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Joined: Dec 2008
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First the things I have:
  1. Silver Breastplate (wearing it)
  2. 2002 gold in inventory
  3. 5 bottles of Dwarven ale from Rimmer
  4. teleporter stone (the other's by my bed)

Is there anything else I need in my inventory? Also the 3 crystal balls for instance seem to be conspicuous by their absence, as does the bowl mentioned. For instance there is a mention of "coins from the resulting panel"; I take this to be the 2002 coins taken from my current hoard of coins. If there is ANYTHING else, please let me know, since i want to get this particular quest out of the way before I go into Stormfist Castle (I've already done both the Rivertown and the Verdistis Sewers as well as the Cursed abbey and the Cathedral)


Palimpsests

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You need the 4 treasure maps in your inventory, but I assume you have them already since it sounds like you are past the first room.

The following cave map shows the locations of the crystals and the bowl.
In the graphics options within DD, you can change the darkness setting to 50 to increase the light range, and maybe bump up the gamma a bit to lighten the screen. That should make it easier to see stuff.

Drop any rope you have in your inventory. Once you get past the sacrifice bowl the 4 rope you need will be beside the teleporter pad.

You are correct about the gold; just drop/store anything you have except for a single stack of 2002 pieces.


Silver Armour and Treasure Maps

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OK, thanks for that info, I have got the 4 treasure maps in my inventory. Do the ropes come in the next section of caves, or have I missed some?

Quote
Drop any rope you have in your inventory. Once you get past the sacrifice bowl the 4 rope you need will be beside the teleporter pad.

I had that wall open once, but forgot to save immediately afterwards, with the result I was killed and of course am now trying to get that wall open again.

My save takes me to the first room (with all the spiders) - they're all dead now and I managed to get into the second room. So far that's as far as I've been able to get, though I did manage to open that wall once, I didn't take note of how I did it.

EDIT: I've found out how to open the wall - one of the treasure maps is marked as a scroll, if this is opened, and then shut with the X at the bottom, it triggers the wall. That pentagram and the 2 chains as well as the 2 mounds are just a smokescreen it seems. You'll see I've put part of your post back to me as a quote, that'll teach me to make sure what's said.

By the way, if you're wanting to make better maps, I've been using a technique that should suit you.

  1. Using a good graphics programme, create the map and save it to a folder of your choice a .jpg file.
  2. Insert it as a picture into Microsoft word or other word-processing programme. This will allow you to annotate (insert text where necessary); when you've done this use Prt Scr to copy it to clipboard and use the graphics programme again to select a decent sized area and save it to another folder also as a .jpg file.
  3. If you don't have it already get a programme called Irfanview - it's free. Find the last jpg, the one that is annotated, use the crop selection, then use image/resize-resample, and increase the resolution from the default of around 96dpi to upwards of 350 dpi, you may also want to sharpen the image as well.
  4. Save the result into a different folder again.


If you want to see what I mean, take a look at my game walkthroughs website - you'll find the address on my homepage in my profile.

Last edited by Palimpsests; 30/01/09 09:50 PM.

Palimpsests

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If you had opened the 'scroll' map piece earlier, you probably just would have had to have the 4 pieces in your inventory to open the way further into the cave. The game apparently does not accept them as meeting the requirements until they have been opened (which makes sense, since the maps are suppose to be what guides you to the cave in the first place).


The maps and site I linked to were made by Kiya (though a few of the screenshots there were by Dragon). While I don't see anything particularly wrong with them, she did start off using Photoshop, which is overkill and a bit cumbersome for someone with no previous graphics experience (plus it saves with crappy jpg quality).

I use a combination of CompuPic and a few other graphics programs for editing and annotating screenshots. My final save is always done in CompuPic, as it has the best image quality per file size of any graphics program I've tried (it is also very good at resizing, cropping and adding text). I have a few other programs that are better at adding arrows, or circles (etc) to images, or which support layers or other various features.

Kiya switched to CompuPic after I posted about it and a few other programs (link below), though by them she had most (all?) of the screenshots done for her DD site. Actually, I've collected a few more graphics programs, but have not gotten around to trying them out yet in any detail.

graphics programs, for editing screen shots - there is a second set of program reviews in a reply to the original post

For the initial screenshot, and any interim edits, I always use a lossless format. The screenshot function built into DD saves as a jpg in the original release, and as png in a patched or already updated game version. I usually use PNGShot if I need a bunch of screenshots, though. I have a couple screenshot program names saved to try out, sometime... maybe I'll get around to that before D2:DE is released.


For your walkthroughs, can you not just add the plain screenshot, and then overlay that with arrows and text in the pdf file? That should allow better text quality (especially when zooming in) and the text would remain editable and movable. The graphics file could also be edited or replaced without loosing (or even effecting) the text. I have not made any pdf files myself, but that is my understanding.

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Thanks for the replies, unfortunately I DID try to go down the avenue of just using a jpg for the screenshot, then adding shapes and characters afterwards - it didn't work. The problem is that when you have a jpg image in a block of text, you need the text to flow around it (I use a good Desktop publishing programme for this), then when I've got everything sorted out (by this time I've increased the resolution on the various maps) I publish it into pdf format.


Palimpsests

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Many thanks for all you help Raze, it was most gratefully received. By the way, you know of the cellar full of tough bugs - well I used the Poymorph spell on them, then wnet after the creatures (they were then all rabbits and frogs) with a Bastard Sword. I still got the armour upgrade as well.

By the way, I've found that often when you are in a really tight corner, that polymorph spell really helps. There's only one quest remaining before I enter Stormfist Castle, that's the Sword in the Stone at the Elven Ruins, and this Easteregg gave me a few pointers on how to complete that!

As you see, it's not always pointless to ask a question - in fact, one of my mottoes is "If in doubt - Shout" or in other words, if you;re stuck ask someone who may be able to help.


Palimpsests

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I was mostly finished with Rivertown, Verdistis and the Dark Forest before I entered the easter egg area, so didn't have any problems with the bugs there. Playing a warrior I never used Polymorph; Kiya was a big fan of it, though (sometimes preceded with the survivor's Curse spell to lower strong opponents' resistances).

Sword from the Stone (56KB) - Fake Excalibur
Don't keep the sword unless you are done with the quests in the Dark Forest (the camped merchant and elven village).


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