Co8 Mod Pack 4.0.0

Agreed. I'd love to see it, even if it's like a separate download or what have you...it could be something featured as the center piece of a new "downloads" section.

 

Thanks for the praise.

There is a PC Voice Mod out already. You can find it here. It is not in an installer version, though it is still pretty easy to use. The Portrait Packs should hopefully be up today or tomorrow (depending on where you live). They too are not going to have an installer version.

An installer for the Portriat Packs would be tricky. A file that portraits depend on can be mod dependent, namely portrait.mes. Some mods, such as ShiningTed's Mod and Co8 4.0.0 use there own custom versions of this file. That means that for the Portrait Packs to be compatable with these mods, they must build off of this custom file. The Portrait Packs I am developing will be compatable with these mods (I am using their custom file to make them). Hopefully future mods will also be developed to be compatable with the Portrait Packs as well. But as you can see, one installer for all mods just won't work. Toffee (Toffee = ToEE Front End) poses a different set of problems for an installer. With Toffee mods are stored in seperate folder, and for custom portraits to work in a mod they must be installed in that mod's folder. That means if you have 4 different mods installed, you have to install the portraits in 4 different folders. Maybe someday an installer version will be available, but it will be far from idiot proof, and may be almost as complicated as the unzip install version.

 

Nice job guys - I could not believe my eyes when I saw a thread devoted to putting "Keep on the Borderlands" into ToEE's application...that is incredible. You all keep it up and some serious job offers might come your way. If I was Atari, that is....lol

BTW, thanks again for the hard work!

 

Hey, guys. It's been awhile. Dropped by and was happy to see there's a new version of the Co8 patch. I installed it today and played around with it and so far, so good.

It looks like a lot was done to fix the monsters and bring them more in-line with their PNP counterparts. I started a new game this afternoon to play through (The equipment caravan thing at the beginning is nifty) and the only thing that really stands out so far is Lubash's CR is still wrong. The game doesn't take his level of Barbarian into account when calculating it and the resulting XP award.

Other than that, no complaints so far. Glad to see this place is still alive and well.

 

Apologies in advance if this belongs in a different thread, or has been discussed previously. Thanks to all who made 4.0 happen. In attempt to be helpful, rather than critical, I would like to comment on my post 4.0 install experience. I know many of these bugs date back to the offiical release and livs unfinished?! mod. Not knowing exactly which were to addressed in the cumulativeco8 fixes, I present them here.


My rig: xpsp2. Clean install from discs. official patch 1 & 2. co8 4.0. no cd v2. running via toeefe w/ level 10 cap, 4.0 mod, and desperate wives.

SPOILER ALERT

1. Can't cross east hommlet bridge from R&B's to main road.
2. Random encounter: something about avatar, recieved iolo's crossbow? huh?
3. Slowdowns - are minimal! Huzzah!! Make note that settings s/b changed when entering fire temple and 4 th lvl: no scroll acceleration, high resoloution, not too many savegames etc.
4. Desp. wives - Mandy: After botching the dialogue to get batswing, (the demands for i t seemed a little harsh for a cg party) is there no other option (other than console) to procure one -ie shop purchase, or mandy shows up in hommlet and can be re-asked?
5. Desp wives ending: I may well have missed a sub-plot about packages, but this made no sense.
6. Smigmal. First encounter, wasn't given option to re-attack after parley, so she vanishes. Second encounter, she is invisible and non-detectable, even if you kill her in this state can't loot her stuff.
7. 4th lvl corridor electrical trap. This is the only major PITA so far. Dialogue w/ trolls didn't reveal a password. Unable to blow it up w/ spells or disarm. Was a viable solution ever implemented? If not, might I suggest doing something with the Scarabs.

And that's as far as I got.

EDIT - Please disregard #1. User error.

 

Thanks Gaear for the quick response.

1. You have the spot right. There are easy work arounds as you mentioned, but they are are a minor pita. I mentioned mainly because, prior to 4.0 I never had this problem. Just seemed a bit strange. Didnt know if anyone else was experiencing this or not.

7. I was dealing with the trolls as you mentioned, and got the dialogue about revealing info about the temple, but they never revealed a password or any other info. I even tried (unsuccessfully) resurrecting a few trolls and beating them back down to see if it would re-trigger the dialogue. Boy was that a theatre of the absurd,

 

A shout-out to the Ultima series. Was that a Co8 addition, or was it always in there bu bugged? I've never seen it.

I'm with you; this isn't good design.

Disarm is possible, but you'll need a rogue with Disarm skill 16. Assuming one point from Guidance (most parties should have access to this), you'l need a 10th level rogue with 14+Int, or a 11th level rogue with 12+. Stiff, but doable for most parties (Liv didn't much care if you built a party she considered nonoptimal).

Interrogating a troll is more problematic. If I read the script right, there's only one troll that will talk, so you have to make sure not to coup de grace any of them during combat, and if you're tossing Fireball around you might be SOL. Also, your party leader has to have one of Diplomacy 12, Intimidate 10, or Bluff 10, but by the time you get to Temple Level 4 someone should -- assuming you haven't found dialogue quests to be a waste of time.

I like the idea of the Scarabs doing something, especially since their original function didn't make it in from the PnP module. Also, if you're doing Hedrack's quest, he really should tell you the password. Just on logical grounds -- you can't possibly do the quest for him without getting past the barrier.

Weird new bug (or at least it's new to me): my party leader has picked up a +15 miscellaneous bonus to most of his skills. On the positive side, I can finish off the Hommlet quests easily enough now.

Edit: never mind. Turns out he was wearing the Sorcerer's Helm. That thing is sick.

 

The trolls don't have the password, but someone or something else on the level does. And yes, you can get to them without passing through the trap. I have never gotten them to give me the password, but then again I have never had any trouble dissarming the trap.

 

OK, if you'll keep in mind that most of those aren't available to all parties. Bardsong needs a bard. A wizard will probably end up with Fox's Cunning -- it's not certain, though, since the one for sale in the game is on Skole, and he could end up dead or run off without you getting it. A sorcerer almost certainly won't take the spell. So a party with no bard and no wizard won't have the spell, the bardsong, or the items.

And of course, this assumes you've built at least one character with maxed Disable Device in the first place. Whether this is good design is a matter of opinion, but requiring a particular approach to a puzzle hardly strikes me as the best approach.

Which takes me back to the interrogation method. Looks like we're wrong. Any troll on the right level will spill the beans if you've got the right skills. The issue is, as usual, are the skills on the party leader? This is a general ToEE design flaw, but it's made worse by the player not having any feedback as to what's necessary. If you know what's going on, you could just swap party members into the first slot until someone hits.

 

Sorry to disappoint anyone who may have been looking forward to my spell package release within an hour or so. I have been having trouble finding a way to make protection from spells work for all spells that it should work for and only spells (nothing else which would require a saving throw.) It does work for almost all spells but some, like cloudkill, which persist after they are cast , I haven''t found a solution for yet. I will do up a zip of what I have so far (includind the incomplete protection from spells and the incomplete prismatic spray) and release it tommorow sometime. There will be something from me for sure by midnight MST tommorow.

Darmagon

 

Once again, the trolls don't have the password. That the trollls let you interogate then is a clever ruse that Livonya added to put us off the scent. Look elsewhere for the password. Also, the issue is not skills on the party leader, but skills on the party in general. Liv was so clever she devised a way that, for conversations such as the interogations where a specific party member does not initiate them, the script looks to the party member with the highest appropriate skill in question. Never underestimate Liv. She is more clever than the rest of us put together.

You know, everything that has been said here about the lightning trap was said months ago when Liv first released her mod. Nothing has changed. Saying "I don't think it's right to require me to have a rogue with maxed disable device skill to disable one trap" is very much like saying "I don't think it's right to require me to have a cleric to cast Heal." It is just the way it is. There are other ways around it. The password is out there. There is combat mode. Some clever and creative individual even found a way to deactivate it with a spell. There are ways to buff your rogues ability. If your wizard or sorcerer doesn't have the spell, and you can't get it from Skole, pick up another NPC, hit some random encouters until you can level them up enough to get the spell, scribe it and give it to your wizard or socerer. If all this is too much work for you, well, I'm sorry. When I first saw this new trap I was excited. A new puzzle to solve, something this game was sorely lacking. Yes, it is difficult, but that makes defeating it that much more rewarding.