A:EftP - A couple questions before I get into this game (spoiler ahead)

[blueskirt]

I first played Avernum ages ago, back in 2006 or something, and I recall that, I must have been more than a couple of months of free time sunk in that game when I stopped playing because of several naggy feelings and Lost Forever situations. One of those naggy feeling was that once I killed the lizard king and the remaining lizards surrendered and made a truce with the humans, I had this naggy feeling that my days of fantasy racism, when I crushed lizard baby eggs for cheap XP, were going to bite me in the butt at some point, or that all those unexplored dungeons with lizards in them would become off limit once the truce was signed. I eventually managed to put that feeling in a box and move forward in the game, when at some point, when I walked on a square in one human outpost, I saw a message that a demon army or something went on and attacked that huge castle in the area I was before, killing hundreds, and destroying the castle and I was all "Dammit, I wasn't done exploring and doing the quests in that castle, and I hadn't saved since that pesky gremlin dungeon" and it was at that point that I stopped playing if I recall correctly.

 

I have a bunch of questions before I give that game another shot and sink in a couple months of free time in it.

 

A) Will I get bitten in the butt by the game (get locked out of quests, storyline, miss powerful items or spells) at some point if I:

-Steal stuff that isn't mine

-Crush baby eggs

-Do other acts of dickery that the game puts in my quest log and sometimes rewards me with XP

 

Are there any Lost Forever type of scenarios in the game? By that I mean situations where, if you don't get that item/spell or do that quest before this event happens or before you enter/leave that area, well you won't be able to go back and the item/spell/quest is now lost forever.

 

C) I know there's an orb that allows you to walk on water squares in the game, but is there a magical item that allows to walk over bottomless pits/lava squares? I remember, back in my first playthroughs, when I got the orb I went back to revisit every areas, towns, dungeons, to check if there were treasures or secret passages behind those waterfalls and underground rivers I encountered up to that point. And I remember telling myself "Man, I hope there won't be a magic item that allows me to walk over all those bottomless pits/lava squares because I'd hate to do this all over again."

 

D) Is it possible to respec your party's stats and skills like in Avadon? I recall, back in my first playthroughs, that I had to restart the game a couple of times before I became confident I had chosen the right classes, skills and stats that would allow me to give these optional bosses a go. The respec was a feature I loved in Avadon because I could quickly try different classes, skills, stats and scarabs combo, and it didn't take long before I ditched the normal difficulty to jump straight to torment difficulty because of that.

 

I think that's all the questions I had so far. I look forward giving this game another shot. For the longest of time it has been, with Jagged Alliance, Might & Magic IV and VI, in that list of those games I walked away from after I gave them several tries and sank more than one month of free time in. Since then I actually finished Jagged Alliance and Might & Magic III, IV, V and VI and Avernum is the last game remaining on that list.

[Randomizer]

A) Fort Remote should be visited before you kill the lizard king. That is the area in the Great Cave's southwest corner that you remember being invaded by demons. There are two versions of this place, the peaceful before demon invasion and the less peaceful area with demons still lurking and waiting to kill you.

 

Otherwise most of the game doesn't care except to lower your reputation and give you a Dread Curse for doing low down thieving and killing actions. The exception is killing the Dragons, Athron, Sulfras, and Khoth before getting whatever you need from them.

 

C) The Orb lets you get passed most hostile terrain like lava and chasms. Sometimes you need it and others lets you get some loot.

 

D) The game editor, accessed from the main screen, lets you alter your party to fix mistakes or just change things when you figure out how you want to build your party. You should save in a different slot the party before editing it.

[blueskirt]

Thanks for the quick answer, Randomizer!

[Mechalibur]

Regarding your first question, I think you get 1 free steal attempt before everyone in the town starts attacking you. It's actually a bit harder to steal in this game, since you can't close doors after you open them. NPCs with names in blue also don't count as part of the town, so you can steal in front of them. At any rate, you should quicksave before you try and steal anything.

 

Destroying the eggs has no consequence for any other part in the game. It's morally dubious, sure, but no one sees you do it, so no loss in reputation (and people hate Slith enough that they probably wouldn't care)

 

There is one quest where you have to do something morally questionable. The only penalty for doing it is a loss of reputation, which really isn't a big deal.

 

There are also two quests new to the remake where you have to choose between giving an item to three different people. None of them lock you out of any content, the only difference, really, is what rewards you get.

[Synergy]

You can kill Ssss-Thsss, the lizard king at any time you're able. Just don't report that you did it to King Micah before you visit Fort Remote and do the Fiery Pack quest for the commander there first.

 

Almost every town lets you steal four things where you are seen, before turning hostile. Almaria gives you unlimited thefts, so loot everything in sight if you feel so inclined. The Randomizer Items List for the game will tell you the thefts permissible for each town. There are all kinds of tricky ways to optimally loot in friendly areas. In stores or barracks where the people and guards walk around, if you open the doors, eventually they will walk out of the room out of sight and you can steal some very valuable things this way, even early in the game getting steel armor and such and extra cash for spells. If you are patient, you can loot all the gold, iron and armor in the shops in Fort Draco, for instance. You can go into fight mode and split up your party to put all PCs out of sight where there are tight spaces (singletons and duos have an easy time looting—you have to get more clever with a full party of four).

[blueskirt]

Thanks for the tips, guys, and yeah, I found myself extremely patient and creative when it came to robbing place blind without getting seen. My latest trick now is to summon a ghost where nobody can see me, attack it with a stick or the cold damage sword to turn it hostile, then have all my priests cast Call Storm to blow the ghost into a shop with a stationary shopkeeper, wait for the shopkeeper to get hostile on the ghost, and then blow the ghost all the way into the back alley, luring the shopkeeper away from the goods.