Kelsey NPC MOD for Baldur’s Gate 2
VERSION 6
A Pocket Plane Group Project
http://www.pocketplane.net
Thousands and thousands of new lines!
Voicework!
Countless new NPC banters!
Romance!
More romance!
Family, friends, and enemies!
Flirting!
New magical items both powerful and bizarre!
Sorcery of epic proportions!
Copious epilogues!
This, Baldur’s Gate 2 fans, is Kelsey.
(Yes, I've put my final thoughts at the top of the README rather than the bottom. You're slightly more likely to see them up here.)
XXXXXXXX
I'm writing this late at night, hoping that this will be the last time I put together the Kelsey mod for download. It's been over two years since the Kelsey project started, and while there's always one more banter, one more audio clip that could be re-re-voiced, one more flirt I could add or lovetalk subject I could explore or quest interjection I could create, I think that Kelsey is pretty well "done." Oh, there will be more content in other mods such as the Banter Pack and hopefully inter-mod interactions, but as far as the core of Kelsey goes, I think it's time to stamp it "complete."
The list of people who have supported Kelsey, and supported me while I discovered that I was actually a creative writer waiting to happen, is really long, but if you've ever had a kind word to say about it, then I thank you. In particular, of course, thanks to Ghreyfain, who lost many months of his life trying to figure out how to make Kelsey work in the first place, thanks to Wolfmoon who stayed up later than he should have doing my forum and website- running bidding, and thanks to Westley Weimer who had to deal with copious feature requests (most of them useful) and bug reports (at least some of them accurate.)
And, of course, I need to thank my wife for trying very hard not to get annoyed when every so often I'd steal her laptop, plug a microphone in it, and whisper sweet nothings into it for Kelsey romance players to hear.
To my eye, Kelsey is what I've always wanted him to be--a joinable NPC character that fits into the Baldur's Gate 2 gameworld, adding a worthwhile companion to the game for virtually all play styles. He's not simply "a romantic substitute for Anomen" or "a mage substitute for Edwin." He may not be everybody's favorite NPC, but he's a legitimate NPC nonetheless. So for everyone who made it possible for me to start developing Kelsey, and more importantly to finish, thank you for your support.
That includes those of you who download and install Kelsey, including him in your BG2 experience and making our hard work worthwhile. Without your interest there would never have been Kelsey, and without your ongoing interest, there won't be new projects from PPG and other groups. So for your continued patronage, I thank you in advance.
Now, on with the README.
-JC
Kelsey is an NPC add-on for Baldur’s Gate 2. As a modestly noteworthy trader, Kelsey has traveled far and seen much, but has not found a real sense of purpose to guide his inner talent--sorcery. Fortunately, you have a destiny that needs fulfilling. Kelsey followed the PC through all of Shadows of Amn, and will stand by to take on the challenges of Throne of Bhaal as well. And if your PC is a very special lady, she and Kelsey can find comfort in each other as they take on the challenges of the Five.
The Pocket Plane design goal for Kelsey can be summed up simply: if we’ve done our job right, you’ll swear he was always meant to be in the game. We have tried very hard to give him the same level of detail as the Bioware NPCs, right down to audio recording and inter-party dialogue. If you have any reactions to share, please let us know at the Pocket Plane Group forums: http://forums.pocketplane.net
Alternately, e-mail the developers: [email protected]
Mirror sites, the latest Kelsey updates, alternate portrait suggestions and more will always be available at http://forums.pocketplane.net
(If you have already clicked the KelseyNPCV2.exe file, of course, you are almost done!)
You should obtain and install the latest SOA or TOB patch from www.interplay.com or www.bioware.com BEFORE installing Kelsey. Really bad things happen if you don't have the Bioware patch installed before mods, even worse things happen if you try installing the patch AFTER mods.
1. Extract the KelseyNPCV2.exe file from KelseyNPCV2.zip, and place it anywhere on your drive.
2. Double-click KelseyNPCV2.exe. The installer will launch, and will automatically suggest installing in the directory where Windows believes you have BG2 installed. Unless you have a VERY unusual configuration, accept this default.
3. Click to accept the install directory. The installer creates a new "Kelsey" directory in your main BG2 folder, copies a number of files, then exits. A new file, called Setup-Kelsey.exe, has been created in your main BG2 directory, and will automatically be run.
4. A console window (DOS window) opens up and asks whether or not you wish to install Kelsey. Answer Yes.
5. Files will be copied, dialogue will be compiled, and the game will generally be made ready for Kelsey. This process may take a minute or two on a slower system.
6. After the text window tells you to press enter to exit, there is one final stage--decompressing the compressed audio included with Kelsey to standard WAV format. The window will fill with text: THIS IS NORMAL. This process may take a few minutes on a slower system.
7. Enjoy!
If anything goes wrong with the process, or you later wish to uninstall Kelsey, run the Setup-Kelsey.exe program once more and select the U option. You may see warnings about the uninstaller not being able to find .ogg files: this is normal, as we erase them from the override directory after they are decoded to .wav.
The optional components are:
Solaufein Content: This adds a Solaufein banter, as well as the Solaufein romance conflict to SOA. Kelsey becomes "aware" of the PC's relationship with Solaufein, and will complain about it. This module can only be installed _after_ Solaufein is in place, but if you install Kelsey-SOA first, then add Solaufein later, simply re-run the Setup-Kelsey.exe program and ask to install the Solaufein Content module.
Optional Portraits: In version 3, the default Kelsey portrait has been changed to the work of Karse Soze. A selection of alternate portraits from various artists, including the previous default work by Wynne Lurty, can be selected by the Kelsey installer. Additional portraits are available at http://www.pocketplane.net/kelsey, or you may substitute your own.
Ascension-Specific Content: Adds a few lines for Kelsey (and, depending on the situation, Imoen) if you have Ascension installed. You MUST use WeiDU Ascension, and we suggest version 1.4.12 or better. Ascension must be installed BEFORE you can install this particular option. Applies only to installations with Throne of Bhaal.
You do not need to start a new game in order to take advantage of Kelsey if you do not wish to do so.
In Shadows of Amn, you can find Kelsey in the Government district of Athkatla. He is standing near the Firecam Estate (at roughly 2000x2000, in the SW region of the map) and he will approach you and initiate dialogue.
In Throne of Bhaal, Kelsey can be acquired through the Fate Spirit if he did not accompany your player character through the transition between Shadows of Amn and Throne of Bhaal.
Kelsey is a romance-enabled NPC, which means he will initiate a romance with a female PC who is human, elven, half-elven, or halfling. While we think the romance is an important part of Kelsey’s character, he is still a valuable and talkative addition to a party with a male PC, or a female PC who simply doesn’t think Kelsey is her type.
Note: The Fate Spirit summoning can be used to summon Kelsey "in-romance" for a compatible female PC, allowing you to play through the Kelsey romance in Throne of Bhaal without completing it in Shadows of Amn.
Whether Kelsey joins in Athkatla or the Pocket Plane, he will appear to be Level 9, and in need of a level-up. This is deliberate. Because spell selection greatly affects the playing strategy for a sorcerer, we did not want to make any more decisions for you, the player, than were necessary. We actually considered leaving virtually all of the spell selection up to players, but it seemed best to provide a ready-to-go Level 9 Kelsey, then leave the high-level spell decisions open for you.
We have slightly altered the interaction between Kelsey and Anomen from early versions. Anomen's romance will no longer supercede Kelsey's until one LOVETALK _after_ his AnomenRomanceActive variable goes to 2 (to indicate "committed.") The Anomen romance works a little differently than most given the way it is tied into his test, so we felt this made a little more sense. It helps, slightly, with their final conflict as well.
If you install the optional Solaufein awareness module, Kelsey will have a banter with the drow fighter/mage. Also, Kelsey will no longer tolerate the PC having concurrent romances with himself and Solaufein. After Solaufein makes his intentions clear, he will ask her to cut off relations, and if she does not, there are consequences. Solaufein's behavior is not altered by this patch, only Kelsey's.
This is an OPTIONAL module, and while for role-play value I strongly recommend its use, because of Solaufein's dialogue design it is best to only use it with Solaufein VERSION 60 AND ABOVE. In earlier versions it is actually not possible to cut off the romance with him once he makes his romantic intentions clear.
Kelsey has a grand total of ten epilogues: one for no-romance, one for his Imoen romance, and eight for the possible outcomes of the PC romance. We also modify Imoen's epilogue if she romanced Kelsey.
It's really very unfair, and not in the least bit realistic, that the protagonist of Baldur's Gate 2 is forever waiting for his or her significant other to make the first move. So we decided to do something about it. Yes, finally, Kelsey's girlfriends can simply ask for a kiss if they want one.
A PC involved in a romance with Kelsey can initiate a brief romantic interlude (a flirting session, really) by clicking the Talk icon and clicking on Kelsey's avatar or portrait. You will see a list of options, to which Kelsey will have a random response.
Also note that the flirting is not "enabled" until after the third time Kelsey has a romance discussion with the PC. There is one interlude between romance discussions (LOVETALKs) where flirting is disabled. Finally, there will be new flirting options once your romance becomes more "serious", so if you haven't checked in a while, go back and have a look.
Kelsey will also initiate his own flirts with the PC. If you find them distracting or inappropriate, you can ask him to stop flirting with you from your own flirt menu, but beware that the decision is permanent. In general, the flirts are more intense and graphic in Throne of Bhaal.
Unfortunately, sometimes when multiple MODs are installed and uninstalled, funky things happen to the strings associated with a mod NPC's name, his select/confirm text, and so forth.
If this should happen to Kelsey, select him and press the K key. This should correct the problem.
We believe Kelsey is fully compatible with both BG2 - Shadows of Amn proper, and BG2 with Throne of Bhaal installed, but he was developed in a TOB environment and it is possible that one of the custom items you may encounter with Kelsey in the party will only work properly if you, too, have TOB installed.
Kelsey was one of the first mods to be developed and released with WeiDU. (The fourth, actually.) As literally hundreds of mods have been created and released since then, it is possible that there are some incompatibilities. This new release attempts to address those problems.
Kelsey is compatible with some old-style overwriting, TBG, or IAP-based mods. However, for maximum compatibility you shouldn't be using those anyway.
To minimize confusion and maximize the potential to be compatible with other add-on projects, we use a prefix system for virtually all of the new game elements (files, variables, etc.) we created for Kelsey. The two prefixes are "J#" and "FW". If, for example, you want to check on the Kelsey romance variable to make sure you haven’t "blown it", you need to look up the global variable J#KELSEYROMANCEACTIVE. J#KELSEYROMANCE controls his timer, in case you are impatient for more loving. Some TOB LOVETALKs are event-triggered rather than timer-driven, however.
The one exception to the prefix rule is for files that are already supposed to have a different prefix. So, for example, Kelsey’s inter-party dialogue is stored in BJ#KLSY.DLG, because interparty dialogue files all carry the B prefix by Bioware’s mandate. Note that because of the way Infinity Explorer operates, you cannot easily browse Kelsey's dialogue in that tool unless you obtain the beta or a version greater than 0.75 is released, but Near Infinity works just fine. Or you can open up the .d dialogue code files in your Kelsey install directory.
Kelsey uses WeiDU (Weimer Dialogue Utilities) for all of its dialogue and game-script patching and installing. (In fact, "Setup-Kelsey.EXE" is merely a renamed copy of WeiDU.) We cannot stress enough how powerful this program is for creating Baldur’s Gate 2 add-ons. While many other programs each played a significant and important role in Kelsey’s creation, it is fair to say that without WeiDU, Kelsey could not have been as well- integrated into the game as he is.
Kelsey was brought to life with the help of these BG2 modding tools:
V6:
V5:
V4: (Thanks again, Wisp!)
V3: Package overhaul by Wisp. Thanks!
V2.1: Corrected a very stupid mistake because I neglected to test the game on an SOA-only install.
V2: Many more fixes.
V1.5: Many, many, many fixes.
V1.0.4:
V1.0.3:
V1.0.2:
V1.0.1:
V1.0.0: Initial Release
V2.2: Corrected a really stupid error that prevented the Anomen cheating sequence from working in all versions after V1.
V2.1: Corrected a directory naming conflict that created problems for users upgrading from Kelsey-TOB V1. (Symptoms: Kelvim and/or Birinar would never show up.) Upgraded to WeiDU 136.
V2: Several bugfixes. Corrected code to be parse-compliant with syntax-checking WeiDU. Added two new PC lovetalks, three new Kelsey/Imoen lovetalks, new Kelsey flirts, new banters, new voicing, two new epilogues. Whew.
V1: Initial Release
Special thanks to Wynne for audio coaching.
Special thanks to Kish for Anomen and Valygar dialogue suggestions.
Special thakns to Arian, Domi, Queen Akasha, Serendipity, and others for their Kelsey stories, which were a real inspiration while working on Kelsey-TOB.
SOA Testers: Glenn Christer Bjørge, Westley Weimer, Gebhard Blucher, "Queen Akasha", "Arcana", Neil Sharp, "Keldron" (V1.5 quality assurance: Kish, Gebhard Blucher, Sorschana) (V2 quality assurance: Kismet, Indi)
TOB testers: Kish Moore, Glenn Christer Bjørge, Jennifer Pahl, Westley Weimer, "Pirotess" (S. Finnimore), Chelle van Fossen, Chris Minten, Amy Johnston, Lady Caetlyn, Pirengle
Spanish translation: Clan DLAN (Bhasbuto, Siraen, Immortality, Yonkijote, Mhoram, Interloper, Memento)
German translation: Beaz and Beyshaliban
Russian translation: Prowler at www.arcanecoast.ru
Kelsey and Merritt audio segments engineered by Bohus Blahut at Gulag Picture Radio Studios, Chicago, USA. (www.gulagpictureradio.com)
Kelsey employs Ogg Vorbis for audio encoding and decoding. More information, including complete source code, can be found at http://www.xiph.org, http://www.vorbis.com
"Haunted", the Kelsey love theme, is published by Token Media. http://www.token.com
Kelsey's serenade is excerpted and adapted from "Ritual" from Tales From Topographic Oceans by Yes (Copyright © 1973 Yessongs Ltd.)
Special thanks to the entire Forgotten Wars team of years past.
Special thanks for Westley Weimer and Valerio Bigiani, who have combined to put out more than 200 versions of WeiDU, many many many of which have been specifically to meet our seemingly endless needs.
Special thanks to everyone who waited eight months to play Kelsey, and many more months for us to get it fully right. :)
Acknowledgements: Leo Fellmann, TL/"Gustov Montessi", TeamBG and TeamBG.org, Shak Ahmed, "Deano", Jon Olav Hauglid, "Kensai Ryu", "hlidskialf" (Ghrey adds that he does not want to thank hlidskialf whatsoever. His beer-hoarding and impromptu eye surgery were not appreciated in the least.)
Merritt and most of Kelsey audio segments were recorded using an Electrovoice 667A mic, a Mackie 1402VLZ mixer, and SoundForge 4.5.
Kelsey technical elements, including scripts, are Copyright © 2001-2003 Jesse Meyers. Kelsey audiovisual elements, including recordings and dialogue, are Copyright © 2001-2010 Jason Compton except "Haunted", Copyright © Token Media.
Kelsey is not developed, supported, or endorsed by BioWare or Interplay/Black Isle.
REDISTRIBUTION NOTE: Kelsey was created to be freely enjoyed by all Baldur's Gate 2 players. However, Kelsey may not be sold, published, compiled or redistributed in any form without the consent of its authors.