#locking the best healer in the games best healing abilities behind a battle is bad enough

[cultofthepigeon]

ive failed the vestals second shrine "battle" like 6 times now because of how unintuitive it is and it has easily dropped this game a whole letter grade because of it

[scoutception]

Dragon Quest III: The Seeds of Salvation review

The original Dragon Quest was an extremely important and influential game that built the foundations to the Japanese role playing game genre, but was an extremely basic game that would end up outclassed by nearly any other RPG on the NES released afterwards that wasn’t completely incompetent, and while Dragon Quest II improved upon the foundation of the original, namely in terms of party progression, it was also a rushed, unbalanced, overly difficult and overall tedious experience. Despite its importance, Dragon Quest’s third installment would have to be a significant step up, and as luck would have it, it was, becoming another of the most legendary and important RPGs ever made, and firmly cementing Dragon Quest as a series that would stay around even to the present day, and how exactly this came to be is what we’ll be looking at today. The version I played was the SNES remake with a fan made English patch, so many of the names in the screenshots won’t match up with official translations. Other options are the Game Boy Color version, which was officially released in English, and even has a bit more exclusive content, namely a very time consuming sidequest and a bonus dungeon related to it, the Ice Cave, and much more recently, the mobile/Switch version, which is also available in English, and is based on the SNES version, minus some of its exclusive content. Be warned, there will be spoilers.

Story: In an unnamed land, geographically similar to the real world, the archfiend Baramos has appeared and unleashed monsters to plague the land, with its people’s woes ranging from groups of bandits robbing kings and kidnapping citizens, to monsters impersonating rulers, to entire towns being wiped out by the forces of Baramos, who ultimately plots to destroy the entire world. A hero from Aliahan, Ortega, once set out on a journey to slay the archfiend, only to fall in combat with a dragon over a volcano. The child of Ortega is thus given the task of slaying Baramos themselves on their 16th birthday, with the help of a group of adventurers recruited from Aliahan’s tavern.

On the surface, it’s still not much more of a plot than the first two games, and for the most part, that is true, but it’s still much more interesting simply because there’s much more going on. Many of the towns you visit are facing some sort of crisis, or have some sort of interesting circumstances around them, such as the immigrant town that slowly changes and expands as the game goes on, making them a lot more fun to discover and explore compared to the towns of the first two games. Additionally, there’s the famous and influential late game twist that strikes after defeating Baramos, namely the reveal of Zoma, Baramos’ superior, and the second world map of Alefgard, the setting of the first Dragon Quest. These two twists are a large part of what made Dragon Quest III so impactful when it came out in 1988, and considering the game presents itself as unrelated to the previous games, and that by the time you defeat Baramos, you’ll have explored the entire world, barring two small locations at most, they hold up fairly well even today. There’s not much more for me to add besides this, however, so it’s time to hop straight to the gameplay.

Gameplay: Dragon Quest III uses the same turn based battle system as the first two games, and besides things like new types of spells and weapons, not too much is changed with the combat itself. The biggest change DQ3 provides is to the party progression system. Instead of the Hero being completely alone like the first game, or gaining two fixed party members in the second, DQ3 allows you to build a party from the ground up, besides the Hero, who’s always required to be in the party, and has the exclusive Hero class, with well balanced stats and unique and useful spells. The party size has been increased to four at a time, and party members can be created and exchanged in Aliahan, with a total of 8 different classes they can be: warriors, slow, yet well equipped physical fighters that act has tanks and heavy hitters, priests, who specialize in healing and support spells and, contrary to most healers in RPGs, actually have decent equipment and offensive options, mages, typical magic attackers with great offensive spells, yet bad physical stats, martial artists, physical attackers with great agility who forgo most equipment and have a higher chance of landing critical hits, merchants, average at best fighters who have supporting abilities like being able to earn extra gold after battle, gadabouts, odd and clownish characters with bad stats besides luck, and a fixed chance to simply goof off and take random actions instead of doing as commanded, thieves, a class exclusive to the remakes, with great agility and several abilities that mainly help with exploration, and sages, who learn nearly every spell in the game, and have a wide selection of equipment options, yet cannot be put in the party to start.

Compared to Final Fantasy I, which had a similar class based party system, and came out only a few months before DQ3, this system actually has quite a few advancements. Most importantly, you’re never simply stuck with the party you start with. As long as you can make it to Aliahan, you can simply make new characters and swap out whoever you’re currently using. Obviously, doing this too much isn’t very practical, considering new members will be behind on EXP, but not being able to permanently lock yourself into an awful party combination is a big improvement alone. Party members who have reached level 20 can also change classes at Alltrades Abbey, resetting their level to 1, and cutting their stats in half, but keeping any learned abilities, meaning, if you were so inclined, you could make a mage with the physical stats of a warrior, a warrior with the speed of a thief, and so forth. Changing classes like this is also the only way to get sages into the party, and even then, only with the use of a Words of Wisdom book, of which only two exist in the game. This lends itself to a lot of creativity, and while I personally didn’t use this mechanic much, only turning my priest into a sage, it’s still an impressive level of complexity for a game this old.

The class balance is also fairly interesting, as beyond the upsides and downsides already listed, classes also level at different rates. Warriors are expensive to equip and very slow, but level the fastest out of the main offensive classes. Martial artists are, by contrast, very cheap, but have the third slowest leveling rate in the game, and the little equipment they do have is usually pretty difficult to get, especially their weapons. Merchants are guaranteed to eventually fall behind if you try to use them, but actually have quite a bit of exclusive, and good, equipment early on, and level the fastest out of everyone. Gadabouts are liabilities, but level second fastest, and can become sages for free once they reach level 20, making them an investment class. Despite how several classes are very obviously inferior in the long run, you actually can get away with some pretty unorthodox party combinations, at least earlier on. Take my party of hero, warrior, martial artist, and priest: very strong physically, but expensive to upkeep, despite the martial artist somewhat balancing it out, and lacking in offensive magic. While switching the priest to sage later on mostly fixed the latter issue, I was still left wishing I had taken a mage with me from the start several times, and yet I was still more than capable of finishing the game. While the difficulty has definitely been lowered compared to the first two games, that’s still a sign of ultimately successful balancing.

For some more combat related changes and improvements, some stats have been added or changed since the first two games. Resilience now determines how many hit points a character can gain when leveling up along with being added to physical defense as before, Wisdom determines a character’s potential magic points, as well as how soon they learn spells, with spells being delayed or expedited by up to three levels, and Luck determines how well a character can avoid debuffs and status ailments inflicted by monsters. Related to these stats, exclusive to the remakes is the personality system, which affects the stat growth of each character, with each party member gaining a personality during character creation or, in the case of the Hero, through a personality quiz given at the start of the game. While this generally doesn’t matter too much for casual play, assuming you aren’t unlucky enough to get the worst personalities on all your party members, it still adds an even greater deal of complexity, either allowing you to try to compensate for a character’s weaknesses, or add to their strengths. You could, for example, give a female warrior the Amazon personality, raising their strength growth, but lowering their agility, wisdom, and luck growth, stats they don’t care about much anyway. You can also change personalities during the course of the game, either temporarily by equipping certain accessories, or permanently by reading certain books scattered throughout the game, which further adds to the depth. It’s a bit overwhelming, but still pretty interesting to see.

Beyond the combat and classes, there’s still a lot of nice things to see. The bag from DQ6, which can hold an unlimited amount of items which can be taken out at any time, has been added, allowing easy inventory management on the spot. The Zoom spell now lets you return to towns of your choice, rather than the last place you saved your game, and while not every town can be warped to, it’s still a massive time saver. There’s a day night cycle, which gradually changes when traversing the world map and affects the state of the towns, and while it isn’t super prominent, there are a few towns pretty heavily affected by it, and you actually get a few ways to manipulate it later on. There’s also a few minigames added, once again exclusive to the remakes, those being the monster arena, where you can bet on computer controlled monster fights for the chance of winning money, and Treasures n' Trapdoors, which is basically a giant board game one of your party members can traverse, with several very valuable prizes available, both from winning and from landing on certain spots on the boards. Despite being very luck based, it’s creative and rewarding enough that the boards are actually a lot of fun to play, and the Switch version lacking this minigame entirely is a big shame. The remakes also added the Cloudsgate Citadel, a bonus dungeon accessible after defeating the final boss, with a superboss, Xenlon, waiting at the end. Defeating Xenlon within a certain number of turns allows you one wish, such as opening up a new Treasures n’ Trapdoors track, or resurrecting a certain character, and thankfully, you don’t actually need to traverse the entire dungeon again to refight Xenlon for more wishes, as a Zoom location is added only a few rooms away.

The biggest improvement DQ3 makes, however, is just how well the game flows. There’s still grinding to be found, yes, but generally, the game goes by much faster. Characters move quickly, the difficulty, as mentioned before, is much lowered, so you don’t need to grind 5 levels just to walk a bit north, and there’s just a lot of variety that keeps the game fresh all the way through, instead of becoming monotonous like DQ2. The dungeons are also much more reasonably designed compared to the giant, nightmarish mazes of DQ2, and while you do get a ship like in DQ2, it comes quite a bit later, keeping the amount of areas now available to explore from being as overwhelming. The obligatory key item fetch quest, this time collecting the six orbs to hatch the phoenix Ramia, is also much more reasonable to complete, with the orbs either being in locations that NPCs directly talk about, or being acquired by fighting bosses. Speaking of which, there’s also many more bosses than in previous games, and while they’re not as frequent as in most RPGs, they still add a nice bit of variety, along with actually being pretty challenging, in a good way. Overall, Dragon Quest III’s gameplay actually holds up very well, and just makes it a lot of fun to play. Even considering this is a remake with a lot of quality of life improvements, I was amazed that this was originally an NES game.

Graphics: DQ3′s visuals are quite nice, as the SNES version was made with DQ6′s engine. To give a comparison, whereas the games using DQ5′s engine were about comparable to the visuals of Final Fantasy IV and V, the visuals here are comparable to Final Fantasy VI, and considering that’s one of the best looking SNES games out there, that’s a pretty big leap. The character designs come out quite well, and many locations have unique looks to them, both towns and dungeons, with the Pyramid and Baramos’ ghastly castle sticking out the most to me. The enemy battle sprites are still great, and are actually animated whenever they attack, adding a lot of life to them.

Sound: As with the rest of the series, DQ3′s soundtrack was done by Koichi Sugiyama, and it’s once again a great soundtrack, even better than the soundtracks of the previous games. From the peaceful Small Shrine, to the iconic Overture, to the peaceful Heavenly Flight, to the world map theme Adventure, to the great final boss theme, Hero’s Challenge, it’s a soundtrack that’s a joy to listen to. It also gives towns different themes for both day and night, which is one of my favorite things to see in games.

Conclusion: Overall, I would give Dragon Quest III a recommended. It’s aged very, very well, and genuinely feels like it could have been on the SNES to start. Between the much deeper, yet ultimately accessible mechanics that give quite a bit of replay value, to much better overall design gameplay, graphical, and sound design, it makes a fantastic entry point for the series, if you have a liking for classic RPGs. Till next time. -Scout

[backpfeifenguy]

All in your head

WARNING: This story contains mental health issues, violence, self-destructive behaviour and references to suicide.

You’re a fucking joke. Not the most pleasant thought to be woken up by, it must be said. The whole team’s ashamed of you, they only keep you on out of pity. Nevertheless, it was the first thought in Beast Boy’s head as he woke that morning, morning in this case meaning ‘there’s still ten minutes til noon’. I mean, it’s not like you bring much to the table.

Beast Boy blinked the sleep from his eyes, looked up at the clock, and rolled himself out of bed. Robin’s basically a ninja, so they don’t need your smaller forms for stealth. After a quick trip to the bathroom and a check to make sure he’d remembered to put a shirt on, he was just about ready to face what remained of the day. Cyborg and Starfire have you outclassed for raw power.

As he lurched out the door and towards the kitchen, he heard the drone of conversation. They’re talking about you behind your back! He paused at the door, taking a moment to slip into a lazy grin, and strolled into the room.

“Wassup dudes?” He asked cheerfully, strolling into the kitchen and grabbing a box of cereal. Really? ‘Wassup dudes’? Loser.

“Not much, Grass Stain.” Cyborg replied. “Rob was gonna chew you out for sleeping in so long until Star talked him out of it.” See? Robin’s sick of your shit, he’ll be kicking you off the team any day now.

“I guess that’s one I owe her.” Beast Boy chuckled, pouring himself a glass of orange juice. Try fifty. “Anything else?”

“Well, Raven’s started reading a new book.” Cyborg offered jokingly.

“Do tell!” Beast boy exclaimed, treating the information as though it were some juicy piece of gossip.

“Well…” Cyborg looked around shiftily for a moment before leaning in towards Beast Boy. “I’m pretty sure it’s a modern fantasy novel!” He hissed conspiratorially.

“How bold!” The changeling snickered, doing his best to look scandalised. “And the name?”

“Good Omens.” Cyborg replied simply.

“Good Omens…” Beast Boy murmured disbelievingly. “By Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett?” Not a chance! There’s no way that Raven’s reading something you’ve actually read. She’s smart, you’re dumb; had you forgotten?

“I think so,” Cyborg confirmed. “Why?” A coincidence, nothing more.

“I’ve actually read that one.” Beast Boy muttered, grinning hugely. “Raven’s reading a book that I read first!” Doesn’t matter. Still an idiot. “For once, I can start a conversation about something she’s interested in, and I’ll know more about it than her!” He rubbed his hands together deviously. “This is gonna be great!”

“Yeah, well a word of advice, B.” Cyborg wrinkled his nose. “Brush your teeth first, you got some nasty morning breath!” You disgusting animal.

As he brushed his teeth, Beast Boy found himself studying his own reflection. It was unlikely that any of his friends would find this behaviour surprising, considering the fact that he had something of a reputation for vanity. What they would have found surprising was the way his brow furrowed and the corners of his mouth turned down. Jesus, what a mess! The fangs, the skin… the ears! You really got hit with the ugly stick, huh? He put his toothbrush away, idly noting that it had been torn up by his fangs, and left the bathroom. What, running from the mirror? Can’t say I blame you.

“Hey there Rae.” He said cheerfully, approaching the couch.

“Hey Beast Boy.” Raven replied without looking up from her book.

“Good book?” He asked, grinning like an idiot.

“Exceptionally so.” Raven replied, her eyes never leaving the page.

“So who do you like better,” Beast Boy began. “Azriphale or Croweley?” He positively revelled in the look on Raven’s face as she turned to face him.

“...Croweley.” Raven answered after a moment.

“Yeah, I can see that.” Beast Boy nodded. “A demon who goes against his supposed place in the cosmic order and saves the world? Makes sense you’d like him.”

“So you’ve read it.” Raven stated bluntly.

“Three times.” He replied. “Six if you count audiobooks.”

“So who do you like better?” Raven asked.

“Well, I--” The alarm sounded. “Will have to pick this conversation up later.” He finished, running to the elevator and cursing his bad luck. It’s what you deserve.

It was Control Freak. Of all the villains it could have been, it was Control Freak. Attacking a comic book store, because of course he was. “Sell my preordered comics while I’m in prison, will you?” He ranted, firing his remote at basically every figurine, poster and cardboard cutout in the store. “I’ll show you, I’ll show you all!”

“Your payment was declined!” The helpless cashier wailed. “Your accounts were frozen when they locked you up!”

“Great,” Raven deadpanned. “An angry, entitled nerd. Just what I wanted to deal with today.”

“I wonder what he preordered.” Beast Boy mused. Probably all the same stuff you read, since you’re both totally pathetic.

“Well, if it isn’t the Teen Titans.” Control Freak sneered, “Come to stop me have you?”

“Give it up, Control Freak!” Robin exclaimed. “If you surrender now, nobody gets hurt.”

“Why would I surrender?” Control Freak giggled. “After all, I’m in my element here!” And with that, A wave of comic, movie, anime and game characters surged forward to attack. Robin found himself caught up in a brawl with Spike Speigel while Starfire engaged in an aerial battle with Iron Man. Cyborg and Raven were back to back fighting Link (as in, every single version of Link), and Beast Boy found himself face-to-face with a man wearing a dark coat and a tricorn hat, wielding a bizarre oversized saw.

“Are you kidding?” Beast Boy chuckled, ducking and weaving around his assailant’s attacks. “You sent Johnny Bloodborne after me?” With that, he struck the nameless character from the box art of Bloodborne in the stomach before leaping back. “Dude, I platinumed this game ages ago!” Are you seriously bragging about that? Lame. He transformed into a wolf, ducking under a heavy attack and exploiting the opening it created to devastating effect. A few repetitions of this pattern of dodge and strike left his opponent on the verge of defeat; he just needed to get one more shot in and-- Take the hit.

Raven was in a bad mood; she’d had a pleasant conversation interrupted, discovered that Control Freak was to blame, and was currently being attacked by a swarm of blonde elves, all of whom insisted on grunting ans screaming loudly and incoherently as they fought. “How many of these are there?” She asked Cyborg as she sliced one in half with a blade of telekinetic force.

“Legend of Zelda is a long-lived and influential franchise!” Cyborg replied, blasting an especially small and cartoony-looking one.

“Meaning?” Raven demanded.

“Meaning there’s a lot of ‘em!” Cyborg exclaimed.

“Great.” Raven scowled, throwing up a barrier just in time to deflect a sword aimed at her stomach. “Well, it shouldn’t be much longer until one of the others can back us up, so let’s just--” She fell silent, her empathic sense warning her that something was very wrong. “Beast Boy’s aura feels weird, what’s happening?”

“Oh crap!” Control Freak squealed, his voice nearly an octave higher than usual, as he pointed in apparent horror at Beast Boy. Beast Boy lying in a pool of his own blood. With a giant saw stuck in his shoulder.

“What did you do to him?!” Raven demanded, a wave of shadows tearing through their foes and throwing Control Freak against the wall.

“He was supposed to dodge it!” Control Freak shrieked, his aura radiating blind panic and… sadness? “He dodges it, then he beats it! Then you guys beat me, I go to jail, and nobody gets hurt!” His eyes began to tear up. “He wasn’t supposed to get hurt!” The fat, scruffy nerd blubbered inelegantly. “It’s no fun like this!”

“Fun?” Raven demanded. “You think this is a game?! Beast Boy is dead!” She screeched.

“Not yet he ain’t!” Cyborg called out. “So how ‘bout you get your butt over here and heal him?”

“What’s the damage?” She asked, at Beast Boy’s side in an instant.

“Punctured lung, blood loss, broken collarbone and ribs, torn muscles.” Cyborg answered with clinical precision. “Think you can handle it?”

“Easily.” Raven replied, more confidently than she actually felt. “Azarath Metrion Zinthos!” She intoned, setting about mending the damage done to Beast Boy’s ruined frame.

“Is there, uh, anything I can do to help?” Control Freak asked, his voice little more than a squeak.    

“You want to help?” Robin scoffed. “Haven’t you done enough?”

“Can you make some kind of healer?” Cyborg asked pragmatically, more interested in saving his best friend’s life than in recrimination.

“Just give me a minute, okay?” And with that, Control Freak dashed off into some other corner of the store.

A moment later, a middle-aged man dressed like Doctor Frankenstein rushed over, carrying a device that looked for all the world like a cannon.

“Is zis mein patient?” He demanded, his voice carrying a thick German accent.

“Great,” Raven sighed. “A mad scientist. And with that accent, and how unsubtle game designers are, he’s probably a Nazi.”

“I am no such thing!” He replied sternly.

“There’s actually evidence to suggest that the Medic is Jewish.” Control Freak interjected.

“Okay, fine, but how is he useful here?” Raven demanded.

“Step aside und I will demonstrate, frauline.” The Medic replied curtly leveling his weapon (?) at Beast Boy and firing a strange red beam. Raven lunged forward at the sight of this, only to be held back by Cyborg.

“It’s not a weapon.” Cyborg reassured her. “Technically it’s the opposite.” And indeed, Beast Boy’s wounds began to heal, although far too slowly for Raven’s liking.

“My remote can’t replicate his abilities perfectly.” Control Freak offered in response to Raven’s glare. “It produces a weaker version of any power that isn’t purely physical.”

“It’ll do.” Raven replied blankly, returning to the business of mending Beast Boy’s injuries and, if she was being honest to herself, trying not to freak out. It was bad; the combination of a punctured lung and massive blood loss were a recipe for hypoxia, and honestly his lung wasn’t so much punctured as it was carved. The shattered collarbone and shredded muscles only served to complicate things, and it occurred to Raven, not for the first time, that out of all of them, Beast Boy seemed to be the one who ended up getting hurt the most, which struck her as vaguely unfair.

I mean, it’s not like his life before the Titans was sunshine and rainbows; can’t the universe cut him a break? Can’t it cut any of us a break? Nevertheless, Raven set about dealing with the hand that had been dealt, repairing Beast Boy’s lung and replenishing his blood. She felt her strength begin to fade just in time for the Medic to blink out of existence, to her considerable annoyance.

“They don’t last forever.” Control Freak offered by way of explanation. “And using an ability like that really eats into their lifespan.”

“Good to know.” Robin remarked dryly.

“Oh crap, I shouldn’t have told you about that.” Control Freak muttered.

“Ughhh…” Beast Boy moaned, his eyelids fluttering open.

“He’s conscious!” Raven called out.

“What happened?” Beast Boy asked groggily, hie head swimming.

“You nearly got yourself killed by some Hot Topic lookin’ piece of crap is what happened.” Cyborg answered bluntly.

“Oh,” Beast Boy sighed, his memories returning quickly. “Right.” What the hell is wrong with you? Look how exhausted Raven is from keeping your dumb ass alive.

“Hey, uh… guys?” Control Freak mumbled awkwardly. “This whole thing kind of freaked me out so, uh, could you just kinda, y’know, arrest me?”

“Wait, you want us to arrest you?” Beast Boy asked incredulously.

“Dude, you nearly died!” Control Freak exclaimed. “That was seriously messed up!” Great, now even Control Freak is taking pity on you.

“Why do you care what happens to me?” Beat Boy demanded.

“Hey man, I do robberies and consequence-free mayhem!” Control Freak replied, somewhat indignantly in Beast Boy’s opinion. “I don’t kill people!”

“Discussions of Control Freak’s relative morality can wait,” Robin said firmly, cuffing the obese villain. “Right now we need to get him into custody and start on the paperwork. And after that,” He shot Beast Boy a Look. “We need to talk.” Welp, you’re boned.

[bunnycosmos]

Hi there! I’m glad you asked, but you have no idea what you’ve set in motion here. ( Tons of nerdiness under the cut! )

These are my Fairies! I sometimes swap one with my Interesting Pokemon of The Time, but most often I’ll use all of them!

First up is Azumarill

Nickname: A’cqua

Ability: Huge Power

Nature: Adamant

Moveset: Superpower Aqua Tail Play Rough Dig

Azumarill is my powerhouse. After the Huge Power addition in X and the addition of fairy type, he because an obvious choice. He’s got the potential for an easy 1 hit KO on anything he can STAB (Play Rough & Aqua Tail bb!) And I top it off with an unconventional Dig to cover more type advantages and catch opponents off guard

Next, Sylveon!

Nickname: None (perfect name already)

Ability: Cute Charm

Nature: Docile

Moveset: Moonblast Attract Shadow Ball Charm

Ah, Sylveon. My least polished member of the team, but this is because he’s the very same one that I played through my while game with! I’ve used him more than any other pokemon (yeah, a him w/ attract) and I can’t bear to part with him just to get better IVs and a more advantageous gender. He can knock folks down a peg with charm and the STAB on Moonblast isn’t a hard sell. Overall he’s sturdy and makes both physical attackers and special attackers work for it. He’s often my first send out b/c he’s so safe!

Next on the list: Whimsicott

Nickname: Dizzy

Ability: Prankster

Nature: Timid

Moveset: Leech Seed Substitute Encore Moonblast

I could talk about Whimsicott for hours. Lovely design, great types, and a movepool that leaves a lot of options open. I go with this wonderful and immensely powerful Prankster set, using a start of Substitute (and maybe leech Seed) into an Encore at the first opportunity. If she can lock you in, you’re absolutely out of luck. While you’re spamming a stat booster, I’m bolstering my defenses with leftovers and leech seed, standing behind a full substitute and whittling you down with moonblast. She’s an unforseen monster and she knows it!

In this corner: Gardevoir

Nickname: Cervello

Ability: Synchronize

Nature: Modest

Moveset: Focus Blast Psychic Thunderbolt Moonblast (Seeing a pattern here?)

Gardevoir is my type coverage. With two stabs, she’s already my best special attacker, but stack on that the movepool that allows for an electric type and a FIGHTING TYPE? You’ve got a recipe for a great addition to the team! She can’t last long alone, but if she can get a hit or two on you then you’re gonna feel it. Low speed is her weakest point, and she sadly often gets taken out all at once ):

Almost done: Mawile

Nickname: Pasaku

Ability: Hyper Cutter / Huge Power (Mega)

Moveset: Play Rough Stone Edge Iron Head Sucker Punch

Mawile is my mega stone holder. She’s swift and powerful, but is also a genuine glass cannon. Nothing, though, is as satisfying as watching my baby girl one-shot a mega tough opponent with an unforeseen sucker punch. She’s not got great speed, but her type matchup leaves her less vulnerable than most of the team, and running with Huge Power only helps. If you don’t have anything to deal with sucker punch, then it becomes a mind game of “Am I going to one-shot you because you chose an attacking move, or are you going to risk me using an actual STAB by choosing a status move?” And it’s a fantastic game (which Mawile usually wins)

And, bringing up the rear: Aromatisse

Nickname: Aromatisse ( Traded :| )

Ability: Healer

Nature: Bold

Moveset: Light Screen Reflect Heal Pulse Trick Room

Aromatisse will ruin your day. No sugar-coating on this bad girl, she’s running with a Light Clay (hello eight turn walls) and Light Screen/Reflect, she’ll turn the tables with her Trick Room, making her abysmal 47 speed a genuine boon instead, and she’ll throw up double walls and heal her battle partner while she’s at it, to make everyone pretty much invincible. Since everyone in my team is slow to begin with, Trick Room almost always works in my favor, and always works in Aromatisse’s favor. She’s sassy and chic and turns the other cheek (Which is easy when you can’t deal any damage to her.) Throw in Healer for the occasional surprise status-save, and we’ve got a recipe for one hell of a tank. Thanks, Aromatisse!

That’s my team! I played competitively for a while with them and, for a one-type gimmick team, they did very well! Thanks for the question! I love you everybunny!

[stormwaker]

A Guide to Woodie/Kiting in the Forge

A Semi-Complete Guide to Woodie Kiting (by Crowe)

I hear a lot of people saying that Woodie is a very weak character with no real perks, that he’s extremely useless and not recommended to play as. This guide on how to use him to carry your team to victory will serve as my counterargument, and I hope that this will be helpful information for whomever is attempting to play as a kiter in a Forge match. As someone who has won three Forge matches as a kiter Woodie, I am very eager to share the information I have learned.

_____

Let’s start off with some of Woodie’s perks.

#1: Lucy

When Woodie throws his special axe, Lucy, it will instantly draw aggro onto him. This is an incredible perk of its own, and it will be very helpful in later stages.

When thrown, Lucy can also stop spinning Snortoises, provided that you are lucky/skillful enough to hit them.

#2. Higher HP

While he can’t be resurrected as quickly as Wes, Woodie has relatively high health, his maximum being 200 HP. This means that, even with the lowest defense armor (60% protection), Woodie can survive 4-5 hits from the Boarilla/Grand Forge Boarrior before death. This allows a few mistakes from the player, and also increases Woodie’s survivability in difficult situations.

#3. Quick attack speed

When attacking normally with Lucy, Woodie’s attack speed is greatly increased. This isn’t as useful as his other two perks, but in a pinch, he can make short work of weaker enemies.

_____

NOTE: It is a given that Woodie will be using the feather helm (20% more movement speed) and the reed armor (10% more movement speed), but I recommend switching to a higher defense armor during the fight with the Grand Forge Boarrior (splinted mail is a great choice).

_____

Levels:

1. Pit pigs

The first wave is relatively easy. You can chop down the lone pigs or throw Lucy from a distance as the tanks demolish them. It becomes a bit harder to use Lucy’s melee attack once there are multiple groups of pigs— hang back and throw Lucy at your discretion, making sure to keep an eye on the reviver.

2. Crocommanders

Fighting these head-on is not recommended. Use Lucy to instantly destroy the banners, and draw the fire of the Crocommanders if your health is high enough. This can help the team a lot, especially when the tanks are being attacked by multiple enemies.

3. Snortoises

This is where Woodie starts to show his usefulness. Explain to the team that you are going to distract the top group of Snortoises, and proceed to head in that direction. These top two can be kept in an endless loop of aggression until your team is ready to destroy them.

I have had the most success in kiting the Snortoises into the shape of an 8 (one walking behind the other). Moving in a half circle around them, you can quickly run to the top and throw Lucy at the Snortoise at the front of the pair, then circle back to throw at the bottom one. This ensures that they are constantly aggressive towards you, but their slow speed allows you to complete this process with almost 100% safety.

Note: As mentioned above, the Snortoises are very slow, so make the circle you run around them extremely small— just out of the range of their “pufferfish” spike attack. This is an added measure to keep their focus on you, and not on the rest of your team. Try to keep them occupied as far away from the team as possible.

Another note: Lucy’s throw has the ability to stop the spinning Snortoises in their tracks! If you can make the shot, go for it, especially if there’s a spinning Snortoise attacking your healer.

Scorpeons:

The strategy for these should be the same as the strategy for the Snortoises, but you are in a bit more danger than before, as the Scorpeons have attacks that can melt even the most armored tank. The team also may need your assistance more than before, since tanks can quickly be overwhelmed if not watched closely. While it is the healer’s job to attend to them, they may not always be nearby.

Keep an eye on the health bars of your teammates on the upper left. If one of them appears to be in a bad spot, or being attacked by multiple enemies, you can use Lucy’s instant-aggro throw to make their lives a bit easier. Of course, use your own judgement as to whether or not this is necessary, since keeping two Scorpeons away from the team for the entire level is also useful.

Boarilla, Part One:

I cannot emphasize this enough— please make sure that you have healed up during the last round. It will be a lot less stressful for you to be kiting the Boarilla with 200 hp rather than 140. By now, you should have the feather hat and reed armor, so keeping out of the boss’s range is not impossibly difficult.

The Boarilla will spawn at the bottom right portal. Leave the smalls for the tanks and dps immediately after they spawn— you don’t want to draw their aggro at this point.

Camp the Boarilla’s spawn portal and throw Lucy as soon as you see him. I recommend to lead him along the outer border of the map, so that there is much less chance of the boss accidentally targeting the team. However, this is not always a good choice, as the fight with the smaller enemies doesn’t always take place in the center of the map. Once again, use your own judgement when deciding which path to lead the Boarilla on.

The Boarilla will take anywhere between 3-5 steps chasing you before he attacks. I suggest letting him attack at you twice, then throw Lucy to reclaim aggro, maintaining your position just outside his attack range. You can also throw Lucy after every attack, if you are more comfortable with that. You may have to slow down at times to make sure the Boarilla’s focus is on you at all times.

When the team has finished off all the grunts, lead the Boarilla towards them. Hang back while they destroy it— take the time you need to heal up before the next fight, if you’ve sustained some damage.

Boarilla, Part Two:

Communicate with your team as to which Boarilla you will be kiting, top or bottom. Remind them to drag their Boarilla to the middle of the map if they can, as it will make your time a lot easier.

Kiting the 2nd Boarilla is more of the same; the most dangerous part of this level is when the two waves of smaller enemies appear. When you see Pugna’s warning speeches, try to avoid going near the spawning portals, but this is not always an option while dragging the Boarilla across the map.

The job of the DPS and/or the tanks is to keep the smaller enemies off of you and the healer, dividing their focus between this and taking care of their own Boarilla. This can create a very tense and hectic situation, as you may lose aggro of your Boarilla during this fight. If this happens, lead it to a healing area if possible and let it sleep, then reclaim aggro after you heal yourself a bit.

The Crocommanders are definitely the worst during this part of the fight. Their homing projectiles will always hit you if they lock onto you, and if you are caught by the Pit Pigs or Boarilla during the duration for which the projectile stuns you, you’re practically a goner (unless you are saved by some miracle).

The best advice I can give, at my current level of knowledge, is to stay as far away from the Crocommanders as possible. Be sure not to lose your focus, though— this is a crucial time for the team, so try as hard as you can to not lose the attention of your Boarilla.

Grand Forge Boarrior:

This is it, you’ve made it this far. By now, there should be one or no Boarillas left. Usually there is one left, so make sure you’ve healed up to at least 3/4 health and go to the bottom right portal to meet the Boarrior.

Let your team take care of the Boarilla while you kite the Boarrior around the arena. He won’t start doing his groundpound + fire attacks until he’s lost a substantial amount of health, so you can lure him with relative ease and little danger to yourself while your team takes care of the last Boarilla.

Once the fight with the Grand Forge Boarrior commences, you should equip some heavier armor. Splinted mail is the best option, but wood armor is another option if someone else has equipped the splinted mail. I highly advise against standing behind or in front of other people, as the Boarrior’s ground-pound attacks may unintentionally harm you or others near you.

Your role becomes slightly different during this fight. The healer is often targeted by the Boarrior, especially in the later stages of the battle, and teammates are constantly dying. You MUST (and this is a big MUST) keep the Boarrior from attacking the healer while he/she is reviving or casting. Do not attack the Boarrior much during the fight; save your health for those moments when aggroing the Boarrior can buy the healer those crucial seconds to complete a revival or cast the life flowers.

This is especially important when the Grand Forge Boarrior summons his minions, which is announced by the Boarrior clapping his swords together, making a hollow banging sound. Take down the standards as swiftly as possible. This is the most chaotic part of the game, and many of my teams have met their demise during this time.

With any luck, you will be able to keep the Boarrior off of the healer during times of misfortune, while also keeping an eye on the smaller enemies. Do not let yourself or others become swarmed, as you can be stunlocked into an instant and brutal death. Always watch your Wilsons. Take note of how much health they have in the upper left corner of the screen.

After the smalls have been taken care of, hang back and heal. Watch the Boarrior and try to remain at a decent amount of health so that you can distract him if need be. Don’t throw Lucy at him when the healer is casting life flowers on top of the Boarrior, as this will draw him out of the healing circle (he avoids the circles during the latter part of the fight, thus he will not sleep unless the circle is cast DIRECTLY on him).

With a little luck, a little skill, and a lot of teamwork and communication…you and your team will be able to get the better of the Grand Forge Boarrior and tell Battlemaster Pugna to stick it where the sun don’t shine! Congratulations— and good luck!