Tseng

i don't know if this is a bug.

but usually when i sell items like watches or rings or stuff to a weapons seller those things vanish into a sink, and next time i go there there are only weapons for sale.

i read in a walkthrough that after completing Fu Syndicate i could go to any arms dealer and i would get new fine weapons, like the .50 cal handgun.

i went to Tseng and...

his for sale inventory was completely full with both old weapons and all the junk i had ever sold to him, but he had not on display the new weapons, i gather because there was no room in his inventory to display them.

is this a bug?

it sure was mighty inconvenient. and not the least unexpected.

As far as I know, your runthrough is wrong. Not every merchant offers every weapon. And if I remember right, most runthroughs mention that you should be careful about selling junk to the merchants because their inventory might overflow. Personally I never had any trouble of this sort, probably because I usually buy from Mercurio and sell only to the other dealers, mostly to Larry or Trip.
You can get the Desert Eagle from Mercurio. I think he's your best choice anyway. Usually I wait until I "get it for free" at the Society of Leopold.
My favorite gun is the Steyr (Available at Mercurios after the Fu Syndicate, or take it from the hunters). As a full automatic it does a good deal of damage, and the zoom is good for checking out the terrain before you go into unknown territory.

-

Steyr Aug and Desert Eagle are my favorite too, but i would rather have them before i tackle the society of professor, thank you.
perhaps the only peev i have with this game is... well, this. it feels that society of professors is too hard a challenge to tackle without those weapons that you only get already there.
unlike some i don't like the feeling of coming to a challenge underprepared, outgunned.
even in a game i would rather have superior firepower before i tackle a challenge like a quest.
same applies with XP and what abilities i can buy with them, i always feel that only after completing a part of the game have i become powerful enough to tackle the part i just finished tackling.

anyway, i was planning on making it to mercurio eventually, indeed because i had higher hopes of finding those new weapons in him and more importantly that he already had new weapons that only he can give.

oh and for checking territory there is nothing like auspex.

but thanks.

I'm not sure about the DE, but you can buy the steyr and the swat rifle from Mercurio before you go to Leopold. Sorry if I didn't make that clear in my last statement.

-

as of this time, i got the Desert Eagle at Trip and the Steyr Aug is indeed one of the special weapons that only Mercurio provides, but i already went to him and he did indeed have it,
so i did get to go to the Giovanni Mansion fully prepared.
And indeed i got the Swat Rifle from Mercurio a long time ago, i have it already, was useful in Chinatown, and in fact i became aware of it before i became aware that Fat Larry was selling a slightly weaker version of it, the Hunter Rifle that also uses High Velocity rounds.
So yes by this time i am satisfyingly fully equipped.
But thanks for the input.

Disclaimer: even though this is my favorite game ever, this is only the second time in my life i am playing it, and the first time was a long time ago, i have forgotten a lot, and i had to go and play the Camarilla Edition the second time around (and the third time i will play CE 1.3)

so i fear some of my questions might not be those of an expert in the game probing aspects unique to the camarilla edition, but sometimes those of a newbie (re)discovering the game.

but... since this time around i AM playing the camarilla edition, i felt this was the place to bring my questions...

and indeed the quantity of other posts by other people seems very varied...

No problem there, youare welcome to send questions about any aspect of the game, no matter if they are CE specific or not.
Just ask and we'll try to help you the best we can.

-

Heck, I actually look forward to what Velvet is going to post next.

I like your comment stating that you have this feeling of only reaching the level of preparation "required" for a level only after you completed it... You completed it to get this feeling actually so that sounds like a proof of the good equilibrium of the game that can prove challenging all along and does not fall into the cliche of being very easy once you get a certain level of mastery over your skills.
A good point to me

@Childe of Malkav: Thank You Kindly for your Willingness to Help.

@Zeromorph: me too!! me too!! but... wait... you looking forward...
do i get it right? aren't you one of the devs, so you know what it will be, but no matter that you know, because you created it, and even no matter how many times you play the game, it still feels new, like the first time, so it is always a treat with that glow of first time?
aww...

@kelben: you... did understand that i did not exactly mean that as a compliment?
but, yeah, i will admit that that is my flaw, like i stated i like to feel fully prepared when i tackle something...
so if you want to take it as a compliment, why, by all means!
though my compliment wouldn't be that it is too easy, it will be that it is not so challenging as to seem impossible.
i am more frustrated by things seeming too difficult than by things being too easy, i do like smooth rides, not rocky journeys.
but i will grant you that, it is indeed well balanced, if it doesn't feel too easy it also does not feel too chalenging, which is a good for me.
but what i meant was well in the case of xp more a question of mathematics. i don't think you can get enough xp to fully explore all aspects of the game, there are always abilities that you have to chose over others, so that you have to stick to certain approaches to the quests, like, in the course of the game you always have to shoot your way in or lockpick or persuade, and sometimes you cannot afford to seduce the hooker if you want to hack the next computer.
i will grant that you can probably always solve the game.
the point of a replayable game with different kinds of character clan is that with one clan one approach is more valid, with another clan another approach is more valid, if you want to experience with several approaches why experience with several clans, play the game several times.
once again it is me who is greedy, i want to have a jack of all trades that has at his disposal every approach available, but in the end is a big lump of wood, because it would be the flaws, what he canNOT do, that would give him personality.

which reminds me.

DOORS.

doors came forcingly into my attention when i tried to pick up the odious chalice.
in the end totally by accident i discovered that by pressing a total of 4 keys at the same time i could give jumps far more impressive that i had ever thought possible.
the door from the chamber of fire to the chamber of the odious chalice was a background object, i could not figure how to open it or whether it was supposed to open, and it was totally by accident that i figured out a way to jump back out through the window.

but.

usually you can pick a door, and often if you cannot you use bloodbuff, there are probably ways around like hacking if it is important for the main quests, but too often, specially for sidequests...

i always thought that if you could not lockpick a door you should be able to what is the word? burst it open with strength, brawl or melee, or you should be able to shoot it open, maybe with enough damage (like bash in AD&D)

there should be always more than one way to skin excuse me open a door.

and perhaps more of the doors should be reactive and lead somewhere, i always find it sad when a door is a neutral object in the background.

maybe doors that didn't advance the quest but led to treasure, like the one in the luckee star motel.

Yes I understood what you mean. As you mentioned, would you be able to raise all your skills to the max that the game would become very flat only leaving the special abilities of each clans as a differentiation. I think with the online college, you can already pretty much max out this part of a vampire capacities if you play well of the different books and people learning you something. Of course money is a limitation.

What Kelben says about a lot of opportunities to increase the abilities is right. I'm actually thinking of removing or changing the levels of some of the books. But I don't want to throw things away just like that.

-

what, make it even more of a challenge??

Nothing is decided yet. And remember that the college gives you the equivalent of 66 xp that weren't even there before CE 1.3. And as I said, I wouldn't just throw the books away, if I take them off, then I'll use the freed item slots for something worthwile.

-

on the subject...

i had the impression that CE1.3 was already available for downloading,
but now you seem to speak of it as a work in progress...

anyway, for one that had the game then overlapped CE1.2 you can just download and overlap CE1.3, right?

Malkavian is my favorite clan.
second time around, i decided to try another clan
and Tremere seemed...
well

but i am jonesing Malkavian.

i am so close to the end now, i will stick to my guns

but i can't help starting all over again with a Malkavian,
and if available,
the third time i play the game play CE1.3 already

(i am getting ready for Leopold)

CE1.3 is out, yes. And if you have the email college, you are playing version 1.3. But the whole CE project is work in progress. In fact, today I downloaded the new 7.0 unofficial patch and started preparations to update CE to UP 7.0 +.

So what I meant was, perhaps in future versions of CE, the books might be changed or taken out.

-

Yes I find the college more of a dangerously overpowered tool than the book mainly because you need to spend some XP in research to make them worthwhile. If you remove the books, better remove the related skills... Not a very smart move to me, I would rather re balance the college.

Maybe college should require research skill as well? After all one need some skills in order to use google properly

getting back on topic
(i have no idea what you're talking about, except to be careful when i next upgrade the game, to be sure i am downloading the latest version of CE, and when you mention college shouldn't it be like in histories?)

i just got the flamethrower. i bought it yes, silly me. from Mercurio. before departing for Leopold.
i was expecting the Dragon Breath.
when will i get the Dragon Breath from Mercurio? Before Hallowbrook? it is one of the best anti vampire weapon, and hallowbrook is a sabbat vampire nest, i would appreciate it by then...

have i already suggested that College be a history? and that you balance other histories accordingly?

Question:

where, when, and if at all, do i find the:

TAL'MAHE'RA blade

and the

Dragon's Breath?

In CE there is no Dragon Breath, the Rahe blade is in Andrej's lair.
-

already got the ra blade (are we supposed to make a dash for it? it might come in handy fighting andrei, but i was too busy fighting him to go pick it up... nvmd)
and aw i was lusting for the dragon breath, an upgrade on a shotgun that fires fire ammo, the ranged equivalent of the ra blade - or is it the flame thrower? i wanted to trade in the spas for the dragon's breath...

not that i feel the need for it.
i might agree that for balancing purposes, keeping it a challenge but still feasible, you already have stuff enough, it might imbalance things, make it easier, but...

i was lusting for it...

After completing Hallowbrook i went to Mercurio and he greeted me saying he had cobbled up the Dragon's Breath, but when i asked him to let me see it it was not in his for sale inventory.
what gives?