jlsgaladriel

Since he's between life and death, you also must be between life and death to do real damage to him. Click to reveal.. Move your party -- especially your damage-doers -- next to the pool just north of Gssch, and drink. They will receive a death curse. Damage Gssch at will. Only those affected by the curse will be able to do serious damage -- I actually left my priest out of the pool scramble, and included a summoned something. Just before the curse is to wear off, move those affected to the south pool, and drink the cure. Move north and repeat as necessary. On normal, I think I only needed to drink twice, so it's not an awful cycle.

I wonder if it's too silly to include a reminder of the difficulty level on the startup screen, with a pointer to the difficulty adjustment options. Just today I found myself thinking ooh, this is harder than I remember -- it's my second runthrough -- and it's taken my reading this thread to remember that I'd switched the difficulty level from "normal" to "hard." I enjoy the challenge, so the realization isn't going to send me back to an easier option, but I'm betting I'm not the only user who's forgotten that, after all, she had *chosen* the more difficult path!

Back on the meanest monster track -- I'm playing through for the second time, and glancing at my (printed out) map, I discover one spot I'd marked omgwt*bbq, where * may be replaced with whatever word you choose to express extreme unhappiness. It's the Tunnel Horror just west of Komlos' smithy. At the right level, it's not that awful, but when one first encounters it: pwnage.

Quote: im surprised aloreal hasn't complained about his someone stealing his shtick yet Well, Eigenvalue did pay him tribute in the imitation; it's not like it was a straight-up steal.

Synergy and Randomizer, have I told you lately how much I appreciate you?

Quote: Hardest Quest -the one I could never get myself to complete- for me was, though not the toughest, was driving off Roark, the text that popped up just made it impossible to finish it I haven't done this either, because Roark epitomizes the spirit of the Abyss! But now I've made up an all-slith party -- well, three sliths and one nephil wannabe -- who're going to favour All That's Reptile in the end. Down with the human infiltrators! The question, of course, is it better for reptilian life if I take out *three* parties for Melanchion, leaving only the Horde? Or is it better for the Horde if I only take out two?

Quote: Actually not levelling up very often at this point. Even the 26 knowledge brews I got in Tenevra haven't made a huge difference. I'm pretty sure that knowledge brews have nothing to do with leveling: they're just a straight-up granter of skill points.

Ah, I remembered being annoyed by the inventory management in the earlier games, but had forgotten that the encumbrance didn't come in until later. I'm glad Jeff continues to say that he plans to update his earlier games... I haven't played Exile (or for that matter A1) in ages, and would love to go back and do so, but for what now seems like an unfortunate interface.

I very much like SoT's answers, but I'll give a bite at what I suspect is the real overarching answer: Users complain about gameplay issues far more than about realism. More happy players = better revenue for Spiderweb, so Jeff will pretty much always decide in favour of playability rather than enforce rules of physics. Early Spiderweb games like Exile* did measure encumbrance by what was carried, rather than just what was worn. It led me to make a lot of strength-heavy characters, thereby limiting my more interesting options, and making the game less fun. I doubt very many of us would really want a return to an old-fashioned encumbrance system. correction: exile 3

I'm not sure A6 by itself would engender a full understanding of Gladwell's uncoolness. A5 is the appropriate game in which to learn true Gladwell hatred.

This thread discusses what we know about the new series. Then, in true Spiderweb style, it veers off into a discussion of the realtionship between Norse mythology, Wagner, gender equity, and Tolkien... ... but you'll still get what you're looking for there.

Originally Posted By: tcheedchee I seem to have forgotten all the places, where I have met trainers. And I didn't find them listed in the forum either. Slarty's got a list of the cheapest trainers available for each skill, complete with an analysis of money-per-skill-point-saved ratios: skill trainers. I love this list.

Time doesn't matter in game, except *within* a few quests, all of which are pretty obvious. I can't think of an occasion in which time *between* quests really matters. So when you're trying to chase down fleeing bandits under Blosk, time matters, but it doesn't matter how long it takes you to begin the Blosk quest after it's been assigned. Likewise, time has an effect in the battle under Cotra, but it doesn't matter how long in game it takes you to begin the quest. The only possible exception is that your heroes do consume food slowly over time. There's so much food available in the game, though, that for food to become a temporal issue, you'd need to sell most of it, ignore the unsellable mushroom biscuits, and basically willfully starve yourself into a state of weakness.

Quote: I think there are also one or two other places where you find books to raise it, as I recall. From Randomizer's list: AL 8 - Patrick's Tower - Gladwell's Mertis Spiral quest AL 8 - Tower Colony - after Purging the Haakai quest The spiral book raises dispel barrier by 2; the book upstairs at the tower colony increases it by 1; Kreador is right about the trainer, also at the tower colony. I think those are all the options!

Madrigan, it isn't an outwait-them quest. But nothing happens until you trigger the event. See my post here.

Originally Posted By: "Jeff" You know all those bodies you're always finding in the back tunnels with tiny chunks of loot on them? There's your other adventurers. Also, every pile of bones and skulls. ::snicker::

Somehow I'm trying to picture Galadriel as Brunhilde, and it's making my head hurt. ...Earth-daughter, protects /the great wizard's pet hobbit/ the great God's little human son, who two /books/ operas later becomes ring-crazed for a cursed ring which can only be purged in fire... If anything, Tolkien stole all the good parts away from Brunhilde, and gave men all the good active bits. Eowyn's really got the most oomph to her, but Galadriel basically bestows a few gifts and sails west. The women's parts don't have much in common. But certainly that ring theme wasn't unknown to Tolkien.

No, he specified that it was an Hungarian opera, Bluebeard's Castle. Although he also said while it provided idea inspiration for him, the game would in no way be obviously derived from the opera. Still, I don't think I'll open that seventh door.

Originally Posted By: acky He was talking about how the party will be based off of Geneforges class system (Agents, Serviles, Warriors etc). Oh! I didn't think that was at all what he was saying. (See above for what I heard him say.) Originally Posted By: dantius Planned release is early 2011. For mac, or Windows? Jeff always releases first for mac. Hopefully the archon's right, and he's just giving himself breathing room. On the other hand, building a whole new system, even on top of a geneforge core engine, has got to be more work than modifying an engine for a new release in a series.

Quote: The part I found funny is if you listen closely, you can hear a Vogel offspring in the background. Yep, I actually played the podcast while in the tub, so for a while I wasn't certain if there was a ruckus in my own house, or on the podcast. I kept thinking I should pause the play to check, but didn't seem like knowing the answer was worth handling electronics while wet.

Yep, three parties (?) -- I wasn't sure if he was talking about affiliations, or group size -- characters chosen from four types with radically different abilities. This is done for variety's sake (hooray!) but also so that even folks with poor skill-choosing abilities won't lock themselves out of a successful finish. ::shrugs:: Jeff mentioned many times the importance of branching plotlines, such that one feels the effects of decisions made during the game. (This is one of my favourite things about Jeff's games, so again: hooray!) Oh, and he's keeping a log of all the game details, so his dragons won't change sexes from one installation to another! No hints of world design, other than the reference to the opera, and he says while it sparked some good ideas, its influence won't be obvious. Jeff's building a carefully crafted deep immersive world, but, well, that's kind of like saying water's wet and chocolate is delicious. Planned release is early 2011.

Oh, heck, I guess class-bounded characters are easier to play and harder to break, but I like flexibility. I thought Jeff had a pretty good compromise going in Avernum, in which he offers balanced starting characters, which I am then free to ignore! I do like the Geneforge system for its replay value: a character who relies on shaping plays very differently from one who's fighting and/or casting her own way through battles. It's more of an ability-based distinction than a restrictive class system, though, so I doubt that's what he means. Designing something which adds variety is very different from designing something to make character design easy or unbreakable. The podcast is now on my iphone...

Quote: Or could he really care less, and you could get Jasmine and Levitt quests BOTH, but only in that order? I believe that's true: one can clear both quests as long as one mentions Jasmine first when in dialogue with the mayor. It seems to me as if that's a bug, not a feature: I wonder if Jeff might fix this in a future version, so that clearing Get Help for Silvar isn't dependent on dialogue order when speaking to the mayor?

Quote: Help me, jlsgaladriel; you're my only hope! I can't get involved! I've got work to do! It's not that I like the Empire, I hate it, but there's nothing I can do about it right now. It's such a long way from here! ...I reloaded my endgame party from the last runthrough and went back to Silvar to verify: there aren't any dialogue options which would clear that quest. So it's possible to basically do what Jasmine asks, but opt for dialogue options in Silvar which lock you out of finishing the quest.

Quote: if I give my fighters a level each in Priest/Mage... Oh! I've found that giving everyone a priest level or two is very nice -- especially, as folks have pointed out, if they're divinely touched. Minor heal is useful even in endgame, and is cheap to buy levels for. On the other hand, I'm not convinced a level or two of mage on a tank would do anything for you other than waste skill points.