The Bard's Tale: Sewers, part one

 

After some training, I've re-evaluated the group's combat skill.

• RedSlayer, at level 7, has improved dramatically. Now he hits twice per round, and as a monk, hits harder than anyone else. His natural armor class is decent too. Unfortunately, his HP just hasn't kept up with the rest.
• Kurisu also gained a second attack, and his damage and HP slightly surpasses Ahab's.
• Ahab, like Kurisu, has two attacks per round, and my HP is much better than it was. Supposedly as a paladin I enjoy protection against evil, but I'm not sure what that even means.
• Grub has fallen. He's still a tank, but only hits once per round. His critical hit ability is neat when it happens, but we'd need to be up against much tougher enemies for it to be worth the tradeoff.
• Sunfall still fights poorly, but has decent HP.
• P-Tux has improved a little bit, but is no better than Sunfall, and has much worse HP.

I checked RedSlayer's stats, and noticed something nasty. His constitution, which I had rolled at 17, fell down to 11! I have no idea how this happened, or when this happened, but it explains why his HP is so poor. Except that Grub, who also has a constitution of 11 (and rolled it that way), has nearly three times as much of it.

For now, I explore the cellars with RedSlayer in the third rank, but he's on probation.

My mages, who now with access to level 3 spells (and are eligible for level 4 but the cost is too high), are much better too. Viila's best combat spell is Magestar, which blinds a group of monsters for one round, making them miss most of their attacks while you beat up their partners, followed by Warstrike which damages them. Scribe is also useful in combat now; Mystic Shield lowers party AC by 2 for the whole trip, Mithril Might by another 4 for a combat duration, and Starflare is pretty good as a group-damaging spell. Spell points are precious, though, and we've got to conserve them for the difficult fights.

Annoyingly, and bafflingly from a design standpoint, there is no way to restore all of your spell points at once! It recharges on its own in town, even when you're in the safety of the adventurers guild, but only one point every several seconds. I wind up using turbo emulation to bypass this wait.

It still takes me a few trips, but I map out the wine cellar without much difficulty fighting the enemies there, who are simply repeats of Skara Brae's denizens in bigger numbers, though I do need to keep an eye on RedSlayer's HP and heal him when it starts to dip.

A Stairs up B Message C Combat D Stairs down E Trap

Monster XP Kobolds 60 Hobbits 70 Gnomes 80 Dwarves 80 Hobgoblins 90 Magicians 100 Conjurors 100 Orcs 100 Thieves 110 Skeletons 110 Nomads 120 Spiders 150 Mad Dogs 180 Barbarians 200 Mercenaries 220

 

It's a pretty sparse dungeon, but thematic, and easy to navigate. A few fixed encounter spots here and there, no special enemies, and a spiked pit trap in the northeast quadrant. Gold more than pays for the healing, and the XP yields are decent enough for the difficulty and I don't feel like I am mindlessly grinding as I had been in preparation for it. A few more of us reach level 8.

Stairs down lead onward. 

The sewers beneath are mazelike, and hold more difficult (and more rewarding) monsters, but nothing troublesome for the party. Black Widows are particularly rewarding; a short encounter with three yields 512XP/character, and the spots are repeatable.

It's during this level that I realize it's okay to run from fights. There are a lot of fixed combat encounters here, and fighting is slow, boring, and drains SP. From here on, I only fight if the combat will give a decent XP reward, or if the initial attempt to run away fails.

A Stairs up B Message C Combat D Black Widows E Trap F Stairs down G Teleport

Monster XP Magicians 100-512 Conjurors 100-512 Orcs 100 Nomads 120 Spiders 150 Mad Dogs 180 Barbarians 200 Mercenaries 220 Wolves 256 Jade Monks 256 Half-Orcs 256 Zombies 512 Swordsmen 512 Sorcerers 768 Black Widows 1024

Some notes:

• This area features coordinate wrap-around where walking north from 21N takes you to 0N on the south edge of the map, and east from 21E takes you to 0E on the west edge. Orange line segments on the map border indicate where this is possible.
• One sub-section of the map is isolated from the rest of it and is transposed to the north edge for clarity.
• A few sub-sections are darkened. Your light source, magical or not, is extinguished upon entering, forcing you to navigate blindly.
• There are several messages here. Some are just flavor text, but some wall inscriptions seem like clues:
• Pass the light at night
• IRKM DESMET DAEM
• A large spider etching.

The Bard's Tale: Wine, weapons, and song

The wine cellar of the Scarlet Bard is the first dungeon, and a taste of what the rest of the game's going to be like. No more healing your wounds in nearby temples; they're all above ground. No more automatic SP recharging; that only works in daylight. No daylight means you've got to use spells or disposable torches to see anything. No street signs and no direction headings; that takes magic too.

I'm able to somewhat easily circumference the cellar, which seems to be divided into quadrants. Random encounters are similar in difficulty to the surface, though on occasion one is friendly and offers to join your party, occupying the top 'S' slot. A dwarf joins in this manner, but his collaboration is short lived. At the very least, he absorbs a hit that otherwise would have landed on my permanent party.

Once I begin to explore the lower-left quadrant near the stairs, though, I find some fixed encounters that are considerably more difficult than anything up in town. And not only are these encounters dangerous, they're also unrewarding, giving maybe 40-130XP per character when the lone Samurai immediately above grants 170XP. The gold, often found in chests, is better, but I don't really need it at this point.

So I train on the samurai a bit, and get all of my fighters up to levels 4-5, and assess their battle prowess.

• Grub becomes a beast, with 59 HP and more damage throughput than anyone else, and that's not even considering his critical hit power.
• Ahab hits the next highest, though with only 22 HP is still a bit fragile. Still, it's much better than the 10 HP I used to have.
• Kurisu's attack power is a bit below Ahab's, but with 38 HP is sturdier.
• Redslayer does about as much damage with his fists as Kurisu does with a poleaxe, but only has 22 HP and wears no armor, making him a mediocre fighter.
• Sunfall fights poorly, but that's okay. She has music. 47 HP on a backrow character feels like a waste, though.
• P-Tux fights even worse, but that's okay, he can disarm traps. Just like Viila, who can also conjure fire, ice, heal, and boost combat power. Why do we have a hobbit again?

I also do some testing on Sunfall's music. It's difficult to assess this scientifically, but the most effective battle song appears to be #5, which is also the only song that has a directly observable stat benefit.

The Apple II and C64 versions are also based on public domain music, though most of it is still a few centuries too new to convey renaissance-era barding.

1. Falkentyne's Fury (Hungarian Dance no. 5) boosts combat damage. I have no idea if repeat songs stack, or what effect it has when played outside of battle, but it definitely works when played in battle. The second-best combat spell.
2. The Seeker's Ballad (Danse macabre) produces light and boosts combat accuracy. The latter effect is barely helpful; my frontmen rarely miss anyway.
3. Wayland's Watch (Russian Sailor's Dance) allegedly makes foes hit less hard, but I'm not yet convinced it does anything.
4. Badh'r Kilnfest (Polovtsian Dances no. 17) heals the bard while exploring, and heals everyone when played in combat. Too bad it only heals 1 HP per cast.
5. The Traveler's Tune (Slavonic Dances no. 7) lowers party AC by 1. It can be cast before combat once, and each cast during combat is cumulative. For prolonged combats, this is great.
6. Lucklaran (The Barber of Seville overture) gives magic resistance. Obviously a situational song, but so far, evil spellcasters haven't been that much of a problem.

Magic still isn't great, but Viila's conjurations are of some use in combat, especially the second-level spell Freeze Foes, which the manual makes them easier to hit, but seems to also make them miss more often. Scribe's combat utility is dubious; his single-member buffs aren't as useful as Sunfall's team boosts, and aging spell Wither Strike doesn't seem to do anything, but Holy Water is good against skeletons, and he has both light and locate spells.

But I'm still too weak to last long down here, so I return to Skara Brae to train where it's safer and more rewarding. In particular, the Stone Giants offer nearly 300XP/character and typically aim for Grub, who has enough HP to withstand a hit. I can earn upwards of 900XP/character in a run that takes about eight minutes, which isn't a lot when it takes multiple thousand to level up, but it's better than the Scarlet Bard's cellar.

With another round of levels added to my party, I can take on the three Ogre Lords too, and now a run around the city earns 2,500+ XP/char in 15 minutes, although the temple bills are prohibitive and I must rely on my own magic for healing. A few boring hours later, everyone is at levels 6-8.

A Guild of Adventurers B Credits C Garth's Equipment D Temple E Review Board F Tavern G Iron gate H City gates I Ogre Lord J Stone Giant K Golem L Teleport M Samurai N Scarlet Bard O Temple of the Mad God

Monster XP Kobolds 60 Hobbits 70 Gnomes 80 Dwarves 80 Hobgoblins 90 Magicians 100 Conjurors 100 Orcs 100 Thieves 110 Skeletons 110 Nomads 120 Spiders 150 Mad Dogs 180 Barbarians 200 Mercenaries 220 Samurai 1024 Stone Giant 1792 Ogre Lord 2816 Golem ? Wolves ?