[MOD] High Power Baldur's Gate v2.5.0
OlvynChuru
Member Posts: 3,080
High Power Baldur's Gate
Version 2.5.0
The main changes:
More abilities!
In High Power Baldur's Gate, everyone in the game, from fighters to diviners, from kobolds to zombies, has their own abilities that make them different from everybody else. Many of these abilities are very powerful: in this mod, you get to play with abilities that are normally reserved for high-level characters, like attacking ten times per round, stopping time, getting critical hits on every attack, or casting multiple spells per round. But the mod is balanced such that these abilities don't make the game too easy, so enjoy using them!
You get these kinds of abilities right from the beginning of the game. After you create your characters, they get their own set of new abilities. Different classes and different kits have different abilities.
NPC party members do not get these class and kit-based special abilities. Instead, each NPC has their own unique abilities. Kivan, for example, has increased vision range, so he can shoot enemies before they see him. Dynaheir counts as six levels higher for purposes of determining the power of her spells, so she can launch four Magic Missiles with one spell at level 1. Khalid is permanently hasted. All the NPCs have cool stuff like this.
The reason these crazy powers don't make the game too easy is because enemies throughout the game now have their own crazy powers. Monsters in High Power Baldur's Gate are far more interesting to fight than they are in the unmodded game. No longer do most enemies just walk up to you and attack you. Instead, each kind of monster has their own tricks that you'll have to adapt to. There will be plenty of surprises.
The same goes for all the minor characters in the game. The mod fleshes out the abilities of each minor character, even giving some individual minor characters their own signature abilities and spells, like "Zordral's Corrosive Breath" or "Ragefast's Duplication." Nearly every spellcaster in the game is given a unique AI and set of spells. In this mod, characters are just as badass as they claim they are. Zal really is the fastest dart thrower, capable of throwing ten darts per round. That guard in the Cloakwood Mines really is going to give you a world of hurt.
More interesting items!
The magic items in Baldur's Gate 1 are normally pretty boring. Most of the top-tier weapons in the game are +2 weapons with no abilities. This mod does something about that. It gives new abilities to almost all the magic items in the game.
Additionally, the mod adds a lot of new items to the game. Some of them are original; others were taken from Baldur's Gate 2, Icewind Dale, or Planescape Torment. The mod spread cool items throughout the stores in the game so that almost every shop sells something interesting. Although some of the new items are quite powerful, they do not obsolete the original items, since the mod also powers up the original items.
The mod increases the rewards from many quests. Now more quests will reward you with unique items you can't get anywhere else, rather than just a small amount of gold or a weak magic item.
The mod also places lots of stat-increasing manuals and tomes throughout the game, mainly in the hands of enemies. There are enough of them to get one or two party members to 25 in all stats by the end of the game. Don't worry: having 25 in all stats won't be overpowered in this mod.
More interesting spells!
Some of the spells in Baldur's Gate 1 are useless or almost useless, so this mod makes them better.
The mod adds over 40 spells from Icewind Dale, as well as over 100 new spells!
And various other things!
I've made a lot of other little changes: I've moved items around, added new encounters here and there, put new monsters into the game, and more.
Additional components
Aside from the main component, which installs most of the changes in the mod, there are currently 29 optional components that tweak things such as spells, rules, and kits. You can find descriptions for all of them in the readme.
Reasons to try out this mod:
- Since the NPCs all have very different powers, the game can play very differently depending on which NPCs you have in your party.
- The variety of interesting abilities granted to the player characters, as well as the diverse selection of equipment, allow for all sorts of different builds.
- You have great leeway in determining the power level of your party. The mod enables you to change the experience cap and/or have your party start the game at a higher level. The mod has a very flexible difficulty; starting at a higher level will not make the game too easy, but it's still beatable if you start at level 1.
- This mod makes the game feel new and different. You never know what creatures, encounters, or items you'll come across in the next stretch of wilderness. You can't rely as much on prior knowledge of the game.
Lastly, the mod is just plain fun. I made this mod because I was bored with the unmodded game and I wanted to spice it up.
Tips for playing this mod:
- For the first playthrough, play on Normal difficulty.
- I recommend installing the component that gives additional experience to the PC at the beginning of the game, and setting the experience given to 10000 or 20000.
- When exploring the wilderness, always have a character scout ahead in stealth or invisibility. That way, they will know what enemies are up ahead and your team can prepare for battle without as much metagaming.
- Watch out for doppelgangers. They appear very early in the game in this mod and they deal a lot of damage in melee. If you fight a doppelganger, don't let it get near you.
Compatibility:
Since the mod gives unique starting abilities to each kit, it should give starting abilities to custom kits as well. If your PC is one of the following kits, they will get their own starting abilities, usually based on the abilities of that kit.
Arcane Archer (fighter and fighter/mage versions) by @AionZ
Chaos Sorcerer by @argent77
Charlatan by @Raduziel
Dreamwalker Shaman by @Ulb
Expanded Classes and Kits by @semiticgoddess
Lost Druid by @zupsky
Mercenary by @Raduziel
Militia Officer by @Raduziel
Pale Master by @AionZ
Shadow Magic Kits by @AionZ
Storm Caller Shaman by @Ulb
Warhorn Shaman by @AionZ
Warlock by @AionZ
Witchlight Shaman by @LavaDelVortel
Since the mod gives unique powers to NPCs, it is only fair for mod NPCs to also gain unique powers. If you have one of the following NPC mods installed, this mod will give them their own powers.
Aura by @AionZ
Bristlelick by @LavaDelVortel
Drake by @AionZ
Ellyrian by @CaloNord
Emily by @Skitia
Finch by @Bons
Gavin by @berelinde
Helarine by @Jackkel_Dragon
Helga by @Skitia
Indira by @Ghreyfain
Ishlilka by @WarChiefZeke
Isra by @Rhaella
Kale by @Skitia
Korax by @semiticgoddess
Mur'Neth by @Andyr
Recorder by @Skitia
Sirene by @AionZ
Tenya by @Coutelier
Valerie by @Tempest
Verr'Sza by @LavaDelVortel
Vienxay by @Skitia
Vynd, Littlun, Flara, Moidre, and Dave by @Glam_Vrock
Walahnan by @LavaDelVortel
White by @LavaDelVortel
Will Scarlet O'Hara from Northern Tales of the Sword Coast by @Aurelinus
Zakrion by @jmaeq
The mod also gives powers to enemies in certain quest/encounter mods.
BG1 NPC Project by the BG1 NPC Project Team
BG1 Unfinished Business by icelus, SimDing0, Ascension64, devSin, Idobek, CamDawg, SixOfSpades, and Echon
Extra Expanded Enhanced Encounters by WithinAmnesia
Northern Tales of the Sword Coast by Aurelinus
Rough World by elminster
Shadow Magic by AionZ
Kit, NPC and quest mods must be installed BEFORE High Power Baldur's Gate for it to give powers to the content of those mods.
Since this mod makes many changes to items and spells, it is currently not compatible with Item Revisions or Spell Revisions.
NOTE: You MUST install EEex in order to play this mod. It's okay if you don't know much about EEex; just install it. EEex currently only works on Windows, so you will need to be on Windows to play this mod. Once you have EEex installed, to start the game you must click on EEex.exe, rather than Baldur.exe or SiegeOfDragonspear.exe.
Version 2.5.0
Download
High Power Baldur's Gate gives a variety of new abilities to party members as well as most other creatures in the game, and makes many changes to items, spells, quests, encounters, and other aspects of the game. The mod aims to make Baldur's Gate 1 feel new and interesting, like it was when you first played it!The main changes:
More abilities!
In High Power Baldur's Gate, everyone in the game, from fighters to diviners, from kobolds to zombies, has their own abilities that make them different from everybody else. Many of these abilities are very powerful: in this mod, you get to play with abilities that are normally reserved for high-level characters, like attacking ten times per round, stopping time, getting critical hits on every attack, or casting multiple spells per round. But the mod is balanced such that these abilities don't make the game too easy, so enjoy using them!
You get these kinds of abilities right from the beginning of the game. After you create your characters, they get their own set of new abilities. Different classes and different kits have different abilities.
NPC party members do not get these class and kit-based special abilities. Instead, each NPC has their own unique abilities. Kivan, for example, has increased vision range, so he can shoot enemies before they see him. Dynaheir counts as six levels higher for purposes of determining the power of her spells, so she can launch four Magic Missiles with one spell at level 1. Khalid is permanently hasted. All the NPCs have cool stuff like this.
The reason these crazy powers don't make the game too easy is because enemies throughout the game now have their own crazy powers. Monsters in High Power Baldur's Gate are far more interesting to fight than they are in the unmodded game. No longer do most enemies just walk up to you and attack you. Instead, each kind of monster has their own tricks that you'll have to adapt to. There will be plenty of surprises.
The same goes for all the minor characters in the game. The mod fleshes out the abilities of each minor character, even giving some individual minor characters their own signature abilities and spells, like "Zordral's Corrosive Breath" or "Ragefast's Duplication." Nearly every spellcaster in the game is given a unique AI and set of spells. In this mod, characters are just as badass as they claim they are. Zal really is the fastest dart thrower, capable of throwing ten darts per round. That guard in the Cloakwood Mines really is going to give you a world of hurt.
More interesting items!
The magic items in Baldur's Gate 1 are normally pretty boring. Most of the top-tier weapons in the game are +2 weapons with no abilities. This mod does something about that. It gives new abilities to almost all the magic items in the game.
Additionally, the mod adds a lot of new items to the game. Some of them are original; others were taken from Baldur's Gate 2, Icewind Dale, or Planescape Torment. The mod spread cool items throughout the stores in the game so that almost every shop sells something interesting. Although some of the new items are quite powerful, they do not obsolete the original items, since the mod also powers up the original items.
The mod increases the rewards from many quests. Now more quests will reward you with unique items you can't get anywhere else, rather than just a small amount of gold or a weak magic item.
The mod also places lots of stat-increasing manuals and tomes throughout the game, mainly in the hands of enemies. There are enough of them to get one or two party members to 25 in all stats by the end of the game. Don't worry: having 25 in all stats won't be overpowered in this mod.
More interesting spells!
Some of the spells in Baldur's Gate 1 are useless or almost useless, so this mod makes them better.
The mod adds over 40 spells from Icewind Dale, as well as over 100 new spells!
And various other things!
I've made a lot of other little changes: I've moved items around, added new encounters here and there, put new monsters into the game, and more.
Additional components
Aside from the main component, which installs most of the changes in the mod, there are currently 29 optional components that tweak things such as spells, rules, and kits. You can find descriptions for all of them in the readme.
Reasons to try out this mod:
- Since the NPCs all have very different powers, the game can play very differently depending on which NPCs you have in your party.
- The variety of interesting abilities granted to the player characters, as well as the diverse selection of equipment, allow for all sorts of different builds.
- You have great leeway in determining the power level of your party. The mod enables you to change the experience cap and/or have your party start the game at a higher level. The mod has a very flexible difficulty; starting at a higher level will not make the game too easy, but it's still beatable if you start at level 1.
- This mod makes the game feel new and different. You never know what creatures, encounters, or items you'll come across in the next stretch of wilderness. You can't rely as much on prior knowledge of the game.
Lastly, the mod is just plain fun. I made this mod because I was bored with the unmodded game and I wanted to spice it up.
Tips for playing this mod:
- For the first playthrough, play on Normal difficulty.
- I recommend installing the component that gives additional experience to the PC at the beginning of the game, and setting the experience given to 10000 or 20000.
- When exploring the wilderness, always have a character scout ahead in stealth or invisibility. That way, they will know what enemies are up ahead and your team can prepare for battle without as much metagaming.
- Watch out for doppelgangers. They appear very early in the game in this mod and they deal a lot of damage in melee. If you fight a doppelganger, don't let it get near you.
Compatibility:
Since the mod gives unique starting abilities to each kit, it should give starting abilities to custom kits as well. If your PC is one of the following kits, they will get their own starting abilities, usually based on the abilities of that kit.
Arcane Archer (fighter and fighter/mage versions) by @AionZ
Chaos Sorcerer by @argent77
Charlatan by @Raduziel
Dreamwalker Shaman by @Ulb
Expanded Classes and Kits by @semiticgoddess
Lost Druid by @zupsky
Mercenary by @Raduziel
Militia Officer by @Raduziel
Pale Master by @AionZ
Shadow Magic Kits by @AionZ
Storm Caller Shaman by @Ulb
Warhorn Shaman by @AionZ
Warlock by @AionZ
Witchlight Shaman by @LavaDelVortel
Since the mod gives unique powers to NPCs, it is only fair for mod NPCs to also gain unique powers. If you have one of the following NPC mods installed, this mod will give them their own powers.
Aura by @AionZ
Bristlelick by @LavaDelVortel
Drake by @AionZ
Ellyrian by @CaloNord
Emily by @Skitia
Finch by @Bons
Gavin by @berelinde
Helarine by @Jackkel_Dragon
Helga by @Skitia
Indira by @Ghreyfain
Ishlilka by @WarChiefZeke
Isra by @Rhaella
Kale by @Skitia
Korax by @semiticgoddess
Mur'Neth by @Andyr
Recorder by @Skitia
Sirene by @AionZ
Tenya by @Coutelier
Valerie by @Tempest
Verr'Sza by @LavaDelVortel
Vienxay by @Skitia
Vynd, Littlun, Flara, Moidre, and Dave by @Glam_Vrock
Walahnan by @LavaDelVortel
White by @LavaDelVortel
Will Scarlet O'Hara from Northern Tales of the Sword Coast by @Aurelinus
Zakrion by @jmaeq
The mod also gives powers to enemies in certain quest/encounter mods.
BG1 NPC Project by the BG1 NPC Project Team
BG1 Unfinished Business by icelus, SimDing0, Ascension64, devSin, Idobek, CamDawg, SixOfSpades, and Echon
Extra Expanded Enhanced Encounters by WithinAmnesia
Northern Tales of the Sword Coast by Aurelinus
Rough World by elminster
Shadow Magic by AionZ
Kit, NPC and quest mods must be installed BEFORE High Power Baldur's Gate for it to give powers to the content of those mods.
Since this mod makes many changes to items and spells, it is currently not compatible with Item Revisions or Spell Revisions.
NOTE: You MUST install EEex in order to play this mod. It's okay if you don't know much about EEex; just install it. EEex currently only works on Windows, so you will need to be on Windows to play this mod. Once you have EEex installed, to start the game you must click on EEex.exe, rather than Baldur.exe or SiegeOfDragonspear.exe.
Download
Post edited by OlvynChuru on
21
Comments
Spellcasters who have gotten this treatment so far include:
Tarnesh
Degrodel
Lendarn
Osmadi
Hareishan
The Red Wizard squad
Droth
Kahrk
Several other ogre mages
I've also created some of my own spellcasting enemies and I've given each of them a unique set of spells too.
I've changed just about everything in this mod: I've revised many items and spells (in my own way), I've created a few new items and spells, I've given monsters and companions powers that they're not supposed to have, I've created new enemies, and I've put in a lot of little things throughout the game.
This mod makes each enemy as unique as possible in addition to making them stronger. Now, fighting a Doom Guard is very different from fighting a Battle Horror or the Doomsayer. Fighting tasloi is very different from fighting xvarts. The original game was filled with enemies which simply walked up to you and attacked you with no tricks up their sleeve, and this mod changes that.
Dynaheir:
- Level increased by 6 for purposes of determining mage spell power
- 99% innate resistance to fire
- +10 to hit and damage while unarmed (this also applies to spells like Shocking Grasp)
- Can cast Spellstrike 3/day (Spellstrike in this mod lowers the target's resistance to fire, cold, electricity, acid and magic damage by 100% for 1 turn), and Protection from Magic Energy 1/day
Edwin:
- Can memorize double the number of spells for all spell levels
- Starts knowing several high-level spells of each level, including Wish (though good luck using that with Edwin's pathetic Wisdom)
- Can cast Superior Magic Armor 1/day (grants him AC -10 for 2 turns)
Xan:
- 18 Strength, 3 Constitution
- Has five points in daggers and two points in Single-Weapon Style
- Every hit he makes with a melee weapon is a critical hit
- His moonblade is now a +5 weapon which gives him +99% fire resistance and gives the target a -10 penalty to saves vs enchantment spells for 3 rounds with each hit
- Can cast Enchanted Weapon 3/day, and Critical Sequencer 1/day (store several spells that are released on the next critical hit)
To make your mod fully compatible with other mods that don't directly conflict with your changes, you still will need to package it using WeiDU and make use of EXTEND_BOTTOM/EXTEND_TOP to add your custom scripts to existing area scripts (so as not to erase changes from other mods) and make use of WeiDU's creature/area patching macros instead of replacing .are and .cre files outright (so you don't delete custom items or creatures that other mods placed there). The alternative would be to dump all of your files into the override folder before installing any other mods, leaving it up to everyone else to use compatible patching methods... which probably would work for a v1 release, but isn't a great plan in the long run.
You can find the latest documentation about how to use WeiDU here. It has a handy feature that can scan a directory and spit out the necessary code to put everything there into the override folder, although that auto-code-generation feature doesn't always use the most modern & optimal methods, so some manual coding is still very much required.
In any case, I look forward to trying this mod when you decide to release it.
This is not a difficulty mod. It'll make some parts of the game easier and some parts of the game harder. All the enemies have been powered up; the only question is whether the powerup on the player's side will make it easier than if no one was powered up.
The mod also makes it so that many enemy characters throughout the game drop stat-increasing tomes. You could potentially have one or two characters with 25 in all stats by the end of the game. Don't worry: having 25 in all stats will not make the game too easy.
By now I've been working on this mod for about a year, and over that time I've gotten a lot better at modding. The initial modifications I made to creatures a long time ago were done with EEKeeper alone. I didn't use NearInfinity (I actually had NearInfinity but it crashed whenever I did pretty much anything with it; it took me a while to realize that I was using a really old version of NearInfinity which was made before the EEs. Now I have a newer version of it.).
I was able to do some pretty cool things with EEKeeper alone, but a lot of the modifications I made were really primitive, and I'm still trying to undo the mess I made. For example, I wanted to make vultures summon special enemies each round. However, since EEKeeper doesn't let me make new spells or creatures, I had to modify an existing summoned creature. I edited the nishruu (which nobody in the game could summon) to make it the special creature I wanted. Then I gave the vulture a Cast Spell on Condition effect that made it cast Summon Nishruu every round.
Nowadays, I want some enemies to summon REAL nishruus, so once I got a usable NearInfinity I reverted the nishruu file back to the way it was and made a unique creature file for the vultures to summon. However, I still have more stupid mistakes to correct.
I can't stress enough the usefulness of WeiDU to make a everywhere-installable version of a mod.
Right now my override folder has about 3100 files without the WeiDU installation, but filling that folder is no longer the ultimate goal. Instead, I want to be able to install all those files with WeiDU. The only problem is writing the code for all the files. That's going to take a while. But eventually I'm going to finish it.
So far I've done the following things with WeiDU:
*I've given names/descriptions to (or changed the names/descriptions of) most of the items and spells I've created or modified. I've given names to the new creatures I've created.
*I've written the code to install the changes to the CRE files of all non-SOD companions. They have all the new powers I wanted to give them.
*I've written the code to install the changes to some of the ARE files I've modified.
I'm still overriding files with EEKeeper and NearInfinity. This is simply because it's easier to figure out what changes I want to make to the files when I'm not looking at them in the form of code. However, eventually I will write WeiDU code for them all.
Oh, and @jastey , my version of BG:EE is not outdated and neither is my dialog.tlk file. The file comes from the latest version of Siege of Dragonspear. I haven't overridden dialog.tlk in a long time.
(for anyone who didn't see original name of the mod, it was called the Baldur's Gate Standalone Mod)
I decided to showcase the abilities of one kit: the Invoker. Actually the Invoker only has one special ability, which is the ability to cast Meteor Swarm once per day (currently there is no other way for the player to cast Meteor Swarm in this mod).
I changed the spell Meteor Swarm significantly. Now it is unlike Meteor Swarm in other DnD games; it bears more resemblance to Elysium's Tears from Planescape Torment, except more powerful and much sillier.
Meteor Swarm now curses the target creature to be hit by 12 small meteors over 5 rounds. Each one deals 1d6 crushing damage and 1d6 fire damage to the target and to anyone within 15 feet. In addition, all creatures affected are knocked back. A successful Saving Throw negates the crushing damage but does not negate the fire damage or the knockback.
I created an Invoker named Azu at Candlekeep and went to the bunkhouse. Carbos was there. He became hostile once Azu began casting Meteor Swarm on him.
As usual, Carbos started summoning his Lesser Death Shades; he managed to summon two before the first meteor hit. Over the next few rounds, he got pounded by multiple meteors, which killed his shades and severely injured him.
Carbos's stoneskins blocked some of the crushing damage, so it looks a bit less powerful than it usually is.
That's hilarious!
I've also been modifying in-game items.
I also brought in a few items from Baldur's Gate 2!
I also had an idea for a two-handed shield which can't attack but gives a really large AC bonus, but I couldn't get it to work right.
My next task is to finish modifying the content added by Beamdog for Neera, Rasaad and Dorn. When the day is done, goblins will breathe lightning bolts and Rogdok will be a terror to behold!
The next thing I'm going to work on is Durlag's Tower, which I've postponed for a long time. That's the last big thing I have to do for this project. After that, I just have to finish up the small things.
Today I finished modifying the floor of Durlag's Tower with the warders as well as all of the upper floors and the roof. Now the roof has more ghastly foes than mere basilisks.