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fulgurbugs · 1 year

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ok i’m about to go to bed but i’m like halfway thru the main stories of everyone and here’s my octopath 2 thoughts so far:

gameplay:

Hikari go brrrrrrr. this guy hits like a damn truck

also, i learned how concoct works finally and i am now a true concoct beliver. luv u castti <3

a lot of stuff was nerfed for some classes, some of it i like, some of it i miss

-no more 8stack reflect magic damage, RIP. cleric final ability is no longer a double cast but instead allows the target to take an extra turn after everyone else (i like this one, opens a lot of cool stuff you can do, but you also need to manage bp more if you wanna max your damage or casts instead of just getting double. cleric also now has an SP stealing staff move, reflect is replaced with a shielding move that prevents a % of damage based on boost, and also gains a physical and elemental buff. overall really good changes to the class.

scholar no longer has double hit spells. i kinda miss these, i really didn’t get much use out of the new skills scholar has, except for elemental barrage, which can be good for scouting weaknesses or big damage if solo targeting. but it means enemies with primarily magic based weaknesses are more annoying to break.

i think those two classes got the biggest overhauls. everything else of the 8 main classes seems to have its biggest tools intact (leghold, donate bp, etc) so i was pretty familiar with how to setup and beat bosses pretty efficiently. i do miss the generic multi hit wind and dark spells a lot tho….

otherwise, despite overall nerfs to some of the stronger more abusable strategies (i’m told runelord tressa equivalent is still in the game tho) latent power is balancing that out by being also busted as hell and fun to use. all of them are unique and a fun extra management tool that can make or break your turns. (poor castti tho, if you have enough money, hers is kind of irrelevant.)

ok anyways MINOR GAMEPLAY SPOILER TIME. THIS IS A SPOILER WARNING FOR MINOR PARTS OF CASTTI, HIKARI, PARTITIO, AND THRONE’S BOSS FIGHTS IN THEIR CHAPTERS.

SPOILERS START HERE:

ok. don’t really like how casttis chapter 4 boss has basically the same gimmick as alfyns, with max hp reducing poison. i think this fight is harder than alfyns by a little bit tho.

Hikaris final chapter is. super long. there’s 3 whole boss fights in the last chapter, so be ready for a lot of those in a row. i found the second boss harder than the third fight tho.. lol. it’s again also kinda similar to olberics ch4 so i already knew how to cheese it a bit, though it wasn’t as easy to set up on this guy.

partitios ch4 was piss easy, just did not hit very hard lol. and i don’t think the boss has that much health

throne ch4 was also pretty easy, but had a pretty cool unique mechanic. makes you play a bit different with it because of it, so you gotta get creative sometimes or compromise on your damage etc. good stuff even if it wasn’t too bad on me.

OK. THIS IS STORY SPOILER WARNING. IM GOING TO BE TALKING ABOUT WHAT HAPPENS AT THE END OF THE 4 CHAPTERS I JUST MENTIONED, SO CONSIDER YOURSELF WARNED

SPOILERS NOW:

casttis story was ok. didn’t like it as much as alfyns in ot1 but it wasn’t terrible. i think i’m just usually not that big on amnesia plot lines. i like castti a lot in her travel banters tho, she’s actually pretty funny compared to how serious she always is in her story chapters.

hikari was pretty alright too. i think his evil demon blood is probably tied to galdera in some way, but they never actually explain where it comes from in his route and i was kinda waiting on it the whole time. kinda funny he becomes king and all, gets crowned, and then we’re off to go to partitios silly capitalism project with the new king of ku in tow.

partitio himself is probably my favorite traveler so far, but i think his story falls a little flat at the end. mostly because mr roque gets literally no comeuppance at the end despite literally ruining multiple towns worth’s of peoples lives by putting them in abject poverty and extorting them. partitio just goes i’ll hire you and we’re back to hunky-dory. kinda wish he didn’t accept defeat and suicided or was killed by his own creation or something more fitting, partitio never even confronts him for scamming his family and altering the contract. like come on man.

Throne. i don’t know how i feel about this one, the chapter 4 is. insane. you will never predict how the fuck her story wraps up, so i actually won’t even say even with the spoiler warning. just go fucking play the chapter 4 lol. i like the stuff in her chapter 3s with mother and father tho, even if it’s edgy and whatever. throne also has some fun travel dialogues, i like her well enough. it’s just that the chapter 4 is so bonkers i can’t decide how i feel about it and her lol. idk

looking forward to the other 4! i think all the stories are solid despite if it seems like im saying otherwise here, they’re definitely on par with the first game, which i think had quite a bit simpler plots lol. cant wait to get to the cross character chapters as well!

#octopath #octopath traveler #octopath traveler 2 #octopath spoilers #i leveled everone in the b team and i’m gonna start their ch2s tomorrow

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alynnl · 1 year

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Octopath Traveler and Class Balance

In the two playthroughs I’ve done of Octopath Traveler, I’ve learned a great deal about how the game works. I likely don’t know all there is to learn about the technical side of it, but there’s an observation I’ve made that’s worth noting.

To start with, each character has their own unique beginning class. No two are alike. Some of them fill similar roles. Hunter and warrior are attacking types (with hunter also having useful debuffs,) cleric and dancer are supporting classes, Apothecary is both healing and debuff, thief is focused on debuffing and quick attacks, scholar deals in magical attacks, and merchant is sort of a jack of all trades.

Even with the addition of secondary jobs by finding each God’s shrine (including the secret jobs) - balancing your party is still a key part of gameplay because of how they work.

In other RPGs with a class-change system, one has the ability to technically make all your characters the same class, and dominate the battlefield with a specific set of moves.

In Octopath Traveler, however, only one person may use a secondary job at a time.

This leads a player to carefully consider which secondary class best pairs with each party member's stats and starting class abilities to get the most out of their party setups. It also leads one to consider how they spend their skill points, to get the support abilities that would best go with that character. (Physical Prowess on Olberic, and Snatch on Therion for instance.)

Breaking and boosting makes it important to have a varied party, so one can buff, debuff and hit enemy weaknesses to get the best outcome.

Knowing which stats affect different actions changes how one plays as well. (M. Attack for magically inclined units, M. Defense for cleric’s healing, Phys. attack for melee users, speed for thieves/Aeber’s Reckoning.)

With all the consideration of classes, skills and support abilities, it’s possible to make any team work for the player.

OCTO and PATH? Each one has a healer, a damage dealer, someone to earn money or items, and a good spread of elements to hit those weaknesses. Also, all path actions are possible.

Guys and Girls? Each team still has a healer, and coverage of elemental and physical enemy weaknesses.

Noble and Rogue starter classes? There is still a balance of physical and elemental damage, with the addition of all path actions also being possible.

Octopath Traveler is truly one of the most flexible class change systems I’ve seen. There are still multiple ways to cheese battles (even bosses) with the right setup of support skills, equipment and secondary jobs, but there’s a lot more that goes into it than changing everyone into a job that makes all others obsolete.

(Although the idea of Oops all Warmasters and Oops all Sorcerers is amusing.)

Mechanically, Octopath Traveler was a fresh take on turn-based and job-based RPGs, and I look forward to seeing how the sequel steps up on improving the formula (and hopefully keeping the parts I like about it similar enough.)

#Octopath Traveler #observation #meta post #gameplay ramble #Lynn observes video games #unadulterated praise for the Octopath Traveler mechanics

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viewer-of-many · 1 year

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5 THINGS THAT MAKE YOU HAPPY!! GO!🫵

Firstly, thanks for including me in this. Now, here we go!

Pokémon. Suicune is my favorite, and I love making Pokésonas for each game I play. If you want to know more about them, just ask!

Transformers. Mainly Botbots and the Aligned Continuity, though I have seen bits and pieces of other parts of the franchise.

Video games in general. Aside from Pokémon, I have a fair amount of RPGs(Three Houses, Bravely Default 2, Octopath Traveler[don't have the sequel yet], Gems of War[a match 3/RPG]), a few online games(Howrse, Forge of Empires, and Hero Wars on Facebook) and a bunch of casual Steam games(clickers from Autotelic Games LLC, Blush Blush and Crush Crush, Idle Monkeyology, Cell to Singularity, and Zoo 2: Animal Park)

Magic. I have a collection of books about magical creatures(mostly fairies), astrology, and how to use plants and stones for spells.

Italian food and sandwiches. Pizza, Pasta, and all things cheesy. I even like cheese on fish(hot take, I know.)

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drowninginfelines · 5 years

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yo real shit winnehild is fucking HARD man but like i dont wanna cheese this fight i feel like im getting really close to beating her but when she uses war cry it just fucks me up

i was able to have olberic survive it with shackle foe + hired help merc defense + somewhat overhealed but everybody else died and then i wasnt able to get ophilia back up to overheal them both to survive the next round

but GOD DAMN IM SO CLOSE I CAN TASTE IT ive lost to her i think four or five times now i just need to prioritize shackle foe/defense more over breaking her cause i feel like sometimes ill decide to attack without realizing that a buff or debuff is gonna run out the next round

#difpost #octopath traveler #hey guys im playing octopath again lol #im playing it a really weird/bad way so im kind of stuck with olberic ophilia cyrus and therion #theyre all like mid sixties and everyone else is like. level nine #otherwise id get tressa in here not for sidestep but bc i need more opportunities for hired help #i REFUSE to do the runelord cheese thing i know i can beat this chick

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lesbiangemma · 4 years

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Hi Im going to rant about nostalgia for a bit because im experiencing Emotions and I dont have anyone to talk to about it.

I think the memory that started this was this camp I went to when I was 12. It was in the middle of a quiet forest with about 50 kids from school. We had little cabins and a big area in the middle with a campfire. This was when I was first discovering that I was a lesbian and I felt so alone and scared and confused. We did an activity where we stood in a big circle, the camp leader would say something and if we related to it, we step in the circle. Everyone would hold up their hands and do the sign for “I love you” in sign language to show their love and support.

Anyways, this went on for a little bit, and then the leader said “step in the circle if you are part of the LGBTQ community” and I was like, oh shit thats me. I was so scared I didnt want people to know, I felt like they would be against me and I was so alone. A couple kids stepped in and after a moment of hesitation I followed. I looked around and everyone in the circle raised their hands in support, showing they loved me for who I am. I immediately broke down in tears, I really wasnt alone. I felt loved

That night we walked to the campfire around 10;00 pm, and people sang songs around the fire. I stared up at the stars, there were so many, I heard the fire, the singing, the crickets, the breeze. The girl I liked at the time came and sat next to me, we watched the stars together before returning to our cabins.

The next night we got on the bus and headed home around 7:00 om, and two hours in the girl I liked put her head on my shoulder and we both fell asleep the whole ride home.

Another thing I remember was the Halloween events we would have in elementary school. We would be there until around 10:00 pm which was so exciting because I was never allowed to stay up that late. Me and my friends dressed up, and we all hung out on the swings together. I did the cake walk and won a delicious angel food cake with strawberry frosting, and fell asleep on the car ride home.

I miss when almost every friday nearly in 9th grade I believe, my best friend at the time would come over and we would play super paper mario together, he had to play most of it cuz I sucked at it. We ate cheese dip and drank arizona tea. We have drifted away because he got popular and I somehow got less popular than I already was. I miss it a lot and I really hope he doesnt read this.

I miss two years ago, my brother and I began to become friends as I got out of my depression and we talked for the first time in at least a year. The first time we really talked was when we went camping and two moths got into the tent and I started having a panic attack. My parents didnt understand my phobia and he immediately came to my defense, he looked out for me the rest of the trip and he still does.

I remember being at my grandmas old apartment, we would sleep there every saturday and binge TV shows with her for hours, and then I would stay up half the night playing tomodachi life and octopath traveler. I went to see my brother in the other room, and he told me that he wants me to play kid icarus, he really liked it and thought I would too. He got it for my birthday and we started playing it together. He had to beat most of it for me.

We went to this hotel with my parents, and when we werent doing much we would sit in the room and play kid icarus together. We started developing inside jokes, we started getting along well, I always laughed so much around him, I felt like for the first time we were really becoming friends. I miss sitting in his room and watching him play outer wilds for hours. He let me play at first, but i couldnt stop crashing like a dumbass so of course, he had to beat it for me. I remember crying my eyes out at the ending.

I miss playing minecraft with him, he was pit and i was tressa and we mostly messed around. I miss playing stardew valley with him too, all he did was fish but it worked. I miss playing raft with him and some of his friends occasionally, i miss playing octopath traveler with him. for once i had to beat the game because he sucked at it, sorry dude.

I dont know, Im listening to minecraft music and just really miss this. Maybe its because everything is so shitty right now that I wish I could go back to these happier, simpler times. But even if things are fucked up or not, I wish I could experience those again. I think I miss a lot of people that used to be in my life, it almost hurts to look back at, but at the same time I’m glad I experienced these things.

I think I’m scared for life to go on.

#if anyone read this thank you #it all sounds so stupid but i appreciate it #sorry for any typos im on desktop and never learned how to type #mimi’s memos

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penroseparticle · 4 years

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the fibonacci sequence, as always

1. What’s your go to snack?

I’m really getting into cheese

1. What’s your go to snack?

and crackers

as a snack. It’s just very fulfilling to me.

2. What’s a movie you could watch over and over?

Anyone who reeeeeeally knows me knows the obvious answer so I’ll go with a brand new one that very clearly seems to have made the list for me- Knives Out. I just think it’s neat!

3. Favorite show to binge?

I’m using this quarantine to watch a lot of content I’ve wanted to but don’t have time for. I’m becoming more fluent in gay so part of that is RuPaul(Fracking Extraordinaire)’s Drag Race. I have been given a watchlist and am diligently doing my homework.

5. 5 songs that make you feel less lonely?

Caramelldansen by Caramell

Dragostea Din Tei by O-Zone

Chocolate Rain by Tay Zonday

Never Gonna Give You Up by Rick Astley

Always by Erasure

8. Favorite thing to do when doing self care?

I really like taking baths rather than showers.

13. Favorite videgames?

Oh god. I’ll just list what I’m currently playing- Desktop Dungeons, Octopath Traveler, Fire Emblem: Three Houses, MTG Arena, and FFX/X-2 Remaster.

21. Any new skills?

Um... no, not really. Other than the running which I mentioned.

34. When was the last time you got up and stretched?

I actually stand and lean on a counter when doing most of my computer usage, so less than an hour ago

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steve0discusses · 5 years

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Yugioh S2 Ep 43: Things Get a Lot Less Vague, But it’s Still Pretty Vague

I’m taking full advantage of the laziest time of the year and I’m watching even more Yugioh. I even gave myself a buffer. Sort of. I kinda lost a day playing Octopath Traveler and I don’t even remember that happening.

Now this episode doesn’t have anyone getting struck by lightning, but if that happened, it would have fit right in. A lot happened in this episode. So, to start off, Mai decided to play one of the three cards we were given explicit instructions to never ever play and it has immediately screwed her over via orb.

Everyone else watching the orb has become completely enamored by it. Especially Kaiba, who is pretty positive he can turn this sphere into a dragon. I don’t know why anyone would ever come to this conclusion, but welcome to Yugioh, it’s well into S2 and I’m just still jaw agape and saying “HOW?” at my screen.

Like y’all I don’t know how to play this game, which should be hella apparent from reading any of my posts, but like there is one thing that everyone knows--even I knew--about Yugioh the game. Let me just, once sec

Ah, there we go.

Like sometimes it shows that your game is originally in a language that doesn’t require spaces between words. And like this is coming from me. You know how verbose I am, I freakin love words. But maybe that’s too many words for a card.

(read more under the cut)

And while this is pretty much the worlds most BS card already, what’s even better is that none of this jargon appeared until after Mai played the card. Like basically the card pretends to be completely normal and then is like “Boom, gotcha. I’ll just be a cool Ikea orb lamp instead!”

At this point, while everyone is scrambling around trying to fathom what to do about this huge ass fake sun blinding everyone down in Domino, Marik decides to deposit some more bizarre lore.

I kind of assumed Yugi and Kaiba were born with the correct soul formula to become the reincarnation of these people from 3000 B.C.E. without any actual blood relations but apparently, somehow, you got people from Ancient Egypt migrating to Ancient Japan. Sure, I mean if you did enough trading routes it could happen. It just seems like it would be a difficult transition?

And we could get real head canon and talk about their parentage since there’s a lot we don’t know. Mokuba and Kaiba could have different fathers, since they are quite different looking, which may be how Mokuba is exempt from all this lore while it still applies to Seto (Cuz Mokuba has been staring at that card for like quite a while and he cannot read it). But like, I don’t know if the show will even bother to cover that.

I don’t know if we’ll find out when in their bloodlines Kaiba and Yugi’s Egyptian cursed lines arrived in Japan. Was this during like the Edo period? Was this to set up a really bizarre Shogun Yugioh spinoff?

Wait, is that a thing? I don’t actually know, Yugioh seems to have like 8 spinoffs that all look a lot of the same to me. It may just be 1 spinoff that Netflix keeps changing the preview image of to trick me into thinking there’s 8 of them.

Or, did Kaiba have a relative that showed up in the 80′s and had a crazy weekend and a one night stand? Would Kaiba even know who his real Dad is?

Whatever, I’m sure there’s plenty of fanfic made over the last 20 years to cover this so I don’t have to. Moving on.

And then this kid’s show decided to tie up Mai to a wall or something? Man, Marik and chaining people up, this is the fourth person he’s chained up today! At least this time she doesn’t have a box over her head.

Still pretty kinky though.

Yo did Mokuba just...casually walk out of Marik’s Shadow Realm just now?

Again, do they cancel the game at this point because the equipment is...clearly malfunctioning? Like, this is the part that Kaiba is supposed to have full control of because he made all the equipment they’re using and he’s just...glossing over this? Like, this is the one thing that Kaiba would be like “OK wait, wait, we can’t ship it like this, my company is actually ruined if the game can do this, one sec, cancel everything.”

Nah. They just kinda watch.

And now, Marik decides to say the bird chant so we can hear what was actually written on the card and it was...a...

...it was the definition of what a poem is all right...

This is the lyrics to the Ra poem, just so you can see how bad it is. My search engine history will never be the same, but I just want y’all to glory on how kid’s show this poem is, compared to everything else going on in this kid’s show at this moment.

"Great beast of the sky, please hear my cry./

Transform thyself from orb of light and bring me victory in this fight/

Envelop the desert with your glow and cast your rage upon my foe./

Unlock your powers deep within so that together we may win./

Appear in this Shadow Game as I call your name,/

Winged Dragon of Ra"

Bravo, writers. Bravo. This corny as hell poem with its very awkward meter was voiced over alllllll the other nuts stuff going on in this show and guys, it’s a juxtaposition.

Now at this point, Kaiba has his poem he needs to make the card works--so he no longer needs to translate it--so he can just cancel. He’s got everything he wants now. Time to just cancel. Throw the cursed boy in whatever prison you got on this ship. In fact, just toss him off the ship entirely. You no longer need him. He doesn’t even have the card anymore. Mai has it.

I honestly think Kaiba just spaced the hell out at this point.

Also then Marik follows it up by saying this:

Joey gets wind that this is pretty bad and we’re going to get a very dead Mai--I mean Joey was the one who just recently got struck by lightning so it’d make sense that he’d be the one to say "I know for a real true fact none of you are going to do a damn thing about this unless I do this myself.” So he runs directly over to Kaiba but then I think the show decided to edit out him talking to Kaiba because it just jump cuts to Joey talking to Roland instead.

Like it really felt like Joey went the long way around to get on this platform but I dunno, maybe he tried to punch Kaiba in the Japanese version and that’s why they edited it out? I dunno.

Also, how many times will Joey get DQ’d before he actually gets DQ’d? Will anyone ever in fact get DQ’d in this entire tourney?

As Ra starts warming up his engines to start spewing fire all over the field, Joey decides to take a moment to try and talk to Mai. To tell her that yes, he did have a dream about her, but didn’t want to tell her earlier, because no teenage boy in their right mind would tell an adult woman that they had a dream about them during a near-death experience.

Which honestly most of it was lost on the fact that Mai can only hear him as a sort of ghostly spooky echo.

So then, through the power of...the show only calls if friendship, but it’s very vague, y’all...they break the curse that Marik put on Mai, and she remembers Joey. Also because Joey is touching her face. Like literally touching her. This would have been way spookier if she could not see him at this point.

So Ra is getting ready to fry these two up and I thought “wow, we’re gonna get two bodies at the end of this episode. What a treat!” but there’s a twist.

What? Lol what?

Within like 3 milliseconds, Yugi goes “dammit what are these assholes doing?” and leaps up to the platform and then takes yet another direct fireball hit in order to save Joey Wheeler. No one even asked Yugi to do this--he’s not even competing in this game, but he certainly got up there and took it.

This episode must have been a right up shipping frenzy when y’all were 12.

Marik is so pleased that he got to eff up Yugi more in this duel than the one that he actually tried to kill Yugi Muto in. If I remember correctly he did mention that this all was very convenient--I mean he got 3 in one go and he wasn’t even trying. So, Because Yugi is passed out and because Kaiba will never actually step in and stop anyone in this show unless Mokuba orders him to, Marik walks straight up to Joey and Mai and makes some more nonsense right in front of everyone on this show.

This is right in front of most of the entire cast.

Maybe it’s the color scheme but I got strong Stinky Cheese Man vibes from this magic effect.

I thought of pulling more caps from this point but there was waaaay too much shirtless Yugi in it. In my mind, all cartoon characters, when they take their shirt off, have another shirt on underneath. And if they take off that shirt, it’s yet another shirt. It’s shirts and boots leggings on all the way down to infinity like a russian nesting doll, and the image of shirtless Yugi really puts a kibosh to my world view and I didn’t like it.

No kinkshame, of course, if that’s your thing, well, you got a 18x18 pixel shirtless Yugi right there for you to enjoy. Enjoy.

Now that Mai has been trapped here in this hourglass resort, she will lose her memories of her friends for the rest of time, obsessively watching everyone else's vacations that are full of friends having way more fun than she is having.

This is just Instagram basically. Y’all, this is just Instagram.

And some of y’alls Instagram has shirtless Yugis in it, I just know it.

And not to get too real but like, last episode we went through how Marik basically gave Mai depression--and it says a lot that his way of doing this was illustrated in a show written like 20 years ago in a lot of the same way social media works today. Just throwing that out there.

Overall, I feel like the theme of the Mai ark is “Marik just sped up what they were already doing and it was super effective.” Mai trapped herself in her own false and negative insecurities. Kaiba failed to moderate anything. Joey waited way too late to say the right thing. Yugi sacrificed himself again to such a degree that he couldn’t save Mai later when Marik was just strutting around cursing people willy nilly.

And I’m not going to lie, Marik’s cargo pants/cape strut was hilarious.

It was probably supposed to be menacing, but this long cut of this ridiculous cast just watching this weird boy go was great.

Up until now Seto has been a very patient impatient person, but now it’s finally his duel, and he’s so excited to duel Ishizu--but y’all it’s just Seto up against a phsycic again. I imagine it’s gonna go real great.

Other than that one guy in town, will this boy ever duel a normal person?

Also...been debating on whether Mai is dead or alive, and her soul still seems attached to her body--like she’s still salvageable? So I’ll say alive for now. Seems more like a dream than like she literally got transported elsewhere.

Dude. It is S2 and I just realized that Mai Valentine is a pun.

Damn.

If you just got here, this is the end of S2 and things are rapidly losing their mind. Click here if you want to read from ep 1

#yugioh #yugioh recap #photo recap #s2 ep43 #So like this season is almost over and nothing is getting resolved?#joey wheeler #mai valentine #yugi muto #seto kaiba #marik ishtar #How many times in one day can yugi Muto get hit with a fireball #Do not understand how this boy isn't in smash yet #mokuba #tea gardner #tristan taylor #I guess duke devlin was also here in the background

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desert-locust · 7 years

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How to cheese Project Octopath Traveler Demo Ver.

Spoilers?

Playing as Olberic:

Before setting off to fight the brigands that kidnapped Philip, challenge everyone in town to a duel.

Item drops:

Watchman 1 - Healing Grape

Watchman 2 - Inspiriting Plum

Philip's Mother - Healing Grape

Headman - Fire Soulstone

Captain of the Watch - Inspiriting Plum

After getting through all the encounters, every NPC will be knocked out. Enter the house that the Headman was blocking for a Healing Grape (L) and the house that the Captain of the Watch for a Jewel of Vitality.

You can then rest at the Inn and save with the traveler. Walk outside the town and walk back in to find all of the NPCs back on their feet. Proceed to fight them again to farm for the items dropped. Note that the fight with the Captain is the only one that will last more than three turns, you can effectively skip this fight and farm for the plums via the other Watchman. Repeat the fights, rest at inn, save, exit and re enter as many times as you want to. Fire Soulstone sells for 100 (Currency?) So you can purchase the equipment from the General Store after enough of these are obtained and sold. I've been playing for an hour and have all the equipment and tons of cash. Now to enjoy the rest of the Demo!

#Nintendo #Nintendo Direct #Project Octopath Traveler #Project Octopath Traveler Demo Ver #Project Octopath Traveler Demo #Nintendo Switch #Square Enix #Cheesing #Exploit #Me

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rat-game · 4 years

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On adaptive AI in a jRPG context

In this piece I will talk about rat_games AI, how it will be implemented and why I choose the ways it works to... work that way. One of the main gripes with jRPGs like Final Fantasy, Pokémon and recently Octopath Traveler is the complexity of the AI. F.E.A.R, Left 4 Dead and the Sims implement revolutionary designed AI almost 15 years ago now, how is it then that playing the newest Pokémon the Trainers still work the exact same way. While I won’t claim that rat_game is the first jRPG to go a step further, doing so is the main motivation behind my entire battle system. Not only do I want it to be easily understandable but I also want it to allow for sophisticated and intelligent AI. It is fairly easy to write an AI that does well against the player. A trivial approach to an AI in a Fighting Game for example would be to analyze each player input, look up what move is best suited to for example block the attack and then execute this move. A lot of knock-off fighting games like Shaq Fu and Mortal Combat for the original gameboy (yes, they did that) took this approach and it is incredibly frustrating to play against. To remedy this, one approach would be to handicap the fighting game AI with input lag. Instead of processing the inputs and reacting in the same frame, the AI could react let’s say 20 frames later. The problem with this approach is that the AI is still too simple, it will always pick the same (optimal) action just delayed and the player will pick up on this and cheese them by for example spamming a move that will make them commit to a risky action every time and then just waiting it out and attacking. A good example for this is the final boss Dark Link in Zelda 2 for the NES. The fight is very difficult because the enemy can use the exact same moves Link can and you’d think that would make it a fair fight but because the AI is programmed as discussed above you can just stand in the corner making the AI jump infinitely and stabbing them while crouching to win. This exploit only works because the AI is programmed to do one thing depending on where the player is. Back to our hypothetical fighting game: the QA tells you about this problem, what do you do? The next step could be to introduce randomness. Instead of always picking the optimal action, the AI instead flips a coin, if heads they pick the optimal action, if tails they pick another action that’s suboptimal or even chosen at random. As far as I know the newer Pokémon games stop exactly there, difficulty is achieved by configuring how likely heads is in that coin toss, for wild pokemon they will always get tails and pick at random, for the Elite 4 champions they will always pick the optimal choice. I don’t like this approach because I would like my AI to be predictable, even if the enemy has a low difficulty. In my opinion the reason that AI like this doesn’t work is because it does not make use of a fundamental principal of computing: memory. Rarely (in jRPGs) will the AI consider previous moves by the player in their decision making process instead using simply the current state of the battle. For rat_game I tackled this problem maybe a little bit too hard as my AI does not only take into account the action in the current battle but (since my story is about a hivemind taking over the world and all of the bosses have literally the same brain in canon) the enemies take into account all of the players actions in all battles since the started the games story. Another intention with my AI that I rarely see addressed in jRPGs is multiple enemies planning strategies together. Even if the AI does take into account previous states, enemy A will analyze the states and pick an option and enemy B will do the same independently from enemy A. Being a hivemind I want my enemies to plan strategies together. For example one enemy could charge up a strong attack and to help them another enemy will protect them as long as they’re charging so they can’t get interrupted. How, then, will rat_game achieve these intentions? (warning for some programming stuff, it’s okay to skip the next paragraph)

During battle every move the player does is logged into basically a giant spreadsheet. The data stored however is not the entire game state but rather the part of the state the enemies character has access too. The player for example cannot see how many potions the enemy has left and similarly the enemy should not be able to see how much potions the player has left. Limiting what the enemy can observe in this way will make sure that the player does not feel cheated, if the enemy was controlled by a human they would have the same information the player has about the enemy and my AI should too. Having now generated all this data the AI will attempt to calculate the likelihood of what the player will do next. I studied Data Science and the first thing that springs into my head reading a problem like this is “neural networks!” or “model it as a markov chain!”. While this would work really well it is also in my opinion too sophisticated for my application. My system should only use relatively basic statistical techniques. This can happen on a by-attack basis, for example if the enemy considers casting a spell that prevents healing the attack will query the data set and lookup the average percent of one of the players party members was at before they were healed. Let’s say on average the player heals character A if they go below 40% health. If A is above this threshold the enemy will instead consider other options, if they are below they will prevent healing. This way will make the player feel like the enemy predicted their move but behind the scenes the actual calculation taking place is a simple averaging of the players health. What if multiple moves would be a good choice then? What if instead of preventing healing they enemy could’ve just attack the low-health character and killed them? To allow for this a scoring system will be implemented. Each attack-type will have a way to score how good of a choice it would currently be. Considering our healing decision the AI would look at the number of players it knows to be faster than the attacking enemy. If there are no players faster than them they will give the attack option a very high score of lets say 90 while the healing option will get 40 points. Which option is picked in the end is decided by randomness but rather than a simple coin-toss between two options all decisions are pooled and the likelihood to pick them is proportional to their current score. In our example attacking will have a 90 / (40+90) = ~70% chance to be picked while the heal prevention will have a 30% chance. This approach is similar to the coin-flip discussed above but as there will be way more than just two options and the chance for each options aren’t uniformly distributed making the outcome more predictable. If there is one objectively best answer for a problem the player knows that the enemy will go for that every time and if there isn’t, the player will have to think about what option is closest to it. Now that we know how the AI works how will we actually make it fun to fight against? Let’s first address difficulty: If every fight in the game had an AI that takes the entire data set into account it would be absolutely exhausting. Not every fight should be this much of a battle (no pun intended), hell, not even every boss should be in my opinion. My way to achieve a smooth difficulty curve is to create tiers of AI: A the very top we have the AI acting as described above: Analyzing all the players move they ever took. The only enemy that will do this is the final boss of the game. By that point the dataset will have grown very big and the more data the AI has the better it will be able to predict. Tiers below this will vary in how much data they take into account. For example the tier below the optimum could be that all moves that happened against an enemy of the same type are taken into account. The next tier could be only this battle, only the last 3 turns, only this current turn, etc.. This granularity will give me a lot of control of how to set how “smart” the enemy should act without actually implementing different AIs. The only thing that changes is how much data is considered. This inherently makes early-game enemies easier because the player just started out and the dataset will be small. This approach has furthermore the side effect that the player will be softly rewarded for switching up their strategy. If all they do is heal the same character and use the same move at first this will work but as they continue doing it the AI will score the option to counter it higher and higher until the point where the players strategy just gets countered completely. Surprising the AI with a creative approach will be the best way to catch them off-guard which may sound like it could make the AI trivial but if this is achieved by the player coming up with a new strategy every battle I am more than willing to let that happen. Another way to reduce the difficulty is a fairly obvious one: Give the enemy worse moves. If the enemy picks the optimal choice but the optimal choice is a move that isn’t that good it won’t feel unfair. This coupled with my AI will hopefully give the player a feeling that the AI does not only scale in the damage values like most jRPGs do but also in how smart it acts and that it reacts to what the player does. Closing on a personal note I will be honest and say that I have not yet fully implemented this. My engine is already set up on a software-design level to allow for this but I have so far focused on other things. When rat_game was still just a pipe dream I promised myself to make the best AI ever and use all this crazy data science stuff but having taken a step back I realized that sometimes simple is better. What is not better, however, is simplicity to the point of reducing sophistication to the point of what I have so far observed in many of my favorite jRPGs and I hope that my system will present a battle system that’s more engaging and impressive.

#rat_game #game development #game design #ai

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bugfragged · 4 years

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youtube

Reflect cheese is a thing in this game.

THE CULTISTS' TRAP - Let's Play 「 Octopath Traveler (PC) 」- 24

#video games #pc games #jrpg games #youtube #let's play #octopath traveler #square enix #acquire #steam #gaming #gameplay

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unsupervisedidiot · 6 years

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Who is my 26 yo self

1. Who was the last person you held hands with? A cute guy that I just started seeing 2. Are you outgoing or shy? Depends. Socially, very shy. But if you ever start me on politics or history, I get very passionate. 3. Who are you looking forward to seeing? That cute guy I just told you about 4. Are you easy to get along with? I think so. I don’t get angry very easily. And if i’m being honest I’m pretty darn funny 5. If you were drunk would the person you like take care of you? I guess? But I tend to take care of myself, thank you very much. 6. What kind of people are you attracted to? Kind, honest and caring people. I also absolutely adore guys with dark eyes and long eyelashes. 7. Do you think you’ll be in a relationship two months from now? Who knows! I sure don’t. 8. Who from the opposite gender is on your mind? fjdsk;afk 9. Does talking about sex make you uncomfortable? Absolutely not. 10. Who was the last person you had a deep conversation with? I guess it was that guy I’ve been seeing. 11. What does the most recent text that you sent say? I’m bitching about my landlord to my best friend. 12. What are your 5 favorite songs right now? Picture of Health, by We Were Promised Jetpacks - First View of Tokyo, by RADWIMPS, My Sweet Lord, by George Harrisson, Love like You, from Steven Universe and I guess Octopath Traveler’s entire soundtrack 13. Do you like it when people play with your hair? oMG YES 14. Do you believe in luck and miracles? Luck, yes, Miracles, no. 15. What good thing happened this summer? So many my dudes, so many. 16. Would you kiss the last person you kissed again? YUP 17. Do you think there is life on other planets? Absolutely 18. Do you still talk to your first crush? Not at all, but we’re friends on FB and he’s marrying the woman of his dreams this week, and I’m so happy for both of them. 19. Do you like bubble baths? I DOOOOO 20. Do you like your neighbors? nooooooooooo 21. What are you bad habits? Procrastinating, over eating (oops) 22. Where would you like to travel? I would like to go back to Japan and Italy, and I wish I could go to the UK, Ireland, Iceland, Finland, Denmark, etc. 23. Do you have trust issues? In myself, yes, In others, sometimes, mostly for friendship. Almost never for relationship. 24. Favorite part of your daily routine? Breakfast 25. What part of your body are you most uncomfortable with? Shoulders/boobs/arms 26. What do you do when you wake up? I check my phone. It’s a bad habit. 27. Do you wish your skin was lighter or darker? I’m quite happy with my skin! 28. Who are you most comfortable around? My friend Tania 29. Have any of your ex’s told you they regret breaking up? Nope. I actually broke up with almost all of them. 30. Do you ever want to get married? Honestly, I don’t know. I feel like it’s the kind of things I’ll know if I meet the right person for me. 31. Is your hair long enough for a pony tail? Yup 32. Which celebrities would you have a threesome with? Carrie Mulligan and Eddy Redmane? Dude, I don’t know. It’s weird. 33. Spell your name with your chin. gfsw no this is dumb i’m not doing it 34. Do you play sports? What sports? LOL 35. Would you rather live without TV or music? TV 36. Have you ever liked someone and never told them? Yes, multiple times. 37. What do you say during awkward silences? “En tout cas.” 38. Describe your dream girl/guy? Dark eyes/hair, smells nice, kind, curious, smart, likes to discover new food. 39. What are your favorite stores to shop in? EB Games, Indigo and Omer Deserres. 40. What do you want to do after high school? lol 41. Do you believe everyone deserves a second chance? Yes. Especially my students. But just one though. 42. If your being extremely quiet what does it mean? I’m thinking 43. Do you smile at strangers? Yeah? Like at the cash register or if someone has a dog 44. Trip to outer space or bottom of the ocean? Bottom of the ocean 45. What makes you get out of bed in the morning? Coffee 46. What are you paranoid about? That people don’t like me and are just pretending 47. Have you ever been high? Yup. 48. Have you ever been drunk? Yup. 49. Have you done anything recently that you hope nobody finds out about? Yup. 50. What was the colour of the last hoodie you wore? Grey 51. Ever wished you were someone else? Yes. 52. One thing you wish you could change about yourself? I wish I could be a bit more sociable. 53. Favourite makeup brand? Too Faced 54. Favourite store? Indigo 55. Favourite blog? none. 56. Favourite colour? Deep purples and blues 57. Favourite food? Sushi, ramen, Tartare, my dad’s osso bucco 58. Last thing you ate? Salmon with veggies on egg noodles. 59. First thing you ate this morning? Bagel with smoked salmon cream cheese 60. Ever won a competition? For what? I don’t think so? I don’t like competitive stuff 61. Been suspended/expelled? For what? For missing out school with my first boyfriend. We skipped math to kiss in the park in front of my high school. My teenage self had no sense of priorities. 62. Been arrested? For what? Almost! For protesting. 63. Ever been in love? Yes, but very few times. 64. Tell us the story of your first kiss? I was drunk, he was high. I was mad that the guy I liked didn’t give me the attention I wanted, so I kissed this one guy instead. Yup, every little girl’s dream of a first kiss, ladies and gentlemen 65. Are you hungry right now? Nope! Just had dinner 66. Do you like your tumblr friends more than your real friends? No 67. Facebook or Twitter? Twitter 68. Twitter or Tumblr? Twitter 69. Are you watching tv right now? Nop. 70. Names of your bestfriends? Tania and Francis 71. Craving something? What? Can’t tell! 72. What colour are your towels? White! 72. How many pillows do you sleep with? Too many 73. Do you sleep with stuffed animals? Nope! 74. How many stuffed animals do you think you have? 4? 75. Favourite animal? DOGGO 76. What colour is your underwear? Teal! 77. Chocolate or Vanilla? Chocolate 78. Favourite ice cream flavour? Mint and chocolate chips! 79. What colour shirt are you wearing? Stripped 80. What colour pants? Jeans 81. Favourite tv show? Wow that’s hard. Probably card captor sakura? Princess Jellyfish? How I met your mother? 82. Favourite movie? That’s also super hard. I’d say the LOTR trilogy 83. Mean Girls or Mean Girls 2? Haven’t seen the second one. 84. Mean Girls or 21 Jump Street? ? 85. Favourite character from Mean Girls? All of them. 86. Favourite character from Finding Nemo? Dory! 87. First person you talked to today? Tania! 88. Last person you talked to today? It’ll be Tania, Francis or Lara! 89. Name a person you hate? Trump, my landlord. 90. Name a person you love? I’m not in love right now. 91. Is there anyone you want to punch in the face right now? lol. yes. 92. In a fight with someone? No? I don’t think so. 93. How many sweatpants do you have? One! 94. How many sweaters/hoodies do you have? Three 95. Last movie you watched? Kimi no na wa 96. Favourite actress? Oh that’s hard. Emma Watson 97. Favourite actor? Eddie Redmayne, Adam Driver 98. Do you tan a lot? NOOOOOO 99. Have any pets? I wish I had a doggo ;___; 100. How are you feeling? Tired! 101. Do you type fast? Yes! 102. Do you regret anything from your past? No, not really. 103. Can you spell well? In French, yes! 104. Do you miss anyone from your past? No. 105. Ever been to a bonfire party? Yup. 106. Ever broken someone’s heart? Yes. 107. Have you ever been on a horse? Yes! 108. What should you be doing? MY HOMEWORKS 109. Is something irritating you right now? My landlord. 110. Have you ever liked someone so much it hurt? Yes. 111. Do you have trust issues? Wait, again? 112. Who was the last person you cried in front of? I don’t think he noticed but that guy I keep talking about. We talked about my mom, he said something (it wasn’t mean or anything, but it made me realize there are some things I should have done differently). 113. What was your childhood nickname? Gaby or Gab! 114. Have you ever been out of your province/state? Yes! 115. Do you play the Wii? I have a Switch! 116. Are you listening to music right now? Yes! We were promised jetpacks. 117. Do you like chicken noodle soup? YUS 118. Do you like Chinese food? YUS 119. Favourite book? All the Harry Potter books 120. Are you afraid of the dark? Yes. 121. Are you mean? I don’t think so. 122. Is cheating ever okay? No. 123. Can you keep white shoes clean? Nope. 124. Do you believe in love at first sight? No. 125. Do you believe in true love? Yes. But I don’t think everybody finds it. 126. Are you currently bored? Nope. 127. What makes you happy? Food, kisses, video games, good books. 128. Would you change your name? No, i like it! 129. What your zodiac sign? Gemini 130. Do you like subway? The restaurant? It’s ok i guess 131. Your bestfriend of the opposite sex likes you, what do you do? Well this guy is in a relationship with my best friend, so I slap him back to reason. But I truly believe that the boyfriends i’ve had were my best friends at the time, so in that regards... it’s fine. 132. Who’s the last person you had a deep conversation with? Again? 133. Favourite lyrics right now? I always thought I might be bad, now I know that it’s true cause I think you’re so good and I’m nothing like you. Look at you go, I just adore you, i wish that I knew what makes you think I’m so special 134. Can you count to one million? No. Life is too short. 135. Dumbest lie you ever told? “I love you” yup, I’m that jerk. 136. Do you sleep with your doors open or closed? I don’t have a door! 137. How tall are you? Short. 138. Curly or Straight hair? I prefer curly 139. Brunette or Blonde? No opinion really. 140. Summer or Winter? WINTER 141. Night or Day? Day 142. Favourite month? December 143. Are you a vegetarian? Nope. 144. Dark, milk or white chocolate? Dark 145. Tea or Coffee? Coffee 146. Was today a good day? Yeah! 147. Mars or Snickers? Mars. 148. What’s your favourite quote? Never be cruel, never be cowardly. Always try to be nice, but never fail to be kind. Laugh hard. Run fast. Be kind. - The Doctor. 149. Do you believe in ghosts? No.

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