![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Fun & Games
Diablo: I haven't had much free time lately, but I've managed to catch up a little with Diablo 2. One nice thing: since I upgraded to Windows XP, my system can now play all the cinematics. On the down side, when I start the game it freezes solid about half the time, requiring a full manual system shut-down. Once it has started, though, it's good to go.
I'd played a barbarian up to level 22; he was at Tal-Rasha's Tomb, but I suddenly found myself having real problems. When that happens it's usually time to drop back down to an easier area and level up a few times, and/or get some better equipment. But no equipment was available, and somehow I didn't feel like wandering around the Arcane Sanctuary for days on end. So I started up a new character, a sorceress.
It was more fun than the barbarian, so I stuck with it. On the old system the barbarian had been much easier to play than the sorceress, but this time the sorc was much easier than I expected. This may have been because I was playing smarter this time.
For example, in the old days my sorc had a HELL of a time with Duriel in Tal-Rasha's Tomb. I must have died thirty or forty times before I managed to kill him, at least. I remember running around with Blaze up for what felt like hours...it sucked.
This time, though, I stood there and cast Static Field over and over. It's already up to level 12 or so, so it has a nice range - and it wipes out 25% of the current hit points of all enemies in reach. Meanwhile my henchman kept firing arrows. I died twice, and then finally killed Duriel.
Another odd thing: my new sorceress is having a much easier time finding magic items than the barbarian did. The annoying thing is that they're items which would be great for the barbarian - and since I'm in single-player mode, I can't switch the items between characters. I've found the Barbarian Hauberk, Cleglaw's Pincers, and Cleglaw's Brace...all of which aren't much use to a sorceress, unfortunately.
The sorceress is up to level 26 now, and is in the jungle looking for Kurast.
D&D: Everyone else in my Thursday night D&D game is in the SCA, so they're all off for Pennsic this week...therefore no game last night. But last week (or was it the week before?) I came up with what I think was a pretty clever idea.
We needed to find someone who had been kidnapped. We didn't know who had kidnapped her, or where she was. She was completely blocked from scrying. There were virtually no clues at the kidnap site, and no witnesses. It seemed to be a total dead end.
And it was probably meant to be, but I found myself interested. I found myself pacing back and forth, trying to figure out some way to get more information.
Eureka! The Sending spell is not the same as scrying. It lets the caster send a 25-word verbal message and get a reply. I wasn't sure it would work, but it seemed worth a try. But now we had a new problem: you can only Send to someone you know personally, and none of us had known the kidnappee. In fact, NO cleric had ever met the victim.
I was thinking pretty furiously at this point. I'm not all that familiar with the D&D 3.5 system, but I remembered that spells can be placed in scrolls, which can be read by non-spellcasters with the appropriate skills. And one of the victim's servants, it turned out, could read magic scrolls.
The odds weren't good for success on the first try, but the DM rolled well and the message went through. The reply was a bit disconcerting; it seemed that the victim had chosen to leave, and her reply was either threatening, a prophecy of doom, or (possibly) a warning.
I don't know if we'll be following up this thread any time soon, but it was nice to have a chance to use my brain.
Currently Reading: Touched By the Gods by Lawrence Watt-Evans. A lengthy non-Ethsharic fantasy novel. Not bad, but not his best work; it's longer than his older novels, and somehow that doesn't seem like a good thing. One flaw, I think (at least as far as commercial success goes) is that the hero seems a bit dumber than LW-E's usual, and (spoiler, invisible ink - click and drag from here to the end to read) that he insists on rejecting his role as champion. If you want to appeal to teen-aged boys (which I suspect is the majority of the modern fantasy-readers demographic), you want to write something that those boys can identify with - and boys generally aren't into demanding a life of anonymity and non-recognition as a reward for feats of incredible heroism.
I'd played a barbarian up to level 22; he was at Tal-Rasha's Tomb, but I suddenly found myself having real problems. When that happens it's usually time to drop back down to an easier area and level up a few times, and/or get some better equipment. But no equipment was available, and somehow I didn't feel like wandering around the Arcane Sanctuary for days on end. So I started up a new character, a sorceress.
It was more fun than the barbarian, so I stuck with it. On the old system the barbarian had been much easier to play than the sorceress, but this time the sorc was much easier than I expected. This may have been because I was playing smarter this time.
For example, in the old days my sorc had a HELL of a time with Duriel in Tal-Rasha's Tomb. I must have died thirty or forty times before I managed to kill him, at least. I remember running around with Blaze up for what felt like hours...it sucked.
This time, though, I stood there and cast Static Field over and over. It's already up to level 12 or so, so it has a nice range - and it wipes out 25% of the current hit points of all enemies in reach. Meanwhile my henchman kept firing arrows. I died twice, and then finally killed Duriel.
Another odd thing: my new sorceress is having a much easier time finding magic items than the barbarian did. The annoying thing is that they're items which would be great for the barbarian - and since I'm in single-player mode, I can't switch the items between characters. I've found the Barbarian Hauberk, Cleglaw's Pincers, and Cleglaw's Brace...all of which aren't much use to a sorceress, unfortunately.
The sorceress is up to level 26 now, and is in the jungle looking for Kurast.
D&D: Everyone else in my Thursday night D&D game is in the SCA, so they're all off for Pennsic this week...therefore no game last night. But last week (or was it the week before?) I came up with what I think was a pretty clever idea.
We needed to find someone who had been kidnapped. We didn't know who had kidnapped her, or where she was. She was completely blocked from scrying. There were virtually no clues at the kidnap site, and no witnesses. It seemed to be a total dead end.
And it was probably meant to be, but I found myself interested. I found myself pacing back and forth, trying to figure out some way to get more information.
Eureka! The Sending spell is not the same as scrying. It lets the caster send a 25-word verbal message and get a reply. I wasn't sure it would work, but it seemed worth a try. But now we had a new problem: you can only Send to someone you know personally, and none of us had known the kidnappee. In fact, NO cleric had ever met the victim.
I was thinking pretty furiously at this point. I'm not all that familiar with the D&D 3.5 system, but I remembered that spells can be placed in scrolls, which can be read by non-spellcasters with the appropriate skills. And one of the victim's servants, it turned out, could read magic scrolls.
The odds weren't good for success on the first try, but the DM rolled well and the message went through. The reply was a bit disconcerting; it seemed that the victim had chosen to leave, and her reply was either threatening, a prophecy of doom, or (possibly) a warning.
I don't know if we'll be following up this thread any time soon, but it was nice to have a chance to use my brain.
Currently Reading: Touched By the Gods by Lawrence Watt-Evans. A lengthy non-Ethsharic fantasy novel. Not bad, but not his best work; it's longer than his older novels, and somehow that doesn't seem like a good thing. One flaw, I think (at least as far as commercial success goes) is that the hero seems a bit dumber than LW-E's usual, and (spoiler, invisible ink - click and drag from here to the end to read) that he insists on rejecting his role as champion. If you want to appeal to teen-aged boys (which I suspect is the majority of the modern fantasy-readers demographic), you want to write something that those boys can identify with - and boys generally aren't into demanding a life of anonymity and non-recognition as a reward for feats of incredible heroism.