Knights of Legend

[octavius]

This game looks interesting and has very good graphics for its time.How come it is hardly ever mentioned on the Codex?

The combat especially is extremely detailed; too detailed maybe, as it will take some time to battle only one orc.

Anyone know how much random encounters one can expect? Too many random enxounters combined with either a too boring and/or too slow combat system is my number one reason for not completing old CRPGs.

 

[Excidium]

I've seen it being mentioned here and there, looks interesting but I heard combat is rather boring.

 

[Nukester]

I was very interested in this back in the day, because it was the first game (or one of the first to my knowledge) that was supposed to support additional mods. Of course the mods never came to fruitation, so the game was pretty much forgotten

 

[MMXI]

The problem with Knights of Legend isn't the actual combat system, it's the time it takes to actually do things in combat combined with the repetitiveness of encounters. The combat system is in itself quite good and rather extensive, but the actual tactical depth is lacking because the encounters are pretty shit.

In other words, be prepared to spend hours fighting, while executing a lot of the same steps again and again.

 

[mondblut]

And no saving in combat, sheesh.

 

[MMXI]

And no saving in combat, sheesh.

Worse than that. You can only save in town. Funny, because I'm a huge proponent of limiting saves to inns/temples.

 

[Carlos' Bitch1]

The C64 version on emulator combined with save state = save anywhere. A little initiative Codex, a little initiative.

The game itself is enjoyable enough, but anyone that cannot bring themselves to finish Magic Candle shouldn't bother.

 

[octavius]

The game itself is enjoyable enough, but anyone that cannot bring themselves to finish Magic Candle shouldn't bother.

OK, I'll play Oblivion instead.

 

[MMXI]

The C64 version on emulator combined with save state = save anywhere. A little initiative Codex, a little initiative.

I finished Knights of Legend without save states. Even though I've been critical of the game, it was still fun to play.

The game itself is enjoyable enough, but anyone that cannot bring themselves to finish Magic Candle shouldn't bother.

What? Have I missed something? Looks like I need to hunt down the Magic Candle thread.

 

[Crooked Bee]

Looking good. I should play this one.

(I don't mean the Apple II version, of course.)

 

[laclongquan]

pixelated bikini... i'll pass.

 

[villain of the story]

It's an incredibly tedious game merely due to retarded interface design.

 

[Carlos' Bitch1]

The game itself is enjoyable enough, but anyone that cannot bring themselves to finish Magic Candle shouldn't bother.

OK, I'll play Oblivion instead.

Oh, come on...

Let me rewind.

You don't finish MC because the Dungeons contain too much 'trudging'. MC has some very interesting Dungeons too...

This game looks interesting and has very good graphics for its time.How come it is hardly ever mentioned on the Codex?

It has been mentioned quite a few times, by myself and a few others.

The combat especially is extremely detailed; too detailed maybe, as it will take some time to battle only one orc.

Is that so? And you know this from...?

Anyone know how much random encounters one can expect? Too many random enxounters combined with either a too boring and/or too slow combat system is my number one reason for not completing old CRPGs.

Ok, I will bite: What old CRPG's have you enjoyed/finished? With this information, I can easily steer you towards games you will enjoy.



As for Knights of Legend combat;

Let us say that one of your characters, Volourn the Moron, is facing a Goblin (don't laugh, Goblins can be a real pain, since they are very quick and good at dodging).

Volourn eventually gets next to the Goblin with his warhammer. His foresight is average, so he only has a slight indication of what the Goblin is planning in his turn, so out of the attacking options (depending on weapon: Thrust, swing, overhead hack, berserk) he picks thrust, the quickest, and least powerful attack, hoping to jam the lump of metal into the Goblins head (he therefore picks the upper half of the enemies body to attack).

Out of the defences available (back up, duck, jump, stand (effective with a decent shield), he chooses back up, hoping to attack and move away from the Goblin in time.

The start round button is pressed. The Goblin, who is quicker, moves first. He attempts to swing his Scimitar at Volourn, who narrowly backs off in time. Volourn thrusts his hammer, knocking the Goblin on the chin but doing little damage.

Both opponents have used up some of their energy while doing this. Care has to be maintained to not wear yourself out as well. If you find yourself low on energy, resting is the best option. Nothing as embarassing as taking out two ogres and then dropping from exhaustion while an orc stands there waiting to take all your possessions. Wounds, armour weight and your general condition from travel and previous fights is also a factor with this.

Plenty of other factors such as ranged combat, magic, different effects such as terror and so on, but I thought a basic 'encounter' would paint things a bit better.

The random encounter amount is not large, but the battles can be long, drawn out affairs. Randoms can be avoided altogether by purchasing decent horses (though this means you won't be able to have a Dwarf in the party...).

Hope this helps.

 

[octavius]

The game itself is enjoyable enough, but anyone that cannot bring themselves to finish Magic Candle shouldn't bother.

OK, I'll play Oblivion instead.

Oh, come on...

Let me rewind.

You don't finish MC because the Dungeons contain too much 'trudging'. MC has some very interesting Dungeons too...

The problem is that I am at the stage where I have talked to all the towns and village people and all that is left is collecting stuff from 5-6 dungeons to use in the final ritual. I know where all the stuff is and how to use it. Finding out this stuff in Magic Candle is more fun than actually retrieving the items.
The combat system is rather boring and after you've maxed out skills and have more money than you can spend, there is no incentive to fight more monsters. And as I've mentioned after awhile the encounters get repetitive.
There is also litte scope for tactics. What annoys me most is that no matter how high your Dex is you are never guaranteed getting more than one action, so all combats end up being the same: Eat Gonshis to make sure you get three actions. Use Fear to immobilize enemy spell casters, while shooting and meleeing the other members. Use Niffts when needed. Then kill the paralyzed spell casters.
And why the hell can the monsters move diagonally when I can't?!?

Oh well, I may try to finish it later, but when I played it last time it felt more like work than fun. Why force myself to do something I don't enjoy? It's not like I get paid for it.

The combat especially is extremely detailed; too detailed maybe, as it will take some time to battle only one orc.

Is that so? And you know this from...?

From reviews. And I tried it myself, by following the tutorial of TFM. '

Anyone know how much random encounters one can expect? Too many random enxounters combined with either a too boring and/or too slow combat system is my number one reason for not completing old CRPGs.

Ok, I will bite: What old CRPG's have you enjoyed/finished? With this information, I can easily steer you towards games you will enjoy.

Gold Box games, early Might&Magics, Phantasies.
Gold Box games have detailed combat, but it's not too slow.
MM and Phantasie are abstract, but fast. MM1 and especially MM2 also had a great incentive in that you could find such varied loot.
Ultima IV and V are detailed, but slow. U5 had hardly any random encounters and the fixed encounters were good, so I enjoyed and finshed that game.
So if there are not too many random encounters and not too many repetitive fixed encounters I can stomach a slow and detailed system.

As for Knights of Legend combat;
[snip]
The random encounter amount is not large, but the battles can be long, drawn out affairs. Randoms can be avoided altogether by purchasing decent horses (though this means you won't be able to have a Dwarf in the party...).

Hope this helps.

Thanks, this help. Especially that bit about horses is something to consider.

 

[Awor Szurkrarz]

As for Knights of Legend combat;

Let us say that one of your characters, Volourn the Moron, is facing a Goblin (don't laugh, Goblins can be a real pain, since they are very quick and good at dodging).

Volourn eventually gets next to the Goblin with his warhammer. His foresight is average, so he only has a slight indication of what the Goblin is planning in his turn, so out of the attacking options (depending on weapon: Thrust, swing, overhead hack, berserk) he picks thrust, the quickest, and least powerful attack, hoping to jam the lump of metal into the Goblins head (he therefore picks the upper half of the enemies body to attack).

Out of the defences available (back up, duck, jump, stand (effective with a decent shield), he chooses back up, hoping to attack and move away from the Goblin in time.

The start round button is pressed. The Goblin, who is quicker, moves first. He attempts to swing his Scimitar at Volourn, who narrowly backs off in time. Volourn thrusts his hammer, knocking the Goblin on the chin but doing little damage.

Both opponents have used up some of their energy while doing this. Care has to be maintained to not wear yourself out as well. If you find yourself low on energy, resting is the best option. Nothing as embarassing as taking out two ogres and then dropping from exhaustion while an orc stands there waiting to take all your possessions. Wounds, armour weight and your general condition from travel and previous fights is also a factor with this.

Plenty of other factors such as ranged combat, magic, different effects such as terror and so on, but I thought a basic 'encounter' would paint things a bit better.

The random encounter amount is not large, but the battles can be long, drawn out affairs. Randoms can be avoided altogether by purchasing decent horses (though this means you won't be able to have a Dwarf in the party...).

Hope this helps.

Sounds interesting. Are one-hit kill critical hits possible?

 

[Saxon1974]

I have tried playing this game a few times and it never really held my interest.

I am all for lots of details and stuff but the combat felt a bit tedious and the game version that I played had no sound whatsoever.....

Part of my problem is working full time with a family gives me only about an hour or so a day to game late at night so if I am going to play an old school RPG it has to be really really good because my time is so limitied. (See Magic Candle)

IS this game supposed to have sound?

 

[octavius]

OK, just defeated three Mist Giants in my first random encounter en route to Shellernoon and Tantowyn Forest. The Dwarf was rendered unconscious and the Kelden was made useless by a wound in one of his arms. My Highwayman (guess his name?) survived with hardly a scratch (how did those Giants know that my mage is only able to heal Humans?).
I'm surprised I won this first battle, as three Giants vs wet behind the ears adventurers sounded like a raw deal.

It's hard to get a good "feel" about the characters' fatigue and encumbrance. There is no table showing the relation between encumbrance and fatigue for example, so how do I know how much a character can carry without being encumbered?

And how do I cast spells outside combat? Is it not possible to cast healing spells in camp? Despite two of my fighters taking heavy wounds in combat, their damage meters don't show much red, though.

 

[octavius]

Ah, the joys of playing several hours and then the fucking game hangs when I chose not save to hard disk. I thought that meant "no saving", but apparently it meant "save to floppy disk", and when the game doesn't find a floppy disk it hangs. At least that is my theory. Hitting Esc or the C icon does not help.

And the manual is wrong, it is not the first four letters in a character's name that is shown, but five. So I could have come up with better names, too.
Oh well, most of the playing time was spent talking to NPCs, only interruped by to combats. So I'll start again, using the Save States version of DosBOX to avoid the shitty save system of this game.

 

[Excidium]

I like the smug face of that npc. It's like she knows you fucked up hard.

 

[octavius]

I like the smug face of that npc. It's like she knows you fucked up hard.

The fat fuck was jelaus of the hot archer chicks in my party, giving them a sour look and saying they were too skinny. I guess she got to have her cake and eat it too.

 

[Carlos' Bitch1]

Gold Box games, early Might&Magics, Phantasies.
Gold Box games have detailed combat, but it's not too slow.
MM and Phantasie are abstract, but fast. MM1 and especially MM2 also had a great incentive in that you could find such varied loot.
Ultima IV and V are detailed, but slow. U5 had hardly any random encounters and the fixed encounters were good, so I enjoyed and finshed that game.
So if there are not too many random encounters and not too many repetitive fixed encounters I can stomach a slow and detailed system.

In that case, Magic Candle 2, 3 and Bloodstone will be quite a bit up your alley. Progressively more varied loot, more detailed combat system, more ways in which you can defeat enemies (and they can defeat you). And random encounters that you can (largely) avoid if you like.

OK, just defeated three Mist Giants in my first random encounter en route to Shellernoon and Tantowyn Forest. The Dwarf was rendered unconscious and the Kelden was made useless by a wound in one of his arms.

You must have a winning combo to have defeated three Mist Giants on your first battle, incredible luck, unless, like Wasteland, the DOS version is dumbed down compared to the 8 bit original versions (have never played the DOS version of this game).

It's hard to get a good "feel" about the characters' fatigue and encumbrance. There is no table showing the relation between encumbrance and fatigue for example, so how do I know how much a character can carry without being encumbered?

You don't become encumbered...you just spend ever more fatigue points. What armour/weapons are you using on who? and what race/classes are they?

And how do I cast spells outside combat? Is it not possible to cast healing spells in camp? Despite two of my fighters taking heavy wounds in combat, their damage meters don't show much red, though.

Unfortunately no. If you want healing, head for the Abbies. Magical healing is only a temporary comfort. Slow healing occurs over time with rest and decent meals, but I was never going to wait around for that.

I am all for lots of details and stuff but the combat felt a bit tedious and the game version that I played had no sound whatsoever.....

None of them have sound, except for a couple of beeps in the 8 bit versions.

Sounds interesting. Are one-hit kill critical hits possible?

Yes. Other hits can be so devastating that, even though the target is still up and about, all they can do is stand there resting, slowly bleeding to death. Don't expect them unless you have a lot of power or skill though.

 

[octavius]

In that case, Magic Candle 2, 3 and Bloodstone will be quite a bit up your alley. Progressively more varied loot, more detailed combat system, more ways in which you can defeat enemies (and they can defeat you). And random encounters that you can (largely) avoid if you like.

Sounds good. Do you know if you have to finish MC 1 to transfer characters? I'll probably finish it later some time anyway, though.

You must have a winning combo to have defeated three Mist Giants on your first battle, incredible luck, unless, like Wasteland, the DOS version is dumbed down compared to the 8 bit original versions (have never played the DOS version of this game).

Highwayman
Dwarf Tunneler
Kelden Cliff Guard
Plainswoman
Male Pyar Elf
Female Usip Elf

First three are melee fighters, Plainswoman is scout/archer, elves are archers/mages.

Spent a long time rerolling to get near max stats, something I very rarely do in a CRPG.

 

[Michael Ellis]

I bought this when it came out but never finished it and I finish 90% of the games I start.
Nothing to really do in the towns and the combat was repetitive.
As Blackadder pointed out, the attack and defense choices were cool at the time this was made but when consistently encountering groups of 10+ enemies for example things became a little tedious and anytime you moved an inch on the map you had another battle.
I loved all things Origin but never could get into KOL.
The only thing I remember fondly after all this time is that Seggallion(?) was in this and Ultima : )
You should Let's Play this as I am curious to see if things get more interesting late game.

 

[octavius]

Sorry Slackbladder, but this game gives a whole new meaning to tedious. I just spent two hours battling 8 Goblins. I don't know what Goblins are made of in this game, but they can move around in some of the heaviest armour without getting tired, they can hit my scout with 90 Quickness before she runs away from melee and are difficult to hit.
With only my Dwarf left standing, thanks to his plate mail, the other two fighters down (one to exhaustion) and all three archers out of arrows, I had to use hit and run tactics while my dwarf got some rest. When there was finally one goblin left, I couldn't find the fucker and he couldn't find me. So an hour was spent walking across a big featureless battleground with no visible borders looking for a fucking goblin to kill, before I gave up.
My gooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooood, the combat in this game is tedious.

 

[Jaesun]

So basically, the best combat engine ever?