I'm New and Naked: Starting Equipment Issue

Hi there, I'm new to both ToEE and the forums.


I'm about the play through ToEE for my first time, but I heard the 'vanilla' version has plenty of bugs and rule compliance issues even in the official patches, so I searched for unofficial patches and found the Circle of Eight's modpack.

However, after installing the Circle of Eight Modpack 6.1.0--non-NC--my characters don't start with equipment. I'm not sure if beginning like this is a preference for D&D purists, but, as much as I respect their opinion, I'd prefer to begin otherwise. Is there an option to enable starting equipment? If so, where can I find it? (I apologize if this is a common question, but my search yielded zero hits)


Any help would be appreciated, and thank you, Circle of Eight, for creating this awesome modpack.

Shadowcloak


P.S. Quick question, do ranged sneak attacks work in ToEE, unlike in NWN2?

 

Are you starting in a house like setting-the equipment room map. If not, you have not installed the mod correctly. The equipment map has several chests full of arms, armor, equipment, and clothing. Each class has a certain random amount of gold, so it adds up to the party's total. You cannot spend more than this, so plan wisely.


Ranged sneak attacks do work quite well. You must meet the requirements-the target must be flatfooted or flanked, and you must be within 30 feet. I find its easy to tell the distance since most medium sized characters can move 30 feet a round, and the game does show you how far you can move during your turn, so if you can walk up to them, you can sneak attack them.

 

Thank you for the quick reply!

Hmm... I downloaded, installed, waited for all the cues, and activated... all after patching ToEE up to official patch 2. Did I need to d/l and install previous versions of the modpack?

Is it possible the room you mentioned is only in the NC version of 6.1.0?


Also, I'm very excited to hear about the ranged sneak attack. I always wanted to create a character based on the mechanic. =D

 

Shop map is in all the mods since 4.0.

Are you playing with the front end mod, and when you start the game, does it show the version number below the title?

Check here for how to install correctly:

http://www.co8.org/forum/showthread.php?t=7743

 

I do run the game through the front-end mod, and 'Circle of Eight Modpack Version 6.1.0' is labelled under 'Dungeons & Dragons' and other copyright stuff while the intro and menu are loading, but the version isn't labelled anywhere on the menu itself.

Thank you for the link. I checked it, but it doesn't appear I missed anything. However, to be sure, I reinstalled everything--to no avail.

For the record, I've only been starting games with one character, and, when I started a true neutral game (this happened before reinstalling as well), my character 'did' start with a spear in hand and a scimitar in his inventory but no armor, just farmer clothes. I will try starting a game with a full party tomorrow and see how that goes.

I realize shop maps have always been incorporated in the mod, but I would still also like to try using 6.1.0 NC ...if I can the front-end to disable certain new content the front-end--in order to make it "as vanilla as possible"--is this possible?

Thank you again for helping me with this. I'm so excited to give this game a go =D after things are figured out

 

It sounds to me that you are having faulty exe. The correct size should be 33kb.

Just install NC. If you for some (strange) reason do not want to play the new content, just don't talk to brother Smyth for "something different" and u will never trigger it. So once u do want to play, u wont have to reinstall everything.

 

I am led to believe by Gaear (i.e. one of the Circle of Eight modders) that the only difference between the standard version and the NC version of the Circle of Eight Modpack is that Brother Smyth has a dialogue option where you can ask him for "something different" in the NC version (selecting that dialoge option triggers the new content). The standard version of the modpack includes all of the new content files and is just as big a download as the NC version, so you would be MAD to download and install the standard version of the modpack. You should use the NC version of the modpack and, when you feel like starting a game where you want to experience the new content, you can simply talk to Brother Smyth and ask for "something different".

I believe that a character only begins the game with a weapon in his/her inventory if he/she started the game with the Weapon Focus feat in that particular weapon. The fact that your character started the game with 2 weapons makes me think that your modpack wasn't installed properly. If you are not beginning the game in the shop map, then something is definitely wrong with your installation (it sounds as though you are playing the vanilla version of the game because I believe that characters do start the game with weapons in the vanilla version of the game). Correct me if I am wrong, Gaear.

 

Could you clarify whether:

(1) The game starts without the shopmap.
(2) The game correctly starts with the shopmap, but you want the standard starting equipment.

(1) results from a faulty installation - look around the forum for the solution, I believe it's quite a common issue.
(2) is a matter of preference. If that's the case, maybe we ought to consider adding an option to the game portal "Give me the standard starting items", since someone has asked for that before.

 

The problem is fixed! I think. stage was technically right; there was something wrong with my toee.exe. I followed Sitra Achara's advice, looked around the forums for install problems and solutions, deactivated my anti-virus software, and voila! (I'm sorry for saying that!) I now begin in the shop map.

There are a few things I'm noticing, however, and, considering I've confirmed modpack content in-game--with beginning in the shop map and all--I'm assuming these are beyond installation issues...? I'm also not getting hits on the forum search. Please, if it's possible, and you guys don't mind, I would like to list them and ask for further assistance.


From least important to most...

-Wearing both a cloak and a long coat causes clipping issues. This isn't surprising, but I thought it might be worth mentioning...?

-Sitra Achara is very good at reading between the lines it seems, because I actually would like to begin with Troika's default equipment, and I think allowing an option for it would be a great idea. For now, however, does anyone know the default equipment for each class, so I can I just buy it off the shop, or is there a file I can edit?

-There is no black fog, and I can see everything in the shop map, on the streets, and I imagine in any other area. There was black fog when I did a trial-new-game before installing the modpack, so I assume no fog is a bug?

-Wearing a long coat with no cloak causes a visual glitch where the coat looks like it has an additional layer of extremely transparent fabric extending beyond where the coat should end. So there is some weird discoloration/water-effect, around my character's feet, that flows like, and has the same physics as, the rest of the coat. This does not happen when I'm wearing a cloak with the long coat. This is also my largest worry, simply because having a character wearing a long coat would be cool for roleplaying.


Thank you so much, guys, for your advice so far =)

 

For now there is no way to start with default items.
Black fog is the way its intended by Troika. We can assume that once you visit a place, the heroes make a map of it or something.
The clipping issues of some cloaks I think its only for some of the colors but not sure. Well its not really a major bug, there other stuff you should be more worried about and they have to do with the Fire node/temple. Anyways since I don't really have useful advice about the cloaks and the other issue, just make sure you are running at correct resolution, as maybe it has something to do with it.

Supported widescreen resolutions for ToEE are:

1280 x 720, 1280 x 768, 1280 x 800, 1440 x 900, 1680 x 1050

http://www.co8.org/forum/showthread.php?t=5629

 

I was saying there is no black fog right now, but I just did another trial and went into moattown, beyond Hommlet, and saw that there was black fog... So I'm assuming things are good...

It's a shame about the other stuff. My screen is 1366x768, but I had to set the game at 1280x768...

Anyway, I'm gonna actually start playing soon =D Thank you very much, everyone =)

 

Fog of War was disabled for the "civilized" locations (Hommlet, Verbobonc, Nulb).
The rest is as usual (FoW enabled).