Let's Play Monster Quest part 13
So it turns out the monster-slaying weapons and the Juna Fruit aren't actually unused. You could get them at an event in Japan.
Non-Japanese players just plain don't have access to them in regular play, so for most of the world it's accurate enough to say they're in the code but non-functional.
So that's interesting.
A straightforward enough name.
WHY DID I AGREE TO WALK THROUGH THE MOUNTAINS I NEED A BREAK
... I don't remember you doing so?
... you know, you're right. I just... followed the boy.
What's that sound?
WHEEEEEE
It's just-
No, the other sound, from that abandoned fort over there.
Huh. I hear something too, now that you mention it.
Sounds like monsters scuttling about to me. HELLO THE FORT! DO YOU ACKNOWLEDGE THE DARK LADY OF RENAIS AS YOUR TRUE QUEEN?
RACE TRAITORS, ALL OF YA! HUMANS IS FOR EATING, NOT LEADING!
Oh great, they're monster supremacists.
I think we should prepare for battle.
Let's.
To start, here's what I can see using Colm. None of the monsters in Colm's sight are particularly interesting.
But, first, our soon-to-be allies!
L'arachel is... a Light magic user?? Huh. I was looking forward to a Staff Mogall. The series does associate Light magic with Staff usage semi-consistently, so I guess this makes sense. I guess I'll just keep on trucking with Tethys as my only healer until I start getting promotions. It's worked surprisingly well, really, and the run feels very different from the unmodified game with me relying on the durability of my units instead of abusing healing magic constantly.
Stats-wise... well, she's seven levels higher. She's gained a point of Constitution and lost a point of Move (Also she's lost Canto, unfortunately), but the Constitution is a bit misleading since Staves ignore Constitution, making Troubadour L'arachel's Constitution only relevant to Rescuing. The relevant comparison point is going to be when she's promoted. Her other stats... comparing her to Troubadour L'arachel's averages at level 10, she's roughly 3 HP ahead, 4-5 Magic ahead, 6 Skill ahead, 2 Speed ahead, about on target for Luck or slightly ahead, 2 points of Defense ahead, and on target for Resist.
So she's actually better than L'arachel would usually be at this level, really, and I won't need to feed as much experience to her to get her not so horrifically vulnerable. Light magic is also inherently improved by Monster Quest making it uniformly effective against monsters, and she's not got Artur's horrible Luck. If it weren't for Artur and Lute already having an A in their Support, I'd probably just straight-up dump Artur from here on out. I may yet do that anyway, really, as her stats are actually fairly comparable to his overall, except she has obscene Luck.
Artur and Lute's Support is mostly defensive anyway: at A rank it'll be +3 to Defense, +15 to Avoid, +15 to "crit avoid" (Which admittedly patches up Artur's awful Luck when he's with Lute, more than offsetting L'arachel's Luck advantage), plus 7 Accuracy and 1 damage.
(For reference, the baseline modifications are: +6 HP, +7 Magic, +8 Skill, +5 Luck, +3 Defense, +3 Resist, -1 Move, +1 Constitution. That Skill score in particular is impossible for even a perfectly lucky base-game L'arachel to match, and base-game L'arachel would at best tie on Magic)
So here's Dozla the Cyclops. Compared to Berserker Dozla, every stat has gone up a lot except for Strength (only 1 point) and Move. (Down a point) His Luck, in particular, has jumped from a terrible 4 points to a solid 14. He hasn't lost the Berserker crit chance bonus, either, otherwise his crit wouldn't be so high with the Battle Axe. We'll see if Cyclops are able to cross rivers and mountains like Berserkers or not, but Dozla is much improved in Monster Quest, and I actually consider him passable for a pre-promote in the base game. Awesome.
(Specifics: +6 HP, +1 Strength, +9 Skill, +9 Speed, +10 Luck, +7 Defense, +10 Resist, -1 Move, +3 Constitution. Wow)
Here's the forces I brought and the formation I started with.
I actually brought Franz over Ross in my first attempt at this mission, but the mission is overall a little more friendly to bringing an Axe user than to bringing a Sword/Lance user -no enemy on the map has an Axe, and there's a number of Lance users- and I'm still trying to get Ross some experience in hopes of making him usable. If he just got enough Speed that he stopped being doubled by everything, he'd be okay, really.
I only had two failed attempts at this mission. In spite of being a fog mission, I tend to consider it to be a bit of a breather mission, though Monster Quest has made it a bit hairier with its changes to monsters and their weapons. The first failed attempt revolved around me not properly accounting for Revenants having exceptional Speed rather than 0 Speed. The second failed attempt... involves a specific part of the map. I'll talk about it when I get to it.
For this attempt I actually stripped most of the stealable items from my units. I don't want to be dealing with Revenants lunging out of the fog to take my stuff, especially since there's a little time pressure to the mission, sort of.
The first thing I do is have Neimi break out her Longbow to hit this archer Bonewalker. She crit-kills them, which, incidentally, is why I have Colm starting at the south of the map. That way he provides his (A-tier) Support bonus to her, which includes a crit chance bonus. +15 for the two of them, in fact, so she'd have no chance of this if he wasn't present. It also adds 3 damage and 15 Accuracy, so Colm's moral support is doubly necessary for this to be a kill, as 8x3 is not equal to or greater than 31. It's just 24.
Next I have Tethys use her Torch Staff to reveal more enemies. The only noteworthy one is the Bonewalker next to the chest, whom is carrying a Longbow.
I then do a fair amount of moving up, ending turn like this. Ross is hopefully going to get some decent experience off of the Revenants down south -among other points, I'm pretty sure Monster Quest Revenants have the Thief experience bonus. (A Thief provides 20 experience on top of whatever else they're supposed to provide when killed, unmodified by the killer's level)
Enemy turn, and a Bonewalker goes for Tana and misses. She doubles them and kills them.
The second Bonewalker actually lands its hit, but otherwise things don't go any better for it, and Tana gets a decent level out of killing it.
Then for some reason we jump down to a Bonewalker suiciding on Dozla.
This, of course, isn't necessarily reflective of how Dozla actually looks, but it's interesting to me how he has pinkish skin. Normally Cyclops have grey/green skin.
Then we bounce back to Tana being attacked. She's again hit -she actually could've died here if I'd been unlucky, but eh- and again doubles and kills her attacker.
Then we bounce back again to Dozla being attacked and murdering his attacker. This time he gets a crit.
Also wow does the Cyclops belly look gross when I can see how far it hangs out and how its discoloration isn't, like, shading or something. Ew.
Lute baits out a Bow-wielding Bonewalker successfully.
Ross gets doubled by a Revenant and misses his retaliation. At least they missed their first hit.
Lastly, Dozla walks up to and vaporizes another Bonewalker. (He doubled them and got the crit on the second hit)
My turn, and I open up with Neimi softening up the closest of Ross' Revenants.
Then I bounce over to having Lute finish off that archer Revenant with Tethys' support. She gets a depressing level out of the kill.
Tana heals, and I do some general moving up.
Ross risks taking a shot at the Revenant Neimi weakened, and to my pleasant surprise he finishes them off successfully, netting him a decent level. I'm especially happy at the point of Speed, though it's too bad Revenants are so fast they still double him.
This ends my turn.
Enemy turn, a Bonewalker goes for Tana, lands its hit, and dodges one of her retaliatory hits. Well, that's vaguely annoying. Oh well.
Meanwhile, over with Ross, another Revenant goes for him. He lands his hit and dodges their second attack, too. Going well!
After a fairly uneventful enemy turn, it's L'arachel and Dozla's time to waste more experience. Due to Dozla missing one of his swings/not critting on the other swing, L'arachel comes along and finishes them off, looking really weird. Hard to say whether this is what she'll look like or not -L'arachel does have green hair, and hair color seems to be one of Monster Quest's main ways of defining palette.
My turn, and I start by having Tana finish off this Bonewalker.
I actually wanted to have someone else take the kill so Tana could help in the north, but circumstances conspired against me.
So instead we have Amelia getting a successful chip on the Mauthe Doog -which I am treating with extreme caution and want dead now- to my pleasant surprise, followed by-
-Eirika going for a Killing Edge swing. (Shadowkiller isn't a one-hit-kill, unfortunately) She fails to get the crit, but the Mauthe Doog doesn't crit her either, not that it would've killed her if it did. That works out, since I don't want Eirika getting the kill, really. She's over-level, and I really ought to focus on feeding her the occasional boss.
Instead Vanessa takes a chance and, to my intense relief, lands the lethal hit.
Okay, awesome, first Mauthe Doog down.
The last noteworthy event here in the east is Tethys healing Lute.
Over west I push my luck with Ross, and he gets the kill!
Then I have Neimi Longbow the Entombed -soften it up for later- and final moving up occurs.
Bonewalker goes for Eirika, thwacks her, and then gets double-critted to death.
The Dark Lady of Renais cares not about the weapon triangle. She is victory.
Then the Longbow Bonewalker I mentioned earlier goes for Vanessa and misses.
Also holy crap is that an awesome-looking motion blur.
Meanwhile over with Ross, he exchanges blows with the last Revenant, and again dodges one of their hits and lands his own hit.
The RNG likes you, Ross.
... not sure when this Revenant showed up. Last turn, I guess, but I didn't notice the camera moving to indicate its arrival. Weird.
Ross runs east into some woods once Colm and Neimi are out of the way, and Tethys heals Ross so he can go back to getting that Revenant experience in a minute. Colm spots nothing actually new in the process of moving.
Up in the east, Marisa bites this Longbowskeleton twice, no crit. Eh, that's fine. Even if she'd double-critted he'd still be alive.
Instead Amelia chips for some more experience, and then Vanessa lands the two finishing blows.
A whole bunch of moving up happens, leaving me like this -Lute and Artur are placed in an attempt to bait out any ranged attackers there might be that I'm not seeing.
First action of the enemy turn is a Bonewalker missing Vanessa and being mauled in turn.
Then a Mogall follows up and hits Vanessa. Eh.
The other Mogall goes for Eirika and misses. Nice.
One Revenant goes for Ross, and neither of them can land a hit. Okay. Like, Ross should've missed earlier, definitely, but he's still dodging weirdly often.
Enemy turn ends and more reinforcements arrive in the upper-left corner, in addition to the unexpectedly large mob of Revenants you see here.
Colm moving up and revealing... mostly a lot of nothing. This Bonewalker has a Slim Sword, though, so I should be careful about them.
Ross retreats further -way too many Revenants are in reach, and I don't want to let any of them attack him from a Forest tile- and I have Tethys heal him for lack of a particularly better move, really.
Marisa goes for a Mogall, gets one crit. Needed two, really, but this might work out.
Vanessa chips the Bonewalker that attacked her, netting her an okay level, all things considered. 10 Luck is an important break point.
Tana then lobs a Javelin to finish off the Bonewalker, netting her a decent level too.
Amelia then finishes off the Mogall that Marisa weakened, gaining another high-stat level. Nice.
Lastly, Eirika takes out a Killing Edge and insta-gibs the Mogall before it can move. Excellent!
This ends my turn.
The Slim Sword Bonewalker goes for Eirika, lands a regular hit, and is critted and then whacked with a regular hit, leaving it nearly dead.
Over with Ross, a Revenant goes for him. Alas, Ross misses his retaliation.
My turn again, and Marisa backs up and gets healed by Tethys.
Amelia exactly finishes off the Bonewalker that attacked Eirika. It drops a Chest Key, which I promptly send to the convoy.
Vanessa and Tana both get some healing in, heading to the west to help fight the tide of Revenants.
Then I do some moving up I don't bother to screenshot and end my turn. Whoops.
First a Revenant goes for Colm, missing him. His retaliation nets him a quite nice level. More Luck and Resist would be nice, of course, but honestly, past 10 Luck the biggest benefit -lowering enemy crit chance on you- diminishes in value, with 15 Luck being enough that even promoted enemies with perfect Skill have no crit chance on you. I'm not liable to see any such enemies for a while, if ever, so him sitting at 14 Luck is fine.
My turn, and Colm moves to block in the enemies. Ross goes to try to finish off the Revenant that attacked Colm, misses, and is doubled for his trouble. Ouch.
I have Tethys break out her Recover Staff to fully heal him.
Meanwhile over east, Artur and Neimi take apart a Mauthe Doog. Still need to do something about the other one.
Bouncing back to the zombie hordes, Amelia takes a pot-shot. She lands her hit, too. Awesome.
Not much I can do at this point. I end the turn.
The remaining Mauthe Doog goes for Artur, and doubles him. It's only blind luck (And possibly his Support with Lute helping) that he's not critted to death.
Yikes.
Over to the west, a Revenant... fails to hit Ross twice, and he fails to hit it in turn.
Uuuuh. Okay. That's the second time this has happened, and this time the Revenant had in actuality something like a 90% chance to hit per attack. This is lunacy.
Colm gets attacked by a different Revenant. Eh.
Reinforcements show up in the northeast, in the fog.
Amelia finishes off the Revenant that attacked Colm, netting her another quite nice level. I'm almost certain she's got good growths, at this point.
Tana lobs a Javelin at the Mauthe Doog that went for Artur, and to my surprise actually lands her hit, killing it.
Tethys backs up to heal Eirika.
Ross takes a potshot at a Revenant in back, using his Hatchet, as I'm trying to avoid getting him killed/hopefully get him a level to help him out here. He gets a pretty nice level, though I was hoping for Speed, really. Defense helps right now, though, where Speed would not prevent him from being doubled by the Revenants. Make him slightly dodgier, but I'd rather have the Defense. So, okay, whatever.
Colm backs away, revealing the enemies as nothing of interest, and Artur heals.
General moving up happens, and I end the turn looking like this.
The archer Bonewalker goes for Artur, and to my shock Artur finally gets a low-odds crit, instantly killing it.
This opens the way for another Bonewalker to go for Artur, this one by throwing a Javelin, but it misses and is doubled to death.
Back over west, the Revenant in front of Ross attacks him, and he hits it with his retaliation. (Wait, why didn't I have Vanessa Trade-manipulate his Fiendcleaver into being equipped?)
Vanessa gets attacked too, and doubles and kills her tormentor after they miss her.
Another Revenant goes for her, this one too fast for her to double. They both get in a single successful hit.
Lastly, reinforcements show up in the southwest.
My turn, and I open up by having Artur cripple this Gargoyle.
Then I bounce back to having Ross try to finish off the Revenant that attacked him.
He misses and is doubled down to near-death.
Amelia takes a pot-shot at Vanessa's Revenant, and Tethys heals Ross with a Recover Staff again.
Vanessa backs up and Tana comes in to take the kill, and is just short of leveling.
I end turn shortly afterward.
The last reinforcement Bonewalker makes a failed attempt at hitting Artur, and mauling them with his magic nets him a decent enough level.
Really want Speed and Luck, though. He can get by without Magic and stay relevant against monsters, but his iffy Speed and poor Luck are really hurting him. It's not like Supports can provide Speed, either.
A Revenant goes for Ross, dodges his retaliation again.
Other Revenant goes for Tana. She brings it to the verge of death and gets a nearly perfect level out of it. Excellent.
My turn again, and I start by having Colm loot the chest. It's a Secret Book. Uh. Hmm. I have a lot of characters with low-ish Skill, but nobody really stands out as having sufficiently atrocious Skill that they're the obvious pick. Hmmm.
Honestly, Skill Books are, in my opinion, the least useful of the stat-up items. A slight increase in accuracy and an extra 1% chance to crit is essentially invisible.
Amelia finishes off Tana's Revenant, then Tethys gives her another turn while Tana moves forward, letting Amelia finish off another Revenant. She gets another solid level up.
I think she's competitive with Franz right now, even though she's still like 3-4 levels below him.
Neimi goes and vaporizes one of the two Bonewalkers to the east, netting her this meh level-up. 3 stats is nice, but I'd rather she get other stuff. Oh well. She could still theoretically cap everything except HP and Luck before promotion.
Artur advances his relationship with Lute to A, and Lute uses the Power of Love-
And hellfire. Can't forget the hellfire.
-to utterly destroy the other Bonewalker in the area.
So Lute, I'm pretty sure you've been hitting on me since we were, like, twelve.
... I don't remember ever hitting you?
Um, no. I mean you're obviously interested in a relationship with me, and have been for ages.
You are my favorite student.
... a romantic relationship.
That word sounds familiar. I think it was in a thesaurus I read once.
...
...?
This is going to require extreme measures.
Eirika advances south, staying out of reach of the Gargoyle I can see, and uses a Torch. It reveals... another Gargoyle.
Huh. I thought the enemies on the other side of that door were directly next to it.
Enemy turn. One Revenant suicides to no effect on Tana.
The other Revenant dodges Ross again.
Come on, (horse)man!
My turn, and I start by having Tethys heal Ross, and Ross smack the Revenant.
Successfully, this time.
Amelia finishes it off and gets her (I think) first merely okay level. I'm fine with this.
I have Artur finish off the northern Gargoyle, and moving up happens, leaving me looking like this.
Somewhere in the fog, something loots that western chest, which apparently contained a Restore Staff.
Well. I should be able to loot it by killing them.
The Gargoyle goes for Marisa, and misses. Awesome.
More reinforcements arrive in the southwest.
General moving up happens, placed just so. I'll explain in a minute.
This is roughly where I ended up having to retry my second, final time. Right now, though, Eirika is advancing west to recruit L'arachel and Dozla, refreshing her Torch radius in the process.
General moving up happens again, with Tethys healing Tana.
And this is why I was being careful.
I'm not sure of the exact trigger area, but if you go near the door, there's a Bonewalker with a Door Key on the other side of the door who will open it and an entire force in the southeast pours through.
In this case, all that happened was Marisa taking a weak hit from a Bonewalker archer, but this spot cost me my second run, even though I knew it was coming. I was a little too aggressive, and got overwhelmed unnecessarily.
Enemy turn ends and Green Team's turn begins. Dozla goes up into the fog -showing that the AI ignoring the fog applies to Green Team allies, something I'd never specifically thought about before- to tear apart a Bonewalker, and L'arachel goes over to maul another one.
... putting her out of Eirika's reach on my turn.
This makes Dozla's earlier miss a lot more painful. If Dozla hadn't left that enemy alive way back when, L'arachel wouldn't have moved one tile to the west, and this Bonewalker would therefore have not been in her reach, and therefore she would've held still, and therefore come my turn I would've recruited her and she'd have recruited Dozla.
Ugh. So much experience wasted.
I think it gets worse, too, but I'll cover that later.
My turn, and Tana goes to murder a Gargoyle.
... instead she misses her second hit. Arrrgh.
At least she dodged the retaliation. That's something.
Tethys gives Ross another move, so he can contribute to the upcoming Lance-filled fight.
Lute finishes off Tana's Gargoyle, while Neimi goes for a Killer Bow kill on the other one.
Nope.
Ross misses again, this time on 74 listed Accuracy, and gets doubled in exchange.
He's now at risk of death.
Why, game, why.
Marisa weakens the Bonewalker archer, but refuses to crit them.
Artur finishes off the Gargoyle Ross should've killed, opening the way for Vanessa to swoop in and finishes off the Bonewalker archer.
Now nobody will die to the RNG screwing with me.
Lastly, Colm moves up, leaving us looking like this. (Eirika is covered by the menu)
Note the Deathgoyle. Also note that it's not the boss of the map -I haven't simply missed the little boss shield icon flashing onto the screen. For some reason I always remember this Deathgoyle as the boss, but it isn't.
Enemy turn, and one Bonewalker gets itself mauled by Tana. It doesn't even manage to injure her.
The Bonewalker that goes for Vanessa has the same fate.
Aaaaaaaah
L'arachel avoids dying to an archer Bonewalker through blind luck, and the Entombed steals her Elixir.
Really really aggravated about Dozla's miss way back when.
Green Team's turn, Dozla murders the archer Bonewalker while L'arachel flies away to safety, thankfully.
My turn!
Oh. It's you again. Are you with these renega-
Oh, hello there your Dark Majesty! Lovely day to bathe in the blood of our enemies, isn't it?
-er.
You know, I think Fomortiis himself wants us to ally. We just keep meeting! 'tis fate.
Well, um, that's nice miss... what's your name again?
L'arachel, of course! Definitely not the princess of Rausten by the same name, nosiree, just a popular name in Rausten you know.
You know, I was about to ask if you were the Pontifex's niece, but you're right, it would be an absurd coincidence for me to run into her by chance.
Ha ha, yes! Absurd. Quite.
I don't think she's ever left Rausten's territories, in fact.
Oh, I wouldn't know, your Dark Majesty. I'm just a simple traveler with her enormous, enormously bloodthirsty bodyguard, drowning our foes in their own blood!
... charming. So you'll fight alongside us? You and your, um, bodyguard?
I'll just nip on over to let him know, yes.
Good.
First attack of the turn is Lute mauling this Bonewalker.
Ross takes the iffy odds of finishing off said Bonewalker with a Hatchet, and finally lands a hit, never mind that now he's at the weapons triangle disadvantage.
Tana takes this opportunity to inflict severe damage on the Deathgoyle, taking a pretty nasty hit in turn.
She had a chance of instantly dying to a crit, but I felt the odds were low enough and my options few enough that it was a worthwhile risk.
... though it's only occurring to me this very moment that Tana's Luck is too high for the Deathgoyle to have a crit chance on Skill alone (She has 15 Luck, so even if the Deathgoyle had capped Skill she'd be immune), and I know Steel Lances don't have an increased crit chance in Monster Quest. It appears Monster Quest has given Deathgoyles a crit chance bonus, to make up for not getting a weapon on promotion. Neat. Annoying at this very moment, but it means Tana and Vanessa have something to look forward to... assuming I don't take whatever their other option is. No idea what that might be, actually.
Amelia crit-kills this Bonewalker. Between not expecting it at all and the fact that Bonewalker throwing crit animation is lightning fast, I utterly failed to screenshot it, not even managing to get the red burst effect.
The rapidity of the Bonewalker Lance crit animations suggests to me that Bonewalkers/Wights were a relatively late addition or otherwise suffered from insufficient attention, as part of the reason their Lance crit animations are so fast is that there's very little actually new spritework drawn. Play one or two frames of art, done.
The fact that it drops a Chest Key indicates it was the Bonewalker that opened the door.
Neimi takes a shot at the last Bonewalker of the group.
Colm loots the last unlooted chest, netting me a Short Spear, which he promptly sends to the convoy. This'll come in handy.
Vanessa finishes off the Bonewalker for a decent level. I like how she's a mixed tank.
Artur then finishes off the Deathgoyle.
He gets a somewhat disappointing level out of it, though at least his Luck increased. One more point, come on man!
Tethys heals Ross and gets another ridiculous level out of it, though no +2s this time, while L'arachel heals herself even though I'd like for her to recruit Dozla this turn.
The enemy turn comes and goes, and it's a Dozla-fest, involving him killing two Mogalls (One on their turn, one on his) but losing his Elixir to the Entombed.
Unfortunately, he's currently out of L'arachel's immediate movement radius. Arrrgh.
My turn, and I have everybody pile to the west. Tethys helps Neimi along, since she's currently one of my lower-level characters thanks to the Juna Fruit.
I don't even bother to try to get the Elixir back from the Entombed, since Entombed apparently have an innate +15 to crit. Too much risk. Instead, I have Eirika take a small risk in killing it. Thankfully, she dodges its retaliation, and gets a solid level out of it. I mean, I'd really like more Strength and Defense, but +4 stats when one of her best stats is capped is pretty good.
Incidentally, at this point I suspect Entombed are hilarious experience bonanzas. Since Revenants seems to have the Thief experience bonus (fixed +20 when killed), and Entombed have an innate experience bonus in the game (fixed +60, should be), Entombed are probably worth a minimum of 80 experience when killed, regardless of level. I know for a fact that boss Entombed are automatically worth 100 experience, between the boss experience bonus and the Entombed experience bonus. (Plus the fact that experience caps at 100 gained from a single fight)
Point being, this was a contributing factor to having Eirika take the kill. Aside from pre-promotes, she's my highest level character, currently.
Even more moving up, and I end turn like this.
Surprisingly, the enemy turn comes and goes with nothing of interest happening. Dozla also fails to waste a Revenant's experience by managing to miss it, which is nice.
First thing I do on my turn is have L'arachel recruit Dozla, so he'll stop wasting experience.
Then Tethys heals Tana.
Neimi takes out this Bonewalker that's just sitting there, chilling while we kill its buddies, while Colm hangs out providing moral support.
Finally, a bunch of moving up happens, ending looking like this.
Revenant goes for Eirika, misses. It's too fast for her to double, so it's not dead yet, and more importantly nothing can pile onto Eirika.
My turn again, and Tana flies toward the southern portion of the force and then is assisted by Tethys to actually reach the archer Bonewalker and maul them.
... I have no idea why that first screenshot has the 'select unit to refresh' text on a black background. That's not normal.
Eirika backs out of the way to let Ross take a bit of a risk. Fortunately, he lands his hit, and gets a solid level out of it. Most notably, more Speed!
Then even more moving up happens, ending like this -note that I'm using Neimi to block in the Bonewalkers so they can't do any dogpiling.
As a result, the only action on the enemy turn is a Bonewalker missing Neimi.
My turn, and Tana finishes off the Bonewalker archer, getting a solid level, including capping Speed.
Artur takes a shot at this Bonewalker with Lute's moral support, and to my surprise gets another low-odds crit, allowing him to actually kill this Bonewalker, rather than merely weakening it.
It abruptly occurs to me that we haven't seen L'arachel in action since she was recruited, so she goes in and takes a shot at this Bonewalker.
She looks really weird and messed-up. I do like the grey to her eye, but otherwise she looks like a floating glitch. Unfortunate, though I can't help but feel it's appropriate to the girl herself.
By a similar token, I decide to have Tethys re-move Dozla, just as an excuse to show off how he looks in battle when he's not on the Green Team.
As far as I can tell, he looks identical to his Green Team graphic.
All right then. Fair enough.
I have Amelia take a shot at the Bonewalker.
Come enemy turn, and it suicides on Artur. Yeah, sure, fair enough.
It's at this point that the "only one enemy left on the map" music kicks in and moving Colm south I spot the boss.
... whom Monster Quest has completely botched. If it had the B-ranks it needs to wield all those Brave weapons, it would be pretty terrifying. As-is, it's an experience pinata with a free Elixir to steal.
You might notice that at no point did an enemy drop a Restore Staff. At this point my suspicion is that Green Team guys don't take drops from enemies for some reason, and Dozla and/or L'arachel killed whoever looted the chest. If I'm right about that, it's even more painful that Dozla had that one miss early on. Uuugh.
I don't even bother to screenshot the "fighting", nor the theft. Here's the level-up highlights.
... I actually didn't mean for that last hit to go to Amelia. I was auto-piloting through and didn't account for the fact that she'd gained Strength. My intention had been to have her weaken it, and then Eirika finish it. Whoops.
With the last foe slain, talking ensues.
So hey I'm going to run on ahead again and meet my teacher!
Wait no don't-
-gone already. Seth, was Ephraim ever so foolish as a child?
No, m'lady.
... was I?
No comment.
...
Ho there! My Emperor, may he reign eternally, informs me you butchered Port Kiris for no good reason! I am skeptical of course, because I saw you at a distance one time at a party and therefore believe you to be far too gentle to have done such a thing. I am probably basing this entirely on your nature as a soft human female, but of course nothing could possibly go wrong with such an assumption!
Well, they did refuse me the charted ship I so politely requested.
Eirika what are you doing?? Uh, no, obviously the emperor is lying to you for no good reason, Glen. It's ridiculous to imagine that Eirika would deserve the title of Butcher of Kiris. Anybody can see her innate gentleness and kindness by looking at her wonderfully beautiful face.
Ha ha yes, my thought exactly! I will leave now, as I have questions to ask of my emperor, not that I would dare imply he has ever done anything wrong!
Fare thee well!
... but Innes, I did sacrifice everyone at Port Kiris to Fomortiis.
The best kind of win in war is one where no battle occurred.
... no it isn't? If I don't fight people, I don't get experience points.
... damnation! Tana, I don't suppose you'd chase him down and antagonize him for us, so we can kill him for experience points?
What? No. That's mean. You're mean.
Also he's faster than us.
Well, obviously.
Great, now Eirika will never think I'm smart, suave, and attractive.
Meanwhile, just off-screen!
Hi Glen! I'm sure I didn't just see you totally not kill Eirika like you were assigned to do! Savoring the moment, eh?
Savor-? I don't follow, you disgusting aberration.
Aww, you're sweet, but I don't go for men.
Also it's my job to kill you now that you have an inkling of the TERRIBLE SECRET that you're working with the Bad Guys.
Wait, that's supposed to be a secret? I thought it was obvious, and that I was either going to talk the other good Generals into leaving or talk Emperor Vigarde into getting rid of you scumbags. I mean, come on, we're smashing the Sacred Stones for no reason, Prince Lyon does that creepy puppet thing with the Emperor, we attacked everyone in the entire world also for no reason...
Look, I don't write this script, I'm just the deranged psychopath that kills people for fun and occasionally profit.
... you're the player?
You're about to die, so sure, let's go with that.
--------------------------------------------
See you next mission.
Non-Japanese players just plain don't have access to them in regular play, so for most of the world it's accurate enough to say they're in the code but non-functional.
So that's interesting.
A straightforward enough name.
WHY DID I AGREE TO WALK THROUGH THE MOUNTAINS I NEED A BREAK... I don't remember you doing so?... you know, you're right. I just... followed the boy.What's that sound?WHEEEEEEIt's just-No, the other sound, from that abandoned fort over there.Huh. I hear something too, now that you mention it.Sounds like monsters scuttling about to me. HELLO THE FORT! DO YOU ACKNOWLEDGE THE DARK LADY OF RENAIS AS YOUR TRUE QUEEN?
RACE TRAITORS, ALL OF YA! HUMANS IS FOR EATING, NOT LEADING!Oh great, they're monster supremacists.I think we should prepare for battle.Let's.
To start, here's what I can see using Colm. None of the monsters in Colm's sight are particularly interesting.
But, first, our soon-to-be allies!
L'arachel is... a Light magic user?? Huh. I was looking forward to a Staff Mogall. The series does associate Light magic with Staff usage semi-consistently, so I guess this makes sense. I guess I'll just keep on trucking with Tethys as my only healer until I start getting promotions. It's worked surprisingly well, really, and the run feels very different from the unmodified game with me relying on the durability of my units instead of abusing healing magic constantly.
Stats-wise... well, she's seven levels higher. She's gained a point of Constitution and lost a point of Move (Also she's lost Canto, unfortunately), but the Constitution is a bit misleading since Staves ignore Constitution, making Troubadour L'arachel's Constitution only relevant to Rescuing. The relevant comparison point is going to be when she's promoted. Her other stats... comparing her to Troubadour L'arachel's averages at level 10, she's roughly 3 HP ahead, 4-5 Magic ahead, 6 Skill ahead, 2 Speed ahead, about on target for Luck or slightly ahead, 2 points of Defense ahead, and on target for Resist.
So she's actually better than L'arachel would usually be at this level, really, and I won't need to feed as much experience to her to get her not so horrifically vulnerable. Light magic is also inherently improved by Monster Quest making it uniformly effective against monsters, and she's not got Artur's horrible Luck. If it weren't for Artur and Lute already having an A in their Support, I'd probably just straight-up dump Artur from here on out. I may yet do that anyway, really, as her stats are actually fairly comparable to his overall, except she has obscene Luck.
Artur and Lute's Support is mostly defensive anyway: at A rank it'll be +3 to Defense, +15 to Avoid, +15 to "crit avoid" (Which admittedly patches up Artur's awful Luck when he's with Lute, more than offsetting L'arachel's Luck advantage), plus 7 Accuracy and 1 damage.
(For reference, the baseline modifications are: +6 HP, +7 Magic, +8 Skill, +5 Luck, +3 Defense, +3 Resist, -1 Move, +1 Constitution. That Skill score in particular is impossible for even a perfectly lucky base-game L'arachel to match, and base-game L'arachel would at best tie on Magic)
So here's Dozla the Cyclops. Compared to Berserker Dozla, every stat has gone up a lot except for Strength (only 1 point) and Move. (Down a point) His Luck, in particular, has jumped from a terrible 4 points to a solid 14. He hasn't lost the Berserker crit chance bonus, either, otherwise his crit wouldn't be so high with the Battle Axe. We'll see if Cyclops are able to cross rivers and mountains like Berserkers or not, but Dozla is much improved in Monster Quest, and I actually consider him passable for a pre-promote in the base game. Awesome.
(Specifics: +6 HP, +1 Strength, +9 Skill, +9 Speed, +10 Luck, +7 Defense, +10 Resist, -1 Move, +3 Constitution. Wow)
Here's the forces I brought and the formation I started with.
I actually brought Franz over Ross in my first attempt at this mission, but the mission is overall a little more friendly to bringing an Axe user than to bringing a Sword/Lance user -no enemy on the map has an Axe, and there's a number of Lance users- and I'm still trying to get Ross some experience in hopes of making him usable. If he just got enough Speed that he stopped being doubled by everything, he'd be okay, really.
I only had two failed attempts at this mission. In spite of being a fog mission, I tend to consider it to be a bit of a breather mission, though Monster Quest has made it a bit hairier with its changes to monsters and their weapons. The first failed attempt revolved around me not properly accounting for Revenants having exceptional Speed rather than 0 Speed. The second failed attempt... involves a specific part of the map. I'll talk about it when I get to it.
For this attempt I actually stripped most of the stealable items from my units. I don't want to be dealing with Revenants lunging out of the fog to take my stuff, especially since there's a little time pressure to the mission, sort of.
The first thing I do is have Neimi break out her Longbow to hit this archer Bonewalker. She crit-kills them, which, incidentally, is why I have Colm starting at the south of the map. That way he provides his (A-tier) Support bonus to her, which includes a crit chance bonus. +15 for the two of them, in fact, so she'd have no chance of this if he wasn't present. It also adds 3 damage and 15 Accuracy, so Colm's moral support is doubly necessary for this to be a kill, as 8x3 is not equal to or greater than 31. It's just 24.
Next I have Tethys use her Torch Staff to reveal more enemies. The only noteworthy one is the Bonewalker next to the chest, whom is carrying a Longbow.
I then do a fair amount of moving up, ending turn like this. Ross is hopefully going to get some decent experience off of the Revenants down south -among other points, I'm pretty sure Monster Quest Revenants have the Thief experience bonus. (A Thief provides 20 experience on top of whatever else they're supposed to provide when killed, unmodified by the killer's level)
Enemy turn, and a Bonewalker goes for Tana and misses. She doubles them and kills them.
The second Bonewalker actually lands its hit, but otherwise things don't go any better for it, and Tana gets a decent level out of killing it.
Then for some reason we jump down to a Bonewalker suiciding on Dozla.
This, of course, isn't necessarily reflective of how Dozla actually looks, but it's interesting to me how he has pinkish skin. Normally Cyclops have grey/green skin.
Then we bounce back to Tana being attacked. She's again hit -she actually could've died here if I'd been unlucky, but eh- and again doubles and kills her attacker.
Then we bounce back again to Dozla being attacked and murdering his attacker. This time he gets a crit.
Also wow does the Cyclops belly look gross when I can see how far it hangs out and how its discoloration isn't, like, shading or something. Ew.
Lute baits out a Bow-wielding Bonewalker successfully.
Ross gets doubled by a Revenant and misses his retaliation. At least they missed their first hit.
Lastly, Dozla walks up to and vaporizes another Bonewalker. (He doubled them and got the crit on the second hit)
My turn, and I open up with Neimi softening up the closest of Ross' Revenants.
Then I bounce over to having Lute finish off that archer Revenant with Tethys' support. She gets a depressing level out of the kill.
Tana heals, and I do some general moving up.
Ross risks taking a shot at the Revenant Neimi weakened, and to my pleasant surprise he finishes them off successfully, netting him a decent level. I'm especially happy at the point of Speed, though it's too bad Revenants are so fast they still double him.
This ends my turn.
Enemy turn, a Bonewalker goes for Tana, lands its hit, and dodges one of her retaliatory hits. Well, that's vaguely annoying. Oh well.
Meanwhile, over with Ross, another Revenant goes for him. He lands his hit and dodges their second attack, too. Going well!
After a fairly uneventful enemy turn, it's L'arachel and Dozla's time to waste more experience. Due to Dozla missing one of his swings/not critting on the other swing, L'arachel comes along and finishes them off, looking really weird. Hard to say whether this is what she'll look like or not -L'arachel does have green hair, and hair color seems to be one of Monster Quest's main ways of defining palette.
My turn, and I start by having Tana finish off this Bonewalker.
I actually wanted to have someone else take the kill so Tana could help in the north, but circumstances conspired against me.
So instead we have Amelia getting a successful chip on the Mauthe Doog -which I am treating with extreme caution and want dead now- to my pleasant surprise, followed by-
-Eirika going for a Killing Edge swing. (Shadowkiller isn't a one-hit-kill, unfortunately) She fails to get the crit, but the Mauthe Doog doesn't crit her either, not that it would've killed her if it did. That works out, since I don't want Eirika getting the kill, really. She's over-level, and I really ought to focus on feeding her the occasional boss.
Instead Vanessa takes a chance and, to my intense relief, lands the lethal hit.
Okay, awesome, first Mauthe Doog down.
The last noteworthy event here in the east is Tethys healing Lute.
Over west I push my luck with Ross, and he gets the kill!
Then I have Neimi Longbow the Entombed -soften it up for later- and final moving up occurs.
Bonewalker goes for Eirika, thwacks her, and then gets double-critted to death.
The Dark Lady of Renais cares not about the weapon triangle. She is victory.
Then the Longbow Bonewalker I mentioned earlier goes for Vanessa and misses.
Also holy crap is that an awesome-looking motion blur.
Meanwhile over with Ross, he exchanges blows with the last Revenant, and again dodges one of their hits and lands his own hit.
The RNG likes you, Ross.
... not sure when this Revenant showed up. Last turn, I guess, but I didn't notice the camera moving to indicate its arrival. Weird.
Ross runs east into some woods once Colm and Neimi are out of the way, and Tethys heals Ross so he can go back to getting that Revenant experience in a minute. Colm spots nothing actually new in the process of moving.
Up in the east, Marisa bites this Longbowskeleton twice, no crit. Eh, that's fine. Even if she'd double-critted he'd still be alive.
Instead Amelia chips for some more experience, and then Vanessa lands the two finishing blows.
A whole bunch of moving up happens, leaving me like this -Lute and Artur are placed in an attempt to bait out any ranged attackers there might be that I'm not seeing.
First action of the enemy turn is a Bonewalker missing Vanessa and being mauled in turn.
Then a Mogall follows up and hits Vanessa. Eh.
The other Mogall goes for Eirika and misses. Nice.
One Revenant goes for Ross, and neither of them can land a hit. Okay. Like, Ross should've missed earlier, definitely, but he's still dodging weirdly often.
Enemy turn ends and more reinforcements arrive in the upper-left corner, in addition to the unexpectedly large mob of Revenants you see here.
Colm moving up and revealing... mostly a lot of nothing. This Bonewalker has a Slim Sword, though, so I should be careful about them.
Ross retreats further -way too many Revenants are in reach, and I don't want to let any of them attack him from a Forest tile- and I have Tethys heal him for lack of a particularly better move, really.
Marisa goes for a Mogall, gets one crit. Needed two, really, but this might work out.
Vanessa chips the Bonewalker that attacked her, netting her an okay level, all things considered. 10 Luck is an important break point.
Tana then lobs a Javelin to finish off the Bonewalker, netting her a decent level too.
Amelia then finishes off the Mogall that Marisa weakened, gaining another high-stat level. Nice.
Lastly, Eirika takes out a Killing Edge and insta-gibs the Mogall before it can move. Excellent!
This ends my turn.
The Slim Sword Bonewalker goes for Eirika, lands a regular hit, and is critted and then whacked with a regular hit, leaving it nearly dead.
Over with Ross, a Revenant goes for him. Alas, Ross misses his retaliation.
My turn again, and Marisa backs up and gets healed by Tethys.
Amelia exactly finishes off the Bonewalker that attacked Eirika. It drops a Chest Key, which I promptly send to the convoy.
Vanessa and Tana both get some healing in, heading to the west to help fight the tide of Revenants.
Then I do some moving up I don't bother to screenshot and end my turn. Whoops.
First a Revenant goes for Colm, missing him. His retaliation nets him a quite nice level. More Luck and Resist would be nice, of course, but honestly, past 10 Luck the biggest benefit -lowering enemy crit chance on you- diminishes in value, with 15 Luck being enough that even promoted enemies with perfect Skill have no crit chance on you. I'm not liable to see any such enemies for a while, if ever, so him sitting at 14 Luck is fine.
My turn, and Colm moves to block in the enemies. Ross goes to try to finish off the Revenant that attacked Colm, misses, and is doubled for his trouble. Ouch.
I have Tethys break out her Recover Staff to fully heal him.
Meanwhile over east, Artur and Neimi take apart a Mauthe Doog. Still need to do something about the other one.
Bouncing back to the zombie hordes, Amelia takes a pot-shot. She lands her hit, too. Awesome.
Not much I can do at this point. I end the turn.
The remaining Mauthe Doog goes for Artur, and doubles him. It's only blind luck (And possibly his Support with Lute helping) that he's not critted to death.
Yikes.
Over to the west, a Revenant... fails to hit Ross twice, and he fails to hit it in turn.
Uuuuh. Okay. That's the second time this has happened, and this time the Revenant had in actuality something like a 90% chance to hit per attack. This is lunacy.
Colm gets attacked by a different Revenant. Eh.
Reinforcements show up in the northeast, in the fog.
Amelia finishes off the Revenant that attacked Colm, netting her another quite nice level. I'm almost certain she's got good growths, at this point.
Tana lobs a Javelin at the Mauthe Doog that went for Artur, and to my surprise actually lands her hit, killing it.
Tethys backs up to heal Eirika.
Ross takes a potshot at a Revenant in back, using his Hatchet, as I'm trying to avoid getting him killed/hopefully get him a level to help him out here. He gets a pretty nice level, though I was hoping for Speed, really. Defense helps right now, though, where Speed would not prevent him from being doubled by the Revenants. Make him slightly dodgier, but I'd rather have the Defense. So, okay, whatever.
Colm backs away, revealing the enemies as nothing of interest, and Artur heals.
General moving up happens, and I end the turn looking like this.
The archer Bonewalker goes for Artur, and to my shock Artur finally gets a low-odds crit, instantly killing it.
This opens the way for another Bonewalker to go for Artur, this one by throwing a Javelin, but it misses and is doubled to death.
Back over west, the Revenant in front of Ross attacks him, and he hits it with his retaliation. (Wait, why didn't I have Vanessa Trade-manipulate his Fiendcleaver into being equipped?)
Vanessa gets attacked too, and doubles and kills her tormentor after they miss her.
Another Revenant goes for her, this one too fast for her to double. They both get in a single successful hit.
Lastly, reinforcements show up in the southwest.
My turn, and I open up by having Artur cripple this Gargoyle.
Then I bounce back to having Ross try to finish off the Revenant that attacked him.
He misses and is doubled down to near-death.
Amelia takes a pot-shot at Vanessa's Revenant, and Tethys heals Ross with a Recover Staff again.
Vanessa backs up and Tana comes in to take the kill, and is just short of leveling.
I end turn shortly afterward.
The last reinforcement Bonewalker makes a failed attempt at hitting Artur, and mauling them with his magic nets him a decent enough level.
Really want Speed and Luck, though. He can get by without Magic and stay relevant against monsters, but his iffy Speed and poor Luck are really hurting him. It's not like Supports can provide Speed, either.
A Revenant goes for Ross, dodges his retaliation again.
Other Revenant goes for Tana. She brings it to the verge of death and gets a nearly perfect level out of it. Excellent.
My turn again, and I start by having Colm loot the chest. It's a Secret Book. Uh. Hmm. I have a lot of characters with low-ish Skill, but nobody really stands out as having sufficiently atrocious Skill that they're the obvious pick. Hmmm.
Honestly, Skill Books are, in my opinion, the least useful of the stat-up items. A slight increase in accuracy and an extra 1% chance to crit is essentially invisible.
Amelia finishes off Tana's Revenant, then Tethys gives her another turn while Tana moves forward, letting Amelia finish off another Revenant. She gets another solid level up.
I think she's competitive with Franz right now, even though she's still like 3-4 levels below him.
Neimi goes and vaporizes one of the two Bonewalkers to the east, netting her this meh level-up. 3 stats is nice, but I'd rather she get other stuff. Oh well. She could still theoretically cap everything except HP and Luck before promotion.
Artur advances his relationship with Lute to A, and Lute uses the Power of Love-
And hellfire. Can't forget the hellfire.-to utterly destroy the other Bonewalker in the area.
So Lute, I'm pretty sure you've been hitting on me since we were, like, twelve.... I don't remember ever hitting you?Um, no. I mean you're obviously interested in a relationship with me, and have been for ages.You are my favorite student.... a romantic relationship.That word sounds familiar. I think it was in a thesaurus I read once.......?This is going to require extreme measures.
Eirika advances south, staying out of reach of the Gargoyle I can see, and uses a Torch. It reveals... another Gargoyle.
Huh. I thought the enemies on the other side of that door were directly next to it.
Enemy turn. One Revenant suicides to no effect on Tana.
The other Revenant dodges Ross again.
Come on, (horse)man!
My turn, and I start by having Tethys heal Ross, and Ross smack the Revenant.
Successfully, this time.
Amelia finishes it off and gets her (I think) first merely okay level. I'm fine with this.
I have Artur finish off the northern Gargoyle, and moving up happens, leaving me looking like this.
Somewhere in the fog, something loots that western chest, which apparently contained a Restore Staff.
Well. I should be able to loot it by killing them.
The Gargoyle goes for Marisa, and misses. Awesome.
More reinforcements arrive in the southwest.
General moving up happens, placed just so. I'll explain in a minute.
This is roughly where I ended up having to retry my second, final time. Right now, though, Eirika is advancing west to recruit L'arachel and Dozla, refreshing her Torch radius in the process.
General moving up happens again, with Tethys healing Tana.
And this is why I was being careful.
I'm not sure of the exact trigger area, but if you go near the door, there's a Bonewalker with a Door Key on the other side of the door who will open it and an entire force in the southeast pours through.
In this case, all that happened was Marisa taking a weak hit from a Bonewalker archer, but this spot cost me my second run, even though I knew it was coming. I was a little too aggressive, and got overwhelmed unnecessarily.
Enemy turn ends and Green Team's turn begins. Dozla goes up into the fog -showing that the AI ignoring the fog applies to Green Team allies, something I'd never specifically thought about before- to tear apart a Bonewalker, and L'arachel goes over to maul another one.
... putting her out of Eirika's reach on my turn.
This makes Dozla's earlier miss a lot more painful. If Dozla hadn't left that enemy alive way back when, L'arachel wouldn't have moved one tile to the west, and this Bonewalker would therefore have not been in her reach, and therefore she would've held still, and therefore come my turn I would've recruited her and she'd have recruited Dozla.
Ugh. So much experience wasted.
I think it gets worse, too, but I'll cover that later.
My turn, and Tana goes to murder a Gargoyle.
... instead she misses her second hit. Arrrgh.
At least she dodged the retaliation. That's something.
Tethys gives Ross another move, so he can contribute to the upcoming Lance-filled fight.
Lute finishes off Tana's Gargoyle, while Neimi goes for a Killer Bow kill on the other one.
Nope.
Ross misses again, this time on 74 listed Accuracy, and gets doubled in exchange.
He's now at risk of death.
Why, game, why.
Marisa weakens the Bonewalker archer, but refuses to crit them.
Artur finishes off the Gargoyle Ross should've killed, opening the way for Vanessa to swoop in and finishes off the Bonewalker archer.
Now nobody will die to the RNG screwing with me.
Lastly, Colm moves up, leaving us looking like this. (Eirika is covered by the menu)
Note the Deathgoyle. Also note that it's not the boss of the map -I haven't simply missed the little boss shield icon flashing onto the screen. For some reason I always remember this Deathgoyle as the boss, but it isn't.
Enemy turn, and one Bonewalker gets itself mauled by Tana. It doesn't even manage to injure her.
The Bonewalker that goes for Vanessa has the same fate.
Aaaaaaaah
L'arachel avoids dying to an archer Bonewalker through blind luck, and the Entombed steals her Elixir.
Really really aggravated about Dozla's miss way back when.
Green Team's turn, Dozla murders the archer Bonewalker while L'arachel flies away to safety, thankfully.
My turn!
Oh. It's you again. Are you with these renega-Oh, hello there your Dark Majesty! Lovely day to bathe in the blood of our enemies, isn't it?-er.You know, I think Fomortiis himself wants us to ally. We just keep meeting! 'tis fate.Well, um, that's nice miss... what's your name again?L'arachel, of course! Definitely not the princess of Rausten by the same name, nosiree, just a popular name in Rausten you know.You know, I was about to ask if you were the Pontifex's niece, but you're right, it would be an absurd coincidence for me to run into her by chance.Ha ha, yes! Absurd. Quite.I don't think she's ever left Rausten's territories, in fact.Oh, I wouldn't know, your Dark Majesty. I'm just a simple traveler with her enormous, enormously bloodthirsty bodyguard, drowning our foes in their own blood!... charming. So you'll fight alongside us? You and your, um, bodyguard?I'll just nip on over to let him know, yes.Good.
First attack of the turn is Lute mauling this Bonewalker.
Ross takes the iffy odds of finishing off said Bonewalker with a Hatchet, and finally lands a hit, never mind that now he's at the weapons triangle disadvantage.
Tana takes this opportunity to inflict severe damage on the Deathgoyle, taking a pretty nasty hit in turn.
She had a chance of instantly dying to a crit, but I felt the odds were low enough and my options few enough that it was a worthwhile risk.
... though it's only occurring to me this very moment that Tana's Luck is too high for the Deathgoyle to have a crit chance on Skill alone (She has 15 Luck, so even if the Deathgoyle had capped Skill she'd be immune), and I know Steel Lances don't have an increased crit chance in Monster Quest. It appears Monster Quest has given Deathgoyles a crit chance bonus, to make up for not getting a weapon on promotion. Neat. Annoying at this very moment, but it means Tana and Vanessa have something to look forward to... assuming I don't take whatever their other option is. No idea what that might be, actually.
Amelia crit-kills this Bonewalker. Between not expecting it at all and the fact that Bonewalker throwing crit animation is lightning fast, I utterly failed to screenshot it, not even managing to get the red burst effect.
The rapidity of the Bonewalker Lance crit animations suggests to me that Bonewalkers/Wights were a relatively late addition or otherwise suffered from insufficient attention, as part of the reason their Lance crit animations are so fast is that there's very little actually new spritework drawn. Play one or two frames of art, done.
The fact that it drops a Chest Key indicates it was the Bonewalker that opened the door.
Neimi takes a shot at the last Bonewalker of the group.
Colm loots the last unlooted chest, netting me a Short Spear, which he promptly sends to the convoy. This'll come in handy.
Vanessa finishes off the Bonewalker for a decent level. I like how she's a mixed tank.
Artur then finishes off the Deathgoyle.
He gets a somewhat disappointing level out of it, though at least his Luck increased. One more point, come on man!
Tethys heals Ross and gets another ridiculous level out of it, though no +2s this time, while L'arachel heals herself even though I'd like for her to recruit Dozla this turn.
The enemy turn comes and goes, and it's a Dozla-fest, involving him killing two Mogalls (One on their turn, one on his) but losing his Elixir to the Entombed.
Unfortunately, he's currently out of L'arachel's immediate movement radius. Arrrgh.
My turn, and I have everybody pile to the west. Tethys helps Neimi along, since she's currently one of my lower-level characters thanks to the Juna Fruit.
I don't even bother to try to get the Elixir back from the Entombed, since Entombed apparently have an innate +15 to crit. Too much risk. Instead, I have Eirika take a small risk in killing it. Thankfully, she dodges its retaliation, and gets a solid level out of it. I mean, I'd really like more Strength and Defense, but +4 stats when one of her best stats is capped is pretty good.
Incidentally, at this point I suspect Entombed are hilarious experience bonanzas. Since Revenants seems to have the Thief experience bonus (fixed +20 when killed), and Entombed have an innate experience bonus in the game (fixed +60, should be), Entombed are probably worth a minimum of 80 experience when killed, regardless of level. I know for a fact that boss Entombed are automatically worth 100 experience, between the boss experience bonus and the Entombed experience bonus. (Plus the fact that experience caps at 100 gained from a single fight)
Point being, this was a contributing factor to having Eirika take the kill. Aside from pre-promotes, she's my highest level character, currently.
Even more moving up, and I end turn like this.
Surprisingly, the enemy turn comes and goes with nothing of interest happening. Dozla also fails to waste a Revenant's experience by managing to miss it, which is nice.
First thing I do on my turn is have L'arachel recruit Dozla, so he'll stop wasting experience.
Then Tethys heals Tana.
Neimi takes out this Bonewalker that's just sitting there, chilling while we kill its buddies, while Colm hangs out providing moral support.
Finally, a bunch of moving up happens, ending looking like this.
Revenant goes for Eirika, misses. It's too fast for her to double, so it's not dead yet, and more importantly nothing can pile onto Eirika.
My turn again, and Tana flies toward the southern portion of the force and then is assisted by Tethys to actually reach the archer Bonewalker and maul them.
... I have no idea why that first screenshot has the 'select unit to refresh' text on a black background. That's not normal.
Eirika backs out of the way to let Ross take a bit of a risk. Fortunately, he lands his hit, and gets a solid level out of it. Most notably, more Speed!
Then even more moving up happens, ending like this -note that I'm using Neimi to block in the Bonewalkers so they can't do any dogpiling.
As a result, the only action on the enemy turn is a Bonewalker missing Neimi.
My turn, and Tana finishes off the Bonewalker archer, getting a solid level, including capping Speed.
Artur takes a shot at this Bonewalker with Lute's moral support, and to my surprise gets another low-odds crit, allowing him to actually kill this Bonewalker, rather than merely weakening it.
It abruptly occurs to me that we haven't seen L'arachel in action since she was recruited, so she goes in and takes a shot at this Bonewalker.
She looks really weird and messed-up. I do like the grey to her eye, but otherwise she looks like a floating glitch. Unfortunate, though I can't help but feel it's appropriate to the girl herself.
By a similar token, I decide to have Tethys re-move Dozla, just as an excuse to show off how he looks in battle when he's not on the Green Team.
As far as I can tell, he looks identical to his Green Team graphic.
All right then. Fair enough.
I have Amelia take a shot at the Bonewalker.
Come enemy turn, and it suicides on Artur. Yeah, sure, fair enough.
It's at this point that the "only one enemy left on the map" music kicks in and moving Colm south I spot the boss.
... whom Monster Quest has completely botched. If it had the B-ranks it needs to wield all those Brave weapons, it would be pretty terrifying. As-is, it's an experience pinata with a free Elixir to steal.
You might notice that at no point did an enemy drop a Restore Staff. At this point my suspicion is that Green Team guys don't take drops from enemies for some reason, and Dozla and/or L'arachel killed whoever looted the chest. If I'm right about that, it's even more painful that Dozla had that one miss early on. Uuugh.
I don't even bother to screenshot the "fighting", nor the theft. Here's the level-up highlights.
... I actually didn't mean for that last hit to go to Amelia. I was auto-piloting through and didn't account for the fact that she'd gained Strength. My intention had been to have her weaken it, and then Eirika finish it. Whoops.
With the last foe slain, talking ensues.
So hey I'm going to run on ahead again and meet my teacher!Wait no don't--gone already. Seth, was Ephraim ever so foolish as a child?No, m'lady.... was I?No comment....Ho there! My Emperor, may he reign eternally, informs me you butchered Port Kiris for no good reason! I am skeptical of course, because I saw you at a distance one time at a party and therefore believe you to be far too gentle to have done such a thing. I am probably basing this entirely on your nature as a soft human female, but of course nothing could possibly go wrong with such an assumption!Well, they did refuse me the charted ship I so politely requested.Eirika what are you doing?? Uh, no, obviously the emperor is lying to you for no good reason, Glen. It's ridiculous to imagine that Eirika would deserve the title of Butcher of Kiris. Anybody can see her innate gentleness and kindness by looking at her wonderfully beautiful face.Ha ha yes, my thought exactly! I will leave now, as I have questions to ask of my emperor, not that I would dare imply he has ever done anything wrong!Fare thee well!... but Innes, I did sacrifice everyone at Port Kiris to Fomortiis.The best kind of win in war is one where no battle occurred.... no it isn't? If I don't fight people, I don't get experience points.... damnation! Tana, I don't suppose you'd chase him down and antagonize him for us, so we can kill him for experience points?
What? No. That's mean. You're mean.
Also he's faster than us.Well, obviously.Great, now Eirika will never think I'm smart, suave, and attractive.Meanwhile, just off-screen!
Hi Glen! I'm sure I didn't just see you totally not kill Eirika like you were assigned to do! Savoring the moment, eh?
Savor-? I don't follow, you disgusting aberration.Aww, you're sweet, but I don't go for men.Also it's my job to kill you now that you have an inkling of the TERRIBLE SECRET that you're working with the Bad Guys.Wait, that's supposed to be a secret? I thought it was obvious, and that I was either going to talk the other good Generals into leaving or talk Emperor Vigarde into getting rid of you scumbags. I mean, come on, we're smashing the Sacred Stones for no reason, Prince Lyon does that creepy puppet thing with the Emperor, we attacked everyone in the entire world also for no reason...Look, I don't write this script, I'm just the deranged psychopath that kills people for fun and occasionally profit.... you're the player?You're about to die, so sure, let's go with that.--------------------------------------------
See you next mission.
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