# House Rules for IWD:EE

Author: Smeagolheart Version: 1.1 Introduction | Compatibility notes | Components | FAQ | Version history | Credits | Legal Notice | Contact info

Introduction

HOUSE RULE. : a rule (as in a game) that applies only among a certain group or in a certain place.

This mod represents a compilation of various house rules and tweaks which are designed to change certain aspects of the game. It works on Icewind Dale Enhanced Edition. The mod is divided into multiple components all of which can be installed separately and are completely independent of each other. Classic Tabletop D&D players embraced house rules. 1st edition D&D had a rule that demihumans could not advance past certain levels. once your immortal elf reached a certain level, he stopped advancing while a human could keep on leveling. As one might imagine, this was one of the first rules to be modified by our tabletop playing predecessors. After all the rules are like guidelines, man. Tweak them how you to and play the game you want to play. This mod may expand its scope in the FUTURE; after all there is always the opportunity for more house rules. Enjoy, Mark G. (Smeagolheart)

Compatibility notes

Note: In order to experience all of the new content introduced by this mod it is recommended to start a new game after installing it.

This mod should be compatible with most other WeiDU mods. In particular, if this mod is installed AFTER installing any kit mods, it should detect the installation of the mod kits and patch the additional kits.

Components

Reveal City Maps

Reveal Kuldahar, Easthaven & Lonleywood

Reveals the maps of the original Icewind Dale towns and the Heart of Winter expansion

Reveal Kuldahar & Easthaven Only

This option only reveals the original icewind dale towns and not the town of Lonleywood from the Heart of Winter Expansion ITEMS

ITEMS

Pomab & Conlan Sell Convenient Ammunition

This option gives Quiver of Arrows, Case of Bolts, and Bag of Bullets to Pomab and Conlan’s inventory. In addition, an ammo belt is added to pomab’s inventory.

Emmerich sells Quiver, Case & Bags of Plenty +1

This adds convenient ammunition with +1 enchantment to Emmerich's store in Heart of Winter Expansion

Conlan Sells Magic Clubs

This component is meant to address the lack of magical clubs in Icewind Dale. This option adds two +1 Clubs and the Night Club +2 to Conlan's inventory. Start a new game to see the items in his shop.

Barbed Club of Pain

This option adds the barbed club of pain designed by artificial_sunlight to a chest in Dragon’s Eye level 5.

Jiedra and Doluv Bonus Merchants

This option adds merchants inspired by the Baldur’s Gate 2 Bonus Merchants included on the Collector's CD. Jiedra sells the planescape torment inspired items that were sold by Deidre in Baldur’s Gate 2 and DOLUV sells items from Baldur’s Gate 2.

Orrick's Sells All His Items

Orrick sells all his items from the start of the game, not after chapter breaks. If you install this component after orrick has already gotten his 2nd or 3rd items into his store, then an additional copy of those items will be added to his store. For best results, start a new game or use this component before orrick has restocked his store. please note that some of these items are fairly inexpensive and could be very powerful at the beginning of the game if purchased, restraint is suggested.

No save for fire arrows

In the unmodded game, fire arrows allow a save vs. spells for 0 fire damage. similar projectiles such as ice arrows and acid arrows do not allow a save. This component removes the save from fire arrows. This component will ensure that unconcious trolls hit with fire arrows die and don’t roll out of the way while unconcious to take no damage from fire arrows if they make their save vs spells.

Class HLAs

This components restores some of the BG2 TOB HLAs to Icewind Dale EE.

Background: I feel that high level characters should get some stronger. The difference between a level 20 fighter and a Level 10 fighter shouldn't just be a couple higher numbers on a chart. That level 20 fighter should be able to seriously whoop the level 10 fighter in a cool and interesting way, right? At the time of TOB, D&D 3E had been released and introduced Epic Levels and Feats which added significant abilities to higher level characters. Baldur's Gate: TOB sort of attempted to implement something similar in a house rule designed for the high level campaign of the BG2: TOB expansion. Did it succeed? It is debatable. I'd argue that the HLA additions are welcome but execution is flawed. For one thing, they can overwhelm all your previous character development and tatics you've relied on by the HLAs which can be way more powerful than your previous skills. Another thing is that you just get too many of them. You get too many high level abilites. If you sent an Iphone back in time and showed a caveman your device, he might think you were a god. But today, when everyone has Iphones, one Iphone does not a god make. When everyone has superpowers, no one has superpowers. This component was not conceived as a way to totally recreate the TOB HLA experience. I wanted to implement high level abilities in a creative and slightly different way.

A high level character gets new special abilities every 5 levels starting at level 15. These abilities are described on the vanilla unkitted class text window in character creation and in game under kit description for the unkitted class. The new descriptions only appear on the unkitted class similar to how the regular abilities of paladins only are listed on the unkitted class. The abilities are also listed in a pdf file included with the mod in the main folder. As an example of how this works, the fighter class gets at level 15, 1 daily use of power attack special ability at level 25, the fighter gets 1 use of critical strike high level ability. Great care was made to not put in some of the sillier, worthless or extremely overpowered abilities and to basically provide something that gives your character an edge. These house rules just add something neat that extends and showcases your character's power and growth.

NOTES AND CAVEATS:

* House rules high level abilities are class abilities. A vanilla fighter gets the same high level abilities as a kensai and wizard slayer.

* Abilities that were spells in BG2:TOB have been implemented as special abilities. They will show up in your special abilities menu, not your spellbook.

* If you dual class before you reach level 15 in a class you will not get the high level abilities for your initial class. A level 14/20 kensai mage would only get the high level abilities of the mage class.

* Multiclass characters get the high level abilities of both classes. A 15/15 fighter/mage would get the level 15 high level abilities of both the fighter and mage classes.

* These abilites should work on mod kits if this mod is installed after the mod’s kits are installed.

Kit Tomes

This component adds a new NPC Panver the Loremaster, a half-elven merchant, to the Root Cellar Tavern of Kuldahar. Panver sells magical tomes that can add a kit in game to your characters. Now you can be that mutliclassed kensai/mage that you always wanted to be.

Characters can add one (1) class kit using a magic career tome. For example, a multiclassed elven fighter/mage will be able to toggle between fighter/enchanter or berserker/mage but is not able to become a berserker/enchanter because that is two kits. If that same character was a human who dual classed (instead of multiclass elf), they would be able to pick the same classes (so fighter/enchanter or berserker/mage but not berserker/enchanter).

Using a tome will removes the all of active creature's current kits and add the specified kit. Abilities gained from any previous kit are removed.

Magical tomes can create combinations not normally available without using a tool such as shadowkeeper or eekeeper. instead of firing up an external program like eekeeper, you can change classes in the game. Class restrictions apply for kits. When attempting to add an invalid kit, the existing kit (if any) will be re-applied; it will be as if nothing happened. If you do not qualify for berserker because you have already taken weapons proficiency points in a ranged weapon, for example, nothing would happen if you used the tome of the berserker.

!Use tomes with caution they permanently affect your character. Save your game before you use one so the worst thing that could happen is that you have to reload.

You may configure the number of tomes in Panver's inventory through an installation option. If you select 02 then Panver will have two copies of every tome for sale.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: I've found a bug in House Rules for IWD:EE. What should I do?

A: Visit the mod forum Report it and follow the instructions provided there.

Q: I've found a compatibility issue between House Rules for IWD:EE and another mod. What should I do?

A: Visit the mod forum Bug and Report it, it could be an issue with this mod or the other mod.

Q: I'd like to translate House Rules for IWD:EE into a different language. How should I do that?

A: CONTACT THE MOD AUTHOR.

Version History

V1.1 update– December 05, 2014

Added bonus merchants

Added ORRICK'S SELLS all his items

Added Revised Fire Arrows

Revised component numbering, bug fixes

Revised HLA component

HLAs are gained every 5 levels instead of every 10 and several new HLAs are added to account for the new progression.

Completely altered some progressions such as Cleric

V1.0 Initial release - November 28, 2014

CREDITS

Thanks everyone for the help, especially Wisp, subtledoctor, argent77 and the ever helpful Mike1072. Custom bams from artificial_sunlight.

Legal Notice

* This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Francisco, California, 94105, USA.

Contact info

Contact user Smeagolheart on either baldursgate.com forums or Spellhold Studios forums.