Detect Illusion questions

Fardragon

What can actually be detected with this thief skill? Does it only work in search mode? How much do you need to be useful? Can multi-class use this ability whilst wearing heavy armour?

Fafnir

Persistent effects of the Illusion school. Yes. Dunno, but probably over 50; no more than 100. No, it's restricted as usual for thief skills.

lunar

-All illusion spells used by enemy spell casters: Mirror Image, Blur, Invisibility, Improved Invisibility, Shadow Door.

-It works only when searching for traps. But there is a neat trick. Pause game, order your character to attack the enemy, and then press search traps. When unpaused your char will go attack the target AND actively check for traps/illusions at the same time! Ordering another attack will cancel it, though.

-It takes approximately one round, in other words, when the skill is active, it makes a single check in any given round. Example:You have %25 detect illusions, you have %25 chance of dispelling an enemy illusion for one round of checking. Basicaly, when you hit %100, you guarantee to dispel an illusion in one round of checking.

Note that the range is rather poor, you must be very close to the target for it to work. So I use my strategy above, attack the mage in melee and detect illusions at the same time.

-Haven't tried in heavy armour, but I guess that should work.

Oxford_Guy

Fafnir said:

Persistent effects of the Illusion school. Yes. Dunno, but probably over 50; no more than 100. No, it's restricted as usual for thief skills.

You can search for traps (but not remove them) with no penalties wearing Full Plate if a Fighter/Thief or Cleric/Thief so in theory this should be possible for Detect Illusions too, as it uses the same button.

Madhax

Thanks, @Lunar. I had a vague understanding of how the skill worked, but I've never actually had the opportunity to use it (Either I run with a DC thief like Imoen, or my PC thief is more focused on stealth and such).

Aranthys

It's a very powerful skill in BG2, a little less powerful in BG1.
It's still great against mirror image.

Fafnir

Oxford_Guy said:

Fafnir said:

Persistent effects of the Illusion school. Yes. Dunno, but probably over 50; no more than 100. No, it's restricted as usual for thief skills.

You can search for traps (but not remove them) with no penalties wearing Full Plate if a Fighter/Thief or Cleric/Thief so in theory this should be possible for Detect Illusions too, as it uses the same button.

Strange, I was *sure* the button was grayed out last time I did that with Shar Teel. Must have been mistaken. Good to know.

Gallowglass

In addition to Illusion spells, Detect Illusion also seems to uncover enemies who are Hiding in Shadows. However, it doesn't seem to do the latter so reliably ... perhaps it may be checking against the stealth ability of the enemy and deducting that from your detection ability, I'm not sure.

bbross

Hi everyone.

Not to create an nth topic on the subject, I decided to post my question here. Hope it's fine.

Is there any reason for the Detect Illusion skill NOT to work in particular instances ? I have encountered 3 situations in my recent playthrough where it didn't seem to dispel illusions properly. In all 3 situations, my thief had 100% Detect Illusion. And I tried several times each time it happened, to no avail.

1) In Durlag's tower, against an invisible (or hidden ?) ashirikuru.
I knew exactly where it was, I moved my thief in stealth mode right next to it, activated "detect traps" and waited. Then got slaughtered when my stealth faded away, after 2 or 3 rounds of failed Detect Illusion.

2) Right before the final battle, against the mage in Rahvin's group. I think his name is Shaldrissa.
Failed to dispel a basic mirror image.

3) During the final battle.
Failed to dispel the mirror image of Semaj. In this case, I even tried with a pumped up Detect Illusion (200, 230, 250 - thank you EE Keeper) but it did not work.

So, I have to ask
* are there any factors that affect the success of Detect Illusion other than the skill level ? Armor, caster level, etc ?
* are some enemies immune to Detect Illusion ?
* is that some kind of bug that I need to report ?

Thanks a lot.

zur312

bbross said:

Hi everyone.

Not to create an nth topic on the subject, I decided to post my question here. Hope it's fine.

Is there any reason for the Detect Illusion skill NOT to work in particular instances ? I have encountered 3 situations in my recent playthrough where it didn't seem to dispel illusions properly. In all 3 situations, my thief had 100% Detect Illusion. And I tried several times each time it happened, to no avail.

1) In Durlag's tower, against an invisible (or hidden ?) ashirikuru.
I knew exactly where it was, I moved my thief in stealth mode right next to it, activated "detect traps" and waited. Then got slaughtered when my stealth faded away, after 2 or 3 rounds of failed Detect Illusion.

2) Right before the final battle, against the mage in Rahvin's group. I think his name is Shaldrissa.
Failed to dispel a basic mirror image.

3) During the final battle.
Failed to dispel the mirror image of Semaj. In this case, I even tried with a pumped up Detect Illusion (200, 230, 250 - thank you EE Keeper) but it did not work.

So, I have to ask
* are there any factors that affect the success of Detect Illusion other than the skill level ? Armor, caster level, etc ?
* are some enemies immune to Detect Illusion ?
* is that some kind of bug that I need to report ?

Thanks a lot.

there is immunity to divination spell that works vs true seeing and such but i dunno about thief skills
i think you were just unlucky with detecting

bbross

Thanks for you reply zur312.

From what I've gathered around the web, immunity to divination spells doesn't work against the thief's Detect Illusion.

I doubt it was down to bad luck, given the amount of tries and the flawless repeatability of the unfortunate result.

In fact, as mentioned above, I suspect either a bug, unconventional hidden immunities, or unknown factors accounted for that prompt the need to raise the skill higher than 100%.

Is there anyone in the know able to enlighten me ?
Pretty please ?

ShadowTiger

It could be a scripted version that can't be detected... Do any spells work to remove the illusions?

AaronDemoncia

detect illusions is the single most underrated thf skill in the game, it bypasses immunity divination, destroys some of the most annoying hindrences to melees in combat and like said before is usable in heavy armor and WHILE ATTACKING. sadly whiles its long term the best skill a thf has its not explained in a tutorial or anywhere except on the levelup screen. and its more important for single thf parties to cap open locks and find traps. and depending on the thf perhaps even set traps/ hide in shadows before you can really touch Detect Traps.
HIDDEN BONUS: Dwarves are the only race to naturally get any detect traps. so they hold an advantage at least slightly in that regards. especially with the attack/detect string

DreadKhan

Gnomes have a bonus to find traps and illusions. Unless that got removed.

Oxford_Guy

DreadKhan said:

Gnomes have a bonus to find traps and illusions. Unless that got removed.

Gnomes get a +10% bonus to Detetct Illusions, Dwarfs 5%, see:
http://www.pocketplane.net/volothamp/thief.htm

Gnomes make great thieves, especially as a Illusionist/Thief or Cleric/Thief

bbross

ShadowTiger said:

It could be a scripted version that can't be detected... Do any spells work to remove the illusions?

Yes. Dispel Magic and Remove Magic both worked. At least as far as Semaj is concerned.

BelgarathMTH

What about the Non-detection spell or items? Perhaps the immune enemies listed have it?

bbross

If I'm not mistaken, non-detection spells only counter magical means of detection, like True Sight etc.
At least that's what I understand from reading around the Internet.

Ah well. I'll post a bug report. We'll see how it turns out.

smeagolheart

Fafnir said:

Oxford_Guy said:

Fafnir said:

Persistent effects of the Illusion school. Yes. Dunno, but probably over 50; no more than 100. No, it's restricted as usual for thief skills.

You can search for traps (but not remove them) with no penalties wearing Full Plate if a Fighter/Thief or Cleric/Thief so in theory this should be possible for Detect Illusions too, as it uses the same button.

Strange, I was *sure* the button was grayed out last time I did that with Shar Teel. Must have been mistaken. Good to know.

The thieving button gets greyed out. The detect traps does not.

CamDawg

bbross said:

Hi everyone.

Not to create an nth topic on the subject, I decided to post my question here. Hope it's fine.

Is there any reason for the Detect Illusion skill NOT to work in particular instances ? I have encountered 3 situations in my recent playthrough where it didn't seem to dispel illusions properly. In all 3 situations, my thief had 100% Detect Illusion. And I tried several times each time it happened, to no avail.

1) In Durlag's tower, against an invisible (or hidden ?) ashirikuru.
I knew exactly where it was, I moved my thief in stealth mode right next to it, activated "detect traps" and waited. Then got slaughtered when my stealth faded away, after 2 or 3 rounds of failed Detect Illusion.

2) Right before the final battle, against the mage in Rahvin's group. I think his name is Shaldrissa.
Failed to dispel a basic mirror image.

3) During the final battle.
Failed to dispel the mirror image of Semaj. In this case, I even tried with a pumped up Detect Illusion (200, 230, 250 - thank you EE Keeper) but it did not work.

So, I have to ask
* are there any factors that affect the success of Detect Illusion other than the skill level ? Armor, caster level, etc ?
* are some enemies immune to Detect Illusion ?
* is that some kind of bug that I need to report ?

Thanks a lot.

It's subtle, but @Fafnir's got the key here--it works against spells from the illusion school. Ashirukuru are actually hidden in shadows, so DI shouldn't be outing them. The other two are actually exposing 'cheats' of the engine--both of those mages use a ring to simulate pre-buffs, so they're not true mirror images. That should actually be fixed.

bbross

CamDawg said:

It's subtle, but @Fafnir's got the key here--it works against spells from the illusion school. Ashirukuru are actually hidden in shadows, so DI shouldn't be outing them. The other two are actually exposing 'cheats' of the engine--both of those mages use a ring to simulate pre-buffs, so they're not true mirror images. That should actually be fixed.

Ooooh. That's why ! Makes sense now.
Thank you very much for this clarification !

For the sake of completeness, here's a link to the mention of a fix being in the works for that acknowledged bug : http://forum.baldursgate.com/discussion/comment/309955/#Comment_309955

CamDawg

Yeah, I'm the one that sic'd aVENGER on the problem. He already had something similar for aTweaks.