Pools of Radiance Questions

[Jamski]

Quick question.

Is the current D&D game "Pools of Radiance" the same as the old game from 1993-ish that I used to play? Has anyone played both and can give me a comparison? Is this game a real RPG? Is it realtime, ot turnbased like the original? Anymore info? I loved the old version, played it on my Amiga, also the sequels. I guess I'm a sad old freak.

-Jam

[Grumbold]

PoR(2) is a new dungeon-bash game inspired by the original. It was the first game to feature elements of the new 3e rule set although like the others liberties have been taken with them. It is feared a new pool of radiance has opened and you're just the guys to find out what happened to the guys sent in to deal with it.

It is essentially two huge multilevel dungeons with one overland area connecting them. You spend almost all your time exploring dark dangerous tunnels and dusty rooms. It doesn't jumble up a hundred monster types just to give you pretty stuff to look at. If you're in an area controlled by orcs, you're going to meet and fight lots of orcs and only occasionally stumble across a raiding party, long entombed undead or other oddity.

Unpatched the one thing most likely to ruin your day is the speed of combat. It takes the 3e intitiative system so each player/monster acts out their move individually once combat starts (realtime outside combat.) With sometimes a dozen monster opponents this can take ages. Thankfully someone released an unofficial speed routine so that you don't die of boredom as the third wave of zombies advance. Get it! The turn based mode does allow characters to use the 3e system for flanking/attacks of opportunity etc pretty well, something NWN and IWD2 didn't.

If you can get it cheap and you're not afraid to kill 200 orcs to make it to level 2, take a look. I enjoyed many hours play, although I confess to not finishing it.

[Alex]

If I recall correctly it was universally despised when it was released, but maybe it was because the game had a ton of bugs and stability problems. I don't know if the patch fixed these problems.

[Jamski]

Ah, it was this round-based combat that I loved in the original. I'm going to buy it. The orginal was despised too, and I played it through 4 or 5 times.

*Whistles happily*

-Jam

[Grumbold]

Yeah a number of vocal people didn't like . Special attention was focussed on the low Xp per monster and they couldn't seem to get it through their heads that it was make the Xp shrink to fit the size of game or shrink the game to fit the 3e Xp system. It'll never win any awards but at budget price its worth the money for sure.

[Jamski]

I can't remember the old Xp values. I haven't played a D&D game since I was a teenager (about a decade ago ) Now I just have to find a place to buy it...

-Jam