Armies of Death

While Ian Livingstone tends to follow a pretty fixed formula for his releases, Armies of Death does shake up the usual figthing fantasy system a little.

You play as the commander of a force of troops, out to beat the next big bad which has emerged from the horizon. Gold isn't an issue here, as you start out with a huge amount and aren't really in any real danger of running short. You can recruit additional soldiers along the way, which might come in handy as the final battle puts you through a gauntlet of destruction before testing your troop strength. Fail, and you die. That said, it's not that unforgiving, and I managed to enter the final battle well over the troop minimums. (But well, I was pretty aggressive with recruiting troops and also uh... fudged some dice rolls.)

Still, you'll need way more than a mountain of steel to win this. As this is an Ian Livingstone book, you'll need find all sorts of items and information before the final confrontation with the big bad. Missed something? THEN DIE! You will likely need a few attempts to find the one true path, picking up everything you see and hoping that it'll be the magic item to save you from the dreaded game over. There is also one extremely annoying character who demands a huge laundry list of items for very stupid reasons before giving you the numbers you need to win. Yeah, miss one thing, and you know you'll see a game over down the line.

Anyway, this is an interesting departure from the usual fighting fantasy formula, even if you have to submit yourself to the usual lengthy item checklist to win.