DylanRPG

View File Stylized Portraits by Tinman888 These are beautiful portraits of the KOTOR PC and companions by Reddit user u/Tinman888 . This mod was made with the artist's permission. There's two folders in the Override - PC and Companions, in case you just want to use one or the other. As you can see from the preview, the PC portrait is one size fits all, and will appear as such regardless of your character's gender or appearance. I really loved the style of the portraits done here and just had to have them in my game, so I set about converting the images, and now you can all enjoy them too. Submitter DylanRPG Submitted 10/11/2021 Category Mods K1R Compatible Yes  

Thank you, that is what I did. I found a tutorial on these forums about how to edit the script with the footlocker. It was actually in response to someone who wanted to add something depending on class, which isn't what I needed. But I figured out to do what I needed to do. I changed the script like so: I then compiled it as k_pend_area_01.ncs and put it in the Override folder. In a way it was simpler to do than I imagined, but without the direction I would never have been able to figure it out.

JCarter, I sent you a PM. It's a link to a pdf that outlines my plans for this, and which parts I've done already. I appreciate the feedback.

"Yeah, I get that, but - if you want any sort of distinction at all (a name, a feat for just that class, etc) then they will have to be different classes, in terms of proramming. Even if you make them fundamentally the same. Then you've used up all the classes again. And by playing the same I mean you have up to four Jedi in the party, and currently they all have different hit dice, saving throws, feats, amount of Force points and powers, etc. And the player has the option to vary all this. With a single class you'd be losing all of that. Finally, the tabletop version has a nifty list of things in the talent trees that tells you what each type should go for, but we can't have that here. So I'd suggest some sort of administrative work on that just to make it clearer, because I don't think it would be very clear to someone who wasn't intimately familiar with them already." So - I don't want any sort of distinction at all. I don't want a feat for just that class. That class doesn't exist in this scenario. There's just the Jedi class. And yes, with a single class, Bastila, Juhani and Jolee would all be the same class. They would not, however, play the same. Because they would start with different abilities and different skills and different feats and different powers - simply because, they would be programmed to have started with different ones. Just like Canderous and Carth. "Finally, the tabletop version has a nifty list of things in the talent trees that tells you what each type should go for, but we can't have that here. So I'd suggest some sort of administrative work on that just to make it clearer, because I don't think it would be very clear to someone who wasn't intimately familiar with them already." I don't think the different "talents" even need to separated very much, I don't think it needs to be made super clear what each type should go for. I don't even think "should" is the word. I think it's no more complicated than updating the descriptions to point out which Feats and Powers are best suited to a Jedi following the path of a Consular who focuses on studying the force and diplomacy, versus a Guardian who focuses on lightsaber prowess. The whole "Consular", "Guardian" "Sentinel" distinction becomes not very important, and statistically nonexistent. It's just a theme. It's totally okay to mix and match them, it would just be a fun flavor thing in the description, no more significant than pointing out the Echani's part in making energy shields. "Having 7 class skills seems like a bit much to me, but when I play the second game I end up with everything as a class skill, so I also wouldn't complain about that. One thing you should keep in mind is that - I believe - you retain all your class skills from non-Jedi levels when you multiclass to Jedi." That's a good point. It should be much more focused. "Assuming you only want to edit their starting attributes, yeah. If you wanted it to level up you'd have to do it via script, and then you'd run into that problem. On that subject, I would definitely suggest editing their stats anyway because they are not consistent with the game's rules." Yeah it would just be their starting attributes. "Sounds like it would work, although it feels a bit weird to me to have classes affect attributes, given that's usually a racial thing." True. A shaky justification would be the lack of species choice in the game for the player character. But I hear you. I'll tell you this, when I first played KOTOR, on my old Xbox years ago (which I bought to play KOTOR on), the first thing I noticed when I went to create a character is that I had to be a Human. I was mystified. "They made a Star Wars RPG and I can't be a Wookiee?!" Players want to be Wookiees, and Twi'leks and Mon Calamari and Rodians. I know because-of-the-plot blah blah blah and romance blah-blah-blah, (and more importantly) a lot of extra work blah blah, but it's what players want and if I was really going to make a wish list that defied reality, that would be on there. "Play as Wookiees, Droids and Twi'leks!" the box proclaimed. But they were talking about your companions. Sometimes I get the itch to make a retro game where resources aren't so demanding, sprite-based graphics, and put out the KOTOR SAGA Edition I've always wanted, tactical combat, the works. But I digress. So, yeah, I think it's a good idea from a gameplay stand point, the ability differences. But it's not in line with the tabletop game. Pros and cons.

You were talking about the suggestion of the unused inventory slots for class-based attributes. This is very encouraging. Because - I don't think I DO have to look for some party members using those slots. For the party members, you can just edit their starting attributes directly, and account for the increases/decreases in your calculations.

I think this is what had me thinking about Attribute Bonuses tied to Classes, although this sounds like there's not an elegant way to do it. But it would make them distinct. You could easily specify the attribute bonus difference in the text at the character creation screen. What do you think? If Scouts, Scoundrels and Soldiers got Feats at the same rate, and the same number of Skill points (based on Intelligence), but had statistical differences, and retained their class-feats? I.e., Scoundrel: +1 Dex, +1 Cha, -1 Wis. The scoundrel is an agile charmer, but prone to brash decisions. Scout: +1 Con, +1 Int, -1 Cha. The scout is a knowledgeable survivor, but often aloof. Soldier: +1 Str, +1 Wis, -1 Int. The soldier is a deadly tactician, but neglects intellectual pursuits. And if we're still doing the Jedi classes: Jedi Consular: +1 Wis, +1 Cha, -1 Str. The Consular pursues knowledge of the Force and is less adept with lightsabers. Jedi Guardian: +1 Wis, +1 Str, -1 Wis. The Guardian focuses on lightsaber training and is less adept with the Force. Jedi Sentinel: +1 Wis, +1 Dex, -1 Cha. The Sentinel relentlessly guards against the Dark Side and is less concerned with diplomacy. Or if we're doing just 1 Jedi class: Jedi: +1 Wis. The Jedi is attuned to the Force, and is part of a larger world. [^In this version, the Jedi class doesn't have any penalties, unlike the non-Jedi classes. But this is balanced because the non-Jedi classes have 2 attribute bonuses and the Jedi only gets 1. Of course, multi-classing becomes advantageous, as the PC will end up with 3 class-based attribute bonuses. Seeing as the player character is the only one who gets to do this, this seems okay). There could be a datapad in the player character's inventory (the first footlocker) that explains the stat differences. Basically like a crew manifest type thing of the Endar Spire and what type of crew they recruit. And then the training computer on Dantooine could still be the method that fills the character in on Jedi differences (if using different Jedi classes). But the rate of progression for Feats and Skills (and Powers for the Jedi) would be the same.

I'm encouraged that a KOTOR Saga Edition sounds appealing to you. I have a long way to go before I have the skills to really pull that off. I think you don't understand what I'm saying about the Jedi class idea. I'm talking about 1 Jedi Class, not 3. The issue is not that the classes would play too similarly -- there would be only 1 class to play (as a Jedi). I don't mean sub-classes. You wouldn't choose one of three different feats. You could choose any feats you wanted. There would just be something in the description letting you know what kind of Jedi would take that Feat. It's just for flavor. There would be 1 Jedi class, and that Jedi class could take any Force Powers and any Feats available to the Jedi class. So - i am just talking about descriptions, with regard to "differences" between Sentinel, Guardian and Consular. It's an in-story difference, the same difference between (say) a "Mercenary" and a "Trooper". Maybe Canderous is a mercenary, and Carth is a Republic trooper. They're both soldiers, there is statistically no difference. Or a Smuggler and a Gunslinger within the Scoundrel idea, and so on. Going back to Feats. I did try it with all the Classes with the same Feat progression. At one point I had the classes with 1 extra Feat at first level (because they're Human), and getting a Feat pretty much every level. I ended up having no Feats just on the levels where you get Ability points. This felt really good, but if I kept going that way, I would probably run out of useful feats, like you said. In this version of my mod, the difference between classes came down to Skill Points, Hit Dice, Reflex Saves, and the feats you get automatically for your class. Another thing I did was give each Class the same number of Class Skills (but different amounts of Points). So every non Jedi class gets only 1 non-class skill. For Scoundrels the only Class they don't get is Treat Injury. For Scouts it's Security. For Soldiers it's Stealth. And then Jedi only have 2 Class skills to make up for their access to Force Powers: Awareness and Persuade. But every class can use Persuade. It's an idea. Maybe something to do would be to go in the other direction. Slow down everyone's Feat progression, but make it uniform. And then restrict more of the Feats to certain classes. This way what makes the class unique is still what they can do, and not how fast they learn different things. Some of the Talents from SAGA Edition can be adapted as active Feats too, so adding those in would go a long way. For example, check out these two talents, "Disruptive" and "Walk the Line" Talent from SAGA Edition, they belong to the Scoundrel's: "DISRUPTIVE: By spending two swift actions, you can use your knack for causing trouble and instigating chaos to disrupt your enemies. Until the start of your next turn, you suppress all morale and insight bonuses applied to enemies in your line of sight." ---KOTOR translation: ^This would be an active Feat only the Scoundrel can pick. I would make it a single-target Feat, and it would remove positive status effects on the enemy. The animation might be similar to a flash grenade, or maybe just some kind of aggressive character animation. The drawback of this Feat is that the Scoundrel can't move or attack this turn. "Walk The Line: As a standard action, you can do or say something that catches your enemies off guard. Any opponents within 6 squares of you and in your line of sight take -2 penalty to their defenses until the start of your next turn. The penalty is negated if line of sight is broken. Prerequisite: DISRUPTIVE" ---KOTOR translation: ^This would be an active Feat only the Scoundrel can pick. It would require that you had already picked DISRUPTIVE. This would be a single-target Feat that would lower the enemy's Defense and all of their Saving Throws by 2. If this isn't possible to code, than it lowers the enemy's Dexterity, Wisdom and Constitution by 2. Once again, the Scoundrel would not be able to move or attack when using this Feat. I'm thinking a good (and funny) animation for this would be one of the dance animations (definitely catches them off guard). So, it was stuff like this that I had in mind as far as Talent adaptation.

Hey JCarter thanks so much for the thoughtful reply. I did realize my mistake after posting this - for years I've been under the impression that KOTOR was based on SAGA Edition, and when I discovered that this isn't the case a lot of their design decisions have made more sense, particularly with regard to the Jedi classes, the Scout class (even just thematically) and Saving Throws and the like. As a result my philosophy has shifted a bit. I'm not quite as determined to "make it more like the tabletop game" as it is based off an earlier version to the game I fell in love with, as you rightly point out. If I go ahead with some of my plans, the goal becomes "make it more like SAGA edition". I really enjoy the results of editing item damages and cost to mirror SAGA edition, as blasters become far more powerful and vibroblades become truly a backup weapon to switch to when enemies come close, and the whole balance between Jedi and lightsabers and blaster characters and attack bonuses for hitting ranged characters makes a lot more sense. So that part I like, and I plan on releasing this simple mod soon. The increased costs of items will be offset by the player starting out with 3000 credits which is also a nice little boost. So I've become less ambitious about this, partly because I've realized, as you point out in a nice way, that I'm trying to "fix" an issue that isn't present. I thought about representing the Talent system with Feats, but without passives this becomes pretty impossible. The reality I came to, backwards as you rightly put it, is that without Talent Trees the chief way to make each class distinct is to change the rate at which they progress in different areas (skills, Feats, Powers), which is exactly what the game does. I tried setting the Feat progression to be the same across all classes and mirroring SAGA edition, but I dont think this was a good idea and again, it taught me why things are as they are. With so many less Feats in the game, the player picks them up too fast. And without a Talent system, the differences between Classes becomes about skill points, Hit Dice and a few exclusive feats. And this doesn't really make them different enough. I DO have an additional question about skill modding though ... can the formula for skill point progression or skill point allocation at level up be changed, or is hard coded? As far as Jedi talent trees go, if I did one class, I would probably not attempt "limit choices" per se. Not having Guardian/Sentinel/Consular would be about avoiding this very thing. It would be more about labeling in the description of Feats or Powers. After all in SAGA edition you're not locked into a Talent Tree - Talents Trees are just thematic groupings of Talents, some with others as prerequisites. So with one Jedi class a "Sentinel Power" or a "Consular Feat" becomes a simple guideline in the description to help the player make their decision. "This is a Power favored by Jedi Guardians" on Force Jump, that sort of thing. That's how I would do it. The Chronicler at the Academy would still ask you what color crystal you want and which one suits you, Guardian, Sentinel or Consular. But then Zhar would level you up to "Jedi" and you would be 1 class. And Guardian/Sentinel/Consular would become a thematic difference. It would make things more streamlined, but I would be taking away a fun moment for the player to make a choice about their class. And maybe that's not so good, I don't know.

Nevermind, I figured it out

So one of the things I've discovered is that I don't need to mess with variables as far as placing starting Credits in that first footlocker on the Endar Spire ... Because each Class is supposed to start with the same amount credits. This is 3d4 * 250. The maximum amount possible here is 3000 Credits, so I'm adding that to the footlocker. But I don't know what I'm doing, apparently. I placed the new footlocker file in the Override folder, and it changed every footlocker in the game to contain those contents (or at least - the footlocker in the Taris apartment was identical). So do I need to place that file into the rim of the modules directory in KOTOR? Or place it into the rim and place that module in the Override? I've seen tutorials about creating your own modules, but I haven't yet tracked down helpful instructions on just changing placeables.