Marak

The Ivory Skull is your phat lewt for killing the Shadow Beast. Unfortunately, depending on where in the room you kill it, the Ivory Skull tends to get mixed up with other skulls. Only a lucky mouse-over saved me from missing it.

At least these little solo side quests are fairly short and not too brutal. And even if you're all passive, that's a good excuse to burn up some Wands or Scrolls or buffing consumables.

Aloreal summed it up quite nicely. The only "lost forevers" I can think of occur very late in the game, and only because your actions finally cause the quest givers to depart. The only thing you lose at that point is obsolete, low-level quests that you wouldn't have gotten much out of any way. The game warns you very, very clearly when you hit the Point of No Return that leads to the game's end, so when you get that warning, you have the opportunity to go back and do whatever before continuing on to the Endgame. Also, unlike earlier Spiderweb titles, there are no otherwise-worthless items to lug around to turn in later, no saving sticks and gems to make wands, no Herbs to haul to the apothecary to be brewed into Elixirs, etc. The only 2 items you need to save are Arcane Scrolls and Drake Skins: everything else that has a value but you're not going to equip can be safely tossed in the almost-bottomless Junk Bag and lugged back to town whenever you're done questing in a region. P.S. who else had to stop themselves from clicking on every Iron Bar and Bag of Meal they came across? Old Avernum Training dies hard.

To build on Lilith's post, she also has a larger repertoire. 1-2 Cone AoEs, 1-2 circular AoEs, free Firebolts whenever, Ice bolt, circular Daze, and at least one of not two Cloak spells (self only and Party wide). I also gave her the Dark Bolt and Mass Curing Scarabs. I almost never found her stuck in the position of "quaff a potion or default to a Wand attack". Of course, that's exactly what my Shaman was doing in any fight that lasted more than 3-4 rounds. Having easy access to Acid and Corruption and Ensnare debuffs tacked onto AoE damage is also a plus. Lastly, flavor. I'm a sucker for Glass Cannon, Spell-flinging, AoE-happy Wizard-types.

Well, that's good to know. Didn't realize that the correct "path" was Get denied entry to fort -> go crying to Runner Faiga. I'll have to try that next playthrough.

Also, the best stat in the game is generally "+ % Physical/Magic Damage", which is another reason why Broadswords, etc. are superior. Most of them grant 10% more damage vs. the 5% that lighter one-handed weapons typically give you.

Originally Posted By: Kiexcolo The cool down for abilities is just way too long. There are periods of time when my sorceress/shaman had to use their physical ranged attack because all my spells were in cool down and the enemy is immune to my default magic attack (And I like to save my wands...) This is a hard habit to break, but start training yourself now! When you get into these situations, use your Wands, your Scrolls, or one of your 2 dozen Cooldown-restoring Potions/Elixirs. Trust me. If you don't do this (and I didn't!), you'll find yourself swimming in a lake of 45 wands that no longer do viable damage because they're wands of *crappy spell that's only good in the midgame* and you're whipping them out for *late game boss fight* and accomplishing nothing. The game throws more consumables at you than you can use unless you're playing poorly, getting unlucky, or are trying to use them up on purpose. Don't be me like and beat the last boss with 35 Battle Elixirs and 8 Restoration Elixirs and 7 Wands of Corruption and 12 Ring of Fire Scrolls. Because at that point, they never did you any good and you never get a chance to sell them.

In a word, no. In fact, in order to open up the area where the Beast was last seen, the game forces you to tell the wizard why you're there. I found this completely infuriating. I was all prepared to get into Private Detective mode and be all sneaky "oh don't mind me, I'm just a Hand of Avadon, I'm here because Avadon says so and you lowly Farlanders don't need to know anything," but alas, the game doesn't let you. You have no choice but to ignore your orders and "confide" in the somewhat-helpful-seeming wizard. As for the other townsfolk, it doesn't seem to matter if you tell them or not, although I'm pretty sure you'll miss out on some quests if you don't. Again, you're rewarded for disregarding orders. It's quite silly.

The more I read this thread, the less I want to try and go the "piss off Redbeard, I could totally be a better Keeper than you!" route, especially since I'm now attempting a Torment playthrough. Sounds like he's pretty much impossible on Torment and takes about 15 times longer to kill than he should on anything other than Casual. o_O I like whoever summed it up in that other thread... "the general consensus is that he's hard for all the wrong reasons." Sounds about right.

Yeah, the Krysanth is behind the Runed Door that requires the Athame to open. Said Runed Door is in the basement level near the stairs that take you up the courtyard with the imprisoned Demon Lord. I'd suggest having your swords and wands at the ready when you crack that door open, just in case you need to, uh, do some high-energy dusting. There's certainly not a pack of bloodthirsty demons hanging out in the secret library, nosiree.

There's actually a story reason that all your Party Members have major flaws. Don't want to spoil it but, near the end of the game, you can find out WHY they all have these issues that you end having to deal with (or not). If you like, here's a only-sorta-spoilery summary: Click to reveal.. After the final Castle Verbeaux questline, you'll have a little chat with Heart Miranda that explains a great deal. She's easy to miss when you return to Avadon, so be sure to seek her out and keep her chatting.

Yeah, if a Shaman isn't your main character, I can't really recommend taking one along. The only time I can see a NEED for a Shaman in the group is if you're fighting some particularly nasty foe that's tossing AoEs around or summoning a ton of adds or something, and you need the Mass Heal. However, a Sorceress with the Mass Heal Scarab can partially fill that role, and if your offense is good enough, you'll never need a lot of healing. If all else fails, it's not like the game doesn't throw a ton of Mass Heal scrolls at you.

Yeah, I had my code within seconds when I ordered. Also, don't judge by the demo. The game gets much, much better, but only a little ways after the demo ends. At least, it did for me.

Personally I used the dresser in the main character's bedroom to store stuff that I currently wasn't using but didn't want to sell. Like the junk bag, you can cram a LOT of stuff in that dresser before it fills up. As for favorite Nicodemus items, I'm going for "none of the above". I stopped bothering to check in with him once I got the reproducing bulwark and realized that all his stuff was, basically, junk.

Watch out for the spellcasters in the Honored Forge camp. They're arguably tougher than the Main Bad Guy and should not be underestimated. Once they get themselves hasted and blessed you need to focus on them or you end up eating 8 attacks/round. And yes, I killed them off even though I didn't really feel like I should, but there weren't any repercussions. And as Turtle said, there's some nice, phat lewts to be had.

I picked a Shaman as my Main Character on Hard and I have to agree she was generally the weakest link in my Party and ended up playing a Healing/Utility role most of the time. That said, she does have a few strengths: 1) Vulnerability Curse. Keep her Dex higher than Nathalie's and watch out. 2) Her summoned Pets all have special abilities. Wolves can use Battle Curse. Hellhounds have a cone of fire. Salamanders have an AoE fire pulse (think Ring of Fire Scrolls). Drakes have a much stronger cone of fire that recharges every other round. If you're using the Summoning Rods, Spiders have AoE Poison Mist (the weaker version) and a cone of webs that does low damage but can Ensnare things. 3) Summoned pets, when boosted by the middle tree passive, can take tons of hits for you and distract monsters from going after your Shaman or Sorceress. Have them wade in and use their special ability and most monsters will be glued to them for a good long while. I made best use of my Shaman by always keeping my pet out and having it toss AoEs around and generally make a nuicance of itself. From there, I'd have her alternating Vulnerability Curse, heals, and her wand attack. I also gave her the "cone of fire" Scarab for some extra offense. Also, keeping her Dex above Nathalie's but below your Blademaster/Shadowwalker worked out pretty well for me.

Shadowstep does have it's uses, no doubt, but the Decoy Level 6 "upgraded" version is terribly unimpressive.

Since Avadon is clearly based on the same engine that ran the later Geneforge titles, it also kept the "move from zone to zone via a region map with squares on it" type of World Map that Geneforge used. I admit to being confused as to why you had to initiate certain dialogues to "open up" Key Zones, as I seem to recall that you could explore Geneforge more or less as you pleased, with new zones appearing adjacent to the area you just exited, based on which direction you exited a zone from. Key Zones were normally (but not always) found by going from Zone A South to Zone B and then West to Zone C, instead of opening up via dialogue trees. I guess it sort of makes sense in the context of Avadon's plot, you're being sent to specific areas to do specific things, not wander around at your leisure. However, it's sometimes too easy to miss the one dialogue tree from that one out-of-the-way NPC that opens up the area you need to go to to complete the next 5 quests in your log.

Personally I was supremely unimpressed with both the Decoy spell (the "upgrade" to Shadowstep) and Flash Powder. Getting the Shadowwalker's Focus and upgraded Blade Shield isn't too bad, IMHO. I dunno, with the Shadowwalker, it seems like your best bet is to pump the middle tree to all 8s and then try to get Focus/Blade Shield and then... uh... whatever. The left tree is mostly a waste, Shattering Strike is only good when a Knockback comes in handy, since the damage is only marginally better than Disarming Blow. And having to waste points in a "better Razor Disk passive"? Ick. I dunno, I'm sure people will disagree with me but I say get 8 in Disarming, 8 in self-heal, 8 in the entire middle tree, try to get the upgrade to Shadowwalkers Focus, and then Disarm Trap if you have points to spare.

Originally Posted By: Goldenking As for arguments about realism and immersion - really? You want to give this annoyance to your fellow gamers in the name of immersion? That seems counter-intuitive to what the marketability of Avadon was all about. Fair enough. If the immersion argument doesn't work for you, then I say it was done to increase the difficulty of most encounters. Since this game (especially compared to the Avernum games) is about killing smaller groups of foes that are designed to slowly whittle you (and your fatigue bars) down, it makes sense that Jeff wanted you to occasionally use up too much fatigue on too big of a spell/ability because you're not sure if that Really Dangerous Bad Guy Over There has 10 Health or 30 Health left.

Yeah, for the Zephyrine test, I did it as soon as I got it. I sent in my Shaman's pet and ran her and Nathalie away. I mostly got lucky. The dragon killed everyone but (I think) my Shaman in about 3 rounds, and then she suddenly stopped attacking and said "good job, yadda yadda," and the quest was complete. You might have to reload a few times and try some different positioning tricks to "win". Also yes, the Tartum quest is confusing as heck. You'll keep that quest in your log until you can ALSO complete the quest that Tartum himself gives you (which is a fair bit later in the game), at which point you can turn both of them in (one to Tartum, the other to Abi).

Yeah, I can't recommend skipping any side quests that aren't the same quest with 2 different people to turn them into. Also, don't be like me and never find the caretaker guy in Zethron's Aerie. Missed out on like, 3 pretty decent quests that would have made some mid-game stuff a bit easier. Also, the game really does ratchet up the difficulty of Bosses and even Quest "Bosses" quite a bit as you approach the end of the storyline. Getting your levels up and figuring out good builds (and using the Retraining gal liberally, she works for free) is pretty essential to not burning thru half your consumables on one tough fight only to face 3 more fights just like it before you can rest. Of course, I did all this on Hard difficulty; your mileage may vary.

That's one of the exciting parts about Avadon 2: there are so many ways that Jeff can go at this point. Will he jump into the future a la A4 to A5? What state will the Pact and Avadon be in then? Will your Hand from Avadon 1 be mentioned like the mysterious "group of Aventurers" from Avernum's past? Will we see more of the Pact nations that didn't make it into Avadon 1? Will we see more of the Farlands that didn't make into Avadon 1 (*cough* the Corruption *cough*)? Will he add more Character Classes? Will we see female Shadowwalkers and male Sorcerers? And so on and so on. Guess we'll have to wait until he starts up his "making of Avadon 2" blog entries sometime next year

I'd say you're looking at 40-60 hours of gameplay depending on how thorough you are with completing side-quests and whether or not you bother with the optional end-game Bosses. That's just a guess tho, I didn't keep track of all my play sessions or anything.

re: Randomizer Yeah, good point, I keep forgetting that in Avadon, there's 13 sides to every story. =p