Ephesos

As the others have said, you don't need to kill him to get the Emerald Chestguard... but it's fun to do it. My technique, which is fairly reliable: -Daze Nociduas before his turn in combat comes up. -When he's dazed, he can't cast his spell, so he never finishes it. -Once his turn passes, hit him with everything. -Daze him again. -Repeat. (It helps to haste your mage for this part, and a second mage helps as well)

Since you don't have Erika, I think you just have to keep hacking away, and you'll reach the control panel eventually. I could be wrong, though. EDIT: Found it. You get teleported 5 times, and then you can use the panel.

If you haven't reached Correlea (the Castle mage) yet, giving yourself the item (the Onyx Scepter) won't help, because your party probably isn't powerful enough to last one round with the shades. Repel Spirit and straight-up hack'n'slash kill the shades fastest. Though I will say that for the shade of Ice and the shade of Sickness, Divine Retribution works great (particularly when they summon help). It's not so stellar against the shade of Anger, however. On a tangent, I can understand forgetting the name of one mage with no previous Avernum appearances. However, the Onyx Scepter is another matter completely... how does one forget it?

Quote: Originally written by VCH: I do not like the grid or knowing how many HPs a monster has left. Please give me an option to turn this feature off in A5! This has been a standard feature of the entire Avernum series... I fail to see why it's a problem now. Granted, you had the option to conceal the grid in the previous games, but seeing the health bar is just standard.

Quote: Originally written by Schrodinger: The undead gave me trouble my first time through as well. However, going to talk with the hermit really makes things much easier, and I'd recommend doing just that prior to taking on the majority of the undead. I'd recommend talking to the hermit before taking on any of the undead... toughing it all out while Acid Spray does its work is no fun...

Quote: Originally written by Schrodinger: The undead gave me trouble my first time through as well. However, going to talk with the hermit really makes things much easier, and I'd recommend doing just that prior to taking on the majority of the undead. I'd recommend talking to the hermit before taking on any of the undead... toughing it all out while Acid Spray does its work is no fun...

From this thread : Quote: Originally written by Synergy: 1 point Quick Action adds 5% chance for second hit EDIT: Quote tags... drat.

Quote: Originally written by ASH LorAEL: —Alorael, who thinks the nearest tunnel entrance is almost due north of Patrick's Tower. Just follow the southern wall of the Great Cave and look for trap doors. There's also a fun way down over to the East of the tower (I think the next section over, in fact). It's full of basilisks and a few good valuables...

Quote: Originally written by arghhhhhhhhh: what's the point of tools? They have no purpose, as Alorael said. Decoration, perhaps? Something to taunt rogues who can't quite open that difficulty 33 door?

Can't Hawk King's character editor fix this? The only other place I can think of to learn Dispel is in the ruins of Harston, west of the Abyss... and you need Dispel to get that far.

Quote: Originally written by When in the course of Nathan Ashby: The image loads fine, but quite slow. I've got a T1 connection with usually between 200 KB - 500 KB per second, and anyone with a slower connection will wait even longer. Very good point, Aran. 'Tis fixed. (And now I won't use up bandwidth as quickly, I hope...)

Quote: Originally written by Niemand: Er, hate to tell you Ephesos, but several of the graphics, such as http://www.freewebs.com/ephesos/Images/Sanctuary1-medium.png, don't seem to want to load. It's fine otherwise. I like the undead prohibition. Drat... that means more messing with the stupid File Manager...

Eh, might as well plug mine then... finally messed around with Freewebs today. Nothing's there, but it's still cool. (pokes sig)

Quote: Originally written by NickLemming: I eventually got through by just running through as fast as I could (group haste is good), and resurrecting any dead members (luckily my priest didn't die). It isn't really a problem on the way out... Quite true. Funny story: On my first time through, I didn't realize that defeating Rentar deactivated the pylons. So I took the time to haste and sneak back out, slightly uneasy about the fact that nothing was attacking me. As another consequence, I never got the spellbooks in the remote tunnels...

I believe the person you're looking for is one of the actual miners. Look in the mine, and you should find someone named Santo. (Hitting Tab helps, and saves time talking to boring, average miners)

Quote: Originally written by Dintiradan: The changes to Tool Use threw me for a loop at first too. In A1-A3, it was "Bing! All doors are now open". In BoA, it was "Bing! Now use your rogue for the rest". Now, I'm no longer able to have priests and mages who do nothing but max out on Intelligence, Mage/Priest, and Magery. It's still possible, as Alorael said. In my first game, I was able to get a rogue to level 25 Tool Use. Granted, it absorbed a lot of late-game knowledge brews, but it still worked just fine. And the rogue could still hack'n'slash with the best of them.

Quote: Originally written by Infernal666hate: Acid Bow..... (one of the best bows) Acid Spell... (one of the best all-game spells) Acid Spear... (the best spear) Acid Sword... (one of the best swords) Think JV may have something he wants to share with us? I dispute the first two claims. I think the Shockwave Bow and Heartstriker are far better than the Bow of Decay, and that other spells serve much more extended purposes than Acid Spray... Daze, for one. Also, while the Jade Halberd is probably the best spear, the swords offer a far more balanced variety. I personally found the Frozen Blade's cursing to be very useful, as well as Demonslayer's plethora of defensive bonuses. And the Radiant Soulblade... heck, even the Ghostly Blade has enough ungodly defensive bonuses (+6% hostile resistance?!) to outshine the middle-of-the-road Oozing Blade.

Quote: Originally written by Infernal666hate: Acid Bow..... (one of the best bows) Acid Spell... (one of the best all-game spells) Acid Spear... (the best spear) Acid Sword... (one of the best swords) Think JV may have something he wants to share with us? I dispute the first two claims. I think the Shockwave Bow and Heartstriker are far better than the Bow of Decay, and that other spells serve much more extended purposes than Acid Spray... Daze, for one. Also, while the Jade Halberd is probably the best spear, the swords offer a far more balanced variety. I personally found the Frozen Blade's cursing to be very useful, as well as Demonslayer's plethora of defensive bonuses. And the Radiant Soulblade... heck, even the Ghostly Blade has enough ungodly defensive bonuses (+6% hostile resistance?!) to outshine the middle-of-the-road Oozing Blade.

Yes it does. Not only do you get to enact some vengeance for the beast's participation in the sacking of Cotra, but you also help out the mayor by taking a dangerous prisoner off Cotra's hands. And your interrogation prevents others from being tempted, tricked and killed by the beast. It's a win/win/win, really. Everybody wins, except for the eyebeast.

Yes it does. Not only do you get to enact some vengeance for the beast's participation in the sacking of Cotra, but you also help out the mayor by taking a dangerous prisoner off Cotra's hands. And your interrogation prevents others from being tempted, tricked and killed by the beast. It's a win/win/win, really. Everybody wins, except for the eyebeast.

Quote: Originally written by Walter: And how about the imprisioned eyebeast west of Cotra? If you kill it the mayor is quite upset about how much they could have learned from it, yet you get some nice rewards for doing so, and if left alone it might trick someone else into letting it escape. Ah, there's a trick to this... you question it, then tell the mayor that you didn't learn anything. Then you go kill the eyebeast, and the mayor doesn't care. You don't even get the option to tell the mayor that you killed it.

Quote: Originally written by Walter: And how about the imprisioned eyebeast west of Cotra? If you kill it the mayor is quite upset about how much they could have learned from it, yet you get some nice rewards for doing so, and if left alone it might trick someone else into letting it escape. Ah, there's a trick to this... you question it, then tell the mayor that you didn't learn anything. Then you go kill the eyebeast, and the mayor doesn't care. You don't even get the option to tell the mayor that you killed it.

Yeah, I never understood that. Demons should be much more vulnerable than they are in A4... but that's just my impression. And it's not like you see more than maybe twenty of them in the entire game.

Quote: Originally written by Kelandon: Long corridor of lava? The long corridor of lava guarded by a bunch of efreet. It's all down by Erika's Tower, and it's pretty hard to miss if you've taken the time to map the area.

So... did you make a character editor? If not, the image doesn't really help anybody. And besides, Hawk King already made an editor. Look at the A4 forum page.