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Engine limitation

Mentioning the game engine limitation is not about design intent, ShaDoOoW. It's letting custom content makers (and players) know the difficulty in changing this. --The Krit 19:53, November 19, 2011 (UTC)

• Then we can add the reasoning "due to the engine limitation" into everything, like that Bestow Curse doesn't stack or incorporeal status disappear after rest. To make undead immune to the negative damage energy from weapon can be done via one line inside OnSpawn script, to make them heal could be done in OnDamaged if needed. My point is that I think its rather intent as it would be quite unbalancing if the negative damage on weapon would healed them. --ShaDoOoW 01:03, November 20, 2011 (UTC)

• Bestow curse does not stack with itself because spells do not stack with themselves, so this is desired behavior (but thanks for reminding me to revert your edits over there). Incorporeal concealment disappears after rest because it was not made supernatural, which is a scripting issue, not a game engine issue. Making undead immune to negative energy damage does not cause them to be healed by negative energy damage. Still an engine limitation. --The Krit 02:18, November 20, 2011 (UTC)

• You didn't understand my point. Nevermind. --ShaDoOoW 03:25, November 20, 2011 (UTC)

• No, I understood your point, but since your point is your unfounded opinion, I ignored it rather than address it and risk insulting you or getting drawn into a pointless argument. (Not to mention that your point is rather unrelated to the subject at hand -- there is a game engine limitation that prevents a weapon's damage from healing instead of damaging. Regardless of why that limitation exists, its existence is of interest to the people seeking to bring NWN closer to D&D rules.) You are entitled to your opinion, after all. --The Krit 04:26, November 20, 2011 (UTC)

• Nonono. My point is that there is missing any reference to the reasoning you used. It is documented anywhere?, nope, thus based only on your unfounded opinion. Unless there is a clear reference, it can be only guess. Maybe its a good guess but shouldn't wiki represent only proofed facts? And btw, the note I added into Bestow curse was copied from Negative Energy Burst. So by this logic that spell usually do not stack, you should remove this note from there and Ray of Negative Energy spell as well. But then don't be surprised if there would be question whether the spell effects stack in talk pages sometimes in future because not every player is familiarized with how the spell effect engine works. --ShaDoOoW 04:48, November 20, 2011 (UTC)

• What part of my reasoning would you like a reference for? And what sort of reference would you be looking for? (For example, would an exhaustive search of item properties and effects in the Toolset be sufficient reference to convince you that the game engine does not support the automatic conversion of damage to healing?) Negative energy burst article is now cleaned up, but not the one for "ray of negative energy" because there is no such spell. (The closest spell would be "negative energy ray", but that one has no note about stacking.) --The Krit 20:48, November 20, 2011 (UTC)

References:

1. "Mentioning the game engine limitation is [...] letting custom content makers (and players) know the difficulty in changing this" — This came directly from the person (me) who added that phrase, so is as reliable a reference as to the intent of that phrase as you can get.
2. "Bestow curse does not stack with itself [...]" — claimed by ShaDoOoW right before I mentioned it.
3. "[...] because spells do not stack with themselves, so this is desired behavior" — The script x2_s1_shadow has a comment explaining that an effect application was delayed for 0.1 seconds "to sever the connection between this effect and the spell, so its effects stack".
4. "Incorporeal concealment disappears after rest [...]" — claimed by ShaDoOoW right before I mentioned it.
5. "[...] because it was not made supernatural, [...]" — the script nw_s2_default9 implements this, and there the concealment and cutscene ghost effects used for incorporeal creatures are converted by the command ExtraordinaryEffect(), not SupernaturalEffect(). The comments documenting ExtraordinaryEffect() state that this means the effects "are removed by resting", while the comments documenting SupernaturalEffect() state "Permanent supernatural effects are not removed by resting".
6. "[...] which is a scripting issue, not a game engine issue." — No reference for this, but it has been demonstrated. By simply changing which command is called in a script, the behavior is changed. This fits the definition of "scripting issue".
7. "Making undead immune to negative energy damage does not cause them to be healed by negative energy damage." — This would really be easier to test than to reference, but I was able to find one. The patch notes for 1.66 state "Fixed an issue with Damage Immunities not working correctly once they were stacked way too high above 100%" which implies 100% is the limit of damage immunity, and 100% immunity has no implications of healing.
8. "Still an engine limitation." — The limitations of the NWN game engine are generally not documented anywhere, making this a tough one to get a reference for. I'll stick to the reference I gave above (there are no scripting commands to create an effect that does this and there are no item properties defined that do this) until I get a better idea of what sort of reference is desired.
9. "[The existence of this engine limitation] is of interest to the people seeking to bring NWN closer to D&D rules." — I suppose the main thing to reference here would be the D&D rule, so see D20 SRD. It is stated "Negative energy (such as an inflict spell) can heal undead creatures." While this remains vague about negative energy damage from weapons (the word used is "can" instead of "does" and there are no weapons dealing negative energy in the SRD), extending the healing to weapons is a common conclusion, based on various posts I have seen in forums. (Should I locate one of these posts as well?)
10. The existence of this engine limitation says nothing about BioWare's intent. — Does this seriously need to be referenced? BioWare designed and created the game engine and its limitations. If an engine limitation obstructed something BioWare wanted to accomplish, they could relax or eliminate that limitation. (In fact, they have done so for other limitations.) On the other hand, BioWare is a business and sometimes they accept undesired limitations when the cost of making a change is too high for the expected benefits. (BioWare had responded to a number of feature requests along the lines of "That would be nice, but we do not have the zots to do it.") So the continued existence of an engine limitation can be the result of either BioWare desiring the limitation or BioWare not willing to pay for a change. No conclusion about BioWare's intent is possible based solely on the existence of a game engine limitation.

Did I leave out anything that needs a reference? --The Krit 23:43, November 22, 2011 (UTC)

Undead Healing

Can undead use healing kits or regeneration items? -- 67.42.106.117 12:43, 30 November 2011

They can use healing kits to heal themselves, and will regenerate from items, as neither of these are seen as invoking positive energy. WhiZard 19:07, November 30, 2011 (UTC)