Incline Wizardry 8 Enhancements - A Call to Arms!

[WaltC333]

You mean trynton?
Got screenshots etc?

Yes, Trynton. It's really nothing worthy of a screen shot (besides the fact that it wouldn't really say anything about the cause of the lockup)... Basically, with my current save games, about 50% of the time when I engage in combat the game will simply lock. It's very predictable--wasps, faeries, whatever--the game locks in Trynton. This could be related to anything, though! As I said initially, I should have simply started a new game when I installed .75, but...I didn't... This is one of my all-time favorite games, actually. I first played it the year it originally shipped, and remember thinking, "Well, this is a pleasant surprise--what a well-kept secret!"

I really, really appreciate what K is doing here, and I'd be lying if I didn't say that I was sort of lusting after the completed version... But, things are done when they are done, right? I'm not concerned with it--I guess "bug" was a poor choice of words--since I think it's related to simply using an earlier save--which may in fact be older than than I think it is!

 

[Bloax]

If it's relevant at all then I've shortened some combat sounds since some of them were quite long and didn't really achieve much but stall the faster combat.
Although whether they can be put to use is an entirely different question.

And speaking of faster combat - if you're the guy behind speeding up the monster animations, that is - then you forgot to speed up the Savant Orb animations. :p

Sais could also use something besides adding 1 AC and a couple of extra Kill% to the class that already instakills a lot, perhaps Kill 4%/Swings+1 instead of Kill 5%? (After all, you'll only "reliably" get them at Ferro.)

 

[Bloax]

Pardon the doublepost (this forum really doesn't want me to edit my posts does it) - but necklaces of endurance being wearable by any class and race except fairies is both strange and encourages something awful like reloading until the monastery assistant's chest gives you a locket of reflection.
And I can tell you from experience that it's no fun doing that, and it would be easily preventable if said necklaces didn't have a weird exception like that.
(Since getting a pair of these doesn't require an hour of redoing a specific early area of the game.)

 

[DraQ]

I think the elephant in the room as far as the Lord is concerned is that unlike the weeaboo classes Lord can't rely on class specific equipment.
Weeaboo classes have their own little gear universe that can be tweaked to compensate for their wimpiness, Lord, OTOH, being a westernfag, uses the same old swords, maces, and armour as other classes.
This means that no matter how powerful you make Zizka Star or Saint Bastard or whatever Lord will keep sucking until the endgame where he gets it.

I really think Lord should get an overhaul.
First is bishop's uncurse usable only out of combat? It could be a neat ability to give to Lord, and would play nice with health regen as it would make Lord the primary user of cursed stuff without versatility loss.
Second, priest's prayer - it would fit well with character (see all the folklore about noble knights praying left and right) and help make lord more distinctive and useful. Maybe some bonus resists too?
Of course class skill changed from 2W to something else (though maybe not mace).

I'd also consider downgrading Lord to non-hybrid (so non-caster) - sort of pious, extremely tank oriented fighter with no berserk, without magic, but defensive and supportive specials. Defensive role could be further reinforced by some class-unique high tier armor and maybe cloak.

As for the other classes - what about giving bards 2W as class skill and glass-cannoning ninjas as much as possible (backstab in addition to crits and thrown criticals, mage's health on level up)?

And axing stealth (since we can't unbreak it)?

 

[Bloax]

Well axing stealth would mean ninjas and monks having nonexistent AC, and where's the fun in that?

 

[DraQ]

Well axing stealth would mean ninjas and monks having nonexistent AC, and where's the fun in that?

Axing stealth would mean rogues not being Übertanks anymore and ninja shouldn't be able to tank at all anyway.
As for the monks, they could get buff to their damage resistance, HPs and whatnot.

 

[Shadenuat]

Stealth allows for flexibility in choosing front row and tanking characters so no, axing it would be a bad idea.
Lord is okay as he is now, but a resist to some status effect probably won't hurt. Many classes have one. Not sure what it should be, Hex maybe? Since he can't be cursed.

 

[DraQ]

Stealth allows for flexibility in choosing front row and tanking character

Yes, it allows non-tanks to tank.
Maybe we should give all classes 4-school casting abilities, locks'n'traps, berserk and eliminate all item restrictions.
This way there would be even more flexibility.

 

[Shadenuat]

It allows classes without heavy armor to hit something while standing in melee and not die while using abilities that are core of their class - like backstab, unarmed, critical hit, etc.
There is no "tanking" in this game, because there is no aggro mechanics. And Stealth only rocks after midgame, before it the best defence is bloated HP pool.

Also, removing skills is not an "enhancement", it's closer to "meh perfect view of balanced gaem". Stripping game of "unbalanced" content is a poor way of modding it. Either balance shit or don't touch it. I can balance game like that too: make a char with stealth and not put 3 points in it every level. Fixed stealth lol.

 

[Kaucukovnik]

Agreed. Stealthy char is no tank unless you have full front row of them, in which case you are most likely intentionally cheesing the game and you are not interested in a fix for that anyway.
One or two stealthy chars just redirect more damage to non-stealthy ones, effectively reducing your "tanking HP pool".

Got full party of rogues and ninjas? Hope you enjoy throwing away 90% of found equipment and dying to area effect spells.

Bloax : Thanks for the sound effects, if they indeed work I'll make them a part of the "fast combat anims" option. And you will be credited, of course.
Good point with the necklace too. Removing the strong need to farm for certain key pieces of gear is very much my intention. I can get the idea behind the limitation (pronouncing fairy frailness), but it's unnecessary given its side-effects.

 

[DraQ]

It allows classes without heavy armor to hit something while standing in melee and not die while using abilities that are core of their class - like backstab, unarmed, critical hit, etc.

It first and foremost allows classes without heavy armor to behave as if they had heavy armor. If you have some heavily armored fellows in the front row they make a good job prolonging the lives of their lightly armored comrades by distributing enemy attacks alone, they can also actively defend them literally taking blows for them, light frontliners can also be cycled to the back of the party if they can't take the heat, or, if you're using "hollow point" formation, have tanks move in front of them even if they are incapacitated. Then you have buffs like stoneskin and guardian angel as well as plain old healing.

There is no "tanking" in this game, because there is no aggro mechanics.

Whenever you can arrange for a more durable character to take damage instead of a less durable one, you have tanking.
Aggro mechanics is for WoWtards who lack intellectual capacity to manage tanking without magical ability to order enemies to attack suboptimal targets.

Also, removing skills is not an "enhancement", it's closer to "meh perfect view of balanced gaem".

Actually, I agree.
The thing is that we aren't making the game and don't have full access to things we would like to change.
I know how I'd fix stealth - make it not contribute to AC and make ignored characters (successful stealth) incapable of blocking access to deeper rows just like incapacitated ones - but if we can't do it, then axing seems to be the way.

I can balance game like that too: make a char with stealth and not put 3 points in it every level. Fixed stealth lol.

We are discussing modding game, not playing it.
I don't care how you larp.

Agreed. Stealthy char is no tank unless you have full front row of them, in which case you are most likely intentionally cheesing the game

Is having, say, monk, rogue and ninja in the front, then, for example Vi and someone else on flanks, plus a bunch of casters in the center such a clearly cheesed party?

Got full party of rogues and ninjas? Hope you enjoy throwing away 90% of found equipment and dying to area effect spells.

You can have whomever you want in deeper rows, including casters to buff against AoE and valkyries or such on flanks (for extended attacks to the front and heavy gear utilization).

 

[Kaucukovnik]

Is having, say, monk, rogue and ninja in the front, then, for example Vi and someone else on flanks, plus a bunch of casters in the center such a clearly cheesed party?

Should we axe stealth, the party from your example has no capable frontliners in most late-game areas (Vi won't go to Bayjin and Rapax areas, at least not without heavy penalties).

And sure, you can swap glass cannon frontliners with "tanks", but remember that THE criticism of Wiz8 is tedious combat. Do you really want to add on top of that for the sake of removing possible cheese?
And is stealthy front row really that much more cheesy than, say, three fighters berserking all the time?

 

[Shadenuat]

Aggro mechanics is for WoWtards who lack intellectual capacity to manage tanking without magical ability to order enemies to attack suboptimal targets.

Oh don't give me that bullshit. Monster attacks in Wiz8 are highly random and all carry crazy status effects, and you'll be able to maybe guard just 1 char. Getting everything on 1 guy will just get him wasted, and without stealth non-fighters will get wasted. If there would be a better way to distribute damage around characters it won't be such an issue, but that's just how it is in the game. Get poked by Picus, blind, you're out for a time, if not dead.

We are discussing modding game, not playing it.
I don't care how you larp.

And I don't care what your sawyer complex dictates you to cut for balance. As I see it, the mod tries to make playing poor classes more interesting and party composition more flexible, make weak abilities and spells valuable, make classes like mage or lord more competent. Not downgrade those that are already fun to shitty.
I see no reason to remove anything from the game if we're talking "enhancing" experience, not stealth, not ability to solo game with ninja fairy or whatever.
If you find Stealth too powerful and would rather use Guard/micro rows - you can do it without any mods.

But that's really just arguing mod ethics. P. banal, and that's all for Kaucukovnik to decide. If he was able to mod Stealth formula somehow he would probably done it or at least concider it already I guess.

 

[DraQ]

Is having, say, monk, rogue and ninja in the front, then, for example Vi and someone else on flanks, plus a bunch of casters in the center such a clearly cheesed party?

Should we axe stealth, the party from your example has no capable frontliners in most late-game areas (Vi won't go to Bayjin and Rapax areas, at least not without heavy penalties).

You can recruit other NPCs, force Vi into areas she doesn't want to, switch classes, rely on buffs, try to fight from distance, try to glasscannon your way through, etc. The game gives you the tools.

Anyway, you shouldn't expect to be able to tank if you have no tanks.

I absolutely *LOATHE* axing shit, but I don't really see how to manage stealth cheese without deeper access to underlying mechanics than is currently possible.

but remember that THE criticism of Wiz8 is tedious combat.

Nope. If Wizardry 8 had tedious combat no one would be playing it, because there is scarcely anything else to do in it but combat.
THE criticism of Wizardry 8 is too much filler combat which slows meaningful gameplay progression to a crawl and makes even excellent combat tedious.

Putting more emphasis on party and formation management in supposedly tactical blobber is a good thing.

 

[Wizfall]

Stealth is indeed a broken skill, i even avoid playing any stealth able class because of it.
A good solution would be to cap the skill at 50 but i don't know if it's doable.
Fighter are also too good, still not possible to make berserk (and backstab) attacks only 50% more powerful instead of 100% ?
Would really be perfect IMO.

 

[DraQ]

Oh don't give me that bullshit. Monster attacks in Wiz8 are highly random

That already works in player's favour. If the enemies attacked rationally not getting fucked to death would be a form of art.

Get poked by Picus, blind, you're out for a time, if not dead.

Don't fuck with picuses or hogars util you can survive over a turn of rape and then heal or cycle back and heal?

And I don't care what your sawyer complex dictates you to cut for balance.

I have a syndrome now?

As I see it, the mod tries to make playing poor classes more interesting and party composition more flexible, make weak abilities and spells valuable, make classes like mage or lord more competent. Not downgrade those that are already fun to shitty.

I'd say that important factor is also making shit that's all the same diverse and different. Rogue being essentially a fighter, except relying on backstab rather than berserk to deal 2x damage and on stealth rather than being tincan for AC doesn't help set those classes apart (and then there is Bloodlust sword that effectively turns Rogue into superfighter that can also open locks and steal shit).
I don't want to make rogues shitty. I want them to work poorly in prolonged melee without someone to soak damage for them rather than having potential to become invisible forcefield wall between enemy and the rest of the party.

I see no reason to remove anything from the game if we're talking "enhancing" experience, not stealth, not ability to solo game with ninja fairy or whatever.

Fairy ninja with CoC is integral part of flavour. Rogue being overpowered is not.

If you find Stealth too powerful and would rather use Guard/micro rows - you can do it without any mods.

Then maybe let bishops use all gear and give them berserk + more HP? As long as you're not forced to use it...

Really, after oblivion people should know better than that - optional breakage is still breakage.

If he was able to mod Stealth formula somehow

...that would be way more awesome than axing any single thing.

 

[Black]

If Wizardry 8 has tedious combat why do people play it? For the plot?

 

[Kaucukovnik]

Stealth is indeed a broken skill, i even avoid playing any stealth able class because of it.
A good solution would be to cap the skill at 50 but i don't know if it's doable.

How do you accidentally reach Stealth > 80? I don't think I've ever had any skill above 70 without consciously trying to or prolonging the endgame just because.
Cap at 50 would be great, but again, I'm not aware of a way to accomplish that. There is Lua scripting though, maybe townltu might know.

Half of the bloody game is possible cheese and exploits. Stealth, Berserk, Bishops, skill training by use, summoning elementals, combat running... And it is not my intention to overhaul it towards perfect balance. Strive for balance destroyed D&D and destroys most competitive, and even cooperative games (nerfing classes with anything unique to them, boring symmetrical maps in strategy games...).

What I'm trying to do here is mainly removing the need of foreknowledge in order to avoid useless characters and limiting the need to savescum for certain pieces of gear to make all your characters competent.

As DraQ said, the combat is great on its own, it's the amount of "filler" battles that turns so many people off.
Changing formations is too cumbersome to be made an integral part of combat for some classes.

 

[TigerKnee]

If Wizardry 8 has tedious combat why do people play it? For the plot?

On a first playthrough and up until around halfway through the game, combat is still kind of fresh and fun.

Then you reach shit like the Rapax which are just huge sacks of non-threatening HP bloat.

And on replays the "tedious" feeling tends to come a lot faster seeing as how you've already played the game before.

It's not like it's tedious from the moment you boot it up.

 

[Shadenuat]

Then maybe let bishops use all gear and give them berserk + more HP? As long as you're not forced to use it...

How the hell is not touching something equals lolo munchkin screwing the fuck out of some other class in your head?

I want them to work poorly in prolonged melee without someone to soak damage for them rather than having potential to become invisible forcefield wall between enemy and the rest of the party.

I already said I don't care what you want. I want an icecream and would realy like one.
I also like that parties in Wiz can be based around so many classes, front row included. And if you played with exotic chars a lot you know how slowly they start and how hard it can be to keep them alive there. For example, my recent playthrough was with fgt/ninja/lord in front and ninja still had to rely greatly on fgt&lord. She died less that others but only because tough guys died for her. I have a playthrough now with rogue&ranger in front. And sure, rogue is decent tank, but with all hits to the shield/no extra hp/stamina regen he runs out of stamina and has to rely on casters to get him back up. He dies a lot easier than fighter.
I think my Vit/Div bard turned out to be toughest tank in that party actually, lol. All them sexy HPs.

Prolongued melee is something you are forced into in Wiz8 on constant basis, and if melee class can't handle itself without constant baby sitting by someone for at least a while, he's a dead weight for party in my eyes.

 

[DraQ]

I don't think I've ever had any skill above 70 without consciously trying to or prolonging the endgame just because.

Half of the bloody game is possible cheese and exploits. Stealth, Berserk, Bishops, skill training by use, summoning elementals, combat running... And it is not my intention to overhaul it towards perfect balance.

Except stealth is a category of its own. Train by use is basically how the entire system works, summoning can also be used against party (and hurts), berserk makes otherwise meh fighters worth something and it carries some penalties, combat running is a bit cheesy but it's the only way to get a drop on someone and doesn't have many opportunities to break anything.

OTOH stealthy front row is just wut and perfectly achievable without consciously aiming for cheese. It's also boring, because the AC bonus it confers reduces difference between stealthy character and armoured one.
I'd like the party build choices as interesting as possible and choice between heavy berserk hitter that tanks well with armor conferred AC and heavy backstab hitter that tanks well with stealth conferred AC just isn't.

Changing formations is too cumbersome to be made an integral part of combat for some classes.

Except you wouldn't be changing formations all the time, but just for hairy encounters.

In vanilla you can still keep a Rogue without stealth pumped up or a priest in the front row despite their comparatively shitty armor.

OTOH making ninja really fragile, but giving them backstab in addition to crits, thrown crits, weeaboo weapons and thrown auto-penetrate would really help making them unique - bloody fucking murderers that can make pretty much anything dead, but just can't go toe-to-toe with much anything. This would be fun despite requiring much formation management, because it would make ninja powerful, yet unique.
If so, then why not make Rogue something in between ninja and fighter?

Then you reach shit like the Rapax which are just huge sacks of non-threatening HP bloat.

Rapax succumb quickly to water and mental magic.

I already said I don't care what you want. I want an icecream and would realy like one a donut.

Fixed.

FFS.

And sure, rogue is decent tank, but with all hits to the shield/no extra hp/stamina regen he runs out of stamina and has to rely on casters to get him back up.

So just like pretty much every other frontliner other than fighter?

Prolongued melee is something you are forced into in Wiz8 on constant basis, and if melee class can't handle itself without constant baby sitting by someone for at least a while, he's a dead weight for party in my eyes.

Not if they hit for OMFG points of damage.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Stealth is OP, but no more OP than dozen other things in Wiz8. Don't do retarded stuff like powertraining it on weak critters in the monastery and you'll be fine. Since the classes that have it also have quite a lot of different skills to develop, you can also refrain from adding the level up points to it for added effect.

I can only reiterate that I'm strongly for balancing/fixing the game through equipment availability (more so) and power (less so). Apart from making the ninja normal hybrids (stripped of alchemy), swapping of class skills and bonuses is obsolete from my point of view and even though I can agree with some of it, I'd definitely like to see it as an optional component.

I can also feel it in my bladder that it's high time for another playthrough, so I'm up for testing the new version when it arrives.

 

[TigerKnee]

Apart from making the ninja normal hybrids (stripped of alchemy)

If you strip it of Alchemy, I think we can probably just knock Ninja to basic class along with Rogue and Fighter. Those two classes have better passives anyway but it's still probably an improvement for the Ninja who probably wouldn't be using Alchemy unless you really want to grind mixing potions.

 

[DraQ]

I'd keep alchemy (you can always just not develop it) and hybrid status, but give ninja backstabs in addition to crits.

OTOH I would glasscannon the living fuck out of the class and strip vitality requirements.

 

[WaltC333]

Well, there is the exp change for Ninja that is save-incompatible, but that shouldn't cause a lockup, you should just still have any Ninjas from your saves level up as elite. Did you try an earlier save & running up to the point of the freeze? Maybe we could isolate a point in your game when the cause of this bug appeared. I could use your saves to experiment...

If you have the pagoda preview installed it may be some weird pathfinding issue or maybe simple overload for the engine? It IS a bit wonky on different machines after all.

I want to have the two complete areas ready for the release. Within a week there will be a release candidate of the basic (no-new-content) version. I'll start a playthrough and will appreciate anyone else doing so and reporting anything wrong.

And if anyone makes a sensible sub-mod, I welcome it as an optional component. For example most of the doable class changes are very easy to do, same for item and monster stats or placement.

There is one pretty common criticism of Wiz8, which is tedious amount of combat and possible remedy for this.
This is actually quite controversial change to do. Less combat means you will be sorely underpowered for most fixed opponents. Faster exp gain doesn't cut it, as the main benefit of frequent battles is skill growth. Which means some kind of "easy mode" would have to be included.

Again, new areas should solve this need for training naturally. Skeletons in the crypt will mean less poppies on Arnika road.

My fault for taking so long responding! (This site I check *at least* once a week to see what's going on...) Somehow I looked right over this post, K...Let me look at this again and I'll be happy to send you a save, if you think it may help. I'm running the game @1920x1200 (just scaled up of course--not too worried about aspect ratio at the moment), D3d, on a 4.5GHz FX-6300 6-core machine with 8-gigs of ram, 2GB Radeon 7850 @ 1.05GHz, Cat 14.7 RC1's, Win8.1x64, and the latest June2010 DX9.0c runtime installed. I have pretty much no configuration issues or peripheral kinds of software issues that crop up that I can't solve quickly in the rare event that I encounter them, so I'm well-versed in the differences between routine software config issues & real issues in an application/game I'm running. None of us has time to waste dickering around with common environment problems, right? I've found Win8 generally--well, once I got rid of the "Metro" GUI which is only optional in Win8, anyway--excellent at compatibility with older games--I mean, it's really good in that respect. IMO, it is actually better at it than I found to be true with Win7x64! (See, now you've gone and pushed my buttons and said "RC" and I'm all excited and stuff!...)

Tell you what, can I take you up on the testing for the RC? I'm actually pretty good at that kind of thing and even better, I enjoy it!... When you shoot out the RC I'll just start a new game and we can take it from there. If you'd like the help, I'm offering. You're bound to have no shortage of willing volunteers, but it's been awhile since I've done any in-depth beta-testing, and I would enjoy it. Let me know...! PM here, if you'd like--I'll get you an email address, etc. However. Here if you need me... Thanks again for taking the time to polish this old gem of a game to a blinding sheen!....:D