I'm having a problem assigning metamagic feats to spells for my wizard. This problem is something I've never encountered in previous updates and also haven't seen mentioned in any posts or bug lists. I'm playing a game using the 5.9.1 NC update. My wizard (elf Ranger 1/Wiz12) has 2 metamagic feats, Empower Spell and Heighten Spell. I am unable to assign one of these feats to a spell. For example, I try to add Empower Spell to Fireball to create a 5th level Empowered Fireball. I click on the 3rd level Fireball Spell, but in the screen to assign feats, the spell listed is some random low level spell like Daze or Truestrike. I have tried several times to assign both assign either feat to different spells, but I always get some random spell in the assignment screen. After several tries, I got a successful Empowered Magic Missle and Empowered Ray of Enfeeblement, but most of the time have not been successful at getting the random spell to match the spell I actually want to empower or heighten. I have other high level casters in this party, but haven't given them any metamagic feats because of the problems I have with the current wizard. The Empowered spells work just fine, but I'm unable to successfully create any besides these two.
I've never used any of the metamagic spell feats except for extend spell. I kinda feel that the spell feats that cost more than 1 spell level upwards are a huge disadvantage. I should try them though, just to see what the game does with them.
I pretty much rely on metamagic feats since I prefer not to craft a lot of uber-powerful items. So not getting empowered spells really affects how I'm playing.
I'm of the same mindset about crafting so I also pick up metamagic feats. You are futher along in your game that I am at the moment. I'll eventually have my wizard pick up Widen Spell, Quicken Spell, and Max. Spell. When I do, I'll see if I encounter anything buggy with them for the 5.9.2 version and post the results here.
Maximize spell is useful, as a specialist wizard may not have good choices at some upper levels, and a maximized fireball always comes in handy.
Metamagic spell feats can be very handy. I like widen spell as it doubles the damage range of a fireball. You can take out or damage very large groups this way. Maximize with a fireball is awesome too. The quicken spell will let you get a spell off without it costing you your round so you can get off a second spell. So image a quickened fireball followed by a maximized or widen fireball both in the same round of play - the damage is deadly. Also at the end of the game, I will maximize and quicken magic missiles. That way I can get two strikes of missiles in each round with my wizard against the big bad monsters there. The only thing I have to overcome is their spell resistance and then the strikes are automatic. I find them more effective than fireballs at that point.
I noticed the same problems with every spellcasting class that has to prepare spells. Bards & sorcerers can have the same problem, but only if you put the meta-magics on spells of different level. It's an age-old problem, meta-magics were buggy since the dawn of ToEE, with or without the Co8 mod... Why I do like metamagics? Ever heard of a bard, improved focus on charm, with a THLaughter with 3 or more Heighten Spell? Even Zuggy laughs her ass off
So, I just encountered the same problem. I only ever use extend spell and up until now everything worked as it should. Now whenever I try to assign a meta magic feat to a spell the window in which you drag & drop the feats doesn't show up or it displays a different low level spell (I think it's always 2 levels below the spell I actually picked). It's REALLY annoying not being able to extend Righteous Might or Stone Skin. It's a real shame cause the metamagic feats are great great fun! EDIT: Obviously save/load helps sometimes.
Yes, I know this. I suffered and identified this concrete bug some time ago. After some testing, I determined that this issue appears when your character is multiclass with more than one spellcasting class, (which coincidentally is your case.) The brief definition of the bug would be that in the spell list window of all the spellcasting classes BUT the first one in alphabetical order (that is, the class tab at the leftmost position in the spell menu,) the up-down scrolling sidebar doesn't function at all regarding the assignment of metamagic effects. Let me further explain this: Let's say we have a character like the original poster's one: a Ranger X/ Wizard X who has selected any metamagic feat (neither the race nor the exact number of levels of each class nor the concrete metamagic feat matters.) If we enter in the spell menu (the button in the inventory screen where you see what spells you have and prepare the daily spells for the classes that need it) and select the Ranger tab (which is the first tab, since Ranger comes before Wizard in alphabetical order,) we can assign our metamagic feat to whichever spell we have with no problem whatsoever (in case we have enough ranger levels to be able to cast any ranger spell at all.) However, when we select the Wizard spell tab (the last one in the tab list,) our problems assigning metamagic feats begin. When you click on the Wizard tab (which you must do each time you select the spell icon in the inventory, since the Ranger tab, being the first one, appears first by default) what will appear, as you already know, is a window like this: Note: the @ being the icon you click to assign the metamagic effects. This window, as you also know, has an up-down scrolling sidebar that is by default in the upmost position each time you enter. Well then, it turns out that the spells that appears by default in this window each time you enter it, that is, the spells that fit in that window with the scrolling sidebar in the upmost position, are the ONLY ONES the metamagic feats can be assigned to. Let me explain you what exactly happens if you move down the scrolling sidebar looking for more spells to which assign a metamagic effect: lets say you move the scroll three places down, so that, acording to the example window I posted above, the level 1 Magic Missile spell goes three steps up and takes the place where originally was the level 0 Flare spell. Well then, when you click on the @ icon of the Magic Missile to assign the metamagic feats, you'll see that in the sub-window that, as you know, opens to manage the metamagic feat assignment, the name of the spell listed isn't Magic Missile, but Flare, the spell whose place before any scrolling was just there. In the same manner, if you scroll down to a high-level spell that doesn't appear in the unscrolled window because is too low in the spell list, when you try to assign a metamagic feat to it, you'll end up assigning it to the low-level spell that originally occupied the place in the unscrolled window that the high-level spell you wanted to enhace is now occupying. Also in the same manner, if you scroll down to a point in which a spell occupy the original place of one of the spell level division indicators (Spell Level 0, Spell Level 1, etc,) when you try to assign a metamagic feat to it, nothing happens (well, the @ icon will briefly chage color to yellow after being clicked, but that's it,) just like if you tried to assign a metamagic feat to one of those spell level division indicators. And the opposite is also true: if a spell level division indicator takes the place of a spell, you can assign metamagic feats to it by clicking where the @ icon would be; but of course in reallity you'll be assigning them to the spell that originally occupied that place. So that's exactly what happens: the scroll in the spell list window doesn't work regarding the assignment of metamagic feats. It works perfectly for checking what spells you have and for selecting which spells to memorize, but not for the metamagic feats. Also, the problem occurs ONLY when you have more than one spellcasting class and the first spellcasting class in alphabetical order doesn't suffer it at all, so a Cleric/Paladin will have probems only with the paladin spells, and a Bard/Ranger/Sorcerer will suffer them with his spells from the ranger and sorcerer sources. Besides this, we have to take into account that ALL spellcasting classes, no matter whether they don't have spells in their first levels, add to this problem. Therefore, if you are a Ranger 1/ Wizard X or a Paladin 2/ Sorcerer X, you won't have any ranger or paladin spells respectively, but their tab will still appear in the spell menu, and since both Ranger and Paladin come alphabetically before Wizard or Sorcerer, you'll have irremissible problems assigning metamagic feats to your principal source of magic power. On the other hand, multiclassing any spellcasting class exclusively with non-spellcasting class/es is OK, in that they wont cause any trouble in this regard; for example, a Monk/Fighter/Wizard, will be able to enhace freely and with no problem whatsoever any spell from his spell list. So that's it. I hope to have been able to clearly and exhaustively explain my research on the nature of this problem, since I really think this is a nasty bug that hurts considerably the multiclassing options of some of the best beneficiaries of the metamagic feats: the primary arcane spellcasters, wizards and sorcerers, which being alphabeticaly in the last places due to their first letter, will be always losing in any multiclassing with another spellcasting class (as if the lost of spellcasting power weren't enough dissuasion for multiclassing.) So, I hope this could help any of our great modders out there to take a look into the issue and see if a workaround is possible... but I must admit, already knowing a thing or two about the state of the game, that chances are that this is another case of hard-coded engine bug Best regards to you all.
Eventhough that is quite the bit of sad news, it is also good to have this knowledge. So thank you, LionXavier, for publishing your research.
Lionxavier, thanks for spending the time and energy to discover an explanation. I had noticed that the problem metamagic feats wouldn't assign properly with multiclass spellcasters, but not all aspects i.e. only happens with multiclass characters with multiple spell casting classes, the first alphabetical class is not affected. One question though, does this bug affect NPC's also?? It's been a while since I played a game using Pishella, Burne's assistant in the party. She starts as a multiclass Sorc 1/ Wiz 1. I don't remember running into the same difficulty assigning metamagic feats with this NPC (and I was mainly using her wizard spells, I think). So are NPC's the exception or am I remembering wrong??
Hmm, that's an interesting question. But it could be that with Sorc/Wizzies one does not get the erronymous metamagic feats because both classes share the same Spellbook. But that will be for someone else to find out, as I hardly hire NPC's, and I don't see the benefit of a Sorc/Wiz.
Interesting point about Sorc/Wiz maybe bypassing this problem. But I agree, the Sorc/Wiz combo doesn't make much sense. I use NPC's frequently, especially spellcasters like Ronald or Spugnoir. So I just had to try Pishella once or twice. She's a good caster, but I think she makes a better wizard than sorceror. The Sorc/Wiz combo isn't very good, must have been for story reasons more than playability.
