Tactics Ogre: The Man Who Would Be King- Finished.
So, mentioned this in my stat topic update, but hinode was right all those ages ago. The would-be King of Valeria can prepare for the capture of Heim via boldly heading into the swamp where he slaughters octopi and their foul worshippers alone in the muck, and suddenly be much more powerful. This. is. stupid, but better a stupid option (like grinding back up Arycelle's loyalty - which weirdly enough skyrocketed for some reason later, she became super loyal) than no option, I suppose. I like to imagine Denam said "This is for Leonar" before killing Catiua, but no, things proceeded as they always do, she's just as crazy as ever. The only thing you fear is your brother deserting you, and so you desert him, and when he comes back you do... that. Got it.
The battle with Brantyn is still pretty awesome, one of the best in the game. He's one of the very rare highly damaging mages; why is he so awesome at it when the others aren't? But he's balanced by having his 'tank' line be largely Terror Knights wielding 2H weapons, which, well, they've got Rampart Aura so they make you deal with them, but they aren't ACTUALLY annoying supertanks like Knights or Golems. So it's reasonable to whittle you way through 'em while also being able to have Canopus dive the backlines and assassinate other clerics / mages. Good times.
While on the Terror Knight note, Dievold was a pleasant surprise. PC Terror Knights are actually okay since you'll be smart enough to equip Spellstrike, so they can toss out reasonably solid Paralytic Waves before engaging or if not in range, and Sleep is actually pretty decent if you can't close, too. Against bosses or annoying knights with Phalanx, Drain Power is quite solid: certainly spamming Drain Power on the final boss was quite helpful to see fewer of his ultimates. And if you want/need to actually kill a supertank dragon or golem, Frightened is pretty useful for speeding up the clock. So yeah, he was alright, although dat speed.
Hanging Gardens were just as boring as ever, although the Andoras fight is good fun. I cannot imagine how many horrible accidents Dorgalua's servants had navigating it.
Surprisingly enough, Lord path gets to actually do a minor bit of Kingdom Policy post-Heim: after checking the Interwebs, I was surprised to learn that you actually want to ignore soldiers in your own army raping & looting Heim, mostly because it makes recruiting Cressida easier in the Chaotic path. I can see it now: "Why won't you join me Cressida?" "You jerk, you punished rapists. You don't have the backbone or moral fiber to lead and make tough calls." Uh huh. Interesting, anyway, it's a classic hard problem even if the effects are wacky. (The Galgastani & Walister army you just lead like it if you let 'em off the hook, but the Bakram hate you. If you punish them, it's the reverse.)
On that note, worst assassin ever. Checking the loyalty of new recruits, the Walister liked me, the Galgastani were okay with me, and the Bakram hated my guts. So clearly I should be assassinated by unhappy Bakram supporters, right? Nope, it's Walister fanatics yelling "Glory to the Walister" that gun me down. YOU MORONS, you have one of your own on the throne, lay off the crazy pills man. It's a small touch, but I wish they slightly adjusted the ending based on which faction hated you the most and having that faction kill King Denam. Also Cistina/Cerya you are FIRED from running my security, run guests through the darn fusil detector.
I do kinda like how the game portrays Denam being King at least: he got there the way many royal dynasties get there, by having the first guy basically be a warlord who conquers the place with an army, then his supporters say hooray he's a noble king. Less surprise royal blood from nowhere, more "me and my 11 friends with swords all say I'm King, you agree, right? Right?" And that this approach doesn't always work, either.
Anyway, fun times, but I really doubt I will do the aftergame, again. Especially since Lord ending inexplicably locks you off from the Coda or something, along with already not having Gildas who's needed to unlock a major aftergame quest. I guess I could World tarot back and cruise through Law on EZ mode and get a Princessy ending, but that'd be really boring, so no. Alas.
Back to Awakening equal-XP, most likely.