Pagan: Super Green

It would be nice if this door would just stay open.

         

I start this session by returning to the Upper Catacombs, which I don't think I fully explored last time. Following the rightmost wall pattern, I first come to a door to the Lower Catacombs. It's locked, but it opens with my Key of the Scion, which being a staff instead of an actual key, doesn't go on the same key ring that I can use for every other key.

    

The Lower Catacombs that I enter do not seem to be the same place I visited before (by falling down a pit). It's a maze of  columbaria and bones, cracked floors showing lava underneath, fireballs shooting constantly from hidden spouts on the walls (why?). Levers open gates as I move forward. Skeletons stand as sentinels against the walls but rarely attack.

      

This doesn't seem right.

        

Continuing to follow the right wall, I come across a door flanked by two skeletons and a fireball spitter. The door closes as I get near, but I'm able to open it again. Unfortunately, I cannot get through it. In the game's perspective, the open door blocks the passage beyond, so I cannot see whether there's actually an opening or just a blank wall. I try jumping for some reason, and it works, sending me soaring through the door and into a room with multiple treasure chests, flasks of oil, and weapons. The chests have banal things like helmets, more oil flasks, and shields—until I open one full of magical weapons, including a copy of the Slayer mace I've been carrying for multiple sessions. Is this some kind of cheat room? If so, the player ought not to be able to stumble into it so carelessly. I'm on the verge of letting myself take a magic shield when I realize I have no way out of the room. I don't want to navigate back here, so I reload from outside of the room and continue. 

    

Twenty minutes later, I'm so annoyed by the Lower Catacombs' constant fireballs, lava pools, skeletons, one-way gates, and twisty passages that I just reload from the beginning of this session, undoing all my progress. Why am I bothering to explore anyway? My character is already at max statistics and has more money than he knows what to do with.

   

I re-enter the Upper Catacombs and this time head right for the Birthplace of Moriens. When I unlock the door with the Key of the Scion and enter, it seems I've been teleported to an entirely different dungeon. An altar with some sparkly lights above it has a plaque reading: "The Birthplace of Moriens"; it seems odd to me that he was born on an altar in the catacombs.

 

His parents were into some kinky stuff.

     

I continue exploring this area and find the remains of some previous adventurer. Based on a letter and a book found in his backpack, I gather his name was Trecaste. He was sent on a mission from someone  named Drokar to find the ancient Zealan shrines to the gods of emotion, "which could be the key to freedom." The shrines were mentioned in a book written by someone named Yradan the Scholar. Drokar warned Trecaste that "the agents of the Titans, both human and otherwise, are numerous."

      

A large set of double doors exits this tomb to the east, where I enter a twisty earthenwork cavern. Encounters here:

   

• Spiked balls rolling back and forth across the corridor in several places. I try to avoid them and of course manage to walk into them every single time.

     

Just what the dungeon needed.

       

• Five levers surrounding a fenced-off chest. "Do not go near that, Avatar," the Guardian advises as I approach. When I pull one of the levers, the others all activate in a particular order. I watch the order, figuring I will have to replicate it. But as soon as I pull the first one, the gates lower and I have access to the chest, which has a single key to a nearby double-door. I don't know what the other levers were for. When I try a couple, it just sets off traps, so I leave them alone and continue on.

      

This was easier than it looks like it should have been.

       

• A chest has something called the Skull of Quakes. It seems to be a usable item, as I get a targeting cursor when I double-click it. 

• A gate that I cannot figure out how to open, so I have to approach the area from a different direction.

        

Never figured this one out.

       

• This different direction involves a room with a maze of one-way gates. I'm able to avoid a lot of them by climbing up to a platform and just jumping over them, although that's perhaps the intended solution.

     

I feel like I should be able to leap over these fences.

         

• The maze dead-ends in a gravestone that reads "AMRAZHAR. BY THE ANCIENT ONES, HE IS MET." I'm about to turn around and go back (to where?) when I realize that a nearby table has a vial of blood, a pile of blackmoor on it, and an empty pouch. These are the two reagents needed for "Open Ground," the spell that opens passages in stone walls. Figuring that's too specific to be a coincidence, I mix the spell and cast it. Instead of a hole opening in the wall, a pit opens in the ground. It then takes me longer to figure out how to finagle the game into actually letting me jump into the pit than it took to solve the puzzle in the first place. 

• A bunch of locked doors that none of my keys open. 

        

The Avatar can see that this pit goes straight through to the next floor, but I cannot.

         

I arrive at a room with a table and a bunch of colored "rolling spheres," like billiard balls, some on the table and some on the floor. There's also a skull on the floor. A closed gate is shut nearby. I spend a good half an hour in this room, trying to figure out what to do. Double-clicking on the balls causes them to skitter away from the player, and if they hit another ball, they carom in a predictable direction. The physics are fun, but to what end? What do the colors mean? Can I even see all of them?

      

I spent forever trying to bonk the balls into the skull, trying each color, then trying each color off of a different color. I try shooting the balls under the gate, which doesn't work. Finally, I'm at my wit's end. I open my browser to search for a hint, then I figured if I'm going to do this, I might as well do it right. I download the official cluebook and search for a hint there. Do you know what the answer is? To throw one of the balls (which the book calls "marbles") onto the raised platform beyond the gate. That's it. None of the colors or physics or the number of balls has anything to do with it. Meanwhile, there's nothing about the platform that says "throw something up here." This may be one of the worst CRPG anti-puzzles ever designed.

         

Someone needs to suffer for this.

      

The area beyond has chests and barrels with a bunch of reagents, almost 250 obsidian coins, and two keys. One of the keys opens one of the doors in my backpath, but there's nothing behind it but bones and trash.

   

I next come to a puzzle involving three stairways with three pressure plates in front of them. In contrast to the "rolling ball" puzzle, this one I ultimately find tough but fair. Some experimentation shows that:

   

• Each stairway has four steps. 

• The rearmost step can be up to four steps high. The third step can be up to three steps high, and so forth. 

• Stepping on each plate affects the stairway in front of it. 

• The first time the Avatar steps on a plate, it lowers the forwardmost step in the associated staircase by its current height.

• The second time he steps on a plate (whether the same one or a different one), it raises the rearmost step that is not currently raised by the same height.

• However, no step can be higher than the step behind it. Nothing happens in that case.

   

I hope that makes sense. The overall goal is to slowly transfer the stairs from the rightmost staircase to the middle staircase, using the leftmost staircase as a kind of holding place. Solving the puzzle felt very familiar. At first, I thought it was like playing solitaire and transferring cards between stacks so you can put the cards you want in the correct order. It is a bit like that, but my memory was more atavistic than that. Suddenly, I recalled a toy I had when I was a kid—maybe when I was four or five years old—involving three pegs with fat plastic rings around them, with the goal to transfer the rings from one peg to another. I did some Googling, and it turns out that this puzzle is called the "Tower of Hanoi" and was invented in 1883. It works with any number of disks (or stairs) and only three pegs, but the total number of moves needed to complete the transformation is 2^n-1 with n being the number of disks. With four stairs, I needed 15 moves to solve the puzzle, not accounting for any errors, which sounds right.

             

In the midst of the puzzle. I started by walking on the tiles, but there was a handy clock nearby, and it seemed easier just to stand in one place and transfer the clock between plates.

           

At the top of the stairs are a couple of beams of light that kill me when I try to cross them. I can't find any way to turn them off, and throwing things through them doesn't accomplish anything. I can't climb the walls around them. At first, I think this is the moment for the "Withstand Death" spell, but something tells me to try "Rock Flesh" first, and that works. Nearly put myself in a walking dead position there, since "Withstand Death" apparently works only once, and you need it in a very specific place.

      

On the other side, I come to a temple with three statues, two male, one female, and I gather these are the old gods of emotion worshiped by the Zealans. I seem to have gone far afield from Moriens' Birthplace. The door behind the statues is locked. I find a key beneath a skeleton, but it doesn't open the door. I turn around to try the key in the doors in my backpath, and of course I forget about the lasers and blunder right into them, forcing me to reload from before I even solved the rolling ball puzzle. What's wrong with me?

        

Every. Damned. Time.

          

One of the doors the key opens takes me to a room with a Zealan Ceremonial Shield, with three icons that appear to be a sword, a hand, and scales of justice. The game won't let me equip it as a shield, but I'm so over-encumbered that I have to leave my regular shield behind to take it. 

   

Back in the temple, I put the shield on the shrine. Nothing happens at first, but then I walk into the area between the three statutes, and they begin speaking to me.

   

• Male: Greetings, Avatar. We are aware of you and from where you come. We also know of what you seek.

• Female: And we wish to help you! You must become your destiny.

• Avatar: What is my destiny?

• Female: That is not important now. Know that we wish to help you in your quest. Behind us lies the tomb of Khumash-Gor.

• Avatar: Who is Khumash-Gor?

• Other Male: Only the most fearsome warrior who ever lived! Eons ago, he was a great chieftain to our worshipers. But now he lies forever entombed in honor of his valor.

• Female: With him rests an artifact that is the key to tremendous power. It is made of Blackrock, a substance with which you have considerable familiarity. The small object is shaped like a pyramid. But be warned!

• Other Male: For even in death, Khumash-Gor has kept the fighting spirit to which he held so tenaciously in life. He will not part readily with his possessions.

• Female: Good luck, Avatar.

      

Assuming that the three ancient gods named in the Chronicle of Pagan are the only emotional gods, I suspect the first male is Apathas, god of impartiality. He delivers his lines in an indifferent monotone. That means the female god is Amoras, the goddess of love and joy, and the other male is Odion, god of hate and grief.

     

Alas, the gods spoke only on audio, no subtitles.

         

Khumash-Gor is mentioned in the Chronicle of Pagan as the warleader who united the Zealans into a single society, although his empire did not survive his death. He seems to be based on Genghis Khan. 

    

The problem is, the door behind them still doesn't open. I waste a lot of time running around the level, shifting every pile of bones and piece of junk, looking for the key. Eventually, I head back to the cluebook (boy, is that dam broken now) and discover that I have to use one of Mythran's Scrolls of Dispelling Magic Portals on the door. And that's what the scrolls are called, cluebook, not "Opening Scrolls" like you have it. So apparently they work on both illusory walls and regular doors—two completely different things. What makes this door magical, even? How many other locked doors could have been opened with this spell? How did players ever win this game back in the day?

    
"Who is foolish enough to disturb the sanctity of Khumash-Gor!" a corpse in a throne demands as I enter. A phantom appears, but it dies after a few swings of Slayer, leaving the Scepter of Khumash Gor. A chest behind him has Blackrock pendant. 

     

Khumash-Gor is just a regular ghost.

       

Back outside, the gods congratulate me, saying the Blackrock pendant is the key to unlocking a great power. Then they lay out the rest of their plan: I will become the fifth elemental titan, the Titan of Ether. I will then steal the powers, and the worshipers, from the other titans. "The greater the abilities you can accrue, the better chance you have of weakening the other four and eventually standing with them as more than just equal." They recommend that I somehow deal with Hydros in her underground temple next, even though I haven't exactly stolen Lithos's power or worshipers yet.

     

To me, this sounds like a plan for the gods of the Zealans to get revenge on the elemental titans who usurped them, not a plan for me to get home. I go back through the screenshots to recall what Mythran told me: "It is the power of the Titans that makes [interplanetary] travel impossible . . . Therefore, it is reasonable to assume that to depart from Pagan, one must master the powers of all four of the Titans." This whole time, I've been assuming that an extra-dimensional portal will somehow require me to channel Air, Earth, Fire, and Water together like an Aes Sedai in The Wheel of Time or something. But a reread of Mythran's text suggests that he means the Titans are somehow blocking inter-dimensional transport, and I'll thus need their powers to defeat them and destroy this blockade. That's the only way I can come up with to reconcile Mythran's suggestion with the Zealan gods' plans, anyway.

        

The elemental titans suck, no argument, and I suspect that they're either creations of the Guardian or somehow in league with him. They don't seem to be very good for the Pagans, and thus worthy of toppling, although I'm not sure the God of Apathy or the God of Hate are better options. Plus, the damage seems to have already been done. There are about a dozen people left on Pagan. The best I can do is open a portal and lead them all to a different place, not restore their ancient gods.

   

There is an extent to which these conversations re-contextualize the events to which I objected during the previous session. If the Avatar already suspected all of this, and was just playing Lithos for a fool, his behavior is a bit more defensible, although I still feel bad about lying to Vividos and the other necromancers. I think the bigger problem with Pagan is the Avatar himself. Commenters are right that previous Ultimas didn't give a lot of role-playing options, but it still felt to me that the Avatar was more of a real person. His dialogue occasionally had a bit of wit. He had friends. The Avatar of Pagan is a featureless marionette, helmeted even when he isn't wearing a helmet, constantly repeating the last thing that an NPC said, as if he recently read a pop psychology book about mirroring. I don't know what's going through his mind. It's not the same thing going through my mind. There's no relationship between player and Avatar.

     

As I head back to Vividos—goddamn it, I walked through the lasers again—I have to wonder what his big spiritual experience was at the Birthplace of Moriens. Was it the shiny lights? Or did he make it all the way to the Zealan gods? When I return to Vividos, I tell him I've completed the quest, but all he has to say is, "I hope that your experience was as wonderful as my own." He has no more dialogue options or quests. I guess I've finished the Lithos questline, then? I don't really feel like I've defeated him or stolen his followers, not that there are many left.

      

Well . . . I now have a quest to steal your power and kill your god, so probably not.

        

So where do I even go to learn Tempestry, Sorcery, or Theurgy? The theurgists supposedly live on Argentrock Isle, reachable by a bridge, but I don't believe I've found this bridge. The sorcerers live at Sorcerer's Enclave, but I don't know how to reach that, either. As for the tempests—well, Devon is the Tempest, thanks to me, but the Zealan gods mentioned something about an underground temple. Devon, wandering around the palace still in his fisherman's clothes, has nothing to offer.

          

A different Ultima might let me help with that kind of thing.

        

I end up doing a full follow-the-right-wall loop around Tenebrae again, looking for anything I missed, re-talking to everyone I see, discovering nothing new. I end up back in the cemetery again, then the Catacombs, not actually believing that the path to anyplace can run through the Catacombs, especially given that you need an earth magic spell to enter in the first place. But I continue following the right wall, eventually coming back to the Lower Catacombs entrance where I began this session. I sigh, enter, and spend a half hour dealing with lava, fireballs, skeletons, ghosts, one-way gates, levers, innumerable dead-ends, and equally innumerable reloads before finally emerging in a new area with a plaque reading: "NOW ENTERING THE PIT OF DEATH." I explore this area for a little while, then accidentally jump into some lava, then quit.

      

Just before tragedy.

          

Time so far: 33 hours 

    

****

   

Previous entry in this series

   

Next entry in this series 

10/16/2026 

Ravenloft: Strahd's Condition

"What about children?" "No, not children. That would be messed up."

            

Chasing a burglar who stole a holy symbol, Somers the Paladin and Quill the Ranger have been transported to a strange alternate Transylvanish dimension, full of gloom and fog, ruled by a shadowy figure named Strahd von Zarovich. Strahd presides from his gothic castle over a land of thieves, werewolves, and gypsies. A thin remnant of humanity, putatively ruled by a Burgomaster, huddles in the half-abandoned town of Barovia. Although every player going into this game knows that Strahd is a vampire, the word has not yet been uttered in the game itself.

   

Last session, we accepted Strahd's invitation to visit his castle, where he intimated that he's as trapped in this realm as we are. He asked us to investigate rumors of a dimensional portal in a cavern. Along the way, we were joined by a cleric named Irmgarde (also looking for a way out) and a fighter named Vladislav, who looked suspiciously like Strahd himself. We found the portal, but while Irmgarde and Vladislav disappeared to parts unknown, Somers and Quill just ended up in the forest outside the cavern.

        

Somers expresses her own doubts about Vladislav.

        

Our last session ended with the party reuniting with the elf mage Glorianna and the half-elf fighter Tatian. We really want a cleric, but Irmgarde seems to be gone for good. Commenters warned me to create a cleric when I started the game, but I imagined that I'd be able to find a cleric NPC, not realizing that NPCs are sometimes temporary. I also think I mis-remembered AD&D rules and thought my paladin would have more cleric spells, and sooner.

   

This session begins with the party investigating another cave in the Wooded Area West of Barovia. It is small and dark. We find a werewolf huddling in a corner, but he's not hostile. We can speak to him. "Get away!" he warns. "By all the gods, leave this place!" (His voice acting is probably the worst in the game so far.) We have several dialogue options, two of which suggest things that I'm not aware of: that we've learned about lycanthropy, and that we know about a three-spell process for curing it.

       

Did I forget about a scroll or book somewhere?

       

The werewolf is grateful for our offers of assistance but warns that he's on the brink of not being able to control himself. He tells us that the "progenitor" of the werewolves in the area is a large albino, "a beast who lives in the unholy joy of the cruelty he causes." In contrast to the voice acting, the writing in the game is occasionally quite good.

     

I previously met werewolves in the Wooded Area at night. I explore a bit and find the albino werewolf in the southern part of the map, along with a couple of grey minions. They're not hard to kill, but after the albino werewolf is dead, the one in the cave has no new dialogue. I don't know what these "three spells" are that my characters are talking about, so I reluctantly leave him. 

     

Which other CRPGs feature albino werewolves? I feel like there have been a few.

        

Our next step is not entirely clear. We decide to return to Strahd and report on the cave. On the way, we fight darklings and bandits in Barovia, then zombies on the North Svalich Road. None of them pose much danger. Unfortunately, when we reach Castle Ravenloft, we find the doors locked.

   

Checking through my notes, I discover that we found a new key in the caverns. The only place I remember encountering locked doors is in the Old Church Grounds north of Barovia, and since the key is called the Church Vestibule Key, that seems promising. Sure enough, it opens the door. Encounters in the church:

    

• Beyond the locked door are three doors, all leading into the church's main chamber, which is occupied by half a dozen hellhounds. I have to reload twice as they repeatedly kill Somers before I can kill them.

     

Hellhounds in a church? They must love irony.

       

• A priest is kneeling in front of the altar, curiously unmauled from the hellhounds. He is unresponsive when I try to speak with him. He may be dead.

       

I didn't realize that D&D priests were called "Father."

       

• A mirror shows the visage of a man howling in horror. He begs us to free him, ranting about some book and the "secret to the mirror."

      

I love how insensitive the party is. Can you grant wishes? Can you tell me who is the fairest of them all?

       

• Somers notes a hidden button on the wall; without her dialogue, I never would have found it. It leads to a room with a bunch of cleric scrolls and potions. 

• Another barely-visible button opens the door to a large chamber with a cleric holy symbol and a Tome of Evil Artifacts and Cursed Items. It describes the Mirror of Life Trapping, which can only be shattered with "certain words of power," which the book says are on the next page, but I can't get the page to turn. Maybe it's gone.

 

The button is just to the left of my cursor. I'm glad my party members alerted me to it.

         

On the floor of a side-chamber is a scroll. It indicates that one way to travel between dimensions is by Trimia's Catalogue, but to use the tome, I will need to find five items:

1. A fiery red gem.
2. A "finely crafted elven piece" of gold, white gold, or platinum.
3. The feather of a wereraven.
4. "The Mists," a card from a Tarokka deck (the Vistani seer is missing one).
5. A symbol of truth, honor, and religious devotion, but stolen from its rightful owner. That of course is Lord Dhelt's holy symbol, the object that we've been seeking since the beginning.

            

Finding the scroll. Note the various decorations.

        

I have none of these items so far, so I guess the game has a ways to go.  

     

Stairs lead to a larger lower level. Continuing the encounter list:

   

• Lots of zombies. Almost every room disgorges at least a few.

• Several doors opened by pull chains. One room has a Gold Church Key, which opens many other rooms on this level. Another has—hallelujah—a key ring. My joy is soon tempered by the fact that it has only six slots.

       

Here, you can see both zombies and pull-chains. I love it when I can get some synergy going in my screenshots.

          

• On the floor of a room: Van Richten's Tale of Strahd. It describes how Strahd's brother, Sergei, was murdered by a Ba'al Verzi assassin on the day he was set to marry a woman named Tatyana. Although Strahd tried to "comfort" Tatyana, she threw herself from Castle Ravenloft. This event coincided with a failed revolution inside the castle, led by "agents of treachery." I can't wait to compare these events to the original module.

      

Are the "agents of treachery" the party members in the original module?

     

• In a library, we find Trimia's Catalogue! When we try to use it, Somers remarks that it's useless without the rest of the items. Still, that's progress.

• In the same library, in a side-chamber: A Special Scroll of Atonement and a Rod of Smiting. 

• A room with four potions of healing. 

• An old guards' chamber is occupied now by half a dozen skeletons. There are a lot of items of weapons and armor here, but only a suit of bronze platemail offers any advantage over what we already have.

• A pair of illusory walls (both noticed by my characters as I approach) leads to an ancient locked door. No key in my possession works on the keyhole, and Somers remarks that she wouldn't be surprised if the key were found outside the church.

        

That's what we call a "hint."

        

• There are a couple of doors I never find any way to open. I try "Knock" to no avail. I spent forever looking for buttons.

     

Is there any door in the game that responds to "Knock" or lockpicking?

         

• A corridor has four of those tiny buttons. Three of them cause a fireball to shoot at me, while the fourth opens a nearby door. Guess which one I pressed last.

• A pile of bones on the floor excites me until I realize this is not Eye of the Beholder, and I'm thus not likely to get a new NPC that way. (This turns out to be an incorrect assumption, although the mechanism is different.)

        

Most of the lower level of the old church.

        

We find three scraps of parchment on the floor which I suspect make up the missing words to break the Mirror of Life Trapping. I don't know how many there are to find, but when we can't seem to progress any farther, I head back up to the top level. It takes me a few minutes to figure out how to make it work. I first have to place the scraps of parchment on the book, which causes them to disappear into it. After that, using the book causes the mirror to crack.

     

Can we afford to just stay at the inn for the next seven years?

         

Nothing happens after that, but I suspect that the soul in the mirror belonged to the inert priest. Returning to the chapel, I find that I'm correct. The priest is hale and standing. He thanks me but does not, as I'm hoping, join the party—though he does say that the bones on the lower level belong to his apprentice, slain by Strahd. "If only the vigor of life could be returned to his loyal bones, I'm certain he would work to bring the count to justice." Unfortunately, he says that "no mere spell" can raise the bones: "A resurrection is necessary." I thought resurrection was a spell.  He also provides a key to the nearby cemetery.

           

Man, this game really makes you work for your cleric NPCs.

         

I can't think of any way to raise the bones except the "Raise Dead" scroll, which I can't use until I get a cleric. That's a Catch-22. The party heads for the cemetery hoping to find another option.

        

My characters frequently comment on what they see and experience, which I mostly enjoy, although I don't love the game putting words into my characters' mouths.

      

But before we head out, I decide to use the apse to store some excess equipment, of which I have plenty. In addition to what I'm wielding and wearing, my inventory is bursting with stuff, much of which I just need to use, much of which I don't need at all. A lot of it is quest stuff that I'm reluctant to get rid of. There are about 10 cleric scrolls waiting for a cleric. 

   

The Cemetery is swarming with ghouls, which can paralyze, so I take pains to kill them from a distance. This uses up some of my accumulated spells and wands, but the real workhorse here is the Dagger of Throwing, which I must have found in the caverns last session. It automatically returns to the hand of the wielder, and quickly enough that using it feels a bit like playing a first-person shooter. Later, I find an Axe of Hurling, which doubles this effect.

    

The dagger, axe, and Glorianna's spells also save the party when we start encountering vampires. The couple of times that we get level-drained or paralyzed, I reload.

         

One must move gingerly through this area, or this happens.

        

Cemetery encounters: 

       

• One tomb has a four-stanza verse on a stone slab by the entrance. Inside, a banshee wails and immediately kills Tatian and Glorianna. On a reload, I'm able to get up to the banshee, but all of my attacks do only 1 damage each. I experiment a bit and find that the Rod of Smiting does a decent amount of damage, but I still cannot defeat her before she kills all of us. I mark the location and move on.

      

Have I fought a banshee since Pool of Radiance? I don't remember.

         

• A tomb is occupied by a vampire, who attacks the moment I enter. It takes a couple of reloads to kill her without suffering level drain. An illusory wall behind her leads to a chamber with four cleric scrolls, including two "Negative Plane Protection" spells. Sure would be nice to have a cleric. 

• Among the tombs and mausoleums, I find a magical quarterstaff. Tatian has been wielding a regular two-handed sword, as I have not found any magic two-handed weapons capable of attacking from the rear rank. I give her the quarterstaff, one of the few times in any RPG that I've had a fighter using a quarterstaff. That only lasts a short time, however, as I soon find an Axe of Hurling.

• The Axe of Hurling is in a mausoleum alongside a suit of chainmail, a shield, and a pile of bones. 

• Another mausoleum has a second key ring. You cannot, I discover, put a key ring into a key ring.

• A locked mausoleum has a slab outside indicating that it's occupied by Victor Grymig.

• Amidst some gravestones, I find an NPC: a thief who freely admits that he's robbing graves. He's Vuko, a Level 7 chaotic neutral human male thief. I'm not even remotely tempted. Thieves don't seem to have much to do in this game, and this one is pretty vile.

      

Plus, he looks too much like Quill.

        

• A Ring of Wizardry in one tomb lets Glorianna memorize two additional Level 3 spells. 

• On the ground outside, we find a pouch of Unusual Golden Dust. 

       

The constantly-respawning ghouls and vampires are good for our experience levels. Glorianna levels up twice during this session, Tatian once. They're now both Level 6. Somers (paladin) and Quill (ranger) don't level, but they were already Level 7 at the beginning of the session. They're at least halfway to Level 8. 

     

I toss my Dagger of Throwing at a vampire caught behind a tree.

        

The trip hasn't gotten us any closer to the next quest step, whatever that is, nor do we have any idea how to resurrect the apprentice. But during my explorations, I remembered the jeweler's ghost who wanted me to destroy an undead bandit named . . . Victor Grymig, the owner of the locked tomb.

   

I zip back to Strobel the Jeweler's house. As before, he demands we destroy Grymig (who murdered his family) and possesses Somers. He also leaves the key to Grymig's vault on the floor.

      

It's hard to believe that Barovia was ever populated enough to justify such a specialist position.

       

Inside Grymig's tomb, we find a "ghoul lord" and kill him in a few blows. There are lots of goodies in the tomb, including some mundane weapons, a suit of magic chainmail, a Ring of Fire Resistance, another pouch of Unusual Golden Dust, and a Rod of Rebirth, which sounds like the resurrection item we were looking for.

    

I was expecting more of a fight.

        

As we leave the tomb, the jeweler keeps his word and departs from Somers's body. He tells us of a secret treasure in his house and gives us a key.

    

Before heading back to the church, we go to the jeweler's house again, use a key to open a door, and find a fire ruby on the floor. I assume that this is the first item we need to use with Trimia's Catalogue.

     

Somers assumes it, too.

         

Back at the church, of course I can't remember where the damned bones are, so I have to loop the entire level twice (missing them the first time). When I finally find them, I wield and use the Rod of Rebirth, and the bones turn into a strong young man.

      

Before.

        

It is the young cleric, Mischa, who first tells us that Count Strahd von Zarovich is a vampire. The cleric suspected Strahd's nature and invaded his castle to confront him. Driven away by Strahd's minions, he returned to the church to find Strahd waiting for him. Moments later, he was a pile of bones in the corner. "This land will know peace only if he is destroyed, and I will gladly join any efforts in that regard." Even better, he has a key to Strahd's castle. Finally, we have a hopefully-permanent cleric. We bid a sad farewell to Tatian, who is unhappy with our decision.

          

After.

        

Mischa is a Level 4 neutral good human male cleric with solid statistics. He comes with a magic mace, regular chainmail, and some potions and scrolls. He weirdly has no trouble wielding the Axe of Hurling. He has some spells I don't remember in any previous D&D CRPG, including "Magical Stone," "Invisibility to Undead," "Draw Strength," and "Draw Dexterity." He also has "Light," which I didn't even realize existed in this game. I've just been exploring in the dark, I guess.

      

Our new companion. He must have somehow had 19 constitution in his previous life.

       

I rather wish I remembered Strobel the jeweler before entering the cemetery, did Grymig's tomb first, and got Mischa into the party before fighting all of the ghouls and vampires. A lot of experience was wasted on Tatian.

      

Some miscellaneous notes:

       

• The church had some good visual cues: furnishings, decorations, statutes (lots of them peacocks, for some reason), candles in pricket stands. I've said this before, but this is the first game that I can remember since Ultima Underworld that manages to instill a real sense of atmosphere.

       

Or maybe it's a turkey.

     

• I desperately need an "Improved Identify" spell scroll. I haven't had the spell available since I lost Velika.

• Somehow, a "Detect Magic" spell I cast in a previous session never wore off.

• The game really wanted me to find robes and cloaks. I must have run across eight separate sets, none of them magical, during this session. 

• Is there any purpose to holy symbols? In Eye of the Beholder, they were necessary for casting cleric spells, but in Ravenloft, the holy symbol is baked into the interface, above the character's head. Nonetheless, I've found two cleric holy symbols and one paladin holy symbol. 

• I wonder if the Rod of Rebirth can be used anywhere else in the game.   

     

The next thing that I know for sure I can do is visit Strahd's castle, but I'm not entirely happy with the locked doors I couldn't open in the church, nor the banshee I left alive in the cemetery, nor the werewolf that I haven't been able to cure. I'll take light hints on any of those things. Ah, wait—while preparing this entry for publication, I looked at the verse outside the banshee's tomb again and saw that its last stanza reads:

   

Dust to dust, our blessing gains

A magic to calm our sister's soul.

And then below, seek out the sign

That to Avernaith will release us all!

   

This suggests to me that the key to defeating the banshee is those two pouches of Unusual Gold Dust. So maybe I'll try that before moving on to Castle Ravenloft. Who is Avernaith, by the way? He or she is mentioned earlier in the poem: "In death, elves to Avernaith must go." I don't remember that name in the D&D pantheon.

      

The full text.

       

I'm really enjoying Ravenloft, though it suffers from the same problems as Pagan: excessive linearity, limited role-playing opportunities, and illusory dialogue options. Nonetheless, I look forward to my Ravenloft sessions while dreading my Pagan ones. I'll have to make sure to analyze this disparity before both games wrap up.

         

Time so far: 18 hours

    

****

    

Previous entry in this series

   

Next entry in this series

10/13/2026 

Pagan: In the Hall of the Mountain King

 

I wash my hands of this Avatar.

             

The Guardian has marooned the Avatar on the world of Pagan, which is dominated by four elemental titans, each with its own school of magic. The Avatar has learned that if he wants to escape, he's going to have to master the different magical systems: Necromancy, Tempestry, Theurgy, and Sorcery. He has managed to apprentice himself to the head (and perhaps only) Necromancer. He has sent me on a quest to learn Necromancy from his predecessors, now long-dead in the Catacombs. When I wrapped up the last session, I was exploring the Catacombs, trying to find these teachers. I have found plenty of corpses, but none that respond to the "Death Speak" spell.

      

As we begin, let's deal with two lingering questions from the last session:

   

1. What happens if you use the Key of the Caretaker on your entire reagent bag? Alas, the game just says, "something is not right." I expected DOSBox to crash.

 

2. Can you jump up onto the roof of that columbarium from the pedestal? Yes! There's nothing there, though. But at least we learned some new vocabulary. Loculi are the slots on the wall; columbaria are structures with lots of loculi. These days, they typically just hold urns.

        

At least the view is nice.

       

With that accomplished, I keep exploring:

     

• Lots of ghouls and skeletons, at least one ghost.

     

Either this guy has killed a lot of people or the Pagans stopped using loculi at some point and just started tossing bodies into a pile.

       

• An area where the Catacomb wall has crumbled away and the surrounding cave is intruding. As I enter, a chunk of concrete falls from the ceiling and crashes to the ground.

• Plaques: SHOENROCK | HEGLAND HEGWOOD | JOHN OF GARLAND | TIS FAR TOO LATE FOR ME | HEAVRIN, ARCHITECT, LAID TO REST IN HIS OWN PLAN | DON'T LOOK NOW I TOLD YOU IT WAS MY ECHIDNAS | LESIFER BELOVED SISTER M.F.H. (?). I assume that like the gravestones, these are references to the design team or other in-jokes.

• A locked tomb has a plaque next to it: THE BIRTHPLACE OF MORIENS (the first necromancer). I revoke my previous vow not to search all the skeletons in the area, but I don't find the key.

     

I'm going to be glad later that I noted this.

       

• A tomb to KAYLITH, TREASURER. This one is unlocked. It has a couple of containers with obsidian pieces, junk, and (best of all) another bag.

• Traps include sinkholes opening up into lava or acid or  something (recounted last time), gouts of flame that come out of the floor, and jets on the walls that shoot fireballs.

      

Nailed by a fireball. A sinkhole lies nearby.

      

• Exploration is confounded by one-way gates.

• A body labeled MASTER OF THE KEYS has a key. It does not open the Birthplace of Moriens but rather a locked chest protected by two fireball jets. There is nothing in this chest. 

      

A locked door is advertised as going to the Lower Catacombs. I don't know where to find the key, but it turns out that's not an issue. When I open the door to a particular mausoleum, I immediately fall through the floor to a cavern. A trio of barrels nearby has a ton of spell reagents, in particular the two I need for the "Death Speak" spell, just in case I didn't think to bring them. It's soon clear that I'm going to need a second reagent bag. Just when I thought I had enough bags.

       

About to fall.

       

As I explore the area, the ground shakes, rocks fall from the ceiling, fireballs shoot from the walls, and ghosts, skeletons, and ghouls periodically attack. At last, I find stairs leading upwards to a corpse on a platform. It is labeled "Necromancer." I thought I'd be casting "Death Speak" on random bones, but I guess the ancient necromancers are pretty well-labeled.

        

What a moron.

      

This one sits up when I cast "Death Speak." He says that I'll be visiting the other necromancers in succession. Each will teach me a spell that I need to reach the next one. This one teaches me "Mask of Death" (QAS CORP), which will make me appear dead to anyone who sees me.

   

It becomes clear a few minutes later why I'd want to do that. I run into a trio of demons. In battle, I'm unable to kill more than one of them. I could probably handle them with enough reloads and some luck, but as expected, when I cast "Mask of Death," they take no notice of me.

         

No one's going to confuse these guys with gargoyles.

        

Following my rightmost-wall exploration pattern, I'm soon killed by a lightning bolt that comes out of nowhere. On a reload, I go the other way and pick up a couple of backpacks full of reagents before meeting the second necromancer, Bentos. He teaches me "Rock Flesh" (REL SANCT YLEM), which requires wood and dirt.

    

This spell gets me past a corridor full of lightning bolts, although I note that nothing visual changes about the Avatar with either "Mask of Death" or "Rock Flesh."

   

Past a kith and some more ghouls is the third necromancer, who teaches me "Summon Dead" (KAL XEN CORP), which requires blood, bone, and wood. Fortunately, the game keeps throwing reagents at me. After I speak to this necromancer, I'm automatically teleported to the next area.

   

The pattern breaks at this point, as I don't need "Summon Dead" to reach the next necromancer, past some pillars that shoot lightning at regular intervals. This one teaches me "Grant Peace" (IN VAS CORP), which puts skeletons to rest permanently. This is timely, as one particular skeleton keeps menacing me while I try to talk to this necromancer, although as soon as I'm finished with the conversation, I'm teleported to a new cavern.

     

I know who I'm casting it on first.

       

This last necromancer, incidentally, tells me that he doesn't trust me and doubts my devotion to Lithos. This is a solid observation, as I'm not devoted to Lithos at all. Unfortunately, the game doesn't give me the option to say that. I can only say: "I am devoted, Necromancer." Dialogue options and role-playing aren't really things in this game.

      

This last cavern is large and square, with an area of grass and foliage in its center. A building in the middle of the grassy area has a large throne, but as I approach, I'm teleported away. 

     

I never discover what this key is for.

       

More caverns. Lava. More fireballs shooting inexplicably out of the walls and exploding nearby. Ghouls. Changelings. I find a suit of magic armor and yet another reagent bag, then a key with no lock anywhere nearby. This is getting annoying. I have to reload a couple of times when fireballs kill me. I have to jump from platform to platform. I'm teleported mid-jump to yet another new area. Here's another necromancer—only he's not the last, as he says I'll need to seek someone named Galious, who will teach me how to get an audience with Lithos.

        

Alcohol and a rock?

       

This unnamed necromancer, meanwhile, teaches me "Withstand Death" (VAS AN CORP), though he warns me that I'll only be able to cast it once, I guess in my entire life. He says I'll know when I need it. I mix it but naturally don't cast it.

   

Past more tremors, skeletons, chests of reagents, a kith, and a seeker, I find a building with a door. Galious is lying on a slab inside. He says that to reach Lithos, the Mountain King, I will need to find Stone Cove and cast "Create Golem" (IN ORT YLEM XEN) on a patch of mud. Only this golem will be able to open the door to Lithos's hall.

      

A nearby door takes me back to a familiar area: the Upper Catacombs, before I fell through the collapsing floor. I don't remember doors that I couldn't open, but I start poking around. It doesn't help that I took a four-week hiatus in the middle of this entry and can't remember anything about the geography of this area. I keep getting killed by exploding flaming skulls (how are you supposed to defend against these?) and crumbling floors that dump me into lava.

        

There are a lot of reagents here.

       

A door that I don't remember leads to an extremely long and windy set of caverns, with multiple places that appear to be dead ends until I jump over a river or maneuver around some rock. The game gets extremely finicky with movement in this area, and I have trouble going where I want to go. Amidst more skeletons, tremors, falling rocks, fireballs, and floor traps, a lever opens the way to a door.

    

The door takes me to a large cavern that ends at a lake. A small structure has a locked door, but more important is an enormous double-door right next to it. I find a patch of ground that looks like mud and cast "Create Golem." An earth golem appears. I have several commands; for now, I have it "Follow" me to the door and then "Open" the door.

      

With great power comes great grunts.

        

It would be nice if Lithos were just sitting on a throne on the other side of the door, but of course that's too easy. In the subsequent long and complicated series of caverns, I reload close to 50 times, dying from falling stones, fireballs, and falling into water because of either mistimed jumps or platforms that disappeared underneath me. The vaunted improvements conferred by the famous patch seem to disappear in this area; the Avatar dies repeatedly by simply misjudging distances and miscalculating the appearance and disappearance of stones. It doesn't help that the "jump" command (clicking with both mouse buttons) fails about half the time.

         

A second later, that platform will disappear, and I'll be in the drink.

       

I ultimately have to find a couple of keys to get through a couple of doors, but along the way:

    

• A ruined building with two double-lanterns outside. What is powering these lanterns?

       

Did they run gas lines down here?

      

• Multiple areas in which sections of platforms appear and disappear. 

• A maze of invisible force fields in between pillars. They become visible, and damage the Avatar significantly, when he tries to walk through them. A note on a dead apprentice from times of yore indicates that the Avatar can throw the area's copious mushrooms between the pillars to test for force fields and thus find the path through the maze. I do this for a little while, but it turns out that the force fields, while harmful, do not actually stop the Avatar from going through the pillars. And since there's no obstacle to resting and healing as often as necessary, this area is just begging for a brute force solution. At its end, a chest offers a key and an orb that allows free passage through the fields in both this and another area.

     

A mushroom reveals a force field. Because it's organic, I guess.

       

• Two skeletons belong to two previous apprentices, twins, named Bruce and Bryan. The texts are both identical, bemoaning that their "frail bones" have ensured they will never meet Lithos, both asking the finder to tell the other brother of his passing. 

• A futhark room on a platform teleports me back to the beginning of the area.  

    

At last, I'm in Lithos's chamber. Skeletons and ghouls stand at attention (kind of a waste of resources, in my opinion) in a long row leading up to a pair of stone obelisks with busts of Lithos on the top. The caverns rumble and his face appears out of stone before me.

       

Duh-duh-duh-duh-DUH-duh-duh, DUH-duh-duh, DUH-duh-duh . . .

            

"What human is this who comes before me?" The Avatar explains that Vividos is now the Necromancer, which Lithos already knew. Lithos demands that Lothian, the recently deceased Necromancer, must be interred: "The scent of her rotting flesh shall perfume my garden of delights." The Avatar asks to become Vividos's apprentice. "Then fall before me and serve your master!" Lithos rumbles; the screen shakes; the Avatar stumbles to the ground and gets back up again. 

    

Just as with the necromancers in the caverns, the player has no dialogue options, just automatic lines. This is a bit of a slap in the face to players of previous Ultimas. But the offensively scripted nature of Pagan becomes even clearer in what happens next. "Kneel before me, worm!" Lithos demands. I'm preparing myself to click on the dialogue option that of course will say "The Avatar kneels to no one" when, right in front of me, the Avatar #*&@ing does it! No input from me at all. He just kneels, bows, and refers to Lithos as "my lord."

   

Did the developers forget that the Avatar doesn't really want to be Vividos's apprentice? That he isn't even from this world? That he is, in fact, the savior of multiple worlds? That he's a savvy traveler of the multiverse? I should be able to have a peer-level discussion with Lithos, getting some insights into the true nature of Pagan and its gods, clarifying some elements of its official history. Instead, the game has me acting like the most pathetic supplicant to an unworthy god. At best, you could claim that the Avatar is just going through the motions long enough to get off this rock, but that isn't very Avatar-ish of him. Plus, you would think that if anyone would know about multidimensional travel, it would be the putative gods of this setting.

   

But instead of asking any of the sensible questions, the Avatar just meekly accepts his next task, to inter Lothian as per Vividos's instructions. Lithos's final words are: "Do not come before me again until you are the Necromancer!" "Or what?" I wanted to say. I even went back to the beginning of the room, then turned around and marched back to the obelisks. He didn't appear.

       

On the way out, I kill all his stupid servants.

      

The game lost me this session, first mechanically, then thematically. I am playing the rest of it in protest. If it weren't an Ultima game and I didn't just come off a month-long hiatus, we wouldn't even be talking. 

     

There is a teleportation pad near Lithos's hall, which suggests that I'm going to have to come back here again. But it reminds me of the teleportation system, and even though I have some areas of the catacombs left to explore (I think), I decide to warp out of this place. When the menu comes up, I choose to return to the Plateau and Mythran, mostly because I can't remember if I need to check in with him now and then.

         

I like to think that "Nowhere" just dumps the Avatar into a void.

        

I find Mythran on his first floor, and conversation with him reminds me that he has spells and scrolls for sale, which is good since I've been collecting money for no reason. He teaches me two Thaumaturgy spells, "Meteor Shower" and "Confusion Blast," both of which require reagents I have to buy from him. They don't sound like they're going to be necessary to solve puzzles, so I just note the necessary reagents for now.

      

He also sells me two Scrolls of Dispelling Magical Portals, which turns out to be serendipitous. When I warp back to the Palace, I decide to remind myself what's happening with Devon and his forthcoming execution. Devon is still in the dungeons, it turns out. While I'm reviewing screenshots, I come across Salkind's logbook of executions, which indicates that the "forbidden research" for which Bentic was executed is "secured in the dungeon evidence chamber."

   

I can see Bentic's Journal in a sealed room. I spend 15 minutes or so clicking around on the walls and looking around the dungeon for levers. I'm not going to pretend like I figured it out myself; I got frustrated and looked up a hint. The solution is to use one of Mythran's scrolls, which really ought to be called Reveal Secret Doors or something, not Dispelling Magical Portals. 

         

The "magical portal" is right in front of me.

          

Bentic was definitely into some dangerous stuff. He'd done some genetic genealogy and determined that Devon was the illegitimate son of the previous Tempest, Keldan, and having been born first had a better claim to the throne of Pagan than Lady Mordea. 

    

No sooner have I put down the book than three guards show up to arrest me. "Try to take me!" I shout, but the game doesn't actually let me fight. It just fades to black over the sound of clanking and crashing.

         

Is it because my name is "Thief"?

       

When we fade in again, I'm being escorted by the guards to the docks, where Lady Mordea, Salkind, Darion (captain of the guard), and the executioner Shaana are already arrayed in front of Devon. The guards relate that they have caught me stealing. "The block always welcomes another neck," Mordea gloats. Devon offers a sad goodbye.

   

I have the choice to say that "Devon is the rightful heir!" or "The tyrant Mordea has no birthright!" They seem essentially identical to me. I try the second, and Mordea kills me instantly with a lightning bolt. On a reload, I try the first option. Everyone is confused.

       

At least I got their attention.

        

Mordea orders the execution to proceed. "I have proof!" I shout. Before anyone can stop me, I explain what I found in the book. The resulting conversation is amusing, as Salkind confirms the contents by saying: "Mordea, I locked the book safely away!" and Mordea herself says, "Fool! Now the whole world knows the secret!" just before blasting Salkind into the sea.

      

I like how you can see the daggers Mordea is staring at Salkind even though the graphics aren't quite good enough to depict it.

       

Mordea again orders the execution, but Shaana grows a pair and refuses. Mordea blasts her to the ground. She then orders Darion to do it, but Darion also (surprisingly) puts honor first: "I cannot kill him, my lady. He is the Tempest." Soon, he's writhing on the docks. The three generic guards don't even get a chance to disobey; they're soon sprawled on the planks along with the Avatar.

   

Mordea starts casting a spell to kill Devon, but he somehow figures out his Tempest powers and blows her off the end of the dock, where a sea monster appears to swallow her. The Avatar groans and gets to his feet. Devon joyously turns to me and declares the end of Mordea's tyrannical rule. "I make it my duty to bring prosperity to all of Tenebrae," he says, before announcing that he's going to leave for a while. "I need time away from Tenebrae to contemplate all of the recent events." He casts a spell (he sure learned Tempestry fast), jumps off the end of the docks, and strides away on the water.

      

Could you teach me that spell before you go?

      

So that's a bit of a wreck. The city has no leader; its supposed new leader has gone on sabbatical, and almost all of its named citizens are dead in front of me. (Once again, the Avatar has saved a society mostly by depopulating it.) Well, maybe. I'm not sure how to interpret it, but both Shaana and Darion seem to groan when I double-click on their bodies. I can't access their inventories the way I can for the generic guards. Later, Shaana is in her house, though with no new dialogue.

         

Despite his previous claim, Devon is in the Palace when I visit (though he doesn't have much to say), and all of the guards now say that they serve him. I guess that's progress.

     

Good luck undoing all those beheadings.

         

I finish this long session by returning to Vividos, wondering why he doesn't have a damned teleporter pad. I tell him that I have met with Lithos. He gives me something called the Key of the Scion, which he says will get me through locked doors in the Catacombs as well as make Lothian's body ready for burial. It looks just like the Key of the Caretaker. That's not going to be confusing. I touch the key to Lothian's body, and the ground immediately consumes her. Lithos booms that he's pleased.

     

Why don't you just lick his boots, Avatar?

         

I'm ready to move on to the next school of magic, but Vividos and necromancy aren't done with me. The Necromancer names me his Scion and says that my next task is to make a pilgrimage to the birthplace of Moriens, the first Necromancer. I will access this place through the Upper Catacombs. Vividos says he saw something amazing on his own pilgrimage, but he won't tell me what it was. In any event, I guess we'll start the next session back in the catacombs again.

            

I can hear the Avatar saying, "Oh yes, my pilgrimage" in a perfectly flat tone.

       

Miscellaneous notes:

 

• I started to face serious encumbrance issues this session. I dumped most of the flaming oil containers.    

• There are times in which I inexplicably cannot pick up an item right next to me. 

        

What is that damned "X" all about?

       

• How am I supposed to avoid floor traps? I can't seem to jump over them. 

• As I save, load, sleep, and just walk along, the Guardian frequently speaks up to taunt me about what he's doing to Britannia while I'm stuck here. 

• There are still a lot of locked doors in the Palace's dungeon. I wonder whether there's any way to open them. 

     

The sequence on the docks was fun (I thought Mordea's defeat would be the climax of the game), but I'm still raw about the Lithos encounter. As there doesn't seem to be any more character development, the plot is mostly linear, and the game clearly isn't going to give me any meaningful choices, I honestly feel as if I'd get as much from Pagan if I simply watched it. I'm not going to do that, but I will say that a better game would have inspired me to be creative and to avoid the obvious subtitle.

        

Time so far: 27 hours 

    

****

   

Previous entry in this series

   

Next entry in this series

10/17/2026