Painted Lady

it'll be worse since some of us defeated him last time.

The emphasis is on "some." I wonder what percentage of players got through Redbeard on their first playthrough. I certainly did not.

The exploit you gave (level 14) for Tassik-Schai worked great for me. Actually, I got back into the hallway next to the stairs before attacking him. There was one message about "the smell of vinegar getting stronger" but that was it. The slimes never spawned at all and that ordeal became a piece of cake.

Just one quick question for Jerakeen. Your guide says that after level 15 you start spreading your points around a bit. The question is, do you stop with your character's main skill at a certain point or do you keep going? For example, Mage Skills need to be at 17 to cast the most demanding spells, yet upgrades are possible until you top out at level 30. How high do you normally raise that stat?

Jeff doesn't have a fixed schedule. Basically depending upon how much of the game engine is new the testing starts 4 to 5 months before game release.

Well, we know that Avadon II is going to be a bigger game than Avadon i was. So, if we assume the release occurs in late October or so and that the Mac beta takes 5 months, that would mean a start date in early June. And, the PC and iPad versions will probably start beta testing in early August. More or less - of course.

Has anyone noticed that the clock the bulletin board is using is way off any times used in the US?

It will be very interesting to meet Miranda again, I'm also curious to see if Redbeard gets a new wife.

First - When we head to the Taewon Empire I'll bet Miranda will show up in some capacity.

Second - I'll be surprised if our litttle, yet ambitious, Nathalie doesn't worm her way right into Redbeard's confidence and replace Miranda.

Third - For those who have worked on the Mac beta in the past - How long after the announcement of a game does the beta normally begin?

Thank you so much for this guide. Even though I have played through twice - once on Normal and once on Hard, I was getting stuck on Torment. In fact, I was just about to give up. You have given me some great ideas for getting further down the road. Good stuff!

I think Redbead is overseeing the rebuilding of Avadon after the attack that took place at the end of game 1. It looks to me like he is telling Sevelin what he thinks of the repairs to the castle while Nathalie looks on. Since Heart Miranda is no longer around, Nathalie has probably become Redbeard's new chief assistant.

Although, maybe the mac version will have fewer bugs initially because there will presumably be more people beta-testing prior to the release (since he'll have two versions to beta-test).

Actually there will be three versions - Mac, PC and iPad....

I'm curious about the pacing of the beta testing. Normally, the Mac version is released before the Windows and iPad versions start testing. Looks like we are going to have some overlap this time. Gives me shivers just to think about how much fun this is going to be.........

Does the trait "Strong Back" influence To Hit in a meaningful way?

 

As I mentioned before I think a kickstarter project would be a great thing - or just a merchandise shop if he really dislikes kickstarter. Would love to buy (potentially overprized) Shirts, Cloth Maps, Posters and whatnot from this game. And I I am sure that lots of people in this community would not hesitate to spend more money for the game than "necessary".

Basilisk Games tried the tee-shirt, mouse pad, poster shop a few years ago. Apparently it was quite time-consuming. And, even worse, there was so much investment in inventory (not all of which sold well) that it wound up being more trouble than it was worth.

I'm trying to figure out how the Mac, Windows and iPad versions can all come out in the fall of 2013. It seems to take 4-5 months to test the Mac version. Jeff can start the iPad and Windows betas simultaneously, but it's probably about two months before those are finished. So, that would mean the Mac version in September and the others in November?

I absolutely cannot wait!

I totally agree with Student of Trinity about playing Geneforge in order. There is a continuity to the story-line that you don't want to miss out on. It's a great series of games. And, when you start the series try playing as a Shaper right away - it will pull you into the unique game design.

I personally thought the Geneforge series was unique in it's concept - lots of fun and quite interesting. And, I played straight through - 1 to 5. I would highly recommend that you do the same. Not only does the engine look more up to date as the series progresses, but you definitely lose some of the story line if you didn't start at the beginning.

Also, if you start with Geneforge, jump in and play as a Shaper right away. Otherwise you won't immerse yourself in the things that make Geneforge unique.

I adore the Blessed Athame. It looks so perfect - small, deadly and beautiful. My current favorite!

Well doh! It was a Shielding Potion in a Quick Slot. I must have dragged my palm over the slot while trying to manipulate the tunnels. Thanks!

I'm re-playing Avernum: EftP on the iPad and have had an odd thing happen two times so far. My party is walking along (indoors) and we are winding around in some tight area. Suddenly one of my guys gets a status change; he gets Shield Chant, Spine Shield and Regenerating. Any idea what causes this?

I finally defeated Redbeard. God, it was long and ugly - it took 2 hours. First I turned the difficulty down. Having planned on the battle from the beginning I had hoarded haste and battle potions, so I had lots of those. I wound up with Sevelin and Jennell in the east room. Raidon and Shima were in the west room. Poor little Nathalie was stuck with Redbeard. What finally turned the corner for me was when Nathalie wound up in the west room and Redbeard followed her there. I had to send Jennell over there to heal everyone, so all but Sevelin were together. That was more efficient because we could switch from fighting Soul Jars to fighting Redbeard depending on what was most advantageous. That was undoubtedly with most difficult battle I've ever seen. Yikes!

I'm about to start the last sequence of quests in Avadon. Am playing on Hard, and it has been fun, but reasonably challenging. So, my question is - how much harder is Torment than Hard? I don't want to start something that is absolutely impossible, but if I could possibly do it I might want to give it a try.

I have an iPad 3, and there are not too many freezes with Avadon. They still happen, but I wonder if they are more common on the earlier iPad models?

I think the thing that bothers people who have this complaint about Avadon is that it feels as though you ought to have choices with consequences, but you don't. I think part of this is that some very obvious moves (go back to Redbeard and complain about not getting into the castle) are explicitly mentioned by characters but cannot be done, and sometimes you do have seemingly important choices that end up having no consequences.

 

It's interesting that Jeff decided to do this. It didn't bother me, but it bothered a fair number of people.

I saw somewhere that Jeff said he had been thinking about the fact that people in real life do things and often don't have to face the consequences of their actions. It would seem he brought that reality to Avadon...

I have the same thing happen on both Avernum and Avadon about 25% of the time. Must be something about the game engine interacting with the iPad's gyroscope....

Have you contacted Jeff about these weapon pictures? I am sure he would want to include them in the section on Desktop Art because they shouldn't get lost in a forum.

Those are really excellent!