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ideahat-universe · 8 months

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It's like Pokemon but mask off.

I like monster catching games and like with most westerners my first taste of the genre was with Pokemon. But it didn't end with Pokemon. A lot of people who fell in love with Pokemon rarely extended their interest to other titles. As a result many other members in the genre languished in obscurity. The most notable ended up being Digimon but Digimon never got a big piece of the pie, but when rpgs were having a monster catcher craze I jumped in.

Monster Rancher, Dragon Quest Monster, Digimon, Azure Dreams, Robopon, and even something completely off the wall.

And after playing that and many more I had my illusion completely shattered on how good Pokemon actually was.

Every game had a little something that Pokemon either dragged their feet on having or never had.

Robopon gives you the ability to customize and change your abilities based on whatever load-out you gave your Robopon. On a surface level this looks like something that makes the identity of your Robopon irrelevant but that's far from the case as items have to be compatible and certain levels of compatibility make moves more or less effective. But the most important part is acknowledging is that when this game came out Pokemon still had sparse, single use TMs and HMs that were permanent. Robopon allowed you to access to basically every move in the game, you just had to discover which combination of items on which Robopon enables it.

Dragon Quest Monsters 1 has a breeding system and mandates that you use it. Not only are bred monsters stronger than wild ones but carefully bred monsters can have unique and very powerful offspring and even if you settle on a specific monster and want it to be your main, the monsters have level caps that are less than 100 meaning that you'll fall off if you insist on holding a monster indefinitely.

Dragon Quest Monsters 1 came out a full year before Pokemon Gold and Silver came out and when that came out and had breeding as well, the differences were brutal. You were expected to wait out the egg hatching (as if running around in a circle was ever going to be a fun game mechanic), then your egg would hatch and the Pokemon would either be the mother in its base form or a not Ditto. But wait, it's even worse. Pokemon have breed compatibility that is obfuscated with vague terms and now instead of mixing and matching at will you have to consult an insane flow chart to divine who can make babies with whom and you just end up using Ditto anyways.

But the worst part is that outside of shiny breeding (and learning a couple of moves from the parents that can't be acquired otherwise) and getting baby forms you don't get anything special from breeding Pokemon because any random Pokemon can have the stats you're looking for meaning that catching Pokemon is going to be better than breeding in almost every regard.

Azure Dreams allowed you to fight with your monsters and your monsters followed you around in the over world. Two years prior Pokemon Yellow came out with the trademark mechanic of having Pikachu following you in the over world. But this feature would not consistently stay in future titles and it took till Arceus for a trainer to be ever slightly more involved in the fight than just standing and giving commands.

Monster Rancher sacrifices a lot of commonly loved mechanics in monster games in order to have the most definitive monster training experience. Monsters have to train via mini games and non-combat related activities.

Monsters get tired, they get sick, they eat, they have favorite and least favorite foods, they can get hurt, they can get angry, they can run away from home, they can cheat their training, and they can fight with or without your guidance. When you play Monster Rancher you will miss out on the exploration and the range of creatures but when you let your Pokemon get one shot because you didn't know the match-up and basically nothing happens to you or them you'll miss how Monster Rancher makes you care about the well being of the Monster and when you're in a cave or a patch of grass or a large body of water, grinding out experience by fighting a small handle of Pokemon over and over again (back then! I know experience gain is really easy now but back then) you'll wish you can just go to a real gym and exercise the experience you want.

Digimon World changes from game to game but the very first one for the PSone is THE game that screwed up how I felt about Pokemon's basic mechanics.

Digimon World 1 gave you only one Digimon to train and raise at a time and a couple dozen transformations but you could feed the Digimon, it has moods and behaviors, you need to discipline it, you can train it in combat or at a gym, you can adjust its stats, it can learn dozens of moves on top of a super move and Digimon are programmable. Intelligence isn't just a magic damage stat. The smarter your Digimon is the better it can comprehend specific commands and complex maneuvers, meaning that with enough training your Digimon can be told to do everything from evade oncoming attacks, go whole hog and do max damage, Defend from all attacks, or even conserve mana spending.

Dragon Quest Monsters had this as well where depending on how they are trained they handle fights and understand commands based on your training or lack thereof.

Nothing like this really exists in Pokemon. When Reverend breaks Pokemon down to "press the button to receive dopamine." It's a joke but in reality, as a trainer you should be expected to actually train your Pokemon well enough to actually do things on their own. In real life every trainer for every sport expects the person they train to be self directing, when you do a coliseum match in Dragon Quest Monsters you can't give monsters specific commands so you have to rely on how you conditioned them to fight well beforehand.

A Pokemon Trainer should be able to be hands off, and have your Pokemon handle it on their own. If you have to tell your Pokemon what to do and when to do it, have you really even trained them anything?

And you might think this is a long diatribe on what is clearly a post about Palworld but my point is that I play the Monster Collector/trainer games and have been finding Pokemon lacking for maybe 15 years. So I look forward to and support the little differences that make other monster collection/training games better than Pokemon and Palworld offers a very unique experience when compared to Pokemon.

Let me break it down.

Pokemon slowly phased out regular real world animals in favor of more Pokemon but they often gloss over how because there are no normal animals and there's just Pokemon for everything, that Pokemon have to be the main product that's consumed and killed and that hundreds of Pokemon more than likely exist to just be butchered and consumed regardless of how sentient and sapient

many of them are. At the very least Pokemon have their own food cycle where they brutally murder each other to stay alive.

In Palworld you don't have that issue! It's a dog eat dog world, whatever you don't feel like capturing or keeping you thrash 'em and scrap 'em. The game has ragdoll physics so when you're done murdering the sheep and stripping it of its assets you can roll its dead body into a river.

Pokemon talks a big game about friendship and love and how you can't just treat Pokemon like emotionless weapons. However, that's exactly what players do. There's no consequence for letting your Pokemon get nuked so there's no particular care for their well being. Nine times out of ten you don't win because you love your Pokemon more. You win because your Pokemon out levels the opponent or they hard counter the opponent.

In Palworld they don't worry about that ethical dilemma. You know what? Your Pals are weapons and if you really want to up the ante, give them a gun! In the Pokemon world most conflicts are resolved with a Pokemon battle but in Palworld killing people is a team effort!

Gary may think he's smarter than you but is he smarter than bullet?

Throughout the games and the movies and the comics and even TV show what you'll notice is that actually Pokemon battles are a low priority for most Pokemon owners. A lot of people treat Pokemon as family members and pets but even more use Pokemon as a utility to solve everyday problems or participate in special contests.

Depending on the Pokemon game you are playing the side content can enable ways for you to treat the Pokemon like a friend and not like a living gun. There are even mini games that allow you to train your Pokemon towards a goal that doesn't involve just fighting the opponent but these things aren't added on top of each other with each title, they're swapped out. Never the same mini games, never the same friendship mechanics and in each game they are very shallow.

In Palworld you are expected to fight with your Pals but the main feature is putting your Pals to work at your base. Building and turning your complex into a well oiled machine. Not every Pal does the same job so you're invited to get many pals for many different tasks.

So in Palworld they are a pet, they are also a gun, and a hammer. But it's all a core feature and not side content and there's no pretense where you pretend that the creatures you control is not just tools to serve you and do what you desire.

Speaking of desire! Pokemon has Winked and nudged at the idea that Pokemon are occasionally more than friends and pets. There are an odd amount of Pokemon that are more human than monster and there's a redacted text log that says Pokemon and humans were mates and got married. It's hard to know just how close Pokemon are to humans without it being kid friendly or just extremely strange.

Palworld doesn't have that issue! In fact.

youtube

Here's Lovander! A Pal whose text entry more or less says that it's fucking everything that moves! It has only recently set its sights on humans, but that's not a big deal. After all, humans can be captured in Pal spheres like any other Pal. That's right game theorists! in Palworld humans are just Pals and are subject to the exact same mechanics.

It takes courage to say the quiet part out loud.

Now is Palworld the Monster Catcher game I've been waiting for? Kind of. It's in early access and if it adds more tasks and locations and objectives it could be quite good. Being completely unhinged and unethical is what makes Rimworld great. If this game can be modded easily, for 30 dollars. It's worth your time. Let's just hope that Craftworld was just a stepping stone for this and not an indication of the devs being more idea dogs than developers.

#palworld #pokemon #digimon world #video games #rpg #Youtube

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canmom · 4 months

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what's the book for? part 2

[here's an intro where I talk about the three hour video essay that inspired me to do this]

[here's the first part where I argue that there's a big difference between the actual thing you do in an RPG and the book that tells you how you're allegedly supposed to be doing it]

So if the actual TTRPG games are mostly learned by observation and practice, what is the something that RPG books claim to give you in order to enable that?

Here's three things I can think of.

This isn't intended as a Forge-like categorisation of games, most RPG books offer (or claim to offer) all of these to some degree, ideally in complementary ways...

A ruling reference - RPG book as legal system

In the intro to a typical mainstream RPG book, this is typically the explanation that is given.

Over the course of a telling a story together, all sorts of weird edge cases come up where you might not want to simply make a call on how it should resolve. Moreover, consistency is valued, for both challenge and narrative reasons.

In this case, the RPG book is a big collection of rulings for specific situations. 'What happens when a character falls off a cliff?' You can look it up. It's like legal precedents. This is how a lot of the stuff in the early D&D books started - stuff that someone had done, and a referee had made a ruling, and it got written down. Then it would get systematised, unified, and streamlined so that it's easier to remember and extend to new situations.

A lighter game avoids special cases and just suggests a general procedure for resolving situations of uncertainty, conflicts etc.

This angle doesn't tend to cover procedures for how the game is physically run - how to go about setting up the scenario, who should get priority when speaking, etc. etc. - beyond perhaps offering prebuilt modules to inspire you. In older games, most of that is stuff you pick up by watching. In newer games... well, hold on.

A grab bag of interesting prompts - RPG book as inspiration in the moment

Most RPG books have flavour text; many also have tables of weird shit you can roll on or select when building a character, character sheets full of interesting abilities, descriptions of NPCs and so on. A select few RPGs like Unknown Armies and Chuubo's Marvellous Wish-Granting Engine have really distinctive prose too.

The aim of all these tools is to give you something to latch onto when you're in the moment and you need to think of the next thing to say. It's also to get people onto some shared understanding of what this game is all about.

This is where the bulk of many RPG books lies. It's explicitly the aim of Apocalypse World's MC moves. Many one-page RPGs are nothing but lists of evocative names and description elements, and a short snatch of prose.

Prompt tables and lists of names are popular in just about every tradition of RPG design - trad, storygames, OSR, all use them. Sometimes they're the most memorable thing about an RPG, like Dark Heresy's crit tables.

Sometimes pages of tables is the RPG - in recent years, card-based games have become popular, using a regular deck of cards which indexes into a big table of events, each of which is like 'here's a short description. how do you respond?'. This type of game has a great deal in common with storylet-based interactive fiction like Fallen London.

Prompts don't have to be short, though. Arguably an adventure module can be pretty much this - something you consult when players arrive in a new place to get an idea of who they should meet for example.

In D&D, the Monster Manual is straight up a book of real freaky guys you can put in your game. It also has stat blocks for them, of course, but the descriptions and pictures do a lot of work here to make them concrete.

This is why I describe the pictures in Lancer as load-bearing. The pictures help - or are supposed to help - grease the wheels of imagination when you're trying to imagine mechs.

This function of RPGs is a large part of the angle you're playing if you tie the game to a particular genre, setting or IP.

A machine to guide you to a specific experience - RPG book as auteur blueprint

So here's the newer flavour.

RPGs can be one of the most feelings-dense forms of art that humans create - it's your story, with your characters. This is something that tends to arise organically after you spend a long time with a character and 'get into their head'.

However, there is often a desire on the designer's side to structure the game to bring about a particular kind of emotional experience more directly. From horror games to games self-consciously 'about' colonialism, abuse, romance, etc., these games try to give you a particular experience, similar to what a film or book gives you - or indeed, a computer game.

Here are some examples:

My Life With Master is an older Forge game. It's about the 'Igor' servant characters in a classic horror movie, billing itself as 'a roleplaying game of villainy, self-loathing, and unrequited love'. It presents you with an emotionally charged scenario and mechanics that try to push you towards specific drama - if you want to be critical, a firm instance of the incentives and buttons oriented design that Huntsman was talking about, sometimes quite explicitly saying 'this mechanic was designed to...'

Dog Eat Dog is a game 'a game of imperialism and assimilation on the Pacific islands', with the DM reimagined as a colonial power adding more and more restrictions and the players as native people who will inevitably break its rules, until they are eventually pushed to 'run amok' (fatally), or assimilate. It's a game whose entire argument is more or less spelled out in the book itself.

But games don't have to be this narrowly scoped to have this kind of aspiration. Something like Apocalypse World still wants to bring about certain kinds of interaction, laid out quite explicitly as 'agendas' for the MC and players. It is strongly 'opinionated', in programmer terms.

Even a very flexible game can take on this model. Fiasco is a very abstract structure, designed to set up a chaotic situation like in a Coen Brothers movie. Microscope is designed to give you a fractal zoom in and out of a fictional history. These games are almost all procedure; Fiasco has some fantastic prompt tables, and a clear way to cook up your own, but the bulk of it is the stuff it tells you to do with scenes and dice.

These could be seen as games on an auteur model, with many of the emotional beats of the scenario already rigged up in advance. You get this type of book to experience a good/meaningful story - with a certain amount of flexibility in the details that gets you more attached. If there is a GM/MC/etc. they have instructions to facilitate the expression of that story.

...well, I refer to it as an auteur model. Thankfully not everyone is Ron Edwards! Apocalypse World has a whole chapter about how to modify the game to your taste, or build new games on its framework, and that - plus its conceptual simplicity - probably played a role in its hundreds of derivatives. 'Hacking' games was well established as a practice in the storygames milieu right from the early days. Probably the vast majority of games put out on itch.io are simply hacks of an established framework, very few offer real innovation.

Despite this, the offer of these products is still that they'll tell you how create a kind of verbal machine to realise some very specific thing.

Secret fourth thing...?

I can't think of others right now, but I hate presenting a list as exhaustive unless I can prove it's exhaustive. It's very likely there's some other function a book can claim to perform.

However, to summarise, you look at an RPG book to get:

a consistent set of rulings to handle situations of uncertainty

a set of prompts to help inspire your imagination when you need inspiration

a carefully designed procedure to lead you to a specific experience

The third thing is kind of a different beast to the other two, huh? You might be thinking that the first two are trad games and the third one is post-Forge 'story games', but it's really much older than that. Paranoia is a great early example; there are shades of it in many games published in the 80s and 90s. Not all these games are affiliated with the Forge and its diaspora either - take for example Jenna Moran's games and Bliss Stage.

Story games are not books either

The Forge and its diaspora led to a lot of games being printed, and launched the careers of many an 'indie TTRPG designer', which was not really a thing you could be in the same way before. It would be easy therefore to think this was the main contribution: we should assess it on the basis of the printed games that resulted.

However, nothing says you have to use a book to pilfer from their idea pool.

The really interesting contribution of the whole movement, to my eye, is that it calls our attention to a facet of TTRPGs that had often been left implicit. Who speaks, when? Who gets the 'narrative authority' to make the final call on what becomes 'true'? How do you organise time - do you frame scenes, use flashbacks, cut between different characters? What makes a dice roll exciting? How do you work out what would engage the other players, and communicate your own interests? Are you trying to help your character win, or are you more like a writer who might choose to make them suffer? How do you make a compelling character arc? What can be changed around behind the scenes to make a better story?

These are all aspects of 'play', the thing that you do at the table. Any given TTRPG group will settle on its own implicit or explicit approach to this kind of thing.

Different RPG books will tell you to do this or that. Some games will tell you to set stakes, or make failure interesting, or make choices that act as 'flags' to show what you're looking for.

But these tools are not tied to any specific game. You don't need the 'permission' of a book, nor can a book stop you doing it. A book may lay out a procedure that makes it easier, may introduce you to an idea that you haven't heard before, but once you have the idea, you can play with it however you like.

The way I approach a trad game like D&D, from either side of the DM screen, has become very different after my sojourn into the world of story games. A lot of what I liked there, I kept doing. Other inspiration comes from outside of the 'hobby' entirely, in related milieu like improv comedy.

This is something the OSR milieu seems to understand quite well. Everything is expected to be mixed, matched, and interpreted by the needs of your group. Posts will be framed as mere advice, which can be picked up and applied regardless of context.

But that all depends on a certain amount of common ground as to 'what the game is'. There is an authoritative DM who runs the scenario. The emphasis of the game is probably on exploring some kind of ruin and surviving in a dark, decaying fantasy world populated by various factions at odds with each other. Players control flimsy characters whose survival is not guaranteed, but if they live long enough, they can become major powers. There is a heavy strategic aspect: you are trying to use your resources to survive and get something. This is the general shape of a 'prototypical OSR game'.

the shared context of storygames

Story games form their own subsubculture, but they do not have this level of shared context. Instead, a different kind of shared context is kind of implicit in the milieu.

Here's how things go at the London Indie RPG Meetup Group, which I've attended a couple of times: a group of nerds gather in a pub. People will pitch games with a couple of sentences; then people will form groups and play that game as a one-shot session. Someone will have a book, or printouts. Most players will not have heard of the game before.

In this kind of context, a lot of the quirks of story games make sense. 'Read this out' paragraphs, rapid character creation based on selecting prompts, simple mechanics designed to push you into drama as quickly as possible: all of this stuff is perfect for a one-shot game you play once or a few times. This type of game is not really trying to 'take on' trad games.

But then there's the 'middle ground' kind of game, which are closer to a 'trad' game - a game master, persistent characters each controlled by one player, multiple sessions, progression - but also instruct you to do something more experimental by trad-game standards. This includes Apocalypse World and its derivatives, Blades in the Dark and its derivatives, the Burning Wheel/Mouse Guard lineage, Jenna Moran's games... and so on.

It's this point of overlap where things get sticky and it all becomes a bit tense. Since, well, story game fans can be quite evangelistic - and part of that evangelism depends on a dismissively book-determinist view of trad TTRPGs. But conversely, trad players can be quite reluctant to imagine there is any other way of approaching this whole activity, and dismissive of any other approach. I do not like it, Sam-I-am.

So you end up with a situation of camps, with both groups bristling at the sense that they should be compelled to give up the thing they like to do it the way they consider inferior.

And if you want to criticise the other camp, what do you do? Pick up their book and criticise it as a product, according to your sense of what a TTRPG book is for. Which seems hopelessly besides the point when a book is such a small part of the story.

I've played trad games, story games, OSR games, 'freeform' forum games, LARP, MMO roleplaying, improv comedy... Not as much as I'd like of anything, but enough to get a sense of the many ways we can do this 'roleplaying' thing, whether by explicit rule or implicit convention.

So the puzzle I now have is, if there is to be a book involved, what is that book there to do? What really makes for a good RPG book? Are there other ways to get that thing? How do you game design honestly?

We'll try to address that in part 3 of this series, coming... sometime soon, hopefully!

#roleplaying games #story games #ttrpg #tabletop roleplaying

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goron-king-darunia · 2 months

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DotNW Draw-a-thon Days 25-31

It's been a wild ride! But I think I made it out more or less unscathed!

I'll do a masterpost tomorrow along with some final thoughts. But for now, enjoy some content for the best boys. I can't get my Richter's quite right, which was what I was afraid of. But they're not bad and I will see if I can fix them into something I like better in more polished revisions. In the meantime, enjoy. DotNW deserves more love than it got. It's definitely not Triple A GOTY never seen before material. But it's way better than people give it credit for and if it wasn't stuck in the shadow of the original Symphonia, I think people would have enjoyed it more.

I started replaying it to try to get better reference shots and the only complaint that I have so far is "why is this game so laggy and grindy? Just let me befriend all the monsters and let me level faster!" Which is less of a "this game is bad" issue and more "I'm an experienced player that can't access my old save files because of personal technical problems so I'm impatient." And I'm pretty sure the lag is mostly "This game was made to run on the Wii, why are you running it on the Wii U?" But it's also just me being impatient probably. "What do you mean I have to wait 3 seconds for a fight to load?"

But for real. I'm actually giddy about some of the worldbuilding they put in that I never noticed before, little details. I think my only main complaint that isn't an impatience thing is how some of the skits are locked behind events with random components, i.e. trying to fail several pacts in a row which is at least partially determined by the luck stat which you can only reset by sleeping at an inn and you cannot otherwise control. Yeah, anyway, less yammering, more doodling.

I think I will eventually get around to doing all the monsters. But I might take a break for a while.

Shout out to @catcantnavigate for keeping up! I loved seeing all your work throughout this event! And shout out to @aerypear for hosting/coordinating. I hope to see more DotNW stuff trickle out! Game is not a masterclass of innovation or storytelling but it is SERIOUSLY underrated and one of my favorite games of all time and definitely the source of my top favorite characters for real.

#DotNW #ToS2 #my art #art by GKD #Richter Abend #Aster Laker #Emil Castagnier #Centurion Aqua #Ratatosk #Centurion Tenebrae #Pontus #Monsters #Polwigles

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rocketbirdie · 9 months

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A New School Hunter's Guide to Old School Monster Hunter: What to Expect

World and Rise have come and gone. These are the games that introduced you to Monster Hunter. But now that you've completed every goal you set out to achieve, there's a big 2025 sized hole in your hunting heart where Wilds may one day be. "In the meantime, why not catch up on the old MH games?" you think to yourself, blissfully unaware of the hell that you are about to subject yourself to.

Below the cut is a SUPER LONG and very dramatic post, intended for new-ish Monster Hunter players who are bored of being good at the game, and want to remember what AGONY feels like— but would rather not jump in 100% blind like I did, doomed to hilarious suffering.

Note: This post mainly refers to MHGU, but much of it applies to older MH games as well. I came from Rise, and have not played World. If I made any incorrect assumptions about games I haven't played, apologies in advance. Let me know if I made any glaring mistakes.

Also, feel free to reblog and add any more info that I missed! I am but one mortal hunter, after all.

Table of Contents, because I wasn't kidding when I said this is a super long post:

Preparing for a Quest

GATHERING TAKES FOREVER

Paintballs, and other things that aren't in the newer games for a very good reason

When the monster attacks you

When you attack the monster

Armor Skills (AAAAAAA!!!!!! AAAAAAAAAGHHHHH!! AAAAAAAHHAGHHAAHGHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!)

The Desire Sensor (You Will Grind.)

No but really, you'd better have ~30 minutes set aside if you're planning on reading this whole thing in one sitting. Enjoy!

1. Preparing for a Quest

Many of the conveniences of the modern quest hub layout are nowhere to be found in old school MH games. Sure, you've got an overpriced shop, a smithy, and a quest handler all in one spot. And if you're lucky, maybe even a place to eat before the hunt. But if you want to change your equipment, save the game, or entrust your cat with an overseas trade deal, you'll likely have to do it somewhere else. And that means loading screens.

I'm telling you now, get used to the loading screens. Make sure you know what you want to do and where you need to do it, before you sit there and wait. Our spoiled Gen 5 asses are so accustomed to seamless transitions; the load times are not unreasonable, but the sheer number of interruptions will make you feel like a rabid animal gnawing at the bars of a wire cage. You'll get used to it. <- That's a phrase you're going to see a LOT in this post.

Go to your house to pick out your weapon and armor, and feast your eyes upon the horror: all of the equipment is haphazardly thrown into one box. There are no separate storage spaces for individual weapon types, meaning your sweet precious baby angel, the hammer, has to share menu real estate with the fucking light bowgun (UGH).

You cannot sort armor by head, chest, arms, etc. Want to see how your armor skills are looking? Close the box. Open the start menu. Navigate to "status," then flip through a page or two of normal, healthy stats. Find the armor skills page. Black out for a split second. Feel your heart rate spike, then immediately close out the armor skills, and decide that it's not important right now, and that you'll figure it out later.

Get your items in order. Set an item loadout if you can. Money is tight, and that won't be changing any time soon, so keep an eye on your zenny while you're shopping and smithing. Excess bones and ore are a decent source of cash if you're desperate.

I know I probably don't have to say it, but EAT! Eat something before the hunt! It increases your health and stamina bar and may grant you temporary skills. Some skills are exclusive to food, and can't be acquired via armor or decorations, so try out as many foods as you can. You'll be able to make more dishes using ingredients that you obtain as side quest rewards.

Before you set out on your quest, make absolutely certain that you have everything you might need. This is EXTREMELY important. The main camp is pretty much just there for show. (And for delivering eggs, but that's beside the point.) You cannot change your equipment or refill your items AT ALL once you're out there. If you forgot to eat, too bad, sucks to be you. And whatever weapon you bring is the only one you'll be using for that entire quest.

Alright, time to hunt! Talk to the quest handler, no, not that npc, no, that's not her either- ahem. Talk to the quest handler, aaaand yippee. 1 Star is all gathering quests. Well, at least they'll go by quickly!

2. GATHERING TAKES FOREVER

The first thing you'll notice on your first gathering quest in old school MH is that you slowly. Gather. One. Item. At a time. Maybe two if you're really striking it rich. Please for the love of all that is good, hold down the gathering button. Save yourself some time. Don't be an idiot like I was for more hours than I'm willing to admit.

YOU NEED TO GATHER. You need to gather so much, all the time, constantly. If you're not actively in combat, you should be gathering. If you're not gathering, then you should be moving to another gathering spot in order to gather more stuff. Bring a gathering palico. Hell, bring two. They are The Best type of palico, it doesn't even come close. There is no moment when you should not gather.

I can't stress this enough. Old school MH games will not just shower you with free items. Quest rewards are often pitiful, and it's safe to assume that the trader won't have what you need. Yes, gathering is slow and boring. But that's exactly why you need to weave it into every beat of downtime that the game gives you. GATHER, always. You'll thank yourself later.

You will need pickaxes to mine, and bug nets to catch bugs. These take up precious inventory space, but are well worth bringing to regular locales. If you want to fish and actually obtain something worthwhile (PLESIOTH), then you'll need to craft bait or bring some with you. And if the crafting recipes aren't listed anywhere in game, then gog help you.

There is a chance that crafting will just... not work. It'll consume the materials but spit out garbage instead of what you wanted to make. The odds of this happening can be mitigated by bringing a crafting book with you on your quest, which you can buy from a shop. But that book will take up space in your already miserably small inventory, assuming you brought sensible things along too, like potions. And a map.

Unless you have the locale memorized, you won't know where you are without the map item. In Low Rank, a map is courteously provided in the main camp's rations box, along with some field meds and food. (Don't get used to this kind of generosity. It'll be gone in High Rank and beyond.) Now that you have a map, you'll be able to see where all of the gathering spots are.......... right? RIGHT?????

WRONG. If you want to know where the spots are, you'll have to find them and then dedicate some real-life human brain memory space for that info. In some games, the gathering spots are obvious, with a big question mark that pops up when you can interact with them. In older games... uh... ha. Haha...... yeah. Good luck.

On the bright side, at least the map is good for keeping yourself safe. Y'know, because of the titular monsters. You can see the monsters on the map......... right?

Okay I'm gonna cut straight to the chase.

3. Paintballs, and other things that aren't in the newer games for a very good reason

Craft a pretty pink paintball with a paintberry and a sap plant. Equip it in your item scroll bar, and press that sexy item use button to throw it at a monster. Voila! A pink dot appears on your map. This (and psychoserum) allows you to see the monster's location.

Get into the habit of bringing multiple paintballs with you on every quest. You will miss a few throws. Also, the effect wears off after a few minutes, meaning you'll have to find the monster and hit it with another paintball again in order to keep it on the map. Be mindful of flying wyverns, who are aggravatingly hard to follow without a paintball. That includes some unexpected honorable mentions, for example Mizutsune, Zinogre, and Rajang, who can just... fly to the opposite side of the map. Yeah, I know. Don't ask.

So Zinogre has just taken to the skies. Now's a great opportunity to sharpen your weapon! If you remembered whetstones, that is. They're not an infinite resource, and they're not just automatically in your inventory. You'll have to go out of your way to obtain them and bring them with you on your hunts.

Likewise, I mentioned earlier that you need pickaxes and bug nets for gathering their respective items. What I didn't tell you is that they too are a finite resource. Pickaxes and bug nets can and will break, and you'll have to buy or craft new ones. If you're planning on doing a lot of gathering, eat for skills that reduce the likelihood of your tools breaking. It makes a huge difference.

Pay attention to what locale the quest takes place in. Some locales are hot, like Dunes and... *shudders* Volcanic Hollow. Bring cool drinks with you to hot locales, or else you'll take passive heat damage. Trust me, you do not want to be on fire the whole time you're running away from (and whiffing your attacks on) Uragaan. Ask me how I know that.

Similarly, cold locales will ruin your stamina bar over time. Hot drinks protect you from this stamina drain. Some locales, like Desert, have both hot and cold areas. Which is annoying because the drinks cancel each other out. Keep this in mind.

Don't be lured into a false sense of comfort just because you didn't forget your cool drinks. Because once you get into High Rank, there's a pretty good chance that you won't spawn at the main camp when you start a quest. One day, you will spawn right into a pool of lava, directly in a monster's line of sight, with zero time to prepare. It's okay to be a total chicken and run away screaming. After all, it is a monster, and it will attack you.

4. When the monster attacks you

I almost guarantee that your first old school hunt will leave a bitter taste in your mouth. Not bitter enough to make you instantly hate the game, but just enough to make you want to put the controller down and go outside and maybe even interact with other human beings, which is just as tragic.

Want to get some practice in with your weapon before the hunt? Well, too bad bucko, there's no training area. There may be a so-called "training quest," in which an npc barfs tutorial text onto your boots and then pits you against a real monster in an inescapable arena fight to the death, which is hilarious if you think about the in-game universe implications. Anyway. If you want to learn the in and outs of your weapon, then you'll have to do it the old fashioned way: get out there and get your ass kicked.

Great news! Getting your ass kicked is cheap, easy, and quick. Monsters' attacks will hit you like a cement truck packed with explosives speeding towards a steel wall. Even dumb little attacks like tail slaps and nibbles will take a CHUNK out of your health bar. Good thing you brought potions!

Terrible news! You are extremely vulnerable for several seconds while consuming healing items. Whether you like it or not, you will stand there in place, unable to move at all, glug, then flex your strong beautiful arms for the whole world to admire. And if the monster turns its attention towards you while you're doing this, there is nothing you can do but watch in despair as all of the health you just regained AND then some, gets torn away from you in an instant.

Don't wait until the fights get tough in order to prioritize learning monster's attack patterns. Even early on, only heal when you know for certain that it's safe to do so. Remember, it's okay to run away like a little wuss to put distance between yourself and the monster so you can use your items in peace. Hell, leave the area altogether if you have to. That being said, don't let the fight get too close to the edges of the area. Loading zones always get the last laugh.

Sooo.... hitboxes. They suck. They're bigger than they look, and they're present for longer than they should be. And some attacks have little to no tell or wind-up animation. Some monsters are just a vile conglomeration of both of these problems. (here's looking at you, Yian "You Mother Fucking Son of a Bitch" Garuga). Sigh... you'll get used to it.

If you came from Rise, getting knocked down by an attack will feel EXCRUCIATING. There is no fast way to fling yourself back onto your feet after taking a big hit. You will lie there, recoiling in pain, seething for way longer than you want— and you may even like it after a few hundred hours. Hang in there.

If a strong attack sends you flying into a wall, you'll very likely get stunned. Getting stunned is the single most dangerous thing that can happen, far worse than poison or waterblight or what have you. You can escape stun significantly faster by mashing buttons and wiggling the control stick. And I guess you could also bring the Stun Res skill, but... we'll, um, come back to that later.

WATCH OUT for pin attacks! You may very suddenly get snapped up and chewed apart like a dog toy, and it will be very bad for your health. That's why you should keep your pockets lined with literal shit. Chuck a dung bomb to escape a pin attack before the monster finishes ripping you to shreds. Dung bombs may also convince an unwanted monster to leave the area, which is great for when you'd rather not fight Gravios and Shogun Ceanataur at the same time. Which is all the time.

5. When you attack the monster

Your favorite weapon is not what you remember it being. Moves are missing, or mapped to completely different buttons. "How tf do I vault? Why won't my kinsect go where I want?? Stop shooting pheromone pellets!!!" whines the insect glaive main. "What do you mean there's no shoulder tackle?? How do I get to TCS faster????" cries the greatsword player. "Oh, ok, nothing's really changed," says the SnS main. It's a travesty, I tell you.

All of your movement is clunky. Attack timing is off. New school muscle memory is going to get you carted a lot. But hands down, the absolute most traumatizing thing is that there is no backwards dodge roll. You can dodge left, right, and forward, but never back. As a hunting horn main myself, I can assure you, this is a fate worse than hell. They say you never know love until you've loved and lost. You loved the backwards dodge roll, and soon, you'll know it.

And it gets even funnier if you play lance or gunlance— you can kiss your forward hop goodbye. Need to close the gap? Turn around, aim your squishy butt cheeks at the monster, and hop backwards towards it, expending absurd amounts of stamina in the process. Otherwise, walk slowly and threateningly towards it like the apex predator you are. Oh, and don't bother blocking attacks. It takes too much stamina, inflicts an abysmal knockback, and half of the time, you'll just get hit anyway. Guard and Guard Up are 100% necessary if you plan on using that shield. Good luck obtaining those skills, sucker.

The charge blade is somehow simultaneously more complicated and way easier to play than its modern iterations. The opposite is true of the switch axe, imo. Blunt weapons are stronger, but there's something a bit off about the way they feel. The longsword is the longsword. And as for the bowguns, I wouldn't be able to tell you, because I know better than that.

It doesn't matter what weapon you pick, because either way, you are going to develop a highly concerning dash juice dependency.

Take advantage of every tool the game provides. The usual stuff like barrel bombs, traps, and ballistae are indispensably helpful. But there are other familiar mechanics that are way more useful in old school MH than they are in newer games. That includes invading monsters (DEVILJHO!!), who will indiscriminately attack you AND the monster you're hunting, inadvertently aiding your hunt without you needing to wyvern ride or seek out a turf war. Jump off of ledges to rack up mounting damage in gen 4 games, which may reward you with a free knockdown (if you can mash fast enough)!

Monster's movements are janky, and this is in your favor. Get good at "head sniping" the monster as they turn around in 90 degree increments. Don't get greedy during small opportunities. Remember, monsters can go from t-posing, straight to crushing you to death, with zero wind-up animation.

There are no damage numbers when you land a hit. This may spoil the instant gratification factor of the game for a while. If you're a greatsword main, you will suffer from withdrawals due to Big Number Addiction. But over time you'll realize that it's actually fantastic, because now you're less obsessed with landing the super big awesome attack on the ultra weak spot for maximum damage. Instead, you'll find yourself savoring every little hit you manage to land. It'll be better for your cardiovascular health in the long run.

That's a good analogy for the entire new school to old school pipeline: it sucks A LOT for a long time, then gets really, really good later on once you get over the "Gen 5 stages of grief." Listen, you will have an abusive relationship with this game. It took me 80 HOURS before I could actually say with confidence that I liked MHGU more than I disliked it. Not that I loved it, but merely that I didn't hate it. 80 real life hours. That's... probably not good, but whatever.

There is one thing that I don't think I'll ever learn to love, though. And that's...

6. Armor Skills (AAAAAAA!!!!!! AAAAAAAAAGHHHHH!! AAAAAAAHHAGHHAAHGHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!)

Face it. You will never, ever, ever be as powerful as you are in World or Rise. You will not have your maxxed out attack and affinity boosting skills plus the comfy stuff like Flinch Free and Stun Res all at the same time. Not in Low Rank, not in High Rank, and not quite in G Rank either. Here's why.

Skills have tiers as usual. But now, they also have thresholds. For example, you want the skill Speed Eating +1, then you'll need 10 points in the Eating skill. If you're even one point short, then the skill will not activate. But Speed Eating +1 doesn't increase your potion glugging speed... if you want that to happen, then you'll need to add 5 more points, for a total of 15, to activate Speed Eating +2. This is true for every skill, and is way easier said than done.

Some skills will feel nerfed big time, like Handicraft. You'll almost never see purple sharpness without Handicraft +2. On the other hand, Crit Draw is a one tier skill that gives you a flat 100% affinity boost on every draw attack. Which is absolutely busted.

Wearing a single piece of armor will provide a few points towards a given skill. If the armor has slots, then you can slot in decorations to increase the points as well. Slot "sizes" are weird and inconsistent, and the decos themselves typically only add 1 or 2 points per skill. Considering the fact that the average skill takes 10 points to activate, and the average full armor set has maaaybe around 7 slots to work with, decos are not going to be your primary source of skill activation.

Now for another problem. Let's say you want an armor set that has just three skills: Status Attack +1, Constitution +1, and Stun Res +1. Pretty modest, right? Should be easy enough. Well would you look at that, High Rank Nerscylla's armor set gets you the first two, and because Stun Res decos are worth 2 points each, you can just slot the last skill in! Nerscylla's set has 5 slots, which is the exact number you need to get those 10 points in Stun Res.

Great! So you do just that. Except when you check your skill points, you discover that Stun Res has a whopping zero points.

Yeah, so... negative skills are a thing. Nerscylla's armor comes with -10 points in Stun Res, activating the "skill" Double Stun. Which as the name suggests, doubles the amount of time that you stay stunned, and I don't think I have to explain why that's bad. -10 plus 10 is zero. So much for that Halve Stun you wanted so bad.

Not all skills have equivalent negative skills, but many armor pieces and most decos will have negative points. The challenge of set building comes from having to carefully balance and calculate your skill points, to make sure you're not accidentally charging into battle against Agnaktor while at -20 Fire Res. It can be frustrating if you're like me, and you've got swiss cheese for brains and can't handle the math. Fear not, I've got something amazing for you.

Allow me to introduce you to your new favorite website, Kiranico. This website hosts Monster Hunter databases containing literally everything that the games don't tell you, or do really half-ass job of telling you. That includes weapon upgrades, material drop rates, monster hitzones and health pools, and most importantly, armor sets and their respective skills. Being able to view all of this info all in one place makes it SO much easier to theorycraft new equipment sets.

Kiranico will save you from so much grief. Bookmark it and cherish it like your firstborn child.

Alas, no amount of Kiranico homework will make it easier to obtain the materials you want. The Desire Sensor is real, and it demands sacrifice.

7. The Desire Sensor (You Will Grind.)

It's commonly said that the game can sense exactly what you're grinding for, and will go to un-fucking-believable odds to avoid giving you that which you need most. This is the alleged "Desire Sensor."

Now, don't get me wrong, the newer games have moments like this, too. Don't even get me started about the 46 tries that it took me to get ONE Golden Almudron Orb, out of the TWO that I needed in Rise.

But until you get better gear, a single old school monster could take you 15+ minutes. Especially if you're on your own. Monster's health pools are not well scaled for solo players, so chances are, hunts are going to take way longer than usual if you don't resign yourself to getting tripped by a cheater with a longsword. Couple this with some god awful drop rates plus the disheartening quest rewards, and you're in for a loooooooong grind.

I would say you'll get used to it, but honestly, you won't. You'll get sick of it. You'll be shaking Kiranico by the metaphorical shoulders, desperate for any little thing that might speed up the grind. You might even be tempted to pick up a bowgun. Such a lapse in sanity is frightening, but it will pass. Stay strong.

Take breaks from the grind every now and then, or at least have two different grinds that you can switch back and forth between when you get exhausted of one. Since there is no escaping the Desire Sensor, this is unfortunately the only advice I can offer.

Disclaimer: the Desire Sensor is, as far as I'm aware, not a real mechanic programmed into the games. But godDAMN if it doesn't feel real. As anecdotal evidence, here's a small sample of my own suffering. Materials I wanted, the amount of them I wanted, their drop rates, and the sheer number of attempts it took to complete my goal (yes, I kept count.):

Lightning Sac x8 (G Rank Khezu): 15% chance to carve. 18% chance as quest reward. 27% chance as part break reward. HUNTS: 22

Paddock Cream x1 (G Rank Tetsucabra/Zamtrios): 40% chance to obtain two as subquest reward. 25% shiny drop. 25% chance as capture reward. 14% chance as quest reward. HUNTS: 8. I mean, what the fuck.

Monster Broth x5 (High Rank Insectoid Small Monster): 20% chance to carve. 20% shiny drop. SLAIN: >70

Viscous Radiant Mucus x17 (G Rank Nakarkos) 40% chance to gather; multiple gathering opportunities. 18% chance to obtain at least one as quest reward. 18% chance to obtain at least one as subquest reward. 15% chance per tentacle broken to obtain two. HUNTS: 15 (IT'S A 30+ MINUTE FIGHT SOLO. FML)

Was it worth it? Hell yeah! Do I think we should go back to the way things were in the old games? Fuck no! 46 Almudrons haunt me in my wildest nightmares— but at least I didn't feel my hair getting longer playing Rise.

On the bright side, at least the Desire Sensor has a sense of humor, if that last Khezu was anything to go by. Shout out to carving three lightning sacs in a row.

Phew! That about wraps things up.

Don't let this post deter you from trying out a "hard" Monster Hunter game. I don't regret my old school experiences. They've made me a much more patient and observant player, which weirdly enough, has carried over into other series I play, too. I can't say the same about any other game I've played in my life, and that's just one of many reasons why Monster Hunter holds such a special place in my heart.

I hope that by sharing my wisdom, I've saved at least one overwhelmed player a whole lot of headache. The rest is up to you, fellow hunter. Take it slow, and have fun!

Oh, and one more thing: press the dodge button while climbing in order to climb faster. Learned that one by accident 200 hours in.

#monster hunter #monhun #mh #oops. had an autism moment and banged this one out in under 48 hours. lmao #i don't know what compelled me.#i just think we need more text based guides in a world dominated by video tutorials. so uhhh #here ya go!#long post #very long post #lol.

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lilyblackdraws · 8 months

Text

198 - Plume as every class.

Musings on the choices below.

Vanguard: This one's just Plume. You know this one.

Guard: I struggled a bit to find a good subclass here. A lot of them are kinda too fancy for her. Could've gone with Dreadnought, since that's just souped-up Charger, but went with Liberator because it's interesting. Her weapon is just a Monster Hunter Gunlance. During her charge-up time she sharpens and reloads the thing and waits for Wyvernfire to come off cooldown and also recovers her stamina. She starts her skill with several big aoe blasts and then goes into regular sweeps and slams. Plume's not very strong, so I took her coat away to lighten the load a bit.

Defender: Plume's not really suited to this class. I thought about Duelist, since she's already in the "stat stick" subclass of Vanguard, but it didn't feel right. I chose Protector because it's very plain and Plume's very plain. Double up the coat, put a lil guard on the halberd and that's good enough.

Sniper: There were obvious picks in Marksman (default) and Deadeye (great eyesight makes for good long range), but I didn't have any good ideas for Marksman and Deadeye felt too fancy again. Besieger would also play into the long range aspect, but I didn't feel it. In the end I went with Flinger because I liked the idea of her throwing explosive darts.

Caster: The "physical" jobs were easy. Plume can swing a weapon around just fine, but for the "magical" stuff I had to think a bit. I played into Plume's patience with Mystic. (That was also a point for Liberator) She knows to bide her time to find the right spot to strike. I went for a very different outfit base for the green classes, because I wanted something lighter. Mystic Casters tend to wear like "high society" clothes anyway for the most part. Iris and Ebenholz come to mind. I like the look for Plume; It's like a discrete bodyguard at a party. The staff keeps parts of her halberd and the three-pronged design is just an obvious thing for Mystic. The halberd blade can be the fourth point if she gets that module. The stored casts have an arrow-like appearance, because it felt nice. Another subclass I considered was Phalanx, but I went with this. Phalanx was too "hit take-y".

Medic: Medic. This is the class Plume's the least-suited for. I think the extent of her medical knowledge is enough for her to apply first aid and field medicine stuff, not be an actual Medic. But I also think that if you handed her a light crossbow with healing bolts prepared that she could handle that just fine. She looks quite happy here, which is a bit out of character. Not that she's never happy, she just tends to have a more subdued expression. That's because my basis for her pose is the "Think fast!" thingy. It made me laugh.

Bard: She could've been mostly any kind of supporter, aside from Artificer I'd say. The most "basic" type is probably Decel-Binder, but I only base this on the fact that that's our only 3-star type. She's not big on arts. But you don't need arts to sing. Plume's from Laterano aka "I can't believe it's not Catholic" so there's no way she didn't receive some kind of musical education. Probably some choir singing. I think it's a nice image, Plume sitting there, playing her bass and singing a little song. I like it. I also wanted to draw her in an outfit like this too. The specifics of the dress and the veil all play to my tastes.

Specialist: This could've been Executor too. It was either that or Ambusher, both work. Even when she's beaten and broken, Plume will keep defending you to the bitter end. You should meet her devotion in kind.

#arknights

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magic-hcs · 2 years

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Finally finished the revamp of the boys abilities!!! HAZAAAAA!! I hope I never have to do this ever again *flops down* It’s illegal how long this took and how difficult it was. You have no idea how I had to scour every piece or snippet I had ever written about my boys to make this list as accurate as possible… It may still be a bit inaccurate with some stuff missing or something I’ll edit those when the time comes. This all may not be grammatically correct but I don’t really care.

Anyways! If you wanna see the difference, the old inaccurate post is here

Time to cast some magic and see what we’ll get! ✨

✨ ✨

(UT)

Sans:

Shortcuts: Traverse the Void in a dimensional pocket and reappear in another place within a blink of an eye. He needs to know what the desired location he wants to go to looks like and where it is on the map. Having been at the location before makes traversing more smooth and allows him to take multiple others with him.

Stat check: CHECK further than a normal monster can and see the ATK, DEF, LV and HP of the target.

Gravity manipulation: Turn the SOUL blue to push it to the ground or throw it around, engulf the object with magic to move it around without needing to touch it. Needs to keep it in his field of vision to work.

Bone attack control: Manifest bones in all kinds of sizes, manipulate the movement of the bones or use them as projectiles.

Gaster blaster: Manifest a skeletal beast head that has a lot of concentrated magic held taut before shooting it out in a controlled powerful beam.

Void pocket: Create a dimensional pocket in the Void where time passes differently, making it seem like reality has frozen in place. This is very taxing to him.

Corrosion magic: The parts of the target’s SOUL filled with LV will create a sapping damage whenever in contact with an attack. A SOUL with no LV will not take sapping damage.

Reset knowledge: Remembers full RESETS through fragmented dreams and flashbacks that happen during the day. Remembers what happened in a branch of the halted timeline due to a LOAD.

Papyrus:

Levitation: Able to make himself, others or objects levitate off the ground without the use of Gravity manipulation. Does not need to keep it in his field of vision once the levitation ability is activated.

Gravity manipulation: Turn the SOUL blue to push it to the ground or throw it around, engulf the object with magic to move it around without needing to touch it. Need to keep it in his field of view to manipulate it.

Healing magic: Capable of transforming the essence of kindness in the SOUL into external healing energy. He excels at this however, the moment his SOUL is in pure distress or the mind is out of deep concentration he loses the ability to do it without needing to think about healing thoughts or good memories.

Strong empathy: Capable of feeling other people’s emotions when it’s strong enough to leak through the cracks of composure. However if the emotion is not strong enough it’s harder to gauge the emotions, moods and feelings of others when only going off on facial expressions.

Fog density: Control the density of evaporated water in the air of a limited area and create a heavy fog in a controlled area.

Blaster: Gather up a lot of magic into one place putting a lot of strain on it before letting it loose into the form of an uncontrolled beam. He often creates a foundation to make it more controlled; like a cannon out of bones. It drains the user a lot. Calls this his ‘special attack’.

Massive bone attack control: Manifests bones in all kinds of sizes, shapes, creations and manipulate the movement of the bones or use them as projectiles. The attack can keep existing even if he isn’t nearby or if he isn’t focused on it.

Damage control: Exert control over how much damage the attack will cause. Takes a lot of focus and only plausible when able to control the intent behind it.

Blue attack: Imbue an attack with the ability to phase through an unmoving target without damaging them.

Observant: Able to observe many small details others might overlook.

Alternative universe knowledge: Gets fragmented dreams of versions of him experiencing different things that happened in the past. Said fragments of copies of the universe he is in or of side branch universes which can differ slightly or a lot. He has a hard time remembering the dreams after waking up.

✨ ✨

(SF)

Razzle:

Shortcuts: Traverse the Void in a dimensional pocket and reappear in another place within a blink of an eye. He needs to know where the desired location is and know what it looks like.

Gravity manipulation: Turn the SOUL blue to push it to the ground or throw it around. Or engulf the object with magic to move it around without needing to touch it. Need to keep it in his field of vision to work.

Great bone attack control: Manifest bones in all kinds of sizes, shapes and manipulate the movement of the bones or use them as projectiles. Can make the projectile follow the target for five seconds, afterwards it goes in the direction it last pointed towards.

Gaster blaster: Manifest a skeletal beast head that has a lot of concentrated magic held taut before shooting it out in a controlled powerful beam.

Blue and orange attack: Imbue an attack with one of the two abilities:

Blue ability; to phase through an unmoving target without damaging them. Orange ability; to phase through a moving target without damaging them.

Stat check: CHECK further than any other normal monster being able to see ATK DEF LV and HP of the target. Cannot tell the exact number, instead he can gauge if the HP is completely filled, lost a bit of it or a lot.

Interrogation magic: Can make a room soundproof. He doesn’t need to be in its vicinity for the magic to keep having effect.

Reset knowledge: Retains the feeling of deja vu whenever a LOAD or a RESET has happened and he does stuff he has already done. Others used to be freaked out when he could recount exactly what was going to happen a few seconds before it happened. He used to not know why and what was going on but thanks to communicating with his brothers he found out what it meant.

Connections: Having been the deputy of the Royal guard and captain of the Snowdin area, not to mention being the strategist of the Queen, he has gained quite the reputation and connections among the monster kind. Providing him with lots of useful information. There’s very little he doesn’t know that happens in the Underground. These connections are also useful on the surface, providing quite the valuable information.

Damage control: Have control over how much damage the attack will cause. Takes a lot of focus and only plausible when able to control the intent behind it.

Coal:

Healing magic: Capable of transforming the essence of kindness in the SOUL into external healing energy. Capable of feeling how much HP the target is recovering.

Bone attack control: Manifest bones in all kinds of sizes, manipulate the movement of the bones or use them as projectiles. Or use them as foundations for blanket forts.

Blue and orange attack: Imbue an attack with one of the two abilities:

Blue ability; to phase through an unmoving target without damaging them. Orange ability; to phase through a moving target without damaging them.

Phasing ability: Can make himself and whatever he’s touching phase through walls or floors. Can traverse like normally inside walls or floors. Can launch himself out of floors or walls quite fast. The limit of staying inside a material is a bit unknown, he has never tested what happens if he stays too long. The longest is ten minutes until now. There’s no surface he can’t phase through except for magic canceling materials.

Damage control: Have control over how much damage the attack will cause. Takes a lot of focus and only plausible when able to control the intent behind it.

Gravity manipulation: Engulf the object with magic to move it around without needing to touch it. He doesn’t need to keep it in his field of vision for it to work.

Reset dreams: Get slivered fragmented dreams whenever a LOAD or RESET happens. The dream entails stuff that happened before the LOAD or RESET took place. He’s restless while he dreams, and once he awakens he is only able to remember certain events vaguely and feels a big sense of dejavu.

Emotional intelligence: Understanding of how others and himself function on an emotional/mentality level. Is more open to self reflection and aid others when struggling with their own emotions and mentality.

Creativity: Very good at putting his thoughts or perspective on paper in an artistic way with harsh colors and textures like charcoal. He often sketches those images instead of drawing them or full lines. However even with just a sketch he’s capable of creating a lot of emotion inside his creation.

Quick reflexes: Having trained with his two brothers a lot (training that mostly covers dodging) and spars with his twin, he’s gotten skilled with his reflexes and agility. Capable of avoiding sudden strikes or moving very fast in a second.

Mastiff:

Target magic: Put a tracker mentally upon the target. Only he can see it. The target has to be in view for the tracker to be placed. Once placed he will be able to find wherever the target is located at. He can also mentally remove the tracker by looking at the target. The limit/ reach of this ability is still unknown.

Great bone attack control: Manifest bones in all kinds of sizes, shapes and manipulate the movement of the bones or use them as projectiles. Can make the projectile follow the target for 3 seconds, afterwards it goes in the direction it last pointed towards.

Blue, orange and red attack: Imbue an attack with one of the three abilities:

Blue ability; to phase through an unmoving target without damaging them. Orange ability; to phase through a moving target without damaging them. Red ability; an ability only accessible when he loses control of his LV. The attack will be infused with rage and hate, doubling the damage the target will take three fold. Consumes a lot of magic and afterwards will leave the user immobilized for a small duration of time.

Weapon creation: Can create and manifest bones in all kinds of weapon-like shapes. He uses long saw toothed bone weapons the most.

Laser beam: Concentrate the magic within his body into the palm of his hand. Once released, a white beam will shoot out of his hand. This ability is lesser compared to the Gaster blaster. It drains a lot of magic.

Object one way teleportation: A lesser version of the Shortcut. Hold the object in his hands and send it through the void to let it appear somewhere else in a blink of an eye. Needs to know what the location where the object is supposed to go to looks like and needs to have been there at least once.

Stealth: Capable of walking and moving in such a way that he’s hard to be noticed or heard when he wants to. Excels at blending in crowds and silently walking across varying terrains like snow and rocks. Is particularly loud in water.

Timeline/multiverse/alternative universe knowledge: Having stolen documents and research from the Dr’s lab when he made his escape, they were filled with theories and analyses of a phenomenon called alternative universes and timelines. He has read them over and over again, having memorized the contents.

Sculpting: Create all kinds of statues or figurines out of stone or wood. If putting in the effort he can create deeply detailed realistic looking statues.

✨✨

(UF)

Red:

Shortcuts: Traverse the Void in a dimensional pocket and reappear in another place in reality within a blink of an eye. Forced to blip in and out of the dimensional pocket of the void causing rapid fire disappearances and reappearances within a short distance between each shortcut .

Stats check: CHECK further than a normal monster can and see the ATK, DEF, LV, EXP and HP of the target. Checking high EXP causes him to become LV crazed for a duration of a time. (LV crazed meaning having bloodlust or starts acting like a violent manic drunk.)

Bone attack control: Manifest bones in all kinds of sizes, manipulate the movement of the bones or use them as projectiles.

Good reflexes: Got good reaction capabilities, making him able to react to something like an attack or a sudden movement within just a second or two.

Poison magic: Imbue attacks with magic that will poison the target once hit. Inside an Encounter it will drain the target’s HP, outside the Encounter it will make the target sick. One hit will make the poison last for a small duration of time. However the time will stack when being hit multiple times.

Orange attack: Imbue an attack with the ability to phase through a moving target without damaging them.

Gravitation manipulation: Turn the SOUL blue to push it to the ground or throw it around, engulf the object with magic to move it around without needing to touch it. Need to keep it in his field of vision to work.

Gaster blaster: Manifest a skeletal beast head that has a lot of concentrated magic held taut before shooting it out in a controlled powerful beam.

Reset knowledge: Remembers full RESETS through fragmented dreams and flashbacks that happen during the day. Remembers what happened in a branch of the halted timeline due to a LOAD.

Mechanic: Mastered the skill to fix already existing machinery or create something new completely from scratch.

Charon:

Weapon creation: Can create and manifest bones in all kinds of weapon-like shapes. Main weapons of choice are a spear or dual daggers. He can infuse his weapon like bones with orange, blue and or red magic.

Great bone attack control: Manifests bones in all kinds of sizes, shapes, creations and manipulate the movement of the bones or use them as projectiles. Can make it so the attack stays instead of evaporating when the target has been hit by it.

Sticking ability: By touching something or someone he can push it against the wall, floor or ceiling and it will stick to that surface until he decides to release it. Doesn’t need to touch to release an object or person. Can make himself stick to surfaces as well.

Blue, orange and red attack: Imbue an attack with one of the three abilities:

Damage control: Have control over how much damage the attack will cause. Takes a lot of focus and only plausible when he’s able to control the intent behind it by having no will to harm nor any grudge towards the target.

Healing magic: Capable of transforming the essence of kindness in the SOUL into external healing energy when thinking about good memories and healing thoughts.

Animals: Animals seem to gravitate towards him without reason.

Cooking: Cooking has a calming and relaxing effect on him, due to this he has gotten very good at it.

✨✨

(AT)

Raven:

Flight: With the aid of his winged arms, he’s capable of soaring and flying through the sky. However to get off the ground he’ll need to get enough wind underneath his wings to set off. Once in the air, he is capable of great speeds, athleticism, flexibility and acrobatics.

Bone attack control: Manifest bones in all kinds of sizes, manipulate the movement of the bones or use them as projectiles.

Agility and speed: With his fast moving wings he can cover distances at great speed and can move and bend his body in all sorts of ways. Making it possible to avoid projectiles or soar through a dense forest easily. Short distances like just a few meters he can traverse in a blink of an eye. Making it seem as if he just teleported.

Great reflexes: In possession of great instinct makes him alert of his surroundings automatically. It will be hard to catch him off guard. Paired with it are his great reaction capabilities, making him capable to react on reflex in less than a second.

Blue attack: Imbue an attack with the ability to phase through an unmoving target without damaging them.

Stat check: CHECK further than a normal monster can and see the ATK, DEF, LV and HP of the target.

Feather projectile: Let a few of his feathers glow either a white or blue color before launching the lit up feathers as projectiles.

Long tongue: In possession of a long, slender tongue that is slightly forked. Once the tongue has been stuck out it can flick around 12 times within the time span of 1 second. It’s mostly used to taste his food before eating. The tongue will also automatically stick out when he’s surrounded by flowers. With this appendage he can hold small objects for a duration of time, however he prefers not to due to others finding it a weird sight to see.

Gaster blaster: Manifest a skeletal beast head that has a lot of concentrated magic held taut before shooting it out in a controlled powerful beam.

Echo voice: After inhaling a deep breath of air infused with magic, release it in a loud screech that can render the target paralyzed. The voice can be heard for miles.

Air magic: Capable of using his magic to create an air current. This magic is mostly used to launch oneself into the air or to aid the wings mid-flight when there’s no up draft to carry oneself further. The amount of energy it costs to use air magic to fly depends on the weight and height of the user.

Glowing patterns: Inside the wings are intricate patterns - which are unique to each individual - that can glow up. This ability is used to communicate but also a way to try and court a potential mate.

Crest:

Massive Bone attack control: Manifests bones in all kinds of sizes, shapes, creations and manipulate the movement of the bones or use them as projectiles. The attack can keep existing even if he isn’t nearby or if he isn’t focused on it. Can make the projectile follow the target for five seconds, afterwards it goes in the direction it last pointed towards.

Blue and orange attack: Imbue an attack with one of the two abilities:

Blue ability; to phase through an unmoving target without damaging them. Orange ability; to phase through a moving target without damaging them.

Flight: With the aid of his winged arms, he’s capable of soaring and flying through the sky. However to get off the ground he’ll need to get enough wind underneath his wings to set off. Capable of hovering in the air at complete standstill.

Talon blades: Capable of letting his talons and claws grow into or create long blades that are one with his appendages.

Damage control: Have control over how much damage the attack will cause. Takes a lot of focus and only plausible when able to control the intent behind it.

Camouflage: Capable of dying his wings and body in all sorts of colors and shape/create a few extra feathers, fur or other kind of protrusions like spikes to camouflage himself as a completely different species at first glance. Looking very closely one can see that it’s just a disguise.

Feather projectile: Let a few of his feathers glow either a white, blue or orange color before launching the lit up feathers as projectiles. Capable of lighting up multiple feathers with different attack colors at the same time.

Voice imitation: Capable of mimicking voices of other individuals accurately after having heard their voice a few times.

Healing magic: Capable of transforming the essence of kindness in the SOUL into external healing energy.

Reset knowledge: He partially remembers certain events that happened in prior RESETS.

✨ ✨

(US)

Sky:

Great Bone attack control: Manifests bones in all kinds of sizes, shapes, creations and manipulate the movement of the bones or use them as projectiles. Can make it so the attack stays instead of evaporating when the target has been hit by it.

Blue and orange attack: Imbue an attack with one of the two abilities:

Blue ability; to phase through an unmoving target without damaging them. Orange ability; to phase through a moving target without damaging them.

Shortcuts: Use tears in the Void to move through a dimensional pocket of the Void to reappear in another place in a blink of an eye.

Void tears: Capable of seeing slight fractures in reality that connects the world to the Void. He can tear the fracture the slightest bit to give him access to the Void for a shortcut. The tear will become a harmless fracture once again when it has been used.

Reset knowledge: Will regain memories of previous RESET the longer the current timeline goes on. Capable of remembering every prior RESETS if the current run doesn’t get interrupted by a complete RESET for a few years. Remembers LOADS as moments of deja vu.

Stat check: CHECK further than a normal monster can and see the ATK, DEF and HP of the target.

Great stamina: Doesn’t get tired from intense workouts, can sprint the same speed for medium distances and can keep up with well endurance trained horses no problem. Going full out in an encounter he can hold himself for hours.

Damage control: Have control over how much damage the attack will cause. Takes a lot of focus and only plausible when able to control the intent behind it.

Healing magic: Capable of transforming the essence of kindness in the SOUL into external healing energy. Has to have a liking to target for it to work well. Healing will be less or not at all effective if he hates the target.

Syrup:

Computer smarts: Knows how to work with code and knows the ins and outs of a computer and its many many office packs, browsers and sites.

Fog density: Control the density of evaporated water in the air of a limited area and create a heavy fog in a controlled area.

Reset knowledge: Has fever like dreams of LOADS and RESETS, mostly bad ones. Having the feeling of knowing what someone is going to say or do a certain thing and actually guessing correctly.

Bone attack control: Manifest bones in all kinds of sizes, manipulate the movement of the bones or use them as projectiles.

Blue attack: Imbue an attack with the ability to phase through an unmoving target without damaging them.

Object density: Control the density of an object and make it lighter or heavier, bigger or smaller. He’s only capable of making an object twice its size or twice times smaller. He has never tried this ability on a person.

Stat check: CHECK further than a normal monster can and see the LV of the target.

✨ ✨

(HT)

Bear:

Stat check: CHECK further than a normal monster can and see the ATK, DEF, LV, HP of the target and see if they are a threat.

Great reflexes and strength: Due to having to survive in a harsh environment his reflexes have heightened. And due to the transformation his body had gone through his strength also has improved greatly. Making him capable of bulldozing through stone.

Reset knowledge: Has remembered full RESETS through fragmented dreams and flashbacks that used to happen during the day. He remembered what happened in a branch of a halted timeline due to a LOAD. However there hasn't been a RESET in so long he doesn’t worry about these things anymore, so he has mostly forgotten about those things. However he sometimes may still get nightmares about it. And the sight of Frisk or their striped shirt will trigger a flashback of so many moments of prior RESETS it will be overwhelming. The flashback will feel so realistic he loses himself and forgets what is real and what isn’t. This state is dangerous for both himself and others involved.

Alternative universe knowledge: Having communicated with his brother about everything, he now knows about the fragmented dreams of alternative versions of his brother that his brother used to experience.

Bone axe weapon: After having lost the control of a bone attack, a new bone attack was born from it. Tearing from the ground a vertebrae that eerily looks and works like a battle axe.

Claws: Due to the transformation his body went through, his phalanges have grown and sharpened into claws. With which he can crush wood and crumble rock.

Great jaw strength: Due to the transformation his body went through, his teeth have become bigger and sharper, his jaw has become stronger too.

Survival knowledge: Knows how to survive alone in the wild for a long time. Knows what is edible, how to track game, avoid danger, find resources and build shelter.

Traps: What once was knowledge for making puzzles has now been used to make hunting traps instead. The constructions can range from a simple snare to an elaborate puzzle trap which even the most cunning will have a hard time escaping from alive. The simple snares are his preferred method, for it takes less time to make and has way less steps to keep forgetting due to head injury.

Stealth: Capable of walking and moving in such a way that he’s hard to be noticed or heard when he wants to. Excels at blending in the shadows and walking on snow and through woods without alarming any wild life.

Bean:

Bone attack control: Manifest bones in all kinds of sizes, manipulate the movement of the bones or use them as projectiles.

Alternative universe knowledge: Used to get fragmented dreams of alternative versions of him experiencing different things that happened in the past.

Reset knowledge: Having communicated with his brother about everything, he now knows about the fragmented dreams of full RESETS his brother used to get. And will help him through a bad episode during and after something has triggered him or a nightmare.

Stealth magic: Due to having lost most of the magic due to magic shortage, his levitation ability has been rendered to only being able to lessen gravity’s pull. Making him lighter on his feet and causing less sound while walking.

Vision magic: Due to being easily triggered by dark colored stains he decided to hone a magic skill where he doesn’t have to worry about such a thing. Once his sight has been handicapped by a cloth the magic ability will activate; revealing outlines of objects and figures in the complete darkness. Has to keep his sockets open for it to work.

Claws: Due to the transformation his body went through, his phalanges have grown and sharpened into claws. Making him capable of tearing through tree bark and dent metal.

Traps: What once was knowledge for making puzzles has now been used to make hunting traps instead. The constructions can range from a simple snare to an elaborate puzzle trap which even the most cunning will have a hard time escaping from alive. Despite the cruel nature of these traps, there’s still hints of the puzzles he once made for fun in there: Like a small maze, or making all the crosses into ‘os’’. He has a preference for making the complicated puzzle traps just to feel like how it used to be once upon a time, just for a little while, before all this horror went down.

Healing magic: Transform the remainder of the essence of kindness in the soul into external healing energy, it isn’t strong and needs to be accompanied by thoughts of wanting to heal. It often flickers, causing full heals to be impossible.

Survival knowledge: Knows how to survive alone in the wild for a long time. Knows what is edible, how to track game, avoid danger, find resources and build shelter.

✨ ✨

(HF)

Rust:

Great strength and reflexes: Due to the transformation his body had gone through his strength has improved greatly. Capable of taking down bigger enemies and tearing through rough materials. And due to having to survive in a harsh environment his reflexes have heightened.

Stealth: Capable of walking and moving in such a way that he’s hard to be heard when he wants to. When moving slowly, almost no one will notice him until it’s too late.

Calculative: Capable of estimating if the opponent is worth taking down head on, via a more indirect approach or to avoid entirely.

Great amounts of magic: Due to the Core exploding the remaining magic that got sent into the air got absorbed and strengthened his body and magic abilities. The repercussions of said heightened magic capabilities made The body got bigger and fatal wounds were healed.

Bone attack control: Manifest bones in all kinds of sizes, manipulate the movement of the bones or use them as projectiles.

Orange attack: Imbue an attack with the ability to phase through a moving target without damaging them.

Gravitation magic: Turn the soul blue to push it to the ground or throw it around. Engulf the object with magic to move it around without needing to touch it. Need to keep it in his field of vision to work.

Survival knowledge: Knows how to survive alone in the wild for a long time. Knows what is edible, how to track game, avoid danger, find resources and build shelter.

Mechanic: Mastered the skill to fix already existing machinery or create something new completely from scratch.

Poison magic: Imbue attacks or a trap with magic that will poison the target once hit. Inside an Encounter it will drain the target’s HP, outside the Encounter it will make the target sick. One hit will make the poison last for a duration of time. However the time will stack when being hit multiple times.

Thatch:

Great agility, reflexes and senses: Always keeping himself on alert with his heightened senses, it will be hard to catch him off guard when not completely relaxed. Despite his tall stature he moves swiftly and has fast reflexes.

Weapon creation: Can create and manifest bones in all kinds of weapon-like shapes. Main weapons of choice are all sorts of javelins. He can infuse his weapon like bones with orange, blue and or red magic.

Blue, orange and red attack: Imbue an attack with one of the two abilities:

Blue ability; to phase through an unmoving target without damaging them. Once hit, the target will be overflowing with chilling magic that causes them to be paralyzed for a small duration of time. Orange ability; to phase through a moving target without damaging them. Once hit, the target’s veins will be overflowing with hot electrifying magic that forces the target to spasm. Red ability; an ability only accessible when he loses control of his LV. The attack will be infused with rage and hate, doubling the damage the target will take three fold. Consumes a lot of magic.

Great amounts of magic: Due to the Core exploding and releasing all its magic and forcing the unsuspecting inhabitants of the Underground to absorb it, his body has forced itself to heal his wounds, mutilating his height and spine in the process. His magic reserve has been doubled to what it once was. Any magic ability he will use will have its force and quality doubled for better and for worse.

Ecto tentacles: Due to the great amount of magic inside of him, forming an ecto body has a side effect of creating a multitude of tentacle-like ecto appendages of several shapes, sizes and lengths all round his body. Can manifest said appendages without the need of an ecto body. Some days when the magic becomes too overwhelming the ecto tentacles will appear without his consent.

Magic pulses: The sometimes overwhelming amount of magic stored inside of him escapes by radiating off of him in waves and pulses that can send objects or others flying backwards. Depending on the force the pulses can crack tiles or shatter objects near him. When strong negative emotions are in the mix things can get out of hand quickly.

Climbing ability: With his slender appendages and sharp claws he is capable of swiftly climbing trees and maneuvering through them. Jumping or swinging from one tree to another is done at a frightening speed and silence.

Camouflage: With his long and slender body and proportions he can bend and fold in certain ways which when he’s wearing dark colored clothes, he’ll completely disappear in the trees. Making everyone who glances towards his location think he’s just part of the tree’s branches and or bark.

Stealth: Feeling almost at home among the branches and being very agile despite his height, he can navigate through trees with next to no sound nor cause rustling leaves.

Sniper ability: Capable of hitting a distant target accurately without the need of a scope.

Reset knowledge: Knows about RESETS and the nature of it due to his brother having told him about the fragmented dreams about the RESETS his brother used to get.

Herbal knowledge: Knows the medical properties of man plants and can utilize its capabilities for remedies and medication. Due to the magic that flows from him in waves the plants’ properties he takes care of and grows will be enhanced because of it.

Mood ring eyelights: His eyelights light up in different colors, sizes, shapes and brightness depending on his mood due to the excessive amounts of magic in his system. The current list explaining his mood ring eyelights is as followed:

-Flashing bright/ sharp: agitation -Shining brightly mixed with yellow/or yellow tint inside the mahogany: happy/excited -Dimmed to a brown: depressed -A bit dimmer than normal: disappointed -Shining a deep bright scarlet: danger/rage -Mahogany color: neutral -Slight flickering: curious -Simmer and or pale: fear -Eyelight shrinking: Startled/panic/anxious/ sometimes nervous -Flaring eyelights: very strong emotions/determined

Survival knowledge: Knows how to survive alone in the wild for a long time. Knows what is edible, how to track game, avoid danger, find resources and build shelter.

✨ ✨

Thank you for participating in this spell, I hope it was to your satisfaction.

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meister-de-cachinnation · 5 months

Text

youtube

-= MONSTER PROM FAN SONG =-

DISCLAIMER: The music and vocals for this video were generated by AI. I do put a significant amount of effort into the videos, mixing and tweaking in post-processing audio software once the tracks are generated, but I recognize that many people will still not like it. I make these videos purely for fun and a love of the fandom, and don't claim to be an artist of any sort. If you don't enjoy them, that is okay. But if you do, thanks for bopping along!

*FINAL REUPLOAD! I promise. The last upload had loads of equalization / volume / clipping issues because, surprise, I don't know what I'm doing. BUT! I learned a lot, and now this version is much more consistent and sounds a lot better. THANKS FOR ENJOYING!

==== LYRICS ====

Yo, yo, yo, listen up, gather 'round,

It's Monster Prom, it's going down!

From Spooky High to the spooky camp too,

Where hearts beat fast and dreams come true.

Amira's fiery, yeah she's got that spark,

Brian's chillin' like a zombie hiding in the dark,

Oz may be yellow, but his nerve never flinches,

Vicky's fun and dorky, she's a tapestry of stitches,

Damien's a demon, from the 8th circle of hell,

Liam sips on only ethically sourced blood cocktails.

Miranda's a royal with a murderous twist,

Polly parties hard, she just can't resist.

Monster Prom, it's a crazy time,

Stats and secrets, we gotta decide,

Will we find love or be rejected fools?

Either way, we're gonna break all the rules!

Scott's a werewolf, dumb but true,

Vera's a boss, she'll run over you,

Calculester's a robot, with a gold heart,

Zoe's old as time but making a fresh start

Witches Joy, Faith, and Hope cast their spells,

Juan's selling potions, you can never tell,

In the auditorium, we're puttin' on a show,

In the library, we're makin' that cash flow

Monster Prom, it's a hell of a ride,

In the cafeteria, where fates collide,

With every choice, our story moves,

We'll find romance, or just improve!

Smarts, boldness, and creativity,

Charm, fun, and money, it's all you need,

From class to the gym, we're making moves,

In the bathrooms causing hijinks, getting smoove

So leave a good review, spread the word around,

Beautiful Glitch got us all spellbound,

Monster Prom, it's a night to remember,

With monsters in love, from Spring to December.

Monster Prom, it's the ultimate test,

Will we get a date, or leave depressed?

But in the end, we'll stand tall and loud,

At Monster Prom, where all love's allowed.

We've only got 3 weeks to make our night,

To seize every moment, and hold each other tight.

Who knew so many monsters could touch our hearts,

But we were young and unafraid, and ready to start!

So leave a good review, spread the word around,

Beautiful Glitch got us all spellbound,

Monster Prom, it's a night to remember,

With monsters in love, we're gonna break all the rules!

Monster Prom, it's the ultimate test,

Will we get a date, or leave depressed?

But in the end, we'll stand tall and loud,

At Monster Prom, where all love's allowed!

==== CREDITS ====

Music & Vocals: Suno AI

Lyrics: AI Generated (then heavily modified)

Audio Visualizer: Tuneform

Lyrics Subtitle Sync: YouTube AutoSync

Audio + Video Editing Software: Vegas Pro 19

20+ Hours of Editing: Me

#monster prom #monster camp #monster roadtrip #fan song #beautiful glitch #amira rashid #brian yu #oz #vicky schmidt #damien lavey #liam de lioncourt #miranda vanderbilt #polly geist #scott howl #vera oberlin #calculester #zoe monster prom #Youtube

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tiredead-a · 2 years

Text

tag dump hours. i havent written a doc for him yet though so fuck me

#OOC. → ⸢ also a sleep enjoyer. ⸥#IC. → ⸢ my favorite date: a nap. ⸥#INBOX. → ⸢ tonight’s the night of the living dead. ⸥#PROMPT. → ⸢ so many choices... ⸥#ISMS. → ⸢ just a walkin’ talkin’ bag of guts. ⸥#MUSINGS. → ⸢ what’s in your head? ⸥#CALL. → ⸢ doesn’t know how to communicate. ⸥#HCS. → ⸢ let them be buried! buried alive! ⸥#MUSIC. → ⸢ the dance of the dead. ⸥#PROMO. → ⸢ the dead need company. ⸥#SELF PROMO. → ⸢ some things are made to take to the grave. ⸥#DASH COM. → ⸢ no one listens to the dead. ⸥#CRACK. → ⸢ hello darkness my old friend. ⸥#STATS. → ⸢ get a load of this monster. ⸥

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tiredead · 2 years

Text

tagged poste

#OOC. → ⸢ also a sleep enjoyer. ⸥#IC. → ⸢ my favorite date: a nap. ⸥#PROMPT. → ⸢ so many choices... ⸥#ISMS. → ⸢ just a walkin’ talkin’ bag of guts. ⸥#MUSINGS. → ⸢ what’s in your head? ⸥#CALL. → ⸢ doesn’t know how to communicate. ⸥#HCS. → ⸢ let them be buried! buried alive! ⸥#MUSIC. → ⸢ the dance of the dead. ⸥#PROMO. → ⸢ the dead need company. ⸥#SELF PROMO. → ⸢ some things are made to take to the grave. ⸥#DASH COM. → ⸢ no one listens to the dead. ⸥#CRACK. → ⸢ hello darkness my old friend. ⸥#STATS. → ⸢ get a load of this monster. ⸥#AMIRA / SPKSCRY. → ⸢ light the match to taste the heat. ⸥#OZ / FULLCFPHOBIAS. → ⸢ you make the darkness less dark. ⸥

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team-heavenly · 11 months

Text

And Now, An Interlude

I did coast through Blizzard Island pretty quick, but my next week or so is kind of insane. I'm out of state from 11/6-11/9 and I'm honestly not sure I can get the arc posted before then :(

But for every cloud, there's a silver lining. I definitely have time to share the nonsense I got into while I was stitching together the Sky Peak post. I really wanted to keep playing the game but without advancing the plot and getting ahead of the blog, so... I improvised.

This picture is basically the theme of the post so enjoy lol

(No, we did not recruit her unfortunately 😔)

First, I want to share some teammates I snagged... and some I lost.

LOOK AT THIS GOD TIER STARAPTOR. Literally the GOAT. I was so, so upset when our client Pidgeotto later got destroyed by a Monster House. I suppose I could have gone through with the defeat, but the risk of losing more than a few exclusive items just wasn't worth it.

But we did get to keep someone I'm pretty sure is Young Guildmaster Wigglytuff:

And HE COULD LEARN ROAR OF TIME. SO I SAID "SURE WHY NOT" AND GAVE HIM THE TM.

It's not a practical set of moves by any means (confusion from Petal Dance (which missed a whole ton anyway), 30% accuracy on Fissure, low PP and stall after using Roar of Time), but definitely fun to play with.

Andrea also tried learning Vine Whip upon level up, but... It wasn't very strong, so I passed on it. Honestly, unless she gets something incredible, I'm thinking her current move set is final.

...Yeah, I told you this was gonna be a common thread. Thankfully we dodged an encounter with the ancient god of the land because... *gestures to the stairs Being Right There*

After a few days of odd jobs, I realized I didn't want our duo getting too far along the experience curve. But how else could I satisfy my itch to keep playing this game? I could play as other Pokémon, sure, but most of them were far too weak for the average Bulletin Board request.

...And then I remembered: I hadn't tried a single dungeon from Poliwhirl's Dojo yet.

(Okay yeah I took these photos after completing all of them but shhhh)

This was our menu of offerings (loaded with affluence and laughter, apparently). Some were conquered on the first try. Some required a little bit of elbow grease. And some... well, they certainly put my patience to the test. I remember Affluent Turn, Hilarious Court, Prosperous Outback, and Hilarious Abyss being particularly troublesome.

"Wait, but aren't the dojo mazes only five floors-" Correct! But these dungeons are randomized like any other, meaning they have three things the mazes typically don't: traps, monster houses, and a whole lot of sticky items.

Granted, this was the squad:

But the traditional starters are well-boosted in the stats to begin with, so it wasn't too bad. And this is a randomizer, so...

I'msorryCharmanderlearnedWHAT?!

(I now want to watch an anime episode where a tiny Igglybuff and Charmander wreck Dialga's sh*t with Roar of Time.)

After enough tries, we were able to nudge the three starters towards evolution. And hilariously, they all insisted on learning OHKO moves (and Dig for some reason):

G-Grovyle, my beloved...

You Do Not See The Palkia, Grovyle Is Clearly Fighting Primal Dialga Here.

Yet the one thing that was consistent across these dungeons to the point of skepticism... was the sheer abundance of legendaries.

Like I honestly think it would be easier for me to list the legendaries NOT included. That's how many there were. Take a gander at this list (bold indicates the Pokémon sighted):

Kanto: Articuno, Zapdos, Moltres, Mewtwo, Mew

Johto: Raikou, Entei, Suicune, Lugia, Ho-Oh, Celebi

Hoenn: Regirock, Regice, Registeel, Kyogre, Groudon, Rayquaza, Jirachi, Deoxys (multiple forms, all mirage)

Sinnoh: Uxie, Mesprit, Azelf, Dialga, Palkia, Heatran, Regigigas, Giratina (both forms), Cresselia, Phione, Manaphy, Darkrai, Shaymin (both forms)

Most of these were in the Final Maze, too. No wonder it was called this instead:

In total, we only recruited two of these legends, which is pretty impressive when you remember you're forced into these places with an empty bag (so no items to help increase the recruitment rate). The first, as you can see above, was Uxie, one of the True Time Gear Guardians.

Not bad! Not bad at all.

And the second... the second is pretty special. I'm still giddy about it even all these days later:

😍 YEAH, THAT'S RIGHT. I RECRUITED THE LADY HERSELF!

I SCREECHED when I saw her in the dungeon to begin with, so you can imagine the commotion I made when she wanted to join the team!! When you talked to her in a dungeon, she even said the phrases. You know, stuff like hating the decay brought about by the world of darkness, and there being no need to worry because she can't ever be caught, of course!

I suppose she's a little confused by her displacement in time and space, but you know what? This really makes it feel like her... so I wouldn't have it any other way <3

She originally joined us at Level 38. I already knew, without a doubt, that she was gonna become a permanent fixture of the team. So I loaded her up with 3 Golden Seeds, every Gummi I had leftover from the mazes, and some Proteins.

Why Protein? Well, she originally knew... Tackle, Endeavor, Strength, and Meteor Mash lol. Her attack stat was also dreadfully low, so why not catch that up to the others when I happen to be swimming in Proteins?

I did also feed her some TMs to diversify the move set a little:

This shot is actually outdated already: presently she knows Super Fang instead of Rock Climb and Hidden Power instead of Defend Order.

There is one slightly unfortunate caveat to my sheer excitement:

Yeah... Normalize. So she can't benefit from the STAB on Giga Drain. But I suppose there are worse things.

Here's something I doubt many people have seen! You're technically not supposed to be able to speak with her in Rotom's Cafe, right? So of course I was dying to know what she said when you spoke to her there, and:

Forgive the desaturation and such, as you can see by the reflection I snapped this one with my phone 💀

Interesting, no? Read that again: Magneton. If you recall, that Pokémon was her replacement in the story! Funny to see it show up here, in what I can only presume is the title of her idle pose. For reasons unknown to me, sometimes she said "standby 2" instead.

Anyway, she and the Gabite you saw earlier were our tried and true teammates during our many, many attempts to conquer Massive Tomb. To skirt around the excess EXP problem, I simply reset whenever things went awry.

The thing with Massive Tomb is... It has 48 floors, right? (Which I found odd, why not make it 50 at that point?) And you're not allowed any items upon entry. So either you miraculously find a string of Secret Bazaars to replenish your belly until you find an Apple of some kind (lol) or you starved to death by floor 11. Oh, and basically every other floor was a Monster House. So it really came down to sheer luck.

There was one attempt where I got as far as 43F. But my string of good fortune turned sour: back-to-back Monster Houses slowly picked off my teammates and made Andrea run out of PP for Blizzard. So when we ran into yet another Monster House (this time mandatory), all it took was one Triple Kick from Persian before it's all over. That loss felt particularly devastating.

The one attempt that finally succeeded was the one where we didn't run into a single MH until we were over 2/3s of the way through. Although the one that did finally show up nearly ended me.

But finally... Finally!

YEEEEEEEHAAAAAAAW!

On the one hand: Can you imagine if the aura you got at the beginning was Brown? I would be so mad if I had two of the same color lol. Though on the other hand, aura color doesn't really matter? It only shows up in the flavor text and item sprite - the latter of which you only see if the item gets knocked off of you.

But hey, I'll take it. I'm just glad I finally got through the darn place!

Oh geez, this "mini update" was very close to 30 images somehow 😬 But I hope you enjoyed seeing this not-insignificant, optional part of the main world!

Bonus:

...Okay I guess I lied, we recruited three legends.

#pmd explorers #pokemon mystery dungeon #randomizer #post game #and now an interlude #expect chapter 23 to come out in the next couple of weeks!

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monstersdownthepath · 1 year

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Monster Spotlight: Gearghost

CR 5

Chaotic Evil Tiny Undead

Bestiary 4, pg. 123

Wickedly persistent Undead born from the souls of thieves and adventurers who’ve died to a hidden trap, a relatable death if there ever was one. I can think of several dungeons which must be positively chock-full of these things, each filled with hate and envy for the living and waiting so, so patiently for them to step on a tile, or over a tripwire, or onto a switch. Gearghosts make their living in the same dungeon that killed them, familiarizing themselves with every room and hallway and using their +17 in Craft (Traps) to reduce, reuse, recycle any material they get into parts for their vile machinations, slowly rigging their homes into... well, deathtraps in more ways than one.

Fun fact: The craft DC of a trap with a CR of 1 to 5 is a mere 20, so a Gearghost only needs a 4 or higher to succeed their arts & crafts project. Even going into CR 6 to 10 raises the DC to 25, so a Gearghost needs only an 9 or above to have one built. However, depending on the trap in question, that can cost quite a bit of money (ignore the official rules for trap prices please i’m begging you for the sake of your sanity ignore them), which is why most Gearghosts either repurpose materials they find from other hapless adventurers... or eschew the higher CR traps and Craft (Traps) in general in favor of twiddling their fingers and creating one.

Once per week, a lone Gearghost can create any trap with a CR of 4 or below without investing a single copper, their diabolic devices springing into existence fully loaded and seamlessly integrated into their surrounds. Even with the CR restriction, a Gearghost’s repertoire is quite intimidating; I recommend clicking that link to familiarize yourself with the lower CR traps, which nonetheless include heavy-hitters like the Acid Arrow trap (2d4/round for 4 rounds), the ever-reliable bear trap (2d6+3 plus bolting the victim to the surface the trap is on), the simple but effective spike pit (a 10ft pit that can deal up to 4d4+8 on first drop), or the electricity arc trap (4d6 Electricity damage in a 30ft line). By increasing the CR of an existing trap, the Gearghost can also add a poison to it just for some extra stat damage on top! There’s no limit to what kind of traps a Gearghost can magic up, and the DM is encouraged to create their own fabulous death devices so long as they fit inside the CR restriction! See this section to find out just what sorts of death can be doled out.

Side note: Two or more Gearghosts working in tandem become astronomically deadlier, as the CR limit for their traps raises by 2 per ghost involved!

With enough time to set up its gadgets, a party may be worn out or even half-dead before they even know the Gearghost is present, simply believing their rotten luck to be owed to a particularly sadistic trap-maker who inventions continue to work long past the time they’ve died. But unlike the trap-maker and their curious art, the efficacy of the Gearghost’s contraptions are very much witnessed by their creator. Gremlins in all but creature type, Gearghosts use their Tiny size and ability to fly to keep a close eye on any adventurers they detect coming into their hallways of pain (a Gearghost can add the Alarm spell to any trap it creates without adjusting its CR). Their +24 to Stealth checks is nearly impossible to overcome without serious Perception investment, so the little bastard could potentially trail the party for hours through a dungeon without any of them realizing it’s there... letting it perform its secondary and, arguably, far more dangerous function.

A Gearghost is an expert Resetter, amplifying its already Gremlin-like qualities tenfold. As a move action, the phantom can cause any trap with the “manual” or “repair” reset conditions to fold back into its ready position, and if the trap rearms itself over time, the Undead can make it spring back into function as a free action! The ability is loosely written with very little description, and so its functions are incredibly broad; as written it works on traps of any size or type (mechanical, magical, natural), it manifests new ammunition for any projectile trap, recharges expended magic in a trap, fixes any broken parts (like tripwires) and scenery back into place (eliminating any trace of its presence), and worse still there’s no listed range limit! Though, presumably, it must be within the ghost’s Telekinesis range, meaning it must be within LoS and 760ft, which is still considerably generous. Resetter works with ANY trap, not just a trap the Gearghost has conjured, so any traps native to the horror’s dungeons are fully within its power to repair and reset. Even smashing the traps to pieces won’t work, because they have Mending at-will and Make Whole 3/day, and Resetter has no limit to how often it can be used. Have you ever wondered just how traps inside of dungeons that no creature has entered in centuries stay functional? There may be one of these things lurking nearby, giggling to itself as your party Rogue fails their fifth Disable Device check in a row to shut off the arrow trap that somehow keeps going off.

Despite the unbelievable utility it offers to a dungeon’s ecosystem, a Gearghost caught in direct combat is basically helpless. Their AC and HP aren’t outstanding for their level, and though their 40ft Fly speed would normally confer a significant advantage to them, their choice of locale (dungeons) means their maneuverability doesn’t really matter. They have a pair of pathetically weak slam attacks (1d4-2) that are only really a threat to creatures who’ve been worn down by their traps, and the only offensive magic they have is... well, it’s Telekinesis at-will, which is by no means bad, but it’s not going to kill someone with any particular swiftness. Indeed, the primary purpose of their telekinetic prowess is to shove people into traps, or push them back into one they’ve just escaped. Because Resetter is, at its slowest, a move action, the Gearghost can re-arm a dangerous trap and then use its standard action mentally picking up and putting down the victim on the firing switch. Hell, in some cases, it may just trigger the trap itself with its telekinesis if the party is especially keen on avoiding the triggers.

With DR 5/-- and Undead immunities protecting it a Gearghost takes a while to go down, but go down it will, especially if the party can somehow grab it and drag it into its own maniacal devices for extra irony, as it possesses no innate immunity to traps and isn’t incorporeal despite its wispy appearance. However, this isn’t the end of things, because a phantom so sadistic isn’t easy to keep down forever. A Gearghost Rejuvenates in just 2d6 days unless holy water is poured over the tiny bits and pieces of rusted metal that made up its corporeal form WHILE the pile is within a Hallow spell... which, you may notice, is a little out of reach of a player party that’s within the Gearghost’s CR range. The best a party can do is haul its remains to a sanctified location and perform the destruction ritual there, and that’s probably what you need to do, because the wretched little thing will spring back to life from assorted scraps anyway unless you destroy every single trap within 100ft of its body. That’s every trap currently in range of its corpse, so taking its corpse out of the dungeon and into a Hallowed area negates that otherwise completely ridiculous resilience!

Still, though, the fact it requires a 5th level spell to permanently kill combined with the fact Resetter works with traps of any CR suggests to me that this little bastard is meant to be sent after much larger prey than a bunch of level 3s and 4s. Even in the 8, 9, or 10th level range, these monsters can punch above their weight class so long as they have an environment they can work with, keeping out of sight of the party and messing with them from a distance via Telekinesis, tripping traps the party thought they avoided while resetting every single one they manage to disable or move past unharmed, making the trek OUT just as painful as the trek IN.

You can read more about them here.

#Monster Spotlight #CR 1 to 5 #Pathfinder #Dungeons and Dragons

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