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Weren't the "good" elves descendants from the Valheru's sex slaves (they even had a "Power word: go into heat!"), while the "bad" elves were the descendants of the worker slaves.
That's what I seem to recall from those Asshen-Sukar flashbacks in first two novels.
Other way around, IIRC... the moredhel/"bad" elves are descended from the Valheru's personal servants (and thus were closer to them or more subject to their influence or whatever) while the eledhel are descended from their foresters and hunters and such.
I have thoughts on the utter clusterfuck that is Feist's wasted opportunities with these two peoples, but this is not the place for them.
Well... we'll see a lot more of the eledhel later in the game. For now - I'm back from Greece - so here's the next session:
We sneak up on the larger group of snakepeople.
Oh man! 5 of them and if they're all spellcasters... Well, at least Owyn takes one out with a Grief spell.
Gorath was supposed to take out a second one but... missed.
For his trouble he gets hit with a fully charge fireball. At least some snakepeople around him get burned too.
And the next one hits him with a Frostbolt. Gorath is out of comission and there are still 4 active snake people casters about. This fight is going awfully.
Not much Owyn can do but Grief a second snakeman.
He gets hit with a half charged fireball afterwards.
Gorath gets his strength drained. Whew.
But then gets hit with a second Frostball and goes down...
Owyn gets hit with a second half charged fireball and finds himself 1 on 3 with 17 health left.
Oh well, not much to do but chug Restoratives and hope for the best.
Somehow all the enemies started running around and no one hit Owyn with anything. So he Griefed the rightmost snakeman.
Another one ran away and the last one MISSED!!! with a frost ball. It would have ended the fight in their favor right there if it had hit.
Instead Owyn fireballs the offending Snakeman... but it stays alive.
Must be really low though as Owyn gets a second turn. Which he repeats with a fireball - finally ending last active snakeman.
After that its a matter of Unfortunate Fluxes.
And healing back up.
It takes...
A few more casts...
To finish...
The bastards!
Gosh this was a difficult fight! We're lucky we managed to win it.
While we spend even more restoratives, healing packs and time to get Gorath operational again - we start looking at their stuff.
Seems like these snakemen have considerable financial resources on top of their magical powers.
Or maybe only some of them.
Why do they have armor enhancement items if they use no armor?
This was the last fight blocking us from Malac's Cross so we go into the tavern first.
Seems like he's forgotten about losing an emerald to us in a chess game. It's back to joking.
Not about anymore. Well, unless they've got replacements near by, would hate to see that.
Now there were some snake people there sure - but how do a few snake people hold a whole town hostage?
Apparently by some of the town laughing at the proposition of the situation.
To be fair - I wouldn't have taken such rumors seriously either. But being on the receiving end of those spells tends to change people's minds.
I wish all they did was steal chickens...
Anyway - we're here to get Petrumh's ale.
What sort of name is that by the way? Does not sound feminine at all.
Seems like she cones in a drinks quite a bit to me.
How did she manage to forget a whole keg by the way?
I guess Ivan runs a relaxed ship - people are just allowed to come in and bring their own kegs of ale to consume in his establishment.
We go sell some stuff, then go to the temple. Its teleportation device is not functioning - which explains why the Abbot is still here.
Its strange how some characters just seem to know who or what these Pantathians are. Its as if its fairly common knowledge.
Didn't seem like they cared about Abbot's denials.
Risky to stay, risky to go...
Mobs don't always care about the atrocities they do. Something about spreading the offense about in such a way that no one person is obviously guilty.
Again... where in the world is the army or the garrison? How can a few snake people terrorize a town so?
Wow... its easy to get people to confess in this game.
What a holy man this guy... by the way - why is he wearing a cross as if Ishap is Christ?
I'm not quite seeing a link to snake people here...
Hmmmm... its one thing for Crawler to "find out" - but its another to prove it... Or maybe the damage to Graves' reputation alone would be enough...
So the Crawler... is connected to the Pantathians somehow?
Oh, they're his masters... The plot thickens.
Seems like Owyn is still chasing longshots. One would think that Graves is talking about the Idol rather than Book of Macros.
Mitchel? We haven't seen that guy since Chapter 2. All the way near Romney.
Eh... seems like a problem for the church of Ishap, not so much the magistrate at this point.
Fair enough.
OK, ok. I guess we'll go to Romney before returning the Keg of Ale.
First order of business is to defeat the enemies ahead of us.
We start with Owyn griefing the leftmost enemy.
And another enemy getting shot by his buddy.
Gorath misses with his first action - attempt to kill the crossbowman.
Turns out that crossbow bolt was poisoned! Good thing it missed Owyn and hit that guy.
Gorath's persistence pays off as he kills the archer with a hit for 87.
And continues his rampage with a one shot kill for 66.
And another one for 61. These guys don't have much hp.
Owyn is given a chance to get range and Grief the last active enemy.
Turns out he got better at defense while blocking blows coming at him from all angles.
After he rests up from his spellcasting - he beats one of the frozen guys to death.
Than the second one.
That got him better at both hitting harder and more accurately. Too bad the staves are not nearly as dangerous as these end-game swords.
Turns out Gorath got better at swing his weapon as well.
Sweet gold!
There's the dude that poisoned his friend. I'm not surprised - both that crossbow and a poisoned standard bolt give penalties to accuracy.
Even more cash.
Restoratives are always welcome.
Looks like this guy forgot to apply his Silverthorn.
After we move forward for a bit - Owyn suddenly speaks up.
Seems like Gorath is not up for detours.
Hard to believe that powerful mages like Owyn don't have some magical means to contact people.
Fair question, no?
Seems far fetched...
But I guess I can't blame Owyn for worrying.
Now that I think about it - why ARE we wasting time looking for Pug? Aren't there other mages Prince could call on and our time would be better spent contacting them rather than looking for some random book in hopes it will lead us to him.
In my hurry to get to Romney I ran straight into another group of enemies.
The have a spellcaster! But fortunately for us he casts the most useless spell at the less useful target. He drains Owyn's strength.
And takes Gorath's enchanted blade to the gut.
His friend follows suit.
Third time is not the charm however as Gorath fails to hit.
His follow up is more successful. Only 50 damage though? Enemy must be wearing Dragon Plate armor.
It was still enough to finish that guy in one hit. Unfortunately Owyn takes a scratch.
And Gorath finishes the fight.
Yeah, that's our tough enemy. Dragon armor is no use if you only have 50 health...
I don't know why the game tosses so many identical keys at us.
Wow. Good thing this guy never shot.
Think this was the spellcaster.
We... arrive at Romney without encountering Waylender. Talking to the duke does not bring up any mention of him either.
Did we miss Waylender on the way? Were we supposed to detour to Silden or one of the places off the road? I guess I need Codex input - do we:
A.) Head back down South and try to check everything to see if we can find Waylender.
B.) Continue north to Owyn's family and hope Waylender is somewhere on the way as well.
Idk if there's anything to be found there in the south to see anymore, but might as well check - you cleared the path of enemies already for the most part so its a quick detour.
Well due to split vote I decided to combine the results:
By the way, I built a new PC, which involved a completely different video card. Hence the difference in the screenshots in this new post. Let me know if you hate them and I'll try to play around with the setting some more.
Anyway - we decide to go back south to try to find the Guildmaster and do not see anything new until Sloop.
Where the last house in town appears to have someone!
YESSS! So glad we went this way, but I have no idea how we were supposed to find him, I don't believe the game let us know previously that he lives here.
Either way, we're able to proceed with Graves's quest.
By the way - has anyone ever tried Waylander's facial hair style? It feel like even though it looks good on him - it would look pretty terrible on most people.
I'm trying to picture how I would react if someone came to me and told me a whole town is out to kill someone and I'm the one who has to help him.
Hmmm... seems like a rough thing to blame the guy for. Then again, after we've learned all of the shadiness of Crawler and Graves...
There's also a matter of the snake people. But probably best to leave that information out.
Sounds like a rough call. Hope it doesn't come to that.
He better appreciate it so much - he tells us about the damned book of Macros.
We tried to read the note Mitchell gave us - but I guess its not meant for common eyes.
Since our main task here is done - lets do the other part of the vote - go north to check on Owyn's fam.
We proceed north and find nothing in our way.
All the way up past Prank's Stone. But suddenly we are greeted by Moredhel outside of Cavall Keep.
We're so sneaky now.
Owyn starts by freezing the leftmost moredhel.
And Gorath takes out another one.
He gets bit for his trouble. Turns out dogs don't pierce Dragon Plate all that well.
Owyn finds himself one on one - and decides to beat on his opponent.
While Gorath finishes off a dog.
Owyn continues the beatdown.
While Gorath misses the second dog.
Owyn hits harder - either his strength went up - or more likely his opponent burned through his stamina and is taking health damage.
Gorath lands a strike on the second dog.
As Owyn finishes his opponent.
They rest up and Owyn starts working on the second enemy.
But I misclick and Gorath immediately ends the fight.
Hmmm, seems like we were at risk of getting poisoned.
Very at risk. That early Owyn Grief and Gorath's charge must have saved us from having to use antidote.
Well, nothing particularly interesting on these guys.
Just a few steps later we find yet another group. No enemies for miles and now two groups within a hundred meters.
Our sneak roll succeeds.
And Owyn griefs first moredhel.
While Gorath one shots another.
Owyn gets a turn to freeze a second moredhel.
And Gorath one shots a fourth.
He then misses the dog.
And gets bit for his trouble.
But the dog quickly pays for it.
After resting - Owyn beats down one moredhel.
And then another.
Quite boring.
Well, these are always nice.
Ooooh. What's this?
Hmmm... Sounds like maybe this was supposed to help us find the spellcasters from last chapter if our guys decided to try the south route. But... not sure this would have helped. This IS south of Northwarden. And its nowhere near where the spellcasters hid.
Last guy had boring stuff too.
We enter Cavalls Keep and try Count's residence.
But seems like we have to go to Kenting Rush instead.
At least its not far. We'll see what's happening with this side quest next time.
Now that I think about it - why ARE we wasting time looking for Pug? Aren't there other mages Prince could call on and our time would be better spent contacting them rather than looking for some random book in hopes it will lead us to him.
I'm trying to remember but I think actual NPC magicians are pretty uncommon in the Feist books. You always have these talks about the academy but not that much live graduates running around. There were much more of them in the Tsurani part of the cycle. I might be mistaken, though, it was a long time ago.
By the way, I built a new PC, which involved a completely different video card. Hence the difference in the screenshots in this new post. Let me know if you hate them and I'll try to play around with the setting some more.
Think this was due to me using a default media player to playback my recording instead of VLC. Let me know if this following session looks better:
We keep on going north and reach Kenting Rush without finding any opposition.
But we run into someone right in town. They look like enemies but seem to trigger this.
What a question...
Well, our magician is not about to be intimidated.
Strangely this does not start the fight. We can still prepare to attack them apparently.
And we do just that. We need to proceed after all.
Own freezes the leftmost guy.
Gorath can't quite reach AND hit his opponent. But Owyn gets a chance to freeze the 3rd guy since that guy is charging him.
Gorath kills his opponent.
Owyn rests up then finishes the first guy he froze.
Then the second guy.
This makes Owyn better at smacking things with his staff.
I'm not quite sure why this encounter worked any differently from any and every other fight we had.
Well, at least it looks like there was a chance for us to get poisoned.
In general - this fight does not seem like a challenging encounter for us at this stage of the game.
The town is big, but we've been here before so I get generic stuff at houses. We find an open Tavern though.
Seems like this guy has some custom text.
Wow, its a side quest we don't get the chance to reject.
Lets try this guy too.
Hmmm, don't remember this type of convo. Seems specific to situation at hand.
A useful job that.
But does not seem like we can do anything with that. Seems like sending a message to Arutha that Pug is missing would make sense.
We keep on checking houses to try to find the Count but it seems we find Ugyne instead.
Why the long face?
It does seem like moving closer to a moredhel invasion isn't the best idea in the world.
More like they're going to war with us...
Well, at least he's honest when it comes to his dereliction of duties.
Famous last words.
Seems like he should be more concerned now that he knows she's basically at the front.
Rations... a lot of rations. Months worth of rations.
Ah. I guess the side quest gets solved through here.
Probably not here...
Women and the headache excuse...
Yup, you will not fail us the side quest so easy Ugyne!
Who is this Lady Boswich that keeps coming up?
Why does the game force us to ask another topic instead of just continuing the previous one?
I guess I kinda thought he would too.
She got into a fight with him but still followed him to the front?
Seems to me like the tension was already there back in chapter 3.
Seems like she's learned a few things...
That's a very detailed explanation of what happened. I wonder how she learned ALL of it.
Ouch, sounds like she fell for him. Yeah, that's going to cause some trauma.
Hahaha. Owyn with the "You're hysterical!" response. It's so... Victorian era.
That exhausts our topics with her.
Best of luck with your trauma in a land of no therapists.
We move around and see some guys ahead - clicking on them tells us there are way too many. I think remember them from chapter 3. We couldn't do anything with them then.
When we come closer it turns out they're guarding the infamous Lady Boswich.
And its clear we're here for one reason. Instead of looking for Pug we're trying to solve the alcohol crisis.
It seems that she doesn't have the most reliable guards.
Well, might as well solve this side quest.
Heh, he better hope we do not.
Seems like we've met the lady.
Whoa... sounds like the Lady outranks the Count!
It feels like the Count keeps getting ego checked over and over in this game.
Hmmm, some pretty big magic? Was it done by Pug?
Well I guess the road to solving this side quest is open and we'll solve it - next session.
The aspect ratio is different and it looks like there's some saturation and postprocessing contrast trickery going on that makes the pixels stand out very much resulting in a noisy and dirty look. Are you putting on some kinda filters?
The aspect ratio is different and it looks like there's some saturation and postprocessing contrast trickery going on that makes the pixels stand out very much resulting in a noisy and dirty look. Are you putting on some kinda filters?
I dunno. Was trying stuff with defaults - but AMD card vs Nvidia - think it's some sort of thing their respective configuration apps are doing. Will try to play around with it some more I guess.
I dunno. Was trying stuff with defaults - but AMD card vs Nvidia - think it's some sort of thing their respective configuration apps are doing. Will try to play around with it some more I guess.
If you screenshot from the video player using another program on top, could be that or that the player is postprocessing. The cleanest screenshots would probably be done by internal DosBox thing.
Unfortunately Dosbox was creating absolutely tiny screenshots. Anyway - I think I got it fixed at the very end of this session:
We head East to the mountains to try to find the hidden passage and notice a soldier ahead.
Hmmm, more clueless mercs?
Seems similar to the other encounter in town - first a random staredown - and then we still have to fight them to proceed.
At least Gorath replies this time. I would not want a lesson in swordplay from him.
Well, seems like we have to fight them anyway to try that alcove to the east.
Somehow we still surprise them after talking them down.
Owyn does his thing to the guy on the left.
Gorath can't quite reach anyone - Owyn gets a chance to freeze a guy that shot a bolt.
Gorath chases down a guy beelining for Owyn.
And Owyn has a chance to freeze the guy that Gorath chased but couldn't reach in the beginning of the fight.
The rest is Owyn resting for a long time. And then killing them.
One.
After another.
Beating that many people down improved Owyn's muscles.
Now its time to pick up the change.
Wow, how did this guy miss? Elven bolts help a lot.
The guy that went down while taking only 11 damage. Funny thing - spend 2k gold on armor - all it does is make you last a few rounds longer if a Mage gets a chance to Grief you.
Ooooh, maybe it was this guy that missed. Good thing too!
So we go to try that alcove.
And it turns out to be a solid mountain - but at least there was a hidden chest here.
A puzzle one, have not seen them for a while. Unfortunately I forgot how I usually do this and did not record possible letter combinations.
Solution:
Somehow I just knew this one. I had assumed I've already seen this chest.
But apparently not as the loot was still there:
I had to spend a long time poking at mountains until finding correct one - its the wall directly east from our location. It's like you walk into a mountain and it just vanishes. Not on the map though - looks like you're walking right through a mountain there.
On the other side we seem to run into a trap!
With trolls no less. Owyn Griefs his.
And Gorath mauls his.
His second attempt at mauling gets parried though.
And riposted. It's crazy how good Dragon Plate is - I remember when trolls hit really hard. Not anymore.
Gorath does keep missing however.
But then rediscovers his touch.
And finally finishes the tough little troll.
Once Owyn is up to max travel hp it takes him a really long time to down his troll.
The trick to the trap is to disable the second line of lightning staves since they goo all the way across.
And blocking the second gun.
Owyn's efforts at beating a grieving troll to death made him better at hitting grieving trolls.
Surprisingly one of the Trolls has a sizeable sum on him. Maybe the lady bribed trolls to guard her Ale? But then why did she not warn us?
Ah, here's her secret store.
All the chests are full of these. We spent a long time shuffling inventory around to grab a bunch.
And not a moment too soon!
Should save his butt for a while.
Nice to see a happy man. And we seem to be getting a reward!
Ah, a practical reward indeed!
Bah - that's the same sword Gorath is already using!
Turned out the game took only a single of our casks. We had to run back and put most of them back in their place. After: I got the idea that maybe the other party could use the sword - so I left it in an abandoned Barn in hopes they'll be allowed to venture this far south.
We had to run quite a ways south to find a temple to teleport us back to Malac's Cross.
Wow, those serpent people are still blocking teleportation to town somehow.
Well, Temple of Ruthia is fairly close.
We reach Abbot again to give him the good news.
Hopefully Abbot knows the code.
Yeah yeah - you deserve it buddy.
Would be nice to finally have a lead on Pug. I wonder why Crawler would be looking for the same thing though?
Haha, this was a dead end.
Hmmm, this GUarda Revenche again - didn't we hear about it back in Chapter 3. Something about it cursing Owyn's uncle's lineage.
Ah yes, Tomas - Fiest's first book made him seem like he was just as important of a character as Pug. But then he kinda disappeared as a main character to follow.
Well, I guess that can be called a lead?
I still think we should have dropped by the Northwarden to report that Pug is not likely to be coming. At this point he'd be sure to miss the siege.
If I was him - I'd give the wrong direction. Never good to leave people that know exactly where you're going if you're going to be on the run from criminal organizations.
He'll need it.
Next time - we'll drop by the Oracle Dragon to see if he knows anything about a magical sword around these parts, drop off the second cask with the drunkard grandma - and head West from there.
But right in front of the path to the Dragon Statue we encounter some more Snake People!
Our stealth helps us.
Just two - Owyn immediately shut down the first one.
Unfortunately Gorath can't get close enough to the second one to prevent spellcasting.
And pays for it by taking 68 damage.
At least Owyn freezes that Snake man.
Everyone rests up and Owyn beats down one.
And the other.
That clerical oilcloth is very powerful and we have a lot of stuff to boost Gorath's damage, I take it and use it on his sword.
Antidotes are great!
Looks like coming here was a great idea! A lot of topics to cover.
Maybe we should have come here in the very beginning.
Or maybe not...
Yeah, it is a bit confusing.
Hmmm, well we were heading that way anyway.
Let's focus on main quest first.
The million sovereign question.
That... tells us so much and so little at the same time!
Good question - Pug is supposed to be godly powerful.
Who would have prepared the way for us? I'm starting to think someone is manipulating our way forward - ever since someone let us out of Delekhan's jail.
Now for the reason we actually thought of dropping by here.
Wonder why Owyn didn't state which sword he's talking about. In theory - any sword would help.
I don't think we've been to such a place. Perhaps we'll find it in the future?
On the way to Sarth - we drop by Darkmoor and find Petrumh to return her Ale.
Sounds like we interrupted something.
I don't actually have any idea what she gave us.
We drop by Krondor to see if our favorite Tax Collector has anything to say about what we found in that tax office. But looks like the answer is no.
When we start going north from Krondor along the coast - Gorath alerts us about an ambush ahead.
And when we sneak by it - we learn that Stealth can go above 100% when using a boosting item such as Elven Mocassins.
Our first enemies on the way north appear to be scorpions!
We're so sneaky now!
Owyn Griefs the closest Scorpion.
Unfortunately Gorath can only reach that one - so he takes it out. Seems like I should have Griefed one of the other ones.
Second one down!
Third one is as well - but unfortunately a scorpion charged Owyn after all - preventing him from resting up.
Oh well - Gorath takes care of it. Owyn is slightly below full travel health. I figure he'll rest it up when its night time.
We pop into the temple to see if there's any reward from clearing scorpions right outside.
But no - this looks like a generic response.
As we approach Sarth - there are some rogues ahead.
Did we... fail a stealth check???
I'm not on my game and use a Frost Bolt instead of Grief for some reason.
Gorath gets shot for 3.
And then for 6.
Owyn gets shot for 12 by a fire arrow.
Gorath takes one of the rogues down.
And both he and Owyn get shot for 7 more. Seemed like Owyn got poisoned to boot.
Gorath takes down a rogue charging Owyn.
And I take a risk by Griefing a far away rogue.
And pay for it immediately after Owyn takes 2 poison damage and another 10 from a quarrel.
Gorath gets shot for 7 more.
And takes out one of last active rogues.
Then the other.
And start working on the frozen ones.
Which does not take too long. But I did pay dearly for poor tactical decisions in two fights in a row. Owyn was slightly hurt from having to cast during the Scorpion fight - and I chose to disable an enemy instead of Dragonskinning him when he was low on health.
Let's hope there are some healing items on these guys.
But no luck so far.
Their stuff isn't that good - but they kept landing their shots.
Chapter 2 stuff at best.
At least we're near Sarth - I think I can sell the potion there.
2 poison shooters? Seems we're lucky Gorath escaped it.
Sarth is near - we'll search their vaults next time.
Not sure... think the dragon who's body it uses was in those mines near La Mut sometime previously?
Either way, next session is here:
First we go over to brother Mark.
Oh great - this is going to be some artificial blockage of us getting the information we need form the vaults isn't it?
What's funny - the temple of healing is fairly close too...
I mean - that seems like a very mild symptom.
Right... are they worried it will infect us or something?
Oh, that... doesn't sound good.
Not a concept I've ever considered. Makes sense. Actually now that I think about it - this concept was explored in BG2's Spellhold.
Do we need to run back to Temple of Sung?
Sigh... That doesn't sound promising.
Let's try the mine topic.
Where are we going with this?
Hmmmm, wasn't that deed from murdered Tax Collector's office for this?
Oh, sounds like a work-around for the issue with not being able to enter Sarth.
Right, so this is how that side quest is relevant. Nice to know we did not waste our time chasing down Nivek's drunk murder mystery.
Yeah... Stellan is dead, but we're good - thanks.
Maybe he knows something about Book of Macros?
Owyn is of a similar mind.
Yeah, we need to get into those vaults.
Back to being blocked by Dominic.
Hmmm, guess this is how these guys keep safe from all the moredhel running around.
Ok, seems like Marc can't help us further.
We go up to Sarth and try the front door. Seems like Brother Dominic is quite the spellcaster.
Let's try the mines instead.
We've already explored this portion, there's nothing here.
Except for this exit on the south side of the map.
Seems like that might be the way to go.
Yes, good that we didn't leave that deed where it was or toss it out by mistake.
Whenever I hear about these things - I'm always paranoid that after all that drudging in the dark - they'd reach a door that was locked or sealed - but somehow this one still worked.
Hmmm... what exactly do they think we did? Or do they think the door was barred because of some sort of thieves in the monastery?
Great... now its a library quest.
Experiments with peas? Well, if you gents ever wondered what its like to be a monk - apparently you have so much free time that you start making experiments with peas...
Hmmm, a free book and?
Nice! That is worth a few hours of our time.
We still have to search the vault for anything on Macros...
There we go...
Well, well, well... it seems all roads lead to Tomas.
Well, at least we get some hints as to how to get there.
We leave the monastery and head north... And run into some moredhel immediately.
Owyn gets shot for 8 by the crossbow man on the right.
Might as well smack the guy in his face.
The crossbowman on the left manages to hit his friend instead of Gorath.
And the one of the right hits his other friend instead of Owyn.
Owyn is low in hitpoints and really needs his assailants to die so that he can grief an enemy and rest up. So Gorath takes one down.
Guy on the left somehow misses BOTH Gorath and Owyn and hits his buddy on the other side of them.
Guy on the right is more accurate with his shot and hits Owyn.
Gorath finishes Owyn's last assailant.
Well, melee assailant that is.
Owyn griefs the archer on the left.
And Gorath gets in the way of the bolt meant for Owyn.
Owyn starts resting as Gorath takes care of the active crossbowman.
After resting up for a long time - Owyn finishes the grieving one.
Which improved both his skill and his strength.
First guy has trash.
So does the second one.
Oh... this must have been crossbowman on the left. He only ever hit his friends.
And the more accurate one.
Well, we'll continue our way towards La Mut next time.
Hmmm - thank you Arrowgrab! I'll have to backtrack a little bit in the next session then.
Meanwhile, here is this one:
We continue heading North - and keep encountering these ambushes that Gorath notices and we keep sneaking past.
Eventually we reach the end of the zone.
And proceed - game seems to act like we're still in Chapter 1.
Oh well, closer to our destination.
After resting at the tavern in Zun we notice an improvement in our health situation.
Must have been a sanitary room for once.
Nothing but another skipped ambush stood between us an La Mut. We decide to drop by the garrison.
But it just warns us that we might encounter some hounds. They seemed pretty harmless when we last fought them, so no matter.
The shop here finally buys the book we got in Sarth. Unfortunately I forgot that the innkeeper in La Mut is an NPC with conversations so I don't check on him.
Well, the Dwarven mines south of La Mut was our guess for reaching the Elven forest - so we give it a try.
Oh right, there was a dwarf near the entrance.
Yup, that's him. Gave us a quest for that Earth Elemental in chapter 1.
Well... the moment of truth...
YAAAAY! We've found the way.
I only remember one Brak Nurr, but I'm glad we were able to help.
Hmmm, I do hope there's not some other side quest we have to do to get through...
As if - you all know we'll be exploring every nook.
Hmmm, generally we just ask.
So as not to have these filler sentences.
Sarth? Seems a strange place to ask this guy about.
... We just got here - how do you know they're not having problems with it?
Hmmm... is this some hint to player as to how to resolve the Sarth side quest?
Seems like it.
I kinda though all of this dwarven stuff was made clear in our conversation with the Brother outside of Sarth.
Mejawho?
I don't remember this person.
Hmmmm, doesn't seem to lead us to the Tax Collector where we found the deed. Confusing hint.
Anyway, lets move on to the main topic.
I mean... we do have a map.
Seems like everyone and their mom knows Gorath is a moredhel.
I guess it is theoretically possible Naddur was fishing...
Yeah, Naddur is no fool - but Owyn sure sounds like one after THAT point is made.
I guess this is one of those moments when Owyn turns from a badass wizard to a naive little boy.
Hmmm, well maybe his brother will give us some way to approach the elves without becoming pin-coushions.
Only a single thing really - on a flimsy lead at that.
OK, we'll give it a try.
Owyn sounds like me when I was in Greece.
Nice, no getting butthurt about cultural appropriation here. Weren't the 90s grand?
We head west - but his advice gets confusing here as multiple paths lead west from here. I end up trying the North branch first - but the correct direction was north - west and south from my current location.
Hmmm - out to Elvandar already?
Down... guess not.
OK, let's see what's here.
We find a door on a side route.
It's locked with a key we have.
But Gorath just plain picks it.
Seems like some rogues are inside. What are they doing here?
Gorath decides to inquire with his sword.
Owyn sees that there does not appear to be much danger - so he decides to join in.
Gorath puts down the one Owyn just smacked.
The one Gorath gutted originally moved towards Owyn and got finished by him for his trouble.
We were actually super short on torches, I keep forgetting to buy them.
And we were out of Healing packs, though 3 is not many.
There's a chest here - but we can't seem to pick is so far.
Will train on the door outside for a bit next time. Then backtrack for the humor quest and then continue on exploring the path towards Elvandar. See you all next time!
I'm a bit late chapter-wise with this (or maybe a bit too soon) but I'll just leave that here. IIRC, that track is only played twice in the game but my memory is hazy now.
And now - lets see if we can make a dour man laugh:
But first we need to open that chest. I started practicing on the door we can pick - the one leading to the room we're in. It took until 88% before Gorath finally picked the chest!
I see - optional - but definitely enrichening. Can't quite remember if we'll ever find stuff to spend the money on at this point.
We need to backtrack to finish the joke side quest.
Wow... it would be funny if the game was just like - you attempt to ascend the stairs and Owyn breaks his neck, game over.
We sell all the gems and are up to 6k now.
Now lets try Sumani for that joke.
Hmmm, Owyn is acting like he has memory failure again.
A man of few words.
Does it work like that? Thought soldiering is a fairly dead end profession, especially for the enlisted.
Wow, dramatic.
Yes - lay out your dishonor to a random customer why don't you!
It appears he does not want to do so - what a surprise.
Kid's skill with social graces is far below his skill with magic.
We try to talk to the Dwarf at the inn.
Still clueless.
I dunno, trying to pry into a painful moment from one's past seems like something that should viewed as a bit too nosy in the kingdom too.
Ah yes, that makes everything A-OK.
Man did they copy the Japanese with these guys.
Owyn just doesn't quit.
So - a triple watch?
I mean... seems like partially Sumani's fault too - why in the world is he involved with a laboring calf in the middle of the night as a soldier?
Eeeh.
Wow, that's an interesting punishment.
Well - that's what he gets by trying to be a nice guy I guess.
The alternative being?
Prooblem? Bushido code copy and paste is a prooblem indeed.
Anyway - somehow this lets us chat Sumani again. Not sure how we acquired imminence.
Hmmm, Makala? Don't think Owyn even knows what Makala did.
Oh yeah - two Japanese in the country - they MUST know each other.
Well, know of makes more realistic sense.
... come on Owyn. You know how you're a noble and there are people that are NOT.
Yeah, sounds familiar.
Well, there it is - the JOKE!
Yeah, this guy seems hilarious...
Hmmm, that is a pretty good way to be funny - if you can deliver well. I never seem to...
Sure - you just need to know exactly how people dishonored themselves.
Hmmm, well I suppose we need something different to make that guy laugh.
Wow, seems like we need to know a lot of inside knowledge to keep up with this one.
I guess... the shoes will be make out of this harulth?
Yeah, that joke is lost in translation.
We head south and eventually Gorath fails a scouting check so we trigger an ambush.
Seems like a good opportunity to check out how this ring works.
Sounds pretty awesome.
Blue rings expand from the target's head repeatedly.
For all that - 45 damage. It's not bad, its just that...
Gorath hits harder without any enhancements on his blade.
Well, at least Owyn can finish the guy he used the ring on.
But yeah, Gorath is a lot more efficient.
He does get scratched though.
Owyn gets parried.
And so does Gorath.
Enemy continues parrying - but this time Owyn hits.
And so does Gorath.
No parry there - just a miss.
Gorath hits though.
Trash on the first guy.
And the second.
Ooooh. Nice!
Not bad here too.
Wow - two dudes with high quality rubies in one encounter.
Anyway - we get to Questor's View without further incident and it does look like we can attempt the joke.
Does anyone? Its just Gorath with you buddy. Seems like this Grimm knows his Tsuraninni Emperors.
Wow - I guess this guy has a Tsurani sense of humor.
Not sure 80 gold is worth the trouble, but the extra flavor is!
Will continue trying to get through to the Elven lands in the next session.
Let's try to get through those Dwarven mines once again:
But before we can reach the mines again - we run into another ambush we kept sneaking past previously.
One of the rogues tags Owyn.
While changing Owyn's skill focuses - we notice how Skills look when they have a boosting item - the skill value actually goes over 100.
After that - Owyn smacks one rogue.
And Gorath skewers another.
Owyn continues his work.
And so does Gorath.
It's almost like - maybe Owyn should just pick up a sword when enemies get close. Its not like he can cast in that case - and he'd hit so much harder.
Anyway - Gorath downs a third rogue.
While Owyn finally finishes one he's been beating on.
Gorath gets scratched.
And takes revenge.
I wish we could sell all the extra keys.
These Tapirs are fairly rare.
All 30 charges, should last us quite a while. Dragon Plate Armor does not decrease in quality all that much.
These guys are all quite wealthy.
Nice, we really need the torches.
Anyway, we get back in the mine and go down to the lower levels, very quickly we find some more enemies to fight. What are they doing down here? Aren't dwarves suppose to keep random rogues out of their mines?
Either way, we sneak up on them - which is no surprise with our stealth skill.
Just 3 guys - Owyn griefs one.
And Gorath smacks another one really hard - though that guy stays upright.
Gorath goes for a fresh one on the next turn. This guy does NOT stay upright.
The grievously injured dude tried to limp towards Owyn rather than away. Big mistake.
After Owyn rests, he gets some batting practice.
More gold, mercs?
Is someone paying mercs to hang around in the middle of a Dwarven mine just because?
Probably should stop overthinking it, mine would be boring if it was deserted.
We haven't even explored a whole lot here yet.
We find some more mooks.
I assumed Gorath would go before the spell caster - so I griefed the far left dude instead.
Big mistake as Owyn gets some of his own medicine!
Fortunately Gorath finally gets his chance to one-shot the spell caster.
And start working on the other guys.
Owyn gets scratched though.
And Gorath misses.
So Owyn gets scratched multiple times. This time with a swing!
Gorath lands a hit - but only 46 damage. Must be good armor.
Doesn't help that much.
I tried waiting out for Owyn to ungrief - but the other guy got free at the same time - so Gorath had to finish.
No gold for once.
The good armor guy.
Seems like all of these have matching swords.
Or not. Restoratives are always welcome.
We keep exploring - this place seems large.
We see a pit ahead, but when we approach it - we hear of delusional Kobolds.
Grey Tower Plate? I haven't seen one of those in a long time. Think they might be sold in Krondor? I'm NOT going all the way back there. Hopefully we can find another suit in this mine?
We keep going, strangely - some rooms are devoid of both enemies AND chests.
And there are random doors here and there.
There are so many side passages I'm bypassing... This place is going to take a long time to explore.
And we see some more enemies ahead. Will fight them next time!
First thing first - attack the enemies in front of us.
Trolls! Well - Owyn Griefs the first one.
And Gorath misses the second one.
Good thing Owyn's armor is so good - these guys hit hard - but there's only so much they can do with enchanted Dragon Plate.
Gorath gets a hit in. These guys have fairly tough hide as well, but Gorath's force and super weapon is tough to resist.
While Owyn is furiously blocking - Gorath and his troll exchange hits - in this case Gorath missed agian.
But not the next time. 2 for 4 so far.
3 for 5.
And 4 for 6 does it.
Meanwhile Owyn's troll gets Owyn into his health pool.
Gorath comes to help the young mage.
Who is suddenly having trouble blocking blows.
At least Gorath is doing better with this troll.
And finishes him in 3 hits instead of 4.
Owyn rests up - then starts working on the grieving troll - but eventually said Troll wakes up and gives Owyn something to grieve about.
So - Gorath needs to help out.
Though Owyn gets some smacks in too.
And the fight is over.
Despite Owyn defending for most of the fight - it is Gorath that gets better at defense.
There was a post in this room.
We try our luck - but nothing but a body there. Did the Trolls put up the sign?
There are 3 chests in this room - first is locked.
And contains a spell!
Touch of the goddess of Death huh? Wonder what it does - we can't cast in melee range.
Second chest is a wordlock! Wonder how moredhel got it down here. Well - here are the possible letters.
CUOHHD
BLITRY
PRSPES
GETEON
Answer and loot:
I love playing this game after being in the US for 26 years. When I first played it - I was only here for like 2 - so these word chests were a lot more trouble due to poor English skills.
My goodness - 2 spells!
Another spell I don't recognize. Who are the Eight?
When I saw this spell - I though Owyn bought it in some store already. But actually Owyn was able to learn all three.
Only one of the trolls had anything - this:
And the last chest has a lock as well.
More gold that I have no idea how to spend.
There's nothing more in this open area.
But as we explore - we find a chest in a middle of a hallway.
It wasn't even locked.
Eventually we stumble into a Brak Nurr.
In fact we run headfirst into him, so no suprise.
But he's slow to act - Owyn still gets to Grief him. I forget to check out the new spells, sorry.
This gives Gorath a chance to see what Brak Nurr's are all about. It's tough and very strong, but not much else.
Owyn rests up - then takes a very long time to beat Brak Nurr down.
\
The lengthy practice session gets Owyn more accuracy and Strength.
Past Brak Nurr is what seems to be the exit from this place. So we backtrack to check out passages we missed. Eventually we run out of torches so Owyn casts Candle Light spell.
It makes everything look green. Also all the passages we skipped turned out to be dead ends.
So we backtrack towards the exit.
Yes, that seems to be what it is.
Damn, that sounds like quite the stairway.
And we are out! We'll check out the area next time.
So unfortunately I had a little mishap where my last recorded session is a whole lot of black screen - and the backup save is quite a bit behind. I've got a vacation coming up too - so its probably going to be around a month before the next session. Sorry guys!
