#i have to lvl up a long range attacker

[novirp13]

Pic is transparent~

I've been using Diluc as my main DPS since I accidentally got him a year ago (and cuz he's the only 5 stars character that I have, really. The other one is Qiqi) and now that I decided to play the game again, I realized. This team composition...

Kinda turned Diluc into a TIRED DAD, LOL!!! :'D

BONUS:

I got Scara yaaayy~

[lilbombus]

excuse the constant different name spellings but Malaine Jona Harley (or May May Jona for short) is the eldest daughter of Jade Harley and Davepeta.

She’s the essential scout of the group and the heart of the family. Due to this new session trapping the kids and descendants in the game without their parents, she usually scouts the dream bubbles to find any clues on how to get back home, while finding ways to lvl up. She talks to dead versions of the trolls and even becomes close to her Leijon side of the family. While she’s hesitant to meet the beta and alpha groups, she may talk to them without fear of them finding out who her parents are by hiding her blond hair strands, wearing black mascara, and wearing a face mask. 

One of the strongest players in the group, she has multiple skill sets in both long-range, short-range and even hand to hand combat, she also has two sets of pistols with different modes such as charged electric shots, ray gun, lasers shots, grappling hooks, and regular bullets that she can change with ease. Also her two pistols can be attached together to make a long ranged rifle. Her specialty is probability - making it extremely difficult for her opponents to predict her next moves due to her numerous “combo” attacks. (think of her like those character in fighting games such as street fighter)

Her personality and Inspo were based on Sango (Inuyasha), Edward Elric (FMA), and Kanaya Maryam.

Anyways, I like to think May May Jona met Davepeta during the few years Davepeta’s was in the game and gave them a note with half of her name on it. She never told them who she was but she kept calling them "Renny." Davepeta was suspicious but didn't know if she was a Leijon descendant or their "direct descendant".

(if you're wondering May May Jona was born from the ectobiology machine with Davepeta's dna mixed with some random trolls dna. she might not be biologically related to Jade but she's her kid and they have the same laughter. Jade added Jona to her name so she'll follow the name trend of the family in hopes she wouldn't feel left out.)

Her name created a paradox and guaranteed the crisis countdowns’ timeline/universe.

[before-calamity]

Gladiator/Paladin Skills Overview: Part 1

Alright, let's do it. Each class/job we'll look at will be in two parts, with one part being Class skills and the second part being Job and Class Traits. This is so you don't get a giant wall of pics or text on your Tumblr dashboard. I'm trying my best to tumblr.

I'm only going to comment unless I have something interesting to say.

Fast Blade, a classic. It was your lvl 5 Sword weaponskill, and it's your starting skill in both forms of FFXIV. Notice it has a frontal positional - many FFXIV tank skills are like that, sort of like a prototypical Goblin Punch.

Another 1.0 thing is that there are attacks that can only be used if you evade or block them. Such as Phalanx here.

Sort of like a prototypical Holy Sheltron back when Sheltron was just an automatic block.

Combos in 1.0 work similarly as they do in ARR - you use an attack with a combo, if you have the resources attack for the next in the combo, it'll be highlighted. However Combos in 1.0 are more complex, as we'll see in a second. Also combo bonuses are not always an increased damage.

Good ole flash. It was a GLD/PLD main enmity getter up until the big Tank rework in Shadowbringers, and in 1.0 it didn't even have the blindness effect that actually made it worth using (...yet). It also wasn't AoE. Also note that the timeouts of these weaponskills are quite long.

Probably a remnant of the Sentinel class, and it's still in ARR today! Now it's a stun on GCD, back in 1.0, it had a 30 second recast time. When I play PLD these days, I don't have it on my hotbar, because Low Blow is better. As Shield Bash is technically a sword class...you may not necessarily need a shield to use it (something to try for later!)

Notice how 1.0's descriptions don't tell you anything? You know that it reduces damage taken but not by how much. Also doesn't tell you how long each ability lasts. This skill is still in ARR as GLD/PLD's 120 second, 30% damage reduction skill. No enmity generation anymore, but the tank stance added in EW kind of makes that irrelevant.

So here, you can branch Fast Blade off of Savage Blade or go into Fast Blade, depending if you want damage or enmity.

Yeah, Riot Blade has a back positional and is ranged for some reason. Now it's just part of a GLD/PLD's standard 1-2-3 combo.

Kind of like EW's Sheltron (at the beginning before it became just a 15% damage reduction)/Bulwark, but also with TP generation.

Probably another Sentinel skill that uses a shield. It's an AoE skill and is an actual shield attack. May not need said shield for the attack itself - looks like it only requires a sword (will experiment later).

I started playing FFXIV during Stormblood, and this was my least favorite skill, because I never saw the point of it - you rarely get binded or heavy, and while knock back and draw in are useful abilities, I never used it (but I was also really new to the game by then). It is amazing to me it survived from 1.0.

Told you combo bonuses are a bit different in 1.0. Basically if you combo Rage of Halone, you'll have more accuracy to hit all five melee attacks. At least the animation in ARR is similar.

(Here is where people scream about PLD losing their DoTs in the "PLD Rework" during EW). Also another skill better for whoever is playing as an off-tank or a fake DPS.

Stay tuned to part 2, where we'll cover Paladin actions & traits. They are very familiar to what you know today. Very similar.

[kanohirren]

How to Make Etho in DnD

I’ll go level by level and explain the reasoning behind my decisions and how I think it fits them in character. This build assumes starting at level 8 but includes notes on differences if you start at level 1 and progress to 8. This isn't intended as a guide on how to play dnd, just how to build this character.

Class: Artificer (Battle Smith) 5, Rogue (Inquisitive) 3

Race: Human (Variant) or regular Human if you don’t use feats.

Base Ability Scores:

Str 8 (-1)

Dex 14, (+2)

Con 10 (+0)

Int 15 (+2) +1 from race = 16 (+3)

Wis 13 (+1) +1 from race = 14 (+2)

Cha 12 (+1)

Background: Mercenary Veteran

Etho was an especially interesting character to build. I wanted to make sure to incorporate his redstone prowess (hence the artificer) but also acknowledge that he is very good at the social aspect of games and very good at sneaking around (hence the rogue). I opted to give him high intelligence as that is the main stat of the Artificer, but also gave him decent Dexterity. I also gave him decent Wisdom and Charisma due to him being so good in social situations, but unfortunately he’s a bit washed up at melee combat, so he has low strength and constitution.

Before getting into the classes, let’s start with the variant human race features:

Feat: Fighting Initiate, choose the Archery fighting style for a +2 bonus to your ranged attack rolls (leading to more consistent damage) (Etho bow skills baybee)

Skill proficiency: choose History (because Etho’s been around a long time, his knowledge of Minecraft or whatever world this takes place in is unmatched)

And the Mercenary Veteran background features:

Skill proficiencies: Athletics and Persuasion

Mercenary Life: You can identify other mercenary factions and find mercenary work. (I considered the Hermit background but ended up going with this one instead.)

At 1st level, we take a level in Rogue. This grants us:

Proficiency in light armour

Proficiency in simple weapons, hand crossbows, longswords, rapiers, shortswords

Proficiency in thieves’ tools

Proficiency in Dexterity and Intelligence saving throws.

Skill proficiencies: Insight, Perception, Stealth and Investigation (chosen with Etho’s skills at reading people and assessing situations in mind)

Expertise in two proficient skills: Insight and Stealth

Sneak attack: an extra 1d6 damage on enemies if you have advantage on the attack or if an enemy of your target is within 5 ft. of them (doesn’t activate if you have disadvantage).

Thieves’ Cant: Some sort of secret code. Maybe only understood by other Canadians (What’s the deal with bathroom p-)

Starting as a rogue instead of artificer gives you access to better saving throws and more skill proficiencies. The tradeoff is delaying your power spike at level 5. If you’re starting below level 6, you could start artificer instead and only multiclass into rogue after at least five levels in artificer, but this leads to a slightly different build.

At 2nd level, we take our first level in Artificer. This grants us:

Proficiency in medium armour and shields

Proficiency in tinkers tools and one other artisan tool of your choice (suggested alchemist’s supplies, you’ll get smith’s tools later)

Magical Tinkering: A fun little device you can make that lets you either make a little bit of light, record a message, play a sound or make a small image. You could use this to play intimidating boogeyman music or secretly pass information.

Two Cantrips: Mending (useful for repairing tools and also really helpful for later class features, Create Bonfire (flint and steel)

1st level spells (reflavoured to be technology): Artificers are prepared casters, meaning they can swap out their spells after a long rest. At level 1 with 16 Intelligence, you can have 3 prepared spells. My suggested spells are: Alarm (redstone trap with a tripwire), Feather Fall (he’s gotten pretty good at mlg water buckets) and Absorb Elements (just a solid defensive spell)

Artificers are pretty loaded at lvl 1 in terms of utility but aren’t super strong in the damage department yet. Without any damaging spells, your main source of damage would be using a shortbow and getting sneak attack damage off. Tinkering and technological side of the class feel perfect for Etho and most of the other Redstoners on the list.

At 3rd level, we take a second level in Artificer. This grants us:

Four Infusions known: useful feature that lets you enchant items. Though you can choose four options, only two of them can be active at a time. Choose Repeating Shot, Replicate Magic Item, Enhanced Weapon and Enhanced Defense

Two Infused Items: Take Repeating Shot and infuse a shortbow to give it +1 to your attack and damage rolls. Also take Replicate Magic Item, one of the most versatile infusions that lets you create a magic item from a list that can be useful in almost every situation. Go-to is Rope of Climbing because it’s the closest to ladders (ayy, he goes up he goes down).

One more prepared spell: Suggested Identify (always a useful spell)

The infused items are how I imagine Etho upgrading his weapons using redstone. Adding some sort of aim assist to his bow or making night vision goggles using redstone, that sort of thing just feels Etho to me. With a +1 bonus to attack rolls and damage from Repeating Shot infusion, your lower stat in dexterity is somewhat made up for and should suffice until level 3.

At 4th level, we take a third level in Artificer. This grants us:

The Right Tool for the Right Job: handy feature that lets you create any type of tools you might need.

Artificer Subclass: Battle Smith

Battle Smith grants you some very useful things.

Proficiency in smith’s tools

Extra prepared spells: Heroism and Shield

Battle Ready: Proficiency in Martial Weapons and when you attack with a magic weapon, you can use Intelligence instead of strength or dexterity. Super important because now we can upgrade to a longbow instead of a shortbow and use our higher intelligence stat instead of dexterity to deal more damage with our longbow.

Steel Defender: A little robot friend that can aid you in combat. As sneak attack doesn’t require a creature, just an enemy, your Steel Defender can in fact provide sneak attack. The downside is that it takes its turn after yours, not before, so some planning might be required. If you don’t need your bonus action for anything else, it can also attack people so that can alleviate the lack of an extra attack at level 5 if you’re starting below level 6. Unfortunately, Rogues make use of their bonus actions very often so it might just be a sneak attack provider. On the bright side, you can restore its health using the Mending cantrip.

Now here’s where things get interesting. Now Etho gets to use his Intelligence for his bow attacks, which optimizes the build a little in terms of stats. With a 16 in intelligence, you have a +3 modifier. Your ranged attacks will start being very consistent. +3 from intelligence, +2 from archery fighting style, +2 from proficiency bonus, that’s a +7 to hit, which is really good at this early of a level.

I also think it’s just very Etho to use intelligence-based attacks.

At 5th level, we take a fourth level in Artificer. This grants us:

Ability Score Improvement OR Feat: Etho doesn’t really need another feat at this point, so we take a +2 to our Intelligence, bumping it up to 18 (+4), which not only affects our number of artificer spells we can have prepared but also makes the longbow even better!

More prepared spells: Now that we have 4 levels in artificer and a +4 intelligence modifier, we can have 6 total prepared spells. If we count the previous suggested ones, we can have two more. Suggested: Disguise Self (he’s a cheeky boy) and Sanctuary (when he doesn’t want trouble).

The increase to intelligence is very helpful here, and if you’ve started below level 6 the extra consistency should slightly make up for the lack of extra attack until you get it next level. With your proficiency bonus now being +3, your attack rolls will be 4 (int) + 3 (prof. b) + 2 (archery) +1 (infusion) for a total of +10 to hit. You won’t miss very often.

At 6th level, we take a fifth level in Artificer. This grants us:

Subclass feature: Extra Attack

2nd level spells: Suggested: replace a 1st level spell with Invisibility (Etho likes to snoop around) flavour this as like camouflage technology or something.

This is where the build starts to really pick up. Intelligence based attacks means that you’re not suffering from lack of building dexterity because sneak attack only requires ranged or finesse weapons. The stat used doesn’t matter. With two attacks, you both double your damage output on your longbow itself (with EXTREMELY consistent attack rolls at a +10 to hit) and give yourself two chances to land that sneak attack damage (which is still only a d6 for now but that will soon change).

At 7th level, we take a second level in Rogue. This grants us:

Cunning Action: you can dash, disengage or hide as a bonus action.

Not much to say here other than that cunning action is extremely useful. With the ability to hide as a bonus action, you can grant yourself advantage consistently, meaning you no longer need to rely on your Steel Defender or party members to provide sneak attack. This also means you will pretty much never miss your first shot, because with advantage, you will on average be rolling at about +15 to hit (advantage statistically provides roughly a +5 bonus on average on top of your already high +10).

At 8th level, we take a third level in Rogue. This grants us:

Subclass: Inquisitive

Inquisitive grants:

Ear for Deceit: This is why we chose Expertise in Insight. With this feature, you can never roll below an 8 for Insight. With Expertise and a +2 wisdom modifier, that gives you a +8 bonus to your insight rolls, meaning your minimum insight roll is 16 every time. Sure, a high deception character could probably roll higher than that, but the important part is the consistency as well as the synergy with one of the other Inquisitive features.

Eye for Detail: You can use a bonus action to try to spot a hidden creature or search for clues. Not terribly useful outside of combat, but also very situational in combat.

Insightful Fighting: You can use a bonus action to use Insight vs the target’s Deception. If you roll higher, you can use sneak attack on them for 1 minute without needing advantage. Again, the high consistent Insight rolls will be extremely useful here.

I was facing a dilemma between Swashbuckler and Inquisitive for Etho. Swashbuckler is a bit better in combat with the ability to avoid opportunity attacks and the ability to get sneak attacks without spending a bonus action (all you need is for your target to be isolated) but the Inquisitive abilities just said “Etho” way more to me. The ability to just never roll low on Insight and the whole “figuring out a weakness” and investigative nature of the subclass just felt far more fitting to me, even if it is less optimal.

Summary:

Final Stats:

Str 8 (-1)

Dex 14, (+2)

Con 10 (+0)

Int 18 (+4)

Wis 14 (+2)

Cha 12 (+1)

Feat: Fighting Initiate (Archery)

Sneak Attack (2d6)

Minimum Insight roll of 16.

Two Attacks

Longbow attack: +4 (int) +3 (prof. bonus) +2 (archery) +1 (infusion) = +10 to hit, 1d8 + 5 piercing dmg.

Artificer Infusions: Enhanced Defense, Repeating Shot, Enhanced Weapon, Replicate Magic Item (Rope of Climbing)

Cantrips: Mending, Create Bonfire

1st and 2nd lvl spells: prepare up to 6.

And that’s it for Etho! This one was super interesting to make, because there are so many aspects of Etho that make him who he is, and it was really making him a multiclass combo that’s less common but also works well. If anyone has any suggestions or feedback, I’d love to read them! ^^

[ashes-of-ailell]

Shez (Three Houses Unit)

For the Ashen Wolves route I'm creating, Shez may end up being a character within it (if this were something I could actually make, they'd be a playable unit). As a result, I've attempted to adapt them into a Houses unit based on what they can do in Hopes.

This is going to be a long post because I've thought about this perhaps more than I should have. Also - a lot of this will be subject to change depending on how the Wolves Route stuff ends up unfolding. This is just what I've got so far :3

Forgive the probably weird formatting - I'm on mobile browser.

Shez will be an optional unit recruited via a paralogue battle. Their gender will be determined through a dialogue prompt in a small cutscene before the fight (note that their gender will have no effect on the game outside of appearance. They can be S-supported regardless). This paralogue is unlocked shortly after the timeskip.

When recruited, Shez will have two unique classes. One is unlocked upon recruitment and is their default class (Fluegel), while the other is unlocked by completing a separate paralogue battle that appears a bit later on in the story (Asura).

Shez's sword will work how it does in Hopes and share qualities with whatever the other sword you have equipped.

With that background out of the way, here is Shez's unit information:

Personal Ability - Shadowflash (Unit is capable of dashing at incredible speeds, granting them cavalry type movement regardless of class or terrain).

Default Abilities - Sword Prowess Lvl 3 / Reason Lvl 3 / Authority Lvl 2 / Rally Strength

Default Combat Arts - Wrath Strike / Grounder

Default Learned Magic - Blizzard / Banshee / Mire

Default Skill Levels and Strengths/Weaknesses:

Sword - B (Strength)

Lance - E

Axe - E+ (Strength)

Bow - E

Reason - C+ (Strength)

Faith - E (Weakness)

Authority - D+ (Strength)

Heavy Armour - E (Weakness)

Riding - E

Flying - E+ (Budding Talent)

Combat Art/Spell Pool (Specific Skill Level Ups):

Sword - Windsweep (A)

Lance - Tempest Lance (D) / Knightkneeler (C) / Frozen Lance (A)

Axe - Smash (D) / Helm Splitter (C) / Wild Abandon (C+)

Bow - Curved Shot (D) / Point-blank Volley (B) / Ward Arrow (A)

Brawl - Fading Blow (D) / Rushing Blow (C) / Bombard (C+) / Mighty Blow (A)

Reason - Luna (B) / Dark Spikes (A)

Faith - Heal (D) / Nosferatu (D+) / Physic (C)

Authority - Battalion Wrath (C) / Rally Speed (C+)

(Those listed above are just specific combat arts/spells the unit can learn. Unit will learn all other abilities as anyone else would as long as they are not unit specific. All combat arts/spells were cross-referenced with the ones Shez can learn in Three Hopes).

Unique Class Information:

Fluegel (Unique, Advanced) - A dual wielding class exclusive to Shez. Speedy and strong, this class excels with swords. This class can also use magic.

Class Abilities

Vantage - Allows unit to attack first regardless of speed/combat initiation.

Axebreaker - Grants Hit/Avo+20 when using a sword against axe users.

Class Mastery:

Ability - Dual Wielder's Ploy (Increases unit attack range)

Art - Shadow Slide (Allows unit to warp to an allied unit on the field (3 uses per battle))

Asura (Unique, Master) - A dual wielding class exclusive to Shez. A force to be reckoned with, this class boasts a mastery of swords and is highly skilled with dark magic. (Unlocked through paralogue battle, Overcoming Destiny)

Class Abilities:

Vantage - Allows unit to attack first regardless of speed or combat initiation.

Axebreaker - Grants Hit/Avo+20 when using a sword against axe users.

Heartseeker - Adjacent foes receive Avoid-20 during combat.

Class Mastery:

Ability - The Creation (Prevents foes from instantly killing the unit)

Art - Shadow Slash (Allows Shez to unleash their power for a devastating blow. Ignores target's resistances and has a chance to instantly kill non-commander units (6 durability cost)(Asura Only))

For Shadow Slash, it is essentially supposed to be their warrior special in Hopes.

The Creation had two possibilities, one was what is listed and the other was 'Grants Def/Res/Luck+10 during combat. Please let me know if you think the alternative works better! :D

(As a side note, I'm aware that Fluegel technically counts as an Intermediate Class in Hopes, but for the sake of Houses story progression and when Shez is actually recruited here, I've changed it to be an Advanced Class equivalent).

If you've read this far, thank you so much and I hope you like this adaptation of Shez! As I mentioned earlier, this is all subject to change, it's just what I'm working with for now. If you have any feedback or ideas I'd love to hear them too! :3

[elysia-nsimp]

Hi friends and followers and everyone else, not my usual kind of post but I’d really really like to share this because it’s made my day!

Be prepared for a long post about my dog with CHF (I promise pictures at the end)

So, my family has five dogs. We love dogs. One of our dogs, Paige, is a rescue. She’s a chihuahua with congestive heart failure who grew up with a homeless person—they lived in a car for all of Paige’s life, with little food or shelter. When her first owner just couldn’t continue to take care of her, she was passed on to a friend who lived in a hoarding house. When that person couldn’t care for her, she was passed on to a shelter. She lived in a foster home with lots of other dogs (especially one that picked fights and stole food), so Paige grew super anxious over her space and food.

We found her through a festival we went to, where I got to pet a little kitten and my parents flipped through the book of rescues while they waited. At the time, she was considered a hospice dog and was looking for a retirement home where they could live happily at the end of her life. We all agreed in nearly an impulsive decision, that we needed to give her a home.

After a couple days, the people who had her reached out and said our application was accepted and to come meet up with them so we could do paperwork and stuff. My dad and I went in first to go meet her.

Paige was skeletal thin, you could see her entire rib cage through her skin, her fur was coarse and dirty, she had like… so few useable teeth, and she spent our meeting hiding under the table and only coming out when I offered her food. My parents took care of all the official stuff, while I tried to convince Paige we were friends and introduced her to our other dogs. Eventually, we took her home with us, and she sat on my lap the entire way.

Since then, we’ve been taking care of her. She sits on her lofthouse by the window, she actively asks for her meds when her cough gets really bad, she asks for hugs and spends most of her time giving us yucky gross old doggy kisses. She’s gained some actual meat on her bones, and she’s gone from so frail we were scared to pick her up so we didn’t hurt her so spry enough that she has daily zoomies! We’ve seen so much improvement in her condition and we’re all really happy to see her up and moving.

This finally brings me to the point of this post, now that you’ve gotten all the backstory to Paigey. On Friday, my mom took Paige in to the vet for a checkup and hopefully a revaluation on her meds (we keep upping her meds as she gains weight). Today, my mom gave me the full rundown to what the vet said.

1. Paige has gained weight. She was 7.4 pounds when we first got her, now she’s 8.2 pounds. That’s substantial weight gain for her !!

2. Her heart murmur dropped from a level 5 to a lvl 4!!! We don’t know exactly if the highest level (lethal) is lvl 5 or lvl 6, but she’s no longer in deadly range of CHF

3. Her heart has actually shrunk, which is SUPER RARE!!!!! That doesn’t like. ever happen?????!!!!! It used to press against her spine and 4 of her ribs, now it only goes 3 and a half ribs and it’s not pressing as hard against her lungs, and her spine especially .

4. The vet said her lungs look great!!!

5. The vet also said her quality of life seems great, since mom gave a rundown of her behaviors as of lately.

So the big TL;DR to take away from this, our sweet little Paige is NO LONGER a hospice dog! We fully expect that despite her condition, Paige will have a full chihuahua life now. Like, she’s doing so well that her CHF is actively in remission, which, again, SUPER rare from my understanding. It’ll never go away, and she’ll likely have that cough her whole life, but we’re all absolutely ecstatic that we were able to nurse Paige back to a healthy enough condition that we aren’t worried she’ll have a heart attack.

Anyway, here’s pictures of Paige giving my parents snuggles!

Can’t express in words how happy I am, knowing Paige is feeling better.

[wetbloodworm]

i like thinking about mechanics and i’ve got a character with homebrew shit going on so under the cut i got some musings about how the dream-eating thing with zenith might work

as always, in an actual in-game scenario, DM makes the rules and gets final say on how things work. i just don’t have a framework for how all of this would go yet so i wanted to come up with ideas to give more bones to my daydreams lol i can’t not know. i need details. i need bones. can also be the scenario of like this is how zenith as a character i play with in my brain-space free of rules works vs zenith as a character i play with other people. idk it’s not that deep and it’s not set in stone, just having fun here!

talked about this a little bit previously in a big meta post but expanding some here

so first off, talking about zenith in three stages. there’s his starter stage just being himself out in the far realm, there’s the split stage where he’s half in the far realm and half in the material plane, and then there’s the merged stage when he moves entirely into the material plane.

starter zenith is full power and largely equivalent to his eventual lvl 20 self, so i use that sheet for reference re: stats and stuff.

split zenith is the character i’d be playing most of the campaign, who only has access to some of his power and gets more over time. i’m using his lvl 8 sheet for reference though the stats would obviously vary as he gets stronger

merged zenith is endgame shit, so back to the lvl 20 sheet. if he was able to get his full self into the material plane early he’d shoot up to lvl 20 upon merging anyway because there’d be no barrier to his full power anymore, but in a game setting i just figure he’s not going to get that chance until he’s actually earned lvl 20 to avoid skipping levels.

anyway, dream-eating! when he’s hunting, zenith basically sits himself down to meditate and starts reaching out psychically to find dreaming minds. he can’t sense the minds of those who are awake or those who sleep/trance without dreaming, they’re completely invisible to him, but if someone is actively dreaming he can smell it, or the psychic equivalent. i imagine that when he finds someone, it’s a wisdom saving throw to prevent him from accessing their mind. a successful save keeps him out entirely, a failed save results in zenith having free range to either straight-up eat the dream or project himself into the dream first before eating it. having a dream eaten causes psychic damage and wakes the dreamer up.

i’m not sure how much psychic damage it’d be, though i think it’d be a static thing. like it doesn’t matter how strong zenith is at the time, it’s the same number of dice across the board. it’s not an attack, he’s not TRYING to do damage, it just. it just happens. it’s a bad experience to have your dream ripped out of your brain while you’re actively experiencing it. i’m thinking 1d8 psychic damage? not a LOT of damage, though that really depends on your HP i guess.

i want to say that you can’t outright die from this damage, but i don’t know if that’s a mechanic i can control. if i had my way, it could absolutely bring you to zero, but you’d just be unconscious + stable. get 1 HP back in 1d4 hours without intervention. i wouldn’t be too bothered if i can’t swing that, it just makes more sense to me that you can’t straight up die in real life from dream shenanigans. if you can, though, oh well. zenith wouldn’t care if he knew.

notes on how easy/difficult hunting is for zenith based on what stage he’s in:

starter - incredible range, harder to access. the far realm and the material plane are very far away from each other, but zenith can reach it just fine. he has basically free range of the material plane as long as the dreamer’s mind isn’t protected somehow, though it takes him a while to actually get there. he has no idea WHERE in the material plane the dreamer is, he has no reference point, it’s basically just sticking his hand blindly into a bag and wiggling it around until he touches something. if he’s visited a specific dreamer before, he can sometimes find them again if they’re in the same general area, but it’s hard. the real problem that he IS very far away, so while he can find minds pretty easily, actually breaking in is more difficult. the save DC is WIS 19, but the dreamer has advantage even though they’re unconscious. the good thing for zenith here is that if he fails, he has basically unlimited attempts. he just has to find someone else and try again, and keep trying until he gets someone.

split - limited range, easier to access. being in two places fucks him up and severely limits his abilities while he gathers his strength. he can only reach dreamers within a certain range of his actual physical location in the material plane. not sure what’s a reasonable range, but i think it increases as he levels up? lvl 8 zenith might have like... a mile radius? since he’s physically in the material plane he has a general idea of where the dreamers he locates are, like oh they’re that direction near the edge of my reach. he can also find people much quicker than he could when he was fully in the far realm, though he only has a vague concept of that, since time in the far realm is a fucky thing. the save DC at lvl 8 is WIS 15, and i’m unsure whether it’d be a straight roll or at disadvantage b/c unconscious. i’d be good with either. the biggest problem is that zenith can only do this so many times before he tires himself out; he’s already split in two, reaching outside of both bodies when he’s not at full strength is hard. i think at lvl 8 he gets three attempts before he’s gotta stop, and if he fails all three attempts then he just goes hungry that day. attempts reset with a long rest. also, and i’ll touch on this more later, zenith can’t project himself into dreams in his split state, only eat them.

merged - best of both worlds! zenith’s back to being able to reach anyone sleeping on the material plane that doesn’t have their mind protected somehow. again, he only has a general idea of the direction and distance of the dreamer in relation to himself. he can find dreamers he’s visited before a bit easier, though if they wander too far from their previous location it can take a while. since he’s at full strength again AND has the upper hand of being on the plane he’s hunting in, the save DC is WIS 19 and it’s at disadvantage. he’s no longer limited in attempts he can make, though he’s likely to succeed faster anyway.

this is all assuming natural sleep, btw. i imagine someone being under the influence of magical sleep is easier prey. but listen, he might be helping, because when he eats their dream and it hurts them it might wake them up! you’re welcome!!

are people who are resistant or immune to psychic damage harder to break into or do they just take less damage from having their dreams eaten? not sure! i think less/no damage but he can still get ‘em.

if zenith pokes around in the dream first, i feel like there’d be different ways for the dreamer to wake up and spare themself the damage. they could just get scared awake if zenith shows himself/they spot him and they find him scary, or if they’re more lucid and want to get out of the dream they can actively try to wake themself up, or if they’re fully lucid and aware that this is an actual being in their mind they can try to force him out. 

not everyone has the option to get scared awake because not everyone would find zenith scary enough to need to make that roll. not sure what kind of roll that would be? maybe another wisdom save? successful save actually keeps you in the dream, failed save wakes you up. DC could be custom for the individual. how scared of monsters are they. zenith can’t do anything about this, if a person is too scared of him he just gets kicked out. it’s one reason why he’s generally pretty friendly when he chats with dreamers; he figures if he’s nice they’ll be less likely to get alarmed enough to force him out. the eyes and the teeth and the claws and the size and the void of him are often too much to be overlooked by some friendly chatter, though shdkfj and like. his true voice can be unsettling to people too so there’s only so much mitigating he can do lmao

for lucid dreaming, i’m thinking there might be a check first to see if the person is aware that they’re dreaming? if they pass, then they get the option to try to wake up if they don’t like what’s going on. probably a wisdom check rather than a save since they’re actively trying to do a thing. not sure what the DC would be, maybe zenith’s save DC (WIS 19) to simplify things, though it could also be custom based on the person. again there’s not much zenith can do about this unless he can tell the person is trying to wake up and he tries to talk them out of it. he doesn’t have control of a person’s mind or body like this, if they’re gonna wake up they’re gonna wake up.

forcing him out of a dream is different matter, though, that zenith can and will fight. as long as the person is asleep, he’s got his claws dug in. i’d imagine it’d be a wisdom contest to force him out. on a success, zenith is kicked out. on a fail, zenith is just mad about it and likely to skip chatting and go straight to eating.

not sure if the difficulty of this wisdom contest would vary based on the stage zenith is in? my instinct is that it doesn’t. he might have to try harder to get into a dream depending on his circumstances, but once he’s in he’s in.

as i mentioned, zenith can only project himself into dreams in the starter or merged states. being split in two is difficult, and he can only stretch himself so thin, and he’s already reaching outside of himself enough as it is just by hunting. he is deeply annoyed by this, because he LIKES looking at people’s dreams! they’re fun to watch, he’s fascinated by them! it’s probably for the best since the longer he lingers the greater his risk of getting kicked out, and in his split state he can only make so many attempts, so he shouldn’t risk it anyway. but listen. it’s the principle of the matter. another upside though is that he doesn’t only get to socialize with material plane denizens through dreams anymore, he can just go anywhere and find them in person if he wants to chat. he misses actually getting to see the dreams, though.

i think when he eats a dream he gets flashes of the emotions tied to it, no visuals or details or anything, just vibes. like without actually seeing the dream he can tell if it was a nightmare, or an anxiety dream, or a happy dream, etc. this is basically the equivalent of different flavors for him.

he gets hints of those vibes when he’s hunting and catches the ‘scent’ of a dream, and can ‘smell’ it stronger if he actually enters the dream because then it’s everywhere. he thinks it’s funny when the flavor changes after a dreamer sees him.

outside of being able to appear in a dream and talk with the dreamer, zenith has no additional control. he can’t shape the dream or have any affect on the dreamer, can’t cast spells there, etc. if he doesn’t share any known languages with the dreamer, he can’t communicate with them either. he also can’t control how he appears to the dreamer beyond the limits of what he can actually do with his body. all he can do is observe, chat, and eat.

in terms of mechanical benefits, zenith doesn’t like... get anything extra from eating dreams. like it’s not that he eats a dream and then gets health from it or anything. it’s just food. he has to eat regularly to avoid the consequences of starving like anything else that eats. he also craves dreams intensely, but that’s just him being Hungry, not him looking for a specific benefit.

tl;dr mechanics summary:

starter - zenith can access any dreaming person who isn’t otherwise protected if they’re on the material plane. the dreamer has to make a wisdom saving throw with advantage (DC 19). on a successful save, zenith is denied access and the dreamer experiences no effect. on a failed save, zenith can chose to eat the dream at any time, causing 1d8 psychic damage and waking the dreamer. if the damage brings the dreamer to 0 HP, they remain unconscious but are stable, and regain 1 HP in 1d4 hours. zenith can also enter the dream to observe it and/or speak to the dreamer. if the dreamer is scared of him, they make a wisdom saving throw (undetermined DC); a failed save wakes them with no damage. if the dreamer is lucid, they can choose to make a wisdom check (DC 19?) to wake up with no damage on a success, or a wisdom contest against zenith to remain asleep and force him out of their mind. zenith can attempt this an unlimited number of times, though he can’t attempt to target the same dreamer if he’s already failed or been booted once by that individual already that day.

split - zenith can access any dreaming person who isn’t otherwise protected if they’re on the material plane and within range (1 mile at lvl 8). the dreamer has to make a wisdom saving throw (?with disadvantage?) (DC 15 at lvl 8). on a successful save, zenith is denied access and the dreamer experiences no effect. on a failed save, zenith can eat the dream, causing 1d8 psychic damage and waking the dreamer. if the damage brings the dreamer to 0 HP, they remain unconscious but are stable, and regain 1 HP in 1d4 hours. zenith can attempt this a limited number of times per long rest (3 at lvl 8), and he can’t attempt to target the same dreamer if he’s already failed once at that individual already that day.

merged - zenith can access any dreaming person who isn’t otherwise protected if they’re on the material plane. the dreamer has to make a wisdom saving throw with disadvantage (DC 19). on a successful save, zenith is denied access and the dreamer experiences no effect. on a failed save, zenith can chose to eat the dream at any time, causing 1d8 psychic damage and waking the dreamer. if the damage brings the dreamer to 0 HP, they remain unconscious but are stable, and regain 1 HP in 1d4 hours. zenith can also enter the dream to observe it and/or speak to the dreamer. if the dreamer is scared of him, they make a wisdom saving throw (undetermined DC); a failed save wakes them with no damage. if the dreamer is lucid, they can choose to make a wisdom check (DC 19?) to wake up with no damage on a success, or a wisdom contest against zenith to remain asleep and force him out of their mind. zenith can attempt this an unlimited number of times, though he can’t attempt to target the same dreamer if he’s already failed or been booted once by that individual already that day.

[moonndust]

gonna put out my honest thoughts about my current progress in fire emblem engage bc i need to talk about how silly this game is

i’m only at chapter 7-8 btw and i’ve already spoiled myself half of the plot

i couldn’t choose between f!alear or m!alear bc their designs were.. something. i chose f!alear for my first run since i did the “same ingame gender as irl gender” thing (and it was an entire tradition for me at some point).

didn’t even reach chapter 6 and f!alear’s design was too much for me. i liked seeing her in a ponytail tho but i was not gonne be patient enough to change her class JUST for the ponytail. like girlie ik ur the divine dragon n shit but atleast try to not get your long ass hair pulled midway in battle.

and wtf is your armor??? you have individual boob cups for what?? your entire outfit does not look an ounce comfortable and yet you still slept in that shit. the short ass skirt too?? the stocking things??? there are like 10 design atrocities and i could even name more (and that’s just on a scale of practicality)

made a new save file and chose m!alear bc i was getting tired of f!alear’s entire armor outfit. ngl i preferred playing as m!alear bc he felt a lot more comfortable playing as an mc. but his entire victorian child fit wasn’t the best but it was more practical than the boob cups.

still mad there’s no unisex mcs.

anyways the prologue was kinda funny. our ass just wakes up and suddenly the world is in shambles bc some salty ass kingdom made sombron become the second coming of jesus christ.

queen lumera only had like.. 2 seconds of screentime until the ultimate mentor/parent death trope scene bc dead parental figures are a must for fire emblem mcs (unless ur sigurd and become the dead parent)

the firene siblings appeared. albert is precious and céline is lowkey on thin ice because of that damned outfit. like maybe wear something more practical in battle other than easy hair pulling and frilly dress?? (i know i can change her class but i’m a lazy bum). im still currently trying to know my way around albert’s skill set but he’s a good unit atm.

the twins are splendid little creatures. clanne got too many mvps and is still on the mvp streak ever since i paired him with celica (i abused warp ragnarok too many times). framme is just there for moral support and actual healing support.

vander’s lvl 1 grandpa ass was actually doing decent damage comapred to lvl 6 alear. you don’t know how many times vander had to come in clutch when alear was 3 hp away from evaporating.

i paired albert w/ sigurd and clanne w/ celica. that shit was game changing. i revoked céline’s emblem privileges for no reason. i just gave celica to clanne since he technically did more damage. he is like low tier but he’s my biggest carry atm. how the turns have tabled.

i changed alcryst’s class to tireur d’élite the second i got his lvl 10 ass. i’m pretty sure he might be my strongest unit atm (lvl wise).

idk who i should pair micaiah with so i just let her stay with yunaka. i never rlly used micaiah’s abilities for healing but i only used her to widen yunaka’s range w/ magic if she needed to chip in some damage to an enemy.

i always get tired at like the 7th turn in every battle and I just abuse celica’s warp ragnarok to beat up that one enemy to win the battle. somehow clanne still deals big damage w/o the engage boosts.

listen i have no clue what they fed the stewards but i am now afraid of them with my every being.

jean and anna r just there. jean doesn’t do shit bc i alr have framme. ik that jean might be decently better than framme but i don’t want his lvl 1 ass dying every single time. anna is a pretty good backup for chain attacks actually. but everytime i see her i get reminded of her commander version from heroes (bc it was my first fe game)

i spent the good majority of my bond fragments on arena emblem bonds w/ my current lineup bc i gotta get those big boi skills n shit. i also watched my units kill each other bc ig that’s a thing now. (i witnessed alcryst beat the shit out of céline)

sommie is a silly little fart.

still waiting on the day i get lucina’s emblem. i want to witness a gang fight.

outside of all the cutscenes, the game has the animation budget of 2 dollars.

i feel like i should make a seperate post on fe13 design atrocities and impracticalities (im bad at character design)

[mlynar-nearl]

heya so sorry i havent asked anything in a long while lifes been really hectic haha and i only rmb'd that i said id ask more after i saw ur latest mytol fic (oops....)

anyways it was a really beautiful fic !! i really like the way you write about uncle nearls grief and the way he and toland just go through it, one step at a time, but only when uncle is ready to move on and all. i just think its really neat man....

also on another thought i would love to hear more about ur oc (as always!) how do you think hed fare as a deployed operator tbh ? like putting him into ingame contexts such as uh trials of navigators/is2/sss settings, how do you think hed react? since technically such enemies are pretty... uhm, lets just say the power lvl in ak is cracked. yeah, so how do you think shealtiel would do ? im just curious to know more ww and i think putting them into ingame contexts are cool and fun (hehe) ps trials of navigators is.... i hate the ultimate trial and i hate mandragora i havent started ch 9 out of laziness but i hate her so much alr also wow this is a very long ask im very sorry haha i hope ur well <3

LMAO no please don't worry and take care of yourself! glad you liked the fic, i think grief is such an integral part of who mlynar is and how he interfaces with the world right now. think i made a post about that last night. he grieves for his brother and SIL so, so deeply, and you can see the through-line to why he's so against what his nieces are doing. he doesn't want to lose them, too.

as for my oc! shealtiel! i love him!

i think in terms of gameplay he would unfortunately be pretty niche, but niche in a way that i specifically enjoy, haha. i've said in response to another anon (unless that was you? dunno) that he would be my personal favorite archetype, the deadeye sniper, with a focus on debuffs/crowd control. fartooth is one of my favorite units (eternally glad i built her) and i think she doesn't get nearly enough credit for what she can do if set up correctly. i think shealtiel would need a functionality similar to fartooth's dodge ignore to see stronger use in things like IS and TFN, but in my experience, snipers fall off so hard in SSS that i see basically no way to legitimize any but the strongest of snipers (chalter, pozy.) i think that the funniest/ideal thing for his lore would be that he works very well as a counter to enemies and bosses like andoain, who rely on not being blocked and high dodge when he sets down the dodge field. since andoain is his mortal enemy (?) (questionable at best) it makes sense for him to be a concerted counter to these things. plus, the grappling rope arts i gave him just applies well to crowd control, and that would probably see the most effect on enemies that are unblocked/cannot be blocked.

i'm so sorry about mandra. she's suuuch an annoying boss sometimes. my pro tip is that in her second phase you can bait her into dropping the pillars on herself with a FRD or similar and the pillars deal her true damage. you can also bait her laser beam by dropping two ops on her. eg surtr + nearlter s2 where surtr baits the laser beam and nearlter does the real damage. or use ranged damage to keep her from having anything to attack (gg, pozy typewriter, my beloved fartooth although the last section of ultimate trial has very few fartooth lanes). hope this helps !

[nokarmaunique]

for chillicheff

Hello chillcheff! I have some feedback for you regarding lulu/support. It’s up to you whether you want to read it or to improve. You can ask me a question at any time, and if you disagree with something, you can also let me know and we can go through it together.

your itemisation seemed off during the game. rushing shurelya's might not be ideal for every matchup. Moonstone would have been better in our game together. you can consider dreamweaver and ardent censer instead, especially when you're already following me closely. redemption is good but not always a second item. larger heals/shields from moonstone could have really helped in fights(, but the delay from redemption makes it undesirable). redemption functions better when you have a champ that has multiple hard cc. repositioning with shurelyas is only great in certain scenarios and, again the bonus hp/heal is superior. It is a very matchup dependent item. I understand taking the crown for games against a lot of assassins/burst or strong snowballers. But if you need crown every single game, maybe you are not positioning correctly, and should remember to use q, wards and sweeper to help you clear, and to improve your macro so you can predict enemy movement/positioning. 

you also took guardian, and take that into every matchup. that is not good, because you need to incentivise yourself to poke in lane using aery, as well as the bonus dmg comes from when pix attacks through E. again, this should be matchup based as some champs are obviously inherently stronger in lane e.g. tristana, or versing a super all in jg like jarvan jg and leona supp and thats where you're certain you'd need guardian. The upside to guardian is that as long as you're in range, it procs on 2 champions. 

In that game, i think that aery wouldve been 2x better than guardian, considering. you also took ignite into jhin and lux which are champs that both outrange and out mobilise you, which is terrible because you should never be in range to cast it. The best thing you can do is to take heal/exhaust or even barrier depending on the enemy team comp. ignite kinda sometimes beats those if enemy supp is melee, as well as killable, or versus a soraka. but after the laning phase, it becomes useless and you don't want to take it anyways unless you are certain that in your game, you cannot buy grievous wounds. 

Regarding stats and damage output, enchanters have extremely high damage in the early game. maybe you should consider leveling q first to poke + add pressure/damage for level 2 fight. you can use it to hit the enemy and to hit the wave so that you and your adc can guarantee the lvl 2 first. i think in all scenarios, q works better over e first (obviously, still max E first though).

As I mentioned earlier, enchanters have really high damage in the lane. I would prefer if you would consider tethering a bit more forward. the way you position is useful in the late game where you need to be wary, but in the early game you can really use your damage, e.g. lvl 3, im lulu and i fight the enemy adc, i aa e(them) q, and that's 1/3 of their hp bar which is really good poke, and since they're slowed at 325 with q, you're free to run away.

your roam timer is also off, i'm assuming that you are not familiar with how waves push? because everytime i needed you, you were in another lane when you shouldn't have been. but if you keep an eye on how the wave is, and its general flow, push and pull, you can leave lane safely without sacrificing your lane. theres a lot of videos online on how you can roam as support. it just looks like a bit of weak macro.

also you cast perpetually when your abilities are up, which is not necessarily the worst thing i've seen, but you should be casting on me when i'm starting to poke or already poking them, or trying to clear the wave. i'd prefer you save mana. in a way, because you w/e me, it can enable me to go in, however you should try to focus on when i'm starting the fight, as i will have my cds/hp/mana/summs/wave all in a better spot, and just perpetually spamming them can be detrimental. It can be hard to punish longer ranged adcs. this might be due to a weak reaction time? although i disagree, i think your reaction time is strong, but i'm not sure of the mindset behind spamming. also it's hard to want to poke with aa when you e/w me, as we will do less damage cause you take guardian instead of aery (which again, procs on pix e).

if i were to run lulu in a ranked game, i would go:

heal/flash

Aery: mfb, transcendence, scorch/gs. inspo: boots/biscuits. cosmic

moonstone, lucidity boots, ardent/sfw, locket/redemption/mikaels/shurelyas, situational/wardstone. 

(theres a lot of flexibility on support, so this is not rigid, and again very match up based, and its important to pay attention to the pace/speed of the game as well as everyone's wincons). i feel like, with your playstyle, you will enjoy moonstone/sfw a lot.

[jackidy]

FFXIVWrite Prompt 6: Ring

Pairing: HienWOL (Hien/Raina) Characters: F!Viera WOL, Male Viera OC, Lyse Hext, Hien Rijin Warnings: Stormblood spoilers, pre/post LVL 70 quest Stormblood Rating: T Fandom: Final Fantasy XIV

Summary: Freis had simply laughed at her in the teasing way he always did, clearly knowing more than her but never intending to share the joke with her, sighing contently as he remarked that she truly was an oblivious idiot.

"I won't be oblivious if you tell me."

"Oh but where's the fun in that."

[AO3]

-----

It starts with a carving of a spriggan, rough and imperfect, Raina having accepted it with enthusiastic but bemused thanks. She offers tips on how to improve, the little details missed to the encouragement of the gifter who listened with rapt attention, hanging onto every word. 

Raina sits Hien down before Daffodil - the giant pet spriggan she'd had for years - talking with passion about the teeth, the gems they carry and the purpose for them. "Are you even listening?" She asks, frowning, catching the Lord of Doma looking at her instead of the subject matter. 

"You have my undivided attention." She frowns, squinting at him before continuing her lecture on spriggan anatomy, now more than aware he was looking at her more than Daffodil. 

The next one is better, more accurate, a gemstone held aloft in its wooden hands, large enough for her to need both hands to hold it. How long did this take him? Should he not be focusing his attention elsewhere? Hien didn't seem more tired than usual but also he'd never been busier since they'd returned from the Steppe. 

She still doesn't fully grasp why he's doing this, they were already friends, weren't they? The hyur was yet to provide gifts for the other Scions, so what made her so special? It wasn't the Warrior of Light thing, was it? 

Upon receiving more spriggans, ranging in sizes but never bigger than the second, she asks her brother. Freis had simply laughed at her in the teasing way he always did, clearly knowing more than her but never intending to share the joke with her, sighing contently as he remarked that she truly was an oblivious idiot. 

"I won't be oblivious if you tell me." 

"Oh but where's the fun in that." He laughs, coy smile on his lips, quickly stepping away as she reached to grab him. "Perhaps he just thinks of you as special." 

So it was the warrior of light thing after all, Raina sighing as she looked at the collection of critters Hien had made for her. Yugiri and Gotsetsu had praised this man so much and he was simply gifting her carvings of her favourite thing as some strange hero worship. 

She feels like she's wilting under the Ala Mhigan heat, the heavier aspects of her gear abandoned to the side as she kept to the shade waiting for the next order of attack to come through. 

Returning to Gyr Albania had given her time to think over the Hien situation more clearly. He was a handsome man, that much was obvious, dedicated to a fault, funny and enthusiastic. The effect he has on her is confusing, she's drawn to him but the weirdness with the gifts was strange and off putting. 

There's a sloshing noise, something cold pressing into her hair and it makes Raina blink, thoughts of Hien gone as she looked up to the intruder. It's Lyse, waterskin in hand looking a mix of amused and concern at whatever expression Raina was wearing. 

"You'll end up with frowning tan lines if you keep that up." Lyse laughs, Raina smoothing out her face before shrugging. She's sat in the shade, she's unlikely to burn here even with skin as fair as her. "What's up?" 

"Does Hien actually like me or do he just give me gifts as some weird form of hero worship warrior of light reason?" 

The look on Lyse's face is one of stunned silence. Was she expecting something more related to the current state of affairs? About the mission to drive the Garlean forces out of Gyr Albania and take back Ala Mhigo? 

"You're so oblivious it's painful sometimes." Lyse rests her forehead in her palm, frustration on her face before sighing and doing the breathing exercises she did to calm herself. Whatever Raina had failed to realise had been a point of frustration for the other, the viera waiting for context as Lyse seemed to internally fight with herself over something. 

She finds her answer soon enough, seeming to wait until Raina was drinking before speaking her conclusion. "He's been trying to court you, Raina." 

Hand shoots to her mouth to keep herself for spitting the water out, swallowing thickly as the words settled in. He was gifting her hand made carvings of her favourite thing as a show of affection. It wasn't weird hero worship. It was affection. 

She can feel her cheeks burn feeling flustered by both how wrong she had been and the gesture of it all collimating into one. She's a fool. An idiot. The definition of oblivious. 

No wonder her brother had looked so humoured everytime a new one was gifted, he'd known all along and was taking joy in watching her struggle to understand it. 

"You are so lucky that man is so determined because anyone else would have given up by now." 

Lyse is either oblivious or uncaring to Raina's inner turmoil, hands on her hips as she regarded the viera with minimal sympathy. She had to make him something back, do some form of gesture. He's spent months now doing this, never giving up despite her less than amazing responses. 

Oh gods, she had criticised the first one he made. 

She's absolutely mortified. 

"Star to Raina, you in there?" Lyse asks after time has stretched on in pure silence, leaning to the side slightly before jumping back as the viera turns to her and yells in panic. 

"I…I have to… FUCK!" 

—

It's not her best effort, a mixture of limited resources and working off of memory combining together to try and make the gift before Hien returned to the east. She hadn't had much time to think of something, having already done one gesture for the other that had yet to be revealed or noticed. 

The new weight on her ear was easy to get used to, tapping her foot nervously as she waited for her opportunity to present the gift gripped tightly in her hands. Curry buns shaped to look like namazu, three in total with a range of ridiculous expressions upon them. Happy, shocked and unconscious.  

Present him with food, tell him to have a safe journey, say goodbye. Three steps, she just had to do three steps and she could stop being nervous about all this. What reason does she even have to be nervous? She had no reason to doubt what Lyse had said to her about it, none at all. 

"Oh, Raina, I hope we'll be able to see you again in Doma soon. Hopefully under better circumstances." 

She jumps, fumbling with the box of food she'd made for him before catching it, smiling nervously. Smooth. "I would like that." Raina offers at first before clearing her throat, pushing the food forward. "I made you some food for the road, you mentioned curry buns once and I thought you might enjoy them."

It's like witnessing the sun, his grin near luminous as it reached his eyes, his enthusiasm near infectious as waxed poetic about the food. He forgot himself, it seems, no longer an alliance leader but a normal mam enthusiastic about the simple gift of food. 

Poll 9 9It's then he notices the earring, a small spriggan dangling from large hare ears does any hope of him regaining composure left the window.

[theworldbrewery]

Hi im a new fighter in a homebrew campaign and need some advice. Im a ranged battlemaster fighter at lvl 7 with a single lvl Bloodhunter dip i multiclassed out of bh. I was wondering if u had magic item suggestions. alr have amulet of health and Periapt of wound closure and a luck stone. Id ask for multiclass advice but then this'll be too long lol

Depending on if you're able to carry a shield while attacking at range (the two-handed feature of some ranged weapons *can* mean you're unable to also carry a shield, DM ruling advised), I would love to see you take the Arrow-Catching shield, which plays well against being attacked from a distance. Note that the item description says "ranged attacks," not ranged weapon attacks, which means you could use this shield to defend against ranged spell attacks made against you as well.

If a shield is a no-go, I'd focus your efforts on upgrading your ammunition. If your DM is a homebrewing type, you can ask them to come up with different kinds of ammunition to use, but a good place to start is Walloping Ammunition, which knocks the target prone. In terms of upgrading your weapon itself, the only great option is the Very Rare item Oathbow, which lets you swear vengeance against an enemy for some fun bonuses, but isn't very kind to a flexible attacker who switches between weapons.

For a wondrous item option, I'd consider the Boots of Speed, the Bracers of Archery, and Gloves of Missile Snaring for other effective combat items. In general, any item with out-of-combat utility could be promising for you, but I'd choose that based on the type of campaign you're in -- e.g. a seafaring campaign might net you a ring of water walking, an underdark-themed campaign might encourage a gem of brightness, etc., so it's tough to say what non-battle items would be a good fit without knowing more about the campaign.

Good luck in your hunt for fun items!

[ajentmm]

August '23 Refine Theorycraft

Wow, this month sees two enemy-phase distant counter calvaries getting their remixes (and a bunch more long over due). These two have some very nice benefits for beating back those that initiate, but all those benefits are in enemy-phase, so their movement is under used. Additionally, their HP/Def/Res are lacking due to them being cavalries, and thus, lower total base stats. Thankfully, IS has being remining this by giving us more calvaries with perfs that give high amounts of in combat stats debuffs to foes and percentage based reduced damage, so I’d imagine their refines will look like those.  

Seliph: Scion of Light 

Lvl. 40 5 ☆ 41/41/17/37/26 Max Invest 49/49/24/45/33 

Virtuous Tyrfing : Grants Res+3. If foe initiates combat or if unit's HP < 100% at start of combat, inflicts Atk/Def-6 on foe during combat, and if unit deals damage to foe during combat, restores 7 HP to unit. (Triggers even if 0 damage is dealt.) 

Ignis – Distant Ferocity - Holy War’s End II - Joint Hone Def 

Holy War’s End II: At the start of combat, if unit's HP ≥ 25%, inflict Atk/Def-5 on foe during combat, unit makes guaranteed follow-up attack, and foe cannot make a follow-up attack, and also, if foe initiates combat, unit attacks twice (does not stack). 

Legendary Seliph was kind of bad at launch. His enemy-phase desperation was cool, but again, he’s a calvary. Plus, that weapon wasn’t doing much. Now, with Holy War’s End II, he’s getting omi-breaker, Atk/Def-5, and the ability to attack twice during enemy phase. He’s now quad attacking after the foe’s first attack. Presumably, the weapon refine will fix the condition for mixed phased usage and make him more tanky to the first hit, so he can hit four times and trigger Ignis on the last hit if necessary.  

Virtuous Tyrfing: Grants Res+3. At start of combat, if foe initiates combat, unit's HP ≤ 99%, or foe’s HP = 100%, inflicts Atk/Def-6 on foe during combat, and if unit deals damage to foe during combat, restores 7 HP to unit. (Triggers even if 0 damage is dealt.) 

Enables [Canto (2)]. If unit or foe initiates combat after moving to a different space, inflicts Atk/Def-X on foe during combat (X = number of spaces from start position to end position of whoever initiated combat × 2, + 4; max 12), and also, if unit's HP ≥ 25% at start of combat, unit’s HP > 1, and foe would reduce unit’s HP to 0, unit survives with 1 HP. (Once per combat. Does not stack with non-Special effects that allow unit to survive with 1 HP if foe's attack would reduce HP to 0.) 

Yep, he’s getting Canto and Miricle. He’s still healing 7 per hit, a potential 28 HP healed, over half his max HP, he just needs to live the first hit. A since Brave Seliph is already using true damage = foe’s Def, I just went with a lot of reduced Atk/Def on foe (23 in total). I would have liked damage reduction based on whether the foe is ranged or not, seeing as Sigurd’s Divine Tyrfing had 50% damage reduction to magic too, but Miricale is already good.  

Freyja: Lady of Nightmare 

Lvl. 40 5 ☆ 40/38/44/24/22 Max Invest 47/45/51/30/28 

Nightmare Horn: Grants Spd+3. Unit can counterattack regardless of foe's range. If unit's Spd > foe's Spd, reduces damage from attacks during combat and from area-of-effect Specials (excluding Røkkr area-of-effect Specials) by percentage = difference between stats × 4 (max 40%). [Calvary Beast] 

Luna – Atk/Spd Solo 4 - Binding Necklace+ - Pulse Smoke 3 / Spd Smoke 4 

Binding Necklace+: Removes the condition to transform. Inflicts Spd/Def-4 on foe during combat. If a skill compares unit's Spd to a foe's or ally's Spd, treats unit's Spd as if granted +7. If foe initiate combat or the number of adjacent allies ≤ 1 grants Atk/Spd/Def/Res+3 to unit and inflicts Atk/Spd/Def/Res-3 on foe during combat, and also, if foe has bonuses, grants bonus to unit's Atk/Spd/Def/Res and inflicts penalty on foe's Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat=current bonus on each of foe's stats. Calculates each stat bonus independently. 

Freyja, the lady of Nightmare, and goat mama, was a terrifing foe in the story maps where there was 6 or so attacking you in a defense map, but if you actually came prepared for DC, DR, and kept the Bonuses at home, you wil be fine. The unfortunate thing with cavalry beasts was that their transformation bonus was player-phase only, so a perf that has distant counter wouldn't get the benefits on the Atk/Def penalties on foe when countering ranged foes. Freyja’s summer alt ditched the DC for better player phase nuking and it was better for it. Now, there’s a new calvary transformation bonus that’s mixed phased, so long as the initiator moves one space. On top of that, we got Eitr, that gave use an Arcane weapon that has the same effect as Freyja’s Binding Necklace, and a new Beast B-Slot skills that removes the condition to transform, gives phantom Spd, and Dodge of 40%. Huh? So the Binding Necklace part is getting the first two parts of Beast Sense 4, since her weapon already has Dodge of 40%, AND she’s getting Spd Smoke for another Dodge of 40%. Would that mean her weapon would look like this?  

Nightmare Horn: Grants Spd+3. Unit can counterattack regardless of foe's range. If unit's Spd > foe's Spd, reduces damage from attacks during combat and from area-of-effect Specials (excluding Røkkr area-of-effect Specials) by percentage = difference between stats × 4 (max 40%). At start of turn, if unit is adjacent to only beast or dragon allies or is not adjacent to any ally, unit transforms (otherwise, unit reverts). If unit transforms, grants Atk+2 to unit, inflicts Atk/Def-X on foe during combat (X = number of spaces from start position to end position of whoever initiated combat + 3; max 6), and also, if X ≥ 5, reduces damage from foe's first attack by 30% during combat. 

Accelerates Special trigger (cooldown count-1). At start of combat, if unit's HP ≥ 25%, inflicts Spd/Def-X on foe (X = 50% of highest total bonuses + penalties on foes within 3 spaces of target, + 6, Max 22), neutralizes effects that guarantee foe's follow-up attacks, and effects that prevent unit's follow-up attacks. 

Epic. So, I copied pretty much everything from her brother, Freyr, but re-flavored it for her. She has the AS, she has the new cavalry transformation, she get NFU, and she get to inflict Spd/Def penilites on foe, based on how many bonuses and penalties are on the foe, since she is stealing the foe’s bonuses, it’s fine if they have any, and she’s inflicting Spd-7 on foes so that’s another 3. And you know she’s getting a big bonus when fighting L!Robin. I made the Max 22, just because that’s the highest Freyr can get, now that the flood gates of +8 visible stat buffs have been opened.  

Est: Springtime Flier 

Lvl. 40 5 ☆ 39/38/35/17/26 Max Invest 47/46/43/24/33 

Eagle's Egg: Grants Atk+3. If unit is within 2 spaces of an ally, grants Atk/Spd/Def/Res+5 to unit and neutralizes unit's penalties during combat. 

Moonbow – Fury 4 – Chill Atk/Res 2 – Hone Fliers 

Spring Est is . . . a blue tome flier. That’s it. She is immune to penalties so that’s cool, but it’s all she got to work with.  

Eagle's Egg: Grants Atk+3. If unit is within 3 spaces of an ally, grants Atk/Spd/Def/Res+5 to unit, neutralizes unit's penalties, and also, if unit's HP ≥ 25% at start of combat, reduces damage from foe's first attack by 40%. 

If unit initiates combat or if unit is within 2 spaces of an ally, grants Atk/Spd/Def/Res+4 to unit and inflicts Spd/Res - X on foe during combat (X = highest total bonuses active among unit or allies within 2 spaces.), neutralizes effects that prevent unit's follow-up attacks, and also, if unit initiates combat and 2 or more allies are within 2 spaces of unit, unit attacks twice (Does not stack). 

Well, that’s something. I gave Spring! Est a neat effect where she prefers granting bonuses to herself and allies, instead of using Rein skills. These bonuses fuel the Spd/Res pentiles inflicted on the foe akin to a Blade tome. She then gets half-NFU and the cherry on top, in combat Triangle Attack. In a way, she’s going to be identical to Legendary Seliph, just with more prep needed, unfortunately. I will not be surprised if she just granted [Triangle Attack] just like her sister Catria.  

Alright, the rest of the refines are under here with links to past blogs. The only one I would change is Ced, and add more in combat stats to the green part of the refine. And remember, next month, we might getting CYL5 refines, and we are getting Itsuki, the first of the TMS heroes. I did their theorycrafting here and here.

Echidna: Unyielding Idealist 

Heroine Axe Western Axe: Grants Atk/Spd/Def/Res+X to allies within 2 tile radius of unit during combat. If unit is within 2 spaces of an ally or structurers that a foe can destroy, grant Atk/Spd/Def/Res+X to unit during combat. (X = number of allies or structurers that a foe can destroy with 2 tile radius x 2; Max 8) If X ≥ 3, foe cannot make a follow-up attack. 

If unit’s HP > 25%, foes with Range = 1 cannot move through spaces adjacent to unit, and foes with Range = 2 cannot move through spaces within 2 spaces of unit. (Does not affect foes with Pass skills.) At the start of combat, if unit’s HP > 25%, inflicts Atk/Spd/Def-4 on foe during combat and restores 7 HP to unit after combat. 

Mareeta: Sword of Stars 

Mareeta’s Sword: Accelerates Special trigger (cooldown count-1). If unit initiates combat or is not adjacent to an ally, grants Atk/Spd/Def/Res+4 and neutralizes effects that guarantee foe’s follow-up attacks and effects that prevent unit’s follow-up attacks during combat. 

If unit’s HP > 25%, grant Atk/Spd+6, inflict Special cooldown charge -1 on foe per attack during combat, and also, if unit initiates combat and unit’s Spd > foe’s Spd+10, unit attacks twice. 

Ced: Hero on the Wind 

Winds of Silesse: Grants Spd+3. If unit initiates combat or is not adjacent to an ally grants Atk/Spd+6 to unit during combat, neutralize penalties on unit’s Atk/Spd, and inflict Special cooldown -1 on foe per attack. 

At start of turn 1-4, inflicts Atk/Spd -6 and [Gaurd] on foes with the lowest maximum Special cooldown for their next action and inflict Special cooldown count+1 on those foes. (Cannot exceed the foe’s maximum Special cooldown.)

Travant: King of Thracia 

Thracia Kinglance Tyrannical Gungnir: Grants Atk/Spd/Def+5. Inflicts Res-5. At the start of combat, if unit’s HP > 25%, grant unit a guaranteed follow-up attack. 

If unit initiates combat or is not adjacent to an ally, grant Spd/Def +5 to unit and inflict Spd/Def -5 to foe during combat, and also, if unit’s Def+Spd > foe’s Def+Spd, deals damage = 20% of unit’s Def (excluding area-of-effect Specials), and reduces damage from foe’s attacks by 20% of unit’s Def during combat (excluding area-of-effect Specials). 

[horngryeyes]

not gonna lie ive been feeling like an accomplished adventurer lately just doing my genshin dailies. the rush of dopamine i get when visiting katheryne in her adventurers guild stand and redeeming my rewards for performing tasks is crazy. and then after i do all my important tasks i even have some free time to walk around and loot some chests and stuff. god i wish i lived in genshin impact

[astrxealis]

i think it’s really cool when. tables kinda turn like. doing e5 normal raid DESTROYED me. i died like. idk. 10 times. but yeah i died a LOT <//3 but then i helped out w doing unsynced eden raids some time ago, i remember, and went rdm and. literally saving the party

[utilitycaster]

It hurts my soul when Fearne still uses Flame Blade. I know it's thematically appropriate but it's a 2nd lvl spell, costs both an action and a bonus action, and uses concentration. Please just use Primal Savagery, if fire is needed Scorching Ray is right there and doesn't even need to be prepared.

You know, I was thinking about making a post about optimal choices in D&D once again and this is a great jumping off point:

Optimal is complicated, and when people say things like this my gut reaction is "you have not played a lot of D&D". Which is not a judgement! It's hard to get a game together and to work with the schedules of busy people, and plenty of people haven't had the opportunity. Or maybe you have, and your playstyle differs wildly from mine; a lot of the "burst damage above all people" have played a lot of D&D (though I suspect they've played versions prior to 5e more so than 5e) and just happen to have very different priorities than I. But in the end, with D&D, as with many things, no plan survives contact with the enemy, and statements like this are, well, a plan that hasn't encountered the enemy.

Mechanics are fun to talk about in a vacuum but you're playing a whole entire game, and a skilled player will use their mechanics to inform their RP and vice versa. Consider: it would have been more optimal for Caleb to have picked a different set of spells. He got to level 16 without a single short-range teleport, meaning that if he got grappled, he was at the mercy of the creature unless he rolled very high or Yasha took pity on him or something. His damage spell list skewed heavily towards fire except at high levels, which was a serious disadvantage when fighting Lucien, who had fire resistance - it would have been more optimal for him to have had Chain Lightning instead of the fire-themed reskin, Web of Fire, for example. But he had Web of Fire, because that is who he is. "Thematically appropriate but not mechanically optimal" is a completely valid choice and, worryingly, it's one I feel gets unevenly questioned depending on who is doing it.

(With that said I do need to point out though that purely from a mechanics standpoint, if you're playing by strict rules, Scorching Ray is at disadvantage in melee. Flame Blade is in fact Fearne's only melee attack that does fire damage; even if you'd prefer she played as a ranged rather than melee attacker, sometimes casters end up in melee and it's not a bad thing to be prepared for that.)

This is also a conversation that comes up commonly elsewhere. Remove Curse, for example, is cheaper and lower level than Greater Restoration - but it's more limited in scope. If you're a prepared support caster with access to both? You have Greater Restoration in permanent marker on your spell sheet because it is far more versatile (Remove Curse won't work for exhaustion, illnesses, petrification, etc). If something can wait until the next morning, then you can prep Remove Curse and be frugal about it.

And most generally: maybe she likes Flame Blade. Maybe Ashley is having some fun. It's not hurting anyone for her to choose that. I haven't seen the party suffer terribly for the lack of her having other spells. It's one spell slot. I am trying to focus on that here but like. I could write an entire thesis on how FCG keeps using Detect Thoughts when Imogen is literally right there, has a higher save DC, has the option of not using a spell slot, has the means of potentially recovering spell slots, has much more damaging cantrips available, and isn't the party's primary healer. I have to admit that next to that, any other "suboptimal" play that I've seen this campaign pales.

All in all, everyone's entitled to play how they want as long as they're not being selfish, and people are similarly entitled to have their own opinions about play, but I'm afraid I cannot relate to this in any way.