kensuguro

I think you can kill Sulfras without much problem if you're level is high enough to finish the game. (in normal, not sure on higher difficulty)

Whaatt... that's pretty serious issue in the first time user experience.. it's a usability issue..

It'd be interesting if they employed people from the Abyss to rid the enemies for pay. I mean, they can kill for a living. Sounds like a pretty good deal, esp for the murderer folks.

whaatt.. you can eliminate all of Kyass? That's heart breaking. I think I killed all the dragons and Thantria. Thantria just got on my nerves, such an attitude. I guess I can off the hermit. So there really aren't any other places other than the land exit and Erika's place where enemies spawn on user action?

I don't really have time to replay the whole thing, so I'm just running around finishing quests and looking for things to kill. I already killed the town in the Abyss, killed Sulfras, and finished all quests that I can finish. I can still: 1. go through sulfras' place and kill respawning monsters on the passage to land. (that last room with the runeward and steelward giants) You get a ghostly blade and resurrect scroll each time, so I'm keeping this to keep count how many times I killed those bastards. 2. go to Erika's place and kill monsters that spawn from doing the maze the wrong way, not too much fun, but still something to do (turns out they don't respawn) 3. wander around 'till a monster spawns, but this is boring. Is there anything else I can kill? It'd be nice to go back into Hawthorne's castle since the castle guards keep respawning.

ey, the don't get paid enough to fight. lol.

ah, ok. so it's not all that awesome. I was wondering if it was a part of a scripted event since I remember it being a special item. Oh, found it.. I guess I took it from a coffin in the foul cavern. btw, another strange item is the strange cloak.. I guess it just shimmers? fashion statement? It doesn't seem to have any special properties. I guess it'll make you look like this, which is totally rad lookin'

I have a wavy sword I picked up somewhere (forgot where) that's not enchanted.. is it supposed to do something? It's not really powerful either, but I remember picking it up as a special event kind of thing. Know what I'm talking about?

Ya, I was confused with that part too. there is no physical key, it's the crystal.

Just out of curiosity.. there are shady ninja type characters in both Avernum and Avadon. I guess they're not really ninjas like ninjas from Japan, but more like a secretive clan that kind of "look" like ninjas. In my mind, I tend to think of these types as high egility/dexterity theives.. are ninjas pretty common in fantasy rpgs these days? They seem kind of out of place to me. Ninjas and dragons.. just a bit strange. Tho, I am Japanese, or at least grew up partially in Japan, so my views are definitely biased. Interestingly, even in Japan ninjas are somewhat of a fantasy thing. They're real, historical, factual clans, but because of secrecy and maybe some strategically planted lore, they tend to be thought of somewhere between fact and fiction.

Ya,I agree about killing the leader not necessarily placing you in control. As rebellious as their project may be, it seems to be carried out in a civil manner. Besides, if you're there to unite them back to Avernum, it's exactly what they don't want, so of course they're going to be pissed. I do wish Kyass good luck though I'm not sure what happens to them later in the series. It's an interesting concept. Avernum getting all resources and power is not much different from Hawthorne's absolute power (maybe without the paranoia and evil intent) but would still create a huge power asymmetry. Then the weak would come together and demand equality. So an opposition or independent force like Kyass is a good form of checks and balances, if they're able to coexist with others but cooperate when required. (sort of like independent states and federal government) Though somehow I'm lead to believe that Avernum is not such a peaceful and diplomatic place.

Did you buff with wards and cloaks? I haven't tried on torment yet, but planning to, and was wondering if that'll make some difference. I'd imagine invulnerability would still turn the battle upside down even on torment.

I wouldn't be surprised if certain npcs were just hard coded that way.. is this just a particular guard in the royal spire? (you're talking about hawthorne's place right?) Also, could it be that the particular guard has modifier items that starts his hit rate way above 100%? Or that torment level starts enemy's hit probability above 100%? But I guess it's still strange that there's such a huge variance. How are you measuring hit rate btw? Are you tracing out results from a hit rate function through a debugger or something?

I bought a bunch of spells and money flow was alright. I think I had most spells by the time I got to stagnant tunnels. It seems like you missed lots of quests, or are hitting points that are above your level. I can't map it out exactly, but the quests need to be done in a specific order. Go whack some random monsters and do the smaller quests. If Areneas are killing you that quick, you may have also missed smaller "kill the boss" quests. Which Arenea cave are you talking about? The one by the friendly spiders? Or the hidden one with the queen in it? The queen one is much harder.

yeah, what would have been nice is if you killed Athron, you could have just gotten the password from the death, like she tells with last breath kinda thing. Then you'd have the option to kill, and foolproof password retrieval.