Blades of Avernum Character Faq By Deathknight1728 Contact-Deathknight1728@aol.com True Rogue, or “Bully” Character Guide Little Intro to this game-Blades of Avernum is the offshoot scenario editor to the awesome game series Avernum. Avernum 1-3 are great games and while I like them a lot, this game is my favorite of the games made by Jeff Vogel. I have played nearly all of Jeff’s games and like each of them but Blades was always my favorite because it just has everything you could want. Blades of Avernum is based on scenarios, not one big world like Avernum 1-3 and I think that’s why it is so amazing. To this day, people are creating scenarios that almost force Jeff Vogel to don the Redbeard, heh. Anyway , that’s all I can for intros. If you like it fine, and just the same if you don’t. Brief Reason for why you should read this guide- This is by no means, a regular character guide for the game- Blades of Avernum. This is more or less a way of playing that I find to be a lot of fun and seeing as there are no character guides for Blades of Avernum; I thought it made sense to make this one for blades of Avernum. This guide while exclusively for blades of avernum, can be played for Avernum 1-3 pretty well too. So without further talk, let me explain this type of playstyle. I’ve always liked playing games different and in a game like Avernum, you can only play so weird before getting devoured by something vicious. This will detail a particular character in your party. I will not be giving ideas on how to make your entire party, but instead will give you an idea for how to play the game in a neat and fun way. Enter the True Rogue or Bully character. This character was made somewhat famous from a user on the spiderweb forums named- ValdaintheKing. The skill assassination has always been a cool skill. So how do you maximize its potential, by getting to a higher level than almost every creature. At that point, you will be assassinating almost everything while only lethal blow characters (very few of them) that they are, can come close. So how do you do this. Its actually kind of simple- disadvantage traits. Already I can hear the shouts of rebellion as gremlins and people storm my house each holding pitchforks screaming you’re nuts! But no, the disadvantage traits actually give a different advantage to this unique character guide. The disadvantages start out slow but eventually you will be “bullying” most monsters if you took the right traits. Disadvantages give you experience bonuses like no other. And when you take the least lethal of them, you become very powerful in a game like blades of avernum. Especially since there is no level cap, so yes you will by mid/endgame be assassinating everything even bosses, which is so cool. Firstly, assassination is a very dominant skill. It activates for most fighters on most low monsters and for True Rogue’s, on almost all monsters. This is excellent when you think that you can save so many points to level other things as assassination is pretty much maxed at 7- 10. You can increase anything else that you desire and that makes you stronger than your other melee comrades as they are 1 of lower level, and 2 need to get blademaster, anatomy and lethal blow to be as effective. This is not to say that lethal blow is useless. It actually is more powerful, but also a real you know what to unlock. Likewise, this is not a powergaming thread. The traits that you need to be less impaired-Pick at least 1 (and possibly 2 if you are a masochist). NOTE- SICKNESS PRONE IS A GOOD DEAL TO PICK IF YOU DON’T WANT TO RISK THE OTHERS, IT IS ALMOST NEGATABLE COMPARED TO NOT TAKING ONE FOR YOUR ROGUE. Sickness Prone (20% bonus exp)- This trait is almost too good. If you die from poison it will be regardless of having this or not. Why? Because endurance hardiness and luck are needed anyway. You need all three and they offshoot this trait. An easy 20% bonus and a must for this guide. Cursed from Birth (20% Bonus exp)- This trait is kind of meh. Although you take a little more damage, which sucks, Its not really that bad as I have used this trait with sickness prone with little problems. Its usually a good go to trait giving you 40% bonus exp if you took sickness prone. I would say a good 2nd choice. (For avernum 1 and 2 players, this trait is glitched. It actually doesn’t increase damage and instead just gives you a negative chance to hit of 10% which can be offshooted by 2 easy points of weapon mastery and a small negative chance to clouding magic. That’s really not so bad if you are playing that game.) Sluggish (30% Bonus exp)- This trait is only if you don’t want to take cursed by birth and I still wouldn’t recommend it. I mean its not really that bad as it will knock you up to 50% if with another. Still, it makes things much harder. It’s actually not bad to people that know the game. If you know the game, you can easily get items that give you 1 ap, making the trait non-existant. Some people think it’s the best to choose. I think its only good if you are a pro and willing to sacrifice until you get something to offshoot the loss of ap. I used sluggish on one character and it worked fairly well. I was assassinating some bosses in quite a few scenarios, which was cool as I only had a 30% experience bonus. +ValdaintheKing- makes mention that a decent level of quick strike will offshoot the penalty of both speed and ap problems, making this actually not bad at all. The types of True Rogues I will now go over the types of true rogues that you can do for successful characters. Assassins-This type of rogue is amazing against human types as the bonus to damage against any humanoid is by percentage which rocks. You can get damage to a high level with this type of character. The good thing about this rogue is that assassins are also good at healing with first aid. That might seem useless, but not when your healing 200 hp per shot, something that healing magic wont do, especially when out of mana in dungeons. I recommend 10 in anatomy. Just remember that this build is only extremely powerful against said enemies. This character against humans is capable of 1 shotting quite a few tough humanoid characters and some bosses as well. Rebel- This type is more like an oldschool rogue. He is good at missile weapons giving him the ability to shoot arrows or thrown at people, something the assassin cant balk at. He does less damage than the assassin against humanoids, but is more viable overall as he can do ranged and still assassinate with the best of them. I would recommend a high dexterity to take advantage of ranged, making him more finesse than the assassin. Mage-Killer: This is not really a class but always has been a favorite of my roleplaying types of characters. This character is all about 1 shotting mages- assassination’s favorite targets. Because of that, Resistance is a must, along with high dex and endurance just to get the skill. Besides that, a fair amount of parry. Other than that, this rogue is a mages worst nightmare although is not as powerful as an assassin, or as viable as a rebel. Still my favorite. Gymnastics recommended. The Brute or “Common Bully”- This is the fighter rogue build that I will go over. It is the most common bully both in real life and in the game, heh. Just a big, tough jerk that rushes up to enemies and annihilates them. Any that are left and in melee range are destroyed from a decent level riposte. Riposte makes this guy very good against melee. While the assassin can deal more damage (I think), this guy has some nice defensive capabilities. Riposte and parry make this guy nasty against against people in melee and parry also helps against some ranged and magic. The mage-killer still is better at killing mages though, at least to my knowledge. The BeastLord-This is the 2nd to last build so far and I have found it is a very “different” form of rogue. Sacrificing some bit of assassination ability allows you to take the beast master trait which is a positive trait. Now run with me on this. Thoukiyides on Spiderweb Software, has tested beastmaster’s summon beast and has found that every 15 levels you get new beasts to summon up to some very nasty and powerful enemies. Because you gain levels so fast, Every 15 levels allows your character to gain summons that would normally be unavailable to mages and priests in the same predicament. Add on top of that, a still decent assassination and you have-The Beast Lord. I will go into more about this lower down if anyone is interested. The Sniper-This is the last build and only one where I will go all ranged. This build should focus on either one of 2 types of characters-A Pure finesse sniper and a mage killing sniper. The finesse one will have the highest chance to hit and damage and will likely just pick one disadvantage to keep from crippling the character. Likewise sickness prone is the best one to choose. All points in dex and bows or maybe throwing allows this character to clear house with damage. The other choice is to make a character that can be adept at fighting mages and other creatures that deal elemental damage. This sniper is more focused on luck, intelligence and hardiness, all of which make your character tough as nails at the otherworldly creatures. How to Make it Work The problem right away with this guide is that most people wont know how to make it work the right way. So I will give you the stats that you should base this off of in the beginning. I am not going to mention this later, so instead I will now-ALL OF THESE CHARS WILL NEED TO PUT POINTS IN ASSASSINATION, AT LEAST 5-10 POINTS ARE NEEDED THERE. The rest is up to how often it activates for you. You should not put more than 10 into it as there are items that do the rest. -An assassin rogue should have 4 strength, 4 dexterity, 4 intelligence and 4 endurance in the beginning. He should spend points to get 6 intelligence sometime around level 5-10, after he’s spread his points out in major things like melee or spears. He has to decide if he will go spears or melee as he wont be using both and getting blademaster. This build should focus a bit on first aid as he should be decent at it too. Defense and hardiness are a must though too extreme. This is an offensive build, not a defensive. A marginally decent parry but should focus more on defense and dexterity for defensive measures. By level 10, this character will be fair but by 15-20, he will start to notice anatomy kicking in as you fight ogres, sliths, humans and nephils. From that point on, you will want to start putting points in anatomy once it reaches 15-20 skill points. From then, maximize your defense and minor offensive skills like melee and dexterity. Remember that this class will be more about getting that 1 shot attack and thus, will need to maximize his movement. Quick strike will be necessary and I do NOT recommend using sluggish trait. Whenever you are fighting humans, this character will shine, especially at high levels. -A rebel rogue should start out with 2 or 3 in strength so you can carry a bit. 5 or 6 in dexterity as its your bread and butter, leave intelligence alone, and endurance at 4 or maybe 5. The rebel will want dexterity to be focused on almost exclusively, every 2 points in dex gives you 1 level of damage for bows and chance to hit in melee with blades. Focus on melee instead of spears as you wont have the strength to lug around spears/halberds. You can use daggers quite well for assassinations and will also be able to shoot from afar. You could use razordisks but I would recommend using bows as they are easier to use/less weight. Focus on bows and assassination with a few spare levels in melee. You wont need as much melee as you will hit with assassination which boosts damage nonetheless. You wont need as much hardiness and defense as your dexterity will be high. This class will be ready to use from the beginning. It’s the easiest rogue/bully build to use as it requires little to be effective unlike the others which require unlocking skills. I would say that it’s the most adaptable rogue build as whenever things get bad, you can jump out of sight and shoot a few arrows allowing your warrior or tank to get in there and take over. Once your attack skills are maxed, focus on endurance. Forget about parry. When you are higher in level and melee (20), get quick strike which will give you 2 attacks for bows and maybe 2 attacks in melee. Remember, don’t be afraid to use the bonus action points to get out of sight and take a shot with bow. This class of rogue will have less health than the common fighter and thus will be more susceptible to taking death blows. He will need be a secondary fighter and primary archer. An ideal way of thinking about it is like baldurs gate 1’s kivan. Kivan is primarily an archer, but can still fight alright as a secondary combatant. That’s how this class will work. -A Mage-Killer Rogue should start with 3 strength, 4 dexterity, 3 intelligence and 5 endurance. Points should be spent to raise endurance and dexterity to high levels along with hardiness close behind. This will be needed to get resistance. Resistance will make this char shine and luck at level 5 wont hurt either. Too much luck is practically cheating as you wont die almost ever. I say stick with resistance as it provides help against clouding magic. This char will want to focus on defense a little but more on the 3 main skills and melee or spears. Spears offer more damage while swords offer benefits being lighter and some swords/daggers give assassination, a good bonus. You can do either. Once resistance is reached, this character is going to be a mages worst nightmare as assassination mixed with an extremely higher level fighter that is almost immune to magic=a dead mage. This class will need to be fast and will require a different style of playing. You will want to take the attention off of your rogue and onto your tank in the party. They will divert the attention by luring/attacking/skirmishing the enemy while your mage killer moves in. Because your endurance and resistance are so high, regular enemies wont be able to do as much and thus, this rogue is a decent tank at times. -A brute or “Common Bully” should start with 5 in strength, 4 in dexterity with more focus on strength. None in intelligence and high endurance. Parry is a must, as is blademaster and riposte eventually. This char should put a decent emphasis on parry as it is your bread and butter. This char can barely be called a rogue as it is more fighter than any of the others mentioned. These chars you see going up to brutes and killing them in 1 to 2 shots while other enemies kill themselves attacking your character. They are not bad to divert mage’s attention either as magical attacks get missed with a high parry. Mostly, these characters are good with allowing the rest of your party destroy the enemy with spells and arrows/ranged weapons. They are more or less just a regular fighter that has a decent assassination ability and high level which makes it deadly. They still don’t come close to the amount of assassination damage an assassin can do. Nor are they as viable as a rebel, or as tricky as a magekiller. They are mostly just a good choice for someone that wants to beat people up and assassinate punks that the party could do without. I would say a bully is good as using spears to make him more deadly. A good halberd makes these fiends nasty and their attacks go far. Make this character like a regular fighter and you should be fine. Quick strike at a few points is not bad, but don’t spend too much in it. -A Beast Lord Rogue should start with obvious points in dexterity and a little in endurance. The rest is up to you. Strength can make this more like the common bully, you can add anatomy to make him more like the assassin. Its easily the most adaptable rogue that you can make. Here is what Thoukydides has said on this ability- Thoukydides- I have to say that I was very surprised at some of the creatures I got using the summon beast ability. The lack of a level cap certainly helps it because in the first trilogy Summon Beast is outclassed by the mage spell Call Beast. In Blades of Avernum though, at around level 70 I was able to summon ogre mages, shamblers, centaurs, vampires, and flame hydras. This is equal to a mid- or high level summon aid spell, except the spell summons 4 monsters. Also, my level 118 character can summon a fetid zombie, a skeletal warrior, an efreet, or a rakshasa with the ability, so it does in fact increase with level. I don't know if it will go higher than that, but I assume it can depending on the types of monsters available. I suspect that a 120+ character may be able to summon a drake lord or a dark wyrm. So, yes the summon beast ability does increase with level. Every ~15 levels will give a new tier of creatures. So at 1-14 you summon monsters from group 1, and at 15-29 you summon monsters from group 2 and so on. At 60-74, or group 5, you get the same creatures I listed above, and at 105-120, or group 8, you would get the efreeti, rakshasa, and high level undead. So yes, the beastlord is the most interesting class even if you only get to use it once a day, its very interesting with some of that information on there. I would suspect that you can build that class as I stated earlier, any way you want. And that’s pretty much it. I didn’t expect this to be a big guide and im sorry to disappoint if it wasn’t what you wanted. I would be more than happy to answer any questions at my email. Its definitely been something that I always wanted to do and for once, I had some actual knowledge in a video game worth playing. If you have any ideas for other builds, I would be more than happy to upload them on the site. Thanks for reading and hopefully we will all stay safe from Redbeard’s gaze. -A Sniper should have low strength 2 or maybe 3 to start, 5-6 dexterity, 4-5 endurance and possibly some intelligence. The cool thing about this build is that you can play pure finesse sniper and go all out with dexterity or focus a bit more on intelligence and other things that raise your magic resistance. The reason that you do this is that snipers are naturally a burden to mages. And when your sniper has high spell resistance, a dexterity so high that melee and ranged cant hit, the rest of your party can stay from the other end going for the kill on the mage while you distract with shots. I like that as an idea and if you go with that, a high (maybe 70% resistance to all magic) is nice. However, its just as nice to go with the finesse sniper, focusing on defense, dexterity, bows or thrown, and some hardiness and luck. You really don’t need parry, but a skill of 5 might not hurt. This finesse sniper character will be extremely powerful as those skill points add up. Either character can benefit greatly from 2-3 points in priest spells. Shielding and Battle Blessing are excellent for these characters as they do less damage than the melee counterparts. Copyright Rant Im just going to be blunt-I don’t really care about copyright. You can take my guide and send it to the New York times, only to get 5 million dollars, that fine: I don’t care. This is a minor project that I had fun doing and anyone that wants to use it can. I don’t own the company of the games I’m writing about, nor will I ever own any of the company so take it up with the man. Spiderweb Software is the owner of the games I am talking about, not me. Dedication-I dedicate this page to everyone that’s ever supported me at writing. I don’t have to list people, you should know who you are and thus why I am doing this faq. My email is as follows if you have something to contact me about- deathknight1728@aol.com Note-I will not respond to emails that don’t make sense, are about how much you hate my faq, or hinder me in any other way. I don’t believe that I am being a jerk by offering my time to give you, the reader, another way of looking at the game. If you cant deal with that, then you probably shouldn’t be reading this to begin with. If you have any questions feel free to ask them, also character guides (that relate) to this type of character are always helpful. I am hoping to do a magic run with priest and mage rogues in the future to find new ways and characters to play this great series.