NWN2: Mask of the Betrayer Community Update #7

Neverwinter Nights 2 community manager Shane DeFreest stopped by the official forums to post a seventh community update for the game’s upcoming Mask of the Betrayer expansion pack.

So this week Kevin Saunders wanted to give a preface to the update answers that are forthcoming as many of them might not exactly be what the community wants to hear. Thank you for your patience and understanding.

-Shane

Preamble:

“Hi folks. Unfortunately, my answers to a lot of the questions below are “no.” It give me no joy to let you down like this, but I’d rather inform you of the reality than just ignore your questions. We really do wish that we could implement everything you’d like to see and more. We do our best to concentrate on where we think we can benefit you all the most – when we don’t address certain concerns it’s not because we don’t think it’s a good idea or that it’s unimportant issue, just that for the resources required it feels like the wrong thing to focuson.

As always, thank you for your patience and know that we’re listening and doing what we can.

Note that I’m answering based upon what we expect to have implemented by the time NX1 launches. Details of subsequent improvements are to be determined. -Kevin”

Question: Could you explain more about the changes being made to the crafting system? Will we ever be able to craft from scrolls? Can Warlocks imbue items?

Obsidian: Our work on the crafting system is primarily related to enchantments. You’ll be able to add enchantments to any equippable item. You’ll be able to enchant items using a container you carry instead of having to use a work bench. Overall, the system is more flexible.

We hope to allow crafting via scrolls.

Warlocks will be able to use Imbue Item with the new NX1 recipes and you’ll be able to create new recipes that work with the Warlock’s ability.

Question: What will be done to make the toolset more accessable and easier to learn/use to streamline the current process?

Obsidian: We’ve fixed numerous minor bugs with toolset and added many small features. For example, you can now look in the Area Contents section to see which creatures and placeables contain droppable treasure. As you know, we also added terrain undo.

We would love to create a more beginner friendly toolset, but it’s not in the cards this time around.

Question: I would like to know what work, if any is being done on the walkmesh system to make it work more reliably with placeables that should be walkable?

Obsidian: Nothing further at this time.

Question: Will we get a Script Generator Wizard like ScriptEase or Lilac Souls Script Generator for NWN?

Obsidian: Sorry, no.

Question: Can you have more than four classes? And can I give Npc’s as many levels in as many classes as I like?

Obsidian: No, we looked into expanding to five classes, but it turned into a major undertaking that felt like it wasn’t the best way to spend our programming resources.