It is tricky but the interface is there. To the right of the arrow keys in the lower right corner of the view screen is a up/down view slide bar. Face the ladder directly. To go up a ladder, slide the view arrow up, then press forward arrow. To go down, slide the view arrow down, press forward arrow. The tricky part is if half your party is still on the floor and not over the ladder shaft you can forward the party right off the ladder into major damage below. *oof* And when you are in ladder prep, the left and right straffe arrows turn your view left and right instead of sliding the party left or right as they do on the ground. You'll need to turn the view right or left just enough to get the whole party on the ladder without turning too far and plunging them to their doom, then use the view slide bar to choose up or down. I'd save first, lol.

Your header says 'ladders made easy' but what you're actually writing is completely puzzling! All the small arrows you're talking about can be manipulated with keys and/or r/l mousebutton. And what the heck do you mean by 'if half of the party is still on the floor'? , it's a first-person view and so there is really only one 'person' involved, that's it! The whole ladder climbing procedure is badly programmed, that's it! So, I keep on jumping and losing 4 points, (who cares!) instead of frustrating arrow-clicking. This is one of the nminor bugs in this game. Still waiting for a patch.

Okay, one person, six people, however the party is described, the party still does have "mass" in the game environment. When part of the "1st person" body is still over the floor adjoining the ladder shaft, you can't go down, just like you can't go through a doorway if you're not lined up properly. If you don't want to use the arrow keys on the view screen or if you've removed them, you can use keyboard or combination keyboard and mouse. Use the mouse view (left mouse click drag) to look up or down, scooch over to directly face the ladder, then use keyboard forward arrow key to ascend or descend.

When characters only have 12+/- hitpoints and fall to lose 4+/-, and then, for instance, immediately have to battle with a wood spider, the odds are against everyone surviving the encounter. So it does matter, more at the beginning than later perhaps, to be able to successfully use a ladder.

E

Well, only problem with ladders is to get on one if you want to go down. Moving on ladder is easy, just look in direction you want to go and press forward key. Still didn't manage to get on ladder going down instead of jumping down.