Brocktree

I pored over the documentation, and apparently intelligence should improve both the hit chance and success rate for mental attack spells. I haven't experimented enough to know either way.

After playing part of AEFTP and feeling rather disappointed, I thought I'd give Avadon a whirl. I've held off trying it out for a while, since what I heard wasn't good. Comments included: Skill trees that were a poor imitation of those in Diablo II, a cookie-cutter swords and sorcery game in a generic fantasy setting, a stale plot, and linear gameplay. Either way, I went through the motion of the starter dungeon, and wasn't too impressed. The Kva lands weren't much better. But as I kept playing, the game grew on me. The story is decent enough to be engaging. The maps, while linear, still allow for a certain degree of exploration via side quests. The skill trees are actually *very* well implemented, much more so than its successor (AEFTP). Investing in lower end abilities eventually unlocks the opportunity to invest in high-end abilities, yet lower tier abilities remain vital to success. Better yet, consumable items remain useful through the entire game. The difficulty is a bit of an issue. There is a huge spike at the mindtaker drake, and from then on the game gets more and more merciless. I had to drop the difficulty from torment, to hard, to normal, and eventually to casual for the end fight. And holy hell, is the end fight against Redbeard *insane*. I got my teeth kicked in on the first attempt, and just managed to scrape through on the second attempt. I understand he's an optional challenge boss, but come on, I could hardly lay a hand on the guy. It came down to who would break first: Redbeard, or my mind. I was gunning for Redbeard since about half-way through the game, simply because he came across as a bit of a douchebag. He has a complete lack of cultural sensitivity (a real bad trait in an international peacekeeper), a nasty habit of having people he has tortured serve as his trusted advisors (Miranda and Leila), and does nothing to stop his servants acting as assassins for hire. It's a shame the PC is so stupid (eg. not realizing that the Wayfarer is *gasp* acting against the Pact) and railroaded into acting as a loyal hand. I played through as a druid. I first tried a summoner, which failed miserably. I then retrained to specialise in attack spells. This provided me with a PC who could hit with a variety of different elements, which was much better. If I had my time over again, I'd probably try a sorceress or blademaster who specialised in buffs/debuffs. Oh well. The game gets a tick of approval from me. It sure craps all over AEFTP.

I've started playing Avadon, and amazingly the skill tree system is *better* than in AEFTP. Higher tier skills are more powerful and kickass, while the lower tier skills remain useful.

1. Are the sorceress's mental spells (eg. daze and charm) improved by strength/intelligence/dexterity? 2. Are the level of a druid's summons improved by strength/intelligence/dexterity? 3. Do strength/intelligence/dex improve the druid's healing spells?

1. We are both in agreement that archery is inferior to other means of dealing physical damage. Even worse, it no longer has the tactical advantage it afforded in earlier Avernum games. You can't fire at someone directly next to you, which really sucks because most enemies close in on you in the first round. So essentially, you are investing in a source of physical damage which has a lower damage output than dual wielding (and even pole weapons!), that can't even be used against enemies near you. Bye bye 1/4 of the skill tree, it was nice knowing you! 2. You're right in the sense that Torment is meant to be hard. However, this 'hardness' occurs due to HP bloat, astronomical damage, and a hidden penalty to your PCs resistances. That's not a good sort of hard. And as I observed, Normal difficulty suffers from HP bloat, it's just not *as bad* as Torment. Honestly, combat just isn't interesting with the skill system and HP bloat, which is real bad, since combat is the main focus of the game. 3. I'm 100% sure summoning focus is bugged. Summons do not gain levels. I've tested this with the editor, and my summons do not receive an increase in their %to hit with the Summon Focus trait. Blessing focus does not cause my War Blessing spells to increase my chance to hit by 5%.

I thought I'd respond to this thread instead of starting my own since I'm in agreement with the OP. Avernum: EFTP is probably the least enjoyable Spiderweb game I have played in a while. I have to admit, I'm in a different position from many gamers here, since I've played Exile 1 and Avernum 1. In otherwords, I've essentially played the game through twice already, so Avernum: EFTP holds no surprises for me. I'm simply covering old ground when it comes to the game world, story, dialogue etc. Also, Avernum 6 was my last game, and I regard it as solid good fun. For me, Avernum: EFTP doesn't improve on anything. It still suffers from the same problems of the previous games, which include: - HP bloat. Avernum is, at its core, a hack and slash game. You need to fight to advance. This is unfortunate when you have a truckload of enemies thrown at you whose HP exceeds that of all your PCs combined. This was a major problem in Avernum 5. It was scaled back in Avernum 6 (with the exception of a few powerful end-game bosses, most of whom were optional fights), but now it's back in full force. - Poor documentation and in-game info. I'm amazed that the game manual does not include spell descriptions, or even spell effect descriptions, this time around! Furthermore, in-game information is flat out wrong. I'm sick of the incomplete and misleading in and out of game documentation. Given that the developer has many so many games and remakes, it's inexcusable that the documentation is so poor. - Useless/unbalanced skills. Archery is still useless, pole weapons are inferior to dual wielding, most of the skills higher up the skill tree are downright inferior to those lower on the tree. However, Avernum: EFTP actually is worse than previous games in several aspects: - The skill tree format is actually more restrictive than the old system, which wasn't that great to begin with. Most of the higher skills are downright inferior to the lower tier skills. You're usually better off investing in melee than blademaster, or mage spells over spellcraft. And now you need to invest in weapon skills to improve hardiness. Archery is inferior, so that eliminates 1/4 of the entire skill tree screen. In my mind, the whole idea of a skill tree hierarchy is that as a result of investing in lower level, 'core' skills, you are eventually rewarded with kick-ass, flashy high end skills. When lower tier skills are *better* than higher tier skills, this just has me question why Jeff would even bother with the skill tree system. - Having the game automatically move your PCs to the appropriate range is rather annoying. It sucks even more when there is no in-game grid to see actually how far you need to move before you can execute a ranged attack. - This game is *hard*. An abundant number of enemies seem to have ranged, area of effect elemental attacks that can kill your characters in one round (poison rain, lightning spray). That would be fine, if you had some sort of defense available. Unfortunately, it all boils down to killing them quickly enough so that they never reach that point in their scripting where they resort to such an attack. Playing the game on torment is about as fun as mud-wrestling a skunk, and you hit a brick wall once you reach the Great Cave. Normal difficulty is tolerable, but boring due to the HP bloat that persists. - Enforced linearity. Exploration of the open-ended world is sorely limited by monster level. If you venture too far off the beaten track (ie. anywhere remotely interesting), you are often killed in the first round of combat. Hell, you don't even get to fire a shot, since these monsters get to move before you. Gothic used a similar system of linearity, particularly Gothic 1. However, Gothic had a stronger plot, it had a storyline you needed to play through. Avernum's main selling point is its free-ranged exploration. So Jeff is essentially inhibiting free-ranged exploration is what is supposed to be a free-ranged exploration game. - Spell system seems incomplete. Each spell has three levels, but as far as I can tell, a large number of the spells don't receive a notable increase in power when you upgrade them. - A number of traits appear bugged. Summoning focus *does not* work, and neither does blessing focus. - Last but not least, the weapons/armour in this game seem underpowered. Exile 1 had a shortage of high-end gear, but at least when you got a magic item, it really kicked ass. None of the magical weaponary/armour in this game is ground-breaking. Overally, AEFTP is pretty disappointing.

Question of the Day: When does Lightning Spray do more damage than Arcane Blow? Answer: When you have cast Cloak of the Arcane. No kidding. Near the end of the game, my priest was consistently doing more damage with Smite than my mage was doing with Arcane Blow. Curious as to why, I did some testing, and have discovered that Cloak of Arcane does *not* boost the spell power of area-of-effect damage attacks. It only does so for targeted damage attacks (ie. Firebolt, Smite, Lightning Spray, Spray Acid).

Originally Posted By: Nioca Originally Posted By: Brocktree And it was innocent civilians who created the Shapers. By the logic you present, every living sophont on Terrestria is guilty of creating or supporting tyranny, regardless of how far removed they actually are. You asserted that "The Shapers have a lot of problems, yes, but rogue creations wasn't one of them." It was rogue drayks, drakons and serviles, *created by Shapers*, who formed the rebellion. Clearly Shapers had (and continue to suffer) problems with rogue creations.

Originally Posted By: Nioca What. Have you... have you even played any Geneforge game past the first? The Shapers have a lot of problems, yes, but rogue creations wasn't one of them. IIRC, 90% of all the rogues and rogue problems we've seen were the results of the rebels, Shapers created the rebels who spawned those rogue creations.

Originally Posted By: Harehunter I have mentioned before that the women in this family do not see themselves as helpless and dependent no matter what. Their view is that their relationship with their spouses is a partnership, Lies! Heresy! Any married woman who does not earn as much as her husband is *obviously* controlled by him financially. No woman seeks out a relationship where she is financially dependent on a man, it is forced on her by the 'Patriarchy' . Remember those black 'slaves'? Well, one could argue that they were in the position of power. It was they who generated the revenue for their white 'masters'. If they chose to leave the plantation, then the plantation owners would have been financially ruined. That's an awful amount of power those 'slaves' had right there, which they could have quite easily abused.

Originally Posted By: Kelifornia Girls Originally Posted By: Darth Ernie Originally Posted By: Jewels in Black I want my boys to grow up striving to be strong competent men rather than settling for bumbling fool, and I wouldn't mind there being a few more entertaining role model characters on prime time to show them what that might look like. 007 terminator If you want your kids to be soulless automatons, or alcoholic womanisers, then you could do a lot worse than Ernie's suggestions! I think he was referring to Kyle Reese. And what man doesn't want to be James Bond? Furthermore, what woman doesn't *want* James Bond?

Man, the flame wars sure suck around here.

Isn't there a summary ending if you beat all three main quest in Avernum 1 and 2?

It's stated in-game that the cave lizards can live off blighted mushrooms. So I don't understand why the Avernites don't just breed more lizards.

The best future for Avernum is Gladwell in power, and Melanchion dead. Good luck achieving the latter.

Huh? 12 in parry costs 99 skill points, if you factor in pre-requisites (+33 skill points)

Originally Posted By: Barzhal Originally Posted By: Brocktree No he doesn't. An in-game character gives you a non-critical game item for committing a morally questionable act. Big difference. Nice rationalization...killing babies is a questionable act. The item received is irrelevant. Jeff rewards killing babies. Period. Trying to extrapolate "A fictional character in a video game gives me a virtual item as a reward for smashing the eggs of a non-existent race" to "Jeff is promoting baby killing" is a big stretch. If Jeff ever starts depositing money into your bank account for every baby you kill in real-life, you would have a case.

No he doesn't. An in-game character gives you a non-critical game item for committing a morally questionable act. Big difference.

Originally Posted By: Masquerade Jeff wants me to KILL BABIES No he doesn't. He simply provides you with the opportunity to do so. It's entirely up to you as to whether you are willing to commit mass abortion in order to obtain a non-critical game item. Quote: Sure, the sliths may be at war with humans, but that doesn't excuse a crime of this magnitude. Just imagine what would happen if the sliths did a thing like that to a human village, the people of Avernum would be enraged and rightly so, but in reverse its ok? How is killing a bunch of babies going to be of any help to the war? As a previous poster pointed out, this isn't some sort of political or ideological war with established rules of engagement. It's a no holds barred war of survival. Avernum is a harsh, barren land, and both the sliths and humans are not living their by choice. There is a finite amount of space in the caves, and both sides have spilt blood for every inch of territory taken. If the slith savages had the opportunity, they would indeed kill Avernite civilians. This is shown conclusively in Avernum 6. It's easy for you to get all high and mighty about them taking drastic measures to survive, but at the end of the day, its either Avernum or the slith savages. Quote: But there should be other ways to interact with the eggs and get that chainmail. Why should you be able to have your cake and eat it too?

Done some more number crunching: ------------------- Assume 150 skill points to spend: 100% of skill points in hardiness = 46% damage reduction 100% of skill points in parry = 51% damage reduction (melee only) 50/50 split = 48% damage reduction 80/20 split in favour of parry = 54% damage reduction ------------- If 110 skill points 100% of skill points in hardiness = 40% damage reduction 100% of skill points in parry = 39% damage reduction (melee only) 50/50 split = 37% damage reduction 80/20 split in favour of parry = 41% damage reduction 40/60 split in favour of hardiness = 34% damage reduction ------------- If 80 skill points 100% of skill points in hardiness = 32% damage reduction 100% of skill points in parry = 27% damage reduction (melee only) 50/50 split = 27% damage reduction 80/20 split in favour of parry = 32% damage reduction --------------------------------- As you can see, you start to gain defensive benefits from parry once you have spent approximately 80 points between hardiness and parry. Ergo. You need to invest at least 80 points in hardiness and parry before your investment in parry actually begins to pay off, in regards to melee damage reduction. *But* - Even if you invest a whopping 150 skill points optimally between parry and hardiness, you only gain an additional 6 percentage points to reduce *melee* damage, in comparison to investing all those points in hardiness. - More importantly, this 6 percentage point damage reduction only applies to *melee* damage. With the 80/20 split, you will be taking much more damage from ranged attacks and aura attacks, than had you invested all those points in hardineess. - Hardiness also reduces the damage duration from poison, acid, and lightning effects. - Hardiness enables you to resist curse, weaken and slow. --------------------------------------------------- Conclusion: Parry is vastly over-rated. Even with a high skill point investment in parry to offset the pre-requisite costs, the payoff is still less than had you simply taken those points and invested them in luck and hardiness.

Oh wow, I never knew about that little trick. I don't think it would be intentional though.

Yesterday I was trying to create a mage character with decent defense. When I attempted to unlock parry, I realised that quite a few skill points are wasted in pre-reqs. I started to wonder exactly how many skill points of parry you need to purchase before it actually becomes a better investment than simply sinking your points into hardiness. I discussed how to do this with Thuryl. Since the skill points invested in the pre-requisites are essentially 'fixed costs', they can't be incorporated into marginal analysis. He suggested that I calculate cumulative damage reduction/cumulative skill points for each level of hardiness, luck, resistance etc. http://www.box.com/s/xf2dcfusfcc29451nf8g Note that in the above, when calculating values for resistance, I did *not* include the skill point investment for endurance and hardiness pre-reqs. You will almost certainly invest in some endurance, and trying to incorporate the damage reduction from hardiness is a pain. I did consider dexterity, however.

It's taken me almost a year, but I've managed to restore the Great Portal and triumph over the last installment in the Avernum series. I've been a fan of Spiderweb Software games since the release of Exile 1. Since those early days, there have been some ups (Exile 3, Nethergate, Geneforge) and downs (Geneforge 3, Avernum 4). Personally, I feel that Avernum 6 is the best game to date. Finally we have a game which is relatively new and fresh, with its own identity. The game engine has been polished, and the mechanics balanced. Combat is rather enjoyable, and thank god for that, since there is bucketloads of it. The game is also a throwback to Exile 2, with a driving central storyline, but also a degree of non-linearity. At last the realities of an underground ecosystem are adequately addressed, and observations are made about the stagnation of an empire. There are some glaring weaknesses which have yet to be addressed, though. The big one is the distance between towns. Even though the Avernum world map is huge, sometimes towns are a stone's throw within each other. Exile dealt with this by having an outdoors section, and Geneforge via zone travel. A number of in-game and manual statements are incorrect and misleading. Also annoying is being unable to tell what status effects you have inflicted the enemy with. But overall, a great game.

After working my way through to Melanchion's lands, I can't help but make a few observations: - A couple of my PCs have two AP increasing items. However, they often do not receive 10 APs due to being stunned. - My mage (with no quick strike) has very poor initiative. - You can't create quicksilver bulwarks until near the very end of the game. All three observations suggest that quick strike is worth investing in, even if 2 AP increasing items are available.

Lure Lystak to the elevator, and then take it down. You can hit him with missile weapons with impunity.