A new one for me. (possible spoilers)

Never gave the Water Temple priests...

time to start into dialogue. Start off with a Holy Smite follow it up with a Fireball chaser, add a few well placed arrows and the only things typically standing by the end are Belsornig, the Juggernaut, and a couple of gargoyles. Belsornig is typically blinded by the Holy Smite. My elf fighter gets right in his face so that when he attempts casting a spell she gets an AoO.
I guess my question now is why people are talking to the 4 high-priests in the first place? If you are not good aligned then that question stands answerd. If you are good aligned aren't the quests the temple priests give out things that might conflict with your alignment, especially if you have a paladin in the party? Sooner or later you are going to have to turn against them as you move against the Greater Temple. My own personal feelings are just "cut to the quick" and just kill the four lesser leaders.
While I'm at it: What is the difference between Fragarach and Scather? Both read the same identical way in abilities but Fragarach is worth more when you try to sell it? I consoled in both swords for a comparison then sold them. Why? I guess I want to earn Scather.

 

Sherlock Holmes and the Water Temple

Well, too many people to answer to. Don't get offended if I ignore your last post, I red it and found it interesting.

Now, let's get to the matter.
It seems Verbononc Attorney had been too quick accusing the poor Juggernaut of the assaults. My later investigations carried evidence of another possible guilty: Nallorem.
Let's see the naked facts.

1) I leave my party out of the room and only the spokesman enters.

2) I can enter the room and nothing strange happens. It seems the Juggernaut is in its statue mode (or it's because I can't see the critter and I see the scenery instead?)
Pic WaterT02.jpg


3) I can approach the Priests, combat do not start, the Jug is statue, Mallorem does his duties to whatever accursed deity he worships...
But Nallorem is standing and does nothing. Why? It's definitely a suspect behaviour.
Pic WaterT03.jpg


4) As soon as I walk the line, combat begins. Nothing new here. Reload
Pic WaterT04.jpg


5) Reloaded, the Juggernatut remains unstatued (this is what made me believe it have always been unstatued, this is wrong, only on reloads, if I exit and enter the map it return statue, another aspect of a well studied phenomenon, let's not speak of that here).
If I approache them invisible, I can speak with Belsornig (not shown here, I already know that). I try to speak with Mallorem, he starts his lines... but Nallorem does not catch them, and they do not do their correct duet.
Pic WaterT05.jpg


6) Now I try to speak to Nallorem (he shouldn't say anything useful, but now I'm curious) and, not only he doesn't start his dialogue, but he's also angry (red) at me. Further reloads did not have him angry, but still he won't speak to me.
Pic WaterT06.jpg


Now I suspect Nallorem is my man.
However, with my "Hidden Relationship" approach I'm going to finish the water Temple quests and get a pass for Hedrak. So, if anone has similar problems, this may be a fix for it.
(Damn, can't something go right? Now I have problems relating Romag that I killed Antonio e Tubal. Flags 119, 115, 116 are correctly set to 1, I have never heard of quest 45, what the heck wants this guy?!? After some tries I deleted the prerequisites in .dlg file and completed the quest as is my full right. I have other things to do in my life.)

 

Re: Never gave the Water Temple priests...

Just one simple answer: IT'S FUN!
Weakening the temples, putting their rivalries against each other, is a very fun way to get rid of them (especially after a couple games using your "cut to the quick" approach, due to Paladins in party). Think to Akira Kurosawa's "Jojimbo" (sp?) or Sergio Leone's "For a Fistful of Dollars".
The four temples, and me in the middle... And then, when I'll have conquesred Hedrak's trust, the strike will be swift and definitive. No more Temple of Elemental Evil.
I'm going to make my players play this module, and I hope they will take this route.

As for their quests, they never asked me to do something I wouldn't have done myself sooner or later (kill this and that), except, maybe, the "deserters" ones, but if I plan to eventually kill everyone, what problem is for me what colours they wear?

 

Yojimbo, yes. And there other versions of the story (the older I know is "Red Harvest", 1929)

Flag 105? And how in the Nine Hells I managed to set that thing? This time I should have some older saves, so I may try to find some time, this evening, to make experiments with it.

Thank you all very much, you've been of immense help (as usual).

 

Here is bug information posted on the atari forums, dated 10-15-2003.

"bugged confrontation with Balsingor (the water temple priest, I cannot recall the spelling)

I loaded this several times and got three different results. My party enters the room and
1: occupants are non-hostile, priest converses and asks you to do something for him.
2: occupants are hostile, initiative screen comes up, battle ensues. Whether they are hostile or not seems to be random.

What was bugged was with what happened the third time:

The occupants were non hostile when I entered the room. My rogue initiated dialogue with the priest. Apparently at the same moment, the room went hostile and the initiative/combat mode comes up, and one didn’t cancel the other out. My char ends up having the entire conversation while in combat mode.

When the conversation was over, combat mode remained. The problem was that the character “selected†was in conversation mode, with no option but “speaking†to the priest. The character who won initiative could not take their turn as it was impossible to “select†them instead and get their radial menu up.

I had to hit the space bar to move initiative along, and then the combat went normally. I am not sure if this was a glitch for me only or if others have had it too."

 

just for the record.

Rogue Trader -- I don't have a paladin in my party. I run a 7 member party with 6 characters actually neutral good in alignment, the barbarian is chaotic Good (you can guess who I'm setting up for Scather).
What I'm watching out for is alignment considerations. In one game I ended up joining the Air Temple, I convinced a bunch of Water Temple bugbears to defect to the Air Temple, Defiled the Earth Temple altar, and I had already killed Belsornig(sp?) -- water--and Allarem(sp?) --fire--. I got the "Member of Air Temple" reputation only to have the Air Temple leader attack me. As it is being talked about I think Kelno's reaction may have been because I picked up Serena before I reported back to him.
One thing people don't seem to answer clearly around here is whether or not quests have an effect on your reputation or alignment. There is a quest from Skole in Nulb that if I remember correctly calls for the assassination of Tolub's lady because she's selling magic items in his tavern and cutting into his business. Assassination is seen as an evil act so if I were to take this quest wouldn't this be an evil act? Granted she's Lawful Evil but I would think openly taking an assassination mission would have alignment and reputation penalties attached to them. Perhaps I'm just overthinking thus making the game harder than it actually is. (or maybe I'm not thinking enough.)
I haven't been hired to assassinate the temple priests, killing them is merely a side effect of ultimately stopping the Temple of Elemental Evil's full return. The only priest that does try to talk to me is Kelno of Air Temple who sounds so pitiful that you wonder why he hasn't taken himself out. The rest of the high priests attack me on sight at which point I consider my actions justified (self-defense).

 

The Rogue Trader and the unsolvabe mistery of the muredrous Water Temple

OK, made some experiments.
Nothing is what it seems.
flag 105 is 0. Of course: Belsornig is alive.
I checked the scrips, and found the Nallorem had a modified script. I do not know from where it came, but I deleted it, reloaded the map, and he started to act normally.
Ater seeing him prostrate I happily ran in the room, calling "Belsornig, I've completed your qu..." but, combat started again.
So it seems it's not Nallorem.
Maybe the Juggernaut. It's in non-statue mode (I wander invisible, so I'm sure) even when the priests make their worship acts...
I reloaded an old save, before first time I went to Temple. I ran directly to Water temple, and, invisible, controlled the situation: all was normal, including the damned Juggernaut-statue.
So it seem it's something I did. Doh.
However I finished both Water and Air quests, so no longer a problem. Next time I'll go to Water Temple combat will be a desired result.
Funny thing is that something quite similar happens whan I go taliking with Hedrak: when I approach him he talks to me, but when I exit dialogue, combat begins. This is getting old *very* fast. Iuz, if you have something urgent to do, do it quick, because I do not grant you'll have much time, you understand?!?:biggergri

 

Re: just for the record.

I prefer smaller parties, for they level up more quickly.

Serena? Why should he care? Oh, well, these priests seem to be definitely unpredictable and fickle. It's just understandable one would end killing them.

Some quests add you a reputation. Reputations do not have effect on your aligment, but on the reaction of npcs. Example: if you kill Lodriss as Skole asks you (neved did, I speak only for having parsed the .dlg files in order to translate them) you'll get a "Killer of Lodriss" reputation (now, let's speak about "perfect crime" ; ) that would mean Tolub and is pirates will react to you at -100 (I think this means "Kill on sight") while the assassin's giuld will react to you at +30 and all the inhabitants of Nulb at -10.
Of course if you're roleplaying a good character you won't do it, as I never did it.
IIRC, you can do it even with any aligment, but going with her on the docks will make a paladin fall. Not exactly the best solution, if you ask me, but it's left to roleplaying.

Troika games sometime do have quuestionable moral choices, I remember a couple issues in Arcanum...

To me killing is killing. But my game is not your game.

As I said, these priests are people you really can't rely upon. As many priests I know, but I digress ;P

 

It occuorred to me that it may be a problem with my having completed both Kelno and Belsornig quests, but not having been escorted to Hedrak. IIRC the dialogue was about the Air Temple, not the Water one, but I got to Superior Temple on my own, so, maybe, I lack some important variable/flag.
I'll check the scripts, but it's very likely. I did not anything important, just Kill the Ettin Prison Guard, the Leucrottas (BTW, I found Kelshane's ones a bit too easy for the XP they grant) and some trolls, and I freed Mandy and Whitman. Oh, and I can't disarm the :rant: :rant: :rant: trap that someone had the brilliant idea to add to lvl 4...