Swifter than the Ambermoon's Sphere

Encountering my first of the fairy-folk.

          

This was an enjoyable session as I continued to solve Spannenberg's various problems.

   

We began by bringing Alkem's ring back to him. In reward, he swung his stick at us and we got "a strange feeling that you are suddenly able to learn new skills." I have no idea what that meant functionally. Our character sheets were identical before and after this so-called "reward."

        

. . . I was already able to learn new skills.

         

But giving him the ring also caused him to open the scroll shop and the potion shop on the first floor of his tower. There, we bought a couple of empty flasks. But we also noted a host of potions, including attribute potions, which might serve as a useful money sink in the future. I looked over the scrolls and purchased "Magic Lantern" and "Levitation" for now. More on spells in a bit.

   

We went east into the swamp I'd found previously, this time looking for a flower called swamplily. (We need to cure a case of swamp fever back in town.) We found it on a little island in the middle of a pond. Fortunately, I was able to walk up to it and take it.

      

Father Anthony gave good directions.

      

Our next stop was the Temple of Gala on the eastern coast, for the third ingredient to the disease-curing potion. We used Father Anthony's key to access the place. "As you open the door," it said, "the scent of spring flowers surround you and you hear quiet, festive music." The entry room had a statue of Gala, though the game noted that we couldn't quite see it because of limited light. This was a hint.

   

Exploring the area, I touched two "pulsating lights" that increased Qamara's maximum stamina and strength. A crystal ball displayed runes that read: "GALA MUST STAND IN A BRIGHT GLOW." Another said: "THERE IS ALWAYS A WAY." These were also hints.

   

The second message indicated the presence of secret doors in the area, one of which led me to a table with a flint and steel. The first message was a clue to use the flint and steel to light the four candles surrounding the statue of Gala, which revealed a door in the north wall.

     

That's a little creepy.

      

Unfortunately, my success ended shortly thereafter. As I explored, stone statues came to life. They were capable of casting spells like "Mudsling" and had very damaging melee attacks. Meanwhile, our attacks did very little damage to them. They didn't feel completely invulnerable, but they sent the message that maybe I should get some more levels and training before fighting them. After they killed two of my characters, I reloaded from outside the dungeon and made my way back home.

          

I had been reticent about spending too many training points on the "Attack" skill, but looking over our character sheets, I realized that "Attack" is what I'll be using both Qamara and Egil for almost exclusively. When I finally find a trainer who specializes in "Read Magic" and "Use Magic," I'll clearly want to invest some points there, and perhaps "Swimming" will turn out to be important, but it seemed inevitable that I would max out "Attack" by the end of the game, so why not do it now? I went back to the trainer and got Qamara up to her maximum (80%) with that skill and Egil relatively close. I accidentally trained Nelvin 10 points higher than his maximum. I'm not sure what the consequences are; I assume the game just ignores those extra 10 points. Otherwise, why have a maximum?

       

These foes were beyond any of us.

      

I went to the house, where I'd stored excess spell scrolls in a cabinet. Qamara flubbed "Magic Lantern" but learned "Levitate." I realized that trying to memorize "Magic Lantern" was probably a waste since I already had two lighting spells and every character can only memorize a certain number of spells. Thus, before I ran the risk of wasting Nelvin's relatively few spell learning points, I took a deeper dive into the spell system.

    

As commenters noted in my last entry, the English manual doesn't have the appendix from the German manual. The appendix lists each of the spells, the number of points it takes to learn and cast them, and a few notes about what they do. I ran the section through a translator. There are four schools of magic--healing, alchemy, mysticism, and destruction--each the domain of four classes: healers, alchemists, mystics, and mages. Mysticism has only 16 spells; the others have 29 or 30. Adventurers can memorize alchemist spells, and I guess thieves can memorize healer spells--or maybe just cast them from the scrolls.

    

There goes ¤250.

        

Spells cost anywhere from 1 to 30 points to learn and anywhere from 3 to 250 points to cast. I think you get roughly 2L learning points per level. 

  

Most of the destruction spells just generically damage hit points, but a few have status effects, like "Lame" (paralyze), "Sleep," "Poison," "Blind," and "Petrify." I decided I should probably prioritize those over a large variety of damage spells, of which Nelvin already had several. So I was sure to have him memorize "Lame." As we'll see, it's a good thing I did.

   

I decided to give the orcs another try. They were lurking to the west of the city and were either working for or with some mischievous fairies. They had been blamed for raids and thefts in the city, including the theft of the baron's chain of office. The baron's wife had followed them to their cave one night, although the baron thought she was just dreaming.

   

I encountered an orc patrol where I'd encountered them before. Some pre-combat dialogue indicated that they were looking for the fairies, having tortured one of them to find the locations of the others, so I guess I was wrong about them working together. The first orc battle was with two regular orcs and an orc chief.

   

I used the opportunity to test out the mage's spells. Here's a field report, keeping in mind that orcs have somewhere between 40-60 hit points and chiefs have about twice that. My mage had around 150 maximum spell points as we engaged the orcs.

   

• "Magical Projectile" only does 2 damage (at my current level, anyway) to a single creature for 5 spell points. It's not worth the spell points, particularly since I have a returnable magic throwing weapon.

      

That's one I'll never use again.

       

• "Magical Arrows" does 2 damage to every creature in one row. I didn't find it very useful against only two foes. Perhaps if more of them lined up, I'd use it to soften them.

• "Mudsling" does 5 points of damage for 8 spell points. Thus, you get a better bang for your buck than with "Magical Projectile."

• "Winddevil" does 9 points of damage to a single foe for 12 spell points. But it fails a lot at my current level.

• "Rockfall" does 18 points of damage to a single foe for 15 spell points. It's thus the most economical of the lot, but it almost never succeeds.

      

Nelvin's spell selection, with the number of castings I have remaining.

     

• "Sleep" (15 spell points) puts a single enemy to sleep. I don't know for how long. They always woke up when we attacked them, but never before. Against the orcs, I didn't know why you'd possibly cast it instead of "Lame," which has a better effect for less points.

• "Lame" paralyzes a single enemy for 10 points. If the enemy ever gets un-paralyzed, it must take a lot of rounds, because I never saw it. At Nelvin's skill level, it succeeds about 60% of the time.

      

Against the orcs, "Lame" was the obvious winner. In fact, it seemed a bit overpowered. Battles with orcs fell into a rote predictability. I would have the two fighters engage the closest orcs while Nelvin stood in the back, paralyzing the enemies one by one. When they were all immobile, he joined the battle with his throwing scythe. But even so, it took dozens of rounds to finish off groups of two, three, and four orcs, of which I fought many. Even paralyzed, their armor class and resistances were high, and I had to reload now and then because a favorite weapon broke. Thus, "Lame" made the battles too easy, but I think they would have been too hard without it.

     

It's actually pretty effective.

       

After the initial battle with the two orcs and their chief, I found a cave titled "Sylph Cave." As I entered, I heard an orc say: "Go, find me those damned fairies. If I take them to Reg, he will make me first lieutenant. Then I won't need to carry these huge amounts of food any more." I didn't know what he was talking about, but it was clear that the orcs and fairies (or sylphs) weren't allies. I fought maybe 8 orc parties in the dungeon, each using the strategy above, resting occasionally to restore spell points. Nelvin hit Level 6.

   

The cave culminated in a locked portal for which I didn't have the key. I was about to do another sweep when something tugged at a memory from Lady Heidi's account of following the creatures. I looked up the relevant screenshot, and she said: "When they landed, one of them took something out of a hole in a tree next to the entrance to the cave." Sure enough, when I went back outside and searched the tree, I found a "strange little stone." I love games that make you pay attention this way. A modern game would have a quest marker pointing you right to the tree.

      

Outside the fairy cave. Searching that tree produced the key I needed.

           

The little stone opened the round portal. I stepped into a room to find "several young women" with "blue or green skin and long shimmering wings." (I thought for a moment that Ambermoon was acknowledging my color blindness, but I guess it was saying that some of them were blue and some green.) All but one flapped their wings and disappeared. The one that stayed behind introduced herself as Sariel, a Sylph thief. (The translation can't decide whether it's spelled "sylph" or "sylphe." I'm using the more common spelling.) She said that the Sylphs are magical beings whose wings can teleport them between worlds. They like Lyramion because it has a lot of shiny things. However, Sariel's sister, Selena, was captured by orcs and imprisoned in their caves to the north. She begged us to free Selena, told us the password the orcs use to get by their magic mouth, taught us the Sylph language, then disappeared herself.

          

Was it necessary for the game to use ALL CAPS?

      

A chest in the room held 2,489 gold, the Baron's chain of office, the second golden goblet, a bundle of silverware, another pair of wishing coins, and another Windpearl.

     

I returned to Spannenberg before moving on to the orc caves, mostly because I wanted to take a break from fighting orcs. I took the chain of office back to Baron George. When he heard our story, he resolved to go apologize to Lady Heidi, his wife, for doubting her story. He gave us another Windpearl as a reward.

   

I took the golden cup back to Canth, the woman who reported it lost, and she gave me her grandmother's brooch. Egil reached Level 8 from solving this quest. I took the brooch to the sage to identify it, and it turns out that it increases charisma by 50. I like the identification system in this game. After you pay a flat fee of 250 gold, you get an eye symbol on the item's stat page. It opens up a separate page that tells you the item's secrets. 

       

I wish there had been such a sage in Dungeon Master.

         

The orc caves were on the east side of the mountains to the north of the Sylph caves. There was a wandering patrol of orcs outside and plenty more inside. I got rather sick of fighting them, again because with "Lame," the combats became boring and predictable.

   

Inside, I gave the password to the mouth (OKNARD, the god of blood) and began exploring. In a previous encounter, an orc chief had indicated that he followed someone named Reg. In the caves, I entered a kitchen where a note gave the recipe for "Dinner for Reg": 10 sheep, 3 pigs, 1 cow, 35 loaves, and 10 barrels of red wine. This was the first hint that Reg was a giant.

      

Or a Skyrim player.

      

Gongs were interspersed throughout the level, and I rang each one I encountered. I imagine they were probably all necessary to open the central chamber and get to Reg. Qamara hit Level 13 (still only one attack!) in some orc battle. 

       

I don't know. I'm enjoying that orc's dancing act.

        

A locked chest, opened with a pick, contained a two-handed sword called Bihander (that was on-the-nose) and some potions. The sword is only equippable by warriors and paladins. I was really hoping for something better for Qamara, who was using a long sword until it broke, then switched to one of the orc's axes. Egil has been doing the heavy lifting in every combat. In a combat with four orcs, for instance, after paralyzing them all, I might have Egil start with the rightmost one while Qamara and Nelvin pick away at the leftmost one. Typically, Egil kills three orcs while the other two are still working on the one. Anyway, if I had been paying attention, I would have realized that Egil's Firebrand is equippable by an adventurer, so I could have given her Firebrand and given Bihander to Egil. I didn't figure this out until much later.

   

Bypassing one locked room we couldn't open, we made our way to the central chamber. Reg, a hill giant, lumbered to life and indicated that he planned to eat us ("raw meat is said to be very healthy"). He attacked with two orcs and an orc chief.

   

Reg was a tough one. He was capable of casting destruction spells like "Winddevil" as well as hitting hard with a sling and club. I naturally tried casting "Lame" in the first round, but the game said he was immune to it. I tried "Sleep," and it worked, so now I know the use of that spell. I paralyzed all of the orcs, killed them, and had my party surround Reg. He woke up at the first blow. Round after round, I chipped away at him while he pounded away at me. I had to have Nelvin feed Egil healing potions every round--fortunately, I had plenty--to keep him alive. 

     

Reg is taller than the orcs, sure, but still not much of a "giant."

         

Nelvin hit Level 8 when Reg died. Reg's loot included only two things that I wanted: his head and a "prison key." A nearby chest contained, oddly, the same set of gear I'd gotten in the undead crypt during the last session: a mage's robe, a Windpearl, and a magic throwing sickle. (Sickles, incidentally, would make the worst throwing weapons. The edge is on the inside of the blade and thus highly unlikely to strike a target.) It also contained a couple thousand gold, and by now I was at maximum encumbrance.

      

This raises the question as to why other slain enemies don't leave heads.

      

The key opened the locked door we'd previously bypassed. We found Selena inside. "Torn wings hang in tatters from her back." The orcs had tortured her by ripping her wings (anticipating Aerie in Baldur's Gate). She said that because her wings were destroyed, she couldn't teleport to wherever her sisters had gone. She asked if she could stay with us instead. "I'm quite a good thief." I was delighted to accept, first because I like the origin story, second because we need a thief, but most importantly because she could help carry the rest of the stuff we otherwise would have had to come back for.

     

As long as you have two arms and a backpack, I don't care what kind of thief you are.

        

We went back to my house and stowed most of our accumulated gold and the extra magic items. My gold total is over ¤20,000, so maybe it's time to spend it on some of those potions. 

   

Back in Spannenberg, the wishing coins got us another point of strength. I returned the giant's head to Baron George, and he rewarded me with 2,500 gold and another copy of Firebrand. That was when I realized my adventurer could use it, so I expect her to start pulling her weight a bit more.

     

Do you want to leave so much resting on "probably"?

         

Some notes:

   

• I was going to complain a bit about the way that each area only seems to feature one or two types of monsters, but I realized that there are positive aspects to this approach. It gives you a chance to hone your tactics. By the time you finish a dungeon, you feel that you're a real expert on fighting that type of monster.

• Spannenberg has over a dozen waypoints for fast travel, but most of the dungeons don't have any. I would have liked to see more, particularly at entrances and exits. Once I've cleared the dungeon, there's no reason to make me navigate back to the entrance.

         

No waypoints on this map.

        

• While I appreciate how much lore the game's dialogue imparts, I think the authors missed a lot of opportunities for dialogue. NPCs only respond to a couple of words--usually words that they themselves have introduced. Selena, for instance, has nothing to say about SYLPH, even though she is one. Neither of the sylphs have anything to say about GOBLET, even though they stole it, or ORCS, even though Selena was kidnapped by them.

• Most of the dungeons seem to show all the enemies in the environment, and once the dungeon is cleared, it stays cleared. Only in Spannenberg have they jumped out of nowhere, and only until those quests were solved. In the top-down outdoor environment, the only random enemies I've encountered are the desert lizards.

• I can't believe I haven't mentioned this before, but I searched my entries and I couldn't find anything. Like its predecessor, I don't believe the game has any sound effects. If it has, it's nothing more than an occasional clank. That's a pretty big omission this deep into the 1990s.

• The swamplily and the tree outside the sylph cave were the first times that anything in the outside world was interactive. I haven't been bothering to try the eye or hand on features in the overland map; I'll have to watch for more opportunities.

• I wouldn't mind if the game was more open-world. One of the things I like about Bethesda's games is that they rarely require some quest-giver to give you a key before you can enter a dungeon and retrieve the artifact. I always enjoy those moments in which you get a quest and then can tell the quest-giver, without leaving the dialogue, that you've already solved it. Ambermoon likes to gate its areas with keys and passwords, but what harm would it have been if I had rescued Selena before meeting her sister, or if I'd found Alkem's ring before he told me about it?

      

Despite a few quibbles, I am enjoying this one. It's been a bit slow to develop, but it maintains a consistent challenge, metes out its rewards at satisfying intervals, and--as I've covered before--feels like a complete RPG in ways that many other titles of the era--including Serpent Isle--do not. I'll probably get annoyed around the 45-hour mark, but for now I'm eager for the next session.

  

Time so far: 27 hours

    

*****

I was playing a little Fallout 4 a few weeks ago and laughing about how much healing you get from some of the Nuka-Cola varieties, particularly Nuka Quantum, which can bring you back from the brink of death. But almost all food has this healing effect. It made me wonder if, pre-war, consumers noticed that their soda fixed their broken limbs or a box of mac-and-cheese caused their wounds to stop bleeding. TV Tropes has an entry about this called "Hyperactive Metabolism."

     

I mention this because YouTuber Search Your Library has created a video titled "Why the %!@# Does Food Heal You?" His primary focus is Magic: The Gathering, but he includes a history of healing food in RPGs. More importantly, he takes the video in some interesting directions, looking at historical, scientific, cultural, and linguistic bases for the notion of healing food. I ended it feeling that I'd learned a lot that I didn't expect to learn going in.

I helped the creator with a question about food in RPGs and told him I'd mention it on the blog. I was waiting for an organic moment (such as an RPG that includes the trope), but it's been a few weeks and it hasn't come up, and I didn't want to lose sight of it. Check it out. I think you'll find it informative and well-produced.