challenge game

[grobblewobble]

Hi guys,

Currently I'm playing the SP in hard mode. I'm greatly enjoying it!
All enemies are dangerous. You're really forced to plan ahead and to use all available tools and weapons to their full potential. In fact, I discovered all kinds of new tactics and details while doing this - every little bonus counts.

However, I'm also thinking about increasing the difficulty of the game in a different way. What I was thinking was to start a game with the following rules to increase the challenge:

- no drinking potions
- no load and save (except if the game should crash)
- no pausing the game

Those options should make the game experience harder, as well as more realistic. To compensate (I am not *that* masochistic) I will relax the game difficulty to 'normal'. Have any of you tried something similar? Any additional suggestions, maybe?

[Kilarin]

no drinking potions

I almost never carry potions in LOH anymore, you won't miss them much.

no load and save

Or if you quit to sleep I presume! BUT, this makes for a VERY hard game. I wasn't able to pull it off that way.

no pausing the game

Now you are talking NIGHTMARE difficulty!

Keep us updated, I'm interested in seeing how it goes, I may have to try those last two myself! MAYBE.

[Artamos]

O.K.

You've got me...

After a major software meltdown I'm back up and running..

Got DSLOA loaded.. Downloading LoH..

On cable... Upgraded RAM and Video card.. Have been forced into retirement (time zones not that big a deal)..(.....)

Good to go..

P.M. me...

I would love to play from scratch.. New Chars only..
.
.
Artamos..
.

[Liantedan]

I'm with Kilarin on the potions front. Every character I have carries at least one of them with them, but never actually uses it. Mana is potion enough, for me. And when mana runs out, the fight wasn't planned well enough, and you deserve to run with your tail between your legs to lick your wounds and reflect on the mistake.

Loading is something I try to avoid instinctively, and thus far has happened very rarely. Despite all that, I still save every 10 minutes or so. ( Also may have something to do with the old pc's I use, though. This one managed to crash three times before my MP character was level 5. Full resets were required, too. And no, it had nothing running in the background either... )

No pausing ?

I seem to recall Xaa having stated he was able to play Mageworld without using he pause-button, depending on "how much blood was diluting his caffeine-circulation system"...
I suppose the same would count for LoH too.

I also often go play tag with the trolls, and forbid myself the use of the pause-button. True, it levels your character faster, but it also means that if they take a single hit, they're dead. ( Also, the troll must be killed by the time it stops giving xp, else you're in trouble too... ) Try telling me the character will not get experienced from seeing their lives flashing before their eyes each time that club comes down
Though I only do this in MultiPlayer. In SP, I don't go speed-levelling. Much more fun to just go with the flow and follow the storyline.

[grobblewobble]

Nov 22, 2008 23:09:34 GMT -5 Kilarin said:

I almost never carry potions in LOH anymore, you won't miss them much.

Through most of the game I use very little potions too, BUT..
On hard mode, drinking potions was the only tactic I could think of to survive the fight with the bandit recruiter at the beginning of the game. In combination with the other two restrictions, I think it does add some additional challenge. And I like this restriction because it adds to the degree of realism.

Nov 22, 2008 23:09:34 GMT -5 Kilarin said:

Or if you quit to sleep I presume!

Well of course. ;D No load & save is also known as the 'iron man' challenge and all it means is that you don't reload from an earlier point in time. No time travelling, so to speak. Save & quit the game is allowed.

On second thought I'm going to add another rule: in addition to 'no pausing', I'm not going to turn the game speed below 1.0, either.

Nov 22, 2008 23:09:34 GMT -5 Kilarin said:

Now you are talking NIGHTMARE difficulty!

Keep us updated, I'm interested in seeing how it goes, I may have to try those last two myself! MAYBE.

Thanks. So far I didn't even start yet - instead, I decided to try this thing in the original DS first. That went ok so far (I'm at the end of the ruins of Wesrin Cross now), but there was a lot more tension than usual and there were some very tight moments.

edit: As an update, I just started on it. No picking up potions leads to an interesting money problem at the start of the game. However, I was able to manage the black forest without the leatherworking skill this time and I succesfully escaped the assassin and ancient guardian. To be continued..

EDIT 2: I Restarted today, because I wanted to try a different party (male melee hero). This time I realised that even with the money constraint it is still possible to craft some items in the black forest, if you sell the crafting kit back to the vendor afterwards.
They made it to Tir Malani, but down there they were overwhelmed by a couple of shards that were on the other side of the river. May they rest in peace.

[grobblewobble]

Tried it again. This time I added another restriction: no headgear. Seeing the blinking eye effect is too awesome.

First I barely survived getting to Hamlin. I accidentally alarmed a lot of Hyperboreans and wasn't ready to fight them. So I fled into a quiet corner, but one Hyperborean guard kept pursuing and killed T'Vril. Jeff, the hero, managed to defeat the guard and buy a resurrection scroll (as well as much better gear). When T'Vril was standing again, I decided to take revenge and kill them all. Bad idea.. soon, T'Vril was running for it and Jeff was dead, surrounded by a swarm of bloodthirsty skeletons.

But T'Vril found a way out of this mess. She had trained nature magic a little bit, so she bought a res scroll and a healing wind scroll from the witch. Then she sneaked up to dead Jeff, and used one after the other. Jeff was raised, immediately punched unconscious again, but healing wind saved him. Together they ran off to Hamlin.

After beating up a lot of Hobgoblins, they avenged themselves properly on the Hyperboreans and went to Tir Malani. Carefully they worked their way through the dark forests, sneaking past the dangerous witches and bridge troll. In Tir Malani they fought and sneaked to the necromancer and here T'Vril finally could catch her breath and take her time to learn about the dark arts.

On the way back to Lord Dalar it was mostly smooth sailing, until they bumped into an unexpected greater forest troll. They tried the dance of death, but without the pause button it went wrong. T'Vril, standing still in the center while Jeff was running circles, was attacked by the vicious beast and lay unconscious on the ground. Jeff panicked and ran away with the troll on his tails. He had to run back all the way to the renegade camp, were he was saved by his new friends.

When Dalar thought it would be a funny joke to see Jeff dressed up in a robe, they decided that they weren't feeling up to fighting all the elite hobgoblin soldiers on the way. So they ran by them instead and made a little early side trip to Stonegate. There, Jeff met a Shikari who learned him all about the honorable art of robbery. He went to the dwarves to get some practice and complete his collection of rings that formerly belonged to Lloyd. Then he sold his honorably stolen goods to the merchants of the town. The merchants either didn't recognize the treasures of their fellow dwarves or pretended not to, not sure about that. In any case, they went back, all loaded and armed, to see that priest.

The priest was gullible enough to believe Jeff was a fanatic follower of Azunai. However, after Jeff bought a robe they got confused about the way they should walk. T'Vril accidentally showed her face to the guards! They heard angry screams from the church as the priest finally realized he had been hoodwinked. They panicked and ran for it, never to come back.

After that, killing a few darklings was easy.. but only because they never fought more than two of them at once. When they saw the glowing chest, they didn't trust the silence one bit. They quickly grabbed the hammer from it and ran off with it, avoiding a very dangerous fight.

In the valley of the four winds, T'Vril looked very frightened, perhaps in a moment of clearvoyancy. She warned Jeff how dangerous a place it is.. if only he had paid more attention. The earth witches were tedious to fight. Luckily T'Vril had taught her minion effective ways to offend girls, making them charge after him recklessly instead of keeping a distance. Next up, the air witches seemed to be pushovers, so they relaxed and let down their guard.. alas. Before they realised it, they got into a fight with one air witch too many and were overwhelmed. Jeff panicked and tried to run away, but the witches kept sending lightning bolts at him from afar..

May they rest in pieces.


And if you haven't tried this challenge yet, I really recommend it! The game has much more excitement and tension when you know that any mistake can be your last. Next game I think I will not allow resurrection spells either, as an additional restriction. If one dies, that person is dead and the game is over.

[Kilarin]

how on earth did you resurrect Tvrill? I thought her death ended the game.

I'm playing again, (just took a break from the happy hunting ground to go round up some more npc's)

It's amazing how well this game survives the test of time.

I started out trying with no restart after death. But, then I died. Of course, i was playing on hard. Perhaps I should try it on normal.

No pause? I'm still hesitant on that. I live by the space bar!

[grobblewobble]

Totally use the rules you enjoy most. I enjoy this particular set of challenge rules, but then I play on normal. Playing on hard you deserve some compensation I guess. ;-)

The game doesn't end as soon as T'Vril dies, so it is possible to buy a resurrection scroll, raise her and continue the game. But I'm starting to feel like resurrection is an unfair advantage I have over the monsters, so I will not do it this time.

I started anew, in more traditional style. Ranged + combat magic, that is. Escaped from the hole and training on goblins south of Hamlin now. So far it went much smoother then the previous round.

How did you die? I am interested to hear how you manage things. Are you using potions? I never managed the Kalzerai recruiter without potions on hard.

[Kilarin]

I believe I died from a bad click while trying to kill the dark elf assassin. I don't like leaving him, or the gobbot behind.

I used some potions, as in meat, in the very beginning. But by the time you pass the gobbot, the auto drink function seems to hurt my timing more than the potions help, so I quit carrying them.

I went for an all magic approach this time. Hero as nature mage, Tvrill as combat mage.

I'm not following the proper order for everything. As soon as I got to hamlin, Tvrill and I used cloak of shadows, a bit of fighting, and a LOT of running, to sneak to the light elves and get me some nature mage spells. Then we went to the dark elves to get combat mage spells. But as soon as we had acid gas and leech life, I headed over to the swamp to do some troll hunting. That is TOUGH at that level. But I got one giant troll to chase me all the way back into the incubalous forest, and there I kept him running in circles while tvrill used acid gas/leech life and my hero used flash until we FINALLY got up high enough level to kill him. Some more trolls, some more expensive troll clubs, and I went BACK in to the dark elf city and bought some MORE spells. Usually I try to take out everything in the queens palace at this point, but I was having a hard time with it this time and decided to leave it for the end where it is supposed to be.

I went back and killed more trolls until I had a LOT of loot in troll clubs, visited the dwarves to get the hammer, spells, and some nice spell books, rings, amulets, and hats!

Went pretty much according to the plot until we got to the Valkyries, There I snuck both of us through to the happy hunting ground and started killing dragons. That got me up past 45th level, so I decided to go back and pick up the 3 npc's that are available before the rats.

I DO wish there was some way to kill that dratted slaver upstairs in hamlin. Just gets my goat that the evil slaving slime is untouchable and I have to BUY one slave free and leave the others sitting there...

Anyway, soon as I get Adara, Lord Collingway, and Evangaline all equipped I'll probably head back up to the happy hunting grounds for some more dragon slaying fun! Then it will be back to the dark elves to settle with that long staircase and Lactri. Then there is the castle, the dungeons, and monster island!

[grobblewobble]

Hahaha! Ok, yes. That is erm.. another way to do it.

Reminds me of some games I played long ago. The corpse in the middle of the church in the swamp is also worth tons of XP, while you're at it.

This is the reason why I don't want my pause button, hehe.

Oh yes, I totally wanted to attack that hobgoblin slavetrader too. Then again, how about the trader downstairs? .. he is in it, too..

In my last game T'Vril died, after I tried taking out the palace guards with soul lance early on and fumbled it. That'll teach me taking unnecessary risks.

[grobblewobble]

I tried it on hard mode. A recap of the rule set I was using:

- hard mode
- no pause
- no picking up or buying any potion
- no resurrect spells
- no reload
- hats allowed this time

It went surprisingly well at first. I found out that beating the bandit recruiter can be done without a potion, if you start out as melee. You will reach strength 14 just before fighting him, which gives you enough health to absorb some hits. And then you just need to run away and regenerate your HP when you are wounded.

Getting to Hamlin was easy after that. It seems I am bothering less and less with fighting any monsters on the way there.. hobgoblins are slow enough that it is safe to just run past them most of the time.

Then it was time for some training on the hobgoblins and taking out the hyperboreans. Hard mode made it rougher than I am used to, but still doable.

During the trip to the dark elf city I didn't bother fighting anything, either. I just ran straight for the Renegade camp and had them kill the monsters following me. That was a dangerous move as the forest trolls got in a few hits (and boy do they hit hard). Still, I feel this way is safer than fighting.

Once in Tir Malani, the first Crystal Shard killed my party. I wasn't ready for them with a working strategy and running away from them doesn't help. However, although I failed the challenge I am still going to finish this game, to get a better feel for hard mode.

[grobblewobble]

An update. I finished the failed challenge attempt game and played through the SP campaign on hard, while still trying to stick to my own rules as much as possible.

The main challenges were:

- Reaching the necromancer alive. Everything is brutal when you just start out, especially the crystal shards.
- Valley of the four winds. Doable, but they are treacherous and making a mistake is easy.
- Princess T'Pring on the stairs.. she is a beast. The most reliable way I could find to deal with her is soul lance from afar, but the stairs still make it a dangerous bussiness.
- The fights in the palace itself are nerve wrecking, too. The illuminati that carries the web scepter seems to hit harder than a greater swamp troll.. Lactri herself is walking death. The only way I could find to beat her is with Flaming Defender + life steal items.