Calling All Those Wishing To Serve As Selectors To Volunteer...

Under Amanda Pakade's presidency, enormous changes have been effected to further streamline MSSA.

With the selection of any team there are always those who claim that they could have done a better job at selecting the team.

It does not matter which sport it is, it could be rugby, football, netball, hockey, and so forth, but there are always members of the community who are quite vociferous about their opinions.

Sometimes, however, such critics are right.

There is always someone out there that does know better. There is always someone who can make a great contribution.

Thus Mind Sports South Africa (MSSA), being truly aware of the talent that exists in South Africa, has opened the Selection Committee to interested persons who do not have to be Registered Players.

There is now, no reason, to be a side-line selector.

MSSA needs four individuals to be its selectors for 2020. At least two have to be Registered Players, while the other two do not have to be Registered Players.

However, the people elected as Selectors shall sign the Undertaking and keep all discussions confidential.

All Selector's shall be suitably qualified for the role, which shall include, but not be limited to: 

• previous experience as a selector, 
• previous international experience as a player or involvement with competitive gaming, 

The emphasis shall always be placed on knowledge of the level of competition required at international level.

Mind Sports South Africa thus requests all interested persons to send in their applications, together with a CV., to mindsportscorrespondence@gmail.com by 15 February 2020.

Also read:

• Changes to the Selection Committee.
• The new national team selection criteria.
• 2020 Calendar of Events
• MSSA's umpiring course - 25 January 2020.
• 28th OLD EDWARDIAN SUMMER CHAMPIONSHIPS - 1 & 2 February 2020
• 10th Online School Championships - 8 February 2020.
• The road to Eilat

Testing Esoteric Lists: Gunny & Madrak2

Last night I was able to get an astounding two games in and as I was heading to my FLGS I decided I didn't want to just run the popular pairing of Madrak1 and Borka2, mainly because I've played a ton of Madrak1 already and while Borka2 is fairly new for me I have had a few rounds with him already.  I just wanted to try some lists that were of my own design that I thought were interesting and possibly strong.

So in I went with a "pairing" to put down into whoever I was playing against: Gunnbjorn and Madrak2.

I'll tackle each list and the match up in turn.

Gunny 

Trollblood - Gunny Goes North

Theme: Storm of the North
2 / 2 Free Cards     75 / 75 Army

Captain Gunnbjorn - WB: +28
-    Trollkin Runebearer - PC: 0
-    Dozer & Smigg - PC: 18 (Battlegroup Points Used: 18)
-    Dire Troll Bomber - PC: 19 (Battlegroup Points Used: 10)
-    Dire Troll Mauler - PC: 15

Hearthgut Hooch Hauler - PC: 18

Bog Trog Mist Speaker - PC: 4
Valka Curseborn, Chieftain of the North - PC: 0

Krielstone Bearer & Stone Scribes - Leader & 5 Grunts: 9
-    Stone Scribe Elder - PC: 3
Northkin Raiders - Leader & 9 Grunts: 15
Swamp Gobber Bellows Crew - Leader & 1 Grunt: 2

I was really excited about this list since it seems like it can clear a lot of infantry off the board or shoot a heavy off the table.  I've been dying to find a way to make the module of Hauler + Raiders work, and I feel giving them Snipe via Gunny or Grim2 is the way to really make them shine.

I put this pair up vs. my friend Brian who was coming back to playing Khador after 8 months of playing Circle and a lot of other games.  He had Butcher3 with Jacks Galore and a Zerkova 2 list with lots of Greylords and a smattering of Doom Reavers.  I really wanted to try Gunny and on discussion of the matchup it was clear that Zerkova 2 would get shot down pretty hard on the approach before she could really do any damage, plus most of my army is going to be Cold Immune, meaning he had to drop Butcher.  Madrak is probably the better Butcher3 drop, but I wanted to see how Gunny would match up.

Brian's list from memory was roughly:

Butcher 3
-Wardog
-Berserker
-Berserker
-Ruin
-Grolar

Forgeseer
-Behemoth

Forgeseer

Eliminators
Eliminators
Mechanics 

Brian won the roll off and elected to go first.  Scenario was Outlast.

After running his army into position up the field on turn 1, I replied by feating early to avoid the Behemoth clearing out swathes of my Raiders and running to be just out of Brian's threat ranges.

Thanks to Dozer's animus I was able to get lucky drifts/boosts onto one member of each unit of Eliminators and take their gang bonus off the table.  Still I was being a bit too timid by staying out of his threat ranges and I had blocked up my Hooch Hauler behind my Raiders making the order of activation awkward on this and the following turns.

On Brian's second turn he simply positions to threaten the entire zone and moves Butcher on to the central flag on his side. He moves Ruin into some rough ground for cover and positions both Argus centrally to threaten as well. 

On my second turn I decide that Ruin and both of the Argus must die to take away relentless charge from Butcher so I can use Rockwall to try and control him plus the drags.

 

I'm able to kill both Ruin and the Argus, but it takes literally everything my army has to do it with. I made a mistake and failed to contest Brian's flag and we both go up a point.  I use a Rockwall to prevent Butcher from being able to charge/move+impending doom any of my heavies in, so Brian elects to keep him on the flag for the turn and merely runs or sends in what Jacks he can to jam me up.  He does clear one zone and manages to score it however. Still, far too much of his force is out of threat ranges and his ranged attacks don't do too much work on the Raiders. 

At this point we start doing trades, and I'm able to tie the score on CP's, but I make a mistake with Gunny and move him too far forward to where he is in danger of the Butcher and I forgot to cast my Rockwall. I do end up decently ahead on Attrition, though Butcher can swing things back around had Brian not gone for an assassination. 

Sadly for Brian his dice manage to fail him completely and Butcher is left engaged with a Bomber and Gunny in melee and concedes based on the fact that Butcher has zero camp and will likely get splattered. 

In hindsight I should have lost this game on two fronts: First the assassination should have worked as a punish for my mistake, and second if Brian was simply more aggressive just running literally every Jack at my list, I don't think I'm able to effectively trade pieces and take what is necessary before the Butcher can come in and remove all threats to himself and then just seal the game from there. I'm sure if this wasn't his first game with Khador in 8 months I'd have been splattered pretty handily.

While I think the list seemed great on paper, it doesn't bring a lot of bodies to the game. Perhaps my feelings are colored by the matchup being bad overall and with better placement of the Raiders and Hauler I would have more game against other lists on the same scenario, but this will require testing and a skeptical eye to see how things are.

Madrak2
 
Trollblood - Madrak2 Toughallo

Theme: Band of Heroes
3 / 3 Free Cards     74 / 75 Army

Madrak Ironhide, World Ender - WB: +28
-    Trollkin Runebearer - PC: 0
-    Dire Troll Mauler - PC: 15 (Battlegroup Points Used: 15)
-    Dire Troll Bomber - PC: 19 (Battlegroup Points Used: 13)

Fell Caller Hero - PC: 0
Fell Caller Hero - PC: 0
Eilish Garrity, the Occultist - PC: 5

Krielstone Bearer & Stone Scribes - Leader & 5 Grunts: 9
-    Stone Scribe Elder - PC: 3
Trollkin Long Riders - Leader & 4 Grunts: 20
Trollkin Long Riders - Leader & 4 Grunts: 20
Kriel Warriors - Leader & 9 Grunts: 11

I was/am really excited about this Madrak2 list. My initial thoughts with the caster is to pretend I'm a MK2 Cryx player and jam in 2x Fennblades + 2x Kriel Warriors + solos and run screaming at my opponent.

Then I got to thinking about how while other warlocks can deliver units like the Long Riders, a unit I absolutely adore, no one really makes them hit any harder and while they're very strong, they're not going to just blow up a heavy without any buffs.  Plus the problem with a 40+ dude infantry swarm with Madrak2 is it lacks basically any relevant guns and it's not very hard for enemy shooting to continually clear off my infantry. Once the Fennblades have been hit, the Kriel Warriors will get out paced and likely shot up pretty hard.  This would turn things into a game of "Who won to go first".

With the Long Riders I should still be able to chew through enemy models and also withstand enough shooting to do serious damage once the lines meet.  Initially the list had two units of Kriel Warriors to back up the Long Riders, but I decided the list was susceptible to control and I threw Ellish in. With the extra points I upgraded my Earthborn to a Bomber to get some ranged presence which I really found to be helpful. 

I played this list into Sean, someone who I've met but haven't played against.  He dropped Skarre1 Dark Host into me:

Skarre1
-Scarlock
-Inflictor
-Stalker
-Stalker

Wraith Engine

Bane Riders
Bane Knights
Min Bane Warriors + CA

Darragh
Necrotech
Tartarus

Scenario was Standoff and Sean won the roll to go first.

This game ended up being a bit of a back and forth with some key positioning elements due to equivalent threat ranges on our Cav and my spacing models out properly to avoid a Stalker being able to kill multiple Long Riders without issue.

I won the game in the end, but part of that could have been due to the fact that Sean had deployed Darragh with the infantry units on the flank opposite the Bane Riders, so we shared a threat range rather than him having an advantage.  He also apparently didn't know that Long Riders could slam models, and so I was able to eliminate all of his Bane Riders in exchange for sacrificing only one of my Long Riders.  It should be noted that Blood Fury'd Bull Rush slams, when knocking the slam target into another model or terrain is very strong.   Still Sean was very careful to only feed me feated on Bane Knights for my feat turn, and spaced appropriately with his other units in reserve to prevent me from getting too far ahead on attrition. I suspect if we played again this game would be much tougher and far more favored to the player who wins the roll to go first based on how each of our lists were designed.

I know I could play this list in Storm of the North to get extra speed on my units, but I think having Band of Heroes for the extra 2" and Takedown/RFP is absolutely crucial in the meta ATM.  Right now Trolls are balanced in that we can either speed up our Long Riders or we can buff their damage, but we can't do both. I do think the unit has a lot of untapped potential, and since I own two units of them now, I want to experiment a lot with them.

Conclusions

After both games I am more optimistic about Madrak2's list than I am about Gunny.  I am not sure how I feel about leading with my Cav up front, but I do know that making Long Riders weapon masters makes it so that they can easily kill any heavy on the charge with the usual amount that can get into one via positioning rather than not.  They also are fairly well positioned to be able to handle infantry due to Bull Rush.

As for Gunny, I think he just needs more testing. It may well be that what I have is sufficient, but man does it ever feel like having just more units to be able to throw into zones is the way to go.  Melee also just feels much stronger than guns at being able to do what is necessary: Jam up and piece trade, so as to allow Trolls the ability to play the Attrition game we're supposed to be very good at.  Guns still have a lot of value, but it's more about being able to snipe out a key model in a zone or scalpel out an important support solo or CA/WA/etc.

Still, I really want to find a way to make the Hauler + Raider package work well, it just seems like it should be so good on paper. I believe Grim2 is the next place to look with them, but I'm having trouble rounding out a SotN list that I like that includes that module.

Castlevania: Symphony Of The Night Is Now Available On Mobile - IGN Games

Castlevania: Symphony of the Night Is Now Available on Mobile

Ragnarok: Won! (With Summary And Rating)

I'd say that's better than getting membership in a guild.

         

Ragnarok

United States

Norsehelm Productions (developer and publisher); distributed in Europe as Valhalla by Optyk

Released 1992 for DOS

Date Started: 28 January 2020

Date Ended: 26 February 2020

Total Hours: 23

Difficulty: Moderate-Hard (3.5/5)

Final Rating: (To come later)

Ranking at Time of Posting: (To come later)
        

Summary:

Ragnarok is an excellent freeware game with a roguelike base. Veterans of Rogue or NetHack will soon become familiar with the partly-randomized game maps and the game's 47 keyboard commands such as (A)ttack, (i)nventory, (q)uaff a potion, and (Q)uit and save, but they will also appreciate the original and varied things that the developers did with potions, scrolls, wands, and other inventory items, as well as the interface upgrades. The story is also richer here than in most roguelikes, requiring the player to solve a series of quests that will turn things in the gods' favor at Ragnarok. Character development, inventory, monsters, and combat tactics are particularly strong, but as with most roguelikes, there isn't much "role-playing." The game allows saving every 200 turns, which takes the edge of the permadeath of other roguelikes but still requires the player to act judiciously.

*****

What a ride. I was up late with this one Wednesday night, and even though I had to play through the endgame a couple of times, I never got bored with it. Ragnarok is one of the best games of 1992 and my blog in general. A lack of any real "role-playing," including NPCs, will prevent it from reaching the absolute top spot, but it's excellent for what it does.
            

The game warns me to stop wasting time.

          

Late in my last session, Heimdall had warned that Ragnarok was at hand. Relying on one commenter's statement that there was no time limit, I ignored Heimdall and kept exploring around the River Vid, which wraps around the base of the world. As I was screwing around, a comment happened to come through from Thomas Boyd that there is, in fact, a time limit. Right about then, Odin appeared before me and his voice came booming from his astral form:

          

Many days will the gods battle fiercely with the forces of death. Make haste to reach Asgard but take care as well. You are the only hope that we have left. Aid us and join the ranks of mortals who have been honored with greatness. Fail and the universe shall perish. First, take Gjall to Heimdall at Bifrost or we shall be overwhelmed. We await you at Vigrid.

            

At this point, I only had solved two of the six quests: I had found Freyr's sword, Mimming, and Odin's spear, Gungir. I knew where the Miner's Well was to solve the third quest, and I had Thokk's soul in a ring, which would allow me to solve the fourth if I could find Hela in Niflheim. I hadn't heard a word about Mjollnir or a weapon that would allow Tyr to fight with one arm.

I headed back to Mimer's Well and used my Wand of Wishing to generate a Scroll of Knowledge, which teaches you one skill or ability. I think it selects at random, so I took a save just before using it, prepared to save scum for the "Swimming" ability, but I got it on the first try. This allowed me to enter Mimer's Well, where I promptly sank to the bottom, couldn't move, and was soon slain by the serpent Aspenth. Apparently, I had to divest myself of heavy items first.
            

Mimer's Well had a fun title screen even though it was only a small area.

          

I reloaded, and suddenly the game had never heard of "Swimming." It took me about 12 reloads before I finally got the skill a second time, dropped most of my heavy stuff, and entered the well again. This time, I was able to maneuver. I drank a couple of Potions of Speed and attacked the serpent in melee range, killing him in about four blows. He dropped Gjall, Heimdall's horn, and I snagged it.

Worried about time, I figured 50% of the quests was good enough to try. I made my way back along the River Vid to the Bifrost, which occupies its own map. Heimdall was standing at the end. He gratefully took the horn and blew it to call warriors to the final battle, then disappeared. I followed him north off the bridge and into Asgard, at which point the game told me that the Bifrost collapsed and I wouldn't be able to use it to return.
            

Not so much a "rainbow" bridge as a Romanian bridge.

           

Asgard was under attack, with enemies and allies everywhere. I didn't last long. In addition to hel dragons and draugr, which killed me in single blows, the map was swarming with a handful of unique demons. One of them had a piercing wail like the zardons I'd made extinct. Another could sap my strength from a distance.
           

I didn't last long in this crush of enemies.

         

I reloaded an old save, from before I wasted so much time exploring the River Vid, and considered my options. Clearly, I needed to develop my character a bit more, with whatever time I had remaining, but also perhaps get some better equipment. Character and inventory development in Ragnarok are both consistent and rewarding because there are so many different methods. These include:

        

• Regular experience and leveling.
• Finding and quaffing Potions of Experience.
• Raising your strength with Potions of Strength.
• Raising your constitution with Potions of Constitution.
• Raising your luck with Holy Water.
• Finding better items of equipment.
• Improving your primary weapon or any piece of armor with Scrolls of Enchantment (preferably blessed).
• Improving your constitution by eating hel dragons.

         

Hel, yeah!

       

• Improving your speed by eating blurs (this is temporary but long-lasting)
• Improving levels, for a while, and then maximum hit points by eating dead wraiths.

             

If you explore an area that generates a lot of monsters of different types, like the dungeons, it's nearly impossible that something on this list isn't going to happen every few minutes. Thus, I spent some time back in the forest and dungeon just hewing through monsters and finding items. I saved every 200 turns unless I hadn't accomplished anything in those 200 turns, at which point I loaded the previous save and tried a new area.
          

Speed is worth a note. A high speed allows you to attack multiple times for every one attack from an enemy, and I found that it was absolutely necessary for some high-level enemies like hel dragons. The character has 10 by default and can boost it up to 60 or 70 with potions, dead blurs (a monster), and the Amulet of Quickening. Above 70 runs the risk of killing you. Unlike all the other attributes, I don't think there's any way to make the increase permanent. Potions and blurs wear off and even the amulet eventually loses its power and becomes an Eye of Sertrud (it turns out you need five of these to retrieve Mjollnir). Thus, it becomes important, particularly towards the endgame, to load up on speed-granting items. Since potions don't stack but dead bodies do, at some point I used one of my wishes for 10 dead blurs. It worked, and that supply kept me speedy for most of the rest of the game.
        

At some point, I figured I'd try to re-visit Niflheim and see if I could make it to Hera. I was feeling pretty strong, and I had a Wand of Wishing with 5 charges and no particular idea of how to spend it. Niflheim turned out to be as hard as I remembered, but I learned how to use speed to keep ahead of hel dragons. I'd attack them, dart away, wait for them to close, then attack again. Eating their corpses significantly boosted my constitution.
         

Taking out a hel dragon with throwing weapons.

        

Niflheim consists of 9 maps arranged in a 3 x 3 grid. Each one is ruled by a demon lord, and I recognized a lot of their names from the battle at Asgard. Apparently, if you don't kill them in Niflheim, they show up in Asgard. Thus, I took my time trying to kill them here. It wasn't easy; they're all immune to wands and have a variety of special attacks. Here's the rundown:

           

• Konr Rig: a powerful fighter-type demon. He can drive you insane, so you have to kill him before that happens. He's immune to wands and missile weapons. I had to get my speed up to the highest levels and kill him with a few melee blows.

• Vanseril: Hardest of them, I think. He has a psionic attack that he uses every few rounds, and it will damage you for several hundred points anywhere on the map. I had to look up an online hint to see that the only protection was a Disperser Helm, which hadn't shown up in the game for me. I ended up wishing for one. But even then, he can drain your strength from anywhere on the visible map. It took me almost an hour to kill him with hit and run tactics using missile weapons and speed.

           

When wishing for things, you can wish for a "+" equal to your current luck.

       

• Plog: Easiest of them. He summons monsters and drains wands, but I learned to just drop my wands and wait until he came into melee range.

• Emanon: An annoying demon who takes your equipped weapons and armor. I killed him with throwing weapons.

• Anxarcule: Second-hardest. He can steal your equipped weapon, create copies of you that fight you, and eat your legs. And he's also immune to wands. As with the others, I used a combination of speed and missile weapons to kill him.

           

Speed and missile weapons are the key to this whole area.

            

• Nidhogg: Not only is he immune to wands, he removes all their charges if you try to use them anywhere on his level. (That was a reload.) He also messes with the items in your backpack, turning them into useless items. Again, it was missile weapons and speed that finally did him in.

• Gulveig: This guy was easy. Two whacks.

          

Hela occupies the final section, and when I first approached, she took Thokk's soul and asked what soul I wanted released in return. I said BALDER (the game's spelling) and she complied. I then attacked her and was surprised when she died in just a few blows. She dropped a magic scythe, apparently one of the most powerful weapons in the game. Once I enchanted it a few times, hardly any enemy lasted more than one blow.
          

Solving the fourth quest.

       

Much stronger now, I returned to Asgard and started punching my way through the battle to the eastern exit. With the demons dead, I only had to worry about hel dragon and draugr. Draugrs return to life a few rounds after you kill them unless you (uck) eat their corpses.
             

The chaotic final battle in Asgard. You must make your way from the left side of the screen to the right.

         

Asgard has several buildings. One of them, in the mid-south, had stairs up. On the second level, three rooms held stacks of almost all the items in the game, including blessed versions of every scroll and potion--15 of them! I gorged myself on Potions of Strength, Holy Water, Scrolls of Enchantment, Potions of Constitution, and the like. I rendered a dozen creatures extinct (including most of those fighting below, but draugr and hel dragons are too powerful). I used Potions of Endurance to pump up my temporary health to ungodly levels. I loaded every free inventory slot with blessed Potions of Curing. Scrolls of Knowledge filled in every skill I didn't have.
         

 A bonanza of items just before the end.

        

It all turned out to be useless. A few steps later, I was off the Asgard map and onto Vigrid, site of the final battle. The game immediately started telling me that Heimdall was fighting Loki, Odin was attacking Fenrir, and so forth.
            

The character joins the battle in progress.

      
Giving the weapons I'd recovered to Odin and Freyr involved simply walking up to them. However, there was nothing else I could do. If I tried to attack any of the evil gods or monsters--if I even caught their attention--they would kill me from afar.
           

Sometimes it's best not to be noticed.

             

Thus, all the bonuses I'd gained in Asgard served for nothing. I just wandered back and forth until I got a message that the gods had won the battle and I was welcomed into Valhalla. This was accompanied by a nice image.
           

A real paradise would have more outlets near those tables.

          

So you only need to solve some of the quests. I'm not sure you'd even have time to solve them all. I guess the fewer you solve, the less likely the gods are to win at Ragnarok, but I frankly couldn't even make a loss happen. When I reloaded from my first step into Vigrid and refused to hand over the weapons this time, the gods still won. This happened on two more reloads.
          

I guess they really just needed Heimdall.

         

In addition to the two major areas I never explored and the two quests I didn't solve, there are many aspects of the game I didn't experience, including:

          

• Making use of spells or psionics (apparently, every time you pick up a "diamond needle," you get better at psionics).

• Dimension traveling. I got the ability when I ate a breleor, but I wasn't sure how it worked and never had occasion to use it. Apparently it makes traveling between the major areas much faster.

         

"The Crossroads" lets you travel between different planes. I only even visited for this screenshot.

          

• Potion making and potion-mixing. The alchemist was the last class I tried. He can mix potions into combinations otherwise not found in the game.

• Ironworking. I guess I could have had a very powerful weapon (the runesword) long before I took Hela's scythe.

          

Blacksmiths can make things out of other things.

          

• Polymorphing, which can grant skills not available to regular classes. 

• Taming animals or creating golems.

• Writing my own scrolls, a sage ability.

• Helping my allies. You can give equipment, potions, and other useful items to any human fighting alongside you at any point in the game. I didn't explore this.

           

But unlike some players who prefer the so-called "completionist" approach, I enjoy leaving a game with plenty of content to be explored. It gives me an excuse to replay.
            

The various areas of Ragnarok. Although I played for 23 hours, I still missed a lot of the maps.

        

On my GIMLET, the game earns:

               

• 5 points for the game world. We've had other games use Norse mythology--notably Dusk of the Gods, which has the same plot. But it's still relatively original among RPGs.

• 5 points for character creation and development. Development is satisfying, rewarding, and constant, as we saw. I don't think the different classes matter as much as they should, though. Since they're all capable of using the same items, the only real purpose of the classes is to work your way up to the highest level and get the class-specific skills. More benefits and restrictions would have made a more interesting game.

      

My character at the game's end.

        

• 2 point for NPC Interaction. It gets this for the hint-delivering Ravens and the occasional NPC ally that you can help. It's too bad there are no dialogue options with any NPCs.

• 5 points for encounters and foes. There are no non-combat encounters or puzzles, but the bestiary is as original and varied as its source material while not being completely derivative of it. I enjoyed learning their strengths and weaknesses and adapting my own tactics in response.

• 6 points for magic and combat. As with most roguelikes, combat seems somewhat blunt but is surprisingly tactical. I was underwhelmed by the magic system, though.

• 8 points for equipment. Easily the best part of the game. Ragnarok doesn't feature quite as many item interactions as NetHack, but it still has a wide variety of things to find, use, and equip. You can even make your own items as a blacksmith, sage, or alchemist.

          

Dragons always drop a wealth of treasure.

         

• 4 points for the economy. You stop thinking about it, or bothering to collect gold, about halfway through the game. But during the portion when you find the occasional shop (the forest and the dungeon), it has a reasonable amount of relevance.

• 3 points for a main quest with multiple parts, some optional, but no side quests nor role-playing choices or alternate endings.

           

An "alternate ending."

         

• 4 points for graphics, sound, and interface. It gets almost all of it for the excellent interface. One command=one key, logically mapped, but with a mouse backup. I like the way the main interface shows both a large-scale and small-scale area. Graphics are a step up from most roguelikes; sound is sparse and only okay.

• 8 points for gameplay. It's mostly nonlinear and quite replayable. It offers the challenge of a roguelike without the insanity of permadeath. Limiting saves to once every 200 turns is just about perfect. The game lasted exactly as long as its content supported.

        
That gives us a final score of 50, six points higher than I gave NetHack. Omega (1988) remains the best roguelike I've played so far, but Ragnarok is a close second, and frankly a better game for a player who wants a tighter storyline.
          

A slick ad for what was essentially a shareware game.

        

As we now know, Ragnarok was a passion project of two California-based college friends, Thomas Boyd and Robert Vawter, and I thank both of them for offering comments and recollections during my coverage. Norsehelm was their company, meaning they self-published and self-distributed the game in the United States, albeit with (as we see above) commercial production values. Their London publisher, Optyk, apparently never sent them any royalties, so the duo decided to offer it as freeware after a few years of modest income.

I couldn't find any contemporary American reviews. European magazines mostly weren't kind. The lowest score came from the February 1993 PC Joker, where the reviewer compared it to a flight simulator and seemed to find the number of keyboard commands bewildering despite mouse buttons, including a help menu, right on the screen. Other reviews simply suggested that the reviewer wasn't really aware of roguelike history and was looking for fancy graphics and sound. PC Games (March 1993) had the only complimentary review, recommending it for its replayability and challenging strategy.

It's too bad that Norsehelm never produced another game. Mr. Vawter hinted in an e-mail to me that they started one based on the Seven Wonders of the World but didn't get very far. Both seem to have done well for themselves, however, with successful technology careers in the San Francisco Bay area.

I gave the choice of the next game to commenter Lance M., who's helped me a lot lately with "lost" games. Lance wanted me to play GayBlade, one of the games he managed to turn up. This led to a confusing bit of research. GayBlade is listed as a 1992 game on a lot of sites, but I've found comments from the author that he based it on DragonBlade (1993), and moreover only released it after he got into a rights battle with the publisher of his Citadel of the Dead (1994). My attempts to contact the author have not been answered. For now, I have to assume DragonBlade came first and play it first.