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Post by a moderator on Oct 31, 2023 22:32:22 GMT
I got so ridiculously lucky back when I started rebuilding my FF collection that for a while I was reluctant to pay more than £1 per book. Yes, I plugged the gaps in my collection back around 2007 so I think the most I paid for one book was for “Curse of the Mummy” (Puffin edition). I think I paid a max of £20. I rebuilt my collection between December 2001 and November 2002, inspired by the discovery of 16 of the books (including Curse) for 25p each in a charity shop. Less than a month after that, I found Magehunter and Revenge in another charity shop for 30p each. After that, going all the way up to £1 for the likes of Island of the Undead and Knights of Doom seemed to border on crazy money. On the subject of low-quality photos of gamebook collections, I submit the following slightly outdated image:
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Post by a moderator on Oct 31, 2023 22:22:31 GMT
X) Identify a human whom you may fight (their Skill and Stamina must be listed) during the adventure. Man in white – 3 (Vastariner, Evilwizard, Scouserob) Leader - 3 (Hallucination, Peter’s wife, Adrius) The Earl of Drumer – 2 (Gabe Fandango, Peter) First Man – 2 (Kieran, Trialmaster) Hunchback - 1 (Petch) Devil-worshipper in the Man in White's cell – 1 (Per) White-haired Man - 1 (Sylas)
After avoiding duplicating everyone bar Sylas, Evilwizard finally gets into a proper pile-up, while Shekou's brief moment of fame has already faded.
There was one viable answer that nobody picked: the Master’s Servant (also known as Second Man). Scouserob's thorough list of potential answers also included 'Franklins', but that's almost certainly a wrong answer. According to Out of the Pit, Hell Demons 'are able to assume the form of any human they encounter, usually killing and eating the person after they have copied him', so the likelihood is that even if the Franklins you encounter at the start of the book is human, by the time you can fight him, he has been replaced by a disguised non-human.
Final scores Box cage 1) Sylas - 18 2) Hallucination - 22 3) Gabe Fandango, Per, Scouserob - 23 6) Trialmaster - 24 7) Peter, Peter's wife - 26 9) Vastariner, Adrius - 27 11) Kieran, Evilwizard -28 13) Petch -38
Tall cage 1) Evilwizard, Sylas - 96 3) Hallucination - 252 4) Per - 448 5) Gabe Fandango - 672 6) Scouserob - 720 7) Peter's wife - 840 8) Trialmaster - 1920 9) Peter - 2880 11) Vastariner, Adrius - 4032 12) Petch - 10752 13) Kieran - 11520
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Post by a moderator on Oct 31, 2023 21:58:24 GMT
IX) Describe a full-page illustration which accompanies a section that you cannot reach in the course of a successful attempt at the book. Vampire in the Shaitan room – 4 (Petch, Per, Scouserob, Adrius) An old man in a white gown sitting on the floor of the corner of a small room with crumbling walls - 4 (Kieran, Peter, Peter’s wife, Sylas) Ghoul in the kitchen – 1 (Gabe Fandango) Changing room at the local temple, on the wall of which someone has put up an HIM poster, and in which various golfers try to work out which cloak is a best fit, Brother Sylvester noting that he cannot dab while wearing a goat head, possibly for health and safety reasons given Brother Roderick behind seems to be a bit dubious about the pointy bits - 1 (Vastariner) An ugly man sitting on an uncomfortable chair in a room with rough walls and a blood stained table with a goats head on it - 1 (Evilwizard) Great Danes – 1 (Trialmaster) Goat-masked cultists and young woman victim - 1 (Hallucination)
Another question for which every possible answer was picked at least once - though obviously different players had different ideas about how much detail was called for in the description. While Vastariner's use of artistic license goes a bit far, his answer is a more effective description of the picture than his earlier, insufficiently detailed 'Brother Isaacson'.
Running totals Box cage 1) Sylas - 17 2) Hallucination - 19 3) Scouserob - 20 4) Gabe Fandango - 21 5) Per, Trialmaster - 22 7) Peter's wife - 23 8) Vastariner, Peter, Adrius - 24 11) Evilwizard -25 12) Kieran - 26 13) Petch -37
Tall cage 1) Evilwizard - 32 2) Hallucination - 84 3) Sylas - 96 4) Scouserob - 240 5) Peter's wife - 280 6) Gabe Fandango - 336 7) Per - 448 8) Trialmaster - 960 9) Vastariner, Adrius - 1344 11) Peter - 1440 12) Kieran - 5760 13) Petch - 10752
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Post by a moderator on Oct 31, 2023 21:25:23 GMT
VIII) Identify a liquid you are given the opportunity of drinking in the house.Green liquid - 4 (Kieran, Vastariner, Trialmaster, Peter) Coffee – 2 (Per, Adrius) White Wine – 2 (Gabe Fandango) Poisoned White Wine from an unlabelled bottle in the small storeroom - 1 (Scouserob) Brandy - 1 (Evilwizard) Water - 1 (Hallucination) Clear liquid - 1 (Peter’s wife) Tea - 1 (Sylas) WRONGSoup – 1 (Petch) Petch's answer sent me down a semantic rabbithole, as the question of whether soup is drunk or eaten is a matter of some debate. What consensus I could find indicates that if it's Cup-a-Soup served in a mug, you drink it, but if the soup comes in a bowl and a spoon is used, you eat it. The book isn't clear either way, stating only that "Soup follows", but given that it's a course of a meal served in the dining room of a member of the landed gentry, odds are that we're talking 'bowl-and-spoon' here. Thus, it counts as a wrong answer, scoring 14 in the Box cage and (thanks to the popularity of the green liquid) 8 in the Tall cage. Gabe and Scouserob's answers bring up the rarely-used 'More specific variants' rule. Gabe's more generic 'White wine' encompasses all three of the opportunities to drink white wine (at the start of the meal, in the storeroom, in the larder), while Scouserob narrows the field to just the one instance described. Therefore Gabe scores 2 and Scouserob scores 1. In addition to his clearly delineated set of answers, Scouserob also gave details of every answer he could think of for every question. Some quibbling was averted by his not picking 'Red liquid' here: while the book does initially suggest you might 'risk taking a sip' of a liquid from a vial, you don't actually get to drink any of the red liquid, as its fumes alone suffice to bring about your character's demise. Other acceptable answers not given were yellow liquid and red wine. Running totalsBox cage1) Sylas - 13 2) Scouserob - 16 3) Per, Hallucination - 18 5) Peter's wife - 19 6) Gabe Fandango, Peter, Adrius - 20 9) Trialmaster - 21 10) Kieran - 22 11) Vastariner - 23 12) Evilwizard -24 13) Petch -33 Tall cage1) Sylas - 24 2) Evilwizard - 32 3) Scouserob - 60 4) Peter's wife - 70 5) Hallucination - 84 6) Per - 112 7) Gabe Fandango, Adrius - 336 9) Peter - 360 10) Trialmaster - 960 11) Vastariner - 1344 12) Kieran - 1440 13) Petch - 2688
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Post by a moderator on Oct 31, 2023 20:39:53 GMT
VII) List an item you may use as a WEAPON. Kitchen knife - 5 (Kieran, Scouserob, Trialmaster, Peter, Peter’s wife) Kris Knife – 2 (Gabe Fandango, Adrius) Silver dagger - 2 (Petch, Vastariner) Length of branch - 2 (Evilwizard, Sylas) Letter-opener from the Azazel room – 1 (Per) Meat knife - 1 (Hallucination)
The question with the lowest number of possible right answers, but we still got a couple of unique entries, and even the highest-scoring one wasn't a Shekou-scale pile-up. Kieran's answer to this question was phrased as 'Knife from ghoul room'. This was sufficient to identify it as the kitchen knife, qualifying it as a correct (if popular) answer, but also raises the intriguing possibility that Kieran's preferred term for 'kitchen' is 'Ghoul room'. Hallucination's 'meat knife' is the one from the unnamed upstairs room where you also find the garlic and white white wine, rather than the popular one from the ghou kitchen.
Running totals Box cage 1) Sylas - 12 2) Scouserob - 15 3) Per, Peter - 16 5) Trialmaster, Hallucination - 17 7) Gabe Fandango, Kieran, Peter's wife, Adrius - 18 11) Petch, Vastariner - 19 13) Evilwizard -23
Tall cage 1) Sylas - 24 2) Evilwizard - 32 3) Per - 56 4) Scouserob - 60 5) Peter's wife - 70 6) Hallucination - 84 7) Peter - 90 8) Gabe Fandango, Adrius - 168 10) Trialmaster - 240 11) Petch, Vastariner - 336 13) Kieran - 360
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Post by a moderator on Oct 31, 2023 17:52:14 GMT
VI) Name or otherwise identify an opponent with a Skill score that is an odd number.Shekou (also referred to as Hunchback) – 7 (Gabe Fandango, Petch, Per, Vastariner, Hallucination, Peter’s wife, Adrius) First Fire Sprite - 2 (Kieran, Trialmaster) Second Fire Sprite - 1 (Evilwizard) First Great Dane - 1 (Scouserob) First Zombie - 1 (Peter) Second Skeleton - 1 (Sylas) Acceptable answers not given were White-haired Man, Zombie (the one from the Balthus room rather than the eligible one from the Shaitan room) and Great Dane (the first one in the cellar, not the Abbadon room - it is theoretically possible to fight both within the course of one adventure, so they must be separate dogs). until Sylas' answers came in, it appeared that everybody had forgotten about Shekou. Well, he might have been forgotten back in question II, but not here. Apologies to the seven players who chose him for this question if my earlier observation raised false hopes of a low score. [Cackles like Steve Jackson after penning a 'doomed either way' decision.]After the first 3 sets of answers came in, all giving the same answer, I actually went back and re-checked that there were other viable answers. Then people did start sending in some of the others, but Shekou's popularity continued to increase too, leading to quite a shake-up in the rankings. Running totalsBox cage1) Scouserob, Sylas - 10 3) Peter - 11 4) Trialmaster - 12 5) Kieran, Peter's wife - 13 7) Per - 15 8) Gabe Fandango, Hallucination, Adrius - 16 11) Petch, Vastariner - 17 13) Evilwizard -21 Tall cage1) Scouserob, Sylas - 12 3) Peter's wife - 14 4) Evilwizard - 16 5) Peter - 18 6) Trialmaster - 48 7) Per - 56 8) Kieran - 72 9) Gabe Fandango, Hallucination, Adrius - 84 12) Petch, Vastariner - 168
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Post by a moderator on Oct 31, 2023 17:19:33 GMT
V) List a scoring answer for the torturer’s test that gets less than 5 points. Man in white - 3 (Kieran, Vastariner, Adrius) Apollyon – 2 (Trialmaster, Hallucination) Kris – 2 (Gabe Fandango, Per) Mammon - 2 (Evilwizard, Sylas) Diabolus - 2 (Scouserob, Peter) Man in grey - 1 (Petch) Azazel - 1 (Peter’s wife)
Acceptable answers not given were Asmodeus and Shaitan.
Running totals Box cage 1) Peter's wife - 6 2) Per - 8 3) Gabe Fandango, Scouserob, Hallucination, Adrius, Sylas - 9 8) Petch, Vastariner, Trialmaster, Peter - 10 12) Kieran - 11 13) Evilwizard - 20
Tall cage 1) Peter's wife - 2 2) Per - 8 3) Gabe Fandango, Scouserob, Hallucination, Adrius, Sylas - 12 8) Evilwizard - 16 9) Peter - 18 10) Petch, Vastariner, Trialmaster - 24 13) Kieran - 36
For the second question running, Sylas collides with Evilwizard on what had been an unique answer.
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Post by a moderator on Oct 31, 2023 16:40:23 GMT
Is anybody developing a preference for one scoring system over the other, yet? It certainly seems that the Box cage (thread default) scoring strongly penalizes wrong answers, but the Tall cage (rare answers) is extremely harsh on repeated answers, especially across multiple questions, while the penalty for being wrong then depends on the worst-performing (i.e. repeated) correct answer, and in our case is bounded between 4 and 13. Is there an additional penalty for repeated wrong answers though? The cumulative effect of multiple wrong answers can be pretty devastating. If someone had managed to give a wrong answer every time in this quiz, their Box cage score after question IV would be 56, but their Tall cage score would be 576. And once you start getting to the questions where there's more overlap of answers, the wrong answer penalty goes up quite a bit.
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Post by a moderator on Oct 31, 2023 16:31:30 GMT
IV) Give a name which is on the name-plate of one of the upstairs rooms. Eblis - 2 (Petch, Vastariner) Azazel - 2 (Evilwizard, Sylas) Erasmus – 1 (Gabe Fandango) Apollyon – 1 (Per) Tuttivillus - 1 (Kieran) Shaitan - 1 (Scouserob) Belial – 1 (Trialmaster) Asmodeus - 1 (Hallucination) Mephisto - 1 (Peter) Diabolus - 1 (Peter’s wife) Balthus - 1 (Adrius)
Mentioning the name-plates in the question was a bit of a careless move, as the book doesn't always specify that a room's name is revealed by a name-plate. Still, it is a reasonable inference to make, so I'm not going into "There's no mention of a name-plate on the Apollyon room door, so you could have had the name telepathically revealed to you by the ghost, which means it's a wrong answer!"-type speculation. I actually mentioned name-plates to avoid the sort of arguing that arose when I posed a similar question in a Rare Entries contest many years ago. Back then I'd asked for the name of a 'named' room, and somebody tried to make a case that 'kitchen' was the name of a room, and therefore the kitchen was named, so it should be an acceptable answer.
Also eligible but unmentioned were Mammon and Abbadon, the latter of which may have been avoided because of the prominence it gains thanks to the clue in the condensation.
Running totals Box cage 1) Peter's wife - 5 2) Per, Adrius - 6 4) Gabe Fandango, Vastariner, Scouserob, Hallucination, Sylas - 7 9) Kieran, Trialmaster, Peter - 8 12) Petch - 9 13) Evilwizard - 18
Tall cage 1) Peter's wife - 2 2) Per, Adrius - 4 4) Gabe Fandango, Scouserob, Hallucination, Sylas - 6 8) Vastariner, Evilwizard - 8 10) Peter - 9 11) Kieran, Trialmaster - 12 13) Petch - 24
Until Sylas' answers came in, the tall cage system put Evilwizard in joint second place with Per and Adrius. Unique answers do a lot of heavy lifting under the traditional ruleset.
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Post by a moderator on Oct 31, 2023 15:47:18 GMT
Shouldn't Evilwizard be on 5 rather than 4 points in the tall cage? In the 'tall cage' system, scores are multiplied, not added. 4 x 1 = 4
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Post by a moderator on Oct 31, 2023 15:46:01 GMT
III) Describe a way of regaining Stamina in House of Hell. Resting in the Belial room – 3 (Kieran, Scouserob, Peter) Drinking dogs' water – 3 (Petch, Trialmaster, Sylas) Eating poisoned cheese – 2 (Gabe Fandango, Peter’s wife) Bedtime snack – 2 (Vastariner, Hallucination) Resting in the Diabolus room - 1 (Per) Eat some dried fish - 1 (Evilwizard) Eating cake - 1 (Adrius)
The book does specify that eating cheese from the larder restores Stamina as well as killing your character, so it's a valid (if bizarre) answer, and Gabe and Peter's wife are unfortunate in having both seized upon this oddity.
There were a few correct answers not given: drinking brandy, and eating bread or meat from the larder.
Running totals Box cage 1) Peter's wife - 4 2) Per, Vastariner, Adrius, Sylas - 5 6) Gabe Fandango, Scouserob, Hallucination - 6 9) Petch, Kieran, Trialmaster, Peter - 7 13) Evilwizard - 16
Tall cage 1) Peter's wife - 2 2) Sylas - 3 3) Per, Vastariner, Evilwizard, Adrius - 4 7) Gabe Fandango, Scouserob, Hallucination - 6 10) Peter - 9 11) Petch, Kieran, Trialmaster - 12
Is anybody developing a preference for one scoring system over the other, yet?
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Post by a moderator on Oct 31, 2023 15:24:26 GMT
As Kieran was working from memory when he started this thread, some of the rules that have become the norm here are not part of the traditional set-up for Rare Entries contests. The most significant differences with 'our' ruleset are that scores are added rather than multiplied, and the algorithm for scoring incorrect answers has been replaced with a simpler and (usually) harsher calculation. Both of these can significantly affect scoring (the difference they made until Sylas shook things up with his entry was remarkable), and I thought it would be interesting to rank everybody according to both systems. Thus, in the box cage we have scores determined by the Fantazine forum system, while the tall cage contains scores according to conventional Rare Entries rules. I) Describe something that causes the gain of exactly 1 Fear point.Discovering that you are locked inside the Shaitan room – 2 (Per, Kieran) Discovering that you are locked inside the Balthus room – 2 (Trialmaster, Adrius) Falling into the cellar – 2 (Petch, Vastariner) Lady Margaret talks to you through her painting – 1 (Gabe Fandango) The thought of a ceremony that involves human sacrifice - 1 (Scouserob) The thought of sitting in the darkness all night - 1 (Hallucination) Curtains in the Mammon Room that open and shut seemingly by themselves - 1 (Peter) When you turn towards the mirror in the reception room and notice it casts no reflection of you – 1 (Peter’s wife) Seeing the word 'Find' being written across a piece of paper - 1 (Sylas) WRONGEnter the Shaitan room – 1 (Evilwizard) Evilwizard's answer falls foul of the old 'correlation does not equal causation' issue: the Fear gain is caused by the words you hear upon entering the room, rather than entering the room specifically. By forum rules, that scores a rather shocking 14 points, but the standard Rare Entries rules use a different formula: The median of: - the number of entrants (13) - the square root of that number, rounded up to an integer (4) - double the highest score that anyone would have on this question if all answers were deemed correct (in this instance, 4)
This gives a 'wrong answer' score of 4 for this question. Acceptable answers not given include being attacked by bats, seeing a sheet rise up in the air, becoming paranoid about the Earl's intentions, and further Poltergeist-related shenanigans in the Mammon room. II) Name a character you may encounter in or under the house.Kelnor – 3 (Gabe Fandango, Hallucination, Peter) Franklins - 2 (Petch, Kieran) Dirk – 2 (Per, Adrius) Rafferty – 2 (Scouserob, Trialmaster) Brother Isaacson – 1 (Vastariner) Orville - 1 (Evilwizard) Brother William - 1 (Peter’s wife) Shekou - 1 (Sylas) Nothing too contentious here. The only eligible answer not put forward by anyone was Mordana, though until Sylas' answers came in, it appeared that everybody had forgotten about Shekou. Running totalsBox cage1) Peter's wife, Sylas - 2 3) Scouserob, Vastariner - 3 5) Gabe Fandango, Petch, Per, Kieran, Trialmaster, Hallucination, Peter, Adrius - 4 13) Evilwizard - 15 Tall cage1) Peter's wife, Sylas - 1 3) Scouserob, Vastariner - 2 5) Gabe Fandango, Hallucination, Peter - 3 8) Petch, Per, Kieran, Trialmaster, Adrius, Evilwizard - 4
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Post by a moderator on Oct 31, 2023 13:58:41 GMT
"Twin Dilemma" is the least liked DW story of all time. It has consistently polled last since 1984, not just for the season but for the show overall. Some fans have even accused DWM (Doctor Who Magazine) of trying to obfuscate this with the 2023 60th anniversary poll by not ranking all the stories together as they have done in the past, but just by doctor (although even here it still polled last of the 6th Doctor). I really buck the trend with that one I guess. The opposite of The Ark in Space which is apparently heralded as one of the best stories ever for reasons I cannot fathom, but bored the life out of me. One thing you can't say about The Twin Dilemma is that it's boring! What issue of DWM is this poll in? Wouldn't mind giving it a read through once I finish the show. One of the members of this forum has been standing up for Dilemma in Who fandom for decades, so you're not alone. On the topic of fan conspiracies regarding the poll, there's also one suggesting that the unpopularity of certain Capaldi and Whittaker stories would have resulted in Dilemma's not polling last this time, and DWM changed the way the results were presented to hide that 'fact'. The poll results are spread across multiple issues. Each Doctor's stories have been ranked in isolation from the rest of the series (barring McGann, for obvious reasons), and the results were published two Doctors at a time over the course of issues 589-594. The top 3 stories for each Doctor (plus McGann's one-off) went through to a final vote-off, the results of which have yet to be revealed.
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Post by a moderator on Oct 31, 2023 0:00:43 GMT
Answers received from Adrius and Sylas, making 13 participants. Unlucky for some, as the saying goes...
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Post by a moderator on Oct 30, 2023 20:43:33 GMT
Legend of Zagor Stubble Sk7 St16 Lu9 Go16 (roll of 11)
Some astonishingly bad dice rolling saw me only hitting the corpse lizard once before he hit me 8 times.
Kills:0 Just checking re gold - the book says 'roll three dice and add 2' and that Stubble gets an extra 5, so when you say 'roll of 11' do you mean that the dice added up to 9, or did you forget to add the other 2?
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Post by a moderator on Oct 30, 2023 18:58:06 GMT
I always think of Battleblade Warrior as the most 'OK' book in the series. It has its flaws but nothing too bad. It has its strengths but nothing that makes it stand out. It has its decisions, but not that many opportunities to move away from the rails...
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Post by a moderator on Oct 30, 2023 17:09:37 GMT
I got so ridiculously lucky back when I started rebuilding my FF collection that for a while I was reluctant to pay more than £1 per book.
I think £6.39 for The Secrets of Salamonis might be the most I've paid for any FF book for myself. Or, if you include P&P where charged, the 25th anniversary edition of TWoFM edges it out by 3p.
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Post by a moderator on Oct 29, 2023 23:59:39 GMT
24 hours to the DEADline.
Answers received from Hallucination, Peter and Peter's wife. Two more entrants, and we'll have a thematically appropriate thirteen.
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Post by a moderator on Oct 28, 2023 23:02:48 GMT
As the clocks go back tonight, you have around 25 hours to get in results for week 43.
Week 44 Starship Traveller (dice depend on gameplay – see below) Dead of Night (4 dice)
Please state if you use a guide, if you allocate dice at character creation rather than taking them as they fall, or if you make more than one attempt at a book. Only combats which you win should be included in the list of enemies defeated.
Owing to Starship Traveller’s being winnable without any rolling of dice, there are some special rules to keep it from becoming an automatic 10+ points for everyone.
1. When the stats bonus is calculated, only stats that were used during play get counted. If a member of the crew gets into a fight, you may include their Skill and Stamina. If one of them never fights, but does make a Skill roll, just give their Skill. The ship's stats likewise count for nothing unless you get into ship-to-ship combat.
2. You must keep track of all the planets visited in the course of the book, and list them when posting your results. If you make it to section 340, you get 2 victory points (to a maximum of 10) for each planet on which your character sets foot where you did not acquire part of the information required for finding the correct black hole. You will have to deviate from the ultra-safe path listed in the solution thread in order to score anything.
3. In the unlikely event that everybody fails as a consequence of taking risks in order to qualify for points under rule 2 (or a fatal error in the maze), planets visited will similarly be used (scoring 1 point per planet, to a maximum of 5) to determine the number of bonus points scored by the player(s) who got furthest through the book.
Note that at section 223, the section numbers given are the wrong way round: a successful roll means that you should turn to 46, while a failed roll should lead to 129. This is also true of 326: rolling below or equal to your Skill should lead to 266, while exceeding it would take you to 12.
Week 42 scoring 1st: terrysalt – 19 (stats bonus 4 + victory bonus 10 + most fights won bonus 5) 2nd: hallucination - 16 (stats bonus 1 + victory bonus 10 + most fights won bonus 5) 3rd: evilwizard – 12 (stats bonus 2 + victory bonus 10) 4th= kieran – 4 (stats bonus 4) 4th= trialmaster – 4 (stats bonus 4) 6th: kalieum - 2 (stats bonus 2)
Running totals 1st: evilwizard - 577 2nd: terrysalt - 571 3rd: hallucination - 519 4th: King Gillibran - 287 5th: kieran - 184 6th: peasantscribbler - 76 7th: kalieum - 66 8th: juniorhornet - 44 9th: nathanh – 33 10th: trialmaster - 18
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Post by a moderator on Oct 26, 2023 23:00:04 GMT
Four days to go.
Answers received from Kieran, Vastariner, Evilwizard, Scouserob and Trialmaster.
There's still at least one acceptable answer yet to be submitted for each question.
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Post by a moderator on Oct 24, 2023 22:15:50 GMT
Yay!
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Post by a moderator on Oct 23, 2023 22:59:37 GMT
Answers received from Gabe Fandango, Petch and Per, thank you.
Everyone else has a week left in which to find and submit a set.
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Post by a moderator on Oct 22, 2023 1:14:36 GMT
I may as well say right away that what I have in mind involves picking numbers between 1-16 which then have various mechanical effects and modifications to the barrier fight based on the Proteus lineup, so you can tell me whether we already did that exact thing (the barrier fight appears to have only Brunskill monsters?). The barrier fight includes opponents drawn from issues 1, 4, 7, 16 & 20. You've covered issue 2 comprehensively (and hilariously) with the initial Viki encounter, and there's a parody of a bit from issue 12 in para 102. The author of issue 14 has been a running gag throughout the Yellow Snow saga, though I don't remember anything specific to that adventure being referenced here. I don't know how comprehensively you want to represent the Proteus oeuvre in this, nor how much of it you already have worked out, but I can think of a few quirks that could provide food for riffing if you're looking for ideas David Brunskill's other pseudonym, J.A. Collar (and the fact that you need to acquire a certain collar during the adventure with his name on). Elizabeth Caldwell's sharing Ian Livingstone's fondness for 'roll 1d6 and miss out on something essential if you get the wrong number' moments. M.W. Bolton's erroneous beliefs regarding how many legs a crab has. Ken Bulmer's love of arbitrary Fate/Fortune penalties.
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Post by a moderator on Oct 22, 2023 0:44:34 GMT
I think they should be single use.
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Post by a moderator on Oct 21, 2023 23:01:43 GMT
Around 24 hours to get in results for week 42.
Week 43 Legend of Zagor (6-7 dice depending on character – standard stats plus gold) Portal of Evil (4 dice)
Please state if you use a guide, if you allocate dice at character creation rather than taking them as they fall, or if you make more than one attempt at a book. Only combats which you win should be included in the list of enemies defeated.
Week 41 scoring 1st: terrysalt – 19 (stats bonus 4 + victory bonus 10 + most fights won bonus 5) 2nd: evilwizard – 12 (stats bonus 2 + victory bonus 10) 3rd= hallucination - 11 (stats bonus 1 + victory bonus 10) 3rd= kieran – 11 (stats bonus 1 + closest to victory bonus 5 + most fights won bonus 5) 5th: trialmaster – 2 (stats bonus 2)
Kudos to Kieran for attempting to discover the Livingstonian solution to Return to the Icefinger Mountains, even if it did (not entirely surprisingly) end in failure owing to lack of an essential item.
Running totals 1st: evilwizard - 565 2nd: terrysalt - 552 3rd: hallucination - 503 4th: King Gillibran - 287 5th: kieran - 180 6th: peasantscribbler - 76 7th: kalieum - 64 8th: juniorhornet - 44 9th: nathanh – 33 10th: trialmaster - 14
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Post by a moderator on Oct 21, 2023 22:16:36 GMT
I'd prefer one of: [ ] Fantazine adventures played in order [ ] Review more Puffin books like Tide or Portal [ ] Revisit Twist of Fate and wrap up VR
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Post by a moderator on Oct 21, 2023 15:17:14 GMT
Almost a year ago I wrote a post on my blog about gamebooks with only one ending. This is what I had to say about You Can be the Stainless Steel Rat: Not dissimilar to Die Ruine, going by schlendrian's description, but that bit more railroady because DR does include the possibility of character death.
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Post by a moderator on Oct 20, 2023 22:17:12 GMT
So if I'm reading this halfway right, on the Pandoroid path you can either confront Cait O'Riordan (no idea if there's a clue for this) in possession of a Molotov cocktail containing Viki Llundsbrand, who is a ghost (which no doubt required jumping through no very precise hoops), and end up with the slippers. Or you can try to use Little Gaia, then use a secret redirection gained from listening to too much of a gamebook version of "Fifty Ways to Leave Your Lover", and end up with the speaker. Meanwhile another de-petrified Pogue is a mini-boss on the Thrombocyte path (which you'd know to do based on Googling a passing reference to accordions two hundred sections earlier) and nets you the accordion. That's the gist of it. And if the Pandoroid path does contain any hint that Cait O'Riordan is the correct Pogue to confront, it's too obscure for me. We're not famous enough? They're only taking on new authors who have a 'ch' somewhere in their names? Unfavourable alignment of the stars?
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Post by a moderator on Oct 20, 2023 16:31:12 GMT
Like Kieran, I didn't bother reading the story in Knightmare gamebooks - in fact I didn't ever bother, in all the years I owned them. I've no idea if they were well-written & what they were like!
The stories in the Knightmare gamebooks I've read were pretty decent. At least some of them also contain information that could help with some of the puzzles in the gamebook, so you've potentially been making things more difficult than they need to be by skipping them.
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Post by a moderator on Oct 20, 2023 16:27:22 GMT
(I believe the thread title's intent is to exclude Junior CYOA, although I don't know why as CYOA for Younger readers like CYOA can be well-written as well as enjoyable). No, the thread title's intent is to indicate that this is about whichever gamebook was the first one you read, rather than being exclusively for discussion of Your First Adventure, the CYOA-for-toddlers series featuring anthropomorphised animals and (based on the ones I've encountered) only one choice and one ending per book. The parenthesis in the title is for disambiguation, not exclusion. If there's anyone here whose first experience of gamebooks was a YFA, that book would be just as relevant to the thread as the ones already mentioned.
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