After many days of journey, Carth Onasi reached Avestria, a small town south of Ferdok. This is where his adventures begin. The guard didn't seem happy to see a newcomer.
Above is the trend on every 'quest hubs' that you visit in Drakensang. It's a design decision I suspect, where players are made to spend plenty of time in a single zone, achieving a primary objective while having optional secondary objectives in form of sidequests. There was hardly many quest that forces you to trek from one town to another. Most of the time it's social quest/fedex or dungeon exploration. Avestria is a starter town that most people should not find much trouble doing. It's a crash course on how to play the game. The difficulty WILL increase after this, so if you don't have enough foresight like the first time I played it, you will struggle in the mid game before you smarten up and simply steamroll everything thrown at you.
Our current objective is to gather two recommendations to pass this small town of Avenstria to proceed to the next hub. I think it would've been nice if they actually placed a 'bribe / sneak past option' on the checkpoint but I suspect for narrative reason they decided to 'railroad' you from hub to hub while dropping hints on the 'bigger story'. I've finished this game once, so I can connect the dots better this time around and comment.
Walking a bit further in town, I stumbled upon a marketplace where a guard was conversing with a gypsy lady. She seemed really upset about something.
This sounds a job for Carth Onasi, defender of the innocent! And helping her out will probably net a recommendation! So I offered my help. Contrary to what the dialogue says, this isn't optional. You're not leaving till you do this quest!
So Runkel Bagthumper. That's our lead. I checked the alchemist and didn't see much goods to purchase. A travelling salesman offered a sidequest though.
This is a simple herb gathering taskthat requires plant lore skill to accomplish which Carth doesn't have. But I bought 5 oneberries from the alchemist anyway that totals up to 6, we just need to find 4 more either from harvesting (plant lore) or random drops. Oh btw, the currency is like this: 100 Copper Farthings = 10 Silver Thaler = 1 Gold Ducats.
If you hadn't notice, Drakensang actually had filler text to disguise 'press any key to continue dialogue'. It really is a simple one choice dialogue option you had to click through to proceed. I can't make up my mind if this is a good thing or not, but it kept conversation flowing in an intelligent manner. The next dialogue is one of notorious sample.
I walked up to the hooded figure, Runkel Bagthumper to ask about Dranor. Lore: Phex is the god of thief and merchants
Then comes another optional side quest:
A thief asking another thief to pick lock? What the hell? Carth will need the services of a thief since he isn't one himself. That brings up our sidequest count to two. The next step would be to visit the innkeeper to find out where the murderers hide, and possibly locate Dranor, the rogue.
I came across an open air pub with a strong-looking amazon in heated debate with the innekeeper. She appears to be asking for directions to a bear cave but the innkeeper felt womyn shouldn't be venturing into dangerous places. Well, maybe we can take her along. We could use the extra muscle.
And another sidequest!
This is Rhulana's character sheet.
She doesn't have high strength, and her favored weapon is a saber. With extra endurance to spam more special attacks. She's not bad. Notice the Plant and Animal lore, which means she can harvest the oneberry bushes we'll find in the wilderness.
Oh, I almost forgot, we need to ask the innkeeper for the possible hideout of the murderers, don't we?
Alright, before we head off to Bald Mountain let's get some combat training. A pair of mercs hang out near a campfire and challenged us to a sparring match. Perfect way to explain how combat works.
The game will automatically pause when a combat is initiated. The crossed sword indicating that combat has begun. Pay attention to the top right hand corner when everyone is at 'neutral' order and the hotbar at the bottom. Hotkey 1 is tied to Mighty Blow, a special attack that cost 20 ED (endurance) and does double damage - if it hits.
The moment you left click that move or hit '1', it will override whatever you are doing. In this case Carth is doing nothing, hence Carth will move towards the target when unpaused to execute a Mighty Blow. Left clicking an enemy will initiate normal attacks that resume automatically if no special orders are given. Notice the 4 Mighty Blow Icons in a row. The furthest one on the left are queued. Might Blow takes 1 Combat Round to execute. So over 4 rounds, Carth will execute the M.Blows. But since his max ED is only 32, he will cancel the 2nd Mighty Blow and revert back to normal attack. The bottom row indicates parrying, an automatic defense roll. You can only parry ONE attack per round, unless if you are wielding a shield and train a special defense abiity. Special moves will also allow you to parry multiple times in a round.
When a move icon turns red, it means it has been done and cannot be cancelled, the ED has been deducted. To cancel a move simply click on the icon next to your char portraits.
I lost the first fight pretty badly and received a wound.
Treat wounds / heal spell will remove wounds. Wounds will lower your overall stat like AG. ED, Dodge , Attack and Parry as well as Ranged Combat. You may recieve multiple wounds in combat. Getting more than 4 is an automatic knockout.
Before my second try, I decided to train a special attack from the mercenary. You can spend experience points to buy special moves from trainers. This move is called Feint.
It reduces your opponent parry roll (making it more likely to hit) and reduces his armor rating (dealing more damage) and cost cheaper than Might Blow 20 ED. With Carth's Pool of 32 ED, I can start with a Feint and queue a Might Blow after it.
It went differently this time around.
Hmm. new weapon. Let's compare it with our current weapon.
Taken from Manual:
But it doesn't explain the 1W+4 with Strength 14. So I don't really get this part. So please, if anyone could enlighten me? I suspect it has something to do with inflicting wounds.
Each weapon also has different sets of special attacks. They may share some but 2 handed weapons are generally more suited for high damage attacks, while 1 handed weapons have more accurate attacks as well as able to attack multiple times in a round. Moves with yellow borders means they can be used with the corresponding weapon. The top screenshot is a two handed sword, while the one at the bottom is a single handed sword. Strike of Wrath is 2H only move that deals triple damage and has a chance to knock down. The Sword has access to Stormblade that gives 3 attacks per round.
And that concludes this entry. I might update it in a while.
Anyway, we can still save Dranor from thugs, so let's get to it.
