The Stack

I said earlier that there were twelve levels in this game. This is incorrect. There are twelve main quests. The first quest is simply to escape the castle where you start the game, so when I left that area and the first of twelve empty boxes filled in, I mistakenly thought that the rest of the quests would be similar: a linear series of endpoint-reaching exercises, as is common in videogames. But it turns out that some quests are given in parallel, with at least one of them spread out over multiple areas.

In addition to the main quests, there seem to be three “single” quests which require a specific character. The first one I was given involved talking to an old friend of the Leader. Only the Leader can do this. The second, which I have not completed, requires the Berserker. An NPC mentions three powerful adversaries who have set a challenge, and the Berserker immediately declares that he accepts the challenge, even if he’s not in the party. Which he wasn’t, because he’s one of the charcters I had decided to ignore. But I can’t actually do the challenge without shifting him into the party.

I haven’t checked the docs on this, but I’m guessing that the single quests are optional. However, I’m too much of a completist to just leave this challenge unattempted.

It’s going to be hard. The party is nearing 20th level at this point, and the Berserker was abandoned at level 1. In most RPGs, this wouldn’t be a big problem: you could just stick the low-level character in the back of the party and tell him to defend himself while the big boys win him some XP. That doesn’t work here, because the party doesn’t share XP at all. In most RPGs, that wouldn’t be a problem either, because you could just take the low-level characters back to the earlier areas and level by means of random encounters. But, as in Diablo, the monster supply here is finite, and I’ve been pretty thorough about clearing areas as I pass through them. There just aren’t any low-level XP farms left. In order to reach a level where he’s capable of completing the quest, the Berserker will simply have to fight a large number of things that are tougher than him.

Well. Can the other characters help, with buffs and twinks and healing? Sadly, there are no healing spells, and no buffs other than self-buffs. They can twink to a certain extent, but the better items have level and/or stat requirements that prevent this. Mainly what they can provide is cash. There’s no reason not to give the Berserker the best equipment he can use and a big stack of healing potions.

Despite difficulties, I have managed to get the Berserker up to level 5. I should bring out the Ninja and Wizard and start levelling them too, just in case I need one of them for the third single quest.