Okay. I trained Orcus to everyone's level, then trained all of my units to level 3 except Kachua and Vice; they are still guests, and guests can't be trained.
Equipment: Orcus has the blue necklace, which helps with INT and MEN, leather jerkin, and a short sword. His secondary weapon is a short bow; I bought that for him at the shop.
Leon, Delta, Julia, and Freesia all have a short sword, a tower shield, and a leather jerkin, along with a cure leaves. Bruno, Belgger, Dorony, and "Area" all have a short sword, a leather jerkin, and a bow as a secondary weapon, along with cure leaves. Thus, our party is divided between fighter-archer combos and pure fighters with better defense, with one extra fighter-archer combo. Fair enough.
Let's examine and assess stats. Orcus is the most powerful of the soldiers, with a STR (with the effects of weapons) of 74. He also has the highest INT. Belgger has the highest HP of all the soldiers, but also has the highest INT of all the soldiers, except Orcus, who I plan to make into a fighter. That's a toughie. Leon has the third highest INT, of 45. I might make him into a wizard; I plan to make most of the amazons into archers and healers. We'll see. The rest of the soldiers seem decent; Delta seems to be more durable than Bruno, who is more powerful, but by a very small margin.
Let's see the amazons. Area has, by far, the most bow skill of all the amazons, a 60. The closest is Dorony, with 56. I'm definitely going to make Area into an archer when we can change classes. Julia and Dorony are tied for highest INT; Julia has 3 more strength points then Dorony. However, Dorony has 57 bow skill. Hmmmmmm... Freesia seems all around weaker compared to Julia, in everything. She may be the first one I shaft when I get plot characters, or I might make her into a cleric. We'll see when I can change classes.
Enough assessing my units, time for our first battle!
Seems we have to fight at a "Tanmas Hill" before we can get to Krizar.
◊ This is what I like to call a "filler battle." It serves no purpose and does not advance the plot; it is there to simply extend the game. Normally, I won't transcribe these battles; it would be a pain in the ass, to be frank; but this is our first real battle.
I select Tanmas Hill.
Fight It Out!
We are brought to this screen.
◊ Like FFT, this is where we position our party members. Look at this picture that I crudely made in Paint.
◊
As you can see, I've numbered each square. I'll be referring to this picture for the rest of the liveblog, so keep this post in mind.
Here's our position.
◊ I moved all our archer-fighter combos to the back; Area to 1, Belgger to 3, Bruno to 7, and Dorony to 9. I moved Orcus, however, to 6; this is because of the discrepancy of archer-fighters and fighters. He still has good health and VIT, so he's on the front line with Julia at 2, Leon at 4, Delta at 8, and Freesia at 10. As you notice, there is a maximum of 10 units that can go into battle, unlike FFT's measly five. That's one of the reasons I like this game so much; the larger number of characters that can enter battle means there's a lot more strategy. As you may notice, we have only 9 people in our party, leaving one space blank. I wonder why that would be...?
We are confronted by
◊ some soldiers, amazons, and a wizard, Oruba, who is the boss.
◊ He tells us that he'll stop us from finding Leonard, and then... what?
◊ He says he doesn't feel right leaving us and says he'll fight with us.
That's right! Canopus is now a permanent party member, though right now he's a guest.
Victory Condition: Kill The Leader
Sorry, no music, the only guy I could find on You Tube who has tracks of the game doesn't have it.
The enemies move, into this position.
◊ Canopus attacked the amazon the cursor is on,
◊ hitting her for 37 HP.
All of the enemies are at level 3, except the boss, who is at level 4.
Now I'll explain how the lance works. The lance has a range of two; thus, it can hit units two spaces away. It can also hit two units at once; if two units are caught in it's range, they both will be hurt, though the farthest enemy for a lot less.
When using bows, you will not be counterattacked, even if your enemy has a bow. Same with wizards. That's one of the reasons why archers are ridiculously overpowered, among other things.
Here's our current position in relation to the enemy.
◊ It is Belgger's turn. I move him to the space highlighted,
◊ select the bow, and hit this soldier with it.
◊ It works, and the soldier loses 21 HP. Area's turn. I move her to the highlighted space
◊ and have her attack the same guy Belgger did, "Spider." Spider blocks. I move Orcus here.
◊
I have Orcus shoot Spider. It hits, doing 28 HP damage to the enemy.
◊ I have Bruno move here.
◊ Note how is back is protected by shrubs. I shoot the amazon the cursor is on. It hits, doing 20 HP. I have Dorony move next to Bruno and attack the same amazon, Garnet I move Leon here; since he has no bow, he simply waits.
◊ I move Delta so his back is protected by Leon and waits. I move Freesia next to Garnet and attack. She does 22 damage, and Freesia blocks Garnet's counterattack. I have Julia attack Sophia, the enemy Canopus attacked earlier. It does 33 damage! Sophia is an archer only, so she simply punches Julia, doing 4 damage. Vice attacks Garnet, getting her down to 4 HP.
◊ He blocks the counterattack.
The leader attacks Julia with a spell; it gets her down to 52 HP. Three enemies gang up on Freesia; she gets down to 10 HP. Delta attacks Spider, getting him down to 5 HP. Canopus uses his cure leaf to give her 50 HP. Belgger attacks Sophia,
◊ who fled, and he... is blocked. Damn. Area, however, does hit Sophia, killing her! She becomes a card. Kachua heals Julia for 16 HP. Orcus attacks this enemy, and...
◊ hits, for 29 HP! He's counterattacks for 17. Bruno comes behind Spider and kills him. He becomes treasure. Dorony moves forward and attacks the enemy Orcus was fighting, Zach, for 16 HP! Leon attacks this enemy, Penelope, who has a lance,
◊ for... 31 HP! He's counterattacked for 35. Freesia attacks Garnet with a rock, dealing 2 HP and killing her! Julie kills Zach.
This goes on. Delta kills a soldier, Belgger and Area try to shoot the boss and miss.
However, something interesting does happen. Orcus is behind Penelope. She has a lance. Time to persuade her to join our side!
If Orcus is next to an enemy, he can try to persuade him/her. How successful it is depends on how low the enemy's health is, the direction she's facing, and a lot of other factors. Let's see if it works.
Yep, Penelope is now on our side! We get a new soldier, and more importantly, an extra lance!
◊ She's a guest until the battle ends.
I advance all my troops forward to kill the boss!
◊ Leon picks up a mentality card. His MEN increases by 2. Delta picks up a magic card; his MP increases by 5.
Orcus kills the boss. How fitting.
◊
Oruba: I can't die... here... We get 1550 Goth, and the Fire Burn spell. Awesome, we can teach this to the wizard I'll be making soon!
Canopus
◊ and Penelope
◊ join our squad!
Next time: we save Leonard!
Most battles won't be explained in this much detail. I just did it here since it's our first real battle. Most battles will be discussing strategy and notable things that happen; for example, "Canopus and Area move to the south, killing some amazons along the way, while the rest of our forces meet the bulk of the enemy," and stuff like that. Heh, writing this liveblog is a lot harder than I thought it would be! But it's very rewarding, and I'd do anything to spread awareness about this game, because frankly, it Needs More Love.
