User talk:The Krit

Looking for mods
Please forgive the unconventional contact method, but from your edit history, it seems you're quite active here.

I've been looking around for a mod or set of mods to fix issues in NWN -- eg, inconsistencies in spell and feat descriptions and how they perform, odd ability progression of familiars and animal companions, etc. After some looking, I stumbled across Shadooow's Community Patch mod; unfortunately, a number of the changes it exacts are undesirable. Judging by the comments you left on his patch's Vault page, you hold similar views on the subject and have significant experience with mods of this nature.

So, the question: are you aware of a mod (or group of mods) that correct issues of this nature?

Thank you for your time.

- SilkTopHat, 18:36, February 19, 2012 (UTC)


 * The spell fixes I have looked at all seemed to go beyond making things consistent and introduced some of their authors' ideas of "how it should be done". However, one of them might be close enough for you. The one whose link I can readily locate is Script, Spell fix compilation, and there are some others you might be able to find by searching the Vault for "spell fix". The familiar and animal companion oddities are addressed by Familiar & Companion Fixes. --The Krit 08:02, February 20, 2012 (UTC)
 * I checked them out (and will be adding most of ILKAY's modifications) as well as some of your own mods. Thank you - I appreciate the advice. --SilkTopHat

Stuff to be done
Uploaded 2 png point buy screen shots, one of a half-orc fighter and another of an elven sorcerer. Is this what you had in mind, TK... or rather a "before & after" pair? You hadn't indicated whether it may be preferable to crop out only the actual point buy portion on the left or not. If so, I can easily upload revisions. These stand at the standard 800x600 screen print size and can either be shrunk (though compression will fade the text significantly) or just displayed as thumbnails that link to the full size image when needed. Not sure how this (on-screen image display convention) is being handled on the wiki. Lemme know if you need more, feel modifications are more suitable or if you would like me to make a stab at inserting them into the article myself. --Iconclast 04:03, March 1, 2012 (UTC)


 * They look mostly good, but could you click on the constitution line before taking the elven sorcerer image? That way the "cost to increase" would be filled in, and the right pane would show the calculation with the racial modifier. (If you do that and leave the half-orc one alone, the pair of images will show probably all of the relevant details someone might want to know.) --The Krit 09:26, March 1, 2012 (UTC)


 * Done (please note the addition of PB-elvensorcb.png). I had tried to frame the PB screen, slightly resized, within the finished character screen to more clearly illustrate EXACTLY what race each was associated with, but found the resultant image more confusing for a new player than it was helpful.  I believe these "as is" should suffice unless a member of the community has a better idea. --Iconclast 12:50, March 1, 2012 (UTC)


 * OK, but why upload it under a new name instead of overwriting the old version? --The Krit 14:29, March 1, 2012 (UTC)


 * Habit. It's how we maintain engineering document control when dealing with many editors submitting changes simultaneously for a common document (diagram, schematic, plot, etc.)  Purely a reflex action, TK.  Entrenched tenets are hard to break. ;) --Iconclast 17:35, March 1, 2012 (UTC)


 * Since there is not a pressing reason to keep both, I merged the two images onto File:PB-elvensorc.png so it's easier to see the changes. --The Krit 18:07, March 1, 2012 (UTC)

Bored
Mostly a little bored but... using awkward vocabulary only makes for an awkward entry. I believe that I noticed it on other entries, but right now I'm looking at "superfluous" and can't help but notice that word was tacked on as an afterthought (and in some cases, not quite right [you often mean redundant rather than excessive]).

The issue with your "superfluous" entries is that they attempt to define the word rather than use the word. "Many players find this superfluous as "x"" over "x, thus is superfluous"

It is partly some passive voice thing or what not, and partly the redundancy of the statement. By saying "x" we KNOW that it is redundant (rather than excessive, meaning doing more than what is needed). Why need we be told what we think?

Rather than enriching the material, the vocabulary is coming across as a pompous excuse to use it.

* minor note on IP User Contrib Great_cleave*

If an enemy is killed in the middle of a flurry, every remaining attack in that flurry is replaced by a superfluous great cleave. These attacks are made upon the just-killed enemy as it dies. After the enemy falls, a legitimate great cleave is made on the next target.

Does this say "Upon killing an enemy, all subsequent attacks are overridden until the next flurry; after which the cleave is performed?" (thereby implying that a character can only change targets once per flurry). That if the third or fourth attack kills the enemy, etc etc... (and the Attacks per Round rewrite doesn't help much either... just a note on how little information is actually there and how many words are used to convey it.)

Then we have Flurry disagreeing with Great Cleave as to the number of attacks per flurry (somewhere a 5th got added in).

Just bored and making a few notes. --173.171.224.117 19:25, 14 March 2012


 * Sorry, I do not know which of my contributions you are referring to specifically. Nor do I know why you are using my talk page to comment on a specific article (instead of that article's talk page). Forgive me, but I have better things to do than trying to make sense of this. --The Krit 20:27, March 14, 2012 (UTC)

Translate!
Hey there!

I really gain much from this wikia, and I'm pretty good at english so i thought I'd like to translete it to Polish (my language ;). Can you help me with that? because I'm not very good at site-maintaining things and I'd like a copy of this if it's possible and I don;t know how to do it.

87.205.248.220 17:14, April 12, 2012 (UTC)Jashin


 * By "a copy of this" you mean a copy of NWNWiki? Were you thinking of translating within NWNWiki or creating a new Polish-language wiki to mirror NWNWiki content? --The Krit 02:50, April 13, 2012 (UTC)


 * Edit: I meant a new wiki looking just like this one(at wikia.com), but to be filled with Polish-language articles, Or if its' possible it could be a languge changing button on this wiki, which would lead to translated. articles . 87.205.248.220 09:09, April 14, 2012 (UTC)Jashin


 * So you are looking to download the entire wiki. You can get a database dump over at special:statistics. (I just requested an update, which could take a week to process.) --The Krit 15:58, April 14, 2012 (UTC)

So You suggest to get this data now or after the update?

And what to do with that xml fiile? :P

Thanks for help 87.205.248.220 20:36, April 16, 2012 (UTC)Jashin

P.S. I invite everyone to my fav. server world in the shadows :) 176.9.82.66:5121


 * The update is done, so go ahead and get it. I don't know what exactly to do with the file, though, since I have not looked at it yet. (Presumably it was designed for importing into another wiki.) However, you asked about getting a copy of the wiki, and that is the only format I know of for getting a copy. Not sure what else I can offer. --The Krit 04:13, April 17, 2012 (UTC)
 * Ok, I'll figure it out or ask the staff, thanks a lot. I'll msg here if something moves
 * 87.205.248.220 17:29, April 17, 2012 (UTC)Jashin

A Bit More on Metamagic
Hello again, TK!

First, thanks for the thorough explanation you provided within the spells.2da (content) talk page to explain how the game utilizes the 2da to provide the slots available for metamagic versions of each spell. It was more involved than I would have suspected but I can now understand the flexibility it creates by structuring it the way Bioware did.

Using the 2da source I was able to hash together an Excel workbook that contains the maximum metamagic use for each of the 7 casting classes and forwarded to those who had requested it for further testing. Apparently, it is very useful for them in helping to decide which feats to select during character progression. So, for players anyway, it may be worthwhile linking in the wiki. I'll leave it up to you to decide its merit but it is there for the general public to use as they wish. It has been only sample-tested in-game as I am leaving it to the requesters to take up that gauntlet. However, since it is purely a reconfiguration of the basic 2da's metamagic column applying the guidelines you provided (in our respective prior discussion), it should be consistent with actual in-game observation. (The domains.2da also needed to be consulted to make the final list comprehensive for cleric spells.)

I had also considered uploading a comma-delimited version for those without Excel to use in their favorite spreadsheet app but will await your evaluation of that effort before doing so.--Iconclast 13:22, April 13, 2012 (UTC)


 * It would probably be better to have that info in wiki tables so that it does not require an external program to view. Of course, if you want a division of labor, you could upload a comma-separated version for someone else to convert to wiki format. Oh wait, nevermind. It looks like the Excel version is already uploaded. Might not need a comma-separated version at the moment. --The Krit 13:51, April 13, 2012 (UTC)


 * Well, I had considered converting the spreadsheet into wiki table format because I really find the magic row sort gizmos very handy. But I remember when MJ converted the scribe scroll and other crafting tables he had to write a program to do it economically.  Converting the entire spreadsheet manually would be a bear unless you know a quick way.  The 2da tables on the wiki are huge and have been converted... so... has someone made a conversion app for general public consumption on the wiki?  If so, I would like a crack at trying it myself, like viewing the output in the sandbox, perhaps, to see how it works before plugging in an article.  BTW, which article would you consider it to be best displayed or else a stand-alone article?--Iconclast 17:00, April 13, 2012 (UTC)


 * I can take the .xls, save each sheet as a space-separated table, then feed it to my .2da-to-wiki converter. So the conversion is no big deal. I just haven't yet figured out where would be a good place to put the table. --The Krit 17:58, April 13, 2012 (UTC)


 * How about near the statement "Metamagic feats cannot be used with all spells. See the specific feat descriptions for the spells that a particular feat cannot modify." in the Metamagic article? Either furnish links thereabouts to a separate article called "Metamagic tables" or place the tables in their own section in the current article.  Keep in mind, though, that all I did was use the spell labels from the 2da and never wiki-ized them, but maybe your conversion app also does that. ;) --Iconclast 22:40, April 13, 2012 (UTC)


 * Another issue popped up that may need to be addressed in that same article. Neither a paladin nor a ranger can select Quicken Spell feat even though they both meet the game's stated prereqs (ability to cast 4th-level spells).  However, if enough levels are taken in a viable casting class to take the automatic version (like wizard), all the paladin and ranger spells will be cast with the autofeat applied.  So then, do all the feat-granted spells like an assassin's Darkness fall into this category and exhibit the autofeat characteristics? (Feel free to move this paragraph to the Metamagic talk page if you feel it is better addressed there, TK.)--Iconclast 22:40, April 13, 2012 (UTC)


 * Paladins and rangers do not get to choose quicken spell presumably because none of their spells can be cast with it. (They do have level 4 spell slots, but no cantrips to quicken into those slots.) No, feat-granted spells are completely different than paladin and ranger spells. (Just look at where they appear in the radial menu.) Paladin and ranger spellcasting mechanics are identical to cleric and druid spellcasting mechanics, just lacking level 0 and level 5+ spell slots (and lacking spells of those levels as well). --The Krit 00:20, May 10, 2012 (UTC)


 * Just posting something here to say I have not forgotten about this. I was thinking it might be worth trying to use collapsible tables for this (so the reader could simply expand whichever tables are of interest), but the easy way apparently requires a MediaWiki version one higher than what Wikia uses. So it's not impossible, but will take more time than I hoped. --The Krit 03:08, April 21, 2012 (UTC)


 * Update: Collapsible tables should be much simpler to make use of once Wikia finishes their upgrade of the MediaWiki software (which should be done by the end of July). --The Krit 02:30, July 6, 2012 (UTC)

G'Zhorb article
TK, when you can, please check the G'zhorb the all-seeing eye article I just created, for wiki compliance. I used the beholder article as template so have left in some of the beholder notes which perhaps should be deleted from this article and just referenced via link (to make it easier for change control). I wasn't sure which photo to use from the toolset, so just captured one with a size similar to the beholder one. Also, I am not sure how to make the wiki title search work efficiently since wiki doesn't use metas like html pages (at least I can't recognize it if it does). So you may need to wiki-ize the article title so that it can be found. Finally, I have not added this to any list pages, not yet anyway... not until it receives your TK-stamp-of-approval. ;) --Iconclast 15:58, May 4, 2012 (UTC)


 * The photo is better extracted from the game resources (e.g. with NWNExplorer), rather than captured from the Toolset. For the article name, I'm not sure what you mean. It should be capitalized since it is a proper name (G'Zhorb is a specific beholder, not a subtype of beholder), but search should still work. --The Krit 13:47, May 7, 2012 (UTC)


 * Ahhh. I didn't know if NWNExplorer would export them or not.  I did another manual screen capture on the portrait (since it appears the articles always use the portrait rather than the in-game appearance) but I had a problem trying to overwrite the first one.  I thought I did it correctly by using the link (the underlined text phrase) at the bottom of the photo upload screen, but when I checked the article the "old" one was still there.  So I had to use a new file name, as much as I preferred just replacing the existing one.  Perhaps this was a case of latency that the revised photo didn't appear fast enough (I waited about 3-5 mins and decided I screwed up the revision somehow) but if you find the original screen grab version floating around somewhere, it can be deleted.  I just don't upload enough photos to be handy at it and the wiki method is unusual enough for me compared to other sites I use to consistently confound me.  Thanks for sanitizing my new article attempt. ;) --Iconclast 19:13, May 7, 2012 (UTC)


 * It just takes some time for replacement images to filter their way through Wikia's computers. As long as you see the new image in the "File history" section of the image page (e.g. File:Aberration_gzhorb.jpg), it's in the system and will work its way through eventually. Usually within a day, but it was taking a week or so back when Wikia was having cache problems. --The Krit 20:07, May 7, 2012 (UTC)

Strategy for dragon articles needed
As part of my compilation project, the stats of dragons will be gathered from the toolset so I figured this may be a decent opportunity to publish those articles. However, there are different ways to approach this but I feel the most streamlined would be to build articles similar to the drider chief article with all of the adult, old & ancient stats tabled in one article... but the wyrmlings in separate articles due to their significant differences from the adult forms. However, I'll need some help getting all the forms linked to the same article once they have been published, though I was planning to expand the Dragon category list to link each discrete version... else have the distinctions made only on the consolidated articles. Any comments and/or pitfalls that I should be aware of before I begin this? --Iconclast 00:36, May 8, 2012 (UTC)


 * Off the top of my head: there is a reason I decided dragons would be the last group of creatures I would get to in my own efforts to flesh out our articles about creatures.... ;) --The Krit 00:58, May 8, 2012 (UTC)


 * Just uploaded a Black_Dragon.doc which you may want to consider for a template. There are at least a few places that need to be addressed (like the skills section and my AB calculation), but it should at least serve as a starting point to get things structured very similar to the creature template already being used. Naturally, with article titles like this, indexing it to the 3 different versions may involve some "wiki magic" but it should prove more efficient than multiple articles containing essentially the same information. I discounted the possibility of a single "dragon" article with a huge table listing the differences but I suppose it is a viable concept.  Anyway, when you get a chance, please check it out and critique accordingly. --Iconclast 11:50, May 8, 2012 (UTC)


 * The following dragon-related articles have been either revised or created to reflect the standard current creature template or a reasonable facsimile thereof:
 * wyrmling, wyrmling black dragon, wyrmling blue dragon, wyrmling brass dragon, wyrmling bronze dragon, wyrmling copper dragon, wyrmling gold dragon, wyrmling green dragon, wyrmling red dragon, wyrmling silver dragon, wyrmling white dragon, black dragon, blue dragon, brass dragon, bronze dragon, copper dragon, gold dragon, green dragon, red dragon, silver dragon, white dragon


 * Among the sanitization procedure, please check specifically the white dragon article. That species seems to have enough oddities to make its presentation dubious or at least tedious. --Iconclast 15:42, May 22, 2012 (UTC)


 * Quick tip: the wikicode  produces "Creature", which can be a handy way to link to templates (tl == template link). ;) --The Krit 16:23, May 22, 2012 (UTC)

Skill ratings
A skill-related issue I should mention: the (low-high) skill rating scale being used with creature statistics. I tried finding a quantitative table or algorithm within the wiki that converts the skill values displayed in the toolset with a rating (e.g. very low, low, high, very high) but could find none. The best I can tell... it is somehow proportional to the creature's hit dice. If you could either link me to the article which contains this or furnish it here, I can make the substitution when I publish any further bestiary-type information. Also, related to skills... 1) if a creature has been assigned a skill focus feat, is it reflected on the toolset value or must it be added to arrive at the final "rating"? and 2) if an inventory item has been furnished in the default blueprint, like armor or shield, an item which could modify the in-game value of the skill, should this also be adjusted in the skill rating of the article? (at the moment, I cannot give an example of a default, but any of the DEX skills come to mind). --Iconclast 13:12, May 10, 2012 (UTC)


 * I've been using "high" if the (unmodified) skill ranks are significantly more than the class skill limit (hit dice + 3), "low" if the ranks are about the cross-class limit (half the class skill limit), "very low" if the ranks are about half the cross-class limit, "extremely low" for about a quarter the cross-class limit, and "single rank" if that seems more appropriate. I try to be not too rigid in these classifications, so that skill ranks that differ by 1 can be classified the same (different classifications would suggest a significant difference between them). I do not include information that is present elsewhere in the article (e.g. ability modifiers and feats). For items affecting skills, I would include direct bonuses to skills – with a commented note to make sure other editors do not overlook the item bonus – but possibly not the armor check penalty. (Not sure if the latter has ever come up though. Creatures with ranks in skills affected by the armor check penalty tend to not have that penalty.) The idea is to convey how strong the creature's skill ranks are if facing an equal-level opponent. Using the class skill level as the norm is based on a tendency for players to max out their skills. --The Krit 15:23, May 10, 2012 (UTC)


 * Very good. I've copied this to my "wiki tips" file for future reference.  When you can, please check the ratings I've set on the shadow dragon article.  If I have grasped it close enough I'll incorporate this system with any other creature articles I touch if it's not there already.  BTW, I had considered identifying the applicable skill table in the monster class article since they don't appear in the manual (like dragons use the cleric skill table) and may be further helpful for players to understand the potential when they appear in-game.  Just a thought. --Iconclast 14:58, May 11, 2012 (UTC)


 * The skill tables are meaningless for NPCs, unless they are being leveled in the game (c.f. henchmen in the expansion packs). The vast majority of creatures are built in the Toolset, so mentioning the skill tables can be greatly misleading. (There may be a place to mention that info, but it would be someplace for a subset of builders, not players in general.) --The Krit 18:09, May 11, 2012 (UTC)

Reorganizing Category: Dragons
Hello again, TK... another tutorial needed here... I would like to create a subcategory off of Dragons called Wyrmlings. Right now, Wyrmlings appear as a list item of the Dragons category but not as a subcategory (at least, I don't think it is yet). I would like to link all of the wyrmling article versions to the single category Wyrmlings rather than list each one separately under Category: Dragons. I've seen this hierarchy done with a plus sign (+) elsewhere, but do not feel I should simply begin experimenting and make a mess of things. There are also two other Wyrmling dragon articles that had been written previously that I would like to link to the same subcategory and coincidentally remove from the Dragons list. Not sure how to do that manipulation either. If you have a better suggestion how to organize, I am all ears... errrr... eyes. Ideas? --Iconclast 23:09, May 16, 2012 (UTC)


 * Are there enough wyrmlings to justify a subcategory? Maybe it would be better to give them a navigation template like was done for slaadi. --The Krit 01:13, May 17, 2012 (UTC)


 * Well, there would be 17 items in the list of the dragon category when all additions have been completed, plus the 10 wyrmling versions which makes 27 (actually... 28 with Dracolich, which doesn't belong in the race grouping). I just figured it would be appropriate to tie the wyrmlings into a single dragon subcategory for faster navigation and condense the dragon list appearance.  But the slaad link compilation article method would work as well.  It just requires accessing an additonal page before an individual wyrmling version can be selected.  Either way works.  Didn't realize there was a minimum number of items required to assign a subcategory or that it could create undesirable overhead. --Iconclast 04:15, May 17, 2012 (UTC)


 * There is no hard minimum for a subcategory, but... well, would it be helpful to have every category contain only a single article? Not particularly. The other extreme (all articles in a a single category) is not really any better. So there is some sort of balance to be struck. Twenty-seven is really not that big a category. Also, in principle, wyrmlings are just another age bracket for dragons, so if they get a subcategory, then the old dragons are going to want one of their own, which means the ancient dragons won't stand for anything less, and... but I digress. :) --The Krit 05:25, May 17, 2012 (UTC)


 * Okie doke. Then... once each of the individual creature templates have been applied for the wyrmling versions, they will all get "collected" within the Wyrmlings article which will be reorganized to provide all 10 links as per the Slaadi article.  Works for me. ;) --Iconclast 13:43, May 17, 2012 (UTC)


 * Another alternative is to have the wyrmling age as part of the dragon articles. For example "red dragon" would have the ages of wyrmling to ancient.  (This could also be done to include young wyvern in with the wyvern article).  The main difference between wyrmling and the other ages is the appearance (and wyrmlings are considered flying creatures by some scripts like caltrops). WhiZard 17:43, May 17, 2012 (UTC)


 * See also . --The Krit 19:00, May 17, 2012 (UTC)


 * I did read that, but seeing how few differences there were between young wyvern and the other wyvern, (and also between wyrmling and the dragons) I am not sure if Iconclast's conclusion of making separate articles for the youngest of ages of each dragon type (while clumping all the other ages together) is warranted, especially if one or two extra lines of notes maybe all that is needed when all ages are put together. WhiZard 00:50, May 18, 2012 (UTC)

How to get in touch with you.
Is it possible to speak with you without the whole conversation to be written here indefinitely? You haven't left any contact anywhere and nwvault email feature doesn't work anymore. You ain't registered on the new NWN forum too. I would like to ask you something, but I feel its unrelated to this wiki so I won't do that here. Leaving email is dangerous these days but isn't there a way to contact another user of the wiki privately? Alternatively tell me please where to register since you apparently don't want to on social.boware.com. Thanks. YouKnowWho77.92.213.119 14:49, June 27, 2012 (UTC)


 * There used to be an "email this user" link on user pages (and I know some people have used it in the past to contact me), but I cannot find this link on the new skin. (Removing the link might have been one of Wikia's ideas for "improving" wikis, maybe part of their plan to make wikis more "fun".) --The Krit 15:23, June 27, 2012 (UTC)

Wiki style sheet changed again?
I notice today that the Wiki's style looks to have changed again, at least changing the style that determines the text and background colors (and probably more). With your help last year, I was happy with the dark-text-on-light-background wikia.css that is still in my profile, but it no longer seems to function. Is wikia.css still the right file for Oasis? Or perhaps the page is specifying a different style? If you know what has happened, I'd like to know, Thank you. - MrZork (talk) 00:16, July 11, 2012 (UTC)


 * It looks like we've been upgraded to MediaWiki 1.19. That is probably the cause of the changes. I'll look into this in more detail later. --The Krit (talk) 09:09, July 11, 2012 (UTC)