The Best of Select: Games Special 4/THE BEST OF SELECT Games Special 4 (Select CD-ROM)(1996).iso/tips/cheetcht/3qok-sol.txt

Text File | 1995-02-06 | 56KB | 1,148 lines

~Dark Queen Of Krynn

Tips and Mini-Walkthru - Corrected by MAGIC


~Part I: Getting Started

Dark Queen of Krynn (or DQK for short) is somewhat atypical for
a gold box game. In particular, where the usual AD&D product
pretty much leads you by the nose so you have no trouble staying
on track, DQK goes in the other direction, not giving you much
help at all in deciding what to do or where to go next.
Sometimes, even when you think you know where to visit, nothing
seems to be happening there (or at least, nothing of much
importance).

Also, a number of events are triggered by doing certain things,
some of them not very obvious. This is especially the case in
the Tower of Flame, where getting from one level to the next may
be a frustrating experience.


In addition, there are several set-ups in the game that you need
to know about so you can survive the experiences. A lot of
gratuitous damage gets tossed at your party, and knowing when
it's coming can help your people stay alive.

The first thing you need to know about is the nasty bug in
regard to multi-class characters. Usually, when a character has
enough points to go up a level, his or her name shows pink on
the screen. However, the bug prevents this from happening with
multi-class types. So the character is accumulating points, but
never seems trainable.

In fact, that character CAN be trained (if race limits have not
been reached), even though the name has not changed color. You
will have to keep track of the experience points for
multi-classes, and train them when they have enough points for
the next level. This was more of a problem for dual-class types,
since my triple-class characters usually got the color change.

If you are creating a party from scratch (instead of bringing
one over from Death Knights, which is better than making a new
one), you don't want Silvanesti Elves unless you plan on
bringing them in as single-class mages, clerics, or rangers, or
as multi-class in those professions. Those are the only ones
they can max out (unlimited advancement) in; as plain fighters,
they will get only up to level 10, which is not really very good
for this game. You want at least level 14 fighters, to get that
double hit per round. For the usual F/Mu combination, Qualinesti
elves are the better choice.

My own party consisted of one human knight, 3 F/Mu's (two red
mages, one white mage), and two triple class F/Cleric/Mu's (both
white mages). So everyone could fight, and everyone could also
cast spells. The knight (of the rose) was especially important,
since having him in the party let me control the various NPC's
who joined us for varying periods of time.


Of course, the triple-class guys went up slower than anyone
else, but they were still worth having. You are going to need a
lot of magic, and also a lot of healing, to get through this
game....and there will be times when you can't sit encamped and
fix everyone up; you'll need individual healing spells. The more
you have, the better.

I went through DQK at the novice level, mainly because I found
out about the training bug too late to do anything (we were in
the Tower of Fire by then), so for most of the play, I was under
the impression my mages were never going to go up in level. With
mages of only 13th-15th level, I figured we needed some sort of
advantage. Even with that, many of the combats, especially with
enchanted Draconians, were hard.

While you now know about the bug, and won't be stuck like I was,
you may still want to lower the difficulty level, especially in
certain areas like the Tower of Fire, where there are several
tough encounters with Draconians and others. In addition, you
will find that low armor class (-10 or lower) is not as good
protection against hits as you might expect. Your party will be
absorbing a lot of damage throughout the game, one way or
another.


Money isn't of much use in DQK. After awhile, there isn't any
reason to pick up the steel, gems, and jewels that are offered
after a combat. The only things you need money for are (a)
getting items identified and (b) buying passes at Hawkbluff. The
inns are free, training is free, and equipment offered for sale
is mainly mundane stuff you don't want to bother with. So don't
weigh yourself down with a lot of useless treasure.

If you are bringing a team over from Death Knights, you may be a
little short of magic arrows. There was only one place in DQK I
could find to buy arrows, and they were a bit expensive (15,000
for ten +2 arrows)....and that was well along, when we were in
the Gnome tower on the Burning Sea. If you need arrows(or good
bows, or both), the simplest thing to do is play the old game of
"Muggee".

Create several fighters (stats, name, etc are irrelevant). They
all come with +2 composite bows and 40 +2 arrows. Bring them
into the group, trade off what you want, and then dump them.
This is about the only way you'll get magic arrows in the game
(there is a place where you can get some +4's, but not many, and
only once).

As usual, the best stuff comes after combat. However, you'll
notice that many of your opponents only carry mundane items, or
no items, just some gems, jewels, and/or steel. Even the Dark
Wizards have junk for treasure; you can't even pick up bracers
from them (which makes me wonder how they got that armor class
of -1). Accumulating good equipment will be a slow task.


~Troublesome Critters

DQK features some nasty monsters, many of which can do
considerable harm to your party. These include Dark Wizards, and
bombardier Draconians.

Dark Wizards are high-level (I'd hate to guess how high) mages,
and they come into combat with all their defensive spells up and
ready before the fighting even starts. The spells they have in
effect are Fire Shield (cold), Mirror Image, and Globe of
Invulnerability. For some time, these guys are going to be a
pain to kill.

Mirror Image makes it very hard to target them with arrows. The
Globe will protect them from the usual damage spells such as Ice
Storm, Fireball, and Lightning Bolt. Fire Shield will generally
keep them safe from the Delayed Blast Fireballs (or DBF), and
bestow double damage on anyone who hits them with a hand weapon.

One way of handling them in the early going is Cone of Cold. If
you can get someone close to a Dark Wizard, and have time to get
off the spell, this will usually kill them, since the Cone is an
area spell and too high in level to be stopped by the Globe.

This is tricky, though, since the Wizards tend to lurk in the
back ranks, where they are hard to reach. Also, THEY throw
DBF's, and as we all know, the DBF is an instant spell (like
magic missile). One of those, and your party could be in bad
shape (not to mention, unable to cast any spells of their own
that round).

Another way to get to them is an arrow barrage. Enough arrows
will disperse the various mirror images (or you may even get
lucky on a shot and hit him in spite of the duplicates). Once
the images are gone, he is a sitting duck for arrows.

The last, and best, way won't be available for awhile. When you
get a white mage high enough, have him (or her) learn Power Word
Kill (for some reason, this choice only shows for white mages).
Power Word Kill is an instantaneous spell, and it works first
time, every time. One of these, and you won't have any more
trouble with Mr. Wizard. You will have to get fairly close to
use it, since the range is only 1 square for every four
experience levels of your mage (ie, a 15th level mage can only
toss it about 3 squares away).

The other problem comes from the Enchanted Draconians, which
have been put in the game to make your life much more difficult.
Not only do Auraks blow up when they die, so do Sivaks, Kapaks,
and Bozaks. Of these, the Bozaks (which I always thought of as
Bozos) are the worst. I cringed whenever these guys showed up in
combat.

First, Bozos have a F