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Post by Charles X. on Jul 19, 2021 23:10:10 GMT
As a kid (and today) I felt a kids' book where you could buy and sell slaves was out-there and risque. I'm not sure it'd get a free pass these days?!
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Mar 2, 2022 3:21:01 GMT
I hadn't played this before doing so for the Fortieth Frenzy challenge and did so off a dodgy pdf. I was surprised to see that the rules section contains nothing about being able to Test your LUCK in battle. Then if anything more surprised that this isn't commented on in this thread, or the solution thread or even on the Titannica page where the rule quirks of SoB are listed. Am I missing sommething? Also are there any other books that miss this out?
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Post by Peter on Mar 2, 2022 6:38:19 GMT
Yes there are some that miss this out. I think Space Assassin is one. I didn't realise Seas of Blood was one. It seems Andrew Chapman decided not to include this rule.
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kieran
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Post by kieran on Mar 2, 2022 9:17:53 GMT
Clash of the Princes also lacks that rule.
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Post by a moderator on Mar 2, 2022 9:57:41 GMT
Clash was also Chapman. As was The Rings of Kether, which - surprise, surprise - similarly lacks the option to use Luck in battle.
In other authors' books, Starship Traveller, Freeway Fighter and Star Strider don't permit the use of Luck in battle, either. Blood of the Zombies doesn't even have Luck in it (or playability, or likeability, but that's even more off-topic than this tangent). There may be other exceptions, but I don't have time to check every book right now.
The 'no using Luck in battle' thing doesn't apply to all SF FF books - the rule is present in Rebel Planet, Robot Commando and Sky Lord. And Luke Sharp only left it out of his first book.
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Post by nathanh on Mar 4, 2022 12:47:59 GMT
It's an odd choice to omit. It's not like the mechanic is particularly powerful, and it helps reduce the all-powerful impact of SKILL. The only positive about remove it from a writer's point of view is that it makes calculating the probability of winning a book much easier, but given how difficult Seas of Blood is, I doubt Chapman was concerned about this.
In passing, I misread a couple of rules in Seas of Blood when I had another go at it last year, and they made the book more fun: crew strength is 2d6 + 12; you recover stamina whenever you add to the log, not just when you choose to rest.
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kieran
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Post by kieran on Mar 4, 2022 13:47:15 GMT
you recover stamina whenever you add to the log, not just when you choose to rest. That's still how I play it - is that not correct?!
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Post by nathanh on Mar 4, 2022 14:56:19 GMT
It's unclear; the sentence that tells you that you recover one stamina can certainly be read that way, but the sentences around it make me believe that it's not the intention to recover stamina except when you deliberately add days to your log specifically for resting.
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Post by Peter on Mar 5, 2022 8:21:50 GMT
The book states: "For every day that you add to your log, you will be able to recover 1 point of stamina." The bit following, about being wary of spending too much time resting and adding too many days to your log, seems to be, to me, analogous to the warning about relying on luck too much and this becoming riskier (when you can't choose whether or not to use luck most of the time).
In other words, it is just there to reinforce the concept of urgency, to add another factor to your decision-making and make you more emotionally involved in the story. You add to your log as instructed, and gain stamina as a by-product of the passage of time (which is a realistic by-product - you rest while sailing the open seas between encounters).
Prior to this, in the section about your log, it says "you should keep a record of your log as instructed in various passages in the book." This also suggests that you can't choose to add extra rest days at will.
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Post by a moderator on Mar 5, 2022 17:21:28 GMT
The book states: "For every day that you add to your log, you will be able to recover 1 point of stamina." The bit following, about being wary of spending too much time resting and adding too many days to your log, seems to be, to me, analogous to the warning about relying on luck too much and this becoming riskier (when you can't choose whether or not to use luck most of the time). In other words, it is just there to reinforce the concept of urgency, to add another factor to your decision-making and make you more emotionally involved in the story. You add to your log as instructed, and gain stamina as a by-product of the passage of time (which is a realistic by-product - you rest while sailing the open seas between encounters). Prior to this, in the section about your log, it says "you should keep a record of your log as instructed in various passages in the book." This also suggests that you can't choose to add extra rest days at will. I've just checked the books that do not permit the use of Luck in battle, and all but Freeway Fighter lack the usual warning about relying on Luck. It doesn't seem unreasonable to infer that, since that warning almost exclusively appears in books where voluntary expenditure of Luck is possible, the presence of a similar warning relating to spending time resting in Seas should be taken as meaning that the reader can add additional days to the log in order to recover Stamina. Especially as the 'don't rely too heavily on Luck' warning has been removed from the rules of Seas.
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Post by terrysalt on Mar 5, 2022 22:55:49 GMT
I've always read it as every time the book tells you to add days to your log, it heals you by that many stamina. I just assumed it was to compensate for not having provisions and to reflect that you were using the travel time to recuperate.
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IoannesKantakouzenos
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Post by IoannesKantakouzenos on Jun 13, 2022 15:44:15 GMT
I've always read it as every time the book tells you to add days to your log, it heals you by that many stamina. I just assumed it was to compensate for not having provisions and to reflect that you were using the travel time to recuperate. That's how I understood that rule as well.
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Post by slloyd14 on Jul 7, 2022 15:10:04 GMT
As a kid (and today) I felt a kids' book where you could buy and sell slaves was out-there and risque. I'm not sure it'd get a free pass these days?! I was just thinking that. I mean, it is super profitable if you get lots of slaves and get lucky with the price, but it seems that slavery is still around in some form in the real world, so if it was written today, the book might just stick with the looting and plundering. Maybe replace slaves with gems or something.
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Post by slloyd14 on Jul 7, 2022 15:12:36 GMT
I liked this book.
It's nice to be a villain. It's nice to get stinking rich. It's nice to lead a band of merry pirates and have group combat. The encounters can be pretty bland, but it's more about the sandboxyness rather than the story. The bet at the beginning is just an excuse plot to loot as much as possible. The cyclops fight at the end is very Way of the Tiger-esque. Pretty epic and not reliant on die rolls.
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Post by Wizard Slayer on Feb 16, 2023 15:09:19 GMT
I really enjoyed this book, until every avenue was exhausted and it became a slog to finish because of the need for high stats across the board. It really would have been far better if there was one path that was better for a stronger captain/weaker crew and another better for a weaker captain/stronger crew. Anyway, this took me 19 attempts to finish (after finally giving myself automatic high stats on the final try), and unusually for a gamebook every single way I failed in this book was different apart from one. For posterity: 1) Killed by Pit Creature tail sweep 2) Held by skeleton until dead from thirst 3) Lost battle with Enraki priests 4) Killed by Brain Eater worm infection 5) Overrun by Shurrupak mariners 6) Defeated by Enraki priests again 7) Killed by Elverines 8) Killed by acid ball 9) Drowned in trap 10) Turned to stone by Basilisk 11) Killed in fight with Shade 12) Killed by spike door trap 13) Crew opened bags of wind 14) Not enough gold 15) Defeated by warships 16) Killed in gambling den 17) Out of time 18) Blown off course by storm I've always read it as every time the book tells you to add days to your log, it heals you by that many stamina. I just assumed it was to compensate for not having provisions and to reflect that you were using the travel time to recuperate. I think I originally interpreted it as needing to add days to add stamina, but that way makes far more sense!
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CharlesX
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Post by CharlesX on Feb 16, 2023 16:44:47 GMT
Seas Of Blood is one of those FFs where non-true-path is every bit as interesting, perhaps more so, than true path.
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CharlesX
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Post by CharlesX on Feb 18, 2023 17:32:22 GMT
I really enjoyed this book, until every avenue was exhausted and it became a slog to finish because of the need for high stats across the board. It really would have been far better if there was one path that was better for a stronger captain/weaker crew and another better for a weaker captain/stronger crew. <snip> It (Seas Of Blood) is another gamebook which would benefit from a Curse Of The Mummy style re-edit where enemies were made easier, maybe all the enemies could have 1 lower Crew Strike so you wouldn't have to have 11 Crew Strike and high other stats to stand a chance (!).
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IoannesKantakouzenos
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Post by IoannesKantakouzenos on May 4, 2023 11:13:28 GMT
"The seaport of Tak is the largest den of thieves, pirates and cutthroats the civilized world has ever seen." Always thought that description would fit Port Blacksand. How about having a book set during a war between Tak and Port Blacksand to see which city is the biggest city of thieves?
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Post by a moderator on May 4, 2023 14:53:11 GMT
Geographically speaking, Port Blacksand warring with Tak is roughly equivalent to San Francisco vs Adelaide in our world. Only with much more primitive transportation and communication, so logistically it'd be something of a nightmare.
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