Ooh Bard's Tale. I only finished III. I wiped out Trajan pretty easy – don't remember losing anybody.
I dunno how your monk is dying – monks are crazy strong in that game. But then BT I seemed a lot harder at the start than II or III the last time I tried running it through an emulator.
A friend however told me that when he completed the intro dungeon, the old wizard gave his party several dozen levels all at once. I don't remember the levels but when you complete the intro dungeon you are at level 10(for sake of arguement). His characters were put up to level 30? in one shot.
So I finally got to the top level of MANGAR'S TOWER, which is the pretty much the end of the game.
I get to the last main door. The following three items grants me access to the other side of the door: the SILVER CIRCLE, SILVER TRIANLE, and SILVER SQUARE.
Too bad I only had the SILVER CIRCLE...
AUUUGGGHHH!!!!
Two ours of crawling WASTED....
Worst of all, I *have* the Silver Triangle and Square, just not in my party -- they are in the inventory of my spare character, back at the adventurer's guild...
Oh, jeez, the Bard's Tale... I was just chatting it up with someone about it the other day.
Played it way back on my MSDOS box when I was in grade school. And BT II. And BT III. Full disclosure: I used the Cluebooks.
Tips and tricks not in the cluebooks (warnng: spoilers!):
1. In BT1, you want to start with 2 mages and they should progress as follows:
Mage 1: Conjurer to level 13, Sorcerer to level 13, Wizard to level 13, Magician
Mage 2: Magician to level 13, Sorcerer to level 13, Wizard to level 13, Conjurer
2.
A Bardsword lets your bard sing without getting thirsty. The Bard's "dodge" song stacks during combat. Once you find a bardsword, take advantage - your bard should sing to lower AC every round until everyone is at LO.
3. Once your two mages are "Archmages" (know all spells), your frontline dudes should be at LO armor class. At this point, make a third mage and
go to the 396 berserkers repeatedly to level him.
4. Wind Dragon is the best pet. Really.
5. Soul Mace (or Spectres, like King Aildrek) - one hit drains you of a level. Go to a temple and pay to have your dude restored. If you're clever, you note that when restored, you have enough XP to level AGAIN. Go to the review board and level up. You are now one level higher than when you started. If you have a soul mace and do intraparty attacks, this gets very ridiculous very quickly.
6. Make sure to visit the room 1 N of Mangar before you kill him.
The Spectre Snare is the best item in the game - a weapon that reduces your AC by 8, critically hits automatically (death blow) and can be "used" to capture any enemy in the game and put him in your party in your NPC slot (Mangar, perhaps? Don't bother - the Demon Lords and their stone ability are cooler).
7. Against super-deadly foes, have two mages firing off MIBL every round. The third Mage should fire off a REST every round (to fix stoning, keep HP high, etc.). You DO have 3 mages toward the endgame, right?
I'll have to think back for the tricks I used for BT II and III, but there ya go.
I have a NES port of the first Bard's Tale, but unfortunately from what I can tell, a lot of stuff was stripped out and simplified in it. There are missing spells, only two casters which don't change classes (and I think they lumped the spells from the original classes under the two), and a lot of the magic items don't have the powers they do in the original game. And there's no room with 99 99 99 99 Berserkers, there is a room with three group of 9 enemies each, but thhat's hardly the same thing. It's not a bad game though, but the NES port of Wizardry is a lot better.
I remember (with disturbing clarity) using the 396 Berserkers as an XP factory. Once your front-rank fighters are tough enough to not get killed in one round, it's easy. Tell the front rank to attack, the bard to use his Fire Horn on one set of 99 Berserkers, one spellcaster to cast REST, and the other spellcaster (or two -- I usually went with a third spellcaster instead of a thief-type) to cast MIBL, then go and have dinner. Come back, repeat the same orders, find something else to do while the C64 churns through the second round. Two or three rounds was usually enough.
The 99 berserkers is in one room and it is best avoided. I had the original many years ago and the clue book for it was entertaing to read, it was written as a diary of a previous adventure group that had failed at the very end. and it mentions that room as a specific spot to avoid.
very very fun game.
And remember Roscoe is your friend and the mad good if i remember is Mangar or something like that. oh and an old trick, if you start a bard song right before you get a drink for your bard its like getting an extra song for free.
The clue books were a great read, even without the game. They wrote them like someone telling the story, which was cool.
I remember several versions had various bugs.
The Amiga version of BT1 had a bug where ONLY warriors and monks got multiple attacks as they leveled up, so your paladins never got any.
In versions where they all got multiple attacks, often the Warrior was useless, as the Paladin could do the same amount of damage but had other advantages (I don't remember the classes well enough though, just that Warriors were useless).
There's a dungeon in BT2 that is nearly imposable, since the room is darkened and has spinners in EVERY location, so you have to simply wander around till you find the ladder, but you're more likely to leave the room first.
