I can't believe I've missed this until now. Now all 4 games (since Planescape: Torment doesn't need one) have some form of tactics AI mod out there to really give you a run for your money after mastering the original. I just discovered this and the IWD2 one tonight. I have no idea why these that one and this are so obscure when SCS is a staple of BG 1 and 2. Does this mod require HoF be turned on to take effect, or is it just the name??
@jjstraka The mod can be played on any difficulty setting, but I recommend you play on Insane (with double experience turned on) or on HoF (only if you have the component installed that disables the regular HoF bonuses).
I just finished the base game with this mod installed and will start the expansion content soon. It's a pretty incredible accomplishment overall, and I certainly prefer it over the regular version of Icewind, even if the mod is demanding to the point that the notion of going through it more than once is a little too daunting.
The Belhifet fight in particular was a bit much, though to be fair the more frustrating parts of it, such as the incredibly resilient golems and bleeding effects, were always there to begin with. I can't deny that the feeling of satisfaction from beating him (with all party members alive, thankfully) after painstakingly constructing a second-by-second strategy over the course of hours of trial and error was worth it, though.
For reference, I'm playing on Heart of Fury with double damage and experience, along with the component that disables the normal stat changes made by Heart of Fury. I'm not using any other mods besides the Gibberlings Tweakpack, which does admittedly allow for some normally unavailable combinations in race selection and Fighter/Cleric weapon usage.
My party consists of:
- A Gnomish Cavalier (Sword and shield tank in most cases, but dual-wields in emergencies or when employing Sword of Days cheese, which I'm frequently guilty of relying on; by far my most reliable character overall)
- A Dwarven Fighter/Cleric (Intended for use as an off-tank, though in practice used mainly for support casting; I often find myself wishing I had used a single-class Cleric instead, though the ability to equip Sword of Days and use it in conjunction with high-level casting that my Paladin can't handle is nice)
- An Elven Assassin (Probably the most situationally useful member of the party; contributes little more than modest crossbow fire in most cases, but backstabs and traps have proven invaluable in plenty of fights)
- A Halfling Skald (Pure utility character mostly used for buffing and the occasional summon)
- A Dwarven Dragon Disciple (Mostly built around offensive CC, debuff, and AOE damage spells; this is my first time using a Sorcerer in an Infinity Engine game, and I've consequently definitely made a few mistakes in spell selection here and there, though the sheer potency of things like Timestop and Project Image makes up for this; I'm very much looking forward to unlocking the dragon shapeshift ability down the road)
- An Elven Archer (The ultimate glass cannon and my main source of single-target DPS; frequently the only character I bring alongside my Paladin when I'm clearing easier areas and don't want to deal with managing the whole party)
I'll post a few more updates as I go through Heart of Winter and Luremaster. Thank you for all your hard work on this phenomenal project.
I ran into an issue with my Archer, one that would presumably affect all single-classed Rangers and possibly Monks as well. Thief skills can't be leveled up past 250, but all available skill points MUST be spent upon level up. In practice, this means that Rangers, which can only put points into two skills, will eventually reach a point where they become stuck on the level-up screen, unable to spend the points they have.
In the case of my character, who has a base DEX of 24 before gear, that happens during the transition from Level 31 to 32. Adjusting the skill values in EE Keeper didn't work, as the level-up screen doesn't recognize the edited values even though the stats page does, and I couldn't turn anything up using Google.
It's not going to kill my playthrough or anything (using EE Keeper to change the character into a Fighter but with Archer listed as the Kit seems to be more or less the same thing, and I can properly level up now), but it's a consequence of the raised level cap that's worth noting.
Finished Heart of Winter. While hardly a cakewalk, most of it was considerably easier than Lower Dorn's Deep. I mostly relied on stealth and Turn Undead inside the underground barrows, picking my fights carefully and not worrying about fighting the enormous Festering Drowned Dead until my Paladin was a high enough level to stealth-explode everything else.
The Gloomfrost was very straightforward. The Ice Beholders weren't as bad as I feared, and the giants just required the same tactics used on their counterparts in the base game.
The Sea of Moving Ice was mostly easy until I reached the temple, at which point I finally hit a massive difficulty spike. The massive horde of standard enemies took awhile to clear out, and the lack of any breathing room forced me to once again rely on cheap tactics like Sword of Days and running from the room and resting once my Time Stops ran out. Even after that, the Olhydra gave me considerable trouble, and I experimented with a number of strategies for killing it. In the end, I dumped a ton of Incendiary Clouds on top of it using Time Stop and used my Paladin to soak up its damage and keep it from moving while the fire damage ticked away.
Icasaracht herself was a great boss. She was difficult and took some time to deal with, but she never felt unfair or cheap the way Belhifet and his golems did. I actually killed her first form on my second try, but that ended up being a bit of a fluke, and I had to kill her several times before figuring out how to handle the Soul Gem, which is just brutal in terms of the damage it can put out. Thankfully, it doesn't seem able to dispel your protections, unlike Icasaracht. After I used Sword of Days and a very careful Dispel to kill the two Wyrm spirits while under Time Stop, my Paladin was able to weather the maelstrom from the Gem through 100% MR achieved from Pale Justice, a spell, and a few passives. He still periodically took Crushing damage that would have one-shotted anyone else, but he had a large enough HP total to safely take the hits and enough Lay on Hands left to recover from them.
Now only Trials of the Luremaster remains. I fully expect every last inch taken to be hard-fought, but the end is in sight!
Turns out the end was a bit of a brick wall that made Belhifet look tame.
Sorry, but I think the Luremaster fight is where I'm calling it quits, at least for now. Fatigue of the game was already starting to set in (not your fault; I started this run fresh off another playthrough), and a fight that feels like it would take over a week of grinding to ever clear just isn't at all appealing to me at the moment. I realize that you wanted to make it the hardest encounter in the game, but it's just far too chaotic in my opinion. I felt so overwhelmed out of the gate that I gave up after only a couple of hours.
If I might offer feedback toward any future updates, I'd consider toning down the fight by substantially increasing the time it takes for enemies to spawn in, or at the very least having the timer affected by Time Stop. Alternatively, perhaps enemies past the first four knights could spawn in only after others have been killed, resulting in a fixed number of foes that the player has to worry about at any given time.
I hate to be critical, and I must stress that I genuinely did enjoy the mod overall, particularly the class/kit revisions and new minibosses. Reworking the whole game like this was a massively ambitious undertaking, and I applaud your talent and dedication.
Maybe I'll give the Luremaster another shot at some point down the road. Even if I don't beat him, I might at least be able to get a better sense of the fight and offer more detailed thoughts on it.
In the next update, I'll implement some of your suggestions.
* Belhifet/Poquelin won't use Mass Flaying; there just aren't enough good ways to defend against it or cure it. I might make them use the regular Flaying ability instead.
* I should be able to fix the problem of Rangers getting stuck on the level-up screen.
* I'll make it so each wave of enemies in the Luremaster fight only arrives when the previous wave has been defeated.
* I'll probably weaken the Sword of Days, restoring its original drawback of blocking Haste effects. You aren't the first person to call it cheesy.
That change to the Luremaster fight definitely sounds like it would make it doable while still being a tough battle of endurance. If the patch doesn't break saves, I'll have to look into it when it's out!
I'm not sure how viable it would be to implement, but one change I would consider making to the Belhifet fight would be to add text above his sprite whenever he starts casting certain spells, similar to the messages you have displaying above enemies with leadership auras. I found that the fight became substantially easier whenever I noticed things like Fire and Ice via the text log, allowing me to move everyone to a different part of the room before it actually hit. Given how quickly the text log moves, however, it's very easy to miss such crucial information.
Having messages like "Belhifet is casting Mass Flaying on <CHARNAME>!" be displayed above his sprite gives the player a bit more information to work with without actually nerfing the fight. Players still have to deal with the AOE, but it's now a bit more realistic to expect them to deal with it by moving or using a quick buff.
The only other thing I can think of would be to ensure he prioritizes his casts on targets that are nearby or attacking him. I eventually settled into the rhythm of sending my Assassin up to him to dispel his illusions and eat his Mass Flaying, since the bleeding effect isn't nearly as devastating on non-casters. However, this only worked part of the time, as he'd occasionally ignore her and target the bulk of my party in the center, causing a mass bleeding and forcing me to invoke Power Word: Reload. If his behavior was a little more consistent, players could plan around it. Then again, I suppose that simplifying the AI opens up more opportunities for things like cheesily kiting the boss, so it could be a double-edged sword.
One final suggestion for the fight (and again, I don't know if this would be possible) would be to have the game autosave or quicksave just before the fight actually starts, preventing the player from having to go through the scripted bit with Everard every single time. Given that the fight can easily take well over a dozen attempts, it becomes annoying very quickly, especially if the voice acting isn't disabled, and is honestly one of my biggest issues with the fight. Obviously it's a problem with the base game and not your mod, but I'm sure I'm not the only one who would appreciate a workaround to it.
Do you know when the script trigger 0x26 TargetUnreachable(O:Object*) is supposed to return true?
Like you, I wanted to use it to make sure a certain creature doesn't attempt to move towards another creature if it's completely surrounded by other creatures, but it doesn't seem to work...
Hi @OlvynChuru , is it possible to separate your Better Call for Help system as a component? I'm new to Icewind Dale and CRPG as a whole and I'm looking for some way to remedy the obvious cheese that is picking and killing one enemy at a time from groups. However: I don't want the game to be too difficult and to not start with a lvl 1 party.
Any other way to resolve this issue is welcome too (By the way, I really like your spell pack mod, incredible work)
Sadly, the call for help system I made for this mod isn't really feasible to separate. How it works is that when an enemy sees the party, they aggro every other enemy they see, and those enemies then aggro every other enemy they see. This doesn't aggro the whole map at once because groups of enemies are usually separated by enough distance that they can't see each other. But for that to be the case, I had to move enemies around, sometimes removing enemies. It wouldn't be enough just to separate the AI into another component.
However, the base game does often divide enemies into encounters as well, so I wouldn't worry about it too much. Enemies in IWDEE aren't quite as susceptible to that tactic as enemies in BG1.
@OlvynChuru a basic question here. Does this mod change anything while starting a play through on a normal mode with 1st level party? Is it only valid for Heart of Fury mode or is it general SCS-like mode that would enhanced my non-HoF run?
@Cahir It's a general SCS-like mode. However, the mod includes a component to disable the normal HoF bonuses (no ridiculous HP on goblins). If you install that, then HoF would be the recommended difficulty setting, but you could still play on another difficulty.
Is this mod seems to include a drastically changes to gameplay, by changing the core rules such as attacks per round, Kits and so on? Is this settings that changing a core stuff are optional? Where I can look for README or something for the mod? Is this mod compatible with Steam version? I mean achievements and stuff?
Is this mod seems to include a drastically changes to gameplay, by changing the core rules such as attacks per round, Kits and so on? Is this settings that changing a core stuff are optional? Where I can look for README or something for the mod? Is this mod compatible with Steam version? I mean achievements and stuff?
A lot of the changes to classes and kits are contained in the optional "Class and Kit Enhancements" component, so you could choose not to install it. I do recommend you install it, though.
A lot of the changes to classes and kits are contained in the optional "Class and Kit Enhancements" component, so you could choose not to install it. I do recommend you install it, though.
Thank you, but I have already found Readme on GITHUB pages of your modification to IWD. — Is components mentioned in the Readme are optional? To be more precisely: "Change the summoning limit", "Modify Fighting Styles", "Disable the normal Heart of Fury Mode bonuses", "Disable the normal Heart of Fury Mode bonuses", "Class and Kit Enhancements", "Turn Undead Synergy", "Allow high-level spellcasters to cast multiple low-level spells per round", "Allow druids to cast spells while shapeshifted". — Is your modification will work with Steam (achievements and so on)? I mean if the game after installing this mod will start to update it's files this will be no good coz' I have a total sux connection to the world informational network. — Besides components mentioned in the Readme, what exactly changes making this mod in the original game? — Why you suggesting to include component "Class and Kit Enhancements" into the setting?
I am apologizing for such lot of questions asked, currently stopped playthrough and thinking on crossroad to install or not to install "Improved HoF". If I will play with mod this can be a nice test to, because me usually exploring a full map, completing all sidequests (exception the evil one missions) and so on.
— Is components mentioned in the Readme are optional? To be more precisely: "Change the summoning limit", "Modify Fighting Styles", "Disable the normal Heart of Fury Mode bonuses", "Disable the normal Heart of Fury Mode bonuses", "Class and Kit Enhancements", "Turn Undead Synergy", "Allow high-level spellcasters to cast multiple low-level spells per round", "Allow druids to cast spells while shapeshifted".
— Is your modification will work with Steam (achievements and so on)? I mean if the game after installing this mod will start to update it's files this will be no good coz' I have a total sux connection to the world informational network.
— Besides components mentioned in the Readme, what exactly changes making this mod in the original game?
The mod empowers enemies, items, and some spells. It improves enemy AI. It makes combat much less tedious than in the regular Heart of Fury Mode because enemies don't have such ridiculous HP and AC, but in the long run it'll be just as challenging if not more.
— Why you suggesting to include component "Class and Kit Enhancements" into the setting?
Because it makes a lot of previously boring or underpowered classes and kits much more interesting and useful. The changes it makes are pretty balanced; the classes and kits that are empowered the most are the ones that were previously the most underpowered (like single-classed characters).
The mod empowers enemies, items, and some spells. It improves enemy AI. It makes combat much less tedious than in the regular Heart of Fury Mode because enemies don't have such ridiculous HP and AC, but in the long run it'll be just as challenging if not more.
Well I liked that HP and AC in HoF. Nevermind, I will download the mod, should I start a new game then? And if I wish to deinstall "Improved HoF" after, the uninstallation process should be fine? I hope I don't need to redownload a whole game because of that? Where I can find precise list of changes that a mod does? Is such thing exist?
About Improved Kits, me dunno... I will not install such component. I don't think that single classed characters are underpowered, they actually good as teamplay, and I have already the party with the characters that was pre-made in Enhanced Edition by devs, so I think no need for such drastically changes.
Any mod that I should install along with "Improved HoF", or it's fine by alone?
Well I liked that HP and AC in HoF. Nevermind, I will download the mod, should I start a new game then? And if I wish to deinstall "Improved HoF" after, the uninstallation process should be fine? I hope I don't need to redownload a whole game because of that? Where I can find precise list of changes that a mod does? Is such thing exist?
You should start a new game, yes.
There is no precise list of changes. But I thought you didn't want spoilers anyway.
OMG I installed your mod and cheesed my way to Kuldahar with Kahiri blasting fireballs offscreen hehe. Fight with the giant Rhino was awesome. Soloed him with my barbarian, Dusky and Orra healing but she almost died. That friggin goblin marshals on speed, fireballed them mercilessly. Then I saw your Belhifet screens, pfffft, what a loser, gonna own him with Summon Weasels spell!!!
I am trying to download and install by the link above to the archive but it's saying cannot open folder, it's invalid and so on. Is there any installation instruction?
I am trying to download and install by the link above to the archive but it's saying cannot open folder, it's invalid and so on. Is there any installation instruction?
I'm not sure what link you're talking about. Try downloading it here and see if you still have problems.
Comments
Is there something wrong on my part?
@jjstraka34 You can play on any difficulty setting. This mod's effect is cumulative with the game's difficulty setting.
The Belhifet fight in particular was a bit much, though to be fair the more frustrating parts of it, such as the incredibly resilient golems and bleeding effects, were always there to begin with. I can't deny that the feeling of satisfaction from beating him (with all party members alive, thankfully) after painstakingly constructing a second-by-second strategy over the course of hours of trial and error was worth it, though.
For reference, I'm playing on Heart of Fury with double damage and experience, along with the component that disables the normal stat changes made by Heart of Fury. I'm not using any other mods besides the Gibberlings Tweakpack, which does admittedly allow for some normally unavailable combinations in race selection and Fighter/Cleric weapon usage.
My party consists of:
- A Gnomish Cavalier (Sword and shield tank in most cases, but dual-wields in emergencies or when employing Sword of Days cheese, which I'm frequently guilty of relying on; by far my most reliable character overall)
- A Dwarven Fighter/Cleric (Intended for use as an off-tank, though in practice used mainly for support casting; I often find myself wishing I had used a single-class Cleric instead, though the ability to equip Sword of Days and use it in conjunction with high-level casting that my Paladin can't handle is nice)
- An Elven Assassin (Probably the most situationally useful member of the party; contributes little more than modest crossbow fire in most cases, but backstabs and traps have proven invaluable in plenty of fights)
- A Halfling Skald (Pure utility character mostly used for buffing and the occasional summon)
- A Dwarven Dragon Disciple (Mostly built around offensive CC, debuff, and AOE damage spells; this is my first time using a Sorcerer in an Infinity Engine game, and I've consequently definitely made a few mistakes in spell selection here and there, though the sheer potency of things like Timestop and Project Image makes up for this; I'm very much looking forward to unlocking the dragon shapeshift ability down the road)
- An Elven Archer (The ultimate glass cannon and my main source of single-target DPS; frequently the only character I bring alongside my Paladin when I'm clearing easier areas and don't want to deal with managing the whole party)
I'll post a few more updates as I go through Heart of Winter and Luremaster. Thank you for all your hard work on this phenomenal project.
In the case of my character, who has a base DEX of 24 before gear, that happens during the transition from Level 31 to 32. Adjusting the skill values in EE Keeper didn't work, as the level-up screen doesn't recognize the edited values even though the stats page does, and I couldn't turn anything up using Google.
It's not going to kill my playthrough or anything (using EE Keeper to change the character into a Fighter but with Archer listed as the Kit seems to be more or less the same thing, and I can properly level up now), but it's a consequence of the raised level cap that's worth noting.
The Gloomfrost was very straightforward. The Ice Beholders weren't as bad as I feared, and the giants just required the same tactics used on their counterparts in the base game.
The Sea of Moving Ice was mostly easy until I reached the temple, at which point I finally hit a massive difficulty spike. The massive horde of standard enemies took awhile to clear out, and the lack of any breathing room forced me to once again rely on cheap tactics like Sword of Days and running from the room and resting once my Time Stops ran out. Even after that, the Olhydra gave me considerable trouble, and I experimented with a number of strategies for killing it. In the end, I dumped a ton of Incendiary Clouds on top of it using Time Stop and used my Paladin to soak up its damage and keep it from moving while the fire damage ticked away.
Icasaracht herself was a great boss. She was difficult and took some time to deal with, but she never felt unfair or cheap the way Belhifet and his golems did. I actually killed her first form on my second try, but that ended up being a bit of a fluke, and I had to kill her several times before figuring out how to handle the Soul Gem, which is just brutal in terms of the damage it can put out. Thankfully, it doesn't seem able to dispel your protections, unlike Icasaracht. After I used Sword of Days and a very careful Dispel to kill the two Wyrm spirits while under Time Stop, my Paladin was able to weather the maelstrom from the Gem through 100% MR achieved from Pale Justice, a spell, and a few passives. He still periodically took Crushing damage that would have one-shotted anyone else, but he had a large enough HP total to safely take the hits and enough Lay on Hands left to recover from them.
Now only Trials of the Luremaster remains. I fully expect every last inch taken to be hard-fought, but the end is in sight!
Sorry, but I think the Luremaster fight is where I'm calling it quits, at least for now. Fatigue of the game was already starting to set in (not your fault; I started this run fresh off another playthrough), and a fight that feels like it would take over a week of grinding to ever clear just isn't at all appealing to me at the moment. I realize that you wanted to make it the hardest encounter in the game, but it's just far too chaotic in my opinion. I felt so overwhelmed out of the gate that I gave up after only a couple of hours.
If I might offer feedback toward any future updates, I'd consider toning down the fight by substantially increasing the time it takes for enemies to spawn in, or at the very least having the timer affected by Time Stop. Alternatively, perhaps enemies past the first four knights could spawn in only after others have been killed, resulting in a fixed number of foes that the player has to worry about at any given time.
I hate to be critical, and I must stress that I genuinely did enjoy the mod overall, particularly the class/kit revisions and new minibosses. Reworking the whole game like this was a massively ambitious undertaking, and I applaud your talent and dedication.
Maybe I'll give the Luremaster another shot at some point down the road. Even if I don't beat him, I might at least be able to get a better sense of the fight and offer more detailed thoughts on it.
Thanks for all your feedback!
In the next update, I'll implement some of your suggestions.
* Belhifet/Poquelin won't use Mass Flaying; there just aren't enough good ways to defend against it or cure it. I might make them use the regular Flaying ability instead.
* I should be able to fix the problem of Rangers getting stuck on the level-up screen.
* I'll make it so each wave of enemies in the Luremaster fight only arrives when the previous wave has been defeated.
* I'll probably weaken the Sword of Days, restoring its original drawback of blocking Haste effects. You aren't the first person to call it cheesy.
I'm not sure how viable it would be to implement, but one change I would consider making to the Belhifet fight would be to add text above his sprite whenever he starts casting certain spells, similar to the messages you have displaying above enemies with leadership auras. I found that the fight became substantially easier whenever I noticed things like Fire and Ice via the text log, allowing me to move everyone to a different part of the room before it actually hit. Given how quickly the text log moves, however, it's very easy to miss such crucial information.
Having messages like "Belhifet is casting Mass Flaying on <CHARNAME>!" be displayed above his sprite gives the player a bit more information to work with without actually nerfing the fight. Players still have to deal with the AOE, but it's now a bit more realistic to expect them to deal with it by moving or using a quick buff.
The only other thing I can think of would be to ensure he prioritizes his casts on targets that are nearby or attacking him. I eventually settled into the rhythm of sending my Assassin up to him to dispel his illusions and eat his Mass Flaying, since the bleeding effect isn't nearly as devastating on non-casters. However, this only worked part of the time, as he'd occasionally ignore her and target the bulk of my party in the center, causing a mass bleeding and forcing me to invoke Power Word: Reload. If his behavior was a little more consistent, players could plan around it. Then again, I suppose that simplifying the AI opens up more opportunities for things like cheesily kiting the boss, so it could be a double-edged sword.
One final suggestion for the fight (and again, I don't know if this would be possible) would be to have the game autosave or quicksave just before the fight actually starts, preventing the player from having to go through the scripted bit with Everard every single time. Given that the fight can easily take well over a dozen attempts, it becomes annoying very quickly, especially if the voice acting isn't disabled, and is honestly one of my biggest issues with the fight. Obviously it's a problem with the base game and not your mod, but I'm sure I'm not the only one who would appreciate a workaround to it.
Do you know when the script trigger 0x26 TargetUnreachable(O:Object*) is supposed to return true?
Like you, I wanted to use it to make sure a certain creature doesn't attempt to move towards another creature if it's completely surrounded by other creatures, but it doesn't seem to work...
Any other way to resolve this issue is welcome too
Sadly, the call for help system I made for this mod isn't really feasible to separate. How it works is that when an enemy sees the party, they aggro every other enemy they see, and those enemies then aggro every other enemy they see. This doesn't aggro the whole map at once because groups of enemies are usually separated by enough distance that they can't see each other. But for that to be the case, I had to move enemies around, sometimes removing enemies. It wouldn't be enough just to separate the AI into another component.
However, the base game does often divide enemies into encounters as well, so I wouldn't worry about it too much. Enemies in IWDEE aren't quite as susceptible to that tactic as enemies in BG1.
A lot of the changes to classes and kits are contained in the optional "Class and Kit Enhancements" component, so you could choose not to install it. I do recommend you install it, though.
Here's the mod's readme.
— Is components mentioned in the Readme are optional? To be more precisely: "Change the summoning limit", "Modify Fighting Styles", "Disable the normal Heart of Fury Mode bonuses", "Disable the normal Heart of Fury Mode bonuses", "Class and Kit Enhancements", "Turn Undead Synergy", "Allow high-level spellcasters to cast multiple low-level spells per round", "Allow druids to cast spells while shapeshifted".
— Is your modification will work with Steam (achievements and so on)? I mean if the game after installing this mod will start to update it's files this will be no good coz' I have a total sux connection to the world informational network.
— Besides components mentioned in the Readme, what exactly changes making this mod in the original game?
— Why you suggesting to include component "Class and Kit Enhancements" into the setting?
I am apologizing for such lot of questions asked, currently stopped playthrough and thinking on crossroad to install or not to install "Improved HoF". If I will play with mod this can be a nice test to, because me usually exploring a full map, completing all sidequests (exception the evil one missions) and so on.
Yes, those components are optional.
It should be fine.
The mod empowers enemies, items, and some spells. It improves enemy AI. It makes combat much less tedious than in the regular Heart of Fury Mode because enemies don't have such ridiculous HP and AC, but in the long run it'll be just as challenging if not more.
Because it makes a lot of previously boring or underpowered classes and kits much more interesting and useful. The changes it makes are pretty balanced; the classes and kits that are empowered the most are the ones that were previously the most underpowered (like single-classed characters).
I haven't really been working on this mod in a while, sorry. I'm currently working on Icewind Dale 2: Enhanced Edition.
About Improved Kits, me dunno... I will not install such component. I don't think that single classed characters are underpowered, they actually good as teamplay, and I have already the party with the characters that was pre-made in Enhanced Edition by devs, so I think no need for such drastically changes.
Any mod that I should install along with "Improved HoF", or it's fine by alone?
You should start a new game, yes.
There is no precise list of changes. But I thought you didn't want spoilers anyway.
I'm not sure what link you're talking about. Try downloading it here and see if you still have problems.