Ambermoon: Creature Feature

"'Cause this is thriller, thriller night . . ."

         

The first time I play a game, I like to do it organically. I adopt attitudes, priorities, dialogue responses, and other choices that seem to me consistent to the character I'm playing. There are times that I miss content using this approach, or end up with a less-challenging game, but I figure that if I like the game enough on the first go, extra content and extra challenges are what replays are for. If I don't like it enough to replay it, then it probably wasn't a good use of my time trying to find every hidden nook anyway.

   

In replays, to increase the level of serendipity as well as the overall challenge, I sometimes let Siri make my decisions with random numbers. A few months ago, I was playing Fallout 4 again, and I randomized everything from what quest I did next to what perks I took on leveling up. This approach created some interesting challenges. I ended up going to Far Harbor while I was still in my teens, level-wise, and I had to pass by innumerable locked chests, doors, and computers because I never developed those skills. My randomness had me choose "Aquaboy" for an early perk--something I never would have chosen on my own. It lets you breathe underwater and avoid radiation damage from water. I soon found that you can negate most of the danger of getting from one place to another (I was playing on survival) by simply taking water routes. It was a fun style of play for a while.

       

Blah, blah, blah, here's the library I talk about later.

              

Even though I'm playing Ambermoon for the first time, once the world opened up and I had a ship, I decided to try some of that randomness for a bit. I numbered each of the game's islands, generated a random number . . . and rolled the island that the game wanted me to visit next anyway, the one with Newlake. You may wonder why I didn't just re-roll, but I figure if I allow myself to do that, I'm not randomizing anything anymore, I'm choosing.

   

Before I sailed the ship to the central island, however, I took some time to figure out the scope of the game world. First--groan--it wraps. Seriously, by 1993 that ought to have been a thing of the past. Realistic game worlds don't pretend that you can literally explore the entire world, let alone sail its circumference in a day. I'm curious what the last CRPG is that does this. I don't want to be hearing about goddamned toruses for the rest of my blogging career. 

        

At the origin of all things.

        

Second, the coordinates go to 800 x 800, which has some interesting implications. The coordinates in Amberstar only went to 400 x 400, so the world has adopted a new coordinate system in the intervening years, and, more to the point, the physical game world has four times as many tiles as its predecessor. Second, that means the real game world is square, in contrast to the map, which is a third wider on the horizontal axis than the vertical. Then again, maybe the tiles themselves are rectangular. It's hard to tell.

   

We reached the island, and I burned a day circling it looking for a dock. I didn't find one, but fortunately the game lets you sail the ship right up to shore and disembark. Using the map, I found my way to Newlake without any problem.

    

A new city. I wonder if it will have all kinds of problems for us to solve?

    

I braced myself for some disaster as I entered, but fortunately Newlake seemed trouble-free. There was the usual selection of shops and services--blacksmith (repairs), tavern, healer, food, general store. Some NPCs roamed the streets. Their rumors were:

     

• Undead have been stirring in Newlake's crypt. The baron ordered it sealed and personally carries the key.

• If I visit the main library, I should look around very carefully. "Who knows what secrets the library holds?"

• No one who has gone to join the Brotherhood of Tarbos has ever been seen or heard from again. Something is not quite right at their temple. 

       

Who would have thought that suspicious things were happening at a temple dedicated to a demon who once tried to destroy the world?

     

• A town guard reports having visited the temple once on the baron's business. He happened to see a huge demon in the center of the hall.

• The whirpool west of Godsbane used to carry people to an underground cave [ed. as in Amberstar], but the cataclysm blocked the cave entrance, so now the whirlpool just tears you to pieces.

      

The baron's house is in the northwest corner of town, surrounded by statues to Shandra, Monika, and Eric the Great. Shandra is the wizard from Twinlake (the former name of Newlake) in the first game; I'm supposed to be trying to contact his spirit. "Eric the Great" and "Monika" are not characters from the first game (unless I missed something) but rather references to designer Erik Simon and artist Monika Krawinkel. The baron himself is named Karsten, after designer Karsten Köper.

       

If Lord British gets away with it . . .

       

Baron Karsten's house, unlike Baron George's in Spannenberg, is a 3D dungeon. When I first entered, I took a peek into a side chamber rather than head up the main hall. I was immediately attacked by a "guard golem." I couldn't do anything to the guy. He was immune to most spells, and at best, I could get him down to 241/350 hit points before he started killing my characters.

         

The results of the useful "Monster Knowledge" spell.

      

After a couple of feeble attempts, I reloaded and marched directly for the baron's chambers. I caught him in his bedroom. He immediately started complaining about the Brotherhood of Tarbos, whose temple is east of Newlake, on the same island. (If I'm reading the map correctly, the brotherhood's temple actually occupies the original site of Twinlake; Newlake was just undeveloped woodland in the original game.) Scouts he has sent to the temple fail to return, and the head priest has threatened to cause trouble if the baron meddles in their affairs. He encouraged us to launch our own investigation. On a more immediate matter, he asked if we would clear out the crypt so that pilgrims can visit Shandra's grave again.

   

We gave him the painting that Master Rottermund had given to us in Burnville. This resulted in an absurd experience point reward, enough to raise Qamara seven levels. She got a second attack per round while Egil got a third. He also gave us 15,000 gold. This all made me glad I came to Newlake despite my initial desire for a random destination. The game probably assumes we got this extra experience when calibrating later encounters.

     

Qamara gets 40% stronger for delivering a painting.

      

Baron Karsten mentioned that he was writing a book called Ambermoon, and indeed we found the draft in his chest. The only words so far were "ONCE UPON A TIME." Later, we noticed the painting we had delivered hanging in the main hall--it's the box cover for the game.

     

A cute bit of world-building.

       

With our new powers, we had an easier time taking on the guard golems. They were guarding some pretty cool treasure, including a pair of Lightning Boots (increases speed) and an Anti-Magic Ring.

   

We took the baron's key and unlocked the crypt. There was a statue of Bala, goddess of death, in the main room. The crypt had roving parties of undead, including skeletons, zombies, and ghouls. They attacked in batches of 10, the largest parties we'd faced so far. I got a lot of use out of "Magic Arrows," which hit every enemy in a single line, and the three Holy Horns I'd been toting around. Sabine was capable of three castings of "Destroy Undead," each of which deals with one foe. Despite their numbers, the monsters were relatively easy to kill.

      

The underground mechanism that this activates must be impressive.

      

Another crooked cross, when straightened, opened the way to a secret area containing Shandra's coffin. This area had another large undead party, this time with a couple of banshees. I'm not sure what they were capable of because I was able to destroy them in the first round with one "Destroy Undead" and two Holy Horns.

    

As we approached Shandra's coffin, a voice said, "REMEMBER SHANDRA!" We used Shandra's Stone near the coffin. A misty figure appeared and spoke to us, introducing himself as the "Essence of Shandra." He warned us that Lyramion was in great danger. "You must go to the Temple of the Brotherhood of Tarbos as quickly as you can.  Everything else will be decided by your fate there." It continued that the coffin contained a key to a secret door in the Main Library in Newlake. In the room behind the door, we would find a recipe. Without it, we will not get into the temple.

     

After 40 hours: the main quest.

    

I had actually found the library before any of the other buildings, but I couldn't finish exploring it without the key. The library has numerous bookshelves in several rooms, and searching the shelves provides an occasional result. There were three books of note. The Last Paladin discussed Gryban, our first companion in Amberstar, who had himself put in a magical slumber in Godsbane. He "awaits the day when he is needed again to fight against the darkness." Apparently, there are no more paladins around, though I'm not sure why.

      

Report on the Wind Gates of Lyramion answered some of my questions about the necklace and Windpearls I've been finding. The complete necklace allows passage through 12 pairs of wind gates, but you need 12 pearls to create a full chain. I only have 11. When I have the twelfth, I need to visit the Wind Shrine on the Island of Winds. The book also says that a rod made of Xenobil wood coupled with a gem can, at the Wind Shrine, be formed into a Rod of Construction, which will repair damaged wind gates.

       

Part of a long treatise on wind gates.

      

The Book of Herbs discusses several reagents available in the land, including the Swamp Lily, which we already used to cure the girl's disease in Spannenberg; Kalmir Herb, which grows on the "island on the artificial lake south of the Tower of Lebab"; and the Fire Thistle, which grows in the hills at the northern end of Mera's Island.

   

In addition to these books, the library had an unbelievable number of scrolls. It had stacks of up to a dozen for all spellcasting classes. (They included "Repair Item" and "Resurrection," so neither death nor weapon breakage is an automatic reload.) I was just barely able to carry them all. My policy for the time being is not to memorize any spells as long as I have more than one scroll capable of casting it. I need to clear some of these out. 

       

One of several scroll caches.

      

The "recipe" that Shandra wanted us to find was for a spell called "Demon's Sleep," apparently necessary to get rid of the demon guarding the Temple of the Brotherhood of Tarbos. (It is "so powerful that even the greatest magician on Lyramion has no chance against it.") It requires a Fire Thistle, a flint stone, a Swamp Lily, a red mushroom, a blue mushroom, Kalmir Herb, and an empty phial. It must be "brewed in the cauldron of a witch or witch master." The text breaks off just as it's about to tell us something important: "But you must ensure that . . ."

[Here begins a lot of paragraphs with no screenshots because I had just come off a session of Warriors of the Eternal Sun, where the screenshot command is CTRL-F12, and I forgot I had mapped it to DEL in WinUAE.]

Because of The Book of Herbs, I know where to find some of these things. I assume a flint stone is from a regular flint & iron kit. I think I have at least one mushroom back in my house, and I think in the last game, I found others for sale in either Illien or Gemstone. I don't know where to find a witch or witch master, but it would make sense to try the old Gray Wizards tower, or maybe the Temple of Sansri. Overall, I have a cogent reason to visit almost all of the islands.

Before leaving this island, though, I decided to check out the Temple of the Brotherhood, just because Shandra encouraged me to visit quickly. It turns out, I can't even approach it. It's on an island in the middle of a lake, and the island is surrounded by a ring of choppy water that I can't pass on my magic disc. I'll need to get a boat into the lake somehow or find another mode of transportation capable of crossing rough water.

   

We were bursting with training points and money, so I decided to do a quick circuit of the trainers (I've found trainers for everything except "Searching") and spend some of both. As I did, I noticed a curious thing: Most of my characters are already at their top levels with useful skills. By the time I was done, for instance, Qamara had maxed "Attack," "Read Magic," and "Use Magic." Nelvin and Sabine had maxed all three, too. Selena the thief has a few extra skills to learn, but she's pretty close. I don't know what I'm going to do with the extra points I have. I guess I could pour them into "Parry" and "Swimming," but I don't get the sense that these are useful skills. 

I visited home, stored some stuff, and grabbed an extra Swamp Lily and empty phial that I'd picked up. I also took the mushroom, which could be red or green.

      

Back on the boat, I took stock of my open quests, hints, and rumors:

   

• Go to Illien and check out rumors of the city having troubles with the disciples of Sansri. 
• Visit the Master of the Forest on an island east of Burnville (where the map shows no islands), where there are Xenobil trees that I need for the Rod of Construction.
• Visit any of the cities, looking for Windpearls or mushrooms.
• Go to the Island of Winds when I have one more Windpearl.
• Check out whether that whirlpool really does kill you.
• Visit Gryban, the last paladin, in Godsbane, and maybe wake him up.
• Get the Fire Thistle on Mera's Island
• Get Kalmir Herb at the island with the Tower of Lebab.
• Find a witch.

  

I went back to my original plan, rolled a random number, and got the second quest. Again, the map shows no island east of Burnville. There are several possibilities: it's there but not on the map; it's there but hidden behind the compass on the map; by "east," the NPCs meant so far east that you wrap around on the other side of the map, and it's actually the island labeled Waldreich, which would make sense thematically.

   

The island in question is quite large, and the map doesn't give any indication of where things are to be found. (Most of the islands have obvious towns, buildings, or cave entrances.) Trying to explore it systematically drove home how hard it is to get anywhere in this game, constantly bonking into things that look like you ought to be able to pass them. I found out that the magic disc apparently takes up a couple of tiles while the character icon only takes up one, so there are lots of places you can't access with the disc.

      

It took a long time to explore all that forest.

    

The first place I found was a dungeon entrance upon a northern mountain. Inside, it was titled "Beast's Cave." I wasn't long inside before I was attacked by a trio of imps. They were easy enough, but the next party had six or seven of them. They were nasty, capable of "Cause Disease," "Poison," "Drug," "Fear," "Cause Aging," "Cause Blindness," and "Madness" among damage spells, and they resisted spells cast against them. Fortunately, I'd just found a pile of scrolls to reverse most of those status effects, many of which can only be cured in camp. 

       

Not the message you want to see when you're overloaded on scrolls.

       

I should mention that all of these statuses have a symbol that appears next to the character portrait (it cycles through multiple symbols if the character has multiple effects). "Drugged" hilariously has a marijuana leaf. It is the only status effect that messes up the interface. When you select a "drugged" character, the screen starts flashing psychedelic colors and the cursor starts agitating all over the place, making it hard to click on anything.

     

Nelvin is poisoned; Qamara is high.

     

There were only three imp battles, and I found nothing else in the cave, so I left, assuming it was a side quest.

   

It was a long, tedious, frustrating slog through featureless forest before I found the next point of interest: a hut on the top of a hill. We entered and found ourselves speaking to Norel, a ranger. He said he was looking for his apprentice, Kay. At this point, we realized we had misinterpreted the clue that the Forest Master was "looking for an apprentice." He went on to say that he thought Kay was dragged off by a beast--which lives in a cave "at the north end of the island." That's all right. This sort of thing happens in open-world games.

     

This kind of quest is more up our alley than becoming druids.

     

He offered a key to his weapons cupboard, where we found a magical throwing axe, an Elfbow, and 89 magical arrows. I gave the bow to Valdyn. 

   

On a return trip to the Beast's Cave, we found a secret room in the center that I had missed the first time. I'm not sure whether it was inaccessible or whether I just overlooked it. The Beast, labeled simply "beast," attacked as soon as we entered. He was a large, tough creature, capable of some damaging spells along with three brutal physical attacks per round. Fortunately, he wasn't immune to magic himself. Having decided I was going to replace Firebrand with a magical throwing axe for Qamara, I spent the combat burning the rest of the sword's "Fireball" spells. I killed him in about four rounds.

      

He certainly looks like a "beast." No false advertisements there.

         

In a plot twist I 100% saw coming, the Beast had Kay's necklace on his corpse. After combat, the Beast's corpse turned into a young man, who then decomposed swiftly into a skeleton.

   

I returned the necklace to Norel, who seemed shocked that Kay was the Beast. To thank us, he gave us a stick made out of Xenobil wood.

      

We'll keep those weapons, too.

      

I figured I might as well finish exploring the island. I took another 20 minutes to look around the part jutting off the southeast, and I found another dungeon. It was labeled "Donner's Old Labyrinth." But it had an impassable locked door at the entrance, so we noted the coordinates and left.

          

This dungeon existed in Amberstar; it was the home of a dwarf named Donner.

     

I'll keep picking away at the list. I also really need to start experimenting with spells. As I've been doing with my Serpent Isle entries, I think I'll start closing these posts with the results of my experiments.

   

This was an enjoyable session except for all of the poking around the vast forest. The outdoor areas of the game really don't have much purpose except to make you hunt for the indoor areas. As a commenter recently pointed out, except for the desert lizards on the first island, plus a couple of scripted encounters near the orc caves, wilderness combats are either nonexistent or rare enough that they might as well be. Nothing seems to attack you on the water, either. Balancing the annoyance of outdoor movement, the dungeons have had the decency to be compact and quick. I was worried they were all going to be multi-level monstrosities like grandfather's basement. Maybe there will be more of these in the future, but lately they've been hitting just the right length.

 

Time so far: 44 hours