Board 8 > MenuWars Plays, with TiTS.

(+) Yeah! (+)

We head south to the Sapphirl Tower, to check if there's anything going on there after finishing up with the mayor. There isn't but we get a level up for our latest recruit Kloe, before continuing south again to Air-Letten to get rid of the unwanted guest.

We arrive at Air-Letten to find Mikelson, Lindsay and Bartholomew spying on a conversation behind closed doors. We head upstairs to find a guard and find it is indeed lord fat chops causing the ruckus here, and Phillip is attempting to assuage the situation.

CWO Hahn is grateful to see us, and explains the situation to us, sort of, it appears he's trying to bribe him with food, not a bad choice tbh. The guys who have apparently been bullied charge Hahn and Joshua steps in to hold them back whilst we have to go deal with the incident in the dining hall.

Fatty is trying to book the entire checkpoints rooms to himself and boot everyone out despite Phillip advising otherwise. Lmao we're supposed to make him leave, but I prefer the second option of bunging him into the falls personally, but I doubt that'll actually be an option. Let's try the diplomatic approach then.

I butter him up with the Your Grace bit... I tell him I've come from the Mayor's estate to grab him... Hmmm I insult the place out of desperation... but it fails and he says he wants to live like commoners do, a Pulp reference if ever there was one... but we tell him there's a cockroach by his foot and he panics... after telling there's monsters too he bails out and Phillip thanks us. Woohoo! Caesar seems kind of bitter about the whole deal though which sucks.

We head back and report our successes to the guild before visiting the Orbal factory to grab the maintenance parts from Tobias and receive a lecture in return for our troubles, lame. Next to find our escortee. We do learn that Vogt has a particular drink he likes that Tobias wants to hook him up with so I guess I'll check the bars around here first to see wassup.

Primo at the bar gives us a cocktail to give to him and says it needs anchovies too? Wut... well I think I bought some of those earlier but I'll check the shops on my way anyway, I'll check the bar in the docks too first. Nothing and I can't find Amelia here either so she must be at the other village as I remember her so off we go.

I visit the inn to visit the kids from the Orphanage but they're not there, Theresa thanks us for our help and we go on after buying some more anchovies from the store just in case. The kids are playing in front of the Mayor's house bless em. Everything seems to be getting a bit better apart from the Mill's still filled with swag and abandoned for no apparent reason.

We meet up with Amelia who seems to be one of the bickering siblings we encountered earlier? K then... it's a trap!... but apparently the dudes already buggered off without us, meh. We venture inside to find Zack wants black eyes in redemption for the arson at the orphanage and I think he's being fairly generous there so we'll let him live on innocently and proceed with our missions. To the lighthouse!

We hand over the maintenance tools, the cocktail and some anchovies (he's got the munchies bless him, I suppose getting high at the lighthouse would be kinda cool, can't fault ya fella) ... we get a workman's helmet and gladiators headband from the old fella, sweet. As he regales us a little with the fact he used to be an adventurer also.

Hmmm gladiator's headband's pretty cool, I give it to Josh so I can spam flicker better when needed... and we move on to Krone pass to try and find the wanderer.
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...and so off we go. We eventually make it halfway through Krone pass to discover Orvid being attacked by some fireturtles. He immediately sets about insulting Estelle after we rescue, it's becoming somewhat of a theme at this point. Liberl indeed. Ahhhh it's that dude from the beginning of the game that wanted shrooms, right you are. He was a dick then too.

We check out Krone checkpoint and there's nothing of interest going on so we head back to Manoria village where Orvid bites his tongue and agrees to accept us as business associates then buggers off without saying anything to his family, so we go do it for him, she thanks us for the rescue and apologises for him being weird.

We then do a check on everyone in the village for missed stuff, there isn't anything, we check back with everyone at Ruan and report our successes at the guild and then move on after looking for Orvid in Ruan for a bit to no avail.

Time for the Campus partaaay. We go through Vista Forest Road which splits in the middle for no apparent reason and make our way to the Campus grounds.

The Royal Academy is pretty chill and has nice background music, our first order of business is to meat Dean Collins. Who appears to be Dumbledore. Right you are then. Gotta see Jill the head of the student council. Thanks Dumbledore. Saved by the bell, we speak to him again to find out there's a school cafeteria and we're off to explore!

We meet up with Jill and Hans after talking to a few people as they bicker over the play. So Kloe is the schools top fencer bar none, it shows, and we have duel her in the finale of the play, cool. Oh jesus the SJW crowd is in the house... this games already a slow burner, don't preach to me I beg of you.

Jill's glasses steam up at the sight of Princess Joshua... lel. Jesus wtf is going on here... now she's a sexual predator? Ugh now they're acting offended because Estelle has Joshua. Alright so Jill's a bitch... let's move on then.

Nice bonding moment between Kloe and Estelle over Kloe's sad past. She's turned out very well after that kind of heartbreak. On our way to talk to the dean we get roped into putting up decorations for the Janitor, which turns out to be a quest, so I think I'll go exploring before doing anything else yet.

That dude in the clubhouse said he was looking for something earlier so I guess he's a good bet for now. Haha we overhear the guys discussing Estelle and Kloe and of course they blush and want to flee the scene immediately. This will they won't they thing is so incredibly innocent.

Now I've gotta find some books for Logic, ugh these could be bloody anywhere. We find the first one in the boys locker room nearby, and then head for the boys dormitory cus we haven't been there yet, some dude called Argyle tells us the old school house is a death trap and dares us to go there, so we shall, when we've looked for these books here first. We find book 3 behind him then check next door where Mr Effort tells us some kids haven't returned from the old school building and have the key, so that's next on the agenda for sure.

We make it to the old schoolhouse to find Mickey running for his life and a cool spooky soundtrack, time to investigate! We kill some asshole spiders and then dip outside through the east wing to find an ep charge and a little shop of horrors reference, nice.

Monsters dead but no book found, so we search the girls dormitory, nothing... then the auditorium see previous, and so finally we're left with the school building itself.

The humanities classroom has been turned into a tea shop, but we can't buy any. People are milling around everywhere and we find the second book in the faculty room, so with everywhere searched we return to Logic and complete that quest. Saving for now and will continue on from here tomorrow.
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More?
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Seems interests died, but I'll carry on regardless seeing as I said I'd do it. Looking forward to the play.
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I've been reading, just haven't had much to say!
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We head from the Clubhouse to the Dean's office to meet up with Jill again, and hopefully Joshua too cus I didn't realise how much I'd been relying on his speed in battles until they took him from me. Everyone's looking forward to the festival and it seems Richelle has a bit of a crush on Kloe. Nothing else of interest seems to be going on though.

This is all a bit Harvest Moon at the minute tbh. Jills got some sort of plot about tomorrow going on. Hans is employing Joshua as his wingman at the festival, lol. Good luck with that dude. The festival is finally upon us and tons of people flood the school. Nial on some sort of secret investigation among them. Interesting I wonder if shit's about to get real?

I stock up on Ice cream and Popcorn and all sorts of food this place is recipe central! Dumbledore and the Mayor are friends. Gilberts here too. Mayor Maybelle's here too much to Joshua's embarrassment. Good job he looks cute in that dress! Lila's as stoic as ever. I think she might be a robot tbh.

Carna's here on guard duty, good to know, and yup the alumni of a royal college being rich and famous is to be expected. Ugh Duke Dunan and Phillip are here also, I should've guessed but was hoping they'd've gotten lost sightseeing somewhere.

Oh cool they've got an orbal computer in the classroom... begin test? Errr sure why not. Oh it's like a matchmaking computer lol... The only love match I get is Kloe and Estelle before I get bored.

Commander Amalthea's here too, and without Alan Richard apparently, time to chat her up immediately. But we're distracted by Alba showing up on business. I wonder if I missed my opportunity with him in the Tower? Balls... Albeit he says the investigation is still under way so perhaps there'll be a request awaiting me upon my return to Ruan. Nope he just wants escorting to the project Logics working on, fair dos.

Awwww the kids from the Orphanage have shown up. Nice work distracting the kiddos Joshypoohs. Oh shit I didn't realise the Mayor's Villa was in Grancel I must've let that slip my mind, no wonder she had a problem with the decision. Hmmm Silver haired guys been at the campus, although Amalthea said AR hadn't been here I can't think of anyone else it could be currently. Hmmm...

Anyway on with the play! Or not as we go chasing Joshua to the Old School Building... man I love this tune. No real revelations there, we report to Carna and we outty for the play.

Estelle looks pretty bad ass in the armor it's gotta be said. Annoying buzzer sound, thanks for that. Lol Lila calling out the maids. Cool play, and oh the silver haired dude showed up, def not AR at all. Admittedly he's more blonde but that was the best guess I had.

Erm... wassup with Estelle? Dumbledooooore... Holy fuck he is Dumbledore. Nice work splurging on the Orphanage fella. Time to say goodbye to the Academy, but as we're leaving we learn that Mother Theresa and the Orphans have been attacked near Manoria, gawd dang it. Fuck that noise we're going to Ruan first to check the shop and guild!

Crazy Matilda gives me a Carnelia book out of nowhere and also agrees that it's kinda crazy. K. Shit I better check the fucking tower again first too.
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xp1337 posted...

I've been reading, just haven't had much to say!

Thanks man :)
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Also I just realised Alan Richard can be shortened to A. Dick. Heh.
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I've been reading too.
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Bollocks the bridge is up and the boat man doesn't give two shits so I guess I've missed my shot. On to Manoria then with a new quest to murder a monster too.

We fight three Jabba's and a bunch of sharks which is the quest we've picked up, it's a nasty battle and we take some licks during but win out and reach level 20 with the fat chunk of xp it rewards. Kloe is still lvl 19 by a fair margin.

We check the orphanage first but it's still abandoned and then venture into the town where everyone is gobsmacked by the mugging, we visit the inn to check on Theresa. Apparently someone used sleeping powder on them to knock em out. So they've been robbed by masked men, only masks I've seen so far are that dude on the boat from earlier. Hopefully it is them as I'd like the plot to start tying itself together a bit now.

Agate shows up, and immediately takes charge of the investigation and joins us, kinda surprised figured he'd just do off again tbh. We exit the inn and Sieg shows up and tells us where the attackers headed, Agate is left with his mouth agape and forced to give chase with us or be abandoned as Sieg takes the lead. Suck it big boi!

He joins up anyway and we're led to the lighthouse, I use this time to reequip Agate cus his items and quartz are god awful, there's not much I can do to remedy his quartz problem as he only has three slots available so I just give him hp 2 instead of 1. But at least I can give him better shoes and armor. I equip some anti sleep stuff just in case and continue on into the lighthouse.

We get into a fight with Deen immediately who seems to be on drugs or something, either way they hit like trucks. We then have a similar fight with Rais, then Rocco... Noone on the next floor so we keep heading up. Fucking Gilbert. Framing the Ravens so that the orphanage stays destroyed but why? Oh shit the Mayor's involved too, asshole, all this for some bloody expensive housing you can sell on. Oh Gilbert, you done fucked up son. I'm gonna wear your grumpy little face as my underpants when we're through.

Not the kind of conspiracy I was expecting at all, but hell it's given me a nice villain to murder. It'll do.
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Tulip_OHare posted...

I've been reading too.

Glad you're still around, should I be like, doing stuff differently with the playthrough? I'm not exactly a vet at this stuff.
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I'm also reading. I beat First Chapter pretty recently so I like seeing someone else's thoughts!
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I have also been reading as you go

holding my tongue mostly to avoid spoiling anything
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th3l3fty posted...

I have also been reading as you go

holding my tongue mostly to avoid spoiling anything

I can understand your frustration when you felt compelled to PM me. He'll understand soon enough.

MenuWars posted...

Tulip_OHare posted...

I've been reading too.

Glad you're still around, should I be like, doing stuff differently with the playthrough? I'm not exactly a vet at this stuff.

You missed much less stuff than I did my first time around. As far as I know, you even have perfect BP! And your writeups are great.
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Loool taste the power of my Heavy Blade indeed, oh god they're fast and hit like trucks and poison and attack delay this'll be fun. Not a bad little battle theme versus the two Masked Ninjas, now it's Gilbert smashing time! Albeit I hope I get to heal up first.

These mercenary ninja dudes have a lieutenant eh, I don't see why I'd care if you shot Gilbert tbh. Go for it I'll just kill you next, albeit not sure how we'd actually do against that gun you just pulled outta your ass. Yeah fine taking the old dude as hostage works, can you at least shoot that other dick again before you leave please? No, fine you guys are next. Agate runs off and leaves us giving chase.

We lock everyone up in the mill, guess that's what it was for this whole time, and accidentally tread on Gilbert's leg on the way out, Carna is back on her feet and thanks us and tells us to go and report to Jean at the guild. She's worried about Agate but that guys built like a tank so he'll prob be fine.

Awwww man we might not even be able to bust up the Mayor? There's gotta be a way round this surely, don't blue ball me. Wait what did Kloe just betray us aswell? Man fuck this.

Okay so we've gotta stall the mayor while the Army gets here to arrest him, Kloe shows back up and has perhaps done the same thing, hmmm. I check the guild board and nothing new and nothing new in the town so to the mayor's it is! Ha and of course Dunan is involved hopefully we get to bust his chops aswell, smooth moves there Joshua, smooth moves.

Bahaha the maid's fallen for Joshua too lel.

A 100 Million in debt huh Mayor? Nice work Nial. Oh shit giant ass Chimera type things. That of course hit like trucks and are fast as hell... and one of em's weak to magic and the other physical, and they get a huge ass buff when one dies. Alright that was a proper boss, good job I've been stocking up on food I'll need to make more after that.

Dude can freeze time wut? The ol Chronos rod eh? Looool Daddio even finds a way to out hero us when he's not even here. Curious as to what Joshua meant by those techniques though. Hmmm.

We meet Julia Scharz of the Royal guard after a pretty cool chase through the city and into the ocean. Nial buggers off to write a story, the Mayor apparently can't remember a thing and A. Dick looks much more blonde than I'd remembered. Bugger. Totally off there.

Julia's pretty badass, and there's something a bit off about Amalthea. I dunno what Estelle was on about with Dick apparently eyeballing Kloe though, sometimes the graphics let this game down a little I feel.

Ah so Cassius put the smackdown on Agate and that's why he joined the Bracers makes sense... and he's now off to Zeiss chasing the Ninja dudes. Which I'm pretty sure is where we'll need to go for our next badge after we get this one, woohoo! Jobs a good un, but yeah sucks to be leaving Kloe behind. We rank up in the guild again to 3rd class and receive a deathblow 1 quartz sweet maybe this one won't be one use.

We're then treated to a battle as Agate gives chase through the woods, one against the red masked dude from earlier too. Not sure about the random disco music, seems a little out of place, but it soon mellows out into a much better tune. Anti climactic and rather confusing battle ends with the guy disappearing into the forest and leaving Agate pissed off.

We rendezvous with Kloe on the dock, but figure we need to do a round check before leaving here for good anyway, so I'll start with that next time and leave it here for now.

Good stuff nice to see a recurring bad guy and meet some cool new characters. Agate's still a bit off but I'm assuming when we get more into his backstory that'll be explained in due time and he's lightened up a bit for now, excluding the last cutscene.
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Tulip_OHare posted...

th3l3fty posted...

I have also been reading as you go

holding my tongue mostly to avoid spoiling anything

I can understand your frustration when you felt compelled to PM me. He'll understand soon enough.

MenuWars posted...

Tulip_OHare posted...

I've been reading too.

Glad you're still around, should I be like, doing stuff differently with the playthrough? I'm not exactly a vet at this stuff.

You missed much less stuff than I did my first time around. As far as I know, you even have perfect BP! And your writeups are great.

Ah sorry if I've missed something obvious or something or my feelings on someone are out of whack I'm just giving honest thoughts as I proceed and there's a hell of a lot to remember.
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You missed nothing. Something amazing and silly happens in the next game that is pretty much impossible to predict until an hour before it happens.
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as far as I know, the only things you've missed are books and potentially BP from dialog options

the only way to guarantee not missing books is to do the full NPC sweep every time, and I can totally understand why one wouldn't do that
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Some thoughts, I both like and dislike how characters seem to appear for a chapter then leave, I'm used to more permanent characters in games like these and it's difficult to form bonds with anyone when you're constantly meeting new people, but constantly meeting new people keeps things fresh so it's a double edged sword.

After giving me a huge boost of power at the end of chapter 2 spells are falling off a bit now, which is actually okay given how strong they were initially but it worries me a little as I don't think I can get much better than I have currently. No idea if my builds are optimal or not at all but it's working for the most part. Kloe was an awesome magic user so she's gonna be a sore loss.

I can't tell if Joshua and Estelle are just super duper close because family or if there is any romantic inclination involved there as the game plays it up and downplays it constantly and Joshua's poker face is mighty strong.

I hope Olivier shows up again cus he was great fun and we ended on a bit of a cliffhanger with him turning out to be an agent of some sort.

Pretty disappointed that fishing was a CYOA and that's about it.

Enemy designs are pretty cool, but I feel like the animations really hold back proceedings, like with a bit more flourish this would be amazing. Overall the aesthetic fits and is good enough looking for it not to be a negative. The last boss fight was probably my favourite encounter so far and felt pretty dramatic too given the situation.

Still need to read the Carnelia books I keep getting, and I really hope I didn't miss an Alba quest.
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Yeah missing books sounds about right, way too many npcs to keep in constant contact with.
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Fishing is a huge system in SC, don't worry, and you're fine on the Alba front.
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I've been reading too. Just finished T*** quite recently myself as well. Put SC on hold to play other games like Persona 5 and NieR. Will be playing SC soon so this topic is a great refresher even though my memory of the game is still quite fresh.

Outstanding story and characters with an amazing OST. The pacing and barebones gameplay is the only thing it suffers from.
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Yeah other than the combat gameplay is very bare bones, but combat wise I've played far worse, it's certainly suffering from pacing somewhat, albeit some of that is down to me trying to find as much as I can on a first playthrough, so can't hold that against it too much, but usually in games I tend to drop that approach in favour of pursuing the juicy main plot or exploring cool stuff and forget about the npcs and things, this game I'm not feeling that pull.

Albeit the regular NPCs are far better written and more cohesive than your traditional rpg and the fact the game boxes you into these areas for a chapter keeps the exploration down a notch especially with the detailed map. When/If the game world opens up is when I'll probably start missing things in abundance.
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Okay so we buy the paper and Nial straight up talks about the Arseille even though he was requested not to do so, so typical reporter there. Everyone else is baulking at the news of the Mayor being a massively corrupt criminal. Jimmy's apparently figured out the map but is still laughing to himself maniacally.

Matilda's still chilling on the bridge being philosophical. Off we go to the Academy as our next stop. Dumbledore's pissed at the Mayor as only Dumbledore could be. Good show, ol' chap. Argyle really likes being in darkness even while bathing the creepy fucker, let's leave him to it.

Purity is looking for inspiration for her Novels and gives me a Carnelia book. Sweet. Hans and Jill wish us farewell and foreshadow us meeting later down the path. Cool beans. We leave and head over to the Orphanage, still burnt to a crisp and noone's here so on to Manoria.

We arrive to buy a few more bits and bobs for food, Theresa gives us a massive thank you from everyone for our help and wishes us safe travels.

There's a few people working at the mill now, nice. Finally let's visit the old man at the Lighthouse. He's back on his feet again but we advise him to take his time, and he agrees, see ya old timer. Still not allowed on the roof though lame. Looks like it's time for pastures new!

Clive's staying in Ruan rather than accepting an engineering job in Zeiss because of his little brother Todd, and Todd feels bad about it. Awww.

We go and investigate the Mayor's place and the staff are all unsurprisingly shocked and the dungeon doors still open, we find a draw bridge control and someone brought the boats back. Nothing else of interest. Weirdly the gang are all back at their hideout, that was fast.

We go to Sapphirl tower again just in case but seemingly nadda, while I'm at it though the center pieces, usually located on the fourth floor seem to correlate to something noteworthy nearby, Esmelas had a big tree for Mistwald, Amberl had a massive piece of Amber for the mine I'm guessing? and Sapphirl has a fountain for the nearby falls. Also Emerald, Amber, Sapphire... so the next tower being Carnelia, I'm guessing a red Carnation maybe? I should definitely read the books before going there.

We sign out at the pass in Air - Letten, other than game reasons I don't get why it's always a one way trip. Like the entire populace of Liberl has to travel counter clockwise round the country or they're stuck forever? Wut?

At least Sieg came to see us off. We make a date to see Kloe in Grancel around the Queen's birthday celebrations. Woohoo. Touching moment with the farewell as learn we taught Kloe to be brave through our buffoonery. Screee! Aha I knew there was something up with Kloe let's see wassup. Reporting directly to the Royal Guards huh. Intriguing, but pffft to you being stronger than us, unless you mean like spiritually or something. You're a no good dirty healer yo.

Anyway, into the tunnels we go.
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MenuWars posted...

Like the entire populace of Liberl has to travel counter clockwise round the country or they're stuck forever? Wut?

it's probably just because bureaucracy and paperwork are both a pain, and since you have no need to go that way, why go through the trouble?
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th3l3fty posted...

MenuWars posted...

Like the entire populace of Liberl has to travel counter clockwise round the country or they're stuck forever? Wut?

it's probably just because bureaucracy and paperwork are both a pain, and since you have no need to go that way, why go through the trouble?

That's a quote from the guard not Josh or Estelle though, he literally just said, once you fill this out, you can't come back ya know. (Paraphrased so the word literally is badly placed there if taken out of context)
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MenuWars posted...

th3l3fty posted...

MenuWars posted...

Like the entire populace of Liberl has to travel counter clockwise round the country or they're stuck forever? Wut?

it's probably just because bureaucracy and paperwork are both a pain, and since you have no need to go that way, why go through the trouble?

That's a quote from the guard not Josh or Estelle though, he literally just said, once you fill this out, you can't come back ya know. (Paraphrased so the word literally is badly placed there if taken out of context)

I think he was saying you can't go the other way without filling out the paperwork again.
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I'm going to assume that, but it reaaaally seems like they didn't think this thing through tbh.

Either way just going through Kaldia tunnel, picking up some Swag and battling what seems to be lots of singular unique enemy types for now.
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I reach a crossroads leading to a beware monsters Limestone Cavern or something and call it there for the night I'll decide where I go next time. CLIFFHANGER!
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I've been doing my best to let you do your own thing, to allow you to explore the game on your own at your own pace and to shield you from spoilers. I'm going to intervene now.

Do not go into the Limestone Caverns.

Not because it will force you to miss something or because it will ruin the plot later on.

Stay away from the caves for your own sanity. I'd like for you to be able to sleep at night.
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Haha.

Well, if we're offering advice then, I'd say head towards Zeiss for the moment. Either way is fine though.
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Lol as if the cliffhanger actually was a cliffhanger, alright I'll take your guys advice the enemies are beefy enough round here anyway.
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Right more time today so let's get into this and make some progress.
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We venture up toward Limestone Caverns just to take a peek and grab a chest on the way and end up inside with the sweet music from the old school house. Nice. I kill two hardcore penguins and then leg it cus they're a bit out of my league right now with no elemental weaknesses.

We continue on through the caverns and find a Celestial Balm full heal revive, nice! Then continue on to the exit where we hear some scrambling towards us in a panic. It's some little girl with goggles who's apparently being paid to be a lamppost mechanic like we were back in Rolent, we decide to chase after her and see wassup.

There's a load of those weird leach things congregating around the lightbulb she's trying to fix. She's got a bloody grenade launcher or something, sweet. Oh and she joined us for the combat as we rescue her and gets to use it as a regular attack, nice, nice.

Yeah you tell him Estelle, shurrup Joshypoohs stop killing the story bro. Haha Tita. Okay then, nice to meetcha. So the lights are all linked up to a computer database, that's about as techy as we've got so far. So basically Tita, the lightbulb fused or something, gotcha gotcha, or the filament burnt out whatever. Cool we escort her back to the factory and it's look pretty impressive down here.

I think the regular crafts have started to eclipse the S Breaks in terms of combat viability at this point, a good flicker is usually worth more than an S Break, same with motivate and hurricane and comet. I'm gonna see how this pans out for now, cus unless someone's capable of one shotting me I can just stall them out and rinse them regular arts and crafts (lol) spam.

Massive place with no map, hmmm k then. Faye seems to be having boyfriend problems. Everything else seems blocked off for now so we continue up. Hazel tells us Supervisor Travis wants a word with Tita.

We check the shop nearby and find a world of ridiculously priced Quartz has been opened up to us, holy shit. Think I'll stick with what I've got for now while I try to figure out what I need. So let's check that other route first. We find ourselves in the archives where we read a book about a haggard old genie with bad eyesight that eats people.

Prometheus working in the design part, heh. The others are worried about the Arseilles engine which is apparently what Clive would've been working on if he were here. Karl the dude whose gun we retrieved works here also. Apparently his bad ass super gun will be ready for sale soon, sweeet.

Next we meet Dr Miriam, and Terry and Ray in the lab, Terry's an insomniac and Ray's a mad scientist obsessed with evil Tomatoes we take a few samples with us.

Operations department has Tifa and Travis talking about bugs in the system and nothing else of interest other than a crane arm outside on the balcony, roof is barren.

We ride the escalator down to the city after exploring the docks where we find Antoine the cat (is that the one we rescued earlier? same Nyao)...and nothing else. We meet Stain (looool) who tells us he owns the weapons shop here and it's across the road from the guild so he'll hook us up with some swag.

Then we head to Bracer guild. Ugh... Kilika seems like she's going to be a pain, hopefully we won't have to deal with her much. Mr Murdock is the mayor/corporate engineer dude around and we're given a letter of introduction. A- Team Music plays. We pick up two quests one a monster hunt and one for Librarian duties at the place we're heading to, both are long term so no need to rush for now.
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We head off to become librarians. We read the books, Kitty talk for dummies is hilarious, and Tomorrow's Cooking gets us a new recipe, sweet. We return them and get given a clue for another wild goose chase to find another book somewhere in a mountain village, so I guess this Elmo or Wolf Fort?Albeit Elmo might be a volcano, judging by the map.

We buy some new equipment, new booties and weapons, a hp 3 quartz for Estelle and two ep cut 2's. We also come upon a professor R at the Russel home who is surrounded by high tech equipment and Joshua suggests we shouldn't disturb him further. Guess I'll go deliver my letter for now then go chase up the book once I'm a little more settled, need to kill that monster too, but I'm hoping I can get Tita back in the party or someone else first.

Carnelia Towers on the cards also, but this place seems like the biggest area on the map with tons of places to visit so I'm gonna play it by ear here.

Emma the maid at the hotel is kinda nuts. Cosimo and Professor R built the clock, and the town used to be known by it apparently. Alright town explored time to get busy this time.

We get sent to an appointment with Murdock who has crazy eyes so the names quite fitting for him. Apparently our Black Orbment has no Caliber which means very little to me... and it's got no maintenance cover either it's just a thing at this point.

So Professor Epstein invented Orbment technology and Professor Russell or R was one of his underlings...annnnd Tita's the old fellas Grand Daughter, everythings come full circle, good good. We get to the Professor's house to find him apparently fapping at his desk. Ut oh. He finishes up and we get roped into an experiment for some kind of stealth technology.

Yeah you tell him Estelle, or rather go make us another cup of... ow! Alright so back on track, the black orbment is made out of some sort of special metal also. Then we have lunch with the eccentric family. Before proceeding to try and scan it to see what it does.

Dramatic music starts before anythings even been pressed yet, ut oh. Oh so it's gonna be like an anti magic thing? Or perhaps just a devourer? Yup pretty damn bad ass too, city wide blackout is impressive. Getting a weird Suikoden 2 vibe from the game for a while now and this kind of compounds it. It's just on a smaller scale. With greater emphasis on individuals... and of course for now at least, no war.

Gotta side with Joshua here Estelle keeping Tita as a pet would definitely be all kinds of creepy. We buy Tita a new gun after flogging some old crap and we're once again broke. We then try to sneak out of the south exit to try and go monster hunting after checking in at the guild but it seems we're unable to, so to the factory it is then.
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The Kitty Talk book is actually consistent with the cats in the game.
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So we go to the factory and learn we need to assemble a combustion engine to try and crack open the black orbment, so we use the orbment version of Google, CAPEL, to track down the parts we need and head off to grab them.

We go to the docks first, and coincidences meet coincidences as the chief who was away lands just as we enquire about him, and upon the factory Leibnitz or whatever he has the combustion engine we're looking for, which was coincidentally being used for research by the military at Leiston Fortress. Either way we have one, but that was a barrage of coinkydinks to crawl through.

Now to the basement to hopefully pick up some gasoline. Thanks for the gas and lecture on the conveyor system Faye, seeya! We deliver the goods and our ears are assaulted by the engine and saw in motion.

It did bugger all but apparently they want to proceed like this anyway even though it'll probably destroy the orbment completely *shrug*. We then discovered the hot springs at Elmo is in trouble because the water pumps broken down so we arrange to escort Tita there to fix it, and hopefully bust some monsters on the way, sweet. It's finally time to explore!

But after all that plot exposition that'll be it for tonight.
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woodman posted...

The Kitty Talk book is actually consistent with the cats in the game.

Wouldn't surprise me at all but I'll be damned if im gonna remember all that.
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whoa there

Kilika is great
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It was a very cold reception she gave us when we arrived at the guild, maybe she'll get better if not, you have bad taste sir :P
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Looking forward to getting into this later, yesterday was mostly just cutscenes and talking to loads of people. Should get to bust some heads and explore later.
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Kilika the best
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We visit the Bracer guild on the way past and pick up a boat load of new quests, most of which have short time spans so gotta be careful here. then we continue south to pastures new. Nevermind we've got two quests on the fourth floor of the factory to pick up first so let's go grab em.

So first we go to investigate the stolen cigarettes and recruit Antoine the cat to come with us with some fresh milk. Kinda wish I hadn't given that kitty book back hopefully I'll be able to remember some of it and work it out regardless.

We then go to grab the test product from Terry in the lab, he gives us some Strega sneakers to test out by wearing them to various places so I guess I should equip them before we venture anywhere and then Estelle fangirls out about the shoes. I let Estelle wear them as she seems the obvious choice.

Then we go and interrogate Travis about the cigarettes, but Antoine doesn't react to him at all so he seems in the clear for now. Next up the guy in the lobby then. Hugo seems like a dead end too so we need to go look for clues. We head back to the medical centre to learn more but there doesn't seem to be anything going, guess I've just gotta search this place top to bottom then. To the roof! Nadda. Fifth floor and Stairwell are clueless also. Third floor time.

Karl's still working on his super gun and Louise seems bored, moving to her to the engine crew definitely seems like a good idea. Still no clues though, onward to the 2nd floor. Ohhhh cool the book for kittys is back on the shelf, I can make use of this. We get cutscened as we move towards the office and Antoine's onto something.

Ha the cat's selling ol Murdock eh, we need proof though. Antoine detective cat extraordinaire directs us to the back room, but we need a key. We find it hidden in a green book on the desk to the side, like a sneaky bond villain. Poor chief Murdock is busted, the dastardly villain was smoking because he was stressed! Vacation my butt, to prison with you sir!

Good job Antoine you grass, now on to pastures new with our new booties. Actually while we're here we'll run the booties over to Air-Letten first, we also find out Rudi has the hots for Faye but blew it while we make our way there. It gets us a level up for Tita which'll help and replaces some of our stash of Sepith, Warrant Officer Kientz said FUBAR :O, but it seems like words travelled fast about the accident in Zeiss. No cutscene or anything about the shoes, hope im doing this right :/... either way we head back then go south towards Elmo, I'll swing back for Wolf Fort on my way back to report the quests then take the Easterly route afterwards, visiting everywhere should obliterate these shoes.

Holy shit the plains is full to the brim with monsters, albeit in small quantities everywhere, including creepy sheeps that touch me and armoured rabbits that look like cockroaches. I then open a chest and discover a badjillion Creepy Sheeps inside, I thought I'd remembered opening a gold chest before and not getting ambushed but maybe I was just lying to myself, either way it's magical bombardment time. Tita manages to blind the majority of them with her craft and it's a fairly decisive victory for us. We get a hit 3 Quartz for our troubles and give it to Tita immediately. Sweet.

Man this place is massive. We make it to Elmo and introduce ourselves to Mrs Mao, she gives us the pump key and tells us where to go to repair it, then we find a book under the bridge as we explore the hotel, getting a little worried I'm about to reach a critical point of no return for quests soon but I still haven't found the Plains monster, guess I'll go head off towards Wolf Fort first then. Fuck I can't exit the village so have to reload, fuck you game you're not stopping me that blatantly yet. The book can wait at least I know where it is.
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For the record, the reason I suggested heading towards Zeiss before was because you literally run into Tita further down that very screen.

My first playthrough I explored and cleared out the Limestone Cave with Estelle/Joshua when I first saw it... then left and continued on... and saw Tita and was like "oh god now i have a third party member... who also just missed all that exp"

I very carefully worded that as "towards Zeiss" rather than "enter Zeiss" for that reason.

And yeah the plains around Zeiss are pretty big and surprisingly good at hiding things like chests... and sidequest monsters. >_>
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It's hard enough to find the Tratt chests in FC. In SC they hide chests behind rocks!
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I'm part way through another write up for this but stopped to get some stuff done and eat, but part of the reason I've slowed my exploring other than poking my nose into areas is because I keep ending up way over levelled if I explore fully first time and then it takes til the end of the chapter for stuff to catch up to me again. This way I get to explore for quests and don't get super powerful, albeit more chance of me missing stuff but I'll take the risk for an overall better experience.
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Oh, yeah, I wasn't saying that you should go to Limestone Cavern or anything. Just that if that was something you wanted to do, recruiting Tita would have been helpful and that's why I suggested what I did.

If you do Limestone Cavern early you absolutely are overlevelled the whole chapter, those penguins give crazy EXP.
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Yeah I gotcha, I kinda feel like hardmode would've been better for me this game with the 100% run mechanic, had I known about it earlier. But I'm used to turnbased rpgs with difficulty levels absolutely shitting on you for playing without a guide so didn't want the hassle.
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Nightmare is a Nightmare, FYI.
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Phew we find the Plains "monster" over on the way to Wolf Fort and manage to defeat them. They hit like trucks and get a super buff when on low hp or near one that is but Tita's smoke bomb with the range up perk I have on her is bloody amazing.

I turn around a find a crashed truck, so I'm guessing this is my haulage mission also, thank god I hadn't saved after I'd explored the village. Woulda missed everything. This turns into a massive ambush versus Cockrabbits but they bunch up infront of us and get smoked, nice job holding them off Wong. Bruno tells us to speak to Prometheus if we have time so we'll definitely do that as well before proceeding after we check out the Wolf Fort, and maybe the Tower too.

I spy a Shining pom and equip a deathblow 2 rune on Josh to a secure a single kill and get some mad xp. Then we have a quick look inside Carnelia tower. We find a bunch of chests on the first floor but no cutscenes or anything, and head onto the second where we get into a nasty fight with some robber trappers, we're getting great xp but nothing seems to be going on up in here and the battles are costly so we leave with a Mind 3 Quartz and Black coat for our troubles. We'll be back.

We make our way to the exit near but not to Wolf Fort and find a little enclosure containing upgraded versions of those things that were robbing the farm back in Rolent, it also has a weird monolith thing in the centre. We continue on and find a trapped chest containing a daddy version of them and a group of the smaller ones, after blinding Estelle they split up and play dead mostly whilst we bombard them with arts and crafts. We win out and grab ourselves a sapphire talisman, yoink.

We leave and do a double check of the area to loot anything we missed then head to Wolf Fort. We find another trapped chest with a Black Bangle in it and nothing else of interest so on we go. In the next area we find another load of enemies with a trapped chest containing a Long Barrel which is a great item for Tita, nice.

Inside Wolf Fort at the border to Calvard, we find Warrant Officer Gerwin clearly vying for promotion and having a good old moan about CWO Pace. We meet Rufus from the Republic of Calvard working at the inn and CWO Pace saying he wishes to remain in peace with them. Right you are. At the gate we find Private Brahm sleeping on the job, he wakes up yelling Faye's name, she must be quite the catch.

We find ourselves being roped into a relationship break up and agree to deliver a letter and get a gift for Faye to try and help repair it for the poor oaf. Joshua thinks we're getting in over our heads a bit and frankly I agree but a quests a quest... well plenty of reasons to go back to Zeiss now so let's do it, plus I forget to go to the bar earlier also... and we need to use the other exit to head out towards the other areas here to run these bloody shoes in. If it's not done after that I guess I'll just run round in a circle for a bit.

We go to the bar first and Ben chooses one of those tomatoes we stole earlier much to everyone's surprise and of all the things he could've made with it, turns it into a Tomato sandwich. Good job Ben I'll be voting for you in master chef buddy. Either way mission compreeto.

We go to the local store to see if we can buy a gift and the only thing available that's in any way shape or form cute is the Woolly Knit Hat... which is 200 mira more than Brahm gave us but I guess it'll have to do. First things first we visit Prometheus. But he's useless we've gotta go use Google. It's apparently in the underground factory entrance which is pretty much where we're going for Faye anyway unless she's buggered off so let's go kill two birds with one stone.
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