Using dosbox without dfend because dfend kept complaining about not being able to mount a drive in secure mode and I couldn't find the setting to make it insecure mode. Keyboard is not working in game menus where item is highlight. Up/down, pgup/pgdn, nothin. I suppose some conf file trickery is in order.
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Gold Box SSI's Gold Box Series Thread
- Thread starter Saxon1974
- Start date
Excidium
P. banal
That is weird. Goldbox games always worked p. much out of the (DOS)box here. Retarded question but you don't have num lock on right?
I tried toggling numlock. Are you supposed to use the numpad exclusively or do arrows work as well?
Edit: oh apparently numpad 7 is up and 1 is down in menus, as opposed to 8 and 2 like most things. Found that by randomly hitting keys but now that I look at the quick ref. card that is what it says.
Edit 2: also I noticed in the manual that "gender affects the possible strength of a character." So my female fighter would be better off in a more feminine role?
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vanshilar
Educated
- Joined
- Jun 10, 2014
- Messages
- 17
Edit 2: also I noticed in the manual that "gender affects the possible strength of a character." So my female fighter would be better off in a more feminine role?
Yes, in fact:
Females are limited to a strength of 18, while fighters for example can have a strength of 18(00). So if you have a female in the party, make the female a cleric or a mage. I personally usually have the female as one of the human cleric-to-mage dual class characters since they can only have 18 strength anyway.
There is a use for females in the game, however, so I would highly recommend one of your characters be female.
There is a use for females in the game, however, so I would highly recommend one of your characters be female.
Gozma
Arcane
- Joined
- Aug 1, 2012
- Messages
- 2,951
Human females can get up to 18/50 strength as fighters in first edition
If you are rolling randomly instead of cheating or rerolling a million times you'll never get 18/00 anyway so the fighter just waits until they can get Gauntlets of Ogre Power which give anyone 18/00. Or you get to a decent level and the enlarge person buff gives 20+ strength.
If you are rolling randomly instead of cheating or rerolling a million times you'll never get 18/00 anyway so the fighter just waits until they can get Gauntlets of Ogre Power which give anyone 18/00. Or you get to a decent level and the enlarge person buff gives 20+ strength.
Excidium
P. banal
Yeah...Besides goldbox games already cheat on the rolls for you anyway. 
I think it was designed to be played with the numpad because on menus all the buttons are there and on combat you have diagonal movement.
Excidium
P. banal
Did you make that? P. cool but square icons are cooler
Well this shortcut is in the same folder as MM1-3 and U4-6 from GOG so it had to be round.
Revenant
Guest
People using shortcuts to launch games, pffff. Real gamers type START.EXE in the terminal to launch their GoldBox game
Luzur
Good Sir
pffft, i can just walk around the corner, grab the real box, take out the real disks, setup a real C64/Amiga, and type in the commands.
Looks cute. :3
Edward_R_Murrow
Arcane
Gold Box mastermen, I have a few mechanical questions I can't seem to find the answer to with my Google-fu.
-How exactly are multiple attacks handled? More to the point, on any given round in which a character may be entitled to multiple attacks (e.g. every other round for a lv7+ fighter with 3/2 APR), do they "lose" the extra attack opportunities if their first shot/swing misses? This is how it seems to work, but I'm not entirely certain if this is correct and if it applies to all games in the series (as there were many rules tweaks from early games like PoR and CotAB to later Gold Box releases).
-What exactly do a lot of the seemingly extraneous items actually do? Mirrors, silver weaponry, and flasks of oil/water...I know what those do, but are there any benefits to things like holy symbols or armor made out of silver?
-How exactly does initiative work? I know it factors in Dexterity plus a random component, but I'm not exactly certain the relative magnitude of each upon the overall outcome. Also, does it re-roll every round for all combatants or only selectively based upon some criteria?
-Is there an efficient method for forcing unique random encounters like "lairs"? Anything better than traipsing around the overworld like a decapitated fowl?
-What exactly determines whether or not the party is surprised in a random encounter? Are there any ways the player can reduce the frequency of said occurrence? I can't really tell whether or not having Search Mode toggled made a difference or not.
-How exactly are multiple attacks handled? More to the point, on any given round in which a character may be entitled to multiple attacks (e.g. every other round for a lv7+ fighter with 3/2 APR), do they "lose" the extra attack opportunities if their first shot/swing misses? This is how it seems to work, but I'm not entirely certain if this is correct and if it applies to all games in the series (as there were many rules tweaks from early games like PoR and CotAB to later Gold Box releases).
-What exactly do a lot of the seemingly extraneous items actually do? Mirrors, silver weaponry, and flasks of oil/water...I know what those do, but are there any benefits to things like holy symbols or armor made out of silver?
-How exactly does initiative work? I know it factors in Dexterity plus a random component, but I'm not exactly certain the relative magnitude of each upon the overall outcome. Also, does it re-roll every round for all combatants or only selectively based upon some criteria?
-Is there an efficient method for forcing unique random encounters like "lairs"? Anything better than traipsing around the overworld like a decapitated fowl?
-What exactly determines whether or not the party is surprised in a random encounter? Are there any ways the player can reduce the frequency of said occurrence? I can't really tell whether or not having Search Mode toggled made a difference or not.
I've never noticed the second of two attacks always missing if the first one misses.
Silver Shields work like Mirrors and reflect the gaze from Medusae and Basilisks, so they are quite handy. Holy Symbols are only in PoR, I think, where they don't really seem to have any use. In theory they are supposed to help with Turning Undead.
Dexterity plays a major part in determining Initiative, which is partly why it is the most important stat. With 18 Dex for all your guys you are almost guaranteed to always have one of your characters starting the combat, which can be critical in the hardest battles, like the finale in Pools of Darkness.
Initiative is recalculated for each combatant when a new round starts, in my experience.
Note that in FRUA, unlike the GB games (except special areas like the Tilverton Sewers in CoAB), it is my experience that monsters get a +2 or +3 global modifier to all their dice rolls, including initiative. You will often see half the Golems, Ogres, Trolls, Giants and other slow (Dex 10) monsters move before your 18 Dex guys.. This has really soured my enthusiasm for FRUA.
You mean the lairs on the overworld in PoR? No idea.
Seems to be totally random for the random encounters on the overworld (where Search have no effect) in the later games.
IIRC, In PoR areas have a "pool" of encounters, some of which will have you surprised, so surprise in these cases is "scripted". Once the pool is empty the area is cleared. Search mode will only determine how fast you trigger all the encounters.
In FRUA surprise is always predetermined by the module designer; there's no random chance. Probably the same for most Gold Box encounters.
Silver Shields work like Mirrors and reflect the gaze from Medusae and Basilisks, so they are quite handy. Holy Symbols are only in PoR, I think, where they don't really seem to have any use. In theory they are supposed to help with Turning Undead.
Dexterity plays a major part in determining Initiative, which is partly why it is the most important stat. With 18 Dex for all your guys you are almost guaranteed to always have one of your characters starting the combat, which can be critical in the hardest battles, like the finale in Pools of Darkness.
Initiative is recalculated for each combatant when a new round starts, in my experience.
Note that in FRUA, unlike the GB games (except special areas like the Tilverton Sewers in CoAB), it is my experience that monsters get a +2 or +3 global modifier to all their dice rolls, including initiative. You will often see half the Golems, Ogres, Trolls, Giants and other slow (Dex 10) monsters move before your 18 Dex guys.. This has really soured my enthusiasm for FRUA.
You mean the lairs on the overworld in PoR? No idea.
Seems to be totally random for the random encounters on the overworld (where Search have no effect) in the later games.
IIRC, In PoR areas have a "pool" of encounters, some of which will have you surprised, so surprise in these cases is "scripted". Once the pool is empty the area is cleared. Search mode will only determine how fast you trigger all the encounters.
In FRUA surprise is always predetermined by the module designer; there's no random chance. Probably the same for most Gold Box encounters.
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I don't know what you mean by unique random encounters, but check the time of day in your game menu. If each step only takes you a few seconds, then you are not in search mode. If each step takes ten minutes, you are in active search mode and I believe because you are taking longer you increase your chances of random encounters.
I don't know how the Gold Box games handle surprise, but the old AD&D and BECMI rules had it so that in an encounter where both sides could be surprised, each would roll 1d6 and be surprised on a 1-2. If both were surprised it was negated. If monsters set-up an ambush, they are not surprised but you must roll a 1d6 to see if your party is.
Here is a post discussing surprise: http://mathofoldschooldandd.blogspot.com/2012/09/ad-combat-round-versus-d-combat-round.html
I contacted the author of Weekend Waste Monster and asked for his permission to update the PoR codewheel: http://pajamaman.github.io/poolwheel-wwm/
Then I made one that rotates: http://pajamaman.github.io/poolwheel/
Then I made one that rotates: http://pajamaman.github.io/poolwheel/
Alchemist
Arcane
- Joined
- Jun 3, 2013
- Messages
- 1,439
That rocks - well done! I've been wondering why no-one ever made a rotating digital codewheel.
- Joined
- Mar 2, 2010
- Messages
- 10,872
Memories flooding back, this is awesome
Don't think it means I've forgiven you for MM1 though
After you begin the game and save it, can you add more characters to your party? On the first menu I can Create, Add, Load or Exit. Add does nothing. Load brings me to the 3d view of the town. After that point I can't figure out how to add anybody else.
Telengard
Arcane
Find your nearest Trainer in Phlan, enter and then:
"(A)dd new character to party" as an option should be available to you.
"(A)dd new character to party" as an option should be available to you.
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