Mod request: stay in SoA after the final battle, choose when to start ToB
_Connacht_
Member Posts: 169
in BGII:EE Mods
The game automatically starts ToB after you end the final confrontation of SoA. However, I would like to continue to mess around in Amn before going into ToB. Thus it would be available with some sort of character dialogue, like how the transition between BG1 and BG2 was managed in BGT before SoD.
My request is mainly for role-playing reasons:
1) Can't think of a better time for doing the Watcher's Keep, as there are more urgent questions to be solved during ToB, and it is unbalanced for SoA. First levels give you too much XP, money and good gear making SoA trivial, last levels could be too hard during chapter 2 (I don't like leaving quests half-completed for a while and during chapter 6 I don't want to detour from the very urgent main quest just for seeking treasures elsewhere);
2) Even if I usually complete all side quests during chapter 2, some players might still leave some of them because they think that it would take too much time when you are in a hurry for Imoen and you had enough money since weeks;
3) Plot states that CHARNAME spent some time in Suldanesselar before the other Bhaalspawns started to annoy people in ToB and everybody noticed their fuss, but in-game the transition is instantaneous.
Thank you!
My request is mainly for role-playing reasons:
1) Can't think of a better time for doing the Watcher's Keep, as there are more urgent questions to be solved during ToB, and it is unbalanced for SoA. First levels give you too much XP, money and good gear making SoA trivial, last levels could be too hard during chapter 2 (I don't like leaving quests half-completed for a while and during chapter 6 I don't want to detour from the very urgent main quest just for seeking treasures elsewhere);
2) Even if I usually complete all side quests during chapter 2, some players might still leave some of them because they think that it would take too much time when you are in a hurry for Imoen and you had enough money since weeks;
3) Plot states that CHARNAME spent some time in Suldanesselar before the other Bhaalspawns started to annoy people in ToB and everybody noticed their fuss, but in-game the transition is instantaneous.
Thank you!
0
Comments
first of all, the quests that opened up in chapter 2, you can always come back to them in chapter 6 and even 7, in fact, there is absolutely nothing stopping you from being underneath suldanesselar killing those parasites ( and as long as you have one left ) you can leave suldanesselar and go back to athkatla if you truly desire
also as far as im aware ( except for some joinable character related quests ) there is absolutely no rush to finish any major quest in the game ( saving imoen, chasing irenicus, saving suldanesselar, ect.. )
but im reading your post again and you did say it was for RP reasons, and ToB makes it pretty clear as to why you didnt stick around suldanesselar for long
but in the meantime just remember you can leave suldanesselar at any point right up until you confront mr irenicus
Besides I don't detour from a very urgent objective: that is, stopping the very bad guy from killing a sacred tree and getting back my soul, just to explore the Watcher's Keep.
If it weren't for these reasons, I wouldn't care.
The best timing for the Watcher's Keep is after the end of SoA and before the beginning of ToB. You defeated Irenicus, but didn't have news yet of the Bhaalspawns arising.
As for now, the only thing I can do is cheating with time advancement (ctrl T) and map loading before Ellesime awakens me, since the journal doesn't update about the defeat of Irenicus. So I can pretend something, but it is forced and a bit annoying.
It would also help the game's narrative cohesion if you add to this a timer for these MAIN PLOT LIFE OR DEATH EVENTS. I've always hated that Bioware in all their silliness sacrificed any real sense of urgency for the sake of enabling you to experience most of the game's content at a stress-free pace. i.e. actually lend a sense of urgency to moving the story forward or else Imoen perishes, and eventually you crumble into the game over screen of doom - make it so you CANNOT afford to dilly dally for months cheesily chasing down every last bit of loot, quest, and xp while Imoen and you are wasting away. Come back to finish stuff up AFTER Hell, if your character feels it's important enough (or is greedy enough) to do so.
Game design decisions like this is why no one will take D&D games too seriously at a narrative level, and the genre after all these decades remains dominated by silly powergame nerdom that's happy to settle for phat xp/loot over a story that makes sense.
Having a timer over your head for the entire game that says "GET BACK TO THE MAIN PLOT RIGHT NOW OR GAME OVER" is the definition of railroading and railroading is almost universally agreed to be a flaw in any game.
However it's rumored that some weirdos do enjoy a gameplay style that's a bit more nuanced (dare I say to the equivalent of a second or third rate Marvel movie, one can dream) where if you stop and think about what's going on your head doesn't completely implode at the silliness, which at times the BG games can be... if we work hard to ignore these kinds of huge gaping holes in the storytelling and game design.
It's an idea for a mod; you can certainly continue to play the unmodded game however you wish.
It’s really telling how you automatically assume completionists are only interested in numbers. Your assumption is false. As an aspiring writer I love a good plot more than anything, but I’m also a completionist because I want to see everything a game has to offer, and the good side quests often build upon the world or the characters. That’s far more enjoyable for me than a plot that has to ‘make sense’.
Oh, also, even if urgency has its place in a narrative I still don’t agree with you. A good game invokes the feeling of urgency through proper pacing. A bad one forces it upon you with arbitrary restrictions that act as a detriment to the rest of the game.
I understand that you really don't care as long as you get to play your game the way you like, but does the above at least make sense? Can you understand why it might appeal to some people?
An aspiring writer... good god.... please don't turn out to be another Philp Athans