Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

[dawn spindle]

||Man, I know it's very different in character than outsider but accross these 3 women nobody is making any connections and Im kind of incredulous||

||ok they're making some now||

[halcyon elbow]

Act 2 ||Yeah the game gives you enough to know that they're paying attention, but I also think "okay we'll figure this out later we have a Paintress to kill" is an extremely reasonable mentality here||

[nova temple]

Get in, losers, we are killing the Paintress!

[halcyon elbow]

Great now I need a gif with the Expedition in that car

[dawn spindle]

||This makes sense as long as you ignore Maelle having visions, someone that was alive before the cataclysm, Renoir clearly being up to something, etc||

And moreover ||Because we have a character like Lune who considers that gathering information and understanding the situations is the way, not just butting against things||

[nova temple]

||I do agree with that, Lune feels like she would be working overtime trying to figure that stuff out||

[dawn spindle]

||So I can buy it, I don't feel this is like... game breaking or immersion breaking or anything like that, but it is something I believe is unlikely to happen as it's put. Though Verso lying through his teeth doesn't help||

||Anyhow, now I must kill the paintress||

[nova temple]

||It's really funny on a replay/rewatch see just how much he lies all the time!||

||Virtually every time he goes "I don't know" he does know ||

[halcyon elbow]

Act 2 ||I do think Lune has been pretty consistent in not slowing the roll of expediency to ask questions and waiting until return to camp for that kind of thing||

[dawn spindle]

Act 2 ||Monolith|| ||I have to say that although it was rather obvious that Maelle is Alicia and this is an alternate creation of the things she/they lost. Maelle saying "are you going to burn my face again" has made me actually 🤨 since it does sort of imply that whatever's tugging at Maelle's memory blames her "mother" for it?||

[halcyon elbow]

https://tenor.com/view/michael-jackson-comendo-picoca-gif-9669437860846841235

[dawn spindle]

||I have been saying this from the beginning! It is impossible he'd not know even without knowing what I do know now||

||That said I am still missing a lot of information||

[nova temple]

||Well... I will point out that the Paintress tried to burn her face just before you entered the Monolith||

[dawn spindle]

ah true

I had skipped that little bit

in my memory

(I think this might not fully change what I'm thinking but it does give more options)

[nova temple]

You are about the get most things answered for you, so you can use this knowledge either as an opportunity to get some last-minute theorycrafting, or as an excuse to give your break a break

[dawn spindle]

haha, yeah I figured, I have done a lot of theorycrafting i'm just not very fond of the process of trying to organize those thoughts and put them into text

I should take a break though...

but

who needs dinner anyway?

[halcyon elbow]

If you are going to take a break, now is the time

[exotic ember]

I wouldn’t

Answers are good

[dawn spindle]

||I do need to finish the paintress fight, at least||

||I know I won't get a break after but this is going to take a few tries anyway||

[halcyon elbow]

They are but I know I would not want to break for dinner any time in the next ~two-three hours

[dawn spindle]

||but it seems slightly e4asier than her dead husband (famous last words before I find out she also has some messed up second phase||

[exotic ember]

To be fair the fight Usha is about to do took me 2-3 days to beat

So maybe you’re right

[dawn spindle]

Okay, I just died, so I'm going to heed your advice and actually get dinner done, not for me but because my mom's dinner is pending on me too since she broke her elbow

And she won't care what information I'm about to find out

[halcyon elbow]

(Source: I was looking for a break here to come back because it was after midnight and I had to be up before 6am the next day, and did not find one)

[dawn spindle]

ah tbf I can just pause mid cinematic

since I don't have to close the game

[nova temple]

||From what I've seen - and what I remember - the Paintress is an easier fight||

[dawn spindle]

but I shall take my break now

[exotic ember]

Really wanting to do a NG+ run. And also really want to try a parry/counter-only run

[halcyon elbow]

I didn't want to

I did need to

But like

Riveting

[exotic ember]

Speak for yourself. That was the hardest fight in the game for me

[nova temple]

But mooom, so the listen, there's this Paintress...

[dawn spindle]

That's what I've done since I upped the difficulty in early Act 1. Come on you can do a parry/counter only run 😈

[halcyon elbow]

Act 2 ||I found both similarly difficult||

[dawn spindle]

I have told her about the entire game so far, she does put up with a lot of crap from me, lmao

[halcyon elbow]

In some ways, it is easier

[dawn spindle]

counter/parry is harder to learn, but makes the game much easier, but I do think Spooky did mostly parry anyway?

[exotic ember]

Oh that’s not what I mean. I didn’t dodge when I played. I mean a run where I don’t use skills or attacks . All damage done just through parry counters

[dawn spindle]

aaah, gotcha

Yeah, I keep my masochism for more private scenarios

[exotic ember]

Yeah parrying/counters is 100% the way over dodging

[halcyon elbow]

Counters are a significant source of damage and stun, and you get AP back, so your damage from your own turns is also higher. It is also substantially better supported with Lumina

So you just get attacked a lot less times

[dawn spindle]

the ap wouldn't matter if you're doing what Spooky is speaking about

[halcyon elbow]

https://tenor.com/view/phrasing-archer-boom-thats-what-she-said-falling-gif-26682190

[dawn spindle]

You do have to admit beating the game with only counters does sound like a high level of self inflicted pain

[exotic ember]

Oh yeah I’m well aware haha. In both of my runs I played on expert and exclusively use parrying. And I played with all the luminas that made it such that if I missed a parry, I died

[halcyon elbow]

A lot less so from the perspective of having done it

[dawn spindle]

you didn't use skills?

[halcyon elbow]

Oh

Okay

[dawn spindle]

yeah

[exotic ember]

Yeah that’s what I mean

[dawn spindle]

yeah

[halcyon elbow]

I didn't understand what was being said here

Eh even so

[exotic ember]

No skills, no attacks. Damage done is exclusively done via counters

[halcyon elbow]

Can even get the breaks you need

[exotic ember]

A challenge run

[halcyon elbow]

Harder for sure but not masochistically so

Not like staying under the damage cap

Or some of the other unhinged challenge runs I've heard

[nova temple]

Just skipping all those turns sounds annoying

[exotic ember]

Oh please do tell

[dawn spindle]

Oh no

This is how we lose Spooky

[halcyon elbow]

I mean I'd prefer counter only to a no dodge no parry run, for example

[dawn spindle]

tbh I think this would just take so much longer, too. That I find it just the effort and time to put into it kind of masochistic, I want to play other games and such

[dawn spindle]

this sounds just annoying tbh

[exotic ember]

Maybe my girlfriend was right to ask what’s wrong with me

[halcyon elbow]

No Lumina runs

[dawn spindle]

The correct answer is "where do you want me to start the list" (This is the correct answer for everyone not just from you)

[exotic ember]

Hmm I guess you could make the parry run such that you’re allowed to use skills that buff your team? To try to maximize counter damage and all that

[halcyon elbow]

It is weirdly popular, from the JRPG side of the Expedition 33 fandom house

[exotic ember]

All too true

[dawn spindle]

isn't that just... tanking?

Like... does it even require skill?

[exotic ember]

It sounds painful

[dawn spindle]

It just requires you to put time and nothing else

[halcyon elbow]

The skill of buildcrafting

[dawn spindle]

Eh....

eh

[halcyon elbow]

Yeah they're mostly looking up no dodge no parry guides I imagine

[exotic ember]

Interesting

[halcyon elbow]

It doesn't sound fun to me but some people are deeply offended by the parry/dodge

[exotic ember]

Meanwhile the parrying is one of my favorite things in the game. It’s so fun

[nova temple]

Ah, the Expedition 34 way

[dawn spindle]

Some people are deeply offended by so many things

[exotic ember]

I love the way they designed the enemies and their attack sequences

[halcyon elbow]

I've also seen the Expedition 60 way now that you mention it

[dawn spindle]

I was talking to a friend about the game who's alreasy finished and all and he repeated to me like 7 times that I shouldn't be going to other areas until after Act 2

Even though I very clearly said "I don't care i will do this anyway"

[halcyon elbow]

(No pictos or luminas)

[dawn spindle]

I have stopped talking to him about the game, his entire reasoning was "but the game intends for you to not go back to do any side content until after Act 2" which is obviously BS, if the game intended that then I'd not be able to go anywhere else.

[halcyon elbow]

This is also a huge part of the community, it is one I've seen several streamers complain about from E33 tourists in their chat

[exotic ember]

I think one amazing thing about the game is that there are so many ways you can approach it. All equally valid

[dawn spindle]

That is how games work!

[halcyon elbow]

"You're making the game too easy, you won't see all the moves, I want to see you suffer, etc"

[dawn spindle]

Sometimes the devs do not gauge things correctly, and that can happen. But you can't tell me I can access 10 things but it's unintended...

that's not how it works

[halcyon elbow]

Preach stumbled into a high powered Picto fairly early on and he had to start banning people malding about him using it

[exotic ember]

People like that are ridiculous imo. It’s perfectly valid to self-impose those rules to amp the challenge.

If that’s what you want

[dawn spindle]

but Kon, the game is too easy

Yeaaaah

[exotic ember]

But you shouldn’t try to impose that stuff on others

[dawn spindle]

play however you want!

[exotic ember]

Yes!

[dawn spindle]

this is old stuff, wasn't there a LOT of people going bananas with dark souls summoning thingy?

I don't recall the name since I've not played it

[exotic ember]

I played masochistically for some reason. But I wouldn’t tell others to do that unless they express a desire for it

Like I made the game brutally difficult for myself on my first run. It was amazing. But it’s absolutely not for everyone

[dawn spindle]

Yes, someone else told me "you shouldn't care about the gameplay it's not what makes the game good"

[exotic ember]

That’s WILD

[dawn spindle]

and like, okay, I can agree to some degree in the sense that everything else about E33 is so good that the gameplay itself isn't what's the best of it. But damn

let me enjoy whatever I want? lmao

[exotic ember]

Lol yeah I personally think E33’s gameplay is peak. One of the best gameplay systems I’ve ever experienced

[dawn spindle]

I don't love turn based, and I don't love parry systems, but it does a very good job at tying it all together

I do like the feeling of learning a fight though

[exotic ember]

That’s very fair. I thought I hated parry systems until this

[dawn spindle]

I don't think this is going to change my mind a lot

Or rather, I don't hate it, I'm just really bad at it

[halcyon elbow]

It reminds me very positively of FFXIV in that way

[dawn spindle]

to the point I tend to hit a hard wall of skill in games that require skilled combat

And so I just don't

[exotic ember]

Yeah I think that’s the big thing for me and a big reason why I made the game so hard for myself. I enjoyed being forced to learn the fight really well and didn’t want to just over-power enemies. I wanted to consistently get the parry timing on all their moves

[dawn spindle]

yup, that's what I've been trying to do

I did repeat one fight actually

[exotic ember]

Yeah, I’m just extra bad at the game

[dawn spindle]

But not more than one so far

repeat as in, I loaded a prvious safe cause I was unsatisfied

[exotic ember]

Yeah I think I had at least one fight I didn’t feel I earned the win so I skipped turns to let the enemy kill me instead of finishing them off

[dawn spindle]

We are a little wrong in the head I think (highly)

[exotic ember]

Totally valid!

[exotic ember]

Agreed haha

[halcyon elbow]

There's also plenty of good challenge content

That One Boss is my least favorite of the challenge fights

Including [act 3 general] ||plenty of reprise fights that are very fun||

[exotic ember]

Yeah, and now you can make the challenge content even more challenging! Which is great imo

[exotic ember]

Yeah different fights definitely appeal to different people!

I pretty thoroughly enjoyed all the challenge content as far as I recall. They did a lot of very interesting stuff with what they had

[halcyon elbow]

Act 3 challenge fights ||I wish there were Axon reprises but I think everything else gets at least one good reprise that is notably more difficult||

[exotic ember]

I loved the fights that push you to engage with the game differently in particular. Act 3 all spoilers

|| Golgra, Serpenphare, and Simon stand out as a few ||

I think || Clea || was a really cool fight, but too easy so I look forward to revisiting that one with some of the challenge modifiers in NG+

[exotic ember]

That’s really fair yeah

Ugh I want to replay the game more

But right now I also am going through Sekiro at home and Lies of P at my girlfriend’s place

And I want to play Elden Ring too

But a NG+ run of Clair Obscur is calling to me for sure

[halcyon elbow]

I think Elden Ring is likely to call to you more than Sekiro actually

Sekiro is great for parry juice

And Elden Ring has parries to some extent

But Elden Ring has real buildcrafting in a way a lot more similar to E33

[exotic ember]

So I had played around 10 hours or so of Elden Ring around launch. Got to the first main boss. || Margrit I think? Put these foolish ambitions to rest guy? I think near a castle entrance? || Never beat him. Would like to go back. Game was fun.

Sekiro took me a while to start really enjoying, but I’m liking it quite a bit now. Proving to be a really fun system. Just beat || Genichiro I think? Guy at top of Ashina castle that has another phase where he strips down and starts channeling lightning attacks ||

Lies of P has also been quite enjoyable so far.

I think I really like the process of engaging with and learning tough boss fights with interesting attack patterns. Dying over and over until I get it

[exotic ember]

Huh, I wouldn’t have expected that

[halcyon elbow]

Elden Ring also has a lot of bosses

[fallow geode]

You were built to play souls-likes

[exotic ember]

Apparently. Though I don’t love long run backs I will say. I like respawning right by the boss and just being able to smash my face against it over and over until I finally get it right

Clair Obscur proved my gateway drug in a big way it seems

[scarlet trout]

They fixed the run backs in Elden ring

[exotic ember]

So I’ve heard! I almost chose to start a new Elden Ring save on my Steam Deck at my girlfriend’s place. But I decided to do Lies of P first

[fallow geode]

Yeah, it took them that long to figure out "what if we had bonfires that you could only respawn at"

[exotic ember]

Yeah I heard that too. Was commenting more on hearing that DS2 and 3 had awfully long run backs

And Sekiro had an annoying early run back. But I think it had a Stockholm syndrome effect because by day 3 of doing that same boss fight I was starting to enjoy it.

I was cackling like a maniac when I conquered that fight finally. Most satisfying win I’ve had in a game

Was so glad to finally be done with that boss fight lol

[halcyon elbow]

Don't actually super recommend it. The PC port is held together with duct tape and baling wire and barely works on Steam Deck

I spent two weeks in a hotel in North Carolina playing Elden Ring on the Steam Deck and it did work, but it isn't a great experience

[exotic ember]

Ahh gotcha. Hmm so maybe I should buy the game again on PS5 and play on that? Has the advantage of being able to take the PS5 back and forth between my place and my gf’s

Once I’m done with Sekiro and Lies of P

Assuming I don’t squeeze a Clair Obscur NG+ in before Elden Ring

[scarlet trout]

It works well on the ps5

Can confirm lol

[exotic ember]

That may be the call. Especially since I know it’s supposed to be an immense game

Clair Obscur has really ignited my passion for gaming again

[scarlet trout]

Plus the dlc is massive and fun

[halcyon elbow]

If you have a solid PC that probably still is the way to go, especially as supplemented by some mods (to include DLSS, which the game does not natively support)

[exotic ember]

I have a brand-new top of the line PC but AMD GPU

[halcyon elbow]

Well

It is a very pretty game

Your PC is likely to showcase that better than PS5 (the mod I mentioned also supports FSR)

[exotic ember]

Honestly I loaded Elden Ring when I built the PC and was like “huh, I feel like I remember the game looking better”

Probably needed to tweak graphics settings

[exotic ember]

Historically I haven’t been one for massive games because of my tendency to bounce off after 15-20 hours

But that may be changing

Or it could just be Clair Obscur obsession. 85-90 hours I think on Steam and 35 hours in the save on PS5

Which means probably like 45-50 hours in total because in game save tracking is weird

I am 20 hours into Sekiro with no plans to stop though

Souls-like era has truly begun haha

[halcyon elbow]

I do love that E33 is getting people to dabble in or re-dabble in genres they had previously written off

[exotic ember]

Yeah I’m curious about Metaphor too

[halcyon elbow]

If you haven't tried classic Final Fantasy games that's another place you might consider looking

6, 7, and 10 are all well-represented here

[exotic ember]

Yeah I do need to give those a try for sure as well

[dawn spindle]

okay I'm back with dinner and beer

time for murder

[analog tiger]

well

boss fights are a big draw for the souls series but like

so is the map around them

they are more like megaman in this way

[exotic ember]

Different strokes

[dawn spindle]

I had done like 3 tries for this so let's see how long this takes me 👀

[analog tiger]

the stage itself is the challenge, if you just want the boss fight it can be not what you are looking for, especially going back to older ones

I played Elden Ring on PC and it was pretty fine but my PC is relatively beefy for when Elden Ring launched

nowadays it's mid to low end

[exotic ember]

See I think the big thing for me is when the stage ends up not being a challenge. It just becomes tedious. If the stage is a challenge, sure. But if the only challenge is the boss itself and it’s trivial to get back to the boss, meh

[dawn spindle]

Act 2 ||monolith end?|| ||This metheors... ||

[nova temple]

hehe

[dawn spindle]

no hehe

[nova temple]

||the void meteors went from my least favorite to my favorite ability of hers, because it turn into a free 9 AP... once I figured out how to parry them||

[dawn spindle]

||I get hit by the first 2 then parry the last 4 for sure then it's (?) in the middle but by then half my party is dead or stunned||

||so I'm sure I'll get it but kinda sucks to learn through the skill lol||

[analog tiger]

the further back you go the more of a challenge even the normal stages become

Demon's Souls is a megaman game in this essay I will

[dawn spindle]

attempt #6

oh, before that it seems I forgot to assign some lumina, whoops

[exotic ember]

I honestly don’t know that I’d agree that’s necessarily how difficulty works. Unless you mean just in the sense that you start to play the stage half-focused and being making careless mistakes.

[exotic ember]

Oh yeah those took me ages to really get down consistently. They were the bane of my existence

[analog tiger]

oh I mean further back in games lmao

[exotic ember]

Ahh yeah that’s fair lol

[analog tiger]

like half the stages in Demon's Souls are harder than the bosses

[exotic ember]

Oh dang lol that’s interesting

[nova temple]

Feels like this has moved from being E33-adjacent to being a fully just a conversation that has nothing to do with it

[exotic ember]

Fair.

I really hope that Sandfall’s next game continues to build on what they’ve done in E33 and that we get even more brutally difficult bosses and enemies to fight

[dawn spindle]

noooo got it down to 10%...

well, okay, attempt #7

[nova temple]

We continue

[dawn spindle]

now i got it down 10% instead

There is a little bit of rng... ||in that I just got ALL the meteors thrown at the same guy and since he was stunned he just died and I just stared like "well, okay" which feels very wasteful||

[nova temple]

Yeah, that can happen

[exotic ember]

And that’s why you just don’t get hit

I wish I had counted my attempts on each enemy and boss

I’m sure some must have been dozens of attempts

[dawn spindle]

||Verso what in the flying... crap, "look what I found"??? He's had the flying stonehidden this entire time!?! this is the ultimate betrayal that I will not ever forgive him, everything else fine||

that was attempt 12, 13 now

[nova temple]

||I love that among all the shady stuff Verso does, "I had Soarrie the entire time" is the one that never fails to get people||

[exotic ember]

|| See I didn’t really clock how shady that was but uhh yeah, totally valid. Verso is shady as… crap ||

[dawn spindle]

||top 10 anime betrayals really||

||attemtp 13 had me getting the tiny!paintress really quickly and without using any tints, now let's see phase 2||

[nova temple]

https://tenor.com/view/arrowfit-progress-gif-23751277

[dawn spindle]

||the change of perspective is really not good for my eyes I can't see crap||

[fallow geode]

||There's one attack in particular (you'll know it when you see it) that always surprises me with its first hit||

[exotic ember]

I will say || Phase 2 has one of the coolest attacks imo. Not sure if it’s THE coolest but one of ||

[nova temple]

I can probably guess which one 😅

[fallow geode]

they're the same picture

[nova temple]

||But yeah, her being far away definitely makes some attacks trickier to avoid||

[exotic ember]

I am pretty sure I still never got the timing down on some attacks in || phase 2 ||

[dawn spindle]

||I'm too blind i think||

||they are easier than phase 1 from what I've seen so far, but I reach phase 2 very beaten down||

attempt 15 now i think

[nova temple]

For the ones who attempt after

[exotic ember]

I just couldn’t get some of them for some reason. I was always off on timing on them

[dawn spindle]

not me, I got tired

[dawn spindle]

which?

[fallow geode]

||The Paintress rips reality apart||

[dawn spindle]

ah

Is this where I tell you that I've parried that perfectly from the first time?

Because, that's the easiest for me to parry from the whole set

YOU KNOW

[fallow geode]

I refer you to our previous conversation

-# Kon-versation

[dawn spindle]

||I think it's because the point where you need to hit the button is at the same part of the curve as the stupid volleyball beach and I actually got that down||

[fallow geode]

||It's not that it's hard to parry, it's that I'm still looking at the pretty effects||

[dawn spindle]

hmmmm

I don't much like it

||Whenever the camera gets far away from things I literally cannot tell anything apart so it doesn't even look pretty, it looks like vomit grey with a giant woman in the way||

||It was the same with Sirène||

[fallow geode]

that doesn't sound 🤔

like, that sounds like your graphics are broken

[dawn spindle]

Yes, my organic graphics are broken

[fallow geode]

ah, that's not fun

[dawn spindle]

It is cheaper than my GPU being broken tbf

[dawn spindle]

couple more tries before going off to bed 👀

[nova temple]

Risky

If you succeed, you'll be stuck for a while

it's cat-in-lap rules

[dawn spindle]

that's fine

That went really well until ||the instadie bit||

||which happened when I had 25% left on phase 2 😭 ||

||dunno if that was chance or what but i guess I'm equipping against it now||

[nova temple]

||There's no insta-die||

[ionic kite]

Act 2 ||Sirene fight was incredible||

[nova temple]

Indeed

[dawn spindle]

||no, I got cursed and it was "die in 2 turns" and no way to clear that||

[nova temple]

||Sorry, I should've been more clear. There's no unavoidable insta-die. You can avoid dying to the curse||

[dawn spindle]

yeah, I had no way to do that

I now do

[fallow geode]

you do not need to build into it

||unless you had literally no free shot||

[dawn spindle]

||Do you mean for shooting the balls?||

[fallow geode]

||yes||

[dawn spindle]

||They were completely untargetable and my shots did nothing to them so I thought that wasn't it||

[nova temple]

||You must've missed them or something, there should be nothing special about their targeting||

[dawn spindle]

||no no, I did see them and shot at them||

[nova temple]

||I don't know what to tell ya, they don't have shields or anything like that||

[fallow geode]

||So what should have happened, is each orb killed gives the shooter +1 to their counter||

[dawn spindle]

Yeah. this did happen now

I also almost got it

But i did say 2 tries so 😔

I'm clearly very close to getting it even if it's being a little so-so on my parry

[nova temple]

you sound like a quitter

[dawn spindle]

||THere's a second phase thing that says "the paintress unleashes" and it means it. This game surely doesn't have false advertisement with the names 😭 ||

[nova temple]

||Yeah, that move sucks ass||

[dawn spindle]

It is the reason for my death in the last 3 tries

well if you add that with the fact that I'm almost fully parrying everything perfectly, which is to say

out of every attack, I miss about one (1) parry

Which is rather annoying, since that means I get no counter damage, and I get hit by a truck

[nova temple]

mmhmm

[dawn spindle]

||I can't for the life of me parry the first meteor, I'm now parrying all of them perfectly! GAH!||

Tomorrow more

I am having a lot of fun dying non-stop 😌

[fallow geode]

welcome to my world

[dawn spindle]

the one with skill issue? 🤨

[fallow geode]

the dying over and over

[dawn spindle]

That is what I said 😈

[nova temple]

Early Act 1 predictions from a playthrough, but they are informed by trailers and stuff, so I'd say maybe don't click unless you are in Act 2

(unless you are okay with names and character designs shown off in trailers)

[fallow geode]

||huh, some misses, but some good hits too||

[ionic kite]

Post-Sirene ||I think the Paintress is Verso's mother||

Monolith ||Oh. We're just. Going into it.||

[dawn spindle]

You're reaching me!

I must play more tomorrow

[ionic kite]

I'm surprised

I spent so long not playing

[dawn spindle]

I'm slow!

But also I've not been playing like crazy either

[ionic kite]

Monolith ||How the hell did Expedition 70 get in here||

[nova temple]

Good question

[dawn spindle]

||i was wondering that too for the entire time... I went through a few minor theories and none make sense as is||

Because ||I went in thinking "there should be no journals here"||

(Might not be safe for aneon yet) ||then I found one and thought "well this is a copy and/or refletion of outside so it might have transposed the journal"||

||then I read the journal and they acknowledge being inside the thing so that wasnt it||

[exotic ember]

Another birthday gift from my girlfriend! 🙂

Not sure if it needs spoiler tags so I’m just going to say Act 1 || Esquie’s Nest ||

|| Esquie canvas print! ||

[dawn spindle]

Ooooh

||I am speeeeeed||

[ionic kite]

I love that I can make just

A full Free Aim team

I just found ||Monoco's|| Free Aim weapon

[exotic ember]

I think you mean || whoooooo ||

[silver pawn]

-# Takes notes…

[nova temple]

If you can parry 😛

[exotic ember]

Or if you can’t parry but have a strong masochistic streak

[dawn spindle]

Parry takes a bit longer to learn but the trick is the sounds

[nova temple]

Sometimes

[silver pawn]

Can’t say I have a masochistic streak haha, but so far have only been dodging consistently.
But will make more of an effort to parry instead!

Still feel like I’m building up that muscle memory in combat, so maybe I should start parrying now, before I get too set in my ways 😅

[fallow geode]

if you're getting perfect dodges, you can get parries (it's the same timing)

[nova temple]

I mean, you don't have to

[dawn spindle]

You can surely build around dodges/other things that aren't parries

[silver pawn]

But surely it will make things easier for me when fights start to get harder?

[nova temple]

Parrying gives you those counterattacks, which are often powerful, but you play the way you want to

[fallow geode]

the real issue is that you have to build around not-parrying, while parrying is good from the beginning

[dawn spindle]

Not mandatory though

A few people here have beat the game just fine and relatively fast with only dodges. So it's up to whats fun for you. But if you're going to want to parry then yes, better start now

[silver pawn]

Pretty consistently getting perfect dodges. My brother gave me a trick, dunno of spoilers, but gameplay || to watch the edges of the screen for the zoom out, and to dodge right as it gets to the furthers zoom out.|| so far seems to be working!

[dawn spindle]

There are so many potential builds too, it's kinda crazy

[nova temple]

I think this is the first game I've seen you comment on, so I don't know where in your experience you are

[silver pawn]

Ok so verdict seems to be, play however you want! Next time I play, I’ll give it a try and see how much pain I’m comfortable inflicting on myself 🤣

[nova temple]

Yep!

What difficulty are you playing on?

[silver pawn]

I’m super casual. Last game I played was Hogwarts Legacy 😅 had just seen lots of chat about this one, and pick it up mostly for the narrative

Story 😎

[nova temple]

You should be fine then

[silver pawn]

Cool cool cool

[nova temple]

Enemy damage isn't high enough to be super punishing if you miss your parries

[exotic ember]

@silver pawn Yeah just to be clear you 100% don’t have to parry

It’s very much a preference thing and what you want your experience to be

[analog tiger]

Act 2 all biggest disappointment in the game tbh

[analog tiger]

you don't really need to, tbh

I beat the game pretty much entirely on dodging

you do a bit less damage but eh who cares

[fallow geode]

Sorry
*If you want dodging to be as strong as vanilla parrying, you need to build around it.

Which, yeah, you don't need that power, but it is nice if you can reach it

[dawn spindle]

Parry provides damage before you're equipped to build in any way, yeah.

[exotic ember]

Plus parry gives AP

And can be built to give even more AP, such that if you’re parrying you have max AP every turn

[ionic kite]

Yeah but the point of dodge is to be the safe option. Obviously Parry is better, if you can get it down

But it would be that even if it did just provide damage

Dodge is the option with the larger window, to dodge attacks you can't get the parry for

To each their own purpose

[ionic kite]

Theory revision. Monolith full ||The Paintress is not Verso's mother. The Paintress is Alicia. The fire that scarred her also killed Verso and Renoir, and the Verso and Renoir we know are Nevrons created by her. That's why they're immortal.||

[halcyon elbow]

This is consistently the best part of the game to see people discover

[ionic kite]

It is pretty awesome

HOO

That was a hard fight

Peak tho

[halcyon elbow]

Same advice I gave Usha earlier:

If you want a stopping spot any time in the next several hours, now is the time

An hour of cutscenes alone

Upcoming

[analog tiger]

Act 2 ||Monolith all|| probably not safe for neon ||eh there's a pretty decent pause point if you want just after the next boss fight||

[ionic kite]

||Okay no I was right the first time, the Paintress is Verso's mother||

||I was right about Verso being dead tho seemingly||

[ionic kite]

I don't know that I can do this fight on hard

I'll probably stop for the moment

Since it's very hard

I need time to do this

Might grind out my underleveled characters

[halcyon elbow]

I did generally find that tightening up my builds was normally sufficient for story stuff

But also that I got way more milage than I expected by having good lumina combos

[ionic kite]

Yeah I figured level up stats didn't do much

But also I don't really know what to give most characters?

It doesn't help that I dump all my extra lumina points into ||Verso||

Because he's the only one I actually know what to give him!

He's the only one that actually benefits from lumina builds, at least the way I'm playing!

[halcyon elbow]

It is probably worth speccing out a support (usually Sciel or Lune, who have the best abilities for it) and that can get kind of lumina intensive

And just simply for survivability if you're not sure where you want to take your third. And then some standbys like Burning Critical that are just extra damage regardless of build

[reef iron]

oh my god you have one person using luminas 💀

[halcyon elbow]

Oh yeah also leveling your weapons can be kind of an insane damage spike too

[nova temple]

If you truly are dumping everything in one character, you may want to consider giving the others a little bit, just so you can run some useful utilities, if not damage

One potential source you may have missed (or not done lately) ||is the Gestral Village, there's a merchant there who will give you lumina points the more expedition journals you have||

[halcyon elbow]

It is a lot

I hadn't been going to him and did a dump that got nearly 100 lumina

[ionic kite]

It's not like only one person is using them, everyone has their points as fully specced as I can

And tbh, the other two members of my main party don't need more

Cuz they do 9999 or close to consistently

I just don't really know what to do with everyone else's

Lune I have an idea

Because I have her on the free shot build

[ionic kite]

I haven't gone back there in a while at least

So that might be a good thing to check in on

[reef iron]

i think those are the one thing in this game that can't changed later?

[ionic kite]

||But yeah the reason I'm speccing out Verso so much is that he's the one that I know what to do with, and since I'm actually doing things with him that aren't "use biggest damaging skill"||

[nova temple]

We could probably help you brainstorm some ideas, if you'd like, but if you are hitting the 10k cap regularly, there isn't much you can improve

[ionic kite]

||He's the one that I'm actually looking over my stuff||

tbh the problem is survivability, and a large part of that is timing

And ig AP gen

Because ||Monoco and Maelle|| do run out of AP fast

And I have no consistent way of getting them up if I can't parry (if i cant parry or dodge they die anyway, ive been mostly dodging for this fight because i cannot get these timings down)

That's kinda the issue with them, they do a ton of damage at the start but then can't really keep up the momentum

The fight doesn't feel completely impossible, it's just. Really long. ||And I have to redo Phase 1 if I lose in Phase 2 which is frustrating||

[nova temple]

It is

||Some story bosses are just like that - big chunks of health you can't just muscle through, you have to learn them. Pictos can help give you a little more time - I really like Healing Fire and Solidifying - but it comes down to skill at the end, especially on Expert||

[halcyon elbow]

I got some milage out of the SOS luminas, but I did end up phasing them out pretty much entirely as better options came up

Not bad if you're just looking for more survivability to slot in

[ionic kite]

You can see how many points everyone has lmao

[reef iron]

oh no

[nova temple]

Yeah, that's definitely not a bad distribution

or at least not an unuseable one

I see people hovering around 90 at this point pretty regularly

[ionic kite]

||Verso is running Double Mark, Breaking Attack, Energising Attack 1 and 2, Augmented Attack, Augmented Aim, Breaking Counter, Breaking Shots, Burn Affinity, Burning Mark, Burning Shots, Combo Attack 1, Critical Burn, Energizing Start 1, 2, and 4, Energizing Turn, Exposing Attack, Marking Shot, Piercing Shot, Powerful Shot, Rewarding Mark, Stay Marked, and Versatile||

||Maelle is running Second Chance, Healing Fire, Auto Rush, Augmented First Strike, Breaker, Burn Affinity, Dodger, Energizing Start 1-4, Immaculate, and Teamwork||

[halcyon elbow]

I don't see the need to run both Breaking Counter and Breaking Shots

[ionic kite]

||Monoco is running Greater Powerful, Energizing Turn, Immaculate, Augmented Counter 1, Augmented First Strike, Auto Rush, Breaking Counter, Charging Tint, Dead Energy 1, Dodger, Energizing Start 1-4, Enfeeblind Mark, Healing Tint Energy, Powerful Revive, and Teamwork||

[halcyon elbow]

Nice to have if you have wildly more Lumina than you need, more Break options never hurts, but if you're still investing in him you can almost certainly find a better use of Lumina there

[ionic kite]

Maybe so, since I'm not countering a lot anyway

Because these attacks are really hard

Tho I also don't have a ton else to really put on

[halcyon elbow]

Energizing start 1, 2, 3, and 4????

With Energizing turn you're already overcapping turn 1

[nova temple]

I find AFS to be pretty useless on long boss fights, you go through so many turns, doing a bit of extra damage on the first one doesn't matter

[ionic kite]

Dead Energy is a wasted slot, Burning Break is redundant and I'm not breaking THAT often, Auto Death is a no, Augmented Counter is a matter of not countering a lot, there's a few Last Stand skills that I'd rather not need to rely on, and Weakness Gain doesn't work cuz the boss has no weakness that I can exploit. Rejuvinating/Powerful Revive, Healing Tint Energy, and Charging Tint I guess are good options

[nova temple]

Enfeebling Mark also feels pretty meh to me

[ionic kite]

I never really did the math lol

I like having as much AP at the start of battle as I can though

Because it just means I can do more stuff

[nova temple]

ES4 is just sooo expensive though

[halcyon elbow]

The only AP management I ever needed was getting Lune to 8 on turn 1 so she could Typhoon, with "gives AP on heal" on her

[ionic kite]

You might be right. If I can find something to replace it, I may

[ionic kite]

I like starting with my big swings, being able to do anything on turn 1

That's why I say that Maelle, in particular, has trouble with AP management past turn 1

Cuz I'm using either Fleuret Fury or ||Gustave's Homage|| turn 1

And she has no way of really getting that AP back as it stands

[reef iron]

hey, you know luminas would help with that

[halcyon elbow]

Typhoon heals the whole party every time Lune gets a turn

So if she's also giving AP on heals, she's just giving the whole party mass AP every turn

[ionic kite]

I dunno what to give

[halcyon elbow]

I basically never start a turn after the first with anything other than max AP

[reef iron]

energizing turn is at least 1 a turn

[ionic kite]

Oh you know that's fair, I should give that to everyone

[reef iron]

maelle i never struggled with ap, actually

[ionic kite]

That should probably replace ES4 on everyone tbh

[halcyon elbow]

ES4 is very difficult to justify at all

[ionic kite]

Rewarding Mark is also a good one to grab

Since Mark is going around so often

[reef iron]

lots of ap generation stuff in the luminas!

[halcyon elbow]

For the quickmaffs:
You start with 4 AP
You gain one turn one for 5 AP
ES1-3 get you to 8
Energizing Turn gets you to 9

Energizing Parry is also worth running even if you're not getting the full counterattack chain every turn

[ionic kite]

The problem is that I'm too scared to try and parry a lot of these attacks

Because I die so fast

If I miss two, or even one parry, it's over

[halcyon elbow]

Do you have Pictos with decent defense stats?

[ionic kite]

It's helpful if I can get the timing down but that might take a while depending on the attack

[halcyon elbow]

You should have at least one solid defensive Pictos per character

[ionic kite]

Maelle and ||Verso|| are the only ones with triple digit defenses

Former with 506, latter with 343

[reef iron]

oh my god

[halcyon elbow]

Yeah that's a Pictos problem

And maybe even stats

[reef iron]

wait i can't remember my stats at that part of the game

but i think that's an "oh my god"

[ionic kite]

Double Mark, Breaking Attack, and Energizing Attack 2 on the latter
Second Chance, Healing Fire, Auto Rush on the former

[ionic kite]

This is true, I build my characters around whatever their offensive attack stats are

Which means those two are the only ones with a defensive stat

[halcyon elbow]

Running bad Pictos for hard fights just to save on Luminas is not the way

[ionic kite]

Sciel is rocking 1 defense

A whole 25 total

[halcyon elbow]

Think of Pictos as gear in most other games, you want them for their stats primarily

[ionic kite]

But also

She's taking double damage anyway

So it doesn't matter for her

[halcyon elbow]

Jesus

[ionic kite]

Cuz I'm using Chation

Lune and Monoco only have 10 defense, and they have 77 and 91 respectively

[reef iron]

ok when talking stats forget the 1 you've allocated, just the final number is fine enough for this

[halcyon elbow]

If you're already running into damage cap problems, nuking even harder on your first turn at the expense of defenses is probably where the struggle is here

[ionic kite]

I never really looked at my stats honestly

[reef iron]

with my endgame stats my characters currently have 0 defense allocated but my actual defense stats are fine, because of pictos

[ionic kite]

Everyone but ||Verso|| is teetering on 2000 damage, if not surpassing it

Sciel and Monoco are passing it

[reef iron]

if you're running a low-no defense strategy

then it does require some amount of bashing your head against the fight until you learn how to dodge then parry

[halcyon elbow]

Act 2 ||Paintress Savage ||

[reef iron]

so reallocating stats is a way around having to bash your head on it if you don't actually enjoy doing that

[ionic kite]

How much do the stat numbers even affect tho

[reef iron]

stats are good

[halcyon elbow]

On expert? It is the difference between getting one shot on any given attack and getting one shot by tanking every hit in the chain

[reef iron]

i'll tell you, my characters could tank MANY hits

defense actually does something yes

[halcyon elbow]

I also thought defense was a bait stat

Turns out Might is the bait stat

[nova temple]

If defense is a flat damage reduction, 300 defense is the difference between getting hit for 2.5k damage on a 5x500 combo, and getting hit for 1k

I also never respected Agility, until I started running into bosses that were taking 4 turns for every one of mine

[ionic kite]

Sciel why do you have healing share

Get rid fo that

You don't need it you're on the backup team

[halcyon elbow]

Healing Share is fantastic actually

Paired with Typhoon it makes it so as long as I survive to Lune's next turn she's guaranteed to top off the whole party passively

[ionic kite]

The thing is, if Sciel needs healing, it's because she's dead

Well not anymore cuz now she has a defense stat

But also she's taking double damage from all attacks

[halcyon elbow]

Since she heals them all and then they all share their healing with each other too

[ionic kite]

I also don't have Typhoon

[halcyon elbow]

Top 3 abilities in the game

[nova temple]

Never learned it!

[halcyon elbow]

Easily

[reef iron]

i also don't think i ever learned it

let me update e33 and go back in

[nova temple]

Genesys gang rise up

[halcyon elbow]

It lets Lune do a full support's job without committing anything other than the one ability and a handful of Luminas

Shell on heal, powerful on heal, etc all just passively reapplying over and over again

And free AP for all

[reef iron]

see the real answer is running a (act 2 on) ||maelle verso and monoco party||

[halcyon elbow]

(Including herself)

Typhoon is also surprisingly spicy on damage

[ionic kite]

Anyway as for Lune and Sciel, here's what I have on them
Lune has Double Burn, Powerful Shots, Auto Regen, Augmented Aim, Auto Rush, Breaking Counter, Breaking SHots, Burning Shots, Critical Burn, Dodger, Energizing Start 1 and 3, Energizing Turn, Immaculate, Marking SHot, Piercing Shot, Rewarding Mark, and Teamwork

(She's running with the free shot weapon)

[nova temple]

Immaculate is probably a trap

[ionic kite]

Sciel has Glass Cannon, Energizing Turn, CLeansing Tint, Auto Rush, Breaker, Critical Burn, Dead Energy 2 (i should remove this), Dodger, Energizing Jump (I should get rid of this), Energizing Start 1-3, Enfeebling Mark, Immaculate, Teamwork

And now everyone has at least double digits in defense

[halcyon elbow]

I do actually like Energizing Jump

[ionic kite]

It is good when enemies give you jump attacks

[nova temple]

Meh, too rarely useful

[ionic kite]

Because they're super easy

But yeah

Jump attacks are rare

[halcyon elbow]

I'd look for a better source of Rush than Auto Rush if you feel compelled to run it on everyone

[nova temple]

Maybe consider not giving your "takes double damage" Sciel also Glass Canon 😛

[ionic kite]

Yeah I thought of that, but I also dunno what else to give lmao

With her my strat is literally just

[reef iron]

i think that one moved on to "actively detrimental"

[ionic kite]

Marking Card - Card Weaver - Sealed Fate

[halcyon elbow]

Support Sciel is very very good

[ionic kite]

Repeat

I use Card Weaver for free damage even if there's only one enemy

Cuz it does 9999 casually lmao

I don't know why

Sealed Fate doesn't hit 9999 consistently

[halcyon elbow]

Intervention is also a top 3 abilities in the game

[reef iron]

what's your third

[nova temple]

Yeah, I think you are just too far skewed towards damage, and as you head into Act 3 that will start costing you pretty regulalry

[ionic kite]

Noted

This is how I play games lmao

I always look for "big number go brrr"

[nova temple]

Then become a parry god 😛

[ionic kite]

I very rarely do support stuff lmao

Even when I know

I really really should

Like now, it's just hard to get me to not do big damage

[nova temple]

I mean, becoming a parry god is an option 😛

[reef iron]

right like, people DO run the game like this

[halcyon elbow]

Act 3 ||Burning Canvas||

[reef iron]

but they're also the same people who aim for perfect parrying battles

[nova temple]

I didn't run any support characters in my expedition, and I ran Glass Canon for essentially the entire game on almost everyone

[ionic kite]

The problem is I'm not good at video games 🙂

[reef iron]

hmmmmm!

[halcyon elbow]

Sciel giving your main damage dealer a free turn and 4 AP does feel like a great way to get The Big Numbers

[nova temple]

Well, something's gotta give 😛

[halcyon elbow]

Dualiso gunslinger build with Intervention can amount to functionally four consecutive turns gunslinging

[ionic kite]

I wanna finish a Hundred Line route, when I do I might do a run of the fight again and record it so you guys can see how delightfully terrible I am

[reef iron]

act 3 general ||there's a part of me that wants to be running anti-blight all the time even tho it's not necessary||

[halcyon elbow]

Lune's LB2 is my anti-blight

Anti-inverted too

[reef iron]

ok fiddled with my luminas with some new information

i still need to figure out what i can remove so i can give maelle ||cheater|| but i have a fair amount of free aim stuff for her that i don't have for anyone else because of her Stuff but can it possibly be as good...........

[halcyon elbow]

||Lune (with the one weapon) and Verso|| are who I'd build free aim around

[reef iron]

it's an artifact of an earlier game build when i needed to make sure i had SOMETHING to give her a chance to mark

but i don't really do that anymore

or, not this way

[halcyon elbow]

Act 2 ||Verso|| has Follow Up which is very spicy on a gunslinger but also requires a fair amount of Luminas to reaosnably pull off at peak performance

[reef iron]

everyone's at around 200 lumina points and it doesn't feel like enough

[halcyon elbow]

I got a lot from turning in the Expedition logs and then just going back and shaking down gestrals in old dungeons I hadn't fully bought out from

Also the Act 2 end ||Clair Obscur in the Monolith|| is repeatably farmable and has a high chance of dropping 5 Lumina if you have the patience to farm for it

[reef iron]

oh i did the logs

i guess i could chase down the final ones for completion and clean up

[halcyon elbow]

If you're high enough level [Act 3] ||Renoir's Drafts|| also just drops a lot basically all the time

[reef iron]

not quite!

[silver pawn]

Act 1 ||Stone Wave Cliffs|| ||hmm second time this young boy has shown up. Talking about pain. Pain as in Paintress? Hmmmm. Is this where people go after the Gommage? Frozen in time? Questions questions||

Or! Crack theory ||This is all just a Jack and the Beanstalk analogy. The Paintress is a giant baker because obviously pain = bread in French, and she’s searching for Englishman to grind their bones. But every year she keeps coming up with only Frenchman.
And maybe Esquie’s pet rock that they’re searching for is like a magic bean, and all the expeditioners need to do is take Esquie’s rock to the Paintress so she can grow a magic beanstalk to England and take the Englishmen instead of the people in Lumiere.||

Or maybe I just have too much time on my hands! Either or!

[silver pawn]

End of Act 1 || Holy Moly! Gustave noooooo! So much lore drop! Verso! I need to think about what all this means. Seems I was rightish about time standing still here.||

[dawn spindle]

I think you didn't go through with the fight, for this fight, which I haven't finished yet, I put on Solidify which was certainly my saving grace from "everyone dies almost inmediately" to "everyone's dead by near the end", fairly I did also get good a bit, but I can tell you that lumina made a difference.

[dawn spindle]

I also think that I'm at a point where i have a very potent build but I could remove like 25% of the damage luminas because all my damage is 9k anyhow

additionally, I went and changed my skills for anything that does medium damage but a lot of hits. ||Specially broken with Monoco||

Since anything between medium and extreme damage does 9k

So basically half of my skills for every character are a complete waste

Which goes back to the game having slight balancing issues.

So I am doing 50k with some medium damage skills, while a lot of the high damage do 10k cause it's just 1 hit.

||I expect this has to change after this sequence because I've been hitting that while for quite a while now and I don't think I'm going to think it's very fun if this keeps going on||

[silver pawn]

Question about skills. Do you eventually get enough points to unlock everything? Or should I be a bit more careful with how I’m spending them and what I’m unlocking?

[dawn spindle]

afaik you will get enough eventually

But also some skills require 9AP to use and those aren't very useful to you yet I think

So I'd do a little bit of planning on what's actually useful for you right now, etc

[silver pawn]

Yeah definitely not yet. Ok I’ll try and be a bit more strategic

[dawn spindle]

someone else might give you a better answer

I'm not done unlocking them all yet and I am, I think, very nearly Act 2 end

but i am pretty close to having them all unlocked

but also I have done all side content I could find/reach except a couple of things.

[silver pawn]

Ok awesome! Yeah I’ve mostly just been following the story, but trying to explore as much as I can in each area.

[dawn spindle]

mhm, I'm a bit obsessive with the exploration

[silver pawn]

I’ve only come across a couple places in each area that I can’t access, blocked by a big glowy rock thing. And I can see there’s goodies on the other side but I just. Can’t. Get. There! Haha very frustrating. Will have to go back again later once I figure out how to get past the big glowy rocks

[dawn spindle]

Yup! I skipped 2 areas cause they were too hard for me, and a couple of bosses on their own because of similar reasons.

I'm sure I can go back to those soon!

[silver pawn]

Haven’t come across any bosses that were too hard for me yet. I mustn’t be exploring hard enough

[dawn spindle]

You finished Act 1 yeah?

Act 2 general ||I think you have the mobility now to go back to a lot more things 👀so maybe you will! ||

Oh also I am playng in expert which must make a difference (I hope)

[silver pawn]

Yep just finished, about to ||enter the Forgotten Battlefield|| but had to break for dinner.

Oh that’s probably true too. I’m only playing on story mode, so that must play a part in how hard the bosses are

[dawn spindle]

I'd hope so

[silver pawn]

Maybe I could I up my difficulty since it feels like I’m kinda breezing through

[dawn spindle]

You can always try and move it back to story if you don't enjoy it

But it depends how much you care about the combat itself and such

[silver pawn]

True true true! I’ve surprised myself tbh - picked it up for the narrative but I’ve found myself really enjoying the combat! Having to strategise and optimise!

[dawn spindle]

I felt I wasn't learning to parry cause I was killing them too fast, which is why I moved to Expert

[silver pawn]

And you noticed a difference?

[dawn spindle]

yeah, it took more turns to kill the regular mobs so I could get in more practice

[silver pawn]

More often than not, I’m completing combat with no damage taken. So I’m thinking I can definitely move up a difficulty level

Appreciate the advice haha!

[dawn spindle]

Yeah during Act 1 I was definitely just killing everything on my first turn

I switched to expert after ||Meadows||

Act 2 seems to have a difficulty leap in that they did a lot more damage and had a lot more health, etc.

[silver pawn]

Hmmm ok. Well maybe I’ll do a couple battles in Act 2 on story mode, and see how I go. If it still feels kinda easy, I’ll switch up the difficulty. And like you said, can always switch back if it’s too hard 😊

[silver pawn]

Oh wow! Are you just Resting and grinding?

[dawn spindle]

Nope, I've made sure to kill everything once

but I've not tried to grind or farm

I've woken up in one of the ultra clumsy days - mode. I dropped coffee all over my counter and almost threw a bunch of boiling water at myself (that I dodged very ungracefully), now the question is if it's now a good moment to go back to my fight

[dawn spindle]

First attempt: nearly got it
Second attempt: ||Died on the first chroma wave 😔 ||

[merry lance]

Should've parried the water, it would've helped get you in the mood~

[dawn spindle]

listen I wouldn't put it past me

Also ||The "the paintress unleashes" JUST. JUST. GO DIE||

My spoilers are Act 2 ||Monolith end (?)|| spoilers.

[dawn spindle]

||phase 2 done, is that it? I'm wary||

||now it is??? Also she healed me? 😭 ||

WAIT

||The cap lifting is A LUMINA?|| I don't think I like that

I think that must have been attempt 21 or 22

oh hmmm my fps are kinda dying

too many particles on screen I guess

||No Maelle I don't think it's real lol||

[halcyon elbow]

||It is only five Lumina which becomes pretty negligible by this point||

[dawn spindle]

ah okay fair

[dawn spindle]

as you know Ive not been able to look at the menu yet

[halcyon elbow]

Act 3 ||https://fixupx.com/clairepngart/status/1934564563565138005 ||

katsup blast (@clairepngart)

care for a snuggle? #Expedition33

**💬 2 🔁 120 ❤️ 541 👁️ 6.7K **

FixupX · Jun 16, 2025, 10:51 AM

[dawn spindle]

||I'm about to get hit in the feelings am I not||

ˆ Act 2 ||monolith||

[halcyon elbow]

For about an hour

Good luck

[dawn spindle]

I have exactly 1h and 5 minutes so hopefully that's enough

[halcyon elbow]

It took me fifty minutes

[dawn spindle]

Act 2 ||post Monolith|| ||Oh, we are gommaging the entore town, got it. TBH I was expecting this to happen when we killed her, was kinda surprised we even made it back to Lumière lol||

[dawn spindle]

It could absolutely tell you that tbh

[halcyon elbow]

Act 2 ||It may be of interest to you at this time to know that Broche's original name for the game was "We Lost"||

[exotic ember]

Lol yeah my endgame build similarly has that character holding far more lumina points than everyone else too

[dawn spindle]

okay, the most important thing so far ||Is that i really like this outfit for Maelle||

heck, I want the lower part for myself 🤔

[halcyon elbow]

A lot of people do, very common sentiment

[dawn spindle]

Yes, I know I'm rather basic, thanks 😠

||I have to say I had guessed a lot up to this point butttt Ive no clue where we are going with it now||

... perhaps tt wasn't the best letter to emphasize that word

||Alice's sister can go die in a fire instead...||

Act 3

[nova temple]

I think by the you finish Act 2 you pick up on enough hints that the big lore dump isn't so much surprising at it is connecting a bunch of dots

[dawn spindle]

yup

and I think that's fine of course, I like to be able to get most of the big things together and then the game just weaves it for me, still surprises me in places ofc

||The Obscur outfit with the white hair is so ||

[nova temple]

It's definitely outfits endgame

[dawn spindle]

Ah Beginning of Act 3 ||There's the curator-absolutely-not-Renoir||

[halcyon elbow]

Act 3 / Baldur's Gate ||Jennifer English in two nickels territory with characters whose hair turns white in the third act||

[dawn spindle]

listen, it's a good choice no matter what story you're telling, this is facts.

[halcyon elbow]

||Her Elden Ring character also has white hair lmao||

[dawn spindle]

didn't know she even was on that game

[halcyon elbow]

Minor role

[dawn spindle]

I have to say I must be too much of a gamer because my entire thought over this sequence is ||Who's gonna upgrade my weapons||

[halcyon elbow]

She's got a nose for the GOTY though

[halcyon elbow]

https://tenor.com/view/thanos-gif-25117042

[dawn spindle]

predictions Act 3 ||I don't think Verso makes it out of here alive||

errr ||I mean, the inpainting Verso I think will be dead by the end of the story, too||

hahahaha

||Lune's freaking out over the whole Maelle is a Paintress etc etc and Esquie is "SOOO COOOOL RIGHT?" ||

[fallow geode]

||Esquie is bae||

[dawn spindle]

||"ooooooh everyone's maaaaad at you"|| lmao

Act 3 still beginning

Yup, the best

||Well, now that Sciel's thinking about bringing her husband back, can I bang Lune or still no?||

ALSO ||I was completely right the entire game is about Aline and Renoir fighting! I guess no one filed for divorce yet though||

[halcyon elbow]

||The terminology is, more or less, "[Name]" for the "real" character and "Painted [Name]" for Aline's creations, with the general exception of Verso because 99% of the time you're talking about a Verso it is Painted Verso||

[dawn spindle]

gotcha

[nova temple]

You made your choice

[dawn spindle]

haha

||I have to remake all of my builds now I feel, but I guess this is it for now||

[halcyon elbow]

||Everyone does. Painted Power is enough of a game changer that Act 1/2 builds stop making sense here||

||Also, go straight back to camp. It'll have more new stuff for you (this is arguably the most awkward thing the game does pacing-wise)||

[dawn spindle]

||I mean, it put me back into camp automatically||

[halcyon elbow]

Yes I know

[dawn spindle]

Or you mean exit and reenter?

ok

||Well first Maelle has to succubi her way through every corpse||

Hmm, that's a sentence I just wrote

[halcyon elbow]

||When you're done with camp it'll spit you out on a maroon beach, and if you go back to camp it will have more, with everyone||

[dawn spindle]

Maybe I shoud have stopped playing

[exotic ember]

It was my way

[exotic ember]

I always just ran pictos that had lumina costs lol. I completely ignored pictos stats all game

[dawn spindle]

||Will Esque say "let us get dry" now when I fly?||

[nova temple]

but what if

no

[exotic ember]

Imagine if he said || Tell me, do I look fly? ||

[dawn spindle]

||Monoco telling Verso he can't rely on charm and good hair anymore and I'm here like "no, but we can rely on Ben"||

[exotic ember]

Coward

[nova temple]

Hey, I kept Glass Canon on her!

[dawn spindle]

||I have noticed the flag menu has a "Challenges" tab however I must leave now so I can't check it out 😭 ||

[nova temple]

Oh, that must be the new stuff

That's not what you think it is

that's (Act 3)

[dawn spindle]

Hmm no I had no idea what it was

But I'm running a bit late lol

[nova temple]

Well, it's this 😛

[dawn spindle]

Good to know

[nova temple]

It's useful if you feel like you are outleveling the story content

[shell minnow]

Literal sandbagging

[dawn spindle]

Well I can make sure I dont go beat that chromatic thing and oneshot it, because id hate that

Act 3 early ||i think I'm levels 51-53||

[halcyon elbow]

There is a sandfalling joke in here somewhere

[exotic ember]

New content you say?

Yes please

[exotic ember]

I forgot about that line! So good

[exotic ember]

Ahh nvm then 😅

[boreal galleon]

Act 3 ||So, who did you guys romance? Idk why but I thought Lune was gay, so I didn't even think it was possible and ended up with Sciel||

[nova temple]

Act 3 ||I didn't want Verso anywhere near Lune, but I figured he and Sciel are matching disasters!||

[exotic ember]

|| I accidentally romanced Sciel on both playthroughs. Second time I was very intentionally trying to romance Lune so I could get both, but then I mistakenly button mashed through dialogue and hit the Sciel romance. So NG+ will be Lune ||

[shell minnow]

Act 3 ||Lune best girl, I held out for her 😤 ||

[exotic ember]

Nothing really unique or special here, but it’s still so fun to see someone go from naysayer to glazing the game and saying it’s one of the best games they’ve ever played: https://youtu.be/vrxhOanMc7E?si=qq8arydLqorGWel9

[fallow geode]

Act 3 ||You could romance Lune? ||

well I know what changes I'm making if I ever do a NG+

[exotic ember]

Also fun fact

This forum thread has about 1/4th of the number of messages the general video game thread has and will soon surpass warframe’s thread in message count

[dawn spindle]

I am absolutely loving the game, and I'm sure this is really the best game some people have played, but I feel people are losing their minds in the social media vacuum chamber quite a bit

It surely doesn't make it to my top 3 and likely not my top 5, probably top 10. And this is nothing negative about the game

[nova temple]

||She is, and that's why Verso couldn't be allowed near her!||

[exotic ember]

I’m very curious what your top 3, 5, and 10 would be.

Just to be clear, your opinions are 100% valid! Everyone has different preferences!

I think that different games appeal to different people for different reasons, and everyone has a different experience with the game. “Best” is so subjective.

It’s definitely pretty easily my number 1 favorite game of all time, followed by Doom Eternal

[dawn spindle]

Oh no doubt it is some of you faves I just have trouble believing it is everyone's fave.

Like I'm not saying this is bad by any means, but social media has a tendency to make everything extreme

[exotic ember]

Yeah, I think the game just resonates with a lot of people in a lot of ways and social media can definitely see people come out of the woodworks to praise and shower love on something that resonates with them so strongly, such that it feels like it’s “everyone”. And of course you can get that echo chamber, particularly if you start to engage with the content that is focused on showering the game with praise

[dawn spindle]

Nah, I think every streamer (which not every one does) must say this is their favourite thing ever, best game, etc. And people get ultraobsessive

[exotic ember]

Fair. I think recency bias can also be a factor too

[dawn spindle]

Just like there's people legitimately seething and raging and sending death threats over Silksong, which is very extreme

[exotic ember]

Yeah 100%

[dawn spindle]

People go full on crazy haha

As for my favourite games I have a very hard time rating them, but my favourite is probably The Longest Journey

E33 can go very top on visuals and combat though

[exotic ember]

Yeah, that people definitely do.

Like I personally think the game deserves all of the praise and love it gets. I’m of the mind that it’s an absolute masterpiece across the board: music, story, writing, gameplay, voice acting, visuals. It just hits the right notes on every level for me.

I also don’t have a wide array of completed single player games under my belt, which I acknowledge. For a long time I gravitated towards competitive multiplayer games.

But I think that’s also the great thing about the age we live in and the amount of games that there are available. Everyone can have that game that just hits all the right notes for them, and that’s great.

But I think it’s just as valid for it to not be your top game. Just as it’s valid for people to not like the game at all. I think people shouldn’t be harping on others for not enjoying the game as much as them or for even not playing it the way they feel it “should” be played. It’s ridiculous.

[dawn spindle]

That's for sure.

[exotic ember]

People don’t seem to be able to understand for some reason that even if the game isn’t in your top 10 for example, you still think it’s a great game. It’s not a diss on the game or those for which it is a favorite. It’s just that you’ve played a lot of great games, some of which have hit the perfect notes for you

[exotic ember]

Haven’t even heard of that one! Will look into it!

[dawn spindle]

Its very old, very old graphics

Hard to reccomend if you're not used to 90s graphics

The one thing that I think its great so far but not groundbreaking for me is the story, I love it, I love how it's delivered too, but it doesnt do the full reach

[exotic ember]

Like I really am of the mind that if someone says “yeah the game isn’t in my top 10, but it’s still great”, I just want to know what that top 10 or even top 3 would be because it’s nice to have recommendations for what should likely be some other fantastic games to check out

[dawn spindle]

However I'm surely going to go play that other turnbased game that has qte too

Which I already owned, I just hadnt gotten to

[halcyon elbow]

I think insofar as there is objectivity in art (and I do think there is some) E33 executes what it sets out to do with a high degree of competence and hits its targets, regardless of personal opinion on parries or turn based or the story didn't land for you or whatever

[dawn spindle]

This is true

The only objective complain I can dish out is the UI in the menus

[exotic ember]

That’s very fair! Stories are such personal things.

My friend who didn’t know about luminas until late act 2 is on NG+ right now, and he has multiple times during NG+ texted to say that the story is still making him cry, despite knowing what’s going to happen. The story just resonates with him in a certain way due to personal experiences, particularly in recent years.
He has also said “This game went from my top 10, to my top 5, to my top 3”. And I think the story and how it hits him in particular is a big reason why. Though he was loving the combat even without knowing about luminas too haha

[dawn spindle]

Lmao yeah that's true

This game deserves a lot of love

[exotic ember]

Yeah I personally would agree. Butterscotch shenanigans, a small indie studio started by 3 brothers, have a game dev podcast. But they also talk about life and whatever else they want. When they discuss games, they tend to talk about whether they think the game “nailed it” or not - looking at what the game seems to have set out to do and whether they nailed the execution of that concept.

[dawn spindle]

Also, this is an uninforned opinion, but we live in an age where we have crossed many technical limits to deliver amazing visuals and many games are having amazing graphics but doing a lot of the same, which sometimes works, sometimes doesnt. But Sandfall went "nope, not us"

[exotic ember]

Yeah I don’t dislike the UI myself, but I can see a lot of room for improvement in it. Particularly with sorting/organizing/filtering pictos and luminas.

Yeah Sandfall had a vision and they executed it brilliantly. Which is extremely commendable in its own right. I’m really happy for them for seeing the level success and praise that they have received. It must be incredibly validating and deeply moving to experience that outpouring of love and support for something that they clearly poured their hearts into.

[dawn spindle]

Mhm, nobody will be satisfied with what they do next

Well, a lot of us likely will

But on the grander scale

[exotic ember]

Yeah I imagine it must be really intimidating looking forward

[dawn spindle]

Today before I left my cat had a blast with E33

Act 3 ||camp stuff|| ||"Verso keeps swimsuits hidden in Monoco's bag, and a lady's swimsuit too just in case, Sneaky Verso"|| had me cackling

||sneaky sneaky indeed, I haven't forgiven him for the flying stone yet||

||Sciel like "listen, I gotta be faithful to my husband now, but, and hear me out, maybe one last time ey?"||

||most important is the new swimsuits, though where's the speedo for Verso hmm? HMMM??||

||verso getting flustered over Sciel and Lune is very cute 👀 ||

[nova temple]

That's for you to discover on your own 🙃

[dawn spindle]

cowards

[nova temple]

You say cowards, I say "you gotta work for it"

[dawn spindle]

I have already conjured this in my mind, so it's fine

uhm....

HELLO Act 3 ||What is this counter damage? Oh this has given me goosebumps (positively) 😈 ||

I had mentioned my build was being a bit wasteful

lmao

||I know this must not be impressive to the rest of you but after 50h seeing 9.999 non stop... y'know||

[nova temple]

Oh know, everyone's been there

[dawn spindle]

yeh yeh, figures. Delicious.

[halcyon elbow]

https://tenor.com/view/star-wars-more-gif-21856591

[dawn spindle]

YES

but first i need tolearn this picto

then I will redo all my builds

[dawn spindle]

Act 3 ||Fallen Leaves|| ||Welp, didn't expect to get this guy first try...||

[fallow geode]

||I did Falling Leaves in Act 2, so...||

||you're going to smash it||

[dawn spindle]

||I already did this area, but i didn't have access to the Scavenger, I don't think you do until after the Paintress?||

[nova temple]

||Nah, you absolutely do. I also did the entire area in Act 2, you just need to talk to the boy, then talk to the lady in sap, and talk to the boy again||

[dawn spindle]

oooh

I see

||I did not clock that is the one who i had to talk to, I had done that||

||Even thoughshe literally tells you, now that i remember, but i was also rather distracted||

[shell minnow]

Oh interesting I don't think I've found that area

Maybe I got danger warned away from it and didn't come back

[exotic ember]

|| Yeah I personally love the cap in act 1 and 2 because it pushes you to engage with the game differently in act 2 - adjusting the build to maximize damage on multi-hits - before act 3 lets you start breaking the game ||

[dawn spindle]

Hmmm, I don't think it's well balanced so I can't say I personally loved that

BUT it is one of those things that they need to balance between someone engaging all side content or not

[exotic ember]

Yeah that’s very fair. I didn’t do side content on the first run through - just story. Balance felt great there (in that I was constantly getting destroyed and struggle was very real).

Second playthrough I did side content in each act and I’d agree that it made things too easy/cut a lot of the challenge.

Definitely hard to strike a balance there. Like I guess you could scale enemies based on average/median team level or something, but idk. Probably unlocks another can of worms

[nova temple]

It is a danger area for a good chunk of act 2

[halcyon elbow]

You'd know if you had, it is visually distinct

[reef iron]

act 3 general mechanics ||every time i see people in act 2 talk about how they don't need luminas for their characters anymore cause they're already hitting 9,999 i flinch||

[ionic kite]

I don't think I have that one

[nova temple]

Kon, they are all visually distinct

[dawn spindle]

hmmm, they are all so visually distinct that they aren't

[dawn spindle]

i see, I've no clue where i got it from tbh

and I'm still not willing to look it up

[nova temple]

If you want to know where Solidifying comes from, (Act 2) ||it's from the Crushing Cavern||

[dawn spindle]

gotcha

well up to them if they want to go get it, I don't think it's needed but it surely helped

Act 3 ||camp stuff|| ||YES VERSO WHY'D YOU HIDE SORRIE, tell us! 😠 betrayer||

||"You have the fluffliest soul" D'aaaw||

||The amount of camp scenes is bieng kind of ridiculous... ||

||All with the same intro text, like I have to go through identical text to get a new cutscene, multiple times, eh||

[nova temple]

Yeah, camp is a little janky like that, unofortunately

[halcyon elbow]

Yes yes but the name plus the visual (if she'd been there) should ring a bell

Camp is I think pretty uniformly the least baked part of the game, other than maybe menu UI

[dawn spindle]

I have to say, I love every single song, but I still always just play Lumiere...

(Yes yes we've already gone over me being basic)

[nova temple]

if ain't broke, don't fix it

[dawn spindle]

I have a question, mechanics, uh... I guess end of Act 2 or so ||Does greater powerful need to be equiped on every person receiving it or only on the character dishing it out?||

[nova temple]

I believe it matters who's applying the effect

[dawn spindle]

That is what I thought but I wasn't completely sure and since I'm redoing all the builds...

am here wondering how to optimize my starting AP

like hmmm, do i want AP on base attack or just more starting AP, I have the AP I need for the leading skills so 🤔 decisions!

but also i don't do base attack that often so 🤔

[reef iron]

i feel like i base attack i've failed

[halcyon elbow]

On the gunslinger build, if you're using that, you usually want to even if you aren't using Dualiso, so you have enough to shoot out your AP -> attack -> shoot down to 2AP, then use Follow Up

[reef iron]

but interesting base attack luminas, so...

[nova temple]

I only do AP on base attack if I am using Combo Attack

[dawn spindle]

Right, which I am, atm

[halcyon elbow]

Two combo attacks and one AP is what I'd settled on

[dawn spindle]

but this is also because I don't have all my AP optimized

[analog tiger]

"new content" 👀

inb4 it's more minigames

[dawn spindle]

I'd certainly not expect much in the form of new content for that

[analog tiger]

Act 3 ||I kept my builds 😌 ||

[analog tiger]

Act 3 ||unfortunately romanced both 😔 ||

[analog tiger]

same lmao

I don't know if this game makes my top 100 and I really enjoyed it

[analog tiger]

also the games that do what this one does did not have the same publicity

is that an x to doubt?

don't tempt me, I will compile a list of my 100 favourite games and inevitably forget some that really should feature 😔

[exotic ember]

Do it

That’s an absurd number of games

[analog tiger]

I wanted to play a little PoE today 😭

I'm not even to maps 😭

maybe I'll do it slowly

[analog tiger]

I could make a top 100 for each of PS2, PSX, NDS and GBA 😔

SNES would be hard because looking back there were like 30 good games in that system and a lot of B-Listers

but some of those 30 were peak

360 would be hard but I think I could do it too

the hardest part is remembering all the games that deserve to be on the list tbh

[halcyon elbow]

Act 3 end (not you Usha) ||https://youtube.com/shorts/FIyx3x3Hb-4 ||

I did not catch this

||I also very badly want a print of that painting||

[dawn spindle]

MAN, I feel so called out?

I was moving my mouse to click when the message spoke to me Though I'd have stopped before clicking with the tag

But still, so called out

I am still watching that one guy play right and I just caught this which had me like huh

[nova temple]

Gonna need Discord to update its spoiler tags to support recaptcha

[dawn spindle]

Act 2 END (big spoilers) ||In the beginning of Act 2, Verso is talking to Esquie and Esquie says he feels he knows Maelle and Verso teases him about him thinking all humans look the same, and Esquie goes "you're all cousins, just like Verso is Verso's cousin" and I was like damn||

[dawn spindle]

Do not give the monster ideas.

[nova temple]

You remembered that, huh

[dawn spindle]

No, I'm watching a streamer play

And I am making sure to stay about 1 act behind just in case he goes in any weird order and discover things before him, so I started watching his Act 2 just now since I finished Act 2

Oh Act 2 END ||I do remember the Maelle bit, since Maelle is obviously Alicia and all of that, but there's nothing particularly surprising about remembering that bit||

[halcyon elbow]

||Did you catch the very similar "Renoir is not acting like Renoir" after he kills Noco?||

[dawn spindle]

oooooh

||SNEAKY SNEAKY||

[dawn spindle]

Act 3 ||I killed an burgeon and there was an enemy that i needed the skill and monoco was eaten at the moment the thing died and it didn't count and this is kind of frustrating...||

[nova temple]

Annoying

[dawn spindle]

Act 3 ||I'm doing that one gestralt beach thing where you need to climb up a ladder with balls falling and... the controls are so unresponsive, ffs||

||I have to go up 3 times and then maybe it moves?||

[nova temple]

Also annoying

Also, now that you are nearing the end of the game, I have to tell you that there's no 't' in gestral

[dawn spindle]

lmao

have i been spelling it wrong the entire time?

[halcyon elbow]

Yes

Well

A lot, not every time I don't think

[nova temple]

Pretty much, yes

[dawn spindle]

and pray tell why wait til I am 50h in?

[nova temple]

Well...

[halcyon elbow]

Genuinely unsure if it was a bit

[nova temple]

I didn't want to call you out

For a while I thought you were making a gestalt joke I couldn't understand

[nova temple]

Got bad news for you, brother

[dawn spindle]

lmaaao

I was not making any pun but my brain kept trying to go to "gestalt" in fact I think I've even typoed it that way a few times

also technically that is a t it has, just sayin'

[nova temple]

Glad we cleared that up

[dawn spindle]

got the achievement for that

err for the gestrals not for clearing that up

Though it is requiring very much conscious effort to type that

[halcyon elbow]

There is a log there!

Or no wait

That one is elsewhere

[nova temple]

Nah, it's there

[halcyon elbow]

But [final Gestral Beach] ||this is your first introduction to Expedition 60||

[dawn spindle]

||I like them whoever won this thing wanted to go around naked and I respect that||

[nova temple]

||Actually the greatest expedition in history||

[dawn spindle]

||that said there were 60's flags inside the monolith, though mostly were from the 70 and the journal was from the 70||

also I will tell you

this outfit is quite ugly

which is the first time i've said that the entire game

[halcyon elbow]

I think it is intentional?

[dawn spindle]

eeeh

[halcyon elbow]

||I get the impression they don't love the idea of people being Weird about Maelle||

[dawn spindle]

||I think people will be weird about this outfit if the want to anyway but yes they've gone for a childish cute swimsuit, but it could be actually nice and not ugly as all crap||

[nova temple]

||I don't hate it, it's kind of unique, and a little fancy||

[dawn spindle]

I don't hate it, but I don't like it

I like the colour if anything

||but idk wtf that thing over her chest is, besides ugly||

[nova temple]

||I admit I didn't spend much time with it, I wanted to immediately go back to the sick Alicia outfit 😅 The color was nice though, yeah||

[dawn spindle]

nah I only looked at it enough to form this opinion

||the Alicia outfit is great but the Obscur... 😔 yeah.... yeah||

[halcyon elbow]

I stuck with the Lumiere outfit the whole game

[dawn spindle]

This is very you for some reason, too.

[nova temple]

The expedition outfits are very

[dawn spindle]

Yes

||I'm basically switching between the regular one and the white one||

||I might have Verso permanently on a suit atm though... 👀 ||

[dawn spindle]

I just realized what you meant with this ||you mean the journal in the beach?||

||There was a journal there but it wasn expedition 60||

||it was 37, someone that abandoned their expedition and spent their time trying to beat the challenge but didn't manage, was there another one besides that one?||

[halcyon elbow]

No

[nova temple]

No, you got your bit about 60 up top already

[halcyon elbow]

Final Beach ||I conflated the gestral at the top talking about 60 with the 60 log||

[nova temple]

60's journal is elsewhere

[dawn spindle]

gotcha, that makes sense thanks

[dawn spindle]

||Dark Shores ✅ ||

[nova temple]

nice

[halcyon elbow]

The Pictos here is the one Preach started banning people over

[dawn spindle]

lmao

It did still say Danger! for me even now though

[halcyon elbow]

It is accessible in act 2 and he just Solid Snaked his way to getting it and people were big mad about it

Good early farm spot too!

[dawn spindle]

yeah I had gotten a bunch of things from here by running around but not that one tbf

[nova temple]

I do wish it had been drop, but if it's on the ground, fair's fair

[dawn spindle]

yup also like it isn't easy to get at all

even if you're just going around