Modding question: How to change the backstab multiplier of categories of weapons in BGEE

[halfcelestial]

Apologies if this is not the right category (or even forum). I come from Beamdog forums.

Is this possible?
I'm asking because editing individual weapons in NI has as a side effect, that the bonuses or penalties stack if you're dual-wielding them, which is not what I wanted to do. Thanks

My plan is essentially decreasing backstab multiplier of all backstab-enabled weapons by -1, except short swords and ninja-tos and increase the multiplier of daggers by 1. Because there is zero point to using daggers for backstabbing in BG unless the extra effects they have are attractive enough. With the exception that you can attack faster with daggers, which can be a minor advantage at backstabbing (and it gets nullified with higher levels of enchantments anyway).

Another option would be to mod them so upon a successful backstab, an amount of damage is added on top, say 2d6 points of damage. But I don't know how to.

Is any of this feasible, and if so, can someone give me some hints on how to do this with NearInfinity? Thank you.

 

[Urdnot_Wrex]

Apologies if this is not the right category (or even forum). I come from Beamdog forums.

Is this possible?
I'm asking because editing individual weapons in NI has as a side effect, that the bonuses or penalties stack if you're dual-wielding them, which is not what I wanted to do. Thanks

Hi and welcome to our Tavern!

The category is absolutely correct! You might just want to add the full name of the game in your thread title, so that it's easier for people to recognize what you're asking about. We don't have subcategories and even if many of us came from BD forum, we're discussing all kinds of games here.

As to the technical part of your question, I hope that someone else can answer it.

 

[halfcelestial]

Thank you. I'll change the title.

 

[Xzarloxara]

Well, I am not sure the first option of changing backstab multipliers for individual weapons is possible for the exact reason you mentioned; both the main hand multiplier and the off hand multiplier would combine together and mess each other up.

The second option is fairly easy to do, though. Adding a flat bonus to damage upon a successful backstab can be done with opcode 340; which is Backstab Hit Effect. Just create a custom .spl file for each weapon type you want to alter and then link it to a global effect for opcode 340 which you add to each individual weapon file to be altered. (This kind of thing would be much less of a headache to do with a weidu script, honestly, but weidu can be difficult to learn for some people.) I have attached an example of this type of modification to this post so you can see how to do it. This particular example adds 2d4 bonus damage to any backstab done with an ordinary dagger. Feel free to use it however you see fit.

 

[halfcelestial]

Thanks, I was able to figure that out, thankfully. What I did is this:

Normal daggers inflict extra 1-6 upon backstab.
+1 inflict extra 2-7 upon backstab
+2 inflict extra 3-8 upon backstab
+3 inflict extra 4-10 upon backstab
+4 inflict extra 5-12 upon backstab
+5 inflict extra 6-15 upon backstab
+6 inflict extra 7-18 upon backstab

I did some math to compare the damages with the Short Sword backstab values and it seems pretty balanced. Makes the damage closer or surpasses it slightly in some cases.

I believe this solution makes the dagger take down 2 layers of Stone Skin. Feature? Lol
My RP interpretation of that is that because the dagger is a small weapon, you can perform another quick stab after the first, taking down two layers. I'm OK with that.

 

[halfcelestial]

The problem I have with daggers is that there is no need to use them damage-wise unless you do so for RP reasons, or because of the very few daggers with interesting effects attached. But if you're going for damage (i.e. killing enemies), you're better off with a short sword.

In NWN, there are other things to take into consideration, such as the individual critical strike probabilities and multiplier. Sneak attacks scale better no matter what type of weapon you use. They're just flat amounts of damage added on top, so daggers are perfectly decent weapons for rogues.

My aim is trying to simulate that sort of thing into daggers found in BG 1 and 2. Something that tips the balance somewhat.

So in short, what I did is:

-- All daggers have an extra +1 THAC0 bonus (they're smaller and easier to handle)
-- All daggers are 5% more likely to strike critical hits (easier to stab vital parts)
-- All daggers do extra damage upon backstab as per the previous post.

Any thoughts?

 

[Antimatter]

These sound like great ideas, I like them! It indeed provides more RP opportunities and gives some love to this underused weapon category.