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Trails in the Sky time
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Cassius children don't work on finders keepers rules
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you can't just take home a child you found
Princess Emily
that is in fact how their family operates
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Boy goes "My name... is..."
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fade out
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was expecting a PS1 era style name entry screen
Wolfgirl Winter
Don't you say anything bad about my son, just preemptively
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From what spoilers I know from osmosis I'm aligned against him
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the feel of this intro is very different from the CS1 intro
Snowman's Dance
I don't see why he can't just take the child
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it feels less like an anime OP and more like an anime game intro
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Snowman's Dance
I understand that while he was taking the child, you were on the bench
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why didn't you stop him
Snowman's Dance
I was over on the bench
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anyway I would already die for Estelle
Rama
This is the correct response
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I'm cringing in advance of future plot as I watch Estelle and Joshua act extremely completely like siblings
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what was this for originally, PC? PSP?
Rama
PSP, I think
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so I guess this is one country east from Erebonia
Rama
The map is something like Liberl and Crossbell sit between Erebonia and Calvard, but don't border each other
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I don't see crossbell on the map
Rama
It'll come up later
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cursed deadname
cursed deadname
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all right
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let's talk gameplay
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is there anything I should know in advance about properly breaking this game in half
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focus on Speed/Delay?
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status effects?
Princess Emily
I don't remember enough concrete stuff to rec breaking the game in half, but I remember Delay being good?
Rama
Speed is the best stat and delay is the best status effect
Rama
Joshua is therefore the best character
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OK I'm confused in the orbal tutorial
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I equipped an attack 1 on estelle and an action 1 on joshua
Rama
Arts are very powerful especially when you get AoE ones
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and now the teacher's telling me to do something involving setting up recovery arts?
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I don't have those
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what's going on
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"Now install a quartz into your orbments so that you can use both recovery and attack arts"
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I only have one orb slot and two quartz and neither of them provide recover arts
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sooo
Princess Emily
quartz works a LOT different in Sky than in Cold Steel
Rama
Water quartz is recovery, most anything else is attack
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so I guess I need to get HP Up to use healing magic??
Princess Emily
there are no direct give-you-arts quartz in Sky, instead yeah
Princess Emily
you equip various other quartz and the amount of certain elements unlocks Arts
Princess Emily
like 1 water quartz for basic heal, 3 water quartz for better heal,
Princess Emily
I don't remember the specifics but stuff like that
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okay tutorial defeated
Princess Emily
(and for Nerdo's knowledge, in Cold Steel you'd just get a Tear quartz, equip it, and it'd let you use the heal spell Tear)
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time to put all your training to work! go into this sewer
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how old is estelle
Princess Emily
16
Rama
Estelle and Josh are both 16.
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the camera zooming out every time I try to do anything in combat is really annoying
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the visuals of this game feel very Disgaea
Rama
See, I thought Super Robot Wars because of the cut-ins on Crafts, but now that you mention it yeah.
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Disgaea has those too
Rama
I've played one of them a lot more recently than the other.
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I got a bracer emblem
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was kind of expecting it to be an actual bracer you can wear
Rama
You would think
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OK
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as of first session, MUCH stronger first impression than CS1
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I feel like I'm playing a forgotten PS2 RPG, not a 2012 light novel anime adaptation
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I'm vibing more with the rando NPCs in this one too because like
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Estelle knows these people
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and has relationships with them
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instead of Rean just being the new boy in school, blankly listening to strangers
Rama
They're good kids, Brent
Snowdrops ﾐ☆
Correct reaction to Estelle yes
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I hear the plot kicks off in this one some time before literally after the final boss fight
Rama
The rando NPCs in Sky are by far the best I've seen in any RPG
Princess Emily
the rando NPCs are one of the best parts of Trails in general
Snowdrops ﾐ☆
You definitely don't have to but it is possible to talk to the NPCs at various times and they'll be moving along in their lives and it's wonderful
Princess Emily
also a bunch of the Sky NPCs reappear in Cold Steel and I think it says a lot that I actually fucking remember the random NPCs in Sky to even know it's the same ones in Cold Steel
Rama
And I'd definitely agree that actually giving Estelle a personality and reputation and friends in Rolent puts an incredibly strong start to the setting.
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Estelle has opinions about things and people
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how did we go from this to Rean
Rama
Oh lord, does she have opinions
Princess Emily
You can see the progression in Estelle > Lloyd > Rean
Princess Emily
of marketing
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...does Sky switch protags
Princess Emily
Lloyd is Zero/Azure
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ah
Princess Emily
and is somewhere in between Estelle and "light novel protagonist"
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playing Sky is making me hate Rean even more than I already did
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which was a non-negligible amount
Rama
I can't say I planned for that exactly, but I did get you this on the basis of it sounding more like your thing than CS.
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while the art is more late-00s I'm still constantly imagining Estelle making huge 90s anime faces
Rama
The whole thing is very 90's anime in terms of plot and tone
Rama
Although which 90's anime the tone is varies wildly.
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I'm thinking a bit of slayers, a bit of el-hazard, visually
Princess Emily
I can see that
Cyouni
oh I didn't realize you started this
Cyouni
Sky overall is much harder to break than CS
Cyouni
Arts are Very Good
Cyouni
Time has Action and Cast and is therefore the best overall element for casting
Rama
Oh right I forgot to mention: the best solution to random encounters are area of effect Arts
Rama
I mostly spammed Aerial and White Gehenna in FC
Cyouni
sounds about right
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you didn't forget to mention that
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you said that AOE arts are the best
Cyouni
the true secret to hilarious dumb things is Chaos Brand though
Rama
Oh okay I'm just sleep-deprived
Cyouni
see, way less people are immune to Confuse than should be
Cyouni
even a lot of bosses/minibosses can be Confused into punching each other
Rama
Yeah that one I learned about after I'd already beaten the games
Cyouni
this is in fact the key to surviving Nightmare, which the game is not balanced for AT ALL
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I'm on normal difficulty
Rama
I'm not sure I ever cast it
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because there was no easy option
Cyouni
that said just play normally and you're gonna be fine
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am I gonna want a guide for shit or will i be fine if I assume I don't care about getting max bracer rank or whatever
Cyouni
you'll be fine overall if you check the board constantly
Cyouni
Short/Med/Long is in terms of plot beats
Rama
I think they're some really neat sidequests you might not encounter if you don't use a guide, especially in the first game, but nothing vital to plot progression.
Rama
(Tragically, not every sidequest is on the board)
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no guide it is
Cyouni
Carnelia books though are utterly lol to try and do without a guide
Cyouni
you will literally never do them
Cyouni
I found a sum total of 0/11 on my first playthrough
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is that bad
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I collected like 1.5 books in the whole of CS1
Cyouni
it's fine
Rama
You trade them for an ultimate weapon
Cyouni
you won't miss it
Rama
You don't need the ultimate weapon
Cyouni
unlike CS the timing is also hilariously tight
Cyouni
as in
Cyouni
turn around and do not walk towards the story event literally next door tight
Rama
I got every Gambler Jack in SC and missed trading them for the weapon token because that involved turning off the critical path in an end-of-chapter cutscene fest
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looks like I won't get the ultimate weapon
Snowdrops ﾐ☆
yeah don't worry about it imo
Snowdrops ﾐ☆
also if you continue trails in the sky series to 2, I'm gonna be real I'm someone who always picks easy and that one's easy mode was like... boringly, oneshot everything immediately easy, so ymmv