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[marko river]

Yeah, P key for sure. I remember playing this game in several turns with years long pauses. And every time I would go from the start. Few years ago I discovered accidentally that potions can be used and game became easy then. But I probably won't be able to beat it without potions...

[Aramazon]

Hey, so I'm playing Darklands again, and being wanted in a town has got to be totally bugged...cause I had low rep in one town for a bit...-17...suspected....and then I killed a bunch of muggers at night and took it down to -4....well anyways now when I try to get into like half the towns in Germany the guards freak out and attack me "Hey, he's wanted around here!" Is there a fix for this? If I could I would totally just get rid of guards at this point, they're not making the game fun at all, just HELLA annoying.

[Japo]

Simply staying out at night gives you bad reputation, because it's apparently illegal. You won't manage to be in good terms with the law if you like to roam the streets at night, even if it's to kill muggers, unless you pay the fine every time the guards catch you, which can be several times each night. Try going to a different city where you haven't been, and where your local reputation will be 0.

[Borodin]

Originally Posted by Japo

Simply staying out at night gives you bad reputation, because it's apparently illegal. You won't manage to be in good terms with the law if you like to roam the streets at night, even if it's to kill muggers, unless you pay the fine every time the guards catch you, which can be several times each night.

Staying out at night in the city does not lower your reputation. I know: I've run numerous groups that actually built a positive reputation (as well as their fighting skills) up in a town by staying out at night.

Staying in unsavory areas of the city, even to wait a bit, will. Being caught by the law and fighting them will. Engaging in nefarious activities at night (such as burglarizing an office to get something for someone in another city) and being caught will. But staying out? No effect on your rep. Not only that, but it's almost essential at the start of the game, when your party has next to no skills. The fights you'll find outside a city are much harder.

I've generally found waiting a bit until after sunset by hanging around the city grove is best. Then move back and forth to the docks. You'll usually encounter some bandits. Note that if you do run into the law, you can also choose the option of running away when confronted by the law. It's good to have somebody in your party who's Streetwise. They'll lead your party in an effort to lose the law. If they're reasonably decent, you'll succeed. If you fail, though, your fine will be higher than it would have otherwise been. Not a great deal, but the choice of what to do is up to you.

One note: if you stay in any city longer than 30 days, your reputation there will start to decline. You're not a resident, you haven't got a local invitation from someone who is, and people become more nervous at your presence. So be sure to move on before that point.

[Borodin]

Thought I'd post a few more things to keep in mind while playing:

Maximize your rewards. How do you do that? It's like the realtors always say, location, location, location. Once you have a reasonably experienced party, choose a group of cities that are relatively close together. Then hit up the marketplace on one, looking for raubritter quests. (Be sure to hit all the merchants who sell things, too. Once you build a local rep, they'll start handing out quests.) Then go to the other nearby cities, and repeat. With any luck, you'll get some similar quests for that same raubritter.

Avoid fulfilling quests that run a risk of putting you in bad with a city, such as robbing an office after dark. The rewards simply aren't worth the loss of access to the place for a good long time.

At the start of the game, I suggest selling your alchemical ingredients. You don't need them then, and the money you get can be put to good use buying better weapons (and better grade weapons) for your two best melee types.

As a rule, I try to have two weapons for each of two best fighters. One has excellent damage and so-so penetration, and one has excellent penetration and only fair damage. Being caught in a situation where none of your weapons will hurt that raubritter in plate (for example) is not a good thing.

Remember to set a party member on defensive if they're up against more than one opponent, or not very good yet at fighting. Watch them carefully, and use healing potions as required. If necessary, run and evade. Don't ever let their health drop so low that they can't move, because then you may have to drop inventory before they can run.

Don't let a novice party out of the city gates. The fighting encounters will all be much stronger than you'd find in the city at night. Even if it costs you some coins after being discovered roaming about at night by the city guards, it's worth it to build up your skills, armor, and weapons from defeating plenty of bandits. Plus, it gives you a better reputation in the city.

Check the churches in every city you enter for saints that give a boost to local or regional rep. These clerical prayers are the best you can ever buy, in my opinion.

[Japo]

Originally Posted by Borodin

Being caught by the law and fighting them will.

That's what I meant, my wording was poor. At any rate trying to get away from the guards is risky (in terms of reputation), only paying the fine every time is safe, but expensive. At the start of the game when I'm not rich, I run away every time, that way I also build up those skills. But later when I'm rich I pay those bastards every time they catch me.

I meant that what Aramazon saw as a probable bug, was probably due to his being caught at night by the guards, and he was probably unaware of its effect on reputation. Both killing muggers and being caught patrolling at night for them have effects on local reputation, mutually opposite.

Not only that, but it's almost essential at the start of the game, when your party has next to no skills. The fights you'll find outside a city are much harder.

True of course. The first hours of every game are vigilante work.

[Borodin]

Originally Posted by Japo

That's what I meant, my wording was poor. At any rate trying to get away from the guards is risky (in terms of reputation), only paying the fine every time is safe, but expensive.

One point which still seems to need a bit of clarification: if you run from the guards, whether you escape or are caught, you don't lose any reputation. The only thing that happens if you're caught again is that the fine rises.

The only time you lose reputation through an interaction with the guards while being caught out innocently at night is if you try to fight them. Otherwise, your reputation's safe.

One additional note--no matter how much weaponry and armor you pick up from killing bandits, the guards will never take that. So if you start the night with no money and lose what little you find to the guards, you can still make a profit turning the armor and weapons around at a local shop.

I also find it useful to move between towns with no money in my party's pockets for that reason. Covetous bishops and false preachers can't get to you, that way. Later on, paper notes serve the same purpose--only more so. My parties never carry large sums of money around between cities, since people like the bishops will ask for gold based on a percentage of your current funds. Paper escapes their notice.

[Pex]

I'm sure I posted this before, but since the thread is being revisited I thought to give my $0.02 again.

Although a very good game, I never managed to play it for too long, since it gets very repetitive. As you both pointed out, in every city/town you arrive to, you have to spend several nights killing bandits, to boost your reputation, before you can get some nice quests.

Next thing is, that although your skills increase from using them, there is no typical leveling up, so you most important traits (health and stamina) always remain the same, meaning that you can't put enough armour on your characters and your priest/alchemist or thug will always be a weak point due to limitted health.

Another thing I mind is that you can't decide whether or not to accept a quest, they just get given to you. So, you often get one of those 'damn if you do and damn if you don't' quests where doing it would upset someone and not doing would upset the person who gave it to you.

Don't get me wrong, I really like the game and I played it for long - with breaks (even killed a dragon once), it's just that it could've been much better.

[Borodin]

Each to their own, Pex, and I mean that. Your opinion is as right as mine, since these are opinions, and not facts.

That said, I will note this:

The early game is slow, as your party builds a rep, but I expect that. I like games similar to the Ultimas, and the Magic Candles, where it takes quite a long time to make an impression on people. The sense of accomplishment, to me, is a lot more when my party carves out a regional rep. I've never been a fan of the idea that your newbie party, with cardboard weapons and armor, can be given plenty of quests right out of the character generator.

But yeah, the bandit killing can get damn redundant. I wish there had been one or two regular alternatives that offered more of the same, but under slightly different conditions, and with slightly different rewards. This was actually something the development team was working on at one point, according to Arnold Hendrick, when I spoke with him back in 1992. They did add in that spider quest on the bulletin board, but just ran out of time.

Right about no typical leveling up. It's a matter of taste. I've always liked games that buck the modern trend towards leveling systems in this respect. It's also one of the reasons I much preferred Betrayal at Krondor to Return to Krondor: the latter uses a traditional leveling method, while in the former, you improve your skills, find and buy better items. I'm not saying I want this for every game--I don't. But in Darklands, it just seems to make more sense to me that it's what you do through dealing with the environment that improves your party. You improve by fighting, praying, making potions, etc. They don't gain experience and level up. It feels more...interactive. Much as I love Planescape: Torment, for example (and it's my favorite RPG), it just doesn't have this.

The way I always took the quests was as if someone was saying, "This is what I have available right now. Interested?" If you weren't, you moved on and found others. What I don't like is the short, repetitive list of quest types. It makes perfect sense to me to have 6 different merchants in 3 cities complain about a single raubritter nearby, but none for 3 merchants to each want a different artifact that sounds identical, and is described in identical terms.

Don't get me wrong, I really like the game and I played it for long - with breaks (even killed a dragon once), it's just that it could've been much better.

Agreed. And I do wish they'd had the chance to do a second version. But back in those days of Meier and "Wild Bill," Microprose never seemed to get the idea that putting out followups could make money. And Darklands, it has to be said, sold slowly, largely on account of all the bugs in the early releases. The PR rep I dealt with at the time actually didn't like the title at all, and was surprised when I did. But then, she never really was into the history or beliefs of the early Renaissance period in Europe, and I was. Spent quite a long, enjoyable time discussing these with Hendrick.

A shame the current license holders have no interest in letting a remake be made unless they have complete control of the product and a huge barrel of cash. They don't seem to realize that a followup is found money: they're not doing a cent for it. Ah, well.

[Japo]

Again my words were open to misunderstanding. :P Thanks Borodin for clarifying.

Pex, there are two kinds of reputation: local in every town, and global (or fame). Later when you're famous, you get the best quests everywhere where your local reputation is 0.

The procedure has been pointed out already: do some street vigilante work until you can hold your own and have minimum armor. Then start hunting raubritters, whom you can despoil of plate armor. Invest the money in studying to raise your skills. Later when you can make healing potions you can stash them and take on the longer quests (satanic covens and the main quest, or mines).

It's true that the lack of levels means that you won't get superhuman attributes, and precisely because of that you must choose your skill set wisely. It's true that in this game you can't play any character you want and survive. Precisely because you can raise your skills from 0 to 99 quite fast, but you can't raise your attributes (although there's one forest creature that can give you a fruit to raise your strength a little, if you're lucky to find him), my strategy is making all my four characters strong thugs who can wear plate armor. Skills such as alchemy don't need to be very high at the start, you don't have money for ingredients anyway, you raise it later by studying. At the start you may want it to be only high enough for town alchemists to talk to you and accept exchanging formulas, I think that minimum was (besides knowing one formula of course) 20--speak common is more important to raise your probability of the alchemist's accepting the exchange.

To each his own, it's true. People who like mainstream RPGs don't like this one, and think it's too hard (it's only so at the start). Myself, I dislike RPGs based on classes and levels, and I like skill-based ones. On pen-and-paper my favorite was RuneQuest, and D&D was my least favorite. Among CRPGs my favorites are The Elder Scrolls saga, even though it has (skill-based) levels and classes (I usually build a custom one), and you get insanely powerful and proficient at everything too fast. Darklands is simply my cup of tea, an exact match for my taste, also because of the historical setting.

It's true that the random generator of places, quests, etc. gets very repetitive, but that's because of hardware memory restrictions, you won't find a game from that age whose quests or missions aren't drawn from templates in the same way: not only the RPGs but flight simulators, anything. Even Daggerfall four years later is equally repetitive.