Colonel Haste

My take is that AEFTP is more close to Avadon in terms of creating true classes than anything else in the Avernum or Geneforge series. The reason is that you don't have to pay increasingly more skill points to improve skills as you go along. In Avernum games I typically found myself playing with two fighter mages and two figher priests because as the game went along I didn't want to, say, pay two levels worth of skill points to improve my tank's Blademaster by one point. Instead I'd put the points towards spell-casting. Here that just doesn't work very well since I am not allocating Intelligence to my fighters, which limits their ability to multi-task. So I've ended up with characters that have Avadon type classes.

The biggest problem I'm having is trying to figure out where to go when. I blundered into the Slith island too early after getting the quest at Cotra. Came back many levels later (after visiting Micah) and it still seems awfully difficult. I don't think I'm going to go upstairs yet. Not sure quite where to go next. Indeed I'm a bit concerned there's an area I've skipped that will be far too easy when I get there. So I'm not sure if anything can be done to appease those of us who might prefer a more linear approach or at least clues as to how to do that. I can handle hard difficulty if I'm prepared for it but it's more annoying if I keep randomly bumbling into it. (Especially after enjoying your more recent games where this isn't an issue). I tried reading one of the old walkthroughs for the original Avernum to get a clue as to the progress order but it wasn't detailed enough. Maybe somewhere publish a rough hint of areas to tackle in order? Still, enjoying the game, glad I bought it, keep up the great work, etc.

I have given Negotiator to two of my characters. I assume the 10% bonus is cumulative but has anyone tested this? Thanks in advance.

For me I do try to role play the characters. I liked A5 because in many cases it was "legit" to steal depending on your viewpoint. In A6 I mostly couldn't steal and still consider myself a true soldier. In this game I'm doing some minor stealing early on because I still haven't figured out if I'm really trying to adjust to life in Avernum or whether it's just do whatever I can to get out and get revenge. So I'm trying not to steal and call attention to myself, but on the other hand if someone is a jerk to me or its strongly in my self interest to steal something I might.

Ok, my mistake. I didn't realize you were supposed to do Formello before finishing the Cotra quests. I haven't been there yet. Thanks for the feedback.

My first impression is pretty severe disappointment in balance. Not right at the beginning, but I'm now at the Slith island which is a quest from Cotra so I believe it is still part of the demo. (Since I paid I'm not sure). I have completed all other quests that seem possible to have completed and have been to Fort Dranlon and bought better spells. I have read Randomizer's advice on how not to suck. And my two melee fighters have about a 10% chance to hit the Slith warriors that I face right when I walk in the room. I die. I try again, buffing more in advance. Almost die again and run away. Come to the forums to see what I'm doing wrong, am I the only one going through this? I'm sure I'll get through the fight soon enough but it's pretty frustrating just swinging and missing, swinging and missing, swinging and missing. I'm playing on Normal and am an SWEB vet. In retrospect I probably put too much into arcane lore and cave lore (roughly four or five each) but even if I had put it towards melee I'm thinking it would only be a few percentage higher to hit. Maybe I need to remove some armor? Or is this just the way it goes and I need to move to Casual if I don't like it? TL;DR: Why can't I hit Sliths when I seemingly am at the stage when I'm supposed to be fighting them?

This was a hard one for me to answer. I picked one-shots but am not sure that really describes me. I had the AD&D Dungeon Master Guide nearly memorized back in maybe 1985 or something but was too antisocial to have actually played in long campaigns with anyone. I remember buying dungeons (or whatever the pre-made booklets were called) and also designing my own, and then playing them with just me and my best friend and maybe one of our brothers. By the time Exile came out I was in college (or grad school?) and my tabletop days were over. Since then I'm not sure I've ever played any other non-SW RPGs except for Baldur's Gate. So I guess I'm an SW fanboy with non-relevant AD&D experience?

One problem here is the assumption that the opponents have relatively the same capabilities as the PCs. At any time after the very early game the PCs tend to be loaded for bear with their Super-Ultra-Sword+10 and Ring-of-Kill-Everything and Helm-of-Telepathy, etc. (How come nobody we kill is ever nearly as decked out as we are?) How much does this gear affect our intrinsic abilities? I haven't done the math but would guess in the average sweb game it adds at least 50% to the PC's capabilities. In other words, all else being equal I think I'd rather have a 10th level PC Guardian equipped with the average loot obtainable by that point than a 15th level NPC Guardian equipped with a bronze sword and iron helm. Add to that the fact that if you are willing to fight to the death (and don't care about conservation) you have an effectively unlimited supply of potions, pods, and wands for any one fight whereas your opponent has, at best, a single potion. Finally the PC usually has the ability to dictate the terms of the fight (ie to attack first or retreat). Short of "cheating" or having an unusually advanced AI you need to face superior opponents or there is no challenge at all.

I am indeed using my shadowwalker as a ranged fighter. I can't say whether it's optimal or not, although I do love the fact that Dex helps with both offense and defense, making the pump decision easy. I'm playing on Hard, not a singleton, and usually go out with a BM and sorceress. At level 26 I don't think I've had to reload since the last fight in the Beraza pits, which took me two tries. In brief, my strategy is to spread the party out. In order to use backstab by definition you have to have two characters in contact with a single enemy. This makes you vulnerable not just to getting hit but also to cleave and area attacks. I prefer standing back and hitting with razordisks and area spells. I use the BM to block and get in close but have also given him a lot of ranged skill. Another factor that rewards being able to hit from afar is that there are a bunch of boss fights so far where it is almost impossible to close to melee range. Offhand I can think of the one where the spell caster keeps teleporting around early in the game, and then later when you are fighting 8 drakes at a time in a big room. Coincidentally however after posting that I didn't like the Battle Frenzy skill, in the next half hour I spent playing I got a free Battle Frenzy twice. And I am of course sometimes using backstab even if it isn't my primary strategy. So I'll take it back. But I don't regret starting this conversation, I do think it is interesting. I also think it is relevant to the other thread going on right now where the person is arguing that you can't specialize once you pick a class. At a minimum the shadowwalker has two viable builds.

My vote for the most useless skill is maxing out the bottom middle skill for the Shadowwalker, which gives you a chance at going into battle frenzy when you are hit in melee. At least for me, since I'm pumping Dex like crazy to avoid getting hit and for better razor disk attacks, I think I got a free battle frenzy maybe twice and I'm now at level 26. This would be much more useful for the Blademaster who isn't likely pumping Dex.

I went down into the pits with my Shadowwalker along with the Shaman and Sorceress on the mistaken assumption that I'd have extra melee help with me. So I wasn't really set up well for this battle. But I did manage to (barely) survive the first time through (on Hard) by doing this: - Speed potions for my Shadowwalker, exclusively throwing razordisks at the demon. - Ignoring the imps as much as I could but using the other two to shield and heal and keep the imps away from the Shadowwalker. - I did this fight before even thinking about the wheels, so the imps guarding the wheels did not join the fight against me. I was easily able to mop them up later.

I was a bit disappointed you couldn't avoid the rune by teleporting across. Finally, I thought, a great use for teleport! But no. I couldn't find the switch and now I'm like at level 13 and still haven't completed the quest. I guess I'll go back next time I'm in town and complete it just to get it off my list. And if I'm offended by the reward I guess I can always just kill her.

I don't think so. But even worse than getting the skill points drained is that you cannot enter the Shaper towns for the rest of the game, meaning you miss out on a lot of quests. When this happened to me I decided to just accept it and play on as a true rebel. It's a bit more of a challenge but you can have fun and get a better ending that way too.

I like the auto-healing. In A6 I would fully heal after every fight and never had a resource issue. Mainly because First Aid was so useful. But also I used a dedicated fighter with one level of Priest and even with an Intelligence of 1 for part of the game where he had the endurance knife he always had enough SP to fully heal the party. But the healing was a bit of a grind; I sometimes had to cast it 8 or 10 times. Woo hoo, I saved some SP from my real Priest, but yet I kept doing the grind because it made strategic sense. Anything that elminates the grind is good.

I find myself with a whip and a fishing rod and various other worthless items in the fear that a collection quest looms in the future. This doesn't increase my enjoyment so I'm interested in knowing whether I can relegate this stuff to my junk bag. Also, I'm wondering how much to sell versus save my items. What generally do we end up spending money on in this game? Unlike Avernum it seems you can't buy training or spells, so am I just saving up for a fancy new scarab (or 20 scarabs?), or are there other uses for money as the game progresses? Thanks in advance, Colonel Haste and his trusty Shadowwalker Rafe.

So far (at level 5) I am a bit bored with just choosing to pump one of the four main attributes. However I have not even really begun to comprehend the subtleties of the skill system, so I think that will give me enough strategy choice with leveling up to keep me satisfied at least in the core RPG regard. I do like the feel although I'm more used to Avernum than Geneforge so the real-time aspect takes some getting used to. Avadon itself is huge, as are the other areas. It took me awhile to get my bearings, and there was perhaps too much info to take in early on as opposed to fighting. In particular after spending a lot of time wandering around Avadon you leave and the next town is also a town. It might have been nice to put a mostly-fighting area in between. But overall it seems pretty great, and of course I have already gladly paid the $25. Great work Jeff if you see this.

So, first time through, how will you be doing it?

It's now live on the website. Have at it.

The original topic was actually the question of when Avadon will launch. I'm betting on this weekend, either Saturday between 2 pm and 5 pm Pacific time or Sunday during the same window. I base this on (1) the promise of a late February release and (2) the timing of the posts in the Announcements forum for the last three releases. All were weekend late afternoon announcements.

I don't find myself ever using Stunning Blow either. Sometimes a stun can be very useful, but I use the shockwave bow to apply stuns where appropriate. Are there tactical situations where it also pays to use a Stunning Blow?

I agree, but DW is comparatively less effective early, at least if you plan to use the trainer and invest in DW.

There are subtle differences between DW and Pole that are perhaps worth mentioning. 1) Well Aimed Blow and Mighty Blow make Pole better comparatively because you only get that on the first strike. 2) Cloak of Curses makes DW better because you get double the chance to add a curse. 3) Similarly swords that slow or curse make DW better comparatively. 4) Pole works better for sliths, meaning DW is comparatively better for humans and nephil. 5) Pole is more effective early and DW is more effective late. Since I die more often in the early game than late game this affects the strategic choice. Bottom line, it is definitely more than just adding to damage, but these differences are admittedly subtle. They are more likely to appeal to the hard core like those of us who read the boards. (Of course the DW coolness factor has perhaps the opposite effect.) My last thought is that I think the shields in A6 are pretty great. You can get one eyebeast chitin pretty early and by end game you can get two of those plus two quicksilver bulwarks. Given the excellent shields and my preference for the better early game action of Pole, I had to seriously consider whether to use DW or not, notwithstanding the better late game damage.

Interesting. I do use Control Foe quite a lot particularly when facing battles with Nephilim Archers and the dark green sliths. Even with Control Foe though I had to run from the fang clan. The endurance though, wow, I thought I was putting a lot there but haven not been pumping it to that level. I guess I know where my next batch of skill points will go. Thanks for the feedback.

I'm a long time Spiderweb enthusiast having played Exile before Exile II even existed. But I'm relatively new to these boards and have always played on Normal until recently. After reading a lot here I decided to have a go at A6 on Torment. I wanted to check in and see if my experience is typical or if I'm just not cutting it from a tactical perspective. The problem I'm having is that in many, perhaps most, medium serious fights I'm having trouble finishing without having one or more team members going unconscious. Many times this necessitates a retreat back to town, followed by a return to finish the fight, and this is tormenting me. I'm pretty sure I've done an adequate job building my party so this probably isn't my problem. I also know A6 having completed it twice previously, once on Normal and once on Hard. I'm using the full available set of buffs before all relevant fights. It is possible that I should be using more potions, wands and scrolls. I tend to be conservative and given the way I've built my party I don't necessarily need to save up for late game. So I will try being a bit more aggressive in that regard. But I don't think even substantially more aggressive use would would be enough to eliminate the retreat requirement. FWIW I'm now just about to head into the Abyss having done everything prior to that except for the honeycomb and a few battles that I just can't win (eg crypt wight). An example of a medium serious fight where I had to retreat and reload was the fang clan bandits near the Tower Colony. I don't remember this fight being particularly tough, but I had to take out the mage and chief separately. Since I've completed nearly everything I can up to this point I feel like this should be a doable fight without having to run. But putting expendable magic aside, is this just the way it is in Torment in A6, or do I need to go back to school on tactics? Note that I'm not reloading all that often; I'm usually able to survive as long as I don't mind cutting and running and coming back.