This particular volume is a pastiche of Dungeons & Dragons cliches. It doesn't have a great deal to do with the Kingdom of Loathing setting, but it maintains the same sense of humour and still features the same stickman illustrations as garnered the first set of Game of 1000 Blank White Cards materials I ever saw! Speaking of which, this weekend I'm headed to Portland, Oregon, where I presented the Game of 1000 Blank White Cards as payback for having introduced Eat Poop You Cat. Great games all; both probably better than this gamebook, but this offers more solitaire value.
Kingdom of Loathing
The Home Game* version of www.kingdomofloathing.com
*Or, more likely, The While You're Standing In Some Line At Comic-Con Game. We basically had that discussion before, though.
And Now, Something Else Entirely
NEW!
Now with totally readable font-size!
(In case you left your magnifying glass at home.)
You scratch idly at where your new leather armor chafes, then, with your hand on the hilt of your father's worn old longsword, you push open the door to the village tavern.
The inside is dimly lit, and (being midafternoon) mostly empty—the local farmers are still doing their chores, you guess. Apart from the bartender, only one person is in here—a man in a dark, hooded robe, sitting in a shadowy corner of the room.
- To order a drink from the barman, go to section 43.
- To approach the shadowy figure, go to section 69.
"Oh, you've heard of Amalgamated Squid?" you say.
"Not really. What kind of music do they play?"
"They're kind of a college-radio band," you reply.
"What, like Hootie and the Blowfish? I love them!"
- To lecture her on her taste in music, go to section 30.
- To play along, go to section 97.
- To manfully kick the door down with reckless abandon, go to section 54.
- To open the door slowly and cautiously, like a wuss, go to section 81.
- To listen carefully at the door and see if you can hear anything on the other side, go to section 19.
You reach up as high as you can and wedge your hedge-trimmers between the wall and the ceiling. This slows its movement somewhat, so you start pounding on the door, attempting to break it down. Then, with a sudden flash of insight, you realize that the door was designed to open inwards and, bracing your feet on the doorframe and pulling as thought your life depended on it (which it obviously does), you manage to wrench the door open just before it is blocked by the falling ceiling, which smashes the door into a rain of splinters as you dive into the next room.
I guess picking the silly option at the general store worked out pretty well for you after all.
Nah, just kidding.
As you make your way through the forest, you are interrupted by a howling that sounds uncomfortably nearby. The underbrush parts, revealing three gray wolves who stalk slowly toward you, baring their fangs and growling menacingly. It's a sight that would look pretty awesome on a tshirt, if only it weren't still late afternoon, and the moon was out.
Fortunately for you, they appear to be the standard sort of wolves, not dire wolves ("dire" in this context meaning "bigger than usual"). Interestingly, the dire wolf was a real creature, before they went extinct... the dire rat and dire badger, not so much.
COMBAT!
- If you win, return to the section you were at when the random encounter happened.
- If you lose, go to section 106.
Between classes, you find yourself staring at a beautiful girl with a bitchin' henna tattoo and a nose piercing. "Hey, nice shirt," she says.
- To talk to the girl, go to section 2.
- To run away in fear, go to section 16.
You pass through the door and find yourself in a shadowy stone hallway. It measures ten feet wide by twenty feet long, at which point it turns left end extends for a further forty feet. You see a door at the end of it, but before you reach it, something tells you that a trap is nearby.
The thing that tells you is basically me being forced to ask you if you happen to be carrying a ten-foot pole with you. Yeah, it's kind of a giveaway.
- If you have a ten-foot pole, go to section 61.
- Otherwise, go to section 74.
You sheathe your sword and look around the room. It is 30' square, with unadorned stone walls. The rear wall of the room has two exits: the one on the left is a simple archway in the wall, but it appears to contain some sort of odd force-field that glimmers and distorts the light, rippling gently like a pool of water, but slower. The exit on the right is carved to look like the face of a bearded devil or possibly a satyr. It is bright green, and its mouth is open in a wide O, forming the entrance to a tunnel. The tunnel itself, though, is utterly, impenetrably black.
Neither of these two "doors" is particularly appealing.
- To enter the shimmering archway on the left, go to section 91.
- To enter the black devil-mouth on the right, go to section 37.
You sit down next to a girl who looks approachably attractive (and attractively approachable). When she says "hello," though, you're so nervous that you empty your beer cup in one big gulp. Well, at least it was the beer cup you emptied, and not your bladder.
"This is a great party, huh?" she says. You nod, because you're afraid if you open your mouth, you'll throw up.
- To continue the conversation, go to section 80. To escape while you still can, go to section 56.
You shake the little crystal box, and the ring rattles around inside it.
At this point, you really aren't feeling brave enough to try it on, nor to open either of the other two chests.
That leaves you with the question of how to get out of here — the only door in this room is the one you came through, and you don't have any way to cross the pit.
Looks like it's time to (drumroll)... CHECK FOR SECRET DOORS!
- Flip a coin, then go to section 107.
"All right, fine," you sigh. "Keep your pie. What's behind the doors?"
"Hallways," the orc shrugs. "I didn't go exploring; I figured it was best for me to not leave my post. And anyway there's bound to be traps and all, and I wasn't in the mood to go risking my life, you know?"
"Yeah. Okay, well, thanks."
"Sure. Good luck, man."
- To take the door on the left, go to section 67.
- To take the door on the right, go to section 8.
You poke around in the thorny bushes and dense shrubbery for ten minutes, but don't find anything unusual. Time to make another Search check; flip your coins again.
- If they both come up heads, go to section 102.
- Otherwise, go to section 25.
So, go ahead and roll on the wandering monster table in the back of the book, and come back here when you're done with all that.
...
Ready? Hope the wandering monster thing went okay for you.
- Go to section 60 for the next bit.
You cautiously make your way down the hall toward the door and find it to be (not unexpectedly) locked.
Somewhat more unexpected is the fact that, when you tried the knob, a stone wall crashed down behind you, sealing off the hallway. Engraved on the wall is the statement: HA HA GOT YOU YOU BASTARD.
The ceiling begins to slowly grind down toward you in classic "pancake trap" fashion.
- To attempt to break down the door, go to section 100.
- To jam the ceiling with your sword, go to section 23.
- To jam the ceiling with hedge trimmers (if you have them), go to section 4.
- To jam the ceiling with your ten-foot pole (if you have one), go to section 66.
You feel a little vomit rise into your throat at the thought of interacting with the opposite sex. You turn and flee, finish out your school day, and waste most of the evening playing a Multi-User Dungeon on your dial-up modem connection. As you fall asleep, you hope you'll dream about being an adventurer in a dungeon again.
Hey, wow — you just barely survived! Nice going! I would offer you a high-five, but the impact might be enough to knock you unconscious.
At the end of the hallway, you come to a stout wooden door. I feel obliged to be a little more descriptive than that, but... well, it's a door. Made of wood. It probably has bronze or iron fittings; I'll go with iron, I guess.
You put your ear to it and listen carefully, hoping to get a clue as to what's on the other side; you hear a non-specific sort of murmur that indicates a random encounter. Since our random encounter system doesn't provide for the possibility of surprise, it doesn't really matter if you try to sneak in quietly or charge in shouting.
- To sneak in quietly, go to section 14.
- To charge in shouting, go to section 14.
You press your ear against the slight gap between the door and the wall, and listen intently. You hear a low muttering sound, like someone talking... if you concentrate, you can just barely make it out:
"...hope an adventurer shows up soon. How long have I been sitting in this stupid room, anyway? Man, I knew I should've taken that call center job, but nooo, be a dungeon encounter, they said, it's like money for nothing, they said. Stupid temp agency, they might've at least warned me to bring a magazine..."
- To kick the door down in hopes of surprising your foe, go to section 54.
- To open the door slowly and cautiously, hoping to sneak past, go to section 81.
Unfortunately, we ran out of space in the book, so we're gonna have to end with a kind of a cliffhanger.
Seriously. This isn't some kind of cop-out. We really did write it, and we're going to use it in next year's exclusive promotional San Diego Comic Con Choose-Your-Own-Adventure.
I know what you're saying. You're saying, "But I don't want to wait a year to find out what happens." But chin up, tiger — you'll live. You just need to find something with which to occupy your time.
Hey, I've got an idea. How about if you spend the next year playing The Kingdom of Loathing, our super-groovy web-based multiplayer role-playing game? You can find it in your computer at http://www.kingdomofloathing.com/ — that's right — the game is inside the computer.
You finally sense that the moment is right: the two of you have really made a connection. You lean in to kiss her, lips tingling with anticipation.
"Hey! Get the hell away from my girlfriend!" a dude in a letterman's jacket stomps over, punches you in the mouth, and leads the girl away by the elbow. She looks back over her shoulder at you, but there's nothing you can do.
A display of tools catches your eye... it looks like you've got enough money left to get either a rope and grappling hook, a ten-foot pole, or a pair of hedge-trimmers.
- To buy the rope and hook, go to section 86.
- To buy the 10' pole, go to section 72.
- To buy the hedge trimmers, go to section 96.
- To decide you don't need any of this junk, go to section 82.
You reach up as high as you can and wedge your sword between the wall and the ceiling. This slows its movement somewhat, so you start pounding on the door, attempting to break it down. Then, with a sudden flash of insight, you realize that the door was designed to open inwards and, bracing your feet on the doorframe and pulling as thought your life depended on it (which it obviously does), you manage to wrench the door open just before it is blocked by the falling ceiling, which smashes the door into a rain of splinters as you dive into the next room.
Your trip through the forest is interrupted by a small number of kobolds, who jump out of the bushes at you, waving little spears. A kobold if you're not familiar with them, is a small yappy dog-lizard-man that occupies the lowest rung on the ladder of common humanoid monsters (kobold - goblin - orc - gnoll - ogre). Their major purpose is to be easily and offhandedly crushed, giving players a chance to warm up their dice at the beginning of the game session.
COMBAT!
- If you win, return to the section you were at when the random encounter happened.
- If you lose, go to section 106.
Your refusal to cheat, even in the face of an obstacle as pointless as this one, is truly admirable. You search for another ten minutes, finding nothing. Flip your coins again.
- If they both come up heads, go to section 102.
- Otherwise, go to section 25.
A female voice penetrates the silent darkness around you. "Honey . . . Honey, get up! You'll be late for school!" You pry your eyes open and see you're in your own bedroom in the quaint, quiet, backwards hick town of Prescott, Arizona.
"Wow," you mumble, still groggy, "I had this crazy dream about a wizard and a quest..."
Your mom gives you a warm smile (not as warm as the smiles she gives me, though). "Well, you're safe and sound now, back in good old 1995. Get dressed."
You crawl out of bed and survey your closet.
- To wear a T-shirt for a band nobody's heard of, go to section 7.
- To wear a T-shirt with an airbrushed wizard on it, go to section 104.
"Actually," you say, "I've never understood the need to alter one's perception of reality to have a good time. Drugs and alcohol always seemed like crutches for those who aren't brave enough to simply be who they are."
"Get the hell out of my house," the guy working the keg says.
"Oh, what, I have to drink or I'm not one of the cool kids?"
"Nah, man. Have the beer or don't, but don't be such a prick about it. I'll give you a hint, man. When you start a sentence with 'actually' or 'technically,' you're about to say something that'll make everyone want to punch you. Now get out."
You stand triumphantly over the fallen body of your foe — that'll teach him to sit quietly in a small room for an indeterminate amount of time waiting for an adventurer to show up! Ha!
You search the room for treasure, but don't find anything other than a pie wrapped in waxed paper. It smells pretty good, so you take it along with you. (You could write that down if you like, but if at some point I should ask you "Do you have a pie?", I think you'll probably remember, right?)
As I mentioned before, there are two exits from this room:
- To take the door on the left, go to section 67.
- To take the door on the right, go to section 8.
The guy flips through his filecards again, shaking his head. "Sorry, kid — it looks like that's all I've got for a first-level. There's not a lot going on in this sleepy backwater farming community. Take it, or leave it."
- Take it – go to section 51.
- Leave it – go to section 109.
"Actually," you say, turning up your nose, "Amalgamated Squid are a post-noise techno-funk band. Their brilliant use of irregular time signature and ambient traffic sounds makes their music far more intricate and substantive than the bland frat-boy stylings of Hootie and the Blowfish."
"Oh, I see," the girl says, narrowing her eyes. "Well, I guess my tastes aren't refined enough for you, then. Later, smart guy."
She spins around and, with a flip of her perfect ponytail, she's gone from your life forever. You head home and spend the rest of the evening alone, again.
Nope, you died. Actually, it was quite close — you were only knocked unconscious and bleeding, but there was no one around to heal you before you went to -10 hit points, so... yeah.
Eventually, you come to a thickly-wooded spot that seems to be roughly where your map indicates the entrance to the dungeon should be located. Despite the fact that the story can't continue until you find it, it looks like you're going to have to search the tangled undergrowth to do so.
This is accomplished with a "Search" or "Spot Hidden" check, which we will simulate by having you flip two coins.
- If they both come up heads, go to section 102.
- Otherwise, go to section 13.
You back up for a running start and charge toward the pit. At the last moment, you jam the end of your pole into the crack between two floor cobbles, and jump as far as possible. The pole flexes with a creak as it boosts you into the air, and you push yourself away from it with all the strength you can muster.
You hit the floor on the far side of the pit and roll, then lay on your back for a moment and gasp for breath as your ten-foot pole clatters into the pit. You made it! High-five!
You crawl through the little tunnel, scuffing your knees and banging your head on a low-hanging rock from time to time. It's generally unpleasant, and makes you start to question your choice of career. Then you reach the end of the tunnel, and push aside the flagstone in the ceiling. As you climb out into the next room, you hope that maybe things will look brighter from here on out.
That's when you get attacked by a wandering monster.
Roll on the table at the back of the book, and when you're done with whatever monster it turns out to be, come back here.
...
- Ready? Now go to section 9.
"Geepee?"
"Right. You know, gold pieces."
"Not meat?"
"What? Oh – no no, this isn't a Kingdom of Loathing adventure. It's a pastiche of old Dungeons and Dragons tropes. The currency here is gold pieces."
"Ohhh. I was wondering why I hadn't met any hobos yet."
- Head off on your new adventure – go to section 51.
- Haggle over the fee – go to section 47.
You clear your throat. "Actually," you say, "you mean we spend our days lying around watching TV. One should only use the very 'to lay' when using an object, like 'I was laying the cards on the table'."
"Wow," she says, "I totally get it! Let me try: 'because you're a know-it-all prick, I don't want to lie down with you, or lay you!'"
You hop into the green devil's mouth and are instantly and irrevocably annihilated (which is similar to being disintegrated, but there's no dust left). I guess you're not up on your classic D&D modules, because that was straight out of good old S1: Tomb of Horrors.
Don't feel bad about it, though; if you've never actually played Tomb of Horrors, you can count yourself lucky, because it was the meanest, most vicious module ever. I've been in Paranoia games with fewer casualties. Anyway, go to section 106.
You step onto the impromptu dance floor and try to remember everything (or anything) you know about dancing. You remember an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000 that was set at a teen dance. Maybe that'll work!
- C'mon, baby, let's do the twist — go to section 70.
- On second thought, just bob your head to the beat — go to section 45.
Your sword makes an exciting schting! noise as you draw it from the scabbard. "So much for diplomacy," grumbles the orc, as he picks up a nasty-looking spiked club that was leaning against his chair.
COMBAT!
- If you win the fight, go to section 28.
- If you lose the fight, go to section 44.
"My question exactly," snorts the wizard. "What the hell are you doing here, and who the hell are you?"
"I'm... I'm an adventurer," you stammer, "and I'm here to find an ancient crystal ball at the end of this dungeon."
The wizard holds up a cantaloupe-sized crystal ball, which glows softly in the dim light. "You mean this one? Looks like you're too late, I've got it already. Finders keepers."
"Hey, look, I really need that..." you say, reaching out for the sphere.
"Not on your life, Bunky," says the wizard as he clocks you in the head with his staff. Everything fades to black...
- ...and then the black fades to section 26.
It's possible that the darts don't actually kill you — anywhere from one to eight of them might hit you, and they do d4+1 damage apiece, so that's anywhere from 2 to 40 damage you'll be taking, which is theoretically survivable for a low-level character.
You wake up suddenly, the sun shining in your face, your equilibrium shot. Your eyes focus a little, and you see you're tied up and slung across the back of a horse being ridden by a wizard. The wizard's carrying a crystal ball.
He hears you fidgeting against your bonds and turns around. "Huh. Looks like I didn't hit you hard enough," he says, and cracks you over the head with the ball, knocking you unconscious again.
You step up to the bar and order a mug of ale. The bartender looks at you appraisingly.
"What level are you?"
"What? Uh... first, I guess."
"Sorry kid, we don't serve booze to minors. Come back when you've got some orcs under your belt." He pauses, then looks up from the mug he's polishing. "...That sounded a bit dirtier than I intended, actually."
- To talk to the shadowy figure in the corner, go to section 69.
- To leave the bar, go to section 109.
Oh man. Feel that? That's what it feels like when an orc crushes your skull with a big spiky club. Yeah, it doesn't feel particularly good.
You stand on the edge of the dance floor and bob your head almost imperceptibly. A jock walks by you, and says, "Hey, man." He interprets your head-bob as a non-commital nod, and nods back. You feel a warm glow suffuse you — that's the first satisfying social interaction you've had with a jock in your entire high school career. "You should grab a beer, man," the jock says.
- To accept the beer, go to section 49.
- To decline the beer, go to section 27.
The lid of the wooden chest creaks open. You have just enough time to see that there's nothing inside before there's a bright flash of light and a gigantic skeleton — easily nine feet tall and wielding two huge scimitars — appears before you. It's wearing a little party hat that says "Surprise!", which I guess is someone's idea of a joke.
There is frankly no point in running combat against this monster, even if the combat in this book weren't total nonsense — it kills the hell out of you. Sorry!
"Only 500 meat — I mean, g.p.? That doesn't sound like very much."
"It's way more cash than anyone else has around here," the man comments dryly. "Kid, you're only first level. The real money comes much later. Anyway, chances are that the dungeon will have more treasure in it than the trinket I'm asking you to fetch. Especially if you're gonna be one of those guys who takes the brass candleabras and everything else that isn't nailed down."
"Fair enough, I guess."
In this room you encounter a large rooster with a lizard's tail, which you identify (despite this being your first adventure ever and never having seen or even heard of one before) as a cockatrice.
This is a bad thing, but it could be worse — D&D cockatrices only turn you into stone if they bite you. If this were Nethack, it could do it just by sneezing at you, or possibly even just looking at you funny. God help you if you were to actually pick it up and then fall down the stairs.
COMBAT!
- If you win, return to the section you were at when the random encounter happened.
- If you lose, you get stoned. Har, har. Go to section 106.
"Sure, I'll take a beer," you say. You take a few tentative sips of the stuff. It tastes terrible, but you can feel yourself relax a little bit.
- For an important message from Gamers Against Youth Wantonly Abusing Alcoholic Drinks, go to section 89.
- To try and talk to a girl, go to section 10.
This section is a moment of silence for your trusty ten-foot pole, which saved your life twice before being lost to the horrors of the dungeon.
Pole, we hardly knew ye.
- When you've finished drying your tears, go to section 18.
"All right," you say, "I'm in. I just bring you the crystal ball thingy? No problem. Anything I should know about this place? Traps? Monsters?"
"Almost certainly, and yes of course."
"...A little more info would be nice."
"Sorry kid, no spoilers from me. You're an adventurer now; surprises are your stock and trade."
The man waves as you leave the tavern.
You dive into the next room, feeling pretty clever about how you got out of that trap. The feeling quickly fades, however, due to the fact that there's a wandering monster in this room, and you no longer have a weapon to fight it with.
You could turn to the Wandering Monster Table in the back of the book and see what monster it is, if you like... but it kills you, so it doesn't really matter.
"Yeah, it's really cute," you say. "It's from a Japanese cartoon I... er, my kid brother watches. It's actually pretty good; you should check it out sometime!"
"Maybe you can bring the VHS to the party tonight," she says, and scribbles an address on your Trapper Keeper.
- To go to the party, go to section 71.
- To be overwhelmed with panic at the thought of socializing, go to section 75.
You back up for a running start, and ram your shoulder into the heavy wooden door with a roar of fury, slamming it open with a powerful crash! The small room beyond (which you instinctively note to be exactly ten feet square with another door on each of the left and right walls) contains a rather surprised-looking orc.
"Dude!" he says, "it wasn't locked or anything."
- To attack the orc, go to section 63.
- To greet him in more friendly terms, go to section 99.
The lid of the chest creaks open, and unexpectedly, a swarm of terrible little green snakes pour out of it, biting you all over and filling you with poison until you start to swell up like some kind of horrible meat zeppelin. ("Unexpectedly," in this context, refers to the fact that it was snakes in particular; you were probably totally expecting that something would jump out and kill you.) You have just one chance: did you acquire the vial of antivenom?
- If you did, go to section 90.
- Otherwise, go to section 106.
You smile, nod, and jump off the couch and run to the bathroom, where you lock the door and stay until the party's over. It's not all bad, though: you do find an old joke book and learn some pretty funny jokes.
You gain 37 experience points.
Oh, sorry, did I say "filler?" What I meant, of course, was "dramatic encounters to fuel role-playing and possibly provide plot hooks to later stories."
Anyway, put your finger on this section, and flip to the back of the book, where you'll find a "Wandering Monster Table." Follow the instructions to choose a "Wilderness Encounter," and then come back here when you've finished. (If a combat is involved, you'll find the instructions for that on the back cover of the book.) I'll wait here till you get back...
Done? Everything come out all right? Great! Now you know what to do if the text says "roll for a wandering monster" in the future. Oh, don't look so surprised, of course you're going to have to go through that again. You saw that there were two charts back there, right?
- Anyway, now continue to section 32.
"Hey, is that a Hamster Inflator Yuki backpack?" you ask.
The girl shrugs and rolls her eyes. "I don't know. I got it at Hot Topic. Isn't it soooo cute?"
- To lecture her on Japanese culture, go to section 68.
- To play along, go to section 53.
This room is strewn with human skeletons, possibly the remains of previous adventurers. Not being a dummy, you give odds of 99 out of 100 that they come to life and attack you as soon as you get to the center to the room, and this is of course what happens.
Fortunately, there's only a handful of them, and skeletons aren't exactly tough. They take less damage from non-bludgeoning weapons, but as previously mentioned your sword is pretty dull, so I'll give you a pass on that.
COMBAT!
- If you win, return to the section you were at when the random encounter happened.
- If you lose, go to section 106.
As I said, this room contains three large chests. They're about four feet across by two feet wide, and three feet tall. The first one appears to be made out of gold, the second is made from some silvery sort of metal, and the last is strong oak banded with bronze. None of the three appear to have a lock, which makes you wish you still had your ten-foot pole.
I miss that ten-foot pole. :(
- To open the gold chest, go to section 55.
- To open the silver chest, go to section 76.
- To open the wood chest, go to section 46.
Tonk. Huh, that's weird.
You poke at that section of the floor a bit more and soon find a pressure-plate that causes a pit to drop open across the full width of the hallway. You cautiously peek over the edge, and find it to be very deep, and very pointy at the bottom. Man, good thing you had that ten-foot pole, eh?
The question now is, how are you going to get across? You could probably pole-vault over, but you would lose your pole in the process, and wouldn't be able to get back this way. If this passage should turnout to be a dead-end, you'd be stuck... but surely I wouldn't be that mean, right? Right?
Another option would be to go back to the orc's room and take the other passage instead.
- To vault over the pit, go to section 33.
- To go back and take the left door out of the orc's room, go to section 67.
"A stick."
"Correct," the sphinx grumbles. "You may pass."
"That's a terrible riddle," you say.
"Well, you caught me off-guard. Go away."
"You've been sitting here waiting for someone to come along so you could ask them a riddle, but you did''t have one ready? No way. You were going to ask me the four legs/two legs/three legs one, weren't you?"
"No, I wasn't. Go away before I eat you."
- Return to the section you were at when the random encounter happened.
"Die, evil monster!" you shout, drawing your father's sword from its scabbard and clubbing the startled orc in the head with it before he can react. (I say "clubbing" because, well, it's an old sword and dull to the point where you wouldn't trust it to slice a tomato. Still, it's heavy and metal and seems to do okay at the basic task you require for it, i.e. hitting things.)
The orc crashes to the ground with a scream. He appears to be dead, but you spend a few minutes jumping up and down on him just to make sure. You then carefully search the room, but don't find any treasure except for a pretty tasty-looking pie. You can write that down on your inventory list, if you're bothering to keep one. As I mentioned before, there are two exits from this room:
- To take the door on the left, go to section 67.
- To take the door on the right, go to section 8.
Nope, you died. You might be interested to know, though, that you got hit by all eight darts, and took nearly full damage from them, so at least you died spectacularly. If damage taken in D&D corresponded to visual effect, those little darts would have totally exploded you.
You join the keg line, since it's the least terrifying of the party options that presented themselves. You smile and nod manically at everyone around you until someone offers you a plastic cup full of that yellowish, weird-smelling swill you've heard about, but never actually tried.
- If you accept the beer, go to section 49.
- If you decline the beer, go to section 27.
You hold up your ten-foot pole, and wait nervously for the ceiling to drop to its level. When it does, the ceiling slows with a creeeak, visibly bending the pole, but coming to a halt.
Whew!
...And then the pole snaps in half and the ceiling smashes violently to the ground. Upon which you were standing.
You open the door and step into a stone hallway, which measures ten feet wide and twenty feet long, at which point it turns right and continues another forty feet to a door.
Past the turn, the flagstones have been engraved with a cryptic message:
ADVENTURER, YOU HAVE INVADED MY TOMB
UNDOUBTEDLY SEEKING MY TREASURE TO STEAL
BY ENTERING THIS PLACE YOUR FATE HAS BEEN SEALED
AND ALL THAT YOU'LL FIND HERE WILL BE YOUR OWN DOOM.
THIS POEM WOULD NORMALLY GIVE YOU SOME CLUES
TO GUIDE YOU PAST TRAPS AND THE PITFALLS I'VE SET
BUT WHY SHOULD I HELP YOU? I'M NOT GOING TO LET
YOU HORK ALL MY STUFF WITHOUT PAYING YOUR DUES.
SO SCREW YOU—YOU CAME HERE TO LOOT SOMEONE'S GRAVE
AND I'LL DO MY BEST TO MAKE SURE IT'S YOUR OWN
YOUR BLOOD WILL BE SPLATTERED LIKE RAIN ON THESE STONES
I LEAVE YOU WITH THIS PARTING THOUGHT: BURMA SHAVE.
Well that's cheerful.
"Well, that's just typical of you gaijin, to buy something from a chain store because it's 'cute.' I'll bet you didn't know that Hamster Inflator Yuki is the third most popular anime in Japan, and that individual issues of its manga have sold more copies than The Bridges of Madison County," you say.
"Whatever, nerd," she says. "I just thought it was cute." She turns around and walks away, leaving you to sadly wave goodbye to the inflated hamster on her back. You go home, alone, and spend the rest of the night on the computer, alone.
"Guild?"
"The Shadowy Figures in the Corners of Bars Union." He shows you his membership card. "We've been providing quests to young adventurers such as yourself since time out of mind."
- To request a... quest, go to section 105.
- To leave the bar, go to section 109.
With an almost audible ego crash, you realize they're keeping their distance because your arrhythmically flailing limbs are a danger to yourself and others. You hang your head and slink off of the dance floor before you hurt something worse than your pride.
- To join the keg line, go to section 65.
- To talk to a girl, go to section 85.
You screw your courage to the sticking place, ponder for a minute what a weird expression that is, and head into the party. It's your typical mid-'90s teenage bacchanal: a keg of beer, various bottles of whatever kids could steal from their parents, people making out, vomiting, and dancing (sometimes all three at once).
- To try and dance, go to section 38.
- To stand in the keg line, go to section 65.
- To talk to a girl, go to section 85.
Ah, the classic ten-foot pole, useful for poking things from a long way away when you don't want to touch them with your hands. No adventurer worth his salt would leave town without one, although the obvious difficulties inherent in actually carrying a ten-foot-long wooden pole around with you everywhere are generally ignored.
Bad luck — looks like you didn't find any secret doors. Fortunately, you can try as many times as you like.
- Flip a coin, then go to section 107.
No? Ooh, that kind of sucks then, because you missed out on detecting the pit trap that just opened up beneath you. Well, I mean, you've detected it now, but it would have been more helpful to have done so before you were actually standing on top of it.
I would ask if you have the grappling hook and rope, to climb out of the pit with, but it turns out not to matter very much, because the bottom of the pit is covered with spikes — hollow spikes that shoot smaller spikes out of them, which are themselves coated with poison.
You try to psyche yourself up for the party, but you just can't find the heart, the brain, or the nerve. "I bet there won't be anyone there I can really talk to, anyway," you tell yourself. "They're probably all a bunch of MTV-watching sheeple. And those grapes are totally sour."
You flip open the lid of the slivery chest, and dive back out of the way. Several long moments pass with nothing happening, so you creep forward and peek into the chest. It appears to contain only a small cut-crystal box about the size of a pack of cigarettes; through the transparent lid, you can see a small silver ring.
You reach out tremblingly and poke the box with one finger, then jump back to safety again. Nothing happens.
Feeling a little more sure of yourself, you reach into the chest and take the crystal box. This is, of course, when a handful of razor-sharp steel darts shoot out of the bottom of the chest at you.
77You have encountered a sphinx. In case you've never read any fantasy or mythology ever, a sphinx is a creature with the upper torso and head of a man, the lower body of a lion, and the paws that refreshes.
"Greetings, adventurer," it says. "If you can guess the answer to my riddle, I will allow you to pass."
"Is it 'a man'?" you ask.
"What? I haven't even asked the question yet."
"No, but I figured there was a pretty good chance it would be the old 'What walks on four legs in the morning, two legs in the afternoon, and three legs in the evening' one."
The sphinx frowns and gives you a shifty look. "No, I... no. Certainly not. That old chestnut? Pshaw."
"All right, what's the riddle then?"
"I um... give me a second..." The sphinx drums its claws on the floor and furrows its brow in thought.
"That was the question you were going to ask, wasn't it?"
"No. Shut up." The creature sighs. "All right, um... what's brown and sticky?"
- To answer the sphinx’s riddle, add up the numerical values of the letters in your answer (A=1, Z=26; omit extra words like 'a' or 'an') and turn to that section of the book. If the section you get makes sense, keep reading from there.
- Otherwise, the sphinx eats you and you go to section 106.
- If you totally can’t figure the riddle out, or if you know the answer but don't feel like doing any math right now, you can cheat by going to section 98.
Nope, you died.
The orc gives you a cautious look.
"Well, yeah, that's the intention I suppose, but in all honesty I'm not sure that it's really necessary, I mean I'm perfectly willing to let you pass..."
"Are you guarding any treasure?"
"No, just these two doors. Well, and my lunch, I guess, but that doesn't really count..."
"What is it?"
"A pie."
"Hmm," you say. "I am in fact hungry for pie. Is it a tasty pie?"
"Well, my buddy Monte baked it, and he's quite a good cook, so yeah, chances are that... hey! Are you seriously considering killing me just to get my lunch?"
"Well, you are an orc, after all," you say. "Orcs are inherently evil."
"Sure," he replies, "but you don't have to be a dick about it!"
- To be a dick about it and attack the orc, go to section 39.
- To not be a dick about it, go to section 12.
You still don't trust your digestive tract to keep running the proper direction, so you smile and nod at the girl. "You know," she says, "sometimes I think all of these people are just total MTV-watching sheeple. Like, we all just waste our days laying around watching TV."
- To correct her grammatical error, go to section 36.
- To nod sympathetically, go to section 103.
You carefully open the door and peek through. The small (10' square) room contains a door on each of the left and right walls, as well as a rather bored-looking orc, who gives you a little wave. So much for the element of surprise.
- To attack the orc, go to section 39.
- To greet him in more friendly terms, go to section 99.
Are you sure? Unless you're just being contrary, I advise you to go back to section 22 and buy something. I can't force you, though.
Heck, you're probably going to cheat and assume you've got any equipment I happen to ask for later, aren't you?
Well, you didn't make it all the way through the adventure, but you did get to defeat an orc and drink a virtual beer! You should definitely check out the Kingdom of Loathing at http://www.kingdomofloathing.com/, where there are several varieties of virtual booze to drink, and hundreds of fantasy monsters to slay! Like this pamphlet, it's totally free. Unlike this pamphlet, it's actually a game.
Congratulations! While you didn't actually win this adventure, you did defeat an orc, drink a virtual beer, and you almost had a complete and satisfying human interaction.
You can practice all of those skills at http://www.kingdomofloathing.com/. It's a free, multi-player online game with plenty of monsters to fight, drinks to drink, and a fantastic community to chat with. Sorry, 'with which to chat.' Although if we learned anything from this whole experience, it's that people never thank you for correcting their grammar. Or their grampa.
- To join the dancers, go to section 38.
- To join the keg line, go to section 65.
You plunk down the last of your money and buy a grappling hook and a sturdy coil of hemp rope. It's not as fancy as the silk rope that the rich adventurers buy, but it should be perfectly serviceable for your first time out.
And hey, if you get bored, you can always just smoke it.
Haha, just kidding, we don't use direct drug references, as a general rule. Anyway, it's the wrong kind of hemp, and that totally wouldn't work.
Well, it appears that human interaction isn't your strong suit. May we humbly suggest that you play The Kingdom of Loathing? It's full of all the orcs, dwarves, and elves that you like, with the strong sense of disaffected irony you crave. Plus, it's a multi-player game with an awesome community, so you'll have plenty of opportunities to practice your people skills! Check it out at http://www.kingdomofloathing.com/. It's free!
You find an upstairs window that opens onto the roof, and the two of you lie down and talk while you stargaze. As the sky starts to grey with the approaching dawn, the moment is finally perfect: you turn to her and share a deep, satisfying kiss. You hold her tightly and drift off to sleep.
Let's step away from the pleasant fiction for a moment and get real, okay? We here at Gamers Against Youth Wantonly Abusing Alcoholic Drinks wish to remind you that while a sip or two of beer won't kill you, and might help you adjust to new social situations, that alcohol is a dangerous drug when used to excess. Make sure that your one or two beers doesn't turn into eight or nine and a vodka shot, because that can lead to jackassery, vomiting, clumsiness, and death. So don't drink to excess, and don't drink and drive, and remember to brush your teeth before bed.
If you use alcohol responsibly, you too can be a total GAYWAAD.
- For an important message from Dudes Opposed to the Utterance of Childish Homophobic Epithets, go to section 5.
- To try and talk to a girl, go to section 10.
Ha ha ha, fooled you. There isn't any vial of antivenom in this book.
Yes, I'm a douchebag, but at least I'm not a liar, liar.
There is a soft plorp sound as you step into the shimmering field, which envelops you like transparent jelly. Exactly like that, in fact, because you have just walked into the side of a gelatinous cube. If you weren't completely paralyzed, you might be inclined to kick your own ass.
Fortunately, you are saved from being slowly digested over a long period of time when someone explodes the gelatinous cube with a fireball. Unfortunately, someone explodes the gelatinous cube you are inside with a fireball.
Alerted by loud crashing and roaring sounds, you dive into some bushes and hide. Just in time, too, as an angry-looking owlbear bursts into the clearing. This creature is basically a nine- or ten-foot tall bear with the head of an owl. Thus, it has the strength and ferocity of a bear, and the... uh... something of an owl. You might guess "wisdom", but they're not actually smarter than the average bear. Are owls like constantly pissed-off? Because that would fit.
It's said that owlbears were created by wizards messing around with animal experimentation, which makes sense, because wizards often get funny notions about what constitutes a "good idea."
This particular owlbear has rumbled off in the other direction, and that's good, because it would surely smash you into paste if you tried to fight it, and it would be cruel of me to kill you off so early into the book.
- Return to the section you were at when the random encounter happened.
Nope, you died.
Question 1: "Is it round?" Yes.
Question 2: "Does it have a lot of eyes?" Yes.
Question 3: "Does it kill the hell out of me?"
Yes.
Hey, congratulations, you only needed three questions!
You carefully search the floor behind the chests, and find a flagstone that seems a little loose. Levering it out of the floor with your sword, you reveal a narrow crawlspace that winds away into the darkness. It doesn't look very pleasant in there, but honestly you haven't got much in the way of alternatives at the moment.
Hedge trimmers? Seriously? That's hardly a standard piece of adventuring kit.
Oh, I get it — you're assuming that the most absurd and obviously jokey piece of available equipment is probably the one you're most likely to need, considering the perverse sense of humor that's already apparent in this book.
What you fail to take into account is the fact that I'm totally making this up as I go along. Still, I hope it works out for you.
You swallow your snobbery and try not to choke on it. "Well, Hootie's great, but these guys are a little edgier, weirder, maybe. You've got to hear them if you haven't."
The girl smiles. "Well," she says, "maybe you can bring the CD to the party tonight." She scribbles an address on your Trapper Keeper and bounces away.
- To go to the party, go to section 71.
- To be overwhelmed with panic at the thought of socializing, go to section 75.
The answer is "a stick", and those letters add up to 62, you dirty cheater.
"Er, hello," you say.
"Hi. Man, am I glad to see you, it's boring as hell in here. Hang on a sec, I've got a script..." He pulls a sheet of paper out of his pocket and clears his throat. "Read the following dialogue to the player(s). Fie on thee, filthy human! You may seek to loot the treasures of this ancient dungeon, but even if you manage to defeat me, there are far greater traps and guardians ahead of you! Your doom is assured! Evil laugh!"
"You're... pretty new at this, huh?"
The orc sighs. "Yeah. It wasn't my first choice for a job, believe me. But the market is just terrible right now."
- To continue the conversation, go to section 79.
- To end the conversation abruptly by attacking the orc, go to section 39.
You desperately ram your shoulder against the stout wooden door over and over, but it shows little sign of weakening. By the time you notice that it was designed to open inward, the ceiling has dropped low enough to block its movement. Squish.
You dive into the next room, which happens to contain a wandering monster. Fortunately, it turns out to be a reasonably polite one, which allows you to pick yourself up and catch your breath before attacking you. When you're ready, turn to the Wandering Monster Table at the back of the book, and then come back here when you've resolved the encounter. ... Ready? Okay, now go to section 9.
After a brief struggle, you manage to shove the slab far enough to one side to allow you to squeeze through. (I could have made you flip more coins for a strength check, but I'm not a complete bastard.) Lighting a torch, you make your way cautiously down a dusty stone staircase to section 3.
You nod sympathetically, and keep your fool mouth shut. You keep quiet and keep listening until you can safely make a comment without criticizing the girl's taste in popular culture or correcting her grammar. All that listening means that when you do finally say something, it's on a topic that interests both of you, so the conversation continues.
- To keep talking on the couch, go to section 21.
- To head to the roof, go to section 88.
You put on your wizard shirt and head to school. Between classes, you find yourself staring at a beautiful girl with a backpack modeled after an adorable Japanese cartoon character.
- To talk to the girl, go to section 58.
- To run away in fear, go to section 16.
The man pulls out a small box of filing cards. "Let's see now... you're first level?"
"Yup."
"That's what I thought. Standard-issue leather armor and an old sword, probably inherited from a relative. What have I got for a first level fighter?..." He flips through the cards for a moment, and pulls one out. "Here we go, a little dungeon crawl. Classic jumping-off point for a budding young adventurer. Interested?"
- "You bet!" – go to section 35.
- "Nah, not really." – go to section 29.
Perhaps you were using the more difficult version of the combat system and a monster took you down, or maybe it was one of the adventure's more devious traps — and by "devious" I mean "unfair". (As you may have noticed, we're using the old-school methods of trap design in this one. Not quite up to Grimtooth's standards of evil, but since we're not really counting on you to have dice, there's no reason to give you a saving throw.)
Anyway, point is, you're dead. If you're anything like me, you've got a couple fingers stuck between the pages, marking earlier choices — now's a good time to go back to one of them. Otherwise, you'll basically just have to start over. Sorry! Another option would be to put the book aside and just check out the free online game we're advertising. It's at http://www.kingdomofloathing.com/, and I promise that it's much, much harder to die there.
- If the coin you flipped is older than 1980, go to section 95.
- Otherwise, go to section 73.
Lars stood by the window, clothed only in the moonlight. Helga admired the way his supple buttocks flexed when he shifted his weight from foot to foot. "What is it, my soul twin?" she asked.
Lars stared at the scene before him. He was a man of few words at the best of times — he was a man of action, of deed, of sword and sinew, blood and bone. The vast passion play in the sky outside the window swept what few words he had from his mighty brain, and it was an eternity before he responded.
"I see a great wolf blotting out the sun," he said. "I see a snake eating the moon. Giants — no, not giants, far larger than giants—gods stride across the land, decimating forests with a single sword stroke, boiling the seas with a glance, stabbing their lances deep into the heart of Grothmir, the Earth-Mother, herself. In the distance, I hear the labor pangs of Hreldamar, the Dark Mother, and soon her son will be unleashed upon us." Lars turned from the window, concealing his taut buttocks but revealing further mysteries. "It is the Drakmaglinoth, Helga. The End of All Worlds."
"Then we have little time remaining," Helga said. "Come back to bed with us."
"Yes," Olga added, tracing the line where the steel of her biomechanical leg met the smooth flesh of her thigh, "come back to bed."
Deciding you're not going to find what you're looking for here, you strike off on your own, and eventually find yourself embroiled in the adventure of a lifetime!
It isn't the one we actually wrote, though. But hey, you've clearly got things to do, people to see. Why not add to your workload by doing some things and seeing some people in the Kindom of Loathing, our web-based multiplayer role-playing game available online at http://www.kingdomofloathing.com/? WANDERING MONSTER TABLES
Instructions: Roll 2d6. Considering where you got this book, I will be somewhat surprised if you don't know what that means, but just in case: Roll two six-sided dice (the regular cube-shaped ones). If you don't have any handy, there are a multitude of 99¢ iPhone apps that will do it for you—isn't technology great? Failing that, ask two people standing near you to each think of a number from one to six. They will give you funny looks, but you should be used to that by now.
Anyway, once that's done, look up the total on the appropriate chart below, and turn to the section indicated. The rules for combat are in a section labelled "COMBAT", which should be around here somewhere. Maybe on the next page.
Dungeon Encounters:
2-4: Section 59
5: Section 77
6: Section 48
7: Section 94
8: Section 48
9: Section 77
10-12: Section 59
Wilderness Encounters:
2-5: Section 6
6-8: Section 24
9-12: Section 92
HOW TO RESOLVE COMBAT!
Those of you who played last year's Kingdom of Loathing Comic-Con Adventure Gamebook ("Episode 3: Past as Prologue
") may wish to use the Classic combat rules from that, which are fully compatible here. (Consider all combats in this book to be of regular difficulty, except for the Emo Unicorn and Banshee Cheerleader Pyramid (who are "hard") and the Literary Criticism Golem (which is "stupid hard").
If you don't have that combat system memorized and don't have a copy of the book handy, or if you wish to try our new ultra-streamlined Combat System 2.0 instead, then read on!
Here's how it works:
1) When a section of the game text says "COMBAT!", make note of which section of the book you are currently on (so that you can find your place again after combat is over).
2) Close your eyes, flip to a random page of the book, and poke the book with your finger or the eraser end of a pencil.
3) Take the number of the section that your finger/pencil landed on, and divide it by five, rounding up.
4) Return to the section of the book you were at when you entered combat. There should be two options at the bottom of the section: one for which section to turn to if you lose, and one for which section to turn to if you win.
5) Turn to the section listed on the "if you win" choice, and continue reading.
Some people feel that this system is too easy, and does not make the game challenging enough. If you are of this opinion, you may optionally choose to take the "if you lose" choice instead. This will make the game much more difficult, and is recommended only for the hardcore elite.
Hey! If you enjoyed this book (even with all our shameless self promotion), why not try our advertising-free, subscription-free, totally free online game? It's free! www.kingdomofloathing.com
It's not actually very much like this book, except that it's got a lot of funny things to read in it, and this book was written by the guys who write for the game.
Also the game is a whole lot longer than the book, and has a lot more of our beautiful hand-crafted images in it. The really important pictures even move a little bit!
Wow!
Plus, it's got various numbers that you can make bigger, and a combat system that actually makes sense. It even has PvP, kinda! For visiting us at Comic-Con, you can even get a Comic-Con Exclusive in-game item! It's free! Just like the game!
Writing: Nathan "Riff" Conner and Josh "Mr. Skullhead" Nite
Writing and Artwork: Zack "Jick" Johnson
All content copyright © 2009, Asymmetric Publications, LLC
If you missed previous years' booklets, you can get them at: http://images.kingdomofloathing.com/cyoa/
Sunday, September 29, 2013
IF Competition 2013
(Also discovered while checking them out: free hosting for Twine games over here!)