A Fighting Fantasy Journey
Book three: The Forest of Doom
I have a couple of copies of the forest of Doom and the mini of the shape shifter from the cover. Written by Ian Livingston this one takes us out in to the woods in search of two halves of a hammer belonging to the dwarves of stone bridge. This opens up the world as we meet the wizard Yaztromo for the first time. One if those wizards who just lives in a tower selling magic items to passers by.
For some reason one of the minis by Atlantis miniatures is of Bigleg the dwarf who you meet in the introduction and dies giving you the quest to find the Warhammer the dwarfs need to fight the hill trolls. An odd choice for a mini as there is no illustration of him. He looks a bit lord of the rings for my liking
We have to search the forest for the two parts of the hammer each taken by a goblin, so find the goblins and we find the hammer. We have to choose items to purchase from Yaztromo to help us in this journey. If you pick the wrong items you wont get past some of the trials the forest has to offer.
The Fighting Fantasy world does make you wonder whats going on with some of the characters you meet. For example in the middle of this Forest filled with nasties we we find a shack with a strongman living in it who just likes arm wrestling people. Maybe he needs to get a job at a circus or something where he might get more work.
The shapeshifter cover is one of the best in the series and this miniature was great fun to paint and captures the art well 
I played through this book the other night and found it easier than I remember. It added new locations to the world and Yaztromo who will pop up again. We meet a crow who gives us information for money. He's saving up to earn enough to pay Yaztromo to turn him back into a human. Even the nice wizards have s cruel streak.
Very cool.
I looked into geting some of these books a while ago.
I vaguely remember leafing through a few in my youth, but like all things sci-fi and fantasy related they where a rare find in the netherlands.
They did have my fascination as a kid and I still want to give it a go at some point. Maybe not collect them, but just a few…