![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
freshfeelingThis sixth and final session of play in the quest of the voweless knights was played on January 15, 2022. Even though there's a bit of grinding at the beginning, this was the shortest session in this particular playthrough.
I started by coming to terms with the fact that a few levels might help. I decided to grind using the Eye in the Ice Cave. Earlier, the Ice Cave was a terrible place to be, but it's quite a bit more tolerable now with things like Ribbons and ProRings and... levels. We started with everyone at levels 17 and 18. We fought the Eye enough in 10 minutes to get to level 21, and then I wasn't paying close enough attention and walked into a hole.
By about the 15 minute mark, we were starting to hit level 23. No O was hit with RUB by a Mage, and then No I went down, too, so I figured I should leave. We were running into Wizards on the way out, and while they used to be quite scary they definitely aren't anymore. I also decided to grab AFIR for No O and No E; I seem to have removed from all characters when correcting an earlier error. I had made some good use of ALIT so I thought AFIR might be useful, too.
With our new levels, here's a look at the party:
And here's a look at our stuff, which is final besides possibly the Masmune:
On our first dive (or, more accurately, our 15th?), No I got affected by a Mage's RUB spell before Phantom and I decided I was starting over. On the second (or 16th), the Phantom was no problem. No I was petrified on the earth floor, but we had Soft Potions so it was a non-issue. We also managed to swat Lich before he NUKEd us.
Kary was so afraid of our newfound AFIR that she didn't even try to burn us. We took her out without much issue.
Fighting Waters on the water floor earned No I a level where he crossed the 96-hit threshold to earn an extra hit, so that might help. Kraken didn't one-shot anyone this time, so that's a treat. He two-shot No O though, which isn't way better. But we won. We'll press on.
We got the Masmune, and we beat Tiamat with the remaining three knights alive.
We had a whole plan for Chaos. AFIR, ALIT, and White Shirt (or maybe RUSE) to get high evasion. Let CUR4 happen, and then go on the offensive. We actually didn't need to do AFIR or ALIT, since No O was dead. No I, who has no Ribbon, was killed by Chaos' CRACK fairly early on. No E and No A seemed to be hanging in there, although No E was hit by SLO2 after several turns and clobbered with a critical attack shortly after. Suddenly, this wasn't going well.
Y'know, that is still somewhat encouraging. This was a lot simpler feeling than most of the runs yesterday.
Attempt #17: We didn't hit a lot of unrunnable battles and thus the pace of this run was way faster. Lich did manage to NUKE us this time, but everyone survived so it wasn't a big deal. Kary took us a couple of rounds, but barely made a dent in the voweless crew at all.
Kraken did some damage, but we also got ALIT and a load of White Shirt spam off and then stall for healing against him. It worked out pretty well!
As I got the Masmune, I said, "Just so you know, I am thinking about whether this run is going well or not and I'm choosing not to comment on it because doing so will destroy me. You know?". We reached Tiamat in excellent condition. Everyone survived BANE, too. It went well.
Here are our stats before this attempt at Chaos:
You can see we've arrived in great condition! We'd need some pretty terrible luck to fail this time. A good strategy could help, too. We used AFIR, ALIT, and some evasion bonuses and we also happened to dodge CRACK on turn 1. We're still going to try to boost evasion, and No I and No O are just going to be attacking henceforth, with the Masmune and Xcalbur, respectively. Chaos tried to get No I with SLO2, but it didn't work, which is just awesome.
After that, we were fully buffed! Our offense was solid. In fact... we managed to outpace CUR4.
Despite the 17 attempts at the final dungeon, this was generally a very fun and unique variant playthrough. It was a new way to experience the game, taking the most powerful class in the game and treating it differently but with clear restrictions, and not requiring excessive grinding nor excessive luck. It really seemed like the tiny bit of grinding at the start of this session really helped me win.
How about further runs of this sort? I don't want to beat this idea to death by trying it in a ton of other games or anything like that... but in the relevant GameFAQs thread, beege_man and The_Hacker both suggested doing this with mages and I think that might be legitimately interesting. White mages without the letter A or U would be neat, and black mages without the letter I would be very different. One day I might do that one.
<< First | < Previous | Index
I started by coming to terms with the fact that a few levels might help. I decided to grind using the Eye in the Ice Cave. Earlier, the Ice Cave was a terrible place to be, but it's quite a bit more tolerable now with things like Ribbons and ProRings and... levels. We started with everyone at levels 17 and 18. We fought the Eye enough in 10 minutes to get to level 21, and then I wasn't paying close enough attention and walked into a hole.
By about the 15 minute mark, we were starting to hit level 23. No O was hit with RUB by a Mage, and then No I went down, too, so I figured I should leave. We were running into Wizards on the way out, and while they used to be quite scary they definitely aren't anymore. I also decided to grab AFIR for No O and No E; I seem to have removed from all characters when correcting an earlier error. I had made some good use of ALIT so I thought AFIR might be useful, too.
With our new levels, here's a look at the party:
And here's a look at our stuff, which is final besides possibly the Masmune:
On our first dive (or, more accurately, our 15th?), No I got affected by a Mage's RUB spell before Phantom and I decided I was starting over. On the second (or 16th), the Phantom was no problem. No I was petrified on the earth floor, but we had Soft Potions so it was a non-issue. We also managed to swat Lich before he NUKEd us.
Kary was so afraid of our newfound AFIR that she didn't even try to burn us. We took her out without much issue.
Fighting Waters on the water floor earned No I a level where he crossed the 96-hit threshold to earn an extra hit, so that might help. Kraken didn't one-shot anyone this time, so that's a treat. He two-shot No O though, which isn't way better. But we won. We'll press on.
We got the Masmune, and we beat Tiamat with the remaining three knights alive.
We had a whole plan for Chaos. AFIR, ALIT, and White Shirt (or maybe RUSE) to get high evasion. Let CUR4 happen, and then go on the offensive. We actually didn't need to do AFIR or ALIT, since No O was dead. No I, who has no Ribbon, was killed by Chaos' CRACK fairly early on. No E and No A seemed to be hanging in there, although No E was hit by SLO2 after several turns and clobbered with a critical attack shortly after. Suddenly, this wasn't going well.
Y'know, that is still somewhat encouraging. This was a lot simpler feeling than most of the runs yesterday.
Attempt #17: We didn't hit a lot of unrunnable battles and thus the pace of this run was way faster. Lich did manage to NUKE us this time, but everyone survived so it wasn't a big deal. Kary took us a couple of rounds, but barely made a dent in the voweless crew at all.
Kraken did some damage, but we also got ALIT and a load of White Shirt spam off and then stall for healing against him. It worked out pretty well!
As I got the Masmune, I said, "Just so you know, I am thinking about whether this run is going well or not and I'm choosing not to comment on it because doing so will destroy me. You know?". We reached Tiamat in excellent condition. Everyone survived BANE, too. It went well.
Here are our stats before this attempt at Chaos:
You can see we've arrived in great condition! We'd need some pretty terrible luck to fail this time. A good strategy could help, too. We used AFIR, ALIT, and some evasion bonuses and we also happened to dodge CRACK on turn 1. We're still going to try to boost evasion, and No I and No O are just going to be attacking henceforth, with the Masmune and Xcalbur, respectively. Chaos tried to get No I with SLO2, but it didn't work, which is just awesome.
After that, we were fully buffed! Our offense was solid. In fact... we managed to outpace CUR4.
Despite the 17 attempts at the final dungeon, this was generally a very fun and unique variant playthrough. It was a new way to experience the game, taking the most powerful class in the game and treating it differently but with clear restrictions, and not requiring excessive grinding nor excessive luck. It really seemed like the tiny bit of grinding at the start of this session really helped me win.
How about further runs of this sort? I don't want to beat this idea to death by trying it in a ton of other games or anything like that... but in the relevant GameFAQs thread, beege_man and The_Hacker both suggested doing this with mages and I think that might be legitimately interesting. White mages without the letter A or U would be neat, and black mages without the letter I would be very different. One day I might do that one.
<< First | < Previous | Index
