The Second Swordsman - The Monster Mash
By Malcolm Garcia
As I’ve ventured far and wide across Titan, using the process of always
choosing the second option has meant I’ve encountered, and slayed, all manner
of ne’er-do-wells, animals, the undead, and occasionally even plants. I’ve also
met with universal failure. In this episode of the Second Swordsman I attempted three books where the aim of the
adventure is ridding the world of one of the classic monsters of legend.
In Curse of the Mummy YOU are
hired by an archaeologist who wants to stop a cult from resurrecting an ancient
king who will take over Allansia. In Howl
of the Werewolf YOU are in a race against time to overcome the effects of
being attacked by a werewolf and turned into a werewolf yourself. And in Vault of the Vampire the aim is a relatively
simple one – rather than trying to save the world or yourself, YOU need to infiltrate
the castle of Count Reiner Heydrich and assassinate him, for he is the vampire
who has been terrorising the locals.
There were several other commonalities across these three books. All
were illustrated by Martin McKenna and both Curse
and Howl were written by Jonathan
Green (Keith Martin, who I last did an adventure of in Night Dragon,
did Vault). Howl and Vault were both set
in Mauristatia in the Old World (while Curse
was set in the Desert of Skulls in western Allansia, where I previously met my
end against the Giant Sandworm in Temple of Terror). However the outcomes of choosing every second option were quite
different in each adventure.
In Vault even though I fought only
four creatures, the adventure was quite enjoyable. I started with promising SKILL,
STAMINA and LUCK scores and also had the FAITH score to keep track of. This got
me out of several battles as my FAITH was able to keep some creatures at bay.
Following the Second Swordsman
process had me not waste any time and I caught a coach – which included an
early test of FAITH – straight to Castle Heydrich. Upon arriving I explored the
castle and met some of its various inhabitants, not all of whom needed to be
killed on sight. In fact, even though Vault
is an assassination mission, in most of my encounters I chose to talk to people
and learn more about the evil of the Count and how I could defeat him. Along
the way I met an unhelpful alchemist and his homunculus, a doctor motivated
only by money, the castle’s helpful governor, the Count’s harmless brother (who
I unfortunately did kill), and the Count’s weird and manipulative sister.
Vault was also enjoyable because choosing the second option was not always
choosing to ignore an opportunity for exploration; instead it would give me a
different way to proceed. By doing this I managed to find and destroy one of
the Count’s coffins, and actually acquired some useful objects, including a STAMINA-restoring
ring, a silvered stake and the keys to the Count’s crypt. Unfortunately, I did
not find a magic sword, which was referred to several times.
My first fight in Vault was a
long way into the adventure, and against a pair of zombies – creatures I
haven’t fought since attempting Legend of Zagor. Although they were easily dispatched, the rest of the enemies I
encountered were not. After drinking some wine, I was attacked by a vampire bat
and vampire weasel. The wine temporarily diminished my SKILL and
the weasel scored attacks based on random dice rolls. This meant I lost nine
STAMINA in the one encounter, even though the bat only hit me once. Later on, I
was attacked by a wraith and, because I lacked the aforementioned magic sword,
I was unable to defend myself. While fleeing this fight my STAMINA was reduced
by eight and my SKILL by one. Later, in the crypt itself, I faced off against
the stench ghoul whose foul odour reduced my SKILL by a further two, which I
think was a bit severe. Thus disadvantaged I was paralysed by the ghoul and
eaten alive.
I also started Curse with some
decent starting scores and was given a POISON factor to keep track of. As in
many Jonathan Green books (such as Bloodbones, Spellbreaker and Stormslayer)
I had a fight at the very start of the adventure. I then headed into the desert
for another fight, after which, choosing the second option meant I returned to
the oft-repeated pattern of ignoring opportunities to investigate the desert.
During this journey I had some more fights, but then an imposed SKILL loss at
the start of a fight against a Great Baboon resulted in a very close battle,
from which I came off second best. Thus my defeat in this journey into the
Desert of Skulls was even quicker than in Temple of Terror.
The outcome of making every second choice in Howl could not have been more different. Similar to my earlier
attempt at Battleblade Warrior, in Howl I fought a lot of
creatures – exactly 22 in both (I also fought 22 creatures in Stormslayer). And
as in Battleblade, I also came tantalisingly close to
success in Howl. But more on that
later. I started with poor STAMINA and LUCK scores and, as happened in the
other two adventures, had an additional factor to keep track of – the CHANGE
score, which keeps track of how dire the hold of the lycanthropy is on YOU. As
in Curse I had a fight at the very
start, but this only lasted for two rounds before I fell over and got bitten by
the werewolf. For the rest of the adventure the Second Swordsman process meant I tended to engage with people if
they were by themselves or in small numbers, but ignored larger groupings and
towns.
In Howl there are several
opportunities to go on side quests, usually to assist the locals who live in
this tormented part of Mauristatia. However, I only undertook one of these, and
with no success – other than finding another creature to add to my tally. Eventually
my own body began to experience the effects of the lycanthropy and I gained
some new abilities, as well as additional SKILL and STAMINA points. This pushed
my SKILL score to 12, which made most creatures no match for me. I eventually
reached Castle Wulfenstein, home of the head werewolf (and possibly a video
game from the 1990s) and choosing every second option led me to an amazing
healing potion and to Count Varcolac himself. And it was at his feet that my
journey ended. Without a special sword (again!) the demon inside the Count
defeated me. Having come so close to success I went back and revisited some of
my choices. I thus found that had I made one just choice differently (by not
ignoring an opportunity to investigate a place) I would have gained the special
sword relatively easily, and with it, almost certain victory.
And so, the Second Swordsman
process proved to be no match for the evil that surrounded the big three
monsters – the vampire, the werewolf and the mummy. Some luckier dice rolls
would likely have made all the difference in Curse, and one different choice would have given me a rare success
in Howl. I’d also like to return to Vault, both to try and find the magic
sword and grant the Count’s brother the benefit of the doubt. And to give that vampire
weasel a damn good kicking.
Thank you once again to Malcolm for his latest entertaining Second Swordsman post. You can read more about the three adventures featured in this month's Second Swordsman in YOU ARE THE HERO - A History of Fighting Fantasy Gamebooks.
The book's author, Jonathan Green, will be attending Bath Comic-Con tomorrow (Saturday 17th March) and will have copies of the book on sale, if you are in the area and would like a signed copy.
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