Kelandon

It was 1).

Okay, to be clear: Nethergate used the original version of the Avernum engine, which had the isometric graphics engine of Nethergate, Avernum 1-3, and N:R, but not the scripts of Geneforge/BoA/Avernum 4-6/Avadon/N:R. Nethergate used nodes much like BoE's nodes. So it was a transitional engine. As far as dialogue, I believe it was closer to BoE: there were still keywords and such, rather than selections as in Avernum, right? (I say from a maybe decade-old memory.) I'm not sure how one would accomplish outdoor dialogue in BoA. You need a dialogue script loaded, and the game doesn't load one for an outdoor section. The call begin_talk_mode() works, but it gives an error for lack of dialogue script. Has this actually been done successfully by someone? If so, where?

Four? Good lord. I only came across one. Another thing to find on a replay.... It seems as though there's a LOT in Avadon 2 that requires looking in the right place at the right time. I never found most of the optional fights, and I don't think I completed all of the sidequests, despite trying very hard to (and finishing off everything in the quest list). This is a weird design choice. Not bad, necessarily, just really different from, say, Avernum 1.

It is true that there aren't the same kinds of quest chains to get weapons in the later games as there were to get Demonslayer. You do some fetching of major items in Avernum 6 (including Demonslayer), but there's no "wander around and find 3 pieces and then reforge it" in quite the same way anywhere. And it would be cool if there were, especially if it proves necessary for a fight, as with Garzahd in Avernum 2.

You might also check the quest list. It may tell you something informative.

This is a really good idea.

I mean, the games are full of high-end items and spells. It's just that there aren't game-breaking items and spells because Jeff has decided that he wants to control the level of challenge for fights and make sure that they're always a little hard. Frankly, I'm not sure that was a good decision. I liked being able to explore and fight monsters that were the wrong level for me from time to time and then come back totally overpowered for the particular quest that I was on, back in Avernum 1. And there were spells that were grossly overpowered (Divine Warrior) in Avernum 1 and 2. And there are still stats that are grossly overpowered (Dexterity) in some later games (Avadon 1). And that's kind of fun. But Jeff is trying to move towards a very tactical, balanced, linear game. It's sort of a bold move for someone who started doing something rather different, really. Come to think of it, it seems to me that when there are spells that are totally overpowered, it's usually blessing spells (Divine Warrior, Call of the Frenzy), not direct damage spells (meh Divine Retribution or Arcane Blow). Maybe I'm wrong about that, because I frankly don't use high-level direct damage spells all that much, but I'm really accustomed to casting Bless and Haste before combat.

There probably will not be any future versions of this game. You can watch your characters' progress on the Tab map and then click again on where you want to go if you're blocked, and that usually resolves it.

I really enjoy the huge fights involving groups of allies and enemies, but most Spiderweb games don't end that way. Avernum 6 is the only one that comes to mind. Otherwise, you're either fighting a single enemy (Redbeard) or a group of enemies with a boss (Hawthorne). There are some mid-game fights of that nature (Konstina in Avadon 2, Ornotha Ziggurat in Avernum 2, Solberg in Avernum 6), so it's not a technical problem. It's just a design choice.

Given that the top topic on this forum was already on this very topic, I'll lock this and point you there. And also direct you to read the replies to your posts before creating new topics, now that I notice that you asked this exact question in that topic.

o_O From the perspective of someone who's played on Hard or Torment since BoA at least, difficulty has ramped up rather dramatically in the more recent games.

Sounds like the original poster wants to play Avernum 6! That takes care of 1, 3 (in part), 4 (I think), 7 (I think), 9, 10, 11, and sort of 14 sometimes. Or Avernum 3. Avernum 3 does 1 (I think), part of 2, 5, 7 (I think), and 9 (sort of). You'll have to go to Avadon 2 for 6 and sort of 15 (and another dose of 5, if you want). You're out of luck on 8 (all the hardcore players on these forums want this, but Jeff doesn't do it) and 13 (the newbies all want it but the hardcore players on these forums don't, and neither does Jeff).

Dikiyoba, you and I have different ideas about the meaning of the phrase "very clear."

And Shapers = Vahnatai, so the sequence is Avadon -> Geneforge -> Avernum. Right? Right.

As I recall, the first Avernum trilogy made reference to previous PCs, but only in the same vague, elliptical way as Avadon 2 does. If I remember correctly, the canon was that the Avernum 1 party vanished (rumored to have escaped to the surface), and the Avernum 2 party stayed in Avernum, doing good deeds while the Avernum 3 party was on the surface. So it's not all that odd that we get only the vaguest answers about the canon for the Avadon 1 PCs. It just would've been fun to see some of them again. Well, mainly Nathalie, really.

I'd go chronologically, unless the oldest games seem too crude. I'd also probably skip the first Avernum trilogy if you've already played the Exile series, unless you want a refresher. Thus, I'd play: (probably skip Avernum 1-3) Nethergate: Resurrection Geneforge 1-5 Avernum 4-6 Avadon 1-2 (maybe Avernum: Escape From the Pit) If you find yourself not liking a game or a series, feel free to skip it. You get a little better sense of plot and world development if you go strictly in order within a series, but it's not truly necessary, and the four series are unrelated to each other except broadly thematically. Also, I think it's nice to follow a series to completion, but Geneforge games alternated with Avernum games in terms of release schedule, and you could follow that (e.g., Geneforge 3, Avernum 4, Geneforge 4, Avernum 5, etc.) if you wanted. By the time you're done with all that, you'll probably have the re-remakes of the Exile trilogy to play, and maybe Avadon 3 as well, because it'll probably take a while to get through all those games. Oh, and have fun! There's a lot of really good stuff in there.

Fair enough. I don't recall the later ones doing this, but I may just not have paid attention. Either way, I think we've resolved the experience issue.

This is why I added the parenthetical. You're crazy. You don't count. I think these two points go well together. I would've liked Khalida's quest much more if it had more steps. We found out a little of what went on in the dungeons. Then we went and summarily executed someone. That was pretty much it. I'd rather have gotten more of a plot reveal: what goes on in those dungeons? Can we dwell a little more on why Khalida's mind is so broken? It's said, summarily, that there is no way to fix it. How do we know that? There were possibilities here for more action within Avadon that could've given this a little more flavor, and could've added some more steps so that we could've lingered longer on the details. Maybe we go deeper into the dungeons. Maybe we question more people in Avadon. More could've been done on the back end, too. Was Xenophon just craven, or was there more going on? Could we get a little more backstory on that? Maybe Xenophon could flee into the woods, and something could happen out there. I don't know. I bring up Nathalie's sidequest only because Zhossa Mindtaker was a compelling villain for me, at least on the creepiness scale. Nathalie's motivations and the "choice" involved weren't particularly striking, but the scene-setting and the combats were solid.

Redbeard mentions once that he gave one other the opportunity that he's giving the PC in Avadon 2 (to choose a new position). This appears to be a reference to the PC from Avadon 1. But, given that the PCs from Avadon 1 are nowhere to be found, death in combat does seem plausible (that is, the PC was given the choice, and the PC chose to fight Redbeard). Not sure how to interpret this, really. It's also odd that it's clearly Nathalie in one of the loading screens, but she appears nowhere in the game.

GF2 definitely gives experience for Mechanics-based solutions, in general. GF1 definitely doesn't. To the best of my knowledge, none of the GFs give a message if you're too high a level to get experience from something but otherwise would. So my guess is that Randomizer's explanation accounts for what went on in your case.

And I could see Jeff struggling with this during the scene. But the problem is that when you're writing scared, you don't write well. And this writing was clearly scared. I don't mean that there ought to be elaborate description of the physical acts. That would probably be weird. I just mean a description that suggests some sort of emotional experience. We're talking about a player who has actively selected into pursuing something with Silke, so the player clearly doesn't mind a romantic feel to the writing. Jeff has worked hard on developing moral quandaries and urgency, and he conveys those feelings well; he could, I don't doubt, do the same for romantic emotions as well. But he was clearly uncomfortable writing this, and that made it not work out well. Well, Yannick's was not forgettable. And the SO's sort of wasn't, just because of the angst that he seemed to have in killing Pact warriors. And I remember Khalida's, just because I was so thrown off by it. But compare those to, say, Nathalie's sidequest in Avadon 1. It's just not the same. Meh. You get a "better for Fort Foresight" ending if you don't bring extra NPCs, but you basically can't kill Redbeard (unless you're crazy) without all the NPCs. So it forecloses at least one important ending. Yeah, that makes sense. I'll probably try that if I play the game again.

As far as I know, yes. Strategy Central has all the analyses that people have done on Avernum 4. Also, because this is an Avernum 4 topic, I'll eventually move it into the appropriate forum, but perhaps not immediately, per the OP's wishes. EDIT: Now moved (on Dec. 7).

Two things: 1) Clicking on an enemy to do a range attack from too far away causes a character to run a step farther than he/she needs to in order to do the attack. This is annoying when I'm trying to stay as far back as possible or use as few action points as possible. It would be nice to step just close enough to do the attack, automatically. 2) As a general matter, there ought to be more use of different numbers of Hands for different quests. There are various parts of Avadon 1 and 2 in which the main character goes alone. The first trip into the dungeons in Avadon 1 gets only one companion. The final battles in Avadon 1 and Avadon 2 get all loyal companions. But otherwise, we're stuck at 2 companions for virtually the entire game. Why? We could have much more interesting combat dynamics if sometimes there were 1 companion, sometimes 2, sometimes 3, sometimes 4, and so on. I found that I didn't maintain my rarely used companions as well as I maintained my core group, so they were weaker in the endgame (despite having the same levels) just from disuse.

I just finished Avadon 2, and here's what I think. WHAT I DID I played on Hard. My primary character was a Blademaster specializing in bows and the middle column. I mostly raised Dexterity but did a little with Strength and Endurance here and there. I usually brought the Shadowwalker and Sorcerer with me; the SW was sort of half-razordisker and half-melee, but all three were mostly middle column and a little of the left column. I played loyal to my companions absolutely and loyal to the Pact below that. I became a Heart on Hard, and then I reloaded and killed Redbeard on Normal. ENGINE UPGRADES I definitely appreciated a few of the changes. Marking quest locations on the map was a little jolting at points — isn't the point that I'm supposed to look for this hidden person or thing, half the time? — but it was so convenient that I ended up deciding that I liked it. (Kind of like the Junk Bag and auto-healing after combat in Avadon 1.) The simple "Quest Advanced" approach was really good. There still ought to be some sort of division between unending general collection quests ("Bring me all the arcane scrolls in the land!") and specific tasks ("Kill the baddie and bring me the MacGuffin!"), but this was good. Making Dexterity less game-breakingly unbalanced was, on the whole, good. It was less obvious to me how to develop the characters, but I felt as though I had a little more flexibility. Some of the new graphics (e.g., the "City on the Edge of Forever" portals) were fun, too. Oh, I almost forgot. The level cap still sucks. It shouldn't be there. SILKE Of all the things in the game that were new, this seemed like the boldest departure for Spiderweb. A romance? In a Spiderweb game? Silke's "early mentor" role in the beginning of the game was kind of like Shanti in Geneforge 2 (or, to a lesser extent, Greta in Geneforge 4), but this made it so much more interesting. My first impression, which lasted pretty deep into the game, was that the romance subplot was really cool and I hoped Jeff would never do it again. If this became a regular feature (like killing Redbeard or using the Geneforge), it would get profoundly annoying very quickly. But as a one-time thing, it was great. As soon as I picked up on what was going on, I flirted with Silke at every opportunity, just to see where it would go. But there were two problems. The first, I think, is less significant. I was trying to stay loyal to the Pact, but when it came time to get Konstina, there was nothing to do but choose between the Pact and Silke. This was totally unsatisfying. I actually replayed the sequence three different times to see if I could get Silke without turning completely traitor. I understand the point, and I get that this is intentional, but I didn't like it. The second problem was bigger, though. I finally broke down and betrayed the Pact for this girl, just to see what would happen. After all this awkward flirting, and after such an extreme step, we run through all the right dialogue options, the climactic kiss happens, and...! "You lean forward for a kiss. Silke responds positively. You spend some time together." That writing is bad. It's embarrassingly bad. I betray the Pact for this girl, and the end result is writing that is terrified to show any emotion at all? There doesn't need to be elaborate description — indeed, there probably shouldn't be elaborate description — but given how sweet some of the awkward flirting was, I was expecting more than this limp prose. I was expecting some level of emotion. To make matters worse, that's apparently it. Nothing else happens. Compared to a more interactive relationship — maybe you rescue her from Ghorus, or maybe Odil's attack goes wrong and Konstina captures you and Silke rescues you, or whatever — this didn't go anywhere. The game even hints at a more elaborate ending for the relationship when you buy the house in the Riverlands — "You take a moment to daydream about a possible future life, a farm, a hometown, perhaps a family" — a family with whom? With your scout girlfriend? But even in the ending, all that happens is that you visit her from time to time. Not worth it. I reloaded and played loyal again. THE REST OF THE PLOT For a game entitled Avadon 2: The Corruption, I was kind of expecting the Corruption to feature more prominently (and not just be one of three places you go). I liked this line of quests; it was sufficiently creepy and mysterious to be cool, in a Nethergate-y kind of way. I loved the multiple origin stories for the Corruption in the Core. Likewise, the Tawon Empire/Dheless plot was solid. The temples were definitely weird and eerie enough, and the whole "gods" thing worked well. Dheless's Kenny-like power to die again and again was... an interesting twist? I don't think my character responded with enough, "Huh?" I liked it, though. The Contested Lands plot was pretty forgettable. (I actually don't remember it very well right now, and I literally just finished the game.) It seemed like just a random rebellion/monster plague, as if straight out of Exile 3. It didn't have the same significance as Miranda or Dheless or the same foreign-ness as the Corruption or the Tawon. The character sidequests were completely forgettable. Alcander's was a little tricky, but Khalida's execution of Xenophon? I didn't really get it. I guess it was just supposed to be about the choice, rather than the challenge, but it's hard to agonize over a choice when you know you need them in the endgame. THE COMBATS Avadon 1 was really bumpy in difficulty, which was why the Dexterity exploit was so necessary. It didn't matter if the enemies were completely trivial one moment and out-of-control hard the next if your character was unhittable. Avadon 2 was much smoother. Boss fights were generally harder than lead-up fights, but the difficulty ramped up and was not totally wacky. I did some hacking and retreating on some of the hardest fights, but I didn't do it as much as in my Avernum 6 no-skill-points playthrough. A few combats were really hard for me, and I burned through a ton of consumables or reloaded a lot (and had to look up the mechanics of the combat here, because I frankly wasn't sure how it worked in a number of cases). * Miranda's merry-go-round of teleportation. For some reason, I couldn't kill enough monsters quickly enough, and I ended up swarmed and dying. * The triplets right before Miranda in the Core. I hit them hard, got down to 1 party member left, ran, ended combat to revive the others, and repeated at least twice more before I finally got them. They just did too much damage to me. * Miranda in the Core. I could not for the life of me figure out the mechanics of the combat (the orbs disrupt Miranda's defenses), and I kept taking huge amounts of damage even after I figured out the mechanics. * The 6 guardians in Redbeard's Tower. I ended up using scarabs and level changes heavily: Battle Fury and summon before combat, slam the statutes with area of effect spells, teleport away, drop down to the lower level, Battle Fury again, come back up and hit the statutes again with an area of effect spell and drop down to the lower level before they could attack again, etc. I burned a lot of consumables, too. If they landed a single stun on me, I was dead. * The Temple of Aetius, final combat. The southeast spawning rock monsters were particularly problematic; I killed a few and retreated several times, because I couldn't kill them fast enough and they kept swarming me. * Redbeard. Not a stupid fight like in Avadon 1, but just hard. I couldn't figure out how to get enough damage on the 4 summons that they wouldn't come after me and at the same time do any damage to Redbeard, who was also doing huge amounts of damage to me. On Normal, though, no problem. Also, other than Redbeard, I apparently didn't do any of the main optional combats. I guess I just didn't notice them or something. All the more reason to go back and replay, I suppose. OVERALL The game mechanics and combat balance were better than in Avadon 1. Some of the components lacked the plot strength of Avadon 1 — the companion sidequests in particular. The romance was intriguing, even if it ultimately fell flat. We got to see a bit of the Corruption and of the Tawon Empire, both of which were fun. Avadon 1 brought me back to Spiderweb, and Avadon 2 is keeping me here. It's a great game, and I'm looking forward to Avadon 3.

Check Strategy Central, particularly the Skills link.