#getting to play the tutorial levels with a maxed out team

[faust-terrorsofthenight]

🥹

[kirric-the-fan]

Gameplay guide and tips for Magia Exedra

Aka: "Why is my team so underpowered compared to everyone else my level?"

A quick guide for people playing: I'm currently level 39, and my party power has just hit 10k. When I get back on wifi later I'll be running through the mermaid witch labyrinth.

So, if like me you're playing Magia Exedra, you may have discovered the in game tutorial isn't exactly comprehensive, often leaving players wondering why things have suddenly gotten so difficult.

Here's my attempt to break down the main mechanisms of levelling in Magia Exedra so you don't have to rummage around underlevelled or underpowered for so long, and can make the most of your resources without worry! I hope it helps!

Levelling, and where to gain levels:

Player level:

Importance: Player level is the limit for character level.

Where to progress: Player gains levels predominantly by completing the main quests, although exp is gained in smaller amounts elsewhere.

Requirements: Battle wins mostly, general gameplay etc.

Advice: you probably don't have to worry about this one unless you're trying to unlock something specific.

Character level:

Importance: General stat improvement

Gained through a number of sources, including a chunk when completing main quests, HOWEVER, this will not keep up or get to the level cap, and is not the main source for character levels!

Where to progress: Home - party - training - kioku - select kioku:

Requirements:

A-Q coins and growth enhancement

Advice: Make sure to prioritise your main characters, and I recommend to only ever level up to one less that char level, as this will allow the char to keep gaining experience which will save on the amount of growth enhancement you need for next time.

Where to get the resources:

- Upgrade quests- kioku. QP required.

- magia chest

- trading (see later note about event quests)

Advice: Both the kioku and magic levelling use qp points, the closest thing this game has to a stamina limit. It restores slowly over time, as well as fully (stacked) when you level up (player). Ensure the max level is unlocked as much as possible as this increases the rewards per qp spent. I suggest prioritising specific magic levelling reqs before spending on this. Make sure to spend out your qp when maxed to make the most of its generation.

Refilling qp: besides naturally, up to 8 magia cubes can be spent per day to restore qp, or 50 magia stones.

Character Magic Level

!!!

This is likely the one missing if your power levels seem low compared to other players of a similar level.

Importance: Magic levels contribute towards character stats, and battle abilities, so it is important to keep up with them.

Where to progress: Same as with character level, but the magic button this time

Requirements: They require prism stones: up to level 30, each level requires 50 prism stones, with every fifth level requiring the prism stone colour associated with the character's element.

Where to get the resources:

Advice: I recommend you aim to get your main team magic levels up as high as it can go for the rewards you are getting. The battle abilities make a huge amount of difference, so target those per kioku. Remember, the kioku will need element specific stones to upgrade their abilities.

Variation in resources: There are elemental stones, and the higher level elemental gems, which come into use from magical level 30. While the upgrade rewards improve each rank, I am currently max upgrade level 10, and have not yet seen the higher tier rewards. Cannot confirm yet but I suspect a 1-2 level matching on rewards.

These higher level resources can also be gotten from trading (see later event recommendation)

Elemental bonuses:

Different chars have different main elements, and different monsters have different elemental strengths and weaknesses. At the moment, it seems to me that maintaining a powerful team is a better priority than spreading thinner for trying to get every elemental bonus. I do welcome further discussion on this point though.

Heartphial level

- mainly story unlocking w minimal direct char improvement. Still worth using daily for your favs, or if you want specific portraits improved.

Special attacks levelling:

Upgraded by magia scrolls and grimoires, and limited by kioku ascension level (from pulling multiple of the same kioku)

Found under the skills section of the kioku upgrade tab:

Auto Party:

I can't do a guide without a quick word on the auto-party, mainly in that it is limited. It can't select multiple element types, and I have seen it generate a weaker party than what I had before, although that is rare. Good for general building though. Try to make sure you have a balance of char battle types and elements, and I recommend at least one defender, breaker, and either buffer or debuffer. Auto party will be biased towards your higher levelled chars and does not care about balance if you're looking for specific skills

Auto battle:

Be careful of the different levels: full auto is the only one that uses specials. Generally good for otherwise nuisance battles like the upgrade level upgrades. (7! Every. Time!) Use when you have power advantage.

You will always be able to fight better than auto battle, but auto battle is non-optional for player matches! I haven't looked into setting up an auto specific team yet, but I think that us something I will be doing.

Events

Each event gets a daily slot of five plays, and rewards can be multiplied by having specific chars and portraits in your party. Most event rewards start with a specific portrait, but then also has a range of resources available to trade for. This can be utilised to farm the resources you need for upgrades etc, especially after you've cleared the quests- skip-clear the highest level with bonuses and you can rack up a lot of resources.

Recommendation: Make sure you keep coming back to an event each day after you've cleared it, as the rewards can be traded for useful items for your team.

Magica stones:

The paid/free heart of the game. 3000 is the magic number for the 10 keys with bonuses pulls, and the good news is that they are quickly accumulated by general gameplay. In particular you get 300 for completing a labyrinth, and that's not including the 10 or 30 per first level clear, or finding a new picture, or completing any quests, or the 100 that sometimes hides in the labyrinth itself.

Speaking if which: (or, uhh, witch:)

When you're going through the Labyrinths, keep an eye on this number here: if you clear out all the rooms (which you should do all the time) and it doesn't match, that means there's a hidden 100 stone item in there somewhere.

So there we have it: not a comprehensive list, but hopefully a helpful one! If people find it useful or have more q's I'd be happy to do a q&a or more guides for this game! Still learning it myself aha so disclaimer there. I'm only human after all!

[tobiasdrake]

The Hundred Line: Last Defense Academy 19 - Mad Dash for the Kitchen Asuras

Here we are on Day 4. Still awaiting word that will probably never come.

Are we ready to explore the probability that we've been abandoned to fend for ourselves yet?

Also, Hiruko talks about Alexa exactly the same way my family talks about our cat.

Yeah, that's my thinking too.

Also, Miss Amemiya. Very polite of you, Ima. Darumi deserves the respect.

Ooh, good catch. If Alexa isn't here then he can't get pissy about who eats what. Though I would still have some reservations by the possibility of an enforcement mechanism of some kind. We don't know what the rules are, so eating things other than dry bread might make you explode or something if you aren't using the Infuser.

We don't know what the rules are. There is a non-zero chance that all of the food in the real world is somehow lethal to anyone who hasn't Blood Cocooned themselves and the dry bread is actually for all-a y'all's safety.

Only one way to find out. I guess Now and Then have volunteered to be our guinea pigs. If you guys explode, while try to jab your corpses with Infusers and see if that's good enough for the Revive-o-Matic.

Gaku, you work for slave wages to support a family. How is something so basic as "A rule only exists so long as it can be enforced" lost on you? Have you never had to shoplift to get by?

Now and Then have definitely had to shoplift to get by. I did not miss the part where they're orphans or some shit.

But I also would have expected better of you, Gaku. Shame on you. Go outside and steal from the pharmacy until you learn.

There you go. That's better. You know, if you're this much of a stickler for obedience to authority, I bet you aren't working a union job, huh? That might be part of your problem. You're letting the capitalists take advantage of you. If you ever see your home again, you should considering unionizing.

And stealing from corporations where needed. Learn from the orphans, Gaku. They know how to get by in this cruel, cruel world. Unless they explode.

I'd at least give Now and Then like an hour to see if something happens to them. But if y'all want to dive in now then be my guests. Since we now have the full team eating, we all get to share in whatever fate may or may not await.

To be fair, that was a staged event for shock and intimidation. I don't think Monokuma could actually summon the Spears of Gungnir wherever he wanted. He just wanted Class 78 to think he could.

Now, AI Monokuma and the Exisals, THOSE were another story.

OH WOW I FORGOT YOU WERE HERE

Full team -1 eating, I guess.

Not joining the others in making a mad dash for the kitchen Asuras?

...I kinda think that's the point, Hiruko. He gave us the tools we need to defend the school and then removed himself to a place where we can't keep pressuring him for information.

We definitely aren't going to find him, but if it makes you feel better, sure.

In any case, while they're searching the school, I have one other tutorial I need to learn about.

I mean, I'm also going to be hanging out with peeps too. Sorry, Hiruko, but I refuse to only use my time productively.

VR Training simulations are practice battles for grinding XP. Yeah, that makes sense. Much bigger and more complicated than the little battles I ran into while exploring, too.

Darumi's MVP mugshot is fantastic. 10/10.

I don't know how the level system works but it could hypothetically also be good for bringing underleveled characters up to speed. That's a problem you run into sometimes in other TRPG franchises like Fire Emblem.

Aha, here we go. This is the level-up system and--

I FUCKING KNEW IT

That WAS what the Lv.4 and MAX at the end of her two skill names meant! Hiruko's fucking near-maxed out on two separate skills while the rest of us are level 1.

She has played this game before.

Alright, while y'all look around for something we aren't going to find, I'm gonna go find out what Darumi's crying about.

Well, shit. That is a crisis. In fact, it's a bigger crisis than Sirei's vanishing because we actually have a >0% chance of success searching for it.

Why would that matter, Takumi? Even if something is cheap, it still sucks to lose it. Especially if it's something you need to use regularly. Gonna flick your nose if you think like a capitalist again.

Relatable. Sometimes you just need to let it out.

Some people's problems can't be swept under the rug by running up and declaring, "I'm your Daddy now!" Take your anti-crying propaganda somewhere else, Takumi.

[cerastes]

It’s great that IS4 will have better distributed and more “fun” oriented intensifiers (called ‘Natures’ in this case, until they release an official term, if they change it). Waves in IS3 were, to be frank, rather shoddily implemented, starting with the way Arts damage gets kneecapped horribly bad. In IS4, it’s instead a general, smaller Damage Reduction for both Phys and Arts.

The Hope handicap in IS3 was the reason a good amount of people didn’t really even try or stuck to People Skills squad: it was too early, too much

3* non-reserves cost 1 Hope. That immediately changes how IS is played at a fundamental level: Kroos 3* is a great addition to any team because of her innate good damage, spinach compatibility, and 0 cost… But is she worth that precious 1 Hope when your 6* mainliners will cost a whooping 7 Hope? Suddenly that Reserve Sniper seems a whole lot better at 0 cost. It’s a pretty big ask at Waves 4: Even if you only consider Waves 7 as the max difficulty for the purposes of scoring, that’s still way early to throw such a huge change into the mix. Nature 6 seems more apt, and note it only affects 4* and up. I think it’s a step in the right direction; at Waves 4, using Reserves is fine, but at Waves 13 and up, by the time enemies receive their Floor 2 buffs, that’s already a stat heft the Reserves will struggle to compete with, and they have no Skill to even the field. Yes, Waves 8 and above is flexing and testing your own limits, but this can and should also be fun, and getting Hope-starved so badly is a huge turn off to a lot of people, so they use People Skills squad. Then they get bored because using anything but People Skills squad on Waves 4 and above means dealing with the Hope drought.

I also would like if they made Natures more apparent in the UI tbh. This is definitely not an HG blunder, but a concerning amount of people didn’t know (maybe don’t know) that there’s a ladder of difficulties in IS3, because AK players hate reading or are allergic to tutorial text or some other phenomenon, so I had plenty of anons saying IS3 was easier than IS2 and in the same ask asking what these Waves I spoke of were.

All in all, I hope IS4 ends up feeling better than IS3. I do like IS3, but it was a bit of a letdown, to be dorothy frank. I think the Seaborn aesthetic was not really used to its fullest (maps are boring slates of light blue with a pretty boring bgm). It was fun grinding out the Week 1 Waves 15 clear, but after that, it didn’t grab me nearly as hard as IS2 did with it’s excellent aesthetic and replayability.

When it comes to bosses and minibosses: IS3 minibosses are kiiiinda mid. IS2’s Golem and Jetman are fun, the Clown was scary depending on your build, the… Shooty dude was mid, and IS3 midbosses feel like him for the most part.

I like Highmore Boss more than Phantom Boss, I think Highmore is a really good boss and map. Last Knight is the single most miserable boss to fight in the game and very boring even when you know what to do, and somehow worse than Big Sad Lock. Ishar-mla is fine, not bad, not very good, just fine, which is a bit of a letdown for me, considering Mouthpiece is one of my favorite bosses in the game. Jury’s still out on Boss #4, hope it’s good, Playwright isn’t phenomenal but he’s good.

My thoughts on the state of IS3. Though these are various criticisms I have for it, I do wish to note: it’s still a fun mode, and I think a great learning experience: balancing a roguelike or roguelite is not easy and it wasn’t as good as I wanted it to be, but it’s still a fun game mode.

[eelwaffles]

Flow-State in Helldivers 2

Flow state is colloquially, “the zone,” a state of ease/ smoothness of play that requires intense focus but no effort from the player to maintain that focus. A player can be in this state of flow from anywhere from a few minutes to hours, and often results in near perfect gameplay from the individual at their skill level.

For me, its when the outside world quiets down and my mind focuses on the game. Games with player-driven difficulties accomplish flow-state and Helldivers 2 is one of them.

Helldivers 2 is a co-op third-person shooter by Arrowhead Games. It's a satirical game that many have compared to Starship Troopers and for me, it's a giant parody of of post 9/11 Bush Era American Jingoism. Squads of one to four players battle against the squidlike Illuminate, the robotic Automatons, and the insectoid Terminids.

The flow-state for me comes from the endless enemies and the fact that the game requires full mental focus. I've been with my main squad since June with a rotating cast of squadmates [Ninja_925, Salty, UndyingRadish along with assorted subs] and we play weekly.

It's been a pleasure seeing the squad become a well-oiled machine and the flow happens because I can trust each of us to lock-in and play, and not grief if things become serious. Sometimes we loose and that's chill, or hilariousness happens thanks to things like me accidentally killing teammates with a well-placed 500kg. Or [Ninja_925] kicking me off a rock. Allowing Friendly Fire = A+ design, the levity of being able to troll friends is great. If I'm feeling overwhelmed or disassociating, I can trust my main squad to take things in stride and help me with the cognitive load. Salty pings enemies to avoid or heavies to shoot, and will often provide cover fire. One memorable time, they decided to act as a distraction for the bugs by running in circles. Max aka UndyingRadish and Ninja aka Ninja_925 have amazing synergy, like when they took out the meganests on Super Helldive 10. And then shot me in the face. At least for me, a good squad and good communication is vital to good flow in this game. It's much easier to get into the zone without having to worry if randos are going to grab samples or call extraction early. Or worse, grief.

It's one thing to laugh off some hilarious team-kills but malicious griefing is a mood killer. I remember when Salty was learning the game, I had a squadmate who kept throwing grenades at them and Salty didn't know where the explosions are from. As a co-op game, Helldivers 2 relies on more experienced squadmates teaching noobs. There is a tutorial but it's very basic. It doesn't cover things like how the various missions work or how to capture side objectives. There is a culture of much higher leveled players going down to the easiest difficulties and teaching the cadets, aka the lowest-ranking title. [Ninja_925] taught me the game and [UndyingRadish] got me started by buying it for me. As a noob, I remember the sense of accomplishment from learning the ropes, seeing the achievements rack up, and unlocking the various stratagems and weapons with earned in-game currency. Flow back then was basically following my friends around, and shooting stuff as they crushed the objectives. As I leveled up, the game induced a sense of flow by making it easier to pick difficulty level. Levels are unlocked as you finish the highest difficulty available to you even if playing on another player's ship. There are currently 10 difficulty levels available ranging from Level 1 - Trivial to Level 10 - Super Helldive. The earliest levels have you go after objectives that become side objectives in the higher difficulties, and more difficult enemies are introduced as you go up the ranks.

Devastators, Bile Titans, and Factory Striders are mainly high level enemies but are objectives for noobs to defeat on lower levels. This teaches them how to defeat them and builds up a sense of confidence.

Devastators are tanky robots with the head in a tight, hard to hit spot, Bile Titans are kaiju sized bugs that barf on players and Factory Striders are even taller, tanky 'bots that create more 'bots to take out Squads. Retrieving information from a crashed rescue pod and destroying rogue broadcasts are all early level objectives. But in higher difficulties, these are all side quests. Maps are also filled with points of interest, filled with samples to upgrade ships, super credits[premium currency] to buy war bonds, medals to buy more weapons, and requisition slips to buy more stratagems.

My squadmate, [Ninja_925] pointed out for him, this means games can be high risk/high reward. The game gets harder the longer the players are in. Players can just do the main objective and go, or stick it out and go do the side objectives for more rewards while dealing with more and more spawns.

For me, this can be extra risky , since staying longer will mean extra deaths and increased mission failures. It's extremely frustrating to spend forty minutes in a difficult mission, only to fall into a hole and permanently loose ten rare samples that can't be retrieved. For me, flow state is part of the gameplay loop, that addiction from collecting samples to the addiction of upgrading my ships. The game pushes you to go to higher difficulties since as you upgrade your ship, the costs get higher and the rarer samples are only found on higher levels. Highest level difficulties have the most samples and medals. Hence high risk/high reward. Though low level difficulties are also rewarding for high level players since super credits spawn the most on those small maps. Quoting, my squadmate again [Ninja_925], for him, the flowstate comes from the game being simple but doing it well. The game has pretty smooth controls, with movement being based off Metal Gear Solid 5, and he doesn't have to fight it.

I'm apt to agree with him, since despite all of Helldiver 2's flaws, flawed movement was never one of the flaws. (outside of getting stuck). Games without smooth accurate movement, would remove me from the game and render it unplayable for me. Weapon control is also buttery smooth and the sheer amount of stratagems and weapons, means different playstyles are supported. Getting into the higher levels is possible without mastering every single one. I've leveled up into the 70s and there's a lot of weapons I have barely touched despite them being very popular - (the recoiless rifle, the quasar cannon, etc.) For those who enjoy a touch of realism, reloading weapons before they are out of bullets, means the bullets are now gone, keeping detail-oriented players state of disbelief intact and therefore flow-state running. My playstyle requires weapons with the least cognitive load aka laser weapons like the Sickle. With careful management, no reload is necessary. Nothing ruins my flow harder like running out of bullets and then getting flooded by bugs. I do sometimes take on more explosive weapons like the grenade pistol or the explosive crossbow, but if I'm not careful, I'll either blow myself up or my teammates.

One memorable time had me accidentally shoot Ninja_925 when he wore the explosive armor, which led to him dying and blowing up, which led to me and Blood Hawke also blowing up and dying. Several weapons have different modes to shoot them, like the Recoilless Rifle's safe and unsafe modes and the Airburst Rocket Launcher's cluster and flak modes. I'm not the kind of player to take advantage of this, but I know my squadmates [Undying Radish, and Ninja_925] take this into account with their loadouts. Squad loadouts are important when it comes to missions. Loadouts in tandem = smooth teamwork = more smooth missions = smooth flow. Before Bile Titans were nerfed, someone would have to bring dedicated anti-tank weaponry while another person would clear out the swarms. During illuminate missions, my usual loadout was to bring the Wasp, long-distance cluster misslles against the flying overseers, while Salty would bring an HMG to provide covering fire and Ninja_925 would bring his flamethrowers against the voteless zombies. So in Helldivers 2, flow-state is achieved through a complex player-driven experience of custom difficulty level choice, the choice in going through the main objectives or/and side objectives as well, weapon choices and squad load-outs, along with squad cohesion.

This all leads to a very rewarding gameplay loop as the player's sense of accomplishment, trust in squadmates, and confidence grows.

Hence why its one of my favorite games.

[stinkywormynoob]

Thoughts on Worms games from someone who didn't grow up with any

Worms: Armageddon

I barely played this one, I didn't even know how to jump and gave up at the tutorial because I found it to be too unforgiving. Hearing about its popularity seems to have a reverse psychology effect on me, but I want to try it again at some point. I don't find it visually appealing, but the gameplay must be good if people praise it?

Worms 3D

Feels like Mayhem with janky movement physics. The worms in this game are cute, but they tend to look like they're either sad, drunk or have a case of Resting Bitch Face.

Worms Forts: Under Siege

I feel like this game is a spin-off but also not? I played through the tutorial, felt bored and confused simultaneously, didn't want to touch the game for a while afterwards, and just started the campaign yesterday only to feel that way again once I got to a level where I had to actively build. I wished I was doing something else. It was more fun watching the worms' animations than actually playing. I also hate how the camera controls feel. I probably would've liked the cancelled kart game better.

Worms 4: Mayhem

I got this one after WUM, initially to try out the free camera thingy, then test the OpenSpy patch (I haven't tried much, but I heard it doesn't work well, maybe I should just try LAN instead). Maybe I could try modding something oneday, since WUM seems to be modding-unfriendly. I don't want to play the campaign here because I know what kind of "voice acting" it has.

Worms: Revolution

This game makes me feel like an idiot. I like the worms' designs in this though, they have to be my 2nd favourite. I also recognize a lot of animations borrowed from Mayhem.

Worms: Ultimate Mayhem

This was my introductory Worms game. A friend suggested trying it back in February. We played it together via Parsec and it was funny experience. Wormpot helps spicing up the gameplay a lot. Worms flying high and far from overpowered explosions is a type of comedy. In rare occasions worms may get stuck in unexpected places, which is also funny. My first team was one with blue hair and I became attached to it, hence why that detail appears in my art a lot. The worms' design in this game has really grown on me and become my favourite.

Worms: Crazy Golf

I'm far from great and I just don't vibe with it overall.

Worms W.M.D

I'm pretty sure this was my first 2D game. I felt lost (and still do to an extent) with the amount of crafted weapons. Things tend to go wrong, but that can make it fun at times. This was also suggested by a friend, we played it together, and they used some mega destructive weapon (don't remember the name), and... let's just say it didn't always go in their favor.

Worms Rumble

I happened to be fortunate enough that a veteran player gifted me a code, so I bypassed Steam's regional restriction AND didn't spend any of my own money. There are a lot of maxed out players who can casually kick my ass, but there still are middle level and even new players I have a better chance against. As someone whose judgment isn't clouded by nostalgia, I want to say this game is... enjoyable. I only played one Battle Royale type game prior, but I didn't stick with it, maybe I chickened out. I recognize there's a problem with the number of active players: Quick Search rarely gives me Last Worm Standing and Last Squad Stading matches because they're always getting a single digit number of players. I heard there've been no updates lately and suggestions to make the game F2P. Regardless I've passed Level 25 (max is 50) and I'm certain I want to keep playing.

[raccoongamejournal]

Pokémon X Chapter 15: Finally, More Information About Mega Evolution (and the Third Gym Badge)

...and I'm back again after another long break.

I do enjoy writing these entries, but it also slows me down a lot, so I'm going to start writing a bit less per entry (no play-by-plays of random trainer battles, for example). This might mean shorter entries, but it might balance out.

Time to explore Shalour City!

A friendly NPC gives me a Soothe Bell, which should be useful once I find an eevee. Tierno catches up and gives me an Intriguing Stone that he got for showing off some dance moves.

Next stop: The Tower of Mastery.

This feels like a good place to look for information about Mega Evolution...

I've found the Mega Evolution Guru.

Exposition time!

Apparently, there's only one Mega Ring...

...so now I get to finally fight Calem.

...and I'm about 10 levels higher.

Glamdring takes out Calem's meowstic, Po defeats his absol, and Volta finally gets to fulfill her role of being the counter to Calem's frogadier, winning the fight.

However, to get the Mega Ring, I'll need to beat Korrina, the 3rd Gym Leader, first. So that's the next step.

The Gym seems to be a big roller skating rink, which is a fun design. Since I have Browser, Batman, and Po, I think I should be all set for a fighting-type Gym (and being overleveled can't hurt).

Browser sweeps through the four Roller Skaters without any problems (apart from one Fake Out that didn't actually do that much damage due to the level gap), and then I'm on to face Korrina.

Korrina starts with a level 29 mienfoo, who faces off against Browser (level 39). Browser gets hit with Fake Out, which hurts a bit, but then takes out the mienfoo with Psyschock. Korrina's machoke then also gets Psyshocked and faints. Korrina's ace is a level 32 hawlucha, who is also no match for...you guessed it, Psyshock. That might have been the easiest Gym Battle I've ever had (thanks to a very powerful Psychic type and being at least 7 levels higher than any opponents).

Badge acquired

To get the Mega Ring, I now need to get to the top of the Tower of Mastery. First, however, I stop back at the Pokémon Center to heal up my team.

This game has some really good statues.

Also, we finally know his name now.

The climb to the top is fairly uneventful.

Alright, Mega time!

Then it's time for a lucario battle with Korrina, helped by one of her lucario. I think this is a Mega Evolution tutorial.

Finally, the first fight in a while where I'm not super overleveled!

Also, I have a shiny new button now:

...and I have to hit that button first or I'll lose the fight immediately, as I found out. Time for take two! (Success)

With the fight over, I now mostly understand how Mega Evolution works, and got a new lucario friend. I think I'll call him "Bucket". So that pool of 8 or so "regulars" is now 9.

A Hiker gives me a Sun Stone in exchange for the Intriguing Stone, which he apparently lost. Seems like a fair trade.

And I get Surf!

I immediately teach it to Po, since that's a thing that can happen apparently.

I can now ride on a swimming giant panda thing. This is very silly.

Before I continue on to Route 12, I consider doubling back to a few earlier routes to check for spots where I can use Surf but ultimately decide to wait until I can use Fly, since that will make travel much easier.

I walk out to Route 12 and immediately am given a lapras. Does the game have a very specific team it wants the player to use?...oh wait, all the free pokémon I've gotten so far have Mega Evolutions, don't they (EDIT: nope, lapras has a G-Max form, not a Mega.). Anyway, I name the lapras "Frost" after thinking for way too long. Maybe the player is supposed to teach Surf to the lapras...well, I think it's funnier with Po so I'm sticking to the bit. Frost is also part of the "regulars" now (the water/ice typing fills a nice gap), so the total size of that group is/will be 10. But that's probably it. Probably.

Anyways, I catch a miltank and name it "Moo", followed by a slowpoke who I name "Flash". Next is a Rest-spamming tauros, who I decide to call "Hypnos". The encounter after that is a surprisingly-hard-to-catch chatot who I name "Umbrella". A bit later, I find a tentacool, catch it, and name it "Tiramisu". I then fight Swimmer Alessandro (Glamdring and Browser handle his team easily) and keep going. While on the water, I also catch a mantyke who I name "Bert Z".

Right after reaching land again, I fight and defeat Backpacker Joren and his linoone. After that, I find a horde of wingull, catch one, and name it "Cheeseborger".

I have arrived at the Baa de Mer Ranch on Route 12, but I'm going to call this entry here for now.

The current party

Stay safe everyone, and thanks for reading. See you next time.

[gertlushgaming]

PAYDAY 3 Review (Steam)

For this PAYDAY 3 Review, we step out of retirement back into the life of crime in the shoes of the Payday Gang, the envy of their peers, and the nightmare of law enforcement wherever they go. Several years after the crew’s reign of terror over Washington DC has ended, they assemble once again to deal with the threat that roused them out of early retirement.

PAYDAY 3 Review Pros:

- Fantastic graphics. - 46.05GB Download size. - Steam Achievements. - Graphics settings - window mode, resolution, framerate limit, v-sync, field of view slider, brightness, contrast, motion blur, depth of field, anti-aliasing, NVIDIA DLSS SR, view distance, shadows, post-processing, textures, effects, and foliage. - User interface settings - subtitles, subtitles text size slider, fps count, reticle, reticle editor (bar width/bar length/dot size/min Crosshair scale/max Crosshair scale), hit indicators, and indicator scale slider. - Full controller support. - Two controller presets. (default/Legacy) - Colorblind support. - Keyboard players can rebind the buttons. - Cross-play support that can be turned on and off. - Optional tutorial setup. - Invert axis and sensitivity sliders for both the controller and the mouse. - In-game chat can be turned on and off. - First-person shooter gameplay. - Challenges give infamy that is used for vendor items, and awards for skill points. - The challenges are split into heist, career, and combat. - Vendors sell - weapons, masks, and suits/clothing. - Loadout slots - primary, secondary, deployable, overkill weapon, armor lining, throwable, tool, and skills. - Appearance slots - character, masks, suits, and gloves. - Six base characters - Wolf, Joy, Dallas, Chains, Pearl, and Hoxton. - You set your preferred characters for multiplayer online. - Full friends list integration with an invite system. - Cutscenes are a mix of still art, FMV, and in-game interactions. - Every level can be played in multiplayer. - Lobby options - public, friends only, and invite only. - Four difficulties - normal, hard, very hard, and overkill. This affects Ai's difficulty, and money earned and may add modifiers. - The shooting feels a lot better with improved feedback and feel. - You can give orders to your Ai teammates and they will revive you. - All new cop types. - Call in heavy-duty overkill weapons. - The main mission and any triggered optional missions will show at all times. - Everything you do earns EXP and you level up to get new gear. - You get exp and cash even if you fail or quit out of a heist. - Every heist randomizes the locations of key items and where you need to go. - Heists can be done in so many different ways. - Environmental hazards can be triggered like fire extinguishers, sprinklers and so much more. - Cool flyover of the heist beforehand. - Earn exp for every weapon you use to upgrade the gun. - You can mark enemies. - Gets very addictive. - For me, it feels more like PayDay 1 rather than PayDay 2. - Every game with random is different and usually a huge learning curve. - A full 3D world with 360-degree camera control. - Infinitely replayable for many reasons from leveling up to upgrading guns to getting more loot. - When someone in your team puts their mask on it's just the, not the whole team so you can stay in stealth. - As you complete heists you get new story cutscenes. - All the heists are unlocked from the get-go and you are just unlocking the story. - Guns can be customized with charms, patterns, colors, and stickers. - Upgrading your gun affects stats and things like grip, attachments, mods, etc. - Full 3D models for each item/weapon. - Play and proceed in the game how you want. - Earn skill points and put them into the massive skill tree for new passives and upgrades. - 17 classes to unlock and use that change your passives and abilities - CQC specialist, Strategist, tactician, hacker, Grifter, Gunslinger, Engineer, Manipulator, Enforcer, Demolitionist, Escapist, Sharpshooter, Tank, Infiltrator, Mower, ammo specialist, and medic. - If players drop out they get replaced with bots. - Each class has its own set of upgrades in the tree. - Three main passives kick in depending on your class, load out, etc. - Edge (10% extra damage), Grit (take 10% less damage), and Rush (faster movement). - Eight total heists. - Streamlined simple to use mission select screen. - No in-app purchases at launch. - Enemies can drop ammo. PAYDAY 3 Review Cons: - Immediately greeted with a signup/sign-in to the Starbreeze system. - The game is having major matchmaking issues. (Has improved somewhat) - You cannot have two players the same in a group. - You are still subject to a long matchmaking time even in friends-only and invite-only lobbies. - No designated offline/solo mode. - Getting disconnected errors when playing solo or when matchmaking. - The mouse cursor stays on the screen even when using the controller. - Went in a few times set to invite only and got matched with random. - The tutorial is fine but still goes on the philosophy that you already know what you are doing. - Always online requirement. - No pause. - The guns don't feel that different. - Have had the AI cops just storming a room and then standing in the corner with their back to me. - It's all aimed at returning players and is not new player-friendly. - There is no way to mute individual players or check the audio settings when in the lobby. - Only eight heists at launch. - A lot of grinding is needed to unlock the better weapons and masks. - It is possible for Rogue random players to troll and ruin games. - Rank doesn't equal skill and instead represents time played. - When you finish a heist it just ends and kicks you back to the menu, no way to stay as a team or give feedback. Related Post: Call Of The Wild The Angler Review (Steam) PAYDAY 3: Official website. Developer: Starbreeze Entertainment Publisher: Deep Silver Store Links - Steam Read the full article

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[petes-5yr-cocoa]

ASXNXBSJWNAINXVAVKSM HI

Uh so for this to make sense you need to know some background hcs I have for Max:

He’s actually pretty smart, he just has adhd and never really had someone to encourage him to apply himself to schoolwork

His dad is neglectful at best and his mom hasn’t been around since he was a kid

because of that, he’s been cooking for himself since he was probably too young to have needed to and is p damn good at it (maybe it’s even a coping mechanism for stress?)

anyways uhhh

Idea 1: Culinary Scientist/Nutritionist

(also works for just like, being a chef but that’s not as fun i don’t think)

so i imagine max follows a specific diet for football and to maintain his physique, one that he figured out himself with online tutorials in freshman year and regularly updates

maybe his teammates are even like jealous of his homemade meals bc they’re always both healthy and delicious

so after he tears his acl and can’t play anymore he’s looking for a way to still contribute to the team and is just chatting with the guys about lunches one day

and he just offhandedly figures out what each of them is doing wrong in terms of nutrition bc he’s sneaky smart and ended up teaching himself a lot through the internet over the years

so over time he gradually figures out that he really enjoys preparing healthy foods for others and helping them

mellows out as his emotional outlet gradually shifts from bullying, which his heart isn’t really into anymore, to cooking, which actually makes him feel better and is something he can share with others

maybe even bonds with one of the nerds (Pete prob. idk why but it feels like he’d be the one that cooks between him and Ted) over cooking

Long-term, maybe he’d end up as a nutritionist for a professional sports team, but I like the idea that while exploring in college he really found it satisfying to work with younger children that had nutritional deficiencies or conditions; he could also be a culinologist, working as an r&d chef if you have him fall more in love with the scientific process and actual cooking of it than the science and biology in nutrition

Idea 2: Teacher

2.1: Elementary Teacher

Maybe after Max tears his acl, his coach invites him to be a coaching assistant for the elementary level team

Max is hesitant at first but he needs the distraction so he does it, and he falls in love with it (think Roy Kent with his niece’s team in s2 of Ted Lasso or Coach when he was the PE teacher in New Girl s4)

The kids love him and he loves working with the kids

esp if maybe he connects with a kid that’s been kinda standoffish all season and manages to get the kid out of a bad home because of that

this fuels a desire to work with kids and help them

alternatives could also include: Elementary PE teacher, social/case worker (duke keane taking him under his wing anyone?), child therapist, or school counselor (miss holiday taking him under her wing anyone?)

2.2: Junior High/High School Teacher

if, however, you want it to come full circle and really get some good character development, you could make him into a high school teacher

tbh with this one there’s a bit more emotional legwork to be done, but it’ll be worth it, prommy

so this one would probably start with some self reflection after Waylon Place, followed by him developing a good relationship with one of the nerds over time and ending the bullying (gradually or subtlety)

then comes the guilt, which leads to Max doing his best to try and make reparations by being the schools Resident Nerd Defender

he finds it really satisfying to be able to help others rather than hurt

using his secret smarts, he goes to school to be a science (see idea 1, also just seems like a fun chemistry teacher), social studies (seems like someone who’d be obsessed with the Roman Empire and/or WW2), or english (look at his vocabulary, he’s so secret smart in words) teacher

the important thing is that he becomes a high school teacher not to reclaim the power he once had, but to prevent kids from becoming like him by reaching out and connecting with them (might be esp interesting to have him take his spouse’s last name in this case so that students don’t really realize that he is That Jägerman unless he tells them)

i also think it’d be really cute if mayb tom houston was a mentor/father figure to him in this situation but mayhaps that’s just me

also it just gave me the cute idea of a michie au where they’re “rival” teachers (i feel like richie would def be math or film lit) that have this weird tension and all their students wonder when they’ll get together but they’ve secretly have been dating or married the entire time (if married, maybe they hyphenate but just use one last name at work bc they’re in the same school system)

idk that’s all i’ve got for now but maybe i’ll add more later

i need to write so much michie forever . fic ideas go (npac is still continuing i just . need to write more)

[twstgameplay]

General Gameplay Advice

🐙Cards and Magic/Spells  🐬Tests/Exams and Battles 🦈Events and Story

Mod Stuff

☆ ASK THE MODS

Why do we do card analysis?

How are team comps chosen?

Which cards do we have 10/10 Magic?

Do the mods spend real money?

How do we figure out the math?

Mod Jeido - Why stop leveling at Lv.99?

What type of card do we want to see added?

Most number of rolls without getting rate up SSR?

Any cards we’ve changed our minds on?

Which cards are we uncapping in the Guest Room?

Are we fluent in Japanese?

How did we get our Dorm Cards?

If we had to fight the battle from the tutorial, what team would we use?

Do we max our SSR with honey or use lessons?

What event R/SR do we find useful?

What are the Mods’ favorite cards?

What teams do the Mods have for all tests?

☆ BRAGS

Mod Zuzu - SSS Omni Defense Test

Mod Zuzu - SSS Flora Basic Test

Mod Zuzu - SSS Fire Defense Test

Mod Zuzu - SSS Cosmic Defense Test

Mod Zuzu - SSS 9th NRC Unified Exam (Part 2)

Mod Jeido - SSS Omni Defense Test

Mod Jeido - SSS 5th NRC Unified Exam

Mod Jeido - SSS Cosmic Basic Test

Mod Furoido - SSS Omni Defense Test

Mod Furoido - SSS 9th NRC Unified Exam

Anemone Viru - SSS 6th NRC Joint Exam

☆ PREDICTIONS

Club Card Order

Bloom Birthday DUOs

General Gameplay

☆ GENERAL INFO

Player Rank

Change your character’s outfit on the homescreen

Where to find the chibi animations

Double Login Bonus

Badges and Titles

Customer support inquiries

Post About Chapter 6 to Twitter?

Use VPN to play EN/JP game out of your region

What are the payment methods possible?

How do people have alt accounts?

How is TWST doing money-wise?

[EN] Will LP Increase to 30 like JP?

How to reach Friendship Lv.100 for the Roommate Badges?

What are the Roommate Badges?

How long does it take to max Friendship?

How to get more madol/thaumarks

Retry Tickets

Do a Batch Download to help minor glitches

☆ AWAKENING PERFUMES

Where to get Perfume

Perfume recommendations: [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]

☆ GEMS

A Guide on How to Farm for Gems and Keys

How to purchase gems with Android

How to purchase gems with iOS

Update game using VPN

☆ MATERIALS

Spending AP/LP starshards

Refreshing AP/LP with gems

Using waffles efficiently

Using honey efficiently

Should honey be used in small quantities?

Running low on thaumarks

Do consumables have a limit?

When should we spend consumables?

Best way to grind textbooks.

☆ MYSTERY SHOP

Sam’s Item Gacha

Recommended things to purchase for beginners

Where to find the voice lines purchased during Unified Exams

Worth purchasing the tenfold summon

What should be purchased with alchemy tokens?

Does the Gem Shop give one single key, or three?

☆ PLAYER BIRTHDAY

Setting up your birthday

When are the birthday wishes available to view in-game?

☆ MISSIONS

Is there a limit to missions?

☆ SUMMONING SHOWCASE

How to find groovy art

Keys vs Gems

Tenfold Summon vs Single Summon [1] [2]

When do previous event showcases return?

Is it viable to play with only Standard Showcase summons?

Is it worth summoning Dorm Jamil?

Limited card summoning recommendations

Guaranteed SR+

Can you “choose” the event SSR you want?

What is “pity”?

When should you stop summoning?

Chance of getting featured card on single pull

Indications of SSR

☆ GUEST ROOM

How to craft new furniture / Where is the battle map?

How to collect room medals

Can cards go over Lv. 100 with an increase in friendship?

Are the drop rates for collection battles consistent? [1] [2]

Are the number of guests in the room RNG?

How to increase the room medal drop per hour

Is it possible to get Great or Perfect on Friendship level up?

How often will Great/Excellent boosts happen for Friendship at 300+?

Does mat drop rate depend on how well you do in the battle? [1][2]

Are the RP bottles in the Gem shop worth getting?

Club Medals: Do they expire?

Drop Rate on Gift Items

Does higher comfort level affect trouble?

Are some items worth more comfort points than others?

Are there themes that work better together?

How to get great/excellent voice lines

Unlocking exclusive furniture (How to get exclusive furniture) [2]

Is Guest Room timegated for new players?

Better ways to get Sunshards?

How many dorm points do the statues give?

Estimate of Drop Rates (JP: outdated)

How to maximize space for comfort levels.

Do Theme and Dorm points stack?

Interactions with specific furniture

Unlock portrait recipes for SSRs

What are the “bars” of Theme points?

Guest Room Mat Drop Stats

[my-forgotten-notepad]

Playing Pokemon Scarlet

I have been playing the recent Pokemon release; Pokemon Scarlet, blind. As in, I did no research and I haven't watched any letsplayers or poketubers to understand any of the difficulty curves and new mon introduced with ScarVio. What I came to realise is that due to it's open world nature, ScarVio has an incredibly steep difficulty curve if you don't know where your going or what regions (and the nearest Titan pokemon, Team Star Base and Gym Battle is) you end up in wild encounters, trainer battles or at gyms that a radically overlevelled in comparison to you.

I had just assumed Gamefreak had heard people bemoaning the lapse in difficulty with recent additions and racheted that shit up hardcore. Leaving the player to fight Gym leaders who had aces several levels higher than the max training cap you have. Turns out I had just goosestepped into the harder gym battles; but because of open world planning, I can't tell where the next gym close to my level is. I literally have to adventure and hope I havent stumbled into an area 10-20 levels higher than my best mon.

It certainly turned my blind Nuzlocke attempt into a normal run because I had ended up wiping out twice before even getting within spitting distance of the academy. Once was due to Nemona showing off the central power gimmick and cleaning out my team the next time was a courier with mon 4 levels higher than all of my team on the route to the gym.

They still use the full-party exp. share that they've been doing since Sun and Moon; but unlike Sun and Moon you can't turn it off anymore. so if you want to level up a specific mon, you need to remove all other pokemon from your party to do so. making levelling up and maintaining team balance and not going over the training level cap very frustrating and very grindy.

I think if I ever wanna replay the game and do a proper Nuzlocke run; I will wait several months and once all the info/data has been mined from the game, do research so I'm not blind-sided by an OP trainer and lose the run before finishing the tutorial cutscene segments.

[rfadaydreaming]

the rfa playing minecraft

oh the chaos a mysme minecraft server would bring ♡

jumin

• does not know how to move in any direction except straight

• keeps falling into caves because he just… walks

• stands there in the dark for a few seconds to process what happened

• “the game broke, i cannot see”

• yoosung is like wtf how is it broken

• cave noises start to happen

• “h elp”

• seven has to track him down and it takes absolutely forever just because jumin does not know where he is… not even a hint... he was just walking around

• finally seven finds him and brings him up with a fishing pole, but when he finally gets him up, they both get blown up by a creeper

• “i don’t like this game very much.”

• has a house with v because there’s no way in hell he’s about to share a home with zen

• their house is actually so cute, modern on the outside but super cozy and cute on the inside

• here’s some reference pictures of what i think their house would look like !! starter home / end game home

• his room is so naked omg v comes in and adds a desk, some pictures, plants, just to make it more homey

• has so many cats to the point where it lags HEAVILY when you enter his room, it’s just a giant barrage of meows

• his playstyle is fishing, taming cats, naming cats, fishing again

• he gets lost in the boats so much though, you have to come save him because he’s stranded in the middle of the ocean

• you show up and there’s a cow stuck in the back of his boat, he’s starving to death, the phantom is killing him

• but the nice part about fishing all the time is he gets really good loot and enchantments so he’ll give them to whoever wants them since… well he doesn’t really need them

• except zen omg he gives him like. chain link boots, seaweed, paper

• zen breaks into his room and takes whatever he wants though because jumin doesn't know how to make a locked chest

• he’s honestly just here for the vibes, he’ll lay on his bed even when no one else is sleeping and listen to what everyone’s talking about in the voice chat

• you cannot even see him on his bed because it’s just a sea of cats + a drop in frame rate the second you open up his door

zen

• he’s so bad with technology so he has to read the tutorial like three times before he plays

• takes awhile to get used to the controls so he’ll stop walking, jump over a block, pause, keep on walking

• it’s cute to watch actually

• he follows everyone else around and likes to pretend he knows what he’s doing? but really doesn’t

• beats the shit out of jumin for just existing

• gets stuck in a village well and silently flips out because he’s too embarrassed to ask for help

• jumin finds him and they just stare at each other in silence… jumin figures out how to hit him one singular time before running away

• he lives in a dirt home with the green top for so long it’s actually embarrassing

• inside is just a torch, furnace, crafting table, basic bed and chest literally just a straight mans home

• it’s so ugly

• v tries to spruce it up a little because he just does not like to look at it… every time he walks by he gets the ick

• jaehee eventually adopts him out of pity and they live together, but she has to do all the hard work

• their house looks like this

• he mooches so hard oh my god she’ll spend an entire day cycle mining only for him to take all the iron and make himself a silly little outfit

• she never complains though because he’s really appreciative about it

• will give her little flowers in exchange for outfit materials

• and of course gives you flowers just because you’re you

• leaves them in a pot in your room with a sign that has a little winky face

• is always changing his clothes, every time he wakes up he changes into something different

• jaehee works so hard to find diamonds for him so he can be the first to have some diamond armor

• seven kills him the second he steps out of his house and snatches it from his dead corpse

• zen’s playstyle is just following everyone else around and pretending to help but he doesn’t do much, being sweet to jaehee and you, annoying jumin

• he gets bored easily so he doesn’t play for very long :( also gets mad at jumin and rage quits omg

yoosung

• absolutely loves minecraft and he’s been playing for years, he’s really good at it!!

• so sweet and fun to play with hehe he’s like the cheery little team leader

• helps everyone get settled and works hard to make sure the newbies have a nice amount of starter materials

• even if they die and lose them all he’s like “oh that’s okay don’t sweat it you guys!!” and runs to get them new stuff

• hums to the music while he’s playing, always updates people on what he’s doing and asks if anyone needs anything

• a man on a mission, gets to work on gathering materials with jaehee the second the game loads in, knows exactly what he’s doing

• he’ll move fast to make a quick little community house for everyone to sleep in for the night

• doesn’t like the day one dirt homes it gives him anxiety

• it’s a little small but cozy!! makes everyone a chest and puts a sign above it with their name on it

• adds a “:D” at the end of everyone’s names on the signs, but a “♡” to your name only!!

• zen goes off and makes his gross little dirt house because he doesn’t wanna sleep next to jumin

• he ends up just expanding off the community house once everyone leaves and lives solo with his little parrots

• unless you want to join him!! go ahead he’d love the company

• so nervous in caves and will only go into the shallow parts where the sun still hits, a very silent miner because he’s concentrating

• he’ll go deeper into mines when seven and saeran are with him but he almost pees his pants when the cave noises start to play

• gets startled so easily and screams whenever something happens, it's so loud that the mic automatically cuts it off– so you hear 0.2 seconds of a scream, dead silence, then suddenly “yoosung fell from a high place” it’s so funny

• 9 times out of 10 seven pushed him off too

• takes it seriously, wants to play until the end of the game but everyone else is busy running around with gremlin energy

• his playstyle is a little bit of everything, he’s not a bad builder but he doesn’t spend too much time on it. goal for him is survival and exploration

• if anyone needs anything he’ll run to get it without a second thought doesn’t get the appreciation he deserves >:(

• seven picks on him so much oh my god, once he asked him to come help mine diamonds but actually pushed him into lava and yoosung started to cry

• everyone made seven feel kind of bad for it so he apologized with a full set of diamond armor, tools, flowers and a cake… it still hurt though

jaehee

• minecraft queen

• plays by herself a lot, the music, building on peaceful mode, all the alone time she gets

• loves it a lot actually, especially after a hard day at work

• but she gets so stressed out playing with everyone else

• it’s kinda bad for her health

• sighs into the mic whenever someone’s acting like an absolute fool

• tolerates no bullshit

• do not hit her. not even by accident. do not do it

• it’s so tense, she slowly turns around stares at them for what seems like forever it’s actually so scary

• only you’re allowed to hit her because for the two of you it’s not a smack, it’s a boop

• she does it back too

• “boop!” with a cute little giggle afterwards

• instantly goes to get the basics set up when the game loads in, sticks with yoosung in the beginning to get a bunch of starter materials gathered together

• is always running around doing something but no one knows exactly what because she doesn’t share. she is doing something though, a very productive crafter

• she has never died, ever. probably the highest level here out of anyone else

• the resident necessity provider, will throw you stacks of bread exactly when you need some, it’s like a 6th sense

• has basic mining chests set up for everyone to take from if they want to, so torches, food, tools, dirt, armor etc

• she really likes to decorate more than build, but she’s still really good at it!

• loves designing up floor plans

• not the best at adding the little details though

• her homes always look kinda square so v helps her out with that

• she organizes other people’s chests because she just hates how messy it looks, seven gives her so much anxiety especially

• she’s always cleaning up after him and shutting his doors since he leaves them open constantly

• her play style is a little bit of everything, not afraid of the caves whatsoever so she’ll mine if no one else wants to do it

• you can usually find her decorating though

• spends so much time making a cute little kitchen in her house especially

• a “coffee machine” is definitely a must in her house, also has a really pretty and huge bedroom

• white concrete and dark wood slabs, her house looks so lovely

• decorates zens room for him too

• she doesn’t talk much in the voice chat when jumin’s in there because she doesn’t wanna get fired

• likes to come into peoples houses and jump around a few times to say hi before running off again

• her and zen throw flowers back and forth to each other while crouching up and down like a couple of nerds ♡

seven

• the second the game loads he is off to the races, he is gone baby!! no one knows what he’s doing but everyone knows he fears nothing so it must be exciting

• “GOD707 was slain by enderdragon”

• we’ve been in the game for an hour max how did he- nvm don’t question it

• he’ll randomly show up to the community house out of nowhere, do a few random things here and there, leave again for a few days

• comes back on a skeleton horse, enchanted diamond armor, a fleet of dogs, elytra, the wandering trader enslaved on a lead

• saeran follows him around most of the time so they’ll usually be off doing something together

• seven dies so much omg every five minutes there’s a death message in the chat

• if you manage to track him down you find that he is living absolutely lavish

• has so many bases scattered around like this, this, or this

• spends a lot of time building once everyone else goes offline, does not sleep until his base is done and he’s actually an amazing builder

• v loves to go around in his bases and just gawk

• he does not decorate whatsoever, that's for saeran to do! jaehee comes and organizes because he just throws everything into a chest and leaves

• his playstyle is chaotic horrifying, he does a bit of everything but the main goal is to get to the void and beat the ender dragon with his bare hands, he wants to become god

• never shuts his doors so there’s just big creeper explosion holes in his home that he’s too lazy to fix, claims it adds ~character~

• he loves spelunking so you can find him running around in caves most of the time, there is no fear in this man's soul whatsoever, loves battle and fighting mobs, insults them most of the time while killing them

• throws his diamond armor into lava just for the funsies, always parkouring in caves, you will get so much anxiety being around him

• sometimes mimics the cave noises just to scare yoosung

• burns down villages, starts random fires, jumps into holes, beats up any animal he sees

• sometimes he comes in to hit jumin’s cats just to hear him raise his voice a little and be like “Hey!” it’s really funny but annoys jumin

• he edges the creepers omg gets them to the point where they almost blow up but backs up before they actually do

• redstone master!! builds so many insane things out of it, has an entire theme park dedicated to himself, definitely has a torture room somewhere in his mansion

• he’s always joking around with everyone, especially with you

• “hey mc, hold this for me?”

• he slowly gets real close to you until your hands are touching and your heads are almost morphing into each other

• “bro... are we ab to kiss rn...”

• will come into your bedroom when everyone’s asleep does NOT knock first this man barges right in and stands over your bed, silent for a few seconds before suddenly tossing hundreds of diamonds down on you, throws back some ass a few times before running off once again

• hits people for absolutely no reason and yes he will hit with the intention to kill

• “no swearing in my christian minecraft server”

v

• gets motion sick at video games usually but he actually really likes minecraft!!

• a complete dad so he takes a little bit getting used to the controls but warms up quick

• don’t you dare hit him. that’s evil. he’s like “woah!! something just happened, i got attacked out of nowhere!! we have to be more careful you guys!”

• he’s genuinely so confused and concerned for everyone’s safety

• adores building so much, not just houses but also little structures here and there

• he’ll make greenhouses, vineyards, beach homes, treehouses, statues

• villages get completely revamped if he thinks they’re ugly which most of the time, he does

• his playstyle is completely just building and decorating, sometimes he’ll send jumin out for supplies but it ends badly most of the time

• aka jumin gets lost and/or dies

• he helps build everyone their own little structures so jumin gets a luxury cat mansion, zen gets a shrine dedicated to himself, yoosung gets a stage for his parrots to dance on, jaehee gets a coffee shop in the village, seven gets a giant ph pepper statue, saeran gets a sunflower farm all to himself, and of course you get whatever you want! omg he’d make you a heart shaped nether portal

• he’ll help when he’s needed but he doesn’t really play, he just builds

• everyone brings their spare materials to him if they don’t need them, yoosung and saeran help him farm for stuff if he needs something in particular

• really loves giving house tours when he’s done with a build and it is the cutest thing in the entire world

• he is just so insanely giddy and excited as he shows off all the little details, you can hear the smile in his voice

• everyone validates him and matches his energy too it’s so sweet :’)

• he’s always complimenting everyone on anything and everything they do

• “look at you, finding diamonds! good job!”

• “this house is so very lovely, i love the warm energy it brings.”

• he likes to wander around and find white cats for jumin to tame

• on the rare occasion he comes caving, he’s always the little cheerleader for everyone else of course

• “good luck down here everyone, please stay safe and call out if you need anything. we’re all here to help each other, alright?”

• two seconds later yoosungs drowning in lava, seven is mining bedrock, jumin is being shot by a skeleton, jaehee is fighting off a mob spawner, zen is lost, saeran is riding minecarts around

saeran

• he’s pretty quiet while he plays so no one ever knows what exactly he’s up to, he’s just shy

• picks flower fields absolutely clean, not a singular flower in sight, only if he finds a beehive somewhere then he’ll leave some for them

• has a lot of dye because of that, resident banner creator!!! he’ll make anything that you’d like

• he follows people around– especially seven, and just goes with the flow of whatever they’re up to, chaotic or not

• sometimes you think he’s afk so you just stop and stare at him but then he moves and you jump a little

• yoosung and him will just spam crouch for minutes on end together when they’re bored

• by himself a lot of the time, you can find him playing with some turtles on the beach somewhere or planting flowers

• builds a lot on his own solo server, but doesn’t really like to in the main one because he gets insecure comparing it to v’s and seven’s work.

• he does have his own little house away from seven’s mansion basement though

• if you come in and start complimenting it he gets so shy and blushy

• “thanks… it’s not that impressive i just whipped it up really quick…”

• seven knowing damn well that house took him several hours: 👁_👁

• he hits people to get their attention and then crouches all guiltily when they turn around, throws them a quick little flower before running off

• he has a ton of pink sheep collected outside his house, an army of jebs live in his basement

• his playstyle is just doing whatever he feels like. sometimes he’s getting materials for everyone, other times he’s just sliding around on ice with the polar bears for awhile

• he likes enchanting potions and that kind of stuff

• smacks seven with random potions like slowness, fire, poison

• had a pet fish in a little aquarium at his place, one day it despawned and he nearly burnt down his whole house from being so upset

• still convinced seven killed him

• he doesn’t get scared from the mines

• the nether though is is a different story, it’s terrifying to him

• especially ghasts and the sounds they make. will not go in there unless you are and you beg him to hold your hand or something

• has secret little minecraft pinterest boards full of silly statues and stuff that he likes to build around randomly

• blames herobrine for all of them which scares yoosung

mc (hey thats you!!!)

• jumin lets you name his cats, dye their collars, anything you want even if it’s silly. if you have your own cats then sometimes he brings his favorites over and they have little baby kittens together, you both spam crouch and jump around afterwards from the excitement of it all. don’t worry he pays child support !! you don’t know where he got diamonds but. you’ll take them anyways

• zen brings you random little presents that he thinks are super useful but… are not. you don’t have the heart to tell him that though. thinks spider eye is like the rarest thing in the entire game, secretly comes in to give them to you and message you something like “shh… keep it secret jagiya~ ;)” it’s the thought that counts

• yoosung is always so sweet with everything he does, he’ll bring you any sort of materials, tools. anything you need it’s yours. once he ran in front of you to take the hit from a poison spider when you know he’s absolutely terrified of them so you could get away safely. he tries his best to be brave for you <3

• jaehee invites you to her kitchen for taste testing, you’ll come in and try all the lil cakes she has sitting out while giving your feedback on all them in detail. mm yes very good, love the electric taste of the pixels in this one! finally she’ll be like wtf are we doing

• seven surprises you by making a cute little heart shape out of redstone, you press a button and it lights up red, fireworks go off, he’s jumping around throwing flowers and diamonds at you. he’ll put a sign down that says “will you… put your minecraft bed next to mine?”

• v is constantly checking in on you, he’ll say “knock knock!” before coming into your room, you’re like hey what’s up!! he replies i missed you! i just wanted to say hi :) before leaving again, comes in every day cycle with snacks to make sure you’re eating properly of course

• saeran brings you flowers all the time, he’ll shyly sneak into your room, crouch over to the bed super slowly, suddenly start throwing stacks of flowers all over you, crouch up n down a couple of times before running for the hills. forgets to shut your door and runs back real quick to shut it before leaving again

thanks for reading! find more on my mysme masterlist ♡!

[pianoperson]

Ikerev Army Boys Playing Twisted Wonderland

After reading @valnyte’s HC with Ikevamp, I wanted to do one with Ikerev too.

Alice introduces the boys to Twisted Wonderland and is shocked to get them all hooked into the game. Let’s say they all understand the game.

*just want to say, the strategies I typed in these HCs are actually legitimate strategies I’ve heard from people, and if you have the cards for it, I suggest you try them out

Black Army

Ray Blackwell

He’s in mainly for the story.

F for him, his fav character is Che’nya.

He claims Heartslabyul is his favorite episode because it has the best story out of the currently released episodes so far, but the Black Army isn’t falling for that.

He’s not wrong though, in my opinion. Heartslabyul, along with Octavinelle, has the best story.

He had to make it a rule that no one should spend the Black Army funds for gacha after the one time Seth spent 10k lin for gacha.

He does assemble his team but only bases his assembling on favs and a bit from Sirius’ advice.

He can’t help but smile fondly at Ace and Deuce’s shenanigans and dumbassery; they remind him of him and Fenrir.

Sirius Oswald

Oh he’s gonna have fun with the strategizing part of the game.

He will write down in a notebook all the card information he has attained and would ask from other soldiers for their cards if he doesn’t have a certain card so he can note down their stats at max level groovied, their magic skills, their typings, their buddies, and even how they perform in battle.

He’s the first and only one in the Black Army who scored SSS on tests. Everyone was floored.

Listen, he probably discusses these strategies at dinner especially because some people ask him how he scores ridiculously high in tests.

“Fairy Leona may be a defense card, but if with Kalim and Rook, who are his attack buddies, his attack stat will increase to 5k+. If you have SSR Kalim, who boosts your ally, his attack stat will increase further, and it’s even better that Kalim’s attack boost is magic 1 and he is Leona’s duo partner, therefore strengthening Leona’s duo magic. If limit broken at a certain level, he can deal 10k damage per hit with duo magic. The only other SSR who can inflict the same amount of damage is Riddle dorm and even then, you need to have Cater on your team with max buddy to even experience such a boost.”

He may not have superb gacha luck and he is an f2p, but whatever cards he possesses, he can somehow make them work in his favor.

He has a spiritual connection to Trey Clover.

Luka Clemence

Hello, may I introduce you to Luka “I have 7 SSRs only, it’s not that much” Clemence?

No, I’m not kidding. This guy has insane luck as an f2p.

He snagged 7 SSRs in two weeks and when Seth was crying about his gacha luck, that was the only time Luka realized 7 SSRs was a lot?

“I JUST WANT AN SSR SO BAD, I ONLY HAVE MY TUTORIAL PULL ONE”

“Huh?¿ How can you only have one?”

“BECAUSE I’M THAT UNLUCKYYYYY WHY HOW MANY DO YOU HAVE”

“I only have 7...”

Seth’s screams could be heard from Red Territory.

Ok but Seth has every right to freak out. Luka has ALL dorm leader SSRs, biggest tank of the game SSR Trey, and tweels.

Luka dislikes Riddle and Vil for the fact they both bear similarities with his brother. He has mixed feelings with the former, though, due to his backstory.

When it comes to rhythmics, he laments about how he’s a musician yet he can’t get the timing right. Poor fingers are slow.

Rip him in hard mode, especially for Octavinelle’s and prologue 14. They’re h e l l.

Seth Hyde

Rip Seth, he just wants an SSR

His initial SSR was Ruggie and he was crying when he learned from Sirius that he could have rerolled.

His favorite character is Vil and he wants him to come home, but only his Rs arrived.

It’s a wonder how 10k lin wouldn’t bring robe Vil and lab Vil home.

And he still has less SSRs than Luka LMAO

He’s cried at almost every OB backstory except Leona’s.

His favorite rhythmic is the paint the roses one.

Fenrir Godspeed

Luck in battle? Yes. Luck in gacha? Who’s that?

Fenrir spends money on the game but he uses his family’s wealth. Don’t worry, he knows how to manage his savings, but that’s mainly because he accidentally inputted the wrong birth year when he first put it in, so it listed him as a minor.

He loves Ace because he felt like he could relate to him so much.

His first SSR was Riddle, so he really wanted Azul’s SSR when his banner first came out. He hit pity pull and got duped by Floyd.

It’s ok Fenrir, I feel your pain, except I never hit pity.

He loves the rhythmics. Often, he’ll be singing the tunes out loud.

He’s gonna sing the Magift rhythmic songs when he’s training with other soldiers.

Red Army

Lancelot Kingsley

It took him weeks to figure out where alchemy classes are.

He has 4 SSRs who duo with each other, so that’s lit af.

He doesn’t know why he keeps losing in certain battles, though.

He also spent money on gacha oof

Riddle makes him chuckle. He has such a huge resemblance to Jonah, after all.

Trey makes him think of Sirius too often.

He ends up laughing at the thought of Sirius being Jonah’s helper.

I mean hey, they could have at least been friends if things played out differently back in school.

His favorite is Malleus, though, for the fact that he is powerful and lonely.

Jonah Clemence

He didn’t touch on the game at first because he thought it was ‘a waste of time’. It didn’t help that Edgar teased him for having the same voice as Riddle. It was only when he found out Lancelot plays the game and looks so happy with it that he decided to give it a try.

He was surprised at how similar he and Riddle are, and he liked the little queen even more for his birthday, being the same as Luka’s.

He will never admit he likes the game, though, but the soldiers catch him humming some of the songs sometimes.

Another thing he will never admit: he felt a lump in his throat when he read Riddle’s backstory, but when he got to Azul’s, he cried for an hour. He found himself most impressed with Azul’s voice acting prior to the overblot, but the story about Azul’s past had hit him hard. They experienced the exact same thing after all (being bullied) but it was interesting how differently they both turned out afterwards.

Jonah isn’t too big on the meta gameplay. Sure, he strategizes, but he mostly takes into consideration the stats of a card, not so much with the performance of it in battle. He won’t ever say it to Edgar, but he does take Edgar’s advice into consideration, even applying it if he has the cards for it.

Jonah scoffs at spending on gacha. Ultimately, they’re just JPEGs. Why spend on something that can’t be touched? Anyway, he has 5 SSRs and several good SRs such as robe Jade, robe Vil, and lab Trey. He can manage.

He loves the rhythmic section of the game. He may not be the best in the battles, but he’s talented in the rhythmics. Sure, some rhythmics were difficult, but he always scores SS on one or two tries regardless of difficulty. His favorite songs are the fairy gala songs and he’s caught humming them.

Edgar Bright

Just like Sirius, he has fun strategizing in battle. He will blab to Lancelot, Jonah, and Zero about the different strategies he’s come up with.

“Did you know you can make SSR Jade an attack SSR? His magic 1 raises his attack stat, and if you max it, hm will it exceed 5,000? I forget. And if you put Trey in the same team as Jade, he will further boost his attack, and if their buddy level has been maxed, hm perhaps you might reach 6k+ for Jade’s attack stat?”

“Did you know Azul’s attack stat can surpass even Floyd’s attack stat? If you max his buddy with Jade, he can be as strong as Riddle dorm at lvl80.”

“I’m sorry, but after testing out fairy Kalim, his SR cards are still better performance-wise.”

He’s the first and only one to have SSS and just like Jonah, he aces the rhythmic section.

He finds himself most amused with Jade for his shadiness and is probably the one who goes, “Jade, don’t you just want to go apeshit?”

Kyle Ash

He tends to miss lessons often either because he has a lot of patients or because he’s hungover, so he tends to complain about how weak his cards are.

He doesn’t care much about the meta gameplay and plays by favorites. Somehow, he manages to use the good cards and hits rank S.

He doesn’t join the events and doesn’t understand the woes of gacha since he always manages to get the cards he wants.

Luckiest guy honestly, and some of the soldiers jokingly beg for his luck.

Zero

He also strategizes but he mostly follows Edgar’s advice since he tends to get to it first before Zero.

Zero doesn’t play too often because of work, but the game is addicting enough to make him catch the restored AP every 2.5 hours. Anyway, even if he didn’t want to, Alice would have tried to get his workaholic butt off of work.

Poor baby has given up on prologue 14 hard mode rhythmic.

His favorite character is Jack for his good boy nature and he found himself liking the Octavinelle chapter for his presence and rationality. Beans Day event was also fun for him because of Jack.

[atlas-the-worldbuilder]

Final thoughts on Pokemon Sword/Shield

So in case you weren’t aware (which is most of you, I’m sure), a few months ago I started a Pokemon Shield blind Nuzlocke Run.  And recently, I completed the main portion of the Nuzlocke by defeating the Champion.  Having played through the game, though, I thought I’d give my final thoughts on it as a Pokemon fan, a gamer, and as a storyteller.

The Story & Characters

In all honesty, I rather enjoyed the main story of this game.  The Pokemon League has always been presented like a professional sport (at least in the anime/cartoon), so it’s fun to see the games taking that perspective and rolling with it.  It felt like an actual tournament/championship, to compete for the title in an officially organized manner, rather than just running a gauntlet of preset combatants.

In addition, I liked how they incorporated both the gym leaders and our rivals into the league story as not only combatants, but also as individuals with their own lives and aspirations.  Marnie and Team Yell are adorable, Hop is... mostly tolerable, thus far, but by far my favorite rival character has been Bede, the Psychic/Fairy trainer.  His haughty and prideful demeanor make him a delight to defeat, and his arc is a wonderful story to see unfold.  I’m really curious to see what he gets up to in the after-story! The Gym Leaders are also fun to meet and battle; the Pokemon games as a whole have been gradually attempting to give more and more character to each of the Gym Leaders you meet, beyond just trials to overcome on your journey to victory.  And while I always have a soft spot for the Hoenn & Sinnoh gyms, I like that they opted to have the Gym Leaders return in place of having more Elite Four members to fight  I only wish I could get more opportunities to get to know them better, cuz there’s some standout leaders from this batch which I truly enjoy!

My biggest complaint with Sword/Shield’s story, though, has been the “Heroic Quest” plotline which has become increasingly common these days.  I like the character of Sonia the researcher, and Oleana is satisfying to watch lose, my biggest complaint has been the pacing of the plot; the first 2/3rd’s of the story are us teaming with Sonia to gradually get the backstory revealed to us, and then in the last half hour, right as the Tournament’s getting underway, all the villains suddenly crawl from beneath the floorboards and run amok while you have to chase them down!  There didn’t feel like there was a proper buildup explaining why the villain wanted to summon the legendary Pokémon, especially one which we heard next to nothing about! This brings about an interesting idea, however... what if instead, they had completely forgone any Legendary-Summoning stories until after the league?  Honestly, I was way more invested challenging the gyms and fighting the champion than I was stopping the literal POKEMON APOCALYPSE from happening... so what if for future games, they saved those for after you became champion?  As a sort of test of your skills, to prove your worth to bear the mantle you have taken!  Maybe it wouldn’t have meshed well, maybe they needed to show of the game mascot more, I dunno...  it’s just my thoughts.

The GamePlay

THEY FINALLY LET US TURN OF THE GODS-FORSAKENED TUTORIALS!!!  PRAISE THE ALL-FATHER!!!

Ahem... In all honesty, I think I’d grown a bit too used to the 2nd screen of the DS-series games, but after a couple days of getting used to the mono-screen style again, I am pleased to say I found it very easy to settle back into.  Though there are still some features I wish would make a return (the HM moves as opposed to public transportation, poison’s effect while walking, wild double battles, etc.), there are alot of fun mechanics introduced and remedies to older problems that have been introduced!

I think one feature which hasn’t had much said about it is the introduction of the Poke-Jobs system; this system allows you to send your Pokémon out on timed “away missions” to gain both experience and items.  In the old days, if you wanted to passively level your pokemon, the only real option you had without introducing a second player was the Daycare center, and they could only raise two pokemon at once... and you had to pay for it.  With Poke-Jobs, though, I can send anywhere from 5-10 teammates out for whatever amount of time I want them to be out for, and then come back later to see them lively and with goodies to show for their work! At first, I didn’t think I’d get much use out of this system; I, like many players out there I’m sure, prefer to guide my pokemon’s training personally, honing their movesets and guiding their levelling and points the way I want from them.  But as I progressed further in my Nuzlocke, and as my daily life became busier and busier, I found myself sending my backup teammates out on jobs to keep them on par with my main team.  Given that the Move Deleter/Tutor and Name Rater are now services that have been rolled into the Pokemon Center, yet another good thing this series has done, I found it much easier to keep my reserve Pokemon prepared in case I needed a substitution. Some Nuzlocke “Purists” may call that taking the easy way out, but... frankly, I don’t have the willpower to do that much grinding.  I’m here to play a game and have fun doing it, dammit.

The Wild Area is another thing I’ve wanted to see from Pokemon for a long time - taking more steps to make the regions seem like an open world, with vast sprawling environments full of pokemon and secrets to uncover.  I’ll admit, though, the execution is... not entirely perfect.  While open expanses are fun to explore, the Wild Area did seem a bit... flat to traverse.  And while the weather mechanics translating into battle are fun to deal with, the same sets of wild pokemon appearing did start to wear me down.  I think what the Wild Area really needed, in the long run, was a system similar to how Black/White/Black2/White2 did - having seasonal progression ingame, where different pokemon would show up during different seasons, making the different places unique and novel all over again throughout the year. And for the record, many of my gripes with the Wild Area were addressed in the Isle of Armor’s expansion island.  VASTLY superior, and much more fun to navigate and traverse.

...I’ll openly admit this: I was not a fan of Mega Evolution when it was first introduced in X/Y.  I felt it was fine enough to see Pokemon battling without power boosts or “digi-volving” or whatever you wanna call it.  When Sun/Moon Introduced Z-Moves, it felt like a step in the right direction, but at the same time, I ended up not using it very often.  If I had to have a power boost to my pokemon, I would want it something that couldn’t be used as a crutch when the going gets tough - something that has a limited usability, and offers benefits specific to the time it’s being used. I say this because I initially approached Dynamax the same way: as just another power boost to level the playing field and shake up the battle meta which I don’t keep track of.  However, after barely surviving all 8 gym leaders without using a single dynamax pokemon, I decided to give it a chance: after having completed the Isle of Armor’s subplot and gaining access to the Max Soup, I fed it to my Toxtricity Spike, and started running dynamax raids.  As I started using it more and more, I started gaining a certain appreciation for it that I hadn’t before; this was something written in to being a unique cultural effect!  This literally is imagining Pokemon as Kaiju!  And for the most part, it works! While I still feel mega-lvl-power-boosts in pokemon are a huge waste, at the very least I can say Dynamax didn’t leave me with too bad a taste in my mouth.  I do hope, however, that Dynamax stays a Sword/Shield exclusive power; given it’s cultural importance in Galar, and how Mega-Evolution was in the previous generation, I think having power boosts specific to regions works better than having the same stuff used across the board for every meta onwards,

What Do I hope for the Future?

I can’t say for sure if they’ll release a sequel game for Sword/Shield, but if they do... I would want them to make these minor changes:

Hold off the Heroic plot for after the League plot; devote the main first half of the game to just the gyms and league story like was done here, and then save meeting uber-god-tier Pokémon for after you’ve claimed the title of Champion.

Having said that, fix the pacing of how the Eternatus/Darkest Day subplot feels as it’s being played out.  Offer us more insight into Rose and Oleana’s mindsets as they go about their business, and give us more coherent exposition from our field trips with Prof. Sonia. 

Fix how the Wild Area looks - give it more variations for each sub-region and offer more varieties of habitats, like in the Isle of Armor.  Or, alternatively, try to implement a seasonal mechanic to make the same areas change over the year, opening new paths and new avenues to explore!

Let Bede defeat Oleana.  Give my boy some closure.

Allow us to see and interact with the Gym Leaders outside of the gyms more.  I had, like, barely 2 lines of dialogue with Nessa, and even less for Milo.  Not asking for a whole lot, just a bit more to tie us into who they are as people.  Piers is best big brother.  <3

That’s all I had written for now.  If y’all want a biography of my champion team for my Shield Nuzlocke, let me know, and I’ll scrap a post together! <3

[recentanimenews]

Mitrasphere Beginner's Guide - Part 2

    Table of Contents:

Part 1

Starting Your Journey (0 - 1,000 CP)

Advancing the Story (1,000 - 15,000 CP)  

Part 2

Traveling to Hard Mode and Beyond (15,000+ CP)

Core Combat Mechanics

Bonus! Nekia Item Exchange

    Traveling to Hard Mode and Beyond (15,000+ CP)  

1. Clearing Hard to Unlock Expert

  Now that you’re more familiar with Mitrasphere and powering up, you might start to lay your eyes on higher-difficulty content. With that in mind, you should definitely take a look at Expert stages. These are boss fights you can find in almost every story chapter, with an emphasis on cooperating with other players and setting up a balanced team.

  Unlocking access to them simply requires you to clear the Hard stages of their chapter.

    Do not despair, for Hard Mode is actually not particularly difficult. It functions exactly like Normal Mode and can be cleared solo. However, it requires a higher and increasing amount of CP to access, starting with 15,000 CP for Chapter 1 Hard.

  2. Limit Breaking Gear

  If you have already spent quite some time farming seeds, it may feel progressively more difficult for you to gain additional CP as you’ve maxed out your gear. The initial maximum level of equipment depends on its rarity: Lvl. 20 for 1-star items, Lvl. 30 for 2-star, Lvl. 40 for 3-star, and Lvl. 50 for 4-star.

  Every item, no matter its rarity, can be limit broken 4 times to increase its maximum level by 5 per limit break, meaning 4-star items can reach a maximum level of 70. It can also be interesting to note that a fully upgraded 3-star item will reach Lvl. 60 and thus might give more stats than a standard Lvl. 50 4-star equipment. To reward you for sacrificing items, levels above the initial cap grant a higher amount of stats compared to base levels.

  There are two ways to limit break items, which mostly depend on what gear is available to you.

  The first method is to use perfect duplicates of your items (same element and rarity) to immediately limit break your item once, increasing its level cap. Using a perfect duplicate also allows you to limit break the maximum skill level of an item, up to skill level 9.

  The second method is to use duplicates with a lower rarity. Each lower tier of rarity gives a fifth of the experience needed to level the item, so consuming a 3-star equip to limit break its 4-star equivalent will grant you 20% towards its next limit break. You will earn 4% if the item is 2 tiers below and 0.8% for 3 tiers below. This allows you to slowly limit break your gear even with common drops. However, you will not be able to raise the maximum cap of your skill level using lower-rarity duplicates.

  Please note that 4-star rainbow equips do not have lower rarity equivalents, and thus rely on perfect duplicates to be limit broken. These items are however often very interesting even without any limit breaks  due to their Command and Passive Skills.

    Core Combat Mechanics

  Jumping into Expert content will give you a new perspective on the game. Also, you might get your butt kicked by a fairly angry boss. This part is all about reminding you of a few core combat mechanics that you might have forgotten, even though they are briefly presented during the initial tutorial.

  1. Moving Between Rear and Front Rows

  Every weapon displays a small triangle/arrow icon indicating if using this attack will move you to the front or back row of the arena. You do not need to already be in that position to use the attack; it will simply move you to it if you are not already there.

    The most important thing about combat lanes is related to mitigating incoming damage: any player in the rear row will take half damage from every direct damage source (everything except poison damage and similar status conditions basically).

  As Expert fights often include abilities dealing high damage to everyone in the party, staying in the rear row when such an attack is being prepared by the boss will be helpful or even necessary to survive. Remember that dead people do not deal damage, and that resurrecting dead teammates is not always possible for your Cleric.

    2. 4-Second Global Cooldown

  Every time you use a weapon skill, you cannot use another for the following four seconds, which we call a “Global Cooldown” or “GCD.” It allows for consistently-paced tactical combat, rather than a reliance on pure reflexes or button-mashing.

    Defensively speaking, it also means you are “locked” into your current lane for the next four seconds after using an attack. If you recognize that the boss is about to use a powerful move, it it may be dangerous to use an attack that will move you to the front.

    3. Elemental Advantages and Disadvantages

    Mitrasphere includes elemental advantages and disadvantages, and while you may choose to ignore them during the early stages of the game, it is something to keep in mind as it will give you an edge in tougher battles.

  Attacking an enemy with a weapon that is strong against the enemy’s element (for example, a water against fire) will apply a +30% damage multiplier. On the flip side, the opposite will apply a -30% damage multiplier, significantly reducing your damage.

  It is recommended to keep lower-rarity weapons of different elements for your main Job, even if its level and skill levels are lower, as it may still result in a damage increase against a particular monster.

  Keep in mind that this also applies to damage taken. Your equipped armor and accessories, including pieces in your support slots, will grant you elemental resistance or lower your resistance up to 30% if everything is of the same element.

  4. Buffs and Debuffs

  You will notice that every Job has weapons dealing damage and weapons applying beneficial effects (or “buffs”) to themselves or their whole party. This is another reason why having a balanced party is typically the best strategy, as more support-oriented roles like the Archer are still particularly useful, even though their damage is lower than a Swordsman or a Mage.

    It is generally more efficient to buff yourself then follow up with a devastating attack than to do two low-damage consecutive attacks. It is especially true when the Dragonkin Gauge comes into play. Activating your Dragonkin typically multiplies a weapon’s damage by three. Stacking your buffs then unleashing a Dragonkin attack will turn many problems into dust. 

  You will also notice that every buff or debuff is followed by a letter (e.g. Physical Damage Dealt UP (10%) (A)). This letter explains how this particular effect interacts with other effects.

  Effects of the same nature (e.g. Physical Damage Dealt UP) with a different letter will stack; in other words, they will both be applied for their respective duration.

  For example, applying Physical Damage Dealt UP (20%) (A) and Physical Damage Dealt UP (50%) (B) means that every attack you do while both buffs remain active will benefit from 70% extra damage.

  Effects of the same nature with an identical letter will not stack. When you apply the second, you will keep the stronger buff and refresh its duration with the second effect’s duration.

  For example, applying Physical Damage Dealt UP (50%) (7.9s) (A) then Physical Damage UP (10%) (24s) (A) means that every attack you do in the next 24 seconds will benefit from 50% extra damage. As long as the buff doesn’t expire, you just need to reapply the second buff to benefit from the stronger effect of the first

  Finally, please remember that you can check what kind of effects affect a character (be it you, an ally, or an enemy) during a fight by pressing and holding your finger over the character.

    5. Understanding Common Concepts in Boss Battles

  There are various forms of boss battles in Mitrasphere, spanning across Grand Battles, Extra Battles, Expert boss battles, and more to come. When challenging the more difficult levels of bosses, you’ll come faced with various interesting game mechanics. Most bosses have an assortment of abilities that are fun to experience when you come face to face with them for the first time, but they also have more common attacks that can be categorized into the following:

  a. Tank Busters

  “Tank Busters” in MMO terminology refer to particularly strong single-target attacks that are meant to be absorbed by the most durable character of the group, which will be the Guardian in Mitrasphere. The Guardian’s damage mitigation buffs and more defensively-oriented stats will allow them to survive these hits, while other Jobs would likely be severely hurt or killed on impact. It is paramount for the party’s Guardian to have his mitigation buffs on and retain the boss’s attention (or aggro) when this attack happens.

  b. Raid Busters

  “Raid Busters” refer to party-wide attacks that are meant to be soaked in by the entire group. These attacks target everyone in the party no matter the circumstances. They will typically deal less damage if damage reduction debuffs are applied to the boss, if the party stands in the rear row and/or applies damage mitigation buffs, or may be completely negated if you increase your evasion or reduce the boss’s accuracy to force a lucky miss.

  c. Cleaves

  “Cleaves” or “row attacks” refer to attacks dealing damage to an entire row, (\most commonly the front row. They are often as powerful as tank busters but may hit multiple players if they stand in the harm’s war when the attack lands. As they deal very high damage but are easily avoidable, it is important for non-Guardians to move to the rear row to avoid getting killed. However, contrary to tank busters, at least one person should stay in the hit lane, preferably the party’s Guardian, as the attack will always hit at least one person. If everyone is in the rear row when a cleave lands, everyone will be hit.

  d. Other Common Mechanics

  Most boss fights include a few specific mechanics that differ from the usual array of attacks presented above. Identifying them and learning how to deal with them is part of the fun of any RPG. However, below are a few mechanics that are still relatively common.

  Buffs and Debuffs: Enemies also have access to abilities increasing their power or decreasing yours. Some of these have a short duration, increasing the potency of their next move, while others can last the whole fight.

  Damage On Action: Some enemies can apply poison or other similar status conditions on one or several targets. These skills are listed as debuffs and deal damage every time you use a skill based on a percentage of your maximum health. Some weapons that players can acquire can also apply poison. While most bosses are immune to it, it can be devastating on anyone that is affected by it.

  Guts: Some enemies benefit from a specific buff called “Guts.” Guts allow them to resist lethal damage. If an attack is meant to drop their health to 0, they will instead survive with 1 health point and lose one stack of Guts, assuming they have more than one. Guts can also be applied to a player, although it is a relatively rare effect at the current juncture.

  e. Meeting Players to Tackle Boss Fights

  You cannot clear difficult boss stages by yourself even with the best equipment and mechanics in mind. At this point, you’ll need to find other like-minded players to group with. You have a few tools at your disposal for this.

  First, try joining a battle in progress.This works best for content currently being challenged by many players. To check if there is a team with an open slot fighting your desired stage, simply choose “Coop” instead of “Start” after selecting a stage. Active teams with open slots will be displayed here.

  Second, recruiting in the World Chat via the General or Recruit tab. For more efficient communication, it is recommended to state your Job and targeted content (e.g. “Cleric LFG Chapter 2 EX”) as there are many ongoing battles in the game and a balanced group is generally more efficient.

  Third, you can use the Groups feature to communicate more easily with players you want to play with regularly. Groups are persistent chat rooms that you can join or create and may also serve as a substitute for guilds. Every player may be a part of more than one Group.

  Finally, you can find fellow players on your usual social networks such as Discord. Don’t hesitate to try to set up activities yourself as many players are waiting for an open slot in a group! 

  Bonus!

1. Nekia Item Exchange

    The Nekia Item Exchange contains a lot of goodies! You can acquire items such as new weapons, avatar pieces, and even voices. There is also a healthy amount of Sea Crystals to obtain as well as 4-star rainbow accessories! Please check the Nekia Item Exchange regularly as new items may be added with the release of new content.

  You may redeem Pearls for items in the exchange, which can be found via the shiny Search spots. 

  You may also redeem Nekia Medals for items. Nekia Medals can currently be obtained by completing Achievements. Make sure to check out your Missions to see what needs to be done to obtain these. More methods for obtaining Nekia Medals will be added in the future.

  To access the Nekia Item Exchange, go to Zone -< click on the circular Search icon on the bottom middle of your screen - Item Exchange.

    That’s it for this guide! We hope you were able to gain some insights into the vast and deep world of Mitrasphere. 

  If you have questions about the gameplay or are looking for players to group up with to tackle content, hop on over to the unofficial community Discord!

By: Guest Author