What changes would you make to the Sorcery! series?

[misomiso]

It's such an iconic series, and such a fan favourite, but what if any changes would you make to the Sorcery! Series?  Were there any pet peeves that you had? 

My three would be: -

1) Make the Shamuntati hills a bit longer; I like that it's relatively easy to complete but just bit more length would have been great. 

2) Change the Seven Serpents.  I like how Book 1 is easy, Book 2 was a 'key hunt', but Seven Serpents always felt a bit off for me.  I would have liked maybe: 

    a) Greater difficulty and structure, along the lines of House of Hell or Creature of Havoc 

    b) Perhaps doing something that Inkle did and have some Temporal flashback / exploration aspect. 

3) Different ending.

    a) Book 4 could be an even 1000 pages to lengthen it a bit.  Steve could have made the ascent a lot more nasty as well flavour wise!

    b) I really HATED the 'twist' ending!  I think it would have been so much better with a big epic fight a la Citadel of Chaos. 

Anyway these are my pet peeves!  What are yours...?

[CharlesX]

It's a very specific peeve, but I dislike his use of the ZIP spell!

SPOILER: Click to show

You can only use it successfully a single time in the adventure, and when you use it, it kills you!

Like his House of Hell and his Creature of Havoc, I'm pretty sure \ I know this was the sort of thing Steve was going for, but for me it's not entirely to my taste.
   I think the series doesn't quite feel epic enough, because as you essentially pointed out in another thread, without the many fail magic entries Sorcery! isn't so large. Although I heard the famous Sorcery! app expands on a few things.
   That might be what Steve might be thinking with his musings about doing another Sorcery! book, although he will have a hell of a job getting it to even approach the quality of the classic series.
   The warrior side of Sorcery! feels more than a touch tacked on, perhaps if there were specific parts of Sorcery! aimed at warriors such as duels or sub-quests.
   As some have commented, it's weird when the wraith attacks the sorceror and he\she cannot use spells, but I get Steve did that for gameplay reasons, and it's only once in Sorcery!, so for me that isn't a big thing.
   

[scouserob]

3 books in and loving it.
Perhaps take out the whirlwind and storm from day 2 of The Seven Serpents and give the space to extra defence stages of the Moon and Time serpent battles.
(The Time Serpent toying with you, of course.)
Those two encounters seemed a bit brief.

[vastariner]

I can repeat what I said elsewhere - magic needs a major tidying-up as too many spells are, functionally, duplicates, or there are duplicates when there is no need. E.g. why would you waste 4 St on a spell like DUM when you could get the same (or better) results with DIM? What's the real difference between WAL and FOF? Is there ever a situation where you would be forced to use HOT rather than ZAP or vice-versa?

Some are massively overpowered. RES? That ought to be 10 Stamina cost minimum and ought to leave the resurrected with 1 Stamina. Instead it's almost a free gift with cereal packets. Why can't you pick up sand or pebbles from anywhere as spell items? Why can't you use HOW in things like the Courga ritual where it would be most useful?

Wizards ought to have a maximum skill of 6 and there be more reliance on spells to win/avoid combat or tricky situations. So e.g. when faced with the Deathwraith be able to use the RES spell, so a low Sk would not matter. And I would have some sort of encumbrance limit because with all the spell items you would not be able to move. I'd also like an explanation as to why the Analander does not leave home with at least some spell items...

Paradoxically there is not enough world-building. How does Kharé work if nobody can leave it to the east? I assume traders come in overland and leave via the Jabaji southwards, but why can the Analander not do that?

To a large extent though this is picking holes with decades of post-Sorcery! experience, I did not pick up much of this at the time, the neophilia of it all took over.

[misomiso]

charles X
I don't mind the warrior part being tacked on as I think it made the book accessable to a lot more people.
The App is very good. I loved 1 and 2, hated 3, and didn't finish 4, but I would recommend it to everybody. It's one of my favourite games of all time.
I originally thought a Sorcery! 5 would break the spell of the original, however if it was all based on magic, more refined, and very large it could be amazing.
scouserob
In general I think that 'seven' serpents is too much; i get that you need seven for the title and theme, but trying to cram seven into a small book makes each fight not feel as epic.

[misomiso]

@varstariner

I never really thought about it but you're right about the spells.

For Sorcery! 5 I definately think they could refine the formula a bit, but I think it's good to give the OPTION of playing with a warrior. Just to give the series more wide appeal.

[petch]

I always found the sudden difficulty spike between books 1 and 2 kinda jarring. Hills is probably Jackson's most forgiving gamebook overall, whereas for Khare he reverts to type with its prescriptive 'one true path' solution. Don't get me wrong, I think Jackson excels at that kind of puzzlebook design, but it made the series feel sort of inconsistent for me.

[scouserob]

Yeah, a huge jump in difficulty from book 1 to 2.
(Then 3 eases back off a bit.)

I don’t mind it though.
It reminds me of The Lord of the Rings, a little.

Begin with a stroll through wild but relatively gentle towns and the surrounding countryside, camping and staying over at inns.

Followed by Moria/Kharé, which is filled with a whole new level of danger.
All you want to do is get out of it at the other side.

Then navigating the lonely desolation of the Emyn Muil and the Dead Marshes, trying to avoid being grassed up, or murdered, by winged Nazgul/Serpents.

And that is as far as I have got.
Mordor next, I guess.

I wouldn’t change much in The Shamutanti Hills or Kharé.
Any nitpicks I have with either are very, very, tiny.

I would very much make a change to clarify what happens if you fail your skill roll to jump out of the pit during the epic (my favourite of the 7) encounter with the Earth Serpent.

That one irks.
The way it reads to me is that you get no penalty and just have to roll repeatedly until you climb out.
Which is rather pointless.
Much better to have the little snake bite your fingers each time you try.

[misomiso]

I don't mind book 2 changing to the 'key hunt' structure, but I felt it could have been made a bit easier.

For example Deathtrap Dungeon isn't actually that hard with the key hunt aspect compared to Khare; Steve could have gone for that level of difficulty and then upped it again for Book 3.

[bloodbeasthandler]

Apr 20, 2022 16:04:30 GMT misomiso said:

1) Make the Shamuntati hills a bit longer; I like that it's relatively easy to complete but just bit more length would have been great. 

This is the one I agree with you most on. 
A bit more length is something always to be welcomed. (Said the actress to the bishop). 

But I wonder if the reason for the relative shortness of this book is due to something more practical and nothing directly to do with Steve J - ie that it came in a box with the Sorcery! Spell Book... 



Is it something as mundane as 'space taken up on a shelf' or simple maximum wordcount across both books?  

[Wilf]

The Shamutanti Hills:

* There should be a couple more clues as to the deadly nature of the black lotus flowers.
* The encounter with Gaza Moon should be both optional and escapable.
* It is possible to blunder into the Headhunters' trap without passing the head on the post. I would fix that.
* HOT should damage the Manticore on the spot.

Khare - Cityport Of Traps:

I'd pretty much leave this one alone, actually.

The Seven Serpents:

* The Face In The Tree should be an optional, not mandatory, encounter.
* Shadrack tells you the Moon Serpent's weakness and gives you the means to make fire (after all, that cave of his would be mighty cold if he didn't have something).
* Whenever you're told a Serpent's weakness, there should be a secret reference to turn to when you encounter it.
* It should be possible to release the Sun Serpent. Otherwise, what's the point of it being captured?
* The encounter with the Air Serpent should be optional, not mandatory.
* Lake Ilklala and the Vischlami Swamp should take longer to cross and have more encounters. It feels like the author ran out of time after writing the Baklands and Forest Of Snatta sequences.
* The Ferryman takes Fenestra's silver whistle from you, so you don't have it when you need to call Peewit Croo in the next book.
* It should be easier for a warrior to pick up the Hiz Fiz Danno Do parchment.
* The encounter with the Serpent Of Time should be both optional and escapable.

The Crown Of Kings:

* There should be a way for a warrior to cross the chasm without meeting Colletus. (It should not be easy, though!)
* There should be a way for a recognisable Analander warrior to escape Ridd The Gnome without a blessed spear. (It should not be easy, though!)
* It should be possible to reach Naggamanteh via Throg's larder.
* There should be some explanation as to whether the Archmage is really the Archmage.
* There should be a clearer explanation as to whether the Archmage is actually a Netherworld Demon.

[misomiso]

Wilf

These are all really well thought out changes!

[bloodbeasthandler]

I would maybe look to tighten up the logic of having to pass through Khare a bit more.
Come up with a reason you have to transit the city rather than just go round it. If the river upstream or downstream is too dangerous to cross by boat, how is it a cityport? How to boats even come in and out?
Maybe you are instructed back in Analand to meet one of our agents in the city? Maybe you can't just lower a rope over the wall and drop down because of some magical entity guarding the length of the wall )

[Wilf]

Actually, I do have one note for Khare:

* I would include an instruction confirming the order of the Spell Lines.

[misomiso]

I think I said it before but generally the jump in difficulty to Khare is a bit too much.

Generally difficulty levels for me would have been: -
Shamuntati hills: Same Level
Khare: Deathtrap Dungeon
Seven Serpents: House of Hell
Crown of Kings: Maybe Citadel of Chaos difficulty, with an additional ending that's much harder.

[CharlesX]

May 22, 2022 10:43:41 GMT misomiso said:

I think I said it before but generally the jump in difficulty to Khare is a bit too much.

Crown of Kings: Maybe Citadel of Chaos difficulty, with an additional ending that's much harder.

That's interesting to me, because Citadel Of Chaos is a very easy FF once you figure out the true path, where Crown of Kings is somewhere in the middle. Aside from the blessed hardwood spear, are you a supporter of the 'you should be able to succeed in most attempts, no matter what your starting statistics'? Is it that the main ending would be not a very good one, perhaps with the Zed spell leaving you in the middle of nowhere, and to get the proper ending it would be more like the original difficulty level?
   As a side note, Citadel of Chaos is dying for someone to write an amateur fanfic where you are escaping from the Citadel after failing to have a spare Levitation spell, if someone has not already done so.

[misomiso]

charles X

I'm not sure I remember Citadel being quite hard as you need some exact 'key' items to get through. The Ending of Crown of Kings is very hard though.

On the 'you should be able to succeed in most attempts, no matter what your starting statistics' issue, I think there's room for a variety of gamebook styles; some you should be complete first go and others not.

[misomiso]

I would say though I utterly loath the ending of Crown of Kings. It's such an anti climax to a marvelous series and I really wanted a 'balthus dire' type final boss. Think that's one of the best bosses in the series.

[slloyd14]

Changes for me:

This would be a lot of work, but since you can go all the way to section 1 of book 1 with the ZED spell from book 4, then the spell options that require components should all have sections that say what happens if you have the component. For bonus marks, that will drive first time players insane, looking for ways to get the components in the earlier books.

The warrior should have a way to kill or at least severely weaken the manticore in book 1.

Take out the sections in book 3 for killing none, one or two of the serpents. If you make it to the end, you have to have killed the time and air serpents and the sun serpent has been captured.

Make the Shamutanti hills longer so the warrior has an at least 400 section gamebook.

I agree with Wilf about book 2 needing an instruction for the order of the spell lines.

Basically, more options for the warrior.

[a moderator]

Jul 9, 2022 20:20:52 GMT slloyd14 said:

This would be a lot of work, but since you can go all the way to section 1 of book 1 with the ZED spell from book 4, then the spell options that require components should all have sections that say what happens if you have the component. For bonus marks, that will drive first time players insane, looking for ways to get the components in the earlier books.

The Wizard reissue of Crown added lines indicating that you lost all your possessions if the ZED spell took you back to an earlier book.

[slloyd14]

Jul 9, 2022 21:08:36 GMT a moderator said:

Jul 9, 2022 20:20:52 GMT slloyd14 said:

This would be a lot of work, but since you can go all the way to section 1 of book 1 with the ZED spell from book 4, then the spell options that require components should all have sections that say what happens if you have the component. For bonus marks, that will drive first time players insane, looking for ways to get the components in the earlier books.

The Wizard reissue of Crown added lines indicating that you lost all your possessions if the ZED spell took you back to an earlier book.

Awww. I loved starting book 1 with about 50 gold pieces and a ton of provisions and stat boosting items plus the stat boosts from book 3. Spoilsports.

[sylas]

The final battle with the Netherworld Demon/Archmage should be more impactful. The weak enemy stats are a joke as is the option to one-shot it with a spell.