End of the Iron Crisis

Cerevant

This discussion was created from comments split from: "Stuff I think is cool that you probably didn't notice" Thread.

Dharius

Dee said:

My cool thing:

When you resolve the iron crisis (after you flood the Cloakwood Mine), all your metal non-magical weapons will no longer break at random. No more iron plague means no more brittle metal.

Not sure about this one (sorry)....it always made sense to me that the existing iron in the local system would be contaminated for some time after the crisis was over. This doesn't seem very realistic to me. It's nice though.

justfeelinathome

@Dee ...which I find nice from a roleplaying-standpoint, since it gives you a sense of accomplishment for actually having solved the crisis. Logically, however, it's just weird that all of a sudden all the weapons along the Sword Coast should become stable at once. I never had much of a quarrel with the lingering effect of the crisis, because to me it seemed quite believable that it would take a while for new weapons to fill up the shelves of smithies and old ones to leave.

Out of curiosity: Why was this point of the story chosen as the one for solving the crisis? After all it was not this mine from which the tainted iron sprouted and, on the contrary: It was one of few sources (other ones unnamed excluded, perhaps) of untarnished iron still left. So flooding the mine is, as presented in game, a necessary evil. But how did it solve the crisis?

Well I'm just thinking to logical for DnD, sometimes...

P.S. Ninja'd by @Dharius on most of my post.

Dharius

justtravelinthrough said:

it was not this mine from which the tainted iron sprouted and, on the contrary: It was one of few sources (other ones unnamed excluded, perhaps) of untarnished iron still left. So flooding the mine is, as presented in game, a necessary evil. But how did it solve the crisis?

Agreed, realism problems aside, the solving of the iron crisis should be much later (perhaps Chapter 7 or so), when the Throne is rendered (relatively) harmless?

Dee

The part of the crisis we're looking at is specifically the part with contaminated iron. Obviously Cloakwood Mine isn't distributing contaminated iron, but Nashkel Mine may be too sudden a shift to remedy the plague (or potentially too early in the game to "fix" all the player's weapons).

This behavior isn't hardcoded, though; if you think it should work differently, let us know.

Dharius

Personally I think the contamination should last throughout all of BGEE. It won't affect most players at that part of the game (Chapt 4 onwards) anyhow.

justfeelinathome

Glad to hear it ain't hardcoded.

And it's tiny things like these, soft coded ones, that I like the accessibility of these games for: Don't like the abrupt end to the iron crisis? Change it. Want Cleric/Rangers to gain all the druidic spell and not just those up to level 3? ...You get the idea. It offers more room for personalization than simple checkboxes.

Rodrian

Yeaa, it doesn't make much sense at all and at this point, I think that *noone* would care for normal weapons that much either to implement it. Iron Crisis should really stay until SoD starts up IMHO. .

Thels

Agreed, it feels odd and arbitrary for items to suddenly stop breaking when you flood an unrelated mine.

Though honestly, I may not have noticed it happening at that point.

Ammar

Dee wrote: »

The part of the crisis we're looking at is specifically the part with contaminated iron. Obviously Cloakwood Mine isn't distributing contaminated iron, but Nashkel Mine may be too sudden a shift to remedy the plague (or potentially too early in the game to "fix" all the player's weapons).

This behavior isn't hardcoded, though; if you think it should work differently, let us know.

I have to agree with other that this does not really seem to make sense. After all, the Cloakwood Mine gets flooded, so it stops being a supply of pure iron.

The Nashkel mine will start producing "clean" iron again. Even under normal circumstances it would take a bit of time for the iron to get to the smiths, for them to produce new weapons, which then have to end for sale. Not to mention that a lot of unscrupulous merchants will probably try to offload the bad stuff first.

But given the tensions between Amn and Baldur's Gate it seems unlikely that the iron would end up in the regions north of Nashkel anytime soon. Even then, it would seem likely that the Flaming Fist would want to fix their equipment first.

In terms of gameplay it probably won't matter, as everyone will probably have a magic weapon by then anyway.

Ithual

Dee wrote: »

My cool thing:

When you resolve the iron crisis (after you flood the Cloakwood Mine), all your metal non-magical weapons will no longer break at random. No more iron plague means no more brittle metal.

But surely those weapons were bought during the iron Crises. So would they not still be susceptable to the poison from Nashkell?

Jarrakul

For what it's worth, I'm pretty sure it's stated somewhere that the iron crisis is contagious and is actively infecting even weapons forged before it began. Given that, it makes exactly as much sense (which is to say, very little, but it's the same sort of nonsense) to say that stopping the iron crisis would cure even tainted iron after a while, in the same way that stopping the flu from spreading would eventually cure everyone of the flu.

GreenWarlock

and as per my reply a while back - it could just mean confirmation that we got lucky, the weapon we purchased/picked up did not happen to be using contaminated iron, and non-contaminated iron becomes much more widespread after the stocks held back in the cloak wood mine are widely available.

Contagion is a likely effect if you ever use your sword in combat, parrying weapons that have that iron-contagion in them. Especially likely if there is a magical/curse component infused into the alchemy.

SirBatince

I wish weapons didn't break in BP1. Its just an obnoxious left over from bg1

Natreg

Instead of just solving the Iron Crisis after Cloackwood, why not diminish the probability a bit for weapons being broken each chapter after Nashkel?

That way it would seem as it's being solved gradually to the point that once on the final chapters it would be either completely solved, or just have so low a probability to happen that it would be a rare sight to see a weapon broken.

Dee

Natreg wrote: »

Instead of just solving the Iron Crisis after Cloackwood, why not diminish the probability a bit for weapons being broken each chapter after Nashkel?

That way it would seem as it's being solved gradually to the point that once on the final chapters it would be either completely solved, or just have so low a probability to happen that it would be a rare sight to see a weapon broken.

The current solution is an answer to the problem of what to do to make weapons no longer break (a necessity for Siege of Dragonspear) without requiring an entirely new set of .itm files (for mod compatibility and general resource management). There's a chapter-based check in one of the 2da files that prevents the weapon disintegration from happening. There's no way to reduce the probability without duplicating the resources, so it's an all-or-nothing game in this case.

As for immersion, there's no in-game notification that weapons are magically "cured" (because as has been noted, that's not how the iron plague works). The change is intended to be a quiet shift that signals the end of the crisis. @GreenWarlock has an explanation that works just fine; descriptions you read in-game suggest that the iron contamination is so strong that if your weapon is contaminated, it'll break within minutes, not weeks. So if your weapon hasn't been contaminated (i.e. broken) by the time the curse is no longer affecting the world, it won't be contaminated (i.e. break) from then on.

00zim00

There is a very important reason why none of this make any sense... There was a cut/missing quest which resolved the Iron Crisis and created a "cure" for the tainted iron/ore. I would think a solution would be for this quest to be re-added in BG:EE then some form of conclusion in SoD so it makes logical sense within the time that passed.

This would then explain why the player has weapons that no longer break as you could assume that even if the Tainted Ore is still being restored elsewhere the player character would conceivably receive a cure such as a vial of oil that he can rub down his metal weapons with to remove the taint.

The Tainted Ore

The Tainted Ore is a cut quest from Baldur's Gate that is included in the Unfinished Business mod. It allows for completion of the Investigating Nashkel Mines quest. In Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition this quest does not appear and instead Investigating Nashkel Mines simply disappears after completing Chapter 2.

After clearing the Nashkel mine speak to Berrun Ghastkill and tell him about the poisoning of the ore. He will then ask you to bring an sample of the Contaminated iron to Taerom Fuiruim, and the "mineral poison" (Vial of Mysterious Liquid) you found to Thalantyr so that they might figure out a way to counteract its effects.


http://baldursgate.wikia.com/wiki/The_Tainted_Ore
http://baldursgate.wikia.com/wiki/Vial_of_Mysterious_Liquid
http://baldursgate.wikia.com/wiki/Contaminated_iron

Note the "Vial of Mysterious Liquid" is still now a item drop from the kobolds in the Nashkel Mines so even old saves should be able to complete quest if it was reintroduced. Also... would be cool to have SoD introduce this mini quest into BG:EE for everyone who has it. Would really help join the stories and answer some questions!

rashkae

I'm all for immersion and story consistency, but I also think dedicating any more programming resources, thought cycles, or even request tickets, on what arbitrary point non-magical weapons (who is still using those by Chapter 4?) stop breaking is a waste of digital ink.

The parts of BG1 that matter, (chapters 1 and 2.) will still be as they always were, but this solves issues with transition to the new plot. All's good.

Ithual

Dee wrote: »

Natreg wrote: »

Instead of just solving the Iron Crisis after Cloackwood, why not diminish the probability a bit for weapons being broken each chapter after Nashkel?

That way it would seem as it's being solved gradually to the point that once on the final chapters it would be either completely solved, or just have so low a probability to happen that it would be a rare sight to see a weapon broken.

The current solution is an answer to the problem of what to do to make weapons no longer break (a necessity for Siege of Dragonspear) without requiring an entirely new set of .itm files (for mod compatibility and general resource management). There's a chapter-based check in one of the 2da files that prevents the weapon disintegration from happening. There's no way to reduce the probability without duplicating the resources, so it's an all-or-nothing game in this case.

As for immersion, there's no in-game notification that weapons are magically "cured" (because as has been noted, that's not how the iron plague works). The change is intended to be a quiet shift that signals the end of the crisis. @GreenWarlock has an explanation that works just fine; descriptions you read in-game suggest that the iron contamination is so strong that if your weapon is contaminated, it'll break within minutes, not weeks. So if your weapon hasn't been contaminated (i.e. broken) by the time the curse is no longer affecting the world, it won't be contaminated (i.e. break) from then on.

I like this actually. It makes perfect sense in game terms. There is no notification, no journal update. So those using non-magical weapons won't even notice a difference.

And to be fair, by the time I've finished with Nashkell, weapons breaking are no longer and issue for me.

Caradoc

I've always liked the weapon breaking thing in bg1. It really adds an extra layer of unpredictability to the low level campaign. I'm also running the tweak mod that applies the same behaviour to non magical metal armors & helmets.

Its quite fun how the entire armor can break during a battle. And sometimes it works for your advantage. Some difficult encounter with one of those mercanary groups can actually change it's course when the enemy fighter's armor breaks.

So i would not mind if the breaking thing would still happen past clockwood.

bob_veng

00zim00 said:

There is a very important reason why none of this make any sense... There was a cut/missing quest which resolved the Iron Crisis and created a "cure" for the tainted iron/ore. I would think a solution would be for this quest to be re-added in BG:EE then some form of conclusion in SoD so it makes logical sense within the time that passed.



This would then explain why the player has weapons that no longer break as you could assume that even if the Tainted Ore is still being restored elsewhere the player character would conceivably receive a cure such as a vial of oil that he can rub down his metal weapons with to remove the taint.



The Tainted Ore



The Tainted Ore is a cut quest from Baldur's Gate that is included in the Unfinished Business mod. It allows for completion of the Investigating Nashkel Mines quest. In Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition this quest does not appear and instead Investigating Nashkel Mines simply disappears after completing Chapter 2.



After clearing the Nashkel mine speak to Berrun Ghastkill and tell him about the poisoning of the ore. He will then ask you to bring an sample of the Contaminated iron to Taerom Fuiruim, and the "mineral poison" (Vial of Mysterious Liquid) you found to Thalantyr so that they might figure out a way to counteract its effects.





http://baldursgate.wikia.com/wiki/The_Tainted_Ore

http://baldursgate.wikia.com/wiki/Vial_of_Mysterious_Liquid

http://baldursgate.wikia.com/wiki/Contaminated_iron



Note the "Vial of Mysterious Liquid" is still now a item drop from the kobolds in the Nashkel Mines so even old saves should be able to complete quest if it was reintroduced. Also... would be cool to have SoD introduce this mini quest into BG:EE for everyone who has it. Would really help join the stories and answer some questions!

this quest was cut because it was a poorly designed quest i think.
it had dramatic consequences for the plot while being extremely easy to miss (miss to pick up or even notice the quest items) and probably forcing the player to backtrack through the booooring nashkel mines.
this was an even bigger problem before autoloot because it was especially easy to miss the "vials of mysterious liquid" that are dropped by 2 nondescript kobolds.

now, with autoloot it could work better. to make it better, more vials should be added. lots of vials of mysterious liquid in an important place such as a chest.

but yeah, you're basically right. this quest should be brought to the EE in some form.