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Completed Let's Play MMVI: The Mandate of Heaven

Azira

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Nov 3, 2004
Messages
8,518
Location
Copenhagen, Denmark
Codex 2012
Back in 1998, New World Computing and 3DO released the sixth game in the Might and Magic series of RPGs. The Mandate of Heaven as the game was also called, is a classic cRPG toting levels, stats, skills, spells and quests. Add to this NPCs, timetables and day cycles, lots of dungeon spelunking and an alchemy crafting system, and most of our resident cRPG afficionados should be pleased.

This is the first of the Might and Magic series I played. Bought back when it was released and played it a lot. Just the year after, in 1999 however, NWC/3DO released the next game in the series, For Blood and Honor, which became my next drug of choice, and The Mandate took a back seat. In short, I haven't played MMVI for more than a decade, and recently I decided that I ought to revisit this game, and what better way to do that than with an LP?

First though, I will treat you with the opening video. Found it on youtube, as FRAPS decided not to load for me during the opening FMV. You can see it here:


The plot is simple. The world is threatened by demonic invasion, and it's our job as Proper Heroes to save the world. Tired mayhaps, but I was young and impressionable and would take any excuse for some level-grinding and monster-bashing. :roll:

The LP will start properly later. Updates will not be at any set schedule as my spare time has shrunk considerably since I did the UFO LPs. I do fully intend to finish this LP eventually however, just don't expect anything less than erratic updates.

A proper starting update will hopefully follow later today. :salute:

I might even, at one point, introduce stuff for the readers to vote upon. M:
 

Azira

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Nov 3, 2004
Messages
8,518
Location
Copenhagen, Denmark
Codex 2012
Alright ladies and gentlemen! Let’s get this game on the road, shall we? From the starting screen
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We press the “new game” button and this short video starts playing:

In short, our party is supposed to be the four characters seen in the intro video, who were saved by the dodgy looking fellow with the beard. Three years later, the two women in the party have undergone sex-change and the classes have been reconfigured and we’re now proper adventurers! :salute: Before the game has even begun, our intrepid group of four has raided a goblin camp alledgedly found 5 letters. Only one of those 5 is in our inventory when the game starts, but let’s ignore that for now..
Let’s take a look at the four heroes:
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Every class has two skills hardcoded to them to start with. Each character then gets to choose two more skills from a shorter list of options. Sir Dicksmoker has chosen two non-spell skills, the rest of the group chose spell skills however, as they represent quite a money saver. Spell skills are the most expensive to buy in-game, and when you start with them, you also start with the knowledge of the first 2 out of the 10 spells available in a given skill. :M
Now let’s take a look at what’s in the inventory. Each character starts off with a ring that has a chance of holding a minor enchantment.
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It seems only DR got the short end of the stick here. No worries however, as these represent really minor enchantments. We will soon get access to better equipment, so DR shouldn’t worry over much. Not pictured is the equipment screen for the jewelry. Every character can wear boots, armor, helmet, cloak, a weapon in the right hand and either a shield or secondary weapon in the left hand and a bow slung over the back. All of these are visible on the screen to the right in the inventory screen. Apart from these items, everyone can also wear up to six rings, an amulet and a pair of gloves. Clicking the looking glass in the lower right of the character portrait inside the inventory screen lets you access these 8 additional items.
The five golden buttons below the inventory screen lets you access different information screens. From left to right they are character sheet, skills, inventory, awards and memberships and finally exit (to the main game interface). Let’s take a look at the character sheets for our newbie heroes:
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Not very impressive to say the least. :M The four golden buttons in the bottom right corner of the screen lets us access the spellbook, the resting screen, the quick reference chart and the game menu. The quick reference chart is quite useful and looks like this:
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Once people have enough xp for a levelup, their level indicator will be in green. We can also see that our current reputation leaves something to be desired. Noone knows of us yet, but that will soon change. :smug:
Now that we’ve exited the inventory screens, the main game interface opens up. In the large window is the information screen where we navigate the world and interact with monsters, NPCs and objects, but it also fills up with information when we access other parts of the interface, such as the brown books below the mini-map and the two placeholders for followers (more on these later).
The brown books let us acces, from left to right, quests, auto-notes, maps and the calendar:
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That’s our starting quest. Go to the inn and pick up some cash. :salute:
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The auto-notes book contains a plethora of different information, that has thankfully been categorized. The categories are potion notes, fountain notes, obelisk notes, seer notes and miscellaneous notes. This book is currently empty, but will soon fill up with useful stuff.
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The maps book lets us zoom in and out and navigate the known current map. Useful, but often not really necessary, at least not when it comes to overland maps, as they are fairly easy to navigate.
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The calendar book might come off as silly and useless, but that’s a far cry from the truth. This game has cycles, some shops are only open in the evening, others during the day, and some quests are wholly dependent on the month or possibly even the exact date. More on this in a later update.
Now, let’s return to Sir Dicksmoker’s inventory, because he has some interesting stuff in it. Mainly, two empty bottles, and two flowers/herbs..
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Now comes the alchemy part! It’s quite simple really, you left-click on a herb in the inventory to pick it up, then right click on an empty bottle to make a potion of the corresponding colour!
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And the potion notes part of the auto-notes remembers the combination for us! This is highly useful for later, when we start to combine different potions to make really powerful stuff. The basic potions are rather tame, and dreadfully easy to remember, but once you combine enough potions, the colour changes to either white or black, and then you cannot simply deduce from the colour what you need to combine to achieve said effect.
I’ve played this game before however, and I’m not too proud to look at a guide for the more powerful potions, so we’ll see black potions that permanently raise stats in a later update. :incline:
Enough jabber! Our group of heroes have yet to move from the spot, let’s get the game going, shall we?
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We start just outside the little town of New Sorpigal. Movement is simple, you use the arrow keys, and delete and page down lets you look up and down, and end centers the view. Useful for picking up stuff from the ground, or attacking creatures above or below you. We’ll also be able to fly at some point in the game, and the altitude is controlled by insert, page up and home. Just don’t press home unless you’re either close to the ground or ready to take some falling damage. :roll:
Now let’s go chat up some NPCs.
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My, isn’t she an uppity bitch? The right-hand part of the screen holds the dialogue options. No, we cannot parse our own input to this game. We have the choices to the right part of the screen and that’s it. No running around saying “penis” to random strangers in town I’m afraid. :roll:
This NPC refuses to talk to us due to our reputation. Let’s try to bribe her..
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Huh. Seems money doesn’t solve everything after all. Then let’s beg her. I’m sure Sir Dicksmoker’s puppy-dog eyes will sway her.
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Success! We can now talk to her. Most NPCs have 2-3 topics they’re willing to “discuss” with you. What they do is dump information on you. Some of which is useful, some of which is only flavour. Wandering NPCs offer to join us for gold, which is the middle option. Let’s hear what she has to say about the two other options first however.
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Flying is powerful in this game. Fly over ground-based enemies, and you can pelt them with ranged attacks with impunity. Unless of course they have ranged attacks of their own. Flying does not work indoors however, so no flying in dungeons.
The NPC has the title of Wind Master. Wonder what she can bring to the party?
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Very useful indeed, but far from cheap. Besides, we only have 200g at the present, so we say our farewells and keep on exploring New Sorpigal. Just inside the city walls we find the coach station with stables right next to it. Stables are Important. Why? Because they often contain horseshoes.
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What is not readily apparent from the description is just how useful these shoes are. When used, they add two skillpoints to a character! Levelling up skills takes skillpoint. It takes an equal amount of skillpoints as the level you’re trying to achieve in said skill, and you have to level up incrementally. Going from skill-level 1 to 2 takes 2 skillpoints, from 2 to 3 another 3 and so on and so forth. Every little bit counts. We’re going to hold on to these for the present, but I have a plan for whom to use them as you’ll soon see.
Now, having played the game before, I know this starting town holds several secrets. One of which is hidden in the south-facing wall of the bank.
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We move up next to the wall, and click on it:
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Voila! A scroll! But not just any scroll..
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A fly scroll! :smug: This will be useful for visiting a special secret area. M:
We’ll hold off from that for now however and continue simply exploring town. New Sorpigal contains several larger buildings that have official functions such as shops, training grounds, temples, inns and town center. It also holds several smaller buildings that are unnamed. Inside these buildings are where we can find unkillable NPCs. This is where New World Computing put NPCs that offer skill training for instance, people you’d hate to find killed by a marauding goblin (wandering monsters can enter town and kill NPCs wandering around outside, but they do not enter buildings)..
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Inside a shack, we find two ragheads. They seem friendly enough, so we chat them up.
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The male, which I assume is the father, offers a bit of information, offers training to expert level in a skill and also lets us know where we can find the teacher that can train us to master level in said skill. This is quite helpful, as you might end up running all over the place trying to find people to train you in your skills. To get to expert level in a skill, you need to have it at skill-level 4 at least. To become a master, the different skills have different requirements, but often you need to have at least 8 in skill-level.
The young female in this shack doesn’t have anything interesting to say:
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She seems remarkedly mature about goblins. :roll: The game randomly assigns these tidbits of information to NPCs, leading to weird situations like this one.
The other houses contain similar teachers and people offering tidbits of information.
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Sometimes they offer quests that won’t be listed in your quest book:
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Sometimes they offer memberships to certain guilds where you can learn new skills:
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Sometimes you get offered proper quests:
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Levelling up in this game isn’t something that is automatic. First you need to accrue the required amount of xp, then you need to find a training grounds and pay the fee.
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We’ll need to return once we’ve actually killed some monsters, as our xp total is just enough to define us as level 1 adventurers. :M
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The Buccaneer’s Den is a place where we can learn new skills if we have enough money. It’s a shady place however, and is only open after dark.
Scattered around the maps are also fountains that can have temporary or permanent effects on the party. Dicksmoker and Edward seem quite pleased with this luck-increasing fountain:
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Other fountains provide cheap but limited healing and restoration of spellpoints.
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These have limited charges per day and are only really viable in the early game. Our next stop is the town hall.
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Alright, info on the “Shadow Guild” and some goblin raiders coupled with a few quests. You can usually rely on the town halls to be useful for info and quests. They also offer bounties..
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The bounties are extra ways of earning some cash. Kill one of the kind of monster for the month, report back in time and be rewarded. The rewards scales with the difficulty of said monster.
Each town also holds a bank where you can deposit and withdraw gold. If you get in over your head and all the party is killed, you’re usually teleported back to the nearest town, but lose all of your gold, and most of your equipment will be broken and in need of repair..
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Yep. But enough dilly-dallying. Let’s go to the Inn and turn in the quest.
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Totally not shady eh? :roll: Good for us he also seems incompetent and scared like a little girl. :smug: We’ll bleed whatever cash we can from him however.
In the Inn we can also talk to the innkeep to stock up on food, rest or get drunk and hear tips.
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The sneaky innkeeper will not let us tip him unless we first buy a drink. Getting drunk boosts luck but lowers other stats. It’s best to sleep it off before trying to fight monsters. :M
While exploring New Sorpigal we see this tower with a keyhole and button. Unfortunately, there’s no way to interact with it yet.
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I don’t remember the importance of this tower, but I have a feeling we’ll be returning to it at some point.
Now let’s go visit the local weapon shop:
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Most of the options in the shop should be pretty selfexplanatory. The “special” option lets us take a peek at his rare stock:
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A bunch of daggers, none enchanted. And frankly, none that we’d care to pay for at this point.
And how does the smith feel about what we have to sell to him?
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:lol: Well, wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d just refused to buy it from us. Seriously, it’s just a simple wooden club. :roll:
Now, back to the wandering NPCs. Picking them up is not mandatory, but some of them offer quite useful skills.
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Wizard eye puts markers on the minimap, alerting us of friendly critters (green dots), hostile critters (red dots) and treasure/loot (blue dots). At higher levels, it will also alert us to “points of interest”. Hiring this NPC will spare us some manapoints, so we pick her up, and immediately the effect is visible:
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This is useful. :incline:
With our new NPC in tow we continue exploring New Sorpigal. Blade’s End is a training facility where we can pick up new skills:
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Is it just me or does the guildmaster look both bored and crosseyed? :roll: Well, as long as he can impart the skills in question to our heroes, I won’t complain.
Some houses in town have more than one story. The second story is then often accesible through a ramp. One such building is the guild where we can learn new priest-type spell skills. What is odd about it is, the top floor is infested with goblins!
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Goblins are a fairly neglible threat, unless they’re present in large numbers. We proceed up the ramp and slaughter them all withouth engaging the turn-based fighting mode. Real-time fighting is also turn-based in the sense that the rate of attack is linked with the type of weapon you’re wielding, your skill with said weapon and your speed stat.
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Soon the goblins are dead, and we only sustained minor wounds. We’ll just take a moment to heal them. We access our spells by pressing the ‘c’ button, and once inside the spellbook we can assign a single spell to a “speedcast” button (meaning we can cast the spell without having to first access the spellbook and choosing it, it doesn’t cast quicker in combat, the delay’s the same. It’s just easier).
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This is the most basic healing spell and it currently heals so little as to be bordering on the useless. Once we boost our magic skills, this will change. Until then we just have to heal in small increments..
DR assigns a spell to his speedcast button as well:
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I choose his basic damaging air spell, as I plan on him raising his air skill first and foremost. We want him to be able to cast master-level fly ASAP. :smug:
Inside the “Guild of Self” we see why I chose spell skills for our starting characters:
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750g for learning a single skill. Compare that to the 375 for the weapon skills. Quite a savings, eh?
After visiting the Guild of Self, our party scours the seaside for herbs and other loot and comes across a suspicious looking rock..
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Why is this suspicious you ask? Well, most rocks are labelled with a small ‘r’, and this one’s capitalized. Let’s try clicking on it..
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It turns out to be a hidden and trapped chest. Good thing Sir Dicksmoker had enough health to not drop unconscious, or this would have been a rather humiliating first update.. The rewards are well worth it however.
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A handy bunch of gold, and a sword and bow that we currently can’t identify as none of our characters possess the skill to do so. We’ll have the smith take a look at them.
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Too bad none of the party knows how to use a bow yet, but that sword is a hefty upgrade for Sir Dicksmoker! :salute: A note on bows, they do not use ammo. For some reason, all bows and crossbows have unlimited ammo, so no micromanagement there. :decline: As disappointed as we might be by this, we’ll exploit it all the same. After all, the enemy does have a limitless supply as well, so I guess that’s fair.
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Sir Dicksmoker proudly brandishing his shiny steel rod! :salute:
The Initiate Guild of Elements is just as expensive as the Guild of Self when it comes to spell-skill training, and Edward lacks introduction to three different spell-schools. We’ll remedy that, we just need to get rich first.. :roll:
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Now to use the fly scroll and explore things hitherto unreachable. M:
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The flying boots icon in the top right indicates the flying effect is active. As can be seen, we’re now above the treeline. :smug:
A bit north of New Sorpigal is a small encampment of NPCs. We can loot their cookpot and go click on a buoy which does strange things..
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Making the volcano look like it’s erupting doesn’t really do anything, it’s just one of those quirky secrets the developers added to the game. The volcano really isn’t active, and in fact it’s hiding a few goodies.
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Two more horseshoes and a strange obelisk that spells out a nonsense message when manipulated.
We’ll encounter many more obelisks during the game, and once we’ve visited them all, we should be able to piece together a message possibly leading to a great treasure. Neat huh? :smug:
We use the horseshoes collected up to this point to beef up DRs air skill.
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Almost good enough for expert training, and he’s still only level 1. :salute:
...
All of New Sorpigal has been explored, except for a well-hidden secret. A secret which will give us a nice boost at this early in the game. To get to the secret we need to be able to fly, hence the flying scroll. If we fly to the Buccaneer’s Den and land on the roof, facing the north-side wall, we can find the secret:
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Before clicking on the wall, we enter turn-based combat by pressing the enter key. In the lower right we now see an open hand, palm facing us, this lets us know that we’re now in turnbased. When our turn is done, it changes into an hourglass until it's our turn again. It also means we cannot move at present, but if we choose to, the currently active character (surrounded by a gold sphere in the character portrait, presently DR) can attack or cast a spell. The turn is decided by delay on attack/spell and speed characteristic. The little coloured gem to the top right of the portrait lets us know that no monsters are close by (the green colour). If it were yellow, monsters were close, if it were red, they could melee attack us. Those characters whose gem is colourless (Dick and Edward) cannot act in this turn and have to wait until the next turn.
Undeterred, we click the wall and are instantly teleported elsewhere!
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Dragonsand. If you think that bodes ill, you are correct. Note though, that the structure we’re standing close to looks like a globe with a sword thrust through. Does it remind you of anything? :smug:
Still our turn and in turn-based combat, we turn around (turning and looking not counting as movement) to survey our surroundings.
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Guess we know why it’s called “Dragonsand”, eh? If these dragons attack, we’ll all be dead within seconds. But we turn back to the structure, hold down the up key and exit turnbased combat. Our group quickly rushes inside the building and start clicking the walls like crazy. We find another secret entrance (no visual clues as to where it is) and transition to inside a building, leaving the angry dragons behind us. M:
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As you can see from this screen, there’s plenty of blue markers on the minimap denoting treasure, but a blessed lack of red markers, meaning no hostiles within range..
Instead the place is populated by strange named NPCs that hold no dialogue:
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Very odd. The furnishings also look weird, though at places, we can pick up loot:
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The cube on that desk provides us with 4 basic cloaks. We take what is freely given and wear them with pride. Every single point of armour class is well needed.
Another room holds shelves filled with books. One of those of poignant interest to us:
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:incline: The spell is currently much too mana-intensive to be of use to us, but it represents a hefty savings, and we will eventually get to fire off this bad boy to burn no-good evildoers. :bro:
Speaking of evildoers. It is not only named NPCs wandering this location. As our group of heroes wander around, looting this and that, they stumble over this guy:
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Taking advantage of crappy AI, our group stands on the other side of the desk, just outside of weapons range for the opponent, but not quite for themselves, and soon
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Trip Hawkins lies dead at our feet. Loot from his body was a meagre 20 gold pieces, nothing to speak of. Elsewhere in this mysterious location other loot is found:
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The plate armour is to be sold off. Maybe Dicksmoker will eventually learn how to wear plate armour, I don’t quite recall, but for now it’s just gold in a different shape.
The boots and chain mail will be worn shortly however. The chain once Dicksmoker learns how to, the boots right away.
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This chest keeps adding a small amount of gold until our balance reaches 10.000 gp! Once our balance crosses that amount, it subtracts a small amount until we’re below that mark, then starts adding again. So while this is indeed useful, we won’t become millionaires here.
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Clicking this dispenser poisons Sir Dicksmoker.. It says he ate some bad food. Hardcore! Fortunately other dispensers have provided us with herbs and empty bottles galore, we mix and match for a while and finally end up with:
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A purple potion which will cure poison! :bro:
Sir Dicksmoker isn’t adverse to drinking a purple drink and immediately quaffs the potion.
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No longer poisoned, just happily drunk. Note, this isn’t a side effect of the poison remedy. This was due to him becoming drunk from the former dispenser before he was poisoned. There’s no “coffee” potion to remedy drunkenness. :roll:
While exploring the secret location we encounter several rather non-descript doors. Behind one of them something sinister hides..
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A wild Jon Van Caneghem! Backpedalling while hitting the attack key wins the day however.
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Again we’re disappointed by the poor loot these goblins in disguise carry, then again we’re relieved they do not pose a bigger threat. What was it Jon was guarding? Inside his room we see another of these odd cubes:
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Clicking it puts all four heroes in the red! And they look mightily scared at the same time!
The fear effect triggers as soon as you enter Jons room, and disappear when you leave it again. Our heroes are still in the red however. A closer look at their character sheets reveals the reason.
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A mighty but temporary spell has affected our party, buffing their stats to god-like levels! This also means that derived stats such as hps have received a boost, but only the max hps, not the current. This will be important later, when we get access to this kind of magic ourselves, but that’s quite a few updates down the line. :M
You have probably already guessed it, but a look at our maps reveals that this location is created after
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The New World Computing offices. Not only did they code in their own offices, they made their boss a killable goblin. :incline:
Now though, the entrance to the offices is in the middle of Dragonsand. Fortunately for us, there’s a shortcut back to more safer havens.
Again we initiate turn based combat, then exit the compound.
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We orient ourselves, note that not only dragons but also “thunder lizards” are visible
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But we run immediately to the west, click on each and every wall we pass by, and as we find the right one:
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We’re teleported back to where the game starts, just outside the gates of New Sorpigal. :salute:
This trip can be repeated, but the loot on the ground will not respawn, nor will Jon or Trip. So you can make about 10.000 every time, assuming you’re broke as you go, and you can collect additional empty bottles and herbs. I will be taking advantage of this in a future update, but first we need to be able to cast fly reliably, either from an NPC or getting the spell ourselves. This also limits the usefulness of this secret location.
Our newfound gold is spent buying skills for our 4 heroes.
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The first skill bought for all heroes is the merchant skill, as that reduces the cost of everything, training included. Spell skills now cost 675g instead of 750, a hefty 10% discount. For a rundown of what the skills do, check this table:
Code:
Staff     
Description: A staff is a two-handed pole equally good on offense and defense. Expert ranking in the staff will increase your armor class and master ranking will allow you to occasionally stun your opponents.       
Normal: Skill added to Attack Bonus
Expert: Skill added to Armor Class
Master: Chance to stun equal to skill     
 
Sword     
Description: The sword skill covers most types of blades longer than a knife. Expert swordsmen gain a quicker attack while master swordsmen may use any one-handed sword in their left hand and another weapon in their right.       
Normal: Skill added to Attack Bonus
Expert: Skill reduces recovery time
Master: Permits use of sword in left hand   
 
Dagger     
Description: While daggers don't do the kind of damage that a sword or an axe can deliver, they are very quick - sometimes letting you get two attacks for every one of your slower opponents. Expert dagger fighters can wield a dagger in their left hand while using another weapon in their right. Master dagger fighters have a chance of doing a triple damage attack.       
Normal: Skill added to Attack Bonus
Expert: Permits use of dagger in left hand
Master: Chance to cause triple damage equal to skill     
 
Axe     
Description: While rather slow on the attack, axes do a lot of damage when they hit. Expert axe fighters gain a little more speed on their attacks while master axe fighters can deliver extra damage.       
Normal: Skill added to Attack Bonus
Expert: Skill reduces recovery time
Master: Skill added to Attack Damage     
 
Spear     
Description: Spear covers all kinds of pole weapons with blades attached to the business end. Spears are versatile and can be used one or two handed (they work better with two hands). Expert ranking in the spear will increase your armor class and master ranking will boost damage.       
Normal: Skill added to Attack Bonus
Expert: Skill added to Armor Class
Master: Skill added to Attack Damage     
 
Bow     
Description: Bow skill covers both bow and crossbow usage. Expert archers gain a speed increase with their weapon, while master archers can fire two arrows with every attack.       
Normal: Skill added to Attack Bonus
Expert: Skill reduces recovery time
Master: Bow fires two arrows on every attack     
 
Mace     
Description: Mace skill covers all kinds of blunt trauma weapons ranging from batons to flails. Expert mace swingers do extra damage with their weapons while master ranking gives a chance to stun opponents.       
Normal: Skill added to Attack Bonus
Expert: Skill added to Attack Damage
Master: Chance to stun equal to skill     
 
Armor skills
 
Shield     
Description: Shield skill directly improves a character’s armor class while a shield is employed. Expert and master ranking in the shield increase this defensive bonus.       
Normal: Skill added to Armor Class
Expert: Skill added to Armor Class (Double effect)
Master: Skill added to Armor Class (Triple effect)     
 
Leather Armor     
Description: Leather armor is the lightest armor a character can wear. While leather provides less protection than chain or plate armor, it also slows your character down the least. Leather armor skill increases the protection offered by leather armor. As with all armors, Expert and master ranking both reduce the amount the armor slows you down.       
Normal: Skill added to Armor Class
Expert: Recovery penalty reduced
Master: Recovery penalty eliminated     
 
Chain Armor     
Description: Chain armor is the medium armor type. It provides more protection than leather and less than plate, but it also slows your character down more than leather. Chain armor skill increases the protection offered by chain armor. As with all armors, Expert and master ranking both reduce the amount the armor slows you down       
Normal: Skill added to Armor Class
Expert: Recovery penalty reduced
Master: Recovery penalty eliminated     
 
Plate Armor     
Description: Plate armor is the heaviest armor type. It provides the most protection, but it slows your character down more than leather or chain. Plate armor skill increases the protection offered by plate armor. As with all armors, Expert and master ranking both reduce the amount the armor slows you down.       
Normal: Skill added to Armor Class
Expert: Recovery penalty reduced
Master: Recovery penalty eliminated     
 
Magic skills
 
Fire Magic     
Description: Fire magic is a good source of offensive spells and includes spells having to do with speed. Expert and master ranking permit access to greater versions of fire spells.       
Normal: Effects vary per spell
Expert: Effects vary per spell
Master: Effects vary per spell     
 
Air Magic     
Description: Air magic tends to be defensive and informational in nature and includes spells having to do with flight. Expert and master ranking permit access to greater versions of air spells.       
Normal: Effects vary per spell
Expert: Effects vary per spell
Master: Effects vary per spell     
 
Water Magic     
Description: Water magic is equally defensive and offensive and concentrates on spells that move or change things. Expert and master ranking permit access to greater versions of water spells.       
Normal: Effects vary per spell
Expert: Effects vary per spell
Master: Effects vary per spell     
 
Earth Magic     
Description: Earth magic is defensive and includes spells that protect, bind, and strengthen. Expert and master ranking permit access to greater versions of earth spells.       
Normal: Effects vary per spell
Expert: Effects vary per spell
Master: Effects vary per spell     
 
Spirit Magic     
Description: Spirit magic concentrates on spells involving life and death. Included are spells to raise the dead, spells that affect the Undead, and spells that influence aging. Expert and master ranking permit access to greater versions of spirit spells.       
Normal: Effects vary per spell
Expert: Effects vary per spell
Master: Effects vary per spell     
 
Mind Magic     
Description: Mind magic tends to be offensive and informational in nature. Charm, fear, and telekinesis are all examples of mind magic. Expert and master ranking permit access to greater versions of mind magic.       
Normal: Effects vary per spell
Expert: Effects vary per spell
Master: Effects vary per spell     
 
Body Magic     
Description: Body magic is concerned with spells of healing and enhancement. Spells to heal, wound, and cure disease and poison are all part of body magic. Expert and master ranking permit access to greater versions of body magic.       
Normal: Effects vary per spell
Expert: Effects vary per spell
Master: Effects vary per spell     
 
Light Magic     
Description: Light magic spells represent some of the strongest spells in Enroth. Usable only by Clerics and Sorcerers, light magic cannot be chosen before creating your characters; rather, light magic must be learned and mastered during your travels.       
Normal: Effects vary per spell
Expert: Effects vary per spell
Master: Effects vary per spell     
 
Dark Magic     
Description: Dark magic spells are the strongest spells in Enroth. While casting spells of darkness can have spectacular results, dark spells sometimes come with unwanted side effects. Dark magic cannot be chosen before creating your characters, and is restricted to Clerics and Sorcerers.       
Normal: Effects vary per spell
Expert: Effects vary per spell
Master: Effects vary per spell     
 
Other skills
 
Identify Item     
Description: The identify skill will automatically identify an item if your character’s skill level is high enough when you right click on an item. Certain items require your character to be an expert or master in this skill to properly identify them.     
Normal: Higher skill allows more unusual item identification
Expert: Double effect of skill
Master: Triple effect of skill     
 
Merchant     
Description: Merchant skill helps adjust prices in your favor, whether you are buying or selling.     
Normal: Skill adjusts shop prices in your favor
Expert: Double effect of skill
Master: Triple effect of skill     
 
Repair Item     
Description: Repair skill allows your characters to repair broken equipment. Higher skill level allows you to repair better items and expert and master skill rankings allow you to repair complex items and artifacts. The skill will work automatically when you right click on a broken item in your inventory.     
Normal: Higher skill allows more difficult item repair
Expert: Double effect of skill
Master: Triple effect of skill     
 
Bodybuilding     
Description: Bodybuilding skill adds hit points directly to your character’s hit point totals. Multiply the skill in bodybuilding by the character’s base class bonus (4 for knights, 1 for sorcerers, etc.) to get the total. Expert ranking doubles this total and master triples it.     
Normal: Skill added to Hit Points
Expert: Double effect of skill
Master: Triple effect of skill     
 
Meditation     
Description: Meditation skill adds spell points directly to your character’s spell point totals. Multiply the skill in meditation by the character’s base class bonus (4 for sorcerers, 0 for knights, etc.) to get the total. Expert ranking doubles this total and master triples it.     
Normal: Skill adds to Spell Points
Expert: Double effect of skill
Master: Triple effect of skill     
 
Perception     
Description: Perception increases your chance of noticing a trap as it goes off and reducing or avoiding the damage it would cause Perception also allows your character to notice treasures where others would not. Higher perception skill allows you to escape stronger traps and notice harder to find treasures.     
Normal: Skill increases chance to avoid traps and notice treasures
Expert: Double effect of skill
Master: Triple effect of skill     
 
Diplomacy     
Description: Diplomacy helps to soften the impact of begging, bribing, or threatening someone to get them to cooperate with you. The higher the skill, the less your reputation will suffer when you take any of those actions. Expert and master ranking will double and triple the effects of diplomacy.     
Normal: Skill reduces reputation cost of begging, bribing, or threatening
Expert: Double effect of skill
Master: Triple effect of skill     
 
Disarm Traps     
Description: Disarm traps skill is checked automatically when opening a trapped chest or other container. A higher skill in disarm traps gives a better chance of disarming the trap. Expert and Master rank doubles and triples the chance to successfully disarm the trap.     
Normal: Skill increases chance to disarm traps on chests
Expert: Double effect of skill
Master: Triple effect of skill     
 
Learning     
Description: Learning skill directly increases the experience your character receives. Every point of skill is a percent of awarded experience that is given as a bonus (plus a starting bonus of 9%). Five skill points would turn a 100 experience point award into a 114 experience point award. Expert doubles and master triples this bonus, so 10 points of learning at master rank would give a 39% bonus to all experience point gain.     
Normal: Skill increases amount of experience received
Expert: Double effect of skill
Master: Triple effect of skill
There’s another small secret outside New Sorpigal, though I hardly count it as one. On a hill east of town you can find this sword in a stone, you can retrieve the sword if your strength score is high enough (easy-peasy with the buff still in effect)
THVUg.jpg

PeBhv.jpg

It’s a simple two-handed sword however, nothing fancy. In fact, the champion sword we found in the trapped and disguised chest is better.
A look at our quest book now that we’ve spoken with everyone in New Sorpigal:
mCddO.jpg

7MUPJ.jpg

I decide to go explore Goblinwatch first, as it’s quite close by. We’ve also established that we can reliably handle goblins without making too big asses of ourselves. :roll:
7T0nA.jpg

If there’s a wall nearby hostile critters, you can exploit the poor AI. Eventually, some of them will pathfind their way to you, but in the mean time you can stand there and Pop Moles.
TXq90.jpg

In a chest behind Goblinwatch we find our first magic item!
Lindblum plays dressup.
F4ZTl.jpg

At this point in the game, the enchantments are rather unimpressive. They will improve vastly later in the game. But every little bit helps.
On top of Goblinwatch is a door which doesn’t lead to the interior of the keep. Instead it serves as a simple house. Who’d want to live there you ask yourself?
pK1zv.jpg

UsE0r.jpg

Why, a rude goblin is who. Blaming us for killing those outside might be fair, all things considered. But they did attack us first. It is impossible to completely avoid combat in Might and Magic VI! Yes, we could have run away, but eventually we will be going up against McGuffins that need to be wasted to advance the plot.
All proper dungeons have doorways that look like this:
CNsMT.jpg

This lets us know that we’re now going spelunking. Bringing our own light sources might be a good idea. Fire mages are ideal, as the first spell they learn is Torchlight. Later I shall try to find a list of the available spells for your perusal.
Inside the dungeon, we encounter a giant rat!
EdAhD.jpg

These fuckers seem like a bigger threat than the goblins. This one managed to seriously hurt Lindblum in any case, so I decide we’d better have everyone learn how to use bows. Getting some shots in before the enemy closes is always a good idea. So we exit Goblinwatch for now and hire a coach for Castle Ironfist.
6iIx1.jpg

Once there we pick up a new quest and fill our packs with 20 days worth of rations. Rations are used when resting outside of Inns and when traversing maps on foot.
TDGRK.jpg

gvYoD.jpg

The reason we came to Ironfist is to learn how to use bows. This proves more costly than I anticipated, but fortunately we have just enough cash to have everyone take up archery.
moKqm.jpg

And this is where I left off. I’ll post our intrepid four heroes’ stats and skills for now, for your perusal. Next time we browse around Ironfist, travel back to New Sorpigal and goes properly spelunking. :salute: Note please, that Dicksmoker is the only one with a bow, as he got the Magic Bow we found in the trapped chest. The rest of the group will have to wait with the bows until we’ve either found or bought some.
RdpaE.jpg
ePxBN.jpg

bYMwW.jpg
o8wVk.jpg

19eYq.jpg
GVK6V.jpg

e5yG3.jpg
jvltd.jpg

I’ll fiddle around with FRAPS a bit more before the next update. I could’ve sworn I’d disabled the FPS counter from showing on the screenshots, but I see that wasn’t the case. Next update might arrive in the coming week, and it might not. I hope it’ll be less work with fewer screenshots. :roll:
 

Luzur

Good Sir
Joined
Feb 12, 2009
Messages
41,358
Location
Swedish Empire
well, most Codexers have played this game like 10 times already, so we kinda know how this LP will go, but every time is a special time.
 

golgepapaz

Augur
Joined
Nov 3, 2009
Messages
381
Location
Istanbul-Ankara express
Divinity: Original Sin Wasteland 2
This was also my first might and magic game and it was a blast.Fondly remembering that I've failed an DSP exam because of playing this game and not studying. Good days
 

Erebus

Arcane
Joined
Jul 12, 2008
Messages
4,760
Very interesting start. I finished the game, but it was a long time ago and I don't remember much about it.

I do remember finding the plot even more forgettable than in the other M&M games. The intro doesn't make much sense (the generic old wizard's plan to fight the demons is to spend three years training four guys just so they can reach level 1 ??). But then, the M&M games are mostly about exploration, not story.
 

Azira

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Nov 3, 2004
Messages
8,518
Location
Copenhagen, Denmark
Codex 2012
I've played some more, explored Goblinwatch and the abandoned temple on the New Sorpigal overland map. Only a few more things to do on that map for our current party, and then we'll move on to clear the Castle Ironfist map. So far I've taken about 75 screenshots, and might be taking a dozen more before the map's cleared. Or as much of the map as we can safely clear. There's a location we'll have to visit later when we have the proper spells and levels. :M
No ETA on the update yet. My youngest will be baptised saturday and there's a bit of planning going into that, and in particular the celebration afterwards. So I don't know whether I'll have any spare time this week, or my wife insists on me spending my time on less frivolous things than this LP. :roll:
 

octavius

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Aug 4, 2007
Messages
19,164
Location
Bjørgvin
Good show!

Are those character portraits the goofiest ones ever or what?

I only heard about the NWC office in the game, but never visited it. Funny that JVC was a goblin and killable. Did you see George Ruof, the lead programmer? He used to hang around on comp.sys.*.rpg when MM6 was released and seemed like a nice guy.
But what was Trip Hawkins doing there? Wasn't he the EA boss?
 

Azira

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Nov 3, 2004
Messages
8,518
Location
Copenhagen, Denmark
Codex 2012
I chose some of the less-goofy portraits available, but they're rather amusing, yes. They are also animated as you can probably see. They frown or look angry when they miss their attack, smile or grin smugly when they kill something or succeed on a skill roll (checking for traps for instance). And they are also voiced. So they blurt out small exclamations from time to time during combat and exploration. I think I've avoided the most annoying of the voices, but that might also just be due to the low volume I play at.

As to George Ruof, I can't say. Wasn't taking notes. But I will keep a lookout later, as I plan on revisiting the NWC office later to farm potions. Just need to get the fly spell or the NPC with that skill first.
Wandering NPCs are randomized upon entry of the overland map by travel. So going with the coach to/from Castle Ironfist would reset the NPCs. Just not sure I'm going to bother, just to find another wind master, so our return trip might not be for a while yet.
As to Trip Hawkins, I have no idea. :M I'm sure someone else around these boards can help though.
 

Monstrous Bat

Cipher
Joined
Dec 30, 2011
Messages
638
Maybe we're playing diffrent versions but I'm pretty sure hitting home to terminate flight doesn't hurt your guys as long as the spell is still active.
 

Azira

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Nov 3, 2004
Messages
8,518
Location
Copenhagen, Denmark
Codex 2012
Ah, would make sense with Fly doubling as a Feather Fall spell. I must admit that I did not test it. Your characters scared expressions when terminating flight while in mid-air just had me assuming they'd take falling damage. :M
 

Pope Amole II

Nerd Commando Game Studios
Developer
Joined
Mar 1, 2012
Messages
2,052
Well, if I was on your place, I would've tried to touch the shrine of the gods, preferrably dying horribly in the process - would've been larpy, wouldn't it?
And I hope that you're not going to delay black potions for long either - the faster you're gonna get those "+10 to all stats of your party", the smoother this LP will go.
 
Joined
Apr 4, 2007
Messages
3,585
Location
Motherfuckerville
So, how long until our MAJESTIC party can kill some dragons?

Interesting that NWC people made themselves into goblins too. Pretty humble of them to not make themselves endbosses or immortals.
 

Azira

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Nov 3, 2004
Messages
8,518
Location
Copenhagen, Denmark
Codex 2012
Well, if I was on your place, I would've tried to touch the shrine of the gods, preferrably dying horribly in the process - would've been larpy, wouldn't it?
And I hope that you're not going to delay black potions for long either - the faster you're gonna get those "+10 to all stats of your party", the smoother this LP will go.

Coming soon, I promise. They have been made and quaffed, just need to find the time to write the update. :M

I recall there was an infinite amount of poisoned food you could take from those offices. You didn't get those?

There is. It just requires a lot of clicking, and I couldn't be arsed to do that for poisoned food. Buying or conjuring (with the light magic spell we'll get eventually) more food isn't much of a hassle anyway. :smug:

So, how long until our MAJESTIC party can kill some dragons?

That'll be a while yet, unless we manage to encounter a single dragon inside a room large enough to be suitable for kiting... :roll:
 

Lindblum

Augur
Joined
May 3, 2011
Messages
659
Yes I'm a somewhat Homoerotic looking pirate Cleric!

I could never get into this game myself, looking forward to you playing this.
 

Luzur

Good Sir
Joined
Feb 12, 2009
Messages
41,358
Location
Swedish Empire
I only heard about the NWC office in the game, but never visited it. Funny that JVC was a goblin and killable. Did you see George Ruof, the lead programmer? He used to hang around on comp.sys.*.rpg when MM6 was released and seemed like a nice guy.
But what was Trip Hawkins doing there? Wasn't he the EA boss?

because he was a co-founder of 3DO while also being a EA board member at the same time, if i remember correctly.
 
Joined
Aug 21, 2009
Messages
717
Here's hoping for a mega update today... ;)
 

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