Pool of Radiance AAR: A GrogHeads™ Experience

[Sir Slash]

A Fireball spell landing in the middle of a pack of Kobolds is one of life's most beautiful moments. 

[KyzBP]

Great to see this is back!  The conversations are priceless.

[BanzaiCat]

Update: I went after the Kobolds all right, but the ruddy bastards were reinforced with some VERY heavy-hitters. Not to mention, a multi-stage battle. I got my ass kicked. Badly.

Actually, my FIRST time through, we beat the first wave, and in the middle of handling the second wave, the game decided to crash. So I had to go reload and restart again. Fortunately, I saved just before the big battle. My second try at this, though, was no better than my first. In my third try, I managed to defeat the damned second wave, when a THIRD wave came, with MORE heavy-hitters, and they cut my party down because we were all in the single-digit hit point range.

Trolls cheat too, by the way.

In any case, it's painfully obvious this party is totally not prepared for the Kobold Caves, so I'm changing our plan to go after the Nomad Camp instead. I'll update when I can.

Thanks for reading!

[Sir Slash]

I remember the Nomads as being a Mother too. Do you still have Dirten with you or did he take off after the Library?

[BanzaiCat]

Do you still have Dirten with you or did he take off after the Library?

He's still around. Dirten is...well, he kind of reminds me of being a 15-year-old and hanging out with your friends, but one of your buddies is forced to bring his 7-year-old annoying brother along. He's landed a few decent blows here and there, but not against anything more impressive than Kobolds. He's not much of a fighter and likes to cast spells on himself. He can stand right next to one of our party members whom is in dire need of healing and completely ignore him. (I know the AI is somewhat limited, but still, it's both angering and amusing at the same time to behold.) I've had to redo his memorized spells so he stops wasting them...all his 2nd-level spells are now Hold Person, which he uses with great aplomb. Sure, he uses them on Kobolds, but at least he's doing something constructive. (By this point, B_C, GUS, and MIRTH can all Sweep against Kobolds, doing up to four attacks if there's four monsters adjacent.) Also of minor import, he's one of the few NPCs that does not demand a cut of the loot whenever we find treasure. I could go pick up an NPC hireling from the Training Hall in Phlan, but they tend to not be very helpful. The only time I ever remember doing that was back when I was first playing and hiring one to help with that final battle in the Slums.

The main reason I have him on board, though, is because I have his five 1st-level spells set to Cure Light Wounds. It's always useful to have an extra Band-Aid box hanging around.

The bottom line is, if he falls in battle, I'm not going to waste a round bandaging him.

I remember the Nomads as being a Mother too.

Yeah, there's a multi-stage battle in that one, too, but it's not nearly as challenging as the Kobold Caves.

The Kobold Caves have a literal horde of Kobolds. Not a big deal in and of themselves, but we're talking about 50 or so of them, plus Kobold Leaders, whom stand in the back and hurl arrows. The latter sucks because they love to target BBMIKE. They hit maybe two out of five shots. Which I don't get...they're 1-HD monsters, right? Hitting an AC -2? Okay...

Anyway, the REAL b*tch is in the first wave, there's four Trolls. I can usually handle everyone in that first wave, but you gotta be careful with the Trolls, in that once they fall, you have to remember where that is and stand a character in one of their two spaces so they don't get up again. They also hit HARD. In that first go-through of mine, I had two Trolls left standing. One had 9 HP left. KYZBP hit him for 8 HP (of course; goodness forbid he drop him), leaving the Troll with 1 HP. And next, of course, that damned Troll hit my namesake not once, not twice, but three bloody times, dropping him from 40 or so HP to about 10. Not good when your tanks get whittled down like that.

The second wave is made up of even more Kobolds (it seems, anyway), plus Warthogs. Or War Hogs. Or something. I don't know. But these guys are even more annoying than Trolls. If you drop one, they just stand right back up with a little message telling you they "stand up and grin." So, sometimes, you have to drop them one, two, three times before the damned things stay down. Beating the second wave isn't too hard, but it will take its toll on the party's HPs.

The final wave sports more Kobolds, more frikkin' Trolls, and Envoys. The Envoys are fighter/magic-users, because they like to stand back and throw a Magic Missile before running into the fray. The one time I made it to the third wave, these bastards dropped three of us with Magic Missiles (we were THAT low on HPs). We had no chance.

I'll be back, though, probably just before the final battle. Or maybe just after. We WILL destroy them.

There's a couple of frustrating things about PoR that drive me crazy sometimes. One is the "only hit for just enough damage to drop the monster to 1 or 2 HP so it can strike one more time for massive damage" rule. Well, okay...it's probably NOT a rule, but it suuuure feels like it sometimes. Case in point, the Troll from that first wave.

The other not-really-a-rule-but-it-sure-feels-like-it is "spend four hours memorizing a Cure Light Wounds, but only heal 1 HP when cast." I know, I know - CLW was a range of, I think, 1-6 HP or 1-8. But the odds of consistently hitting 1 HP when cast is a PITA. Especially when your Cleric has an 18 Wisdom.

It's especially frustrating when you're camping in a dungeon or in the wilderness and bracing for an ambush while trying to memorize spells so you can heal a few guys up. The game does that a lot to me, too, which has gotten me to the point where I won't rest anywhere that's not safe unless I have no choice. Too many times playing PoR on the Apple IIc did I try to memorize a bunch of spells, with an eight-hour rest, only to have the rest interrupted with 30 minutes to go.

I'm just venting. Despite the frustrations, the game is amazing, especially considering what a small footprint it has (at least, small compared to today's computers).

I'll report on the Nomad Camp endeavor in the next couple of days.

Sorry for the long post of ranting.

[BanzaiCat]

Huh. I just went through the posts and realized we haven't been to the Graveyard yet. Sigh. I really don't like undead in this game, but I dislike not clearing out everything before the endgame starts, so we'll have to get to that at some point soon.

[mirth]

My character's kinda a badass now. Reminds me of a character I ran years ago that was an elven fighter/magic-user. Think I made it to 8th level with that dude. He kicked ass. Getting him there was a chore though.

[JasonPratt]

Why not level up more with the Lizardmen, before trying the Nomad camp or the  >:D Kobold Camp again?

Your friendship pass with the Lizzies should be handy somewhere there.

[BanzaiCat]

Entry 21-A:
Do These Coins Make Me Look Fat?

After leveling up, I decided to go check out the stores and get some equipment identified.

One big problem I noticed in my last battle was, my guys were moving at a snail's pace. That's because the horked-up rules governing encumberance as a measure of coinage was being pushed to the limit.

I checked, and found that we had nearly 9,000 Platinum coins. Not to mention a whole crap-ton of other coins, too. We had a movement rate of 3. So dungeonin' has been good to us, but we need to do something about that.

Beforehand, we go and ID some equipment.



BARTHHEART, being the resident sneak, gets a sweet Cloak of Displacement. There were a few other items as well though I didn't take screenshots of them all. Regardless, it's good to spend some money on something. I sell off some extraneous equipment as well, for two reasons. One, to get rid of it - items carry with them a coinage weight as well. While that does add to the coin pile, the second reason is, doing transactions at a store will 'condense' your coinage into higher denominations. So, if you get thousands of Copper pieces, and visit a shop and just buy one simple thing (or sell something), the game will automatically cash it out to Platinum, Gold, and so forth until you have the same value of coins, but higher denominations, therefore fewer of them. (As long as you POOL your cash first, though.)

Sort of like having one hundred $1 bills for the strip club but knowing that making it rain on a bunch of toothless truck stop strippers is not good for your kids' college education fund, so you exchange it for a $100 bill. Well...okay, maybe it's not like that at all. But you get the picture.

Behind one of the shops is a jewelry shop. While you can Appraise gems and jewelry at any store, the jewelry shop sells fine gems and other goodies to help 'rich adventurers carry their wealth in a convenient way.' Or words to that effect.

If you walk into a shop down one particular street, and see a door immediately opposite you, you'll know that's the jewelry shop. Thing is, you can't interact with them in there if you interact with the first shop. In the first store, just tell them 'no' when they ask if they can show you something.



He'll go away, and then you're free to advance into the next store. I guess technically they're two stores, but they count as one, so if you actually interact with the shopkeeper in one, it cancels out the other one. At least, until you leave and revisit. Kind of a pain, but not too difficult to figure out.



Saying 'yes' brings up a VERY diverse list of purchasable items.



While the game (somewhere) says that this is a way for rich adventurers to easily carry around wealth, it's actually kind of a rip-off. Anything you buy off of this list instantly is worth half what you pay for it. So, if you buy that 50,000 GP Gold Necklace, if you want to sell it later, it's only worth 25,000 GP.

Yeah...ha..."only." 25,000 GP in this game is an OUTRAGEOUS sum, let alone 25,000. Really, you only have the shops in Phlan to interact with, and there are NO magic shops, so there's no expensive magic weapons for sale anywhere in the game (that I recall, anyway). Since leveling up a character costs 1,000 GP, and I think characters are capped at 6th level in this game, that's 30,000 GP worth of training to advance everyone to 6th level...if they're single-class characters, of course. Multi-class characters will cost more, since you have to pay that 1K for each separate class level advance, but you get the idea.

Now, you can always just DROP your money, if you want. Coins count against your weight, and as there are no banks or hoards to create, you're stuck with the excess cash. Unless you drop it. Or level up a LOT. Or buy expensive jewelry.

Yeah...so I bought the "Fine Opal Pennant" for 28,500 GP. Which means if I sell it I'll get 14,250 GP back. Oh well. Considering my purchasing options are limited and MIRTH has no tavern whores to cavort with, I'd rather have something to show for it than just drop it somewhere (which means it goes right to oblivion as the game isn't nearly sophisticated enough to remember where you drop anything).

This purchase instantly eases our collective coin burden and jumps us all back up to maximum movement rates, thank goodness.



Oh yeah. I had forgotten about the scrolls. I'm able to scribe a few, including the ones you see here (which are going into BBMIKE's repertoire).

I already wrote at length about the disaster that is the Kobold Caves. I'm going to need significantly stronger characters and a lot of healing potions before I take that on. And I don't even think the ruddy things are sold anywhere, to be quite honest.

For now, we'll head over to the Nomad Camp, which is north of the Wizard's Belching Butt-Plug.



At least this time, we travel up a nice green valley instead of a funky strip of land.

I want to know where those horses came from, though...hmm.

It doesn't take long to gain sight of the Nomad Camp. We don't run into any encounters; the monsters must not like fresh, healthy landscapes. More likely, we were just lucky.



"Will I Enter It" is #2 on the list of least likely things to be said by most of the forum-dwellers around here.

Of course we do. That's what adventurers do - stick their noses in where they don't belong.



That's an AWESOME 'stache and goatee combo there, sir. You've started the hipster movement before it was anywhere near being mainstream.

This must be the boss. I assume levels of filth are considered ranks around here.

Yep, this is looking more and more like a hippie commune camp.



Curious little buggers, eh?



Uhh...sure...?

I mean, why NOT welcome every party of seasoned, heavily-armed adventurers that you don't know at all into your village and have a great feast in their honor?

The thought of poisoned food and a local greeting somewhere in line with the Red Wedding comes to mind, but the game probably doesn't have nearly enough RAM requirement to be that devious.



We're automatically led off to the center of their small village, which is a great place to be for an ambush.



Okay, well, maybe this isn't as bad as I thought it would be. As long as we keep our demands for "golden crowns" and rants about dragon's blood in our veins to a minimum, we should be fine.



So, great merrymaking is had by all. No hint of alcohol dropped either, though one has to wonder if there wasn't a cantrip or two hidden under MIRTH's or BBMIKE's sleeves to turn water into wine.



Aaaaaaaaaand here comes the catch!

Journal Entry 55
Delivered as you sit around the campfire.

"You must beware the many dangers in this region. Several days' walk to the west there is the pyramid of evil. It has long been avoided by all sensible men. To the southeast is a lair of many ferocious hobgoblins. The areas to the southwest are inhabited by evil men - buccaneers, marauders, and soldiers of an evil empire far to the west. And all good folks avoid the swamps to the east. Nothing but danger grows in the swamps.

Sounds like he's priming the pump before laying something big on us.



Oh boy, here it comes...



KOBOLDS?!? Is that it? HAHAHAHA. You make it sound as if this is the greatest danger of them all! What, did you run out of dog treats or squeak toys to take care of these horrible, terrible creatures? HAHAHAHAHA

(Admittedly, this isn't exactly Good-alignment roleplaying...)



In other words, "Don't answer now, go ahead and go back to your hut and rest the night. Meanwhile, I shall send some EGA babes in nomad bikinis to help you make up your minds."

And I, for one, would be perfectly okay with this.



Hmm. Seems rather empty. Berift of both bosum babes and beds of any kind.

Ah well. When in Rome...or more accurately, in hippie-land...

There's enough time to rest for about six or so hours before he comes unceremoniously back into the hut, making demands.



AH! GODS. Can't a man wake up and have breakfast and nuzzle a lass's bosum or something first before we go RIGHT to business?!?

Well...the path to greatness is via XP. And XP is only had when the blood of your enemy's fresh corpses decorates the landscape. These weapons and spells weren't built to make the world a better place...so yeah, I guess we'll help these poor sods.



"Richly rewarded," eh? I dunno...I can imagine quite a bit.



There's plenty of time to rest, actually. Since everyone already has spells memorized and we didn't have any encounters on the way up here, we're already at full strength. So time is passed resting in 6-hour chunks. It takes about 18 hours of in-game time to pass, so we probably do things like sharpen our weapons and watch MIRTH try to teach nomads how to karaoke and I guess sew sequins into their flowing robes or something.

Before long, though...





That "lone sentry" must have been a cook or weed grower or something. How anything can be cut down by mere KOBOLDS is beyond me!

Next...to battle!

[mirth]

Ah, my intrepid band of karoaking nomads! I shall lead them in lyrical battle!

[BanzaiCat]

Entry 21-B:
Kobold Apocalypse

Gee, Grandpa, tell me a story again about what you did during the Moonsea Troubles!

Eh? What? Who are you? Why do you look like me and talk like you're eight years old?

Because you have dementia, Grandpa. I'm your grandson!

Oh yeah, that's right. Too many maces to the head, y'know.

Oh! I know! Tell me all about that time you and the Legion of Grogs helped those nomads fight off the horde of Kobolds!

Kobolds? Eh? You wanna hear 'bout them weak-ass monsters? Why? You some kinda pansy, boy?

Silly grandpa! Dementia is funny! (tee-hee)

Welp, fine, if'n it'll get ya t' shut yer trap n' let Grandpa have his 'potion' in peace...now, lessee...



There we was, all lined up as neat as you please, in the front line. That was 'cuz the nomads was jus' a buncha useless hippies armed with flutes an' bongos and wacky weed.

What's 'wacky weed,' Grandpa?

Ask yer mom about it someday. Tyr knows she grew enough of the stuff t' supply half the Moonsea.

Now shuddup and listen...



Them thrice-damned dogmen was comin' at us, straight up th' middle. Hunnerts of 'em. 'N we, we was only, like six real warriors an' the rest of them tree-huggers.

Well..maybe five real warriors. But thas' a story fer another time...

Anyways, we's seen them comin', so we was ready. We was gonna wait n' use th' buildin's t' anchor our flanks and stuff, but at th' lass secon', I jist charged the bastards.



Yessir, them Kobolds started t' howl and whine like th' danged dirty dogs they was at my approach.



Wow! What'd you do then, Grandpa?

'What'd I do?' You touched in the head, boy? What d'you think I did, eh? I slaughtered all them bastards! Started swingin' m'broad sword this way and that way...or wait, was it a Guisarme-Voulge? Y'know, I cain't rightly recall. There was this city guard back in Greyhawk, now he had a hell of a Guisarme-Voulge on him. All the ladies said so. Prolly why he broke up half the marriages in-

Grandpa!

Eh?

The BATTLE...?

Oh, yeah...wellssir, I cut 'em all down. Made a buncha doggy parts, yessir I did!



What about the others?

Eh? What others?

You know, silly Grandpa! The LEGION!

Ohh-oh yeah. Yeah I guess they were around there, somewhere.

Now, I jus' took care o' them little doggies, n' I guess the resta the boys came up n' helped me a little. Jus' when we was thinkin' the dogs were done, someone let more o' them out, and along came another damned wave!



Well, we all done charged in agin, lookin' fer a tussle. More o' them hippie boys had our back, I guess. They was flingin' arrows left n' right, hittin' more dirt then they was bodies o' Kobolds, but they made a hit erry now n' agin.



Now, guess what I done did, boy!

(Gasp!) You CHARGED 'em?!?



Y'bet yer Beanie +1 I did, boy!



Ah yeah, I 'member our furry lil' midget man chargin' like a banshee, carvin' them Kobolds up like roast dinners. It was a sight to see, I tell you whut.

Wowwww!

Din't take long fer them mutts t' be put down, neither. We-all had such a pile o' dog parts, there was these restaurant folks owned by these Chin-

Grandpa! Mom says you shouldn't say mean things like that!

What? It's a fictional world, boy! How kin ya get all offended n' stuff over a buncha danged jokes? Yew ain't even real no-how anyway. We mighta taken a Troll-sized hammer to the keister erry once 'n a whall, but I 'member all this stuff that didn't happen like it was yesterditty...

Uh...okay...

Anyway, after we-all beat down that thar second wave, danged if a third one wasn't a-comin' on!





Man, I tell you, it looked like the whole dang Kobold nation was a-comin' down on our heads! We was just gettin' done wipin' Kobold blood off'n our weapons when their leader, Arman, or Fabio, or Richard, or somethin' like that, came up t' us and said...



Hot damn, Grandpa! You charged them, didn't you?

Damn right, boy!

[KyzBP]

Genius.  ;D

[Sir Slash]

Damn that Gusinator is tough. And short.

[airboy]

I read all 10 pages today.  A classic. 

Recently though it has been:
Cry Havoc and Release the Pathetic Pups of Evil!!!!!!

[BanzaiCat]

Entry 22-C:
Criminal Butchery, then
Criminal Brawling
(which kinda sorta turned into Criminal Butchery itself)

(Thank you for putting up with that interlude. I hadn't planned on reporting it in that style until I was struck with inspiration at the very last moment.)



For this last battle among the Nomads, a very large wave of Kobolds is approaching. However, we have one thing going for us:

...they're Kobolds.

Their lives are about to be worth less than a truckload of dead rats in a tampon factory.

Along with us, this time the nomads reveal some relatively 'real' warriors in the form of several 4th-level fighters. If we were able to defeat two hordes of just Kobolds with barely any help, these guys are going to help us clean up but good.



So instead of standing around and waiting for them to come to us, I did just what ol' Grandpa Banzai-Cat said in the last installment: charge 'em!

Thing is, NPCs are right bastards. They'll charge into any fray, even if hopelessly outnumbered. Had this been fifteen Black Dragons, I guarantee they'd all charge them pell-mell with little regard for tactics other than "charge straight ahead and see what happens." Very Soviet of them.

Anyway, it's an easy fight. As you saw above, GUSINATOR had a good hit. We were able to close the distance in a couple of rounds, with our final movement spent in that second round to get adjacent to the buggers, so we had to take what hits we could.



As you can see here, a 4th-level fighter NPC could probably take on this whole horde by themselves.



Hassad (that's his name, Grandpa) is the nomad leader, and he's even more of a badass than his 4th-level fighters.

Between the fighters, MIRTH, GUSINATOR, and BANZAI-CAT doing sweeps and cutting Kobolds down like ripe wheat before a scythe, it didn't take very long before these morale-challenged mutts started doing what they do best!



The fight wasn't all that rewarding XP-wise; we each receive 489 XP.

As for monetary rewards, we looted 3,000 GP and 848 CP, a rather tidy sum. I can't imagine what this much loot was doing on Kobolds, but whatever. Maybe their Sarah McLachlan residual checks came in before the battle.

However, for helping the nomads out in that last battle, we received a LOT more reward across the board:







Not a bad haul.

In exchange, we had taken a few lumps, but nothing serious.

DIRTEN, our resident every-cleric-for-himself self-caster, was down to 3 HP.



We headed back to Phlan to plan our next move, but I decided to make a detour before healing in an Inn.

We headed over into a tavern and started asking around for rumors. I wanted more leads just in case there were some other places we could visit out there in the wild. I also seem to remember there was one particular mission that wouldn't be unlocked unless it was revealed through a tavern tale.



Unfortunately, most of these so-called "tales" proved to sound pretty much just like this. Here's a sampling:

To the west lives a tribe of insect-men who worship normal men and give valuable gifts to all who visit them.

A vast fortress of Kobolds dominates the western tip of the great swamp. These normally weak creatures grow to great size and have extraordinary powers here.

To the east of Phlan lies a gleaming castle of gold that shifts its location from time to time.

Great treasures are to be found on the banks of the Barren River as one ventures northward.

Wells throughout the city often provide access to hidden dens and underground passages.

...

So basically, a bunch of bull-.

This line of questioning, however, led me to another heretofore forgotten aspect of this game: "wearing out one's welcome."

Oi! You! Fancy-pants!

Eh? Wot?

Nooooo-wwww, not yew! YEW!

Pardonnez-moi, monsieur. Je ne l'ai pas fait expres!

...

Yer a fancy-talkin' boy too, huh? Hey fellas! We got ourselves bleedin' royalty over 'ere, we do!

Oh s'il te plait!

...you know, yer not helpin' yer case any, sonny...

Silly pirates! Such good-natured joshing!

Mate, they ain't joshin', they's lookin' fer a fight...

Oh of COURSE they're not looking for a fight! We're all here to have a good time, not hurt each other's feelings!

...err, well, now that yer friend here mentions it...

Hmmm...Hey, Pirate Guy. Tell the fab one here (whisper whisper whisper whisper)

...wot?

TRUST me, mucker. (turns around, takes out dagger, starts sharpening it)

Now why in the bloody blue blazes of the fifteen hells would I wanna say, "Xanadu is the most overrated movie of all time?"

GASP...YOU TAKE THAT BACK!!!

Heh-heh-heh...

WELL...well...uh...WELL YOUR BREATH WOULD PUT AN OTYUGH OFF IT'S BREAKFAST!

VAS IST LOS?!?

Now, now, George, we don' want no troubles...joo wreck-a da bar a-last time, I jus' pays it off!

MY HONOR HAS BEEN OFFENDED!

So are our noses, sweetie...can you talk without opening your mouth?

Yeah, whew...I'm not even IN this game, but I can smell you from clear over here!

RRAAAAARRRRRR

Well...who REALLY knows how these things start, huh?  O:-)

The longer story shorter, a WILD BIG HONKIN' BAR BRAWL APPEARS!



I really don't like bar brawls...they're a pain in the Otyugh.

HEY

Oh...sorry!  :-[

They're a pain in the butt.

The main reason is, as you can see, we're sandwiched in between two sides. It takes a few confusing rounds to get oriented, so that I can see that the NPCs behind our party (above them in the screenshots) are on our side, while the rest of the bar is packed with wild murderers spoiling for an ass-beating.

There's a LOT of them, too, so it takes a while. I'm of a mind to just close, but like a dummy, I didn't save recently...so I'll just have to see this one through I guess.

We manage to get through the fight and corner the remaining rabble-rousers, putting them to the sword. Which seems kind of non-Good. One would think those that run would surrender quickly but okay. Also, it's just a BRAWL, for goodness sake. Sure, blood's gonna get spilled, maybe a toof or two knocked out...but skewering each other on polearms and swords isn't exactly an expected outcome.

But hey, who am I to judge? XP!

Once the bar clears, it doesn't take long for the author-ih-tahhs to arrive to bust heads.



Nope!

Don't need to be confronting the City Watch. The city is our bread and butter right now. I'm pretty sure if we fought them we MIGHT win, but I don't want to take that chance. Nor take the chance at flipping some hostile switch deep in all 256K of this game's memory, either.

(First though...note DIRTEN is at zero HP. Heh-heh-heh. Unfortunately, I went ahead and spent a round with one of the characters, bandaging him so he wouldn't die. Sigh. It wouldn't have been a Good thing to do, especially considering some of us weren't even getting our hands dirty, like BBMIKE. I just kind of moved him over to the side out of range and didn't bother with any spells in the Kobold battle.  >:D)

So, we choose RUN.

We manage to get away safely. Funny story: we're right outside the tavern. How we managed to get away so quickly...and to just get away one space over...huh.

Guess I shouldn't ask too many questions, huh?

I immediately encamp and SAVE the darn game. Whew.