Darklands is an old, PAINFUL computer RPG from 1992, during the golden days of Microprose. It takes place in 15th century Germany, in a setting best described as "all the myths are true". Alchemy works, virtuous people can invoke saints to help them, witches eat children, dragons can be awoken and plague the landscape, gnomes can infest the mines, and the Knights Templar secretly worship Baphomet. It's a world where roads are often dangerous, and strangers are not trusted. The lord who rules the countryside from his keep may be a good and caring man, or a tyrant; the sick and hungry refugees could just be a trick to mug you. Even the church is not immune, but virtue DOES live in the hearts of many, and God himself can have missions for true heroes.
In Darklands, you have four adventurers at a time, occasionally with one NPC along for the ride. Your adventurers have pasts that you create in chargen; they can come from any walk of life, and may have held different professions before becoming adventurers, starting as young as 20 years old or as old as 60! Of course, older heroes are very frail, and 40 is a more practical limit.
It's distinguished by a high mortality rate, for this kind of RPG. Your heroes have 'strength' and 'endurance'; a glancing blow only hurts your endurance, but a deep cut or other nasty wound will also damage your strength. Lose your endurance, you're knocked out, lose your strength and you die. Endurance is healed most of the way after a battle, but strength needs days or weeks of rest at an inn. The game has a huge quantity of choose-your-own-adventure style events, and if you (say) try to climb into the castle with a rope, you'd better have high agility and take off your armor first, or you're likely to fail. Finally, to give a nasty example of the mortality rate: If your whole party is fighting hungry wolves, and loses their endurance, all getting KO'd...well, most of your party might be able to crawl away, while the wolves are distracted by eating someone!
People need high intelligence to be good at alchemy, and the way skills work, you kind of need specific training to start out with certain skills. (For example, a Recruit--good first profession--lets you put decent points into all your weapons, but not so much into speaking latin. A laborer on the other hand has plenty of opportunity to improve Impact Weapons, just not so much skill at Missile Devices!) Everyone needs decent strength and endurance, and perception, charisma and agility are important for SOMEone to have. That rounds out the six attributes. And while everyone needs some virtue and will work on it over time, it's still possible to start as a scoundrel of some sort.
Current Characters:Zubmeh Roosh (Dragooble), 35-year-old peasant-class monk
Gaweir Orsidious (WorkerDrone), 30-year-old noble knight
Tickelme Elmo (Zaithemaster), 50-year-old merchant proprieter
Meph Longarrow (Meph), 25-year-old lower class hunter
Dead characters:Gary the Yellow (chaoticjosh), 25-year-old lower-class swindler. Eaten by wolves.
Queue:Strife, 25-year-old veteran or captain
Neo (neo1096), 25-year-old lower-class veteran
Returning Players (Last in Queue):Adala Alke (chaoticjosh), 20-year-old noble novice monk
SIGNUPS:Give me a first and last name, gender, an age (multiple of 5, from 20 to 50), a general social class (from the lowest of peasants, through the merchants, to the nobility), and a vague occupation from the list below. If you want to be a 20 year old born as a peasant, you might not wind up as a bishop or a manorial lord, but I'll do what I can. If you want specific skills from the list, point those out and I'll do what I can, and maybe pick a weapon type too from the list below.
Recruit * Soldier * Veteran * Captain * Hunter * Bandit * Peasant * Schulz (village leader) * Noble Heir * Courtier * Knight * Manorial Lord * Hermit * Novice Monk/Nun * Monk/Nun * Friar * Priest * Abbot * Bishop * Oblate * Student * Clerk * Physician * Professor * Alchemist * Master Alchemist * Vagabond * Peddler * Local Trader * Travelling Merchant * Merchant-Proprietor * Laborer * Apprentice Craftsman * Journeyman Craftsman * Master Craftsman * Thief * Swindler
Missile weapons are not a big deal, so you'll want some melee skills!
Edged weapons (good damage, wide variety, not always great penetration)
Impact weapons (fast, cheap, often heavy, very good penetration)
Flails (Good all-round)
Polearms (slow, good penetration)
Bows (decent all-round missile weapons)
Missile Devices (crossbows and simple guns, expensive, plan on one shot per fight)
Thrown (cheap and fast but weak)
Alchemy (make potions)
Religion (recover divine favor faster, better reactions sometimes)
Virtue (I will always max this out--allows better saints)
Speak Common (talk your way out of things!)
Speak Latin (talk your way into universities, appreciate Mass)
Read & Write (better reactions from intellectuals)
Heal (highest heal score improves party heal rate)
Artifice (lockpicking)
Stealth (be sneaky)
Streetwise (be sneaky in town)
Ride (travel faster, joust better, escape faster--rarely used)
Woodwise (scare off wild animals, survive snowstorms)
Oh yeah, and pick your appearance from "Average Male", "Average Female", "Thin with Funny Hat", and "Fat Balding Male in Robe". There's various colors too, but those are the only appearance options.
I'll take the next character in the queue when someone dies, regardless of how viable they are! (Four alchemists ahoy!) Every update, I'll ask for advice on where to go next! This is my first Let's Play ever!
FOR THE GLORY OF GOD! OR FAME! OR AT LEAST MONEY!
Party History:August 27, 1400: The Awe-Inspiring Order of the Holy Cross is formed in the Alte Mühle in Hannover. Zubmeh, Gaweir, Elmo and Gary swear to slay evil.
September, 1400: The Order purges the streets of thugs, hears of a quest to retrieve prayer books from a cave northeast of Heidelberg, and defends themselves from mercenaries in the wilderness. They travel south, stopping in small villages on the way.
October, 1400: While travelling south, they encounter a hut with a witch, and Gary is eaten by wolves. The hunter Meph joins the party in the town of Kassel. The group retrieves the prayerbooks, barely escaping a giant cave spider.
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Topic: Let's Play Darklands: The Prayerbook is safe from the GCS! (Read 22626 times)