The Hobbit: Back again

The Hobbit is a tough nut to crack. Despite what's been written about it, I don't believe it is especially complex or sophisticated internally. I haven't seen it do anything that couldn't have been done in an Infocom game of the era. In fact, I believe Zork's object-oriented design would have been perfect for what The Hobbit was trying to achieve, if only the Z-Machine ran on the poor old 48KB Speccy with no disk drive. Everything that you can interact with is represented as a data record, and "actors" such as the warg and wood elf have tables of performable actions, and a script of sorts to help them select one.

Reading the data records is easy, thanks to Wilderland. Each object has a name, a starting location, a number of copies (for instance, Bilbo's round green door has two copies, one in the tunnel-like hall and one on the lonelands, and manipulating one also manipulates the other), a volume, mass, and strength, a few additional variables that nobody has yet been able to decipher, and eight boolean properties such as emitting light, being opened, being locked, and being alive. Understanding the full extent of what all of these properties do, on the other hand, is very difficult. Amazingly, someone managed create a detailed analysis of the code. It's mostly in Spanish, which I can understand more or less, but I still couldn't glean nearly as much about this game as I had hoped to. For instance, one can clearly see where the routine for combat resolution starts and ends, but I have no idea what's going on during this routine, and gained little appreciation for how combat works here.

Here's a list of immobile objects found in The Hobbit:

Name	Start location(s)	Volume	Mass	Strength	Notes
Heavy rock door	Trolls path, trolls cave	Infinite	Infinite	0	Locked
Small curious key	Goblins cache	0	0	0
Curious map	Gandalf	2	0	0
Large key	Hideous troll	1	1	0
Round green door	Tunnel-like hall, lonelands	Infinite	Infinite	0
Small insignificant crack	Large dry cave, dark stuffy passage	Infinite	Infinite	Infinite
Spider web	Spider threads place, smothering forest, levelled elvish clearing, deep bog, green forest	160	80	64
Red door	Dark dungeon, elvenkings great halls, elvenkings cellar	Infinite	Infinite	0	Locked
Fast black river	West bank, east bank, bewitched gloomy place	Infinite	Infinite	0	Full, fluid
Goblins back door	Inside goblins gate, outside goblins gate	64	Infinite	80
Mountains side door	Side door, smooth straight passage	Infinite	Infinite	0	Locked, invisible, turns visible by waiting at side door
Large trap door	Elvenkings cellar, forest-river (2)	Infinite	Infinite	0
Magic door	Elvenkings great halls, levelled elvish clearing	Infinite	Infinite	0
Short strong sword	Trolls cave	3	4	64	Emits light, full
Red key	Butler	2	2	2
Valuable golden ring	Dark stuffy passage	0	0	Infinite	Wearing turns you and it invisible
Goblins door	Goblins dungeon, big goblins cavern	Infinite	Infinite	Infinite
Rope	Trolls cave	2	2	32
Barrel	Elvenkings cellar	32	3	32	Full, respawns
Wine	Barrel	31	5	0	Fluid
Water	Running river, 7 other locations	0	5	0	Fluid
Black water	Bewitched gloomy place, 2 other locations	31	5	0	Fluid
Bow	Bard	5	3	16
Strong arrow	Bard	2	1	16
Window	Goblins dungeon, dark winding passage	96	Infinite	112
Torch	Big goblins cavern, inside goblins gate	5	5	128	Emits light, full
Sand	Goblins dungeon	101	101	0
Trap door	Sand	Infinite	Infinite	128	Locked
Goblins cache	Trap door	Infinite	Infinite	0	Open
Heavy curtain	Beorn's house	Infinite	Infinite	0
Large cupboard	Wall	Infinite	Infinite	0
Food	Large cupboard	5	5	1
Valuable treasure	Lower halls	32	32	5
Wall	Heavy curtain	Infinite	Infinite	0	Open
Wooden chest	Tunnel-like hall	64	Infinite	0
Lunch		5	5	1	Spawned by Elrond
Strong portcullis	Forest-river (2) and long lake	144	Infinite	0
Stone	Empty place	254	254	Infinite
Wooden boat	East bank	64	Infinite	0
Fast river	Forest-river (1)	Infinite	Infinite	0	Full, fluid
Golden key	Deep misty valley	0	0	0

And a list of characters:

Name	Start location(s)	Volume	Mass	Strength
You	Tunnel-like hall	16	64	64
Red golden dragon	Lower halls	192	96	192
Nasty goblin	Dark stuffy passage beneath large dry cave	64	48	72
Gandalf	Tunnel-like hall	21	96	112
Thorin	Tunnel-like hall	29	80	104
Wood elf	Levelled elvish clearing	112	Infinite	64
Elrond	Rivendell	32	48	64
Butler	Elvenkings cellar	48	48	32
Vicious warg	Treeless opening	48	48	55
Gollum	Deep dark lake	5	5	32
Hideous goblin	Dark stuffy passage	64	48	72
Bard	Lake town	48	16	96
Hideous troll	Trolls clearing	144	144	160
Vicious troll	Trolls clearing	144	144	160
Horrible goblin	Dark winding passage	64	48	72
Mean goblin	Dark stuffy passage	64	48	72
Vicious goblin	Dark stuffy passage	64	48	72
Disgusting goblin	Dark stuffy passage	64	48	72

One of Wilderland's tools is a game script window showing you all ingame events, including ones that occur outside Bilbo's observation. We can see, for instance, the Warg wander around for several turns, unsuccessfully following people, until it eventually gets captured by the wood elf and can't leave the dungeon. I have noticed that there tend to be some problem areas where characters often get stuck, moving back and forth between two or three rooms indefinitely, and yet not necessarily forever. Very rarely they break this cycle and go somewhere else. I don't know if this is by design, or due to a quirk in the random number generator, or if passages are weighted, or if there's some other reason entirely.

Between these tools, the game map, and the list of objects and properties, I have compiled some observations on the characters after several playthroughs.

You

Eating food increases your strength, initially 64 points, by 10. Wearing the ring quarters it, rounded down. When the effect wears off, it quadruples, though may not be quite what it was before if it had rounded down when using it. Try eating food while invisible for a 40 point increase! Just don't overdo it - you die of gluttony if your strength goes past 255.

Contrary to what the manual states, fighting does not decrease your strength.

I don't know what strength does exactly, but I'm sure it has some bearing on the odds of successfully killing enemies / breaking objects. The round green door, with 0 strength, is broken immediately on the first try. On the other hand, the heavy rock door with the same stats is never broken, so again, I'm not sure how anything works.

Red Golden Dragon

In v1.0 of The Hobbit, Smaug doesn't perform any actions until you reach the elvenking's cellar. Once you do, he starts wandering around his territory. His wandering seems to be random, but I have never seen him go past the dragons desolation room, or north from the side door.

Goblins

The nasty goblin, hideous goblin, and vicious goblin have rigid three-room patrol patrol patterns that I've never seen them break. The rest of them just seem to move randomly, though the mean goblin does appear to have a disinclination to wander far from his starting dark stuffy passage. The nasty goblin is special, as he's the only one who ever leaves the dungeon, and is able to to this because he can open and close the crack beneath the large dry cave. I have never seen a goblin leave through the back door, even if you open it yourself.

From what I can tell, the three goblins on predefined routes will capture any non-goblin that they see, while the others will fight. The nasty goblin may capture the warg if it enters the large dry cave.

If you walk into a room where a capturing goblin is, it will capture you immediately. But if a goblin walks into a room where you are, you can deal with it by fighting, leaving, or wearing the ring.

Killing goblins causes them to respawn.

Here's a map of the dungeon (not all passages are present), marked with the goblins' patrol routes and their starting locations, plus Gollum:

Gandalf

Oh, Gandalf. Truly the most inexplicable character here. He mostly wanders around. Wilderland's event window shows that he talks to himself a lot, whether Bilbo can hear him or not, and his dialogue consists of "hello," "hurry up," and "you are doing a great job." He'll pick up items that he himself dropped and muse "what's this?" He occasionally tries to drop items he doesn't have. Sometimes he attempts impossible actions like taking doors and lifting rivers. Sometimes he tries things so ridiculous that even the engine doesn't know what he was trying to do, only that it can't be done.

During one playthrough that I recorded, he started off by giving me a map. Then he opened my door and walked east to the lonelands. He tried taking the door, could not, and went north to the trolls clearing. Then there were various "Gandalf is not carrying it" warnings, and he went southeast to Rivendell. Then he got lost in the misty mountains for a long time, going mad as he muttered to himself every 3-4 steps he took. Eventually he found his way out and reached Beorn's house, where he tried to do something impossible, couldn't, and instead just opened the curtains and left for the great river. From there, he went to the mountains, to the forest-river, and the engine spat out "I cannot do that" several times. Then he tried to lift the river, and to drop another item that he didn't have. He then walked back and forth between the mountains and forest-river for awhile. Toward the end of the game, he backtracked and entered the forest path, where he and Bilbo briefly saw each other as they passed each other. Gandalf then spent the rest of the game wandering around the three rooms in the waterfall area.

Thorin

If Thorin isn't given any orders, he will follow you whenever possible. If he's already with you, he may wait, may say "hurry up," and may just sit down and sing about gold. He will take the small curious key from the goblin's cache if he can see it. If he can't see you, then he may just wander around.

Wood elf

The wood elf does nothing until you enter the lonelands, and then he starts wandering. He seems to get stuck in patrols easily, but again, I'm not sure what determines this. During one game, he spent the entire time walking back and forth between the bewitched gloomy place and the west bank, though this may have been because of disabled passages - see Elrond's section for more on that. During another, he got stuck in the waterfall-forest-running river area. I can't tell what his boundaries are, but the odds of running into him are pretty good, which means you can skip the spider's thread maze entirely.

Elrond

Elrond has the power to change the world geography! At the start of the game, one of these passages is randomly disabled:

• Long lake to Lake town
• Forest gate to Bewitched gloomy place
• Beorn's house to Great river
• Misty mountain to Narrow place
• Treeless opening to Outside goblins gate

Asking him to read your map will enable the chosen passage. I am fairly certain that the closed passage is also closed to wandering characters, and don't know for sure if having Elrond read the map opens it to them as well.

Butler

The butler does nothing until you enter Beorn's house. Curiously, he's also invisible until this time. When you enter Beorn's house, he turns visible and says "thank you." Then he follows a rigid routine:

• Unlock the red door
• Open the red door
• Close the red door
• Lock the red door
• Open a barrel
• Drink wine
• Close the barrel
• Open the trapdoor
• Get the barrel
• Throw the barrel through the trapdoor
• Close the trapdoor

The butler gains one point of strength every time he drinks wine.

If there's anyone in the cellar when he acts, he will capture them and put them in the dungeon on the other side of the red door that he keeps locking and unlocking.

Vicious warg

The Vicious warg likes following people, especially you. Each turn, the script window spits out "the vicious warg cannot follow <character>" for every single character in the game, starting with you. If it can't follow or attack anyone, then it wanders. There's a good chance it will get captured by the nasty goblin or wood elf, in which case it's stuck there. If the wood elf captures it, then most likely the butler will open the door and be mauled to death, leaving the warg to roam around the halls with no way out.

Gollum

Wanders the goblin caves. I've never seen him do anything except say "what has it got in its pockets?" and take the ring from me when I answer.