JP pronouns are fun!

Rush - オレ (オレがラッシュだ！)
David - 私 (formal), 俺 (towards Rush, and others later)
Emma/Emmy - 私
Blocter - 俺
Pagus - 私
Torgal - 私
Irina - 私
Loki - 俺
Baulson - 俺
Nora - あたし
Gabriel - オレ
Violet - 私 (わたし/わたくし, depending on the context. Watakushi is spoken when seizing her items)
Rhagoh - 僕
Allan - 俺
Kate - 私
Darien - 俺
Haruko - 私
Khrynia - あたし (also refers to herself in third-person. キルネア)
Caedmon - 私
Zolean - ワシ
Jorgen - 俺
Leshau - 僕
Gaou - 俺
Wyngale - 俺
Paris - 僕
Sibal - オレ
Maddox - 私
Glenys - 私
Sheryl - 私
Jager - 俺
Ghor - ワシ/わし
Roberto - 拙者
Yuniver - 俺
Leucetius - 僕


Snievan - 私
Zuido - ズイドウ (third person)/俺/オレ(used during his quest)
Hinnah　-　俺
Hannah - 私
Milton - ワシ
Young - 俺様/オレ
Ludope - 俺


Lukorra - おいら
Vinnery - 私, probably
Neo - 俺


Tornado Lotion Lv1 - ~4000 (3600 against Observer)

HOLY CRAP I CAN STYLE CHANGE WHILE A NINJA.

HOLY CRAP DAVE IS AWESOME FOR HITTING 170K WITH BLUE RAIN.

Takes until BR37 on Ransatsu to get Fornstrand to start at equal Morale...
Kate and Rhagoh can definitely be done at lower than BR50, easily, but the normal encounters in the lower area start at low army morale. Got the best reward possible in "Love Will Rise Again" because I just blitzed the bosses when the finally showed up. Balterossa then Royotia, 3 and 5 turns.

The Assistant: materials needed are far less than the 360 counterpart, and the numbers needed are correctly displayed in JP.

Xenophobia/Hoarfrost is physical, not mystic, according to the JP text. A lot of things seem to be translated wrong...

Vinnery's on the Mystic route despite having no mystic arts. Looks like just sticking them in a certain union will do that to them. Using mostly combat arts when you're supposed to be a mage is pretty bad, as it'll result in having a mage with a combat focus. Guess the guide was right about using commands to shift focus. If they've already asked twice, chances are, they're already set. Unless you immediately go out and act against your own orders...

Spawn tables...

Well... Got the Pale Leafhopper, that only appears when you get close enough, to spawn. But it spawned with conditions that aren't seen on the wikia. Now I'm seeing tons of Spiritlords and Dragons, with a Spiritlord/Oversoul in the Searing Cove. No rares on this map... Terrapests aren't visible when you first zone in. I think I killed about 18 of them by now, which is needed for the Ring of the Labyrinth guild. Still needs a while before that one opens up. Will probably end up opening the one in Elysion first since I don't want to finish Glenys' quest just yet. Just have enough generics for a full 18-member team. Going to give the uniques their weapons then leave them on the bench until they reach their "max" stats, then get them trained for the battles. I think I'm going to need more room on the bench. Then there's arts training, which I can't do if Sheryl's in the party... Well, I can hack her in for that purpose, then remove her when it's time to finish her quests.

Speaking of generics... I noticed that a bunch of the katana-wielders are very fond of asking for Tataraichi customizations, and that they don't stop at the balance stage. They go all the way, but only if you steer them into that direction. One of them is going for the Parrying Tataraichi and she's capable of using Mystic Arts. Probably because I've been using her as a melee unit instead of her Remedies. I'm only grabbing a ton of generics right as placeholders until I can started on recording their WAs and other specials. One thing I won't do is set it to Yakety Sax. Maybe.

Gaou says something like ”は、俺か?” when claiming an item... Leshau says a lot when he gains stats or a skill. Baulson has a really long status quote. Gabriel needs to shut up at times. Yeah, I haven't exactly used these guys before. Never really had to. Loki: やった！やったぞ！ when claiming an item. Maybe I'll compile a list at some point...?

And there's a type of compensation EXP thingy going on... I gave Rush a bunch of skills at Lv. 1, then checked on the trainer to see what had happened by the time we reach the Gates of Hell. Turns out he gets 25EXP to EVERY skill he has available to him, as long as it's set to Lv.1 or higher. That amounts to every Rank C Item Art to reach Lv. 2, and for Lotions to obtain Clearance Lotion. What I didn't get though is why he got Medical Heal. Not complaining, but it's kinda weird since he never sparked it in the first place.

*insert expletive* YOU.

The Fallen killed the team at the end of Turn 5. Rain of Blades, physical. Massive "ow" on the remaining 2 unions, which one was half-dead anyways. Also, way to steal the most painful move from Saruin. Next attempt was with several weapon upgrades later... And just decided to suicide the team at Turn 9, because seriously? They're not going to survive ANYTHING that's coming at them. So I just used a trainer to OHKO the Remnant. Didn't really hang around the Ancient Ruins since my patience with the Items Only team was wearing thin. Since I can just use the trainer to expand just how many people I have in the reserves, I can take on those challenges pretty much at any point. It just means that I have to grind in the Ancient Ruins because I'm doing my Girls-only battles. A funny thing that happened during the final battle was Reversal! playing way too early. Rank 5 since I didn't complete enough quests, and I didn't want the fight to drag on too long. Actually, I think they would have outright died at the Rank 8 fight. Healing capabilities are way too low to counter anything the Conqueror could throw at them. He summoned the Lob Omen, which was quite a pain. Kept using Mystic Mine to kill off unions. I have no idea why it went from Nisus straight to Reversal! even though it took about 10 extra turns to kill him off. His portrait wasn't even flashing red. Doesn't matter, started my new run and have the saves there in case I want to investigate it.


By the way, I'm still laughing at how they translated トールハンマー as Hammer Toll. I think that the [Thunder]+5 effect would have been a pretty big clue to have it translated as THOR Hammer instead. I think they're pronounced the same in JP, hence the confusion and misnaming. Drill/Mr. Diggs sounds like a pigeon...?


010B3030 02 -> 03. Fixes Mystic Focus "bug." Need hex editor for this. HP and MP values are fine for the PC version since there aren't any real caps to speak of.

Time: 2:07'08"77
1776935
+4: 157
+5: 29
+6: 57
+7: 8
+8: 3
x2: 270
x3: 86
x4: 30
x5: 12
x6: 1
My best score in Panel de Pon so far... I suck at this game. And managed to get a +12 right afterwards, but then screwed up so I ended up losing.

How frustrating.

Oh blazing hell... The multipliers for the 360 version are all over the place. Some of them have +8% and others have +10% at *weapon*+1. That just throws a wrench in almost everything. Bluesteel is definitely following the same route as the PC... As is the Wand/ハードロック. A bunch of others have the +10% route. Unfortunately, there's just not enough info to make a concrete conclusion on the matter. Not even the guides go into it in any sort of depth. What makes it even more frustrating is that getting those upgrades just takes too long. You need to whack something 250~300 times PER upgrade. That's normal attacks, not skills.

Also, the flattest "What" I can muster: Ninja Theory, the guys behind Heavenly Sword, are apparently working on DMC5. Uh... from what I remember, they didn't have a jump button in Heavenly Sword, and the combat was rather slow and clunky when compared to DMC4. And DMC4 was flawed to hell and back. The first one is still, and probably forever will be, my favourite. DMC2 is OK if you just look at it as an action game and not a DMC game. DMC3 was rather... I don't even know. It was good, but completely unbalanced. It's supposed to be hard, but it should be logical and gradual, not "I really want to throw my controller at the TV" hard by the time you get to the 3rd mission. Anyways, that's the newest rumour that's gotten many people a little be unsettled. And I believe that could be an understatement.

That's all for now. I did play something while eating dinner, but it's really nothing to write about. Just playing someone else's file for the hell of it. And wondering about the lack of quests finished. At least I know that Baulson is still up for hire, seeing as his quest is still open despite passing the Nest of Eagles.

Solved.

Normal/Remnant equips: +7%/+10%/+13%/+15%/+18%/+20%/+23%/+25%/+30%.
Ancient/Auld/Antique: +5%/+8%/+10%/+13%/+15%/+18%/+20%/+23%/+25%.


Why they're different, I don't know. But at least that's done. Should have been done a long time ago. I guess it makes a little sense for the rarer weapons to not strengthen as much, seeing as how you wouldn't want to use them in the first place. Most of them have sub-par stats. Anyways, those are the PC values, obtained using a trainer to change the weapon modifiers. Used 2-3 samples for the 2 categories, so I'm fairly certain that I have the right values there. It's important to note that the game TRUNCATES the final value, not round. Many games do this, so I'm not too surprised about it. It's also easier to just chop off numbers to the right of the decimal point than to round up or down depending on what rules you impose on the system. It'll probably take too long for someone to find all the 360 modifiers, unless someone is willing to go through the trouble of using 2 Remnants, at least 2 normals and a few Antique types. I'd be more than willing to during the summer... if I had a 360 to use. But alas, I don't. Nor am I willing to buy one just for the sake of testing this.


Anyways... Got absolutely nowhere in the past sessions of play~ Not even the Eldritch Dragon is falling to my army. So all I've been doing so far is just arts training on Bai Ze. Really don't think that my army's going to get anywhere if I tried to grind using the Wisdom's Echo exploit. The next best places would be the Second and Sixth Paths in Siebenbur, but even that has its limits. The absolute best would be the Ancient Ruins, but I can't access that until I kill The Fallen. I could stick the item into my inventory, but I actually want to beat it and have Wyngale ready for hire. The one thing that I'm having trouble with is Faye's lack of willingness to change wield styles mid-battle. I have all of her One-handed arts open, at Peerless, yet she refuses to use them by sticking with Mighty Triple Axel II. Weird.

EDIT: I KNEW IT. The 360 modifiers are different. For one, the +3 modifier is 15%, not the 13% that's found in the PC version. I think the +1 modifier is a little higher at 10%. This needs further testing... Might have to ask a friend about it.

EDITx2: Finished over at my Wikia profile. Now gathering the numbers/EXP required for each level.

I need a new SaGa game to play.

Six Bases and Koenigsdorf are done! None of them were that much of a problem at BR39~45. I think there's no way around gaining almost 1BR per base. I think I gained 2BR during a quest, but I don't remember which one it was. Well, either way, I haven't been upgrading their equipment, but decided to give Faye the Shielding Hawkwind and Might Splitter. It turns out that the generics don't ask about their equipment focuses, so I really don't know how the game decides what route they take. Maybe it's through their actions? I know that the JP guide has a little chart explaining that if you give them a certain focus but act against it, then they would start moving towards that focus instead. Like this: You tell them Mystic, but spend time either A) being an idiot by acting in Balance, B) focusing on hammering them with Combat Arts/weapons or C) actually doing what you're told. For ~10 battles. That's apparently all it takes for the focus switch to take place. So A) would lead to a more balanced Mystic type (could be bad), B) would just confuse them into becoming a Combat-based unit (REALLY bad), while C) is probably the intended path (self-explanatory). Now, that's only the 1st talk. The second talk can even further complicate things, but that's the idea. Not sure how badly it affects the PC version though. I'm pretty sure that a lot of the Common/Generic Leaders alter their focus depending on what they do, which isn't all that hard since they never seem to ask. It's just damn near impossible to alter it easily. Faye going Mystic when she has no MAs to speak of? Yeah, that'll go over well. She'll still be dual-wielding though. Of course, this can be bypassed if the unions are organized properly.

Actually, I've also made it past the Darken Forest events. Yay for seeing many of my units fall victim to the Enthralled status. Funny enough, they managed to kill a few of my unions. Not so fun, especially knowing that one of them could quite possibly use an AoE attack. Singleton's Snowfall immediately comes to mind. Now, the next order of business is to beat The Fallen. I really don't think I'll be able to kill it within 10 turns. I lasted 6 turns, but didn't get anywhere near the damage I needed to deal by then. I was short by at least 200K. It also kept blocking a good deal of Item Arts directed against it. It also killed Wyngale pretty early in the fight (2 turns, it's a record!). BR50, as a note. It's possible to kill much earlier, but we're talking about a bunch of ragtag soldiers here. With no MAs to speak of. Quite literally the bulk of the damage being dealt is from bombs, traps and weird mystic combinations of items. And all of them can be blocked quite easily at BR50. For the time being, I guess I can beat the everlasting crap out of Bai Ze for arts training. Doubt that I'll get anywhere fast with stats until the Frosthold FortressAncient Ruins open up, which requires me to beat the Fallen in the first place. I completely forgot about Duke Ghor's quest, but I don't really care at this point. With a trainer, I can change the BR accordingly with a new file to take on simultaneous runs.


So I also decided to visit the 360 boards... And what's this about hitting themselves with Arcana? Sounds rather amusing, and even more reason for me to try the 360 version. I want to see all those glitches and bugs with my own eyes! I already knew about fussy Torgal, but I didn't know that it was that bad. The Leraje Princeps bug was already pretty bad in my book (stops him from upgrading for a VERY long time or until you give him something better), but being stuck with both the Halphas and Gremory Dominus customizations when you tell him to go all Combat? That's really bad. Hawkarang hits for considerably more damage than Cerulean Rain due to their damage modifiers. And going by the 360 weapon stats, there's really no reason to not go for the Halphas Dominus. Overall, the stats are better. Doesn't really matter as much on the PC, since you'd be focusing on the WA more, which still leads to the Halphas Dominus. The only reason you'd go for the Gremory Dominus is to get Cerulean Rain and because of the higher MYS stat. But knowing Torgal, going mystic isn't the best choice. It feels kinda sad that the 360 board is more active than the PC board.

Also decided to grab a little something off the net, but much to my surprise, there was really nothing there. I couldn't even find any of the game's internal data. There was an empty folder for audio and the video. No textures, no voice clips, nothing. Must be the way they organized the data because the PC discs are vastly different. To the point that the disc sizes are insanely different. Maybe there's something on the 2nd disc. I want to see if I can replace the critical files from the PC version with the 360 ones. It's too much of a pain to try altering the PC files to emulate what the 360 is like. Not to mention they changed the scaling so that it doesn't hit you as hard. Unless you're playing Hard Mode.

Note: Celeron D 356 (3.33GHz), LGA775, 9400GT 512MB, 512MB RAM.

Exam period and requests.

So, I basically said "Screw it" and played some LasuRemu. Sad thing is, I wasn't even playing my saves. I helped someone get past the Nest of Eagles at BR40. I was never that high in any of my runs, but I always had better stats and better weapons. It was a little jarring to say the least when I loaded it up just to see a bunch of underleveled units. Stats and Abilities. It almost made me want to say "Just restart." Still, got through it just fine. Purposely tried to abuse David's Gae Bolg spam, but that didn't really work out at all. He only used it when the battle was almost over, and only managed to kill off Roeas and the remaining mooks. Castenea did not prove to be a problem at all, which was a plus. At least the person requesting help finally said thanks. Three days later. Anyways, I did another person's request, which was to get past the Nest of Eagles from the beginning of the game. Was supposed to be a reconstruction of the person's file, but he didn't give me anything to go on, so I played the way I would normally play if I were just starting out. Which leads me to this: WHY THE HELL IS DAVID'S UNION ALWAYS DYING?! HIS UNION ISN'T EVEN LACKING IN HP! IT'S LIKE HE HAS THIS INTRINSIC FACTOR THAT BASICALLY SAYS "HIT ME DAMN IT." *sigh* Final stats? Rush has Swift Devil's Due V. He's a freakin' powerhouse with that, along with decent Mystic Arts and Item Arts. He's really lacking in Remedies this time around, but only because I wasn't bothering with too much training. Managed to get enough people that can revive other unions. Stuck Emmy and Dave in the same union since Dave can revive while Emmy can do massive healing. I've already upgraded their weapons almost as far as I can get them, so this guy is going to be fairly well off. Only problem is? I didn't minimize BR. Then again, this is Normal mode we're talking about, and I've already minimized it in terms of how many necessary encounters while gathering materials. Well, I think it was worth the effort. The user said thanks the day I posted the save, so it's all good. I can't believe that I managed to almost perfectly mimic the guy's progress. Maybe even better than his original too with BR and equipment. Turns out the guy was gathering all the unique leaders, so that was an interesting point he made. Playing at x3.0 speed was pretty interesting too.



OK, I lied. I did play my own file. Got past the half-way point. Also did a little number crunching. Turns out that the +9 modifier gives a 30% truncated boost to equipment. That's a sizable stat boost... Still not enough to save the Nightbloom's horrific DEF and MDEF values, but it's not like I'm using Rush as a tank in the first place. It took forever for Faye to take the Shielding Hawkwind and Might Splitter, and even longer before she decided to request the Black Belt. The Base fights are up next, and everyone's getting their equips upgraded now. I'm still not actively looking for their components. Interesting thing: Faye didn't ask about her equipment focus. She's gone Combat, but with the Shielding Hawkwind in her main hand. It technically should be the Might Splitter, but it doesn't really matter. I doubt that the [Combat Arts]+5 would stack between the 2 weapons. So now she's just training up the One-Handed wield style for Hawkarang, which I should have been doing from the start. Now she's pretty far behind, but managed to get Triple Axel. I probably should start abusing Bai Ze soon for training all of their combat arts. Hired 2 soldiers with Remedies and a wield style learned, in case I really need someone to take care of some healing.

I should just hurry along with the file. Want to really start the unique run already... But I also want to make sure that I start gathering some data about the soldiers' weapons too. Their upgrade paths are somewhat different from the 360 version, and can result in a weapon capable of a weapon art. That's my reasoning to deal with the it. Sure, no one uses them, but it only helps with fleshing out the wiki. Already got that upgrading Faye's Combat Tomahawk to the Baalukian requires Iron Orex3, Spider Silkx1 and Natural Oilx1.

Go multimedia here with my fandoms?

I wonder if I should just include other fandom stuff here. You know, manga and anime instead of just limiting it to games? I find myself watching and reading it a lot more lately, simply because I haven't had much access to my games by my own volition, even though I'm using my monitor at the moment. Just that the computer's not on. I still need to figure out a better way to record from my consoles. That TV tuner card isn't going to cut it and it's an ATI card. I have an nVidia card, so go figure. I just don't feel like clogging up my LJ with that kind of stuff anymore since I tend to write about RL things and use it to watch any fandom related things. Which reminds me, I need to join the Kuroshitsuji communities. And find something for the costume already. I now know that Sebastian's vest is purple according to the manga's character guide. So that's what I'll go with.



And I'm still helping out on the boards. Maybe I shouldn't help out while doing my papers? I'm almost finished my part, but I still need to write up another 2-5 pages for the other. Still, the question I'm answering isn't too bad. It definitely reminds me of when I started the game. I had, and probably still do, have a rather strong dislike of using Item Arts. It'll probably change once I get full access to Shards. I've never used Shards extensively before, so maybe my opinion will change then.Still, no LasuRemu for me until after some of the exams blow over.

Played a little FFXIII before heading to bed because I just wasn't feeling tired at all. The fact that I woke up at 11.30 is a moot point because that's what I always do on Sundays. Grinded some more, pretty much finished Hope, Lightning and Fang's primary roles. I think I'm almost done with the other 3, so just starting on their secondaries. Kept a save before heading into Chapter 12, in case I need to deal with more grinding. I'm only grinding because I can't read JP that quickly, so that slows down my command entry by quite a bit. Not to mention that the JP and EN names are different, so it's somewhat easy to mix up at times, or trying to find the command, but it's not there. It's going a bit smoother now, although I can't seem to remember how I beat the Ochu and Pikochus.

One funny thing... I've managed to get one person to like Hope a lot more! He was annoying at the beginning because of all of his whining, but when you look at things from his perspective, it becomes a little more understandable. But from a gameplay perspective, he's awesome, if you can stand the fact that he's THE most fragile mage. Ever. Good thing he can buff himself before letting loose a whole lot of pain. Got him started on the Jammer role so that he can help out with debuffing the enemy. While Fang does a good job, her best role is Attacker and her magic stat is easily one of the worst. Yeah, my team includes the 2 extremes and the most balanced character. Go me.

Also, I'm still a little annoyed that the 480i/480p output is so bad. I remember hooking it up to the (really old) bigger TV, and it looked horrible compared to my small monitor. I could hardly see the text! So I'm refraining from using that TV to play games. It probably needs to be replaced at some point. There's a few caption boxes burned into it... Two lines worth. It's really bad.

Busy...

Hm. It's been 10 days since I last typed up something here. Then again, I have good reason for not having much to say. You know, uni life, assignments and other miscellaneous things. Instead, I've been helping out at the Last Remnant boards more than I would really like to. Then again, I've kinda done that on the Tales of Rebirth PSP board too. It's now largely abandoned because they've moved on. That, and Namdai has no intention of localizing the title even though it's another chance for them to release the damn game! Passed over in favour of Tales of Legendia, not that Legendia's a bad game. It's just a bad Tales of entry, that's all. Been hanging around the SaGa boards instead, so...


ANYWAYS. Helping other gamers. I'm surprised I haven't snarked any of them yet. I guess it's mostly because they're all newbies to the game, so it's probably better not to get too sarcastic with them. Unless they ask a dumb question, then they were asking for it. There's still the occasion when someone asks if their computer/laptop can handle running the game. My patience for such questions is wearing quite thin now, since the demo's quite readily available for download and testing. DAMN IT YOU GUYS, SEARCH THE NET FOR IT AND TRY IT OUT. Or look up the recommended specs. *ahem* Also,I can't believe that I replied to a post saying that I was a girl. He seemed a little surprised, although it's understandable. After all, there are no girls on the net and the fact that my handle is rather ambiguous. There's really no need to be a GIRL anyways. Well, it also doesn't help knowing that people can never guess whether or not I'm a girl based solely on my typing patterns and interests. Until I bring up my preferred ships. I don't engage in shipping wars, so...



Found the Kuroshitsuji costume online... It's going to cost a bit just to get the top. I have enough black pants to last quite a while, so I just really need the vest/waistcoat, shirt (because that collar is weird...) and the tailcoat. I can't believe that I'm agreeing to dress up as a butler! Oh and gloves. I don't have white gloves. Still... it means that I get to act like a total jerk while smiling~

*yawn*

... Someone's asking about how to deal with the E7 battle. Stated BR, but didn't say if he was playing on Normal or Hard. That bit might actually be critical here. And he focused on getting rid of Snievan first? That's a first for me... Practically everyone I watched so far tries to off Milton first so that they can do Morale control with Snievan. Much easier to deal with since it's easier to heal after getting capped in the face or hit with Curse since he's not likely to Instakill an entire union twice. Eh, whatever. Looks like their question was answered.

Hm. I just haven't played anything lately mostly because of the impending assignments that need to be dealt with right now. Two 10-page papers isn't that fun to look at. Sure, they'll be double-spaced, but still. Then again, I actually had fun writing my 10-page report on polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). It was a fascinating topic. These ones? Not so much. And I just haven't felt like playing anything lately. I still haven't bothered ordering End of Eternity, been busy fangirling over Baccano! and Durarara!!, with interest in Vamp! and Etsusa Bridge being tickled a little bit. Too bad light novels are such a pain to translate that there are hardly any licenses over here. Good thing that the fans are pretty dedicated. Besides, I want to see batshit insane Japan (Etsusa Bridge) since batshit insane America has been done and is still going (oh silly Claire, and Baccano!).


I seriously need to start drawing something now. Add another character that OnoD voices, and now I really want to do a costume switch. Let's see: Snow, Sigma, Shizuo, David. Funny... the oldest is Shizuo at about 23~24 and arguably the skinniest, youngest is Sigma at 17. Three of them are blond. The other... I have no idea what colour that is. Wait. I forgot the demon butler. And I'm listening to him singing.




BACON LETTUCE

Various notes on the leaders...

Redone here.

Bored, should really be asleep right now.

Hm... kinda tempted to hire Faye. Dual wields axes, can have Hawkrang if she masters the One-handed style. Black belt can help with upping damage even more ([Dual Wield]+5 and [Axes]+5). Is a generic. And she can heal with items (Herbs and Lotions). Doesn't cost too much to hire, and she can come fairly early. Too bad she's in Celapaleis, somewhere that I don't visit that often unless I'm restocking on supplies and checking up on Rhagoh for his quests. Still, she's a candidate for another run. Maybe I'll hold off from doing the UL run until I can get the mic working properly without sounding like a complete idiot. I'll still probably record a bunch of random things though. Hopefully I can optimize the run even further since I want to beat everything at the lowest BR possible. Lots of Bai Ze then,huh? Good thing she has decent starting morale, at 67. Compare that to Rush... who starts at 45. Pretty high for a generic... I'm really curious about her upgrade paths though. Would she be willing to request the Shielding Hawkwind if I tell her to down the Combat focus? She needs to be in the Combat focus in order to take the belts, that's for sure. Having the Shielding Hawkwind and Might Splitter could be quite beneficial for her damage output seeing as how the Hawkwind customization has much better stats, and the Might Splitter imparts [Combat Arts]+5. Combine that with the Black Belt, and that's quite a few bonuses right there. Of course, it doesn't apply to actually using Hawkrang since it's a One-handed WEAPON Art, not Combat Art. Still, having the Peerless modifier on Dual-wield arts is great. Too bad she'll be pretty slow because of it, using Power modifiers and all.

Who else to consider... I always hire McGrady. Maybe I'll give him a Glaive this time so he'll get the Heaven's Door WA. Making him go Mystic will help amp up his Remedies. Problem with all the Generics is that none of them will have the "Special" attribute. So... it's going to be like the soldier run, only that they'll actively say stuff to you and can somewhat mold them to your liking. ... I also have no idea who has Hexes or Psionics. Eh... whatever. If I can deal with my current run with no Hexes, then I can deal with it using generic leaders! It would help though... although I think I'll be speed running the thing because I'd like to start hearing my party's voices. I'm really starting to miss Rush shouting all sorts of things while Emma's scolding him or being sarcastic about his performance on the field. "Hey1 Look at what I've got!" - Rush, when he sparked Life Powder during the Niram Sin/Namul Sin. "It's about time..." - Emma. And I wasn't really that low on health either... Actually, I just really miss Dave's voice.


So I guess it's decided. Next run will be using generic leaders, and the one after that will be using Unique Leaders. Hopefully I can get some... interesting lines out of them~ And stuffing all those Sovani into a union just to see how they react to one another.



Going through the 聖剣伝説４ OST... Tracks: Burning Spirits (Itou/Sekito), Reminiscence (Itou), Shadow of Vine (Sekito), Goblin's Beat (Itou), Red Wyvern (Sekito), Seeking the Light (Itou), Rondo of Sand (Itou), The Fool's Dance (Itou), Roar of the Iron Clump (Itou), The Final Decisive Battle (Itou), The Child of the Sprite Tribe (Soken), Don't Hunt the Fairy (Soken), The Darkness Nova (Soken), Irwin on Reflection (Soken). Disc 4 stuff, only the SK4 edits.

The OST really sounds like it was composed right after completing the ミンサガ OST. Lots of similarities, mostly because it's the same 2 composers involved in it, so it's really not that much of a surprise. Still, it sounds very SaGa like, not very Mana like... Maybe because the Mana music I usually listen to is from 下村陽子, and she did Legend of Mana, the only Mana game I've played to completion. With a partner because it wasn't my idea to play it.

Netbooks aren't meant for gaming!

Can I punch the idiot who's asking if LasuRemu will work on his netbook? Seriously... Speaking of which, I just got a netbook myself so I can type up my notes during class instead of writing them out. Kinda need to since my papers are getting a little on the messy side. Anyways... the requirements for LasuRemu aren't that demanding if you're just planning on running the game. If you want it to run very smoothly, then you'd need a lot more than the listed recommended specs. I have this feeling that I'm bottlenecking the GPU somehow, so I may need to look into that at some point. The resolution isn't really bothering me, so I'm good for now. Kinda pissed that Windows 7 Starter doesn't let me set my wallpaper, so currently stuck with this blank looking background. Bleh. A netbook just isn't strong enough to run the game anyways, so stop asking. By the way, it'll run on Windows 7. Or if you're crazy enough, just run it using the XP compatibility mode.


Progressed pretty quickly to the Aqueducts... Maybe a little too quickly? I haven't had the time to go looking for materials for those little soldiers. And... because of that, they're a little behind in their equipment. Well, not that it really matters because they're growing past their max (360) stats anyways. Still, they're taking a lot more damage than I had anticipated. Still, not that it really matters since all of them are quite capable to reviving, as long as I remember to let them revive. What I should do is never touch the "make the art unavailable" button and see what happens in my next run. But... that might screw over my Unique Leader run that I've been looking forward to doing all this time. Not to mention the recording at 1080p! I'm thinking about redoing the playthrough anyways, since the one that I recently did was really for testing purposes for the computer. Needless to say, it passed with flying colours. Still, recording at 1080p for the entire run is out of the question. Hard mode with the soldiers it is then! With no farming for components, and no need to show the grinding since that aspect of the game is boring to watch. And I'll throw in what the unique leaders are up to in the meantime.

So yeah... progressing quite well. Just cleaning up the side quests at the moment. Did all the ones concerning The Seven, so now I don't have to worry about recruiting them. Not that I'm going to end up using them anyways. They'll be needed for the Dragontail III formation, which grants a nice 200% ATK rating, for the next run, but it'd still be a while before they can even be used. The only ones that could be considered useful are Hinnah/Hannah (Shards, Twin Snowpetal), Ludope (Galaxy [Omni attribute, rarely seen], Arcana) and Milton (Wards, 10AP buff skill, and the fact that I don't have many people with Power Grip). Good thing I also have Cheat Engine installed to use the speed hack while traversing The Great Sand Sea, aka "the really, really, unnecessarily big obligatory desert stage."

I find the Grandhammer a rather amusing weapon to look at. It looks even too big for a yama to use properly~ Still, it's not a very good weapon considering the new PC stats. It's geared towards mystic users, but the ones that come with the weapon? Item users. Utterly useless for them, since their focus would be towards their item arts, or smacking the enemy with combat arts, which would favour higher ATK stats. Hm. Too bad it doesn't have an upgrade path that would lead to a better weapon path... Eh, whatever. They're mostly support units anyways. Good thing for my current run, I don't need certain skills to boost INT because it's absolutely pointless. Oh, and I'm definitely going to be struggling against a certain set of bosses. There's hardly any morale control since I'll only have access to the Traps users' Retreat/Rousing Flare and/or Pandora's Box, and there are only 3 of them. So much for morale... Might as well go all out with increasing my BR. At least the scaling isn't as bad as the 360 version... Or is it? It seems that the PC version monsters still hit a hell of a lot harder than the 360 version, and still longer to take down.

Of hockey and Sovanis...

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.

Torgal's upgrade paths are pissing me off. They go from Power to Speed to Power then back to Speed, and that affects the modifiers on his arts. But if I give him the weapons, then he'd lose all the equipment EXP he would have gained thus far. Pretty sure there are others, but he's the only one I've looked at somewhat thoroughly. I've already decided to let him go the Combat route, along with Caedmon. Wyngale and Leucetius... Still not too sure. Probably both will go Mystic. Still just poking at the characters. I actually haven't started the run yet since I'm kinda just focusing on the no MA run. Started it, but I've only made it to Dillmoor, and currently camped there, experimenting with the trainer. I'm going to transfer the stats over when I actually start the run. Until then, they can stand around while the soldiers have vastly superior stats and inferior weapons.

Speaking of which... I'm still looking for a way to change the modifers on the end-stage Bluesteel customizations. I'm not sure how big the difference is between Mighty and Godly, but effects they have are tempting (Physical/Mystic Resist +5). Just don't want to train the arts that have been modified for speed suddenly changed towards power. Maybe I'll figure it out.

Also noticed that the game engine is incredibly stupid. You can trip flags, then roll back your BR, and the effects remain. What am I referring to? Recruiting the soldiers. By setting your BR to something ridiculously high, you can reveal all the soldiers that only appear based on BR (but the tiers are based on story progression). Then when you set it to 1, then disappear... but if you set it to a minimum BR, whatever effects that occurred from BR255 stay. So, by changing the BR each time before talking to the recruitment officer, you can force them to reach max stats AND have them reach maxed out arts! Too bad their weapons remain the same. Unfortunately, it also screws up their class if you were aiming for something. This is especially true for Herbs and Lotions users, because the Guardian/Scout/Hunter classes are all Rank 5 and have some shared requirements. The Scout class is especially annoying because the requirements are Rank 4, but it's a Rank 5 class. So, in other words, if you want Guardian, you HAVE to achieve combat significance, or not use items at all until reaching STR47. So then... what's the point of having IA if you're not going to use them?!

Then there's the formations I want to use for the unique leader run. Blizzard, Rattail, Whirlpool, Raiders' Fork, Pendulum, Hawk-Eye (only 4 units!), Batwings, Mystic Seal, Obelisk (?), and maybe Comet (if they can actually take damage).

Soldier formations? Uh... Let's not talk about that. There are hardly any formations they can use past the base. Still, since I probably won't be playing for a while, I can keep poking at formations a bit since I have no access to MAs.


Just making a note.
save01 - Fiery Gates.
save02 - White Conqueror.
save03 - Dead Heart, before using the Tablet.
save04 - Enlightened Seven.
save08 - Idols fight.
save09 - Demigod.
Archived: 22.Feb.10

Actually, there's another reason why I'm screaming. It's tied to my country and the Olympics. Go figure.

Mostly done...

So uh... I killed The White Conqueror without any problems at BR84. I don't think that was supposed to happen! Also got rid of the Demigod while I was at it. Recorded them too, so that was a plus, although it was with JP text. I think I accidentally killed The Lost Remnant without recording it, so that fight is currently missing. Unless I did record it... The one fight's that really pissing me off is the Idols fight. I actually managed to beat them... with 3 unions down. But I haven't been able to reproduce the fight. If I don't flank them, my team's screwed because of the end-of-turn attacks that really, really hurt. Especially from the Charged Idol and Divine Idol. They just don't have good enough defense to deal with all the damage, even while in the Mystic Henge formation, which boosts M.DEF by about 13% in its most basic form.

Oh, can't forget the Jhana Royals. That was a fun fight. Everyone survived and there wasn't much of a struggle against the giant piece of armor, Ala Melvilana Fusion. I still find it funny that they use Hermien's voice clips during the fight. Guess they can't really do too much about it since it's a DLC boss. Still, I wonder how the fight would go on the 360... Seeing as how everything just hits a lot harder on the PC. I watched MasterLL's version of the fight, and was amazed at how little damage Assault Frost did. Only about 600 or so. Normal mode at about BR21? I'd suffer almost 2000. Hard Mode? Uh... Practically kills the union (about 4000~6000, depending on units hit and if there's a critical). Uh. Yeah.


Started a new run with unique leaders. I'm just goofing around with the trainer at the moment, since I still need to do the Rank 8 fight with those soldiers. I really think it's going to be near impossible once the Valeria Heart pops up. It's physical damage, and I don't have anything to protect against that, unless you count using the Shield Potion. Yeah. It's really not going to help. Crimson Flare and Fatal Eclipse are going to kill as well since they have the Omni modifier. There count be a chance for them to dodge those... but only if they're Mysticknights. At least they seem to be dodging and countering a lot more lately. Kinda weird. The Ancient Ruins isn't giving me as many stat ups as I'd like. Not to mention that there aren't that many enemies to deal with in the first place. How the hell did I manage to get Rush's Intellect to 255 anyways?! I don't think too many of the soldiers are anywhere near 200 for either Strength or Intellect. Speed and their Unique don't matter too much, and trying to get their arts to the Peerless/Swift modifiers. Still taking too long, and they're bound to kill Bai Ze in fewer than 30 turns. I don't have enough units to lower Morale without dealing way too much damage. Maybe I should bring in those Rogue Athlum Soldiers? They all have WAs to use if I can get their weapon and wield stats high enough... Anyways, was just checking to see what types of weapons they would take along their upgrade line. What I WILL do for the run is to change the BR to force them to ask about their focus (and re-focus) and their new arts. Oh, and change their class to their legitimate end-game classes. It means that I'll be at a slight disadvantage because they'll be stuck in the first rank of said class until they reach the requirements for the next rank up. Which WILL take a while since most of them are Rank 5 or higher. Rank 7 in Rush's case. I'll give Emmy the Legendary Ninja class as well since I'm not exactly keen on giving her the Nightbloom. Maybe. I'm going to have 2 other simultaneous runs. One is a fresh run. The other is a No Mystic Arts run. Yes, absolutely no MA. Morale control is going to come solely from items (Pandora's Box, Retreat/Rousing Flare) and flanking. All soldiers that are going to be hired will be using either IA or only WA. Going to choose the soldiers that have One-handed and Power Grip options. That'll help with variety of moves used. Again, I'll only be recording special fights (events too for the 1080p Unique-乱殺 run).

Last Remnant references...

So, I got bored and started looking up all the Remnants, then weapons, and some of the skills. Well, what do you know, lots of callbacks to the SaGa series, which really shouldn't come to a surprise. Considering the Executive Producer, the fact that its working title was "SaGa Frontier 3" and plays like a successor to the Romancing SaGa trilogy? Well... It's just missing the Minstrel to spin the tales~ It's very much a work-in-progress, and I'll probably never finish it, but this is what I have so far. Mind you, I've only played RS1/MS and SaGa2/SaGa2GOD extensively, so any mumbling would really be limited to those 2. The others... I'll get through someday. *looks at computer and emulators because systems are really old*

ONWARDS!

Remnants

アンバーマリーチ/Umbermarici - Celapaleis' Remnant. Appeared in SF2 and MS as an accessory, more specifically as a necklace in MinSaGa (Amber Maleate).

ヴァレリアハート/Valeria Heart - Athlum's Remnant. Appeared in SF as a sword, but was spelled "Valleria Heart." Interestingly, the flame attribute carried over to the Conqueror's version.

オブシディアン/Obsidian - RS1/MS. The Obsidian Sword, one of the Destiny Stones used to seal Saruin. Funny enough, you find the Obsidian Sword in the Frosthold Fortress, which I mistook the Ancient Ruins for. Must be the ice-like walls...

エメス・タグ/Emeth Tag - Royotia's. SF. An accessory.

グゥエイン/Gwayn - Nagapur's. RS3. Was also a dragon.

ゲイ・ボルグ/Gae Bolg - Another of Athlum's. RS2, where it appeared properly as a POLEARM.

月下美人/Nightbloom - RS3, SF. Found as a katana, much like here, but was named "Silvermoon" in SF. This one's an interesting one as well... The JP name is a name for the "Dutchman's Pipe," which is an actual flower. It's sometimes also called the Nightblooming Cereus.

ケレンドロウス/Kellendros - MS. Was a polearm, spelled Khellendros, and channels Aerology (wind magic).

氷の剣/Frostsword - RS3. Large sword. You get this when you kill Young... Too bad it's not the Ice Sword!
*アイスソード/Frostblade - RS1/MS. This one is. It's probably a little jab at a certain character that many people will remember as "the guy who had the Ice Sword." Why is this significant? Because no matter what, you can't really get the weapon. Galahad will always buy the sword right when you get enough money. So, how do you get it? Get him to join the party... OR KILL HIM (and earn Saruin's favour while going towards the Evil end). Or you can take the Ice Sword to Pyrix and watch Galahad's horrified expression when it's destroyed. Fun. I personally opted to kill him~

シルティーク/Syltique - RS3, SF. Armor, but I think more specifically as clothes.

スキアヴォーナ/Schiavona - MS. Was a Long Sword. Also, it's a historical sword, more specifically of the basket-hilted types. Cue WTF expression when I learned that it's a Spear here.

トウテツ/Tao Tie - Balterossa's. RS2, SF, SF2. Was a monster in RS2, and accessory in SF/SF2. Known as the Tao Tie Pattern then (Tao Tieh Pattern).

ハートエイク/Heart Ache - RS3. Accessory.

ハルモニウム/Harmonium - Undelwalt's. SF2. Accessory. Known as the Harmonium Earrings.

ビールキス/Bilqis - Ghor's. US, MS. In Unlimited Saga, anything made with the Queen Shiva as the base material would result in a weapon called Bilqis. Was a Hand Axe in Minstrel Song, which allowed the skill ベルクウィニスの刃/Fury of Bel'kwinith. Strangely enough, it looks like an axe mixed with a chainsaw. Could it also be a reference to the chainsaw weapon found in the original SaGas (hilariously broken in 魔界闘士サ・ガ because you can OHKO God)?

フラショナル/Flachonelle - US, MS. Armor.

ブルーエルフ/Blue Elf - Melphina's. SF, MS. Armor.

ブリムスラーヴス/Brimuslabus - Baaluk's. SF2, MS. Appears a staff. It also appears as a staff in TLR, if you use a trainer to hack it into your "Special Items" list. Too bad it's not usable. Anyways, it channels Bewitchery in MS. Very useful~

ブリューナク/Brionac - SF/SaGa2GOD. Appears as a gun in SF. Since SaGa2 was released AFTER TLR, you could almost say that its part of the SaGa family. Oh, it was a spear.

ラストリーフ/Last Leaf - Crookfen. SF2, MS. Accessory, and a ring in MS.

ラバーソウル/Rubber Soul - Dillmoor. SaGa in general. Usually pops up as shoes or some sort of accessory.

ロブオーメン/Lob Omen - RS2, MS. Appears as a sword. Was renamed "Werewolf" in Minstrel Song, and can be upgraded to the "Beowulf."

ワンダーバングル/Wonder Bangle - RS2, RS3, SF, MS. Was a shield in the first 3 listed, and gloves in MS. Sometimes translated as "Wonderous Bangle."

デッドハート/Dead Heart - Darken Forest. RS3. Accessory.

シルマールリオン/Simarrionne - SF2 accessory

ブラッドチャリス/Blood Chalice - SF accessory, no Instakill.

アラ・メルビラーナ/Ala Melvilana - Siebenbur. MS. Appears as... armor. Named A'la Melviranna, is a quest reward. Decent defense ratings, but kinda heavy.

E7 fights, go!

Yep. I got mauled by Ludope. The problem is that I kill off Snievan way too quickly leaving me against Milton, so it doesn't give me enough time to regroup. I also don't have the advantage of having a summon for a distraction, so no massive regrouping. May need to abuse Bewitch and set the Hex users as leaders. Cachexia isn't going to do any good against them, although it can stop Milton's massacre if he starts with an AP-based ability (like Mixed Message V). So that was attempts 1 through... I lost count.

My attempt on recording day, after going through about 2/3 of the Ancient Ruins, I beat them. Yay! Of course, it could also mean that I was vastly overpowe(ry. Like hell I was overpowered... Morale was still mostly red when I start the battle at BR71. I didn't take that many chances against Milton, so it took longer than necessary. Not to mention that he didn't abuse Iron Will III as many times as my previous encounter. When Ludope and Zuido entered the scene, the bar was all blue, so that helped with keeping the damage lower, although they still kinda died from excessive damage. Young was easy. Hinnah and Hannah weren't too bad, but take too long and they'll hit you with Twin Snowpetal fairly often. Kept a save around because a friend wants to see the fight. I don't have a save before I went into the Ancient Ruins to upgrade my equipment. Actually, I think I would have won at BR67 if I had remembered to turn on only Bewitch... Oh well. Wait. I think I still have a save at BR66. Hm...

Also bested The Fiery Gates. Wasn't too bad, but I decided to fight it multiple times, and noticed that the flow and outcome of the battle varied quite wildly. Some of them turned out OK, without too much effort required of bashing of my unions. One of them was spectacularly bad because I always had one union Enthralled, and managed to kill Mayfield's union so that the Gates could use Pandemonium on them. Oh, and the fact that no one could get the morale to anywhere near the middle. Spelled out to lots of pain my way...


Anyways, on the "game-related, but doesn't involve actual playing" front... I've decided to go through the ENTIRE SaGa series for their arts, characters, locations, etc. to see what was referenced in Last Remnant. Insane, probably won't ever finish, but it's something to do over the Reading Week other than, you know, read/study. And maybe learning how to play D&D. I can't believe that I've actually caved into playing with them... but now's a good time to explore one of the first commu-based RPGs. With my friends, no less.

Farming...

OK... Component farming now. Grinding can be done along the way since the weapons are more important right now. After beating The Fallen, it's off to the Ancient Ruins for even more grinding! And maybe not dying against the Demigod? Most of the components needed are from magazine drops, making it even more annoying since I would have to chain them together to improve drop rates. I should also clear up some of those Guild Quests now. Still can't seem to spawn Prometheus, which is annoying me to no end. It's required to reach Union of the Golden Chalice Rank 2. Rank 1 is easy enough by zoning in and out in Blackdale. And to think that I'm planning to do this all again in Japanese for my next run.

Notes
Mattis upgraded to an Excellent Konbo from the Commander's Bludgeon, and has items listed for the Blackjack. Will probably stop upgrading at Superlative Blackjack. If that's the case, he too will have a Weapon Art: Double Down. It looks like if there's a customization to another "type" of weapon that's less expensive, they'll go for it. Although... There was a soldier in my previous run that didn't do that. He was using the Tomahawk customizations, but didn't upgrade to the Hawkwind. I think the line has to split sufficiently early before they do that. The Commander's Tomahawk only has the Elite's Tomahawk as its upgrade, unlike a few other "Commander's" weapons. Still, it doesn't really explain why Mayfield goes from Spatha to Bluesteel, other than it's less expensive and requires fewer materials. It's still stupid though. He goes from the Power modifier to the Speed modifier. At least for this run I realized that and just kept him from using ANY arts. Still hits a few things with the sword though. Still... Can't upgrade to the Bluesteel until after beating The Fallen.

CE has a speedhack that I can use. USE IT WHILE GRINDING.

... I need to start drawing again. Really want to draw ラシュダヴィ just to annoy a few friends, and possibly much to the delight of another. Stop looking at me like that.

Curbstomping the Gates of Hell?

Well, the Gates of Hell isn't even a challenge anymore. What the hell. So, I'm currently past the 1st half of the game, and now have the option to create a full party. I've already hired everyone that I need (I think), so I think I'll get right onto training them. Really no need to component farm for now, since they'll just upgrade on their own. I'll probably start farming once I need to beat The Fallen.

Jager and the Lob Omen weren't too much trouble. Don't really remember how many unions fell, but I was able to keep the two away from each other. The Base fights weren't too bad, but it's a good thing I left Snievan for last. The Cyclops was a huge pain to deal with. So much that I had to restructure my unions to 4 just to survive the Gae Bolg [Berserk] blasts every other turn. And in return... having to run around healing all the damn time as well. Eh, whatever. It's over and done with. The unique leaders should have an easier time with this. I kinda want to start a fresh file just for kicks. Anyways, need to grind and possibly component farm a bit because The Fallen can kill everyone in 2 turns. Ugh... BR's already kinda high and they're not quite good enough to grind against Bai Ze for some reason. Will probably have to re-evaluate my tactics against it if I want to get those Peerless and Swift arts ready for smacking around. AP is also a little on the low side... Somewhat annoying for the larger unions. Not so much for the Item Arts union, since most of the damage is from throwing around Frost Tinctures, Flame Bottles and Cyclone Creams. The Land Mines and Explosives aren't dealing that much damage yet. Still no components for Rousing Flare, so I guess Retreat Flare is all I have to work with at the moment. The only other place I can grind right now would be in Aveclyff. I have the option of going against a huge number of Landworms, or smack around those dragons. No items will be used, or else they're going to die too quickly. Hm...


Hm. So Irina says "やった！" when she wants something, and says "えぇ。。。しかったないと。" Or at least that's what I heard. It's a good thing that they have to be in the active party if they want to request equips that weren't dropped or were dropped when they didn't participate.

This is interesting... We'll see what happens from here. Hopefully it's true, because I know that I'll definitely get it for the PS3 even though I already own it for the PC (thanks Tommy!). I'm holding out for a sequel/prequel as well. There are still things that could be wrapped up, and ラシュダヴィ. Want/need more ラシュダヴィ! It's just so blatantly obvious.

The other interesting thing... Square-Enix and 5 unannounced games, of which 2 will come out this year. One of them better be a SaGa game... And there's supposed to be Versus XIII info this month too.

Speculations...

And thus I have confirmed that you can spark the same tech twice in the same battle. The Speed/Power modifier and Art level. Got Lavelle to spark Blue Streak IV, then a few turns later, Nimble Blue Streak IV. This makes sense since the experience gains for them are independent of each other. Other stuff later...


Also, I'm having a decent convo on GameFAQs. Kinda strange, isn't it? Well, we're just talking about the possible changes if there's a Last Remnant sequel/prequel. We're just throwing around ideas, although it hurts my brain a little bit when I'm reading the posts with not-so-perfect English.

Anyways... I wanted bows and more unique assisted arts. There was a whole cast to work with, but we only got 1. OK, 2. Twin/Dual Snowpetal were added for the PC release. The difference between the 2 were the activation conditions and the characters required to use them. Twin Snowpetal requires Hinnah and Hannah, 50AP, can be used at the beginning of every battle, Godly Slash modifier, can be recruited as soon as you can beat the Enlightened Seven. Dual Snowpetal requires Irina and Khrynia (who can't be recruited until past entering Undelwalt), 50AP, high Union Morale/Tension (I think) and has the Godly Pierce modifier. Those are the differences that I know of. Think about it... There are many character relationships, so there really should be more assisted arts. Rush and Irina, Rush and David, David and his Generals, Torgal and Allan, Pagus and his buddies (Maddox and Sibal), Caedmon and his Silver Falcons, Nora and the Ladies of Bloody Alice, etc. There was also the suggestion of stat boosts and decreases when certain units are placed in the same union. I'm assuming that's on top of the formation attributes as well. Would make sense to me since certain characters may not like each other all that much. Don't mind the idea of support convos either.

I don't like the idea of "manual" control simply because of how it eliminates the need for unions. That wasn't the point of the design, which uses pooled AP, and can be used to justify the escalating AP costs for the end-game skills. I mentioned the Fixed Order thing that I really liked from Unlimited Saga and Minstrel Song. Seems like they agree as well, but there's the potential for making the game too easy. By controlling when (and how) the unions moved, you could force very specific art users to flank the enemy. This could be balanced by making the enemies harder to beat, or tone down the damage from attacks. The Raidlock thing, I can understand because you're purposely taking a risk by attacking from afar, leaving yourself open for attack from other enemy unions. The one option I would have loved was allowing units to defend while healing and maintaining Deadlock. Breaking Deadlock in this situation may be beneficial, but if you had bad morale control, it could just lead to being Terminated.


Then there's this poster that comes along to suggest a bunch of things that don't quite fit into the established LasuRemu world. Firearms could be used, but only if it was a sequel. The world suggests that the tech isn't quite good enough to make guns. Or there are guns, but aren't widely used. Guess he also hasn't played enough SaGa, because there's the martial arts style that units could use. No need to bring up Tifa or Sabin for it. And then there's the one thing that really pissed me off: suggesting chocobos. THIS IS SaGa, NOT FF. LasuRemu references the SaGa series. There was no (or barely any) trace of FF in it. A stronghold for storing stuff and your own blacksmith? Redundant. Why? Because you visit towns along the way that provide you with those services. Also, individual character inventories? That would only work if you didn't have that many units to deal with... But with an entire army?! Not to mention the costs for upkeep on Item Arts users... Guess he also didn't catch that Remnants don't really do anything until it wants to or the one that it's bound to uses it. Survival battles suck, and SaGa's kinda been a series where you try to find the fastest way to kill something. Eh... I could skewer it even more, but I'll stop here.