#in absence of an abyss twin player

[notbrokenjustfake]

Lantern Rite

“Still watching?” Akuji chuckled. “He’s just a stubborn as you, L.” He looked over the blonde woman sitting under a large tree overlooking Liyrue Harbor.  

Kites dot the night sky, bobbing and weaving in the winds over the city. Lantern Rite was not anything he intended to participate in, coming simply to meet Lumine. They had met in the depths of the Abyss, the puppet making a concentrated effort to find her after removing himself from the Irminsul. While he had only been curious at first, there is a certain amount of comfort being around someone such as her. Someone who has also been forever changed by the knowledge of Teyvat’s truth.

This time of year, she was easily locatable to a rare few as she chose to watch her brother participate, just as she had… once.

Lumine smiled at the puppet and let out a soft sigh. “Aether will just have to learn the truth for himself. You know as well as I do the truth of this world is not something you simply tell someone. I trust you haven’t told him.”

“Aside from telling him that you are recorded. No and not Buer either, but that was before…” He paused and sat beside her. “There are some things that should be kept secret. I don’t think he’d be too pleased with our little meetings anyway.”

Not that the puppet particularly cares what Aether thinks, the Traveler is dull, naïve, and hopelessly optimistic in his opinion. Lumine on the other hand, was quite steeped in darkness and he enjoyed the chaos she brings to the otherwise mundane and fate-driven world in which he occupies.

“It can’t be helped.” She replied flatly. “I never asked for you to do this nor do I need your company. You persist at your own free will. Is it care or curiosity that drives you?”

Akuji glanced over at her and huffed. “Care?  Hardly.”

He does not care for the Traveler, their relationship merely a debt owed in his mind despite what Aether wanted to believe. For her, however, the situation is a bit complicated. She is not a mewing would be hero and her distain for the Gods is only rivaled by his own and perhaps just as equally driven by vengeance.

The blonde rested her head on his shoulder. Her eyes still fixated on the streets of the harbor. “Hmm. A lie? Even so, I’m not going to tell you that I am unhappy to have company.”

The girl’s existence is just as lonely as his, especially since having lost Dain’s company. She moves now in orders and manipulation, pulling and plucking at the strings of Teyvat in the attempt to pull herself toward Celestia. No matter the cost. Surely this is something the puppet boy understands, no?

Akuji’s brows furrowed at her actions, but he made no effort to move her even as his fingers crept closer to hers and allowing them to barely meet the tips of hers. Maybe there is a bit of care or simply he’d just seen himself reflected in Lumine. An understanding and acceptance which had not been found in anyone he’d met in Teyvat.

They sat in silence for a long while just watching until the sun began to creep over the horizon. The little comforts they had ended far sooner than both would wish for.

“I have to go now…” Lumine whispered.

He nodded as he watched her leave though the swirling purple portal she opened. Lumine looked back only once, her gaze ran from the city to him, before stepping through and removing herself once again from the face of Teyvat.

Akuji could have easily followed her had he wished to do so, but some things are better left alone. So instead, he sat alone underneath the big tree. Still watching and still wondering. How will all of this turn out? In the end it may not matter at all, at least for him. The wind will carry him onward, forever just wandering and doing nary a thing more than he pleases.

[m1d-45]

RED DEAD OF NIGHT IN HIS ASHLEY ARC (<- things that only make sense to shining nikki players. wait oh my god they’re both associated with fire it works)

BUT YEAHHHH RED DEAD OF NIGHT FULLY SPLITTING FROM DILUC… personally i’m calling him red to distinguish the two but that’s just what i’m doing everyone else can do their own thing! anyways him and diluc fighting it out….. red knowing that he isn’t the “real” diluc but honestly not caring bc he’s yours, real or not.

ALSO UNRELATED. but there is a little girl named susan who is a magician, streamer, and stylist and her younger twin brother william is an alchemist and also a stylist. i need them to meet klee. i need the three of them to be friends - teddy anon

“red knowing that he isn’t the ‘real’ diluc but not caring because he’s yours, real or not.” you…. you get me.

i’m thinking about red and diluc meeting during the hunt. maybe he’s searching for food to bring back to you. i’m thinking about diluc on patrol for his darknight hero stuff, seeing a flicker of flame and worrying. i’m thinking about him pushing into a meadow, following the dark fire, and freezing on the edge.

i’m thinking about red crouched by a bundle of sweet flowers, one hand holding a ball of fire to light up the plants. he looks up, assessing him, slowly rising to his feet. diluc drawing his weapon, wary of the one that looks like him. it’s a scarilu accurate imitation, and he fears how advanced the abyss is that they can make copies of him that detailed. the gloves, the suit, the hair.. it has to be a trick, right?

red not saying a word, not even an expression on his face as he reaches and stomps on one of the flowers, dragging it across the ground to uproot it. the ground begins to burn red as he douses his flame, turning to walk away, leaving diluc to handle the whopperflower that bursts from the ground.

i’m thinking about immediately post hunt, when people are aware of what they’ve done but you’re still wary. diluc seeing you walk around windrise, seeing himself at your side. there’s two others—a girl and someone that looks suspiciously like fischl—but he doesn’t pay attention to them, simply rushing up to greet you.

not-him and not-fischl are the first to see him, and though he slows as he gets closer, he sees both of them move to protect you and the girl. he kneels, immediately, but doesn’t get the chance to speak.

“what business do you have with the divine?” not-fischl asks, still carrying the same tone as the real thing.

“i’ve come to talk,” he says. “on behalf of-“

“and you thought now would be appropriate?”

he hesitates, looking up at the ‘him’ who’d spoken. he really was nearly an exact copy, and ut was strange to hear his own voice.

“i… you haven’t been seen, and relations must be opened at some point-“

“and you don’t think our absence is intentional?”

diluc pauses. he knows, obviously, that you’d need some time to recover, but you’d barely been seen. it was always the girl with you, or the imitations of the archons. he’d assumed you were sheltered away somewhere, kept safe from the hunt.

(he didn’t want to believe he could have hurt you.)

“what are you?” he asks finally, standing to address.. himself. “or who? why do you look like me?”

he stiffens, and the girl puts her hand on his shoulder. “red, you don’t have to.”

‘red?’

“i’m you,” he says simply. “but better.”

“what? that can’t be-“

“it is. i’m you, but not as foolish. you, but i follow the correct god.” he could tell he was a bit too eager to speak, as if he’d practiced. “i’m you. but better.”

diluc was quiet. in the silence, he turned toward you, expression softening.

“shall we go, my god?”

[wanderingmoonsword]

Reliquary Guardian

Many faiths practice the art of statuary, raising tribute or icons to their gods in the form of stone and clay given the shape of gods, servants, and monsters from their faith. Reliquary guardians turn these works of religious art from mere decoration and devotion to protectors of the faith’s most important places, wielding holy magic to drive out any who defile their charge. Any faith sufficiently aligned with the moral or ethical precepts can build reliquary guardians, though none among the gods who claim no allegiance host such protectors. Massive statues the size of ogres, reliquary guardians can deliver a holy pronouncement that hammers at those who hear and wield aligned magic in small amounts, but they’re largely physical combatants, something these constructs are well-armed to conduct. Reliquary guardians are tucked away, protecting temples and cathedrals. They make excellent protectors of lost holy sites of nearly any faith but there’s no reason these constructs have to be opponents – their might could be just the thing to turn the tide in a battle for a party that can convince them of their righteousness. (Or, of course, the depths of villainy in their blackened souls…) Finally, remember that reliquary guardians are intelligent, thinking beings, not automatons, nor are they necessarily bound in any sense to the orders of well-being of co-religionists. Attempts to make use of them – by the players or their opponents – could go awry when the reliquary guardian’s purpose, philosophy, or interpretation of its god differs from what someone expects.

The drow House of Alkenzari abandoned their fortified holdings at the eastern end of the Chasm of Zareth when their abyssal patron, a demonic power of cave-ins, entombed secrets, and stone, was swept from much of her power. Still, some trickle of the faded demon lord’s power remains, enough that the reliquary guardian in a cavern shrine still wields its massive tetsubo that shakes loose debris and stalactites when slammed into the ground. In the absence of the drow and their slaves, the reliquary guardian has greedily taken possession of much of House Alkenzari’s former hold, browbeating the morlocks that swarm the place into a rough worship of its mostly-forgotten patron and serving as its foot soldiers, spies, and servants.

The stony resting place of scores of dwarves, the fortress-tomb of Khanturhm was built was an eternal resting place for the honored dead. With walls shored up against the movement of the mountains, ingenious traps, and guardians sworn to endless duty, the place is a sanctuary from the ravages of scavengers and tomb-robbers, but its most formidable protector is a massive reliquary guardian. Known as the Guarantor, the axiomatic construct refuses the entry of anyone but sanctified priests of a god of the dead forgotten today, even to simply retrieve an artifact laid to rest with a hero. Such is the law of the dead – it was consigned to their eternal rest and the dead shall keep it.

Long ago, the twin gods Jaione and Lemdione – the shining god of justice and righteousness and the ruby-fisted goddess of tyranny and conquest – established a joint sanctum of law in the mountains of the Pelmere Rise. Now the tyrannical anti-paladin Resheph hopes to reawaken the ancient guardian of the Thorn-Crowned Tyrant, leaving the other reliquary guardian consigned to the ages in its timeless slumber, claiming the entire cache of axiomatic weapons and other implements for his own purposes rather than portion them out to fight the demonic incursion at Sakarak.

- Tome of Horrors Complete 510-511

[fume-knight-of-shovelry]

Thoughts on Dark Souls 3

(Note: I made this right after I finished the base game back in April. I just wanted to clean this up and get it published while going through my drafts. This only applies to the base game.)

All right, first off, I’m going to clarify that I love Dark Souls 3 and have not played Dark Souls 1 (was too young when it came out to play an M-rated game).

That being said, Dark Souls 3 has some serious issues. I know Fromsoft will never see this, and in all honesty most companies should ignore everything on tumblr (otherwise BioWare’s future games would be awful, awful, awful and Overwatch would be doomed). I still wanted to verbalize this, though.

1: The Bosses

I cannot be the only person who thinks that, ironically, Dark Souls 3 has more “Armored Knight” bosses than Dark Souls 2.

I mean, if we compare the bosses, there are 32 in Dark Souls 2.

The following could count as “Dudes in Armor”:

The Pursuer

The Looking Glass Knight

The Ruin Sentinels

The Old Dragonslayer

Velstadt, the Royal Aegis (who is awesome)

Vendrick (who’s naked, so maybe it doesn’t count?)

The Dragonriders/The Twin Dragonriders (counting these as two bosses)

Throne Watcher and Throne Defender

The Gank Squad (okay, only two of them are in armor, but we’ll just count these guys/girls/whatever)

Sir Alonne (who is awesome)

Fume Knight (who is super awesome)

Burnt Ivory King 

So that’s...thirteen bosses out of 32, twelve if we exclude Vendrick. Of the 23 bosses in the vanilla game, 10 of them are dudes in armor (9 if you exclude Vendrick).

Let’s compare that to Dark Souls 3. Of the 19 bosses, the following could be counted as “Dudes in Armor”:

Iudex Gundyr (or, at least, his first phase)

Vordt of the Boreal Valley (he’s got the behavior of an animal, but still counts)

The Abyss Watchers

Pontiff Sulyvahn (who is a great boss)

Dancer of the Boreal Valley

Champion Gundyr

Lorian, Elder Prince, and Lothric, Younger Prince (okay, only one of them is in armor and the boss is badass, but c’mon, they count)

Nameless King (phase 2)

Soul of Cinder

So, that’s 9 out of 19.

So 47% of the Dark Souls 3 bosses are armored knights, while 37% of the Dark Souls 2 bosses are (counting the DLC and excluding Vendrick: it’s 40% if we count the base game without Vendrick). So, percentage wise, I’m mostly splitting hairs since the difference doesn’t seem substantial (although 10% is nothing to ignore, so we’ll have to wait and see how the DS3 DLC shapes up).

While the overall quality of the non-knight bosses in Dark Souls 3 is better compared to those in Dark Souls 2 (Prowling Magus, Blue Smelter, and Royal Rat Vanguard, I’m looking at you), I still feel a bit disappointed in the buildup to the bosses in DS3. Plus, there aren’t all that many optional bosses, and, except the entirety of the Archdragon Peak area, most of these optional bosses aren’t well-hidden.

Remember exploring the now-unlocked areas in the Lost Bastille and coming across the Gargoyles and the Bellkeeper covenant, or finding the Darklurker at the end of the Pilgrim questline? There aren’t too any bosses like that in DS3. The DLC might fix this, though.

The Lords of Cinder are quite good, but two exceptions stand out; Yhorm and Aldrich. While Yhorm’s fight is a love letter to a Demon’s Souls boss, it still feels like it embodies a critical flaw in the game; sacrificing interesting or innovative ideas on the altar of nostalgia. Aldrich is appropriately horrifying and a gut-punch to DS1 players, but after the initial shock, goes down without too much trouble. On the other hand, the Soul of Cinder is an epic love letter to Dark Souls 1 and 2, and many of the other bosses are excellent additions to the Souls boss repertoire, there are still plenty of disappointments (Deacons of the Deep, Crystal Sage, Ancient Wyvern, and the Greatwood [arguably]).

So, in conclusion, while the bosses are excellent, I hope the DLCs do a bit more to hide the optional ones, increase the number of optional ones, and diversify the boss lineup.

2: The PVP

I’ll be careful about blanket statements, but the PVP seems to have overall been received much more poorly in Dark Souls 3 compared to Dark Souls 2. Part of this is flaws in the covenant design, but a lot of it is the core design choices of this game and how they differ from before.

Let’s start with the positives. The absence of Soul Memory is an obvious plus, making it much easier to find appropriately-leveled and geared friends and enemies. The online connectivity is the best it’s ever been, with fewer instances of game-based lag, and generally smooth hitboxes even for notoriously problematic weapon classes. Covenants once again offer a place for players to carve themselves out in the world, and the differences between some of them lead to far more creative gameplay then we’ve ever seen before. Increasing the number of possible players in a world leads to even more chaotic brawls.

Unfortunately, there are a slew of negatives to go along with this.

For one, you can no longer be invaded in areas where you have cleared a boss; while I can understand the desire to make an area permanently “safer”, this means that end-game players are left in the lurch for areas to PVP in.

[NOTE: As of the original time of writing this, the arenas were not yet announced. With the presence of arenas, this issue has been largely addressed.]

All weapons in a weapon class have identical movesets. This makes it more fair when it comes to predicting possible attacks and helps unify weapon balance, but robs the ability of some weapons to stand out based on their specific moveset (Santier’s Spear, anyone?), meaning that good weapons are determined by stats alone and there are far fewer viable options.

On that note, Whips, Scythes, and Lances are essentially nonexistent or so poor as to be unviable choices (with the lone exception of Friede’s Great Scythe). Gone are the days when dual bleed whips were a viable strategies and the Grand Lance’s running attack was the terror of tight corridors.

And now, we come to poise. Whoo boy, poise. “Working as intended” memes aside, poise is a difficult issue to pin down. Making it too strong leads to the death of fast weapon builds and the overabundance of tanks. Unfortunately, the opposite occurred, and for a long time after launch, fast straight swords (Estoc and Dark Sword spam) ruled the meta, and running heavy armor was essentially worthless. The situation hasn’t been fixed, but people have adapted a bit.

Lastly, we need to address the covenants, which are the worst they’ve ever been. Never mind that some of the rewards are worthless or poorly placed (Mound-Makers get Warmth? Really?). For weeks after launch, auto-summon covenants (Blue Sentinels/Blades of the Darkmoon and the Watchdogs of Farron) weren’t working at all, making levelling up in these covenants a near impossibility. The Blue Sentinels/Blades of the Darkmoon were hit particularly hard by this, given that there are no rewards for joining the Way of the Blue and thus people didn’t have much incentive to equip it, further killing the chances for “Bluebros” to get summoned.

Perhaps in anticipation of this, much like how covenant spells were available in NG++ from Chancellor Wellager in Dark Souls 2, some enemies drop covenant items. While they shouldn’t drop regularly enough to disincentivize online play, the drop rate for some items is inexcusable. I never want to see another Silver Knight again; far too many hours were wasted hunting for Proofs of a Concord Kept, and it’s only marginally better for Wolf’s Blood Swordgrass and Pale Tongues.

That being said, the positive from above are worth noting, and being able to swap covenants instantly and keep progress is a welcome and overdue boon.

3: The Levels

I’ll preface this by pointing out that the levels in Dark Souls 3, mostly, are vast, interconnected webs with shortcuts, interesting navigational tricks, and clear connections to other areas. From the tower in Farron Keep, for example, you can see the Undead Settlement, the High Wall of Lothric and Lothric Castle, the Cathedral of the Deep, and (maybe) Irithyll of the Boreal Valley. The areas make good use of verticality and looping-back to feed into a growing sense of comfort with the ins and outs of a place of exploration.This is all fantastic.

However, in terms of the sheer variety, Dark Souls 3 feels like it drops the ball. A few too many areas have the ambiance of a cathedral (sections that stand out in particular include parts of the High Wall of Lothric and the entirety of the Cathedral of the Deep, excluding the graveyard portion), to the extent that once you get to areas like Lothric Castle, I was a little sick of grand arches and choir chambers. Plus, almost every area you visit has already been colonized, inhabited, or otherwise has some continuous sentient presence. The primary reason areas like the Untended Graves stood out, aside from the genuine creepiness of the whole place, was the sensation of isolation that wasn’t really present when tearing through the Undead Settlement or Irithyll of the Boreal Valley.

In addition, some areas are of baffling length given their placement. The Road of Sacrifices feels poorly paced; besides the section with Corvians at the beginning, one can essentially bolt in a straight line from Anri and Horace to either of the two connecting areas. Though the Consumed King’s Garden and Smouldering Lake are optional, these areas have the distinct sensation of halting at awkward times. The Garden has a few wandering abyss-snake dudes and some confusingly-placed Cathedral Knights, but ends after a single shortcut. The Smouldering Lake is a confusing mess of tunnels that can be skipped by…running in a straight line from the entrance, if one is ballsy enough. Sure, deactivating the ballista is an interesting operation, as is finding all the goodies, but the Lake does feel like a strange tribute to DS1’s most hated area. Anor Londo made a little bit of sense as a beloved an important area from DS1, but Lost Izalith?

Unfortnately, the Profaned Capital does not have “it’s optional” as an excuse. After the confusing but rewarding hell of the Irithyll Dungeon, an area with the tagline “Profaned Capital” brings to mind something more like Lothric Castle, but instead is a very fast L-shaped pathway towards a boss that sacrifices interesting mechanics for nostalgia, with an optional hellswamp.

On that note, the amount of poison in Dark Souls 3 feels a little overbearing. Farron Keep on its own is worse than any previous poison zone, and even if they’re short, the Consumed King’s Garden and the swamp section of the Profaned Capital feel like an extra kick in the nuts.

The larger problem I have with the level design is actually less the level design, and more the world design with respect to player choice. Dark Souls 3 is pretty much a linear shot the whole way through, with only two notable diverging points; whether you kill the Deacons of the Deep before clearing the Catacombs of Carthus, and whether you kill Aldrich or Yhorm first. Technically, one can also get to Lothric Castle early by fighting the Dancer of the Boreal Valley before Vordt, but you can’t ­­a­ actually get to the Lorian and Lothric, or even the Grand Archives, early. In comparison to Dark Souls 2, where you could not only choose which area to go to first (within a limited framework), but also which boss you could fight first, the restriction feels more than a little unwelcome.

That being said, most of the game’s areas are very well-designed. As mentioned, Irithyll Dungeon is a confusing, claustrophobic, terrifying and unforgiving environment, and the Cathedral of the Deep offers plenty of shortcuts (developer-made or otherwise) to make navigating the well-designed building easier. Archdragon Peak is of just the right size for an area so off the beaten path, and the Grand Archives are a fantastic final wall to throw up in front of players before the end of the game, involving heavy vertical as opposed to horizontal travel. And especially in comparison to Dark Souls 2, as mentioned above, even if the player has less choice in where to travel, the ways those areas link up is much more fluid and interesting.

On an unrelated note that I couldn’t think of any other place to put, the lack of differences between NG and NG+ and beyond are noticeable. In Dark Souls 2, new enemies and items were very common and the difficulty jump was noticeable. In Dark Souls 3, there are new rings, and that’s pretty much it. It’s a small issue, but combined with the lack of build variety, really hurts the game’s replayability.

4: The Story

The story is the part that hurts the most for me personally. While the characters and plotlines introduced in this game can be genuinely interesting, there’s no way to beat around the bush. Far too much of the story feels like it’s directly repeating Dark Souls 1.

While some of my complaints are to do with the dropping of interesting threads and characters from Dark Souls 2 (in the base game, there are a handful of items and areas referencing it, and the only enemies that carry over are the fucking poison bugs; even Yhorm turns out to not be a Dark Souls 2 Giant, although he’s implicitly related to the Giant Lord), I’m actually mostly frustrated because it means that the genuinely interesting threads from Dark Souls 3 get dropped. The entirety of material relating to “The Deep” ends up a dead end, Lothric itself feels like it’s repeating Lordran and Drangleic in uninteresting ways (even if that’s a theme of the series), and some of the most interesting original areas (Irithyll of the Boreal Valley, the Grand Archives) turn out to be connected at the hip to key elements of Dark Souls 1 that take over the new plotlines. Several new characters are essentially repeating roles from previous games, either in new coating (Lautrec for Leonhard), or even with the same appearance (Siegmeyer and Siegward [while I love both of them, the latter feels a little too much like silly fanservice at first]), and some of the new characters don’t…really go anywhere. Greirat finds an old woman’s bone and…dies after a while? Cornyx and Karla don’t go anywhere, although Karla has enough interesting questions to excuse her case.

And even for a Souls game, some of the material feels like such a tiny amount of substance is given to it that attempting to make connections is more frustrating than interesting. How on earth did VaatiVidya get enough material to make videos on the Angels of Lothric and Londor when very few items make any substantial connections? Again, what on earth is going on with Sulyvahn, the Church of the Deep, Carthus and more?

That being said, there are some excellent storylines and questions that pop up, and many of the previous callbacks enhance the story of the original Dark Souls. Again, the Untended Graves pops out as a positive, adding a great deal not only to the game’s story, but extending the importance of a seemingly silly character (Ludleth), and several storylines pan out in interesting ways. In general, the purely original elements of the story and characters stand out as great; some of the previous tie-backs fall comparatively flat.

Conclusions

Vocal people were spending the last 2 years whining about Dark Souls 2 and the developers tried so hard to recapture Dark Souls 1 that it kind of feels like DS3 fell flat in both respects. Genuinely good aspects from the second game were discarded for reasons that really aren’t clear, although they deserve props for learning from DS1′s mistakes and what DS2 didn’t do well.

I feel like Dark Souls 3...doesn’t really have its own identity. It blends elements from the previous entries very, very well but I genuinely think the story is too hung up on DS1, even with the excellent references to DS2 (Shield of Want and theories regarding Eleum Loyce being the Profaned Capital/Irithyll, anyone?).

Dark Souls 3 is an excellent game. At the same time, it feels like it’s trapped in an identity crisis between the first Dark Souls, and, occasionally BloodBorne.