Eye of the Beholder: Stuck!

The party encounters a key NPC.

 

A short posting today representing a lot of gameplay. 

I spent this last session jumping around on Levels 9 and 10, the latter accessed primarily through teleporters. I could only explore a bit of Level 10 because the teleporter area wasn't connected to the rest of the level except through what I assume is a one-way door that opens from the other side. However, the small area was enough to hit upon several major plot points.

The enemy encountered on Level 10 was "mantis warriors," incorrigible bastards that move fast and paralyze characters with one hit. The solution, as with all tough enemies, was the "combat waltz," but it was harder with these guys because they move so damned quickly. Fortunately, there were only about four of them in the area that I could explore.

I can hear more of them through the walls, though.

Through a northern door, I ran into the Drow leader that a previous NPC had told me about: Shindia. She surrendered immediately and offered to tell me how to cure the dwarven king's illness. I accepted, and she told me to search for a potion in the room of levers on the level below (which I can't access yet). She then ran off before I could do anything else with her.

      
I wondered if Shindia was a known Forgotten Realms character or invented just for this game. The Forgotten Realms wiki confirms that it's the former. I only read briefly because I saw Xanathar mentioned, too, and it gave me the impression that this game's entire plot is lifted from a book or module. I'll look that up after I finish the game.

Nearby on the same level, I found the dwarven prince, Keirgar, chained to a wall. I had the options to free or kill him, and naturally I chose to free him. He joined my party, so I dumped the other dwarven fighter who'd been with me since Level 5. Keirgar informed me of his desire to forestall a war between the dwarves and the Drow and wanted me to bring him back to the other dwarves on Level 5.

 

I hauled Keirgar back to his fellows, and he instructed them how to get out of the dungeon. (They didn't actually leave, though.) He decided to stay in my party. I'm not sure if freeing Keirgar is a necessary step to win the game, or if I can legitimately call this a "side quest." I assume that the dwarves will give me the Wand of Silvania when I return with the medicine for their king--is there an alternate evil path by which I could have just killed everyone?

      
Having done all I could on Level 10, I took the teleporters to Level 9 and explored there. It was the most puzzle-intensive level so far, with numerous pressure plates, buttons, keyholes, and other mysteries, and as we'll discuss in a second, I'm out of ideas for some of the puzzles. One of them required me to weigh down 4 pressure plates with a suit of armor, a sword, a missile weapon, and a packet of food. The first three were no problem thanks to the extra junk I'd been toting around, but I stopped bothering with food ages ago. I had to go all the way back up to Level 6 and kill some Kenku to get some more.

       
Enemies on Level 9 were displacer beasts and rust monsters, both very easy. They mostly attacked individually, and there were plenty of large rooms to do the combat waltz. Rust monsters never struck me once, so I didn't have the frustration of having my armor or weapons destroyed. There was one area with a very large pack of displacer beasts, but my mage's "Ice Storm" and "Fireball" spells thinned them very quickly.

The rust monsters are particularly well-drawn, I think.

      
I'm very frustrated with the equipment system, which as we discussed refuses to tell you anything about your items. I still haven't found an "Orb of Power" to use at the Oracle on Level 5. On the bones of some dead paladin, I found a sword called "Severious," but I have no idea if it's better or worse than my "Chieftain Halberd" or my "Night Stalker" sword or my mace +3 or my multiple adamantite long swords. At the same time, equipment upgrades hardly feel like they matter because the combat system is more about action than logistics. While I don't mind killing things and leveling up, in a tactical sense combat is the weakest part of the game.

You play this game with six characters, but I feel like you could win with two without much difficulty. Most of the time, my rear four characters don't do anything. I defeat most enemies with the "combat waltz" because it's such a pain to pick up missile weapons after the end of each battle. Only late in this session did Marina start pulling her weight as a mage. "Ice Storm" and "Fireball" are particularly valuable, as is a wand of "Cone of Cold" that we found. As for "Melf's Acid Arrow" and "Magic Missile"--it doesn't seem they do much more than a missile weapon.

Resting to recover cast spells.

 

My clerics are useful mostly for the healing spells, "Remove Paralysis," and an occasional "Bless"/"Prayer"/"Protection from Evil" combo when I need to buff. Gaston has several "Hold Persons" memorized, but I've never had a chance to use them. "Flame Blade" is a bit of a waste unless I want to put him in melee range, and there's no reason for that. I haven't come under the influence of anything I need "Dispel Magic" for.

As much as I've been able to map of Level 9.

   
As we come to the end of this session, however, I'm completely stuck. I've been over the maps and levels a dozen times and I can't find any way to move forward. If you can give me a light hint off my textual descriptions, I'd appreciate it. If this is too confusing, I'll have to look at a spoiler site.

• On Level 7, there's a small teleporter hub that's not accessible from the rest of the level. I've identified teleporters to Levels 4, 5, and 9 from here. There are two portals I can't use because I lack the appropriate items: a stone ankh and a stone gem. Was I supposed to have found these already?

• There's a door leading out of the Level 7 teleporter hub to the southeast, but I can't get it open.

• Large swaths of the southeast of Levels 7, 8, and 9 remain unexplored, but I can't find any way to get in there. There are no pits from Level 6 to drop me into the area.

• On Level 9, there are two doors in the northeast that require keys to open, and I haven't found any. Lockpicks don't work.

• There's an "Oracle of Devouring" on Level 9, but I don't know what it wants.

I've tried everything.

• There's a "Hall of Thieves" on Level 9 with a bunch of niches in the wall, but nothing I do here seems to produce any results. A sign at the end of the corridor that says "You forgot something" is no help.

• There's a room on Level 9 with a bunch of buttons and a sign that says "Combination Lock--Be Quick." The buttons just seem to shoot magic missiles at me. I can't find that they do anything in any order. A door just outside this room is permanently closed.

I hate this message.

• One set of stairs from Level 9 to Level 10 (in the southwest) just leads to a door I can't get through.

• I can teleport to Level 10 from Levels 6 and 8, but the area I can explore from the arrival is quite small. There's a door to the north of the teleporter hub, but it won't open from this side. A sign that says "Welcome" in the corridor just causes damage to my party.

There were some pits on Level 9 that would have taken me to Level 10, but I closed them by stepping on a pressure plate, and there doesn't seem to be any way to re-open them. Hopefully, I haven't put myself in a "walking dead' scenario.

Time so far: 30 hours
Reload count: 11

*****

I thought I'd check out the all-German Antares and perhaps put together an introductory post while waiting for the hints to come in, but I'm having some trouble: I can't figure out how to create characters! (And I can't find a manual online.) The only YouTube video of the game shows the player loading up the game, getting to the introductory screen, and then frantically clicking around for a couple of minutes, presumably trying to find the character creation options just like me, before he quits in frustration.

There's a "load party" option if you hit ESC, but when I do it, most of the party members are damaged or dead. I suspect these guys have already been playing a while and then just came on the disk. Especially you German-speaking readers, if you look at that video, do you see anything promising? Has anyone here played the game before?