Thanks for the help guys, I'll probably have the game up and running later tonight.
I leafed through the UUW1 Cluebook today, mostly because I realized that I had it lying around and had never really read it. It's written from the perspective of the villain, and while it isn't an all-encompassing detailed guide to everything in the Abyss, it has some wonderful tidbits in it, like how he causes mischief in some small and insidious ways. Remember the forgetful Mountainman engineer who's lost his blueprints, who claims that he knows where a Flying potion can be found? The villains says that he put a potion of Poison right next to it to confuse and torment him. The cad.
There's also some other interesting bits of info, but these are mostly related to gaming mechanics, and not outright spoilers.
# While the Lore skill works on all items that the Avatar looks at, it works best when the Avatar looks at items he has in his inventory. In other words, distance penalizes the skill.
# The carrying capacity of containers is based on the weight of the items within, not on their volume. Backpacks can carry 25 stones, crates and sacks can carry half that, a bowl can carry 5 stones and a pouch only 2 stones worth of stuff.
# The maximum possible level of a skill is determined by which class you pick during character creation. The maximum is always 30, but sometimes it's capped at 25, or possibly even lower. (I have no further details on this.)
# Of some runes there is only one found in the entire game, namely the Corp, Des, Ex, Kal, Lor, Quas, Uus and Wis runes. Some of these are found very early in the game, so make sure to check the first floor carefully.
to the guy who made it! It truly adds a new level of... dare I say it... immershun to UW1 that I've not experienced before! 
