Playin' any games today, Flying Nun? (WGAYP - 2011 Edition)

[Shale]

SRWZ: Stage 44 done! 43, the one with Bartfield, Harry, Kira and Gym vs. the world, was a giant pain in the ass. Had one full reset, and then ended up relying on Lacus to hit a 10% shot in order to take everybody out in time, but I did it. 44 was simpler, but still involved starting over when I forgot about the full restore that happens when Sol Gravion arrives for the first time and didn't set up for it at all.

Also I ordered a PSP in anticipation of Z2, so clearly after I finish this run I should relax by playing Advance Portable. This is the way.

[Captain K.]

SO4:  Had my first game-over at Kokubiel.  Actually that was the first time I'd even had to switch out of the front four characters.  Checked a FAQ to save time and saw that Bacchus is supposed to be good in that fight, so I stuck him with three healers and just spammed Termination for a very long time.  Then I got a 45-minute cutscene.  I'm used to 45 minutes of not playing in the beginning of tri-Ace games, but in the middle of the game itself is quite another story.

After that went to Nox planet and was promptly murdered multiple times by randoms with guns.  So decided to go look for better armor/IC stuff before tackling Nox.  The good:  instant teleport to any town in the game.  The bad:  Disc swapping.  What the fuck is this Legend of Dragoon?

Found some good stuff in Wind Ring-locked chests.  Then went and played in the Colosseum.  Got up to rank 20 or so with Arumat before losing.

=======

DQ9:  Mortamor is kind of annoying.  Not hard, just takes longer than I'm used to.  Normally I kill Legacy bosses in 2-3 turns.  With him it takes 5-7 turns.

[Niu]

CK, just how much you are behind on the IC and equips? By that point, even you don't know about Kokubiel's defense trick, his damages should still be very pathetic to let you outslug him.

[Luther Lansfeld]

FE6 - I heard you like Nomads so I put some Nomads in your maps so they can kill you while they shoot. Still enjoying this game, Alan is still absurdly speed and defense blessed. Only complaint is wanting more Zephy screentime!! omgsolame

MK2 - Fought Yun, he was not as easy as I thought he'd be. Did Enna and Goto CQs, Enna to see Flay and Goto cuz I dunno. I've done a ton of synthing though, even though it annoys me a little bit.

[Dhyerwolf]

FF 13- Just beat Bartandalus' second form. Damn, I was not expecting that fight. Or I wasn't expecting that level of HP on an enemy where staggering wasn't an auto-win. Took a damn long time to whittle down all that HP, although he's not exactly damaging so generally wasn't too badly pressured.

[Grefter]

Welcome to the end of FF13, where in which they decide that you have grinded the fuck out of Chapter 10 or have levelled your weapons up and jack enemy HP up out the arse and figure that they have to counter the combat method that they have drilled into you all game and have bosses punish you for staggering.  Hooray for choosing between having to alternate between offensive and defensive or between slow and boring whittling down enemy health!

If you have capped out tier 2 weapons then feel free to stagger things and launch them, just have a Defender/Healer/Healer combination availble to handle the counter.

[Dhyerwolf]

Lol capping out tier 2 weapons. I have 1 tier 2 weapon, nowhere near capped out. But staggering worked fine on him at least. Just no one near as effective on most+a bucketload more of HP. Not happy to hear that the remaining bosses would all be in this vein though.

[Grefter]

Abusing the weapon upgrade system it isn't to hard to at least upgrade to tier 2 where you are at.  There is a simple sidequest (like it is just running around the area finding items) that will give you more than enough currency to do it back on the destroyed town of the crazy bitches.  You can go back there whenever you want when you get to the last chapter.

[Dhyerwolf]

Oh, tier II beginning isn't hard. Of course, tier II beginning is worse than tier I ending. Either way, I did a few hunts, but upon realizing that the only real sidequest was 64 revamps, I wasn't too enthused to do too many.

[Grefter]

The quest in particular I mean isn't hunts, it is finding and fixing up an old robot or something, it is really just running around that last area of chapter 10 for a while and it gets you a stupid amount of Gil/items worth a stupid amount of Gil.

[Idun]

This is eery. Ok, so there is an enemy I cannot pass in The Last Remnant, so I set the game aside for a moment as when dying long into a long battle is exhausting. I just set it aside - it's the sidequest I want to do before I beat the game.

But.

This is eery. (Maybe no so)

I picked up Radiata Stories, even when my WA3 disc was on the inside. I really have some unfinished business with this game. The first playthrough, I did the Elf arc. I have embarked (with the option, restart even stronger! ! !) on the human arc now. But what is eery. Eery. Is that. I. I played this game for 7 hours straight. This is my longest gaming experience since Xenosaga Ep III. I am excited. Perhaps RS can prep me for conditioning myself to sit at the TV for long periods of time again. This means I can get shit done.

I've only done the first required Croccogator task for Theatre Vancoor. I bought a really spiffy outfit from the armor store in the town square (can't remember its name at the moment) . . . Hm. Yes. Poor Ganz.

[superaielman]

Defense Grid- Bought and beat the DLC maps. MAnaged to get a silver star on every map except the free form one, which I got a gold medal on. Now looking at youtube videos to see precisely what strategies worked for getting gold medals on maps. The solution I saw posted to roundabout was a bit surprising (Way shorter path than I expected).

[Luther Lansfeld]

Dunie seems to have questionable taste in what to marathon.

[Idun]

Radiata Stories is awesome.

Currently doing a sewer quest.

[Captain K.]

Do not question Dunie's taste; it is obviously impeccable.

[Luther Lansfeld]

I prefer Ratatta Stories.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

* Jo'ou Ranbu haunts Ciato with the ghost of aiels past thwacking her with VPDS.

[Luther Lansfeld]

You mean present?

[superaielman]

What can I say, I like giving.

[Shale]

Three more stages down in my quest for self-flagellation!

45: Looks more threatening than it is. Tons of Mobile Suit squads with shields and the Garuda, the Frost Brothers and a crapton of Psyco and Destroy Gundams beyond them...but the only reinforcement is a gimped version of Big Duo Inferno. Just wade in and take care of business. Didn't even need Seven Swell, although I had to let one of the Frosts get away.

46: One reset - this is a fake-out stage and it got me good. It's got a very similar arrangement to 45, with a bunch of Gundam enemies and Psyco Gundams and battleships waiting behind them. Plus there's a time limit of four turns for the skill point, so with no upgrades the natural strategy is to get to those capital ships ASAP and start wearing them down, killing what grunts you can for Will while the rest get left for a cleanup MAP. Except that when you kill enough squads, everything retreats and a fresh set of Turn A enemies show up instead, including Turn X. And you have to kill them by turn 4 for the point. The first run I didn't even trigger them until turn 4 and had no chance in hell. The second time through I focused on wiping out grunts, got the Turn A goons to show up at the beginning of turn 3 and Seven Swell wiped the floor with them.

47: OMG REUBEN ISN'T NICE. The first half of this stage was a bitch. With no upgrades for me and 50% for them, Asakim's parallel Glory Star jerks got ~40% hit rates against Setsuko, and she got 4% against them. Thanks to 11/11 B I had 10 SP Inspire and Focus to make that more fair, but I still had two resets where they killed me on 10-20% chances. Lovely. But then I finally triumphed over the RNG, got the Balgora Glory's final upgrade, and went on to steamroll the second half of the level. It looked challenging when I thought I had to kill all three 60K-HP Chimeras, but then it turned out I only needed one, so I got the skill point with a turn to spare, and a Hyper Jammer from Xine's corpse.

Now on to the ZEUTH route! I've been looking forward to this.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

You mean present?

No, I mean past. The ghost of aiels present tries to stuff VPDS into your stockings.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Idun should play some other tri-Ace games perhaps? RS has its fun points, but there's definitely better in the same vein. VP2 comes to mind.

Legaia 2: Popped this in on a whim and it really... exceeded expectations. It is challenging enough to be engaging, but straightforward enough that I can rush through it when it feels slow. The characters are kind of fun and the beginning is amusing and well-paced. It's nothing to write home about, but it was easy enough to get all the way to the penultimate dungeon in 2 days, so I'm glad to be finishing up another ranked game.

One thing that really worked for this series' concept: They turned it into a cheesy martial arts flick (only with some JRPG magic trappings) and played up the corny villains and Kazan's even cornier dialogue. I think this is what Legaia 1 wanted to be but the directors were just so excited to be making a game in THREEDEE that they forgot about everything else.

Having a talking main helps, too. Especially since you can make him into a snarker without any real consequences. Yay for getting the main character punched in the face by his step-father!

Cons: Maya. Taking too long in the beginning to get enough art slots to do something worthwhile. Maya. Sharon joining so late in the game. Maya. Randomly making one of the first bosses the victim of animal rape by a man named 'Bubba'. Oh god my soul. *weeps in a corner* Also, I really dislike Maya. I thought she was an annoying plot device when she was mute, but then she started talking and she just got worse and -more- bland somehow. Also, she's a terrible PC. Probably one of my least favorite RPG characters of all time if nothing interesting happens with her in the next few cutscenes? Even Kongol, I mean Ayne, gets more amusing scenes than her.

Side note on DL site stuff: Sharon's last name is Blade. Ayne's real name is Silent Eagle, Ayne is just a nickname that Lang came up with. Kazan's an alias - his real name is Nazak, the "Thunder God". Not sure if the last two really need to be reflected in the DL, though there is some precedent for it with Nadia/Marle and Nanaki/RedXIII. (What is it with JRPG PCs' real names starting with 'Na'?)

[Idun]

Idun should play some other tri-Ace games perhaps? RS has its fun points, but there's definitely better in the same vein. VP2 comes to mind.

Played it, and no.

However, Legaia 2 Kazan = awesome drinking. He's also fairly useful when going through the trials later on, spiffily to Soldier's Ordeal.

[Sierra]

Also, she's a terrible PC.

What. Do you not have Gospel yet? I forget when that shows up, but from what I recall buffs + healing pretty much makes Maya indispensable. She sucks at offense throughout the game, yeah, but still, LoL2 bosses aren't so feeble that you can get by without healing. EDIT: Well, unless you're demolishing everything in one turn with variable arts or whatever. Should note that I never bothered with finding/learning the really broken skills in that game.

[DjinnAndTonic]

I'm abusing the 2x Item Effect passive ability on all three good PCs and ignoring Maya's existence. I was just worried she was going to be forced at some point.