What Games Are You Playing 2013?

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

It's no secret Pablo's quite possibly the worst mage (and one of the least impressive units in context) in the whole game, because Earth Rune is just -that goddamn bad- and the only mage with physicals that register on curves anywhere is Andarc. You could hand him Fire/Water Runes, I guess, but then Andarc, Corselia and even the generic mages can do better, with superior stat spreads and a less shitty specialty rune (though Corselia and Andarc just rise above the competition with their unique niches - Corselia being a ridiculous physical wall with nigh-unbreakable evade and Andarc being balanced on durability and having a surprisingly solid physical game).

EDIT: Also, noticed this quite late, but:

And unlike every other SRPG in existence, the Terrain Effects are actually DL-legal, so it's kind of interesting to think how the PCs translate, despite the game not having enough players apparently.

Kind of surprising, considering just how Fire Emblem-ish the game is....

Sequel to Suikoden Literally Pro Drunken Fridge Steering Live Simulator 4. Surprise dispelled instantly.

That context aside, though, Suikofish is honestly about on par with the likes of Suikoden 2 to me. The game is a weird little thing that ends up better than the sum of its parts.

[Fudozukushi]

I think Pablo actually has worse attack than Corseilla. 

Like, how do you do that.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

By being a Warlock groupie, apparently.

[Cmdr_King]

Pretty sure Kika is one of the plot immortal PCs, so she fits your criteria entirely!

[Fudozukushi]

Pretty sure Kika is one of the plot immortal PCs, so she fits your criteria entirely!

And she's wind so she and Lazlo can wreck all things together.  And that wind-panel generating co-op she has with him.

WIND!

[DjinnAndTonic]

Kika's immortal, but not plot-forced.

Bought Pablo a Cyclone Robe and a Wind Rune and turned him into a temporary Wind Mage. He's still not -good-, but at least he can toss out Wind Terrain and help Seneca and Lazlo tear it up!

...I can't wait until I get more Mages, I can't even field a full team at the moment: Kyril, Seneca, Andarc, Lazlo, Maxine, Pablo (plus the Ninjas for their forced battle). I think Katarina is coming up soon, but I'm not sure I really need another Fire Mage...


UNRELATED NEWS! I finished my Battle Mechanics Guide for Romancing SaGa 3 and I'm ready to submit it to GameFAQs. If any of you RS3 players would want to look it over for errors, formatting, and such, I'd appreciate some feedback.

[Luther Lansfeld]

Suikoden Tactics is my fourth favorite Suikoden, which is actually fine considering that it is a sequel to drunken fridge. The plot makes more sense than DF but nothing to write home about. The gameplay is the second best in the series? Clap clap clap clap~

[Grefter]

Balance in RPGs

You two of all people discussing balance with how much you both consume your RPGs on the Fun axis rather than the "quality" of design axis.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

Balance in RPGs

You two of all people discussing balance with how much you both consume your RPGs on the Fun axis rather than the "quality" of design axis.

Leave me out of this, I actually -care- about balance and design. Doesn't mean I won't brutally abuse its absence, but I care.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Not really that in-depth of a discussion on balance from me... I'm just kinda playing a challenge run of a game and making comments. Everyone else around me is discussing balance.

Can't wait for the next Disgaea game! Fun fun fun!

Suikofish: Got Katarina and... okay another Fire Mage is just fine with me after all. She also comes with a free Lightning Rune she shouldn't even have the unlocked slots to equip... So, yeah, she's not amazing, but she's a damage mage with Canto Extra Move, so she's certainly speeding up the maps considerably!

[Grefter]

I am sure Djinn cares as well, but that won't stop him from brutally abusing either.

[dude789]

Penny Arcade OtRSPoD3: Played through this, it's a fun little game for fans of both PA and Zeboyd games. It plays like Grandia with time cards like MK and the result is a lot of fun despite being really easy to break later on. Figure I'll break down the team.

Gabe: Brute/Tube Samurai/Hobo Gabe was my main physical attacker and he was quite good at it. I ended up giving him the fork(MT) in his accessory slot which combined really nicely with the Hobo's passive ability to grant a cancel effect to basic physical attacks. Against bosses he would usually play support at first until he built up the mp for one of his stronger attacks. Brute itself is probably the best physical skillset class, but Hobo gives it some good competition with a decent array of attacks as well as good passives. The final class was just whatever gave him the best strength bonus so it shifted a bit.

Tycho: Scholar/Diva/Gentlemen I had a bit of trouble deciding what to do with Tycho as he's more moderate statwise than Gabe and Jim. I ended up setting him up as a healer/support character. There's a lot of overlap between Scholar and Gentlemen, but as a whole it wasn't too bad and I couldn't resist combining the two classes. Diva was mostly there for the speed boost. I originally envisioned using Diva to steal away MP from other characters because Tycho's MT healing is expensive, but it never really came up.

Jim: Necromancer/Elementalist/Gardener: Jim was the cannon in the group especially in random fights. Around endgame my typical random fight was Gabe attack, Moira MT Speed boost, Tycho give Jim an mp item, and Jim blow everything up with Dark Wave. Against bosses, Call Skeleton and later Bottled Fury are really really good and Dark Surge hits really hard. Elementalist was kind of redundant because I suspect that Jim does more damage with a boosted Dark Surge than a super effective Elementalist attack, but the magic boost was nice regardless. Gardener was surprisingly useful and the HP Regen/MP Regen/Attack Buffing/ and Magic Buffing all saw use.

Moira: Gumshoe/Cordwainer/Apocalypt: Moira took a bit to get going, but as the game goes on her speed game gets better and better until it gets completely ridiculous. She could shut down most bosses on her own just by cancelling them repeatedly and Stun was really helpful too once she got it. Cordwainer and Apocalypt have some nice synergy so you can boost your speed and then stack a bunch of Apocalypses on top of each other which was nice against bosses. Boils and Locusts are the big standouts from that skillset.

Overall a fun little game and I like the job system. If the playership goes up they could make a fun pick for the dungeon or something.   

[Niu]

2nd OGs: Okay, stage 44 was challenging, stage 45 is just a dick move. Accurate duel boss fighting a PC who gets one-shotted if hit, with a secret that requires you to go on the attack. And an escort mission where you're defending a battleship that responds to all incoming attacks by trying to dodge. Oy.

Finished the total PITA part, at least, which means EX-Exbein/Igzexbein/Excessbein is go! Now to let loose all the frustration from the first half of the level on Code: Evil.

The problem with that stage is more about foce deployed rather than actually being hard. Those grunts should not be too bad if you have about 5 upgrades on mobility and weaponry. Samething woth Ing vs. Urs, Ing isn't really dying if you have enough mobility upgrade.
Thankfully I main Ing and R-Gun, and has enough upgrade on Armorlion and Excellence to make that mao not cringe worthy. But that secret sucks, I regreat spending the time trying to get it.
On the other hand, Amala just have to tell the world who she is by that background music....

UNRELATED NEWS! I finished my Battle Mechanics Guide for Romancing SaGa 3 and I'm ready to submit it to GameFAQs. If any of you RS3 players would want to look it over for errors, formatting, and such, I'd appreciate some feedback.

I can take a look.

[Shale]

On the other hand, Amala just have to tell the world who she is by that background music....

Background music nothing, the attack she hits Ing with is a Deadend Slash.

[Dark Holy Elf]

DMC1 Dante Must Die - Mundus is dead, dark souls have been filled with light, game is beaten, fuck yes. That probably ranks as the most challenging boss fight outside of self-imposed challenges I've ever beaten, so I am pretty happy right now.

Just in time for Fire Emblem tomorrow!

[Cmdr_King]

FFIV-2: Fin.

Is there anything meaningful to add really?  Well, it's worth saying that unlike a lot of the DL, I did appreciate things like Eddie's chapter.  A set of dungeons where Edward is legitimately your best character, despite the contrivances, tickle me a bit.  And if I'm being honest Palom is actually a pretty enjoyable character when he's getting real lines.  If every chapter had things on the level of his interaction with Leonara, and that level of attention to how these characters have grown and changed over the past 17 years, this game might be worth talking about in context of anything but being a dungeon crawler.

As one of those it's pretty cool.  I feel like the lowest levels of the main dungeon were a bit lackluster.  The random enemies skew too closely to their FFIV counterparts, all the loot is for a set of characters who are a) pretty boring and b) got a full set of good endgame gear in the previous layer of the dungeon.  Like, c'mon game, Crystal gear is still competitive with what everyone else got, don't give a straight upgrade to that then shaft everyone else.

For the record: Edge, Rydia, Palom, Ursula, Leonara.  Levels ~63.  I feel like if I hadn't got bored in the end there, what with the endless spam of Deathmasks which I just ran from because they are an amazingly boring and stupid enemy after the first half dozen you kill, I might have actually started to pay off that last.  But even then eh.  Takes way too long to learn Curaja, although I didn't notice that bad because it wasn't until well after she finally did that enemies could overwhelm Curaga backed by the occasional ninja pill.  PS: Edge is freakishly good in this game.  Far as I could tell legitimately the best in the game, albeit it's hard to account for "Golbez drags the corpses of teh party kicking and screaming through the void until they gain 10 levels".

For all the immense plot stupid at least they clearly put effort into rebuilding all those bosses into FFIV's system.  Granted, the fact that FFIV-2 ATB actually fucking works correctly (for the first time in the series since freaking VIII, as mind-numbing as that statement is) plays a part in that.

So anyway, s'alright.  6/10.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Is there an intermediary game to actually use traditional ATB besides FF9? (FF9's may be part of the reason they scrapped it, of course.)

I didn't run from things and also ended up at 63 (dunno what's up there, I got lost less maybe?) so yeah I dunno about Leonora actually paying off.

[Meeplelard]

FF10-2 kind of did.  That's about the closest I can think of offhand.

[Luther Lansfeld]

It's my favorite implementation of ATB because speed actually matters.

[Clear Tranquil]

Mario Karts 7- Just unlocked Honey Queen Umm, am I missing something? So far I've used Peach, Daisy, Shy Guy and now I'm trying out Honey Queen, but does it even matter? I'm having a harder time with Honey Queen so maybe it does~

[Luther Lansfeld]

I think there is a weight component associated with different people. Do you want to play together sometime CTs?

[Cmdr_King]

Well there were the three separate releases of FFIV that each managed to fuck it up in a new and exciting way.

[superaielman]

Tales of Maj'eyal- Beat the Master. He was a whore of a boss. Whoof. Running an Alchemist Cornac. Enjoying the game more now that I flipped permadeath off, though it does lead to such exciting things as me opening vaults in dredfell. I need to stop doing that.

[Grefter]

Why are you ruining Roguelikes for everyone else that plays them by turning off permadeath?  Do you hate fun? Glad to hear you are enjoying it dude.  Obviously I had figured you would get a lot more out of it like this.  They really are a niche genre and hardcore fans sometimes miss that when they are ranting and raving about how things like that option ruin the games.  As if death is the only reason they like the games

P4 - I finished and there will be a big post when I have power back and am not typing on my phone.

[superaielman]

My laziness means that I am unable to respond to you in your topic, but yeah. I do like the gameplay and really love the auto search feature.  More games need that.


Still, fuck Dredfell Vaults.