Betrayal at Krondor: Comin' Round the Mountain

Gorath dreams of a better future.

        

In the last entry, Gorath and Owyn, stuck in the northlands of the Moredhel, had tried to make it to two of three passes leading south. They were both too heavily guarded, so as this session starts, we have to loop all the way around to the west and south, hoping to reach the Inclindel Pass north of Tyr-Sog, although it was impassable the last time we were in the area.

    

Most of the game takes place on fairly linear corridors, bordered by mountains, through which a main road runs. In this part of the world, the "corridor" is quite wide, particularly to the south, so I thought as we headed around, instead of sticking to the road, we'd hug the mountain that lies in the middle of our journey's arc, if that makes sense. 

        

Cullich's text makes sense, but I don't know what that woman modeling her character was doing.

      

The game scoffs at my attempt to avoid notice by having us attacked by goblins and Moredhel almost immediately. Behind them is a little cottage with a well, and when we click on the house, Owyn is astonished when Gorath boldly enters. Inside is a Moredhel woman named Cullich to whom Gorath says, "Your husband is home." Instead of greeting him with warmth, Cullich mocks his fall from grace. It's clear she bought what Murmandamus was selling and is now a full member of Team Delekhan. Gorath offers his vision for the future of the Moredhel, when they're civilized and trade and treat with the Kingdom of the Isles just like the Eledhel elves.

     

I wish Irene and I sounded this sophisticated when we argue.

    

Nonetheless, she still has enough fondness for Gorath to give us some help. Gorath asks her opinion as to what path we should take south--it would be nice if we had come here first--and she directs us to the Inclindel. She also does something that allows Owyn to understand Moredhel and that increases his magic power. Finally, for 800 royals, she teaches Owyn a spell called "And the Light Shall Lie" that will disguise him as a Moredhel when we enter Moredhel towns. Not that this has been a problem so far.

    

I have to say, I found the writing superior in this section. Both Gorath and Cullich made some excellent points, used apt metaphors, and otherwise engaged in a level of dialogue rare to RPGs of the era.

        

Cullich explains why she's charging us.

    

Moving on, we continue hugging the mountain, but it's a bad choice. We run into so many parties of Moredhel and ogres in a row that Owyn is soon "near death" again. There are literally like five battles within the space of a few steps. We find some minor treasures, including a skill book called Kalem's Dialectic that we must have already read because it does nothing.

       

One of many battles during this section.

      

Eventually, we're on the west side of the mountain heading south, but before long, the gap narrows, and the mountains crowd up to the main road again just as we see the city of Harlech. Owyn casts "And the Light Shall Lie" as we get near, and Gorath confirms that it worked. We have to refresh it frequently as we explore the town.

   

Knocking on one door, we find Delekhan's son, Moraeulf. Gorath tries to pass himself off as a messenger from Delekhan, saying that Moraeulf is to round up The Six and join the search for Narab. He also teases out some intelligence that Delekhan's ultimate goal is to free Murmandamus from a Kingdom prison. Again, the official line is that Murmandamus died at Sethanon in the book, so it's unclear whether Delekhan knows something we don't, whether he's just making it up to unite the clans, or whether something else is going on.

       

These "Six" get more mysterious by the day.

     

The only other building open is a tavern called The Point, but nothing much is happening there. Keeping Owyn's disguise up, we make our way out of town to the south. Cullich only promised that it would work in Harlech, and sure enough, when we reach the next ambush of three Moredhel and two goblins, we're forced to fight. It occurs to me that perhaps this chapter was meant to be a "stealth" chapter, in which case I'm really bungling it. I've left more bodies on the road in this one chapter than in the previous three combined.

    

We fight three or four more battles, one at practically every junction, as we continue south. In between battles, I typically take a potion or use a magic item to prepare for the next one. The nice thing about this game is that when you use a magic item, it doesn't wear off until the next battle, no matter how far in the future that is. There are a lot of items to use. There are potions, like Dalatail Milk, which adds to your defense; Fadamor's Formula, which adds to your strength; and Redweed Brew, which adds to your melee accuracy. Owyn gets Lewton's Concentrate, which adds to casting accuracy. There are lots of items to apply to weapons, including Naphtha (adds fire damage), clerical oilcloths (enhances damage), and Silverthorn (poisons). There are items to add to your armor, but these mostly protect against effects that are somewhat rare, like frost or enchanted blades. Anyway, almost every battle or treasure chest delivers a few more of these items, so you don't need to really conserve them.

        

Gorath forgets we're not in Prince Arutha's lands.

      

There are several slain Moredhel at the junction of a road heading west, so out of curiosity we take it to the fortress city of Armengar, which features prominently in A Darkness at Sethanon. Prince Arutha finds Guy du Bas-Tyra, assumed up to this point to be a villain, in charge of the city. Shortly afterwards, Murmandamus attacks and destroys it. In the game, the Moredhel have set up a shop and a tavern in the ruins. The shop sells herb packs and restoratives, for which I never seem to run out of need. I typically have an herb pack going at all times. 

    

In the tavern, we meet a Moredhel named Irmelyn who isn't a fan of Delekhan. His friend Obkhar has been kidnapped by the Six and tossed into the Naphtha Mines. Gorath--certainly not acting on my instructions--asks what Irmelyn can offer if we free him, and Irmelyn replies lots of gold. Delekhan tells him to get the gold together, as if we don't have more pressing things to do. I mean, I'm usually up for a side quest, but I'd like to make that choice, Gorath.

        

Dude, I agree with you, but maybe you want to keep your voice down.

      

There's an entrance to the Naphtha Caverns from the city, so we take it, but it's just a menu screen on which we find a bunch of Naphtha, making Gorath sick in the process. I'm not sure where the Nahptha Mines are--maybe back north on the part of the road between Sar Sargoth and Harlech that we skipped.

           

This is another situation in which your characters can nearly die but you don't find out until you've exited the menu screens.

      

We keep moving south. A side road leads to a store called Children of the Green Heart, which sells adventuring supplies, including herb packs and restoratives. I can't complain that this chapter doesn't give us plenty of opportunities to buy healing items. 

  

The next battle is with two goblins and one Moredhel warrior, which ought to be easy, but Owyn, despite having a casting accuracy of 100%, accidentally nails Gorath with a "Fetters of Rime" meant for a goblin. That means Owyn has to take out the three enemies on his own, which he mostly does with his Lightning Staff.

     

Enemies guard the third and last bridge.

       

We get excited as we near the Inclindel pass, only to find it guarded by Moredhel who demand "the password from Moraeulf." We spoke to him, but he didn't give us any type of password. Fortunately, the game lets us just fight the group of three Moredhel warriors and two highland ogres. Owyn has enough stamina for a full-strength "Evil Seek," which as usual does wonders.

    

We cross a bridge but face another battle against Moredhel warriors and goblins. On the other side of them, a Kingdom guard named Finn comes trotting up the pass, demanding to know what Owyn is doing with a Moredhel. Owyn demands that Finn take them to Prince Arutha in Dimwood Forest. "Why would he want to see a boy and a Moredhel?" Finn demands. Owyn, lacking time or patience to explain the real story, just says that Arutha sent us to spy on the Moredhel. "They'd never suspect a scrawny nineteen year old boy and a Moredhel."

     

Why are you bringing my mother into this?

      

Finn buys the story, and Chapter 4 transitions to an end as Gorath and Owyn reach Arutha's camp and show him the plans. Arutha is skeptical: "How can I believe this scroll you have given me is the genuine article and not a forgery trumped up by Delekhan?" Owyn delivers a pass phrase that James gave us, and Arutha concedes. Like James, he is concerned that Delekhan hasn't designated enough men to successfully seize Northwarden, so he wonders what the strategy is. "Honestly, he has never displayed that kind of wit." Arutha asks us to go on to Krondor to apprise Master Magician Pug of the situation.

         

This was a well-composed cut scene.

       

Chapter 5, "When Rivers Run Blood," begins from James's perspective. He and Seigneur Locklear are in Northwarden. James has told Baron Gabot about the coming attack, but Gabot is more concerned that his magical adviser, Patrus (who we met in Chapter 3), has gone missing with Nighthawks in the area. James and Locklear head out to recover the mage, and they find him toying with a Moredhel spy.

     

What spell is this and why isn't it in your spellbook?

      

As we get control of the game, the party comprises James, Locklear, and Patrus. James has all his equipment from Chapter 3, and I guess Locklear has the equipment I left with him in Chapter 1, but obviously that's not such good equipment anymore. Patrus has a Lightning Staff and Standard Kingdom Armor. His spellbook is much poorer than Owyn's, although it has both "Evil Seek" and "Fetters of Rime." James has the party's money from Chapter 3, so if we find a store, we'll be in good shape.

     

Locklear kept all of his stuff. And the mustache.

       

Our goal is to "defend Northwarden!" We're just to the south of it, so we head up the road. I soon have cause to regret not spending more of James's money on restoratives when I had the chance. We face three battles back to back, each with at least a couple of Moredhel spellcasters (who start far away) in addition to witch hags, goblins, and sentinel ogres. It sucks when enemy spellcasters hit you with "Fetters of Rime." I have to reload twice because someone keeps getting knocked out, and I don't think the urgency of this chapter is in line with resting for days to recover from "near death" status.

    

But eventually, we make it to Northwarden, where the shop sells herb packs and restoratives as well as a suit of Dragon Plate for Locklear.

      

That looks like a relatively defensible position.

     

When we're done, we visit Baron Gabot in the great hall. He explains that two of his field captains have been found dead. "That leaves me with one garrison company and two field companies operating under green commanders." He wants us to "find ways to slow down or stop the oncoming enemy companies," which the scouts estimate at 1,500 Moredhel. I would have thought Gorath and Owyn killed that many. Gabot thinks Nighthawks have infiltrated the troops, and when the siege begins, they'll slaughter their way through the command structure.

      

But with all those medals you've won, surely we'll be victorious.

     

Gabot tells us to go find Duke Martin, a major character from the two Magician books. When the books begin, he is Duke Borric's Huntmaster, but he later finds out that he's the bastard son of Borric himself and the older brother to Lyam and Arutha. When the king dies during the Riftwar, Borric's house is next in line, and there's a tense moment where Martin nearly challenges Lyam for the throne but ultimately backs down to become Duke of Crydee.

       

He does not, under any circumstances, look like this.

     

Gabot can't tell us where Maritn is--just outside the castle somewhere--but he also asks that we look for the minstrel, Tamney. "It will work against the morale of the men should he remain absent."

   

It takes us a while to find Martin south of where we started. He and James exchange pleasantries and he gives James and Locklear some bow training. As our first mission, he asks us to find fairy chests in the area (which the Moredhel use for storage; they only reason we've been able to interpret the riddles so far is that Gorath has been with us), figure out how to open them, and poison any rations inside.

    

The text on a fairy chest when there's no one to translate it.

     

It was useful for Owyn and Gorath to have the spyglass, but now I wish James had it. At least he has the Coltari poison.

    

We try going north at first, but all we find in that direction is endless battles with goblins. After we win three of them and there are still goblins in view, I assume it's not possible to clear them. 

    

Why is Patrus taking on all the enemies himself?

       

Not far from where we met Martin, we're ambushed by three witch hags and two goblins. The party starts in the weirdest configuration sometimes, with Locklear and James together on the far left of the screen and Patrus by himself on the far right. We make short work of them regardless and find three fairy chests nearby, which I'm sure I've already opened. I consult my notes and see that I mentioned them a couple of entries ago. The passwords are DOOR, OUTSIDE, and ONION.

     

Patrus looks like Ebeneezer Scrooge fighting in his bed clothes.

     

Patrus has to cast the "Union" spell to read the text. There's nothing in any of the chests, including no rations, and I can only assume that's because we looted them earlier. I end up poisoning some of my own rations and leaving them in the chests, which I hope is good enough. 

   

Applying poison to some rations.

    

My notes don't mention any other fairy chests in the area, so I head back to Martin. He next wants us to find Tamney, and of course we have no idea where to even start. The closest town is Dencamp-on-the-Teeth, so we decide to go there. There are so many battles on the road with Moredhel, goblins, witch-hags, ogres, and the like that we make slow progress. Both James and Locklear get poisoned in one battle, and lacking any means of curing it, I go all the way back to Northwarden to buy Silverthorn anti-venom.

    

The Moredhel will pay for this.

       

There are Moredhel in Dencamp-on-the-Teeth, too. When we clear them, we visit the tavern. A patron talks about a bard who played there recently, and the description is clearly Tamney. He was looking for a place to sleep and someone told him about a nearby barn. We can't get the door open, so we have to buy some Fadamor's Formula at a nearby shop.

   

We muscle the door open and find Tamney the Minstrel. He's scared to return to the castle, not believing he can do any good there. The others try to convince him that a minstrel's songs can make the difference in battle, but he's still on the fence about going back. He wants us to retrieve a pattern stone, which can foretell the future, from the nearby Diviner's Halls. Yeah, that seems like a good use of our time.

     

Tamney makes a good point.

     

I guess we're about halfway through the game at this point, with the titular betrayal coming up in the next chapter. I was really hoping to get there this entry, but games stop being fun when you push them too hard, so I think I'll stop here and just look forward to another dungeon next time.

    

Time so far: 49 hours