u/BlackBricklyBear

Hi, everyone. I just finished SoD and would like to use some mods for BG2:EE before I start that up. Here's the list of mods I'd like to use for this playthrough:

• Level 1 NPCs
• Divine Remix
• SoD to Baldur's Gate 2: Enhanced Edition Item Upgrade

So my questions are, will these mods conflict with each other? How do I go about installing them? Has anyone here used this specific combination of mods before?

I've heard about WeiDU but have no idea what it is nor how to use it. Any relevant answers to my questions would be much appreciated.

I was playing through SoD and recruited Glint (who is a Cleric/Thief Multi-Class) into my party, only to discover to my dismay that he can't seem to backstab with the blunt weapons that are the only weapons allowed to Clerics. Every time I tried, I got a "Your weapon is unsuitable for backstab" message, which makes no sense to me because, realistically speaking, bashing someone from behind on the head with a Morningstar (a bludgeoning weapon) should deal extra damage than stabbing them from behind with a Short Sword (a piercing weapon in AD&D).

Does this mean that a Cleric/Thief Multi-Class character can't backstab at all? Seems like a waste of that Multi-Class' Backstab Multiplier stat to me. The "bludgeoning weapons are the only weapons allowed to Clerics" AD&D rule made no sense to me either, especially since Deities in Faerun have "favoured weapons" that their Clerics are supposed to be able to freely use, and those "favoured weapons" aren't always bludgeoning ones. Can anyone explain this to me?

I think I flubbed Neera's romance in BG1 by not giving her the right answers to her later romantic dialogues, to the point where she stopped bringing them up, though I did finish her character-specific quest with Adoy, her mentor. Can I resume the romance with Neera in SoD and BG2 anyway? Or is that impossible without console commands?

Also, are you absolutely committed to having a romantically-involved character in your party if you want the romance to continue? I'm thinking of ditching Neera for another BG1 party member soon, but I don't know if that automatically terminates the romance, or if it terminates after the romantically-involved character is away from your party for too long.

To quote Yoshimo from BG2: "A little help here?"

When I met and recruited Alora in BG1, she already had a Proficiency Point in Two-Weapon Fighting Style that I couldn't reassign (i.e., it was automatically assigned and could not be removed and reassigned). Why is that? I can tell this is an addition by Beamdog, because Fighting Styles weren't yet a thing in the original BG1.

What I can't understand is why Alora would always have a Proficiency Point in Two-Weapon Fighting Style. As a Trueclass Thief, she can't assign more than one Proficiency Point to that Fighting Style, leaving her with a hefty -2 penalty to Main Hand THAC0 and -6 penalty to Off-Hand THAC0. Even taking her Rabbit's Foot luck bonus into account, that still leaves Alora with no THAC0 penalty to her main hand and a -4 THAC0 penalty to her offhand. Her situation isn't helped by how poor Alora's base THAC0 is, so she will normally struggle to hit anything while fighting with two melee weapons, short of some involved buffs.

Did someone in the BG1 and 2 community specifically ask Beamdog to include an unremovable Proficiency Point in that Fighting Style? Or did a Beamdog developer find Alora particularly appealing and pre-assigned that Proficiency Point to make her more "unique" in a way?

Did anyone here come up with a way to make Alora more viable while using two melee weapons? I'd like to know.

In BG2 I remember there was a lot of stuff worth pickpocketing off of NPCs and thus worth investing Thief Skill Points to do so. But what about BG1? Are there actually items worth pickpocketing in that game, given the lower level cap and the less-powerful items? Anyone got pointers here?

I'm having a bit of trouble figuring out exactly what uses are Potions of Insight (sets Wisdom to 18 for 6 hours) and Potions of Genius (increases Intelligence by 4 points for 3 hours) might have. Right now, I can't think of much.

In the case of the Potion of Insight, unfortunately, 6 hours is not long enough for Priests/Druids/Paladins/Rangers to memorize bonus spells gained if 18 Wisdom is an increase from their current Wisdom stat. The Baldur's Gate Fandom wiki for this potion type claims "the most significant uses" for this potion is how it improves the options you get from the Limited Wish and Wish spells, while also increasing a character's Lore value, both of which are situational at best. The Potion of Insight might be more useful if the "Magical Defense Adjustment" stat (used to give a bonus or penalty to saving throws, or even outright immunity, against certain mind-influencing spells) from pen-and-paper AD&D rules were used in BG1 and 2, but that was never implemented into those games.

As for the Potion of Genius, all I can think of for making that potion useful is the bonus to Lore value and a better chance of scribing Wizard Spells for Wizards and Bards from scrolls.

In another Infinity Engine game, that being Planescape: Torment, the player character's mental stats (Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma) played a larger role in that dialogue-heavy game, but BG1 and 2 don't have that kind of system.

Can anyone fill me in here on what else I can use these two Potion types for?

Oh, and if any modders are listening, perhaps a high Wisdom stat (even a temporary one) could be useful for increasing a character's ability to Detect Traps and Secret Doors? Or a high Intelligence score could give minor bonuses or penalties to Open Locks or Remove Traps? You have to be able to figure out how a trap works in order to be able to disarm it, or figure out how to open a complex lock in real life, after all. Perhaps even the "Magical Defense Adjustment" stat could be implemented into BG1 and 2 with bonuses given to high Wisdom?

I'm coming back to the first two BG games after a long time, but as things have changed with those games, the current details might not exactly be as I remember. The specific things I'd like to do regarding those two NPCs is the following:

• Last I recall, if/when you complete the Harper-related questline with Jaheira in Amn in BG2, you can't kick Jaheira out of your party and still have her be recruitable afterwards, even if you're not romancing her. In other words, once that questline is finished, the moment you kick her out, it's permanent. Might there be a mod that lets you send Jaheira to the Copper Coronet in the Slums of Amn or something like that if you kick her out once that questline is finished, instead of having her leave the party permanently as she would normally?
• You need the blood of a Silver Dragon to finish the Human Skin Armour being made by the evil tanner in Amn. However, the only way to get that blood is to kill Adalon, the Silver Dragon in the Underdark. This got me thinking; given that successfully helping Adalon in her quest should, by any measure, make her very grateful to you, why can't the player character ask Adalon nicely for enough blood (which shouldn't be that much) to finish the Human Skin Armour as a reward? This technically wouldn't be hard to mod in; a modder could just add a small dialogue prompt at the right moment and give the player character the right item afterwards.

Any relevant info anyone here can share with me would be appreciated.

I've noticed that Pilot Traits that are supposed to grant bonus C-Bills upon successfully completing a mission only work some of the time (i.e., the descriptions of Pilot Traits that are supposed to give you more money after winning at missions make you think they will work every time, but they don't actually do so), even when you are working for the specific faction these traits supposed to work with. The Pilot Traits in question are as follows:

• (Great House Name) Noble - Gives bonus C-Bills when working for that specific Great House.
• (Great House Name) Patriot - The same as the previous one, but this Pilot Trait also gives two extra Salvage Shares after winning a mission for that specific Great House.
• Con Artist - Should work with any employer, but only works occasionally.

Is there a reason why these three types of Pilot Traits don't actually work all the time even when working with the Great House specified in these traits? Was this intentional on the part of PGI? Oddly enough, Pilot Traits that give extra Salvage Shares upon winning a mission are always active, like (Great House Name) Patriot and the Scrapper Pilot Trait, so I don't see why the "bonus C-Bills" Pilot Traits aren't always active as well.

Do the three aforementioned Pilot Traits only work some of the time because otherwise it would make earning C-Bills with a specific Great House too easy? If that's the case, PGI could make the amount of bonus C-Bills for those traits a random amount, from a pittance to a good-sized bonus. What does everyone here think?

EDIT: Okay, since some of you have requested to see screenshots of faction-related C-Bill bonuses not triggering at the end of a successful mission, here you go.

To give you proof, I went on a "Scorched Earth" mission setting House Marik against House Kurita. I brought along these two pilots, one of which has the "House Marik Noble" Pilot Trait and the other of which has the "Free Worlds League Patriot" Pilot Trait.

https://preview.redd.it/h6qqjopy2y1h1.jpg?width=1140&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=510063da904dd53e20181958c50031c9baa0d445

I finished the mission, and below is the end-of-mission payout screen.

https://preview.redd.it/cotge1q13y1h1.jpg?width=2101&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=cc1249c4ec0c2599594a49a1c69659a08c9be4f3

To prove that I was indeed taking both the two aforementioned pilots on this mission, below is the post-mission score screen showing their presence during the mission.

https://preview.redd.it/lc9hrus33y1h1.jpg?width=2560&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e28feddabd44a820cd0d8784344d3f2d6bf318d2

And to top things off, below is a screenshot of an end-of-mission payout screen from another mission where both the aforementioned pilots' House-Marik-related C-Bill bonuses triggered.

https://preview.redd.it/on1oah353y1h1.jpg?width=2101&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f86a6fd6b9a64979d21b9bf88b4a9b019bf9169c

Can anyone tell me why these faction-related C-Bill bonuses only trigger occasionally, even when used with the right faction? Or why the "Con Artist" Pilot Trait leads you to believe that you can get a C-Bill bonus with any faction employing you, only for that to only trigger occasionally as well?