Gold Box SSI's Gold Box Series Thread

[eXalted]

X-Com Files has handcuffs in the newest version which makes it already more "cop action" oriented than Chimera Squad.

 

[Ladonna]

Wrong thread?

 

[eXalted]

Wrong thread?

Definitely.

As I am here:
Tried to play Pool of Radiance a couple of time but I just couldn't get into it. Those FRUA modules have really spoiled me...

 

[Null Null]

To get around the level caps, I'm told you can use Curse of the Azure Bonds as a trainer (Gateway and Curse have the same character file format, and Treasures has the same format as Pools of Darkness). This may be more trouble than you want to go to.

I thought Savage Frontier was actually pretty good, they just failed to give it an epic finish.

 

[Erebus]

How maximum hit points work is one of those rules that changes multiple times.

It was almost certainly a bug, but I once had a ranger reach 255 HP in DQK.

Read the last moments after Caramon escapes the Abyss with Raistlins staff. The Dark Queen is chimping out because she cannot get Raistlins soul or something like that.

And then Raistlin just returns to life in Dragons of a Summer Flame, because no one's ever really gone (at least not when they're popular characters).

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

Is Dark Queen canon? Again, at the end of the book above, Raistlin was protected by his brothers spirit, or something like that. Then I find Raistlin being tortured in the Abyss in the game!

I know there were a lot of third party Krynn books that retconned many of the things that were written in the original trilogies, so the history seems a bit murky.

No. Raistlin was never protected by Caramon. Caramon lived and returned to his own time. He reconciles with Tika and they went on to have 5 kids.

Read the last moments after Caramon escapes the Abyss with Raistlins staff. The Dark Queen is chimping out because she cannot get Raistlins soul or something like that. I can't believe I still remember this! haha

I think that was Raistlin finding redemption and the Gods of Good were shielding him as a reward.

A blast of flame seared Raistlin's flesh. A taloned claw stabbed him in the back. He stumbled, falling to his knees. But he never took his eyes from the Portal, and he saw Caramon, his twins face anguished, take a step forward, toward him!

"Shut it, you fool!" Raistlin shrieked, clenching his fists. "Leave me alone! I don't need you any more! I don't need you!"

And then the light was gone. The Portal slammed shut, and blackness pounced upon him with raging, slathering fury. Talons ripped his flesh, teeth tore through muscle, and crunched bone. Blood flowed from his breast, but it would not take with it his life. He screamed, and he would scream, and he would keep on screaming, unendingly. ...

Something touched him ... a hand.... He clutched at it as it shook him, gently. A voice called, "Raist! Wake up! It was only a dream. Don't be afraid. I won't let them hurt you! Here, watch ... I'll make you laugh."

The dragons coils tightened, crushing out his breath. Glistening black fangs ate his living organs, devoured his heart. Tearing into his body, they sought his soul.

A strong arm encircled him, holding him close. A hand raised, gleaming with silver light, forming childish pictures in the night, and the voice, dimly heard, whispered, "Look, Raist, bunnies. . . ."

He smiled, no longer afraid. Caramon was here.

The pain eased. The dream was driven back. From far away, he heard a wail of bitter disappointment and anger. It didn't matter. Nothing mattered anymore. Now he just felt tired, so
very, very tired....

Leaning his head upon his brother's arm, Raistlin closed his eyes and drifted into a dark, dreamless, endless sleep.

 

[Cael]

Is Dark Queen canon? Again, at the end of the book above, Raistlin was protected by his brothers spirit, or something like that. Then I find Raistlin being tortured in the Abyss in the game!

I know there were a lot of third party Krynn books that retconned many of the things that were written in the original trilogies, so the history seems a bit murky.

No. Raistlin was never protected by Caramon. Caramon lived and returned to his own time. He reconciles with Tika and they went on to have 5 kids.

Read the last moments after Caramon escapes the Abyss with Raistlins staff. The Dark Queen is chimping out because she cannot get Raistlins soul or something like that. I can't believe I still remember this! haha

I think that was Raistlin finding redemption and the Gods of Good were shielding him as a reward.

A blast of flame seared Raistlin's flesh. A taloned claw stabbed him in the back. He stumbled, falling to his knees. But he never took his eyes from the Portal, and he saw Caramon, his twins face anguished, take a step forward, toward him!

"Shut it, you fool!" Raistlin shrieked, clenching his fists. "Leave me alone! I don't need you any more! I don't need you!"

And then the light was gone. The Portal slammed shut, and blackness pounced upon him with raging, slathering fury. Talons ripped his flesh, teeth tore through muscle, and crunched bone. Blood flowed from his breast, but it would not take with it his life. He screamed, and he would scream, and he would keep on screaming, unendingly. ...

Something touched him ... a hand.... He clutched at it as it shook him, gently. A voice called, "Raist! Wake up! It was only a dream. Don't be afraid. I won't let them hurt you! Here, watch ... I'll make you laugh."

The dragons coils tightened, crushing out his breath. Glistening black fangs ate his living organs, devoured his heart. Tearing into his body, they sought his soul.

A strong arm encircled him, holding him close. A hand raised, gleaming with silver light, forming childish pictures in the night, and the voice, dimly heard, whispered, "Look, Raist, bunnies. . . ."

He smiled, no longer afraid. Caramon was here.

The pain eased. The dream was driven back. From far away, he heard a wail of bitter disappointment and anger. It didn't matter. Nothing mattered anymore. Now he just felt tired, so
very, very tired....

Leaning his head upon his brother's arm, Raistlin closed his eyes and drifted into a dark, dreamless, endless sleep.

That was what Raistlin thought. The thing is, Caramon's still alive, so there was no way he could have done that, unless Krynn has weird rules for spirits that we are not aware of.

 

[GarfunkeL]

The point is that knowing his brother is safe helps Raistlin to avoid torture. It's like a shield for him that keeps the DQ impotent in her torture. He's not being saved because he did too much bad shit in his life but the torture isn't eternal and everlasting because at the final stage, his love for his brother overcame his lust for power and he sent Caramon away to safety.

Or that's what I vaguely recall from two decades ago when I read them.

 

[Harlin]

The Curse of the Azure Bonds longform walkthrough is finally up! https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/pc/564786-curse-of-the-azure-bonds/faqs/78365

I forgot that GameFAQs can take many days to approve something this long, if it's new. For the record, it's about 50% longer than the actual Azure Bonds novel, which is about 450,000 bytes.

There is a section corresponding to anything that was in the Pool of Radiance walkthrough, plus additional text on plot background (including a novel summary), a brief strategic rundown of every location in the game, and a formalized list of bugs (which didn't quite hit triple digits). I also didn't just skip over scripted mechanics as lightly as I did in Pool of Radiance.

Anything different in Curse of the Azure Bonds should be updated. As normal for the Gold Box games, lots of completely random things don't behave the same and I re-verified everything I could think of. Elves no longer get a bonus with crossbows, for instance (that's the one I always remember offhand, somehow). A few things I thought were different actually do behave the same; for instance, Sleep specifically has logic that prevents it from ever working on 5-hit-dice creatures that are PC races, but can still work on 5-hit-dice ogres (4+4 HD in the tabletop game, but the Gold Box games don't have fractional hit dice).

I expect that I'll soon be making minor factual adjustments before it stabilizes. I'm quite confident this is still far more accurate than the original Pool of Radiance walkthrough I submitted, though.

Pool of Radiance longform walkthrough also updated to v1.31: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/pc/564785-pool-of-radiance/faqs/73869
I moved references and acknowledgments to the end because it was starting to take up too much space at the beginning, and there is a new version history (retroactive; multiple people asked), but the only change in the actual gameplay writeup is that you can make the hostile magic-user in the Valhingen Graveyard friendly (if you really want to).

I'm planning to eventually either write up Secret of the Silver Blades next, or create unofficial patches for Pool/Curse, but I'm going to take a break from Gold Box for a while -- I'll look at the original Phantasie next.

 

[Deuce Traveler]

Also thinking back to Death Knights of Krynn, is this the cannon explanation of how Soth ended up in Ravenloft? Which if I recall correctly he was later kicked out of Ravenloft by the dark powers for being "too boring" and just staring into a mirror all day.

This is the novelization, so yeah it's canon:

It's not a bad novel, as for as RPG books go.

"On the fabled world of Krynn, Lord Soth finally learns that there is a price to pay for his long history of evil deeds, a price even an undead warrior might find horrifying. Dark powers transport Soth to Barovia, and there the death knight must face the dread minions of Count Strahn Von Zarovich, the vampire lord of the nightmare land. But with only a captive Vistani woman and an untrustworthy ghost for allies, Lord Soth soon discovers that he may have to join forces with the powerful vampire if he is ever to escape the realm of terror. "Knight of the Black Rose" is the second in an open-ended series of Gothic horror tales dealing with the masters and monsters of the Ravenloft dark fantasy setting.

 

[Null Null]

The Curse of the Azure Bonds longform walkthrough is finally up! https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/pc/564786-curse-of-the-azure-bonds/faqs/78365

I forgot that GameFAQs can take many days to approve something this long, if it's new. For the record, it's about 50% longer than the actual Azure Bonds novel, which is about 450,000 bytes.

There is a section corresponding to anything that was in the Pool of Radiance walkthrough, plus additional text on plot background (including a novel summary), a brief strategic rundown of every location in the game, and a formalized list of bugs (which didn't quite hit triple digits). I also didn't just skip over scripted mechanics as lightly as I did in Pool of Radiance.

Anything different in Curse of the Azure Bonds should be updated. As normal for the Gold Box games, lots of completely random things don't behave the same and I re-verified everything I could think of. Elves no longer get a bonus with crossbows, for instance (that's the one I always remember offhand, somehow). A few things I thought were different actually do behave the same; for instance, Sleep specifically has logic that prevents it from ever working on 5-hit-dice creatures that are PC races, but can still work on 5-hit-dice ogres (4+4 HD in the tabletop game, but the Gold Box games don't have fractional hit dice).

I expect that I'll soon be making minor factual adjustments before it stabilizes. I'm quite confident this is still far more accurate than the original Pool of Radiance walkthrough I submitted, though.

Pool of Radiance longform walkthrough also updated to v1.31: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/pc/564785-pool-of-radiance/faqs/73869
I moved references and acknowledgments to the end because it was starting to take up too much space at the beginning, and there is a new version history (retroactive; multiple people asked), but the only change in the actual gameplay writeup is that you can make the hostile magic-user in the Valhingen Graveyard friendly (if you really want to).

I'm planning to eventually either write up Secret of the Silver Blades next, or create unofficial patches for Pool/Curse, but I'm going to take a break from Gold Box for a while -- I'll look at the original Phantasie next.

And I thought I was nuts when I made the lists of monsters in DKK and POD.

Sir, I, and my 13-year-old self who couldn't get out of the Cave of the Beholder, salute you.

 

[Harlin]

And I thought I was nuts when I made the lists of monsters in DKK and POD.

Most of monster bestiary generation is now scripted. It includes an AI to automatically equip the best melee-equipment set; this changes monster combat statistics in a way that I'm pretty sure is correct by this point.

... well, at least in Pool and Curse. I'd be completely unsurprised if the rules change in Secret or the Krynn games; there are several obvious flaws in how this actually works that may well be fixed:

1. Monsters don't get their THAC0 recalculated for class, level, or statistics. (The THAC0 in the monster file is only modified by the plus on the chosen weapon.)
2. Monsters don't get effects from items they equip. (If a monster has a Ring of Fire Resistance, it won't actually resist fire.)
3. Monsters don't get a movement penalty from armor. (If you equip regular plate mail, your movement drops from 12 to 6. If a monster does, it still has movement 12.)

NPCs do get the above properly done; that's the major hand calculation remaining.

Once I'd written this up for Curse, I backported it to Pool (originally, about half of that was scripted, but the rest was done by hand the slow way) and the whole thing still worked perfectly with only a couple minor adjustments, and it fixed up many minor mistakes I'd missed before.

Monsters still mostly play by the same rules as your characters. The above still isn't much compared to most other classic RPGs.

Sir, I, and my 13-year-old self who couldn't get out of the Cave of the Beholder, salute you.

In case your 13-year-old self was wondering ... no, there's no way to sequence break your way past Dexam the beholder. You really do have to kick off the fight; the stunt of just running away from combat doesn't work here. (It rarely usefully does in the earlier games.)

Starting the fight in the western room does work out much better than trying to fight a beholder in a hallway.

 

[Ladonna]

I wonder if the Amiga version has any major differences under the hood to the C64 and DOS version of Pool of Radiance.

It was made by a different team, on a different continent. Perhaps there are a few differences lurking there somewhere.

 

[Null Null]

I wonder if the Amiga version has any major differences under the hood to the C64 and DOS version of Pool of Radiance.

It was made by a different team, on a different continent. Perhaps there are a few differences lurking there somewhere.

I bet you're right!

I was always sad the demo disappeared from the PC version of Pool of Radiance. It was amusing to see if Tarran, Restal, William D'Or, and Diane would beat the ogre and orcs r not.

For the uninitiated, the graphics are famously better, to the point where they were ripped for FRUA (and used in the FRUA remake).

 

[Ladonna]

I wonder if the Amiga version has any major differences under the hood to the C64 and DOS version of Pool of Radiance.

It was made by a different team, on a different continent. Perhaps there are a few differences lurking there somewhere.

I bet you're right!

I was always sad the demo disappeared from the PC version of Pool of Radiance. It was amusing to see if Tarran, Restal, William D'Or, and Diane would beat the ogre and orcs r not.

For the uninitiated, the graphics are famously better, to the point where they were ripped for FRUA (and used in the FRUA remake).

Yeah, I forgot that they didn't put the demo on the Amiga version of PoR.

I used to notice, in most of the demos the party would win, usually easily. However, in GtSF the party usually got smashed by the squids.

 

[Cael]

I wonder if the Amiga version has any major differences under the hood to the C64 and DOS version of Pool of Radiance.

It was made by a different team, on a different continent. Perhaps there are a few differences lurking there somewhere.

I bet you're right!

I was always sad the demo disappeared from the PC version of Pool of Radiance. It was amusing to see if Tarran, Restal, William D'Or, and Diane would beat the ogre and orcs r not.

For the uninitiated, the graphics are famously better, to the point where they were ripped for FRUA (and used in the FRUA remake).

Yeah, I forgot that they didn't put the demo on the Amiga version of PoR.

I used to notice, in most of the demos the party would win, usually easily. However, in GtSF the party usually got smashed by the squids.

8 attacks plus movement penalties made those squids pretty nasty in GtSF. Doesn't help that you are pretty low level, too. Mind you, Freezefire immediately after that insane fight with the Hellgate Keep guys takes the cake in more ways than one.

 

[octavius]

Freezefire was just the icing after you had eaten the cake.

 

[Null Null]

He was kinda pointless. They set up this whole plot with intrigue and 3 evil groups plotting against the 'good guy' Lords of the North, foil a huge attack...and then it's off to fight a dragon?

I still think they owe us an epic finale. (I'm planning to write one, but I want to get better with FRUA first.)

 

[Harlin]

A different version probably does work differently under the hood in tons of subtle ways; there's no way they'd catch many unintentional smaller differences back then.

I used to notice, in most of the demos the party would win, usually easily. However, in GtSF the party usually got smashed by the squids.

In the Curse demo, for whatever reason, the monsters get -6 to-hit, and the party gets +8 to-hit. That's with the demo party already having absurdly low THAC0.

This is different from Pool, incidentally; this temporary party combat modifier no longer affects damage. I actually watched the Curse demo quite a few times to verify that.

 

[Ladonna]

He was kinda pointless. They set up this whole plot with intrigue and 3 evil groups plotting against the 'good guy' Lords of the North, foil a huge attack...and then it's off to fight a dragon?

I still think they owe us an epic finale. (I'm planning to write one, but I want to get better with FRUA first.)

Ha! I remember thinking 'wtf?' about this as well. It was largely set up from those dwarves you met, as a separate story, but I didn't think it would be the final battle. It was tough enough though.

 

[Ladonna]

A different version probably does work differently under the hood in tons of subtle ways; there's no way they'd catch many unintentional smaller differences back then.

I used to notice, in most of the demos the party would win, usually easily. However, in GtSF the party usually got smashed by the squids.

In the Curse demo, for whatever reason, the monsters get -6 to-hit, and the party gets +8 to-hit. That's with the demo party already having absurdly low THAC0.

This is different from Pool, incidentally; this temporary party combat modifier no longer affects damage. I actually watched the Curse demo quite a few times to verify that.

I used to load the games while I did other things. On a C64, it was usually good to have other pots on the boil while games loaded. I would come back in, and the demo would be auto playing, so I would often see how the battle went before loading my save. I didn't know about the Curse bonus though, which is strange when you consider they used the Curse engine for GtSF (on the C64 version anyway).

 

[Cael]

He was kinda pointless. They set up this whole plot with intrigue and 3 evil groups plotting against the 'good guy' Lords of the North, foil a huge attack...and then it's off to fight a dragon?

I still think they owe us an epic finale. (I'm planning to write one, but I want to get better with FRUA first.)

Ha! I remember thinking 'wtf?' about this as well. It was largely set up from those dwarves you met, as a separate story, but I didn't think it would be the final battle. It was tough enough though.

TSR doing what cuckfinder:bloatmaker did 30+ years later with a better plot, better NPCs, better NPC romance and less hardware raping.

 

[ProphetSword]

TSR doing what cuckfinder:bloatmaker did 30+ years later with a better plot, better NPCs, better NPC romance and less hardware raping.

Don't you mean SSI?

 

[Harlin]

One major thing I didn't check in Pool/Curse was to investigate transfer to/from Hillsfar. So ...

• This can prevent the Strength bug that prevents Enlarge from working.
• You do get to keep unusually high statistics, from either Pool to Hillsfar, or Hillsfar to Curse. No guarantee that won't actually hurt you beyond Curse (in SSB/POD), though -- it might not be fully supported.
• This is how you get the extra Harper messages on the World Map. That requires winning Hillsfar; you'll get a message saying that the Harpers will assist you.
• You'll automatically gain any levels you're eligible for. You won't gain any hit points doing this, however.

 

[Null Null]

Any actual advantage in-game apart from the Harper messages?