Eye of the Beholder II: Reflexes like Jelly

I probably meant to cast "Fireball," but that works, too.

     

Darkmoon has an interesting dungeon structure, and I wish more dungeon-crawlers followed its lead. Instead of n levels of a relentlessly predictable size, all marching progressively (and unrealistically) downward, it offers a bunch of individual areas of smaller size, connected via a plausible maze of stairways. You don't so much explore new levels all at once as expose new parts of existing levels, and every new key has you scrambling back through your notes and maps to find the door to which it might apply. To this extent, Darkmoon is more "realistic" than some of its predecessors, and thus more of a bridge between earlier dungeon crawlers and Ultima Underworld than I may have given it credit for in my first entry.

My basic pattern hasn't changed. Upon arriving in a new area, I map as much of it as possible, annotating places that I can't pass in yellow for future exploration. After mapping as much as I can of the "obvious" rooms and corridors, I carefully study each wall for buttons or levers, and then bash into any walls that could plausibly hold illusory doors. I trust that this system is uncovering all or most of the valid pathways.

When I left off, I was heading down a staircase behind a secret door to an unexplored section of D-2. Spiderwebs, which I had to slash apart, blocked many of the passages, and I was delighted to find that the Webdings font has a spider web ready for this very purpose. There were six total webs, and a couple of Scrolls of Neutralize Poison at the end of a corridor, so I geared up for a fight with some giant spiders.

   

Not a large area, but an intimidating one.

  

It finally came when I stepped on a pressure plate in a short hallway. It generated exactly two spiders. Both died in a couple of hits without even hitting or poisoning me. That was a lot of build up for nothing.

  

That includes Bugsy's dramatic statement.

        

The purpose of the area seemed to be to put a copper key in my hands. Copper keys are necessary for a few doors on D+1 (the level above the main entrance) that I previously couldn't access. I headed there next.

D+1 consisted of a long, ring-like corridor that looped back on itself. The hallways were filled with clerics who respawned continually during my explorations. Numerous small corridors led off to bedrooms with various treasures.

    

The upper level.

     

In a room to the southwest, I was surprised to find one of those teleporters from the first game that looks like a stone doorway. It has a series of eight symbols--ankh, pendant, gem, staff, and so forth--and you have to find stone equivalents of these items to activate the teleporter in the center. I can't remember if objects correspond to the origins or the destinations of the teleporter. Either way, finding it disabused me of any notion that I was a significant way through the game. I'd mapped parts of six levels, but this was the first doorway I'd found and I hadn't found any of the objects.

         

I guess it makes sense; both structures were supposedly built by Drow.

         

A teleportation field in the southeast took me to a room with no apparent exits. The room had four slots in the walls, three with a different-colored gem, and a "soft spot" in the middle of the room. It didn't take me long to realize that putting all three of the gems in the same slot opened a secret door, but made the wall, the slot, and the gems disappear. That meant I could only open one out of four ways. I tried it on the south wall first and found myself in a short corridor ending in a 2 x 2 room with a Wand of Magic Missiles, several potions, and a "tropelet" seed; I don't think this is a real word, but it's an anagram for "teleport." Planting the seed back in the main chamber generated a teleporter that took me back to the temple.

Just for the purposes of mapping, I reloaded and tried the other three corridors. They all had the same configuration and ended in a room of the same size. There were different treasures in each room. The "best" of these had a plate mail +3, a two-handed sword +2, a "Raise Dead" scroll, and a Ring of Adornment. However, it also had a sign that said, "So much to take, and nowhere to take it!" and sure enough, the way back to the main chamber was closed. A skeleton in the chamber held a note that identified the owner as Lord James of Natingdale, and it said that despite fighting valiantly against "Dran and his minions," Lord James had been locked in the chamber with no way out. Anyway, I'm curious if there's any legitimate way out of this room. I tried everything I could think of, but ultimately I had to reload. I finished off by doing what seemed to be the fair thing and collecting the treasures I'd found in the original path I'd taken.

         

You cannot canonically get this message and survive.

       

"Dran" was a name I'd heard before. Outside, a chamber, we overheard two clerics arguing about Dran and his use of a local "hag" to help kidnap innocents; I assume the hag is the old woman we met in the forest. He's clearly someone important in this temple, if not the head.

 

How novel it would be to have an entire militia take on the temple instead of 6 bedraggled adventurers.

         

A jail cell in the upper chambers had a body and a note identifying the body as Amber, Khelben Blackstaff's "scout." The note confirms Khelben's suspicions and says that: "The clerics here have completely deceived the surrounding populace. Everyone believes them to be kind and helpful, while secretly they gather an army of undead warriors." I should probably resurrect Amber, but I'll need an empty spot in my party to do it, and I rather like my current configuration.

I left the upper floors with two areas unexplored. One was a corridor that insisted I needed "the mark of Darkmoon" to pass. The second was a southern door for which I lacked the right key. I was also a bit perturbed by a large empty area in the middle of the level, but I couldn't find any secret doors or buttons. It's possible that the ankh room (where you resurrect characters), otherwise accessible only by teleporter, is slotted in here.

          

It's not a giant hickey, is it?

       

The only path open to me at this point was a staircase down from D-3 to D-4. This led to a large dungeon level, the most difficult in the game so far. It was full of gelatinous cubes and margoyles, and they would not stop respawning. Moreover, the door to the previous level close behind me, blocking escape, and the level wouldn't let me sleep. I'm afraid I had quite a few reloads.

     

The lowest level I've explored so far.

       

Gelatinous cubes are one of the goofier AD&D monsters, but I don't remember encountering one in a non-wireframe game, so I thought the images and associated sounds were fun. What wasn't fun is when one destroyed my fighter/thief's shield +1. Fortunately, they die in a couple of hits and instantly from "Magic Missile" or "Melf's Acid Arrow."

       

Too bad there's no "Hot Water" spell.

        

The margoyles were a lot harder and more annoying, and they occasioned a few reloads. One memorable area closed a door behind me and spawned five of the creatures the moment I picked up an object. I had to go all-out to defeat them: "Prayer," "Bless," "Haste," Potions of Giant's Strength, and so on. Later, they swarmed a series of corridors in the southern part of the level and wouldn't give me a moment's peace, respawning as soon as I killed them.

Oddly, the problem I was having with unresponsive keys went away after the last session, so perhaps it was based on an animation peculiar to the skeleton warriors. The margoyles were more susceptible to the usual tricks like fighting retreats and the combat two-step. The problem is that the layout of the level itself offers few locations where the latter works, and the "fighting retreat" falls apart the moment you retreat right into another enemy, which happened quite often.

        

Backpedaling down the hallway as I fire off spells and missiles.

      

I'll never entirely be sold on Dungeon Master-style combat. I'm just not quick enough mentally or physically. At least Dungeon Master had nice big buttons, all in a row, for your attack options. In the Eye of the Beholder games, you have to right-click precisely on the weapons, spaced somewhat far apart from each other, in smaller boxes. I'm constantly clicking on the wrong thing, accidentally left-clicking and picking up an item instead of right-clicking to use it, opening the character sheet, clicking on the character's name and initiating a change of positions, and so forth. Sometimes I amuse myself by pretending this is all happening during tabletop play:

DM: A margoyle has just entered the corridor in front of you. What do you do?

Starling: Drop my sword!

Bugsy: Swap my axe for my shield, then swap them back!

Marina: Open my backpack, then swear, then close it!

Gaston: Try to swap my holy symbol for my bow! Throw my holy symbol at him!

Shorn: Swap positions with Marina! Never mind!

San-Raal: Open my spellbook and cast "Remove Curse!"

DM: [facepalm]

Marina: We have to get out of here! Strafe right!

DM: You hit a wall.

Marina: Strafe left!

DM: You hit a wall.

Marina: Turn left and then run forward!

DM: You hit . . . you know what? I'm out of here.

The game does a particularly good job with sound. Every enemy has both an attack sound and an "ambient" sound, the latter of which lets you know that he's in the area. The frequency and volume of the ambient sound creates a real tension as you explore and madly check up and down corridors for whatever's making the noise. But all the respawning on this level basically ensured that the ambient sound never stopped. It would have been nice to have a brief break now and then.

The level culminated in a puzzle by which I had to figure out the right selection of pressure plates to weigh down to open a door. There were nine of them, which is a lot of potential combinations, but I figured the solution would be symmetrical and worked from there. I got it after a few combinations: each of the corners plus the middle.

The corridors beyond delivered a lot more margoyles plus a couple keys I needed and a stone orb for the teleportation door, a second of which was on the level. As I wrap up, I can either take that door or a stairway downward, but either way, I really need to get somewhere where I can sleep.

       

This is bogus.

      

Miscellaneous notes:

       

• It's a good thing that "Create Food" exists because I hardly ever find any food. Of course, the existence of the spell (which completely sates every character) makes the few rations I do find redundant.

• I guess everyone has leveled up once by now. When it happens, you get a quick message at the bottom, but it's easy to miss it if you're in combat.

• I keep finding "magic dust." I have like eight pouches now. I have no idea what it's for.

      

Is this a drug?

         

• I also keep finding lockpicks. I have four sets now. A party doesn't need more than one set. I doubt they even really need the one. They hardly ever work.

• On the upper level, I found that in addition to smashing windows, I could smash statues. I figure any act against the cult, even vandalism, is a net gain.

      

Not anymore!

   

As predicted, my use of an imported party means that I haven't been getting good equipment upgrades as regularly as a new party would. Most of the stuff I find is +1. But there have been some notable exceptions. I got a +5 robe, +5 bracers, and a +3 cloak called "Moonshade" that have lowered the AC for my mages. I replaced the +1 shield Bugsy lost to the gelatinous cube. Assorted wands, scrolls, and potions have all been valuable. I'm certainly not so jaded that I ignore treasure piles. And San-Raal's "Improved Identify" has been a god-send. This is what games ought to have instead of weird power orbs that you don't even find until the 8th level.

       

Finding a cursed weapon briefly sucked, but at least I could identify it.

     

I can't imagine I'm more than a quarter done at this point. I hope everyone's settled in for a long pairing of Eye of the Beholder II and Deathlord.

Time so far: 12 hours