The Three-Part Key

I am close to the final stage of my journey. It would be bad for the party to run out of food while I am down in the dungeons so I went to Skara Brae and bought an additional 8 packs of rations. The party traveled by moongate to Minoc and sailed a short distance to the dungeon Covetous. My goal was to get a lot of treasure on my way to getting the three-part key. Level 5 was well stocked with treasure and Katrina only got poisoned once getting the Gold in both areas. On Level 6, Shamino touched a magic ball. Jaana and I then cast Heal spells to raise his hit points to a reasonable number.

The party worked its way down to Level 8 and the first altar room we found in the southwest corner was for Courage. I had expected more resistance but there were only four swarms of Insects and a single dragon. These were easily dispatched before I went to the altar to use the four stones. For some reason I was confused and used the yellow stone in the first slot. I quickly realized my error and canceled the action. On my second attempt I carefully selected the four correct stones and was rewarded by receiving a third of the three-part key.

Backing out of the altar room the same way I came in, I then made my way to the northeast corner room of Level 8 - the altar room of Love. Again I was greeted by insects and a dragon. I made no mistake in selecting the four correct stones yielding the second part of the three-part key. I could not remember which dungeons each of the other three exits would lead. I chose to go across towards the East exit. This led to the dungeon Wrong. I had been down here before so it was not too difficult to figure out where the altar room was located. My party had a quick rest before entering the altar room. This one had a group of gremlins - an even easier battle.

I used the blue, green, purple and white stones and obtained the final portion of the three-part key. An X-it spell later, I was on the surface of Britannia. I fought my way traveling south until the going got tedious; I cast my first Gate Travel spell to the moongate portal outside Castle Britannia. Lord British raised Katrina and Dupre to Level 6. I had more than enough Gold for the two magic bows and did not feel like wandering around the lands to try and get Geoffrey more experience since he was still around 250 points short of being raised to Level 5. (Shamino also had a ways to go to reach Level 6.) It was time to take a ship to Buccaneer's Den.

At the Arms shop, I had a brainwave. If I sold all my unneeded weapons and armor, I might have just enough to get 1 magic bow and 1 magic wand instead of getting a pair of magic bows. I would not sell any of the mystic swords as this would not be in line with the theme of the game. After buying 1 magic bow and selling the weapons and armor I had 4996gp. So close! I decided it was worth selling two Flaming Oils to make an even 5000gp and bought the last magic wand for Jaana's use. The party also put on their mystic robes in preparation for the last stage of the journey.

I then sailed south and east to the island of the abyss. As I sailed into Pirate's Cove I was in for a surprise. Although my six ships were still there from defeating the pirates the first time, the pirates had reset and there was a fresh group of eight to ten ships. I quickly used the wheel of the H.M.S. Cape to strengthen my ship's hill and then sailed in with cannon's blazing. Although I was able to destroy at least half the ships by blasting them to oblivion, I still had to fight four broadside hand-to-hand combat encounters. Amazingly throughout all the battling, my party emerged unscathed after the last of the pirates was defeated.

Three quarters of the party was poisoned in the marshland between the cove and the entrance to the abyss. I mixed batches of spells I would probably use battling my way down to the lowest level of the abyss. I have now reached 24 hours of gaming stretched over 3 weeks. This was a good stopping point. 27 years ago, the journey down the abyss took somewhere around three hours so I will need to find a decent time block to complete the game. I'm guessing it will take two hours thereabouts since I have experienced the Great Stygian Abyss once before; although it took somewhere closer to 9 months and way more hours the first time around to reach this point.

44136 moves. Cumulative playing time = 24 hours.