Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura: Difference between revisions

* [[MacGyvering]]: You'll do this a lot if you play as a scientist.

* [[Magic From Technology]]/[[Clarke's Third Law]]: Technology in this setting is capable of doing things so fantastic that it's essentially indistinguishable from magic in many ways (though magic itself is still a separate, distinct thing). A healing salve that closes gashes and mends broken bones in literally seconds? A staff that fries your foes with pinpoint-accurate bolts of lightning? A ring that gives you limited [[Super Speed]] when wearing it? A chemical concoction that can ''bring people back from the dead''? All of this and more can be yours through the wonders of [[Steampunk|late 19th Century]] [[For Science!|SCIENCE!]]

** A hilarious and quickly-tiresome conversation occurs every time you try to buy a train ticket, basically boiling down to "Are you a wizard?", "Are you sure you're not a wizard?", "You might be a wizard, if-" and quickly turns out to be completely redundant, since the conductor has a device that detects hazardous levels of magic before letting you board a train anyway. Conversely, simply being inside a train station instantly lowers your magicka stat.

*** And by "device", we mean that he holds up his watch and checks so it doesn't start running backwards when you come near.

* [[The Magocracy]]: The Elven Council in the Age of Legends.

* [[Master of Unlocking]]: There are two ways of becoming this. Either max out the Lockpick skill, or learn the Unlocking Cantrip spell with 100 Magicka. Being seen by guards while picking a lock will cause them to attack, so the former option is best for stealth, since all spells raise awareness levels (because they're flashy). The latter is better for repeat business (say, if you manage to unlock a shop's inventory, or plan to squat a house for storage), since a lock unlocked by magic will never be relocked.

* [[Multiple Endings]]: In the manner of ''[[Fallout]]''.

* [[Murder, Inc.]]: The Molochean Hand.

** [[Highly-Visible Ninja]]: Played straight and averted. Unless you pickpocket every person (barring [[Random Encounters]], who are quite open about their intentions) you talk to, you don't know who's in, but they are easily identified by the necklace once you do.

* [[Nice Hat]]: A bullet deflecting top hat.

* [[Nice Job Breaking It, Hero]]: If you have the Bane of Kree in your party at the end of the game and gave him the [[Infinity+1 Sword]] you found in the same area, an ending sequence has him waging war upon all of Arcanum, for which you are blamed. While it would seem obvious what effect bringing him back would have, there's no real dialogue or even a hint as to how to trigger this unless you have a specific follower in your party. Contrast with the half-man, half-dragon Kraka-Tur, who will explicitly threaten to do this should you release him yet won't (no doubt being a coward dissuaded him from causing trouble with you around).

* [[Nietzsche Wannabe]]: It is more or less disputable what {{spoiler|Kerghan}} is or is only under certain circumstances. Least doubt should be about him being a [[Well-Intentioned Extremist]], who pulls his conclusions from a [[Nietzsche Wannabe]]s point of view. {{spoiler|Kerghan}} does not see a reason to live, which is nihilistic, but on the other hand wants to solve this problem in a constructive way, which would be the characteristic of an [[Anti-Nihilist]]. But if he was anti-nihilistic, he would do good after he understands his fallacies. He accepts then to be vanished forever, which is a nihilist action again. The existence of this specific ending also leaves doubt seeing {{spoiler|Kerghan}} as an [[Omnicidal Maniac]] or [[Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds]]. The possibility of convincing {{spoiler|Kerghan}} that he is a [[Nietzsche Wannabe]], makes him one, if the player does so.

** [[The Other Wiki]] states that technology is liked by humans because the effects of machines are permanent.

* [[The Obi-Wan]]: Elder Joachim to Virgil.

* [[One-Gender Race]]: An in-game reason was made up to explain what amounted to space limitations. Dwarf women are rare (you never see one in-game, and bringing up the issue with male dwarfs can somehow [[Berserk Button|trigger homicidal rage]]), while gnome and halfling women apparently suffer from [[Stay in the Kitchen]] syndrome.

** Don't forget Half-Ogres, but it is never explained why in universe.

* [[One Size Fits All]]: Averted. Body armor comes in three sizes: medium for humans, elves, orcs, half-elves and half-orcs, small for dwarves, gnomes and halflings, and large for ogres and half-ogres. Also, ogres cannot wield pistols or other small firearms because their hands are too big.

* [[One Stat to Rule Them All]]: Dexterity and weapon speed, in ''both combat'' options. In ''Arcanum'', number of hits simply outweighs raw damage by a huge amount.

** Played straight to the extent that female dwarves are simply a rumour dwarves never discuss (and your player can't be one), so all dwarves to be found are bearded males.

** Averted with city dwarves, who eschew the old clan customs, and are more proud of their city of origin than their dwarvishness. They still don't talk about their females.

** [[Screw You, Elves]]: Unless you are totally unwilling to put up with her shit, in which case it's time to start killing (or pickpocket her).

** [[Technical Pacifist]] Runs are a bit easier: just build up your Charisma until you can sign up a bunch of henchmen to do your fighting for you.

* [[Peninsula of Power Leveling]]: One early [[Sidequest]] involves the discovery and destruction of a one-way dimensional portal spawning an [[Alliteration|endless array of enemies]]. Destroying the portal allows you to complete the quest, but it's actually possible to just sit outside the portal and kill the not-quite-endless swarms until they simply run out. You'll jump about twenty to thirty levels for your trouble, in a game where the [[Character Level|Level]] [[Cap]] is only fifty.

* [[Point Build System]]: ''Arcanum'' has one of the most flexible character creation systems in all of gaming.

* [[Protagonist Without a Past]]: Of course, if you take the trait "child of a hero", the game claims that everyone knows your father is famous, but no one will acknowledge it (although they will tend to react more positively to you).

* [[Purely Aesthetic Gender]]: Averted. Females of any race (where applicable) get gain one point of Endurance and lose one point of Strength. The maximum possible value for a stat is 12 added to the starting value from race and background, and hitting 20 in a status gives you bonus (for example, doubling damage for strength) on top of normal effects for increasing stats, so females can't get that bonus without an artificial boost. Gender also affects dialog, though there's only a few times this is more then just sir/ma'am pronouns etc, such as the Gentleman's Club in Tarrant.

* [[Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil]]:

** Half-Orcs are subject to a lot of [[Fantastic Racism]], partly because most people assume that at some point in their ancestry, a male orc violated an unwilling human woman.

* [[Rock Beats Laser]]: Averted. A few decades prior to the beginning of the game, the nations of Cumbria and Tarant went to war. The mighty army of the kingdom of Cumbria, renowned for their skill at arms, consisted mainly of mounted knights and heavily-armored swordsmen. The poorly-trained conscript military of Tarant consisted of riflemen, artillery, and machine-gun teams. The battle is ''exactly'' as one-sided as it sounds. The Cumbrians only ever won any battles through ambushes in dense terrain, and these were few and far between. By 1885 (when the game starts), Cumbria is a decaying, run-down shadow of its former self, while Tarant is thriving.

* [[Science Hero]]: You can play a technologist character yourself, but there are straight examples among NPCs as well.

* [[Selective Memory]]: Our hero was going from the second largest city on the continent to the largest one, but does not remember where these cities are located. All our hero has is a map which shows the major topographical features of the continent, but none of the settlements. The player character is supposedly from a different continent which makes their lack of geographical knowledge about Arcanum understandable.

* [[Shout-Out]]:

** Several to ''[[Fallout]]''. You find a power-armor-wearing man outside of the secret mage city. He was sent to find a water crystal but now they won't let him back in because he's been contaminated by the outside world.

** There's also a two-headed cow in Parnell's museum of curiosities. [[Lampshaded]] when your character claims to have seen one somewhere else.

** The weapon you retrieve for Throwing mastery is the [[Krull|Glaive]] in all but name.

** Evil Virgil tells Joachim [[Star Wars|"Your powers are weak, old man."]]

** A sidequest involves the player in an investigation around prostitutes murdered and disemboweled in a district called "Whythechurch". An obvious shout-out to [[Jack the Ripper]], the "murderer of Whitechapel".

** If you can recruit the demon Gorgoth as an ally, he will sometimes scream [[Austin Powers|"GET IN MY BELLY!"]] during fights.

* [[Skippable Boss]]: The end boss can be talked into letting you kill him without resistance, again echoing ''[[Fallout]]''.

* [[Small Name, Big Ego]]: Magnus, who tries too hard to be a traditional dwarf when it's apparent to all around him that he's not, and gets defensive when called on it. He does at least get better about it over the course of the game, and finally admits to it when the dwarven king himself starts prodding.

* [[Sniper Pistol]]: One of these can be made, although the trope is played with a bit in that the resulting firearm is designed and built specifically as a sniping weapon rather than just being an ordinary pistol with a scope bolted on.

* [[Space Jews]]: The gnomes are small people with large noses and exceptional prowess at handling the money who own a large part of the industry and banking. Moreover, they've been subject to much prejudice because of these.

* [[Spot of Tea]]: Debating the merits of green tea over earl grey is required to recruit a certain [[Cultured Badass]] as a follower.

* [[Stealth Expert]]: You may play as one, which is of particular importance for [[Pacifist Run|pacifists]] and [[For Massive Damage|backstabbers]]. Why, you can hide in an open field if you're good enough!

* [[Take a Third Option]]: In the Boil, you have the option of joining one of two gangs to defeat the other. To get the good ending for that section, you have to wipe out both gangs. This is actually a quest in itself, but you could be forgiven for never actually receiving that quest since it's a bit difficult to find.

** Most of the quests in this game have a third option that can be taken in lieu of the "correct" one. For example, one quests tasks you with retrieving a gem from a shrine, only to be told that making any noise (i.e. failing to Sneak) will summon a bunch of monsters to kill you. There's nothing to stop you from just walking up, murdering the hell out of the monsters when they appear, then taking the gem at your leisure. Quests only ever give you an objective, they never say it has to be completed a certain way. That said, quest-givers do occasionally reward you better if you do it according to their instructions.

* [[Third Person Person]]: Ristezze in Shrouded Hills, the first town you come to.

* [[Too Awesome to Use]]: Magic Scrolls end up being this to many players. You rarely encounter them lying around, and they cost a lot of money; even the nearly-useless ones. So they just end up sitting there, waiting for "that time" where you'll want that Scroll of Fireflash.