TriRodent

Try a little bit south of the empire encampment that had an arrogant/taunting dervish but north of what used to be a major slith temple (or east of a now empire fort but west of some shipwrecked medicine...). All those intersecting lines should get you in the ballpark

Wait - 2 switches? Lots of undead & giants around there too along with vaporized empire troops? Are you at the first tower or have you been sent to the second tower? The second tower is where the switches that need to be thrown a certain way are (& they're right inside the front door, kind of hard to miss). The empire found Sixus' original tower & he had to run with his followers to the 2nd tower. There are directions to it in the 1st tower. Edit: and now I see that Lilith answered that too, I thought it was just an answer for Erika's tower. Ah well...

It is possible to reset the statistic counter/medals earned. Doing the following will reset the counter/statistics for the entire game so it should really only be done if you are starting over from the beginning/starting a new game. In the saved games folder (for windows it is in your documents library/spiderweb software/avernum 2 saved games/) there is a file in there (avernum2settings) that is displayed as a CD movie but is actually a data file. If you remove this file from this folder (delete it or move it into another folder) it will reset everything. BE AWARE THAT DOING THIS WILL ALSO DELETE YOUR REGISTRATION INFO, so make sure that you have your registration key available to unlock it again. The same thing can be done for resetting A1EFtP's statistics (different save folder obviously) & probably every other SW game that has the statistic counter (I'm not sure when Jeff started including it in his games). I'm not sure where the file is located for Mac users but if I'm recalling a long ago discussion correctly the process is similar (in that the file is in your saved games folder). The same caveat applies though, deleting/moving this file will remove any registration info so make sure that you have the registration key available.

On my latest run through I wanted to make sure that I had Cloak of Curses at L3 before heading down the river. Having also been following the 'SL/AL, what is really needed' threads I was keeping an eye on training the minimum AL needed. As SL wouldn't show up until L12 for my guys, I did have to put the points into AL to get the spell(s) at L3. So I can confirm that your #s are correct for BoF, CB, & CoC in the first section. Edit: Also for Divine Fire in Blosk, a piercing crystal won't take down the barrier in Bart's room. So DB L2 is needed there.

The lower SW area leads to the area under the NW part (the entire western basement is one big room/area). To get there though, in addition to killing the beasties right at the bottom of the steps you have to get through the maze in the SW area (it's been a while so I don't remember exact details). Doors/walls will open if you walk through/past certain points moving in a certain direction which leads to other points which need to be moved past in a certain direction which leads to other points which.... it takes a while to figure out/make it through the maze. Once through it though, iirc all that is left is a decent fight with 3 reasonably strong giants & then you have access to the three storage areas (one of which has the athame - again iirc).

I tend to do most everything with the keyboard. Walking around being the exception & even that has only recently (past few games) been done by using the mouse. Prior to that when the only way of finding secret rooms was to bump into every wall space.... sigh.... I used the keyboard to move as for every step forward there had to be 1 to the side into the wall (or 2 if you were in a narrow hall). In the same general ballpark of complaints is the one where it would have been nice if the letter to cast assorted spells stayed the same from one game to the next. I couldn't begin to count the number of times towards the end of the game when I was in a big fight & for my magic user I automatically typed "mt" to whack the big group of powerful enemies with Arcane Blow only to see that I had summoned a giant or some sort of undead being to run around on my side of the battlefield & generally just get in the way (yes I know there is the issue of new lower powered spells being added). Also, heading out of the cities my priest would often try to Dominate one of the gate guards leading to some rather awkward conversations with the local constabulary.... (typing "pp" thinking I was getting the Ward of Elements ("pr") set up like it would in A1EFtP).

In one of his final "thanks for all the help everyone" emails to the beta testers he said that he was going to be working on the iPad version/conversion of A2CS & then off to Avadon 3. So if that's true (& I have no reason to doubt it, however life does interfere with the best of intentions at times) then it will most likely be at least a couple of years until our favorite cave dwellers see the light of the sun again.

Yes, add me to the list of those disappointed by finding Kyass in the tower & completely underwhelmed by how his story arc ended. Given where his stronghold was located it was obvious that it wouldn't survive the empire invasion (right on the edge of where their lands/checkpoints start. However someone with such dreams as he had & enough followers to make such a decent sized stronghold/fort in A1EFtP wouldn't/shouldn't have just been bulldozed into the ground. If anything it could/should have been somewhat like the Philippines and American soldiers in WW2, many of those that weren't killed or captured right off the bat went into the hills & fought as guerrillas for the duration of the war (and thinking of it further, so did some Japanese soldiers when the US came back in '44-'45 (some fighting/surviving in the hills until the 1970s). With Kyass' location he could have very easily made it to the northern islands & fought a guerrilla war from there OR (setting Jeff up for the eventual(?) rewrite of A5) pushing north past the islands & deeper into unexplored caves. That would have given Jeff a chance to make a new town/dungeon from the original A2 (perhaps them needing help clearing out a band/town of savage slith that were blocking the river into the depths) & giving a much better closing to him than - you stumble upon this tortured mess & he melts down into some goo....but back to the story... Coulda, woulda, shoulda... ah well. Why yes, I do tend to over think some things, why do you ask...

No. You continue to get your stat point every level (rotating among the four stats as usual) but only get the 2 skill points on the 5th (35, 40, etc)

The icy rain spellbook is in a solo area that you can go back to later if you need to (or if you find out that you missed the book on the first time through...not that I know anyone who did that...). Unfortunately it's at a point in the game where you're more than likely on to bigger & better spells so it's usefulness is questionable. The solo area I mentioned earlier in the thread is an unreturnable one but the only things you get are just some good equipment earlier than you normally would find similar items. Not a huge deal if you miss it.

As pretty much everyone mentioned, L10 is way too early to be heading to the Great Cave... at least for any combat quests/encounters. One thing I did after returning to the ToM was head up to Silvar & buy a boat. By getting the boat you can take it west & north up to Ft. Dranlon (cheap spells) & then west & south to the landing at the edge of the Scree Pits. From there it is a quick (& generally safe) walk to Gnass, Blosk, Dharmon (activating pylons wherever you find them) & back out through Ft. Emerald (potentially doing the Castle, Almaria, Patrick's Tower triangle as well although there the potential for wandering monsters is much higher). This gives you (in addition to pylon access) a chance to pick up some higher level spells/gear sooner than if you had to fight your way overland to get to those cities. Add in a few of the noncombat quests (greymold salve for Brian for instance) & you could pick up a level or two. After that you'll be in better shape & better equipped to take on the Eastern Gallery.

Speaking of stacking TU on a single character, make sure to have 5 TU on someone before starting the big one way rafting trip. There is a chance for some nice grave robbing (without a big fight unlike the original A2) in a solo area halfway down the river.

Yes you can 'turn them on' before you get Magi Clearance, just go touch them when you run across them. After you get the clearance Bevk, you then need to go to the Tower of Magi & ask around a bit. Eventually you'll find what you need to do to attune yourself to the main teleporter there & then be able to travel from pylon to pylon.

This question intrigued me enough to go back to the original A2, start a new game & make a dash for Ft. Draco. A few minutes later lots of dead rats & no spiders (friendly or otherwise). Very curious indeed. If the question about the screenshots was how to take one you can find directions here. After you do that then you can upload it to imageshack, photobucket or another hosting site like Slarty said.

You can get a point of spellcraft as well from the old drake in the SW corner of the Scree Pits for 2000gp (for the entire party)

Not for the same question but related somewhat - Unlike the way Spiderweb works XP in Avadon, members of your party won't earn experience when one member of your party is off doing singleton stuff. There are various places in the game (such as the various Vahnatai 'Test of ___' & a few other places) where you will need to send just one character off to do something. While he's gone he gets ALL the XP earned & the others get nothing. Not a big deal unless you are trying to keep everyone leveling up at roughly the same time. If you always send the same party member through to go do whatever then after a few of the mini quests/dungeons he's going to be a full level or so ahead of the others. Similarly, if during combat someone gets knocked unconscious/'killled' then he doesn't earn XP from the time he's knocked out until he gets revived. Also not a big deal unless it is one member constantly getting 'killed' early in a fight, leaving the others to deal with waves & waves of goblins (& getting experience for it). Over time the imbalance will start to show.

I don't know/remember the specific benefits from having a different race along in your group but there was something such as an extra couple of points in pole wielding for sliths to start with (pulled out of my butt example, I'm not sure what the actual benefit is so don't hold me to it). Each race had something but it wasn't anything really spectacular iirc (I 'think' sliths got a couple extra points in pole weapons & nephs got a couple extra in bows at the start & humans got an extra 'trait' every for every 4th trait earned - so each race has something extra but it isn't enough to want to change the build of your party). There is a nice benefit to having a slith in the party once you get to Gnass but I'll leave that for you to discover (if it's worth it overall though is another discussion...). Not to insult you but you aren't supposed to get the whole picture yet. Jeff designed/nerfed the game so that anyone with little to no gaming experience could, on normal difficulty, grab a premade party & make it through the game without constantly getting everyone vaporized or not being able to do 'x' at the end because you didn't have THE perfect skill tree build. For those that have played & beaten Jeff's games before then 'hard' is probably a much better level to play at. It will be challenging but there too you won't destroy your party's chances by a not-optimal pick of a trait way back on level 3. I haven't tried it on torment yet but I can't imagine that things won't hold true there too. My point is to not worry about the big picture/tiny detail things yet. All that you really need to know right now to have a great time is that the Empire invaded your cave systems & all of a sudden these strange magical barriers were closing off passages. Go enjoy the story & immerse yourself in this huge spelunking expedition for this run through as, even on the most difficult settings, the game has enough of a buffer built into it that it really won't matter if you can hit someone 62.2378% of the time doing 217 points of damage per hit or hit them 83.6754% of the time doing 145 points of damage. If in a couple of weeks, after you've played the game to the end, you're still wondering which is better (or frankly if it really matters) then we can hash it out. For now though, go out & enjoy this huge & wonderful playground that Jeff has built for us (for what it's worth my 1.5 fighters (1 pure melee & 1 fighter/mage combo) are human dual wielding. There are just too many good swords out there with extra abilities to use two hands to hold a spear (no spear is twice as good as a couple nice swords). Along the same lines, I've decided that the extra damage dealt out is worth more than the higher armor/different benefits from using a shield)

As Hume mentioned about A1EFtP, with A2CS there is a soft cap at level 30 & then things slow way down. After level 30 you continue to get your usual single attribute point per level (strength, dex, etc), but you only get 2 skill points every 5 levels rather than the 2 per level before that. Traits completely stop at L30. On my first playthrough (normal difficulty) I hit the L30 cap right about when I started to finish up the final quests needed for the victory conditions. So the cap came right about the time that it didn't matter much any longer (I think I finished with my guys at L32-33) On the other hand, my second playthrough (hard difficulty) had me trying to do most of the side quests & other little things as I came across them (the first was just a quick, get it done, race to the end). In this case I reached the cap at about the time when I'm started to get the final quests sorted out (about 75-80% through the game - they finished at about L35-36). Either way though the game is well balanced & by the time you get to where you hit the cap you're powerful/skilled enough that you really don't notice or need another point here or there. However you get there though, enjoy the journey as it's a great game. (I was one of the beta testers if you didn't figure that out...)

I saw if for sale on GOG this morning (a nice front page/initial slideshow of games placement) so that's at least 3 different places that it's for sale (Steam, GOG & SW itself) & probably more. As to the topic at hand, it's perfectly understandable. Keeping track of decades old customer info (information that probably 2 addresses, 3 phone #s & 5 email addresses out of date....) is something that would take a lot of time for very little return. I would much rather that you put your time into getting A3 & the return to the surface in the works... so when's that coming out ?

You don't. As was mentioned, you can transfer your saved games over which certainly is important. More importantly though, you don't have to buy the games again. You will need to reinstall them though as just copying the save game files over won't do that (I'm 99% sure). Depending on where/how/when you got the games you should have gotten a registration code with it (unless you got the games in a fully functional bundle, in which case you can skip this part). After reinstalling the game/s you'll need to reenter that to take it out of demo mode*. Once that is done your saved games should be fully functional. Worst case, contact Spiderweb & explain the situation and they'll get you back up & working (don't ask how I know this...more than once...sigh) *rereading this prior to posting, if I'm remembering correctly, on some of the SW games the registration info is buried in the saved games data somewhere. If that is the case then copying over the whole saved games folder just may take care of that for you. If not though, the bottom line is that you only have to buy the games once & Jeff/SW will help straighten it out

It's been a while but your mention kicked something loose in that filing system my mind uses. I 'think' the ZKR reference was in A5 (maybe with the Anama or later on) where you were chatting with a minor character in one of the towns & he was reminiscing about his time in the army & how the trip down the river reminded him of when he was posted at one end of the ZKR.

I'm involved with grid computing as well, starting with SETI back in the mid 90s under a long forgotten user name & long defunct email address (although I wish there was some way to look up those stats as I'd be curious to see just what I was able to accomplish way back when). Today I'm pretty much exclusively on BOINC/WCG ( my stats if anyone cares). At one point a few years ago I/we had about 8+ computers exclusively grinding away on grid projects. Today though that number has been cut in half & my production is way down. While it'd be nice to have a few new powerful computer flying through several hundred work units every day, I'm perfectly content with this older gear as it does everything else that I need it to. As to the projects themselves I'd rather devote my time towards the more physical type of projects (water, energy, rice, etc) than the assorted theoretical ones (cancer cures, other medical, etc). However the main personal goal is to get to a years worth of work on each project before switching out to another one. Doesn't always happen but that's the goal anyway.

Originally Posted By: Halbarad These ideas wont really work for this series now but a future idea maybe. Even if it's just small references of text to the past game like "this is where the heroes fought a great battle against sulfras" There are actually references like that scattered throughout A2-6. Conversations with storekeepers will mention the previous group passing through years ago, prior excursions into the pit, etc. I think that my favorite one was the one guy who was confused (because so much time had passed) if the group passing through had 4 or 6 adventurers with them (in the Exile version you controlled 6 characters compared with Avernum's 4). It is nice to find those as you're going through the games as it gives a feeling of continuity/history to your quests & yet are so subtle/unimportant that someone new to the games won't even notice. Plus the comments are generic enough that it doesn't matter if you changed their names in your previous game. **** Jeff ought to stick in a "Raffles Room L" plaque in an inn in one of the older towns commemorating the spot where the plot to assassinate the Emperor was hatched by Erica, Patrick & Micah..... that would be funny

If you can manage not to get her angry at you for asking, Linda has a hair dryer that you can borrow....

I just noticed the 'post #1', welcome to the chaos.