Amulets & Armor Shareware Demo __________________________________________________________________________ It is STRONGLY SUGGESTED that you print out this file and keep it handy for reference while exploring our demo. Amulets & Armor is a vast game, and there are lots of great tips herein that will make the demo adventure much more enjoyable. __________________________________________________________________________ ================================== I. Getting Started - A Walkthrough ================================== The following 'quick start guide' is designed to make a novice adventurer more comfortable with the Amulets & Armor interface. Follow the steps below to create your first hero and quickly learn the basics. ----------------------- A. Creating a Character ----------------------- After starting A&A, you will see a brief intro screen that will tell you a little about the first adventure. Read it, and then press a key. ** From the next menu, press the CREATE button to create an adventurer. You will see that 'CITIZEN' is the current character archetype. For this tutorial, you should play the citizen character but later feel free to try out the other archetypes. Notice that the archetype's basic statistics are displayed. See the STATISTICS section in this file for a better explanation of how these abilities affect your hero. ** Type a name for your character and press ---------------- B. The Town Hall ---------------- You will now see the town hall. From here, you can visit: - the STORE to buy and sell items - the BANK to deposit your gold or buy magical rings and amulets - the INN to save your character and leave the game - the GUILD to choose and adventure or start a multiplayer game. Unless you've started a multiplayer game, the GUILD button will be inactive in this demo. For more information concering multiplayer games, see the GUILD section in this file. For now, you will not need to visit any of these areas, since the citizen archetype has a pretty good set of starting equipment. Notice that your journal is open on the right side of the screen. There will be some control bolts in this area that will allow you to view the journal entries that you have collected. In the demo version, some pages have been given to you that will describe some information about A&A. You might want to go ahead and read these entries by scrolling through the journal with the < and > buttons. ** Hit the key to exit the town hall and start your first adventure. ---------------- C. Castle Arius ---------------- You are now standing outside of Castle Arius, on the path to defeat the evil necromancer Exiguus. You are safe where you are standing but if you move too far you will get assaulted by magicians that are guarding the keep. Take a moment to wander around in this area, but don't stray too far! ----------- D. Movement ----------- To move with the keyboard, use the arrow keys. If you hold down the key you will run. Holding the key down will allow you to walk sideways (good for dodging fireballs and such). The key will cause your player to jump up (or fly, if you get a fly spell.) Holding down the key will cause your hero to activate or use the item in the READY BOX (bottom center of the display) - in this case it causes your hero to swing his sword. To move with the mouse, put the arrow in the center of the 'world view' area and hold down the left mouse button. Move the mouse around a bit and you'll get the hang of it. Also, while moving, if you click the left mouse button again you will jump. To attack or use the item in the READY BOX, click the right mouse button while holding down the left one. ----------- D. The View ----------- In the upper left hand of the screen will be the 'world view'. This area obviously shows what your hero happens to be looking at. If you want more specific information about an item or monster that you see, hold down the right mouse button. You will get a closed eyeball icon. Move this icon over the object and it should turn into an open eye. When you release the mouse button you will see a brief message describing what that item is. ** Hold down the right mouse button and move the mouse over the sword in the 'READY BOX' area until the eye opens up. Now, let go of the mouse. You should get a message saying 'Iron Short Sword [5 dmg]'. There are a maximum of 4 messages that will 'float' on the view at any time. To scroll up or down the list of messages, use the and keys. You can change your hero's perspective of the world with the and keys. The key will center the view. To take an item from the world, click on it with the left mouse button. NOTE: If you hold down the key, the item you have grabbed will automatically be put in your inventory. Also, if you hold down the key, A&A will attempt to 'auto equip' your item for you. If it can't equip it then it will be put in your inventory. To drop something, just click again in the world view with the left mouse button. --------------------- E. Menu Control Panel --------------------- In the lower left hand corner of the screen you will see a set of nine 'display control buttons' that will bring up various menus. Currently, the JNL button is depressed, showing that your Journal menu is active. ** You can select any one of these menus by holding down the ALT key and pressing the corresponding keypad number. ---------------------- F. The Statistics Page ---------------------- ** To see your character's statistics, select the STS button or hit ALT+Keypad 9. Since this demo actually is a medium-level adventure, we've taken the liberty of automatically advancing your character to the 6th level. You will see a portrait of your character with his vital statistics appear. Notice that he is 6th level and will have attributes between 30 and 45. These attributes are important to how your character acts, so you might want to read the ATTRIBUTES section later. --------------------- G. The Equipment Page --------------------- ** To look at your equipment, select the EQP button or hit ALT+Keypad 8 You will see a representation of your character at the top of the equipment page. Your character is currently wearing iron studded leather clothing, so his overall color will be gray. To look at what he is wearing, hold down the right mouse button and you will get an eyeball icon. Move the eyeball over the part of him that you want to examine and then release the mouse. You should get a message that says 'Iron Studded Leather Jerkin (6)' or whatever description is appropriate. Below him there will be a list of boxes that represent his current 'coverage' - i.e. the amount of damage that will be absorbed by his armor if he takes a hit. It will be 6% on all areas except his head, giving him an average armor value of 5%. The SHIELD entry in this list is special, it denotes magical protection. To the right of your character is 5 boxes, one large and 4 small. The large box is for equipping amulets, and the small one is for magical rings. --------------------- H. The Inventory Page --------------------- ** To look at your inventory, select the INV button or hit ALT+Keypad 7 The display that will appear represents the items that your hero is carrying with him. You will see an assortment of food items, a few potions, and some runes. Go ahead and eat some food (preferably a yummy piece of chicken) ------------------------- I. Inventory Manipulation ------------------------- ** To use an item in your inventory, hold down the right mouse button to get the 'eyeball' icon. Move the mouse until the eyball opens up over the item that you want to use. Then click the left mouse button (while still holding the right mouse button) to use the item. Note that you can only use consumables this way (i.e. potions, scrolls, and food items). To use other items, see the Ready Box section. If you click on an item with the left mouse button you will 'pick it up'. Notice that the mouse icon now represents the item that you grabbed. To drop the item, click anywhere in the world view. Also, note that you can stack certain 'like' items together in your inventory by placing them on top of each other. -------------------- I. The Finances Page -------------------- ** To look at your finances, select the FIN button or hit ALT+Keypad 6 This display will show you how much money you are currently carrying and how much you have in the bank. You should currently have 4 gold pieces. In A&A, 1000 copper = 100 silver = 10 gold = 1 platinum. You can grab a coin to give to someone (or drop, if your a looney) by clicking on the appropriate button here. ------------------- J. The Options Page ------------------- ** To see the options page, select the OPT button or hit ALT+Keypad 5 Here you can adjust the sound and music volumes, as well as toggle them on or off. Also, if you happen to be interested, you can peruse the credits. ----------------------- K. The Communicate Page ----------------------- ** To see the communicate page, select the COM button or hit ALT+Keypad 4 With this menu active you can send 'canned sayings' to other players (in a multiplayer game, of course) or type messages to people. You can also quickly type a message off to someone by hitting the key to activate this menu. ------------------- L. The Journal Page ------------------- ** To see the journal page, select the JNL button or hit ALT+Keypad 3 This area will automatically appear when you grab a 'journal entry' item in the game. Your journal contains valuable information and spell rune combinations necessary to cast magical spells. To look through your journal, use the <<, <, >, >> buttons. You can remove a journal entry (to throw away or give to someone else) by clicking anywhere on the journal graphic. Also, you can remove the introductory 'help' journal pages by hitting ALT-J at any time. ----------------- M. The Notes Page ----------------- ** To see the notes page, select the NTS button or hit ALT+Keypad 2 This area allows you to jot down things (they will be saved with your character) - just type what you want on the keyboard. ---------------------- N. The Ammunition Page ---------------------- ** To see the ammo page, select the AMO button or hit ALT+Keypad 1 Here you can see how many of each type of bolt that you are carrying. Since you probably don't have a crossbow or bolts, you will have to experiment with this one later. -------------- O. The Potions -------------- To the right of the menu control buttons are a series of 4 potions. These potions represent your relative levels of Health, Mana, Food, and Water from left to right. Health - How much damage your character can take before biting it. Mana - Used to cast spells and activate wands. Food - Directly affects your health regeneration. Eat well to stay healthy! Water - Directly affects your mana regeneration. Drink lots if you wish to cast spells! ---------------- P. The Ready Box ---------------- The ready box represents what your character is holding in his right hand. This area is generally used to put weapons and wands, but you can place anything else here to use it. To use the item here, just hit the key or click the button beneath it. ---------------------- Q. The Digital Readout ---------------------- Here you can see your character's Health, Mana, Food, Water, and Load readouts. These are here for people who don't like the potions. Load is important because it represents how much your hero is carrying. If you carry too much weight, it will slow you down! ------------------------ R. The Spellcasting Area ------------------------ This funky display will change according to the amount of mana that your character has in reserve. Beneath it there is an area that will show the current 'runes' that your character has selected. See Casting Spells for more information about magic in Amulets & Armor. ----------------------- S. Rune Control Buttons ----------------------- Here is a set of buttons that select different runes for spellcasting. A spell is 'incanted' by selecting up to 4 of these runes. Let's try a spell. ----------------- T. Casting Spells ----------------- To cast a spell, you will need to first enter the proper rune combination. ** Open up your journal page with ALT+Keypad 3 ** Scroll through your journal until you find the 'Pull' Spell (it should be on page 27) ** Look at the runes listed. ** Either press the appropriate buttons to enter the selected combination or type in the 'code' on the keypad - for this spell it will be Keypad <7> <8>. ** If you make a mistake, you can clear the entered runes by pressing the 'cast' button or pressing ** Once the proper runes are entered (they should appear in the Spellcasting Area), select the key or press the cast button with the mouse to cast your spell! If the spell was successful, you should see a bolt fly away from you. You might have gotten a 'YOUR SPELL FIZZLED' message which means that you jumbled up when casting the spell. In this case, you can just hit the to retry casting the spell. If you get a message 'YOU FEEL SOMTHING IS JUST NOT RIGHT' it means that you goofed while entering the rune code. In this case you will have to re enter the spell. Don't worry about clearing it first, the spell area will clear automatically after the next key. Another message you may receive is 'YOU ARE TOO EXHAUSTED TO CAST THIS SPELL', meaning you need to hang out for awhile and let your mana reserve regenerate. This bolt you fired will pull anything it hits toward it. Great for pulling those nasty wizards off the walls later! If you happened to be near a wall when you cast it, you will see that it pulled you towards it when it impacted the wall. You can continually attempt to cast this spell by selecting the 'CAST' button or hitting . The next time you select a rune, the Spell Area will be cleared for the next spell. There are lots and lots of neat spells in A&A, many of which you can learn from journal notes found in the demo. Unfortunately, your hero is a citizen and not much of a spellcaster. Spells are divided into three categories, MAGE, CLERIC, and ARCANE. MAGE spells are only useable by Mage, Magician, and Warlock archetypes. CLERIC spells are only useable by Priests and Paladins. ARCANE spells are only useable by all the other classes. The runes that you have in your inventory can be dropped or given to other players. You may also occasionally find runes on your quest, but they might not be useable by your class. In the demo, arcane magic using archetypes will have all of the 9 runes available at the beginning, but clerics and mages will have to find some. Note that arcane magic users don't have nearly the potential variety of spells that the mage and cleric magic systems offer. ------------ R. The Quest ------------ If you follow the castle wall around to the right you will find the entrance into the main hall. Be careful, there are lots of enemies around. You will probably get killed a few times, but with practice and patience you will surely prevail. Make sure that you grab the magic mapping ring located in the throne chair. Equip it to get a floating map (see The Equipment Page if you don't know how). Red lines on this map generally designate doors, entrances, or windows, so use the map to locate a secret door in this room. -------- S. Death -------- In A&A, you never really die... well, you may get clobbered but you will be 'revived' at the beginning of the level. Unfortunately, you will lose all your wonderful equipment! You will have to make your way back to where you died to pick up your stuff. ------------- T. Conclusion ------------- This concludes our walkthrough. For more information, read the following reference texts. If you find some problems or crashes, we beg you to print out the BUGREPT.TXT form and mail it to us. Your help will make a difference!! Thanks for playing our demo! __________________________________________________________________________ II. Statistics Reference __________________________________________________________________________ Here's a list of character statistics and how they affect your hero: Level (LVL): Every time you do damage with a missile or melee weapon, your hero will gain experience. Get enough experience and you will advance a level. When this is achieved, you will gain: - A higher maximum health, depending on your constitution attribute - A higher maximum mana pool, depending on your magic attribute - A higher base health and mana regeneration rate - Random increases to all attributes, depending on your class archetype and lady luck - A better chance of casting spells successfully Strength (STR): Affects how much damage your character can do with a melee weapon. Also affects the amount of weight (load) that your character can carry without slowing down. Constitution (CON): Affects the amount of health that your character gains each level. Also affects your health regeneration rate. Accuracy (ACC): Affects your 'auto targeting' width, i.e. how far off dead center you can be when firing a missile for it to aim correctly. Also, accuracy affects your chance of making critical hits with melee weapons, causing double damage. Stealth (STL): Affects opponents 'auto targeting' width - if you have a high stealth it becomes hard for them to aim fireballs and such at you. Also, stealth affects the chance for a monster to notice you. If you have a high stealth you can walk right by them and they'd not even know! Your stealth rating receives a big bonus when you are standing still. Magic (MAG): Kind of like 'magical constitution' - affects the amount of mana that your character gains each level, and affects your mana regeneration rate. Also, when casting a spell, your magic rating affects your chance of success (as well as the spell difficulty.) Magic also will affect your chance of sucessfully identifying an object when you use it. Speed (SPD): Affects the rate at which you swing your weapon and move about. Having a high speed is important for running away and making long leaps. __________________________________________________________________________ III. Spells Reference __________________________________________________________________________ The following is a list of spells that you may find in the demo version of Amulets & Armor. Please note that this list of spells is only a small portion of the actual spells that are available!: ----------- MAGE SPELLS ----------- Deflect - temporarily imparts a 20% magical shield Magic Dart - a small missile that inflicts 2 points of damage Magic Missile - same as magic dart, but will 'home' on the target Disorient - causes an enemy to loose his target for a second Attract - pulls target creature or player towards you Repulse - pushes target creature or player away from you Force Door - attempts to unlock a door. Note that this spell only works on doors that have been locked with a spell Magic Map - creates a magic map for a short duration Enhance Vision - gives the player better vision in dark places Cloud of Acid - a missile that inflicts 5 points of acid damage Poison Arrow - a missile that inflicts 3 points of poison damage Fireball - a missile that inflicts 10 points of fire damage Elemental Fire - gives caster a firey melee attack Slow - temporarily slows target creature or player Shadow Form - makes player translucent for awhile Blink - causes caster to teleport forward a short distance ------------- CLERIC SPELLS ------------- Rejuvinate - heals the caster from 5 to 10 health points WaterWalk - caster can 'walk on water' ignoring the pull of current Purify Blood - halves the amount of poison in the caster's blood Resist Impact - gives player temporary immunity to falling damage Earthsmite - a missile that inflicts 5 points of damage Knock - attempts to unlock a door Pull - pulls target creature or player towards you Push - pushes target creature or player away from you Magic Map - creates a magic map for a time Blood Shield - gives caster immunity to the effects of poison Glow - gives caster better night vision Life Water - creates a healing potion Wolf Speed - speeds the caster up Lava Walk - caster can ignore the effects of lava Identify - caster can identify all currently equipped items ------------- ARCANE SPELLS ------------- Feather Fall - slows the rate of descent while falling Cast of Sand - gives the caster better traction on slippery surfaces Pull - pulls target creature or player towards you Push - pushes target creature or player away from you Knock - attempts to unlock a magically locked door Magic Map - creates a magic map for a time Glow - gives caster better night vision Wolf Speed - speeds the caster up Shadow Form - makes player translucent for awhile Blink - causes caster to teleport forward a short distance Wolf Speed - speeds the caster up Regenerate - causes the caster to heal at an abnormal rate __________________________________________________________________________ IV. Types of Damage __________________________________________________________________________ There are several different types of damage you can sustain in A&A. Note that enemies are subject to the same effects! Normal - Reduces health Poison - Reduces health and causes recipient to continually take extra damage over a period of time. Fire - Does extra damage Electricity - Causes extra damage to targets wearing metal armor Mana Drain - Reduces health and mana of recipient Piercing - Ignores armor Acid - Recipient's equipment may be destroyed! Note that some missiles actually do multiple types of damage (for example, a mage 'Death Ball' does acid+poison+mana drain. Protection from certain types of damage can be imparted by amulets, rings, and spells. __________________________________________________________________________ V. Multiplayer Games __________________________________________________________________________ To start a multiplayer game, you must first have an IPX network set up. The final release of A&A will also support serial communications. Follow this guide to start a multiplayer game: 1. Have all players run the SETUP program. 2. Have all players select NETWORK GAME from the listing. 3. Have all players either create or load a character. 4. When entering the game, the TOWN HALL functions as a 'chat room'. People in this area should appear in the textbox on the left side of the town hall screen. 5. When everone is connected, have all players select the GUILD button. 6. One player will need to host the game. He should select the 'CREATE' button to create a new game. 7. All other players should select the 'JOIN' button. 8. As the players join, the game creator should see their names appear in the lower left textbox in the GUILD area. 9. As soon as all players have joined, the game creator should select the 'BEGIN' button to start the game. 10. Any player may leave the game in progress by hitting twice. __________________________________________________________________________ VI. Ordering Information __________________________________________________________________________ The full version of A&A will be available sometime in November or early December. The price is $44.95, shipping included. To order your copy of A&A: Call 1-800-430-5848 and have your VISA or MASTERCARD available. Sorry, we do not accept American Express. Optionally, print out ORDERFRM.TXT, fill it out, and send a check or money order for $44.95 to: United Software Artists Box 135 Athens, ME 04912