Hello!

For the beginning, no questions, just some thoughts.

As far as I heard DQK is more difficult than CoK and DKK. I already know that some maps are more complex and enemy mages use protection spells.

Although, I can lower the difficulty (I play with the preset medium level) and I still have some margin as I found CoK (after some initial problems) overall easy to medium and DKK overall medium difficulty.

And I still have not used staffs, potions, necklaces, scrolls or "Haste". Just having the fighters attack with e.g. the necklaces of missiles in the first rounds instead of waiting for the monsters should make some difference, as should using "Fire Touch" more often, for example.

The Characters have 18 or 19 in the major stats (18/xx strength for the warriors plus strength increasing gear) and weapons of +4.

150 HP / -11 AC / level 14 knight (cut down from 154 HP in DKK after importing...)
140 HP / -10 AC / level 14 fighter
117 HP / -10 AC / level 13 fighter / 13 cleric - mostly for close combat, spellcasting mainly pre-battle buffing
117 HP / -08 AC / level 13 fighter / 13 cleric - mostly for spellcasting and second row archery (AC -5 with bow)
068 HP / -03 AC / level 14 mage (white)
068 HP / -03 AC / level 14 mage (red)

Leveling: very soon after the beginning (it might have been after one fight but definitely not more), the non-multiclass characters got level upgrades. So the knight is 15 and the fighter and both mages are 16. Strange, but I don't complain.

The difficulty reputation is earned, already the first battle is against three dragons. And then, in the caves there are multitudes of draconians.

Although: I try to be economical with the spells, even when I am able to rest. With more generous spellcasting, even a bunch of dragons or a draconians (of which the normal ones even don't have many hitpoints) are not that hard. So partly it was because of my defensive spell strategy. I changed that a bit, had no more problems and still had to rest only once in the caves. Still some reserves for future stronger monsters.

But what is it about the Auraks?

1. Goes mad - cannot be attacked (?)
2. Rises in new form - can still not be attacked (?)
3. Immolates - what the heck? Kind of like explodes?

And sometimes, my characters "get zapped" or stunned, is this from number 3?

And is there any chance I can see in which state they are, so I don't waste attacks or I am able to get away without being attacked?

The journal does not say anything about this.

The Adventurer's Journals in gold box give you kind of an overview of what monsters you will (probably) face, but they often aren't great with details. This is, as best I recall, is the deal with aurak death throes:

1. When you "kill" an aurak the first time, it "goes mad" or "goes berzerk" (I thought the games used the latter wording, but in any case...), it now attacks you solely with its claws, no spells or other attacks. You now have to kill it again.
2. When you kill the aurak a second time (this time more for real), it "rises in a new form." From what I recall of Dragonlance, this means it transforms into a ball of flame. This lasts a few rounds...(2 rounds, I think). You do not need to attack the aurak again.
3. In the mean time, anyone adjacent to the dying aurak ball of flame may take damage or (I guess) get stunned by the fire. That (I'm pretty sure) is what the "immolates" refers to. Effectively, the dying aurak is "flaming outwards" against those nearby.
4. When its time is up (after becoming a ball of flame), the aurak explodes, damaging everyone adjacent. Generally, after the aurak "arises in a new form," it is best to move all adjacent characters one square away from the dying aurak.

I'm not sure what you mean that the aurak "cannot be attacked" after being killed the first time. You are supposed to kill it twice and then move away before it explodes. At least, that is the usually recommended course for fighting auraks.

One more thing: after you complete the Draconian Caves, you will be entering an adventuring environment that is completely unique in gold box games. This environment has many unique rules which you will have to get used to to fight effectively there. I don't want to spoil what is coming up, but I can give you a primer on the rules in the next map area of the game, if you want.

Naulidis: very interesting and athmospheric indeed. I had no problems with the changes because of boots of speed, rings of free action and using lightning instead of fireballs.

Luminari: it is where I am now. The hintbook says it is safe to rest in the "eye of the vortex" but this is not true (safer than elsewhere, though).

Enemy mages: how to fight them? A walkthrough said "dispel magic" but it does not work. So far I just attack them and hope to hack away their images and not die from their automatic magic attacks. Darts of hornet's nest might help, apparently because they multiply on attack and get rid of the images in one round. But I only have five of them.

Are there many mages to come? There is no sense in not using the darts and still having them after the final battle, either. On the other hand, I might be able to buy more, depending on loot and whether the magic shops have them (although it is annoying that they don't stack. I already am overloaded although two of the fighters have STR 20+).

Helms and boots: non-magical ones don't have any use and I can throw them away, right? They at least do not lower the AC.

(Again) I have never played The Dark Queen of Krynn (twice tried to play Pools of Darkness, the Forgotten Realms game for equivalent level characters, but was never able to complete it and numerous sources have suggested to me that even it is somewhat easier than DQK, mostly due to a greater number of magic items), but I get the impression that "safer than elsewhere" may often be the best you can hope for when resting in this game.

I know DQK enemy mages come with numerous (or maybe MANY) prep spells ("buffs") already cast (and thus hardcoded). I have to admit I do not quite know how to deal with them. I know that many appear in the game (particularly in the Tower of Flame, where the game's climax essentially happens), so you should probably expect to deal with them throughout.

Being "overloaded" in gold box is (I think I talked about this once before) an effect both of carrying too much weight overall and of the number of entries on your item list (which I am discovering again now that I am replaying Pool of Radiance). Make sure you don't have too many items. It is unfortunate that most Gold Box games don't have vaults for your excess money and items. (As I recall, Secret of the Silver Blades does and the two Savage Frontier games do, all Forgotten Realms games. (Actually, the Savage Frontier games have the unusual feature of having a slightly tongue-in-cheek quest magic item that allows you to withdraw from any of three distantly spaced vaults, once you have the item.) Pools of Darkness sort of does, too (i.e. Elminster in Limbo) and this is vital given the game's "pools rule," but much of the time you have difficulty accessing him. I believe we already found that Death Knights of Krynn (which you already played) also has a vault, but it is not always conveniently located.

Non-magical boots and helms are only available in the later VGA gold box games. I do not know for sure if they have any effect (all classes other than single class magic-users can wear helms). They also appear in the Eye of the Beholder games, where they do not seem to do anything, but in the Baldur's Gate games (which are second edition, as is EOB) the game says that helms "protect against critical hits." I do not believe any gold box game has any critical hit rule, though (something that may not have officially existed in 1st edition).

(I do hope to complete Pools of Darkness and The Dark Queen of Krynn one day, though, maybe within the next year.)

One more thing: I would again strongly recommend Gold Box Companion for DQK. I would use the features I consider "cheating," such as instant healing or spell recovery, with caution, but there will be a point where basic services like training halls and item ID are no longer available and you will probably be very glad to have GBC then.

Enemy mages: I totally forgot that normal darts are also two attacks per round, so I might try them.

Mirror Image spell: sometimes when hitting a mage with arrows an image is gone with no damage and sometimes with some damage. I thought it just negates one image but maybe there also is a chance for damage. No complaints here as it benefits me, of course. Although, if I am not mistaken, at least once or twice an enemy mage did cast although he was damaged before.

Carrying: thanks for the hint. I assumed but only now did I check this - there are just 16 slots. Not too many, at least at this point - having gotten stuff from more than two games - those slots almost are just for the basic gear. For example, my knight has:

01 Solamnic Plate
02 Helm +2
03 Shield +4
04 Long Sword +4
05 Flail +4 (against skeletons and as a spare against baaz draconians)
06 Dragonlance
07 Mace of disruption
08 Ring of free action
09 Scroll of prot (bugged, see below)
10 Girdle of giant strength
11 Boots of speed
12 Ring of protection +2
13 Potion extra healing
14 Necklace of missiles

Not to mention the mages with all their spell scrolls and staffs.

Bug with the "scroll of prot dragon breath"

In the inventory, it is just "scroll of prot". Furthermore, it cannot be identified. And when using it, it works like an armour!

Must have happened while depositing it in the bank (just a short time for rearranging inventory). Already the bank in DKK was bugged - when I came back, the money was still there but the items were gone, instead there was an item roster like in a shop. So at least for DQK, I won't deposit vital stuff.

Fortunately, I have another savegame. Although, when using the scroll, the effect is not seen at "Encamp / Magic / Display". I hope that does not mean that it is not working, just it is no "normal" magic status.

Enemy Mages: Don't these mages already come with Protection from Normal Missiles? Your Darts of the Hornet's Nest might be a better bet.

Mirror Image: In 1st Edition, there is an equal chance when attacking a mage with Mirror Image up of striking one of the images or the actual mage. It's protection but not perfect, though I hear the spell is somewhat bugged, at least in the early gold box games. (Keep in mind that The Dark Queen of Krynn is the last true gold box game, as I define it.)

As for the concern about damaged mages casting anyway, it is very unclear in gold box when one round ends and the next round begins. My suspicion is that you had moved to a new round and the mage could cast again. Initiative is randomly determined in each round. It is not constant throughout a fight.

Carrying: You'll probably have to prioritize what you carry if you're concerned the vault is bugged.

I don't know what to say about this vault bug in Death Knights of Krynn. I was unaware of it. Just to be clear: Are you sure the scroll was originally a Scroll of Protection from Dragon Breath, and not simply a "Scroll of Protection?" (Mind you, I never heard of an item simply called "Scroll of Protection" in D&D.) I should also assume you know what you are talking about, so please don't take my question the wrong way.

Thank you for the hints!

Mages: good point that they might have "protection against normal missiles". I keep that in mind, if so, I have to start using the darts +3 or the hornets - it anyway makes no sense to save stuff and have them still after the final battle.

Scroll: yes, I am sure these were the Scrolls of Protection from Dragon Breath.

Beholders: another pain in the neck. So far, I just try to hack them down fast, hoping my saving throws don't fail. But it works okay, as long as there are two or three beholders at most and I can reach them.


Asking whether I am sure about the scroll: absolutely no problem, your question was polite and there is always the possibility that I am mistaken, of course.

I guess I may also make a suggestion: for me, topics are easier to read when quotations are only used for short passages and in case a) the reader would not know what the answer is about or b) the answer would not be comprehensible without the original passage, both maybe because the original was some posts ago.

No offense here too :o)

Unfortunately, I don't know how to "snip" (cut out sections from) my quotes, so I end up reprinting the entire thing.

As I said, I never heard of this "Scroll of Protection" bug; there may be places to ask around but I don't know where.

As for beholders, yes, they can be a pain. One thing about beholders: their deadliest eye beams only work at short range (about 4). If you move beyond that range, you will still be subject to some rather debilitating eye beams out to the end of medium range (about 10) but the beholder shouldn't be able to kill your characters instantly at that range. One idea is that you might be better off distancing yourself from the beholders somewhat and using ranged weapons. As you already know, they're immune to magic. Unfortunately, you can't backstab beholders (except that you don't have a thief anyway, so for your party it wouldn't matter). Now, THEY might be an enemy whom Darts of the Hornet's Nest would work very well against, provided a strong warrior-type throws it.

Word of caution: you may reach a point where you face more than three beholders at once. In Pools of Darkness, in the final fight against Gothmenes, the second wave features many beholders of various kinds, the standard type,as well as elder orbs and death tyrants. In The Dark Queen of Krynn, I would think the most likely place for this would be the Tower of Flame, again. (The final fight in the main game of Pools of Darkness is infamous for its near impossibility on any difficulty above novice and can be very frustrating even at that level of difficulty.) I had one thought about why your characters suddenly leveled up upon beginning The Dark Queen of Krynn. You may have hit the level caps in Death Knights of Krynn (I think those are about the level caps in that game) but had subsequently earned enough experience that you were able to level up right away in the next game.

You do realize that, by 1st edition rules, you may not go up by more than one level at a time. If you have enough experience for a level beyond that, your xp are removed to set you at one xp below the amount you need to gain the next level after you leveled up. That's why it's wise to hit a training hall as soon as you can once you're ready. (At least, it's not hard to gain one additional experience point for another level.)

Hm, I see, quoting seems to be only for the whole post, not for parts. Maybe no quoting, then? I know what you guys are refering to as long as it is not more than two or three posts prior.

Levels: yes, that should be it. Nice trom the game to not stop register the XP when the maximum limit is reached but kind of keeping it in store. And I think I read about "only one level at a time", but it was not really clear so far.

Beholders: thank you for the tip, one reason more to get more bows (although then even more taken inventory slots).

In the Kristophan tomb I encountered what I thought was the most difficult battle so far - the vampire mob. But I realized it was only difficult because I wanted to win without level drain. After quite some tries I gave up on that - I had a win with only the NPC (don't much care about him) and the red mage (does level fast already) drained, good enough. Although, after healing I realized they got all their XP back instead of just the amount that is needed for the level they were before (as we discussed before and would be the standard at least in some D&D editions).

High level spells: in this battle, I even could use "Power Word Stun / Kill" after thinking they would be immune to that because Vampires generally are quite powerful and immune to some spells. Actually, I often think what are the high level spells for when every second monster is immune to them?! On the other hand, also powerful monsters might have weaknesses, for example I read that dragons have bad saving throws so "Hold Monsters" and "Stinking Cloud" are often working - something I can only partly confirm. Also, "Summon Monsters" is not as helpful as I hoped because you cannot choose where they appear.

Also (again), you can use "Dispel Magic" not against "Mirror Image" but against "Fireshield" so the fighters can hack away the images. NIce to see kind of a learning curve - mostly I want to fight as I am used to but I should experiment more often.

You can actually adjust the quotes however you like, the same way as you can edit your reply. You can even fake quotes. The way quotes work is that they start with {quote_X} (in square brackets instead of curly brackets, where X is the post number in the current thread). The quotes end with {/quote} (in square brackets instead of curly brackets). So you can add a {/quote} (in square brackets instead of curly brackets) to end the quote early to add your comments. You can then add {quote_X} (in square brackets instead of curly brackets) to restart the quote. You can delete any other text you want to remove parts of the quote, or even change the text if you want.

So just make sure that everything you want to quote is inside the pair of {quote_X} (in square brackets instead of curly brackets) and {/quote} (in square brackets instead of curly brackets), and that all of your replies are outside of those pairs. If you're doing a lot of quote manipulation you will have to be careful there aren't any extra quote tags lying around, or it will mess up your post.

Actually, if you mess up and the pairs don't match up, it will look like your post is taking forever to post.

(A better solution would have been to have the forum display an error message in this situation.)
Why are you saying such nonsense?

(Note: This is intended a s a joke.)

Three new questions and some random chatting :o)

Potion of Haste: unlike the spell, this comes without aging, right? I tested it on the fighter and he got not older. Is the P&P effect of having to rest one round after the effect is gone implemented?

Enemy mages: against "Fire Shield", "Dispel Magic" works rather fine. Although, is there a chance it fails even though the game tells me "(vampire) mage is affected"? I feel like the fighters still "got zapped" after I dispelled. Or maybe I did not and was mistaken.

And I have to cast "Dispel Magic" before "Power Word: Stun" or "Silence" ;o)


Current progress: just arrived in New Aurim and I am curious for the game's first magic shop, so I brought all the money and a load of items to sell (that means the stuff that could be carried beside the "real" gear).

Man, was Hulderfolk Wood annoying. And the Luminari and tomb dungeons with their teleporters. So far, DQK won't become my favorite part of the series (I played CoK and DKK prior).

Staffs: I have two of each kind and did not use them until now as I wanted to withhold them for hard battles (or multiple ones if resting is limited). But - argh, I noticed they don't do much damage. although it might be obvious because they are from the CoK and DKK and they are not linked to the mage level. But maybe not completely useless, if I can use them for preventing enemy casting and save spell slots in the process.

Also, I was very cautious with arrows +2 but now, about halfway in the game, I might as well use them (depends a bit on whether they sell magic arrows in town).

Hey again. 01kipper, thanks for the help with quotes. I get your point about fake quotes, but I would never do that. (Not to moralize, but the world has enough trouble with that kind of dishonesty, although it's usually pretty trivial here.)

Yes, dtgreene, I have had that problem

Back to Britannia47:

Interesting about level drain from the vampires in The Tombs or, more specifically, the effects of Restoration in this game. I had always thought gold box games only restores you to the minimum xp. It should be noted that The Dark Queen of Krynn is (again) the last gold box game and may have implemented better features than could be found in the older games, such as the ability to exactly save your lost xp. (I'm just guessing here.)

There are a lot of spells in the game and I don't know enough to offer advice on every one. I will say that undead (all undead) are immune to all sleep, charm, and hold spells (meaning spells that have those specific words in their names) but are not usually immune to moist other spells. Liches may have good magic resistance, or even be immune to much, but I'm not sure. I think undead are also immune to cold damage in 2nd edition, but I don't think that is true in 1st edition.

As I understand it, the basic rule for Dispel Magic in gold box is that it will dispel spells that are cast during the fight but is helpless against spells that enemy units start with in combat. The latter are considered "hardcoded" and thus treated as an inherent part of the enemy. Hardcoded spells have to worked around. I am still not clear if the enemy mages you are talking about cast Fire Shield early in combat and started combat with it already up.

You should also note that Dispel Magic can fail; it has a random percentage chance of this. This chance, however, is relative to the comparative levels of the original caster of the magic and the caster of the dispel. At your levels in this game, it may be that Dispel Magic will work more often than not.

I'm not sure why you have to cast Dispel Magic before spells like Power Word, Stun or Silence 15' Radius. One thing I'm wondering now is whether it IS possible to dispel pre-existing spells in TDQK, possibly do to it being a late game again. My knowledge of pre-existing "buff" spells comes from Curse of the Azure Bonds, where hardcoded spells cannot be dispelled.

Yes, I can see how Hulderfolk Wood, Luminari, and The Tombs could be frustrating. You know, if you get too frustrated, the Clue Book can help. (I, personally, have read all the gold box clue books many times. I actually don't find that ruins my enjoyment of the games, at least for these games, considering how hard they can be.)

Good idea with the staffs and disruption. I think you mentioned earlier about monster immunity to spells. If you have a particular question, I can try to look it up for you, if you don't want to do it for yourself. (I don't know anything about dragons having poor saving throws. That idea comes as something of a surprise to me.)

Because of this level dependence, it can be useful to have a fast leveling character that can cast this spell. In this game, it looks like Red Mages need the fewest XP per level after a certain point (fewer than clerics, interestingly enough), and therefore may be the best a t dispelling and other level-dependent spells later in the game. In Forgotten Realms SSI games, this would be Clerics, I believe, while in some later games, Bards end up being the best at this. (Note that this only applies to 1e and 2e based games; later editions gave everyone the same XP table regardless of class.)