SKIE: THE COST OF ONE GIRL'S SOUL
INTRODUCTION
The mod gives the player a chance to continue Skie's plot that began in Siege of Dragonspear. The DLC gave the Silvershield girl a very important role, and I felt as if it should be continued in the BG2 portion of the game. The mod has three different components:
- component A - Skie: The Cost of One Girl's Soul – A new quest for Baldur's Gate 2 EE => this component provides a new quest that gives the player a chance to save Skie Silvershield after what happened in Siege of Dragonspear. You should be warned, though, that saving her comes with a price. The mod starts at Irenicus' Dungeon when you find the main quest item.
- component B - Allow Skie to return as a joinable NPC => This component allows Skie to join you if you decide to help the Silvershield girl and succeed. She will find you after some time. Skie will start to look for you in certain inns, so remember to stop and rest from time to time. The NPC comes with some timered and situation talks, banters with each NPC (at least 2 in SoA + 1 in ToB), interjections, an epilogue, and other things joinable companions should include. Note that there is no romance here, as I wanted to stress companionship and loyalty based on friendship and not romantic love. The NPC component was written to enjoy Skie's presence in the group, rather than provide hundreds of lines, but she should talk to you once in a while. In terms of size, she could be compared to Kulyok's Tiax or Coran.
- component C - Add Player-Initiated Dialogue (PID) for Skie => This component requires component B to work and allows you to discover new lines by clicking the dialogue cursor on Skie Silvershield. As the original NPCs do not have PIDs, this was made an optional component, so you could decide if you want these additional lines in your game or not.
- component D - The Return of Eddard Silvershield => This component (which also requires component B) adds a new quest happening after Skie's friendship path. It starts in the Bridge District. It leads Skie and the PC to a surprising discovery: Eddard is alive as he wasn't actually killed but captured by slavers during his mission. After completing the quest, Eddard may join the team. He is a romanceable character (for non-evil male and female protagonists with a Charisma score of 13+). The NPC will stay with you for both SoA and ToB and will also have some heart-warming talks with his sister, Skie.
- component E - Add Player-Initiated Dialogue (PID) for Eddard => This component requires component D to work and allows you to discover new lines by clicking the dialogue cursor on Eddard Silvershield. As the original NPCs do not have PIDs, this was made an optional component, so you could decide if you want these additional lines in your game or not.
- component F - Add brand-new SoD-related items to BG2 => this component introduces new SoD references to BG2 by adding a few items that somehow correspond to Siege of Dragonspear characters, places, and happenings (Skie included). The items are sold by a new merchant at the Promenade. He's standing near Lord and Lady Ophal. This component is independent and may be installed without components A and B.
Note that Skie in this mod is supposed to continue the Siege of Dragonspear character, so she may be a tiny bit more mature, but still a bit reckless, and will not hesitate to tell you how she feels about people and events. The change in her character may be seen in both her dialogues and soundset.
Also, to make her portrait blend in better with Baldur's Gate II style of portraits, the mod uses an edited version of her original picture.
INSTALLATION AND COMPATIBILITY:
As with any WeiDU mod - unzip the archive to your Baldur's Gate II: Enhanced Edition and run setup exe. Each of the components will be displayed as a separate option. To install component B you need to install component A, though. Their stories are related, and Skie can't join if the quest isn't completed first.
The mod may be incompatible (story-wise) with other mods that add the Soultaker, Skie and/or Eldoth Kron plots to Baldur's Gate II, including my own Skie mod released years ago.
In case you did not like the portrait edit that should blend in with BG2 style, I included a directory with the old portrait. If you want to use it, copy the images from the "portrait-old" directory to your "override" directory (located in your main BG2 folder) after the installation of this mod, and pick the option to replace the existing files with the new one.
If you want to enjoy additional talks between Skie and NPCs added by mods, remember to install BG2 Crossmod Banter Pack: https://www.gibberlings3.net/mods/npcs/crossmod/
GAMES: BG2EE, EET