Common bugs

Common Bugs

Arelith Wiki
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Armor Weapons - Melee / Ranged / Siege Resources - Poison
Arelith Changes:
Classes - Skills - Feats - Trap Summons - Familiar Reskins Spells (list) - Misc
Help:
Rules - Roleplay - Maps Console Commands Common Bugs - Staff Support Tickets - Character Remake [The Astrolabe]

"Pfah! You didn't get the memo?

"A wizard did it" has been a consistent and amazingly fool-proof way to explain the unexplainable for years now." Artos

Notes

The problems listed on this page are known to developers. You do not need to report them again, since they were already reported several times. Before you report any new bugs, please try to look at the Issue Tracker on the community if something similar was not reported already and see the Guide to bug reporting. You can also use Search function on forums to obtain useful information.

General NWN problems

Dual Core Processor and NWN

Enable Party Invite Popup

More players from the same network

Horses freeze my game

Lag

Vista and NWN

Connecting problems

CD key still in use

Problem: When I try to log in the server, it gives me a message: your CD key is still in use, wait 5 min to retry.

Information: This is not an issue with the server, but with connectivity with GameSpy.

Solution: Wait a few minutes and retry logging in. Direct connect from desktop could help with this issue.

CD Check Authentication Denied

Problem: After logging into the character vault and creating or selecting a character to play I receive the error: CD Check Authentication Denied

This is part of the character/player authentication method Arelith has created to replace the Bioware user login that no longer exists. Basically what the error is saying is "The Username you are trying to play with was not created with the CD keys you are currently using"

Solution: Double check that the CD keys you are currently using are the same ones you used when first logging into the Username. If you still get the error, change your Username.

Crashing after Entering Area or Logging On

Problem: I have a char that crashes the game each time I log on. The first time was when I went through a transition and now it won't load up. I can connect to the server, the game loads, passes through the loading area, then sends me to area I was last. Just as it gets done loading and I can see the terrain, it seizes up, and the "this program is not responding" message appears. Occasionally, I'll get an "abnormal program termination" message.

Problem is persistent over resets.

Solution: Turn Shiny Water settings off.

1.) Press ESCape in game (can be done in single player or on another PC).

2.) Video Options

3.) Advanced Video Options

4.) Ensure that box next to "Enable Shiny Water" is unchecked

5.) OK

Alternative problem: Bad overrides can cause this problem too.

For example a cave override that is supposed to put ceilings in, make the cave walls look better, and all that. For one reason or another, it may not work (probably if the file is corrupt somehow). Then going into a cave with it, the game crashes instantly and crashes again every time player logs in until that override it taken out.

Solution 2: If turning off Shiny Water doesn't help, player can try renaming whole override directory (probably C:\NeverwinterNights\NWN\override on Windows) to something else (like override_backup) and see if that helps.

Election by citizens

With more then 10 candidates for position, not all candidates will show up to players for voting. Details are described here.

Known bugs with Spells

Are listed in Spell changes.

Scrying Bugs

• You can currently scry on Dead characters. This is not supposed to happen and therefore some players will RP it as the scrying being enveloped in a misty fog and nothing else.

• In times of high lag the whole script occasionally won't fire and the scrier can sometimes appear, stuck on *follows* next to the scry-ee, and they will not return to where they were originally scrying from. Relogging usually resolves this issue, though sometimes a server reset will be required.

• Logging out or getting disconnected while scrying will respawn you at the location of the scry-ee rather than the location you were scrying from. This can also occur during times of high lag.

• AoE damage can ping off of hidden scriers, revealing them in the combat log. This is considered meta information and shouldn't be acted upon.

Suggestions:

• Avoid scry during laggy times and keep your character fully satiated and well rested. The slouching script may trigger issues.

• The results of this bug may be taken as in character. Magic is a powerful force and can be unpredictable at times. Thus, use with caution.

Rules on Reacting to Scrying Bugs OR Using -scry Exploits

1) "Seeing" someone like that is generally a bug, and whilst we understand mistakes happen (I've done it myself once or twice) you should try not to abuse having "seen" them.

2) Using -Ward_Teleport after "seeing" a character (or of course spotting their name on the party list - that's out and out an exploit) is also bad form. Please desist from doing it. -Ward teleport is not supposed to be used that way, period.

DM Grumpycat

3) Our past rulings on thw telepoftation [sic] is that it is a feature. A danger of scrying!

DM Always This Late

My character

I can not see my character on list when logging on server

The Linux switched has caused some bugs, a minor one of these is the amount of time it takes for loading your character vault occasionally. Wait about 15-30 seconds (maximum) or simply log in again. This will solve the problem.

Disappearance after transferring between Surface and Underdark servers

Problem: I was playing with my character A on surface server. When I zoned to the Underdark sever, I was logged in with a totally different char of mine. And I appeared in the little ooc area that has the two server portals. I logged out. When I went to find my character A, the char was not appearing in my char list in either the surface or the UD server.

Cause: Uncertain as of yet.

Mithreas: "I've seen this happen occasionally, but (a) it doesn't happen enough and (b) we're always able to restore from backup, so I've not got around to investigating it yet."

Solution: Contact the current admin team to have your character restored from most recent backup. You can post your request on the Issue Tracker forum.

Character is not visible

Problem: Character vanishes, appears invisible, but is still playable. Image

Cause: This can sometimes happen after character goes by 'Cutscene Invisible', either through -scry or the caravans.

Solution: Rest or -dispel should fix this problem.

All characters are invisible

Problem:PCs and NPCs are not visible except within very close range.

Information:Sometimes when Ultravision spell ends, the game starts to treat your character as if it was in darkness and without Ultravision spell. This regularly occurs when a character has the ultravision spell cast on them while they are invisible, or when the ultravision spell wears off when they are in a darkness spell.

Solution:

• Relogging is the most effective solution to this problem.

• Casting ultravision or true seeing acts as a temporary solution, as the issue returns when the new spell wears out.

Third class is not visible on characters' sheet

Cause: The space to display race and classes is limited. Arelith implemented many subraces and backgrounds that make text there much longer then NWN developers expected. It is nothing to worry about. The text is just written outside of visible area.

Solution: The third class is still there, it can be visible on logging screen or when leveling up. It may be beneficial for player to keep track of characters' levels on paper or inside in game journal.

I move slower than I should

Sometimes this can be caused by lag in combination with:

• transferring between servers
• weather scripts (strong wind, high snow, etc.)
• armour penalties

Movement speed penalties work similar like subrace stats. Instead of putting a proverbial modifier on it, it hard-scripts the movement penalty every time you change your armour. Of course, when the server is laggy/crashes/etc, it might not register the removal of the armour penalty when you change your armour, thus, making your 80% movement speed your new base movement speed.

Solutions:

• Activate stealth and search mode at the same time, then deactivate them.
• Try to re-equip all your items with armour penalty (armour, helm, shield).
• -dispel
• *prays*
• Make sure that your slowing down is not caused by high snow or strong wind in the area by transitioning indoor
• If switching servers caused this then switch back, toggling stealth and search.
• Overload yourself so that you become heavily encumbered. When you get unencumbered your movement speed could get back to normal
• Have someone kill you in the arena: go to Cordor/Jhared's/The Tower (where death is disabled) and get your character killed
• Server reset.
• If all else fails, contact a DM.

I am stuck

If you are stuck in some wall or furniture, then try one of these:

• Use Arelith console command -makesafe.

Simply hit the key directly to the left of the number 1 on most keyboards, type in your command and then hit Enter. This function will move the player to a safe location, meaning a valid location in the area (ie. not in walls or on other creatures). If you are stuck on edge of rocks or walls, then this command will often not help.

• Use the*follows* command while near another PC and have them walk away or transition to another area.

• Relog.

• Try contacting DMs in game to help you out

I receive messages that I shouldn't

There are several symptoms of this. You could be experiencing any or all of the following:

• Receiving multiple messages on a "tick" (every hour) lowering your food/water/rest much lower than it should or displaying the status of a deity that you don't follow. While this bug usually doesn't cause death when the values of food/water/rest reach -100%, there were several cases when the character did die from it.
• Receiving tells intended for a different player.
• Clicking on your icon will initiate a tell to a player with a different log-in name than yours.
• To others, your character is missing from the player list and they are unable to send you tells even when clicking on your icon.
• Being tied up to someone else corpse. You receive messages when it is picked up or dropped, even when your character is not in the Death area. If someone raises that corpse, it might get you teleported to them.
• You hear everything that some other character is hearing somewhere else. You might be also receiving his food/drink/rest status in addition to your own.
• Your character is displayed several times on the player list.

Cause: Lag or wrongly ended connections of some players. The server thinks that your character is tied to some different logging name.

Mithreas:

"Each character exists in two parts. There's the character file, which has your stats, inventory and stuff, and the game object representing your character, which stores your state (location, variables such as hunger/thirst, etc). Under conditions of lag, we've seen numerous cases of one character getting their state mixed up with another character's, which leads to Bad Stuff happening.

Happily, state is dynamically recreated after each server reset. So a reset is always the fix to any "Really Odd" problems you encounter."

Solution: Restart of the server. Sometimes logging out and back in helps, but often it doesn't. If it bothers you or your character is in danger of dying because of this, then log out of this character and play different character until the next server reset. You can try to ask on DM channel for a restart due to serious bugs occurring.

Clones / Multiple Characters

This could be reason for some problems described above in topic I receive messages that I shouldn't

Cause: This could be caused by More players from the same network.

Solution:

• See the link above to avoid future occurrences.
• Try and ask a DM for a reset or just log off and come back later after restart of server.

Lycanthropy bug

Logging in or out while under monthly influence of lycanthropy can cause some problems. If a lycan logs in during the hours when they would turn they are struck with the confusion (auto attacking all they see), but none of the other effects. The problem is that if other players see this, they don't see a werewolf attacking people, they just see the character going on a rampage. The same can happen when logging in after the character was logged off "under influence".

Solution: Stay logged on character until the tick occurs (every 5 minutes) and it should fix itself.

Totem druids

See current bugs on Druids' page.

Duergar/Svrif deleted on creation

Delete character error CHA requirement workaround for Bard, Warlock, Favored Soul, Harbinger, or Sorcerer.

Link to Discord discussion about bug.

Symphony wrote:

   It's because the auto increment up to 11 for bard only takes away 7 points. They start with 4 Charisma, but, it should take 8 points to get to 11, just like it takes 8 points to go from 8 to 15. The last point is two points.
   Bioware's ability score buy page in character creation autospend up to 11 isn't smart enough to know about the point buy diminishing returns.
   When you open the page with 11 CHA, you've already overspent, if you put points into the rest of your scores, you will have used 31 points, and that's cheating, and Arelith will kick you.
   You also can't move past the ability score window until you place all 31 points. What you can do is finish making the character, then before pressing play, open your ability scores, and lower an ability score by 1 point. Then cancel. This should leave you with one unspent point, which, once you join the server, will be seen as using 30 points, and you won't get kicked.

I see dead people or PCs that are elsewhere

Problem: Players can see characters where they are not. Very of often those are "death" PCs from death area.

Solution: This is classical symptom of lag and server needing a restart.

Death in a no-death area (arena)

Problem:If you die (blacken out) in the Arena and you crash or log off and back on, you die without a corpse. This is known bug.

Solution: I'm sorry. Unless there is a DM willing to assist you, the only option you have is to reread the book titled "When Bad Things Happen to Good Adventurers".

Bank is telling me incorrect amount on my account

Causes:

• Lag (It can mix up some texts for dialogues and variables, which then change places and show up incorrectly.)
• Remake of character with same name

Solution: Follow the links above.

I can not use my Shop, Quarters, Bank, or Portals

Are you by any chance playing from different computer with different installation of NWN and therefore different CD Key?

All should return to normal after next reset of server. Just don't use them till then and try to play with the same CD Key in future. (All CD Keys are saved in file nwncdkey.ini in your inventory. You can just copy that file if you are using NWN on different computer.)

Crafting station, Enchantment Basin, Shop, or Chest is not working

Solution: Server reset should fix this.

To avoid this: Try to always properly close all dialogues and fixtures when you end working with them. Don't just run away from them and leave them to close by themselves. Also, multiple people opening the same crafting station (or Enchantment pool, or shops, etc.) causes this.

Chest bug

Problem: In chest some items keep appearing while others are disappearing.

Cause: Database malfunctioning.

Solution: The "official fix" is to empty the chest over the course of a few resets of server. Remove again anything that mysteriously appears in the chest until stuff stops mysteriously appearing after resets of server. More is in this topic on forums.

Cuchilla:

"So the recipe is this:

• Leave chest empty.
• Wait for next reset.
• If spawns in the empty chest after reset: Remove them.

Situation 1: It's single items: It should be safe to put the items in your inventory back in the chest.

Situation 2: It's stacked items: Leave chest empty for next reset. Continue removing the stacks after each reset until they disappear.

Items

Stackable items

Current status is that there are the following known bugs.

• Unstacked items will keep the same name, but loose their custom description.
• Items taken to inventory will automatically stuck on items of the same type on all unfilled stacks. Any custom name or description will be lost in process. This includes:
  • Trophy Heads of PCs
• Partially finished crafting works should not stack. Each item is given a random tag (via scripting) when creating it, yet two same random numbers can be sometimes created. There is 1/1000 chance of the same unfinished products to stack together, so it is always better to finish each production first, before starting another one.
• 'Cast Spell X, N uses' items (small list below) will drain a whole stack when used, rather than just draining charges/uses from one item. This is an unavoidable side effect of stacking and will not be fixed. Workaround is to split one item off the stack, quickslot that item, and when it runs out split another item off, rinse repeat.

Lifesavers

Bandage rolls

Writing paper

Guaji Root

Blade Orbs

Travel provisions, Wind Bags, etc.

Robes and cloaks are not visible

Cause: Video settings.

Solution: Check NWN video settings. If they are in "Compatibility Mode" some higher end graphic items are completely invisible.

Finding unusual items

Sometimes you can find unusual items in remains from NPCs. Those items were likely not intended to appear in those remains. One of the most common examples of this is creature weapons (claws). Other examples include items named:

• Creature hides
• Stolen Treasure - it looks a little like a deck of cards
• PC properties

Cause: Lag or small overlook by developers.

Solution:

• If there is no lag involved, report found item on forum, so that developers can see if it's marked properly as "non dropable".
• In case of lag, leave those items in the remains they were found in. They will despawn shortly.

Weight reduction from my Fixture is gone

Problem: After enchanting an item with weight reduction, placing it, then picking it back up, it loses the weight reduction property.

Reason: Any enchantment placed on fixtures (for example Tent or Cooking Station) will disappear from them once you place them on ground. Note that should you try to barter the fixture, it will be placed on ground automatically instead.

Details: When you set down the Fixture a new instance of a different object is created. Currently additional properties are not transferred to this object.

Fixture description is gone after reset of server

"There's a restriction in the database access code in the amount of text that can be retrieved of 16*128 characters, or 2048. I could bump this limit trivially but I'm not sure yet what the impact on performance would be (this is the size of the buffer object we create that is then rewritten for every single database call)." Mithreas

Please, use 2048 or less characters in any description to avoid problems. This count includes spaces and 2 characters for each carriage return (end of line). (So a paragraph break is 4 characters = two times end of line.) Note that Microsoft Word's "Characters (Including Spaces)" does not count carriage returns.

Any longer description will be replaced by the default fixture description on reset of the server.

Dropped Weapon/Shield

Problem: Equipment occasionally seem to "randomly" drop out of inventory.

Information:When a character has a full inventory and unequips a weapon via a quickslot, Bad Stuff starts to happen. Weapons will drop automatically, regularly sticking to the ground and becoming unable to be picked back up. This includes DMs, who will not be able to save your equipment.

Solution/Prevention: Do not unequip items when your inventory is full. Be sure to have enough space to carry your things about with you at all times.

In case you do happen to drop your shield (you had quickslotted both a weapon and a shield in the same slot) it's likely you will loss the shield suddenly due to a nwn bug. The solution to prevent this, is to pick it up and relog.