There’s minimal actual roleplaying in them (excepting Natuk) but that’s been largely true of the Genre in it’s existence. They have character development/party management/looting & equipment buildup/etc. They do everything the classic CRPGs did.
They happen to have TB tactical combat. Large party tactical combat. They trace their lineage back to Wizard’s Crown via the Gold Box games.
Is the combat rewarding enough to put up with the old school RPG conventions?
Excepting a few dubious mechanics choices here and there, there’s nothing problematic or icky about the “old school RPG conventions”. The majority of the problems you’ll find in Nahlakh and Helherron are all due to shitty UI (and would be solved with superior UI; also, occasional bugs). Oh, sure, one is a LBD game and one is a classic level based game and one just has you spend exp like money. These are relevant details and make for different gaming experiences, but at the end of the day these are just details and they don’t make or break the game (unless they are implemented really badly; Helherron does not implement it’s system badly but it could implemented it better).
To be clear here, the oldschoolness isn’t really relevant. If the graphics turn you off they turn you off. The UIs can be a big problem but it’s not an “old school CRPG proble”. Ask yourself: does the thought of replaying a fight 5 times seem awful? That’s the type of game we are talkign about. It’s not every fight by a long shot (depending in part on your tactical acumen and moxy, of course). Some people enjoy teasing out the answer to that kind of puzzle. I guess a shitty real life approximation would be a go or chess problem. Lots of fights involve that kind of thinking.
Tim did you play WC/The Gold Boxen games? Have you ever played a CRPG where you were out numbered in a fight 5x1 and the enemy composed of: melee, super mean melee, ranged, casters (problematic for different reasons but both problematic), and possibly to rub your face in it a super mean fuck you melee/boss type (or both of the later. that/;s the boss fight in the first caves in helherron)? Does thinking about that make your crotch tingly? The AI in these games is always going to be problematic, but it’s still an interesting and challenging tactical situation that you’ll find yourself in.
I will say this for the Helherron dev; he was pretty devious on encounter design as well.
Between this, answers from SkeleTony and guide sent by donpachi, I got answers for pretty much all my game mechanics questions for now.
Now my only remaining problem is to get Helherron 2.04 for Linux to work properly on my machine (meaning - with sound). I’ve tried to play without sound in my current setup but I’ve found it to be quite a bit less convenient, considering very brief and limited combat feedback text (just 1-2 lines of text describing the most recent combat action) and inability to see combat log. (is it indeed impossible or am I missing something here?)
So the big question is - Has anybody here ever played Helherron 2.04 for Linux? And if so - does it indeed have sound, just like Helherron 2.04 for Windows has?
As it was mentioned before, Linux version supposed to be pretty much bug-free, including absence of the infamous “horde crash” bug among many other bugs. So if you have Linux OS (or, like myself, are willing to download and install virtualbox/udutnu or something similar), you definitely want to play Linux version.
Also if you will be able to make it run with sound let me know. (I just got confirmation on OO forum that Helheron-Linux version indeed has sound, and works fine with virtualbox/ubutnu - I just need to figure out how to achieve it on my system)
Fixed the above as far as the ogre instead of troll thing. But I do not think trolls get the increased Strength boost that golems get As far as I know trolls can only carry what their strength score would indicate for any other character with that score. Golems are, as you note above, different.
This will save you lots of trouble. The main difference between Barbarian and Fighter is that the former gets better skill multipliers for 2h weapons while the latter gets them for 1 handers (+5/+4 versus +4/+5). You won’t level that much - 12 to 15 times plus myabe a couple more - so the multipliers matter.
Pretty sure I hit at least level 20 in 2.04(where you don’t even get that ‘Elemental planes’ quest until you reach level 10. But the above may have held true in earlier versions(though I am fairly certain that in 2.03 I was around level 16 while doing the ice caves on that third island).
I love having 2 mages and 2 priests. If you only want 3 casters, get 2 priests. I never played a Shaman (introduced in 2.04), I remember the feelings on them were mixed. Fairies have the best max int/wis really. And they fly. The flying will be useful in certain places.
Agreed about everything above except to note that Shamans could be argued to be overpowered but other than that I don’t think most would have mixed feelings about them. They cast both magic and prayer spells, and get a +25% to summoning spells. Orcs make the best shamans(fairies cannot be shamans though but even if they could I would take the orc) because of that dark vision thing(and I believe they may have gotten an undocumented bonus to prayer skill or something like that?).
Lizard Man is the preferred choice for a HtH geared monk; Elf for a caster geared monk. The HtH geared monk will be better in the long run, IIRC (that was absolutely true at one point around 2.0; I don’t know now. Actually caster monks were decidedly lacking at one point - you just won’t get a high enough caster skill to summon 20 demons or anything). It will take awhile but your monk can turn into a vicious killing machine. They ignore Zones of Control. Also, monk was the popular choice for the special new game + mode (1 character, but you get significantly higher base stats, by the dozens).
All true but note that in 2.04 ‘ZOC’s’ are only ignored via a successful ‘Stealth’ skill check(Monks get a +5 multiplier to Stealth though, on skill-ups).
move items are very valuable. they can really make a monk, archer, or one of your true heavies very useful. Golems only get move 2 and I think Trolls are at move3 (everyone else starts at 4). Don’t misunderstand the Golem; they’re sturdy and they hit hard and the lack of move won’t hurt as much as you think. But find him a nice + move ring.
Trolls start with move 4 just like everyone else, at least in 2.03 and later.
General play:
I did not like the lighting system introduced some time in 2.0+. Characters can’t see very far so much of the battle field remains shrouded in darkness. It’s a toss of the dice as to whether you’ll start with what amounts to a “flare” spell, and it’s usefullness is somewhat limited. But the Troll has great darkvision. So you can still get a feel for the battle while in the deployment phase. If you are really sneaky, you can make note of pesky caster/ranged attacker locations and target blind.
I actually like the limited vision because it makes orcs and trolls better balanced against other races. Sure this is due to poor design decisions on Antti’s part as far as race and class balance go but without the vision fewer people would bother with trolls or orcs for ANY class/build.
Field spells are useful. Field of Ice isn’t as crazy as it used to be (there was a pathing problem and also a mechanics problem that basically made it ridiculusly OP) but it can be useful. Web to tie a caster/archer down just for a turn or two can be super useful. Water is the best - every turn enemies inside must make swim checks or flounder and lose a turn. The create 3x3 water spell is something you want early for your clerics.
I would only add here that one should NEVER cast the ice spells when dealing with large hordes of monsters and using the Windows version of 2.04 since it will result in the ‘Horde crash’ bug that occurs when one creature attacks another(via sliding into him in this case).
But mages can do lots more. They get wonderful buffs and disablers - a little more variety than the clerics get. An d they get their fair share of summons.
My memory may be off here but do mages get ANY summons?! I seem to remember that Priests(and shamans) got all the summon spells?
Int is important since it gives out more skill "increases"on level up, but it’s not super important on non casters. The system is slightly weird; you get X skill increases. Each invested in a skill gies + Y skill points (based on the multiplier), but you can’t spend more than 3 increases per skill per level up. That means your castyers should get +15 spell skill every level up and if you aren’t doing this you are playing the game wrong (possibly living your life wrong as well). Weapon skill doesn’t necessarily need to zoom into the 300s, but you generally want to focus. Have at least one character use 1h swords. There are things that can add penalties to spell casting, IIRC.
Actually it is ‘Learning’ that effects points you get to spend on leveling up, not intelligence(at least in the latter versions but I seem to remember this being the case in 1.5 as well). Intelligence seems to only benefit mages & shamans(and bards) in that it determines Mana points for those casters.
Positioning matters. Enemyes (And players!) can get knocked back. It can hurt something standing behind the thing being knocked back. Fairy casters that get body slammed by flying Golems are not going to enjoy it. It’s part of the game (those golems, starting mid game, are going to be tossing lots of creatures around like rag dolls!).
I have never seen anything knock a golem back(Maybe a dragon?!) but yeah, other PCs getting knocked into your fairies can hurt you a bit. Something to be wary of but not something worth replacing fairies with elves or some such IMO(as I have heard of others doing).
Scrolls and potions and such are there for the using. DO NOT BE BASHFUL IN THIS.
Except that ‘mega-damage’ scrolls are best saved for ‘horde’ encounters to avoid the crash bug.
This going to be incorrect, but I think:
iron < mithril < diamond < eternium, with missing materials. There are materials that can add penalties (bht they might make an item more expensive/sell for more). Diamond is definately a booster, but some other rare material types are mixed bags for pure “do more damage/hit more/etc” purposes. I am pretty sure I am missing something - Dwaven and elven maybe. I think elven does what you think (a little more protection but lighter). Is there adamantium? I forget.
I do not remember Adamantium(but this would probably be so whether Adamantium existed in game or not). Dwarven weighs like twice as much but has greater AC and damage bonuses. Elven stuff weighs 50% less IIRC but also has some AC and damage bonuses(not as high as dwarf stuff). Obsidian items add +10% to resistances(all of them IIRC). I will have to play some more to rediscover the rest…
There are tactics (uhhhh, shift-t?). I can’t quite recall the specifics, but you can trade offensive ability for defensive protection. There is actually dodging and damage mitigation. Those lumbering fighter types (golems and to a lesser extent Trolls) will never be good dodgers, but never mind that.
Yes. First thing I do when setting out with my new party is to set the tactics to ‘Berserk’ for Golems and trolls(get like a -10 DB or something like that and a +20 attack bonus?). I leave monks alone as far as tactics settings go and I set all my casters to max ‘Defensive’ settings. My (thief)archers I sometimes set to ‘Aggressive’ since they normally won’t need to be dodging but bards I set to defensive.
I would only add that In Proudfoot’s games(nahlakh, Natuk etc.) there were mechanics problems far beyond the UI. Ogres and half-trolls and such get large strength bonuses upon character creation because they are very large guys. But he also, probably due to his experience with the early GURPS system, figured “Strength” to account for ‘stamina’ and decided that spells would drain from this attribute. GURPS’ developers realized this problem and fixed it in 3rd edition(which also helped game balance in that system) by basing ‘Hit Points’ on Strength and basing ‘Fatigue’ on Health(whereas before HP were based on Health and Fatigue was based on Strength’…just like Tom’s games).
What this lead to was what I often call the ‘Buff Mages problem’ where ogres and the like would seem to make the best casters in game and ALL mages tend to end up way stronger(more muscular) than the front line warriors.
Also, since Intelligence determined how much EXP. a PC got from battles, even the dumb-as-a-brick half trolls would end up with triple digit Intelligence scores by the end game since all PCs ended up dumping all experience into boosting Intelligence first. He could have solved these problems by A) not allowing attributes to be improved with experience(or making it cost prohibitive at least) and B) being more logically consistent with how his attributes are defined. The size of a character SHOULD be defined in the attributes during character creation but THAT attribute should not double as a general ‘fitness’/stamina score as well. Combining those like that is like combining “Dexterity” and “Constitution” into a single attribute called “Coolness” or something. May sound like it makes sense to some when it is not examined well but the same sorts of problems will become apparent in the game’s design(such as fairies being both dexterous and tough as nails while ogres cannot handle a club and will probably be killed by dropping the club onto their feet).
A word of warning though: you will become annoyed by your party buffs!
The caster buffs are pretty much essential to winning, but must be manually recast on every character. This gets tedious, and is what prevented me from finishing the game with 100ish hours into it. It would be awesome to find out that I was Doing It Wrong, or something.
I think if I went back, I’d probably use some sort of macro program to automate the buffage.
For which game? In Helherron you CAN auto-buff the party with single casts(I can’t remember the key-press offhand but it is something like ‘Shift + A’ from the point after you highlight the spell you will cast or something like that).
For Nahlakh though, yeah…I believe we are out of luck.
But speaking of Nahlakh you can still download the “Hint Book” but I cannot post the link evidently because of the post count rule but in the “Nahlakh” section of the Proudfoot forums there is a thread by me which contains the link.
This guide contains various spoilers such as spell syllables(for all spells), some maps, monster stats, item materials, which PC icons indicate which ‘class’ and what skills those grant etc.
I am playing Helherron atm (Linux, 2.04, no sound alas ;( ). Using your custom icons. (nice work btw, thanks! Wish you would have done it for all Helherron tiles - yours are much better :) )
I’ve finished bunch of quests, have party at about lvl 4. So far I love it! It has its flaws, which could be easily fixed with some design tweaks.
(for example, I don’t really like the way experience is awarded in this game, it kindof encourages you to prolong battles artificially. It would be better if exp would be awarded based upon fixed amount for each battle, that would be calculated based upon on challenge level of this battle and your party level.)
But nevertheless it is a great game! Some of the best tactical combat mechanics in any turned based RPGs I’ve played. (and I’ve played a lot of them, since it is my favorite computer game genre ;) ). Helherron also has very good spells and char development systems, very diverse loot system, et cetera.
Question - since you are clearly very experienced with this game as well as Natuk and Naklakh game (I haven’t played these two yet, but I keep hearing about them), how would you compare these two games with Helherron? Should I give them a try, after I am done with Helherron? And if so - which one in your opinion is the best, Naklakh or Natuk?
(FYI: Things I care about most in games like this: interesting and deep tactical combat mechanics, challenge level (I love challenging games), strong char development system and magic system, interesting and diverse enemies that force you to adapt your tactics, et cetera. Interesting story and quests would be nice too, but it is my understanding that none of these three games are really focusing on that part.)
So what do you think?
BTW if anybody else here has experience with these games -Helherron, Naklakh, Natuk, and would be willing to write their impressions and compare them, you are also most welcome to do it.
Thanks. I wish I had had more time before the 2.04 release. That title screen image I did was rushed as all Hell(IIRC I did the penciling and then the embellishing and coloring in Paint Shop pro in just a few days)! Plus it would have been nice to have gotten ALL the custom icons I did into the official release. Not sure which customs you downloaded but I did new mummies, wraith-things, NPCs and various PC icons that did not make it in(I probably put most of them up for download on one of my pages though).
I’ve finished bunch of quests, have party at about lvl 4. So far I love it! It has its flaws, which could be easily fixed with some design tweaks.
(for example, I don’t really like the way experience is awarded in this game, it kindof encourages you to prolong battles artificially. It would be better if exp would be awarded based upon fixed amount for each battle, that would be calculated based upon on challenge level of this battle and your party level.)
I hear you. I don’t really mind the experience system as it is but there were generally a lot of things that could have been improved upon.
But nevertheless it is a great game! Some of the best tactical combat mechanics in any turned based RPGs I’ve played. (and I’ve played a lot of them, since it is my favorite computer game genre ;) ). Helherron also has very good spells and char development systems, very diverse loot system, et cetera.
Question - since you are clearly very experienced with this game as well as Natuk and Naklakh game (I haven’t played these two yet, but I keep hearing about them), how would you compare these two games with Helherron? Should I give them a try, after I am done with Helherron? And if so - which one in your opinion is the best, Naklakh or Natuk?
Nahlakh is closer to Helherron in terms of UI and graphics and a few other things but it has a lot of features that will probably bug you(they bug me anyway). The weird picking an icon to determine your race/class(without telling you in game what is what) and races having zero effect stat-wise(half ogres are no stronger or less intelligent than humans). The often nonsensical ‘adjectives’ instead of numbers for skills(and Tom being unaware of many ‘positive’ adjectives like “Enormous”, “Titanic”, etc. and so there are a disproportionate number of ‘negative’ adjectives instead).
Natuk is, as Peacedog points out, more polished. Better graphics, more spells, more and better tactical options, more interesting ‘character’ of the game itself where you play a band of orcs, ogres and half-trolls(of particular ‘orcy’ classes such as shamans, assassins, scouts, etc.) on a quest for revenge.
Both games suffer from some bad design elelments though. Tom was heavily influenced by early GURPS RPG mechanics which were quite broken themselves priod to the third ed. “Compendiums”. In particular the ‘spell casting drains from the Strength attribute’ thing. The problem was(as with the early GURPS systems) that “Strength” was both an indicator of ‘Size’(hence ogres got huge Strength bonuses) AND ‘stamina’(logically these two should be entirely separate attributes. GURPS’ developers realized and fixed this.Tom did not catch on though). This lead to casters ending up(in Natuk especially)) being ‘buffer’ than the front line ogre tanks.
There were other similar flaws such as the dumb-as-a-bag-of-hammers’ half-troll warriors ending up with triple digit Intelligence scores because Intelligence determined how much experience you got from battles and such. These things could have easily been fixed by just re-thinking his attribute definitions.
(FYI: Things I care the most about in games like this - interesting and deep tactical combat mechanics, challenge level (I love challenging games), strong char development system and magic system, interesting and diverse enemies that force you to adapt your tactics, et cetera. Interesting story and quests would be nice too, but it is my understanding that none of these three games is really focusing on that part.)
So what do you think?
You shouldn’t be too disappointed with either Nahlakh or Natuk then. Nahlakh is WAY harder and has a certain primitive charm to it. It also allows for aimed attacks at specific body parts for impressive damage effects(at the cost of attack chance penalties). You will want to download the PDF version of the “hint book” from the Nahlakh forums at tom proudfoot’s site(scroll down to a post by me about this for the link. I cannot post the link here because of post count restrictions).
Natuk is, overall a much better game though IMO. It allows for some impressive tactical options such as dual wielding weapons, more robust aiming at specific body parts, feinting, ‘beating down’, etc. Plus you can add your own custom PC icon graphics easily(I did 9 or 10 which you can look at and download from the Natuk forums at Tom’s site also). Natuk also has more spells and a difficulty option(you can select from between ‘%50’ and up to %500 difficulties in game).
Natuk is also a more modern, mouse-driven interface and has a nifty in game help system(pressing F1 key to access IIRC).
Thank you for your detailed answers SkeleTony, it has been very useful. I think I will give Natuk a try. I’ve downloaded already, it definitely looks and feels more sleek and refined than the other two games. But it’s a pity about design choices for STR and INT in Natuk that you’ve described - from what you are saying it sounds to me like if it pretty much destroys or at least seriously ruins the elaborate char development system of that game, with all these 20-30 various skills plus attributes, as well as that it leads to very similar and unrealistic party members by the end of the game.
On the positive side I like the sound of possibility of setting 500% difficulty, as long as the tactical combat is fun and deep it sounds like a great option to have for those players like myself who enjoy challenge. :)
I’ve assumed it contains all your individual icons changes that didn’t make it into 2.04. Is it indeed so?
I hear you. I don’t really mind the experience system as it is but there were generally a lot of things that could have been improved upon.
Just to clarify my statement - what I dislike about exp system in Helherron are two things - first that the longer the battle is the more exp you’ll get, which kindof encourages you to not finish your enemies quickly if you want more exp. Second it encourages you to do things with each character each round to get most exp. Like having your bard play on his music instruments each turn, even if all you are facing are last half dead kobold that would be obliterated by any of your fighters next time they swing their blades, without any help from your bard. But if you want your bard not to fall behind your other chars you have to use him.
All and all - IMHO it is not the best exp system, and it could be very easy changed to something much more sensible with just a simple design tweak. Oh well…
It’s not a game breaking moment for me, just what I feel is one of the design flaws that could be easily fixed with a design tweak. But like I said still it is a great game despite its flaws.
BTW the thought has just occurred to me. You know what I think would be an amazing game to play in this style and genre? Something like any of the Jeff Vogel’s Spiderweb RPG games (Avernum/Geneforge series), with their nice stories/quests and overall decent level of polish and production values, but with much better combat and char development/magic from Helherron, to replace their rather bland (and unchanging for each new game!) Spiderweb’s tactical combat system and pretty limited loot and magic system. For me that would be the ultimate indie old-school RPG. :)
Someone should have force Jeff Vogel to play Helherron, if he hasn’t done so already… :) In particular from the programming/design point of view it would be relatively easy to implement many of these tactical combat additions and char development/magic features from Helherron, which IMHO would increase the fun from his own games tremendously.
I don’t know, personally it wasn’t a big factor for me so far. I am not that far into the game yet (level 4 party although as you know levels come slowly in this game), but so far I’ve had to cast party buffs before the battle for only 4-5 especially challenging battles that I couldn’t win otherwise. (And even then you only had to cast specific buffs for specific characters, to save mana for the battle, so the efficient autocasting would be difficult to implement since it would have to be customized)
Besides due to Helherron’s chars experience system that I’ve described above, you will get more exp if you cast your buffs during the battle. :)
I could not tell if Tciecka was talking about Helherron or Nahlakh or Natuk? In Helherron, as I described above, you CAN auto-buff the entire party(IIRC it is ‘shift + A’ from the spell selection screen. Costs you 8x the mana but buffs all 8 with the selected buff).
I totally understood your point about experience in Helherron…the way it can encourage cheesy powergaming behavior. It just wasn’t as big a deal to me because I never really do that kind of thing in crpgs I play and there were a LOT of more problematic issues with Helherron(bugs, some character creation/design issues, several lackluster dungeons, balance issues etc.). But you are right in any case that ideally all such design issues should be ironed out via alpha and beta testing. I think Antti had like a handful of people testing Helherron and was not getting any sales(when the game was shareware) so the result is a great game that could have been legendary had he had more resources to work with(time, money, playtesters, additional coders maybe…).
Re: Jeff Vogel’s games
Have you tried his older games(before Avernum, Geneforge etc.)? Exile 2, 3 and Blades of Exile in particular?
Blades of Exile is now open source/freeware. it is an CRPG ‘Cosntruction kit’ wherein you can use the editor to create scenarios and play custom made scenarios using BoE. All these older games are top-down, 2D(same perspective and graphic style as Helherron/Natuk etc.), and have better magic systems, more spells and so forth. The older Exiles(the Avernums are remakes of the Exile games using the isometric pseudo-3D graphics, and dumbed down spell system) lacked a few nifty Avernum features such as the better skill system and ‘special skills’ but other than that they are superior to the Avernums IMO.
I’ve downloaded your “helherron.dat” file from here: (link omitted because of silly rule)
I’ve assumed it contains all your individual icons changes that didn’t make it into 2.04. Is it indeed so?
Probably has most or all of them. IIRC I only set up the above page because I WAS using a free web hosting service that did not allow me to host files as big as the helgraph.dat file. I ahve since paid for a real web site but have been too lazy to move all my stuff over there yet(one of these weeks…). Not sure if I did any more icons that are not in the above file but I think the above has them all.
