Can not play HoF! Help me!

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I played for three days non-stop and finished ToTLM, HoW, and IWD normal game, allways on insane difficulty. It was soo fun. And cool final battles. But easy. I reloaded only once when confronting Lure Master, and HoW and end game fights were so easy nobody was wounded. Really.

My party ended up being level 28-34. I decided to play HoF enabled, so turned on via configuration, exported my characters and started game.

Hrothghar came and chit-chatted, and when he was gone, game was frozen. Totally. I had to quit via CTRL+Alt+Del. I tried again and same thing happened.

Why I said, thinking it may be due to an item in my PCs, I stripped them from all of their possesions ( I was planning to do it anyway for icnreased challenge), and re-started. It was frozen again.

I thought maybe it was HoF bug? I created brand new characters, all level 1 and fresh, and started HoF. No, game was normal and healthy. I was suprised. I tried to export my old characters in game, I deleted a new character and exported only my main character BUT it was frozen again when game started. Why? My character files are corrupt? How can I fix?

Oh BTW I have ToTLM, AB, and IWD tweaks installed.

Can you say anything to this cause? What can I do to fix? Any ideas?

Another problem. Seeing that I can not play HoF with my old PCs, I decided to have it a go with level 1 PCs. It was a foolish attempt.

I never knew it was soo hard. I watched in terror as they tried hitting the pathetic bugs in Griselda's cellars. They could not even hit with a natural 18 roll. So they all kept swinging till they got a critical hit. They could only hit a bug with a critical! Then a bug attacked my naive thief, rolled a mere 5 and hit! And left my poor thief with 1 HP. What the heck?

I managed to kill damn bugs just barely, did a few quests, and leveled up. Decided we could take on goblins.

No way.

They all need a natural 20 to hit goblins, while goblins hit them easily, and kill with 1 or 2 hits, so quick it is not funny, it is as if everything is reversed, they are mighty adventurers and my party was feeble goblin army.

This sucks. I love challenges but this is not a challenge, rather, a carnage. HOW do you play HoF mod? With level 1 PCs? I need help!

So please help me to play cool beyond words HoF with my old party, or give tips about playing with level 1 PCs, if it is possible.

I now started a normal game on Core. But now I think game does not recognise I had already beaten the game before, since it only spawned one Ogre. Is it due to difficulty? Last time I was on insane, BUT it was my fresh install but the game thought I had beaten the game and had spawned all new extra encounters, it was cool. Any ideas? I feel so confused.

ANOTHER important question:Is there a way to play the game on insane difficulty but without doubled XP rewards? That double XP is so ridiculous it makes all my PCs uber high level and thus makes the game easier for me instead of making it harder. I want to play on insane for diffculty but avoid double XP, if it is possible.

Please help me with my troubles, and questions; I really simply LOVE this game and want to play it more! Thank you!

 

Sorry, I just need to ask about this. I was under the impression that you could only go up to level 30 maximum.

When switching to HoF, I've had to save, and reload from there in the past. The switch never happened for me without reloading.

 

First of all the beginning is the hardest part in a HoF game.Then I am sure things will go much better.

For the beetles in the celar,the easiest way to kill them is to attack with your characters armed with quarterstaves.They have bigger range than the other weapons and if you attack from a safe distance the beetles will not fight back
Still you will be able to hit them only with criticals (it will take a LOT of time)

The Kuldahar Pass is probably the most difficult part of the early game.With my solo fighter I couldn't fight them, so I had to run at the other side (taking a lot of damage) and passing to Kuldahar.I guess it's not possible for your party since you will have less HPs and I am quite sure that the goblins will block your way.Maybe a solution would be to pass with your characters who can use stealth and resurrect the others later ?

If you decide to fight them I think a good tactic is to try to go to the Ogre Tower.If you manage to get there, you will be able to rest and then you can use the tower as your base for your attacks.Go outside kill some goblins.Get inside - rest ...The difficult part would be to get in the tower though since you would have to kill many goblins first.
Spells that can be useful:

- Summons (They are ideal for HoF mode,since they get the bonuses too.Support them with ranged attacks.)
- Charm spells
- Horror (to get rid of the archers)
- Call Lightning, Entagle, Spike Growth

Also before you leave from Eastheaven be sure to buy a lot of arrows and to search for hidden spells (2nd floor of Pomab's store).

 

If you have a Bard, have him sing often. The +1 to hit can make a huge difference early on. Also, if you can summon anything, do it.

 

I just realized that Silverstar was talking about the goblins in Eastheaven

In this case they are a lot easier to kill.Try to fight them one at a time.Lure a goblin with one of your characters and have him running around in circles.Attack with the rest of your party using ranged weapons.

Also don't forget to save and rest often

Then the next difficult fight will be in the orc cave.There you should be very careful,trying to attack only one group of orcs at a time.When bad injured or out of spells retreat and go at Eastheaven to rest.Then repeat the same tactic
(Cromatic Orb and Hold Person can help).

 

You can also wimp out with the orc cave by clicking on the caravan outside and coming back to town.

The wolves are a lot easier to fight if you have a Ranger who can charm one of them.

 

Maybe start with cleric, first do all quests in Easthaven, second sanctuaried go visit caravan, after that run sanctuaried through Kuldahar Pass.
When you get to Kuldahar, add as much characters as you like and after that go hunting goblins in Pass or yeties in Vale.

 

Eh I forgot to say that I also had a level 40 patch, not from AB though, AB's is blasphemous, allowing bards to cast many 9th level spells.

Thank you very much for the tips but my other questions still remain unanswered.

1-Why can't I export my old party to HoF?

2-Is there a way to negate insane difficulty double XP rewards when playing non-HoF games? Messing up with some files may work? Help? I now hate insane difficulty as my party became sooo high level, the last battles were NO challenge (or fun) at all. But now HoF with 1st level party is hardest than I oculd ever imagine. Some serious balance problems I have.

Aaand, here is my new party in case of HoF:

Human Thief to be dualled into mage at level 7, will put all points into stealth, he will get cool evasion ability, and will happily blast fireballs/skulltraps AND Horrid Wiltings (FUN spell) here and there. Fun combination!

Ranger, I wanted something different and he will use two handed weaponry, spears, halberds, two handed swords. (Minsc!) I was happy to see he still got +1 attack/round with a spear! And since he won't be using a shield for extra attack, he can use biggest and baddest weapons available! Makes sense to me.

Dwarven Fighter/Thief. Will be lock-picker and trap-finder, but he has insane ability scores, a 18/93 STR, 19 CON, 17 DEX and he will use swords, axes and crossbows. (he won't be doing backstab much though, not fit to his character) Ah and I never played with small folk so it is interesting. And he has neat saving throws thanks to his 19 CON!

Gnome Cleric/Illusionist. Urgh they use dwarven avatars. Sucks. But he is a cool character, I made him evil. This way he can use cool evil cleric spells like Slay living, Harm and (gasp) Destruction! I hated my previous T/C as he could not use this spells, his spells were destined to be disrupted. BUT this time, my guy will be protected by stoneskins, and miror images, AND will be able to finish his deadly spells! Yay! Will use hammers, slings, maces, whatever.

Half elven F/C. This is Lawful Good so he will be able to cast Heal, Ressurection etc. Will use quarterstaves, slings and morning stars.

Female HE druid. My last game had a F/D but since he was also a fighter I never bothered with druid special and cool shape-shift abilities. This time it will be different as she will have to use Shape-shifting a lot to be effective in melee. Gotta be fun!

What do you think about my party? I took lessons from my previous party and wanted my next party to be even cooler!

[ May 15, 2006, 12:05: Message edited by: Silverstar ]

 

Unfortunately I can not answer your questions, but party is very good. All specialities are covered. Since druid is single class, you will faster get cool special abilities and high level spells.
Are you sure that ranger has +1 attack per round with spear???

 

Yup, I had played and checked yesterday, he is specialised in spears, and he had 2+1/2 attacks/round, half attack from specialisation and 1 attack from rangerhood. Is this a bug? I guess so but I won't really complain about it.

 

1. I don't know, maybe it's because of the extra spells and other modifications AB or another nod added to your characters.
Maybe your game is screwed because one of the many modifications you did didn't uninstall properly. You might consider backing up your saves and characters and reinstalling from scratch.
You can try to import characters from other games non AB-spoiled games or saves prior to the final battles. Level 28-34 characters are overpowered for starting HoW anyway.
But the real challenge is starting HoW with an unequipped level 1 party.

2. It was your decision to make the game easier by playing a double XP level, using a smaller party and installing a level 40 mod which does mess up more than just the maximum available levels.
One possible solution for your problem is to alter the XP tables, so that you need twice as many XP for levelling.
Or play normal mode. Double damage doesn't increase the difficulty much if most of the monsters are dead before getting into melee range.

About HoW:

Easthaven is pretty easy since the monsters there don't work in teams. The beetles can be attacked with any not too close range weapon like longswords or morning stars without them fighting back.
The goblins can be fought one by one, after the archers have shot the few arrows they have they shouldn't be able to hurt you anymore if you use shoot and run tactics.
A successful sunscorch can give you a few free shooting rounds.
The wolves near the orc caves can even be shot without them seeing their attacker, you can also get extra XP if you do the same with the orcs standing outside.
Try to finish the orc caves, you'll be grateful for the extra XP at Kuldahar pass.
No monster should be able to pass 3 entangle in a row, your clerics hold person is useful and you can try charm spells as last ressort.

Once you have survived Kuldahar pass the game gets pretty easy again since the monsters in the VoS don't work in teams and you can gain millions of XP in HoW easily by using invisibility spells.

About your party:

I'd consider dualing the thief to mage at level 10, you get 5 HP for less than 1/3 mage level.

Turn on 3E sneak attack rules if you don't want tyour dwarf to do traditional backstabs. Else make him a pure fighter instead, your thief/mage gets enough skill points.

The druidic shapeshifting doesn't affect base thac0 and extra attacks for fighter level, so a pure druid will do less damage while shapeshifted. Pure druids also can't wear the shields which add physical resistances.

Don't exspect anyone to be very effective in melee in HoF mode.

 

Ah how can I play with XP tables? And can I play with some game data files to negate double XP rate on insane? I vaguely remember someone saying there was a way to play on insane without double damage, by editing some files. Maybe the reverse can be applied as well, it will be less tedious I guess. I want double damage from monsters but normal XP on insane on normal, non-HoF game.

And. I want to play HoF later with an exported party from normal game, without double XP rate and a full party I hope they will be of lower level and will prove to be challenging for HoF.

Playing HoF with level 1 characters is a real challenge indeed. It will be my ultimate challenge though, I first want to fisnish normal game again and be able to finish HoF once with my exported not too high level party. Am I asking for too much? I just want to play this game more and more! I love it! Hack and slash is fun most of the time!

Anyway, I had started with this party on normal difficulty, I am in Kreselack's huge tomb. But there are no extra mosnter spawns which occur only once you finished the game before. (three ogres, Presio's apprentice etc.) Why? Is it related to difficulty? Will they only spawn on insane? Help me please! I want to play with extra spawns, even double damage is acceptable, but I do not want double XP rewards. Really, I am sick of leveling up every minute, like I did in HoW. A simple talk-bring quest and 840K XP?! Ugh.

 

Your level40 mod should have written new .2DA files into your override folder. Use a texteditor to find out which of the .2DA files inludes the XP tables and change it manually.

Another option is playing normal mode with charcters having realistic con (not more than 14) and have the hitpoints at level up rolled instead always maximum.

Having less than half the usual hitpoints is pretty similar to having the monsters doing double damage.


The only extra monsters I realized when replaying in HoF mode were the extra Ogres in the first caves and Presio's and Yxonomej's helpers.

The other extra spawns you faced were either to weak for me to notice or must be AB related.
I guess the extra XP and items you gained from AB monsters must also have made your game easier later.
Insane mode doesn't add more monsters compared to normal mode.

 

@Silverstar

Yes there is.
Don't you remember this thread ?


The Tougher Enemies component from the Mix-Mod does it.And it can be used for all IE games.

 

Silverstar, if you haven't started yet, ditch that Half Elf F/C for a C/R.

 

@Klorox

Well I had a C/R in my last run so I want somethin different now, no matter how weak or lowly.

@thetruth

Yep I do remember the mod but I am afraid of putting new mods to my IWD game, as even now it has more problems than my heavily modded BG2 game, for some reason.

Anyway, I think I will listen to kmonster's advice and will disable max HP per level, this will have the very same effect of double damage, in a more realistic and AD&D way, I hope.

 

a F/C isn't weak, far from it. But a C/R is better.