FMs - Ghost/Perfect Thief Results (Part 7)
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25th Jan 2010, 02:42 #151
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Report #3 of 7
FM: Bad Intentions [Thief
Anniversary Contest]
Ghost - Success
Perfect Thief - Success
Supreme Ghost - Failed
Perfect Supreme - Failed
Time - 23:27
Loot - 2700 out of 2700
Pockets Picked - 2/3
Locks Picked - 3
Backstabs - 0, Knockouts
- 0
Damage dealt - 0, Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0, Kills
- 0, Bodies Discovered - 0
Secrets Found - None
Consumables - None
See the entire report
with screenshots here (FMs).
Loot list here.
Comments:
My third 10th Anniversary
mission was ‘Bad Intentions’. The objectives this time were to enter Lord
Jonstone’s manor and steal his precious gem ring. 2,500 was the required loot
amount, and the objectives already demanded Ghosting procedures. In addition, I
had to find a way to make Jonstone unsuspicious of me.
The first stop of trouble
was passing the guarded storage room in the basement. The door in the opposite
corner led to the 1st floor, so there was no way around it. A patrolling
swordsman from the hallway had this room as part of his route also, making it
even tougher (see image below).
For plain Ghost it wasn’t
a problem, but eliminating all comments without dousing either of the two
torches was a pain. The sentry had three facing angles, and turned quite
frequently. As I entered he was facing away, and I snuck towards the dark nook
with the barrels on my right, hoping he would stay turned. After about 10-12
tries he finally stayed turned long enough. Reaching the door to the stairs was
easier, as I could move swifter without getting spotted. The key from the
patrolling guard disappeared upon use. After all the hard work passing the
basement unseen, I found it very anticlimactic to bust Supreme in the first
room of the next floor. A lady servant stood her ground in the kitchen,
immediately commenting on the basement door opening. Frustrating, but
inevitable.
I moved my way upwards
without further problems. The mission design was ok, but lacked some detail to
pass for a realistic manor. By far the prettiest area was the living room on
the second floor (see image). The girl here had a longer patrol route going
back and forth from the downstairs kitchen.
Lord Jonstone’s loot was
hidden behind one of his bedroom paintings. Cleverly, there was a hidden switch
within this secret nook (see image below).
It opened a crawlspace
behind the dresser with information on his stolen gem. This spawned some items
in the downstairs study, including a money box unlockable with the well-hidden
key from the attic (see image). This was the only key that could be replaced,
so I made my way back up one last time to cover my tracks. Had to drop the
confession note onto Jonstone’s nightstand anyway.
Passing the basement
storage room to exit the mission wasn’t as hard as before. The kitchen lady
still gave a comment when I descended the stairs though. Overall, a decent
contest mission.
Notes & Busts:
- Got a comment from the
old lady servant in the kitchen when opening the basement door. Had to return to
the basement later also. These two comments busted Supreme in the end.
- The body discovered is
probably from the mage fight at the end. But I was long gone before they even
showed up.
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25th Jan 2010, 02:49 #152
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Report #4 of 7
FM: The Homeless Dude
[Thief Anniversary Contest]
Ghost - Success
Perfect Thief - Success
Supreme Ghost - Failed
Perfect Supreme - Failed
Time - 17:57
Loot - 1223 out of 1223
Pockets Picked - 1/3
Locks Picked - 3
Backstabs - 0, Knockouts
- 0
Damage dealt - 0, Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0, Kills -
0, Bodies Discovered - 0
Secrets Found - None
Consumables - None
See the entire report
with screenshots here (FMs).
Loot list here.
Comments:
My run through the Thief
Anniversay Contest had come to ‘The Homeless Dude’. It was undoubtedly the
shortest entry so far, but not the worst by a long shot. My objectives read as
follows: steal a weapon from the store, aquire 1,000 in loot, and obtain the
Serpentile Torc.
I started in the streets
close to the store. I could reach the blackjack by standing on top of the
lamppost base timing the guard’s patrol. The first real challenge came in the
sewers, when needing to pass two stationary spiders. Most players know that
spiders see with their rear ends, so the exiting tunnel was well-covered by one
of the critters. I found one way to stick to the shadows without causing any
alerts (see images below).
I hopped across the lit
gap and landed silently on the sloped piping foundation. From here I could
creep along the path as shown, without getting spotted. The side of the tunnel
closest to the spider was dark all across.
The rest was standard
Ghosting. Dodged the patrolling archer when he made his turn, lifting his purse
in the process. The guard in the store basement had a short, but annoying
route. I had to enter the bedroom to get the key, unlock the front door
upstairs, then come back down to replace the key (and pick the safe). A little
tedious, but all in a day’s work.
Unfortunately, picking
the door to the house across the street alerted the thief inside. The guard
also commented unless I waited for him to move away, but the thief’s mumbling
could not be avoided. Supreme busted there I’m afraid. The thief further
commented on opening the bedroom door, and again when picking the footlocker
with the torc. The guard in the streets also heard this, although I can’t
imagine how. A short mission, but with several fun and challenging situations.
Oh and the mission
wouldn’t end after taking the Serpentile Torc. Something is messed up with the
objectives, so I just ctrl+shift+alt+ended it to get the stats.
Notes & Busts:
- The thief in the house
across the street from the store commented on me picking the front door,
opening the bedroom door and picking the bedroom footlocker. The latter was also
commented on by the guard patrolling the streets. Supreme busts.
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25th Jan 2010, 02:54 #153
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Report #5 of 7
FM: Falling Down [Thief
Anniversary Contest]
Ghost - Success
Perfect Thief - Failed
Supreme Ghost - Not
Attempted
Perfect Supreme - Not
Attempted
Time - 16:51
Loot - 400 out of 420
Pockets Picked - None
Locks Picked - 3
Backstabs - 0, Knockouts
- 0
Damage dealt - 0, Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0, Kills
- 0, Bodies Discovered - 0
Secrets Found - 1/0?
Consumables - 1 Moss
Arrow (coffin at start)
See the entire report with
screenshots here (FMs).
Loot list here.
Comments:
Perhaps the most unique
mission of the bunch; in a good way! The initial objectives didn’t reveal much
of the story. In fact, the mission as a whole didn’t provide much of a story at
all, which was kind of a downer. From the start I had to avoid any “unwanted
delays”, whatever that meant. No knockouts or kills either. Didn’t go for
Supreme in this one, only plain Ghost.
Ghosting challenges
started right off the bat though. Plunging down the grotto I somehow managed to
step onto a ledge right above the coffin. I can’t give a proper how-to, as it
was sort of a fluke, but it kept me from losing health. I repeated the move
several times. Falling from this height made me break the coffin and alert the nearby
crayman to hunt mode. Actually it wasn’t the break but the skeletal remains
dropping to the ground that alerted him. I circumvented this by mossing the
coffin from the ledge first (see image below).
The situation was now
deemed an unwanted delay, so that objective got marked red. Instead I had to
find my way out of the cave system. There was also an optional objective of
getting all the loot.
Found I could sprint out
the first cave without getting spotted by the crayman (the one that alerted
from the coffin breaking). He gave a high-pitched chirp indicating a first
alert, but that was allowed. The spider nearby had a rather peculiar patrol
route, involving a leap and some on-the-dime rotation. I could grab the loot
inside its cave quite easily. Inched back behind the sentry to reach the caves
above. Had to dodge a mushroom-carrying patroller to reach a narrow side cave
with a dead beast. It had a retrievable claw stuck in its belly (see image).
Figured it’d have some purpose later.
Had no further problems
until reaching the top cave, past the idol worshiper. A beast patrolled a
partially flooded area with bottles dropping from the surface. I could hear the
culprit above. Two pieces of loot lay in the pool, but I couldn’t get to them
without alerting the crayman. His patrol was so short he heard me wading in.
Initially I thought he might have alerted to the falling debris only, but after
waiting him out and trying to go for the loot again I still found it impossible
without further alerts. He might have been more on edge after all the rattle.
The coin and the fine wine were therefore skipped. Only 20 loot so no biggie,
but the optional objective was screwed.
This meant I couldn’t get
the doorknob from above either. The traditional way out by means of the gate
was thereby out of the question. Had to get the necklace from the deposit box
by means of the idol below (see image). A rather funny situation indeed. The
creatures nearby went haywire, but I figured it was ok since they alerted to
the crayman’s actions, not mine. If people want to deem this a bust that’s ok.
I finished the mission both with and without the necklace anyway. The stats
would be the same, only 125 gold less.
Took a while for me to
find the hidden exit. There is no hint regarding its location (or existence)
anywhere in the mission, at least not that I found. I was pretty sure it
involved the claw, and after some thorough searching I cashed out, no pun
intended (see image below). Fun mission!
Notes & Busts:
- Had to skip two pieces of
loot from the flooded area in the topmost cave. The crayman alerted when wading
in to grab the loot.
- Making the crayman
break the deposit box to retrieve the necklace inside alerted the beasts below.
I accepted this as it was the crayman’s doing, but I finished the mission
without too, just to be safe.
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25th Jan 2010, 02:59 #154
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Report #6 of 7
FM: The Kindred Vault
[Thief Anniversary Contest]
Ghost - Success
Perfect Thief - Failed
Supreme Ghost - Not
Attempted
Perfect Supreme - Not
Attempted
Time - 39:06
Loot - 1575 out of 1675
Pockets Picked - 0/2
Locks Picked - 3
Backstabs - 0, Knockouts
- 0
Damage dealt - 0, Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0, Kills
- 0, Bodies Discovered - 0
Secrets Found - None
Consumables - None
See the entire report
with screenshots here (FMs).
Loot list here.
Comments:
My sixth mission in the
anniversary contest was up. I was to break into a haunted crypt situated
outside of town. During the night I needed to obtain 1,500 in loot and an
invisibility ring. I hadn’t robbed the dead for a while, so this could be a
good one. Supreme was way out of reach, so I kept it to plain Ghost.
Top crypts
The initial burricks were
easy to dodge. Found some hidden artifacts in a compartment by the double
doors. Took my way into the crypt by way of a hidden lever under the brazier.
The rolled up rug spawned a spitfire trap, but that is allowed in Ghost. I
ascended into the depths.
A zombie and a mummy were
my only concern in the main part of the crypt (see image). Smaller chambers
were spread around a central foyer. The two patrollers had predictable routes,
and waiting them out usually provided small windows of opportunity for safe
movement. The middle of the room was dark, despite the four surrounding
torches. The side chambers has light sensors that triggered on entry. The
doorways however was dark and I could reach most of the stuff leaning in.
Snuck upstairs to grab
the second keystone. These unlocked floating bridgeways accessing the eastern
area of the upper floor. Two cages had floor panels outside the gates. I could
leap by without spiringing any traps. The loot in one of the cages also sprung
a gas trap, but I got out of there in time. Supreme wouldn’t have been close to
the loot requirement due to all of the traps. Two tiny gems were hidden in plain
sight in one of the wall paintings (see image).
After using the pagan
keystone I got access to the last caged chamber upstairs. Taking the mask here
set off a fire arrow that alerted both of the patrolling undeads. Needed to
skip it to keep Ghost intact. Perfect Thief was thus unattainable, but it
cannot have been intended from the author’s side either.
The deeper the better
The last gate downstairs
was now open. It gave me access to the tombs below. The innermost chamber held the
final casket with the invisibility ring. When opening the lid, three zombies
were set loose to patrol around the floor. They all gave a growl initially, but
I think that was part of the trigger, as I was totally out of sight. They never
went into hunt mode as far as I could see. I could wait in the dark hall until
they passed (see image below).
There was a ‘master key’
in the casket also, but it didn’t unlock anything that I could find, so I left
it. I always try to replace objects and return conditions to their previous
arrangement, even when not going for Supreme Ghost. I guess that mode has
rubbed off on me a little too much throughout the years. Another lever provided
the exit back to the main floor.
I emerged in the
southeast chamber. A new stationary zombie had now spawned in the middle of the
foyer. It could see me quite clearly through the doorway. I had to cross the
caskets and inch into the doorway for the lights to go out and avoid the
zombie’s looks. Then crossed the casket outside to the stairs. Two skeleton
archers had also spawned upstairs (see image). They blocked the intended way
out through the metal door. I could have used the invisibility ring to pass
them, but they function kinda like potions, and that would label my stats ‘chemical
success’. Others might disagree on the ring’s function, but there was an
alternate way out regardless. The ladder could namely be reached from the lower
level by the use of a stackable object. I fetched the healing potion from the
northwest chamber upstairs to complete the job. Had to leap from the ramp to
avoid the skeletons. This way I could even close up the gate leading to the
downstairs tomb. The small height addition provided by the vial was enough to
reach the ladder and exit the crypt.
Notes & Busts:
- Had to skip a mask in
the northwestern upper chamber. It set off a fire arrow trap that alerted the
zombie and the mummy below.
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25th Jan 2010, 03:05 #155
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Report #7 of 7
FM: An Old Friend [Thief
Anniversary Contest]
Ghost - Success
Perfect Thief - Failed
Supreme Ghost - Not
Attempted
Perfect Supreme - Not
Attempted
Time - 34:20
Loot - 2200 out of 2623
[Chemical: 2348]
Pockets Picked - 0/3
Locks Picked - 2
Backstabs - 0, Knockouts
- 0
Damage dealt - 0, Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0, Kills
- 0, Bodies Discovered - 0
Secrets Found - None
Consumables - 1 Water
Arrow (in sewer worker’s hideout), [Chemical: 1 more Water Arrow & 1
Invisibility Potion (the pub)]
See the entire report
with screenshots here (FMs).
Loot list here.
Comments:
My seventh ghost run of
the anniversary contest brought me back to good old Lord Bafford. Apparently
he’d been moving down in the world, now residing among the town’s less
fortunate. My job was to steal his beloved scepter, plus 2,000 gold worth of
loot. The objectives said I needed to return to the starting position, but the
readme.txt informed me this was a mistake. The mission would end as soon as all
the other objectives were met. From my first playthrough I knew Supreme was far
beyond impossible, so I kept it to plain Ghost for this one.
The streets
The map has some
unrealistic sound propagations. I noticed this right off the bat, with two
nearby guards going straight to hunt mode. I was still inside my quarters when
it happened, way out of sight. I waited for them to settle down and went on
with my business.
The initial streets
contained three guards of worry. One stationary archer up the stairs by
Bafford’s main entrance was extremely wary. He was probably the one who
triggered earlier. As long as I stayed east of the bridge I was fine. Another
guard was stationed by the pub, an area I needed to deal with later. The last
guard was circling the canal, with a pit-stop by the recently mentioned sentry.
The armory was tempting, but had an insanely hard front door to pick. I knew of
an alternate way in through the sewers, so I headed southeast to the only
unguarded area of the streets. Underneath a pile of crates was a manhole
leading me to the stinking depths.
Underground
The home of the sewer worker
posed somewhat of a challenge (see image below). He gave a first alert upon
opening the door, but didn’t see me enough to start hunting. The doorway was
dark with occasional flickers, I think from the mushroom just outside. He did a
strange pivot after a second or so, providing enough time for me to leap onto
the bed behind him. I couldn’t leave without nudging him off the bed though, so
I opted out of that move entirely. Instead I doused the torch behind him and
stole his possessions without any mutters. I needed the key from his desk to
access the wizard’s tower later.
Further down the sewers I
passed a patrolling archer and found a secret thief’s den behind a sliding
panel (see image). The hidden lever was on the backside of a metal pillar at the
far end of the walkway (see image). The den’s owner was dead, but he’d kindly
provided access to the weapon’s shop above. In addition, there was another key
to the wizard’s tower on the desk. I cleaned the store, including an annoyingly
hard-to-pick lockbox under the counter.
Now I could pick the main
door from the inside, which obviously made the job a lot easier. I was aware of
the outside patroller, so I listened for his footsteps while working the
lockpicks. For some reason, the footsteps remained absent and the door opened
without any patroller in sight. I soon realized the numbnut had fallen into the
canal and drowned (see image!). I know this “breaks” the intended street
situation, but I was in no mood to start over.
The wizard’s tower was
now accessible. I cleaned the upper floors without trouble. The underground
study had a barrel covering the opening. It was backed too far into the corner
to be pushed out. The only way to get rid of it was to break it, but that’s
considered property damage. I had to skip the coin stacks down there worth 75
gold. Perfect Thief busted.
The pub was a different
story. The guard outside made it impossible to Ghost conventionally. I started
by dousing the alley torch; that way I could approach the doorway and peek inside.
The customers reacted like normal enemies. There were no removable light
sources and a total of 148 gold on the counter. An additional 200 were hidden
downstairs, way out of reach. None of the loot in here was needed to make the
mission requirement, but I wanted to see if it was possible nonetheless. The
only way to reach any of it was by the use of the invisibility potion from the
wizard’s tower, and even then it was a tight call. After a couple of tries I
got my moves right and left with the loot and a couple of grumbles only. Keep
in mind that this renders the status ‘Chemical Ghost’, a mode less favored by
most thieves.
Bafford’s
Bafford’s was my last
stop. With the patrolling swordsman “conveniently” out of the way, my only task
was to elude the archer in the stairs. He ended up being easier than first
anticipated. I rushed to the stairs from the east corner and ducked down, only
spawning a comment. If applying enough speed, most AIs can be tricked this way,
if going from bright to dark. He quickly settled and I could plan my next move,
which involved using the same tactic past the west corner. This was more
difficult, as I now was going from dark to bright. It took about five tries
before I got it right.
The side door led to a
servant’s quarter with some loot and a key. The key unlocked Bafford’s kitchen
door, which opened straight to a stationary guard and a patrolling maid. Like
before, I could rush across the hall without stirring the guard’s attention. I
slipped through the curtains behind his back and cleaned the upper floors.
Nothing to report except for Bafford who woke up when going for the key on his
nightstand. Actually, it was the commotion from the door that woke him. No
worries though, the room was dark and it only counted as a 1st alert.
The area below the
kitchen held more loot. It also had a hidden lever behind some old crates (see
image below). The lever opened a hidden crawlspace under the kitchen stairway
(see image). I passed the maid easy enough and grabbed the secret loot. The key
from Bafford’s bedroom unlocked the footlocker holding the scepter.
Overall, this mission is
a very good contest entry. Unfortunately, there are too many bugs and
shortcomings to win a competition like that, but this is one of those missions
I really wish would be rereleased as an expanded version. The map has a good
layout with a nice background story. You see various interconnected parts of
the city, with some interesting readables and informationals spread around. I
hope Lost Soul finds it worthwhile to elaborate on this gem’s potential.
Notes & Busts:
- The cointstacks in the
wizard’s underground study was skipped. The barrel blocking the entrance could
only be removed by means of property damage.
- Getting some of the goodies
from the pub (148 gold) solicited the use of an invisibility potion. The
success status is then depicted as ‘Chemical Success’. I opted out of this
method, but included the possibility in my report for completion.
Klatremus' Supreme Thief
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25th Jan 2010, 03:22 #156
Hexameron
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Great reporting there,
Klatremus! Your solutions are very interesting to read. I hope designating your
recent reports as # _ of 7 doesn't mean you're not going to contribute more
For "The Kindred
Vault," I think it's possible to sneak by those two skeletons. Like you, I
opted to stack my healing potion (and dewdrop) so I could reach the ladder.
Dafydd noted a long time ago in the TTLG thread for this FM that he was able to
sneak past the skeletons without using the invis ring. I would link to the TTLG
thread if I could find it, but ever since their forum changed, I haven't been
able to find a bunch of old threads through keyword searching. Either some
threads have disappeared or TTLG's search functionality is handicapped at the
moment.
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25th Jan 2010, 05:12 #157
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Glad you enjoyed them
The numbering was more to
remind readers multiple reports were recently submitted. I guess it also confirms
my ocd-like behavior in being overly systematic. I am in no way shape or form
done reporting.
I don't really see how
those skeletons could be Ghosted, but I can't say I tried a whole lot once I
discovered the other way out. I guess if dousing whatever there is of torches
it could be done. Kinda makes me wanna go back and retry ... I might just do
that.
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27th Jan 2010, 01:54 #158
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FM: The WaterWay Tunnel
Part 1
File:
ftb-thetunnel1-2.zip
Ghost - Failed /
Incomplete {and aborted}
Time - 00:14:28
Loot - 91/1524
Pockets Picked - 0/2
Backstabs - 0 Knockouts -
0
Damage dealt - 0 Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0 Kills -
0
Cause of Failure /
Incompletion:
-The mission may be
ghostable, but I could not fulfill my objectives and find what I needed to, so
I aborted
Comments - This may be
one of the worst FMs I've ever played. Frankly, I don't know what the author
was thinking - a mission that basically puts the player in a bland labyrinth of
underwater tunnels with no distinguishing landmarks, very few pockets of air,
and only a couple of breath potions? What Thief player would find this fun?
The way I played this
mission was to explore as much as I could while consuming my only breath potion
until I found an area above water. Then I would reload and try to swim to the
newly-discovered location without using a breath potion. There is just not
enough air pockets or breath potions to make it to one area and back. Death
from drowning in this FM is a given. I tried drawing a map of the underwater
tunnels, but gave up on that quickly.
The surface areas I
found:
-Gas plant area with
frogbeasts (that do not alert) and dead thief
-Cabin with apparition
(there's a switch near the mattress on the first floor; I heard something open
after frobbing it, but I searched high and low and could not find the source!)
-Interior hammerite
quarters with a locked door that I found no key for
-Interior room with
diving helmets; is this the mission end?
-Navigation globe at the
end of a tunnel with a forest-textured wall blocking the path
This mission is really
puzzling and I have a lot of questions that not even its TTLG thread could
answer, although I'm glad I'm not the only one who had trouble: practicaly
everyone including the indefatigable FM player, Nightwalker, said they couldn't
figure out how to complete the mission. A number of people said they couldn't
get the objectives to check off, so I assume the mission is bugged. Many
couldn't find enough loot, too, and that plagued my game experience as well.
________________________________________
27th Jan 2010, 03:27 #159
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FM: The WaterWay Tunnel
Part 2: Ground Guest
File: ftb-thetunnel2.zip
Ghost - Failed {and
aborted}
Time - 00:27:12
Loot - 0/201
Pockets Picked - 1/2
Backstabs - 0 Knockouts -
0
Damage dealt - 0 Damage
taken - 4
Healing taken - 0 Kills -
0
Cause of Failure
-Could not fall into well
near meteorite without alerting nearby zombies
Comments - Although
WaterWay Tunnel Part 1 was a masochistic exercise, Part 2 did not turn out to
be as bad. This is an undead mission with a lot of haunts and zombies in an
abandoned town. I still ended up aborting the mission as I never found the key
to the armory gate and I reached a point of no return by entering the sewers.
-The frogbeasts at the
beginning do not alert to the player.
-In the first section of
the town, there is a chimney access into a house. The fall down the chimney
causes damage, but I found nothing of interest in the house; it seemed
pointless except for a house key that lets you exit. Also, dropping down into
the sewers causes damage; I later surmised that if I continued playing after
falling into the house, it's possible that I would have died once I fell down
to the sewer part. I didn't find any healing potions in the mission. So I
reloaded and did not bother getting into the house.
-Getting past the
pivotting zombie with the lantern is a real hassle. I had to wait for the
patrolling zombie to make his way behind me and then make sure the lantern
zombie faces either the left or right wall. I could then run behind his flank
and jump onto the wall ladder and then onto the ladder leading out of the
sewer; there are two ladders that must be climbed. What foils this easy
maneuver is an invisible barrier between the zombie and right-side wall. I
could mantle over the barrier and then jump onto the ladder, but it took a
dozen reloads to get by without alerting him. It's also possible to move by his
left flank, but the success rate for the left side seemed lower for me. The
zombie randomly pivots and only faces one direction for a few seconds. I did
manage to ghost him, though:
-Although I didn't
complete the objective to find new equipment, I assumed the mission end is the underwater
corridor accessible from a well. Dropping down the well results in a splash,
but due to bad sound propagation, I could no longer hear the zombies once I was
in the water. I did hear multiple 1st alert groans for an instant after my
splash, but the sound muted immediately. Judging by the proximity of the splash
to the zombies standing near the meteorite, I think it's safe to say that the
groans I heard were 2nd alerts.
________________________________________
27th Jan 2010, 03:39 #160
Hexameron
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FM: Gladiator
File: Gladiator.zip
Ghost - Failed
Time - 00:01:25
Loot - 0/0
Pockets Picked - 0/1
Backstabs - 0 Knockouts -
0
Damage dealt - 10 Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0 Kills -
1
Cause of Failure:
-Cannot reach nobleman
without being seen by the arena combatants
Comments - This may be
the shortest mission I've ever played! It takes place in a gladiator arena in broad
daylight. Opening the gate to the arena activates a melee between a thief,
haunt, apebeast, bluecoat, and two spiders. I avoided the ensuing battle by
easily mantling out of the arena. The only objective is to kill the nobleman
responsible for putting me in the arena. On my way towards the nobleman, the
arena combatants had spotted me; the area is just too bright for any sneaking.
The nobleman seems to be blind and deaf; I killed him with one horizontal sword
slash.
________________________________________
27th Jan 2010, 03:45 #161
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FM: Powerslaves
File: power.zip
Ghost - Failed
Time - 00:05:41
Loot - 0/0
Pockets Picked - 0/1
Backstabs - 0 Knockouts -
0
Damage dealt - 0 Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0 Kills -
0
Cause of Failure:
-Could not reach
powerslaves victrola without alerting a zombie
Comments - This isn't a
serious mission. The objectives are to sneak past the guards and into the museum
and listen to every recording. The recordings are sound bytes of songs from the
heavy metal band, Iron Maiden. I started listening to recordings on the left
side of the museum until I found one pedestal that didn't have a victrola on
it. At this point, a new objective occurs to find the powerslave recording.
It's lying on gravel in a bright section of the sewers. With no water arrows, I
had no means of sneaking past the zombie who was staring at the victrola. He
was alerted after I ran through.
________________________________________
27th Jan 2010, 04:04 #162
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FM: The City Square
File: CSv2.zip
Ghost - Success
Perfect Thief - Failed
Time - 00:07:16
Loot - 180/327
Pockets Picked - 1/2
Backstabs - 0 Knockouts -
0
Damage dealt - 0 Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0 Kills -
0
Comments - This mission
should have never been released. It reminds me of some of the unfinished and
raw amateur FMs released in 2000. With only one essential objective of finding
100 loot, you could probably finish the mission in two minutes, but ghosting
this one is a little tough because the author clearly intended for
confrontations with the AI. The ambient lighting is extremely high and most
areas are way too bright.
Right at the mission
start I'm faced with a dilemma of sneaking by three AI. The first is an archer
to the left who thankfully pivots. The second is a guard with a short
rectangular patrol around the lamp post. The third is off screen and is a
mechanist patrolling around the church to the right:
The trick to even
entering the streets is to wait for the archer and patrolling guard by the lamp
post to be facing away. Then I made a sharp right dash into the narrow streets
surrounding the mechanist church. This is the only feasible path because it's
dark. However, the mechanist will soon come around the bend and the street is
so narrow that she got stuck walking into me. I was able to move right through
her by staying crouched, literally running into her, and leaning left.
-Inside the mechanist
church is a tiara. It might be possible to ghost the church, but I didn't have
the energy for it. I would need to moss the metal platform in front of the
church entrance, wait for the outside patrols to be in my favor, and then run
inside the church to douse the gas lights inside. Since two mechs inside face
the entrance, it just seemed like I would be setting myself up for a reload
fest and it's not worth the effort.
-Only one of the double
doors of the bank can be picked; I found 80 loot inside.
-It took me 20 minutes in
another saved game to find the signet ring in the pool. It's very difficult and
I searched the entire grounds including the pool floor and still didn't find
it. I knew it had to be there because a readable clearly said a ring was lost
in the pool, so I searched very thoroughly until I found it. It's on a black
tile near one of the corners. You have to be looking straight down at your toes
to see the ring highlight:
-Thanks to bad sound
propagation, it's possible to make the splash into the pool and not alert the
patrolling maid and bluecoat. They don't even 1st alert when I splashed into
the water.
-The warehouse is too
hard to get into and the guard inside seems to be alerted by the nobleman or
spider bot as soon as the mission starts. On my first time playing, the guard
inside made some commotion and alerted the archer outside. I reloaded and this
didn't happen again.
________________________________________
27th Jan 2010, 04:26 #163
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FM: The Mechanist
Cathedral
File:
MechanistCathedral.zip
Ghost - Failed
Time - 00:37:08
Loot - 1227/1242
Pockets Picked - 0/1
Backstabs - 0 Knockouts -
6
Damage dealt - 117 Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0 Kills -
4
Iron Beasts Destroyed - 3
Causes of Failure:
1. Could not sneak by two
mechanists upstairs through concert hall
2. Could not get into
elevator room without alerting two mechanists
3. Could not sneak
through elevator room without alerting golden child
4. Could not sneak past
two spiders in the crypt
5. Could not sneak by
appartion in the deepest recess of the crypt
6. Could not sneak into
chapel without alerting two mechanists
7. Could not reach hand
of glory without alerting either spider bots or the watcher
Comments - Yeah, this
isn't a mission for ghosting; it's not even a mission I enjoyed playing because
the rooms are so huge and spacious that it killed my framerate. Every room was
literally a gigantic square with marble flooring and AI blocking pertinent
doors. There is only one difficulty (Normal) and a pretty hefty loot
requirement (1200) considering there's only 1242 in the mission.
-I was able to ghost the
combat bot outside of the cathedral, which I'll bet is not what the author had
in mind. The outside of the cathedral is illuminated to the maximum and the entrance
to the cathedral is locked. A combat bot patrols back and forth near the
entrance, making a confrontation seem inevitable. Well, it took me about five
minutes, but I defeated this situation by running up to the locked door when
the combat bot is patrolling away, picked the door for a few seconds, and then
ran away before the bot could see me. I repeated the process until the door was
picked open:
-I might have been able
to douse enough torches in the concert hall to avoid alerting the two mechanists
by the stage, but I'm glad I didn't try since I would be busted by so many
other things.
-I could loot everything
from the pub counter without alerting the two servants; I also got past the
spider bot guarding the two safes and doused one torch in the room, which
enabled me to be close enough to pick the safes.
-In three instances, the
author positions two AI at a few doors you need to get through, thereby mocking
any hope you might have of sneaking through. I quickly gave up sneaking because
of this and started KOing and killing anything in my way.
-The hand of glory is
guarded by three spider bots and a watcher. If the floor wasn't marble, I could
have ghosted the bots and watcher. But I couldn't move fast enough to evade the
watcher's gaze without making noise on marble and alerting a spider bot:
I resolved to use fire
arrows and mines on the spider bots and then retrieved the hand of glory with
no problem.
________________________________________
27th Jan 2010, 04:53 #164
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FM: Happy New Year Mister
Lambert!
File: Lambert.zip
Perfect Thief - Success
Time - 01:15:26
Loot - 3932/3932
Pockets Picked - 7/9
Backstabs - 0 Knockouts -
0
Damage dealt - 0 Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0 Kills -
0
Secrets Found - 5/5
Comments - This is an
excellent FM with an interesting story and hilarious little touches from the
author, like the drunk guard carrying dewdrop and the party guest animations.
The snowy city and christmas tree in the foyer makes this a very fitting FM for
the winter season. Ghosting is straightforward with only a couple of issues.
-Sneaking through the
party room looks daunting at first. The key is to douse both gas lights in the
room; only then could I enter it without one of the partiers noticing me. They
tend to dart quickly across the room and start dancing. The erratic nature of
their movement makes sneaking a little intense at times.
-I used one moss arrow at
the foot of the staircase in the foyer just to ease sneaking. Sometimes the one
guard and servant who regularly patrol through the foyer get stuck in a door
frame. I found that the third guard who comes by is able to eventually push
everyone through the door frame:
-At one point, a
noblewoman leaves the locked bathroom upstairs. She is important to find
because she has the balcony key on her waist.
-Once on Lambert's
balcony, a haunt (or supposedly an undead Jack) finds his way in and attacks
Lambert. This scripted event results in Lambert being slain and Jack continues
to hunt around. Once he calmed down, I picked the balcony door and was able to
sneak through Lambert's quarters without alerting Jack. He routinely exhibits a
2nd alert animation even when he isn't hunting:
-It took me a separate
blackjack run to find all of the secrets, loot, and especially the frobbable
coathook in Lambert's bathroom. This coathook opens a niche with Lambert's
code. With all four codes collected, I followed the formula described in
Lambert's journal. I used pen and paper to do the arithmetic of adding and
subtracting the four-digit codes until I got it: 7284.
Hard-to-find loot:
-Snowy city: goblet and
plate on balcony
-Snowy city: two silver
nuggets on ledge above the pub
-Mansion kitchen: gold
plates under donuts; they appear invisible to the eye unless you pick up the
donuts.
-Gold wine bottle in one
of the hyperactive party guest's hands
Secrets
My mission stats count
five secrets, but I thought there were much more than that:
1. Barracks outside of
mansion kitchen: switch opens a compartment in the fireplace; I had to inch up
carefully without being burned and lean forward until I frobbed the purse.
2. Servant room in
mansion: switch behind curtains on upper window moves a painting with loot
behind it.
3. Barracks inside
mansion: frobbable crayman trophy opens niche with loot.
4. Locked bathroom:
switch under sink opens an alcome above the bathtub with an amulet and tiara.
5. Library: switch on the
right-side bottom ledge concealed by a potted plant; opens a metal plate inside
the fireplace with Mazarin's key (this opens the portrait in Lady Mazarin's
bedroom)
6. Foyer with christmas
tree: frobbable statue makes a banner slide open revealing an invis and healing
potion.
7. Lambert's bathroom:
coathook opens compartment in his quarters with his code.
________________________________________
27th Jan 2010, 05:03 #165
Hexameron
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TDM FM: Trapped!
Perfect Thief - Success
Time - 00:35:13
Loot - 2260/2260
Pockets Picked - 5
Damage dealt - 0 Damage
taken - 0
Kills - 0 Knockouts - 0
Stealth Score - 10
Comments - It's not often
that I manage to obtain perfect thief and avoid any first alerts in a TDM
mission. I might call this close to being a perfect supreme, but I didn't
supreme ghost this one because I failed to return the keys I took. The AI are
spread thin enough throughout the thieves hideout and with plenty of dark areas
to hide in, I had no trouble avoiding first alerts.
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27th Jan 2010, 05:18 #166
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TDM FM: Living Expenses
Ghost - Success
Perfect Thief - Failed
Time - 01:16:17
Loot - 1848/2347
Pockets Picked - 2
Damage dealt - 0 Damage
taken - 0
Kills - 0 Knockouts - 0
Stealth Score - 0
Comments - I'm
disappointed with my zero stealth score, but I couldn't do any better with some
of the AI I encountered. I think the dining room downstairs and the upstairs
bar with skylight are what tripped me up. In the first case, there are two AI
that routinely patrol through the dining room. I couldn't stay in any portion
of the room without someone 1st alerting. In the bar with skylight, it's not
possible to get in or out without one guard reaching 1st alert. The floors are
marble and even staying on the carpet isn't effective because of the other
guard's path. I must have gotten at least four 1st alerts here.
-The room with the
diamond is impressive to behold. At first, I was confused. I went through the
trouble of picking the complex lock and thought I had found only an empty room
beyond it. By closing the door behind me, however, a portion of the room
changes. A series of buttons and panels reveal themselves until the diamond
display makes a grandiose appearance.
________________________________________
28th Jan 2010, 23:56 #167
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FM: Under Templehill
File: templehill.zip
Ghost: Failed
Perfect Thief: Failed
Time: 2h 38min
Loot: 3020 out of 3070
Pockets picked: 16 out of
17
Backstabs: 0, Knockouts:
0
Damage dealt: 0, Damage
taken: 0, Healing taken: 0
Innocents killed: 0,
Others killed: 0
Iron Beasts Destroyed: 0,
Disabled: 0
Secrets found: 9 out of 9
Hidden objectives: 4 out
of 5
Karras Volumes: 7 out of
9
Reason for Failure:
Unfortunately, this mission cannot be ghosted successfully. The principle objective
requires you to destroy two devices and the mission cannot be completed until
you do so. Even if the property damage itself could be subsumed under rule #
11, there is no way to destroy the devices without alerting numerous AI.
There is also one optional
objective which can’t be completed since it calls for the destruction of a
generator. It can be done without alerting any AI but as an optional objective
it isn’t covered by rule # 11.
Comments:
This is all unfortunate
because the rest of the mission is quite ghostable and presents a very fun
challenge when doing so.
The police station:
There is not much reason
to go into the police station. There is one purse that is easily obtainable on
the fourth floor (the only loot in the building) and one optional objective
that can be completed there. It is funny and certainly worth seeing once but
I’m not completely sure it is worth the time it takes to ghost the station just
for that objective.
You can enter the police
station either via the rooftops and balcony over the courtyard with the archer
practicing, or through the underwater secret entrance. The front doors at
street level aren’t an option for entry with several guards and a watcher
inside, nor is the street level door to the stairwell with a guard right behind
it and facing the door.
I entered via the roof.
There is a guard in a fourth floor office that may not appear ghostable at
first glance but if you hug the left wall as you enter the room you can read
the note and grab the purse from the desk without him noticing you.
There is an archer behind
the third floor stairwell door to the room with the portcullis lever so there
is no entry there without dousing torches. I had to resort to dousing a torch in
the stairwell and one in that room in order to raise the portcullis. There is a
spot on the stairs that has enough shadow to hide from the guard that patrols
the stairwell:
You can traverse the
stairs without using any consumables. As long as you are in shadow the guards
seem not to notice you. I had one walk into me and then around me without
noticing I was there.
When you enter the second
floor from the stairwell the archer that was practicing outside is now
patrolling in and out of the door to the courtyard very quickly. This doesn’t
give you much time to enter any of the rooms there without dousing torches. And
there is no reason to enter any of the rooms on that floor unless you want to
complete the optional objective or pick pocket the arrows from the archers.
There is also nothing to be found in the cells on the lowest floor except one
drunk that is best left alone.
Ironguage’s mansion:
Entered through side
door. Found secret in wine cellar. Using the hiding place under stairs in the
main hall, it’s fairly easy to ghost the watcher and the single patrolling
guard, even without resorting to the fireplace passage.
Mechanist Church:
I entered the Mechanist
area via the window at the north end of The Shamblings across from Jemola’s
place. There are a lot of noisy surfaces here so I timed the guard/bot patrols
and creeped across metal walkways and tile floors. There are plenty of shadows
so being seen isn’t an issue.
The room with the two
large bots is quite difficult to ghost. I was unable to find a way to ghost the
bots without the use of a speed potion and two moss arrows. They are very
sensitive and The Pixie arranged a setup that clearly did not have ghosting in
mind. I tried riding the metal platform without being noticed but it is impossible.
The only way to bypass the bots is to creep out into the shadow on the floor as
close to the bots as possible and then use a speed potion to get past them
without them noticing you. I was successful doing this once without mossing the
floor but could never do it again without moss.
If you’re going to creep
around the first floor of the church it is best to avoid the central aisle. I
found that I made slight tapping sounds when using that aisle no matter how
slow I went. It seems as if Garrett’s feet sink slightly into the floor surface
in that center aisle.
The Crypt:
The crypt is easily
ghosted. You can avoid the flying eyeballs and patrolling zombies easily as
there are plenty of shadows and hiding places. There are lots of arrows to pick
pocket from the skeletal archers and it is simple to do so. But the mission
requires you to destroy the upper and lower cones which are generating the
energy that is imprisoning Jemola in order to free her. There is no way to
destroy the cones without alerting the AI that are guarding them.
________________________________________
29th Jan 2010, 06:48 #168
Hexameron
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Nice report, Tannar! You
mentioned having to destroy certain "cones" and alerting the AI; how
did you destroy the cones? Were the AI triggered to alert when the cones were
destroyed or was it the loud means of destroying the cones (such as using fire
arrows) that caused alerts?
As for the unavoidable
foot noise you described when you tried creeping in one area, it may have been
due to a bad framerate; did you experience any slowdowns? On many occasions,
I've had my creeping function severely broken when an area is laggy. Normally I
can glide forward smoothly without making foot noise, but when I'm experiencing
lag, I can't even press the creep key without making an instant foot noise or
tap as you described.
P.S. What are the
"hidden objectives" and "Karras volumes" you listed in your
stats?
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29th Jan 2010, 07:09 #169
Tannar
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Originally Posted by
Hexameron
Were the AI triggered to
alert when the cones were destroyed or was it the loud means of destroying the
cones (such as using fire arrows) that caused alerts?
You have to use fire
arrows to destroy them. There seems to be no other means provided.
Originally Posted by
Hexameron
As for the unavoidable foot
noise you described when you tried creeping in one area, it may have been due
to a bad framerate; did you experience any slowdowns?
No, it wasn't lag that
was the problem. I didn't experience any lag there. It was as if there was a
problem with the terrain. This occured in several areas of the city as well,
usually when there was sloping terrain (which is not uncommon with the dark
engine) but the cathedral floor was flat. It just seemed that Garrett
"sank" into that section of the floor a bit.
Originally Posted by
Hexameron
What are the "hidden
objectives" and "Karras volumes" you listed in your stats?
These are unique to this
mission. There are 5 hidden objectives to discover and 9 books to read which
The Pixie included in the stats page. I probably didn't need to include them in
the report but since they were in the stats, I did.
________________________________________
1st Feb 2010, 20:09 #170
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FM: The Taffer's Bank
File: taffbank.zip
Perfect Thief - Success
Time - 00:14:10
Loot - 3550/3550
Pockets Picked - 6/7
Backstabs - 0 Knockouts -
0
Damage dealt - 0 Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0 Kills -
0
Comments - This is a short
dromed training mission with no ghosting problems. Two of the large rooms
upstairs were empty and pointless. Perhaps the only trouble I had was getting
to the moneybox behind the counter next to the bank teller. I crouched next to
the bench against the right wall and ran forward to the edge of the counter.
The teller remained 1st alerted for a while. I waited for him to calm before
leaving the counter area. Again, I could only crouch and run to the bench;
standing was a sure way of being seen.
________________________________________
1st Feb 2010, 20:27 #171
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FM: Gearheart
File: gearheartv3.zip
Ghost - Failed
Time - 00:21:14
Loot - 1007/1007
Pockets Picked - 3/4
Backstabs - 0 Knockouts -
6
Damage dealt - 37 Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0 Kills -
0
Iron Beasts Destroyed - 1
Causes of Failure:
1. Could not sneak to the
altar in the chapel without alerting at least one mech priest
2. Could not sneak by masked
mechanist guarding way to crypt/dining room.
Comments - Regardless of
difficulty, all loot in this mission must be taken to fulfill the 1000
requirement. The only loot I had trouble finding was 2 loose coins on the floor
in front of some pews in the chapel. I could not sneak through the chapel with
two patrolling mech priests. Once I picked the chapel key from the priest, he
would get stuck in the door. I could use this to my advantage by locking the
door behind me as I went into the chapel, but the illuminated interior and mech
priestess inside conspired against me - I had no chance of ghosting it. Dafydd
mentioned in the FM's TTLG thread that he couldn't ghost the chapel either.
-I had another issue with
the mechanist guarding the way to the crypt and dining room. If I could have
ghosted the chapel, I would try harder to deal with the mechanist guard. Over
his head was a gas light and I could not enter the area with the guard without
dousing the light. I should have been able to lean left while hiding behind the
open door and douse the light, but it just wasn't working out for me.
-I had no trouble staying
in the darkness of the door frame in the dining room and dousing the gas light
in front of the watcher. I could also sneak by the patrolling mech upstairs in
the barracks if I stayed to her left flank as she turns.
-Dousing the four gas
lights in the lobby is essential, but sometimes dousing them puts the combat
bot or mech priest on 2nd alert. I had to moss the marble section of the floor,
wait for everyone to exit the lobby, and then run up to the switch controlling
the gas lights. That way I wouldn't have to douse them with water.
-Owing to my two ghost
busts earlier, I gave up sneaking and KOed just about everyone.
________________________________________
1st Feb 2010, 20:43 #172
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FM: Last Gleaming of the
Rising Sun
File: risingsun.zip
Ghost - Failed
Time - 00:35:18
Loot - 1885/1985
Pockets Picked - 1/3
Backstabs - 2 Knockouts -
0
Damage dealt - 167 Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0 Kills -
9
Cause of Failure:
-The only way to progress
to the basement is to bash the doubledoors leading there
Comments - This is an
undead mission that would have been fully ghostable if I could have found a key
to the basement. The basement key does exist, but it is in the basement and
there is no way down there except through the locked doubledoors.
-Reaching the book about
what happened to the colony is a little tough. One must use a rope arrow to
reach it and there is a broken window pane on the floor. Once you climb the
rope, the pane will be directly under the dangling rope and it is impossible to
detach from the rope without making foot noise on the pane (equivalent to
walking on marble). Instead, I had to place my rope arrow in such a way that
the rope lowered to a section of wood flooring. I then proceeded to climb until
I could frob the book. Although I still could not detach from the rope, I could
remove the rope arrow itself and drop onto the wood floor without making noise
- however, if I had been over that window pane and removed the rope arrow, I
would make loud marble foot noise.
-As mentioned previously,
the only bust I incurred was having to bash the basement doors in. This alerted
just about everyone including two haunts and zombies. I used all my flashbombs
on them and dispatched any remaining zombies with my sword. I could sneak by
the two haunts in the basement, but I saw no point this late in the game, so I
killed them with all my broadheads.
-Without lockpicks, the
only way to traverse the tunnel leading to the vault is to avoid the mines on
the ground. There's enough space to get through without tripping any.
________________________________________
1st Feb 2010, 21:13 #173
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FM: Saints and Thieves
File:
saintsandthieves.zip
Ghost - Success
Perfect Thief - Failed
Time - 01:24:41
Loot - 1867/4439
Pockets Picked - 7/9
Backstabs - 0 Knockouts -
0
Damage dealt - 0 Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0 Kills -
0
Comments - A perfect
thief is not possible to obtain here because it requires rescuing the child
slaves and bringing them to a city gate. When they flee towards the gate, they
drop the vault key on the ground, which makes enough noise to alert the
patrolling thief.
I gave it my all to get
that key without the thief alerting. Escaping with the children is bad enough.
When you enter the slave pen where the children are being kept, the objective
to find the smuggler's cache is cancelled and a new objective pops up: find
incriminating evidence and let no harm befall the child slaves. It really is
clever of the author to enable the player to frob the children to get them to
follow you or stop in place. Unfortunately, it doesn't always work smoothly,
and ghosting your way out of the hideout below the warehouse with these
children in tow is very frustrating. At least I could douse every torch along
the way. Still, if the children stop at any point in the light, most AI will
see them. Also, if you bring them into any rooms, the children tend to never
follow you again, so you are confined to move through the corridors. If the
children remain in the darkness, guards will brush right by them and not
notice:
I was perturbed that
after rescuing the children, the author deigned to position an archer on the
steps leading up to the warehouse, which means my easy way of escape was
foiled. Instead, I had to go all the way around through the barracks and deal
with numerous thief patrols:
Once I exited the
warehouse, I had the children follow me to the city portion and towards a gate.
Once they got there, they ran to the gate and dropped a key. No matter where
the patrolling thief stood during his patrol, he always heard the key drop. I
tried luring the children to the gate and waited for the thief to walk far away
and it still didn't work. I even tried placing some scrolls and a healing
potion on the ground where the key would fall. And still the key fell through
the items and made noise:
What makes the situation
worse is that it's easy to break this scripted event of the children running to
the gate and vanishing. For example, if I run in front of them before they get
to the gate, they stop in place. Usually, if I leave the gate, they will resume
their path, but often they don't and will remain stuck forever:
Bottom line: I could not get
the vault key from them without the thief hearing it. I discovered later that I
didn't have to rescue the children in the first place; the objective merely
states to let no harm befall them so I could have left them in their pen all
along. And I found enough loot to satisfy the 1600 requirement and I had
located the incriminating evidence without having to descend into the vault. So
I let the kids stay in front of the gate for the remainder of the mission; the
patrolling thief didn't see them. Yet without the vault key, I could not reach
the rest of the loot in the mission.
-I found the
incriminating letter in the safe behind a painting in the captain's office on
the top floor. I dropped this in the city watch building to satisfy the
objective.
________________________________________
1st Feb 2010, 21:29 #174
Hexameron
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FM: Rosaries Are Red
File: rosaries.zip
Ghost - Success
Perfect Thief - Failed
Time - 00:33:32
Loot - 3581/3693
Pockets Picked - 0/1
Backstabs - 0 Knockouts -
0
Damage dealt - 0 Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0 Kills -
0
Comments - This has only
one (Normal) difficulty. It cannot be ghosted if a) the two haunts spawn in the
office after reading the desk journal and b) the new objective to escape
through the pump station is triggered by reading the scroll in the basement. I
had to maintain my two primary objectives only: find 3000 loot and the rosaries
from vault 8.
-Reading the journal in the
office on the top floor causes two haunts to spawn and the office door to lock
shut. You have to kill the haunts and then the door will open:
I didn't garner any
useful information from the journal, so I reloaded and didn't touch it again.
-Reading the scroll on
the floor in the basement triggers a new objective to escape through the pump
station. To do so, one would incur two busts. The first results from dropping
the node and bulb into the workshop machine chutes in order to create an
explosive device. Dropping these items into the chutes is loud enough to alert
nearby zombies, and mossing the chutes didn't seem to help. The second bust
inevitably occurs when using a fire arrow on the explosive charge to blow open
the pump station door. I reloaded and didn't read the scroll in the basement,
thereby avoiding all of these busts. Once I had 3000 loot and picked up the
rosary, the mission ended.
-To obtain the vault key
and workshop key, I had to figure out the four-digit code that opens a
compartment behind the bookcase in the top floor office. There are four statues
in the mission with placards that have a single number on them. One might
appear as "[3" and another just "8". I realized after I
found four that the numbers comprised the code: "[3" "8"
"3]" and "0". It made sense that the brackets designate
which digits are first and last. Thus the code would either be 3803 or 3083;
the latter one is the real code.
________________________________________
1st Feb 2010, 23:45 #175
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Dual Plot FM: The Ghost
House / Haunted Hospital
The following two
missions are part of a joint FM. Even though the "Haunted Hospital"
is a separate mission, it still has the heading "The Ghost House" in
the objectives and save slot screens. At one point in the beginning the player
chooses which mission to play. Once I completed one, I restarted to play the
other.
* * *
FM: The Ghost House
File: Ghosthouse.zip
Ghost - Success
Perfect Thief - Probable
Success
Time - 00:25:45
Loot - 1350/2405
Pockets Picked - 0/2
Backstabs - 0 Knockouts -
0
Damage dealt - 50 Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0 Kills -
1
Comments - I reported
that I might have achieved a perfect thief because in the darkloader mission
notes, the author says the stats' loot count is wrong, that the total loot is
"about 1350." Considering he said 1350, I assume that's the real
maximum and I did find all loot.
This FM reminds me of
"Deceptive Perception" - very eerie and full of scary ambient noises
and special scripted effects. Some effects made ghosting difficult. Walking
into the kitchen causes a disembodied voice to say "Leave!" followed
by a butcher's knife flying across the room that damages the player. It's possible
to avoid the knife, but it took me a lot of reloads because the knife is quick.
I also had a terrible
time getting safely beyond that annoying ghost in the walls. The effect is
stunning really and I didn't know such things were possible in dromed: an
apparition whose face and limbs appear in the walls, floors, and ceiling will
swipe at the player, and it can be hard to dodge. I found that if I just ran
away or backed up quickly into the lady's bedroom, the apparition would miss.
Otherwise, simply staying in the hallway where the apparition hides in the
walls is close enough to take damage.
I had some difficulty
sneaking around the apparition guarding the bedrooms upstairs. It didn't help
that on the way to him I had to worry about the wall apparition attacking me. I
mossed the couch on the right and waited for the dimming lights to go black and
then jumped across:
On my way back, I
repeated the process, but once I entered the hallway, that apparition in the
walls started up again. He really is irritating. One more reload and I managed
to sneak by the idle apparition and ran downstairs before the wall apparition
appeared. It's worth noting that this wall apparition is not an alerted AI.
-The objective to kill
the undead in the basement really interprets to "kill the zombie." To
do that without alerting the zombie, I used the holy hammer that was alluded to
in a readable. It's lying on the ground next to a dead thief. I waited for the
zombie to face away and threw it:
Upon impact, the zombie
explodes and a dead thief apparition appears briefly before dissipating
entirely:
* * *
FM: The Haunted Hospital
File: Ghosthouse.zip
Ghost - Success
Perfect Thief - Failed
Time - 01:13:49
Loot - 1685/2455
Pockets Picked - 0/2
Backstabs - 0 Knockouts -
0
Damage dealt - 0 Damage
taken - 0
Healing taken - 0 Kills -
0
Comments - This mission
may not have as creepy an atmosphere as The Ghost House, but it is a horror FM
on steroids, replete with all kinds of spooky AI, ambient sounds, and horrible
sights. I'm still unnerved by the randomly opening and closing doors - such a
brilliant and eerie effect. The doctors are certainly the scariest custom AI
I've ever seen. And the nobleman with a zombie head that turns 360 degrees a la
The Exorcist is quite memorable too.
I also had quite a few
scares that caused me to yell loudly in real life when I triggered the spider
traps... My fright turned to glee, though, when I saw that the undead and
spiders don't get along. It was hilarious to watch the skeleton and haunt futilely
attack the spiders, never able to dish out damage while the spiders circled
around them. Likewise, the spiders couldn't hit the undead and it was a
stalemate that could go on forever. Obviously, I reloaded and avoided tripping
the spider traps:
-I had to use a moss
arrow in one corridor after entering the hospital wing. It seems the author
allowed enough room for the player to scale on top of the rafters, which I did,
but once the rafters branch out to the first two corridors, there isn't enough space
to climb back up after dropping down; essentially, for those corridors, the
rafters are a one-way trip. With the haunt and zombie patrolling through the
+-shaped halls, I couldn't get through fast enough without moss. It was only
these two corridors that I couldn't squeeze through when climbing a rope arrow.
-I read about the mercury
and snake blood and found them as two canisters in a laboratory. I used them on
the lich Nemazidah's heart and then frobbed the death scroll I found next to a
dead mechanist. The objective checked off and I can only presume the lich died
instantly from that. I found him earlier in a ruined church surrounded by
haunts. I think he would have been far enough away that none of the haunts
would hear or see him die.
-There is an objective to
save all patients from the hospital and it took me about an hour in another
game to figure out how many patients there are. It's deceiving. Some of them
are unconscious bodies lying around in rooms. I found one patient being
operated on by a doctor, but there was no way to pick him up and I couldn't get
in there without being spotted. I saw one guy hanging on to the balcony of the
upper hospital ward, but he was a red herring:
He moans "Help
me" whenever the undead haunt and doctor patrol through. When I tried to
frob him, he laughed and I was dealt damage... Forget him
I took as many
unconscious bodies as I could find and dropped them off of the balcony near the
mission start. I found two patients in the upper ward. There is one guy in a
room in the last corridor on the left when entering the hospital wing. Another
patient is in a room overlooking the garden with the weird legless zombie. I
carried them both across the overhead rafters, which made ghosting this place
much easier. The last patient was the unconscious pagan near the female zombie
on the balcony. After I tossed him over and saw my objective complete, I
realized there are just 3 patients that must be saved. By the way, dropping the
bodies over the balcony doesn't seem to do any damage to them:
-In the darkloader notes,
the author says the loot total is 3330. I wasn't feeling energized enough to
scour this freaky mission looking for more loot...