Last week we presented the first in Malcolm Garcia's series of Second Swordsman blog posts. Such was the positive response that this week we have the second blog in the series. So, over to Malcolm...
The Second Swordsman – ‘The Walks’
By Malcolm Garcia
In my first
attempts at using the Second Swordsman
process to successfully complete a Fighting Fantasy adventure, I failed in each
of the first three books. The process of always choosing the second option
resulted in me dying in a variety of ways, occasionally while tantalisingly
close to my goal. For my next couple of attempts I decided to revisit one of
the most famous adventures (if only by virtue of its cover), Deathtrap Dungeon and the V2.0 version
of it, the Trial of Champions, both
were written by Ian Livingstone CBE. The first published in 1984 and the second
in 1986, so I was hoping that his temperament would have eased over those two
years to give me a decent chance of success.
Or not. Once again
when following every second choice I failed in each of my adventures and both
deaths were also somewhat disappointing. In Deathtrap
I foolishly chose to eat some strange mushrooms I found in a cellar. They
caused me to swell dramatically in size (similar to Violet Beauregard in ‘Charlie
and the Chocolate Factory’) and I became stuck in there, apparently forever. (Don’t
cleaners ever visit the dungeon to remove the remains of unsuccessful
competitors?) And in Trial I eventually
fell victim to Lord Carnuss’s meat-grinding-series-of-trials after having to
fight one-slave-too-many and I died on Blood Island without even managing to enter
the new dungeon.
In Deathtrap, unflinchingly choosing the
second option still had me ignoring many potentially useful things, such as a skeleton
holding some parchment – seriously, in a creepy labyrinth I ignored parchment! –
a box with my name on it, a giant idol with jewelled eyes, and an unattended
backpack. I also didn’t take a wristband decorated with rat skulls, but I’m
okay with that choice. During my journey I ignored three doors – which is a silly
way to go about exploring a place, but this wasn’t as bad as the
door-ignoring-spree I went on in The Warlock of Firetop Mountain. However the
Second Swordsman process did force
me to eat the aforementioned dodgy fungus, rather than giving me the option to
ignore it.
Choosing option
two also provided an awesomely stupid start to Trial as I decided to attempt the least‑thought-through escape in
the history of Titan, and, as a result, I lost 4 STAMINA points by assaulting a
guard. (This would later prove to be a hefty price to pay at such an early
point in the adventure.) But option two did make me choose the correct weapon with
which to take on the Bonecrusher beast.
During my short-lived
journey through Deathtrap I only
fought one creature, the decidedly un-exotic caveman. However, I was happy with
this because my initial SKILL was fairly low, but I still lost more than a few
rounds of combat before killing my opponent. In Trial I faced a total of three adversaries before being killed, but
all were just varying sorts of slaves. The first had a SKILL of 10, which I
think was a little too high at such an early stage in the adventure (my
starting SKILL was 7). He reduced my STAMINA to 4, and the remaining two slaves
I fought each won a single round against me. Without the opportunity to
replenish my STAMINA between fights, even though the enemies got slightly
weaker, this continual wearing-down was unlikely to result in anything other
than my early death. But this is probably just as Lord Carnuss (and Ian) would
want it – there’s no sense in sending anyone other than the strongest fighter
into the new labyrinth.
One aspect of Trial I was pleasantly surprised with
was that the results of several brutal trials were based on tests of SKILL or
other random dice rolls, rather than testing my LUCK. Had it been the latter I
would almost certainly have been unlucky eventually, and probably killed, much
sooner than I was.
Unlike The Citadel
of Chaos and The Forest of Doom, I got nowhere near the geographic
end of Deathtrap or Trial. If I was to repeat Deathtrap I would certainly map the
underground labyrinth – there were many occasions where I would reach a
junction but have to go north, without being given the option to explore
earlier parts of the maze. And if I were to repeat Trial I wouldn’t be so stupid as to attack an armed guard at the
first opportunity.
Because both Deathtrap and Trial ended so ignominiously, I thought I’d try another adventure
to lift my spirits. Caverns of the Snow
Witch was also written by Ian Livingstone and the results of following the Second Swordsman process were not nearly
as grim. Sure, I didn’t succeed in the adventure (I’m now zero for six), but I
did get as far as finding the lair of the titular Snow Witch. And although I
didn’t have the necessary items to kill her, the Second Swordsman process did helpfully provide me with a cloak that
deceived some demon-worshippers and summoned a genie that helped me evade a sword-proof
Crystal Golem.
Caverns also had some interesting
battles, each of which lasted more than a few rounds. These put the ‘Fighting’
into Fighting Fantasy. Both the Mammoth and the Yeti were very hard fights
early on (with SKILL scores of 10 and 11 respectively), but unlike Trial, once the weaker characters have
been weeded out by these strong adversaries, the victors are able to replenish
their STAMINA and continue on. Because I also had to fight a Giant and a Dragon
during my adventure, this was the first time I’d needed to use my STAMINA
potion (the second potion available to choose) and half my rations.
So while I’m
becoming less confident that the Second
Swordsman process will lead me to victory, I am finding that it’s not
proving to be a constant path to becoming creature compost.
Thanks again, to Malcolm, for his blog post, and don't forget to get in touch if you have any suggestions for item for the Official Fighting Fantasy blog via mail@fightingfantasy.com.
