Presents an Unofficial Guide to: Planescape: Torment By Samuel Brown Baker, II Brought to you by: Introduction This is not a complete walkthrough of Planescape: Torment. Short of playing the game several times as different classes, exhaustively going through every dialog path with every possible set of stats, spending months of time to do so, there’s no way to do that. This is how I played through the game, step by step. I won't even say it is the best way. I sometimes missed and forgot things and had to come back to them. So do what you want to do, play how you want to play. It's your game. The conversation paths that I took playing the game are presented here as a narrative and will not necessarily match the choices on screen or the responses word for word and frequently differ in tense. They are also truncated and condensed where I could do so without spoiling the flow of the tale. However in every case where a conversational choice is made I included key phrases so that someone reading along could easily tell which path I followed. There are conversations that took place that I did not include because they offered no new information or experience, or were short and without branches. Planescape is the most amazing computer role-playing game I've ever had the pleasure of playing. In many respects I feel it is the first CRPG that is really worthy of the name. I found myself thinking about how I felt about people and actions in the course of play, being drawn further into the game and the persona of my character the longer I played. Planescape became a personal experience to me, as I suspect it has to most of those who have played the game. The characters seem real and players’ actions seem real with consequences that make sense. If we are good or bad, choose to side with law or chaos it is because we come to feel that way as we work through the game and not because the designers force us. I've been playing computer games for nearly twenty years and Ps:T is perhaps the finest ©2000 All Rights Reserved game I've ever played of any type. I salute Interplay and Black Isle for their efforts. Sincerely, V’Ger Suggestions for Character Creation and Development There just aren't enough points to go around, so you'll have to make some tough decisions. If I were starting again I would raise my wisdom to 18 because of the large experience point bonus and the additional dialog options that open up. Nothing else is as clear. Putting your strength at 18 puts a fighter in a good spot for when they get to level 7. It takes 5 points, either through levels or in the creation screen to raise your strength from 18 to 18/00, but if you are a fighter when you first take a character to level 7, your strength will automatically move up to 19 from 18, essentially giving you 5 stat points for free. High strength will also let you bash in locked doors and containers that don't require a specific key. Putting so many points into strength and wisdom only leaves you 3 points for other stats. I put mine in intelligence and let constitution, dexterity, and charisma fend for themselves, but you might want to choose differently. A high charisma (14+) will let you succeed in certain dialog options, for example. Charisma is the least critical stat at the start because it can be raised once you become a mage by using the Friends spell and there are people and one faction that will boost it further, as well as tattoos available at Fell's Tattoo Parlor. Once I had the money I bought several charisma tattoos and put them on before bartering or talking to someone important. You do need a charisma of 14 or more to get Stale Mary to do something for you in the Dead Nations, which I passed by. ©2000 All Rights Reserved Whatever way appeals to you: fighter, thief or mage you should level up as a fighter first for every level except the 7th and then change to a thief after you reach level 9 as a fighter to reach level 10 as a thief. This will maximize your hit points. Fighters get 1d10 for each level they rise through 9. When they reach level 10 and on they only get an additional 3 while thieves still get 1d6 hit points when they go from level 9 to 10. After level 10 the fighter gets more hit points, but you may want to stick to your preferred class; it all depends on how narrowly you want to focus. Specialization Here's the straight dope: You want to reach levels 7 and 12 first as the same class because of the specialization bonuses you get at those levels. At level 7 you get a bonus of +1 to the primary stat for your class. For fighters you also get the option to use 4 proficiency slots for one weapon. Checking into Fell's you'll also find a new tattoo specific to your class boosting your stats and adding additional abilities. Now here's the catch. If you're a different class when you reach level 12 than you were at level 7 you only get +1 to your primary stat for that class, so if you were a fighter and then a thief you would get +1 to strength at level 7 and +1 to dexterity when you reach level 12 as a thief. On the other hand, if you hit levels 7 and 12 with the same class the 12 level bonuses are really nice. For a fighter at level 12 you get +1 strength, +1 con, +3 maximum hit points and can now use 5 proficiency slots for one weapon class, not to mention the tattoo at Fell's which gives +3 to armor class, +3 to strength and +9 maximum hit points. This is a big reward. The rewards for the other two classes are equally impressive. ©2000 All Rights Reserved Class Switching In order to become a mage you need to talk to Mebbeth in Ragpicker’s Square. That's also where you'll find Ratbone who can train you as a thief. Once you have seen them and been trained you can switch back and forth from class to class by talking to Dak'kon and Annah. Annah can change you to a thief (or fighter?) and Dak'kon will change you to a fighter or a mage. You can do this at any time, even in combat. For hit points and specialization the only class that counts is the one you're at when you first reach that level. If you are a fighter the first time you reach level 6 you get the usual 1d10 hit points. If you were a 6th level thief first, then you'd only get 1 hit point when you reached level 6 as a fighter. My feeling is that the best path is to go to each level from 1-9 as a fighter, then get to 10 as a thief, and then go back to fighter for level 12. That gives you the maximum number of hit points and I found that having the extra proficiency slots and fighting abilities of a fighter made for a very powerful character. My other choice would be to hit 7 and 12 first as a mage. You can't be a weapon master (5 proficiency slots used for one weapon), but the tattoos for a mage really let you load up on first and second level spells. But that doesn't mean those are the only right choices. Do what you will enjoy and if it isn't the "optimum" solution, so what? We're doing this to entertain ourselves. Save before talking to any named character. You can fall into a conversational trap and close off other branches or completely alienate another character, turning them hostile. ©2000 All Rights Reserved Walkthrough [Note: throughout the walkthrough, I’ve noted experience and character point gains in parentheses. (250) means a gain of 250 points.] [This walkthrough does not include conversations with generic characters such as dabus, villagers, collectors and so forth. They may give you information, but as a rule it’s nothing you won’t find out in more detail from the named characters.] [Be sure to read your journal. There’s a lot of information in there, some of which you might not have caught when you were talking to people. The notes help flesh out the quests and give more detail on what you’ve done and need to do. And, of course, the quest section can keep you on track.] Prelude OK, self. Here we go again. If you're reading this, things are even more screwed up than they were last time so keep your wits about you and your head attached. It's going to be a bumpy ride. One thing, this guy, I should say skull, Morte. It's OK to trust him. He yaps a lot, but he knows useful things and you'll need him to keep you on track, since you keep forgetting stuff when you die. When you can't figure out what to do next and even reading this doesn't help, try talking to Morte. He usually knows what's up and needs doing.