Elevator Mission T1 V1 (Released Dec. 25 2000) - by RokingRoger
Dafydd on 11/9/2003 at 22:59
[Epithumia]
Quote:
It is beyond me why anyone would complain about this mission when so many of us have said not to play it unless you're a masochist.
My complaint is not that it's hard or frustrating, Epithumia. My complaint is that it
doesn't play like Thief.A long, hard, often frustrating FM that I truly enjoyed was Ominous Bequest... because no matter how difficult it was -- and there were many times I was totally stuck and frustrated and needed help from the kind folks (mostly Eshaktaar, of course) in this and the Eidos forum -- what OB asked of me was
thiefly skills. To play Ominous Bequest, you must sneak and skulk and inch your way forward, hide in the shadows, and as far as humanly possibly, avoid any contact with the AIs.
In fact, I ghosted it -- though I missed some of the loot and two of the secrets.
But Elevator basically plays like an arcade game, with the emphasis on backstabbing, knocking out everything in sight, and often running pell mell, in plain view, frantically trying to jump to a ladder or rope, where the AIs can't follow because of quirks in the Dark engine.
A great many rooms full of AIs don't allow sneaking; you have to knock them out, or even kill them -- often, in the early phase, by clubbing them to death, since you don't have the sword yet -- before you can pass through. This is more like Doom or Tomb Raider than Thief!
It does not play like I expect a Thief FM to play, like nearly all the other FMs I have played; indeed, like the original games themselves.
That is my complaint: not the difficulty, but the out-of-character anomality.
[Hawklette]
All right, I finally found the stupid hand.
[spoiler]You have to go into the big, central room downstairs in the haunts' area; on the left side of the desk which the haunt was guarding is a button. Pushing that button opens a hatch in the floor; down a ladder there, you find a pickable vault. The Hand of Glory is inside, but you can only see it if you stand (not crouch) right next to the open vault.[/spoiler]
Yeesh. Now I get to go back to the portal thing and do it all over again.
Thanks,
Dafydd
Dafydd on 12/9/2003 at 04:41
[Epithumia]
All right, I have all the objectives but the Keeper. I'm in the balcony area, but there are two mages here that I can't seem to get around.
[spoiler]I went through the room with the guard looking through the window (lever back in the shadows behind him) up to the balcony. From there, I hopped down to the courtyard below... this is all to the left of the two mages, as viewed from the now open main door. On that side, I knocked out a monkey-man and got the Scepter, then went up the stairs on that side and got a couple more rope arrows.
But I can't seem to get past the mages to get to the other side. There is a door directly opposite the door that led me up to the balcony, looking like it would lead me to the other side; but it won't open or even light up; it's obviously opened by a switch somewhere that I'm not seeing.
There is also an area behind a cage, before you get to the rooms. I can see two switches there, but I can't reach them. And I notice a peculiarly light square in the bottom of the fountain, but I can't open it.
Finally, back at the zombie pit, is there anything on the other side of it? Should I go back and rope-arrow up out of the pit on the far side, or is that a waste of time?[/spoiler]
Thanks; I think I'm near the end, but maybe not: I haven't even gotten to the long swim yet.
Dafydd
kimper on 12/9/2003 at 05:01
Due to the recent reemergence of this mission I thought I'd give it a whack (pun intended).
I've reached the point where [SPOILER]you can drop through the floor of the hallway beside the kitchen but if I do this I'm faced with blank doors (unopenable) and an invisible table.[/SPOILER]
Obviously I've missed a button or I've misunderstood previous posts. Can anyone point me in the right direction?
This is a sick mission but fun anyway.
Kimper
epithumia on 12/9/2003 at 18:05
Invisible anything usually indicates that you're trying to run a Thief Gold mission (which Elevator is) on Thief 1.
kimper on 12/9/2003 at 19:23
Epithumia:
I'm aware of that as I've played other Thief Gold missions successfully.
Is the Elevator mission finishable using Thief 1 (Gold patch installed) and if so, what am I missing re: above post?
Thanks
Kimper
Dafydd on 13/9/2003 at 23:04
[Folks]
I'm right near the very end... and I'm at the worst impasse yet. If I can't defeat this stupid haunt, I'll have to throw in the towel -- after over eleven hours of gametime and at least three times that in real time!
[spoiler]This is after the long swim, after getting the End of the Key, after teleporting back inside the cage and opening it, which also opens the doors at the far side of the zombie pit.
Passing through them, I find a room with a guard in shadow who is easily knocked out -- and a guard in the light who never attacks or even fights back -- but who has infinite hit points. I hit him at least fifty times, spilling much blood; but aside from him screaming (including "oh, this is an absolute disaster!" which is a new one on me), he never dropped. When I stopped hitting him, he just casually walked back to his place. He never seemed to see me at all.
Going into the rooms on either side, I scooped up a couple of fire arrows and flipped a switch, turning on a light. Then I passed through a one-way cage into a tile corridor. This corridor makes a left turn, and there is a haunt before an unfrobbable door at the other end.
This haunt also seems to have infinite hit points: at least, I shot him with two fire arrows (from cover), then threw a flash bomb and ran up and gave him a big overhand from behind with Constantine's Sword, then hit him at least fifteen times from behind -- yet he still managed to turn around and kill me with two or three strokes.
I tried reloading to before I saw him, then sneaking up on him; but no matter how slowly I move, and no matter how long I stop when temporarily behind a pillar (in one case, more than thirty minutes of gametime), before I get near enough to backstab him, he spots me and charges, killing me instantly.
I tried shooting him with the fire arrows, then waiting twenty minutes out of sight, then sneaking up on him; at the same point, he spotted me... oddly, he first doubled over with pain for a second and then charged at me, killing me.
There is too much light from the torches and an overhead light, but I haven't found any water arrows or switches to turn them off. I even reloaded and turned off the lightswitch in the earlier room before proceeding, but it did nothing. There is no wood for a rope arrow to climb up out of his reach. You can't even run back through the cage, as it appears to be one way only. I don't have a mine; but if two fire arrows and an overhead smash didn't kill him, I doubt a mine would add much to the pot.[/spoiler]
In any event, if killing him doesn't open the unfrobbable doors behind him, I have no idea how to proceed anyway.
Anybody have any ideas? So far, people trying to remember what they did have suggested either just "sneak past him" (which appears impossible) or "try to kill him," which appears equally impossible.
Thanks,
Dafydd
Dafydd on 14/9/2003 at 06:21
[Smithpd]
Thanks to your suggestion (noting the sliver of shadow extending from the pillar to the wall), I was able to get behind the haunt and backstab it; I managed to stay behind it while hacking away for a while, maybe twenty-five whacks, and it finally dropped.
I really didn't like this FM: it just didn't have the look or feel of Thief to me.
FWIW, here were my final stats:
Loot: 2553 out of 2920
Pockets: 8 out of 10
Locks: 26
Backstabs: 97 (??) (I guess it counts every blow from behind as a backstab)
KOs: 77
Damage dealt: 1695
~ taken: 18, healing 16
Kills: 20 (haunts & ghosts)
Bodies discovered: 7
It's those middle stats that tell the whole story of why I didn't like this FM: ninety-seven backstabs, seventy-seven blackjacks, and 1695 damage dealt. As I mentioned to Nightwalker, I felt like I was playing Doom or Quake, not Thief.
I play Thief because I like sneaking and hiding and not being seen. This episode was an "anti-Thief" mission, in my opinion.
Dafydd
smithpd on 15/9/2003 at 00:16
Well, yes, but you must use thiefly skills in many places to position yourself well, as you found out at the end.;) Apart from the large number of tricky buttons (which you did not mention as a problem), I enjoyed it a lot. But then, I am a Doom head and enjoy all those games. It does not bother me when a designer tries something different. JIS is always trying something different. In this mission it was switches and dealing with almost no resources.
If you want to give JIS another chance, try Mine shock or Main shock T2 (same mission, I think), which has a very complicated maze and no weapons other than a few mines, so you must sneak through most of it.
And then there is UFO. The idea there is that you have to find 100% of the loot to succeed, but the mission can be ghosted without too much difficulty. The loot is very difficult to find, however, and you will no-doubt be tearing your hair out in that one as well. I did make a loot list, however, which I think is posted at Cheap Thief Downloads.
And UndeadLand. The concept there is to kill undead with a blackjack and nothing else. It's easy and fun, but nobody here can figure out what the last objective is.
Vlad Midnight on 11/7/2004 at 15:34
Thread Necromancy Warning: The post you're replying to is more than 30 days old. :cheeky:
Not a question but I would just like to verify that Expert/Samurai is indeed achievable as I've just done so myself :p My mission time was only 2:02:35 my first time through :confused: Very good mission if you ask me. Now I feel like building something like it :tsktsk:
[SPOILER]The breath potion is apparently in the same place in all 3 difficultys. Hidden in COMPLETE dark where the shadow is being cast by the pillar of the first room after your initial dive.[/SPOILER]
