I was just playing the Sega Master System version of Ultima 4, playing as a solo mage, and I got slept to death. It was a dungeon hallway fight with two reapers. I started the battle healthy, got put to sleep, and never woke up before dying. Has this happened to any of you?

Folks, this is why you mix some Energy spells ahead of time so you can poison yourself (which prevents enemies, but not sleep fields, from putting you to sleep).

(The SMS version is pretty faithful to the original; the major differences are that the conversation system has been modified (you now choose words from a menu and sometimes have to learn that you should ask someone about something before you do so), you can mix multiples of a spell like in Ultima 5, dungeon hallways are overhead view rather than first person, and attacks aren't limited to the cardinal directions.)

I believe this sort of thing can also happen in Ultima 5; if you don't believe me, just try to complete the game without using the crown. (Is the crown ever strictly required?)

For the curious, in the NES version of Ultima 4, sleep doesn't seem as bad, though it can still lead to a sleepy demise if you get unlucky (especially since you have to do the Abyss solo); however, the trick of poisoning yourself doesn't work there.

I have not encountered this in any other Ultima game, though I know for a fact it can't happen in Ultima 3 and earlier because there's no sleep effect (and no mechanic that would let you sleep, for that matter).

Hello there!
I did actually early in the game run into mages in Ultima 4 and have my team slept to death. That was when I was originally playing this game on either a TRS-80 or a color computer 2. This game was incidentally the first time I actually had to upgrade a computer as the water would appear red due to not having enough memory. I went from 128k memory to 256k memory.
(Maybe it was Ultima 5 where I had to upgrade? It has been a long time)

I remember the NES version of Ultima 4, which as I mentioned elsewhere is quite different from other versions (but still good), being my first exposure to the series. I later played Ultima 3 NES (but have never beaten that version), and my brother got Ultima 5 NES as a gift, which I didn't get to play because it had only one save slot. Of course, from watching Ultima 5 NES I could already tell that it was not good, unlike the other 2 NES games, and in fact that made me reluctant to try the DOS version when I got ahold of the Ultima Collection years later.

Of course, when I finally decided to try Ultima 5 DOS years later, I liked it, even though, like all Ultima games, there are some annoyances that I could have done without.

(Ultima 5 NES being bad isn't just my opinion; it is really objectively bad in many ways, to the point where I would put it at the same tier as games like ET and Superman 64.)

My first Ultima game was Ultima 3. It got me started although the one that blew me away was Ultima 4. I loved the fact that it was based around Virtue and the gameplay was all about that. I tried Ultima 3 again recently and I don't know but it just does not hold up like 4 or 5 does.

I still like Ultima 3. It has the best and most balanced class system in the series (though that isn't saying much), I like the focus on building up your characters (something that many more recent RPGs have de-emphasized), and I like being able to actually use magic, including weaker spells like Missile, without having to worry about reagents.

By the way, the NES version of Ultima 4 holds up pretty well; if you have the means, you should try it. NES Ultima 5, on the other hand, does not.

(I think I need to make a topic about the definitive versions of each Ultima; in fact, I'll do so right now.)

sleep is horrible
so many times it has wrecked my party in ultima 4 and ultima 5
( C64, DOS and GOG versions for me )

in all honesty i had never heard of the poison trick

Yeah, been slept to death more times than I like to admit in Ultima 4. Taught me a lot about the importance of (N)egate. Now I never go to a dungeon without it. Because Reapers suck. Balrons too, but you usually don't face an entire battle field full of Balrons.

And Gazers, whose sleep can't be stopped with the Negate spell.

Then again, Gazers can only put one character to sleep at a time, so they're not as dangerous unless you're going solo.

Then again, in the NES version, you're required to solo the final dungeon, so you do need to watch out. (It's interesting to note that enemy sleep spells may be the most random aspect of battles you need to worry about, as combat is significantly less random than in other versions.)

Gazers also have to be able to hit somebody to put them to sleep, so you can just have ranged characters hide in the back of the formation and kill the Gazers in perfect safety.

It's seriously almost exclusively Reapers who cause death by sleep in Ultima 4. At least in my experience.

In the NES version, hiding in the back won't help against Gazers, as ranged attacks in that version can target any opponent on the battlefield, and aren't affected by enemies or walls that are in the way. (It's one of the many differences between the NES and other versions.)

Also, have you tried soloing the dungeons?

Huh, I find it annoying enough that monsters can shoot diagonally in Ultima 4 and my party members cannot, I can't even imagine how frustrated I'd be if they could just arbitrarily target anything on the battlefield.

I have tried soloing dungeons. In fact, when I'm playing as I prefer, I tend to remain solo until I have become 8 parts Avatar, as controlling a big party is highly frustrating when you're just trying to get through the virtue grind. Only if I am playing a Fighter or Shepherd do I recruit a second character early - nearly always Jaana, since she has good magic and can use a bow. I have hated big group combat in Ultima 4 since I first played it back when it was shiny and now on my C-64 until I recently tried Xu4 with its ability to select an active character.

I've never done all my dungeoning solo, though, since I try to bring somebody who needs the experience and/or stat boosting magic balls once I'm really into plumbing the depths of Brittannia's dungeons. Just any early visits when I'm not yet ready for the final grind to prepare for the endgame.

NES Ultima 4 is at least fair in that regard; you can hit any enemy on the battlefield with ranged attacks just like enemies can. So while that Gazer could hit your characters in the back, at least you can hit the enemy back with your ranged weapons, even if the enemy is hiding behind walls or other enemies.

The Sega Master System, which is more faithful than the NES version, has a different approach; both you and the enemies can target any enemy within range, but shots are still blocked by walls or other targets. This sometimes means you can attack enemies that might not have originally been intended to be attacked, making certain rooms easier (but remember that this goes both ways).

Same here, though the NES version, which I grew up on, make group combat less annoying.
* You can only have 4 characters in the party at once, so the battles don't get too big. Also, encounters are limited to 8 enemies.
* Once you've killed all the enemies in the room, the game will leave battle mode, and you can now move around the room as though it were part of a town, making it easy to open chests and leave the room in the direction of your choice. (Exception: If the main character leaves the room during battle, the party will leave the room in that direction immediately after the last enemy is killed.)

I tried xu4, and the issue there is that enemies don't seem to do as much damage as they do in other versions. There's a difficulty setting, but all it does is that it makes it harder for your attacks to hit, which is one of the worst ways of increasing difficulty.

Does this forum even accept new posts?
Cant make it work.

EDIT: You can't post links. Got it.

You can't post links until you have gotten a few reputation points. I ran into that with my first post. I upvoted your post to give you a point toward that (don't remember exactly how many you need to post links, though).