Neverwinter Nights Thread

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Note, by the way, that GOG also has the "Enhanced Edition".

Edited by ArsThaumaturgis on Dec 26th 2019 at 2:45:02 PM

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Is Baldur's Gate 1 the only Enhanced Edition with the new party members and content that people rage about?

I didn't mind it for the few hours I played BG 1. Granted, I never played the original. Also the one girl I ran into very early on, lie a half-vampire or something. sounded so much like Felicia Day/Tallis. She talked in "new Bio Ware speak" as well. Ya know, like she was from Dragon Age while everybody else in BG talked in this very theatrical typical fantasy dialogue.

Yeah pretty much. The new NP Cs are noticeable. The other E Es don't HAVE new party members so there's nothing to be mad about.

I've been informed that, contrary to what I was told two years ago now, Sorcerers do not use Vancian Magic. Vancian Magic is Wizards and the whole spell memorization component is vital. It's not just the spell levels and having to recharge them.

I'll keep this in mind for NWN 2 and Pathfinder Kingmaker which I just bought.

Edited by Nikkolas on Dec 26th 2019 at 10:09:24 AM

Ah, that's quite right: I'd forgotten that Sorcerers simply have a limited number of spell-slots per spell-level, and can use any spell from a given level as long as they have slots of that level.

Wizards, on the other hand, are pure "fire-and-forget": they have to prepare spells before use, filling their slots with specific spells to be fired off later.

This is balanced by Wizards having (potentially) access to a larger number of spells per level than Sorcerers.

(If I'm now remembering correctly.)

[edit] If I recall correctly, Clerics work more or less like Wizards—save that they can spontaneously "convert" unused spell-slots into healing/harming spells (as appropriate to their alignment).

Edited by ArsThaumaturgis on Dec 27th 2019 at 4:31:31 PM

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Wizards have a larger library of different spells, while sorcerers can cast more spells before having to rest. In gameplay, this lends sorcerers to be more aggressive in spell choice (firing off damage spell after damage spell), where wizards can carry more buff and support magic.

Expergiscēre cras, medior quam hodie. (Awaken tomorrow, better than today.)

Of course, in NWN, there are very few limits on when and where you can rest, so there is nothing stopping you from firing everything you got at the enemy, rest, and move on without any real consequences other than the minor annoyance of having to sit down for ten second and casting all your buffs again.

It kind of takes the bite out of the entire magic system.

For me, it was one of the things that made it tolerable. :/

The thing is, I think that I might actually like a Vancian system in a tabletop game; where such limitations are storytelling opportunities, rather than mechanical shackles, and where—if I have it correctly—there are generally fewer enemies overall, and thus less drain on a player's spell-slots.

If I'm going to be ploughing through hordes of enemies, then limiting me to "fire-and-forget" is a nuisance. And if there are no opportunities for DM-and-player-authored creative solutions, then what's the point of asking me to guess ahead of time what spells will prove useful in coming encounters, other than requiring me to be psychic?

Ah, but I'm complaining a lot. Let me say, then, that while I don't much like the use of Vancian magic in Neverwinter Nights, I do very much like the game itself. (And do always play as a caster.)

Niggles aside, the combat can be a lot of fun. And better yet, I am rather fond of the companions—especially once you get to Hordes of the Underdark (I think that it is) and can have two companions bouncing off of each other. (Deekin plus Sharwyn is a particularly amusing pair, if I recall correctly. Well worth having no party-tank.)

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Oh, yeah, the companions in Hordes of the Underdark are much better than what we got before.

Also, Deekin is a treat. Also surprisingly capable. Not much for damage output, but there's nothing wrong with a Bardic Buffs dispenser to help you get stuff done.

Then again, I tend to play non-spellcasting characters, so I probably got more use out of him than a caster would. I think my last run through the expansion was with an Arcane Archer, so that's about three levels of wizard to qualify, followed by a lot of "make my arrows pointy-er" levels.

Edited by Kayeka on Dec 27th 2019 at 12:11:06 PM

I think that I recall encouraging Deekin to investigate and stretch his Dragon Disciple abilities. I don't recall whether it helped much—we were still a pretty squishy party, I think—but it was neat having him have little wings and breathing fire! ^_^

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Interestingly, there's an argument that even Aribeth is better-characterised than in the original campaign... ;)

Edited by ArsThaumaturgis on Dec 27th 2019 at 3:53:08 PM

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I downloaded NWNEE a week and a half ago. Got quite a bit throught, and I'm enjoying the nostalgia trip.

The travel system can be a bit painful, but I'm not entirely displeased with the whole game.

I recently found out that NWN 2 has a cheat that lets you use more party members at once. I’ll probably try it out in my next attempt.

You say I am loved, when I don’t feel a thing. You say I am strong, when I think I am weak. You say I am held, when I am falling short.

I found the three NPC party in NWN 2 much less annoying than the single NPC limit in NWN. It means you don't have to do all the work with you character.

So, for anyone who played the original NWN back around release, I have some really wonderful news: Beamdog has the premium modules! Not just the Kingmaker/Diamond Edition trio either, but Pirates of the Sword Coast, Wyvern Crown of Cormyr, and they've started to release the unreleased ones. Darkness Over Daggerford and Tyrants of the Moonsea have both received official releases and new aesthetic improvements, music and voice acting, in line with the other premium modules.

I'm jumping into WCOC after some 15 years of pining, so I'm about as happy as can be.

Edited by Watashiwa on Jun 27th 2020 at 1:14:16 AM

Awesome. I sort of ignored the Enhanced Edition before, but now I may check it out.

Gone to Faerie, no forwarding address. (AO3)

My favorite part is that apparently Alzander's been hired to make AL4, so we'll be seeing ''The Blades of Netheril'' as well.

Booted up Darkness Over Daggerford, I'd forgotten how janky NWN looked. And the writing's a bit... hm. It's not quite purple, but the narrator talks too much about what people look like when it could work that description into what they're doing. Very interesting to read it from this side of adulthood.

Turns out that the glow-up's been rather dramatic: most named NP Cs have voice acting now, the cutscenes are narrated, they've written 16 new pieces of music for the game, rebalanced the loot (to provide class-specific loot in places and reduce the chances of the PC ending up a multimillionaire by level 12), hundreds of script fixes, hundreds of quest fixes, and some work on alternative (read:rogue-friendly) solutions to quests. This is goood.

Just bought it to take advantage of the Steam sale, and I see it has a Workshop, with many of the old mods already available - awesome!! This should be a fun weekend.

Doom doom doom-doom doom DOOM!! Doom doom doom-doom doom DOOM!!

Gone to Faerie, no forwarding address. (AO3)

A. What happened to ~Tropers/Nikkolas's playthrough?

B. I noticed something. When I finally got through the prologue of NWN 1, I got an achievement from that. And apparently, only 18% of people on Steam got through it.

...Are...are people playing this game only for the mods? (on Steam, anyway?)

Edited by fredhot16 on Dec 22nd 2020 at 9:44:36 AM

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Absolutely. NWN's base campaign is far from Bioware's best showing, while the mods and premium modules are much more creative, compelling, and fun.

Which isn't to say NWN has zero redeeming features, there's some stuff I still think about twenty years later.

Even if I owned the game on Steam and not the GOG version (hell, if I look around, I think I actually have disc copies), why would I play the first campaign? It's long and a slog and you can only have one tagalong, which vastly reduces your options...

SoU and HotU address both of those on top of just being more fun.

Hey, XP1 and XP2 are not premium modules. They came before that.

Edited by RainehDaze on Dec 22nd 2020 at 5:39:55 PM

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The first area in NWN is such a clustertruck as well. Even as someone who finished and enjoyed the game, I'd rather just play the expansions.

Edit: As in the first area past the prologue.

Edited by deludedmusings on Dec 23rd 2020 at 3:43:27 AM

I said base campaign! I suppose I did exclude Undrentide and Hordes, and I'd argue that Hordes is Bioware's best realized game after Shadows of Amn.

But yeah the OC is a glorified tutorial for the Aurora Engine masquerading as a full-length CRPG. I did like the trial sidequest in Act 2 though.

Isn't the trial NWN2?

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No no, that trial wass part of the main quest, in NWN 1 there was the spooky castle in the forest haunted by ghosts and you're tasked by an angel to investigate the murder of everyone there.

Ooooh, don't remember that one.

Last campaign I played in NWN was one where I decided to solo the game. I ran into engine caps some 2/3 of the way through Act 3 of HotU.

I started off as a Dwarf Barbarian and I think took a level dip in Bard just so I could go Dragon Disciple in Epic Levels for stat bonuses. Enemies... did not have a good time.

Edited by RainehDaze on Dec 22nd 2020 at 6:09:39 PM

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