A Sorcerer's Guide to GemStone III By Manny Revilla (Revised July 1995) Important Note! If you've never played Gemstone III before, you may find to much material in this guide to absorb in one reading. You must not let this discourage you. Gemstone III is a fun game. You don't have to understand everything to enjoy playing! As a beginner, the only thing you should read is Part I. Then play the game for a few days. Once you feel comfortable with the basics, read the rest of the guide. It's that simple. Welcome to the land of Kulthea! Table of Contents: Introduction Part I: Let's Learn the Basics I.1 Character Generation I.2 Character Skills I.3 Equipping the Character I.4 Injury and Death I.5 Combat I.6 Experience and Advancement I.7 Closing Comments Part II: Understanding the System II.1 Character Classes II.2 Character Races II.3 Encumbrance II.4 Armor II.5 Spell Failure (ESF) II.6 Magic II.7 The Resistance Roll II.8 Lord Trachten's THT Chart, BETA Part III: Putting it all Together III.1 Role Playing III.2 Kulthea: The Shadow World III.3 The RMSS and MERP III.4 Gemstone's Graphical Front End for GEnie III.5 Of Interest to America On-Line and Prodigy Players III.6 Odds and Ends Part IV: The Sorcerer Class IV.1 Stats IV.2 Skills and Training IV.3 Spells IV.4 Soloing IV.5 Role Playing a Sorcerer i. Introduction (or, "The Absolutely Mandatory and Therefore Unimportant Stuff", which may be skipped as these things tend to be boring) i.1 This guide is an overview of the game Gemstone III. While much of the material is applicable to any class of character, it is written with the sorcerer class in mind. i.2 This guide contains the best information available to me. Therefore, it represents the game as I understand it. It is not a product of Simutronics or Iron Crown Enterprises, but written by a player. It will contain errors. This is inevitable as the game is always changing and being improved. I will try to update the guide as best as I can. Feel free to E-mail any comments and suggestions to me at m.revilla1@genie.geis.com or to snipe@ibm.net. i.3 Whenever the masculine pronoun he or his appears in the text, it should be treated as if it reads he/she and his/hers. This is done to make the guide a little more readable. The game favors neither gender. i.4 If a term is given, it will normally be defined by it's RoleMaster Standard System rules meaning unless otherwise noted. i.5 Readers should note that some terms initially appear in full text and are abbreviated in every use afterwards. As an example, the statement "... Concussion Points (CP's) ..." appears early in the text and the initials "CP's" are used afterwards. I hope to have some type of "glossary of common terms and abbreviations" available in the future if there is sufficient interest. i.6 As to why the guide is organized as it is, I have chosen a modular approach. Let's just say that the game has grown a great deal from when I started playing. Many unimplemented thingies now are implemented, and the list of improvements and additions is huge! To try and grasp everything at once, especially if the new player has never played a fantasy role playing game before, is a daunting task. My goal was to try and make it easier by breaking things up into smaller, easily understood, portions. Hopefully you will approve of this effort! i.7 The paragraphs are numbered. This decision to do this was difficult, but two factors decided the issue. Firstly, this is a first release, and reader feedback would be made easier by giving you something you can reference (like a paragraph number). Your comments and suggestions are important! This guide cannot adequately improve without them. Secondly, this guide contains a great many tables and suggestions which benefit from being easily referenced. Hopefully readability has not been to badly destroyed. i.8 Older players will notice that Part I has much in common with Natasha's Guide. This is not by accident. I would like to thank Natasha, Fawn, Trachten, and several GM's and AGM's for their help with this guide. i.9 This guide is dedicated to the many people I've played GemStone III with. Part I: Let's Learn the Basics I.0 Gemstone III is a fantasy roleplaying game. Basically, you will create a character and play out his actions ("roleplay") in the imaginary world of Kulthea. I.1 Most people use their first character to learn the game. Let's generate a fighter class character for you to use. Once you feel comfortable playing with this character, read the remainder of this guide (especially the sections on magic!) and consider regenerating into something more to your liking - Such as a Sorcerer ;) I.1.1 Upon entering the game for the first time, you will be asked to generate a character. This is often referred to as "rolling up a character". Two options will be presented. Quick Generation or Full Generation. I.1.2 The Quick Generation option, which produces a ready-to-go character without any intervention on your part, sets up a character with everything RANDOMIZED. For example, you could get a healer who can't heal but swims very well. Bottom Line: Quick Generation characters are unplayable. Please select the Full Generation method. I.1.3 The next step is to generate ten numbers. Two options will be given. You can generate all the numbers at once or generate them one at a time. The numbers you get are the same which ever option you select, so in the interest of time let them all get generated at once. I.1.4 The numbers generated are not really random., they are weighted. The first three will all be between 75-100, the next three 50-80 and the last three between 20 and 50. The very last roll could be any value between 20 and 100. I.1.5 After the numbers are generated, you will be asked if you would like to rearrange them. Answer YES. I.1.6 You will now assign the ten numbers to your Personal Characteristics, usually referred to as "stats". They will be used to define the basic mental and physical attributes your character will have in the game. I.1.7 There are two kinds of stats which you have. There are the developmental stats and the primary stats. Developmental stats are used mostly in developing and training your character. Primary stats are those which primarily influence direct play. Lets examine these stats closely before assigning numbers. I.1.8 What the stats are: Development Stats: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Constitution: general health and well being, physical resistance to disease, damage resistance, etc. Agility: Manual dexterity and litheness Self Discipline: Control over mind and body. Referred to as: will, faith, concentration, etc. Eloquence: Memory: Your ability to learn and to remember Reasoning: Intelligence: The ability to absorb, comprehend and draw conclusions. Primary Stats: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Strength: Power, conditioning, stamina Quickness: Reflexes and reaction time Presence: Control of one's own mind. Referred to as: Charisma, courage, bearing, appearance Intuition: Perception, insight, luck Empathy: Judgement, wisdom. I.1.9 What the stats do in the game: Development Stats: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Constitution: Every character has a number of concussion points (CP's) that he may receive before dyeing. A bonus in Constitution modifies the % of CP's your character will have. Agility: Agility affects your ability to maneuver, hit with Directed Spells (DS) and defend yourself from DS attacks. Self Discipline: Helps you in stalking, hiding and picking pockets. It is rumored to influence a sorcerers ability to summon and control demons. Eloquence: This controls how much experience your mind can store before you must rest to absorb it. Reasoning: Affects the RATE at which experience is absorbed. Experience stored in your mind must be absorbed and converted into real experience. Note: Earning experience is how you advance you character. Upon earning sufficient experience, your character will gain a "level" and be allowed to train, thus expanding his abilities. Primary Stats: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Strength: Any bonus here affects your "Offensive Bonus" (OB). It is a major factor in determining how much you can carry. Quickness: Any bonus here affects your "Defensive Bonus" (DB). A high number in this stat is usually desirable. Presence: Presence affects trading. It is rumored to influence a sorcerers ability to summon and control demons. Intuition: Bonuses here apply to lockpicking, searching, perception, the disarming of traps. It influences channeling. This stat controls the number of power points a Healer, Cleric, or Ranger will get per level. (Also partially influences a Sorcerer's spell points.) Empathy: This stat controls how much Essence you can manipulate. This is represented by power points, and how many a mage or bard gets per level. (Also partially influences a Sorcerer's spell points.) The bonus affects rolls for controlling wands. I.1.10 At this point, you are almost ready to assign those numbers. There are two more things to consider: Your characters race and class. I.1.11 Your decision about what race you will be will need to be considered as each race has its own strengths and weaknesses which can seriously affect how well your character performs. There is no one best race! I.1.12 The next choice is the characters class. This will determine how much your training costs. Also, every class has two primary stats that automatically get raised to 90 if they are below that. I.1.13 The charts are grouped together on the following tables. Meanwhile, let's continue to generate our fighter character. (I.1.14) Table of Stat Effects ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Power Power Stat Bonus pt/lvl DP's Stat Bonus pt/lvl DD'S """"""""""""""""""""""""" """""""""""""""""""""""" 100 25 3.0 10 90 10 1.5 8.4 99 23 2.8 9.8 87-89 9 1.4 8.2 98 21 2.6 9.6 84-86 8 1.3 8.0 97 19 2.4 9.4 81-83 7 1.2 7.7 96 17 2.2 9.2 78-80 6 1.1 7.4 95 15 2.0 9.0 75-77 5 1.0 7.0 94 14 1.9 8.9 72-74 4 .8 6.8 93 13 1.8 8.8 68-71 3 .6 6.6 92 12 1.7 8.7 64-67 2 .4 6.3 91 11 1.6 8.6 60-63 1 .2 6.0 41-59 0 0.0 5.5 [and it gets progressively lower] (I.1.15) Table of Racial Bonuses and Penalties to Stat Numbers ````````````````````````````````````````````````````` ST QU PR EM CO AG SD Hits Depart Time Men: Common +5 - - - - - +5 d8/120 14 High +10 -5 +10 - +10 -5 - d10/150 13 Elves: Half +5 +10 +10 - +5 +5 -10 d10/150 10 Wood - +5 +5 +5 - +10 -20 d8/100 10 High - +10 +10 +5 - +5 -20 d8/110 10 Fair - +15 +15 +5 - +5 -20 d10/120 10 Dwarves: +5 -5 -10 -10 +15 -5 +5 d10/120 16 Hobbits:-20 +10 -15 -5 +15 +15 -10 d8/80 16 IN, RE, and EL are currently unmodified by race Note: RACE Bonuses and Penalties are in ADDITION to your STAT bonuses. (I.1.16) Table of Primary Stats: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Mage: reasoning, empathy Bard: eloquence, empathy Healer: Eloquence, intuition Ranger: constitution, intuition Sorcerer: intuition, empathy Fighter: constitution, strength Cleric: eloquence, intuition Thief: agility, quickness I.1.17 Now let's assign those numbers to the stats. Place your lowest two in strength and constitution to take advantage of the two automatic 90's. Place your highest number into quickness. Place the remaining numbers as you see fit. Remember the higher the numbers are in your developmental stats, the more DP's you will have to spend on training your character, thus the more likely you are to have a viable character. I.1.18 Choose a race of your liking. As seen from the tables: dwarves are strong but slow, men tend towards the average, and elves are quick but receive no racial strength bonuses. Avoid halflings for now. They are tricky to play as a race and make poor fighters. I.1.19 Next choose the profession for your character. Select fighter. We will use the fighter class to teach you the basics of the game. Magic will come later. There is to much to learn at once otherwise. Trust this crazy sorcerer on this one ;) I.1.20 After all this, the system shows you the end result of your efforts. One additional column has been added, called "potentials". The numbers you assigned represent what your character starts with. You will train and grow into your potentials as you gain experience and levels. This normally takes 5-8 levels to reach your potentials. (The "stat gain table" may be included in future editions of the guide if there's enough interest in it.) Your potentials are what determine whether to keep the character you just generated or not. I.1.21 It should become obvious at this point that you do not have complete control over how your character will look at the end. I.1.22 If you don't like the numbers, for whatever reasons, just make your way through the whole program as quickly as possible (selecting no training, etc.) At the end of the process, you'll have the option of "rerolling" the character you just created, which means scrapping him and starting over. Reroll again. Don't disconnect, sometimes that gives you the same old numbers again. Rerolling and following the prompts gets you new numbers and you can continue in this manner until you are satisfied with the outcome. Rerolling is sometimes your only option. I.2.1 You are almost ready to play! You will next be taken to the training screen. You will train twice to determine what skills you will have upon starting the game. This represents what you learned as a teen and what you learned during your apprenticeship. I.2.2 After you have completed that training twice, you must select what you want to study upon achieving level 2. Learning will always be done like this, you choose what to learn before you accomplish the level, and then you reap the rewards of it when you gain sufficient experience to advance. I.2.3 Each time you go to train, you will be presented with a list of skills and their associated costs in terms of DP's. Think of it as purchasing "ranks" (or levels) of each skill with your DP's being the money. I.2.4 What follows is a listing of the skills available. There is a description of the skill, which is applicable to all character classes, and there is a description of the skill as seen through the eyes of a fighter, which is what we are generating. Sometimes the descriptions are the same. I.2.5 The first four choices represent armor categories to train in. Armor is at your option. There is no "best" armor category. The only thing to be careful of is to be certain not to wear armor you are not fully trained in. There are easier ways of committing suicide. ;) I.2.6 For our purposes, we will spend 7 DP's on "soft leather" during our first two training sessions. We will thus have 7 ranks of training in soft leather armor upon starting the game. The "soft leather" category provides excellent defenses against spells at little DP cost. It is a good place for a new fighter to start. With 7 ranks you will be able to wear any type of soft leather armor. There is currently no point to training any more that 7 ranks in soft leather, so invest in a different skill for your third training session. I.2.7 The next few categories are weapon training. Remember bows and thrown weapons are not yet implemented in the game. Each rank you train in here will raise your OB with that class of weapons. Choose one or more categories to train in. Keep in mind that not all weapons are useable with shields! The only thing to remember is that you want to maximize your weapon training. Always train twice in the weapon categories of your choice if it is allowed. The game quickly becomes unplayable for fighters otherwise. I.2.8 As for the remaining skills: I.2.9 Climbing and Swimming: These just happen to be things you will eventually need, but not right now. You will need these skills to get into and around in some of the higher level areas of the game. I.2.10 Riding is unimplemented and it is rumored to be scheduled for replacement with a different skill. I.2.11 Perception lets you find things (like entrances) and helps in detecting traps and pick-pockets. Like climbing and swimming, it is a skill you must have to get into higher level areas. Tho how much you need as a minimum is anyones guess. I.2.12 The Stalking/Hiding and Ambushing skills go hand in hand. Currently, there is no point to studying one without studying the other. Like weapons training, it must be maximized (trained in to the fullest extent possible) for it to be effective. I.1.12 The intent of these skills was to simulate the affects of surprise and tactics to combat and provide a skill for all arms realm classes (fighters and thieves) to excel at. In game terms, it allows arms realm classes to get better criticals (they hit with better effect) than other classes. I.1.13 Unfortunately, it is perceived as a thieves backstabbing skill by most players and thus not studied by most fighters. As a result, most fighters deny themselves the use of a skill they are excellent at (arguably, even better than thieves). I blame this on several reasons. I.1.13 The most important reason being its implementation. You can only ambush when you are hidden. I would argue that tactical surprise should not be dependent on whether you are hidden or not. Rather, hiding should enhance ambushing, not be a prerequisite. Tactical surprise should be the ability to do what the enemy least expects. I.1.14 Combine this with a thieves lower training costs in DP's for these skills and the choice of the names for these skills, is it any wonder the average player considers these skills fit only for thieves and assassins? I'd hope ambush somehow got separated from hiding. Maybe rename it tactical skill or such. I.1.15 Bottom Line: If you have enough DP's to also fully study these skills you will give yourself and advantage when you get older. Remember that Hiding and Ambushing are there for fighters too! I.1.16 Staves/Wands skill lets you use staves and wands. As the spells contained in them usually require other magic skills to use properly, this skill can be safely ignored by a fighter. I.1.17 Runes: this skill represents the ability to read magic scrolls and then temporarily learn the spell that was contained on the scroll, gaining the ability to cast the learnt spell at some future time, sort of a spell-on-call deal. Many spells can be found on all sorts of runes. READ the rune to determine what spells are on it, then use the command INVOKE #### to prepare the spell for casting. Where ### is the spell number on the rune which you have just read. Then cast the spell normally. This is a good skill to place any extra DP's into. As a fighter, it will give you limited access to a wide variety of spells. I.1.18 Channeling is a skill which allows you to transfer power points from an essence user to another essence user [not a Healer, ranger, or a Cleric] or from a channeling user to another channeling user [Not a mage or bard]. This is a complex formula which depends on both the skill of the sender and the receiver. Note that a sorcerer can channel to any other class of character. Fighters seldom train in channeling. I.1.19 Spells will be discussed in greater detail in part II of this guide. In brief: I.1.20 The most currently available spell lists can be found in the Tomes at GEnie page 931. Search under 'spells'. Keep in mind that the lists are not entirely accurate as they are not quickly updated. I.1.21 At the time of this writing, only the bard list remains to be released. After this, there are still some unimplemented spells and several lists need a major overhaul. The spell lists are: Open Channeling Spell List Open Essence Spell List Closed Channeling Spell List Closed Essence Spell List Cleric Base Spell List Healer Base Spell List Mage Base Spell List Sorcerer Base Spell List Ranger Base Spell List Bard Base Spell List I.1.21 Your characters class will determine what lists he has access to. Fighters seldom learn spells. The cost is rather prohibitive for them. I.1.22 Body Development: Increases CP's. The table shows what type of dice are rolled per rank and what your maximum CP limit is for your race. The constitution bonus is applied on top of this basic hit point total. This is the only way your character will gain hit points. Most character classes should single train in this skill until they have maxed out their CP's. I.1.23 First Aid: Allows you to wrap up bleeding wounds until you can get them healed. The more training you have, the worse the injury that you can affect, and the longer the bandages will hold. Bandaging is time consuming tho, so be careful. Training in First Aid will also help you with being able to skin carcasses. I.1.24 Trading: This will help you barter better with the some merchants (but not all!). Especially since some of the merchants can be racist and/or sexist, or some particularly friendly/ unfriendly to specific professions. This is a nice skill to have if you like to shop. I.1.25 Disarm Traps and Pick Locks are skills Fighters and, of course, Thieves can be very good at. Helps you open up those chest and coffers the critters usually hide their loot in. I.1.26 Pickpockets: A way to add some cash to your pockets. (See the general note below.) Whatever you do, don't get caught. Should you get caught, you're in more trouble than you realize, usually from other players. Generally, it is considered very bad form to steal from healers and clerics as you are eventually going to need their services and may find them unavailable. Try not to steal from any magic using types that you've come to rely on for defensive spells and such, as you will no longer get them. Some of the more bad tempered folks will simply kill you outright, or at least try to. Did I mention how important it is not to get caught? I.1.27 Brawling: this skill is like a weapon skill in that it adds to your OB. It covers a wide variety of non-traditional combat situations. It is more than bare fisted boxing, but it is not martial arts. Sadly, brawling weapons such as "brass knuckles" are no longer available in the game. You will not likely be able to afford one of the few that remain in player inventories. This skill is currently mostly studied for self-defense when weaponless. It is a good secondary skill for a fighter. I.1.28 General Note on skills: Learn patience. Many of the skills such as pickpockets, detect traps, pick locks, hiding, and ambushing are really not useable until you've gotten a little older and have more ability. In some cases lots older :) I.3.1 Finish choosing your skills and you will be ready to start the game. There are three commands you need to know. I.3.2 First is ADVICE. There is a good online help system available to all first level characters. Type ADVICE to access it. I.3.3 Secondly is DIRECTION (DIR). You will be using this lots until you get to know your way around town. It too is only available to level one characters. I.3.4 Third is ASSIST. Use this command sparingly as it will summon a GameMaster (GM) to assist you. A GM is one of the staff who help run the game world. Only use it when you absolutely have to. Do not abuse this command! I.3.5 When you enter the game, you will find yourself naked with a small sum of coins that you've borrowed to get yourself started. First things first, you have to go shopping. I.3.6 Use the DIR command. Go to the armorer's to buy some soft leather armor referred to as AT6, a shield, and a helmet. If you followed my training suggestions, you will be able to use these just fine. To buy something from a merchant, type ORDER. Armor will be explained in much greater detail in the next part of the guide. GET the items you just purchased, then WEAR them. I.3.7 Continue to use the DIR command. You should then head towards the general store. You need something to keep your stuff in. Every carrying item has a maximum capacity in both the number of items carried and the weight carried. Perhaps someone will generate a table someday. Buy a knapsack. If you need additional carrying capacity, get a sack. Backpacks, while holding more items and weight, tend to be heavy. A knapsack and a small sack will weigh less than a backpack and hold almost as much. The Encumbrance system will be explained later on in part II. Now GET and WEAR the items purchased. These items can be OPENed and CLOSEd. I.3.8 Using the DIR command, get to the arm's shop. ORDER a weapon that you have trained in. GET the weapon and PUT it in your knapsack. If you still have money left, you should go to the office in Moot Hall and start repaying your loan. I.3.9 Helpful Hint: Use the word MY lots! For instance, if you had purchased a sword, type "Put my sword in my knapsack" Otherwise, you will end eventually up donating your gear to another player. Had you typed "put sword in knapsack" and there was another knapsack on the ground, you would have placed your sword in someone else's pack. Players shouldn't leave packs on the ground, but they do. Remember MY! I.3.10 To see what is inside your pack, use the LOOK command, such as "L in my knapsack". Remember to have your pack open! To see what you are wearing, type I for inventory. To see what is in your hands, type GLANCE. I.3.11 Helpful Hint: You can use DIR to get to Town Square, referred to as TS by players. This is the common meeting spot for most players. You may find some folks have left equipment for younger folks for free on the benches there. LOOK ON, UNDER, and BEHIND the BENCHes. You will often find other players who are generally willing to help you as well. Bear in mind that some people are away from their keyboards (AFK) so don't be insulted if some folks ignore you. (In roleplaying terms they are napping in the park.) It is here that you should try and join a group of folks. Why? well we have to discuss Death. I.4.1 As a level 1 character, you will find that dyeing is rather easy. You have few CP's, and even minor levels of bleeding from your wounds will kill you quickly. Unlike most other online fantasy roleplaying games, it is possible to bleed in Gemstone III! I.4.2 When you die, your body will remain in the game for a set amount of time listed under the TIME column of the stat table. If you are not resurrected (called rezzing by players) by a cleric in this time frame (which may be extended thru spells), your body decomposes and you will reawaken in the temple on the altar. You can get to the temple earlier by typing the command DEPART. I.4.3 Clerics get no experience for rezzing level 1 characters. So don't be surprised if no one runs out to assist you. It works both ways though. As a level 1 character, you are shielded from death penalties and the system of rezzing which uses "deeds" that older players must contend with. I.4.4 The method for obtaining deeds is a small puzzle. It is considered bad form to give away the solutions to puzzles, so I won't tell you. If you can't figure it out yourself please ask another player for help when you get close to making level 2. You will need to have "deeds" and rezzing figured out by then. I.4.5 What matters to you is that when you awaken on the altar at the temple you are once again naked. This time with no cash. You will have to go to TS and try and ask someone for help. This is why you should join a group. At least the other group members can recover your gear and bring it to you. It is therefore strongly recommended that you don't venture out alone. At least not your first time out. Hunting alone can be enjoyable and profitable (as you keep all the loot) but should not be tried your first time online! If you have difficulty finding people your own level to adventure with, try looking for folks on the bulletin boards. It normally isn't too difficult to make friends! :) I.4.6 You have already begun your adventure, whether you wanted to or not. As a fighter, the only things left to discuss are combat and gaining experience (advancement). I.5.1 You will use two commands in combat. They are ATTACK and PARRY. I.5.2 When you ATTACK (usually shortened to AT) a critter, please try and type in at least the first four letters of the critters name. For instance, if you typed AT KOBOLD, you would attack the kobold. Had you typed AT KO, and a player who's name started with KO (such as Kory) was in the same location as you, you be attacking the player instead. I.5.3 When you type AT KOBOLD, you will see a message similar to the following: Line 1 You swing your sword at a Kobold! Line 2 [OB:40 DB:35] = +5 Line 3 THT 74: [D100 = 80] Modified Roll: 85 Line 4 Strong cut to the knee, slicing his leg off! Line 5 ...10 points of concussion damage Line 6 A kobold falls to the ground, grasping it's mangled leg! I.5.4 Line 1 tells you who hit what target with what weapon. I.5.5 Line 2 Tells that your OB is 40 and the targets DB is 35. The difference gives you a +5 edge. His DB may change as the fight continues. I.5.6 Line 3 tells you that you have a To Hit (THT) of 74 on the critter and that your dice roll was 80. Add 80 to your bonus [or penalty] from Line 2 and you have the actual value. I.5.7 Lines 4 & 5 are the results of your attack. Either it will say "miss" or "hit" in which case it gives you descriptive stuff & CP points lost. I.5.8 Should you see an extra line or two tossed in after (as in line 6) that says you are awarded an additional # of hits or is descriptive of additional wounds, it means your dice roll from line 3 was high enough to score a "critical wound" (extra roll) of one kind or another. Those critical injuries are generally pretty graphic and gruesome as a rule. I.5.9 Now lets discuss the concept of PARRY. Every character has an Maximum OB (Your OB at Parry 0) and a Minimum DB (Your DB at parry 0). PARRY is a command that allows you to convert a percentage of this OB to DB. For example: PARRY 0: OB is 100%, DB is at Minimum DB PARRY 50: OB is 50% of Maximum OB, DB is Minimum DB + 50% of maximum OB PARRY 100: OB is 0% of maximum OB (or 0), DB is Minimum DB + 100% of Maximum OB I.5.10 When entering combat in an unfamiliar area, the normal practice is to start at PARRY 100 and gradually reduce your parry so that you reach a point were you can hit the critters harder than they are hitting you. You will eventually learn what parry settings to use for a given area based on the abilities of your character. I.5.11 After you have killed a critter, you may be able to SKIN and SEARCH it. Hides may be sold at the furriers, gems at the gemshop, and most other items at the pawn shop. You will learn what loot is worth taking and what isn't as you play the game. I.6.1 Killing critters earns you experience. The formula is unimportant for now. Type EX to see this information. It tells you how much experience you have, how much you need to gain a level, and much more. Pay attention to the messages that tell you of the state your mind is in. They are: 'clear as a bell' 'fresh and clear' 'clear' 'muddled' 'becoming numbed' 'numbed' 'must rest!' 'saturated' I.6.2 Once you get to the 'must rest!' spot, you will earn very little experience until your mind has cleared some. Your combat abilities remain unaffected regardless of the message. These messages tell you roughly how much experience you have stored and is ready to get converted to real experience. I.6.3 When you need to rest try to do so at a NODE. A NODE is a special area in which the absorption/recovery rates for characters are doubled. The TS and parts of the Temple are among the many NODES available to players. I.6.4 When you have earned enough experience to advance a level, go to the Raging Threk Inn and CHECK IN. This is also were you would go if you decided to reroll your character. I.6.5 Recall that you start the game with a debt. As you earn wealth, go to the office located in Moot Hall and pay this debt off. Once you have done this, there is a bank in town at which you may DEPOSIT and WITHDRAW money. I.6.6 You also have access to a locker with a 10 item limit located in Moot Hall. There is a fee for this storage service. To use, OPEN the locker, PUT or GET items in/from the locker, then CLOSE the locker. Always remember to CLOSE your locker! I.7.1 Go out there and play the game, there are lots of verbs to discover, lots of things to learn, and lots of friends to make. Return to this text after you start to feel comfortable with what you have. I.7.2 I have a few random comments in closing. Firstly, I want to make you aware that there is a good chance that fighters will soon be able to use two weapons to attack with. The details are not yet available but it seems to be getting a thorough going over. I.7.3 There is the question of why a fighter? There are three reasons. First there is so much material in this game that I thought it best if magic were introduced later. So much to learn, so little time. Secondly, fighters are the easiest class to advance when young. It is not until a fighter hits his late teen to early twenties in level that he gets severely outclassed by the other professions. By then, the new player will be ready to move on. Thirdly, balancing the fighter class is high on the priority list of things to fix. Lots of good things are headed your way :) I.7.4 The intent of Part I was to have a character that would be viable for the first 10 levels of the game so that the new player can learn the basics and then go back and reroll into something he likes (even another fighter!). I think it succeeds in that. Part II Understanding The System II.1 Character Classes II.1.1 RoleMaster has 4 realms for character classes. They are the realms of arms, channeling, essence, and mentalism. The realms of essence, channeling, and mentalism are collectively referred to as the realm of power in the literature. RoleMaster also lists two special categories. Semi's, as they are popularly called, are a combination of the arms realm with one of the realms of power. Hybrids are character classes that combine any two realms of power. Gemstone III has incorporated these RoleMaster concepts. II.1.2 There are eight character classes in Gemstone III. The fighter and thief class represent the arms realm. Mages represent the essence realm. Healers and clerics represent the channeling realm. There are currently no character classes available for players from the mentalist realm. II.1.3 There are also two semi classes and one hybrid class. The two semi classes are rangers (arms and channeling) and bards (arms and mentalism). The bard spell list, currently unimplemented, is rumored to be the only list that draws its power from the mentalist realm in the game. One side effect of mentalism is that helmets and headgear interfere somewhat with spell casting. II.1.4 One thing that makes RoleMaster different from many other games is that the ranger class is not considered as an arms realm class. Many players are surprised at the concept that thieves are supposed to be better at combat than a ranger. There are game balance issues currently being addressed which should make the arms realm (fighters and thieves) the best at fighting when the dust settles. If this concept bothers you, Blame RoleMaster, not the GemStone III programmers. II.1.5 The one hybrid class in the game is the sorcerer class (essence and channeling). It should be noted that while a sorcerer is not as good at essence as a mage, or as good at channeling as a cleric or healer, his strength lies in the versatility of having access to both realms. II.2 Character Races II.2.1 There are twelve character races in RoleMaster. GemStone III allows a player to select from among eight of these. They are listed below along with some of the Shadow World background material about them (on the continent of Jaiman) to give you a few ideas to use in your roleplaying if you so choose: Common Men: There are several distinct cultures, some of the more prominent are: Duranaki, Talath, Y'kin, Haid, Jameri, and Zori High Men: A unique race of man who's blood is said to contain traces of the blood of elves and gods. They are great warriors and empire builders. Half Elves: The Ta-Lairi, half elf and half man. Wood Elves: The Erlini Elves, This the type of elf most likely to be encountered by non-elven races. High Elves: The Loari Elves, Great warriors, second only to the Linaeri among the immortal Elven races. Fair Elves: The Linaeri Elves, noblest of the elves. Very haughty and arrogant. They are superior and they know it. Dwarves: The Nom-ri, they primarily use a clan structure. One well known clan are the "Grantok". Halflings: The smallest of the human races. Commonly referred to as "Hairfoots" II.2.2 The Loari and Linaeri Elven races are collectively referred to as "Iylari Elves". There is a race of evil elves called the "Dyari" who are very similar to the Loari elves. It is speculated that they may once have been a Loari group that turned to evil. II.2.3 In terms of game mechanics, high men and dwarves are strong (high OB) but tend to be slow (low DB). Common men and half elves are the best balanced. Elves are fast (high DB) but tend to not be very strong (moderate OB). Halflings are an extreme case. They are fast and very weak, and they are probably the most difficult race to play. II.3 Encumbrance II.3.1 Encumbrance has many people confused! GemStone III switched from a set 20 item per character limit to a weight based encumbrance system and no one seems to know how much they can carry anymore! The little material available can be very difficult to understand. Let me try and make it easy for you. The first step is to figure out your characters weight, the second step is you look at how much he can carry and how this affects you in the game. Listed below are the tables that are currently being used in GemStone: (II.3.2) Base Weight Table ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Character Race Base Weight Common Man 170 High Man 220 Half Elf 180 Wood Elf 140 High Elf 160 Fair Elf 125 Dwarf 150 Halfling 76 (II.3.3) Stat Bonus Table ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Strength or Adjustment Constitution Factor (AF) 100 25 98-99 20 95-97 15 91-94 10 76-90 5 26-75 0 11-25 - 5 5-10 -10 3-4 -15 2 -20 1 -25 II.3.4 Step One: Figure out your characters weight by plugging your numbers into the following formula: BsWt + (BsWt * StAF / 100) + (BsWt * CoAF / 100) = Body Weight II.3.5 As an example, my character who has a 76 strength and a 76 constitution has a body weight of: 170 + (170*5/100) + (170*5/100) = 177.6 170 + 3.8 + 3.8 = 177.6 II.3.6 Remember that GemStone III uses integers for weights, so the final step is to round your number to the nearest integer. For instance, my characters body weight is 178 pounds. At this point, you have finished with the hardest part of the encumbrance system! From here on out it is simple, just remember two things. II.3.7 Firstly, the maximum amount of weight a character can carry is equal to twice his body weight. II.3.8 Secondly, the heaviest item a character can lift is equal to his body weight. II.3.9 There, that wasn't so bad, now was it? You now know exactly what your character can carry. Lets discuss the effects of carrying this load. II.3.10 The point at which a characters encumbrance (load) affects his maneuver rolls is simply found by calculating a percentage of their body weight. To see how much you can carry before getting a penalty, add 15 to your strength bonus and use this number as a percentage of body weight. II.3.11 Important! The Strength Stat Bonus is calculated without racial bonus applied, except for Dwarves. Currently the Strength Spell (509) and Phaon's Strength (606) add +15 and +10 to the calculated Strength Bonus respectively. II.3.12 Again, using my character as an example: a 76 strength, 178 pound common man 15 + Strength bonus = percentage of body weight carryable without penalties 15 + 5 = 20 So I can carry 20% of my body weight without getting encumbrance penalties. 20% of 178 is 35.6, so I can carry 36 (round to nearest integer) pounds of gear before getting any maneuver mods due to encumbrance. II.3.13 Once you carry more than this amount your character begins to suffer a maneuver penalty caused by their excessive load. The amount of this penalty seems linear. Maneuver penalties affect climbing, swimming, and standing (if you've been knocked down) among other things. While it is possible to calculate the exact penalty, characters are unlikely to be doing so during the course of a game. Go as far as realizing how many pounds you can carry before you start to get modifiers and take it from there. II.3.14 If severe enough, this penalty will even affect your round time (RT) when using a weapon in combat. Note that combat RT's take both strength and speed into consideration, so by the time the encumbrance penalty affects your RT you will also already have a rather high maneuver mod penalty. Giving this, it is best not to use RT's as an indicator to how much you are carrying when facing critters that can knock you down (Ewave, etc.). II.3.15 There are a few things to know when calculating how much weight you are carrying. II.3.16 Do not include the weight of normal worn armor. Lighter/heavier than normal armors only count by the amount they are lighter/heavier. This is because armor already has a maneuver penalty. II.3.17 For instance, if a normal set of armor weighs 10 pounds then: Lighter: an 8 pound suit of armor would reduce your load by 2 pounds Normal : has no effect in calculating your load Heavier: a 12 pound suit of armor would increase your load by 2 pounds II.3.18 Worn items such as helms, greaves, and supposedly some items of clothing will be adjusted by race to compensate for the fact that a helm that fits a Halfling is much smaller and thus weighs less than one fitting a High Man. (II.3.19) Racial worn item modifier table: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Common Man...........100% High-Elf.............95% High Man.............130% Fair-Elf.............75% Half-Elf.............105% Dwarf................80% Wood-Elf..............80% Halfling.............45% II.3.20 Coins weigh in at 160 to the pound. As a result of the recent switch to a weight based system, Promissory notes have been introduced into the game. Hold the note in your right hand to use it at a merchant. If you forget how much it is for, you can READ it. II.4 Armor II.4.1 Below are the tables currently used for the strength, break factors, and training requirements for normal store bought armor. Special materials (such as ithloss) will alter these numbers. (II.4.2) Armor Tables ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Armor Type Strength Break Factor Ranks of Training 1 10 80 0 2 20 80 0 5 10 80 0 6 20 95 4 7 35 100 6 8 35 120 7 9 85 170 9 10 95 195 12 11 95 200 15 12 99 250 19 13 95 300 12 14 95 400 15 15 95 430 19 16 99 445 21 17 90 400 15 18 95 480 18 19 95 500 23 20 99 590 24 II.4.3 The strength and break factors for armor currently exist but are not used. It is rumored that armor and weapon damage (instead of outright breakage) will be implemented, at which time the numbers above will be used. II.4.4 Most armor must be trained in to be worn. Although it is possible to calculate the exact penalties for your levels of training, there really is no need. Do not wear armor you are not fully trained in. As has been previously stated elsewhere, there are easier ways of committing suicide than wearing armor you are not fully trained in. :) II.5 Spell Failure (ESF) II.5.1 Extraordinary Spell Failures affects everyone, player and critter, equally. II.5.2 Basically is comes down to what the armor is made of. Leather armor inhibits the casting of only essence spells, whereas metal inhibits the casting of all spells. Therefore, players who cast from the channeling realm (healers, clerics and rangers) may wear Armor Types 1-12 with no penalty. Characters who are casting from the essence realm (Mages and bards) suffer penalties for casting in Armor Types 6 or above. Sorcerers, which are a hybrid of both types, suffer the average penalty of the two realms. Bards are currently using the essence table as their base list is unimplemented. Their base list is from the mentalism realm and I have no idea how ESF will ultimately be handled for them. One thing to remember is that mentalist magic is interfered with if the character is wearing a helm or head gear. To what extent this will be followed by GemStone III remains to be seen. It is rumored that some type of restriction on helmets is being considered for bards. The table for the failure rates for characters wearing armor is as follows: (II.5.3) Armor effects on Spell Casting (ESF) Table: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Armor Type Essence Users Channeling Users Ranks Fully Trained 1 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 4 0 0 0 5 0 0 0 6 0 0 4 7 10 0 (8) 6 8 15 0 (10) 7 9 5 0 (5) 9 10 10 0 (10) 12 11 15 0 (15) 15 12 15 0 (15) 19 13 10 10 [7] 12 14 15 15 [12] 15 15 25 25 [25] 19 16 25 25 [25] 21 17 15 15 [10] 15 18 20 20 [15] 18 19 35 35 [25] 23 20 45 45 [32] 24 Generally, armor types 5-12 are leather armors. In special cases, where some of these armors may be metallic, the numbers in parentheses apply. Similarly, for armor types 13-20, there may be special cases where the armor is not metallic (laen is a hardened volcanic glass, for instance). When this is the case, the number in brackets applies. II.5.4 While it is possible to calculate the exact penalty based on the number of ranks of armor training a character has, there is no point to it. You should never wear armor you are not fully trained in. Anyone who does so should be given a t-shirt for their character to wear by a GM with the words "Heal Me" written on the front and "I love rezzing clerics" on the back. Maybe even draw in a nice targeting aid like an archery target as a background for the text. II.5.5 The spell failure rates listed above are but the beginning of the implementation of some kind of ESF system. Expect them to get tweaked. Currently, they have been reduced by at least 20% of the listed values. They will probable continue to fluctuate until a final ESF system is decided upon. II.6 Here's how magic works. II.6.1 There are three realms of magic: essence, channeling, and mentalism. They are collectively referred to as the realm of power. The spell lists in GemStone III are: Open Channeling Spell List Open Essence Spell List Closed Channeling Spell List Closed Essence Spell List Cleric Base Spell List Healer Base Spell List Mage Base Spell List Sorcerer Base Spell List Ranger Base Spell List Bard Base Spell List II.6.2 Healers and Clerics have access to the two channeling lists, as well as the lists applicable to their professions. Mages have access to the two other Essence Spell lists, as well as the base Mage Spells. Sorcerers get access to their base list, plus the Open spell list from Channeling and Essence, due to their being hybrids using spells from both realms. Bards and Rangers, semi-spellcasters, get access to the open list in Essence [for Bards] or open Channeling [for Rangers.] II.6.3 Mentalism (Bard Base list?) is currently unimplemented. It is rumored that there will be restrictions as to what type of helmets/headgear can be worn. II.6.4 Channeling spells primarily use Resistance Rolls (RR's) The subject of RR's will be discussed in detail in section II.7 II.6.5 Essence spells tend to use the Direct Spell (DS) skill although a few use RR's. Let's see how a to use a DS attack. II.6.6 The first thing is to check and make sure that you have enough Power Points (PP's) to cast the spell. If you do, PREPARE the spell for casting. If you wanted to prepare a fireball, type PREP FIREBALL. Alternatively, you may also type PREP , tho I find this method can confuse some players. II.6.7 One a spell is ready, you have to use the PARRY and CAST commands II.6.8 When you CAST at a critter, please try and type in at least the first four letters of the critters name. For instance, if you typed CAST KOBOLD, you would attack the kobold. Had you typed CAST KO, and a player who's name started with KO (such as Kory) was in the same location as you, you be attacking the player instead. If you are fighting a critter that runs around lots, try typing CAST AT to reduce your misfires! II.6.9 When you type CAST AT KOBOLD, you will see a message similar to the following. Notice it looks very similar to the weapon attack messages: Line 1 You hurl a bolt of freezing ice at a Kobold! Line 2 [OB:40 DB:30] = +10 Line 3 THT 64: [D100 = 80] Modified Roll: 90 Line 4 Chilling strike to the knee, kneecap shatters! Line 5 ...10 points of concussion damage Line 6 A kobold falls to the ground, grasping it's mangled leg! II.6.10 Line 1 tells you who cast at what target with what spell. II.6.11 Line 2 Tells that your OB is 40 and the targets DB is 30. The difference gives you a +10 edge. His DB may change as the fight continues. II.6.12 Line 3 tells you that you have a To Hit (THT) of 64 on the critter and that your dice roll was 80. Add 80 to your bonus [or penalty] from Line 2 and you have the actual value of 90. II.6.13 Lines 4 & 5 are the results of your attack. Either it will say "miss" or "hit" in which case it gives you descriptive stuff & CP points lost. II.6.14 Should you see an extra line or two tossed in after (as in line 6) that says you are awarded an additional # of hits or is descriptive of additional wounds, it means your dice roll from line 3 was high enough to score a "critical wound" (extra roll) of one kind or another. Those critical injuries are generally pretty graphic and gruesome as a rule. II.6.15 As you can see, it is the same method that you used when you attacked with a weapon. The difference is that your OB refers to the spell casters DS skill. Likewise, the critters DB also uses the critters DS skill. just like strength enhanced your weapon skill, your characters agility stat acts as a bonus to your DS skill. II.6.16 Currently, DS skill is parryable in GemStone. It uses the same parry setting as that which you have set for physical combat. II.5.17 The rapidfire spell will allow you to cast the same spell over a quick period of time. The haste spells do not enhance your spell prepping times! II.5.18 Currently under consideration are the addition of a three second round time to the cast command. Also it is rumored that soon you must lower your parry to at least 75 in order to cast a spell. II.5.19 Mages use wands and runes to enhance their abilities more than any other class. The empathy stat not only provides a Mages power points, but the stat bonus is also a modifier to wands activation rolls. To use a wand, you WAVE it at the target. A roll is then made to see if you have activated the wand. If you have activated the wand, the spell commences normally. The modifiers to the wand roll (aside from the stat bonus) are: (I.5.20) Wand/rune modifier table: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ +30 You know the spell. +10 You don't know the spell but it is one you can learn -20 You cannot learn the spell , but it is in the same realm. For Instance: A closed essence spell *is* in the sorcerer's "realm." -30 The spell is from a different realm. II.7 The Resistance Roll II.7.1 Resistance Rolls (RR's) is the method most channeling and sorcerer spells use to determine effect. Lets see what one actually looks like: Line 1: You gesture at a torkaan Line 2: Bar: D100 9 + 14 = 23, General RRMod: 45 Line 3: Target RR threshold: 93, D100 55 + 45 = 100, resisted! In the above example, I missed the torkaan with the sorcerer's Touch of Disruption (ToD) spell. II.7.2 Line 1 tells you who cast at what target. II.7.3 Line 2 gives you the Basic Attack Roll (BAR). This is a random number from 1 to 100. Currently, the casters level (the 14 in my example) is added to the roll. The result is then looked up on one of several tables depending on the targets armor. No armor leaves you very vulnerable, Leather helps you resist a little, while metal offers the most protection from RR spells. II.7.4 Line 3 is actually two parts. First is the RR threshold. The RR Threshold of 93 in my example means that if the end result of the second half of this line is less than 93, my spell works. Otherwise it misses. The RR threshold is based on the differences in levels between the caster and target. So you will find it easier to get your spells working on critters below your level and harder if the critter is of a higher level than you. In this example, the spell missed. II.7.5 Next lets see what happens when a spell hits. Line 1: You gesture at a torkaan Line 2: Bar: D100 36 + 14 = 50, General RRMod: 0 Line 3: Target RR threshold: 93, D100 66 + 0 = 66, resistance failed! Line 4: A weak blow. Line 5: Blast to the head fractures the torkaan's skull. Line 6: Brain matter sprays over everything. Line 7: +20 hits Line 8: The torkaan hisses one last time and dies. II.7.6 The first three lines should look familiar to our previous example, except that here I have hit the target with the ToD spell. II.7.7 It is at this point, line 4, that sorcerer spells differ from those of healers and clerics. Most channeling spells use the fourth line to tell you the effect of the spell working. They require no further dice rolls. That is, a critter will be blinded, bound, etc. The cleric and healer spells also have their durations based on the casters level, such as 10 seconds per level. Their is no more dice rolling to get the result. II.7.8 Sorcerer spells however, require several more die rolls before the full effect is known. In the above example, ToD gets 2 rolls on the crit table. The type of crit (A-E)is determined by the amount by which the resistance was failed in line 3. Line 4 then, is result of the first roll on the crit table. Line 5 is the second roll. In this example, we have scored a rare "death crit" which accounts for the extra lines. The results of many sorcerer spells tend to be graphic ;) II.7.9 Likewise, the duration for sorcerer spells is not level based. Rather than the flat 5 or 10 seconds per level a healer or cleric gets, sorcerers get things like 1 second per number the RR was failed by. Using the above example, a 93 RR threshold and a 66 end result means the critter failed his RR roll by 27. so our hypothetical sorcerer spell would have a duration of 27 seconds. Sorcerer spells, as a general rule, have shorter durations and more variable outcomes in the case of a successful cast than those of healers and clerics. II.7.10 Rumor has it that as spells on the older spell lists get reworked they will also have both their effects and their duration based on the amount of RR failure. Similar to what sorcerers currently have. II.7.11 One feature of RR's is that they are unaffected by parry. Many sorcerers and binders (healers and clerics) cast at full parry 100. This will probably change soon. There are rumors that all casters will soon have to lower their parry to at least 75 to cast. Also, it seems their may be a Round Time in the area of three seconds. A full ESF system is being discussed, of which phase I was implemented with the armor fix. Parry will then affect both the chance of preparing the spell and the chance of hitting with it. II.7.12 Another consideration is that the RR's, in their current form, are taken from a 20 level game (RoleMaster). The system falls apart when stretched over 100 levels as is done here. Now that an increasing number of characters are passing level 50, the results are being felt in the game. Under discussion are ways of altering RR's so that they will properly work over 100 levels. Expect to see some changes! II.8 The next 2 pages contain Lord Trachten's To Hit Charts in their **BETA** release. Players should search the GemStone file libraries using the keyword TRACHTEN for the latest release. The game is currently undergoing a great many changes and Lord Trachten does a good job of keeping his material current. "The following are the THT charts for the CCS. If you find any errors, please let me know at trachten@genie.geis.com. This is a BETA version of the chart. The final version will not be uploaded to the library until I see the new THT's in action and the GM's have time to tweak them a bit. I apologize for the cryptic attack names, but I had to whittle the tables down to acceptable width. Trachten" Trachten's True THT's Version 2, *BETA* Page 1 | | | | Arm Cls Skin | Soft Lthr |Rigid Lthr | Chain | Plate Arm Typ 1 2 3 4| 5 6 7 8| 9 10 11 12| 13 14 15 16| 17 18 19 20 ------- -----------+-----------+-----------+---------------+--------------- QU Pen. 0 0 0 0| 0 0 10 15| 0 5 15 15| 5 10 20 20| 10 20 30 40 'A' Rng 10 10 10 10|20 20 20 20|30 30 30 30| 55 55 55 55| 80 80 80 80 'B' Rng 16 16 16 16|27 27 27 27|38 38 38 38| 65 65 65 65| 92 92 92 92 'C' Rng 22 22 22 22|35 35 35 35|47 47 47 47| 75 75 75 75|104 104 104 104 'D' Rng 28 28 28 28|42 42 42 42|56 56 56 56| 85 85 85 85|116 116 116 116 'E' Rng 35 35 35 35|50 50 50 50|65 65 65 65| 95 95 95 95|127 127 127 127 | | | | *** 1 Hnd Edged ***| | | | Dagger 85 75 89 93|64 67 71 76|69 77 82 86| 59 69 74 79| 50 59 69 74 Falch 75 65 79 83|54 57 61 66 45 53 58 62| 35 45 50 55| 27 36 46 51 HandAxe 80 70 84 88|57 60 64 69|46 54 59 63| 34 44 49 54| 25 34 44 49 MnGauch 83 73 87 91|62 65 69 74|64 72 77 81| 54 64 69 74| 45 54 64 69 Scimitr 80 70 84 88|57 60 64 69|54 62 67 71| 44 54 59 64| 30 39 49 54 Rapier 65 55 69 73|47 50 54 59|53 61 66 70| 39 49 54 59| 48 57 67 72 Broadsw 75 65 79 83|52 55 59 64|49 57 62 66| 39 49 54 59| 30 39 49 54 Sht Swd 70 60 74 78|52 55 59 64|54 62 67 71| 49 59 64 69| 40 49 59 64 | | | | *** 1 Hnd Blunt ***| | | | Fist 00 90 04 08|87 90 94 99|84 92 97 01| 74 84 89 94| 61 70 80 85 Club 90 80 94 98|67 70 74 79|59 67 72 76| 49 59 64 69| 35 44 54 59 War Hmr 80 70 84 88|52 55 59 64|49 57 62 66| 29 39 44 49| 18 27 37 42 Mace 80 70 84 88|57 60 64 69|49 57 62 66| 34 44 49 54| 23 32 42 47 MornStr 75 65 79 83|52 55 59 64|44 52 57 61| 32 42 47 52| 25 34 44 49 Whip 84 74 88 92|62 65 69 74|64 72 77 81| 64 74 79 84| 55 64 74 79 | | | | ****** Bows *******| | | | Bola 85 75 89 93|62 65 69 74|59 67 72 76| 49 59 64 69| 36 45 55 60 CompBow 84 74 88 92|51 54 58 63|51 59 64 68| 29 39 44 49| 25 34 44 49 HvyXBow 77 67 81 85|46 49 53 58|45 53 58 62| 24 34 39 44| 20 29 39 44 LtXBow 82 72 86 90|55 58 62 67|51 59 64 68| 36 46 51 56| 30 39 49 54 LongBow 78 68 82 86|49 52 56 61|48 56 61 65| 26 36 41 46| 22 31 41 46 ShtBow 87 77 91 95|56 59 63 68|60 68 73 77| 39 49 54 59| 30 39 49 54 Sling 87 77 91 95|67 70 74 79|55 63 68 72| 44 54 59 64| 30 39 49 54 | | | | ******* 2Hnd ******| | | | BattAxe 75 65 79 83|49 52 56 61|43 51 56 60| 26 36 41 46| 17 26 36 41 Flail 71 61 75 79|46 49 53 58|39 47 52 56| 26 36 41 46| 17 26 36 41 WarMatt 75 65 79 83|49 52 56 61|43 51 56 60| 24 34 39 44| 12 21 31 36 Staff 90 80 94 98|64 67 71 76|61 69 74 78| 51 61 66 71| 45 54 64 69 2HndSwd 70 60 74 78|46 49 53 58|41 49 54 58| 29 39 44 49| 20 29 39 44 | | | | **** Pole Arm *****| | | | Javelin 81 71 85 89|58 61 65 70|55 63 68 72| 46 56 61 66| 40 49 59 64 Lance 75 65 79 83|48 51 55 60|44 52 57 61| 22 32 37 42| 10 19 29 34 Polearm 77 67 81 85|54 57 61 66|50 58 63 67| 39 49 54 59| 30 39 49 54 Spear 79 69 83 87|57 60 64 69|49 57 62 66| 36 46 51 56| 34 43 53 58 Trachten's True THT's Version 2, *BETA* Page 2 | | | | Arm Cls Skin | Soft Lthr |Rigid Lthr | Chain | Plate Arm Typ 1 2 3 4| 5 6 7 8| 9 10 11 12| 13 14 15 16| 17 18 19 20 ------- -----------+-----------+-----------+---------------+--------------- ***** Natural *****| | | | BeakPnc 57 61 73 82|58 62 69 71|73 81 88 95| 38 46 52 53| 3 10 15 22 Bite 43 47 59 68|58 62 69 71|66 74 81 88| 32 40 46 47| 10 17 22 29 ClawTln 40 44 56 65|62 66 73 75|69 77 84 91| 36 44 50 51| 11 18 23 30 HornTsk 41 45 57 66|61 65 72 74|63 71 78 85| 34 42 48 49| 11 18 23 30 Stinger 39 43 55 64|68 72 79 81|68 76 83 90| 36 44 50 51| 12 19 24 31 Tiny 34 38 50 59|59 63 70 72|66 74 81 88| 33 41 47 48| 8 15 20 27 TrpStmp 23 27 39 48|45 49 56 58|57 65 72 79| 19 27 33 34| -1 6 11 18 FalCrsh 15 19 31 40|28 32 39 41|43 51 58 65| 2 10 16 17|-10 -3 2 9 MAStrik 36 40 52 61|46 50 57 59|64 72 79 86| 23 31 37 38| 11 18 23 30 | | | | * Natural, Reverse | | | | Ensr(1) 04 91 99 95|86 80 72 67|54 51 45 41| 16 13 6 3|-25 -28 -32 -36 RmBtBsh 02 89 97 93|89 83 75 70|58 55 49 45| 21 18 11 8|-23 -26 -30 -34 MASweep 08 95 03 99|80 74 66 61|52 49 43 39| 12 9 2 -1|-35 -38 -42 -46 (1)GrapplGraspSwing| | | | | | | | ****** Spell ******| | | | WatrBlt 59 57 69 73|65 70 75 73|57 64 69 74| 29 32 39 40| 2 5 13 18 FireBlt 43 41 53 57|58 63 68 66|48 55 60 65| 19 22 29 30| -9 -6 2 7 ColdBll 31 29 41 45|43 48 53 51|32 39 44 49| 5 8 15 16|-22 -19 -11 -6 FireBll 28 26 38 42|37 42 47 45|25 32 37 42| 1 4 11 12|-26 -23 -15 -10 | | | | ** Spell, Reverse *| | | | ShckBlt 68 58 73 80|75 74 74 72|66 71 72 69| 30 25 20 17| -2 -7 -14 -19 IceBlt 62 52 67 74|62 61 61 59|57 62 63 60| 27 22 17 14| -6 -11 -18 -23 LghtBlt 58 48 63 70|59 58 58 56|58 63 64 61| 19 14 9 6|-12 -17 -24 -29 Part III Putting it all Together III.1 Role Playing III.1.1 Remember that GemStone, like the RoleMaster System it is licensed from, does not use the concept of having a set alignment with regards to good/evil, law/chaos. III.1.2 Some games, such as Dungeons and Dragons, require you to choose an alignment and then force you to rigidly adhere to it. GemStone III, like RoleMaster, recognizes that character personalities (and human nature) are far to complicated to be restricted in such a fashion. Rather, it is how you roleplay your character that will determine how you will be perceived in the game by your fellow players. III.1.3 The key to roleplaying a characters personality is to be consistent. Stay in character! If you have to discuss game mechanics or last weeks football game, use whispers or find someplace private. III.1.4 Outstanding roleplaying may even occasionally earn you an experience award or such. If you are always in character the chances of getting noticed for one of these awards goes up. Even if you never get an award, roleplaying is fun! People play this game to have fun, and it is difficult for those around you to stay in character if you are trying to discuss out of character (OOC) matters! Try to stay in chacter as best you can. Even when soloing. III.1.5 As you decide on how to roleplay your character, remember that GemStone III is a family game with just about every age group represented. Watch the language, and recall that Player vs Player (PvP) violence is generally frowned upon. III.1.6 There are many approaches towards roleplaying your character. Think of it as acting. Some people need to generate a detailed character background before they can act the part. Some just jump into the role with no preparation. Both methods are correct. If your the type that needs to generate a background in order act out your actions I have provided the next few sections on background material for our world. III.2 Kulthea: The Shadow World III.2.1 GemStone III is set on the planet called Kulthea. There are 14 known continents on our world. The town of Kelfour's Landing is located in a northern continent called Jaiman. It is the year 6051 of the third era. What? you don't know about your history? In brief then: III.2.2 The first era lasted about 80,000 years. It saw Kulthea become the heart of a large, interstellar empire built upon technology and magic. In the end, there were two groups struggling for control of the empire. On group was lead by the empress Kadaena, the other by a cousin of the empress named Utha. Both died in battle that saw almost everything destroyed. Entire worlds were shattered. Little remained. III.2.3 The Long Night is a period lasting about 100,000 years. This was a time of rebuilding. The Lords of Orhan, who had remained hidden during the first era, play a large role in this effort. III.2.4 The second era starts with the founding of the college of Loremasters. They are dedicated towards bringing the world out of the Long Night. The Dark Gods first appear on the moon Charon in the year 1900 other the second era. Unfortunately for the Loremasters' goal, the "Wars of Dominion" start during the year 6450 of the second era. III.2.5 The Wars of Dominion represent a three hundred year struggle against the Unlife and their allies. The forces of darkness (the Lords of the dark moon Charon, and some survivors of Kadaena's forces from the first era, etc.) had long been building their strength. The coming of the Unlife in 6450 was their signal to raise their dark legions and together destroy those that would stand against them. So it came to pass that the forces of light (the Loremasters, Lords of Orhan, the Titans, and the free people) defeated the forces of darkness. The Unlife was driven back into the void, with only minor servants remaining behind. III.2.6 The end of the Wars of Dominion marks the start of the third era. The Lord's of Orhan seldom venture forth from the moon Orhan, the Loremasters are back to their task of rebuilding the world, and the forces of darkness are recovering their strength. It is now the year 6051 of the third era. Welcome to Kelfour's Landing! III.3 The RMSS and MERP III.3.1 If you were intrigued by the previous section, let me tell you about the game systems GemStone III is based upon. GemStone III is a product of SIMUTRONICS Corp. It is loosely based on (licensed from) the pen and paper fantasy roleplaying game systems published by Iron Crown Enterprises (ICE). III.3.2 ICE has two game systems which form the basis for GemStone III. They are "Middle Earth Role Playing" (MERP) and the "RoleMaster Standard System" (RMSS). MERP (ICE part no. 2000) is a one volume game designed as an introductory to intermediate level fantasy roleplaying system which allows you to roleplay a character set in the world created by J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Hobbit" and "The Lord of the Rings". The RMSS is designed for the advanced player. It allows you to roleplay in a universe of your own creation or in one of several pre-designed modules set in the imaginary world of Kulthea. III.3.3 One question that many players ask is what products are available to help them with GemStone III? The answer is none. That's why your reading my guide. :) III.3.4 The ICE products are excellent. If you wish to use them in your own roleplaying groups at home then by all means get the rules. If however, your intent is to only play GemStone III, then forget the rules and consider the shadow world background materials. III.3.5 The game GemStone III uses tables and formulas from both systems. However, a great many were custom designed for the game. Adding to the confusion is that the tables used are from earlier editions of both MERP (currently in it's 2nd ed) and RoleMaster (currently in its 3rd ed)! Having the rules will cause as much confusion as it avoids. III.3.6 The background material is much more relevant. The names and places will be familiar to many players immediately. The following list describes the shadow world material. ICE may be contacted at 1.800.325.0479. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * IMPORTANT! None of these items are required to play GemStone III! * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ICE product no. Title Notes ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 6050 Shadow World Master Atlas, 2nd ed. The world of Kulthea 6010 Jaiman: Land of Twilight Continent of Jaiman 6001 Quellbourne: Land of the Silver Mist Kelfour's Landing 6200 Stormriders Novel part no. 6001 is out of stock. When I spoke with ICE they said they would consider having another printing if they can get 500 pre-orders. You may get lucky and find it on some hobby shops shelf still. If you are on a budget, consider getting just part no. 6200. This inexpensive paperback novel will easily give you a feel for the fantasy world used by GemStone III. III.4 GemStone III's graphical front end for GEnie III.4.1 GemStone III is a text based game and any communications program can be used to play it. To try and add a little color to the game (literally), a graphical front end was developed. THERE IS NO ADVANTAGE GIVEN TO USERS OF THE GRAPHICAL FRONT END IN TERMS OF GAME MECHANICS. III.4.2 Available in the GemStone III libraries is a graphical front end (FE) for the game. It will run any IBM PC or 100% compatible. It features an extensive scripting language and allows for many macros. I think it is worth the download. It has certainly added to my enjoyment of the game. III.4.3 The FE is contained in a self extracting zip file. Place the file into a subdirectory (make one called GemStone or some such) and run the program to decompress the files. You are now ready to use the front end. Before you do so however, try and download the optional file r10.exe. This self extracting zip file will add many graphic screens (most merchants). run the file in the same directory that the FE is in. I strongly recommend you get r10.exe. III.4.4 Setup the FE, and start enjoying the game with sound and graphics :) III.5 Of Interest to America On Line and Prodigy Players. III.5.1 GemStone III will soon be available to folks on these other networks. Welcome to our world :) There are a few useful things which will be of interest to new players. III.5.2 Drop your baud rate. Yes I know you can get as high as 28k baud on these networks on certain lines. GemStone III is a text based game. Ever try reading a wall of text at 28k baud? III.5.3 Drop down to 9600 or slower. The GemStone III UNIX based host will have the unenviable task of synchronizing players from several networks. The GEnie network (were GemStone III originated from) only supports speeds up too 9600 baud. III.5.4 GemStone is a family game. There are strict policies on language and behavior. The GemStone III policy is posted on the home page for all to read. Playing the game implies consent to these policies. Simply put, watch the language, and remember that this is NOT a Player vs Player (PvP) network. I have known of accounts who have been locked out of the game as a result of abusive behavior. Always remember everyone is in this game to have fun! III.5.5 I have accounts on other networks than GEnie ;) I'll report what I find out. I'm particularly interested in knowing whether the GemStone III graphical front end will work. III.6 Odds and Ends III.6.1 There are some useful settings which you can customize once inside GemStone. Type SET to list them for you. You will see a list of the command names and a brief explanation. Any exclamation marks mean that option is turned OFF. setting MONSTERBOLD to on is a very popular option. PROFESSION is also popular, it determines whether you let people know what class your character is when they LOOK at you. III.6.2 If a cleric is going to perform a resurrection in the area where you are in, DO NOT ATTACK THE CALMED CREATURES. Both the cleric and the newly resurrected character are at risk of severe of harm from creatures during and after the ritual. III.6.3 A number of player-run organizations called Houses exist in town. There are varying entrance requirements, dues and obligations. Most all of them offer expanded storage in 40-item lockers. You cannot join any House until you are at least level 5. III.6.4 There are laws in town. The constable is currently under revision. You'll get arrested and fined for breaking the law. You can check out the case in the Constabulary (on Andraax Avenue) to see the current list of arrest warrants. III.6.5 If you are arrested, you will be tossed in jail and then brought before a judge who will decide upon your fine. Fines are based on both character level and the severity of the crime. Your "criminal history" counts too. If you do not have enough silver on you to pay the fine, You will be given a chance to get it from the bank. Otherwise your inventory will be sold off (in random order) until the fine is paid off. Any inventory remaining can be picked up in the constabulary, where it is stored in a sealed box on the constable's desk. Only the owner of the inventory can open the box. Unclaimed inventory (anything left after about an hour) is lost forever. Part IV The Sorcerer IV.1 Generating a sorcerer character is unfortunately a difficult matter. It should only be attempted by players who have a good understanding of game mechanics. Success as a sorcerer is an act of sheer will combined with a healthy budget. Let's have a look at the issues involved. IV.1.1 Stats: IV.1.2 A sorcerer needs Power Points (PP's). He needs lots a them. Sorcerer spells are very PP intensive. The basic combat spell, Touch of Disruption (ToD) uses 2 PP's per cast! Also, unlike their mage counterparts, Sorcerers tend not to use wands. Further adding to this need for power is the fact that many sorcerer spells need to be used in combination with other spells to achieve maximum effectiveness and the fact that sorcerer spells use Resistance Rolls (RR's). IV.1.2 For instance, using the curse spell (15 PP's) to make a target more vulnerable to torment (18 PP's) uses 33 PP's (assuming both work). As these spells use RR's they tend to need more than one casting to get to work. Did I mention how important PP's are to a sorcerer? IV.1.3 To figure out how many PP's per level you will get, average your empathy and intuition statistics and consult table I.1.14. IV.1.4 An informal survey of sorcerers in the game yielded an averaged stat of 96 (rounded up to the nearest integer). It seems sorcerer's game-wide are currently averaging 2.2 PP's per level. IV.1.5 Since both empathy and intuition get automatic 90's, and you need more than that for PP's, it forces you to consider placing your best numbers in these stats. IV.1.6 One work around is to place a 100 in one either empathy or intuition and take the automatic 90 in the other stat. This gives you a 95 average when calculating your stat bonus. You will have to decide for yourself how many PP's per level you will accept as a minimum. IV.1.7 PP recovery rates are rumored to be under review at this time. Some society skills will likely be adjusted as well. Lets hope things get better. IV.1.8 Another area of importance is your quickness. A high quickness helps give you good DB. It will take you a long time to kill critters as a sorcerer. You will need as high a DB as is possible. IV.1.9 The stats of Self Discipline and Presence are being rumored to influence a sorcerer's ability to summon and control demons when those spells get implemented. Reinforcing this rumor is that the sorcerer class in the RoleMaster Standard System (RMSS) uses three primary skills to GemStone III's two. They are Intuition, Empathy, and Self-Discipline. (More on the RMSS and Sorcerers later) IV.1.10 Agility will help a sorcerer hit with Mages wands and the 11th level Open Channeling List "Flare" spell (hits like the Mages fireball). It also helps a sorcerers DS defenses. IV.1.11 Constitution is a consideration for society members who need lots of life levels (LL's). IV.1.12 Strength will help you carry loot and hit with weapons. IV.1.13 Seems like you need lots of high stats for the ideal sorcerer? That's part of what makes a sorcerer difficult to generate. Sorcerers need to make hard choices and then live with the results. You simply won't get everything you want. IV.2 Skills and training: IV.2.1 A major consideration is the extent to which your sorcerer will use a weapon. The quickest way to gain levels is to be a warrior-sorcerer. Use a sword for your first twenty levels, if not longer. Gradually increase your spell usage as PP's permit. IV.2.2 Be aware that if your vision of a sorcerer is one of a "pure spelluser" (spells only, no weapons, no brawling) your advancement rate will be dramatically slower and your DB will be too low to have a viable character past a certain level (usually the mid twenty's). This approach is strongly not recommended. Game mechanics currently favor a sword swinging sorcerer over one who relies solely on his spells. IV.2.3 One compromise position I personally prefer is the "spells only" approach to sorcery with the "brawling" skill to provide for DB. However, most players simply do not have the patience for this approach. Advancement is very slow. This approach is one that is done solely for role playing reasons. I personally find it comes in very handy. For instance, I like being able to eat chocolate chip cookies in combat situations. :) Relieves the stress. IV.2.4 Brawling also is not very popular among sorcerers due to the high DP cost. Sorcerers generally have a higher DP cost than Mages for skills. Brawling at 18 DP's uses up slightly less than half of the average players available DP's, leaving very little for other needed skills. IV.2.5 Once you've decided what kind of sorcerer you wish to be (probably trained in one hand edged due to its low DP cost) finish the training plan for your character. IV.2.6 Always put 10 ranks into your spell gain roll. This will guarantee you one new spell per level. IV.2.7 Channeling is also important, once per level is recommended. Sorcerers can actually use a skill rating over 100% in channeling, so never stop. IV.2.8 There is the issue of whether a sorcerer should single or double train in the DS skill. This largely depends on whether he intends to use this ability for offense or defense. You should double train if you intend to use DS spells for offense (i.e. the OC list Flare spell). Remember that there are currently no spells on the sorcerer base list that use DS skill. IV.2.9 Skills such as wand/staff and runes are cheap enough for you to single train in each. Do so. You can stop training in these skills when you feel you have reached a comfortable level in them. (i.e. you can use them easily) IV.2.10 Try and get a little training in climbing, swimming, and perception with any spare points. You will need these skills to get into and around many areas of the game. IV.2.11 Outside of possible double training in DS and putting 10 points into a spell list, there is currently little point to double training in any of the other skills. IV.2.12 Helpful Hint: As a general rule, double training wastes DP's and should be avoided unless the skill is a "Core skill" for a character class. For instance, fighters have to double train in weapons if allowed in order to remain viable. IV.3 Spells: IV.3.1 Destruction, pain, and fear are a sorcerers tools. Sorcerer spells generally do not kill quickly. That is, "death crits" are few and far between, if they even exist at all for a given spell. A sorcerer kills primarily through CP loss. CP loss can be caused by bleeding, pain, disease, etc. IV.3.2 In game terms, this means you will be in combat with a critter for a considerable amount of time. THE CRITTER WILL GET SEVERAL ATTEMPTS TO DO MEAN AND NASTY THINGS TO YOU. You therefore have to worry about your DB. IV.3.3 Currently, one of the primary characteristics of the sorcerer class is the ability to hunt with his spells at full parry (parry 100). Parry does not affect RR's. IV.3.4 This will not be the case for future sorcerers! IV.3.5 Rumor has it that any day now, you must lower your parry to 75 in order to cast a spell. Spell Round Times (RT's) may also be introduced as well - probably in the order of 3 seconds. IV.3.6 As the engagement system (which will allow for ranged attacks and the introduction of bows, etc.) gradually gets put into place, the rest of the Spell Failure (ESF) system will also be brought into the game. You may recall the first phase of the ESF system went into effect when armor was fixed. Parry will then affect both the chance of successfully prepping a spell and the chance of getting the spell to work when casting. IV.3.7 Future sorcerers will be played differently than those in the game today. It will still take you a long time to kill the critters, but you will no longer have your parry 100 defenses to hide behind. You must account for the effect this will have on your sorcerer! Plan now! IV.3.8 How you decide to fight will be the biggest influence in your choice of what spell list to study. Basically: IV.3.9 Open Essence: Currently best for weapon using sorcerers. Excellent DB (Guard True is arguably the best DB spell in the game) and contains spells such as E-Blade, E-Wave, and True Strike. Has very good utility spells like Word of Opening and Word of Disarm. IV.3.10 Open Channeling: The first three spells are required DB spells for any sorcerer. Airwall offers good DB and is the second best spell in the game against bows and thrown weapons. The list contains many good spells such as resist/cure poison/disease, guidance, telepathy (same spell as crystal amulets), and Alkar. It is rumored that a "web" type of spell may be added to the list. IV.3.11 Sorcerer Base: The first two spells, Word of Bleeding (WoB) and Touch of Disruption (ToD), are the cornerstone of the sorcerer list. Afterwards, there isn't a decent spell until you learn curse (15th). By decent I mean one that you will use constantly on your hunting trips. The 3rd through 14th level spells, while little used, are fairly good for the most part. The 15th through 20th level spells on the list are rather well designed. IV.3.12 This would be a good time to remind you that the RR roll system was originally designed for a 20 level game. It has been stretched to fit a 100 level game, but doesn't work well once you get past 50 or so. IV.3.13 Now that players are past level 50 in increasing numbers, the results are being felt and it is rumored that players can expect to see some major tweaking of the RR system in the future. The point being that you must try not do design your character to take advantage of a bug (aka "feature") provided by current game mechanics. Long term planning is the secret to success as a sorcerer. IV.3.14 Lets look at the sorcerer base list: IV.3.14.1 WoB: An excellent spell that can see you to lord level and then some. WoB only works on living critters. It causes a critter to suffer a level 1 bleeding wound (loosing 1-2 CP's per round) for each successful cast. You may as well know that healers aren't the only ones who get to learn what level the different types of wounds are ;) IV.3.14.2 ToD: Currently uses the impact crit table and as such is lousy against armored critters. It takes more casts to kill armored critters in UNIX GemStone than it did under the older Mark III system. A disruption crit table is in the works at which should hopefully fix this spell. ToD is considered to be the sorcerers basic attack spell. IV.3.14.3 Forget: The 15 second duration is to small to be of any general use. This spell is useful only in a few highly specialized situations. I found it good for soloing wraiths in the few instances were the attic was empty. IV.3.14.4 Phase: An interesting concept, but one that is poorly implemented. You can only phase through a door or portal if it can be opened by any player (using the OPEN and CLOSE verbs). Having a lock on the door (regardless of whether the door is unlocked or not) will prevent phase from working. This spell can also be cast at a chest, and if you don't leave your hand inside there is a small chance you may pull out something. Unfortunately this spell can take literally hours to empty out a chest or coffer and there is no way of knowing if the chest or coffer is actually empty. To my knowledge, every sorcerer who ever made it this far up the base list has complained about phase. IV.3.14.5 Breaklimb: Causes a level 2 bleeding wound on the critter. Otherwise similar to WoB. IV.3.14.6 Mind Jolt: Causes a short duration stun determined by the amount the targets RR was failed by. Not as good as the OC stun spell in which the duration is level based (X seconds per level), but costs much less PP's to use. IV.3.14.7 Eye Spy: A good spell for it's PP expenditure. It is the closest thing a sorcerer gets to the mage's familiar spell. It is very limited in it's abilities, but can be used to cast the level 17 Evil Eye Spell at range. Remember to always have the eye return to you before the spell duration wears off or you'll have a blind eye and be in a 10 round stun! IV.3.14.8 Major Pain: Causes a temporary, non-cumulative, 25% Cp loss in the target. Lasts about two minutes. IV.3.14.9 Quake: An Illusion of an earthquake. Gets random knock downs as critters loose there balance. Good for role playing and little else as it is too unreliable in it's outcome to use against critters. IV.3.14.10 Maelstrom: Effects everything in the room except the caster. Causes lots of short stuns and some CP loss. Has no known death crits. This spell is useful if you want to clear out a room as most critters (but not all) will run away from this spell. IV.3.14.11 Limb Disruption: Causes a level 3 bleeding wound. Otherwise similar to WoB. IV.3.14.12 Word of Pain: Causes a permanent 25% loss of a critters currently existing CP's. The effect of repetitive casting is cumulative. IV.3.14.13 Nightmare: A good spell but expensive to use. It has very good role playing potential. Everyone should know what their worst nightmare is :) IV.3.14.14 Summon Demons: Unimplemented IV.3.14.15 Curse: Actually several spells in one depending on the casters parry. It will need get tweaked a bit in the future as the way parry effects spells changes. IV.3.14.16 Flesh Destruction (Disease): A visual treat. Can be quite effective if the target fails it's RR by a substantial amount IV.3.14.17 Evil Eye: Basically similar to the fear spell used by many undead critters. When cast at a fellow player character it can even send you running back to the town gates :) It can be cast through an eye spy spell. On the down side, you don't get to search the critters for loot with this spell - they are too busy running. IV.3.14.18 Torment: Will kill the target if it doesn't kill you first. This spell seems to get quite a bit of usage. IV.3.14.19 Dark Catalyst: This spell only affects targets if they have PP's. It converts a portion of these PP's to CP loss and transfers some of them back to the caster. The casters channeling skill is a very important factor. Sorcerers can benefit from having their channeling skill over 100 when using this spell. IV.3.14.20 Implosion: A vacuum which sucks the air out of a room doing terrible things to critters in the area. Try countering it with airwall should you encounter one. Actually, some of the best coding for this spell occurs should a player character get sucked in too his doom. You should try to experience it once. IV.3.14.25 Summon Demons True: unimplemented IV.3.15 Spell Training Strategies: IV.3.16 Under the game as it exists today, the most favored training strategy is something along the lines of: Start the game with Guard I (Open essence (OE)) and WoB (Sorcerer base (SB)). Then learn ToD (SB). Switch to the Open Channeling List (OC) and learn Protect I, Airwall, and Aura. Then switch back to the OE list until you learn guard III. At this point you have to decide whether to continue OE and get Guard True or switch to the SB. IV.3.17 The strategy here is that since you have no DB spells on the SB you only learn the first two SB attack spells and then go up the open lists for your DB. IV.3.18 One note of caution about this strategy is that there is a trend towards making a spells effectiveness based on how many ranks you have studied within a spell list. Under these circumstances, You would want to give serious consideration towards studying more of the SB earlier in your career. For instance, it does seem that current thoughts about any revision to the way RR spells work will be along these lines. The dilemma facing a sorcerer then becomes one of how much defense (OE & OC) vs offense (SB) to study. Things are gonna get real interesting :) IV.4 Soloing: IV.4.1 One of the biggest hurdles to playing a sorcerer character is the large amount of time that he must spend soloing to advance levels. Weapon using open essence list sorcerers will probably want to solo until they have E-wave or longer, while those of us who hunt with our spells should plan on soloing for the first 30 levels or so. IV.4.2 Young Sorcerers make lousy group hunters. This is due to the experience formula which gives the most experience to the person who scores the most CP damage. Sorcerers slowly whittle away at their prey, and simply can't keep up when causing CP loss. In my opinion, the inability to effectively participate in a group is why most first time sorcerers reroll. I call it a "frustration factor". IV.5 Roleplaying considerations IV.5.1 Roleplaying a sorcerer in GemStone III is not terribly difficult. Recall all the things you've learned! Everything I mentioned in Part III.1 applies. There are a few additional things that you need to keep in mind. IV.5.2 It should be noted that unlike the RoleMaster Standard System (RMSS), all sorcerers in GemStone III have a dark side to them! To understand why, we have to discuss how the sorcerer class differs in the two games. IV.5.3 In the RMSS, sorcerers are masters of destruction. the sorcerer base list and its six sub lists all deal with ways of destroying things. (fluid destruction, solid destruction, etc.) As a result, players can play good sorcerers as well as evil sorcerers. For instance, in the Shadow World background material, the character of Vurkanan Tyes the Loremaster is a 45th level sorcerer (i.e. generally considered one of the good guys). IV.5.4 In GemStone III, sorcerers are much more than just creatures of destruction. After all, otherwise we'd have a spell list with 20+ attack spells on it. IV.5.5 GemStone III took as its sorcerer base list spells from many other areas of the RMSS, tho some were made up and are unique to the game. Phase, eyespy, and evil eye (fear) are but a few spells that come to mind. As a further example, the Demon Summoning spells come from the RMSS Evil Essence Entity Summons list. (Elemental Summoning is also on the Evil Essence Entity Summons list in the RMSS.) Many of a sorcerers spells in GemStone III have a dark power or demonic presence about them. It is therefore difficult to roleplay a good sorcerer. IV.5.6 When I was faced with this dilemma, I found that this is were not having an alignment system comes in handy. It occurred to me that one of the possible outcomes to roleplaying an insane evil sorcerer character is that he turns out to be "good". Therefore I roleplay a character who is generally considered to have a few screws loose by his friends. He is also generally considered good by most of the players he meets. Now not everyone should generate their own version of Manny the Mad, besides - you'd have to get your own tickling feather if you did, but it's one example of how it can be done. IV.5.7 There is another major difference between a RMSS sorcerer and a GemStone III Sorcerer. GemStone III is loosely based on earlier version of the RoleMaster Rules. As a result, sorcerers in GemStone III have only two primary characteristics (Intuition and Empathy) and use a severe racial modifier table. IV.5.8 The RMSS (the current edition of the rules) states that sorcerers have three primary characteristics: Intuition, Empathy, and Self-Discipline. The racial modifiers have been toned down some. Elves, as an example, no longer have a -20 Self-Discipline modifier. IV.5.9 The reason the RMSS is mentioned in our discussion is that the two games influence each other. While GemStone III is NOT RoleMaster, it is influenced by RoleMaster (and vice versa). IV.5.10 Hopefully you now know enough to succeed as a sorcerer. :)