Battle For Elements: D2 Mod

NEWS

Changes list:

New:
- Important one: Now you can to setup game difficulty at the start of every game session. This is not standard difficulties (Normal, Nightmare, Hell), but additional ones (Easy, Normal, Hard). The main difference between these difficulties is monster power and drop ratio, but not only.
- More missiles have Friendly Fire, so following missiles, skills, and effects have FF now:
+ all explosive potions, arrows, bolts, javelins, throwing axes and knives
+ Amazon: Magic arrow, Multishot, Strafe, Ice Arrow, Freezing Arrow, Exploding Arrow, Immolation Arrow, Lightning Bolt, Lightning Fury, Lightning Strike, Plague Javelin
+ Assassin: Lightning Sentry, Blade Fury, Fists of Fire, Claws of Thunder, Blades of Ice
+ Necromancer: Teeth, Bone Spear, Poison Explosion, Corpse Explosion
+ Barbarian: War Cry, Howl
+ Sorceress: Fire Bolt, Ice Bolt, Inferno, Fireball, Fire Wall, Ice Blast, Lightning, Chain Lightning, Glacial Spike, Meteor, Blizzard
+ Paladin: Blessed Hammer
+ Druid: Molten Boulder, Arctic Blast, Tornado, Volcano, Armageddon
- Crafted Diamond Needle was added as necessary item for runewords in crafted items.
- No more Private Inventory and keys at the starting. Character takes Favorite Talisman at once.
- New User Interface elements.
- Monster AR and damages now scale with /players X command on all difficulties.

Balance:
- Experience character takes from monsters in optional location "Lost Valley of Ice Warriors" was reduced.
- Drop rate for Elemental Planes was enhanced.
- Monster density in "Ancient Vault was reduced". Drop rate there was enhanced.
- Skill balancing: Holy Bolt, Fist of Heavens, and Sanctuary now damage any type of monsters, not only Undead. Though Sanctuary boni like To Hit and Enhanced Damage still work vs Undead only.
- Throwing Knives and throwing axes are cheaper now.
- Magic and rare jewels were enhanced.

Bug fixes:
- Wall's permeability in Ancient Vault was fixed.
- Some UI and item graphics corrections.
- Act 1 and 2 vendors crash was fixed.
- Item souls price was fixed.

How to install:
Make sure that you have version 1.37 of mod installed to install this update pack. Unzip all files to Diablo2 root folder with files replacing.

And again I introduce no secret recipes. But also no secret item. It is secret runeword now! :)
You need to find one new runeword in game :)

The first one who will assemble this runeword will immortalize his/her victory in game!

If You have assembled this runeword AND You are first who done it: You may send me character files by e-mail (the item with runeword should be in inventory). And this time I also don't want to reveal contest prize. It will be revealed only if contest will be won.

Oh, by the way, I have a hint for you, this runeword contains 6 (six) runes ;)

The winner will be announced here.
Good luck!

Changes list:

New:
- Important: New feature - Friendly Fire. Some of ranged weapon as well as some of skills can harm allies now. You can see this in item or skill description as "(can harm allies)" line. Some of skills that have this feature also have raised damages to prevent making these skills useless. :)
- New contest! See details above.
- One special superunique monster (Stephen Colbert the Great Alchemist of Truthiness) was added in Act 5 as contest result. See details here.
- 7 new monsters.
- 2 new areas.
- New User Interface elements.
- Some new items (like Ancient Keys) were added.
- Some changes in Ancient Containers opening. You'll need to figure it out.
- Runewords were enabled for crafted items.
- Crafted items were improved (See Special Recipes in Cube Recipes.doc/pdf).
- Some new modifiers for high quality items were added.

Balance:
- Random resistances/immunities for summons were removed.
- Some skills were rebalanced.
- Some unique items were rebalanced.

Bug fixes:
- All mercenaries have proper names, icons, and sounds now.
- Oak Sage doesn't have physical immunity on Nightmare anymore.
- And again you can kill Cow King without banning your character from Moo Moo Farm.
- Some Favorite Talisman upgrade recipes were changed to prevent bug with "+X to Vitality" modifier on Talisman.
- Bug with missed quantity on socketed combo weapon (such as javelins etc.) was fixed.
- Bug with wrong sizes of Shadows (it was hard to select these monsters for attacking) was fixed.
- Some graphical glitches in Nihlathak Temple area were fixed (thanks to SheX).

How to install:
Make sure that you have version 1.36 of mod installed to install this update pack. Unzip all files to Diablo2 root folder with files replacing.

No secret recipes this time!.
You need to find one new item in game :) If you'll found this item then I think you'll know what I talking about ;)

The first one who will find this item will immortalize his/her victory in game!

If You have found the item AND You are first who found it: You may send me character files by e-mail (the item should be in inventory). And this time I also don't want to reveal contest prize. It will be revealed only if contest will be won.

The winner will be announced here.
Good luck!

Changes list:

New:
- New contest!!! See details above.
- Act 3 Town map was changed.
- Moo Moo Farm map was changed.
- Some new modifiers for high quality items were added.
- Mercenaries graphics were changed to look as characters.
- Some new unique monsters were added.
- Weapons of God became Legendary Items. More Legendary Items were added.

Balance:
- Favorite Talisman don't have "Reduces Vendors Prices" and "+% to Experience" properties anymore. It was senseless anyway and was resulted to exploit. :)
- Max price vendors pay you for your items is 50000 now on all game difficulties.
- Some character skills were rebalanced again.
- Some unique items were rebalanced again.
- HP of Diabloclone on Normal difficulty were raised, but level of Firestorm was reduced.
- Mimics drop was enhanced.
- Range for Exotic Weapons was increased.
- Rare blood (Council Member, Frog Demon, Overseer, Frozen Horror) drops more often now.
- Maximum levels of aura and summon skills on charms were raised to 24/16/8. See Cube Recipes. Required character levels for using these charms are same as required character levels for creating these charms.

Bug fixes:
- Critical one: TCP/IP multiplayer mode was fixed.
- Korlic is visible now.
- Bug with wrong quantity of spirit wolves and dire wolves was fixed.
- Range for Corpse Explosion was fixed.
- Incorrect description on Cold Mastery was fixed.
- Aura of Countess and her sister don't have exploit anymore.
- Broken level-up modifiers on unique shields were fixed.
- Bug with enourmous damage on fire enchanted boss' death was fixed.
- I enabled firebolt retailation from goatmen again. Hope this time it will work. :)
- Innate bug with wrong damage and life displaying on Raise Skeleton and Raise Skeletal Mage skills was fixed.
- Bug with Megademons' animation glitch when they cast Poison Explosion was fixed.
- Some property strings for item descriptions were reduced to minimaze chances for famous 2048-symbols-on-item bug.
- Multiplayer bug with item personalization was fixed.
- Deckard Cain and Tyrael monologues at Act 4 were fixed ( Great thanks to Gravity for "pidgin english to english" translation :D ).

How to install:
Make sure that you have version 1.35 of mod installed to install this update pack. Unzip all files to Diablo2 root folder with files replacing.

[26 January 2007]

Hi all! :) So... it happened! Battle for Elements won first place as best RPG mod of 2006 year in Mod of the Year contest (MotY) on ModDB!

Best RPG mod in the 2006 Mod of the Year Awards

To be honour, I did not expect such result. After all, over 4000 mods took part in this contest ( though not so many was RPG mods :D ). So this was VERY pleasant surprise for me. :)

I want to thank you all, my dear players. This victory would be impossible without your support!

Oh, and by the way, version 1.36 coming soon. ;)

I'm very glad again to congratulate Gravity, another person who won one of BFE' contests!

He has found "Composite Potion" recipe: /Potion of Fire Resistance/ + /Potion of Cold Resistance/ + /Potion of Lightning Resistance/ + /Potion of Poison Resistance/ = /Composite Potion/ and immortalized his victory in game! :) He has received the right to choose any nickname for new monster. This monster will be placed in Nihlatak Temple Entrance, will use Nihlatak graphic model (it is brother of Nihlatak actually), and his name will be "Stephen Colbert the Great Alchemist of Truthiness". This monster also will have some unique properties.

There are 1 additional secret recipe in the version 1.35.
Now this recipe requires 4 components. Great number I know. :)
All components are an items existing only in BFE.
Output of recipe is the hmm, well, I don't want to reveal this, because it'll be just a hint. ;)

The first one who will find this recipe will immortalize his/her victory in game!

If You have found the recipe AND You are first who found it: You may send me character files by e-mail (output of secret recipe should be in inventory). This time I also don't want to reveal contest prize. It will be revealed only if contest will be won.

The winner will be announced here.
Good luck!

Now I want to thank three persons who helped me a lot with this patch: Cubaholic, as author of all map changes in this patch, Necrofan, as generator of ideas, and Boojum, as usual mod's instigator. :) Also I want to thank SheX - Lost Mage of Wind for 4 skill icons.

Changes list:

New:
- New contest!!! See details above.
- Special monument was added in Act 4 town as contest result. See details here.
- New map for Kurast (Act 3 town). Made by Cubaholic.
- New map for Tower Entrance (Act 1). Made by Cubaholic.
- New map for Monastery Entrance (Act 1). Made by Cubaholic.
- New map for Arreat Summit (Act 5). Made by Cubaholic.
- New map for Baal' Throne (Act 5). Made by Cubaholic.
- Countess and her sister have some nasty aura now. :)
- Druid helms are available at shops.
- New unique arrows/bolts were added.
- Some new magical properties were added (for unique items only).
- 9 new skills were added (for unique items only).
- All weapon unique items were changed.
- One new cube recipe for Favorite Talisman upgrade. See Cube Recipes.doc/pdf.

Balance:
- I reduced item levels of most unique and set items so set and unique drop can become better now.
- Some character skills were rebalanced again.
- Drop probability of loq quality items was reduced.
- Superfluous version of Ancient Kaa the Soulless was removed from Arcane Sanctuary.
- Values of random resistances on normal difficulty were lowered.
- Hephasto don't have "Spectral Hit" property anymore, he have "Magic Resist" property instead.
- Diabloclone was weakened on Normal and Nightmare difficulties.
- Rare Extractor is cheaper now.
- Duration of stamina potion effect was increased by two times. Duration of following potion effects was reduced a bit: Potions of Fire, Cold, Lightning, Poison, and Magic Resistance, Potion of Accuracy, Potion of Defence, Potions of Strength, Dexterity, Vitality, and Energy, Potion of Missile Avoidance.
- Number of missiles in Dark Necromancers' Teeth was reduced to reduce lags, but damage was increased.
- Sarcophaguses now cast Decrepify on death instead of Poison Ball when struck to reduce lags.
- Elemental absorbs of Lister and Izual were reduced, so now you potentially can to kill them with magic.
- Megademons now cast Poison Explosion when struck instead of Poison Nova when struck to reduce lags.
- Wraiths now cast Ice Blast when struck instead of Frost Nova when struck to reduce lags.
- Level of Kaa's Unholy Bolt was reduced.
- Recipe "Any weapon + 3 beaker of blood of same monster = Same weapon with "+150% Enhanced Damage vs. appropriate type of monster" now have 150% value as you can see. :)
- Bonus to kick damage on "Ur" rune was reduced to 10.
- "Knowledge" rune requires character level 60 now.

Bug fixes:
- Broken AI of some Fallens was fixed.
- Kain dialogue in act 5 was fixed.
- Some walkable tiles in Worldstone Chamber were fixed. Number of meteors here was reduced to reduce lags.
- Firebolt retailation from goatmen was disabled as broken properties to reduce lags. Sadly, I can't find reason of this bug, something with new videocards and/or drivers here I think.
- I removed Dragon Flight skill as possible skill for Shadow Warrior and Shadow Master. Hope it'll help to players to keep their summons alive longer.

How to install:
Make sure that you have version 1.34 of mod installed to install this update pack. Unzip all files to Diablo2 root folder with files replacing.

P.S. May be you have noticed that I added my webmoney accounts to download page. If you like BFE then feel free to send me few bucks and support development. ;)

And again I am grateful to Boojum, who helped me a lot with this upgrade pack and I'm sure that his imagination will not be exhausted in the next patches too. :)

Changes list:

New:
- Automap for Tristram was added.
- One new recipe for adding Endurance on Favorite Talisman was added. See "Favorite Talisman Upgrade" section in Cube Recipes.doc.
- Some new magical properties were added (for unique items only).
- You can kill Cow King without banning your character from Moo Moo Farm.
- New version of Mimics.
- All armor unique items (torso, helms, boots, gloves, belts, and shields) were changed.

Balance:
- I removed random resistances/immunities for Shadows in Lair of Fenris so now these guys can't be spawned as immune to anything. Same with Tomb Gurdians.
- Minions of Szark the Burning don't have Fire Wall on strike/when struck anymore. Also level of this Fire Wall was reduced.
- Ancient Kaa the Soulless don't have Might aura anymore.
- Level of Teeth skill for Dark Necromancer was reduced.
- Damage of champions was reduced a bit.
- Monster drop was rebalanced, must be better now.
- Some monsters AIs were improved again.
- Some character skills were rebalanced again.
- Magic Extractor is cheaper now.
- I reduced base kick damage on boots a bit.
- Monster Blood drops more often on Nigtmare and even more on Hell difficulty.
- Freezing effect was removed from Frost Nova.

Bug fixes:
- Wrong damage calculation for WhirlWind at negative percentage was fixed.
- Missed item types for some of unique items was fixed.
- Ranges of some aura skills was fixed.
- I tried to fix some bosses with 1 HP. :)
- Antidote potions work now.
- "Jera" rune have weapon effect description now.
- Bug with incorrect displaying of spirit wolves life was fixed.
- Bug with wrong requirements on Easy Colder and Colding Easer runewords was fixed.
- I removed small glitch when your character can pass from Cathedral to Catacombs from other side of wall.
- Bug with unwalkable areas in Elemental Plane of Air was fixed (I hope).
- Critical one: Random bug with "Missile firing too far" game crash after Baal killing was fixed.