29) Midnight Rogue Solution

[champskees]

Midnight Rogue is pretty good; in fact it is almost one of my top books. What wrecks it for me is the final few areas where there are a couple of mandatory Sk 10 fights. I recommend Skill 10+ for a fairly easy run. I also recommend taking the Potion of Fortune. I note that due to the author not always being explicit regarding the nature of backpack items that I have decided what items would be counted as a backpack item if there is no indication of same. I assume you start with two backpack items (Potion & Food).

- Take following skills: Spot Hidden, Sneak, Pick Pocket.
- Go to the Noose.
- Try to find a beggar.
- Thank him & give him a gold piece (-1 Gold).
- Take Rope & Grapnel (+Climb ability, +1 Backpack item, +1 Luck).
- Go see Madame Star.
- You have 2 Gold Pieces (-2 Gold).
- Add clue: Para 289 (Noose).
- Leave the Noose & look elsewhere.
- Go to the Merchant’s Guild.
- Ignore it and carry on to the Merchant’s Guild.
- Look for another way in.
- Go down the alley on your left.
- Open the door.
- Stay where you are. You do not have the Hide skill.
- Stand still and hope for the best.
- Tell him that you are a friend.
- Take Lock Picks (+Pick Lock ability, +1 Luck).
- Check the passage for traps. You have the Spot Hidden ability.
- Try the left hand door.
- You have the Pick Lock ability.
- Search the desk.
- Take ‘L’ Key & 10 Gold.
- Add clue: Para 90 (Guild).
- Go and search for clues in Brass’ house.
- You do not have the Hide ability.
- Try to bribe the patrol.
- Offer them 6 Gold. Roll D6 (Auto success).
- Try the house on the left.
- You have the Pick Lock ability. Pick the lock.
- Take Black Hooded Cloak (+Hide ability).
- Examine the tray.
- Leave and look at the house across the street.
- You have the Pick Lock ability. Open the front door.
- Go up the stairs.
- Try the door on the left.
- You have the Pick Lock skill.
- Search the rest of the room.
- Take Bottle of Brandy (3 drinks, each restore 2 Stamina. +1 Backpack item).
- Investigate the safe.
- You have a key marked ‘L’.
- You have the Pick Lock ability.
- Take 20 Gold.
- Add clue: Para 335 (House).
- Leave the room via the window.
- Try to find the Eye of the Basilisk.
- Go to Barrow Hill.
- Use clues: House (3), Guild (9), Noose (2). Go to Para 392.
- By the house.
- Inspect the statue.
- Jump across.
- Test Skill. Fail = Fight Sk 6 St 6 Piranha (-1 to your Attack Strength for this combat).
- Point it at the standing stone near the barrow.
- You have the Spot Hidden ability.
- You do not have a silver whistle.
- Fight Sk 5 St 12 Bats (-2 to your Attack Strength for this combat).
- Look for a way around the slab.
- Stay in the alcove (+1 Luck).
- Fight Sk 6 St 5 Skeleton.
- Fight Sk 5 St 4 Skeleton.
- Fight Sk 8 St 6 Skeleton Lord (enemy +1 to Attack Strength for 1 round when enemy wounds you).
- Take Magic Sword (+1 to Attack Strength for 1 round when you hit enemy). Equip it.
- Take Bronze Helmet (+1 Skill) & Polished Stone Axe (+1 Backpack item).
- You do not have the Secret Signs ability.
- You have the Spot Hidden ability.
- You have the Sneak ability.
- Try to take the key. You have the Pick Pocket ability.
- Go right.
- Go down the hole. You have the Climb ability.
- Advance into the room.
- You have the Sneak ability.
- You have the Pick Lock ability.
- Ignore the bottle & continue down the passage.
- Try to disrupt your shadow.
- You have the Spot Hidden ability (+1 Luck).
- You do not have the Secret Signs ability.
- Test Skill. Fail = -1 Skill, -1 Luck, 2 Damage.
- Fight the animated corpse.
- Fight Sk 5 St 6 Animated Corpse.
- You have a magic weapon.
- Fight Sk 10 St 10 Possessor Spirit (lose a point of Luck when hit in addition to 2 Damage).
- Take 5 Gold & Throwing Knife.
- Drink the potion (restore Skill to Initial value).
- Ignore him and continue down the passage.
- You have the Sneak ability.
- Ignore it and carry on down the passage.
- Test Skill. Fail = 1 Damage & Deal 0 Damage in first round of combat.
- Fight Sk 7 St 8 Giant Spider. If hit, 2D6 Stamina Test. Succeed = -1 Skill. Fail = Death.
- You have the Climb ability.
- Investigate the bodies.
- Test Skill. You have the Spot Hidden ability (-2 to roll). Fail = Cut your foot free.
- Take 2 Food.
- You have the Spot Hidden ability.
- You have the Pick Pocket ability.
- You do not have a map.
- Equip the Stone Axe.
- Test Luck. Fail = Test Luck until successful. 0 Luck = Death.
- Fight Sk 10 St 13 Crystal Warrior.
- You have the Pick Lock ability (4 Damage).
- You have the Spot Hidden ability.
- Try to lift off the disc without setting off the trap. You have the Pick Pocket ability.
- Take Obsidian Disc (+1 Backpack item).
- Try to block the light.
- Use an obsidian disc.
- Test Skill. Fail = Test Luck. Succeed = 4 Damage. Fail = Death. Repeat process until successful at Skill test.
- You have passed your test, and have received full membership of the Thieves Guild in Port Blacksand!

[electricwater]

Midnight Rogue was one of my favourites when it came out, but having just read it again, I feel this book was such a missed opportunity.
There should have been a lot more of the unique element - the stealthy exploration of a benighted Blacksand - and a lot less of the generic dungeon-crawl.
The atmosphere in the first section of the book is great, and is perfectly complemented by John Sibbick’s artwork (which pays homage to Iain McCaig’s City of Thieves work).
I just wish there was more to it than three locations.

[lordomnibok]

Oct 15, 2017 19:51:58 GMT electricwater said:

Midnight Rogue was one of my favourites when it came out, but having just read it again, I feel this book was such a missed opportunity.
There should have been a lot more of the unique element - the stealthy exploration of a benighted Blacksand - and a lot less of the generic dungeon-crawl.
The atmosphere in the first section of the book is great, and is perfectly complemented by John Sibbick’s artwork (which pays homage to Iain McCaig’s City of Thieves work).
I just wish there was more to it than three locations.

Yes, this is obviously subjective, but I also found the beginning fantastic and I wanted more of the book to be like that. The ending did not impress me but the beginning was very, very memorable.

[Error there]

Hello, how you can pay with gold when there is no information from beginning, how many gold coins you start with?
It isn't in Rules neither in story.
Only notion is in Background of Story that you have "few coins". Im confused how can I start and play fairly, when I dont know exactly how much money I have and can spend. Please, can somebody help?

[Charles X]

Sept 28, 2021 6:46:56 GMT Error there said:

Hello, how you can pay with gold when there is no information from beginning, how many gold coins you start with?
It isn't in Rules neither in story.
Only notion is in Background of Story that you have "few coins". Im confused how can I start and play fairly, when I dont know exactly how much money I have and can spend. Please, can somebody help?

Where it doesn't say, assume you don't have it. Few coins would imply nothing valuable, and a gold piece sounds very valuable. You will only even have the chance to spend coins once in this adventure, and by that point you will have more than enough.

[Error there]

Sept 28, 2021 7:12:13 GMT Charles X said:

Sept 28, 2021 6:46:56 GMT Error there said:

Hello, how you can pay with gold when there is no information from beginning, how many gold coins you start with?
It isn't in Rules neither in story.
Only notion is in Background of Story that you have "few coins". Im confused how can I start and play fairly, when I dont know exactly how much money I have and can spend. Please, can somebody help?

Where it doesn't say, assume you don't have it. Few coins would imply nothing valuable, and a gold piece sounds very valuable. You will only even have the chance to spend coins once in this adventure, and by that point you will have more than enough.

Error there Ok, I got your point: "Where it doesn't say, assume you don't have it." 
But in champskees's solution (3rd and 6th step), he gives gold to beggar and even to Madam Star (3 golds) How you can know, you got that 3 gold coins? You see me?
First time, you take some gold (10) is much more later I feel like, if I'm going to use that route then It's some kind of cheating... Hate these situations   LOL

[Charles X]

Sept 28, 2021 9:20:32 GMT Error there said:

Sept 28, 2021 7:12:13 GMT Charles X said:

Where it doesn't say, assume you don't have it. Few coins would imply nothing valuable, and a gold piece sounds very valuable. You will only even have the chance to spend coins once in this adventure, and by that point you will have more than enough.

Error there Ok, I got your point: "Where it doesn't say, assume you don't have it." 
But in champskees's solution (3rd and 6th step), he gives gold to beggar and even to Madam Star (3 golds) How you can know, you got that 3 gold coins? You see me?
First time, you take some gold (10) is much more later I feel like, if I'm going to use that route then It's some kind of cheating... Hate these situations   LOL

I don't have a copy of Midnight Rogue so I can't check again, however, Titannica lists 5 gold pieces as amongst your starting possessions. Suggest you check again  .
   You cannot acquire any more gold before those 2 points so it'd be very strange if the book offered you the chance to pay when you had no money, and no, this isn't one of the several FF books which has those sorts of errors.

[greenspine]

The list of starting equipment on pp13-14 includes '5 gold pieces'. Between the tinder-box and the Provisions.

[Error there]

Sept 28, 2021 11:30:14 GMT greenspine said:

The list of starting equipment on pp13-14 includes '5 gold pieces'. Between the tinder-box and the Provisions.

Guy, you are right, I check the original and its really there, 5 coins. Unfortunately, in Perseus Czech translation edition that part is Missing. So thank you guys one more time, now everythings make sense!

[thealmightymudworm]

Equip the Stone Axe

Is there a prompt – either in the paragraphs making up this solution or elsewhere in the book – that you should change your weapon to the axe here?
Or is it just something that you have to learn from playing it through? Para 169 makes it sound like if you start using a sword you can't switch to the axe and have to use your sword pommel, which is pretty disastrous.
When fighting the Possessor Spirit not long before you need to be using a magic sword.

[terrysalt]

Oct 17, 2022 4:06:34 GMT thealmightymudworm said:

Equip the Stone Axe

Is there a prompt – either in the paragraphs making up this solution or elsewhere in the book – that you should change your weapon to the axe here?
Or is it just something that you have to learn from playing it through? Para 169 makes it sound like if you start using a sword you can't switch to the axe and have to use your sword pommel, which is pretty disastrous.
When fighting the Possessor Spirit not long before you need to be using a magic sword.

I don't believe there's any trigger, just knowledge from previous attempts. "Last time I got killed by that damn crystal warrior. This time I'm equipping a stone axe right before I turn to 169." It's a genre built on trial and error so I can't really fault the reliance on prior knowledge in this case. Though it would definitely be a frustrating way to end a run.

[kieran]

Oct 17, 2022 4:06:34 GMT thealmightymudworm said:

Equip the Stone Axe

Is there a prompt – either in the paragraphs making up this solution or elsewhere in the book – that you should change your weapon to the axe here?
Or is it just something that you have to learn from playing it through? Para 169 makes it sound like if you start using a sword you can't switch to the axe and have to use your sword pommel, which is pretty disastrous.
When fighting the Possessor Spirit not long before you need to be using a magic sword.

There's a similar issue if you're fighting the wood golem - if you are using a torch as your weapon, it's more effective, but there's zero indication you can use the torch as a weapon prior to this.

[thealmightymudworm]

Oct 17, 2022 7:18:29 GMT terrysalt said:

Oct 17, 2022 4:06:34 GMT thealmightymudworm said:

Is there a prompt – either in the paragraphs making up this solution or elsewhere in the book – that you should change your weapon to the axe here?
Or is it just something that you have to learn from playing it through? Para 169 makes it sound like if you start using a sword you can't switch to the axe and have to use your sword pommel, which is pretty disastrous.
When fighting the Possessor Spirit not long before you need to be using a magic sword.

I don't believe there's any trigger, just knowledge from previous attempts. "Last time I got killed by that damn crystal warrior. This time I'm equipping a stone axe right before I turn to 169." It's a genre built on trial and error so I can't really fault the reliance on prior knowledge in this case. Though it would definitely be a frustrating way to end a run.

I think that is a fault though. Whenever someone plays through a gamebook they have their character/avatar making choices. Sometimes those are decisions for which you can work out the best option using perception and intelligence; more often there's nothing to go on (left vs right) or competing reasons. Of course your character will be increasingly likely to pick the right options the more playthroughs you make. But they should always be decisions that your character might have made anyway.

It's bad enough if you have to pick an option which defies reason ("Slather myself in mustard and run into the dragon's mouth screaming 'juicy juicy juicy!' ? Of course! Turn to 28") but just having to spontaneously do something when it's not even suggested is a shocker.

There are plenty of ways it could have been handled better, e.g. giving you time to perform 1 action before combat, letting you use a successful attack round to swap weapon as an alternative to inflicting damage, allowing you the option of temporarily escaping to an alcove for a break in the fighting...etc

I think I might write a grumpy post about Midnight Rogue on its main thread at some point. There are several things which grate a little in it.

[terrysalt]

Oct 18, 2022 4:06:26 GMT thealmightymudworm said:

Oct 17, 2022 7:18:29 GMT terrysalt said:

I don't believe there's any trigger, just knowledge from previous attempts. "Last time I got killed by that damn crystal warrior. This time I'm equipping a stone axe right before I turn to 169." It's a genre built on trial and error so I can't really fault the reliance on prior knowledge in this case. Though it would definitely be a frustrating way to end a run.

I think that is a fault though. Whenever someone plays through a gamebook they have their character/avatar making choices. Sometimes those are decisions for which you can work out the best option using perception and intelligence; more often there's nothing to go on (left vs right) or competing reasons. Of course your character will be increasingly likely to pick the right options the more playthroughs you make. But they should always be decisions that your character might have made anyway.

It's bad enough if you have to pick an option which defies reason ("Slather myself in mustard and run into the dragon's mouth screaming 'juicy juicy juicy!' ? Of course! Turn to 28") but just having to spontaneously do something when it's not even suggested is a shocker.

There are plenty of ways it could have been handled better, e.g. giving you time to perform 1 action before combat, letting you use a successful attack round to swap weapon as an alternative to inflicting damage, allowing you the option of temporarily escaping to an alcove for a break in the fighting...etc

I think I might write a grumpy post about Midnight Rogue on its main thread at some point. There are several things which grate a little in it.

I think it would have been better if it said "Only a blunt weapon will harm the crystal warrior. If you have a stone axe, you can use it to conduct the fight as normal. If you don't, you have no choice but to use the hilt of your sword and must reduce your attack strength by 2 for this fight." but the roguelike nature of gamebooks means I'll forgive quite a lot as learning from your repeated deaths is a feature not a bug (which is why I get frustrated at the books where the only lesson to be learned from dying is that you should roll better numbers next time).

[thealmightymudworm]

Oct 18, 2022 6:02:56 GMT terrysalt said:

I think it would have been better if it said "Only a blunt weapon will harm the crystal warrior. If you have a stone axe, you can use it to conduct the fight as normal. If you don't, you have no choice but to use the hilt of your sword and must reduce your attack strength by 2 for this fight."

Yep, that would be another good variation. Anything where you get an opportunity to choose after it's obvious, or an opportunity & hint that it might be worth doing before it's obvious.

but the roguelike nature of gamebooks means I'll forgive quite a lot as learning from your repeated deaths is a feature not a bug (which is why I get frustrated at the books where the only lesson to be learned from dying is that you should roll better numbers next time).

I think there's an important distinction though in terms of narrative and suspension of disbelief between nudging your character to make all the best choices out of a large number of reasonable ones, and having them do something totally unmotivated spontaneously. (And it's hard to forgive when it's really easy to avoid as we've just demonstrated.)

As a comparison: say on the third viewing of a film you notice that whilst a character is giving a long speech her husband, who is standing in the background, isn't wearing his wedding ring. You would have been very unlikely to notice on the first viewing as you were concentrating on the speech, and probably you wouldn't have marked it much if you hadn't seen the reveal of the character having an affair later in the film.

Alternatively, on your third viewing you notice that one of the extras in the far background is actually the director who is wearing a big grin and a T-shirt with text that reads "Dave is bonking Jenny but Julia doesn't know yet."

In both cases you're picking up on things which foreshadow events that haven't happened yet in the film. You are experiencing the film as someone who knows what is going to happen and so can't truly be experiencing the scene as something that's happening now. But still, one of these is a delicate touch and the other is an excruciating, jarring crime against cinema.

When I'm switching to the stone axe I can feel my character in the book wondering why the hell he's doing that. Like Kryten in Red Dwarf: Back to Reality (from about 22:40).




Strongly agree on how infuriating gamebooks are when you know the best route(s) and yet still keep bashing into a wall of dice. My opinion is that a gamebook played with a walkthrough should have an overall chance of winning of 50%+ and ideally even a low-statted character should have a half-decent chance.

[Charles X]

Oct 20, 2022 14:06:48 GMT thealmightymudworm said:

Strongly agree on how infuriating gamebooks are when you know the best route(s) and yet still keep bashing into a wall of dice. My opinion is that a gamebook played with a walkthrough should have an overall chance of winning of 50%+ and ideally even a low-statted character should have a half-decent chance.

There's a long conversation\thread to be had about what exactly is the right % chance of victory that is acceptable, with the vocal minority who support Livingstone being perhaps under-represented here and\or over-represented elsewhere. I'm puzzled just where Livingstone got the idea his readers cheat all the time - as an experienced boardgame designer and RPG player you might think he'd know that isn't the way those games are played.

   Personally I think 50% is a pretty arbritrary number - if gamebooks are to be about escapism and magic - but I agree it's unfair in cases such as Seas Of Blood or maybe Island Of The Lizard King where a really good gamebook is just far less playable because the majority of stats rolled will have little, negligible or no chance. Call me a hypocrite on the basis of my last sentence if you like, but I also think the do-or-die rolls are often too strict - the barrage of prosaic 50%(!) chance of survival rolls in Livingstone books, combined with no second chance at all if you fail, and the overall difficulty level of an entire gamebook, can be awful. I think the 1 in 6 chance of getting an essential item in Masks Of Mayhem, which is combined with a 2 in 3 roll to survive, sums up FFs problem with excessive difficulty. I don't know where these FF writers got the notion the majority of young people cheat, but I don't see any basis in fact. I thiink the writer's reasoning was "This FF has some cool monsters and cool do-or-die rolls. Oh, I wonder what the difficulty is like? Sky-high even if you roll maximum stats? Doesn't matter, I bet those dumb, silly young people cheat like crazy anyway. Probably a good thing."

[terrysalt]

Oct 20, 2022 14:06:48 GMT thealmightymudworm said:

I think there's an important distinction though in terms of narrative and suspension of disbelief between nudging your character to make all the best choices out of a large number of reasonable ones, and having them do something totally unmotivated spontaneously. (And it's hard to forgive when it's really easy to avoid as we've just demonstrated.)

As a comparison: say on the third viewing of a film you notice that whilst a character is giving a long speech her husband, who is standing in the background, isn't wearing his wedding ring. You would have been very unlikely to notice on the first viewing as you were concentrating on the speech, and probably you wouldn't have marked it much if you hadn't seen the reveal of the character having an affair later in the film.

Alternatively, on your third viewing you notice that one of the extras in the far background is actually the director who is wearing a big grin and a T-shirt with text that reads "Dave is bonking Jenny but Julia doesn't know yet."

In both cases you're picking up on things which foreshadow events that haven't happened yet in the film. You are experiencing the film as someone who knows what is going to happen and so can't truly be experiencing the scene as something that's happening now. But still, one of these is a delicate touch and the other is an excruciating, jarring crime against cinema.

When I'm switching to the stone axe I can feel my character in the book wondering why the hell he's doing that. Like Kryten in Red Dwarf: Back to Reality (from about 22:40).

Strongly agree on how infuriating gamebooks are when you know the best route(s) and yet still keep bashing into a wall of dice. My opinion is that a gamebook played with a walkthrough should have an overall chance of winning of 50%+ and ideally even a low-statted character should have a half-decent chance.

I agree with you that it's handled really badly, I think I just have a higher tolerance for this kind of thing. I mean, I think the "Dave is bonking Jenny" shirt would be absolutely hilarious. That'd make me enjoy the movie even more.

[greenspine]

Oct 20, 2022 14:06:48 GMT thealmightymudworm said:

but the roguelike nature of gamebooks means I'll forgive quite a lot as learning from your repeated deaths is a feature not a bug (which is why I get frustrated at the books where the only lesson to be learned from dying is that you should roll better numbers next time).

I think there's an important distinction though in terms of narrative and suspension of disbelief between nudging your character to make all the best choices out of a large number of reasonable ones, and having them do something totally unmotivated spontaneously. (And it's hard to forgive when it's really easy to avoid as we've just demonstrated.)

The mini-adventure in Fighting Fantazine 16 is horrendous in this regard. My best theory as to what happened is as follows:

Review of Crypt of the Sorcerer - "It is shocking that the book forces you to choose between murdering a harmless old man and being unable to avoid a brutally difficult fight."
Author of FFZ 16's mini-adventure - "Hold my beer."

[thealmightymudworm]

Oct 20, 2022 17:23:05 GMT Charles X said:

Oct 20, 2022 14:06:48 GMT thealmightymudworm said:

Strongly agree on how infuriating gamebooks are when you know the best route(s) and yet still keep bashing into a wall of dice. My opinion is that a gamebook played with a walkthrough should have an overall chance of winning of 50%+ and ideally even a low-statted character should have a half-decent chance.

There's a long conversation\thread to be had about what exactly is the right % chance of victory that is acceptable, with the vocal minority who support Livingstone being perhaps under-represented here and\or over-represented elsewhere. I'm puzzled just where Livingstone got the idea his readers cheat all the time - as an experienced boardgame designer and RPG player you might think he'd know that isn't the way those games are played.

   Personally I think 50% is a pretty arbritrary number - if gamebooks are to be about escapism and magic - but I agree it's unfair in cases such as Seas Of Blood or maybe Island Of The Lizard King where a really good gamebook is just far less playable because the majority of stats rolled will have little, negligible or no chance. Call me a hypocrite on the basis of my last sentence if you like, but I also think the do-or-die rolls are often too strict - the barrage of prosaic 50%(!) chance of survival rolls in Livingstone books, combined with no second chance at all if you fail, and the overall difficulty level of an entire gamebook, can be awful. I think the 1 in 6 chance of getting an essential item in Masks Of Mayhem, which is combined with a 2 in 3 roll to survive, sums up FFs problem with excessive difficulty. I don't know where these FF writers got the notion the majority of young people cheat, but I don't see any basis in fact. I thiink the writer's reasoning was "This FF has some cool monsters and cool do-or-die rolls. Oh, I wonder what the difficulty is like? Sky-high even if you roll maximum stats? Doesn't matter, I bet those dumb, silly young people cheat like crazy anyway. Probably a good thing."

I'm conscious that this discussion is spiralling away from Midnight Rogue so if this is to continue much longer it should probably be in a different thread (this one for example).

Anyway, no, not arbitrary, except in the sense that if any number was treated as a sharp dividing line it would be misguided. (I think I may have suggested 40% as the minimum previously. It's the same ballpark.)

That rule of thumb stems from how I see the role of dice in gamebooks. In short: the risk of being killed by dice adds a bit of excitement, but actually being killed by dice is quite boring. (The stats and dice add a tactical dimension as well of course: when to eat provisions, whether to buy a potion, when to use LUCK in battle... but this needn't relate closely to what overall probability is best.) So I always think that a good gamebook is one in which if you die you're thinking either "What decisions could I have made better?" or "I've been a bit unlucky". If you've got the book worked out you should have the feeling that you have a good shot at winning your next playthrough.

Other people don't have to agree with that principle of course, but I don't understand what the advantage is supposed to be in making a book 'dice-hard'. So that the reader experiences the atmosphere better (gets to 'feel' the book, we might say) through relentless cube-tossing? That seems to be the opposite of escapism, since you mention it.

Oct 20, 2022 21:00:37 GMT greenspine said:

Oct 20, 2022 14:06:48 GMT thealmightymudworm said:

I think there's an important distinction though in terms of narrative and suspension of disbelief between nudging your character to make all the best choices out of a large number of reasonable ones, and having them do something totally unmotivated spontaneously. (And it's hard to forgive when it's really easy to avoid as we've just demonstrated.)

The mini-adventure in Fighting Fantazine 16 is horrendous in this regard. My best theory as to what happened is as follows:

Review of Crypt of the Sorcerer - "It is shocking that the book forces you to choose between murdering a harmless old man and being unable to avoid a brutally difficult fight."
Author of FFZ 16's mini-adventure - "Hold my beer."