Randomizer

I'd have reduced the strength and put it into intelligence myself. A little lower armor and higher battle magic to attack with spells especially firebolt or burning spray after seeing what didn't get dazed. If you augment and then get in the face of a drayk it will usually only get the weaker melee attack for about 50 damage instead of the stronger missle attack of 170+. Did you try the battle alpha and glaahk at the Shaper camp? I found them easier to kill them I expected with my base stats shock trooper and a cryoa before meeting Crowley. Blessed and a 2 icy crystals followed by a discipline wand got each. If you position yourself properly only one at a time will attack.

Quote: Originally written by Chitrach Exterminator: BOVINE THUD! I keep seeing the catapaulted cow from Monty Python and the Holy Grail unless you mean a gigantic hoof from the sky crushing the non-believers.

A servile and an infiltrator are not meant to be pack leaders although an infiltrator has the essence to do it. A lifecrafter and a shock trooper are not meant to be singletons, They are designed to summon an army and then lead it by different means. The warrior is the left over guardian in the middle with a little better ability to summon creations than in the earlier games. The idea is that they are optimized for their playing styles. Although a servile is the closest to a generalist in this game since he can run by himself or lead a few powerful creations in the endgame.

It's a two part quest. Bevan, the mayor of Almira send you on the quest and mentions that a lady wizard knows something about where he might be hiding. The first place is going north and then a little east to land on the coast. You have to go inland and I think you need to find a secret passage to his hideout. After exploring and killing you find a golem that gives you a message about his new hiding place at the north end of the swamp on the west coast. There is a piece of paper with the lever code to access his new place. If you use move mountains at the right spot you can find a back way into to Sixus so he doesn't kill himself. It's a better quest ending but it doesn't change the reward.

The difference between Exile and Avernum is the greater spell lists and the ease for adding new ones. Avernum requires removing a spell to make room for a new one. So we might as well start nominating our least favorites spells again to be voted out. I want to see the end of the mage's call beast and animate undead. You don't get to pick which one is summoned and they are usually fairly lame. Replace arcane blow with shockwave to bring the mage on par with the priest's divine retribution.

This is the problem with cheat codes. They change flags in the game and the flags determine the dialog options.

Maybe you are thinking of the fyoraskin cloak.

A shock trooper is a different approach to playing. ST and warrior are for the player that wants to fight and not use spells. A few powerful creations that don't need to be healed all the time and you get to spend your time hacking away. With the number of items that give blessing magic +2 and less powerful mental magic, you can run a powerful character. It's just a different emphasis. An infiltrator and a servile are both the combination of spells and fighting where you don't need support creations except in a few special areas. Lifecrafters rely on an army and use spells to power it. Those three classes are all overpowered even facing the armies of hostile creations in the Fens and certain other areas.

I carry all the charms, infiltrator items, tinker items, and a stealth boots plus a few swap items like captain' shiv. Then there are a set of pods/spores for quick healing, etc. The rest I store at Southforge Citadel at the start and later the north end of the Eastern Rise. I used to use other places just to keep things neat. I do tend to sweep areas for every last item that can be sold. I now tend to sell most items that I will never use just to have the money and keep the areas neater.

I am surprised that BoA hasn't sold that well. While I haven't had the time to play the community created scenarios since I am going through the older games, some day I will get to them. I'm hoping a successful year of the new games will revive sales in BoA so you will reconsider.

I think it was ET that played the no canister game and finished at level 5. There have been some no canister games and running as a guardian would be the easiest. There are some places to pickup skills without using canisters.

Exile is the only game where you can equip your fighters with 2 one-handed weapons. Once hasted they give a buzz saw effect with multiple strikes per round to quickly destroy their opponents. By the end of the game they can do 6 strikes per round with all the blessings and hasting spells for ridiculous damage.

ET - you can die and be forgotten without becoming a martyr (except in your own mind). Getting to explore an adjacent area will allow for starting characters to build up before getting into trouble. Of course this ruins my idea that we start off as surface tourists with no really useful skills going off the beaten track.

Synergy is right since I've played most of my games and found that mechanics of 8 at the start and leadership raised to 6 in chapter 1 gives you all but 2 trapped chests. Raising mechanics to 10 is the most that you will need for the rest of the game since you can use items for the rest. Leadership of 7 to 8 with items will give you most of the remainder of the game. The extra experience from disarming traps and mines, and opening doors will raise you quickly so you can put points into the other skills. The game is designed so you don't need more combats or magic skills until the middle of chapter 2. Even then you can find areas that will give you lots of experience with the geek skills of leadership and mechanics.

A shock trooper won't be able to train as quickly in mental and blessing magic as a lifecrafter, but by choosing the right creations and using items like the captain's shiv and boots all you really need to do is concentrate on mental magic. With enough creations you don't have to get mass madness and charm to convert the opponents to your side. A force of 5 tier 3 and 4 creations will work fine on mass energize. I'll try it next week and handicap myself with a pro-Shaper path with no canisters and only Shaper approved creations.

The west panel is used to turn off the security electric field for the east panel in a few endings where there isn't a combat. but that is a different control then the ones asked in the beginning.

Basically you get a little different speech from the Shapers since you are a lowly servile that they are forced to use and the serviles don't treat you any better.

For spellcraft with leadership of 6 or more, in Chickweed Bridge from Burkes. For combat skills in chapter 3 from Captain Archibald at Rebel Camp Aziraph. Melee and missle weapons are 1800 Quick action and parry are 1200 No one else in the game so just use canisters for the few that are available.

We won't start out as worms? The lighting should either go back to what was in A1-3 or chose better contrasting colors for the area floor color versus monster color. No more black monster on dark color floor. Sounds good so far since the main objection to A4 was the plot.

Where? I don't remember where that is from. If that is from the Inner Shaping Hall then they aren't to be adjusted to end the game.

I have to agree with Delicious Vlish about a servile using battle magic. I didn't increase my mechanics and leadership as much at the start and I held off on increasing combat skills until after train in chapter 3 with no ill effects. I still swap some equipment to do blessing magic when I enter an area. Battle magic makes a servile almost as powerful as an infiltrator. He does have a little less essence and spell energy to play with in combat so you burn through essence pods a little faster. This encourages hit and run tactics to whittle an area down in sections rather than in one trip. For the Poryphra Ruins I did a clump or two or creations each trip leaving just the shapers in the far side for last.

Elevations distinguish Avernum and Nethergate from the other games. The merging of towns and outside wouldn't have been so bad if the proportions had been maintained. I would buff and haste my party and race through an area until the haste wore off and leave fight mode to save. It was depressing how far you could travel between towns in A4 on one haste. It would be nice to have a new area to explore outside the current caves. Even as a new underground level like the tunnels under the Great Cave with more interesting encounters. Maybe more than 2 levels in a area so you have a multilayer dungeon over more than one map area in the level.

I doubt Jeff will revise the current Geneforge 4 since he has enough to do with other planned games. However he seems to want to keep this format for Geneforge 5 and may use information to make changes for it.

Fire shaping starts off a little weaker if you just use fyoras, but by chapter 3 the drayks and kyshakks more than make up for the earlier weaknesses. Drayks have unlimited missle attacks and kyshakks are walking shields with decent attacks. I agree that you don't need to put much into shaping skills since you can store the items for the few times you need to create creations. Jeff's revision during beta testing made it easier for all classes to create and lowered the requirements dramatically. Lifecrafters and shock troopers still have the advantage in essence to create armies where the others have to be more selective. Pumping intelligence is still the way to go since more creations allows for more attacks per round. With enough damaging attacks you can wear down an opponent even with weaker creations. The only problem is if they take too much damage and flee in terror so you have to use mental barrier and watch their health.

On Dhonal Island, the Purification Plant along the east edge of the island has crystalline fibers lying on a table just inside the southern entrance. You don't have to go that far into the poisonous atmosphere to find it using the "get" command and checking items.