DS1 Legendary Mod for DS2 Beta Thread

I've updated the DS1 MapPack to Beta 9. Please see top of thread for download links. All files have been updated so unfortunately that means downloading 271 Mb of files again but the mod is essentially finished from my perspective now as any lacking features are beyond my ability to fix. Any major bugs will be attended to if I can fix them though.

Here's the updated readme for the MapPack; http://www.siegetheday.org/~iryan/files/DS1_Map_Pack_for_Dungeon_Siege_2_Beta_9a.txt

Should be compatible with existing saved games but there's no guarantees. So please make backups just in case.

There's also 3 minimods available for the MapPack; one turns the 3 dwarven recruitable party members into proper Dwarves in Broken World and another allows playing as an Utraean in Broken World. Neither of these work in vanilla DS2 and are both alpha versions though quite playable and haven't caused any issues so far in testing.

The third minimod is to correct a difficulty problem that seems to have been caused by the latest version of the MonsterLevelAdjust Mod. The amount of experience being gained by the party also seems to be effected by this bug. This mod is temporary until the MonsterLevelAdjust Mod can be updated again.

After a year working on it, I feel I've taken the mod as far as I can. How we're going to publically release the mod I don't know as it's dependent on KillerGremal's 4 mods to operate, which are also in beta or alpha forms.

There's still a lot that can be done with the mod in the aspects of the NIS flick sequences as you can see with what KillerGremal has done at the Ruined Bridge on the way to the crypts in Kingdom of Ehb, auto-equiping party members as per Return to Arhok and the missing or unfinished monsters such as Swirling Midges, Zepherylls and Dopplegangers from LOA and even the gobbots and such from DS1.

Thanks to KillerGremal for the pioneering work and framework upon this mod rests and also PhoeniX, DarkElf, Bare_elf, Ghastley, Niko Makela and the crew at Project Britannia, and everyone else for their assistance and support with the project.

Iryan,

We have a problem or two. First being that DS1_Mod_Cat_Mansion_Characters_Beta_03b.ds2res no longer works as you can see from the screen shots. Not Just on the Utraean Peninsula but on all maps.

At first I thought it might be the DS1_Mod_BW_Dwarves.ds2res mod since it alters some of the same things and has a newer date. So I disabled it. That did not work. So I just raised the priority of the DS1_Mod_Cat_Mansion_Characters_Beta_03b.ds2res and that appears to fix things because

Second when I went back to check out the end game on the Utraean Peninsula the elevator to the final quests was closed and I no longer have any of the town-stones. So I will take your word for it that the end game works as I do not feel like doing the entire map over before checking out the changes to Kingdom of Ehb, Legends of Aranna and the other maps.

Related to the Level Adjustment mod, as far as (re)tested there is currently no technical indication that something is wrong with the adjustment of stats or experience.
Should a monster seem to be too hard to defeat it would help a lot to know some more details - monster name/template, your average party level, party size, map you are playing and any other difficulty related things you know (custom settings for example).

Concerning exp rewards I also would need to know if exp jewels are dropping or not and if the Hotfix mod is installed for example (without Hotfix mod the exp jewels are actually a bit less complicated, but meanwhile there is an extra work-around so all ways should work fine).

I'm also rethinking about to add a (test) option to report stats at first hit, right now however you only can check the life points yourself.
If interested in it, here is the default life formula of a melee mini-boss when a party has 2 members (on average about +/-17% per member added/removed):
life = (33 * #monster_level + 66) * (0.12 * #monster_level + 1.0)
This is only an approximation though, a small variation may happen (for example because the level is displayed as integer number while internally it often has digits). However as long as life points match the expectation, it's very probably that also damage and defense have the correct values (since all 3 stats are adjusted together).

 
Concerning the lever/button on player's storage chest: Button and chest are two objects, both close together but not at the same place. It's imaginable (improbable but possible) that the button gets lost because outside the frustum while the chest is still loaded. In particular this may happen if the expiration times of both objects are not in sync for any reason.

 
Last but not least, also chest-related but in general way: There may be several reason why a loot chest doesn't open. One very odd reason is a use-point inside the blocked area around the chest. It may help here to lower the bounding volume of the chest or simply to replace use-point and chest a bit.

@Iryan

As you know I am now redoing Kingdom of Ehb (EHB) and I discovered several problems with the DS1_Map_Difficulty_Fix.ds2res. The first being some cages like the ones the Phrak's are stored in can not be opened by ranged, melee or combat magic. The Phraks that are flying about free can not be attacked, when you point at them they show red and not green. However they can not be attacked with any discipline. They also do no damage. They just follow you about until they find someone not moving and keep poking them doing no damage. I disabled DS1_Map_Difficulty_Fix.ds2res and went back a saved game or two and tried again. They could be killed, their cages could be opened and as normal Phraks they could do damage.

@KillerGremal, I must agree with you that the monster level adjust mod version 5 is okay. Even if it sometimes appears that the characters are not adding skill levels fast enough.

We arrived in Glitterdelve and saved the Dwarf miners from the evil Krug then hired Gloern. Things are going quite will after turning off the DS1_Map_Difficulty_Fix mod. Raising the priority of DS1_Mod_Cat_Mansion_Characters_Beta_03b. If you are playing using Broken World I would really recommend that you install the DS1_Mod_BW_Playable_Utraeans and the DS1_Mod_BW_Dwarves. If you are playing with Cat Mansion Characters you will just have to wait for your own copy of DS1_Mod_Cat_Mansion_Characters_Beta_03b until I have tested it in all the maps. Now it is off to save Trog.

I've updated the Cat Mansion Characters Mod to version Beta 3d.
http://www.siegetheday.org/~iryan/files/DS1_Mod_Cat_Mansion_Characters_Beta_3d.ds2res

Basically it's just a priority rebuild just like bare_elf discovered herself so credit to her for this fix. Apparently a later timestamp can still get priority over a mod with priority defined for it if that's priority's not high enough as the DS1_Logic_Beta_9a.ds2res has no priority defined at all for it and the previous beta of the Cat_Mansion_Characters Mod had a priority of 20 or so. Oh well, I've given it a priority of 50 now and it seems to work okay.

I've also pulled the difficulty fix since KillerGremal believes there's no problem though while testing the Cat Mansion Characters Mod I had party members getting one shotted by minibosses a few times now. This is with No Mods installed apart from KillerGremal's 4 mods that's essential to the Map Pack. I guess we'll wait and see what players discover.

Detailed Report of Deaths in Combat
2 to the Frost Giant in Legends of Aranna at level 8 or so(though this has custom health and damage and isn't a miniboss)
Whole party to the Bear miniboss in the first cave in Kingdom of Ehb at level 12.
The first couple of minibosses in the Utraean Peninsula were okay but the party was below level 7 at that stage.

Thank You Iryan.

Oh just one small thing iryan Berseba's portrait_icon (she lives on the Utraean Peninsula) shows pink that is because the actual portrait_icon is b_gui_ig_i_ic_c_kiira1.dds but her template references portrait_icon = b_gui_ig_i_ic_c_kira1 I fixed it in my copy you might wish to correct it on the one posted here.

After saving Trog from the monsters in the Glitterdelve mines we headed for the exit. Once the door was open we clicked on the what appears to be the wrong lever (the one beside the elevator and not the one on it. No one got on, the elevator went up but would not come down again. I thought the single use elevator was fixed a few revisions ago?

Help me I've fallen and I can't get up.

Update: I went back a save and tried again. It appears that it is only the lever located next to the elevator that does not recall it. This time I put 5 of my party members on the elevator (the silly dwarf refused to get on) so using the lever on the elevator platform up we went. using the lever at the top of the elevator I sent it back down for Gloren. This time he got on and using the lever next to the elevator he did not go up or down. So I switched to my main character at the top of the elevator and used that lever to pull Gloren up and send him back down again. This time I had him use the lever on the elevator platform and up he went to join the rest of the party. Now we move on to find the overseer and deliver a sister's message.

We arrive in Glacern complete our tasks and found one tiny bug that has been there since at least beta 7a (the innkeeper in the blacksmith's extra room, maybe he is just the night clerk at the inn) now we are off to explore the Alpine Caverns

Made it through the Goblin Warrens to the room where the warding staff was being held. The Starting NIS ran correctly and then someone turned out the lights. Could only see the very top of the two towers that you must destroy, Could not see the goblin in the robo-suit, the warding staff or the switch to release it.
I was able to destroy the two towers and my party killed the robo-suited Goblin, I think by touch or smell. I was able to find the lever to open the staff's Prison and have the staff (but that was totally from memory and pretending I was blind. Tap tap with the staff tap tap).
The ending NIS was very washed out and very dark (this could be my computer) Here are two images to help explain and the location is marked.

Everything else from the Traveler Camp to this point worked correctly.

I say what has happened is the fades are broken. When you enter the room, the ceiling should fade away so you can see everything. How it works is that rooms like that are covered by black nodes so you can't see into them before you enter them. A trigger then tells the ceiling nodes to turn transparent so you can see what's there.

In the previous beta I spent a lot of time getting that room to work. In this beta when cleaning up the orphaned triggers, something must have broken.

I'll look into that straight away as it's a serious error, though you were able to get through. Thanks for the report.

*Update
Found the error, the fades were missing a link to the door (or rather the door had a link that went nowhwere). Seems to work now. Rather unpleasant experience testing it though since as soon as my party spawned at the starting position near the goblin robo suit they were quickly decimented by the Gobbots. However by spawning right at that very spot, the party was able to prevail and gain a foothold in the Goblin Warrens.

Also the broken lever in the Mines should now be fixed as well as the inn emoticon above the soldier's head in Glacern. Since you've managed to get pass this point I won't upload the fix for now, instead I'll wait to see if you find anymore bugs. You seem to be the only one testing the mod at the moment anyhow.

I've actually found a bug in the Level Adjustment mod. :o
The scope of a global variable was larger than assumed/intended, reducing exp if a monster increases its level and if exp jewels are disabled.
I'm going to fix this soon.

Thanks that will be great. That mod is quite complicated so it's not surprising bugs pop up now and again.

I've just started a mod that enables the MonsterLevelAdjust Mod in DS2 and BW. It's still only the first alpha version but the party started in Eirulan successfully bypassing the tutorial, was able to get the main quest, the ring of submission was around the main hero's neck and the early monsters were adjusting their levels with the party. Of course there's a lot to do with the main bosses and specific monsters needing their templates modified so they'll level up properly and store's getting a wider range of level items to sell, etc. Eventually perhaps a player could play all the maps, including the DS1 ones, and get close to level 100 without having to replay any map at all.

We are on the way to save the king and discovered a quest giver missing his Quest Icon. Otherwise no problems from the fort to the castle.

Thanks, now fixed. He was a merchant in the previous beta but since there's now a town portal spot right next to him, he's just a regular guy who gives you a quest. I just forgot to keep his indicate_emitter that displays the quest icons.

If everyone remembers in the original DS1 map he was a recruitable character but I didn't make him so in this mod since by then you would already have more than enough party members and in DS2 you can only have 6 party members unlike DS1 where you could have 8. Plus he was distinctly unintersting and had no redeeming features to make you want to recruit him.

By the way has everyone noticed a pattern here? The original DS1 allowed you to have 8 party members, DS2 reduced it down to 6 and DS3 reduced it down even further to 4. Does this mean if there's ever a DS4 you only be allowed 2 party members?

I also noticed that DS1 + 8 party members = 9, DS2 + 6 party members = 8 then the math breaks down because I would have thought that the next number in the series would be 7 however DS3 + 2 = 5. Maybe the cause of this is that the programmers of DS1 could count to 9 then they hired new people just out of school (and every one knows that math and science test scores have been on a downward tend in the USA) these people could only count to eight. What happened to the poor programmers for DS3 do they only have one hand to count on and therefore 5 is the highest number they can reach?

While in Castle Ehb I noticed that is several areas that parts of the scene would turn either pink or purple Discovered this was a very expanded Punisher Aura.

Now for the big problem (sorry no screen shots because the game locks up) I entered the Chamber of Stars (first time)and once in the door I could not move in any direction not even out the door. The only thing I could do was save and then restart at the elevator that goes down to the king. I entered the Chamber of Stars (second time) and could not move up the right path but the left path worked. Got to the Statue that is still standing and watched the NIS sequence and received the last quest "Dungeon Siege" and the completion of several others. When I clicked on the trunk next to the statue the game froze again and I was forced to wait about 3 minutes before I could save exit and start again at the elevator. This time I will not enter the Chamber of Stars and attempt to finish the game. Viewing angles in the Chamber of Stars are also limited and quite weird.

The GOM is dead long may he sleep. Iryan I found no additional errors after the Chamber of Stars.
Now it is off to another map Legends of Aranna I think unless there is something else you want me to have a look at.

I attempted to test that area as best I could and found no problem with the Punisher's Auras so I've got no idea what up with that.

I couldn't test the Chamber of Stars since I spawned a test party near Hein. This meant that I didn't have the key to unlock the Chamber of Stars and I couldn't get the key as the door to the King can't be unlocked from the other side (you have to speak to the King first). I do know that the viewing angles are a little strange in the chamber due to it's unique construction but there shouldn't be any crashes or lockups there.

I'll have to leave this one for the time being as it's too difficult for a low level party to make it to the Chamber from the nearest start point just outside the castle. Maybe we may get some reports from someone else about the Chamber of Stars in the meantime (though I don't know if anyone else is even playing the beta).

Will take a couple of days to get there depending on how much time I can devote to play, but will check this out for you.

I am running through the DS2 version of Legends of Aranna one more time. My party has made it as far as the Traders Camp (where the giants live) and up to this point all has gone very well with the primary quests, secondary quests and the hireable characters. Currently my party is 1 elf girl, 1 human girl, 1 female utraean and two male utraeans. The skins look good, the armor works. next we are off to visit a dwarf.

Thanks for your help. I've updated the map with the minor fixes bare_elf reported;
http://www.siegetheday.org/~iryan/files/DS1_Map_World_Beta_9b.ds2res
http://www.siegetheday.org/~iryan/files/DS1_Logic_Beta_9b.ds2res
http://www.siegetheday.org/~iryan/files/DS1_Map_Pack_for_Dungeon_Siege_2_Beta_9b.txt

So the elevator at the end of the dwarven mines and the fades at the goblin robo suit encounter should now be fixed.

I have a high level party at the droog village taking language lessons and a lower level party working their way to the goblin warrens. So off we go to look at the fixes. At Castle Ehb we found that the Punishers Auras where now the correct size (can you tell me what was wrong?). The Chamber of Stars works and the NIS runs cleanly. The elevator at the end of the dwarven mines works the only thing left to look at is the fades at the goblin robo suit encounter, but I think that can wait for a while as I was right in the middle of a battle in Legends of Aranna and I want to see of the newest version of the level adjust mod works. Just a side note Iryan the guy that gives the quest about the king outside of Castle Ehb still does not tell everyone he has a quest. You know he has no ! icon

I wish I could tell you what was the reason with the Punisher's auras. When I tested that area they were normal. The elevator at the end of the dwarven mines had a trigger with no mood attached, so I added a mood with an extra tall frustrum that allowed the lever to call the elevator. The problem with any trigger is that it only has a limited range due to the size of the frustrum.

The fades of the robo suit encounter somehow got broken in that the door was linked to an invalid trigger and not to the one controlling the fades. So all I had to do was repair the link.

Yes I forgot about poor Lord Bolingar so I'll give him an quest icon before I forget again.

The Innkeeper in Stonebridge likes to get his exercise. He stops running when you talk to him.

Heading for StoneBridge at the first DC checkpoint after exiting crypts Lothar started running so I let him go to his destination. He went to the signs in front of tower.

DC checkpoint before Dwarven Mines portal from town puts all in same spot. I could move still though.

And noticed some time ago that Grass Snakes do no damage but forgot to mention it. Tried adjusting attack_range from 1.0 to 0.5, still no damage. :?

I've been fiddling around trying to make miniboss encounters more memorable by adding intro and defeated text and dynamic battle theme music that plays during these encounters.
Thanks to KillerGremal for invaluable hints and code on how to make this work.

If anyone wants to see how this works ingame you can try these experimental files;
http://www.siegetheday.org/~iryan/files/DS1_Map_World_Test_9c.ds2res (60 Mb)
http://www.siegetheday.org/~iryan/files/DS1_Logic_Test_9c.ds2res (3.43 Mb)

The changes only effects the first 5 minibosses to the Crypts.
There are some issues with the Grizzly Bear and Klandak the Krug if they follow you out their caves. Any suggestions on how to keep them put? (I tried reducing job_travel_distance_limit a bit but it doesn't seem to effective). Also with Brankur you may not see his intro text depending on who goes down the elevator in Edgaar's Cellar.

The Phrak Ballista and Alpha Wolf work well and the battle music will cut out if you run far enough away from them and comes back on if you then re-engage them. The track used for the Farmlands is the one that comes with the game. Originally GPG planned to use such battle music in DS1 but canned it because all the fighting meant it would be used all the time and 1 track would become boring. I plan to only use it for miniboss and boss encounters though maybe some of the tougher monsters like Rock Beasts, Mine Worms and Drakes also deserve battle theme music as well as some of the tougher normal battles in the game (like some of the Goblin Warren encounters).

So let me know if you think this adds anything to the game. I do have royalty free battle music that can be used for other regions in the map so there's a bit of variety.

Incidentally there's a couple of tweaks to the map included as well as a critical fix that could cause the game to crash. This fix has been included in DS1_Logic_Beta_9b.ds2res which has been re-uploaded.
http://www.siegetheday.org/~iryan/files/DS1_Logic_Beta_9b.ds2res

Thanks for that, I've never noticed but you're right as I've been doing some tests on them.

My first thoughts were that since they inherited from a magic based actor evil template, that was the reason but changing that did no good.

Somehow the attack animations are broken. They're not alone in this regards as other DS1 monsters have broken animations in DS2 but they're usually magic (droc) or ranged (desert braak). This is the first time I've encountered broken melee animations (though I did try to use feral rabbits in a special encounter as a request from bare_elf but they couldn't attack either: they just hopped around looking silly).

I "fixed" them by substituting magic animations instead and now they will bite. So Ehb is even more dangerous a place.

Glad you were able to get them working as I could not.

I like it Iryan. the text messages and sounds do add to game. As far as keeping the grizzly bear and Klandak in one place I would suggest large nails through their feet. Just kidding. Anyway I like it.

Took a few tries to get to the Grizzly Bear and Phrak Ballista for testing but I like the encounters also. Level 60 Phrak and level 17 Krug were stomping my level 4 toons.
Put LA beta5 back in until beta5a is fixed.