Aecius' Quest 4 - Birdjacked

*An edited, illustrated and narrated playthrough of the game Caves of Qud*

Aecius continues towards the 6 day Stilt, but is interrupted by an...important..mission..maybe..I hardly know anymore.

----------

Thanks to everyone who helped out with this episode!

-Mrs K for her unending support
-And of course, you, for watching, my bearded bastard.

[ECasThat]

I truly was not ready for animation. You really knocked it out of the park this time Krugg.

[herpderp]

Haha, talking to the snapjaw, convincing him to join you... sudden sexy time, LMAO!

[snakelady]

There is a book in this game called "Aphorisms about Birds".

It contains pearls of wisdom like "If asked who's responsible for your misfortunes, blame birds. They neither care, nor can they muster much of a defense."

[mamlechinookclan]

the humor was on point in this episode

[ebheron]

I love how Aecius quest keeps getting progressively goofier

[GrimTEAM]

Great pronunciation of the mayor's name.

[justmutantjed]

The "Doom guy" face when Aecius equipped the jackhammer was fantastic. Really cracked me up!

[alenceon]

The "Fast Travel" navigates you one tile at a time across the world map, and rolls an encounter chance every tile. It stops you at points of interest and sometimes you simply lose your bearings and must explore the local area before you can resume overland travel. The overall effect is more varied encounters.

Also, when you camp, the cooking option cooking lets you throw the plentiful ingredients you gather into meals to get various buffs and powers for the day. Some combinations are really cool!

[Solusphere]

I absolutely love the humour in this series. I was laughing aloud every couple minutes!

Also, those crocs are in fact normally aggressive, but that scaled vest was giving you enough reputation with Unshelled Reptiles to make them peaceful toward you! It's also potentially a great boon in the salt desert.

IF you're interested, a somewhat wordy rundown of how that works is below.

Some creatures are easier to pacify than others, that's what the "Base demeanor" part of the creature description is talking about. Docile = You need at least -600 rep with the creature's faction(s) for them to not attack you. Neutral = You need at least -250 rep. Aggressive = You need at least 250 rep. You can view your current rep (taking into account bonuses from items etc.) for all factions on the Factions tab of the character menu, including details for what transgressions they will and won't tolerate, such as you existing within their line of sight. In the rare case of creatures belonging to two factions, such as Dawngliders (the fire-breathing "birds" you mentioned), you need to meet that rep requirement for BOTH factions for them to be peaceful.

Dawngliders have an Aggressive demeanor and belong to both the Birds and Unshelled Reptiles factions. So, if you can manage to get both Birds and Unshelled Reptiles reputation to 250 or higher, it will largely remove dawngliders as a threat. Not an easy task considering reptiles usually hate your guts from the start of the game, but given that your vest gives you a large bonus to both, it's not outside the realm of possibility, and it would certainly make exploring the salt desert a lot safer!

[NCPHLN]

I love the trippy edits! They totally fit the setting of Qud!

[gwentan]

Note, you just have to find the thing. You've made your way into the lair so that's pretty good already. And it's still just a fish, legendary, but only among other fish. You could just look around til you find it if someone's not carrying it.

[nicholasprepejchal]

You are driving me insane with your artistic liberties, keep it up

[nils-peterwihlney]

Hahahaha! Man, this felt like that bureaucracy house in the Asterix & Obelix movie The Twelve Labours. They were being told to gather all manners of strange-worded formulas, permits, and more to get Form 38. Only replace it with them trying to find a specific person among various birds telling them different directions.

[domv]

Gotta say, the art is spectacular. These are my favorite this episode
6:20 - great face
11:55 - Mario & Sonic Take on me
13:08 -vampire mode
19:37 -caw

[ElgateTKL]

I love how much fun you seem to be having with these animations. I know they must take you a -LOT- longer to do, but they have so much charm and individuality.
I have never played this game. I am now somewhat tempted to play this game but with the same trepidation of wanting to stick my arm into a mysterious dark hole, but I definitely want to keep watching the journey of Aecius to whether the hell he's going.

[HelciusCabral]

I understand the point of avoiding traveling through the map, You get to see one thing or other along the way, on the other hand, you don't interact with the getting lost mechanic, and do spend a looong time just walking

[victorchat]

I just love watching this lil guy try to survive ! The design you chose for Aecius is perfect

[Iron_Codpiece]

Fun tip: put a torch in your thrown item slot, then light and throw it to have a spot of light to fight around!

[BigBoyMemeZone]

7:16 not as relevant rn, but in the later game things in the "trade goods" tab like that beaded bracelet are actually really useful since they let you carry the equivalent of a ton of water in a way more portable form and can be traded to any non-hostile npc to redeem their value. the alternative is either carrying around like a dozen waterskins or having somewhere to leave behind all of your extra stuff when you're travelling

[TTHJJD]

As a point. Cooking is so important for the main story as well as game mechanics, it basically lets you specially craft buffs that you can give yourself before encounters little pasive effects, extra mutations, strange abilities. Disease immunity. Learning what plants and meats do what as you travel along is very good for the future of your character essentially