set monster level

[ian363]

Hi, could someone help. I'm getting to the point where I have most of my maps complete and need to add all the monsters. Is there a rule of thumb for setting monster level. I can't really play the whole thing through to see if I have set the levels right. After how many monsters should the level go up to the next? Thanks Ian

[Drakkan]

I do not know exact formula for calculating this, but to be honest I do not think this is too much important for starting modder. Generally you should level up only monsters which you want make much harder than regular one for some reason- hp and attack increases are quite significant and you need know what are you doing if you want level up monsters like this.

[minmay]

rule of thumb for setting monster level: 1

it doesn't change the monsters' speed or ai so it just makes them take longer to kill (and give more xp) instead of making them more challenging, there's little point in using it at all generally; even Isle of Nex acknowledges this and almost all monsters are level 1 except for skeletons

[ian363]

OK, thanks for the info. Ian

[AndakRainor]

I just tested it on one turtle, but it also seems to increase its damage. Ok it does not make it faster or more intelligent, but you could say the same for a leveling player (if you finished the main campaign before playing a mod, I doubt your skill will increase a lot !).

Would it be possible to make a monster think, move and act faster ? I really wish to be hunted by an very hostile and running turtle

[THOM]

In my Mod I modify the events a bit depending if the player starts with a new or an imported party. I think it is a good option to level up some monsters to make fights with - let's say - turtles be a bit more challenging even for Level 12 fighters.

[Azel]

Agreed THOM. That's on my "wish list" for my Mod, but not sure I will have time to do that for all monsters since it's taking me so long to finish as it is. However, you are correct in that a good Mod should adjust at least some Monsters' level so that the game isn't a complete walkthrough for a level 10+ imported party. Interestingly, the one monster that seems to be a challenge at level 1 no matter how high a level your champions may be... is the damn Crab

[minmay]

I just tested it on one turtle, but it also seems to increase its damage.

Yes, it increases attack power as well; it might also increase protection and accuracy, too lazy to test. In Grimrock 1 there were healthIncrement, attackPowerIncrement, and protectionIncrement fields for manipulating this. Those don't seem to be present anymore, presumably since the monster leveling mechanic is rarely useful in the first place.

Would it be possible to make a monster think, move and act faster ? I really wish to be hunted by an very hostile and running turtle

Easily, you have complete access to the monster AI with MonsterBrainComponent and its onThink hook, and of course you can add your own animations (this Blender plugin makes it extremely easy to modify existing animations, and not terribly difficult to make them from scratch). There's also the animationSpeed field and MonsterAttackComponent:setAnimationSpeed(), MonsterMoveComponent:setAnimationSpeed(), MonsterTurnComponent:setAnimationSpeed() if you are too lazy to make new animations and don't mind them looking/sounding silly.