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The Escape
Didn’t have time to write notes as I went. 10 minutes means 10 minutes, and a helpful little clock was ticking away in the corner of my screen the whole time.
I said before that I couldn’t wait to get back to the treasure blocked by the fire. Mmmm! Those words are delicious!
Went through the castle and jail as best I could, collecting chests. Some elixirs, some Elven Mantles (nice accessories to help block damage), assorted other stuff. Many “Monster-in-a-Box,” wich slowed things down considerably. Running wasn’t an option in most cases. Or maybe it was, but it wasn’t working in the first few seconds and I didn’t want to waste time continuing to try.
Made it with 0:04 on the clock.
There were also like 2-3 attempts I made where I exploded at the last minute, running out the castle gate, but close isn’t good enough with exploding castles.
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New Crystals
-After watching the castle explode from a safe distance, three crystal shards found our party and imbued us with new jobs:
BEASTMASTER
GEOMANCER GEOMANCER GEOMANCER (sorry, I fell passionately in love with this in FFIII)
NINJA
Spent a while running around the Overworld playing around with these. Some initial thoughts:
--Beastmaster: Hm. Catch monsters and release them as abilities. Can only catch them once they’ve been weakened. This feels like a lot of wind-up for a little reward. My favorite outfit easily!
Dressed like a sheep or ram or something LOLOL
--Geomancer: Our love affair as been rekindled. The surprise of Gaia attacks, the look of the effects themselves. And best yet for grinding? Gaia spells are mana-less.
Rip van Galuf.
Too bad the outfit is frigging ridiculous.
Compare that to the FFIII geomancer:
Sure, it looks a bit out of place in a desert or volcano, but it still looks reasonable. And weathery! Oh well.
--Ninja: Yes please! Massive damage and dual-wielding.
I swapped Galuf over to leveling up Geomancer, and changed Faris from Berserker with Two-Handed equipped to Ninja with Berserker equipped. She’s a terror.
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Karnak
-Bought a Diamond Bell for Galuf.
-The castle’s explosion blew up the wall blocking the Library of the Ancients. I think I know what’s next. In the story.
-Mid, Cid’s grandson (YAY continuity across parallel dimensions from FFIV:TAY) is there in Jachol, the town with the Library.
-The fire-powered ship is now pretty useless without the crystal.
-In the western desert lives a Dhornma Chimera. It’s apparently pretty nasty. They weren’t lying about the Jackanapes, probably not lying now.
-The queen survived the explosion, but she’s pretty out of it and having some creepy hallucinations.
-The game’s doing really well at starting to build the tension regarding whoever’s going to be the big bad. I’ll be honest though – a part of me is worried that this game will be almost TOO compact. That I’ll get to the earth crystal, it’ll shatter, the final seal will break on Shadow McBigbadderson, we’ll kill it, the end.
-If that happens, that’s okay! I just wonder if there’ll be something more.
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Fire-Powered Ship
-Cid is on here. He’s expressing great guild, great remorse, for the development of the amplifying machines.
-He leaves the ship. Not sure where he went. Maybe I’ll see him in Jachol.
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Castle Walse
-Before pushing on, I want to head here to follow-up on a few things.
#1) Ok, Lone Wolf is still in jail here. That means that the werewolf in Karnak was different.
#2) Can we beat the Jackanapes?
Answer: NO. But I just read the wonderful Stephen King book, “Doctor Sleep,” and he described an AA saying: “F.E.A.R. = Fuck everything and run.” I tried killing Jackanapes, but I either missed or did practically no damage. Galuf’s “Gale” actually healed him. So I ran.
Didn’t always work, but with !Flee on Bartz (now a Thief with Bare-Handed passive equipped from his monk job) and !Smoke on Faris, and my higher HP, I survived and ran. Got a new spell, “Speed,” some gil, and other random stuff from chests around the basement.
#4) Is the Garula in town still peaceful?
I guess?
#3) Can we get Shiva now? I’d like to give Galuf a trio of destructive magic to rotate through, including (currently) Geomancer, Black Mage, and Summoner. This’d be a nice boost to the Summoner tree.
Answer: YES! Shiva was easy this time, with Fira, new skills, new levels.
#5) You know what. YOLO. I let out the pickpocket, Lone Wolf, from the jail. Hopefully this doesn’t come back to bite me in the ass.
Why would I let out a thief? He must have been jailed for a reason. Why would I do this to the good people of Walse?
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Overworld
-Stopped by the town of Walse briefly to stock up, and discovered a few low-level summoner spells I missed before. Huzzah!
-Went to look for Castle Tycoon, but couldn’t find it.
-Went back to the first cave to see if Boko was hanging around, but no luck.
-Oh well. Back west through the meteor.
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Next time: Jachol.
