(It’s a slow day, so you’re stuck with Mokor)
Subject: Mokor revealed…
Yes, Mokor is no mere wandering wannabe. He is the reincarnation of the great hero of yesteryear, Nerevar! It is his Destiny to unite the Three Houses and the Four Tribes against the final Foozle, Dagoth Ur.
Not only does Alma know this, she was once married to Nerevar (Mokor swears he must have been enchanted or six sheets to the wind at the time). She tells him about Trueflame, his great magic sword. The sword was broken in a terrific battle, and the pieces scattered. Now the time has come for Trueflame to be reforged (funny, this has a familiar ring to it. Speaking of rings, there will be more on that anon - the poetic anon, not the anonymous anon).
Alma has one piece that she generously hands over, leaving our hero to find the others. One happens to be in the possession of the Queen Mother (you remember, we saved her life somewhere back there). In gratitude, she gives it up.
[Actually no, I recalled that wrong. She just gave me a hint as to where I could find one of the pieces. There were three in all, not four.]
Remember the king’s champion? No? Well scroll back a bit and refresh your memory. He has a piece, too. And since Mokor beat the crap out of him, the Champ holds our boy in great respect, and promptly forks over his section (probably doesn’t want another beating).
The last piece is in the Museum of Artifacts. They don’t really know anything about the sword piece, but they do have some crappy old shield that probably isn’t an artifact. Poor workmanship, looks all wrong, they don’t even have it on display, they’re so embarrassed by it.
But they’re not willing to give it up. At least, not unless Mokor trades in two good artifacts. Two? For something they won’t even show the public? [grumble mutter]
So Mokor reads the Book of Artifacts, handily sitting on a table. Here we must digress a moment to mention that, from time to time, we have needed to consult various Tomes of Wisdom (also known as OPW, or Other Peoples’ Walkthrus). A wise move, indeed, for we learn that this Book of Artifacts is not entirely accurate.
A number of items listed won’t be accepted, while there are other items, not listed, that will be accepted. With this knowledge, I determine that Mokor has only one artifact to donate toward the sword piece (he should have had two, but the other is “unacceptable” though on the list, while the donatable one is of the working unlisted items).
Where to get another donation? Well, one ToW mentions going to the second floor of a certain house, talking to someone, then going to talk to someone else, then to some location, flooding some place or other, swimming up to….
` <--- The incantation to summon the Console of Godly Powers
player->additem dagger_fang_unique “1″ <— Divinely creates an item from nothing
` <— Dismisses the Console of Godly Powers
With all pieces in hand we dash to the forge of the great Orc smith (yeah, we’ll have no shoddy Elven workmanship here!). He says come back in a couple of days, so we find a quiet, convenient corner of the room, wait 48 hours, and VOILA! Trueflame is whole once more!
Except there’s no flame.
It’s a fabulous weapon (amazing damage for a one-hander), but…no flame.
“So whaddya want? I’m a smith, not a magician. But hey, if you could maybe find some old Dwarven book somewhere, maybe I could fix up a little heat”.
Where have we seen any old Dwarven books? Right, down that hole where we went to turn on the ash storms…
ok so i came to the party late
besides being some kind of turkish king running around in china OR some kind of cambodian dance just what in the HECK is Mokor????
Yeah Ag, very late. Why not browse back through the Mokor Letters category to the first post and be enlightened ;)
Man - why is it that artifacts are ALWAYS broken into pieces in these games?
I was going to have something like that in Frayed Knights - and make a joke out of it - but scope compression required that I shrink down the number of areas ‘n stuff. I may keep the joke, but have an artifact that was already assembled by unwitting adventurers who scoured the lands for pieces ahead of you.
why not the weapon still in one piece but it’s powers stripped by those that defeated it/weilder in battle.
thus to ‘re-assemble’ the power of the weapon the previous winners must be tracked down and vanquished so the weapon can re-absorb it’s powers?
works for me.
Hey Ag, nice idea. I don’t think I’ve come across that anytime in the past. Sure beats the old “pick up sticks”!
see the old dawg still has a few tricks left to teach you pupps
here is a slight twist to that which if done right could add some, always desireable, ‘replay’ option to the game.
have the tracking down method multi path. ie did i help NPC twinkletoes out to get the name of baddie 3, or did I slay twinkletoes and steal the crib nore, OR did i just stumble upon baddie 3. Thus the power applied or spell can be weak, neutral or strong Or even evil/not benefitial, good/helpful or just ho-hum.
so what you think?
i don’t recall seeing that type of game twist either - YET it is too simple not to have been done before.
next time willey coyote is over here flag him down and ask him - after all he’s the professional we are just mere players.
Hey Ag, you ever consider writing games? ;) Seriously, though, I like that one. Maybe Coyote will steal it for his Frayed Knights. Heh.
great, my xmas present to coyote.
I kinda like that idea. In fact, I like the idea a lot. It’s got a more natural / magical feel to it. Yet mechanically, it comes down to about the same thing as the “broken into X pieces” trope.
But I could also envision some kind of Highlander-esque Quickening taking place that way…
Might be a little late for FK (at least in this first incarnation), but there’s still a buncha design work being done on it. So who knows? And besides, do you really want such a great idea ruined by my dorky game? :)
well coyote, i am more of a programer or analyst so i can’t use it as you could.
why release the game while still dorky? since you have no marketting suits pushing you?
it is possible to make it either a weapon or casting item so mage or warrior path is likely. then you don’t need to start out with amensia but rather some normal fellow/gal fleeing the evil running rampant in former homeland.
while plowing up the field to plant new crop or dusting off the books ect in the small library a dull tinnish type OBVIOUS a child’s replica of the legendary ______ of ole is found. then as things slowly evolve, s/he becomes aware that NO it is in fact the REAL ____ of ole and starts off on his quest of rebuilding/restoring it to it’s former power so he can go save his homeland.
Hey Ag, maybe you could be a designer after all. Nice idea, and the library would be the perfect place. Player could be intrigued by the “toy” and maybe research it. Then go looking for the “real” one, and slowly learn the toy sword is IT. Hmmmmm.
well ‘it’ depowered-stripped of it’s awesomeness!
you know, ie a longsword +3 that has been stripped of it’s +3ness.
and NO memory lose, just your average run of the mill commoner who slowly is forced into the position of wanting to recover his former homestead ‘in the ole country’ s/he fled. and the adventures travelling back stiffen(empower) s/he to confront this terrible evil. ie M&M IV scorpia monster in hot pants.
That was M&M III, Ag ;)
Still, I like the idea. Maybe some game designer out there will grab it and make a good game (if you’re gonna make a bad game, leave the idea for someone else!).
I hate games with ‘destiny’ and ‘fate’ and reincarnation. It makes me feel like I ain’t in control. Techically I know I ain’t but leave me the illusion I am.
I once quit a pen & paper game because the DM did that. My dwarf cleric character was the first to be ‘revealed’ as the avatar or Clangidin or whatever. As soon as he finished describing the transformation and giving me my uber stats I told him my character slit his own throat in depression. When he said I couldn’t do that I handed him the character sheet and asked to role a new character. When he said no I told him to call when the campaign was over and I’d play the next one and walked out.
Don’t abuse my character with crap like fate and destiny and “chosen one” bull. I’ve stopped playing more computer games when that dialog came up than I can count. It’s almost as bad as the crappy ‘amnesia’ plot line.
BTW - That campaign I walked out on ended just 3 weeks later with a player revolt. Everyone realized they had no control and no say and were pawns of the DM. They all quit. So I got called up and told they were starting a new campaing and came back and happily rolled a new character.
Vag, I’m tired of that “chosen one” line, too. It’s not enough your character is the hero who saves the world. He/she has to be “extra special”, like the offspring of a god.
Of course, in mythology (especially Greek), there were heroes who did have a god as a parent. And people did believe in destiny, that the three Fates were weaving your life.
But we’ve had enough of that in games by now. Time for the designers to drop those and give us something new.
I want to see a “Life of Brian” like game. One where the character thinks they are chosen but they ain’t. It’s revealed their entire quest was a diversion for the real hero who thanks them for being a wanker at the end of the game. That would restore my faith in the gaming company who releases it.
Oh yea, I ain’t Greek. Greek mythology is nothing more than the superstitious beliefs of a dead civilization that managed to get passed down as material for bad hollywood movies. Kinda like that Beowulf story. Kinda like what will happen to America one day a few thousand years from now. All civilizations die from stagnation and corruption and/or war to be dug up and mis-interpreted by archeologist in the future.
I remember hearing about the difference between western mythology and fairy tales, and that was a key point. In myth, the hero is born to be a hero. In fairy tales, the hero starts comes from lowly, everyman beginnings.
I kinda prefer the fairy tales, really.
And the great quote by G.K. Chesterton: “Fairy tales do not tell children the dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children the dragons can be killed.”