The Warlock of Firetop Mountain: Final Thoughts

Given that The Warlock of Firetop Mountain was my introduction to fantasy gaming as a whole, you'll understand that this is by no means an unbiased review.  I have nothing but love for it.  I killed my first orc in Firetop Mountain!  That said, I'm not blind to its flaws, and it certainly does have some.

Probably the biggest is how disjointed the setting feels.  There is some sort of structure to Firetop Mountain: orcs near the entrance, tougher monsters further in, lycanthropes near the river, undead after that, then the maze, then the warlock.  Many of the encounters are interesting, but they don't connect much at all.  This has a benefit, in that you never really know what's coming next (unless of course you're re-playing the book), but it also makes Firetop Mountain feel a bit unreal.

Structurally it's pretty simple.  The dungeon design (at least before the river) is basically a straight line, with a few branches here and there.  It wouldn't hold up for a game of Dungeons & Dragons, but it works fine for the purpose of the book.  It's obviously designed for replay value.  You need three keys at the end to unlock the warlock's treasure chest, but there's no guarantee that you will find them.  You will probably even find some fakes.  It's unlikely that the reader will complete it on the first try, but that's fine.  This isn't a gamebook that rewards intelligent decision-making; you can simply fail by choosing to go left instead of right.  What it does reward is persistence, mapping, and exploration over the course of multiple read-throughs.

From a structure standpoint, the Maze of Zagor is probably the most impressive thing in the book.  It's not a particularly difficult maze when you look at a map of it, but the way it's written makes it disorienting unless you map it out carefully, and the teleport traps strewn about make that even more difficult.  Sadly it's also the most boring and frustrating part of the book, and I've already mentioned how I used to get stuck here a lot as a kid, going around in circles.

The confrontation with the warlock is also quite well done, with a number of fun options.  You can duke it out with swords, if you feel like a very tough battle.  You can drink a Potion of Invisibility and fight him that way, or you can lessen his power by burning his enchanted cards.  Or you can do what I did and go for the insta-kill by using the Eye of the Cyclops.  Gamebooks are always improved when there are multiple paths to victory.

In terms of game-design, The Warlock of Firetop Mountain hits a good balance.  There are some tough fights, but most can be avoided.  Most importantly, the book can be completed by a character regardless of Skill, Stamina and Luck scores.  The Iron Cyclops is the toughest unavoidable combat, but I have scraped through that fight with a Skill 7 character before.  At this point in the series, the claim that any adventurer can make it through is still a true one.

Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone apparently split the writing of the book, with Ian designing the first half and Steve designing everything after the river (and rewriting Ian's text to mesh their styles).  Generally, the encounters written by Steve are more interesting, as he provides the player with more options.  Ian's half of the dungeon has a greater variety of encounters, but many of them are simple combats; you will often find yourself ambushed by a foe, with no recourse but to do battle.  The way the first half was structured allowed for more monsters and encounters to be included, and on the whole I feel like it has more moments that stuck with me from my childhood.  Steve's half comes through on atmosphere; there is some creepy stuff going on.  But the maze, while well-designed, can be tedious.  I give the points to Ian, just barely.

I also need to give props to Russ Nicholson.  In later years his style gets a lot thicker and busier, but here I love the thin line-work.  It's brilliant, atmospheric stuff, loaded with detail.

The Warlock of Firetop Mountain is hardly the best of the Fighting Fantasy series; the authors are obviously still figuring out how the format works.  But it is very solid, well-designed and fun, with great illustrations.  It may be a little too much of a "funhouse dungeon" for some, but that happens to be something that I enjoy.  Hell, it's the book that turned me into a fantasy gamer for life.

THE SCORE

It should be taken as no great achievement that I completed this book on my first attempt; I basically have the whole thing memorised.  The dice were the only things that could stop me, and those came up in my favour.  I can mark The Warlock of Firetop Mountain down as won on the first attempt, but foreknowledge was a great help.  The same can be said for most of the early books; it won't be until House of Hell that I start to have trouble when it comes to picking the correct path.  As for dice rolls, they're a different story...  I'll be fine until Deathtrap Dungeon, I think, though City of Thieves could pose a problem.  That's some way off, though.  I'll be back soon with my first attempt at book 2, The  Citadel of Chaos.

ADDENDUM - S.T.A.M.I.N.A. RATING

As outlined in my final post on Island of the Lizard King, I've started rating the gamebooks I play in seven different categories, which gives me a final score I can use to compare them.  So now I'm going back and rating the books I played earlier in the blog.   Here goes!

Story & Setting: The story is bare bones but effective: there's little more basic in a fantasy RPG than killing an evil wizard.  As for the setting, it's heavy on standard D&D fantasy tropes, and there are a number of things that don't make sense.  It's the first book in the series though, it probably should be heavy on the cliches.  It also gets extra points because Firetop Mountain is truly iconic.  Rating: 5 out of 7.

Toughness: This is a really well-balanced adventure.  Any gamebook that can be finished regardless of your stats is going to get extra points from me, and Warlock manages to do that while still remaining a challenge.  It's a little easy once you know the correct path, but a big part of the challenge is finding that path over multiple games.  Rating: 5 out of 7.

Aesthetics: Firetop Mountain has a strong atmosphere, and enough weird, random elements that it maintains an air of mystery.  The Russ Nicholson artwork is definitive for the Fighting Fantasy series.  Rating: 6 out of 7.

Mechanics: This is the book that defined the mechanics of Fighting Fantasy, and it utilises the rules well.  On its own, I would probably give the Fighting Fantasy rules system a 4: it's functional, but a bit too reliant on the player rolling high stats.  I'm going to bump Warlock up a point, because it uses those rules well.  I like the restrictions on eating provisions, and I like that the magic swords affect Attack Strength and not Skill.  There's an attention to the rules paid here that doesn't always carry forward to the rest of the series.  Rating: 5 out of 7.

Innovation & Influence: As the first in the Fighting Fantasy series, and the gamebook that started the craze, I have to give this one top marks.  Rating: 7 out of 7.

NPCs & Monsters: Most of the monsters here are the old D&D standards, but they're used memorably; there are a few throwaway encounters, particularly in the middle section from the portcullis to the river, but for the most part the encounters are well done.  The other characters aren't deep, but they are well-defined, and the book has a great villain in Zagor.  Admittedly he doesn't get much personality here, which knocks this down a bit.  Rating: 5 out of 7.

Amusement: Given that this might well be my favourite book of all time, and that I still enjoy it after nearly twenty years, I have to give it top marks here.  Rating: 7 out of 7.

In addition to the above scores, I have an ill-defined bonus point which is really only there so I can get a round score out of 50.  Basically, if I love a book it gets the point, and Warlock definitely deserves it.  Adding the scores above, plus the bonus point I get a score of 41, which doubled gives the book a STAMINA Rating of 82.

STAMINA RATING: 82 out of 100.

Next: The Citadel of Chaos!