Useful Familiars Mod

[Wutchamakalit]

Familiars.

We all have them hidden deep within the darkest reaches of our backpacks. The only one that ever sees the light of the day is the ferret, and that only happens once every blue moon. With this mod I hope to improve that to about once per week.


All good and evil familiars have been turned into thief-mages, with stats like so:
95% pick locks, disarm traps, pick pockets. They retain their original spells
and resistances.

The neutral familiars were all thieves to being with, so I just boosted all their
skills to 95%, except detect illusion which I left at whatever value they had.

I know, I'm a real modding wiz. I even added some dialogue options! Rawr!


Of course, they still can't steal from stores, so they're pretty much only useful to solo mages who prefer to no eat a trap that can't be avoided.


Readme
Download

Anyway, if it sounds like something you'd like, install it, if not, don't. I made it primarily to enhance my own gaming experience, or something.

If you find any bugs, just post them here or send me an email.

[Illumina Drathiran'ar]

You know... That's not a bad idea. After all, the familiars and their skill remain static all the way through ToB. Logic says they'd grow stronger as their master does.

[Bithron]

I guess that you wrote those questions for the faq.. Didn't you, didn't you?

[img]smile.gif[/img]

[Wutchamakalit]

Originally posted by Bithron: I guess that you wrote those questions for the faq.. Didn't you, didn't you? [img]smile.gif[/img]

Guilty as charged

[SixOfSpades]

Certainly an improvement over the current system--although that isn't saying much. I do disagree, though, with all Good and Evil Familiars having identical abilities. I would either allow an in-casting menu (similar to the Spell Immunity menu) to allow the caster to choose the type of creature to summon, or break it down by alignment: Lawful casters get Priest-like Familiars, Neutral casters get Warrior Familiars, and Chaotic Familiars have Thieving skills. (I'm assuming that the caster himself can handle the Wizard side of the spectrum.)

The topic of Familiars "leveling up" needs upgrading too: Something better than the "In Throne of Bhaal areas, Familiars gain double hitpoints, etc.," that is implemented currently. I'd say that there should be 8 gradations of each Familiar, with upgrades occuring as the PC's EXP passes each 1-million mark.

Neutral Familiars having all their skills set at 95%, especially right from the very beginning, is indeed way too much. It's all very well if you're a Solo Wizard, but not when it blows your need for an actual Thief right out of the water. Skills should only reach levels like that near the very end of the game, when even Multiclassed Thieves are likely to be around 200% in everything anyway (even so, they'll still overpower Nalia and Imoen).

I'm already toying with my own Improved Familiars system (I have some of it written down.....somewhere), but that doesn't mean I can't support yours. [img]smile.gif[/img]