Highroad
-At first, I was pressing “x” on every person I met, hoping to recruit. I couldn’t, so I stopped trying. But then as I was playing World of Warcraft’s new expansion the other day, something hit me: maybe the recruits are more like champions than followers.
(Context: in the last WoW expansion, you had an army of random no-names at your disposal, “followers.” In this expansion, you have fewer minions, but they’re big names, major characters, “champions.”)
So first going to backtrack a bit and try talking to some of the named people I met on the Highroad to recruit.
-Well, never mind lol. Looks like it’ll be the no-names. I was sure I was going to be able to recruit Rin himself, but no. I was however able to recruit Ropp, one of the dudes working the counter at the agency.
Welcome to the team!
-Lucil won’t join my team either.
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Season 1, Round 10: vs. Al Bhed Psyches
-Ah. The hated Al Bhed Psyches. In real life, I hate the Atlanta Braves as Mets fan, and all they've done is beat us a lot. If their organization committed a major kidnapping, it'd probably escalate the rivalry even further.
-Botta is sitting. Ropp looks like he’ll be a good defender, so trying him out there. I was hoping he’d be able to replace Keepa, but he has no CA.
-Maybe I shouldn’t give up on Keepa just yet. He definitely has at least a few slots available for techniques. Just nothing I’ve found yet.
And that 11 CA is nothing to sneeze at.
-GOAL!!! Jecht Shot 45 seconds into the game sneaks one by again Nimrook, who’s got a ridiculously high CA of 19. Even the Jecht Shot was only at 15 when it reached him. Lucky.
-A second Jecht Shot at 2:19 puts me up 2-0.
-This one Al Bhed defender keeps Nap Tackling me and it suuucks. Even worse, I’ve been too quick on the Techcopy trigger each time.
-Learned my lesson this next time around. When there are only (lol) two defenders on Tidus, I don’t need to attempt a breakthrough (and risk getting Nap Tackled). Keep Calm and Jecht Shot On.
Another defender falls victim to the legendary shot.
-Victory! 3-1. We are now in second place, 1 point behind the Luca Goers.
-Oh. That’s the end of it. The league is over. No playoffs, which surprises me as an American. (I remember hearing somewhere that non-US leagues often just end after seasonal play.) We finished in 2nd. Won an Elixir and a Rename Card.
-Letty’s contract is up, but without seeing his stats (which they should really show on the contact renewal screen), I don’t remember whether I want to renew him or not. I’ll renew him for one game and decide next time.
-Let’s move forward.
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Operation Mi’ihen
-Maester Seymour gives a rousing speech to the combined Crusaders/Al Bhed force.
I’m a bit confused. The Crusaders and machina-lovin’ Al Bheds are not beloved by Order of Yevon. But Seymour is giving an explicitly Yevon-based blessing.
Is this… I dunno, is it kosher? Seems like it goes against his order’s teachings.
-Not just me. Wakka objects strongly.
-Yuna goes against Wakka here… and… I agree with her? And with Seymour? The Crusaders are violating the teachings, sure, but they are doing so to try to take down Sin. I seem to remember a Bible passage that may apply here: “The Lord ponders the heart.”
[Later edit: hoo boy. I checked the passage, and saw a few lines later something that may also apply: “Haughty eyes and a proud heart – the unplowed field of the wicked – produce Sin.” Knowing Jecht, that may not be that far off.
Although, who knows. Maybe the Jecht in the future turned over a new leaf and became Sin to take someone else’s place. So much about this whole process we don’t know.]
-If Seymour had been given triumphant music, I’d be totally on his side right now. It’s just that cinematographically, everything is still pointing to him pulling sinister strings.
-Seymour walks up to us.
AURON: “I’ve got nothing to say about it.” And walks off.
SEYMOUR: “I… see.”
Auron SNUBS THE FUCK OUTTA HIM. Definitely something personal between these two. I’ll bet that Seymour somehow played a role in Jecht becoming Sin.
-lol Wakka is so awkward with the formalities of being around Seymour.
-Seymour is a great speaker. But again, it’s mostly because I tend to agree. He’s covering himself here by saying that he’s NOT here as a master of Yevon, just as a citizen of Spira wishing them well.
WAKKA: “But using machina… that’s bad, isn’t it?”
SEYMOUR: “Pretend you didn’t see them.”
Everyone gasps. This is pretty shocking to hear. Like someone in Hebrew school who gets caught smoking pot by the rabbi and the rabbi just says “lol whateva, we all gotta toke up sometimes.”
-Seymour walks away.
Tidus echoes my thoughts – Seymour seems sinister, but his words and ideas are reasonable. I’m convinced he’s going to end up a villain, but I don’t know just yet whether he’s noble but unorthodox in a way that will lead to unintended chaos, or whether he’s actively manipulating shit to end badly.
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Mushroom Rock
-The map system is great. Gives me a really solid sense of where we’ve been and where we’re going, and a general feeling of comfort with the world map – at least, the corner of it we’ve seen.
-That was weird. Tried using the Dragon Fang limit break but it wouldn’t acknowledge the buttons I pushed. The first part of the combo was a left arrow and I tried pushing that on the D-pat and with the stick, but no luck. [Non-rhetorical question: was I doing something wrong there?]
-A kid named Clasko runs up. Tells us that Maester Seymour requests Yuna’s presence at the command center.
-I love Lulu’s new Moomba focus. I think this is the second Moomba appearance in the series since FFVIII.
[Non-rhetorical question for y’all: I’m at O’aka - who possesses Namingway’s talent for sneaking into dangerous areas btw – and am selling some redundant stuff. I noticed that I have duplicates of a number of items, such as Thunder Ball, but one Thunder Ball has the ability Lightningstrike while another has that same ability plus a blank space.
Can items in this game level up, or acquire new abilities? What am I missing here? This feels both important and unexplained/unmentioned.]
-Going to grind up a little bit to get that last item from O’aka that I want.
-Progressing on the Sphere Grid. I want to be careful with my L1 sphere keys because I don’t know how many I’ll get.
-I may want to get Wakka some more mana. His skills are really useful, with Sleep Attack and Dark Attack.
-The combat really seems to reward strategy over button mashing. For example, when I get into combat against a Dual Horn/Bomb pack, I have to rotate characters in to ensure AP gets spread, keep Dark on the Dual Horn with Wakka to minimize damage (either through his Dark Ball or his dark-inflicting skill), and use Lulu and characters with Ice Weapons on the Bombs.
It rewards knowledge of the enemies. Makes me feel much more engaged with the combat than I might otherwise be.
-Reached a neat platform that elevated me to higher ground. Tougher monsters here.
-Hi Lucil! Just saw her riding by.
-Oh god, no, random dude! One of the Crusaders on the road is talking to me about how after they beat Sin, they’re going to head to Luca to celebrate. They even reserved a space. STOP JINXING YOURSELF
-Awesome design on this new monster.
Gandarewa.
-Even Shelinda is here. She’s great. She felt discouraged initially that the Crusaders wouldn’t listen to her, but changed her mind and decided to help them in the end.
-There’s something disingenuous in Seymour saying he’s just here as a citizen of Spira. His words carry so much more weight than that – for the Crusaders, though probably not for the Al Bhed. Everyone here feels boosted by those words, supported by them, because they’re said by a master. Lucil echoes this.
-But lord, she’s realistic. In case there are many casualties, she asks Yuna to perform the Sending.
-There’s a whole valley down below with treasure and stuff. I imagine I’ll get there soon.
HOLD THE PHONE
NOW GIVE THE PHONE TO ME
THIS IS HUGE. I just learned that when I backtrack on the sphere grid, it doesn’t cost S.Lvs to go back over nodes I already activated.
I feel so much freer to explore and experiment! Like I won’t be punished so hard for forgetting something or wanting to go back down a different branch.
This also helps me understand the presence of so many empty nodes. They exist not just to fill in with stuff I find along the way, but to make it so that there’s at least SOME cost to going down one branch rather than another.
[Later edit and non-rhetorical question for y’all: I may have misunderstood this. It seems like there’s a bonus to traveling along previously-activated nodes, but not total negation of S.Lv cost. Does it reduce the S.Lv cost by a certain set amount? A percentage? Or something else altogether?]
-Kumahri just got Jinx, which lowers enemy luck. Non-rhetorical question for y’all: what does luck actually govern? Critical hit chance?]
-Another platform takes me up towards the command center. Hm. I seem to be moving away from that treasure-filled valley below. Maybe I’ll come back there later, or I just missed something.
-Hee! Yuna has a little Esuna poem: “Light shine strong, our woe begone!”
-Saw that message again!! It was quick, but I was on the lookout this time: “Kimahri has learned Overdrive mode Warrior.” That’s what Tidus also must’ve gotten. It makes his Overdrive gauge fill when he deals damage rather than when he takes it. Nice. Activating it.
-Found Al Bhed Primer vol. X, Z -> J.
-Saving.
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Next time: to the command center.
