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| While 'sleep'ing those two piggies, I also 'sleep'ed my fighter. That happens a LOT with these people. My fighter is NEVER going to go up a level- if the monsters don't take him out, his team mates do. |
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Either I'm dumber now than I used to be, or I just don't understand how to play an computer AD&D game. I'm not stupid- I played, and beat, Bard's Tale 1 when it first came out. It took me months of careful map making, cutting out sections that were wrong and taping in new correct map sections. I could make my way through 6 or more dungeons by touch and look alone, making it to the next dungeon in line to clear out. I've continued my career of compute rpging since- buying and playing all the way through the 90's (though I am hard pressed to remember the names during that time- I was also an active alcoholic until 2000, and much of the 90's is a blur). Since 2000 I have played, and beaten a cornucopia of rpg's including MM6, Arena, Morrowind...
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| In the past 20 fights, I have saved up less than 60 GP in treasure. |
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But I just am having the devil's time with PoR. I mean, if I take it slow and careful I'll never get anywhere. It takes a fighter 2000 XP to make it to level 2, a magic user 2,500 and a thief 1,250 (a cleric takes 1500). Getting 70 XP on a GOOD fight is going to take 28 successful fights. I usually only get 35 XP! So I'm gonna have to strap on my fighting hat and charge into the unknown to get anywhere!
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| Well, I don't like the Boss, so there. |
Except that if I strap on my fighting hat and charge into the unnkown I have to reload the game after my party is wiped out. Over half of my party has 5 HP or less. If I am lucky, the schmuck foes I go up against only do 2 hp, but about every 3rd hit they smack me for 6 or more HP and BOOM goes the dynamite. So even if my party does survive the fight, only 1 or 2 pcs get any xp at all.
I sincerely doubt I have the sticktoitiveness to slowly and carefully go through 40 or more combats just so that one of my characters can go up a level... while the other four have a range of twenty to forty more combats before THEY go up a level.
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| No, you have that backwards, son. |
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On the other hand, I did figure out how to get my thief to attack- I just pretend that the game is a roguelike :) If I walk any of my characters into a foe during the movement phase, they go straight into an attack. So I just run my thief face first into a foe and BOOM! 3 out of 4 times I will miss.
Combat is a long and laborious thing in my game, as every one of my characters only hits once every three or four swings... and the enemies only hit once every two or three swings. Add that up and I have to reload games a lot after everyone dies.
Is this game like this for everyone? Or am I just accursed by God?
It was tough going for me at first, too, but not quite this bad. The Nintendo combat screen looks really ugly, too, although the monster portraits are kind of cute.
ReplyDeleteThe distance between Level 1 and Level is always the toughest.
All of your experience isn't going to come from fighting. In the Slum area, there are plenty of places to pick up good treasures that will increase your experience point totals. You also get experience rewards for clearing out areas from the Council Clerk (who I assume you went to go see before you ran into the Slums).
ReplyDeleteWell, I need to clear out Sokal Keep and also discover the past history of old Phlan by finding books and scrolls and such. Maybe after clearing a few rooms, such as I have "done" (i.e. gone through the random combats in a few rooms) I'll get some reward. I'll fill you in.
ReplyDeleteAnd oh, our fearless Addict, I haven't given up yet- I'm just somewhat dismayed and depressed by how stacked against you the NES version seems to be. I also have to remember that to artificially make games last longer back then, the NES games ramped up the difficulty to crazy stages.
I am looking at your Characters and I wonder if you have equipped their armor? Their AC scores are awfully high... (high AC is bad)
ReplyDeleteThe best I could afford, scale for everyone but the thief who has leather and yup, equipped. Everyone but the thief also has an equipped shield which brings down the AC by 1 as well. I know- their ACs SUCK and their stats are pretty good, considering!
ReplyDeleteThe beginning wasn't as rough for me, but I think I got lucky with a lot of magical item drops. I also only equipped the front line fighters with banded mail until I could afford more. I concur though, LOTS of missing and combat takes forever. I had three magic-users though, which meant I usually just put them all to sleep.
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