RANKINGS
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13. The Plague Lords of Ruel - Score = 7.5 Tier = Good
Sections: 350
Attempts to Beat: 8
Alright! After quite a bit of a layoff from this series, it's time to get back to some of that good-good Lone Wolf action from venerable author Joe Dever! And the first book in this, the "Grand Master" portion of the series, I found to be....... quite good! (Although I felt like it could have been much more). The story opens very strongly, as we learn that in the 5 years after the defeat of the evil Darklords seen in the events of the previous book, The Masters of Darkness, our Lone Wolf character is now a Kai Grand Master. Not only that, but he has spent those years rebuilding the Kai order back at the monastery in Sommerlund, and has even recruited a fair number of Kai initiates that he has been training so that the ways of the Kai will live on even after he is gone. In spite of the world of Magnamund having moved on from the Darklord threat, it is still undergoing the process of rebuilding, and it wouldn't be much of an adventure without a quest to undertake. Fortunately we are given such a task when we are visited by an old friend of ours, Lord Rimoah, who has learned through a captured enemy agent, that the Cener Druids who rule the nearby small kingdom of Ruel (I guess they "rule Ruel"), are currently undertaking a dastardly plan. It would seem the druids, who worship the gods of pestilence and decay, are concocting a deadly plague virus deep inside their main fortress of Mogaruith, which once finished, they plan to unleash on the rest of Magnamund, having first given themselves the antidote, which would kill most if not all of the rest of the population. This is obviously a dire threat, so Rimoah asks Lone Wolf (knowing he will say yes) if he is willing to venture alone to Ruel, sneak into Mogaruith, find where the plague is being developed, and somehow destroy it. I immediately did have to wonder why the whole of Magnamund would not have been immediately mobilized to remove this catastrophic threat that would affect everyone rather than just send one person, even if that one person IS the most badass warrior in the world. But this is one of the first rules of gamebooks (why send an overwhelming force when you could only send one guy?), but the book does at least attempt to give a reason for this, and I had no problem going along with it, even if it did feel unlikely that the Druids could have repelled the rest of Magnamund. You agree to the quest of course, are taken to the border of Ruel by another of your old friends, Banedon and his flying ship, where you then set off to accomplish your goal alone and on foot.
As far as opening premises go, I thought this was great. While yes, you are once again invading an enemy stronghold, at least it is not to assassinate someone this time, and I thought the destroying of a plague virus was a nice fresh twist on the formula, as was having your enemy attempt to use biological warfare as opposed to calling forth some unstoppable demon for example. But now I need to turn to the rules, and oh boy, this is where the head scratching started. First off comes the all important Combat Skill stat, which is arrived at for new players by choosing a number from the Random Number Table (or rolling a 10 sided die) and then adding 25. Hang on a second, add 25? Wasn't it add 10 in the previous books? You are also told you "can" carry your Lone Wolf scores over from those previous books should you have played them (can I carry over my items but re-roll my scores then?), but doing that would put you at a serious Combat Skill disadvantage would it not? Maybe this was meant to balance out newer players not having access to the powerful Sommerswerd and its +8 to Combat, but not all players who played some of the previous books would have the Sommerswerd either (and anyone who didn't play book 2, Fire on the Water, is instantly f&#%ed). I wasn't sure what to do here, so I just decided to roll up a fresh character.
The confusion didn't end there though, as now I come to the most egregious part of the rules, which concerns your Kai Discipline of Healing or Curing. Yes, all those great Disciplines you picked up in the previous adventures are not only carried forward, but also awarded to new players of the series as well. So far so good. However, after playing the book a couple of times and dying in combat because I did not seemingly have anywhere close to enough Endurance points to make it through the adventure, I suddenly remembered that the Healing and Curing Disciplines awarded you 1 Endurance point for every new section you turned to that did not contain a combat. This is an absolute game changer, and thanks to the NUMEROUS sections you need to turn to between combats, I routinely found myself pumped back up to maximum Endurance before the next fight. So, that was my own fault for not remembering that particular Discipline and its effects right? Fair enough. But the egregious thing is, the rules do not mention this +1 Endurance at all when briefly outlining these Disciplines, all it says it provides is "steady restoration of lost Endurance points (to self and others) as a result of combat". What the heck does that mean? And most importantly, how the hell would any new player even know they were supposed to be getting this +1 Endurance per section???? Brutal miss there!
That all being said, the Discipline system once again returns and is handled much as it was in the Magnakai series, with you getting to choose 4 from among 12 different Grand Master Disciplines before beginning the book, and you then get to add another Discipline after that each time you successfully complete a book. I couldn't help but notice that one of the Disciplines, Kai Surge, allows you to add +8 to your Combat Skill at the cost of 1 Endurance point per round. Needless to say, this seemed to me to be easily the most powerful of the Disciplines that you can select, and I wonder if the point of adding this was to give players who didn't have the Sommerswerd, as mentioned earlier, a fighting chance. Other than this obvious selection, I do feel as though Dever did a nice job in mixing up what Disciplines are useful where, and I enjoyed experimenting with almost all of them. Don't get me started on the Deliverance Discipline though, as it states it can only be used once every 20 days. How do we know how many days have passed in most cases? Will we always be told? For what it's worth, I eventually decided to go with the Disciplines of: Assimilance (enhanced invisibility), Grand Pathmanship (ability to avoid hostile plants and ambushes), Kai Screen (to fend off any pesky psychic attacks, which are some of the most dangerous in the game), and of course, Kai Surge. Once you have selected your new Disciplines and loaded up your trusty backpack with a selected number of items from a list, you are ready to begin.
The adventure takes a little bit to get going, as you are treated to several pages of description about your travels over Sommerlund towards Ruel where nothing of note really happens, until you then arrive at the outpost of Stonewatch located on the border of Ruel. At this point, one of the best things in the gamebook happens, as you get to decide between two routes that will take you to the enemy fortress of Mogaruith. You can choose to take the more direct and dangerous approach through the Forest of Ruel, or you can choose to take a more circuitous underground route through caverns located beneath the Skardos Mountains that will eventually surface near the fortress. Both of these routes were a lot of fun to explore and very well described. And while each one in itself felt rather linear, there were still quite a few things to experiment with when it came to which Disciplines you selected at the beginning. I will say though that the shorter route, the one through the forest, was made out to be that way because it was supposedly the more dangerous of the two routes, however I actually found the forest route to be the easier of the two paths, and eventually settled upon it as my route of choice (after having fully explored and enjoyed the mountain route as well). I also found the enemy encounters along the forest route to be more interesting with its swamp monsters and shambling ghouls, as the mountain route contained a lot of encounters with the main "footsoldier" enemies of the book, that being the Vazhag. These Vazhag are described as rat-men, and to me were a big disappointment. They seem to be afraid of everything, and hardly pose any threat at all to Lone Wolf, with our character sometimes dispatching several of them at once without even having to roll any dice. They also seem to exist to take the place of the Giak from the previous Lone Wolf books, but do not instill any sort of dread whatsoever. The Cener Druids who command the Vazhag fare much better though, with their all-consuming hatred of Lone Wolf coming through loud and clear, making them feel a threat due to their sheer intensity alone, if even they too are not much of a match for our character in combat.
Eventually the two routes converge just outside the fortress of Mogaruith, where you must then sneak inside and locate where the plague virus is being developed. I have to say that sneaking into the fortress felt shockingly easy, once inside the keep though, you are again given the choice of two routes, as you can either investigate the Library or the Laboratory. While not bad, I did not find either of these options all that interesting to explore, although if you played some of the previous Lone Wolf adventures it can even lead to an extra section or two of exposition. The two paths join up much quicker this time though, as you descend deeper into the bowels of the fortress. Here you come across a dark congregation of pestilence worshippers before needing to solve a numbered puzzle. This seems to me to be a quirk of these Lone Wolf adventures, as Dever often throws one, and only one, of these numbered puzzles into the books. This one is not very difficult however, and you then proceed toward the confrontation with the main antagonist of the adventure, the Arch Druid Cadak. In a bit of an unexpected twist, while I did end up defeating Cadak's minions, I did not end up actually killing Cadak himself, who disappears once his most powerful servant, a bull-man called Exterminus, is vanquished. It may be possible to slay Cadak, I am not sure, I only know that in my playthroughs he seemingly managed to escape. Your mission is not complete yet though, as you still need to locate and destroy the plague virus, which you proceed to do in the next sequence, as the lab where the virus is being developed is immediately adjacent to Cadak's quarters.
I have to say, from this point onwards the adventure started to drag. While I enjoyed the description of how Lone Wolf ends up destroying the lab and the virus, the book from here on begins to introduce something that has always infuriated me, that being random rolls where if you roll low, you die. Not only that, there are a few of them sprinkled in here to contend with, thus increasing your chances of one lone roll scuppering over an hour of gameplay. Why did Dever insist on putting these in here? True, many of them can be influenced by being able to add a certain amount to your roll should you have a particular Discipline, but it felt silly to me to need to select a Discipline solely to help you pass one die roll near the end of the book. Almost all my failures (after I remembered I had the Curing Discipline) came on one of these rolls, and I even twice rolled a zero that led to my death when any other number would have seen me pass through. To be honest, my personal experience with these rolls likely cost the adventure some review points in my eyes that it might not have otherwise suffered had I not fallen so afoul of them. It's absolutely maddening to strategize and plan, play for well over an hour, only to roll a low number near the end and be told, "Welp, that's it for you I guess. Better luck next time". This aspect reminded me very much of "Freeway Warrior", and you would think that the same author was responsible for it here as well. Oh wait....never mind!
One aspect of this final stretch that I did appreciate though is how even after destroying the virus, you still need to escape the fortress and make it back to friendly territory. Many times this return trip after completing your goal in a gamebook is just glossed over in one paragraph, I suppose because the authors feel the return journey would be anti-climactic, but I enjoy the "realism" of it for lack of a better term. However, there is yet another do-or-die random roll right at the end of the adventure before you finally make it back to the safety of your allies. Grrrrr. There were also some other aspects of the Lone Wolf game system that appeared to be afterthoughts here. The inventory system for example. You start with a backpack that can carry up to 10 items, and get to choose 5 items from a list before you start, such as meals or a rope. Was any of this even needed though? I only infrequently came across something I could pick up, and while there are some items you will probably need to beat the adventure, such as a Cener robe and mask, and a Copper Key, these seemed incredibly hard to miss. The robe and mask can be taken off of a couple of different Druids that you need to defeat, and even should you lose them later, you can just pick up a replacement left hanging on a hook! The Copper Key seemed like a joke too, as I was asked if I had it to unlock a door immediately after I had just picked it up in the previous section! And what happened to the Meal system here where you need to eat when told or you lose 3 Endurance points? I think there was one time I was asked if I had a meal in the whole adventure. To be fair though, the whole meal system feels rather unneccessary at this point in the series due to Lone Wolf's abilities, so this one I am ok with, and I feel like it is just there because it always has been, so Dever was just stubbornly keeping it in.
I wanted to end on a positive note though, and one thing I want to give Dever a ton of credit for is the writing here, which is wonderful. I mentioned in previous Lone Wolf reviews that Dever's writing noticeably improved as the series went on, and that was even more true here. This is one of the better written gamebooks I have read lately, and for me was up there with some of Dave Morris' efforts. The text is fantastically atmospheric and descriptive, and with lines such as "like a ravenous vampire let loose upon a maiden's throat", how can you beat that? And as become expected for the series, we once again have a beautiful map of Ruel located on the front cover of the book, although it didn't really come in all that handy this time and acted more as flavour for the adventure, but in that respect it worked very well.
Ranking: This is a gamebook, which for me, is one of high peaks and low valleys, albeit thankfully with more of the former. There were times I was thinking this might end up being the best entry in the series so far, but then something would happen to piss me off. The score here is buoyed mainly by two things. First, the writing, which is excellent, and second, the opening of the gamebook which gives you two distinct paths to take in order to get to Mogaruith, with both of the paths having interesting things to experiment with and discover. What brings it down though is a sometimes drab trek through the latter half of Mogaruith itself, the confusing rules, and most importantly (in my case anyway), the brutal "roll low even once and you die" tests that pop up near the end of the book. Overall though I don't see how I can say this is anything other than a "Good" gamebook, and other than the random-death dice rolls I enjoyed it quite a bit and do think it is one of the better ones of the entire series to date, but it does feel like it could have been even better. I suppose perhaps it was just leaving some room for improvement in the books to come!
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14. The Captives of Kaag - Score = 6.0 Tier = OK
Sections: 350
Attempts to Beat: 3
So the thing is this. While I generally prefer challenge in a gamebook, it certainly doesn't HAVE to be that way for me, and I have greatly enjoyed and given "Great" scores to books that were not all that difficult when it came right down to it. However, when all the challenge of a gamebook comes only from random instant-death rolls, now that is a real problem that actually makes things even worse (for me at least) than an incredibly easy book, because any deaths encountered only serve to feel incredibly "cheap". Even this could possibly be overcome with a great story and atmosphere, but I still have no idea why an author would want to potentially anger their readers, but I am not a gamebook author so what do I know. Anyway, more on this topic later.
Ok, so book 14 kicks off almost identically to how the previous book began, with Lone Wolf receiving a visit from Lord Rimoah in the Kai Monastery who just so happens to have a new quest for him. It would seem our old friend Banedon has been kidnapped by the forces of evil and taken to the city of Kaag, which lies not far to the west of Sommerlund, and we of course agree to rescue him. So another title for the book might be, "The Captives of Kaag: This time IT'S PERSONAL!". After gathering up a selection of items to take with me as usual and also selecting a new Grand Master Discipline as the reward for completing the last book (I initially took Grand Nexus, but more on this later as well), my Lone Wolf character once again boards the flying ship Skyrider, whose dwarven crew anxiously want the return of their master Banedon, and will drop me off within walking distance from Kaag, using a dust storm currently raging over the area as cover.
I need to take a minute here to discuss the dimensions of the city of Kaag itself, because they almost beggar belief. We are told that it is a walled circular city that is 40 miles wide across! I actually stopped reading when I came to this figure so I could do some checking on whether that would remotely make sense. On a heavily populated planet, I could see this, but Magnumund, in typical fantasy fashion, has always felt at least somewhat sparsely populated to me, so the presence of a city this size seems rather crazy. I realize it is one of the "bad guy" cities so they would likely have all manner of creature jammed in here, but still, imagine just the logistics required to keep this place running. But hang on, it gets even crazier, as we are additionally told that the center of Kaag contains a massive citadel that rises 2 miles into the sky! Ok, I was eventually prepared to go along with the 40 mile wide city, but a 2 mile high citadel just seems ludicrous. And we are supposed to traverse this huge city, climb this citadel, free Banedon (who could be anywhere in all this), and return to the Skyrider in a mere 2 days before they assume us dead and leave? Just for some context, the tallest structure currently on Earth is the Burj Khalifa located in Dubai, standing at a whopping 828 metres. The Citadel of Kaag would measure 3218 meters tall! Oh, and we are additionally told that it is a pyramid-shaped structure, so you can just imagine how big the base of this thing must be. And yes, I realize a certain level of hypocrisy in mentioning something like this in a world populated by evil sorcerers and rat-men, but there still needs to be some kind of internal realism.
Anyway, into the massive city we go, and much like in how the previous book began, here we are given two different routes to make our way towards the citadel, as we can choose to enter either via a breach in the north wall of the city, or a similar breach in the east wall. I gave a large amount of credit to the opening branching paths in the previous book, but unfortunately this is done far worse here, as the two routes are nowhere near as different or interesting as the forest and mountain options provided in the last adventure. The city of Kaag itself is pretty much still in ruins after the war against the Darklords was won (and just how the Freelanders were able to assault a city of this size must make for a great story), so our character finds himself travelling down mostly deserted streets and alleys, with only a few roaming gangs of Giaks and their masters to contend with. I tried both the path through the north wall and the one through the east wall, and I couldn't really tell much of a difference between them. There are running battles between two different gangs of Giaks occurring in the streets that you need to avoid, but I found this whole sequence rather dull no matter which opening path I took. The reason for this gang battle is revealed in a fashion where the author also apparently wants us to know how horrific it is that the Giaks are apparently cannibals, as it is hammered home about how repulsed we are when it is revealed that the reason for the gang fighting is over a food source of dead Giak bodies (would we really be surprised at this though?). It's a shame too because if this massive city had been fully populated, this could have made for a tremendous urban-set gamebook, where our character got to explore various districts of a bustling city, perhaps having to gather clues as to where Banedon could be found. Instead though, I found myself covering the presumably 20 or so miles to the base of the citadel rather quickly and without much of note happening. That is, until I attempted to enter the citadel itself.
Earlier in the review I mentioned how I had selected Grand Nexus as my new Discipline for beating the last book. Well, that would soon change. Because in order to enter the citadel, you need to first climb up to a landing platform closer to the ground, where you intend to then mount one of the flying beasts currently on it in order for them to bring you further up the tower. In order to climb up to this platform, you can either take an exposed staircase, or scale the wall itself. Problem is, both of these options require one of those oh-so-wonderful random death rolls, where you roll once (or choose a number from the Random Number Table), and should you roll too low, you instantly die. I don't know what it is with my luck on these things lately, but in my first two attempts at the adventure, I rolled very low both times (once attempting the stairs, and once climbing the wall) and had my character unceremoniously killed off in each case. I did happen to notice however that you are given a boost to your roll should you have the Discipline of Grand Huntmastery, which I did not have. So, not wanting to suffer the ignominy of failing this a third time in a row, on my next attempt at the book I decided to take this Discipline instead of Grand Nexus. This turned out to be a good move even beyond this roll, because this Discipline is called upon quite often throughout the whole quest. I thought the previous adventure did a nice job in mixing up the uses of the Disciplines, where it felt like each one came in handy at some point. In this book though, it's Grand Huntmastery all day every day. Take this one and don't look back.
Once inside the citadel itself, we then begin the arduous trek of exploring this vast edifice. This is probably the best part of the adventure, although it doesn't have much to compete with, as we get some freedom in exploring the various levels and rooms, and can at times choose to go either up or down (but who are we kidding, we know we need to go up). The citadel fares better than the city in terms of things of interest going on within it, but still it feels rather empty overall, but with the size of this thing I guess that should come as no surprise. I love how at one point it is glossed over in one sentence how Lone Wolf climbs 60 stories of this thing! Nothing happened during that time? I will say though that there is a very well done and poignant encounter that occurs later on when Lone Wolf runs into a group of ghouls who are the remnants of previous prisoners of war held within the citadel, who had been tortured so badly that they now exist in a state of perpetual despair. After all this, including an encounter with a Helghast who is pretending to be Banedon to lure you in (and I remember the Helghast being more dangerous in previous adventures than portrayed here? Perhaps this is just due to Lone Wolf now being more powerful.), you finally make it to the chamber where the real Banedon is being held prisoner.
Banedon is being guarded of course, and in order to free him we first must pass a very weird encounter, as we face off with a tiny furry creature (called a Vodok), before then needing to deal with a swarm of insects, and then after that a dragon. Quite the eclectic mix there! Once again though I do like how once this is done and Banedon rescued, we still need to escape and make it back to safety. Being a pyramid shape, I was half expecting Lone Wolf and Banedon to slide down the outside of the citadel, all 2 miles to the bottom, which would have made for quite the sequence. Instead, after passing through some spooky halls and a library, the duo attempt to escape using the same method Lone Wolf used earlier in the adventure, by commandeering a flying beast from one of the upper level landing platforms and flying away. It is then that I came upon a startling revelation.
This is where my question regarding Arch Druid Cadak from the previous book is answered, as it turns out he was behind the kidnapping of Banedon all along, as the villain himself steps out of the shadows to confront us. We were initially led to believe that Banedon was captured by the Nadziranim (evil sorcerers who serve the Darklords and wield "right-handed" magic), so that they could hopefully extract from Banedon the secrets of the good "left handed" magic. While this may have been an added benefit to the plan, the real reason for Banedon's abduction is revealed to be as bait for Lone Wolf, because Cadak knew we would be sent to rescue him. At this point though one of the more curious encounters of the adventure happens, as we have to face down yet another of Cadak's powerful minions, a creature called a Zavaghar, which is some kind of overpowered giant rodent. The strange thing about this combat though, is that as long as your Combat Skill is high enough, I don't see how you can possibly lose. If you kill the creature, then obviously you win, but even if you find yourself on the losing end, once your Endurance drops below a certain level, you are told to immediately turn to a specific section. Once you do this, Banedon steps in to help you, and the creature is instantly defeated. Granted, if you had a low enough Combat Skill, you could find yourself one-shot killed by the Zavaghar, but otherwise this just felt rather pointless.
Even after this, the quest isn't quite finished, because.....oh no.....we have one final random death roll to contend with as we fly away, with enemy archers taking some last desperation shots at us. C'mon with these! Thankfully you have a 90% chance of passing this, but still, how unfair would it feel to roll the one number that will kill you at this late stage of the adventure with no modifiers that can even be added to this roll even through prior planning? Considering my luck on these recently, I held my breath when rolling for this, and let out a large exhale when a 6 came up. Phew! With that, Lone Wolf and Banedon fly back to the Skyrider with another mission successfully accomplished. I assume though, because we once again did not kill Cadak, that he will be the ongoing antagonist for the Grand Master series.
Returning to the point in my opening paragraph, my only two failures at the adventure occurred at the same place, that being the random death roll while trying to climb to the landing platform to enter the citadel. After passing this, I was able to make it all the way to victory first time, so the challenge here for me was pretty much solely tied up in passing those pesky one-chance-only rolls, although to be fair the back-to-back fights against the Vodok and then the Dragon was not a cakewalk by any means.
Overall this was a rather large step back from the previous book in several areas, one of these areas being the writing. What happened there? The Plague Lords of Ruel was excellently written, and while still reasonably good here, I immediately noticed a big drop-off in that regard right from the opening sections. Looking at the release schedule of these books, I wonder if because more time elapsed between books 12 and 13 than did between books 13 and 14 if that contributed to this, and Dever just didn't have the same amount of time to commit to the prose. I also found the map at the front of the book to be rather disappointing. Oh don't get me wrong, the artwork itself is quite good as usual, but the total distance we travel from our Kai Monastery to Kaag makes me wonder why they even bothered. On that note, is it just me, or do the Lone Wolf books work better when our character is making a long overland trek before arriving at his destination? It seems to fit the Lone Wolf character better with his more rustic style skills and general portrayal on the book covers. I used to greatly enjoy following along on the map as my character traversed such long distances and explored many of the different areas of Magnamund. Here though, that is all glossed over in a skyship trek that is covered basically as an introduction. A detailed map of the massive city of Kaag could have been awesome and was a missed opportunity in my opinion.
Ranking: This is a rather middling gamebook for this series and is definitely not one of the better Lone Wolf adventures I have played, and in fact I have it near the bottom of the 14 books so far with only Castle Death and The Prisoners of Time below it. Despite that statement, it's not what I would call "bad", it's just rather so-so in almost all areas. The opening of the adventure felt very similar to the previous book, except done worse, and the sequence travelling through Kaag was rather bland. It gets a bit better once you get inside the citadel, and there are some different areas to explore, but I personally didn't find all that much of interest going on in the interior either save for perhaps the odd moment here and there. Despite how massive both the city and citadel are supposed to be, they felt rather empty and I never really got the sense of their supposed enormity in my playthroughs, only knowing (and not believing I might add) of their size because I was told flat out their dimensions. City-set adventures can be fantastic, so this was a real pity. The random rolls leading to death are present once again, and have already become tiresome. Everything about this book felt like a step back from the previous entry, with even the writing falling victim to this, and I hope that at only 2 books into the Grand Master series, the entries are not already being rushed.
And a 2 mile high tower?
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15. The Darke Crusade - Score = 7.4 Tier = Good
Sections: 350
Attempts to Beat: 1
I'm not sure what it is with the Lone Wolf books that only take me one attempt to beat, but they have so far been some of my favorites in the series, and this was another really good one! This adventure begins once again in the Kai Monastery, where Lone Wolf finds himself visited by the quest-giver for this book, but this time it is not Lord Rimoah, but an emissary from the faraway Kingdom of Lencia, located in the Western Tentarias, who has come seeking our aid on behalf of his king. We are given the rundown of what exactly is going on in the region, and I thought the premise for this adventure starts off rather well. For once, the "good guys" in Lencia are actually winning the war against the evil Drakkirim holdouts in the area, and have had the few remaining Drakkirim fortresses in the region under siege for quite awhile, with it only being a matter of time before they are finished off. Problem is, the leader of the evil forces, Magnaarn, is making a last desperate attempt to locate a magical artefact known as the Doomstone of Darke, thought to have been lost in the region long ago, which he plans to re-unite to its former place atop a magical sceptre. Should he succeed, this item would not only grant him great power, but would also win over many to his cause that as of now, refuse to join the fight against the Lencians, which would then lead to a much longer and costly war. It is therefore imperative that Magnaarn not recover the Doomstone, so Lone Wolf is tasked with locating it first and destroying it. Because Lencia once helped Lone Wolf out in the past, we agree to return the favor, and thus head out with the emissary aboard the.....sigh....Skyrider (again?) to make our way via the airship to the distant kingdom. While the adventure may eventually turn into a more typical kill-the-bad-guy style of quest, I thought this opening was rather unique in that the good guys were currently holding all the cards, with the bad guys being the ones making a last-ditch attempt at victory, and it was up to us to deny them that.
After that opening I was all keyed up to get the mission underway (once I got off the damn Skyrider of course), but I immediately would come across what I felt was the adventure's biggest failing, that being stretches of sections with little to no player agency. I mean seriously, check out the string of sections this adventure begins with:
Section 1 - Turn to 140
Section 140 - Turn to 257
Section 257 - Turn to 25
Section 25 - Did you take part in the Battle of Cetza in a previous Lone Wolf Book? If so, Turn to 315, if not Turn to 123
Section 315 - Turn to 80
Section 80 - Do you possess Grand Pathmanship? If so, Turn to 202, if not Turn to 159
Section 202 - Turn to 273
Section 273 - Turn to 60
Section 60 - Do you take the left channel or the right channel? (Yay! Finally a decision!)
So you can't tell me the above opening sequence of sections isn't noticeable for its lack of anything required of the player. Heck, even the two sections that ask if you were in the Battle of Cetza and if you possess Grand Pathmanship don't require you to do anything, either you have those or you haven't. If this sequence had occurred in the middle of the book somewhere, I might have chalked it up to some form of "intermission" of the adventure, but coming right at the start as it does, it is incredibly noticeable and was, for a brief period for me, very concerning. I can't even say this is the only time in the book this happens, as there were a couple of other stretches where this was noticeable as well, although I don't think they covered quite as many sections as this opening (although I could be mistaken). While perhaps not a huge "negative", this all does contribute to the gamebook feeling like a 300 section adventure that was stretched out to make it to the 350 section count. These always seem like arbitrary numbers anyway, and a tighter 300 section gamebook with more player agency would probably come across better. I guess Dever felt like he had to make it 350 sections no matter what? This did cost it a little bit in my score, as there were times I felt I was reading a fantasy novel as opposed to playing a gamebook, but thankfully the adventure itself (the parts that I got to play) helped to make up for it.
Once I actually got to make some decisions, I found myself in the middle of a pretty darn good adventure. Although it doesn't usually bode well for them, we get ourselves a travelling companion for this quest in the form of Captain Prarg, a Lencian soldier who you may or may not remember from back in book 10, The Dungeons of Torgar. I have to confess that while I do remember the Battle of Cetza, I had no recollection of Prarg, but it has been awhile since I played that adventure after all. Prarg is to be our guide as we seek out the Doomstone, as he is well acquainted with the area and can help lead us through some of the more dangerous places we will need to pass through. This then begins a quite tense journey through and along swamp, forest, river, and plains, most of the way spent under a very atmospheric snowfall, as we travel along avoiding rogue bands of Drakkirim and wild beasts. One of the better sequences involves you infiltrating an enemy encampment in a search for clues as to either Magnaarn or the Doomstone's whereabouts, where Prarg gets captured and you then need to rescue him. Later you find yourself in a labyrinth located underneath a temple (and as I suspected, these "inside" areas have much more impact when they are used sparingly), where you get to come face-to-face with Magnaarn himself, who surprisingly gets the better of Lone Wolf, leaving him for dead (and once again capturing Prarg, who is going to have PTSD after all this). Of course, we know Lone Wolf is going to escape the situation, but all this is told in a very claustrophobic and anxiety-driven manner, with our character needing to escape the fate of being buried alive.
It takes Lone Wolf over two weeks to escape from this situation, and in that time Magnaarn has done exactly what we expected he would do. With his newfound power granted by the Doomstone, he has secured the aid of all the nearby Nadziranim forces, who combined with his own Drakkirim army and not to mention the mighty Doomstone itself, now have the Lencian forces in the area on the run. Lone Wolf is not out of the game yet however, and steels himself to complete the quest by tracking down Magnaarn and destroying the Doomstone. We now find ourselves travelling across a region with war raging all around us, and this sets off a couple more quite good sequences, including one where Lone Wolf rescues a group of prisoners of war from the horrible camp they are being kept in. With their aid we can participate in a final assault on the fortress of Darke, where Magnaarn is located, to hopefully end the war once and for all. Travelling through a war-torn area has always seemed to be in this series' wheelhouse, and that holds true here as well. The assault on Darke itself is glossed over a bit, with Lone Wolf fighting his way inside past some guards rather quickly, but once inside the walls we are reunited with Prarg, who has presumably escaped from his captors during the confusion of the battle (and why they didn't just kill him is a mystery, but I was more surprised that a travelling companion of Lone Wolf's actually survives!).
Sensing that Magnaarn and the end of our quest is near, Lone Wolf and Prarg ascend the fortress tower for a final confrontation with the villain, only to discover that the Doomstone, and the sceptre it now rests in, have now become one with Magnaarn, transforming him into an evil, disgusting, and barely recognizable monstrosity. As they make it to the top, Prarg is conveniently knocked unconscious (again, I was dumbfounded he wasn't killed outright here), leaving us to face Magnaarn alone. But wait! First we need to defeat a Tahrdemon that Magnaarn has summoned (wussy!), and upon doing so we find that the main bad guy has flown the coop and run up onto the top of the fortress. So now that we have him right where we want him, it's time to finish him off for good as we close in for the........oh no, don't tell me....yep, it's another random instant-death roll! Before you can get to him, Magnaarn opens up a chasm in the floor that you must leap across, and although Grand Huntmastery can help you here, it still leaves a 20% chance of instant death! Should you not have Grand Huntmastery, this is a 40% chance of instant failure, which is nuts! Well, at least it came before the final fight this time, as little consolation as that is. Thanks to having the required level of Grand Huntmastery, and from finally getting out from under the cloud over my head on these rolls, I was able to pass this check my first time (phew!), and moved in for the final fight with Magnaarn. This fight isn't as difficult as it initially might appear, as even though he does have a rather high Combat score, his Endurance score is somewhat low for a final enemy, and combining this with the Combat Ratio Table greatly favoring your character as always, I was able to dispatch him without really coming close to death myself. And that's it, no final escape sequence this time, but that's ok as it wouldn't really make sense anyway, as with Magnaarn defeated the Lencian forces and their allies can now easily take the fortress. You then head back to the castle at Lencia to be feted with the standard gamebook celebratory banquet.
Thankfully the writing of the adventure is on the upswing again, and I found it much more atmospheric and enjoyable than the previous book, although the setting of it helps out greatly in that regard also. (Although there was a line in here about a village being "raised to the ground" that had me razing an eyebrow). I do have to wonder though about the acquiring of items such as a Silver Rod that needs to be inserted in a hole later on in the quest, and question whether the author knew what this would sound like. (C'mon don't tell me you didn't go there either! Dever must have known how this might read, right?) Another aspect of the gamebook that contributed very positively to that atmosphere, at least for me, were the interior illustrations by Brian Williams, which I thought were great. There is a wonderful drawing from Lone Wolf's point of view as he looks up a staircase just in time to see himself being saved by a still-alive Prarg near the end of the adventure, and another more simple illustration that showed a stone bridge spanning an icy river that I thought was beautiful in its simplicity, and this is just to name a couple. Even the drawing of the rat-like Tahrdemon seemed to me to be an homage to the ROUS (Rodent of Unusual Size) from "The Princess Bride".
And saving this for last, in the course of this adventure I happened to acquire an item called the Jadin Amulet, which is a Special Item that allows you to add 1 to your roll when attempting to make a Random roll to avoid a missile such as an arrow or dart. Considering the random death rolls that have been popping up at the end of these books, this item could be gold I tell ya....GOLD! (And speaking of gold, is there any point to carrying gold pieces in these books?) On the other hand, this Amulet might raise more questions than it answers. For one, this would seem to suggest that Dever was aware of how these rolls might be frustrating, so put this item in to counteract them, but then, why have the rolls in the first place? It also wasn't lost on me that the final random death roll in this adventure did NOT involve avoiding a missile, so while useless here, I can only assume this is going to come in handy in the future. But boy, talk about rubbing salt in the wound to anyone who fell victim to the arrow shot death while fleeing the citadel in the last book. I can only imagine them having some choice words upon finding this item one book too late! Seriously, this feels like trolling.
Ranking: This felt like a more "back to basics" entry for the series, and I enjoyed it quite a lot. I did find it rather easy, but that might be a factor of having played all the books up to this point, and other players who have not done so may find it more difficult. Unfortunately, there are some noticeable stretches here where nothing at all is required of the player which does detract from it a bit, but thankfully there is enough gameplay to be found overall over the course of the adventure that I don't feel that aspect ruined the book by any means. I do feel that my statement from the previous review regarding the Lone Wolf adventures working better when longer overland treks are involved held true (for me at least), as I think it fits the feel of the character better and contributes to the adventures feeling more "epic". Yes, there is yet another random-death roll right near the end of the adventure, and at this point I am wondering if this is now a series staple that I can expect in every book going forward. But on the positive side the writing, while not quite at the level of The Plague Lords of Ruel, is headed back in the right direction, and I found it much improved from The Captives of Kaag. Overall, while I can't say this is my favorite book in the series, I put it in the upper half of the rankings so far thanks to its intriguing story and captivating action sequences. Just please stop with the Skyrider already!
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16. The Legacy of Vashna - Score = 6.5 Tier = OK
Sections: 350
Attempts to Beat: 4
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17. The Deathlord of Ixia - Score = 5.8 Tier = OK
Sections: 350
Attempts to Beat: 10
I return to the Lone Wolf Grand Master series after a short break to find that as I begin this adventure, not really much has changed. Once AGAIN we are visited by Lord Rimoah in our Kai Monastery, who informs us that the Deathstaff we thought destroyed in the last book apparently has found its way transported to the remote northern kingdom of Ixia. This is particularly bad news, because Ixia just so happens to be where long ago the Old Kingdom mages imprisoned a notably powerful Deathlord, Ixiataaga. It is now believed that not only has Ixiataaga been freed, but is now also in possession of the Deathstaff, and is even now preparing an undead army to wash over and subjugate all of Magnamund. So let me guess, you want me to go kill him all by myself right? Well, yes, that is exactly what Rimoah wants from you. I am starting to feel like we are Rimoah's servant here. Anyway, we agree of course and make preparations to head to the Kingdom of Lencia, which lies to the south of Ixia, from where we can launch our infiltration of the frozen northern kingdom. Oh, and just how do we get to Lencia? Well, our old friend Banedon once AGAIN takes us there aboard his flying ship, and I am wondering if we should just buy the damn thing off him at this point (it's not like we ever get to spend our gold on anything else anyway).
I have to say that this adventure does not get off to the best start from a gaming perspective, as there is a loooong stretch of sections here with nothing required of the player, merely asking you things such as "have you done this?" or "do you have that?" It's much better from a narrative perspective, but that is cold comfort when I want to play a gamebook. Anyway, after a quick stopover in Lencia where we are joined by our old friend Captain Prarg (and I keep wanting to call this guy 'Prig'), we sail by boat this time northwards through the frigid waters of the Tozaz Sea to a fort located on a small island some distance off the Ixian coast. This fort is garrisoned by a Lencian detachment who have apparently suffered the Lencian equivalent of being "stationed to a base in Greenland", and shortly after our arrival, the fort is attacked out of the mist by a ghostly ship manned by a group of undead warriors. We then assist the garrison in fighting off the attack, destroying the undead down to the last man, when Lone Wolf then gets the brilliant idea of using the ship the undead came on in order to sneak into Ixia disguised as one of their own. Taking a small group of "redshirt" sailors to accompany us (but with Prarg wisely staying behind), we head out into the Tozaz Sea where we soon find ourselves needing to navigate a dangerous icefield lest we suffer the same fate as the Titanic. Once we accomplish this feat, our ship is unavoidably swallowed whole by a much larger Ixian vessel which acts as a very large and mobile "docking station". As a side note, I thought the description and illustration of this larger ship were quite atmospheric and very well done. Once trapped inside, the undead manning this station quickly realize that we and our crew are very much among the living, and we then need to either battle or sneak our way past them, make our way through the station, and out onto the Ixian tundra (with the rest of our crew dying in the process of course).
On my first playthrough at this point, and despite that rough opening of "turn to" sections, I thought this might end up being one of the better books of the series so far. (Oh silly me!). A ghostly ship coming out of the mist with its undead crew attacking a remote outpost followed by a harrowing trip through iceberg infested waters and then an escape from a seaside naval base? Sign me up! Once you finish the naval part of the adventure though, it slips back into the usual type of quest: Sneak inside a ruined city? Check. Sneak inside the fortress at its centre? Check. Make your way up to the top? Check. Defeat bad guy? Check. Escape crumbling edifice? Check. And none of that is even interesting here, as it all flies by very quickly. Ok, so there is admittedly a trip through a Shadow Gate which is a brief change of pace, but I didn't find anything going on within the Shadow Gate realm to be particularly interesting either. In fact I found myself groaning when I realized we would be taking one of those "alternate dimension" trips which I almost never enjoy.
I have said before that I find the Lone Wolf adventures to be at their best when they involve outdoorsy overland trips, and the one chance we get to do that here while travelling across the frozen Ixian tundra toward the ruined city of Xaagon is almost totally wasted. It involves a choice about whether you want to seek shelter in either a cave or a circle of rocks....and that's it. Once this flies past, you arrive outside Xaagon and must decide if you want to sneak in either by a breach in the wall or through the unguarded city gate, and I'm not sure that it even really matters which one you pick. There are some guards wandering around the city, but they can be avoided shockingly easily (will you fight or try to escape? Escape you say? Good news, you lost them, carry on! Okayyy well that was fun). Once you sneak past those incredibly inept guards (and I guess that's what Ixiataaga gets for employing zombie soldiers lacking in braaainnnns!), you enter the spire at the centre of the city, and things don't get any better inside here either. There is a lock puzzle in here that involves using the map at the front of the book which is a great idea, unfortunately this is one of the easiest puzzles I have seen. I found it so easy that when I turned to the corresponding section to my answer, I was sure I was about to die for getting it wrong, as it seemed so straightforward that there must have been something I had missed, but no I did in fact have the correct answer.
It really doesn't take long to arrive at the top of the spire although you can find yourself in a couple of tough fights along the way, where you then encounter an enemy from a previous book, the demon Tagazin, before both you and he are pulled into that Shadow Gate I mentioned earlier. Sigh. Not much really makes a lot of sense in this dimension as you make your way through some kind of swamp area, except that once more you will likely have to battle your way through at least a couple of enemies with Combat scores approaching 50 (which was not much of a problem for my kitted-out Lone Wolf, but would certainly be for new players). After that it's one more encounter with Tagazin who leads you to the Shadow Gate exit, where you arrive back at the top of the spire for the final confrontation with the Deathlord Ixiataaga himself.
And oh what a Combat this is! Difficult, but for all the wrong reasons. Ixiataaga comes with a Combat Skill of 60 for the battle, and any new players might as well just close the book right now, if they were even able to make it this far in the first place (and without the benefit of the 1 point of Endurance per section for Curing, I question whether this is even possible). Even with my experienced Lone Wolf character, I still found myself fighting this battle at a negative Combat Ratio, and having my Endurance whittled away by previous encounters without enough time in between battles for Curing to fully take effect, I was at a disadvantage there too. And while I appreciate a more difficult adventure for a change, this combat appeared to be the only reason this book was remotely difficult, as my super-strong Lone Wolf character was almost guaranteed to at least make it to this fight pretty much every time. So, it then became a process of trudging repeatedly through the adventure to give myself another crack at Ixiataaga, hoping I would get good enough rolls to beat him this time. I eventually got those required rolls, although just barely, as the rolls on my winning playthrough against him were not extremely good, just "good enough" so that I was barely able to beat him with 1 Endurance point remaining. (And then praying I wouldn't stub my toe on the way out the door, suffering an authorially imposed Endurance point loss before Curing could suitably restore me).
But oh no, it wasn't over yet. You know those "do-or-die" rolls that have become common at the end of these adventures? Well here comes another one! Yes you need to make such a roll as you escape from the crumbling spire. Thank goodness I passed this one on my first try, as I would have been royally pissed otherwise. Once again, why are these even here? Not only that, but you might find yourself encountering ANOTHER one of these do-or-die rolls as you sail back across the Tozaz Sea (although this one is at least avoidable), as there is an unusually long sequence after the final fight when you make your way back to Lencia. With that all being said, I do have to give props for the twist ending, as much like with The Dungeons of Torgar, I didn't see the ending to this coming, when you learn what has been going on in your home country of Sommerlund while you have been in Ixia, and I think it serves to set up the next adventure very well, making me want to jump in again right away.
Now, on to a final bit of housekeeping........
Yeah.....you wanna know what's bullshit? This right here is:
Pick your four Grand Master Disciplines with care, for a wise choice will enable any player to complete the quest, no matter how weak their initial Combat Skill and Endurance scores may be. Successful completion of previous Lone Wolf adventures, although an advantage, is not essential for the completion of this adventure.
The above is taken from the rules section of this very book, and I don't know how this was written with a straight face. When the unavoidable final boss has a Combat Score of 60 (not to mention the other high stat enemies before you even get to him), this is enough to make you fall down laughing. When it comes to the difficulty, why not just tell it like it is? Why do they gotta freakin lie??? It might not be a huge deal for players carrying a character all the way through the series from the beginning, but first time players are screwed. I was also left wondering what constitutes an "undead" creature, as it's an important distinction seeing as how the Sommerswerd does double damage to the undead. Some are obvious, like the zombies for example, but what about the Deathlord himself? I wouldn't think he would be classified as undead, but I don't believe it's ever made clear.
Not only that, but the more I played this book, I started to question how much some of my choices actually mattered. For example, there is a section during the zombie attack on the fort in the beginning where you are asked if you want to fire a catapult you are manning at either the horde of zombies rushing from the attacking ship, or at a strange sphere located on the ship itself instead. Both choices turn out to be completely ineffective, and just send you on to the same section regardless. That kind of thing always grinds my gears.
Ranking: The excellent writing helps to mask some of its faults, but not enough of them. The opening act with the zombie attack on the fort and the sailing through the icebergs on the Tozaz Sea was initially great, until I realized the more times I played it that some of my decisions didn't really seem to matter all that much. After that it just fell into a typical fantasy adventure, but not even a particularly good one. The final confrontation against Ixiataaga is a terrible boss battle, challenging only because he is given a high Combat Skill with seemingly no more thought put into it than that. And then of course the not one but possibly TWO "pass these dice checks or die" rolls immediately after it are a slap in the face. New players to the series probably shouldn't even bother here. Would this adventure even be possible for them to beat? This is neck-and-neck with The Prisoners of Time for worst designed book in the series for me, although the writing in this adventure I found to be much better, which is the main reason I am ranking it higher than that previous entry, even though this is overall still near the bottom of the rankings for me. I still have a dozen or so of his books left to go so I hope I am proven wrong, but I am sadly coming to the conclusion that Dever may have been a much better gamebook "writer" than he was a "designer".
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18. Dawn of the Dragons - Score = 7.4 Tier = Good
Sections: 350
Attempts to Beat: 1
Nothing about my opinion from the previous review regarding Joe Dever being a better gamebook writer than designer changed much here, but even so this was a far more enjoyable adventure. One thing I loved about this book right off the hop was in how it picks up immediately after the previous one ended, with Lone Wolf still in Lencia, and now needing to get back to his home country of Sommerlund post-haste when he learns that his Kai Monastery is currently under siege by the forces of the Dark God Naar. This means that for a refreshing change we do not start the adventure within our vault at the monastery, nor do we get a lift from Banedon and his skyship to our desired destination. We have a long journey ahead of us back to Sommerlund, and with time being of the essence, we set off right away, being accompanied by a contingent of Lencian soldiers meant to aid and protect us on the journey.
As I have said a few times already, I greatly enjoy the overland treks in the Lone Wolf adventures, and this one has that aspect in spades. The map at the front of the book is back to being a fantastic addition, as you will need to travel from one side of it to the other. It's great fun to trace your route across the map, gauging how much farther you have to go, and in seeing what villages or geographical features are coming up next. The maps have seemed to me to have become something of an afterthought in many of the Grand Master adventures, with them being there and looking great as always, but you often find yourself travelling across large swaths of it in a few sections (thanks to the flying ship), or with many areas of the map left unexplored altogether, and I was glad to see it return to a more immersive contribution here.
We set off from Lencia on the western side of the map heading east with our accompanying garrison, and it doesn't take long before another great aspect is added to the adventure, as we soon learn that we have a price on our head, and there are assassins lurking in every shadow and around every corner, looking to collect. Granted, I feel like Lone Wolf has been on a general "hit list" for many books now, but bringing it to the fore here adds a nice layer of tension and paranoia, as you never know who you can trust, and every situation you come across feels like it could be a trap. The meat of the book then becomes you travelling across the countryside, through forests and over plains, fighting and/or avoiding bandits and the like, and entering villages, with some of them being friendly and some decidedly not. This all takes up a huge part of the book, and while I can't say there was anything that we haven't really seen here before, it was all well told and very enjoyable nonetheless.
Along the way, you learn that allies you have aided in previous adventures are rallying around you, and one of them even sees fit to have a new skyship constructed for you (not sure how I feel about this to be honest), as it is also conveyed to you that Banedon's flying ship was witnessed to have been destroyed while attempting to defend the Kai Monastery, with the fate of Banedon and Lord Rimoah who were both onboard at the time, left unknown. The new flying ship, dubbed the Cloud-dancer, is being constructed in the city of Casiorn, located on the far eastern side of your map, and this thus becomes your new destination. It will come as no surprise to veteran Lone Wolf players that it doesn't take long for you to lose the garrison that was initially accompanying you, but I think in this case travelling alone made the adventure better. I was finding the adventure to be rather on the linear side, until I came upon a junction point where I was asked whether I wanted to head through an area where a battle was currently raging, or instead try to sneak through the hostile city of Duadon. I chose the Duadon option on my playthrough, feeling so proud of myself that the enemy would least expect a move like that right? Wrong! I was discovered almost immediately, and as far as I can tell you cannot avoid being captured here which felt a bit of a cheat, but because it was a rather exciting incarceration and jailbreak sequence, I was prepared to give it some leeway. Going back afterwards to check out the option of travelling through the battle area instead, I was happy to learn of the inclusion of these divergent paths that were both viable, which is something that I wish we saw more of in the series, as it works extremely well in books such as The Jungle of Horrors.
Before I move on to discussing the final act, I have to give this adventure credit for all the callbacks to previous books! You can encounter several characters from earlier adventures, including Gwynian the Sage and Captain D'Val, but the best in my opinion was the meeting with the ghostly form of Roark from The Kingdoms of Terror. He was such a memorable over-the-top, if somewhat minor villain, that getting to vanquish him once and for all was a treat. And the manner in which he haunts a deserted village like some sort of Headless Horseman was an incredibly nice touch. There may even be some callbacks present in the adventure that I either missed, or had them go over my head if I happened to have forgotten the character in question, which is always possible. These wouldn't mean anything to newer players of the series of course, but for those like myself who have played the series all the way through, they were very fun to try and spot.
I will also say that the closer you get to Casiorn, the faster the adventure seems to fly by, almost like Dever knew he was quickly running out of sections and still had the endgame to get to. The book itself even seems to acknowledge this, as at one point with still many kilometers left to travel, you are provided with what is apparently the fastest horse in Magnamund, who speeds you along those many kilometers and the associated countryside in an absolute glossed-over blur. Once at Casiorn, you quickly board your brand new flying ship and make for Holmgard, the capital of Sommerlund. Here, you are greeted by King Ulnar, and a plan is devised (although not much of one), whereby you and your old buddy Captain D'Val will lead a force against the horde besieging the Kai Monastery, where the force will engage the enemy while you slip inside the monastery by means of your hidden tunnel out in the woods that leads to your vault in the lower levels. From inside, you will need to find the location of the Shadow Gate from where Naar's forces are emerging, and close it by throwing an explosive device into it which was provided to you earlier in the quest by Gwynian the Sage.
I must say that the approach to your monastery is quite tense, as you are not totally sure what to expect. For all you know the monastery may have already fallen, and you are kept in suspense the whole way there. This culminates in an absolutely wonderful moment, along with an illustration, as you crest a ridge and view your monastery still holding out against Naar's hordes, with your banner still flying atop the tower even as it is being circled by the vicious flying creatures known as Lavas, not to mention the ruins of Banedon's flying ship that can be seen just inside the walls of your fortifications. You easily make your way inside as Captain D'Val distracts Naar's forces, where you discover that both Banedon and Rimoah survived the crash of the skyship, although I am wondering what happened to the dwarven crew, as I don't believe their fate is ever mentioned? We even promise Banedon that we will replace his ship by gifting him the Cloud-dancer. (But is this even ours to give? I was under the impression it was constructed for us to use, but was not flat out just given to us. Mind you, we have saved the whole of Magnamund a few times over by this point, so I suppose it wouldn't be too much to ask!).
After a brief sequence that sees us help the defenders of the monastery stave off yet another attack from the besieging forces, we learn the location of the Shadow Gate from where these forces emanate, which just so happens to be but a short distance outside the monastery walls. Under cover of night, we sneak out alone to destroy this Shadow Gate, but in so doing we find ourselves unexpectedly thrown into the Shadow Gate itself before we can destroy it with our "bomb". Although come to think of it, maybe we should have been expecting this, as there was no way we were NOT going into this Shadow Gate right? Pleasantly, my usual disdain for entering these alternate dimensions was not an issue here for a few reasons. First, this sequence is not very long and does not require any sort of travel, you are tossed inside and must immediately get back out again. Second, this realm, with its endless lava fields, desolation, and extreme heat, is fitting in this case, because let's face it, this is supposed to be Hell and Naar is Magnamund's version of Satan right? This is also where the final confrontation of the adventure takes place, and where the Dragons from the title of the book finally come into play. I was going through this whole quest waiting for some Dragons to show up, and the whole time I was expecting them to be on the side of good, hopefully arriving just in time to aid us in the final defense of the monastery. ie. The "Dawn" of the Dragons meaning their return to Magnamund to help us defeat Naar over the last two books. Well, so much for that idea, as nothing could have been further from the truth. They are in fact under the command of Naar himself, and you must defeat the Dragon leader before you dive back through the Shadow Gate, where this time you successfully detonate your explosion, thus closing the Shadow Gate and defeating Naar's plans to destroy your reconstituted Kai order. While I usually give a lot of leeway in the form of artistic license when it comes to the titles of gamebooks and their covers, in this case it felt like one big tease, if not an outright "cheat", as the promised Dragons barely make an appearance.
Dragons or not, that was an enjoyable quest. However, it was not without its share of faults. Firstly, and this is strange to say seeing as how I like this adventure so much more than the previous one, but it didn't seem to me to be written quite as well as that last entry. Don't get me wrong, the writing is still rather good, however I wouldn't say its excellent like I did with that one, and at times it did feel somewhat rushed. Second, there were some noticeable "turn-to" stretches here that require nothing of the player, which isn't anything new for the series I suppose, so maybe I just need to take this aspect in stride. Third, and this was a problem in the latter half of the Magnakai series as well, but if you have played all the books up to this point, you will have acquired almost all of the available Disciplines (getting awarded a new one every book), so that the vast majority of all the various "Discipline checks" will become foregone conclusions, allowing you to bypass what for all you know could have been interesting situations with ease. Finally, and this one isn't really a criticism but more of a missed opportunity, is that a lot is made here about how you are rightfully in a great hurry to get back to the monastery before your Kai acolyte defenders are overrun by Naar's attacking forces, however there is no penalty at all from a gameplay perspective should you choose to "stop and smell the roses" as it were. I am usually against having time limits in gamebooks as I feel it discourages exploration, however considering the story here, I think a time limit could have been a great inclusion (if it was done right of course). If you needed to track how many days it took you to get back to the monastery, and did not make it back in time, this could have led to a great failure sequence where you return too late and find everyone slaughtered. Most importantly though, I think this could have been a brilliant way to add some difficulty to the adventure that would have existed for both new players and veterans alike, as for once your stats and equipment would not have mattered nearly as much as would finding that well hidden optimal path through the gamebook that allowed you to get back just in time to defeat Naar's forces. Ah well, maybe next time.
Ranking: One of the books in the series that has what I would call an "epic" feel to it. The wonderful overland journey with all the great callbacks to previous books really stood out as a positive, although you probably need to have played all the adventures preceding this one to get the most out of it. I have The Plague Lords of Ruel slightly ahead of this one, as I feel that book was a bit better written and had more of a unique plot. There really isn't all that much gameplay-wise in Dawn of the Dragons we haven't seen before, but what it did do it did very well. It was also too easy of an adventure for me to score much higher than this despite my enjoyment, but by this point I have come to the admission that the balancing of these books for both new and seasoned players is an unmitigated mess. Sadly, I feel there was a way around that this time if a time limit had been used which would have affected all levels of players equally, but that will have to remain wishful thinking. Bottom line, I think this is the second best of the Grand Master series so far. However, would I say that Dawn of the Dragons is a great gamebook? No, it doesn't ever seriously approach that level. Did I have a really fun time playing it though? Absolutely!
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19. Wolf's Bane - Score = 7.2 Tier = Good
Sections: 350
Attempts to Beat: 1
So maybe I shouldn't have re-rolled my stats before starting the Grand Master series after all? Because it seems like this is just the way I'm going to conclude this series now, with this being the second book in a row that only took me one attempt to get through. Mind you, had I not re-rolled for my stats, then I very well might not have made it past book 17, so perhaps it's a case of damned-if-you-do and damned-if-you-don't. Wolf's Bane certainly gets off on the right foot, at least briefly, when in the introduction we learn that 3 years have passed since the events of Dawn of the Dragons, in which time the Dark God Naar has retreated to his own Plane of Darkness in order to lick his wounds while our Lone Wolf character has continued to do what he does best, that is travelling far and wide across Magnamund helping various countries and cities with their problems. It is upon our return home to Sommerlund after one of these adventures where we immediately find ourselves arrested by our own people, and quickly the reason for this is established as apparently someone has been impersonating us in our absence, committing all kinds of murder and mayhem in the process. This is so obviously a ploy by the dark forces under Naar's command to discredit us that even though the imposter looks completely like us, I have a hard time believing anyone would not immediately know that this wasn't in fact the actual Lone Wolf. As it turns out, we are just as quickly revealed to be the true Lone Wolf thanks to Banedon's magic, and are then released from prison where we are sent towards the last place our evil doppleganger was seen, that being the city of Tyso. And thus, the adventure begins with us setting out to find and stop him from further besmirching our good name (oh, and to stop him from murdering anyone else as well of course). One thing to note is that all of this introduction is contained within "The Story so Far" section which is found at the front of all the books. This can be disconcerting, because if you have played all the books so far you would not think you would need to read this, but if you don't you will start off in section 1 having it make no sense at all and with you having no frigging clue as to what is going on!
Anyhow, you make your way to Tyso (by means of the flying ship.....naturally), where you track your imposter to an underground necropolis where he has taken refuge. There are a couple of different places you can enter the necropolis, but you will eventually catch up with your nemesis, who fittingly is going by the name "Wolf's Bane". He appears to be like you in every respect, except that he is absolutely evil to the core. Before the initial confrontation can really get going and you can learn anything from him, the both of you are thrown into a Shadow Gate (sigh), where the adventure continues on a different world. At this point, you can cue the Benny Hill music again, because from here right up until the endgame, the adventure becomes one long chase sequence. This actually isn't a bad idea though, and it helps to give the adventure a "freshness" from the usual style of quest. I only wish this had remained on Magnamund, because right from the moment we enter the Shadow Gate and emerge on a distant planet, things just get very weird. You first find yourself trapped within the confines of a giant flower, complete with humungous bees buzzing around trying to collect its pollen, and must find a way to escape. Cripes. How come Wolf's Bane didn't end up in here? Once you manage to overcome that, you continue the chase of your adversary, through caves, abandoned villages, and even some sort of futuristic warehouse patrolled by flamethrower-wielding guards (I think?), with the latter of these feeling really out of place, even for this strange planet.
Despite my not really enjoying the setting here, there was one aspect added to the chasing of Wolf's Bane that I found an interesting inclusion. As you are pursuing him, you are often asked if you want to take it slow lest you blunder into an ambush he has set for you, or throw caution to the wind and try to catch up to him as fast as you can. However, if you are too cautious, it may give him time to prepare a deadly trap for you. The adventure even lures you into taking the cautious approach early on when a devastating trap is discovered outside the necropolis in Tyso. Unfortunately I don't think this was used as often or as well as it could have been, as regardless of which approach I took, I didn't have any trouble overcoming the obstacles thrown at me. It was funny to note that when you speak to him earlier in the quest, Wolf's Bane appears to think you are not even in his league as a warrior, yet he then runs away from you every chance he gets. It becomes clearer near the end of the chase that he is not as convinced of the outcome of a fight between the two of you as he lets on, and the whole pursuit has been about wearing you down and leading you to Naar's sanctum before the inevitable battle (or perhaps he will get lucky and the planet you are on will do the job for him). You finally catch up to him of course, and are now ready to square off against him once and for all and obtain justice for all the innocents back on Magnamund that he has killed.
At this point, I thought this book was merely "Ok", but where the adventure really shines, and what helped pull it up a few notches for me, was the end game. First, you finally get to face off against Wolf's Bane inside a castle in the clouds, and it was immensely satisfying to finally take this arrogant prig down. What really stands out about this fight against him though is in how Joe Dever attempts to balance the combat for all players, both new and veteran, by telling you to fight against him at a Combat Ratio of -4 no matter what your stats or various bonuses may otherwise be. This is an interesting solution to the balancing issue that has been going on throughout these adventures, and at first I wondered why he hadn't been doing this all along. Then of course I quickly realized that giving the Combat Ratio you should use for every Combat would make all the equipment and experience you have been gathering this whole time completely meaningless. Heck, even rolling for your initial stats would be pointless (although I can't say I have a problem with that one in particular, as I have always felt that random character stat generation was a bad idea right from when I first played The Warlock of Firetop Mountain oh so many years ago, and it boggles my mind that it's still in use in Fighting Fantasy to this day). As it stands, I do think providing the Combat Ratio for you can work if its use is kept to a minimum and saved for special encounters such as this. You only need to fight Wolf's Bane until his Endurance is brought down to 10 points or lower, at which point the combat ends. With a Combat Ratio of -4, I thought this was a really nice balancing act that I was just able to beat on my first try. However, you are also told to set Wolf's Bane's Endurance score for the fight equal to what your own is at that moment, which brings about the completely silly and immersion breaking result of what happens should you enter this combat with an Endurance score of 10 or less yourself. I guess you just beat him without having to lift a finger? Thankfully because of my Curing ability I didn't have to worry about that situation, but for a player without that enhancement, this encounter could play out in a very odd manner.
Even after Wolf's Bane is defeated, you are not out of the woods yet, as Naar himself decides to finally take to the battle and confront you. It seems to me that when representing pure evil, you can decide to either make him an incredibly beautiful and angelic being, so that at first sight anyone would immediately want to follow him, or you could choose to make him the most grotesque creature that you can think of, perhaps something Lovecraftian in nature that instills paralyzing fear and disgust in anyone who so much as glimpses their being (although there is a famous expression about the "banality of evil", so maybe I don't know what the hell I'm talking about!) They definitely decided to go with the grotesque look for Naar, in this adventure at least, and I was really both impressed and disgusted by both his description and accompanying illustration. Well done there! You can't defeat a god in combat of course, so your only goal here is to escape through an open portal back to Magnamund before Naar or any of the minions he calls forth can kill you. Thankfully for us, our strange ally Alyss from The Legacy of Vashna shows up again to buy us some time so that we have a chance to do just that (and I hope this Alyss character will be explained further at some point), where we then successfully escape and complete the adventure. We are obviously no match for Naar himself, so I do have to admit to being incredibly intrigued about how we are going to defeat him in the final book of the series.
Maybe I just got lucky on my playthrough (or unlucky depending on how you look at it), but there was a surprising lack of combats in this book. I was very deep into the adventure before I encountered my first one, a tiger, and then nothing more until the very end sequence against Wolf's Bane and then Naar's minions immediately following. The challenge then apparently comes down to passing various dice checks, except that thanks to having almost all the Grand Master Disciplines by now, I was usually granted a bonus that allowed me to pass them. Even the odd one I did fail did not lead to instant death (shockingly), but instead an Endurance point loss. And even though these could be quite large losses, thanks to the overpowered Curing ability my character has, it wasn't nearly the obstacle I'm sure it was meant to be. The good news is that the writing once again returned to top notch form, which always helps in masking some of the faults of an adventure, even if only on a surface level. One thing I noticed when playing through the book though, and indeed the whole series so far, is that there sure are a lot of places and characters that have "an aura of evil" about them. So much so that I am starting to feel like I see evil in everything, much like Grandpa Simpson.....
Ranking: Unlike the previous adventure which felt like a comfortable chair that I enjoyed plopping down into, Wolf's Bane certainly tries to spruce things up with some new elements, with varying degrees of both commitment and success. The evil doppleganger isn't exactly the most original idea, and while I thought having the whole adventure being basically one long chase sequence was an interesting idea, it started to become repetitive at a certain point which only contributed to it wearing out its welcome sooner that I would have liked. Also, one of the best things the series has going for it is Magnumund itself, with its wonderful geography and with various nooks and crannies containing fascinating history and atmosphere, so that having almost the whole of this book taking place on a different and much less interesting world (in my opinion), acts as a not-insignificant detriment. For that reason, this adventure for me was on its way to a score in the high range of "OK", however the endgame really helped to bump up the score, and I thought it was one of the better ending sequences of the series. Overall I put this square in the middle of the 7 books of the Grand Master series I have played so far. One more to go! I am looking forward to seeing how this all wraps up.
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20. The Curse of Naar - Score = 6.3 Tier = OK
Sections: 350
Attempts to Beat: 2
Oh dear. Well, this wasn't the ending for the series I was hoping for, but it was the one I got nonetheless. This isn't to say The Curse of Naar is bad, as it is perfectly serviceable, but in both the Kai and Magnakai series I found the final books to be my favorite ones, so having the ending to the Grand Master series fall rather flat for me was a considerable disappointment. In my opinion, the adventure does not start off well at all, as it begins right where the previous adventure left off, as we materialize back on Magnamund having just dived through the Shadow Gate in Naar's throne room thanks to the sacrifice of the god-like character Alyss. At the end of that last adventure, we learned that Naar had somehow obtained the incredibly powerful Moonstone (an indeed legendary artefact), and was using it to open Shadow Gates at will and send his evil forces through to conquer Magnamund. This also explained why Alyss was willing to sacrifice herself, as she was trying to reclaim the Moonstone. Now that we are back on Magnamund, it is quickly determined by a council of the most powerful and respected people in the land that we must aid in the reclamation of the Moonstone at all costs, or else Magnamund will eventually be overrun (natch). We are thus tasked with returning to Naar's throne room and getting back the powerful artefact no matter what. So let me get this straight, the goal of this adventure is to return to the exact same room WE JUST LEFT! And it's not like many years have passed either, as we are in the process of making our way back to Magnamund from this very room right in section 1 of THIS adventure! To borrow a phrase from the 90's...that is wack!
Fortunately, there is a Shadow Gate located in the city of Toran (maintained by the forces of good) that we can use to travel back to Naar's dimension. Oh no! Yet another immediate trip off Magnamund so that we can travel through space and time? My expectations were now officially in the dumper at this point. Before we leave we are given The Tome of Darkness, which contains information that will allow us to progress back through Naar's dimension as it pertains to the various areas and obstacles we must overcome. The adventure then becomes a series of mini-quests where you need to figure out how to escape each of the different realms of Naar's domain in order to progress to the next, until you finally make it back to the throne room. Unofficially breaking down each of the areas you must pass through below:
The Realm of Nza'pok- My fears regarding leaving Magnamund again were actually allayed here, as this realm is a swampy jungle area that would be right at home in The Jungle of Horrors, which I think is one of the best books among the first 20 entries. The Tome of Darkness reveals to us the secret name that, if spoken at him, will freeze the evil ruler Nza'pok in place. The Tome also tells us that we will need to acquire a certain talisman that will allow us to leave his ream and proceed to the next, which he likely keeps on his person. We thus need to find him by exploring the swamp and jungle, avoiding the dangerous inhabitants along the way, before finally arriving at a remote village. Nza'pok himself is something of a Jabba the Hut-like creature and makes his appearance in this village, where we speak the secret name (at which point all his followers just scatter), grab the talisman from him, and proceed to the next realm. This all seemed rather easy to me, as just remembering the secret name from when you read it earlier in the adventure is the crux of what you need to do (and most seasoned gamebook players will have probably written it down). That said, I thought this realm was rather enjoyable, conjuring up feelings of playing some of the earlier books, and I would ultimately find it one of the better parts of the adventure.
The Realm of The Kunae - We continue on to the next area where the Tome reveals that this realm is ruled by the two Kunae, otherwise known as The Lords of Decay. We are once again given their secret names to "freeze" them, along with once again being told that a talisman is required to leave this realm. After a brief encounter with a wild beast guarding the entrance to the Kunae underground lair, we run into an old acquaintance from previous adventures, as our former enemy Arch Druid Cadak makes an appearance as a ghost. The book could have done something really cool here by trying to trick you into forgiving Cadak, except the first thing he says to you, with hatred in his eyes, is how he is now going to take his revenge upon you, ruining any surprise about what you should do next. We then arrive at the Hall of the Kunae, where the Lords of Decay sit on thrones resting atop a giant carcass. And yet again the book had an opportunity to do something interesting here, by having you need to determine which Lord of Decay was which in order to successfully freeze them, but it blows that as well by flat out handing you on a silver platter who was who. What a pity. Anyway, with another of Naar's overseers defeated and talisman claimed, we move on to the next realm. Despite my above issues, this was another rather good area of the book, with Dever doing a great job with the whole theme of decay, and at this point I thought this adventure might be headed for the Good tier. Oops.
The Realm of Zantaz - Here is where it starts to go downhill fast. This area is ruled by Zantaz, The Lord of the Pit, and did I miss something or is this realm incredibly short? You find yourself inside a mine, and immediately must avoid a fast-moving minecart. From there you almost immediately move on to face Zantaz himself who is guarding a bridge out of this realm, and that's it. No secret name, no talisman. Although you do actually have to fight for a change, but Zantaz really shouldn't pose much of a problem for experienced characters. This whole realm felt incredibly rushed, and I'm sorry to say this aspect didn't improve much over the rest of the adventure.
The Realm of the Wyrm - This realm is ruled by the dragon Huan'xhor, and is another one over rather quickly. Well, at least this area provides a couple of different routes to make it to Huan'xhor's tower, as you can either attempt to cross a well-guarded bridge or sneak into a cargo net that one of the Lavas is carrying, and have them you ferry you there. Both routes have dice checks to pass, and my one failure at the adventure came here where I rolled a 0 on two successive Discipline checks while trying the cargo net path (seriously, what are the odds of that?), which caused me to become overwhelmed by enemies, with not even a chance to fight my way out. Once you arrive at the tower, you need to make your way up to the roof where the talisman you need to exit this realm is located. How do you make it up there? Simple, just walk up the stairs. What happened here? The tower is completely empty with almost nothing to overcome. Maybe the most disappointing thing about this area is that you do not even need to confront Huan'xhor at all, you can just snatch the talisman from his nest and dive out the portal to the next realm. Weak.
The Realm of Shamath - Hey whaddya know, another visit to a chamber we have been in once before, as we find ourselves back in the same room where we defeated the Goddess Shamath back in The Legacy of Vashna. She is currently sitting on her throne when we arrive, plotting her revenge, and this is another really quick area, as we just need to find a way to sneak around her throne and escape through the portal located behind it. Honestly, this whole sequence just felt like an excuse to jam in more characters that were encountered in previous books, but hold on because I hadn't seen nothin yet when it comes to that!
The Realm of Avarvae - This realm is very weird, as it appears to be set in outer space, or at least on some sort of astral plane, and is ruled over by Avarvae the Tormentress (because you know, she likes to torment people). This realm also happens to be filled with the souls of those she is tormenting, and I need to stop right here because a question that has been bothering me since the end of the Magnakai series is finally answered, as we learn that one of those tormented souls happens to be Lord Paido! So he DID die then? I am just learning this now? My character acts like he knew this already, but I sure didn't. Paido isn't alone, as he is also accompanied by the tormented souls of two other characters from that series, Lord Adamas and Sebb Jarel! Jeesh, could we cram any more cameos into this adventure? Normally I find these callbacks very cool (such as the Roark encounter in Dawn of the Dragons), but jamming all 3 of these guys into this one spot smacks of the author trying to make sure absolutely everyone who played any kind of significant role in the earlier adventures gets a name drop. Anyway, we free all 3 of them from the torment, where their souls pass on to finally rest in peace. As for Avarvae herself, chalk up another area ruler that doesn't need to be defeated, as we can successfully pass a dice check to move on past her to the next realm.
Yes! Paido!
The Realm of Naar - Finally! We emerge here on The Plains of Despair, which we must cross to make it to Naar's tower. We then need to ascend his tower to make it back to his throne room (you know....the one we just left at the end of the last book). I have to say again, all of this felt extremely rushed. Making it across the Plains and up the tower was a breeze, presumably thanks to all the Disciplines and associated bonuses I now have, and flies by very quickly to boot. You would think climbing the tower would make for some interesting and drawn out stealth sequences, but nah, you got Assimilance? Then you good bro. One thing that really struck me as odd though, and that is to gain access to the tower you need to add up the 3 numbers found on the talismans you collected earlier, and then turn to the associated section. The odd part is that, as far as I understood, the acquisition of those talismans was required in order to leave the various realms, so is it even possible to get this far without all of them? Anyway, once you have proceeded up the tower, you enter the throne room to see that Alyss is still in fact alive, having been trapped inside some form of energy prison that is slowly draining her strength. Strangely, she still has the Moonstone with her (I guess Naar needs to kill her before he can take it?). Looks like you have arrived just in the nick of time then, but not so fast, as Naar calls forth his champion, Kekataag, who you must then defeat. Kekataag has some high stats indeed (Combat Skill-60 and Endurance-58), but thanks to the trusty Sommerswerd I was able to beat him on my first try at him. The final encounter with Naar though is really something else. And by "something else" I mean non-existent, as you don't battle him or vanquish him in any way. The Sommerswerd is able to free Alyss from her prison, and that's it, the two of you head out through the Shadow Gate again and you have won the adventure.
During the ending, Alyss gives you the Moonstone and sends you back to Magnamund. At this point, and considering this was the last book of the Grand Master series, I was expecting much more of a denouement. Hell you don't even see what happens when you arrive back in Toran, it's basically just "Congratulations! You saved the world! Thanks for playing!". That's seriously all I get? Man o man did the last half of this book feel rushed. I do have to give credit yet again though for the overall prose of the book, which is once more completely on point. That being said, this is easily one of the most anti-climactic endings to a gamebook series I have come across. What a let-down. One more thing I need to call out here. In the final section of the adventure you are told that Lone Wolf can finally achieve the rank of Kai Supreme Master. But hold on just a dang minute, as that situation should only occur if you have now obtained all the Disciplines, which means it could only be achieved by players who went through the whole series. Right? (Although Lone Wolf's quest to become the "pinnacle of Kai perfection" never felt very monk-like to me anyway).
Ranking: While the adventure was certainly well told (up until that ending at least) with writing that helped to elevate it, this was another situation that became a mirror experience to the book I played just before it. With Wolf's Bane, I thought the ending sequence really gave it a nice boost right when it needed it most. With The Curse of Naar though, after a good start in the first couple of realms, the adventure got worse as I went along before culminating in a hugely disappointing finale. I'm still rather stunned that this whole Grand Master series ended like that. On my winning playthrough I was also only required to fight 2 combats in the whole book (against Zantaz and then Kekataag), and by this point it seems like Dever all but gave up on trying to balance the combats, and turned to just using them sparingly instead. Being the last book in the series brings about certain expectations, and while not my least favorite book in the Grand Master series, The Curse of Naar slots into the bottom half of the rankings, and it's tough for me to feel like this wasn't a wasted opportunity to do something special. (Lone Wolf sacrificing himself at the end perhaps?). As I understand it, the next Lone Wolf book sees us playing as a new character, so I look forward to seeing the direction the next series takes. It seems like a golden opportunity to re-balance and freshen up the system, and maybe even overhaul it completely.
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Well, another Lone Wolf series in the books. Is it just me or does there seem to be a slight decrease in quality with each one? Actually, when I crunch the numbers I see that my average score for the Grand Master series is a bit higher than the Magnakai series, which is surprising to me because if you asked me to my face which series I preferred I would have answered Magnakai without much hesitation. (Looking at my scores, Castle Death and The Prisoners of Time dragged the score of the Magnakai series down more than I thought) To be fair, I think my perception of the decrease in quality is mostly due to the balancing issues of trying to make each adventure enjoyable for those for whom each book might be their first, along with those who may have played over a dozen of them by this point. The sheer weight of trying to balance all of this from a gameplay standpoint may have finally torn at the seams like a pair of tight fitting jeans.
On the subject of the game system, it feels like many elements are still here because they always have been and that's all. For example, I look back fondly at the backpack system from earlier books and wonder what has happened. In the Grand Master series we have been given 10 slots for our backpack in which to carry items, but I cannot recall one adventure when I even needed to carry close to that amount. I sometimes hear gamebook players decry an item hunt, or a required "shopping list" of items necessary to beat an adventure, however I think these are actually good things, as it provides a challenge to the book (ie. finding a list of ideally well hidden items) that is something other than just throwing a high-stat enemy at you and calling it a day. (Or even worse, one single do-or-die roll that must be passed).
Much has also been made elsewhere about the effect of the Sommerswerd and how it affects the balance of the adventures, and rightfully so. It seems like new powers and weapons were introduced for new players to make up for this, but this also contributes to Sommerswerd-wielders becoming even more powerful too. It also appears to be handled rather unevenly when it comes to The Plane of Darkness, as you are told more than once that using the Sommerswerd there will alert Naar to your presence, yet only at a few places does it come with this effect, and most times you will be using it as your regular weapon with no adverse consequences. However, the more I played through the Grand Master series, I realized that the real culprit when it came to balancing issues was in fact the Curing discipline. There are so many long stretches in the books with no combat, that allowing you to regain an Endurance point for every section means that you are at full power for almost every fight. For this reason, even more so than the Sommerswerd, I feel like Curing may have "broken" the system to a degree, and I would like at some point to try this series again without using that discipline to see how it changes the experience. I like to end on a positive though, and it must be said that the world building here by Joe Dever is still very impressive. The actual writing of the books also has gotten better with each series, and it has been quite enjoyable to watch Dever's growth as a writer over these 20 entries. I'm not sure he has much room left for improvement in the coming books, but even if he just maintains the writing standard of the Grand Master series, he already has a leg-up when it comes to quality of the adventures.
The idea of the higher starting stats was to compensate for new players lacking the equipment and disciplines from the previous books. I understand Dever purposefully didn't explain to new playershow Healing etc worked so they would be a bonus for veterans.
ReplyDeleteI think you made the right call to reroll your stats yet apply all the bonuses from previous books because the combats in this book are very unfair and that's true of the whole Grand Master series. Think I might do the same next time I play them.
I agree with your assessment of the book overall - great read, some replayability but it outstays its welcome and is too unforgiving.
You can actually meet a Cener Druid in Book 1 and Roark from Book 6 was a secret member. Some good world building from Dever.
I'm not sure how new players would be able to complete the book though without the Healing bonus? It's possible I guess, but man that would be one rough ride. And I am not sure what players who only played a couple of the previous books and wanted to bring over their character would do. It seems like in trying to balance the books for both new and old players, it is turning into a bit of a mess.
DeleteTotally agree on the world building, excellent stuff.
I've been looking forward to these reviews. I played through books 1-12 a few years ago and then did the first few Grand Master books, before having a child (in real life) and losing the Kai discipline of Sleep at Night made me stop.
ReplyDeleteI also remember the excellent writing in this one.
lol! Ok that is one Kai Discipline I don't think I could do without. Hopefully no encounters with a level 15 Poop-monster! Not having kids myself I have avoided that battle, otherwise I am not sure I would even have time for this blog.
DeleteWhen you take into account the Combat Skill bonuses provided by the Lore-Circles in the Magnakai books, a veteran's CS is effectively 1d10+15 rather than 1d10+10, but that still leaves a 10-point gain unaccounted for under the new rule for character creation.
ReplyDeleteOne noteworthy outcome of the lack of explanation of the Endurance recovery provided by Curing is that, while massively unlikely, it is theoretically possible for Lone Wolf to be killed by a thrown cabbage in one of the later Grand Master books.
I have often ranted about the final randomised chance of death in this book. While the melodramatic prose does help disguise it, that ending boils down to 'you save the world and a bridge falls on you', which has to be one of the most bathetic fates in all gamebooks.
I would like to piggyback on that rant, because that is the very same randomised death I fell victim to on 2 consecutive playthroughs. Considering how long it takes to get there, to say I was "irked" would be putting it mildly.
DeleteBook 14 has not started off well in that respect either. I have already failed my first 2 attempts due to a randomised death while trying to get into the citadel.
The bridge death in Plague Lords is more infamous but I died in that final roll in Captives way more! Very frustrating.
ReplyDeleteJoe Dever's approach to dungeon adventures is quite odd. Most gamebook dungeons describe every twist and turn while Dever's more 'You climb fifty flights of stairs, and explore forty-three rooms, killing seventeen giaks en route...' Not a bad approach per se but definitely unusual.
I have definitely noticed that and I am not mapping out his dungeons like I would in say, Fighting Fantasy (actually drawing out the layout of the dungeon), but rather by using a decision tree instead. I can only imagine how messy my maps would be!
DeleteA quick search on Ebay reveals this series to be quite pricey in the second hand market - par for the course these days for most vintage gamebooks.
ReplyDeleteIt also gave me a good look at the contents - a nice color map on the inside page and the black and white illustrations appear to be of a high standard although Gary Chalk had long been replaced as the regular artist.
Its a bit of a liberty to claim that this series had a ' unique ' gameplay system since SORCERY offered the same ' play one or all together ' option.
I bought the entire Grand Master series as a lot on eBay a few years ago now. I figured the price would only go up so grabbed them while I could. Thankfully at least with this series they can all be played for free online.
DeleteWise move, i just hope it didn't cost too much.
ReplyDeleteI would still prefer to read the actual game book rather than play it online.
As regards lengthy strings of sections with no player input, one of the worst offenders has to be the mini-adventure in issue 12 of Fighting Fantazine. I've yet to complete it, but based on the few attempts I've made, more than half the sections through which I passed only led to one other section, and once you take out the results of rolls and situations where what happens depends on what happened earlier, I'd estimate that less than a quarter of the sections end with actual decision-making.
ReplyDeleteAs for The Darke Crusade, I read it once in the 1990s, and participated in an online group playthrough over a decade ago, so memories are vague. All I really remember are the 'twist' where the villain beats you to the Doomstone, and (bizarrely) the crying Drakkar from somewhere in the endgame.
That one kind of sounds like someone took an existing short story and just chopped it up into sections? Maybe to meet a tight deadline? I kind of look forward to it now in a strange way just to experience it and see how blatant it is for myself.
DeleteI think I go against the grain when it comes The Darke Crusade which seems to have a pretty good reputation amongst fans. It's easily my least favourite Lone Wolf that I've read. I find the setting really dreary and miserable and bereft of meaningful decisions. At least with Plague Lords and Captives, there's some variety to be had on a retry if you get killed in those unfair instant deaths, but Crusade just means trudging through the exact same depressing locales all over again.
ReplyDeleteCompletely fair! It would be a boring world indeed if we all felt the same way about all the books. One thing about beating a book on the first try is that I am not always aware of how truly linear it may be (or not be).
DeleteIf you're playing the Red Fox edition, then don't feel bad that you couldn't solve Shamath's riddle. The general consensus among fans is Joe Dever messed up and forgot to include some vital information which rendered it unsolvable (although I have seen one argument that if you resolve the equation you are left with X=X and since X is the roman numeral for 10 which is the correct answer, maybe that was Dever's intention to reflect the deviousness of the demoness. Of course if you assign a different letter than X to your expression then that's not going to work!). Later editions added a fix.
ReplyDeleteI like this one more than you I think though that might be because of how much I dislike the previous book. It's nice to have a bit of variety in pathways for replays. I agree the last stretch is a slog though.
I think this book also has a fight with a drunk who's stronger than Darklord Gnaag.
Yes I am indeed playing the Red Fox editions of this series. Well, glad to know it wasn't just me who couldn't solve the riddle then! Seeing as how failure to solve it doesn't auto-lock you out of winning, I could even see the argument that this was done on purpose. Makes sense that the villain would cheat like that and give you an unsolvable riddle. Of course, the fact that later editions felt the need to fix it "puts paid" to that theory I guess. (To borrow another phrase Dever liked to use).
DeleteI think I missed that drunk fight!
IIRC (based on an online discussion I read over a decade ago, so I may be misremembering details), the ‘teenage girl’ is a character from the series of novels based on the Lone Wolf books. Despite the appearance, she’s actually some kind of divine being who’s been meddling in Lone Wolf’s affairs for a while, which could explain the punch. She’s also one of those characters that the author seems to love way, way more than the fandom do.
ReplyDeleteAh, so a character just this side of Jar Jar Binks then? Now I am curious if any of the novels are worth a read that might enrich the gamebooks.
DeleteIt's hilarious how gamebooks lie about how it is possible to win regardless of stats. Fighting Fantasy does it all the time, although it was true for some of Steve Jackson's earlier books.
ReplyDeleteThese later Lone Wolf books feel very disconnected and lack the overarching storyline of the earlier series, but at least it sounds as though the next book has some plot potential.
Yeah I wish they would just omit that statement altogether than lie about it. I get that it's probably just copy and pasted from book to book but I can't believe it would be that hard to just remove it.
DeleteI believe the Deathlord is an undead creature, as I think it was not only explained in the Magnamund Companion (an interesting supplement with mini Banedon adventure you should check out), but if a dude has a skull for a face, then that’s good enough for me—double damage, easier fight!
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely. And he has the word 'death' in his title, which is just asking for double damage.
DeleteI didn't know it at the time but it seems like you are correct and he is considered undead. I just figured you would have to be considered "alive" at some point so that you could then become dead....and then finally "undead"!
DeleteI've never gotten past this one. Good to know it's actually possible!
ReplyDeleteAlso well done on your 300th review!
I might not have either had I not re-rolled my stats at the beginning of this series!
DeleteAnd thanks Kieran, I am surprised I have lasted even this long!
Allow me to add my own congratulations - well done John !
ReplyDeleteThanks ed! Most appreciated!
DeleteBelated congratulations on your 300th review.
ReplyDeleteI don't know what it says about me that my principal memory of Dawn of the Dragons is that this is the book in which it is technically possible for Lone Wolf to be killed with a cabbage. For it to happen you'd need to be unaware of Healing-based Endurance recovery, to have been brought to the verge of death by preceding encounters, and to deliberately make what is fairly obviously a sub-optimal decision, but even so, the potential for having the many-times saviour of the world die because a snooty lady throws a cabbage at him is quite something.
I don't think I could even be mad in that scenario, honestly. That would be downright impressive. What a way to go out!
DeleteI feel like that my character dying in that manner would have stuck with me too! I can only imagine the surreal moment of "Wait......did that really just happen?" as you put the book down. I will have to see if I can find that section now.
DeleteAnd thank you very much for the congrats Ed!
ReplyDeleteThis series (books 13-20) does feel more like miscellaneous adventures, rather then a coherent story, but it will be interesting to see what the next books are like with a new character (I think they are still working on publishing the last book in the series?)
Looking forward to discovering which books you cover next!