Parrhesia

[spoiler=Update 49] CLAN TRIALS. BARREL. STRONG. DAB HANDS. BARRELS 2, BARREL HARDER FUCK BOMBS WE BARREL ON FIVE-MINUTE TITLE (FUN LITTLE TIDBIT) i accidentally made us too dumb at talking to take the other thing we need. Now that's what I call negotiation. They are level 12 rabbits. woo ah, yes lol This is the basic General Training 2. They throw one guy at us with a time limit, a level 44 werewolf. A reinforcement will be airdropped in if we dawdle, so we don't dawdle. This is one half the reason we're doing this. Returning to Aptitude 2 and for fuck's sake, Gren. He would've grabbed this barrel on the first turn, too. Fuck's sake. We become Master Artificers and get Power 5. Anyway we're gonna be this for the rest of the game, so take note. Master Adventurers is the same as Adepts only with more reinforcements if you dawdle, which we don't. Wolfe finishes with a critical hit. Aaaaand we're done with Clan Trials forever. There's some wizard out in Jylland who will remove your title for you and I don't think there is literally any reason to ever. It's unfinished business time. ZOOM ZOOM ZOOM, BITCHES, JUST LIKE THE MAZDA AD! AHHAHAHAA IT'S JUST LIKE THE- ohhh shit there's a damage law. With Nofilia in the area, we've probably got this under control. So Hurdy's stats are bad, right? And he's got no real attacking potential. What class would have synergy with him? Well, I gave him a gun. The bird gets knocked down to critical, but that just quickens her and she runs. And then heals herself! Remember how we failed this without Move 2 and there was nothing we could do about it? Okay admittedly this is still dicey. The bird's been crit like, twice, and had the werewolf been smart enough to hit the flank this mission would be over! One down. In the next zone, a reminder to train a balanced squad. Trying to pack out your 24 is more guys than optimal but I'd probably say you objectively want 10 generics. I DID NOT NOTICE THIS CHOCOBO. WELL. SHIT. The flan moves into my pile of guys and blizzards himself... but all three of my guys absorb frost. It makes up somewhat for that I've forgotten to give Nathala Black Magic. And then we kill him with counterattacks. Christ. Thankfully these birds are pacifists and also quick on their talons. fuuuuck Whew. It's in the bag from that point. Two down. By the way, the first instance is where the cursor is, the second where we are now and the third in the !, so these always happen in the same order. (You can't choose not to do the quest when you run into the !). Wait, whaaaaaat?? Yes. This quest is to unlock the chocobo knights, Caul's destiny. If the mug rings a bell, he ran into the shop when we were keeping it for the Bonga Bugle. Witness I'm pretty sure the only glimpse of Ursla as an archer on the field you will ever get. I'm not really sure why she's learning Lightning Strike and in fact I'm going to have her stop after this quest. Yeah, let's save Bochopo and his pocochos. So the deal with chocobo knights is that they get the A-abilities and movement of the chocobo they're riding on. They're a cool gimmick unit and they're needed for completionism since there's sidequests that demand you fetch chocobos of the appropriate colour. There's a satandragon here but he's actually really fragile. Ursla ensures that the chocoboyz can beat on the drake in safety. Easiest of all the three, somehow. They do actually do twirls and whirr at us. Caul will fucking eclipse you. Next up on FFTA2: We try to complete this picture.

"So is classical music (or romantic, to be pedantic) allowed? If so, here's one of my favourite choral pieces, by Liechtenstein composer Rheinberger. If nothing else, it will at least add some diversity to the playlist. ;)" Variety is the spice of life, ping.

If it isn't one of your first couple of FEs, you'd want to play on Hard. It's technically the game's Normal mode - the original Hard was inexplicably removed from the international release.

Didn't this guy have something to do with these forums? fucking lmao, nice

Normal with salt and butter. Snowflake-shaped.

[spoiler=Update 48] The more things change... The more they stay the same. We got this quest like eight story missions before vikings, The Only Axe Class, even unlocked! Mack needs help, too. See, I wouldn't leave you without a gameplay bit! what the fuck Mack's suffering from some, uh... ... academic differences in opinion. Mack's a good lad who doesn't deserve this shit. I brought Guinness to lead because, well... he's been the guy talking to Mack this whole time. Let's kill these smug pricks. And there's something these nerds don't know - each of our boys has an elemental absorption. We also have regeneration! Except that I immediately forget about the law and we immediately lose it. It's a good thing those rewards stopped mattering a while ago. Admittedly, the enemy arcanist's daring plan to heavily injure himself takes me offguard. Oh no it hit two of us as well as two of them- haha nevermind. Jesus though will I be glad to kill that black mage. Like say with my next turn. The Seer has a deeply weird skillset, combining Mana Shield with, um, Blood Price. Which just about evens out to 'being a normal unit'. er. Kyrie, incidentally, mastered Templar, but he's returned to his roots. Mack's Mad Scientist move confers a random buff and man does it hit a jackpot with Nathala. Still, they start to crumble. Especially after Nathala hits the Fuck It button. But they're- oops. - done. Were wrong, and are dead. Well, he writes a letter upon our return back to town. Ahh, poor Mack. In far less interesting subplots, more of this shit. I send Nofilia and Wolfe to finish the job in Fluorgis and Moorabella. The Memories guy, by the way, is literally called 'Old Man Boiboi'. Also Cid's theme is playing because the guys who named the soundtrack weren't the same guys who actually assigned it to scenes. Presumably having more wayfarer logs (those stamp collections you grab from regions) means more reward. We have, like, three? He gives us mythril. You might think that's shit because mythril gear's usually bad in all final fantasies. But it's actually very high-end loot and, God bless, it actually unlocks a new set of gauntlets for us. They aren't that good, but the skills are the important bit. Ursla briefly moonlights as an archer to criticise me, which is weird because moogles and nu mou are totally fine with it. Oh, bullshit! You too, Yoana? Bye Elm. This is the most ironic your name has ever been. Normally I only show the funny responses, but... this is just really sweet. No. Bad Yoana. It probably should be Nofilia, but she's off hitting on that chick in Fluorgis, so here's Yvet. Anyway, that's enough for one update. Next time? Shit I really don't want to do.

yes, treating people as though they are objects, the meaning of 'objectification', is in fact a bad thing... objectively.

Continuing the theme, FUCKDONALDTRUMP adds; "i am fuccboi and i have not even finished listening to this song before submitting it. MF DOOM samplecore"

[spoiler=Update 47 - Wolfe] Went with the chief and the kid to Bisga, we were negotiating the handover of the artifact. It went... eh. Poorly. Guinness? Yeah, Guinness was pretty shocked. And it's fine. We've trained for this. We will be strong. Until we see that face. The bastard ran off so we were left to kill these lowlives and move on. I wanted this over with but that isn't our way. We don't leave survivors. Isn't that a horrible thought? They hit us hard, but we played our regular game. Their leader had just run straight at us. That was a mistake. He was first to fall. The attacks came thick and fast, but our new robes and shields did wonders. Adelle, though... overcommitted, and fell in the distance. A rough lot, they were. Like our doctrine, heavy infantry and archers. But one of their swordsmen, well... threw himself at one of Cid's blows and fell underneath it. A pack of paper tigers, the lot of them. But paper tigers that had outsmarted our leader, no matter how easy that might be, and thus been a thorn in our side. I went to track the bastards, but didn't have much luck. Still, back where we'd left them, the bosses were chatting... And what they talked about was very interesting indeed. My tracking might've lead nowhere, but at least we had a lead to go on, snatched it up by chance back in town. The decision was made, then. But it could wait. There were other things that demanded our attention, particularly with Khamja on the prowl. This was a time to bide our time, and gather our strength. And, most importantly... ... to settle some scores. Like hell we were taking him on face value. We were taking this ambushing little scumbag down. One of those times where the law could turn a blind eye. Because we were gonna give the gilded pigboy a black eye. He actually called himself a 'gentleman trader' on the pub request, the smug bastard! Hate... so... much... ! AND THE SODDING LAW COULD GO SCREW ITSELF This was for a handful of humiliating retreats when all we wanted was a goddamn auction! The bastard even stole Yoana's shield! Well that was for that! That's for your repeated inability to stick to your empty promises to stop your crime! That's for constantly using the law to cover your fat arse! And finally? LEARN! TO! COUNT! ... . . . So, I was true to my word. I set him free. Into the goddamn canal. Annoyingly and contrary to my expectations, he floated. Still, he's not my problem anymore, and never will be again. In spite of all the dramas going around the camp, I am glad that nobody would ever follow in the footsteps of that idiot. Next up on FFTA2:

A few a day is my idea of a marathon, tbh... 1-3 is about my average range.

"I told you I was ill." - Engraved on the tombstone of Pope John Paul II.

Supports are a nice bonus but it doesn't take an LTC mindset to admit that they simply don't happen organically, bar a couple of the easiest ones. Either way, your team is clearly good enough, and the supports you do have will help that in small ways. Perceval, incidentally, is only terrifyingly good in Hard Mode IIRC, though still perfectly above-average in Normal.

If played with and brought down to earth a bit, capably, yes. If, alternatively, treated as the terrifying, arrogant abominations they are and allowed to flaunt, then yes, that too. Christian Greys, though, don't cut it.

I don't think disInnocence was pleased with the US election result, given that the only comment leftFUCK

I also feel as though Tails Gets Trolled and Karl Pilkington are somewhat unironic but deliberately playing up to the audience.

[spoiler=Update 46b] Back in Moorabella, Adelle's herself. Speaking as the guy who has needed to go and buy a whole box of lemons in the middle of workday, that job fucking sucks. Well, this extremely attractive thespian is correct. Maybe we haven't recruited our only special character of the day! ... What? Er, well, hey, maybe it wouldn't be such a bad idea. To be honest. No, that'd be Ursla. Err. Bye. (Montblanc's in the scene, by the way, hidden by all the textboxes.) Sounds like a plan. Let's just read the notices... Fffffair enough, then. Alright, so this quest. Next up on FFTA2: No reason for delay, right?

[spoiler=Update 46a] Hey, look! New paperweight! Anyway, we're off to go find wood for our boy Hurdy who is not yet actually our boy. I am sure that nothing will go wr oh. Well put! This would be all well and good until he pulled out a raptor thug out of the background - a ranger, too, for that matter. Astra makes the next debuff automatically miss, which in practice means you're immune to debuffs because why would you waste a debuff attempt breaking Astra? Hey, Fredrika! Can't be hurt by the law, huh? Try this on for size. Oh, come on! Also forget what I just said about Astra because I mean, yet again, 'using abilities attached to regular attacks' is the answer. Power Crush eats the Astra even if it does nothing else. Doesn't really matter, anyway - Nathala gets the job done thanks to the miracle of throwing ice shields at everyone. That's great, dude, but I've already stopped her. The alchemist's called Zohl, by the way, and he is totally unremarkable. He does have Beast Lore secondary, though, which... apparently lets him give his own units of the appropriate type a free action or something? Huh. Nathala's not a fan. By the way, what do you think happens when the half-accuracy double-damage skill gets used on someone who everything has a 100% chance to hit? Yeah. Rangers set traps and I hate them. Has Nathala even ever killed a unit before? Well she's on two now. Yvet does her global summon thing. I. I wanted the chest opened. This is it, this is peak Opportunity. Fortunately the alchemist's so slow we just wait for Gren's turn to come around again, pillage a dark matter and then finish the job. Wow, you might be thinking, that was such a filler mission. Surely there's some plot to come? No! Potentially. Actually, there's a hitch. He gives us a spiral vine and some cash. Strawood (which is unique loot) combines with the spiral vine to make this... Or we can go pick a fight in the Sant d'Alsa Bluff to find some flutegrass. This is it. This is the one line preceding fight. Some rabbits and faeries and a lamia. Remember when Rodanu fucking sucked? I do. Guinness finishes the job. Well... so much for Nathala. If only we had other sources of fire close to hand. Unsurprisingly the notably fragile earlygame monsters fold under our iron boots. Was it, though? He better. Anyway, now we can craft the one Hurdy wants. Annoyingly we will never have the opportunity to get Strawood again so all the Brilliant Theorbo stuff is locked to us and you can thus never master Beast Mastery or Barddom. This is really stupid design. As soon as we make and buy the instrument (they both work), Hurdy shows up for the handover. Well, let's not get ahead of ourselves here... So much is going on in this scene. Cid's said 'fuck this' and walked off, there's a depressed fighter, a monk showed up and is circling the roast and the white mage is just impassively staring forward. Forever. And Adelle? She smells 'recruitable B-list character'. And she's right. So does Cid, he's just late on the uptake... or maybe has more important subplots on his mind. And he runs off, because he's Guinness. And here he comes! Hurdy has a special class that replaces Caul's future class, but he can reclass freely. As is the case in basically all games, bards buff people. Hurdy's stats, though, are fucking terrible. Even when given proper equipment, he's the slowest and most fragile unit in our army, with the second-worst physical attack (to Lawrn) and as many HP as Nathala. His resistance is average, his magic is sky-high but I don't think he actually has any use for it. Anyway, I've never actually used him before. I do have a plan to make him a bit more... exciting, though.

It's just you and smee now, and he was surfing through Youtube and found this glorious piece of music. Enjoy. (I, Parrhesia, did.)

I have enough faith in humanity to be certain that My Immortal was written unironically and sincerely.

You can technically beat the game with 0% growths - FE6 has a lot of decent prepromotes that can slot right in if your team feels weak. You seem to have a pretty solid squad assembled. Promoting around level 15 is advisable, maybe even earlier for some units (healers, mostly).

[spoiler=Update 45 - Kyrie] This templar lark isn't what it's cut out to be. I remember the good old days back as a monk... not that I did much monking, just ate and drank and fought a lot. That was the life, eh? But for these magics to work... well, the Law expects higher standards. I volunteered to lead the next three missions. Figured my attitude's maybe why I'm not getting many jobs lately, I gotta push my way back to the front of the queue. I'd been given a B-team, maybe as some kind of punishment - Nathala's still wet behind the ears, all Elm can ever do is hit people, Pyrrh barely knows which end of his cannon is which and I don't even know who the fuck Dillan is. And you know after the way he walked right into a tripwire and fell over I dunno if I want to know who the fuck Dillan is. Pyrrh kept rubbing his hands, tittering about "oh, it'll be a turkey shoot." Easy for him to say, it'll be me, Torch and the fat lad facing the claws and beaks. I'll be honest, we mostly just hurled Elm into 'em. It worked a treat, too. Dillan's not really in touch with that part, see, he made the mistake of 'being near him'. Elm doesn't know a whole lot, but, man. Punches. He knows punches. Heh, I think by this point Torch just wanted not to be overshadowed. Too late, though. So now all we had to do was bring the kid's cockatrice back to him in one piece. Anyway, that's the story of how we had to buy the kid a new bird. Ha, kidding. Kidding! Hey, trust me! Anyway, uh, if you'd been in my shoes, you'd... I mean, the mission in the mines, it... it didn't go so... ... Anyway, the Kthili job. That's the one you want to hear about. So Icicle Ark were this notorious group of frost warriors and wizards, on the run from Fluorgis. We tried to corner 'em in the mines when, well... anyway, kept chasing 'em. Into a desert. We were all ready to kick some ice. Gren got in the wrong place at the wrong time. So did their nerd. At the cost of Caul. ... And Yoana. And, well... Look, it was shit, alright? There was only one thing that could've saved us from that point. Nathala came prepared. She fought like a demon... But they left us for dead in the desert. And I just... read the damned letter, over and over and over again in my head, just... hammering home that I was a failure, that I hadn't been... ... Anyway, lad, that's the moral of the story. You see those Icicle Ark lads? Don't fuck with 'em. 'Cause that's on my head. And next time? Next time I'll be fucking ready. Next up on FFTA2: There's still some nice stuff to do locked by the plot! Mostly I'm tired of Elm only having three skills. So it's the plot for us!

Yeah, upon reflection playing the game Viera probably have the best - certainly most varied and interesting - class-set, up there with humans. That said, human magi aren't that great. Moogles have several interesting classes but lack any real powerhouses - Caul is a very solid unit and Gren is great but no skillset really combines that well with Juggling. Bangaa have a variety of very good melee jobs - in a full team of six there would definitely be Torch in there and another proper melee guy - but even the four I have overlap a little. Seeq... well, getting Viking and Lanista arbitrarily takes forever, same with Gria getting Ravager and Geomancer. So you really just want the one of each. Funny thing is? All those summoning items are the rewards from the tournaments.

Yes! Yes!! yesssss y e s YEAH FIGHT THE POWER HELL YEAH Demagogue, but yes! yes!!!! Wait, huh? Anyway, I can't think of any good answer. I'd take Boswell and hope that my life story became a smash hit.

Knight Falchion reckons "Saintseneca is one of the few bands where I actually like their current alt-rock stuff better than their folk-rock origins"

[spoiler=Update 44] Spot the odd clan out. Not that it does them any good, of course. But first, this - these from memory come around like... annually, but in a cycle, so we could do them all in a row. Most likely we'll do these two now and finish them in a year. (So, Camoa Silversun, Graszton Ashleaf, and so on.) First up, uh... Clan Racism? This group is a joke. Black mages can never be underestimated, but the equipment is like second-tier all around, soldiers are garbage, the blue mage doesn't know anything good and a white mage is hardly going to deal us harm. Also the law's against Opportunity commands and I'm gonna bring my A-Team for this. Yvet is insanely fast, Nofilia is a really good mage and Wolfe and Ursla are... terrifying. Ursla half-murders the black mage, Yvet Tranqs Nofi who silences the black mage and then Yvet dodges a 90% speed rend. Confused AI is intentionally really stupid, and makes for great things like this needless boom targeted on Nofi that also hit the priest in the back. Yeah we murder and disable them basically. Oh, by the by, the odd one out in the Elementalist range is White Flame - a healing fire spell noticeably more powerful than Cure. Wolfe harvests the nerd... for two Gilhet Leads, one of literally the only two loots you will always have double digits of for the whole game. Anyway we finish the last two off. Unsurprisingly all of Humeism's fans were... ... human. ... Sorry, what did you say your clan name was? On second thoughts maybe just don't talk at all. Yvet looking less than impressed. Er... alright. The archers are very average and the male hunter borrows Blitz and Beat Down from the fighter skillset, both of which are worse than regular attacks almost always. Annoyingly Ursla can't just kill her because the Arbalest is earth-elemental and she has gaia gear, which absorbs it. Oh wow now they aren't capable of inflicting damage anymore! Houndforce - one good surprising move at the start and yeah that's their peak. They don't even have any fans. oh you motherfuckers. Don't you remember when we beat the shit out of you and killed half your men? On fucking Tuesday!? They all rush in with their first moves and man does that go badly for some of them. And the juggler gets slowed on top of it. Grayrl's lackies briefly dally with a Fits Into A 5-Tile Cross formation but think better of it when they get blasted by Wolfe and Nofi. Ursla picks off the rabble. The slow juggler two turns before being about to move... ... then Grayrl the turn before he would've recovered from Disable... Animists gonna be animists. Well, okay, the Animism secondary. Anyway, Ursla is herself and her girlfriend- hey, what's this? Er Anyway, Ursla. Yeah alright then. Moorabella's auction has some Really Good Shit. Now for Fluorgis! We've got Fluorgis itself, which is straightforward, but Tramdine is an absolute son of a bitch to own. Sant d'Alsa rewards giving up at the start and then winning at the finish, which I can get behind. I'll be honest Bowen is the only one of these that rings a bell... or is Prost connected to Syrenead? Anyway, Nazan is insanely fast and hard to deal with. Champs 4 lyfe. And now for Goug - wait, how many tokens?! Well, I'm not going to risk it being the auction's theme, I'm just gonna cheat. This is for south... oh fuck me I've had the continent names mixed up this whole time. Jylland's the east, Loar's the west. Anyway. By the way, we've unlocked every area in the game by this point. Oh, okay, yeah, we're just... we have more 3-tokens than everyone else has ... tokens. Hahaha imagine having to play that legitimately? Fittingly, I celebrate my success by accidentally loading a savestate, because I savescum the Bazaar because loot is scarce and I think it's fair given that I'm balancing 20 guys instead of Six. hahahahahahahahahha also lol the pirates are out and whoever the fuck Griv's Caravan are are in. Guess who wins by dint of still having coins? It Me. Oh man, I guess I can blow all my tokens on the last bit, hahahahah! Go fuck yourselves, Jytras! Yeah. Champions for life of... the world. No special reward sadly, we've basically maxed out the auction system and can expect annual Monty hauls for loot. Let's finally finish this quest. Cid, this is gonna be your class in a second, you may as well get into the spirit of it. That's better! Let's kick their heads in. !!Useful Opportunity Command!! Anyway Gren immediately almost died but the Master Monk was alone and unsupported and had no Counter so he's having the shit kicked out of him. So one of the basic Master Monk abilities is basically melee doubleshot. I really have to wonder why that's even in the game, double damage is just almost always the option you want, and it says a lot about how great one of the other Master Monk abilities is that there is a credible alternative. So yeah Gren takes two hundred and forty-six damage. They're pretty glass-cannony though. The dying guy in the middle got aced by Caul. Let's all just be proud of how far Rodanu has come. :) Guinness is a paladin now because, I mean, fuck it, why not, right? Rodanu does explode in the background, but this fight's over. Damn right they are. Next up on FFTA2: Mistakes are made.