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The Gothic FAQ v1.0
"How to Be a Cheap Ass"
--------------------------------------
By Mochan
created February 4, 2002
last modified February 4, 2002

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cheap adj(1509) 1: at minimum expense
2: gained with little effort
3: obtainable at a low rate of interest
4: STINGY
ass (bef. 12c) 1: any of several hardy gregarious mammals (genus Equus)
that are smaller than the horse and have long ears
2: a stupid, obstinate, or perverse person
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DISCLAIMER
-----------------

This FAQ written while playing Gothic v1.08j

All things written herein were tried and tested using that version only.
If anything does not work for you, it might be the game version. If you
want to get in contact with me for any reason, write the e-mail above but
PLEASE include this tag in your subject line:

[GOTHIC FAQ]

Thank you.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
===============================================================================

DISCLAIMER
TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. Why this FAQ was written
2. How to Be a Cheap Ass
2.1. INFINITE FOOD!
2.2. Free Skin!
3. LEGALESE
4. CREDITS
5. OMAKE!


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1. Why this FAQ was written (Wala lang, bored ako)
===============================================================================

Gothic is a nice little game that is everything the utter sheep
Ultima 9 should have been. Whatever, this game has its problems
but overall it's a good game to play and I do not regret playing
it at all.

However, it is terribly difficult to get a foothold in this game
at the start, be it due to missing mice, devilishly tough enemies,
or whatever. So here I am to help you make the best out of yourself
and if you are having any trouble playing this game at all, you've
come to the right place.

Some things to consider first, though:

1.) This game uses the mouse!!!

I've heard numerous complaints that some people couldn't get the
mouse to work. Rest assured it works. At least on my PC, in my
version. I don't see the cursor though. I've never seen the cursor.
It really feels like a console game, that you have to press up and
down to cycle through menus. Unfortunately, the mouse buttons are
set and you can't reconfigure them, M1 is for "USE" and M2 is for
"JUMP."

That's enough for now. In the future I *may* add a more conventional
"how to play Gothic" portion somewhere over here to help people play
the game, because understandably the interface is... unorthodox to
say the least. But I don't feel like it right now so I'll shut up
right here.

End lecture.



2.) A question from me: How's your game performance? The game slows
down on my machine a bit. I have a Athlon XP1600 and a 32MB GeForce
2 card, I think that's fine, but I only have 128MB RAM. Do you guys
think this is why the game slows down on my rig when lots of people
are on-screen and there's lots of scenery details? I'm using
1024x768x16 at 60% visual range right now, at first I was at
1024x768x32 at 100% without any problem, but as I went along the
game started chugging. Any input?




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2. How to Be a Cheap Ass
===============================================================================

Well, to be honest I don't have too many tricks yet. I've only been
playing the game for two days. But I have found out some nice things
that you might want to know about.


2.1. INFINITE FOOD!

Yes, believe it or not, my cheating genius has exploited a bug in
the game which gives me an unlimited supply of food! This probably
doesn't sound too impressive if you've been playing Nox or something
where food is laughable. But in Gothic food restores life AND acts
as currency in the barter system. In other words, with unlimited
food you're financially set for life, and you need never fear
suffering from wounds again! So what's the secret?

Step 1: Kill a Scavenger or Molerat, easy prey even for a level 0
dweeb (which is what you are at the start)

Step 2: Get the Raw Meat

Step 3: Go to any of the camps and look for a cooking Pan. It's
those grey little things stewing over a fire. Now stand in front
of it it, and it should say "Pan".

Step 4: Open your inventory and select "Raw Meat". Hold the Use
button down, and you should crouch before the pan, as if you
were going to cook the Raw Meat with it.

Step 5: Do NOT press Up or initiate any action, just let go of
the Use button. Now look at your inventory again and look at
your Raw Meat. It's now double the quantity!

Step 6: Repeat. So if at first you have 1 Raw Meat, after this
you will have 2 Raw Meat! Nice. After a while you'll have hundreds
then thousands, I stopped at 60,000+ pieces of Raw Meat, that
should be more than enough to keep you financially and healthily
fit for the rest of the game. And if not, just find another
frying pan.

NOTE: I'm not entirely sure if you can exceed 65,000 pieces, since
games usually use a Short for these quantities, which lets values go
up to some 65,000+. I tried it, nothing happened. I'm just assuming
that's the limit. I was actually surprised it didn't go negative,
which is usually what happens.


2.2. Free Skin!

You actually don't need this trick after learning the Raw Meat trick
above, but it's good for laughs.

Step 1: Learn "How to Skin Reptiles" from Drax or whoever.

Step 2: Go to the Brotherhood swamp camp. Run to the swamp and find
a swampshark.

Step 3: Run close to the shark and have it chase you. Run towards
the Templars. If they stop chasing run back to them and hit them or
just make them chase you again. This can be hazardous but with
practice you can do it.

Step 4: Watch Templar whack Shark and then pick up the skin when
it's dead. That's a free 100 Ore!

Step 5: For fun, lead the shark over to the novices and the Baals
harvesting swampweed, and watch it kill them (if they don't run
away). Hmm, this can get you in trouble finishing some quests, so
don't do it, but it is fun to watch. ^_^

NOTE: This works with any monster actually, but it is quite
dangerous to try it with some enemies (like Snappers, who are
faster than you!)


Okay, those are all the tricks I have right now. Sorry, I've only
been playing for about 15 hours.


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3. LEGALESE
===============================================================================

Please read my Evil Summoner FAQ also available at GameFAQs which
will tell you what you can do with this document. Or you can try
my Counter Strike Tactics FAQ (I think Gamespot calls it the Zen
of Counterstrike, whatever that meams). Do not do anything with
this material until you have read either of the two. Or else. Heh
heh heh.

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4. CREDITS
===============================================================================

To my Internet provider PLDT DSL who finally after months of my cursing,
coaxing, and pestering, finally decided to approve my application and
let me get on the net to upload this for your viewing.

That's it!

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5. OMAKE!
===============================================================================

Since this FAQ is so pathetically short and devoid of content, I think I
will do a mini-review here for your reading (dis)pleasure and to make this
FAQ a bit longer and less embarassing.


Setsuna's silly little Gothic Review:
---

Gothic is a nice little (or big?) RPG which reminds me a lot of Ultima 9.
NO! Do not take that badly. Ultima 9 was crap, but Gothic gets things right
where Ultima 9 messed up big time.

First of all, the game looks a lot like U9 -- third person view with full
3D landscape. The world is very interactive, though not quite as fully
interactive as the Ultima world. Still, this game is a big improvement
because it doesn't have all the silly things that made U9 such a bad game.


GRAPHICS

The graphics are nice, they are not exactly breath-taking or stunning by
today's standards but for an RPG they are good. The character models aren't
exactly pretty, you yourself look like an idiot but overall the graphics
are good. However, you should be using at least 800x600 resolution or they
will look bad. But if you run at 1024x768 they are quite nice indeed.

On the downside clipping is still a big problem, hey what 3D game doesn't
have this problem, arms still go through walls, if you fall down a cliff
onto rocky ground actually your body will look embedded in the rock (maybe
it is, hmm). The people in the game really look barbaric though. Whatever.

The world graphics are a bit static, you won't see moving trees or
shrubbery here like in Ghost Recon or Hitman, the water effects are
normal and not worth commenting on, overall decent graphics, but nothing
incredible.


SOUND

Sound is very impressive, every single line of every single conversation
(and there is a lot) in the game is voice-acted, this game is practically
no-reading required. However, on the down-side many voices are shared.
For instance, Cavalorn is a very distinguished gentleman who talks with
a rather haughty accent. But when you piss him off by standing in his
way for instance or drawing a weapon he uses the default "get angry voice"
which everyone else in the game uses. Ah well, we must cut corners
somewhere.