Annoying Stat Maxed Error

I've been playing Arcanum off and on for years and it is still one of my favorite rpg's. However I've recently run into a very VERY annoying problem.

The first time it happened I was playing a Dwarf tech character and was up to the last skill in smithing. I went to increase my intelligence with a recently earned point and it said "stat has reached its maximum value" when it clearly had not. I was not able to reach the full level of any tech skill.

After this I downloaded and ran the latest patch. I played a few more times and everything was good. Today it happened again. I'm playing a half-ogre mage and it has giving me the same "stat has reached its maximum value" on will power at 17. Now I can't get the last magic spell on anything. I have the points it just will not let me increase the stat.

Has anybody run across this problem or know how to fix it? If so please help.

 

Well, I've never had this before, but I'm guessing it has something to do with the character's race and/or background, maybe you should check the vantages and disadvantages of the chosen background.

Wow... A Half-Ogre mage... that's a weird vision =P

 

Indeed, racial and background penalties do lower the stat and skill caps. You generally cannot manually invest more than 12 character points in a stat and 5 CPs in a skill.

That being said, what was the background of your dwarf and what is the background of your half ogre?

If nothing else, a character editor can be used to counter this problem if using such a tool is alright with you.

 

Thanks for the quick replies. Yea I thought it might be the background, with the half-ogre it probably is. I used Ran Away With the Circus on him and that took off 3 from willpower. I guess I just assumed I could still max at 18, but if his normal cap is 20 then yea I guessed wrong haha.

Haha, yea I try to stay inventive with my character creations and a half-ogre mage sounded like a good idea. Next time I'll choose a different background for him. I chose that one because the strength boost allowed me to max his combat quickly so I could concentrate on other things.

The dwarf though I hadn't picked a specific background for him. I just played him as a straight tech character and his intelligence wouldn't go high enough to master the tech skills. I think it was intelligence of 19 that he needed and he stopped at 18.

I'm not sure what happened there, it's very frustrating to get that far in the game and not be able to utilize the master skill. I wouldn't normally use a character editor, but in this instance I might. Do you know of a good one?

I'm not sure if this is character problem for sure or if its a game problem because of the dwarf. I have run across some strange errors in this game even with a patch, so maybe this is just one of them.

 

What kinds of errors? I want to see if the errors occurring in my game also occurs in yours.

 

What's happening with the half ogre is completely normal and intended. The thing with the dwarf sound rather strange, though. Some random thought about the matter:

• Was the value of Intelligence a red number?
• Were you suffering from any curses?
• Did you notice your Intelligence dropping at any moment of the game for whatever reason?
• Were you experimenting with Therapeutics?
• Did you dwarf have contact with the Lethe Wyvern and/or its venom?

This one should be fine.

 

Some of the errors I have experienced:

• 1. The cursor icon always has a block around it, sometimes black, sometimes part of the background graphics.
  
  2. The game will crash with bars of color flashing horizontally, sometimes it stays like this, and sometimes the screen goes black. After this I'll try to load a recent saved game and it will load with my characters wearing no clothes in the middle of nowhere with a chest beside them (weird). The chest contains what a general store would have. This has happened to me twice and I save multiple games now because of it.
  
  3. Playing half-ogre characters if their armor gets broken it doesn't graphically get removed from the character. If I'm not paying close attention I can go for awhile thinking I have armor when I really don't.
  
  4. I played a half-elf character and Raven would not rejoin the party after her dialog at the ring of brodgar.
  
  5. Same half-elf character, had persuasion maxed and a high intelligence but was not offered the dialog to talk Kerghan out of destroying the world and into destroying himself instead.

Those are the major ones I can think of right now, I've also had some trouble with the music score.

As for the dwarf character, the stat was not in red and I did not notice any drop previously. No curses, drinks, or therapeutics. I did cross the Wyvern but to my recollection I just ran up to him, took the photo, and ran off. If he did get a hit in would that cause the problem?

Thanks for the editor link, I'll give it a try.

 

Well, the errors number one and number two are very likely to be a graphics card error, how much RAM does your card demand?

Error 3, well, I guess it's a corrupt file problem, but I can't be sure.

Error 4, same as above, probably during the installation some script lines could have been corrupted or misplaced, is your copy legal (CD) or illegal (.iso; .bin)

Error 5, same.

 

Are you playing patched, link381? I recall hearing about #4 before, but it was most probably a bug removed either in the latest (1.0.7.4) official patch or at least in Drog's unofficial one.

#1 and #2 sound like some graphical errors which can most probably be dealt with one way or another. Perhaps this thread will prove useful to you.

In #2 the game resets to what happens behind the scenes during character creation. You are one of the naked men, the second one is the initial merchant and the chest contains his stock. It's usually a dead end and Arcanum's way of saying a save has gone corrupt.

#3 happens to me occasionally. Not sure what is the trigger deciding whether or not the wearer keeps looking dressed after his armor gets destroyed.

#5 - did you have 20 Charisma? Did you have Arronax in your party?

It could. Each attack of the Lethe Wyvern has a chance of permanently decreasing you intelligence by 1. The stat's value stays white, but since you cannot invest more than 12 CPs in a stat, the cap drops as well.

The Lethe Wyvern's venom from the Zoological Society works similarly - it permanently lowers intelligence by 1, yet the stat in question is marked as red after its application.

 

#1 should be fixed by running the game in the safe mode (by using the -no3d command line argument).

 

I'm not sure what graphics card this computer runs on. I do know it was built last year with Windows 7 so it should be able to run this game without problems. Yes my copy of Arcanum is legal and is patched with the latest 1074 version.

That's a very abrupt way of telling you a save file is corrupt to stick your character naked in a field with the original merchant haha, but ok.

As for my half-elf character missing out on dialog options to talk Kerghan down, I did have 20 charisma and Arronax was in my party. He did his interruption dialog when I agreed with Kerghan for the first time, but after his dialog I was not giving the option to select "I think I can talk him out of this" I guess this might be as Vaapeli said a corrupt file with the script.

My dwarf character may have been hit by the Wyvern, that might have been what did it. I try to just take the picture but it is possible he hit me before I could run off.

If I run the game in safe mode will it detract from any of the visuals/graphics?

 

The "safe mode" here just means software acceleration. There are very minor differences in graphics quality, but it's a pre-rendered 2D game, you can't really make it look worse.