By the time one has managed to complete the book (reached one of the 2 'best' endings), most of the challenges probably won't be much of a challenge. The player must have played it enough times to know exactly where all the other things lie. :)
The only one that would be really hard is the Black Sword challenge, because that one is strictly based on luck.
Actually another challenge that's actually tougher than most of those already listed would be killing both the War Ghoul and its master. I usually take that as a personal challenge myself whenever I start with a SKILL 12 character. :D
The main thing that make or break you in this game is pretty much the one random encounter you have in the "dark place",
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because the winning path involves you fighting with a -2 SKILL penalty there so if you run into a SKILL 4 monster your chances are pretty bad (since it takes only 3 hits to kill you). Even if you survive that fight, if you get badly wounded then even the Growth Potion may not be able to save you from the adventurer later.
Thanks to Andy for doing the challenges, the second non canon successful ending and I only just noticed the superb artwork - Eddora is even hotter than I imagined. Thanks also to Mage for playing my book apparently lots of times :) what are the challenges in fact?
Eddora is played here by Viconia DeVir who is apparently a character in a game called Baldur's Gate.
For those who want to complete all the challenges, they should probably
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pick up the Black Sword every game until they get lucky and win with it. That way, you not only complete 2 challenges at the same time, but you also get the most difficult chalenge out of the way and can then complete the rest with ease. :)
...you would know (as the author) that the Black Sword has a random chance of forcing you to attack whenever you're given the option. You'd also know that to reach the best endings, there're certain people you absolutely can't kill (Defender and the Necromancer). So you have to be lucky (I'm not talking about in-game LUCK stat here) for the Black Sword to not be triggered when you confront those people.
The only way to get rid of the Black Sword after picking it up is to pick up the Bastard Sword after you kill the Nightshade Phantom (the game allows you to switch one sword for another). I understand that this wasn't in the original version of the book you wrote. :)
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Maybe he didn't intend it to be possible, but
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I can't see anything in the original that prohibits changing swords.
Cheers to both. I don't recall writing that you couldn't actually just drop the item in question at any time, or that you didn't keep the original, then again I don't recall any standard Fighting Fantasy rules in general about dropping things, carrying spares or inventory management as a whole. Of course no one not familiar with the original myth and its many derivatives in classic sf would see it as any way undesirable....
constrained to only that one opportunity to get rid of the Black Sword. But the way the game here is run, most of the time the PCs don't get the freedom to just 'drop' items any time he wants to, so the challenge becomes a lot more difficult. :)
Fair enough then. Are the challenges difficult to do? If not how about killing the Spiral Architect, killing the good wizard, Vampire Killer, getting the green venom, getting the zombie assistant, or making friends with everyone :)
No, they're not that hard, particularly as by the time you've completed the gamebook once you've probably learnt most of what you need to know.
Killing the Spiral Architect, Vampire Killer, getting the green venom are effectively covered by existing challenges, the zombie assistant is probably too easy and you generally didn't give Aria the option to make friends with people. I do like the wizard suggestion though, maybe I'll add that in.
Well, I just saw the newest challenge added, and THAT's certainly gonna take me some time to complete:
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Undisputed Champion - Defeat the nine most powerful opponents (SKILL/PSYCHIC greater than 12, YOUR SHADOW not included) on the way to one of the two best endings.
For a start, I can only think of 7 such characters off the top of my head, so it's definitely going to take me more than a few tries.....
I've added a Seas Of Blood style ship combat mechanism, and partially implemented the piracy option at Blackmaw. At the moment crime doesn't really pay, but it's something that could be made use of in future.
I think we need to implement a system that allows making money with travel and commerce (with goods having different costs depending on the marker where you buy or sell them them) a bit like Fabled Lands... and a dedicated job just about sea travelling (again like Fabled Lands) wouldn't hurt as well... Still too busy to work on these issues in the next months, but maybe a bit later...
I'm encountering a bug when I battle the "Fiend from the Pit" (the monster where you have to test your Luck every time you hit it, and you either do double or no damage depending on the result). I reduced its STAMINA to 0 after passing the Luck test, but there's no option to move forward. The game just gets stuck there with the screen displaying the combat with the monster's STAMINA at zero, with no options or text below.
I'm "continuing" the game straight from Hellfire for my playthrough, not sure it that affects anything.