goblindolf

Originally Posted By: Mod. It is killing anyone and everyone. SWS games are getting too linear now, and now all characters are too important for you to be able to kill whoever you want Well, I agree they are too linear, but not because of the amount of people you can or cannot kill. Long gone are and big unknown worlds to explore, with hidden away dungeons and treasures waiting to be found if you explored. Avadon felt like a long tunnel with nowhere to go but where npcs told you to go, places only existed if you were told they existed.. It felt like someone was holding your hand throughout the entire game and refused to let go of you incase you hurt yourself by choosing where you wanted to go, not that you actually could on any normal difficult setting. I remember reading somewhere on the forum that jeff scrapped the big explorable worlds in favor of linear gameplay because it's easier to balance, but the tradeoff is just not worth it. He removed one of the best parts of his previous games in the tradeoff. He always added stuff like warning dialogs and semi tough encounters before the really tough places so you knew if you struggled with them it was time to turn back.. or just reload if you ignored the warnings and died anyway? autosave isnt a new concept

Originally Posted By: Danny the Fool I can get the same kind of choices from skills, except those choices where my character becomes super powerful because I pumped 99% of my points into one stat... which I don't think enhances the game a lot. There is no link between high stat customization and one overpowered stat which you put everything into... actually didnt we get that with dexterity and less stats than the previous games? In the previous game you would never just pump one stat, ever. Also in avadon isn't the best strategy to focus on the middle tree and sink points into the same skill 4+ levels in a row all through the game?

Originally Posted By: Randomizer No word on how he's going to handle the dungeons. I remember he said he was keeping outdoors for the remakes. I don't remember him saying he was using the avernum 6 engine though. So I guess dungeons will be handeled the same way unless he has changed his mind since he said that. Hopefully he remembers that outdoors makes the world feel like an actual world, instead of a set of zones that only exist if someone tells you they exist, and considers it again for future games.

The latest post in the announcements forum says the following Quote: * What Else Is Coming? We are also slowly starting work on a ground-up rewrite of Avernum, which is itself a rewrite of our first title, Exile: Escape From the Pit. After a decade, Avernum is showing its age and very much in need of freshening up, with a new engine and graphics. What changes are you hoping Jeff will make in the remakes? Personally I would like to see him bring alchemy created poison back to the game. I would like to see more skills affect ranged weapons this time too, as damage increasing skills like assassination never seemed to work on ranged weapons, making them inferior. I would like to see him get rid of the damage cap, which I really disliked, where you could waste skill points on skills which you expected to increase your damage, just to find you had hit a damage cap.

Originally Posted By: *i Part of the issue with balancing a second weapon with a shield is the inherent asymmetry between killing your target faster, therefore ending damage permanently, versus suffering a little less damage, on average, each turn for longer. The former is almost always a better choice from a game theoretic perspective. Couldn't you say the same for 2 handed weapons vs 1 hand and shield? I like the idea of blocking though

How old? There is realmz 1.3.2 here: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/realmz/files/ I am assuming it came with scenarios at that point

I think the main thing to watch out for when going from avernum 4-6 to 1-3 are the different mechanics. There is also blades of avernum which I think is inspired by realmz where you have a party and play different scenarios with them. As for the interface of 1-3 I think jeff plans to modify and polish it(after avadon I think). If you like a good story there is Nethergate, which I think is the best game jeff has made, especially story wise, but it doesn't get as much attention as his other games as it is a single with no sequels.

With skills like sharpshooter and bows in the game you would think it was considered a primary option, in fact I think it was intended to be, it's just underpowered. Then skills used to increase character damage per round like quickaction don't apply to ranged weapons and ranged itemization tends to be a bit poor compared to melee weapons.

Archers have been very underpowered in most spiderweb games. I don't know if jeff is aware of it though. Considering they don't improve with new games I guess not.

I think the food thing is to make the game 'easier'. Maybe instead in the future he could bring food back and leave it for higher difficulties or an option to turn it on/off. I liked the original's skill point system. You would get a lot of satisfying "tink!" sounds

If you don't want to risk losing your place you could repair it yourself with plaster and paint over it. And get some anger management

A presequel to A1 where you have to find a place to put the undesirables could be cool. I would like to see a new world from jeff though. I liked nethergate a lot, but it doesnt look like its getting a sequel, maybe something else loosely based on history.

It should work in xp mode (basically a virtual machine with xp installed on it which you could use if you dont have xp mode)

Quote: Serviles would be a good easter egg creation, if it weren't for the Create Ornk canisters. Besides, in later games, you can play as a servile, so serviles shaping serviles isn't exactly a good idea. it would have been kind of cool to be able to shape weak serviles. put equipment on them and send them in, then loot their equipment back when they die

Oh, is the reason for 3) so the mage can heal when needed? But there are some damaging priest spells so they don't need to get mage spells for damage? What spell is usually aimed for. I plan to play on torment if that makes a difference

Hello! So I plan to play through avernum 1-6 + blades of avernum and I know the engine changes a lot through the series. 1) For which games do traits really hurt your leveling? 2) Are bows competitive with melee in any of the games? 3) Does it ever make sense in any of the games to have a seperate mage and priest, and continue dumping the rest of your points into skills to make those spells better? Or do spells/skill cost scale in such a way that you should make each caster take both?

Does anyone know if there are more than 2 druid bracelets in the game? I know of one in hagfen and one from the spiders. And is there more than 1 mauling leather in the game? I'm sure I ended up finding more than 1 on my roman playthrough.

Is it possible to get sever seal from anywhere but the bazaar? I didn't start with any skillpoints in spirit circle, and it costs 2800 gold to buy the spell from the bazaar, which is a bit much for my low level party

the Hollow hills and the Faerie Bazaar didn't seem to care when I killed Raven with my roman party. I ended up walking up to both their leaders and killing them later on for the crones

Does killing raven even set any flags so the game knows it was done? Found this in the Raven file in data. beginstate DEAD_STATE; erase_char(39); erase_char(41); message_dialog("This awesome creature, this God to a faraway people, has been destroyed. Once again, the power of humanity is supreme.",""); Im guessing 39 and 41 are his summons, but thats all that seems to be done from what I can see.

So i've just finished the game as roman and i'm debating whether or not to kill raven for the all circle scroll on my celt playthrough. I remember reading that he is mentioned in the ending, but after killing him with my roman party the following was in the ending "spiders pass, and a huge strange looking bird." The bird comment sounds like raven to me, even though I killed him, so does killing him really affect the ending at all? I mean hes dead and hes still passing through the gate (at least for romans).

Quote: It's based on an opera he saw. I'm imagining characters in tutus singing their way through the game. Evil monster, you will dieeee! Fireballlll! I am slainnn! Quote: It's using a modified Geneforge game engine. aww Hopefully its modified to bring ourdoors back. Quote: The characters will be using four classes and less of a classless game system that has been used in past games. I liked the generic avernum type system myself. I guess you will only have one party member, which is why he went with the geneforge system, the geneforge class system would be strange if you had 4 party members.

Since the manual seems to conflict with the in game information, I did the following tests with darts of ice to see if druidism increases its damage or not. Test 1: against spectral wolves (0 resistance) intel 18, druidism 10, war circle 9 Damage: 70,65,60,66,69,66,68,74,64,65,69,70 average 67.1 Test 2: against spectral wolves intel 18, druidism 40, war circle 9 Damage: 94,103,98,94,101,100,99,102,106,98,100,102 average 99.75 Test 3: against spectral wolves intel 40, druidism 18, war circle 9 Damage: 96, 95, 92, 102, 101, 99, 95, 100, 101, 106, 92, 100 average 98.25 Test 4: against spectral wolves intel 22, druidism 23, war circle 22 Damage: 100, 106, 94, 96, 93, 96,99 ,99, 91, 109, 103, 98 average: 98.6 I guess for darts of ice at least, all 3 seem to increase damage equally.

Does anyone know if intelligence/druidism and points in specific circles increase spell effectiveness equally? And if any sort of penalty exists past 10 points in any of them? I was experimenting and I noticed points in war circle increased darts of ice damage, even though the war circles description doesn't mentionb that it increases effectiveness of spells.

hmm.. In that case I get the feeling it was not intended. It just inherited BoA spears 1 handedness