Not a problem. I can handle the CS, then. Most of the real work is setting up those Excel sheets. I didn't set them up too well for the Weapon Mod. There were so many variables, so I had to split everything up on different sheets for it to make sense to my brain. This also makes it a bit frustrating to work with. PirateLord was kind enough to aid the tedious task of inputting the new values into a format the CS will import correctly. If you'd like to take a stab (haha) at playing around with things, you are more than welcome. I also got all the original weapon properties data off of the http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Main_Page. It isn't totally complete for the TB and BM expansions' weapons, I might have filled that in from the CS, or I might not have.

What I'm going to do is take a look at values and then post up relevant changes. However before anything else I need to decide on EP formulae to use. Unfortunately I have no ability with excel, as I ALWAYS do my stuff by hand, but I can work out formulae and post them up for you.

However straight off changes for weapons that would make sense:

Halberds: These are choppping or slashing weapons, not thrusting weapons.

Throwing Weapons: As previously stated they need a damage boost.

Arrows&Bolts: My recommendation is to drop 4-5 points from Bow and Crossbow max damage and add the same amount to the Ammunition.

Reach: The original reach values are a little bit weird, My recommendation:

Daggers: Reach 1, Fast, low individual damage

Other Shortblades: Reach 1.1

Tanto: These MAY be chopping weapons, I don't remember clearly though

Wakizashis: Visually these appear longer so reach 1.2, These are slashing weapons similar to katana

1H Classical Longblades and Blunt and Axe weapons: Reach 1.3

Longswords: These are thrusting or chopping weapons

Katanas: Reach 1.4, this is a slashing weapon not a chopping weapon

2H Long Blades, axes, blunt: Reach 1.6

Dai-Katana: This is a slashing weapon

Staves: Lower damage, better EP, Wide swings. reach 1.3

Spears: 1.8-2.0

This SHOULD prevent any taking advantage of reach. It also gives a SLIGHTLY wider variety of damage types.

Do you have any suggestions for EP formulae? A base formula based on health may be most effective.

Lookimg over "Weapons final.xls" I see some weirdness with the enchantments. Somehow staves have managed to become CONSIDERABLY less useful for enchanting. Once I figure out exactly how you put together your formulas for EP (I opened up the tab but I haven't figured out exactly what goes where) I'll see if I can figure this out.

Just an example so that you see the problem...

Daedric Staff EP: 101 (presumably before division)
Daedric Spear EP: 115
Daedric Warhammer/Battle Axe/Claymore/Dai Katana: 144

Ebony Staff: 95
Ebony Spear: 108

Glass Staff: 59
Glass Halberd: 67
Glass Claymore: 84

The trend continues with the other staves. Staves should be viable as items to make CoTarget or CoTouch. Or to place powerful CwS enchantments. This should be counter-acted by a lower damage value than other items. Your stats actually make them no more than middling for enchanting... And since you haven't altered damage values this makes them some of the WORST melee weapons.

Yeah, I didn't really think those out very well, I guess. I was using the same general formula for everything. Might need to redo the formulae - but, I didn't really have any good ideas for how to balance things. It shouldn't be too hard to change the EP values for staves. I think I put some sort of description of what the formulas were at the very bottom of each sheet... in one of those sheets... Sorry. As I mentioned, I wasn't very organized when I was saving different versions as I worked on this.

You list the formulae all right. My reccomendation is taking a second shot. I'm not a forlmula person, but I can work something out.

My goal is to "cap" EP value at about the max it is at except for staves. Preferably boosting them to the 20-30 rabge at the upper end. A 150% EP bonus to staves would work I think.

Edit: What if we use Steel as the base enchantment ratio? Specifically that "steel" is a 1:1 EP conversion? After that... Hmmm...es this will standardize EP distribution, as well as completely rebalancing EP. However because of the nature of enchanting... I can see this as a good thing.

Let me play with some numbers until I get EP I like

Numbers used in Vanilla Morrowind, Steel is set to 1

	PART	RATIO	BASE	Multiplier	Axe	45	0.9	50	Battle Axe	55	1.1		Broadsword	55	1.1		Claymore	70	1.4		Club	40	0.8		Dagger	20	0.4		Dai-katana	70	1.4		Halberd	50	1		Katana	60	1.2		Longsword	60	1.2		Mace	50	1		Saber	50	1		Shortsword	40	0.8		Spear	50	1		Staff	70	1.4		Tanto	22	0.44		Wakizashi	45	0.9		War Axe	50	1		War Hammer	55	1.1		Short Bow	50	1		Long Bow	35	0.7		Crossbow	50	1

Material values in vanila MW

	MATERIAL	Mat.Multiplier	Chitin	0.5	Daedric	3	Dreugh/Bonemold		Dwemer	0.75	Ebony	2	Glass	1.2	Imperial	1.4	Iron	1	Nordic	1.1	Orcish	1.45	Silver	1.15	Steel	1	Adamantium		Huntsman		Nordic Silver		Stalhrim

Note that I'm not quite finished, and I used the new EP coefficients we decided on for Dwemer, Silver, Glass, Nordic, etc

Playing around with the numbers above...

The materials added in the expansions DO NOT have set numbers, so I chose numbers of my own.

Adamantium: 2
Huntsman: 1
Nordic Silver: 1.26
Stahlrim: 2

Bonemold Dreugh: 1.2

Staves: I prefer to increase these to 1.6

I'm continuing to play with the numbers... In general the hard-hitting 2H weapons have TOO much EP, I'm considering dropping them from 1.4 to ~1.2 in order to provide some balance. This will still leave them better EP than 1H weapons of the same material.

Sounds good!

Oh, no, part of me actually wonders if we can set up integrals and functions for all this. :ahhh: That's what 2 semesters at Engineering college will do to you.

Well... in the spreadsheet you sent me you already have all the functions set up. You need only to plug in the proper numbers.

Now... Do you intend to alter weapon damage values? If you do I already gave some input involving damage types and such.

Anyway... The numbers above combined with my own changes produce an almost-vanilla number spread.

I don't suppose you've made the changes already in Excel? Would save time, to be sure - but I don't mind doing it. As for weapon damage values... it's a big beast to tackle (at least in my mind). But, maybe it won't be so challenge with your help. I think the first thing to do is fix what is already on those sheets, and then move on to weapon damage.

-- Just as a note: I might not be on quite so frequently as the evening wears on (I live on the east coast, USA). Feel free to experiment, I'll make sure to check back to these threads. I really appreciate all your help, Autocthon. :icecream: I would even go so far as to say that you've saved this mod from the grave.

I'm in Maine actually, sio east coast as well.

Anyway... Yes I made the changes myself, though I didn't alter the main tab labeled "data". Shall I upload it somewhere? I'm not all that internet savvy. Great wioth numbers and games, noot so good at working the internet.

http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?mi1znyjmrqn I think it should work.

Edit: If you intend to use those dew Arrow and Bolt damage values listed under the Ammo tab of that spreadsheet you need to alter the damage values of Bows accordingly. You also need to reduce the damage value of Daedric Darts. They're so rare that using them is kinda pointkess anyway, but it's still pretty high. Then again...

*looks in tree-stump behind thirsk*

There's plenty of broken stuff anyway...

Thanks! Just downloaded it, I'll take a look at it in the morning.

As for darts... yeah, you know, part of me has been itching to somehow make them more common. Especially the glass, daedric, and ebony. I have no idea how to manipulate Loot Lists, though. That'll be a mod for another day.

Once you've begun work on the damage values upload it and I'll start some manipulating of the numbers. I don't think there's much more I can do now besides thoe changes to reach.

Which I do recommend as a reach of 3 might be a BIT much.

When I said "I'll look at it in the morning," I ought to have said "I'll look at it when I wake up."

Had to download OpenOffice, my laptop is on the fritz at the moment. I'm not quite sure what to do right now. Part of me wants to start from scratch again, so we can use better formulas. What do you think?

Well the EP formula on the weapons is great. Nice simple numbers.

Everything else can be scrapped if you like.

No, no, I changed my mind. I don't really want to start all over again. :wacko: I kind of like the reach values I set, but I haven't tested them ingame, so I have no idea if they are crazy or not.

There's a mod here called http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=6044, it also changes chop/slash for some weapons. Might be able to incorporate some of these changes. From the readme:

The question is... Will the game USE values less than one? It might round them in the input... Hmmm... Can you test those ranges? See if <1 actually is <1?

I forget where it was mentioned to me (probably in a thread somewhere) but, no, the game will not use values of less than one. I was mostly thinking of the changes to chop/slash. Test it out in-game? I could try, but I don't know what I'd be looking for.

The changes to chop/slash/thrust would be good.

For testing it... Well I'd imagine you would take a "short" weapon, and a "normal" weapon. Then you'd see how far away you have to be before it will begin to connect.

You should also remember that individual weapons have to be changed one-by-one IIRC for their stats when they're enchanted. Unless you're doing something in a different way than myself.

Uh... I don't think I could do that. I find combat to be very stressful. I know, I'm such a whimp (unless my character is suitably god-like and invincible - which she isn't).

As for individual weapons - you mean the pre-enchanted weapons? Yeah, they need to have their reaches and such changed by hand. PirateLord's addition to my spreadsheet makes that more bearable, though.

Hmmm... Well... If I can get hands on a working Morrowind I can test myself.

However why not try to hit a wall for testing? A hit-box is a hit-box is it not?

Edit: Do you intend on altering the Artifact Weapons and Unique weapons as well?

Yup.

As for you getting Morrowind to work - is it that you need a new copy of MW, or that the discs have been misplaced? If you need a new MW, amazon sells it. http://www.amazon.com/Elder-Scrolls-Morrowind-Expansion-Pack-Pc/dp/B00009M97K/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&s=software&qid=1231448138&sr=8-8, http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Morrowind+GotY&x=0&y=0.

I'm simply away from home. I diodn't bring my disks with me and it's an iffy chance whether this PC will run Morrowind anyway.

I should be able to get hold of my copy soon enough anyway.

Any word on this?

It ocurred to me that some of the more interesting things you could do with staves is nerfed with then EP drop on the ebony staff... So Perhaps we should make the EP bonus for Staves much more noticeable? Specifically to boost even the weakes staves high up in enchanting. On the downside they shold all be physically weak.

I'm going to play with the multipliers and see what I can get.

Feel free to make the adjustments. Although, do note that a good twack with a staff can break bones. Maybe not overly weak - stronger than clubs, but not as strong as maces. A flawed anology: A staff is to a club as a claymore is to a longsword. Which is to say, the difference is that one is one-handed, and the other is two-handed - yes, and does more damage. The mace, though, is specifically designed to inflict wounds moreso than a club or staff. Staves are traditionally magical, and I don't think it would be amiss to increase the EP rating, given the artifact staves are also intended for magically inclined classes that rely on spells rather than weapons to damage foes.

Staves are a very good defensive weapon compared to many other weapon types. A simple rod is much easier to maneuver than a big heavy axe.

Actualy traditionally a Claymore-type sword is wielded in a manner very similar to a staff. I know I read taht somewhere... I think it was the history channel that I saw it on.

I want Staces to have CONSIERABLY higher EP than any simlar weapons, but we tradse that for making them less damaging than other 2H blunt weapons.

Edit: That was something true in vanilla, however with such a dearth of Staves it was hard to see. That and all the Daedric Weapons had the same EP value. I'm fixing that though.