Yendorian Tales: The Night We Brought a Horse into the Bar

"Found guilty?!" There wasn't even a trial!

         

The island of Yendor is in danger from a nebulous source. Its mines, vital to its magic-based economy for their Nuore ore, are overrun with monsters. At a recent presentation, the chief wizard, Zamora, was struck down by a shadowy figure who stole Zamora's orb. The party has agreed to help, and is following clues offered by Zamora's journal to consult with the members of the Society of Wizards. The first one, a hermit named Flagell, demanded that we slay a nearby wyvern before he would help us.

   

The wyvern was on a hill above the hermit's cave. It took me two tries to defeat him. He was capable of a freezing attack across a long distance that took my party members out of the action semi-permanently; to undo it, I had to take them to a healer. Unless I've missed a spell (which is possible—see below), I don't think there's any other way to undo it.

     

The wyvern is briefly "held."

      

He also had a powerful physical attack for characters who got into melee range. On my second attempt, I defeated him partly by lobbing flasks of flaming oil at him (again, more below on that tool) and partly by using the wizard's "Hold Monster" long enough for my melee characters to cross the distance and get into range. He still managed to freeze Alcala, who didn't get any experience from the battle. 

           

Why can't we just put her out in the sun?

       

We returned to Flagell, who said he transcribed a portion of the journal onto a scroll. We got "Flagell's Scroll" in our inventory, but I wasn't able to do anything with it (like read it). He told us to seek The Diplomat next. As we left him, we heard Zamora's voice say: "The first of last is third, and the third of first is last." That sounds like a classic word puzzle, suggesting that some ultimate keyword is going to be:

   

_ _ L _ _ R

 

Of course, we don't know how many letters are between "third" and "last," but my crossword-trained mind already started looking for possibilities: COLOR, SOLAR, BELABOR, CELLULAR, SPLATTER. I guess we need a few more letters.

     

Settle down, Costello.

       

I had no idea where to find The Diplomat, but there were at least nine cites that I hadn't explored, so I figured it was time to leave the starting area. I decided to try to gain one more level before I did, as I didn't know how long I'd be gone or how much of a pain it would be to get back. I spent a couple of hours circling one of the mines, fighting enemies and mining ore to pay for the inevitable training. I was also very low on Nuore and figured I'd have to buy some at some point.

    

When the entire party had the letter "T" next to their names again, I returned to Saccate and sold my equipment and ore. The resulting gold total—more than 25,000—seemed like a king's ransom, but in fact it was barely enough to get my characters to Level 6. 

      

When does this madness stop?

          

While in Saccate and feeling flush, I made the fateful decision to buy a horse. It only cost 200 gold pieces, and I figured it might speed our journey across the land. Ha. Let's see if you can find the problem caused by this pattern of facts:

   

• Nothing visual changes when the party is riding a horse (I say "a horse," but of course it only makes sense if we're riding horses, but the game continually refers to it as a single beast). The party icon is the same.

• It is illegal to ride a horse into a building in town. You have to tie the horse to the hitching post when you first enter town. It took me a while to figure out how to do this; you have to (U)se a rope on the post.

• If you do ride a horse into a building, you're not notified of your crime until you leave town, at which point you're arrested and hauled off to the jail in Mantov, where you must pay a fine or serve a sentence.

        

You must have a helluva strong back.

      

You can see the problem. If you forget to hitch the horse—which of course I did every single time—and then save while you're in town, there's no way to avoid the subsequent arrest and transportation to Mantov. I thus spent the next few hours continually having to walk back to the starting towns from Mantov, which involves crossing a bridge where the party is almost always attacked by trolls.

   

The horse has other problems, too. It's always throwing shoes, requiring the party to visit a blacksmith to replace them. (I confess I don't really know the consequences if we don't do this.) And it's equally easy to forget to (P)ick up the horse from the hitching post when you leave town. As for the benefits . . . I think health and mana restore a bit faster. It doesn't seem to speed up actual travel, though; enemy parties chase me down at the same rate as they did before. All in all, the horse doesn't seem worth it, but I stubbornly kept retrieving it during this session.

    

All the trips to Mantov were good for something. I found a buried chest near the city that had 250 units of Nuore, saving me from having to spend money on it and allowing me to explore my growing spell options.

      

The best chest so far.

       

Until this point in the game, I had mostly just cast the cleric's "Heal" (sometimes "Improved Heal") and the wizard's "Magic Missle" (sic, but an extremely common one). I had tried "Fireball" a few times, which damages a 3 x 3 radius and is duplicated by throwing flasks of flaming oil. As I mentioned, during the wyvern battle I had some success with "Hold Monster." But my spell list had been growing and growing, and I hadn't experimented with anything else to conserve Nuore.

   

Even worse, my spell list had been growing a lot more than I thought. What I had taken for the entire list of spells was in fact only the first page. You have to click the down arrow to see the rest. Instead of 14 spells I'd barely explored, my spellcasters have close to 30. (An exact count is hard because some spells are only available outside of combat, some only in combat, and some in both.) Since the small text file that serves as a "manual" has nothing to say about spells, I decided to try them all against a pack of bridge trolls.

     

The first page of cleric spells. For a while, I thought it was the only page.

      

But before I get into spells, let's talk about combat in general. As I discussed previously, it's very similar to Ultima V in that each character can really only do one thing per round (no "movement points" in this game), and many actions call up a targeting cursor. The actions include:

   

• Moving one space, including diagonals. If the character moves off the edge of the screen, he flees. If the entire party flees, the enemy party disappears from the game map with no penalty. I've used this a lot (no loss of honor in this game!), either because the enemy party was too large or difficult or because I just didn't want to fight right now.

      

This is what we call a "hell, no" situation.

         

• Attacking with either a melee weapon or missile weapon. Characters above a certain dexterity get two attacks. Characters cannot dual-wield like in Ultima V, though, and there are no spiked shields or spiked helms to allow extra attacks. Some melee weapons allow attacking across two spaces.

• Cast a spell. None of the spells, even targeted ones, have range limitations. This means that clerics can heal, "Cure Poison," and so forth from anywhere on the battlefield. I often leave a cleric lingering behind for that reason.

• Use an item. So far, the only useful items to use in combat are potions and flaming oil flasks, which function like the wizard's "Fireball" but for no Nuore cost. I love them. The distance that the character can throw them is based on his strength, which I don't think I've seen before. The flasks themselves come from Ultima, of course, but there they were a single-enemy device that kept burning after the initial toss.

    

Terrain and formation play a reasonably large role in combat. The game does a very good job mirroring the surrounding world terrain on the battle map. Characters can use it to funnel enemies and create defensible space, although rarely can the player plan for a specific terrain when an enemy approaches.

       

We're running out of room.

       

The chests dropped by slain enemies create their own terrain challenges sometimes, alternately screwing up the player's attempt to maintain a defensive line or providing cover from too many enemies at once. You cannot open chests and get rid of them until battle is over. I've had a few situations in which chests completely blocked off the battlefield, requiring me to finish enemies with ranged attacks.

     

As with many RPGs, most of the tactics found in Yendorian Tales come down to spells. This is what I can report so far:

   

Wizard spells:

    

• "Miner's Light": There are two ranks of this spell. I haven't cast it because I have plenty of torches and don't want to waste the Nuore. 

• "Magic Missile": Shoots a weak missile, doing about 1D4 damage. The slingshot the character starts with is equally powerful. Not worth the Nuore expenditure.

• "Thin Skin": Reduces enemy absorption. I suppose it would be a good option at the beginning of a battle with a large number of enemies.

• "Finger of Flame": Another single-target missile spell that does around 2D4 damage. Might have been useful earlier in the game. 

• "Flying Rocks": A missile spell that bounces around the different enemies, doing around 1D6 or 2D4 hit points each. Not bad. 

• "Deep Sleep": Puts every enemy on the map to sleep for a round. Worked on 3/4 bridge trolls. I don't know whether it wears off fast or whether it just wore off because I attacked them.

     

They look so adorable when they're sleeping.

      

• "Distract Monsters": Enemies who succumb to it lose their turn. It worked on about 2/3 of the trolls. 

• "Icy Stare": No staring involved. Just shoots an ice ball. I don't know how much damage it does since it just killed the only enemy I tried it on.

      

Cleric spells:  

    

• "Open Chest": A non-combat spell that safely opens a chest. I hate to spend Nuore on it, but my thief is so inept at disarming them. 

• "Heal": Heals about 2D4 points to a single ally. 

     

The game follows the Ultima convention of classifying wounds as "minor," "severe," "critical," and "near death."

      

• "Sleep": Casts on every enemy and puts them to sleep, but only works on weak targets. "Deep Sleep" is better.

• "Thick Skin": Increases everyone's absorption by a few points. 

• "Minor Wounds": Causes a few points of damage (1D4 maybe?) to literally every enemy on the screen. Wow. I wish I knew about this one earlier; it would have made battles with insects go a lot faster. 

• "Undead Assault": Haven't tried it yet, but there's a more powerful version called "Vanquish Undead."

• "Cure Poison": Does what it says. Since poison causes the player to take damage every round in combat, it's vital to cure it quickly. 

• "Hold Monster": Holds monsters for a couple of rounds. Fails a lot. Not worth it except for single powerful enemies.

• "Bolt of Fire": Shoots a bolt of fire at a single enemy, doing around 2D4 hit points' damage. Doesn't seem worth it. 

• "Poison": Explodes in a 3 x 3 radius and poisons everyone. It causes some immediate damage (maybe 2D6) and then a little bit of damage every round. I like it. 

     

Either "Poison" or "Fireball" goes off amidst some goblins and hobgoblins. They look the same to me.

         

• "Deep Sleep": Same as the wizard spell.

• "Read Scroll": This seems to let the caster use special magical scrolls that you can find. I found one called the Scroll of Holy Rain, but I don't know whether it's a single-use item and I didn't want to waste it here.

• "Improved Health": Heals about 4D4 hit points. A necessary upgrade from "Heal."

• "Arms of Giants": Increases strength on a single ally, either by exactly 6 or I got lucky on a 1D6. Not really worth it in my opinion. 

          

My foes. I was so busy recording spell effects that I didn't think to take many screenshots.

         

Now, I got most of the above from a single large troll battle. When I was done, I was down to 251 Nuore from 320. I still had plenty of spell points. The real problem with spells in this game is Nuore conservation, at least until I'm richer or find a plentiful source. I went in order from lowest to highest, so I didn't get to experience some of the awesome-sounding spells like "Linked Lightning," "Ice Storm," and "Erase Monster" yet. 

        

I general like the combat system, but I wish the authors had come up with a few refinements to speed it up, including having each character auto-target the last enemy or the closest enemy, smaller overall maps (sometimes it takes forever to even get in combat), and the ability to set an "active" character like in Ultima V and VI. Battles do get a bit boring. 

 

The map of the game world suggests three basic sections: The northwest, cut off from the rest of the world by the bridges connecting the island that Helsingor is on; the southwest, including Mantov; and the northeast. Since Mantov was the next logical spot, I skipped the journey by getting myself deliberately sent there. I made the usual rounds, also feeding JOURNAL and DIPLOMAT to every NPC, just in case.

    

• Mantov has an inn, a tavern, a map shop, a mine shop, an armor shop, and fighter training. There is no weapon shop, healer, or alchemy shop.

• The jail takes up a decent part of the eastern quarter. The head jailer is named Floyd, whose wife, Kiri, hangs out in the tavern.

     

And there's one permanent resident.

      

• An armorer named Ian demanded that I buy a round for everyone in the tavern. When I did, the other NPCs all commented on it.

• Most of the NPCs in town are relatively generic miners (Calvin, Zane, Stuart, etc.). I couldn't identify any keywords that elicited anything valuable from them. 

• The armor shop has full plate and silver shields. I'm still wary about spending too much money, particularly since:

• An NPC named Hayes will increase our strength by 4 for 14,000 gold. Abraham will increase stamina by 3 for 12,000. 

     

We definitely have different definitions of "mere."

     

• Gabriel (a woman despite the spelling) sells flowers. I bought one. 

• The map shop offered six new sections of the game world for less than 1,000 gold pieces total. I bought all of them.

      

This sounds like a place where we could get rich or die trying.

         

• I was glad to find a fighter training center. That must mean that the other classes have multiple options for training, and we don't have to wander all the way back to the northwest quadrant. 

• In the fighter training center, a woman named Nola (my favorite name!) said that charisma determines bonus points during training. That's weird. You'd think it would be intelligence. I wish I'd put more points into charisma. 

          

One wonders how "points" appear to the denizens of the game.

      

Miscellaneous notes:

   

• Reasonably good water effects near the hermit's cave. Well . . . maybe not for 1994. I keep thinking of this as an earlier game.

       

Maybe I'm just easy to please.

         

• As I noted in the first entry, weapon and armor items have minimum attribute requirements. Oddly, the requirements for armor are centered on dexterity rather than strength. I had been prioritizing strength for my fighters and dexterity for my thief; thus, my thief is the only character able to (counterintuitively) wear field plate.

      

Are you sure you're a thief?

       

• The little character icons used in battle actually change to reflect current equipment, including a slight glow for magic items. That's a cute touch.

• Taverns serve ale, but it doesn't seem to have any benefit. It does have a small chance of making you drunk, which is yet another crime that you can get tossed into jail for. There's an inebriate named Joseph permanently in the jail because of this law. One wonders how taverns even stay in business.

         

The jailer lays out the incarceration schedule.

      

• I can't remember if I mentioned it before, but you can't actually "fight" in the towns (except Thieves' Guild, where there are no laws). If you try to attack an NPC, he simply says, "Don't waste your time on me!" Then you get arrested when you try to leave town. 

• The Ultima series has me primed to look for hidden NPCs in remote places. Tales mostly eschews that trope, though. There aren't really even any remote places. If it's not an "active" part of town, it's probably blocked off by trees that the player can't get around. The hidden area of the Athaneum basement is an exception, but the only one I've found so far.

        

Shrubbery blocks access to this remote area.

       

As I wrapped up this session, I realized I was really looking forward to the next one. I'm enjoying Yendorian Tales a lot more than I expected when I started it, enough so that I'm not particularly eager to rush to the next game. It offers solid tactical combat, satisfying character development, both a main quest and side quests (if not the most compelling examples of either), and good RPG mechanics all around. It's not only a superior shareware title, but it rivals many commercial titles of the era.

   

Time so far: 13 hours