Thanks, comments and a few bugs (some spoilers).

[nicke]

First of all, thanks for a great game! For someone who has gamed very little since the Fallout and Baldur's gate days (except some Nethack which never gets old) it was a joy to get a classic rpg. Nice and interesting story with some surprises.

First I played it through with a sword wielding fighter-elementalist who diversified his skills enough, especially in alchemy (to polish the armor a bit brighter) and some other stuff. The game started out tough enough, lacking mana to soften up the enemy without sleeping all the time, but in the end nothing could touch the guy and he really delivered some damage (some tougher enemies and less goblins at the end would have been better imo (not to say that pretty much any new enemy encountered wasn't a real challenge at first, just wish it wouldn't have stopped producing tougher opposition). All in all a fun experience with a bit of save-loading and trying to find better loot. Missed a few (quite well hidden I think) things that I read about later, but quite suitable rails allowing lots of free roaming.

Only bug encountered: the possibility of switching maps and ending up in the forest with no way to get out or back to the old map. Learned to stay in open areas when exiting a map, but still happened a couple of times when left on "auto-walk".

My mousepad on the laptop didn't really perform perfect all the time and sometimes I ended uo p walking around while the enemies kept hitting me. Assume that's just me...

Sometimes a bit tedious walking between places in an explored area (more or less) knowing there would be no enemies or other new things.

Either I'm (even more than I knew) unlucky or you're just not supposed to be able to pick locks without being a master thief or buying every lock-pick in every shop. Getting a 40% chance to pick a lock would usually mean 10+, even 20, attempts and several broken lock-picks. Now obviously sometimes it would work on the first attempt, but at some point I started counting a sample of a couple of hundred tries and was a lot below expected value. Being a physicist I know enough statistics not to be fooled by what seems to be weird odds in small sample sizes and feeling unlucky and so on, but really, is there some modifier after the value shown or should it be taken as your actual chance to pick the lock? I did feel a bit similar about to-hit probability, but never checked any statistics on it.

Tried all (I could think of) endings. Achieving destroyer was easy as no one really got in any hits on my guy!

Then, immediately afterwards I started a new game (which indicates it's a really good game! (and a bit on the short side (though really quite nice length)). This time starting out as purely diviniation magick user, no save-loot-scumming and really trying to avoid save-loading (while not going for iron-man). Made for a very interesting game with two deaths, once forgetting to close the door when stealing from Lilith and another stupidly standing too close to a hellfire trap after luring a taurus to step on it. Not to mention a lot of running away and sleeping

The guy ended up very well versed in both diviniation and elemental magick, but ultimately chose to do in most late-game enemies with a buffed up executioner's axe... just more effective...

On the way into the citadel the guy lost faith in mankind (a.k.a. went nuts), portaled back to aridell and started slaughtering the known world. He thinks, and hopes, he didn't leave a single breathing thing alive in Thaermore. The eyes in the vault were a bit tough to kill without getting thrown into the cage (yes, could have portaled out, but didn't feel like unloading the equipment somewhere (as noted to be needed in the first game when trying to chat up the vault keeper after visiting my chest)) and the wizard in shadowmirk managed to do quite a bit of cold damage the one time he got past my magick-defense (on the first try, lucky bastard). Otherwise never encountered any meaningful opposition after that, except:

The game started crashing quite a lot when attacking friendly NPCs, seemed mostly random, but for instance Mo--whatever his name was, the elementalist in Blackwater, where I had to reload a couple of times making sure I was buffed up enough to get him killed with the first two (hasted) hits, as the game would crash if he tried to cast a spell. The crashes were instant program shut downs and the game has never crashed for me in any other situation. I'm running the Windows 1.04 version*, on a laptop which is just at recommended specs (and often run much lower with power saving, but never encountering any problems except the walking speed getting a bit sluggish).

My guy was also a bit surprised to see giants stealing his xp when attacking the citadel, after the bloody slaughter in the giants' village the day before.

It would perhaps have been interesting for the game ending to take into account that there really isn't any Thaermore anymore, or goblins to over-run it. Also tried the "good" ending and the chancellor didn't seem too upset with the slaugher...

Anyway, I might sound negative, but that's just because I've left out the thousands of good, impressive, interesting things about the game. But that's another post, as well as suggestions for book2.

*Speaking of which, it would be nice if it would be possible to download the game for all os's with one purchase (now there's the cd with all of them, but don't think that was availible when I bought the game and anyway, I don't need the cd). Would just be nice to have it for linux as well, but not nice enough to pay full price for (even though putting it out for the three systems deserves be applauded and supported, I won't pay again for a game I already own and just have to boot to windows to play).


Cheers,
Nicke

[Daemian Lucifer]

Either I'm (even more than I knew) unlucky or you're just not supposed to be able to pick locks without being a master thief or buying every lock-pick in every shop. Getting a 40% chance to pick a lock would usually mean 10+, even 20, attempts and several broken lock-picks. Now obviously sometimes it would work on the first attempt, but at some point I started counting a sample of a couple of hundred tries and was a lot below expected value. Being a physicist I know enough statistics not to be fooled by what seems to be weird odds in small sample sizes and feeling unlucky and so on, but really, is there some modifier after the value shown or should it be taken as your actual chance to pick the lock? I did feel a bit similar about to-hit probability, but never checked any statistics on it.

Really?I used to open 10% locks using just two picks.And more often than not,I managed to open 20% locks in my first three tries.

[Martin]

Some luck there I would think. I usually got the more difficult ones open after about 10 tries and about 3 picks.

[Daemian Lucifer]

Some luck there I would think. I usually got the more difficult ones open after about 10 tries and about 3 picks.

It goes wih its share of bad luck as well.I managed to roll a 106 AP character once,only to have my computer crash before I started the game.