No Happiness Will Dwell In This Kingdom! Let's Play Rolan's Curse 1 & 2

Kyle, of course, uses the THUNDER ROD, which he’s got plenty of shots of. (I swapped Lee in briefly, but he only had a couple of shots of Firework and his Sai really wasn’t very effective because I had to get so close.)

Lane’s usefulness becomes more apparent after doing a boss battle without her: Her Healing spell affects everyone, where Potions only affect one character. Sharply limited healing made it much harder to get through this battle.


Machine Head leaves a Fairy Wing when defeated.




Returning to town and talking to Lee’s master results in him learning a new technique.


Rapid-Fire is an improvement over Firework because of its drastically lower cost, if nothing else. Lee’s flurry of blows hits a six-square spread in front of him for decent damage, which would be much more useful if DURN’s sword wasn’t basically doing the same thing at this point.

Next time, we’ll take that exit north from the Ruins and continue into the desert.

Voting Time! Our choices for who to leave behind are: Kyle (could we possibly be tired of THUNDER ROD?), Jude (glass cannons for everyone!), or Lee (ACHOOOO!).

Lee is textbook boring character design. Random eastern-style martial artists in a generic western-style fantasy world, yawn. Toss him.

Yeah, Lee's much more boring than a monk should be. Get Lane back in here!

Rolan’s Curse 2, Post #7 – The Deadly Desert

We can't get Lane back (yet), but we can get someone almost as good.

As we resume our quest, we head north through the Ruins again, this time taking that northern exit that I had pointed out before.


That leads to a new forested area.


It’s full of a lot of monsters we’ve seen before, though in somewhat greater numbers. Monkeys and Wizards early on.


This is most likely a level for someone not currently in my party.


There’s a north and south path through this area, and the north path requires liberal application of THUNDER ROD.


Holy Dark Knights, Batman!


That could have gone better, but I netted a Level Icon for Kyle.


The small pond above me spawns increasing numbers of Vultures as I kill the pre-existing Shadows.


I need to THUNDER ROD my way out of the north path, too.


This is generally a short area without much to find.


So we move on to the Desert (also known as “Fossils”). Where we’re welcomed by…desert Frogs? (There are two paths through this area, north and south of the river. We’re doing south first, then we’ll loop around.)


What’s a desert without flying Animal Skulls? These things behave like pretty much all of the flying heads we’ve encountered.


The Snails from way back in the Mushroom Forest reappear here, too.


There are a number of chests for characters I don’t have.


And a last Level Icon for Lee.


This canyon has the first important thing.

An old man caring for a strange winged woman.




Lora was sent by a goddess to help save the world. Sounds good enough for me!


Just drop off the key, Lee!


Lora is a CUPID. She has the healing spell that Lane needed to kill a boss to learn.


Her arrows are decently powerful, but her range is strangely short. Perhaps that will improve later. We can also spam her arrow attacks really quickly, which is a big advantage.


Her first Level Icon is just outside.


Shortly followed by her second.


I work my way back to the entrance of the desert, and take the north side path.


Chest for someone else.


Level Icon for DURN.

Level Icon for Lora. The enemies are the same on both sides of the river: Snails, Frogs and Animal Skulls.


The area break leads to the More Deadly Desert, which should be evidenced by the number of giant beasts that have died here.


One-Eyed Ghosts count among the reappearing enemies here. They show up in large numbers and can be very irritating when they’re doing the semi-spawned haunting trick.


Level for Lora.


New to this area are Death Knights. They move like Duckmen or most generic land-based monsters, but also shoot fireballs in front of them. They’re best taken out through barriers via reach attacks.


Up around the corner is another Level Icon for DURN, who’s just shooting up in levels.


Both north and west of that are Level Icons for Lora.


And following the path further to the west nets yet another one. She's caught up to Jude at this point.


Here we have another example of my being able to continue without fighting the boss—the area break is right here.


Just north of the boss teleporter.



Here’s a look at the party. DURN is a beast, and Jude seems to have fallen behind (especially have gone for some time without gaining a level). Lora has caught up nicely in a very short time, and I've forgotten how nice a healing spell can be.

Oh, and regarding DURN: His sword’s range has expanded to “wide”, which means it’s hitting basically the entire area Lee’s Rapid Fire did. Only for free and much more powerfully.


His Power Crystal also fires further and faster than originally.


This is the %&#@ Dragon. I hate him so much.


He shoots two homing fireballs at you. They move fast, and each hit does a monstrous 40 damage. They are annoyingly hard to dodge.

Which means none of our characters are particularly useful. DURN is the best, being durable and having some amount of range. Lora isn’t bad either.

Kyle needs to get in really close to use the THUNDER ROD, which leaves him vulnerable.


Jude’s ability to keep his distance is totally thwarted by his tiny HP total.


Needless to say, I had exhausted Lora’s MP on healing by the time I knocked this thing’s head off. The body then dissolves, but doesn’t drop anything.






Heading back to the old man doesn’t give me a message about it, but is the trigger for Lora’s wings healing. This is both an upgrade and a downgrade.

On one hand, her arrows will fly further and can still be rapid-fired.


On the other, she loses the healing spell I had just been enjoying. In its place, she learns Teleport, which functions as a Fairy Wing and allows me to revisit any place I’ve been. (Which is probably a cue to go scour previous areas for Level Icons for my current team, but I’m not going to do that until at least after we recruit the final member, or possibly not at all.)

Next time, the canyons and our final companion.

Voting Time! This will be our second to last vote: Who gets knocked off the team in order to allow our last companion to join? Kyle (he’s been our best Zombuddy since he joined, but he’s now the only terrible-range member), Jude (I’m feeling his low HP and have a new distance attacker), or Lora (whose bow is great, but I kinda wish I could downgrade her back to a healing spell).

Jude has outlived his usefulness.

And he wasn't very useful in his supposed area of usefulness before.

Jude has been around for long enough, time for him to go.

I'm Team Kyle 4 lyfe, and I dig the new cupid character that's actually halfway original, so ditch the boring spellcaster that hasn't been pulling his weight.

See ya, Jude!

Get rid of Kyle.

I'm tempted to vote Kyle, but how could anyone vote off the Thunder Rod? Lora's new enough to not be evicted yet.

Down with the black mage!

I probably don't have to add my vote at this point, but yeah, I think it's time Jude went back to his books.

Man, how rarely do we see all the voters on an LP be so in sync?

I guess I'll be the voice of dissent and vote for Lora. Her primary attack is good, but she has no secondary combat ability.

Rolan’s Curse 2, Post #8 – The Treacherous Canyons

That was our first split vote, but it looks like Jude is getting the axe.


Last time, I point out the exit north from the desert. We’ll be following from there into another field/forest area.


This is a moderately large area with two distinct paths (it’s another circle, where you can opt to go clockwise or counter-clockwise), but nothing new to see and little to find. In the lower-left corner is a chest for a non-member.


North of that is a Level Icon for Lora. Monkeys, Slimes, Wizards, Shadows and Dark Knights all reappear along the way.


The right-hand path just has another non-member chest.


I could blow up these rocks to get to the north side of the river, but there are lots of bridges and there’s nothing noteworthy to retrieve up there, anyway.

(The abundance of bridges implies there were more man-made settlements here before this. Perhaps further out frontier towns that were already destroyed by Barius? Or, if the bridges were made of stone, perhaps a much older civilization predating the first game and Barius altogether?)


All in all, a boring interim area.


Then we arrive at the Canyons. There are a lot of Wacky Dwarfs here.


Immediately to the left of the entrance, we can pick up a Level Icon for Kyle. It’s guarded by Tentacle Masses, which still take a ton of hits to defeat.


North of the entrance is a non-member chest.


You can’t fall into these holes, by the way. They’re just scenery. Makes the place feel more dangerous, though.


I got a ton of Magic Potion drops from the Wizards and Tentacle Masses here. (Which is good—there aren’t any Houses of Healing for a while yet.)


Continuing north reveals another non-member chest.


I blow these rocks with the THUNDER ROD to save myself a walk around.

These Jumping Ticks are new. They leap up into the air and arc towards you, and can survive a few hits.


At the end of that path is a Level Icon for Lora.


Shortly followed by a second along the main path.


And one last one for Jude in this little nook.


Just south of there we have a cul-de-sac.




A knight on a quest? Well, we already have one of those, but I’m willing to test-drive a second.


Na Na Na Nanana-na, Nanana-na, G’bye Jude!


Zold is a “Master”, and in practice plays like a low-level DURN with better stats.

His sword range is crap, though he’s strong.


And his Mega Ball is so expensive because it’s not like DURN’s Power Crystal at all—it summons this monster that hits everything on screen. No, I have no idea what that’s supposed to be, but I find it rather horrifying.


As you could probably guess, the two chests right outside his little hiding place are both Level Icons for him. (And lots of speedy Lizardmen, which are very annoying with a tiny sword.)


And the area break is just north of there.


The second part of the Canyons is just like the first. Same monster selection, though they are seriously dense to the ground at this point. Six Tentacle Masses is a really unpleasant time.


Level Icon for DURN.




There are a lot of mini-potion chests here, followed by a Level Icon for Kyle, then some more. I suspect that there’s a level icon for every member you could have at this point—which is everyone.


Followed by another Level Icon for DURN, bringing him up to level 16 (which I think is max level).


Just next to there is the boss teleporter.

Here we have the party. DURN is a fantastic all-rounder, and apparently with this upgrade his Power Crystal becomes free. I hadn’t really been aware of it, but Kyle’s THUNDER ROD has been becoming cheaper with level-ups, too. Everyone’s got a respectable HP total, and while Zold is absurdly underleveled and has terrible reach, his attack power is some of the best.


This is GrimKnight, the last roadblock before Barius. Like Hand-Eye Coordination, there’s no avoiding him. Fortunately, he’s not that bad as bosses in this game go. He has a set pattern of moving back and forth along the top of the screen and flying down at you, which means it’s all a matter of dodging and hitting him where you can.


A little THUNDER ROD…


A few arrows…


Some Mega Ball…


And a lot of stabbing, and he goes down, leaving a Fairy Tear behind.


The second teleporter here leads to the next area, but we have a detour to make first.

If we hike back to where we first picked up Zold, the GrimKnight’s spirit is waiting to return the other half of the Grim Sword.


With this upgrade, Zold’s range problem is solved.


The arc sword will only fire one at a time (you can slash again before it leaves the screen and you’ll just get a normal sword attack), but it travels far and hits as hard as Zold’s normal attacks.


Next time: The final area, the final battle.

Voting Time! Now that we’ve seen everyone, I can go back and switch characters we’ve dropped back into the party. We can keep the current party of Kyle, Lora and Zold, or we can trade for anyone we left behind. Who will be joining DURN in our final party, to take on Barius?
Pit – Bombs, boomerangs and pointy ears!
Lane – Healing spells, terrible reach and feminism!
Kyle – The zombie with a bone to pick and the mighty THUNDER ROD.
Jude – Incredibly fragile wizard with fireballs and earthquakes at the ready.
Lee – Martial artist with a lot of HP and little else.
Lora – Our winged cupid, with a rapid-fire bow and ability to teleport to safety.
Zold – A variant on DURN, but with sword-beams and Great Balls of Horror.

(Voting will be closed on Sunday night, since I’ll be away for most of the long weekend anyway.)

Take Kyle, Zold, and Lane.

Kyle, Lane, and I dunno who else.

Pit, Jude, and Lee. Give the B team some screen time.

I don't particularly care who goes, but I vote for you to do the boss at your current level. No more level icons for you!

I second this.

As long as Kyle is along for the ride, I don't really care as much about the rest. Zold seems pretty game-breaky, so sure, why not, and I definitely support having at least one of the two female characters in; Lane seems to be carrying the day there, so, again, sure, why not.

They had their chance.

Kyle, Zold, and Lane.

Rolan’s Curse 2, Post #9 – The End


I actually zipped over to this town first before doing anything else—this is Farewell, the real “last town” in the game. Apparently the word of Barius’s revival was premature: It’s currently a work in progress, and we still have a chance to cut it off before he becomes too powerful.


You and me both, man.


There are six people in this town, plus one dog, and only one small house. This town is actually just the hermitage where NedJim met an old man with a thing for turkeys centuries before: A respite, a hideout, and a home for a couple of kooks who await a hero to defeat Barius. The woman and child here are obviously just refugees from a destroyed town or travelling group caught by monsters, because they have no place in this enclave of nutty monks who were awaiting the awakening of the Beast and the foretold coming of a hero to destroy him.


(The reason I did this was 1. I really needed a trip to a Healer and 2. It gives me a post-Canyons place to teleport.)

Anyway, though, the winning party will be Kyle, Zold, and Lane. Which means we’ll need to teleport back and retrieve Lane.


I’m actually going to have Lora fly us all the way back to Virgin so I can check mini-potion chests from the very beginning, and take a very long walk looking for Level Icons. (I realize this is contrary to aturtledoesbite’s vote, but have a special bonus update planned that I suspect he’ll enjoy.)


That means we’ll discover that the very first chest in the game is, in fact, a Level Icon for Zold. Apparently the developers expected us to do exactly this.


There’s a second one on the road between Cadal and Baroa.




In Baroa, we pick up Lane and send Lora packing.