Ambiguities in gamebooks

[tom]

I always try to play gamebooks fairly and find it annoying when ambiguities occur. Thought it would be good to have a thread where people can ask opinions on what the correct course of action is/what’s fair and not cheating etc.

Question: At what point do you restore the skill point you lose when you look at the fortress in Crown of Kings? What constitutes/at what point are you ‘Inside the Fortress?

[kieran]

I always took it as once you are through the front gate. I suppose you could argue that it means the inner keep, but I think Steve would have spelt it out in that case. It also makes the book much harder.

[tom]

Thanks.

[tom]

Another Crown of Kings question. **spoiler warning**. After using the Zed spell at the end of the book do you carry on with the same stamina/equipment before you cast the spell or assume lost stamina points have been restored (minus the 7 lost for casting the spell) and your weapon no longer broken as you have travelled back in time?

[Law]

Dec 28, 2020 1:16:50 GMT tom said:

Another Crown of Kings question. **spoiler warning**. After using the Zed spell at the end of the book do you carry on with the same stamina/equipment before you cast the spell or assume lost stamina points have been restored (minus the 7 lost for casting the spell) and your weapon no longer broken as you have travelled back in time?

Nothing would be restored I feel, as the spell is not to Rewind Time but to travel through both space and time at will. Like you've become a TARDIS.

If you cast it before Jann is able to explain its functions adequately enough you can end up travelling to an apocalyptic end-of-days! 

[kieran]

Dec 29, 2020 17:39:58 GMT Law said:

Nothing would be restored I feel, as the spell is not to Rewind Time but to travel through both space and time at will.

That interpretation is a bit odd though as Farren Whyde doesn't recognise you after you go back in time. So that means you travelled back to before the first time you met him. But then surely the Original You will then enter the tower to find Farren dead and someone has already left with the crown. Which means Original You will never be directed to go to the prison tower to meet Jan and be told what the Zed spell does and so will never go back in time and kill Farren and rescue the crown. All a bit of a head-scratcher!

[Law]

Dec 29, 2020 17:51:44 GMT kieran said:

Dec 29, 2020 17:39:58 GMT Law said:

Nothing would be restored I feel, as the spell is not to Rewind Time but to travel through both space and time at will.

That interpretation is a bit odd though as Farren Whyde doesn't recognise you after you go back in time. So that means you travelled back to before the first time you met him. But then surely the Original You will then enter the tower to find Farren dead and someone has already left with the crown. Which means Original You will never be directed to go to the prison tower to meet Jan and be told what the Zed spell does and so will never go back in time and kill Farren and rescue the crown. All a bit of a head-scratcher!

Not if you are "travelling" back along your own time-line. You jump back to just before you enter Whyde's room, thus making all the events he manipulated you into a paradox that falls into oblivion?

Perhaps getting the spell wrong, (also a bit of a head-scratcher) is what causes this misunderstood full rewind affect, as you are not able to utilise spell artefacts in book one even if you should have them.

So we must assume you directly undid all the events of the past four books.

[Law]

So it should be impossible to meet your old self whether you perform the ZED correctly or no.

[Law]

Pretty scary spell, really... For it to function properly, the caster is the centre of the Universe.

[a moderator]

In the Wizard Books reissue of Crown, every section that had the ZED spell send the reader back to a previous book specified that they'd lost all their equipment while being transported through time.

[Law]

Dec 29, 2020 23:41:19 GMT a moderator said:

In the Wizard Books reissue of Crown, every section that had the ZED spell send the reader back to a previous book specified that they'd lost all their equipment while being transported through time.

All equipment... So...

[bloodbeasthandler]

Dec 30, 2020 0:06:30 GMT Law said:

Dec 29, 2020 23:41:19 GMT a moderator said:

In the Wizard Books reissue of Crown, every section that had the ZED spell send the reader back to a previous book specified that they'd lost all their equipment while being transported through time.

All equipment... So...

Not sure about this. If you roll a 3 you end up outside the inn in Khare - '... you are in a dirty street outside a rowdy tavern. You spend a few moments getting your bearings, then enter the tavern. Turn to reference 110 in Book 2 of the Sorcery! series' 
Quite what the reactions of the locals are to finding someone wandering dazed and nude into their pub is not recorded. But no-one seems to bat an eyelid. 

[petch]

Dec 30, 2020 17:49:36 GMT bloodbeasthandler said:

Dec 30, 2020 0:06:30 GMT Law said:

All equipment... So...

Not sure about this. If you roll a 3 you end up outside the inn in Khare - '... you are in a dirty street outside a rowdy tavern. You spend a few moments getting your bearings, then enter the tavern. Turn to reference 110 in Book 2 of the Sorcery! series' 
Quite what the reactions of the locals are to finding someone wandering dazed and nude into their pub is not recorded. But no-one seems to bat an eyelid. 

'I need your clothes, your boots and your carthorse.'

[a moderator]

The Wizard edition adds, "But you have no gold to buy yourself a drink. All your possessions have been lost!" between 'tavern.' and 'Turn'.