Thoughts on NPC Project mod?

SharGuidesMyHand

I never tried any mods back when I played the original BG1, but I recently decided to give the "experimental" version of the NPC Project for BG:EE a try. Although I only tested it out relatively briefly and experienced only a fraction of its content, I was curious to see other people's feedback on it, and perhaps get some advice on how to better my experience with it.

For anyone who needs a refresher, here's a list of the mod's components, nearly all of which are optional (except for the one that explicitly says "required modifications"):
http://www.gibberlings3.net/readmes/readme-bg1npc.html#compon

An issue that I had expected to have even before I installed the mod, is that I appreciate the "less is more" approach of the BG1 NPCs' personalities, which allows you to form your own interpretations of the characters. However, the Project projects someone else's interpretation of the NPCs into the game, which may not necessarily be the same as my own.

On one hand, I do like what I've seen from Imoen. The little snippets of dialogue that we see from her in the original game suggest that she's upbeat, outgoing, nosy, intrusive, and somewhat childlike - but this portrayal was greatly undermined by the fact that she was a late addition to the game and lacked properly developed dialogue. With the Project now installed, Imoen's behavior is much more consistent with her "nosy little sister" personna IMO - pestering me with questions, interjecting herself into nearly every conversation with characters that we meet, etc.

By contrast, I'm much less enthusiastic about how Kivan was handled. To me, Kivan had always presented as a quiet, gruff, occasionally offensive character (hence his low charisma), but the Project depicts him as talkative, reflective, even somewhat polite. I imagine Kivan as someone who would tell Imoen to "Shutup!" or "Leave me alone!" rather than engage in extended conversations with her. Even in the few conflicts/arguments with other NPCs that I've seen, his responses were far too polite IMO. I also don't like that he talks about his background, which I would prefer to be shrouded in mystery.

After having Kivan share a party with Xzar and Montaron very briefly, a conflict developed between Kivan and Monty over the fact that Monty apparently has "torture tools" in his possession, which ended with me having to decide whether to keep one or the other in the party. I didn't like this altercation because,
1. It seemed to happen far too quickly after having added those NPCs to my party,
2. Kivan's responses still seemed uncharacteristic to me - they were still somewhat polite even in defiance, and I'm not sure that he is the kind of character that would object to the possession of "torture tools," even if he had been tortured himself. I imagine him as the kind of character that would want to give his enemies "a taste of their own medicine."

In general, I felt that the intra-party banters happened far too often - sometimes with barely a minute in between. Likely not coincidentally, I did install the component that accelerates the frequency of banters - perhaps I shouldn't have done this?

Alternatively, I'm toying with the possibility of not installing the "banters, quests, interjections" component of the mod (which is considered the primary feature of the mod), and instead just installing some of the smaller features like the accelerated banters or the added portraits for non-joinable NPCs - has anyone here ever tried that?

I'm also a bit curious about some of the romance options that are available for my (female) character - but what should I expect from a romance that's described as "adult" rather than "teen"?

Thanks for any feedback.


PS, is anyone else running into a problem where any time a mod is installed, it causes a problem with scrolling to the left? I know others have complained about this, but it seems to happen to me only when I have a mod installed.

CrevsDaak

SharGuidesMyHand said:

In general, I felt that the intra-party banters happened far too often - sometimes with barely a minute in between. Likely not coincidentally, I did install the component that accelerates the frequency of banters - perhaps I shouldn't have done this?

If you play at the default FPS (30), I don't think I would recommend this component, because banters might not enough to trigger all across the game, I mean, you could literally run out of banters.

SharGuidesMyHand said:

PS, is anyone else running into a problem where any time a mod is installed, it causes a problem with scrolling to the left? I know others have complained about this, but it seems to happen to me only when I have a mod installed.

That's a known engine bug of the Windows platform, it has nothing to do with the mod since it does not modify the engine

Dazzu

SharGuidesMyHand said:

By contrast, I'm much less enthusiastic about how Kivan was handled. To me, Kivan had always presented as a quiet, gruff, occasionally offensive character (hence his low charisma), but the Project depicts him as talkative, reflective, even somewhat polite. I imagine Kivan as someone who would tell Imoen to "Shutup!" or "Leave me alone!" rather than engage in extended conversations with her. Even in the few conflicts/arguments with other NPCs that I've seen, his responses were far too polite IMO. I also don't like that he talks about his background, which I would prefer to be shrouded in mystery.

Just wait until this attitude intensifies in his BG2 Romance mod... you can even bring back his wife (whose been dead far longer than Khalid and Dynaheir by the by.)


I'd have thought there'd be a price on my head the way I loathe Kivan's mod... I can safely walk outside?
But in all honesty, @SharGuidesMyHand‌ is spot on towards my core problem with Mod Kivan's interpretation.

terzaerian

"Less is more" approach? There wasn't any approach to fleshing our the characterizations of the NPCs because there wasn't any in the first place. All of them were essentially blank canvases. It also seems like you're judging the entire mod based off an experimental implementation and a very bare handful of interactions with only three characters, before you've given the main quest in particular time to unfold things - Kivan's aversion to torture becomes abundantly clear through your friendship with him and progress through the main quest, and is completely in-line with (what little exists) of his established background and the canon story. It also does a wonderful job of showcasing the lore surrounding Kivan's folk. You talk about wanting Kivan to be standoffish and a loner - this mod has that. It also has him in moments of weakness and doubt, some rare moments of happiness, and thoughtfulness. It treats him like a person, not a caricature. Imoen has this too - a lot of the time she acts like you said, as a "little sister," but in particular, when you find Gorion's body, she shares a moment of raw grief with the PC at his passing. This complexity is its single greatest strength as a mod.

And on torture specifically, people who have been tortured in real life often become the strongest proponents against it. John McCain, for example, is famous for being hawkish on war and has little respect for America's real and perceived enemies, but even he could not support waterboarding and other "enhanced interrogation" methods after suffering even worse at the hands of the North Vietnamese during the Vietnam War. That banter makes perfect sense within the context of the mod, the timing was just unfortunate.

I have never had a moment with BG1NPC's that broke my immersion in the game - if anything, I've struggled to find the seams between it and the core game. It is a masterful fleshing out of not only the characters but the worlds they live in within the wider world of Toril.

Dazzu

The fact is, Kivan also uses a lot of elf words, if I'm not mistaken, and I mean a LOT of them. This flowery speech really clashes with his soundset which sounds like a guy who might cut you if you bug him too much.

And his whole revivable dead wife thing in his BG2 romance mod (which is very much a sequel to the NPC Project appearance) just begs the question why we can't revive someone whose been dead far shorter.

Maybe that's unfair of me but it colored my view on the whole a bit poorly.

SapphireIce101

To be honest, I think Kivan and Xan use the most elvish, mostly because they don't usually leave their respective Elven communities. Only reason Kivan left is revenge for his Deheriana. The only reason Xan is inside the Nashkel mine is because the Greycloaks want him to investigate the Iron Crisis. Meanwhile, Coran is the polar opposite. Coran has been leaving his elven community of Suldanesselar since he was old enough to go do it. Hence why he speaks common more than Xan and Kivan.

As for reviving Deheriana after like a year, apparently Kivan's bond with her is the reason why she can come back, and if you don't have Cernd, Aerie, or if you aren't a Cleric, she can apparently die again. However, I really don't like Deheriana. Once, Deheriana comes back into the picture, Kivan never ever talks. I mean I know we barely know Deheriana, but that doesn't mean that Kivan needs to stop speaking entirely.

As to why you can't revive someone whose been dead in a shorter amount of time...Well, Jaheira explains why she doesn't want to bring Khalid back, and the party never finds Dynaheir's body, and the only account that you have on the fact that she's dead is Minsc.

terzaerian

Dazzu said:

The fact is, Kivan also uses a lot of elf words, if I'm not mistaken, and I mean a LOT of them. This flowery speech really clashes with his soundset which sounds like a guy who might cut you if you bug him too much.

Because he is an elf. If a German speaks German it's not because he's trying to sound particularly angry or aggressive (traits projected, fairly or unfairly to how German sounds) it's because it's his mother tongue. And again, people are complicated, not caricatures. Gruff people can have moments of tenderness and vice-versa. When Kivan waxes nostalgic he is often reflecting on his life before he took up his mission of revenge, and unless you think Kivan was born with an innate hatred of ogres and distrust of the world it makes complete sense.

I also think people are reading too much into his soundset. Jaheira references 1970s Battlestar Galactica in a rare quote; does this mean she is canonically a secret Cylon transplanted to Faerun on some mission, or that Xzar is actually Hannibal Lecter in disguise? The soundsets serve to underline traits the characters possess, not to define the character.

Dazzu said:

And his whole revivable dead wife thing in his BG2 romance mod (which is very much a sequel to the NPC Project appearance) just begs the question why we can't revive someone whose been dead far shorter.

So you're judging a mod for one game based on a mod for another game? I am failing to understand the logic here. Installing one doesn't mandate installing the other. I'm sorry this BG2 mod disappointed you but its merits or shortcomings are immaterial to the BG1NPC mod as a whole, which is what this thread is about.

Dazzu

The thing that bothers me is that I only hear it from elves. There's never any Dwarvish spoken, and only a smattering of Deep Gnomish, and that's more because they want to stay uncommunicative.

Heck, even in game, only Viconia uses her tongue, and that's because she's got an underdark excuse of separation. Aerie is seperated but never uses Elvish (or Avariel tongue if its different.)

My question is, why are elves always treated so special? It gets really offputting.

kaguana

SharGuidesMyHand said:

By contrast, I'm much less enthusiastic about how Kivan was handled. To me, Kivan had always presented as a quiet, gruff, occasionally offensive character (hence his low charisma), but the Project depicts him as talkative, reflective, even somewhat polite. I imagine Kivan as someone who would tell Imoen to "Shutup!" or "Leave me alone!" rather than engage in extended conversations with her. Even in the few conflicts/arguments with other NPCs that I've seen, his responses were far too polite IMO. I also don't like that he talks about his background, which I would prefer to be shrouded in mystery.

After having Kivan share a party with Xzar and Montaron very briefly, a conflict developed between Kivan and Monty over the fact that Monty apparently has "torture tools" in his possession, which ended with me having to decide whether to keep one or the other in the party. I didn't like this altercation because,
1. It seemed to happen far too quickly after having added those NPCs to my party,
2. Kivan's responses still seemed uncharacteristic to me - they were still somewhat polite even in defiance, and I'm not sure that he is the kind of character that would object to the possession of "torture tools," even if he had been tortured himself. I imagine him as the kind of character that would want to give his enemies "a taste of their own medicine."

In general, I felt that the intra-party banters happened far too often - sometimes with barely a minute in between. Likely not coincidentally, I did install the component that accelerates the frequency of banters - perhaps I shouldn't have done this?

I bet you never saw the way Kivan talk to Alora and her cheerfulness. Also I think you are ignoring Kivan wisdom that is 14 that itself give him the option to as you say "engage in extended conversations", which for my thinking isn't that long. Maybe his charisma is low but he have the wisdom is above avarage wish give him the choice of how to talk to people he meet, and the way he comment on thing.

I don't think you should judge the game base on the little you saw, I think it a great mod that add a lot to the game and the intra party banters that happen far too often for you is for my thinking because you don't use to it, for me it really isn't enough and I wish someone would have add more to the mod or make another mod to add, but adding isn't possible because the mod is finished, so I wish other would have mad more banters mods to to the first game, because the second game have more then one even with the intra banters already inside the vanilla game.

terzaerian

Dazzu said:

The thing that bothers me is that I only hear it from elves. There's never any Dwarvish spoken, and only a smattering of Deep Gnomish, and that's more because they want to stay uncommunicative.

Heck, even in game, only Viconia uses her tongue, and that's because she's got an underdark excuse of separation. Aerie is seperated but never uses Elvish (or Avariel tongue if its different.)

My question is, why are elves always treated so special? It gets really offputting.

This sounds more shortcomings of the base game itself. It is odd that Aerie never uses Elvish if she grew up amongst the Avariel, but that's not the fault of the BG1NPC mod, that's a shortcoming in the base game. But as you can see other characters do use their native language a lot so it's hardly out of scope for Kivan, either.

As for Dwarvish characters in BG2, well one, there aren't that many (is Korgan the only one?). As for Dwarven characters enhanced by BG1NPC, I can't say. I've only had Kagain for any length of time, and his dialogue is predictably focused on money and plotting. Yeslick I can't say either way as I've never recruited him with BG1NPC, but it definitely seems like his character would be the most ripe for exploring dwarven culture and religion, seeing as he is a fighter-cleric with ties to the originally dwarvish mine in Cloakwood, and failing to do that with him arguably would be an oversight. That sounds like a good project for myself, going forward.

SharGuidesMyHand

kaguana said:

I bet you never saw the way Kivan talk to Alora and her cheerfulness.

You mean with or without the mod? Without the mod, Kivan will repeatedly tell her to "Shut up!"

SCARY_WIZARD

SharGuidesMyHand said:

An issue that I had expected to have even before I installed the mod, is that I appreciate the "less is more" approach of the BG1 NPCs' personalities, which allows you to form your own interpretations of the characters. However, the Project projects someone else's interpretation of the NPCs into the game, which may not necessarily be the same as my own.

Yep. It's a great mod, but after a playthrough with it, I said "this isn't for me," and uninstalled it. I, too, prefer my own interpretations of the first game's NPCs, but that there is a mod that fleshed every one out is cool.

Ravenslight

I can certainly understand how someone who prefers the “less is more” approach of the original game would find this mod unappealing. It really was designed for a player who likes much more interaction from their party members. I think it is an inevitable problem that when any modder expands the character of any of the original NPCs from the game, their take on that character is not going to fit with every other players interpretation.

I am a fan of the mod, yet I can’t say I agreed with the direction that was taken for every NPC. I had my own personal perceptions already in place before I played the mod, just like everyone else. In the end it didn’t matter. I felt that overall, they did an excellent job of maintaining the general intended character of the NPCs while greatly expanding my ability to interact with them. The unavoidable fact that my own perception had to bend a bit when confronted with some personality points that I previously had a different take on, didn’t matter all that much.

It was well worth it to me to let go of a few of my own preconceptions to be able to experience more fleshed out and interactive characters in my game.

demented

I just finished a playthrough with the mod for the first time and was very impressed with it. I felt that most of the extra dialogue was true to the characters. It added a great deal to my game and made the victories and losses more meaningful.

As for Kivan, I always had the impression that he was a moody, but sensitive person. He's curt and standoffish, but I could easily see his softer side coming out when getting to know someone. He strikes me as a hard on the outside, gooey on the inside type of character.

Dazzu

The whole elvish thing reminds me of that movie character whose an annoyingly French guy. Even if he's using a suave sounding French accent, he still just throws French words into his dialogue because you can't guess he's French otherwise. Isn't it distracting?!

Meanwhile there's also guy from some other, less prominent country that the less than average American has never even heard of has a fairly accurate accent, but only speaks English. It may be broken, but he never throws in his native tongue. We wouldn't want consistency.


It's a feeling like that.

kaguana

SharGuidesMyHand said:

kaguana said:

I bet you never saw the way Kivan talk to Alora and her cheerfulness.

You mean with or without the mod? Without the mod, Kivan will repeatedly tell her to "Shut up!"

There is that and there are banters inside the mod.

shawne

BG1NPC works especially well with the EEs, though - Dorn, Neera and Rasaad stick out in the vanilla game for having more banters/quests than most of the original NPCs, but with the added mod content they're all more or less on the same level.

SharGuidesMyHand

terzaerian said:

It also seems like you're judging the entire mod based off an experimental implementation and a very bare handful of interactions with only three characters, before you've given the main quest in particular time to unfold things - Kivan's aversion to torture becomes abundantly clear through your friendship with him and progress through the main quest, and is completely in-line with (what little exists) of his established background and the canon story.

I never suggested that Kivan's aversion to torture wasn't well developed, or that it was inconsistent with his persona from the original game. My point was that there are multiple possible depictions of him that would've fit with his persona - but whereas the original game allows you the freedom to imagine one of them, the Project mod adopts one as the "canon" instead.

Ravenslight said:

I am a fan of the mod, yet I can’t say I agreed with the direction that was taken for every NPC. I had my own personal perceptions already in place before I played the mod, just like everyone else. In the end it didn’t matter. I felt that overall, they did an excellent job of maintaining the general intended character of the NPCs while greatly expanding my ability to interact with them. The unavoidable fact that my own perception had to bend a bit when confronted with some personality points that I previously had a different take on, didn’t matter all that much.

It was well worth it to me to let go of a few of my own preconceptions to be able to experience more fleshed out and interactive characters in my game.

Thanks for the feedback.

I'll probably give the mod a much more earnest try, although I haven't decided yet which of its components I'll install.

jackjack

I love the mod, and struggle to play BGEE without it, despite the fact that I prefer it to BG2EE, but I must confess I've never bothered to pick up Kivan. I like to wander on my merry way, keeping to my own schedule if any, not somebody else's, so I can't speak to his characterization.

SCARY_WIZARD

Dazzu said:

The whole elvish thing reminds me of that movie character whose an annoyingly French guy. Even if he's using a suave sounding French accent, he still just throws French words into his dialogue because you can't guess he's French otherwise. Isn't it distracting?!

Sort of an unrelated note, but I'd like to see something that end horribly. Like, for negotiations with some hired toughs to get really hairy because somebody insists on throwing in phrases in Sasquatch or something.
-"Alright, give us the gold, and we'll give you the hostage."
"Ragnar, goonie goo-goo."
-"What?"
"Goonie goo-goo! Ragnar, goonie goo-goo!"
-"They're giving each other orders! Draw steel!"
Roll for Initiative.

kaguana

jackjack said:

I love the mod, and struggle to play BGEE without it, despite the fact that I prefer it to BG2EE, but I must confess I've never bothered to pick up Kivan. I like to wander on my merry way, keeping to my own schedule if any, not somebody else's, so I can't speak to his characterization.

You know having Kavin in the party still give you time to explore before you go to the bandit camp it is true that it less time but it not so bad as it looks like and after the bandit camp you can keep exploring as you like you don't have to rush anywhere you know
I did it I pick him up at the beginning before Nashkel Mines and still was able to do lot of exploring, 20 days is a lot of time.

Quartz

@jackjack : I've never once had Kivan bail on me and I pick him up every other play through. I didn't even know he DID bail on you until I read up on here. Probably the only people who have trouble with it are those who cast all their Wizard spells immediately, rest, repeat.

Delvarian

The only thing I dislike about this mod is that I can't play it on my IPad.