@KeithS - Do the skillrac and skilldex 2das need to be modified as well? The manual I have implies that stealth/hideinshadows/movesilently all have the same bonus for race and dex, but that doesn't appear to be the case with the 2das that we are using which is bumping the stealth skill higher than it should (as it is taking all its bonuses from move silently).
Would you happen to know if the interplay bg1 manual should supersede the AD&D handbook? The conflict is on page 138 of the pdf I downloaded from here - http://www.sorcerers.net/Games/BG/index_tips.php
@SethDavis - Several aspects of vanilla BG1 were house ruled, which means the devs had taken liberties with P&P AD&D rules and performed either light or heavy adaptations. If your goal is to be true to vanilla BG1, then yes: the BG1 manual supersedes the AD&D Player's Handbook.
In the case of Move Silently / Hide in Shadows, however, the difference between the BG1 engine and the BG2 engine also comes into play. In vanilla BG1, both abilities were grouped into a single thieving skill called "Stealth", to which the table on page 138 of the BG1 manual was applied. In BG2, both abilities received their own separate thieving skill entry. The bonuses were most likely house ruled, but you should look for them on the BG2 manual.
Personally, I am a rules lawyer and would like every rule in BG:EE to be as faithful as possible to P&P. In this regard, I would treat any house rule as something to be fixed. But this, of course, is just me (and there are mods out there to achieve this anyway) :-)
@SethDavis, @KeithS What is skillrng.2da? Is it an unused duplicate? I'm afraid not. Baldur.exe contains the string 'skillrng' and doesn't contain the string 'skllrng'. I think the reports about this being unfixed come from that.
Confirmed Fixed... I think... at least for the OP.
SKILLRNG.2DA has been modified from vBG which had 20 as the STEALTH value to now 21 as the MOVE_SILENTLY value. Actually the vBG2 SKILLRNG.2DA was also wrong- had a 20- though it shares the MOVE_SILENTLY modifier designation.
@Tanthalas You mean for testing purposes? Hmm... not sure how to test for it other than use an item that gives 79% move silently and 100% hide in shadows and see if 1 in 100 tries you fail to stealth. heh
The thing is that the BG2 manual doesn't list the Stealth stat for Rangers (or at least I couldn't find it), it only has a table showing Move Silently and Hide in Shadows separately and I have no idea how those two stats interact to produce a Stealth stat.
Stealth only existed in vBG1, and grouped Hide in Shadows and Move Silently together. The two were split and assigned their own thieving ability status in BG2. I have no idea how @SethDavis decided to go about this, though my best guess is that he checked ingame bonuses against the BG2 manual and made them consistent.
This still doesn't answer where that 1% is coming from though or whether it's testable. Actually it is testable if I just do some 2DA meddling and check if it affects in-game scores... brb...
So the 22 is showing up at Lvl 1, not Lvl 2. It's also doing lots of oddball calculations it shouldn't be. Just to test further I tweaked the 2DA to see what would happen:
I imagine that Hide in Shadows should also affect the Ranger's Stealth, but apparently what the game is doing is basically use the Move Silently score +7.
@Tanthalas, @Bhryaen I came across this repeatedly in my Minsc/Kivan testing over in the joinable NPC bug thread, and we can close this as Not An Issue.
The ranger stealth score is simply an average of their move silently and hide in shadows score, but they still receive their racial and dexterity bonuses. Essentially, they get their base score from skillrng.2da (despite the column name, this score goes to both HiS and MS) and then their racial bonus (skillrac.2da) and their dexterity bonus (skilldex.2da). With the correction of the level 2 score, skillrng.2da now matches the BG2 manual. (I can confirm that rangers get the correct initial values for HiS and MS from character creation and get their correct values upon further level ups.)
@Bhryaen's test above is what the scores should be when you figure in a human's +10% move silently and +5% hide in shadows. At level one, a human ranger with 13 dexterity has 25 move silently (15 base +10 race + 0 dex) and 20 hide (15 base + 5 race + 0 dex), which averages to 22.5, or 22 rounded down. At level 2 we have 31 move silently (21 base + 10 race + 0 dex) and 26 hide (21 base + 5 race + 0 dex), averaging to 28.5 or 28 rounded down.
Since skillrng.2da is applied only at level up and not dynamically, it would explain how in the later tests the level 1 character didn't reflect the changes but the other levels did.
Comments
These are from the AD&D Player's Handbook, for reference:
SKILL DWARF ELF GNOME HALF-ELF HALFLING Move silently - +5% +5% - +10% Hide in Shadows - +10% +5% - +15%DEXTERITY MOVE SIL. HIDE IN S. 9 -20% -10% 10 -15% -5% 11 -10% - 12 -5% - 13-15 - - 16 - - 17 +5% +5% 18 +10% +10% 19 +15% +15%Would you happen to know if the interplay bg1 manual should supersede the AD&D handbook? The conflict is on page 138 of the pdf I downloaded from here - http://www.sorcerers.net/Games/BG/index_tips.php
In the case of Move Silently / Hide in Shadows, however, the difference between the BG1 engine and the BG2 engine also comes into play. In vanilla BG1, both abilities were grouped into a single thieving skill called "Stealth", to which the table on page 138 of the BG1 manual was applied. In BG2, both abilities received their own separate thieving skill entry. The bonuses were most likely house ruled, but you should look for them on the BG2 manual.
Personally, I am a rules lawyer and would like every rule in BG:EE to be as faithful as possible to P&P. In this regard, I would treat any house rule as something to be fixed. But this, of course, is just me (and there are mods out there to achieve this anyway) :-)
What is skillrng.2da? Is it an unused duplicate? I'm afraid not. Baldur.exe contains the string 'skillrng' and doesn't contain the string 'skllrng'. I think the reports about this being unfixed come from that.
I'll grab this quick then
[EDIT] The typo has been fixed
SKILLRNG.2DA has been modified from vBG which had 20 as the STEALTH value to now 21 as the MOVE_SILENTLY value. Actually the vBG2 SKILLRNG.2DA was also wrong- had a 20- though it shares the MOVE_SILENTLY modifier designation.
Is this one actually visible in the game?
You mean for testing purposes? Hmm... not sure how to test for it other than use an item that gives 79% move silently and 100% hide in shadows and see if 1 in 100 tries you fail to stealth. heh
I mean, does this fix show in the character records? Because my level 1 Human Ranger with 13 Dex starts with 22% Stealth already.
The thing is that the BG2 manual doesn't list the Stealth stat for Rangers (or at least I couldn't find it), it only has a table showing Move Silently and Hide in Shadows separately and I have no idea how those two stats interact to produce a Stealth stat.
Do you have the BG2 manual to verify the ranger scores as simply a combo of HiS and MS? Actually @Lunever seemed to say it was in this post:
http://forum.baldursgate.com/discussion/comment/11054/#Comment_11054
This still doesn't answer where that 1% is coming from though or whether it's testable. Actually it is testable if I just do some 2DA meddling and check if it affects in-game scores... brb...
Present 2DA: So the 22 is showing up at Lvl 1, not Lvl 2. It's also doing lots of oddball calculations it shouldn't be. Just to test further I tweaked the 2DA to see what would happen: Definitely something funky going on there... And even with the 2DA set for 0% stealth at Lvl 1, it grants the same 22.
I came across this repeatedly in my Minsc/Kivan testing over in the joinable NPC bug thread, and we can close this as Not An Issue.
The ranger stealth score is simply an average of their move silently and hide in shadows score, but they still receive their racial and dexterity bonuses. Essentially, they get their base score from skillrng.2da (despite the column name, this score goes to both HiS and MS) and then their racial bonus (skillrac.2da) and their dexterity bonus (skilldex.2da). With the correction of the level 2 score, skillrng.2da now matches the BG2 manual. (I can confirm that rangers get the correct initial values for HiS and MS from character creation and get their correct values upon further level ups.)
@Bhryaen's test above is what the scores should be when you figure in a human's +10% move silently and +5% hide in shadows. At level one, a human ranger with 13 dexterity has 25 move silently (15 base +10 race + 0 dex) and 20 hide (15 base + 5 race + 0 dex), which averages to 22.5, or 22 rounded down. At level 2 we have 31 move silently (21 base + 10 race + 0 dex) and 26 hide (21 base + 5 race + 0 dex), averaging to 28.5 or 28 rounded down.
Since skillrng.2da is applied only at level up and not dynamically, it would explain how in the later tests the level 1 character didn't reflect the changes but the other levels did.
... which is totally right on.