Don your armor, prep your spells, and grab your favorite fluffy towel; Flagstaff: Chapter Two is here! The next installment of Joel Esler's cute and silly RPG offers the same relaxed dungeon crawling as the first chapter, plus new enemies, new powers, and a new hero to play.
If you played Flagstaff: Chapter One, then the mouse-based controls of Chapter Two will be familiar. On your turn, click a character to control him or her. Click on the tile you want the selected hero to move, or pick a power and click on the character(s) you wish to target. You can only move your hero so many spaces a turn, and powers can usually only be used within a certain range, but Flagstaff intuitively shows you where these limits are. You can also move all your heroes at once, and you can speed up character movement by clicking again as they move. Once you have done everything you wish to do, click the "End Turn" button and see how your enemies react. As you defeat foes, you can level up by selecting a new power for one of your heroes, or by upgrading an existing power. Explore, kill enemies, level up, and figure out what is behind the dungeon's infestation.
Environments in this chapter of Flagstaff are the same randomly generated stone-walled dungeons as Chapter One, but there are some new faces this time. In addition to the classic Knight-Ranger-Wizard-Priestess quartet, you now can also play as the King, who offers an interesting mix of pugilism, leadership, and towel-based powers (really!). Several wizardly "sauciers" offer a bit more challenge than the fragile skeletons and guards of Chapter One, and a boss fight lends some variety to the standard hacking and slashing. Still, if you select your powers well, the game shouldn't put up too much of a fight. Flagstaff remains more about the silly story and casual pace than about seriously challenging veteran RPG players, but the design is cute and distinctive, the heroes all have interesting and balanced powers, and the pace is perfect for a light bit of dungeon crawling. Chapter Two builds on the promise of Chapter One, and tantalizes for the next installment of the Flagstaff series.
Walkthrough Guide
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Flagstaff Chapter 2: Tips and Tricks
Ranger
In my opinion, the most useful character. A well-built ranger can kill a sauceror in one turn, before enemies get a chance to attack.
Upgrade to two actions a round soon. You'll be able to take advantage of extra attacks more often since you can attack at range.
Increasing speed and line of sight will also help you get more attacks.
Sometimes you can get away with moving the Ranger to within shooting range, firing, and retreating, without the bad guys ever following you.
Point Blank Shot doesn't seem particularly useful, since the melee oriented classes can protect you from having to fight in melee.
Wizard
The wizard is sort of like the ranger, with several utility powers in place of higher damage. Many of the tips for the Ranger apply to the wizard as well.
Of the unique powers, I found Sleep was most useful, especially when facing multiple saucerors.
Knight
Does the most damage, but only at melee range.
Upgrading hit points and the Block power will make the knight more durable. It is often a good idea to put the knight on the front lines, where he will attract the most attacks.
Taunt doesn't seem like a particularly useful power, as proper positioning means that enemies will most likely attack the knight anyway.
The spin attack power is pretty useful. Remember to move the knight to where he can take advantage of it.
King
The new character. The king is mostly melee based, and can be used as a backup knight.
Royal Command is excellent. I often used it with the Ranger, to gain up to three ranged attacks in a round.
Priestess
The healer. After the ranger, she is the most important character to give extra actions a round to, so she can heal multiple characters in a round, or heal a particularly wounded character twice.
Righteous is a nice power to get a little extra healing.
Smite is useful to give the Priestess something to do in case no healing is necessary, though its damage and range are limited.
General tips
Enemies won't attack you or move towards you unless they see you, and won't seek you out.
Saucerors are more important to kill than guards, as they can attack at range, and can attack multiple targets at once.
Saucerors can also teleport, so you can't count on your melee characters to have more than one round to kill them.
You can end a level once you find the exit, or once you get the message that you have killed all enemies. When you start a new leve, your party is at full health.
Boss fight
Get rid of the saucerors first. It won't take too long, and you can focus on Attila without worrying about extra magical damage.
Attila can only attack in melee, so get the ranged characters out of his way.
Attila deals a lot of damage, but it's nothing the priestess can't heal in one round.
Attila has a spin attack like the knight, but the priestess's Heal All power should take care of any damage dealt.
Put the king and knight in melee with Attila, have the wizard and ranger attack at range, and keep the priestess on healing detail.
Posted by: Mike
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May 6, 2011 12:49 PM