[Let's Play] Fighting Fantasy 38 - Vault of the Vampire

[Laertes]

There has not been a fight thus far. If this pace continues, there might not be a fight for the entire game. We have a magic sword gathering dust. We need to take the opportunity while we have it!

[Shiritai]

Show the Wraith our wrath and attack.

[Darth Rabbitt]

Blade's sword cannot forgive evil.

[SGamerz]

After all this time, Blade finally gives in to the irresistible urge to stick his blade into something!

Do you have a Magic Sword?

Not only that, but he's got a mighty blade that shines!

You are able to strike at the cowering Wraith before it can attack you. Turn to 200 and deduct 2 points of STAMINA from the total given there for the Wraith to allow for the damage inflicted by your first strike.

Booyeah! Up yours, Wraith!

The Wraith is a highly dangerous enemy, and your sword-arm must serve you well in this combat!

WRAITH SKILL 8 STAMINA 9 7

If you win, but the Wraith has wounded you, turn to 290. If you win without being hit at all, turn to 316.

COMBAT LOG:

Wraith 12, Blade 17. Wraith is at 5.
Wraith 13, Blade 16. Wraith is at 3.
Wraith 18, Blade 14. Blade is at 14.
Wraith 16, Blade 15. Blade is at 12.
Wraith 12, Blade 21. Wraith is at 1.
Wraith 16, Blade 16. Tie.
Wraith 15, Blade 19. Wraith is dead....well, re-killed.

Damn, Wraith got lucky and scored 2 shots on us despite the lower SKILL. I would have used luck to finish it off quicker, but our initial Luck score is pretty low, so I decided to minimize use of Luck in battles unless really necessary.

Roll one die. If you roll 1-4, the Wraith's blows have drained 1 SKILL point from you; only if you roll 5 or 6 have you been lucky enough to avoid this. What's more, your intuition tells you that there are probably worse undead creatures you haven't met yet!

How encouraging!

We roll a 2.

You ascend the narrow, steeply sloping wooden stairs until you come to a landing before a wooden door which is barred and decorated with warding glyphs of amber and silver. Something is scratching on the other side of the door. There is a distinctly unpleasant charnel smell here. You can summon your courage and open the door or retreat downstairs, go back and open the north door in the entrance hall.

That battle with the Wraith really didn't go down too well, and it looks like there may be another fight right ahead. Continue?

EDIT: Image of Wraith now attached above.

Adventure Sheet:

Name: Blade Belmont von Alucard
SKILL 9/10
STAMINA 12/21
LUCK 8/8
Faith: 8
Equipment: Sword, Leather Armor, Shield, Lantern, Garlic, Magic Sword
Provisions: 12 Meals (+4 STAMINA)
Afflictions:
Gold Pieces: 2
Treasure: Crystal Vial (worth 4 gp)

[Silent Wayfarer]

Open the door and indulge our savage thrusting passions.

[Darth Rabbitt]

Chow down on a Meal and then enter the door.

[SGamerz]

We are loaded with meals, so we eat one to get our STAMINA back to 16.

You open the door and gaze into a low-ceilinged room with some narrow stone steps visible on the other side. Bones and horrifying, bloodied lumps of flesh and gristle lie around the room, and the occupant - a huge Ghoul - intends that you should be his next feast! Roll one die and add 4. If the total is lower than or equal to your FAITH, turn to 30. If the total is greater than your FAITH, turn to 70.

We roll a 4 + 4 = 8 (equal to FAITH)!

The monstrously large Ghoul backs away from you, spittle drooling over its blackened stumps of teeth. You can ascend the stone stairs opposite the door or attack the retreating Ghoul.

The Ghoul wants no part of our sharp poker.....but do we want to stick it in him anyway?

Adventure Sheet:

Name: Blade Belmont von Alucard
SKILL 9/10
STAMINA 16/21
LUCK 8/8
Faith: 8
Equipment: Sword, Leather Armor, Shield, Lantern, Garlic, Magic Sword
Provisions: 11 Meals (+4 STAMINA)
Afflictions:
Gold Pieces: 2
Treasure: Crystal Vial (worth 4 gp)

[Silent Wayfarer]

Stabby ghoul.

[Laertes]

We have won a fight against a terrifying enemy. Blade has therefore been scientifically proven to be immortal and invincible. Let us test this proposition on the Ghoul.

[SGamerz]

Blade has a fetish for thrusting his blade at undead stuff. (With living humans he prefers to use his tongue).

You get a free hit at the Ghoul as it cowers away from you, but after you hit, it fights back! Turn to 70 to fight, and you may subtract 2 from the STAMINA total given there for this monster.

What? The audacity! How dare it fights back! It should have just stood there and take the shots like a good Ghoul!

The Ghoul springs at you with filth-encrusted and bloodied talons, its rank breath hot on your face. Its eyes are miniature infernos of fiery hatred and hunger for living flesh!

HUGE GHOUL SKILL 8 STAMINA 11 9

If the Ghoul hits you three times, turn at once to 127. If you win, turn to 159.

This ghoul is certainly tougher than the Wraith we killed! What's more, it looks like something bad happens if it hits us 3 times, so we might have to spend Luck to speed up the fight and save Blade's life if it starts getting lucky!

COMBAT LOG:

Ghoul 13, Blade 16. Ghoul is at 7.
Ghoul 12, Blade 14. Ghoul is at 5.
Ghoul 17, Blade 21. Ghoul is at 3.
Ghoul 18, Blade 18. Tie.
Ghoul 10, Blade 12. Ghoul is at 1.
Ghoul 13, Blade 12. Blade is at 14. (hit once!)
Ghoul 10, Blade 14. Ghoul is dead! (whew!)

Those of you who are familiar with FF will know that getting hit by a Ghoul 3-4 times (it varies between books) in an FF Gamebooks usually leads to:

paralysis and almost always insta-death via being devoured by said Ghoul,

so that was a pretty lucky series of rolls for us this time, considering our SKILL scores were pretty close!

Moving on.....

You climb the stone steps, cobwebbed and filthy, past growths of mould and fungus on the walls, and ascend to the top of the tower. Moonlight streams into the circular chamber through tinted glass, and it seems almost as if the shadows in this place are skulking and watching. Opposite you, bathed in moonlight, is a young girl sprawled across a chair, bound by her wrists and ankles with a mesh of fine cobwebs - but they could be a lot stronger than they look, perhaps even magical. She is very pretty indeed, with long curly auburn hair and a fine, smooth complexion. Roll one die and add 4. If the result is less than or equal to your FAITH, turn to 225. If the result is greater than your FAITH, turn to 269.

We roll a 4 + 4 = 8 (equals FAITH! again!)

You sense both a strong good and a strong evil in this chamber, but you aren't certain which impression comes from which area.

Hmmm....apparently having strong FAITH not only gives us an Aura but also gives us the ability to Detect Aura??! Not that it's a lot of help in this case, since we then go to the same paragraph we'd have gone to if we failed the roll next......

Looking at the sleeping girl, will you try:

Waking her up?
Searching the room?
Leaving here and returning to the north door in the entrance hall?

Well, we're here to save a girl....but is that the girl?

Adventure Sheet:

Name: Blade Belmont von Alucard
SKILL 9/10
STAMINA 14/21
LUCK 8/8
Faith: 8
Equipment: Sword, Leather Armor, Shield, Lantern, Garlic, Magic Sword
Provisions: 11 Meals (+4 STAMINA)
Afflictions:
Gold Pieces: 2
Treasure: Crystal Vial (worth 4 gp)

[Silent Wayfarer]

Seduce the room, loot the girl. Oh wait...

Loot the room first.

[Laertes]

Huzzah! Further proof of Blade's immortality!

If we save every girl, we'll eventually save the girl we're looking for. However, looting the room should probably come first.

[SGamerz]

I'm chowing down a meal while we search as a precaution: STAMINA up to 18.

You start to look around for secret alcoves, trapdoors and the like - and you tum your back on the girl. She rises from her resting place and you are about to get a very nasty surprise.

Although the text makes it look like searching the room and turning your back on her is the wrong choice, it is actually the correct one. Trying to wake the girl will give you the option to kiss her awake, in Prince-Charming-fashion, which gives her the opportunity to return the favour by giving you a 'love-bite'....on the throat!

Suddenly the girl stands upright, arms out-stretched, with her head thrown back. She screams! Roll one die and added 4. If the total is less than or equal to your FAITH, tum to 150. If it is greater than your FAITH, turn to 195.

We roll a 1 + 4 = 5 (<8)

We just escaped an insta-death!

You are now fighting a direly evil undead creature, and the Baobhan Sith casts a spell at you! Determine whether you or the Baobhan Sith has the higher Attack Strength for this Attack Round (the Baobhan Sith has a SKILL of 9). If you have the higher Attack Strength, you strike her and spoil her spell; turn to 253 to finish the fight, subtracting 2 from the STAMINA total given there for the Baobhan Sith because of this hit. But if the Baobhan Sith has the higher Attack Strength, then she will cast her spell and evade your blow, so turn to 207.

Baobhan Sith 16, Blade 11. Blade misses and Baobhan Sith casts her spell!

The evil magic-working woman points a single forefinger at you, and green shards of light shoot from her hand and surround your body. They sink into you and you feel chilled, faint and weak. Deduct 3 points from your STAMTNA, and you must also subtract 2 points from your SKILL - but the SKILL loss (alone!) is temporary; it will last until you have fought three battles (including this one), so you should record this in the Notes box on your Adventure Sheet now. Now you dose to fight with her.

Damn, this is straight out NASTY! This puts us 2 SKILL points below her. Even though combat technically can be said to have started (we fought 1 round) I'm gulping down 1 more meal before we move to the next section for the proper combat, to restore STAMINA back to 19, because we're going to need all the help we can get in this fight!

The evil magic-wielder smiles as she draws a razor-sharp dagger, its blue crystalline blade set into a silver handle. She is very nimble and swift and dodges your blows; she will not be easy to overcome.

BAOBHAN SITH 5KILL 9 STAMINA 9

If you win, you can search the place; turn to 324.

COMBAT LOG:

Baobhan Sith 17, Blade 13. Blade is at 17.
BS 18, Blade 13. Blade is at 15.
BS 19, Blade 14. Blade is at 13.
BS 18, Blade 15. Blade is at 11.
BS 21, Blade 14. Blade is at 9.
BS 15, Blade 18. Blade tests his Luck: rolls a 4 (Lucky!) BS is at 5.
BS 19, Blade 17. Blade is at 7.
BS 17, Blade 19. Blade tests his Luck: rolls a 5 (Lucky!) BS is at 1.
BS 12, Blade 14. BS is DEAD!

That was close!

If you have the Lycanthropy Affliction, tum to 7. If you have the Major Lycanthropy Affliction, turn to 385. lf you have neither, tum to 51.

Quickly eating another mean to restore STAMINA to 11. We don't have any Affliction.

Checking carefully, you find a small secret door in one wall; it conceals a wall alcove, from which you draw out a white shield with a red cross. This is the Shield of Faith; gain 1 FAITH point and 1 LUCK point for finding it, and add it to your Possessions. Now you must leave the tower, go to the entrance hall, and open the north door there.

Although this wasn't explicitly mentioned in the text, the Shield of Faith

is in fact Siegfried's shield. We've found one of the 3 McGuffins (Sword, Shield, Armour) that will help us against the Count).

As cool as this find is, I've always been disappointed by the fact that finding a powerful magical shield doesn't give us any SKILL bonus, which we rather badly need at the moment (we're still stuck at SKILL 7 for the next 2 combats). Let's hope we don't run into anything as tough as that chick until we get those back!

Anyway, we move all the way back to the main hall (that's a long backtrack!):

You push open the north door in the entrance hall and see a brightly lit corridor stretching out before you. The floor is tiled, and there are small watercolour paintings hung on the walls. Before you, there is a door on the east wall, and further along one on the west wall; between the two, there is a side-passage to the east. There is also a door facing you at the (north) end of the corridor. Will you:

Open the north door?
Open the east door?
Open the west door?
Go down the eastern side-passage?

I'm going to have Blade munch on another meal while his hiveminds decide which way to go.

Adventure Sheet:

Name: Blade Belmont von Alucard
SKILL 7/10 (-2 SKILL Blade hs fought 2 more combat)
STAMINA 15/21
LUCK 7/8
Faith: 9
Equipment: Sword, Leather Armor, Shield, Lantern, Garlic, Magic Sword, Shield of Faith
Provisions: 7 Meals (+4 STAMINA)
Afflictions:
Gold Pieces: 2
Treasure: Crystal Vial (worth 4 gp)

[Darth Rabbitt]

I suspect that the eastern passage takes us onwards, so we want to find at least one magic item in the doors before that. I suggest the east door, but I could very easily be swayed to any of the others.

[Sirocco]

East door sounds as good as any.

[Laertes]

East door sounds good.

[SGamerz]

You push open the door and come upon a scene of domestic homeliness - a cook and two servants at worktables preparing food. However, there is an unpleasant smell mixed with that of the food: a vile rotting smell which catches at the back of your throat. The workers look up at you with mindless eyes - and you see at once that they are Zombies! Roll one die and add 2. If the result is less than or equal to your FAITH, turn to 238....

I'm not even going to bother to roll for this one, because with our current FAITH score we can't possibly fail this.

The Zombies pick up knives and cleavers, but they are keeping well away from you. You might be able to get past them and through the entrance into the main kitchen and stores to the east if you try.

Get past them into the main kitchen?
Attack the Zombies?
Leave and go to the north door in the corridor?
Leave and open the west door in the corridor?
Leave and take the eastern passage off the corridor?

The kitchen staff in this castle probably have a more relaxed schedule than most others, since from what we've seen so far only a select few occupants actually have to live on normal cooked food (vampires probably like their blood fresh). But then again, these folks probably don't get paid anyway, so I guess it's fair enough.

Stab more undead (they are only things we've been killing so far), walk past them, or go somewhere else?

[Darth Rabbitt]

Cross over to the west door.

[Silent Wayfarer]

West door!

[SGamerz]

I'm rather surprised by the choices here, not only do we spare the Zombies, but we're actually passing up the opportunity to restock FOOD (which we've been consuming at a rather rapid pace recently) from the kitchen!

We leave the kitchen and take the west door:

You open the door into a large and plushly decorated dining-room. A huge, centrally-placed mahogany table is flanked by chairs; it groans under the weight of silver cutlery, utensils and crystalware, laid out on lace cloths. Heavy drapes are drawn across the windows to the west, and there is a large tigerskin rug stretched out by the north wall; just past this is a half-open door. Deciding to investigate the room beyond, you walk past the rug, but you hear a growl and a snarl, then the thing rises to its feet and its eyes gaze at you with hostility! Snarling fangs and claws and fur are about to fly at you, so you must fight this unusual enemy!

TIGERSKIN RUG SKILL 7 STAMINA 7

First a door and now a rug. So far, for the most part, the people we've met here have been less hostile than the furniture.

In a way I'm glad we're having this fight, since we still have to go through 2 fights with SKILL penalty, and a meeting a relatively weak SKILL 7 monster now can help us get over the penalty quickly without too much risk, before we run into something tougher.....

COMBAT LOG:

Rug 16, Blade 12. Blade is at 13.
Rug 15, Blade 14. Blade is at 11.
Rug 13, Blade 15. Rug is at 5.
Rug 15, Blade 16. Blade is at 9.
Rug 15, Blade 15. Tie.
Rug 11, Blade 13. Rug is at 3.
Rug 18, Blade 15. Blade is at 7.
Rug 12, Blade 15. Rug is at 1.
Rug 13, Blade 13. Tie.
Rug 12, Blade 13. Rug is ripped into shreds.

Some rather unlucky rolls here!

If you win, you can take some treasure from this room: some silver items small enough to carry, worth a total of 4 gold pieces (add these to your Treasure). You look round the door to peer into the next room.

We're still in the same combat section, so waiting for the next paragraph (hoping there's no combat there) to eat and replenish our STAMINA....

You look into a very snug room that is evidently used by diners who have had too much to eat and drink. Among the armchairs, footstools and cushions you spy two objects of note. First, there is a decanter of what smells like brandy. Although there are only two large measures left in the decanter each one will restore 4 lost STAMINA points. You can drink one or both now, or save the brandy for later. (If you do this, add it to your Possessions, subtracting a measure when you consume one. If you keep the brandy, you can drink it at any time, except during a combat.) There is also a small drape across one corner of the room, and when you draw this back you find a small silver mirror on a table. If you wish to take this, add the Silver Mirror to your Possessions.

You leave and go back to the corridor. From the east door opposite, you hear a loud slamming sound and a shout. Perhaps something has been discovered, or someone has been alerted! You must now deicide either to open the northern door or to head down the eastern side-passage.

Handy find here. Since we're supposed to eat only one meal per (combat-less) section, and we're rather low on STAMINA, I'll have us chow down one meal and wash it down with one measure of brandy (feel free to voice out any objections to that) to restore 8 STAMINA points. And yes, in FF regular big doses of alchoholic drinks is almost always good for your health instead of destroying your liver like in real life. Which is probably one reason why the series was that popular. >.>

We've opened the east door before (kitchen), and now that option is denied to us due to some "loud slamming sound and a shout". So, north door or side passage?

Adventure Sheet:

Name: Blade Belmont von Alucard
SKILL 7/10 (-2 SKILL until Blade has fought 1 more combat)
STAMINA 15/21
LUCK 7/8
Faith: 9
Possessions: Sword, Leather Armor, Shield, Lantern, Garlic, Magic Sword, Shield of Faith, Decanter of Brandy (1 measure left, +4 STAMINA), Silver Mirror
Provisions: 6 Meals (+4 STAMINA)
Afflictions:
Gold Pieces: 2
Treasure: Crystal Vial (worth 4 gp), Assorted silver items (worth 4 gp)

[Darth Rabbitt]

I kind of figured that Zombie-prepared food would give us diseases, and wouldn't be worth the fight. North door time; one of these has to give something good.

[Silent Wayfarer]

I'll second the northing. Now boot and loot!

[SGamerz]

We go back to our 'leave no door unravished' policy....

This door has a silvered lock. Do you have a Silver Key? If you have, turn to the paragraph whose number is the same as the number on the key. If you haven't, you can't opne this door. You can either go back and open the west door in the corridor, if you haven't already done so, or go down the eastern side-passage.

Well, seems like there probably is "something good" here, considering it's under lock, but we don't have the key for it. Looks like thrusting our blade into stuff doesn't work everywhere. Sometimes, you need to stick the exact right kind of thing into the hole....

....I was talking about key-holes, of course. >.>

Taking the only option we haven't already done....

After progressing some ten feet, you come level with a door on the north side of the passage, and then the dimly-lit, tiled corridor continues to a door at the end. Will you:

Open the north door?
Or the door further along?

More doors! Take your pick!

[Silent Wayfarer]

Enter the second north door!

I mean, seriously, the count must be wondering what that racket from downstairs is.

[Darth Rabbitt]

Agreed on both counts (no pun intended).