#scout’s weapon is kinda glitched but oh well

[paninicupcakke]

[ofcartographers]

on weathered shore

pairing: Johnny Silverhand x Female V

warnings: implied/referenced child pornography, implied/referenced sexual assault — to avoid, skip the paragraphs denoted by 「」

spoilers: The Hunt, They Won’t Go When I Go, Sweet Dreams, Dirty Biz

summary: Johnny Silverhand was many things — washed-up rockstar, former terrorist, womanizer extraordinaire, and occasional dickhead — but one thing he wasn’t was a heartless bastard. Sure, he and V weren’t exactly best chooms and exchanged heated barbs most of the time, but Johnny would never undeservedly give her shit. Especially not for something like this.

read on ao3 or ↴

Johnny Silverhand’s interest was piqued when the familiar lilt of “Welcome to Clouds” reached his ears. Oh ho! Interesting, he sneered into existence, nestling himself into the worn leather chair at the end of the hallway. His little merc was too preoccupied with the blue-haired receptionist to notice him making an appearance.

Materializing a lit cigarette in hand, he took a few drags and waited for his ‘brain-dead host’ to finally take notice of him. He supposed he shouldn’t be surprised V was here to “get her bean flicked” given how much of a raging bitch she had been lately. Chick was wound tighter than the stick up that one ‘Saka scum’s ass. She needed to get laid. Badly.

Thanking the receptionist, said woman was near giddy with excitement as she made her way down the hallway towards Johnny — until she spotted him. “What?” She ground out through grit teeth, wrenching open the nearby locker with more force than necessary, her mood now soured.

Johnny almost felt offended that a mere glimpse of his ruggedly handsome face would sour her mood just so — keyword: almost. “Nothin’,” he drawled innocently, to which V let out a sharp bark of laughter — she didn’t believe him and he couldn’t blame her. “‘M just surprised,” he began nonchalantly, reveling in how tense V’s back had suddenly become in anticipation of his jab at her. “Sweet lil’ V visitin’ this kinda place?”

V’s gaze dropped to him, a saccharine smile spreading across her lips, “How ‘bout you go an’ fuck yourself?” She suggested sweetly, flipping him off for good measure.

Unperturbed, Johnny adjusted his aviators to perch on the tip of his nose so he could meet V’s gaze. “Don’t need ‘ta, princess. ‘Specially with you doin’ it for the both of us,” he leered, rivaling her saccharine smile with his own.

Slamming the locker shut, V whipped around to face him, pointing a manicured finger in his face. “Fuck off, Johnny,” she seethed, jamming her unoccupied hand into her jacket pocket, only to retrieve a telltale blue pill.

Johnny balked. Shit. “Oh, come on—” he began to grumble, as V waggled the Omega blocker in his face before popping it into her mouth and dry swallowing with a grimace. Within a few seconds he could feel his conscience beginning to fade as his body began to fizzle in and out of existence. “Cunt!” He managed to yell out, before feeling himself fade into nothingness.

He wasn’t sure how much time had passed when he awoke to the darkness of V’s apartment, her small form curled up in that ridiculous position of hers on the edge of the bed, sound asleep. Peering over her sleeping form, Johnny couldn’t discern whether or not she had gotten her needs satisfied , so to speak. Her body felt heavy with exhaustion and she was sleeping soundly. And well, Johnny wasn’t sure about her, but he always slept like a baby after a good fuck.

---

Not two weeks later did Johnny find himself blinded by the neon pink signage of Clouds.

V let out an annoyed groan when she spotted his reclined form in what was sure to become his usual seat. “You gonna behave?” She asked pointedly, sparing him a glance as she placed her belongings in the nearby locker.

“Scout’s honor,” Johnny beamed, holding his organic hand up in a three figured salute.

“Bullshit!” V snorted, immediately calling his bluff, “You were never a boy scout, ya gonk.”

“Ah. Got me there,” he smiled sheepishly, feigning innocence.

There was a pause as V casted a cursory glance at Johnny, the Omega blockers in hand. With a weary sigh, she hesitantly placed the bottle in the locker before closing its door with a gentle click. Spinning on her heel, she stared down at him with crossed arms. “Don’t make me regret this,” she hissed; Please, begged her mind.

Johnny scoffed, “Relax, princess. Ain’t nothin’ I seen before.” This earned him a withering glare from the now-seething woman. Reflexively, he raised his palms in a yielding manner, hoping to mollify her. “I ain’t gonna peek!” He bellowed, running an exasperated hand through his dark locks. “Christ, V! Why the fuck would I watch you when there’s a bunch’a whores here?”

A brief look of hurt flashed across her face before she grimaced and sniffed indignantly. Turning on her heel, V stomped away from him. “Asshole!” She hissed under her breath, retreating to her designated room.

Rolling his eyes, Johnny scoffed. “Cunt!” He retorted immaturely, knowing full well V couldn’t hear him. Whatever! He thought with a huff, jumping to his feet. He wasn’t going to let that bitch ruin his fun — especially not when he had front-row seats to best free show Night City had to offer: depraved sex.

---

It wasn’t until her third trip to Clouds that Johnny began to notice a pattern.

Since he was true to his word for not making an unwelcome appearance during her last romp, V decided to forgo the Omega blockers completely; though the threat of still taking them loomed in the air.

Johnny wasn’t planning to peep on her, but after being subjected to 15-minutes of God-awful lazrpop that was blaring mind-numbingly loud in the lobby, Johnny was desperate to be anywhere but there. Sure, he could’ve simply retreated back into her headspace where he would’ve remained unaware of both his and her surroundings, but where was the fun in that? Besides, curiosity was beginning to get the better of him the more he thought about what V was like in the sack.

He could feel his imagination beginning to run wild as he tried to paste a scene together with bits and pieces of her previous sexual encounters he’d seen from her fleeting memories. Materializing in her designated room, he wasn’t quite prepared for this. What he saw instead made him feel something awful deep in his chest.

In the center of the bed was V, curled up into a tiny ball, her shoulders wracking with heavy sobs as the doll rubbed soothing circles into her heaving back. “I-I-I-I n-n-nailed him t-to it a-an’ an’—” V tried to gasp out between hiccupping breaths, being too overwrought with shuddering sobs to continue. The doll — Skye, he vaguely remembers — held the trembling woman in her arms, murmuring soothing words and kisses into the crown of her head.

Fuck, Johnny nearly uttered aloud, realization dawning on him. She was talking about Joshua Stephenson and his fucked up “last request” of having V play the role of his executioner in his crucifixion. That shit was grim, even for Johnny.

And then it clicked.

「 The first time she went to Clouds — for pleasure, not business — was not long after V had taken care of the father and son XBD duo whose specialty was children. Johnny could remember the white knuckled grip she held on her pistol as she dug barrel harder into the son’s temple as he began to babble incessantly — much to his father’s chagrin — about the other XBDs they had and that he wasn’t sure which victim V was talking about. 」

It was then he could feel something snap in her as she pulled the trigger and was left staring coldly into the lifeless eyes of the son, blood slowly seeping from his bullet wound as his father’s wails permeated the air. He too shared the same fate not long after, too far gone in his hysteria to even put up a fight.

V had remained eerily collected as she silently rifled through their XBD collection, searching for the raws that Regina Jones had requested. Johnny hadn’t dared to make an appearance or say a word — it was unsettling how mechanically she went about the rest of the studio and how oddly calm she was reporting to the Watson fixer of what had gone down; almost as if she was in a fugue of some sort.

「 The second time was immediately after her massive fuckup of landing herself in a scav haunt, stripped bare of her weapons and clothes. Johnny would never admit it, but at the time he was scared out of his goddamn mind — helpless to watch as the scavs perversely divested her of her clothes with both vulgar hands and eyes lasciviously roving over her form, before tossing her into the icy bath like she was already a fucking corpse. 」

And what had he done? Retreated to his old ways and acted like a dick when she awoke — called her “Night City’s dumbest merc” despite the look of abject fear, which quickly faded to hurt, in her eyes.

Armed with nothing but her mantis blades and Johnny at her six, they somehow managed to make it out alive, despite their stacked odds of 12 armed scavs to one naked, agitated merc. They were on such an adrenaline high that Johnny didn’t even blink at her declaration of going to Clouds. After all, what better way to feel alive than a good near-death-experience fuck?

A choked sob broke him out of his reverie. Sparing one last glance at his distraught merc, Johnny glitched himself out of the room, reappearing on the leather armchair from earlier. The awful feeling was back in his chest and he could almost put a name to it. Shame? He fleetingly thought, before grimacing and pulling out a much-needed cigarette.

Taking a long drag, he exhaled through grit teeth. “Fuck!” He let out a frustrated growl, slamming his fist into the arm of the chair. Johnny Silverhand was many things — washed-up rockstar, former terrorist, womanizer extraordinaire, and occasional dickhead — but one thing he wasn’t was a heartless bastard. Sure, he and V weren’t exactly best chooms and exchanged heated barbs most of the time, but Johnny would never undeservedly give her shit. Especially not for something like this.

It hurt to know that V didn’t think she could trust him on intimate matters such as this. That she thought so lowly of him that he would mock her for being human. After seeing how small and fragile she had looked earlier, he wanted nothing more than to scoop her into his arms in a tight embrace, with a fierce promise of zeroing the fucker that hurt her. “Shit,” he groaned, scrubbing his face with a worrying palm. She was growing on him — he actually cared about her.

He was chain smoking by the time V exited the room; a habit of his whenever he was overwrought with nerves — or in this case: guilt. Plucking her things from the nearby locker, V sighed suddenly, turning to shoot him a quirked brow. What is it? Her expression read.

Johnny glanced up at her, pretending not to notice her reddened nose or the puffy state of her eyes. “S’nothin’,” he mumbled, tossing the remains of his cigarette to the ground, crushing it with the sole of his boot.

Before V could open her mouth to retort, Johnny was up out of his seat and glitching down the hallway, desperate for fresh air — all these newfound emotions were stifling. Slightly winded, she caught up with him in the elevator, though it wasn’t like he could operate it anyways. “What’s up with you?” She asked, her tone void of aggression for once — a hint of genuine concern in her voice.

Luckily, her ringing holo saved him from having to fumble for a reply. “River,” she answered hesitantly, casting a furtive glance at Johnny, knowing the mere mention of the cop’s name put her cohabitant in a foul mood.

“V, hey. I need your help.”

---

As soon as the Trauma Team’s AV was up and out of sight, Johnny could feel a wave of exhaustion wash over V — though he knew she wouldn’t let it show and instead put on her brave façade, like she always did. Not here, he could hear her repeating to herself, like a mantra.

The drive back to V’s apartment was uncomfortably silent, despite the blare of the radio and the buzzing of Night City nightlife. Johnny was grateful that V had decided to take Jackie’s ARCH this time, giving the ex-rocker an excuse not to make an appearance. Though he doubted she wanted any company or interaction right now, with how white-knuckled her grip was on the handlebars and how tightly her jaw was clenched.

Upon crossing the threshold of her apartment, V hastily began to divest herself of her clothing and gear, eager for a shower — eager to clean herself of the filth of Edgewood Farm. Johnny gave her privacy and made himself scarce during her undressing and shower, only to reappear when she looked ready to head out the door.

“‘M goin’ to Clouds,” she mumbled dazedly, grabbing a jacket from the closet and slipping it on with trembling fingers. As she turned and made her way to the door, Johnny suddenly appeared, blocking her path.

Without his trademark aviators, his face appeared more severe than usual. “V…” He began softly, his tone serious.

“What?” She looked up at his face, refusing to meet his gaze directly. Her eyes were wide and glossy, the slightest tremble in her lip.

“It’s okay.”

“W-What?” She chuckled nervously, hysterical laughter beginning to bubble in her throat.

“It’s okay,” Johnny repeated firmly, his earnest eyes boring into panicked ones. Gripping her by the shoulders, he pulled her into an embrace; his cold, metallic hand rubbing soothing circles into the small of her back.

Immediately he could feel the levee break as she crumpled bonelessly into his arms, her back beginning to wrack with sobs. Carefully, Johnny lowered their entangled forms gently to the floor, moving her small frame to cradle her protectively in his lap.

She was crying uncontrollably now, desperately clutching at the front of his shirt as if it were her lifeline, her small fingers tangling in his dog tags. Her face, wet with hot tears, burrowed further into his neck as he  murmured soothing words into her hair, his lips occasionally pressing a sweet kiss into her crown.

“I got you.”

[waynekelton]

Review: Invaders from Dimension X!

What if a wargame transformed completely but kept the same outer shell? If it were still about squad management, line-of-sight fire, and hand-crafted scenarios but with an added dash of chaos? Hemmann Luttmann’s Invaders from Dimension X is this very game. Zany, helter-skelter, yet still relatively strategic within its own wide, permissive ruleset, I stumbled upon the game as a lark and am quite glad I did. It’s lovingly made and great fun, but the bare-bones interface and rare bugs make it difficult to recommend. Still a nice game, a bizarre yet successful twist on wargame conventions.

Marines (from the Unified Space Alliance Defense Force) square off against a strange and sudden incursion of the Kay’otz (Obligatory get it, chaos much? interjection) and seek to eliminate the hostiles and preserve their dimension. The enemies are strong but erratic, with unusual weapons, tactics and objectives. In-game this means some delightful asymmetry. Humans use plasma weapons which kill the Kay’otz but are restricted by line-of-sight and friendly fire. (You can’t fire through your own units, mountains or lava). The Kay’otz, by way of contrast, use lasers and can fire through anything and everything but will only incapacitate, never kill, their prey. (Obligatory ‘set to stun’ interjection).

The bigger chunk of variability comes from the Activation Cards, which have big bursts of activity on the enemy turn, but with a lot of conditions and uncertainty attached. Oh, and the pool of enemy Activation Cards are always the same, but the order won’t be. Especially fearsome are the AOE stun card, which randomly deploys anywhere on the map and paralyzes any nearby troops, and the frenzy card, which has the Kay’otz attack over and over until the dice roll fizzles. The chaos is iterated and compounded: events could happen anytime and once triggered can range from harmless or inconvenient, to serious and routing. While the scenarios have well-defined victory conditions for the humans, the Kay’otz instead have a grab-bag of objectives, with one triggering at the end of the game to see whether they win.

Somewhat confusingly, there are many different qualities and kinds of victories. The humans can win instantly by fulfilling the specific scenario conditions at any point, or, more commonly, the clock will run out and the game ends once the last of the Activation Cards is used. If the Kay’otz win condition is met, they win at the point; otherwise, the human  evaluate whether they’ve scored an overwhelming, modest, or paltry victory based on criteria peculiar to the scenario at hand.

Everything in combat is decided by dice rolls, which in of itself is not unusual. Units have three stats, one each for movement, power and armor. The power determines the number of dice rolled, and the armor stat of the opponent qualifies which rolls count as hits. Killing the Kay’otz is rather difficult, as it should be.  If the enemy scores hits, human units are either stunned or paralyzed. They don’t recover from this stasis automatically, however, and must instead use a ‘Rally’ action to regain full function. The ‘Rally’ action is itself a die roll, meaning that a laughably bad streak can leave someone effectively perma-stunned, which would be hilarious if it weren’t such a setback.

Invaders from Dimensions X is full of long-odds edge cases like this, which is more than half the fun. Everything about the Kay’otz, and by extension the game state itself, is both strong and fundamentally unpredictable. The challenge is always to ride the wave, to manoeuvre through the tumult as best you can with the weaker, yet comparably more dependable tools the humans have at their disposal. For example, rallying might whiff, but this nastiness can be mitigated by smart positioning next to HQ or Logistics units, boosting the roll. Even the enemy turns can be micromanaged with a little luck, for the Scout units have a Recon ability which gives a 50-50 chance to select one of two possible Activation Cards.

So it’s messy and potentially ‘unfair’ but never unwinnable. The unit types are just specialized enough to make for cohesive squads and a solid pay-out for good strategy and positioning. I’m probably the furthest thing from the intended audience and enjoyed it thoroughly. Caveat emptor, though. There are a few visual glitches, one of which appears to hide the win condition tab which is more-or-less essential when playing a scenario for the first time. Another fires shots from the wrong spot. These are irksome but not deal-breakers. The game’s reference materials are pretty good for in-game refreshers, but the app itself lacks a tutorial or in-game rulebook, even, choosing to skirt around this failing by redirecting inquiring minds through a hyperlink to the full rulebook. Standard answers for how to make a maximally functional game on a shoestring budget. The result is serviceable and even spirited at times but also kinda ugly.

The scenarios aren’t too long or taxing, presenting a stiff challenge in a reasonable timeframe; the player units and combat ruleset are standard, but the enemy is truly a leap into the great unknown. Dimension X is an unusual and rather fun novelty which mashes-up unlikely inspirations into something worthwhile The limited play modes, drily functional interface and various bugs mitigate this praise, so in the end give it a chance if you’re seriously curious or habituated to this type of experience.

Review: Invaders from Dimension X! published first on https://touchgen.tumblr.com/

[sleepymarmot]

MEA liveblog #4

Spoilers!

Voeld

Why am I asking a person I've never met before about "Ice talkers" which I've never heard before but she apparently has mentioned?

Okay, I took two steps back and the banter that mentions the ice talkers triggered.

Don't you love the conversation angles where the person talking to your hero is not in the frame at all?

Liam: "Seriously, Ryder, you didn't bring any music?" Ryder: "I swear, I will turn this car around" Um? Why is she snapping so viciously? There's absolutely no reason, it was very jarring. Is it because I almost never use casual options?

Vetra and Liam are so chatty?? I don't think I've ever heard a single conversation from Peebee and Liam on Havarl, but these two talk regularly.

Will I have to kill people over these whales? :/

Bought a weapon for the first time -- the Isharay, because everyone's praising it.

Damn, Isharay really does feel nice!!

After like an hour of driving, climbing and fighting, I finally found the kett base and established a forward station near it.

Well the kett base was ridiculously easy as a vanguard... I had much more difficult fights on the way here!! Is this really all?

A Dhan? Nice, I've been meaning to try it out.

I really don't understand what and where I'm supposed to find in this base...

Of course I had to climb the mountain on foot and deplete all of my life support just in time to reach the kett camp and be shot down.

For fuck's sake, they respawned in the lower base I just cleared. Well at least I'll get extra xp?

Why is the UI so dumb? I have my three powers and profile active; I assign them to a favorite slot; the powers are saved but the profile is empty, when I go to the profile screen it's unchecked, I have to re-check it and assign the favorite again.

Finally, another forward station!

Gosh, this entire questline is so dull and frustrating. I only do it because people asked. (And because I want 100%.)

Holy shit, a kett carfalon! I gotta go back to the forward station and equip it immediately.

And here's the medicine cache I've been searching!!

The carfalon has higher base damage than the omniblade, but feels weaker/slower.

Dancing among enemies with full shield and health is fun. Not as fluid and quick as the ME3 novaguard though, but everything has a downside.

Just as I said that, got shot down and now I have to redo the last five minutes.

Charge to restore shields + melee to restore heath is great

Look game, I know I'm strong, but why don't you let me fucking save. It's been like 15 minutes!

OH SHIT AN ASCENDANT

PLEASE DONT KILL ME NOW!!!!!

Where's the elevator?? Do I have to defeat the Prefect to get to it?

Turned the difficulty down to easy to kill him. I've had enough.

Oh god, I can save! It's over!!

Shout out to that person who wrote somewhere either on BSN or Reddit that the kett corfalan restores health on hit. I literally owe them my Ryder's life.

I'm level 21 now btw, thanks to all this fighting.

This wasn't enjoyable, Bioware. This was frustrating and dull and then frustrating and stressful. I'm getting off this goddamn planet. Oh wait, gotta do Cora and Peebee's quests, too.

"You made it look so easy" IT WASN'T, BELIEVE ME.

No you know what, I'll at least go back to the Tempest and buy some consumables. I used my last shield right before the Prefect appeared.

Tempest

Aw, Peebee and Lexi!

Oh, a strike team brought me a Disciple! And a Reegar! And a Sandstorm, whatever that is. Btw I don't see that last thing in my inventory -- does that mean all rewards that go over the limit are lost? Wait, there's no Reegar too. The inventory officially crossed the line from Evil to Irredeemably Evil. :(

Voeld

It looks like the quality of planets goes downhill with every new one. Eos was intriguing. Havarl was a bit too DAI-like, but still had the original spirit of exploration. Voeld is just a brutal grind.

Oh shit, that's Peebee's LM! Looks like an ordinary Remnant site, so it's probably safe to do something here without triggering the entire mission. I was trying to avoid it, but it's right in the way to the ancient city, and obviously I can't not take her there.

BTW I'm really tired of bringing Jaal everywhere just because it's all about his people.

Is it my imagination, or did my adept profile dodge become faster after I reached a new level of this profile?

Stop! Telling! Me! About! Temperature!

I know it's cold, SAM. Tell it to the designers who make Peebee run around in -40C wearing one layer of clothing with a belly window.

Of course I can't save again. But now the game finally autosaved, so I can call it a day.

Wait, I'm not getting this choice. So the AI wants to die? And she holds the angara hostage so that I'd kill it? And if I kill the AI the hostage will be free? And both will get what they want -- AI wants to die and the man wants to live? If so, that seems like a vastly better option.

Alright, tried the other option. The AI kills the hostage, Ryder makes a renegade speech. Peebee disapproves because the AI is untrustworthy and the Nexus already distrusts AI in general. Jaal approves -- for some reason through a radio despite standing right here. The AI asks to work with SAM instead of the angara, and you can make a choice. So this is a more interesting decision for the story... But it doesn't feel right. For my pure paragon character, at least.

Yay, a forward station! I think I have all of them unlocked now. It's time for The Only Fetch Quest That Matters aka dad's memories.

And an outpost! I feel really productive. "They invited us here," though? When?? But at least I had the option to talk about cooperation with the angara. Also Addison's textures glitched like hell here.

Shit, shouldn't have talked to the outpost leader, she acts like it's been a month and gives me a rescue mission immediately. But I could say that I was surprised that the Angara had let us put an outpost here. You and me, Ryder...

Aw, the name of the outpost is "Forward together" in shelesh(?)! She made a nice speech here.

Okay, I'm going to just pretend all of the outpost stuff takes place in the future. I'll go to Cora's LM and then proceed with the main story.

Cora why do you have a boring fetch quest for a LM?

Wait, the Perifona is only one ship, right? Not the entire asari arc?

Ah, okay, it's a scout ship.

This was one of the few instances I chose all casual options and they were fine. Ryder sounds realistically upset. Usually casual options are awkward unfunny jokes...

And finally, I'm free to move on!!!

Tempest

Flirted with Peebee, not the biggest fan of the acting but w/e

Whoa, I have two cryo pod points!! Bonus xp and caches on maps, here we go. It's funny that my pacifistic nerd has most points poured into military and none in science.

"But we are outsiders"

Liam, you're a sweetheart, but please get dressed

Redid the conversation with Vetra without the flirting. First, unless Peebee suddenly makes me hate her, then I'm romancing her; second, Vetra is a great person with great looks, but she's such a Mom Friend(tm).

Hold on, I've already asked Jaal all these questions, why are they not greyed out??

Why is "I wasn't close to my father" on the left and "I'm sorry, I lost my father too" on the right?

Why is Jaal speaking so slowly

Whoa, Voeld is 71% already? And I haven't even touched the monoliths!

Aya

Alright, I'm going to headcanon that establising the Voeld outpost happens after this scene. Now that would make a lot of sense!

Why did Ryder fricking yell at this person for being "hearless" when he asked if the supplies are safe?? I'm too lazy to reload, but it was stupid. 

Aya feels really peaceful.

It sounds like the same actress voices half of the NPCs in this game and DAI. I constantly get a feeling I'm still in the Hinterlands...

Vanadium is too expensive to buy... I get shield boosters every time I see them, though.

It's a good idea to let me have an opinion on the exaltation, but it's hard to predict from the wheel what these opinions really are. And the emotional one is kinda stupid. The kett weaponise their victims to make you hesitate? Nobody knew that until last week! (As implausible as that is.)

The sound quality in this location is pretty terrible. Different layers of sound don't blend together but abruptly switch on an off as I walk around.

For fuck's sake. Tried "friendship" option with Jaal again, and it was actually flirting again. What's the fucking point???

Logical: "The more we know about kett, the easier it will be to hurt them" Uh, nope. Let's go with my heart this time. Though I don't want to hear another stupid "Oh no, how shocking and horrible", it'd be still more in character.

"City planners don't walk around in battle armor with rifles on their shoulder" Thank you! Though it would work better in a conversation where I'm actually wearing armor...

"We traveled to build a new life here" "That's what invaders always say"

Casual Ryder asks Cora for advice for living among aliens, her answer: "Be polite about scanning your food"

"Don't take this the wrong way, but this isn't your only city, right" BHAHAHA BEST LINE IN THE GAME

"I noticed that you, Efra and Jaal all speak with different accents" Well I didn't...

Ryder, you already know angara have big families, why do you sound so surprised?

What the fuck, did I just hit on the governor? I thought it was another question!!!

A task to relay letters from angara to the Nexus sounded nice already. I thought it'd be just a fetch quest and didn't expect to see actual letters! It's a very effective way to represent a realistic range of opinions. More than I expected from the game. And I have to choose whether to edit them or not! That's original. I don't understand how exactly I'm supposed to edit them -- tried in an alternate save, and nothing new happened.

Oh look, I discovered a new spot on the way to the terminal! Which I guess is the main purpose of this quest, except I only talked to the governor after exploring almost everything else. It's nice that the game helps you explore and force you to read the codex.

Alright, I think I've done everything here, let's proceed. Who do I take with Peebee? Let's take Vetra.

Oh, it's not a mission? Just a cutscene with me and Moshae? Alright.

I don't like where this is going. So now instead of exploring I'll have to build an army to take the Meridian? How boring.

And the codex says that this makes the mission more urgent... ugh.

Wait, the Archont wants to destroy all non-kett life in the cluster? I thought his goal was to improve the kett by assimilating others...

So that's what I need on Kadara.

I still find the angara pretty dull, but as a hub Aya is very well built.

Tempest/Aya/Tempest

Gil's poker notes! :D

Peebee and Vetra are standing next to each other: :) They're not talking: :(

I just left Aya and wanted to go to the Nexus, but w/e, if Liam wants I'll pretend we haven't taken off and go meet him in that bar. Again.

Lexi... has eyebrows?

Tann appreciated the uncensored letters! See, he's good.

Sorry Kallo, but talking about "respect" is pretty dumb in this situation

Got a Hornet as a strike team reward. 

I don't get it. How is scanning food is going to help us grow it? Liam says he "stopped the operation" but he not only continues it himself but makes me do it -- for no reason? What the hell was that.

It gets worse. He gave out some classified and Nexus data?? In exchange for fixing something? What. the. fuck.

Liam's LM

I had to make that Star Wars reference, of course.

The bad guy apparently plays threatening music over the comms in-universe lol

Of course Ryder had to make a joke with Liam! She is a kid like him after all. And Vetra was like "I wish I could punch both of you"

The designers sure had fun with vertical mobility huh :D

Wait, it's been on easy all this time? Since when? I only noticed when an armored target went down too fast...

Had to melee the Hydras. Thanks to the MP community for explaining that they don't have a sync-kill...

Bradley & co are so competent!

"What's he complaining about? Put him right side up, didn't we?"

Oh fuck, a fiend! Good thing I have a flamethrower, and brought incendiary ammo.

Look, a hacking objective. Had an extraction on Voeld, now this. I hope we won't have to do the new ABC upload at some point...

"We need to bring everyone back home safely" vs "We need her to saty while we replace the codes" um, both?

I picked the latter. Liam got mad. Um, why? I'm not trying to blame Verand, it's just a safety precaution. I used the interrupt. Then, to soften the blow, told him he was right. He was so shocked! :D And the line was pretty nice too, not "I take everything back, I'll kiss everyone's ass to get their approval" but "We're in over our heads"

Good mission! Very cinematic, nice humor. I don't get Liam's logic at all very often (and now am relieved I didn't go for the romance) but he had some nice warm character moments here. 

The next step in Liam's story is to do Jaal's mission! I'm loving this. Just before thiggering this conversation I overheard the two of them and thought how nicely their friendship is established. But this level of connection between companions is completely new!

Tempest

Before the game's release, people were talking about Kallo as a young person. I didn't expect him to have such an old man story.

Why doesn't the ship's database have its own schematics in the first place?!

"Just think: while we're poking around in kett's genetics, they're probably doing the same with ours" "Wonderful. That's me never sleeping again"

I've complained about the galaxy map, a lot of people did, but let's take a moment to appreciate the fact that we don't have to spend fuel!

Nexus

"Lexi: Bottom of the Bottle" Hmm, I wonder where I could find her... :D

This woman is worried whether we should welcome angara as if it weren't us who are alien visitors here... Good thing I had the option to tell her exactly that! Even though it wasn't labeled clearly enough.

I had a feeling when I saw the name of Lexi's quest that Peebee's bullying got to her!

"Every one of my exes said that"

Whoa, the game rememebered that I flirted with her! That's a nice bit of continuity. "Yes! I mean no! Don't change the subject!" Btw "Don't change the subject" not only works here emotionally, but is also a smooth way to bring you back from an investigation dialogue option to the main conversation.

All casual options with Gil hell yeah

I refused to cheat initially. Then did it in another save. Ryder comment on Jill changes! And when she wins we get all four options. Seems like only one of them confesses to cheating. I picked that one. Hmm, not sure which one I like better... Btw it's really nice how Ryder replies to SAM but makes it sound she's replying to Gil.

Oh, Peebee's in the starting area too? I was expecting to search for her everywhere...

Aaaand I got stuck in some plant. Reload!

Whoa! So that's how Remnant VI is unlocked!! That's so cool. I sort of assumed I'd just pick it up somewhere. Now I've got to learn it!!! Using a power personally designed by your crush for you is amazing!!

What is this Leliana-Marjolain shit

At least she has a classic asari face texture :D

The translations are getting weirder and weirder. "Glad to see you moving on" -> "Glad to see you move to a new place"

Oh, it's even unlocked by default! Nice!

And now I'm finally free to deal with my own personal story! Btw I didn't realize until this second, but it's great that in this game the protagonist *has* their own personal quest. 

Let me guess, Alex's "fix" will backfire and kill Ellen faster?

"My education on human mortality began that day" -- the translators misread "mortality" as "morality"!! Argh!

Recordings of a quarian historian and the Shadow Broker!

I have two unlocked memories today (from Havarl and Voeld). There's only one remaining. It makes me sad... Does this mean that after Kadara we'll move onto the endgame already?

Family flashback!! There's no reason to have this specific memory blocked, it doesn't reveal anything, and it kind of restricts roleplaying possibilities... But it was amazing to see everyone in a cinematic! And the Ryders were very defined characters already anyway.

Oh, so this doesn't count for unlocking dad's restricted logs! This is good news.

I knew the spoiler that the attempted murderer goes back to cryo... I won't call a suicidal guy a coward.

Tann: "Stay away from Kadara. I cannot stress this enough" Ryder: "Lol"

Don't spring life-and-death decisions on me like that! Told the turian to stay on the Nexus just to be safe. Though this might mean he'll be killed when trouble inevitably comes here...

Baby krogan engineer Kesh!! How cute.

You know what I don't like? When the game greys out the questions I've already asked before, but have new answers now. Like when you talk to SAM about the unlocked memories, or to Addison about viability. Meanwhile, Peebee's "Flirting" is still open...

Oh, there's a viability chart in Pathfinder HQ! There's one more planet after Kadara. This is a bit spoilery if you ask me.

Aw, poor Tann is out of his depth!

Alright, I think I've done everything here.

"Our leaders have discussed whether we should send colonists there" FUCK NO!!! Are you serious?? Angara themselves have to rotate because that one planet can't support them all at once, and you're talking about burdening it with aliens?? You know, I like being a hero in this game just to prevent bullshit like this!!

Tempest

Peebee... I've already met you in Aya museum...

Multiplayer

I lost connection to a session so hard it threw me out of multiplayer into the starting screen...

Extracted from a Bronze Apex mission with bonus to combos as an asari adept. Everyone else played ranged characters and stayed close together on a roof or something -- sorry I ran off and died several times, I need to be in melee range!

Wait, it's not marked as completed -- what?

This mission has a bonus to explosions, and I still can't kill a mook 

This game on wave 3 is already longer than the previous game on 6...

God, this was the laggies, glitchiest match ever. 20+ minutes Powers took a second to process. Couldn't refresh shield in cover or use ops packs. I got shot down on 00:00. And nothing registered: APEX mission not completed, no credits, no xp.

Nobody joined my own lobby, let's try again

Finally! A normal full extraction, and mission finally complete. But when I tried to disable a device I couldn't progress more than halfway

I increased the range of Annihilation, but can't feel or see the change :(