Might and Magic VII: For Blood and Honor (PC) Playthrough

Back when this game was originally released, I made it to the decision and got stuck. I had more important things going on in my life than to try to either figure out what I missed or restart, and I've never gotten back to it until now. I'll be playing the Millennium Edition release. I really dislike not having a physical manual.

Looking at the on-disc manual, the skills that are limited to certain classes that I’m most interested in having are Disarm Trap, Identify Item, Repair, and Alchemy, in addition to having all spell casters. So, I switched the Knight and Thief from the default party to Paladin and Ranger, keeping the Cleric and Sorcerer as is. I didn’t change anything else about the 4 characters. My party’s starting stats are:
Zoltan – M Goblin Paladin Mgt 30, Int 5, Per 5, End 13, Acy 13, Spd 14, Lck 7
Roderick – M Human Ranger 13, 9, 9, 13, 13, 13, 13
Serena – F Dwarf Cleric 12, 9, 20, 22, 7, 13, 7
Alexis – F Elf Sorcerer 5, 30, 9, 13, 13, 13, 7

Huh, they stuck with the same character names from M&M6 for the default party.

Equipping and learning all the spells in our inventory, we leave the Emerald Isle dock and begin the scavenger hunt. Speaking to Mia Lucelle in the house by the dock, it seems there’s a resident dragon on the island that protects it from pirates in return for tributes. I do like how the Skills are available at the various establishments as opposed to the Guilds in M&M6. Exploring town, we meet a rather suspicious individual who offers us a magical wand to aid us in the treasure hunt in return for some future favor. Contemplating for a moment, we take Mr. Malwick up on his offer and receive a Wand of Fireballs. Next to the Body Guild, we come across a fountain that grants a permanent +2 to Luck eight times. Nice! Making our way to where Lord Markham is waiting to reward the treasure hunt winners with Castle Harmondale, he also mentions a 1000 Gold reward for finding the missing contestants. First thing first, thanks to a chest near the shore, we have enough gold to have Zoltan learn the Merchant skill. Now to get him enough to learn Bow. With the gaggle of dragonflies being too tough for us, we wander around and enter the Temple of the Moon, which we need to get a floor tile from.

Entering the temple, the squeaks of mice or bats can be heard, as well as what sounds like a fireball trap. Defeating a few Giant Bats, we spy a red pulsing segment of the wall, which turns out to be a chest. Nothing too exciting inside, but it does hold just enough Gold for Zoltan to learn Bow. Being nighttime, the blacksmith is closed, so we wait a few hours for it to open and Zoltan now can use the bow we found. Back to the Temple, exterminating more bats and rats, we make our way through the cavern to the actual temple and beyond the fireball traps audible from the cavern entrance to a library with a bunch of spells as well as a bottle to make a Red Potion, a Wealthy Hat and a floor tile for the hunt. Even though the Crude Bow is classified as a longbow, it doesn’t count for the scavenger hunt. Unable to take out the spiders in the Temple, we wander around outside and come across Sally selling seashells by the seashore, just outside of the Dragon’s Cave, so we buy one for 100G. That just leaves the longbow and an instrument to find.

Around behind the cavern to the Temple is a pedestal with blue flames. Examining it, it’s a Game of Endurance, which nobody can win right now. Heading around to the island’s northern shore, we find another chest with enough gold in it to get a 3rd Merchant and 3rd party member proficient at bows. We just need to find one more bow and some more gold, and the goal of having everyone able to use bows will be achieved. Able to take out the swarm of dragonflies, thanks to the +5 HP and +5 SP fountains by the healing tent, we ended up wasting 100G since in a small stone structure in the middle of where the dragonflies were, one of the four chests there holds a seashell. Being after 6pm, the stores are closed, so we head back to the Temple, draw out the spiders a few at a time, and finally clear the dungeon. Another red glowing section of wall is found in the spiders’ area. Opening this chest, we get a shield. Now we need to get someone able to wear the shield. Since we’re able, we spend a couple weeks training everyone up a couple levels. Dang it! I didn’t realize I would have to buy the lute for 500G for the hunt. Selling off a jewel we found, we have enough to buy the lute. Now we need to find that longbow. Hmm… Do we have to buy the one from the weapon shop? … Nope.

And the game froze up my computer on the load screen while trying to enter the caverns to the Temple. I couldn’t close out of the game, but was able to close everything else with Alt+F4 even though it didn’t actually display the program I Alt+Tabbed to, and was able to reboot via the Start Menu. I reloaded the game and it’s working fine again. Hopefully that’s a one-time occurrence.

Checking the temple to see if I missed anything, which I didn’t, the only place left is the Dragon’s Cave. Taking advantage of the Day of the Gods pedestal next to a cannon at the top of a hill, then healing up at the fountains by the healing tent to gain those added HP, as well as utilizing the Fire Resistance pedestal just outside the cave, we head in. Dashing around the small cave, scooping up everything as we go, we find several items from the missing contestants who met their demise at the hands of the dragon, as well as what I’m hoping is the Longbow needed for the hunt. Other than the dragon breaking Serena’s shield, our little foray went well. Being after 6 pm, we wait for 6 am, and present the missing contestants’ gear to Lord Markham and receive 1k Gold and 1k Exp. The longbow found in the Cave meets the requirements and Thomas the Judge declares us the winners of the scavenger hunt. Lord Markham then names us Lords of Harmondale, gives us the deed to the castle, and we can now board the ship at the dock. Before leaving, Alexis learns Identify Item and Zoltan learns Repair Item, since both can become Grand Masters at those skills. Training up a level, we then board the Lady Margaret and leave the Isle for Harmondale.

The cutscene mentions goblins taking an interest in our land, so it looks like we have our first task. I chuckled at a bit of the history of Harmondale that became available. Trying to enter our new castle, the Butler tells us of the goblins who’ve taken up residence. It’s time to slay us some goblins and fully claim our castle. Making our way through a bunch of rats, and then some goblins, the chests being trapped causes us to leave and get someone to learn Disarm Trap in town. Without a Thief, Roderick the Ranger is our best bet (and actually our only option), since he’ll be able to advance to Expert level. While trying to find the tavern, we enter the town hall and there’s a bounty for killing an Archer before the end of the month. Selling off all the useless weapons we’ve found as well as a ring, Roderick learns Disarm Trap. While in the tavern, talking to Davrik Peladium gets us a quest to retrieve his signet ring from some bandits who’ve set up base south of Castle Gryphonheart in Erathia. That’s not happening right now, so back to our castle to start opening chests. In one of the chests in the main room we find a letter from the goblins setting up an ambush of the humans. I’m assuming the four empty rooms will eventually be filled. With all the monsters killed, all the stat increasing barrels drunk from, and unable to move the rock in front of the door to the throne room, we leave and head back to the Butler in the tavern.

Talking to the Butler, he’s relieved we cleared out the castle, informs us that the dwarves living in Stone City with the Barrow Downs to the south might be able to rebuild the damaged parts of the castle, and rewards us with 5k exp each. Loitering just outside the tavern by the Stone Skin pedestal is a fellow who tells us about lighting the beacon fires by the road to Barrow Downs to alert the Erathian forces for aid. It turns out that he’s actually the Hairbaugh from the letter we found in our castle and attacks. Easily defeated, we move along our merry way and start exploring the town. Like in M&M6, around the stables, we find three horseshoes that give 2 Skill Points each. We get a quest from Darron Temper to find his brother, Elron, who was going to the White Cliff Caves to practice Arcomage strategies, but hasn’t been seen since. Maybe we’ll get a deck of cards to play out of this. Coming across a mistake, finding out who the Repair Item Master trainer is adds the Merchant Grand Master trainer to the auto-notes. Heading towards the guilds, the fountains around the Water Guild entrance poison, while the small fountain grants everyone a permanent +2 to Accuracy. Yay! Finally, at the temple, a not so well looking Tarin Withern quests us with retrieving the Lantern of Light, which was lost during transport from the Stone City temple to this one.

Heading east out of town, we run into some goblins in pitched battle against some swordsmen. Helping out the swordsmen the best we can before they get overwhelmed by the rather large goblin forces, we fight our way to a fort, which is repeatedly shooting out some sort of magical projectiles from its turrets. A chest in the floor of the fort holds a fragment of a soldier’s diary mentioning the goblins receiving aid from some sort of flying magical creature. Suddenly being swarmed by goblins, we hightail it back to the road leading south and arrive at a small village. Other than some trainers and buying membership into the Earth and Water Guilds, the major thing in this village is the Monk’s promotion quest to Initiate. We have no Monks in our party, so maybe we’ll get Honorary status for completing it, like in M&M6. Heading back to Harmondale to train, an oversight is found, as the Body Building description is the same as that in M&M6, which doesn’t make sense in this game, since Sorcerers cannot learn it.

And the game locked up again. For some reason, this game is using up 99% of my laptop’s CPU. While I’m using an old laptop, being about 10 years more recent than the game, I really don’t think it should be having this much of an issue running the game. I guess I’ll move it to a more recent laptop. After installing it on a laptop that’s less than 5 years old, it’s still using about 50% of the CPU. At least it doesn’t sound like it’s going to blow up.

Heading back out to explore, in the northeast corner of this area, we find our first obelisk. A little south of the fort, we find a little shrine that looks like a small gazebo with an altar that does nothing when we pray. Climbing up the hill just south of Harmondale, we find a couple huts, which are home to some trainers. Back at the small village, we take the south road towards the Barrow Downs and then head up the unpaved path, crossing the bridge above the road and, after killing some goblins, come to the White Cliff Caves. Completing our exploration of this map, the path around the caves leads us to a nice looking house with The Arbiter, Judge Grey, inside, who only tells us to repair our castle. With the outdoors fully explored, we head back to the caves and enter to try to complete a quest.

Once in the cave, we’re greeted by some troglodytes. Considerably easier than the ranged attacking goblins, these pose very little threat. I do like how some monsters will actually attack other monsters, as there’s an emerald ooze in battle with a couple troglodytes. As with M&M6, oozes are immune to physical attacks, so Alexis is needed to defeat it with her Fire Bolt spell. We find a hidden room (the wall wasn’t fully mapping in the NE corner) with some chests with plenty of equipment upgrades for us. We also come across some stat boosting barrels. We come across another battle between troglodytes and sapphire oozes in a little path. Allowing the troglodytes to keep the oozes occupied, we slip by and find Darron’s brother’s remains along with his notes on ArcoMage strategies as well as his deck of ArcoMage cards. Woohoo! I can now play ArcoMage! Leaving the oozes for later, we leave the caves and head back to Harmondale to deliver the grave news to his brother. Darron rewards us with 2k Exp each, 750G, and lets us keep the cards as the game has brought enough pain into his life.

Before heading to the Barrow Downs, Zoltan learns Body Magic so he can get the Heal spell. The three non-Sorcerers also get the Chain Mail skill. Selling off useless equipment, we head south to the Barrow Downs. Arriving by the road, the road ends at a trio of buildings. Entering the tavern, we win a game of ArcoMage and collect some gold. We learn of medusas infesting the Red Dwarf Mines and are told that there used to be Circles of Stone for each cardinal direction, but the Eastern Circle in Nighon was destroyed during the wars between the Churches of the Sun and the Moon. Noticing a path up the side of a small mountain, we arrive at the entrance to Barrow IX.

Entering the barrow, we’re immediately attacked by a few goglings with their ranged fire attacks. And just lovely: they combust upon death, injuring everyone. What looks to be a door has a lever on the left, which I can’t figure out what it does, and a keyhole on the right, for which we don’t have the key. A bookcase hides the path that can be seen on our map, so we move it aside and head through. A-ha! The lever changes which barrow the tunnel by it leads to. Several of the barrows are too tough for us, so we make it back to Barrow IX and leave, instead braving the undead roaming around outside.

At the base of a hill in the NW section of the area is a Haunted Mansion. Not having any business here yet, we move along. In our exploration, we stumble upon a chest with a journal fragment regarding a couple Brothers of the Temple of the Sun trying to make it to a mansion located in the eastern part of this area. Heading to the rather high bridge, we make it to a large fort-like structure that turns out to be Stone City. Being where we are supposed to find the dwarves to repair our castle, we enter.

Picking up a few more skills and training up a level, we avoid all the tempting chests (which we can't open without setting off a currently devastating trap, anyway) and make it to the throne room. Hothfarr IX tasks us with rescuing the dwarves from the mines, giving us an elixir that will cure them of the medusas’ stone curse, promising to fix up our castle in return. He then warns us of griffins in Bracada before we take our leave. Exploring more of the town, Zoltan becomes our first Expert, training up in Repair Item. We pick up another quest from Spark Burnkindle to rid the tunnels underneath Stone City of troglodytes.

The game is still randomly crashing at various load screens or when I try to load a save, so I downloaded the Mok patch. While I don’t have to run it in compatibility mode (I’ll still have to see if the sounds are fixed and not have to turn off sound acceleration), the main screen still gets stuck on the previous screen (e.g. if I go into the options menu and exit, the options menu is still showing) when I Alt+Tab out of the program, making it impossible to play – something it didn’t do on the first, older, laptop I tried playing it on. I’m guessing it just doesn’t like laptops. Oh, well. I just have to make sure to open up the Task Manager before playing so if it continues to crash, I have a program I can change to in order to shut down the game without needing to reboot the PC.

Taking a little venture into the underground tunnels, the troglodyte queens are annoying with their poison attack, so we head back to the Dwarven Barrows. Back in Barrow IX, at the far end of the room at the end of the path hidden by the bookcase, we find a fake wall hiding a small room with a chest. Taking a bit of damage opening it, a key is the only thing inside. Using the key in the keyhole next to the entrance, the stone wall (that I was thinking was a door) parts, revealing a mural depicting the tunnel destinations. Figuring out that I can cheese my way through some of the enemies by going to turn-based before going through a tunnel, picking off as many enemies at range as possible, then turning around, going back through the tunnel and returning, all while staying in turn-based, thus resetting the monsters to their start positions (although this restores their health), I’m able to make it further than I would otherwise be able to. We fully map out everything but Zokarr’s Tomb and clear out all the monsters. Since all the chests are too strong to loot, we head back to Stone City to train up and tackle the troglodytes there.

Back in the tunnels, we’re using up a lot of our reagents creating Cure Poison potions. Eventually, we come to an exit into the Nighon Tunnels. Not far into it, some Magogs are fighting some dwarves and water warlocks, with the dwarves and warlocks easily taking care of them. While this is nice, we didn’t come down here to investigate these tunnels, so we head back to finish clearing out the troglodytes. Just beyond the entrance to the Nighon Tunnels, we come across our second obelisk. Other than a bunch of chests we still can’t open safely, the only other thing down here are a few veins of ore to mine. With all the troglodytes hopefully killed, we head back to collect our 6k Exp each reward. With that taken care of, we’ll try our hand at the Nighon Tunnels. Other than a bunch of gold and an area that’s too far to jump to, there’s nothing for us to do down here. With only the chests to loot when Roderick can become an Expert at Disarm Trap, we decide to finish exploring this area’s outdoors.

Trying to navigate around this area is a pain, thanks to the large number of goglings, gogs, and magogs. It’s a pain since they just run up and down the mountains as though they aren’t even there. While running around in circles, we come across our third obelisk just about dead center in the map. Making our way to the southwest landmass, on our map we notice a structure on a small hill. Shimmying up the hill, an altar is up here, which gives everyone a permanent +10 Might and Endurance. Very nice! Taking the gentle slope up to the high bridge, a chest holding a Golem’s Chest is found. Not sure what that’s for, but I’m guessing we’ll eventually find out with some future quest. Fully mapping the area, there’s a small village in the southwest part with only a fire resistance well of note. Thinking the meditation spot we need to find was outdoors, and not locating it, we head back into the Dwarven Barrows and to Zokarr’s Tomb.

That was definitely worth the trip back as we reach a well surrounded by four obelisks that rise out of the floor as we approach. Searching the well, Bartholomew Hume appears, telepathically contacting us to promote us to Honorary Initiates. This is worth 15k Exp each, which is a nice amount at this point. The only other things in here are empty pillars in the middle of the four rooms surrounding the well. I’m guessing these will serve some purpose later. Since I believe the Dwarf King said the Red Dwarf Mines are in the Bracada Desert, we leave the barrows and head west.

Shortly after arriving in the northeastern part of the Desert, we encounter a couple of those griffins we were warned about. Just great. Huh. These griffins are extremely weak compared to the griffins found in the previous 6 games. Moving along, a few Bronze Golems are milling around, just east of the village of Bracada. Since they don’t attack, we let them be. As is standard, there are three horseshoes lying on the ground around the stables. Speaking to the villagers, it seems the golems were created by the wizards in “the School” and will attack any followers of Darkness. That could be interesting if I choose that path. It also seems that the Divine Intervention spell has been missing for centuries. This place is a bit annoying with all the teleporters that send you to the various locations in the town. Making our way around the town, we find Leda Rowan, who will promote Cavaliers to Champions, but we don’t have any Cavaliers. Nearby Leda is Lysander Sweet, who promotes Hunters to Ranger Lords. Again, we can’t take advantage of this. Not able to find the Red Dwarf Mines, which I thought were here, or, more importantly right now, some training grounds, we visit the stables and head to Erathia.

Arriving in the town of Steadwick in Erathia, we pick up the three horseshoes lying around the stables and start exploring the town. We’re told by one of the denizens that Lord Markham’s mansion is in Tatalia. Qillain Laraselle will craft weapons from the lumps of ore we’ve been picking up. Next door, Robert Sourbrow will craft armor. And next door to him, Cloud Agraynel will craft items. We’re told the criminal, Bill Lasker, who is tied to several unusual events, is hiding in Steadwick’s sewers. Heading towards the town hall in the center of town, a royal griffin is circling around, but doesn’t attack. The temporary +50 Might fountain in front of the hall is nice, even though it doesn’t get recorded in the autonotes. In a house northeast of the city hall, we pick up the promotion quest for Knights to Cavaliers from Frederick Org. All we need to do is kill all the undead in that Haunted Mansion in the Barrow Downs. Gina Barnes informs us of an ArcoMage Championship, and by winning a game of ArcoMage in all 13 taverns, we’ll be crowned champion. We’ve already won 3 of them. We get another quest from Norbert Thrush to deliver a letter to Lord Markham and be given, and return with, Parson’s Quill. The well north of Norbert’s house grants everyone a permanent +2 to Might. The Armory is selling some nice gauntlets that regenerate SP, so we buy some for Serena. We also win a game, or ten, of ArcoMage while we’re here.

With everyone trained up and all the skills to be had bought, we head out of town and enter nearby Castle Gryphonheart. We can’t do much here as the throne room is locked. Crossing through Fort Riverstride, we see a small group of tents to the south of the road to Harmondale, which is home to a couple teachers. A little to the south of the tents, we pray at an altar and each receive a permanent +10 to Luck. Sweet! Continuing to explore the area, in the mountains east of the tents is a Contest of Endurance. Possibly thanks to the Day of the Gods buff we got, everyone wins it for 5 Skill Points each. Nice. Taking out a decent sized group of robbers east of the road leading south to the Bracada Desert, a cauldron grants +2 Air Resistance to one character. Scaling the mountains to access the southwest corner of the area, we fight through some griffons to reach our fourth obelisk. For a minute, I though we were trapped in this area and would have to reload the Autosave file, but just southwest of Steadwick is a small pass we can scale to get out. Finishing our exploration of the area, we come to a small group of houses in the northeast corner, a bit north of the entrance to The Bandit Caves. Ignoring the Erathian Sewers, Fort Riverstride, and The Bandit Caves, we take the coach back to Bracada to train to Expert in a few skills.

In the annoying area of Bracada, we pick up Experts at Bow, Dagger, and Learning. We also scale our way up to another obelisk. Veronica the Factor is hired on for a ~5% boost to our gold findings. It’s now time to finish exploring this area. We pick up a couple Genie Lamps lying in the desert here. I’m guessing we can sell them to traders. Oh, they can be used, giving a permanent +3 to Accuracy. Woohoo! Fighting through the large group of griffins in the eastern desert, we come to the elusive The Red Dwarf Mines. Needing to unload a bunch of inventory, we head back to Harmondale.

Back in our “hometown,” we missed the house where Lawrence Mark lives. He’s important since he’ll promote Warrior Mages to Master Archers. Visiting the village south of town, Bartholomew Hume will now promote us to Master if we choose the Light Path. After getting all the experts we can, we head back to the Barrow Downs to tackle the Haunted House for our second promotion. Before heading to the Haunted House, we loot that chest at the base of one of the hills in the Downs that was giving us serious issues earlier. Getting a few nice items, since we had already wiped out all the gogs, the chest teleporting us to where they were is no longer an issue. We then stop by Stone City for some more experts and then head to the Haunted House.

Making our way through a bunch of undead, we pilfer the Angel Statue Painting hanging on the wall of one of the rooms on the main floor. Climbing the stairs in the foyer, we battle our way to a library. Hunting around, picking up some spells and spell books, we spot a book sticking out the top shelf of one of the bookcases against the walls. Pushing in the book opens a secret door and we take out some more undead. The Barrow Wights can age a character, so we need to be careful of them. Finally defeating all the undead, we investigate that lever, which shoots a fireball out when activated. It says Door on mouse over, and makes the sound of a door opening or closing, but I cannot figure out what it does. That done, we head back to Stone City, sell off our inventory, then go back to the Barrows to loot the chests.

Those SP regenerating gauntlets are really coming in handy right now. We make a quick dash through the lever maze to the couple barrows with chests and pick up the Lantern of Light we need. Returning to Harmondale, we head to the temple, give Tarin the Lantern and receive 5k Exp each and 1k Gold. Being Sunday, we take the coach to The Arena and win a Page battle. Back in Harmondale, there’s nothing left to do here, so we trek west to Erathia to complete the Cavalier promotion quest.

Oh, I didn’t notice that Frederick Org’s house has another house right next to it. Sir Charles Quixote lives here and promotes Paladins to Crusaders for slaying a dragon in Tatalia. Since I don’t feel like having him in my party just yet, I reload since he doesn’t give you an option to decline his quest. Visiting Frederick, we’re promoted to Honorary Cavaliers and receive 15k Exp each. He will then promote us to Black Knights if we choose the dark path. With that done, we’re off to the Bandit Caves to retrieve the Signet ring for Davrik from Harmondale. Before going there, we see what armor we can get forged and, holy crap, we get some Plate Armor with 48 AC and 14 Mind Magic resistance.

Entering the Bandit Caves, it seems, even at Level 14, we’re way overpowered as the robbers and thieves are absolutely no match for us. We quickly find a couple chests in this rather small dungeon and pick up the Signet ring. The only other thing of note is a letter to Velatyr concerning the bandits’ raids on Deyja and Harmondale, and that they are sending payment to him. Since we’re close to heading to Tatalia to see Lord Markham, we pick up Sir Charles Quixote, then head south to Bracada Desert to rescue the dwarves in the Red Dwarf Mines.

Entering the mine, we find a handful of oozes. Good thing we found a couple wands with about 35 charges each, so we have very little trouble with them. In the beginning chamber is a dwarf that was turned to stone. Searching it, the dwarf comes back to life and disappears, presumably heading back to Stone City. At the end of one of the paths, we find a journal entry lying on the ground telling about the miners’ discovery of the medusas. Scattered throughout the ground floor of the mine we end up rescuing seven petrified miners. Taking the lift down, we start encountering the medusas. These doorways are a pain since they usually act as walls blocking spells and shots. Real lovely, a medusa kept slithering against a wall and eventually ended up inside the wall, still shooting at us. Of course, we couldn’t hit it since it wasn’t an on-screen target anymore. Approaching the easternmost chamber, we can hear a clock-like ticking. Hmm… Arriving in the chamber and taking out the few medusas, there’s some sort of mechanism with rods going back and forth. Hmmmmm… Maybe it’s the lift engine mentioned in the journal entry? Anyway, we’ve saved all the dwarves, exterminated all the monsters, and mined all the ore, so it’s time to leave.

Hiking back to the Barrow Downs, we visit Hothfarr IX and he sends his engineer to fix our castle as reward for saving the dwarves. He also tells us that ambassadors from other lands will be visiting us, and to head back to our throne room. He gives us 5k Gold and we receive 12,500 Exp each. Upon our arrival back in Harmondale, Erathia and Avlee have both taken notice of our success and have both decided to lay claim to Harmondale. Our simple rescuing of the dwarves has caused war between those two nations to flare up and it seems we’ll eventually need to choose a side.

Before making our way to the castle, we stop by the tavern and return Davrik’s ring, netting us 5k Gold and 5k Exp each. Checking out our castle, the boulders in the main hall are gone and the four rooms have been cleared out, all now with the exact same layout, sporting a chair in front of the large window along with several candelabra making the rooms nice and bright. In addition to cleaning up the place, the construction crew also hung a bunch of paintings along the halls. The dungeon is now accessible, and we find a few items lying around, including a journal entry recording the interrogation and torture of a prisoner, who revealed that some tomb is located in South Erathia. Heading further down, we find our very own set of stocks and a rack. Woohoo! Fully exploring what can be explored of our castle, we head to the throne room. Even though it’s the middle of the night, our butler and the ambassadors from Avlee and Erathia are waiting for us. Both Queen Catherine of Erathia and King Parson of Avlee invite us to their respective castles. The stables are going to the Tularean Forest today, so we take a ride there.

Arriving, first thing first, we search around and find the three horseshoes. Just east of the stables, in a tent, Anthony Green will promote Druids to Great Druids if we visit the three temples to nature that were erected centuries ago. We’re told that the oldest tree in the Tularean Forest will communicate with people. Entering the bank for some reason, the head of Bremen the Banker is not quite connected to his torso, so at one point in his animation, a gap is clearly seen between the base of his neck and his leather vest. Oops. Visiting the houses, we come to the home of Thom Lumbra, who has a quest for us to return the statuettes to the shrines in the Bracada Desert, Tatalia, and Avlee. I don’t recall seeing a shrine in the desert. Continuing, we find Ebednezer Sower, who will promote Rangers to Hunters if we can figure out how to enter a faerie mound in Northern Avlee. Picking up another quest from Johann Kerrid, we need to deliver a letter to the Faerie King in the northern part of Avlee and return with payment for a job Johann had done for the king earlier. We learn that the boat captains won’t sail to Evenmorn Island until they get a map of the reefs, which was stolen by pirates. We also find out people have been going missing at night. We knock out the ArcoMage Championship requirement, and noticing a structure a little north of town on our map, investigate to find our sixth obelisk.

With everything in, and in the close vicinity of, the town visited, we head into the castle. Making our way to the throne room, King Parson tasks us with stealing the plans to Fort Riverstride and returning within a month to prove we are on his side, or else he will order his forces to attack us. Well, I think I want to see what Queen Catherine has for us before deciding, so… Reload! We hadn’t quite visited everything near the town. To the southwest are the expert trainers for Air, Fire, and Water Magic, as well as an altar in the mountain that grants a permanent +10 to Air, Fire, and Water Resistances to everyone. Yay! We then head north to continue exploring the area. Lovely, the trees are shooting fireballs at us. Well, we were told that the forest had gone mad. Zipping by the maddened trees, we reach the eastern point of a little peninsula, which holds the Contest of Luck. But we all fail. From this vantage point, we can see a long bridge heading north to south a little ways out in the water. Very well hidden on a side of the northwest hill is the entrance to the Tularean Caves. We have no reason to enter, so we move along. Crossing the narrowest part of the river, we make it to the landmass with the entrance to the long bridge, killing a bunch of what turn out to be pretty weak fire-shootingtrees. Hmm, I have two items that increase Disarm Trap, but on mouse over, it doesn’t appear that they stack, only getting the benefit of the better item. Going to enter the bridge, it turns out to be Clanker’s Laboratory. Again, we don’t have anything to do here, so we don’t bother exploring it.

The stables are going to Deyja, so we travel there. After picking up the three horseshoes, the first thing we notice is that the Stables are open from 6pm to 6am rather than during the day. Across the street from the Stables is a well that grants a permanent +2 to Intellect. Stopping by the tavern, we win a game of ArcoMage. A little east of the town, up in the mountains, we find a shrine. Praying at the altar, we all receive a permanent +10 to Mind, Earth, and Body resistances. Nice. A little west of town is the home of the Villain, William Setag (Setag just happens to be Gates spelled backwards (really…?)). He says he’ll train us in the Paladin’s arts if we choose the dark path. While exploring nearby, we encounter some harpies, with harpy hags that can Curse. Yeah, I’m not feeling the harpy hags in this game that are a solid red color. Circling up the path west of Deyja, we come to Watchtower 6, which according to the description is the last of a series of watchtowers that used to guard the Deyja border. Nice entryway in the description screen. Until we have a reason to explore this place, we’ll leave it be. Noticing a Challenge near the bend in the road, we scale the mountain to reach the Challenge of Personality, but no one is charming enough to win. Taking the road back towards town, we’re accosted by Lunius Shador, who demands a 1000 gold Necromancer Tax to continue on our way. Refusing, we’re surrounded by a bunch of Rotted Corpses, which we have no trouble wiping out.

Continuing our exploration of the area, north of Watchtower 6 is a trio of houses, along with our seventh obelisk. We just have to fight through several undead to reach it. Oh, hey, moving while in turn-based mode make scaling mountains a lot less tedious. Near the eastern border, just south of the large body of water, we come to the entrance to The Hall of the Pit, which we’d heard about in town. Rather than entering, we decide to map out as much as we can of the area. A little north of the Pit, we find another Genie Lamp lying in the sand, this one worth 1k Gold. Bummer. I wanted a stat boost. The treasure chest up here holds the Golem’s left leg. We find another Genie Lamp on the northern peninsula, again worth 1k Gold. Making our way to the northwest corner of the area, we come across a small town in the little valley. Deadalus Falk lives here and will promote Clerics to Priests for bringing him a map the pirates hiding in Tidewater Cavers west of Erathia may be holding, so he can find the temple on an island south of Bracada. Also living here is Seknit Undershadow, who will promote Rogues to Assassins. In addition to telling us to seek the Master Thief in the Erathian Sewers, drinking tea with him grants a temporary +50 to Endurance. Another treasure chest northeast of this little village holds the Golem’s right leg.

Without much to do in Deyja, we take a ride back to Erathia to sell off inventory and train. Since we’ve been told to seek the Master Thief, we enter the Erathian Sewers. Man, this moving floor is bugging me out. Being peopled with nothing but thieves and rats, the enemies are no issue for us. Wondering what the two slots in the walls are directly across from the large gap between doors above the floor, we flip the switches to raise the bridges. Crossing the first bridge, we learn the hard way that those slots shoot out shurikan-like projectiles. The switch puzzle to form a bridge is annoying as it’s split between the rooms opposite the chamber, which is a bit of a hike. Solving it, we cross to a room with several stat-boosting barrels. The door in here is where Bill Lasker is hiding out. If we bring him the vase from Lord Markham’s manor, he’ll promote Thieves to Rogues. He’s also a tutor for a few skills. That adds another task that needs to be done in Tatalia. I just hope the bridge stays intact so I don’t have to do the switch puzzle again when we return. The ship is sailing to Tatalia today, so we shove off.

Near the docks in Tatalia is the tavern, so we win a game of ArcoMage. The next order of business is picking up the three horseshoes around the stables. Nearby the Wine Cellar, which is home to a Speaker of the Dead enemy (which is too tough for us to handle), is a well that grants everyone +2 Speed. Several people tell us that some Wacko has the boat schedule, and, lo and behold, a guy named Wacko has the boat schedule. Heh. Ferdinand Visconti quests us with finding paintings of King Roland, Archibald, and one of the angel statue in Castle Ironfist’s courtyard. We already have the angel statue painting. Unfortunately he won’t take it until we have all three, leaving it to take up inventory space. A little south of the village is Lord Markham’s mansion. Having business here, we enter and cross the small foyer to his chamber. Do we really have to conduct business so far away? He reads the letter from Norbert Thrush and gives us the feather used to sign the Treaty of Pierpont, having us respond that he will come to collect his promised piece of Norbert’s collection. The guards are too difficult for us, so stealing the vase will have to wait.

Leaving the mansion, we check out the part of town in the marshes to the south. Were they running out of clever names or something? Another person with the boat schedule is named Your Conscience. At the southwest corner of the land, we find an altar that does nothing. I’m guessing this is the shrine for one of the statuettes we need to find. Exploring the swampy area, we find a very nice shield just lying on the ground. The trolls nearby are a bit of a bother, especially since they concentrate their attacks on Serena. Heading up the north road and around the mountains to the west, after fighting through some more trolls, as well as aiding all the archers fighting the trolls, we find the first of the three stone monoliths. At the end of the road is a small village, thankfully with a blacksmith, armory, and training grounds. It’s also home to the Mercenary Guild. We peek in and find some stat-boosting barrels. Going slightly deeper into it brings out the same guard enemies that we couldn’t handle in Lord Markham’s mansion, so we leave.

Being told that Wormthrax’s Cave is to the west of the Mercenary Guild, we head over there. More trolls are waiting for us along the way, but they don’t pose too much of a threat. Chasing the blue dragon around his cave, dealing some good damage when we can get in melee range, it takes a while, but we finally defeat it. Sir Charles Quixote congratulates us and promotes us to Crusaders on the spot, since he’s been tagging along. He said he would give us pointers during the battle, but never did. He will also be whom we need to seek out to become Heroes, if we follow the Path of Light. Before heading back to town, we finish wiping out the trolls west of the cave and find our eighth obelisk. With only the western bay left to explore, and not having Water Walk, we hang around until daytime, then sell off inventory and train up. Serena becomes our first Master, in Shield. Since both the stables and ship go to Erathia, and we can’t explore the water, we head back there to do some spell shopping, as well as return the Quill to Norbert.

Back in Erathia, we head to Norbert’s house and he rewards us with 2k Gold and we each receive 5k Exp. Unfortunately, there are only clerical guilds here, so Alexis can’t get Water Walk. Being in Erathia, we check out what Queen Catherine wants us to do, so enter Castle Gryphonheart. Again, why do we have to stay a mile away from the queen to do business? Her task, should we choose to accept it, is to free Loren Steel from a cave near Pierpont in the Tularean Forest and return with him within 28 days. Since we have some quests in Avlee, I want to take care of those first, so… Reload!

With the stables going to Bracada, we make a quick stop there, hoping that the Water Walk spell is for sale. It is, but Alexis can’t learn it since she hasn’t become an Expert at Water Magic. While we’re here, since Roderick has upped his Disarm Trap skill, he opens the chest by the cluster of teleporters with no problem, finding the Abbey Normal Golem Head inside, as well as a Bill of Sale listing the parts of the Golem and the areas they were sent to. There’s another head in Bracada somewhere. Now if only we could acquire the reason for getting these parts. Alexis becomes our second Master, in Identify Item. Checking out the archway near the stables, we find another chest, which contains the other Golem Head. We can see a doorway at each end of the bridge high above the ground, but can’t get inside.

With nothing else to do here, we ride the coach to Harmondale. After selling off the few items from the chests, we head to the Arena. Well, there’s a new crash. One of the enemies was a Minicore, except it was invisible and when I went to identify it, the game crashed to the desktop. Loading back up, we try again at the Arena, winning another Page battle. Since we have yet to go to Avlee, we wait for dawn and the stables take us to the Tularean Forest, saving a few days’ travel. The ship just happens to be going to Avlee today, so after a quick stop to have Alexis become an Expert at Water Magic, we set sail. Finding the tavern, we win our game of ArcoMage. The well near the northeast corner of town grants everyone +2 to Endurance. Nice. In one of the tents in the northwest corner, Steagal Snick will promote us to Warrior Mages if we sabotage that machine that I was curious about in the Red Dwarf Mines in order to keep the creatures trapped in the lower section. Interesting… Heading as far along the coast as we can to the northwest, there’s a structure shown on the minimap that would be outside of the area map. Along the way, we pass the entrance to The Hall under the Hill. Since a couple townsfolk mentioned it, we enter.

Being just a large mound inside a dome-like chamber, this must be the Faerie Mound we need to solve the secret of how to enter. Ok, so the clue is in the location description/load screen when entering. Walking around the mound, teleportation sounds can be heard at a couple spots, and the entrance appears. Entering the mound, the Faerie King greets us, promoting Roderick to Hunter and the rest to Honorary Hunters. Yay! Now Roderick can cast spells! We also receive the Faerie Pipes to return to Johann in the Tularean Forest. Unfortunately, that cost us all our food. Hearing the hissing of some monsters, we take the lift down and fight off some dragonflies, with the Queen Dragonfly dropping a Faerie Key. Arriving in a bricked area, a very, very well hidden panel reveals a keyhole. Even though it doesn’t disappear from our inventory, I’m assuming that Faerie Key is needed here. Well, that’s disappointing. All that leads to is a small chamber with a well that does nothing and a chest with some useless equipment. Having cleared out this dungeon, we leave.

Exploring the area, the dirt path through the mountains leads us into wyvern territory. Lovely, Ancient Wyverns can kill as a special ability. Fighting through the group of wyverns, at the end of the peninsula, we pray at the second of the three stone monoliths. Since we can’t get to Evanmorn Islands until we complete the Priest promotion quest, this will be in our quest log for some time to come. Heading down to the coast, the group of three small islands has a very nice Minotaur Axe just lying on the ground on one of them. Exploring more of the area, we encounter several water elementals near a bridge. Well, that’s a different route to go for the Sprite enemy design. Looks more like the Water Elementals in the Heroes games, which is a bit odd considering there are Sprites in the Heroes games. Another unreachable structure can be seen on the minimap near the southwest corner. Heading towards the structure we CAN reach, several hydras are guarding the entrance to the supposedly, according to its description, abandoned Temple of Baa. Let’s check it out.

Interesting… When you mouse over the human enemies, it says Cleric of Baa for every one of them, but when you hit it, it says the actual enemy name, be it Acolyte, Cleric, or Priest of the Moon. We find a letter from Xenofex lying on the ground in one of the rooms. Xenofex, Xenofex, Xenofex… That name sounds familiar. Taking some serious damage from all the ranged attackers in here, we leave and head back to town to sell off some inventory, and allow those few HP and SP regenerating items to do their job. On our way back, we decide to take care of those water elementals. Sheesh, ranged attackers are annoying. In the middle of the enemies is a fortress on a little island. Crossing the bridge, this is the Titans’ Stronghold. Yeah, I’m not interested in fighting Titans right now. Passing up the Stronghold, we head back to the Temple. Without Fly, I wonder if it’s possible to reach the Test of Personality on the roof.

Back in the Temple, we make our way to a room with three cell-like doors with devil workers and devil captains behind them. Good thing they have nothing but ranged attacks that can’t go through the spaces between the bars, while we can just attack through the bars with our melee weapons. Killing the High Priest of Baa, he drops the Cloak of the Sheep, which has some negatives that seem like it isn’t a good idea to wear it. Leaving the lower area for later, since I can’t find a way to get there other than dropping down from either spiral ramp, we leave and take the coach to the Tularean Forest.

Roderick becomes a Master at Perception, and Alexis becomes an Expert at Alchemy to make a bit more money from potions. We present Johann Kerrid with the Faerie Pipes and he rewards us with 1k Gold and we get 5k Exp each. Since Roderick can now cast all clerical and sorcerer spells, he needs to get the skills to do so. Ooh, that Fire Aura spell looks like a nice way to tackle the Ooze monsters. I guess it’s time to advance the game and take the King’s quest.

Entering Castle Navan, we decide to go where we aren’t supposed to and have all the guards start attacking us. There’s several stat boosting barrels in the rooms off the main entrance. Heading down the lift, I chuckled at the portrait of the rather buff bare-chested fellow with flowing locks (kinda like a brunette Fabio) hanging on the wall in one of the rooms. There’s a red glowing section of the floor, but I can’t find what activates it. Ok, exploring causes the throne room to be locked. So, reload the Autosave. We take King Parson’s quest to steal the plans to Fort Riverstride and exit. Off to Erathia.

Since there is no transport going to Erathia, we buy some food and hike to Harmondale. Upon arrival back in our homeland, a Messenger greets us at the border and tells us that Judge Grey of Erathia has died of a supposed heart attack. The Erathian ambassadors wish to speak with us at our castle, declaring a truce until a successor can be found for the judge, so we head back there. According the history our butler is keeping, we’ve now been recognized as the rightful rulers of Harmondale by Deyja and Bracada, with them both having sent their ambassadors. Of course, speaking to the ambassadors, they both suggest we choose theirs as the successor. Needing to get those plans, we wait until Monday and ride to Erathia.

Heading to Castle Gryphonheart (oh, hey, there’s a couple secret doors that open a shortcut straight to the throne room), Queen Catherine has caught wind of King Parson’s job for us and has some fake plans drawn up for us to take back. That’s handy. We then accept her request to free Loren Steel. Needing to get back to the Tularean Forest, being Wednesday, the coach takes us to Bracada, where we make a quick stop by the Red Dwarf Mines to sabotage the lift. Back in Bracada, now that it’s Saturday, the ship sails to the Tularean Forest.

With false plans in hand, we make a beeline to King Parson. As with Queen Catherine, the King presents someone who looks like the spy, Loren Steel, to take back with us. I seems Loren is slated for execution. There are two options for presenting the false plans. If you present them in a way that he figures out they’re fake, you’re all executed for a nice Game Over. Presenting them as real, we get no reward, other than an Award added to our list. Leaving the castle with the Fake Loren, wondering what happens if you bring the fake Loren to the real Loren, we head to the Tularean Caves.

Entering the cave, we fight through some wyverns and troglodytes, who are attacking each other. We pick up a letter from a Mr. Stanley to the jailkeeper about a new addition to the caves and how to access it. We found the invisible bridge. Now we need to find the trio of teleporters. All I can find is a lever. Ah, that activated three sections of a wall in a room I had already been to. I guess those are the teleporters? Not much of a trap, as the two supposed traps simply send us to locations in the cave we’ve already been to. We find a letter that Loren was apparently carrying inside a chest, which states that if the war continues, Archibald’s position will only strengthen. Well, we got to a jail cell, but it’s locked. Hmm, I think I fully mapped out the cave and there was one chest on a ledge I couldn’t reach. If the key is in that, I guess I won’t be having the two Lorens meet. Unable to find any way to access that chest or open the cell, we leave.

With the ship sailing to Avlee today, we travel there to complete the Warrior Mage promotion quest. Returning to Steagal Snick’s house, he rewards us with 7500 Gold and promotes everyone to honorary status. We receive 15k Exp each, and he would promote Archers that chose the dark path to Snipers, if we had any in our party. While in Avlee, Roderick becomes a Master at Identify Monster. Our brief stay complete, we set sail for Erathia.

Back in Erathia, we head to Queen Catharine. Telling her about delivering the fake plans, we get 5k gold deposited in our account at the bank, as well as receiving 5k exp each. As with King Parson, if we choose the present fake Loren as a fake, we get executed, this time getting our heads lopped off. Presenting him as real, she thanks us and offers him a job in the Royal Diplomatic Corps. I just noticed that the Returned Faerie Pipes to Johann Kerrid award only shows up in Zoltan’s list. Since we’re here, we head into Fort Riverstride. One of the rooms has a portrait that says “Vault” on mouse-over, but we can’t open it. I’m guessing we would have been able to if we didn’t have the fake plans. With only a bunch of useless equipment and some gold in the many cabinets, we leave, heading back to town and then sail to Tatalia.

Arriving in Tatalia, Zoltan becomes a Master at Repair Item. We then head back to Lord Markham’s manor to try to steal the vase. Utilizing the Regeneration spell, the guards give us some trouble, but we’re able to defeat them (it helped having a few of them get stuck behind a treasure chest, unwilling to attack us) and successfully steal the vase. Having a Master item repairer came in handy. We also picked up some nice equipment from the chests and cabinets. As with Castle Navan, having the guards turn on us causes the door to Lord Markham to become locked. Oh, well. We don’t have any other business to do with him right now, anyway. Leaving the mansion and walking across the water to a small island in the western bay, we find a chest containing the right arm of the Golem. Selling off excess equipment at the armory and blacksmith on the island, we enter the Tidewater Caverns in search of a map.

Entering the caverns, we run into some very weak enemies in thieves, skeletons, and specters. In a chest in a hidden room in the ship portion of this area, we find the Map to Evenmorn Island. With this place cleared out, we exit and sell off our loot. Since we’re in the neighborhood, we head back to the Mercenaries’ Guild. The Masters of the Sword are some tough enemies, but being able to draw them into the entryway while we head into one of the rooms on either side makes them easily manageable, as they won’t attack through the windows while we can just hack away at them through the windows We're also able to trap them between some crates and a treasure chest in one of the rooms as they keep trying to walk into the crate and we can just step back and take them out with our bows. They generally drop some very nice equipment. Inside a chest, we find a Heart of the Wood. Being worth 0 Gold, this leads me to believe it’s important. With nothing left to do here, we sail back to Erathia.

In Erathia, we sell off a bunch of reagents, rings, and gems, and then head into the sewers to complete the Rogue promotion quest. Thankfully, the bridge to William Lasker is still intact. He gives us 5k gold for bringing him the vase and we each get 15k exp. He then will promote us to Spy if we choose the Light path. With that done, we head to the stables and take a ride to Deyja to knock out another quest.

We make our way to the northwestern village and return to Daedalus with the map. He rewards us with 5k gold and promotes us to Priests. Serena gets 30k exp and everyone else gets 15k exp. That just leaves Alexis in his/her base class. Daedalus then becomes the promoter to Priest of Dark. Even though he says we can keep the map, it disappears from our inventory. Since we passed on it earlier and still haven’t gotten any quests to check it out, we head into the Hall of the Pit.

Other than the obsidian gargoyles that are immune to physical damage and can paralyze, the enemies here aren’t tough at all. I’m not sure what the two stone pedestals in the rooms off the starting chamber are for. Ok, so we got to a large door that says, “Enter the Pit” but I can’t activate it. Either I need something to enter the Pit or it’s a bug, so with nothing to do, we leave. Trying to find the Judge, we eventually enter the tavern and he’s waiting for us. It would be nice if it had some option other than “I choose you.” Not choosing him, we take our leave.

Realizing that we should get a reward from King Parson for taking the Fake Loren to Queen Catherine, we head to the Tularean Forest. Speaking to the king, he rewards us with 5k gold in the bank and we each receive 5k exp. Now that we have Water Walk, we can make it to the Oldest Tree in the Forest on the island to the southeast. After mowing down the trees that shoot fireballs, we approach the docile tree with a face on it. Ah, so that’s what the Heart of the Wood is for, as it tells us that it was stolen by “The Walkers”. Speaking to it again, it starts going on about its lineage, mentioning Leaf-point from World of Xeen (I think it’s from WoX). Hmm, it doesn’t show up in our Quest Log, and he won’t accept it. Do we have to leave the area and return? Oh, I guess I could have crossed the bridge. I just didn’t notice the stairs leading up on the exterior of the structure. Well, if we have to leave and return, the ship is sailing to the Bracada Desert, so we head there to choose the successor.

We never did check out the School of Sorcery near the docks, so we decide to head in. Ok, so the door directly in front of the exit simply damages whoever tries to open it. Speaking to Eric Swarrel at the information desk, we can purchase a 6-month membership for 5k gold. We’ll pass. To his right is the room of Thomas Grey, who will promote us to Wizards if we build a golem. All we’re missing is the left arm. Checking out the Water Guild on the off chance it has Town Portal, it does, so we buy it for the future. Needing that last golem part, we make our way back to Avlee to find the chest with it. Hiking to Erathia, then having about an hour and a half to make it to the boat, we sprint there and sail to Avlee.

The chest must be on an island in the bay. The northeast island just has a few grandmaster tutors. Fighting through a bunch of annoying water elementals, the small island to the southwest has our ninth obelisk. The only chest that gives Roderick any trouble has the final piece of the Golem, the left arm. On a small island to the south, protected by more elementals, we find a small structure that holds another of the altars that must be where we deposit one of the statuettes we’ll eventually find.

With all the golem parts in hand, we head back to Bracada by way of Erathia. Heading to the School of Sorcery (man, I hate these teleporters), we now have to assemble the golem to get it animated. Ok, how exactly do you assemble it? The parts are all sitting horizontally, except for the head, and I’m not seeing any way to rotate them. While fooling around in here, I found a switch in the desk by Eric Swarrel that opens the door that damages whoever tries to open it. We’re not allowed in here, though. Ah, so there’s an NPC (that was hidden since I have two NPCs that boost the gold found) that assembles it for us. Everyone is promoted to Wizards, or honorary ones, which just leaves the Druid promotion. We’re then told to take the animated golem back to our castle and leave him there to defend it. Thomas Grey will then promote us to Archmage if we choose the Light Path. Oh, shoot, I never went to the tavern to choose the Judge’s successor. We make it to the Tavern and choose Judge Fairweather. Thankfully, it’s Saturday, so the Stables go to Harmondale.

Back in Harmondale, we return to the castle and pick up a quest that just says “O”. I thought I saw something about this in the Readme file. Looking it up, the readme file just says it doesn’t affect gameplay. It also says that invisible monsters won’t appear in The Arena, so unless the patch I downloaded undid that fix, that’s wrong. I should have read through that file since I didn’t notice that right clicking on buildings on the map shows what they are. Anyway…

We now have a Gold Golem wandering around the main hall of our castle. We then take a little hike to install the new arbiter. After watching a short cutscene of King Parsen, Queen Catharine, and the newly appointed Judge Fairweather divvying up the land, the Judge tells us that the leader of the Wizards wants to speak with us in Celeste, reachable via the Bracada teleporters. According to the History, Harmondale is now under Erathian control. It also seems that we won’t be able to travel through Deyja with ease anymore. Interesting: the mouse-over text, marbling on the main screen, outlines of the active spell icons, and the backpack background all changed to blue.

Still having one promotion quest left, we head to Tatalia and kill a couple days waiting for the ship to sail to Evenmorn Island, which is now available to us, having completed the Priest promotion quest. While in Tatalia, Serena becomes a Master at the Mace. We also finish looting Lord Markham’s Manor and the Mercenary Guild. Sunday has arrived, and it’s off to a new area.

Upon our arrival, we’re immediately attacked by several skeletons. Oh, no. With the tavern near the docks, we win our game of ArcoMage. Nine down, four to go. Aw, it takes a Personality of 50 to become a Master Merchant. About in the center of the starting island is the Grand Temple of the Moon, with a Test of Speed next to it, which no one wins. On the small island to the southwest is an altar that grants a permanent +10 to both Speed and Accuracy to everyone. Awesome! Back on the main island, we cross the bridge and see a group of gargoyles and specters fighting. Not wanting to take sides, we start attacking all of them. In the middle of the fracas is the Grand Temple of the Sun. We have no business in either Temple, so we ignore them for now. Two islands down the chain of islands is the reason we came here, as we pray at the third monolith to almost complete the Druid promotion quest. On the final island of the chain, we find our tenth obelisk. Floating in the middle of the ring of islands is a Water Guild. Without anything else to do here, we fully map out the area and then take the boat to the Tularean Forest, which just happens to be where we need to go to finish the Druid promotion.

Back in the Forest, we head over to Anthony Green’s tent to be promoted to Honorary Druids, finishing off all the promotion quests. He then becomes the promoter to Arch Druid if we choose… So it appears we’ve chosen the Path of Light. I guess whom you choose as Judge Grey’s successor determines which path you take. For the Arch Druid promotion, all we need to do is find King Zokarr IV’s remains in the tunnels between Stone City and Nighon, place them in his coffin, and return here. Doesn’t seem difficult at all since we’ve already cleared out that area.

Wanting to get dual wield with a sword for Zoltan, we head to Deyja. Oh, no, the hobgoblins are attacking. I’m so scared. With that done, we start the nearly 2-week long hike to the Barrow Downs. Arriving in the Downs, everything has respawned, so it looks like it’s going to be simply annoying to get around the barrows. Oh, I guess I only need three more ArcoMage wins, as I didn’t record both taverns here in my notes. While in Stone City, Roderick masters the axe. Unfortunately, the stat barrels don’t respawn. Ah, the outdoors have respawned, but not the indoors, as the troglodytes are not back yet. Making our way quite a ways further than we did in our brief foray into the Nighon Tunnels, we find Zokarr’s Skull in a small chamber. With the Skull in hand and all the gogs killed, we head back to Stone City. Gotta love the dwarves that just wander around in one of the corners that has a fireball trap and basically commit suicide. Hmm, you can’t sell Zokarr’s Axe.

Heading to the barrows, the cauldron has respawned, yielding another permanent +2 to Earth Resistance for one character. I can waste inventory space and start recollecting Golem parts. Navigating through the barrows, which have not respawned, we get to Zokarr’s Tomb. The only thing in here that looks like a possibility is a stone sarcophagus-looking thing. Clicking on it gives the success sound and everyone’s portrait reacts. The Skull disappeared from our inventory, but unfortunately, the two-handed axe did not. Now I just have to remember to stop by Anthony Green’s tent the next time we’re in the Tularean Forest. With nothing else to do here, we head back to Stone City to travel to Nighon.

Exiting the Tunnels towards Nighon, we find ourselves in Thunderfist Mountain and are immediately attacked by some Minotaurs. Lovely. While not too difficult, we then run into some annoying eye enemies that can inflict sleep. Great, Evil Eyes can inflict Insanity, as can Minotaur Headsmen. Plus, Minotaur Lords can kill. I think I’ll wait until Serena can cast Cure Insanity before tackling this place. So, it’s back to Stone City and eventually to Bracada.

Back in Bracada, and consulting some online resources because I don’t feel like searching back through this, we start picking up the final promotion quests. The first stop is back at the School of Sorcery for the Archmage quest from Thomas Grey. We’ll need to retrieve the Divine Intervention spell, last known to be in the Breeding Zone in the Pit. I guess we needed this quest to access the The Pit? Next is the Champion quest from Leda Rowan due north of the School on the ledge. Well, this seems like it’ll be more annoying than anything since we’ll have to win five Knight level Arena battles. Dropping down to the little cluster of houses, we pick up the Ranger Lord quest from Lysander Sweet, needing to return the Heart of the Wood, which we already have. With that out of the way, we head to the teleporter cluster to enter Celeste.

Entering Celeste… Yay, we can fall to our death by walking off the path. Why would anyone actually design a floating city that way (or if they made it float, not make it nearly impossible to stumble to your death)? Finding the Tavern, we win our game of ArcoMage. Passing on the Walls of Mist, which we later find out a quest here is required to become a Master at Light Magic, we come to the home of Rebecca Devine, who will promote us to Priests of Light. After starting into another *checks my Dr. Demento 20th Anniversary Collection for the correct spelling* “Ti Kwan Leep/Boot to the Head” reference, she tells us that we need to purify the Altar of Darkness (referred to as the Altar of Evil in the Quest Log) in the Church of the Moon on Evenmorn Island so the Church of the Sun will be able to win the battle between the two churches. Nestled in amongst some Hostels, which have nothing to do in them, we come across our eleventh obelisk. Inside the healer is the entrance to the Temple of Light. Entering this gives me a serious end game vibe to it, so we only look around for a little bit and leave.

We make our way to Castle Lambent and receive an audience with Gavin Magnus. Oooooookay, so the Throne Room is similar to a store as we arrive before 6 am and can’t enter. Before we can discuss any business, we’ll need to pass the test of the Wizards’ Path, which involves traversing the Walls of Mist without killing any creature therein, after which we’ll be granted membership in the Guild of Light. Yeah, a short trip in tells me that not being able to kill any creatures means this will be a job for later.

Leaving Celeste and taking the coach to Erathia, we stop by the Quixote residence for the Hero promotion quest. We’ll need to rescue Alice Hargreaves from the tower of the evil Bill Gates, I mean, William Setag, which is located in the Deyja Moors. A quick stop back in the sewers and we get the Spy quest, needing to basically sabotage the gate of Watchtower 6, also in Deyja Moors, which will cause the gate to not close, making it unable to defend against the next attack by the necromancers. Thinking Invisibility might be useful in the Walls of Mist, we take the boat to Avlee so Alexis can master Air Magic.

Picking up some spells in preparation for the future, and putting a nice dent in our Gold reserves, Alexis masters Air Magic and we can now fly and become invisible. While we’re here, we train up a couple levels and Serena masters Mind Magic to be able to cure insanity. Since the coach is going to Deyja, we head there to take care of three quests.

In Deyja, we make the short trip west from the stables to Setag’s Tower. Immediately inside, a few Initiates of the Sword attack us. Taking the rather long lift up to the next level, we find William surrounded by rats that are attacking him. With Alexis’ new toy, Implosion, we’re able to kill William and obtain his Tower Key. A Master of the Sword, after putting up a tough fight, drops a very nice Villain’s Blade. Using the key on the wall that says it’s a door, we free Alice and she joins our NPCs. Having cleared out this rather small tower, we head further west and enter the Watchtower.

Taking out the decent sized group of Shades and Necromancers on the ground floor, we take the lift down and have Liches to deal with on either side of the small cubby we land in. Just great. I hate Liches. Well, the only thing Identify Monster says they can do is cast Toxic Cloud, so maybe they aren’t nearly as tough as Liches in all the previous games. Hmm, I guess we never went around the exterior during our previous visits to this area to find the lower entrance. Nice, going up the next lift puts us in the center of a large chamber with a handful of Liches on the platforms across a large gap. Luckily, there’s a switch opposite the lift switch that extends a bridge and we sprint across that and down some stairs and into the midst of a relatively safer small group of Clay Elementals. Taking them out, and the couple Liches that were on this side up above, we see a switch that lowers something on a long chain. Being a safe distance from the other sides now, we let Regeneration do its job before tackling more of this area. Ah, so the same switch extends all four bridges. Clearing out the four areas, the only place left is at the base of this large area. Dropping down to clear out the remaining enemies, it seems we’re stuck. There’s one area where the danger level is not green, so we start hunting around for a secret door and eventually find one. Finishing off the enemies in this corridor, there’s nothing left in here, so that must have been the weight we needed to drop. With this place seemingly cleared, we leave. Not having a “Let’s get out of here!” exclaimed at the exit makes me confident we performed our task.

Trekking across the area, we venture back into the Hall of the Pit. And this time, clicking on the door actually allows us to enter The Pit. The Speaker of the Dead enemy is one tough cookie. This place is extremely annoying with all the Necromancers and Liches shooting at us, and the magma to damage us if we leave the paths. We do make it to the tavern and win a game of ArcoMage. The Queen of the Dead keeps us from going deeper into this place, but we do spot a staircase going down to The Breeding Zone, which is where the Divine Intervention spell book is thought to be.

After clearing out the entrance of the fire elementals, the only thing to do is drop down. Doing so, we land in the middle of several Behemoths. We dash for the tunnel on one end of the landing zone, and the behemoths are too big to follow, making them easy pickings with our bows. Pushing every button we come across, we find a little room with a chest containing the Divine Intervention spell book. One fountain in a corner of a room says, “Take a drink” but does nothing. Ok, why are we not getting experience from killing these Behemoths? Is it because we’re carrying the Divine Intervention book? Well, since we aren’t getting experience, there’s absolutely no reason for killing anything, so we leave the Pit.

Just in case we can’t gain experience while carrying around the book, we start heading back to Bracada Desert. The coach in Deyja is going to Erathia, so we head there. Stopping by Castle Gryphonheart, we test out Alexis’ new Invisibility spell and we’re able to sneak around the castle. We find the painting of Archibald in the northwest tower. Now to find the painting of Roland. Well, that’s dumb. That still triggered all the guards to attack even after re-entering the safe zone. I don’t feel like fighting all these guards, so… reload! Testing out the experience gain, we take out one of the Raiders guarding the town, and we do get experience for it. Hmm… Do you just not get any experience in the Breeding Grounds? Since we do get experience, let’s pick up the remaining promotion quests in Harmondale. We wait until the stables open and hitch a ride back home.

Once we arrive in Harmondale, a Messenger greets us with a message from a Niles Stantley, one of Malwick’s associates. So, I guess it’s time to repay him for that wand he gave us back on Emerald Isle that we never used. We have two weeks to speak with him in the Mercenary Guild, or else he promises dire consequences to befall our little town. Before heading there, we stop by Lawrence Mark’s residence to get the Master Archer quest. We’ll just need to retrieve an enchanted bow from the Titan Stronghold in Avlee. Stopping by the town hall to see what the bounty is, it’s a Guardian of Flame. Even though we just killed a bunch of them earlier this month, because we didn’t visit here before doing so, it doesn’t count. Grr!!! Stopping by Bartholomew Hume’s place in the little village south of Harmondale, we accept the final promotion quest, that of Master. We just need to kill the High Priest of the Order of Baa, which I believe we already did, as evidenced by us having the Cloak of the Sheep. Speaking to him again, he promotes everyone to Honorary Masters and gives us 7500 Gold. We all receive a nice 40k exp for it, too. Since we’re suddenly on a tight schedule, we trek to Erathia on our way to Tatalia.

Since we’re in Erathia, we can complete a couple promotion quests. Returning to Sir Quixote with Alice, we complete the Hero quest, making Zoltan the first to achieve his final class. We then stop by the Sewers and visit William Lasker to be promoted to Honorary Spies. He gives us 15k gold for our troubles. Now we can head to Tatalia. Niles Stantley greets us at the entrance to the Mercenary Guild, and tasks us with recovering a tapestry in Castle Lambent in Celeste that he claims had been taken during an attack on Watchtower 3 years ago. We have one month to retrieve it, or *Nino Rota music starts playing* we’ll find the head of our prized racehorse in our… er, some goblins and swordsmen just might find their way to Harmondale. You know, if all that happens is Harmondale gets attacked by goblins and swordsmen, I think we can handle them. Hey, Alice Hargreaves is still tagging along. Shouldn’t she have left us in Erathia?

Well, we have to go to Celeste, so time to finish off another quest in Bracada. Man, Town Portal would be useful (dang Minotaurs). Taking the coach back to Erathia, we then head south to Bracada. Stopping by the School of Sorcery and giving Thomas Grey the Divine Intervention book, he rewards us with 10k Gold and Archmage status. He then magically copies the book and returns it to us. You’d think that little deed would grant us access to the rest of the school, but no. With that accomplished, we head back to Celeste.

Thinking that stealing the tapestry will lock us out of being able to meet with Gavin, we try the Walls of Mist, this time armed with Invisibility. While Invisibility didn’t last for the entire trip, there were enough spots where we weren’t being attacked to remain healed up to complete the trial. The biggest annoyance was the button and lever puzzle, since there are zero clues as to how to solve it that I could find. We return to Gavin and are now allowed to speak to the advisors. We’re also rewarded with 50k exp each. Saving before sneaking around the castle, doing so turns all the guards against us (even though we were invisible), and I really don’t feel like dealing with them. So, we’re just going to take our chances with our town being attacked. Heading back to the four hostels by the obelisk, we run into some old faces from a previous game, three of which have tasks for us to undertake, and the fourth to come after completing the previous three. Sir Caneghem tasks us with stealing soul jars from the Necromancers’ Guild Castle. It’s nice to have to look at the Quest Log to find out where this Castle is. Resurectra requires us to return with the two halves of a key to some important place of the Necromancers. Each half is located in the Temples of Light and Dark. So, maybe the Temple of Light here in Celeste isn’t the end game location, after all. Finally, Crag Hack wants us to investigate deaths and disappearances in Tatalia that he thinks is the work of a vampire. With a new laundry list of quests to perform, we leave Celeste, but not before training up, which should make that month deadline pass. Yeah, those 7 or 8 levels per character took over 2 months, so let’s check out Harmondale.

Back home, the villagers are being attacked by guards and hobgoblins. It seems they’ve all holed up inside their homes and have locked the doors during the attack. Clearing out the town, the doors are still all locked, so we head into our castle. In addition to being infested by more of these pests, we now have shops in the main hall and quite a bit more of the castle has opened up. With the castle cleared out of invaders, everyone in town feels safe enough to reopen all the buildings. Now that Serena can cure insanity, we try again to make it to Nighon so Alexis can master Water Magic and cast Town Portal.

Making our way through the Evil Eyes, which dropped a couple very nice rings, the Minotaur Lords force us to what turns out to be the exit to Mount Nighon. South of the entrance to Thunderfist Mountain is a small town. Like Deyja, the shops are open throughout the night. A fountain here grants +2 to Personality. Wow, food here is expensive, but you do get a LOT of it. We knock out what I think is our 13th and final game of ArcoMage. Another well here gives everyone 2 Skill Points. I wasn’t expecting that. Dang it, Learning Master requires 50 Intellect. But I do have enough equipment to boost everyone’s to 50 that can become Master. In the same house as the Water Magic master tutor (yay! Town Portal!), Maxim Dusk asks us to find the remains of his late brother that were lost in transit so he can lay them to rest. Now we just need to find the Maze. And with that, I’ve hit the 100 hr mark.

We slowly and methodically start making our way through the groups of hydras by the lake in the southeast corner in search of the Maze. With no luck there, we head back to the town. Just great, the warlocks on the path near the town were attacking us, so we fought back, which made all the warlocks in town turn on us. Circling around the mountain to the southwest corner, we pray at an altar for a permanent +10 to both Personality and Intellect. Very nice. Tackling the desert area in the north, other than a few nice drops and a couple Genie Lamps, this area is mostly just annoying with all the hydras. The northwest part of this section does have The Maze, which is where Haldar’s Remains should be.

Unsurprisingly, we find minotaurs in this place, along with warlocks and hydras. The nice thing about this place is there are some long straightaways where you can walk backward and let fly your arrows, taking down the minotaurs without them getting into melee range. Aaaaand, I just noticed we lost the 400,000 Gold we had in the Bank! In a chamber in the back of this place, we find the first of the three statuettes for the quest that’s been growing mold in our log. Since we lost a huge chunk of gold, we really need Serena to become a Master Merchant. Unfortunately, Town Portal can’t send us to Evenmorn Island, or Tatalia (Grrrrr), so we portal to Erathia. Since Zoltan is now a Hero, he becomes a Spirit Magic Master.

Since it’s Saturday and the ship to Evenmorn Island only leaves on Sunday, there’s no reason to make the trip shorter, so we hike to Tatalia. Being in Tatalia with time to kill, Serena and Roderick become masters at Body Magic. We then venture back into the Wine Cellar to try to take care of Crag Hack’s quest. Throwing every buff we have available on the party, we get a Queen of the Dead trapped behind one of the wine racks, then dart into melee range, have everyone attack, then dart out of range. A handful of these attacks and she goes down. The Speakers of the Dead aren’t nearly as deadly as before, and the vampires are easily dispatched. Since we didn’t find any Quest Items, I’m guessing we just had to clear this place out of monsters. With nothing else to do here except kill three days, we just stand on the docks and wait it out.

Sunday has arrived and we sail to Evenmorn Island (we really need Lloyd’s Beacon, if it exists in this game). The monsters have respawned to give us a bit of cash. Serena becomes a Merchant Master, and since we were holding onto all our equipment to sell, we don’t have any space to tackle the Temples, so we Town Portal back to Erathia to sell off our excess equipment. We should also see if we did indeed complete the ArcoMage quest, so we head to Gina Barnes’ house, and we have! We’re rewarded with a handsome prize of 100k Gold, receive 50k exp each, and the chest outside her house has been stocked with some very nice equipment. Too bad the good stuff is all race-specific and therefore almost all unusable. And they can’t be sold, so we’re stuck with them either in our inventory or needing to find a chest to stash them in. I guess we’ll portal to our castle and put the unsellable equipment in one of the chests there.

Portaling to the Tularean Forest to take care of a couple quests, we head to Anthony Green’s tent to have the Ceremony of Ascension performed and become Honorary Arch Druids. We then fly over to the Oldest Tree and finally get the quest to retrieve the Heart of the Forest. Backing away from it and re-approaching, we receive 2500 exp each for returning the Heart that we had back when we first conversed with it. Since it’s now after 6pm, and almost all the promotion quests we just need to return to the giver to finish are in locations we can’t Town Portal to, we portal to Nighon to finish off the Maze.

Still having issues with Minotaur Lords, since Protection from Magic doesn’t protect against Special on Contact (or whatever the terminology is), this place is slow going. Fortunately, they’re too tall to exit one room, so we can just pick them off at distance there. That room happens to have the chest containing Haldar’s Remains. With our bags full, we leave the Maze to sell everything off and complete Mazim Dusk’s quest. Returning with his brother’s remains, he rewards us with 35k Gold and we receive 50k Exp each. He then vows to attempt to bring his brother back as a Lich. Um… Yay? Now with inventory space, we head back to the Maze to clear it, as well as maybe find the other statuettes. Well, that was convenient. In the room with the altar and two crosses, the minotaurs got stuck on top of the altar allowing us to just stand back and shoot them to death. The two fountains on either side did nothing that I could tell, yet made all the indications that they did something.

With the Maze fully cleared, we leave and hunt for the obelisk in this area. We haven’t explored the very northwest corner, so flying up to the top of the mountains and fighting off a group of rocs, we find our twelfth obelisk. That just leaves the mountain in the southwest that we can’t fly to the top of. Wizard Eye is showing quite a few items lying about up there. Now if there was only a way to reach them. It’s Sunday, but we still have a few hours to kill before the Harmondale stables open, so we decide to clear out Thunderfist Mountain. Hmm, suddenly I can’t cast anything. Neither the C nor the Cast Spell buttons do anything. A glitch? I had to close out of the game and restart.

In the Mountain, we find the entrance to the Tunnels to Eeofol, but since we need to get cracking on the quest to win 5 Arena battles, we turn right back around. Making our way to a library of sorts, we come across a case of soul jars. Hmm… I thought that was supposed to be in a castle in The Pit. With this area cleared, we leave, portal back to Harmondale, and win Knight Arena battle #1. It took three days to return from the Arena. Why didn’t everyone’s health get restored? Our buffs went away. The Tularean Forest stables are going to Avlee today, so we portal there.

It’s time to take on some Titans. So you can’t get into melee combat with them because they’re so tall. I guess those legs that touch the ground can’t be attacked? Well, that’s nice of that trio of Titans to just stand at the end of the corridor right at the edge of our bows’ range and not shoot back. We got our first Relic out of it: the crossbow Ania Selving, with its +150 Acy. Oh, lovely, there’s a dragon in here, too! In a chest, we find another Relic, Twilight, which I think can only be equipped if we chose the Dark Path, along with some other nice equipment. And the red dragon drops a nifty Phynaxian Shield of Arms, which somewhat offsets that Ania Selving. Making our way around this place with relative ease, we find the [not-so] Perfect Bow in a treasure chest in the only room not guarded by dragons. Being Sunday, and with all of our bags full, we leave and portal back to Harmondale.

A quick stop by the Mark Manor and we’re promoted to Honorary Master Archers. With a misplaced “the”, he fixes up the Bow and gives it back. We then head to the stables and go back to the Arena and win our 2nd Knight battle. With that done, we head back to Avlee to clear out the Titans’ Stronghold for all the nice item drops. Hmm… There’s a monster showing inside the walls that we can’t get to. I wonder if this is a Q-like enemy. Time to hunt for a secret door. Interesting, at x: 2160 y: -2671, there’s an invisible wall that sticks out that’s about the size of a column to get around, which is close enough to the monster in the wall to turn our danger indicators red. It actually blocks the entire area, making it impossible to pass between the easternmost column and the wall. So, there isn’t a secret room, and the monster just somehow went through the wall and ended up stuck inside the walls. When we left the Stronghold and re-entered, what turns out to be a Green Dragon, returned to its home location, which is in one of the rooms. Killing that last straggler and fully looting this place, being Sunday, we portal back to Harmondale to knock out arena win #3.

We might as well see about that case of soul jars in our quest log, so we portal to The Pit. Exploring a bit more of this place, we come across what I’m assuming are the hostels where the quest givers would be if we chose the Dark Path. Battling our way through extremely annoying Queens of the Dead and Lich Kings, we find our 13th obelisk. I’m guessing the 14th and final one will be in Eeofol. The obelisk is right next to the Temple of Dark, which is the only place we've come across that's only open between 1pm and midnight. Needing to find an Altar Piece in the Temple, we venture inside.

After getting surrounded by Acolytes and Clerics of the Moon, which are merely annoying with their ranged attack, we start wiping the walls with the vampires. I do like the secret path in the fountain. So, we’re at the altar, and there is no Altar Piece. We fully mapped out the place and can’t find anything. There is also a dead end on the path hidden by the fountain that has a section we can’t get to. Hmm… Hunting around the altar, it turns out there’s a button on the bottom of it that’s really hard to spot. It moves the altar forward to reveal a chest with the Altar Piece. Ah, that section we couldn’t get to is actually the entrance. It’s just that it being directly overhead makes the map look like there’s another section behind the wall. Leaving behind the nearly worthless items in the cabinets, we leave this place.

Back into the major annoyance that is The Pit. Since we get much worse prices for selling items here, we portal to Harmondale to sell off a ton of inventory. Ha! The traitor Hairbaugh has respawned by the Stone Skin pedestal. Might as well kill him again. Which means everything else has respawned out here. Unfortunately, the stat-boosting altar doesn’t reactivate. But the Horseshoes did. Yay! Free Skill Points! It’s time to finish off the Evenmorn Island promotion quest, so we portal to Erathia and take a ride to Tatalia to catch to boat to the Islands.

Taking advantage of the few pedestals before heading into the Temple of the Moon, a chest behind a secret door holds the Eagle Statuette. Two down, one to go. So we fell into a jail cell and behind a hidden panel is what seems like an infinite supply of Telekinesis spell scrolls. I think it’s hinting at something. We open the cell thanks to using one of the Telekinesis scrolls and, finding our way to the altar, we touch it to purify it. Cleaning this place out, we leave and check out the Temple of the Sun. Hmm, I guess they didn’t get the memo that we’re supposedly on their side as they’re attacking us. A chest in a room off the foyer holds the Knight Statuette. Now we just have to place them on the altars. Fully clearing this place out, we leave and portal back to Harmondale to sell off our loot. Since the stores are closed right now, we portal to Celeste to finish off a couple quests. Back in Celeste, we head to House Devine. Rebecca promotes us to Priests of Light and rewards us with 10k Gold. That just leaves the Hunter and Champion promotion quests to finish. With everything sold off, we portal to The Pit to finally explore the castle.

Entering Castle Gloaming, we’re immediately attacked by some Necromancers and Speakers of the Dead. The Elder Vampires can be annoying if they pull off their SP drain attack. Climbing one of the interior towers, we can’t cross to the other one, even though it looks like we should be able to easily jump over the short ledge and cross the stonework that connects the two. Rather quickly, we come across a chest that holds a case of soul jars. Oh, yay, a trio of boats that teleport around the castle. And super yay for all the lava. We’re all worn out and it’s now Sunday, so we portal to Harmondale, sell off our loot and win Arena battle #4. Back to Castle Gloaming, and, unsurprisingly, the Throne Room is locked. So, we finish looting the place and zoom to the Tularean Forest, since the ship there is heading to Bracada. While we’re here, Serena becomes our first Grandmaster, in Spirit Magic, and we flesh out Alexis’ spell book a bit.

Back in Bracada for the first time in a while, we visit Lysander Sweet and are promoted to Ranger Lords. We also see a few tutors while we’re here. While I’d like to place the statuette on the altar, the altar is way out of the way and time is tight to be able to make it to the Arena, so we portal back to Harmondale to win the needed 5th Arena battle. With all the stores closed, we portal around, with Roderick becoming an Expert in all seven schools of magic available to him, finishing in Erathia, where the boat is sailing to Tatalia.

Arriving in Tatalia, we head to the southwest corner to place the Eagle Statuette. Since we haven’t trained in a while, and we’re low on Skill Points to really start getting all the Grandmaster levels, we portal to Celeste. Now with a couple Light Magic grandmasters (man, are those Light spells expensive) in our party, we portal to the Tularean Forest to sail to Avlee. Serena is now a Grandmaster at Body Magic (yay, protection from Death attacks!). We then visit the altar to place the Knight Statuette. Waiting for Monday to roll around, we portal to the Tularean Forest to take the ship to Bracada and complete the final promotion quest and place the remaining statuette. Stopping off at Rowan’s House, Leda promotes us to Honorary Champions, completing all the promotion quests. Now that we have Fly, we can reach those doors on that bridge way above the stables. The Air Magic Grandmaster makes sense being up here, but the Merchant Grandmaster? I guess he doesn’t want just anyone learning the extreme intricacies of haggling? Flying (because it makes moving around this map so much easier) to the northwest corner, we place the final statuette. With nothing left to do here, we teleport back to the Tularean Forest to complete the statuette quest. Returning to Thom Lumbra, he rewards us with 50k Gold and we all receive 50k exp. That just leaves the painting and advisors’ quests. We never did explore Clanker’s Lab here, so might as well see what’s in there.

The golems are annoying in that they can break any piece of equipment (so there is a point to having Grandmaster Repair Item as Master can’t repair Relics). Near the room with a ton or reagents, of which we only take the most valuable ones as well as the Black Potions, is a cell with some strange device that just says “Nothing here” when I click on it. My best guess is this is for a quest that we would have gotten if we had chosen the Dark Path. Interesting, we jumped down the hole in the floor and it opened a couple secret little chambers. The spear Relic Gibbet is in one of the chests in these hidden chambers. We’re definitely going to have to come back and finish looting this place. Bouncing back and forth between Celeste and the Tularean Forest, we finish looting everything but the near worthless reagents and return to Celeste to get the other Altar Piece from the Temple of Light.

Entering with a purpose this time, not much is found in here: just a few piles of gold, some nearly worthless items, and a Torn Page of a journal. We arrive at a circular pit with a raised four-pointed star on the floor. Above this pit are three sets of tiles we can raise and lower which seem to line up with what that Torn Page states. Setting the tiles per the Page, we investigate the four-pointed star, which says “Altar” on mouse over. This opens a secret room with a chest containing the Altar Piece, some gold, and a handful of equipment to sell. It’s time to finish off the advisors’ quests.

Returning to Crag Hack’s hostel to complete his quest, we receive 20k Gold, 50k exp each and a new History entry. Crossing the street to Resurectra’s hostel, she reforms the key and we receive another 50k exp each and another new History entry. Next stop is Sir Caneghem and we receive another 50k exp each for bringing the soul jars (for as cautious as he was about them, you’d think we’d give him both cases of jars) and yet another History entry. July 15, 1170 turns out to be quite the eventful day in the history of Erathia. With those taken care of, we pay Robert the Wise another visit. He tasks us with taking the command cube (I’m assuming this is the black cube seen in the intro movie) from Tolberti, one of the advisors of Archibald in The Pit, by any means necessary and return.

Since it doesn’t look like we have any more business in Castle Gryphonheart, we try again to get the other two paintings. Casting invisibility and leaving all the treasure alone, we nab the paintings of Archibald and Roland, drink from all the stat boosting barrels and leave. And this time the guards didn’t turn on us. The ship is sailing for Tatalia today, so we head there to finish off the last non-advisor quest (well, except for that null quest). Returning to Visconti, he rewards us with 50k gold and we receive 50k exp each. Now it’s back to The Pit to assassinate Tolberti.

Back in The Pit, two of the hostels have changed: one is locked, and the other is now the entrance to The Small House. Entering The Small House, we see a figure walking around. Right-clicking on it reveals it to be Tolberti, who is packing heat. Oh, lovely, his pistol eradicates. Well, Grandmaster Protection from Magic is supposed to protect against Eradication, so let’s try that. His Power Cure strings out the battle a bit, but with Eradication removed from the equation, this becomes an easy battle. Looting his dead body, we receive his Control Cube and Blaster. With that taken care of, we teleport back to Celeste.

Returning to Robert, we receive a whopping 250k exp each. He then tells us to visit Resurectra, who is with Gavin Magnus in the Castle Lambent throne room, to receive our next mission. The new History entry suggests we’ll be revisiting Clanker’s Laboratory, as Archibald has been spotted there after leaving Castle Gloaming in The Pit. Heading to Castle Lambent, Resurectra is now the Ancient Weapon Grandmaster. Now we just need the skill and the 2 other tutors. She also tells of the Kreegan and that we need to infiltrate their base and kill their leader, Xenofex. So, we need to go to Colony Zod in the Land of the Giants, which is reachable via a tunnel dug by the Warlocks from their volcano to the Kreegans’ land. Um, I’m guessing this is Eeofol? Oh, I guess we all automatically acquired the Blaster skill. Aaaand, we still can’t explore the castle. Geez, we’re saving the world for you and you can’t even let us tour your castle? Hmm… if Resurectra is the Blaster Grandmaster tutor, I wonder… Yep, Sir Canegham and Crag Hack are now the Expert and Master tutors. Since we were able to train up 10 levels, we might as well all become Blaster Grandmasters. Off to the Land of the Giants!

Before heading to Nighon, we stop by Clanker’s Lab. Archibald greets us at the door and says he’s given up the conquest business. Apparently, his allies have abandoned him in order to conquer the world. He thinks we might be able to stop them. It’s a good thing we raided this place earlier, since we are unable to enter as we now always enter into conversation with Archibald at the door.

Now in Nighon, the description for Thunderfist Mountain when entering pretty much confirms that this is indeed where we need to be. Ooooooookay, the Blaster puts out a stream of shots in real-time mode. Well, with Haste cast, it does. I’ll just have to keep an eye on when Haste is about to wear off and recast Hour of Power. Medusas in here really have a bad tendency to get inside of walls and still be able to shoot as us. Making it to the end of this rather labyrinthine tunnel, Archibald telepathically contacts us. He introduces himself and mentions that he’s retired and might be able to help us in our fight against the devils. He asks us to rescue his brother Roland, who has been imprisoned in the devils’ dwelling and gives us another Blaster.

Exploring around the area, we run into titans and dragons. Unfortunately, this isn’t like the Titans’ Stronghold where the Titans just stood at the end of corridors and got shot to death. We follow the coast and in the midst of a pack of monsters, we find an altar that teleports us to Harmondale. Luckily, the altar we arrive at teleports us back, as that would have been extremely annoying to have to traverse the tunnel to get back every time. Since our Blasters can be broken, we teleport to Erathia so Roderick can become Grandmaster at Repair Item. Back in Eeofol, along the southern shore, we find the 14th and final obelisk. Hmm… I’m kinda at a loss as to what that exactly means. I think I have a decent idea what it’s about. Wandering into some devils, Devil Warriors and Captains can cast Meteor Shower, which is annoying. Having fully mapped out this area, the only locations of note are a cave in the tall mountain in the northwest that’s a pain to reach and Colony Zod in the southwest. Since the Colony seems like our final destination, we’ll explore the cave first. Well, after selling off our loot in Celeste, we now have 1M gold, so that loss of 400k is pretty much meaningless.

Back in Eeofol, I missed the Dragon Caves on top of the mountain, and heading inside, the only things in here are a Blue and Red Dragon and a couple Dragon Eggs that we take. Leaving and entering the Dragon Caves in the interior of the mountain, we kill off the four dragons that greet us. One of them was carrying the extremely nice pair of Hermes’ Sandals. With that cleared out, we sell off items and then head back to tackle the Kreegans’ colony.

With our two blasters firing a constant barrage, the devils in here are easy pickings (especially since they can’t cast Meteor Shower). We find a third blaster in a chest in a room to the east from the entrance. About the only worry with the devils is the Devil Captains’ ability to drain SP. We find a couple more Blasters in chests along with the Relic flail, Justice. Spotting a well-disguised platform that raises in one of the rooms, the hanging cage it brings us next to holds Roland, whom we free. He was able to steal a key from a guard, but it wasn’t for his cage, so he gives us it. He then leaves for Castle Ironfist in Enroth. Apparently, Roland stole an infinite number of Colony Zod Keys and if you keep clicking on his cage, he keeps giving you a key (even though he disappeared from it). Now to hunt down Xenofex. We must have pushed the right button(s) on that desk-like thing as a new path opened. We’ve now found enough Blasters for everyone to have a backup. Making our way up a couple elevators, we easily defeat Xenofex for… nothing of note. Upon leaving the Colony, a cutscene plays where Archibald tries to make amends with Roland and Catherine, only to be sent into exile in Clanker’s Lab.

Before heading to Celeste, we check out both Castle Gryphonheart and Clanker’s Lab. Neither Catherine’s nor Archibald’s dialog has changed. Returning to Resurectra in Celeste, another cutscene plays detailing the advisors’ landing on this planet. We each receive 500k exp and she then tasks us with finding the Oscillation Overthruster (ooh, science fictiony) so they can open a gate to the Ancients. Considering this is labeled “Final Task”, I think the end of the game is near. I’m not quite sure why she’s worried about their former compatriots duplicating the weapons they brought to this world, since IIRC, those weapons were just standard medieval weaponry, the same as everything that’s found here. Unless obsidian is super ridiculously powerful on this world. Well, in any event, it’s off to Avlee and to the now named spaceship, the Lincoln, to recover the Overthruster on board.

We grab the four wetsuits from the chests outside the throne room and leave the castle. We teleport to the Tularean Forest and sail to Avlee. Wow, when she said no equipment, she meant no equipment. Not even rings. Well, almost nothing as we can still arm ourselves with blasters. Ok, so we can’t enter the water… Hmm… Jump? Yep, that worked. I like how the character portraits are constantly acting like we’re drowning. Now to find the spaceship. The deeper colored sea in the northwest corner looks suspicious. Investigating, we can now travel to the Shoals.

Arriving in the Shoals, we’re now underwater. Aw, we can’t cast spells. Ahh! Dragon Sharks! Dr. Evil must be around here. While the sharks don’t have laser beams, they can shoot some sort of magical projectile at us. Dang it! Our NPCs are gone! But they still take their cut of the gold… Near a sunken ship in the southeast section, a chest contains a Temple in a Bottle. Using it, we’re suddenly inside The Strange Temple. Ooookay. But, hey, we can use magic in here! Um, I like the offices in VI better. I got a lovely Fatal Exception by clicking on Sell Bottles to Infernon, causing the game to crash. Hey, it’s Chris Rock! Opening every door, killing off the Blaster Guy, and locating Jon Van Caneghem, who doesn’t attack this time, we leave. Aw, it sends us back to Harmondale.

Back in the Shoals, I have a feeling the spaceship is going to be in the dead center of the map. Well, it’s almost in the center. Now we just have to find the entrance. Oh, my NPCs are back. I guess they learned how to breathe under water. Entering the Lincoln, we’re besieged by several droids. Quickly, or more accurately, instantly donning all of our equipment and racing to one of the cubbyholes on the side, Serena throws up all our normal buffs and we are able to survive pretty easily. Out of places to go, we take the only lift up, clear out the large room of droids, then make our way to something like a power column and Restore Power to something. Heading back down and to the main room, the small room we couldn’t enter before now allows us to open the door. Touching each panel raises a compartment opposite and inside the lone chest are three Blaster Rifles. The switch on the large lift is also activated and we find a chest with the fourth rifle. A panel in the southwest corner moves something across the ceiling. We stumble our way to what kinda looks like the front of the ship and find the Overthruster. The defense system didn’t like that as it activated a whole bunch of Sparks traps as well as releasing some more droids (unless we just never destroyed those in the first place). Putting our wetsuits back on, we leave the ship. Teleporting back to Celeste, we head to the throne room and watch the end sequence. Well, it’s a definite step up from VI’s ending, but not nearly as good as Darkside of Xeen’s.

Final score: 11381
Final play time: 142h 50m

Final thoughts:
The game was more tedious than anything. At least there wasn't another Castle Darkmoor.

The good:
Some of the outdoor areas did have a better feel to them, especially the hilly terrain of Deyja Moors.
I like the second promotion quests, if only for them being a second promotion.
I like how certain monster types would fight other monster types in various places, as well as having monsters that don't attack. It gives a more realistic feel to the world than having every single creature in the world attacking you.

The bad:
The dungeons weren't nearly as impressive as the ones in VI.
I have mixed feelings on the changes to the skill system. While it's definitely a better system, and made me think about which classes to choose, I didn't like how it locked learning higher level spells behind promotions, even though it makes sense.
I really dislike the traveling between areas aspect taking several days (even though it probably has very little bearing on the game).
Same with The Arena being only accessible on one day of the week from one town.
The quests were very annoying, needing to traipse all around the world, rarely taking place in the same area as the quest giver. They just didn't seem to have a good flow to them.

On a replay, there are a few skills I wouldn't bother with:
Alchemy -- I just bought the permanent stat boosting black potions
Identify Monster -- Detect Life gives me the info I care about
And maybe Merchant -- considering I ended with ~1.2M gold

I give it an 8/10.