Serenes Forest's Teehee Thread

[Sooks]

3 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Was the question "name trash"?

Fire Emblem Awakening is the correct answer to that question, though.

[Acacia Sgt]

Was it, name the place this coat of arms belongs to?

[Interdimensional Observer]

I've read about 75 pages of the 30 Years' War book I took out, my neurons are overflowing with activity.🤓 A great deal of fascinating information on the political structure of the Early Modern Holy Roman Empire & Hapsburg Monarchy. I've a liking for this in part because it fills in a vague, empty space in my mind about what real empire, real monarchy entailed, which I can then apply to... notions of deep and interesting world-building that no video game would ever try to integrate. 

I really want to write outlines of each and every chapter, because I love having this information so much and don't want to forget it. Except, that'd take tedious hours of flipping between book and laptop to do. 

This is the second book I've read which chose to reject the long-held idea that the HRE was maddening, unworkable trash. This is, no surprise, throwing me into the pro-HRE camp. Although, maybe my sympathies for it are stemming from a brain that can't tell right from wrong, stemming from the reality that it has been temporarily turned into a pretzel, resulting from complications of attempting to comprehend the feudal German Liberties.

[Punished Dayni]

5 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

I've read about 75 pages of the 30 Years' War book I took out, my neurons are overflowing with activity.🤓 A great deal of fascinating information on the political structure of the Early Modern Holy Roman Empire & Hapsburg Monarchy. I've a liking for this in part because it fills in a vague, empty space in my mind about what real empire, real monarchy entailed, which I can then apply to... notions of deep and interesting world-building that no video game would ever try to integrate. 

I really want to write outlines of each and every chapter, because I love having this information so much and don't want to forget it. Except, that'd take tedious hours of flipping between book and laptop to do. 

This is the second book I've read which chose to reject the long-held idea that the HRE was maddening, unworkable trash. This is, no surprise, throwing me into the pro-HRE camp. Although, maybe my sympathies for it are stemming from a brain that can't tell right from wrong, stemming from the reality that it has been temporarily turned into a pretzel, resulting from complications of attempting to comprehend the feudal German Liberties.

Considering it lasted in some form or other until Napoleon, I'm a little surprised to hear people arguing it could never work.

Any particular tidbits you want to bring up?

[Saint Rubenio]

15 minutes ago, Sooks said:

Fire Emblem Awakening is the correct answer to that question, though.

Well, I wouldn't know. I know next to nothing about that game, as I believe I've mentioned before.

[Lightcosmo]

23 minutes ago, Sooks said:

Fire Emblem Awakening is the correct answer to that question, though.

Nah, 3H is the most fitting answer. Game is literally a snooze fest. Xd

[Hasechi]

2 hours ago, Sooks said:

Just got back from testing for Governor’s School. It was... hard. Not hard because I didn’t know the answers to most of them or anything like that, but because we had TEN MINUTES for every test (except the essay if you count that). I did reasonably well on most of them, but I had to skip every question that took more then a moderate amount of thinking to get on to the next ones, and there were multiple tests where I had literal seconds left to complete it so I rushed through the remaining few just picking any answer. I think I passed all of them except maybe the one on number relations, but if placement is based on how you do compared to how other kids did and not just seeing if you passed then... oof.

What’s FEAT?

I don’t know who this is but yes.

I convert .bin files to .bin.lz and else.  

[Armagon]

2 hours ago, twilitfalchion said:

Gotcha. I'm playing normal, so yay.

I think I'm almost to the final stretch. Anything I should be aware of going in?

My final team is likely going to include both Agate and Kloe. I've bought some supplies and made some attack food, so hopefully I'm prepared for it.

Not sure if you did it but there will be extra scenes for each fight if you bring these characters: Zin, Schera, Tita, Olivier. You can only bring four characters though so there will be a bit of backtracking.

I don't remember the order apart from you should bring Tita to the third boss fight.

@Shrimperor might know the right order.

Edited January 22, 2021 by Armagon

[Sidereal Wraith]

59 minutes ago, Sooks said:

Fire Emblem Awakening is the correct answer to that question, though.

What about TMS # FE. That’s where I place my money.

[Punished Dayni]

I didn't learn this today, but a founder of the Proud Boys chose the name because he disliked a cut song from Aladdin. A song that wasn't even in the movie and if it hadn't been leaked we'd be none the wiser about.

I don't think I could find it in me to be that petty about Dinosaur.

[Shrimpica]

23 minutes ago, Armagon said:

Not sure if you did it but there will be extra scenes for each fight if you bring these characters: Zin, Schera, Tita, Olivier. You can only bring four characters though so there will be a bit of backtracking.

I don't remember the order apart from you should bring Tita to the third boss fight.

@Shrimperor might know the right order.

first fight: Olivier and Kloe

2nd fight: Zin

3rd fight: Schera

4th fight: Tita

iirc. 

@twilitfalchion

Edited January 22, 2021 by Shrimperor

[Shrimpica]

Btw, how's Blonde Kirito? Should i bond him with Rex? He has light element, right? Which is rare, but i don't see it in many combos so far (although i am still at ch3).

Crosette will go to Nia once i unlock 3rd slot 

[null]

18 minutes ago, Shrimperor said:

first fight: Olivier and Kloe

2nd fight: Zin

3rd fight: Schera

4th fight: Tita

iirc. 

@twilitfalchion

I see. Thanks.

Uh...wow.

Spoiler

Renne's fight.

Wow.

Instakills everywhere. That flipping robot.

 

[Lightcosmo]

19 minutes ago, Shrimperor said:

Btw, how's Blonde Kirito? Should i bond him with Rex? He has light element, right? Which is rare, but i don't see it in many combos so far (although i am still at ch3).

Crosette will go to Nia once i unlock 3rd slot 

You mean Corvin? Hes busted as all hell. And more!

[Shrimpica]

6 minutes ago, twilitfalchion said:

I see. Thanks.

Uh...wow.

  Reveal hidden contents

Renne's fight.

Wow.

Instakills everywhere. That flipping robot.

 

''READY OR NOT HERE I COME!''

3 minutes ago, lightcosmo said:

You mean Corvin? Hes busted as all hell. And more!

umu

Blonde Kirito

xD

[null]

That was...something. Zeram powder helped me cheese it pretty easily. Those deathblows were something else though.

Spoiler

Okay. Renne fight is done.

Time to take on Loewe. The game is hyping this up to be a much harder fight than even the previous ones.

Should I use any specific party members for it?

[Armagon]

34 minutes ago, Shrimperor said:

Btw, how's Blonde Kirito? Should i bond him with Rex? He has light element, right? Which is rare, but i don't see it in many combos so far (although i am still at ch3).

Crosette will go to Nia once i unlock 3rd slot 

Oh you want to awaken him that early? Yeah, light is rare because only five (six with Poppiswap) Blades in the entire game have it, three of which are DLC and none of them are Common.

Corvin is good on everyone for several reasons: he's the God of Evasion. One of his battle skills increases Art recharge with every dodge, something he is very good at because he has a garuanteed dodge Art and Special. Anyone who bonds with him also gets a free Smash Art.

I'd say give him to Rex for now. Another of Corvin's battle skills is Party Gauge Up for every crit, so it's easy for him to do Light -> Light -> Light or Light -> Light -> Water with Dromarch. 

As for Driver Combos, Nia can Break -> Tora Topple -> Nia Launch because Nim -> Rex Smash because Corvin.

All this said, I'd personally recommend waiting a bit since Corvin is a bit too good. But if you want to bond him now, it's fine. Overdrive Protocols exist so you can transfer him to someone else in the future should the need arise.

Edit: the bit about Party Gauge Up was referring to Chain Attacks, of which Blade Combos play an important role in.

Edited January 22, 2021 by Armagon

[Shrimpica]

23 minutes ago, Armagon said:

Evasion

Yup, Rex it is as i am going full Agility with him

23 minutes ago, Armagon said:

As for Driver Combos, Nia can Break -> Tora Topple -> Nia Launch because Nim -> Rex Smash because Corvin.

 

Oh yeah, question about that

How's does Topple work in XB2? Like in XB1 you had to Break -> Topple -> Stun.

XB2 kinda missed explaining that xD

Quote

All this said, I'd personally recommend waiting a bit since Corvin is a bit too good.

Maybe i will wait a bit then!

Edited January 23, 2021 by Shrimperor

[Sooks]

2 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Well, I wouldn't know. I know next to nothing about that game, as I believe I've mentioned before.

Good. If you’re smart you’ll spare yourself the horror. What a game...

[Interdimensional Observer]

2 hours ago, Dayni said:

Considering it lasted in some form or other until Napoleon, I'm a little surprised to hear people arguing it could never work.

The view that dislikes the HRE can be summarized in the old Voltaire quote "...neither Holy, nor Roman, nor an Empire", certain components of which may be true. But coming from Voltaire, I get the impression that if the Frenchman barbed you, he aimed to impale. A noted mid-20th century English historian of Medieval German history said of it in 1946:

• A culture "servilely imitative of France and Italy"
• Served only to testify to the "exhaustion of the German spirit"
• Politics were "petrifaction"
• Germany "existed but did not live"
• "Petty absolutisms, whose sole object was self-glorification"
• "The historian's only interest in this stultifying ossification lies in the process by which it was brought to an end"

And the author of the book from which I took this (The Pursuit of Glory, one of my favorite reads from college), said this kind of lampooning was par the course for all historians until the late 1900s.

The main reason for this loathing of the HRE for about two centuries factoring in it appearing first in the late 1700s, is the rise of the idea of the Nation-State. Because the 1800s was dominated by the rise of nationalism in Europe, institutions that appeared antithetical to Nation-States -to centralized governments consisting of a single people- were to be stoned to death or have their graves urinated on if they were already dead. The HRE was not a modern Nation-State, it was not centralized, and it had the only somewhat German Kingdom of Bohemia as an Elector plus the man in Hanover for a time was both an Elector and the monarch of Great Britain. Although there are problems associated with decentralized authority and ethnic diversity in the modern day *coughAmericaCovidresponse&racismcough*, I think the modern era recognizes that decentralization in the form of "autonomy" isn't inherently bad, and that ethnic purity is a supremacist-ly bad idea in any country.

As for views of the Holy Roman Empire in the century before Napoleon killed it (gosh how stupid he was- by destroying the HRE and letting secular Electors eat almost everyone else, he made Germany more of a menace to France in the long term), the author does point out there were a few people besides Voltaire who hated it. Joseph II Holy Roman Emperor being among the most fervent haters, which with great irony let Frederick II of Prussia -who hugely upset the peace within the HRE via his theft of Silesia and subsequent abuse of Saxony as his personal sandbag of money- become a defender of the HRE for a short moment.

But, The Pursuit of Glory also cites a passage from Goethe's Faust wherein the HRE is praised by a young man at a bar, who also says they don't have any idea how it works, and considers themselves lucky they aren't Emperor or Chancellor. And, there were many who the book says, cherished the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, that being its official name, as the epitome of the German spirit and believed it inspired a sense of patriotism that no other country could match. Of course, those voices in praise of the HRE gave rather cold takes for the time, and it's the hot takes that are so much more memorable.

 

2 hours ago, Dayni said:

Any particular tidbits you want to bring up?

I'm not sure if there is anything relevant to the HRE at the moment that by itself is incredible. It's the sheer mass of princes, bishoprics, free or imperial cities, and imperial knights and all the functioning glue that they held them together that is most impressive. The book (The Thirty Years' War: Europe's Tragedy) points out how through the later half of the 1500s that France was engulfed in the Wars of Religion (as was the Netherlands apparently, but the Spanish was the big problem there, not so much each other I think), yet Germany despite religious division was at peace.

if you like thinking of income inequality, consider that 41% of the Kingdom of Hungary (a Hapsburg possession outside of the HRE) was owned by 51 magnate families (magnates as opposed to gentry- the not-mega-rich nobles). And in the Kingdom of Bohemia, the number of knights fell by almost a third in the five decades before 1618, with 11 aristocratic families owning 25% of the country.

Oh, and apparently Calvinists (the book goes into detail about religion in Germany at the time, it is very relevant, if not the only cause of the 30YW as is often claimed) believe in or used to believe in "double predestination". When the Frenchman John Calvin read St. Augustine and saw him describe predestination, he thought "God would be weak if He could only predestine people at birth, I'm almightily against that! God can make it manifest in this world that he has predestined sinners by having them repent later in life". 

One general detail the book mentions is the reason for the Imperial Estates in the first place. During the Medieval period, monarchs were expected to live off their own lands, a king was not expected to tax their nobles as we'd expect them to. Instead, when extraordinary circumstances arose, the king would petition a levy from his nobles, a one-off payment. This explains why the Hapsburgs were able to establish themselves as Holy Roman Emperors from 1438 to 1806 (barring a tiny three year period because of a short-lived Wittelsbach). Being Emperor was very prestigious, but it gave you very few material riches in itself, it was expected the Emperor would have their independent sources of income, and the Hapsburg Monarchy was just that. 

As monarchs gradually became more ambitious, the frequency of the "extraordinary" requests grew, to the point it became ordinary. The Estates were created as a standardized means by which the Emperor could ask for his yearly income, and they functioned in the interest of the bishops, nobles, and burghers who comprised the Estates as well. The Estates formalized the hitherto not so formal contract between the Medieval monarch and his elite subjects. They give him money and manpower, and he respects the rights, freedoms, and privileges that they had accumulated over the centuries. When I think on it reading this, the institutions of the HRE doesn't become the British Parliament of the late 1600s and 1700s, but it sounds to me to be appropriate to the earliest days of Early Modern Europe. It's feudalism, but being so formalized for the sake of the increasing demands of the nascent state, it's a bridge to not-so-early modernity.

The book's introduction started with the infamous Defenestration of Prague too. Three ambassadors sent by the Holy Roman Emperor to Prague in the Kingdom of Bohemia, find themselves thrown out the window of a castle 17 meters off the ground. One of them cracked their skull, but another landed on their feet, and all lived and scurried back to the Emperor to tell him "these Protestant (or Utraquist or Brethren, I'm not sure which yet) fanatics cannot be reasoned with!", the result- war.

 

6 minutes ago, Shrimperor said:

Oh yeah, question about that

How's does Topple work in XB2? Like in XB1 you had to Break -> Topple -> Stun.

XB2 kinda missed explaining that xD

Chapter 3 explains it fairly early on.

It's Break -> Topple -> Launch -> Smaaaaaaaaash!

Each post-Break stage drops HP Potions, Smash also damages the enemy and causes them to drop money and Chips and Core Crystals. You cannot spam Arts of one stage to make it last longer, that could be abused back in XC1 to stop enemies from ever attacking once you Toppled them.

Edited January 23, 2021 by Interdimensional Observer

[Shrimpica]

5 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

It's Break -> Topple -> Launch -> Smaaaaaaaaash!

I see

Thanks^^

[Acacia Sgt]

Alright, Eighth Crusade! And the target it...

Yes, the known world is so Catholic this is the result of looking for Crusading options. And there's the Bavarian Persia I mentioned before, hahaha.

Also, as you can see, I already have troops marching over in order to start acquiring War Score. Gotta get a large share of the Crusade's spoils.

[Benice]

Great job on your tests @Sooks!

[null]

Spoiler

Loewe is down. Man, that was an awesome fight.

Took a few tries, but spamming S-breaks got the job done.

I guess this is the end coming up then.

 

[Shrimpica]

2 minutes ago, twilitfalchion said:

  Reveal hidden contents

Loewe is down. Man, that was an awesome fight.

Took a few tries, but spamming S-breaks got the job done.

I guess this is the end coming up then.

 

ayy grats!

Should do that fight on Hard/Nightmare sometime 😄