Warriors of Legend: I'll Do You One Better

 

I don't like people who sic their pets on me.

    

As this session begins, we've fully explored Illandria and are ready to try again to find Moc Madure, hiding in some caverns beneath Mount Gunderbad. We already explored the caverns a bit in a previous session, but we were driven away by large trolls. I guess you have to equip the "stone heart" like a shield to kill those creatures. Maybe I missed an NPC back in town who would have told me that. I also wonder if spells might work on them, but I didn't try. There are only a couple of the trolls, in any event.

   

We get access to a few more caves and find more treasure, including a complete suit of mithril, as far as I can tell the best armor in the game so far. I have to wonder if I'm missing something, though. I keep fighting my way to deep caverns and finding +2 swords and Dragon Mail, in the treasure piles, but statistically they don't seem to perform as well as Thor's Hammers, which show up all the time in post-combat loot, and mithril mail, which is sold back in town. Perhaps there's something more complex than just attack and defense power going on. Maybe certain weapons work best against different types of enemies (though the hammers seem to kill things awfully fast) or certain armor protects against different types of attacks. I don't know how you'd determine this.

      

This sounds like a cool item, but it pales in comparison to the "Thor's Hammers" we found during the first hour.

    

As I fight dragons and giant spiders and trolls, it really hits me how ridiculous combat is in this game. You have to left-click on enemies to attack once and right-click to attack repeatedly. Why would you ever just want to attack once? Meanwhile, the first character to attack usually blocks the enemy so it's impossible, with everyone moving, to successfully click again on the enemy with a different character without accidentally clicking the first character. Why is there no "everyone attack the closest enemy" option, or otherwise some kind of auto-attack like in Drakkhen (which this interface roughly resembles)?

      

At least it's easier to click on the giant enemies.

      

Eventually, we find our way to a bridge over a flow of lava. With Brand leading the way, we cross. Halfway across, Brand drops suddenly through the bridge and into the lava. On a reload, I try crossing higher/further to my left, but I end up in the lava even sooner. It takes a few reloads before I can find the right path. If there are any environmental cues, I can't see them.

     

Following each other to the beyond.

       

On the other side of the bridge, the passage winds to a stone door. Behind are passageways to two caverns. Two large dragon heads come out of each of the two passages and start breathing fire, but we're able to make quick work of them. 

     

It looks to me like you guys live uncomfortable lives.

      

The left passage goes to another dragon head and then to a treasure room, where we find a Skeleton Key and some herbs.

   

The right passage goes to Moc Madure, a dragon-headed guy sitting pathetically on a throne. "I don't like people who kill my pets," he says. "Death is too good for you." As soon as dialogue ends, he starts tossing fireballs at us and kills two of the characters almost immediately. My hammers don't seem to do any damage to him at all. I assume the Dragon Sword will kill him, but I have no luck there, either.

   

Finally, I turn to spells. It takes me a bunch of tries, and even after those tries, and later experimentation, I can't quite figure out what's happening with targeting. It's hard to click on the right place with a spell to get it to actually cast. My perception is that it's harder if the spellcaster is holding a shield instead of an ankh or Book of Sorcery, but I could just be imagining. Either way, "Armageddon" doesn't seem to do anything to him. But after about half a dozen attempts, I manage to nail him with a "Flaming Death" spell, which kills him.

      

Right at the moment I hit him. This shot was hard to get.

      

Beyond his throne room is a chamber with an obelisk that holds his part of the Chaos Key, plus another Skeleton Key.

   

By the time I get back to Illandria and sell all my loot, I have enough money for all of the spell scrolls I haven't already bought, so I decide to get serious about investigating the magic system. Spells are created by mixing reagents, and scrolls provide the recipes. I verified that you can't just buy a scroll, check out the recipe, and reload. You have to have had the scroll in your possession at least once. After that, once you record the recipe, you can sell it.

         

"Invisibility" requires powder, mandrake, and berries.

     

There are 17 reagents: dragon's blood, carrot, serpent's eye, ox heart, grain, powder, bone, bat's wing, lion's mane, mandrake, clover, rat's tail, herbs, berries, garlic, mushroom. All but dragon's blood are sold in shops for 5 gold pieces each. You have to get dragon's blood from the dragons in the Mount Gunderbad caves. Annoyingly, each character only has 10 slots for reagents (which stack), so one character can't hold all of them. When you mix reagents into spells, you can fortunately cycle through the characters as you toss them into the cauldron.

   

Aspects of inventory management discourage much spell use. You can only buy reagents one at a time, and you can only mix spells one at a time. There's no way to move all the reagents between characters (as a stack) to speed up the mixing process; you have to move them one by one.

   

Once created, spells are inventory items that can be traded among characters, but I've been having Astrovir do all the casting.

      

My list of cleric spells and their reagents.

      

While I'm running around town collecting scrolls and reagents, I happen to re-visit Sahhar the Sage, who reminds me that I was supposed to find a secret room off of Moc Madure's treasure room. I forgot about that. With a sigh, I head back to the caverns and start testing out my various spells in and out of battle. This is what I can report:

    

• "Cure Poison" and "Heal" (cleric) do what they suggest and work fine.

     

Astrovir cures himself after a battle with a spider.

      

• I figure "Plank" (cleric) must be the solution to crossing the bridge safely, but it's not. When cast, a timer appears at the top of the game window, so clearly it's active, but it doesn't stop me from falling into the lava.

     

It would have been funny if this spell had just made you lie down uselessly for a few minutes.

      

• Similarly, I can't find any use for "Detect" or "Stone Speak" (cleric) despite casting them in a variety of locations.

• I assume "Unlock" (cleric) would have unlocked the doors I've been picking. Since I've already opened them, I can't test it.

    

It does not work on this lock.

      

• "Armageddon" (mage) destroys all enemies on a combat screen. Nice.

       

It does not destroy everybody across the entire world.

     

• "Fireball" and "Flaming Death" both shoot missiles at enemies. The enemies I try them on all die instantly.

    

I nail a guy with a fireball.

     

• "Freeze" also shoots a missile, but it doesn't seem to actually do any damage.

• "Invisibility," as far as I can tell, does nothing.

    

After fighting my way back to Moc Madure's lair and clicking on everything, I still can't find any hidden chamber, so I don't know what Sahhar is talking about. 

     

Sahhar's response to us not having anything for him. Is that another barbarian joke?

       

It's also clear that some of the dialogue in town has changed. (Also, houses have respawned items.) I don't really want to run around talking to everyone again, but where before I had dialogue options relating to Moc Madure, now everything is about the Black Witch. This one guy named Taggazah tells me a long story about her: A little girl was born blind and deaf, so her mother took her out into the woods and left her to be eaten by wolves. Instead, demons took residence in her, healing her sight and hearing, and she became known as the Witch of the Ghoul Forests of Zingara (another Conan reference). As for her real name: "The walls know. The very stones shall shout." And somehow a magic potion will make them speak.

    

He looks like another guy whose torso is cut off, but I think he's just sitting in the chair behind the table.

      

Back on the world map, we head to the ruins. Someone told me the Black Witch would be in the ruins, but I forget who. The Skeleton Key fits in the lock we previously discovered, and a wall section swings open. It takes us into a labyrinth in which we're repeatedly attacked by giant spiders, leaving us poisoned and making us grateful for that spell. 

 

The labyrinth is long and difficult to navigate, with teleporters, buttons, and levers. As with the lava caves, there are rooms with waterfalls and treasures, including a "Resurrection" spell scroll. There are more trolls, but fortunately I still have my Heart of Stone. There are glyphs on the walls in some places, and I try both potions and "Stone Speak" on them but get nothing. There's one place where the number 3-1-5-7 appear on a wall.

       

Another waste of a "Stone Speak" spell.

         

Eventually, I come to a long room full of stone tiles with letters. There are only six letters represented: MAGORH. When I step on the "wrong" one, a snake comes out of the ground and bites me. Through trial and error, I figure the name I'm supposed to be spelling out is GAMORRAH, but it's not that easy. First, if you're on a "G" and there are multiple "A" tiles next to it, the game only wants you to go on one of them; the other triggers the snake. Second, movement isn't precise enough in this game to navigate across such small letters. After taking a ton of damage, I just walk through the rest of it by waiting until I heal, walking a bit, getting bit, then waiting until I heal again. I don't mind. I have plenty of other things to do while waiting.

       

"How do you spell 'GAMORRAH'?"

        

The entrance to the Black Witch's chambers is on the other side. It's guarded by another troll. I kill it and enter her bedroom. "Welcome to my home, sweet children," she says. "You look tired and hungry. Might I have the honor of offering you a nice meal and a soft bed?" The game gives me several snarky responses.

     

Despite the way it's spelled here, I'm 99% sure those tiles wanted GAMORRAH.

     

I choose the second one, and she seems to like it. "You're a cool one. I almost regret killing you . . . Perhaps I shall simply let you defeat me. The centuries weigh heavily on me. Should you prevail, I would like one last jab at Khalimad. I bequeath to you a small detection spell that should prove very helpful. Do your best." (When it's all over, I do not have a detection spell, so I don't know what that was about.)

   

She then attacks. As with Moc Madure, regular weapons have no effect on her, so I start experimenting with spells. It takes me about six reloads, but I find that "Freeze" does the trick. Unfortunately, the process of casting it after combat begins—switch to Astrovir, click on "Inventory," wait for his inventory to load, click on the "mage spells" icon, wait for it to load, select the spell, click on the witch—takes so long that I can't complete it before she's able to kill at least one character. Fortunately, I have "Resurrection" now.

      

I even have a resurrection potion!

      

Just like Moc Madure, the Black Witch has a chamber with an obelisk, a piece of the Chaos Key, and a second key (the Dead Man's Key), plus a treasure chamber with a "True Seeing" potion and some other miscellaneous items. There's no way back except to go across that hateful floor again, which I leave for next time.

    

Why did they all need their own obelisks? It looks like each one alone could have united the pieces.

     

Miscellaneous notes:

      

• The game is dedicated to Catherine Anne Bartz-Todd, a producer for Virgin Games, who had a couple dozen titles to her credit (including Heimdall and Lands of Lore) despite being only 24 in 1993. She died in a motorcycle crash on California's Riverside Freeway on 6 August 1993. It's nice that they dedicated the game to her, but it's a bit morbid that the dedication is the first thing that comes up every time the party dies.

• The "fluffy pillows," which I cited as a mystery last time, come into play if you sleep at an inn. You apparently restore more hit points if you have one in your inventory. The thing is, hit points restore fairly quickly just by standing around, so it's rare that you would need to sleep at an inn (or even use a potion or spell).

• So far, there have been about eight types of weapons and four types of armor, helms, and shields. I have only found one type of footwear: leather boots.

• When I went to play this game the other day, I accidentally fired up Worlds of Legend instead. It made me realize how similar the games are. Both feature fixed parties of four members of different classes. Both seem Conan-inspired in their place and proper names. Both magic systems use reagent mixtures. Both have chaotic combat in which it's hard to click on the right things. Other than that, they're so different that it's hard to see how they could have possibly influenced each other.

• Among the many inventory mysteries are Mana Rings. My guess is that they regenerate mana faster than normal, the same way Regen Rings regenerate hit points. However, there are two colors of them, one regular blue and one dark blue or maybe purple. 

• I heard a couple dozen more barbarian jokes and they still have not repeated. (Best: "What would you get if you crossed a barbarian and a rabbit?" "A slow-breeding barbarian.") I'm sure there have been at least 50 jokes.

     

You guys just never give up.

    

• Stores have limited space and may run out of room as you sell things to them. I don't think they ever lose those items, so I suppose there's a maximum number of items that a player could ever sell. We saw this same limitation in WarWizard. 

       

Your stock room is too full for rings?

     

• Character development has been minimal. Everyone has gained 3 points of strength. My archer gained 2 points of agility from some early-game bow use, my thief 2 points of stealth from her lockpicking, and Astrovir 3 points of intelligence from casting.

    

I enjoy the process of exploring the game's locations. I like its graphics, although I think they make the common 1990s sin of trying to depict more than the resolution is really capable of supporting. But I feel like the authors made some bafflingly bad decisions in matters of interface, inventory, and RPG mechanics—less in a way that feels "rushed" and more in a way that just feels like they didn't know what they were doing. I guess is the norm for Synergistic games, which never seem aware that there's an entire genre going on around them.

     

Time so far: 9 hours