I was wondering if there was a console command to even out the roles I get vs what the computer roles for itself. Is it just me, or does anyone else notice that when the computer attacks you, they always roll double digits on the 20 sided die, yet I always roll like 4s and 5s. Is it just me or does anyone else think the computer cheats?
Someone will be able provide you with the details of the random number generator the game engine uses. It really is the same for the player and the 'baddies' In PnP it's relatively easy to cheat on dice rolls (sneaky rerolls, downright lying about results), but pretty difficult for a PC game to do so. And to what end?
When I look at the rolls, it seems I generally get much lower rolls than the PC. Maybe its just me, but it seems that when I have to hit something I usually miss, even if I only need like a 5 to hit it.
The random number generator used for TOEE has been discussed many times and the over all consensus is that the player always gets the short end of the stick. I've rolled a 1 four times in a row, yet the game has rolled a 20 more than it doesn't. I just think of it as if I were playing with a very mean DM who never lets you actually see his rolls. Here's an excerpt from a discussion where the illustrious Gaear chimed in with some helpful information on the RNG. He said; The history of the RNG in ToEE is simple. The original game shipped with one that I can't recall the name of. That was replaced by Troika/Atari in official patch 1 by the 'Mersenne Twister', and that's what we've had ever since. End of story. I could see how you might experience noticeably different rolls playing totally unpatched ToEE vs. anything patched (including our mods), but there is absolutely no difference in RNG function between patch 1 and the present. I don't really remember much about the original RNG to be honest - that was before my time - but Troika/Atari must have thought there was something wrong with it. The only other thing that could be affecting your relative experiences is the Co8 proto overhaul that occurred between Co8 v4 and Co8 v5.5. (It was first introduced somewhere along the line in the early 5.0.x 'cumulative mods and fixes' days and first featured in a regular modpack in v5.5.) The proto overhaul simply brought most ToEE monsters closer to actual D&D stats, because in many cases they were nerfed - sometimes severely - in vanilla. There are very likely instances where some monsters are significantly more difficult now, but by and large, feedback over the years since it was implemented has not indicated any deal-breaker experiences. You said you played v5.x without problems anyway, so the proto overhaul is probably not to blame either. I really don't have a problem with going away from nerfed, regardless. The stats and figures are what they are. That leaves AI improvements, which I won't apologize for. Far, far more players have complained over the years that ToEE's enemy NPCs and battles have been "stupid" than have complained that they are too smart. AI improvements take some rigorous effort to implement effectively, which means they generally apply to specific scenarios as opposed to things across the board. (One across the board AI tweak I can think of is enemies trying to escape from webs, but is that really something that shouldn't be?) But again, you're complaining at least in part about wolves and whatnot, not just Lareth; there are no AI tweaks that were aimed specifically at cannon fodder monsters or battles. Incidentally, lest you or anyone else should think that Co8 is "going off the rails" with ToEE, I feel I should point out that Troika itself has pretty much endorsed us across the board. Back when they were still intact, Co8 did beta testing for them for the official patches. Since then, Agetian has remained in contact with some former Troika staff to get assistance and consultation for coding various elements of World Builder. And they've outright said that their recommendation for ToEE is to use the Co8 mods. That would frankly not be the case if they thought we were being reckless with the game. At any rate, there are a variety of alternatives that remain for you: If you think the NC is too hard, play the standard modpack. If you think the proto overhaul may be to blame but you still want bugfixes, play an older modpack like 3.0.4. If you think the Mersienne Twister is to blame, play ToEE unpatched. If you think we're lying about all this and have evil plans that we're withholding from the public, play vanilla. Do whatever works for you. TFE-X makes it easy.
Its not that its too hard, its just sometimes I am saying to myself, your got to be effing kidding me, like when I need a 5 to hit someone and I keep getting 3s and 4s, and they need like a 14 or something to hit me and consistently get them. I was just wondering if other people felt the same way, or even checked what they were getting for rolls.
At least part of the player perception is selection bias. You likely don't bother to check rolls when they're going as expected. I certainly more stongly recall the odd situations (multiple twenties in a row for the AI coupled with abyssmal rolls for me) than the many happy hours of things going according to plan.
As the DM, I tend to roll very badly when I really don't want to kill/maim a PC and the frost giant gets a 20. You can't cheat in front of the screen... heh. Anyhow. as for ToEE, I haven't found that the comp fares any better than me. I seem get plenty of both good and bad luck.
It's getting harder and harder on our DM with the average level of our party members being level 8 and with a party of seven. He actually had a plane stalker appear right behind our wizard ... AND THE WIZARD LIVED!! We're never going to hear the end of it now. Heh heh All in all, my opinion is that the Mersenne Twister isn't that bad of a RNG when compared to actually rolling the die yourself.
I think part of the problem is that people can't get their head around truly random generated numbers ... they think that it means a nice equal distribution from 1 to 20 but it doesn't. There's absolutely no reason, for example, that a RNG wouldn't randomly generate 20 20s in a row. That said, I'm almost positive ToEE is built to cheat somehow. Examples are the Moathouse ground floor bandit leader who for no good reason since 2003 has rolled criticals on his first attack about 50% of the time, and the frog at Imeryds Run who steadily gets initiative in that battle. There's probably some subroutine built into the .dll that overrides the RNG check much of the time for certain scenarios where it would just so happen to be really cool if the mobs got good rolls.
I can't say I've ever noticed that with the bandit leader- perhaps the fact he always spends his first round getting up from a Greased patch or fending off a Summoned animal (or both!) breaks the effect somehow? Or perhaps my tactics arise from a suppressed memory of some nasty event in the past when he did mince my frontline fighter It's also possible that I just don't notice if he criticals my summoned creaure. I think it is mostly recall bias though- it's easy to remember occasions early on were you spend two rounds swinging and missing against that last bandit or goblin and his remaining hit point while he takes down 2 of tbe PCs who suround him; forgetting that a succession of hits and criticals allowed you to get in this position in the first place.
I've noticed that too, one of my characters actually got killed in the frog battle because 3 different characters rolled 1's,4's, and 5's consistently for 3 turns. I finally landed a hit after he landed a critical and killed my cleric, whom he had swallowed. This isn't related to rolls, but I do find it iffy that my summoned noble salamanders(9th level spell) deal 5d6 with a fireball while the enemy nobles do a whopping 20d6.
