Custom Races and PrCs across CoPaP

JollyOrc · Post by **JollyOrc** » Wed Mar 30, 2005 9:36 am

Thought so.

Thankfully I have already a bunch of ideas on this theme bouncing around, so I guess this will be do-able the one way or another. And if the occasional magic item gets through, so what..

I don't want to discourage people from planar travelling. That's the point of CoPaP after all.

teleri · Post by **teleri** » Wed Mar 30, 2005 12:23 pm

Have a little inn on a floating rock out in the etherial/astral and anyone trying to portal in gets bumped there. and a kindly old man tells them that they need to rent a chest (1gold or something else inconsequential) because anyone carrying any high powered item going throught the door to the world will be seriously injured, give examples (taken directly form the players items (: in fact list all the items the player is carrying that will damage them no grousing that they didn't know ) make hints that this old man is a god or something and let him tell them that thier gear is safe while they are gone but they must return to retrieve it beore going elsewhere. (have the old man be a god or the keeper of the world or any other intereting title you want to give him.

JollyOrc · Post by **JollyOrc** » Wed Mar 30, 2005 12:35 pm

something like that, yes. Only with a bit more elaborate explanation, and not as cheesy

The "little inn on a floating rock" is actually a pocket dimension which is quite large, called "The Last Gasp Inn". It's connected to Cataras deathplane.

Post by **Orleron** » Wed Mar 30, 2005 1:36 pm

something like that, yes. Only with a bit more elaborate explanation, and not as cheesy

ditto... the whole "god taking away weapons" thing is cheesy and overdone. I agree.

Apandapion · Post by **Apandapion** » Wed Mar 30, 2005 5:10 pm

Orleron wrote:
something like that, yes. Only with a bit more elaborate explanation, and not as cheesy
ditto... the whole "god taking away weapons" thing is cheesy and overdone. I agree.

It's nicer than turning them into normal items permanently because the plane couldn't support the magical powers.

Sarrena · Post by **Sarrena** » Wed Mar 30, 2005 11:06 pm

Abyss is goign with a simple little system. Items can only be wielded if your of sufficent perona or will (level and the items base type). On the Lost Layer, lesser enchantments are far more powerful, and thusly that much harder to control. When they attempt to wield something to powerful (the items networth is too high for reason), the magic rejects them and shocks them slightly, anything to get from their grasp.

No taking items, no stuffing them in a box, no PC's complaining about their crap going bye bye. The only real effect is that lower end items are suddenly a bit mroe valuable for planar travel.

JollyOrc · Post by **JollyOrc** » Thu Mar 31, 2005 12:03 am

sounds neat indeed.

Can I have an erf of that ?

Starslayer_D · Post by **Starslayer_D** » Thu Mar 31, 2005 5:56 am

It's simply an adaption of the avlis item level script.. set to way lower gp values afaik.

*grin*

Post by **Orleron** » Thu Mar 31, 2005 8:35 am

It's nicer than turning them into normal items permanently because the plane couldn't support the magical powers.

Um, well, no it's not. Turning them into normal items due to planar travel is an actual 3rd Edition D&D rule for the planes, which CoPaP tries to emulate as best as possible within reason for NWN. That's why it's a better idea.

JollyOrc · Post by **JollyOrc** » Thu Mar 31, 2005 8:55 am

Orleron wrote: Um, well, no it's not. Turning them into normal items due to planar travel is an actual 3rd Edition D&D rule for the planes, which CoPaP tries to emulate as best as possible within reason for NWN. That's why it's a better idea.

the problem is that the effect should only be temporary, and reverted when people go back home.

Otherwise it would be laughably simple, but hellishly annoying to players....

Post by **Orleron** » Thu Mar 31, 2005 10:34 am

Reverting back is easy. If you store the item properties on the item as local variables, they will be persistent and remembered everywhere. Then you can write code to give them back when the time comes.

teleri already has the basics to this coded, AFAIK.

Still though, JO, your world is a Prime Material Plane world, like Avlis/Mystara/FR, etc. The only time items would lose enchantment on your world is if they were native to the planes. Stuff coming over from Avlis would not, so you would still need your quest.

teleri · Post by **teleri** » Thu Mar 31, 2005 1:03 pm

Deleted Redundant (:

teleri · Post by **teleri** » Thu Mar 31, 2005 1:05 pm

Orleron wrote:teleri already has the basics to this coded, AFAIK.

Still though, JO, your world is a Prime Material Plane world, like Avlis/Mystara/FR, etc. The only time items would lose enchantment on your world is if they were native to the planes. Stuff coming over from Avlis would not, so you would still need your quest.

JO this would be fairly easy to implelemnt for your PW all we would need to do is set your "distance" further out say 4-6 planes from everyone this would reduce all magic items by the like amount. Call the effect what you will (magic storm etc....)

Apandapion · Post by **Apandapion** » Thu Mar 31, 2005 1:10 pm

Orleron wrote:
It's nicer than turning them into normal items permanently because the plane couldn't support the magical powers.
Um, well, no it's not. Turning them into normal items due to planar travel is an actual 3rd Edition D&D rule for the planes, which CoPaP tries to emulate as best as possible within reason for NWN. That's why it's a better idea.

This principle gets ignored constantly (and rightly so!) whenever someone decides that it would be more fun to do it differently. I could bring up examples, but we both know them and it would derail the conversation.

That aside, I think that Abyss 404's solution to the problem has a superabundance of grace. (I wasn't aware that it worked that way.) Changing what person A can use on different planes is a really neat way to handle the problem, and it's an interesting planar constant to tinker with.

Someone designing a far-out world should reverse the curve, and let first level characters use artifacts and nukes and restrict 40th characters to sticks and stones. Actually, scratch that, it's a decent P&P idea but it would probably get PGed in 12 seconds flat on CoPaP.

dougnoel · Post by **dougnoel** » Thu Mar 31, 2005 4:25 pm

Apandapion wrote:Someone designing a far-out world should reverse the curve, and let first level characters use artifacts and nukes and restrict 40th characters to sticks and stones. Actually, scratch that, it's a decent P&P idea but it would probably get PGed in 12 seconds flat on CoPaP.

You could make it work...you'd just have to alter the xp model so that players using high-level amgic got less xp for kills than those using level-appropriate gear. Just modify the code that zaps you to set an int "TotalItemPower" each time you add something new.

teleri · Post by **teleri** » Thu Mar 31, 2005 4:49 pm

Apandapion wrote:
Orleron wrote:Um, well, no it's not. Turning them into normal items due to planar travel is an actual 3rd Edition D&D rule for the planes, which CoPaP tries to emulate as best as possible within reason for NWN. That's why it's a better idea.
This principle gets ignored constantly (and rightly so!) whenever someone decides that it would be more fun to do it differently. I could bring up examples, but we both know them and it would derail the conversation.

Looking at these two post I see a very big disconnection between the views.

I see no reason why one should or would ingnore the core rule set with which the game is played, the rules were put into place for a reason, having run a Planescape campaign for over 10 years I found that the fact that Magic items are not dependable has made my players better at thinking on their feet and recating to a new situation in a way that fits a new situation. Though not everything in NWN will be exactly like PnP using the core rules makes sense in the larger sense.

Tristan_Durst · Post by **Tristan_Durst** » Thu Mar 31, 2005 5:37 pm

Teleri it was mention a while back that you were working on code for Magic on the Outerplanes. Cnat help but wonder if you have a working model yet. Been thinking about what Arborea is going to be doing with the magic constraints that the plane enables. Like Divination requires a small sacrifice to the land to work. etc.

Tristan_Durst · Post by **Tristan_Durst** » Sun Apr 03, 2005 5:36 am

Well....

After going through all the 3.0 info, and finding out that Natives of Arborea get the following bonuses, we are not going to be makeing them as custom races.

Natives get Generally all the following:
100% Immunity to electricity and Poison
Cold and Fire Resistance 20
Damage reduction of 10/+1

Um, NO....

As for our BNR of Demi-Eladrine. We are working on it. Just is I can not find anyone on my staff that has worked with 2da's before. They will be the only Custome Race on Arborea that we make, but they will be a VERY tone down version of an Arborian Native, and Eladrine.

Anyone know where I can find a tutorial on how to make a custome race? I know I have to submit it to Themi for inclusion, and first get CoPaP approval before that. I amd thinking ecl 1 or 2 Outsider to off set bonuses they would get.

And Demi-Eladrine was a race I made for my PnP Planescape Campaign. Just translateing them to NWN is going to be semi-Hard...

teleri · Post by **teleri** » Sun Apr 03, 2005 2:19 pm

There is a nice tutorial on the NWNVault as well as a lot of help in the Builders sction of the Bioware site.

Post by **Orleron** » Sun Apr 03, 2005 7:01 pm

As long as the race isn't ridiculous and does not require any copap hak change, you can make whatever you like, according to that post on custom races. Things only get tricky when you have to change racialtype.2da or add any other kinds of 2da's to the hak. That would have to wait until patch time, or new hak time.

Theoretically you could make your Arborea natives have all those powers, but they'd need like an ECL of 4.

heh

teleri · Post by **teleri** » Sun Apr 03, 2005 7:49 pm

Orl my understanding is that to make a race be fully compatable accross all of CoPaP it requires the 2DA changes to be made for all, Please do correct me if this is wrong ( I have been holding back on my PW races because of this).

Post by **Orleron** » Sun Apr 03, 2005 8:16 pm

That's true, unless you have a race that just has stat adjustments, an already-existing base race, and absolutely no racial feats or special abilities. Limited case, certainly, but still possible.

warbosspeter · Post by **warbosspeter** » Wed May 11, 2005 4:12 am

SR (spell resistance) is what some custom races get. Why don't custom race's made in Hala don't get there SR in Avlis and Rockhome. But do get them in Hala and Glantri.

Post by **Orleron** » Wed May 11, 2005 10:10 am

SR should be a power that is placed on the PC hide. If it's done properly and put on the hide, it should function everywhere.

warbosspeter · Post by **warbosspeter** » Wed May 11, 2005 10:46 am

That's one of the bugs of the Deep Gnome, in Hala is it so that if i rest it is gone to, if i die to...