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Update LXXXVII - Featuring: Inoue going sicko mode Music: Forfeit - The Dragon Inquires  Up next on our trip down memory lane is...  The Vermilion Tower! This floor has Criminal Dragons, Spy Dragons, Darkmorph Dragons, and Doom Lizards.    We finally get a checkpoint, saving me from running through the entire place each time I go shuffle my party.  We also finally start getting ultimate for every class, as is the norm for these bonus dungeons. There's just one teeny-tiny itsy-bitsy problem with them...  They're worse than the DLC weapons, meaning they're only useful if you're using multiples of the same class. Only by a few points, sure, but you're still shelling out money for end-game power.  The Cat Tail is the ultimate evasion booster, giving +20% EVD. Combine it with a God Hand's SPD Acupressure and you'll get 45% evasion! ...If evasion was worthwhile over killing the enemy faster.  Downgrade for Mages.  There's a second door on this floor, but it's unusable.  So we have to take the one by the teleporter.  Which leads to Chika and Rika.  This time, the Mage Squad will finally get to do something.  Video: VS Chika and Rika (Again) Music: Battlefield - The Hunter   The massive boost in LF Shadow Agni had is matched by Chika and Rika, with both coming in with 21K LF for a combined 42K LF to burn through.    You know the drill by now.         The Mage Squad has the bare minimum in levels and only has a single level in Volt Storm. This is entirely Inoue's show.            And in one turn Inoue brought Chika to half and nearly killed Rika on the spot.  And you know what the best part is?  Since I needed three turns to set up, I only have to wait one turn before I can do another Unison!    Rika goes down on the first hit.  Inoue's landed so many hits from this that she's fully restocked her EX.  And Chika's a hair off from death.   And done.  Music: Finish Them Off  Music: Forfeit - The Dragon Inquires   And, as the first dragon in this universe, devour the very life it gave birth to...    Next is the lobby of the Diet. Here we have Killhorns, Icemorphs, Carrions, and Noble Rosiers.  ATK/MAT +7, SPD +5.  The only thing to note is that Killhorn Alphas are so bulky that they only take a bit over half their health from Earthquake.   This floor is really short.  The next boss is Yuma, naturally.  The theme this time is Really High Damage.  Video: VS Yuma (Again) Music: Battlefield - The Hunter   Due to his full heal gimmick, Yuma has a much lower 23K LF compared to Chika and Rika combined 42K. Dropping down to Casual still cuts his health in half.   Two turns to buff up.      Who needs Unison?  Music: Finish Them Off  Music: Forfeit - The Dragon Inquires  This phenomenon has never occurred in any previous worlds... However, doing so has caused a contradiction, and created many other dragon-occupied realms. Is this what you truly desire? The despair and confusion that has been born from your decision...?   Also there are two chests here.  Downgrade for Samurai.   And we're sent directly to ND.  Breath of Life is a really annoying buff, so ND will not be allowed to move.  One of ND's roses is noticably clipping into the ground. Video: VS ND (Again) Music: Re:Vanishment feat. Annabel   28K LF. It won't last long.     No buffs for you.   And to make absolutely sure she's stuck I put her to sleep.        Music: Finish Them Off   If you deny this realm, its dragons shall too be erased. You have that power... There shall be one human waiting for you at the top of the tower ahead... He shall be alongside the dragon of beginning. Now go. Give your answer.   The cutscene sends us to... the top of the Vermilion Tower?    More weapon downgrades.  Nyala's staircase from the end of 2020 is here this time, but there's no way that-   Oh, come on. Next time: We finish the Shadow Realm.
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May 23, 2023 03:21
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| # ? Apr 27, 2024 11:02 |
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Okay actually there was a reason Hypnos didn't get many upgrades. For whatever reason all human bosses in the Shadow Realm only get stat increases. They get no adjustments to their skills or AI. Hypnos funnily enough, counts as a human internally, so she skipped out on the upgrades. Nodens... barely gets much of an upgrade either. It's namely stats. The only change to her skillset is that the break chance for Breath of Life is 40% instead of 66%. Her AI is completely untouched. No she's not counted as a human. Her internal enemy classification is a dragon boss.
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May 23, 2023 03:34
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Update LXXXVIII - Featuring: The last (or is it first?) dragon Music: Forfeit - The Dragon Inquires  Yes, they really are throwing the entire second half of 2020's final dungeon at us before we can reach the end.  (God Hand downgrade.)  But what makes this even stranger- Music: Battlefield - UE77  Is that this is the only map in the entire game that has the Alien enemies show up. We got the blue Alien Luzela, the yellow Alien Luzelo, and the red Alien Luzeli. You know? The Aliens? The ones Yuno has been summoning ever since we hit Tier 2 skills in Atlantis?  And since they aren't dragons, we find out that the Shadow Realm's normal battle theme is Battlefield - UE77 again.   Despite being at the very end of the dungeon, the Aliens give jack for EXP. A single Little Dragon from the second section gives more than that.  Since we have a ways before we hit the end, I want to talk about something.  Namely: Can VFD be fixed?  Not story-wise, I mean, that's a lost cause.  But would it be possible to unbreak VFD's gameplay? Ever since we hit Preloma, like 95% of the game has been one Earthquake after another.  Honestly, I don't think you could.  (50% status resist.)  Even if you take a hatchet to Brave Sword and Earthquake, the real low hanging fruit, there's still so many ways to snap the game over your knee.  Unison still exists, but how could you reasonably nerf it?  Require three bars on everyone instead of two? Congratulations, you crippled any team with a Fortuner while dedicated Unison teams are delayed by a single turn.  (Duelist downgrade.)  Double charge timers on Agent, Rune Knight, and Mage? Alright, you brought them to the same baseline as most other classes, but now every enemy that does a turn 1 buff basically gets to do whatever they want while you have no way to break it. No 1 turn charges on ND means you will get nailed by Thorns of Light, while also rendering physical damage irrelevant for the first few turns.  Iod's waiting at the end of the floor.    Iod's a loving liar.  We still got two full floors of this left.   And now we're back to dragons. Shadow Beta has Micro Dragons, Fly Dragonicas, Hammerstrike Dragons, Forval Dragons, Tyrannosauruses, and Twinhorns.  Back on topic...  Okay, what if you just scrap Unison entirely? There's no possible way to balance getting 9 free actions, after all.  Well you put a modicum of difficulty in boss fights, sure, but you still have no risk of attrition in dungeons because you have three full parties you can swap between and use levels to fully heal anyone that starts to get winded.  Reduce leaked EXP? Well now you've just made it a pain to keep each party evenly leveled.  Hell, take the nuclear option and remove the backrow teams entirely?   Well congratulations, you now can't use the Atlantis or Eden classes without completely benching whoever you made in Tokyo, so suddenly a full half of the game's roster becomes much more difficult to use. You'd have to completely rework how all the unlockable classes are obtained.  There's just so many little things that add up.  Even just items having priority helps the initial classes not having a dedicated healer, but it also means they're 100% safe. Also fun fact, items don't actually have priority and seem to just give you a massive boost in speed. I've had a few times here where an enemy managed to go before an item even without Freeze applied. I guess the boost is just big enough that it literally only falls off in the post-game.  Trying to balance VFD would take so many changes that it just wouldn't be the same game by the time you're done.  And if you're going to go that far, you might as well just go the distance and make your own game.  Thankfully, this is the final area of the dungeon. It has Micro Dragons, Fly Dragonicas, Megamaw Dragons, Twinhorn Dragons, and Demon Dragons.   Samurai downgrade.   Even the bonus dungeon can't really pose a threat when I can do 15 EX moves in a row.      And that's the end of the Shadow Realm.  I'll be honest, I sorta ran out of ideas here and just threw all the team leaders at the final bonus boss.    So who could be waiting for us?  Is Takehaya going to show up out of nowhere and become the second boss to be fought in all four games alongside Nyala?   It's...  Blaster Raven?  And there's just a dragon chilling behind him?   This is the first life form that the shadow of our universe gave birth to. The dragon of beginning. It is... a True Dragon. However, it is still small. It will eventually bring life to this world, before going on to consume that very life.   I often wonder how many of my friends would still be alive were it not for the True Dragons. It wasn't even that they all were killed. Many lost their lives to an all-consuming despair... Kirino you seriously aren't trying to both sides the dragons are you? Without the Seed of Life planted by Iod, humanity would never have come into existence. Therefore, killing this dragon is essentially eliminating any chance of new life forms being created. Is extinguishing new possibilities in order to prevent tragedy truly the best solution...? On the other hand, letting this dragon live would unquestionably cause new despair in the future.  I still have my pride as a protector of our planet. Let us fight. The decision will go to the victor. Think about your options while we fight...That's right, the last boss of the base game is Kirino Ayafumi.  The guy that got his rear end kicked on screen every time he picked a fight.  The guy that was a one-off sidequest boss Opal beat on her own. Video: VS Blaster Raven Music: Battlefield - The Hunter  Of course, he isn't going to make it easy for us, what with his jump from 2.9K LF to 47,393! That's more than all of VFD's phases combined. And on top of that, he has a 30% resistance to elemental damage, complete immunity to Hack, 383 ATK, 314 DEF, and 133 SPD. Blaster Raven will break you in half and take anything you can throw at him without flinching.  Not even a perfectly timed War Cry can save us now.  Cutting down on damage here is Not Optional.  Although moveset-wise, Raven's pretty much the same as he was when Opal fought him. Normal attack, Blaster Shot, Blaster Fist, and a self-buff. He at least takes two moves a turn now that this isn't a 1v1.  I think that would have killed without Deafening Roar.    On turn 2, I make sure to have Valerie use Substitute.  Because he'll whip out Blaster Fist with no hesitation, catching you off guard if you were expecting him to buff up first like in the God Hand quest. Since each hit is randomly targeted, Substitute will draw them all in, and the 1.3x DEF buff combined with Deafening Roar will take all the bite out of it.  In a small bit of mercy, Raven will only act once on turns where he uses Blaster Fist.   Honestly, GEORGE! is actually a rather subpar pick here. Raven just has so much bulk that GEORGE! won't deal much damage before running out of bombs for good, at which point the Banisher's intended drawback of having to choose between mediocre bombless moves or dead turns reloading are actually allowed to do something.  Valerie, on the other hand, is perfect. Blaster Raven only has 186 MDF compared to his 314 DEF, so a quick MAT buff from Opal will let her tear through him.  The LF cap is 500, for reference.  And to make things even worse-  He's traded Blaster Strength, a 1.4x ATK buff, for Limiter Release, a 2.0x buff with a measly 40% break chance. It only lasts for two turns, but he will get a kill if he's allowed to move.  So I just have to make sure that he doesn't move.  Although some insurance never hurts.    Aria gets GEORGE! back up.    I honestly feel sorry for GEORGE! here. He spent the entire back half of the game tearing apart everything that moves, and now he can barely tickle Blaster Raven.     That's just sad.  Null Action finally wore off.  Too little, too late. But you know what the funny thing is?  It's theoretically possible to get here without ever meeting Blaster Raven.  Keep something in Nodens unbuilt so you can skip his entire set of sidequests while still having 50 Dz for Iod, never get the God Hand EX skill, and don't buy the DLC so you don't see him there. Suddenly the bonus boss is a random guy who shows up out of nowhere in a dead universe who picks a fight with you so you can't kill a dragon. Music: Finish Them Off  Music: Forfeit - The Dragon Inquires   In truth... this is what I have wished for all along...    And then Kirino just... walks away. How did he even get here anyways? Did he get booted here when we wiped dragons from existence and there was no reason for Kirino to go full Robocop? Did we Chrono Cross his rear end?   In this series all about killing dragons, Iod is the one dragon we never get a chance to fight, let alone kill.   I won't fight it.Getting the lame choice out of the way first. So that is your answer... And then the dragon just turns around and leaves.  This dragon shall bring about the birth of new life in this universe... Limitless possibilities are now attainable. This universe shall likely experience greater tragedy than you have ever seen. The decision that you made will nurture a new future for this realm... A future which shall see a physical manifestation of your willpower. All you must do is wait... Wait for a new life... A new story...  And then we get booted to the credits. But come on, we're dragon hunters! The entire drat series has been spent killing every dragon we see! ~ I want to fight.The only good dragon is a dead dragon!  So that is your answer...  And the very final dragon we fight?  The same Little Dragon we fought all the way back in Seventh Encount. Exact same stats and everything. Anything can kill it in a single hit at this point.  Anything.  In time, this shadow realm shall begin to disappear... Your decision has caused an entire universe... billions of possible futures... to vanish. However, this is but one universe. There are limitless others... You will be unable to interfere with all of them. Someday, dragons shall come into existence once again, in a realm you will not have control over. That existence shall mark the beginning of a new life... A new story... And our entire trip here was entirely pointless! No matter what we do here there's still an infinite number of dragons devouring an infinite number of universes! This is clearly an attempt to leave a soft sequel hook in case they managed to get another 7D game greenlit! That's really loving ballsy of VFD! Music: Re:Vanishment feat. Annabel  All we get for our troubles is a different credits scene! The end, no moral! Next time: OK, OK★
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May 25, 2023 03:39
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brb deleting my thread
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May 25, 2023 03:54
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VFD gets into a pretty heady philosophical topic that it's not really qualified to handle with the choice at the end of the bonus dungeon. Ultimately the choice boils down to: If an existence is doomed to end in suffering, is it better for it to never have existed at all, or do the good things that precede that ending justify allowing it to exist? Or perhaps more pointedly, all humans will die, and there is no hard evidence that anything particularly good happens past that point. In fact, by our current understanding of physics, the universe itself will eventually decay into nothingness, leaving no trace that it was ever filled with anything at all. Given this, would it have been better for us to never have come into being in the first place? Or do the things we experience while we exist carry some intrinsic value, despite the ephemeral nature of all things? Personally, I'm not a fan of questions like that, so I just killed the dragon because gently caress dragons.
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May 25, 2023 04:11
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Sure, the True Dragons may be the genesis of life in this setting. There's nothing saying there can't be another answer that doesn't require such a vicious cycle except this one asshat that's part of said cycle. So gently caress him. Find another way, though it may be doomed to fail. Such a pursuit is more worthwhile than this loaded philosophical question Iod's attempting to sucker you into. Materant fucked around with this message at 04:30 on May 25, 2023 |
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May 25, 2023 04:27
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Time to put my thread on hold as well. Oh wait. Iod is such a huge blowhard here, and he basically goes "but but, there are other universes out there you can't do anything about!" gently caress off, Iod. (even though it's supposed to serve as an out in case more new 7th Dragon games somehow get made) so uh. What was the trip to the Shadow Realm about then?
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May 25, 2023 04:59
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And yeah, I don't think you can really make VFD's gameplay balanced as well. You'd have to change so much that you might as well make a different game. If you buff up the opposition to match your absurd power level, you'd get a kaizo level experience. Or fights have to have Blaster Raven tier durability to stand a chance. And this isn't taking into account Unison which is one of the most broken mechanics in the entire game. Anyways there's Blaster Raven's stats, with the 2nd set being the 1v1 duel much earlier in the game. Dude is loving tanky. You wanna know how he shrugged off a goddamn Earthquake? That's how. He's the only enemy in the entire game completely immune to hack, other than the hopeless fight with Spectus. quote:Blaster Raven (LV. 95/90) quote:Blaster Raven (LV. 54/52) Blaster Raven's skillsets. He's a pretty simple boss. He just bench presses you with the power of raw stats. If you do not break Limiter Release, you will die! Blaster Raven 1 posted:-Take 1 action per turn. His 1v1 AI. Pretty simple attack rotation. Blaster Raven Post-Game posted:Routine 1: His unsimplified AI in the post-game. Because his simplified AI is just: quote:Opening Turn: Yeah. He's a considerably less sophisticated boss than Takehaya was. He basically just bench presses you with raw stats. Araxxor fucked around with this message at 06:32 on May 25, 2023 |
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May 25, 2023 06:27
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Update LXXXIX - Featuring: The End Music: The Daily Grind  Reloading our save after beating Blaster Raven brings us right back to Quantum Nodens.  Although the man himself is still there if you ever want a rematch. The very last thing left to do is Allie's Death March, a post-post-game boss rush that'll make Kirino look like a joke. I need to do a bit of preparing first. I've spent the entire time treating the game fairly, (as fairly as VFD can be treated, at any rate) but for this I'm pulling out all the stops.  A bit of offscreen grinding later, and this will be our party going in. The Mage Squad has been turned into the Rune Knight Squad, and everyone has been leveled straight to 99. Music: Let's Get to Work!!     This is a confidential quest from President Allie! Even I don't know the contents. I have a message... "If you seek higher heights, even after conquering space itself, come to the Parliament Building." That's what it says. I wonder what it's supposed to mean... Unit 13, please prepare for any possible situation before heading to the Parliament Building. Music: UE77 Tokyo  Music: Forfeit - The Dragon Inquires  Allie is right at the entrance.    *nods* Just as I expected! That must mean you're pretty bored... correct? I am so thrilled to see that my beloved Unit 13 has gained powers that surpass even the gods★ Now then, it's play time! Show me the power that toppled even the 7th True Dragon★ *nods*  Allie moves right by the elevators.  And she has friends.  The dragons won't start a fight if you touch them, but they'll turn to face you when you approach.  Music: Battlefield - No. 7 Incursion  The theme for the Death March is...  High Dragons, all of which got skipped over in the Shadow Realm. True Spectus starts us off with 25K LF. That puts him only 3K below ND's refight!  Since I now have the unbridled power of a full Rune Knight backrow, I can just play around for two turns.   Oh, and Valerie now has enough base LF for Life Oath to push her right to the cap of 500. Brave Sword has now hit 100% power.  Spectus finally gets to use his super move.  It doesn't kill.   Aaaaaaaaaaaaaand G-  G????????????????   How did Brave Sword go from dealing 10K+ damage just one fight ago to not even breaking 1K?????? The answer is stat bloat. Every boss in this gauntlet has at least 300 DEF and MDF. Valerie has 357 MAT, reduced to 321 thanks to her Burn. True Spectus has 315 MDF. The damage formula is ((attack - defense) * skill power) * multipliers. So we get ((321 - 315) * 7.5) * (350 * 0.02) for a total of 315, and the other Rune Knights are hindered by only having shop weapons available. Even if Valerie wasn't Burned she'd still only deal around 2K damage. There are exactly two choices right now. Either I grind for hours upon hours using the reclass feature to give everyone a ton of MAT to beat over the enemy's MDF...  ...or I get creative. I did do a bit more offscreen grinding, mind you, but that was just to get the Rune Knight Squad (plus Valerie) 500 LF after LIFE Bonus. That way Brave Sword is hitting for full even though they can't use Life Oath in the backrow. Opal also gets 500 LF because God Hands give bonus LF as a reclass bonus in the first place.  Okay, take two. Video: Allie's Death March  The plan here is really simple:  Aria's entire job is to spam the poo poo out of Ichor. As long as one person survives the turn, any dead allies will automatically revive.  Opal has to land Spinning Edge to stick an MDF debuff. She also gives an extra layer of safety in the event the party dies in one turn. If The Final Flame procs, she'll get back up and Ichor will revive the others like normal.  And Aiden goes for lostpower.exe. Boss has sky high defensive stats? Just debuff them into oblivion.   This is why I need Ichor.    There's the setup.  And the verdict?  Much better.     The bosses here give some small rewards, which is odd when you'll probably be at level 99 with every skill you want maxed out by the time you get here.   Up next is...  A palette swapped Mayhem Fossil?  With an entirely new name? This is the only High Dragon in the Death March that gets this kind of treatment, which makes me wonder if the devs were planning on having us fight Mayhem a third time at some point.  I hope you like my strategy, because I'm using it for the whole thing.  Sylosis has 22K LF and has the same moveset as Mayhem Fossil. The only difference is that for whatever reason Dragon Action has a priority of 5 (just above normal moves) instead of 7. (highest possible) If you want to game the system a bit, you could hold off on EX moves until turn 3 to outspeed Dragon Action and get some easy damage in.  Oh no!  Anyways.  Skipping ahead a bit, this gauntlet actually makes the one drawback to Brave Sword relevant:  Unlike Duelist and Banisher, which have all secondary costs negated in Unison, Brave Sword still eats the user's LF like normal. In any other circumstance you could simply patch the Rune Knight up between fights, but back-to-back bosses like this means that Valerie's sitting at 30% LF and will do no damage if she tries a second Brave Sword. Of course, even this incredibly minor issue is rendered irrelevant due to one simple fact:  A single use of Brave Sword leaves the user right inside Vengeful Sword's best damage range. I just have to keep track of which Rune Knights have used their one Brave Sword and swap to Vengeful for every subsequent fight.   It's nowhere near as much as Brave Sword, sure, but six of them coming out at the same time will still deal a decent chunk of damage.  Plus I, you know, still have undamaged Rune Knights on hand to keep on Brave Swording.    Music: Forfeit - The Dragon Inquires  Back in the Diet, Allie has moved to another part of the dungeon.  She's in the Council Chamber, and uh...  Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhh...  Music: Battlefield - No. 7 Incursion   First up in this set is Zero Blue with 22K LF.      Second is Insomnia with 25K LF.   He also dies, but it takes my last Brave Sword to do it.   Trinnitro with 20K LF.  I got greedy and didn't heal when I should have.  And even a second try nearly failed.   Hack failing to land means I don't get the kill.   Just means I needed a second.    And finally, Tiamat with 22K LF. This is all individually lower than what the Shadow Realm bosses ended up with, but keep in mind that we do have to do all of this in one shot. That's 89K total LF we have to burn through, and with no chance to swap parties between fights like with VFD.  Since I can go and hit the Cat Cafe after this I can pop EX to ensure Hack lands.     I'd like to point out that this was an available strategy from the moment we hit Kazan.  *chuckle* Is it almost time for the main course? You like flowers, don't you? I'll be waiting at Chidorigafuchi Park★Music: Forfeit - The Dragon Inquires   A quick stop at the Cat Cafe later, and I head to the last stretch of the Death March.    And Allie just straight up summons VFD's final form.  This is truly the ultimate battle! Music: VFD ─ Vicarius Filii Dei  34K LF, putting it above ND's refight but below Blaster Raven.  Also Aiden landed Quick Hack so lol.   While VFD has more health than any boss in the last set, the break between fights means I can patch up my Rune Knights and get another 6 Brave Swords to use.  Music: Forfeit - The Dragon Inquires  The growth of living things is truly priceless★ It brings me immeasurable joy.     And the final fight in Allie's Death March is against Allie herself. Music: Dragon of Creation and Destruction  And, bizarrely, an entirely new color scheme to go along with her 38K LF. Even more bizarre is the fact that ND actually gets three new moves for this fight, albeit just reskins of Peck called Poison Beak, Paralyze Beak, and Sharp Beak which have a Poison, Paralysis, and Bleed rider respectively.   She also has 360 MDF and 400 DEF.   But while ND has enough health to survive a barrage-  The fact that debuff timers don't advance during Unison means I can follow up lostpower.exe with sleepmode.exe and be 100% safe until my next Unison.  And GG.   So ends Allie's Death March.  Music: Forfeit - The Dragon Inquires  Unit 13, you have proven that you are truly the strongest in the universe. Here is your reward!  In a world on a different plane of existence... I just can't wait until that time comes!  The ND Defeat Certificate is just a pointless key item you can use to show off. Music: The Daily Grind   Although if you want to do it again, Allie's Death March is a repeatable quest.  But I would really rather not do that.  So I believe I shall call it here. I'm BisbyWorl, and this has been 7th Dragon III Code: VFD. BisbyWorl fucked around with this message at 09:53 on Jul 18, 2023 |
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May 26, 2023 01:15
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The AI of the bosses here aren't any different, neither are their skillsets. Aside from Trinnitro who got a slight buff to Quick Regen. They're namely stat inflated. Motherly Dragons Nodens isn't really that much different from Nodens. She does have more variations of peck, but those are put into her AI's rotation. Anyways here's the VFD enemy stat sheet which also contains encounter formations if you're curious. VFD enemy skillsets. And enemy AI. Oh and turns out items in this game give a 2x speed boost. And that was the video game. What a strange product.
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May 26, 2023 01:55
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It was all worth it for the music and Valerie's winsome smile.
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May 28, 2023 13:53
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| # ? Apr 27, 2024 11:02 |
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Thanks for doing this LP! I have to agree that this game's combat is unsalvageable. All of the factors combine into a game that requires rocket tag for challenge, and by the time you're playing rocket tag, adjusting the game balance is nearly impossible.
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May 29, 2023 02:05
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