Gon

About Hawthorne's golems, imho somehow you'd normally expect this sort of guy to be the pretty paranoid type. As a non magic user, he wouldn't trust these powerful but impersonal, brainless robots that he didn't create himself. For his closest personal protection as the highest profile but an extremely fragile target for assassination in a world dominated by strong warriors and mages he would only trust a close personal cadre of elite corps only loyal to himself. Who knows when these automatons made by others would turn on him? The only explanation I can think of is that Hawthorne had become so crazy he had lost touch with reality. However, you'd expect that golems, unthinking, dedicated, raised from magic and able to withstand lots of damage without a murmur would be just the sort of protection a mage would use, as part of an overall set of self defense mechanisms, specifically against attackers with cold weapons who got too close to himself/herself, as in the case of Thantria and the wizard in the south west near Fort Remote.

The one enemy I didn't want to take out was Kyass at Freehold. I'm not sure if he had done anything to warrant a hit and I didn't like Houghton using us as a hired hit squad to liquidate political competitors of the Castle. If the Castle could buy us to murder one guy, they could buy us to murder anybody. How was that different from the Empire?

The moment of "I come to you in the name of Avernum" when you advance upon the Emperor was a true RPG moment. For the battle, it should have somehow been harder approach Hawthorne when you see him instead of an energy field around him which was a simpler problem to set but made for a tough but not so interesting solution and didn't quite fit in with what had proceeded prior to that, and the fact that Hawthorne was no warrior or mage, as the game states. Maybe a final royal elite of guards instead of golems in the throne room that you had to defeat first before you could actually attack him directly. I fully agree with the aforesaid; this mission should have been the final mission of no return, despite Erika's best efforts to bring you back, with the other two great quests (G'Hoth and Exit) being optional. When you are going up the steps, you are nervous that if you don't find Hawthorne in there, "your deaths will have been in vain." You know you are going to die. My preferred ending of the two, and it would have made much more sense and also for legend telling in the next two games that this one desperate, surprise gambit by a few ill equipped rebels to strike into the very heart of the all powerful Empire, although a one in a million chance successful, will end with the warriors martyred after infinite waves of Empire elite troops flooding them.

Yes, thank you Jeff too for sharing your world with us! I registered last Saturday and when I got up next morning, there was my key in the inbox. Ever since I've been having a blast in game and reading the forums. Thing about AEFTP is that the "feel", the pace, and the flavour of the game is exactly right, and for me the best remake of the Exile series. Exile 3 was almost the perfect rpg which I played until the OS itself (OS7/8/9) completely died. I'm eagerly waiting for the next two remakes using this same style and engine and hoping that Jeff will bring back all the spells in Ruined World (in particular my favs like mind duel, wall of blades and capture soul. Allowed for certain funny glitches like bumping off Prazac and Rentar haha). Even make a cameo appearance as himself again. (I think he did in one of the Exile games, sorry if I remember wrong.) I'm sure that the battle and skill systems can use some further tweaking and fine tuning in the next two episodes. eg: maybe stone paper scissors match up system between different weapon types as in Pole (spear halberd) weapon fighters get a bonus against bashing weapon (flail, mace and Axe) fighters who get a bonus against blade (swords, wave blades, scimitar falchion) users who get a bonus against pole weapon fighters. As for the game itself, one or two odd things; you can kill Micah and Newbury upstairs and the castle does not turn hostile. At Formello, Vermeer does not attack after you attack the mayor and students. You can attack Thantria under Formello but she will only attack if you enter her bedroom. Also, after killing Erika at her tower and then going to the teleportation pad, she will still appear and send you into the Royal spire???