Hi,
is there a way to play "Icewind Dale Complete" without installing Trials of the Luremaster? I want the most original ID as possible and i heard that LotT brings a lot of new features and enemies and even that it makes the game easier. This i certainly do not want.

I use GOG Galaxy. Thank you for your answers.

Trials of the Luremaster introduced new areas (with new items and enemies), but otherwise did not affect the main game at all, except for fixing some crashes:

- Fixed a bug with fighter/druids being fatigued after acquiring "Timeless Body".
- Fixed a crash problem with some wyvern's death animations when played on a Matrox G400.
- Dual-classed characters should now be able to achieve 30th level in their second class.
- Fixed a crash bug that would happen when too many stores/bags were simultaneously open.
- For users who copy their save games from a desktop machine to a laptop via burning a CD, the game will now remove Read Only attributes from several of its directories to allow the game to function properly.

So if you want to play without ToTL all you have to do is not talk to the halfling in the inn. He takes you to the new areas; if you don't talk to him it's the same game as the one without TotL.

Are you not confusing Trials of the Luremaster, with Heart of Winter? Because Heart of Winter is the expansion that besides adding new areas and quests introduced many changes to the existing gameplay (changed the bard making them much more powerful, added new spells, changed experience tables...)

So, no talking to the hafling in the inn. Gotcha!
hmm...you are right! :O I meant Heart of Winter. Dammit....So new question. Is it possible to play the GOG original Complete edition without Heart of Winter?

I'm afraid there is no easy way to do it.

You can skip talking to the Shaman, since he's the one who takes you to the Heart of Winter areas, but there is no easy way of skipping the changes it introduced to the main campaign.

Technically, it should be possible to write a patch to make those changes, or if you're familiar with editors to make them yourself, but it's not easy, and some changes require to patch the exe itself.

I have the original CDs and though almost all of my playthroughs nowday are with HoW included, I did play the original vanilla and it was a slightly different experience, especially with bards.

Looks like your options are:
Get to ebay or similar and try to find the original CDs. Maybe look at physical second hand game shops or garage sales in your area.
Try to aquire the CDs by other means. You have aquired and paid for the game, and there is no easy way to buy the vanilla version otherwise. You know the morality question of it.

I never use bards, so it could be a slightly closer experience to the original game. Maybe if i look for all the weapons and spells which were were added to the game by Heart of the Winter, maybe then.....or it just completely changes the original spells like duration, power etc, making the original enemies easier etc?

One change: experience cap lifted (changed to level 30 which is practically impossible to reach without ultra sleeping and grinding).

New spells were added (check HoW manual - it has full list).
Opposition schools for mages changed - major change for specialist mages.
New abilities were added (check HoW manual) - bards were most affected, but other classes got them too.
Interface changes - Alt key highlights containers, higher resolution, stores now show how many items are stacked...



Check out the HoW manual from page 8 onwards you have the list of changes
[url=https://icewinddale.fandom.com/wiki/File:Instruction_Manual_%28Heart_of_Winter%29.pdf]https://icewinddale.fandom.com/wiki/File:Instruction_Manual_%28Heart_of_Winter%29.pdf[/url]

Other changes, not included in the manual:
New enemies: some "bosses" now get a lackey or two to fight with them.

This is off the top of my head; I can't tell if items were added too.

The point being; it's going to be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to track what changes were made. Besides, the whole of HoW was rebalanced when changes were made, to give an overall balanced experience. If you make some changes, without making others you could be making the game too difficult for yourself.

My adivce: it's not going to be enjoyable trying to pick and choose changes. Having played both vanilla and HoW, I can say that HoW isn't "easier". Get original CDs if you want the vanilla experience. Or just play HoW the way it was balanced.
Also, if you do play HoW, get a bard.

Thank you very much for your extensive answers. :) I will enjoy this game as it is ! :)

Make sure to leave the difficulty slider in the middle else you'll get a bonus to all XP which you didn't get in the original.