Serenes Forest's Teehee Thread

[Saint Rubenio]

Dang, if you'd told me back in the VS1 days that Cezar would end up being one of the best characters in the two games. What becoming the most unconventional advisor-dude ever does to a guy.

Also, I should probably have expected it, Kaga is pretty thorough with these things, but Bonacel mourned Prody in his one epilogue scene. Blamed himself for his death. Quite magnanimous of him not to blame Zade, who personally murdered the kid, but then, considering he was talking to Zade himself, perhaps he was just pretending. He'll plan his vengeance and come back in Vestaria Saga 3 as the main villain.

[Armagon]

3 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Margulite demons need to consume human sacrifices to regain their power. Usually female because... I don't remember if Kaga explained the bias in the multiple novels' worth of text in the two Vestarias so far, but you can imagine the Doylist explanation. Anyway, this character Emilia went looking for one of my team's characters, wandered to the final chapter place offscreen for no reason and got caught by the enemy. Midway through the map, Zagan spawns in and begins to deal 1 damage to her per turn. You have to get to him before he can kill her. Once you open the cell, enemies spawn inside to impede you.

...Except, there's a staircase with archer reinforcements right there. I retreated a bit to deal with the enemies summoned by Zagan, which allowed the archer to slip right into the opened cell and turn Emilia into a stain on the wall. This triggered the event where Zagan finishes her off and powers up, except he didn't finish shit. His meal was stolen by a generic archer lol

My guess is just Kaga didn't actually account for that.

1 hour ago, Lightcosmo said:

If its trash quality it might as well though. And its not as though you van return it once its bought, unlike the base game.

But as Ruben said, you know what you are getting when you buy DLC. You can make an informed decision. You cannot do that with gacha.

 

22 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

AHAHAHAHA, oh yeah I'd forgotten. The game does try to explain why King Naccara would let his daughter keep a slave. It was to save Tallan! Of course. You know how he feels about slavery. That's a direct line Garlan says, and Garlan is never wrong.

...Then why did you let your demon of a daughter have him fucking whipped, man!?

White slave owners in the Confederacy used this same justification by the way. 

[Acacia Sgt]

Come New Year, I think I'll start up SRW V...

[Armagon]

TIL that Skyla/Elesa was a really popular Pokemon lesbian ship.

TIAL that there are some implications in the new Pokemon DLC that is basically 9/11 for Pokemon lesbian shippers

[Eltosian Kadath]

6 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Well, I imagine watching my grandfather's body fall apart since the scare in January until he passed away, going to funerals like every month, becoming unemployed once more, enrolling in a horribly boring waste of time of a course to try and do something with my time, learning my father has cancer and then discovering it may have left his prostate before they removed, or it may have not because the pieces of fucking filthy shit working at the local hospital are incompetent imbeciles, hasn't done much for my mental state.

It's been an absolutely godawful year, coming right after the happiest year of my life. Obviously it wasn't all bad, and it doesn't come even near the year it's been for, y'know, other people, but well, I'd kind of gotten used to living the best life. I can only hope next will be a bit better for all.

Oof. Sorry to hear you are having such a bad year. Reminds me of one of the worst years of my life, where for a month it felt like someone I cared about kept dying every week, ending with my mom having a real scare with cancer. Ironically she was very lucky that it was such a fast growing tumor, as you can't ignore the very sudden appearance of a softball sized tumor in your body, and thus they caught it before it could spread. Life will get better for you, and I hope it does soon.

 

1 hour ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Gotta love the switcheroo the game pulls on you, making it look like you're just going to die horribly. Pretty sure the trapmen don't even fire a shot after Therenius goes down. Kaga just did that to scare the player.

Congrats, on completing VS 1 again.

 

21 minutes ago, Shrimpy -Limited Edition- said:

 

That is a rough map to get through. Fog of War, Wyvern, Longbow Snipers, those nasty crit wolves.

 

11 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

 

Also, I should probably have expected it, Kaga is pretty thorough with these things, but Bonacel mourned Prody in his one epilogue scene. Blamed himself for his death. Quite magnanimous of him not to blame Zade, who personally murdered the kid, but then, considering he was talking to Zade himself, perhaps he was just pretending. He'll plan his vengeance and come back in Vestaria Saga 3 as the main villain.

Damn, what a tragic little detail. Also I can't believe you lost Prody.

[Acacia Sgt]

8 minutes ago, Armagon said:

TIL that Skyla/Elesa was a really popular Pokemon lesbian ship.

TIAL that there are some implications in the new Pokemon DLC that is basically 9/11 for Pokemon lesbian shippers

*looks up*

Huh, all four are from Unova? And then another of them is Drayden's grandson...

[Codename Shrimp]

8 minutes ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

That is a rough map to get through. Fog of War, Wyvern, Longbow Snipers, those nasty crit wolves.

Honestly, i feel like the Fog was unneeded on this map. It's already quite a challenging one with alot to do. Fog makes it a bit of a pain

Then again, the number of good maps with Fog outside Berwick Saga can be counted in less than one hand

[Armagon]

3 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

*looks up*

Huh, all four are from Unova? And then another of them is Drayden's grandson...

Not just from, the DLC takes place in Unova. Somewhere.

[Acacia Sgt]

Just now, Armagon said:

Not just from, the DLC takes place in Unova. Somewhere.

Oh, fascinating.

[Acacia Sgt]

I'm gonna guess Blueberry Academy is meant to be something like an Ivy League inspired thing or something. Specially if it's not too far from Unova itself. That is the area the Ivy League operates...

[BrightBow]

1 hour ago, Saint Rubenio said:

AHAHAHAHA, oh yeah I'd forgotten. The game does try to explain why King Naccara would let his daughter keep a slave. It was to save Tallan! Of course. You know how he feels about slavery. That's a direct line Garlan says, and Garlan is never wrong.

...Then why did you let your demon of a daughter have him fucking whipped, man!?

The fact that no one likes Lyttia (and according to Evil Other Lyttia this includes her dad) most certainly helps but... well, it only goes so far. This rationalization is just bullocks.
Fortunately it's not an important plot point like the Blood Pact or the entire invasion of Hoshido in Conquest, but Naccara does not get to weasel out of this with his dignity intact.

There are a lot of parallels between Lyttia x Tallan and Aegina x Rosalie, but the fact that Aegina did by all appearance not actually keep Rosalie as a slave is kinda an important distinction.
At least with Lyttia I can see that she would visit a slave market, I suppose. You tell her to stay away from an unsafe part of town, first thing she does is go there out of spite. With Aegina, her presence on a slave market most certainly raises some questions. She is obviously much more responsible and dedicated than VS1 Lyttia.

Edited December 16, 2023 by BrightBow

[Lightcosmo]

53 minutes ago, Armagon said:

But as Ruben said, you know what you are getting when you buy DLC. You can make an informed decision. You cannot do that with gacha

Do you truly 100% know what you were getting unless you watch a full playthrough? In which case, it would a bit wasteful anyways, since most the fun comes from not knowing.

And as i said, games such as Awakening's DLC are already in the void.

Edited December 16, 2023 by Lightcosmo

[Acacia Sgt]

Hey, I get my fun that way.

[Saint Rubenio]

43 minutes ago, Armagon said:

White slave owners in the Confederacy used this same justification by the way. 

I mean.

...Jesus Christ, Kaga...

26 minutes ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

Oof. Sorry to hear you are having such a bad year. Reminds me of one of the worst years of my life, where for a month it felt like someone I cared about kept dying every week, ending with my mom having a real scare with cancer. Ironically she was very lucky that it was such a fast growing tumor, as you can't ignore the very sudden appearance of a softball sized tumor in your body, and thus they caught it before it could spread. Life will get better for you, and I hope it does soon.

That sounds like a nightmare come to life. I'm glad it ended well.

27 minutes ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

Damn, what a tragic little detail.

Both Vestaria games handle this very well, as well as TRS to an extent. It's another part of why I find the whole extended prologue cutscene vastly superior to the end cards FE gets. It's a great opportunity for those mourning scenes everyone's always clamoring for.

27 minutes ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

Also I can't believe you lost Prody.

On turn 9 of the Malaya defense map (I beat the map on turn 10), Zade got berserked. He went straight for Prody with Edelstern. I didn't have the heart to go back.

1 minute ago, BrightBow said:

The fact that no one likes Lyttia (and according to Evil Other Lyttia this includes her dad) most certainly helps but... well, it only goes so far. This rationalization is just bullocks. Naccara does not get out of this with his dignity intact.

There are a lot of parallels between Lyttia x Tallan and Aegina x Rosalie, but the fact that Aegina did by all appearance not actually keep Rosalie as a slave is kinda an important distinction.

Eyup. Honestly, Kaga went way overboard with how shitty he wrote her to be. If Lyttia had been just bossy, demanded Tallan go feed her grapes in the dead of night or something, then yeah, I could see it. Maybe establish Naccara merely kept Tallan on as a servant so he had a place to live while he had his people poke around for information about his origins, but Lyttia preferred calling him a slave and pushed him around because she's a dick. Fine. She's still unlikeable, but there's a better set-up for her development there and Naccara gets to actually be a good guy.

...Instead, Kaga made her whip the poor kid on a regular basis, then let him frame himself for her terrible ideas and nearly die for it. She can stay next to his bed till cows go moo for all I care, she's just diabolical.

1 minute ago, BrightBow said:

At least with Lyttia I can see that she would visit a slave market, I suppose. You tell her to stay away from an unsafe part of town, first thing she does is go there out of spite. With Aegina, her presence on a slave market most certainly raises some questions. She is obviously much more responsible and dedicated than VS1 Lyttia.

Hah! Yeah that's a fair point. To be fair, though, we only meet Aegina after she witnessed her father's death, lost everything and went on the run from an ancient creepshow that wants to marry her. Considering the traces of a spoiled personality you can still see in her, there's a chance she used to be a lot more Lyttia'ish before her entire life fell to pieces.

4 minutes ago, Lightcosmo said:

Do you truly 100% know what you were getting unless you watch a full playthrough? In which case, it would a bit wasteful anyways, since most the fun comes from not knowing.

And as i said, games such as Awakening's DLC are already in the void.

With gachas, the entire game vanishes into the void when it stops being profitable. And you can't even preserve them through piracy, like say, Awakening's DLCs, because the game systems depend on the server and aren't designed with longevity in mind.

Frankly, I don't get why you're fighting this fight. I don't like DLC much in most cases either, myself, but gacha is just rotten. There's no comparison.

[BrightBow]

I guess Zayid's face is meant to indicate that he freaks out about the prospect of Sheela drinking alcohol?
Not that there isn't precedent of minors in the game drinking alcohol. Cyltan got completely wasted and Tasha clearly empties a bottle every now and then. And they likely weren't the only ones.

https://km-hs-lr22.hatenablog.com/entry/2018/03/01/121854
 

https://km-hs-lr22.hatenablog.com/entry/2017/09/06/012021
 

https://km-hs-lr22.hatenablog.com/entry/2016/10/21/113712

Edited December 16, 2023 by BrightBow

[Saint Rubenio]

1 minute ago, BrightBow said:

I guess Zayid's face is meant to indicate that he freaks out about the prospect of Sheela drinking alcohol?
Not that there isn't precedent of minors in the game drinking alcohol. Cyltan got completely wasted and Tasha clearly empties a bottle ever now and then. And they likely weren't the only ones.

Oh yeah, for a minute I almost forgot Hilda also goes off with Cezar. If Eddard is dead she returns to Norden with Lianka instead.

1 minute ago, BrightBow said:

https://km-hs-lr22.hatenablog.com/entry/2017/09/06/012021

Damn this person's so dedicated though. Does every bossman ever have art from them?

...Say, completely unrelated but speaking of bossmen, do we know who Saja's beloved was? She doesn't drop any names or concrete hints, and I don't remember if anyone else namedrops her at any point.

[BrightBow]

22 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

...Say, completely unrelated but speaking of bossmen, do we know who Saja's beloved was? She doesn't drop any names or concrete hints, and I don't remember if anyone else namedrops her at any point.

Probably just meant to be a nameless generic. Like with that girl in FE4 whose boyfriend was one of Eltshan's cross knights, and she is a little upset if you visit her town after Eltshan lost his head. Even if you never killed a single one of them and they merely disintegrated after their home castle was seized.

But assuming he is meant to be someone specific, there are not too many named bosses who are even candidates. He is called an Equester, which means he was a cavalry unit of sorts. 
It's not the hairy feet guy, because he survived chapter 15 and is still alive by the time of the final map. It's not Cromwell, because he never actually dies. The lancer boy in the prison map mentions having a wife, saying that while he might die, Cromwell will return to the mainland soon and take care of his wife. Which implies she is also on the mainland and not able to take revenge on anyone in Vestaria in the near future. And even if it was her, Cromwell should likely be able to talk her down.
That leaves the two cavalry duos that accompany those female imperial knights in chapter 16 and 17. The ones in chapter 16 are explicitly stated to be competing for her, so they are unlikely to have someone else. Don't know if it's the same in chapter 17.
And I think that it's a safe bet that it's not intended to be one of the lady knights themselves.

Plus, not a single one of those bosses is technically a required kill.

Edited December 16, 2023 by BrightBow

[Saint Rubenio]

Reading through the Garlan cutscene at the end, at first I was like "ok so why is this scene so needlessly difficult to see."

...Then Garlan spoiled the plot twist and I thought, yeah, maybe thre's a reason this scene is so obscure. I mean, the twist is like, extremely obvious, and Theo does the lampshading if he's alive anyway, but still. Garlan just comes out with it. He knows the plot of VS2 already lol

Oh and I hadn't even realized until I looked through my old savefile with no deaths, but if Eddard is dead, Siegfried makes no appearance in the ending roll. Just, none at all. His only appearance is with Hilda and of course it can't happen if Hilda's already left with Lianka. That's so odd though, why not make him appear there?

7 minutes ago, BrightBow said:

Oh you edited this one in later.

...Look how gay all three of them are, seriously. I can't believe Kaga doesn't realize.

[BrightBow]

20 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

...Then Garlan spoiled the plot twist and I thought, yeah, maybe thre's a reason this scene is so obscure. I mean, the twist is like, extremely obvious, and Theo does the lampshading if he's alive anyway, but still. Garlan just comes out with it. He knows the plot of VS2 already lol

That conversation hasn't aged terribly well. According to it Grevandel is trying to take over Meleda "legitimately" by fasttracking Zech's marriage to Athol.
But of course that's not how this plays out. Instead he has Athol imprisoned immediately and wastes no time trying to have her petrified. Then he simply takes control over the country by his authority as the chancellor.

Even assuming he simply changed his plan on the short term, VS2 makes "virgin power" a vital part of being a maiden, star or otherwise. So this original plan would have a lot of holes in it.
For one thing, if Athol loses her virginity, she also loses her crest. Which would not be ideal for the margulites because then the Tehemos are free to seek someone else. So the wedding night would be rather awkward. They would still have control over Meleda, but they would likely want to keep control over the star crest too.
Theodel most certainly implies that marriage to an active maiden is just not a thing you can do, period. "You belong to the Tehemos until you are 18."
But even if it were possible, Salyna's parents were clearly shunned for their relationship ending a maiden's term prematurely. So at the very least marrying Athol would draw a ton of suspicion that would defeat the point of taking this route in the first place.

But all the stuff we learn about Zech still holds up.

Edited December 16, 2023 by BrightBow

[Lightcosmo]

55 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

With gachas, the entire game vanishes into the void when it stops being profitable. And you can't even preserve them through piracy, like say, Awakening's DLCs, because the game systems depend on the server and aren't designed with longevity in mind.

Frankly, I don't get why you're fighting this fight. I don't like DLC much in most cases either, myself, but gacha is just rotten. There's no comparison.

This is a terrible argument. Piracy really shouldnt be the only way to experience something.

I'm not really "fighting" anything. Just making a point that DLC locks content just the same as any cashgrab. 

[Saint Rubenio]

Excited to get into VS2. You can immediately tell the difference in power levels just by looking at Zade.

(You can also tell Kaga was lazy and didn't want to fill the sides of the map with more map so there aren't hideous black bars on the sides on the first map of the game)

Double the stats, Commander II instead of I, Multichance instead of that garbage Critical Edge skill, twice the uses on Edelstern... And that's not even getting into his entourage. Even the almighty Troy struggles to compete with Zade's friends from VS2, his horse being his main claim to fame against Cancer Swordsman, Immortal Girl and Brave Thunder Tome In Chapter 1. Then you remember who Zade's other friends from VS1 were and there stops being a competition.

You can tell Kaga wanted you to kick ass and take names in this game. Does make it a bit easier than VS1, probably, combined with free saving. But, eh. As out of character as it may sound from me, it makes for the more fun game.

8 minutes ago, BrightBow said:

Probably just meant to be a nameless generic. Like with that girl in FE4 whose boyfriend was one of Eltshan's cross knights, and she is a little upset if you visit her town after Eltshan lost his head. Even if you never killed a single one of them and they merely disintegrated after their home castle was seized.

But assuming he is meant to be someone specific, there are not too many named bosses who are even candidates. He is called an Equester, which means he was a cavalry unit of sorts. 
It's not the hairy feet guy, because he survived chapter 15 and is still alive by the time of the final map. It's not Cromwell, because he never actually dies. The lancer boy in the prison map mentions having a wife, saying that while he might die, Cromwell will return to the mainland soon and take care of his wife. Which implies she is also on the mainland and not able to take revenge on anyone in Vestaria in the near future. And even if it was her, Cromwell should likely be able to talk her down.
That leaves the two cavalry duos that accompany those female imperial knights in chapter 16 and 17. The ones in chapter 16 are explicitly stated to be competing for her. Don't know if it's the same in chapter 17.
And I think that it's a safe bet that it's not one of the lady knights themselves.

Plus, not a single one of those bosses is technically a required kill.

The hairy feet guy, ahahahahaha! Oh, poor Marragas.

Actually, you bring up something interesting. What if it had been Hagedorn's wife and you could have her stand down or even join by talking to her with Cromwell? That would've been a cute little secret. Of course, it'd require rewriting the guy's one line of dialogue but, eh.

2 minutes ago, BrightBow said:

That conversation hasn't aged terribly well. According to it Grevandel is trying to take over Meleda "legitimately" by fasttracking Zech's marriage to Athol.
But of course that's not how this plays out. Instead he has Athol imprisoned immediately and wastes no time trying to have her petrified. Then he simply takes control over the country by his authority as the chancellor.

Even assuming he simply changed his plan on the short term, VS2 makes "virgin power" a vital part of being a maiden, star or otherwise. So this original plan would have a lot of holes in it.
For one thing, if Athol loses her virginity, she also loses her crest. Which would not be ideal for the margulites because then the Tehemos are free to seek someone else. So the wedding night would be rather awkward. They would still have control over Meleda, but they would likely want to keep control over the star crest too.
Theodel most certainly implies that marriage to an active maiden is just not a thing you can do, period. "You belong to the Tehemos until you are 18."
But even if it were possible, Salyna's parents were clearly shunned for their relationship ending a maiden's term prematurely. So at the very least marrying Athol would draw a ton of suspicion that would defeat the point of taking this route in the first place.

But all the stuff we learn about Zech still holds up.

This kinda feels like Kaga either decided to expand on the lore later and retconed this (I don't remember the whole "virgin power" thing being brought up in VS1 at all), or he later realized the contradiction and just sort of hoped nobody would notice lol

Just now, Lightcosmo said:

This is a terrible argument. Piracy really shouldnt be the only way to experience something.

No, but that's not the fault of DLCs, that's the fault of Nintendo for being shit at game preservation lol

Just now, Lightcosmo said:

I'm not really "fighting" anything. Just making a point that DLC locks content just the same as any cashgrab. 

Not "just the same", I don't think, but eh. DLCs are also abused pretty heavily. Heck, I remember back when people were angry about them. Now we've just accepted them as fact. Such is the way of this life, I'm afraid. There'll come a time when everyone views gachas as something perfectly normal, and it'll be the next horrible greed system that gets lambasted. Can't beat money.

[BrightBow]

11 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

This kinda feels like Kaga either decided to expand on the lore later and retconed this (I don't remember the whole "virgin power" thing being brought up in VS1 at all), or he later realized the contradiction and just sort of hoped nobody would notice lol

Yeah, I doubt this was meant to be a thing during the writing of VS1.

In any case, the scene isn't even canon for the sequel. What with Accorte and Theodel being still alive and well. So I most certainly wouldn't expect any writer to get too hung up on it.
 

13 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

You can tell Kaga wanted you to kick ass and take names in this game. Does make it a bit easier than VS1, probably, combined with free saving. But, eh. As out of character as it may sound from me, it makes for the more fun game.

Well, you do get a lot of perks compared to the original 2019 release of the game. For example Edelstern still had 30 uses and no build in stat bonuses. (Zade instead had a short sword). Sheela's bow also still had it's old 20 points of durability.

[Sidereal Wraith]

1 hour ago, BrightBow said:

https://km-hs-lr22.hatenablog.com/entry/2018/03/01/121854

Unending happiness…

[BrightBow]

The oathbreaking of Börte and her husband is honestly really impressive.

Sure, normally an oath of chastity is easily broken. But here we got that whole teleporting crest plot point. That means that the Tenemos know immediately when you are doing the nasty.
Feels like that knowledge should be a little distracting.

https://km-hs-lr22.hatenablog.com/entry/2020/09/13/000000

Edited December 16, 2023 by BrightBow

[Saint Rubenio]

8 minutes ago, BrightBow said:

Well, you do get a lot of perks compared to the original 2019 release of the game. For example Edelstern still had 30 uses and no build in stat bonuses. (Zade instead had a short sword). Sheela's bow also still had it's old 20 points of durability.

Clearly Kaga decided we needed more Kaganess.

1 minute ago, BrightBow said:

The oathbreaking of Börte and her husband is honestly really impressive.

I mean, considering that whole teleporting crest plot point. That means that the Tenemos know immediately when you are doing the nasty. Might as well livestream the act to your parents at that point.

https://km-hs-lr22.hatenablog.com/entry/2020/09/13/000000

Goddammit, Brightbow, now you have me pondering the question of when exactly is the vow considered broken. Does the thing just fly away when the little bird passes through the gates to heaven? Imagine he was on top, blocking the way out. The crest just smacks him on the balls as it flies off. Way to ruin their honeymoon.