Alastor15243

Sanaki figures it out at the end of the game and talks to her about it.

Engage Day 40: Processing This Oooooooookay! So! A lot of shit went down yesterday. I’m just uh… gonna do a light episode today. Just to kinda… come to grips with what the fuck just happened, and get some idea of what I’m gonna be doing with my army now in light of it. First off, supports. Pepsiman and Alcryst’s A. …Alcryst has become the Wolf Whisperer apparently. Which is adorable, but there’s no way I’m reclassing him. He’s way too good as his personal French-name archer class. …And like I’ve been told, that A rank gave Alcryst and Pepsiman a rank 20 bond too. This time giving insane hit and avoid bonuses to any synced or engaged units nearby. Which is awesome, but uh… I’m kind of concerned about what that might do to some strategies on Maddening mode. Maddening has made it plain that it won’t send people charging after the Hiya Papaya Messiah if they have literally no hope of victory. So having a hit and avoid boost I can’t turn off around Pepsiman… …Why in god’s name did they give Pepsiman a magic-exclusively-using art when he has a 20% personal magic growth and a class that doesn’t boost that at all? Pepsiman has four magic! …Though actually… since apparently you can Engage this on other people… imagine a mage with pure-magic gauntlets! …Oh, that’s right! Also, my rings are a bit mixed up. Lemme put them back on the right people. Also, I’ve decided that the perfect Emblem Ring for Veyle… is Micaiah. And Clanne will now be getting Marth instead. Veyle’s got a great magic stat, but no staff access, which this will fix. And she even gets a range boost for staves even beyond what Micaiah normally allows, being in a dragon class and all! Meanwhile, I had great success putting Marth on Clanne in the early game of Maddening, even as a dark knight. And now I can try levin sword lodestar rushes! I’m gonna try putting Leif on Mauvier, and Lucina on Goldmary. Seadall really, really doesn’t need an Emblem now that I have more character slots than Emblems. He just needs to dance. Honestly, in light of my Maddening file where I promoted Clanne to mage knight right away and he quickly snowballed into a menace who managed to get enough SP for Canter before Chapter 10… I’m really regretting not putting him in this class sooner. He might have had a solid strength stat like he does in my Maddening file, and he might have been able to do reasonable damage with normal swords. Ah well. Lesson learned. Veyle has 2500 SP. That should be enough to give her Canter and some decent headway with Staff Mastery. Speaking of which, I had a note I left for myself: …A now-redundant reminder to put Staff Mastery back on Clanne after I took it off in favor of a speed boost… …The results of my unfortunate discovery that Hortensia and Lucina’s bond set does not, at any point, mention the words “Pega Pony Princess”… …Oh yes, and the S-rank lance on Louis! Let’s see how that looks… …It would indeed be significantly stronger than Louis’s javelin… but Louis can only use it as a general, unfortunately. Great knights don’t get S rank lances. Alas, I see a fatal flaw in trying to make Mauvier use Leif: He can’t use a hand axe to give himself the full 1-2-range weapon triangle. I’d need to class-change him to mage knight with a minor in axes. Veyle to Micaiah: You have a little brother, right? I’ve always wondered what it’s like to have a younger sibling. What I Sincerely Fucking Hope Micaiah Is About To Say: Oh, no, actually it’s a younger sister, but that’s a very long story! Micaiah: Ah, well, we aren’t… actually related. But there isn’t anything I wouldn’t do for him. SO I’VE FUCKING HEARD, LITTLE MISS MICAIAH MCCREEPER MCCOY! But yeah, that was their B, to clarify. Their C was Veyle apologizing for what she did to Micaiah, and judging by her C with Sigurd, that seems like it’s going to be a common theme. But yeah, let’s get Veyle suited up, and then work out what exactly we’re gonna try with Mauvier. Alright, thanks to the magic of achievement bond fragments, and a lot of extremely repetitive C bonds with Veyle and Mauvier making their rounds of awkward and unnecessary apologies, I’ve got my pretty damned solid Veyle skill build and my questionable-but-what-the-shit-let’s-do-it Mauvier build. Veyle’s got Canter and Staff Mastery 5, so she’s going to be an absolute menace with Micaiah. Mauvier’s got Resolve and Hit+20, and enough of a bond with Leif that he can use the light brand and master lance. Now I’m going to make him an axe-using dark knight. Also, I’ve heard Mauvier say “I am no longer the person I was” so many times that it’s conjured the mental image of him fighting Hector and him going “Hi, ‘no longer the person I was’, I’m Dad!” Also, let’s just go completely ham on Yunaka and have her get Evasion+30 now. …Of course we don’t have Evasion+30 yet, just Evasion+20. And even if we did… Yunaka only has 700 SP left after buying the 20 version. Despite saving up the entire goddamned game just for that skill. And she’s been fighting incessantly! Nonstop! One of my two megatanks who fight a frankly unhealthy and immoral portion of my foes! How is she still struggling to get the SP to max out ONE FUCKING STAT BOOSTING SKILL SET? Aaaaanyway, there it is. I’ve got all that sorted out. I think I’m gonna be done for today. By tomorrow I’ll have to decide whether I want to tackle the main story, or what I assume are Marth and Pepsiman’s Emblem Trials. Oh yeah, one more thing: Bonds! Pepsiman and Byleth’s A. … … … … Pepsiman… knows what a mercenary is, game. He knows what they do. He talked to Yunaka in their C support asking her if she was one based on her skill in combat. …Though honestly, pretty good ending to the support, even if the setup was stupid. Byleth: They’re fighting forces for hire. We went to war for nations without belonging to them. So our allies in one battle might be our enemies in the next. Pepsiman: Though with enough motive, that could happen anyway… thanks for the lesson, Professor. I dunno, I just like the delivery of it. And how somber the “thanks for the lesson” is. Yunaka and Corrin’s A. …Yunaka exposits that she now identifies with the fake personality she initially just put on as a disguise. That’s… actually interesting. But yeah, alright, I think that’ll be it for today. If you have recommendations for if I should do door number 1, 2 or 3 tomorrow, lemme know! Alastor, signing off!

Honestly I wouldn't even be mad. Pepsiman has fallen way more into a support role for me. I'd have wasted those boots on him, but Veyle could have done everything I've been using Pepsiman for. He's a pretty underwhelming unit in terms of combat.

Engage Day 39: Chapter 22??? Alright, what’s the game got for us now? It threw us the curve ball, and now it’s time for the catcher to teleport behind us, stab us in the spine, and whisper “nothing personnel, kid”. Or something. It’s a crazy feeling, simultaneously feeling like you know exactly what to expect from a story and yet also like you have no idea. Its foreshadowing is so transparently… transparent… that I can see shit coming before it even passes the horizon. And then sometimes it just dispenses with foreshadowing entirely and does completely batshit bullshit out of nowhere. …OH, OKAY, SO SOMBRON IS JUST BATTERED, HUMBLED AND ON HIS KNEES NOW? And here’s Pepsiman! Past Pepsiman apparently. …And he just… fucking… …Sliced Sombron across the chest. …And he’s on the ground. Not moving. Well obviously he isn’t dead. …Unless this is foreshadowing that Fell Dragons can be brought back to life, and so can Pepsiman. Also, this place is on fire, so I’m guessing this is the place where Lumera showed up in that flashback. Yep, here she is. …But oh no, Sombron was playing possum to laser Pepsiman clean through the chest from behind while he was busy talking with Lumera. …Or it was a last breath thing. Pepsiman: But I wanted to be… a good dragon… This entire thing is cringe. …But it looks like my first guess was right. We’re in some sort of limbo. Pepsiman: I wonder if I’ll be able to find Mother here. …I mean, that’s the first thing I’d ask. …But he doesn’t find his mom, he finds Veyle. Somehow. Is this where Veyle goes when she isn’t in control? …Nope, apparently this is new to her too, and she’s apparently dead. OH SHIT. DO WE GET A CONQUEST 15!? DO WE GET A CHAPTER WITH JUST PEPSIMAN AND VEYLE!? …Okay, Veyle’s talking about how she’s tired of trying and failing to make father love her and just be happy spending time with her instead of trying to conquer the world, and just wanting to give up and let things end by the side of the only family member who’s ever genuinely loved her… it’s one of those things I can imagine being heartbreaking in a better story. But this isn’t a better story. This is Engage. …But enough insulting the game. How about some constructive criticism? What would I have done differently about this game’s… “plot”? …Well, one thing that might’ve been interesting is if they just went full ham with the obvious parallels you can see everywhere… and made this game’s story basically a medieval fantasy Super Sentai show. Pepsiman wakes up, Lumera tells him about how he’s a Divine Dragon and all that, and the initial chapters’ plot revolves around him and his team of champions from around the world teleporting from their home base in the sky to all corners of the continent to combat the evil forces of Sombron and his Four Hounds and armies of the undead wherever they happen to be wreaking havoc that day, collecting Emblems all the while. Introduce all three of the allied nations, and the tag-along plot characters that come with them, within the first half-dozen chapters, and all the while, as we fight the forces of Sombron directly, slowly feed us characterization for all of them. Then have Lumera’s death and the big Chapter 11 “what the fuck” moment happen at the same time. Lumera dies, after we’ve gotten more than enough time to get to know her and care about her death, and the rings are taken. Maybe even have the Somniel fall into the sea, and make a defense map where the avatar has to make the thing fly again while everyone else fends off a full-scale invasion from all four Hounds at once, plus Veyle, without any rings. You want to have a story with a cast of recurring villains we fight multiple times rather than a bunch of unique bosses? Okay! Lean into that! Introduce them from the start! Have us gradually get to know each of them from the very beginning, so that shit like what happened to Marni doesn’t come out of left field! And don’t waste time having entire story arcs revolving around tours of countries that amount to glorified window-dressing. Have them actually be window-dressing, and make the real point be our interactions with our enemies and allies! …Ugh, I’m sorry, this was supposed to be a quick tangent, but I really should’ve known better. These few paragraphs have taken way too long to write down. I’m just gonna keep going. … … I… …Pepsiman reminds me of something I totally forgot about. Veyle… can resurrect the dead. …And yeah, it’s pretty obvious this is the entire point of Pepsiman’s phobia of the Corrupted. It’s so he can look all brave and noble by being willing to become one in order to save everyone. So yeah, now Veyle and EVeyle are fighting for control, and yes, apparently it’s just accepted as fact that the helmet can’t be taken off, it has to be broken. Which is what Veyle plans to do. EVeyle: HELP ME FATHER! I BEG OF YOU! Veyle: Papa isn’t coming. He doesn’t care. Oh shit. That’s actually a pretty badass line, taking her millennia’s worth of daddy issues and turning them into a “no one will hear you scream” one-liner. Could’ve been delivered better to suit that, but I still kinda love it. Question though: why does that kill EVeyle? They never said that EVeyle was now confined to the helmet or anything, she’d been inside Veyle for ages. How does destroying the helmet suddenly kill her? Also, while I’m discussing weird plot holes, IF SOMBRON CAN JUST MAGIC THE RINGS OFF OF THEIR USERS’ FINGERS, WHY EVEN BOTHER WITH THE TIME BULLSHIT WITH VEYLE!? AND HOW CAN WE EVER FIGHT HIM AGAIN!? …And Pepsiman comes back as a moaning Corrupted. …Except now he’s not moaning. I guess that was just him waking up or something? Veyle: Brother, look what I found. … Marth’s… Emblem Ring. …DID SOMBRON JUST FUCKING DROP THEM!? OKAY GAME! O FUCKING KAY! …Okay, so they’re just drained and discarded now? But Pepsiman’s gonna try to bring it back. Okay, then where are the others? He tried summoning, it doesn’t work. So he just kinda… summons harder. …And he’s red. …Has Pepsiman… lost his Divine Dragon powers due to being a Corrupted? …He doesn’t have a corrupted weakness though. Alright, this is another two-parter situation where we have to fight with the same army. And I’ve gotta put bond rings on everyone because Marth’s the only Emblem we’ve got right now. And because Marth’s red, we don’t need to engage to use all of Marth’s powers. They’re just active constantly. …And okay, looks like all the Emblems are on the map, and we need to grab all of them. Let’s see… …So is Pepsiman just gonna be called “Crpt. Pepsiman” now? Despite not having a corrupted weakness? …Wait, apparently I misunderstood, Marth seems like he does follow engage rules. I can’t use his rapier or his engage skills without engaging, despite him being red and all the enemies using red Emblems getting to use most of their powers at all times. …Oh cool! Looks like my meal from last time is still in effect! That wasn’t the case in Fates! Woo! …Something occurred to me. …Whoever I put on an Emblem square is probably going to be the one who picks it up and gets to use it this map. I should keep that in mind when planning who goes where. Unless Pepsiman needs to be the one to step on each of them, and I don’t get to use them this map at all. Anyway, this is a bit scary, and I’m worried I’ll forget that someone can’t do something I’m counting on them to do until it’s too late. …The squares the rings are on seem impassable. So it’s not a matter of stepping on them, but going next to them and interacting I guess. Well, better fight our way towards them. …Oh! And we have Veyle now! She’s… got her uses, but her problems too. Especially without an Emblem Ring to patch up her weaknesses. …Okay, our first batch of rings is Byleth, Lyn and Lucina. Byleth’s obviously going on Veyle if they can go on anyone, and Lyn on Alcryst. Lucina I guess on Seadall but it doesn’t really matter as long as she doesn’t go on someone I don’t want to put someone even more important on. Iiiiiiiiiii have a feeling I’m going to be relying on Kagetsu a lot here. This place is packed with enemies, and he’s my only enemy-phase combatant who never really relied on his Emblem all that much to kick ass. …Okay, so I have to get Pepsiman adjacent to a ring to summon it. Gotcha. Alright, time to bulldoze our way towards the first set of them then. I’m having Kagetsu kill these two axe guys near the start with Seadall’s help, and he’ll position himself to take out the wyvern and the mage on enemy phase too. …He’s one attack short. FUCK. Alright, well, the axe guys have fucking 1 hit on him, so he can still handle these four enemies just fine, I just can’t player-phase them and have to have Seadall stay further back. Meanwhile, I have Rosado dive in towards the royal knights to get some headway on killing them, and everyone else heads up behind Kagetsu (but out of the range of the axe guys) to rush the first batch of rings to the southeast. Kagetsu, in spite of his reduced strength and defense, is all “I AM STILL LEMILLION!” over these motherfuckers, and it’s beautiful to behold. Meanwhile, I multitask having Ivy position herself after killing the wounded wyvern so that Seadall can dance her, simultaneously letting him Canter forward closer to the Emblem Rings so Pepsiman can grab them all in one turn if he literally has to be adjacent, and letting Ivy kill one of the remaining royal knights to the east. …False alarm. Just Cantering a few spaces near the closest one got us all three. Let’s see, what happens now…? … … … … … … …I can sync with them by talking to them… …but they say “allies without rings”… …Please tell me bond rings don’t count. If they do, why the fuck would you let me equip fucking bond rings on the prep screen!? …Okay, it looks like I can still talk to them with my bond ring units and put them on. Thank fucking god. But they’re all red. I wonder how they’re going to explain them becoming normal again if Pepsiman apparently lost that power? Also, remember when I said last chapter felt so much like Birthright Chapter 27? …Now in the sequel chapter it’s the same place but rubble! …Lyn’s smiling her usual lively way when you select talking to her. Isn’t she supposed to be a zombie slave in this form? …Fuck, I accidentally put Lucina on Alcryst instead of putting Lyn on him, but it hardly matters right now, we can’t use nearly enough of the Emblems’ powers for that to matter. Veyle can’t even instruct with Byleth, so that was a waste too. …Alright, so I took out the next wave, but reinforcements are coming from the rear. They aren’t too big a deal though. Mostly dagger users, and I have antitoxins and units who literally take no damage from them. And now Clanne has his staves back and Ivy’s stronger with magic. Louis’s hanging back to take out the thieves and wolf knights, while everyone else barrels on towards the last batches of Emblems. Honestly, nothing here is really posing a challenge. Kagetsu dives in, everyone else cleans up. Pretty simple. Rosado… apparently thinks Eirika looks great in red. Huh. Anyway, final batch time. Kagetsu’s got Ike back and he’s in position to smoke some of this last pitiful batch of enemies, then it’ll be time to finish this. I got the S rank lance, which obviously is going on Louis, though I’ll have to see what it looks like once I can see its stats properly. Depressingly, it would apparently be inferior to Kagetsu’s forged silver dagger in literally every way if Kagetsu could equip it, at least according to the “what item to drop” screen. Yep, next turn I’ll grab the last three and we’ll be done. Then we’ll just have to see what comes next. Christ I’m glad this happened on a weekend. I am utterly exhausted and this has taken hours. Ooh nice! Seadall just got Special Dance! It’s like Inspiring Song from Fates, not like Special Dance from Awakening. Dex/Skill/Luck. … … … … I had this tiiiiiiiiiiny bit of paranoia that it somehow wouldn’t be over after grabbing all the rings. I don’t know why. The game has given me no reason to make me that paranoid. But I stiiiiiiiiiiiiiil appear to have a bit of baggage from Three Houses, and I obeyed it, and avoided doing anything suicidal in this last turn, like, say, leaving Hortensia in range of that sniper that just showed up. And uh… it’s good I did that. BECAUSE THE GAME JUST MOVED THE GOALPOSTS ON ME. HOLY FUCK. This isn’t nearly as bad as Foreign Land and Sky because it wasn’t accompanied by an ambush spawn, but the game still told me what the objective was and then CHANGED IT ON PLAYER PHASE AFTER I WON. WHYYYYYYYYYY? …So now I’ve gotta rout the remaining forces. Would it really have been impossible to say “Collect All Emblems, then Rout”? …Well alright. Let’s play ball. …Alright, routed. Didn’t take much. It’s really just the principle of the thing that bugged me. …Apparently Pepsiman’s suffering some side-effects of being revived as a Corrupted. He appears to be falling apart. Is Pepsiman dying for real? Please have the balls to make Pepsiman die for real. Oh shit, him becoming an Emblem is actually pretty damned hype. PFFFFFFFFF AND HIS MOM’S RING IS HIS EMBLEM RING!? AND HE’S ALL BLUE! …So wait, is he still playable with his own permanently-locked Emblem Ring on him? Or is he just an Emblem Ring now? Ooooh! And now the Fire Emblem theme is playing! I AM COMPLETELY CHECKED OUT FROM THE EMOTIONAL ASPECT OF THIS STORY, BUT I CAN’T WAIT TO FIND OUT HOW THIS CHANGES THE GAMEPLAY! Lemme guess, he’s the Emblem of Flames? NOPE! JUST LITERALLY THE FIRE EMBLEM! OKAY! Glad to see we’re not doing cutesy synonym games anymore, but like, seriously, if that’s the case, why not call the other Emblems the “X Emblem” instead of the “Emblem of X”? So they could always use the miracle, but they all had to have a unanimous vote on it. …And like I thought, this means that the Emblems lost all of their “future power”. Sounds like once this adventure is over, the magic goes away forever. …I really hate it when stories do that. Leaves a bad taste in my mouth, lame way to end a story. …So I hope it just means there will be no more miracles, and not that the Emblems themselves will vanish. Looks like the new plot is a fetch quest to destroy all the Fell Dragon Shards protecting a barrier protecting a portal. …I notice Pepsiman has his half-red hair back. Why? …Whatever, fuck it, let’s just check out the Somniel and then finish up. …I apparently… came back both as an Emblem and as a person. I wish they made that more obvious, because like what the fuck. They could have showed the two talking to each other in the last scene. Also, looks like Pepsiman can’t equip Pepsiman. …No… it’s… something else? What? Apparently this is some sort of super Engage called “Engage+”? Hopefully they’ll explain this sometime after the exploration phase. Apparently three maps just opened up. Two paralogues, one of which I assume is Pepsiman’s Emblem Trial or something… and Chapter 23. …Okay guys, I’m gonna be honest with you. I’m tired as hell. I think I’m gonna stop now, and then tomorrow will just be cleanup where I… fucking… process this. See you guys then. Alastor, signing off.

I just beat Chapter 9 in my Maddening ironman, and it utterly boggled my mind seeing that war cutscene again and realizing that it had been ages since I'd seen a cutscene that... populated.

Engage Day 38: Chapter 21 Update on the Maddening ironman: I just got Leif, and so far no new deaths! My first promotions were Louis and Clanne, and both have been delivering magnificently. I actually gave Clanne Marth for a bit because it made his speed so insane he could double just about every enemy on the map. From what I’ve seen so far, I’m really happy with the difficulty of Maddening. It’s super satisfying, I’d say up there with Conquest, though it’s obviously way too soon in that file to tell. I think I should be confident enough by the time I’m done with this playlog to give a serious verdict on difficulty though. Now on to this. …The opening of this seems pretty damned straightforward. I just need to take out these groups up front in order to establish breathing room, then make my way forward. But I’ll be sure to take out the dragons too, because on the off chance something crazy happens, I don’t want to be cornered between a rock and two fucking dragons. I forgot to have Clanne bond with Micaiah. Doing that now. JESUS CHRIST MICAIAH, STOP TALKING LIKE A FUCKING PATRONIZING KINDERGARTEN TEACHER WHAT THE HELL!? CLANNE’S OPENING UP ABOUT HOW AWFUL HE FEELS THINKING ABOUT WHAT PEPSIMAN’S HAD TO PUT UP WITH AND YOU TALK TO HIM LIKE HE’S SIX YEARS OLD! Speaking of which, when I had Louis bond with Micaiah on my Maddening file I was reminded of how she talks about Sothe as this little boy who was “a handful”, and yeah, uh, needless to say I kinda fucking hate this interpretation of Micaiah. She was so much better in the original game it’s not even funny. …Is it just me… or have dragons not gotten a single lick stronger since they first started appearing? They were initially unstoppable walls of incredible defensive power, but their defense started in the 20s and now it’s still in the 20s. Now I don’t even need to use slayer attacks to take them down, my heaviest hitters can just kinda do it between like two of them. Or in Kagetsu’s case, just him, with a meal or tonic. Speaking of which, lemme do some cooking. Forgot to do that. …Oh right, because Yunaka’s on duty. Lemme fix that real quick. Got woken up by Goldmary, and now Louis’s on deck! He made a pretty kickass meal, but only women get the full bonus unfortunately. Interestingly, one big difference I noticed in my Maddening playthrough is that I managed to get Clanne Canter by the time he hit level 10. Probably helped that I gave him proper Emblem rings earlier on this time, but I don’t remember anyone being able to amass that kind of SP before Chapter 11 in my hard file. Alright, enough stalling. OOH! NEW BATTLE THEME! I had a feeling! This game seems pretty liberal with them. The differences between battle and map are subtle, but they do, in fact, seem to exist. I wonder if that means this isn’t a one-map-only thing and is just gonna be the new map theme for the next few chapters? I doubt it, somehow. This game doesn’t really do music based on progress in the story. It’s way more based on space than time. Location-themed, with single-map big moment themes interspersed. …Okay, that’s… half of the enemy forces gone in the first two turns. Now to deal with the two minibosses and their flunkies. Starting with this dragon. …Okay, so the dragon won’t move, and reinforcements are coming. Gotcha. Okay, let’s re-assess this. Alright, so I dove in to take out the corrupted wrym, and I have a feeling that means all of these enemies are going to rush us at once. Zephia: It’s nothing personal. I’m merely following Lady Veyle’s orders. The sheer absurdity of her sticking to this story even though we all know that she’s mind controlling Veyle in the first place… …Thoron has a different graphic on her. It looks more like the sort of dark laser Veyle used in that cutscene against those Corrupted. Is all of her magic darker like that? I haven’t noticed before now if so. Okay, thankfully only Zephia’s group got aggro’d. Imagine if I had to fight both Zephia and Griss at the same time, and kill all of their lackeys, in one turn? I mean, with Goddess Dance I might actually be able to do that, but still. …There’s a Corrupted with an Entrap staff. Can I still take him out with Astra Storm…? …Yes, easily. Alright, that’s what I’ll do when we get closer. For now, Zephia goes down, then we prep to kill Griss. I positioned my actions for turn so that Alcryst ends the turn armed with his longbow, chain guarded, and Pepsiman-aura-buffed just for the hell of it for good measure, so that he can take out these thoron lackeys around Griss and hopefully bait in Griss (who can’t quite reach that range) at the same time. Zephia: Perhaps you do have what it takes… …Please tell me she isn’t some hidden good guy. …Okay, so, enemies are coming in from behind, and I’ve kinda just been running from them out of a weird speedrunning impulse, but they’re gonna be on my ass soon, so I think it’s time to have Yunaka and Kagetsu take care of them while everyone else finishes off Griss and prepares for the final showdown. Funny enough: I’ve been noticing that lately I’ve found almost no occasions when I actually want to engage Kagetsu. His defense is already just about insurmountable, but his evasion is also so insane that halving damage taken in exchange for losing all of that evasion very rarely seems like a reasonable trade. …It doesn’t help that Merrin might have had a chance of surviving the turn that killed her had she not sacrificed all of her evasion. The reinforcements seem pretty relentless. I’m gonna have Yunaka stay behind to deal with them, while Kagetsu goes up ahead to be part of the heavy-duty damage dealers to take out Veyle. Including initially baiting her in. …JESUS FUCK SHE’S GONNA INSIST ON A LODESTAR RUSH, ISN’T SHE!? Christ, now I’ve got all these thoron sages on my ass, perfectly sandwiching me between them and the enemy attack range, all because I wasted a turn thinking she’d move in when she couldn’t use her special. …Thankfully, Micaiah-rewarp saves the day, and I manage to dive in and kill a bunch of the thoron mages to give my allies some breathing room while we take another shot at baiting in Veyle. …Okay, so she does only aggro when you get into super range, but she doesn’t actually use it. Weird. Still, she’s taken the bait. It’s now or never. Also, kickass boss music. But once we actually get her close, taking her out is trivial. Kagetsu and my various dances are generally enough, and I have waaaaaay more in my arsenal than that. …Enough that I can see the inevitable boss convo between Pepsiman and Veyle! …Pretty good, actually! And Veyle’s defeat line where she transitions between evil and good Veyle is a pretty nice touch. …But oh nooooooooooo, I forgot to get the shitty smashing dagger off that one enemy. Whatever will I do to console myself? Victory in 9 turns. …Apparently Marni’s attack wasn’t for nothing. It actually managed to crack the helmet enough for Veyle to fight it off. …Oh no. Veyle’s just giving us Marth’s ring out of nowhere. The only reason I can possibly imagine for her to do this, exactly here and exactly now, is if she herself isn’t going to be joining us yet because some bullshit is about to happen to her at the last second. Sombron: I will not allow it. Knew it. I have to say, I don’t think I mentioned this before: I like Sombron’s design. I like the cobra-head thing he’s got going on. But why in the seven hells isn’t anyone telling her to take that damned helmet off!? … …Energy blast attack. …Pepsiman jumping in the way. …Yeah, uh… I wasn’t spoiled on the details of this… …But I was very recently spoiled on the general gist. …The burn marks on the ground around where Pepsiman blocked the laser is really cool, by the way. Ooh! Typo! Sombron says “Twice now I have struck you down”, but the text on the screen says “Twice now have I struck you down”. …And Pepsiman loses consciousness just barely before he tells Veyle he’s her brother. …I wonder what’s gonna happen to the dragonstone. I half expected it to shatter in that moment, just for the emotional impact, but now I’m suspecting the fact that it isn’t fully destroyed is going to be used as proof Pepsiman is still alive even now. …Nope! Looks like my first guess was right! AND APPARENTLY AT SOME POINT IN THIS FUCKING CUTSCENE, SOMBRON GOT ALL TWELVE RINGS!? WHAT!? WHAT!? FUCKING WHAT!? FUCKING WHEN!? AND SOMBRON JUST FUCKING GROWS TO KAIJU SIZE AND BLASTS OUT OF THE CASTLE! …AND APPARENTLY HE CAN BRING GRADLON BACK DESPITE NOTHING ABOUT THE DRAGON SHARD THING BEING DESTROYED BEING MENTIONED!? AND WHY IS VEYLE STILL WEARING THAT FUCKMOTHERING CROWN!? AND ZEPHIA’S TRYING TO TAKE CONTROL AGAIN WHYYYYYYYYYYYYY!? GODDAMN IT, IT WORKED, WHY DID NOBODY TAKE THAT FUCKING HELMET OFF OF HER IN ALL OF THIS TIME!? …Ohhhhhhhhhhh my god. Like, this is so frustrating, because a lot of this would be genuinely gripping. Like, this game in many ways has the balls to go places no game in the series has had since Genealogy. But it’s just so. Damned. Incompetent about it! Now, obviously the game’s made way, way too much go wrong for this to be the new status quo. Some bullshit is about to happen to undo at least some of what’s just happened, in particular the loss of the rings. …My guess? Next chapter is going to be some sort of “battle inside the mind” where Pepsiman is in some sort of Corrin-esque mid-death limbo, except it’s a battle instead of a conga line of absolution from all moral accountability. …No, wait, that would have like one character they couldn’t conceivably build an entire late-game map around due to variables in stats and even level. Okay, dial back the odds of that, unless his army allies with him in spirit or something. …I guess it’s gonna be some magical back-to-life bullshit. …Unless… …Okay. Full disclosure. There was one other thing I was very recently spoiled on, but I don’t know the context of it. …I know that at some point, we get a 13th Emblem. …A Pepsiman Emblem. But I don’t know if that means Pepsiman’s actually going to be dead for real and stuck in Emblem form, or if he’s going to fully come back to life and the process of that results in him having an Emblem doppelganger or something. …I expect we’ll get the answer soon enough. I just don’t expect it to be well-written. Alastor, signing off.

Granted, but he's also "The Noble One". And uh... wow. Rushed characterization for everyone? That sounds like it could be hilarious. Or just irritating. Time will tell.

I hate how completely numb I have become to that, that I didn't comment on it.

Engage Day 37: Chapter 21 Prep Alright, back to the plot! Incidentally, I thought Maddening Chapter 6 was gonna be a cakewalk now that I knew how busted Illume could be… and it was… except that on the very first turn I overextended and lost Chloé (who I actually planned on seriously using this time) to an archer hiding in a tiny corner near the start of the map. Thankfully Louis, Clanne and Yunaka are still going strong. But this is the biggest meatgrinder of an ironman I’ve had in a long time, and I can only imagine how much worse it would have been if I didn’t already have some of my knowledge of how the game works. So yeah, while it no doubt would have been amusing, something tells me I made the right call picking Hard for my blind playthrough. I don’t have a lot of time today, unfortunately, so I can’t guarantee how much I can do today. …I’m starting to realize why they felt the need to make a teleportation menu on the world map. It’s really, really fucking confusing. The areas are all much, much further apart than they were in Awakening, and connected in frustratingly random ways. Anyway, on to Lythos Castle. So Marni’s here too, along with Mauvier, but Marni doesn’t seem to be on the same page about why. I know Marni isn’t recruitable, so I’ve gotta wonder how this ends. Ohhhhhhhhhh! So Gradlon is sunk beneath the waves right now! And apparently the means to break the seal or something is in Lythos? Which we’ve been leaving comically unprotected until now. I have to wonder though, the fact that Gradlon basically completely encircles Lythos kinda makes it seem like Lythos was continuously under siege. Hard to imagine just how much world-protecting the divine dragons could have done from there. Huh. So there are other continents besides Elyos? And that’s Sombron’s next step? …Hmmmm… So Veyle can’t summon Emblems apparently. …PFFFFF Okay, so this doesn’t really line up with the whole “siblings” thing, but I’ve felt for a damned while that Veyle’s design looks waaaaaaaaay more Divine than Fell to me, so wouldn’t it be hilarious if it turned out she isn’t actually a “defective” Fell Dragon, but a perfectly healthy Divine Dragon who only thinks she can’t summon Emblems because she’s doing it wrong for her species? Like Divine Dragons just occasionally get born to Fell parents? …Parent? Does Veyle even have a mother, or were she and Pepsiman and the others just spawned from parthenogenesis? …Oh, Veyle did have a mother! … … … … Oh shit. They specifically refer to Veyle’s mom. Not Pepsiman’s, Veyle’s. Who’s Pepsiman’s blood mom, then? …OH FUCK, WHAT IF IT’S ZEPHIA!? Wouldn’t that be hilarious? Tell me you can’t picture her revealing that and then, in an ungodly creepy mix of flirtatiousness and menace, going “Give mommy a hug!” …But apparently Veyle’s lived for a thousand years, conscious, hiding all alone in fear of being killed for being related to Sombron. …Which is tragic as hell, don’t get me wrong, but in that case she should not be as comically naïve as she demonstrated herself to be. …Oh, so 900. Then she found Fell Dragon worshippers and slept there for 100 years? So Marni seems sympathetic to Veyle, which suggests to me maybe we won’t be fighting her anymore. Oh, does that make her the one who gets killed offscreen? But yeah, Marni says she was abandoned by her mom because she already had a lot of sons and didn’t want a daughter. …Her story’s sad and all, but first, really badly placed in the story, and second, it, uh, confirms that she has, like, literally no fucking reason to be part of the Hounds. No real serious history with the other Hounds, no massively impressive talent that got her the job, she just kinda got picked up due to working at a Fell church. And Mauvier finally explains that he was basically Veyle’s younger version of Vander, one of the people watching over her as she slept over the generations. …Marni, despite being sympathetic, clearly has no intention of joining us, she’s just gonna go straight back to the Hounds. Marni says she hates Mauvier, but, uh… her words ring really hollow, and given the amount of time they spend together, I have a feeling she actually has a crush on him. Pepsiman: What’s happened to Lythos? The land… it’s fallen to rot and ruin. Gee, it’s almost as if you left it completely unattended with nobody in charge. But noooooo, apparently it’s because they’re destroying the divine dragon shard keeping Gradlon underground. I notice there’s no commentary now about how there isn’t a Lythos guard in sight. So we find Zephia and Griss, and they’re certain Mauvier and Marni are traitors, and Mauvier’s saying he just wants Pepsiman to meet with Veyle. I wonder how Zephia’s going to react to this… So Mauvier pulls the whole “she’s got nothing to do with it” thing and gets Marni back with the Hounds, but is still standing with us at the moment. Uuuuuup! And Evil Veyle… EVeyle, if you will… shows up. Wearing that goofy-ass crown. PFFFFFFF! AND ZEPHIA JUST FUCKING TELLS US SHE’LL SNAP OUT OF IT IF WE CAN WRESTLE THAT CROWN OFF HER HEAD! Anyway, Marni’s having a serious emotional crisis over realizing all the horrible things she’s been doing to Veyle, and… I just don’t fucking buy it. She knew what she was doing. All she didn’t know was Veyle’s tragic backstory making her an even less acceptable target than she obviously already was. But she was still manipulating and abusing that sweet girl with basically no regard for her wellbeing from what we could see. This whole conflict of conscience is basically like her going “I never would have swatted her if I knew she was an orphan!” Great to know there’s some semblance of a pulse in there somewhere, but you still thought it was funny to swat people. It feels like something they’d only put in the plot if how she treated Veyle previously was already set in stone and couldn’t be changed, and they wanted to half-ass a way to give Marni a crisis of conscience. It makes no sense and honestly if I had more respect for this game’s writing I’d probably suspect it was Marni trying to fake a sudden crisis of conscience for sadistic shits and giggles. It’s some of the most artificial bullshit I’ve ever seen in a Fire Emblem story, honestly. …And Marni just fucking announces her intention to break the helmet. AND THEN ATTEMPTS AS MUCH BY DOING A LEAPING BATTLE AXE ATTACK AT VEYLE’S HEAD. Apparently FULLY FUCKING CONFIDENT THAT THIS WILL SLICE THROUGH JUST THE CROWN AND NOT SPLIT VEYLE’S SKULL. …Well. Okay. Killer plan. Lemme guess: She’s not the one that dies offscreen… …Yep. She dies onscreen. Holy shit. …Now if I could just come up with an argument for why Zephia is “the boring one”… …So what was that shortsword that just dropped to the floor? It had no blood on it, but it’s the only weapon we were shown that she could have been stabbed with. Was that a weapon Marni pulled out at the last second to try to kill Zephia before she killed her, or was that the murder weapon, swiftly stabbed in and dropped, and is there no blood on the shortsword because they want to sell this in China or something? Regardless of the answer to that question… fuck this entire scene and the boat it rode in on. I hate it when they start rushing a character’s characterization just because they’re going to die by the end of the episode. …And… Mauvier lets out the most unconvincing cry of feral rage I’ve ever seen. Like, he does the whole thing in concept, growing growls, fingers curled into claws, wide stance, skyward yelling … but it’s just all so completely underwhelming that it’s comical. That said… Mauvier gets a pretty good line, at least in script more than acting: Mauvier: I will never stand by you again, Zephia. Save for the moment my blade pierces your heart! And while EVeyle’s lines are pretty generic, I do appreciate that they’ve finally dropped the “sibling” thing and had her start actually calling Pepsiman “brother” on the regular. Apparently Mauvier’s joining us now though! Awesome, though I hope we get to put an Emblem on him first. This… …this… …Okay, first off, no, we don’t, he’s apparently just going to be ringless for this fight, he’ll join us at the start. But second… …This is just Birthright Chapter 27. This is almost literally just Birthright Chapter 27. I’m looking at it right now, and the differences are so few it’s comical. Also, apparently we’re getting S-rank weapons now! …And the S-rank dagger… is a smashing dagger. …Oh. Oh goodie. Well at least Kagetsu isn’t missing out on anything, but why in the seven hells would I ever put that on Yunaka? The sword seems okay, 15 strength and 12 weight… but I’ve got nobody with an S rank in swords. Anyway, how good is Mauvier looking…? …22 speed is pretty pathetic for this point in the game, and the flame lance is so heavy that even with capped build he’s brought down by four… but I thiiiiiink it’s safe to say this guy is bare minimum a good replacement for Framme at this point. Speaking of which, what are my deployment numbers…? …Twelve, meaning I’ll have 13 when Mauvier properly joins. I wonder if that means deployment won’t cap at 12 after all? Iiiiiiinteresting… …I wonder if Mauvier will start with enough SP to inherit Speedtaker? If I give him that and Resolve, then give him Leif… I might actually be able to let him do some cool things with that. Especially since he’s got the best defense of anyone in my army except Louis and Kagetsu. True, they each beat him by more than ten, but he’s got like five resistance on them as well. If I can just get his speed and hit rate up… …Yeah, unfortunately I don’t have enough time today to actually do this chapter. Today’s a bit of a mess of shit to do, and I’ve spent too much time reacting to the plot already to get anything done in any reliable fashion. I’ll be taking a stab at this tomorrow. Alastor, signing off!

Engage Day 36: Celica’s Paralogue Okay, apparently we’re dealing with Cantors. I can’t see anything else that Jotari’s message could be implying. I wonder what they’ll be summoning. If it’s something Yunaka and Kagetsu can’t handle, first of all holy shit, second of all I hope I have the manpower to player-phase them back. At any rate though I want to be done with the paralogues. Personally I’m not a huge fan of these trials for the most part. Maybe they’d be better if I did them throughout the game rather than mostly all at once, but they’re far, far less consistent in terms of challenge and fun than the paralogues in Fates and Awakening were. Heading back to base to get another meal. Hey, Goldmary’s still on cooking duty! Let’s try again, shall we? So I got an S rank hot crepe, but Alcryst and Ivy made no comment on the meal, they just chatted to each other with small talk about weeds and ghosts. I know I picked a meal that they didn’t both like, but did neither of them like it? In, I guess, Echoes dungeon fashion, I only get to bring 10 units. Let’s see, who to drop…? …I guess Framme would be the best choice, since as I said she isn’t going to be with us much longer. Rosado I suppose can also stay out, but I want to bring Seadall because he’s useful, and Goldmary out of stubborn obligation to make her useful. …Damn it, Merrin, why’d you have to die…? Let’s just rip the bandage off and fight this fucker already. So they’re deploying generic cannon fodder physical units. Nothing that Kagetsu and Yunaka need to be afraid of. Not a fan of this version of “With Mila’s Divine Protection”, gotta say. Though admittedly I heard the best one first, the Brawl one. Thankfully the summons aren’t an “every turn” thing, which would be ridiculous on higher difficulties and all but demand enemy-phase tanking, which would be really boring. …Hilariously, momentum applies even if you stopped to trade with someone before attacking, which is an almost cartoonish mental image, like that Spongebob episode where Plankton was screaming while careening through the spacetime void, and then everything stopped so he could sip a soda, then started right back up again, complete with screaming. …Okay, so, it looks like you get two turns of grace after the first wave of summons, then one of the summoners summons something. Alright, noted. And it seems they can summon more than one thing. The one who summoned wyvern knights last time summoned griffin knights this time. Alright, this is a really, really stupid map. Frankly, the fact that bosses are so eager to move makes so many of these paralogues ridiculously easy to cheese, and I don’t think the piddling amount of gold on the other enemies is enough of a reward to not just rush her. I just baited her in with Yunaka, and now my army’s gonna slaughter her. …I didn’t even need to use Goddess Dance. Alcryst with the brave bow is a fucking menace. His speed is completely out of control, and with alacrity letting him fire off four hits before the enemy can even blink? It’s nuts. Victory in four turns. …Okay, now that I’ve fully upgraded every Emblem but Celica, I’m honestly wondering something about Marth… …He’s the last one left, and from what I remember of his abilities, they’re okay, better than some, but underwhelming compared to others. So I have to wonder what skills he’ll unlock after his paralogue, because it feels weird for the last one we fully get back to be significantly weaker than ones we got at the halfway point of the game. Alright, that was a quick one, so let’s take our time with cleanup. I don’t have as much time today as usual, but the absurd shortness of this paralogue mostly made up for that. Oh hey! It’s night! Let’s check out Seadall’s fortune telling spot! …I read Yunaka’s fortune, and it appears to be randomized goofy bullshit. Current worry: “A wyvern ate an important letter”. Currently thinking of: “Diamant”, who I don’t even recall her ever getting a support with. She got “The Despair”, which is represented by Lucina. Interesting. A Fire Emblem themed tarot deck seems amusing, honestly. Especially since Emblems already feel like stands and all the Part III stands were based off of Tarot arcana. But it seems like a solo version of the hubba tester. …Aww, that’s adorable, Alcryst got a happy fortune. Marth is apparently “The Glory”. …No, it seems each card is double-sided, and the good ones are the right-side-up ones. Eirika’s upside down is “The Cruelty”. … …PFFFHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! “Ivy’s Current Worry: Yelled at the sky. Scared when someone answered.” OH MY FUCKING GOD. THAT IS HYSTERICAL. Leif just asked me why we don’t have stamina drinks in this world, which is pretty amusing given that fatigue isn’t even a thing either. …Honestly, I really, really wouldn’t mind that feature being brought back. I like how it caused the game to be designed around you having a much larger active roster than what you could reasonably deploy in a single map, and also how it (mostly) kept you from relying on specific units in perpetuity, which would really, really help keep characters like Yunaka and Kagetsu over here from dominating everything, for example. I know it was a really unpopular mechanic, but I personally enjoyed the impact it had on gameplay. …Or at least I remember enjoying it. I should probably re-read my Thracia log sometime. … … … I’ve apparently played for 96 hours total, according to an achievement I just got. That… …That’s longer than the playtime I got in my file for Three Houses. And I’m not even done with the game. That doesn’t feel right. That doesn’t feel accurate. That doesn’t feel real. But apparently it is. I don’t feel like I’ve spent more time actively playing this game than I spent playing Three Houses. I’ve definitely spent a far larger portion of that time actually playing the game, and not messing around with random bullshit (though I won’t deny there has definitely been some of that). But apparently the format of Three Houses makes it feel vastly, vastly longer than it actually is, and games that I would give far higher pacing scores can actually be even longer. I’m morally certain I racked up higher playtimes on the Tellius games too, though in fairness that was probably because I couldn’t suspend to take notes. It does, however, in a devil’s advocate sort of sense, make me wonder how much of my negative sense of the game’s pacing was actually the game’s fluff and filler, and how much of it was that mysterious witchcraft best described as “boredom-induced time dilation”. Clanne… actually managed to beat Yunaka in the arena. It was an amazingly close battle, and somehow Clanne was fast enough not to get doubled. It came down to the wire, with both of them having fairly inaccurate attacks against each other… and Clanne won by a hair. Admittedly, if Yunaka had her fancy engraved dagger, I don’t think Clanne would have stood a chance. But still, awesome for him! …Arena battles seem to give an insane amount of support points. Goldmary just fought Saphir again, and unlocked a conversation with her again. Speaking of supports… let’s read them! Yunaka and Seadall’s B. Oh sweet! The acting thing! Seems like Seadall’s play involves a romantic bit for Yunaka’s part, and they’re rehearsing. For a second I forgot what their C was about and was confused why Seadall was suddenly being so outrageously lovesick over Yunaka. Wow, I really like the voice Yunaka put on for this character. And yes, I agree with Seadall, thankfully, that her acting was great. …To the point that Seadall wants to give her the lead part that apparently he was originally planning to play. So is he swapping the sex of the part, or was he originally going to be crossdressing in old-school Shakespearean fashion? …Or is Yunaka going to be doing that…? …Next time you get a chance, look at Seadall’s little metal necklace thing. It is… kind of unsettling how completely out of sync with body, wind and gravity its movements are. It almost feels alive. Also, I like Seadall’s line about feeling this play is important because he wants to remind everyone in times of hardship and war what happiness feels like. If this were a more serious game though, it would probably be more fitting. Goldmary and Saphir’s A. Apparently their cook-off was a tie. …Which begs the question of who they got to judge. …They talk about the people who ate their food, a bunch of people by the sound of it… so I guess it was a group vote? And it was a tie? Honestly, this resolution to their arc is pretty generic, but nothing offensively bad or anything. …Yunaka’s on cooking duty. …I’ll probably do something about that next time, but for now, we’re done here. Yeah, needless to say I found that paralogue pretty underwhelming. So many of these are so trivially easy to cheese, to the point that doing them normally is in most cases actually harder (not as in they give a better challenge, but as in the game makes you actively use stall tactics in order to avoid killing the boss too soon). Thankfully, after Marth’s paralogue, we’ll have nothing but main story left, which should be nice. I wonder how the paralogues are going to be on Maddening. I’ve heard they’re a significant deal tougher. And admittedly I will say that Eirika’s was gripping, Leif’s was at least fun to plan the warp-skip for, and Ike’s was pretty decent. But most of these paralogues were bleh as hell on Hard. But with that, I’m gonna wrap this up, proofread, and get ready for the rest of my day. Alastor, signing off!

Thankfully, I did have a backup plan if that turned out to be the case even without warning:

Engage Day 35: Leif’s Paralogue Alright, let’s take another look at this now that we have more info! …So thankfully staves actually tell you what their hit rate is when equipped! Their adjusted hit rate I mean. And since we know that Entrap has a base hit rate of 50, and Clanne also gets an extra 25 from Staff Mastery 4… 130 – 75 = 55. So Clanne has 55 extra hit between, presumably, his magic and dex. Which seems to imply, since his magic is 28 and his dex is 27… that’s it’s a flat +1 per point in each stat. Hmmmm… Assuming the same logic applies to res and luck for resisting it… Clanne has an 82% chance of entrapping Leif while he has the light brand equipped. Let’s see… what can I do to bring those numbers up…? Obviously I can give him 4 more points through tonics… and I have a secret book in my convoy. Those things I usually struggle to find a good home for, given it’s such a trivial boost for most things… so boosting Clanne up to 88% success rate seems as worthy a use as any. What else can I do…? Clanne unfortunately doesn’t have enough SP to buy even the rudimentary version of Divine Pulse. Does anyone besides whoever has Byleth have the power to buff magic or skill…? …Hold on. Lemme check something. Experiment time. This is more of a curiosity, since I can’t get the skill on Clanne at the moment. But I wonder if Hit+10 applies to staff hit rates too. Thankfully I can test this, because I currently have a character with both that skill and staff use. And it’s doubly more of a curiosity because I just came up with an outrageously superior plan. …The answer is no, hit+10 does not have any effect on Ivy’s offensive staff accuracy rate. Anyway, time for the better strategy: Instead of having Clanne warp everyone, get danced, and entrap Leif… I can use Seadall to have him warp everyone twice. Let’s see… first I’d warp everyone from the shore southeast of my starting location (it’d take a few turns to get there, during which I’d try and take out those weak soldiers with the goodies on them) to the opposite shore where the lowest point of the plus would be just above the middle bow knight, and the top and left would be on energy tiles. Warp, not rewarp, because Clanne can’t be in the center of this formation if it’s going to work. He needs to be in back on the left, and Pepsiman needs to be in the center, because Goddess Dance. Next, I’d have Seadall, who would be in the bottom part, dance him and canter back to his spot in the formation, and we’d warp again so the plus is just barely interlocking with the legion of mage knights from the southwest. Then Kagetsu and Yunaka would each kill one of the mage knights blocking our path, stationary in their spots in the top and right parts of the formation. Then I Goddess Dance everyone. Yunaka Draconic Hexes Leif, Clanne finishes off what’s left of that health bar, Kagetsu takes out the second, gets danced, takes out the third. And if something goes horribly, horribly, outrageously wrong with this plan and we need a little more firepower, I can have Ivy come in to Warp Ragnarok him, as well as have Alcryst follow suit with Astra Storm if it turns out we don’t need him to assassinate that speedwing soldier. Which we probably won’t, because Louis is going down that way and nobody’s strong enough to kill him down there. Plus, he won’t be frozen due to Headlong Rush, and fracture and silence won’t interfere with his job. It'll take 2 turns to get everyone in position, and Framme and Hortensia will be on standby to restore anyone who gets inconveniently silenced or frozen when they dip their toes into the enemy staff range. And on the off chance that something goes spectacularly, catastrophically wrong with it turning out that Warp for some reason doesn’t send you with them like the plus shape would suggest and has demonstrated with every other goddamned staff, I’ve got a backup plan for that too. I’ll have Ivy on standby to rescue Seadall, who will dance Clanne, and then have Clanne rescue the other three back and re-assess my options. Alright. That’s my plan. Let’s see how long it survives first contact with the enemy. …Rather ominously, my headphones started acting up in conjunction with OBS and screaming static into my ear. But I’m not the superstitious type. Let’s do this. Begin. …Of all the ones to make dark, ominous and serious… why Leif’s theme? Why put that in minor key? Still though, I won’t deny it’s cool as hell. Definitely among the better trial themes. Alright, Louis got the speedwing and the silence staff no problem. Those were the two biggest priorities. It helps that, in loving homage to Thracia lance fighters being absolute ass, they’re so slow even Louis can double them. Alright. Turn three. Everything went according to plan, and nobody got hit with a status they weren’t immune to. Both Alcryst and Ivy still have their specials. Let’s do this. …Fuck. I just noticed. Warp doesn’t light up Clanne’s space when it shows me the affected spaces. I need him in the center with rewarp if I want him to come along. …That potentially screws things up immensely. Pepsiman needs to be in the center to best utilize Goddess Dance. Okay, but Clanne probably doesn’t need to come with for that second warp, between Yunaka and Kagetsu and Seadall and Ivy and Alcryst… Hmmm… …I just worked it out. After the second rewarp, Clanne will Canter out of the center. He doesn’t need to be involved in the Goddess Dance if I warp above the rocks instead and end with the right part of the plus two spaces left of Leif. Yunaka will be there, engage, and use her attack to hex him. Then Ivy or Alcryst will finish off that health bar, Kagetsu will kill an enemy so we have more room, the dance will happen for Seadall, Yunaka and Kagetsu… yes. Yes, this should work. Alright, re-adjusting. So far so good. Clanne just rewarped everyone and Cantered out of the way. …Um… …Why is Yunaka doing astronomically less damage than my calculations? …DID I FORGET TO CARRY A FUCKING ONE!? …Man, thank goodness I had so many backup plans for firepower, or that might have ruined everything. Alright, everyone’s moved, Goddess Dance time. First health bar down from Yunaka’s second attack. I have two Kagetsus, an Ivy and an Alcryst to go to take out two more. …And I didn’t miscalculate with Kagetsu. He can take out a whole health bar with every attack. Yep, we don’t need Ivy or Alcryst to kill Leif. Kagetsu’s got him dead to rights on that last health bar, I just checked to confirm. So let’s see if we can get some more treasure with them! Yep, I got 1000 gold taking out one of the ballisticians. Awesome. Alright, time to finish this. That was terrifying, but we managed to beat it with resources to spare! Okay, what’s Leif got to say? Leif: “Once blood is spilled, it cannot return to its source. Make that sacrifice worth something”. Interesting, I don’t remember that line he’s quoting from Thracia! Then again it’s been literal years since I’ve played. Then Leif says that you can never tell if what you did in the past is right or wrong, that you can only strive to make a good future, which is… complete nonsense. It’s only through learning from what you did right and wrong in the past that you can change how you act in the future at all. Today’s a bit of a messy, busy day, but let’s see what else we can manage to do. But first, let’s do cleanup and check out what we’ve gotten our hands on now! Oh right, forgot to mention: I did notice the unusable weapons in the inventory of the general in the castle, that was funny. …Unfortunately Leif’s upgrade doesn’t get us anything particularly cool. I think if I devoted an entire character build from the start of the game to meshing with Leif I could make something out of it, but the big dealbreaker here is that his weapons kinda suck. If the master lance were more accurate, and if the light brand didn’t demand you have a good magic stat to make full use of it, you could do some cool shit like having continuous full-triangle 1-2 range, resisting almost all sources of damage and doing some decent enemy-phasing… but both Ike and Corrin on dagger users are infinitely superior in both of those fields. Honestly, he makes a way more interesting opponent than an ally. …Knife precision might be worth exploring for Yunaka though, gotta keep it in mind. Hmm… Maybe Mauvier can make good use of Leif. He probably has good physical and magical stats, after all. Gotta keep that in mind. Alright, cleanup time, then I think I’ll check out Celica’s paralogue. Fuck it, let’s check out Hortensia and Lucina’s first bond, it won’t take too much, and it’ll be hilarious if she does mention “Pega Pony Princess”. PFFFFFFFFFF! Hortensia fights her and instantly gets one-shot by Parthia for 56 damage. And she gives a very understandably exasperated “Really…!?” …Oh, okay. So it starts off with Hortensia apologizing for using Lucina to fight for the Fell Dragon. Lucina feels she’s already more than made amends though. …If I get Marth back and I still don’t feel too many pressing needs for expenses? Sure, I’ll splurge on seeing what the rest of their conversations are like. Seems only Framme and Chloé got supports though. Let’s see… Framme and Chloé’s C. So Framme and Chloé appear to be on a mission together that Chloé appears to be really eager to finish early because there’s a “folk-food stall” opening nearby and the war has made them rare. …No, apparently Framme isn’t on the mission, because she’s offering to go and buy the stuff in Chloé’s stead, which obviously wouldn’t make sense if they were both equally obligated to be here. So I guess Framme’s just in the middle of this Firenese village… just sorta cuz. Yeah she seems to be on an entirely separate, much less demanding mission that just happened to bring her this way. …She wants a snake sandwich. Framme: Wh-why would anyone… PFFFFFFFFF That’s a great reaction. She recovers quickly and gives a peppy “I’ll be back in two shakes with your sandwich of snakes!”. Oh god, she wants Framme to buy one for herself too. I have a feeling Framme isn’t gonna be too pleased. …Oh no, the conversation just literally ends right there. Okay. …I’m planning on trying to use Chloé more in my Maddening run. Her speed is highly useful right now, especially when I can get her attack up. I regret that circumstances kept me from using her so many times in a row. But then I always tend to struggle to get the first flier to work. Okay, what’s going on with Celica’s trial…? …Wait are we literally just doing the fight with the two necrodragons? They have to be doing more to complicate this… Celica seems… pretty damned embarrassed about her behavior in Echoes, which is hilarious to me. But Pepsiman thinks she’s being too hard on herself. And Pepsiman still hasn’t put two and two together that this is a trial. Damn it. …This… …What is thi…? …This is so ungodly stupid that there has to be a gimmick. A couple of stationary magic users on the beach, along with three slow lumbering wyrms and Celica herself. This is so stupid that unless some horrific gimmick rears its ugly head post-battle-start, the real challenge is going to be keeping Celica alive long enough to milk every last drop of gold that I can out of this map. …I’m going to be rather pressed for time tomorrow, so I think I’m going to leave this here and keep tomorrow simple. Part of me feels guilty for not doing Leif’s paralogue “properly”, but the other half feels that warp-skipping a map based on Thracia is doing it properly. I will say that I’m quite happy with how I managed to put together and then re-salvage my plan, and the win was quite satisfying. Definitely an intense few turns. But that’s it for today. Alastor, signing off!

...Oh shit. That is... christ. Micaiah really is the queen of fog of war in more ways than one, isn't she?

...Shit, that's only 500 SP? That actually might be worth considering putting that on Hortensia.

It was like four times on hard, to my recollection. Ah, but the staff skill also increases how much she can heal.

Unless you're also counting knives, I'd say they were way worse in Fates than in 3H.

Engage Day 34: Chapter 20 (For Real This Time) Alright, sorry about all that bullshit! Time to get back to this! But fun fact, something I learned playing my ironman Maddening file (which has so rapidly turned into sheer chaos that part of me sorely wishes I did the ironman on Maddening difficulty): if you don’t have enough units to fill up all the deployment slots on the map… the empty spaces for units to go on the map don’t show up. If you have 8 units for a 10 unit map, you can’t put your units in the 9th or 10th unit starting spaces, because those spaces won’t appear at all. And, funny enough… it occurs to me that I don’t think I’ve ever been in a position to check if any other game in the entire series does this. Probably doesn’t bode well for that file, but whatever, right now we’re worried about this one! Anyway, I open up with an Astra Storm boosted by Pepsiman’s aura, just barely enough to kill the entrap lady. Now to secure the sides of this opening room, killing the starting enemies. Done. Now to experiment with Illume while Micaiah-engaged. True, it doesn’t let you use it on a distant space, but it might increase that 7-space illumination to 12 or something awesome like that. Or, bare minimum, activate itself on the adjacent tiles so that the range at least increases by one. ...It was the former. It increases the illumination of Illume to fucking twelve. THANK YOU. THANK YOU ANNA, MOTHER OF ANNA, FOR YOUR MERCY! …But unfortunately Griss was hiding on the side of the room I had not spent as many resources on. If I knew Illume was going to be so insane on Micaiah, doubtless I would have had Clanne use it in the center to light up the whole thing turn one. Thankfully he only attacked Kagetsu, and while that 32 damage was terrifying (I have to keep that number in mind and look at Kagetsu’s resistance to make sure I know how much damage Ragnarok Warp does because the skill description doesn’t fucking tell you), nobody else can do anywhere near close enough damage to threaten him, even if they could hit him. Which most can’t. …Okay, actually, now that I know how utterly broken Micaiah-Illume is, I’m barely scared of this map at all. I can see Griss coming from miles away and secure blind spots with ease. Honestly, the biggest danger is killing him too quickly, and failing to get the treasure. …Actually no, not even that! He’s immune to counterattacks and then he warps away! I just have to make sure the people I send to bait him into teleporting away again (so he doesn’t get too close to my party) can take a hit. …Weirdly, the enemies aren’t dousing the torches. Figured they would. Wonder why they aren’t? Okay, Ragnarok Warp did 17 damage to Clanne, who has 30 res, and 32 damage to Kagetsu, who has 20. Which naturally doesn’t add up, so obviously the mystic multiplier is in play. However, the good news is that Yunaka has 30 res too, so I should expect Yunaka to only need to worry about taking 17 damage if she runs into Griss in a dark alley. Which means she can rush headlong towards the treasure with minimal concern. And I’m glad that’s the case, because she did, in fact, run directly into Griss. But that just means I know he’s not where Kagetsu is! Score! …How does Ragnarok Warp do 17 damage to Clanne… and 22 damage to Yunaka… when they have the same fucking res? Okay, so, the two treasures stolen so far are a rescue and a brave bow. I want that fucking brave bow, obviously, so I’m gonna do my best to make sure that thief dies. Thankfully, I know that thieves try to get all the chests in the area before they try to escape, and you get all of their treasure when you kill them. I know this due to the shitshow that was my Chapter 5 Maddening attempt. Oh hey, I missed Griss for long enough to hear the normal map music again! But not for long! Griss has just been uncovered in the dark! Very nearly got Clanne killed going for an energy tile that turned out to be near a bunch of wolf knights, one with a crit-boosting melee knife, but thankfully Framme was able to pull him out of the fire with a warp staff Pepsiman gave her and simultaneously bring him back in range of Seadall so Clanne could take advantage that energy tile this very turn and go back to lighting things the fuck up. Alright, the treasures are almost secure. If all else fails I can have Alcryst Astra Storm the thief to finish the job. …Looks like Griss is tired of Ragnarok-Warping around me, and has returned to the boss tile he started on. …I half-expected the game to sneakily change his skill back to Warp Ragnarok, but no, it’s still Ragnarok Warp. …Goldmary had a weirdly and suddenly-raw “I’m not a child anymore” kill line, which made me start thinking she might have some serious issues with coddling that had a role in her spoiled, narcissistic personality… until I remembered she was engaging with Leif at the time, and thus it was a Leif line. …Which means, theoretically, I could make characters like Anna and Jean say that. Which would be hysterical. As would putting it on Vander, come to think of it. So the total treasure haul is a rescue, a brave bow, a silver blade and a secret book. Okay. Time to take out Griss. Checkmate, Griss moved with his lackeys, now he’s going down. I almost screwed myself due to overestimating my ability to defeat his lackeys, but a quick Micaiah-boosted rescue later to bring Pepsiman back from grabbing the chest, and he was free to goddess dance Kagetsu to take out his third HP bar as well as his first and second. …And Griss survived the battle. But then, as I was very recently reminded… so did Nelucce. And it’s getting pretty late in the game… …At any rate, I just hope we get Celica back. And I cleared the whole thing in 8 turns! Woo! …We got Celica back, but Griss seems to be trying to bait us into summoning Celica for some reason. …And Pepsiman… like… just… doesn’t even react to this, and does it anyway. PLEASE LET ME KEEP CELICA FOR THE LOVE OF GOD …It seems I do. But… Griss… oh shit. This was part of the “intelligence gathering” he mentioned earlier. I think he just figured out Pepsiman isn’t a real divine dragon just by watching him summon Celica. …I’m completely alone in this cutscene. Why? …Okay, that reaction to Griss just flat-out telling him he’s the child of Sombron was… amazingly weak. Like, I was reminded of the infamous “Shadow… Android? Am I… an android too?” from Shadow the Hedgehog. …But that’s a cool twist, having it turn out that only Fell Dragons say those magic words to summon from the rings. Pepsiman believes this way too readily though. He has absolutely no way to confirm or deny anything Griss says here. None. All the Divine Dragons are dead except him. Maybe there’s a book somewhere, but right now, in this moment, nothing Griss is saying here is confirmable, and yet he’s taking it like it’s been proven. Apparently those 8 turns and this cutscene were enough to buy time for Sombron and Veyle to leave. Griss considers that and the knowledge that Pepsiman is Sombron’s kid to be worth it. I wonder what value that is to the enemy? Can Sombron pull any mind control bullshit knowing this? So Alfred and Ivy show up, and tell him not to take his claims so seriously, and stay calm. And then Diamant and Timerra come in, pointing out we also only have Griss’s word that the distraction was even long enough, which is a very good point that hadn’t occurred to me. …They searched the place, and it is indeed deserted. Fuck. …And now Pepsiman realizes what that dream he had between Chapters 2 and 3 meant, and he’s terrified he might relapse at any time and go postal on all of his friends. And Pepsiman just straight-up asks Sigurd if he’s a Fell Dragon, and he says yes. And Alfred is shocked and staggers back. …And oh shit, Pepsiman just pointed out that since he isn’t actually a divine dragon, he probably doesn’t have the power to seal Sombron like Lumera did. …Hang on… …Why is he weak to wyrmslayers? Corrupted wyrms aren’t weak to wyrmslayers, and I’m pretty sure when we fought Veyle, she wasn’t either, though I’d need to check again. But Sigurd reminds him that Lumera gave him the power of a Divine Dragon, and confirms that regardless of intention, Emblems summoned with Fell power can’t have free will. Meaning he is using Divine power when he does it. That must’ve been the point of what Lumera told him about the intentions behind summoning being important back in Chapter 2. Also, the musical transition in this part was, like in Chapter 11, fantastic. Ivy: Conflicted as I might be, I am made resolute by the terror I feel at losing you. …Okay, I can’t describe why, but having seen some of her supports with Pepsiman, I love that line. AND I JUST GOT 50 THOUSAND FUCKING GOLD FROM ELUSIA LET’S GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO It’s nice that Clanne and Framme get lines here in this exploration scene assuring Pepsiman that this changes nothing. But seriously, it would’ve been cool if Lythos as a nation were even remotely fleshed out and this actually threw the place into chaos. …And now Mauvier shows up after I leave, begging Pepsiman to save Veyle, feeling that now that it’s confirmed he’s Veyle’s brother, that that’ll be what it takes to get through to her. And also he says Sombron and Veyle are headed to Lythos, though Mauvier can’t explain why. …But fuck it, we have Celica now! Okay, let’s see… …Oh shit! Nice! When it comes to Warp Ragnarok, mystical units might get a bonus to the Ragnarok, but fliers get a boost to the Warp! So giving it to Ivy is still an awesome choice! Especially since she’s amazing at single-target damage. …Also, I’m gonna be dropping Framme fairly soon. I think it’s time. Her stats are pretty pathetic, despite the fact that she’s been consistently seeing use and getting staff exp for ages. I think I’ll be having Mauvier replace her when we get him. And he might be a good candidate for Roy too. Which only leaves who to give Marth… …The only Emblem-free unit we have left is Hortensia. And I thiiiiiiiiiiiink I have an idea what to do with her. What if I gave her Micaiah, to make best use of her personal skill (albeit at the cost of wasting Micaiah’s staff-use-granting power), and then gave Clanne Marth? True, as a cavalry unit he can’t make use of the mystic bonus turning Lodestar Rush into a magic attack… but he can do that anyway if he just uses Lodestar Rush while using a levin sword! It could work. I’ll have to check it out once I have Marth. Which I suspect is going to be next map, if we’re actually saving Veyle here. …Actually, for now, since I don’t have anyone better to give Roy to, I’m putting Roy on Ivy and Celica on Hortensia. …Okay, I got what I came for. Pepsiman has enough SP to get Canter+, and I now know that warp doesn’t work the way I’d hope it would. Meaning now it’s time to work out how the hell to do Leif’s paralogue. And then probably do Celica’s right after. Okay, back to base for cleanup. First off, Seadall and Lucina’s B. Seadall asked Lucina what she thought of his dancing, being someone from an extremely remote culture to his own. She gave a bit of a lame non-answer. Oh shit, Goldmary’s cooking tonight! Let’s see what she’s got for us! …Rank D. So we just got the base 2 speed from the salmon. Shit. I was hoping to finally get something above what tonics can do. Damn it. Oh nice! Goldmary fought Lapis again and got the sequel to their support chain! Let’s see how that turns out! …Looks like we might have a lot today. Clanne and Louis’s A. …This is kind of weird… being told about the great support conversation we missed because we’re watching a support about the guy who watched the support. Louis is… profoundly weird. Like, this is really bringing his social voyeur tendencies to… um… “new heights”, shall we say? Clanne out of context: Thanks for the support, Louis! Framme and Kagetsu’s B. So in continuation of their C, Kagetsu decided he does want to write to his parents. How are these letters being sent, incidentally? Courier? Ravens? Pegasi? Does Pale Sands even have mailing routes with the rest of the world, if it’s so insular? Ivy and Louis’s B. …Shit, I don’t remember much of what their C was about, but Louis seems to have taken Ivy people-watching. PFFFFFFFFF Ivy’s restrained and yet biting snark is amazing. Louis: What do you think, Princess Ivy? Does the sight of a pleasant gathering prompt any feelings? Ivy: No. Nothing. Louis: How strange. I, for my part, find great comfort in their mundane joys and idle chatter. Ivy: It would seem that phenomenon is unique to you. …Right, was this the one where someone wanted to make Ivy smile? Well Louis seems to have succeeded. Kagetsu and Seadall’s A. Kagetsu nearly got attacked by bears because he didn’t realize his training ground was set up near multiple bear dens. And Kagetsu got out unscathed, and thanks Seadall for his prediction making him paranoid and less likely to dismiss potential danger than usual. So it looks like Seadall managed to save someone with his divination after all! Goldmary and Lapis’s B. Apparently… Lapis’s advice worked! I wasn’t expecting that! Also, it just occurred to me: I think that Lapis’s pink hair and sudden switch to tomboyish-shouting earlier miiiiiiight have just vaguely reminded me of Calliope Mori. Which is amusing. …For a Goldmary support, this is surprisingly nice and wholesome and devoid of bitchiness and chaos. …It’s kind of unnerving, actually, like being paranoid for ambush spawns that aren’t there. …It occurs to me that with Emblem Celica, I might be able to have Ivy Warp Ragnarok in if I keep it on her for now. Fuck it, sure. I’ll give Roy to Goldmary while Leif’s “in the shop”, shall we say. Alright, let’s try exercising again! Lilith can apparently help, and I’ve gotten more success with sit-ups than push-ups when I tried that for the hell of it on the maddening file, so let’s try sit-ups! I did pretty well on normal last time, let’s crank it up to hard. I still only got +2 HP, unfortunately. Which is annoying, since that’s what I got from normal, despite getting the same ranking (though I didn’t get all perfects this time, but that didn’t show in the SSS ranking. Shop has new staves in stock! Entrap, more rescue, more recover, more antitoxins and elixirs and pure waters (still no infinite of any of those though). Hold on… since Leif is a mobile boss… would it be possible to entrap him if I can secure enough staff accuracy on Clanne? Then if I bring Clanne, Pepsiman, Seadall, Yunaka and Kagetsu… that might be enough to take Leif out from a much closer initial position. Assuming, again, that I can make Kagetsu accurate enough with staves that he can entrap Leif. Incidentally, we got some new weapons too, and I decided to seriously upgrade Louis’s greatlance by replacing it with a silver one, and transferring the Roy engrave to that. It has a might of thirty, which should make his overrides absolutely devastating. And before I forget, let’s give Pepsiman Canter+. …Oof. On second thought, maybe not. That would cost a huge chunk of my remaining bond fragments for a boost I’m not even sure I need. Alright, let’s reconsider. What else is worth getting on my army…? …Not much I can see at the moment, at least nothing I’m going to be able to afford any time soon. Well, tomorrow I’ll be taking a stab at Leif’s trial. See you then! Alastor, signing off!

We're just ranking the class, right? Not the skills gained by being in it, unless they can't be transferred such as in Engage?

Just did Chapter 5 on Maddening. Lost Alfred and Etie within the first three turns. Wound up huddling like a coward in the treasure vault as Louis was the only thing keeping the shockingly powerful Nelucce from destroying my army. Learned that backup units will not attack if they can't do damage, but will still swarm for chain pain. Had a moment of terror where I realized items don't activate Canter and Louis couldn't return to the choke point after restocking on vulneraries and using one. Threw Vander into the fire to plug the hole, praying he'd survive (he did). Wore Framme's heal staff down to a nub and realized I was mistaken about having bought more. Nearly got sandwiched between two sets of forces because in my hubris I had Vander open the lower doors simultaneously with my main group opening the side wall, only Clanne and Chloé's decisive intervention saved the day. Survived through sheer cowardice, attrition, and abusing my only real wall, and even then every new turn brought about a new problem I had to fix. It was awesome.

Alright, I'll be starting up again tomorrow. It made the sound again, but my phone's microphone categorically failed to pick the sound up, which made me decide that if it's that quiet of a rattle, maybe I'm being overly paranoid about how badly this really needs to be fixed. I'm going to keep an eye on it to see if it gets worse, but I won't be holding up the playlog any longer in fear that'll keep me from noticing my Switch having a meltdown.

Yeah, I noticed that and unless I'm mistaken I even mentioned it at some point. Kinda cool the sands are actually pale, from a worldbuilding perspective. Of course the "why" of it probably has no canonical answer given the writing.

I've been continuing my Maddening file on these off days while I'm waiting to see if the rattle comes back, and I just re-watched the scene where Zephia meets Alear. So she does realize Alear looks familiar, but gives no reaction whatsoever to hearing Alear's name. Curious. Verrrry curious. Either it means something, or it's just the game's being dumb. It's always fun making bets on that, when a story gets bad enough that you just barely can't tell if something that doesn't make sense is a sign of a plothole or a plot twist.

Update time: I went to the repair shop (and was surprised at how antsy I got when the guy immediately opened up to my ironman file without permission) and the rattling failed to happen for them, so now I have to play until it happens again, record it when it happens, then take it in. I think I'm gonna take a few days off from the playlog since I have no idea what I can guarantee about when I can resolve this and my current location makes going to the repair shop less convenient than it normally would be. I'll aim to get it repaired by Monday and restart on Tuesday.

Okay, spoiler alert: The noise came back. I'm taking a rain check today to get this checked out and see if it's a big deal, but I suppose I might as well post what I managed to write up in the midst of all this: Engage Day 33: Chapter 20 Aaaaaalright, bullet, meet teeth. I’ve got a bit of a weirder setup today because I don’t have my capture card with me, just the Switch itself on my desk that I’m constantly picking up and putting down. Hopefully that doesn’t have a negative impact on my playlogging time for some reason, but who knows? …Oh wow, the music sounds weird now that it isn’t coming through headphones. I’m way more used to it through headphones lately, and… …is that… a sickly-sounding rattle coming from my fan? …Wow, that… could be a pretty nasty problem I wanna get on top of. Sorry, BRB, looking for some compressed air. …That… didn’t visibly do anything… but the noise did stop… for now… …Alright, let’s continue and keep an ear out for it. Another thing I’m going to be on the lookout for when testing Clanne is how Illume works. It didn’t boost the range of rewarp from zero, so I’m not all that optimistic about it changing anything, but if it did, that would be awesome. I’m buying torches at the shop, and it just occurred to me that the shop doesn’t have any sort of “sort by sections” feature like the armory has. You have to wade through the staff options before you find the items. Not overly inconvenient, but enough of an inconvenience that it feels like an oversight not to sort at least between staves and consumables. …Oh shit. I can’t deploy my full army, just barely. I thankfully just barely noticed when I couldn’t find Seadall. I have to drop someone. I’m dropping Rosado for Seadall. Rosado doesn’t bring enough unique utility to this map to justify the risk of losing him to the odd archer in the dark. I’ll have to be careful with Hortensia and to a lesser extent Ivy (she has Hold Out), but they’re staff users and highly handy to have around. And Seadall will be crucial given how many actions I’m likely to expend just lighting the place up on turn one. Alright, quick check for anything terrifying in the enemy ranks that I didn’t see before, before the lights go out. A killer axe warrior by the treasure room, noted… …Griss has excalibur, an anti-flier tome… he’ll have a power of 64 when attacking fliers, which fortunately is not enough to one-shot Hortensia or Ivy. I just bought 11 HP tonics, for use with all of my deployed units. I’d just like that extra little cushion of assurance here. Alright, let’s go. …We’re still using Lythos music. That, uh… hardly seems appropriate for a fog of war mission deep in enemy territory. Honestly I was hoping to see Tear Streaked again. …And Griss just fucking dipped. …He’s disappeared. So he could just be… fucking anywhere. At all times. …But wait. …It’s Ragnarok Warp. Not Warp Ragnarok. …Which means if I can catch him… and freeze him with the freeze staff… or even just engage with Yunaka and immobilize him and then dance Yunaka away… he can’t attack anyone, and therefore can’t warp away! I can keep him in place! But I have to keep in mind that there are treasures on this map, so I’ve gotta get to them before I kill him. …Damn it, this is gonna be frustrating. Needless to say, nobody not named Yunaka or Kagetsu is taking point here, and even with them I’m going to be extremely on-guard. …Fuck, what’s his speed? What’s his speed what’s his speed!? I totally forgot how slow Louis is! What if Griss can double him!? …Well, plus side: I now know how warp works with Micaiah. …It doesn’t increase the range for selecting targets, only the range for selecting destinations. That is… a let-down, and it complicates my plans a great deal. Especially since it means that the warper has to be among the warping party, assuming that fifth slot can even fit anyone at all. For all I know when you use warp, Clanne still stays behind despite being in the plus. Aaaaaaaaaaand my fan’s still making weird noises when the game starts getting more demanding, which it did once I attempted to astra storm that entrap enemy. Okay, sorry guys, I’m gonna have to take a rain check on this. Gotta go into the store and get this thing checked out. We’ll pick this up tomorrow, hopefully. I’ll keep you posted. Alastor, signing off.

Hey, uh, so... ...Sorry, I don't think there's going to be a part today. I just played the game undocked for the first time in a while, and that made me notice that my Switch fan is rattling a bit. I'm trying to work out what's wrong with it and maybe get it repaired, because if there's a problem with the fan that could be a problem for the whole thing eventually. Edit: I'm tentatively proceeding because the noise stopped after I put some compressed air into it, but I'm cautious because I didn't really see any dust come out. I'll keep you posted if something goes wrong.