November 2003

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Neverwinter Wednesday
Posted Thursday, November 27, 2003 - 11:22 CET by Sorcerer

Another week's around and here are the latest NWN Wednesday goodies:

Dwarven Defender Prestige Class
Dwarven defenders are skilled combatants trained in the arts of defense, and are one of six new Prestige Classes featured in Hordes of the Underdark. A line of dwarven defenders is a far better defense than a 10-foot-thick wall of stone, and much more dangerous! Discuss.

Deekin's Big Adventure Part 4
Hordes of the Underdark will take adventurers to a vile, lightless world of festering evil and corpulent nightmares fashioned from horrors undreamt. Who better to brave this dark world of creeping malice and lurking doom? Deekin of course! Check out Part 4 of Deekin's Big Adventure featuring the new Mind Flayer Tunnels tileset. Discuss.

Character Customization in Hordes of the Underdark
Hordes of the Underdark offers a wide variety of new options for character customization, and this article posted on GameSpy outlines many of the features such as new heads, portraits, wings and tails, robes, and new voice sets! Discuss.


New Hordes of the Underdark Spell and Feats
Summon a dagger as your loyal servant you with Shelgarn's Persistant Blade, the new spell (check below) released to fan sites this week! Feel like rampaging through the forest as a dragon? Then check out the 3 new Epic level feats posted on RPG Vault, including Wildshape (Dragon)! Discuss.

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Neverwinter Nights Forum News
Posted Thursday, November 27, 2003 - 0:55 CET by chevalier

Here are today's Neverwinter Nights forum highlights. Please take into account that these are only single parts of various threads and should not be taken out of context. Bear in mind also that the posts presented here are copied as-is, and that any bad spelling and grammar does not get corrected on our end.

Georg Zoeller, Designer

Hellball: Hellball has 40m radius in NWN. You can't evade the explosion but you may be able to run for cover before the Hellball detonates (if you see it coming) ... unless you were directly targeted by the caster, in which case the Hellball is homing on you, tough luck (through you could consider to run toward the caster if that happens).

Summary
- Hellball has a Save, the DC follows the epic spell Save DC rules
- You can not evade hellball
- Hellball ignores SR
- Hellball does not have the 10d6 backlash on the caster because it's not easy to stay clear of the blast area, (through its present in code and can be activated by setting a variable(
- The casting range is "long" and the hellball projectile is homing on the target location or object
- The spell covers 40m, which is roughly 4x4 tiles.

Avoiding Hellball effects:

Quote: does boring, average, "even the kid down the street has two", spell mantle protect from hellball? Or do you need shiny and sexy epic mantle of some sort?

Nothing protects you from hellball (except enough resistance against each of the elemental damage types used). SR does not work.

Quote: Well no reflex save according to Georg. Only the resistance to different types of damage

Wrong, there is a reflex save, but it does not "safe you" from the spell, you would still get half of the damage.

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Temple of Elemental Evil Wrap Report at RPG Vault
Posted Thursday, November 27, 2003 - 0:02 CET by Yerril

Tom Decker, producer of The Temple of Elemental Evil, has written a "Wrap Report" of reflections after the game's release. Here's what he said:

Doing some of the writing for the game, I had a lot of fun with creating some of the characters and quests in Nulb. I particularly felt strongly that since we had several heterosexual marriages available in Hommlet, we should include at least one homosexual encounter in the game (although there were actually two, one was in the brothel that was removed) and not to make it a stereotyped, over the top situation, but on par with the other relationships available in the game. I felt strongly about keeping the character of Bertram in the game, and I am glad we were allowed to keep him, despite any controversy it might cause. It's been entertaining reading the boards about Bertram and reactions to him.

Read the whole thing at RPG Vault.

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Neverwinter Nights Forum News
Posted Wednesday, November 26, 2003 - 23:58 CET by chevalier

Here are today's Neverwinter Nights forum highlights. Please take into account that these are only single parts of various threads and should not be taken out of context. Bear in mind also that the posts presented here are copied as-is, and that any bad spelling and grammar does not get corrected on our end.

Georg Zoeller, Designer

Lay On Hands: It was updated in Hordes to take SR into account, as it is classified as a Spell Like ability. No more instant kills on demiliches for the paladin faction, sorry.

Quote: So the PM's death touch bypasses SR but LoH doesn't? What about quivering palm?

The death touch grants a saving throw instead

2DA Files: Btw, all 2da files prefixed with "des_" are design only 2das, which means they are only read by scripted code(Get2DAString), not by the game engine. I think most new 2das are package and class feat related and use the same layout, which will make it easy to document them.

Epic Spells:

Quote: 1) Just something I was wondering about. But will the epic spell list exist out of both official epic spells (from the Epic HB) and non-official spells (BioWare custom made) ?

2) I don't know if this has changed ... but are there going to be some sort of teleport spells? Even if they just make a flashy animation then teleport your 10 meters away from your current location + turned invisible.

3) Will it be possible to exchange one epic spell for another while leveling up? The same way it was handled for sorcerer's and bard's on levels upto 20.

4) Since the radial menu's will be changeable in this XP. Will it be possible for module builders to create their own spells (normal and epic) and allow the players to choose them?

5) It reads in the Epic HB that when a spellcaster is lucky he can negate an epic spell with Greater Dispelling (when he's very lucky that is), and there's Mordenkainen + Epic Counterspelling. Could you tell us if it's possible to counterspell epic spells? And will the system to do this be the same .. or will you need Epic Counterspelling for it?

6) That brings another question. Can the same epic spell be selected multiple times, thus allowing you to cast more epic spells a day?
When looking at the counterspelling issue you'll need more then one universal counterspell to keep counterspelling. If we only receive one universal counterspell then why even bother getting it?

1. Both
2. No
3. No
4. Yes
5. epic spells can't be counterspelled.
6. no

More on Epic Spells:

Quote: Anyone know how Epic spell slots are being handled then? Are they just going to be considered 9th level spells? I must admit, I am little disappointed to learn there will be no spell slots above 9th, and probably no intensify spell feat either. I'm guessing it has more to do with the engine then the folks at Bioware taking it upon themeselves to "nerf" Epic Spellcasters. At least, I hope thats the case.

- Epic spells are treated completely different, they have their own Epic Spell Radial Menu, and have "epic" level, not 10th or 9th or whatever.

- Saves against Epic Spells are calculated 20 + relevant ability score

Btw, Wizards get the Great Intelligence Feat on their Epic Bonus Feats List....

Monsters: A) The monsters spawned are not dependend on PC level, they are tied to the encounter table used in the area.

B) The system was developed for HotU and all encounter tables inside are tailored toward specific levels in the campaign. You can expand the 2da file or even use your own one (it works on the server only, no hakpak required).

c) The system can be configured via editing 2das, parameters include a day / night percentage for spawning a monster each rest, the monster(s) to spawn, whether the system should try to have the monsters rush in through the nearest door or not, and some other parameters.

Keep in mind that the system was written for the HotU campaign and while you easily can use it for your own modules, it wasn't specifically designed with community modules in mind (i.e it does not support multiplayer situations).

Line Of Sight Function: We got a new function LineOfSightObject which can tell you if there is line of sight between two objects.

Editing Feats: Spells can already be edited, ever since NWN was released. Some feats can be edited (i.e. Turn Undead), as they work like spells, others are Hardcoded and can't be edited. HotU will make the creation of New Spells and Feats through the custom content community easier, but creating spells and feats will never be officially supported and you will never see any official "wizards" or toolset features for that.

Whirlwind: No. Once you start whirlwind you have to finish it before you can move somewhere else, its a full round action. You can't really abort a whirlwind in PnP either.

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New Hordes of the Underdark Spell Revealed
Posted Tuesday, November 25, 2003 - 23:50 CET by Sorcerer

Here's the latest new Hordes of the Underdark spell revealed by BioWare this week:

Shelgarn's Persistant Blade

Caster Level(s): Wizard / Sorcerer 1
Innate Level: 1
School: Evocation
Descriptor(s): Summoned Item
Component(s): Verbal, Somatic
Range: Short
Area of Effect / Target: Point
Duration: 1 Round / 2 Levels
Additional Counter Spells:
Save: None
Spell Resistance: No

The caster summons a dagger that acts as a faithful and loyal servant.

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SP Happenings #25
Posted Tuesday, November 25, 2003 - 20:55 CET by Sorcerer

Believe it or not, the SP merchandise package I've been waiting for for so long finally arrived last week. I'm quite happy with the overall quality and really only found one thing that bothered me, and I think that was the printer's error, so I'm looking into it (nothing tragic, only a slight misalignment of the prints on one of the items).

Most of the people who applied for the online walkthrough writer positions on SP the last time the call was put out have disappointed me (either by failing to write the walkthroughs, or by disappearing completely), so a few new online walkthrough writer positions are available. Veldrin, the news poster who did general news from time to time, as well as Neverwinter Nights forum news, has disappeared as well, so I'm also looking for substitute news posters. Anyone interested in any of the mentioned positions should check this page to learn what the requirements are.

In light of Microsoft's plan to integrate a pop-up blocker in the next version of Internet Explorer, the ad positions in the new SP design had to be reevaluated. Since currently pop-ups are the only real source of advertising income for SP (and they've been removed from the front page and the forums already, so they bring in little as it is), we had planned to use the same approach in the new design. However, if this proves impossible (or too hard to do) in the future, we will need a viable alternative. This is probably going to be the 300×250 medium rectangle ad, since the size would work with our new design, and be still less annoying than those jumbo banners some sites are using.

Though this long delay in getting the new design up has some bad sides, there have certainly been plenty of good ones as well. Over the course of the last few months, many more changes had been made to the otherwise complete code that will make my life much easier in the future. Changes like the ad one described above affect the code on all pages, so implementing them from the start is much easier than going around replacing parts of the code later.

Incidentally, the next site update will probably occur by the end of next week.

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Yet More Hordes of the Underdark Screenshots at Neverwinter Vault
Posted Tuesday, November 25, 2003 - 18:59 CET by Yerril

Neverwinter Vault have posted the latest in their recent flood of screenshots from the upcoming Neverwinter Nights expansion, this time detailing the updated toolset. See them here.

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Gamespot Preview Hordes of the Underdark
Posted Tuesday, November 25, 2003 - 18:53 CET by Yerril

Gamespot have posted their preview of the upcoming Neverwinter Nights expansion, Hordes of the Underdark. Here's what they said:

The new expansion pack has a number of different features, including a new single-player adventure of 15-to-20 hours in length, like the previous expansion's single-player game. Hordes will also feature brand-new enhancements, like six new prestige classes that include the champion of Torm, a beefed-up paladin, and the palecaster, a magician who specializes in necromancy. These classes can be used in the earlier campaigns, as can the more than 50 new feats and 40 new spells. Hordes also gives players greater control for personalizing their characters, as there are new portraits, voice sets, and character models available. Additionally, there's even a way to dye your equipment now so that you can coordinate your armor's colors, which is a must for today's fashion-conscious adventurer.

See the whole article here.

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Hordes of the Underdark Preview at ActionTrip
Posted Tuesday, November 25, 2003 - 18:46 CET by Yerril

ActionTrip have posted their "hands-on" preview of the upcoming Neverwinter Nights expansion, Hordes of the Underdark. Here's what they said:

As an improvement over Shadows of Undrentide, the developers decided to incorporate a fast-paced opening, filled with a variety of missions, side-quests, new monsters, and a whole bunch of NPC’s, to keep you on your toes right from the start. We were rather pleased with this step up, due to which players won’t have to wait too long before tasting some of the new content. But, before delving into the gameplay itself, we spent some time testing the character creation system. In its basic form, the character creation system is very similar to the one we saw in the original game and SoU, so NWN fans won’t have any difficulties getting through the process. Everything is intuitive and easy to master, so it shouldn’t be a big problem for those of you who are less experienced in the ways of RPG lore. The time around, you’re able to experiment with new prestige classes, new portraits, new heads, and new voicesets. Another interesting thing is that the single-player campaign was designed strictly for level 15+ characters. There shouldn’t be any worries if you don’t have one, seeing as the game levels-up any character automatically at the beginning, regardless of its experience and appointed prestige class.

The full article can be found here.

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Brief Hordes of the Underdark Review at Neverwinter Vault
Posted Monday, November 24, 2003 - 20:02 CET by Yerril

Neverwinter Vault have posted a small review of the upcoming Neverwinter Nights expansion, Hordes of the Underdark, alongside some new screenshots of wings and tails. Here's what they said:

The improved graphics and cutscenes really stand out and there are a lot of very challenging battles, though I wouldn't consider myself a master player by any stretch of the imagination. On the downside, the campaign definitely was more combat orientated and I would have enjoyed more roleplaying experiences. Not that I don't like combat but there were a lot of cool scenarios I would have enjoyed exploring more with the characters. While I'm not a big fan of puzzles just for the sake of having puzzles, thankfully Hordes didn't go overboard in that area. I have to admit there were a few that had me thinking, but I would expect most experienced players won't find too much trouble. Unless of course they are playing on 3 hours sleep, in which case the brain gets pretty numb, and you'll probably make mistakes like healing your enemies...sigh.

Read the rest of the article here, and find the screenshots here.

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Temple of Elemental Evil Review at Boomtown
Posted Sunday, November 23, 2003 - 21:08 CET by Yerril

Boomtown have reviewed The Temple of Elemental Evil, with fairly positive results. The final score is 7 out of 10. Here's what they said:

Fortunately the single player mission is long and winding with plenty of sub-quests to be had, that it should keep most gamers going for some time. The game has been well written and doesn’t really suffer from a lack of a human dungeon master, except in the handling of non-player party members. You can recruit two other team members from locals in Hommlet and these are generally hired for a share of the loot. The problem with not having a human DM is that the recruits immediately take their share of the loot as soon as battle is over, which means that they often take essential quest items which they will sell to merchants so that you can buy them back at an inflated price. At least with a DM you can barter with these characters or get in for the loot first.

See the whole article here.

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Hordes of the Underdark Heads at GameSpy
Posted Sunday, November 23, 2003 - 21:03 CET by Yerril

GameSpy have a collection of screenshots of brand new character features in the upcoming Neverwinter Nights expansion, Hordes of the Underdark. They include new portraits, voice sets, and even screenshots of new heads for use with your character. Head on down this way to check them out.

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More Hordes of the Underdark Visuals at IGN.com
Posted Sunday, November 23, 2003 - 13:53 CET by Yerril

IGN.com have posted a few new visuals from the upcoming Neverwinter Nights expansion, Hordes of the Underdark.

- Firstly, a collection of brand new screenshots.
- Secondly, a video of a robed character moving about as the day turns to night.

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Bonus Creatures with Hordes of the Underdark Pre-Orders
Posted Sunday, November 23, 2003 - 13:46 CET by Yerril

IGN Gamestore and EBGames are offering exclusive downloadable creatures when you pre-order the upcoming Neverwinter Nights expansion, Hordes of the Underdark. Do note, however, that this "exclusive" material will be available to everyone later, via the NWN patch updates, so you won't miss anything by not buying your copy at either of these vendors.

- Pre-order at Gamestore, and you'll be able to download the Bulette - details here.
- Pre-order at EBGames, and you'll get the Troglodyte Warrior - details here.

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Yet More Hordes of the Underdark Visuals at Neverwinter Vault
Posted Sunday, November 23, 2003 - 13:39 CET by Yerril

Recently, Neverwinter Vault have been posting a number of visuals from the upcoming Neverwinter Nights expansion, Hordes of the Underdark. They are as follows:

- A short article, featuring screenshots, concerning an in-depth look at the use of robes in the expansion. It can be found here.
- A whole bunch of screenshots featuring robes on female characters, found here.

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Just RPG Review The Temple of Elemental Evil
Posted Saturday, November 22, 2003 - 20:05 CET by Yerril

Just RPG have posted their review of The Temple of Elemental Evil, after having installed the patch, with a mostly positive result. The final score given is 85%. Here's what they said:

All the D&D 3.5 combat options are available to the player, though you could play the game without getting into all the presented complexity by simply selecting simple attack, defend, spell casting, and item usage commands. For the player who wants to have the true D&D experience, you can make reasoned decisions like whether to launch a full attack, fight defensively, ready a spell again another spell, feint, and plenty of other interesting choices. And, the object of all this anger is the ubiquitous, over 100, D&D monster adversaries.

Read the rest here.

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Temple of Elemental Evil Review at Gamer's Pulse
Posted Saturday, November 22, 2003 - 20:00 CET by Yerril

Gamer's Pulse have reviewed The Temple of Elemental Evil, and have given the game a final score of 35 out of 50. This equates to 70%, for the less mathematically inclined, and places Troika's offering in the "Above Average" category. Here's what they said:

Temple of Elemental Evil’s greatest feat of originality is its alignment system. Before beginning your quest, you must decide whether you want your party to be lawful, true (will break law when necessary), or chaotic and whether you wish to be good, neutral, or evil. After making your decision, you must then choose from one to five members who will comprise your party. The kick here is that every member of the party must be in accordance with the alignment you originally chose. Even in a fantasy setting, this adds a bit of realism, as you cannot have both a psychotic ogre and an upright, noble knight in the same party. The game comes replete with a few created characters, but it’s also a ball to make your own. There are a plethora of choices to make in regards to character creation, including seven races, more than a dozen classes, and even the character’s favorite God. Unfortunately, the only feature missing from the creation process is appearance. It is a tad frustrating that you have no say in what style helmet your dwarven warrior wears or what color panties your Amazon princess prefers.

Read the rest here.

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New Hordes of the Underdark Visuals at Neverwinter Vault
Posted Thursday, November 20, 2003 - 20:36 CET by Yerril

Neverwinter Vault have posted some brand new visuals of the upcoming Neverwinter Nights expansion, Hordes of the Underdark. Firstly, some new screenshots, featuring yet more sky, which can be found here. Secondly, an animation, in several sizes, of a character fighting an Hill Giant with a whip, found here.

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Neverwinter Wednesday
Posted Thursday, November 20, 2003 - 19:16 CET by Sorcerer

Another week's around and here are the latest NWN Wednesday goodies:

Pale Master Prestige Class
NWN: Hordes of the Underdark will be in stores Dec 2 and includes 6 new Prestige Classes! For those who desire power over undead, the pale master draws on a font of special lore that provides a macabre power all its own. Discuss.


ScriptEase... Non-Scripters Unite!
The ability to design complicated, engaging, and exciting modules using all the crazy scripting power of the Aurora Toolset is now within reach. A group of talented programmers at the University of Alberta has created the answer to our non-programming dreams - ScriptEase! There is also a step-by-step tutorial with lots of screenshots to get you started on this powerful software. Discuss.

Hordes Wallpaper, Spell, and Feats!
In celebration of the Dec 2 release date for Hordes of the Underdark, download some shiny new Hordes wallpaper! Next, head over to RPG Vault and drool over 3 new Epic level feats, including Improved Ki Strike and Overwhelming Critical, and then visit your favorite fan site (check below) to find details on the newest spell, Death Armor! Discuss.

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Last Week's Poll's Results
Posted Thursday, November 20, 2003 - 13:27 CET by Sorcerer

What we asked:

Q: What aspect of audio do you find adds most to the atmosphere of a CRPG?
(292 votes total)

Music (122) 42%
Spoken dialogue (84) 29%
Ambient sound (62) 21%
Sound effects (17) 6%
I don't care about audio in CRPGs (7) 2%

Not surprisingly, the majority of people who voted in the poll (42%) find that music adds most to the atmosphere of a CRPG.

The next big group of votes goes to spoken dialogue (29%), which is also very popular as far as adding to the atmosphere goes.

Ambient sound got a few votes less, but is still the aspect of audio 21% of people believe adds most to the atmosphere of a CRPG.

Only 6% of people are convinced that sound effects contribute the most to the atmosphere. Finally, a minute 2% of poll participants don't care about audio in CRPGs at all.

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Temple of Elemental Evil Review at GameOver
Posted Wednesday, November 19, 2003 - 20:14 CET by Yerril

GameOver have posted their review of The Temple of Elemental Evil, giving it a final score of 74%. Here's what they said:

Luckily, the TTOEE engine handles combat well. Battle moves are fun to watch (fighting gelatinous cubes is especially cool), there are a bunch of different types of enemies to kill (including some fairly exotic creatures like lamias and leucrottas), and there are a lot of different combinations of characters you can have in your party, with numerous ways of developing those characters, giving you all sorts of strategic options for how you want to deal with enemies. Do you sneak around and backstab monsters, or splash them with spells, or just wade in with fighters and whack them to death? Plus, because you can have up to eight characters in your party, the battles are much larger than you usually see, and that changes strategy as well because you have to be more careful with how you manage your spells, and how you position your party. In some games you never have to heal during combat, but in TTOEE it’s almost guaranteed.

Read the rest here.

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Neverwinter Nights Nominated for a BAFTA
Posted Wednesday, November 19, 2003 - 20:03 CET by Yerril

Neverwinter Nights has been nominated for a BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Arts) Games Award, in the Multiplayer category. The nominees in this category are:

Battlefield 1942
Eyetoy: Play
Moto GP2
Neverwinter Nights
Project Gotham Racing 2
Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory

See all the categories and nominations here.

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New Hordes of the Underdark Spell Revealed
Posted Wednesday, November 19, 2003 - 19:33 CET by Sorcerer

Check out the latest new HotU spell BioWare revealed this week:

Death Armor

Caster Level(s): Wizard / Sorcerer 2
Innate Level: 2
School: Necromancy
Descriptor(s): Magical Armor
Component(s): Verbal, Somatic
Range: Personal
Area of Effect / Target: Caster
Duration: 1 round / level
Additional Counter Spells:
Save: Will negates
Spell Resistance: Yes

You are surrounded with a magical aura that injures creatures that contact it. Any creature striking you with its body or handheld weapon takes 1d4 points of damage +1 point per 2 caster levels (maximum +5).

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SP Happenings #24
Posted Wednesday, November 19, 2003 - 1:02 CET by Sorcerer

Well, if I forgot to say anything important last week, it sure doesn't come to mind this time either. My tooth is much better now (only hurts when I eat), but I'll still try to get rid of the nuisance first chance I get. Things have been very busy for me in real life over the last week, so apart from taking care of the current SP matters, I didn't get much done on the new design. Slowly, but surely, the thing is shaping up, but the main problem is I can only work on it from time to time, so you can imagine this means not getting much done in any reasonable time frame. Along with the current upkeep that SP demands, the redesign unfortunately always comes second. The next month and a half will be especially busy for me at the university, so I can divine that the redesign certainly won't be finished in this time.

There is hope, however. In the middle of January and extending for a month or so, my uni holidays will come up, so if not before, I'll be able to work like crazy on the redesign at that point, and should be able to finish it in the time available. This, of course, means pushing even more content to wait for the redesign (everything but the most important stuff), so by the time the new design goes up, I'll already have a ton of stuff piled up, waiting for site updates. Which should keep me busy for the next few months after the new design goes up. So much for having some extra time to actually play games after the new design goes up...

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Hordes of the Underdark Trailer Available
Posted Tuesday, November 18, 2003 - 14:34 CET by Sorcerer

Atari has given me clearance to post the last Hordes of the Underdark trailer on SP, so grab it here. I have compressed the file which was originally 40MB to 30MB (using WinRAR), so it should be easier to download for those of you on slower connections. The trailer itself is about 70 seconds long (QuickTime format) and shows off various Hordes of the Underdark areas, spells, monsters etc.

Note to any other sites/people that would link to this trailer on SP: Please link to the front page or this news article, and DO NOT hotlink to the file directly. Our bandwidth is not unlimited.

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Hordes of the Underdark Gone Gold!
Posted Tuesday, November 18, 2003 - 12:31 CET by Sorcerer

I have received word from Atari's Senior Public Relations Manager, Brandon Smith, that the second Neverwinter Nights expansion, Hordes of the Underdark, has just gone gold and will be in stores next month. The official press release should be available shortly.

In case you haven't yet, you can pre-order HotU here.

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SP Exclusive: Review of the Zboard Keyset for Neverwinter Nights
Posted Friday, November 14, 2003 - 22:31 CET by Sorcerer

Ideazon, the makers of those custom gaming & application keyboards you've probably heard or read about before, have been kind enough to send us their Zboard starter system, along with a keyset made specifically for Neverwinter Nights (and expansions). Our own Blackthorne TA got his hands on this set, reviewed it - and wouldn't give it back!

Here's a snip from the review:

"The really great thing about this Zboard NWN keyset is that all the keys are fully labelled. I had to rummage around all over in the NWN instruction manual and the quick-reference card to find all the information present on the interface at your fingertips. I hadn't even known that the numeric keypad was a radial menu interface until I saw it labelled. I then checked the NWN instruction manual and found that it was actually documented there, and I just hadn't noticed."

You can read the whole review here.

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TIME Magazine Rates Temple of Elemental Evil in Top Ten Games
Posted Thursday, November 13, 2003 - 22:21 CET by Yerril

TIME magazine, as reported on the official Atari forums, have rated The Temple of Elemental Evil number six on their top ten games of 2003. Here's what they said:

A vintage adventure game gets its computerized revival -- no dice necessary

Remember Dungeons & Dragons, that game for anyone who was too smart for his own good in high school and didn't have a date on Friday night? Time was, you needed a pencil, books of character information, a sturdy imagination, similarly afflicted friends, and the ever-present 20-sided dice to play the game.

Not anymore. Temple of Elemental Evil (PC, $45, Atari) is a computerized homage to one of the best-loved adventure games of all time, enhanced with up-to-date graphics. As with the original, loading up your character (and up to four fellow adventurers) with your choice of spells and skills is almost as fun as the action itself. Your goal for the game depends on these choices: make yourself morally good, and you must rescue a missing elf princess from the eponymous temple; choose the path of the evildoers, and you may end up taking over the place. If Dungeons & Dragons had been this much fun, the geeks would have had a lot more dates.

See the thread here.

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Latest Circle of Eight Modification Pack
Posted Thursday, November 13, 2003 - 21:41 CET by Yerril

Circle of Eight have released their latest Temple of Elemental Evil Modification Pack. It features several fixes, including the following:

-Updated all files to be compatible with the official ToEE patch
-Removed several assorted spell fixes rendered redundant by the patch
-Removed NPC looting fix (NPC looting fixed in patch)
-Fix for Masterwork Light Crossbow size
-Scather changed to medium weapon 1d10 rather than large weapon 2d6

You can download it here.

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Neverwinter Wednesday
Posted Thursday, November 13, 2003 - 20:12 CET by Sorcerer

Another week's around and here are the latest NWN Wednesday goodies:

Robes and Skies Screenshots!
The beauty of the open night sky is upon us! Check out the new Hordes of the Underdark screenshots featuring Robes and Skies, including a new panorama image showing a day to night sky transition! Discuss.

Eyeball, Feats, and New Wallpaper!
Known for causing a lot of embarrassing running and screaming in seasoned adventures who mistake it for its soul-devouring older cousin the Beholder, the Eyeball has been posted to fan sites (check below). A new wallpaper featuring the Drow Matron is now available, and RPG Vault has also released 3 new Epic level feats. Discuss.

Deekin's Big Adventure Part 3
Hordes of the Underdark will take adventurers to the vile, lightless world of festering evil and corpulent nightmares fashioned from horrors undreamt. Who better to brave this dark world of creeping malice and lurking doom? Deekin of course! Check out Part 3 of Deekin's Big Adventure! Discuss.

Module Contest Update - 11 Finalists!
The submission date for the NWVault Module Contest to create a module that bridges the Shadows and Hordes expansions has past, and the final entries are in! There are a total of 11 qualifying adventures and voting will tentatively take place at the end of the month (details soon). So start playing today and note your favorites! Discuss.

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Last Week's Poll's Results
Posted Thursday, November 13, 2003 - 20:01 CET by Sorcerer

What we asked:

Q: Do you think all games should also have a demo version available?
(292 votes total)

Yes, definitely (178) 61%
Not all of them, depends on the game (77) 26%
No, I think demos are not needed (37) 13%

The majority of the people who voted in the poll (61%) think that all games should definitely also have a demo version available.

26% of those who voted are a bit more lenient, allowing that not all games should also have a demo available, and that it depends on the game.

Only 13% of all poll participants think that demos are not needed at all.

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Temple of Elemental Evil Review at Game Industry News
Posted Wednesday, November 12, 2003 - 20:13 CET by Yerril

Game Industry News have posted a very complimentary review of The Temple of Elemental Evil, but as usual, have a little trouble with the bugs. Overall, though, the game is given 5 out of 5. Here's a clip:

Monsters too, look amazing. I remembered something about frogs being bad around the moathouse, one of the first dungeons you will find. But when a giant frog burst out of the marsh and entangled my cleric in its tongue, everything became clear again. I had to crush the frog before it swallowed my party members!

Read the rest here.

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BioWare Releases New HotU Creature
Posted Wednesday, November 12, 2003 - 19:18 CET by Sorcerer

The latest new Hordes of the Underdark beast revealed is the beholder's little brother, the:

Eyeball

Known for causing a lot of embarrassing running and screaming in seasoned adventures who mistake this monster for its soul-devouring older cousin the Beholder, it is much less powerful and should not be feared by veterans of the deep dungeon. Intrepid mages can even take along an Eyeball as a familiar!

AC: 17
Hit Points: 5
Abilities:
Str 6
Dex 16
Con 9
Int 3
Wis 10
Char 10
CR: 2
Alignment: Neutral Evil
Class: 1 Aberration
Special Abilities: Eyestalk ray attack

Check out a close-up shot of the monster:

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SP Happenings #23
Posted Tuesday, November 11, 2003 - 23:48 CET by Sorcerer

Let me tell you the tale of my day... To begin this day of hell, I got a parking ticket early in the morning, then at one of my English seminars, got a lousy schedule for a presentation on a dead boring topic. After I got back from uni, I went to my dentist because one of my wisdom teeth is growing sideways into my other teeth (talk about a scary x-ray), and was told it'll have to be removed... After that, Satan's Bride (my brute of a dentist) gives me three injections and starts cutting up the flesh around the tooth and jolting it around. At that point, I didn't really feel anything yet. Of course, after I came home, the injections started to wear off... I was lying on my bed for 5 hours thinking I will literally go crazy because the pain was so excruciating I was crying for the whole 5 hours. Finally, over the last couple of hours the pain started to subside a bit so I could eat the first thing today... or better, drink. Soup. Because my mouth is still so swollen I can't even properly close it, let alone chew anything. To top this wonderful day, a package I sent to someone got returned because the ****** wouldn't take it and I had to pay for the postage there and back. Also, carrying some wood I got a splinter in my right index finger that went in so deep I had to cut open half of the finger to get it out. In short, I've had better days.

The screenshot of the new design that I promised last week has been delayed for a while longer at least, since we have made some last minute changes to the design and unfortunately it is not ready for public presentation yet. Due to my suffering from terrible toothache yesterday (continuation of that is described above), I was not really able to put the SP merch store up as promised. I still haven't received the samples myself, but as I was assured they look great, I'm confident enough to open the store now. Be sure to check out the Sorcerer's Place Merchandise Shoppe, and leave your feedback in this thread on our boards. Huge thanks to Gopher for his exceptional work on designing all this stuff according to my wishes.

Well, I'm sure I'm forgetting some things which I still wanted to put in this week's Happenings, but my tooth simply hurts too much at present for me to be able to concentrate on anything, so whatever I've missed now will be dealt with next week.

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Hordes of the Underdark Preview at PC.IGN
Posted Tuesday, November 11, 2003 - 20:26 CET by Yerril

PC.IGN have posted another preview of the second Neverwinter Nights expansion, Hordes of the Underdark. Here's what they said:

The team has put a lot of time into enhancing the graphical appeal of the game as well, which is saying a lot since Neverwinter Nights is still beautiful to look at. One slight -- although noteworthy -- addition is that of robes, which waft and wave as your character moves. Shirts and pants may be fine for common farmers, but what's a true spellcaster doing walking around without his fanciful robe blowing in the wind? The robes are brand new, but the entire game is getting a slight facelift. The items and character models in Hordes contain about one and half times more polygons than the original art from Neverwinter Nights, so you can expect smoother, less blocky looking objects.

Read the rest here.

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Temple of Elemental Evil Patch - Out Now!
Posted Tuesday, November 11, 2003 - 20:12 CET by Yerril

Atari have finally released the long-awaited patch for the Temple of Elemental Evil. Alongside a huge list of fixes, you can find it here.

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Shadows of Undrentide Review at Warcry
Posted Sunday, November 9, 2003 - 23:22 CET by Yerril

Warcry have posted their review of the original Neverwinter Nights expansion, Shadows of Undrentide. Here's what they said:

The scenario/module design tool that comes with NWN and NWN Shadows of Undrentide is fantastic. Like NWN, it’s finally a way for gamers to share their vision of D&D with their friends visually rather than just through verbal communication. Don't get me wrong here, I'm still all for a good PnP adventure where I get together with all my gaming buddies and go storm a castle or take down a dragon in its lair. But the ability to supplement that with the Worldbuilder, or to share your game with people all over the world is almost a dream come true.

Read the rest here.

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Korea Trip Movies - Gelatinous Cube Included
Posted Sunday, November 9, 2003 - 23:17 CET by Yerril

Neverwinter Vault have posted three new movies from Bioware's tour of Korea.

The first features joint CEO Dr. Ray Muzyka giving a presentation on the first Neverwinter Nights expansion, Shadows of Undrentide. This can be found here.

The second is a presentation on the upcoming second expansion, Hordes of the Underdark. It features a brand new monster, the Gelatinous Cube, including its gruesome method of devouring adventureres. This can be found here.

Finally, for those of little patience or slow connection, there is a short "Pure Cube" movie. This is essentially a shorter version of the above, concentrating only on the new monster. This one can be found here.

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BioWare Return from Korean Tour
Posted Sunday, November 9, 2003 - 22:58 CET by Yerril

BioWare have recently returned from a tour of Korea, during which they showcased both of the Neverwinter Nights expansions - Shadows of Undrentide and Hordes of the Underdark. Visit the official article here for more information, and some nifty screenshots of Korean NWN!

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Neverwinter Nights Forum News
Posted Sunday, November 9, 2003 - 4:01 CET by Veldrin

Here are today's Neverwinter Nights forum highlights. Please take into account that these are only single parts of various threads and should not be taken out of context. Bear in mind also that the posts presented here are copied as-is, and that any bad spelling and grammar does not get corrected on our end.

Georg Zoeller, Designer

Live Team: There is a lot of Live Team stuff that will hit the community with HotU/1.33:

- user talktables
- hakpak conflict analyzer
- extended store functionality
- won't tell
- won't tell
- ...

The Live Team was quite busy with that stuff (in addition to creating patches, etc) - that's the reason why there were no "new content" releases after Shadows.

Quote: I'd love it if the shapes would be almost as good as their real specialist counterpart (eg. fighting shape vs fighter), since you don't get all items transferred, can't use any items beside potions, and so on. Then again, a mind flayer would do the job.

That would take away the point of playing one of the other classes I guess. No a properly built fighter will always be more powerful than a shifter shapeshifted into a fighting form, but the shifter combined with any druid buffs or special abilities he might have from another class isn't bad either. Plus they have the flexibility of just jumping into mindflayer shape and blasting those with a low willsave

To use a shifter NPC with the AI need to do a custom AI script. The default AI doesn't handle shifting as it doesn't handle polymorph or a druid's shapeshifting ability now - the reasons for this are multiple and anyone a bit deeper into AI scripting will be able to explain them to you if you are interested. The good thing is that HotU makes it much easier to write a custom AI.

Bard Song: Depending on which route you go, you actually may Not want to pick lingering song/lasting inspiration. Why? If you want to make extensive use of the damaging effect of curse song, you want the duration to be as short as possible, as creatures that are affected by the song will not take damage from singing the song again until the song has expired. However, with lasting inspiration you can make pretty sure that the debuff effect of curse song/buff effect of bard song lasts as long as possible ... your choice.

Quote: If they implement the D&D maths correctly for bonus stacking, it's 105 rounds with lingering song. Any multiplcation is done on the original unmodified number, and THEN flat additions are added.

It's 105.

Visual Effects: You could overwrite the mdl files for original ones, but yes, Astorax is correct, anything that is a ProgFx (-> VisualEffects.2da) is hardcoded. HotU will add a variety of new beams (no sound versions of existing ones, no sparks version for some, black and green beams, a flamethrower beam and a "metal chain" beam).

Trent Oster, Producer

Dwarven Defender: As a Dwarven Defender I never stepped out without my handy dandy Dwarven Waraxe. It is a new base weapon, but it uses the battle axle appearance type. We added a few new battle axe graphics to fill out the set though.

Adamantium Golem: When you meet up with the Adamantium Golem it goes very badly for you very quickly. I wandered in and was quickly knocked down and stepped on until dead. My advise is save often!

David Gaider, Designer

Campaign: With such a short campaign, the chance of having class-specific content is pretty low... the chance of having prestige class-specific is almost nil. Ergo, no quests in the HotU OC will recognize the fact you are a shifter or what form you are in... it IS scriptable, however, as shifting forms does change your actual racial type.

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Temple of Elemental Evil Interview at Gamespot
Posted Saturday, November 8, 2003 - 19:37 CET by Yerril

Gamespot have interviewed a number of the development team from The Temple of Elemental Evil. There's a lot about the demo, but almost nothing about the patch. Here's a clip:

While we made ToEE, we played a lot of pen and paper D&D around the office. Anytime we found something frustrating, or confusing we tried to remember it, and focused on making it so the game would abstract out that confusion as much as possible to make the game that much more enjoyable. When I play ToEE, I'm reminded of our gaming sessions, and [I say to myself], this is the way D&D should be played, with all of the fun and fantasy and not too much of the gritty detail getting in the way. It is still there, if you look under the hood (the geek in me enjoys that).

Read the rest here.

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The Temple of Elemental Evil Demo Released
Posted Saturday, November 8, 2003 - 18:57 CET by Sorcerer

As promised yesterday, Atari has released the demo of ToEE today. It lets you explore the moathouse map with precreated characters and also includes a tutorial. The whole thing weighs in at 218MB, and can be downloaded here.

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Another Temple of Elemental Evil Review at DeadAlfs
Posted Friday, November 7, 2003 - 23:26 CET by Yerril

DeadAlfs have posted yet another review of The Temple of Elemental Evil, which finds the game overall quite enjoyable, although very buggy and complex. The game is given a final score of 7 out of 10. Here's what they said:

This all sounds very negative, but then I guess that’s beta testing for you. The actual content of the game is strong; the combat is both engaging and authentic; and debuting features like the modified 3.5 rules and Item creation feats will go down enormously well with the hardcore D&D elite. The mixture of pre-rendered backgrounds and highly detailed - albeit tiny - polygonal characters is very pleasing to the eye and the music is suitably fantastic. Those who have been waiting for a proper representation of D&D on the PC and who don’t mind filling in the odd blank here and there will get a lot out of ToEE. It’s just the other 95% of the gaming population that should steer clear…

Read the rest here.

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Temple of Elemental Evil Review at Gamer's Hell
Posted Friday, November 7, 2003 - 23:18 CET by Yerril

Gamer's Hell have posted their review of The Temple of Elemental Evil, and give it a total score of 7.5 out of 10. Unusually, the review tends to focus on the strict adherance to D&D rules, rather than the endless hordes of bugs in the game. Here's a clip:

Roleplaying hardcore gamers will fall in deep love with this game, yet inexperienced adventures could be driven away by the complex rules as they are perfectly crafted into the game. A game truly not for the broad masses but for specialists – but they will kill for it.

Read the rest here.

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The Temple of Elemental Evil Demo - Tomorrow!
Posted Friday, November 7, 2003 - 1:22 CET by Sorcerer

We have just received word from Atari that the demo of The Temple of Elemental Evil will be available tomorrow! Check out the details:

THE TEMPLE OF ELEMENTAL EVIL DEMO AVAILABLE TOMORROW

Classic RPG Demo to First Appear on GameSpot's New Downloading Destination -- DLX

Atari today revealed that the demo for it's recently released The Temple of Elemental Evil for PC CD-ROM will be available tomorrow via GameSpot's new downloading system DLX http://dlx.gamespot.com. The demo will also be hosted at www.atari.com later that same day. Based on a module developed by Dungeons & Dragons creator Gary Gygax, The Temple of Elemental Evil represents the first interactive role-playing game set in the popular World of Greyhawk. Developed by Troika Games, The Temple of Elemental Evil will feature an exciting party-based, single player campaign, an engaging storyline based on the classic D&DŽ adventure of the same name as well as a faithful translation of the latest 3.5 edition rules.

The Temple of Elemental Evil is now available at retail stores nationwide with an estimated retail price of $49.95 and an ESRB rating of "T" for Teen. Additional information about The Temple of Elemental Evil can be found online at www.greyhawkgame.com, which features message boards, wallpapers, screenshots, game play information and much more.

Well, there you have it. I presume the demo will come with the patch fixes already incorporated...

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Evil Avatar Review Half of The Temple of Elemental Evil
Posted Thursday, November 6, 2003 - 20:46 CET by Yerril

Evil Avatar have posted a feature entitled "Half-Time Show" on The Temple of Elemental Evil, which is essentially a review based on the first half of the game. There is a lot of praise, but some harsh criticism for the numerous bugs. Here's what they said:

NPCs that join your party will drive you crazy. If you loot a body, they will get first pick of everything, taking what they want. Many times they take the best magic items, even though they can’t use it. This is frustrating and so I will no longer invite an NPC into the party unless I have to. And then, I won’t loot anything until they are gone. I don’t mind that the NPC gets loot, but let us be able to “roll” for who gets first pick.

Read the rest here.

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Shadows of Undrentide Review at GameOver
Posted Thursday, November 6, 2003 - 20:39 CET by Yerril

GameOver have posted their review of the first Neverwinter Nights expansion, Shadows of Undrentide. Overall, the game is given 80%. Here's what they said:

That’s a problem because the game is horribly slow at low levels. Since BioWare is sticking to Dungeons & Dragons rules, low-level characters only attack ten times a minute, but they miss most of the time, and so battles take forever to get through. It was smart of BioWare to leapfrog characters to level three in the Neverwinter Nights campaign, but in Shadows of Undrentide, not only do you have to play those first two levels, you have to do it without any sort of useful equipment. As a result, the campaign starts out slow-paced and difficult, but then gets very easy at the end after the campaign designers toss around all sorts of good equipment in the final chapter.

Read the rest here.

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Last Week's Poll's Results
Posted Thursday, November 6, 2003 - 15:24 CET by Sorcerer

What we asked:

Q: Did The Temple of Elemental Evil's reported bugs deter you from buying it at this point?
(337 votes total)

Yes, they did (130) 39%
I've never thought about buying it (yet) (85) 25%
No, they didn't (80) 24%
I had it pre-ordered or got it before I knew about the bugs (42) 12%

Well, the poll results clearly show that Atari didn't do themselves any favours by not extending Troika's deadline on the completion of the game. 39% of people who voted in our poll indicated that the plethora of bugs the game shipped with deterred them from buying it at this point.

25% of those who voted haven't thought about buying it (yet).

On the other hand, 24% of people who voted are very forgiving, saying the reported ToEE bugs did not deter them from buying it.

Lastly, 12% of poll participants had the game pre-ordered or got it before they knew about the bugs.

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The Temple of Elemental Evil List of Fixes
Posted Thursday, November 6, 2003 - 10:55 CET by Sorcerer

Believe it or not, the first (and only? that's the question) ToEE patch will contain nearly 200 bug fixes. The list was originally posted by Steve Moret in this thread on the Atari boards, but you can also read it whole here (if you don't fall asleep before you get to the end):

Patch Fixes:

[quests]
---
* Mona orb quest fixed so that she will always recognize and accept the orb's return to complete her quest.
* Romag now recognizes when you return to him if while doing his quest Rentsch is killed.
* Pishella's dialog updated so that she consistently says the PC's have four days to destroy Zuggtmoy after the skull is destroyed.
* Can no longer tell Hedrack that Scorpp has been killed to get to the end game if Scorpp is NOT dead.
* Can no longer offer Skole's violet garnet to Lodriss if Skole's quest is just mentioned and you do not have the garnet.
* Antonio will allow you to place dice with him again if you are doing quests for Alrrem and exit the dialog the first time you play without winning.
* Belsornig now marks the Oohlgrist quest as botched if you kill the troll or have already convinced him to join Alrrem
* Poison vial from Belsornig must be left in Alrrem to complete the quest (you can no longer just insert it and then remove it)
* Rannos Davl will now continue the Chaotic Evil vignette conversation with the player after the moathouse has been cleared.
---

[spells]
---
* produce flame can no longer be cast multiple times in the first round it is cast.
* touch attack spells no longer allow infinite actions in the first round they are cast.
* magic weapon, greater magic weapon, magic vestment, and keen edge are no longer permanent.
* animate dead now makes the target corpse drop all of its inventory before creating the specified undead creature.
* protection from evil/etc now correctly only applies invulnerability against summoned/conjured creatures of the appropriate alignment (note: elementals are not subject to this effect unless they are themselves summoned/conjured).
* magic circle against evil/etc now correctly only applies invulnerability against summoned/conjured creatures of the appropriate alignment (note: elementals are not subject to this effect unless they are themselves summoned/conjured).
* Haste now correctly gives a bonus attack with the primary weapon at the highest base attack bonus for a full attack.
* the same character can no longer be targeted more than once for Haste (which originally allowed the Haste bonuses to stack multiple times).
* the same character can no longer be targeted more than once for Slow (which originally allowed the Slow penalties to stack multiple times).
* break free is now possible with the entangle spell.
* dismiss spell now works properly with the entangle spell.
* spike stones (damaged state) now correctly responds to the Heal skill or a cure spell.
* spike stones/spike growth now damage a character after movement, rather than before (which would keep a character from moving at all in the spell's radius).
* "spell cast" signal is now properly relayed to all spell targets.
* "break free" now properly relays the correct spell ID.
* "dismiss spells" now properly relays signal to all spell targets.
* touch spells that are held as charges now properly remove themselves when the character casts another spell.
* entangle no longer spawns multiple area effect particle systems.
* softer earth and stone is no longer permanent.
* spike stones/spike growth play sound f/x correctly.
* burning hands is now correctly listed as an Evocation spell.
* see invisibile is now correctly listed as a Domain Knowledge Level 2 spell.
* discern lies is now correctly listed as a Domain Knowledge Level 4 spell.
* spike growth is now correctly listed as a Domain Plant Level 3 spell.
* spike stones has been moved to a Domain Plant Level 4 spell.
* blur is now correctly listed as a Domain Protection Level 2 spell.
* enlarge is now correctly listed as a Domain Strength Level 1 spell.
* endure elements was incorrectly listed as a Domain Strength Level 1 spell.
* endurance is now correctly listed as a Domain Travel Level 2 spell.
* haste is now correctly listed as a Domain Travel Level 3 spell.
* hide from undead is now correctly listed as a Domain Trickery Level 1 spell.
* suggestion is now correctly listed as a Domain Trickery Level 3 spell.
* mind fog is now correctly listed as a Domain Trickery Level 5 spell.
* sleet storm is now correctly listed as a Domain Water Level 3 spell.
* death ward now properly protects against Death spells (e.g. Slay Living)
* darkvision has been removed as a learnable spell.
* fixed, spell 522 (Wall of Fire) was incorrectly mapped to Glibness.
* spiritual weapon is no longer affected by adverse spell effects, such as Web.
* spiritual weapon no longer deals holy/unholy damage.
* fixed circle of doom, cure critical wounds, cure light wounds, cure moderate wounds, cure serious wounds, and cure light wounds, mass to use correct caster level check.
* fixed inflict critical wounds, inflict light wounds, inflict moderate wounds, inflict serious wounds, and inflict light wounds, mass to use correct caster level check.
* fixed slay living to use correct caster level check.
* divine favor now properly applies its bonus to damage rolls.
* true strike now properly set as a Verbal spell only.
* dismissal DC check now correct. typo in 3.5 manual-in-progress.
* cloudkill now correctly checks spell resistance before applying it's effects.
* fixed several issues of Poison damage/effects from spells versus immunities to poison.
* fixed a spell resistance check in the spell module.
* vrock spore attack now properly checks against Poison immunity.
* goodberry now heals 1 point of non-lethal damage also.
* call lightning now correctly reduces duration by 10 rounds per use.
* flame strike now correctly observes evasion/improved evasion when dealing the secondary DIVINE damage.
* spells that were previously being incorrectly reduced by Damage Reduction now deal "MAGIC" type damage, which will not be reduced by DR.
* Conjuration spells that previously were subject to Spell Resistance in 3.0 are now NOT subject to SR as in 3.5.
* Resist Energy no longer removes itself after absorbing damage, and should now absorb the correct amount of damage based on caster level.
* Protection From (Alignment) and Magic Circle against (Alignment) now properly give immunity to mind-affecting/charm spells.
* MANY scrolls were casting aid (mostly 3.5 spells), they should now cast their correct spell
* added a catch-all to remove lingering spell effects that persist after duration expires.
* Targets of command:fall now stay on the ground for 1 round as per PHB.
* Detect Undead should play a sparkle on undead now, before they just happily sat there detected but quiet.
* Lareth's ring of freedom of movement should work more like the spell now.
---


[rules]
---
* tumble now properly works for characters not in medium or heavy armor.
* evasion/improved evasion now properly works for characters not in medium or heavy armor.
* fixed bard spell failure check when not in medium or heavy armor.
* monk and barbarian fast movement fixed in regards to armor (none, light, medium, heavy).
* ranger feats related to medium and heavy armor are now correct, including two-weapon fighting.
* fast movement for barbarians and monks is now correct in regards to medium or heavy armor.
* paladin divine grace saving throw bonus is now properly adding a bonus from CHA (was CON).
* healing domain power (add +1 to caster level checks for Healing spells) should now work properly.
* fixed 1-handed/2-handed issues with dwarven waraxe.
* fixed 1-handed/2-handed issues with bastard sword.
* fixed weapon proficiency issue with bastard sword.
* fixed certain cases in which a creature was "helpless" but not eligible to be subject to a sneak attack.
* equipped shields now properly count against 2-handed (x1.5) damage with melee weapons.
* monks can now use Power Attack with unarmed strike.
* metamagic feats no longer actually increase DC checks for spells.
* using/drinking potions now correctly incurs AOO's.
* evasion/improved evasion now correctly reduce damage appropriately against an empowered damage spell
* weapon finesse updated to 3.5
* added greater weapon focus to levelup screen
* whirlwind attack no longer free after being used multiple times
* Full attacking with dual weapons now uses the correct weapon.
* cleave no longer works with whirlwind attack
* Corrected bonuses for improved two weapon fighting
* changed short swords to use proper type
* Corrected armor check penalties for masterwork armor
* corrected armor check penalties for crafted magic armor
* corrected critical hit ranges
* greater spell penetration added
* Run actions (and all such derivative actions like Charge) now correctly invalidate a 5' step after performing the action.
---

[gameplay]
---
* monsters with -1 int have been changed in protos to have an 10 int (prevents these monsters form showing up paralyzed)
* experience now awarded for monsters with CR > 24
* action system now saves/loads local spell data properly.
* "grapple" state now properly relays any associated spell ID's.
* fixed crash bug associated with the Dagger of Venom when inflicting (any) damage while wielding the Dagger of Venom.
* turn undead action plays sound f/x.
* monster now calculate their non-primary attack damage correctly.
* monsters blinded by the spell no longer take AOO's.
* fixed several inconsistencies with metamagic feat Widen Spell.
* spiritual weapon is now largely ignored by hostile monsters.
* critters can no longer cast spells when raging or under the effects of rage.
* zombies now correctly only get a partial action (in 3.0 terms).
* invisible creatures no longer incur AOO's (with exceptions, See Invisibility, etc).
* invisible creatures no longer take AOO's if doing so will remove Invisibility.
* AI now weighs invisible creatures less, as possible/viable targets.
* NPC's (controllable) no longer permanently remove themselves from the party upon dying.
* previously, there were cases where NPC's (controllable) would not attack certain monsters by just clicking on them (requiring the user to select "Single Attack" from the radial menu). fixed.
* Fixed metamagic feats Empower Spell and Maximize Spell for Healing spells.
* NPC's no longer try to sell items that belong to them. this fixes the bug allowing the player to transfer all NPC items after bartering.
* the highest appraisal score in the party is now always used when bartering (buying/selling).
* open lock checks outside of combat now Take 20.
* added Flee Combat option to Radial Menu->Movement. this is available on any map that the party transferred to via a Jumppoint Icon (i.e. N/A for Teleport or scripted map transfers). selecting this Full-Round action will incur AOO's on all party members, and then a Flee check (factors include: Survival, Character Level, Encounter CR) must be made. If successful, the entire party (including those Unconscious, Dead, or Incapacitated) is transferred back to the previous map at the Jumppoint last used. If used "Out of Combat", it will automatically transfer the party.
* a spell resistance bug was fixed (mainly concering lingering Area Effect spells).
* magic items that cast spells (such as Wands, Potions, or Scrolls) are no longer are added to the wielder's "Casted Spells" list when the item is used.
* NPC's will not loot any item that makes them heavily encumbered or overburdened
* NPC's will not mark loot as non-transferable if they do not pick it up (which happened when their inventory was full but they were trying to loot)
* fixed CN vignette chest not doing dialog when opened via spell
* Zuggtmoy's gem hoard will no longer turn people into chairs
* Ladies' ring now says "From Jay", since he wasn't Black Jay when he had it engraved.
* followers will not terminate dialog if responding to the PC being invisible, polymorphed, or having other monstrous followers (like an ogre)
* followers will loot correctly from stacks of items (like gems or scrolls)
* Burne no longer knows a 5th level summon monster spell (he has the correct 4th level one now)
* St. Cuthbert will always speak when he shows up
* There can no longer be multiple St. Cuthberts
* Romag's diary now works and can be used
* Feldrin now appears in the game and has proper dialog along with Brunk.
* Wicked will now be present in his prison cell to be rescued and possibly join the party.
* Kelleen, the owlbear keeper troll, now has proper dialog with female PC's.
* Tuelk now places his map flags properly to give the locations of the stairs.
* Serena will no longer loot if you take her on as a slave. Ted, Ed, and Ed never loot anymore either.
* Turnkey will no longer be KOS if the party accepts his surrender.
* Fixed spelling mistakes in tutorial.
* Fixed floating dialog messages when Rannos and Gremag enter combat.
* Fixed some text errors in help text for Track and Rumors.
* Rufus will now leave if you ask him to leave your party.
* Hedrack cannot initiate dialog about Kelno (or any other high priest) after the first time you meet him.
* Ironman parties now correctly start with 500gp
* Movement penalties for MEDIUM and HEAVY armor no longer apply if you are medium or more encumbered.
* Non torso armor no longer applies movement penalties if they are classified as "Medium" or "Heavy" armor (e.g. chainmail gloves won't reduce movement but chainmail armor will)
* Monks who already have Combat Reflexes and Deflect Arrows (bonus monk feats at level 2) are no longer stuck at the Feat Selection screen at level up (for level 2), instead they can choose to get no bonus feat (since they already have them).
* Added Melfs Acid Arrow and Gust of Wind to list of scrolls that can be scribed via the Scribe Scroll Feat.
* Scrolls copied to the spellbook go into the correct level location.
* NPC's cannot be made angry at party members while they are in the party (this avoids the problem of disbanding them and them going KOS on you)
* Item creation prereq mispellings fixed (no more SPELL_NONE's in item creation I hope).
* Rangers correctly get animal companions at level 4 (rather than level 5).
* Multi-class clerics of a neutral deity who select positive energy channeling properly spontaneously cast cure spells.
* Coup de Grace should invoke an attack of oppertunity when used.
* Clerics of Elemental Domains (Fire, Air, Earth, Water) properly turn/rebuke the elemental types.
* Jaer's balls of fire no longer cause the game to hang when they cannot be removed from his inventory via script
* Bardsongs that lose track of their targets will no longer crash the game.
* Large numbers of +1, +2, +3, +4, and +5 weapons were not registering as "Masterwork" for item creation purposes, this has been fixed.
* Wands that weighed 10lbs should way 1lbs now.
* Cloak of resistance +2 and +3 should give the correct bonuses now (+2 and +3 respectively)
* Animal companions with missing owners (on game loads) should dismiss themselves properly (previously they could cause a CTD).
* All NPC wizards should know all 0th level spells (Cantrips) now.
* Reducing your encumbrance to exactly a max (light,med,heavy) should properly set your encumbrance (used to be BELOW the max).
* Fallen paladins should no longer be able to level as paladins.
* Fallen paladins should no longer be able to cast Paladin spells.
* You can no longer start sneaking IN combat (you must do this OUT of combat, before monsters notice you)
* If you were sneaking, upon performing a HOSTILE action, you are no longer considered sneaking.
* Fixed random encounters with monsters spawning in walls by fixing the random_encounter script to not spawn monsters 6 tiles away additionally an extra spread out is done after spawning but before combat begins.
---

[interface]
---
* Added tip of the day.
* fixed graphical bug with initiative portraits not updating on an aborted delay.
* fixed weapon quickslots. jebus!
* radial menu now displays spells per day for Bards and Sorcerers.
* in certain cases, opening the Help window no longer closes all other windows (e.g. clicking on an ability score bonus from the Inventory).
* money objects no longer stack.
* long descriptions for items are now available (if it is a magic item, it must be identified first). hover over the item in inventory and press SHIFT-CLICK to access the item description (in a popup window).
* added several generic tool-tip descriptions for certain UI elements.
* transfer of stackable items from NPC inventories now correctly checks if the NPC owns the item.
* showing the inventory by right-clicking party member portraits now correctly closes other windows.
* Unlearning spells for bards/sorcerers actually remove the spell (this fixes Sorcs not being able to level past 9th in some cases).
* Clicking CREATE when no item creation item is selected no longer crashes.
* Added checkbox for scroll acceleration in options screen.
* Removed scroll speed of 5 (a nonexistant scroll speed)
* Selecting 1-5 (via the keyboard) for dialog options no longer will change the active party member
* Group selection keys (F1-F8) work across maps and savegames
* Ironman mode ESCAPE menu contains proper menu entries.
* Item creation interface should close after crafting magic arms and armor.
---

[engine]
---
* Added a brightness/gamma slider
* ToEE.cfg variable added "astar_max_window_ms" the amount of time astar keeps track of CPU usage (in milliseconds)
* ToEE.cfg variable added "astar_max_time_ms" the most amount of time astar can spend on the CPU in "astar_max_window_ms" amount of time.
* Pathfinding during mouse movement is now time window limited and will fail early if too much CPU is being used by the pathfinding engine.
* Random crashbugs dealing with invalid object handles being stored in conditions shouldn't crash (as long as a NULL object is okay).
* Female Dwarves wearing helmets using the Barbarian Helm art no longer crash on map transfers and game loads (mismatched bones in .SKM)
* Male Dwarves wearing full plate no longer crash on map transfers and game loads (mismatched bones in .SKM)
* Numerous crash to desktops related to spell targeting passing invalid objects to the spell system have been fixed.
* Fixed crashbug with losing focus during game load (and movie playing).
* Random encounter NPCs now spawn surrounding the party rather than 6 tiles away.

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Neverwinter Nights Forum News
Posted Wednesday, November 5, 2003 - 21:30 CET by Veldrin

Here are today's Neverwinter Nights forum highlights. Please take into account that these are only single parts of various threads and should not be taken out of context. Bear in mind also that the posts presented here are copied as-is, and that any bad spelling and grammar does not get corrected on our end.

Rob Bartel, Co Lead Designer

Witch's Wake Setting: No. I designed it as part of a custom setting outside of the Forgotten Realms. I haven't developed the setting much further than what you see in WW1 at this point but am looking forward to the opportunity to explore it further when and if the opportunity presents itself.

Module Creation: Just to offer some insight into how we handle this internally, here's an explanation of how we handle this when working with the toolset here at BioWare:

We give one person 'ownership' of the module which means that their version is always the Master version. Every morning the non-owner gets the latest Master version from the owner and begins work. The non-owner keeps track of all changed files in his modules/temp directory (it helps to sort them by date) and then sends them to the owner at the end of the day (they can be sent as an *.erf but we generally copy them into the owner's modules/temp directory directly). File overwrite issues are still definitely an issue under this arrangement so you need to be sure that you're in close communication regarding what who's editing what files, especially towards the end of a project. It's not a foolproof system but, with proper diligence, it can work quite well. For future projects we're working towards a system where all resources (every script, every area file, every conversation, every creature, etc) are stored in a central database and checked in and out whenever they need to be edited, much like programming code is.

Georg Zoeller, Designer

HotU Multiplayer: The OC has no specific coding to take multiplayer into account (i.e. encounter scaling, multi user cutscene support). We found that only a very small percentage of our customers used the opportunity to play the OC online, a too small percentage to justify any special scripting/coding to make a robust campaign in multiplayer - That time was used to make a overall better OC with more replayability and more henchmen

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Neverwinter Wednesday
Posted Wednesday, November 5, 2003 - 21:07 CET by Sorcerer

Another week's around and here are the latest NWN Wednesday goodies:

White Slaad, Black Slaad - Quite Mad, So Bad!
Slaadi are representatives of planes that are entirely alien, wholly violent and utterly lethal. Hordes of the Underdark will introduce the White and Black Slaadi - caffeinated, extra-salted, high in fat versions of their multi-colored cousins, and not to be messed with! Discuss.

Deekin's Big Adventure Part 2
Hordes of the Underdark will take adventurers to the vile, lightless world of festering evil and corpulent nightmares fashioned from horrors undreamt. Who better to brave this dark world of creeping malice and lurking doom? Deekin of course! Check out Part 2 of Deekin's Big Adventure featuring the new Beholder Tunnels tileset! Discuss.

Hordes Feats, Spell, and New Screenshot!
A new Hordes screenshot has been added, and a new Druid spell Vine Mine is posted up on fan sites! Then check out the 3 new Epic level feats at RPG Vault: Epic Skill Focus, Bane of Enemies, and Improved Combat Casting! Discuss.

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New Hordes of the Underdark Spell Revealed
Posted Wednesday, November 5, 2003 - 0:42 CET by Sorcerer

Check out the latest Hordes of the Underdark spell BioWare has just revelaed:

Vine Mine

Caster Level(s): Druid 5
Innate Level: 5
School: Conjuration
Descriptor(s): Nature
Component(s): Verbal, Somatic
Range: Medium
Area of Effect / Target: Huge
Duration: 3 + 1 Round / 2 Levels
Additional Counter Spells:
Save: Yes (Entangle)
Spell Resistance: Yes

When casting vine mine, you must select one of the following:
- Entangle (as the spell)
- Hamper movement (movement speed is halved)
- Camouflage (add +4 competence bonus on Hide checks)

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The Temple of Elemental Evil Patch - Friday Release?
Posted Tuesday, November 4, 2003 - 20:52 CET by Yerril

Another post on the official Atari forums reports that The Temple of Elemental Evil patch is in Quality Assurance, and is targeted for release this Friday.

Read it here.

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Exuberant Temple of Elemental Evil Review at RPGDot
Posted Tuesday, November 4, 2003 - 20:40 CET by Yerril

RPGDot have posted their review of Troika's The Temple of Elemental Evil. It is clear that the reviewer enjoyed the game a great deal, bugs and all, and he gives it a final score of 91%. What an uplifting read! Here's what he said:

Spell effects are also excellent. For the first time ever Magic Missile looks like the spell is described... a swarm of bolts swerving around all obsticles to