Serenes Forest's Teehee Thread

[Acacia Sgt]

1 minute ago, Benice said:

Not being French, I guess.

Though seriously, it's really not that big of a deal here. Well, perhaps in Puebla proper, but ultimately it's not that significant. To us, at least.

[Codename Shrimp]

6 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Morag's probably the only blade I'll ever use.

lmao

[Saint Rubenio]

1 minute ago, Shrimpy -Limited Edition- said:

lmao

What, any bearded old folks I could use?

[Acacia Sgt]

Xeno designs, huh...

...

Spoiler

Seven was a downgrade.

 

[Codename Shrimp]

8 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

What, any bearded old folks I could use?

not bearded, but i think you will like 

That said, i lmao'd because Morag isn't a blade kek

That and beards are super overrated

[GuardianSing]

So wait, why did Colony 6 get annexed but Colony 9 gets to be free?

This game is just the plot of Awakening but every 5 seconds.

You know I really have to hand it to Nintendo for making sure every wildlife critter in their games is some kind of fantasy equivalent instead of the real thing.

Okay it didn't show very well in the screenshot but there is a big bird flying in this shot and I was going to make a joke about Ho-Oh from Pokemon.

This is the greatest game ever created just for this feature alone.

Just when I thought it couldn't get any prettier, the rain comes in.

I'm just now noticing Sharla has a gun, that's not even a sci-fi lazer gun, that's just straight up a sniper rifle

4 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Some time ago, I came upon a video in my reccs, of an American praising Spain's railroad system. Its convenience, its excellent management and comfort, so on and so forth.

As I sit here, still waiting for my train, now accruing over hour of delay and not expected to arrive for another 15 minutes (if the voiceover didn't lie - this time), I just have to wonder. How horrible are trains in the US that Burgerlanders think this shit is great?

Buddy let me tell ya.

Going to the nearest city in my area would add an extra 5 hours if I went by train on what is normally a 45 minute drive.

33 minutes ago, Benice said:

1984 is about leftist governments trying to restrict your speech and its main character is a reflection of a typical American hero struggling against the LBTQ minorities which threaten good western values and woke writers who have characters who aren't white in their stories.

Tyranny at it's finest.

33 minutes ago, Benice said:

(Anecdotally, the Yakuza game with the worst pacing, 5, borks the pacing/character building ratio up magnificently by having a three-to-four hour long prison segment which is pretty much only dialogue with three other characters and no actual gameplay. It also still takes over an hour in the speedrun. I don't need to tell you that XB2 was never even close to this bad)

Writing a story for a video game is harder than people give it credit for. Since you can't really have long dialogue heavy scenes uninterrupted by action it's hard to nail in characterization without being creative.

Lots of games try to tell story via the environment but that can only get you so far.

32 minutes ago, Benice said:

HAPPY CINCO DE MAYO

It's really fascinating how a day that wasn't even that big in Mexico spread to the US as this day of pride for Mexican Americans.

9 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

 Besides I thought you were Canadian, which is like, the cooler US

Tell that to the Natives.

 

[Acacia Sgt]

3 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

It's really fascinating how a day that wasn't even that big in Mexico spread to the US as this day of pride for Mexican Americans.

To be fair, they didn't had to live through the French simply coming back and winning Round 2... and 3... and 4... and 5... and so on.

To them it was just "Mexico won against a foreigner for once!" So yeah, sure, let's celebrate.

It helps that it became beneficiary for the US in hindsight. The French had designs of using Mexico as a platform to support the CSA. So by us delaying that, the Union could have their victories at Gettysburg and the Emancipation Proclamation, thus making the French reconsider the idea of helping the CSA.

[Benice]

9 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Dahlia's like, a masterpiece of bad character design

Which one is she? I don't think I've seen her...

9 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Besides I thought you were Canadian, which is like, the cooler US, you've gotta have trains.

We've got the one going across the country, and then Vancouver and Toronto have them...

I think that's about it, though.

8 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Though seriously, it's really not that big of a deal here. Well, perhaps in Puebla proper, but ultimately it's not that significant. To us, at least.

Huh. My Abuelita's from Puebla (Pueblan?), so it's a pretty big deal to her.

2 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

Tyranny at it's finest.

Indeed.

Another one of my favorite things about 1984 is that the American press basically received as "the DEFINITVE proof that communism is bad" and Orwell contacted them to tell them that they missed the point.

3 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

Writing a story for a video game is harder than people give it credit for. Since you can't really have long dialogue heavy scenes uninterrupted by action it's hard to nail in characterization without being creative.

The funny thing is that Yakuza is really good at it in pretty much every other game, both before and after 5; 5 specifically messes up the pacing so catastrophically that's it's almost funny. It also doesn't help that after the really long prison segment, you have another few hours of an Idol simulator rhythm game.

6 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

Tell that to the Natives.

Our home on native land.

[Acacia Sgt]

Just now, Benice said:

Huh. My Abuelita's from Puebla (Pueblan?), so it's a pretty big deal to her.

Like I said, Puebla is the exception since that's where the battle happened.

[Benice]

1 minute ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Like I said, Puebla is the exception since that's where the battle happened.

Well, I am very gringo too. Remember when I thought my uncle was named "Tio"? 

[Codename Shrimp]

[Armagon]

4 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

No but that's different because Dave Filoni made it, not Kathleen Kennedy. Singlehandedly.

And this is the unironic thought that goes through the community. Dave Filioni is good because he understands Star Wars (even tho now he's just trying to MCU-fy it).

4 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

How horrible are trains in the US that Burgerlanders think this shit is great?

Well for starters we don't have trains.

....nah deadass, American public rail system is non-existent. There's like one line throughout the East Coast.

36 minutes ago, Benice said:

They're mostly being characterized by events that happen outside (or at the very least, beside) the primary conflict of the story, and therefore feel weirdly removed from it (though alternatively, maybe it's the other way around, with the main plot just kinda being tacked onto the characters- One way or another, my overall point doesn't really change).

Can't say I see it that way. The story at is base is a boy meets girl story. Of course, there are other themes going on. The Titans are a metaphor for climate change, there's a theme of legacy (which Xenoblade 3 really builds up on). There's also the theme of optimism. Rex is an interesting character in that he serves as a foil to the rest of the party. Everyone who joins him is either cynical or pessimistic about something and here comes this kid who in spite of it all is just very optimistic. And of course, serving as a foil to the villains who are also pessimists.

I can't see it as by characterized outside the main story when a lot of it is in the story. Of course, there are external moments that happen as well (Heart-to-hearts) that just add more.

Ngl, since you're in Ch.6, I also kinda struggle to see what you mean that the plot is "inconsequential" too. The only chapter that most people agree is probably filler is Ch.4. Ch.1, 2, 3, 5 and onwards all have big traditional "plot moving" moments.

49 minutes ago, Benice said:

Also I got spoiled for the plot twist they talk about in the bathhouse scene because of the silly green fanart website  

🤨🤨🤨

 

40 minutes ago, Benice said:

Even in character-driven stories, characters and plot are closely intertwined; they do not exist separate of each other.

Ehhhh it does depend on the plot/character ratio. 

28 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

You must. I know North America is a horrible hellscape, but c'mon you gotta have trains

Canada probably has more trains than the US.

[Saint Rubenio]

2 minutes ago, Shrimpy -Limited Edition- said:

not bearded, but i think you will like 

Honestly?

First one... no, not really. He's just kind of bland.

Second one looks totally ridiculous. He's like, Raiden from the Funny Senator Game, but if he attended clown college. I don't like like it, but I like it. It's really dumb and I'd probably use him just to bully him and call him names.

2 minutes ago, Shrimpy -Limited Edition- said:

That said, i lmao'd because Morag isn't a blade kek

Wait, what is she then. She's not a real character, that much I do know...

2 minutes ago, Shrimpy -Limited Edition- said:

That and beards are super overrated

Oh fuck you, you're just being petty now.

6 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

I'm just now noticing Sharla has a gun, that's not even a sci-fi lazer gun, that's just straight up a sniper rifle

Little boys pick up bubble blower swords and go on adventures. Real (wo)men go to war.

6 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

Buddy let me tell ya.

Going to the nearest city in my area would add an extra 5 hours if I went by train on what is normally a 45 minute drive.

Holy fucking shit, our trains really are better when even the worst train in the entire country beats all of yours.

7 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

Tyranny at it's finest.

This brief convo has reminded me that I recently discovered Conservapedia, and it's like, the funniest website in the entire internet.

Seriously, swing by if you haven't, it's an absolute treasure trove.

13 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

Tell that to the Natives.

...I think I'd rather not.

6 minutes ago, Benice said:

Which one is she? I don't think I've seen her...

You look her up, I don't wanna.

6 minutes ago, Benice said:

We've got the one going across the country, and then Vancouver and Toronto have them...

I think that's about it, though.

Huh.

How do you live like this?

1 minute ago, Shrimpy -Limited Edition- said:

Okay I gotta hand it to you, that got a big hearty laugh out of me.

The way Dad panics, that's fucking hilarious. Meanwhile Mom looks like she's considering if this could work to the benefit of her public humiliation kink

2 minutes ago, Armagon said:

Well for starters we don't have trains.

....nah deadass, American public rail system is non-existent. There's like one line throughout the East Coast.

That's horrible. You guys need less guns and more trains.

[Armagon]

19 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

So wait, why did Colony 6 get annexed but Colony 9 gets to be free?

It's closer.

20 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

I'm just now noticing Sharla has a gun, that's not even a sci-fi lazer gun, that's just straight up a sniper rifle

Welcome to Xenoblade. In this series, healers will fuck you up. None of this "pwease goddess protect the people" type bullshit. In fact, out of all the healers in Xenoblade, I think there's legit only one character that resembles the traditional RPG healer archetype.

.....Sharla sucks tho. She's good for this part of the game. When the next party member joins, boot her out immediately. Only Xenoblade healer to become a liability.

2 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

She's not a real character, that much I do know...

She's one of the party members.

3 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

That's horrible. You guys need less guns and more trains.

I think legit the reason we don't have an actual rail system is because "but muh expensive" and also lobbying probably. Oil tycoons need them cars on the streets.

[Armagon]

2 minutes ago, Armagon said:

In fact, out of all the healers in Xenoblade, I think there's legit only one character that resembles the traditional RPG healer archetype.

Add in Xenogears and Xenosaga and that number goes up to two.

Like it's really just MOMO (Xenosaga) and Fiona (Xenoblade 3) huh.

[Saint Rubenio]

Just now, Armagon said:

.....Sharla sucks tho. She's good for this part of the game. When the next party member joins, boot her out immediately. Only Xenoblade healer to become a liability.

Of course the only cool-looking girl is bad. Xenoblade just can't--

Just now, Armagon said:

She's one of the party members.

You can't be serious.

That's impossible, that doesn't add up. She's not sexualized.

WHY DID NOBODY TELL ME

Just now, Armagon said:

I think legit the reason we don't have an actual rail system is because "but muh expensive" and also lobbying probably. Oil tycoons need them cars on the streets.

I mean, the way Spain treats its railway, it almost feels like they are trying to phase it out for buses.

...But it still beats the hell out of you guys, like holy shit why does anyone even like in Murica

[Codename Shrimp]

22 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

She's not a real character, that much I do know...

???

What are you on? She's a major character XD

[Saint Rubenio]

Just now, Shrimpy -Limited Edition- said:

???

What are you on? She's a major character XD

I had no idea. Nobody ever talks about her, so I genuinely was convinced she was one of those irrelevant characters you get from the gacha.

In fact, TIL that's Pyra and Mythra. I can bench everyone's favorite girls for whatever memes the RNG deems fit to hand me, but Morag stays.

...What?

[Codename Shrimp]

8 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

TIL that's Pyra and Mythra. I can bench everyone's favorite girls for whatever memes the RNG deems fit to hand me

Well, not on first run. Pyra and Mythra locked in on first run

Edited May 5, 2023 by Shrimpy -Limited Edition-

[Saint Rubenio]

Just now, Shrimpy -Limited Edition- said:

Well, not on first run. Pyra and Mythra locked in on first run

https://gbatemp.net/threads/xenoblade-chronicles-2-100-complete-save.516830/

 

[Acacia Sgt]

37 minutes ago, Armagon said:

None of this "pwease goddess protect the people" type bullshit.

You think it's BS?

[Lightcosmo]

Wait, im confused, is Ruben playing XC2?

[Eltosian Kadath]

4 hours ago, ping said:

I'm looking forward to see how the Elite 4 fights will go. Those are pretty low levels to go up against them, especially with there being exactly one good base stat between all five of your Pokemon. Not to mention that you won't have Agility/SD Beedrill to help you.

I was kinds curious to see how it would go as well, so I came back to this run earlier than I normally do, speaking of which

With my rare candies, I level everyone up to 39, saving a four intentionally so I can use them between fights on battles I feel I might need the Badge Boost Glitch to complete, although in retrospect, I saved far too many for this level

With Lorelei my opening gambit is to bait Dewgong into spaming rest with Gen-1-Miss, thanks to his Psychic type weakness, which I can use to give Badge-Boost a free switch and Swords Dance before the Dewgong wakes up, and with super effective Submission that is enough to one shot the Dewgong, and misses two shotting the Cloyster by a bad range, but with Submission recoil Badge-Boost isn't the finisher here

That is Glitch-City by Mimicing Amnesia from the Slowbro, and safely boosting up on it, as Glitch-City is also weak to Amnesia

Which leads to what seems like an easy clear on Lorelei

And with both Psychic, and Mega Drain, Glitch-City easily sweeps Bruno

But Agatha is just too luck based for me to get past her at this level. Fun little fact, on my first attempt I got stuck with Badge-Boost as my last pokemon left, and he can't actually damage her ghost types (in fact the only move a Pinsir can learn which can damage a Ghost type is Seismic Toss...), so I can only use Badge-Boost against the Golbat, and Arbok.

And I do for a few attempt here to test how lucky this fight really is, and if I can get past Agatha at this level with reasonable luck. This is where I realize that I can even lose the Lorelei battle with some bad luck, in two notable ways. The first is that due to typing, Leech Life ends up as the best move to use against the Jynx (it deals only slightly less damage than Psychic, but heals Glitch-City about as much heal as Jynx deals in return), so Jynx has the opportunity to

double crit (or get a crit just before death, and Lapras gets a crit), or the Lapras can confuse him, and bad confusion luck can end things. Both of those are facilitated by Gltich-City's stats being bad enough that the defensive aspect of Amnesia being a key part of the victory. Although another big thing that makes that a lose state is that Lapras out-speeds and one-shots both my sleepers with super-effective Blizzard.

I do also have a very close call with Bruno as well, which would inspire a very small change in strategy in the future. Admittedly I think a Gen 1 miss was involved, but why even risk defeat on a Gen 1 miss

So I start having Glitch-City mimic Harden, use a few relying on Mega Draining healing him back to full.

I do make a fair number of attempts against Agatha, as I don't see how a few levels will make that battle less luck, but eventually I go clear out cycling road, and after using my Rare Candies, my next attempt has everyone start at level 41, with me saving two rare candies for the Lance and Champion fights, and I was proven very wrong about that

As now Glitch-City learns Sleep Powder by leveling up on the two fights before Agetha, and with a third Pokemon that can put her Pokemon to sleep that have super-effective moves

Especially when I can steal the healing powers of super effective Dream Eater when I do so is enough to make the fight remarkably consistent...although I only realized this strat due to throwing my first attempt at this level against Agatha, as I forgot to recover the power points of Glitch-City before this fight, and the use of Mimic here was just to have more PP to use as attacks against her.

The extra levels even manage to make the Lorelei fight much more consistent as well, as now Long-Range-Trainer can outspeed the Lapras, so losing Glitch-City to RNG doesn't necessarily lead to a loss on that fight anymore.

Now before the Lance fight, the plan is to Mimic Agility with Glitch-City, to get past the Aerodactyl, but I do end up losing the first attempt due to some terrible luck

I end up losing everyone but Glitch-City against the Gyrados, and I thought Glitch-City's PP would be able to deal with two battles, but after Lance uses a Hyper Potion on every single one of his pokemon at the perfect time, that proves insufficient.

Next time our levels are slightly different thanks to the Agatha lottery, and I don't utterly bungle the Gyrados half of the fight

As the plan is the normal Spore-Swords Dance to clear the Gyrados, and I even wipe out one of the Dragonairs while I am at it before letting

Glitch-City clear the rest of the fight with relative ease, but thing go poorly against the Champion...kinda. I luck into a victory on the third attempt, but I was unsatisfied with just how much luck was involved, so I do end up retrying, but I will get to that in a second

So the plan is to sleep the Pidgeot so Badge-Boost can Swords Dance up, and as you can see, Glitch-City (and Long-Range-Trainer, who I will switch to using on attempt 2 onward) can take a Wing Attack, and with the other two moves he will use (as they are all super effective flying-type moves) being a two-turn move in Sky Attack, and Mirror Move, so without a crit we always have a chance of getting past this part of the fight, but bad sleep luck

can really screw us. But lets jump to the lucky win to talk about how lucky it is

Even with 3 Badge Boost Glitches Badge-Boost can't outspeed the Alakazam, but at least he can take a hit from full health

But that is low enough health that I can't use Submission on the Rhydon without sacrificing Badge-Boost, so I have to do it the slow way, hoping Rydon doesn't use an attack. Admittedly only one of his 4 attacks deal damage, and its Fury Attack, which has a 15% chance of missing on top of that, but four hit KOing with a not very effective move makes that around 1/3 chance of making it past the Rhydon (ignoring crits)

And he doesn't even one shot the Exeggutor after that, but thanks to even more luck he makes it past that, but

That ends the Speed Badge Boosts he was getting, so he dies immediately to the Gyrados.

And now its time to show off the strat that would win it all, using Sleep moves on sleeping Pokemon so they can't act despite out-speeding me.

As Both the moves Charizard might use have a miss chance (85% accuracy on Fire Blast, and 70% accuracy with Fire Spin), and Glitch-City and Long-Range-Trainer can both take a single hit of Fire Spin well enough that I can switch in to sack Gen-1-Miss to get a fourth attempt, and even survive a minimum two-use Fire Spin if they start this stage of the fight with high enough health, and despite missing Sleep Powder on the first use

Glitch-City lucks into the win anyway, even after a Hyper Potion use from the Rival. Now I was unsatisfied with how lucky this all is, and would try again at first one higher level with the party, but its only at two higher levels (from the start) that we see much change.

That is enough that Badge-Boost no longer levels after beating Exeggutor, so Badge-Boost one shot Gyrados as well, which gives me another roll to take down Charizard, but getting to that point is still rather lucky, but it is a bit better, as he Three Shots Rhydon now, and one-shot the Exeggutor. Also I learn

That even with the Mimic Hydro Pump strat, it is better to start with sleep.

In the end things end up very similar to the first winning attempt. Badge-Boost doesn't even make it to Gyrados, and after losing Glitch-City and Gen-1-Miss trying to luck into the dodge and sleep on the Charizard

MissingNo lucks into it, and after going for 3 Slashes, I start spamming Spore to secure

the victory.

In quite a few way I am still a bit unsatisfied, but I think it is a testament to how powerful sleep is that bug types can do this at either of these levels, and while it requires a fair bit of luck, I was rolling a fair number of dice to look for that one lucky roll. I might as well show off the team.

[Acacia Sgt]

I think I will go the flashback route for the writing, even if it's not the easier path.

[GuardianSing]

41 minutes ago, Benice said:

Indeed.

Another one of my favorite things about 1984 is that the American press basically received as "the DEFINITVE proof that communism is bad" and Orwell contacted them to tell them that they missed the point.

Authoritarianism is bad and can rise from any large scale revolt if it's unstable enough, which as you can guess is very common in violent revolts which is why they so often result in authoritarianism

Russia is a very interesting example, and you can observe the dynamics and demographics of the country at the time to get a better understanding on how things turned the way they did. Russia, much like France after the first revolution, shifted the power dynamics of Europe greatly and had to face the onslaught of countries abusing that shift in power, they were in a state of emergency and the people were a lot more willing to give authority to folks in charge to ensure their own safety, but of course that state of emergency never ended now that the people in power weren't willing to give up that huge amount of authority, totalitarianism ensues.

There are other factors too, like how the army is usually powerful after a violent revolution by it's very nature, or how the general disunity among rebels can make it easy to cheat the system for your own benefit. It's a very complicated matter.

There is a distinction to be made between communism, socialism and anarchy, but if you ask me, if a country falls to to totalitarianism, that's not really the fault of leftists ideas, as much as it is just a case of a country being easy to exploit after a time of disunity. I feel that when people say "Oh, the soviet union didn't work so we should never listen to leftist ideas" misunderstand how the USSR became a dictatorship, same goes for the People's Republic of China or any other modern "communist" state

That being said, I hear loads of Americans are immigrating to Vietnam because of the better standard of living so...

But yeah, in the same way you wouldn't point at the French Revolution and think that any attempt at Liberal democracy would result in totalitarianism, neither do I think we should say socialist ideas wouldn't work, because of Russia.

And hey, people may like to point to communist states to counter the ideas, but in reality there are loads of worker cooperates that exist outside of states that are an example of socialist ideas working amazingly.

56 minutes ago, Shrimpy -Limited Edition- said:

"Hold up, something not right about this..."

"Police officers don't protect the peaceful city life as heroes of justice! She's been fed terrible lies!"

54 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Holy fucking shit, our trains really are better when even the worst train in the entire country beats all of yours.

Yep, and as others have said we don't really have public transit in cities or trains in rural areas, the lines that exist are owned by freight companies and so Amtrack (Our largest public transport railway) never has the right of way on those tracks, causing hour long delays.

Amtrack does have plans to build their own lines, but since barely anybody is using them and they aren't getting funding anytime soon, the money to do so just isn't there.

This is why homelessness and poverty is such a common problem in the US by the way, buying and managing a super expensive car is pretty much the only reliable way to get around and it's just not something everyone can afford.

1 hour ago, Saint Rubenio said:

This brief convo has reminded me that I recently discovered Conservapedia, and it's like, the funniest website in the entire internet.

Seriously, swing by if you haven't, it's an absolute treasure trove.

I've visited it a few times and it's glorious.

I refuse to believe it's not a shitpost, there's no way any of it's genuine.

1 hour ago, Saint Rubenio said:

That's horrible. You guys need less guns and more trains.

I don't understand why that already isn't the case, the train heritage in this country is far bigger than the gun heritage. The whole explosion in gun culture is mostly a result of post 9/11 American nationalism so it's quite new in comparison.

1 hour ago, Armagon said:

I think legit the reason we don't have an actual rail system is because "but muh expensive" and also lobbying probably. Oil tycoons need them cars on the streets.

*Business owners* "Sorry, we can't do this thing to improve the lives of people because it's too expensive!"

*Also business owners* "Lmao, lets buy the entirety of Twitter for twice the amount of what global warming projects are asking for"

1 hour ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Of course the only cool-looking girl is bad. Xenoblade just can't--

I'm currently resisting the urge to do the Fire Emblem thing and use her anyways.