Hopefully a quick question!
Is there any way to add Weapon Focus and Weapon Specialization feats into NWN 1.69 (not EE!) for the Maul, Goad, and the two Picks?
I’ve had a good fiddle with feat.2da, baseitems.2da, iprp_feats.2da and cls_feat_fight.2da, and have defined the feats as ints in nwscript.nss, all sadly to zero effect
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Option 1:
Usage of EffectAttackBonus function whenever player equips given weapon and has a feat you want them to have. Of course this will count towards +20 cap which is highly suboptimal.
You need to code this yourself as I am not aware of this being at vault in form of a plug-and-play ERF you can just download and import.
Option 2:
NWNX and nwnx_patch plugin if we are talking here about multiplayer or NWNCX and nwncx_patch if this is for singleplayer (or LAN game). That brings new 2da weapon_feats.2da where you can define new feats for new weapons.
I know the OP wants a solution for 1.69 only, but those prepared to upgrade to EE need look no further than the latest CEP 2.x, which has an optional EE plug-in called cep2_add_feats.
Indeed it is fair to mention that NWN-EE allows this as well. Unfortunately, for some reason, despite I explained devs the advantages of doing that with completely new 2DA they decided to do it in form of new columns in baseitems.2da which then doesn’t allow this functionality to work ín every singleplayer module… (without significant effort)
The CEP2.x solution is plug-in-and-go. No significant effort required.
Obviously, the module must have CEP2 first, otherwise it won’t have the weapons in question.
We have different standards then.
I don’t expect player to open the module he wants to play in toolset, add a new hak into the hak list in specific order and then wonder why the module crashes on numerous occasions, to be called “plug-in-and-go”…
Are you saying that a properly installed CEP 2.70 module "crashes on numerous occasions?
If so, can you give steps to reproduce the problem?
That is not what I am saying. OP wants to add CEP weapon feats to any possible module that uses CEP out there, not into CEP 2.70 base module.
Actually the OP is asking about 1.69. This particular CEP 2.x add-in is one of a few that only work for EE because they depends on EE features. The CEP 2.x base remains 1.69 compatible.
Although the OP doesn’t ask about it, it is entirely possible to add the feats to any CEP 2.x module out there. It’s just one extra line in the Custom Content. Obviously the builder needs to keep their copy of CEP 2.x up-to-date, but that’s true of any new feature.
Many thanks @Shadooow & @Proleric for your replies.
Since my base campaign modules include masses of custom content (both my own & culled from just about everwhere) and sweeping ruleset changes to emulate my P&P world, I cannot do global updates in the normal way or try to port my custom files (over 11000!) into NWN EE. Disaster would surely ensue!
@Proleric
“Actually the OP is asking about 1.69. This particular CEP 2.x add-in is one of a few that only work for EE because they depends on EE features.”
If I added the new columns in baseitems.2da from cep2_add_feats to my own custom baseitems.2da, and updated feat.2da and cls_feat_fight.2da, is there any chance that it might work?
Thanks again for your interest, folks.
I don’t think so. I believe the new columns are only recognised by EE.
We do recognize that not every module can readily be updated to EE, which is why CEP 2.x makes new features available to 1.69 builders when possible, with EE-only options offered as add-ins.
Ah word.-splitting again. Okay.
OP asked and received the right answer. You came in claiming that CEP2 has a plug-in-and-play method that will work under NWN-EE. That is definitely worth mentioning, however it is not and cannot be correct exactly due to the nature of how the feature has been, despite my suggestions, complains and later criticism, implemented.
So I guess you don’t understand what is the problem here, therefore I will explain.
If it was implemented in same way certain someone implemented it in certain nwnx plugin, then it could be made “plug-in” and it could work in every module without compatibility issues.
However since it was implemented as new columns into baseitems.2da, then you cannot just put modified baseitems.2da into patch-hak, or development folder or via additional hak over the top as you mention and make this work properly without compatibility issues.
That is because the baseitems.2da from cep2_add_feats will replace the module’s baseitem.2da. Specifically that means, that if the module incorporated its own baseitems or has some of them on different lines, then the game will crash whenever would player encounter them - typically when opening store, when creature is spawned or when encountered pre-placed npc with such item.
Of course, it will work flawlessly in modules that are using CEP2 haks as is without any modification (or at least baseitems.2da), however the compatibility issues with any other module is definitely a huge drawback for which you just cannot claim it requires no significant effort to make it work.
Additionally, I object against your definition of plug-in-and-go. Something that requires you to edit the module you want to play in toolset is not plug-in-and-go. And while you can surely extract the required 2da file from hak (which is not plug-in-and-go either) and put it into development folder that will cause huge number of compatibility issues in any module that doesn’t use CEP2. Using it as patch-hak might have been classified as plug-in-and-go I give you that, but will have same issues and the user needs to know when to disable and when to enable it, which is not plug-in-and-go either.
Ok chaps, I’m going to knock this one on the head.
Sorry for turning a simple (but inadequately explained) enquiry into an epic 
I really only wanted the Maul to have the Focus/Spec feats anyway (though the others would’ve been nice) so I’m going to take the Maul models and associated icons and rename/renumber them as Great Axes.
I don’t use damage differentiation or damage reduction/resistance in my game, so it’s fine for a Maul to count as a slashing weapon and I’m pretty sure that the animations will look ok once it’s turned into an axe and I’ve edited the baseitems.2da and my custom tlk file.
If I’d thought of this at the start, I’d have wasted much less of your time, so apologies are due to both of you. Thanks again for your insights and opinions, which are always greatly appreciated.
Right, that is definitely another possibility if I understand you correctly.
Just note, that If you are willing to replace existing base nwn weapon with one from CEP, then you can change its damage values, crit threat/multi, damage type, well everything it will work. Simply replace the line with great axe with line with Maul (and then clear line with maul with **** to prevent maul showing twice in toolset).
If this is not what you meant, then this won’t work.
So if this is singleplayer then NWNCX patch is definitely not very good method either as that needs to be installed on players’ computer. On the other hand, I think that just adding a note about that in readme - something like “If you want the weapon feats for maul to work install NWNCX + nwncx_patch” would be enough in my opinion. Maybe you can even break the unwritten agreement and provide the executable with DLLs directly within your download. I sure don’t mind you doing it with nwncx_patch.
And I understand your concerns with NWN-EE, there are numerous issues with custom content lately and if you dislike that something won’t look the way you wanted or be straight up broken, then it might look as better option to stay under 1.69, however keep in mind that those with EE can still play your module anyway and therefore will see things badly eitherway…
And because of the above fact you can definitely use the NWN-EE feature and provide the feats for CEP weapons. Again you can note in readme that these feats will only work with NWN-EE.
“Right, that is definitely another possibility if I understand you correctly.”
You were not wrong, Shadooow!
Once WxBlMa_b/m/t_151.mdl became WAxGr_b/m/t_051.mdl and I’d renamed the inventory icons, all was good. I didn’t need to nerf the Maul entry in baseitems.2da, since I now had a Maul that the engine thinks is a Great Axe, and I couldn’t care less if the in-game weapon description says its Base Item Class is Great Axe! Of course, it helped enormously that the data of the two lines in baseitems.2da were almost identical.
The tlk entries for Weapon Focus/Specialization (great axe) now read: (Two Handed Weapons) and the descriptions have been altered accordingly.
Yay! Job done!
Lastly, many thanks again for your help. Amazing to think that I’ve been tinkering with my version of the game for 16 years, and a great many of my stumbling blocks have been removed by you, Proleric, Axe, Boodah, Mmat, Pstemarie, Tarot and goodness knows how many others!!
Onwards, and all the best in all you do, Shadooow.