Weapon Skills in Exile Series

[wheresthefbomb]

Greetings fellow delvers. I have a few questions for you all.

 

What do weapon skills do exactly in Exile? I recently played through Exile 1 and am on to Exile 2. In E1, Str and Dex seemed to have way more to do with to-hit and damage than weapon skills. Weapons don't seem to have an added damage die per skill point like they do in the Avernum series. In fact, the weapon skills didn't seem to do much at all. With this in mind I built my E2 fighters Str and Dex heavy (Almost at 19 in each by ch. 2), and am wondering if it's worth investing in weapon skills at all. I could do a lot of other cool things with those skill points.

 

What does Luck do in Exile? It seems to definitely effect traps/lockpicking. Does it effect dodge and resistances like in Avernum? Wondering if it's smart to boost this or not, I favor high Luck in the later games to be sure.

 

What actual effect do the Slith/Nephil weapon bonuses have, if any? They aren't giving numerical skill or damage/to-hit boosts that I can see.

 

Are there any thorough guide/annotated map projects still up? Drakefyre's site has been down for a few years. Honestly gives me sad feelings whenever I try to visit. I remember it was the place to go when I was a kid.

 

Thank you in advance!

Edited March 12, 2022 by wheresthefbomb

[osnola]

Hello, in Blades of Exile, strength seems mainly used to bash a door and define the maximum weight you can carry, while dexterity is used for many things.

 

The weapon skill is used to choose which pc skill to use to calculate the probability of hitting a monster:

int skill;
if(weap.weap_type == eSkill::INVALID)
	skill = attacker.skill(eSkill::EDGED_WEAPONS);
	...
else skill = attacker.skill(weap.weap_type);

int r1 = get_ran(1,1,100) + hit_adj - 5 * weap.bonus;
	r1 += 5 * (attacker.status[eStatus::WEBS] / 3);
...

if (r1 <= hit_chance[skill]) {
    // do damage
}

 

Luck is used to escape death:

if (... && luck > 0 && get_ran(1,1,100) < hit_chance[luck]) {
        add_string_to_buf("  But you luck out!");
		which_pc.cur_health = 0;
}

but also to disarm a trap (but not lock picking) and to define the probability of finding objects/treasure.

 

[Slawbug]

  

On 3/12/2022 at 3:05 PM, wheresthefbomb said:

What do weapon skills do exactly in Exile?

 

When you attack in Exile, the game first looks up a base hit rate that is dependent on your weapon skill level.  This is from a table, not a formula, and (true to what the in-game help says) the first few points make a big difference.  From 0 to 20:

 

20,30,40,45,50,55,60,65,69,73,77,81,84,87,90,92,94,96,97,98,99

 

Strength and Dex (and Int) offer their bonuses, (like +5% to hit and +1 to damage, spell bonuses for Int, level-up HP bonuses for Str, etc) at predetermined levels.  They use their own lookup table:

 

-3,-3,-2,-1,0,0,1,1,1,2,2,2,3,3,3,3,4,4,4,5,5

 

So the gains come at 2, 3, 4, 6, 9, 12, 16, and 19.  Str/Dex/Int affect enough things that they generally have more use, but getting weapon skill to 3 immediately, and a bit higher later, can still be worthwhile.  It depends how much you want to abuse Bless, really.

 

On 3/12/2022 at 3:05 PM, wheresthefbomb said:

What does Luck do in Exile? It seems to definitely effect traps/lockpicking. Does it effect dodge and resistances like in Avernum? Wondering if it's smart to boost this or not, I favor high Luck in the later games to be sure.

 

Luck does a number of things.

- Pick locks / disarm traps

- Chance to reduce damage taken by 1

- Chance to remain at 0 HP instead of dying

- Party luck affects item drops

 

On 3/12/2022 at 3:05 PM, wheresthefbomb said:

What actual effect do the Slith/Nephil weapon bonuses have, if any? They aren't giving numerical skill or damage/to-hit boosts that I can see.

 

They are just 10% to-hit bonuses.

 

You might be interested in the topic below:

 

https://spiderwebforums.ipbhost.com/topic/13484-code-dissection-munchkin-style/

 

[wheresthefbomb]

This is all the information I'd hoped for and more! Thank you!