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sebmojo posted:That's magical. boooooooooo
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Mar 19, 2020 01:36
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Xenocides posted:Sort of. Druids used cleric spells but were restricted to certain cleric spheres. Pretty sure druid spells did not become their own grouping with unique spells until 3rd edition. That's Second Edition. In First Edition, Illusionists and Druids had a different spell list although they did have some spells that overlapped with Cleric and Magic User. (Sometimes they received the same spell at a different level or with minor changes.) Gold Box has no druids, so rangers receive limited druid spells and nobody else gets any at all. Detect Magic, Cure Light Wounds, Cure Disease and Neutralize Poison are all overlaps; Entangle, Faerie Fire, Invisibility to Animals, Barkskin, Charm Person or Mammal, Hold Animal, and Protection from Fire are all unique spells though really only Barkskin, Charm, and Protection from Fire is likely to see much use. Neutralize Poison is critical to give you a back-up to your cleric as poison is instantly fatal and a dead cleric can't neutralize their own poison. Gold Box does incorrectly allow dual-classed characters to cast Magic User spells in armor. If memory serves, you can do a Fighter/Magic User with the same effect as a Ranger/Magic User. Although the correct choice if you're doing the corrupt party later in the series is to get a Cleric up to L15-20 or so and then switch to Magic User. When I was younger and had too much time on my hands and not enough games, I'd do Pools of Darkness replays with five dual-classed characters. You'd have to stagger the class changes because you get a L1 character (with tons of hp), but they gain levels rapidly and you can get really ridiculous endgame parties this way.
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Mar 19, 2020 04:28
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Chokes McGee posted:Oh, by the way: we're penalized during each and every single one of these fights. Didn't I mention that? Anyone who isn't a dwarf, halfling, or gnome is operating at a THAC0 and movement penalty. These are kobold caves, which means they're made for tiny folk, not lumbering oafs like us. Also, we're dealing with all of this and a second dump truck of kobolds. I like sweeping seven of the little bastards at once as much as the next sadist, but all those plinks and arrows add up. Movement cut in half, -2 penalty to attack and damage rolls, +2 penalty to AC, if they're using the same penalty from the book. Speaking of, at least there are no boars or trolls or wyverns in the module version of the Kobold Kingdom. Instead, it has Kobolds! Specifically, 321 Kobolds spread across a slightly more interesting fortress, usually in groups of 10 that the party can easily chew up and spit out, but the final fight is against 75 of them (in waves of 25 each), after 10 ballistas shoot into you. Then while you're fighting them, the ballistas keep firing, and every kobold in the side rooms if you didn't clear them out first bursts out from behind you. Unlike the game, you actually do get to kill the king, who still bails out with his elite guards once it's obvious the party is going to win. If for some dumb reason you decide not to chase him down and end him, he rounds up a hundred more kobolds and ambushes you at night in the wilderness. On the other hand, the loot here doesn't suck. It's a massive pile of gold and silver and gems (to go with the other massive piles of gold and silver and gems this module throws at the players), along with a magic bow and arrows. And then it's worth another massive pile of gold from the council in Phlan. Also enough mundane weapons and shields that you could probably outfit your own army, and enough rations to keep them fed for a long campaign. As for Zhentil Outpost, I'll reserve my commentary until Chokes finishes it, since I can't rightly remember which details the game sees fit to inform the player of and I don't want to spoil anything. Instead, I'll just point out that the players are expected to go bar-hopping in Phlan before leaving for the outpost and learn ahead of time that the Zhents might not be the most trustworthy of folks. This was back in the old days of course, when the Forgotten Realms had only been an offical product line for a year or so, and even the people who had been playing D&D for a while might not have heard of Zhentil Keep or the Zhentarim.
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Mar 19, 2020 06:49
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Can you tell the efreet that you *are* a vampire just to get a fight out of it?
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Mar 19, 2020 07:15
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Jabor posted:Can you tell the efreet that you *are* a vampire just to get a fight out of it? I believe so, yes. And while that may be funny and absolutely something our current group of idiots would do, I've got better things to do with my time than waste it on a solo fight against a mid tier enemy for a dead end gimmick. Another reason is something I didn't show off because it's completely irrelevant: if you poke around to the extreme Northwest of the wilderness map, you'll find a metallic dragon (silver? I think?) who you can mistake for Tyranthraxus' host and get into a whole heap of trouble with. If you keep your powder dry, he tells you the vague location of the bottle and to bring it back. If you do so, he then unloads the staggering secret on you to use it while you're facing a vampire, which the efreet flat out tells you. There's a reason that little side jaunt didn't make the cut.
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Mar 19, 2020 07:30
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Perhaps unsurprisingly, the silver bottle with the efreet is entirely an invention of the PoR devteam and is only loosely connected to anything in the source material. Instead, that had a magic bottle contained in the treasure hoard of a hobgoblin lair you had to clean out (I don't think this made it into the game at all, at least not as anything more than a minor monster lair with a few fights and some crap loot, like the dozen or so others). The party never actually gets to use the bottle or even find out what it does, since a mage who tricked the party into going in with him to get the treasure (or bribed them if he had to abandon tricking them) steals it and teleports out immediately.
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Mar 19, 2020 08:22
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Chokes McGee posted:Another reason is something I didn't show off because it's completely irrelevant: if you poke around to the extreme Northwest of the wilderness map, you'll find a metallic dragon (silver? I think?) who you can mistake for Tyranthraxus' host and get into a whole heap of trouble with. If you keep your powder dry, he tells you the vague location of the bottle and to bring it back. If you do so, he then unloads the staggering secret on you to use it while you're facing a vampire, which the efreet flat out tells you. Does the mistake involve getting into a fight with the dragon? Because c'mon, a dragon must have decent loot if you ice it.
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Mar 19, 2020 10:26
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The dragon’s name is Diogenes. It Chokes knows the Greek legend, he could probably make some jokes about that. And the guides I checked say you can’t fight him unfortunately. If you try, he just blasts you with his breath weapon for heavy damage and then flies away. The cave where you meet him is otherwise empty and thus clearly not his actual lair. achtungnight fucked around with this message at 14:12 on Mar 19, 2020 |
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Mar 19, 2020 14:07
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achtungnight posted:The dragon’s name is Diogenes. It Chokes knows the Greek legend, he could probably make some jokes about that. Diogenes was an actual philosopher and the founder of the Cynics. He sassed Alexander the Great for reals and would that we all had that on our resume.
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Mar 19, 2020 14:50
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e: whoops we're fine, nothing to see here, move alone
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Mar 19, 2020 16:50
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^^Thanks for the LP and doing your part during this period of social distancing. :
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Mar 19, 2020 19:25
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The exciting conclusion to the Zhentil Outpost fiasco should be coming out here in the next day or two. In other news, I have a confession to make. I've never actually beaten Pools of Darkness; I got about 25% of the way in during dress rehearsals before finally pulling the trigger on the LP. I just looked up the FAQ to get some basic info on the absolute dense frozen sheets of bullshit awaiting me and I... uh... have concerns as to whether or not we're gonna finish this. I can guarantee the end of Blades with what we've got, but some of this poo poo... I dunno. It doesn't even sound doable, let alone fun. We'll see how far we get, I guess! I don't want to engage too heavily in cheating if things go off the rails but, y'know. If you're not going to play fair, game... e: At least Matrix Cubed was good enough to give everyone plasma casters by the end. What the poo poo am I supposed to do against a final boss with hodgepodge equipment and no spells? Chokes McGee fucked around with this message at 07:04 on Mar 25, 2020 |
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Mar 25, 2020 06:55
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You’ve never beaten Pools of Darkness? Join the club! The only times I ever beat it was when I deleted the monsters’ special attacks file, so I’ve never beaten it legitimately either. And I only bothered doing that twice, I think. Even without that file I could never finish Dave’s Challenge... I also had a trick for avoiding the hodgepodge equipment issue you mention. I’ll share it when we get to the game. We will be right with you every step as you play it. May Tymora’s blessings be upon us. If you don’t know Tymora, look her up on Google. She’s my favorite goddess in the Realms. achtungnight fucked around with this message at 07:07 on Mar 25, 2020 |
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Mar 25, 2020 07:05
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achtungnight posted:If you don’t know Tymora, look her up on Google. She’s my favorite goddess in the Realms. *reads* Oh neat, she'd be perfect for this group of lunatics! Right down to her love of singing and chainsaws! .... ... Wait a minute...
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Mar 25, 2020 07:32
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Chainsaws may be more Beshaba’s thing. I’m not sure. Check your PMs, Chokes. I sent you a trick.
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Mar 25, 2020 07:52
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Just remember to show your work
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Mar 25, 2020 11:47
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If a game sets out to break you, set out to break the game.
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Mar 25, 2020 12:51
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The only way I managed to beat Pools of Darkness as a youth was by downloading a bunch of min-maxed characters. They were all dual-classed in ridiculous ways that would be incredibly tedious to manage in practice.
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Mar 25, 2020 13:25
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PoD can be beaten even without getting around the equipment limitation. But you almost certainly want two wizards in the party, you need to exploit a few tricks that neutralize enemies like dragons pretty effectively, and you have to be willing to spend a lot of time casting prep spells and resting wherever the game gives you an opportunity. I’ve forgotten some of my combat savvy over the years, but we should have enough collective experience to help pull you through. If memory serves, my “standard” party was Paladin, Ranger, dwarven Fighter/Thief, Cleric, Magic User, dual-classed X/Magic User(where X could either be fighter, ranger, or in one memorable case, cleric). Making it through PoD with only one mage is considerably more difficult.
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Mar 25, 2020 14:26
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PurpleXVI posted:If a game sets out to break you, set out to break the game. Ask Wizardry. It hosed around and found out 
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Mar 25, 2020 15:35
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n'thing the "shamelessly cheat like a madman" votes here. PoD doesn't play fair, neither should you.
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Mar 25, 2020 16:06
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Pool of Radiance, Chapter 19: Winning Friends and Influencing People (Part 2) Today on the Gold Box Adventures, we're going to fight for our goddamn lives  Right away, we have to deal with these jerks. If you didn't set a watch, they get a free backstab on one character. Since they're heavily armed, this will probably result in said character's death, or at least losing a crippling amount of HP. Two things: first, you don't want that, because this entire section is rough as is. Secondly, why wouldn't you set a watch? Do you need a big blaring siren going WE'VE GOT AMBUSH SIIIIIIGN or something? Becuase you literally just got one! Set a watch, dummy! That aside, these four guys are Aides, which are the top grunt fighters for this area. They carry bows, but we'll be in close quarters for this fight, so they won't matter much. (For now.) Like all fights in this area, we have one primary objective.   WELP CYA  ... Oooh, good thinkin', Rez. Cast an invishubilibly. We are so dead.Priority one is to protect the mage. Get him or her behind the nearest convenient wall, out of sight from arrows. You can't waste spells this early. You also can't afford to lose your mage before the final fight.  No, not that one. The point is, they don't have anything to do, so get them out of there ASAP. Clerics are somewhat in the same boat, although this first fight is actually a good one to burn a Hold Person on. Hilariously, by the time Shanna gets one off, we've already killed three of them. Oh well, whatever works. Now, to get out of this r—   Oh. Welp. This wave has both Aides and Corporals. The latter of the two is slightly lower tier but still solid enough to cause us concern, especially when there's a mixed group of 10 to 15.  EAT HAMMER, rear end in a top hat  Years of emotional suppression just bubblin' right out. You hate to see it. Says you!Granted, we have a drunken cleric rampaging through their ranks right now, but their AC is solid, and they'll take more than one or two hits to floor. Worse, Shanna is drawing all the wrong kinds of attention, as is Justine. That's the worst part of all this. Every generic enemy in this gauntlet has bows, and they all know how to use them. Up until this point, the only ranged units we've been dealing with have been kobolds and orcs, and I don't think I'm spoiling anything to say they're not exactly olympic level archers. These guys, though? They can easily take 20 HP off someone in a single combat round if they concentrate their fire. The AI's too stupid to do that, fortunately, but that doesn't mean the RNG won't screw us at first opportunity.  Keep up the good work, guys!  t At least we're keeping Rez safe. We make everyone a lot deader than before, and we earn a chance to catch our breath.  We're clear! Go! Um, Justine? Shanna won't get very far like this... What, you mean drunk to the point of hallucination? Well, shyeah. And the huge kidney wound. Blesh. That's what we need. *hic* A bleshing. *slapslapslap* Snap out of it and heal yourself!  Buzzkill. The irony here is palpable.Not only do we need to protect the mage, but we can't lose Shanna, either. Dumping our cure spells into her between fights is a good idea. I mean, with the kind of damage getting flung around, three casts of Cure Light Wounds were only going to significantly heal a grand total of one character. No sense in hoarding them.    where's the exit where's the exit WHERE IS IT The entire outpost is going to be here in the next thirty seconds! We need a defensible position! Sure, how's this: in absence of physical manifestation, we can't decisively conclude God exists. That is not what I meant I'll say. You're disqualifying a posteriori experiences and inductive reasoning simply because— OH MY GOD SHUT UP Justine is right: if we get caught out in the open like this, we're going to get murdered to death. We need to kettle these assholes, and cutting through rooms increases the likelihood of getting somewhere before the rest of the base comes down on your head. Fortunately, the programmers were too lazy to code an encounter in the barracks. You can killdozer right through on your way to wherever.   Here's an ideal candidate: a nice, long hallway with a door nearby. This should suit our needs nicely. Using their own ramparts against them is a nice bonus, too.   And here they come, right on schedule!  LEMME AT 'EM *yank* I'll keep the drunkard back here with me. You guys do your thing. Um, Rez? We might need help? RARGH  ...  These next few waves consist mostly of Guards, who are the outpost's most disposable mooks. They have one measly hit die and very little to stop you from killing them. The delightful thing about Guards, however, is that you can sweep them. I think this is specific to the Amiga version, because I definitely don't remember it in the DOS version. I don't think sweep rules even apply against regular-sized targets. I also don't care. Our fighters go wading into their front lines and shred everyone within a turn or two.  With most of their army gone, the backing Corporals give a hearty "gently caress this" and peel out. We let them go. We don't need any of the loot or experience they bring to the table, and we're better off conserving our energy.  Welcome to my world, pal. This message takes the place of an encounter and is basically a giant "Intermission" sign. If you haven't gotten to A Defensible Position™ by now, here's a free pass to get there. Incidentally, I took a look at how the game determines random encounter changes, and there's a RNG check with every step that rockets up the more people you kill. Presumably this is to impede you from leaving, which... I think you can still do? IIRC, one option is to dash straight for the exit, trigger a midboss fight, and then get the hell out. It's probably the easier option, but "Slaughter the Whole Base" gives you the opportunity to not get caught in a bad position mid-sprint, so I think it works out either way. Plus, you get way better loot seeing things through to the end, and that's always appreciated.   How do they even fit all of these people in here? Where are they all coming from? ur butt lol Oh, that's just crass.The next few waves are almost exclusively Guards, which are surprisingly satisfying to rip through. Granted, there are a lot of them. Fortunately, killing their dudes is enough to demoralize their leaders, so these fights are pretty easy to clear. We just have to keep the mages out of the way, then hold our ground and do what we do. (L)ook is your friend in between fights. It consumes 10 minutes and forces another random battle check, so you can plunk down somewhere and make them move you.   Sternn's Sling of Seeking is really paying off here, by the way. At 1D6 damage and +2 to hit, there's literally no reason to put him on the front lines anymore. Just stand back and launch rocks at anyone you want for cheap damage! It's great! I like slings a whole lot in this game, and we'll see why in due time. There's not a lot of good reasons to use ranged attacks in PoR (imo), but we might as well launch rocks at heads while we've got it. The sling, I mean. Not the rocks. There's plenty of rocks. The whole game is just lousy with them. Heads, too. In case you're wondering, we are now six fights into this gauntlet. To recap:
You can't see it here, but we're chugging all those heal potions we've collected in between fights. A standard Potion of Healing casts Cure Light Wounds on whoever drinks it. The Potion of Extra Healing, not surprisingly, has two more uses before being destroyed. (You can also use it on other people, but if we need a single CLW that badly in the middle of combat then things have gone so wrong we're not going to win anyway.) It's easy to forget about them or write them off as useless at the time, but without those potions, we couldn't keep our HP high enough to march against the Zhenthil waves. By the way: you know that scene in action movies where everyone piles on the big guy trying to stop him, and he suddenly bursts up and throws them in all different directions? RAAAAARGH   aaaaaYup. After guard fight #4, the game stops loving around and sends in the miniboss.   Wow. World's largest dwarf. Wow. World's smallest giant. Dang. Owned.  Yeah he was.  Besides the usual smorgasbord of Guards, you also get Aides and Corporals sprinkled in. While it ups the difficulty, that is not the primary concern. You want to floor that Dwarf Fighter right away. The rest of this is a standard fight against the usual mook army, but that Dwarf is packing some serious magical gear and will put a sizeable dent in your fighters in a hurry.    STERNNNNNNNNNNN wow you're right Hanover, this is totally rad. The good news is, you can gank his Gauntlets after he's gone. That's two fighters now with 18(00) strength in our party. This is a big (  ) deal, because in addition to massive 10-13 HP hits every swing, their THAC0 goes way down. Hit harder? Hit more often? Yes please!  After that, it's boss time. You don't get a breather in between the last two waves, so you better get that Dwarf knocked out in a hurry.  Hey, jackass! Remember us? What the—I gave you specific orders to kill them! Why are they not killed?! Sir! Everyone else is killed instead, sir! That is the exact opposite of what I wanted  Well, you know what they say: "If you want something done right..." "...don't send the guys with the giant and the spazzy mage." Well you didn't have to spoil it! FOR BANE'S SAKE WILL SOMEONE JUST KILL THESE IDIOTS Ha. Better people than you have tried, assface. And worse. Also the same. Basically we kill a lot of people, is what we're saying. Wh—   See?  Our final fight—  No! Not that one! Our final fight is against whomever's left working the mess hall, a named mage, and the Commandant himself. I... don't know who that mage is, by the way. I think we run into him later? I'm sure there's deep and exciting D&D lore attached to him but too goddamn bad, he's just another jobber to me, because Rez has the ability to cast  HOLD PERSON The mage version of Hold Person is Tier 3 and badass as hell. You get to target four people instead of three, and the overall chance of sticking it is (seemingly?) higher. Like the Cleric version, you can limit the amount of people you're targetting in order to increase its chances of sticking. With a four target spell, cancelling casts 2 through 4 is a very good boss killer when you need it.  Yeah, your mage is dead. Now what?  You just had to ask, didn't you?  hrghIn other news, the Commandant is an actual, proper boss that's kitted out with loads of magic gear. The very first thing he'll do is chuck a Javelin of goddamn Lightning at your face, which is another compelling reason to have a long hallway to fight in. You do not want that poo poo bouncing off walls behind you before you even get rolling. It'll ruin your day like you wouldn't believe. Fortunately, this is the last fight of the scenario, so you can uncork your remaining spells.  dammit  dammit DAMMITIn addition to his gear and HP, the Commandant is ridiculously high level (for this game), and all his savings throws are equally ridiculous. Also, I think he has a Ring of Resistance. With those powers combined, he Like I said, this guy is not loving around. Default Unique Mage is the first target, because you always geek the mage, but the Commandant is the immediate second. Fortunately, we have a secret weapon. Remember all those scrolls we've been piling up?   Ooh, that looks fun! How did you do that? Well, first I open the scroll. And then—this is the complex part, so pay attention—I read it.     I did a thing!  Rez has a spare fireball just sitting around in her inventory, so we might as well use it. Conversely, that Hold Person scroll is more of a "Break Glass in Case of Emergency" because, at this point, we've thrown every paralytic we have at him. We've already lost a fighter, so we need this whole mess over with now. Also, I'm not really sure why the scroll worked but not our actual casts. Scroll spells are usually weaker. For instance, the scroll version of Fireball appears to only cover rocket launcher range indoors instead of plasma caster range. I mean, there has to be some sort of cost for flinging Tier 3 spells out instantly, or else things would just get stupid. Well, stupider. More stupid? Real dumb. There.  the commandant don't like it~  rock the casbah, rock the casbah~ AAAAAAAAAA  Is singing part of the spellcasting, or do you just like doing it while you dunk all over people? I'unno. Little of both? Victory! And with the win comes an eye-popping loot cache from the Commandant and his buddy:
Hanover gets the plate mail, Heather gets the Long Sword, we divy up the rings and potions, and Rez gets the rest. We really should exploit the Wand of Lightning more, but I just don't get Lightning Bolt as a spell. I can never get the bounce to work right, and it seems kind of silly when Fireball already covers the entire screen.   That's right, this is our fort now, bitches. Now dance for our amusement. DANCE!  Or we could just leave. Whichever. The point is, the Head Councilman tried to Rezencrantz and Guildensternn us and failed miserably, and now there's a smoking crater where the Zhentil Outpost used to be. That's a pretty clear message to both Cadorna and Tyranthraxus. We're riding back to New Phlan now, and we're pissed.  We try to hit the Bucaneer Base on the way back. I mean, as long as we're slaughtering entire outposts in revenge and taking their magic gear... Unfortunately, they must have barracaded it, or fled, or maybe put on fake mustaches. Whatever the cause, moving over the base does nothing. Boo. Onwards!   ... Hey, Sasha.   ...well. Were you in on this? Were you?! I assure you. Whatever the Council is doing, at any given moment, I am most definitely not "in" on it. You have a literal license to kill. Congratulations. Y'know we were gonna do it anyway, right? Sure, but this'll cut down on paperwork. We don't do any paperwork? I didn't mean you. Oh yeah? After all we've been through, why should we trust a single word that comes out of the Council's mouth? We'll pay you double. MOVE BITCH GET OUT THE WAY Welp. That didn't take much. I didn't expect it to. Well, get to it. ...you look well. just hand me that aspirinNext Time: Mission Improbable Chokes McGee fucked around with this message at 18:21 on Mar 30, 2020 |
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Mar 25, 2020 18:23
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The main advantage to ye olde bow and arrow in PoR is that a character with poor STR but high DEX (need 16-18) receives a bonus to hit, and that bows have a rate of fire of 2 shots per round. In a game where your PCs are going to be taking one swing per round most of the time, this is an improvement. Given that very early in the game, you can expect maybe 40-50% hit chances, this is an even bigger improvement. In later games bows are mainly useful when you can't attack in melee, at least until they introduce the Fine Long Bow which allows characters to add their strength bonus to damage from the bow. Coupled with high + arrows you can easily expect to deal 30+ damage if you hit with both arrows. Of course, high level fighters receive two melee attacks per round, so you may still be saving bows for when you aren't able to melee. As for Lightning Bolt, its two advantages over Fireball: 1. You can't hurt fire immune enemies with fire. 2. Fireball can't hit a target twice. For bouncing off walls, you want to set up a 90 degree angle with the wall if possible. The bolt then does a 180 and returns the way it came. Count squares to make sure you don't catch the caster in the returning bolt. Bouncing is easier too against huge enemies (2 X 2 size).
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Mar 25, 2020 18:45
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There's a location in the Zhentil keep where you can scale the wall and nope out of there, I think it's the 'canonical' ending to that quest given how ridiculously overpowered the commander is.
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Mar 25, 2020 19:31
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I honestly never got why anyone decided that lightning bolts would bounce.
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Mar 25, 2020 19:34
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PurpleXVI posted:I honestly never got why anyone decided that lightning bolts would bounce. Somebody mentioned it earlier but it's so Gygax could unify siege engine rules with magic rules and make everyone's life easier. Fireball works on catapult damage, lightning bolt on cannon damage. The rebound is for chunky salsa effect unless someone assumed cannonballs would bounce back 180 degrees from where they hit in which case lol.
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Mar 25, 2020 19:41
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You can escape over the wall but killing the Commandant and all his buddies is FAR more satisfying. 
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Mar 25, 2020 20:43
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The general rule for missile weapons through 2e was "bow if you can, sling if you can't (in other words, you are a cleric or mage), crossbows are shite" Given that most D&D games were made during that era of tabletop, it translates into the CRPGs. The other "rule" is that fireball beats lightning bolt in every video game except for the side-scrolling Tower of Doom/Shadow over Mystara, where Lightning Bolt fills half the screen and wrecks everything and Fireball is roughly the equivalent of a bird going plop on someone's shoes.
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Mar 25, 2020 21:33
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achtungnight posted:You can escape over the wall but killing the Commandant and all his buddies is FAR more satisfying. I love the mental image of whatever's left of the army seeing these six idiots they were supposed to kill take out 75% of the base, their champion, mage, and CO and then throwing down their weapons and noping the gently caress out.
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Mar 25, 2020 22:01
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There is a part of me that wants to see how this ends with evil clerics and animate dead.
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Mar 25, 2020 23:25
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JustJeff88 posted:The general rule for missile weapons through 2e was "bow if you can, sling if you can't (in other words, you are a cleric or mage), crossbows are shite" Given that most D&D games were made during that era of tabletop, it translates into the CRPGs. People also forget that as-written, Fireball fills to express its full volume, spreading out if, for example, there's a 10' ceiling. It fills 33,000 cubic feet. Setting it off in a cave system is a good way to catch the entire party. That's not the most crazy 1E spell. Faerie Fire has an area of effect of 12 linear feet per caster level. It's easy to compute what gets effected... if you know what "linear feet" are. In the pre-Internet era, that was non-trivial unless you had an engineer in your play group (which, to be fair, was not uncommon).
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Mar 26, 2020 00:00
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Chokes McGee posted:*reads* Oh neat, she'd be perfect for this group of lunatics! Right down to her love of singing and chainsaws! Okay, you know how I suggested earlier that you make Justine an unwilling paladin of Rezen? I really want to see that happen now.
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Mar 26, 2020 03:04
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Chokes McGee posted:Our final fight is against whomever's left working the mess hall, a named mage, and the Commandant himself. I... don't know who that mage is, by the way. I think we run into him later? I'm sure there's deep and exciting D&D lore attached to him Oh, yes, he's critically important in a lot of material, such as... actually not a god damned thing, unless he's in the novel. It's kinda weird that the game placed him here since, as you stated, he shows up in the endgame, only appearing there in the module. There is a mage in the module version of Zhentil Keep, but he's unnamed. Actually, the commandant has an entire team of unique dudes, including a high level cleric. His javelins of lightning are directly from the text too, as are the dwarf's guantlets. Like in the game, the party is given the chance to either escape or slaughter everybody. Slaughtering them to the last man gets you a hefty pile of basic magic gear (+1 swords and chain mail), which I guess is handy to keep in a safety deposit box in case of total party wipe. The game dances around what the hell just happened, but it's pretty clear that Cadorna was behind the Zhent's attempt on your life. The module is more direct to the DM, but how much the players learn is based on if they read the documents they're delivering, which is totally an option here, or interrogating the commandant before killing him, or interrogating any Zhent soldiers in the area if they escape without killing the commandant, because operational security is a joke. The papers are a hefty pile of legal bullshit that takes an entire day to read, but this is the important bit: Porphyrus Cadorna posted:Lastly, to demonstrate desires and competence, we request that you shall slay these messengers who have come bearing these papers. Thereupon send their heads back to us as proof of your actions. Of course, since it's a sealed envelope, you then have to convincingly reseal it if you're going to make the delivery without getting caught. The gist of this situation is that there are three interests at play, the Phlan Council, Cadorna, and the Zhents. Cadorna is a member of the council, but is throwing in with the Zhents, probably selling out Phlan to them in exchange. The Zhents were willing to play ball, hence sealing the deal with the party's heads. The whole reason you get to hang out in the keep and have dinner with the commandant? He didn't actually read the papers until after dinner, the night ambush was him trying to get poo poo done quickly and quietly, since he thinks there are enemy spies in the keep (in fact, if the party approaches the keep without being on this diplomatic mission, they get a 'friendly invitation', which if denied turns into an order, which if ignored turns into being captured and interrogated). There's a fair amount more detail, but it would spoil the last mystery the keep has left to offer, so I'll sit on it for now. Amusingly, in the module Cadorna starts out as the most junior and least respected guy on the Council, but he throws his backing behind the party, and your successes are directly responsible for him rising in status and power throughout the adventure, having been promoted to the head by the time you're sent to Zhentil Keep, and now immediately pulls a 'you have outlived your usefulness' on the party. Guy's a dick.
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Mar 26, 2020 07:18
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Truthkeeper posted:Oh, yes, he's critically important in a lot of material, such as... actually not a god damned thing, unless he's in the novel. It's kinda weird that the game placed him here since, as you stated, he shows up in the endgame, only appearing there in the module. There is a mage in the module version of Zhentil Keep, but he's unnamed. Actually, the commandant has an entire team of unique dudes, including a high level cleric. His javelins of lightning are directly from the text too, as are the dwarf's guantlets. Like in the game, the party is given the chance to either escape or slaughter everybody. Slaughtering them to the last man gets you a hefty pile of basic magic gear (+1 swords and chain mail), which I guess is handy to keep in a safety deposit box in case of total party wipe. As
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Mar 26, 2020 17:28
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Truthkeeper posted:It's kinda weird that the game placed him here since, as you stated, he shows up in the endgame, only appearing there in the module. Probably just a reused asset. I'd be surprised if there aren't more cases where Gold Box engine games use a specific named monster as a stand-in for a generic one. I'm amused by the implication that the whole diplomatic reception and fancy dinner was actually on the level until the commandant read the fine print and realized he was supposed to kill you.
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Mar 26, 2020 18:41
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Straight White Shark posted:I'm amused by the implication that the whole diplomatic reception and fancy dinner was actually on the level until the commandant read the fine print and realized he was supposed to kill you. Honestly, it's a running theme in pretty much all the D&D materials I've played that the Zhentarim are like MSF or Destro from GI Joe - sure they'll commit a couple of war crimes and worship a dark god but they're honestly just money-hungry evil instead of child-eating evil. They can still play nice and absolutely will if it gets them better things.
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Mar 26, 2020 18:53
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Years ago, but well after this game came out, someone gifted me an MMO character named Porphyrys - that exact spelling, even. Can't be a coincidence.
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Mar 26, 2020 19:02
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JustJeff88 posted:Years ago, but well after this game came out, someone gifted me an MMO character named Porphyrys - that exact spelling, even. Can't be a coincidence. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyrian_purple ? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porphyry_(geology) ?
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Mar 26, 2020 19:58
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fritz posted:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyrian_purple ? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porphyry_(geology) ? Don't piddle on my dreams, mate.
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Mar 26, 2020 20:46
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JustJeff88 posted:Years ago, but well after this game came out, someone gifted me an MMO character named Porphyrys - that exact spelling, even. Can't be a coincidence. If someone gives you porphyrys, please, both of you see a doctor. it's the responsible thing
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Mar 27, 2020 02:31
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