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Korax Mod 5.3 is available for download from SourceForge and ModDB.
Released in June 2001, Korax Mod 1.0 was the first ever Hexen gameplay mod. Throughout the next few months and years, it introduced a slew of new RPG features: experience and leveling, customizing your character during creation, new weapons and spells, monsters dropping silver and gold bars, buying and selling items at shops, special "damage skin" sprite sets to make it clearly visible a monster is badly hurt...
Today, the same team is raising the bar once more with the release of Korax Mod 5:
Introducing an RPG complexity setting that allows the player to mold the game to his personal playstyle, from a complex RPG system to a near-FPS setup that feels a lot more like Heretic's fast-paced gameplay than the classic Hexen shuffle.
Shortcuts: breaking up the linear monotony and the frustration of the tedious search for the last hidden puzzle switch - now you need to solve less than half of a hub's puzzles to be able to proceed to the next hub (but you might want to linger for the experience and loot).
"Pistol Starts": built-in support for warping to the beginning of any hub and receiving weapons and armor automatically so you have an actual chance of beating the game from that point without using any cheats.
Vastly expanded bestiary: not only are there a few completely new enemies and many new types of existing monsters, even the "classic" ones might surprise you by dodging your attacks, running away when low on health, closing large distances with a single leap, and generally finding ways to move around the map and reappear behind your back.
Defeating Korax wasn't a solo effort: embark upon this epic adventure with a supporting cast of merchants and craftsmen, as well as two sidekicks that will race you to kill the most monsters in the area they stake out.
A large arsenal of new weapons and spells; custom armor with resistance gems.
Designed to support custom maps and mods out of the box: create your own mini-RPG using a large number of new items, weapons and spells, as well as NPCs with pre-configured conversation scripts offering all basic services. Korax Mod is distributed with a Developer's Reference Guide containing detailed instructions on how to create and distribute your maps and mods.
Last edited by rambo on Thu Dec 21, 2023 4:56 pm, edited 3 times in total.
It's nice to see this historical mod back, however since this isn't stated anywhere I'm wondering, does this include brand new levels? If not, I think, this should probably go in gameplay mods instead.
AvzinElkein wrote:How do I make it work in GZDoom?
Korax Mod is for Vavoom I believe, not GZDoom.
Yes, Korax Mod 5 is based on Vavoom. However, the download includes everything except the original Hexen IWAD, so you don't need to download anything else.
Below is a recording of a full playthrough of the Hexen Campaign with RPG complexity set to Old school.
Note: if you watch it directly on Youtube, the description includes 40+ timelinks so you can skip to the parts you are interested in.
The video below demonstrates the "pistol start" feature of Korax Mod 5: you set up your character, then warp to the start of a later hub, and take it from there. No cheating required, as you are outfitted with an assortment of weapons, quartz flasks and armor when spawning.
The character creation process has been overhauled: rerolls are now standardized across classes, with the sum total of all attributes always the same
When RPG Complexity is set to off, the roll screen is disabled and the starting attribute values are significantly higher, avoiding the gimped attributes in the early game
Sidekick improvements
Sidekick NPCs attacks and spells don't damage the player any more
The experience from monsters killed by a sidekick NPC now goes to the player
On Old school RPG Complexity, this experience gain is dependent on difficulty setting: on hard, you only get half the experience than if you'd have killed the monster yourself; on easy, you get double the amount
Player tuning
The Phalanx martial skill now allows the player to move slowly; in turn, its cost has been increased and its duration decreased
Spirits Within behaviour optimized and the feedback message now makes clear what exactly happened
Armor kits now restore 25% more durability
Animated weapons now react more quickly to player input, most notable the Mage's Thunderstaff
Player's Fireball spell damage slightly increased
Monster tuning
Dark Advisors don't resurrect on death any more
Ettin Commander's hammer throw now lights up the monster, giving a visual cue he's about to throw a hammer
Ettin Commander's hammer damage greatly reduced
Lava Dweller's damage damage greatly reduced
Ranged animation timings have been modified for some ettin and class boss types
New options
Options submenus have been reshuffled and a new section introduced (visual options)
You can now separately enable and disable screen flashes on damage, screen flashes on item pickup and screen tint effects from other sources (like berserking, being poisoned or under the effects of mana burn)
The sound effects of class abilites can now be switched on and off
In addition to the on/off switch for the automatic use of health potions, there is now a second setting (autohealth cooldown) to determine whether to use only one potion per damage trigger
Miscellaneous improvements
Like Scattered Evil 2.0, KMOD 5.1 is shipping with the latest Vavoom 1.34 release (GNU/Linux binaries are already 64-bit, Windows 64-bit binaries will be added in a future release)
Ported improvements from Scattered Evil 2.0 (mostly autohealth and berserking related)
Heresiarch damage skin visuals added
Lowered the upper limit on the sum of red and green screen tint effects and the strength of damage flashes
The distribution now includes the full Vavoom documentation as PDF files
Sidekicks have been buffed in Korax Mod 5.1 and this uncut recording shows how they kill Korax and all minions in the Dark Crucible in less than 6 minutes, with you just hanging back, watching, and gaining experience worth over a dozen levels.
Korax Mod 1.0, the first ever gameplay mod for Hexen, was released exactly twenty years ago on June 14, 2001. To celebrate this occasion, a special 20th Anniversary Edition has been released today that includes a unique in-game menu called "Anniversary Extras", containing a short history of Korax Mod, a long-lost interview, and player feedback from the early years.
Improvements and fixes:
The inventory and spellstrip movement bug has been finally fixed
When RPG Complexity is set to Off, instead of the useless weight/hunger/fatigue indicators a new overlay is shown, displaying the current values of all six D&D abilities
Healing prayer now doesn't deduct Faith if the player is at full health
Create Mana cantrip now doesn't deduct Magic if the player has full mana stores
The default roll is now more suitable for the early game
Feedback messages for class abilities are now always displayed in the top left corner
All class abilities now respect the sound setting
Improved the behaviour of the gimme cheats for gaining levels and acquiring all class abilities
Instead of specific monster types dropping predefined items, all monsters now have a chance to drop loot bags of varying sizes
Adventurer’s Pouch: can contain mana, a few silver, and low-tier artifacts like a Flechette
Adventurer’s Sachel: in addition to the pouch contents, it can also contain some instant health or food, a gold bar or two, and mid-tier artifacts like a Porkelator
Adventurer’s Knapsack: in addition to the pouch and satchel contents, it can also contain a large amount of gold, a top-tier artifact like an Icon of the Defender, and even a highly valuable potion that permanently increases your stats
Quality of Life improvements
Fixed the root cause of the long-elusive bug that caused the world and interfaces to sometimes recall the wrong player class or RPG complexity upon loading a saved game
You can now start the game in any episode: after setting up your character, you pick your starting hub and will be automatically leveled up and outfitted to an appropriate degree
Armorer’s hammer can now always be used, regardless of the condition of your armor, and it repairs a percentage depending on difficulty and RPG complexity
Upon leveling up, the player now receives some mana. The amount depends on level, difficulty and RPG complexity
On higher RPG complexities, leveling up also reduces the player’s Hunger and Fatigue by an amount determined by difficulty and RPG complexity
New menu options to automatically assign points on leveling up, to select the detail level of the loot bag pickup message, and to set the threshold where you can start using Armorer’s Hammers
Limited Deathkings support
You can now play through the Hexen expansion Deathkings of the Dark Citadel, starting the game in any episode you want
You start at a high level, with all your weapons/spells/class abilities, as well as a few useful artifacts in your inventory
Instead of shops, you can spend your money to replace your armor with a brand new one any time
Not being able to modify the maps means the total number of monster variations is limited to that of the original Hexen; to shake things up, the following changes have been made:
Standard Ettins have been replaced with Ettin Commanders (whose damage and health has been lowered by about a third)
Centaurs have been replaced with Flame Centaurs
Slaughtaurs have been replaced with Spectral Centaurs
Afrits have been replaced with Afrit Leaders
Dark Bishops have been replaced with Dark Cardinals (whose health has been slightly increased)
Death Wyverns had their health massively increased
The mod description says that the switch puzzles were changed so you don't have to find every single switch. How does this work exactly? Have switches been removed? Are they more clearly marked?
Honestly, I've been eyeing this for a first-time playthrough just cuz the vanilla switch puzzles sound kinda miserable.
