Item - The Caverns of Kalte

The Caverns of Kalte was obviously the third of Dever's brilliant series and it's one of my favourites.

Though the actual book is rather short, this is because there are so many options and ways to go. The thing that makes the book so good, however, is the snow setting. It's exciting and atmospheric and easy to imagine.

There are many cool ideas like Ice Barbarians with archer-children in their backpacks, and the journey through the caverns to the castle is just brilliant.

In short, one of the best of the Kai series, but they are all excellent. Highly recommended.

More reviews by Braxus

I have very fond memories of this book, but having replayed it, I'm not exactly sure why. It certainly doesn't strike me as a bad book by any means, but it doesn't really stand out either. It's a perfectly decent entry in the series, with all the usual characteristics that make a Lone Wolf book fun, but it doesn't strike me as being a really special book the way it did when it first made an impression on me. I think that initial reaction must have been due to the atmospheric icy setting; although I maintain that Dever's style of writing is adequate but nothing too special compared to his greater skill in game design, he does have some nice touches here that help to convey the peril and beauty of a frozen environment -- the threat of snow blindness, the interesting Cloudmaker Mountain, the constant threat of cold-adapted creatures. It all goes by rather quickly, but there are certainly some nice sights along the way.

More reviews by Demian

As someone who enjoys Nordic skiing and most winter activities, I loved the ice barbarians on skis, with their backpack baby archers!

More reviews by Dtar

The third book in the Lone Wolf series is a bit of a step back from the tour de force that book 2 was. While book 2 had a wide variety of scenarios, including the possibility of losing all your possessions, The Caverns of Kalte is a much more straightforward adventure, spending all your time on an icy glacier and the caverns inside.

You are sent to capture a renegade wizard to the hilariously named land of Ikeya (IKEA). The adventure seems well-balanced, it took me about 3 or 4 tries to get through. (It also provided me with a personal dilemma. When my first character dies, I lose all of his possessions, including the incredibly strong Summerswerd, never to get it back. I didn't know if I should award the Summerswerd to the new character. In the end, I awarded myself two new Kai disciplines, I did complete two books, but not the possessions. I was happy to say I was able to succeed without the uber-powerful Summerswerd, which I didn't like much anyway. I'll stick with my warhammer, thank you very much.)

There seems to be a high number of unavoidable combats. One thing I'm not so keen on in the Lone Wolf world is that all of the monsters are given original names, like Bagnar or Kal-somethingorother. Maybe I'm just old school, but I prefer fighting goblins or yeti, rather than their no-name equivalents. While I'm complaining, I'm kind of fed up with the "pick a random number" options. It just feels like there should be a more interesting way to do this.

This book feels very much like an Ian Livingstone Fighting Fantasy book, with the wandering about and collecting needed items. I got definite Caverns of the Snow Witch vibes throughout.

Anyway, it's fine, but I'm starting to see some limitations to the Lone Wolf format. But to be honest, I'm just killing time till I get the courage to try book 3 of the Grey Star series.

More reviews by Kveto