Solafein Q:s

[pcgiant]

What about a dualled level one mage...?

[SixOfSpades]

Okay, that I'll grant you. Open the door in Hell, cast Gate and RUN.... and hope the Pit Fiend can take on 2 Balors, 2 Glabrezu and the Slayer/Mage. If not.....

"Ho! I cast ye back unto the Abyss, foul demons! Fear the might of my Sling of Everard, and my....umm....Boots of Speed! (Which I should be using right about now, actually...)"

[ADD:]It's been a fun 5 hours, but I'm going to bed now. Or maybe I'll start my homework. One of the two. See y'all.[/ADD]

[ 03-11-2003, 03:29 AM: Message edited by: SixOfSpades ]

[Rataxes]

Never mind all the fancy bonuses. Have you people looked at the sheer damage output of this sword? [img]smile.gif[/img] The thing does 1-8 base, has a +5 damage bonus, has a 50% chance of doing an extra 18 fire damage, AND it can push Sola's STR score to 24 for an extra +9 damage.

Using Sola's unmodified Strength score (18/21) as a basis:

(1 + 8)/2 + 5 + (18 x 0.5) + (12-3) = 27.5

Crikey! That's 8 pts higher average damage than the FoA +5

Sure, FoA has a 33% chance of slowing the opponent, but this thing has a 50% chance of blinding the target, which is an even MORE powerful effect than slow. I'd suspect it bypasses both saves and MR as well.

Furthermore, it has an extra attack, ensuring that Sola will never go below 5 APR and always have GWW rate of fire when Imp Hasted. The sword will also give him a +10 THAC0 boost due to increased STR.

Furthermore, the DUHM will give Sola such a great DEX boost that he'll receive an extra +2 AC Bonus on top of the existing +2 AC this sword gives him. The DUHM will also grant him a huge life bonus, and thus remove the only weakness Sola EVER had - his poor CON.

Without even mentioning things like CC, AoF, DW, NPP, or FA, this sword is already the by far most powerful weapon in the game both defensively and offensively. No other weapon in the game even comes close to it's average damage and there's not even a bloody shield in the game that can match it's defensive powers.

There are two redeeming features of this sword the way I see it

The one thing holding this thing back is the fact that the Moonray ability he can get instead of this sword is even MORE wicked.

[ 03-11-2003, 09:10 AM: Message edited by: Rataxes ]

[weimer]

-- Dundee -- everything you have said is true, but I can't see it is an argument against Tsuki per se. Mordy's Sword is still a better wall. You don't need Solaufein to dominate the game if you're careful with Sim (or Mislead or PI).

The traditional weakness ascribed to Solaufein is that he is too distant -- most players seem to wish that he were a bit more affectionate. There is much more activity in the Solaufein forums now discussing possible flirts for him than there has been discussing his tactical merits. Similarly, the perennial topic of possible romances and redemptions for Valen gets much more attention than her phenominal cosmic powers, itty-bitty living space, or her deadly hunters. In my personal opinion, Solaufein's weakness is that he lacks integrity: there's a part of me that always wishes I had made a less accepting Solaufein that would reject players that gave philosophical responses with which he disagreed.

To answer your question with a more tactical slant, Solaufein's two big weaknesses in my mind are fragility and poor spell memorization. The romance will address one of these but not both.

-- Six -- I think this is the point in the debate where we should recognize that nothing constructive will be gained by going forward. As much as I would love to discuss spelling (see AR1202.ARE for another example) or the Cloak of Cheese vs. Cone of Cold, I think it will be more useful for me to state a bunch of tautologies and then a bunch of opinions.

Utility is subjective (or context-dependent). Fury is generally considered to be a strong weapon. However, in a party of six clerics it cannot be used (bladed weapon). The Shield of Reflection is useless against Firkraag. Ages won't help you against Kangaxx. Similarly, the utility of Sola's blade must be measured in context.

It is almost certain that we have different average contexts in mind. For example, I don't recall ever encountering an enemy that used 3x Cone of Cold in BG2. As a result, I tend not to judge things based on it. In my mind, there are really only about ten difficult battles in the game (and I wrote five of them expressly for that purpose). Thus I find it particularly easy to compare items like Tsuki to one-shot items like pro-mw scrolls of special potions: if you are only concerned about a dozen fights, rationing your equipment so that you can use some 'good stuff' in each one is not difficult. Just to restate this: in my mind I don't really care about, say, the Trolls in the Druid Grove because you are going to beat them no matter what. This is my personal opinion: I don't try to judge the differences between Ravager and Foebane based on how they do against shadow thieves.

My context assumes players who have access to the identified descriptions and can do the math. Given that Ages and Fury already exist in BG2, items that are vastly inferior but available at the same time will only be used by players who have a specific (unique, presumably) role-playing reason to do so. Want to use Namarra because your character's backstory makes the silence power or the fact that you got it from a skeleton king particularly appealing? Great! However, if you already have a reason like that then it doesn't matter what I do with some newly introduced weapon: it could be the Rift Device on a stick or a -3 dagger: you're still using Namarra. Barring that, and given that BG2 already exists, new items must be competitive with existing powerful items or they will not be used. I could make a weapon that was comparable to the bard-killing scimitar. It would get a comparable amount of use.

I write mods for myself. I am not interesting in spending the time to code up an item and its backstory and the challenges you must overcome to obtain it ... if I'm just going to sell it in all cases.

Given this subjective context, your "realism" is my "weakness". Actually, it is my personal opinion that BG2 features an incredible wealth of over-powered magical items. However, *given that*, new items must also be powerful. Otherwise only characters with special backstories or low INT will take them. I judge new items against the items that characters are actually using. ( Exception: the item upgrade mod was created for a different reason and is based on the averaged input of a large number of people. )

Some people think that the purpose of playing a game is to be fair (or realistic). I disagree. I think that the purpose of playing a game is to have fun. When I play chess against my grade-school sister I often remove some of my pieces before the start of the game or give her extra ones. This unfairness is introduced in order to make the game more fun for both of us. Interestingly enough, it is a fairly exact analogy for what happens in BG2. The enemies are given queens that you don't have (mind flayer psionics, red dragon breath, special immunities, massive numbers, whatever) in order to keep things interesting. In a "fair" fight your human intelligence would win every time.

-- Rataxes -- Thank you for bringing this to my attention. I must have failed to take into account the extra Str bonus (or the jump from 25% to 50%) when I did the math a long time ago. It was never my intention to make Tsuki a particularly *damaging* weapon.

Time to change that. While I don't agree that Blindness is as powerful as Slow, the 50%/blind/18 could stand to go back to 25%/blind/12 following your math. In addition, it was recently pointed out to me that the NPP ability on the blade is largely irrelevant: while I'm here there's no reason not to remove it.

In general, however, we never seem to include the STR damage bonus when looking at weapons. For example, Crom Faeyr:

Crom: 2d4+3 +5 elec +14 (str damage bonus) = 5+3+5+14 = 27

... also ends up being just as high. I'm not saying that it's not real, just that it's not normally part of the consideration.

[ 03-11-2003, 01:22 PM: Message edited by: weimer ]

[SixOfSpades]

As I was walking home last night, I realized that I really should apologize to weimer. Some of my comments were more inflammatory than constructive (such as my "first-person shooter" remark), and were more likely to cause weimer to never speak to me again than to listen attentively and try to work out a solution. This may have been due to the fact that I'd had something of a bad day (In my Speech & Argumentation class, my debate partner who went before me accidentally researched the same part of the topic that I was supposed to research, thereby stealing most of my key points and forcing me to ad-lib more than half of my argument, which of course made me look like a bozo), so last night, my Inner Troll was restless, and just begging for a chance to Run Free And Unfettered.

Now, with that said, let's get down to the second reason for this post: Sooner or later, weimer, you're just going to have to face up to it--you are a powergamer. Several factors (such as the fact that you still haven't corrected the way that Rings of Preservation can be worn with magical armor) prove this quite clearly. Now, it's one thing to create overpowered items; I can understand that, as many members of your public are powergamers themselves, and keep pushing you for bigger and badder stuff. Obliging them is not, in and of itself, a bad thing. But it's an entirely different matter when you come to the forums and argue that something like Tsuki no Ken (or Throwing Impaler, or Imp. Kitthix, etc) is not overpowered, or that you don't see how it makes the game too easy. For a clear delineation of where you stand on the powergamer/roleplayer continuum, take a look at the stats you gave Solaufein, and compare them with the stats that jcompton gave Kelsey. Even *IF* Sola's stats are his original, unMODded BG2, he's still quite clearly a "powergamer roll:" The stats he wants are 18, the other ones are 10. Kelsey, however, is quite the opposite: Only one of his stats, CON, is at its effective maximum, and even that's only due to his Cloak.

[Dundee Slaytern]

I am not totally against powergaming, but the extent to which you have chosen to let it influence your choices is a tad extreme. This is just my opinion though.

Personally, I prefer powergaming roleplay, where both sides of the coin determine what should be allowed. No other weapon that I know of, have as much enchantments as Sola's sword.

As for Blindness... it can be deadlier than Slow due to ranged attacks. Nature's Beauty is a wonderful example of a bugged spell to illustrate this.

As for Sola's stats. This is from his .cre file.

STR: 17
DEX: 16
CON: 15( heh)
INT: 14
WIS: 11
CHA: 10

[Alson]

Oh, damn! I missed all the fun! Well, time to chime in. [img]smile.gif[/img]

First... and i know i might be stepping out of line here, and this may sound a bit arrogant, but, guys... this is a computer game. Tsuki being overpowered, or Sola's perfect stats are all part of BG2. It has no (well, it shouldn't have any) effect whatsoever on your real life... so there's really no need to get angry. [img]smile.gif[/img]

Now.... Let's talk BG2.

I have to agree with Rataxes. Tsuki obivously needs to be toned down... but offensively, not defensively. Sola is a Fighter/Mage. Between Mirror Image, Stoneskin, Mislead and Pro-Magic-Weapons, he can become melee-invulnerable in mere seconds (or even less, thanks to triggers). Thanks to his Drowish MR, he can also become quite safe from magical attacks. Ergo, the best we can do in order to balance Tsuki a bit is to remove some of its more offensive capabilities. The sheer amount of damage it deals was already mentioned by Rataxes... so i won't repeat it. However, i think cancelling the extra attack per round is in order. Belm, Kundane and Scarlet are all ToB-class off hand weapons - especially when being Imp. Haste becomes a second nature to you - and adding Tsuki to this list is... well, problematic, to say the least.

And now, when we're done with Tsuki... it's Bloodbane's turn.

[jcompton]

Really, I don't think Kelsey's stats compared to Solaufein's stats says much. Solaufein is clearly min/maxed. But really, look at Kelsey, keeping in mind that sorcerers don't really have a prime attribute in BG2--

His STR is on the high side of average because I wanted him to be able to carry stuff.
His DEX is high because I wanted him to be slightly harder to kill, particularly via backstab (yes, stoneskins, but there's always the chance you run out)
His CON is high because I wanted him to be slightly harder to kill.
His INT and WIS are moderate because it suits the character... but in all honesty, unless a mindflayer walks up to him his INT is irrelevant and unless you want to give him Limited Wish, his WIS is irrelevant.
And CHA is on the high side because you're supposed to believe he's likeable.

So my motives were hardly pure. [img]smile.gif[/img] I just didn't see a need to put 18s on his sheet, but he's decidedly and notably above average.

[Rataxes]

-- Rataxes -- Thank you for bringing this to my attention. I must have failed to take into account the extra Str bonus (or the jump from 25% to 50%) when I did the math a long time ago. It was never my intention to make Tsuki a particularly *damaging* weapon. Time to change that. While I don't agree that Blindness is as powerful as Slow, the 50%/blind/18 could stand to go back to 25%/blind/12 following your math. In addition, it was recently pointed out to me that the NPP ability on the blade is largely irrelevant: while I'm here there's no reason not to remove it.

I'm not entirely certain what other penalties blinded creatures get, but I do know that blinded enemies will act as though they were feebleminded unless you get right next to them, and that it gives a cumulative -10 THAC0 penalty (at least that's what I get when blinded). IMHO that's more powerful than a cumulative -4 THACO/AC penalty and APR cut in half. Hell, immunity to Blindless is even more rare than immunity to Slow.

In general, however, we never seem to include the STR damage bonus when looking at weapons. For example, Crom Faeyr: Crom: 2d4+3 +5 elec +14 (str damage bonus) = 5+3+5+14 = 27 ... also ends up being just as high. I'm not saying that it's not real, just that it's not normally part of the consideration.

You also have to take the base STR into consideration. A person with 19 base STR would for example only get +7 dmg with the Crom Faeyr, since he already had a +7 Bonus to begin with. Crom Faeyr can indeed be one of the most damaging weapons in the game because of this, but if one wears the belt of Fire Giant Strength for instance, it's relative damage compared to other weapons is decreased.

Sola already has a +3 Dmg Bonus from his 18/21 STR, so the average damage would only be 24 for him. If he wore the belt of Fire Giant Strength, the relative damage would be even less.

The Moonblade is somewhat affected by this as well, and it's true that FoA +5 is a more damaging weapon in the hands of Sola if you combine it with Crom Faeyr, but then you will have used two weapons to achieve the same offensive power that the Moonblade achieves by itself. Using the Moonblade, you're free to use another weapon in the 2nd slot, or even use a shield (the APR would still be the same as when dual-wielding FoA and CF, since it has +1 APR).

[ 03-11-2003, 02:12 PM: Message edited by: Rataxes ]

[SixOfSpades]

Dundee: Those stats you quoted were from the unMODded Solaufein, correct?

Sure, we're just discussing a computer game here, but it's an "emotional commitment" kind of thing: We've devoted so much of our time and brainpower to it that it MUST be incredibly important. How many people argue over which baseball team is better? For an even better example, how many Europeans were killed during I-don't-even-remember-which-war-it-was, when all they were fighting about was whether or not the Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost were separate entities, or simply facets of a single, indivisible godhead?

I would tone Tsuki down a lot more than just offensively: Sola's MR, Saves, combat protections and spell protections make him immune to damn near everything, and this sword would make him immune to just about everything else. For defensive powers, this thing beats out even the Greater Werewolf Paw--and can be easily left in the offhand, as well, to make room for Sanchuudoku.

Kelsey's stats are indeed above average for Your Typical Citizen, but they're just about average for Your Typical Adventurer. Somehow I can't see someone like Neeber (who may be presumed to have all 9's for stats) even surviving long enough to meet you in, say, a jail cell in the Temple Ruins. And Kelsey's STR isn't even on the high side: Judging by the Weight Allowance table, my own STR is 13 or 14 (I can indeed carry 150 lbs, but I get Encumbered: Slowed), and I'm anything but big & beefy.