SCS: just how tough is it?
namarie
Member Posts: 52
Hi all,
I just completed my second SoD playthrough at insane difficulty (normal damage). I find the combat system in SoD exceptionally satisfying since I've only played vanilla BG1 and SoA years ago. Many combats in the game was challenging enough to force me to make full use resources like potions, wands, and enchanted arrows while not being too overwhelming, with one or two being very stressful but extremely fun (I've got XP cap remover and Thalantyr item upgrade mods, so that might have affected the challenge level too),
Now that I plan to start BG2EE, I've been thinking about getting SCS (and possibly BP Ascension) to set up a more challenging game that emulates my SoD experience. On the other hand, although I've heard good things about SCS I'm still not sure just exactly what this mod offers.
So I guess my questions are:
1) how crazy is SCS AI improvement? (If you've played SoD before it would be appreciated if you compare it to insane SoD AI).
2) I'm especially concerned about mages in SCS (or even just spellcasters in general). I know that mages are generally smarter and much more well protected with their spells in SoD; however I'd like to know if the mages use different combat strategies at all. I'd find it very tedious if all the mages employ the same, albeit likely the most effective, tactic. It breaks my suspension of disbelief too. Sure mages are smart and all that but that doesn't mean they are perfectly rational human(oid)s that always make the most reasonable choice. Mages are just as prone to blind hubris as many normal people in Faerun, if not more so (I mean, just look at the Magisters of Mystra, all are powerful mages, many of whom died from their own hubris or plain stupidity). Personally I'd find it much more satisfying if mages use various tactics, some of which not necessarily optimal.
3)In the same vein as Q2, is there an option to install stronger AI for the archmages like Irenicus and weaker AI for regular pleb mages?
Finally if it makes any difference, I don't plan to use the spell tweak component of SCS - I'd like to keep them as is.
Thanks a lot!
I just completed my second SoD playthrough at insane difficulty (normal damage). I find the combat system in SoD exceptionally satisfying since I've only played vanilla BG1 and SoA years ago. Many combats in the game was challenging enough to force me to make full use resources like potions, wands, and enchanted arrows while not being too overwhelming, with one or two being very stressful but extremely fun (I've got XP cap remover and Thalantyr item upgrade mods, so that might have affected the challenge level too),
Now that I plan to start BG2EE, I've been thinking about getting SCS (and possibly BP Ascension) to set up a more challenging game that emulates my SoD experience. On the other hand, although I've heard good things about SCS I'm still not sure just exactly what this mod offers.
So I guess my questions are:
1) how crazy is SCS AI improvement? (If you've played SoD before it would be appreciated if you compare it to insane SoD AI).
2) I'm especially concerned about mages in SCS (or even just spellcasters in general). I know that mages are generally smarter and much more well protected with their spells in SoD; however I'd like to know if the mages use different combat strategies at all. I'd find it very tedious if all the mages employ the same, albeit likely the most effective, tactic. It breaks my suspension of disbelief too. Sure mages are smart and all that but that doesn't mean they are perfectly rational human(oid)s that always make the most reasonable choice. Mages are just as prone to blind hubris as many normal people in Faerun, if not more so (I mean, just look at the Magisters of Mystra, all are powerful mages, many of whom died from their own hubris or plain stupidity). Personally I'd find it much more satisfying if mages use various tactics, some of which not necessarily optimal.
3)In the same vein as Q2, is there an option to install stronger AI for the archmages like Irenicus and weaker AI for regular pleb mages?
Finally if it makes any difference, I don't plan to use the spell tweak component of SCS - I'd like to keep them as is.
Thanks a lot!
0
Comments
(That being said, I usually use the SCS options such that I only have the AI improvements and NOT the difficulty upgrades that redefine the opponents (e.g. improved Ulcaster etc.); NOR do I use any of the enemy-casters-precast buffs options.
Oh, and for the perfect difficulty combination, I play Core Rules and absolutely NO-RELOADS:
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/40393/
Depending on your install options, SCS can be incredibly challenging. As for mages, the difficulty mostly depends on which enemies you allow to use HLAs and whether or not you let enemy mages use short-duration buffs before combat (both options are customizable).
Some mages' spell picks are partly randomized in that their specialization school is chosen at random, and they won't use spells from their opposed school. No SCS mages refrain from Abjuration or Transmutation spells, however.
Personally I wouldn't touch it even with a 100 meter pole. But others seem to adore this mod to hell and back.
I'd suggest to play at least once with it and see how you can adapt to this madness called SCS. Maybe you'll start to even like it after the 100ths death.
If you play consistently well, you will successfully beat it everytime. No dependence on luck or reload.
If you play sloppy, you will die.
So, it rewards good play.
Keep in mind that, I suggest using ONLY the AI improvements and nothing else (at least for entry level).
If you install everything, by far the most difficult things will be spell-heavy encounters and high level encounters. Enemies are going to do a lot of damage. In some fights, success depends heavily on knowing what spells beat other spells, exactly what spells do, and what spells or potions successfully defend against them. All this in a game with some very piss-poor descriptions and feedback, though for the most part it's okay.
It can be a minor increase in difficulty, or an exercise in outright masochism. It depends sometimes on how in-depth your knowledge of the game is.
Honestly, though, it's not that hard. It's a definite improvement. In some ways it's the difference between Wolfenstein 2D and Half-Life 1, in terms of enemy encounters. That first time a special forces grunt chucked a grenade to flush me out of a corner... lol.
Sometimes it will make you go 'what the hell?'. But most of the time it just makes the enemy AI better. What initally seems impossible will eventually become clear to you, though don't expect too much help from the game. There's a lot of knowledge that could really help a player that it simply refuses to provide. Baldur's Gate is a great game, but it is definitely one of the absolute worst--almost abysmal--games I've played when it comes to player feedback.
As a player, I am very much a gambler and a bit of a 'Leroy Jensen'. I take a lot of risks. But it's not uncommon for me to complete a playthrough with only one or 2 deaths. The no-reload is still an elusive goal for me; but rather than that being a function of difficulty, it's more my need to work on discipline.
Go for it. You can skip some of the things like 'full pre-buffing', but otherwise it's a crazy awesome mod. Don't think I could ever go back to vanilla.
I notice that there seems to be a general theme of stay-the-heck-away from pre-buffs, but that was actually the reason I kinda wanted to install SCS in the first place.
Whenever I play D&D (as a player or a DM) I always pre-buff, I feel that in a scry-and-die scenario any mages with any senses at all will pre-buff for a bit before teleporting in, and it seems like SCS offers the option of only allowing pre-casting of short duration buffs for mages that are ambushing you. Does anyone know if this option makes the game significantly harder? (I'm not sure what counts as an ambush for the purpose of SCS, if those "you have been waylaid by enemies and must defend yourself" encounters count as ambush, then I might skip this part).
I'll probably skip the enemy improvement components too, since if I'm not mistaken, those options simply advance the existing enemies in the game into encounters that are not even remotely level appropriate?
As @sluckers suggested bookkeeping might also become a problem. As someone who's used to the dispel system in D&D 3.x I've never been too into BG's complex spell battles. Can this be ameliorated/avoided if I only install the AI improvements/minimal pre-buff options?
That was a lot of questions. I do realize the best way to find out is to complete the game with SCS - much as I'd love to, I really don't have that much time. So thanks for bearing with me.
The option for pre-buffed mages can make the game cumbersome at times.
Keep in mind that with the enabled Smarter Mages option, every Mage will have triggers, sequencers and contingencies according to their level. That alone is usually a massive pack of defenses to slice through(plus some really nasty surprises aimed at your party).
Usually the more convenient way of dealing with this problem is to circumvent it through crowd control spells or AoEs like Cloudkill.
In the end in can all be handled, if you know what you(and they) are doing. The only thing I'd really advise against is enabling High Level Abilities for Mages in SoA. You don't really want them to rain down Comets on your underleveled party during their Time Stops.
As for the creature improvements, some are rather minor (Githyanki, Sahuagin), some are extensive(Dragons, Mind Flayers), some are slightly annoying and tedious (Vampires, Beholders, Golems).
Some of these modules tend to give them abilities they shouldn't have as per PnP, like the demons.
Therefore, I really recommend looking at 'aTweaks' (it's 100% compatible with SCS, and just requires to be installed after). This mod gives a lot of enemies the abilities they should have as per lore, and will use the SCS scripts for their combat behaviour.
Demons, Fey creatues, Elementals and Angelics become so much cooler with that mod. Like SCS it is modular, and the readme explains all the changes. For demons, you have several options of how tough you want them to be.
It definitely makes them tougher, but also adds a lot of character, as they all have their different individual powers now, as well as spell casting per will. Vanilla Demons/Fiends become laughable wimps way too fast, with aTweaks you really learn to respect them, especially if they come in packs. But even a single Balor can vorpal hit half your party within seconds
On the upside all these impovements will of course benefit you as well, if you summon or gate in such creatures to fight for you.
As for staying level appropriate, you don't encounter large numbers(or top tiers like Balors) of demons early on. So it's safe to play with them.
Stay away from the Beholders, Vampires and Golems and you'll be fine.
Because with the engine limitations is difficult enough to script an intelligent AI for mages, that anyway will be much less intelligent of an human intelligence. Given that they have to survive to a single battle/day and often are more leveled up than your party the uber equipment that you have and they don't is not enough to keep balance. Give the control of enemy mages to a human strong player and they will destroy your party 99% of the times. As they are directed by an AI, with engine limitations, if you have knowledge and are skilled the opposite is true.
So imho, and it is not only SCS related, but true for every AI improvement, is wise that a modder focuses more on the best possible than on variation. Still variation is appreciable, but doesn't have the focus on.
Scripting AI in this games is a difficult and long work, not payed if done by a modder. Hundreds or thousands of lines have to be write, dealing with engine limitations, opcodes, possible player tactics that has to be countered.
Duplicating all that one or many times to give variation is more that we can reasonably ask.
Still some mods, I think also SCS, use very smart triks, like recompiling on the fly scripts or parts of the scripts, that to a certain extent are useful.
But a real implementation of intelligent and not predictable mages is impossible.
And if is true that there can be a not smart mage, that don't make the most reasonable choice, that make really weak and not effective ones, is also true that the one that the one that make the most reasonable choice is impossible to script in this engine. Averaging to the best that can be done seems to me a good solution.
I play other mods and have very little experience with SCS, so I don't give you suggestions about it.
Mages with the "smarter mages" component, (or maybe it's from "pre-buffs", not sure), will have spell immunity: divination and spell immunity: abjuration up - meaning you cannot get rid of their invisibility, misleads, projected images, or simulacrums, and you cannot successfully cast breach, remove/dispel magic, or the various spell protection removers like warding whip and ruby ray of reversal, to get rid of their stoneskins, pfmw's, globes of invulnerability, and spell reflection. That makes SCS players resort to tactics like quaffing potions of invisibility and then just standing there waiting for all the spell protections and illusions to time out.
I always just kind of grin and start shaking my head at all the masochists around here who like to play like that. They seem to be the majority, though. Everybody has their own way to have fun that can be different from mine.
And there's a kind of SCS "street cred" that a lot of people seem to enjoy building with each other. As I read their no-reload posts, it seems like they sort of see it as a special club or something to be able to beat it, especially in a solo no-reload. The holy grail for the club seems to be to beat SCS with a solo of each possible class, especially the classes considered to be "weak" by most people, like wizard slayer or totemic druid.
But for me, SCS is not fun at all. It's a stressful, anxious way to get a headache, and that's the opposite of what I play BG for.
You can take down any SCS mage's defenses with the right magic attacks. Doing it as quickly as possible, while still managing all the other threats onscreen, can vary wildly depending on your party makeup and depending on the fight in question. There's no one solution to it, particularly since not all SCS mages use the same defenses.
Incidentally, a Potion of Invisibility will not be enough to deal with an SCS mage. They have multiple ways of countering it, from divination spells to area-effect disablers to summoning demons and Planetars that can see through your invisibility. And if they can't find you, they will alternately (1) flee, running out your own buffs, (2) chase after you, preventing you from recovering or evading their divination spells, (3) heal themselves with potions or spells, (4) restore their buffs, making sure they're still strong when you do break invisibility and/or (5) summon critters, especially long-lasting Animate Dead summons, for the same purpose as (4). Those are the same things I do when an enemy goes invisible on me.
In my own runs and those of other players, I've only seen Potions of Invisibility used as escape options, since they cast instantly, take no spell slots, and cannot be disrupted. People use them not to wait out SCS mages' defenses, but to flee from combat or get (only) a moment's reprieve. When I've re-entered combat after drinking one, I often find that the enemy has solidified their advantage in the meantime using summons and re-buffs and healing potions. They don't just wait for you to come back.
SCS isn't fun for everyone, but it doesn't reduce combat to a few narrow strategies--it makes things much more complex by letting enemies use some of the same tricks the players do. But there is no mage in SCS whose defenses cannot be removed--not like vanilla liches, or enemies in Tactics or Improved Anvil.
Nor can you mount an unbeatable defense, because SCS enemies will use magic attacks as well, removing your spell immunity/turning/deflection/trap spells, and following up with Breach or Remove Magic or a disabler or a triple Flame Arrow sequencer or any number of other things. Yuan-ti Mages are particularly adept at this, as they come in groups and can therefore debuff, disable, and damage your party in the same round.
It's a tough mod depending on your install options, but there are no unbeatable defenses or unstoppable offenses in SCS.
I can think on the fly of at least 3 methods.
In Soulafein mod there is even an enemy that adds a SI against RROR, 3 active at the same time.
And if you are smart enough you can kill him with spells. And as he is a F/M vampire-lich that uses PFMW and that can easily kill your party, you have to kill him with spells, or be very very tough to survive until his protections wear off.
But understand your point, only some of us are so masochistic to have fun getting in such situations, the game has not to be HARD to be enjoyable.
To encounter Mages with that infamous SI-Combo you have to specifically install a module that allows it. In my game, Mages have either one or the other, but not both, because I didn't install that option.
Same goes for the Potion part.
Yes, you can set up SCS to painful as hell, but that's up to you. Going for the hardest route possible, and then complain about the difficulty comes off as a bit odd.
There's a lot of middleground to SCS, and you alone decide how hard you want it to be.
Some people prefer to breeze through the game, and just enjoy the journey, and that a-ok. But if you are looking for at least occasional excitement and the odd nailbiter moment in your encounters, then SCS is -imo- a fantastic and smarter alternative to crude approaches like the LoB mode, which throws 80+ hp Goblins at you.
Also if the pre-buff component is responsible for this change then I guess I'll skip it too.
I think at this point I've had some idea about what components to choose by the time I start my BG2EE, thanks everyone for the input!
On the one hand this pre-buff option is an adequate means of replicating 'player-like' behaviour. On the other hand, however, it can be very tedious. Despite the fact that there are something like 200 spells in the game, there is a very rock-paper-scissors feel to some of them. Certain spells must be used to combat other spells. The amount of protections a mage can bring to the field can bog the game down considerably, and it can feel more like a chess match than anything else, with player and enemy wearing each other down but, ultimately, getting nowhere. Simply jockying for position, wearing out triggers, debuffing and debuffing again as spells go down, only to pop right back up again with a triggered contingency or sequencer. It can take a long time to batter through mage defenses, and for many people this is an insufferable kink in the pace of the game.
I think it's also dangerous in the later stages of the game, when powerful enemies start getting a plethora or un-announced immunities. Too many for me to remember, at least. You can try to disable or AoE an enemy, only to find out you can't get around their spell and combat protections because they are immune to this or that effect, or to all disablers. Ya, that's right Lavok. &%$# you.
I also don't feel that it's necessarily balanced, at least for me, though it will depend on your play style. Others will disagree. I personally don't think it's fair at all, even though the rationalization for pre-buffing is, on the surface, logical.
Enemy mages only have to fight 1 battle, whereas the player fights many between rests. At least I do. SCS mage spell lists are very heavily slanted towards defence, with a few powerful offensive spells that can absolutely wreck your day. And while it's true that you may have a team of 5 with you, and they might be alone, just remember that they don't have to kill your party; they only have to kill you.
This can make pre-buffing a bit too far in the enemy's favour--at least in my opinion. I'm overtly resistant to the idea of resting after each battle. I like to do maps or levels on one rest, if I can. I don't know why, it just feels right. Or I hit the tavern after long journeys or after 16 hours.
With this kind of play style, you might as well say good-bye to several spell levels as you'd be forced to devote half of your spells to simple debuffers in order to combat what could potentially be several extremely well protected mages who can throw everything (kitchen sink included) at you, whereas you have to conserve your resources. If you have 1 mage in your party, it's very easy for theie playstyle to be cramped by the pre-buffing option; they may end up becoming a mere debuff-bot, as unless they have rings or specialties they're limited to 5 castings per level.
Pre-buffing is less of a problem, I'd imagine, if you like to play spellcaster heavy parties, where you have more than just one spell list at your disposal. There are some people who play with 6 mages/clerics who can thus afford to have 4-8 Breaches at their disposal, along with several pierce magics, lower resistance, ruby rays, etc. That amount of magical attacks can get your through multiple encounters with enemy mages.
And while there are wands in the game for this exact purpose, a single powerful magical enemy can use them up in a single encounter. And they are expensive to recharge.
However, if nothing I've just said fits how you play and you are a magic-savvy player like some of the others on this forum, then pre-buffing may be exactly the thing for you.
The "individual versions of SI" component was added to "justify" the use of SI within contingencies/triggers (old engine was not allowing spells from a sub-menu like SI to be used there). Before EE you could stack non-stackable spells by putting them into contingencies/triggers (EE added a specific opcode to prevent it), but afair even without that exploit multiple SI could be easily stacked even if cast separately...that's far from the only odd/inconsistent thing regarding SI:
- SI:Abj was not covering 90% of Abjuration spells (e.g. no protection vs. spell removals like Spell Thrust or Pierce Magic)
- SI was supposed to make you fully immune to the selected spell school (e.g. you should have not been able to use PfMW under SI:Abj) but it didn't
The spell battles, enabled by the SCS AI and the balancing tweaks, are the singularly MOST AWESOME thing in any CRPG ever.
All other games (IWD, NWN, Pillars of Eternity, whatever) are stunted disappointments compared.
Yes, it takes attention. Yes, it takes care.
But if you are role-playing a clever mage, battling it out with a clever mage, yes, you indeed need to play it smart.
There is no such thing ANYWHERE where you can have something resembling a spell battle!
Ask to your Sorcerer, maybe he can help. Ask to your Thief, maybe he can help.
SCS is amazing. Only installing improved AI will make the game better in every way imho. After that just install the components you feel would make the game more enyojable for you. The readme is very good actually.
Regular mage ai is, basically:
-raise defenses
-cast x spell on nearest target
wait
-cast y spell on nearest target
wait
-cast z spell on nearest target
etc. Pretty artificial and computer-like.
A scs mage will react to what is happening, will kite warriors, try to dispel their potion buffs, and debuff your mages, renew his own defenses as needed, use spells intelligently and don't waste them on immune/protected characters, use attacks and lob sneaky melfs meteors in between spells, when wounded will try to go invisible and flee/heal/rebuff/summon, and if he sees an opening or debuffed/weakened character will nail him with flame arrow sequencer or powerwords. It feels like playing against a living, breathing, thinking opponent. One of the finest and most exciting mage duels and battles can be fought thanks to scs.
With SCS, you can always beef up the difficulty - fighting Lavok with Comets and Planetars actually feels like you're fighting a mage who's been alive for countless years, not some random street punk who accidentaly found a way in Planar Sphere.
I can verily admit that I have done it not for the sake of being in a "special club" but because I enjoy facing a new challenge in the game I have played for many years. The whole "no-reload" concept (which often involves players using SCS) is not about an elitist group, it's about improving the gaming experience after XX playthroughs, it's about adding fun for the player him(her)self. In the end, I post my reports not because "I'm in a club" but because I hope there will be another player (or players) who will find these reports useful. And because these reports actually enhance my connection with characters I'm playing, thus dealing with restartitis.
I'll give an example. @Enuhal , while still on the bioware forum, posted about his solo efforts with a totemic druid many years ago. His advice and his posts served me greatly when I tried to complete the same parts of the game with my own totemic druid. And in my thread I tried to reflect on SCS difficulties and how to overcome them, as Enuhal had played without this mod.
I remember 5 or 6 years ago I started to feel I knew too much about BG, I couldn't find any challenge in this game anymore. After that I tried SCS and it was... it was like finding a new game, really, the game I knew nicely but with a lot of additional information. Yes, it was not easy at the start. But if anything, SCS tought me to learn about magic in this game, about items and their usage.
Actually, from reading no-reload threads both on this forum and on the bioware forums, I can state that the majority of SCS players don't "resort to tactics like quaffing potions of invisibility and then just standing there waiting for all the spell protections and illusions to time out." I can speak for myself. SCS tought me about buffing and removing buffs. Before using this mod I didn't feel any need to understand in what ways Remove Magic was different from Breach, or from Secret Word, or from Ruby Ray of Reversal. I didn't know about the power of Necklace of missiles and potions of explotions, I didn't know about spell levels and the "0" level in particular. I just played this game*.
But SCS - again, for me, - made me understand it: learn it first and then understand it. And still, there're many things I don't know and learn every day.
And it doesn't only teach me. It doesn't only offer an additional challenge. To me, it also offers some more realism - when I attack one hobgoblin, his friends start coming to help him ("Better calls for help"). It seems logical and realistic. When I face Sunin - a high level mage in the BG city, he comes with protections. I don't just get his Evermemory ring for free anymore. I have to dispel his magic protections first, then try to dispel his combat protections, and during all this time I have to protect my characters from Horror, from Chaos, from Fireballs. This fight is much more memorable this way.
As for changes in particular encounters, I understand people can have different views on it. I will always remember my first SCS Bandit Camp. When the whole camp is coming on you because of the alarm effect.
It would be interesting to hear thoughts from @Tresset, who experienced SCS in detail for the first time when playing in our MP attempts. Like Belgar, he too prefers to play these games without SCS, so his opinion will be interesting to read and to discuss.
BTW, during those MP attempts it became obvious that all people involved ( @CrevsDaak , @Gotural , @GemHound and others ) were normal people, without any wish to create a "club". There were jokes around, there were fun moments. Reactions by normal people. And the run was possible because, as "seasoned players", we needed SCS to spice the challenge, and together agreed on using this mod.
So, to me, SCS is tough, yes, but it teaches you to understand how the game, and magic in particular, works.
* "Just playing the game" is a different point of view but I respect it.
If that's your idea of fun, no problem. I absolutely have no issue with people who want to play a relaxed, easy game, or concentrate on the storyline, the roleplaying, the dialogue and so on. The vanilla game is still fantastic without SCS.
SCS is about taking the combat side to the next level (or next several levels). I mean seriously, how much fun is it, or how realistic is it, if you leave your Queen hanging in chess, but your opponent just pushes a pawn forward, because that's the only move it is sequenced to do? IMO, and I think for most people who use SCS, the lack of sophistication in vanilla AI makes combat dull. SCS is about rectifying that, and depending on the options you select, you can decide how extremely you want to change that balance.
If I got too concerned with succeeding at a no-reload of my own, it would wind up taking the fun out of the game for me, and would cause me stress, as I said.
But I do really appreciate the skill and knowledge of all the SCS no-reloaders, and I will continue to enjoy reading about their runs.
Thanks for helping me understand what I was calling "the club" a little better, even though you don't agree with my term for it, or the implied connotations of that word choice. The only way for me to learn is to express a state of understanding for the thing, and then listen carefully to comments along the lines of "no, not that, but this."