At the beginning of SoD, when you confirm you are ready to leave Baldur's Gate and march toward Dragonspear Castle, a cutscene starts with a Flaming Fist officer shouting "Forward march!"
While the words are certainly fit for purpose, the sound clip itself is from the hobgoblin sound set and sound rather off from a human mercenary / law enforcer.
A more suitable clip would be from the paladin-like male player character sound set, where it says "Onward!" The voice is distinctly human, it has an authoritative and/or righteous ring to it, and it's also appropriate for starting the march.
You could swap the sound clip reference and change the dialog string so that it matches.
Another thing worth looking into is music tracks in Baldur's Gate. From the Let's Play I'm watching, it seems like Exploring The Plains plays within the Ducal Palace, which sounds rather off. It would be nice, at least within the Baldur's Gate areas at the beginning of the game, to ensure they play back the track that was assigned to them in the original game (in this regard, watch out for this bug in the Enhanced Edition; the original Baldur's Gate would offer a more accurate frame of reference for what tracks should be playing in what areas.)
Sorry for the late reply @AndreaColombo. I'd be open for tweaks to add them if they come coded, but I fear I will not make them myself. Still, thanks for the suggestions!
Version 3 comes with a new component: "Adjust PC's Starting XP at Beginning of SoD" by @subtledoctor ! Thank you very much, subtledoctor for contributing the component!
Also, it now uses inconv for text transformation between original and EEs.
Changes:
-added new component: Adjust PC's Starting XP at Beginning of SoD, by subtledoctor
-uses HANDLE_CHARSETS for text convertion
-added c#sodtweaks.ini with mod info
The Tweak Pack updates to v5.
Main change is a new component which gives 4 install choices for the ending of SoD, starting after the "slayer" dream killing cutscene.
Description of the new component (for more details refer to readme):
Option 1: "Revised Full Version"
This option changes the overall public perception of the PC's role in what happened to Skie. It always bothered me that in the original, the PC is seen as the culprit although they are clearly laying on the floor when Bence Duncan enters, there is no weapon, and the whole scene can be played as such that the PC doesn't hit the "slayer" monster once.
My revised ending keeps all key moments, but the atmosphere in this revised ending is changed in so far, as it is not the whole world, but only some people blaming the PC. Duke Silvershield being one of them, but also Bence Duncan's hatred for the PC and Corwin's strange request to take the blame were not changed.
Option 2: "Revised Streamlined Version"
This option has all the (changed) content of my revised ending in option 1, but all intermediate cutscenes are removed: no walk through the masses, no cutscene at the public hearing of people walking to and fro. It's basically a series of dialogues and fade-to-blacks until the PC is in prison. There the normal flow (of Option 1) kicks in, with all visits by the Hooded Man, Corwin, the romance interests, and Duke Belt.
Option 3: "Original Streamlined Version"
This option keeps all the original dialogues as they were, but removes all intermediate cutscenes. No walk through the masses, no small cutscenes at the public hearing of people walking to and fro one has to sit through. It's basically a series of dialogues and fade-to-blacks until the PC is in prison. There the normal flow kicks in.
This also means, that like in the original game, to activate the nice ending with Duke Belt coming into the prison, you will have to klick through the repy option at the public trial or install component 1 of this tweak pack.
Option 4: "Skipit Version"
This option makes the ending really short. It's meant for players that did or are planning to play through the ending a lot of times. It jumps from Bence arresting the PC to Duke Belt explaining the situation in prison. Duke Belt will always come, no assassin ending with this option. After walking to the table were the items are, going through the trap door will bring the PC directly to the exit of the sewers were Imoen is.
Changelog v5:
- new component added: "SoD Ending: jastey's Tweaks"
- "More dialogue choices": added lines to Jaheira & Dynaheir at the end about their motivation to join the PC
- added install order syntax for PI
- Russian version now uses English setup.tra directly
@jastey
It's great to see more options for the ending of SoD. For me it is one of the weakest and most frustrating sections of the series so the work you are doing on it is much appreciated.
@megamike15 every area trigger is for ~2 NPC/NPC banter, depending on the NPCs in group. Unless you know exactly which ones are suposed to trigger where, it might also just be that the NPCs didn't have anyone to talk to or weren't in teh group / the "wrong" NPCs were in the group for the trigger in that area.
EDIT which of course, could also be called a kind of wonky since one would like to see as many banters as possible.
Unfortunately, changing the triggers to a timer based concept (as one option) is not that easy, I think, but I haven't looked at it thoroughly yet.
I just finished my first SoD game with this, and it was fantastic. Great work! The only thing that took me a moment was realizing that I needed to have my PC talk to Imoen to trigger the ending - as they wandered the whole mini-map for a moment.
All in all, great work. This really makes the transition between SoD and SoA so much better. It feels more like a chapter switch than a game switch.
@Maurvir thank you for the kind words! Do you refer to the Revised SoD Ending? And Imoen at the sewer exit? If yes I whould have a look at her script again, it's not meant that she doesn't initiate dialogue like in the original. Thank you for the feedback!
Oh, Imoen found my PC just fine, even though she was invisible. I guess she really knows her sister's footsteps! For some reason, on my first playthrough, I found the party just standing there. I think it was because I chose an option that let me manually reconstitute the party by talking to Jaheira and Dynaheir.
On the second play, where I was testing, I simply told her I was ready to go, and it went off fine.
As for preferring it, yes. I vastly prefer the revised ending to the original - and I really like that you added back the unwinnable fight. They actually took out a few of the bad guys before succumbing, but it really added a lot to the experience.
@Maurvir thanks! For the restoration of the end fight, all the work was already done by @swit (aka k4thos) for EET, I just adapted his work to BG:SoD. EDIT: in case you were playing EET then that's the original EET content as the fight is restored in EET on default. My Tweakpack does the same for BG:SoD.
(I was asking whether your comment was referring to the revised ending, but hearing you preferred it makes me very happy indeed.)
Yes, this was an EET run. I didn't realize that EET had added that back, but I'm glad they did. It was a much more satisfying ending than the original. I can't imagine a party at this level just dozing off and taking a nap when they know there is danger.
The new version comes with two new components, fixes, and globally unique LABELs to support Project Infinity.
Description of the new components:
9 Make Portal Close from Dragonspear Castle (Aun Argent survives always)
This component makes it so the blood of Belhifet has to be applied from Toril's side to close the portal at Dragonspear Castle, which will be done by Aun Argent. This gives the possibility that Aun Argent can be rescued even if Caelar died in the battle with Belhifet.
Caelar will remain in Avernus to guard the place in case she survived, so this tweak should be compatible with any Caelar NPC mods.
10 Hephernaan takes Dragonspear Vault Key
This component eliminates the question why De Lancie would have a key to that vault door, which doesn't make sense to me.
With this component, the story is changed so that there is only one vault door key which first is in possession of Caelar. Hephernaan will then take the key with him into Avernus, locking the door to give his master more time to prepare his attack and also to lock Caelar and the PC in so they'd have to follow him to Belhifet or fight each other.
Thus, De Lancie doesn't lock the PC in to fight the fiends of Avernus on their own. Instead, the coalition officers can't open the door at that time even if they wanted to.
This is a small tweak which doesn't have any real influence on the game. It will still be either Caelar or Aun Argent who will hand the key to the PC after the fight before teleporting back.
Changelog v6:
-two new components: "Make Portal Close from Dragonspear Castle (Aun Argent survives always)" and "Hephernaan takes Dragonspear Vault Key".
-Revised Ending: Neeras prison lovetalk should not loop; interjection of bystander should play; journal entries should be sorted for the correct title.
-"More dialogue choices": lines of Jaheira & Dynaheir at the end about their motivation to join the PC are now added at a more sensible point in Imoen's dialogue and only show for the "Duke Belt" ending.
-added globally unique LABELs to support Project Infinity.
-added install checks for "Another fine Hell" Mod.
The mod updates to v7.2 with proofreadings of German veryion by Shai Hulud!
Players of the German version please note: The German version is consistent to the fan-made "Deutsche Übersetzung für SoD". This means, that names and terms could differ from the official German version shipped with the game. Install "Deutsche Übersetzung für SoD" for a consistent game experience.
-new reply options ("More Dialogue Choices & Prevent Dead Ends").
-imoen should initiate correct dialogue when Korlasz' Dungeon was cleared by helpers ("Skip Korlasz's Dungeon").
Comments
So there is hope.
I've got a couple small tweak suggestions.
At the beginning of SoD, when you confirm you are ready to leave Baldur's Gate and march toward Dragonspear Castle, a cutscene starts with a Flaming Fist officer shouting "Forward march!"
While the words are certainly fit for purpose, the sound clip itself is from the hobgoblin sound set and sound rather off from a human mercenary / law enforcer.
A more suitable clip would be from the paladin-like male player character sound set, where it says "Onward!" The voice is distinctly human, it has an authoritative and/or righteous ring to it, and it's also appropriate for starting the march.
You could swap the sound clip reference and change the dialog string so that it matches.
Another thing worth looking into is music tracks in Baldur's Gate. From the Let's Play I'm watching, it seems like Exploring The Plains plays within the Ducal Palace, which sounds rather off. It would be nice, at least within the Baldur's Gate areas at the beginning of the game, to ensure they play back the track that was assigned to them in the original game (in this regard, watch out for this bug in the Enhanced Edition; the original Baldur's Gate would offer a more accurate frame of reference for what tracks should be playing in what areas.)
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Version 3 comes with a new component: "Adjust PC's Starting XP at Beginning of SoD" by @subtledoctor ! Thank you very much, subtledoctor for contributing the component!
Also, it now uses inconv for text transformation between original and EEs.
Changes:
-added new component: Adjust PC's Starting XP at Beginning of SoD, by subtledoctor
-uses HANDLE_CHARSETS for text convertion
-added c#sodtweaks.ini with mod info
Main change is a new component which gives 4 install choices for the ending of SoD, starting after the "slayer" dream killing cutscene.
Description of the new component (for more details refer to readme):
Option 1: "Revised Full Version"
This option changes the overall public perception of the PC's role in what happened to Skie. It always bothered me that in the original, the PC is seen as the culprit although they are clearly laying on the floor when Bence Duncan enters, there is no weapon, and the whole scene can be played as such that the PC doesn't hit the "slayer" monster once.
My revised ending keeps all key moments, but the atmosphere in this revised ending is changed in so far, as it is not the whole world, but only some people blaming the PC. Duke Silvershield being one of them, but also Bence Duncan's hatred for the PC and Corwin's strange request to take the blame were not changed.
Option 2: "Revised Streamlined Version"
This option has all the (changed) content of my revised ending in option 1, but all intermediate cutscenes are removed: no walk through the masses, no cutscene at the public hearing of people walking to and fro. It's basically a series of dialogues and fade-to-blacks until the PC is in prison. There the normal flow (of Option 1) kicks in, with all visits by the Hooded Man, Corwin, the romance interests, and Duke Belt.
Option 3: "Original Streamlined Version"
This option keeps all the original dialogues as they were, but removes all intermediate cutscenes. No walk through the masses, no small cutscenes at the public hearing of people walking to and fro one has to sit through. It's basically a series of dialogues and fade-to-blacks until the PC is in prison. There the normal flow kicks in.
This also means, that like in the original game, to activate the nice ending with Duke Belt coming into the prison, you will have to klick through the repy option at the public trial or install component 1 of this tweak pack.
Option 4: "Skipit Version"
This option makes the ending really short. It's meant for players that did or are planning to play through the ending a lot of times. It jumps from Bence arresting the PC to Duke Belt explaining the situation in prison. Duke Belt will always come, no assassin ending with this option. After walking to the table were the items are, going through the trap door will bring the PC directly to the exit of the sewers were Imoen is.
Changelog v5:
- new component added: "SoD Ending: jastey's Tweaks"
- "More dialogue choices": added lines to Jaheira & Dynaheir at the end about their motivation to join the PC
- added install order syntax for PI
- Russian version now uses English setup.tra directly
It's great to see more options for the ending of SoD. For me it is one of the weakest and most frustrating sections of the series so the work you are doing on it is much appreciated.
sometimes the banters don't fire despite walking all over the map. as they are effected by map triggers in sod not timers.
EDIT which of course, could also be called a kind of wonky since one would like to see as many banters as possible.
Unfortunately, changing the triggers to a timer based concept (as one option) is not that easy, I think, but I haven't looked at it thoroughly yet.
Changelog:
-completed Russian version (with new lines from v5), by yota13
All in all, great work. This really makes the transition between SoD and SoA so much better. It feels more like a chapter switch than a game switch.
On the second play, where I was testing, I simply told her I was ready to go, and it went off fine.
As for preferring it, yes. I vastly prefer the revised ending to the original - and I really like that you added back the unwinnable fight. They actually took out a few of the bad guys before succumbing, but it really added a lot to the experience.
(I was asking whether your comment was referring to the revised ending, but hearing you preferred it makes me very happy indeed.)
The new version comes with two new components, fixes, and globally unique LABELs to support Project Infinity.
Description of the new components:
Changelog v6:
-two new components: "Make Portal Close from Dragonspear Castle (Aun Argent survives always)" and "Hephernaan takes Dragonspear Vault Key".
-Revised Ending: Neeras prison lovetalk should not loop; interjection of bystander should play; journal entries should be sorted for the correct title.
-"More dialogue choices": lines of Jaheira & Dynaheir at the end about their motivation to join the PC are now added at a more sensible point in Imoen's dialogue and only show for the "Duke Belt" ending.
-added globally unique LABELs to support Project Infinity.
-added install checks for "Another fine Hell" Mod.
The mod updates to v7.2 with proofreadings of German veryion by Shai Hulud!
Players of the German version please note: The German version is consistent to the fan-made "Deutsche Übersetzung für SoD". This means, that names and terms could differ from the official German version shipped with the game. Install "Deutsche Übersetzung für SoD" for a consistent game experience.
Changelog:
-German version: Proofread by Shai-Hulud.
Changelog v8:
-French version added, by JohnBob.
Changelog v8.1:
-French version proofread by Machiavélique.
Changelog:
-new reply options ("More Dialogue Choices & Prevent Dead Ends").
-imoen should initiate correct dialogue when Korlasz' Dungeon was cleared by helpers ("Skip Korlasz's Dungeon").
EDIT: translations are complete.
Changelog:
-Russian version completed, by yota13.
Thank you yota13 and JohnBob for the Russian and French translations!
Changelog 9.2:
-French version completed, by JohnBob.
The new texts need translations.
Changelog:
-more reply options with officers in bd3000.
-deactivate Story Mode for the endscene fight component.
The mod updates to v10.2 with a fix to support for Project Infinity: Some components were missing LABELs.
Changelog:
-All components should have LABELs.
Changelog:
-Polish version added, by GoForTheEyes.
Changelog:
-Russian version revised, by Ulpian.
Changelog:
-Spanish version added, by ElGamerViejuno.
Changelog:
- Fixed bug due to doubled patch code for bdrom03.bcs ("Do Not Miss NPC-PC Dialogues").