vanilla shadowbolt is only 35, i restored it if it is too strong i missed something
Expert: incinerate/1.3 = 46 damage
This one i'm not perfectly sure about but at this level you probably benefit from the very potent higher perks and the elemental bonus effects. Maybe it should be a bit lower still... Would be just a few units down because of the multipliers, 40 would already be too low, but I'd be curious to hear another opinion.
The "variety" change is Drain Soul:
I liked a lot that drain soul dealt more damage than it drained, it has personality compared to fixed versions of vampiric drain and other things in the theme, plus it creates an interesting synamic with the choice to use shadow form or not. Plus it tickles my final fantasy dark knight soft spot which oscillates between a glass canon that sacrifices health for damage and a tank that drains a bit of life and mana to fuel itself
Considering 1 heal = 1 damage to a certain extent (especially when we buff the damage, more burst against an enemy can be more powerful by itself) i exchanged 1 drain against 2 pure damage while respecting your values:
Novice: 4 damage 2 drain This is an exception. Considering it has a magnitude of 6 (4 damage and 2 heal since the drain does both) i thought it should join the usual 8
Apprentice: 6 damage 3 drain Transformed 1 drain into 2 non-drain damage
Adept: 12 damage 6 drain Transformed 2 drain into 4 non-drain damage
Expert: 18 damage 9 drain You get it
Anyway, thanks a lot for the patch (and for reading since you're here ^^), i hope i didn't do goof and if i'm completely wrong my apologies
I don't plan on changing my mod's values at anytime soon, as I feel it's in a pretty good place. However, I will continue to play around with the mod and, if I feel something needs to be tweaked, will certainly upload it to the Nexus. Thank you for your feedback!
Personally, I'd try doing it myself, but every time I try opening the file with notepad, I get a a bunch of symbols vomited all over the screen and I can't tell what I'm supposed to touch. Creation Kit is of no use either, telling me it failed "because of multiple masters being loaded" anytime I try to touch the shadow spell mods.
This is the only spell I am having trouble with, all the others are marked correctly in the magic menu.
How can I change the tag from Adept to Expert in SSEEdit ? Or can you upload a fix that properly displays that the spell is Expert ?