Our hero woke yet again in the Inn at Spearpoint. He thought to himself as he gingerly moved his stiff and bruised muscles that he was growing old beyond his years. "See the world they said... be an adventurer! I should have just stuck with the guitar," August thought to himself. With mixed enthusiasm, he headed out to see what the day had to offer.
He awoke again with a start, pain in his head pounding like hammer on anvil. A young healer was leaning over him, dabbing his forehead with a damp cloth. "What... what happened?" August asked. "You ended up on the wrong end of a mammoth, my friend. It must have stomped you a number of times, you're lucky to be alive," the young man said. "That's it," thought August, "I'm going back to Bastille, I'm going to get myself a six-string, and live the quiet life."
After playing for about nine months on and off, something very exciting happened in Forgotten World. I actually encountered someone in game! I hadn't messed around with the chat functions, since it had not been necessary until now. Hitting shift+F2 will tell you what players are "awake" (in game). Typing the player's name, then a message, will send them a direct message (August Star: Whatsup massive baller? will send me the message "Whatsup massive baller?").
 |
| Here is me stating the truth to Grimil. |
He (or she, or it) asked what class I was playing, then my fears were confirmed.
 |
| I had begun to suspect this myself, that my suffering was unnecessary. |
I was a little hesitant to start a new character, as it would mean starting back at 0xp with no chance of recovering my original character if I changed my mind. However, it really didn't take too much internal debate for me to make the decision to create a new character, a ranger, who would dual-class to mage. The character creation process in FW has a handy function that allows you to pick a "build", I picked Ranger/Mage. My understanding is the game then makes sure you have the appropriate stats, and levels you up appropriately as well, so that basically you don't screw up. After all, the AD&D dual-classing rules are a bit byzantine. It would be awful to train your character all the way up to the level max, then realize you won't be able to use the abilities because you can't achieve one level higher in the new class, or to not have the requisite stats to dual-class at all. The game also allows for the player to create their own builds, which is what I chose the first time around with my triple-class half-elf.
When I started my latest session, I was planning to fully explore Spearpoint now that I had a complete map of the sister area (Windy Cliffs) in Neverwinter Nights. I still, not unfamiliarly, got my ass handed to me by most of the battles. Some groups were a little easier due to the fact I can "sweep" in FW, which allows warrior classes to make one attack per level against weaker enemies. I've seen it done in FRUA, however, for some reason the enemies need to be even weaker than in other Gold Box games, like Pool of Radiance,
I'm not sure why. In FW, the battles are generally harder though, since multiple foes gang up on my character and just cut my hp down like a hot guisarme through butter. So, I retired my first character.
 |
| August Star before retiring from the adventuring rat race. His actual strength is 18(15) if I recall, here he seems to be enlarged. |
 |
| A bright new adventurer emerges on the scene in Bastille, August Star! |
Now that I'm a ranger, with high strength and hp for first level, the encounters in the wharves with single humanoids and bugs were much easier than I recall with my other character. The only issue is groups like the royal guards and spies are going to take some time to defeat without the benefit of the sleep spell. Overall, I like the pace of this new character much better though, in a couple hours I was able to reach level 3, where I remember it taking quite a bit longer with my other character. If you're unfamiliar with the AD&D rules, a character with multiple classes divides their gained XP amongst them, meaning essentially to reach level 3/3/3, my old character took about three times as much XP as it took for my ranger to get to level 3.
After exploring the wharves, I moved on to Southshire, there I found that spies were my bane, my success rate against them was about 25%. The times I did beat them, I was usually behind a wall, shooting at them from a table. In FW, your character can stand on tables, then see and shoot over walls! Nevermind how realistic this is, as it's a very fun feature! In the FW community, it is affectionately known as "tabledancing." I'm not sure if this is implemented in any of the Gold Box games, but I plan to find out the next time I encounter furniture in the other games.
 |
| Tabledancing. Normally I would not be able to see this tree man through the wall. |
One important change with my new character is that the "fix" command works differently. Previously, my character would cast healing spells, and then memorize spells. With my new character who has no spells, the fix command sets the time at 1 day then heals some hit points. The interesting thing about this is that at many places, like Inns, this heals 5hp, where as certain places in the wilderness it heals 1hp at a time. I'm not sure how this works. It's notable that the time of day in the game is constant, but a timer still ticks away as when you rest as it does in other Gold Box games. So as far as I can tell, resting determines how often the game checks for random encounters, but does not affect the game clock. It's important to note that I think it's necessary to rest more often as you're exploring than you might typically in a Gold Box game, and you also tend to get attacked less than you might expect in a GB game. This is balanced by the difficulty of encounters though. At first this hurt my immersion a bit, as I like to play as I would a pen and paper game as much as possible, but I understand some concessions must be made for an MMO style game such as this.
 |
| This is part of my backlog of screen shots I want to fit in somewhere. I like how messages like this add to the atmosphere and immersion of the game. |
 |
| Bastille is known for its ale. Here I have readied a flask that I found on an orc! Readied for what? For drinking silly! |
August arrived in Bastille with only a short sword and a purse of coins to his name, standing in the square before the rectory of Father Bartholomew. "Haha, see the world they said! This city is overflowing with oppurtunity, I can't wait to see what it has to offer!" said the enthusiastic young man, out loud to himself, unable to contain his excitement.
To find out how our new hero, who coincidentally shares the name of our previous one, fares in Bastille, the jewel of the North, come back again soon... for This Bard's Tales!
Play Time to Post: 5h 15m
Total Play Time: 27h 5m
No comments:
Post a Comment