(6+ hrs) Gameplay hours is a result of following the main adventure.
Hours will vary depending on how many side-quests you decide to take on while exploring the city.
Number Players
1
Language
English
Level Range
1
Races
Any
Tricks & Traps
Light
Roleplay
Medium
Hack & Slash
Light
Classes
Wizard or Sorcerer
Scope
Medium
DMNeeded
No DM Required
Single or Multiplayer
Single Player
Max Character Level
01
Max # Players
01
Min # Players
01
Min Character Level
01
Content Rating
Teen
Alignments
Lawful Evil, Neutral Evil are good choices.
Good characters will not suit this module due to the body mutilation and undead summoning that is required for your laboratory assistant.
Gameplay Hours
06
Description
This module was created for a single player first level Wizard or Sorcerer of any sex and race.
The adventure takes place within the nation of Calimshan on the eastern shore in a port city known as Almraiven.
Almraiven is a full city adventure and is the first installment of two modules.
"The dark silhouette of the High Tower looms ahead, reaching upward like the many jagged rocks and dead trees that surround the area. For many years it has been home to you and it is within those walls you were taught the arts of the arcane by Bakadah, your master. It is on this night that your training comes to an end and your acceptance into the Auren Society of Weavers is at hand.
The Auren draw their power from a weave that spans into the Land of the Dead. It allows such members to grasp a better understanding of the spirits that roam that realm and use it to their advantage. As of late the weave has felt tainted, as if it has been soiled in some way. Even your assistant Charles, who you summoned from the Land of the Dead, complained of headaches and the like. The dead should not do this.
It is this very taint that has awoken the Council of the High Tower from their slumber in tombs they have remained within for one-hunded and sixty years. On this night your first assignment is to come from Bakadah, an assignment given directly to him by the Council of the High Tower.
Fantastic scripting, and engrossing plot. The most 'alive' NWN city I have ever seen.
This is not really so much a con, merely an observasion. No repsawn (Keep a very up to date save at all times) Some very expensive equipment in some stores, that apart from the properties on them, do not strike me as items a Wizard or Sorcerer would use.
Loved the atmosphere of this truly named city adventure and the sub quests but found the 'necromancy' and cutting up of corpses disturbing and almost didn't play the module because of that! But the screenshots were too lovely so I tried to ignore the disturbing parts and enjoy the city itself!
Posted by ChazM at on09/13/10
Excellent adventure! The attention to detail is phenomenal. The environment really felt alive with the way things changed from day to night and as time progressed. I quickly realized that you never know when someone new (or even someone dead!) might show up in an area. A couple things I didn?t care for: * The Medusa Maze - While the implementation was interesting, the game play was frustrating and felt completely out of place. * Dinars - I didn?t understand the purpose of the dinar money system. My dinars and gold were constantly trading back and forth, but for what purpose? * Spell components - These were an interesting addition, but they felt like a lot to juggle, especially considering that there are a bunch of reagents needed for potions as well. The fact that they don?t stack makes them particularly burdensome. All in all, this is an outstanding module, amazing in so many ways! Story, atmosphere, and technical implementation are fantastic, and I haven?t come across anything ?broken?. Thanks for making this Fester Pot!
Posted by cemeteryschild at on09/07/10
best module i've ever played for NWN1. not quite finished yet, but i love it. excellent work!
Posted by taltamir at 2010-07-0712:48:23
in wundra's quest, if I run ahead and walk into the room where wundra and darwien are with wundra's brother lagging behind, then healing darwien inexplicably fails (it tells you that you tried the healing and it failed). If I wait until he is right near me before opening the door, it works. If you must base the success of a spell on his existence, then check if he is alive and in the party, rather then "nearby". Also, the book says to FEED the person beladona and then cast the spell on them. But the actual healing you perform says you "wash it into their wounds" (which is also silly since they are partially transformed and no longer have said wounds) Also, that quest is rage quitting frustratingly DM fiat. Why in the world do you have to save one and not the other? why can't you save wandra in her home if you brought all the ingredients in time and THEN go into the den to save darwien alone? (wandra's brother should still help here, in gratitute), why doesn't time matter, only order of actions? Why can you only buy one remove curse scroll at the magic store (they don't have more than 1? really?). why can't I feed/wash with drawien the beladona while wandra gets the same from her brother, then cast remove curse on both (one by one?) remove curse literally takes 6 seconds to cast! are you telling me that it just happen to finish feeding whomever I want to save beladona with between 6 and 11 seconds to cast the spell (so i can cast it on one using 6 seconds, leaving me with 0 to 5 seconds, thus not enough time to cast on the other?). That whole experience stinks, reminds me of fable. Also, keeping track of CHEAP material components? not fun. Especially since NWN already massively nerfs wizards... but anyways, its just tedious... 1. Components should be stackable (depending on the type, either 99 or 10 per stack, expensive components such as a 5000gp diamond don't have to be) as to not make a big bloody mess of inventory. 2. Some components should be much cheaper. 3. Component shops should have lots more of the basic components in stock (eg: rose petals) 4. You should start out with much more components in stock. 5. You should consider just have a pouch of "lots" of component, being effectively infinite. eg: a pouch of just pressed rose petals, it can store enough to cast the spell a thousand times over and will not be expensive at all. Makes me wish I could take "eschew components" though like in PnP. Would have been nicer if instead of implementing massive nerfs to wizards, we were given some boons that didn't exist in NWN proper, since wizards already suck in NWN (but are gods in PnP). Examples: 1. Component tracking only for spells that require EXPENSIVE material components. (still a nerf, but an ok one) 2. Remove familiar as you have (familiars a huge XP draining trap due to a bad decision in NWN1 XP algorithm, fixed in NWN2 btw), however, instead let you summon a familiar via a QUEST, said familiar will then appear as an ITEM in your INVENTORY... not as a character on the map... they would be used in gave via dialog options (eg: "command familiar to go fetch the keys for the cell"), and they will provide the bonuses they are supposed to (alertness feat, bonus to a skill or save or HP depending on familiar type). 3. Have "spellbooks" in your inventory where you record your spells, when you rest your character's "spells known" are all removed and replaced by the spells in said spell books. You can capture spellbooks belonging to other wizards (adding spells known), you could "copy" spells as per PHB @ 100gp per SL, rather then only learning them from scrolls ; which is significantly more expensive, a 9th level spell's scroll costs 25*17*9 = 3825gp. On the other hand, copying it costs 9*100 = 900gp in magical ink, and 9*50=450gp standard price paid to wizard who teaches you the spell as his teaching fee (can be zero if you are friendly enough for them to teach you spells at no charge, can be more if they hate you or think the particular spell is worth it, or whatever). 4. Allow the creation of semi-permanent / permanent tanks via golem crafting, animate spells, awaken spells, planer binding spells, dominate, etc etc (naturally many will not be available to a wizard, especially at lower levels, but having wizards actually have access to those will go a long way towards making them not suck in NWN1) 5. Allow permanent spells to exist (none in core NWN1) 6. Allow flight 7. Allow real powerful spells, such as wish (+5 to all stats here I come!), genesis, etc. 8. etc. Instead this wizard only module has MASSIVE nerfs to what is already the absolute weakest class in NWN1 (ironically, the strongest class, bar none, in PnP) _________________________ I do not have a superman complex; for I am God, not Superman!
Posted by taltamir at 2010-07-0710:30:38
in wundra's quest, I tell her brother "there is a cure" without actually ever telling him what she is sick with. _________________________ I do not have a superman complex; for I am God, not Superman!
Posted by taltamir at 2010-07-0710:23:07
the bed REALLY needs an option to wait / rest until noon and midnight. Most quests require that you go somewhere at about those times, with the person being unavailable at both dusk AND dawn. So you have to wait until one or the other, then pass the time one hour at a time. Also, only half the people who give you their name get auto renamed from "race gender" to their name, and cannot be renamed in conversation, so you have to finish conversation, scroll up to find their name, use feather, type Name . Lots of work because of the sheer amount of people, would be nice if all of them auto renamed as they told you their name. _________________________ I do not have a superman complex; for I am God, not Superman!
Posted by taltamir at 2010-07-0710:14:09
ok, i reloaded a save, this time i talked to herbalore, then to kara (well, actually I tried the parrot between the two) instead of kara before herbalore, and now the parrot WILL talk to me and I can progress the quest... mmm, might also be related to my progress with wandra's quest (last time I was at the point where I told him she can be cured, and he gave me money... this time I have done my research and know what she needs to cure, but haven't talked to him)... i concur btw with the idea that it is fairly ham fisted choice, especially because you tell the guy "she can be cured" and no option to cure her there and then (if you were smart enough to shop before entering his house) _________________________ I do not have a superman complex; for I am God, not Superman!
Posted by taltamir at 2010-07-0704:49:35
i am doing the darwien quest, I spoke to kara, then I spoke to the owner of the shop, it advanced the quest. Now I need to talk to the parrot, but it has nothing to say. I did try to speak with it before I acquired the quest (it had nothing to say), and I even had birdseed at the time (It was very cheap and looked like a useful item to carry) Maybe that is why... I also see constant crashes, also, the use of a database in the database folder seems highly problematic to me, due to reverting to earlier savegames and what it would do (Since the database is not kept inside the savegame, but seperate from it). This is really failure of the NWN engine though. _________________________ I do not have a superman complex; for I am God, not Superman!
Posted by taltamir at 2010-07-0621:49:30
since the first module is called Almraiven and the second is called Shadewood (instead of Almraiven 2), it becomes very difficult to describe the series as a whole, as it is unnamed. It would be beneficial to come up with an overall name for the series... say you name it "Alnomicon" for example (almraiven + necronomicon, just a name I made up on the spot) So you would want to name it: "Alnomicon 1 - Almraiven", and the second part "Alnomicon 2 - Shadewood" So people could say "I recommend you play the Alnomicon series by "Fester Pot" _________________________ I do not have a superman complex; for I am God, not Superman!
Posted by colinodbl at on06/26/10
Best module I think I have ever played. Great atmosphere and I love that there is very little combat and the overall manner in which the game is presented.
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