Serenes Forest's Teehee Thread

[null]

Well, this exists now.

[Punished Dayni]

2 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Eh, that wasn't so bad. Krishna phasing through a wall to escape is iffy, but in retrospect, I should've bailed Czene out as soon as he started heading that way.

I meant because of the map layout being so confusing you couldn't see multiple pathways.

That's not specifically related to what happened in the LP, but still a riddle all its own.

2 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

The snow map.

Just... the snow map.

Not enough of a riddle.

Too much slow movement and dragon flying around.

[Saint Rubenio]

Just now, Dayni said:

I meant because of the map layout being so confusing you couldn't see multiple pathways.

That's not specifically related to what happened in the LP, but still a riddle all its own.

Ah, right, right. I get what you're saying now.

Just now, Dayni said:

Not enough of a riddle.

Too much slow movement and dragon flying around.

Hmmmm... Well, there's the final chapter with all the lance knights and the cheese strategy. That can be considered a riddle, maybe?

[Interdimensional Observer]

7 hours ago, Armagon said:

Imma be honest, i've been using infinite HP for pretty much every boss. Because they all hit so damn hard and maybe i'm just bad but it feels like this game discourages defending and healing.

I feared this would be the case.🙁

But keep in mind, it is bearable to some. I got through the entire game winning boss battles with some game overs, but not needing multiple tries on every boss, first try victories happened.

As for defense, I considered that an option, not a requirement. For most of the two runs of BKO I did, I practically never used armor and stuck with weapons in boss battles. I would've been more inclined to use armor if there was a second equipment slot for everyone. I did heal very frequently however, that I did rely on.

While you can go with the flow of what rolls into your hand, except when you need to search for healing/revival, I often relied on building up the MP, and then discarding until I had all the Magnus necessary for one strong Ex Combo, which I used until the boss died.

 

7 hours ago, Armagon said:

The absolute worse ones though are the Machina Arma fights. Literally just "whittle down the opponents HP by single digits until you hit the flag, upon which you'll lose anyway". 

I know someone, maybe here, has complained of Trails having one too many "you "won" but you lost" boss fights, and BKO does do a lot of them, likely too many. 

 

And I forgot to mention before, there is a soldier in Diadem in Sheliak who will give you the Next-Gen Mixer, you have to get them a Quest Magnus found on the boss screen in the Cloudvents. Don't get too close to Nasca, and if you do, choose to run, you can't win right now.

[Punished Dayni]

1 hour ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Hmmmm... Well, there's the final chapter with all the lance knights and the cheese strategy. That can be considered a riddle, maybe?

There is the riddle of "Why the everloving fuck did Kaga decide you had to trigger an awful thing to get the sole reliable option on one of the bosses?" So maybe?

4 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

For most of the two runs of BKO I did, I practically never used armor and stuck with weapons in boss battles. I would've been more inclined to use armor if there was a second equipment slot for everyone. 

Only one equipment slot? What is this, Gaiden?

Is there a particular reason the game goes about items that way? Was playing an RPG with no equipment at all, that had it's own wrinkles and I'm heading off on another topic to a game that's finished.

[Saint Rubenio]

Just now, Dayni said:

There is the riddle of "Why the everloving fuck did Kaga decide you had to trigger an awful thing to get the sole reliable option on one of the bosses?" So maybe?

Don't forget that even if you do trigger it, if you don't hurry the hell up you can still lose it because the important person can die. Thanks, Kaga.

[Interdimensional Observer]

42 minutes ago, Dayni said:

Only one equipment slot? What is this, Gaiden?

Is there a particular reason the game goes about items that way? Was playing an RPG with no equipment at all, that had it's own wrinkles and I'm heading off on another topic to a game that's finished.

Not sure why exactly they chose to this.

But equipment in Baten Kaitos Origins isn't something you throw on yourself pre-battle. Equipment takes the form of Magnus- magical cards that contain the "Magna Essence" of something, which you can draw out to use the item. Magnus are the foundation of combat in both of the two Baten Kaitos games, weapons from swords to spells to saxophones, armor, healing items, everything is Magnus and stored in a deck of cards.

In Origins specifically, each of the three characters has a single equipment slot, which you can fill with a weapon or armor mid-fight. Both of these have limited durability, weapons lose it with every hit they deal, armor with every hit they take. When a weapon or armor loses all uses or is replaced by another, it is reshuffled into the deck and has all its uses restored.

Actual attacking in BKO is done via basic "Attack" Magnus and Special Attacks, weapons can infuse an element in elementally-neutral attacks and increase the damage of all attacks.

This a major change from the first game- Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean. There, the individual weapons and armor were themselves the attacks that hurt enemies directly, if you use an Ice Dagger, the character will go and cut the enemy with it. When the enemy gets their turn, you can play any armor Magnus you have on hand to reduce incoming damage taken. You equipped nothing in the heat of battle, and each character had one passive accessory slot which functioned like typical RPG equipment.

One reason for the change I see, is that Eternal Wings gave everyone their own separate deck of Magnus. Kalas the sword boi and Xelha the magic girl would never run into issues of getting stuck with a hand of the other's spells/swords and thus unable to attack, or their robes/armor and hence unable to defend.

Origins by contrast opted for the three heroes sharing a single deck of Magnus. This decision must've been what relegated much of the attacking to generic Weak/Medium/Strong Attacks that everyone can use. Reducing character-specific weapons to power-boosters reduces the need for so many in the deck, assured Guillo that it won't be stuck spending a turn discarding all the swords & maces of Sagi & Milly that it can't use.

Defense needed an overhaul to the "one mid-battle slot" approach, because of another gameplay change as well. Eternal Wings was traditional turn-based combat, Origins is ATB. Having defined player's turns and enemies' turns allowed for defense Magnus to used as they are in Eternal Wings. With Origins, keeping the "enemy is attacking, play armor cards" would be a major interruption on the game's flow if you were in the middle of choosing cards with a card when the enemy chose to attack.

And yet, this doesn't answer why they didn't opt for two mid-battle equipment slots for each character. Programming a second slot and assigning one to weapons and another to armor/accessories doesn't sound like it'd be difficult at all to do.

 

-If all of the above flew right over your head and took a shat because it was in a kilt without underwear, I'm not surprised, the Baten Kaitos combat systems are a little different from the norm. Neither is an actual "card game", in the sense you aren't playing Pokemon TCG or Yu-Gi-Oh or FE Cipher or one of those card game video games like Cultist Simulator or Wingspan. They're all simpler than that and play as "JRPGs with cards", not "card games fitted into a JRPG form".

 

...Speaking cards and FE Gaiden and myself mentioning weapon durability made me of think FE using cards. Except, card-based SRPGs already exist, right Yggdra Union? I played like four fights into that game, I should start over and try it again sometime.

Edited March 28, 2021 by Interdimensional Observer

[Punished Dayni]

6 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

saxophones

The best kind of attack.

Alright I suppose, cards are used to call on items for attack and defence, there's the differences caused by the changes from separate decks and pure turn based combat to ATB and a shared deck, this resulted in the changes to cards between the two games. I think I get the idea.

TIL Passive camera mode's actually alright in Spyro Reignited, the niece prefers it.

[Armagon]

2 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Tell your friend never to play Subnautica. I don't even have a fear of the ocean and I was still shitting my pants when playing that game.

Oh he's well aware.

1 hour ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

But keep in mind, it is bearable to some. I got through the entire game winning boss battles with some game overs, but not needing multiple tries on every boss, first try victories happened.

I'm sure it's all well and good for some people but it's just that a lot of bosses have very, very powerful specials that cane delete 80% of your HP and it could just be what I have right now but healing items don't seem to recover as much HP as you lose.

Bosses can also easily Down you, which throws another wrench into the plan.

1 hour ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

and then discarding until I had all the Magnus necessary for one strong Ex Combo, which I used until the boss died.

I kinda don't like how you have to commit to discarding. You can't discard two cards and use a third, for example.

Or at least, I haven't been able to.

1 hour ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

know someone, maybe here, has complained of Trails having one too many "you "won" but you lost" boss fights, and BKO does do a lot of them, likely too many

At least BKO makes you lose in the gameplay as well, with the boss doing their super mega move or whatever.

But yeah, it can definitely be annoying. I'd say the writing is much better than in Eternal Wings, there's a lot of intrigue here and sticking to a trio of characters makes their intersections a lot better, but having the heroes lose a lot can be an issue.

1 hour ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

And I forgot to mention before, there is a soldier in Diadem in Sheliak who will give you the Next-Gen Mixer, you have to get them a Quest Magnus found on the boss screen in the Cloudvents. Don't get too close to Nasca, and if you do, choose to run, you can't win right now.

Already did that.

 

[Sooks]

3 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

I am very happy for you. Even if I 100% disagree.

Thanks.

Just wait until chapter 18 destroys me...

Quote

What? What's wrong with this--

Oh.

Wait, what? I thought that battle took place in every route! Are you telling me Claude's role in this route is EVEN MORE INCONSEQUENTIAL than I thought!?

This is why I don't look into Three Houses. Because the more I do, the more I hate it.

No. That’s Dimitri. He dies offscreen before ever showing up and then Byleth has a dream about his ghost where he says the most vaguely worded blather I have ever heard it’s impossible to tell what he’s going to say before he’s interrupted, even if the general subject matter is easy enough to guess. And that’s it, that’s his one scene.

Meanwhile Claude draws away the troops of the alliance territory that sits before the bridge into empire territory so your group can capture it and have an easy way into the empire without them attacking you from behind or on the way and destroying Claude’s untrue face of neutrality for the alliance as a whole, because that can let Claude trick that house into joining his side (during the war the alliance lords are on the sides of pro empire vs anti empire) because the empire will now be unable to attack them with their bridge captured, and it’s implied that house is with the empire because they’re afraid of them.

So yeah, Silver Snow Dimitri bad, Silver Snow Claude good.

Other thing to note is that the war of the Eagle and look also doesn’t take place in Crimson Flower because screw you for picking the evil route I guess.

Edited March 28, 2021 by Sooks

[Saint Rubenio]

1 minute ago, Sooks said:

No. That’s Dimitri. He dies offscreen before ever showing up and then Byleth has a dream about his ghost where he says the most vaguely worded blather I have ever heard it’s impossible to tell what he’s going to say before he’s interrupted, even if the general subject matter is easy enough to guess. And that’s it, that’s his one scene.

Yeah, I heard. It's pretty amazing how each lord has a route that treats them like utter horseshit, except Byleth, who is the super important savior of the world every time. Meh.

2 minutes ago, Sooks said:

Meanwhile Claude draws away the troops of the alliance territory that sits before the bridge into empire territory so your group can capture it and have an easy way into the empire without them attacking you from behind or on the way and destroying Claude’s untrue face of neutrality for the alliance as a whole, because that can let Claude trick that house into joining his side (during the war the alliance lords are on the sides of pro empire vs anti empire) because the empire will now be unable to attack them with their bridge captured, and it’s implied that house is with the empire because they’re afraid of them.

So yeah, Silver Snow Dimitri bad, Silver Snow Claude good.

I didn't know that. But wait, does he even appear on-screen? From what I heard, Claude is just said to have vanished during the off-screen battle at Gronder, and that's all you ever hear about him in Silver Snow. Does he at least get a scene or something?

[Sooks]

1 minute ago, Saint Rubenio said:

I didn't know that. But wait, does he even appear on-screen? From what I heard, Claude is just said to have vanished during the off-screen battle at Gronder, and that's all you ever hear about him in Silver Snow. Does he at least get a scene or something?

He sends you a letter, which is voiced by Joe Zieja (his VA). That’s the closest it gets.

But well, you don’t need to appear onscreen to contribute...

[Saint Rubenio]

Just now, Sooks said:

He sends you a letter, which is voiced by Joe Zieja (his VA). That’s the closest it gets.

But well, you don’t need to appear onscreen to contribute...

I mean, no, but that's still one of the main characters that only appears once and not even in person before being anticlimatically waved off. But at least it's not as bad as Dimitri in the same route, or Claude in Azure Moon. Those are just embarrasing.

[Sooks]

4 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

I mean, no, but that's still one of the main characters that only appears once and not even in person before being anticlimatically waved off. But at least it's not as bad as Dimitri in the same route, or Claude in Azure Moon. Those are just embarrasing.

He’s not a main character in that route because you didn’t pick the Golden Deer.

[Saint Rubenio]

5 minutes ago, Sooks said:

He’s not a main character in that route because you didn’t pick the Golden Deer.

I guess, but what I'm trying to say is, the game puts much emphasis on the three lords and their relations with stuff like the Gronder Field battles, the characters at the monastery lamenting having to kill their former classmates, and such. But that all kinda falls flat when the two lords you didn't pick have four scenes in the entire game - at best! It's not a gamebreaking flaw or anything, but I think it's worth pointing out.

Edited March 28, 2021 by Saint Rubenio

[Punished Dayni]

24 minutes ago, Sooks said:

No. That’s Dimitri. He dies offscreen before ever showing up and then Byleth has a dream about his ghost where he says the most vaguely worded blather I have ever heard it’s impossible to tell what he’s going to say before he’s interrupted, even if the general subject matter is easy enough to guess. And that’s it, that’s his one scene.

I hated that they did this and just wasted everything around Gronder in SS.

It takes two factions out in one fell swoop and just leaves Church V Empire in a way that dissatisfies imo.

5 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

I guess, but what I'm trying to say is, the game puts much emphasis on the three lords and their relations with stuff like the Gronder Field battles, the characters at the monastery lamenting having to kill their former classmates, and such. But that all kinda falls flat when the two lords you didn't pick have four scenes in the entire game - at best! It's not a gamebreaking flaw or anything, but I think it's worth pointing out.

Can't particularly argue with that, but it's not like the game's expected to put equal emphasis on all three lords across all three routes. The few scenes in Part 2 should be obvious sure, but in Part 1 the lack of interplay between all three is still true. Even in the monastery it might have been nice to have some dialogue between them. It's a problem I'd like to discuss in the context of rewriting 3H, because White clouds, for being the best overall imo, still needs a bunch done to it.

[Lightchao42]

Having rewatched Godzilla 2014 the other day, I forgot just how long it takes for Godzilla to show up. The build up to when he actually does show up is great (build up is something G14 does well, since it's inspired by older horror movies like Jaws and Alien), and it's fun when he gets proper screentime. Contrary to popular opinion, I didn't mind the "skip the airport battle" thing too much since we get a proper fight later. Though the fact that Godzilla mostly doesn't factor into the humans' plan to defeat the MUTOs until the end makes G14 feel more like a disaster movie featuring Godzilla than a Godzilla movie (contrast KotM, where Godzilla is important to the plot even when he isn't onscreen). That isn't to say I don't like G14, it's still an enjoyable watch.

Thinking about it more, I appreciate that the MonsterVerse is one of the few times a "cinematic universe" was done properly, though the fact that it only revolves around two popular characters probably makes it easier develop. Can you imagine if KotM had teases for Gamera, Ultraman, and an Evangelion that were completely shoehorned in? Hmm, maybe it could work if it was executed well...

Edited March 28, 2021 by Lightchao42

[Punished Dayni]

1 minute ago, Lightchao42 said:

Can you imagine if KotM had teases for Gamera, Ultraman, and an Evangelion that were completely shoehorned in? Maybe it could work if it was executed well...

Wait, is Evangelion canon to the monsterverse?

[Lightchao42]

24 minutes ago, Dayni said:

Wait, is Evangelion canon to the monsterverse?

Not even remotely (nor are Gamera and Ultraman), I was using it as an example of how cinematic universes can be done poorly by including references without much subtlety to set up something for later.  I was mainly thinking of Batman v Superman and how it had teases for the rest of the Justice League without giving them their own movies, and I used other kaiju things for comparisons sake.

Plus, Eva being part of the MonsterVerse would mean we'd get a live-action Evangelion movie, which would destroy the universe.

[Armagon]

 

24 minutes ago, Lightchao42 said:

Thinking about it more, I appreciate that the MonsterVerse is one of the few times a "cinematic universe" was done properly, though the fact that it only revolves around two popular characters probably makes it easier develop.

It also helps that there's no "finale" to be had. This isn't like the MCU or DCEU where it's all building up to a final battle against the biggest bad (of it was supposed to in DC's case anyway), the MonsterVerse is literally just "big monster". Not saying there can't be a finale but you won't get something like Endgame. Well, I suppose a modern day version of Destroy All Monsters or Final Wars could work something like that.

And of course, Godzilla technically was doing cinematic universes for over half a century before it became popular.

26 minutes ago, Dayni said:

Wait, is Evangelion canon to the monsterverse?

No.

Apart from King Kong, the MonsterVerse relies a lot on licensing. WB and Legendary don't own Godzilla or any of the other Toho Kaiju. So they have to pay up whenever they want to use them. Adding more Kaiju outside of Toho is a different can of worms. Gamera is owned by a different company, so is Ultra Man, so is Evangelion, etc.

And there's also a thing in the current contract that states that there can't be American and Japanese Godzilla movies released in the same year. Which is why we're probably getting a Godzilla TV anime this year and why 2018 had two Japanese Godzilla movies.

[Punished Dayni]

2 minutes ago, Lightchao42 said:

Plus, Eva being part of the MonsterVerse would mean we'd get a live-action Evangelion movie, which would destroy the universe.

This is the way the world ends, This is the way the world ends,

Not with a bang but with a Cruel Angel's Thesis.

1 minute ago, Armagon said:

Apart from King Kong, the MonsterVerse relies a lot on licensing. WB and Legendary don't own Godzilla or any of the other Toho Kaiju. So they have to pay up whenever they want to use them. Adding more Kaiju outside of Toho is a different can of worms. Gamera is owned by a different company, so is Ultra Man, so is Evangelion, etc.

I'd heard a little of that being the case, just don't know the specifics.much.

[Sooks]

I opened up an auxiliary battle and the boss monster had rusted gauntlets that could be forged into dragon gauntlets. I already know that the drop the monster has is random, but a Google search taught me that those gauntlets are effective against dragons. I need these for endgame.

I mean, they’re at A rank because they’re rare, but I should be able to power level Catherine to A gauntlets. And I did manage to get them, I just have to finish the battle.

[Armagon]

Well, if it's anything like Eternal Wings, that means some shit is about to go down soon.

And i have a pretty good idea of what it might be but we'll see.

[Saint Rubenio]

3 minutes ago, Armagon said:

Well, if it's anything like Eternal Wings, that means some shit is about to go down soon.

And i have a pretty good idea of what it might be but we'll see.

If Guillo dies I will go to the developers of this game and hurt them.

...That's all I have to say, frankly.

[Punished Dayni]

1 hour ago, Sooks said:

I opened up an auxiliary battle and the boss monster had rusted gauntlets that could be forged into dragon gauntlets. I already know that the drop the monster has is random, but a Google search taught me that those gauntlets are effective against dragons. I need these for endgame.

I mean, they’re at A rank because they’re rare, but I should be able to power level Catherine to A gauntlets. And I did manage to get them, I just have to finish the battle.

They're also forgeable though silver gauntlets.

I tend to get the rusted ones from the drop.

Anyone else using gauntlets?