Locmaar

Either despair or revert to a saved game before Kingsley had his dreadful accident. Never kill townspeople before you cleared all quests in the area. Ever.

There are quite a few pole weapons in the game, and a few good ones at that. I'm always having a hard time deciding which one's best so I tend to lug them around instead of selling the ones I don't use. With that in mind: why is it my favourite pole weapon is the cheapest of the three I tend to still have at the end? Why is the bestest-ever pole-arm cheaper than the... well, the others? Here are my favourites: 1. Slith Bloodspear (val. 2500) dmg. 14-56 +10 % fire res. +5 % to hit 2. Spear of the Fen (val. 3000) dmg. 12-36 +10% acid res. +3 to Defense +1 to Riposte 3. Chaotic Halberd (val. 3000) dmg. 12-36 +10% cold res. +1 Dexterity Now, the reason I like the Bloodspear best is, that it was the hardest to get, and it does by far the most damage. So why is it the cheapest of the three? This truly concerns me. I know there are certain calculations as to how much any given piece of equipment is worth, but shouldn't the best of them be the most expensive one as well? Or isn't it the best after all?

Which reminds me of... Has anyone else ever felt the urge of giving that blessed shield back? I know I have. General Redmark: "What now? Can't you see I'm busy?" 1. "Yes, sorry Master Redmark, General, sir..." (End of conversation) 2. "Yes, sir, there is. About that shield of yours. Now, if you could just get up for a minute and bend over..."

Okay, the teleportation quest is about stuffing crystals in all of the pylons you find along the way. The general is generally (pun may be intended - I haven't decided) unimpressed with what you do, so don't worry about him. He's into politics, grander schemes and such, and not so much into talking to people who actually work for him. Concerning knobs: if my recollection is correct, there are more knobs (or buttons as you so aptly put it) that don't do anything than there are knobs that do. I guess this is supposed to grind you into not trying everytime you spot-a-knob if it's a wall-opener or a grease stain. Cracks in the wall mean the rock's been working for a long time and beginning to give in, or to crack. My guess is that we won't see the results before Avernum XC, though.

I can only do some guessing here, since I never tried it out, but still: 1.) Avernum 5 runs on Mac OS X and doesn't really care if it's OS X on a PPC or Intel platform (it's Universal Binary) - BTW: OS 10.4 has been coded to run native on both platforms. It's not emulated on either. 2.) If you can get OS X to run on a PC (albeit with emulation software) I don't see why Avernum 5 (or any other Mac OS X compatible Spiderweb game) shouldn't. 3.) The endian format is something the emulator has to handle (and has been doing since the dawn of virtual PC). Performance may be sluggish due to this 'translation' on the fly, but it should run on a decent platform. 4.) When in doubt try it out. Download the demo and hack away.

From what I know I have to say: no. Sorry. Edit: Come to think of it: If you run the game in a virtual machine which in return is run in a window, you can run the game in said window. Other than that I really can't think of another way. Sorry, again.

Boy-o-boy, do I remember this one. I also went in there before beating Lysstak and the Horror wiped the floor with my party. Even with figuring out how to remove the death curse, we got fried bad. When I mailed Jeff about it, desparate as I was, he just replied: "come back later." So it comes down to this: there are a few encounters, all of them optional, that you might not be able to beat when you first come across them. You aren't meant to. This is a little concession to the often criticized linearity of RPGs if you will. It can be frustrating at first, but you will really enjoy this encounter when you come back after, say, beating Moref the Shade. I think that's when I did it. It felt good. Really good. Boy-o-boy.

Quote: Originally written by trinko: ... it looks like there's a secret compartment due west of the worm area, is that where the mindwarp is? Yes. Quote: could it be that since i entered the area, or maybe even killed the mindwarp prior to getting the quest i'm out of luck? thanks I don't think so, unless you've been to the aforementioned area without noticing you have.

Quote: Originally written by Randomizer: ...Search to the west past the altar for a lever (knob) to a secret door ... I can live with that. Infact, this is the sort of compromise that makes the world a better and more colourful place. Right now, I'm very happy.

I am afraid you will have to wait a couple of days, since Jeff is away on a little vacation. In the meantime you might want to have a look at this: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=305779 I know that this is not exactly your problem, but perhaps it might help solve your issue. PS: Welcome to the boards. Leave your sanity on the pile next to the door with the others'.

Oddly enough, I do seem to recall the same thing with the scuttler eyes during beta. I just forgot about it, because I never missed out on it again afterwards. It's probably due to the special item count (eyes, rats) not being triggered unless you got the quest. Then again - maybe it's something entirely different altogether. Who would know but Jeff? And he's on vacation. edit: spelling - again

D'oh indeed. I think I know which thingy you're talking about. I was just about to email Jeff about him having forgotten to place a secret door when I finally saw the knob. This could have been rather embarrassing.

In order to avoid confusion (mainly mine): When Randomizer talks about levers he means these little black knobly things that stick silt-like to the rocky walls of Avernum's glorious caves. Thus it might be better to call them knobs, rather than levers. Then again, maybe I'm just too picky, in which case I apologize rather sooner than later.

If I am not mistaken you can collect your reward anyway. Just talk to the people once more. Seriously, how do you expect them to know you've killed twenty rats, collected scuttler eyes, found a satchel, won a singing contest, mixed a drink, if you don't tell them?

None. It's caves only. Big caves. And small caves. Well, and lakes. And rivers. But no surface.

Quote: Originally written by Bryce: At very least the game should say that. I mean, everyone would know it's just an arbitrary game-balance thing, but at least the game could pretend there is a reason. I feel reminded of my first D&D experience in the 80s, when somebody was trying to climb down a rope carrying two huge bags filled to the brim with coins. The rope tore, sending the PC to his death. The player, close to tears, complained to the DM that he couldn't possibly know that ropes could tear, since it never said so in the rulebook and also it's a fantasy game after all. I felt betrayed a couple of times in the game, too. First off, I don't like the fact that travelling through a series of caves for a couple of weeks can turn someone who is hardly trusted by the Empire to wield a rusty fork into a warrior, who wipes the floor with every single veteran Derwish, the elite force of the Empire. Now that makes sense. On another note: Literally every mage you encounter in Avernum 5 has probably been in training longer than your party, so I don't think the grounds for treating low-level NPC-summons differently are as far-fetched as you claimed. I played through the game with actually summoning something twice, and it was never more than one creature, since I usually prefer nuking the enemy to prepping an epic battle. Also I had the feeling, that it's very difficult as an Empire agent to summon more than one creature down into the caves of Avernum. The creatures got very aggravated and quickly so. I think they feel safer around the natives of the caves, but I'm not sure.

If I remember the grounds for Jeff's decision to cap summons at 2 correctly, it was due to balance issues, i.e. parties could exploit the higher numbers of summons and really wreak havoc during otherwise darn fascinating encounters (soultaker comes to mind, along with a couple of others Randomizer mentioned). Don't get me wrong: I'm not against realism in the way you meant it (consistency). It's just that I don't have trouble imagining a summoner, who's been at the job of summoning for decades, do a better job at it than my spellcaster who just a week ago wet his pants when the first fireball emerged from his fingertips. It's just a shame that summoner won't be sharing his secrets with me after we met. edit: fixed typo

While there certainly went a lot of thought into this, it reminds me of many a discussion on realism in rpgs. Realism may add to the gameplay-experience - then it's probably good and helpful. On the other hand, realism may just as well do not a thing for gameplay value, but drain the poor game-designer's already too little and precious time. I wonder what's the actual advantage of your model while playing the game?

Quote: Originally written by Randomizer: Quote: Originally written by Waterbearer: —Alorael, who actually wasn't able to start that quest chain. Where, exactly, do you find the Xian Skull? First you need to deliver an anvil from Solberg to X. Then you have to survive listening to X tell his life story and his quest to perfect his anvil spell. And that was one of the easier parts of that quest. Personally I wrecked my brain around how to get Hurrr Bellafont in Nephar Beach to sell me her banana boat. I'd never expected a singing contest in any of Jeff's games.

Alo, obviously you can't play one of them. But as I said: you can hire a Vanahiti on the sunny Isle of Vinitawawa after you've completed Gladwell's Cream of Coconut quest. But really, playing a Vahnatai, Pffft. What won't they think of next!

You can hire a Vanahiti on the Isle of Vinitawawa, but you may not play one. I'm sorry.

There will be a few occasions where you will have to do something you might not otherwise. When you do, certain areas will become hostile and you might have to kill certain beasts. If you don't, wicked curses await. The rewards are good, especially the stat-boost and you can still decide to kill him later. On my second time through I wanted to play freely without the geas but I'll kill him anyway. Hope that helped.

Somehow I am a trifle bewildered by the topic's title's assessment. I always felt it was part of the fun to run around with the merry foursome and pounding fell beasts to a pulp, where either of the merry men or maidens was more or less useful at a given point. Isn't this where tactics come into play? On a similar note: every mass, stable or not, eventually gave in, and there was many a fight where my human (what?) melee (oh dear!) swordsman (madness!) was voted Employee-of-the-Month.

I stumbled across the first one when I wanted to bring up a PC's inventory window - for whichever reason now escapes me - and hit the 'u'-button instead of the 'i'-button. Lo and behold! a little white letter appeared on a dark wall to reveal an even darker button. After this I remember walking through half the caves again looking for secret doors. Sheeesh.

The following post might contain spoilers for those who haven't finished the game. Be warned. My impression concerning the ending being anti-climactic was that it somehow had to be, because the story-arc is building up towards Avernum 6. Whichever ending will become canonical, the Empire has an outpost buried deep within Avernum lands. Furthermore, wiht both possible Emperors being nutcrackers, another invasion of Avernum may be imminent. Either way, whatever the story is building up to, Avernum 5 sets the stage for the grand finale. Its ending feels unsatisfying, even anti-climactic, because it simply is.