How often do people choose 'wrong' interesting routes?

[johnbrawn1972]

I am more of a tinkerer than some of the 'professionals' some seem to be on here.

Do you pursue 'wrong' routes often?

Is there a particular enounter that you feel should have been on the 'true path' route?

[a moderator]

Quite a few fans have lamented the lack of opportunity to visit the Testing Grounds as part of a successful attempt at Creature of Havoc.

[offm]

Well i always regret the wrong turn at the beginning of forest of doom,not quite your question i know

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[philsadler]

If I roll up a skill 7 character I'll deliberately send him down any paths I've never explored safe in the knowledge that I won't care what happens to the pathetic wimp.

[Pete Byrdie]

May 19, 2016 19:34:51 GMT philsadler said:

If I roll up a skill 7 character I'll deliberately send him down any paths I've never explored safe in the knowledge that I won't care what happens to the pathetic wimp.

Pretty much what I used to use my low rolled characters for. I think that's part of gamebooking, using poor characters you know have limited expiry dates to explore holes in the map, or gaps in your knowledge of the adventure.

[offm]

Oh and still havent finish howl of thwerewolf but the fighting with the wolves is an epic by now,state of art writing by Jonathan Green

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[vagsancho]

NEVER.

[johnbrawn1972]

May 20, 2016 15:08:42 GMT vagsancho said:

NEVER.

Danger alert in replying to this.

Nevertheless are you quasi-religious in always following a written down 'your true path' solution every time?

Do other posters change your mind or are you dogmatic?

For instance posters on here changed my mind about the +1 a.s. helmet in COT where there are nifty ways to avoid pitfalls along that route. This is a good example as to why I am something of a tinkerer rather than professional.

Do you have an example where you have decided to change your route?

[vagsancho]

May 20, 2016 20:31:42 GMT johnbrawn1972 said:

One. Only one. House of Hell. For me it is absolutely unacceptable that the spectacle of the human sacrifice is not in the path of victory. Without that, this book would not be fabulous book it is. That's why, I've changed the minimum possible the link of some paragraphs, to include the amazing human sacrifice in the way of success. My only change i've made in the 51 F.F. books I've read. And only because I felt it was absolutely mandatory to do it.

[Pete Byrdie]

May 21, 2016 7:19:25 GMT vagsancho said:

May 20, 2016 20:31:42 GMT johnbrawn1972 said:

For me it is absolutely unacceptable that the spectacle of the human sacrifice is not in the path of victory. Without that, this book would not be fabulous book it is. That's why, I've changed the minimum possible the link of some paragraphs, to include the amazing human sacrifice...

Well, that's not at all a cause for concern.

[offm]

I am interested to know in what books would a wrong turn at the beginning of the book leads to sucess or unsucess?

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[a moderator]

How are you defining 'a wrong turn'? Purely geographically, or in terms of any sub-optimal decision?

There's some discussion of how quickly you can make a decision that guarantees failure here.

[kieran]

There's a few:

SPOILER: Click to show

House of Hell, Temple of Terror (not counting spell choice), Appointment with Fear, Masks of Mayhem, Creature of Havoc (the random bits give you some leeway but you can mess up on your first actual decision), Crypt of the Sorcerer, Midnight Rogue, Slaves of the Abyss, Armies of Death, Black Vein Prophecy, The Crimson Tide, Siege of Sardath (I think), Return to Firetop Mountain, Island of the Undead, Spellbreaker, Deathmoor, Magehunter, Bloodbones (I think), Blood of the Zombies.

So 19 out of 71 books. And of the others, there's plenty where you can mess up very quickly indeed.

[johnbrawn1972]

May 22, 2016 11:50:53 GMT kieran said:

There's a few:

SPOILER: Click to show

House of Hell, Temple of Terror (not counting spell choice), Appointment with Fear, Masks of Mayhem, Creature of Havoc (the random bits give you some leeway but you can mess up on your first actual decision), Crypt of the Sorcerer, Midnight Rogue, Slaves of the Abyss, Armies of Death, Black Vein Prophecy, The Crimson Tide, Siege of Sardath (I think), Return to Firetop Mountain, Island of the Undead, Spellbreaker, Deathmoor, Magehunter, Bloodbones (I think), Blood of the Zombies.

So 19 out of 71 books. And of the others, there's plenty where you can mess up very quickly indeed.

Deathtrap Dungeon if you follow the arrow?

[kieran]

Actually no, it's easier to ignore the arrow but not unbeatable if you do follow it.

[johnbrawn1972]

May 22, 2016 14:08:02 GMT kieran said:

Actually no, it's easier to ignore the arrow but not unbeatable if you do follow it.

I seem to recall you can climb the statue with possibly fatal results so I see what you mean. Also you would have to fight the pit fiend. This seems to greatly increase the difficulty but strictly it is not a mistake just there for people with suicidal tendencies.

The reason I posted this was I'm sure somebody 'read' the book for their Dad and they always followed the arrow implying it was a straightforward blunder whereas it was merely a way of enhancing the difficulty.

Just goes to show you should always think for yourself rather than accept someone elses reasoning even if they were on the right lines.

[kieran]

There's a chance you might have to fight the pit fiend either way, but yeah the rope definitely improves your odds of beating the book.

[philsadler]

The Pit Fiend always struck me as odd. It's described as 'Ten meters tall' which means it's even bigger than an adult T-Rex. So then why are its stats lower?

[a moderator]

The Pit Fiend appeared in FF books first, so maybe the question should be why the T-Rex's stats are higher.

Besides, I'm pretty sure that there's no consistency for T-Rex stats across the different books that feature them.

[kieran]

Or maybe the Pit Fiend in DD was just super clumsy.

[Pete Byrdie]

When I first read Deathtrap Dungeon I assumed the implication was that the pit fiend was a late surviving tyrannosaur and, since no one in a medieval fantasy world knew what a dinosaur was, they stuck them in gladiatorial arenas and called them pit fiends. Then dinosaurs of all types began appearing all over Titan in subsequent books, so it became a puzzle for me that the pit fiend wasn't described as what it clearly was, a dinosaur, which is something any hardened adventurer will have encountered. And then, in Portal of Evil (daft title, fun book), dinosaurs are strange creatures entering Titan through a recently unearthed portal to the prehistoric past, once again implying they are unfamiliar to the inhabitants of Titan.

[paltogue]

May 24, 2016 11:02:07 GMT Pete Byrdie said:

When I first read Deathtrap Dungeon I assumed the implication was that the pit fiend was a late surviving tyrannosaur and, since no one in a medieval fantasy world knew what a dinosaur was, they stuck them in gladiatorial arenas and called them pit fiends. Then dinosaurs of all types began appearing all over Titan in subsequent books, so it became a puzzle for me that the pit fiend wasn't described as what it clearly was, a dinosaur, which is something any hardened adventurer will have encountered. And then, in Portal of Evil (daft title, fun book), dinosaurs are strange creatures entering Titan through a recently unearthed portal to the prehistoric past, once again implying they are unfamiliar to the inhabitants of Titan.

Andy Wright (OOTP2) has a cool theory about all this. There are several waves of dinosaurs which have entered Titan at various points through the Portal (or one like it). Early ones have common names and are considered to be part of the local fauna (e.g. the Pit Fiend). Others seem somewhat invasive but have clearly been around for some time (e.g. those on the Plains of Bronze). Then there's the latest wave coming out of the Portal in PoE.

[Pete Byrdie]

^^ Works for me!

[a moderator]

May 22, 2016 11:50:53 GMT kieran said:

There's a few:

SPOILER: Click to show

House of Hell, Temple of Terror (not counting spell choice), Appointment with Fear, Masks of Mayhem, Creature of Havoc (the random bits give you some leeway but you can mess up on your first actual decision), Crypt of the Sorcerer, Midnight Rogue, Slaves of the Abyss, Armies of Death, Black Vein Prophecy, The Crimson Tide, Siege of Sardath (I think), Return to Firetop Mountain, Island of the Undead, Spellbreaker, Deathmoor, Magehunter, Bloodbones (I think), Blood of the Zombies.

So 19 out of 71 books. And of the others, there's plenty where you can mess up very quickly indeed.

I'm not sure about the first title on that list.

SPOILER: Click to show

A couple of things complicate this one, namely the random nature of the FEAR score and the fact that the book allows you to correctly 'guess' the Kris password even if you miss the clue to it. Nevertheless, unless you count rolling a 1 (or possibly a 2) when generating your FEAR score as a 'wrong turn', it takes several decisions before failure is guaranteed.

If you ban the password-guessing loophole, it takes a minimum of 4 decisions to ensure failure (getting yourself knocked out by the younger of the men in the kitchen, and thus missing the first encounter with Shekou).

If you allow the lucky password guess, but roll up a single-figure FEAR score, you can again doom yourself in 4 decisions, but no sooner (get scared by a talking painting, and don't relax in your first encounter with the Earl, and you'll be scared to death at the climax if nothing else does for you first). With a FEAR of 10 or more, it'll be a while longer before you can accumulate enough gratuitous FEAR to ensure a fatal outcome.

And if you're looking for a literal 'wrong turn', as in going one way when you ought to go another, you'll have to wait until after you go to bed/get knocked out. With a sufficiently low FEAR, going the wrong way as soon as you leave the room will do it, courtesy of the ghost bride. Otherwise, not going through the door that gives access to the window where you learn Mordana's name is the earliest possible death-guaranteeing wrong turn.

[kieran]

I stand corrected