Part 15: Update XIII - Goondalf the G(eomorphologist)

Part XIII - Goondalf the G(eomorphologist)

Semi-new Musical Accompaniment
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywG4tMZH_d4



Alright, Caves 1. So we know there's at least one more map of this place. Let's just head up a bit and--oh my god what the fuck is that





I like how the artist straight up referenced from the D&D Monster Manual for the Lurkers.





The Lurkers have a wide damage range, but their accuracy is fairly low. They can hurt like hell if they do hit though. Thanks to our kickin rad magic armor and Aura of Iron, we manage to defeat this one with minimal damage.



Our first combat with a party is a success! Thanks Wyatt and Phelic's Apprentice!

Well, that was easy, wasn't it guys? I could get the hang of this spelunking thing. Oh hey, nice rock formation. I should bring some back to study. Wait, why is it moving...?





Even the rocks are hostile down here? Oh come on!

Cave Golems, weirdly, attack really fast, but have lower damage than Lurkers. Their main ability, as one might imagine, is that they soak a whole lot of damage, even magic damage.

During this battle, Wyatt does what he usually does- move around a lot trying to get the perfect line of sight for his shots while avoiding melee. It mostly works, except friendly fire is a thing, so it is possible both for his arrows to hurt us and for our spells to hurt him. That's where most of the damage the party has taken comes from, to be honest. It wouldn't be such a problem if this area weren't so narrow. Plus, he has a bad habit of causing more enemies just out of sight to aggro on the party.



Then again, he does a lot of damage, so.



1 Training Point per monster we kill is going to add up quickly.

Continuing to wind through the narrow passages...



Starting to take a bit of damage here



Wyatt brings in a Lurker from off-screen who promptly murders Phelic's Apprentice.



Dead party members leave a body with their stuff on it and disappear from the roster. Forever. There is no resurrection magic in this world, so the dead stay dead. Or at least undead (no, in what must be a huge oversight, there is no way for Goondalf to learn necromancy). Keep your parties healed everyone!

This is pretty much an instant reload. If it were a different party member, it might be another story, but Phelic's Apprentice has some fun stuff in later chapters, so f losing him.



Let's try this again.



There we go. As you can probably tell, the main danger of combat is getting ganged up on. Even one more Lurker or golem we didn't expect can mean the difference between victory and party wipe.

Goondalf takes a minute to soothe Wyatt's wounds, though with a stern talking to about watching his aim.



Wait,



there's a guard down here? My dude how are you not dead. All he says is the same thing the previous guard said about the voices too.



Making good caving progress at least.



Note the second golem trying to be sneaky and hide behind some stalactites. Don't think we don't see you there buddy.



At this point I finally remember why I brought Wyatt at all--to cast Shadow on him and bring his Stealth into the 90s.



Just in time too, since the sharp-eyed might notice a Sha'ahoul corpse over there.



Turns out it was a bit premature though, as it's just a bunch of bodies surrounding a dead human.







He has a signet ring, like the one mentioned by our new personal bard earlier.

The Sha'ahoul don't really have anything, except some weird, bad weapons.



Casting Shadow on Wyatt actually wasn't totally premature though, as there are Lurkers... lurking around the corner from the site.



That nearly-empty health bar above the Lurker is entirely from a single shot by ShadowWyatt. Goondalf has not even hit once at this point. Once Goondalf does hit, it's dead. Takes less than three seconds.



The lightly colored brown openings are entrances to the second Caves map, but like all good dungeon delvers, Goondalf knows not to move deeper until one has explored everything else available.



Also, Shadow runs out on Wyatt, but Phelic's Apprentice helpfully casts Hold on this single golem we found. Go Team G!



And this Lurker comes barrelling straight out of that formation to the left. Fuck this place would be terrifying if it weren't oldschool isometric view.



Did I mention there are spiders too? There are spiders too.

Hey, is that daylight coming from down the way?





It is! Hey buddy! Please don't say anything creepy, tia.



Of course not, soldier. I have been sent to inform you that your relief is ill and that Wacian is currently looking for a replacement.

Weldon: Oh, okay. [He yawns] You're the first person I've seen since my watch started, and my replacement was due here a little while ago, so I didn't know what was going on...

I'm the first person you've seen since your watch started? You haven't seen a courier come through here?

Weldon: No, sir, and even if I did, he couldn't get through the gate, like I was trying to tell you earlier. I don't have a key, so I guess the guard who's sick was supposed to bring it. Besides, it takes the order of the Council to open this gate, because it was intended as an escape route.

Thank you, soldier, I... must be on my way now...



Welp. At least the path back is clear, since the vast majority of enemies in this game don't respawn.



Yes. He told me something disturbing: General Roth sent a courier, but he hasn't passed--

Wacian: Not to be rude, lad, but that's none of my care. I'm sure me old pal General Roth would be more interested. I've given ye leave to do as ye wish in the caves. Dismissed!

YOU WOULD DARE-Dismissed, is it, old grunt? Very well.





Apparently, the courier you sent hasn't left the caves yet, sir.



I've something else to report, sir.

I met your friend Wacian; the impertinent old fool actually had the nerve to attempt to "dismiss" me like some common grunt. I think--

[laughing] Oh, don't worry about him. He's an old friend of mine. I told him to sass you a bit, and it looks like he succeeded! I can just imagine. It's good for you, lad, you'll learn eventually... Go have a chat with him, he was kidding! [calms down] Ha... Have you anything to report?

No, sir, not yet. I will return when I have learned something new. Farewell.

I can't believe the Commander of the Fortress of Kings, Hero of the Sha'ahoul war, just trolled us. Well played, General. As a wizard, we must repay this insult, but that will have to wait.





Between doing Wacian's quest and killing tons of monsters, we've built up a healthy reserve of TP. Time for more training!





We can see the training packages we've gotten by clicking Awards & Titles on the bottom. The list is up to two pages now.





Now that that's done, back to the caves. Happily, we can teleport to Caves 1 from anywhere in Avalon, so there isn't too much backtracking.





ShadowWyatt one-shot-kills a Lurker before we can even test out our new training on it.



Tricksy gollumsgolems!



Piles of rocks too? Now we better hope we don't get crushed in a cave-in too, I guess.



Faced with a tag-team of two Lurkers, with Wyatt's Shadow spell broken by the enemies perceiving him, Phelic's Apprentice attempts to save the day. Perhaps jealous of Goondalf's slinging of offensive spells as well, he decides to cast Frost.



It, uh, works?



Meanwhile, Wyatt shoots Goondalf in the back when I misclick into his path. Luckily he wasn't Shadowed, or that might have been an instant death. We make a good team.

But hey, we won, and Caves 1 has been mostly cleared!



Almost immediately we run into a full party of Sha'ahoul.





Wyatt snipes one good, and Goondalf's flames deal with the rest.



We score some sweet leather pants from the victory.



Unfortunately, Wyatt's dumb ass ran too far and found a whole second party of enemies before we were fully healed.



Goondalf dies almost immediately.



Avalon. Turns out the scholars weren't full of shit about the Earthstone.

Rewind!



Goondalf's Stealth is nowhere near high enough to get sneak attack damage from his melee attacks, I just misclicked and accidentally made ShadowGoondalf too. With some careful kiting, reloading, and luck, the second party of Sha'ahoul goes down.





I can't believe they managed to kill Goondalf with shit weapons like this. Just goes to show how dangerous numbers are in this game.

Oh, also there's a third party. Slightly smaller, but also better armored.



But we have ShadowWyatt and the Flames/Ice of G, so get fucked offbrand orcs.



With the third group dead, we finally have a breather to check the map.



Jk there's a fourth group. We can guess why there are so many Sha'ahoul down here based on Chapter Two's death screen above, but Goondalf has no idea.



But they fall to our will just the same.





Didn't even bother with a description. Then again, "Stone Battle Axe" is already pretty descriptive.

Oh nice. Check it:



A huge party of Sha'ahoul, including a mage, are duking it out with a huge party of Lurkers. It's tempting to just sit back and laugh, but then we might miss out on precious Training Points! (I think the game actually awards a flat amount of TP for this encounter once all involved are dead regardless, rather than individually, but I'm not going to risk being xpblocked! Plus, Goondalf is no coward!)



The Sha'ahoul Caster isn't nearly as dangerous as the Lieutenant from Chapter One, but he can still ruin our day if we're not careful. He blew most of his load casting Hold on Lurkers though, so he only has one Hold spell left for us.

Phelic's Apprentice returns the favor and casts Hold on the Caster, allowing us to easily mop up the remaining warriors. You're alright, kid.







I love this robe. It's literally the same as every other one, except it has a Stealth penalty because it's red. The "Notice Me" of magewear.



Not bad, but the real prize here is actually the gloves, because there is already a lot of good competition for accessory slots (which the Mage's Companion occupies), while good stuff that goes in the hand slot is rare.



The same as other gloves, except they have a Coordination bonus. Because... black is slimming for your fingers too???

Just kidding, the actual real prize are some tight tights.



As we explore further, we actually get Held from off-screen! That is one Perceptive fuckin mage.



And then he shoots a fireball at us for good measure, as the warriors with him charge in. This AI can be pretty nasty sometimes.







Motherfucker tries to ice Goondalf, but Goondalf jukes him and responds by casting Sword until he is dead.





More Black Leather Gloves! Everyone gets a pair! You get a pair, and you get a pair, and you get a pair!



Misspelling aside, this is a straightforward but useful item, equivalent to quite a bit of Constitution.

At this point, we've got a lot of stuff to sell and Training to get, so we pull up the map to figure out how far this succession of rapid-fire combats took us.



Not too far. The rest of the map isn't quite as punishing as this section, at least.

The blow-hard Cynric teaches us how to control our body better. Should have waited for 2 more TP to get both remaining Trainings, but oh well.





Goondalf is lookin' good, physically, mentally, and fashionably. But we are nowhere close to his final form, in any category.



I also like how the poisoner's body just stays there until the entire map changes in Chapter 6. Maybe Goondalf convinced everyone to leave it there as a warning to other traitors, especially ones with boring white tabards and only single pairs of pants.

And of course, during the sale of our loot, I failed to heed the gardeners' warnings and glitched out again.



Death could not defeat Goondalf, but the flowers could.


RUMORS


JOURNAL ENTRIES

-protect me from you. I don't care about him, though. I know you will return to me, regardless of what happens in Avalon. With men such as you defending our great kingdoms, we cannot possibly lose. Come home to me, Daniel. Come home safely.
Your loving Joyce.


-for myself so that I could ask your father for your hand in marriage. I don't regret defending our way of life, but how I wish I could return to you. Writing to you seems to make this place less horrible, for horrible it is. Every day, more of our soldiers fall victim to the Sha'ahoul, either directly by their weapons or through disease or lack of food. Think not of these things when you think of me, darling Joyce. Think only of that night in the forest, and of the kisses that we shared. Yours forever,
Daniel.

BOOK CORNER



-could take no more people, the citizens of Oriam made camp where they could, every night praying that an end to the war would come quickly. Farmers returning to their land after the Sha'ahoul retreated swore that nothing would grow, so great was the sadness of the land.