Not fed up

[beowuuf]

There's an option on one of the pull down menus to 'use direct X@ - that should give you sound the next time you run it

[Ameena]

If I remember rightly you have to select one of the options from the top menu (in windowed mode) in CSBWin to activate sound - it's something like "Use DirectX" or similar.
I've always referred to "Rives" as "Air Elementals", seeing how they're non-material, hard to see, and can float over pits. I wonder which creatures could be considered "Earth Elementals" - after all, there is more than one creature made of earthy stuff. I suppose maybe Rock Monsters would be nearest, as they're sort of low to the ground like the other three elementals. Meh, I dunno.

[slide]

Oh, I never noticed a top menu. I'll look next time. One problem I have also is that CSBwin only exists in about 1/4 my screen so I can't really make out some stuff. Anyway, I'll look for a DirectX option if I go there again.

I tried again and ended up utterly confused and feeling that this is WAY WAY beyond what I can do. I ran around ending up in an X place with many pressure plates. Anyway I tried to go I face multiple orange crabs (Oitus?) which quickly wore by team down. I suppose the plates regenned the crabs but I couldn't figure out out how to get away from the X.

So far I really don't get CSB. I am skeptical that it sold all that well because if it's that tough for me after DM, it must have been beyond most folks who tried it or maybe I'm lame beyond belief. I don't even get where I am being as I am up and down stair after stair making my tracking of where I am or why beyond my ken.

I can't even find a flask to make a potion.

[MasterWuuf]

Had me confused there. We must have somehow gotten off the beaten track.
You're frustrated with Chaos Strikes Back, rather than Dungeon Master.

Sure curious about the creatures you're fighting; orange crabs in an X section.


Yipes! Scary little varmint, to be sure.

[oh_brother]

^^That's the cutest oitu I have ever seen.

@slide: I know how you feel. When I played CSB first (at the age of about 11) I didn't have a clue what I was doing. I would have loved a flask. Or food or water. I died a lot. I replayed a few times, and eventually got a bit of a hang of it, but still never completed it. It was not until I got onto these forum and tried again (with the occasional help of the maps on the encyclopaedia) that I finally finished it, 20 years after I bought it. So it is tough.

But now that I understand it I think it is a fantastic game. And Antman finished the entire game in 9 minutes ( ) so it is possible.

[Ameena]

I thought it was Rain who had the nine-minute finish? Can't remember what Antman's was...but to finish the game at all is something, especially if doing so for the fisrt time, and of course it's even more impressive the less help you get with it .
Anyway, don't worry about it, Slide - you were warned, after all . Yes, it's all pits and paths and invisible teleporters and illusionary walls in random places and all that, but there is a set layout to it.
That bit you mention, being stuck at the crossroads with the Giant Spiders, is where I got stuck on my one and only solo attempt - I'd managed to get Fippy (reincarnated Wuuf) through DM and brought him into CSB, but he got stuck there 'cause he didn't have enough mana to kill enough spiders to get past so had to retreat to one of the rooms to sleep and regen himself - but the act of stepping back into the centre of the crossroads again spawned more spiders, which he had to use is mana to blow up again, and so on. So I scrapped that one and started (DM) again with a duo, who did manage to finish CSB as I had enough mana and inventory space and stuff to go round .
If you want a hint or two, one place you will most likely have been to by now is the Junction of the Ways - Wuffy mentioend it in above post - it is a crossroads whre each of the four paths is a Way dedicated to one of the four classes - Ku (Fighter), Ros (Ninja), Dain (Wizzy), and Neta (Priest). So the stuff you find down each way relates to it, but they aren't all self-contained. That is, you might enter Ku only to fall down a pit and end up in Ros, or something. Stuff links to all other kinds of stuff, but all four Ways eventually lead through to the

Spoiler

Diabolical Demon Director, or "DDD"

, and each Way also has a

Spoiler

particular key

that you need - each of these is

Spoiler

different, and unique within the dungeon

. You need these to pass the aforementioned

Spoiler

DDD, and continue onto "Part Two" of each Way

, which eventually leads up to the

Spoiler

Corbum Pillar, on the second-level-from-top

- once you've got

Spoiler

all four Corbums (or should that be Corba? )

, you then go to

Spoiler

the top level

, where you need to find the

Spoiler

Corbum Pit, which looks like a pit with a Fire Elemental over the far side of it, in a dead-end

, and there you need to

Spoiler

chuck the Corbums into the pit

, which ends the game .
As for where to get a flask, I think there might possibly be one at

Spoiler

"Supplies for the Quick"

, which is just around the corner from the start room (possibly accessed by a secret button/lever), though I can't remember for sure.
It's a challenge, though, ain't it? I bet you wouldn't get many games nowawdays which were this hard - people would complain too much that they weren't being given enough in-game help or whatever and that there was no map or quest guide or little health bars above the monsters' heads and stuff. Bleh, people are spoilt these days, too spoilt by the piss-easy games that come out and that are aimed at the oft-mentioned "lowest-common-denominator" who don't know what to do unless they can find an NPC with a great big yellow exclamation mark above their heads, or whatever . I think they need to be unspoilt, by some decent, really difficult games coming out while all there wussy games get temporarily banned .
That said, there are some newish games which are cool. Well, there must be, anyway. I don't tend to play a great deal of new stuff ("new" meaning "came out within the last five years or so"), though I am playing Divinity II atm and that only came out last year (well, the version I'm playing did - the version with the expansion added in).

[oh_brother]

Yes, there is an understandable logic to the dungeon which Ameena has mentioned in spoilers. If I were you I would read it, it is not a spoiler as such, just describing the logic of the dungeon layout, so you know vaguely what you are aiming for in each place.

Anyway, look on the bright side. Being killed by Oitus does make a change to being killed by fireballs.

[slide]

Yes, this has drifted to CSB from DM. My only issue with DM was an issue where I felt RTC was balanced a bit poorly in some areas.

Even though I read Ameena's spoilers, I don't have a clear idea of what I need to get through. No, I don't wish any more spoilers. I'll either return to it or not, but gee, I feel I'm not even close. Well, I was killed by the crab oitus this time, but fireballs the first time I tried so I"m not particularly thrilled. As I said, I tried DM again as a duo finding it pretty easy the second time, but more importantly, the game was playable because the foes were reasonably balanced to the abilities of my team at any given level.

CSB is different clearly. The foes are much stronger relatively speaking to my team than in DM at this, the game's start. In DM, it'd be like my team goes down the first staircase finding five purple worms rather than a 15 (or so) HP mummy.

While DM was a challenge and immersive, I'm' not sure CSB can be due to the extreme difficulty. In DM, I would go into an area, sometimes have to engage but once engaged, I'd find peace to explore. I can't see that in CSB. Instead I'm being chased and tossed around almost randomly or maybe randomly. As I posted earlier, I suspect that DM was a huge seller. I doubt CSB was. Too much is too much.

[Paul Stevens]

CSB requires you to be a bit more clever than
simply attempting to kill everything you
encounter everywhere. There are choices,
unlike DM where there was only one way forward.
In CSB there are many ways. Do them in order
of increasing difficulty rather than trying to
destroy the toughest monsters in your first
fight.

By the way.....even when I play the game
just for fun, I never go to the crossroads
with Oitus. Only if I am playing CSBwin's
alternate challenge of killing every last
monster.

[MasterWuuf]

So I guess I'm being a bit particular in my wishes for CSB?

Mmmm, I mean, I just think the lock picks should open EVERY door, gate, real or imaginative wall, etc. for me.

(Say, but couldn't I kill all the creatures fast then?)

[slide]

Well, Paul, they are trying to kill me, not me them. As to staying out of the crazy crab crosswalk, I didn't see or remember an alternative. I got there & couldn't leave.

Lockpicks? I don't seem to have any.

[Paul Stevens]

I didn't see or remember an alternative.

Rest assured. There are alternatives. That is the
beauty of CSB. Discovering the alternatives is
pretty much the whole game. Many of the puzzles have
several solutions of varying difficulty.

But you are correct in that once you have taken a step
in a particular direction, there is no backing out. You
reload from a comfortable position and try again.

If you are giving up because of this one setback
then you might as well quit before you get too
frustrated. These scenes will be repeated dozens
of times before you are through.

The lockpicks appear in a random location, if I remember
correctly. Knowing where I found them is not likely
to help you. They are not needed but you can eventually
find them if you look long enough.

[slide]

I'm not 100% giving up but probably putting it aside for now. BTW, per my previous post, I did change the sound to DirectX and it works - almost too well. I would have preferred it play in full screen rather than quarter screen but I can live with it.

I'm just at a place now where I don't wish to work this hard outside of work and family. No way can I stroll half distracted through this one which means it isn't suitable for where my mind is now. As I said, maybe later.

[beowuuf]

You can run in fullscreen, but you need to use the config file I think. I'll try to host the conflux .bat file zyx used. There is also a tab somewhere (I think) that does x1, x2 (normal), x4 sizing aswell.

CSB does need some playing through slowly and carefully, and some long exploration to manage to get back to a recogniseable place. Perhaps not the opbvious 'i've made progress' game that DM was. But definitely get back to it at some point!

You cna get a flask (or a few) at ther very start, without going down stairs. If you start using some items with some other items, you can find a 'run and jump' puzzle. Exploring these corridors give you some more puzzles but also some nice items - especailly at 'supplies for the quick'. You might find some momnsters around, but you will also find lightning less nasty.

The crossroads door bit can be evil when you are there, but the solution is to do with caution. Did you ever, for example, discover the spell to open and close doors from afar in DM? Quite useful....

[Paul Stevens]

spell to open and close doors from afar

Hah! I never thought of that. I simply avoided the place.

CSB. Learn new things after 20 years. Thanks.

[beowuuf]

Yup, clear it out one fight at a time, and then carry on at your leisure. Then curse if you come back to the place later

[slide]

Yes, I had to use the open door from afar in DM. IIRC, it was L2 Cast Your [something] puzzle. I didn't notice it working on any other door where I was stuck.

I've tried that time the pit run and jump area a few times & always fell down into the pit. Beats me why I can't seem to get this one timed well. Now that I'm alerted. I'll do the save / try again routine to get through here. I had no idea if the thing was doable based on my few tries to get by there.

I thought it was a gag and not doable because in other similar games, I've done well in the timing puzzles where you need to thread through pits which rotate open or slicing knives or pendulums 'gauntlets'. In fact, physical puzzles like time then run the series of pits was always my strongest aspect.

[beowuuf]

The door spell needs to be used on push button doors.

Run and jump - watch out for leg wounds from the worms. Being overweight shouldn't be an issue. You don't 'jump' as such (no such acting in the engine) so it is just a pit run. I did actually create a fake 'run and jump' where you did have to move fast enough to jump over a pit. This was in an unreleased test dungeon. Don't recall if it worked perfectly when I stopped playing!

[Ameena]

Damn, lol, I hadn't thought of that either - the using the Zo spell on the Spider-crossroads bit. And I would be worried if someone had got through DM without finding said spell - otherwose how would you have got past the "Cast your influence, cast your might" bit?
As for the "Run and Jump" bit, if you approach the pit but don't try to cross it, you'll se that it closes for a moment and then reopens. Maybe you can get a sense for the timing of this (I'm not sure which square it is which triggers the closing of the pit when you step on it, but clearly there is some delay between stepping on the square and the pit closing) and then have another go. As mentioned, make sure you don't have anyone in the yellow so they're able to run at full speed - unless anyone is injured, I wouldn't have thought you'd have found enough stuff yet to encumber any of your chars.
There is something else in that area which I can't remember what it does (you might have found it already actually, since it might have been what opens the wall to "Run and Jump" or something)...but I recall that in/near the starting room there's a

Spoiler

torch bracket, with or without torch, I can't remember - anyway, if it's got a torch then take it out (I'm pretty sure this is the case) - if not then put one in and I think it opens a secret wall. I can remember back on the Atari when me and my dad found this, from then on we'd always take torches out of brackets and just leave them on the floor in case there were any others that did this

.
But there are so many bloody secret bits in this game, lol - fake walls all over the place, random pits and teleports - sometimes it pays to walk down a corridor deliberately clonking your head on every wall, just in case there's an illusionary one hidden among the real ones - there's never any hint that there's a false wall there, you just have to find them yourself.

[slide]

Looking backwards, I think I've hit upon the reason I've not succeeded in the run and jump area of CSB. I've only given the game a go after having been home a few hours and having consumed a few pints. That may have contributed to my lack of manual dexterity.

Well, you fellows have given me a bit of a boost to try the thing again, but this time a bit more seriously in picking my team. My trial team was composed of a few I just grabbed first come first released so I could get going in the thing. If I do lose my sense and give this another go, I'll post my results.

[Jan]

Did you ever, for example, discover the spell to open and close doors from afar in DM? Quite useful....

D'oh! I've never used this spell there either. D'oh and double d'oh!

[beowuuf]

Paul S is right - the power of collaboration to defeat things like CSB and Conflux seems mandatory. One person's obvious trick is another person's cunning new tactic!

I've only given the game a go after having been home a few hours and having consumed a few pints. That may have contributed to my lack of manual dexterity.

Maybe Though I would counter that CSB perhaps makes more sense when drunk than when sober! There is obviously an optimum drinking level to be found here...

[slide]

Well, it may make more sense, but hand eye surely suffers a bit

[beowuuf]

True, you also need a fever so bad thta you deliriously see horrors a fraction of a second before CSB puts them on screen.

[Gambit37]

As for the "Run and Jump" bit, if you approach the pit but don't try to cross it, you'll se that it closes for a moment and then reopens. Maybe you can get a sense for the timing of this (I'm not sure which square it is which triggers the closing of the pit when you step on it, but clearly there is some delay between stepping on the square and the pit closing) and then have another go.

Nope, it's cleverer than that and is exposed by the clue "Run and Jump":

Spoiler

All the tiles leading up to the pit have decreasing time triggers open and close the pit on a decreasing delay for each trigger. So you have to run down the corridor and "jump" over the closed pit before it reopens.

[slide]

Thanks, Gambit. Seems my attempt / theory on the timing was all wrong which explains my baffling inability to cross the *#&* thing.

[Paul Stevens]

theory on the timing was all wrong

Now you have solved the first puzzle in the game.

[Twiggy]

I just read through this thread as I was away when it happened, and I thought some of the monster/location descriptions were fantastic. Had a very hearty chuckle going through that. Especially over the angry cabbages

[slide]

I'm gratified to have provided some amusement to the assembled DM'ers here. BTW, my port of DM has a different image associated with the Twiggy character than your avatar shows. Interesting that Twiggy goes by many guises.

[Twiggy]

Haven't got Twiggy confused with Tiggy have you?