THE SPECTRUM GAMES DATABASE

DARK SCEPTRE

PUBLISHER
Firebird

YEAR
1986

AUTHOR
Mike Singleton

CATEGORY
Strategy

CONTROLS
Keyboard, Kempston. The keyboard controls are redefinable.

INSTRUCTIONS
Tranquil year after tranquil year, the Islands of the Western Sea
slumbered. Then, on the wings of a winter storm, came ships from
the north, tossed and broken by the icy seas. The Lord of the
Isles smiled upon the Northlanders, harboured them and gave them
shelter.

Then came the spring. The Lord of the Isles offered strong, oaken
ships to the Northlanders, yet they chose not to leave, coveting
the riches of the Western Isles. They drew their swords and
demanded land to make homes upon.

The Lord of the Isles smiled no longer. The Northlanders were too
many for even his enchanted sword of lightning and dragonsfire
to chasten. In secret, fearing more treachery, he gathered the
finest smiths he could muster and bade them forge him a magical
sceptre of terrible power.

Five long years passed, during which the Northlanders grew in
boldness and power. Then the Lord of the Isles summoned the
Northlanders to attend his court. "By the Dark Powers", cried the
Lord of the Isles, "Let the Hounds of Hell harry you to the end
of time itself!"

Upon his words, lightning leapt outwards from the sceptre,
touching each one of the Northlanders with fire. One of the
Northlander warlords, maddened with pain, leapt upon the rostrum
where the Lord of the Isles stood.

"Powers of Death, I call upon thee!", cried the Northlander.
"Save us and we will serve you forever!". Now the darkness that
had gathered around the sceptre twisted into long fingers that
reached out to touch the burning, writhing Northlanders, soothing
their pain yet at the same time causing their flesh to become
shadowy and vague, glowing faintly like the embers of a fire.

The Lord of the Isles had made a terrible mistake. Seeking to
destroy the Northlanders, instead he had given them a strange and
evil power. The sceptre had touched the Northlanders with its
dark force. No more were they mere men; now they were Lords of
the Shadow, gripped by evil and ruled by the Dark Sceptre that
had created them The Isles of the Western Sea would know no peace
until the Sceptre was destroyed and with it, the evil of the
Shadow Lords.

You control a company of warriors, your task being to find and
destroy the Dark Sceptre. When (if?) you find it, you must beware
- its dark powers may destroy yoou if you have not taken the
proper precautions. What those precautions are you will have to
discover on your quest.

To hinder you, the computer controls other companies of warriors.
Most of these are neutral towards you but the Shadow Lords
(coloured red) are implacable enemies. The other companies may
become friends or enemies, depending on the events that take
place during the game. You can recruit new members to your own
company, but you can also lose warriors by desertion to other
companies.

The action takes place on the top three quarters of the screen,
with the bottom quarter being given over to a status display. The
features on this are, from left to right:

1) Control options - WATCH, SCAN, CHECK, PLAN and QUIT.
2) A scrolling map, showing a close-up of your warrior's
position.
3) Your warrior's rank, location, object carried and the date.
4) A time-of-day indicator.

The control options control the basic functions of the game:

i) WATCH - Allows you to watch a fight. If you hear the sound
of clashing metal, then one of your warriors is in
battle. Select this option to WATCH the combat.

ii) SCAN - Allows you to see a full map of the Isle. The
positions of each of your (alive) warriors is shown
in yellow. The white square indicates the position
of the currently selected warrior.

iii) CHECK - Allows you to check the personality of the
current warrior and the last orders he was
given.

iv) PLAN - Allows you to plan your orders for the current
warrior. A question and answer session happens in
the viewing window until your orders are complete. If
you select the GO TO command then the map will appear
in the viewing window. You must move the cursor to
the place that you want to go (you may only select
junctions) and press fire.


All play in Dark Sceptre is indirect; like a true commander, you
have no direct control over your warriors' movements. They use
their own skills and personalities in carrying out your orders.
Nonetheless, their strategic thinking is poor and without your
commanding intelligence, they cannot complete their quest. You
must choose your orders carefully, bearing in mind the nature and
personality of the warrior in question.

To give orders to a warrior, first get him in view. Then select
PLAN - this enables you to "contact" the warrior. He will tell
you his current orders and you can then change his orders or
issue further ones. You can select from a large variety of
orders, any of which can be given to any warrior. Some can only
really be carried out by certain warriors, however; the magical
orders, for instance, can only be carried out fully by those with
magical powers.

THE ORDERS: There is a large number of orders available, which
should fit virtually any situation you encounter:

FOLLOW warrior - attach yourself to him as helper
PROTECT warrior - attach yourself to him and guard him in
battle
STALK warrior - go wherever he goes, a few paces behind
HARASS warrior - follow and get in his way as much as
possible
AVOID warrior * - stay out of his way
FIND warrior * - find him and do no more
KILL warrior * - find and kill him

BEWITCH warrior * - find and magically turn him into your
spy
PETRIFY warrior * - find and magically turn him into stone
CURSE warrior * - find and magically change good qualities
to bad
CHARM warrior * - find and magically recruit him to your
company
RELEASE warrior * - find and magically release him from the
effects of bewitchment, petrification or
cursing

THREATEN warrior * - find and take what he carries by threat
of force
CHALLENGE warrior* - find and recruit him to your company by
theat of force
PERSUADE warrior * - find and recruit him to your company by
persuasion
BRIBE warrior * - find and recruit him to your company by
gift
JOIN warrior * - find him and join his company
GIVE TO warrior * - find and give him what you carry
BEFRIEND warrior * - find him and give him a message pledging
friendship of your company to his
INSULT warrior * - find him and give him a message ending
any friendship of your company to his

WAIT FOR warrior * - wait until he arrives
AMBUSH warrior * - wait until he arrives and then attack
him

TRACK object - find it, do not take it, but follow it if
it is taken elsewhere
GUARD object - find it, do not take it, but let no others
take it
SEEK object - find it but do not take it
TAKE object * - find it and take it but do not use force
GRAB object * - find it and take it by force if necessary
USE object * - find it, take it by force if necessary and
use it

BLOCK place - go to place, stay there and let none pass
DEFEND place - go to place, stay there and let only
friends pass
WAIT AT place - go to place and wait there
GO TO place - go to place

ROAM - wander around at will
WAIT - wait wherever you happen to be

Where "warrior" is marked with an asterisk (*), the order can
also be chosen to refer to "friends", "enemies" or "anyone".
Where "object" is marked with an asterisk, the order can be
chosen to refer to "anything". When an order has been completed,
successfully or not, the warrior will automatically follow his
next order; if he has no further orders, he will go into WAIT
mode. Thralls are simple souls who can only remember one order
at a time; other warriors can remember a number of orders.

RANKS: There are eight basic ranks of warrior - all have the same
body (a programming cheat!) but can be distinguished by their
headwear:

THANE - Wears a crowned helmet. The commander; without
a Thane, the members of your company are more
likely to desert.

MYSTIC - Wears a pointed wizard's mask. Possesses magical
powers.

HERALD - Wears a winged helmet. A messenger and a
fighter.

ASSASSIN - Wears a turban/headscarf. A hunter and a killer.

REAPER - Wears a skull-faced mask. The executioner.
Strikes fear into others.

FOOL - Wears a crown. A charismatic talker, not as
foolish as his name suggests.

SAVAGE - Wears a wolf's head. The wild man of the woods,
tough and resilient

THRALL - Wears a cowl. An underling, a pawn. Being simple
people, thralls do not have complex
personalities - they are however numerous.

Six other companies of warriors are at large. During PLAN mode,
you can specify whether an order is to do with friends or
enemies. The purpose of this is so that you can refer to friends
or enemies in your orders without being long-winded.

However, friendship pledged by a BEFRIEND order is different. If
you attack a pledged friend, you will be marked for the rest of
the game as treacherous and other companies will be wary of you.
To avoid this, you must officially signal the end of the
friendship with an INSULT. This may anger the offended party but
you will still be regarded by others as an honest dealer.

The BEWITCH order turns someone else's warrior into a spy for
your company. Even so, he remains a member of the other company
and behaves as such. You cannot give him orders but you can watch
him as he goes on his travels and see what he does. This can be
a valuable source of information.

You can be kind to others in a number of ways - you can give them
objects, send warriors to join their companies or simply pledge
friendship. In return, they are likely to be kind to you. The
motto is: scratch my back and I'll scratch yours for you.

There are seven teams in total. Their colours are:

UMBRARG'S (the Shadow Lords) - Red
VERDAN'S - Green
TYRIAN'S - Purple
KUANO'S - Cyan
AURIC'S - Yellow
GRISUL'S - Grey
YOUR OWN - White

USEFUL TIPS: Some (possibly) useful information:

1) Only Mystics can successfully CHARM, CURSE, BEWITCH or
RELEASE.

2) You will hear the sounds of any fight which one of your
warriors is involved in, even if it's off-screen. Pressing fire
during WATCH will get you straight to the fight.

3) You will hear a snatch of music whenever any warrior changes
sides, even if he's off-screen. Usually this will be someone
joining your side; if you want to find out who it was, check on
your warrior's orders. Warriors with orders you haven't given
will be the new recruits.

4) Petrified warriors will not move off or take new orders.
However, they will fight if forced to and can kill or be killed.

5) Warriors en garde are either in a fight or about to fight.
They will ignore further orders until the fight is over.

6) No more than one fight is in progress at any one time. This
allows you to keep a better eye on what's happening.

7) Warriors will chivalrously not attack a warrior who is already
in a fight or waiting to fight. This sometimes means you can find
a whole bunch of warriors standing by near a fight, all waiting
their turn to try their luck!

8) The outcome of a fight depends entirely on the qualities of
the two warriors. There is no random element. If both warriors
have exactly the same fighting qualities, the attacker wins.

9) Just setting off to KILL ENEMY or GRAB DARK SCEPTRE without
preparing the way first is simply suicidal!