kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,462
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Dec 12, 2021 14:01:08 GMT
How come you did Night before Stormslayer?
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Post by daredevil123 on Dec 12, 2021 14:11:51 GMT
For some reason they're listed that way on the solutions board.
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Post by a moderator on Dec 12, 2021 17:58:27 GMT
Not any more.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 12, 2021 21:18:18 GMT
It didn't seem right but I just assumed I misremembered the order. Guess I was right the first time. Oh well. Stormslayer - 8/14/7/14 I took a bunch of unlucky hits and died to the very first fight against the ice elemental. Stormslayer - 9/14/7/14 How did I do this as a skill 7 but not as an 8 or 9? Stormslayer - 10/14/7/14 The guide said to use the potion of giant's strength for the boulder beasts but I (correctly) figured I could take them without it. This meant I still had it available for the fight against Balthazar and won easily. That was mostly good but I hated the constant tracking of what day it is. Especially since exactly zero of the day-specific effects happened. Oh well, Now on to everyone's favourite zombie book!
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Post by CharlesX on Dec 12, 2021 21:39:06 GMT
Starting Blood with 20-32 Stamina is like bringing a frying pan to a nuclear war (or a fridge - movie references ).
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 12, 2021 22:51:31 GMT
The guide says there was a reprint that gave you 8 extra stamina. I have no such luck, my copy says 2d6+12 and so I start with 14.
Blood - 14 I used both the grenades I found early so when I came across a group of 17, I had none left. My shotgun blasted away 11 but the remaining 6 killed me. Since I had 5 stamina, I gain 2 for next time.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 12, 2021 22:54:25 GMT
Starting Blood with 20-32 Stamina is like bringing a frying pan to a nuclear war (or a fridge - movie references ). Starting with 20 stamina? Luxury!
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 13, 2021 0:32:03 GMT
Blood - 16 Trying to save a grenade saw me limping away from the rats with 1 stamina. The 12 double damage zombies then ripped me apart. All the way down to -5 stamina.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 13, 2021 1:27:25 GMT
Blood - 22 The rats got me to -2.
Blood - 25 My grenade only kills 4 of the double damage zombies so I died pretty fast. Down to -5.
Blood - 31 A group of 19 this time knocks me down to -7. I guess I have to save a grenade for this fight now.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 13, 2021 7:21:38 GMT
Blood - 37 Turns out I can't use the grenade on the group of 19 as it says "you must fight them with whatever weapon you have to hand". But I rolled well and killed them easily. Unfortunately I entered a room where there's a 25% chance of a zombie surprising and killing you which is exactly what happened to me.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 13, 2021 8:45:35 GMT
Blood - 37 - 1 reroll A zombie threw a grenade at me. My flak jacket limited the damage to 3 but since I had exactly 3 stamina...
Blood - 38 - 1 reroll A mob of 16 took me down to -1.
Blood - 40 - 1 reroll I rolled absolutely terribly against the rats. So I was weakened enough that the swarm of 19 got me down to -3.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 13, 2021 10:09:02 GMT
Blood - 44 - 1 reroll Made it to the dogs but they ripped me apart (-5 stamina)
Blood - 50 - 1 reroll Even with a reroll I couldn't avoid the 25% chance of instant death.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,462
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Dec 13, 2021 11:24:01 GMT
Fair play to you sticking by your system with this one. I think I'd be adding 20 Stamina each time at this rate!
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 13, 2021 11:51:43 GMT
Fair play to you sticking by your system with this one. I think I'd be adding 20 Stamina each time at this rate! The plus side is that some the bigger zombie mobs will probably send me a decent way negative so with luck I should be seeing some bigger stamina increases as I get to the later parts of the book. I'll see where things stand after 20 attempts. If I'm close to winning, I'll probably try and finish it off. If I'm still nowhere near the end, I might just declare it to be too broken to keep going.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 13, 2021 20:10:20 GMT
Blood - 50 - 2 rerolls I made quite a lot of progress. I had 1 stamina going up against zombie kong. I figured I could throw a grenade to help get me up to 20 damage but my rolling was so bad that I still only made it to 18. Kong hits for 6 and down I go.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 13, 2021 22:09:43 GMT
Blood - 56 - 2 rerolls I had some comically bad rolls at the start. A group of 8 took 4 rounds to kill! I still made it slightly further than last time though. Eventually a group of 28 got me down to -4. Blood - 61 - 2 rerolls I was rolling like a demon until a pair of axe wielding scientists knocked me all the down to 2 stamina. My "good" luck returned and I managed to get a mob of 27 down to a mob of 4 before they hit me from to 2 to -2. All that for just 3 extra stamina.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 13, 2021 23:12:43 GMT
I think I can win this time. I realised I was being too conservative with my grenades so if I use them on some of the fights I was trying to tough out the hard way it should be a cinch!
Blood - 64 - 2 rerolls Zombie kong hit me twice before I took him down which was rough. I got all the way to Yurr but he managed to hit me down to -1.
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Post by CharlesX on Dec 13, 2021 23:25:27 GMT
I think I can win this time. I realised I was being too conservative with my grenades so if I use them on some of the fights I was trying to tough out the hard way it should be a cinch! I don't know what your tone is, but the odds of an Avatar with stamina in the 60s beating Blood is under .15% according to Champskees algorithmn (that is, around as likely as a non-maxed-out Avatar beating Crypt). So I'm saying - I think - you were lucky to get to Zombie Yurr and then just lose. Madness.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 14, 2021 1:30:26 GMT
Blood - 66 - 2 rerolls This one hurt. Yurr was down to 1 stamina when he killed me.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 14, 2021 1:34:49 GMT
I think I can win this time. I realised I was being too conservative with my grenades so if I use them on some of the fights I was trying to tough out the hard way it should be a cinch! I don't know what your tone is, but the odds of an Avatar with stamina in the 60s beating Blood is under .15% according to Champskees algorithmn (that is, around as likely as a non-maxed-out Avatar beating Crypt). So I'm saying - I think - you were lucky to get to Zombie Yurr and then just lose. Madness. The explanation there is that Champskees' odds are based on only using grenades when explicitly allowed to in the text. I couldn't find any rule saying that these were the only times you could use them so my playthroughs get a lot more use out of them. I think I'm using 4 or 5 more grenades than he does in his guide. So my odds are a lot, lot higher than his stat box suggests.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 14, 2021 3:35:50 GMT
Blood - 67 - 2 rerolls Damn it Yurr, you could at least send me into the negatives so I get more than 1 stamina next time.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 14, 2021 4:44:54 GMT
Blood - 68 - 2 rerolls Yurr not gonna believe this. It's over. The dice gods smiled on me and decided to finally let me push the boulder to the top of the hill. Surprising no one, this is now the hardest book in the series so far, beating out Spellbreaker by 2. It is also the only book that required almost triple the maximum starting stats to complete. Hopefully Ian's bloodlust is now sated and Port of Peril will be a walk in the park!
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 14, 2021 7:19:04 GMT
Since there seems to be some dispute over the rules, here's how I'll be interpreting them. 1) You start with 10 food and a potion. It says clear as day in the rules that you do. It makes no narrative sense but that's Ian for you. 2) Yaztromo's skill bonus does not let you exceed initial values. The rules seem pretty clear on this too. You cannot exceed initial values unless instructed by a particular page. Yaztromo gives no such instruction.
Port - 7/14/7 That was quick. I killed some imps then a boulder smashed into me.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 14, 2021 11:57:17 GMT
I just reread the rules and I don't think there's any prohibition against eating provisions or drinking potions midfight. The only restriction is a rather meaningless "you may only eat one meal at a time". Okay, instead of crossing 3 provisions off and adding 12 stamina I'll just eat one meal, add 4 stamina, eat a second meal, add another 4 stamina, eat a third meal and add a final 4 stamina. Rather inconvenient but hey, rules are rules.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 14, 2021 20:56:18 GMT
Port - 8/14/7 With an extra 52 stamina thanks to mid-combat healing, I made it quite far into the book. An imperial troll finally got the best of me but not a bad effort for a skill 8 in an Ian book!
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 14, 2021 22:03:23 GMT
Port - 9/14/7 The same imperial guard troll took me down but I got closer this time.
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Post by CharlesX on Dec 14, 2021 23:15:08 GMT
Port Of Peril was ranked a miserable 5th to last in Wilf's gamebook rankings. The difficulty level and gameplay aren't particularly off, it has some memorable encounters, as well as a good ending. It's just very mediocre and very dull! Most of Livingstone's later gamebooks (not Blood) wouldn't have seemed so bad in the '80s, before gamebooks became an entire phenomenon. If I was in a mood to face Zagor, I might rather face him in Port Of Peril than spend a day playing through Legend Of Zagor.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 14, 2021 23:30:23 GMT
Port - 10/14/7 I guess I was nostalgic for life as a skill 7. I rolled a 12 on the skill check and got hit by a boulder.
Port - 11/14/7 Victory is mine. Zanbar is defeated. Yaz and Nico are saved. All hail me.
That was not very good. I definitely think Ian had been drinking a little too much port of peril when he wrote the rules. Ah well. Up next, I discover why Charlie Higson is at the bottom of so many people's FF author rankings.
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 14, 2021 23:34:39 GMT
Port Of Peril was ranked a miserable 5th to last in Wilf's gamebook rankings. The difficulty level and gameplay aren't particularly off, it has some memorable encounters, as well as a good ending. It's just very mediocre and very dull! Most of Livingstone's later gamebooks (not Blood) wouldn't have seemed so bad in the '80s, before gamebooks became an entire phenomenon. If I was in a mood to face Zagor, I might rather face him in Port Of Peril than spend a day playing through Legend Of Zagor. Unless I somehow managed to miss him, Zagor isn't in this one! As for Zanbar Bone, I'd play City of Thieves over Port of Peril every time. But yeah, it was a fairly dull and unengaging book. 5th worst might be a bit harsh but I've never tried to rank all the books (I honestly don't think I'd be able to if I tried).
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Post by terrysalt on Dec 15, 2021 2:51:19 GMT
Gates - 7/14/7 Um, I think this book is broken. The guide says to use a death stone to kill the army and final boss but that was on the body that was killed by the obsidian giants. So my new body has no such thing which means I have to kill the 10/5 demon horde with a skill 2 adventurer. So let's just say that instead of drinking the weakwater, I voluntarily fail against the golems and keep my skill 7. Well, when you die against the horde, you just return to your original body. So you can try as many times as it takes until the dice work out for you. But then it asks if you have magic boots and you die if you don't. My old body had like 3 pairs of them, my new body not so much. And this time the infinite loop is not too helpful. SO, I am going to use my super ghostly powers to telekinetically transfer the swift silver boots to the corpse I will inhabit. Now it's just a matter of infinitely retrying the demon horde and Ulrakaah fights until the miniscule chance of success eventually happens (you'll forgive me for not playing this out ). Or, since I'm already cheating, I could just telekinetically transfer the death stone as well. That works too. I'm counting that as a win but for the curious, I needed 11/14/7 to win without telekinesis on the death stone or abusing the infinite loop. So the new books are not off to a great start. Let's see if Ian can redeem himself with Assassins of Allansia.
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