Grailquest

GrailQuest is a series of gamebooks by J. H. Brennan. The books are illustrated by John Higgins. The stories follow the adventures of a young hero named Pip, who is often called upon by Merlin to right wrongs and save the realm from evil. The series is light in tone and does not take itself seriously, often spoofing the fantasy genre and inserting slapstick humor or nonsensical elements.

The series is mostly set in King Arthur's realm of Avalon, although the fourth volume, Voyage of Terror, takes place almost entirely in ancient Greece, after Merlin's summoning spell goes wrong.

While there were eight total books published in the series, books seven and eight were never published in the United States.

Characters

Titles

  1. The Castle of Darkness (1984)
  2. The Den of Dragons (1984)
  3. The Gateway of Doom (1984)
  4. Voyage of Terror (1985)
  5. Kingdom of Horror (1985)
  6. Realm of Chaos (1986)
  7. Tomb of Nightmares (1986)
  8. Legion of the Dead (1987)

Combat

The rules of GrailQuest are quite simple when compared to current RPGs. The player must roll two six-sided dice and add the results. If the result exceeds 6 (which will happen 58.3% of the time), then the enemy is injured and loses a number of Life Points - how much depends on what the dice shows, as every point over 6 will count as a point of damage. When a character's Life Points reach zero, the character is dead, and when they are at 5, they are knocked out.

If wielding a weapon, the number needed to hit may be lower, and extra damage will usually be inflicted. For instance, Excalibur Junior hits on a roll of 4 (hitting 91.7% of the time) and provides a bonus 5 points of damage.

There is no defence roll, but damage is reduced by a set amount by any armor the character is wearing.

Initiative is determined by an initial, opposed roll where the highest roll gets the first attack. From then on, the character and the enemy take turns to attack. Surprise is sometimes involved (for example, in Gateway of Doom, a giant spider gets first strike automatically due to Pip being in its home territory).

If the character dies, the player must go to section 14, which describes his afterdeath and tells him to calculate his Life Points again. Merlin then resurrects Pip, who has to start from the beginning of the adventure again - although some books will only require him to start from a certain point, such as Gateway of Doom allows Pip to restart at the beginning of the Ghastly Kingdom of the Dead, or Realm of Chaos allows him to start from the beginning of a certain location. However, all previously killed enemies remain dead, and any treasure the player found is gone for good. (In some books, killed enemies return to life with half the Life Points they had the first time around.)

Magic spells

In some of the books, Merlin provides Pip with magic spells. In the first book, Pip has only two spells - ten firefingers (lightning bolts) and two powerful fireballs. The firefinger lightning bolts hit automatically for a straight 10 points of damage, while the fireballs score a massive 75 points of damage each, but require a 6 or better on two dice or else they miss completely.

Pip's First Spell Book

In the second book, Merlin provides Pip with a spell book. This provides Pip with more spells of various uses in and out of combat. Pip also receives ten new firefingers (different from the firefingers on the previous book) and two new fireballs. If the player has finished the first book, he can keep any unspent spells from the previous book, and also the dragonhide jacket, which would otherwise be unavailable.

Pip's use of magic is limited by three rules that must be adhered to at all times. First, every spell thrown costs three Life Points whether it is cast successfully or not. Second, no spell can be thrown more than three times in any given adventure (and once thrown, it is used whether or not it is successfully cast). And third, no spell thrown is successfully cast unless a 7 or better is rolled on two dice.

Pip's Second Spell Book

In the third book, Merlin provides Pip with a new spell book. When Pip wonders why this second spell book is shorter than the first one, Merlin tells Pip that spell books require a great deal of research and development, making them quite expensive, and he is not made of money. These spells follow the same three rules of magic described in the second book.

Spell books, Firefingers, Fireballs, the dragonhide jacket and even E.J. are not available in the fourth book. Both spell books are also unavailable in books five and six; in the former case because Merlin has run out of time, and in the latter because no magic will work on account of the curse on Camelot.

Running Jokes

External links