What games are you playing 2014?

[Sierra]

Dark Souls 2: Do not play if you have arachnophobia seriously

So yeah I don't understand what happened here with the giant soul.
So there's a lot of plot hidden in the game and trying to understand the story will probably take a lot longer than in Demon's / Dark. I've noticed that you can sometimes hear faint female-ish voices when you do not move for a little while. Wonder whether they say anything not gibberish.

I just had someone give me something almost resembling a plotdump! By Dark Souls standards. (Of course he stopped before telling me the important bit.)

I only just now noticed the voices in Black Gulch (which I was revisiting for...reasons). Also do not recall an obvious heartbeat being part of the ambient noise there before. God, that place.

And that room in the castle. Jesus.

Yes.

(Progress report Fenrirs would not want to read follows.)

Raided Dragontown. Wow that was probably like two-thirds of the game's crystal lizards accounted for right there. I now have like four titanite slabs I can't do anything with because no chunks. That is just crazy. Oh but it turns out the Black Gulch lamprey mouth monsters drop chunks at a decent rate I should go farming there fuck no. Anyway! Apparently Mr. Callback at the top of the shrine is an optional boss. I do not think that I will be initiating hostilities because: A) disinclined to attack someone who helps me unbidden without asking for anything (and Someone doesn't trust him, which is encouraging); B) jesus that's gotta be the biggest enemy I've seen in one of these games; C) I got to him with three estus flasks left. That walk is just brutal and there's apparently no bonfire save but the one at the start of the zone.

Also, Velka armor set found. Score! I think that it is even more stylish now. Pity the flashiest armor sets show up so late (when you have probably already spent the game's supply of twinkling titanite).

Navlaan are you seriously going to invade me in every zone I visit now. Is that what's going on here. Do you want me to come back and kill you in person for real?

Function of giant/tree things in Forest of Fallen Giants discovered! While I'm back there revisiting all of those, I notice there was a whole wing of the dungeon I never discovered on the first run. And there's a dude in there who gives you the key to the mansion in Majula. ...I've been wondering about that place the whole damn game! And there was an estus flask shard inside it! I also finally unlock the door just outside the Last Giant's boss room. Oh hey salamanders, they shouldn't be too much of a problem, right? *One dead Cid later* Okay, that's it for the night.

Looks like I could probably knock out the rest tomorrow night. Probably won't, got personal work to do with weekend deadline. Saturday!

EDIT: had my first PC invader today! While revisiting the first dungeon of all places. *Flame Swathe, rapier poke, dead* How does that spell do so much damage. Jeebus.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Tomb Raider - Finished this with 81%. Pretty fun even if not necessarily my style of game. Generally I find myself comparing to Arkham Asylum but the comparison is pretty favourable overall: for me, at least, "survive this terrifying island" is more of a draw than "be Batman" even though I expect to be in the minority here, and the combat is definitely better. It's not really the main draw of the game but it takes you nicely along a challenge curve as time goes on, enjoyable enough third-person-shooter if simple. The plot occasionally felt a bit disjoined especially around the middle but a very strong start and it came together pretty well in the end; most of the characters were quite memorable. I'm not one for collecta-thons in general and I certainly didn't collect all the relics or GPSes and didn't finish a single one of the area-specific mini-quests, but I did enjoy tracking down all the documents (which shed a fair bit of light on the characters and setting) and did all the tombs as well since eh fun enough diversion.

Bravely Default - Continuing through chapter 3, currently running two Spellblade Valkyries since that skillset combination is so good (though I may switch one to Pirate), along with a Performer/mage and dedicated healer (Salve-Maker). Now that MP restoration is getting cheaper I may actually take a look at Summoner again, I dunno. Hit the damage cap for the first time recently! That happened kinda early. Fire temple boss was badass but not as badass as water temple boss. C3 asterisk bosses have been a bit of a step down from C2's though, at least so far.

[Fudozukushi]

Dark Souls 2: For want of good bosses.  Gargoyles, Lost Sinner, Scorpioness and Skeleton Lords down.  Scorpioness was the only one to take more than one try(FOUR!).  Garogyles went distressingly smooth, helped out by one of them randomly suiciding.  Lost Sinner is the sad pathetic joke I envisioned her to be with light and a less shitty roll.  Scorpioness got two kills due to being unable to tack her burrowed and the third off her being the only thing in the game faster than a casetus swing apparently.  Skeleton Lords really, really hated Casetus though.  They took only three hits to go down.  Casetus really, really brutalized skeletons in this.  The "shortcut" guarded by regular skellies would have been a cakewalk if I needed to run it.

I scrapped up enough Large Shards to finally get my right-hand Caestus to using Chunks.  From there it was bell-guarding!  Seven fights, five wins!  And one time dying getting invaded myself due to talking with the covenant guy.  Poise being useless means the Caestus' absurd attack speed and minor stamina drain allows me to fully control anyone I hit.  FUN.  For me.  Anyway, Caestus+10 here I go and it only boosts the Dex scaling to A instead of Strength S BOOOOOOO.  Leveling STR stat also gives +1 damage to the +10 Casetus but +2 damage to the +5 Caestus, LOGIC! 

Got enough INT and FAITH for hexes.  Frankly the damage boost from the Enchant Weapons Spells is so minimal I'd be better off just Soul Vessaling all my points into good stats for more consistency.  Like, I actually thought I was doing less damage with a weapon buff up!  Crazy.  Though having Dark Orb as additional ranged damage is OK I guess.  Still have a bow for that though.

Poking around in Lost Bastille I also managed to find Hush and that spell parry shield in load screen descriptions.  Neat, I guess.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

Bravely Default - Continuing through chapter 3, currently running two Spellblade Valkyries since that skillset combination is so good (though I may switch one to Pirate), along with a Performer/mage and dedicated healer (Salve-Maker). Now that MP restoration is getting cheaper I may actually take a look at Summoner again, I dunno. Hit the damage cap for the first time recently! That happened kinda early. Fire temple boss was badass but not as badass as water temple boss. C3 asterisk bosses have been a bit of a step down from C2's though, at least so far.

I find that fairly accurate, since your options just widen considerably. The game at least does a decent job of keeping bosses competent even with the wide array of options you have available. I kinda wish I had figured out what makes Valkyrie good earlier, since the class is great once it gets rolling and its synergy with a few other classes is great, but its first few levels underwhelm me. As for Summon Magic, it started looking appealing to me once I nabbed Aspir, since the summoning costs become self-sustaining with an offensively-geared mage setup. You do need a dedicated attack caster for that, though (and staying in Summoner is -so painful-. At least you don't ever have to touch the class again once you hit L10).

The main draw of Summons is really the fact they're better than Black Magic L3 attack spells in -every way- (cheaper, MT, at least about as damaging and not brutalized by unfocusing), and that's actually notable once they become affordable. It's an amazing random-busting skillset and hardly bad against bosses.

[Dark Holy Elf]

I kinda wish I had figured out what makes Valkyrie good earlier, since the class is great once it gets rolling and its synergy with a few other classes is great, but its first few levels underwhelm me.

Valkyrie has Crescent Moon as its very first ability, and that's fairly easily its best (so far), so I dunno about that! I mean Judgement and Spirit Barrier are nice enough certainly, and the Jump abilities are probably decent when spears are actually keeping up atk-wise (they aren't, at the moment), but really Crescent Moon is the reason to use Acrobatics. Eat it, randoms*.

*and some bosses

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

That mostly fits in the "I wish I had figured it out earlier" part, since yes, the Crescent Moon synergy with Spellblade is amazing and I didn't even think to explore it. So, I got underwhelmed by the inferior stats on spears (which -do- admittedly skip ahead eventually) and the lack of job levels, and at that point I still hadn't entirely worked how to maximize BP-blitzing efficiently. Valkyries are easily the best iteration of Dragoon-like classes since FF3o, but they have some interesting nooks and crannies to sort to get it rolling. Kind of the class' caveat as your introduction to more layered BP management.

(Also, I kept half-assedly comparing a naked Crescent Moon's damage with WEAKNESS-HITTING L2S without making efficiency/synergy comparisons at that point, which is utterly unfair)

[Sierra]

Dark Souls 2: For want of good bosses.  Gargoyles, Lost Sinner, Scorpioness and Skeleton Lords down.  Scorpioness was the only one to take more than one try(FOUR!).  Garogyles went distressingly smooth, helped out by one of them randomly suiciding.  Lost Sinner is the sad pathetic joke I envisioned her to be with light and a less shitty roll.  Scorpioness got two kills due to being unable to tack her burrowed and the third off her being the only thing in the game faster than a casetus swing apparently.  Skeleton Lords really, really hated Casetus though.  They took only three hits to go down.  Casetus really, really brutalized skeletons in this.  The "shortcut" guarded by regular skellies would have been a cakewalk if I needed to run it.

I'm pretty sure Najka can't burrow under the stone panel in the floor of the boss arena. I took to standing there after suffering horrible damage from GRABOID ATTACK and didn't have her emerge under me again, at least.

[Meeplelard]

Soul Silver: Let's try the E4!

*loses once*

Ok, what kind of things can I do to make my team suck less? Well, Magmar 2 levels from Lavaplume, that'll help for PP purposes and consistent damage move better than Fire Punch (Fire Blast is good but a bit unsafe due to accuracy), also high Burn Rate.  Iron Tail on Raikou because SCREW YOU JINX...which I end up never using anyway, but shh!  Also discover Sludge Bomb is available so Vileplume can get actual offense!  I give Tauros a Muscle Band instead of Silk Scarf because I rarely use Strength, finding Zen Headbutt and Payback more useful.  Mamoswine gets Mystic Ice for the slight damage push to Ice Shard.  Ok that's all done, let's try it now!


Things don't go over entirely smoothly; I do Item cheese at points (but nothing beyond Hyper Potions), and a few stupid mistakes too ("Houndoom? I'll counter with my own Fire Type! ...wait, that's one of the stupidest things I could d-*gets Dark Pulsed to death* ...go Feraligatr *He OHKOs Houndoom after eating a dark Pulse putting him into Torrent Range* WHY THE HELL DID I NOT DO THAT IN THE FIRST PLACE!?") 

Lance had me legitimately afraid because of the Dragonites with Outrage and such.  How did that fight go?

Open with Raikou because I forget who his first Pokemon is, but figure it's NOT a Dragonite, so Thunder + Choice Specs will kill.  Sure enough, it's Gyarados, he gets plastered.

Next, Dragonite #1.  Mamoswine opens with Ice Shard, does about 55% damage, whee! *Sitrus Berry* CRAP! That's not very go-*Fire Blast misses* Ok, so I get another chance, yay! Probably won't Ki-*Criticals* ...NEVERMIND!

He brings out the Charizard, I bring out Feraligatr.  It goes about as you'd expect it to go, as in, yay me!

Then comes another Dragonite; I keep Feraligatr in because Choice Scarf Ice Fang, clearly that should work!  Two Problems:

A. I just had it beat Charizard with Waterfall
B. It's STILL slower than the level 50 Dragonite despite Choice Scarf.

Dragon Rush, Feraligatr dies.  So I bring out Mamoswine again.  Ice Shard -> Dragon Rush Miss -> Ice Shard -> Dragonite Dead.  2 Down!

Then the last Dragonite comes out, I pull Mamoswine out in hopes to chip him, and believing this to be the Outraging one.  I use Vileplume as a sacrificial lamb...and it gets Dragon Rushed, and dies.  Ok, Mamoswine, this probably will backfire, but damn it, I need to at least HURT THIS DAMNED DRAGONITE!

2HKO damage from Ice Shard, Dragon Rush hits...and Mamoswine SURVIVES, if barely.  He finishes off the Dragonite.  Yay! Onto Aerodactyl!

I keep Mamoswine in because I can pray for a crit to OHKO, and even if not, he at least can get one Ice Shard off.  Ice Shard -> Aerial Ace -> Mamoswine falls.  It's ok, buddy, you murdered the dragonites, you earned a good rest.

So Raikou could probably kill Aero but requires hitting with Thunder, which can backfire.  Tauros can probably survive whatever Aerodactyl throws out, and can at least chip with Payback and hopefully knock him into "Spark kills" range, so I test that!

Survives Rock Slide as expected! *Tauros Flinches* *^*&@^.  Tauros dies as expected.  Ok, Magmar go.  No, Magmar will not be effective, but he does have Flame Body, so I can hope that kicks in and maybe give me one last chance, or Rock slide can miss, I confuse Ray him, and hope for some confusion hax...except that doesn't happen, so Magmar was useless.

Out comes Raikou; ok, let's hope the RNG doesn't screw with u-*Flinch* GOD DAMN IT!  Screw it, I'm Hyper Potioning til he's out of Rock Slides, because I doubt I'll get a lucky run like this again!

I do that, he starts THunder Fanging, I get a lucky Thunder off, I win.


And thus, main game done, onto Kanto before the entire DL comes after me with torches and pitchforks.

[Fenrir]

Dark Souls 2: Dragons.

Beautiful game!
And long. Very long.
And difficult. This has somehow gotten way harder, bosses excepted.

I'm just going to spoiler tag everything.


I was 100% sure Vendrick was going to be the last boss. Souls tradition.
Then uh a dragon? Like the first dragon you see?
And right now I have absolutely no idea! No clue whatsoever.

I am extremely tempted to do the assassination quest but I know he'll ask me to kill too many cool people
I also wonder what happens if you attack the queen. Hmm. I'm fairly sure it's an illusion?

What's with the traitor? Why and how was she even a traitor, besides scamming people.
How did Yattaf know she was one. Unless she just noticed the orb shaking, used it then the traitor was all "OMG" with no reason... ?? That works. I'm probably wrong in assuming that everyone in this game is as dumb as me though.

In Velstadt's dungeon (by the way that second to last room was a nightmare) there's this dude who hates fire? Well I had a zombie bro with a torch from the beginning of the dungeon who didn't attack me and followed me around so I just didn't kill him and stayed with him.
So I really wondered how that dark dude would take it. Extremely not well, it turns out. He attacked me even though I had no affiliation with torch zombie dude.

I met the Bell Gargoyles really really late and had to fight five of them, including four at once. Maybe you fight more the later you are in the game?
Only reason I beat them was having the whips equipped.

Ornstein and Smough redux (under the Castle) should not be a very hard battle but I just can't beat it. The trick seems to be the way they take ages to recover after attacking. So: Lure one into attacking, make sure its combo string is finished, and make sure the other boss cannot hurt you at this point, then attack.
Waaay easier on paper.

In the Creighton vs Pate battle I obviously went with Pate. He betrayed me afterwards! The nerve!

Rat covenant doesn't seem to attract a lot of people at all. Too bad.

The game's starting to talk a lot more about Dark Souls 1 events, while giving visual cues to Demon's. I hope it bridges the two games in lore.



I've now replaced my fire sword+10 with a warped sword+4, dual wielded with my old rapier +10. The raw attack power isn't crazy, but as a curved sword it has an insanely good L2 attack when two handed. And the R1 is really fast and stylish. I love it.

[Fudozukushi]

Dark Souls 2: Where progress goes somewhere else.  Did Harvest Valley and killed the sad sad boss.  Did Earthen Keep and sat on the sidelines as my Phantom effortlessly killed the boss there.  Hello Iron Keep!  Hello Allone Knights my new bane of existence!  After a couple deaths and the last one being to an iaido prick I couldn't poise break I took my new Ember and ran off to MacDuff.  Hello shiney new Poison Cestus.  Wait... no... I think I went to Doors of Pharross first?  Still can't find the boss there.  Continued on and had another embarrassing death against the Congregation.  The priests have ludacris blunt defense and I couldn't stun them.  UGH.  Whatever, they still die, hello Velka dude and bonfire.  Now to McDuff for real!  Hello Poison Cestus.  Wow you are bad Poison Cestus.

Hello PVP for two hours!  Got well over 20 wins!  Still nothing compared to Fenrir's though haha.  It turns out stacking over 1000 armor makes me durable enough to win the lagfest every single fight devolves into.  This also resulted in three double KOs as well as an ACTUAL RED PHANTOM INVADER with a rapier hahaha.  Won that fight despite them trying to lure me into the mobs.  Also randomly got called over to Bellfry Sol from Lost Bastille, twice.  But whatever!  Just gotta punch all dudes.

[Sierra]

Fenrir: I guess I'll respond to spoiler text in spoiler text! This is all elaborating on stuff you've seen so I don't imagine you'll object:

-Did you pull the switch in Aldia? It disperses the fog wall before Navlaan and switches his personalities. I did this before talking to him, so I didn't even get offered the assassination quest (not that I'd do it anyway). He sells some glorious clothes man, Yattaf should totally check it out. He turns invader afterwards though. I've had to fight him off three separate times now! (And he is an utter bastard on offense.)

-I am absolutely shooting the queen next time I play through the game. Did you happen to wander too close to that portrait on the lower floor? That + her general tone & the current condition of the king (who I guess she wants me to replace one day? No thanks, bub) = I don't trust a word she says. Her position in the world and game progression paralleling Gwynevere so closely isn't helping her any either.

-Traitor = oh, does something actually happen if you use the Crushed Eye Orb? I totally forgot I picked that thing up for a long time, and then I forgot where I picked up so it hardly seemed worth trying to use it.

-The room just before Velstadt is horrrrible. First time I got killed by infinitely respawning ghosts. Second time I just tried running to the fog gate and was brutally reminded that in DS2 you are not invincible while walking through fog gates. Third time I finally figured out that someone had to be ringing that damn ghost-summoning bell, right?

-I fought the gargoyles at level 122 as one of the very last pre-Drangleic bosses and still never saw more than two in the field at once. Of course, I also killed each of them in two hits (LARGE CLUB). My guess is they spawn on a timer.

-The references to Dark Souls 1 are pretty cool (I haven't come across anything that clearly references Demon's Souls, though). Places things in the same continuity without necessarily being reliant upon events of DS1--or confirming either DS1 ending canonically. I think the suggestion is that given sufficient passage of time, either renewed age of fire or age of dark would each have to end as well in turn. Old life must give way for new life to grow, etcetera. There's a degree of fatalism in the way this is presented in-game, as any civilization being an unavoidable cycle of glory and decay, but I appreciate the sense of deep time entertained in the way past events pass from memory into myth (people seem to remember generally what certain Dark Souls 1 entities did, but not exactly who they were).

-Do you have any idea at all what the little shrine at the end of Shrine of Amana is actually for? To be clear, I mean past that last bonfire, the one where there's a door that only opens if you're undead, fight past a hexer and you find that creepy altar (attended to by one of the singing girls) that you can pray at...but so far as I can tell praying appears to do nothing.

Rapier pokes have worked out very satisfactorily for me (as backup weapon for SMAAAASH). Of course by now I have 40 in both strength and dexterity so I basically get optimal damage out of anything I pick up. Kirika living up to her namesake in being able to murder you with anything. Ricard's Rapier is very slightly more powerful than regular rapier at +10 and 40 DEX, otherwise inferior but who cares we use it for style and man that R2.

Fudo: Doors of Pharros boss is up on a ledge. From huge open room with mastodon + curse rat, hang a right and climb up the ladder in the next room, follow the ledge into second floor of huge room and bonfire + fog gate is immediately on your next left.

[SnowFire]

Bravely Default: Still Chapter 1, but after the bosses were tending on the tanky side before, they've taken a turn for the glass cannon lately.  Well, except not that glassy, just the BD system helping make it seem that way at times!  I'm glad they figured out their own way to make turn-based combat interesting.  Dragon was pretty badass and had an amusing gimmick, and I would *not* have survived too long against him, but he is blitzable, especially with a nice elemental weakness.  Then Orthros is Dragon x2 - even less HP per part, but godlike offense - Blazzard is like 400-450 MT damage to ~650-700 max HP, so a 2HKO.  I can knock it to a 3HKO with Default, but oh there's another action too, and that hurts a lot as well (anywhere from 180-300 damage).  MT Cure does *not* keep up with it, and if Agnes tries it she can die quickly to everything, and if someone else tries throwing Hi-Potions they're eating the MT damage  and general pain too.  First boss I've wiped too!  A turn 2 wipe on my 2nd try, no less.  However, my third attempt I got lucky in that he didn't spam Blazzard too much, so Default 3 times or so (with luckily Thief Tiz drawing aggro, aka the person with Life Steal who goes first so can be sorta guaranteed to be back at full health), then UNLOAD onto the heads to get the situation under control.  Then unload on the remnants just to be sure.  Yeesh.  Exciting times, certainly.

Also Norende Village is broken but we all know this.  I can buy what is late-game quality equipment at reasonable prices in Chapter 1?  Tempting but yeah I'm still gonna hold off.  (Also getting StreetPasses is suprisingly easy in NY subways & train stations.  Hooray for general good taste it seems.)

Now, on to the clock tower Grand Mill.

[AndrewRogue]

Dark Souls 2: Just sort of wandered around a bunch. Gutter wasn't too bad. Black Gulch was terrifying. Got my first Great Soul from the Rotten. Went past the statue blocked door. Found two dead ends and invisible enemies and a talking head.

[Fudozukushi]

Alright, gotcha RRA location, I'll do it later.

Dark SOuls 2: Because now is running through Iron Keep!  Hello Bellfry Sol!  Hello stupid greatsword assholes magiclly swinging faster than me!  Hello bell keeper doing 95% of my life with an aoe spell.  Whatever, make if over to the boss door and bonfire.  Caestus are really good against Ironclads yay.  Less great against the boss.  Tried being summoned a dozen or so times, not a single victory.  Decided to go solo!  This was somehow an even worse idea.  It took like... eight?  Tries but I did manage it.  He was yet another all-or-nothing boss and I had enough of that fucking shit back in Demon's.

[Fenrir]

El Cid I had no idea about the "nice guy" switch or being able to kill the bell ringing guy in the crypt.
I went to the shrine but didn't know what was going on. It might have something to do with that locked door earlier.
I also went out of the way to light both torches in THE ROOM in the castle, but I haven't noticed anything changing.
And I don't know what is the deal with the giants.
Or those trees with faces that moan when you hit them in the fog area of the forest.
Or pretty much anything really.

I only know you should really teleport to Majula then walk back to Heide's Tower of Flame right now.


Demon's Souls references are more visual. Majula's blacksmith is pictured on one of the archstones in Demon's Souls. The useless shaking trailer in Aldia's Keep is another extremely obvious Demon's Souls reference, though I don't know if this means anything.
Note that Dark Souls never did this kind of thing with Demon's, as far as I remember.
I really need to finish the game to get another cutscene that explains nothing then being able to talk about the plot at length. But anyway, I definitely agree.

I think I'll actually do assassinations.
The first reward, for not even killing one guy, was very promising. Nothing could possibly go wrong!
Yattaf is already corrupted anyway. At first I ignored those white dudes with cool weapons who could be locked on but didn't move. They seemed nice! Then I just got too curious and started mass murdering them.
I've also killed the ant. I really hope the conclusion to all Dark Souls 2 lore analysis is going to be "that ant is keeping everybody alive. If you've killed it the entire world is doomed, you monster"
I also did the assassination quest on the first playthrough in Demon's Souls.

Oh yeah I really should have talked about the coolest part of the game yet: hidden/future bonfires showing on the list at one point. But you've mentioned this already.

[Clear Tranquil]

@ Meeple re; Graces, if the scenes I told you about (Emotive Pianoist sidequest, play/play related skits) didn't change your mind any then I'm not sure the F arc will help either. For other characters I don't know, well at least for F arc you get RICHARD as a PC and you can get the role play dolls so you can use him in Zhonecage and NG+ too, and RICHARD alone is worth the the F arc I think There is also more humor with combined Richard/Malik trolling if that's your thing, also some Pascal/Hubert humor, etc The gameplay potential/battle mechanics also improve with the additions of Accel modes which helps for making playstyles more unique/etc, and also the dolls for using two or more multiples of the same character if you want, etc, etc~

Tales of Symphonia Chronicles/ToS Cleared the Earth Temple. I am happy because I have Colette back and the gameplay/battle system is really gelling now. I've been playing Hard mode (but not really because Poison Hammer is sooo good~) My team -

Colette L44 (main)/Lunar Ring/Lunar Guard/Mythril Circlet/Bridal Gloves/Rabbit's Foot/Rabbit's Foot
HP - 2734, TP - 343, ATK - 687, STR - 187, INT - 160, DEF - 152, ACC - 109, EVA - 106, LUCK - 189 (w/th equipment and inn RNG combo)
Title - Little Pickpocket (from L21, but could have got it earlier)
Skill set up - Pow Hammer/Toss (Poison) Hammer (alternative Item Rover), Para Ball (alternative Grand Chariot), Whirlwind Rush, Triple Ray Satellite, Holy Song, S-Seal: Wind (Sheena) (alternative, Judgement)
EX Skills - Sharp Eyed, Vitality, Spirit, Stat Boost
Compound/bonus EX skills - Life Thief, Spirit Thief (alternatives with different 1/2/3/4 EX gem skill combos, Life Up, Pow Hammer (counter), Reprise,  Item Getter (for 100% stealings~)

Zelos L44/Flame Dagger/Mythril Armor/Duel Helm/Mythril Shield/Stone Charm/Rabbit's Foot
HP - 2704, TP - 278, ATK - 748, STR - 218, INT - 203, DEF - 196, ACC - 122, EVA - 93
Title - Casanova
Skill pool - T Type
Elements - Attack - Fire, Defence - Earth (Reduce)
Status - Nullify Petrify, Nullify Heavy
EX Skills - Dodge, Vitality, Magical, Eternal
Compound/bonus EX skills - EX Defend, Life Up (alternatives Reprise)
Extras - Added damage to beasts

Regal L44/Bear Claw/Battle Cloak/Pointed Hat/Angel Bracelet/Aquamarine/Stone Charm
HP - 2814, TP - 262, ATK - 759, STR - 224, INT - 172, DEF - 174, ACC - 138, EVA - 124
Title - Battle Artist
Skill pool - S Type
Elements - Attack - Water, Defence - Water (Reduce), Earth (Reduce)
Status - Nullify Petrify, Nullify Heavy
EX Skills - Tough, Dash, Vitality, Eternal
Compound/bonus EX skills - HP Recover, Quick Turn, Life Up
Extras - Added damage to immaterials

Sheena L45/Card of Earth/Witch's Robe/Pretty Ribbon/Mythril Bracelet/Flare Cape/Stone Charm (alternate Card of Ice)
HP - 2359, TP - 350, ATK - 440 (630 w/th Card of Ice), STR - 200, INT - 173, DEF - 176, ACC - 116, EVA - 115
Title - Acrobat
Skill pool - S type
Elements - Attack - Earth, Defence - Fire (Reduce), Earth (Invalid), (Attack - Ice, Defence - Ice/Fire/Earth Reduce w/th Card of Ice equipped instead)
Status - Nullify Petrify, Nullify Heavy
EX Skills - Strong, Tough, Dash, Prolong
Compound/bonus EX skills - EX Attack, Hard Hit
Extras - Added damage to plants (w/th Card of Earth), Added damage to humans (w/th Card of Ice)
Summons - Fire/Efreet, Water/Undine, Wind/Sylph, Earth/Gnome, Lightning/Volt

**

Colette has better equipment for defense/defense boosting, DEF stat is 188 w/th Mythril Guard/Pretty Ribbon/Mythril Bracelet but I've mostly been running a Luck tinked set up with her so far~

**

All the other characters are pretty much all up to date with equipment more or less too (I think Lloyd still needs the more powerful weapon from the resort town though), all are equipped with four EX Gems of various levels, and have shinies like EX Attack/Critical Up (Lloyd), Magic Boost (Raine) and Randomizer (Genis) I am maxxed out on EX Gem L3s from stealing them with Colette and I also have 20 All Divides now from stealing them from the Fake in the sewers as well. I have four Devil Arms so far, for Lloyd, Colette, Zelos, and Sheena but their power has not been unlocked yet. Nuu~ Nuuu~ Nuuuu~ I'm having fun~

To the Temple of Ice!~ 

[Sierra]

I only know you should really teleport to Majula then walk back to Heide's Tower of Flame right now.

Will do! And I also have no idea what was up with the light-up golems beneath Drangleic Castle, also did that and also saw no change. I can tell you what to do with the giants if you want--you probably don't, but here it is in spoiler text just in case:

If you've been to the Ancient Dragon, head back to the Forest of Fallen Giants. Interacting with those dead giant/tree things should now trigger new zones (well, three of them do, in my experience, one by the Soldier's Rest bonfire still only gives items occasionally). The Queen actually mentions this herself if you talk to her first.

[Clear Tranquil]

Oh yes!, forgot to mention I've been rolling in Miracle Gels, Lemon Gels, Pineapple Gels, Energy Tablets, Rune Bottles, Super Pellets, Rare Pellets, and various other assorted goods and extra Gald thanks to Zelos's Personal Skill, and also Spirit Bottles too due to using Rune Bottles to transform Energy Tablets into them~ I currently have 10 Spirit Bottles and am maxed back out at 20 Energy Tablets again~

[Meeplelard]

ToG f: Started F-arc...did the ToV staff take over on writing skits or something?  THEY ARE ACTUALLY ENTERTAINING NOW!

[Fenrir]

Well I finished Dark Souls 2. The true Dark Souls 2 starts here, etc.
It was fantastic.

[interrobangbang]

Bravely Default: Beaten. Thoughts in spoilers below.

Plot:

Edea was the showstealer character-wise; she gets a lot of optional screentime and development, and even in main story/in the little discussions she's easily the most compelling person. Tiz was the loser, though not by too much; he's just a bit one note as Agnes' right hand man. Braev and Einheria get the "what the fuck are you doing" cat macro award; Braev for not dealing with Rosa/Profiteur/Qada from the getgo (though World "2" implies Rosa is why Profiteur and Qada are still on the loose) and in general being an "end justifies the means and also I'm going to sit on every goddamn piece of information I have no matter what", and Einheria for "this guy's orders have made Mephilia crack and Artemia even more unbalanced, just pull the fuck out and save them".

The plot itself, I've got little issue with, outside of the sequel bait/hooks; everything makes a pretty solid amount of sense to be honest.  Tiz's fate (and indeed, Tiz's role in the endgame) is kinda sleazy to drop last minute when everything else has at the same time, and DeRosso is a mystery I want some answers about (that I doubt we'll see) but beyond that... yeah, this all ties up pretty well. Of note is that the game pretty clearly expects you to break the final crystal of World "3", and that anything past that is, while canon, also sort of added content - the optional battles just provide more backstory and challenge, and the crystal awakening dialogue reverts to "let's do this yeeey" sort of crap. I was expecting a lot more drama from Ringabel out of that.

Job thoughts and boss thoughts:

Freelancer: Decent early for Dungeon Master and Divining Rod, useless after that until Mimic.
Monk: Decent early, falls off later since weapon slots give precious, precious speed (or MAtk). Can't justify the class past a point.
WM: Tied for best healer with Salvemaker, and the two complement each other beautifully. Can keep a team going for a long time, especially with Healing Lore/Holy One/Save WM MP.
BM: I'll buy that the class is decent, but it saw next to no use for me (I used it/Arcanist for a bit for Sleep/Twilight abuse).
Knight: Everyone that wasn't my primary healer got Two Handed at some point. That skill is easily the best earlygame offense booster you can get and it stays relevant basically to the end of the game. The rest of the skills... you can probably find use for? I used Stomp as ST offense until better came up.

Thief: Excellent early offense (Bows + Life Steal), tapers off once other classes do its stuff better. Is useful in world "2" for stealing from boss sets, but then vanishes. Speed+% bonuses are very good, though, and saw use all game.
Merchant: Grab More Money, disregard.
Spell Blade: Probably one of the gamebest classes, Brave (as said by others) works wonderfully with this. Elemental weaknesses stay common, too (indeed, both final bosses have them!) so... yeah. Great class. Phantom Weapon could've been neat but it needed to cost 2 so you could have more options in passives alongside it, 3 is too restrictive.
Time Mage: I never once found myself thinking "You know what would be useful here? Time magic." Which says a lot about the active skillset. This said, picking up Hasten World was my best endgame decision, pretty easily.

Ranger: This is what obsoletes Thief. Excellent damage, gets S Bows which is gold, hits weakness on non-bosses. Wishes dearly that its final skill was a Humanoid slayer. Sadly it also drops off some lategame, though an Axe user has an argument to switch to this class for Hawkeye even at the end.
Summoner: Decent randomclearer, but Valkyrie kinda obsoletes it and it costs too much IMO for the times it'd be useful. I tried a Gaia Gear Summoner w/ Phantom Weapon build in the endgame boss rush, but it just wasn't impressive enough - Vampire skillset alone does better.
Valkyrie: Great for ST and MT damage for a long time thanks to Judgment and Crescent Moon. Sadly, endgame it falls off, though a gimmick 4 Valk skillset could do really well, possibly. So... yeah.
Red Mage: Christ this class kinda sucks. Basically all its skills are better for the boss than for you.

Salvemaker: Awesome, awesome class. Excellent healer, great debuffer/buffer, has MT revival near its peak... yeah. Definitely a class worth using, even if you don't use Norende. If you do it's even better.
Pirate: Great w/ Swordmaster, great for inflicting debuffs ST until Vampire comes around, still does damage+debuffs better, and is endgame support material. Amped Strike is too expensive, but if you've got Swordmaster you can spam it seven times over two turns at max BP, so I guess that's a win?
Praline Performer: WE! GO! WILD! The class is really easy to underestimate, I didn't seriously use it until the final stretch and then haed myself for it - Atk buffing MT is glorious, free BP for MP is awesome, the capstone is nasty as fuck when Mimic'd... yeah. Not an always class, definitely a sometimes class, but it shines a ton in its good points.
Swordmaster: bleah. katana lore is good, the final skill is niche but good with pirate.
Ninja: One of the more broken classes, quietly; bosses that are entirely phys/don't brave can be shut down with Utsusemi and Frenetic Fighting/Dual Wielding/Precision is one of the fastest ways to hit the damage cap. Can hit 9999 up to 8 times a turn, making it easily one of the best cannons if you're twinking for that. Its damage isn't that good without that effort, however, and if you're misusing it it can look pretty bad.

Arcanist: see BM for the one use I got outta it. Bonus: it looks silly.
Spiritmaster: The single best support skillset I have seen in any game, pretty easily. MT status immunity? MT element immunity? Damage immunity (for both sides) for two turns, which can be gotten around if you set up right? BP regeneration so this doesn't take many turns? It's reliant as hell on other classes to help it and support it in return, but this is basically my MVP vote.
Templar: Bleah. Useful but comes when your other classes are coming into their own offense wise, and really doesn't offer enough to counteract that.
Dark Knight: RAGE! The class is great until then (Drain Sword + Black Blade + Adversity makes a rolling monster of hate) and Rage + Drain Sword + some combo setup allows you to hit 10+ times for 9999, which is castbest. Don't have much else to say, the class is great.
Vampire: An awesome Blue Mage variant that uses physical offense for its skills. Since physicals are easier to twink this is great news, and the Vampire's skillset is excellent, if limited elementally somewhat (Wind/Fire/Ice/Earth, no Light/Dark/Lightning so can't hit human boss weaknesses)
Conjurer: Ugh. This class... needed something. Make the buffs MT (Protect/Shell style instead so they work with Performer)? Let them have two added class ability slots (to mimic Yulyana's use of BM/WM or Pirate/TM)? I don't know. As it stands this is a really bad final class and best used for Obliterate and then discarded.

Overall pretty good class balance, with mages getting the short end of the stick I feel (Conjurer being a bad capstone for mages doesn't help).

Boss thoughts (pretty simple, but in spoilers below still:

Crystal bosses. These don't significantly improve from world to world, so first showing for each is best p. easily. Gigas Lich has ID and solid damage, but multiple dangerous weaknesses; Chaugmar has parasitic healing and a very high 2HKO in Energy Blast that he loses turns for, probably not a great dueling combo (Notably, his barrier just sets his defense super-high; Fireball can still hurt him, e.g., so ITD is great here), Rusalka has the same weakness (lightning) but his split + rushdown kills ST opponents dead if you let him use Seep turn 1, and Orthros has action economy and can basically grind enemies in a duel down to near-nothing.

Human bosses. Probably either first or last forms; last forms often have different skills but lower durability. First forms will have much better durability and in some cases (Qada) be just as good if not better at relative damage.

Notable PC bosses:
Ominas: May want his form with Heinkel and Barras? He has MT 2HKO fire magic like his other forms, but manages a ST OHKO with lightning magic as well. Has some limited status options in all forms, too, IIRC.
Profiteur: His damage being a low OHKO when he focuses it sounds right; I was relatively high level on facing him and still only had about 500 HP on average. Probably one of the better duelers, annoyingly.
DeRosa: Definitely, definitely wants his first form, where his durability is notable and his damage isn't up shit creek. Charm is a powerful status, and Thundara and Cura are nasty to face at this juncture.
Qada: Dear lord this dude is dumb one on one. Dark Breath is cruel as a skill on bosses and he has it in every single form.
Kamiizumi: Given intelligent AI (aka knows what his enemies can do), could be very brutal against one-note opponents. Multitask physicals aren't too hot otherwise though.
Praline: I'd allow her to summon her fanclub, but she'd have to take a turn to do it and they're basically OHKO bait.
DeRosso: Uhhhhhhhhh. Taking him against his first form... he has three different ways to go about a 2HKO and excellent durability and none of his tricks work on bosses (Bone Crush, Graviga) so he kinda... doesn't work as well as he'd like. Excellent durability. Durable enough to win some slugfests, maybe?
Yulyana: Is bad on durability due to when you fight him, but has Amped Strike off 150% atkpow. May not care too much, that IIRC was a low ST OHKO.

Non-human, non-crystal bosses:

Dragon: Low durability (blitzable) but high damage and good followup against healers.
Elemental dragons: Mean as fuck but entirely walled by phys tanking/perfect evade. Earth is probably the most dangerous in a duel?

Airy: First form gets Slaughter which is a bunch of hits with ID attached, and not much else IIRC. Second form gets infinite defense+counters phys damage, which almost fucked me over as her AI can break and never goddamn drop the shield, and she also has MT stop and decent damage otherwise (2HKOish?). This form also gets the MT dispel+allweak -> massive magic attack combo. (According to FAQs the first form gets the infinite defense skill too? Sheesh.)

Third form (aka true end only form) has the MT dispel+allweak -> Zeta Flare combo, gets full healed three times (I would allow these as innate counters to hitting 0 HP), but lacks the defense buff skill. Probably her best blitzing form if her enemy has ITD stuff as she basically, at worst, is 4HKO'd in this form. A very scary boss.

Ouroboros... the problem here is he's plot and, if you know -how- he works, the fights end way too fast. The first form is his second most durable and it's basically pretty tame on offense; the second and third forms are beatable if you just Brave rush them down (they have less effective HP than any single human refight, for crying out loud!) and the fourth fight is entirely plot and ends on his third use of a skill. He makes for a worse fight than his minion in a duel as a result, but he can still basically MT 2HKO and disable PCs easily.

[Clear Tranquil]

Yaay Meeple, I recommend going to Gralesyde when you get the chance, since you get a shiny, and well visiting places in general for new stuff is a good idea before progressing with the F arc plot, since I don't remember/am not sure if you can do it later after advancing things

[Grefter]

BG1 - So a while back I felt like moving my Halfling Kensai in to BG2.  I formatted my PC and didn't back up saves and lost it.  So rolled a Kensai Dwarf that uses Halberds instead because I haven't used them before.

Halberds are boring.

I get +1 in BG1 from just south of Beregost.  So at level 1.  That lasts until you get to Baldur's Gate.  This is all the enchanted Halberds in the game.

In BG2 it is, get a +2 one from somewhere (Either buy generic one or do Shadelord).  Or Dragon's Bane +3 from Unseeing Eye.  Then... Underdark.  +4 Dragon's Breath with +1 of a bunch of elemental damage types. (Or +5 Blackmist if you are evil).   Can build Wave over the whole game to have a pretty useless shiny that will wreck one area well in ToB!.  From there you get Ravager in Yaga Shura's lair which is your end game choice.

Most of these you will ignore if you have special shops because Harmonium halberd gives +1 Strength.

It is better progression that Bastard Swords at least, but it is a steady slow progression of things that don't do anything of real interest and you are probably going to ignore because strength scaling too good.  Ravager procs are pretty much the most interesting thing on there and by the time you get it everything is going to succeed a poison save.  10% chance to instakill is cute but that is about it.

I prefer stuff like Crossbows even (or daggers!) where your end game option is available early because that is more interesting than slow steady and you tend to need to at least save up for those or go deep diving in dungeons with some Risk:Reward play.  Halberds progression is pretty passive in BG2 just in places you would naturally explore or are plot railroads.

[Fenrir]

Dark Souls 2: Read a bunch of lore discussion on forums and did a whole lot of things in game.
Interesting!

Then started as a mage named Claire. (Doing everything: Miracles, pyromancy, sorcery, hexes)
I wanted to make her average looking on purpose but she looks exactly like Scarlet Johanson in game.

Spoilers, sorcery is OP as hell. I joined the "make everything harder" guild and stuff still isn't that much harder. I've died twice before the first boss though.

[Captain K.]

Pokémon Battle Trozei:  Huh, this is not what I was expecting.  There's basically no rules, you can move any pokemon anywhere at (almost) any time to make combos.  It's just a matter of doing it fast enough because the enemy pokemon is hitting you at the same time.  Extremely frantic, not really my pace of game.