Part 23: Don't Ask About the Other 973

Update 13: Don't Ask About the Other 973



"From the outside it doesn't look too terrifying. In fact, it looks pretty much the same as any other tomb I've ever seen."



"Still not feelin' the terror here. I mean, if they're going to pack a thousand terrors into this tomb, you'd think they'd put at least one near the entrance."



"Aaaaaa! Demon!"
"Calm down, you oaf. It's just a creepy statue."





"Aaaaaa!"
"Aaaaaa!"
"Aaaaaa!"
"Aaaaaa!"
"Eeeeee!"

That lovely sound effect plays when you finish reading the plaque. And when you interact with about half the objects in this dungeon. And sometimes just when you're walking down a hallway. It's not easy on one's nerves.





"OK, we can do this. We can do this. We just have to time it carefully and run when the pendulum is on the way up. I'm telling you, we can do this."



"Ow ow ow ow ow okay maybe we can't do this."



The halls of the Tomb of a Thousand Terrors are full of swinging blade traps, which do damage to the entire party whenever you step on them or turn around on their space. Keeping Power Shield up helps absorb some of the damage. To avoid taking more damage than you have to by turning while standing on a trap, remember that you can sidestep.



"What fortunate luck! A refreshing beverage, ripe for the plucking!"



"Eeeeee! I am not refreshed at all! How can an unassuming drink be so vile?"
"You know, this is what you get for drinking urns full of unidentified liquid in ancient tombs. I'm just saying."
"Gods, why have you forsaken me? What did I ever do to be deserving of this?"
"Stop being melodramatic. It can't possibly be that bad. Here, there's more of it in the other alcove: let me try."



"It's... it's full of chunks. I think I felt one of them wriggling as it went down. I don't know if I want to live in a world that can produce this."



Tomb Juice permanently increases a stat by +5, but also causes Insanity. It's definitely worth drinking it despite the drawback; it just means that you'll be running back to a temple every so often to get people cured.



"Tremble, mortals, for my blade brings you death!"
"Eeeeee! A talking guillotine!"



"Sorry, that was just me practicing my ventriloquism again. Couldn't resist."



Guillotines are similar to swinging blades, but instead of hitting the party for moderate damage, they hit one character at random for a whole bunch of damage. I find them even more annoying than the pendulums (pendula?), as they're more likely to knock someone out and break their armour.



"We must put these pitiful, tortured souls to rest! Look at them: that insubstantial spirit full of rage, and those hunchbacked ghouls. What pain they must be in!"



"Shouldn't we be less worried about the condition of their bodies and souls, and more worried about how they're murderous cannibals?"



"Technically, only cannibals if same species as what they eat. Otherwise, more correct to call them anthropophages."





Ghouls hit twice a round for physical damage and can inflict paralysis, while Tomb Guards inflict minor magical damage to a single character. Both have high resistance to physical damage, but fortunately neither has too much HP.



"I feel strangely exhausted after that battle, as if some of the life had been drained out of me. How unnerving."



It's a good idea to try and kill Tomb Guards quickly, because they can cause magical aging. Every hit from a Tomb Guard has a chance to age a character by a year. Being too old will result in lowered stats, and aging is a pain to cure: temples can't do anything about it.



The coffins in this tomb are pretty sturdy: it takes a character with around 50 Might to get them open.

"Hey, does graverobbing count as a terror?"
"After surviving the Yak Master, I think we can handle whatever we find in there."



"Aaaaaa! How could I have been so wrong? Just look at his cloak -- that look must have been ten years out of date even before he died!"



Tomb Terrors have high physical resistance, and can hit a single character for heavy magical damage plus the Cursed condition. They're a pain.



Like the tombs in Nightshadow or the Temple of Yak, the coffins can be searched once relieved of their occupants to reveal treasure, which can sometimes be quite good.



"What this weird sparkly thing on floor?"



"Whoooa, neat! A teleporter! That's not terrifying at all -- it's awesome! Uh, I just hope there's a way back."



"Is that what I think it is? I think it is what I think it is!"



"It is! It is what I think it is!"
"Quite so. Thanks to this, our journey has been well worth the dangers we've braved to come this far."



"It seems that more of those mysterious drinks have also been left around. Well, this one seems less dangerous than the last..."



"Aaaaaa! It tastes like fruit-flavoured sweat!"



The tomb juice colours work the same way as the barrels in the Dwarf Mines, except with bigger bonuses and more insanity: blue is +5 to Personality.



"Flench not sure if Flench want to know what this is. But Flench try anything once."



"This... this is... no. Flench will not say. Some perversions too horrible to speak of."



+5 Accuracy, and more insanity.



"Ah, surely this will be easing my troubled heart!"



"Once again, my pattern recognition skills have deserted me! Oh, the unbearable egginess!"





"On the bright side, here's another of those sparkly whosits. I bet this'll take us back outta here!"



Sure enough, stepping on the sparkle takes the party out of the enclosed central area of the dungeon and back near the entrance.



"Ooh, now these bring back memories. And they look just the right size for me, too!"



"What? No, I meant memories of escaping from jail! Now let me just try these on and see if I've still got what it takes to break free..."



"Trish? Trish, are you okay? Or has your incredible stupidity caught up with you yet again?"





"Trish! Wake up already!"
"Wha? Oh, I'm fine now, I think. Except my wrists are getting all red and itchy... Aaaaaa! There must have been nickel in those manacles!"





"Fubar parents used to own lots of stocks, you know."
"What, were they in charge of some godforsaken grey building, filled with the worst examples of humanity all cooped up in little cells with no privacy and no hope of escape?"
"Yes! Exactly! How you know Fubar parents were investment bankers?"





"Aaaaaa! I tried on these stocks, but something shocked me!"
"Was it your own reckless disregard for safety and common sense in using implements of torture on yourself? Because I gotta say, that is pretty shocking."
"Look like somebody left live wire in contact with hinge here. Very bad workmanship. Could lose licence for that."



Not all of the torture devices give experience for being foolhardy enough to use them, but some do (in addition to inflicting damage or harmful conditions).



Others contain treasure instead. It's mostly low-level stuff, but hey, free items.



"Oh, come on. You're not really going in there, are you? Even you can't be that stupid."
"Relax. I've just gotta get this latch open, and..."



"See? No problem. I think I see treasure in here, too! Now, as soon as I-- hey, who closed the door? This isn't funny! It doesn't open from the inside! Aaaaaa!"



"Oof. Good thing Fubar here to pull Trish out!"



The iron maidens do a lot of damage, and need a character with decent Thievery to get them open, but they can also contain higher-level items than the cages. This one held an Amber Chain Mail, which is 3 points of AC better than regular chain mail and sells for quite a bit of money.



"Ugh. This juice taste all weird and mediciney."



"Wooooo! Walls covered in faces now! Hello, walls! Be friends with Fubar?"





"This look like more blades than Flench ready to deal with right now. But Flench have plan. Vandesloof, you set beacon here, Flench take us back to temple, you take us back here."
"By all means! Let us get outwards before we all misplace our marbles!"



Lloyd's Beacon comes in really handy in situations like this. We can instantly warp back to a town temple to be cured of our insanity and curses.



And with another spellcaster to set a second beacon, we can easily just zap ourselves back into the depths of the dungeon once we're healed up.



"Now that Flench look at it with clearer mind, blade room not so bad after all."
"Yup! As long as we're careful, we should be able to cut down on our need for healing."



This room can look intimidating, but there's a clear path through most of the blades, and no sneaky tricks like hidden teleport traps or anything.



At the far end of the room are some secret passages, behind which are more Megacredits and Tomb Juice.



"Aaaaaa! This may be the most horrible Tomb Juice yet! Why would anyone with the slightest shred of conscience make such a thing?"



Toot toot, here comes the +5 Might train pulling an insanity caboose.



"Hmm. This one, she has the herbal smell to her. Surely, then, she cannot be so bad?"



"Oh! I can feel it! I am in her grip! Take me away, Green Fairy, to a world of beauty and light!"





"You know, if we keep drinking Tomb Juice like this, we're going to have to pay another visit to the temple."
"On'tday ebay idiculousray. I-ay eelfay inefay."





While looting the last of the coffins, I managed to get a shot of a Tomb Terror's attack animation.

"Aaaaaa! It's flinging its aorta at us! That's not how blood vessels are supposed to work at all!"



"Hey. Hey. Fubar. Give me a look at that flail you just got. Now."



"WOOOOO LOOK AT ME I'M THE WORLD'S MOST BLINGED-OUT CIRCUMCELLION"
"Leisanay! Otswhay ongwray?"
"LAUDATE DEUM, BITCHES"





"I do believe we're done here. Let's make our way back to the temple before we all go completely insane, shall we? Careful on the way up: there are a few cobwebs in the stairway."





"Wow, we got a pretty nice haul from that tomb. Eight Megacredits, not counting the ones we had left over from the Temple of Yak."



Emerald is the next material up from Ruby and the fourth-best material in the game, and the Emerald Flail we found is accordingly an incredibly sweet weapon. Really, Fubar could probably make better use of it, but I haven't found many good weapons that Anleisa can use so it's on her for now.



There weren't any huge XP bonuses for exploring the Tomb of a Thousand Terrors, but we earned just enough experience from combat to gain Anleisa another level. Training costs and spell purchases are the main things we're spending money on right now, and we still have way more cash than we need. Training is a pretty manageable expense right now, but increases in cost with each level; spells can cost 10,000 gold or more, but are one-off expenses for each character.



Experience required to level up doubles with each level gained until it reaches 1,024,000 experience points, at which point it stays at that amount for every level after that. Levelling up may happen at a slow pace from now on, but at least it's slow and steady.

Since all our characters got some significant stat boosts this update, let's take a good look at how they're shaping up:



There wasn't much point increasing Fubar's Might further with Red Tomb Juice: once stats rise above 50, you only get a bonus once for every 25 further points you raise the stat's raw value (compared to every 2 points up to 21, and every 5 points up to 40). Instead, I boosted his Speed with Purple Tomb Juice so that he can smash enemies into a pulp before they act. As you can see, he also caught a couple of years of aging from Tomb Guards: it's no big deal right now, though.

He's still using his Blazing Broad Sword for now: its damage output is great, and the fire damage makes it useful against physically resistant foes (like every single monster in the Tomb of a Thousand Terrors), but the lack of a to-hit bonus can pose some problems against high-AC enemies. Still, with 4 melee attacks per round (compared to 2 attacks for the full spellcasters and 3 attacks for the rest of the party at their current levels), there's an excellent chance that at least one will connect. His own AC is very good, and his lack of elemental resistance gear is compensated for by his massive HP total.



Ms Swallow got the lion's share of the Might boosts, improving her melee damage output. I also raised her Personality, giving her a very respectable SP total for a partial caster. Her equipment selection is balanced between giving AC bonuses, elemental resistances and stat boosts.



I thought about giving Flench some Orange Tomb Juice to improve his depressingly low SP, but as a full caster Vandesloof would benefit more from the same Intellect boost. In the end, Flench just got some extra Speed and Accuracy. He's got his Ruby Flamberge and his high HP to rely on in combat, so he's doing fine.



Between being a Gnome and having slightly lower Endurance than the rest of the party, Trish's HP total is lagging behind a bit, and being one level ahead of the rest of the party is no longer enough to close the gap. I gave her some Yellow Tomb Juice to improve her Accuracy, and she's got decent gear to boost her AC, resistances and Speed, so she's not too far behind the first three characters on offence or defence.



While Anleisa is never going to be a top-of-the-line melee combatant, I gave her some Yellow Tomb Juice to at least shore up her previously terrible Accuracy. I also gave her a dose of White Tomb Juice to increase her Luck and help her resist status conditions, since she's responsible for healing and curing the party. She's got her powerful Emerald Flail to make up for her low Might, and has a good range of elemental protection gear equipped, too.



I fed Vandesloof all the Green Tomb Juice I could find, because he desperately needs the extra Endurance to keep up with the rest of the party's HP totals. Even so, he's still the most fragile party member. On the bright side, he's got a huge SP total thanks to all that Orange Tomb Juice boosting his Intellect, and his armour is decent for a Sorcerer.

And with that, another madness-filled update is over. Next time, should the party explore the town of Asp, do some more outdoor exploration, or use their newfound Megacredits to rebuild Newcastle? Vote wisely!