Time for Alfyn's Chapter 2! I left myself in Stonegard at the end of last session, so the first order of business was getting to Goldshore.
Alfyn arrives in Goldshore noticing that there's a sickness going around, but also that there's an apothecary already in town by the name of Vanessa that's treating it. He introduces himself, they have a nice chat, everything seems fine, but this Vanessa just has a dark vibe to her that I can't ignore. Maybe it's just the way she turned Alfyn's request to learn a thing or two about medicine away with some diatribe about "trade secrets", I dunno.
Anyway, as Alfyn peruses the village, he notices that everyone that Vanessa has cured is now suddenly coming down with symptoms of a whooping cough from a far-off land. Vanessa's intentions are made reasonably clear when he sees her selling a remedy for the cough to nobles at an exorbitant price, and refusing to come down on her price for a commoner, claiming rarity of the primary reagent. Alfyn goes to treat the commoner's child and discovers what's going on: Vanessa's offering a free cure for the original sickness that involves an ingredient that causes a cough much like that whooping cough as a side effect, and then she's bilking people out of their money for the remedy to the cough. I can't sympathize too much with the plight of the nobles, but her intentions are clearly not on the honorable side.
Alfyn asks around and finds that the primary reagent for the cough remedy, a glowing moss, happens to be found in a nearby cave, so he heads there to find it, and most likely Vanessa as well.
Said cave is fairly short and to the point, however filled with random encounters it may be. Sure enough, at the end of the cave, Alfyn sees Vanessa, and she is indeed 100% in it for the profit, like most medical professionals in the real world. Alfyn makes his presence known, and it's party time.
I must be getting to the point where they want me to know about this mechanic, because it's suddenly popping up everywhere: Vanessa has two sellsword guards, and as long as they're alive, her guard can't be weakned. Predictably, she spends the fight throwing various concoctions at you, and using others to buff her guards. Poison is a particularly nasty status effect in this game, left unchecked it will drain a lot of HP, and she throws it out every few turns. H'aanit with the Patience support ability is especially vulnerable, since she takes poison damage at the end of her regular turn, and then again at the end of her Patience turn. Anyway, once the status effects had been dealt with, I had also managed to kill her guards, so I broke her guard and hit her in the face with all kinds of Divine skills and the like until she'd been beaten senseless.
Alfyn uses a sleep concoction on her to ensure she'll still be in the cave when the guards come to get her, takes some of the moss for himself, and heads back to town to make the remedy and give it to the commoner that needed it. Satisfied with his visit to Goldshore and having helped its people, he leaves, declaring the next stop on his journey to be Saintsbridge.
The next stop on my journey, though, is Noblecourt, for Therion's Chapter 2, and thus to wrap up Chapter 2 for everyone. I don't yet have the ability to fast travel there, but Atlasdam makes for a suitable staging area for the journey, so I fast travelled there instead.
The journey from Atlasdam to Noblecourt was rather uneventful. Therion immediately overhears people talking about a crazy scholar by the name of Orlick who's locked himself inside his mansion doing research, and decides that's the guy with the ruby dragonstone he's looking for. As it turns out, not only has he locked himself in there, he has guards to keep people out, and the only way in is the front door, and thus in plain view of the guards. An alternate approach would be necessary to gain entry.
Consulting the powers of eavesdropping on other people's conversations at the tavern, he hears a couple guys talking about Orlick. He joins in and offers them a drink if they'll tell him what they know, and he ends up finding the name of Orlick's old research partner, Barham. Barham happens to live on the south end of town, so he heads there to see what he can find out. As it turns out, Barham is more than willing to cooperate in Therion's removal of the ruby dragonstone from Orlick's possession, only because the two used to be friends before Orlick's research consumed him. Therion just has to procure some stuff from local merchants, and he'll get the password to give the guards so he can get into Orlick's mansion.
The stuff Barham had Therion obtain ends up being components he uses to make a key, that Therion needs to get into Orlick's lab. Therion takes the key, bluffs the guards with a story about an urgent delivery, gives the password, and walks right in the front door. After wading through random encounters, I finally reached Orlick's lab. As per usual, Therion's just about to grab the dragonstone when Orlick comes in with the guards from out front. He's really crazy about that research thing, and given that Therion refuses to back down, the fight begins.
At this point, the "two guards preventing the boss' weaknesses from being exploited" thing is a mainstay of the boss battles, it seems. Regardless, the same strategy as before worked well, mostly thanks to me being overlevelled, no doubt. Beat up the guards, weaken the boss, unload Divine skills, win.
Having defeated Orlick, Therion takes the ruby dragonstone and heads back to Bolderfall to turn it in and procure the location of the next one. As it turns out, the emerald dragonstone is reportedly on the black market in Wellspring, so that's where Therion is off to next.
And with that, Chapter 2 comes to a close. Throughout Chapter 2, I skipped over a lot of the purple chests that only Therion can open, so I'm going to go back and grab them, as well as finishing up whatever side quests I can, and perhaps getting some exploration in the direction of the third town in each region done before beginning Chapter 3.
Wednesday, September 12, 2018
Tuesday, September 11, 2018
Octopath Traveler: Session 11
Let's jump straight into Cyrus' Chapter 2!
Cyrus visits a scholar friend of his by the name of Odette, who lives in Quarrycrest. Upon asking her about the missing tome's subject material, he finds out that it's about necromancy. Then, an ongoing issue of disappearing people gets brought up, and Cyrus investigates. He finds a (not so) hidden entrance to the sewers next to the inn, and upon investigation, discovers a lair therein. A nice big red magic circle, a dead person, some gemstones made from human blood, and a jail cell with more people locked up, at least one of whom still appears to be alive.
The inhabitant of this room, named Gideon, comes in at this point and wonders what Cyrus is up to. Cyrus goes full scholar on him as his way of asking him what this is all about, and naturally Gideon refuses to cough up answers, instead challenging Cyrus. To battle we go!
Gideon has a neat mechanic in that he will summon skeletons and strengthen his guard, which prevents you from exploiting his weaknesses to lower and break it until you've disposed of them. Once I finally got my shit in gear and started saving 3 BP on everyone for when I had him broken, he went down rather quickly.
As it turns out, everyone who was in that cell was still alive, just drugged and passed out. Cyrus finds a book among Gideon's belongings, which at first glance appears to be the tome he's searching for, but upon further inspection is a translated and very abridged copy with some research notes written on parchment stuck between the pages. His search for the tome continues, as it would seem.
But in order to continue that search, he needs to know who translated the tome. Odette first notices that the book is very well constructed, which means that there are very few people that could have produced it. My thoughts instantly went towards the book bindery in Stonegard that I ran into and out of a few times when I was there for H'aanit's Chapter 2. Cyrus finds reasoning based on the type of paper and the material used for the cover of the tome to postitulate that it was indeed produced in Stonegard. He sets out for Stonegard, but not before a mysterious hooded man catches wind that he's investigating something and headed that way, so perhaps we'll see more of this guy in Cyrus' Chapter 3.
Cyrus' Chapter 2 had so little combat that he didn't even get to fully learn a secondary job. While I like the accessible length of these early chapters, I very much hope that they get a bit longer and/or more complex than "enter town, talk to NPCs for a bit, use path actions, journey through explorable area with random encounters to boss room, fight boss, closing dialogue scene".
For now, though, I'm content to go set up for Olberic's Chapter 2. It takes place in Victors Hollow, so I'll be setting up my party in the closest town, S'warkii.
In S'warkii, I had the most annoying graphical bug happen: there's a line of trees along the south end of the village that the game normally turns transparent so you can see through them, but it was refusing to do so. This bug persisted all the way through the journey to Victors Hollow.
Anyway, once there, Olberic finds out that Gustav, the guy he wants to talk to, is participating in a tournament in the town's arena. In order to talk to him, he has to enter the tournament, but there's a slight catch: it's already started and has progressed to just before the quarterfinals. However, there's a rule around this town, where if you defeat someone who's in the tournament, you can take their spot, so Olberic does that after attracting a little attention in order to lure out one of the participants.
Remember what I JUST said about people's chapters having a rather formulaic layout? Well, this was the breath of fresh air I was looking for. Not one, not two, not even three, but FOUR bosses. First boss was the person he had to defeat to get into the tournament: Victorino, the Buccaneer's Bane. I was thinking these fights would be way harder than they actually were, because I figured "oh, it's Olberic dueling people so it'll be 1v1", but all the bosses bring friends, and the game gives you your full party to compensate. Victorino went down fairly smoothly.
Next up was Olberic's quarterfinal match with Joshua of the Frostlands. From here on, each boss had one or more weaknesses that couldn't be used to lower their guard until their supporting people were taken out. The neat thing here is that using Alfyn's path action, you could find out each boss' weaknesses before the fight even began. In my case, since he's not usually in my active party, it meant leaving the arena before each match to run to the tavern and swap him in, and then revisiting the tavern to swap him back out, but the prior knowledge of weaknesses helped a lot. Also, I swapped in Therion on each of these occasions and stole what I could, continuing my tradition of stealing everything that isn't nailed down.
The semifinal match was with Archibold the Crusher, the winner of these tournaments four times running, and heavily favored to win yet again. Of course, I had to break his combo. He attacked with standard Warrior skills like Level Slash and Cross Strike, which was interesting.
The final match was, of course, against the Black Knight Gustav. Olberic had already spoken to him upon arriving at the arena, and they had an agreement that Gustav would answer Olberic's questions only if Olberic defeated him in the finals. Well, that happened, and the goods were spilled. Erhardt is in Wellspring, so Olberic's next destination is there. However, Gustav tells Olberic about Erhardt's past, which basically involves his village being razed in the war. Erhardt held a grudge against the King of Hornburg for not doing anything about it, and enlisted with the intent of spying while he planned his vengeance. Knowing this information, Olberic will likely seek answers from Erhardt before their inevitable duel.
Also, I've been omitting it and focusing on describing the story, but I've been dutifully completing side quests as I get them and find whatever (or whoever) I need to find in order to complete them. There are a couple that I have absolutely no clue what to do, so I just sorta check in on the relevant NPCs periodically to see if anything I've gotten since the last time I checked in will actually progress their side quest. Some side quests are basically sending me to other areas that I have yet to venture to, so I'll get to them eventually, possibly between Chapter 2 and Chapter 3.
That's it for this session! Next up is Alfyn's Chapter 2, which takes place in Goldshore. If I can continue the whole "two people's chapters in one day" thing, after that will be Therion, and Chapter 2 will be concluded. I figure between chapters is as good a place as any to do some exploration and a little levelling up and/or JP collection.
Cyrus visits a scholar friend of his by the name of Odette, who lives in Quarrycrest. Upon asking her about the missing tome's subject material, he finds out that it's about necromancy. Then, an ongoing issue of disappearing people gets brought up, and Cyrus investigates. He finds a (not so) hidden entrance to the sewers next to the inn, and upon investigation, discovers a lair therein. A nice big red magic circle, a dead person, some gemstones made from human blood, and a jail cell with more people locked up, at least one of whom still appears to be alive.
The inhabitant of this room, named Gideon, comes in at this point and wonders what Cyrus is up to. Cyrus goes full scholar on him as his way of asking him what this is all about, and naturally Gideon refuses to cough up answers, instead challenging Cyrus. To battle we go!
Gideon has a neat mechanic in that he will summon skeletons and strengthen his guard, which prevents you from exploiting his weaknesses to lower and break it until you've disposed of them. Once I finally got my shit in gear and started saving 3 BP on everyone for when I had him broken, he went down rather quickly.
As it turns out, everyone who was in that cell was still alive, just drugged and passed out. Cyrus finds a book among Gideon's belongings, which at first glance appears to be the tome he's searching for, but upon further inspection is a translated and very abridged copy with some research notes written on parchment stuck between the pages. His search for the tome continues, as it would seem.
But in order to continue that search, he needs to know who translated the tome. Odette first notices that the book is very well constructed, which means that there are very few people that could have produced it. My thoughts instantly went towards the book bindery in Stonegard that I ran into and out of a few times when I was there for H'aanit's Chapter 2. Cyrus finds reasoning based on the type of paper and the material used for the cover of the tome to postitulate that it was indeed produced in Stonegard. He sets out for Stonegard, but not before a mysterious hooded man catches wind that he's investigating something and headed that way, so perhaps we'll see more of this guy in Cyrus' Chapter 3.
Cyrus' Chapter 2 had so little combat that he didn't even get to fully learn a secondary job. While I like the accessible length of these early chapters, I very much hope that they get a bit longer and/or more complex than "enter town, talk to NPCs for a bit, use path actions, journey through explorable area with random encounters to boss room, fight boss, closing dialogue scene".
For now, though, I'm content to go set up for Olberic's Chapter 2. It takes place in Victors Hollow, so I'll be setting up my party in the closest town, S'warkii.
In S'warkii, I had the most annoying graphical bug happen: there's a line of trees along the south end of the village that the game normally turns transparent so you can see through them, but it was refusing to do so. This bug persisted all the way through the journey to Victors Hollow.
Anyway, once there, Olberic finds out that Gustav, the guy he wants to talk to, is participating in a tournament in the town's arena. In order to talk to him, he has to enter the tournament, but there's a slight catch: it's already started and has progressed to just before the quarterfinals. However, there's a rule around this town, where if you defeat someone who's in the tournament, you can take their spot, so Olberic does that after attracting a little attention in order to lure out one of the participants.
Remember what I JUST said about people's chapters having a rather formulaic layout? Well, this was the breath of fresh air I was looking for. Not one, not two, not even three, but FOUR bosses. First boss was the person he had to defeat to get into the tournament: Victorino, the Buccaneer's Bane. I was thinking these fights would be way harder than they actually were, because I figured "oh, it's Olberic dueling people so it'll be 1v1", but all the bosses bring friends, and the game gives you your full party to compensate. Victorino went down fairly smoothly.
Next up was Olberic's quarterfinal match with Joshua of the Frostlands. From here on, each boss had one or more weaknesses that couldn't be used to lower their guard until their supporting people were taken out. The neat thing here is that using Alfyn's path action, you could find out each boss' weaknesses before the fight even began. In my case, since he's not usually in my active party, it meant leaving the arena before each match to run to the tavern and swap him in, and then revisiting the tavern to swap him back out, but the prior knowledge of weaknesses helped a lot. Also, I swapped in Therion on each of these occasions and stole what I could, continuing my tradition of stealing everything that isn't nailed down.
The semifinal match was with Archibold the Crusher, the winner of these tournaments four times running, and heavily favored to win yet again. Of course, I had to break his combo. He attacked with standard Warrior skills like Level Slash and Cross Strike, which was interesting.
The final match was, of course, against the Black Knight Gustav. Olberic had already spoken to him upon arriving at the arena, and they had an agreement that Gustav would answer Olberic's questions only if Olberic defeated him in the finals. Well, that happened, and the goods were spilled. Erhardt is in Wellspring, so Olberic's next destination is there. However, Gustav tells Olberic about Erhardt's past, which basically involves his village being razed in the war. Erhardt held a grudge against the King of Hornburg for not doing anything about it, and enlisted with the intent of spying while he planned his vengeance. Knowing this information, Olberic will likely seek answers from Erhardt before their inevitable duel.
Also, I've been omitting it and focusing on describing the story, but I've been dutifully completing side quests as I get them and find whatever (or whoever) I need to find in order to complete them. There are a couple that I have absolutely no clue what to do, so I just sorta check in on the relevant NPCs periodically to see if anything I've gotten since the last time I checked in will actually progress their side quest. Some side quests are basically sending me to other areas that I have yet to venture to, so I'll get to them eventually, possibly between Chapter 2 and Chapter 3.
That's it for this session! Next up is Alfyn's Chapter 2, which takes place in Goldshore. If I can continue the whole "two people's chapters in one day" thing, after that will be Therion, and Chapter 2 will be concluded. I figure between chapters is as good a place as any to do some exploration and a little levelling up and/or JP collection.
Monday, September 10, 2018
Octopath Traveler: Session 10
Let's see how much of Chapter 2 I can get done today! First up, Primrose. I'm doing them in the same order that I recruited the characters, so it's going to be interesting since I recruited Cyrus just after Tressa and both of their Chapter 2s take place in the same city.
In Stillsnow, Primrose decides to dance on the stage in the tavern to try and loosen the townspeople's tongues, but the only things she gets are compliments and ogling. However, someone from her past who happens to be there recognizes her. This someone is a woman who served her family, by the name of Arianna. As it turns out, Arianna is working at a brothel to make ends meet, and the man Primrose seeks is the guy who runs it. Getting there to dispose of him is a bit tricky, though. The only way that people can get there is by carriage, and the guy who drives the carriage is very suspicious of Primrose. She asks around and finds that he owes the tavern keeper a debt, so she leverages that to get on the carriage.
Once there, she goes through a secret passage via a cave, to end up directly in his room. From that point, things are fairly straightforward. They introduce themselves, Primrose states her purpose for being there, and the fight happens. Rufus, the Left-hand Man has two sidekicks that are kind of annoying, but die in relatively short order. Rufus, however, took two hits of Brand's Thunder to the face, as well as numerous Cross Strikes boosted to varying levels. He did charge up for a big attack at one point, but I broke his defense before he could use it. Being nothing more than a worthless sack of HP, though, he went down with no issue.
Primrose finds out that her next step is in Noblecourt, and after some words with Arianna, she sets off for the next leg of her journey.
One thing I noticed a few sessions ago but didn't mention for whatever reason: in the Journal, the lengths of the banners change depending on the amount of each character's story (or sidequests for a given region) you've completed. It's one of a variety of things in the game that I'll classify as a "nice touch".
Tressa's Chapter 2 is fairly straightforward: she arrives in Quarrycrest, notes that it's a gold mining town, then through interacting with the locals, finds some stones that look beautiful once polished and decides to start selling them. Of course, this means you have to use her path action to buy them off of the locals first, though thankfully I'd already scoped the area with Alfyn before doing so and found the haggling boost.
Shortly after discovering that the stones polish up quite well, she meets another travelling merchant by the name of Ali who tells her what they are. Her first sale of them goes without a hitch, but on the second one, Ali decides to be the rival merchant, and he's totally better than Tressa at being a salesperson. Tressa does her best Edea Lee impression at one point, letting out a good "Mrgrgr...", which was fun for me, being a player who got the reference.
The entire time this has been going on, we've been seeing cutscenes that show us that the whole place is run by a most unsavory man by the name of Morlock, who insists that he owns the land that they're mining on and that everything they dig up is his. Not surprisingly, he has learned of Tressa and Ali's activities, and declares them to be illegal. Ali goes on a huge rant about how horrible Morlock is, which ends with him getting pwnt by Morlock's guard Omar, and dragged off.
Tressa decides to save him, so it's on to Morlock's mansion a short walk through a few random encounters away. You know, for a guy whose coffers are overflowing, his mansion really needs a lot of work. It's super dark and dusty on the inside. Surely he's got the money to pay someone to clean it... Also, it's got the most confusing floor layout ever. After a while of exploring and beating up the enemies found therein, I reached the final room where the battle actually takes place.
Owing once again to my over-levelled nature, Omar wasn't that difficult. He did the standard "every time his guard is broken, he strengthens it by two hits" thing, but that seemed to max out at 8 instead of 10 or 11 like in previous cases. He did charge up a presumably big attack at one point, but by sheer luck I had his guard one hit away from being broken, so he never got to actually use it. Omar is also accompanied by a couple of sidekicks who were annoying, but died quickly.
Tressa and Ali have another talk after Morlock and Omar run off, and they decide that round two of their MERCHANT BATTLE will be at the Merchant's Fair in Grandport. But first, they need to procure stuff to sell in order to compete with one another, so the next stop on Tressa's journey is Victors Hollow. Every ounce of my being wants that to be "Victor's Hollow", but there's no apostrophe in-game.
As previously mentioned, next up will be Cyrus' Chapter 2, which is also in the town of Quarrycrest. Not having to journey there means I can just hop straight into it next time I pick up my Switch, so it should go by a bit faster. Maybe I can get three people's Chapter 2s done next session? We'll see. I also kinda want to go exploring and discover the third town in each region. Maybe I'll do that once I'm done with Chapter 2.
In Stillsnow, Primrose decides to dance on the stage in the tavern to try and loosen the townspeople's tongues, but the only things she gets are compliments and ogling. However, someone from her past who happens to be there recognizes her. This someone is a woman who served her family, by the name of Arianna. As it turns out, Arianna is working at a brothel to make ends meet, and the man Primrose seeks is the guy who runs it. Getting there to dispose of him is a bit tricky, though. The only way that people can get there is by carriage, and the guy who drives the carriage is very suspicious of Primrose. She asks around and finds that he owes the tavern keeper a debt, so she leverages that to get on the carriage.
Once there, she goes through a secret passage via a cave, to end up directly in his room. From that point, things are fairly straightforward. They introduce themselves, Primrose states her purpose for being there, and the fight happens. Rufus, the Left-hand Man has two sidekicks that are kind of annoying, but die in relatively short order. Rufus, however, took two hits of Brand's Thunder to the face, as well as numerous Cross Strikes boosted to varying levels. He did charge up for a big attack at one point, but I broke his defense before he could use it. Being nothing more than a worthless sack of HP, though, he went down with no issue.
Primrose finds out that her next step is in Noblecourt, and after some words with Arianna, she sets off for the next leg of her journey.
One thing I noticed a few sessions ago but didn't mention for whatever reason: in the Journal, the lengths of the banners change depending on the amount of each character's story (or sidequests for a given region) you've completed. It's one of a variety of things in the game that I'll classify as a "nice touch".
Tressa's Chapter 2 is fairly straightforward: she arrives in Quarrycrest, notes that it's a gold mining town, then through interacting with the locals, finds some stones that look beautiful once polished and decides to start selling them. Of course, this means you have to use her path action to buy them off of the locals first, though thankfully I'd already scoped the area with Alfyn before doing so and found the haggling boost.
Shortly after discovering that the stones polish up quite well, she meets another travelling merchant by the name of Ali who tells her what they are. Her first sale of them goes without a hitch, but on the second one, Ali decides to be the rival merchant, and he's totally better than Tressa at being a salesperson. Tressa does her best Edea Lee impression at one point, letting out a good "Mrgrgr...", which was fun for me, being a player who got the reference.
The entire time this has been going on, we've been seeing cutscenes that show us that the whole place is run by a most unsavory man by the name of Morlock, who insists that he owns the land that they're mining on and that everything they dig up is his. Not surprisingly, he has learned of Tressa and Ali's activities, and declares them to be illegal. Ali goes on a huge rant about how horrible Morlock is, which ends with him getting pwnt by Morlock's guard Omar, and dragged off.
Tressa decides to save him, so it's on to Morlock's mansion a short walk through a few random encounters away. You know, for a guy whose coffers are overflowing, his mansion really needs a lot of work. It's super dark and dusty on the inside. Surely he's got the money to pay someone to clean it... Also, it's got the most confusing floor layout ever. After a while of exploring and beating up the enemies found therein, I reached the final room where the battle actually takes place.
Owing once again to my over-levelled nature, Omar wasn't that difficult. He did the standard "every time his guard is broken, he strengthens it by two hits" thing, but that seemed to max out at 8 instead of 10 or 11 like in previous cases. He did charge up a presumably big attack at one point, but by sheer luck I had his guard one hit away from being broken, so he never got to actually use it. Omar is also accompanied by a couple of sidekicks who were annoying, but died quickly.
Tressa and Ali have another talk after Morlock and Omar run off, and they decide that round two of their MERCHANT BATTLE will be at the Merchant's Fair in Grandport. But first, they need to procure stuff to sell in order to compete with one another, so the next stop on Tressa's journey is Victors Hollow. Every ounce of my being wants that to be "Victor's Hollow", but there's no apostrophe in-game.
As previously mentioned, next up will be Cyrus' Chapter 2, which is also in the town of Quarrycrest. Not having to journey there means I can just hop straight into it next time I pick up my Switch, so it should go by a bit faster. Maybe I can get three people's Chapter 2s done next session? We'll see. I also kinda want to go exploring and discover the third town in each region. Maybe I'll do that once I'm done with Chapter 2.
Sunday, September 9, 2018
Octopath Traveler: Session 9
This is also two sessions combined into one, as the first session I was just running around fighting things around Wellspring, identifying weaknesses, levelling up Alfyn so he could Inquire about things, getting JP (Southern Wellspring Sands looks better on the surface since you can regularly get JP rewards in the 130 range, but battles take FOREVER due to weird sets of weaknesses, so I still feel like Carrion Caves is better), and debating what to do next.
The only real thing of note is that I finally decided to swap around some support abilities now that people have access to a few jobs' worth of them. Currently popular is Inspiration, which has the effect "With each successful standard attack, gain SP equal to 1% of the damage you deal.". When you boost a character's standard attack to get multiple hits, Inspiration applies to each individual hit, so while the amount of SP gained is small, it adds up. This gives a virtual boost to any given character's max SP since I can just do regular attacks to recover smaller amounts of SP. I also discovered that the Thief job makes an excellent SP battery with its Steal SP and Share SP abilities. If you boost Steal SP, you can usually recover close to 100% of what you shared to another character (plus Steal SP's cost of 6 SP), and Inspiration can recover the rest. There's a big caveat to Steal SP though, that may also apply to HP Thief now that I think about it: if you kill the enemy with Steal SP, you don't get any SP. It still pops up the SP gain text, but the value is zero.
Also, everything about the Apothecary ability Amputation paints a rather grim view of what amputations must have been like before anesthesia and other modern medical technology. It's just a really powerful axe swing with a big wind-up... You get the picture, right?
Between the first bit and the rest of this, I decided to not go as gung-ho on the early-game grinding as I have been. It was getting exhausting and kind of turning me off from playing the game because of how slowly it goes. The later areas will surely have better rewards, and this way I actually get to continue the story. First order of business: find the other four shrines so I can unlock the other four secondary jobs. Second order of business: Ophilia's Chapter 2. Also, somewhere in there, make sure I have non-makeshift equipment for people now that their available weapon range is expanding. I love that the game throws you that bone, but as the description of the makeshift weapons implies, you'll want to replace them with a real weapon before too long.
In the process of running around locating the other four shrines, I noticed that it's kinda easy to get lost in Western Stillsnow Wilds, which is going to make finding all the chests in that area fun. If not for the icons on the radar I don't think I would've found the sub-area or the shrine, or at least, not without a lot of walking around fighting random battles because the area is large, open, and completely covered in snow. As in, there are no paths to help you find your way. Western Noblecourt Flats is almost the same thing, but without the snow. Nevertheless, I do now have access to all secondary jobs. Unfortunately, weapons cost money, and the good ones cost a lot, so I kinda had to stop buying the good weapons before I'd replaced all the makeshift equipment.
Anyway, with my party all decked out with secondary jobs that they either mostly know or completely know, it was well and truly way past the time to do Ophilia's Chapter 2.
The first part of her Chapter 2 is as easy as I expected it to be: no enemies, just dialogue as Ophilia performs the Kindling in Saintsbridge Cathedral. Then, while she's taking a walk around the city, she encounters some kids having an argument. Long story short, one of the kids recently lost his mother, and highly values her brooch, which another one of the kids "lost" by bumping into him. In typical "kids being dicks to each other" fashion, blame and insults are thrown at the one who is somehow responsible for "losing" the brooch by bumping into the other. Seriously, kid, if the thing means that much to you, keep it secure!
Anyway, this sets up Ophilia trying to help the kid locate the brooch. They're unsuccessful, and Ophilia goes to have a talk with the kid whose mom died. She eventually convinces him to sort of begrudgingly apologize, but then the kid who's still busy looking for the brooch runs off after a dog who apparently has it in its mouth. Said kid follows said dog straight into a forest full of monsters. Combat time!
This area was fairly easy, both in the "it's still early game and the recommended level is 20" sense, and in the "two of my characters are level 50+ and two are high 30s or low 40s" sense, but also thanks to having secondary jobs set on everyone, I have a lot more weapon options available and can hit weaknesses much more often.
I love how this game incentivizes using regular attacks. In a lot of RPGs, each character's regular attack is kind of lackluster and you only use it when you're low on magic or whatever, but here, you need to use regular attacks in order to break enemies' defenses so you can deal more damage to them. Also, support abilities that go into effect on hit further incentivize this, i.e. the aforementioned Inspiration.
Anyway, I forget how to spell the boss' name because it was full of weird foreign characters that I don't even know how to pronounce, but it was a direwolf that strengthened its guard by two hits after every time I broke it. Even though H'aanit starts out only being able to use a bow and an axe, with Warrior as her secondary the sword is the best weapon for her. I was using the Warrior abilities a lot, namely Cross Strike. At one point I threw Ophilia's Divine skill on her so a boosted Cross Strike would happen twice instead of once. Between me being overlevelled, the extra weapons afforded by secondary jobs, and the relatively low recommended level for the area, the boss went down without issue.
In the end, the kid finds the brooch and they go back to being friends again.
I guess now that I have all the secondary jobs available I should go over my party setup, so here goes:
H'aanit has the Warrior secondary and is using Heighten Senses, Inspiration, Second Serving, and Patience. Ophilia has the Apothecary secondary and is using SP Saver, Inner Strength, Inspiration, and Saving Grace. Primrose has the Hunter secondary and is using Inspiration, Eye for an Eye, Second Wind, and Second Serving. Finally, Tressa has the Thief secondary and is using Inspiration, Grows on Trees, Snatch, and SP Saver.
An interesting thing I've noticed is that the weapon you have selected next to the Attack option matters for the Eye for an Eye support ability. When I noticed this, I had the bow selected when Primrose got hit, and she countered with the bow, which happened to weaken the attacking enemy's guard. Also, attempting to target a job skill that uses a weapon will select that weapon. For instance, with H'aanit with a Warrior secondary, having anything other than the sword selected and then targeting enemies with Level Slash will switch her selected weapon to the sword.
I guess one thing that remains for me to figure out: Does having a secondary job give you access to a weapon that the character already had access to from their primary job shaft you out of a weapon slot, or do you get some sort of attack boost for that weapon since both jobs impart knowledge of how to use the weapon? If I had to guess, I'd say the former.
Anyway, I'm liking this whole "progressing through the game" thing, so up next will be Primrose's Chapter 2. I think it's going to be "all story, all the time" until recommended levels for things catch up to where my characters are.
The only real thing of note is that I finally decided to swap around some support abilities now that people have access to a few jobs' worth of them. Currently popular is Inspiration, which has the effect "With each successful standard attack, gain SP equal to 1% of the damage you deal.". When you boost a character's standard attack to get multiple hits, Inspiration applies to each individual hit, so while the amount of SP gained is small, it adds up. This gives a virtual boost to any given character's max SP since I can just do regular attacks to recover smaller amounts of SP. I also discovered that the Thief job makes an excellent SP battery with its Steal SP and Share SP abilities. If you boost Steal SP, you can usually recover close to 100% of what you shared to another character (plus Steal SP's cost of 6 SP), and Inspiration can recover the rest. There's a big caveat to Steal SP though, that may also apply to HP Thief now that I think about it: if you kill the enemy with Steal SP, you don't get any SP. It still pops up the SP gain text, but the value is zero.
Also, everything about the Apothecary ability Amputation paints a rather grim view of what amputations must have been like before anesthesia and other modern medical technology. It's just a really powerful axe swing with a big wind-up... You get the picture, right?
Between the first bit and the rest of this, I decided to not go as gung-ho on the early-game grinding as I have been. It was getting exhausting and kind of turning me off from playing the game because of how slowly it goes. The later areas will surely have better rewards, and this way I actually get to continue the story. First order of business: find the other four shrines so I can unlock the other four secondary jobs. Second order of business: Ophilia's Chapter 2. Also, somewhere in there, make sure I have non-makeshift equipment for people now that their available weapon range is expanding. I love that the game throws you that bone, but as the description of the makeshift weapons implies, you'll want to replace them with a real weapon before too long.
In the process of running around locating the other four shrines, I noticed that it's kinda easy to get lost in Western Stillsnow Wilds, which is going to make finding all the chests in that area fun. If not for the icons on the radar I don't think I would've found the sub-area or the shrine, or at least, not without a lot of walking around fighting random battles because the area is large, open, and completely covered in snow. As in, there are no paths to help you find your way. Western Noblecourt Flats is almost the same thing, but without the snow. Nevertheless, I do now have access to all secondary jobs. Unfortunately, weapons cost money, and the good ones cost a lot, so I kinda had to stop buying the good weapons before I'd replaced all the makeshift equipment.
Anyway, with my party all decked out with secondary jobs that they either mostly know or completely know, it was well and truly way past the time to do Ophilia's Chapter 2.
The first part of her Chapter 2 is as easy as I expected it to be: no enemies, just dialogue as Ophilia performs the Kindling in Saintsbridge Cathedral. Then, while she's taking a walk around the city, she encounters some kids having an argument. Long story short, one of the kids recently lost his mother, and highly values her brooch, which another one of the kids "lost" by bumping into him. In typical "kids being dicks to each other" fashion, blame and insults are thrown at the one who is somehow responsible for "losing" the brooch by bumping into the other. Seriously, kid, if the thing means that much to you, keep it secure!
Anyway, this sets up Ophilia trying to help the kid locate the brooch. They're unsuccessful, and Ophilia goes to have a talk with the kid whose mom died. She eventually convinces him to sort of begrudgingly apologize, but then the kid who's still busy looking for the brooch runs off after a dog who apparently has it in its mouth. Said kid follows said dog straight into a forest full of monsters. Combat time!
This area was fairly easy, both in the "it's still early game and the recommended level is 20" sense, and in the "two of my characters are level 50+ and two are high 30s or low 40s" sense, but also thanks to having secondary jobs set on everyone, I have a lot more weapon options available and can hit weaknesses much more often.
I love how this game incentivizes using regular attacks. In a lot of RPGs, each character's regular attack is kind of lackluster and you only use it when you're low on magic or whatever, but here, you need to use regular attacks in order to break enemies' defenses so you can deal more damage to them. Also, support abilities that go into effect on hit further incentivize this, i.e. the aforementioned Inspiration.
Anyway, I forget how to spell the boss' name because it was full of weird foreign characters that I don't even know how to pronounce, but it was a direwolf that strengthened its guard by two hits after every time I broke it. Even though H'aanit starts out only being able to use a bow and an axe, with Warrior as her secondary the sword is the best weapon for her. I was using the Warrior abilities a lot, namely Cross Strike. At one point I threw Ophilia's Divine skill on her so a boosted Cross Strike would happen twice instead of once. Between me being overlevelled, the extra weapons afforded by secondary jobs, and the relatively low recommended level for the area, the boss went down without issue.
In the end, the kid finds the brooch and they go back to being friends again.
I guess now that I have all the secondary jobs available I should go over my party setup, so here goes:
H'aanit has the Warrior secondary and is using Heighten Senses, Inspiration, Second Serving, and Patience. Ophilia has the Apothecary secondary and is using SP Saver, Inner Strength, Inspiration, and Saving Grace. Primrose has the Hunter secondary and is using Inspiration, Eye for an Eye, Second Wind, and Second Serving. Finally, Tressa has the Thief secondary and is using Inspiration, Grows on Trees, Snatch, and SP Saver.
An interesting thing I've noticed is that the weapon you have selected next to the Attack option matters for the Eye for an Eye support ability. When I noticed this, I had the bow selected when Primrose got hit, and she countered with the bow, which happened to weaken the attacking enemy's guard. Also, attempting to target a job skill that uses a weapon will select that weapon. For instance, with H'aanit with a Warrior secondary, having anything other than the sword selected and then targeting enemies with Level Slash will switch her selected weapon to the sword.
I guess one thing that remains for me to figure out: Does having a secondary job give you access to a weapon that the character already had access to from their primary job shaft you out of a weapon slot, or do you get some sort of attack boost for that weapon since both jobs impart knowledge of how to use the weapon? If I had to guess, I'd say the former.
Anyway, I'm liking this whole "progressing through the game" thing, so up next will be Primrose's Chapter 2. I think it's going to be "all story, all the time" until recommended levels for things catch up to where my characters are.
Thursday, September 6, 2018
Octopath Traveler: Session 8
I kinda live-tweeted the first portion of this session, so the first portion of this post will be a summary of that, with a few bits interjected because I didn't tweet everything.
I decided to make for Saintsbridgeunder cover of night to do Ophilia's Chapter 2, but on the way there I remembered that NPCs and side quests exist. I found the artist whose last painting is necessary for a side quest elsewhere, and I found a shrine, which was actually the second one I found, but the first one I actually bothered to venture any farther into than the bare minimum to get its icon on the world map. Turns out the shrines are how you unlock secondary jobs, and I should've continued into the first one I found, on the way to Stonegard. Anyway, I now have Apothecary available as a secondary job. H'aanit, Ophilia, and Tressa had a ton of JP sitting around from when I was being an idiot grinding JP for people one at a time, so they immediately learned all of the Apothecary skills. Primrose was the one I was swapping out for that, so she learned everything but the Divine skill. Satisfied with having done that, I left Ophilia as an Apothecary secondary (each job can only be set as one character's secondary job). My thoughts immediately turned to "hey, I should go back to that other shrine...", but continued with "...after I get to Saintsbridge.".
After setting Ophilia's secondary job to Apothecary, she gained the ability to use axes in combat. I didn't actually have a spare axe to give her, but as it turns out, the game has you covered if that's the case. The character gains a "Makeshift Axe" weapon that doesn't have any stat boosts, but at the very least enables you to use the weapon in combat until you get to a town and buy something better. Nice touch, that. Apothecary as a secondary also doesn't grant access to the Concoct menu, sadly, because that's one of Alfyn's unique abilities. Still, it allows a character to heal a single target and remove status effects, which mesh quite well with Ophilia being a healer.
Once in Saintsbridge, New Town Syndrome™ took over and I had to swap in Alfyn and Therion so I could run around and speak to, Inquire about, and Steal from every NPC possible. Inquiring about some NPCs in Saintsbridge needs Alfyn to be level 35, and he was level 32 so I decided to visit the nearby area of Farshore to do some grinding, for both EXP and JP. I haven't really been paying attention to where the best EXP gains are, but Carrion Caves JP gains are still best JP gains. Got Therion the first five Apothecary skills before setting out. Finished up a couple of the easier side quests and decided to go pick up more secondary jobs.
I now have access to Apothecary, Warrior, Merchant, and Dancer as secondary jobs. I gave H'aanit the Warrior secondary, it just made sense. She's a hunter, it's only natural that she might want to learn to wield different types of weapons to better help her while hunting. I gave Ophilia the Apothecary secondary, as its single-target revive and status effect removal mesh well, and she seems to be taking a liking to swinging a giant axe around. My party as I've been running around doing this has had Alfyn and Therion in place of Primrose and Tressa, Alfyn doesn't have a secondary yet (Dancer doesn't really make sense for his character), and I gave Therion the Merchant secondary. This way, it's like he's peddling off his ill-gotten goods, which I kinda do anyway since I steal everything that isn't nailed down.
I realized that it makes total sense which secondary jobs are obtained where: it's the same as the starting region for the character with that job as primary. Also, I finally got around to doing the most basic of math and figured out that it takes 9630 JP to completely learn a job. I doubt I'll cut it that close, but it's nice to know if I'm going to have to be choosy or if I can just go down the list learning all the skills one by one.
Getting secondary job skills, levelling up Alfyn as a byproduct, and doing Ophilia's Chapter 2... next session?
I decided to make for Saintsbridge
After setting Ophilia's secondary job to Apothecary, she gained the ability to use axes in combat. I didn't actually have a spare axe to give her, but as it turns out, the game has you covered if that's the case. The character gains a "Makeshift Axe" weapon that doesn't have any stat boosts, but at the very least enables you to use the weapon in combat until you get to a town and buy something better. Nice touch, that. Apothecary as a secondary also doesn't grant access to the Concoct menu, sadly, because that's one of Alfyn's unique abilities. Still, it allows a character to heal a single target and remove status effects, which mesh quite well with Ophilia being a healer.
Once in Saintsbridge, New Town Syndrome™ took over and I had to swap in Alfyn and Therion so I could run around and speak to, Inquire about, and Steal from every NPC possible. Inquiring about some NPCs in Saintsbridge needs Alfyn to be level 35, and he was level 32 so I decided to visit the nearby area of Farshore to do some grinding, for both EXP and JP. I haven't really been paying attention to where the best EXP gains are, but Carrion Caves JP gains are still best JP gains. Got Therion the first five Apothecary skills before setting out. Finished up a couple of the easier side quests and decided to go pick up more secondary jobs.
I now have access to Apothecary, Warrior, Merchant, and Dancer as secondary jobs. I gave H'aanit the Warrior secondary, it just made sense. She's a hunter, it's only natural that she might want to learn to wield different types of weapons to better help her while hunting. I gave Ophilia the Apothecary secondary, as its single-target revive and status effect removal mesh well, and she seems to be taking a liking to swinging a giant axe around. My party as I've been running around doing this has had Alfyn and Therion in place of Primrose and Tressa, Alfyn doesn't have a secondary yet (Dancer doesn't really make sense for his character), and I gave Therion the Merchant secondary. This way, it's like he's peddling off his ill-gotten goods, which I kinda do anyway since I steal everything that isn't nailed down.
I realized that it makes total sense which secondary jobs are obtained where: it's the same as the starting region for the character with that job as primary. Also, I finally got around to doing the most basic of math and figured out that it takes 9630 JP to completely learn a job. I doubt I'll cut it that close, but it's nice to know if I'm going to have to be choosy or if I can just go down the list learning all the skills one by one.
Getting secondary job skills, levelling up Alfyn as a byproduct, and doing Ophilia's Chapter 2... next session?
Octopath Traveler: Session 7
I began this session realizing that I had a silly gap of 126 JP between Olberic and Therion, that I could easily close by having Olberic use Challenge on a few people. I ended up with them perfectly synchronized, and a good bit of grinding later, they got their Divine skills.
After that, I ran around having Therion steal everything that wasn't nailed down. Levelling up improves his chances of stealing by a lot, so a good many things that had lower chances now had 100% chances. I've got quest items for side quests that I don't even have yet. Anyway, my filching quest took me to Stonegard, where I could also have Alfyn finally use Inquire on the townspeople now that he's levelled up. Satisfied with having exhausted path actions, I went to the tavern to continue H'aanit's story.
By the way, I love this game's use of taverns for stuff like this. You can only swap party members around at a tavern, and if you choose not to continue a story when you enter the town it's taking you to, you can go to the tavern to continue it. It's totally like the other four travellers are hanging out in the tavern, and then you visit it to exchange stories and put together a group to head out and get stuff done.
H'aanit's search for her master, Z'aanta, leads her to a townsperson in Stonegard by the name of Natalia. Before continuing on his hunt, Z'aanta stayed at her place. After a quick talk, H'aanit learns that he was headed into The Spectrewood, and sets off on his trail. Dealing with a rock slide and a weird tree enemy that was blocking the path, she eventually encounters a clearing where there was clearly a battle. Shortly thereafter, she's beset upon by the Lord of the Forest.
Breaking that narrative style for a moment, this was an interesting boss fight. It kept summoning additional plants, and part of its attack pattern involved nomming someone down to 1 HP, gaining two extra hits on its guard, and changing its weaknesses around. It was a difficult fight for me to get into a rhythm, though I did end up with a reliable setup to avoid its powerful lightning attack that hits the entire party: simply weaken its guard to the point where it has one hit left, concentrate on the summoned plants for a bit until it starts charging for the attack, then deal the last hit to break its defense and make it lose the turn on which it would otherwise unleash the attack. It has a ton of HP, it took a few hits of Draefendi's Rage to the face, and they were hitting for over 6000. It was also quite annoying with the status effects, so the battle was a careful balance of figuring out which status effects to let run their course and which ones needed to be removed straight away, followed by weakening its guard, figuring out weaknesses, and also remembering to heal people occasionally.
Anyway, the beast Z'aanta was after, Redeye, apparently has the ability to petrify things, and it's done so to Z'aanta. Fortunately it wasn't the quick form of petrification seen in some works of fiction, but rather the slow version that gave him enough time to write a note asking whoever finds it to consult a specific seer in the town of Stillsnow.
Stillsnow so happens to be where Primrose's Chapter 2 takes place. I won't be seeing it for a bit, as I currently intend to do everyone's Chapter 2 before partaking anybody's Chapter 3, and I also intend to do the chapters in the order I recruited the characters, for no real reason other than "because I can". Anyway, next session will at the very least be Ophilia's Chapter 2. So far, the chapters seem to be designed to be reasonably digestible lengths, so given my play style that mostly involves dicking around and exploring everywhere except where the game is telling me to go, I can probably crank out a chapter in a couple of hours. We'll see how well this works as I get further into the game.
After that, I ran around having Therion steal everything that wasn't nailed down. Levelling up improves his chances of stealing by a lot, so a good many things that had lower chances now had 100% chances. I've got quest items for side quests that I don't even have yet. Anyway, my filching quest took me to Stonegard, where I could also have Alfyn finally use Inquire on the townspeople now that he's levelled up. Satisfied with having exhausted path actions, I went to the tavern to continue H'aanit's story.
By the way, I love this game's use of taverns for stuff like this. You can only swap party members around at a tavern, and if you choose not to continue a story when you enter the town it's taking you to, you can go to the tavern to continue it. It's totally like the other four travellers are hanging out in the tavern, and then you visit it to exchange stories and put together a group to head out and get stuff done.
H'aanit's search for her master, Z'aanta, leads her to a townsperson in Stonegard by the name of Natalia. Before continuing on his hunt, Z'aanta stayed at her place. After a quick talk, H'aanit learns that he was headed into The Spectrewood, and sets off on his trail. Dealing with a rock slide and a weird tree enemy that was blocking the path, she eventually encounters a clearing where there was clearly a battle. Shortly thereafter, she's beset upon by the Lord of the Forest.
Breaking that narrative style for a moment, this was an interesting boss fight. It kept summoning additional plants, and part of its attack pattern involved nomming someone down to 1 HP, gaining two extra hits on its guard, and changing its weaknesses around. It was a difficult fight for me to get into a rhythm, though I did end up with a reliable setup to avoid its powerful lightning attack that hits the entire party: simply weaken its guard to the point where it has one hit left, concentrate on the summoned plants for a bit until it starts charging for the attack, then deal the last hit to break its defense and make it lose the turn on which it would otherwise unleash the attack. It has a ton of HP, it took a few hits of Draefendi's Rage to the face, and they were hitting for over 6000. It was also quite annoying with the status effects, so the battle was a careful balance of figuring out which status effects to let run their course and which ones needed to be removed straight away, followed by weakening its guard, figuring out weaknesses, and also remembering to heal people occasionally.
Anyway, the beast Z'aanta was after, Redeye, apparently has the ability to petrify things, and it's done so to Z'aanta. Fortunately it wasn't the quick form of petrification seen in some works of fiction, but rather the slow version that gave him enough time to write a note asking whoever finds it to consult a specific seer in the town of Stillsnow.
Stillsnow so happens to be where Primrose's Chapter 2 takes place. I won't be seeing it for a bit, as I currently intend to do everyone's Chapter 2 before partaking anybody's Chapter 3, and I also intend to do the chapters in the order I recruited the characters, for no real reason other than "because I can". Anyway, next session will at the very least be Ophilia's Chapter 2. So far, the chapters seem to be designed to be reasonably digestible lengths, so given my play style that mostly involves dicking around and exploring everywhere except where the game is telling me to go, I can probably crank out a chapter in a couple of hours. We'll see how well this works as I get further into the game.
Wednesday, September 5, 2018
Octopath Traveler: Session 6
I left off last session in the middle of getting Alfyn his last few skills, so I picked right back up where I left off. I'd been idly wondering if I could properly handle Hoarfrost Grotto now that I've levelled up a bit, and I was curious if its JP rewards would be higher, so after getting his seventh skill, I paid it a visit. The answers to those questions are yes and no, respectively. I was rather surprised to see that Carrion Caves has better JP rewards despite its lower recommended level.
At any rate, the boss of Hoarfrost Grotto is none other than the Jötunn that I needed to find for a side quest, so I fought it. Without Cyrus around to identify weaknesses and provide lots of elemental damage, the beginning of the fight was a bit rocky. The first thing it does is summon two Snow Elementals, so I had to experiment the old-fashioned way to find all the weaknesses, and then keep my party alive while taking them out. The tricky bit about Jötunn itself is that every time you break it, the number of hits needed to break it again goes up by two, at least until it gets up to 8. It didn't go up after that for me. Alfyn surprisingly doesn't have the ability to boost item usage or his concoctions, so while I was able to use a fire damage concoction to knock two hits off Jötunn's defense every time he had a turn, it deals crap for damage. Ended up shifting strategy to having Tressa donate all her BP to either H'aanit or Ophilia, so H'aanit could use her Divine skill, Draefendi's Rage, more often; and so that Ophilia could pop off large heals as necessary. Once the Snow Elementals went down, the fight went a lot more smoothly. Jötunn ended up taking three hits of Draefendi's Rage to the face before dying.
If you couldn't tell, it's open game on using Fast Travel to move around the "donut" quickly. Fights between areas have gotten to be more of a chore than anything else, and all the delicious, juicy JP is in higher-level areas anyway.
After beating Jötunn, I decided to remind myself of what the JP rewards were like in The Whistlewood, and perhaps bag myself another Flatlands Froggen VI while I was there. The JP rewards are decent, but less consistent than Carrion Caves. Being a rare spawn, Flatlands Froggen VI decided to be a butt and not spawn, but at least I killed a Cait or two. The sword-wielding mercenaries that Tressa can hire via Hired Help can apparently miss, which they did once, but fortunately I'd surprised the enemies on that fight, so Tressa actually got to go twice before the Cait had a chance to flee, and I got it on her second turn.
Later I did end up getting a Flatlands Froggen VI to spawn, and captured it much more easily this time. Walked around the world map a bit poking my head into various sub-areas just to get their symbols on the map so I could remember where they were for later, then returned to Carrion Caves to finish getting Alfyn his Divine skill. Once that was done, I decided to put both Olberic and Therion in the party at the same time to speed up the remaining grinding. I honestly don't know why I didn't combine Cyrus and Alfyn's grinding in the same manner, it would've sped things up considerably.
This session ended with the combination of my "go to sleep" reminder phone alarm deciding it didn't really feel like going off, and me getting Olberic and Therion their 7th skills each. Definitely getting their Divine skills next session, and then hopefully I won't have to grind again for a while and can actually focus on the story, where I'm still between Chapter 1 and 2.
By the way, I'm still looking forward to getting the ability to set secondary jobs. Dunno when that's going to be unlocked. Also, it feels incredibly weird that I appear to be done with JP after having completed Chapter 1, especially given that my characters are still accumulating JP. In before everyone has to learn every job skill individually and my grinding is just getting started instead of being almost done.
At any rate, the boss of Hoarfrost Grotto is none other than the Jötunn that I needed to find for a side quest, so I fought it. Without Cyrus around to identify weaknesses and provide lots of elemental damage, the beginning of the fight was a bit rocky. The first thing it does is summon two Snow Elementals, so I had to experiment the old-fashioned way to find all the weaknesses, and then keep my party alive while taking them out. The tricky bit about Jötunn itself is that every time you break it, the number of hits needed to break it again goes up by two, at least until it gets up to 8. It didn't go up after that for me. Alfyn surprisingly doesn't have the ability to boost item usage or his concoctions, so while I was able to use a fire damage concoction to knock two hits off Jötunn's defense every time he had a turn, it deals crap for damage. Ended up shifting strategy to having Tressa donate all her BP to either H'aanit or Ophilia, so H'aanit could use her Divine skill, Draefendi's Rage, more often; and so that Ophilia could pop off large heals as necessary. Once the Snow Elementals went down, the fight went a lot more smoothly. Jötunn ended up taking three hits of Draefendi's Rage to the face before dying.
If you couldn't tell, it's open game on using Fast Travel to move around the "donut" quickly. Fights between areas have gotten to be more of a chore than anything else, and all the delicious, juicy JP is in higher-level areas anyway.
After beating Jötunn, I decided to remind myself of what the JP rewards were like in The Whistlewood, and perhaps bag myself another Flatlands Froggen VI while I was there. The JP rewards are decent, but less consistent than Carrion Caves. Being a rare spawn, Flatlands Froggen VI decided to be a butt and not spawn, but at least I killed a Cait or two. The sword-wielding mercenaries that Tressa can hire via Hired Help can apparently miss, which they did once, but fortunately I'd surprised the enemies on that fight, so Tressa actually got to go twice before the Cait had a chance to flee, and I got it on her second turn.
Later I did end up getting a Flatlands Froggen VI to spawn, and captured it much more easily this time. Walked around the world map a bit poking my head into various sub-areas just to get their symbols on the map so I could remember where they were for later, then returned to Carrion Caves to finish getting Alfyn his Divine skill. Once that was done, I decided to put both Olberic and Therion in the party at the same time to speed up the remaining grinding. I honestly don't know why I didn't combine Cyrus and Alfyn's grinding in the same manner, it would've sped things up considerably.
This session ended with the combination of my "go to sleep" reminder phone alarm deciding it didn't really feel like going off, and me getting Olberic and Therion their 7th skills each. Definitely getting their Divine skills next session, and then hopefully I won't have to grind again for a while and can actually focus on the story, where I'm still between Chapter 1 and 2.
By the way, I'm still looking forward to getting the ability to set secondary jobs. Dunno when that's going to be unlocked. Also, it feels incredibly weird that I appear to be done with JP after having completed Chapter 1, especially given that my characters are still accumulating JP. In before everyone has to learn every job skill individually and my grinding is just getting started instead of being almost done.
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