tmsidrschnapper

Oh, there are quite some ugly animals around. Let me introduce you to "Fussel" (german for fuzz). Click to reveal..

Originally Posted By: Struggling Little Flies My objection to a system like Dungeon Master's is that it simply rewarded spending a very long time trying out random spells on walls. And then it rewarded keeping notes. Well, it's like studying magic ;-) So it would add some realism, like the food aspect in avernum. Honestly, if someone wants to spend three days to find out all combinations (leave alone that they will be available online within hours after the release) - let him do it. I played avernum 3, avernum 6 and avadon, and there were cheats available in each of them. So I don't think Jeff has any problems with spell lists on the web. Maybe you could stop people from discovering all spells at once with a trick: The caster have to find the more advanced symbols first in-game before they can use them. I also don't think it would break any balance: You could limit the amount of spells one can cast during a battle by the amount of mana used by each spell. So one could cast 5 low level spells or 2 high level spells and his mana is gone (so he would have to rest, use mana potions, touch the pylon or whatever). And you can keep people from using strong spells by having high "failure rates" for spell casters with low experience. They might even suffer from "side effects" when spells fail dramatically: the caster might get injured, or some equipment might get damaged. But while it's nice to dream about it, it's kind of waste of time: We all know that this will never make it into the next game. It's a pity though...

Well, I don't think we will ever see something like that in one of Jeff's games. It would also break the whole character development system. Shamans, priests, wizards – they all would use the same spell system, and a shaman could evolve into a priest or a warrior into a wizard. And at least Avadon shows a complete different direction: no multi-class character, no switching between classes. You have to stick to what you were at the beginning. :-( But nevertheless, it would be cool.

Slightly off topic and maybe Jeff will throw stones on me for suggesting, but: When I think about spells and which game in the past had the greatest spell engine ever, I always just have one answer: dungeon master. Spells worked in a completely different way there: You had to combine several symbols/hieroglyphs to cast a spell. If I remember correctly, it was like that: The first symbol defined to power of the spell, from very weak (but easy to cast and not consuming much of your mana) to ultimately strong (but difficult to cast if you didn't have enough experience, and taking quite a lot of your mana). The second symbol defined the base element (like fire, water, air...). Some spells just required the base element: For example the fire symbol created a magical torch. The more complex spells required a third and some even a fourth symbol. So the fire symbol with the ray symbol would create a fireball, while the fire symbol with the shield symbol would create some kind of fire shield. So you could find very powerful spells by just trying the combinations or by discovering spell scrolls during the game. Theoretically one could cast very powerful spells on a very weak level pretty much at the beginning of the game, but with gained experience you could cast stronger and more devastating versions of the spell later on. I remember having a sheet of paper next to my computer where I wrote down all the combinations that I found. Oh, and there were wonderful spells like "see through walls" or "show my footprints so I won't explore the same corner twice". I'd love to see something like that back again.

Ok, it DOES work. Just found a glittering switch in a dungeon.

The lockpick cheat works, too. I didn't have any time to look for a secret door switch, but I assume it'll work as well.

I assume the MAS version changed (it's version 1.0.3), because I didn't do anything special. Well, in fact I had to enter the admin password to replace the original files with the editor files, but that's all.

Originally Posted By: The Turtle Moves You will not be able to use this editor (or any others) if you bought the game at the Mac App Store. Sorry about that. Just wanted to put something on the table again: I read about the warning and tried nevertheless (yes, I'm a kind of try-and-fail-myself guy). But the editor in fact DOES work with Avadon bought in the MAS.