NEWS ITEM: October 27, 2008 - Final monster profile is up

[BasiliskWrangler]

For our final monstrous profile of Book II, we decided to give you a glimpse at the crimson menace of the southern hemisphere: the Brimstone Spider.

Direct Link: http://basiliskgames.com/monster4.html

Numerous visitors have asked to view the Encyclopedia Biological Preeminence profile on the legendary Orakur. Unfortunately, it was recently discovered that this page from the original manuscript has been mysteriously damaged, despite being locked away in a vault at Lockston Hall Academica. With the recent passing of Saint Gilhelm, we may never know his full extent of his research on this subject. An investigation into the vandalism is currently underway.

[Dragonlady]

OH MY GAWD!!!!!!

I'm gonna have nightmares tonight from just reading that description, let alone meeting it when Book II comes out. Brrrrrr!!1

Oh, and thanks for the warning.

[Unclever title]

Oh, so Eschalon is round then? Good to know I won't go falling off the edge of the world.

Of course that still doesn't rule out falling into a massive abyssal rift, or drowning in a bottomless lake, or being cooked alive and a massive spider drinking my ever so vital fluids.

Hmm... Does Eschalon have any nice vacation spots, or does the grand view always come with a chance of an incredibly gruesome death? Sometimes an increasingly gruesome death.

This game somehow becomes more and more appealing to me...

[IJBall]

OH MY GAWD!!!!!!

I'm gonna have nightmares tonight from just reading that description, let alone meeting it when Book II comes out. Brrrrrr!!1

Oh, and thanks for the warning.

I dunno - maybe it's just me, but I find the Mire Troll potentially much scarier.

I'm not sure how different the Brimstone Spider is from, say, the Jellies in Book I, except that the Brimstone Spider's projectile probably does more damage. (OK, yeah, they're also tougher in armor & HP, but the principle's the same...)

In any case, I'd take these guys on!

The Mire Troll, OTOH, I think I'd be more tempted to run from!!

[CrazyBernie]

Sweet! The partial page on the Orakur is a nice touch.

[AK_Marty]

Are there any water based spells in Book II that might counteract this burning web attack? If this spider has the ability to shoot burning webs, fire based spells might not have much effect on it, like fire dart or fire ball. Maybe the freeze spell would work on these hideous arachnids.

[realmzmaster]

Interesting monster! A 350 pound insect will require a very large can of insecticide! It throws burning webs! Does that mean it can intercept an ice bolt or freeze spell before it can reach it? Now that would be wicked! Will hitting it's body cause fire damage to weapons and armor like the acid grubs?

[Kreador Freeaxe]

Will hitting it's body cause fire damage to weapons and armor like the acid grubs?

Hmmm. That would be cool, and cruel. Maybe it explodes like a powder keg when you kill it.

[Rune_74]

Cool, perticularily like the damaged monster page, nice touch.

[AK_Marty]

Maybe it explodes like a powder keg when you kill it.

If the Brimstone spider did explode like a powder keg when killed, and considering that it weighs 350 pounds, it could prove quite useful for a number of tasks. Anyone know if a portcullis will withstand a blast of 350 pounds of exploding spider?? Need to clear out a patch of Sentinel Stalks? Kite in a big red spider and let the dart shooting plants beware!!

[Saxon1974]

Good stuff Thomas, really like the partially destroyed page, creates an interesting mystery.

So what is in store for us for November?

[obiwan]

This is nitpicking a bit, but I'm a biologist and I just have to say it...

Could some learned and diligent scholar maybe do some editing of the Encyclopedia and change the format of the scientific names to some more accepted format? The genus names are traditionally written (except in bad gardening centers) with a capital, whereas the species names start with lower case. And both should be in italics. So "Arachnid infernus" instead of "Archnid Infernus".

For the rest, it looks great and can't wait!

[Getharn]

This is nitpicking a bit, but I'm a biologist and I just have to say it...

Sheesh, I'm glad I'm not that pedantic!

By the way, I believe you forgot to hyphenate "nit-picking".

[The Noid]

The genus names are traditionally written (except in bad gardening centers) with a capital, whereas the species names start with lower case. And both should be in italics. So "Arachnid infernus" instead of "Archnid Infernus".

And how would you know what the accepted format is for scientific names in the Realm of Eschalon? Just because we use some standard in this world that doesn't mean that same format is used in other worlds!

[BasiliskWrangler]

This is nitpicking a bit, but I'm a biologist and I just have to say it...

Could some learned and diligent scholar maybe do some editing of the Encyclopedia and change the format of the scientific names to some more accepted format? The genus names are traditionally written (except in bad gardening centers) with a capital, whereas the species names start with lower case. And both should be in italics. So "Arachnid infernus" instead of "Archnid Infernus".

For the rest, it looks great and can't wait!

You raise a valid point. One thing I will point out (as The Noid mentions) is that Eschalon is a different world from ours, and we didn't intend to stick with a strict Latin-based biological classification system (for example, Trollin, Foulis and Florus are made up, or at least they are not the Latin equivalent of what we imply). It is important to me that fans call us out on errors whenever possible, but in this case it the scientific names of the creatures are really just designed for Eschalon's world and are not intended to reflect our real-world system.