Men are from Slars

*facetentacle*

It looks like it would be much easier than in G4 to go back and forth a few times and get the rewards from everyone. Let me go check on that, though.

Clawbugs have a base level of 10 and a natural bonus of +4 to their attack level. Plated bugs have a base level of 16 and a natural bonus of +0 to their attack level. 6 levels is 3 points of Strength, which means that a freshly created clawbug will do exactly 1d5 damage more per hit than a plated bug. Obviously, if you make the clawbug earlier and let it level up more, its damage goes up further. However, the plated bug will almost always do more damage *when it gets both attacks in*, and this in fact just increases at higher levels, since 1d5 + poison damage becomes a smaller fraction of the total damage done.

Is it possible to make the game unwinnable by, for example, killing all five faction leaders? I think I still have some vain hope for an Aodare style ending.

I am still too impatient to repeatedly pick up and then sell 5 million times over the course of the game. I just keep an eye of the value of all the loot I see, and every time it gets close to 500, "iampoor".

Correction: the value of the *first shot* of that effect goes up dramatically. The value of additional shots is much lower on any difficulty setting since it doesn't increase the damage much. So Acid Spray is always very useful, but a Searing Artila whose attack does 80 less direct damage than a Wingbolt's, will still be less effective than a wingbolt -- even ignoring the fact that you can cast the acid yourself. Taking that into account, a vlish will be better than the searing artila.

Dear Uber Ur-drakon, I was once your age. I thought I knew everything, and I unleashed myself upon the internet with that attitude. It was a learning experience. So please take some advice from a kindred spirit 15 years removed: you don't know everything and the sooner you stop being so dramatic about everything, the sooner people will start to treat you with respect.

There are two spells with similar names. The one we are talking about only cures poison and acid, and is sold in Isenwood's Spire for 80 gold. I think the other, more expensive one is called Banish Affliction.

It costs 80 coins.

Um, Cure Affliction cures poison. It requires a Healing Craft skill of, I believe, 1, to cast. You can buy it beginning in the third zone in the game. Calm down, dude.

In may day, we programmed in BASIC, and variable names were limited to one or two alphabet letters. Now I just wait for Randomizer to make some comment about VAX assembly or whatnot.

...appears to be pretty constant, regardless of the strength of the attack that caused it. At any rate, my tests with 3 Battle Magic and 17 Battle Magic produced exactly the same results. Stronger attacks just make the condition last longer. This suggests that these effects are more useful at low levels, but also that they are very useful for all singletons, including those who are not magic-oriented. On the other hand, it suggests that high-level status-inflicting creations may not be the best way to inflict them; replacing your artila with a wingbolt and just casting searer once will definitely be more efficient. Damage for poison is around 30, acid is around 55, and lightning aura is around 90.

No, even better -- Cerebrous Wyrm! I knew he (it?) was too cool of a character to be a one-shot.

From memory, I think Alphas have 40% phys and 20% fire/ice resist, so they are better against drayks. Although the clawbug poison effect possibly makes up for this in damage output. Clawbugs have 30% phys. The only real difference between a lifecrafter & shock trooper, as far as defense goes, is the HP multiplier, which shouldn't ever make much of a difference when you are 1 target of 8. (i.e., if you're going to run out of HP, it's probably by a lot and not a little.) Remember that you aren't going to have to invest in shaping skill OR intelligence much in the second half of the game. That gives you over 100 skill points to put wherever you want. Mental magic WILL become a viable defensive option.

Turning in Mehken gives such an amazing reward. It's one of the best rewards in the game, actually, and it's practically the first one you can get. And despite what it would imply, I don't think it restricts you from anything else later in the game -- somebody else might be able to confirm that. The easy, early +3 to Int is one of the main reasons shaping is so great in this game. Combined with incredibly rapid levelling up in the demo, it all but obliterates the early part of past Geneforge games where Shapers have not had enough essence to really flex their muscle.

As long as nobody suggests Erika or Rentar-Ihrno, I'll be happy.

They don't necessarily need to have one at all times. There are areas that are simpler for a singleton with mental magic, than for a half-baked shaper.

Completing the demo area alone should get you to level 15, even with creations. (My munchkin servile got to level 20!) You can have a natural Intelligence of 7 at that point (base 4 + report servile + use geneforge + student's belt). For a shaper-type, getting to 10 in shaping costs only 28 skill points for battle, 34 for magic, 36 for fire. Getting to moderate levels of Mechanics & Leadership is even cheaper, and Int boosts start at 5 a pop. By level 15 you have a total of 85 skill points to play with -- that's more than enough to get, say, 12 Int (for 202 essence), 6 or 8 mech and leadership and at least 10 in a shaping skill. You'll likely have another level or two by the time you get to Quothe in Astoria's caves, anyway. By the time the really good creations are available, you'll likely be level 25 or 30, which puts you at close to 400 essence just from 12 Int. A few more points from level ups and items gets you to an easy 18, for nearly 600 essence. You can get higher if you want. The goal is NOT to start making high levelled cryoas in the third zone, unless you want to go the fire shaping route, in which case you handicap Int and just make two cryoas, which is all you'll need anyway. Otherwise you start making high levelled creations when you get clawbugs, plated bugs, or vlish.

Right, essence is the only real disadvantage since you aren't likely to buy more than 10 or so points in a shaping skill, anyway. The point is that the gap between lifecrafter and sorceress is much smaller than the gap between sorceress and servile -- something you yourself had implied in an earlier post. Buying 10 points of a shaping skill will cost a servile 30 points more than a lifecrafter, and the essence/Int handicap is sizable -- 2 points less Int on top of 6/8 the final essence.

Hmm. G2 and G3 it costs 50. Okay, I'm crazy.

Apparently ice breath uses 30 energy now. It was zero in earlier games, at least in G2 and G3.

Right, that has nothing to do with what I said. ...at this point, whatever.

Originally Posted By: Delicious Vlish G5 shaping feels like G1 shaping. Really it's like G3 shaping. In G1, bonus levels from shaping skill gave +1 to each stat per level, which level ups produced only +1 every other level, so levels gained through shaping skill were strictly superior. Also, a shaper could get to 30 shaping skill in no time at all. G5 is like G3, where creation level ups are important and shaping skill is also important, but at closer to the +10 point.

Battles *are* shorter on Normal. Eyebeasts can run out even on Normal. Cryoa and Cryodrayk attacks use 0 energy, I believe. The fire attacks use 4 energy, and a level 1 or 2 Fyora in G1 is required to not recharge that much energy every round.

If you reaaaaaally wanted to, you could edit a zone script to provide a set of dialogues, checking for various values of the canister use SDF, and telling you which you had.