21) Trial of Champions

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

hynreck said:

This I've known for a while, now. Being a fan of Deathtrap Dungeon in my youth, I made sure to pick this book as soon as possible. I presume just reading the title was enough to tell me it was a sequel of sort to one of my favourite gamebooks, so it was really a no-brainer.

L'épreuve des champions... even young I thought, even though I enjoy this book, something is missing. Back then, I assumed it had something to do with the size of the book, very thin, with space wasted on gladitorial games. Those games were nice but seemed to take away from the dungeon itself, passages and rooms perhaps, traps, creatures... For my younger self, the more time I spent roaming the dark corridors of death, the better.

Nowadays I think it's a bit more than this. Sure if the book had more sections, or at the very least more text, it might help. But not exactly the way I once expected. See, the dungeon itself ain't that bad. It's hard as hell (as it should be, I guess) and a bit redundant (but then again, it's a sequel, usually aim at people who want more of the same), but still fun, and with a few original parts. No, nowadays what I think is missing is atmosphere. From the text and from the illos. Iain McCaig's illos for Deathtrap Dungeon were dark and atmospheric, dirty, full of textures. You could never quite tell what the walls were made of. It was oppressing. Rooms looked dangerous everywhere you look. Just stepping on the wrong stone looked like it could doom you. On the other hand, while Brian Williams illos are awesome in their own rights, they are much too clean, much too tidy. All the passageways and rooms looks man-made with clean bricks. Floors have been swept clean of any nastiness. Corridors are regular affairs. I knew Baron Sukumvit modified his dungeon, but I didn't knew he went to such extreme as hiring an army of maids to keep everything clean. Clean is not scary. Regularity and order is not confusing (which is not what you want to achieve in such a trial).

But Williams isn't to blame for everything. Livingstone is also to blame by adding to the illos with his lack of descriptive narrative. I don't know if it was his intention on keeping everything brief, but everything is just too brief here. You never walk along a corridor in this book; instead you always reach a junction, a door, or some gizmo. Doors are described briefly, surroundings even more briefly. Rooms are mostly empty affairs with one thing sticking in the middle. Deathtrap was oozing with atmosphere; earthen walls dripped around you; it was smelly; the floor could get rock hard or muddy underneath your feet. You actually walked underneath light crystals and got the feeling of being entombed alive. Not so in Trial. Nothing much is said about where you stand. All the locations seems really close by and everything is left to your imagination. Or in this case, left to the illos complementing the text. And those illos are so damn neat.

I kind of like the new cover by Martin Mckenna. I think it's very good, though a bit redundant with Williams illos inside, which was already well done. At the very least, the original cover tried for something different and is an important part of the main setting.

Still, for all it's flaws, it's a fun book to read; especially for those who enjoyed Deathtrap in the first place. Though I would say that it might get tedious near the end of the dungeon, when it start doing it's bottle-neck thing and falls into a special brand of frustration. Suffice to say that this book is far from fair!

I'd add, as a bit of trivia info, that again, the french version is full of missing illos. I counted 6 at the very least. Some great missing: The Eastern Warlord and the Liche Queen.


Speak in extremes, it will save you time.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

hynreck said:

I have some little questions for you guys.

First a very basic language question: How do you pronounce Liche Queen? I've got an idea, but I don't think I ever heard it spoken, so... and I'm not asking about the queen part...

My other is half observation/question: Coming off of Sword of the Samurai, some descriptions for "adversaries" made me wonder... there is an eastern slave and a eastern Warlord that you do battle with, with obvious asian traits, and a Southern man with black skin... bare with me.
Now, Hachiman is on the east side of Khul, they are Eastern people, I guess, but is there an equivalent on Allansia? Are black people found too in the south of Allansia?
It's all too Earth replica for my liking, frankly. It's a fantasy world; couldn't they at least put asian to the west and black people to the north just for a change? I'm half-kidding, but you know what I mean?

I know that even Tolkien did it with Middle-Earth, but at least, the way I see it, Middle-Earth is supposed to become our present Earth. But Titan? I doubt it.
So, anybody versed in Titan's population and geography could help me out? I might find out on my own one day, after reading all the books, but right now it's puzzling.


Speak in extremes, it will save you time.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

daikoku said:

The pronunciation is 'lɪtʃ' according to wikipedia


l
lie, sly, gal

ɪ
kit, lid, fill, bin

tʃ
China, catch

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

hynreck said:

Thanks Daikoku. That's actually how I pronounced it.
Should have thought to check wiki...


Speak in extremes, it will save you time.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

vastariner said:

hynreck said:

Now, Hachiman is on the east side of Khul, they are Eastern people, I guess, but is there an equivalent on Allansia? Are black people found too in the south of Allansia?

It's all too Earth replica for my liking, frankly. It's a fantasy world; couldn't they at least put asian to the west and black people to the north just for a change? I'm half-kidding, but you know what I mean?

I know that even Tolkien did it with Middle-Earth, but at least, the way I see it, Middle-Earth is supposed to become our present Earth. But Titan? I doubt it.

So, anybody versed in Titan's population and geography could help me out? I might find out on my own one day, after reading all the books, but right now it's puzzling.

Hachiman pre-dates Titan, I guess Hachiman actually WAS meant to be Japan but got retconned into the single world.
Isles of the Dawn are literally Japan, though, look at the shapes of the islands, and of course the name is pretty much Land of the Rising Sun; the only difference in Mason/Williams' conception was that "Japan" moved to the mainland and "China" to the islands.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

hynreck said:

That's interesting. I didn't know about the Isles of the Dawn, since obviously I've not read up to there yet.

See, one of the things I'm wondering is if the Eastern Warlord in Trial of Champions is supposed to be from Hachiman (but isn't Khul supposed to be cut from the rest of the world) or if he is from another place that's similar to Hachiman.

That would diminish Hachiman's uniqueness, I believe.


Speak in extremes, it will save you time.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

a moderator said:

hynreck said:

isn't Khul supposed to be cut from the rest of the world

Not easy to reach, but by no means cut off. There's a character in Khul-based book Phantoms of Fear who started out in Allansia.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

greyarea13 said:

Regarding the Easterners in TOC, at Titan_Rebuilding Yahoo! group we have a theory that there must be a colony of them in Allansia, that originally came from Hachiman/Isles of the Dawn, to allow for all the Asian influence in Allansia. One potential spot is the city of Bei-Han, in the Glimmering Sea area, which is at war with Kallamehr in Slaves of the Abyss, though there are probably others...


Impudent Peasant!

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

kieran said:

I think Sword of the Samurai was the first book to suggest there was more to Titan than just Allansia. Earlier books were retconned into being set in Khul (Scorpion Swamp and Seas of Blood for instance) and I think Sorcery! was supposed to be set in a forgotten age of Earth's history (hence all that talk about the Dark Ages in the background). Since Ian probably wrote ToC at the same time as Mark and Jamie wrote SotS, it's probable Ian had no idea that they were designing a Japan equivalent at the same time he was including Easterners in his book.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

hynreck said:

kieran said:

Since Ian probably wrote ToC at the same time as Mark and Jamie wrote SotS, it's probable Ian had no idea that they were designing a Japan equivalent at the same time he was including Easterners in his book.

That's kind of what I think. He probably went oops after but too late. He probably justified it by telling himself Titan is a pretty big place after all, anything could happen.


Speak in extremes, it will save you time.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

paltogue said:

kieran said:

I think Sword of the Samurai was the first book to suggest there was more to Titan than just Allansia.

Yes, SotS is the first book to name the world and its three continents (although the Old World is referred to as Kakhabad). Whether it was always intended to be in Titan or whether this was decided after the adventure was written, but before the intro was finalised, who knows.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

paltogue said:

hynreck said:

I have some little questions for you guys.

First a very basic language question: How do you pronounce Liche Queen? I've got an idea, but I don't think I ever heard it spoken, so... and I'm not asking about the queen part...

I've always in my head pronounced it as 'leesh', or sometime 'leech'. I.e. rhyming with 'quiche', 'niche' (I know this can also be pronounced 'nitch' in the US) and 'riche' (see, we are entirely indebted to the French language for lots of cool words!). But that could well just be me...

Note that the very similar word 'lich' in English, meaning 'dead body', is definitely 'litch'.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

paltogue said:

hynreck said:

Are black people found too in the south of Allansia?

There aren't very many examples - the captain of the guard in 'Blacksand!' being one other that I can think of. Otherwise Black people in Titan are, rather politically incorrectly, members of diminutive primitive tribes in jungles, islands, and other out of the way places.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

paltogue said:

hynreck said:

Now, Hachiman is on the east side of Khul, they are Eastern people, I guess, but is there an equivalent on Allansia? Are black people found too in the south of Allansia?

Allansia does have quite a strong 'Eastern' (from an Earth perspective anyway) element to it, linguistically and genetically. See the 'Easterner' page on Titannica. Here are some examples:

The Easterner

The Eastern Warlord

Bei-Han

Pen Ty Kora? 

Kaypong

Chiang Mai

Ninjas

Fang-zen of Jitar

The Tribesmen of the Flatlands

Not all 'Eastern' by any means, but plenty of evidence for what we, from Earth, might think of as 'Eastern'. A suggestion I've made is that the 'easterner' Tribesmen of the Flatlands are of the same origin as the obviously 'Eastern' inspired Lendleland Barbarians and central Khulian nomads. At some point, probably after the Splitting, maybe even after the War of the Wizards, they expanded in a number of directions in Allansia - pushing into the NW, where they formed the ruling elite (over a 'European' population) of Chiang Mai and Kaypong in the ruins of Gar-Goldoran, and pushing into Bei-Han, which would have been named something else beforehand, leading to renewed tensions in the Glimmering Sea. I suspect the Eastern Warlord comes from Bei-Han or somewhere similar, but it is possible that he has travelled from Khul I suppose.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

hynreck said:

Pretty thorough, Paltogue, thanks.

paltogue said:

...rhyming with 'quiche', 'niche' (I know this can also be pronounced 'nitch' in the US) and 'riche' (see, we are entirely indebted to the French language for lots of cool words!)

It's funny, quiche in french, the very same word, sounds just like riche (a bit like itch without the t sound)...

Plus, Liche, still from the french point of view, could easily be taken for the french verb to lick (of licking fame...)

Slightly funny, more then anything, but still...


Speak in extremes, it will save you time.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

daikoku said:

hynreck said:

Thanks Daikoku. That's actually how I pronounced it.Should have thought to check wiki...

It surprised me - I've always read it with a long i, something like lyche.  Oops.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

hynreck said:

...and I thought you were telling me something obvious!

See, I was pronouncing it the right way (without knowing), but the e at the end threw me off.

Anybody wants to teach me how to pronounce Gilead? I usually say Gil-had, like the jewish word, if I'm not mistaken.

Also, what about Helgedad? For now I go with a soft G. G's are confusing in a lot of languages...

Yea, perhaps I should have started a new thread, oh well.


Speak in extremes, it will save you time.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

kieran said:

paltogue said:

There aren't very many examples - the captain of the guard in 'Blacksand!' being one other that I can think of. Otherwise Black people in Titan are, rather politically incorrectly, members of diminutive primitive tribes in jungles, islands, and other out of the way places.

Mungo looks black in the illustrations. I've always pictured Oyster Bay as being like a Caribbean island. I also think Balthus Dire looks black in Russ Nicholson's illustration of him. But yeah, I'd have to agree, there are few black people on Titan. It's like the Star Wars universe.

Back to Trial of Champions, while I do agree that Deathtrap Dungeon is better, ToC does have the bonus of having a complete bastard of a villain. Wasting a small fortune and scores of innocent lives in the off chance that it will upset his brother takes pettiness to whole new levels. Nothing quite as satisfying as fulfilling your promise to the Southerner and killing Carnuss at the end.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

kieran said:

hynreck said:

Also, what about Helgedad? For now I go with a soft G.

I would go with a soft G too. Although for years I would have pronounced Kai as "Kah" rather than "Kye". Then when I started watching unhealthy amounts of Lexx I got into the habit of saying it Kye.

[thealmightymudworm]

From TUFFF...

hynreck said:

When I was young I said it like this: Kaeee! But now it's Kye.

And I must admit, Carnuss is quite the bastard.


Speak in extremes, it will save you time.

[nathanh]

I got this book today, having not played it for 15 years or so. I'm surprised how much I'm liking it, even though the descriptions are a bit brief. I had the recollection that it wasn't very good, but it's alright so far. The bit at the start is cool the first few times, but once you work out the optimum path it's quite tedious to go through. On the other hand, it gives you opportunity to die almost immediately if you roll a low skill, which is always nice in an adventure like this.

[a moderator]

My TUFF playthrough (sans stats, but it's the commentary on the book that matters, right?):

By the time this book hit the shelves, I had developed the habit of reading while walking along the street. This meant that I did a diceless readthrough between buying the book and getting home, and I remember my character falling victim to the Mind Warp Beast when I was just passing what was the only cinema in town. I'd have been doomed even if I hadn't fallen for that trap, as my path prior to that ignominious ending missed out many essential items.

I shall, of course, be playing it properly here and now. Even if the attribute dice spell out an obvious death sentence. They're not that bad, actually: I probably have more chance of success than a 12-24-12 hero in Crypt of the Sorcerer, but I still think it likely that Lord Carnuss will suffer the non-lethal kind of disappointment when my adventure comes to an end.

Even when I was daft enough to wander through town with my head stuck in a book, I knew better than to attack the guard. As if Ian was ever going to include a 'you escape and live happily, if unheroically, ever after' ending! For the cross-country runs intermittently inflicted on me and my peers at school, I tended to let others set the pace, and focus my efforts on not falling so far back as to merit humiliation. That should work here, too - and it does.

Next up, the 'really gross new monster' (as the Warlock review put it), and since traditional weapons are a risky option even for the maxi-Skilled, I'm definitely going for trident and net this time. The purely random chance of losing Luck here is tiresome, but Luck grows back more quickly than necks. Woohoo, success straight off, and no penalty.

Back to my cell for the night, and my one remaining cellmate doesn't favour the 'one of you can have a lie-in tomorrow' interpretation of the guard's words. I don't know if his Skill has been inflated to take into account my lack of weapon, or if Ian couldn't be bothered to come up with any special rules for fighting bare-handed. Regardless, I'm the one who gets to have a non-euphemistic sleep.

Easily coping with a device crueller than anything my P.E. teachers ever came up with, I make it through to the cover illustration. Back in the summer of '86 I GMed a friend through this adventure. Repeatedly, as he was rubbish at it, but stubborn. I mention this here, because it was during this sequence that he met the first of his many deaths, peppered with arrows for lying down on the job. I sneakily contrive to trip over a corpse, and thus get to hit the ground without being penalised for doing so. This gets me into a fight, but a straightforward combat is less fraught than Blood Island Rules Murder in the Dark. The other remaining contestant is similarly fed up of this silly game, and makes a bold challenge which soon leads to his elimination from the contest. And life.

All that stands between me and the profoundly underwhelming reward is a Southerner. I used to be one of those, though after 12½ years in Hull, I'm now generally accepted by the locals. I don't recall dreadlocks and leopardskin loincloths ever being particularly popular in Tunbridge Wells, but maybe I just never went to the right clubs. While not the wimp that stereotype would suggest, the Southerner loses the fight, and I qualify to get killed by a means of Sukumvit's devising, rather than something dreamt up by his annoying kid brother. Yay, only not.

I do at least get my Stamina back before being sent into the Big Brother Dungeon. Contestant number one has lost even before getting to be the subject of the following summer's minor hit record Livin' in a Box, by virtue of failing to investigate the very first door he encountered. Why is it that non-reader contestants in Deathtrap Dungeons are so rubbish at dungeon-crawling? Even the least inept haven't amassed even a third of the loot you're likely to have by the time you meet up with them, and that's almost never because you got it all first. They're so deficient in Livingstone adventuring skills, they're like an illiterate applying to go on Countdown.

But I digress. I open the door. Bad dog! No surviving! I take the ring and proceed to the first junction. Ian likes right (though he does deviate from his 'generally the same direction every time' model here), so I go that way and reach the bridge. Ignoring the demand for gold, I climb down the rope, narrowly avoid getting pushed off a ledge, and fight a Strider that looks nothing like Viggo Mortensen. Easiest combat yet, as I took some damage from the doggie's halitosis, but am unscathed here. Take his medallion (which isn't very obvious in the picture, though I can see a slight resemblance to Jimmy Saville OBE) and climb back up.

This is the point at which the friend I GMed through the adventure always went wrong (assuming he survived that far), as he would invariably turn around and head back the other way. Not once did he think 'maybe I'll head a little further this way and see what happens'. Back to the junction, down the left tunnel, and on the direct route to failure every single time. He could almost be a Livingstone-scripted contestant. With much tutting and shaking of the head, I continue on the correct route.

The next door has a broom on it, but isn't the cleaner's cupboard. It's been so long since I played the original Eye of the Dragon, I can't remember if the 'Witch with pet Vampire Bats' set-up here is being reused from Ian's first solo-written adventure, or if he copied it from here when padding EotD out to a nice round 407 sections to give Wizard Books an exclusive that wasn't just a winnable Creature of Havoc. Bats battered, dust added to the inventory.

I'm not sure of the significance of the dead bird nailed to the next door. Doesn't really matter, anyway. Kick the door in, convince the Coldclaw to chill out, and acquire further goodies (including the first redundant Skill bonus of the book, drat your anti-Attack Strength bonus agenda, Mr L). Disconnect dem bones to get another essential item, and proceed to the convergence of the first two corridors. By the time this book came out, FF fans were starting to notice the way certain changes of direction were forced on them, so Ian cunningly disguises this one by forcing his readers to start chasing midgets instead. Real smooth, Livingstone.

Ignoring the waste-of-time door on the left, I find one of those cheapo 'bonus-free' magic swords (and how exactly do I realise that it's magical? Is there a trade mark on the hilt?). Oh well, it's better than a poke in the eyes with a Y-shaped stick. The next door has been boarded up, which is a fairly obvious hint of importance in a brand new dungeon complex, so I prise off the boards and enter the room where my friend made an even bigger fool of himself than in the Strider aftermath. The first time he heard the Skeleton's riddle, he got it wrong and died. The second time, he tried to run away (so why bother reentering the room in the first place, especially when he had to remove several planks to do so?) and died. The third time, he got the riddle wrong again. And died. If I hadn't been telling him the possible answers listed in the book, I suspect that he'd never have found the right one. "Uncle?" ZAP! "Second cousin twice removed?" ZAP! "One of those uncles who's not actually related, just a friend of the family?" ZAP! "Long shot, but great-great-granddaughter?" ZZZZAP!

Really, really avoid the next door. At the next junction I notice a door on the left, and check it out. Beyond is the Liche Queen, who offers me a choice between Gauntlet of Pain and death. Don't suppose I could have cake? Alas, no, and I fail the roll. The subsequent combat is quick and fatal, denying me the opportunity of making a tortuous and tasteless joke about Beyonce.

[vagsancho]

I love this book! Magic! Fantastic Atmosphere! Brilliant beginning! Amazing return to the Deathtrap Dungeon. More one of Livingstone's Masterpieces, with Deathtrap Dungeon, City of Thieves and Crypt of the Sorcerer.

[vagsancho]

Trial of Champions - A tremendous masterpiece from Livingstone. Such a magical book. Such a perfect book to me. Absolutely complete. Possibly, my second favourite FF book of all my Fighting Fantasy Books.

[hynreck]

Yes, because posting about this once is never enough. I look forward to your next post saying just about the same thing but with an even bigger font and possibly, could I ask?, colours?

Oh, and I just saw that your favourite gamebook series is now Crypt of the Sorcerer? Good going. Enjoy this epic series of 1 book.

[sylas]

Aug 4, 2015 12:53:39 GMT vagsancho said:

Trial of Champions - A tremendous masterpiece from Livingstone. Such a magical book. Such a perfect book to me. Absolutely complete. Possibly, my second favourite FF book of all my Fighting Fantasy Books.

Not that this isn't informative or anything but could you go into a bit more detail like which bits did you like and which bits you didn't. what makes this book stand out to you? What makes it memorable?

[vagsancho]

Trial of Champions - the Quest with the greatest suffering, the greatest passion, and the greatest solitude. - Magical Book.

[kieran]

I dunno if you suffer that much. You're a slave for like a week. The heroes of Bloodbones, Creature of Havoc, Moonrunner and The Crimson Tide definitely have it harder.

[vagsancho]

When they took off my mask and i saw his eyes... the moment when all sense of ethics, duty, justice, morality, and honor are murdered just leading to a blind single feeling of a "Kill them all." That is called revenge. Sacred.

[Jon]

As with the story of Maior, you are supposed to show mercy in the last instance. Maior had to spare Feior to be free from the Black Vein Prophecy.

The formerly masked warrior can share a cell with Feior, I suppose.