Now at GOG
Thank me later. (http://gog.com)
Quote from: tgb on August 20, 2015, 08:52:03 AM
Now at GOG
Thank me later. (http://gog.com)
(https://www.grogheads.com/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fneobokrug.the-wastelands.org%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2012%2F03%2FRainbow-Puke.jpg&hash=913cb696ffa18bedffabd1db6c9632066cb97046)
GODDAMMIT, TGB.
HOLY JSDFFOISUFSIAWeu;lkFHBVDSIPJZY)*(ERWIQUHROK:FHNSD:KLBVXFJSG:IR(EPWU$RGBJV!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YES!!!! YES!!!
Insta-fookin' buy. I just gotta wait until tonight to play it.
I just went for the second package, the one with Pool of Radiance and the other two in the first trilogy. I never got into the Eye of the Beholder (first package) series and I already own most of the games in the fourth package (with Neverwinter Nights and all).
Now I'm going to be all paranoid that it won't work! I hate waiting, made worse because I'm working from home today! lol...
I think I might do an AAR here in the forums and create characters based on forum members here...hahahahaha
I'm afraid to purchase and play, since it may completely destroy my nostalgic memories I have of playing Pool of Radiance and Curse of the Azure Bonds.
I've tried to install and play these games through DosBox before, and the only issues I had were my PC making the characters move way too fast and it would sometimes lock the game up. I can only assume and hope they've fixed all that for this release. Otherwise I know what I'm getting into...you must buy it, Bison.
Hell, I'm giddy as hell right now over this. I've only installed Pool of Radiance so far, and it comes with all the documentation...and I mean ALL of it, including even the damn code wheel. There's ~36 or so PDF scanned pages of each setting on that codewheel so it looks like you'll have to go all old school and actually enter copy protection! And the Hint Book is included too! I spent so many hours over this game, several times...I'm looking forward to building up characters and putting them through all the games. I just hope everything works right, including exporting characters to later games.
GIDDY.
It's in the cart right now.....but I have so much else to do....trying to resist....take everything out except vol 2....I don't need a complete collection...will breaking...
(https://www.grogheads.com/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.quickmeme.com%2Fimg%2F53%2F537cbcb6d24c4b67f4abf0da57d76fed6a7578f0ba5332d088b86d6a3f152224.jpg&hash=b11cc117227c85b74d86e49345e941a37811b693)
my bank hates the gog galaxy...:(
I'm truly torn. Loved these games but I fear they just aren't going to do it for me today like they did all those years ago. Nostalgia is a two-edged sword.
Edit: Holy crap, it's more than just the Gold Box games, they also have the Eye of the Beholder trilogy and Menzoberranzan available!!
You're a hard man to beat to the punch tgb. Christmas has come early for me. Now I can finally throw away my Goldboxes. I don't need them any more. I told Alias and Dragonbait I'd be back one day and it's TODAY!
I'm going into Pool of Radiance. My only hope is that my nostalgia survives the experience...
Quote from: Bison on August 20, 2015, 10:04:00 AM
I'm going into Pool of Radiance. My only hope is that my nostalgia survives the experience...
Please write a review of going back to Pool of Radiance. I completed that game - 4 times? But it has been so long and computer technology has changed so much.
Price for the 2nd package (8 games) was only $10. That is not a great loss if it sucks. But the mental pain of having my happy memories shattered would hurt so much.
Quote from: Sir Slash on August 20, 2015, 10:03:33 AM
You're a hard man to beat to the punch tgb. Christmas has come early for me. Now I can finally throw away my Goldboxes. I don't need them any more. I told Alias and Dragonbait I'd be back one day and it's TODAY!
It helps that I only get 4-5 hours of sleep each night.
Quote from: airboy on August 20, 2015, 10:21:36 AM
Quote from: Bison on August 20, 2015, 10:04:00 AM
I'm going into Pool of Radiance. My only hope is that my nostalgia survives the experience...
Please write a review of going back to Pool of Radiance. I completed that game - 4 times? But it has been so long and computer technology has changed so much.
Price for the 2nd package (8 games) was only $10. That is not a great loss if it sucks. But the mental pain of having my happy memories shattered would hurt so much.
Your 'mental pain' comment is what I was trying to say earlier, you did it much better. +1
C'mon GOG, release a playable version of SSI's Soldiers at War already! :(
Quote from: bbmike on August 20, 2015, 10:51:04 AM
C'mon GOG, release a playable version of SSI's Soldiers at War already! :(
+1 squillion!
Any idea why the Krynn games weren't included? They were excellent too.
Quote from: Sir Slash on August 20, 2015, 11:52:43 AM
Any idea why the Krynn games weren't included? They were excellent too.
I thought of that too, though I imagine they're going to see how well this does (can't imagine it doing anything more than making them lots of money), and then release the others eventually, too.
Pool of Radiance was what got me hooked on PC gaming. I still have it installed on my Windows 95 PC, although I seldom play it now, 26+ years after it was released.
I hope GOG eventually makes the entire Gold Box series (http://www.mobygames.com/game-group/gold-box-series) available.
I even liked the Buck Rogers games.
Quote from: Greybriar on August 20, 2015, 12:24:04 PM
Pool of Radiance was what got me hooked on PC gaming. I still have it installed on my Windows 95 PC, although I seldom play it now, 26+ years after it was released.
I hope GOG eventually makes the entire Gold Box series (http://www.mobygames.com/game-group/gold-box-series) available.
Although pretty well trashed by critics, I liked the remake of Pool of Radiance much more than the original.
Quote from: Rayfer on August 20, 2015, 12:26:30 PMAlthough pretty well trashed by critics, I liked the remake of Pool of Radiance much more than the original.
But it wasn't the original. ;)
Well I'll post more later but gog did it. They fixed the hyper speed battles caused by faster processing speeds. And other then getting used to controlling everything with the keyboard, it still keeps that old feeling alive and well. I'm going to need to read the rulebook, because I couldn't remember all of the commands like learning spells, how to find my equipment, ect....I LOVE gog today. It's worth every penny of $10. Now I just need time...why cannot a game developer design a time warp to play and complete games?
The one issue and I might just not know how to fix it. When you go to windows from full screen, the game is displayed in a small dos box and I haven't yet figured out how to return to full screen. This is an issue if you need to use the code wheel or look at one of the documents.
Quote from: Bison on August 20, 2015, 01:13:24 PM
The one issue and I might just not know how to fix it. When you go to windows from full screen, the game is displayed in a small dos box and I haven't yet figured out how to return to full screen. This is an issue if you need to use the code wheel or look at one of the documents.
The universal command is Alt + ENTER to go from windowed mode to full screen. Give that a try next time you fire it up and see if it works here too.
Quote from: Banzai_Cat on August 20, 2015, 01:42:42 PM
Quote from: Bison on August 20, 2015, 01:13:24 PM
The one issue and I might just not know how to fix it. When you go to windows from full screen, the game is displayed in a small dos box and I haven't yet figured out how to return to full screen. This is an issue if you need to use the code wheel or look at one of the documents.
The universal command is Alt + ENTER to go from windowed mode to full screen. Give that a try next time you fire it up and see if it works here too.
Yeah that did it BC. Thanks. Well I'm in love again...I totally forgot about racial limits on classes, but I don't care I love me some demihuman multiclass characters. It only really becomes an issue if you port the character to the next volume if iirc, because your demihumans get maxed out and can struggle...
And don't forget to save OFTEN boys! Remember no take backs when buying/selling gear except for losing money in selling or buying back gear. Save and save often. I also forgot about the joy of hitting the "N" key when doing character creation and all of the wonderful stat and money randomization. Hey I got an 18(69) STR for my fighter too freaking bad my CON is 8 :(...N...STR 12 CON 15....N...STR 17 CON 16...I can do better! N!....
Creating a character is an additction in its own... :D
Bison - there's a 'Modify' feature on the character screen, where you can go in and 'update' all of your characters' stats if you wish. You can make your fighters 18/00 and 18 in every other category (19 or 20 in some cases, IIRC, depending on race).
Why Banzai I'm SHOCKED you suggest such a thing! SHOCKED, I say.
Well I've begun clearing out the slums and the game is exactly as I remember it, but to be honest my memories wanted mouse support to be there. It's not, but the game is still awesome.
I think my party breakdown is as follows:
Fighter - Human - male
Fighter - Dwarf - male
Thief - Halfling - male
Cleric - Human - female
Cleric/Magic User - 1/2 Elf - female
Magic User - Elf - female
Now this is diversity!
Unfortunately, my AAR is a sausage-fest. When I played this game before I almost always made my Cleric and Mage a female, sometimes the Thief as well. Ah well...there's always the sequel.
Also, the menu navigation is something of a pain, but not terribly so. I remember being able to fly through menus using the arrow keys, but none of that works (not even the keypad) now. That's okay, I'll get used to it. I'm just happy it works!
well get some more entries in there b/c we're going to share with the TTRPG group over on FaceBook :)
If you're meaning me, don't worry, I will! I'll have it more loaded out later tonight and tomorrow. I want to shorten the posts up a bit as that first one was too long.
What the hell are you two on about?
Also, man that looks like some serious RPG-nerd goodness going on at GOG. I really don't have the time, nor the need, for more games right now but damn.
Damn you all! I was forced to buy The Forgotten Realm Archives - Collection Two!
Quote from: Toonces on August 20, 2015, 06:50:31 PM
What the hell are you two on about?
http://grogheads.com/forums/index.php?topic=14588.0
Somehow I got ignored by banzai; no matter I'm clearing the slum with my own band of vagabonds...uh...heroes. I meant heroes.
Well scheisse, Bison, I saw you post but didn't see that you said you wanted a spot. Sorry if I missed it. :buck2:
It was a silent implied task! Come I thought you could read minds!
On a semi more serious note: I instantly fell back into my habit from 25+ years ago and use colors to identify my characters/classes. Soon the color becomes second nature. Pink do I need to cast a heal? And damn it why can't clerics use ranged weapons?! Time to move in and hope she doesn't die.
I'm doing the same thing with colors.
Though I gotta remember that mirth's character is a fighter/mage. The dress-wearing makes me think the character is a mage so I don't move them near the front line. I gotta get over that.
Maybe change the icon to have a sword and shield with the dress?
I made one of my clerics with a crossbow, because I foolishly thought that they could use them. Surprisingly thieves cannot use crossbow or bows, so I'm rocking the sling. Very sad indeed.
I'll have to check tomorrow...I didn't think you could change the figure icons, except at the beginning when you're creating the characters.
Yes you can from the encamp screen.
I went straight for Pools of Darkness because I never finished the game on my Amiga. Re-created my party from back in the day and headed out to kick Orc-Ass. Man, all those colors to choose from in Character Creation! Must be at least.... what, 16? Can it really be that many? ;D How DO they do it? Another note, my computer's making sounds I never knew it could make. Like from the 80's man. Loving it.
I dig your style Slash, but I need to relive my favorite RPG of all time first. Pools of Radiance. I must admit there is a part of me that is greatly relieved that I don't need to get the hole punch out to make a double sided floppy discs and then spend the next 24 hours making play disc sets. :)
Well I just fought the goblin trainer battle. I remember that fight being SO much harder.
Note to self: Make sure I memorize detect magic.
BTW, fights are realtime or turn based?
Turn based.
Quote from: PAK on August 21, 2015, 03:23:44 AM
BTW, fights are realtime or turn based?
Turn based.
I've also installed on my Macbook. No issues at all with the program running or playing. The only issue is that there is no numeric keypad on the keyboard, so you have to use the 1-10 keys. It took me awhile of moving around before I remembered the layout.
789
456
123
For movement direction purposes in combat. The arrow keys work just fine until you want to move diagonally.
I suspect the linux version will also work without issue.
Quote from: Bison on August 20, 2015, 10:10:51 PM
Note to self: Make sure I memorize detect magic.
LOL
For the Goblin Trainer room, right? I had forgotten about that and moved on, then remembered as soon as I read this post, dammit. :(
I had each of my mages memorize Sleep. It's devastating here in early combats, and how I put them all down quickly. Without Sleep, your 1st-level heroes are going to get chopped up but good.
The Eye of the Beholder trilogy is tempting but I have no desire to do the graph paper mapping routine, they have no auto-map feature. I found some maps online but they weren't printable. They were/are tough games but fun, I never finished any one of them yet put a lot of hours into them.
Quote from: Banzai_Cat on August 21, 2015, 05:15:46 AM
Quote from: Bison on August 20, 2015, 10:10:51 PM
Note to self: Make sure I memorize detect magic.
LOL
For the Goblin Trainer room, right? I had forgotten about that and moved on, then remembered as soon as I read this post, dammit. :(
I had each of my mages memorize Sleep. It's devastating here in early combats, and how I put them all down quickly. Without Sleep, your 1st-level heroes are going to get chopped up but good.
Yeah but I remembered and reloaded. I don't use my magic users for the spell. I use one of my cleric spell slots.
I forgot. It's a set of magical leather armor. Whoever you got roleplaying your gimp is going to be pissed when they find that out.
Ah, shite. Oh well. Maybe I should use the hint book, eh?
I actually remembered that tidbit from 30 years ago. I remember that room being sooooo much harder.
There's three that I remember were nigh impossible, at least until I finally found out how to deal with them.
- The final room in the Slums, with the %#*$*% trolls and ogres. The trolls are nasty opponents for 1st/2nd-level characters.
- Sokal Keep's major battle. Sleep spells are a necessity, as are ranged weapons.
- A wight (?) in a library. That f#cker would drain levels every time he hit, and man that pissed me off. I'd reload every time...it was too much work to level someone up only to have them <DINK> (POOF) there goes two hours' worth of work.
The one battle that sticks in my mind is the massive kobald camp on the overland map. I remember the first time I stumbled onto that battle. Oh yeah...kobalds. Then I saw the numbers I think it's in the 20s or more; it was just a huge wall of kobalds. My party didn't have many spells memorized and wasn't fully healed. That fight did not go well.
Curse of the Azure Bonds had some brutally tough fights for me. The Red Wizard at the top of the tower beat me so many times I rage-quit the game for awhile. Also a Drow fighter on the way to the top of tower. But the one I never could get past was the Mulmaster Beholder Corp. I don't think the battle was ever intended to be winnable by whatever sick bastard came up with it. I'd like to stick a +3 Longsword up his ass. :knuppel2:
Ok...took the plunge and started playing Pool of Radiance. How the hell do exit a game? LOL...what am I missing? I can get a game going but can't get out of it.
Quote from: Rayfer on August 23, 2015, 02:08:09 PM
Ok...took the plunge and started playing Pool of Radiance. How the hell do exit a game? LOL...what am I missing? I can get a game going but can't get out of it.
Camp. Save the game. After saving you are given the option to exit.
That's the most painless way I've found so far.
Quote from: Sir Slash on August 21, 2015, 10:13:01 PM
Curse of the Azure Bonds had some brutally tough fights for me. The Red Wizard at the top of the tower beat me so many times I rage-quit the game for awhile. Also a Drow fighter on the way to the top of tower. But the one I never could get past was the Mulmaster Beholder Corp. I don't think the battle was ever intended to be winnable by whatever sick bastard came up with it. I'd like to stick a +3 Longsword up his ass. :knuppel2:
Not sure if mulmaster BC was azure bonds or secret of the silver blades but I remember one of those games having an optional room with storm giants and beholders. There was a trick to the fight though, dust of disappearance :D
My guess is Mulmaster Beholder Corps was in Azure Bonds because (1) that seems like something way too uber for the party in Radiance; and (2) I remember it being kind of near the end of the game, but we had to abandon SecretSilver due to the aforementioned gamekilling bug. (Which I suppose didn't affect everyone.) So we never got near the end of SecretSilver, much less did we even start the grand finale game Pools of Darkness (though I see that's part of the collection, yay!)
I do think we played through all three of the Krynn trilogy, though. And both Buck Rogers games.
I don't think we ever played the Savage Land duology, though I recall hearing good things about it.
I do recall trying to make an adaptation of the epic Slaver/Giants/Lolth trilogy on FRUA (which also comes with this set -- FRUA I mean), but I got frustrated trying to figure out how to make the plot in Slaver work properly.
We did play a lot of SSI's adaptation of the Krynn strategy boardgame, the name of which escapes me at the moment. Dragonlords of Krynn maybe. A very good adaptation considering the limitations -- we had played the 'hardcopy' boardgame a lot, too, and appreciated being able to run a full campaign over a couple of weeks easily like this. And if one of us got too far ahead, well, it was easy to concede and then start again when our disappointment ended and/or we wanted to try a different strategy.
Too bad SSI never got around to doing Red Arrow, Black Shield with that strategy engine -- it should have worked great. Fortunately, the longest program I ever wrote was a BASIC epic code for taking RABS battle factors and generating results, so we could play it somewhat faster and more effectively that way. But the map and chits were still more inconvenient than would have been true on computer.
(Strictly speaking, SSI did do a RABS game, sort of, though not by that name; Fantasy War perhaps? The battle mechanics were a lot simplified, partly in order to allow a goofy real-time action resolution which was a terrible arcade game. Eventually we just skipped those battles, since they could also be easily gamed to frustrate each other; but we also stopped playing the main game after a while when we realized that ginning up large amounts of elite catapults would win any battle on the map.)
Since it's a DosBox application, you can window the screen by pressing ALT + ENTER, and then close the window with the red X in the upper right corner.
However, if you close it that way, you're not saving your game. The method Greybriar mentions is the best way to ensure you don't lose your progress!
The Mac version has a sound volume, so I can turn down the effects and listen to music. I cannot find the same feature on the PC version.
Never played the Gold Box games before. Started a game of Pool of Radiance. Suggestions for new players like myself: Your created characters start the game with no weapons, armor or memorized spells at all. Don't go in any tavern right away, they frequently break out into a brawl between rival thief gangs, you'll get caught in the middle with no way out. I did and it didn't go well. Thank goodness I had a pre-entry save. Save often! Also, print out the area maps from the hint book. Especially the first starting area. It lists map-locations by number. Go to the shops and buy weapons and armor (you do start with a decent amount of gold). Then head to any inn #'d 19, you can rest and memorize spells safely in those. Those #'d 20 are where the brawls happen. Once armed, armored and with spells....take on a tavern brawl!
From what I remember about Radience, camping after each fight was the key to survival early on until you pick-up some hit points and decent AC. Anytime I tried to take on a second fight, I usually got creamed. It got a little old after a while because the only really safe place to camp was in town so... back and forth, back and forth. So I cast my first Goldbox Fireball since the 90's and landed it too close and hit most of my party with it, but luckily only killed one guy. Gonna need some target practice with that one.
Most all of the areas once you clear out roaming patrols you can rest anywhere, but before then if you clear out a room with a door you usually can rest at will there. Occassionally you'll be interrupted but at a minimum you should get your spells back and a few days rest. Also if you cast cure lt. wounds and them memorize the spell and rest it makes it easier because you are only resting for a few hours or days and not a dozen days.
I know for sure in the Phlan Slums, if you defeat a set encounter (not a random one), you can immediately camp in that cleared set encounter locale and rest without fear of interruption. In my AAR, I made the mistake of stepping out of a cleared location and then resting, which got me ambushed three times. I retreated back into the cleared locale and rested without a problem...but I think that was luck.
Low-level spells cost you about 4 or so hours, and once your mages/clerics are high level it goes up to about 8 hours, IIRC. Wounds heal at a rate of one HP per day, I think.
I had forgotten how obnoxious the cost is to level up low-level characters...1,000 gold is crazy expensive. All the memories of grabbing literally everything that monsters dropped and selling it for scraps of copper or electrum in the hopes of piling up enough cash to level up one character...they're all coming back to me. :)
Yes 1 hp/day resting.
There is a piece of jewelry early on that sells for 10K+ :) It's in the slums. Look harder slacker.
AD&D 2.0 is a harsh, bitter mistress. :smitten:
You guys should read The Order of the Stick if you have not. It's a D&D-themed webcomic, with 999 strips so far. It pokes fun at the entire D&D system but also revels in it.
Quote from: Banzai_Cat on August 20, 2015, 09:28:32 AM
I've tried to install and play these games through DosBox before, and the only issues I had were my PC making the characters move way too fast and it would sometimes lock the game up. I can only assume and hope they've fixed all that for this release. Otherwise I know what I'm getting into...you must buy it, Bison.
This was a problem with numerous old games running in DOSbox, since the processing power needs to be throttled.
Not sure if you guys have discovered this yet, but DOSbox has hotkeys for throttling it up and down. Ctrl-somethingFuctionKeys IIRC. I recall having to use it with the original
Silent Hunter, along with entering a cd loading command that was a pain to get working.
I would imagine that the good people at GOG set DOSbox to run these games at a more appropriate processor throttle speed for modern PCs so you may not have to worry about it. Of course, you can still adjust further after looking up the specific hotkeys.
I'm debating picking some of these up before long. May have to just start with one set at a time, however. I just picked up
WH40K: Chaos Gate not long ago and I'm still in the middle of that. Still - I'm really looking forward to these, especially the
Eye of the Beholder-engined ones since I didn't play those very much back in the day but really enjoyed them.
Quote from: Nefaro on August 24, 2015, 12:57:16 PM
Quote from: Banzai_Cat on August 20, 2015, 09:28:32 AM
I've tried to install and play these games through DosBox before, and the only issues I had were my PC making the characters move way too fast and it would sometimes lock the game up. I can only assume and hope they've fixed all that for this release. Otherwise I know what I'm getting into...you must buy it, Bison.
This was a problem with numerous old games running in DOSbox, since the processing power needs to be throttled.
Not sure if you guys have discovered this yet, but DOSbox has hotkeys for throttling it up and down. Ctrl-somethingFuctionKeys IIRC. I recall having to use it with the original Silent Hunter, along with entering a cd loading command that was a pain to get working.
I would imagine that the good people at GOG set DOSbox to run these games at a more appropriate processor throttle speed for modern PCs so you may not have to worry about it. Of course, you can still adjust further after looking up the specific hotkeys.
I'm debating picking some of these up before long. May have to just start with one set at a time, however. I just picked up WH40K: Chaos Gate not long ago and I'm still in the middle of that. Still - I'm really looking forward to these, especially the Eye of the Beholder-engined ones since I didn't play those very much back in the day but really enjoyed them.
I would do the same with the Eye of the Beholder trilogy if I could find some print-friendly level maps. They don't come with an auto-mapping feature and I have no desire to dig out the old graph paper and do it by hand.
Anyone else try Gateway to the Savage Frontier? I can create characters but as soon as I try to play the game it asks me to insert disc 3. Nothing seems to work to get past this....anyone succeed?
Quote from: Rayfer on August 24, 2015, 02:21:06 PM
Anyone else try Gateway to the Savage Frontier? I can create characters but as soon as I try to play the game it asks me to insert disc 3. Nothing seems to work to get past this....anyone succeed?
This kind of thing seems to happen sometimes with GOG hosted DOSbox games. I see it posted in their game forums sometimes, for various stuff. Something with DOSbox probably needs patching so I recommend posting it on the appropriate forum for the game.
There are commands you can manually enter in the DOSbox command window (when you're running with it up) that can force it to load specific disk-related files. The commands & hotkeys are in a readme file inside the DOSbox install location IIRC. But I imagine GOG should have all this stuff scripted out in a game specific file for it, normally.
I just installed to check. Made a character, added to party, and began adventuring. Sorry no errors here Rayfer. Perhaps re-install?
Quote from: Bison on August 24, 2015, 03:37:45 PM
I just installed to check. Made a character, added to party, and began adventuring. Sorry no errors here Rayfer. Perhaps re-install?
Thanks....I wonder why though? A Windows 10 thing? Regardless...I posted on the GOG forums to see if there is something other than a reinstall to fix this.
Not sure, but I'm running Win 10 too.
Quote from: Bison on August 24, 2015, 04:04:08 PM
Not sure, but I'm running Win 10 too.
Here's the answer from GOG support....You probably tried to save the game directly after creating a party. To avoid the error, save only after starting an actual game. There was supposed to be a support article about it... Looks like someone forgot about it, but it will be up tomorrow.
Ok, are these games really good or is this just nostalgia talking?
I mean, I have a plethora of unplayed RPGs, from Morrowind to Might and Magic 1-6, to Drakensang, to Baldurs Gates 1 and 2...
So do these SSI games usurp all of these or am I ok holding off until I've finished, say, the Baldurs Gate series?
I think the Gold Box games are excellent.
To answer your question, Toonces, I think a lot of it IS actually nostalgia. I think you could wait but you should definitely give it a shot at some point. For $10 for all those games in the Pack 2 collection, that's a great price. I remember buying it from Babbage's for 49.99 back in the day, and that was hard on 3.15 an hour. :-[
I think it's worth trying, BUT I also suspect that anyone who isn't moved by nostalgia to replay the games may find the graphics and UI off putting. Watch some YouTube videos and remember no mouse support.
Yeah, some YouTube videos are a good idea. Thanks for the suggestion...seems kind of obvious.
Yeah, I think it's mostly nostalgia. The games are really showing their age with the graphics and music but still they have a simple charm all their own. The pacing is just about perfect and there's never too much or too little of anything like loot or money. The games don't feel like they're letting you win or trying to keep you from winning. Plus they're AD&D man. Pool of Radience you begin with a handful of HP's and an Armor Class of a marshmallow and by Pool of Darkness, you're helping Elminister foil Bane himself with your God-like powers. Except for POR they are very much on rails though. But the stories are pretty good with some surprises and, most importantly, they are FUN.
Pool of Radiance is IMHO the best D&D game ever made. It just does everything right. The 1st person exploration, the actual turn based combat w/ friendly fire, and the loot scaling. I cannot imagine a game made today where people would be "HOLY SHIT! +2 Longsword and +2 Platemail!! My fighter is going to ROCK!" The game is brilliant in it's implementation.
If PoR was made today by an indie dev team of two or three people who were promising and delivering retro gameplay with as close to authentic AD&D 2.0 rules as possible on a computer, they would be selling the hell out of it.
And probably still in late alpha, asking people to pay for Early Access. >:D
So, those of you that remember...why can't I equip my human thief with a short bow or long bow? I thought both were acceptable. Maybe I'm thinking of another Gold Box game. I bought a sling just to be safe but haven't had a chance to use it yet, as the *#$**% final encounter in the Slums keeps cheatin'...
Fighter 1: miss
Fighter 2: miss
Fighter/Mage: miss
Thief: miss
Cleric: miss
Hired fighter: miss
Troll everyone was trying to hit: THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD everyone dies.
It's just a part of the ruleset. I has a similar experience in that clerics cannot use crossbows, which I could have sworn they could. I think it's the adventure's companion book that outlines armor/equipment restrictions. It's also why going pure thief is, other than roleplaying purposes, not very effective. It's better to have a demi-human fighter/thief, magic user/thief. For the extra equipment availability or additional spells. Also thief is the only class that does not have a race restriction on the number of levels.
Very much agreed about Order of the Stick above, btw. Even though the ruleset for Pools of Radiance is actually older than the ruleset Stick is satirizing.
Thus explaining the thief restriction I think, as Bison mentioned. Nowadays we think of thieves as obviously, necessarily being at least possibly capable of archery support. Back then it was a balance issue. You want archery? You should have a fighter working on that.
Well there are several magic slings that drop as loot too Banzi; it's a minor consolation but it's the best range weapon in the game for a pure thief outside of some magical darts. I'm pretty sure one is a reward in the well, but I don't remember for sure.
That whole exchange was a level of nerddom I didn't know you possessed, Bison. Excellently done by you :)
Damn, I'm not any good at this game anymore. I'm up to my ass in Vampires in POD and they keep draining all my levels. Where the hell's my cross and garlic at?
Quote from: Bison on August 25, 2015, 07:10:42 PM
It's just a part of the ruleset. I has a similar experience in that clerics cannot use crossbows, which I could have sworn they could. I think it's the adventure's companion book that outlines armor/equipment restrictions. It's also why going pure thief is, other than roleplaying purposes, not very effective. It's better to have a demi-human fighter/thief, magic user/thief. For the extra equipment availability or additional spells. Also thief is the only class that does not have a race restriction on the number of levels.
The weapon proficiencies were more restricted, by class, in the old pre-3rd edition stuff.
Frankly, I don't miss those old rigid rule sets. Modern RPGs have more flexibility and customization options. v3/3.5 D&D was a big leap forward from 2nd.
I couldn't find the rule reference in the game manual that outlined armor and weapon restrictions. I'm certain it's in there, I just couldn't find it when I went looking. And you can't do a text search on those PDFs because it's all image scans.
I probably should have done a demihuman thief combo, but I've always adventured with a 'pure' thief character in these Gold Box games. Which is why I could have sworn they could at least use a short bow - but apparently not, as the game says "WRONG CLASS" every time I try to equip one for poor ol' Barth.
Quote from: Banzai_Cat on August 26, 2015, 06:18:48 AM
I couldn't find the rule reference in the game manual that outlined armor and weapon restrictions. I'm certain it's in there, I just couldn't find it when I went looking. And you can't do a text search on those PDFs because it's all image scans.
I probably should have done a demihuman thief combo, but I've always adventured with a 'pure' thief character in these Gold Box games. Which is why I could have sworn they could at least use a short bow - but apparently not, as the game says "WRONG CLASS" every time I try to equip one for poor ol' Barth.
Thief/Rogue could use short bows in v3 and up. Not so in v2. Pretty sure it was just low rent weapons like dagger, club, sling, shortsword (?) etc that were class proficiencies.
Same situation for Clerics and crossbows.
Those darts are just silly weapons. I've only bought them for Mage characters, and only used them when desperate and/or taking out sleeping or Held opponents.
Every time a character throws one I keep imagining a dart like in a game of darts, and it's like a ninja movie where one hit with a dart and the target immediately dies. It's so ridiculous, it's hilarious.
Quote from: Banzai_Cat on August 26, 2015, 06:18:48 AM
I couldn't find the rule reference in the game manual that outlined armor and weapon restrictions. I'm certain it's in there, I just couldn't find it when I went looking. And you can't do a text search on those PDFs because it's all image scans.
I probably should have done a demihuman thief combo, but I've always adventured with a 'pure' thief character in these Gold Box games. Which is why I could have sworn they could at least use a short bow - but apparently not, as the game says "WRONG CLASS" every time I try to equip one for poor ol' Barth.
The weapons, equipment, spells, xp breakdown, and turning undead are in the Adventures Journal appendixes. They are specifically the last 4 pages. You can download it from the same spot that the manual is located from gog. The one thing the game doesn't seem to have documentation on that I could have sworn it did is spell casting ranges and effect radius. But then again I seem to remember blowing the hell out of my party with fireballs until I learned the effective range and radius.
Quote from: MetalDog on August 25, 2015, 10:18:29 PM
That whole exchange was a level of nerddom I didn't know you possessed, Bison. Excellently done by you :)
Shhh....you'll blow my street cred.
Quote from: MetalDog on August 25, 2015, 10:18:29 PM
That whole exchange was a level of nerddom I didn't know you possessed, Bison. Excellently done by you :)
Every thread on this entire board is a level of nerddom so hipster that it ate cake before it was cool, and burnt its tongue.
dunno if this was already posted here or not
http://www.pcgamer.com/how-gog-rescued-13-forgotten-realms-games-from-licensing-hell/
too lazy to check :)
Quote from: bayonetbrant on August 27, 2015, 02:49:13 PM
dunno if this was already posted here or not
http://www.pcgamer.com/how-gog-rescued-13-forgotten-realms-games-from-licensing-hell/
too lazy to check :)
Damn. That's an odyssey!
Dragonlance/ Krynn should be next. A great big :-* to GOG for bringing back the classic oldies.
Quote from: bayonetbrant on August 27, 2015, 02:49:13 PM
dunno if this was already posted here or not
http://www.pcgamer.com/how-gog-rescued-13-forgotten-realms-games-from-licensing-hell/
too lazy to check :)
Very interesting. Thanks!
Quote from: airboy on August 27, 2015, 08:50:19 PM
Quote from: bayonetbrant on August 27, 2015, 02:49:13 PM
dunno if this was already posted here or not
http://www.pcgamer.com/how-gog-rescued-13-forgotten-realms-games-from-licensing-hell/
too lazy to check :)
Very interesting. Thanks!
These games seem pretty old school / hardcore for me, but damn if this article doesn't make me want to buy them just to rewards GOG.
Quote from: bayonetbrant on August 27, 2015, 02:49:13 PM
dunno if this was already posted here or not
http://www.pcgamer.com/how-gog-rescued-13-forgotten-realms-games-from-licensing-hell/
too lazy to check :)
Thanks for the link. It's a good read. O0
I'm not sure why Brant hasn't bought the games yet. They work fantastic on macs.
Quote from: smittyohio on August 27, 2015, 09:10:50 PM
Quote from: airboy on August 27, 2015, 08:50:19 PM
Quote from: bayonetbrant on August 27, 2015, 02:49:13 PM
dunno if this was already posted here or not
http://www.pcgamer.com/how-gog-rescued-13-forgotten-realms-games-from-licensing-hell/
too lazy to check :)
Very interesting. Thanks!
These games seem pretty old school / hardcore for me, but damn if this article doesn't make me want to buy them just to rewards GOG.
Yes, they are very old school and hardcore, at least the Gold Box ones are. I am once again finding myself bitten by the nostalgia bug, only to find the games frustratingly difficult and with ui's that are antiquated and hard to utilize (i.e. no mouse support). At some point I have to stop buying these old games and just accept I enjoy the newer ones much more. I've spent 10 hours or so on the Gold Box games only to find myself returning to Pillars of Eternity.
Quote from: Bison on August 28, 2015, 07:21:59 AM
I'm not sure why Brant hasn't bought the games yet. They work fantastic on macs.
I owned them back when they were first released, and the graphics looked a lot better on the Macs back then, too.
That said, Brant isn't buying
anything right now, because Brant is still recovering from the Summer-of-No-Job™ and has a stack of bills to pay off once the teaching checks start coming in. While I was busy scraping by on one part-time teaching check, and dumping a lot of old clothes/toys at the kids consignment place, my kids were busy racking up hundred-dollar dr's bills for broken collarbones, and burning a lot gas doubling the number of trips for the youngest in preschool.
Real life blows sometimes.
Quote from: bayonetbrant on August 28, 2015, 08:12:44 AM
That said, Brant isn't buying anything write now,
No way...did you really right that? ???
Quote from: Toonces on August 28, 2015, 08:50:28 AM
Quote from: bayonetbrant on August 28, 2015, 08:12:44 AM
That said, Brant isn't buying anything write now,
No way...did you really right that? ???
LOL...very clever Toonces. Well done!
Quote from: Toonces on August 28, 2015, 08:50:28 AM
Quote from: bayonetbrant on August 28, 2015, 08:12:44 AM
That said, Brant isn't buying anything write now,
No way...did you really right that? ???
f'n voice recognition... fixing. ugh.
Funny you said that Rayfer. I've done the same thing-- Gold Box frustration leading to return to POE. But I plan on trudging through Pools of Darkness to finish what I never could 25 years ago.
Quote from: Sir Slash on August 28, 2015, 09:50:19 AM
Funny you said that Rayfer. I've done the same thing-- Gold Box frustration leading to return to POE. But I plan on trudging through Pools of Darkness to finish what I never could 25 years ago.
I gave up on the Gold Box games....not because of their depth, story or battles, I just couldn't take the user interface any longer. It was a chore for me just to play the game...my biggest battle was against the UI.