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Post by Wilf on Apr 23, 2017 14:56:34 GMT
They did. The Ninja stole the diamond from the chest, and (IIRC) the Chaos Warrior found one of the three sets of numbers for Lexus's test.
But yes, there should have been several more.
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Post by a moderator on Apr 23, 2017 20:45:16 GMT
You're right about the Chaos Warrior, who also found one of the gold rings.
I agree that there should have been more of such stuff. Indeed, I did the same kind of thing as philsadler in my unsuccessful competition entry Trial of Treachery. I only wrote a 50-section teaser, but even in that, there were two obvious instances where a previous contestant had taken something from a chamber, half a dozen corpses of dungeon denizens, and one or two traps laid by a contestant to try and catch out anyone who followed the same route.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,458
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Apr 24, 2017 10:10:00 GMT
The Chaos Warrior also demands all your gold rings. Really he's the only contestant with his head in the game.
I suppose it makes a bit more sense in Trial of Champions as you're the second one in and the dwarf falls pretty early. In Deathtrap Dungeon though, everyone but Throm goes in before you and even Throm somehow manages to get ahead of you.
I always wonder what the heck beat up the Eastern Warlord so badly.
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Post by Wilf on May 1, 2017 14:34:47 GMT
Throm doesn't appear to stop to investigate anything. He could easily pass you by whilst you're in one of the rooms.
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Post by lordomnibok on May 1, 2017 19:15:11 GMT
Appointment With F.E.A.R. had a couple of immersion breakers. My character had a physique that would have made Super Man jealous - a massive power house who could fly faster than a jet... Yet a few pages in I was accidentally kneed in the thigh by a jostling granny (by the look of the picture) and I collapsed to the floor in pain. Thank goodness the police came to help me up. (Lose one stamina!?!) Urm... Good job no nefarious villains were watching or that could have been embarrassing.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,458
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on May 1, 2017 21:39:13 GMT
Throm doesn't appear to stop to investigate anything. He could easily pass you by whilst you're in one of the rooms. True. Poor old Throm, he really wasn't cut out for dungeoneering. Killing him was an act of mercy really.
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Post by Paul Mc on May 19, 2017 5:35:11 GMT
The front door bit on House of Hell is very ill thought through. You walk up and open the front door of the House you are trying to escape and FREEDOM!!! However to your horror there is a 1 guy with a goats head stood at the door. He wants to get in but hasn't thought to knock on the door as you would have heard it and someone would be about to answer the door. In fact why is there no one about on the ground floor when there are more guests to arrive?? So you slam the door in his face (which nobody hears even though those same people can hear you drop a set of keys in the kitchen) and run back into the cursed house. Could you not fight the 1 man with a goat head, or even push past him or even bluff your way past him?? I'd have even taken an insta-death here rather than you run back into the house you are trying to escape from.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,458
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on May 19, 2017 8:54:08 GMT
First time I got to that part I was thinking "Hmm, there's no way it's going to be that easy, is it?" Although Jackson could maybe think of a more credible reason why it's not an option. Even if it initially scares the liver out of you, surely you could compose yourself and try to escape anyway? I mean in other parts of the book you can face down an actual vampire and a demon.
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Post by lordomnibok on May 19, 2017 16:30:00 GMT
The front door bit on House of Hell is very ill thought through. You walk up and open the front door of the House you are trying to escape and FREEDOM!!! However to your horror there is a 1 guy with a goats head stood at the door. He wants to get in but hasn't thought to knock on the door as you would have heard it and someone would be about to answer the door. In fact why is there no one about on the ground floor when there are more guests to arrive?? So you slam the door in his face (which nobody hears even though those same people can hear you drop a set of keys in the kitchen) and run back into the cursed house. Could you not fight the 1 man with a goat head, or even push past him or even bluff your way past him?? I'd have even taken an insta-death here rather than you run back into the house you are trying to escape from. I read this when I was very young; the book creeped me out as a little kid, and I really did want to get out of that house. I also seem to remember being exasperated by not being able to fight my way past the goat head guy. I kept thinking, "to hell with this place! I want an option that says smash a window and run for it." In the absence of such options, I eventually gave up. I will try it again in the near future though... I'll probably appreciate it more now.
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Post by Jon on May 20, 2017 9:47:55 GMT
Did you not get the impression that the House of Hell player character is unusually mild mannered and urbane for a fighting fantasy player character (as well as easily rattled)?
If it had been a Livingstone player character he would have thought nothing of smashing a window and attacking everyone. In fact, he would have attacked Franklins as soon as he was admitted, intending to loot his corpse.
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Post by vastariner on May 27, 2017 9:58:27 GMT
First time I got to that part I was thinking "Hmm, there's no way it's going to be that easy, is it?" Although Jackson could maybe think of a more credible reason why it's not an option. Even if it initially scares the liver out of you, surely you could compose yourself and try to escape anyway? I mean in other parts of the book you can face down an actual vampire and a demon. Even better would have been actually to let you escape. End of adventure as you leg it away, never knowing of the true horror within. Back to Sorcery! - Analand magic requires all sorts of items to catalyse the magic. So why don't you take any with you? A jewelled medallion or yellow powder or whatever? Although by the time you get to Mampang you're surely weighed down with all sorts of useless rubbish. And you're not readily going to find a flute or nose plugs in a hurry. (Although you could be wearing the wig and skullcap.) And why can you only collect sand and pebbles when told? A further problem is Analand magic is astoundingly powerful; you can create giants, make people bow to your will, and, astonishingly, bring people back from the dead. All for the cost of a sandwich. There's surely an adventure in an evil Analander king creating an entire army of corpses to march on Lendleland.
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Klea
Wanderer
Writing Lyssia Ulmer's marriage for Camp NaNoWriMo (based on King's Heir: Rise to the Throne)
Posts: 57
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy (Sorcery!)
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Post by Klea on Jul 26, 2017 6:27:40 GMT
Now that I've been novelizing some of the gamebooks for my NaNoWriMo projects, I've noticed some of these oddities as well. The beauty of prose is that I can have the character think, "this is stupid, there must be some other way..." and as the person writing this, I get to figure out why there isn't another way. Or sometimes I just fudge things a bit for the sake of a more coherent story (never anything major that would unbalance things).
Take the situation of Khare. I created a backstory for my Crown of Kings character decades ago - she was born in Khare, stuff happened that led to her becoming a wandering adventurer, and she was on her way back to Khare to search for a missing family member when the whole quest thing was dropped in her lap. So this character has a very personal reason for going to the city, and as for that rhyme at the gate... "What in the world...? That's new!" so my take is that the trapped northern gate wasn't always trapped.
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Jan 16, 2018 19:58:44 GMT
I was just browsing through some old threads and I suddenly realised that something hynreck said gave me the opportunity to post another clip from The Simpsons. Homer Simpson in an Ian Livingstone adventure My favourites Livingston moments are probably those (and yes I recall quite a few from Eye of the Dragon alone): Any time your adventurer finds something hidden away, most likely in a pile of filth, but sometimes in plain sight, and the text goes: eh, idiot, this thing fits in your mouth, you want to eat it? Say you do, I know you do... And while your character is seriously pondering this option, usually the reader's reaction is more among the line of: WhyTF would I ever do that?? Yes I found some green goop drying at the bottom of a vase, this must be 6 months old jello, yummy!
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idontkillzagoragain
Guest
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Post by idontkillzagoragain on Jan 20, 2018 18:08:42 GMT
Stonebridge- I can't understand why SB hasn't any fortificatiooon. It's basically small indipendent of human nobility city-state constantly terrorized by orcish and trollish raids, hostile dwarves and creatures of the forest. Without wooden stockade every larger attack means unnessesary killing, plundering, kidnaping. I can continue but...
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Post by daredevil123 on Jun 9, 2018 18:03:27 GMT
I think the opportunity to make unprovoked attacks is pretty hilarious. As in, you walk into the smithy and see the blacksmith at work. Will you talk to him? Leave the shop? Or attack him with your sword? I can't believe any sane person, let alone a heroic adventurer, would choose to attack random strangers...
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Post by johnbrawn1972 on Jun 9, 2018 20:12:42 GMT
I think the opportunity to make unprovoked attacks is pretty hilarious. As in, you walk into the smithy and see the blacksmith at work. Will you talk to him? Leave the shop? Or attack him with your sword? I can't believe any sane person, let alone a heroic adventurer, would choose to attack random strangers... If you are alignment chaotic evil it makes perfect sense.
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Post by daredevil123 on Jun 9, 2018 20:26:17 GMT
I think the opportunity to make unprovoked attacks is pretty hilarious. As in, you walk into the smithy and see the blacksmith at work. Will you talk to him? Leave the shop? Or attack him with your sword? I can't believe any sane person, let alone a heroic adventurer, would choose to attack random strangers... If you are alignment chaotic evil it makes perfect sense. Yes, but you are hardly ever offered chaotic evil options in FF and the player characters are always implied to be good-aligned, unless you're playing Seas of Blood or something.
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Post by dragonwarrior8 on Dec 17, 2018 17:04:43 GMT
I agree with a lot of the responses here so wont repeat the obvious ones (like eating 4-5 provisions at once to restore health) but one for me is the Bays Ball game in City of Thieves. As much as I like the book, that scene is always a facepalm moment.
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Post by stevendoig on Dec 20, 2018 6:48:49 GMT
I suppose the eating provisions things is the 'acceptable' break in reality with role playing games.
I'm replaying 'Skyrim' for the umpteenth time at the moment and during my last battle I consumed over 100 fruit and vegetables!
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Post by bloodbeasthandler on Dec 20, 2018 9:06:29 GMT
Authors could switch to calling them healing draughts or magical salves or suchlike, no problem. Steve Jackson showed the way on how to deal with food in the Sorcery! series.
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Post by Pete Byrdie on Dec 20, 2018 23:18:42 GMT
Appointment With F.E.A.R. had a couple of immersion breakers. My character had a physique that would have made Super Man jealous - a massive power house who could fly faster than a jet... Yet a few pages in I was accidentally kneed in the thigh by a jostling granny (by the look of the picture) and I collapsed to the floor in pain. Thank goodness the police came to help me up. (Lose one stamina!?!) Urm... Good job no nefarious villains were watching or that could have been embarrassing. Sorry to bump an old post, but reading about being kneed by the old lady has reminded me that there are times that STAMINA becomes an immersion breaker for me. Whenever one loses a STAMINA point for bumping ones head, tripping over a step, getting jabbed in the ribs, I always think the same thing. I could have had only one point of STAMINA when that happened. With a moderate SKILL, on one point of STAMINA I could probably fight a goblin or two in relative safety. Yet I could graze my elbow and it would be fatal? I've never been a fan of what I've called the 'death by a thousand cuts' approach to these games. You've lost a round of combat; lose 2 STAMINA. You've lost another round; 2 more STAMINA gone. I sometimes prefer to think of it as an combatant out-manoeuvring his opponent, exhausting him until he's an easy kill. Do any gamebooks series contain combat without any equivalent to STAMINA?
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Post by philsadler on Dec 21, 2018 8:00:55 GMT
Authors could switch to calling them healing draughts or magical salves or suchlike, no problem. Steve Jackson showed the way on how to deal with food in the Sorcery! series.
That's what I did in all of my books. Makes far more sense that you could quickly quaff a potion or two.
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Post by philsadler on Dec 21, 2018 8:03:05 GMT
They did. The Ninja stole the diamond from the chest, and (IIRC) the Chaos Warrior found one of the three sets of numbers for Lexus's test. But yes, there should have been several more.
I made sure there were plenty of occasions where you either met an opponent or were made aware that they'd been there before you.
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Post by linflas on Dec 21, 2018 9:04:24 GMT
Do any gamebooks series contain combat without any equivalent to STAMINA? Cretan Chronicles series have something like that. Wikipedia : Another difference from the Fighting Fantasy books is the way that the protagonist's health is represented. Instead of having a stamina attribute which decreases as the character is injured, there are four simple stages to measure health: healthy, wounded, seriously wounded and dead. These are automatically reset after a battle. While seriously wounded a combatant is only allowed to add the roll of one die to their Might instead of two to reflect their weakened state.
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Post by bloodbeasthandler on Dec 21, 2018 9:22:29 GMT
I tend to think of the Stamina loss in battle in more abstract terms. If you lost 6 Stamina in the course of a fight it might represent the opponent catching you with one big swipe across the leg, for example, after which you won. A couple of points lost might be just exhaustion on your part.. that sort of thing.
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Post by bloodbeasthandler on Dec 21, 2018 9:27:07 GMT
Throm doesn't appear to stop to investigate anything. He could easily pass you by whilst you're in one of the rooms. True. Poor old Throm, he really wasn't cut out for dungeoneering. Killing him was an act of mercy really. I doubt he looked in the box at the start with Sukumvit's message in it telling you, 'you will need to find and use several items if you hope to pass triumphantly through my Deathtrap Dungeon', and even if he did I wonder what his level of literacy was to be able to understand it.
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kieran
Baron
Posts: 2,458
Favourite Gamebook Series: Fighting Fantasy
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Post by kieran on Dec 21, 2018 9:38:16 GMT
True. Poor old Throm, he really wasn't cut out for dungeoneering. Killing him was an act of mercy really. I doubt he looked in the box at the start with Sukumvit's message in it telling you, 'you will need to find and use several items if you hope to pass triumphantly through my Deathtrap Dungeon', and even if he did I wonder what his level of literacy was to be able to understand it.
Bit unfair that Sukumvit didn't specify basic literacy was essential. He really is a worm. Regarding the chest, I wonder what deadly trap awaited in that chamber? If it did contain the diamond, it seems a bit easy that someone could just lift it out without any trap.
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Post by bloodbeasthandler on Dec 21, 2018 9:53:30 GMT
I doubt he looked in the box at the start with Sukumvit's message in it telling you, 'you will need to find and use several items if you hope to pass triumphantly through my Deathtrap Dungeon', and even if he did I wonder what his level of literacy was to be able to understand it.
Bit unfair that Sukumvit didn't specify basic literacy was essential. He really is a worm. Regarding the chest, I wonder what deadly trap awaited in that chamber? If it did contain the diamond, it seems a bit easy that someone could just lift it out without any trap. Ah, but it was the ninja that took it, wasn't it? A SKILL 11 top-class sneak whose forte is getting at people and things he's not meant to. He must have chosen Picking Locks, Detecting and Disarming Traps as one of his skills.
The poison gas capsule was either the original trap which the ninja avoided, or else something he added to catch one of his rivals out.
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Post by a moderator on Dec 24, 2018 17:08:22 GMT
True. Poor old Throm, he really wasn't cut out for dungeoneering. Killing him was an act of mercy really. I doubt he looked in the box at the start with Sukumvit's message in it telling you, 'you will need to find and use several items if you hope to pass triumphantly through my Deathtrap Dungeon', and even if he did I wonder what his level of literacy was to be able to understand it.
He seems to have been literate enough to solve an anagram while delirious from a cobra bite. Unless the Dwarven Trialmaster broke the rules and allowed him to skip that challenge because the sadistic little pest was so determined to pit two allied contestants against each other.
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Post by bloodbeasthandler on Dec 25, 2018 14:30:25 GMT
I doubt he looked in the box at the start with Sukumvit's message in it telling you, 'you will need to find and use several items if you hope to pass triumphantly through my Deathtrap Dungeon', and even if he did I wonder what his level of literacy was to be able to understand it.
He seems to have been literate enough to solve an anagram while delirious from a cobra bite. Unless the Dwarven Trialmaster broke the rules and allowed him to skip that challenge because the sadistic little pest was so determined to pit two allied contestants against each other. Maybe his literacy levels were taken into account and he was given anagrams of ORC and ELF? You could rip the words up and let the letters flutter to the floor and still get the answer right..
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