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Pierzak
Oct 30, 2010

JustJeff88 posted:

I'm mostly sure that the reason that the Mind Flayer did 82 damage to that one female characters (one more hit point than her maximum) is to simulate what flayers do in pen & paper, which is to paralyse with their cone of mind blast and then eat the brain of their helpless victim. This latter attack is, naturally, quite fatal.
Counterpoint: this is Anya we're talking about.


ed: New update on previous page!

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Lady Jaybird
Jan 23, 2014

to ride eternal, shiny and chrome

THUNDERDOME LOSER 2022



I hate the mind flayers in the EOB series. RANGED,INVISIBLE, SILENT PARALYSIS.

8 YO me had a lot of trouble at this point

JustJeff88
Jan 15, 2008

I AM
CONSISTENTLY
ANNOYING
...
JUST TERRIBLE


THIS BADGE OF SHAME IS WORTH 0.45 DOUBLE DRAGON ADVANCES

:dogout:
of SA-Mart forever

dervinosdoom posted:

I hate the mind flayers in the EOB series. RANGED,INVISIBLE, SILENT PARALYSIS.

8 YO me had a lot of trouble at this point

I don't remember how old I was, but I had problems too, even with a full party of 6. One issues is that there is not way to proactively prevent paralysis, only cure it, so if the cleric is paralysed then there is no way to get rid of it.

Pierzak
Oct 30, 2010

JustJeff88 posted:

I don't remember how old I was, but I had problems too, even with a full party of 6. One issues is that there is not way to proactively prevent paralysis, only cure it, so if the cleric is paralysed then there is no way to get rid of it.

Eh, terminating the flayer with extreme prejudice before he can act counts as "proactive prevention" in my book.

Alpha3KV
Mar 30, 2011

Quex Chest
The damage in that shot wouldn't quite be fatal even if she didn't have an Aid spell on her. Characters become unconscious at 0 HP and die at -10. The screenshot was the reault of reloading experimentation to see the highest numbers. On Anya, they ranged from the 40s to 70s before that one. When Beohram was hit, it was usually from the 30s to 50s. That's what made me think it might be percentage based.

Tiggum
Oct 24, 2007

Your life and your quest end here.


Alpha3KV posted:



This room is at the end of that central hallway. Pressing this button will hit you with a fireball. Another button next to the message "In case of fire..." will hit you with an Ice Storm.
:roflolmao:

sb hermit
Dec 13, 2016





tyrra has always seemed to be a bit prickly. I like how it's reflected in her charisma statl

vilkacis
Feb 16, 2011

:stare: I do vaguely recall the happy fun stun blasts but i did not have any memory of taking those kinds of damage in here. loving illithids :brainworms:

Guy Fawkes
Aug 1, 2014

Lvl 62, +5 meadow defense

achtungnight posted:

I once had a character who challenged every Thri-Kreen he met to a kung fu duel. Not sure he ever met one who knew what he was talking about.

Let me guess, Mantis Style?

Alpha3KV
Mar 30, 2011

Quex Chest
EOTB 10: End of the Beholder

We return to the dwarves on level 5 and give them the potion. Voiced version here.




Here's what we're given:



Wand of Slivias? Excuse me, it was supposed to be the Wand of Silvias. Bunch of scam artists here. As with any other wand, only a mage can use it. We can also take care of that right now by reviving Kirath.



Here are his stats and initial spell list:



Two standouts among his spells. Burning Hands causes damage to enemies in front of you, which increases with the caster's level. It is notable mainly because it has no scrolls, so recruiting Kirath is the only way to cast it in this game. Stoneskin is an incredible buff. It nullifies a certain number of physical attacks, dependent on the caster's level (1d4+3 at level 7). Better yet, it is not time-limited. It will stay on after rest, so you can easily cast it on the whole party. Since only a few enemies are capable of anything other than physical attacks, this essentially means nigh-invulnerability. It does not protect against spells, however. A scroll for it is also behind one of the rock doors in level 9.



I also have him scribe some of the scrolls we've collected. I cancelled out after the first screen since it was listing spells he already knew. The most useful among these is Haste, which lowers the whole party's attack cooldown. Unlike some other games, it has absolutely no drawbacks in this series. Time to make use of some of these spells.



I'm getting revenge on the dwarves for their misspelled wand bullshit. This is two of them lined up in a row near the door. That latter part is important because it gives me an escape to avoid being surrounded. Nothing other than the party can open doors, not even the humanoids who built these places.



Kirath is not a high enough level to cast Cone of Cold, but I have four Wands of Frost. Here's a nice property of the spell: It can be cast through partially open doors. Any other spell would just hit the door, and the party if that spell was Fireball or Ice Storm. With this you can use it to kill enemies before they have a chance to reach you.



I use Hold Person on these stragglers and show what Burning Hands looks like.



The way into level 12 is a portal behind a locked door in the southwest room of level 11. There are two xorns in the room and a mind flayer behind the door, so you can encounter both enemies in the same place.



Level 12 starts in a closed square room with no visible door. These things found around the level are fireball launchers, though this one seems to be inactive.



The way out of the starting room is clicking this lamp to remove the wall behind it.



When you do, you see this message on a wall. In the next room, accessed by a normal door, is another sign saying "You were warned."



That room has a door to the west and this pixel-hunt button that removes the wall to the north.



Taking that path disables a fireball launcher and allows us to get the drop on this level's main enemy type, the stone golem. These are weaker versions made by shortcuts, and they can be hit by non-magical weapons. Spells don't seem to work against them, though. There are four in this room, one of which drops a skull key.



To the north we find where they are made. Two other pedestals are labeled "Stone for substance." and "Potion for strength." Anything besides the Dwarven Healing Potion will work, including Potions of Poison. When each pedestal has the appropriate item, pressing the button on the right will create a hostile stone golem. The only reason to do this is getting some additional experience.



In the south there's another room with three pedestals. The middle one has another skull key. The outer two have Potions of Extra Healing and useless jewelry, but will steal small items from you if you take them. It's best just to ignore them.



This locked door is unique because it will close and re-lock itself when you come back out.



It leads here, with three golems in a corridor at the end. However, they don't come for you until you cross between the two pedestals, unless the whole party is invisible. You can also just pelt them with projectiles from here and never face retaliation. The shelves contain Potions of Invisibility and Vitality, which bring a character's hunger meter to full.



Level 12 is split into three isolated sections: west (where we started), central, and east. Each one has a room arranged like this. Two of the buttons will warp you to one of the other rooms, and the third will push you into the east wall, where you can go forward into another room or back where you came from.



The east section has a different room with three buttons. The outer ones create shelves with items: an Orb of Power to the south, a Potion of Speed to the north. The middle one launches two fireballs that turn onto its location.



North from there you can find a Wand of Magic Missiles between two locked doors.



The northwestern room of this section has a pedestal with three Orbs of Power. They can be used in the central section.



There we find this room at the end of a long hallway. Put an Orb of Power on each outer pedestal to remove the large eyeball. Put another orb there to remove all three pedestals. The orbs will return to the pedestal they came from. The room behind this has two doors that only open from the inside, connecting to that room with the orb pedestal and the golem factory. With the three sections connected, it's time to go back east and finally confront the titular beholder, Xanathar.




Beholders are extremely terrifying monsters that can very literally kill you just by looking at you and are immune to magic. Taking him on in a fight could be a very deadly mistake, so I do the sensible thing and surrender.



Your characters drop everything in their hands if you do that.



drat, who could have guessed the villain was untrustworthy? Xanathar has two "insta-kill" abilities, the death spell and disintegration, that do exactly 100 damage. As you can see here, death doesn't happen at 0 HP, but -10. From 0 to -9, a character is unconscious: not able to do anything, but can still be healed back into action. Anya would survive this. In this case, Ileria is not a high enough level to cast Raise Dead, and I forgot to take any of its scrolls along. Oops. Luckily, the Wand of Inconsistent Spelling is still in Kirath's inventory. What it does is push Xanathar back. This is important because he stupidly put a deathtrap that he is vulnerable to right in his own quarters.



You have to get him through a corridor first, which reveals another mistake I made: neglecting invisibility. The beam launches a fireball from the north, but is not broken if the whole party is invisible. Granted, invisibility is no help against Xanathar himself, who follows this up with his own more powerful fireball that kills Kirath. I'll have to go back for my weapons and do this the old-fashioned way.



This is going pretty badly. Discretion is the better part of valor, so Ileria flees the battle and drags the barely-alive Tod Uphill with her. Obviously, when your last party member gets killed, that's a game over. But if you drop the last survivor, that last kill never happens. That means you can keep playing even with your entire party dead. In this state, while unable to attack or cast spells, you can still pick up items and throw them to damage enemies. I could kill Xanathar that way, but I'm not letting a perfectly good deathtrap go to waste.



That conspicuous bloodstain marks its location. The shelf behind it contains one of each stone portal key. Since I'm no longer able to push him back, I make him follow me instead. Protip: that's a better way of doing it even if you're keeping your characters alive and not using ridiculous exploits. To actually get him in there, I'll have to use the A.I. of the Beholder to my advantage. When an enemy is at your front-left position, it will move ahead to flank you. But if you move forward at the same time, the monster will keep going in the same direction. This also works with groups of four staying in formation.



It took a few tries to do this since he often turns around at the last tile. It seems to work most reliably when you follow him closely but don't bump into him.



When this happens, the special quest sound will play. I'm not entirely sure if specifically for getting him into his own trap, or just killing him by any means. In any case, we have achieved (pyrrhic) victory!



In the DOS version, the ending sequence is an anticlimactic text dump.



Completing all special quests gets you this as well before abruptly kicking you back to DOS. I have no idea where the password is used.

Videos
My absurd strategy in motion.
The Amiga ending, in which the Lords of Waterdeep act like pricks.
Sega CD endings with unused voice lines added.

Alpha3KV fucked around with this message at 19:10 on Mar 8, 2022

OneWingedDevil
Aug 27, 2012
No, you can't kill me, you have to kill one more party member and my whole party is dead neener-neener.

That's a pretty big exploit. Is it carried through to the latter games in the series?

PurpleXVI
Oct 30, 2011

Spewing insults, pissing off all your neighbors, betraying your allies, backing out of treaties and accords, and generally screwing over the global environment?
ALL PART OF MY BRILLIANT STRATEGY!
I love that exploit, it owns. Are there enough tossable items to theoretically clear the whole game in this state?

vilkacis
Feb 16, 2011

:roflolmao: I had no idea you could do that, but also i am not surprised that you can. Video games!! I take it that's the party for the start of EotB2 then? Bit surprised it's three fighters and no cleric in that case but am i misremembering in thinking you can pick up a cleric/mage pretty early there?

"A.I. of the Beholder" is pretty good :golfclap:

I never figured out the wand myself so i just did the "run circles around and smash +5 implements against" strategy with Xanathar and it was honestly probably easier than the "intended" method. Less room for death spells that way.


Also



my dude should probably wait until he's at least in the double-digit levels and more than 5 minutes out of being dead before making claims like that...

Alpha3KV
Mar 30, 2011

Quex Chest

PurpleXVI posted:

I love that exploit, it owns. Are there enough tossable items to theoretically clear the whole game in this state?

Any item can be thrown, which will do at least a little damage if it hits a monster. So yes. Doing this requires more than four party members, so you could potentially do this from level 4 onwards.

OneWingedDevil posted:

That's a pretty big exploit. Is it carried through to the latter games in the series?

As far as I'm aware, it was fixed in the sequels. I'll test it when I start the next game.

vilkacis posted:

I take it that's the party for the start of EotB2 then?

Not necessarily. There's no autosave after killing Xanathar, so the import will use the one from right before. I'll make a poll to go with the EOB2 intro post to decide which four move on, though I'll probably make the spellcasters required.

Pierzak
Oct 30, 2010

Alpha3KV posted:

I'll have to use the A.I. of the Beholder
:frogout:

Clever, but still.

Yes and no. you can recruit her indeed, but she comes a fair bit later in the game

achtungnight
Oct 5, 2014
I get my fun here. Enjoy!
Congratulations. One game down, two remaining. The next is probably the one I played the most back when I had these games.

vilkacis
Feb 16, 2011

Alpha3KV posted:

Not necessarily. There's no autosave after killing Xanathar, so the import will use the one from right before. I'll make a poll to go with the EOB2 intro post to decide which four move on, though I'll probably make the spellcasters required.

I was thinking you might want to go for narrative continuity, but i'm definitely going to vote to keep our strong, dumb girl Anya around in that case :kimchi:

Rushputin
Jul 19, 2007
Intense, but quick to finish

Alpha3KV posted:

drat, who could have guessed the villain was untrustworthy? Xanathar has two "insta-kill" abilities that do exactly 100 damage. As you can see here, death doesn't happen at 0 HP, but -10. From 0 to -9, a character is unconscious: not able to do anything, but can still be healed back into action.

As someone whose first AD&D games (and CRPGs in general I suppose) were Goldbox games, this irritated me a lot the first time I played Baldur's Gate. I was used to games with fragile characters and less than fair encounter designs, but the whole "gotta reload or drag your character to a temple (after leaving or awkwardly packratting their inventory) if somebody loses all HP" always seemed extra harsh even in the context of early edition D&D.

Alpha3KV
Mar 30, 2011

Quex Chest
Bonus Update: Extras of the Beholder

Before moving on to the second game, I'll be showing a few more things from the first. I played through the Sega CD version to record videos, so I'll detail a few of its other unique features.



One of the first things is a different portrait selection. Many of them are very anime, and show up in other Capcom-developed versions of the game. This version supports multiple save files and has background music. It also has a default party, with characters creatively named Fighter, Thief, Mage, and Cleric.



This is also the only version with in-game maps. These aren't automaps, but items which look like scrolls on the ground. Trying to pick them up immediately puts them into a special map slot, where they don't take up space and can be accessed from any character's inventory screen. Green squares indicate doors, and blue ones represent movable or illusory walls. Squares that are red or yellow (which can be hard to see on this background) indicate stairs/ladders, but have no consistency about which direction they go. The white square, which flashes, is the party's current location. Any map can be seen from any level. If you look at a level you have no map for, the only feature (aside from the party marker if you're there) will be a flashing red square showing its location.



Maps are also one of the things tracked on the screen after the credits. "Quest" got changed into "search" by the translation into and back from Japanese. For some reason arrows are the other thing reported here. This playthrough set out to get all the voice lines. I obviously skipped a lot of other things but didn't really rush it. How quickly can this game be beaten? The current world record on the DOS version is just under six minutes. It takes teleporters to skip large portions of levels 2 and 3, dives into a pit as a shortcut to level 5, and from there uses stone portals to immediately get to level 9.



Speaking of the DOS version, let's go back to that for a while. There's no autosave after killing Xanathar, so my last save is just before meeting him. Back to level 11.



And from there to the hub in level 7.



Using ASE's teleport feature, I show the unique graphic of the short sword I passed on for the Ring of Wizardry. I then take the portal to level 9.



In the previous update, I mentioned that Cone of Cold will go through partially-open doors. Turns out that was underselling it. A partially-open door is for all intents and purposes still closed. Here are two displacer beasts dying to a Cone of Cold from behind a locked door. Notice that other red circle in the middle of the walls. I use ASE to go there too.



It's a rust monster. Stoneskin doesn't just prevent damage from physical attacks, it also stops any other effect of the hit landing. That means poison, paralysis, or in this case, the rust monster eating items. That's good here since wands count as metal. Kirath has Vampiric Touch active.



Hitting with it brings his HP up significantly above max. Nobody has Aid cast on them here. I finish it off with the other mage melee spell, Shocking Grasp. However going into the walls wasn't necessary to do this. Closed doors are functionally the same thing as solid walls. Cone of Cold can can go through those too, as shown here:



Near the northwest corner of level 5, there's an isolated room with two spiders in it. There's normally no way in there. The pits in level 4 go to the corridor east of it. The only real indication of it is the spiders' very annoying walk sound when you're in an adjacent room. Unless you chose no sound on startup. Speaking of those options:



:yeshaha: There's a CGA mode for those who can't get enough of magenta and cyan.



The drow levels are the ones that come out looking best in this mode. This portal has no key item. The stone gem doesn't even seem to exist in the game data. The Cutting Room Floor has more details on unused things. There is an unofficial version 1.9 of this game that adds it and makes it go to an unfinished part of level 2. Since I'm not using that, I go to level 5 instead.



Levels 10 and 11 look kind of similar to the dwarf levels. Our final party is unable to translate anything, though still have a decent idea of what "pantry" is.



Other dwarf text will just give this.



Orc runes are also no longer translatable, though it still gives a good idea of what they mean. It's a gnome that specifically identifies them as such. You may have noticed that despite these runes, there are no orcs in this game. There aren't any in the sequels either. On the way here, I encountered a zombie that respawned. Ileria's turn undead instantly destroyed it.



That's enough of that. Back to the grind:



The kenku in level 6 don't just have abnormally high experience values, they also have one of the fastest spawn rates of the game's monsters. Just walking around the level can make a lot of them. There's apparently a limit, and spawning one can't be done without killing another at that point. You can get experience from them without directly engaging them or even just blasting them with Cone of Cold from behind a wall. I get everyone above 200K experience like this (they were fairly close to start) and then add 1 million with ASE. That brings everybody up one level each time XP is gained. Hit Dice are still rolled in this game after levels where that should have stopped by AD&D rules. Which ultimately leads to this:



Anya started with 45 HP at 4th level and gained 12 for each level up to the max of 11. 12x7=84+45=129, but character HP is a signed byte in this game so it wraps around to the negatives. She gets the faded unconscious portrait but is otherwise treated as dead. She gains no experience but also takes no further damage in this state, even from things like fireballs. Perhaps our strongest warrior has ascended to Valhalla. With that, now seems like a good time to move on.

Alpha3KV fucked around with this message at 03:54 on May 21, 2022

PurpleXVI
Oct 30, 2011

Spewing insults, pissing off all your neighbors, betraying your allies, backing out of treaties and accords, and generally screwing over the global environment?
ALL PART OF MY BRILLIANT STRATEGY!
Odd that Cone of Cold ignores closed doors. Does anything else in the game behave that way?

The Cheshire Cat
Jun 10, 2008

Fun Shoe

PurpleXVI posted:

Odd that Cone of Cold ignores closed doors. Does anything else in the game behave that way?

My guess here is that what it's doing is unlike most spells, rather than shooting a projectile it just has some sort of instant effect applied in the tiles ahead of you, and they likely just forgot to have it check for obstacles when doing so. I would guess that burning hands probably uses the same logic, but it only affects the tile immediately ahead of you so you wouldn't be able to hit anything beyond a door/wall with it anyway.

The Cheshire Cat fucked around with this message at 21:45 on Sep 11, 2021

Pierzak
Oct 30, 2010

Alpha3KV posted:

:sickos: There's a CGA mode for those who can't get enough of magenta and cyan.

I have a strong suspicion that quite a few of the eye-cancer CGA versions were meant to be displayed on a black and white monitor.

Yes, I checked, EOB still looks like poo poo on b/w CGA. Better than color, but still nowhere near bearable.

Randalor
Sep 4, 2011



Pierzak posted:

I have a strong suspicion that quite a few of the eye-cancer CGA versions were meant to be displayed on a black and white monitor.

Yes, I checked, EOB still looks like poo poo on b/w CGA. Better than color, but still nowhere near bearable.

The 8-Bit Guy did a video talking about CGA graphics, and depending on when the game was made, there's a decent chance it would have looked... well, not necessarily good, but certainly better. It had to do with later EGA and VGA cards dropping the video port that caused color artifacting that CGA graphics were designed to exploit.

https://youtu.be/niKblgZupOc if you want to see the video in question.

JustJeff88
Jan 15, 2008

I AM
CONSISTENTLY
ANNOYING
...
JUST TERRIBLE


THIS BADGE OF SHAME IS WORTH 0.45 DOUBLE DRAGON ADVANCES

:dogout:
of SA-Mart forever

The Cheshire Cat posted:

My guess here is that what it's doing is unlike most spells, rather than shooting a projectile it just has some sort of instant effect applied in the tiles ahead of you, and they likely just forgot to have it check for obstacles when doing so. I would guess that burning hands probably uses the same logic, but it only affects the tile immediately ahead of you so you wouldn't be able to hit anything beyond a door/wall with it anyway.

I was just about to post this very thing. Lightning Bolt, Fireball, and Magic Missile very clearly shoot a projectile that can travel quite a distance, but Cone of Cold clearly just manifests some swirly white particles in front of the party.

vilkacis
Feb 16, 2011

Alpha3KV posted:

Hit Dice are still rolled in this game after levels where that should have stopped by AD&D rules.

That's kind of shocking! I'd have expected them to stick as closely to the rules as possible.

Does this still happen in the sequels? Or would it be ~optimal~ to grind out levels in 1 and bring your illegal HP levels into them through exports...?

Alpha3KV
Mar 30, 2011

Quex Chest

vilkacis posted:

That's kind of shocking! I'd have expected them to stick as closely to the rules as possible.

Does this still happen in the sequels? Or would it be ~optimal~ to grind out levels in 1 and bring your illegal HP levels into them through exports...?

The sequels stop rolling hit dice at the proper levels, though they both have cases of not doing the HP gain afterwards correctly. In EOB 2, multiclass characters still get the full HP gain for each class (e.g. a multiclass fighter still gets 3 HP for every fighter level after 9). EOB 3 fixes that, but in its character creation (only there, not in the game proper) constitution bonuses are applied to the HP after max hit dice.

Alpha3KV
Mar 30, 2011

Quex Chest
I finally got around to rendering and uploading the higher quality version of my "battle" with Xanathar, now edited into that post:
https://www.polsy.org.uk/play/yt/?vurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3D5OlPb9e-1UA

TapamN
Jan 10, 2008
What's with that glass shutter that comes down?

vilkacis
Feb 16, 2011

Alpha3KV posted:

I finally got around to rendering and uploading the higher quality version of my "battle" with Xanathar, now edited into that post:
https://www.polsy.org.uk/play/yt/?vurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3D5OlPb9e-1UA

Not horribly eye-scarring cga graphics, voted 1 :v:

TapamN posted:

What's with that glass shutter that comes down?

It's like the inverse of this:

Lady Jaybird
Jan 23, 2014

to ride eternal, shiny and chrome

THUNDERDOME LOSER 2022




I love this, where's this from?

vilkacis
Feb 16, 2011

dervinosdoom posted:

I love this, where's this from?

I wish i could tell you but it's really old (saved in 2012 according to file info!) and i have no idea where i got it.

Alpha3KV
Mar 30, 2011

Quex Chest


This game was released within a year of the first, built on the same engine. It doesn't have graphics and sound options at startup. Sounds can still be toggled at the in-game Preferences menu. The intro scene can be watched here.

quote:

You were settling in for an evening by the fire. Then a note was slipped to you. It was from your friend Khelben Blackstaff, Archmage of the city. The message was urgent.

The contents of this letter are shown in the manual.



As indicated it comes with an attachment, which is twice the length of the letter.




That attachment has its own attachment, which is three pages. That's five pages of attachments to a single-page letter.





The party heads to Khelben's place.




Going by what the letter in the manual says, the party should drat well know this considering they've already agreed to his task.




The party climbs some stairs...



...and finally meets the man himself.




Khelben posted:

Ancient evil stirs in the Temple Darkmoon. I fear for the safety of our city.



Khelben posted:

Three nights ago I sent forth a scout. She has not yet returned. I fear for her safety. Take this coin.



Khelben posted:

I will use it to contact you. You must act quickly. I will teleport you to Darkmoon. May luck be with you my friend.



And so the next adventure begins.




I'm making the spellcasters Kirath and Ileria required. The other two will be decided by a poll.

:siren: VOTE HERE :siren:

Alpha3KV fucked around with this message at 04:27 on May 21, 2022

vilkacis
Feb 16, 2011

Khelben's letter looks like spam. Dear Adventurer, Claim Your Free 500 000 Gold Pieces Now... I feel like someone forgot to make sure the sender wasn't like, kheIben@notatrap.underdark and the entire party got suckered :saddowns:

Gonna be fun to see this one, i didn't play it nearly as much as the og. Might actually not have beaten it more than once.

JustJeff88
Jan 15, 2008

I AM
CONSISTENTLY
ANNOYING
...
JUST TERRIBLE


THIS BADGE OF SHAME IS WORTH 0.45 DOUBLE DRAGON ADVANCES

:dogout:
of SA-Mart forever
Since you already have a cleric and mage, bring Tyrra because plain fighters are boring and Tod because I recall this game having a lot of locks.

achtungnight
Oct 5, 2014
I get my fun here. Enjoy!

JustJeff88 posted:

Since you already have a cleric and mage, bring Tyrra because plain fighters are boring and Tod because I recall this game having a lot of locks.

I agree on this, though I did like Anya.

You said there were five manual pages accompanying Khelben's letter. I only counted 4 in your post. Did one get cut? The journal entry seemed half complete from what I could read. Either the image font was blurry or my eyes are finally starting to succumb to middle age. :(

Edit- I ran a search for a transcript of the manual and found what was missed. No trouble reading this, so it must have been your images. Hope you don't mind me posting this, if you do let me know and it will come down.

EotB2 Manual posted:

* KHELBEN'S LETTER TO THE PARTY *

Khelben Blackstaff, mystic advisor to the Lords of WaterDeep, sends you the
following letter :

Dear Heroes of Waterdeep,

I am glad to see that you are all fully recovered from the rigors of your
ordeal in the sewers beneath Waterdeep. Our healers were more than happy
to help you return to your fighting trim.

Congratulations on being named the guests of honour at the harvest
festival in the city of Waterdeep. From the reports of the revelry I
surmise that a good time was had by all.

Also, our scholars very much appreciated your donation of the historic
artifacts that you recovered beneath our city. The study of the scrolls,
keys, and stone items should give us an important new understanding of
our city's history.

Unfortunately, another situation has arisen that could threaten the
city. For some time there have been rumours of people dissappearing
from villages to the North and west if the City. Now, we have
written confirmation of the discovery of human remains in shallow
graves. Evil forces and a powerful ancient artifact may be involved.

Thank you for volunteering to investigate the area to the north and
west of the city where these events have occured. Included with this
letter are copies of the documents that aroused our suspicions.
Provisions have been provided for your journey. Good Luck.

Your trusted friend,

Khelben.


---------------
End of PAGE 1
---------------

OLTEC'S REPORT
==============

With the previous letter, Khelben enclosed the following report from Oltec,
Captain of the City Guard of Waterdeep.


Master Blackstaff,

We may again have trouble near the city of Waterdeep.

After the annual harvest festival, the City Guard made its routine sweeps
searching for lost and drunken revelers. On the second path off the north
road, we came upon the remains of an overturned carriage.

The driver had been killed by an arrow through his heart. There was a
small amount of blood inside the carriage. However, the carriage horses
were grazing nearby and the dead driver still had his purse full of
coins. This was not a simple robbery, for the attackers did not take the
coins or the horses. The only thing missing from the carriage seemed to
be the passenger.

Our tracker followed a faint trail of blood from the carriage off into
the soft sand at the side of the road. There, she pointed out a deeply
set boot print, as if someone were carrying a heavy load. The attacker
must have been carrying the passenger away after the battle.

We searched the area, but lost the trail in the harder ground to the
north. The only fruit of our search was a small wooden box that had
fallen beneath a bush along the attacker's trail. The box contained
a bound journal, the writings of that eccentric scholar Wently Kelso.

I am aware that scholar Kelso's journals were valuable in the past.
They helped verify the existance of that nefarious threat in the sewers
beneath waterdeep. However, Kelso's infernal investigations of
obscure occurences in the city have also been the bane of my men on more
than one occasion.

Because of Kelso's history, I personally examined the journal. I am
glad I did for it's writings foretell ominous events. The journal
contains notes of evil occurences and a powerful artifact. It speaks
of an evil vision and of human remains found in shallow graves. Could
these graves be connected with the mysterious disappearances to the
north that my men have reported ?

My source have confirmed that scholar Kelso was seen riding in a carriage
late on the last night of the harvest festival. People who he met during
the festival mentioned that Kelso spoke of investigating a new mystery.
I believe that we should treat both this journal and the threat it infers
as genuine.

As this matter does not yet directly threaten Waterdeep, it is outside
the jurisdiction of the City Guard. Rather than forward the entire
journal, I had a scribe copy the relevant entries for you. I trust you
will take the necessary actions to ensure that nothing mentioned therein
becomes a threat to the city or it's citizens.

Yours,

Oltec.


Captain.
Waterdeep City Guard.


-----------------
End of PAGE 3.
-----------------


* WENTLY KELSO'S JOURNAL *

Khelben also forwarded a transcribed selection of journal entries written
by Wently Kelso, the eccentric scholar and self-described "famous
archaeologist".


JOURNAL ENTRY 356

As i carefully pulled myself out of the sewers of Waterdeep, my hand
slipped on a particularly slick stone. Only as I fell did I realise that
the stone was slick with blood from my wounded hand. I fell headlong into
an embankment. My skull bouned against a large boulder and my vision
fainted.

How many hours I lay there bleeding I do not know. Suddenly a warm
sensation flowed throughout my body. I slowly opened my eyes. Before me
stood a large robed figure, backlit by an unearthly glow. In the brightness
I could only the outline of fine features and a dark complexion beneath the
hooded robe.

" You are healed. I have save you for without aid you would
have surely died."

I put my hand to my head. My head throbbed, but neither my head nor my hand
were bleeding.

" Saving me was a very civilised thing for you to do.
What do you want from me ? "

He seemed to grow larger and his eyes glowed red from under his hood.

" I ask nothing from you but your undivided attention!"

He opened his hand and placed his gloved palm on my throbbing head. I was
overwhelmed by an intense vision.

In the woods, there was a quiet village on a dark, overcast day. Peasants
in ragged clothes move throughout the village, selling goods, talking, and
just walking along the narrow dirt streets. A woman in a blue gown adorned
with silver stars stood at one end of the town square talking to some of
the peasants.

In the woods outside the village, dark figures moved into position. From
the edge of the wood, a robed figure moved slowly toward the village
square. At the square, it mounted the low structure that enclosed the
drinking well. In it's gloved hand, the figure held a gleaming sceptre.

" Citizens of Torzac," he declared
" hear me now!"

The peasants turned towards the speaker and mumbled to themselves. A few
moved closer. A few backed away.

" From this time forward I am your new ruler!
I will allow no resistance!"

Some citizens openly laughed. Others swore at him. Many just turned to walk
away. One of the locals stepped forward.

" Any who might you be? Show yourself so we might know
our future ruler!"

With his empty hand, the figure pulled back his hood. The slender elven
face was marred only by the blue-black complexion of a Drow. The dark elf
warrior scowled down with disdain at the crowd of peasants.


----------------
End of PAGE 4.
-----------------

The villag went completely silent. Many peasants froze where they stood.
Some picked up stones but dared not throw them.

The woman in the star-decked gown strode forward, weaving her hands in a
complex pattern. "Dark warrior, you will never rule a living soul in my
home village!" She thrust her hands forward and missiles of magical energy
darted at the arrogant drow.

The drow flashed an evil toothy smile and laughed from atop his perch. With
a scornful wave of the gleaming sceptre, the magical missiles dissipated
into nothingness.

Some villagers, emboldened by the attack, hurled stones at the drow. Most
flew wide. But a single stone cut him on the cheek. The drow slowly passed
a gloved finger across the cut. He looked down at his hand and saw a single
drop of his own blood. His mad eyes blazed with hatred.

" I said no resistance!"

Dozens of dark warriors charged from the woods all around the village. The
woman began to gesture frantically, but was hit by an arrow before she
could cast another spell. Some villagers tried to flee, others to fight. It
made no difference. The village was detroyed. All inside were cut down. Not
one survived.

The victorious drow gathered around the remains of the village square. The
leader replaced his hood and raised his sceptre in triumph. The dark
warriors raised the bloody swords in salute.

This is where the vision ended. I awoke with my head resting upon the
boulder. My head throbs even more than before but I am still alive.

=============================

JOURNAL ENTRY 378

The discovery of the history and location of the scpetre in my vision is
my latest investigation. It seems to be an artifact of the drow, and
should be of great scholarly value. My first task is to track down the
village of Torzac.


==============================

JOURNAL ENTRY 381

After reviewing my vision, I believe the village I saw could be somewhere
near Waterdeep. The thatching on the hut roofs is of a type that was common
years ago to the poor villages to the North of the city. The colour of the
clay in the bricks of the well is common in streams to the north and the
east. The city records may shed some light on the location of the village.


===============================

JOURNAL ENTRY 399

I began my search in the records office of the Waterdeep treasury. Nowhere
in the records of the new reign of the Lords of Waterdeep have I found a
mention of the village of Torzac.


=================================

JOURNAL ENTRY 408

I was about to give up my search and call the whole thing a hallucination
when I came upon an ancient taxation record. In part it reads:

Lord Torzac:

According to our records, three of your citizens owe us a percentage
of their fall harvest. Could you please look into this matter? I will
meet with you to discuss further trading arrangements before the
first new moon ........

Then I found this letter to the taxation office:

.... We followed the directions to the village explicitly, but there
was nothing to be found. There was no village nor a Lord Torzac. Our
only guess is that the whole community moved and destroyed the village
before they left.

The letter includes instructions on how to reach the village site. This is
a major breakthrough and I feel it is just a matter of time before I find
the village and the sceptre!


===================================

JOURNAL ENTRY 420

After bidding goodbye to my sweet Miltinda, I began my expedition. I have
full supplies and high hopes.


===================================

JOURNAL ENTRY 427

I have found what seems to be the remains of the village. The wooden
buildings do not remain, but the layout of the remains of the stone
buildings corresponds exactly to the village in my vision. Large trees now
grow on the site of the former village square. Given the size of the trees,
the destruction of the village must have taken place a very long time ago.


=====================================

JOURNAL ENTRY 429

I hired a local guide to support me in my investigations. The guide is a
halfling named Insal. Like my last guide, Insal is of very minimal
intelligence. The forest in this area seems overrun with wolves. We spend
much of our time on the move to avoid attracting the interest of the
wolves.


=======================================

JOURNAL ENTRY 431

We have come across several shallow grave sites, but their occupants were
recently buried humans and therefore couldn't have been the people of
Torzac. There seem to be no human settlements in the area. This is good,
people are always getting in the way and make true archaeology much more
difficult. I have begin searching the area for signs of underground drow
construction as that is the place most likely to still hold the sceptre
after all this time.


=========================================

JOURNAL ENTRY 451

Two female warriors came through our camp this night. I attempted to
question them about underground sites in the local area or any sightings of
the sceptre. They were either uncooperative or uninformed. In the end,
Insal leered at both women so they left in a huff.


===========================================

JOURNAL ENTRY 456

I have searched the area for above-ground signs of drow sites and found
nothing. After I return to Waterdeep for additional supplies I will also
have to search this area for structures that may hide drow underground
constructions.

I have discharged Insal so that I can travel more quickly. He seemed
unhappy to go but I paid him off with a few shiny baubels, rusted weapons,
and dented copper coins. With luck I should return to WaterDeep in time to
spend the harvest festival with my sweet Matilda.


--------------
End of PAGE 5.
--------------

Here's a link to the document I found- https://www.lemonamiga.com/games/docs.php?id=590

achtungnight fucked around with this message at 03:07 on Sep 17, 2021

Alpha3KV
Mar 30, 2011

Quex Chest

achtungnight posted:

I agree on this, though I did like Anya.

You said there were five manual pages accompanying Khelben's letter. I only counted 4 in your post. Did one get cut? The journal entry seemed half complete from what I could read. Either the image font was blurry or my eyes are finally starting to succumb to middle age. :(

Edit- I ran a search for a transcript of the manual and found what was missed. No trouble reading this, so it must have been your images. Hope you don't mind me posting this, if you do let me know and it will come down.

Here's a link to the document I found- https://www.lemonamiga.com/games/docs.php?id=590

I posted 3 screenshots of the rulebook PDF, covering the first six pages after the ToC. They're all fairly large in both dimensions and file size, so maybe one took too long to load. They're all showing up for me. If other people are having problems with those images I'll see about splitting them up, reducing their size or just putting that text transcription in their place.

achtungnight
Oct 5, 2014
I get my fun here. Enjoy!
I reloaded the page and got the rest, you were right, sorry. I'll leave my transcript up as a bigger font option in case anyone needs it.

edit- as I've said before, I played this game a lot back in the day. I have fond memories of it, particularly the villain. It will be interesting to see how it holds up almost 30 years later. Thanks in advance for the chance.

achtungnight fucked around with this message at 04:03 on Sep 17, 2021

sb hermit
Dec 13, 2016





quote:

JOURNAL ENTRY 420

Tiggum
Oct 24, 2007

Your life and your quest end here.


I've always loved how, as presented within the game, your friend asks you to come see him and then, without giving you any opportunity to object or even ask any questions, teleports you into the forest. Thanks Khelben. You're a great friend.

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Pierzak
Oct 30, 2010

Tiggum posted:

I've always loved how, as presented within the game, your friend asks you to come see him and then, without giving you any opportunity to object or even ask any questions, teleports you into the forest. Thanks Khelben. You're a great friend.

It's because if you do give the players a choice, they'll ruin and then complain that it's your fault. And since players are disposable, you can always get new ones if things go wrong, just like with the scout :v:

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