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Author Topic: TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)  (Read 7431 times)

rickvoid

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TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)
« on: August 19, 2009, 03:56:18 pm »

Okay, so the only immediate thread I saw for this is from over a year ago, and didn't go very far. So let's try again.

TOME is a Roguelike based on Tolkein's works about the world of Arda, known more commonly as Middle Earth. The designers went out of their way to be faithful to the mythos, while making a fun and highly playable game.

There are 22 races in TOME. Humans, Elves, Dwarves, and Hobbits (Halflings) make the required appearance, but so do Ent's, Trolls, Half-Ogres, Kobolds, Orcs, and even an evil sentient fungus: the Deathmold. Seriously.

Once you've got race and gender down, you can then pick what type of member of your race you are. The choices;
Classical (No changes to base race)
Lost Soul (Starts in a dungeon, at a ridiculously low depth, and you are expected to fight your way out, past horribly over-leveled monsters. If you do make it out, the game plays the same as for other players, but you keep whatever levels and equipment you gained on the way up. Insane)
Vampire (Blood-drinking, Light weakness, Dark resistance, little to no nutrition from regular food)
Spectre (No-clip Mode, basically. Though you do take minor damage while passing through solid objects)
Skeleton (Resistance to pointy things, MP penalty)
Zombie (Slow and dumb is a zombie)
Hermit (lower HP, higher MP and magic skills).

After all that, you finally get to pick a class. You've got everything from weapon-swingers to priests to mages to thieves to symbiotes to possessors to- I think you get the point.

I found this game several months ago, got frustrated by the learning curve and lack of documentation (The Wiki is okay, but could be lots better) , so I put it away and forgot about it until about a month ago when I got bored and needed something to do. Now it's way fun!

I'm currently running Kain and Raziel (of the Legacy of Kain Playstation series) through the dungeons. Kain is a Vampire Dunedane Mindcrafter (that doesn't pray to his god or do any of the god quests, because he's Kain.) and Raziel is a Specter Dunedane Mindcrafter of Morgoth (Morgoth is the real "Bad Guy" of the Middle Earth story. I felt that was appropriate for Raziel, what with the Elder God yelling in his head all the time.  ;D)

Anybody else still play this?
« Last Edit: August 19, 2009, 03:58:36 pm by rickvoid »
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Malicus

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Re: TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)
« Reply #1 on: August 19, 2009, 04:59:03 pm »

It's a roguelike I know I'm going to have to get into, but between Nethack, Dungeon Crawl, and ADOM, it may be a while yet.

I haven't beaten any of them yet.  :-[

It's an Angband variant, so it's rather different from those three that you listed, just so you know.
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Kagus

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Re: TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)
« Reply #2 on: August 19, 2009, 05:08:48 pm »

I tried playing a death mold symbiant once, because big parasitic molds growing on top of bigger parasitic molds are just awesome.

Then I realized that, as a randomly-teleporting death mold, it's frippin' impossible to pick the slimy little buggers up.  I just had to blast around for a bit until I just let the damn thing die.  Never take an immobile symbiant.  Just, don't...

Keiseth

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Re: TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)
« Reply #3 on: August 20, 2009, 01:22:24 pm »

I never played the online version. The normal ToME is great fun, however. My best character was a Dark Elf Sorcerer, level 30 or 40, died by butchering a dragon out of curiosity. There was no surviving what happened.

Sorcerers are the glass cannons of the game, but you're not forced to be that way. Playing a normal mage class grants you considerable health and defense. Sorcerer is the typical "wizard" class, that is frail and easily destroyed.

I mean hell, between playing as a Deathmold to starting on the wrong side of a dungeon, with classes like Symbiant that attach never-moving monsters to themselves and work together, to classes like Possessor that actually hop from body to body-- it's a pretty insane Rogue.
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Jervous

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Re: TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)
« Reply #4 on: August 20, 2009, 01:25:32 pm »

When I downloaded the most recent version of TOME it didn't have a run .exe...Am I missing something here?

I tried the online version. I started in a house and some drunks and a veteran ran at me and killed me. But WHY?!
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Cthulhu

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Re: TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)
« Reply #5 on: August 20, 2009, 01:53:37 pm »

The basic civilians all attack you.  Avoid the veterans and such and the rest are easy.
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Shoes...

Keiseth

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Re: TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)
« Reply #6 on: August 20, 2009, 02:14:00 pm »

Angband is lacking a bit in atmosphere, what with most of the town inhabitants being insane and wanting to kill you. On the other hand, if you look at it like this, the entire world has pretty much gone completely pants on head bonkers and it sort of makes sense for all of the remaining rational people to be hiding inside, or dead.
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de5me7

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Re: TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)
« Reply #7 on: August 20, 2009, 02:20:47 pm »

ive had about 4 attempts at tome. The first 3 involved me leaving bree (in differing directions) finding a ">" downstair. Decending in to a wood, and being completly surrounded by trees so couldnt move and with no stair back out.. end of game ( i guess i could have waited for starvation). The last one i got killed by a bear in the wilderness.

TOME seems like a good game but getting going is a bit confusing and unintuative
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I haven't been able to get any vomit this release. Not any I can pick up, at any rate.
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Keiseth

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Re: TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)
« Reply #8 on: August 20, 2009, 02:40:51 pm »

Did you read any of the help files? Your first destination should be the barrow-downs. I believe that's the name. Head to the west side of the Bree map (do not enter the world map!) and there's a path south through the trees into the dungeon.

Well, that is, your first destination after buying any meager supplies and possibly doing the house quest if you feel up to it, to get your own home to stash things.
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rickvoid

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Re: TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)
« Reply #9 on: August 20, 2009, 03:47:08 pm »

Did you read any of the help files? Your first destination should be the barrow-downs. I believe that's the name. Head to the west side of the Bree map (do not enter the world map!) and there's a path south through the trees into the dungeon.

Well, that is, your first destination after buying any meager supplies and possibly doing the house quest if you feel up to it, to get your own home to stash things.

A wand of mana-thrust + killing monsters in the swamp south of Bree is a good idea for most characters, casters more specifically. You can get to about Level 20 if you really want to grind it.

Not that I truly recommend doing it all the time, as it is mildly dangerous, boring, and the magic shop doesn't always carry a wand. *Shakes fist*

For those who may not know it, you get the house quest from the Mayor (who is in a building), and the thieves can be found in the orange building with the stairs leading down.
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Keiseth

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Re: TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)
« Reply #10 on: August 21, 2009, 02:28:10 pm »

When I downloaded the most recent version of TOME it didn't have a run .exe...Am I missing something here?

I tried the online version. I started in a house and some drunks and a veteran ran at me and killed me. But WHY?!

Yeah. You probably downloaded the SRC / Source, and not the Win32 binary.

Version 3.0.0 isn't near to being done yet, and isn't meant to be "played". Here's the Windows latest playable:

http://www.t-o-m-e.net/dl/win/tome-235-win.zip
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rickvoid

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Re: TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)
« Reply #11 on: August 22, 2009, 04:23:11 pm »

I use 3.0 for running LordBucket's DragonBall T mod, as it is absolutely flippin awesome.

But other than that, and his Zombie Horror game, there's not much point to the T3 engine. Which is horribly sad, because what Bucketman was doing with it, even in its infant state, was pretty awesome.
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Silleh Boy

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Re: TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)
« Reply #12 on: August 22, 2009, 04:38:47 pm »

Ahh.. I remember this game.
I beat it once with a lost soul possessor, those multi armed demon bodies are handy, until you can get the watcher in the water or whatever it's called (with luck) who, while unable to to open doors, could dig through them, if i recall correctly.
They likely fixed that, though.

The multiplayer version was fun, too, though they kept nerfing mimics, that stopped me playing in the end. One of my best characters on that one was a goblin archer with randart arrows from a halloween boss, and a autoid randart helm.
I wonder if the people I recall playing there still play. Heck, I wonder if they even remember me.

I should play again some day and see.

LordBucket

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Re: TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)
« Reply #13 on: August 22, 2009, 05:14:01 pm »

Quote
rickvoid:
I use 3.0 for running LordBucket's DragonBall T mod,
as it is absolutely flippin awesome.

Thank you.:)

Dragonball T had a large following for a while, up until new engine releases started breaking systems that had been working for years. DBT had all the makings of a mind-bogglingly huge, epic adventure, but with engine development dead I don't really see myself finishing it.

Quote
that, and his Zombie Horror game

Zombie Horror is yes, probably the best module ever made for the T-engine. Only roguelike I've ever played that made me jump in my seat. And I wrote it. I can only imagine what it would be like not knowing what to expect.

Quote
what Bucketman was doing with it, even in its infant state, was pretty awesome.

Again, thank you. If you really want to see some stretching of the engine, you might consider taking a look at Bubblegum Crisis. It was never finished enough to really be "playable" but you can see where it was going and it would have been amazing had engine support enabled me to finish it. Random quest generation, separate control for multiple characters in different locations swappable at any time, 3D map, fully customizable combat suits, body-location targetting system...it was going to be epic.




getter77

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Re: TOME (Troubles of Middle Earth)
« Reply #14 on: August 22, 2009, 05:51:44 pm »

Hopefully things work out somehow down the line with the engine troubles...ToME seems to have some good things going even if it also has a tendency to get stuck in the ditch, so to say, it seems.
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