Skip to content

Flail of Ages +5 Free Action Prevents Haste

Shift07Shift07 Member Posts: 11
edited December 2013 in Not An Issue
I finally got my Flail of Ages +5 (with free action "bonus") and was pretty shocked to see that it would disable the haste from my boots of speed every time I equipped it. Further testing showed that it prevents all forms of haste. I played Baldur's Gate 2 years ago and am positive this did not happen then. I hope this is a bug and not a "fix" from what used to happen. If so they rendered the FoA +5 a pretty lousy weapon with just that one change. I'd almost be better off sticking with FoA +4. Anyone know if this is a bug that will hopefully be fixed?
Post edited by Dee on

Comments

  • doshidaniadoshidania Member Posts: 46
    One can hope. I noticed it too and was hoping it was a bug and not a "fix". It's very lame.
  • Shift07Shift07 Member Posts: 11
    I really did use the two together without issue. I didn't use mods very much but I guess that's remotely possible. The trouble is now I've played through all of Baldur's gate 1 and 2 with the same character always planning to use the flail of ages, putting 5 points into flails, and now I'm stuck with this thing.
  • SmilgeSmilge Member Posts: 104
    edited December 2013
    To be fair, free action did used to stack with boots of speed when you put the boots on after the free action was applied (original game, no mods). If that character died or something you just needed to take off and re-put on the boots.
  • FFGFFG Member Posts: 52
    Smilge said:

    To be fair, free action did used to stack with boots of speed when you put the boots on after the free action was applied (original game, no mods). If that character died or something you just needed to take off and re-put on the boots.

    I remember being able to do this in BGEE as well.

  • JTMJTM Member Posts: 70
    Yep, you could actually have both active in the original game by a little exploitation. Then it was fixed in a BGEE update and now BG2EE. However, I feel this was an unnecessary fix. With the old way, depending on how you dressed your character, you could have free action cancel haste and this would satisfy the crowd that believes this is the way it should be.

    On the other hand, you could just dress your character in a different way and have both effects active to satisfy the crowd that believes that 'friendly' free action and haste effects can stack or co-exist together.

    I'm of the latter crowd and feel there was no reason to fix this. I hope that it's something that can be returned to how it used to be. If not, then perhaps a mod...
  • EmptinessEmptiness Member Posts: 238
    It should be obvious to everyone that getting to benefit from Free Action's immunity to slow while circumventing Free Action's immunity to haste is unintended. The very fact that one had to create that situation by equipping items in a particular order is a pretty clear indication that some sort of bug was involved.

    @Shift07, if you built your character around the idea that this was not an exploit, and you are certain that the only thing that makes the Flail of Ages +5 worthwhile is the ability to also have haste, then I would say that editing your character (with EE keeper) to move those five proficiency points to another weapon would be justified. Personally, I agree that this weapon is good even without haste, but if you disagree then there's no point in letting your play up to this point go to waste.

    @JTM, I disagree completely. There's always a reason to fix a bug. The goal of the Enhanced Editions, as I understand it, is not to absolutely replicate the experience of the original versions, but rather to bring the original versions forward with new content, bug fixes, and other enhancements. I'd like to think that the original Dev team would have fixed all the bugs in BG and BGII if time and money were not considerations. As such, I don't see fixing any bug as corrupting the games but rather advancing the goals of the original design.
  • DeeDee Member Posts: 10,447
    Not an issue. Free action prevents haste and slow effects; that's part of the trade-off you get for having Free Action.
  • JTMJTM Member Posts: 70
    Emptiness said:


    @JTM, I disagree completely. There's always a reason to fix a bug. The goal of the Enhanced Editions, as I understand it, is not to absolutely replicate the experience of the original versions, but rather to bring the original versions forward with new content, bug fixes, and other enhancements. I'd like to think that the original Dev team would have fixed all the bugs in BG and BGII if time and money were not considerations. As such, I don't see fixing any bug as corrupting the games but rather advancing the goals of the original design.

    I should explain better.

    The bug was the way haste and free action items had to be equipped in order to have free action and haste at the same time or they could be combined such that free action cancelled the haste effect. The 'fix' was to have free action cancel any haste effect which is a fix for the crowd that believes they should be mutually exclusive.

    So while I have no problems in fixing bugs, I don't consider the haste/free action 'fix' a fix. The reason being is I don't consider haste and free action effects mutually exclusive on a character as they are 'friendly' buffs. This is closer to PnP rules and would prefer the spell to behave more accordingly.

    Free Action is a friendly spell and effect which should be just that. It is a spell of 'free action' and not 'normal action'. It's intent is to prevent the influence of magic which 'impedes' movement such as Web and Slow for example. NOT gimp the haste effect and cancel it out like a Slow spell.



  • iKrivetkoiKrivetko Member Posts: 934
    ^ Absolutely agree. It is utterly ludicrous for Free Action to prevent movement improvements. With that logic, monks should not receive bonus attacks if they have this effect.
  • Mattly99Mattly99 Member Posts: 11
    edited January 2014
    For those like me who were extremely disappointed after finishing the flail of ages +5 would no longer stack with improved haste or boots of speed (serious downgrade from flail +4 ages) I found http://www.shsforums.net/files/file/888-pnp-free-action-v2/ this mod. I extracted the setup and folder into my bg2/data/00783 folder and that worked well for me. I would have been fine with a mod that removed free action from the flail of ages +5 and would have been happy with it. The weapon dps without improved haste made this a non-viable weapon for me compared to the +4 version. For a final endgame weapon to have such a handicap seems ridiculous to me.
  • benecorbenecor Member Posts: 11
    how do I install that for steam install? I have no 00783 folder.
Sign In or Register to comment.