Forgotten Realms (Silver Marches, in and around Silverymoon)
Gameplay Length
4-6 hours depending on play style
Language
English
Level Range
Player will automatically be set to level 6.
Races
Choose human or elven if you want the story to make sense. Non-standard races may bugger up important parts of the module (I wouldn't recommend using the CODI Character creator).
Tricks & Traps
Heavy
Roleplay
Heavy
Hack & Slash
Light
Classes
Barbarians and monks won't make much sense
Scope
Small
DMNeeded
No DM Required
Single or Multiplayer
Single Player
Max Character Level
06
Max # Players
01
Min # Players
01
Min Character Level
06
Content Rating
Teen
Alignments
I wish you the best of luck staying good (it should be possible... theoretically)
Gameplay Hours
05
Description
You awake from your fevered dreams and find yourself in a vaguely familiar mansion dining room. You don't remember who you are, or who the three corpses whom you THINK you should recognize are. Your clothes are torn and blood-stained, but your skin shows no trace of damage. You pick up a dagger from the floor and cautiously make your way downstairs. In one of the rooms below, something in the mirror catches your attention: You have no reflection! You have become a vampire...
Features a heavily modified and improved version of Ercan's vampire system: Drink blood from innocent victims, subdue a person's will to make him an easy target, change into a wolf or a vampiric mist at will, bluff, sneak or kill your way through a set of mysterious and well-hidden locations in the area in and around Silverymoon as you attempt to find out what the hell happened to you.
Heavily story-based gameplay. Features 2 possible endings, and a story which forks half-way through the module.
@ JonasWaever
I rebuilt/compiled the module saved it under a new name, it works fine now, no crashing what-so-ever. saves seem to load fine as well. only problem it has is it can get a little laggy with so many placeables in certain areas. _________________________ jml's list of community addons/overrides, etc. Link
@Jedijax
I had this happen too when I added something to my override folder. the rod of fast buffing if it matters much, doesn't work anyway so I removed it. saves loaded afterword, but only once. thankfully I had already finished the module before hand :D
@JonasWaever
still very much a good, albeit short, game, I think however you'll need to update it for use with the latest patch to solve the random crash issue. it may even solve the bizarre save corruption, since I've not experienced either before. I personally only had to deal with the random crash thing three times, and luckily it was always shortly after I saved. I might open the toolset and take a peek...might be something simple. *shrugs* Don't beat yourself up about the bird quest, as it was a nice distraction from all the hack and slash anyway ;) _________________________ jml's list of community addons/overrides, etc. Link
played v1.50 back in '05 I think. Don't recall being unlucky enough to run into any bugs. I do, however, remember the module being very good. Glad to see it did manage to earn a Hall of Fame Entry. Downloading 1.52, and looking forward to playing it again. :) _________________________ jml's list of community addons/overrides, etc. Link
Posted by greyspammer at 2012-01-01 08:22:54 Voted 8.50 on 01/01/12
Interesting module and fun to play.
The only negative thing I can say about it is that I fail to understand to logic behind certain alignment hits. Ok, I get evil points for feeding from humans. No surprise there. But I also get evil points for feeding from animals. Even feeding from evil creatures like imps or vermin like rats makes me more evil. Even if a creature attacks me and I act in self defense, feeding from it makes me evil. But the killing it does not. As if the creature was more dead because I drank its blood first.
From the roleplaying point of view, it makes no sense to me. When I was human, I killed non-sentient animals to feed of them and no one considered that evil. Now as a vampire I kill non-sentient animals (even vermin and evil creatures) to feed of them and suddenly, I'm evil.
From the gameplay point of view, it also makes no sense to me. Why would I bother with avoiding to feed of the easily available humans and go through the trouble of looking for animals when hunger strikes me if it does not really matter gameplay-wise? I get the alignment hit one way or the other so I might just kill the first human I stumble across when I need to feed. At least it saves time.
But that is about the only thing I have to criticise about this module.
Posted by Trussardi at 2010-01-29 15:39:22 Voted 9.00 on 01/29/10
I'll admit that my expectation level was rather low with this one as I had yet to run into a playable vampire module that was any good up until this point.
The only real failing is as others already said: areas that are too big and too empty. Some of it I can understand as you want to catch your victim preferably in some alleyway that is away from everyone else.
However if you're playing Rogue/Assassin, then the other problems of the need for stealth and alignment hits towards evil really are not going to be a problem. =/
I was greatly immersed in the storyline, yet had to save in order to go and grab a bite. Surprise, surprise! When I tried to load any of the files, saved at different locations and times, Neverwinter crashed.
Too bad, this seemed like the first good module I was going to enjoy in a sea of Hall of Fame disappointments.
Posted by konditionswunder at 2007-11-23 02:30:31 Voted 9.00 on 11/23/07
Good module.
Didn't experience the bugs mentioned in the review.
I didn't like most of the dialogues. the vampirish feeling was missing there. I did like the town very much although some areas were pretty large and it would have been cool to be able to enter a few more houses.
But overall it was fun playing.
Hi! Nice module, although unfortunately not without some bugs.
One of my problems was that on my old computer (P1500, 256 MB RAM, GeForce 2 T&L, Polish version of WIN98 SE) trying to load a saved game always resulted in a blue screen - looks like I had the same problem as Vorpal. On my now machine (Athlon64 X2, 1024 MB RAM, GeForce 7600 GT, English Win XP x64) it did crash to desktop while loading a saved game, but fortunately only once.
*SPOILERS*
The other problem is that I think that I've found a bug in btob_zach_death (and maybe a few others since its symptomes are very much like the ones which Anthrop reported). After Zachariach was killed by a trap I had set NPCs were unaware that he is dead. I looked into the script, and later checked that my PCs killedzach variable was still 0, so I think, that if a creature is killed by a trap then GetLastKiller() returns a trap, and not the one who set it. I know almost nothing about scripting, but I think, that this problem can be fixed by adding something like if(GetBaseItemType(oKiller) == BASE_ITEM_TRAPKIT) oKiller = GetTrapCreator(oKiller); after object oKiller = GetLastKiller();.
*END OF SPOILERS*
Sorry for my crude English. It is not my native language.
Astero, thank you for your comment, it's testimony to NWN's longevity that people still play custom modules and even bother to provide a bit of feedback afterwards. And it's always nice to know your work is still being enjoyed. I'm sorry about the remaining bugs, but I hope you'll forgive me that I simply don't want to go back and try to fix them. I think I've done what I can for this module, and it'll probably never get better.
Oh and I apologize for the quest with the bird; that quest is the most uninspired piece of junk I ever came up with, and I don't know what I was thinking :-/ _________________________ Jonas Wæver Link
Posted by Astero at 2007-07-02 12:58:15 Voted 8.75 on 07/02/07
Who can resist a vampire story :). I loved how the city looked. Quite suitable to the whole atmosphere you'd tried to create. Nice work with the whole biting and shapechanging. I missed the dominating part though :(.
My char was a rogue. Didn't have such a hard time getting through the entire module except maybe when I decided to kill the head vampire (can't remember his name). I also turned down the offer made to me by the second in command vampire. I killed them all. Went back to my sister and convinced her to change her life. She agreed, but no journal entry, so I didn't know where to go. I went from temple to temple but nothing happened. Then I remembered the vampire hunter at the inn and he told me what to do.
I also couldn't find the bird. I searched but nothing. Maybe I was looking in the wrong place, I don't know. After I'd entered the town and witnessed the conversation between a wizard and a guard through a cutscene, I couldn't move. I was stuck. I reloaded, same thing happened. Finally, the third time, everything went fine.
As others stated, the town should have been smaller. There were few places my char could enter.
But I believe that you delivered nicely. I enjoyed being a vampire with all those special abilities :). Nicely done.
Eep, sorry to hear about your crashes, I have no idea why that might happen. I'm wondering if the hak file is perhaps conflicting with the 1.68 patch, but I don't understand why that would make the game crash, it should just mess up some items or potraits or whatever at worst.
I don't suppose your logs offered any useful information? _________________________ Jonas Wæver Link
Posted by Vorpal at 2007-01-07 21:30:31 Voted 7.00 on 01/07/07
This module looked really interesting, and from what I was able to play of it, it lived up to expectations. Sadly, whenever I tried to load a save game it would crash to desktop. I restarted the module three times, thinking it might be a file corruption issue, but no dice.
During play, I trundled merrily through the crypts, met Phelia, did several quests in Silverymoon and was looking forward to more. However, the constant crashing was beginning to erode my will to live, so in the end I gave up.
I'm awarding the module a 7.00 regardless, purely for originality and ingenuity of execution. It it weren't for the module's instability, I'd have undoubtedly voted higher.
(Oh, and before you ask, yes, all the relevant files were in all the correct places, and there wasn't any extraneous crap sitting in my override folder. Maybe the module doesn't appreciate patch 1.68, but then, as far as I can see, no one else seems to have encountered this problem.)
ericdoman, I'm glad you enjoyed it. The vampire bonuses are given to you via a "skin" (an invisible item slot that all creatures have), which is why you retain it in other modules. Unfortunately the actual special powers you get (such as sucking blood) are included in the module's scripts, so of course they won't work : )
I'm currently planning a quite different NWN2 module based on some of the same design philosophies, only hopefully better this time around (took quite a few versions to get BToB right, I think). I'll post here when something is released. _________________________ Jonas Wæver Link
Posted by ericdoman at 2006-10-31 03:57:39 Voted 9.25 on 10/31/06
Interesting mod. Well worth playing. Because of the vampire undertones, Took down a 5/1 clr/ftr (first time ever played with a cleric) played hardcore and finished as a 7/1 clr/ftr remaining LN. Was tempted to beome evilbased on usinf left and right fang.
Don't now how you did thisbut ifyou use this character in other mods. You retain ability increases etc.
Hello again Mirgalen: If you didn't get a quest update from the maid, you are in really bad luck, mate. I didn't even realize it was possible to come out of that conversation without getting the next clue in the main quest. I wish some of my testers had caught that.
Sorry.
About the hood: I have nothing against vampires that can't go out in sunlight at all, I just thought it'd be an unnecessary annoyance to most players if they had to stop and rest all the time. Especially as there's a limited amount of interior areas in the module. _________________________ Jonas Wæver Link
1. To include a character is a minor thing but a starting area with a DM avatar or at least a warning in the readme would be nice (the later being easier to do).
2. I could've included that, I suppose, but why not just use the hood you find in that chest in your room?
Found the hood and other items I don't need or cannot use but I like the classic vampires those who would burn if they go out during the day hood or not I understand your point of vue if you like "Angel" and/or Dicken Frost makeup in "Blade".
3. By "meal", do you mean the maid that runs up to you as you leave the house? Don't bite her until you've talked to her.
I only did something "bad" after the conversation but IIRC she said she did not know what to do to help. I did not get the clue you mentioned from her.
4. Well, I provided an upstairs area in The Crescent Moon with rooms containing civilians for you to feed on if you so choose. I'm aware of the faction problem some people are getting
I'm afraid I was unlucky and got exactly that bug. It was a room at the very end upstairs, the last in the row.
Thanks for your kind reply I will try this again ASAP.
Anthrop: Glad it worked! Thanks for letting me know, and again, I'm sorry about the bug.
**** SPOILERS AGAIN - albeit minor ****
Mirgalen:
1. Well I guess I could've included a character, but personally I hate that, I want to make my own characters to play with. I'm sorry it annoyed you quite so much, but yours is the first complaint I've received over this, and I'm not sure I see why it's a problem: There's a whole chest of starting equipment right there in the house where you begin the module.
2. I could've included that, I suppose, but why not just use the hood you find in that chest in your room?
3. By "meal", do you mean the maid that runs up to you as you leave the house? Don't bite her until you've talked to her. I guess I should've made her immortal or something, but in my defense, if you kill important characters who are trying to speak to you, it's not my job to make sure you can keep playing, not in this module ; )
4. Well, I provided an upstairs area in The Crescent Moon with rooms containing civilians for you to feed on if you so choose. I'm aware of the faction problem some people are getting, but I've never been able to replicate it myself, and I have no idea what's causing it. Sorry about that.
Also, just in case you're still interested in the module, once you speak to the maid and get the first clue on your main quest, it's possible to survive at least the first large part of the module without biting any civilians, you just need to say the right things to the hooded guy in the inn and he'll set you up with something that'll help. As soon as you leave the city, there'll be plenty of critters to tide you over : )
I'll be happy to help you get back into the module if you're still interested, but otherwise thanks for trying, and I'm sorry I didn't live up to your expectations. _________________________ Jonas Wæver Link
I may have to try again sometime but this module did not work for me (although I am a big fan of vampires).
1. Item strip: That's a big no for me (I don't really mind loosing some XP as they can be regained). If you want people to enter with a fresh character perhaps the best thing to do is to include one (rogue?).
2. Hunger is the first thing that makes you go around. Still you do not like daylight that much. I wish there was a way to rest until dusk other than pressing rest/cancel over and over to move the time.
3. Once you start to adjust to your new life (or un-life) a "meal" is served to you right away. After I only found closed doors that could not even be bashed. Being a fighter/mage I have no pick lock skills. Did not found any sewer either. That would be the most logical area to seek refuge assuming home is not safe anymore.
4. After a while found a building with quite a few NPCs. Being hungry tried to locate the last room hoping to find "food". Food I did find except that the whole town turned hostile after that. Even if that was not the case I have no clue where to go or who to speak to. Too bad.
Posted by Anthrop at 2006-07-24 19:53:10 Voted 9.25 on 07/23/06
That did the trick. Thanks! No quotes were needed. The console asked for a target after I entered what you suggested and I clicked on myself.
Anthrop, I'm glad you enjoyed the mod, I'm sorry to hear you encountered a bug in the end. I've been looking at the dialogue, trying to remember what's supposed to happen so I could figure out why it's not working for you, and I think I recall now. You're meant to set up a meeting with Laren on the graveyard, killing him there will set an integer that makes Zach's next-in-command recognize his death.
Try typing this into the console:
If Ghashian is the surviving next-in-command:
dm_setvarint gotquest_newleaderGHASH_3 1
If Litharnia is the surviving next-in-command:
dm_setvarint gotquest_newleaderLITH_3 1
I hope that helps. Unfortunately I don't know if you need to put the name of the variable (gotquest_etc.) in quotation marks, you might want to try that if it doesn't work. Please drop a comment about whether or not it works, and of course I'll do something about this in a hypothetical next version, it's a pretty stupid bug :-/ _________________________ Jonas Wæver Link
Posted by Anthrop at 2006-07-23 21:05:23 Voted 9.25 on 07/23/06
This has been a fun mod. It's been one of my favorites, and I'm pretty picky. Anyway...
**SPOILERS**
I killed the Lathander Priest guy in the Crescent Moon, but when I try to become vampire guild leader, my killing of him isn't recognized. This is probably because I didn't run through any dialogue with him - I just killed him.
That is an excellent complaint, but it took me long enough to finish this module with its current length. Play it through twice so you can experience it all, then it'll be pretty long ; )
Maybe my next module for NWN2 will be longer (not to mention better planned). _________________________ Jonas Wæver Link
Posted by Samurai Dark Lord at 2006-07-15 23:48:31 Voted 10.00 on 07/15/06
My only complaint is that I wish it was longer.
Posted by JonasWaever ( 83.94.xxx.xxx ) at 2006-07-10 15:22:09
I think it's completely amazing I can break 3000 downloads with a small module and almost no advertising. Says quite a bit about how huge and dedicated the NWN community is. I wish the Deus Ex community was at least a quarter as active and vibrant as that of NWN, then I might feel better about the amount of work I'm putting into that game.
Thank you for the compliments Sapholin, I realize BToB is far from perfect, but I'm glad many people can look past the flaws enough to enjoy the module. I gotta admit I'm slightly bitter that a couple of old votes from the original, pre-patched versions of the module are dragging my score down, but I'm not really Hall of Fame material anyway, so I'll just make sure I'll learn from my mistakes when I make my next module for NWN2.
All you guys are really great. I had fun making a module for NWN based on the core design principles of a hybrid game like Deus Ex. I look forward to getting my hands on the NWN2 editor :D
Posted by Sapholin ( 71.2.xxx.xxx ) at 2006-07-05 07:07:26
A very fine module. I enjoyed it immensely. Please, keep up the good work.
I particularily found the cutscenes to be quite refreshing. It's not often you see them in a user-made campaign. They were professional quality to boot.
Definitely recommending this module to my friends.
No, you don't really settle down in this module, so a coffin would present a restrictive lack of mobility : ) _________________________ Jonas Wæver Link
Posted by ScorpioChess at 2006-06-04 19:58:10 Voted 9.50
I'm wondering about something: does the PC ever get a coffin?
Right! 1.52 uploaded. Fat load of good that'll do anybody who's already playing 1.50, but such is life. Aside from various tweaks and typo fixes, I've also reduced the size of the previously way too spacy Moonbridge South area and finally softened up that trapped crypt hallway so it's no longer impossible to tackle with a direct approach.
As for the Deathless Duties quest... I gave up. It's just a needlessly complicated side quest that refuses to work like it should, and I just don't think figuring out how Arwyn put it together is worth my time, so I've removed it from the module. Sorry. There are still 5 other side quests in the module, and this really isn't about the side quests anyway. Good luck! _________________________ Jonas Wæver Link
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