Well the game Ive wasted much time on is here. Avadon is here and I have the right to speak my mind on a few things.

First things first, this is the only spiderweb game where melee is not as useful as before. Unlike in Geneforge and Avernum, melee is best used as a defense. This is not to say it is useless but as you will find out, it is not as useful.

Next, what are useful forms of combat. I will tell you right away, missile weapons are one and Magic is another. Everyone has missile weapons experience even the shaman who I found a way through the game can use her javelins to great extent.

Magic is good for a shaman and sorceress but damage-wise, the shadowalker and blademaster are able to do more damage with their aoe attacks.

Another thing-This is a much more tactical game than Avernum. Positioning yourself in the beginning of a fight is crucial to getting a few extra shots off with missile weapons. Ranged weapons are excellent in this game and you can take down enemies health by quite a bit before melee comes together.

Also, dont forget the most crucial tactic-almost always engage enemies with one melee character when it comes to melee. This is good as it saves your other allies from damage which means alot when it comes to not having to heal in between.

As far as leveling goes, I find that you can either do a number of things or one thing. The one thing I usually do is getting up to use my character's first area of effect attack. This is important so I usually go with the left column and then the middle a bit. I dont usually go with the right side, but If I do, then I skip a few of the middle column abilities to swap for the right.

The good thing about the right column is that they are usually extremely helpful abilities. I would definitely recommend getting the right column to at least lvl 3 on all abilities for shadowwalkers. Shadowstep is very useful for that character and the focus is great too.

Blademasters usually want to focus alot on the middle column so they get a high parry/elemental resistances.

Best statistic-Dexterity followed by endurance or dexterity and intelligence for mages out there. Dont worry about strength as you will get gemstones to enhance it if you will.

Lastly, specialization is very important as there are usually 2 paths you can go. Battle offers the most damage with your attacks be it aoe or not. Every lvl after you max out at 8 is another 4 damage levels for every power specialization. That means that with 3 specialization levels that equals 12 levels of damage or 12-48 for ranged weapons. Thats a nice amount of damage if you ask me.

However, you can also specialize in power (middle column) for greater defense from resistances and also a few 5% weapon damages for shadowwalker and blademaster. That means that you will get 15% extra damage with ranged weapons which although isnt as much damage as battle, you will still get more defensive abilities to go with that. That could mean that your blademaster gets 12% extra parry chance, extra resistance, extra health, etc. You get the idea.

So basically power is balanced and battle is offense. I would not recommend going with the right column regardless.

Finally, dont get all pepped up and shot down because you fear you cant make it to the 4th tier abilities. Those abilities are not as worth your time as you may think. A specialized character that is using tier 1-3 abilities can be lethal as well.

I almost forgot to mention this. There are 2 endings for the game. But likely, most of us will only get to complete one of them. Its not so much that its hard to get to, its moreso that the likelihood of getting through the fight in 2 hours is possible. Its been called the hardest fight in spiderweb history for a reason. Some people that hacked the game still have a tough time with it, you get the idea. Thats all Im giving away, YOU WERE WARNED...

I JUST finished the last fight ten minutes ago and it was indeed a though one!
Took me just under an hour (50 something minutes) on my third try on normal.

Total play time: 42 hours.

Yeah it gets pretty hard. That game is one of my favorite games and my favorite party based rpg. I really like the fact that jeff took a different approach to the genre, making ranged weapons key to success instead of melee like every other d and d game. Every once in a while I like to think what he will think up for next series :)

*vigorously takes notes*

Might not happen for awhile, I am still working on Avernum 4.

Oh and I forgot to add, for those of you who are really good at his previous games, Hard or torment might be a lot of fun and a good choice. Normal is a little easy, but whats cool is that jeff states that if you want to take it on hard/torment, the enemies unlike previous games, have special abilities that make the fight harder. Its kind of cool and makes fighting red beard almost unimaginable.

Friggin awesome man. Avadon 2 is adding a new class. A razordisk wielding, turret creating tank. This game will be even better 1. 2-3 different endings is cool too and ability to join up to 5 new hands. Anyone that is fans of baldurs gate will love this shit.

So is Avadon even better than Avernum 6 (which I am greatly enjoying so far)?

I feel sad that the games don't have the overmap, but you work with what you have.

It depends. Avadon and all games made after (Avernum EFTP), use a system that is basically what I like to call overclass. Every level your stats go up by 1 starting with strength and going all the way to endurance and then back to the beginning. What this means is that in these games your stats matter just as much if not much more than your skills. You are mostly fighting to gain levels so you can overclass your enemies with higher stats in everything. You dont have as much freedom in beginning as previous games but you will ultimately have more freedom in the long run as you will gain more skills/stats overall.

Because you also gain 2 skill points every lvl, this allows for a heck of a lot more ways to make your character. So for example, in EFTP Avernum, you can specialze in strength and make a brutish fighter with strength every lvl except every 6th or 7th level in endurance. Or make a barbarian with endurance every 4th lvl. Or you can make a rogueish fighter with strength and dexterity and evade most attacks, or strength and intelligence for a bard. This is just stats. Then there are skills which can be modified and then traits which shape your character even more.

Basically, freedom is much more in the newer games overall as there are less ways of making completely terrible characters.

Where the heck are all the Avadon fans? I know I favor Avernum but this game is still an awesome and extremely fun game to play. Its got a great story and Im just surprised that there aren't many topics compared to Avernum and Geneforge. Oh well.

I avoided Avadon for a long time due to personal preferences (to give you an idea as far as Spiderweb games go I prefer Blades of Exile, then Exile 3, then the better Avernums ('Blades of...' and Avernum 5 & 6) and Geneforges and lastly the Avernum 2 & 3 remakes of the Exile games) but since it was only a few dollars for me just now to complete the RPG bundle (with Avadon being the only game I needed) I went ahead and got it. Can't say when I will actually get around to investing serious play time into it though as I would still rather play BoE scenarios and such.

To me the warnings about this 'final battle' being so difficult, while I don't deny this of course as I have not played it yet, as a veteran of Nahlakh I laugh at the warning. I never finished Nahlakh and as any old school CRPGer will agree, there is no shame in that. Nahlakh is the last word in difficulty for CRPGs.

Well, there's only one Avadon (so far), compared with six Avernum games (plus Blades of Avernum) and five Geneforge games. Then there's the fact that those are older so more people have had a chance to play through them. I quite liked the Avernum and Geneforge series, although I haven't played all the games in either of them, but I simply haven't gotten to Avadon yet.

I dunno...i never finish Spiderweb games though i have bought about 6 of them....I played Avadon to the point of the final battle (I think!)...but it seems pretty hopless...just not set up for it...I always get the feeling that i am playing Jeff's games "wrong"....i make the "wrong" choices and end up @#$%ed.

What games have you played? Private message me and I can help you with the games I know. If you are referring to the Redbeard battle in Avadon 1, its fucking impossible almost. The moderators on the team have called that the worst/hardest fight in spiderweb history. Its not that the game is broken but moreso that Redbeard is in his highest point in that game and it tries to show that by making him a formidable foe.

Im decent/pretty good at the games but going against red beard in that game is too much for me. Miranda is a more worthy foe anyway as she is causing all of the problems in the game. Fight against her and you not only get a better ending but a chance to kill tarkus as well. Im pretty decent at Avadon which is more than I can say about other games jeff makes. Let me know what you have problems with. Most problems are from character building and strategy.

Pardon the 2 year necro, but I'm playing Avadon 1 right now & having a great time doing so. I hadn't even looked at this topic until just now, but I'm somewhat fascinated at your suggestion of different builds for the fighter-types. I have no idea if I'm 1/4, 1/2, or even 3/4 of the way through the game yet, but I feel like I'm pretty well into it.

For my blademaster, I've been pumping nearly all my skill points into Strength (which is now close to 30), with just a comparative few in Dex and Endurance (both around 10, I think). The Dex seems to be enough to go before most enemies during combat, he rarely goes down during a fight, and he's dealing a lot of damage.

My shadowalker is nearly the same, but with a little more Dex (around 12).

My spellcasters are the same as my blademaster, I just switch Intelligence for Strength.

All party members seem to (usually) go before enemies during that first round of combat, and it's rare one of us goes down (although it does happen on occasion). I've only had a TPK...I wanna say 2, maybe 3 times. I play on Normal, but those 2 or 3 TPKs were definitely difficult combats.

I suppose if I were using any kind of "strategy" in leveling up my skills, I'd say its a matter of pumping Strength for fighters & Intelligence for spellcasters, occasionally raising Dex if I notice enemies are starting to go first....and throwing some Endurance in there too, so as not to neglect it altogether.