Knights of the Old Republic EP40: SERIOUSLY Hurt Locker

By Shamus Posted Thursday Jan 7, 2016

Filed under: Spoiler Warning 79 comments


Link (YouTube)

Listening to the guy in the locker, I’m pretty sure this is the Davik Kang voice actor again.

This part of the game is a meandering slog with lots of backtracking. So Rutskarn decided to run a 2nd Edition D&D game DURING the show. The dice delivered to us three completely unremarkable peasants during character creation, and then things went downhill.

I don’t want to spoil the adventure, but we will indeed face deadly danger, while making no discernible progress on the adventure Rutskarn devised for us. Indeed, the quest hook itself was nearly too challenging for us, and it involved little more than sitting in chairs and talking.

 


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79 thoughts on “Knights of the Old Republic EP40: SERIOUSLY Hurt Locker

  1. Preciousgollum says:

    1. I also thought that they were talking to a Computer (I don’t remember that quest/scene).

    2. The character movements & resulting aeehhh sound of inserting lightsaber into a locker are suspiciously evocative of a prostate exam.

    1. Gruhunchously says:

      Lightsabre assisted prostate exam? Best not to think about that one.

  2. At 19:50, Shamus has the most unexpected pronunciation of the word “cudgel” I’ve ever heard. It makes me wonder if it came from hearing the title to Stephen King’s “Cujo” too many times? :)

    1. MichaelGC says:

      Aye, I wasn’t expecting that – and I’d read your comment before watching the episode! :D

  3. Wide And Nerdy â„¢ says:

    It was funny to see Shamus ask if this was Neelix. You all have asked that throughout the run. You then met him last week, and now you’re asking again. I do not believe you’ll see him again in the game, certainly not on Manaan. He has one other credited role in this game and I think you already went there.

    1. John says:

      Nope, Neelix reappears on Korriban as the world’s perkiest, friendliest, and most helpful Sith. (He’s an archaeologist.)

      1. Wide And Nerdy â„¢ says:

        I stand corrected. I sit down again.

  4. I’m sure Shamus’ (Excuse me, Eisenhower’s) new expertise at Read Languages will come in handy.

    1. Henson says:

      Sure! C++, PERL, Java…

      1. MrGuy says:

        He can read them, but tragically, coding in them is beyond his current skillset.

      2. Ledel says:

        Really, his superpower is just that he can actually read all doctors’ handwriting.

  5. John says:

    I think you guys are doing the game a bit of an injustice here. The walk speed when you are in the diving suit is–it’s true–very slow. I personally find the trudge back into the base after you’ve finally found the Star Map a bit of a slog. But you spend very little time actually in the diving suit. I would say that if takes you more than two minutes from the point where the survivor gets eaten to get into the next part of the base then you are doing something deeply wrong and may in fact be Josh. (You should probably check.) There just aren’t that many places to go while you’re in the suit and none of them are very far apart.

    While I’m at it, the inventory screen has a “Quest Items” option to go along with the “All Items” option, the “Useable Items” option, and whatever other options that I may be forgetting. If you want to know if you’ve got a sonic emitter, you can check pretty easily.

    1. Daemian Lucifer says:

      When you replay and know where to go,yes you can (somewhat) quickly finish this place.But n your first go,you will spend a lot of time underwater.It is tedious.

      1. John says:

        I guess I got lucky on my first playthrough, then. But seriously, you (i) spot the survivor, (ii) follow the survivor, and (iii) walk until you find a door–there are only two and it is literally impossible to go anywhere else. I just don’t see what’s confusing about that. I thought the game guided you toward the correct action fairly elegantly.

        1. Daemian Lucifer says:

          And before you reach the survivor to go outside,there are all the side rooms.Its not confusing,its sloooow.

          1. ehlijen says:

            And the room furthest from the survivor actually has a loot box in it, so completionists will have an agonising choice to make, even on replays where they know there is little (but not nothing) there.

  6. Chris says:

    I just like how Rutskarn used his “Let’s play D&D while underwater!” joke simply as a pretext to remind everyone why D&D 2.0 rules suck.

    1. Gragsmash says:

      I’m just waiting for someone to post the character sheets.

    2. Wide And Nerdy â„¢ says:

      I’m just glad there are retroclones out there. Like with Pillars of Eternity, some of them fix the needless suckage while retaining the essence of the game.

      1. Ringwraith says:

        Also by building a system from the ground up to take advantage of what computers are good at, and how such games play on them.

        1. GloatingSwine says:

          To be fair, having a computer to remember all the counterintuitive nonsense that was 2e’s character stats, where sometimes you want a big number and sometimes you want a small number and sometimes you want a negative number with no rhyme or reason is pretty handy, and Beamdog are doing a reasonable job of information presentation in the enhanced editions of Baldur’s Gate.

    3. GloatingSwine says:

      2e has opinions about the kind of fantasy adventure you’re going to have.

    4. Hector says:

      You take that back!

      …or you’ll see the longest, whiniest video since Mr. Btongue explored Mass Effect 3’s ending.

      1. Classic says:

        Whatever happened to that paragon of dry youTube commentary? What did he eat? Or more recently, what ate him???

        1. MichaelGC says:

          He’s still going – he just works to no sort of schedule. His most recent vid was three weeks ago – the two before that were 11 months ago!

          PS I’d totally watch Hector’s vid btw; just sayin’.

    5. Ilseroth says:

      I hope that doesn’t mean the next episode doesn’t involve you guys playing D&D, I was really looking forward to it.

      1. Sleeping Dragon says:

        With the party all set up time to enter The Tomb of Horrors!

    6. Ledel says:

      I tried to understand the joke, but I didn’t qualify for it.

    7. Wide And Nerdy says:

      Cmon Josh. We had Eisenhower and Taft. Why didn’t you play Teddy Roosevelt?

      1. djw says:

        Maybe he wants to invade Mexico!

    8. Ivellius says:

      Can’t imagine why he’d do that, Eisenhower.

      (Eagerly awaiting the development of this.)

  7. ehlijen says:

    You did in fact pick up both sonic emitters (there are two) last episode.

  8. Daemian Lucifer says:

    Why is she here only for fun episodes?

    You have that backwards.Its not that she comes only when episodes are fun,its that episodes are fun only when Mumbles is around.

    1. Ledel says:

      I think Mumbles just said “Fuck this! We already covered Bioshock! I’m not doing it again.”

  9. Daemian Lucifer says:

    Why am I not surprised that Josh was the one who remembered getting the guy out of the locker,considering that the only way to do that is to slice through him with your lightsaber.

  10. Wide And Nerdy â„¢ says:

    And now announcing the pregnant absence of Mumbles.

    Much like 4’33”, Mumbles is challenging the audience to experience what is left in her absence, as four men contend with the growing awareness of their dysfunctional cynicism.

  11. NoneCallMeTim says:

    Yay! D&D parody, but not really because that is how it is played.

    1. IFS says:

      Well no reasonable GM would make them keep stats as bad as what Rutskarn rolled (if he actually did roll them I’m honestly impressed he got them consistently so low). Still a funny joke.

      1. Classic says:

        Part of the “fun” of AD&D (which was effectively 2.5e, right?) was blistering your palms and smoothing your dice rolling the STRINGENT PREREQUISITES required for the kind of character you wanted.

        And then having them die to an unlucky goblin crit at level 1.
        Or 5.

        1. Lachlan the Mad says:

          The D&D edition numbers are basically all one number short:

          – Basic D&D (the one where “elf” was a class) counts as 0th edition.
          – 1st edition (Advanced D&D) was the one with Bards as a complicated-as-fuck prestige class.
          – 2nd edition (AD&D2) is the one Spoiler Warning is playing now) was the one with THAC0.
          – 3rd edition was the first one with central unified mechanics which most people have played (although most people actually played the 3.5 revision).
          – 4th edition was “we want to be an MMO”.
          – 5th edition is the new one which is usually described as combining 2e’s challenge, 3.5’s character freedom, and 4e’s relatively strict approach to balance.

          1. drlemaster says:

            I am unable to resist my need to expand on the 0th edition.

            The pre-1980, pre-AD&D (1st) edition is often referred to as Orginal Edition or Collectors edition. The rules were often sketchy, and there were tons of optional rules. Race was not a class, but the rules assumed you were human, and the rules for playing another race were so restrictive it was arguably worse that race as class.

            There was a Basic set around 1979 that was an odd distillation of Collectors Edition with a few other concepts thrown in.

            Sometime early 80’s (post AD&D 1st edition) they published a Basic/Expert set combo. Not specifically a kid’s version, but designed to be more accessible to kids and beginners. This the elf-is-a-class version. This version was fine as a simple ruleset, but actually sucked at explaining the game to beginners. They published another version of these rules in 1983 with much better explanations, starting with Basic and eventually getting up to 5 boxed sets that went all the way to god-level characters. The first couple of sets were extremely popular in their day, and this is the elf-is-a-class version everyone remembers. This version is much derided now, but the player’s intro it includes is still the best explanation of how to RPG for beginners that I have come across.

            Now I know how Mumbles feels when someone says something about Riddler that isn’t quite right.

  12. Daemian Lucifer says:

    For all of you who scoff at bards,they were THE SHIT back in the day:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DIuavbDijZM

    1. Nick says:

      I was going to post this, thanks for saving me the trouble!

    2. Cinebeast says:

      Counter Monkey! Spoony has the best stories, I swear.

    3. Wide And Nerdy says:

      We played many days out of the week

      So jealous.

    4. djw says:

      I do remember looking in the appendix at the Bard in my 1rst ed rule book in high school and thinking wow, that bard looks awesome!.

      However, in retrospect, I think a dual class fighter-thief-druid might be more powerful, in that it would be able to get 7th level spells (bard progression capped at 5th). Bards may have had fewer equipment restrictions though, but in D&D that is rarely a good trade for higher level spells.

      1. krellen says:

        Looking at first edition bards explains why Forgotten Realms’ Harpers, a group of bards, was so powerful. Most people who are more familiar with second editions and later probably think an organisation of bards seems a bit silly.

    5. Alexander The 1st says:

      Okay – what do I need to begin playing D&D 2E on a PbP forum?

      I totally want to pull this off now.

      That is, thank you for selling me on the idea of trying 2E.

      1. Daemian Lucifer says:

        Actually what he talks about is before 2nd edition.As can be heard when Rutskarn talks about bard,in 2e it was somewhat easier to do so.And race and class were separated.

      2. Gragsmash says:

        I thought I had the books and I was going to take a photo, but I’ve only got 1st.

        I frequently see the 2e books at half price, but have never felt the need to buy them.

  13. Henson says:

    And here I thought when Rutskarn asked Josh what class he wanted to be, he’d follow it up with, “no, your class is ‘Elf’.” Guess my D&D knowledge is out of date…

    1. Jsor says:

      I think that was 1st ed weirdness.

      1. Supahewok says:

        Not even 1st, that’s Basic.

    2. Ledel says:

      Yeah, if this was 1st Edition, I think the appropriate response to anyone wanting to be a Bard is loud laughter.

  14. Someone said nothing happened after sticking the lightsaber in the locker. Wrong. You killed the man. His corpse appears in front of the now open locker. He’s the republic soldier.
    The first time I went through this mission I thought the speed was too slow, but it didn’t bother me much. What bothered me is that all the sharks came from behind and I barely had time to hit the sonic emitter before getting eaten. I thought it was designed to happen like that regardless so I went forward without checking and with the mouse on the emitter icon ready to hit. I only had to repeat once, despite that.
    I think the speed annoyed me more in the next place you will be, since there’s nothing to be done but walk to be coherent with the story side about the issues to go where you’re going.

    1. djw says:

      It was a mercy killing.

  15. Galad says:

    At least the blog’s name is now also justified and certified for ’16 as well :p

    1. MrGuy says:

      Technically, so far all it’s been is a six sided tale.

      1. krellen says:

        The saving throw was made with a d20.

  16. Ilseroth says:

    Half expected the title to be like “You are not qualified to watch: KotR Ep 40”

    I am so glad that the video games I played were based on 3rd edition… If I had it restrict my race and class so tightly I am pretty sure I would have been very frustrated.

    1. Jsor says:

      Most of the old games used a point-buy system so you could make whatever you want by manually taking points away from some categories and adding them to others. Though Baldur’s Gate (which, to be fair, was 2nd Ed AD&D, not just D&D) had some weirdness where the number of points you got was random, so it was just an exercise in hitting the reroll button on your stats until you got bored or figured the number was probably high enough.

      Rutskarn kind of rolled the characters in a deliberately trolly way, regardless. Very, very few real games do straight D6s. At the very least, people generally get to choose which stat receives which roll most of the time.

      If Ruts is doing anything, he’s very successfully proving why D&D players are such notorious house-rulers.

      1. djw says:

        In Baldur’s Gate you pick your race/class combo first, and then roll your stats. Any roll below the minimum for your race/class combo would automatically be raised to the minimum.

        You did still have to follow the completely arbitrary and stupid restrictions on what race could be what class.

        The second edition rules are not the high point of Baldur’s Gate. The story more than makes up for the rules though.

        1. IFS says:

          There was at least one character that made some interesting character traits out of the arbitrary class restrictions though (In BG2 that is). Mazzy Fentan, the halfling fighter who would have been a paladin if the rules allowed it. She has some paladin abilities (somehow it’s not explained if I remember right) and basically acts like a paladin, but does have to deal with the fact that she isn’t allowed to be a real one (not that it bothers her that much, it only comes up a few times). A conversation between her and Aerie (if I remember right) even has one of the two saying that maybe the gods will change that rule or something like that, which somewhat amusingly is basically what happened with future editions.

          Also the rules (while they were sometimes annoyingly restrictive for character creation) for 2nd edition in BG made for some excellent tactical combat imo, so I’d somewhat disagree with them not being a high point. I found combat in BG and Icewind Dale much more engaging than combat in say Neverwinter Nights (which was 3rd edition), though Neverwinter did make some other changes beside edition that affected that.

          1. djw says:

            I agree that some of the combat in Baldurs Gate 2 was spectacular, but I think that was a matter of high quality encounter designers being put to work, rather than an inherent quality of the rule set. They also heavily house ruled the mage buffs to set up the mage battles that figured so prominently in BG2.

            I always considered Mazzy to be prime evidence for the stupidity of the human only rule for Paladins. Fortunately it is very easy to remove that restriction with Shadowkeeper if you actually want to play a halfing paladin yourself (I assume, I’ve only actually used it to lift race restrictions on monks, but I assume it would work the same for paladins).

        2. GloatingSwine says:

          Baldur’s Gate actually just rolls you 3D6 in order, but it ditches the stats if they’re invalid for your chosen race/class or if the total is less than 75.

          1. djw says:

            That’s plausible. Statistically it would be very difficult to tell the difference between the two, although re-rolling should result in slightly better stats on average than raising low stats to the minimums.

            I always just mash the re-roll button until I get something reasonable anyway. I have no interest in playing a heroically average character.

            1. GloatingSwine says:

              Yeah, nobody leaves that screen until they’ve rolled over 90 unless they’re planning to just cheat and use Gatekeeper to have the stats they want.

      2. MichaelGC says:

        Some more Spoony, just whilst we’re … spooning? Er, OK, maybe not; that got a leetle awkward – aaaannnyway: here he talks about the virtues of 3d6 straight:

        http://youtu.be/pBmEFgd_4ho

        1. Daemian Lucifer says:

          Indeed.That 5 int thief would make for an excellent mr tulip.

        2. Ranneko says:

          I very much disagree with this. I have played 3d6 down the line. The problem isn’t bad characters, the problem is boring characters, there are so many more interesting ways to do random character generation, but D&D does not have it. It leaves you with a bunch of busywork without the more interesting meaningful choices.

          I am pretty fond of the REIGN one roll approach, you get choices that represent backgrounds and past activities, it is quick and it generates interesting characters not just sometimes but every time.

          1. MichaelGC says:

            Aye right – I’ve never actually RPed myself (I just find it all very interesting), so I don’t personally have a *rolls d4* … bear in this hunt, but I think Spoony would at least agree with you that the ultimate aim is to avoid boring cookie-cutter characters. (He also talks about coming up with character backgrounds & overall motivations as ways of spicing things up – although that may be in a different vid or even multiple vids; can’t quite recall.)

        3. Atarlost says:

          All that proves is that he is a vile archfiend who hates all that is joyful of hopeful.

          Anyone who uses 3d6 in order for anything but determining NPC stat distributions should be placed under a restraining order from coming within 100′ of any random number generator.

  17. Mr Compassionate says:

    Rutscarn has this magical way of transforming what would otherwise be very dull, sloggish episodes into the best episodes ever, of any show. Remember the Marlow Briggs Marital Strife conversations? This D&D thing is reminding me of that. Ruts turning dishwater into fine wine.

  18. Bloodsquirrel says:

    I was hoping Josh would get magic missile and immediately cast it on Chris.

  19. Ivellius says:

    Love the outro clips this week. I expect they prove very apt.

  20. Hermocrates says:

    I’m really glad Rutskarn came in with his always-entertaining dungeon mastering when he did, because I honestly couldn’t see shit in the second half of the video. Might’ve just been how I was holding my tablet near the light, but that area was very dark.

    I’m looking forward to more D&D though, if the Paranoia game with Josh et al. is anything to go by.

    1. Gragsmash says:

      The way he said “You have selected Cantrip!” is pretty much how you run a Paranoia game.

    2. Phantos says:

      Unrelated, but is your avatar thingy the lady from Life is Strange but with an Azumanga Daioh face on it?

  21. Phantos says:

    It really says something about a game if it’s so boring, people have to play an inferior version of a completely different game at the same time just to maintain their sanity.

    If I had friends, this strategy might have come in handy when I was playing Dungeon Siege III.

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