While not a requirement, this mod leans towards neutral to evil.
Description
An original adventure designed for novice Rogues. Two rival rogue guilds vie for control of the twin city area. Join the Saskan Guild, do guild business, burglarize the nobility, court a romance, and maybe solve legendary quests. Replay the adventure several times to see all the quests (not all quests are possible in one game). This mod is designed to explore the diverse abilities of the rogue.
Version 1.10
** NEW 2da OVERRIDE **
place iprp_trapcost.2da into your override directory. It fixes the trap issues introduced with the 1.59 patch and has not yet been fixed.
I've not played this mod in a very long time, soooo. . . *clicks the download link*. though I agree with steve, the twilight paladin series was the better mod. too bad it was never finished. . .:( _________________________ jml's list of community addons/overrides, etc. Link
Posted by Steve_Savicki at 2012-05-26 20:22:19 Voted 4.00 on 05/26/12
Killing of Innocents and poppies implying drug manufacturing tell me that the paladin series was a much better storyline. _________________________ Steve's Characters - please don't forget to vote on them if you play them.
Thanks,
Steve
Posted by Zeruel8227 at 2011-06-26 00:30:06 Voted 10.00 on 06/26/11
Awesome Mode, Great Story too!. Really worth HoF.
Posted by Mirgalen at 2010-04-01 06:02:11 Voted 3.00 on 04/01/10
Avoid. They are several good rogue modules on the vault.
Pros:
+ outstanding scripting, cutscenes and visual effect.
Cons:
- Very frustrating. Adventuring with a rogue should be fun but here you wish you were anything but a rogue, possibly a fighter or a mage. Or may be the guild does not want the guy to succeed therefore no need to provide decent equipment (smoke bomb, caltrop, poison darts, invisibility potions, traps...) at a very affordable price. Instead make sure all the enemies have good equipment and excellent listen/spot so that you are going to be spotted soon enough and cut into small pieces by bugbears or what not.
3-4: It is clear the author tried to make something interesting, but still fell short. With more work it might be worth the download.
Posted by todde at 2009-03-05 15:28:04 Voted 10.00
LOL ok the insightfull comments in the post below this one and rating of 2 given by a poster named Gay Lord. A-yup. That really gonna influence some folks. Keep trying GL. Hope Jr isnt too hard on you.
Posted by Gay Lord at 2009-03-01 05:43:52 Voted 2.00 on 03/01/09
Overall a boring mod. There's a token story, and a mild "secret", but these benefits are completely lost due to the boring and repetitive gameplay. Job #1 = rob a house with guards and traps. Job #2 = rob a house with guards and traps. Job #3, 4, 5, 6...
These manors are also illogical. Every noble has numerous guards up all night. There are scores of very expensive traps guarding crap. I honestly don't know why there wasn't a body pile in the town square, comprised of all the noble and guard corpses that died on all the traps littering these mansions. Maybe us rogues really ARE doing them a favor by coming through...
While there are a few highlights, there is so much repetitive drudgery that it's hard to admire. There were a few areas where it was obvious the author C&P monsters, traps, etc. No wonder it feels like you've been here before... you have!
Hmm, a square room with two dwarven guards and a door. Where does it lead? To a square room with two dwarven guards and a door. Where does this one lead? To another square room with two dwarven guards and a door. No, I'm not making that up. There's actually a fourth room after that, also with two dwarves. This mod really lets you explore the nuances of deja vu, by experiencing it over and over again.
While combat in the beginning is rather hard (and I don't like when monsters have special gear but don't drop it), I didn't find it nearly as hard as others here have indicated. I had an elven rogue with 18 dex, 14 int, and did rog/rog/rgr for my first levels. The rgr hp's helped a lot.
It's clear the author wants you to use your stealth, not to bypass foes, but to get sneak damage. To get the most of this, you'll want to dual wield, either from rgr or feats, but also boost your init as much as possible. My feats were blooded/ finesse/ imp init/ KD/ IKD (although I never wound up using KD). If you start with a 16 dex or lower, you might want to take thug for your fourth feat. With blooded, II, and 18 dex, I had +10 init, which means more sneak damage before the noble guards can hit you.
Many foes themselves seemed illegal, either being very high level, or having bizarre attack or save numbers. There was also serious lag in both towns, which I 'killed' with a few cowsfromhell commands. Ambiance is nice, but I don't need 100 commoners in my towns, thanks.
Copperhawk explains, sort of, how to get a motherload of overpowered gear. You need to Pocket a key from Samar after being told about it by the barkeep. This should help those who keep having trouble. Use the strange device to boost Tommi's ring and Linu's necklace for +8 dex.
Vote = Base 5: +1 humour, +1 map shortcut, +1 xp for rogue skills, -1 typos and grammar, -1 metagame and RL references, -1 C&P, -1 repetitive quests, -1 repetitive combat, -1 illogical monster placement = 2
Posted by ericdoman at 2008-11-30 14:20:38 Voted 9.25 on 11/30/08
Just finished as a female 5 rg/1 rgr/7 assassin about 9000xp short of 14th lvl. So major respect for person who achieved that. Only found 5 of the legend items, missed out on X the cunning (rg/wiz). Had problem with Jond Bames, fond him hournal entry comes up about speaking to his family but no dialogue option, also no romance and no wizard's spire quest was offered. Doubt I would have picked up enough xp from above to gain that 14th lvl
Enjoyed it though but just a change of vote now
Posted by ericdoman at 2008-11-30 03:37:36 Voted 9.25 on 11/30/08
Have been replaying this a while now and noticed some of the comments below.
the one thing is that generally every "rogue" module (dance with rogues, honor among thieves) involves combat. You have to use traps and a little bit of gamesmanship to get by. For example, running and shootin, in particular timing it when the enemy hopefully only one is turning a corner, OR you close a door in front of NME , go into stealth/detect mode open door sneak attack.
Patience has to be a virtue with rogue modules (prob with many/all modules). Again using gamesmanship above and try and have only one guard following you. Again do not shoot at aguard in aroom full of guards as they will all come after you. Stay in stealth and detect mode and wait for the opportyunity where only one guard can see you. Come out of stealth and detect mode and run and then gamesmanship.
When designing rogue for this mod appraise is not important save your points, also only place points on persuade forget bluff and intimidate. Yep I made the mistake on this one. I have a cha and int of 14 but nothing on persuade, you can be as witty and charming as you want in this mod but without persuade on max forget it.
Forget about putting points on craft trap.
I took down a half elf because I believe you can multi class without xp penalties, still not really OK with this but atpresent am 4/1/3 rg/rgr/assassin. The ranger class has a couple of skills similar to rogues, you have dual wield and favoured enemy (always human), martial wepons and shield. I go for the assassin class because of the death attack which leads me onto -
Not using a halfling, the best feat for a rogue is improved knockdown (min int of 13 and knockdown before) bit difficult for a rogue because of size BUT most oppnents succumb to imp knockdown and then the combinations of sneak/death attack and a stun/hold/sleep weapon(s) can make him very tough. To make sure I would wield single handed weapon and shield then try imp knockdown until opponent is down and then dual wield.
This leads me onto talking to inn keeper as he will give you some advice on certain things in the game ie Ramas? secret hoard. Also speaking to belinar will give you additional quests, search the dead bodies and a pile of skulls (can't remember which quests). Based on he above info upgrade ring and amulet, drink potion of cat's grace. I think your pick pocket skill needs to be at 23, pucrhase lesser amulet of the master and the you have some pretty good equipment, actaully "this" hot for your level.
Apologies for giving too much away or for thoise who already know.
In the meantime where do you find the ruddy names for the various legends, only have one and that hasn't worked on the 3 places I have visited. I know I asked the author this a long time ago but he wouldn't help and I do not wish to trawl through the pages of comments.
I started playing this. The gauntlet was awesome and a good intro to rogue skills. However, after that the mod becomes ridiculously hard for a low level rogue... Even though I have my hide / move silently skills maxed out, extremely tough enemies are constantly detecting me.
The mod would be a great adventure for rogues except it seems like you're constantly forced to enter into fights rather than using your thieving skills. For example, I realized an enemy had a key I needed to advance, but picking his pocket was completely impossible..
Perhaps I'll try this again starting with a lvl 3 rogue and see if that makes it less frustrating. It seems like a very well done mod, but reloading 100 times to beat one overpowered monster isn't my idea of a good time...
Posted by Copperhawk at 2008-06-08 01:51:32 Voted 9.50 on 06/08/08
My score is quite high compared with what others have voted because I thoroughly enjoyed this game. In the first 1/3 section of the game, it is slow and like what most other players said, I had to reload a lot. But after a special turning point, gameplay has been improved a lot and I played it all up to the ending.
Now think about it, that turning point is so crucial to the enjoyment of the game that without it, I can imagine that the game would be a hell of frustration. If you want to enjoy rather than to "suffer", here are my suggestion:
1. You don't have to pump your rogue's dex too high. There are many items in the game will boost your rogue's dex. Intelligence is more important because it can introduce many dialog options which requires your "wit", including those legendary rogue item locations
2. Don't overlook the pickpocket skill. If you don't want to suffer, max it.
3. Some others mentioned that if you played a female rogue, the game is broken. I didn't try a female rogue. Playing a male rogue certainly is bug free.
4. The most important quest, i.e., the turning point of this game is a quest that ask you to steal a painting.
5. After you have stolen this painting and if you have enough "wit", you can get a very useful item.
6. With this very useful item, you can pickpocket a VIP to obtain a key. With this key, you can enter a room which contains 6 crates of deadly traps, a crate of armors which contains a +3 armor, and another crate of weapons which contain +2 and a +3 weapon.
So that's why it is a very important turning point. Once you can get the stash, you have tons of $$$$, good weapons, and more deadly traps which you can use. From that point on, gameplay is a breeze!
Posted by Glaucon at 2007-09-04 15:37:26 Voted 8.00 on 09/04/07
Despite my enjoyment with Rick Burton's previous work as well as this module there are just one aspect I can't get over, namely combat. Your character, being a rogue is inherently weaker than most of the enemies you face in the early stages of the game (almost exclusively fighters). These enemies often completely overwhelm you in combat, in spite of any leverage a sneak attack may gain. I'm just tired of running from a lone guardsman two or three times every fight just to stay alive. I appreciate the story line and realism, but this module is simply too tedious to play through with that style of game-play.
On the flip side, the xp gained from picking locks and traps is an excellent inclusion.
The story line was interesting and fun to go through except when i released Bames - i used a healer kit on him and then talked to him but he died afterwards and when i went back to tell his son - there was no way of telling him what happened. so i was not able to complete the romance or solve that quest.
Posted by dwong1207 at 2007-05-23 11:01:09 Voted 9.50 on 05/23/07
Alrighty, I figured out the Bames quest and what's really supposed to happen. I had to restart, mainly because I was so frustrated with continually dying, so I came back with a vengence. I realized that as much as I like the rogue, I'm a hack and slash kinda guy. So now that I've actually been able to progress the story, I'm starting to see how big the module is. I like the different options that are presented and the choices that have to be made. There's some nice twists and turns that you don't expect. Now that I'm not so frustrated, I can say that I like the module and the adventure it presents.
For those trying this mod out for the first time, you may want to start a little higher than level one, say level 5+. It makes it a little bit more manageable.
**SPOILERS**
1) For freeing Bames, if you don't realize that you need to bash the gate and use a healer's kit on him, Bames will run away and the quest is broken.
2) I chose to do the charm quest on Vrugar's daughter. However, when she was supposed to lead me upstairs, she just kept talking. then after I eliminated her upstairs and went back down, she was still there talking. I didn't try talking to her because I didn't want to mess things up.
3) I really appreciated the tribute to what I'm assuming are your daughters. It was a sweet touch...and my deepest sympathy to you and your family.
Posted by dwong1207 at 2007-05-18 14:18:15 Voted 9.50 on 05/23/07
I was able to set Bames free. I used a healer's kit on him to get him to stop bashing at the gate. However, he then started running out and I couldn't talk to him. Does this mean the quest is broken? His daughter doesn't give me an option.
Posted by dwong1207 at 2007-05-18 11:19:22 Voted 9.50 on 05/23/07
Outside of all the frustration of having to keep reloading after time and time of getting killed, the story is pretty good. I'm trying to hang in there. Is there anyway to free Bames Jond without having to kill the guys in the room? Bames keeps trying to bash the door even after I've picked the lock and opened the door for him.
Posted by todde at 2007-03-26 18:43:53 Voted 10.00
Go easy on the mod Hombre, it was one of Ricks and the NWN community first mods. I felt it ended rather abruptly and when I posted that opinion waaaay back in 03 Rick agreed and said that this was one of the places he 'really learned' how to structure a mod. Its got some flaws but overall its still solid and is a good romp. I highly reccoment this mod to newer players or those new to playing a rogue. Its got some really nice things in it for the rogue class that you dont really see in other mods. The floors of the tower for one.
This mod claims to explore the diverse abilities of the rogue. In fact, I felt the lack of diversity was a weakness in this mod. Better than some perhaps, but when the same format is used for multiple quests, and the way to get around every obstacle in the game is to either sneak around it or kill/disarm it the mod does get redundant.
Also, "casing a joint" should involve more than just giving other rogues vague details they would have figured out within seconds of entry anyway. They should give a map of the place, complete with known traps and the habits of the places inhabitants, (as in, when they're most likely home vs being away). The rich residents properties should make more sense. Do you really think every rich abode has a battalian of guards patrolling all day and night and secret areas protected by traps? All to guard a few items that can be sold for a few hundred gold?
My final complaint is the reason I'm giving up on it. I'm trying to kill Thrawken, (or whetever Vrugar's mage's name it), and after using a scroll of invisibility to finally reach her, I find out that low and behold she is immune to my +1 short sword. You know, the highest magical plus weapon available to me at this point in the game? Oh wait, there is that Sniper +2. Ah yes, the bow I was using before I had it upgraded only to discover I can't use it anymore, I guess I hadn't Rick's mind well enough to know to pump my Use Magic Items stat higher than 6 in order to have any ability at all to complete this quest.
That aside, I did like Rick's other mods and highly recommend them.
Posted by djeber2004 at 2006-07-20 21:31:19 Voted 8.75 on 07/20/06
It took me a long time to finish this module, because I'd play it for a while, get frustrated, and go play a different module, and then get back to this one when I finished the other. It's a very well-done module, but also very difficult - I really had to learn how to adjust my play style. My main complaint is that you really don't get much money until over halfway through the game. I could barely afford to buy traps for much of the game, much less upgrade my equipment. Also, the romance quest appears to be broken, and the ending is very abrupt and anticlimatic. Still, despite these things, and the high frustration level, overall I thought it was a very good module.
Posted by mr_karmasinc at 2006-07-20 13:36:01 Voted 9.50 on 07/20/06
I love this Mod but I'm having a slight problem....it won't save or load. If I try to save it freezes...and if I try to load the Autosave (the only save that works)..it freezes. Is there a reason for that? All the other Mods I have work fine, it's only this one that does it.
Posted by Dave Fritz ( 130.15.xxx.xxx ) at 2006-06-28 10:09:45
driftwolf: Nope, can't fix the female romance with a simple bug fix. Those are the quests not available to females mentioned in the Read Me. In order to get along you would have to manually run a bunch of scrips at appropriate times. I agree that there should be a clearer warning in the mod description about this. I'm playing a female, too. No, I'm not going to replay as a male, see below.
Re difficult fights ... I played part way through this a long time ago and found it a reload-fest. This time I used better tactics, learned in the interim.
Spoiler!!!
Use your missle weapon, sneak up, shoot, run away while the shot is still in the air and keep running. Mobs will frequently stop, often leaving only one following you, and you can repeat. You can also get away to rest spots even if that means changing areas. Basically, sneak up, hit, run away and rest a lot. It can take a long time for a tough monster such as the Queen Spider, but you rarely get killed or permanently drained. Takes a lot of arrows, too. Also, use the Special Item at the temple to upgrade some others and go for the Legendary Rogue items.
End Spoilers
Cheers,
Dave Fritz
Posted by ra0313 at 2006-06-27 11:13:22 Voted 10.00 on 06/27/06
Is there a bug fix for the female rogue romance quest? I'm annoyed at having spent all this time and only NOW finding out that I can't complete several of the quests because of a damn bug.
Overall the module seems good so far. Doesn't beat "A Dance With Rogues" for making rogue skills useful, and gives way too much exp for killing things when there are sneakier alternatives (my evil PC just exterminated the prisoners rather than releasing them. That was good for a level up...). So an ok rogue mod, but could be more geared to giving experience when using rogue skills rather than assassin skills.
(currently rogue 8 / shadowdancer 1 and having a pretty good time as an assassin... if it moves, I stop it moving. Except if its already dead. Bloody sneak-attack immunity!)
Are you modifying rolls in this mod? I just tried (for the hell of it) 50 attempts at a fortitude save (triggering a trap). I need to roll a 10 on a d20, so if the rolling is at all random I should get about 50/50. Instead, I got 45 failures. What gives?
Another reload fest trying to get through some sections. Guard dogs seem to have a spot/listen in the 30s. Can't seem to sneak past them no matter what I'm wearing. Sigh.
OK, what's the trick for the "invisible sight traps"? I've tried everything I can think of: moving 1 step at a time, moving in stealth/detect mode to move slowly, moving in stealth mode alone. I'm still getting hit enough to kill me by the time I get to the middle of the room.
An interesting mod, particularly for someone who had never played as a rogue before. Unfortunately, I hadn't read this thread and so played with a female, which meant that I couldn't advance in the romance quest.
I really enjoyed the fact that most of the fighting could be bypassed. One wouldn't get nearly the same amount of experience, but it made *sense*. Also, the increasing difficulty of the tasks was very well thought of.
However, there were a couple of things that bothered me when playing:
- When one places the bombs in the mine fields, the farmers are still working, which should make the PC guilty of mass murder, but without any aligment shift. Worse, when I visited the area later on (a couple of weeks in-game time) while searching for a part of the legendary equipment, they were still working the fields -- the still-burning fields, mind. Not really major, but it did make me stop and look.
- The first house I robbed, I didn't kill any of the guards. Hey, I'm a thief, not an assassin - or I wasn't then, anyway ;p. But when I returned for the second heist, and needed to wait until dark, the only way I could do it was to basically clean the house. Again, not really disruptive, but I was looking to be a little more low-profile.
- The rather abrupt ending. Sorry. :D
Oh, the person bellow who mentioned Bluff -- the module was made with vanilla NW, as is indicated. The Bluff skill was added in HotU. I doesn't work in the module. So they're right in that they might as well not have it. ;b
Posted by slobberknocker at 2006-04-07 19:58:39 Voted 10.00 on 04/07/06
laisee, you hit the nail on the head. If you follow the recomendations that are there for everyone to see. (check the read me) this mod is challenging but doable. A big part of what makes Rick Burton a great mod writer is the fact that he understands game balance. This mod isn't easy but it's very entertaining and rewarding if you can push through the tough stuff. Absolutely fantastic mod if you want to play a rogue.
Posted by slobberknocker at 2006-04-07 19:46:13 Voted 10.00 on 04/07/06
just played 2nd time around. this is an outstanding mod.
Posted by laisee at 2006-04-02 05:05:22 Voted 10.00 on 04/02/06
I just don't see where all these other folks had such problems!!! - I played a standard package halfling rogue throughout with default level ups and had a rocking good time with it, finishing lvl 14. I just missed out on Cern's legendary item as I chose the wrong assassination quest :( so guess I will have to replay it perhaps with an elven female rogue or something. A classic rogue mod with some super quests and challenges (loved the Wizards Spire and many others).
Posted by laisee at 2006-04-02 05:02:02 Voted 10.00 on 04/02/06
I played this with default halfling rogue settings and had a rocking good time. Didn't encounter any of the problems others mentioned. Another Rick Burton Classic!!
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