Quest Digest 29/3/96 From: ">>-Josh->" <J.P.Gallagher@durham.ac.uk> Date: Fri, 29 Mar 1996 00:00:00 +0000 ___ _ / _ \ | | 29th March 1996 | |_| |UEST__| |IGEST \__ | / _ | | |_ | |_| | An e-mail discussion forum for the fantasy |_ / \___/ play by mail game; "Quest". Compiled by Josh Gallagher. J.P.Gallagher@durham.ac.uk o This isn't one of those automatic list thingies, so could all articles be sent clearly marked with paragraphs initalled to me. o If you want off the list, just say! No hassle, no pressure. o All material here is the exclusive property of the author and may not be used elsewhere without their permission. o For answers to specific Quest-related questions, you may want to get in touch with the Quest Helpline; queries sent to quest-help@kokodan.vivi.com will be sent to a panel of experienced Quest players, who will endeavour to answer your problems quickly. Thanks to Bruce Cota for his help. ___ / _ \ I may just have counted wrong, but I think we now have | __/DITORIAL 119 addresses on the mailing list for the Digest. You can \___| check for yourselves, as I have included the entire list at the top of this Digest (as you can see!). This was at the request of someone on the list. (I only hope I don't get lots of bounce messages now Dave! I'll hold you responsible for the safe delivery of this Digest, if you don't mind. ;) Welcome to all the new additions to the list, and greetings go out to all those reading it in the newsgroup still. Easter holidays have caught up with a fair proportion of the UK universities now, hence the temporary drop in articles. All articles are appreciated, whether roleplayed messages, in-game messages or just general discussion about the game. Please read through to the end; there is a suggestion there that I am keen to hear EVERYBODY's opinion on. That means _you_. JPG> On with the articles. Firstly a report from Chris Dickson; -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 22 Mar 1996 02:18:06 +0000 (GMT) From: Chris M Dickson <chris.dickson@keble.oxford.ac.uk> CMD> I went to the FLAGSHIP PBM convention "Triumph" last Saturday (16th March) and, rather unusually for a PBM convention, KJC Games had booked a double stall, with a selection of staff on hand (for a while - before they sensibly went off upstairs to the bar). Had a chat with Kevin about the state of play regarding improvements - Neil the Quest-specific programmer is working on Extra Time, the footy PBM, and looks set to be doing so for the next month or two (at the end of which the game might be actually worth playing... maybe). After that the next thing to be added might just be horses, but they still haven't decided... and they still haven't decided how. They may implement it in a multi-stage process; first just giving you some more MPs and second with all the implications in combat, dungeons and so on. Oh and the delay in the reinstatement of @KJCGames.com is due to letting all the Internet servers around the world know the domain exists. Not sure that sounds right to me - I'd have thought that was a quick, near- automatic job... never mind. Nice to get a chance to meet some other Quest players - 3 other Quest players, none of which were in my game! Hey ho... I did see all the game newsletters, including the game 14 one, the first one of Gerry Duffy's I had seen, which shows how long it's been since I put a turn in. Hmm, now where did that file go? -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 22 Mar 96 09:47:18 EWT TO: ALL FROM: Mike Summerfield (msummerf@esoc.esa.de) MDS> Are any of you playing in Quest game 5? If you are, are you a member of the Red Reign alliance? If not why not? Although a relatively new alliance we are growing extremely quickly and need new members to tighten our grip on the land. I myself have only recently joined this alliance, although I have been playing in this game for over 180 turns, and have found the other members of the alliance to be very friendly and helpful. The alliance leader Lord Strahd, aka Kim Hansen, is doing an excellent job in running the alliance. We have a regular newsletter and of course the benefits of an alliance shop selling equipment at reduced prices. If you are interested in joining the alliance or just want more information, either contact me via e-mail or drop Kim a note at: Monjev 63 st., 4720 Allerslev, Denmark. (JPG> I'd do an advert for my alliance in Game 11 if it weren't for the fact that I think there are only 2 other game 11 players on the Digest list!) -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 23 Mar 96 13:21:42 GMT From: Dave Rees <chaos@thanes.demon.co.uk> > From: j_klein@e-mail.com > To:All > About: Quest-3 German - see call for help in Digest 4.3.96 by Skeltem > I'm known as "giant Hydra" etc. DR > With so many names you're going to need a big tombstone. > Our enemies are inofficials alliances like "raven" or "chaos" which > declared war to us - before they were ready to fight DR > The BKA took on the biggest multigame alliance in quest and won with just 5 groups and we weren't prepared for what was to come. Our enemies taught us well. Too well. > and laugh. They are unable to cordinate actions or to develop their groups. > They are making enemies while calling neutrals - just by saying stupid > things. DR > No group is invincible eventually they will fall. > In germany we are the only ones with an internet homepage Snip. DR > This has little to do with Quest though, perhaps you'd like to send the address in so we can have a look round. But this says nothing about how you play or succeed in Quest. > ... is it our fault that their parties are so poor ??? > ... is it our fault that we could kill them in their own towns ??? > ... is it our fault that we could kick their asses whenever we want to ??? DR > Looks like it's time for it to be rectified then. > Snip. why don't they ???? DR > Quest is a large jigsaw puzzle with no picture, some people are lucky and get the important pieces to fit quickly, some don't. But when the picture is complete there's nowhere to go, and you'll always be looking over your shoulder. And if your really lucky you'll just see the group that is going to grind you into the dust. > In this game there is NO NEED for an evil alliance as long as so many > parties are willing to attack us - WE are JUST DEFENDING OUR HOMES ... > our wifes ... our children ... DR > Wrong, there's always a need for an evil alliance. BKA mkII anyone:) Personally I don't see this digest as a medium for slagging off other alliances. (JPG> You can if you want to, but if it gets too bitchy I'll try and discourage it. Arguments between alliances enhance my enjoyment of the game at least!) > SV> Fight for a cause? Yes. Die for it? Not if we can help it. IOT1 > Just checking:) > AH> Although as cowardly as Skulking Vermin are they wont go N/A when > things go badly for them, unlike a certain alliance head group > "Newpowergeneration" in G3. Yup, hostile since the dawn of time but as > soon as they lose a few characters they go N/A. DR > I rest my case your honour. QED? DR > Everyone knows that if you buy a set of armour the character will quite happily use it straight away. Then why will he pick up a club in preference to a +3 axe when he's got 100% in axes. It's about time the routines were rewritten for characters to use their best listed weapon, not the first available in the backpack. It's plain stupid. JPG> I agree. One thing we could do with is a bug list; little things like this that are obviously just incorrectly programmed and need rectifying. I am quite happy to collect _short_ bug descriptions and compile them together to send to KJC, along the same lines as the Top 5 improvements, but I'll send in all bugs I receive, not just the top 5. JPG> There is a command to change which weapon you use, isn't there? I still agree that in the absence of such an order, the weapon the character is most proficient in should prevail. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Skeltem@aol.com Date: Fri, 29 Mar 1996 03:00:33 -0500 >JK>Our enemies are inofficials alliances like "raven" or "chaos" which declared war to us - before they were ready to fight. PK>Well I think the declaration of war thingy is a little bit hazy. I am agreeing, that none of the KaoS (Kharnes anarchistic, dis_o_bedient Syndicate) is yet ready to fight you, but alas, we never declared war - one of us did (and not even by himself, t'was a 'joke' of our cute birdie associates) and as we are anarchists, no one can tell the others what to do. Your companion the "Grandmaster of Knowledge" saw it our way, but he seems to be a little bit more reasonable and communicative, and less ideologic than the "Grandmaster of Dreams". Well, just thought about it - t'seems logical ;-) >JK>WE are learning from them whenever we could (Wenn ich den Andreas Meyer noch einmal treffe habe ich ein paar wunderschoene Ueberraschungen fuer ihn ...), increasing our knowledge step by step, .. to learn .. to grow .. why don't they ???? PK>We do, Juergen, we do. But we are not running around like some narcistic wannabees and boasting about how many 6-Char. newbies wa have killed. And if you go deep inside of yourself, you will have to admit that the chances for a weak group in our game to survive is not raised by the presence of 'Brotherhood'-groups. So much for impoliteness! (Andreas will surely appreciate your little surprises). And for learning. Most of us (if any) didn't have the advantage to have played Quest in the UK before we entered our german game. You built your powerbase with knowledge we couldn't possibly have. So it is my right to equal the odds! >JK>In this game there is NO NEED for an evil alliance as long as so many parties are willing to attack us - WE are JUST DEFENDING OUR HOMES ... our wifes ... our children ... PK>Oh, Pathos! Oh, Schmerz! In our game is a dire need for an alliance of people who don't like to be dominated by the arrogant and overconfident attitude of Godlike Powerplayers and aren't afraid to say so. Wie man in den Wald hineinruft, so schallt's auch heraus. Quote: JK>We don't like to bother any more with KaoS. I have one of world's 20 best Quest-Groups and I like to develop them further to get into the Top 10. So bugger off, give up your petty alliance and we graciously let you live. PK>Talk about phonecalls, Juergen! Talk about saying stupid things! PK> That was that. PK> Another point I like to discuss with all of you is my favorite: the Halfblood Thief. In my opinion the BT is an excellent choice in every party. Especially in new groups he is an invaluable collector of both Xp and Gp. Also if your EM has got a decent Aw he is likely to profit from the thefts, too. In Wilderness he has many pluses because of his high Aw rating and in dungeons he is the one to open those secret compartments. Now I heard the opinion, that the BT should be dismissed because of his poor fighting and the lack of spellcasting abilities. What do you think? -------------------------------------------------------------------------- JPG> Absolutely not, I wouldn't trade my half-blood thief for _two_ human ones. JPG> On another topic, here are some things myself, Paul Madden and Craig Hall discussed in a pub in Birmingham the other day in our own minature pub meet. JPG> Firstly, our newsletter editor, Mark Payne (of the pub meet organising fame) has started voting on what our version of Kharne will be called when it is no longer to be called Kharne. I presume this is based on some statement made by KJC at some point that entirely passed me by, and not just Mark's hopeful predictions on features he'd like to see KJC implement. JPG> While we came up with a couple of suggestions, we were agreed on the fact that after all these years we were really quite happy to have it still called Kharne. I know this doesn't give it an individual status, but I guess you grow used to anything after a while! JPG> Another discussion point, mainly between myself and Paul, since Craig doesn't as yet have access to the internet, was the one I alluded to at the beginning of this Digest. It was a suggestion put forward by Paul when we were discussing the Change World Spell. JPG> What would you, as a Digest reader, think about starting up a new quest game for Digest readers. The general idea would be for KJC to collect the names of at least 60 people who intended to play and then start the game up. JPG> Most people who read the Digest know quite a bit about the game, and the resulting game would, I think, be highly exciting and hectic. It would in a way be like the 3 day turn around game(s) (but I would suggest this should be 7 day turn around) in its pace, but would enable much faster communication through the pages of the Digest. This would have the side effect of forcing me to produce either the Digest or a seperate production in the style of a game newsletter at least once a week. JPG> Consider the fact that communication between players need not be by letter (slow) or phone (expensive) but by email and related internet facilities. JPG> A suggestion put forward by Paul that I think would add to the excitement of the game but I'm not sure as many people would be keen on doing is to force each new party into one of four pre-setup alliances when the game starts. This would immeadiately promote playing in co-operation with other players and should hopefully prevent all the best players from joining into one all powerful alliance. JPG> I know it would be a matter of money and time for you, as it would for me. I do think that it would be a highly entertaining game however. I for one would certainly play it, as would Paul, I think. Let me know what the general opinion is. JPG> Until next time then; lucky Questing folks! >>-Josh-> "You can't always get what you want" - Rolling Stones Up