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Post by darktalon on Jul 25, 2004 23:42:36 GMT
I'm very much a fan of 'sprit of the game'. I'm sure I'd be the most annoying RPG GM ever for that reason. So even though sometimes, leaving the Sommerswerd in safe keeping makes my life a lot easier, I'll still never do it, because I really can't see Lone Wolf leaving the Sommerswerd behind. You have just described my attitude, including when I GM.
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Post by Relenoir on Jul 26, 2004 11:56:00 GMT
Or not bothering to shoot the master swordsman who challenges you in the middle of a town square when you're in a hurry because it would be considered 'dishonorable'. You have just described my attitude, including when I GM. I third that! Can't imagine anyone leaving their best item behind because they feel it might make things too easy. Of course, detection is another story, but that's why LW eventually got a Korlinium Scabbard.
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Post by Black Cat on Jul 26, 2004 16:50:13 GMT
Now come on, on all the battles in the LW series, how many become more harder because of the Sommerswerd? 2, 3 fights? And there's people who want to leave the Sommerswerd in safekeeping because they are scared of these 2-3 fights and are willing to have ALL the fights becoming harder because they don't want to use this magical sword? It's insane! I played all the books online, and I died in a battle only against Kimah (it took me maybe 10 tries to kill him...), but I survive my meeting with the Chaos Master on my first try (even if I was in a nearly death state with only 2 EP). I have a better chance to survive the whole series with these 2 hard fights with the Sommerswerd than to fight without this sword in all the battles.
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deiseach
Kai Lord
Champion of the Sommerswerd
Posts: 170
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Post by deiseach on Jul 26, 2004 17:51:00 GMT
I'm very much a fan of 'sprit of the game'. I'm sure I'd be the most annoying RPG GM ever for that reason. So even though sometimes, leaving the Sommerswerd in safe keeping makes my life a lot easier, I'll still never do it, because I really can't see Lone Wolf leaving the Sommerswerd behind. Hooray! Someone who thinks the way I do. I was beginning to think I was on my own on this one...
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Post by darktalon on Jul 26, 2004 23:23:39 GMT
Hooray! Someone who thinks the way I do. I was beginning to think I was on my own on this one... I just see it as akin to firewalling in an RPG: keeping player and character knowledge separate.
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Post by ramthelinefeed on Jul 27, 2004 8:43:05 GMT
OK, but you must bear in mind that, for marketing reasons dictated by Beaver Books publishers, each Lone Wolf book had to be playable either as a standalone adventure, or as part of a series all the way from Book 1.
Thus, Joe Dever had to strike a balance between tasty special items and bonuses which could help a newbie to complete the book, and also maintainly the playability challenge for veterans.
The former criterea leads to there being 4 or 5 great Special Items per book... ...and Dever has said more than once in Newsletters that "it really wasn't realistic for Lone Wolf to be carrying all these goodies around with him" - so he made changes to the rules about how many you could bring, and, I suspect, made a few crucial combats much HARDER for Sommerswerd wielders.
In actiual fact, if you have modest or low stats, these combats (Kimah, Chaos Master etc) are nigh on IMPOSSIBLE if you have the Sommerswerd - (you can do the maths from the Random Number Table and work out the odds) ......add to this the fact that it's probably more FUN for Lone Wolf not to have a +11 combat ratio on nearly every combat, but instead have to worry about little losses of EPs, having enough meals and which combats to avoid, and I tend to leave the Sommerswerd at home for most of the Magnakai books. The only real drawback is that the Villians Of Sommerlund may then kill me instead of the Chaos Master!!!
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deiseach
Kai Lord
Champion of the Sommerswerd
Posts: 170
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Post by deiseach on Jul 27, 2004 16:39:33 GMT
...and Dever has said more than once in Newsletters that "it really wasn't realistic for Lone Wolf to be carrying all these goodies around with him" - so he made changes to the rules about how many you could bring, and, I suspect, made a few crucial combats much HARDER for Sommerswerd wielders! But the Sommerswerd isn't any ol' goodie, it's THE goodie! If there was some manner of prophecy which said "take not the Sword of the Sun to the foul pits of Torgar, for the gate of everlasting night shall consume it and Chaos rule forever" (or whatever) and you are instructed by Lord Rimoah that it would be a Bad Idea to take the Sommerswerd with you from Tahou, then fair enough. But the only possible reason for leaving the Sommerswerd behind is if you know that you're going to come up against something really nasty. I'd love to see LW explain it to Banedon - "just a hunch; something better will come along, trust me". He probably would have had LW commited and the task given a novice. Hey, it worked before, didn't it?
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Post by Relenoir on Jul 28, 2004 2:56:57 GMT
I just see it as akin to firewalling in an RPG: keeping player and character knowledge separate. Agreed. 100%, absolutely agreed! ;D And Deiseach too, of course.
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Post by ramthelinefeed on Jul 28, 2004 12:13:23 GMT
Yeah but I tend to respect Kai Wisdom's perpetual words of adice to the player:
"Make notes as you progress along your journey, for they will of great use in this and further adventures" (or whatever it is exactly - too lazy to look it up ;-)
ie - I've noticed that I'm a gonner in book 9 and book 11 unless I leave the Sommerswerd behind (and take the Dagger of Vashna instead)
In this respect, I see Lone Wolf and other solo roleplaying books as less like multiplayer Dungeons & Dragon-style RPGs, and more like your classic 8-bit microcomputer text-based 'adventure game', where you'd keep playing repeatedly through it, getting killed and learning how to solve puzzles over time
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Post by Holmes on Jul 28, 2004 21:01:42 GMT
Ah...the way I usually play the Magnakai books is as follows: 1. Leave the Sommerswerd in "Safekeeping" in Book 9 2. Either a. Take it in Book 11, or sb. kip 11 entirely. "In game" logic I follow is this: Lone Wolf has Sixth Sense and possibly Divination by Book 9. It's not a far stretch that leaving the Sommerswerd behind in Book 9, and retrieving it afterwards can be explained by a premonition, or at least a 'gut feel' taking the Sommerswerd along this time is a bad idea. I always envision him leaving the sword with the Magi to 'watch' while he undertakes this particular mission. The Elder Magi obviously respect his abilities and wisdom, they're not likely to think this an insane request. They probably consider it a great honor and sign of trust on Lone Wolf's part that he asks them to do so. Now, I can't justify "Safekeeping" the Sommerswerd between 10 and 12 as Lone Wolf doesn't have time to 'drop it off' at the end of Book 10: he's plummeting into the Daziarn, ripped from the gantry by Gnaag's bolts of power. As this is the case, I usually 'skip' Book 11, and pick up in Book 12, as if he'd completed Book 11. Now...since he didn't complete Book 11, I don't take the 9th Magnakai Discipline...which means I don't get to take the benefits of completing all Disciplines and all Lore Circles into Book 13. Small price to pay, I reckon. The only times I bother with Book 11 is if I lucked out and managed to achivee either a beginning 18 or 19 CS and reasonably high END in Book 1. Otherwise, no chance. Too risky. Even a 17 CS doesn't make the cut. Even so, I think of the dozen or so times I've attempted Book 11, I've only gotten past the Chaos Master 2 or 3 times. It may be cheating, but the authord didn't exactly write the books in such a way that gave the reader much choice in the matter, unless said reader doesn't mind rereading the earlier books multiple times. Frankly, that gets old after the 6th or 7th time in a row, and I normally get the great pleasure of doing THAT just due to the 'roll a 0 and die' pages that you have to go through at least once in books 2->5...
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Post by ramthelinefeed on Jul 29, 2004 6:58:41 GMT
Yeah, the fact is that Book 11 is rather DULL to play over and over again, since there's a LOT of sections which just link together without even having any choices ...
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Post by Holmes on Jul 29, 2004 13:15:31 GMT
Yeah, the fact is that Book 11 is rather DULL to play over and over again, since there's a LOT of sections which just link together without even having any choices ... So do books 1 through 8 after a while, too... ;D Been there, done that.
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Post by doomwolf on Aug 3, 2004 22:27:44 GMT
D'you ever reach the point where you don't even read the text? With some books I have gotten to the point I can play virtually from memory - flipping through sections and making changes to the Action Chart without reading the book at all
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Post by darktalon on Aug 4, 2004 13:39:42 GMT
Yeah but I tend to respect Kai Wisdom's perpetual words of adice to the player: "Make notes as you progress along your journey, for they will of great use in this and further adventures" (or whatever it is exactly - too lazy to look it up ;-) ie - I've noticed that I'm a gonner in book 9 and book 11 unless I leave the Sommerswerd behind (and take the Dagger of Vashna instead) In this respect, I see Lone Wolf and other solo roleplaying books as less like multiplayer Dungeons & Dragon-style RPGs, and more like your classic 8-bit microcomputer text-based 'adventure game', where you'd keep playing repeatedly through it, getting killed and learning how to solve puzzles over time And interestingly enough, there is a Lone Wolf Spectrum game. Don't know if it's the text-based kind you refer to though. I just about remember games like that - had a book on how to write them when I still had my Spectrum. And it is a medium very reminiscent of gamebooks. I probably think of LW as an RPG because it originated from one, and the only in-print Lone Wolf material is for the new RPG.
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Post by ramthelinefeed on Aug 4, 2004 16:49:26 GMT
I had the "Flight From the Dark" game at the time .... haven't played it for a while now ;-)
It wasn't really like a text adventure - more split screen text/graphics thing - you got multiple choice text at the bottom (just like the books) and you fought combats graphically doing kung-fu style moves and so forth :-)
It ran very slow and was a bit tedious because of this :-)
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