Old RPGs and Old Computers + NWN Series Mods

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Hey, the bearded guy showed up and did his thing, he has messed up a handful of times, and left a lot to be replayed.

Money is good to have on this trip, not as many pickpockets in a small town at least, too bad about the sword as it is a nice one to have against some old red dragon. That fur armor is nice too, always ended up sold, but back with better prices. The small shield in Simons bedroom does not have the spell failure, always kept that for Pia, though her AI never seemed to use her good spells at the right time in my battle plans. You can end up with no one who wants to use a longsword or long bow when there are some very good ones along the way, I will give Pia a fighter level so someone can, and she is not always around so making her the better thief does not pay that well either. Pia will respond better to the commands from the radial menu than some others, and in dialog you can ask her not to follow you and she will stay behind while still in the party and ready to help. I map those radial orders to hot keys for ease of use, but that ice wyrm is nasty without cold and I think slashing protection is what can help.

Signing up as an Ice Princess worker will give access to the building next door, there may be options with this line of work I have not discovered, as there seemed to be more in previous versions, maybe if the Rangers...

Take the trip with the rangers, and be sure to explore the abandoned mine to get ready for the next step in the story. Playing tomb raider with the tomb owner in tow is a bad idea, grab the goodies before hand. The rod says it can't be used on the coffin, but that is what you need to do anyway. Rest and recharge after each use!! The boss battle up next is a pain, Pia, Lady Dana, and the Baron need to survive for the trip home to be available through conversations, (give them better potions while they are party members) there is no resting allowed and you can't leave the castle since it will not let you back inside. Giving better equipment can help but it is likely to be lost when they quit the party at the end of the fight (don't bother with Lady Dana except for some good healing potions). You can save at the start of the battle, but often so much happens at the start of the reload that it can become unwinnable, or someone who won't move could be standing over the best loot pile (the mage has the best stuff). Loot the vault and armory too before starting the conversation to leave, I don't recommend killing the vault guards without a good save before hand as that could mess up a faction, I always just sneak. Pia will head right for detected traps she can see, but will only disarm them, as you may have seen in the Baron's rooms, you must stop her if you want to recover a door or chest trap. Like Golden Chalice, there is a lot of heavy loot left, I might leave a few things behind here but you will have to get past the Dhorn at the gate so leave a vacant spot for weapons you are holding. Have fun and stay warm.

 

Well, things have been a bit hectic here, so I haven’t gotten back to the game yet: heavy snowstorm that has buried my vehicle; circuit breaker to my microwave oven on the blink (I’m learning to cook veggies on the stove again, for the 1st time in decades!); the pilot light to my gas furnace has been going out once or twice a day; etc.

And your last post brought some more comments to mind. So here I am writing more (probably another chapter!) to this long autobiography of a “Dance with Rogues” (beginner) game player.

The bearded guy…hmm…I think I have a save at just before we kill him and get transported to the castle. I might try that spot, so I can run back to see if I still have Simon’s shield in my stash, buy a new one if I don’t, & grab some money while I’m there. I dread having to redo long replays, but that point would be more appealing than redoing the whole quest. (Pick-pocketing all those moving guards in the academy is quite tedious, and redoing that would probably take a lot longer than the run home, so I’m crossing my fingers that I have the right save.)

Yes, I discovered Pia trying to get to traps or locks before me. It took me a couple of times at ordering her to “Follow” to realize that it only partially works. She’d say “I can do that”, walk about halfway back to me, then decide that she can’t do that after all, and head back to the trap or lock. Telling her to “Stand her ground” seems to work better.

By the way, Pia’s voice sounds like the female voice that was my favorite and I always chose for my halfling characters. I had tried to find that same voice when I created this princess but couldn’t find it and had to pick one I don’t care for. Hearing Pia use it has me wondering if Valine removed it from the choices so that only Pia can use it.

Geesh…I just burned the veggies in the bottom of the sauce pan because I didn’t add enough water. Hey, that can happen after you’ve been cooking absolutely all your veggies in a microwave for 3 or 4 decades. I really can multitask. Really. At least most of the time. And don’t worry. I’ve never owned a cell phone, so I can’t talk on the phone while driving.

Let’s see, what else? Ah, yes, the brothel owner. Being my lewd self, I would’ve signed up as a worker if I had been alone. But Pia clearly didn’t like the idea of staying in a brothel, much less becoming a prostitute, herself, so I nixed the idea and simply got us a room. My God, the sacrifices one has to make for love!

I had read in the wikia about the rangers being here. And I saw only 3 guys with names, so I knew who they were and didn’t bother asking the owner about them. But first, we went up to our room to get some sleep.

The next day, I decided to do some exploring first. I like filling in the maps. So first I filled in the whole town, in the process discovering the plotting pair going at it in the old Taylor shop. Then I began to fill in the rest of the map. First I went up to the castle (only to discover that the castle doesn’t appear on the map even after I “discovered” it). Then I began to fill in the rest of the map…and soon got bored with the monotony, deciding that it wasn’t made for exploring. It was just made for fill-in.

So I returned to the brothel to talk with the rangers. Only to discover that they wouldn’t discuss being guides. I thought maybe they won’t discuss it until I actually have 20K on me. So I went to the shops to sell gear, only to find all the shops closed. It was about 1 AM.

So I went back to the brothel owner to rent a room for another night. And he would no longer give me a room. He’d mention that he had them, and told me the price, but he would no longer take my gold and give me a key. I had read in the wikia that if you work for him, you get a place to sleep for free. So, despite Pia's reluctance, I then offered to work for him, and he seemed to like the idea, but he never told me that I was hired or where we could sleep.

At least, I finally asked the owner about the rangers. And then I talked to them and finally got the offer to be our guides.

But it still looked like Pia and I were going to have to sit on our butts, sleepless, until the shops opened in the morning. At that point, it was 3 AM in real time, and I decided it was time for me to get some sleep, myself. And here I am, at the end of the next day, and with my belly full of burnt veggies with a mushroom soup gravy.

 

Know what you mean, fired up all the stove burners just to be sure they worked at a new place, and have not used them since. Had to buy a newer microwave with more power to do my "cooking" though. Last time I burned something on the stove was a bit epic, no fire but who knew making hummingbird sugar water could go so wrong, I would boil it for a bit so as to stay fresh longer, set it on high and left for the computer. Is that smoke I smell? Could not breathe standing up near the kitchen, and I had made a perfect ball of charcoal in the pan.

I'm so locked into that voice set for Pia that when any other NWN or NWN2 module uses it, all I can think of is her. The barkeep has to trigger the rangers to talk about going to the pass, they will ask to be sure you have enough money. I think Pia and I have used that room for another night, not sure why he would not take more money, it is expensive, but spell casting classes have to rest, was the key taken away and the door relocked behind you? Did the barkeep give you some clothes to wear to work? If so, the building next door should now be open, with a few small items to loot, but I think I have not been able to rest there either in some past runs, not sure what is wrong or was intended. Resting is allowed in parts of the town's crypts, since you saw the scene at the tailors it could be open though you must talk your way past the guard, and return there later with the right equipment. I like exploring too, try and find any Easter eggs, but I do skip that here since Valine does not seem to have any for these areas close to town, just the note as a clue where to look. Not like the home town or even some of the mines and tunnels yet to come where exploring is worth it.

That +2 cold dealing sword is good quite a way into the tale, Vico's sword only has a bonus for humans, of course it is hard to get Anden to do much with it but still. The cold damage short sword sold in the hideout is another favorite of mine, even get them upgraded later, and as a warning both family stores will close before departing for part 2, so shop while they are open.

 

Ack! You turned that sugar water into pure, hard carbon! I know for a fact that carbonated soft drinks are not good for hummingbirds. I’m going to guess that carbonated hard drinks are even worse.

So you’re a birdwatcher? I am, too. While I was a wildlife biologist, many of my projects dealt with birds. And I helped set up our area’s first Audubon Christmas Bird Count about 30 years ago. Geesh, time flies.

When Pia and I had left the inn’s room the first time, I didn’t check to see if it was locked behind me. But when I tried to re-rent it, the innkeeper did not give me a key. And both doors to both apartments were locked when I decided to check them anyway. And when I accepted his work, he did not give me any clothes. Is that nearby building outside where his hired help sleeps? I didn’t know that, so I never checked it. I did check the basement in the inn, thinking that might be where hired help slept, but it had no place to sleep.

Well, I did have a save just before I opened up Pia’s cage. So I ran back home and checked all my stash sites for Simon’s shield and the only one I had was a large shield with 15% spell failure (and I think 40% weight reduction). So I checked every merchant I could remember for a small (or large) shield with zero spell failure on it. No one had anything more in either type than a non-magical +1 shield. And every shield included only the standard 5% or 15% chance of spell failure.

I don’t recall what all Simon’s shield had on it, but I have no idea what became of it. Apparently, I sold it, but I couldn’t guess where. If it was “stolen”, it had to be one of the family merchants, but neither merchant had it. Oh, there is one other merchant whom I discovered will buy at least some stolen goods. The Dhorn merchant in West Bet.? Not sure, but I did check him, too, with no luck.

So I gave Pia a +1 small shield, made her a fighter her next level-up, and she’s now using that longsword. I should’ve had her still use one of my shortswords for the battle with the ice wyrm, because it’s immune or highly resistant to cold damage. But we managed to beat it anyway without too much trouble. I wore my ring of elemental resists, and I gave Pia a cloak with 10% cold resist.

I ended my playing last night with just entering the Ice Princess Inn, without yet talking to anyone, just so I wouldn’t make any mistakes while I was tired. So that’s where I’m at now. With enough gold to pay the rangers without needing to sell a single thing that will get a better price from Sanah.

 

Can't do much bird watching at the new apartment, but even though we were just inside city limits at the last place, there were wild turkeys that would visit. Quite a contrast to the hummingbirds, with some of the bigger woodpeckers in between.

Been there, done that, selling something I needed later and don't remember who has it now. I had mentioned that shield of Simons, it was in the cabinet of the room he was sleeping in so I'm sure you would have found it, just neglected to say just what was so special about it. It uses a different icon than most shields, and while it says there is 15% spell failure, normal for the large shield, it then shows a -5% spell failure to get back to 10%. Did you see that armor the dwarf has that does the same thing for the fighter/bard, mithral I think, though I seldom haul that with me to Ravenstower. I do get it later even though Pia is stuck with a don't cast spells in most all my playing.

I'm sure we have rented that Ice Princess room again, likely some script glitch, but not a big one. Maybe if you saw the action at the tailors before renting the room and seeing the note, but who knows. Since you were in the room and can see the floor over the wall you can get back in via the console: Position the cursor on the floor in the room, enter DebugMode 1, then hit the * key on the keypad, and go out of DebugMode. You may have to move the cursor if it is on a yellow trigger area once in Debug, and it only moves the PC, but save and reload will bring companions along. There are some rail fences that anyone should be able to cross and not have to destroy, thus making gardeners and others hostile. I just consider this cheat common sense roleplaying in that case.

Speaking of cheats, I took a look at that shield in the toolset, and I'm not remembering it very well. It is an Ironwood Large Shield, with 15% spell failure of which only 5% is negated so it still has 10% failure. It does have the 40% weight reduction too, but the small shield you have for her now will have less failures at the cost of less protection. If it still sounds good to you there will be time to look around town, or cheat since it is a standard item that a DM could spawn. Debug mode as usual, cursor on bare ground in front of you, then: dm_spawnitem X2_IT_IWOODSHLDL
should spawn the shield at the cursor location, I forgot to check but I don't think she marked it as a plot item which may not spawn this way, then back out of Debug.

 

Well, after 3 tries, I finally managed to leave the castle with Pia, the baron, and Lady Dana still alive, though my “success” may have been only because of a strange occurrence that happened only by chance. Only to get back to the Bearpit and have Pia killed there. Next time, I’ll try fleeing the Bearpit instead of battling. But at that point I lost interest in playing the game. Instead, I went back to the Sci-Fi novel I started a couple weeks ago and hadn’t finished yet because I’ve been playing this mod instead. It’s “The Golden Globe” by John Varley (1998). In a sense, the future of its antagonist had a similar feeling as I do while trying to play this mod without using the walkthrough for just about every step of the way: not very good. (At times, I feel as if I’m playing the walkthrough instead of the game.)

Anyway, I’ll leave off saying any more about that final battle in the castle until I go see what the wikia has to say about it.

Yes, during my first visit to the town of Ravenstower, I had found the note in the stove in the Ice Princess room before I had found the couple at it in the old tailor shop (Yes, it is “tailor”, I see. I had thought for sure I had read a person’s name…Taylor…on the note or on the sign at the old shop, so I had said “Taylor” up above.) And, no, the innkeeper did not give me an outfit or key when I asked him for work.

When I had gone back to Bet. to find Simon’s small shield, I found and checked every large shield that used a non-standard icon, but I don’t think I found a single small shield with a different icon. I know that I checked every small and large shield, standard or otherwise, for a bonus of 5% reduction to spell failure, but no shield had that bonus. Was it listed in the bonus section? Or was it possibly another line up by the “spell failure” line? If it was there, I may have missed it.

A dwarf who has an armor with a cancelled spell failure? I don’t recall any dwarf merchant who even sells any armor. I do recall a mithral armor that was some of my loot from the whole Ravenstower part of the missing Pia quest, but I’m not sure where I had picked it up. Maybe the dwarf ranger. Is there any chance you sold that armor and then bought it later for Pia?

I didn’t even think of looking at its stats or keeping it for Pia. She is a level 4 bard after all, so why waste all those bard levels if she wears armor that a bard is not allowed to use? But then again…she’s been so little help so far that she might be of more help (and have more hit points) if I had her take all fighter levels instead of bard.

Anyway, this time, the first thing I did at the Ice Princess Inn was to ask for work from the innkeeper. He hired me, gave me an outfit to wear on the job, and told me about the place to stay next door. Then I asked him about getting back to Bet., and he told me about the rangers. I went to them immediately and got their offer to be guides, but I saved that trip for the next day.

Then, since it was late, I went to the innkeeper’s nearby home to sleep the night with Pia (in order to get my sexy rating up to 6), and to hopefully find a stove with a note in it. Only to find no stove and that none of the beds were usable. I did later discover that we could have “rested” on the floor, but I wasn’t expecting that, so I missed it the first visit there. So, I rented a room for the night in order to increase my sexy skill rating, and in case I needed that note in the stove in order to keep something from not happening or glitching.

Then I went with the rangers, got the res rod, rested in the innkeeper’s home since it was late again, and sold some loot the next day. Then I sneaked my way into the crypt, raised the baron from the dead (only to find that he was still a jerk), rested, then raised Lady Dana also, then headed for the big confrontation, picking up the guards outside the castle door on the way.

And now I’m going to go read the wikia.

P.S. I just went to post this from my word document and found your changes about the shield. Yes, I had found that shield, but I don’t think the 5% reduction was down in the bonus section where the weight reduction bonus was. That’s why I had missed that. Yes, a small shield would be better for her spells anyway than that large shield, but if mithral armor keeps her from using her bard spells anyway, she may as well get the extra AC that a large shield can have. The mithral armor does keep her from using bard spells, doesn’t it? Because a bard can’t use heavy armor. Or can her level of the UMD skill (which I have no control over) counter that?

P.S.S. I never met Hovazz the dragon. Also, I’m still level 10, not 11. I think I confused my “sexy rating” level-up with a character level-up.

 

When those two dragons get going it is a tough thing in the castle fight, Terek needs to die early to avoid his spells, but it is tough to manage with control of only the princess. Did you find the vault and armory to loot as compensation? Terek's robe remains can be fashioned into the best dress for a mage class a long way into the game.

The Bear Pit fight is a bear too, the Dhorn commander has potions of Heal and there are battlemages too. Make sure Anden helps a little with his bow as he may just stand around with sword in hand but not hitting anything (a Bioware Ranger bug). The time of day matters in this fight since the Bear Pit can be full of people or empty away from meal times. At meal times the crowd lays into the Dhorn and can even kill a few, but at least keeps them busy while your party tries to get the upper hand. I use the back room window for escape, but only after all the Dhorn are dead, I have gone out the front door a time or two with some spells and summoned help but never got much done. Last chance to shop at the family stores, they will close after you spread the warning about what happened. I have not tried to escape early in that fight so I don't know if the conversations about what to do next trigger or not, saying to go to the hideout and warn them. The princess and Pia can have a nice interlude at the apartment but Anden can not be avoided that close to the Bear Pit. I will invite him along then tell him to wait for us out of the party down stairs while Pia and I go up for some fun, role-play that we would not do this after the attack. I'll do this before going with him to the Bear Pit, and also sell all the Ravenstower loot and do some shopping for both companions too. The Dwarf has a store along the street near the North merchant district, look south from the bag merchant store then one more street west, with a lot of unique and expensive armor, including a mithral shirt that Pia can use, just south of the bags is the potion store but prices there are always high. Should have it's own map pin I think.

I don't know if I figured out we could rest on the floor in the "ice house", but the note is only in the Ice Princess room, and I'm guessing it is just a clue where to look for those who don't explore every building (other wise the interlude might not trigger unless the note was seen). That Ice Princess rest with Pia is the main one to start the romance with her. I think some other script failed on your first run to mess things up. The Find Pia quest has undergone a lot of changes through the different ADWR versions, Terek would teleport the pair to Hovazz's lair, who later would fly them home, expecting them to be eaten. The final battle was then in the Ice Princess basement brothel rooms, made a bit more difficult with all the civilians around. The romantic interlude with Pia was in a frozen kobold cave, I like this one better, and all the new portraits Valine put up on the walls.

Finished Planescape Torment, so I'm on my own ADWR run now, working the Golden Chalice quest. Rogue/Cleric for this princess.

 

Ah…I see the wikia calls it the “Taylor’s house”. That might be where I had gotten “Taylor” from. Oh, and I missed adding that visit in my last post. It was after the bedroom scene with Pia and before I went with the rangers.

I also see that Hovazz the dragon is no longer confronted in the latest version. When I first got to the wikia, I had seen a section that discussed various segments of the Ravenstower Barony. That’s where I had started reading after I wrote my post above. There, it mentioned an encounter with Hovazz, who would eventually offer us a ride back to Bet., but that was for an older version and wasn’t updated. And I quickly added my “P.S.S.” above to mention that that didn’t happen with me…only to find out a few minutes later that it was outdated.

That mithral armor that was among my loot came from one of the three dead dragon slayers, no doubt a dwarf, since he also had a dwarven war axe. It would be interesting to compare its stats with the one that you say the dwarf merchant has for sale.

Okay, on to the castle battle. I had control of not just Pia, but every party member, but their responses to my commands varied tremendously. And Pia was one of the least responsive!

TRY #1 of 3: I desperately wanted to explore the map so that I could plan some strategy, but the interlude before the battle hogs the scene as soon as we enter the castle door. I did notice that the battle took place in a large area that took up most of the lower half of the map, with small doorways and corridors beyond it, from the NW to the NE, which might help strategy-wise. But several of my companions were losing health very fast, so all I really did during this try was try to keep them from dying. It didn’t work. I had bought about 50 serious health potions, since you had mentioned that I would need a lot of strong ones. But not knowing how many was a lot, and how strong they had to be, I didn’t know for sure what I would need for my companions to survive. I spread out the serious potions, along with a bunch of moderates and 4 criticals that I had, but all of them should have been criticals, or maybe even heal potions.

Between me spending so much time passing out health potions and my companions spending so much time drinking them, none of us got in very many battle hits. So eventually, they all died except for me. I still wanted a chance to explore that map before I went to try #2, so I finished off all the enemies by myself. That part was relatively easy…and would have been even easier if I hadn’t had any companions at all.

After killing all the enemies, I resurrected the baron just to see what would happen. His response was that he needed to talk to Lady Dana. Which meant that I had to res her, too. Plus, as soon as Pia had died, her quest went into the “Quest Completed” tab as a failed quest. So I had to res her, too, in order to complete everything satisfactorily.

So I went exploring the map, looking for strategic points, and looking for a place to rest so that I could refresh the res rod for more resurrections. On all 3 floors, I found a single bed that was usable for rest. But it was behind a door that could not be unlocked. Since I could see it, I could’ve used the move command to reach it, but I didn’t want to use that, so I don’t know if doing that strategy would’ve worked or not. So I looked for other strategies to try.

You had said the main door that we had come in through wouldn’t work during battle, so that was out. But right above the battle area were 2 more door transitions that went to the next floor. They were one strategy that I kept in mind for try #2. I also noticed that to both the NW and NE were doorways and corridors where I could restrict enemy attacks if I could get my party members to follow me through them. That was the second option that I kept in mind.

TRY #2 of 3: The first thing I tried was getting to one of those transition doorways just north of the battling area, but they were unusable during battle. So I quickly ordered every party member to “Follow”, doing it 3 times with each one, just to increase the chance that they do it, giving all those commands while in pause. Then I ran through a small doorway to the NW. Only Lady Dana and a couple guards followed me. Lady Dana in dragon form couldn’t fit through the doorway, however, and several enemies had followed her. I tried to kill them off before they killed her, but there were too many. By the time she died, Pia was already dead, so this try failed also since I couldn’t res more than one person without using the Debug move command.

TRY #3 of 3: The only option I had left was to try heading to the NE. It had a corridor without a small doorway that would make a nice choke point. But before that corridor were some trusses, in the form of large arches, that had to be passed through. While they were larger than the small doorway to the NW, they were still only half as high as Lady Dana’s dragon form, so I didn’t have much hope of this direction succeeding either, but I tried it anyway.

Again, I began by ordering every party member to follow 3 times while in pause mode. Then, before I started running, I used the wand that disables all of a mage’s spells on Terek. I have no idea if it worked. I was too busy running and reissuing commands to think about checking the lines of dialogue before they went off the top of the fully opened dialogue window. Along the way, I stopped several times and repeated that order, again 3 times in pause mode. In total, I gave everyone that command 15 times. Initially, I could see only Lady Dana and 2 guards following me. Eventually, I could see the baron also approaching me. I could never see Pia.

Surprisingly, Lady Dana could pass through those arched trusses. But both she and the baron moved at a snail’s pace rather than at a run. I think that a dragon form may have only one pace, which is “slow”, but I don’t understand why the baron or Pia would also be slow since they were in battle mode and thus couldn’t be in stealth mode. Since I couldn’t see Pia, maybe she was too surrounded by attackers to make much progress, but the baron wasn’t, and he still moved at a walking pace, even though he had at least half his health left.

Anyway, I got Lady Dana and the baron to the entrance to the corridor with only a couple guards chasing us. So I stopped there and killed the 2 guards before heading into the corridor. I got them safely back to the first junction with another corridor, where they seemed to be safe and where I figured I might get past Lady Dana’s large form and back to the main battle area. I ordered them both to stay in place, then clicked to head back to the battle. Only Lady Dana’s form hogged so much clicking space that I accidently clicked on her instead.

That triggered a very long conversation, during which they both thanked me for saving them, with Lady Dana finally ending it by offering me a ride back home when I was ready. Pia probably died during that long conversation, because she was dead by the time I got back to the battle. Her body was only a few steps from where she had started. After I resurrected her, I checked her supply of potions. She hadn’t used very many, possibly none at all. What did she do, try to use healing spells instead? It’s going to be hard for her to succeed at casting those spells while she’s getting hit so often.

Anyway, I finished off the rest of the enemies rather easily. Terek was already dead, so maybe my use of the wand did work after all. I began to loot all the bodies, lastly those by the mouth of the NE corridor. When done with those, I took a step into the corridor to see if the baron and Lady Dana were still there and okay…when Claile’s husband, Timin, comes running at me and attacks. He’s half dead, so I check Lady Dana and the baron for injuries. Lady Dana has full health, but I can’t find the baron. Is Lady Dana’s large form covering his dead body? I kill Timin quickly, then search for the baron, but I don’t even get his name popping up when hitting the Tab key. So I have to assume that he’s alive but left the area once our long conversation was over. I can only guess that I had misidentified Timin as one of the party guards who had followed me, even though his name should have been in red. But I’m pretty sure that he was not attacking during or after our long “thank you” conversation. So I’m not sure how he got there. Oh, well.

I then resurrected Pia, and noticed that her quest was still in the “Quest Completed” tab and hadn’t changed to show that she was still alive. After Lady Dana flew us home, I went to Alfons. He thanked me and even hugged Pia, but I have no idea if her dying had any effect on how much XP I got from that quest. And I’d have to load that part again in order to see what I did get.

What I can tell you is that I’m getting tired of trying to save other people’s lives when it’s close to impossible to get them to follow orders. Having to issue the “Follow” command 15 times each for seven people (equals 105 times) is a little too much, especially when it still wasn’t always successful.

And I’m not convinced that Pia was that surrounded right from the start, when I had given her my first 3 commands to follow. I did not start running north into the thick of the group of enemies. Instead, I ran due east, which should have been easy for Pia to follow me before she got surrounded. But when I resurrected her, she was a few steps north of where she had started the battle from, not to the east.

Oh, I should add that this 3rd, and successful, try started at the instant that the long pre-battle conversation ended. I had made a save at that point during try #2, just so that I wouldn’t have to wade through that long conversation again. What changes happened from using a save at that point, I couldn’t say. But it is possible to win from that point.

I didn’t do any more exploring of the castle before I had Lady Dana fly us home. So I think I missed that vault and armory that you had mentioned. I don’t think I had found them during my 1st try’s exploration either. I was too focused on finding a usable bed and determining strategies for my next tries. So I may have to see if I have a save after the battle ended, but before flying home, just to do some more exploring before I leave the castle.

At the moment, I’m kind of tired of playing this mod. It’s not really my idea of relaxing. I think “tedious”, “perfect” and “annoying” are better descriptive adjectives. And, for me at least, those conflict with “relaxing”. So I’m not sure when I’ll get back to it. There’s a chance that may be a long time…or even never. I might at least go back to Planescape Torment first, which is still waiting for me to finish my first try at it.

 

I have likely played that Ravenstower battle more than twice for every try of the version. I don't try moving anyone except Pia if she is taking on the other dragon, just try and kill Terek ASAP then go after anyone hurting the Baron or Pia. I hand out potions to each inventory, before and during, because it is just too hard to run up and make them drink when I need to be killing things. I still have fun with this whole adventure, but if it is not keeping you involved and wanting more then must be time to quit and try later, or not. It is not "relaxing" for me either, from the cybersex to getting pretty involved with each princess but I can't stop playing it. I help things along with a new portrait for each princess, though the first several runs were with the character file Valine included with the download (a .bic file, looking at that gives an idea of how she expected things to start) The artwork for my present Lyanna Stormborn: https://www.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/sentry/1948633/?p

 

Okay, thanks for the extra tips. I’ll certainly keep them in mind if I play again. But you still didn’t say what kind of potions you pass out, nor how many seem to be enough. Care to share that info?

Beautiful rendering there, that one and the others in your gallery.

I’ve enjoyed playing with digital art as a casual hobby for many years, but all simple stuff, like beginner digital painting, and making fractals with a free fractal program. More recently, I downloaded the free version of Blender, but I couldn’t stick with the long-term in-depth learning it required. At my age, I prefer lots of short but pleasing moments of small but satisfying creations, rather than aim for a larger satisfaction that might never come before I die.

Relatively recently, I got my first digital camera, and my enjoyment of taking digital photos has surpassed my enjoyment of digital art. As much as I love the outdoors, my favorite subject is nature, from scenics to close-up abstracts.

Here’s one of my favorites, where it won 2nd place in a contest with 74 entries at the Digital Photography Review web site:

https://s3.amazonaws.com/masters.ga...7d4wU=&Signature=QeOF+mm2lBqcAzE9z85nrGj3SXM=

My God, what a long web address! In my word document, it's eleven lines long. LOL But I see that it appears in the post in abbreviated form. It still worked when I clicked on it though.

I don’t have my own web site, nor do I have photos posted anywhere else, so this is the only place where I can show it to you.

And Admin, if you feel the link…or whole post…needs to be removed because it’s off-topic, go ahead. I understand.

 

I just pass out whatever I have on hand that I have pickpocketed along the way, a couple of serious and maybe a critical to the important three, which is why I have to replay so often, I don't spend much on potions since so many Dhorn in this city and the next carry a pair of serious level ones and if I can stun them I'll get them both when they die. I'll have even more than you did later on and be selling them when only a critical or full heal will do the job.

That 3D artist, not me by the way, has some nice ones for fantasy, but tends to use the same head model for many of them without enough changes to avoid being repetitive. My favorite over on deviantart.com is a New Zealander, RGUS from whom I have even bought a dozen poster prints. Another on that site that I have commissioned work for some NWN2 campaigns is Andecaya, bad news there is I only use her head.

My digital camera is 1.3 Mpix, with a serial cable to direct connect to a PC, and SmartMedia storage cards, hard to find readers for that these days. I think your URL got cut off too soon, does not bring up a page.

 

Dang, I hate when that happens! The link still works for me in a flash.

I’ll see if I can send the link to you in a so-called “Private Conversation” (aka “Private Message”), although the instructions don’t make it clear in what way it’s “private”. It says that it’s only for the names that I enter in the participants box, but it doesn’t make it clear if that means only the participants can see it, or if anyone can see it, but only the participants can reply to it.

Yes, I did think your link was to your own artwork. And yes, they were all very similar. The one your link went to was one of the best, I think, and somewhat different from the others. I’ll have to go take a look at the stuff by RGUS and Andecaya at deviantart.com.

Wow, I don’t know how you can possibly win that battle with so few health potions given out to party members. But having given out so few of them, I can see why you have probably played that battle more than twice at every try. LOL

But that still leaves me wondering why Pia didn’t use hers before she died. Among all the health potions still left on her after I had res’d her were the 3 original serious health potions that she had started with.

A stun sword…hmm…that might help her survive battles. It seems to me I had one recently. I think the first shortsword that I had given her, for my first battle with the ice wyrm, had stun on it. She was stunning the wyrm, but I wasn’t sure if it was from the sword or from a spell that she had cast. And, boy, did my damage go up while it was stunned! Too bad it doesn’t come in shortbow-&-arrow form (at least I don’t think I’ve seen one yet; I’ll have to recheck the Ranger’s Guild merchant).

But then the question would be: would she have a better chance of survival with only a percentage chance of a stunning hit, or with slowing down an enemy with some cold damage almost every hit? Decisions, decisions.

Well, with all the Dhorn I’ve pickpocketed in the city so far, I don’t think I’ve gotten a single serious health potion yet. The ones I did have in my inventory (before buying more of them) I got only during this quest, from the guards in the Academy. Although the four critical health potions in my inventory probably came from Dhorn higher ups or nobles (like Simon or the generals), though I can’t recall if I got them by pickpocketing or from loot.

 

fygomatic does have artwork on deviantart as well, some repeats, but not the one I used for this princess, some of his renders of real people are spot on. RGUS does only about one in ten as fantasy, but there are still plenty since he has over 2,000 renders. I got started making a collection of portraits for ADWR princesses then expanded to elves and whatnot, not real sure I have any halflings though.

I did have to put my one heal potion stolen from Simon into Pia's inventory during the fight because she started right next to the black dragon, she did turn and kill Terek right away so that really helped, and my own sound burst spells halted a few of the baddies for a moment so we could survive. They don't leave the party until after the Barons conversation so I was even able to recover unused serious potions from the guards that survived. Pia got stunned in the first fight and survived that, but the Baron was dead and we were getting wiped up by the black dragon's breath weapon, better for all if he stays in melee with Dana or aimed away from the rest of us. Pia might have been trying to cast a little heal on herself, or some other spell and took too much damage in the process, even stopping to drink one leaves an opening for extra attacks, I've had all companions equipped with potions fail to drink one in time.

The hideout store has two swords and two daggers that can stun or put to sleep an enemy, and there is a +2 from one of the big Hyath crypts. If I remember right the jerk with the Top Secret quest has a minor one too if you kill him, but the king is a +4 club at the temple store, this will need STR but it is +4. The Ravenstower battle loot will also include one with stun. I do wish NWN would grant more automatic hits on stunned or put to sleep enemies, until attack numbers get better I will use the time in stun to cast or drink a potion and get some real work done instead of a bunch of annoying misses.

Not all the Dhorn in town have potions, and those that do may not be available for pickpocket, I get some when I kill every one I can before starting part 2. Those in on the Bear Pit attack do, and there are more Dhorn ambushes to come once the hideout is warned. Hmm, an interesting thought, I wonder if those massed outside the Bear Pit have them available for pickpocket, or if they will go hostile if I approach them in any state of stealth or invisible?

 

@Taluntain: Thanks for the tip, but it looks to me like all of those albums are for game-related images only. The photo I tried to link to is one of my digital nature photos, taken from near my back yard. And it's 1.16 MB, so I'd rather not take up all that space on your server.

And I managed to send ralebeau, in a private conversation message, the whole address, unabbreviated, and he got an "access denied" message when he tried to use it. So it looks like only members can view it. That's why the link works for me but for no one else.

 

1.16mb for an image file was not that uncommon from digital cameras 15 years ago. Heck, the ones from the late '90s used to make JPEGs (a lossy compressed format) in the 700-900K range. The only digital picture I have of myself from the 20th century is 720K.
I doubt it will break the server. Just upload it.
Now if you'd said it was 4mb, like my phone will produce when set to the largest, highest quality (sorry, don't own a dedicated camera) ...

 

@SlickRCBD: By the way, it's a jpg compressed from an 11.9 MB image.

Okay, I've created an album called "Why I'm Still Sane".

After I uploaded the photo into it, it says it needs at least 1 tag. But I have no idea what a tag is, so I can't finish the upload.

Never mind. I figured out what tags are & added some. My upload then seemed to get saved, but I still don't see the photo in the album.

So I tried it a second time and noticed that some message had shown as soon as I completed the upload, but it was so fast that I missed it. I suspect that it said something like "Your image will appear once Admin has approved it." If that's the case, I may have posted the same image twice. If so, and if you approve it, Admin, would you be so kind as to remove any duplicates (that is, if I can't do it myself)?

 

That is a good one, reminds me of reaching the Golden Gate bridge to see clouds hiding some except for the tops and bottoms of the towers.

 

Thanks, Taluntain and ralebeau. Even though one of its tags says “my back yard”, it’s actually my front yard view. My back yard is a Wilderness Study Area. When I need a break from gaming or reading, or just need to get the heck outside, I’ll grab my digital camera and head off in any direction. Sometimes I’ll even take a nap while I’m at it.