Optional BG2EE experience cap to maintain balance.

Messi

I would like for there to be an option to have the original SoA xp cap in place when playing BG2EE. Already in vanilla SoA with ToB installed you can go over 3 million xp, if you try to be completionist like I do. With the added quests and other experience opportunies of BG2EE I'd except that number be even higher still.

So the problem here is that SoA has been balanced based on certain expected party level/power and already with SoA+ToB installed this is kinda broken(this is also because of the powerful new items available). I'd rather not see it broken even further so I would really appreciate if you could choose to have your xp capped to 2.95 million(like it was in Soa) until you move to ToB areas.

Even better option would be being able to slow your xp gaining down by 30% or so, but I guess implementing something that would be too difficult so I'll settle with the XP cap! Additionally it would be awesome to have new "smart" difficulty level similar to what SCS is doing!

Iecerint

The final BG2SOA SCS battle is pretty hard even with a gazillion EXP IMO.

Jarrakul

I really like the idea of an optional cap. Not everyone plays with SCS. Some people (myself included) prefer other ways to make the game challenging. An optional xp cap for pre-TOB only would be really, really helpful in that regard. I can't imagine it'd be that hard to implement, either. So yeah, I think this is a great idea.

Jalily

You could also choose not to level up after you hit the old cap.

Jarrakul

@Jalily: But... the little plus sign... it calls to me... :P

Okay, seriously. Yeah, that's an option. The problem is, you still end up overleveled for the beginning of TOB. I can live with that, mind you, but it just seems like an optional xp cap would be such an easy fix. Maybe I'm wrong about that, of course, but it seems pretty simple to me.

Jalily

Experience gained beyond the cap is still recorded, just not shown on the Record screen until the cap is raised. So an SoA cap that is lifted once you reach ToB would result in the same problem.

bbear

The difficulty of random monsters spawn is proportional to your party's (or perhaps the main character's) level. For example, there are several random lich spawns in SoA (Beholder lich area, spellhold, Temple Ruins). They only occur if your party has reached a certain level, otherwise they will be skeletons/mummies.

Another example is the monsters in Watcher's Keep. On the first level, you get the minimum number of statues at low level and more statues at higher level. On the third level, the demons gain powerful new minions and special abilities if your party is at ToB levels. At the demogorgon fight, there are only 2 minions at low level and 5 at ToB levels.

To recap, it may be advantageous to choose not to level up at some points in the game.

Bestopher

I'm all for adding new adventures and otherwise improving the game, but I worry about this optional XP cap, because of the practical implications. So, the game comes out with optional cap in place for those who want it, but... something goes wrong in the code for the cap and it's mandatory for everyone. Beamdog works on the problem as best they can, but the patch takes six months to come out. Many leave the game or make irritating posts on here about how they have been "scammed" (think the crowd that left because of Tethtoril's scroll bug). IMHO @Jalily 's solution is the most practical because if gives those who want it the ability to play that way, while not messing with those who don't.

elminster

This sounds like something people can just mod in. That or edit your characters so they never get higher than the SoA cap. I certainly wouldn't oppose its implementation but I don't think it should be a priority.

Jarrakul

@Jalily: I actually did not know that. Does that mean if I import my BG1 characters into BG2 they might suddenly go up a level? Regardless, I concede the point.

@Bestopher: I am somewhat wary of basing feature requests around the idea that they might be implemented wrong, especially since this doesn't seem like a particularly dangerous change and would be pretty easy to fix if something went wrong (there are about a billion ways to remove the xp cap). That said, I've already conceded that this isn't exactly a necessary addition to the game, so I can see the argument that it's not worth whatever minimal risk it would pose.

Jalily

Jarrakul said:

Does that mean if I import my BG1 characters into BG2 they might suddenly go up a level?

Yes.

Bestopher

Jarrakul said:

@Bestopher: I am somewhat wary of basing feature requests around the idea that they might be implemented wrong, especially since this doesn't seem like a particularly dangerous change and would be pretty easy to fix if something went wrong (there are about a billion ways to remove the xp cap).

You and I are looking at this from two different worlds, my friend. You, I am guessing, from the PC (and Baldur's Gate has always been fun and easy to fix on the PC) and I from the Ipad. In my world I basically have to wait for official patches to come out because messing with Apples f'ed lockdown of a file system is dangerous unless you're fairly experienced.

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