7. How is experience and advancement handled? Do you get experience from completing quests or just from kills? What happens when you advance?

Richard: There is a traditional exponential experience system incorporated… you kill things and complete quests to gain experience, pretty standard… but the Attunement system creates a dual-tiered advancement system. Levelling up via experience increases character hit-points and stats, plus increases the number of Attunement slots available, and does some other stuff like increase the time the character can spend in the Dreamwold, and so forth.

But equipment is far more important in Kult than in comparable Western RPGs… for a start, Attunements are unlocked from items. And the quality of item has a big effect on its functionality… a high level warrior with a tiny bodkin can be beaten by a low level character with a high quality sword, for instance. Though, you know, not necessarily easily…

So, though levelling up does occur, the player is also required to keep a very keen eye on their Attunement set-up… and to do this, they’ll have to use many different weapons and items… so just standing on the spot killing things isn’t the best way to self-improve. Exploration is vital, and the acquisition of new equipment will, in almost every case, provide new game options.