Into the Chokesverse: Let's Play SSI Gold Box Forgotten Realms

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Let's Play! > Into the Chokesverse: Let's Play SSI Gold Box Forgotten Realms

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

Stumbled across this LP recently and read through it over the past week or so. Never got in to the FR goldbox games but I played the hell out of the Dragonlance ones. God bless Solamnic Knights and their stupidly overpowered sword/rose paths.

# ¿ Dec 23, 2020 06:08

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# ¿ May 8, 2024 07:54

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

I briefly played SSB back when I got the goldbox collection and all I remember is finding a +4 silver shield that also worked as a mirror(?) shortly in to the game, and then seeing that Myth Drannor was a location to explore, hoping to be able to assemble the Arm of Valor, and getting wrecked by encounters right off the bat.

# ¿ Jan 4, 2021 21:52

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

Chokes McGee posted:

You're thinking of Pools of Darkness. This game is much less interesting.

Oh, really? Guess I remember even less about this quadrilogy than I thought. :v:

# ¿ Jan 4, 2021 23:05

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

The copy of Bard's Tale 3 I bought years ago had a bug where if you class changed a caster to the same job it turned them in to a warrior. A warrior who had access to every single spell in the game (but only when in combat).

Considering how much of a hellish nightmare grind BT3 is for a new party, you better believe I abused the hell out of that to level my party as fast as possible due to the high damage, low mp cost of geomancer spells and that earth elemental summons were strong as hell. You could also swap between caster classes infinitely so all my casters had 50+ points in every stat, mountains of hp/mp, and still got their poo poo wrecked by random encounters.

It also had a bug(?) that, after killing the crypt boss in skara brae, turned all casters in to archmages at their current level and backfilled their spells. Considering how powerful even 2nd world encounters were this probably was intended though.

No matter how bad these Gold Box games look at times, there were far worse options available.

# ¿ Jan 5, 2021 21:57

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

Straight White Shark posted:

It actually is that bad. There are lots of encounters around town that will wreck a starting party, and advancement is very slow.

I played Bard's Tale on the NES and it was a very different (but still fairly difficult at times) game. As soon as you got the 'turn enemy in to a figurine' spell I'd just run to the Mangar Guard statue, start that fight, figurine them, and then use the figure so I'd have a late game enemy as a party member and they murdered stuff hard for the first 1/3 or so of the game.

And copious amounts of making new characters to take their money until I could buy the best gear (see also: Wizardry and Dragon Quest 3, not that DQ3 needed it but a chain sickle and full leather eq at lvl 1 was fun).

# ¿ Jan 6, 2021 17:36

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

Anias posted:

FF1 still has speed runs on the original cart. The Bard's Tale is not run on any platform that I can find a leaderboard for, it has a youtube but noone cares to contest it.

That should tell you all you need to know.

FF1 has RNG bullshit, but it's -far less- and also more interesting. The Seventh Saga has speed runs. Just let that percolate in your mind a moment.

7th Saga can be broken open in ways Bard's Tale really can't. Plus it's just the NA version of 7th Saga that is a grindy hell due to the localization loving with stats and levelup gains, iirc (which is why apprentices become impossible to beat in fights later on).

Chokes McGee posted:

I love NES Bard's Tale because the people adapting the code took one look at it, went "gently caress that," and made their own game based on it.

NES Bard's Tale was honestly fun to be as a kid simply because it was so drat hard until you got the final tier of magician spells and just wiped all encounters with dragon breath or w/e their big aoe was called.

# ¿ Jan 6, 2021 20:12

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

DGM_2 posted:

I wonder if the nomads and barbarians got accidentally switched around in the encounter tables? Even in the days when CRPG design was uncharted territory you'd think tabletop experience would have told the developers to not do that kind of thing on purpose.

Please re-read this LP and refresh yourself on how batshit early D&D mechanics were. Particularly the permanent stat loss that could come from increasingly common sources (feeblemind, dying and coming back with raise dead instead of resurrection, etc). Tabletop gaming could easily be even more unforgiving. Especially if your D|M was one of those people who actually enforced spell component mechanics.

# ¿ Jan 7, 2021 06:40

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

I take it Blades has an xp/level cap and then PoD has no cap like DQK?

# ¿ Jan 11, 2021 05:38

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

Chokes McGee posted:

I know absolutely nothing about them other than knowing I had problems with the first one due to party management. I can't really do a game very well unless I'm at least passingly familiar with it. Same engine, sure, but still different mechanics and such.

Solamnic Knights of the Sword/Rose are fighter/clerics with all the perks and none of the downsides (other than leveling slowly, but it's still faster than a dual class char, iirc). By the time you hit the level cap in DKK you can strongly consider dropping any clerics you have for more knights and just run something like 3 knights and 2-3 mages with maybe a thief or something too. You can grab some crazy powerful gear pretty much immediately after leaving the intro for DKK (girdle of giant strength + other stuff in one small area, a +4 longsword/shield in another, etc).

Reading Chokes' LP of these games makes me want to replay the Krynn games and I'd be tempted to LP them but the write-ups... :effort:

# ¿ Jan 14, 2021 16:26

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

I can't believe Chokes died and the LP is being run by Tyranthraxus now.

# ¿ Feb 4, 2021 16:09

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

I think I remember these mines, though not all 10 floors of it because holy hell that's a lot of tedious poo poo. Is this the part where you can find a silver shield +4 that reflects gaze attacks and some similarly buff weapons?

# ¿ Mar 28, 2021 21:15

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

I started replaying Baldur's Gate recently and when I saw a note mentioning how someone (I think the Iron Throne?) were planning to scapegoat the Zhentarim it made me think back to this LP and how the Zhentarim have been on the receiving end in video games for decades. Poor bastards. :allears:

# ¿ Apr 3, 2021 03:03

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

I had very strong chills for about 16 hours or so that fully went away about a day and a half after they started. Aside from that and the general aches most people have, the side-effects weren't too bad.

Nemo2342 posted:

Except for when the DM railroads you and decides that magical healing can't cure your plague.

See also: Goku getting a disease with no cure at the time despite the existence of multiple wish-granting dragons they have almost immediate access to.

# ¿ Apr 16, 2021 19:40

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

I remember playing Stone Prophet and one of the areas had a ton of mummies and goddamn their disease effects sucked.

# ¿ Apr 20, 2021 17:26

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

PurpleXVI posted:

So what the heck is the point of the Elixir of Youth? Is magical aging really a threat in these games?

I'm 99% certain that these games have the old age penalties coded in (which include poo poo like permanent stat changes as you get old and frail) and if you're a human, and why wouldn't you be a human, it can get problematic if you enjoy being hasted in hard fights because it adds up fast.

If you're an elf then who cares because elves start at something like 200 years old and iirc old age penalties don't kick in until around 450 or so for them. Plus you'll be dead long before then and since bringing dead elves back to life is a huge PITA you'll make a replacement human character long before old elven age matters.

FeyerbrandX posted:

So we've got Thunk gargoyles, Trollface Elementals, what's next?

Kappa Demons? Some other meme ghosts ?

O RLY Owlbears.

ok that's maybe a lie.

# ¿ May 16, 2021 19:05

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

Chokes McGee posted:

Oh it's even better in Gold Box. When an elf dies, they die. No way to bring them back, period. Just lol roll a new character.

I will reiterate that this plus level caps means there is no reason whatsoever to play anything other than a human in Gold Box. None. You can get away with it if you're only going to play Pool or Curse but if you're planning on going farther than that you better be able to go over your hard caps or you're gonna die.

I thought the Forgotten Realms games in the Gold Box set had Resurrection for 7th circle cleric spells. Do Clerics just not get 7th circle spells in Blades/Darkness or is Resurrection not among those spells? Or is it there and the FR games just go "lol nope gently caress your elf" if you try to resurrect them?

# ¿ May 17, 2021 01:06

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

Murgos posted:

Just caught up and wanted to give you a thumbs up.

Bringing back old memories of playing gold box games all summer. My recollection is that Krynn games are better than these but really a lot more of the same. I also remember thinking that the gold box Buck Rogers game was the best of the lot.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buck_Rogers:_Countdown_to_Doomsday

Although I do remember ridiculous rooms full of mobs in that one too.

The dragonlance games are much better but dragonlance is better than forgotten realms so that�s a given.

# ¿ May 31, 2021 14:42

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

All this talk about bad Dragonlance characters and yet none of them are as tedious as Drizzt.

# ¿ Jun 6, 2021 03:05

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# ¿ May 8, 2024 07:54

Evil Fluffy: Jul 13, 2009; Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

Reminder that new Dragonlance novels are in the works. I would love to see Beamdog take their reverse-engineered infinity engine and make some Dragonlance games since the cowards at Bioware never did. :argh:

# ¿ Jun 8, 2021 03:42

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Let's Play! > Into the Chokesverse: Let's Play SSI Gold Box Forgotten Realms