Feb. 19: Subrace Upgrades

Since I was home all day today, sick with the flu or something, I had time to research, download, research, read, decipher, script, and experiment with LetoScript (programming for dealing directly with character files from NWN).

The result...I now have a way to alter BASE ability scores, skill ranks, and feats via scripting in the game.

This means that I can finally alter subraces so that the bonuses/penalties to abilites and skills, and bonus feats, can now be granted permanently on your character, rather than as a temporary "enchancement" that doesn't completely stack with enchancing items and spells.

I'll be making the changes to subraces soon. Existing characters will get changed automatically once the change is in.

When the change takes place, you'll find yourself booted from the game. You can then just log back in about 30 seconds later after any changes have been made to your character file.

I don't have a definite date yet for the change, but it's pretty much at the very top of my TO DO list now.

EDIT: Ok, so there is a date now, since I sat down and just changed a bunch of the subrace scripts and items to use this.

Sounds great

Couple of questions:

Demonspawns, their dex/speed bonuses are random on rest depending on if they get their tail/wings. Will demonspawns have those bonuses allied as they are now, or will they be leto'ed and demonspawns get booted/log back in on resting?

How will this affect existing characters who've already taken feats that their bonus/penalties would muck up? For example, my wolf blood Alex, and my beastial half orc weapon master. Alex has base 10 int, but 9 int with the subrace stat change.... his skill points at levelup are based on 10 int, instead of 9 (which is a -1 penalty). Likewise, my beastial weapon master has a base 13 int as required for the WM feats, but with subrace, his int is pushed down to 9 as well, which is too low for his feats/some of the feats he's still looking to get, as well as change his skill points.

And when reincarnation/ascension come around, will the characters go back to the base stats at character creation, or retain the stat changes from their respective subraces?

Good points there Manny! Inquiring minds want to know, hehe

Demonspawn will have to be reworked slightly, so they'll likely have the Dex mod permanently (and tail), but wings/horns will still fluctuate on resting.

As far as abilities and class/skill/feats selection go, the subrace adjustments will become just like regular racial adjustments...permanent and affecting eligibility for things like feats.

With the plan for reincarnation, this means that subraces will stay for those reincarnated, rather than be erased upon reincarnating. This also means that I can add in a couple of real ability score increases with reincarnation.

oooh that sounds nice!

is truly one of the great minds of Neverwinter Nights. He cares, he shares, he ROCKS!

Hehe, well, looks like Angar will be quite an oddity then.... only beastial orc weapon master with negative intelligence lol

Sounds neat though that subraces can keep some of their traits on reincarnating. Just imagine... with even more stat boosts, all those bright gnomes out there that reincarnate and ascend will become super-nova gnomes hehehe.

Updated title to show a date for this change to happen.

Since I've wanted to be able to do this for a looooooong time, I went ahead and altered all sorts of scripts in order to get this change into the game.

Here's the changes, which will take place after the next reset by me:

When you log into the game in the Astral Conjunction (every time you do so), you may notice that you're "frozen" for up to 10 seconds. This is intentional, as it gives the game a chance to run a short script on your character for possible later use by other scripting.

If you are an established character already, when you walk through the Sleeping Dragon a script will run that will:
1. check for a subrace
2. if a subrace is on your character:
- - - remove old subrace "skin" item
- - - add new subrace "skin" item
- - - boot you from the game to make changes to your character file (please wait 30 seconds before re-logging into the game to give the software a safe time to make the changes)

If you are a new character, when you select your subrace the game will:
1. add a subrace "skin" item
2. boot you from the game to make changes to your character file (please wait 30 seconds before re-logging into the game to give the software a safe time to make the changes)

EDIT: Forgot about another change for subrace...

There is still the XP Penalty for subraces, but it will be taken off your XP as you earn it, rather than being added as XP Debt at level-up. (Past XP Debt will not be refunded, as there is no way to tell how you got that debt.)

if they ain't careful they may implode and become black hole gnomes.

*starts singing to self...... Black hole gnome won't ya come*

Okay , this all sounds cool... but how does this effect already taken feats/abilities that the PC has.. if they now longer meet the minimum requirements after their stats have been altered?.. Will they keep them?.. Or loose them?..

Is there an in game warning about the boot and wait for 30 seconds?.. new players that have never seen this thread may think they've done something wrong in creation to be booted so soon....

Will the website get an update reflecting how the sub-race effects are applied..?

Will the player still get a feedback message confirming the sub-race effects are applied?...

How will things like wolfblood full moon bonuses / shadowchild/vampire regeneration (the temporary) effects be applied?

Does the game have to cut out into full cutscene mode for the ten seconds (note that this also shuts out the GUI.. so the message about database loading cannot be viewed untill after the ten seconds).. ((noted that last night))..??.. It would be better to just apply a cutsceneimmobilise effect & cutsceneghost.. leading into a vfxformingintheastral at the 10second point... .. ??

As they are not used will clerics get their domain feats completely removed?
Will PC's get feats for their patron diety/ subrace effects reminders (as mentioned/suggested elsewhere in different thread)..??

How does this skin change effect existing people with feats such as "arcane elemental attack".. or did they not use PC skins?

If things go drastically wrong, is there a backup plan to revert to the old system?...

And one last question from me...

Aurora still has her subrace skin fubared. Will there be a way to fix her to properly be Drow should she log in and the system applies the stoneblood skin she's wearing currently?

Okay , this all sounds cool... but how does this effect already taken feats/abilities that the PC has.. if they now longer meet the minimum requirements after their stats have been altered?.. Will they keep them?.. Or loose them?..

Keep them. The previous subrace feats didn't qualify as prerequisites for real feats. After this change, they will.

Is there an in game warning about the boot and wait for 30 seconds?.. new players that have never seen this thread may think they've done something wrong in creation to be booted so soon....

Yes.

Will the website get an update reflecting how the sub-race effects are applied..?

Maybe. The web site doesn't currently state how the subrace effects are given.

Will the player still get a feedback message confirming the sub-race effects are applied?...

Yes. The ability adjustments and bonus feats will be visible on the character sheet screens, just as if they were normal adjustments/feats. The non-feat/ability/skill effects will still be applied each time you log into the Astral Conjunction or rest (with feeback).

How will things like wolfblood full moon bonuses / shadowchild/vampire regeneration (the temporary) effects be applied?

The same as they currently are and have been.

Does the game have to cut out into full cutscene mode for the ten seconds (note that this also shuts out the GUI.. so the message about database loading cannot be viewed untill after the ten seconds).. ((noted that last night))..??.. It would be better to just apply a cutsceneimmobilise effect & cutsceneghost.. leading into a vfxformingintheastral at the 10second point... .. ??

It doesn't have to. Thanks for the feedback, I'll get that part changed for the next reset.

As they are not used will clerics get their domain feats completely removed?

Not yet, but I should be able to do it in the near future.

Will PC's get feats for their patron diety/ subrace effects reminders (as mentioned/suggested elsewhere in different thread)..??

No, but it's a possibility for a future addition.

How does this skin change effect existing people with feats such as "arcane elemental attack".. or did they not use PC skins?

No change, since those are normal feats and do not use PC skins.

If things go drastically wrong, is there a backup plan to revert to the old system?...

Yes. I have a back-up of the module, and I plan on backing up all the character files just before I get this online.

Aurora still has her subrace skin fubared. Will there be a way to fix
her to properly be Drow should she log in and the system applies the
stoneblood skin she's wearing currently?

This will fix that skin problem she's been having. I figured out exactly what's going on with it and changed the proper code, and the changing script for everyone looks at her subrace, not her skin.

Woohoo. Thanks for the reply :-D

Question: Why you gotta do that ball of awesomeness when I got a major assignment due tomorrow?

That, inthecorridors, is called a test of your willpower.

*looks frantically for character sheet to check the will save* Aha! There it is! Inthecorridors' will save is... uh oh.

Do the assignment. Aenea will be here when you are finished.

- The Amethyst Dragon, King of Procrastinators

Holy shite...

First the dedicated server... then random merchant inventory... now we get stacking non-enhancement subrace benefits?

*swoon*

Good Lord, .... nice


One of rusty's questions did give me pause however... I think when he hasked about meeting minimum requirements, what he meant was... lets say my subrace applies a penalty to a stat.... before this change, I could still use my normal base stat to qualify for stuff.... now that the penalty will be applied directly to my base stat, I may no longer qualify for something I took before the change.... will that feat/feature still function?

Is it possible to have the subraces bonuses be applied directly, but keep the penalties as enhancement modifiers so this doesnt get mucked up?

Thanks for answering all the questions that sprang into my mind .. this change looks awsome...

From 's answer, I think that they will still function and you'll keep them. But logically, you wouldn't want to use your releveler scales, as when you get punted back down to level 1, you'd not be able to qualify again for those feats.

MannyJabrielle wrote:From 's answer, I think that they will still function and you'll keep them. But logically, you wouldn't want to use your releveler scales, as when you get punted back down to level 1, you'd not be able to qualify again for those feats.

Bingo!

You won't lose the feats you have now, but if you relevel you may not qualify for them again.

You guys get grandfathered in! Gotta love it!

The Amethyst Dragon wrote:

MannyJabrielle wrote:From 's answer, I think that they will still function and you'll keep them. But logically, you wouldn't want to use your releveler scales, as when you get punted back down to level 1, you'd not be able to qualify again for those feats.

Bingo!

You won't lose the feats you have now, but if you relevel you may not qualify for them again.

I see.

Well, not being able to re-level isnt so bad if you are happy with your current build.... but it
does sort of torpedoe that character being able to reincarnate or ascend with their
build. I realize the issue may not be commonplace, but it would certainly suck a
whole bunch to not be able to correct a levelling error(without a DMs help), or
be able to use one's chosen build thru reincarnation/ascension.

Unless there is something that can be done for that, Im not sure I
would want to chance my character build going fubar.

If going for the exact builds, yes, that could be a problem with R/A. My Beasty half orc would still be able to go weapon master, for example, however, the exact ratio of levels would be different (8 less WM than what he's able to get at the moment).

Hopefully it shouldn't be too much of an issue. A few subraces have negatives to their stats (off hand, I can think of beastials and wolfbloods). Only pre-existing beastials would really get shafted, but then again, I haven't seen many beasital half orcs around on the server yet, and if there are a couple, I think the odds of them having Int/Wis/Cha dependant classes would be rather slim. Wolfbloods are more common, but their minuses aren't so sucky (-1 or -2 to wisdom and intelligence).

A couple of players have already gone through the update-booting, and said that the message flew by too fast in their combat log to read what it said, and didn't quite know why they got booted.

Perhaps a sign in the conjunction explaining the boot and why it happens and such?