Eye of the Beholder: Oh, Great. Drow.

A role-playing encounter that I probably didn't spend enough time thinking about.

This is one of those posts where I have to ask you to forgive me if I tell part of the story wrong. My playing of Eye of the Beholder over the past week has been infrequent and furtive--a half hour here and there in between work sessions. I've also been going around the dungeon in a somewhat confusing pattern, making it tough to recall a specific order. The order of my screenshots helps a little.

Last time, I announced my intention to return to Level 5, track down those dwarves, and see if I can find anything about this "Wand of Silvias" that's supposed to be able to kill Xanathar. By the time I resumed playing, I had forgotten about that plan, and I just kept going to Level 7.

The dark textures on Levels 7 and 8 had me looking for a "Light" spell before I remembered the game doesn't have any.

Waiting for me at the bottom of the stairway were a bunch of Drow--undoubtedly the most over-used enemy in the entire Forgotten Realms oeuvre. I'm hard-pressed to think of a single FR game in which they don't appear, and I've grown sick of them. Their civilization doesn't even make sense; surely any society so brutal, joyless, and cruel would collapse upon itself.
  
For some reason, this game has them all with bushy white hair and drooping mustaches--and all male so far. They confronted me and demanded to know why they "shouldn't run [me] to the slave pens." The game gave me the option to "attack" or "bribe," and frankly I just assumed it was one of those idiot role-playing choices that you sometimes get where only the most pathetic players would hand over all their gold. Naturally, I attacked. The Drow swords were capable of paralyzing my characters, and with no room to maneuver, my party didn't fare very well.

After a reload, I cast a bunch of buffing spells like "Bless" and "Prayer" and potions like "Haste" and "Giant Strength"--the first time so far in the game that I've had to conduct such preparations. I ended up doing much better. Anyway, it occurred to me after the battle that there's no gold in this game, so I don't know what would have happened if I'd clicked "bribe." Maybe there was more to it than the usual, pathetic, throw-away role-playing option.

Both Levels 7 and 8 were crawling with Drow, and Level 8 added Driders. None of them were very hard as long as I could hit them from a distance or do the "combat waltz." They weren't even capable of spells. The Drows' physical attacks paralyzed, but I had "Remove Paralysis" and it wears off eventually anyway. Upon death, Drow dropped Adamantite long swords and Driders dropped spears. I don't know if any of them are better than the weapons my lead characters are carrying, but I've been hauling around a sample, just in case.

Hellhounds also appeared on Level 8, and Level 7 had some enemies that I first took as liches, but when they proved too easy, I looked them up in the manual and found they were just skeletons--a creature that seems awfully low-level for this deep.

These look a lot more elaborate than just "skeletons."

There weren't very difficult puzzles on the two levels, but there were a few areas in which pulling a switch released enemies in my backpath, and I had to stand and fight in a narrow corridor instead of using the maneuverability options.

On Level 7, I found a pile of bones next to a holy symbol, and I remembered that I wanted to talk to the dwarves again.

Bodies decompose in this dungeon remarkably fast.

Rather than make my way up the stairs, I decided I'd try to use the stone portals. That proved to be a bit of a mistake. I had assumed that all the portals connected in the central hub that I'd seen briefly before, but I soon learned a few realities. First, not all the portals go to a hub. Second, what I had taken for a "hub" wasn't really a hub--it only had 5 doors. Third, the places to which the portals take you are parts of the regular levels and need to be mapped as such. Finally, not all of the doors are two-way. Thus did I find myself on Level 8 before I was ready to be there, and the portal via which I arrived wouldn't let me back. It was scary for a bit, because I didn't know I was on Level 8--for all I knew I was on Level 15. Only after I'd mapped nearly the whole thing did I find the stairs and figure out where I was.

Escaping an area via a portal. I still don't know what level I was on here. The textures are all new.

At some point on Level 8, I accidentally walked into a wall and had it open up into a secret area. This is when I first realized that not all secret doors are clued with glyphs on the walls. Studying my maps of the previous levels, I found lots of blank areas, and I became seized with the idea that I'd missed a lot of secret doors, and perhaps that's why I hadn't been fulfilling any of the "secret quests." I decided it was time to head back up to the first level again and test all the walls that could conceivably lead to secret areas. Oh, and I also realized that pits sometimes drop you to areas of the levels that are otherwise inaccessible. I needed to test those, too.

My explorations didn't accomplish as much as I'd hoped--only two secret areas, I think, neither with much in them--but I did solve the secret quests on Levels 3 and 4. The solution to Level 3 was just to run around taking back the gems I'd inserted into the eyes on the wall that opened up the way to Level 4 in the first place. I didn't know I was solving a puzzle when I took the gems out; I was just kind of being a dick. When I got the message, I looked around and found a couple of new "Extra Healing" potions, so that was nice.

The solution to the Level 4 secret quest ended up being so pathetic that I'm not sure what happened. All I did was pull a chain on a wall. I'm pretty sure that the chain simply turns on and off a rotating set of walls in one part of the level, and I'm pretty sure that I pulled it when I first found it, so I guess the quest depends on something else set a particular way in another part of the dungeon. Anyway, after getting the message, I looked around but didn't find any kind of reward, so I'm not sure what that was about. I still haven't solved the secret quests on Levels 1, 5, 7 and 8, and I'm giving up on Level 1 at least. I've been around that level about 6 times.

That was a freebee.

  

I eventually did make my way back to the dwarves, but they didn't have anything new to say about the wand. I had the cleric resurrect the pile of bones, and they resolved into a half-elf cleric. I dumped one of the dwarf fighter NPCs to add her to the party. The game is confused about this NPC. In the dialogue, she calls herself "Sister Ileira," and in portrait she's pretty clearly a female, although I agree it's often tough to tell with Elvish folk. Anyway, her character sheet has her as "Ileria" (note the spelling difference), a half-elf male.

Sister "Ileira" in dialogue....

Brother "Ileria" on the character sheet.

  

Combat remains easier than I expected this late in the game. Most of my battles go like this:

Fleeing backwards down the corridor as I hurl missile weapons.

      
But the "combat waltz" option is always available if they get too close and there aren't a lot of them:

   

Real-time combat is slightly harder in Eye of the Beholder than in Dungeon Master because the game forces you to wait for the ends of animations--both spell and other combat animations, like swinging a sword--before you can move. Thus, if you want to dance the waltz, you have to make sure to leave the square before the attack animation starts. This is easier, of course, when the enemy has to walk into the square facing one direction, then turn to face you.

Miscellaneous notes:

• I'm taking my time wandering around so much because food has ceased to be an issue. Both of my clerics are capable of casting "Create Food and Water," and one casting fills everyone up completely. I don't know why they included a food mechanic at all if they were going to make it so simple to overcome.

• When you remove an NPC, he or she dumps all his or her equipment on the floor. That's a nice convenient shortcut.

I feel kind of bad for sending him off naked.

• I've learned to turn and face every wall while exploring. Some of the secret buttons and messages are really hard to see from the side-view.

• There are large chunks of Levels 7 and 8 with nothing in them. I suspect I'm going to find a way up into those areas from lower levels.

The mapped part of Level 8. I suspect there's something in that large white zone.

• The sounds that the monsters make when in proximity--in particular the shuffle of the chainmail boots on the skeletons--would be a lot more haunting and nerve-wracking if the developers hadn't made it so easy to save and reload. This is yet another game in which I wish there was some kind of time limit on the frequency of saves.

• I have one million cleric scrolls. Fortunately, I have a second cleric to start using them.

• Occasionally, while transitioning between levels, this copy protection screen comes up.

• So far, Level 4 is the only one to have territory that wraps around on itself. It's a silly dynamic, and I'm glad they didn't use it more.

• I accidentally fired up the game in CGA graphics at one point. This is what it looks like. I figured it must be because the emulator was set to SVGA, but when I changed it to CGA, it didn't look any better.

• Stuff I'm carrying around that I don't know what it is or does: a Scepter of Kingly Might, a "Night Stalker" sword, a sling that's magical but I don't know in what way, a Plate Mail of Great Beauty (no effect on charisma), 2 rings that are magic in some way, 1 medallion that's magic in some way. Somehow I got a Mace +3 that's clearly labeled as such; it's the only magic item that hasn't obscured its nature.

You'd think that this would increase my strength, but it doesn't seem to do that.

• Stuff I'm carrying around for no reason: 3 axes, 4 shields, 1 suit of chainmail, 3 suits of leather armor, 5 adamantite longswords, 1 silver key, 2 maces, 2 spears, 1 flail, 1 helmet, 1 wand that doesn't seem to do anything, 2 sets of robes, a green gem, an extra rock, a Potion of Poison (you can't throw it at enemies) and 2 medallions, 2 rings, and 1 necklace not marked as being magical by "Detect Magic." 

     
Not much character development since last time; everyone's between level 6 and 8, with the lower-leveled characters being the multi-classed ones. With experience point requirements doubling between levels, I suspect leveling will be very slow until the end of the game, so I may not be as close as I thought last time.
 

I was a bit disappointed that there were no more dialogues or quest information on Levels 7-8. Time to see what the next lowest ones have to offer. I'll talk more about spells next time, too.

Time so far: 22 hours
Reload count: 8