#tactical combat polycule

[inphront]

so i’m drawing these fashion figures for my capstone project. i decide to make one of the figures look like one of my sex magic ocs just for funsies.

the oc does that thing they sometimes do where they’re like “no i have a mind of my own now” and completely refuses to be drawn in the outfit i had planned.

as mentioned. sex magic oc. exists in a setting where you can get a phd in fuckin and is actively in the process of doing so. this motherfucker hijacks my outfit design altogether. i end up drawing full on bondage gear.

as mentioned. capstone project. for school. gonna present this shit in front of the class. i am looking at this fashion model in leather and have to do some risk assessment. we have to design twice as much shit as we have to make, so it’s not like this would have to be part of the actual final runway show. plus i’m in the small section so i’d only be presenting to six people plus the instructor. said instructor met my best friend in the program at a bdsm group before becoming their teacher. i assess that the risk is relatively low.

i get to class (not the presentation class thank fuck). the instructor lets us know that we are invited to the other section’s presentations and they will be invited to ours. oh boy. he goes on to say he is also inviting several other faculty and the DEAN OF THE SCHOOL.

i will be redrawing this look. god dammit zenith.

[zeravmeta]

all non-despair aus are funny to me because they often settle for "and then x gets a good job" but like i promise you every single one of the classes will have an extended situationship/polycule of some kind where large chunks of them just live together

with the dr1 cast makoto is an unemployed bum in my heart forever but i know there will be some war style tactics within the class to keep him with their subgroups and i know that byakuya and kyoko are also attached at the hip with him likely trading him between professions, definitely touko stays with him not just because of komaru but also he is like the one guy also cool with syo just hanging around and this group definitely combats with junko and mukuro for egg rights, sayaka also falls here. celestia is also an important consideration since she would definitely get her castle and I can see hagakure leeching off her. ishimondo + chihiro is a given as a trio but i can see aoi, sakura, and hifumi also tagging with them.

with the sdr2 cast we know that fuyuhiko offers to let izuru stay with him for however long he wants and it's implied that he extends this offer pretty liberally to whoever in his class needs it so i think the blowjob brothers hajime and kazuichi are definitely crashing with him indefinitely. nagito can cleanly let anyone stay in his lonely fuckoff mansion but they'll def drag him in as well even if he doesn't feel safe to do so. sonia and gundam definitely go and live together and like sonia would be 100% fine with letting anyone in the class without a home to also live with her so that'd be pretty funny to see.

with the v3 cast the graduation plan mode also gives us some combos like kiibo/miu definitely staying together but i know training trio + kaede and ouma are a package deal, they all also somewhat revolve around shuichi so stragglers like gonta and ryoma also stick around. korekiyo and rantarou both actually flat out talk about eloping worldwide with shuichi for their separate reasons so they apply as well.

[dare-to-dm]

So I finally started my couch co-op playthrough of Baldur's Gate 3 with my spouse. He doesn't play D&D and normally doesn't enjoy more complex tactical games, so I was worried he would find the gameplay overwhelming on his own. But with me to guide him, it's been going very well so far!

Couch co-op is definitely the way to go. It makes it very easy to get into actually role playing.

We're playing on the lowest difficulty, which is honestly a little boring for me. But he doesn't care about the combat at all, so this will probably remain our speed. But on the bright side, we have decided to form a polycule with the two of us, Wyll and Karlach. The forces of good have never been so sexy!

[puppy-wife]

hey u seem cool, tell me about ur ttrpg-interest plssss (i need ttrpg-friends)

omg omg omg happily!!!

so ive been roleplaying for most of my life, I got my first d&d books when I was like, 10? and I did a lot of LARP as a kid, both by myself and with sibs/neighbors. I got to play my first d&d game when I was 14, and ran my first campaign at 16!!

the game I've played the most is easily d&d, I started playing in 3.5e, which is imo the best edition of d&d, and have played 4e (I actually think this is a well designed game from a combat tactics point of view, but it's terrible as a roleplaying game and as a d&d edition, it should have been its own game and it would have been much more successful), and have run a LOT of games in 5e

other games I've played a lot of include old World of Darkness (mostly VtM, but I've played most of the major splats in some way or another, and love to mix them), GURPS (which I'm currently starting a new campaign for my polycule), PbtA (Masks and Monster of the Week are two of my favorites, with Bluebeard's Bride getting a special shout-out).

I've also played a lot of custom games, or very loose rulesets. Some of my favorites for those include Doom (not the video game, a thriller/horror game played with a Jenga tower), and a game where instead of dice we used a tarot deck to determine outcomes.

I have two main worlds that I run campaigns in, I have a high fantasy d&d-inspired world named Arcanum (this is actually the name of the primary kingdom most of my stories take place in, the name of the real is Faermont) (this is the setting for the campaign I'm just starting, I'm sending my players into my version of Undermountain, a mega dungeon similar to if you've seen Delicious in Dungeon) (I have a bunch of Arcanum stuff posted to my blog, if you're interested in reading some lore or short fics) and I have a dark urban fantasy alternate earth I call Oakvale, which is the main city that I base my stories in (think vampires, werewolves, wizards, fae, shifters, magic, spirits, etc) (Oakvale is a fictional major city in Maine, with a few fictional surrounding cities that I created as well. The city proper is home to the current vampire government, and the other supes either hide in the city or live in the outskirts or one of the surrounding towns). I've been running games off and on in those settings for about 9ish years now.

I love love LOVE ttrpgs and will happily yap your ear off about anything you wanna know, I'd love to hear about your favorite ttrpgs!!!

[kelplostatsea]

Look at my perfect assassin peeps

From top left to bottom right:

Don Fin: He's new! I didn't have 9 characters for this story, so I made him up :-) . He's in the oldest gen of assassins and acts as an advisor to Giza. Old men should be drawn more.

Kostas Aioli: 2nd gen assassin, defector, and Jules' former partner and husband. Specialises in hand-to-hand combat. Has gone into hiding after Giza took power. Not as red-faced as I could've done, IDK, rendering blushing on dark-skinned characters is hard.

Julius Margherita: also 2nd gen, designated wet cat of the group. Just a pathetic old man who's good enough at sniping and can act as leverage over Kostas, so the agency keeps him around even though he's a sad, dying moron.

Hirosaki Japan: 3rd gen, mainly parters with Cairo but in the 3rd gen Assassins work in teams far more. Yakuza defector turned assassin. Definitely the designated "big guy", except he broke his leg, so Cairo got stuck w/ Jules :/.

Harlem New York: 3rd gen. Designated smart guy, also relatively new, She might be my favourite of these, I really really love how her hijab came out. Kills people via poison darts and injections. Mostly partnered with Los, but also Cairo in covert missions, she's very close with them both. Very tactic heavy.

Cairo Egypt: 3rd gen, Giza's son. A generally skilled assassin that's particularly good at reactive strategies, so he's generally paired with the planners and picks up the slack when stuff goes wrong. Good friends with all the other 3rd gen assassins, with a strong sense of mutual loyalty. Basically, forms a QPR polycule.

Los Angeles: 3rd gen, you may have noticed that they all have stupid names. The stupid names do have a theme, though, for each generation the theme changes on the code names given. 1st gen = animals, 2nd gen = food and 3rd gen = location. Los is mute and enthusiastic about her job, she loves her coworkers, and she loves killing people.

Georgia Brooks: Civilian, and Cairo's bio mom.

Giza Egypt: Designated Girlboss Milf, 2nd gen assassin turned agency boss seen intimidating Georgia. Incredibly meticulous planner and generally mysterious and difficult to read.

[dukeofankh]

I was playing BG3 and trying to keep everyone happy and make some progress in the romance arc and I thought about how fucking hilarious it would be if there was a squad tactics game where the vast majority of the strategy was managing the fact that your entire group was one big dysfunctional polycule.

Like, one of the main character's starting items works very well when paired with another character's stats, but are you going to deal with the social fallout of giving Your Mom's Scarf to that character? Attention is a major stat, and for some characters having too little makes them act annoyed, for others it makes them act clingy. And both of those are concrete status effects with both story and combat implications. Other characters start getting negative status effects if they start receiving too *much* attention, because it makes them feel smothered.

One big part of it is that there is no maximum cap on party size. It's just a question of how many personalities you can juggle at once.

[calchexxis]

If You Did Buy Darkest Dungeon

Then here is a basic walkthrough on how to break the game wide open because the affinity system is laughably terrible and super easy to abuse/be abused by.

The game is basically predicated entirely on being able to control whether or not your people can stand each other. Health? Nope, ignore it. Stress? Irrelevant. Resource management? Did you think this was a tactical game? No, this is Darkest Dungeon Dating Simulator.

So buckle up, lubricate, and let’s get in it.

Step One: Make friends with the plague doctor, she will be on every mission.

Step Two: No, seriously. Unless you want to play a run on Nightmare Mode difficulty, you have to have her. She heals and strips conditions with the same skill, and her Resistance buff dings down your stress once it’s mastered. With those two skills you have a one-girl control

Step Three: Do literally anything that boosts the largest amount of affinity regardless of its effect on your game. You get so many items just passively from necessary battles that between combat items which do not take your turn to use, and your salty Plague Waifu, you will never have to worry about health.

Step Four: Make sure you equip those Combat Items. Prioritize anything that heals, ideally on high-speed characters. In addition, a stack of laudanum on someone goes a long way towards spot healing stress to keep your characters from having a meltdown and flagellating 90% of their skin off on the fly.

Step Five: Playing Cards. Collect Them. Seriously, they are your best friend. At inns they will trigger about a half-dozen rapid-fire affinity events back to back, with a high chance of positive gains. So when you get to an inn, immediately purchase every playing card deck the provisioner has, then use them all at once. Don’t worry, if you get bad luck and get a bunch of negative affinity, you can reload your save and you’ll be back at the inn without having spent anything and you can try again! Rinse and repeat til your wagon crew is a gambling addicted polycule.

Things to remember

Healing Salve is a good default Combat Item equip for everyone but if you don’t have enough then just equip whatever is the most relevant condition-stripping healing item for the zone you’re in (Salve for the Sprawl, Bandages for anywhere, etc...)

Have one person with Laudanum. A Meltdown will ruin affinity.

Do not hoard items. Use them. Suckle at the teat of the item god because they are a generous being that lactates a pure stream resources straight into your open craw.

The map when you load into a zone has green roads and broken-up blue roads. Green is good. Blue is bad. That’s all you really need to know. Unless there’s something at the end of a Blue road that you absolutely need, like a quest objective, avoid them at all costs. Fewer fights are always better.

Hospitals cure bad quirks. Save your gold for this and affinity items. The negative quirks in this are absolutely devastating and many of them will rob you of a turn.

DoTs are better than almost any other form of damage in the game. The end-boss basically requires you to be able to dot them or you will die. No seriously. You will die if you don’t have enough DoTs.

[ixcaliber]

New Year New Video Games of the Month

it’s january

1. Mario and Rabbids: Sparks of Hope

It’s not a new observation that this combination of things shouldn’t work. Neither Mario nor the rabbids have anything to do with xcom style tactical combat. And initially it is funny to see Mario wielding dual pistols. But despite the seeming incompatibility of the elements these games are good.

The best thing about this game for me was the aesthetics. The designs of the planets that you visit, and the designs of the new original characters. Edge and the Spark Hunters are in a polycule and nobody will ever convince me otherwise. Cursa, the main villain of the game, looks fantastic; I loved whenever they were on screen. And even some of the planetary guardians have really great designs, for example Woodrow the doomed poet and Bea the retired pop diva turned farmer.

The biggest problem with the game is that it can feel real slow. Battles sort of happen jrpg random encounter style; you bump into an enemy, are loaded into an arena to have a combat, and then load back into the world. Only it feels more arduous than a jrpg random encounter just because a tactical battle by its very nature takes longer than a similar battle would. It would be one thing if these battles were one and done but enemies do respawn when you move to a different map (even if it’s just like going in and out of a house).

Additionally movement is just a hair too slow and so many of the puzzles you encounter are logistical puzzles where you can immediately see what you need to do, and the puzzle is painstakingly pulling blocks flipping switches etcetera to perfom that action.

Additionally additionally a lot of the main battles you fight are survive battles where you have to simply survive for x number of turns. I was always happy whenever a battle would load up and it was a simple ‘kill these enemies’ or ‘kill x number of enemies’ or best of all ‘reach this area’ because that’s something i can optimize.

Oh actually I know I already said the biggest problem with the game is the slowness, but the actually biggest problem with the game is the enemies ability to spawn in and attack on the same turn. Sure it gives you a heads up where they are going to spawn the turn beforehand, but even so it means that the enemy is almost always going to get free hits on you just because it’s impossible to fully protect yourself sometimes.

Or worse, on levels where you have to protect a building or an item enemies will spawn in and shoot that object taking away one of it’s 8 or so hit points on the same turn and so you essentially have to play perfectly to offset the fact that they get free hits you can do nothing about.

Oh and please note that this was a rental copy and I try not to financially support Ubisoft due to their unaddressed culture of abuse.

2. World of Warcraft: Shadowlands

You know that thing where a parent catches their kid smoking a cigarette and then as a punishment/deterrent forces them to smoke the whole pack? That was pretty much how I felt trying to force myself through this entire expansion as quickly as possible to avoid paying any more money to Activision Blizzard than I had to due to their unaddressed culture of abuse. (Also worth noting I didn’t buy Shadowlands, it was just randomly given to me at some point?)

With that said... I think that this was like my second favourite wow expansion?

(1. Legion 2. Shadowlands 3. The Burning Crusade 4. Mists of Pandaria 5. Warlords of Draenor 6. Cataclysm 7. Wrath of the Lich King 8. Battle For Azeroth)

Battle for Azeroth absolutely killed dead my interest in anything that was going on in the actual narrative of world of warcraft, so it is to the game’s benefit that you spend most of the time dealing with the crises and politics of the various afterlives you visit.

I liked these self contained narratives, like the rebellion of the people of Revendreth against their corrupted Sire, the civil war caused by the disappearance of the Primus of Maldraxus, the doubt and uncertainty creeping into the selfless to a fault kyrian of Bastion, the struggle to preserve nature in the face of an overwhelming drought in Ardenweald.

In Legion I loved the Order Hall campaign. It was a system where each class gets its own unique and aesthetically appropriate headquarters with a unique storyline, a unique armor set and a selection of unique artefact weapons (cool weapons from the warcraft lore with little questlines about how you get them). In Battle For Azeroth it felt like they tried to replicate this idea with the Horde/Alliance campaign and I couldn’t care less.

In Shadowlands you have the Covenant system and it’s a fair approximation of this idea. You journey through each of the four major afterlives and then are given the option of which you wish to align yourself with and there are unique questlines for each, a whole bunch of armour sets (at least one for each armor class), a unique side activity, unique npcs to ‘soulbind’ with, unique skills that are available for use whenever you are in the shadowlands. Honestly it’s a little too much weighing on this one decision and it was really difficult to make my choice, especially considering I wouldn’t have time for a second playthrough with another class (I picked the Night Fae because Ardenweald has the most foxies and it allowed me to take the form of a foxie whenever I wanted).

Sidenote on the ‘soulbind’ thing. It’s first introduced when two kyrian (big blue valkyrie ladies) mention being soulbinds and of course I think ‘oh cool soulbind means getting gay married’. So I got gay married to a cute satyr lady called Niya. Not what they intended I think but I’m taking it.

There’s so many elements in here that I could talk about. Like the garrison missions are now a kind of auto-chess that I couldn’t stand. Like how the Ardenweald side activity is just planting seeds and then waiting until they are sprouted, like a worse version of the Pandaria farming thing. Like Torghast and its pseudo roguelike structure. Like The Maw and its unique sensibilities and how later patches stripped away these more unique aspects. Like the proliferation of Timeless Isle daily quest hubs in patch content and how that continues with Korthia and Zereth Mortis.

My favourite quest was the first one I got after joining the Night Fae, where they ask me to put on a play recounting the events of both Legion and Battle For Azeroth. It was a fun little quest with various night fae npcs illusioned up to look like the major antagonists of previous expansions (and a whole bunch of them running around as n’zoth’s tentacles). And as a bonus it was kind of cathartic to see the Night Fae audience bewilderedly questioning why it was that the Horde and Alliance had gone right back to fighting one another again.

Additionally it was interesting that the main storyline of this expansion was completeable without ever setting foot in a raid or a dungeon. There were little sections where it was clear that raid encounters would go here and it would show you the outcome of those raids to make sure you could follow the continuing events. And it even had its own final boss fight.

Overall it was a pretty good experience even if it was coloured by my desperate desire to finish it within a single month. It’s not an experience I’d like to repeat, though that said if they did randomly decide to give me Dragonflight I can absolutely see this happening again next January. Fingers crossed that they don’t do that.

3. Lunistice

Lunistice is a cute 3d platformer with a ps1 art style and an adorable tanuki protagonist called Hana. It has this sort of dream like aesthetic. Every level is more or less an abstract environment that doesn’t feel quite like a real place, in some kind of endless void. For me it evokes early 3d platformers in the style of like Croc maybe? Except with actually good and responsive controls.

Hana is really quick and responsive actually, and it feels as though optimization of speed is a core element of the game. There are for example branches or waterways that you can slide down and as you do so you get this... almost like a balance gauge that shifts as the slide curves. At first I thought you had to stay in the right zone or fall off, eventually I realized it’s entirely there to give you a speed boost. At least I think so, the game didn’t stop and explain this to me so I’m working a little off guesswork here.

There’s a specific button to hold to move slower and more precisely but you only need it when on the narrowest of platforms... or if you’re good enough you could probably make those jumps without it.

The story such as it exists is told through bonus documents you get for collecting optional collectibles and is a little abstract even if you do read through them all. Like, having done so I do understand the concept of what is going on in the game and the reason why but there’s no detail. No attempt to explain how what you’re doing solved the problem that it allegedly solved.

Overall I really liked it. A nice cute platformer, cozy short and simple after my extended period playing really long games.

4. You Died But A Necromancer Revived You

A short little 2d game of hurrying through a dungeon and dodging traps. You die in a single hit but don’t worry a necromancer will revive you again and again to try try again. I know that’s like the conceit of almost every game that you can die and try again but here it is like partially narrative. The villain of the game is the necromancer that keeps bringing you back and forcing you to run his gauntlet.

The game is procedurally generated, forcing you to adapt on the fly rather than simply memorize a layout of traps. Also your path is gradually replaced by spikes, forcing you to keep moving and pushing you into riskier behaviours. Also on the normal difficulty you have to complete two or three floors before you’ll recieve a checkpoint that you can continue from. 

All of these decisions make a certain amount of sense but sometimes you do get situations where the time pressure of the oncoming spikes and the density of traps creates a series of obstacles that feel insurmountable. 

It does have an easier option which just means you get a checkpoint after each floor. This makes victory seem significantly more attainable for me as it decreases the amount of time you have to play perfectly and makes it less irritating to encounter a level that feels impossible.

A fun little experience. You could not pay me to touch the harder difficulties.

5. Outer Wilds: Echoes of the Eye

I loved The Outer Wilds. I... um... have less enthusiasm about this one. It still has all the things I love. The way that progress is gated by learning new information and shortcuts. The way that the whole game is this ticking clockwork world with predictable changes that happen at specific intervals. The intricate design of the world. The solutions to various problems being things you could have done at any time but wouldn’t think to without some prompting and learning how these systems work is a genuine moment of revelation.

The problem is the stealth segments. I really hated them. I was first trying to play this January of last year and I stopped the moment I hit them. They just do not fit with how the rest of the game plays. I hated the experience of hiding and luring and trying to move around and navigate in the pitch black.

The point at which I quit, I learned when I returned to it this year. I was trying to sneak into The Lodge and I was convinced I wasn’t sneaking good enough. That there was some direction I had to sneak to or some way I had to move that would solve what I was doing wrong. It’s this subjectivity that stopped me from realizing that there was actually a puzzle to be solved here.

It still has some really good moments. Like the revelations of what you need to do to access some of the locks are kind of incredible. And I love the design of The Stranger as a whole. The stealth doesn’t ruin the experience but it does greatly diminish it.

6. Taiji

Have you ever played The Witness? Would you like more The Witness with a slightly different main puzzle mechanic but otherwise recognizable puzzle elements?

I don’t think it’s unfair to compare Taiji and The Witness given that it even mimics the aesthetic of key areas. It’s not one to one but there are times when if you do have that experience you’ll walk up to an area and already have a good idea of how the rules should work in this area, and probably be right.

It doesn’t do as good a job at teaching its new mechanics as The Witness does. In the few instances it has a wholely unique idea to present, such as at the graveyard it essentially explicitly tells you half of how it works and doesn’t even really hint that’s there’s a second half of how it works until the final row of puzzles when suddenly your answers don’t work any more and it’s unclear exactly why.

It does have some neat environmental puzzles but lacks the immediacy of how they can be solved in The Witness.

If you like The Witness you’ll probably like this, though not quite as much. If you didn’t like The Witness you probably won’t like this. If you haven’t played The Witness, play The Witness and then consult this flow chart again.

7. I Commissioned Some Bees 0

After I mentioned playing the hidden object cats game to Forgie she pointed me towards this series of games. This one is free on Steam. It’s ten pieces of art filled with hidden bees. Find all the bees and generally have a chill time. It’s very pleasant.

The only thing I’ll say about this one is that the difficulty curve doesn’t really exist. The smaller levels are obviously easier because there’s less ground to cover and its easier to spot the bees. In some of the levels the bees are like solid objects that can hide half behind other objects, in others they are simply outlines and thus much trickier to find. There’s no real order that the levels are presented in. The second level is huge and some of the later levels are really small, like I think it’s level eight that is just a parking lot. And the outline levels are scattered seemingly at random as well.

Thats a really nitpicky complaint though. Overall the game has chill vibes and one level is a cute woodlands with foxie and raccoon and squirrel and god I would love a game where you find all the hidden foxies so much. That’d be a game of the year contender right there. No danger just chill just so many foxies to pet.

8. Kirby: Star Allies

I’ve never played a Kirby game before... and in some respects I still don’t really feel like I’ve played a Kirby game now. Star Allies was a game Forgie rented, and I think she just had it on her rental list as a placeholder, like, they’ll never send this one out, gives her a buffer to put the games she’s more interested in at the time at the top of the list. Only they did send it out.

It’s not a bad game but it is very chaotic. Me and Forgie tried playing it two player and it was pretty much imparseable.

Maybe saying that I don’t feel like I’ve played a Kirby game still is a little unfair. The only parts that I feel like I might have missed out on are like boss fights. In the chaos I’d quickly lose my copy ability and then not really know what to be doing for the rest of the fight as my allies just beat the enemy for me essentially.

My favourite part was having cute mouse Daroach on my team or whenever there was a team up action as that allowed the whatever was going on on screen to be more parseable.

I’d really like to try a more traditional game, or the new one where Kirby can be a car. I’m considering finding a copy of Kirby: Squeak Squad so I can see more of Daroach.

9. Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order

This game is something of a mishmash. It’s a bit of uncharted in how it handles its traversal, a bit of dark souls in its combat systems and a little bit of metroidvania in terms of level design. And while I do like the game I feel like all of these elements sort of work against each other.

Uncharted traversal makes it take longer to get around a level. If you keep dying to difficult bosses then chances are you’re going to see the same climbing animations over and over and it will start to grate.

Metroidvania level design suffers similarly, both the overlong traversal and the difficult combat make you less likely to even want to come back and search for secrets using your newly unlocked powers. A situation that isn’t helped by the fact that most of the things you can find are recolours for your poncho, your robot friend, your spaceship. The amount of really worthwhile items you can find is like single digits. There’s like total nine collectibles actually worth getting (the eight extra cannisters (your estus flask equivalent) and the one randomly hidden ability to use a double ended light saber). 

And the dark souls style combat just kind of doesn’t necessarily gel with the source material. Like part of the point of a dark souls game is that it’s hard you’ll probably die at least a couple of times and have to get back up and throw yourself at the boss until you overcome it. That’s why you’re always some form of undead entity, so there’s no break in narrative when you die.

But, you know, Jedi die when they are killed. I spent some time trying to construct a justification for this. Your bonfire equivalent are meditation circles and I thought maybe whenever you fail it turns out what you are actually experiencing was a force vision to give you wisdom of how to proceed. Something like that, but it doesn’t quite gel with the fact that you can keep items and opened shortcuts stay opened.

I’d heard people make the dark souls comparison before and it’s like yes they borrowed these specific set of mechanics from those games but not the atmosphere or the things that actually make those kind of games fun to explore.

Also the game really wants you to be parrying. It’s the best way to deal with blaster fire, and enemies guard so much that attacking without parrying is just wasting your time and energy. Yet they also recover from a parry so quickly. I can’t land two hits before i have to actively dodge roll out of the way of their next attack.

I’ve complained a lot here but I did like this game. The things that really worked for me was the narrative... or maybe more accurately it’s the characters. Pretty much everyone is living with trauma after having been forced into hiding by the empire (i don’t remember if that’s what they’re referred to in this one but you know what i mean). A major component of the plot is learning how to move forward with trauma, and how to forgive yourself for your survivor’s guilt. Cere is cool. Merrin is pretty cool. Trilla is pretty cool. I like the little robot and Greez. Cal is also here and no sorry that’s mean, he’s fine it’s just another game where I’d rather be playing as one of the cool supporting cast.

Oh and fuck when they throw two of the bounty hunter boss fights at you at the same time.

10. SteelRising

Now here’s a game that actually feels like a Soulslike. I really liked this one a lot. It’s a soulslike where you’re a clockwork robot in an alternate revolutionary france, on a mission from the queen to find out how to stop the mad king’s mechanical armies.

I love how strongly it leans into its setting. You visit various well known french landmarks such as the Louvre, the palace of Versailles, the Bastille. You meet historical figures, some of whose names I’ve even heard before. It’s just such a neat aesthetic to these machines designed with revolutionary french sensibilities. The worst level in the game is Montmartre where you descend into a quarry and you basically could be in any video game at that point.

The combat is fun, and offers plenty of options and variety. I ran a high agility build with claw weapons and a heavy focus on immobilization and then capitalizing on the critical attacks that would ensue and I had a great time and hang on wait a minute -

Oh and you know what else Star Wars Jedi Fallen Order doesn’t have? Diversity in gameplay style. You can’t really build your character in that game. You don’t even get a second weapon style until late in the game/whenever you happen to randomly stumble across the doublesided light saber. 

Anyway one of the things that is interesting about SteelRising is that most of its levels are designed for revisiting as you complete the various sidequests that you get throughout the game and so every level is like initial this long twisting corridor that you have to make progress throughout, but as you unlock new abilities and shortcuts they open out to be a lot more freeform than you’d expect in a souls game.

The sidequests are also interesting in that it seems as though you have an impact on how the power struggle at the end of the game plays out through your actions. Not just in your choices when you’re given an explicit ‘do you help x person or y person’ choice but also just in who you choose to complete side quests for. I helped everyone and I think it netted me the worst ending where neither side was really happy with the outcome.

Also Aegis and Athenais are gay and dating and I do not care if you disagree. This is simply the facts.

11. LumbearJack

Lumbearjack is a cute little game where a bear lumberjack cuts down and recycles every man made object in his path to help protect his animal friends and defeat the Evil Corporation.

It’s a very pleasant simple game. Your axe is strong enough to chop down objects of a certain size. Chop down everything you can until you have enough materials to create a bigger axe and chop down bigger things. Repeat as needed and watch nature reclaim the land as you chop away garbage dumps and industrial machinery. It’s cute and nice fun.

12. The Case of the Golden Idol

The Case of the Golden Idol is so good. It’s a game that presents you with a series of scenarios frozen in time; often the death of someone connected to the titular golden idol. You can explore the area, examine the items held by every person there, the contents of safes and letters and whatever evidence might be nearby, and once you’re done examining everything and have collected all of the relevant words you are given a number of different charts to fill in.

One common one is a selection of images of the various people involved in the situation with spaces below them for you to input their names. Or for example a map of living quarters and you’re asked to identify who lives where based on the information available to you. And each chapter you’re given a statement filled with blanks that you have to fill to demonstrate your understanding of the crime.

It’s really good. I’ve heard comparisons to Return of the Obra Dinn and yeah there’s so few games that operate on using deductive reasoning like this. Early candidate for game of the year. Going to be on my top ten at the very least. Well, I mean anything can happen but the rest of the year would have to be fucking amazing to keep this from my top ten.

13. Sonority

Sonority is a musical puzzle game. You play as Esther, a girl looking to learn a magical melody that can heal her friend, a talking bear called Batama. I was a little hesitant because I’m bad at musical puzzles in pretty much every game that features them, but the steam page promised that no prior musical knowledge was necessary so I gave it a try.

There are a couple of puzzles in the game about identifying notes that you can hear and playing them back, but these are all optional puzzles. The way that the main puzzles of the game work is that they use the rise and fall between notes as a puzzle element to interact with the world.

It works pretty well all in all, with enough variety in the puzzles and how they are presented to sustain you across the entire game. Though by the end I had like three instruments each of which able to play a slightly different range of notes and I did start to get a little overwhelmed. There were some segments, like the very last puzzle of the game, where I had most of the elements in place and I just had to do trial and error on the last elements because I couldn’t picture how it was supposed to look when I had done it correctly.

Also importantly there is a talking raccoon who is your friend.

[shiftingpath]

House of Bells Third Year Squad 7

Zyden and his squad from school, adorable 16-year-old puppy Zyden with his best friends/polycule!

Cathak Melio, Air-Aspected strategist: a quiet planner who worries endlessly that he’ll never live up to his House’s needs Peleps Kytek, Water-Aspected squad captain: an adaptable combatant who insills her squad with her own flexibility with tactic and weapon, held back by her paralyzing perfectionism demanded by her House Tepet Baladar, Earth-Aspected tank: an easy-going guy and young Zyden’s best friend, whose good humour is blunt and infectious, and whose anger issues are becoming overwhelming as his House falls apart around him Ledaal Zyden, Fire-Aspected duellist: a brilliant fighter and spear wielder who excels in the physical aspects of the military academy and constantly struggles in the academic side V’Neef Zyll, Wood-Aspected scout: a scion of V’Neef with incredible breeding whose fun-loving carelessness gets her into trouble endlessly, and her connections get her back out just as easily

back in the good old days!

-before he stood up to them trying to kill another student, before they beat the shit out of him for doing so, before they hazed him his entire last year, before they hunted him from one quarter of Creation to another. back in the good days.

[crowsent]

a fuckton of things i want in da4

a few words censored bc tumblr will swallow this in the void if i dont. long ass fuck list ahead

a romanceable dwarf

more romanceable elves/qunari

more elf/qunari/dwarf companions

consistent writing for once

more nb representation

good hair. please just give me good hair options. give me long hair. give me luxurious flowing locks. give me braids. give me good fucking hair options

let me shittalk the chantry

dalish elf npcs that impact the plot in unique ways

dalish elf companions that are proud of being dalish

if it is set in tevinter maybe uh. maybe address the issue of systemic oppression (and slavery) of elves???????

a return of the friendship/rivalry system in da2 but improved. maybe instead of a friendship rivalry sliding scale its friendship/rivalry/animosity sliding scale. bc rivalry is more like. two people pushing each other to be better than they were before. friendly competition. hes an idiot but hes my idiot kind of deal. animosity would be just regular disapproval. i liked the crisis cutscenes in dai so high animosity would be the same as low approval and might make the companion leave still, but theres more variety with high approval. high approval “friendship” would be the “were best friends and we share many opinions and agree on almost everything” while high approval “rivalry” being “we disagree on almost everything but goddamn it youre my friend and ill follow you into the fade if i have to” so you can have a high approval with someone instead of being a kissass

actions and choices having consequences again

multiple endings again (epilogue slideshows dont count)

dialogue wheels with descriptions that match what you actually say

characters from rivain, antiva, anderfels, etc

gifts. bring back the gifts. i want to give my companions gifts

maybe. maybe a focus of non-andrastian religion for once?

let me shittalk the chantry

i know its a stretch, but maybe. diverse skin colours. please?

nd characters that are written respectfully and treated w dignity

please bring back the talent wheel from dao and da2

more bi romance options

more wlw romance options

more mlm romance options

ace romance options

nb romance options

background romances

let me shittalk the chantry

far fetched but maybe a polycule?

i lowkey LOVED the fast-paced feel of da2s combat so maybe bring that back in some form? maybe improved to mesh with the tactics of dai to give players absolute freedom of playstyle whether they want to be like me and rush into every encounter or play more strategically

companions with unique companion abilities

would be nice to explore cities

would be nice if the open world were a little smaller so it doesnt feel empty all the gd time

more mage spells. mages felt like just another class of fighter to me in dai. they dont really have any awe-inducing wow factor like in dao or even da2. if the narrative wants me to believe that mages are powerful and dangerous and that it takes multiple templars to hunt down an apostate, maybe show that? give me strong mages

remove the jump ability. its pointless

a narrative that addresses the oppression that the chantry and templars perpetuated please

bring back the attributes

make the choices in dai matter. mages governing themselves? i wanna see that

let me shittalk the chantry

please bring back the healing magic for fucks sakes

multi-class system between rogues and warriors?

multiple specialisations that feel like specialisations and not just skill tree+

player-only skill trees

hardening

companion quests that affect their abilities and further dialogue

actual morally grey choices instead of this stupid mage freedom vs templar oppression narrative that is in no way morally grey but is presented as such and thus leaves the conflicts and narratives set up by dao and da2 to be fucking meaningless

bring back the tactics

would be nice to have an origins-esque prologue again. maybe one that would determine future events in game just to give your character better narrative cohesion with the plot

an approval/disapproval system but for companions with other companions. bringing certain companions together may bring them closer or make them pissed off with each other which affects banter maybe quests maybe combat

give me a fucking mabari bioware. give me back my fucking mabari

day/night cycle

a nightmare mode where you have to finish the main quest on a time limit. it is absurd that dai expects me to believe that i have all this time to do wartable missions that can take literal real life DAYS to finish and still thwart corypheus’ plans in time. bullshit

that said. no more wartable missions. waiting for a countdown to finish isnt very fun

let me shittalk the chantry

kal-sharok. ive been hearing about it since dao let me fucking see kal-sharok

dwarven politics

politics in general. my fav dao quest was the succession crisis plotline in orzammar/the landsmeet and wewh in dai

npcs i can talk to. even with generic dialogue like in dao. makes the world more alive

using the environment to your advantage. far fetched but i would love to be able to pull down boulders if were in the mountains or freeze water to get to places as a mage

home base customisation but the customisation choices you make actually. mean something. and do something. or at the very least give more companion dialogue/banter/approval change

laconic and ergonomic codexes. like. sorted by what kind of codex it is, etc etc but then you just get a brief summary of the codex and the option to read more about it so i dont spend eternity scrolling through cards looking for a specific codex entry. cool aesthetic dont get me wrong but real irritating to deal with. also. maybe. the pc making comments about the codex if you do read more about it? like a dalish elf saying “they got it all wrong” when reading a codex about dalish elves written by a human??? that would a) give character to the pc b) incentivise people to actually read the codex to see what was so wrong about it c) summarise the codex for people who want to learn the lore but dont want to spent the entire game reading text

maybe have the merchants in your home base close to crafting stations so you dont have to take a fucking hike if you miscounted the amount of elfroot you need?

let me shittalk the chantry

avvar companion maybe??? interesting lore right there

bring back stat requirements for weapons and remove the class restriction for most shit. obviously a dagger would be better for a rogue than a longsword and a mage would do better with a staff than a sword and shield but its not about efficiency. its about the roleplay. its about the options. give me the option to make a mage with wildly inappropriate stat distribution

bring back sustained mode abilities

traps. bring back traps. bring back the option to stealth into an area, trap the fuck out of it, and go from there

have the three available classes in kind of a rock paper scissors scenario. warriors do real well against rogues who do real well against mages who do real well against warriors. so you can plan your party depending on who/what youll face AND how much their approval will change during the quest you take them on

let me shittalk the chantry

actually resolve the plot points introduced in dai

a more threatening villain. the inquisitor thwarted every attempt made by corypheus in dai. he was not threatening at all

queer characters. background, companions, etc. queer characters

mounts were meh in dai. maybe. make them faster? or less cumbersome? or have your companions on mounts too so theres still banter?

i liked the armour tinting. let me have armour tinting from the beginning

i would really like mages to move and attack at the same time bc lowkey standing in one spot is uhhhhhhh kinda boring

let me check companions friendship/rivalry levels

would be nice if the narrative acknowledged that elves suffered greatly at the hands of the chantry and stopped victim-blaming them

more taverns. specifically like tapsters in dao where theres a dwarf just reciting something in a language i cant understand and if you look its a ballad/poet about dwarven culture and that was a real nice touch let me have that

dalish elf clan. dalish elf clan that does not get murdered please and thank you

meaningful quests. more cinematic dialogue

make found gear / quest reward gear more valuable than crafted gear

game modifiers like in dai were real nice. i want more

let me shittalk the chantry

quests that can be resolved in multiple ways. like connors fate in dao. and for those ways to impact further quests

companions with varying moral alignments

companions that are mutually exclusive (like alistair and loghain) but are both good companions so itd really make you think

a pc that IS NOT a “chosen one” vanilla da2 is my fav dragon age game for one reason and one reason only and that is because hawke is just some random refugee who escaped lothering. no chosen one magic at all. just an ordinary person who is a real good fighter. and that appealed to me more than this “you are the only one who can do it” narrative

let me meet more elvhen gods

if the setting is in tevinter, GIVE ME FUCKING ARCHITECTURE. give me the high spires, the archways, the buttresses, give me statues lining city gates and magic infused into the buildings. tevinter is a land ruled by MAGES give me magical architecture. give me floating buildings. give me fire floating as orbs above the streets like lamps. GIVE ME ARCHITECTURE

SHALE

let me shittalk the chantry

PIERCINGS GIVE ME FUCKING PIERCINGS BIOWARE

more main quests, longer main quests

if it is set in tevinter maybe. maybe address the fact that tevinter has been at war with the qunari for a while? on and off war is still war. and maybe give us the option to influence the outcome of that war?

more voice options. instead of just american voice or british voice, do the thing in dao again where there are multiple voices of different tones to further cement the pcs personality

more armour designs

biased but uh. can. can taliesen jaffe va a character?

i already said qunari companions but specifically saarebas companions

blood magic

FINISHING MOVE ANIMATIONS

please do not let it be as long as inquisition. inquisition was a SLOG in later playthroughs

body sliders. what if i want a tall but lanky qunari? what if i want a buff as shit elf? body sliders

more eye options

let me call out companions

btw bioware. if you really wanted cullen to be a good guy. maybe handle his fucking redemption arc a little better instead of retconning all the terrible and creepy shit hes done in the past k thx

can female walk/run animations not have. so much swaying hips? no one moves like that

personality dialogue that affects future dialogue like in da2 but meshed with the wider range of emotions introduced by dai

keep the race/s*x lock on romance candidates like in dai. keep the fact that some characters can only be romanced by certain races or s*xes

nb and genderqueer options for the pc

cutscenes of companions interacting

ngl i lowkey liked the random encounters of dao so maybe bring that back

my fav quest in dao is the landsmeet / orzammar succession crisis questline but you know whats my second favourite? the rescue mission if the warden gets captured and you have to play as your party members. give me that again

more creepy/dark shit. dai was too lighthearted for me esp after da2 and dao

let me shittalk the chantry

broodmothers. in hd.

red lyrium broodmothers. in hd

companions with different backgrounds. different faiths. different statuses. different families. etc

maybe make the pcs appearance make an impact on the story? like how bull says he likes redheads, but even if you are a redhead, he says nothing about it????? maybe keep track of which slider the player picks so that can affect the story?

i love my inquisitors but maybe. dont. bring the inquisitor in as anything more than an advisor/npc in this game? let me fall in love with a new pc???

if theres gonna be a homebase like skyhold where youre not in armor. maybe give us better clothing?

a kind of gear skin mechanic similar to ac:odyssey where you can change how the gear looks but keep the stats. so you can equip that higher level armour and keep the look and aesthetic of your old armour and you unlock the skins/looks of the armours you discover/make so you can be both powerful AND aesthetic

i enjoyed the nobility/underworld/arcane/etc knowledge in dai unlocking more dialogue options so maybe keep/expand on that but make it more accessible by side missions or companions or something that isnt the abysmal perk system in dai

let me shittalk the chantry

customisable walking animations. does the pc walk straightbacked? slouched? with a swagger? please

since there will undoubtedly be an obligatory fade sequence, maybe have an option for nightmare demons that ARENT spiders. thank you

slap on subtitles and conlang some languages. i want to hear elvish. i want to hear tevene. give me the languages

more dragons. esp if they look vastly different

more bard songs

i am completely biased here, but i would like to hear laura bailey as a va for a character. preferably a voice option for the pc

hey maybe have the true ending actually included in the base game and not in a dlc (tresppasser cough cough)

better val royeaux

please remove the had to do it to em idle animation tis distracting

on that note, more idle animations. maybe some unique to companions?

very trivial but. unique stair climbing/descending animation

bring back talking to companions on the road. maybe with some dialogue that can only be said on the road???

if banter is interrupted, make like rdr2 and pick up where the banter left off

more vallaslin designs please?

if theres another formal scene like dai maybe. give us. decent clothing. or better yet, decen clothing OPTIONS. i wanna decide how i look in a ball full of haughty orlesians

mage vs templar conflict resolved and addressed please. it is NOT resolved in dai. what we got was sequel bait and a slideshow. resolve it please

let me shittalk the chantry

a pro-mage anti-circle circle mage companion like anders

religious person who doesnt victim-blame elves in the codex or in game or anywhere please

characters more like leliana who question the chantry and acknowledge its corruption and greed

unapologetically sapphic companion

idc if its tevinter i dont want to fucking see queer people being disrespected

a true tal-vashoth companion, one who escaped from the qun

have quest decisions affect whether or not a companion will turn hostile to you or not

if IF solas will be redeemed, please do the redemption arc right

more horn options for qunari

an apostate mage who doesnt use me for their personal agenda whilst hiding something from me (morrigan, anders, solas) thanks

i really dig the whole “leader of an army” thing dai was trying to go for. but you didnt actually. lead. anything. would be nice to have that option. command soldiers. send them places that affect further quests. would even use the wartable for its intended purpose. planning wars. battles. like. you get sent word that there are bandits harassing villagers. you can set up an ambush with your soldiers or confront them headon, and theres a new mini-location on the map like the manor you meet vivienne in where you can go deal with the bandits and depending on your choices, there are actually soldiers with you in a field, or traps in a narrow pass, or even in a city. id rather the wartable shit dont return but if they have to, at least this way youre not just waiting real life time for a bunch of text to appear

i am real fucking excited for the possibility that da4 companions can just fucking die on you. good shit. give me that angst

missions that certain companions would refuse to go with you to. you know. so you actually have to use other members of your party instead of the same 3 (three) people all the goddamn time

disabled characters (i want a character who suffers from the same chronic bad leg disease as i do is that too much to ask)

kinda touched on by the da2 combat point but let me do close combat damage with the staff

no multiplayer. and if there is a multiplayer, dont tie it with achievements

let me fucking explore weisshaupt

(i dont think solas will be the endgame villain of da and i dont think da4 will be the last da game but still) again. for emphasis. resolve the plot points dai brought up

full-body scars and tattoo options

companions and npcs changing their opinions about things over time. eg: a pro-circle mage wanting instead for circles to be abolished after a specific side mission or a main quest decision etc

keep the multiple companion quests. and maybe change what kinds of companion quests are available further down depending on choices made in previous companion quests

please for fucks sake give us more characters of colour

let me shittalk the chantry

[inphront]

i Could get to sleep some semblance of on time and make it to class some semblance of rested. i could also keep fucking around on heroforge and talking with my partner about tactical combat polycule.

[inphront]

tactical combat polycule