[SOLVED]10% Experience boost - why do i have it? Also questions about cat familiar and EE.

Shandoo

Hello

Edit: Meanwhile i have one more question: recently I noticed that after learning a spell from scroll (4th level) my 4 man party received 1100 experience per person, while it should be 1000? ( 4th lvl = 4000 exp = 1000 per person). I the log was "gained 4000 experience" ,but when i checked it in character window and did the math it was clearly 1100 per person...

Is that a bug or is it ok?

1) I'm playing a CN wild mage in SoA and i've summoned a cat. As the ingame description say's it should be able to cast blur, but it can't. Is it a bug? Or the cat will be albe to cast blur later ?(maybe in ToB?).

More over: i'm suprised how ridiculous SLOW it is. I mean it's a CAT. I should be able to move really fast when it has to. And actually it walks half-speed of the party. This and the no-blur-thing makes the cat even less usefull as it should be.

2) And a little off-top question: are there any mods with EE content (npc's,quest's etc.) that i can aply into a vanilla BG2 (patched and fixpacked etc.)? So i can enjoy at least some of the new EE stuff in my old vanila game without the need of buying EE.

ThacoBell

For familiars, spell abilities may be under the special abilities tab. As for EE content, I'd recommend buying the EE edition.

Shandoo

ThacoBell said:

For familiars, spell abilities may be under the special abilities tab.

The special ability buton is gray, and there is no cast spell button.

I've asked for geting the EE content without the need of buying it, like mods could bring (like Fixpack or Unfished Buiseness for vanila). But i gues it's not possible. I just want to clear it out. Some of the EE content looks awesome (WIlson the bear npc) but it sounds like it's not enough for buying a "new" game.

Grond0

I agree the movement is disappointing - I think that's the result of using the smaller icon. The movement is a lot better in the EE, though even there the cat is slightly slower than familiars with full size icons such as the quasit. The blur spell is also properly implemented in the EE.

I agree with ThacoBell that you won't find the new characters in older style mods. The EE is not just about new content of course, but addresses other issues like increased ease of modding, more flexible AI, more user options along with a lot of cleaning up of bugs (such as you've noticed with the cat familiar).

Shandoo

Oh well, i guess that my cat will stay in the backpack for all the time. I think i read somewhere that familiars will change in ToB, but this is probably not revelant with the blur-thing. Without blur and at this slow speed it's to vulnerable.

Grond0 said:

but addresses other issues like increased ease of modding,

What do u mean by that?

Grond0 said:

more flexible AI,

I've SCS for that

Grond0 said:

more user options

Could u write some of the most important?

Grond0

The EE has made transparent a lot of the code that was previously buried in the game engine. There are also entirely new codes available - thus making it much easier to make changes in the way the game operates than in the Bioware original.

SCS is primarily intended to make enemies more intelligent and doesn't do much for the protagonist AI. I can't really comment on it as I never use it anyway, but there are far more options now for using party AI if you're into that.

There are more user options selectable from within the game. e.g. max HPs on level up, turning off difficulty based damage increases, optional whether to move into melee after using an ammunition stack. They've also increased the configuration options outside the game. So, for instance, ranger clerics now only get druid spells up to level 3 (as rangers were always supposed to), but if you're missing the old behaviour you can change the config file to revert to that.

BillyYank

Moving the new characters and quests into a mod would actually be piracy.

Seriously, these games go on sale all the time. Just wait for good one and you can get the games for a pittance.

Bundle Stars
This one is a bundle of all three games, but it's less than $6 a game.

Gallowglass

Yes indeed. Anyone who tried to offer the EE content as a mod could surely expect to attract the immediate attention of Beamdog's lawyers.

Beamdog obviously spent a lot of expensive time and effort producing the EEs, and they're absolutely entitled to charge for their work. If you want their content, then buy their game. If you're not prepared to pay, then do without.

IMO, it's very well worth paying for.

Shandoo

Gallowglass said:

IMO, it's very well worth paying for.

Ok, thanks all for respond, i will think about it.

Meanwhile i have one more question: recently I noticed that after learning a spell from scroll (4th level)
my 4 man party received 1100 experience per person, while it should be 1000? ( 4th lvl = 4000 exp = 1000 per person). I the log was "gained 4000 experience" ,but when i checked it in character window and did the math it was clearly 1100 per person...

Is that a bug or is it ok?

Gallowglass

Shandoo said:

Meanwhile i have one more question: recently I noticed that after learning a spell from scroll (4th level) my 4 man party received 1100 experience per person, while it should be 1000? ( 4th lvl = 4000 exp = 1000 per person). I the log was "gained 4000 experience" ,but when i checked it in character window and did the math it was clearly 1100 per person...

Is that a bug or is it ok?

As you say, it should've been 1000 each, so that sounds like a bug.

BillyYank

There was an old rule that applied a 10% bonus to XP for a high primary stat. But I don't know if the games ever implemented that.

Gallowglass

BillyYank said:

There was an old rule that applied a 10% bonus to XP for a high primary stat. But I don't know if the games ever implemented that.

Perhaps some mod did it.

Shandoo

BillyYank said:

There was an old rule that applied a 10% bonus to XP for a high primary stat. But I don't know if the games ever implemented that.

Hm, thanks, that would explain it somehow.
By "high primary stat" you probably mean intelligence , and this would explain why my main character (18 int w mage) gain 10% boost. But what about the rest of the team ? In combat log it was "gained 4000 experience",
but all of my 4 characters gained 1100 (not only protagonist).

And yea, probably some mod (fixpack or g3 tweaks probably) made it, if not the tob patch.

BillyYank

The primary stat is the main stat for your class. So Int for mages, Dex for thieves, Str for Fighters, Wis for Clerics.

Shandoo

BillyYank said:

The primary stat is the main stat for your class. So Int for mages, Dex for thieves, Str for Fighters, Wis for Clerics.

So i played a bit now for a test and i did a minor quest with 19500 experience reward.
When you divide it by 4 it should be 4875 exp per person (4 man party).
But it is 5362,5 exp per person, so 21450 in total. Which is exactly 19500 + 10%...

So, my whole team gains a 10% experience boost from scrols, quests etc (but not for main quest plot rewards, when experience reward is distributed on separate person earlier and its not divided. In those reward's there is no 10%, or maybe it's aplied earlier... i really dont know how it works).

I'm still not sure if it's a bug or intendent behaviour.

Gallowglass

That's surely got to be a mod doing that. Whether or not it's intended depends upon what the mod is supposed to do!

Shandoo

Gallowglass said:

That's surely got to be a mod doing that. Whether or not it's intended depends upon what the mod is supposed to do!

I also do think so.
I will try to find it in Fixpack,scs and g3 tweakpack readmes, although I am surprised that I have not noticed this earlier.
(I've read it very carefully before...)
Im almost sure that any other mod i have doesn't change that. (unfinished buisness or widescreen, surely not)

edit: i've read once more readme of all those mods and i was not albe to find any information about it.
So i'm still a bit confused...

edit 2: i found a thread with similar subject: https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/6286/10-experience-bonus-for-good-stats
But it still did not clear things out for me...

Grond0

Shandoo said:

So, my whole team gains a 10% experience boost from scrols, quests etc (but not for main quest plot rewards, when experience reward is distributed on separate person earlier and its not divided. In those reward's there is no 10%, or maybe it's aplied earlier... i really dont know how it works).

I'm still not sure if it's a bug or intendent behaviour.

This was a change introduced in vanilla BG2 - I believe when the ToB expansion was issued. They increased XP rewards by 10% over the stated values in the text - I think with the aim of getting a better balance between the XP position in SoA and ToB.

While it seems clear to me that this was intended by Bioware, XP in the EE has taken off the 10% extra - so if you don't like that, there's another reason for getting the EE .

elminster

10% extra experience existed in the original BG2 but was removed in BG2EE. So this isn't from a mod

Shandoo

elminster said:

10% extra experience existed in the original BG2 but was removed in BG2EE. So this isn't from a mod

Thank you, this makes it clear now!

... I've just made a new game for test.I created a ridiculus char with every stat 13 or less (primary stat 9), just to check if the boost is because of high primary stat, as somebody mentioned here before.
I've disarmed first trap with Imoen in Irenicus dungeon, just to check if the 10% boos is there, and it was.
400 exp for disarming (stated in combat log), but for real it was 220 for each (protagonist + imoen) so 440=400 +10%

Now, as u wrote, it's clear for me that even that this is NOT STATED with a proper text in combat log , it is intendent behavior of the game developers (not mods, not a bug). Thank you for that

Shandoo

Grond0 said:

They increased XP rewards by 10% over the stated values in the text - I think with the aim of getting a better balance between the XP position in SoA and ToB.

Man, that's it. That is the info i was looking for! Thank you.

Now i know why there is a 10% boost (at least i can gues), where it came from(developers, not mod or bug), and why it is not apearing in combat log with a proper value (the text is without the 10% boost).

aye, i will think about buying EE . Even more since i discovered there is a wild mage story quest line (i love the idea of wild mages in general).

Gallowglass

elminster said:

10% extra experience existed in the original BG2 but was removed in BG2EE. So this isn't from a mod

Wow, I've no recollection of that! It's been so long now since EE came out, my memory of the original versions is evidently fading.

Thanks for the clarification. I'm not sure about thanks for the shock that my memory has faded so much!