SI: Problem talking to Chaos Hierophant

[Infernal Catfish]

I haven't seen a topic about this problem yet, so I am posting it here.

I am at the point in the game where you are supposed to go to the temple of Enthusiasm and use the spell "Summon Shade" to talk to the Chaos Hierophant, but it is not working out. I checked with a walkthrough, and supposedly you can do it right after getting out of the serpent road. I think it may be a problem with Exult, but I could be wrong. Anyone else have this problem?

Oh, in case it is relevant, I am running Exult v. 1.0 under Win XP.

[Neutronium Dragon]

Do you have the Eye of the Serpent from the Tolerance temple? It is required in order to make the spell work.

(As it's a common mistake, I should add: The Eye that you obtain from the Isle of Crypts is not a viable substitute.)

If you do have the right item, try casting the spell in different places around the garden. Unfortunately, I can't remember exactly where in that area the right body is.

Neutronium Dragon

[Infernal Catfish]

I just tried what you said, and I found a body not only in the garden, but also in the area that looks like a checkerboard, with all the skeletons. Unfortunately, neither one worked...

[Infernal Catfish]

Okay, just to see, I decided to turn on Archwizard mode just so I could cover the whole temple in Summon Shade spells. It worked nowhere. And, yes, I have the correct eye (the glowing blue one I obtained from the guy holding the key for him).

In the walkthrough I have, it also says that the ghost likes to hang out at (71S, 52E). Unfortunately, the teleport system in Exult does not use coordinates, but instead a map. Where on the map is this located?

Speaking of coordinates and such, what exactly does the magic compass do? Everytime I try to use it, it just makes the "spell failed" sound.

[wjp]

I just tried it myself, and I didn't have any problems. I got the 'eye of the serpent' (glowing blue stone) from Sethys' body, used the Serpent Gates to travel to the Temple of Enthusiasm, and cast Summon Shade immediately when I arrived.

(As soon as I cast the spell the Chaos Hierophant started a conversation; I didn't have to start it myself)

[Infernal Catfish]

I did the exact same thing, and it failed. I even went so far as to place the stone in my weapon hand, and still to no avail. Damn, how come I'm the only one in the world with this problem? Any "cheap" way to bypass it?

[wjp]

Can you send me a savegame? (One where you have the stone and are at the right spot)

[Infernal Catfish]

Done. I sent it to the address in your profile.

[wjp]

For some weird reason, the corpse in the far NE of the garden there has quality 0. In my game, it has quality 13. (And this is what the usecode checks for)

I'd quickly change the quality in your savegame and email it back to you, but unfortunately my exult/exult_studio combo crashes when I try to edit an object

[InfernalCatfish]

Is there anyway you could just tell me how to do it? Keep in mind, I never tinkered with exult before. Is this something that you need 1.1.x for?

[wjp]

Yes, you need a recent 1.1.x for exult studio.


One thing I just noticed: the quality is set to 0 after you talk to the Hierophant. Could it be that you already accidentally talked to him before that savegame?

[InfernalCatfish]

I can't recall doing so. Is there anyplace else he appears, whether by bug or design?

Besides, everyone is still acting like I didn't talk to him over at Monk's Isle.

What is it that the Hierophant tells you to do? Maybe I should just try to do it...

[wjp]

If you cast Summon Shade at the right spot and then run away really really fast you could avoid speaking to the Hierophant.


In the original you could talk to the Chaos Hierophant in the gunpowder maker's building on the way to the Mint. Not sure if you could do that in Exult 1.0 too.

[InfernalCatfish]

"If you cast Summon Shade at the right spot and then run away really really fast you could avoid speaking to the Hierophant."

I wish that was the case, but what basically happened was that I exited the serpent road, immediately cast the spell, and it made the black cloud over my head and the "spell failed" noise.

And, damn, my memory is failing me. Which town are you speaking of with the gunpowder maker's building and the mint?

[wjp]

you can get to the gunpowder building by going to the Sleeping Bull and follow the coast to the north. The building is somewhere around where the coast turns east.

[wjp]

Do you have a savegame a little earlier in the game, btw? I'm kind of curious when (and why) the quality was reset from 13 to 0. An earlier savegame may give a hint.

[InfernalCatfish]

I think I have already been to the gunpowder maker's. I don't think he is there, but I will try again.

As for the savegames, they are on their way. There is three of them.

[InfernalCatfish]

Just went to the gunpowder shop. The only ghosts that are there are the ones that attack you.

[InfernalCatfish]

Okay, so I just downloaded and installed Exult Studio, along with 1.1 of course. So now how would I change the body so that I can talk to the CH?

[InfernalCatfish]

Never mind, I just figured out how, but I ran into the same problem you did when I tried to change the quality to 13, which is that Exult crashed out. I wonder why that is...

[wjp]

In all three saves that you sent me the quality is still 13.

The only thing I can think of is that the first Summon Shade you cast there did reset the quality, but the Hierophant for some reason didn't start a conversation with you.

[wjp]

I just fixed the problem in ExultStudio that caused the crash when setting the quality. The next snapshot should contain the fix.

[wjp]

On second thought, I'm not sure there are snapshots of the current GTK+2 version of ExultStudio. So I fixed your savegame and emailed it.

[Kennedy]

When you cast "summon shade" don't you also have to click on the corpse of the shade you want to summon after you cast it?

[wjp]

No, when you cast Summon Shade near the corpse it automatically summons the ghost.

[Achile Dragon]

That's right, if and only if you don't talk to shade in gunpowder shop

Achile

[InfernalCatfish]

Well, the fix worked out, wjp. Thanks for all your work!