Keeps getting killed

[DSLOA]

I guess I understood now what it means by level of difficulty as "hard". It was real tough going to the King's Rook in my SP game, I keep getting ambushed by the black knights and pawns and the damn archers. I nearly gave up, but after saving and restarting about 20 times, I finally found the way to sneak through.
1) Should I have learnt all the combat skills? because I took the time to learn only the staff and ignore the unarmed combat and the rest? Is one set of combat skill good enough to survive?
2) My mundane skill sets are only at 11, and that hardly qualifies me to make better armour to survive the archers hit. How can I expect to survive the tougher regions if I am leveling so slowly?
3) I can't make strong spells with my low skill, I only have dart spell which is a tickle to the enemies.... any advise how to proceed?

[Kilarin]

Should I have learnt all the combat skills?

I always do learn all of them, but I never use anything but staff, so I doubt if its necessary.

My mundane skill sets are only at 11

If you took stealth, use it on the boat trips. It doesn't use any mana but you still get the experiance. You can work you way up to the essential 12 that way. If you don't have stealth, just use foraging, but you won't be able to do quite as much since you will run out of mana.

However, believe it or not, you can equip yourself most marvelously with even just an 11 mundane. Once you've picked up alchemy you can make some REALLY nice stuff. Keep playing with that crafting.

How can I expect to survive the tougher regions if I am leveling so slowly?

Don't sneak through. Kill every single enemy in each and every square. Kill some of them twice! (Yes, that IS possible, just knock them down to zero, let em heal, then knock them down again)

Stealth is a nice bonus, but use it to get TO the enemy, not past them.

If you left enemies behind and you need more levels, go back and smack them all now. Thats walking xp you are leaving behind.

I can't make strong spells with my low skill

Rune forage CONSTANTLY. For spells, use SLOW. It really helps you spread out those large masses of enemies, while helping to build your talent at the same time. After you gain a few more points of talent, that magic will start paying off in combat.

Oh, and of course, make the magic staff as soon as possible. I used my first Rune of Creation to make a Tesseract. That was a mistake. I didn't REALLY need to carry that much stuff and I NEEDED that doubled mana. Would have improved my mundane AND talent scores since you can forage longer.

[Liantedan]

kilarin said:

Should I have learnt all the combat skills?

I always do learn all of them, but I never use anything but staff, so I doubt if its necessary.

That depends on your plans. If I recall correctly, Ahu fights unarmed, an always on the level you have trained yourself. I think the same goes for Mantri. Your skill with weapons is the same skill applied to your companions. If you only train Staff, then Ahu wouldn't be very good in her unarmed combat, and Mantri wouldn't be as good with whatever weapon you equip him that is not a staff, and you should equip Mantri with a shield to keep him alive.

Also, there always is the chance you would grow to like other weapons. And when you're going to fight with mass-based weapons or a rapier, you might need all the skills you can get...

My mundane skill sets are only at 11

You should really consider spending some time to improve that. The time you "waste" by just clicking and clicking to very slowly gain Mundane skill will be given back to you as you progress. Going at full speed without any training (as in learning skills AND using those skills intensively) will make the game only harder. You say you have problems with your curent enemies, keep in lind that they only get harder. Spend some time getting some higher levels, even if you have to go bash up a pell while waiting for your mana to regenerate so you can continue building your Mundane at the same time. After that, you craft some better equipment. Then, go remove all hostile forces from all previous regions. By the end of it, you will notice they are significanly less hard to kill, due to both your characters training and to your improved tactics.

Other than that, listen to what Kilarin said before me, and you'll have less problems and thus more time to enjoy the game.

[Kilarin]

Your skill with weapons is the same skill applied to your companions.

EXCELLENT point! and good advice.

[Xaa]

dsloa said:

I guess I understood now what it means by level of difficulty as "hard". It was real tough going to the King's Rook in my SP game, I keep getting ambushed by the black knights and pawns and the damn archers. I nearly gave up, but after saving and restarting about 20 times, I finally found the way to sneak through.

Congrats.

1) Should I have learnt all the combat skills?

That would have helped, yes.

Is one set of combat skill good enough to survive?

Yes, but it's a lot easier if you have mastered all four.

2) My mundane skill sets are only at 11, and that hardly qualifies me to make better armour to survive the archers hit. How can I expect to survive the tougher regions if I am leveling so slowly?

You're not. You need to build up mundane a bit so you can make better gear - try foraging as you travel, and foraging on the boat. Even in areas where you don't forage anything, you still get the points. There is also a weapon you can make that builds mundane.

3) I can't make strong spells with my low skill, I only have dart spell which is a tickle to the enemies.... any advise how to proceed?

Yes, two things:

1) Magic Dart can be lethal, particularly at higher levels of talent once you have a Wizard's Staff to absorb the mana cost for you. You start getting multiple darts, you don't miss often, and you can keep the enemy dodging by tapping the button repeatedly.

2) Check the help file for more hints and tips.

[DSLOA]

Call me dumb, but i read the readme under hints and i still have no clue which weapon builds mundane. i took the advise to rune forage, keep gettings rocks that stockpile me and mantri's backpack. the only place i had success was the queens castle, any particular reason for that?

[Kilarin]

i took the advise to rune forage, keep gettings rocks that stockpile me and mantri's backpack. the only place i had success was the queens castle, any particular reason for that?

Just luck. it's a roll of the dice. You will probably notice that the Psuedo Random Number generator that DS uses is not very good. It was apparently designed to be easy to keep in sync in a multiplayer game, as opposed to really being random. Thats why I can not get a fizzle on a spell for a long time, then suddenly get 5 in a row. In my first MW game, the first SIX runes I found were ALL runes of protection. IF the Psuedo Random Number Generator was rolling fair, the odds of that happening around 1 in 729...

So, just keep foraging, and any time you get one of those magic rocks SAVE!!!!

[Liantedan]

Call me dumb, but i read the readme under hints and i still have no clue which weapon builds mundane.

We won't call you dumb. This is a special weapon, and you have to figure out how to make it, just like all other weapons that give your melee experience to a skill other than Confidence. There is a weapon that helps you level Talent when you fight melee, there is such a weapon for Precision and one for Mundane. All three are a bit special and require a different way to create. These weapons can be a great boon to you, so it is ment to be quite a challenge to figure out how to craft them.

Also, Rune Foraging adds to Talent, not to Mundane. If you want to improve Mundane, use another skill. Nonetheless, you will be happy when you have some Runes with you. There are over thirty spells, close to fourty now, so if you'd decide to make all those spells, you need the Runes. Also, enchanting things requires Runes, and a high Talent makes enchanting easier. (Works about the same as Mundane for crafting.)

I think I speak for the others as well, when I say that early on in the game we all were waiting for our mana to slowly regenerate so we could cast Forage or even Lockpick or whatever Mundane skill we happened to have selected, just to gain one little point of experience for our Mundane skill, wether or not there was a result. When you use the skill, you get one point. Even when you use the Lockpicking skill without your toolkit in the middle of the boatride.
Later, some of us started crafting and using those special weapons to boost our skills.

Good luck, and have fun.

[vhodhann]

A trick I do to the Black forces on Kings Bishop especially with the spear throwers is to run close to the castle wall stop near the bishop towers go solo and lure them in to the bishops who summon demons that will help you paste them to the floor!

[Xaa]

All I can say is that this game doesn't take lightning reflexes and it doesn't take the brainpower of an Einstein. Once you figure it all out, you'll be hooked.

[Kilarin]

A trick I do to the Black forces on Kings Bishop especially with the spear throwers

Man I hate those spears, they are DEADLY!

is to run close to the castle wall stop near the bishop towers go solo and lure them in to the bishops who summon demons that will help you paste them to the floor!

I was doing the opposite. Trying despertly to keep the black soldiers away from the wall because I wanted the experiance for killing them MYSELF!

[cypherwulfe]

So I know what melee weapon builds Precision, and I know how to make it.
I also know what weapon builds talent, and how to make it.

Anyone care to trade one of those two secrects for hte one that builds mundane? I dont need the recipe, just which one it is.

[Liantedan]

Ah, but alas, by telling you the name you'd know too much about it.

The Talent-levelling weapon's name wouldn't give away how to obtain it, nor for the Precision-levelling one. The Mundane-levelling weapon's name makes it plain obvious to you and as such mentioning the name might be considered a spoiler as big as telling you the recipy...

[Xaa]

Too true, Liantedan. The item's name gives it away as to how to make it.

The bottom line, however, is that there really IS a melee weapon that builds Precision, another that builds Talent, and another that builds Mundane. Discovering these things is, like the rest of the Crafting system, part of the game - it's a process of experimentation.

[Kilarin]

If it's any comfort, I STILL haven't learned which weapon builds mundane. I may have created it and just not tested it.

You can build mundane just fine without it.