Let's get famous in Darklands!

I'm still not through yet but if it doesn't drag on (or I'm mistaken and this isn't the end at all) I would say it took me about 20 hours until now? There is a lot of optional stuff to do that I skipped in my Get Shit Done mode, like collecting saints, building up local reputation and another bunch of minor sidequests (btw are those quests you get for asking around [the one in the rumor menu] tied to a specific location or are they random? I only managed to get one once during my first hour test run and haven't encountered any ever since)

Random pop quiz: what do you value the most?
1. Your soul
2. Your life
3. Your cash

Easy question for Ashe, soul.

Isn't the 1st and the 2nd one pretty much the same (in certain cases)?? Anyways, I choose 3, cash.

Biene's a thief, staying alive while getting all the cash is her specialty, so for reasons of LARPing I'd say 2 > 3 >>> 1.

The vote has been cast and right in the order I like
What follows is a quickie for better readability.

Finally, one of the wandering hermits agrees to talk to Bee.




One more thing that I want to try before the apocalypse is going to a monastery.




Sounds like there is another cleansing quest in order but the monks are surprisingly forthcoming.






The scholars are next but I forget to pick Theocrat as leader.



Wasting some money...



I think we've seen enough.




There are rumours going around that another dragon has been sighted further south and since we may need all the money we can get, we leave the beaten path and begin roaming through the countryside, burning another heretic village in the progress. Someone is definitely not amused.



We arrive at the dragon area but he never shows up. My guess is that you either need a clearing or rescue a maiden first. Maybe the Wild Hunt is messing things up as well. Speaking of which...






He is more of the experimental type anyways.



We get the same event just a few hours later, again giving the fruit to Theocrat who needs it the most. This should improve our chances for the final battle somewhat. Sooner or later however, bad things start catching up with us.




Running away just costs you stamina and never works. Don't even try.



The man animal himself. He would be more intimidating if he would have some help. Single opponents go down way too easily for the most part.



He finds us again the very next night. The ox tries to get him off our trail.



He soon gets a second shot at it.



Woodwise and stealth? Not going to happen in this playthrough.



I think he was in one of the towns a fair bit further up northeast and there is really no chance I'm walking all the way back at this point. So far, we've failed to find the dragon and wasted so much time searching for the dragon that we also missed a nearby Sabbat. Therefore we arrive at Salzburg not as well prepared as I would have hoped. We still got enough money to buy everyone 32q plate armour and Theocrat spends the next week locked up in his room brewing potions. When we're ready, we continue our way south to meet our destiny.





That was actually Bee sneaking inside. She tries to steal the chest.



There are five bears in fact. Thank you for mentioning.



A dark castle is standing amidst the great mountains. We get closer.



Get ready for the super duper mega finale with more tl;dr than you can handle. If this LP ever reaches the next page that is

It's sad to see this lp end. Still, purge the heretics!!! For the Emperor God!!! Bump for the bump god!!


PS: Before you finish this, would you kindly show what does happen with that unnatural strength "blessing" that the witches offered you? Does the affected character mutate into something hideous?

Sure thing but it ain't pretty

Dininininnnn (ambient lurking danger music)....

Pussycat669 said:

Sure thing but it ain't pretty

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ITZ nigh!

It is.




Our last adventure begins in a large courtyard. There are seven doors to the north, maybe as a reference to the seven deadly sins, I'm not sure. Since there is only one door unlocked at a time, we're forced to go from left to right.

Door 1


Uh, Ashe?



We have a face-off with four demons in a barren wasteland, wounded and handicapped. At this point you just know that this is going to be a rough ride.



Door 2


Calling another saint for aid…





What's a ship doing here?






Door 3



Alchemists and lots of traps. This place is just brutal. At least our armour remains intact.



Door 4



I don't even want to know what would've had happened otherwise. It appears to be just one small labyrinth with some skeletons in it.




Door 5


Each swarm drops extra healing potions so I’m not complaining.





Considering the setting, I'm with Ashery on that one. Soul it is.



Not good. What about life?



This goes on for a while.



Filled with regrets, I decide to sacrifice our wealth instead.



Door 6



Ashe strength drops to a meagre 18
Hopefully wasting his last bit of divine favour will lead to a more tolerable result.



We suffer as a community like true communists.



The blade is actually a mighty two-handed sword whose wielder gets extra protection against fire. We might need it soon as there is only one door left.

Door 7



Another labyrinth filled with traps?
No matter, nothing will stop us now.



Seven heads, all the ways to kill, demons really are creatures of temptation. Sick ‘em, boys!




Just kidding. Let’s get serious!




Poor old Baphomet. The group is so much covered in with healing and enchantment potions that his chance of success drops into the single digit area.











There is no way in hell we're backing out of this now.



I just looked it up on Wikipedia. Hope really does count as a virtue. The more you know...



Baphomet's little world is starting to fall apart.




He says something cheesy and villainous but I can't make it out thanks to the bad sound quality.






Sure looks painful. With the evil defeated, light and peace returns to the lands.




I hereby to the game for the very authentic way it presents traditional German customs, like drinking yourself under the table with good beer on every possible occasion.



We might just as well...



Some things truly never change.



So, what sayeth you, honourable jury?

Jesus is disturbed by our violent tendencies and lack of compassion. Thankfully he is still a cool dude so we get his vote.
Beowulf is rather displeased by the absence of extreme gore and mutilation but impressed that we were able to survive the dragon. Another vote for us.
Doomguy is shocked that not a single gun was fired during the whole journey. He states however that our ability to kill demons with 'whack sticks' as he calls them is pretty hardcore. It's another vote well earned.
No comment on that one



Congratulations, ladies and gentlemen. We are now legendary! (and totally broke if I might add)

EPIC!!1

:clap:





Congrats, Pussyneko-sensei! So what are you LPing next?



An embryo of Baphomet? Evil! :twisted:



Saintly aid really seems to be a sine qua non in this game, if this LP is any indication. I wonder if it can be beaten without calling on saints at all.



Sinister!

Pussycat669 said:

I hereby to the game for the very authentic way it presents traditional German customs, like drinking yourself under the table with good beer on every possible occasion.

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EDIT. Also, you should probably add something like "Done, yay!" to the title of this thread.

Congrats!!!! A Winner is you!

I hope to see more of your LPs soon!

Done already ? I haven't even made it to the monastery yet, but I've been collecting saints and destroying sabbats to raise my virtue a bit. I got a saint that lets me predict when and where the next one will happen whenever I come across a site, very useful.

Congratulations, I'll keep the thread in mind and read it once I'm done with the game.

You finished? Awesome! Definitely deserving of this:

That was fast Is there some sort of alternate ending or something? Just to know.

Thank you everyone, thank you, you're great too

I'll try to write a more detailed impression like jimbob did in his Wasteland LP once I've got some sleep. This game deserves a lot more respect than my rushed playthrough provides.

@lightbane
Don't think there is an alternative ending. You can give up to Baphomet but this is more of a lol! try again kind of situation.

Bee said:

Congrats, Pussyneko-sensei! So what are you LPing next?

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I'm actually thinking about doing a run through of the Realms of Arkania trilogy since the other LP was apparently abandoned. Only finished part one so far and I feel like I'm on a roll right now.

Also, you should probably add something like "Done, yay!" to the title of this thread.

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Can't... laziness, it's so... overpowering! (I probably should add an index to this at some point though)

Congrats. The ending was entirely spectacular. hopefully
I'll play this when I ahve the time...

Ok, here comes the impression but, boy, it's hard for me to articulate an opinion about this game. I think I'll try to deviate from the usual pleas and whining that you should give a seasoned old timer a chance because, despite the smell, he's still very much alive and kicking. I rather want to focus on the bad parts or at least potential bad parts that are most likely going to annoy you first. It's sort of a reverse psychology kinda thing.



Skills & Combat
Darkland's character development is based on the traditional learning by doing system. Every time your character succeeds or fails using a skill, this skill has a chance to improve. This chance increases with the likeliness for your character to screw things up. A higher difficult setting also improves those chances. The system is hence fairly intuitive but also shares the same imbalance that you come to expect as some skills (like woodwise) are very hard to train on a regular basis while others (like all combat related skills) will probably reach 70-80 before you've even really started to go to the dangerous places. Taking ox as an example, I think I would have been far better off using his skill points on anything but combat skills for the most part. While he was a big help during the very early stages, his usefulness was soon diminished as everyone in the party started to become just as good of a fighter as he was. Even his significant strength bonus didn't make such a difference that I would have noticed except for some special encounters. There are also weak spots in the system that are easy to exploit, like sneaking in and out of a castle to improve your stealth skill and so on.

As for RTWP combat, there are some complaints on my end, most notably that body protection factors in way too strongly for my taste. Once I got a power armour for every party member, the difficulty of the combat dropped significantly. I think that is mostly due to the way of how the game separates health and stamina. A well protected PC will mostly lose the later which means a mere KO in the worse case while someone who relies on agility and movement will risk losing strength and probably also his maneuverability as he gets more and more encumbered. Take that with the fact that almost all your stamina instantly regenerates after a fight plus the fact that you can simply undress your PCs at any given time for covert actions and there is really not much space left for variety. Same goes to the different combat stances. Your character can fight either normal, parry (better defense, less chance to hit) or go berserk (better chance to hit, less defense). I would claim that the only reason you ever want to use them later on is if you go against a single strong opponent and you want to kill him quickly. Simply get his attention with a PC in parry mode, berserk with the rest and you should bring even a dragon down without much hassle. Otherwise, since the combat skills of the party increase this quickly, they're often better off just fighting in normal stance instead of either taking risks and damage or alternatively not handing out enough damage before hostile reinforcements can arrive. Speaking of which, as the difficulty soon dwindles with better equipment, the only thing you're left to fear will be packs of fairly skilled enemies since they get the advantage in numbers (you get bonuses on your chance to hit if your opponent faces multiple enemies at the time). This makes a lot of later encounters where that isn't the case more of a dull time sink, sadly, and even then you get the advantage that you can drink potions in mid-fight, making you an unstoppable killing machine if you still have a supply



Religion
It's mostly cool and straightforward. Go to church to collect saints (although this can go wrong which is an annoyance at times), get virtue with good deeds to be allowed to call said saints and burn divine favour to get all sorts of skill bonuses. The only thing I got on this one is that the interface is a wee bit cumbersome since you can't just scroll through your saints once you have one selected but have to return to the inventory and select a new one by his/her name. This can get rather confusing once you got about twenty saints in your list like in Ashe's case and don't exactly remember which does what. Still, this little organizational issue pales in comparison to the stuff you have to go through with the alchemist.



Alchemy & inventory
Suffice to say that, before facing the endboss, the group had consumed/used maybe ten potions at best. Theocrat was severely underused in my playthrough and for the most part I don't regret it. I always preferred the ToEE approach when it comes to making things. That is just to invest money + time and let the game do the rest. Running from city to city to get the right ingredients isn't exactly my idea of a good time and dealing with other alchemist is even worse. This is because, unlike monks (who you just need to ask once for a saint, maybe two times when you want training), you have three possibilities to make those guys mad at you. Ask for a better philosopher's stone, ask to exchange recipes and ask to buy recipes (and ask for training if you had been incredible lucky and you hadn't been throw you out at this point). All in all, you will have to deal with some frustration when building up your alchemist.

Theocrat also showed me that organizing your inventory can be a nightmare. The inventory is text based for the most part except for the equipment currently worn by the character. All items do have weight but encumbrance is solely measured again by the stuff equipped so old school purists might be in for a shock. Otherwise, at least in Theocrat's case, it's just a long list of ingredients to scroll through to find the potion I want to give to another character, miss it, scroll back up, find it and finally dragging it over to the other character. That you find equipment of different quality which get a separated row each doesn't improve the overview. A better segmentation of the inventory would have been greatly appreciated.



Others
A lot of parts in the game depends on the random factor, especially when it comes to the world map, quests and encounters. Most of the later are negative and either escalate in a fight or have you lose money and strength or all of the above. Depending on how lucky you are, you may experience your first complete party annihilation by a pack of wolves during your first hour of play. Although you are almost always presented with a way for the characters to weasel out of a situation, it often requires you to switch leaders which tends to get annoying after a while. I also got the impression that the encounters soon begin to repeat themselves and there is only so many ways to make a confrontation with boars interesting. Traveling itself is a rather streamlined experience compared to other rpgs like the RoA games as you don't require supplies and you can't catch any diseases.

EoL
That's most of the seemingly bad stuff I can think of from the top of my head although the utterly, nerve wrecking pathfinding should probably get mentioned as well but I might pop a vein trying that.
Now it's a good time as ever to mention that I find Darklands to be the most enjoyable sandbox game I've ever encountered. It is open ended but does provide you with hooks in just the right intervals. The game world treats you like dirt at the start but that should only motivate you to make it respect you all the more. There are many events despite later repetition and I can only imagine how things would have turned out back in the day if they would have released the engine for later modifications. There are also tons of skill checks and many ways for your individual characters to shine. Got ambushed by bandits? Alchemy might not change the rules of physics like saints do but it has lots of practical applications. Just turn your alchemist into a part time ninja and let him throw a flash bomb. No idea how to escape a deadly trap? A heartfelt prayer can actually save you in this game. Climbing walls, burning castles, the ways to interact with your environment are many and spread amongst the different skills and attributes. Being good at killing stuff won't get you through this game and I can nothing but love it for that.

Kudos for your impressions!

Pussycat669 said:

I also got the impression that the encounters soon begin to repeat themselves

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A shame, really. Still, the game is totally badass.

Pussycat669 said:

Bee said:

Congrats, Pussyneko-sensei! So what are you LPing next?

Click to expand...

I'm actually thinking about doing a run through of the Realms of Arkania trilogy since the other LP was apparently abandoned. Only finished part one so far and I feel like I'm on a roll right now.

Click to expand...

Yeah, TheLostOne seems to be lost (haha) in real-life stuff, so by all means go ahead!! Bee is a she-rogue, by the way.

I just beat the game, and I have to say the Great Monastery is much tougher than Baphomet's castle.

I think he says something close to "My plan is undone". The rest I can't make out because the sounds plays way too fast.

Pussycat669 said:

Religion

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I rarely used saints in my playthrough, because the virtue requirements for most are much too high. If you don't find a spot to grind virtue like you did with the dragon worshippers, most saints cannot even be prayed to, and a successful prayer takes up most of the DF. I ended with about 40 virtue for my best character, and 30 for the others. There are few opportunities to earn it along the game, Sabbat being the best but they can be a pain to get to in time. PCs should take up religious careers and max virtue out as much as they can from the start.

Alchemy & inventory

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How did you manage to beat the monastery without a ton of essence o' graces ? Stamina does get whittled out after each combat, and the later battles are extremely difficult without healing. Knights do hit for 20 damage once in a while, and the alchemist potions degrade armor at an alarming rate.

I found alchemy to be the easiest skill to train apart from combat skills. Tutoring is cheap and you can try once in two days if the alchemist throws you out, and a refusal doesn't lower your reputation like it does with churches. Once you reach ~40 skill, you can start making a huge amount of money when you find a town with all the ingredients for a particular potion. When you have money, you can buy 200 of each reagent when you come across a new town and never have to hunt a particular one again.

My route for each town was : arm making guild to check qualities, alchemist to trade recipes, foreign trader and pharmacist for reagents and church for saints. You can do it all in one day and get out before dusk. Making potions in wilderness camps prevents you from blowing up inns and getting thrown out of town.

When the philospher stone reaches the twenties alchemist can't do a thing to improve it so it's not even worth asking : you have to pay outrageous sums to the university. Sold recipes are always the same Eyeburn or Dark Cloud, none of the really useful ones like Essence O' Grace or Firewall. Reagents sold are the same as the pharmacist, so don't bother asking them about it. Really, trading recipes and asking for tutoring is the only thing you should have to ask of them.

Others

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I would add that some events get repetitive after a while. I must have killed dozen of boars, hundreds of wolves and thousands of bandits during my travels. Sometimes you can escape them, but most of the time you can't.

Thank you for the counter arguments and tips, korenzel. A second opinion is always appreciated.

I used saints fairly frequently, at least during the text segments, not so much for healing and to boost skills. I think 3 guys with 30 virtue and one with about 70 as a main saint collector sounds like a good team up, if I'm not mistaken with the numbers. It depends a bit on luck, I think. Everyone in my party must have earned maybe 20 points for helping pilgrims alone but I can see that this doesn't necessarily happens to everyone, hence alchemy presents a more safe route for a character to improve and it's also true that you will likely run out of divine favour really fast. That deserves some reconsideration. I guess my general disdain for alchemy comes from the fact that Salzburg was the first city that sold enough components for me to actually brew some of the potions I've had a recipe for.

How did you manage to beat the monastery without a ton of essence o' graces?

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I did use the two healing potions that I found on location before entering the final level if I remember correctly. It all boiled down to force those Templars to take you on one at a time or flee if that wasn't possible. That way I was able to take full advantage of the team's superior combat skills and alchemists can't hit you if they have knights blocking their view, or can they?