IWD Random Treasure
Like okay, I get it, there's a metric crap-ton of treasure in IWD so they have to make treasure random and that's cool and all but UUUGHGHGHGHAGHAGHGHHGAHG ASDFJKL
IT'S A LITTLE FREAKIN' DISAPPOINTING WHEN YOU GET A POTION AND A +15% STEALTH RING INSTEAD OF ELVEN CHAINMAIL!! AGHAGHHAGHGHHHH!!
I know you can overcome it by abusing game saves. But it ruins immersion and IWD's strongest point is its immersion and ... agghhh!! If only there were some way to fix this troublesome issue. -_-; Somebody should make a mod that addresses this somehow...
EDIT:
Some ideas that were developed later on that are freakin' brilliant:
IT'S A LITTLE FREAKIN' DISAPPOINTING WHEN YOU GET A POTION AND A +15% STEALTH RING INSTEAD OF ELVEN CHAINMAIL!! AGHAGHHAGHGHHHH!!
I know you can overcome it by abusing game saves. But it ruins immersion and IWD's strongest point is its immersion and ... agghhh!! If only there were some way to fix this troublesome issue. -_-; Somebody should make a mod that addresses this somehow...
EDIT:
Some ideas that were developed later on that are freakin' brilliant:
deltago said:2. Have a trader somewhere in the game that will trade random generated loot for other random generated loot that the party hasn't picked up yet for a price. You can only trade, you cannot buy an item outright.
CamDawg said:Riffing on @deltago's #2, I think I'll be coding up a third option. You'd get a random item, but a new merchant in Kuldahar (or Lonelywood for the expansion items) would do a one-time swap, for a fee, for a different item on the table. I like this option for a number of reasons--it takes away the meta-gaming issue (if you didn't know a chest was special, you can still get it swapped) and provides minimal immersion interruption with the swap mechanism.
Post edited by Quartz on
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And IIRC its actially NOT possible to abuse reloading to get different dtuff. I thought it was all set in the beginning of the game?
Here's my strategy, which is pretty much what CamDawg said above.
1) Save before entering an area
2) Seperate save after entering area
3) Sprint with one character to where the random loot is
4) Check to see if its what you want
5) Reload if not, Repeat
Of course, sometimes its *extra* irritating, when multiple random items drop in the same area (ex. Severed Hand). I tend to sometimes just hack the game and put in the random drops I want. Some may call it cheating, I call it saving time.
Item Randomiser, a large-scale random treasure mod for Baldur's Gate and Baldur's Gate II at Gibberlings 3 modding website
Not sure if it works with BGEE, but I use it in BGT all the time and it adds some re-playability. It doesn't move everything like diablo or something, but it moves a few key items between a few key locations. I think it works well.
Normally I would be against this sort of thing because I do have a sense of game balance, but since it's a mod that would do one, very clear, concise thing, I think it's okay ... people would know what they're getting themselves into.
"Oh I remember last time I got a belt of Bless here."
*Opens chest*
QUIET BOOTS - 7% STEALTH
"...fml"
And before anyone suggests I somehow forget about these items; that's seriously impossible unless I got Alzheimer's. I gave this game a good 3 year break or so and I'm still remembering half of the items.
The lack of NPCs joinable is a problem for me still, but if Heart of Fury difficult later keep the rhythm, i will trully indeed enjoy replay the game.
Baldur's Gate could benefit of the difficult system of IWD.
I even soloed iwd2 with a lvl1 sorcerer on hof. Good times...
2. Have a trader somewhere in the game that will trade random generated loot for other random generated loot that the party hasn't picked up yet for a price. You can only trade, you cannot buy an item outright.
3. Like 1, but you only randomly generate a select amount, lets say 4 items, that the party can choose from. The party chooses one of the items, and the other 3 disappear. The next random chest, the 3 that the party didn't choose will reappear with a new 4th item. If a party doesn't choose an item for 5 consecutive chests, that item will be removed and never reappear being replaced by another new random item. Rinse repeat.
4. Have a random loot bag in the inventory. A once per day use item that will change the structure of any item placed in it for another item on the random loot list. Using this bag, will cost both gold and xp and the results are still random. You may get stuck with a worse item, however, you only have wait one more day to attempt again.
Maybe you should attempt to find one, or if all else fails, ask @Camdawg nicely.
I really wish I had checked this thread and seen @deltago's ideas before I spent all day coding. I don't like this option, mainly because if you didn't know it was a 'special' chest you'd just start looting, pick up the first option and then wonder where the hell everything went. Even if you did, so many IWD items re-use the same icons and you may not pick the right one you want. E.g. you can't tell a Mage Dagger +1 from a Static Dagger +1 because they look the same (and they're in the same random drop... ugh). I like this; more below. This is essentially unworkable mainly because (scripting-wise) you have to know the explicit names of the containers. This is doable, but I suspect it would mainly serve to annoy the players--if we're essentially going to let them pick, there are simpler ways to do so.
Now the good news is that I've spent a pleasant day with the IWD drop tables, found (and fixed) a bug in them for IWD Fixpack, found some new unused items for UB, and coded up two variants of friendly random drops for Tweaks:
Re-randomize on reload. The simplest option. You reload or re-enter an area with a random drop and the item will change, so you could mash quickload until you get the item you want. This is the least immersion breaking, but also slightly annoying since you might have to reload a few times if you have your heart set on a specific item. You'd also run into the meta-gaming aspect again if you didn't know a chest was 'special'.
Pick your random drop Random drops are replaced with tokens; once you have one the token genie appears and swaps it for your choice of the random items. Immersion-breaking, but definitely the best in terms of convenience.
Riffing on @deltago's #2, I think I'll be coding up a third option. You'd get a random item, but a new merchant in Kuldahar (or Lonelywood for the expansion items) would do a one-time swap, for a fee, for a different item on the table. I like this option for a number of reasons--it takes away the meta-gaming issue (if you didn't know a chest was special, you can still get it swapped) and provides minimal immersion interruption with the swap mechanism.
It still boggles the mind that IWD, is both more RP-oriented and anti-powergamer, then BG...even though it's a dungeon crawler at heart.
I think the main thing that really set me off here was how I got screwed out of any sort of Elven Chain Mail. Both of those armor drops are a random chance, so your bard can be pretty gimped.