Snow on Christmas day

This year had an extra feature - snowballs could be picked up from the ground and used as range weapons:

Fireball test

"Minimal track" means that the fireball homes in on a target slightly. They require care when aiming. I suspect players can dodge them easily unless the he has to stand still. They might be a good counter to someone blocking a door or passageway. A volley of triple-fireballs would be quite deadly to a closely-packed group.

"No damag reduc" refers the damage not being reduced with distance. It hit me for 25 several screens away.

More Gram tips

Gram means "Grand Shaman" - one of the community's many slang words.

Dragging the shamans out allows the group to kill them first, while only using a single invisibility potion.

Another tip is to keep yourself healed until he casts confusion, since being confused can get you trapped and killed. He only seems to cast it once. After that, you can let yourself be injured without much risk.

Escaping on a ladder

It isn't always reliable.

Vault ceiling raised

You can now build upwards into a large amount of space:

Lessons learned

1. Carry more cure potions

2. Carry more teleport scrolls

3. Wait for others to enter the Grand Shaman room:

New statue

How to block a door in PvP

Vanner takes his stuff back from "lost and found"

Considering what people were saying, this might have prevented a bloodbath:

However, Salmon did manage to grab the rare pelts, which were on a smaller timer:

Who proceeded to be killed and robbed by Hate/Luke, who is taking his declaration of King very seriously.

About a 1,000,000 worth of items up for grabs

According to town gossip, Vanner has quit and left his items in "lost and found" for other people to pick up when the timer runs out. He is said to have dropped the stuff in the morning of October the 26th 2012. Items in lost and found are kept for one month or three months game-time. Assuming a month is 30 days, that is 72 real hours for one game month and 216 real hours for three game months, or exactly 3 and 9 real days.

The timer on the post above means he dropped it before 7.40 am pacific time, with some error depending on how it rounds to the nearest hour. He might have dropped it earlier, I will be asking around. But since some of the cheaper stuff will be released monday, it will provide a correct time for when the really expensive stuff is released the following saturday.

There is a 3-second logout in the tavern so it is safe for anyone trying to grab these. Some players could theoretically block off the tavern with players andor an artificial barrier, but a polymorphed minotaur could also bust through. However, with the current community I predict the item-grab to be civilized... at least among the game's high-levels.

Vanner quitting has led to the return of two people who he used to kill:

His power unchecked, Hate has once again declared himself King.

Update: Confirmed to be between 6 and 6:50 am pacific time

Update II: It is next sunday, not monday.

Minotaur tips

It is fun to drink a polymorph and temporary become the most powerful creature in the game. I found two tricks to make playing a minotaur easier;

1. His major weakness is health recovery. But he can wear two healing gloves. Combining with the rest bonus from standing still will allow him to heal from 0 to full health in about 10 minutes, rather than 30 minutes. He also has a chance of consuming a normal healing potion.

2. He has hard hitting attacks but a slow attack rate. Axes about every 5 seconds and headbutts about every 10. This means hit-and-run tactics work well - running away from monsters, charging in to attack, then running away again.

I killed the Grand Shaman with help from another player. I think it is possible to solo the room as a minotaur with the right technique and items, I will post a guide if I manage it.

Dueling tip

In other words, if you fight to the last hitpoint, the poison can take that hitpoint off since it isn't cancelled by dueling.

I always advice anyone to not go under a quarter or a third hp in a duel anyway - unless the stakes are really high. At 1 hitpoint, even a bat could wonder indoors and kill you.

My custom shoe-prison

Eventually he remembered the makecamp command.

New area pictures

Trying to work out what he meant, I found a passage of several doors in the orc cave, followed by a descent:

The feature which seemed to most impress people was the smooth lightning from the torches. Perhaps because it contrasts so strongly with pixelated graphics.

Unfortunately the final door closed as I was peaking through. All I could do was listen to the screams of Nightman, Vanner, and Jasimae:

Just joking, they survived:

The Grand Shaman has a spawn timer of about 25 minutes and is normally surrounded by Shamans. None of the new items dropped in the first two kills, but a few people stayed to farm him so I suspect at least one has been discovered by now.

I gather that the keys to the doors are dropped by shamans and disciples. There are many additional disciples in the lower level. There could be an emerging market for keys, but high-levels could also keep control of the circle to avoid having to unlock the doors.

The area would be a very high risk if sketchy players are online. The lower floor has just a single exit, with doorways narrow enough for one player to block. 

Scroll of iron detection

Groovy.

Vault 3.0

I accidentally collapsed the huge "W" in the last design by running around polymorphed as a minotaur. This time I made it more artistic and with more space.

The face on the orc statue is created by placing a potion in front of a spiked shield.

The coin trick

Video of white wolf army

I have a quote from the game's creator:

He also suggested that taming could be a skill in the future.

I don't have the army anymore, but I know of two players buying pink bunnies to tame them.

Another hello from Anthony

Also, here is why you shouldn't use equipment without the necessary skills:

Nightman's shelves:

Lonestar's:

Hate's:

Medal of gratitude

This is the item rewarded from sending in a postcard:

Superior master thief tactics

Just bring normal life potions instead of extra-life potions, the Master Theif is just as likely to steal them, and the Minotaur can still be killed with 2 - 4 players.

Master Thief tactics

The MT can be prevented from stealing extra-life by leaving them in a pile and blocking the passage. Another trick people use is to pull him to the entrance and leave potions outside the labyrinth.

Also, I heard he can now drop "Boots of agility" which grant a 10% dodge chance to the wearer.

Polymorph: Blue bee

Turning into a Blue Bee or Pink Rabbit can be a fun way to mess with other players:

As a bee, it's also possible to hide underneath the tables in Tavelor's bar.

Polymorph: Minotaur

The Minotaur is the jackpot of drinking a polymorph potion. His headbutt attack combined with his axe skills easily produce the highest damage output in the game. His two practical uses are:

PvE: Combined with some larges axes, a belt, amulet and rings, he is able to solo both the Labyrinth Minotaur and Master Theif without needing other potions.

PvP: His attack damage makes him extremely deadly, and some players when at war will buy multiple polymorph potion to try and get the extra advantage from being a Minotaur or Elder Satyr in a fight. He should be able to beat anyone one-on-one unless the opponent has several bags of extra-life potions.

Other notes:

• His vocabulary is limited to mooing.
• He has extremely slow health recovery, especially since he can't drink health potions. If a Minotaur decided to terrorize the town, he could probably be defeated by hit-and-run tactics.
• He can be healed by healing scrolls.
• He will knock over structures made from items. So be very careful if you have built anything in your vault.
• There was a minor scandal recently when a bystander in a war was killed as a Minotaur, because other players thought he was someone else. So if there is a conflict happening you might want to careful not to give the wrong impression to high-level players.