My youtube Lets play Icewind Dale

RiseofBane · Post by **RiseofBane** » Wed Jun 22, 2011 12:46 pm

Hello people

Pleasure to meeting you all and really appreciate for this community for whoever created this awesome website.
I started playing and uploading Icewind Dale in youtube, with self-commentating and in-game sound. I love this game and it has given me special memory when I was in the age of highschool but had no time to really play, perhaps that's how I came back for the unfinished mission.
Please check the
[url='http://www.youtube.com/riseofbane']RiseofBane Icewind Dale Youtube Channel[/url]

edit: 04/07/13

Now I have crystal clear sound quality, took quiet awhile to test it.. I been uploading new videos and now having more than 100parts. Thank you

LastDanceSaloon · Post by **LastDanceSaloon** » Wed Jun 22, 2011 6:43 pm

I've often thought about doing a Youtube Let's Play for Icewind Dale. In fact I often think about doing one for every RPG I play.

The reason I don't do one is because a good RPG does not make for a good Let's Play video series. There are many reasons for this for which I will illustrate a couple below:

1. It's really boring watching other people choose characters and getting the game set-up, but it's too much a crucial part of the game to be omitted from a Let's Play.

2. Watching other people walk through 5 maps to rest, sell, buy and finish and receive quests is very boring, particularly when the NPCs are not audible and one cannot read at the same speed the uploader reads.

3. Most good RPGs use very small characters surrounded by big scenery (Elder Scrolls excluded which is why this series generates a lot of Let's Plays) which makes detail hard to pick-up on for the viewer - such as who's casting what spell or who's using special attacks etc.

4. To make them non-boring one has to be modded to invincibility and just on a non-stop slaughter from beginning to end - which is very boring for the uploader.

At the time of writing this I haven't watched your video so maybe you're just a great talker and the video can just use the game as background to your banter, which sometimes makes for a nice Let's Play regardless of the game, I'll check it out at some point!

---------------------------
Enthusiastic tag-line

kmonster · Post by **kmonster** » Sat Jul 02, 2011 4:29 am

It's quite entertaining to watch your videos. I'm curious if you will be able to make it to the end. I made the following observations:

1.) "Blind" includes not reading the manual.

2.) You don't like characters with low charisma.

3.) You like some characters more than the others. While you made sure that your mages get maxed int and both a dex bonus for extra AC and a maxed con for extra hitpoints you didn't even bother to redistribute your druid's stat points. No high wis for bonus spells, no combat or survival bonus for strength, dex or con. The rogue didn't even use all stat points she had available.

4.) You play a difficulty level which grants 50 percent XP bonus, either easy or hard.

RiseofBane · Post by **RiseofBane** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 5:08 pm

kmonster wrote:It's quite entertaining to watch your videos. I'm curious if you will be able to make it to the end. I made the following observations:

1.) "Blind" includes not reading the manual.

2.) You don't like characters with low charisma.

3.) You like some characters more than the others. While you made sure that your mages get maxed int and both a dex bonus for extra AC and a maxed con for extra hitpoints you didn't even bother to redistribute your druid's stat points. No high wis for bonus spells, no combat or survival bonus for strength, dex or con. The rogue didn't even use all stat points she had available.

4.) You play a difficulty level which grants 50 percent XP bonus, either easy or hard.

Hello Kmonster, thanks for even watching!
to answer your curiosity
1) didn't know blind meant not reading manual, I thought it meant someone completely new to the game

but I won't read manual at all

2) well sorry for the bad English and the saying stuffs incorrectly sometimes :laugh: especially I'm still not used to self-talking in LP. well what I really was saying was Mike the Dark don't want to have high charisma because he don't want to deal with petty stuffs. Trading seems to be petty or even feminen.. I kinda said this in Video Part 1 or 2 , cant remember lol. But in video part 3 (or somewhere), I recreated Mike and gave 18 charisma points by mistake.. and I changed the word quickly saying "Mike likes to get discount.. jes.. xD" So now he is forced to trade.. And no, I don't mind characters with low charisma, I don't dislike them.

3) I was actually afraid that creating characters is taking too long and make the viewers to leave. So I intentionally skipped to choose the optimal stats. In addition to that, I want to see party members to have hard time and face the challenging environment. Since they are weak with bad stats, the game difficulty is even harder, which I love to be that way

It will eventually offset however, as characters level up and pick up the nice gears. I don't want to be too strong and kill the enemies in non-entertaining way

4) don't know what you are talking about. One thing I know is, that the experience points are shared by each party members. And I never heard of 50% XP Bonus..

@Lastdancesaloon I will keep that in mind, although I don't agree with some of the things you said.

kmonster · Post by **kmonster** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 6:24 pm

Sorry I posted somewhat misleading. Your English is fine, probably better than mine.

1.) Watching the video I concluded that you didn't read the manual properly, I didn't want to express that you shouldn't read it when playing blind.

2.) I wasn't referring to your speech, it was just a comment about how you pumped up the quite useless charisma stat (you only need one person for shopping and talking) for everyone instead of the physical stats.

4.) Normal difficulty grants normal XP, easy or hard 150 percent, very easy or very hard 200 percent. Killing a beetle in the cellar grants only 35 XP on normal, you gained 52 and also a 50 percent bonus on quest XP.
Check your game configuration (either external or in-game) to see at which difficulty you're playing.

RiseofBane · Post by **RiseofBane** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 6:53 pm

kmonster wrote:Sorry I posted somewhat misleading. Your English is fine, probably better than mine.

1.) Watching the video I concluded that you didn't read the manual properly, I didn't want to express that you shouldn't read it when playing blind.

2.) I wasn't referring to your speech, it was just a comment about how you pumped up the quite useless charisma stat (you only need one person for shopping and talking) for everyone instead of the physical stats.

4.) Normal difficulty grants normal XP, easy or hard 150 percent, very easy or very hard 200 percent. Killing a beetle in the cellar grants only 35 XP on normal, you gained 52 and also a 50 percent bonus on quest XP.
Check your game configuration (either external or in-game) to see at which difficulty you're playing.

4) Initially the difficulty was Core level, the center of the difficulty bar. But after video part 9th or somewhere, I actually changed into Hard difficulty, which is right below the most difficult lvl. I also made comment about it in that video, that I like challenging. About bonus quest XP, I will check the configuration to see if such thing is added.
Also, I actually have check marked the box in game option "Show the quest XP in the dialogue", which is normally left as unchecked, so maybe you are seeing that.. Not sure though ! I will check tommorow.

RiseofBane · Post by **RiseofBane** » Wed Jul 06, 2011 7:30 pm

I checked both in-game, and the configuration, the game lvl is set to "Hard" which is below "Insane" level.
When I was battling those beetles, I don't actually remember what the lvl difficulty was, but now it is "Hard" for sure. About bonus XP, you can check my video after 15th part, that's where I changed into hard difficulty. I don't know how much XP is supposedly 50% bonus, so perhaps u can tell me.
I also see "heart of fury mode" in config, which makes all monsters very tough, don't think I will try that though. Insane lvl combined with heart of fury mode would be.. like an hardcore action game

kmonster · Post by **kmonster** » Thu Jul 07, 2011 8:14 am

Changing the difficulty to hard won't increase the challenge on the long run, it will even make the game easier. Higher character levels let you have more hitpoints, better to hit chance, better saving throws, more attacks and better spells at higher casting level than you're supposed to have. Those settings are rather for players who want to impress their audience or prefer multiclasses in their parties without slower levelling.

In the original IWD release you didn't get an XP bonus for playing harder levels, but this was changed with HoW due to popular demand. For the challenge HoF mode was added which changes more than just the monsters' damage per hit.

I prefer normal difficulty. A morningstar does 2-8 damage (add 6 bonus with 18/00 strength) according to the rules, it doesn't make sense if the same weapon wielded against your party suddenly changes into a 3-12 damage dealing weapon and 18/00 strength grants now a +9 bonus to damage when used against your party.

RiseofBane · Post by **RiseofBane** » Thu Jul 07, 2011 1:44 pm

That's a very useful information. I actually uninstalled HOW last night prior to checking this forum, because I was having weird glitch after I talk with Hrothgar for the expedition. After we arrive in new place, the game just freeze there, characters are standing and nothing happens. I figured this out from google search, it has to do with INI file, but I just uninstalled HOW anyway. And yes I still have the quick-saved file which is working

Now I suppose there is no more extra bonus XP and advantage in long run with original IWD install

Problem is the mage portrait became question mark because original IWD don't have it lol.. I will look for custom portrait online..
Btw I recorded about 5 parts of videos before this happened, so I will be uploading fresh original IWD starting from quick-save , on weekend of next week.

kmonster · Post by **kmonster** » Sun Jul 10, 2011 3:18 pm

You were really lucky at part 20 fighting the ogre. The game seems to have a mercy mechanic in this early tutorial cave (never noticed this before, maybe it was removed with the latest patch), ogre hits which would have killed your characters were reduced to leave the targets alive with just 1 hitpoint. Normally both priests would have been killed instantly and Lilly Black would have been crushed beyond resurrection, gone forever.

RiseofBane · Post by **RiseofBane** » Mon Jul 11, 2011 12:58 am

hah yea. I think it was really lucky that Ogre did minimum dmg with some merciful HOW engine.

RiseofBane · Post by **RiseofBane** » Sun Apr 07, 2013 6:47 pm

hello guys, I was off for about a months due to busy schedule, I am back again and hope you enjoy if you watch it. Thank you. Also all the sound issue as well as others are all fixed.

IWDPlayer · Post by **IWDPlayer** » Tue Apr 09, 2013 6:40 am

I have been watching your videos and have enjoyed them.
Just a couple of points
- You continue to try to summon monsters despite the limit of 6.
- You cast spells before every battle, quite a lot of the battles work with just hack-and-slash.
- I don't think your characters are that balanced, yes you have a good combo of characters but some don't play a big part in battles which they should.

Also I would be interested in the information about every character, name, level, stats etc.

I really want to see if you complete the game.

RiseofBane · Post by **RiseofBane** » Wed Apr 10, 2013 11:37 am

HelloIWDPlayer, I'm glad that you even enjoyed.

To answer your points,

I wasn't honestly looking at the dialogue believe or not and didn't know there was summoning limit, I am playing this game blind despite the experience of playing Baldur's Gate in the past (almost 7 years ago).
I love casting , but I wouldn't cast much or not cast at all against minions.
Again as a blind player, I didn't know this game to require more tanked melee warriors. I started with 4 characters in the beginning and started recruiting more members based on what I experienced. I did kick someone out of party in the past and I am about to do the same soon, but I am more of story-telling type so if I kick someone, it mainly has to do with story line.

For the information about my characters, I think I will do that since I also need to learn more about how the level effects spells and what not. The only time I check level and other things are when I level up, so it might not be easy to see the whole characters stats in organized way.
By the way I already pre-recorded new videos before reading your comment, so it will be next of the next uploads.

Again thank you for the comment, really appreciate that.