HEY - I like the Rogue (talk to me Rogue players)

[DenverDLfan]

I have been looking at DL since 1995 and am quite happy to find out CE has been released along with a new demo.

As I wait for my copy from NewEgg, I've finished the demo with an Adept and a Rogue (Mage and Fighter don't really interest me).

IMHO the Rogue was much more fun. I like the speed and all the moves. The trapped chests were much easier. I also played a naked Rogue with just a shield all the way through. It took realizing that you improve attributes more rapidly than skills. Now I heed warning that magic is paramount to avoid frustration.

Has anyone else had experience with these two builds, and what were your impressions?

Rogue/Mage/Budoka/Battle Mage/Warlock
Rogue/Fighter/Budoka/Marauder/Ninja Lord

[kathycf]

I have been looking at DL since 1995

Hi there, Denver.

It is my understanding that DL was released around 2005. But no matter, I am glad you are looking forward to playing. For your specific builds you list, I can't comment on directly. I have played an adept/rogue hunter/monk ranger lord and I will say it was very fun. I got a lot of stacking bonuses for archery, athletics, and pole weapons from hunter and monk, and of course it is much easier to disarm traps when you get a learning bonus for thief skills.

I think you are correct when stating magic helps avoid frustration. DL is one of those games that makes it impossible to play a "pure" character. What I mean is, magic classes require a certain skill level in weaponry of some kind, and alot of the melee classes require a certain skill level in one of the school of magic. So even if you don't end up using the skill much, you still have to spend the points on it.

Personally, I don't mind that very much, because I like going back and forth between different styles of fighting. Well, I'll stop gabbing now. Have fun playing!

[DenverDLfan]

Right 2005

You are correct Kathy, I was playing Might and Magic 2 or 3 back in 1995.

I guess I have been looking at this game since 2005 and am glad that it has matured to CE. I stand gracefully corrected.

As for skills this is what I see as needed to complete the game:

Fighting - for XP to increase attributes and skills
Healing/potion - as you will get hit a lot
Range weapon - To kill without being hit
Magic - to drop the swarms that tend to surround and corner you, plus summon some "distractions"
Thief skills - to open the abundance of chests

Have I missed anything?

[Skidder]

I like rogues as well. Just be careful with rogue/fighter combos. I once while obviously not paying attention developed a rogue/fighter/hunter/samurai/rangerlord character to try and come up with a true ronin (fighter and archer type). Upon reaching rangerlord, I realized the character couldn't use heavy weapons or magic weapons so I abandoned the character. The sisterhood, enchantress class would have saved it, but I noticed too late.

Favorite rogue based character so far is rogue/mage/battlemage/budoka/ninjalord. This class combo gives a lot of latitude in game play.

[kathycf]

Trickster is a rogue class that gets magic weaponry. My boyfriend had a mage/rogue trickster/sorcerer wizard. He liked that combination because he received learning bonuses from both second tier classes for nether magic. He likes nether magic quite a bit, and trickster also gets a learning bonus for the bargain skill...I think it may be the only class that does so.

As for skills this is what I see as needed to complete the game:

Fighting - for XP to increase attributes and skills
Healing/potion - as you will get hit a lot
Range weapon - To kill without being hit
Magic - to drop the swarms that tend to surround and corner you, plus summon some "distractions"
Thief skills - to open the abundance of chests

Fighting doesn't just have to be with a melee weapon. There are a fair number of offensive spells in the game, from all four schools of magic. Mostly arcane, but nether has poison cloud (one of the few nether spells I like) plus nether blast, plus there are a few from celestial and rune magic.

Celestial magic also has healing crystals, and you will be able to amass a fair amount of potions too.

Thief skills are mostly good for opening chests, yes. Backstab is a thief skill for melee fighting and there is also sneak and steal.

Yes, a ranged attack is surely useful, especially if your character doesn't have a lot of vitality. Sometimes you will still get swarmed though, because the bows are a bit wimpy and it takes a good amount of time to whittle away at creatures. Rogues get a learning bonus for thrown weapons so those are always an alternative to think about.

[DenverDLfan]

When I get a chance to split

I think I will try Ninja Lord and Warlock in two different branches of saves, but that is a far away dream as I'm not even to Fargrove yet with a Lvl6 Rogue all 20s for Attrib (not the bottom one, Honor methinks) and very few skills. In an experiment I saw damage +1 for every point above 25STR, yeaaaaaaaa.

Trickster is something I may try and thanks for the suggestion. All I want to do is unlock some of those magic powers on weapons.

I saw mushmen in the demo but not so far in the real game, and not many gobbies are dropping their helmets. I kind if relied on them in the demo.

I agree fighting doesn't have to be with a melee weapon. I'm mostly shredding beasties with throwning knives right now as my magic is weak.

I have seen steal in action, but think monsters have a finite amount of treasure, don't think this will get me very far ahead. Also, I can't sneak up on anything to save me life!!!

I'm thinking before I go into the sewers I'll throw one in every general skill (3 in Athletics) and bump chest skills as I run into the more difficult ones.

OK lend me some suggestions (optional of course-and not too much spoiler):

0) Any thoughts on Scout, Repair or Identify?

1) How soon to join the Mage Guild (immediately)?

2) When can I kill the Vampiress?

3) Do the Circene quests or find a haven for more levelling up?

Now to get my 6yo son to do some LAN cooperative with me too.

[kathycf]

Actually, steal does make a difference. It isn't a skill I used very much when I had my hunter, but my bf worked out this whole strategy for it involving using a little dagger (does less damage, you can hit creature more times thus increasing the stuff they drop) in conjunction with the freeze spell. If you are fighting one of the bosses, for example for a class promotion you can get some pretty good stuff that way. Renegade Urgoths in the Forbidden lands drop a lot of armor with this technique too, which you can then sell.

Sneak is more useful in multiplayer, but in single player the guards can be used as a distraction.

Not sure about the helmets, usually the goblins in the sewers will drop at least a couple. Also the ones in the beginning forest (or n00b land as I call it ). If you move towards where the two shacks are, there are goblins back there who should drop a helmet. I usually like to hang around the shacks as they are a good place to hang out and level up. Ranged attacks are very handy for this, and if you set the spawn rate to "more" you can be kept pretty busy. You are pretty safe on the porches of the shacks, although snakes can come up underneath the stairs.

Mushmen are in the game, don't worry about that...nasty little buggers. :laugh:

Scout is useful to help spot enemies and chests. However, once you open the chest it still shows on your map, so that gets annoying. Repair is good to sock some points into, your armor will take damage and if you aren't near a shopkeeper (you can pay to have things repaired) your armor can actually fall off you if it takes enough damage. Identify is extremely handy to have so you know what stuff you are carrying around.

You can get the quest to join the mage's guild as soon as you like. You will need to take care of the Circene quests to get out of the city however. I usually wait on the vampiress quest until I get to a higher level. You won't just have to deal with her, the other inhabitants of the slums will still be around.

[bwfingers]

Thief skills are mostly good for opening chests, yes. Backstab is a thief skill for melee fighting and there is also sneak and steal.

I'm working through on my first character and also wasn't paying attention to the progressions, so thief is my only non-mage type class, (although two of them come from the Sisterhood track: Rogue /Mage /Enchantress /BattleMage /WarWitch). I've come to really like the Steal part of the thief. It turns The Slums in Fargrove into the pit of infinite gold, potions, and lockpicks. When I got my steal up to about three they seemed to drop an item for about every third hit I got. Since most of the thieves drop potions of healing, it becomes very sustainable. I've taken to setting the spawn ratings to maximum and the difficulty to full when I want to recharge my spell books, and just keep wading through the wandering monsters there. Of course, I am about level 19 now, so the closest I come to being in danger is when it spawns 4 hags at the same time I get a graphics glitch. Even then as long as I'm paying attention to my health bar it isn't too difficult. When I'm done I stop by the apothecary and sell my healing potions down to 100 and pocket the extra cash. Last time I think I sold back 169, and about 49 of the greater heals.

The only thing that's more insane is how cheap my arcane magic is now.

[bwfingers]

I saw mushmen in the demo but not so far in the real game, and not many gobbies are dropping their helmets. I kind if relied on them in the demo.

I agree fighting doesn't have to be with a melee weapon. I'm mostly shredding beasties with throwning knives right now as my magic is weak.

I have seen steal in action, but think monsters have a finite amount of treasure, don't think this will get me very far ahead. Also, I can't sneak up on anything to save me life!!!

Don't worry about not seeing mushmen. Until you've got a decent area attack, they are a pain to deal with. Always appearing out of nowhere right underneath you, sleeping and poisoning you. All in all a real PITA.

I haven't noticed that stealing reduces the drop. I think when you steal it generates a random item for the critter list. For instance, if I'm using a light weapon and need to hit a Master Thief a couple of times, I usually get a heal drop for steal, as well as another one when he dies. If the hags weren't constantly vining or sleeping me, I'd use light weapons on them too since they tend to drop nice spell books. But I'm now up to 23 Timestops thanks to the hags, throw in the goblin mages and I have 42 Magic Missile, 42 Fireball, and 44 shrieking stars.

[kathycf]

I've come to really like the Steal part of the thief. It turns The Slums in Fargrove into the pit of infinite gold, potions, and lockpicks.

Yea, my boyfriend really likes the steal skill as well. You really can amass quite a few potions that way, and if you have a good amount of healing crystals you can sell just about all of your potions. The slum is good for that as well as lockpicks.

[DenverDLfan]

Finally outta Fargrove

I must not be getting it??? This game is toough, but I always enjoy a challenge. I'm Lvl9 HumanFemaleRogueMage with all 30s, and think I'm depending on melee too much. I keep getting ganged by what looks like groups of at least ten beasties. I spend so much time running around it's almost not fun. I want to find a way back to being confident about winning battles.

OK how many spells does a Mage really need 10 or 100?

Will I ever get a chance to kill a gobbie in one swing, doing 7-12 with a Fang Blade?

I also swam to find a moonstone as the moonbeasts won't go into the water, and even the fish are getting tougher, that or getting swarmed by killer bees.

And what is this about being chased by Goblin Mage's and Barrowgrim troops every night? Thanks to that one tower NW of Fargrove, I can mow that group down with minor scratches.

[kathycf]

I'm Lvl9 HumanFemaleRogueMage with all 30s, and think I'm depending on melee too much. I keep getting ganged by what looks like groups of at least ten beasties. I spend so much time running around it's almost not fun. I want to find a way back to being confident about winning battles.

When you start the game, go to your options screen and under random encounters choose "less". This will lower both the number of the encounters, and if you have the difficulty set on "normal" it also lowers the amount of creatures in a group.

OK how many spells does a Mage really need 10 or 100?

If you are going to cast spells as a means of survival, you should get as many as you can. When you get your second tier mage class, you will also get the scribe skill, which helps regenerate spells a bit faster.

Will I ever get a chance to kill a gobbie in one swing, doing 7-12 with a Fang Blade?

I also swam to find a moonstone as the moonbeasts won't go into the water, and even the fish are getting tougher, that or getting swarmed by killer bees.

As you progress further in the game, you will find chests inside some of the dungeons that have better weapons than a fangtip blade. You will need patience to load and reload your game in order to keep opening chests to get what you want. Some weapons are very rare, so you might want to search the forum regarding treasure chests. There is a sticky on the topic as well as a fairly recent thread.

I assume you are ready to get locked out of Fargrove if you are going for moonstones. My way of killing them is mostly standing in the water facing the island. (the way you face tends to affect the spawns, so facing away from the water minimizes the fish.) Yes, fish...both fish and bees really suck in this game...They do lots of damage and drop nothing when they die.

And what is this about being chased by Goblin Mage's and Barrowgrim troops every night? Thanks to that one tower NW of Fargrove, I can mow that group down with minor scratches.

Random spawnings. It does make you plan your attacks and defenses. FYI you can pause the game if you need to think. Open up a menu screen by pressing esc or open up your inventory or character sheet. Creatures will not attack you during this, yet time still passes so you can regain your health.

[DenverDLfan]

All better now

I'm back on top as I loaded an old save and just battled in the slums for like 2 days. I have more spells and decided to do the Battle Mage Quest. I'm sad that I didn't get another heraldry from the promotion. Regardless, I'm only at 13-14 fireballs/shrieking stars, etc....but I love my area spells and sparks and ice shards, however I only have one of each, but will stack when the funds permit.

I'm still only at level 10 with about 300,000 skill points to distribute, so I can't see how that other poster is at level 19 unless they are on the second Fargrove trip. I have yet to enter Arindale and exploring West and South countryside isn't too interesting.

Kathy-I don't like to keep reloading but have found myself doing that. Now I wonder if the elven bloodsword or ice dagger is better. I like range between my opponents, and it seems the ice dagger animation makes my game slow down.


*****BIG tip, looking down while using range attack makes knives and arrows shoot faster. Learned this when ranging the mushies and when I back in a corner to range bats. Try it.

[kathycf]

I'm still only at level 10 with about 300,000 skill points to distribute, so I can't see how that other poster is at level 19 unless they are on the second Fargrove trip. I have yet to enter Arindale and exploring West and South countryside isn't too interesting.

Kathy-I don't like to keep reloading but have found myself doing that. Now I wonder if the elven bloodsword or ice dagger is better. I like range between my opponents, and it seems the ice dagger animation makes my game slow down.


*****BIG tip, looking down while using range attack makes knives and arrows shoot faster. Learned this when ranging the mushies and when I back in a corner to range bats. Try it.

The character level depends on a few things. For example, in one of my first singleplayer games (I had really gotten going playing multiplayer) I felt very timid about making the trip into Fargrove by myself, so I made level 10 before I even left the n00b forest. Those shacks I mentioned previously are good for that. Also, the map isn't linear in the way other games are...so your level isn't necessarily dependent on where in the game you happen to be. The game is pretty open ended in that regard. In fact, once you get the moonbridges activated it gets even more open.

Thanks to the game engines random spawns, you can keep playing and leveling in just about any area. As far as I know, the n00by forest is the only area in the game you can never return to...unless you feel like mountain climbing.

Reloading the game stinks, but outside of editing is the only way to get the "good stuff". However, if I remember correctly, you can purchase a blood sword from Sir Nil in Arindale (the hall of weapons) but I think that might depend on if you are a member of the fighter's guild or not.

I have a habit of jumping up on those big boulders or any other tall object that is accessible and using my ranged attacks, so looking down is essential. (I hate dying! :laugh Thanks for pointing out the tip about speed.

[bwfingers]

I'm still only at level 10 with about 300,000 skill points to distribute, so I can't see how that other poster is at level 19 unless they are on the second Fargrove trip. I have yet to enter Arindale and exploring West and South countryside isn't too interesting.

I'm well past the second Fargrove trip. I believe I had recently killed the boss demon in the Tomb of Lost Souls (although I still need to go back and kill the bonus demon; playing CE and the hyped up spell is a killer) when I posted that. But once you have the moonstone you're never far from Fargrove, so when I've depleted my spells I head back to the slums instead of camping. I wade through the thieves, hags, goblins, rats, and snakes because healing is free. But I've been doing that since about level 10 because even then I could pick up at least 2 spare heals for each heal I drank.

After my last trip into Fargrove I went drake hunting by Arindale, and then found a serious bug in the game: free gold when trading. I'm not sure if it is my bargain skill (I'm only a 5 or 6), but when I sell things, I get more for selling them than it costs me to buy them back. I discovered it selling rune stones (at the temple), and for them it gets particularly obnoxious. It won't let you sell a single rune stone, it sells the whole lot of them. I think I netted 40k on my Isl stones. I just checked the Delilah's, the Arkane Emporium, and the Apothecary and found I can do the same thing there.

I'm probably level high for where I'm at in the game because this is my first run through and I couldn't find my way out of the sewer until after I found the walkthroughs on this website. I also tend to be a bit General Meade like in my games: making sure I have 50% more than I think I need to get through the scenario.

If you are at level 10, you are probably ready to make the trip out to the island and come back into Arindale.

[DenverDLfan]

L13 Now, but not yet in Arindale

Since the map is non-linear, but you need certain things to unlock other area, I just keep getting outdoor chests and finding safe places to battle. Best place is the soldier camp north by north-west of Fargrove. Lots of carrion wyrms and ogre trolls and the help of the other soldiers.

When I get a large streak of time, I'll be going to Arindale soon.

I'm back in the saddle again and not just running for my life. The game has once again become fun.

[DenverDLfan]

OK Kathy - where are the Dragon Gloves

All I need is Dragon Gloves to complete what I consider a dream set for the Rogue/Mage/BattleMage/Budoka/NinjaLord, so anybody what all chests have you seen them in, bearing in mind, I've have completed most of the game.

[kathycf]

Hmm, you may be a bit out of luck if you've gotten that far in the game...

The Dragon gloves are uncommon. They can be found in chests in the Fathien keep, Naga temple and The Shadow Ruins. I like them because they match the Imperial armor, and that is my favorite in the game. (unmodified favorite--I like the ninja armor I modified a lot too.)

Anyway...You can look through this thread for information about finding stuff. I posted an attachment in there that gives the locations of various treasures and goodies. Please note however that the thread I am referring to is labelled a spoiler. If you don't want to be spoiled, don't go! Beware the dreaded spoiler! :laugh:

http://www.gamebanshee.com/forums/dunge ... 86412.html

[Queen_Articuno]

selling items.

now when you sell items, notice the slider bar with arrows on the l and r sides? click and drag on that to sell more than one of the same item in the box. if i had nown this sooner, i would have used it in the apothecary in FG.
(to sell leftover nether katals.) (and to get multiple heal potions.)