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AJ_Impy posted:It's a slightly tweaked quote from the Datalinks. It's both.  I spent a while trying to make the linear/quadratic thing work before concluding that that might be a bit obscure of a joke nowadays.
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Apr 1, 2024 02:03
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Honestly, any of the caster generals are perfectly fine. Much is made of Setsuna and Ageboya starting with Scorching Ray, but the first few fights are cakewalks anyways if you know what you're doing and Scorching Ray will pop up as a level up choice at level 2/3 for the other two casters - well before you truly need it. By ~level 7 or so they'll all look mostly the same if you're exclusively picking the "optimal" choices.
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Apr 1, 2024 07:08
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Uneasy Rests the Head Character Overview: Galfrey No great deeds are accomplished without sacrifice. Have you made yours? Lawful Good Female Human Paladin (Plain class) of Iomedae Romance: Men and Women Can I Fix Her: Yes Incompatible Paths: Azata, Trickster, Demon, Lich (sort of), spoiler, spoiler Galfrey is, I feel, one of the most interesting characters in Wrath of the Righteous. And, I feel, one of the most poorly utilized. At heart, Galfrey is a more nuanced and realistic take than usual on the venerable RPG character archetype of an immortal (or at least very long-lived) hero thrust into a position of responsibility by literal and direct divine providence. Namely, decades after Iomedae herself charged Galfrey with leading the kingdom of Mendev against the Worldwound, Galfrey is barely functional as a human being and is threatening to become a disaster for Mendev. She knows it, too, and feels like she's a prisoner of her own oaths, some sworn to Iomedae in person. She wouldn't admit it to anyone, of course, people expect her to be a wise and just leader - she was handpicked by Iomedae herself, wasn't she? Except doubt has gnawed at Galfrey ever since Iomedae charged her with her duty. Galfrey's girlfriend at the time was, in Galfrey's opinion, a far better leader than Galfrey herself ever could have been - and said girlfriend died valiantly in battle against the Worldwound long ago. Galfrey today is, bluntly, suicidal. She's old, psychologically even if magic cordials have preserved her physical youth. She's spent decades in an extremely high-stress job. She was charged with ruling and leading by a goddess. She has no friends, no immediate family, no confidantes or loved ones. She's breaking under the weight of her charge and her oaths, but refuses to back down because she legitimately believes that any hint of political instability in Mendev, and opportunities for a succession that would be bound to be contested given that Galfrey has no heirs, would result in outside forces - from the Worldwound or elsewhere - intervening to cause chaos, and possibly fatally weaken the vigil against the Worldwound. She's not necessarily wrong, either! We haven't seen the last of cult infiltrators in Mendev, and as we'll see in the story, the literally hellish fascist empire of Golarion has eyes firmly set on Mendev as a future addition to their regime. And what, then, of the player character entering the scene? As far as she knows, a random adventurer who popped up out of nowhere with mythic powers, surrounded by rumors that you're blessed by Iomedae, immediately winning fame and even a bit of a cult of personality by saving Kenabres before Galfrey and her army could arrive! There's a reason Galfrey didn't admit to Yua at camp for why Galfrey named Yua Knight-Commander, and that reason is jealousy. Galfrey's pride is stung that some murderhobo won the glory that Galfrey feels was rightfully hers, and in part her decision to name Yua the Knight-Commander is a bit to make Yua directly subordinate to Galfrey in the popular imagination. It's not going to work, and in fact this jealousy is only going to get worse as Yua racks up more victories, quite without any particular direction from Galfrey herself. To Galfrey, Yua has done nothing to earn her fame or glory or mythic powers. She's just an adventurer who got lucky and has been blessed by powers that Galfrey herself never has. Galfrey is of course wrong about that, there's a lot more going on with Yua and how she has these powers than we currently know, but Yua doesn't know that and Galfrey doesn't know that. I'm going out of my way to keep Yua and Galfrey on reasonably good terms, but that's who we're dealing with. An old, traumatized, jealous heroine who resents the PC for their success, basically because Galfrey thinks she's the main character of this story and doesn't appreciate competition. Galfrey has fallen victim to that old fallacy: believing that her suffering and sacrifices Meant Something. Perhaps they did, perhaps it really is an enormous credit to Galfrey that the Worldwound isn't a far bigger problem than it currently is. Perhaps they didn't, perhaps a better leader could have done and dusted this crisis decades ago. We do not know and will never know, outside one particularly extreme edge case. All this makes Galfrey a complex, nuanced, and interesting supporting character in the story, I feel. Just one problem: you don't learn about ANY of this unless you romance her. Galfrey is an especially severe case of a character locking their character development behind her romance. You can, in fact, persuade Galfrey to lighten up, come to rely on you as an equal, let herself mourn for her dead loved ones in private, and grow into a far better person and ruler. Except not only is that locked behind boinking her, so is finding out drat near anything about her motives and feelings at all. It doesn't help that Galfrey has one of the most stringent tightropes to romance her that I've ever seen in a video game. I've read a guide, and her relationship meter honestly does make sense if you're familiar with chivalric romantic fantasy and understand how these stories tend to go: knowing when to be formal and dutiful, when to joke and flirt, when to respect her boundaries, when to push her boundaries, when to give her time and space and when to make grand romantic gestures declaring your love. You have some room for error, but not much, and her romance excludes many popular mythic paths like this LP will follow. And unless you romance her, Galfrey really isn't in the game much at all. In this LP, we'll see far more of Irabeth as the main voice of Mendev and the military than we will of Galfrey. Which, I suppose, also brings us to The Thing That Galfrey Does. I've introduced crusade mode, and in brief we'll be following this mode over the next couple chapters of the game, building and commanding an army and eventually fortresses, building what will hopefully be a well-oiled machine to fight the armies of the Abyss and drive into the Worldwound. And, late in the game, Galfrey will seize command of the armies and reset almost everything. All your hard work fine tuning your armies and forts and towns, poof. This really, really pisses fans off. 95% of the time you hear Galfrey mentioned by the Wrath fanbase, it's people talking about how much they hate her and enjoy killing her. Ask most of them why, and they'll usually cite this. Except... I personally can't hate Galfrey for this, due to reading an interview with Owlcat where a developer claimed that this decision to reset crusade mode late in the game was a decision made during testing to combat player behavior that they didn't like. Allegedly, early in development there was no crusade mode reset, and so you'd head into the late game with the same army and forts you'd developed earlier in the game. And what this lead to was players sandbagging the game hard, delaying main plot progress to build up an unstoppable army and limitless economy, which let them curb stomp the late game when that opened. Owlcat did not like this and wanted to discourage this behavior. After trying a number of solutions, the reset was what they came up with to discourage that kind of sandbagging without loving over the players who *didn't* do so and just proceeded with the story. Leaving Galfrey as the narrative lever to hit that reset button. So, coupled with my intense aversion to playing sides and story routes that I feel are villainous, in the final analysis I like Galfrey - but am deeply frustrated by how the game handles her. I think she's one of the most complex and nuanced characters in the game, but the story struggles to find a place for her without going all Lancelot and Guinevere. Just how badly Yua will piss off Galfrey remains to be seen. Many mythic paths have a way to really honk her tits if you want, and Azata is no exception. Whether I will pursue that option when the time comes, I haven't yet decided. Cythereal fucked around with this message at 01:10 on Apr 3, 2024 |
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Apr 3, 2024 01:07
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Galfrey Doing The Thing is especially annoying when you are playing lawful good angel mythic path, because in that case there is literally no sane reason for her to Do The Thing. Even the spoiler character that is almost literally voice of Iomede is like "uh, I think you might be overreacting a little bit?". From all ways to reset the progress Owlcat chose the most heavy handed.
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Apr 3, 2024 01:50
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Cythereal posted:
Honestly, there would have been an easy and obvious way to do this without pissing off a bunch of people (...well, most of the reasonable ones at least), the problem is how it's done. To dance around the exact details, at a certain point you enter a situation where you obviously wouldn't have command of your army for a while, and Galfrey takes command. The problem is that this is done by her suddenly becoming massively critical of a huge chunk of things the PC has been doing, and in many cases literally evicting them from command. This is the kind of thing that would kind of work for some Mythic paths depending on just how in the weeds they've gotten - mostly Demon, Spoiler or Trickster (i.e. the evil or shits and giggles paths) - or if you truly have been constantly making terrible decisions in running the army (and yes, you can), but she'll hammer the good-aligned paths as well. Angel can generally get away with it, but Azata is basically screwed if you haven't been actively avoiding playing to your path. Ironically the path that actually has the easiest time is Aeon. Like, both a certain character Cythereal heavily dislikes AND a really cool bro whose opinion Galfrey absolutely should be listening to will hammer her on some of the things Galfrey's criticizing the PC about, so it's not even like Owlcat was somehow unaware a bunch of her criticism was unreasonable, because they directly call it out too. The easy and obvious solution would have been to just have Galfrey take command in absentia (the same she does if you pass the requirements), but without the litany of unreasonable criticism she tosses at the party - so it'd mostly just be the evil paths who've been playing them that way who ended up removed. That way it seems far more like she's being reasonable, and you can still have the armies lost before you get back in command by having her basically be presented as hopeful she can do some good and finish the army battle while you were otherwise occupied. Basically the same kind of mindset as we've already had with her decision regarding Staunton - a lot of hope and short term optimism without really considering the long term requirements.
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Apr 3, 2024 02:02
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For me, the forts and towns were retained after the command issue. Only the armies went poof?
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Apr 3, 2024 03:57
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Lord Koth posted:Ironically the path that actually has the easiest time is Aeon. What can she say? She really digs a walking mass of stars embodying the very concept of impartial laws.
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Apr 3, 2024 05:05
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BisbyWorl posted:What can she say? She really digs a walking mass of stars embodying the very concept of impartial laws. She loves fantasy Judge Dredd.
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Apr 3, 2024 05:38
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RC01214 posted:For me, the forts and towns were retained after the command issue. Only the armies went poof? This was the case for me too. I also retained my generals. They just had a 3 day delay before I could use them again. In other news I tried getting Wallflower off on a technicality and didnt see the option. Lawful or Evil, Hulrun still kills him. Maybe if I kill the bastard first? I may just avoid the quest or complete it the Good way my Aeon run. I can make up the Lawful points later and I cant stomach the other options.
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Apr 3, 2024 06:39
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Szarrukin posted:Galfrey Doing The Thing is especially annoying when you are playing lawful good angel mythic path, because in that case there is literally no sane reason for her to Do The Thing. Even the spoiler character that is almost literally voice of Iomede is like "uh, I think you might be overreacting a little bit?". From all ways to reset the progress Owlcat chose the most heavy handed. Lord Koth posted:Honestly, there would have been an easy and obvious way to do this without pissing off a bunch of people (...well, most of the reasonable ones at least), the problem is how it's done. To dance around the exact details, at a certain point you enter a situation where you obviously wouldn't have command of your army for a while, and Galfrey takes command. The problem is that this is done by her suddenly becoming massively critical of a huge chunk of things the PC has been doing, and in many cases literally evicting them from command. This is the kind of thing that would kind of work for some Mythic paths depending on just how in the weeds they've gotten - mostly Demon, Spoiler or Trickster (i.e. the evil or shits and giggles paths) - or if you truly have been constantly making terrible decisions in running the army (and yes, you can), but she'll hammer the good-aligned paths as well. Angel can generally get away with it, but Azata is basically screwed if you haven't been actively avoiding playing to your path. Ironically the path that actually has the easiest time is Aeon. Again, if you romance Galfrey there's a very explicit reason for all of this: she's both extremely jealous of the PC, and also tired, broken down, and suicidal. She just may or may not have a valid reason to be hostile to the PC, but it's very intentionally a character flaw that the green-eyed monster lurks in Galfrey to the detriment of the Crusade. She is, in fact, actively trying to sabotage the PC's success for irrational personal reasons.
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Apr 3, 2024 13:50
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In fact, the deal is that Aeon and Angel as the standard "lawful" paths don't give her many excuses to try and undermine you, right? Azata is another story but one Cythereal will show if she wants to.
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Apr 3, 2024 15:53
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I think Galfrey gets a little disarmed if you choose flirty options because she's so used to being treated like the savior instead of just a regular person. Part of her likes that to me. I'm probably gonna try to do a romance with her on the Aeon path just to see how that plays out.
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Apr 3, 2024 16:01
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"Galfrey is old" Somewhere, a dwarf and an elf elbow each other and laugh. Cythereal posted:and her relationship meter honestly does make sense if you're familiar with chivalric romantic fantasy and understand how these stories tend to go Isn't the answer to "how chivalric romance tend to go" is "badly"? (I admit I have only cursory knowledge of the genre)
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Apr 3, 2024 22:41
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The other thing when Galfrey does the thing is that, when you're romancing her, she says that she doesn't want to do it but having a second person chosen by the gods that is clearly doing better than Galfrey has in decades has led to a lot of factions breaking out in Mendevian politics and so she has to be the strong leader despite admitting that the PC has done absolutely nothing to deserve this.
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Apr 3, 2024 23:02
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Personally, I didn't have much of an issue with Galfrey Doing The Thing- it's stupid and selfdestructive, but it's framed as a mistake by the narrative, she honestly does have decent reason to be suspicious even in a Good Path run, and she suffers the consequences for her actions (potentially way more than she deserves even, her fate in one of the evil paths is one of the worst things in the game). My problem with her came more from her actions, or moreso the lack of them, earlier on. We've already seen how she was a significant factor in Staunton, Hulrun, and arguably Daeran going so far off the rails, and there's more coming. Granted there are reasons for her (lack of) actions as Cythereal pointed out, but given how universally beloved she's supposed to be it rings a little hollow.
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Apr 3, 2024 23:04
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Gun Jam posted:Isn't the answer to "how chivalric romance tend to go" is "badly"? Well, everyone dies in the long run, I guess? She even has a bitter betrayal that (can) poison you against each other built into the romance, so you can go full melodrama if that's your thing.
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Apr 3, 2024 23:25
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Cythereal posted:So, coupled with my intense aversion to playing sides and story routes that I feel are villainous, in the final analysis I like Galfrey - but am deeply frustrated by how the game handles her. I think she's one of the most complex and nuanced characters in the game, but the story struggles to find a place for her without going all Lancelot and Guinevere. I think this is why I ended up liking her. I tend to do a bunch of romance paths at once in games, at least for anyone I like or think I might like, until the story stops me. (I played Azata, so it was never going to work out.) So I saw a good bit of Galfrey and had at least some understanding of what she was thinking and feeling. I can only imagine how much more upsetting it would be to have her just kramer in out of nowhere and knock down all the pins without the game really giving you a sense of her character first. Gun Jam posted:"Galfrey is old" One of the most important things to know about how long elves and dwarves live is that the vast majority of fantasy writers have literally no idea how to deal with how long elves and dwarves live. The standard thing is usually to say "well, being 200 is like being 20 for them, it just lasts 100 years somehow". Long--lived humans never get the benefit of this sort of thing, so Galfrey at about a hundred and forty should be viewed not as a young elf, but as someone is half again as old as any human ever gets and who has been fighting this war against demons for a century. Even fighting in a war for very brief periods of time can give people terrible PTSD; she is and should be a complete wreck of a person.
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Apr 3, 2024 23:55
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As an Aeon, you can undo the youth potions Galfrey has consumed with a special ability. If you want to be a jerk.
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Apr 4, 2024 00:02
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idonotlikepeas posted:I think this is why I ended up liking her. I tend to do a bunch of romance paths at once in games, at least for anyone I like or think I might like, until the story stops me. (I played Azata, so it was never going to work out.) So I saw a good bit of Galfrey and had at least some understanding of what she was thinking and feeling. I can only imagine how much more upsetting it would be to have her just kramer in out of nowhere and knock down all the pins without the game really giving you a sense of her character first. there is an interesting angle on these in the tabletop game Exalted, which I will go to bat for any time the question "hey wait how do magic powers and the way nation-states work interact" comes up the empire with its boot on the throat of the world is run by the Dragon-Blooded, who pass down their Exaltation by blood. sort of. any given kid of an exalt MIGHT exalt, but there's no guarantees, and the vast majority don't, meaning that most exalts have experienced watching their siblings grow old and die while they still look like they're in the prime of youth. as a direct result, it is around the age of a hundred that Dragon-Blooded of the Realm are considered ready to settle down and become proper adults, because they've worked out most of those pesky mortal attachments that make the young so flighty. sure, by the standards of mortals you verge on unrecognizably insane now. but mortals come and go like the seasons. you're finally ready to start operating on the Real People timescale once you've buried your first batch of kids. (it is assumed that if you are playing a Dragon-Blood, you are playing as one of the younger ones, not least because the old people have accidentally backed themselves into a corner where they're about to tear the entire empire apart in a cataclysmic civil war and the only question is what the sides are going to be.)
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Apr 4, 2024 00:09
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Gun Jam posted:Isn't the answer to "how chivalric romance tend to go" is "badly"? Depends on whether you're reading classic literature or more modern takes. Classic literature, yeah Arthurian mythology shares Greek mythology's love of heroes being undone by their own flaws, going mad on a regular basis, and generally being a bunch of drama queens. Which you can certainly indulge with vis a vis Galfrey, should you so desire. idonotlikepeas posted:One of the most important things to know about how long elves and dwarves live is that the vast majority of fantasy writers have literally no idea how to deal with how long elves and dwarves live. The standard thing is usually to say "well, being 200 is like being 20 for them, it just lasts 100 years somehow". Long--lived humans never get the benefit of this sort of thing, so Galfrey at about a hundred and forty should be viewed not as a young elf, but as someone is half again as old as any human ever gets and who has been fighting this war against demons for a century. Even fighting in a war for very brief periods of time can give people terrible PTSD; she is and should be a complete wreck of a person. Very much so. Near the end of her romance, she'll try to break up with the PC because she thinks it's only going to hurt the PC's heart, and she'll cite her age as part of it. Yeah if you're an elf or what have you her age isn't a big deal, but she is not an elf and is ultimately merely human despite her artificially prolonged life. She's not even an aasimar like Daeran, Galfrey is a bog standard human. Also, bonus from recording the next update. Some loading screens recap the bio/sidequest goings-on of your companions, and it turns out mercs also get included. 
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Apr 4, 2024 02:03
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That is an Alucard fit right there.
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Apr 4, 2024 02:29
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Cythereal posted:Depends on whether you're reading classic literature or more modern takes. You really only get that post-Malory, going to the Arthurian Mythos before Malory "codified" it cited Lancelot's courtly love of Guinevere as being part of his strength, and notably, as positive aspect of his character - notably, this was mostly in the French Vulgate/Post-Vulgate Cycle and everything before it. Malory's the one that really began screwing over the Arthurian heroes and removing or demonizing the more "pagan" elements of the stories a few centuries after the Vulgate/Post-Vulgate Cycles. A lot of the Knights featured in tales and poems mostly managed to actually succeed at things - and then Malory happened. There's a few reasons for it, but suffice to say courtly love was seen as a virtue for several centuries, and then for shifting religious ideologies and social mores it became seen as a sin and adulterous, and the Church really wanted to excise/pave over a lot of what they had adapted from what the Romans had syncretised into their faith and then Catholicism through their colonization and cut ties entirely with the pagan roots and, yeah it was a whole big thing. RelentlessImp fucked around with this message at 02:58 on Apr 4, 2024 |
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Apr 4, 2024 02:53
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achtungnight posted:As an Aeon, you can undo the youth potions Galfrey has consumed with a special ability. If you want to be a jerk. See, like that's just a dick move. I doubt you're running around disenchanting all your magic items because "Steel shouldn't be that sharp or on fire."
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Apr 4, 2024 03:12
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Capfalcon posted:See, like that's just a dick move. I doubt you're running around disenchanting all your magic items because "Steel shouldn't be that sharp or on fire." of course not. that's on the NEXT timetable.
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Apr 4, 2024 04:58
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achtungnight posted:As an Aeon, you can undo the youth potions Galfrey has consumed with a special ability. If you want to be a jerk. Of all the dick moves you can do as an Aeon, that's honestly probably the worst simply because it's not like Sun Orchid Nectar is some special unique thing that only Galfrey's got access to. i.e. It's PURELY a dick move, rather than truly enforcing some alien view of the cosmic rules. There's 6 auctioned every year, and have been for 3,000 years at this point, so if Aeons actually thought an elixir of mortal immortality was breaking some cosmic law it's not like they haven't had time to do something about it.
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Apr 4, 2024 05:58
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Not only is it a super dick move, it's maybe hilariously something I'd expect far more from Trickster.
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Apr 4, 2024 06:51
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Capfalcon posted:See, like that's just a dick move. I doubt you're running around disenchanting all your magic items because "Steel shouldn't be that sharp or on fire." Nah, you don't need Aeon powers for that, just mage's disjunction.
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Apr 4, 2024 08:26
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RelentlessImp posted:You really only get that post-Malory, going to the Arthurian Mythos before Malory "codified" it cited Lancelot's courtly love of Guinevere as being part of his strength, and notably, as positive aspect of his character - notably, this was mostly in the French Vulgate/Post-Vulgate Cycle and everything before it. Malory's the one that really began screwing over the Arthurian heroes and removing or demonizing the more "pagan" elements of the stories a few centuries after the Vulgate/Post-Vulgate Cycles. A lot of the Knights featured in tales and poems mostly managed to actually succeed at things - and then Malory happened.
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Apr 4, 2024 09:38
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anilEhilated posted:Wasn't Lancelot himself a later French addition to the Arthurian myth, though? It's been a while but I vaguely seem to remember it was originally Mordred who seduced Guinevere and there wasn't much of courtly romance about that. Slightly, but yes, French; there's the 12th century poem that first introduces him and the courtly love aspect with Guinevere (Troyes' Lancelot, the Knight of the Cart, ca. 1177-1181, about 40ish years after Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae) which got later incorporated into the 13th-century Vulgate Cycle. Courtly love as a virtue was a very French thing, but it spread throughout a lot of the medieval world, especially in high literature. I did misspeak about it being 'everything' before the Vulgate cycle though - just a decent chunk of literature that led into the Vulgate Cycle post-Geoffrey of Monmouth, my bad.
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Apr 4, 2024 12:25
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Lord Koth posted:Of all the dick moves you can do as an Aeon, that's honestly probably the worst simply because it's not like Sun Orchid Nectar is some special unique thing that only Galfrey's got access to. i.e. It's PURELY a dick move, rather than truly enforcing some alien view of the cosmic rules. There's 6 auctioned every year, and have been for 3,000 years at this point, so if Aeons actually thought an elixir of mortal immortality was breaking some cosmic law it's not like they haven't had time to do something about it. IIRC, the specific context of that coming up is if the PC and Galfrey aren't on good terms, and this can lead to the PC accusing Galfrey of artificially prolonging her life out of pride and vanity to enjoy eternal youth instead of aging like a human should. That perhaps she should have let herself age and die and choose a successor like normal people. And when Galfrey refuses, the Aeon can put her to the test by taking away her youth - but not her potion granted immorality. It's not so much part of the core Aeon mythic story as just a hilariously petty rear end in a top hat thing you can do if you happen to be an Aeon and are having a hard break with Galfrey.
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Apr 4, 2024 12:40
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She deserves it for being hundreds of years old and still thinking that hairdo is a good choice.
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Apr 4, 2024 17:57
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Guildenstern Mother posted:She deserves it for being hundreds of years old and still thinking that hairdo is a good choice. good compromise solution to the problems of "i'm going to have to fight periodically" and also "i'm expected to have long hair for big formal events." also does a good job selling that she's putting a lot of effort into appearing to have everything under control
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Apr 4, 2024 19:00
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Ultimately, there is an arguement to be made - and plenty of characters happily make it, and we'll examine it more in Chapter 3 - of "how are you on the Fifth Crusade, and each one has lead to you LOSING ground? Maybe you aren't actually the best leader for this situation?" There's a lot of other behind the scenes kinda stuff going on with the Crusades that showcases the Crusades kinda loving itself over and losing not just because "it turns out demons are very strong," but also because 1) the gods aren't entirely proactive in helping the Crusaders, as Ember points out, and the Crusaders keep waiting for the gods to step in and handle poo poo, and 2) the very mortal and very flawed leaders of the Crusades have been screwing themselves over no small amount, which probably leads to the gods sitting all the way back and letting them deal with their own messes.
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Apr 4, 2024 20:50
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ProfessorCirno posted:"how are you on the Fifth Crusade, and each one has lead to you LOSING ground? Maybe you aren't actually the best leader for this situation?" Galfrey is good version of Abaddon the Despoiler, confirmed.
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Apr 4, 2024 20:54
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Contrariwise, that argument is predicted on the idea that someone else WOULD have done better. Which is far from guaranteed, and the Aeons aren't interested in exploring that particular counterfactual. There's a very real argument to be made that anyone else would have made things even worse than they are now.
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Apr 4, 2024 21:00
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Galfrey is a good character but also she needs to get dunked on real hard, even as an Angel.
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Apr 4, 2024 21:03
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Galfrey at least knows when to seize an opportunity when it arises. The repelling of the Kenabres attack created probably the only opening Mendev will ever get for a shot at Drezen as the demons attempt to regroup.
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Apr 4, 2024 21:36
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Cythereal posted:IIRC, the specific context of that coming up is if the PC and Galfrey aren't on good terms, and this can lead to the PC accusing Galfrey of artificially prolonging her life out of pride and vanity to enjoy eternal youth instead of aging like a human should. That perhaps she should have let herself age and die and choose a successor like normal people. And when Galfrey refuses, the Aeon can put her to the test by taking away her youth - but not her potion granted immorality. I mean, that's how Sun Orchid Elixir works - it doesn't literally make you immortal, it reverses aging by a certain amount, thus making you "immortal" in the sense of reverting your physical body by X number of years when it's taken, after which you start aging again normally. So at the point of the 5th crusade Galfrey's actually taken it twice. Reversing the aging effect of it should just reduce her to a normal old lady (if you revert the second), or likely basically instant death (if you reverted both), not somehow maker her immortal, just old. But yeah, it's a petty rear end in a top hat thing to do with your Aeon powers, but has little to do with Aeon concerns.
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Apr 4, 2024 23:24
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The Blooding Today we open with the first crusade battle of the game. The enemy, correctly realizing they're horrendously outmatched, try to run. I elect to not let them.  For those who have never played a HOMM game before, each unit visible on the field is actually a stack of component units of a given kind. Each stack's overall HP and damage values represent a sum of all the units in the stack, though stats like defense are set per unit. What this means is that as a stack takes damage, units within the stack die. When all units in a stack are dead, the stack is gone. One of the key tactical decisions in a HOMM game is deciding when it's better to spread out your fire to deteriorate multiple stacks and when it's better to focus a stack down. Generally, the key factor is whether a stack has some kind of special ability that's just as effective regardless of how many units are in the stack. If everything on the field are just beat sticks, it's almost always preferable to have two stacks at half than to have one full health stack and one dead stack.  Ranged units, accordingly are extremely valuable in this type of game because they can take apart enemy stacks without needing to close to melee.  One battalion of cultists dies before they can ever reach melee, and the second make it just in time to be cherry-tapped by the footmen.    The first battle of the crusade beyond Kenabres' walls couldn't have gone better. Ageboya directed the troops efficiently, and the cultists broke the moment the lines met. The mood wasn't entirely confident, the atrocity we found as the cultists retreated soured many stomachs, but we now had results to back up the miracles - if that's what indeed they were - at Kenabres. It was a small step, but even the smallest puff of falling ice can be the beginning of an avalanche.  "A whisper sweeps through the ranks, and soon turns into a grumble. There is strange movement in the sky. Black clouds twist into funnels and turn a sickly yellow. The brooding storm is on this side of the river, ahead of the army. Avoiding the strange phenomenon will hardly be possible. The Commander decides to..." [Diplomacy 12] (address the soldiers and boost their morale)This event fires shortly after you enter the Worldwound proper, in case the Chaos Wastes comparison from Warhammer Fantasy wasn't obvious enough already.  "After stopping to catch their breath, the soldiers continue on. Their first encounter with the Worldwound has ended in their favor." The first encounter, but far from the last. I was reminded of the Storyteller's description of Earthfall, a sense like we weren't on Golarion anymore. Katarina, that strange Desnan sorceress, said that in a sense that was true, that the Abyss was tugging at the fabric of reality here and we were no longer entirely bound by Golarion's laws. I thought back to the aeon I met in Kenabres, its outrage at the intermingling of the planes, and in that moment I wondered if maybe the aeon had had a point after all. Winning battles and completing events like this one successfully raise morale. Morale is basically the health stat of the game, and right now there are two triggers. Basically, as long as the crusade keeps winning, morale will stay high. Not just defeat will lose morale, but so will simply bogging down and not making progress.  The road is now open to Seelah's sidequest.    "Greetings, Seelah, and greetings to you, Knight Commander!" (Sir Elan puts his hands behind his back and bows slightly. Then he casts an inquisitive glance at you. He seems less friendly than he was the day you met at the Defender's Heart.) (Jannah puts her hands on her hips. She looks even more dashing than usual. "Elan is feeling a little shy. He thought he asked for help from a couple nobodies like us, but now you've turned into the saviors of Kenabres, knights of the Fifth Crusade, marked by Iomedae's blessing! And you still came to help him dig through a pile of junk, ha ha!" (Seelah frowns a little.) "Let's not talk about it. I assure you, I'm the same Seelah your friend from the League of the Cart. And we came here to help you look for Elan's ring. By the way, where's Curl?" "He didn't come with us. He said an old wound was acting up. All right, my friends! Since we're here, let's finish this mission quickly. I really don't feel comfortable bothering the Knight Commander with my personal problems." "I'm glad we're here to help you, Elan! I hope everything works out perfectly for your wedding too. I love weddings so much they're full of joy and new beginnings. But I haven't been to any yet. Can I come?"One thing I like Wrath for is how it handles the PC's jump from nobody adventurer to famed hero, while still allowing room for the PC to react in many different ways. Queen Galfrey saw a magnificent PR opportunity and put the propaganda machine to work fanning the flames that had already started. Some people are on board with the PC's sudden elevation, some are not, the PC can react to it in many different ways, and the whole thing can blow up in Galfrey's face.  "What does the ring look like and where should we look for it?" "The last time I saw the ring it was with my things in my traveling chest. Now the camp's in total disarray. I don't know how we'll ever find it. The ring is made of a shiny silver metal, with a deep blue-green jewel. You can't miss it. Master Darek is not just a jeweler, he's an artist. There's no mistaking one of his creations." "A trinket worth several months' pay, Elan? The rules on the surface are insane. You should give your girls fried rats like we do. You'd save yourself a lot of trouble!" "Is there something wrong, Elan? Am I making you nervous?" (The young knight is obviously embarrassed.) "I... apologize. Jannah is right much has changed since we met in Kenabres. Some things for the better, some not at all." (He stops short, apparently unwilling to elaborate.) Jannah and I will look around the northern side. We'll see you when we find something. Or when we give up trying..."While it's never specifically stated, I think part of the intent behind everyone's beliefs up to this point has to do with Iomedae herself. By my understanding, Iomedae is very much a Joan of Arc figure, a mortal peasant woman who became a hero and then a goddess. Iomedae's faithful, and those keenly aware of her story, would naturally be primed to be sensitive to mortals - particularly mortal women - suddenly displaying miraculous powers, and thus prone to strong reactions both positive and negative.  There's a lot to loot and click on, but as Elan said, the chest is what you want.   "Elan, look! Look at that creepy thing! What's it holding?":sword: "I've seen one of those before. These small demons like to tease and bully, but it'll bolt if it senses any real threat. Let's surround it and attack all together, before it can figure out what's happening." /ghostbusters GET HER! /ghostbusters    (You hear insolent giggling. The demon is jumping up and down, throwing the ring into the air and catching it.) "Mine! Mine!" "Elan! Jannah!" (Seelah glances at her friends, then turns to you.) "They're all right they'll come round soon. Quickly, Yua, let's catch the little rascal before it runs off with the ring!"Color Spray is a motherfucker of a spell at low levels.  Be careful about clicking on this tent.  There's a couple of brimoraks inside. The fireball casters.   If you have someone using a shield, like Seelah in this LP, don't miss this Mobility check to find this. Using shields may not be optimal, but eh. Anyhow, after chasing the quasit around for a bit, you find it back where you found it. And a certain someone who isn't supposed to be here.   "Curl? What are you-"Oh dear.  (Thrusting herself between Elan and Curl, Seelah barely manages to absorb the blow aimed at the halfling.) "Elan, stop! Have you gone mad?" "He's using a summon spell, why did you stop?"welp  Three babau warp in and are shortly dispatched along with the quasit.  "What am I doing? He lured us into a trap. Curl was the only one who knew where we were going. He knew we thought there wouldn't be anyone at the camp besides some small harmless demons, so he set a trap. I wouldn't be surprised if his demon masters had him targeting the Commander from the start. Talk about believing in the redemption of scoundrels." (Elan scoffs.) "We barely know anything about what happened! Curl is a good lad. He's not a spy or a murderer. Maybe they threatened him, tricked him or even bewitched him with demon magic." "And now we'll never know because you let him escape." "Better to let a thief escape than cut down an innocent." [Good] "Elan, think. Seelah was protecting someone she thought was her friend, and she stopped you from doing something you might regret."Curl, recall, is a member of the Condemned like Staunton, sentenced to a penal battalion for crimes he committed.  "You clearly have something to say. Go ahead then. Spit it out." "Seelah, I didn't want to say this, but I think of you as my friend so I'm going to warn you. After what happened at the Gray Garrison, you're in serious danger. And maybe not just you. You might like to ignore military hierarchy and the rules of knightly orders, but there's wisdom in them that has stood the test of time. A soldier rises from a private to an officer; a knight begins as a squire. Even Iomedae's paladins gain their abilities gradually. But not with you and the Commander. You were granted incredible powers, far surpassing seasoned paladins with experience and skill far beyond your years. You received this gift at just the right moment, and saved a lot of lives across Mendev. That's a great deed that will be remembered for ages to come." "But what happened next was wrong. They began to worship you. The Queen gave you such vast power. All while you sidestepped everything training, experience, hardship. This is not the first time Her Majesty has behaved rashly, and how much good has this brought Mendev? I'm frightened by what I see. Especially by the way that you, Seelah, trust people so easily and leap into adventures without looking. One day you'll lower your sword when you should have driven the blade home. Just like thousands of bright-eyed youngsters will after you." (Elan pauses, as if reluctant to continue, then looks you in the eye.) "I wanted to tell you the same thing, Commander." [Lawful] "You're right to an extent, Elan. But I didn't choose my lot, and I'm just trying to fulfill my duty as best I can."Beyond just the jealousy of the PC's power that people like Lann and Galfrey have shown, there is something to be said for Wrath encouraging the player to think about the example that the PC is setting. Wrath is very much a mythic game, in that it centers on [mostly, not everyone is like this] larger than life characters with grandiose character arcs and destinies. People are going to follow the PC's example, even when the PC makes mistakes, and many people who follow the PC's example won't have their power and luck on their side.  "I said it to Seelah, and I'll say it again this wasn't a reproach, but a warning. The power you've been given... it may be your undoing, and the undoing of all the crusaders along with you." "Don't be afraid of what's new and unknown. We just need to bear in mind our responsibilities. Whatever was given to us, we can use it for good." "In any case, forgive me for wasting your time, and subjecting you to danger here. Now at least we know that Curl is a traitor, and Jannah is a coward ready to abandon her friends when the going gets rough. I hope we'll all learn a lesson from these mistakes. As for that blasted ring... to hell with it. Kiana won't love me solely for the gifts I bring her!" (Elan makes no attempt to conceal his disappointment. Nodding goodbye, he lowers his head and walks away.) (Seelah watches as he leaves. Her expressive eyes are filled with sadness.) "Everything's become very complicated all of a sudden... Please, Yua, let's go back. And I'd like to talk to you about it later. I have a lot to think about."Well, that was a fun sidequest.    I break up the negative feelings by... checks notes... killing swarms of monstrous vermin in the wake of a World War 1 scale bloodbath.  Back in camp, the kickstarter backer characters are still being mysterious. I was actually looking for the Storyteller, as I found an item at the campsite that he can look at, but he seems to have left. So let's talk with Seelah.  "Anyway, that's not what I wanted to talk about. Or not the only thing. Since our raid on the Houndhearts' camp, I've had this sinking feeling that I made a mistake. Dragging you into this, I mean. I should have known that a raid along the edge of the Worldwound wouldn't be so easy. But mostly I was wrong about a lot of people. About Jannah, who lost her nerve and abandoned her friends. About Curl I knew he was a thief, but I really thought he'd turned over a new leaf and deserved a little compassion and trust. And Elan. I thought we were kindred spirits, friends through thick and thin. But it looks like I was wrong about him too." (Seelah looks at you closely, waiting for your answer.) [Good] "Don't lose your trust in people, Seelah. So what if you made a few mistakes? That's no reason to give up on your ideals. Someone has to show people that there's a better path."Seelah's relationship meter is about pushing her towards Good or Lawful. The Lawful options with Seelah are mostly telling her to be a cynical, paranoid hardass.  (She sighs.) "Thanks for listening to my grumbling, and for helping me get to the bottom of this. I'm not going to leave things as they stand. If I get the chance, I'll track down Jannah and see if I can talk some sense into her. And find out why Curl did what he did. I can't stop thinking about what Elan told me in the end. I really have become more powerful than paladins who are far more experienced and selfless than me. There's something not right about it. A servant of Iomedae should gain their powers through dedicated personal effort. It's the only way to make sure they'll use the power for good. Our journey so far it's all wrong. And it means I need to be three times as hard on myself now."You know, maybe we should end this with Lann's idea of asking the PC on a date?  "That's what I wanted to talk to you about." (Lann's expression grows serious.) "I've seen you fight plenty of times now. The way you charge into battle like everything's depending on you. I don't know if you're trying to be a hero or if it's just your own honor at work, but... when I think about you getting hurt, it's like my insides just turn to ice. Because we're friends. And I worry about you. I know, I know, you're the Commander and you've got to lead the charge, but... let me protect you. It's the least I can do for you." (Lann looks into your eyes.) "Because you I mean, we're comrades, right? And I don't want a comrade to be devoured by demons." "I don't need anyone's protection, Lann." "Yes, Commander. Forgive me. It was a bold request, I overstepped, etcetera, etcetera. It won't happen again." "Er, Commander? I was going to bring you a report, but I passed by Lann looking like he'd just been assigned to latrine duty." "Have you ever dated men, Katarina?" "Never dated anyone at all, as a matter of fact. The whole part-fallen angel, part dragon, part earth elemental, mysterious girl given away to the temple thing doesn't leave much time for a social life." "That, Katarina, is the look of a man who's caught feelings but thinks it would be more chivalrous to act like he's doing you a favor instead of just saying it." "How does that make sense?" "It doesn't. The male of the species is a strange and mercurial creature oft given to mischievous wanderings and ramblings. I am entirely content to do without it. Now, you said you had a report for me..."The Crimson Path (this update) Babau 3 Brimoraks 2 Quasit 1 Cultist Platoons 20 Giant Fly Swarms 60 Cythereal fucked around with this message at 01:50 on Apr 5, 2024 |
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Apr 5, 2024 01:27
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Cythereal posted:While it's never specifically stated, I think part of the intent behind everyone's beliefs up to this point has to do with Iomedae herself. By my understanding, Iomedae is very much a Joan of Arc figure, a mortal peasant woman who became a hero and then a goddess. Iomedae's faithful, and those keenly aware of her story, would naturally be primed to be sensitive to mortals - particularly mortal women - suddenly displaying miraculous powers, and thus prone to strong reactions both positive and negative. It's a little thing, but one of the things I like about Iomedae in general is that she looks like this:  Not necessarily the image a lot of fantasy would push (and has pushed) as the goddess who's the champion of The Forces of Good. The reference to Joan of Arc is, of course, pretty straightforward. Cythereal posted:
Honestly, I feel like a lot of the received wisdom about optimal builds involves a batch of spherical adventurers slugging it out with stationary enemies on a frictionless grass tile. Look at this shield, for example: DR 5/magic is fantastic! Most of the attacks being levelled at your tank in the early game are going to be non-magical and having five points knocked off the top is really going to help at these HP levels. Having a shield on a character to use as a tank isn't a bad strategy generally - this game doesn't make it difficult to make the enemies engage your tank, because most of them will just attack the first person that comes in range. (Some have AI that will send them to knife your squishies, of course, because you can't have everything go your way.) Since each point of AC is statistically more useful than the previous point up until the enemy has to roll 20 to hit you, really piling it onto a single character is better than half-assing it. Sure, you can use a pet to tank, but you can also use them to DPS if you want and there's nothing wrong with that. (Yeah, pets are functionally immortal, but you really shouldn't be planning for your tank to get knocked out in every battle.) Cythereal posted:
Well, yes. Cythereal posted:
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Apr 5, 2024 02:31
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