BenS

You don't need to do a plague quest, actually. Just go to the surface, venture just far enough to get 3 (?) text balloons, for lack of a better word, get your achievement/medal if you haven't done so in an earlier game, go back to Anaximander, and go see Mazumdar. Barrier dispelled for you. However, at that point you will be lacking the Arcane Lore to read either pedestal.

Sade, thank you so much! About to start a 2nd game w/ a very different set of PCs, but had another ? 14. Does the party collectively only benefit from 1 member having the Negotiator trait, or would 4 members w/ it be 4x the benefit?

Finished game; some last questions: 7. Are the Get Research Books & Unicorn Horns never-ending quests? 8. Geoffrey in Lorelei tells you that some animal pens have loot; obscure, yes, but did anyone find out which towns have this? 9. Did I miss an alchemist that takes Aranea Fangs? You can't sell them either. 10. I found a 2nd Perfect Flower long after the 1st was used to complete a quest; similar to a 2nd (albeit special item) Dryad Hair. I assume these were just back-ups? 11. It seems like a lot of bows & such were designed to support a priest/archer. But is this really viable, splitting your resource build like this would take? At best, I imagine a slightly gimped priest w/ somewhat decent archery skills. 12. Did anyone understand the cryptic message W of Manara, at the end of some drake fights in a secret cavern: "When the end is near...Pants on the west rune...And step on the east rune."?? 13. In the Monastery of Madness, there's a switch in an upper NW room I could never get to. Anyone have any luck w/ it?

I thought I had a different issue, and that I couldn't escape the quick fire deathtrap. But then I figured out 2 options: (1) trigger it; escape in fight-mode (barely), and re-enter to loot that final room; or, (2) loot all but the final room, trigger it; loot; use Move Mts on the side wall > portal...escape. Of course, I need to stop worrying about most loot b/c of course I'm not going back to spend it ;-)

Can you tell us what it does? And thanks for the picture worth a 1000 words!

The "good" Arcane Summon boost is in the Defiled Crypt, if that's helpful for your list.

Crap; I'll have to keep that in mind for my next, all-human party

I don't believe there's a 2nd Summon Aid level 3 spell book. I do have a soft spot for summoned creatures, though, and even took traits to maximize their levels. Even though it's been a long time since I needed to summon any aid.

Speaking of Blackcrag Fortress, I'm assuming the 1 door that needed Tool Use 18 is the one I found there; perhaps there are others elsewhere. Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised to figure out a spot where I could use Move Mountains to enter that room, since I...wait a minute, w/ the Tinker's Gloves I do have TU 18...d'oh! But for those who don't have TU that high, hope this is helpful info.

Update: this is weird as heck, but swinging through the area again, I was now easily able to catch/kill the unicorns. I did not add anymore Nature Lore since my earlier post! Glad it resolved itself, but I can't explain why it happened in the 1st place.

Looks like I missed the Let me guess; it looked like an innocuous plant and unless I hovered my cursor over it for long enough to read the description, or otherwise saw the intermittent sparkles...I missed it. So be it. I finally dropped off in my manse the 3 annoying items:

That's good to know. I actually feel bad for the dragons, based on their interactions w/ humankind, and don't feel the need to kill them and loot their hoards unless it's required for a plot point.

I'm going to assume the entirely optional dragon fights are the toughest fights in the game, but for some reason I'm not inclined to take them on in this game. Are there any significantly unique items in their hoards?

Sonofa...I never did read that tome a 3rd time, b/c, even though I didn't rob the Anama vault, I didn't want a dread curse. I hope there's another Tier 3 of Summon Aid. Not b/c I need it per se, but b/c we shouldn't be penalized w/ a Dread Curse for getting a Tier 3 spell.

It's in the town of Torria nearby; not in the cemetery.

D'oh! That was it, thanks.

Why does this have the tag "escape from the pit"??

6. How many Xian artifacts are there? I thought I had them all (8) when I triggered the medal/Steam achievement, but now I've found a 9th...

Sorry, I put "bug" in the title b/c I haven't figured out how to use the tags. Anyway, I cleared out the entire town (and cemetery) of Torria before I got the quest from Zachariah in Gale. Yet unlike other such instances, I had no option when speaking to him to complete the quest. It didn't come up as a dialogue choice, nor did I get the black/white text w/ music for the completion of a job board quest.

I don't know the answer to that, but I will say, the switches--except for this particular one--are pretty damn visible in this game. Which is much appreciated!

There is no Xian Chainmail in this version, so...same place I guess; I don't remember the finer details from the earlier version of the game ;-)

By the time I tried it, I had all but one spell increase already, so it definitely wasn't worth it.

Assuming you meant "combined" as I thought you did, split 4-ways, then it's definitely a bug, b/c I have 19 points in all. I'll report it as a bug, thanks.

The Amphora is in the

I'm a little surprised you can complete Find Mundt w/out joining the Anama or getting the ring. When I, much earlier in the game, saw him in his little temple, but got bounced out by magic before I could talk to him, I thought I had made it back to the quest-giver to satisfy it. But I don't believe it was satisfied until I actually spoke w/ him, so maybe I missed a 3rd way to enter that shrine area he's in.