Update 57
Guile
Clothes That Kill Virgins
- Joined
- Feb 19, 2013
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- Just as a side note, it's weird that the same old Keepers that have always taken up guard positions at doors or in the hallway leading to the Big Table are all 'Leave this to us, but hurry'… yet are still guarding random doors. You'd think they'd be over there, holding the gates to the Sun Temple.
Who knows, I'm not some kind of expert in heroic last stands.
- There's a brief aside with Jespar, who wants to know if I'm really down for Tealor's glorious symbolic surrender.
Since there's sadly no 'But it would be funny watching Coarek's face turn purple wouldn't it' option, I have to admit if there's a way to duck out before the curtain call, I'm for it.
Hopefully Jespar isn't going to try and cut a deal with Coarek or something, that never ends well.
- So down into the depths we go, finding something like a small three-way war between the possessed, plunderers out for a quick buck, and Coarek's army.
Everyone has taken a level or three in badass when I wasn't looking; even the rando plunderers are pretty hearty. Deathstorm's self-damage tick is too high and its output too mediocre (albeit area-of-effect), so I have to leave that to Sha'Rim and wade in, swinging swords and popping potions.
It does a pretty good job of proving the wisdom of Tealor Arantheal not sending us all out for some last glorious sally like Commander What's-Her-Face wanted; even fighting like 15 of these guys is pretty hard. Trying to fight a city full of them would be impossible.
- There's also quite a few ghosts, wisps, and ghost-serpents here and there.
Life in the Undercity must be hard as hell. Not only are you probably suffering from flesh-maggots, not only is the orphanage run by Vatyr, but goddamn ghosts all up in your business.
Oh, and everything is on fire.
- There's this cool mini-cutscene on the way, with a Nehrimese soldier standing over a pair of Undercity dwellers with an axe. It's not just murder, though; it's like a religious debate, just with axes.
This guy came fucking prepared for this, okay? When the girl begs, 'We're a peaceful order!' he actually has his bible or chant of light or whatever the heck the local holy book is called, and he can quote it chapter and verse. All the parts where the Radiant Being Which Was Malphas decided to smite some heathens, you know, 'And thousands of lightning bolts crashed down onto the wretched city, destroying everything,' like that.
This small piece of dialogue is actually what I love about Enderal. Because look, make no mistake; this Nehrimese guy is wrong, because people who invade their neighbors and put them to the torch are never right.
But SureAI was confident enough in its players' intelligence to allow him to have a point. You can see where he's coming from; the average Path-abiding citizen is a good person (/occasionally hateful xenophobe), but the Order is a monolithic entity that rules much of the world, and that's a situation ripe for abuse. And the Light-born were apparently of the 'rain of fire' variety of conversion strategy, as you would do if you were some kind of near-omnipotent wizard-god-king.
The Nehrimese are murderous assholes, but widespread revolution doesn't just spring up without a cause. They got that way in response to systematic abuse from a strict caste system that allowed slavery and who knows what else under its rule.
This? This right here? This is my jam.
- I ding Level 58 on the way to Sha'Rim finding just the right rocky wall to entropy into dust to get access to the City of a Thousand Floods.
… How exactly did you know to do that, Sha'Rim? That map we got from the Star Fathers would have to be really specific.
Also, you know… I'm wondering about that name. City of a Thousand Floods. Why would you name your city that if I'm not going to have to be doing a lot of swimming and/or drowning?
Or some kind of Noah parallel, I dunno.
- Solid art (architecture) direction for the City of a Thousand Floods. SureAI doesn't just throw a crumbling city at you when they can throw an overgrown crumbling city full of waterfalls at you instead.
The waterfalls kind of remind me of the building complex beneath the Living Temple; it makes me think this was just an architectural style for the Pyreans, rather than rising water levels or climate change during the 50,000 years in between their time and ours, or something.
The Pyreans just appreciate a good waterfall.
- Now that we're in the Pyrean city proper, there's rather a lot of Lost Ones down here, which the High Ones possess and fight us with.
I don't think these are Pyreans, since those appear to have charcoaled into black carbon statues all over the place.
I wonder if these are the remains of adventurers and grave-robbers that have found their way to the Pyrean city only to meet their end, or if the High Ones have been secretly moving Lost Ones down here to use as a small army.
Either option presents pretty interesting follow-up questions: 'How' and 'Why', respectively.
- All the way down here, Tealor has been the pillar of strength. When the visions cause Sha'Rim to wonder if we're still part of the Cycle (oh hey, by the way, the visions are back), he refutes him. Tealor is certain: We're closer than any have come before to lighting the Beacon. We will succeed. The High Ones are running out of tricks, reduced to throwing possessed corpses at us.
- So of course, that's when the High Ones show up to throw a trick at him. They tune up the video reel, all the carbonized Pyreans' eyes light up (are they a power source? Is this the Pyrean High One speaking to us?) and it's movie time.
Apparently, Young Tealor (with a glorious head of hair) was a bit of a dick. He had a kid with one of the Light-born (and boy, wouldn't that be a story all on its own), and rather than taking the child away himself as she asked, he refused to abandon his position and title and had one of her assistants raise the kid instead.
And didn't get smote for his arrogance. I wish I knew literally anything about this Light-born Indara. I don't think this is the one that managed Qyra, where Tealor accidentally a war...
This kid, of course, is the one (Narathzul?) who killed all the Light-born, including his mom I guess?
So the child Tealor refused to abandon his position for made his position superfluous by killing all Tealor's gods (plus throwing him in jail for like 10 years).
- Tealor is… upset. 'Swinging greatsword at phantom of younger self' upset.
I wish there was time to talk to him about this, because holy cow would that be a conversation. Young Tealor is such a different person. Not all the way, Current Tealor is still pretty arrogant and high-handed at times and he would be an inflexible and implacable enemy. But these days he couldn't give a fuck about the office and his high position. A decade or two in prison really mellowed him out, and taught him more humility than the average Keeper. He takes the long view, but he's at least aware of the cogs that make up the grand design.
The High One clearly thinks this was the 'and that was when it all started to go wrong' moment, and I wish I knew if Tealor agreed. Given the way he just about bisected his younger self with a greatsword, I'm thinking he does.
- And then, having gotten the last laugh by dragging out Tealor's dirty laundry, only then does the High One try to kill us all with red glowy phantoms. I mean, why just murder a guy when you can fuck with him and then kill him, amirite? I'm right.
So we start fighting our way up the stairs to the Pyrean temple in a pretty badass sequence. Most of the phantoms are swinging ghostly swords, but there are at least two lich-type guys (like the Darkhands) and a giant.
- And then, while we're all congratulating ourselves on being stone-cold badasses who don't give a fuck, the High Ones bring in their Heavy: a phantom dragon who spits very real fire.
The front façade of the temple collapses on us (the game takes away control to have the Prophetess look up as the giant cyclopean masonry blocks come crashing down), and then… darkness. Darkness and fire.
The Takeaway:
I'm really digging this segment so far. Going from secret passage to afire Undercity to the picturesque (if corpse-y) City of a Thousand Floods keeps things visually interesting, and each leg of the trip is only three or so vistas (fights or scenes or whatever) so it doesn't feel like a slog.
The enemies look really cool, both the Lost Ones with the glowing eyes and the red smoke monsters.
They're still fleshing out their goddamn characters with unique, interesting character beats, even this late in the game. Hopefully Sha'Rim gets something next, because I can never read that guy.
But my favorite bit is probably that one little conversation between diametrically opposed viewpoints, irreconcialable differences settled with the axe. I'm not sure if SureAI has something concrete to say about all these themes they're throwing around, but even if they're just using them to flesh out their world, this is the good shit, fam.
Who knows, I'm not some kind of expert in heroic last stands.
- There's a brief aside with Jespar, who wants to know if I'm really down for Tealor's glorious symbolic surrender.
Since there's sadly no 'But it would be funny watching Coarek's face turn purple wouldn't it' option, I have to admit if there's a way to duck out before the curtain call, I'm for it.
Hopefully Jespar isn't going to try and cut a deal with Coarek or something, that never ends well.
- So down into the depths we go, finding something like a small three-way war between the possessed, plunderers out for a quick buck, and Coarek's army.
Everyone has taken a level or three in badass when I wasn't looking; even the rando plunderers are pretty hearty. Deathstorm's self-damage tick is too high and its output too mediocre (albeit area-of-effect), so I have to leave that to Sha'Rim and wade in, swinging swords and popping potions.
It does a pretty good job of proving the wisdom of Tealor Arantheal not sending us all out for some last glorious sally like Commander What's-Her-Face wanted; even fighting like 15 of these guys is pretty hard. Trying to fight a city full of them would be impossible.
- There's also quite a few ghosts, wisps, and ghost-serpents here and there.
Life in the Undercity must be hard as hell. Not only are you probably suffering from flesh-maggots, not only is the orphanage run by Vatyr, but goddamn ghosts all up in your business.
Oh, and everything is on fire.
- There's this cool mini-cutscene on the way, with a Nehrimese soldier standing over a pair of Undercity dwellers with an axe. It's not just murder, though; it's like a religious debate, just with axes.
This guy came fucking prepared for this, okay? When the girl begs, 'We're a peaceful order!' he actually has his bible or chant of light or whatever the heck the local holy book is called, and he can quote it chapter and verse. All the parts where the Radiant Being Which Was Malphas decided to smite some heathens, you know, 'And thousands of lightning bolts crashed down onto the wretched city, destroying everything,' like that.
This small piece of dialogue is actually what I love about Enderal. Because look, make no mistake; this Nehrimese guy is wrong, because people who invade their neighbors and put them to the torch are never right.
But SureAI was confident enough in its players' intelligence to allow him to have a point. You can see where he's coming from; the average Path-abiding citizen is a good person (/occasionally hateful xenophobe), but the Order is a monolithic entity that rules much of the world, and that's a situation ripe for abuse. And the Light-born were apparently of the 'rain of fire' variety of conversion strategy, as you would do if you were some kind of near-omnipotent wizard-god-king.
The Nehrimese are murderous assholes, but widespread revolution doesn't just spring up without a cause. They got that way in response to systematic abuse from a strict caste system that allowed slavery and who knows what else under its rule.
This? This right here? This is my jam.
- I ding Level 58 on the way to Sha'Rim finding just the right rocky wall to entropy into dust to get access to the City of a Thousand Floods.
… How exactly did you know to do that, Sha'Rim? That map we got from the Star Fathers would have to be really specific.
Also, you know… I'm wondering about that name. City of a Thousand Floods. Why would you name your city that if I'm not going to have to be doing a lot of swimming and/or drowning?
Or some kind of Noah parallel, I dunno.
- Solid art (architecture) direction for the City of a Thousand Floods. SureAI doesn't just throw a crumbling city at you when they can throw an overgrown crumbling city full of waterfalls at you instead.
The waterfalls kind of remind me of the building complex beneath the Living Temple; it makes me think this was just an architectural style for the Pyreans, rather than rising water levels or climate change during the 50,000 years in between their time and ours, or something.
The Pyreans just appreciate a good waterfall.
- Now that we're in the Pyrean city proper, there's rather a lot of Lost Ones down here, which the High Ones possess and fight us with.
I don't think these are Pyreans, since those appear to have charcoaled into black carbon statues all over the place.
I wonder if these are the remains of adventurers and grave-robbers that have found their way to the Pyrean city only to meet their end, or if the High Ones have been secretly moving Lost Ones down here to use as a small army.
Either option presents pretty interesting follow-up questions: 'How' and 'Why', respectively.
- All the way down here, Tealor has been the pillar of strength. When the visions cause Sha'Rim to wonder if we're still part of the Cycle (oh hey, by the way, the visions are back), he refutes him. Tealor is certain: We're closer than any have come before to lighting the Beacon. We will succeed. The High Ones are running out of tricks, reduced to throwing possessed corpses at us.
- So of course, that's when the High Ones show up to throw a trick at him. They tune up the video reel, all the carbonized Pyreans' eyes light up (are they a power source? Is this the Pyrean High One speaking to us?) and it's movie time.
Apparently, Young Tealor (with a glorious head of hair) was a bit of a dick. He had a kid with one of the Light-born (and boy, wouldn't that be a story all on its own), and rather than taking the child away himself as she asked, he refused to abandon his position and title and had one of her assistants raise the kid instead.
And didn't get smote for his arrogance. I wish I knew literally anything about this Light-born Indara. I don't think this is the one that managed Qyra, where Tealor accidentally a war...
This kid, of course, is the one (Narathzul?) who killed all the Light-born, including his mom I guess?
So the child Tealor refused to abandon his position for made his position superfluous by killing all Tealor's gods (plus throwing him in jail for like 10 years).
- Tealor is… upset. 'Swinging greatsword at phantom of younger self' upset.
I wish there was time to talk to him about this, because holy cow would that be a conversation. Young Tealor is such a different person. Not all the way, Current Tealor is still pretty arrogant and high-handed at times and he would be an inflexible and implacable enemy. But these days he couldn't give a fuck about the office and his high position. A decade or two in prison really mellowed him out, and taught him more humility than the average Keeper. He takes the long view, but he's at least aware of the cogs that make up the grand design.
The High One clearly thinks this was the 'and that was when it all started to go wrong' moment, and I wish I knew if Tealor agreed. Given the way he just about bisected his younger self with a greatsword, I'm thinking he does.
- And then, having gotten the last laugh by dragging out Tealor's dirty laundry, only then does the High One try to kill us all with red glowy phantoms. I mean, why just murder a guy when you can fuck with him and then kill him, amirite? I'm right.
So we start fighting our way up the stairs to the Pyrean temple in a pretty badass sequence. Most of the phantoms are swinging ghostly swords, but there are at least two lich-type guys (like the Darkhands) and a giant.
- And then, while we're all congratulating ourselves on being stone-cold badasses who don't give a fuck, the High Ones bring in their Heavy: a phantom dragon who spits very real fire.
The front façade of the temple collapses on us (the game takes away control to have the Prophetess look up as the giant cyclopean masonry blocks come crashing down), and then… darkness. Darkness and fire.
The Takeaway:
I'm really digging this segment so far. Going from secret passage to afire Undercity to the picturesque (if corpse-y) City of a Thousand Floods keeps things visually interesting, and each leg of the trip is only three or so vistas (fights or scenes or whatever) so it doesn't feel like a slog.
The enemies look really cool, both the Lost Ones with the glowing eyes and the red smoke monsters.
They're still fleshing out their goddamn characters with unique, interesting character beats, even this late in the game. Hopefully Sha'Rim gets something next, because I can never read that guy.
But my favorite bit is probably that one little conversation between diametrically opposed viewpoints, irreconcialable differences settled with the axe. I'm not sure if SureAI has something concrete to say about all these themes they're throwing around, but even if they're just using them to flesh out their world, this is the good shit, fam.