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JustJeff88 posted:Were I foolish enough to play this, what would be a good, easy starting faction/position? Part of me wants to play a high-level mage for the obvious shenanigans, but perhaps I should start of with a faction that's peaceful and relatively far from the main antagonists. Some things to look for regardless of nation: I've mentioned it before, but that level 9 Fighter hireling is pretty much the best you're going to get; comes with some variety of plate armor, and at 9 he's gotten all of his full HP levels*. Not much can compete with him wall-of-meat-wise. As was mentioned in a previous update, there are independent factions you can conduct diplomacy with, and if you make them your Vassal you get both the character and all of their holdings, including what you traded to them in exchange for making them your Vassal. There are some very strong recruitment options you can pick up very, very cheaply. Always do dungeons, even if they're low level; there are some Artifacts in low level dungeons that are extremely disproportionately powerful compared to the effort it takes to get them. One in particular makes that passed-up coffer's bonus look like pocket change. *Well, I'm a bit rusty on whether it's 9 or 10, but past a certain level characters no longer get 1d(x)+(CON bonus) for HP, and just a small flat amount based on class. Fighters get 3.
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May 26, 2022 02:08
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PurpleXVI posted:The victory point source of artifacts seems unavailable to NPC regents, and I think there are some un-labelled ways of getting more victory points, because what we end up with when I check them in the next update absolutely does not match the official calculations from the manual. I'm thinking it's the typical AI cheating developers spam in these kind of things.
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May 26, 2022 02:41
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I'm surprised it lets you recruit such high level goons; by the rules, you can only recruit henchmen of 1 level less than you as a standard adventurer, of equal level if blooded and of a Tainted bloodline, +1 if of Minor, +2 if of Major, and +3 if of Great (if I recall; something along those lines, at any rate). Recruiting level 12 right off the bat is pretty crazy, as those people should be ruling holdings of their own even if unblooded! But of course it's a game convenience thing. Wish they did the same for wizard spells! They give you all Realm spells, after all, which are supposed to be researched just like normal spells (for mage realm spells at least). Shame there's no custom character option to make the ultimate halfling ranger/priest warlord to dominate Anuire and take their rightful place upon the Iron Throne of Anuire! Does the City of Anuire have it's doomstack of Imperial Legion troops? Is it even on the map? In the tabletop, it's a rank 10 city, which is insane in terms of population density as those are usually used for entire provinces rather than single cities, and it's ruled by a long lineage of stewards that stave off the power-hungry and unworthy who would claim to be emperor. This is backed up in no small part by the remaining tradition of the imperial legion, as well as the remaining members of the imperial college of magic, and of course the tradition that the city itself is sacrosanct. Hasn't stopped Darian Avan from all but claiming it as part of his fiefdom, nor Aeric Boeruine, but it's more prepared to deal with their shenanigans than most of the smaller realms caught up in the power struggle.
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May 26, 2022 03:02
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The City of Anuire exists on the map, but can't be entered, attacked, declared war on, negotiated with, etc. which is kind of a shame. It would be interesting if it was possible to attempt it to win the game, for a huge diplomatic malus of some sort, but also a big reward if it succeeded.
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May 26, 2022 10:40
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DGM_2 posted:The foundation of any strong relationship. Well, you know what they say, the easiest way to a man's heart is through the stomach, followed by curving the blade upwards to get around the ribcage.
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May 26, 2022 12:23
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Randalor posted:Well, you know what they say, the easiest way to a man's heart is through the stomach, followed by curving the blade upwards to get around the ribcage. My version is "straight through the ribcage with a six-inch kitchen knife," but yeah. There are SO many jokes you can make with a setup like that. "You don't know her like I do, I can change her!" Hell, if we want to get topical there's probably even an Amber Heard joke in there somewhere...
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May 26, 2022 13:22
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Unoriginal One posted:*Well, I'm a bit rusty on whether it's 9 or 10, but past a certain level characters no longer get 1d(x)+(CON bonus) for HP, and just a small flat amount based on class. Fighters get 3. It's both!  Warriors and priests start gaining static HP after 9th level (meaning you were correct), and wizards and rogues gain static HP after 10th level.
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May 26, 2022 15:21
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I just wanted to pop in and say I am really loving the discussions about old D&D jankiness, how it developed from various sources like Braunstein, etc.
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May 26, 2022 16:01
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If anyone wants to see how great (awful) Birthright the Gorgons Alliance Adventure mode is in video, check this dude's video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtJw3dfr1tY. Its part of a youtube LP where he uses every cheap tactics possible to dominate the strategic layer of the game in order to accomplish a ridiculous strategic goal with one of the hardest nations. He kinda sucks on the adventure layer, though.
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May 26, 2022 16:04
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Ahaha every part of the game's sound design. Profoundly 90s MIDI songs.
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May 26, 2022 16:11
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Kanthulhu posted:He kinda sucks on the adventure layer, though. Four priests when he has a level 16 mage available? Jesus. A single level 16 mage could trivialize the whole thing with Fly, Teleport, Levitate and combat spells to wipe out every enemy(as far as I can tell, saving throws rarely if ever succeed). No kidding he sucks.
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May 26, 2022 16:14
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How did he get up to level 16 when there's basically no levelling in this game?
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May 26, 2022 17:29
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JustJeff88 posted:How did he get up to level 16 when there's basically no levelling in this game? The thing is that levelling seems, as far as I can tell, to come primarily through realm actions. Alliene started at the same level as Rogr, has been in all the same battles and on all the same adventures, but he's now level 10, while she's level 6, despite her class levelling faster than his. Hell, if anything Noelon's almost been levelling faster because I keep giving some of the lieutenant actions to him. The other thing is that some lieutenants/regents just start at high levels. Caine of Endier, for instance, is a level 11 or 13 mage at game start, if I remember right, and some of the vassalizeable(mangled, but you get what I mean) NPC regents are mages which also tend to start at very high levels. I seem to recall that my usual "game-breaking" trick was to vassalize the Eyeless One within the first few turns if I wasn't already starting out as a mage regent.
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May 26, 2022 17:35
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PurpleXVI posted:The City of Anuire exists on the map, but can't be entered, attacked, declared war on, negotiated with, etc. which is kind of a shame. It would be interesting if it was possible to attempt it to win the game, for a huge diplomatic malus of some sort, but also a big reward if it succeeded. I believe you can play as City of Anuire if you use the scenario editor. They have a very strong regent and nearly nothing else going for them, as I recall; it's a very hard start.
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May 26, 2022 20:43
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Xerophyte posted:I believe you can play as City of Anuire if you use the scenario editor. They have a very strong regent and nearly nothing else going for them, as I recall; it's a very hard start. They don't get to start with their level 10 province huh?
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May 26, 2022 21:04
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Chronische posted:They don't get to start with their level 10 province huh? They do, but I think it's a level 10 fort and almost nothing else. You're difficult to invade, but you don't get any actual money, power or influence for it.
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May 26, 2022 21:14
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Xerophyte posted:They do, but I think it's a level 10 fort and almost nothing else. You're difficult to invade, but you don't get any actual money, power or influence for it. That stinks! It is supposed to be maxed out on subordinate temples and guilds, and decently high on Law to start driving out/seizing the other faction's unwelcome law holdings, and have a ton of local high level folks that would serve the steward well. But you aren't supposed to play ot at all, ever, so whatever I guess!
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May 26, 2022 21:17
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Update 06: Double Betrayal     Under attack by means both mundane and magical, our finances were hard pressed. Thankfully the regiments of Knights we'd raised to combat the evil of the Spiderfell were patriot in the truest of terms, and many were willing to take payment in the pride of knowing they were fighting on the side of right.The little dirtclod next to Ilien indicates that it's been Blighted by some dickhead wizard, it makes every holding in the province, and the province itself, generate its minimum possible amount of taxation.    I did not deeply regret hearing about the demise of Tuarhievel, though I wish it had been any but the Gorgon who conquered them. They had long had a reputation of perpetuating the great hunts against humans and others they considered "lessers" or "invaders." As for the reports of others making war on ourselves and Endier... it was starting to become commonplace. Hubaere and Alliene composed a letter to Guilder Kalien promising to provide their "thoughts and prayers."  We had more immediate worries, in any case, it was time to see whether Noelon's "first strike" strategy was going to work or end in all our deaths. We had apparently annoyed Diemed and Medoere enough that they were sending everything they had against us, Medoere's army was even lead by their regent.I just about shat a brick when I saw this, it felt like VERY bad news.    I don't really have any OPTIONS other than "line of knights, then send in the wizards," so I hope it works again.    ...seems like it might. But surely this won't work twice.   For some reason the AI always seems very slow about actually moving out across the field, even if they always deploy their units first, so you can usually box them in on their side of the field which, due to the janky implementation of Birthright's mass combat mechanics, means they can't actually use archers or mages to provide fire support.   Their regent's bodyguard unexpectedly dunks on my knights, so I dunk on them with some lightning bolts.  Retreating in the Gorgon's Alliance is also somewhat forgiving compared to the tabletop game. In the tabletop, for every cavalry unit more that the winner has than the retreater, one of the retreater's retreating units gets deleted, presumably rode down and crushed off-field. This makes it a lot harder to really crush someone's military without boxing them in so they have nowhere to retreat to.   While we were victorious in Braeme, staggeringly so, in fact, Medoere took the chance to besiege the Spiderfell, just after we'd invested in bringing trade, law and temples to its deepest webs. We stood without any immediate way to reinforce it, Endier could have helped us, but between the "Thoughts and Prayers" and the larger nation of Alamie breathing down their necks, I suspected they wouldn't.  Medoere caps off the turn by sending in a bunch of poor infantry to get ridden down by heavy cavalry.  There are fewer wars this time around. Not to say they're any less intense.  It was looking dark, but then something interesting crossed my desk. This is exactly the sort of thing we need! Some way to strike back at Diemed, they're clearly the instigator here, hiding behind Medoere as they break up our ancient alliances. And does this way there are fiends to be slain? That's exactly the sort of thing Haelyn smiles upon. I'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO STORM AN ENEMY'S CAPITAL ON MY OWN. IT REALLY GETS YOUR PULSE POUNDING. GOOD CARDIO.There's no doubt we're doing this, of course. gently caress Diemed. Also just for context. lol. I look forward to the run where I can shamelessly min/max my economy and adventuring.   This turn, Ilien has just been hit with "Honest Dealing" rather than a Blight, which is an... odd spell. It protects the province from Espionage and Agitate actions, but then also dumpsters the income from Guild holdings. In the PnP game it also penalizes diplomacy and anyone who tries to lie in the province has to succeed at a saving throw to do so.    Raiding monsters, being hellwarred by our much larger neighbours to the west and... assholes, they're trying to steal what we stole!  I might've overbid a bit to guarantee they wouldn't get it, so that ate up 38 RP's.  In any case, we have ADVENTURING to do.  Once again, Rogr's spells acquired from adventuring are out of his reach for some time yet.  Also while I go over the priest spell memorizations, I note that they've made Turn Undead into a level 1 spell that does 1d6 damage per caster level to the undead. I'm actually not entirely opposed to this for balancing reasons, but a lot of the changes to basic AD&D mechanics and spells are still odd to me.  The skies over Caer Diem were dark and brooding as we strode into the courtyard. Implausibly we had gotten this far without being challenged, possibly because no one ever expected something this rash and risky. Since we've got quiet for a few moments yet, let's have a look at the situation...  In AD&D, True Seeing just allows you to see through all illusions effortlessly, I believe you can even see the original forms of shapeshifters, that sort of thing. Here, on the other hand, it shows the entire map and also casts Find Treasure on top of it, AND reveals enemies. All the little yellow dots are "treasure," except the game parses anything you can pick up as treasure, so a yellow dot could be a mighty magical artifact, a bucket or a candle.   As we can see on the map, we can enter one of the towers by the entrance and get a completely useless item. As far as I can tell a Ring of Nightvision kind of does the same as Continual Light, but one cast of CL lasts you all mission and you will never really be short for level 2 mage spell slots.    As we attempted to sneak around the side, to an entrance on the right side of the courtyard, the main gate guards spotted us and the battle was once again on. Noelon? I'VE GOT THIS.These guards are notably more durable than goblins or elves, they also hit harder. Might be the halberds that make them hit so hard, since halberds can hit pretty drat hard even in the pen and paper game. They're still largely not threatening, but sometimes they certainly take a while to murder. At this point I also decide to check on Alliene's inventory for some reason and discover...  I have no idea if the save file got corrupted somehow, or if she started with this, or if one of the Necklaces I picked up in the Barrow Mound was actually 100 of them, but she now has 100x8 Missiles. They do 2d6 damage each here, but in the pen and paper game, the throwable missiles on a given Necklace can range from "worse than magic missile" to "double fireball." For the moment I resolve not to use them, since that seems too much like cheating.    I'm not sure why I then decided to go for the LEFT side courtyard instead of just going to the right side one and getting it over with.     Also as a first, we've got some text in this adventure! Imagine if this was used for like, puzzles or storytelling or something. That would be wild. Of course it won't be, except in the jankiest, most ham-fisted way imaginable.   Oh, that was a warning about zombies! That's a lot less dire than I expected.  In the same way that skeletons and goblins are for level 1 characters, zombies are for level 2 characters, being statistically roughly equal to a level 2 Fighter. Rather than letting Noelon carve them into ribbons, I just have Alliene Turn them into ashes.   If you wait around, the stairs that fell to reveal the zombies will rise up again, getting you access to the top of the low wall.   The Gauntlets of Dexterity set Dex to 15 OR raise it by +1 if it's already 15 or greater. Since the Gorgon's Alliance has no ranged weapons or thief skills(seriously), Dex just exists to increase your AC once you've piled on so many magical rings and cloaks you can barely move.     The other courtyard is oddly empty, comparatively. It just has a single guard and a well we can't even jump into. I feel cheated. It also has a ladder.  Now, ladders in videogames can work in a lot of ways. Sometimes they work terribly and stickily, sometimes they're just like ground you walk on despite being vertical, in Gorgon's Alliance, uh.   If you walk up to them and jump, they will ROCKET you into the air at insane speeds, launching you in this case over the wall to come down for a decent chunk of falling damage. What the gently caress. The map says there's a treasure item on top of the wall, but I could not for the life of me manage to land on it while loving with the ladder. So whatever it is will have to be a mystery until I get here with a party that can Levitate and Fly.   Whatever Baron Diem was, he certainly wasn't humble. Look at those pillars out front. I wonder how many servants waste their day replacing those candles whenever they burn down.  The interior spaces look pretty decent, you just have to beat up the occasional guard who comes over to see why you're looting the rugs.     No seating without reservations! I DEMAND TO SEE THE MANAGER.The button on the doorjamb opens the doors in the back of the room past the big table.   Please don't trail mud on the rugs! We'll be out of your hair any moment now. Have you seen an ancient artifact around here?  Feel like coming down here so we can kill you like your coworkers? I think I'm good.NPC's generally won't navigate any drops that would cause falling damage to the player characters if they took it. This results in a lot of scenarios where they just glare at you menacingly from ledges but won't actually do anything about it.   Baron Diem's throne room has a +4 Cloak of Protection, which oddly enough isn't listed in the manual, it only lists up to a +3. In fact we already have several.    It's a shame we have to sully this shrine with such violence. Does that mean I get to live? Ha ha, no.  gently caress this note, by the way, gently caress this note.    The pillar farthest on the right behind the altar folds down when we approach it, allowing us access into the back rooms in the northeast of the castle.   There are like three Ioun Stones if you drop down, but as far as I can tell there's no way OUT of the pit again without Teleport or Fly.   Heading north from the odd hook-shaped structure leads us down these stairs and huh... two doors! Let's open them.    ...I said open the door, Noelon, not the entire wall. I DON'T KNOW MY OWN STRENGTH SOMETIMES.Both walls fold up when you interact with them, the doors just being a texture on the walls, letting multiple zombies jump out at you.   You have to interact with them again to restore the corridor leading downwards, presumably after you flatten the zombies. All they're guarding is a really bad Cloak of Protection and a staff that lets you cast a single 2d8 HP healing spell.   These cross texture wall sections always seem to be illusions or secret doors. In this case there's one on either side and they're illusions, which hide zombies, and the game cannot parse letting Noelon attack through the illusions, so I have to retreat, wait for the zombies to stumble out, and THEN stab them.   Then I go through the wall on the right. And I see a pit, and I go whooooooah! Just like in the note! I should go explore! I also bet I can walk along that ledge around the side and get this potions!    This seems bad. Maybe we should leave and regroup?Once again, without Fly or Teleport, there's no way out, and I'm stuck restarting. I will note that the game has no mid-adventure saves, nor even mid-turn saves, so without a selection of navigation spells, these inescapable pits and such are absolutely the worst. There's attempt number one.     Hey! It's those assholes again! Wait, why are you all alive? Baron Diem offers very good healthcare! Oh thank goodness now I don't feel as bad about this any longer. Noelon? GOT IT.Deciding that I don't want to fall down any more pits, I decide to explore the southeast part of the castle first instead.     The back rooms are, at first, just a collection of little rooms that resemble kitchens, barracks, etc. and contain a White Key that I don't know what unlocks. Also they all have some guards in them that need pummelling.     Well, this certainly seems unusual. Alliene? Maybe in the western kingdoms its all the rage to have your own inescapable pit out back. ...Not even a railing, I wonder how many guards this claims every week.Considering the lackluster AI this would probably be like a pitcher plant for moron guards if they weren't barred from doing anything that might hurt their feet.   Before we jump down, there are actually two approaches to the Royal Pit from the back rooms, if you take the farther one, there's an extremely obvious secret door(if you pull up the map, anyway), concealing a high-tier Ring of Protection and a potion of extra healing.  I think we should just jump in there and get it over with. But what if we get stuck again? Then you should feel free to come back and kill all my coworkers a third time. They're real dickheads. Well, there you go, we've got the invitation.Before hopping in, I make a brief trip back to where I got stuck the first time, and this time I take the illusory wall on the LEFT rather than on the RIGHT, which leads to three zombies and the Blue Key which I also have no idea what opens.   As usual, since no one in this party knows how to fast Featherfall, everyone breaks their ankles. The pit has two doors at "ground" level and two that are suspended eight feet off the ground and currently unreachable.    One of the two ground floor rooms contains this Potion of Flying. There's only one, it has a very short duration, and if you waste it and can't fast Fly on your own, you have to restart the adventure. This is called "foreshadowing."   The one on the other side just contains a pittance of gold. Time to try out that potion so we can get to the higher doors.   So the thing about "flying" in The Gorgon's Alliance is that you might assume it's like the Duke Nukem jetpack. "Jump" to go up, "Crouch" to go down, release to hover. It's amazing how wrong you are. Instead, you hold "jump" to fly upwards, drop like a rock when you release it, and there's no falling damage. There's also no way to hover or "gently" adjust your altitude. Now imagine trying to hit these doorways doing so.   One contains a zombie and a potion of Cloud Giant Strength, it jacks up the drinker's strength to a temporary 23 which is an insane boost in power. In the Gorgon's Alliance this is the only way Fighters and Thieves can get stronger attacks(outside of one magic artifact and Oils of Sharpness, anyway) because there are no actual weapons to pick up. I have no idea why characters' weapons and armor are completely hardcoded like that.    On the other side... Oh look, it's another one of those illusory walls!It is, in fact, the secret entryway to our quest objective, but!  It requires the one key I don't have yet, and even though I can get out of the pit and get it at this point(as I learn later), without the Potion of Flying being active, I can't actually get back to where I need to use it without some acrobatics that I have no idea if this game's trashy engine even supports. Back to square one.    In the third-of-a-turn between adventure attempts, Medoere gets their asses kicked again. They really don't seem to be getting tired of it.   Certainly this time it'll work out, right? ...I am not doing this a fourth time.  This time I'm just busting out that massive supply of Necklaces of Missiles and blasting every guard in sight.     Get out or flame out, losers.  Back in the hole, I pick up the Potion of Flying and DON'T USE IT IMMEDIATELY. Instead I press this button hidden just inside one of the ground floor rooms.   This raises a platform in the corner of the Royal Pit, which will lift us back up to where we came from. To pre-empt anyone asking, yes, it's possible to slip off it and through that door it rises next to, but that door is of course not the raised door we need to enter.    However, when the platform is at its top, it's just possible to leap from the southwestern corner of the pit to the northwestern corner, allowing us access to some exciting new rooms.   Piss off, note.   This room contains a secret door leading back to the main section of the castle, but it always complains that it needs a button to activate it. If there actually is such a button in the adventure, I have not been able to find it in three attempted playthroughs.    The back section also contains some seemingly purposeless bits like this platform overlooking the pit.  Purposeless except for allowing the player to clown on some poor guard earning minimum wage.    What we care about is getting to this balcony overlooking the dining hall. The guard that used to be here got incinerated by a Necklace of Missiles from the ground.    Finally, the Jeweled Key! While we're here, perhaps we should liberate some more treasures from Baron Diem. To limit his power, of course. Of course, only for that reason.  Behind the screen there's another Ring of Regeneration and another Potion of Invulnerability.    The only other unique room up here is what looks like... a small kitchen, perhaps? The Scroll of Armor Enhancement just temporarily improves AC. Nothing special.     Time to finally get where we need to go.   It certainly is dark in here, my light spell barely banishes these shadows. ...do some of these shadows seem like they're... moving, to you? That's no shadow, that's a spectre!As soon as I saw a spectral undead moving towards the party I didn't even stop to see what it was but just let fly with every single memorized cast of Turn Undead. The thing is that spectral undead are almost universally INCREDIBLY AWFUL in the pen and paper game, being hard to hurt and, while they can do damage, usually being more terrifying in the exciting side effects that being hit by them has.  Spectres are an exceptionally awful example. Just at a glance, they're not that bad, they fight and take hits like a high-level Fighter(AC2, 7HD, Thac0 13), but with no strength bonuses to really let them hit hard. You need +1 weapons or magic to hit them, but if the party's of a level where they'd be meeting a Spectre, I'd be surprised if they didn't have either. No, what's awful about Spectres is that like many other non-corporeal undead, they Energy Drain, that is to say, if they hit you, they rip your levels off. Permanently. Basic 2e AD&D had only one way to recover lost levels, Restoration, which required a 13th-level priest casting it within one day of the level(s) being lost, and which then only restores exactly the amount of XP needed to do so. So if you were one point of XP from levelling up... that could easily knock a ton of progress off. Spectres drain TWO loving levels per hit, something which there's no save against. gently caress whoever designed these awful things.   Let's not have any of that.   And with that, we claim the Regalia of Empire. Depending on how many rounds of bidding we have to deal with, this could save between 5 and 15 Regency Points per Investiture attempt. I'm not sure if it also works when attempting to counter Investitures, but if it does, that would be really nice when we're on the defensive. The Regalia of Empire is also one of the special artifacts which grant more than the basic 10 victory points.  We had barely returned from Caer Diem when we received bad news, Aerenwe, presumably acting at Roesone's behest, had joined the battle in Braeme. Not counting Alamie, we were now at war with four states. I had rather hoped that my reign would be more peaceful. It doesn't work well for them, I managed to either rout or kill their regent while I was at it. Dead regents work... oddly in the Gorgon's Alliance, in that their holdings just keep on sort of going without them in charge and does odd things to their diplomacy. Sadly we're missing the part of the pen and paper game where you can stab blooded regents in the heart and eat their bloodline or force them to divest their holdings to you at swordpoint.      Despite our absence for a month, little had changed on the battlefield. Medoere was still attempting to subdue the Spiderfell and rousing the entire region against us, and once more a pack of spiders had taken up residence in Ilien. With us unable to reach it, the Spiderfell's last rebels were at last tracked down by Medoere. It was a bitter sight to see, as so many men and women of Ilien had given their lives to win the battle there not long ago. In less expected, but no less desired, news, Taeghas apparently wanted to ally with us. We eagerly took their offer, any port in a storm, as they say.If you press the "Improve" button when offered a diplomatic pitch, the AI sometimes drops it entirely, but more often tries to improve the pitch slightly. With emphasis on "slightly," in that nine times out of ten, they just reshuffle the offer without actually improving it(like, say, instead of offering to give you a tier 2 holding in exchange for another tier 2 holding, they'll make it tier 1 holdings instead). In this case Taeghas went from a pretty bad offer to one I was eager to accept because another 3 GB per turn actually matters a lot to us.   The next month, we evened the score with Medoere as we liberated the citizens of Braeme. A year ago I would have said anyone would be lucky to be living under the reign of Suris Enlien, a fair and just ruler, but now that they appear to be Diemed's pawns, more eager for power than justice, I can no longer say that. We're doing a good and right thing. I have to believe that.   They don't seem to be taking it lying down. ...how many more lives will they eagerly throw away? The perceptive reader may have noticed something different about this enemy army we're facing, in particular that they're fielding almost as many groups of Knights as we are.   We take an early lead because in a Knight vs Knight fight, the one that closes first and gets the Charge bonus has a chance to get in some early hits that can snowball into a consistent advantage.   The first wave of enemies go down with mage and priest support, but then something odd happens. Enemy troops remain in the reserves on the "3D" battlefield even though they're shown as being closed with my troops on the 2D one. This might just seem graphical, but in practice it prevents my mages' spells from hitting the enemy!   I end up withdrawing several almost-dead Knight regiments into my reserves, hoping they can rejoin into full units afterwards rather than being completely annihilated.   It comes down to the wire, even my lieutenants have had to get into the fray, and many of them have had their bodyguard squads completely and utterly mauled.  That was the most intense thing I've ever experienced. How did we make it out alive? Did we all make it out alive? Barely. Haelyn must have been watching over us. CAN I KEEP THESE SKULLS? No! Put those down!  It seems our persistent resistance against greater power was inspirational, as Brosengae soon joined Taeghas in seeking an alliance with us. Both nations were vassals of Avanil, but rumour had it that neither was so entirely willingly. Were they expecting us to crush Medoere and Diemed and provide assistance against their overlord? I had never had to consider such subterfuge before.       With Braeme ours, an uneasy peace settled over the region. Medoere stopped declaring war on us, possibly because of our new alliances, and we set about fortifying Braeme and reinforcing our army. Noelon trained new regiments of knights while Hubaere and Alliene established law and order. Everything in my gut told me that this was only a temporary peace, even as I hoped that it was anything but. As a brief interlude, note how much the borders of Anuire have changed since the game started. Tuarhievel and Sielwode have been entirely consumed by the Gorgon's Crown, Endier has somehow exploded out into Alamie and is winning the war which it seems like Alamie invited, Rhuobhe seems to be holding a chunk of land in the middle of Boeruine, and I believe I see Five Peaks troop shields in both Cariele and Boeruine. Things are getting wilder by the turn.   If I asked Hubaere or Alliene, they certainly would have said that we should reclaim the Spiderfell from Medoere by force, but I had tired of all the violence and killing, not that I had ever been greatly excited for it. It had been a harsh necessity but... I hoped never to see it again, thus I approached the rulers of Medoere with a proposal, Noelon helped me with the wording. I WILL PAY YOU THIS MUCH GOLD TO gently caress OFF. And it worked! I hadn't quite expected it to, but they accepted the offer and rapidly removed their troops from the Spiderfell, leaving behind a messy, ravaged province with the local goblins and gnolls still in an uproar at the harsh treatment they'd experienced at the hands of Medoere's troops. I should have suspected something was off, due to their eagerness in signing the treaty.   Simultaneously, a spell of Warding prevented us from removing the last monsters from Ilien and a group of rampaging skeletons "happened" to appear in the Spiderfell. I don't think I can make those quote marks large enough. My only hope was to send a courier with a large amount of gold to the locals, offering to pay for them to arm themselves. We could no longer cross through Medoere as the recent hostilities had clearly voided our once-solid alliance.While chaos raiders won't burn down holdings or the like, uncastled provinces they WILL attempt to invest in, which as far as I recall just turns them into neutral provinces that anyone can attack.   Goblin cavalry is interesting. While it's weaker than knights, they also have a weak ranged attack, which means that they can support other troops in a melee even if they can't get stuck directly in themselves.  Against all odds they win, easily clearing the single unit of spiders and then spending almost three minutes beating on a bunch of skeletons until they suddenly break and flee.   I've also been fortifying both Braeme and the Spiderfell, to give me some time to react if they get attacked again. Enemy troops need a single full turn, it seems, on a non-castled province, in order for the occupier to be able to Invest in it, so each level of fortification is another turn you have before you need to clear them out. But phew, what a ride those turns were. I was CERTAIN I was going to be annihilated when Roesone and Aerenwe joined the battle, but they all seemed completely intent on facing my army in Braeme rather than, say, settling in on Ilien and sieging it down, plus Knights seem to be a a bit of a win button compared to most of the enemy force compositions in this game. For the next run I may have to have a "should Knights be banned from my armies, Y/N" vote.  Something's also up with the diplomacy. All of the independents have been vassalized by now, clearly, but the missing nations I'm not sure whether it's because it doesn't display vassals or because it happens when their regents get killed. Because I seem to recall something weird about diplomacy happens when NPC regents die. Our current point tally: 9 for 3 provinces held. 12 for 4 provinces held by our Vassals(Endier has 3 provinces) 4 points for our 2 alliances(Brosengae, Taeghas). 50 points for artifacts held(Dierdren's Ring, Brenna's Favor, Regalia of Empire) 71 points out of 300 needed to win. VOTE Should Diemed and Medoere be Conquered or Left Alone? They clearly represent a threat to us, and have shown that they want to take all our stuff, but for now they seem to be holding out some degree of peace. Medoere also prevents us from having a contiguous territory and from being able to assist Endier. Alternately we could attempt to Purchase Caerwil from Medoere to peacefully give us a path through.
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May 31, 2022 15:53
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Conquer!
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May 31, 2022 16:49
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Conquer!
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May 31, 2022 16:50
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Leave them alone. Until they try to take Spiderfell again, then kick their goddamn asses.
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May 31, 2022 17:15
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We're still playing Mr Nice, leave them alone. The next run we can be as gleefully bloodthirsty as our little hearts desire.
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May 31, 2022 17:35
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Leave them alone. They surely know the error of their ways now.
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May 31, 2022 17:48
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I take it improved fireball is just delayed blast fireball (level D6+1 dmg aoe)? Am I reading right that this dungeon also had zero spellbooks of any kind?PurpleXVI posted:As soon as I saw a spectral undead moving towards the party I didn't even stop to see what it was but just let fly with every single memorized cast of Turn Undead. The thing is that spectral undead are almost universally INCREDIBLY AWFUL in the pen and paper game, being hard to hurt and, while they can do damage, usually being more terrifying in the exciting side effects that being hit by them has. It gets even 'better' because high level poo poo like vampires can drain three levels and a few truly awful things can drain four goddamn levels per hit. I think Bodhi in BG2 is one of those 4 level draining assholes. The old TSR Goldbox AD&D PC games are absolutely lousy with level drainers too, especially the later Krynn games. At least Death Knights don't level drain otherwise they'd probably be the worst undead in any setting. Also if you get level drained to level 0 you are gone. Not dead, gone. Your character cannot be resurrected, short of maybe a Wish spell if you're lucky and the DM is merciful (lol). I'm curious to know how this game handles level 0 if it's the same thing. quote:VOTE They started the fight, let's finish it and conquer those who would attack us. We're nice people and what could be nicer than saving the peasantry from crazy, oppressive rulers?
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May 31, 2022 18:08
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Now that we've learned what happens when you try to be nice in 2e, conquer everyone.
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May 31, 2022 18:31
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Evil Fluffy posted:Also if you get level drained to level 0 you are gone. Not dead, gone. Your character cannot be resurrected, short of maybe a Wish spell if you're lucky and the DM is merciful (lol). I'm curious to know how this game handles level 0 if it's the same thing. Well, I don't intend to let one of these loving things get close to the party if it can be avoided, but I largely suspect that either because they were incompetent, pushed for time or had no idea what they were doing, level draining isn't in this game. It seems like one of those mechanics that would have required effort to implement, like poison for spiders, thief skills, saving throws, the actual Birthright mass combat system...
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May 31, 2022 19:17
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Conquer them. They started the wars, it's time to end them.
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May 31, 2022 19:58
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This game is such a weird mess, everytime you expand on the mechanics at play, my feeling on it is always a mix of thinking it's kind of charming in it's janky mess and just going straight up "What?"
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May 31, 2022 20:19
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Yeah. I keep being torn between wanting to play it, then I see something like that last dungeon that makes me firmly happy to watch Purple suffer for our enjoyment. That dungeon was... someone designed that map that way. That's just evil.
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May 31, 2022 20:26
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Randalor posted:Yeah. I keep being torn between wanting to play it, then I see something like that last dungeon that makes me firmly happy to watch Purple suffer for our enjoyment. That dungeon was... someone designed that map that way. That's just evil. The weird thing remains that they have all the game mechanics there except for a diplomatic AI, that was literally the only thing they needed. They could've just stuck with turn-based dungeons, none of this first-person .WAD weirdness. They could've just flat adapted the mass combat system. But instead we got... [gestures vaguely] this poo poo. If I wasn't already running one D&D game I'd almost be tempted to start up a Birthright PbP after this.
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May 31, 2022 20:31
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Alternative: sack and raze all holdings down to nothing and then leave. Conquering is for posers. Besides, you need room for Source holdings! Ah, level drain. It, and instant death poisons, are my least favorite tropes used in AD&D. For the first, I created a fatigue system used for a couple things (on taking lingering injuries, being reduced to 0, and general exhaustion) where it just adds fatigue If your fatigue ever goes over your level, however, you perish! Drained of all energy! For the second I replaced the arbitrary as hell poisons with my own poison table with no chance of outright instant death poisons (unless you have comically low hp). It has worked well in keeping things interesting and dangerous without being needlessly deadly!
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May 31, 2022 20:34
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That weapons are hard-coded and never change is insane, though that can be said about a lot of this game. Characters just never get stronger melee damage without strength boosts? Are there gauntlets of ogre power or girdles of [type] giant strength at least? Or are you stuck with 18 strength unless your fighter/paladin rolled 18/** strength to begin with? As hellish as those games were at times, I bet this game would be vastly improved if its adventuring system just used the old Goldbox style first person dungeon crawl and tile-based combat system. Alternately: These are WADs so just make a mod that turns it into real time FPS combat like in Heretic or Strife. 
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May 31, 2022 20:41
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There are strength-boosting magic items, at least. But the absence of magic weapons and armor is part of why high-level mages and to some extent clerics rule TGA. I personally replaced level drain with stat drain that recovered by simply resting, or in one memorable case as the vampires were bankers, their touch drained players' money instead, a different kind of horrifying.
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May 31, 2022 20:43
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Honestly there seems to be a bunch of mechanics you can exploit to break the game so I don't think banning knights in future runs is a good idea since everything works so poorly anyway. If you hadn't already said you were holding off on cheesing the game I would have expected you to try Kikoskia's method of breaking it.
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May 31, 2022 22:09
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evilmiera posted:Honestly there seems to be a bunch of mechanics you can exploit to break the game so I don't think banning knights in future runs is a good idea since everything works so poorly anyway. I agree with this. This is one of those games where nothing is balanced, therefore everything is. I like others in this thread keep going back and forth on trying it, but mostly I'm just looking forward to you breaking it good. I don't know how you would even survive without cavalry abuse regardless. Honestly, this game seems to me more of an example of the sad but common tale of a game that was very ambitious and ran out of time/skill/will/money etc. It happens often. PurpleXVI posted:There are strength-boosting magic items, at least. But the absence of magic weapons and armor is part of why high-level mages and to some extent clerics rule TGA. In the 2e days we basically did the temporary debuff as well. It was still terrifying, but not ridiculous. I never played before 2e, so we missed out joyfully on instant-death poison. I'm not voting as I have no bloody clue what is going on, but two questions: 1) Did you actually do that adventure thrice, or were you reloading? I remember you saying that the player can quit an adventure at any time, so I was not sure. 2) Secondly, is it possible to play a passive game of diplomacy like in some Civilisation games, or is this all guaranteed to devolve into an utter ruin of alliances, declarations of war and betrayals? JustJeff88 fucked around with this message at 00:10 on Jun 1, 2022 |
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Jun 1, 2022 00:06
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Copious use of level-draining undead has always been, in my experience, ample justification for punching your DM in the face. It's just such a blatant "gently caress you" to the players that no player, ever, anywhere, has been cool with it
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Jun 1, 2022 00:28
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JustJeff88 posted:I'm not voting as I have no bloody clue what is going on, but two questions: Barring game-breaking bugs or the like, there will be no reloads in this run. I had to do the adventure three times, meaning that rather than spending 1/3rd of a turn on it, I've spent 3/3rds of a turn on it. And a diplomatic victory is pretty possible, vassals are worth a lot of points, and technically you can vassalize just about anyone short of the Gorgon if you have enough money. So if you start as an economic powerhouse, immediately vassalize a bunch of independent churches and traders, and then use that money to literally buy your neighbours, you could get most of a victory that way. Winning purely on vassals would require 100 provinces worth of vassals(minus the province you actually own), however, which I think would be almost all the game map, and the Gorgon and his two vassals are guaranteed to cut into that. So you'd probably want to back it up with some adventuring to secure more points.
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Jun 1, 2022 00:47
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Do just the enemies respawn when you restart an adventure, the loot, or both?
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Jun 1, 2022 00:55
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JustJeff88 posted:Do just the enemies respawn when you restart an adventure, the loot, or both? Both. Hence, say, if there's an adventure with an easily reached spellbook, that's good for wizards with poor starting spells, a mission stacked with Ioun Stones is just generally good, a mission full of rings of regen and cloaks of protection can also be milked, etc. Of course, you're giving up strategic level actions to gain that loot, but it may still be worth your time if you've burned out on gold or regency for the turn anyway.
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Jun 1, 2022 01:03
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DivineCoffeeBinge posted:Copious use of level-draining undead has always been, in my experience, ample justification for punching your DM in the face. Yeah you really only use those to occasionally try to bring some drama to fights. Because suddenly it isn't just the one last HP that's important, it's important not to get hit at all, which forces the players to create defensive strategies. As a DM you don't actually want the players to get hit by level-draining things, you just want them to worry that they might, which is why all of the few times I've unleashed such things I always drop the DM screen to let them know "this monster can level drain and that's really REALLY bad in this edition". The only time that's failed was a rather distractable player whose gnome I/T decided to facetank three wraiths without Mirror Image up.  And in that case he was so close to the next level I decided that he got just enough for it before getting drained, so no real XP setbacks. (Also that nation's prince was very fond of the party and was able to run interference with the local priestly bigwigs so earning the Restoration wasn't very costly.)
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Jun 1, 2022 01:29
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