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Nathan idk what the stat spread optimization is but going into a new chapter without willpower seems bad generally
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# ? Sep 8, 2022 16:09 |
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# ? Jun 10, 2024 02:14 |
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Nathan the last time we ran out of willpower someone got ran over - let's avoid that
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# ? Sep 8, 2022 16:17 |
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Spend the time with Mother
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# ? Sep 8, 2022 16:39 |
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Either Nathan or Gloria.
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# ? Sep 8, 2022 16:40 |
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Nathan for the willpower.
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# ? Sep 8, 2022 17:21 |
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Nathan
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# ? Sep 8, 2022 18:21 |
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RedSnapper posted:
Can't argue with this. Nathan!
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# ? Sep 8, 2022 18:31 |
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Nathan. Gotta be a good big brother.
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# ? Sep 8, 2022 18:52 |
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Yeah, Nathan.
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# ? Sep 8, 2022 18:55 |
Roll with Nathan
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# ? Sep 8, 2022 19:19 |
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TheGreatEvilKing posted:Roll with Nathan Gonna give him such a noogy
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 04:19 |
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1.11 - Bright Lights, Big City Nathan it is! Out of the entire Brante family, he's certainly the most compassionate. And the most lost. This is nice. I like Nathan. He's a delightful well-meaning gently caress-up. I can see why this would raise our willpower. Onwards! We get a quick summary of our life so far. And get ready for the future. As with any chapter, we get a nice timeline of the important stuff that's happened. These are our final adolescence Stats. I gotta be honest, it's not great. With two deaths, the highest I've seen was 6 Nobility, 6 Ingenuity, 9 Spirituality, and 5 Willpower left over (with 3 Determination and 6 Perception from Childhood). An important note: we won't be replaying the entirety of Childhood and Adolescence chapters in future playthroughs. That would take too long and honestly, it's not that varied compared to the rest of the game. I'm still working out the details, but we'll essentially vote on the major events (like the Blood Tide) and which stats to focus on, and I'll just show the major differences. Speaking of deaths, we could've died up to three times so far: 1. Punching Gregor when he threw our soldiers into the fire (+1 Determination, +1 Perception, -1 Gregor opinion) 2. Jumping in front of the horses to save Sophia (+1 Nobility, +1 Ingenuity, +1 Spirituality, -5 Willpower +1 Sophia opinion) 3. Letting Gregor burn the house down while we stand and watch (+1 Nobility, +1 Ingenuity, +2 Spirituality, +1 Gregor opinion, -1 Lydia opinion, -1 Wealth) The first one isn't great, but taking the other ones is often the optimal path, stats-wise. There are times when you can die going forward in the game, and they mostly stop being positive (though sometimes let you "get out" of a sticky situation), but you should be able to finish with no more than one additional death. Exception: there is a path in the Priest Path that requires a shitton of Willpower, and two deaths, so you can't finish it if you died twice before heading to the capital. Anyway, welcome to chapter 3: Youth. We get a nice breakdown of our Skills for the rest of the game. As you can see, Skills start as a combination of our Stats from Childhood and Adolescence. Skills go from 0-20, and as the text notes, most checks are 10+, with difficult choices being 17+. Every stat has a 20 check that really plays in your favour. Note that all Skills show up in all paths. I call a Skill "major" if it shows up more often than the others in a particular path. Diplomacy is one of our two major Skills for the Nobleman Path. It covers how well we know Imperial Law, how easily we travel in high society, and how well we can negotiate with the nobility. This is a really bad score if we want to go for that career. Valour is the other major Skill for the Nobleman. It's our main "hit dude with sword" stat, and also covers commanding troops. At least one of the major Skills needs to be 10+ for us to choose that path, so we can join the college and become a nobleman right off the bat. Theology is one of the major Skills for the Priest Path. It judges how well we can interpret holy texts and construct religious arguments. We are very bad at this. Eloquence is our other major Priest Skill. It determines how well we can speak to a crowd, and how inspiring we are in matters of faith. This is almost tolerable. At the moment, we can't join the seminary and become a priest, because we need to have 10+ in either one of these. Don't worry, we'll bump it up momentarily. Moving on to the Lotless Path, we have Manipulation. It's the skill that defines how well we can lie and cheat to get what we need out of people. This isn't great, but workable. Scheming is our final Skill, and our second major Lotless one. It covers how well we do crime: murder, sabotage, inciting riots, all that fun stuff. This is a pretty solid start, and basically the only thing we're actually good at. Unlike the other two paths, becoming Lotless doesn't require us to pass any specific Skill checks, since it also acts as a fallback plan. As with the other chapters, we have new destiny events. Note that now we have to start planning for outcomes at the beginning of each chapter. The checks become stricter as the game goes on, and some outcomes have very little room for error. On the bright side, what I consider to be the "good ending" is pretty forgiving, and overall quite reacheable. The game itself does not consider it a good ending because of all the reformism it loves. Also note that there are several (at least two, often more) sub-paths in each of the three major paths. Our first outcome is remaining a commoner. We don't go to college, we don't go to seminary, and instead deal with [redacted]. There are no Skill requirements here, we just have to make the choice when it comes up. The second outcome is joining the seminary and becoming a priest. For this, we need to have 10+ in either Theology or Eloquence. The third outcome is our Father's wish: joining the college and becoming a noble. We need to have 10+ in Diplomacy or Valour here. The final option for the chapter end is just straight up dying. This requires us to either die 4 times in total (which I don't think is even possible with our 0 deaths so far), or finding a way to get officially executed. Moving on to personal events. Aylis comes up in two of the paths, and we can find a way to stop her from dying in both. These two options are mutually exclusive, and depend on how we influence the fate of the Lotless, a secret society that comes up in the Lotless Path. More swears! At one point in this chapter, we will be given an option to swear an oath eternal friendship to Tommas. For this to work we need to either be a noble, or just be on really good terms with him. These two are the mutually exclusive options for which side of the schism we fall on in the Priest Path. It just needs a decision when it comes up. Our final possible event is taking first place in the Imperial College Tournament, a dueling competition set up by the university. We need to be a noble, have decent fighting skills, be trained by Father back in our childhood, and make the appropriate choice. That's it for the destiny events. Note that the province screen has changed: with the murder of Patriarch Fotis, he's been replaced with Patriarch Cassius. And this is where we are now, in the center of the Empire - Eterna. Our hometown of Anizotte is in the south. Onwards! Tommas rides with us, since he's trying to become a junior officer. We're pretty excited for this whole thing. Eterna is much bigger than Anizotte is. And much more ornate. The streets are full of people at every hour of the day. We say goodbye to Tommas and go for a walk. Freshmen, freshmen never change. Our first night in the capital. We decide to check out what rich assholes have to say about themselves. Time to hear what the haute bourgeoisie thinks about itself. About what could be expected. These fucks aren't fighting for the rights of the commoners, they're fighting for the rights of rich assholes. Of course, should any actual fighting happen, you can be sure they wouldn't be anywhere near it. But at least we have learned that there are a ton of people questioning the Lots. Also I don't think Gloria would feel too much empathy for the plight of the poor, trod-upon factory owners. Note that we now have enough Eloquence to qualify for the seminary. All three major paths are open to us. Welcome to Eterna! A few days later, we study a little more schismatic theology. Oh hey, they do icons, I missed this part the first time around. More Eastern Orthodox influences. This is Patriarch Luke, the current standard-bearer for the New Faith. Things have moved forward in the schism since we've seen Fotis get got. The movement now has politically important backers. Thread, meet Father Ulrich. Pay attention to how he speaks about the Twins, and which aspects of them he chooses to highlight. The Inquisition is here. Also note how different some of the inquisitors are. Haag is much softer than Ulrich is. However, he hadn't considered an important point. Who the hell is he to order us around? We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. We pick up a Diplomacy point. This is not the first, nor the last sermon Patriarch Luke gives. People are digging this whole "no Lots" thing. The New Faith grows. As does disorder. We continue studying for our entrance exams, but we can't just do that all the time! Time to check out what's happening around town. Let's ask our freshman buddies. These all sound like solid, perfectly legal choices. -- How do we spend the night? A. Technically we're not allowed to use a sword yet, but when has that ever stopped us? Check out the dueling club. B. Imperial secrets? Invitation-only meetings? Sounds right up our alley. Go to the salon. C. Abandoning Lots and indulging in hedonism? We should at least take a look. See what the society is all about.
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 14:42 |
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Also start thinking about which major path we're going to go down: noble, priest, or lotless. We're not voting on it yet, but it is coming up.
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 14:44 |
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Secret society. That seems like something we are good at after all!
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 14:52 |
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Dueling club
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 14:57 |
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C
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 15:00 |
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it's time to d-d-d-d-d-d-duel
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 15:01 |
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So our primary skills are Stabbing (honorable) and Stabbing (underhanded)?
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 15:10 |
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The Lone Badger posted:So our primary skills are Stabbing (honorable) and Stabbing (underhanded)? I prefer Stabbing (in the front) and Stabbing (in the back).
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 15:16 |
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Let’s go watch some stabs!
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 15:42 |
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Also, let’s get our eloquence up and go for the priest route.
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 15:44 |
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I wanna see the swords go swoosh, duel
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 15:45 |
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It tickles my fancy that the goon-led character ends up the most proficient in the stabbing related skills.... and that's it.
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 16:26 |
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We don't need Valor or Scheming, so C I guess.
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 16:33 |
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The Markian Society sounds cool. C.
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 16:57 |
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We're pretty well prepared for a path of secret meetings and stabbing. Go for B and get ready to meet our future comrade! Probably.
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 17:00 |
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Dueling Club!
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 17:48 |
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B gets my vote.
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 18:05 |
Swords!
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 18:07 |
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A, i want to win a stabbing tournament
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 18:36 |
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I like swords.
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 18:50 |
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Honestly the lesser death for punching Gregor seems to be mostly stat equivalent to saving Sophia, since either would result in a global +1 to the adulthood stats. But since the Gregor one has stat gaining alternatives rather than Sophia’s nothing, I’m guessing saving Sophia still comes up ahead. Also, the loving idea that Gregor literally kills you for standing up to him is just this messy nonsense, not to mention he’s responsible for 2 of the 3. Rot in hell you miserable old bastard.
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 18:58 |
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Keldulas posted:Honestly the lesser death for punching Gregor seems to be mostly stat equivalent to saving Sophia, since either would result in a global +1 to the adulthood stats. But since the Gregor one has stat gaining alternatives rather than Sophia’s nothing, I’m guessing saving Sophia still comes up ahead. His ghost appearance at the blood ceremony shows that he's gone to their world's equivalent of heaven, though.
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 19:50 |
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Secret Salon, if we're going to have a revolution we need to get to know what we're dealing with! For better or worse, I think we should go down the Lotless path. If there are going to be multiple runs then we can go down the other two routes when we are more prepared. Right now, let's keep to our current path of winging it.
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 22:31 |
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Dueling and noble path
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 22:59 |
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We kissed the sword, might as well watch some people who aren't our dad use swords. Duels e: We're probably more suited to Lotless statwise, but Noble seems to make (just a little) more sense roleplay-wise RedSnapper fucked around with this message at 23:33 on Sep 9, 2022 |
# ? Sep 9, 2022 23:30 |
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Oh right, we're supposed to vote for general path as well. Noble.
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# ? Sep 9, 2022 23:39 |
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as far as I know all the paths are goddamn rad my first run was as a churcher and felt almost entirely organic
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# ? Sep 10, 2022 00:28 |
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oops, forgot to vote path. Noble seems most in character for this version of Georg, mostly to spite our grandfather and half brother.
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# ? Sep 10, 2022 08:01 |
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# ? Jun 10, 2024 02:14 |
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lotless
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# ? Sep 10, 2022 11:45 |