Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

[languid gyro]

||girl can you see....||

[green escarp]

||I mean when you consider the hair hides Alicia's damaged eye.... ||

[languid gyro]

||want....to hug this man....SO. BAD.||

[pallid gull]

||yeah... yeah 🥲 i love maelle, but that was the first time i genuinely felt something else other than love towards her. i get why she did it, she is alicia in a way, it makes sense. but it felt like once again, verso has no say in anything when it comes to his own life. they just take everything away from him||

[languid gyro]

||YEAH I WAS SCREAMING he really had no chance to say anything at all it just happened immediately as soon as Maelle and Alicia came out of their frozen time encounter 😭 ||

[languid gyro]

big big 🤝

[pallid gull]

||also i can finally talk about it, but i met chalier after doing this and it hit so hard lmao||

||cause it's the same thing. that alicia was also a pawn, just like verso, but she was still his sister and his pain is so understandable||

[languid gyro]

||And like...I get this. Maybe nothing Verso said would have mattered in terms of her decision. And ultimately Alicia has the right to choose, to have the final say. But like...not even a chance to say goodbye? Thank you? I love you? Any words at all? Just completely rob him of any opportunity for closure 🥲 ||

||Also unrelated but I need to change her hair back after this cutscene this is not it for her 💀 also I just wanted to try the new hairstyle but maybe it was in fact a really bad move to have her switch to Alicia's haircut for this Verso conversation right after that scene 💀 💀 💀 ||

[pallid gull]

||this is how i feel seeing renoir's hairstyle and outfit on verso... i'm like damn you slay but you're wearing your trauma feels a lil weird||

[languid gyro]

||verso I'm omw I'll strip that trauma right off of you don't worry||

||do they?||

||Also maybe this is just a personal hangup of mine, but does anyone else have trouble changing Act 3 Maelle to anything besides white hair? Orange-haired Maelle and white-haired Maelle don't just look different, they outright feel like distinct people to me, even though they're still technically "the same"||

[green escarp]

||I keep the red hair because I like how it looks on her better. Plus there's some unique hairs only available in red.||
||But also, I'm extremely biased when it comes to redheads lol||

[pallid gull]

||yeah, i can't really go back to orange hair, i tried for a bit but i switched it out lmao. i guess it's the same as painted verso. while i know he is the same as original verso, it feels "strange" to see them as the person. are they really the same when what they've gone through is so different? it's just a lot to unpack. i feel the same way about their relationships. like yes, verso loves maelle and that's his little sibling no matter what, but it's so obvious that his connection to painted alicia was different. same with how when maelle gained back her memories she treated verso as if she's always known him, because her grief is so tied to the original verso that it seems like it was an instant association.... what da hell was i talking about again... idk how i got here, i think it's kinda unrelated to what you said now that i think about it LMAO||

me just writing my stream of consciousness in this message

pressing send anyway why not

[languid gyro]

I don't think it's unrelated though! Because a lot of those thoughts tie directly into why I feel the way I do about this

||It's such a weird dynamic because Maelle probably thinks of herself as both Maelle and Alicia, in a way, but she treats Painted Verso like Real Verso while PV has The World's Most Intense Imposter Syndrome, so there's a lot dissonance there, added on to the way he does see Maelle as Alicia in a way but it's clearly different because she's not his sister and he's not really her brother and it's all just so messy 😭 ||

[green escarp]

Amphy and Aiden with their passionate articulate thoughts and the thematic connections to their choices and me just sitting here like "red hair pretty"

[pallid gull]

but you're right too!! red hair pretty 🙂‍↕️

[languid gyro]

||(spoiled just to not give away hair change) I think I'm still a white/silver hair believer (like for character designs in general, not specific to E33), even outside of narrative context, but with narrative context I think my choice is cemented tbh||

[pallid gull]

||and i understand both. because alicia (maelle in this case) is someone whose entire life has been shaped around grief. so automatically whenever she sees painted verso she's like omg that's my brother... it's very similar to aline. while she has not taken it to that extreme, the fact that this world has come to mean so much to her an she has got to meet this version of verso, it has clearly affected her feelings||

[languid gyro]

||Oh interesting that Clea did jump into the Canvas after everything went down (and never visited Francois smh), though I guess it makes sense; I imagine she at first tried to directly confront her family to try and get them out||

||Oh moreso than that, she's the reason Painted Verso and Painted Renoir learned the truth at all, which...actually yeah makes sense that they wouldn't necessarily be born just already knowing||

|| 💀 💀 💀 ||

||This does seem to track with even my very limited exposure to Clea||

||I do get the sense that Clea does genuinely care and just forces herself to be cold/hardened, maybe partially personality, but also partially a) her own way of dealing with the trauma of Verso's death and b) because it probably feels like someone in the family has to and no one else is so she has to step up||

||Can't wait to write essays about woman I've seen in exactly one scene||

||I have seen posts (and one particularly sharp streamer who noticed in her first time going through the prologue) pointing out that you can actually visibly (just barely) see Verso's silhouette dragging Maelle away during the prologue beach scene, which is insane||

||Who? Verso?? Lie???? (Still love him very very dearly though)||

[pallid gull]

||you can also spot him while they're going inside the manor in flying waters, there's so many little hints that he's always watching||

[languid gyro]

||ah...||

[languid gyro]

That one I did notice!

||OH wow the game straight up tells you||

[green escarp]

Prologue (NG+1)
||Still gets me... 🥲 ||

[languid gyro]

our two screenshots being next to each other 💀

[green escarp]

Oops 💀

[pallid gull]

😭

[pallid gull]

||this is kinda what softened me a bit on what maelle did lmao||

||they've both hurt each other in similar ways so i was like... alright... let me just keep quiet 😭 ||

[languid gyro]

the way I was about to type something similar in this chat just now before you sent this

[pallid gull]

🤝

[languid gyro]

🤝

[pallid gull]

||dare i say this family cannot exist without hurting each other to a concerning degree lmao||

||therapy is not enough||

||family is complicated as verso says i guess ||

[languid gyro]

||I do wonder... realistically there probably is a good chance Maelle would have refused to take down the Paintress if that meant losing Gustave (especially if she doesn't yet organically gain the memories of Alicia as she did at the end of Act 2, and also thus the emotions behind those memories, as opposed to simply being told). Whether I think that excuses things is a separate matter though, of course||

[languid gyro]

||You're probably right but also I'm not seeing signs that they've tried 💀 ||

[pallid gull]

they have nawt

||but also i do think it's wild that all verso wanted was a world where silly guys exist in peace and because of their grief after he was gone, they transformed his childhood wonderland into the most horrific dystopian type of world defined by grief and existential dread||

[languid gyro]

||ain't no way.................||

[green escarp]

In their defense kinda, ||there also's a war, be it political or something akin to a gang war, serious enough that someone burned down their house, going on between them and another faction, so maybe they don't have family employed therapists. Maybe a therapist would be scared of associating with them at this time. Just a random possibility that popped into my head||

Doesn't mean they still shouldn't have tried but just something I thought about

[pallid gull]

||oh i was mostly messing because i don't think therapy exists in this world unfortunately 😭 which is a shame bc they need it so bad, not even in a derogatory way||

[languid gyro]

||So first question: how is a "weak target" defined? Is it like any enemies below a certain HP threshold? (And if so, what)||

[green escarp]

||thats also a possibility though, that therapy might not even be a thing 😭 .||

[languid gyro]

||Second question: how does the damage compare to Stendhal, if all other factors are the same||

||Third question: What the fuck?||

[green escarp]

||I think in this case its non boss enemies||

[languid gyro]

||Lord have mercy on the poor souls the Writers conjure up for their stories then 🥲 🙏 ||

[green escarp]

||post nerf I found it way stronger than Stendhal, but I also haven't really tried experimenting all that much with setups comparing the two. I just know that gommage combined with buffs on you and debuffs on them (marked, etc) literally deletes fools lmao||

[green escarp]

||Also fun fact! If you picked lie, you don't get this skill. Because Maelle calls out Verso's BS||

[pallid gull]

||i need to watch what happens if you lie to her, i'm curious if it changes much||

[green escarp]

||No Gommage skill for you if you lie||

[pallid gull]

fr??

[green escarp]

Ayup!

[pallid gull]

damn

makes sense though

[green escarp]

It is 100% missable if you fuck up, lol

[languid gyro]

||Well shit I guess I need to start changing my support setups to also build Gradient gauge on top of everything else I'm already doing lmao||

||Though tbf I'm most of the way there I think; even without messing with the new luminas I just got from the Maelle quest area, I can usually guarantee at least level 2 gradient by Maelle's turn with some of the bar filled towards 3||

[pallid gull]

the way this optional boss is still beating my ass... i need to switch around their builds a bit

[green escarp]

Prologue (NG+1) ||Steeling myself. This time I will not cry at the gommage scene||

[green escarp]

||...nope it still got me ||

||Fuuuuuuuuuuuuck this game (affectionate) 😭||

[wheat tulip]

Oh btw about that ||if you lie you dont get the achievement !||

[wheat tulip]

||oh no skill either oh damn||

[green escarp]

(Prologue) It still kills me that ||Sophie and Gustave broke up over whether or not to have children in their doomed world but they clearly still loved each other and they clearly hold regrets about lost time together and the closest they get to a reconciliation is during Sophie's final moments and... ||

Also the goddamn music for that scene, Lorien Testard when I catch you

[languid gyro]

[More post act 2 camp] || 😭 😭 😭 ||

[pallid gull]

||MONOCO ILYYY ||

[languid gyro]

||"You get an existential crisis! You get an existential crisis! Everyone gets an existential crisis!" 🎉 ||

[green escarp]

Outfit spoilers(?) Should I give in to the silly and have this playthrough be ||Team Swimsuits?||

Like on the one hand, I earned those damn things. But on the other...I feel like scenes will make me go "ok no fun time's over this doesn't feel right"

[languid gyro]

||It's either that or Team Baguette||

[green escarp]

Outfit Spoilers: Team ||Swimsuits|| it is!
Edit: oh shit right, this is also a kinda spoiler for NG+ playthroughs, involves party members so maybe don't click this until you're mostly through act 2?: ||You have access to your full party (minus Verso until you get to Act 2) from the word go||

Edit: better pic

[languid gyro]

||Oh I never did check up on the Monolith after the Maelle camp scenes, love to see the new message loud and clear||

[pallid gull]

||i got to see it for the first time during a random boss fight, i just saw it in the background and missed my parry because i was like WAIT THIS IS SO COOL lmao||

[languid gyro]

||Also I never realized the Gestral Village just has a giant Golgra monument at the top that's great||

[pallid gull]

a diva

[languid gyro]

||Baby is back in the village!||

||Love the small ways the quests affect the world||

[green escarp]

I think it's time:

I won't have the same street cred as peeps who did this from the word go, since I have crazy built characters and this is my third playthrough lol but hey

[languid gyro]

||Golgra team member when||

||Oh I'm gonna cry again 😭 ||

||It should be me||

[pallid gull]

||the way this reminded me ive seen yaoi of these two 😭 ||

[languid gyro]

unsurprised

[green escarp]

Act 1 (NG++) I'mma put them in silly outfits! its not like|| it will juxtapose with the horrors or anything! 🙃 ||

[wheat tulip]

Not surprised lmao

[green escarp]

But on the OTHER hand...

[wheat tulip]

Heelp

[languid gyro]

|| 🥲 ||

||Yeah...I get that... oof||

||(also why does she just look so hot help)||

||Every other time Lune talks about her parents I'm just like "damn we had the same experience" 🥲 ||

||Me spiraling thinking about how important this is for Verso because he's fighting so hard for agency that's never truly been granted him 😭 ||

||It should've been me 😭 😭 😭 ||

||Oh my god?? The Lune music track??? We’re actually getting vocals to her camp theme and it’s ❤️ 😭 ||

[green escarp]

||Verso kissing you or Lune kissing you? :D||

[languid gyro]

Yes

[green escarp]

I was waiting for this exact response lmao

[languid gyro]

As if there could be any other lol

[wheat tulip]

Theres no other good answer honestly lmao

[languid gyro]

||Character Development 👏 ||

||I don't think I want to do romance in this game (already talked about it at length before) but flirty Lune has me acting up...||

[wheat tulip]

||me neither but if we are meant to choose ill probably lune everyday sciel is fucking married and not over her man it feels so wrong ||

[green escarp]

||I mean, she was married. I'm sure she'd stick with Verso if the possibility of resurrecting Pierre wasn't on the table lol||

[pallid gull]

||i'm saying, like yes, i'm still ? about the romance aspect but these two have so much in common that i find it really cute... is it influenced by the fact that i want to be in the middle of that... maybe however||

[wheat tulip]

Mmh not sure

||feels like verso were just a fuck buddy to me 😭||

I can be wrong of course !

[green escarp]

||I'd argue she wouldn't have bothered in the first place if she was always going to just dump him later. Sciel doesn't come across as that insensitive to others' feelings. The only reason this dilemma even comes up is because now her husband can be magically resurrected so she doesn't get the chance to really develop another relationship and move on||

[languid gyro]

||So I caved, but also what is this line ???? (as well as some of the lines directly proceeding 💀 )||

[wheat tulip]

||she want a trouple maybe lmao||

[wheat tulip]

True i forgot that part of her

[languid gyro]

||not spoilering the image because I appreciate how ominous it is out of context, but also 💀 ||

[pallid gull]

||i don't actually know how the sciel/verso romance progresses because i haven't gone through with it, but i do think they care for each other more than just fuck buddies. the problem is, that writing this kind of romance that progresses from coping mechanism sex to romance is kind of difficult lmao it requires a lot of unpacking and to my knowledge (i could be wrong) you only really get the swimming scene and that's about it. it has a more humorous/romantic tone than a "let's unpack what's up with you wanting to be used and me not being able to start a romantic relationship just yet". i feel like lune doesn't have nearly enough scenes and sciel doesn't have nearly enough emotional unpacking (not for her as a character, but for the relationship dynamic that they have). idk if i'm making sense. also this is nawt a ship war or a girlie vs girlie type of convo, i'm just giving my 2 cents on the way it was written. i've already seen people trying to pit them against each other for his attention and i'm like... do not make this into another final fantasy 7 ship discourse or i will end up exploding ppl w my mind 😭 ||

[wheat tulip]

LMAO

[wheat tulip]

Oh no of course dw!

[pallid gull]

oh no i know people here won't do that

it was more like a general statement

[wheat tulip]

||i prefer moonsky honestly kckffj||

[pallid gull]

the last part i mean lmao

[wheat tulip]

Oh got it!

[pallid gull]

like me addressing the people doing that... in this case the void i guess

[wheat tulip]

I understand 🙂‍↕️

[pallid gull]

real and true ||french yuri you will always be famous||

[languid gyro]

||wait is that the official ship name that's so cute 😭 ||

[wheat tulip]

Not really thats just how i named them lmao

[languid gyro]

||I love Death Note||

[wheat tulip]

||Or sciel au clair de lune lmao ||

[wheat tulip]

[pallid gull]

||they should've given us the other version of his suit in this cutscene 🚬 ||

[wheat tulip]

At least ||we have choice for his swimsuit😭||

[languid gyro]

||I'm just saying, I was on a swim team in my youth but if I ever met Verso and he asked, I've never gone in water in my life||

[wheat tulip]

LMAO

[languid gyro]

||Sorry I blanked what are we talking about||

[pallid gull]

https://tenor.com/view/orange-cat-gets-flung-and-explodes-orange-cat-funny-cat-meme-explodes-gif-10706110874965244466

||the arm veins 🦆 🚬 ||

[green escarp]

WAIT WHAT????

Act 1 spoilers (NG++)

||WHY IS RENOIR IN A SWIMSUIT TOO?????||

[pallid gull]

help???

[languid gyro]

If this wasn’t already my Game of the Year I think this blew all doubts away

[pallid gull]

i have so many questions

[green escarp]

I stg I'm not using mods or anything 😭

Is it pulling from ||Gustave's model????||

For this cutscene? How? Why???

[languid gyro]

||Stone Wave Cliffs is about to be a legendary experience||

||This was definitely not the intent of the scene, but now I'm just sitting here thinking about what the kids at all the schools I once worked at might say about me now that I'm gone (or if I'm even remembered or talked about at all), or how I would be remembered by people in general if I were gone, and now I'm going into an existential spiral again 😭 ||

||Idk I do think about it sometimes, if what I do at work makes an impact on anyone, if I'll be remembered years later at all, and if so how, or if I'm just another blip that gets lost to time as they move on with life||

||And like...don't get me wrong, I still think what I do is valuable even if I'm not remembered for it; as long as the kids are able to be safe, and learn some stuff, in the year they're with me, I've done my job. But I do still think about it sometimes: the impression, the legacy that I leave||

[pallid gull]

||for those who come after, indeed 🥲 ||

||but i understand, it's hard to not think about these things||

||i feel the same way but for others, not just myself. sometimes i see black and white pictures of very distant relatives long forgotten and i have no idea who they are or if anyone even remembers them anymore and i just experience a completely new type of grief for the idea of who someone used to be lmao||

[wheat tulip]

||secret thing if all of your party is in swimsuit i think i saw something like that on youtube i thought it was clickbait and fake fkfkfk||

[languid gyro]

Truly, devs of, and for, the people 👏

[green escarp]

|| I'm looking it up and apparently the baguette can do this too, and if so this is either a hilarious bug or the devs are just the most fun people lmao ||

||oh sorry, I meant the "tradition" outfits ||

[wheat tulip]

||oh btw you can get a baguette as a weapon in ng idk how tho ||

[languid gyro]

||back at it with the existential dread 🥲 ||

[wheat tulip]

Im watching you!!

[low steppe]

||idk the context but he looks so good in that outfit||

[green escarp]

Ok but honestly who the heck names a bread "tradition." That's just needlessly confusing linguistically xD

[languid gyro]

||OH. okay. gotcha.||

[languid gyro]

so true but also pige why are you clicking random spoiler images 😭

[wheat tulip]

I DONT CARE

[wheat tulip]

Yup...

[green escarp]

WELL I DO!

[wheat tulip]

Its a french game the french know better !!

[low steppe]

im nosy

[pallid gull]

||i love her ||

[languid gyro]

||Like to be fair we already know she's attempted suicide from Sciel's conversation with Gustave way back in Act 1, but it's one thing for it to be implied like that and still a gut punch when said this directly||

[green escarp]

|| keep 3 tokens from the prologue and carry them into your next NG+. I didn't bother though they're kinda lame for stats and there's no achievements tied to them||

[wheat tulip]

Understandable

[wheat tulip]

||i was so shocked when i got this one ||

[languid gyro]

||Esquie you're so important to me (at least I assume that's the implication here) 😭 ||

||back in one of the earlier camp scenes, when she mentioned a stomach scar, I sorta figured back then it was probably something like this.... but still, man...||

[pallid gull]

||the way she lost her husband and tried to drown herself AND lost her child, the devs were like you need to go through more pain actually 😭 ||

[green escarp]

||And just when you thought the game couldn't get darker 🙃 ||

[languid gyro]

I've never been so naive, unfortunately

doesn't lessen the impact each time though

[green escarp]

I do appreciate the game can barrage you with...things....but it doesn't feel cheap or gratuitious

At no point did something happen and I go "oh that is just unnecessary"

Good writing

[languid gyro]

||You know...I have thought about it a bit. Whether Maelle as a Paintress could, in fact, bring back all the people who're gone, like Pierre, or Gustave, or Sophie. But perhaps more importantly, if she should. Which is not a question with a clear black-and-white answer I think||

||Speaking of things that are not in the least surprising but still an emotional gut punch when said out loud: Verso talking about his past suicidal ideation and how it "would solve problems for everyone" if he were gone...........||

[pallid gull]

||yeah, because it goes back to the "natural" course of life, which always ends in death, no matter how you go about it. however, i guess the deaths in question are at the whim of a family that are playing god, so is it really "fair"? i don't know if that has a clear answer because they are the makers of this world so there's that lmao||

[pallid gull]

||love him so much aghhhh ||

[languid gyro]

||Should've just gone all the way and called it "End Walker"; we've already got both "Shadow Bringer" and "Storm Blood" as attacks in this game lmao||

||I have mixed feelings about this skill actually because on one hand, I think it goes very well with one of the niches of Sciel's kit, which is ramping power, but at the same time that highlights one of the flaws of Sciel's kit (or perhaps the encounter design of this game as a whole) in that ramping damage tends to just be so much less effective of a build/strategy in this game, especially in Act 3, than frontloaded burst||

Not gonna go into a whole essay again about kit design because I sorta already did not too long ago, but this just made me think of that again

Also, unrelated to that (but related to what I was just doing in the game) ||interesting that Sciel was the only party member that didn't have any kind of quest as part of maxing their relationship ranking. I don't know that it's actually significant in any way, but it was a difference I noticed||

||Hell, Maelle got a wholeass new dungeon, and I'm slightly disappointed the others didn't get anything anywhere near that expansive||

[wheat tulip]

Probably ||the weak point of this game is the relationship lvls and what it adds😭||

[pallid gull]

||i kinda agree, i feel like compared to the overall writing of the game and the character writing, the relationship mechanic doesn't add nearly enough as i wish it would. i also feel like after a while there aren't nearly as many "check up on others" moments. but again, i get it, at the end of the day it's still an indie game even if they've had a lot of backup. i'm just nosy as hell and love relationships so i get nitpicky lmaoo but there's also some really good things coming out of it. the monoco conversation about "am i loyal because that's how i was made, or because this is who i became" was so good||

[wheat tulip]

||oh yeah i just dont want to praise a game without saying its flaws ||

||they could have done it better but thats their first game honestly i can pass it ||

[languid gyro]

||I agree as well that, writing-wise, the relationship stuff is the overall weakest (there are some really good gems within, still, but if we're talking on the whole, as well as integration with gameplay mechanically...). Also, as far as the "check up on others" moments, I think Acts 1 and 2 had them reasonably sprinkled throughout, but Act 3 has suffered in that regard through its change in format to really just having the one major story location with everything else being freeform optional exploration content. If there were more distinct story beats in Act 3, as with 1 and 2, then there'd be more natural room for camp dialogue progression as well||

[languid gyro]

I think this is in general a healthy mindset to have. Loving something should never mean blindly praising it and ignoring its flaws (or worse, attacking others for voicing flaws they noticed) but should involve understanding it holistically, knowing and understanding its flaws, and still loving it regardless because of how much more important all the things that you loved, or that resonated with you, are.

Expedition 33 has its flaws, certainly, but it is still absolutely a game I adore and will likely be thinking about for a long time

[wheat tulip]

Truly!

[vivid peak]

Playing this game it’s hard to not compare with really established AAA studios releasing their umpteenth game and being really impressed with how sandfall got so close to the mark on their first try (I know some of the devs came from Ubisoft etc but still)

They’ve set a really high benchmark for themselves hope they don’t suffer too much from sophomore expectations

[wheat tulip]

From what ive heard only 2 or 3 people are from ubi!

[vivid peak]

The main dev is right? Guillaume

[green escarp]

Right now the only flaw I can think of for this game is how pretty it is and it doesn't give me a photo mode to capitalize on it

Why yes, I do have my priorities in place why do you ask

[hasty halo]

Same shadow

I NEED a photo mode

[pallid gull]

in my feelings today ||https://youtu.be/oOdJyVmfvXY?list=OLAK5uy_lJbuSXw4Bfo2tDlP6s_CNznTfYGe0GEBM ||

guess it's not exactly spoilers, it's just a companion song, my thoughts were spoilers so i automatically spoilered it 💀

later game spoilers ||i think what gets me so much about this song is how gentle it is lmao it fits who the original verso used to be to the point where he died for his family and it also fits who painted verso has become, someone so full of love and just so sad at the same time... anyway i feel sick i hate this game 🚬 ||

[wheat tulip]

||still seeing verso in the flames in alicias nightmare ||

[languid gyro]

So I’ve made the decision ultimately to just fully explore and complete everything before ending the game, even if that ends up trivializing the finale, in part because it’s sorta what I’ve already been doing up till now anyways (explore first, story last), in part because ||let’s face it, I’m already beyond the point of trivializing the last boss anyways, even if I stopped exploring and went straight to him this very second, so it doesn’t actually make a difference||, and in part because I do think I want to have the credit roll be the last thing I see before putting the game down, instead of continuing on for a bit after

With that said, I don’t have too many places left anyways; I believe the only 3 optional locations left to me are ||Flying Manor, Endless Tower, and Abyss|| so I need to figure out what order I want to do all of that in

I sorta figure ||Abyss|| was designed to be last, so does anyone have thoughts on which of the two between ||Flying Manor and Endless Tower|| makes more sense to clear first?

[wheat tulip]

||endless tower first !||

[languid gyro]

||Realistically I don’t think it matters because my build as is can already one-shot Simon, from what I’ve heard of his HP values, which means every location I go will be about equally “difficult” lol, but I do still want to keep some sense of progression, just for my own personal mental satisfaction||

[green escarp]

https://www.vxreddit.com/r/expedition33/s/zJufGlMoSK

[languid gyro]

Oh hey that’s the outfit I have on her!

She’s so 😍

[green escarp]

Oh my god
https://www.vxreddit.com/r/expedition33/s/CzU7S0Ty9Y

[Prologue] Nooooooo 😭
||https://www.vxreddit.com/r/expedition33/s/pUjyWAYL7R||

[wheat tulip]

Heelp

[hoary nacelle]

I am getting my ass beat so fucking hard by an optional boss rn😭

[green escarp]

https://tenor.com/view/wolf-of-wall-street-jordan-belfort-leonardo-di-caprio-one-of-us-jonah-hill-gif-5441859

[wheat tulip]

Which one ?

[hoary nacelle]

|| Simon ||

[wheat tulip]

OH THAT ONE

[hoary nacelle]

IM CRASHING OUT SO BAD

|| I CANNOT WITH THIS SECOND PHASE ||

The music is so good but my sanity is dropping

These attacks are actuslly diabolical I actuslly don't know what to do with myself

I'm gonna come back to this later omfg😭

[wheat tulip]

||you are trying to beat the hardest boss of the game so understandable lmao||

[fringe walrus]

This is so pretty

[hoary nacelle]

I am coming back when I'm max level cause this makes me wanna

[wheat tulip]

||Honestly i had to go with an oneshot strategy for him😭im not that skilled to beat him otherwise||

[hoary nacelle]

|| yeah i think if I at least manage to get 3 gradient charges and use gommage with maelle I might be able to delete his 2nd phase 😭 😭 ||

[wheat tulip]

Its possible yeah try to focus on that for building your team!

[hoary nacelle]

|| yeahhhh im gonna level up some gradient charge pictos and put them on everyone I think that'll help ||

[languid gyro]

Oh hey thanks this was exactly what I needed for [P6]

[languid gyro]

||My Maelle's currently doing about 300mil damage with just Stendhal, no Gommage, and is about level 80 so it'd probably be more potent at 99. Does he have even more health than that?||

[hoary nacelle]

|| holy shit how r u hitting that much with stendhal😭 thr most I've gotten is like 3 mil djdkksksjdh ||

|| idk if this means anything in this case but I haven't actually done the fight against the real renoir yet in Lumière, I've just been doing optional content lmao ||

[languid gyro]

||Sciel uses Fortune's Fury to double her damage + applies burn via dying (for Burn Affinity on Maelle, not even the burn damage itself) + applies energy and shields on Maelle (for her to benefit from Shield Affinity and Powerful Shield) via both dying and reviving -> Verso also applies shields on death + breaks + applies Mark + applies Greater Defenceless -> Auto-Death + Survivor to instantly get Maelle to 1 HP (for certain lumina buffs) then stack literally every damage-boosting lumina under the sun on Maelle||

||With a good Roulette proc you should be able to hit over 300 mil (or like 70mil if Roulette trolls you), or just keep Roulette off and do somewhere between 150-200 mil consistently otherwise lmao||

[hoary nacelle]

|| that's insane omg😭 😭 ||

[languid gyro]

||Also upgrading weapons is huge, along with making sure you have 99 in each of the stat scalings (and dump the rest into Might, but at A or S rank scaling you get more power from leveling the scaling stat than from might), so if you don't have a level 33 Medalum (or whatever weapon of choice) that's something to work towards before tackling the superbosses also||

[fringe walrus]

Btw @azure ridge thread 👀

[azure ridge]

Got some new duds

Oh, and three levels at once

[hoary nacelle]

|| yeah I have level 33 weapons and 99 in the stat scalings thingies, I'm also level 90.... ||

[wheat tulip]

Yess its a good way to complete it

[wheat tulip]

Omg enjoyy xamtt

[wheat tulip]

Do you want to know?

I can tell you but i prefer asking before 😭

[languid gyro]

It's fine lol

[green escarp]

Ayo we got another one!

[wheat tulip]

Gotcha!

[green escarp]

https://tenor.com/view/one-of-us-oneofus-join-us-you're-in-welcome-gif-10917376549346488353

[fringe walrus]

Told him to get fantasy life too

He also needs to finish Xenoblade

Bullying all my friends to be buried in games like me

[green escarp]

https://tenor.com/view/mando-way-this-is-the-way-mandalorian-star-wars-gif-18467370

[wheat tulip]

Heelp

Good luck to yall

[languid gyro]

@hoary nacelle you can ignore this entirely, but I just typed up a super quick rough sheet of the bare minimum luminas you'd want for the setup to work, along with lumina cost (and obviously if you equip some of these as pictos you can reduce the cost). Just two additional notes:

• Turn order matters: you want to remove members and add your party members in exactly the order listed ||Sciel -> breaker -> Maelle||
• I listed the bare, bare minimum but obviously there's plenty of room for you to add more luminas for each character to help more; go wild! (heck I have nearly 500 lumina points worth of stuff on both ||Verso and Maelle||, the vast majority of which is not needed for this setup; again this screenshot is the bare minimum)

[hoary nacelle]

Omg tysm😭

[languid gyro]

(Also this is just to hit the damage threshold I currently am, but if the boss has less total max HP than this amount of damage, then obviously you can remove a couple of the damage boosting luminas from ||Maelle||; I'm sure it's already overkill lol)

[hoary nacelle]

Yeah that makes sense

Looking through these im actuslly missing a few of the luminas so im gonna have to figure out how to get them djdjjfhdjs

[languid gyro]

I also have not personally fought the boss so I don't know if there are extra phases or anything preventing a straightforward one-shot, but if there are: ||you'd just add stuff that carries over to multiple turns, for example Cheater and Longer Powerful on Maelle, Double Mark on the breaker, energy/AP generating stuff like Energising Turn, Rewarding Mark, etc. ; just stuff like that)||

[hoary nacelle]

Tysm !! I'll try this out at some point once I get all the luminas im missing and stuff

Ill save the image for future reference

Ok the lumias I'm missing are || Revive Paradox, Shielding Death, Exposing Break, Aegis Revival, Greater Powerful, Survivor and Tainted ||

[languid gyro]

All of them are very helpful to have, but imo the most important to grab for sure are ||Survivor, Revive Paradox, and Exposing Break||

[summer yarrow]

Is anybody playing the game on PS?

Is there a way to adjust the graphics? Someone of the pictures the appear button left when someone is talking is cutoff

I can get use to that but I just wanted to ask

The graphics look amazing. Maelle is running so fast and I’m like HOLD UP!!! Ima walk instead

[pallid gull]

i don't own a ps but that sounds like it might be a resolution thing? can you adjust it somehow?

[summer yarrow]

Maybe

I’ll check after this tutorial fight

I fixed it

I had to adjust the display area

The ost

Wow

||Im assuming Gustave is 32 yo? ||

||Ngl I’m glad the characters are grown up and not like teenagers trying to save the world ||

[languid gyro]

Yeah 100%, gives the game a much more mature tone in general, and some incredibly good dialogue throughout

[summer yarrow]

||Already disliking Marie. With her hands on her hips power pose||

||Nvm she came off as rude. I’m sorry Marie||

[hoary nacelle]

Ok so I've made like a half assed ver of this but I am having an issue where maelle keeps going first despite the fact she's slower than everyone else😭

[languid gyro]

Did you reorder your party in the menu? The first turn of battle goes by that for turn order, rather than agility/speed

[hoary nacelle]

I think so but it didn't do anything😭

[languid gyro]

Also, assuming you have First Strike on everyone, you want to start all your battles by just running into enemies, NOT by attacking them, because starting battle with an attack messes up First Strike turn order

[hoary nacelle]

Ok that's makes sense, you can't hit this optional boss to start the fight anyway

[languid gyro]

I would try ||removing everyone except Sciel, then leaving the menu screen (so the game does a quick autosave), and then coming back and adding your breaker, and then Maelle||

I also know that First Strike takes priority over agility/speed, generally, but it might mess up if there's too big of a difference

[hoary nacelle]

Okay I'll try that !

[languid gyro]

Like if their speeds are within like 100-200 of each other it's whatever but if Maelle has like 500 or like 1000 more speed than that might be a big enough difference to overtake

I personally use pictos to speedtune so that everyone's approximately pretty close and generally ordered as I like them to be

[hoary nacelle]

Shes got about || 500 less speed than the others dhdjke ||

[hoary nacelle]

Didn't work😭

[pallid gull]

this optional boss im doing beating my ass so bad im this close to going back and buying weapons and pictos from all the merchants i've ignored because they were charging me a fortune... but maybe they were onto something 🚬

[summer yarrow]

Does the game auto save?

[pallid gull]

it does, yeah

[languid gyro]

So for example, in my current picto setup (which you of course don't have to follow exactly), I currently have:

• ||Sciel with Cheater, Second Chance, and Combo Attack II (2427 speed)||
• ||Verso with Sniper, Charging Critical, and Burning Death (2368 speed)||
• ||Maelle with Survivor, Powerful Shield, Shield Affinity (2267 speed)||

[summer yarrow]

Nice

[languid gyro]

And turn order has been 100% consistent for me for every battle since early-mid Act 2 (I've pretty much had First Strike permanently on since then)

[hoary nacelle]

Its been all over the place for me😭

[pallid gull]

you can also save by checking out a rest point or switching out a weapon/picto

you got this blossom 🙂‍↕️

[hoary nacelle]

Ty aiden😭

Crashing out over this fucking set up so bad

MAELLE WHY WONT U GO LAST GURLLLL

[languid gyro]

Hmm, so just as a checklist:

• All 3 party members have First Strike lumina equipped
• You went into the menu, removed everyone except party member #1, then re-added the rest in order
• Via picto and agility speedtuning, everyone's speed is ordered and within about 100-200 of each other
• You are not starting the battle with an attack

As far as I'm aware, and in my own personal experience, as long as all the above is true, there should be no issues

[hoary nacelle]

I'm gonna try to get maelles speed closer to the others but still slower

And see if that does anything

[languid gyro]

Oh actually wait I might have a clue why things aren't working

Do you already have the luminas to have all of ||Auto Death, Second Chance, and Revive Paradox||? Because if not, the start-of-battle death may be pushing them behind Maelle when they otherwise wouldn't be

I do also have ||Cheater|| equipped on everyone, which I assumed wouldn't affect anything, but maybe it interacts with the death start turn order in a weird way

[hoary nacelle]

I don't have || Revive Paradox || and I haven't been using || auto death on maelle because I have other buffs set on her from other luminas, should I set it up that she has auto death too? ||

[languid gyro]

Oh that might be your problem then; I think without ||Revive Paradox|| the deaths push them behind Maelle

[hoary nacelle]

Ooooh ok... || what does Revive Paradox do and how do i get it djdjjsjsdh ||

[languid gyro]

||Revive Paradox lets revived party members go immediately after being revived, otherwise their turn gets pushed back a bit from death||

[hoary nacelle]

|| ooohhhhh i see ok ||

Idk why i spoiled that lmak

Ok i understand !! Ty!

Do u happen to remember how/where to get it?

[languid gyro]

You can get it in [Act 2] ||Old Lumiere|| by beating the optional ||Chromatic Danseuse|| boss (I did not remember and just googled lmao)

[hoary nacelle]

Lmaooo ok im gonna go back there rn then

And about || cheater. I took it off of sciel and Lune (I'm using lune for breaking) cause I don't acruslly have enough lumina points to put it on lmao ||

[languid gyro]

Also ||having Auto-Death + Survivor isn't strictly necessary on Maelle, but it's a free way to get her immediately to 1 HP at battle start, which then triggers: At Death's Door (+50% damage), Critical Moment (+50% crit), SOS Power + Greater Powerful (+35% damage), and Solidifying (indirectly +20% damage via Powerful Shield)||

||So it's a completely free instant +105% damage and 50% crit that you're otherwise missing or have to get from elsewhere||

[hoary nacelle]

Oook real

I don't have || survivor either lmaoo, do you remember how to get it? ||

[languid gyro]

Also in an Act 2 area ||Monoco's Station; you can buy from a merchant there after giving him an Eternal Ice from the Gargant boss in Frozen Hearts||

[hoary nacelle]

Oooh ok cool I'll be able to do that!

Tysm for the help djjdjdjjsja

[languid gyro]

No problem! Lemme know if you have any other questions

For now though ||until you get Revive Paradox, maybe take Auto-Death stuff off your other two members lmao||

[hoary nacelle]

Gonna try getting it rn so hopefully it'll all work soon lmao

[pallid gull]

missed several easy parries and now everyone's gotta die

[hoary nacelle]

Felt....

[summer yarrow]

It’s going to take me sometime

To get use to the dodge parry mechanic

Is there like a hint?

[languid gyro]

There is!

Pretty much every attack has an audible sound cue that goes with the attack, which for many attacks is a clearer/more precise signal of when to dodge/parry than the ongoing visuals (especially since enemies will sometimes feint and try to trip you up)

[summer yarrow]

Oh

[languid gyro]

If you're just getting started, I would also suggest doing more Dodges to start because the window is more generous than for Parries. However, the Perfect Dodge window is the exact same as the Parry window, so if you start more consistently hitting Perfect Dodges on attacks instead of Parries, that's a signal that it's safe to switch over to parrying.

(Or you can be like me and stubbornly refuse to touch the dodge button ever, only parry or perish, but do as I say and not as I do 🥲 )

This statement is also not going to be universally true of everyone, but most of the time in my personal experience (and that of my friends), you're likely parrying too early, rather than too late (which is very understandable; tension/stress makes for itchy trigger fingers)

You do not want to spam the button, only press it when you actually think you need to, and when you need to is going to typically be as the attack is in motion, rather than you needing to "anticipate" the move (though your mileage may vary based on personal reaction time of course)

For example: if a lance-holding enemy is winding up for a thrust, you want to wait until they finish winding up and start the forward thrust before hitting the button (NOT hitting the button as it's about to thrust, in an attempt to anticipate it)

[hoary nacelle]

Got it!

[vivid peak]

Don’t worry @summer yarrow it took me a while to get the hang of too. The audio cue helped a lot once I started paying attention to it. Just practice until you’re used to it

[pallid gull]

i did it

https://tenor.com/view/orange-cat-gets-flung-and-explodes-orange-cat-funny-cat-meme-explodes-gif-10706110874965244466

[languid gyro]

Btw fun trivia for @hoary nacelle but also anyone past Act 2, really: ||300 mil damage, if done with Maelle’s Stendhal with Medalum equipped, is exactly the damage benchmark that would have been 1 bil damage before the most recent patch. The patch nerfed specifically Stendhal’s damage output by 40%, and also bugfixed Medalum to not just unintentionally double all damage while in Virtuoso stance, on top of the stance’s innate boost. So 300 mil / 0.6 x 2 = 1 bil||

||Basically, I was born in the wrong era reached Act 3 just slightly too late for the big damage serotonin 😔 ||

[languid gyro]

Also CONGRATS AIDEN WHEEEEEEEEEE 🎊

[pallid gull]

‼️ HUGE story spoilers + optional boss later into the game (like endgame) ||CAN VERSO'S PAINTED SISTERS STOP KILLING THEMSELVES IN FRONT OF HIM PLEASE WHY IS THIS A TREND||

the way tagging things is so hard lmao but it's a huge spoiler so do not perceive unless you've finished probably

[languid gyro]

oops

[pallid gull]

||i think what gets me is that painted verso loves painted alicia and painted clea like family because he is the same as them, but because alicia and clea still exist in the other reality, these 2 versions of them are like husks that just live off the grief they have in the family. verso was able to be his own person because original verso is gone and it really hits you that there is no one out there that can understand him because everyone that did is gone||

[pallid gull]

amphy 😭 did you get spoiled dskjhdfs

[pallid gull]

this is tied to the huge spoiler above lmao

[languid gyro]

It’s fine it was my fault 😭

I don’t actually remember what area you just said you were doing ||but I’m assuming Painted Clea is either at/near the top of Endless Tower or in Flying Manor because those are the only places left for me to explore besides Abyss (and I already know who’s there)||

[green escarp]

||Oh its even worse for Painted Clea because Clea found her and basically corrupted her by painting over her, robbed her of her free will and turned her into a nevron factory. When you win the boss fight, she gets a bit of her will back but not enough to be completely free from Clea and well....you saw what she did... ||

[languid gyro]

||Very very interested to see what she’s like actually given I’ve met all the other Painted family members but her||

[pallid gull]

||i feel for this family but man... the way they treated these painted versions makes me feel so sick lmao it's like they were brought into this world just to suffer and never be their own person||

[pallid gull]

||i actually have no idea what the abyss is, i need to explore that 🏃 ||

[hoary nacelle]

@languid gyro || I still don't have everything i could have (not enough lumina points T-T) but it's definitely working to an extent i think !! ||

[languid gyro]

Tbf I wouldn't say I "explored" it so much as I got there, realized "oh I want to save this place for later", and promptly left lmao

[languid gyro]

Yay! Also do you have Roulette equipped? Because if so you'd need to probably do multiple damage tests to get an idea of where your actual ceiling is since it can be inconsistent lol (that or unequip it and just keep in mind that whatever number you get could be up to double or half with Roulette on)

[pallid gull]

||just as i was mentioning it today about how they transformed verso's wonderland into... whatever this painting is 🥲 it's so easy for her to distance herself because she doesn't live in it, but everyone else will suffer||

[hoary nacelle]

I do yeah, I think that might be the highest but I'll try a few more times to make sure

[green escarp]

⚠️ Supreme Post Act 2 Spoilers ⚠️ ||On that note, I find Paintress Clea such a fascinating character. You can tell from things like what Esquie says or from interacting with child Verso's shade that she was a completely different person in the past. She created the world with Verso, she played and sang with Francois, and then the war with the Writers happened, Verso died, and Clea became much colder. She goes on a warpath against the Writers, while also trying to find a way to get her parents out of the Canvas. If you view the inhabitants of the Canvas as real people, the methods she employs with the Nevrons makes her nothing short of a monster. But she also shows hints that she still cares deeply about her family and is doing this for their sake. Its all so supremely messed up but compelling||

||Also as someone who loves the game's music, her theme being present in so many tracks, some more subtly than others, is such amazing musical storytelling and aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa ||

[pallid gull]

||fuck i gave her garments to lune and now this is awkward cause in this save verso is dating her... lemme not expose him to the trauma even further and change that 😭 ||

[hoary nacelle]

Yup it's definitely the highest! (For now 😼)

[pallid gull]

||i feel kinda odd that there's no conversation about it at camp, i know this is an optional boss but given the fact that this is, once again, extreme emotional damage for verso i'm like ? i feel like we should chat a bit idk lmao||

||it's okay, i'll just play his ost on the phonograph while everyone stares at him awkwardly near the campfire... meditating 💆 ||

[green escarp]

||I wondered this myself and my theory is its something that didn't make the final cut for the game||

[pallid gull]

that could be it

[green escarp]

I feel like it was an important enough thing and yet the game is like "welp we will never speak of this again" and I was like "huh..."

Who knows really

[pallid gull]

i had 200 lumina points hoarded what the fawk

[languid gyro]

felt

for the majority of the game I always kept at least 100-200 points in reserve because of who I am as a person lmao

[wheat tulip]

Maybe with a dlc 😭

[pallid gull]

i don't think they'll make one?

unless im spreading misinfo

[wheat tulip]

Ngl probably one of the only game when i feel like i need one

[pallid gull]

but i could've sworn they've said they won't

[green escarp]

We can dream! 😭

[wheat tulip]

For now they dont yeah

[pallid gull]

so valid honestly, you never know

[languid gyro]

I do think I've mostly reached a point in endgame builds where I have enough lumina to mostly finalize the main party builds I want but not enough to fully build out the two backup members so I'm just sorta like "so what do I do with these"

Also, man, I've been mostly trying to not install any mods for at least my first playthrough / 100% run (but maybe on NG+) but I'm really really tempted to just slot this one in: https://www.nexusmods.com/clairobscurexpedition33/mods/134

It has always bothered me a little (okay maybe a lot) when games say stuff like "deal low physical damage" or "deal high fire damage" because I'm like no I need actual specific numbers/ratios and it drives me a little insane sometimes 💀

it's especially egregious once you get to the higher damaging descriptions because low < medium < high is intuitive, even if I wish we had more precise numbers and not just vague adjectives, but once you get to stuff like "deals high damage", "deals heavy damage", or "deals extreme damage", etc. I'm always just like "well which one is bigger 💀 " because different games use those words differently

[green escarp]

Why does it not shock me that this is the most popular mod for this game atm lol
(Repost because I did not mean to Combo Break Amphy's posts)

[languid gyro]

(I see and appreciate you, Shadow ❤️ )

[hoary nacelle]

AAAAAA I KILLED THE OPTIONAL BOSS YAYYYY

[languid gyro]

CONGRATS!! 🎊 🎊 🎊

[hoary nacelle]

THANK YOU !!!

|| it died in one hit LMAO ||

[green escarp]

This game really just has no middle ground huh, lmao.
You're either getting your ass played like the bongos, or you are the Pontiff of Pain and big damage numbers are your God

[hoary nacelle]

|| omg it gives u a really good weapon for verso... too bad I don't use him... || spoilers about the optional boss post act 2

[green escarp]

||I refuse to use any other sword on Verso now because its so cool and I worked for it (I spent like 3 hours on Simon my first playthrough 😭 )||

Oh speaking of said boss ||Blossom do you like Dark Souls? because HOLY CRAP THE HOMAGE||

[wheat tulip]

OMG CONGRATS BLOSSOM!!

||i had to do it in 3 times roulette were pissing on me💀||

[hoary nacelle]

THANK UUU

[hoary nacelle]

|| no I'm sorry I'm not a dark souls person 😭 😭 ||

[green escarp]

I have no one to gush about this with, life is so cruel 😭

[languid gyro]

||Part of me is considering just taking Roulette off for the boss since I'm pretty sure my non-Roulette max damage is already high enough to guarantee the one-shot.... but part of me wants to see the big number on the damage screen... even if that means I have to potentially restart the fight on a low roll........||

[green escarp]

I need Mira to come back and finish that boss fight because I know she's a ||soulsborne|| fan. She'll understaaaaaaaaand

[wheat tulip]

Lmao im sorry you feel so frustrated by that shadow

[wheat tulip]

Hate and love that picto

[languid gyro]

I think no matter what the actual result of it is (which of course can sometimes be frustrating) I will ultimately always love the concept of it, if nothing else lol

[wheat tulip]

True

And the way you get it too lmao

[summer yarrow]

I’ll stop there for today. I started Act 1

[hoary nacelle]

Post act 2 hairstyle spoiler || HELPPP ||

[summer yarrow]

At the end of the prologue, ||when everyone got off the ship and the old man with the cane started walking towards the crew, the old man looked somewhat similar to Gustave ||

[green escarp]

Lol its ok I'm mostly being dramatic

[green escarp]

||Bald Maelle will never stop being cursed lmao||

[wheat tulip]

Thats why my answer is also dramatic !!

[green escarp]

https://tenor.com/view/drama-lion-king-oh-the-drama-best-actor-gif-10261664

[languid gyro]

Congratulations on finishing the Prologue!! 🎊 I'm so glad you're here with us on this journey ❤️

And I hope you're enjoying the game thus far!

[summer yarrow]

I am

It’s so good

[green escarp]

People meme about Peak Fiction but this game really is just incredible

[hoary nacelle]

Ok I've already taken || roulette off of maelle cause I'm sick of the inconsistency djdjdkkka || pictos spoiler ig idk what i should spoiler anymore help

[languid gyro]

Fair lmao

[summer yarrow]

Do you think the studio might make a dlc?

[hoary nacelle]

I somehow spawned 50 colours of luminas so I used those to pop some other luminas on maelle hehhehe

[languid gyro]

I have it on because I want to see the biggest possible damage numbers ||well, to an extent; I still haven't bothered making a setup where Maelle is guaranteed 3 Gradient charges for a round 1 Gommage, but that's theoretically higher numbers than my Stendhal setup|| but it can def be inconsistent, yeah

[languid gyro]

I believe at present there are no plans to (which, honestly, I heavily respect)

[pallid gull]

optional boss mechanic (not super spoilery like the other one i did but still) ||"serphenphare absorbs all aps" it should absorb these nuts||

okay my gif isn't working either

visualize the cat punch

i love this hairstyle on her... might be up there with the braid with bangs for me

[languid gyro]

What a diva ❤️

[pallid gull]

the way i took the second screenshot while the other 2 party members are on the ground lmao

[summer yarrow]

Am I tripping

I saw like a warped Eiffel Tower

[green escarp]

World is a fantasy version of France

so no you're not tripping, lol

[summer yarrow]

Ohhh

[languid gyro]

You've never seen France's famous Leaning Tower of Paris?

[hoary nacelle]

leaning tower of paris is my favourite fr

[green escarp]

Tourists tend to get bent out of shape about it though

[languid gyro]

[Act 2] ||something something verso's leaning tower of paris||

[green escarp]

Amphy

[hoary nacelle]

ok but like.... real..

[pallid gull]

omg there's a horizontal one too 🙂‍↔️

not me getting excited by emojis bye

[green escarp]

discovering new emojis is fun!

[hoary nacelle]

ok i need to go eat and drink something cause i hyperfixed on the game really hard making that build for maelle 😭

[languid gyro]

I know exactly how that goes 🥲 ADHD hyperfixation struggles

but yes go rest and hydrate and eat!

[wheat tulip]

||simon loot!||

[wheat tulip]

Enjoy your food!!

[pallid gull]

stopping as well because i just realized it's almost 3am lmao

went from an optional boss to another one immediately

[wheat tulip]

Did you got ||serpenphare?||

[pallid gull]

no i'm too sleepy and keep messing up and then it's just p2 ||lune|| against the world every time

idk how i've managed to make her a tank but sure

idk what we're spoilering anymore, im just gonna spoiler everything just to be safe 😭

[wheat tulip]

Understandable

Since we got tea and xamtt now

[hoary nacelle]

oooh yeaa real makes sense lol

[wheat tulip]

Yeah got the same reaction lmao

[hoary nacelle]

oh also when yall are saying p[number] are yall referring to the playable characters

by like order of hwo you get them or something cuz im a bit lost lol

or is it something completely different...

[wheat tulip]

Order of their appearance

[hoary nacelle]

oookkk makes sense

tyy

[wheat tulip]

And ||playability||

[hoary nacelle]

oki makes sense, ty for clarifying!

[wheat tulip]

Your welcome!

Im sorry im always talking in different messages😭

[hoary nacelle]

all good no worries

[hoary nacelle]

I clicked on this spoiler by accident and got so scared but it's ok || cause I've already killed this boss fjdkdksljd ||

[wheat tulip]

Blossom

[hoary nacelle]

🥹

[wheat tulip]

At least you already knew!

[hoary nacelle]

Yeah....

That was close 🤡

[wheat tulip]

Honestly theres not much optional bosses you dont know

[hoary nacelle]

Yeah i feel like I've killed a lot of them

I've done the || clea boss || as well

[wheat tulip]

||did you went into the eternal tower?||

[hoary nacelle]

|| the endless tower? Yeah I've been working my way through it ||

[languid gyro]

Rain already answered but yup! I do think at this point a lot of us have not bothered as much with spoilering the starting trio since a) most people are past that point and b) they're sorta plastered all over all the promotional material anyways so even starting off the game you tend to know they're in (but if you'd still like to, then ||P1 = Gustave, P2 = Lune, and P3 = Maelle, of course)||. But for sure everyone after ||so P4 = Sciel, P5 = Verso, and P6 = Monoco|| are good to keep spoilered

[wheat tulip]

Oh right its named like that in en sorry kgkff

[hoary nacelle]

Dw i understood!

[wheat tulip]

Its ||tour éternelle in french so i translated directly ||

[hoary nacelle]

Makes sense

[languid gyro]

Also, I think you've caught on, but we've mostly reached an agreement on ||not spoiler-tagging Act 3 with [Act 3] but instead some variant of [Post Act 2], [After Act 2], [Postgame] or something similar since the game does at least temporarily treat the end of Act 2 as the end of the game, with Act 3 being a surprise after the "Epilogue"||

[hoary nacelle]

Oh and also just before I went off i also did || optional boss in the painting workshop ||

[hoary nacelle]

Yeah that's what I thought!

And yeah that makes sense

[languid gyro]

||Lowkey a little annoyed that he doesn't give you the Lampmaster skill for Monoco 💀 had to go to Endless Tower for that foot instead||

[hoary nacelle]

|| I already knew the game had an act 3 cause I saw in it the title of a stream, plus the ps5 gives you a percentage of how far you are through the story of the game so I knew act 2 couldn't be the end cause it was no where near done lmao ||

[languid gyro]

||I kinda just "knew" because it's traditional for any story with "Acts" to follow a 3-Act structure so I just automatically assumed (and, likewise, it is also tradition for many JRPGs to have the "final boss" set up at the beginning to not actually be the Final boss, so the game continuing on after the Paintress wasn't a surprise for me either)||

[green escarp]

||Yeah the twist isn't gonna fool anyone familiar with dramaturgy, or with jrpgs, or who just looked up achievements or saw the soundtrack online etc. but the game does try to hoodwink you and at the very least it will make some folks go "hang on..." and maybe doubt. Some might even get pranked by it lol.||
||Its still good to preserve people's potential reactions to it by not just outright going in this thread "Oh yeah there's an act 3" so I'm glad everyone's on the same page ||

[languid gyro]

It's always so funny to me any time you do an attack and all the lumina effects pop up

[green escarp]

||I have so many at this point it lags my rounds for a second LOL||

||but if the game didn't want me to be able to equip so many, it wouldn't have given me the option! xD||

[languid gyro]

[Post Act 2 hairstyle] ||WAIT YOU CAN HAVE WHITE HAIR ON THE OTHER CHARACTER'S TOO?? LFGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG||

[wheat tulip]

||endless tower good stuff ||

[languid gyro]

||Damn, nearly 900mil||

[green escarp]

https://tenor.com/view/baylan-skoll-power-such-as-youve-never-dream-ahsoka-tv-show-power-ahsoka-gif-6832054741165723684

[languid gyro]

||Francois??? What are you doing here silly||

[wheat tulip]

||i mean clea did the endless tower sooo||

[languid gyro]

||Oh hey it just took a levelup, but I can hit 900 mil now 🎊 ||

||Wonder if I can manage a 1bil setup by 99||

[languid gyro]

||Oooooh I love this boss design (but also, pain 😭 )||

||Harsh, but true 😔 ||

||oh boo, 0 exp for trials you've already completed, I guess, so no grinding here lmao||

[languid gyro]

[endgame area] ||That's a whole Sith Lord over there||

[green escarp]

||I love you so much for that Star Wars reference ||

[languid gyro]

||Flying Manor is such a cool endgame location||

||look at all these colors ❤️ 💛 💙 ||

||Also really love how it's just... every nevron. Really makes this place feel like the origin (which it is, I gather; it seems like this place is Clea's workshop of sorts)||

[Post Act 2 outfits] ||also can I just say, wow my squad looks good 🤍 ||

Oh I never even noticed this happening but guess I'm a millionaire 💰

||Man maybe I should have come here sooner because this place has some good pictos||

[summer yarrow]

https://youtu.be/yj6JbgMdrZo?si=kh9jPH8UCIyp-zBZ

Lmaoooo

😭 I wasn’t expecting the ending

[languid gyro]

nearly 2 full pages of luminas on [P5] ||my boy Verso ❤️ ||

as deserved 👏

[pallid gull]

wait.... i just realized you CAN see what you've learned and what you haven't

it only took me reaching the end of the game to figure it out lmao

oh huh this is weird

i changed their pictos and later i died but for some reason that save did not register nor did my progress of learning them

i think it was because i did it while ||i was on esquie||

but good to know that doesn't work i guess lmao

[wheat tulip]

Understandable they explained it at the start of the game

[pallid gull]

tbf it's so hard to see it too 💀 no wonder i forgot and thought it never happened

[wheat tulip]

I watched playthrough of what i already played so it reminded me each time i forgot

[pallid gull]

does NG+ carry over your pictos as well?

[wheat tulip]

Huuh idk i didnt do ng+ yet😭

[pallid gull]

i shouldn't have learned anything, now i have a bunch of luminas unlocked and im overwhelmed af

https://tenor.com/view/orange-cat-gets-flung-and-explodes-orange-cat-funny-cat-meme-explodes-gif-10706110874965244466

[wheat tulip]

Aiden😭😭

[languid gyro]

[endgame optional area] ||damn they're really hyping it up I'm excited||

||OH LET'S GOOOOOOO||

||But also….even though I expected to run into Painted Clea eventually it was…not like this||

||So as I understand it, Aline painted in her own Clea just like the rest of her family, and then Clea came in and painted over Painted Clea, effectively transforming her into just… this mindless Nevron factory??||

||There’s like several levels of existential stuff I need to process (while also giving me time to listen to this banger track) before I can even fight 😭 ||

||Though speaking of the fight, I’m a little disappointed that it’s just a straightforward single boss encounter because they absolutely could have set this up to be a different kind of format, maybe summoning a bunch of waves of increasingly powerful nevrons (sorta like the Okumura boss in P5), so that a) players couldn’t just one-turn burst her down and b) so that characters with kits more suitable for sustained combat, like Lune or Monoco, get a chance to shine over the characters like Maelle who lean towards frontloaded burst, which is already a style favored for every other boss fight in Act 3||

||Or it could have been a ramping difficulty kind of fight, to favor a kit more like Sciel’s or Verso’s (well unless your Verso has an endgame setup like mine anyways), something like “summons a few moderately powerful nevrons” -> “summons a few strong ones” -> “summons a really strong one” -> finally “Clea herself comes out to fight and is stronger than the nevrons before” ; just, basically some battle format that’s different from the “you enter the fight and the boss is just sitting there alone ready to get immediately blown up” that’s been the rest of Act 3||

||As expected, just immediately dies 😭 ||

||The turn order was Sciel -> Sciel -> Verso -> Verso -> Verso -> Maelle -> Maelle, and Clea died on Verso's first turn, of three 💀 she never stood a chance of even surviving until Maelle's turn, much less surviving a Maelle nuke 😭 ||

[languid gyro]

||oh...........the way this happened was even worse than I was expecting despite the spoiler.........||

||like I thought it'd be closer to Painted Alicia where she regains clarity after the fight (which, like, kinda happened) and then asks Maelle to erase her, or something, rather than summoning Nevrons to surround and formally execute her wtfff||

[pallid gull]

||thinking about how that's probably the first time she regained any form of free will after getting painted over and it was just to die 🚬 ||

||like yes i feel for the dessendre family but actually if i were verso i would hunt them down||

||but he is split in two at the end of the day, he still feels very strongly for all of the ones involved||

[languid gyro]

||Agreed, big missed opportunity; it's one of those things where I get it's technically optional content but really feels like it should maybe have been incorporated somehow into the main story (though I understand that it'd potentially throw the pacing off but I just wish it were able to be addressed more); I have a feeling Simon is gonna be much of the same once I get there||

[pallid gull]

||the way idk who simon is, i gotta hunt down that boss then||

[languid gyro]

||I still have zero clue who he is or how he fits into anything 😭 he's just a name I've repeatedly heard about on the internet as "the big strong hidden superboss"; it's exactly the same vibes as me playing through Elden Ring for the first time and just being like "I know next to nothing about this Malenia woman other than it seems every one on the internet is hyping her up" lmao||

||Watch it be some shit like "the Dessendre family actually had two sons but this one was estranged/banished/exiled from the family for whatever reason"||

||Maybe this is the uncle of the family and we're about to kick Renoir's or Aline's brother's ass and I don't even know why yet, who knows I'm just spitballing||

||Though interesting that all the Dessendre family's journal entries are here at the top of the page, but Simon is here at the very bottom with Julie||

||So maybe not someone who's blood-related to the family but is important to a member in some other way||

[pallid gull]

the way i wrote an entire essay and derailed from the original point i wanted to make fdsjkhfdsjk

[languid gyro]

||oof...||

[languid gyro]

many such cases 🥲 🤝

||oh I was not expecting to have to make a choice 💀 ||

||Is it weird that I simultaneously feel like it's extra traumatizing yet also extra fitting to have it be either Lune or Maelle wear it; maybe I just give it to Sciel as the "safe" option aslfkjalkjfgasf||

[pallid gull]

||going back to this for a second because i had more thoughts. i know that metaphorically, the point is to showcase what grief does to people and how these "remnants" (verso included) are part of that process, consequences of that. clea painted over herself precisely because she has become a "nevron factory" herself, in the real world. no processing of the grief, just revenge. painted alicia died precisely because maelle has been subjected to guilt tripping both direct and indirect from her family members and is trying to let go of that and gain back some form of agency, for once. i understand, however, it is hard to not see them as "their own people". this verso is a memory, but he has become so much more than that||

[languid gyro]

||Leaning Lune though because she feels similar to Clea to me, in a way||

||Something about the way they compartmentalize their trauma and just harden themselves to continually push forward instead of pausing to grieve 😭 ||

[pallid gull]

||got it for lune, realized they're dating and i changed it because i was like freud would've had a field day analyzing this one 💀 ||

[pallid gull]

100%

very similar in that aspect

[languid gyro]

||(gonna change it back probably but) she's kinda slaying tbh||

[pallid gull]

it really suits her

same with ||cleas hair on maelle, she looks so cute ||

[languid gyro]

||I need Verso to have some kind of agency by the end of this game I swear to god 😭 feels like the entire story has just sorta been him getting tossed around||

||I feel so bad for the remnant of boy Verso's soul too, just watching his childhood Canvas crumble around him as it's torn apart in a feud between his parents||

||The story in general is such an interesting window into grief and loss (and love) and how it affects people (but of course with such a heavy central theme, the tone of the story is going to inventiably be as we can see 🥲 )||

||There's definitely a bitter irony in being so torn apart by your son's death that you effectively tarnish his memory and torment his soul in the process of your grief, to say nothing of the effects on yourself and the rest of your family||

||And to then have the son (both as the remnants of the childhood soul and as the Painted self) be able to bear witness to all the pain happening "because of him" (but also "not him" in the sense of Painted Verso and oh god I'm going into spirals again just trying to imagine the layers of existential pain and dread he's wrapped up in)||

[optional endgame area] ||oh the atmosphere of this area is oppressive as hell||

||Here we go 👀 ||

[pallid gull]

||https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/1361259350966145044/1376187928400625867/SPOILER_Clair_Obscur__Expedition_33_2025_05_25_14_32_52.png?ex=68351322&is=6833c1a2&hm=c1ca0dbb0dc34c3c56ef2aca3fd4408f30c3dc2ec7b49359fb279aa787d40f68&=&format=webp&quality=lossless&width=1068&height=600 ||

https://tenor.com/view/speechless-smoking-man-old-man-smoking-old-guy-smoking-old-man-cigarette-gif-16836230630449212567

[languid gyro]

||Oh that violin is going crazy though 🔥 and harpsichord???||

||Clea painted over him?? I need to know more about him so bad and why he seems so important; because no way some random Expedition member a) gets special attention from Clea, b) is able to fell an Axon by himself, and c) is sealed way deep down at the bottom of the world||

||I'm guessing there's a phase 2 because no way people were worried about some dude who couldn't even survive a few free aim shots from Verso||

[pallid gull]

||the way i have a feeling that i can tell how this is gonna end and idk how i feel about it because i think i've come to see him more as his own person than anything, but i don't know if that's a thing that will lead anywhere with the situation that he's in||

[languid gyro]

||Do we think this story is going to have a happy ending? I want it, but I just can't see it 🥲 ||

[pallid gull]

the french insist on hurting me

[languid gyro]

||Endwalker???||

||Also I guess that immediately answers my question of who he is and why he’s important||

||The Una Vie a T’aimer motif hello???||

I also did not extend this courtesy for the past few bosses (but probably should have, I’m sorry ||Clea||) but kinda want to just pass my turns and redo the battle for real later, just so I can see what the attacks look like

[wheat tulip]

Thats always something i wonder tho ||why una ? Une is hard to understand ?|| i ask because its not the first time i see it

[wheat tulip]

You can always try in ng+ i think

With more hp

[languid gyro]

||"The dead are removed from the Canvas" F||

||OH I get it he has a little phantom sword that trails his attacks, so everything needs to be double-parried||

Tfw you parry 6 attacks in a row but the combo's only halfway done and you die anyways 💀

I do kinda want to eat breakfast soon though, so maybe one last attempt where I don't attack and just try to parry/see the attacks, and then after that I do the fight for real

||Love that Verso with only free aim shots and a basic attack can get take 50% of his HP down on his own, before we even get to Maelle||

|| 🫡 🫡 🫡 ||

||The achievement being called "Peace at Last" though 😭 the man finally gets to rest...||

[wheat tulip]

||Almost a billion...||

[languid gyro]

||Oh just straight up "can't die" I mean sure why not asdalksdjasljd||

||Also very kind of them to give it to me already at level 33||

||It does seem worse for my teamcomp/strategy than what I already have unfortunately, but it's a cool weapon||

||omg it glows! ✨ ||

||Reading this journal entry now, having just come directly from Flying Manor.........||

[wheat tulip]

||thats why clea manipulated simon through painted clea ||

[languid gyro]

Looking at Steam achievements it’s mildly amusing to me that more people have beaten ||Simon|| than have ||collected all of Monoco’s feet, or beaten all the Gestral games even||

damn I remember when I was fighting for my life to get even one of these

Does anyone know if there's a way to sort a) hairstyles and b) camp music records by alphabetical, instead of the default, which is by the order you got them?

[wheat tulip]

Depends

You can in the inventory but not in the disk reader😭

[languid gyro]

F

[wheat tulip]

And i dont think for hairstyles

[languid gyro]

Sandfall please 😭

Oh btw, found this while looking through things to figure out if I'm still missing anything before finishing the story, but here's a handy-dandy 100% Completion Checklist for anyone who would like such a thing (just make a copy first, instead of checking off directly on the source doc)

[wheat tulip]

Idk if we can pin that

[languid gyro]

I'll let @pallid gull make the call

Also pinging to cry with him for a sec because I just found out through the checklist that [white nevron sidequest] ||you miss out on a picto if you don't kill the White Chalier 💀 ||

[languid gyro]

Alright looks like I have pretty much everything except a few pictos to hunt down, which I shall do after breakfast

And then...I might have to stop there actually because I have to go do stuff in about...2 and a half hours? (so with breakfast + picto hunting that's likely less than two hours left)

I think I'd rather do the entire last area all in one sitting rather than starting it and stopping partway

[languid gyro]

Which, granted, maybe two-ish hours is enough to burn through it all, but I don't know that I want to feel rushed, probably safest to just save it for tonight when I get back home

[languid gyro]

Also did not piece this together till just now but ||the fact that the Axon that Simon kills is probably the one that was based on Clea, just by process of elimination (since Visages = Verso, Sirene = Aline, and the Reacher Axon = Alicia).... 😭 ||

[wheat tulip]

Yup...

||it was giant city man right?||

Oh female then since theres that

[languid gyro]

||The one quite literally carrying the city on its back.....the symbolism.......||

[summer yarrow]

Act 1 ||found Maelle. I love her fighting style already and I wasn’t expecting a JUMP mechanic for the fights either. That was amazing ||

||GESTRALLLLLLLSSSSS ||

[summer yarrow]

Wait can someone explain Maelle’s kit for me? ||I understand she changes stances and that offensive stances deals more dmg, but also takes dmg. I don’t understand the other 2 stances. I killed the enemy too fast ||

[green escarp]

Yep!

still backreading, holy posts batman

[languid gyro]

Sure, basically:

• Offensive stance: deal more damage (50%), take more damage
• Defensive stance: takes less damage, more AP from dodge/parry
• Virtuoso stance: deal way more damage (200%)

You can tell what skill switches to what stance by looking at the icon in the top right

For example, up here you can see a red icon in the top right, which means this skill switches her to Offensive Stance (blue icon means Defensive, purple means Virtuoso)

Every time you switch to a new stance (so for example, switching from Offensive to Defensive/Virtuoso), you gain AP; if you stay in the same stance twice in a row (or say, use a skill that "switches" you to Offensive stance when you're already in Offensive), you become Stanceless and have no bonuses (so you're heavily encouraged to constantly be switching)

Also, if you're in Offensive, a basic attack switches you to Defensive; and vice-versa (though I find this rarely comes up)

[summer yarrow]

Ohh ok

[languid gyro]

Finally, some skills have a bonus effect depending on the stance you're already in. This one, for example, will apply more burn if you use it while already in Offensive stance (and then, as you can see from the top right icon, you will switch to Defensive stance after using the skill)

[summer yarrow]

[languid gyro]

If you've ever played any Slay the Spire, Maelle's kit is almost exactly the same as Watcher's (and if you haven't, and you should, then when you one day play Slay the Spire and unlock Watcher, you can immediately go "oh hey this is basically just Maelle's kit from Expedition 33" and understand it immediately lmao)

[summer yarrow]

I’ll add it to my list

[green escarp]

⚠️ ENDGAME SUPERBOSS SPOILERS ⚠️
||I guess I can kinda see Endwalker. But also this is very much a Dark Souls homage ||
||Simon is a walking loveletter to Knight Artorias. A hero who journeys to The Abyss (like, 1 to 1 Dark Souls right down to the area name lol), falls and gets corrupted by dark powers beyond comprehension, loses an arm and wielding a greatsword. He even does the pose in phase 2! Which granted that pose came from Berserk originally and has been referenced in media constantly (including the spectral berserker from Shadowbringers in FFXIV), which Miyazaki (as in Fromsoft's not Ghibli's lol) as gone on record as Artorias and Dark Souls drawing inspiration form Berserk. Simon's greatsword also bears a resemblance to the many incarnations of the Moonlight Greatsword found in Fromsoftware's games||

Don't mind me this particular thing makes me giddy

[summer yarrow]

lol I just learned that I was using lvl 1 weapons

When I have lvl 2 weapons

[languid gyro]

Once you get a little farther into the game (pretty soon actually) you'll be able to level weapons pretty freely, at which point it doesn't really matter what level they start at (since you can just level up the lower-leveled ones to match); instead in the early game you'll mostly care about what special skills the weapons come with and lategame you'll care about what stats they scale with

[green escarp]

Ok I am caught up on backreading now

Got busy in here while I was asleep lol

https://tenor.com/view/good-evil-star-wars-emporer-palpatine-darkside-gif-4624104

[languid gyro]

||Good to know! I have not played any Souls games, so references like these pass me by and I appreciate you bringing them up lol||

I also think I've done just about everything there is to do other than go to the final area:

• I've collected all possible pictos (and mastered them all as well)
• I've collected all possible music tracks
• I've collected all possible outfits and hairstyles
• I've collected all possible expedition journal entries
• I've found ||all the lost gestrals||
• I've collected ||all of Monoco's feet||
• I've maxed ||all relationship ranks||
• I've cleared all optional areas and beaten all optional bosses
  (Obviously all of the above comes with the caveat of *except the ones only found in the final area)

I think I'm ready

[green escarp]

||I feel like that's everyone except me and Mira in this thread, and Mira hasn't fought Phase 2 of Simon yet so I've just been nerding out alone lol 😭||

|| I know Lorie will absolutely lose her mind when she gets to this point though, that will be quite a day||

[languid gyro]

There's only two things, really, that are left I think, which are:

• Reach level 99 with all characters (I'll probably let them organically level within the final area first, and then do outside grinding if needed after reaching the final flag)
• Collect all weapons (this one I...should probably do; I just haven't felt as motivated to do so because I think I'm pretty set on my main team's endgame weapons already)

But also...I have like 40 minutes to kill before I have to leave for a thing, which doesn't leave me enough time to do the final area but does leave me enough time to go weapon hunting so maybe I do that anyways just bc there's nothing better lmao

I know there are quite a few I've left unpurchased at merchants because I was too poor at the time

[languid gyro]

Currently getting my ass beat by ||Golgra, because I need to beat her in a duel with Sciel to get the last Sciel weapon I'm missing|| 😭

||I can get her down to her super saiyan form but then I just do not know the combos lol||

Ayyyyy let's go we did it 🎊

[wheat tulip]

Congrats !!

[keen thunder]

Post Act 1 character spoils || https://vxtwitter.com/sandfallgames/status/1927007462298701928?s=46 ||

Sandfall Interactive - CO:E33 out now! (@SandfallGames)

Just a lunch break at work trying to settle who would win Verso VS Renoir 1v1 between @Vincent_Aros and @deleardvictor.

@TEKKEN https://t.co/IqzJxxEdWQ

vxTwitter / fixvx · May 26, 2025, 2:22 PM

[wheat tulip]

Lmaoo

[summer yarrow]

Is resetting the ability tree bad?

Do I skill keep the abilities I’ve unlocked ?

[summer yarrow]

Act 1 ||reach Gestral Village ||

[wheat tulip]

Nope everything reset when you reset the ability tree so be aware

[summer yarrow]

Ok

[wheat tulip]

And the reset item is quite rare at the begining of the game

[summer yarrow]

It would tell me I can unlock a new skill

And then when I check, I don’t have enough points

[wheat tulip]

It just shows up every time you level up

[languid gyro]

And likewise very common later; I have used like a dozen reset items at this point, have not bought any of the shop ones, and still have like 60 left over

The game is extremely generous with them

[wheat tulip]

Yeah its just at first

[summer yarrow]

||Lazy but powerful. I love Esquie|| Act 1

[summer yarrow]

Finished act 1

||What is happening why does Renoir care about Maelle ||

[vivid peak]

Hope you’re enjoying it

[wheat tulip]

Oh wait not that reaction its an onion💀

[summer yarrow]

||Ngl the same model for the male characters is throwing me off, but the story is amazing ||

[wheat tulip]

Where are you again jonjon?

[languid gyro]

Congrats! And also I’m sorry 🥲

[summer yarrow]

So much happened

In like 3 mins

[vivid peak]

Still in act two

It’s been a while since I last played

[summer yarrow]

Pulling Lorie’s stream up

Just to rewatch this part

[summer yarrow]

Is act 2 long?

Is it longer than act 1?

[wheat tulip]

Oh i thought you were still in act one congrats

[green escarp]

Entirely depends if you do side stuff or not and how well you can get through battles

Otherwise I'd say its maybe a bit longer

[languid gyro]

I think it’s a little longer if you do everything

[vivid peak]

I’m doing a lot of side stuff so

I’m not in a huge rush to finish the story

I just enjoy the world

[summer yarrow]

||I barely managed to defeat the lamp master first try ||

||I wasn’t expecting a phase 2 ||

[wheat tulip]

As you should its a game where you are just chilling ( and fighting for your life)

[hoary nacelle]

2 questions cuz I need help (post act 2 spoilers) || how do I Revive noco? Cause I need to do it for monoco to max out his friendship but whenever I go into the sacred river area nothing happens, no dialogue triggered, nothing, so I'm very confused😭 And number 2: there's like a broken bridge in the Isle of the Eyes area and I want to know if there is any way to cross it?? ||

I'm asking here and not Google cause I'm scared of getting random spoilers i never asked to see lmao

[summer yarrow]

||Is the campfire base portable ? ||

[wheat tulip]

||Wait what? Thats weird you are supposed to trigger a dialogue||

I dont see wdym for the seconde one sorry

[hoary nacelle]

|| nothing happens for me😭 ||

[wheat tulip]

||did monoco talked about it in the camp?||

[wheat tulip]

Yesnt?

[hoary nacelle]

|| the area has like a broken bridge in it with stuff on the other side (enemies and shit) and I wanted to know if anyone knows how/if u can cross it ||

[hoary nacelle]

|| you can go to camp from the open world only ||

|| so if you're like actuslly in an area you cant go to camp, sometimes the game also puts u into camp automatically after story events ||

[wheat tulip]

OH

||you need to find 3 disgusting ennemies and hit their red eyes ||

[hoary nacelle]

|| oki I'll have a look in a sec for that ty 🫡 ||

[vivid peak]

||yeah you can only go to camp outside of the domains/dungeons whatever you want to call them||

[wheat tulip]

||They cant move but their eye will follow you||

[summer yarrow]

||Like while playing through the story, the campfire backgrounds seems the same even though the crew made a lot of progress getting closer to the paintress. That’s why I just assumed it was like portable ? Has do with like a gadget?||

[summer yarrow]

Oh

[hoary nacelle]

|| I actually never paid attention to if the bg gets closer lmaooo ||

[hoary nacelle]

Yippee it worked tyyy

[wheat tulip]

Lets go it was that one i wasnt sure 😭

[hoary nacelle]

Yeah i was super confused when I went there first too 😭 I was just like || wow these eyes are creepy anywayyyyyy ||

[hoary nacelle]

|| yeah im at the stage where if you try to spend time with him it tells you to go to the scared river, but nothing happens when i go there 😭 ||

|| I've maxed everyone's friendships but his because it just won't workkkkk ||

[wheat tulip]

Mmmh try to do some update of the game maybe?

And if it wont work

Huuh

Idk the word fuck

[hoary nacelle]

Say it in French (joke)

[wheat tulip]

Mmh ampho sent a link directing to that sort of issue

[wheat tulip]

Thats the issue idk either !!

[hoary nacelle]

Lmaoo

[hoary nacelle]

The game doesn't need any updates so idk fjdjdkdnxiekemmda

[languid gyro]

@hoary nacelle just to check, you’ve already ||received the quest from Monoco to go to the Sacred River?||

[wheat tulip]

Oh person of the day is here🙏

[hoary nacelle]

Yup

[languid gyro]

And then at ||the Sacred River, did you interact with the big glowing pink gestral?||

[hoary nacelle]

That i have not done.....

I did not see this...

That may explain it....

[wheat tulip]

Oh i forgot we have to do that 😭

Your issue is resolved now !

Lets goo

Thanks ampha!

[languid gyro]

Lmaooo it’s all good; hopefully that resolves it

[hoary nacelle]

OK YEAH

This is it

Thank youuu😭

[summer yarrow]

||Lmao the man bun has me dying. Watching a prologue playthrough and there is this one NPC who asks if Gustave wants a haircut for one token and she somehow makes his hair longer 😂||

Prologue

[pallid gull]

optional area ||endless tower feeling real endless right now||

https://tenor.com/view/dog-walter-walter-dog-bull-terrier-long-nosed-dog-gif-26541605

[wheat tulip]

Which stage are you on?

[languid gyro]

At least the rewards are 🔥

It’s also probably the best place to get [P6] ||Monoco feet|| since you see pretty much every enemy type at least once (and the rest you can get from [endgame optional area] ||Flying Manor||)

[pallid gull]

10, trial 1

[pallid gull]

yeah!! i'm only missing one now

[wheat tulip]

Ooh you can do it!

[languid gyro]

Oh almost there!

||I do think it’s fun that they gave us exactly 33 total trials, because of course they did||

[pallid gull]

||HEEELP NOT 33... gonna be here for the rest of my life||

[languid gyro]

||Just to clarify! That means 11 floors with 3 trials each! Not 33 floors! You’re almost there!! (You can do it!!!)||

[pallid gull]

oh!! okay that's not too bad then 😭

other optional areas ||i think after this im gonna go to check out renoir's drafts... i went there a while back and then ran cause i was severely underleveled and got my ass beat asap lmao||

[wheat tulip]

You are gonna love this place

[pallid gull]

i really wanna finish the game but at the same time im like lots of splorin

i still haven't fought ||simon|| and apparently there's other optional areas i haven't been to yet

[languid gyro]

I explored quite literally everything else first before continuing on (which I haven’t yet but maybe tonight or tomorrow night)

So I get it

Pretty much set that I will be finishing the game this week though

I’m not sure I’m ready 😭

[wheat tulip]

||Same i beat the final boss after have being done with everything else , of course i think i missed some chromatique mini bosses but thats okay||

[summer yarrow]

Act 2 ||Just got to Old Lumiere and now I’m fighting Renoir ||

||renior dancing when attacking 😭 let me parry in peace!! Stop the taunt ||

[hoary nacelle]

https://bsky.app/profile/expedition33.bsky.social/post/3lq5u7no5522n

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (@expedition33.bsky.social)

Thirty-three days ago, we released Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.

Since then, we’ve sold 3.3 million copies.

Seriously. As of today.
We couldn’t make that up.

Another entry on the long list of surreal moments that your support has made real.

Thank you ALL.

Reposts

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Bluesky · May 27, 2025, 2:04 PM

thats insane omggg jrehgrkjefdg

[wheat tulip]

Lets goo

[keen thunder]

They were waiting for the number but congrats to them! Definitely deserved

To put it to perspective it took a few months for NieR Automata to reach 2 million

[wheat tulip]

Oh wow

[green escarp]

One of my coworkers is turning 33 this year and I joked about [Prologue Spoiler] ||The Gommage||.
She didn't get it, but then I told her about Expedition 33 and she's gonna look into it

https://tenor.com/view/im-doing-my-part-serious-stare-gif-11979677

[summer yarrow]

||Damn that Mask Axon took me 25 minutes to beat.|| Act 2

[hoary nacelle]

Post act 2 spoilers pertaining the main story. Question: || I'm about to go do the renoir fight in Lumière, will I be locked out of reaching max level after it or can I like come back and reach max level later cuz idk what to expect (it's cuz i want the achievement lmao) ||

[languid gyro]

I have not beaten the game yet myself, but from what I’ve heard: ||beating the final boss places you at a flag right before it, so you can still explore, level, and do other stuff after||

@green escarp can probably confirm for sure though

[summer yarrow]

How far are yall in the main story?

[hoary nacelle]

Oki ty !!

[green escarp]

You are correct

[languid gyro]

I have done everything (including optional exploration stuff) except the final story boss, so I’m really close to being fully done (like potentially “by tonight” close)

[green escarp]

I'm on NG++, so I've beaten the story twice.

...I don't have a problem

[summer yarrow]

It’s so good

[hoary nacelle]

Time to actuslly continue the main story after doing every single bit of optional content I was able to see 🫡

[summer yarrow]

Totally understand

[hoary nacelle]

I'm trying to get super close to 100 percenting the game this first run and then I'll get anything i missed on a ng+ run

[summer yarrow]

Is the map huge? I see a bunch of clouds blocking the map

[green escarp]

Fairly big by endgame I'd say

[wheat tulip]

Oh wow already?!

[green escarp]

124 hours is "already" to you? :P

[wheat tulip]

I mean look at aiden hours

[green escarp]

Aiden is intentionally holding off on finishing the story

[wheat tulip]

[green escarp]

I'm the opposite of "I'm gonna delay finishing the game because I don't want it to end", I'm the "THIS TRAIN HAS NO BREAKS" kind of gamer lmao

[wheat tulip]

Oh damn no breaks?!

[green escarp]

NONE!

[languid gyro]

I mean I’m over 100 hours and not done with my first playthrough so…

[green escarp]

Eww I did not see the uglyfrog in that gif

is it me or is finding gifs on Discord's thing really shitty lately?

[green escarp]

Yes but you spent at least 50 of those in menus by your own admission

[languid gyro]

An integral part of the experience

[wheat tulip]

Vrai vrai

[hoary nacelle]

Question for ppl who have finished the game/100%ed || am I able to get all of the music records in the game before the renoir fight in lumière? I wanna get the achievement but don't wanna spoil myself by googling it fjdjskkw ||

[languid gyro]

||No, one music record is earned at story completion||

I’m not there but I did look through a list to make sure I didn’t miss anything lol

[hoary nacelle]

How does one look at this list without spoiling themselves tho

[languid gyro]

You don’t, really, but at this point I accepted the risk lol

[hoary nacelle]

Ok i think ill just do it in a ng+ so I don't spoil myself lmao

[languid gyro]

Also remember that you can keep exploring after you beat the final story boss!

[hoary nacelle]

Oh i didn't know that

Ok cool let's goooo

[wheat tulip]

||the last one is in lumière so you cant 100% before || warning last zone of the game

[hoary nacelle]

|| I actuslly just got that one lmao ||

[wheat tulip]

Lmao lets goo

[hoary nacelle]

|| I'm still missing 4 tho 😭 ||

|| but if u can keep exploring the map after killing thr final boss ill just grab them afterwards ||

[languid gyro]

There’s only one, I think, that’s permanently missable, which is ||Lettre a Maelle||, so if you have that one you’re good to grab the rest while exploring later

[hoary nacelle]

I have finished the game.. rolling credits rn ||😭 😭 😭 ||

[wheat tulip]

Congrats blossom!!

||which end did you chose?||

[hoary nacelle]

|| I chose to not destroy the canvas ||

[wheat tulip]

Really hope no one else saw that💀

[wheat tulip]

||ouh maelle end i see||

[hoary nacelle]

|| though I'm gonna go through it again rn to get the other ending ||

|| didn't get to see any of renoirs attacks cause I deleted him lmao ||

|| so from now if I click continue it would start ng+? ||

but i completed the game and got a majority of the achievements in about 60ish hours !!

[hoary nacelle]

|| oh shit what i can't do that lmao ||

|| this save is like after the completion of the game... do I need to do a ng+ to get the other ending? ||

|| oh I just found the ng+ button lol ||

[languid gyro]

Congrats!!

[hoary nacelle]

Ty!!

[languid gyro]

Won’t be home for a couple more hours but hoping to join you later tonight in completing the game 👀

[green escarp]

||If you want to see the other ending without going into NG+ you'd have to find which of your 20 autosave slots is right before the boss fight, but honestly I'd just look up the other ending on youtube because the endings themselves don't matter for achievements or post game progress as it won't treat which ending you picked any differently||

[hoary nacelle]

|| ok cool! I'll do that in a sec then! I think before starting ng+ I'll get all the achievements cause it's probably easier to get them all like that before starting ng+ ||

|| would i be able to then pick the other ending in a ng+ if i wanted to? ||

[green escarp]

||Yep. NG+ starts the story all over again, just with higher scaled enemies and loot, and you keep all your pictos/weapons/levels/lumina etc||

[hoary nacelle]

Yippee ok cool

That all will be for a different day then as I have been playing for like 5 hours😭

[green escarp]

https://tenor.com/view/rookie-numbers-gif-26135237

[hoary nacelle]

|| ok i just watched verso's ending on yt and omfg 😭 this ending is way better man i shouldve choosen this one jsdfghkdsjf || still ending spoilers

[wheat tulip]

Feels that too!

||theres no perfect ending but it feels way better than the maelle one ||

[hoary nacelle]

|| i picked maelle's cuz i love her sm but after watching verso's it has a way nicer conclusion tbh, even tho the canvas is gone and its sad that everyone maelle loved in there is gone, at the same time, staying in escapism forever because you dont have the will to live in the real world is ALSO really sad. I can see both sides of the coin here when it comes to how the two of them feel, but it think the canvas being erased is better for the dessendre family in the end. They'll never get through their grief in they basically live in it forever ||

[pallid gull]

almost clicked

https://tenor.com/view/orange-cat-gets-flung-and-explodes-orange-cat-funny-cat-meme-explodes-gif-10706110874965244466

[green escarp]

AIDEN NO

DON'T YOU FUCKING DARE

[hoary nacelle]

|| tho my only question is, how can u play ng+ with verso's ending if the canvas is gone?? 😭 ||

AIDEN DONT

[pallid gull]

it's okay, i didn't!!

[hoary nacelle]

I SWEAR

GOOD GOOD 😭

u cant click any of this rn grrrr

[pallid gull]

it was almost by habit lmaooo but it's okay

i will finish this week probably

[hasty halo]

Should I level to 99 before finishing the game?

[pallid gull]

after i defeat optional boss ||simon||

[hasty halo]

Or should I save that for NG+?

[hoary nacelle]

good luck 😭

[hasty halo]

I also feel like i'm missing Pictos

[green escarp]

||Ending has no bearing on the post game. While you can't refight the final boss without loading a previous save, the game is basically acts like you're at the point right before.||

[wheat tulip]

Oh wow

[green escarp]

You can if you want to, but you'll get more experience in NG+ because of the scaling

[pallid gull]

||is it harder than clea??||

[hasty halo]

Alrighty

Thanks shadow

[green escarp]

||Yup||

[pallid gull]

https://tenor.com/view/dog-walter-walter-dog-bull-terrier-long-nosed-dog-gif-26541605

[wheat tulip]

||its the hardest boss of the game ||

[pallid gull]

im so cooked

[wheat tulip]

You can do it!!

[wheat tulip]

So gonna see aiden trying to beat it during a week cjfkckf

[green escarp]

||Either invest in the Maelle one-shot builds, or pepare to learn how to dodge/parry all his moves||
Have fun! :)

[pallid gull]

does optional area ||endless tower|| have any story if you complete it?

[hasty halo]

I don't even know if I'm ready to beat the game yet lol

[wheat tulip]

Yesnt

[green escarp]

||Some extra dialogue from Clea's shade||

[pallid gull]

||im like 4 stages away from completing it but im also itching to move on to something else... but i feel like i should just power through lol||

[hoary nacelle]

ahh i see ok

[pallid gull]

||i dont have a lot of optional things left, but i really want to explore renoir's drafts and check on simon||

[wheat tulip]

||clea is such a bitch 😭 i can understand her but at the same time im like really girl?? I guess obession against the writers was her escapism ||

[hasty halo]

Mostly because [Late game spoilers] ||I still can't figure out what to put on Verso||

[green escarp]

|| edit this to say endgame or late game, act 3's existence is something the game tries to make you doubt and we wanna preserve people's experiences||

[hasty halo]

Done

[languid gyro]

Love so many of us finishing in the same week ❤️

[pallid gull]

and then what

[hoary nacelle]

we play ng+ and we CRY

[hasty halo]

we continue

[Late game spoilers] ||Soooo Verso, Maelle and Monoco are all in the 83-84 level range. I just don't really know what skills to put on Verso and Maelle at this point||

[green escarp]

I'd be continuing my NG++ run but I'm just so tired

I hate my job this week

[hasty halo]

I haven't even touched the game in a good few weeks lol

Because I've been playing other stuff

[hoary nacelle]

i think ill start ng+ sometime this week after i get everyone to max level and get all the achievements cause im stubborn and want 100% lmao

[hasty halo]

And kinda needed a little break

[languid gyro]

I see this take a lot and I get it because ||we get so little of her and what we do see is cold, but I honestly really feel for her?? From what we can tell through dialogue from Verso’s soul, Francois, Esquie, etc. by all accounts Clea used to be full of love and joy too (and despite how she talks to Maelle most of the dialogue implies to me that she does care and want her to be happy and free), but she was forced by her family circumstances into closing off her emotions and pushing her own grief aside in order to take on everyone else’s burdens. She’s Verso’s brother too, but she’s not even allowed to stop and grieve because the family is still under attack and everything is just falling apart around her and no one is shouldering this with her because they’re all escaping or infighting in some way||

||In fact the Axon that Renoir painted after her is quite literally a titan holding the entire weight of the city on its back and I don’t think the metaphor gets much clearer than that||

[pallid gull]

||thinking about how verso told maelle "and then there's you, his actual favorite" lmao||

[hasty halo]

Been internally blasting the ost in my mind lol

[summer yarrow]

I skipped this part of the game, but how do I obtain skill points so I can unlock more abilities?

[languid gyro]

||Clea being neither of her parents’ favorite despite killing herself inside to keep everything from crumbling like 👁️ 👄 👁️ ||

[languid gyro]

Level up

[summer yarrow]

Is it by leveling up ?

Oh

Is that the only way?

[languid gyro]

Every level up you get 3 attribute points and 1 skill point

[green escarp]

Yep

[languid gyro]

Yes, it’s the only way

[summer yarrow]

So for me to unlock lvl 10 ability I have to grind

[green escarp]

At level cap you get enough to get every skill a character has

[languid gyro]

You get exactly enough by level 99 to have all skills unlocked

[green escarp]

hi Amphy 🧠

[languid gyro]

It’s not a “level 10” ability, just a skill that costs 10 skill points to unlock

[pallid gull]

||i feel for all of them but i think what gets me is seeing it from painted verso's perspective and then i realize that if i were him, i would harbor a lot of resentment towards ALL of them, including maelle. but i am not him and he has been made in such a way where he feels a connection to them all and despite it all, that's family, flawed and all||

[summer yarrow]

Ohhh

[languid gyro]

If you ever feel a need to redo your skill tree, you can also use a recount (the game hands them out like candy, probably well over 100 by the end just from drops, loot, and shops)

[summer yarrow]

I’m a little curious, but is there like a one shot sciel build ?

[languid gyro]

But generally I’d recommend at least skimming everyone’s skill trees when you first get them so you have some idea of what you’re saving points for

[languid gyro]

There’s a one-shot everyone build

Every character is capable of completely stomping the lategame by the end

And it honestly comes down more to weapon selection (and upgrades) and, even more importantly, your picto/lumina setup, than anything else

[wheat tulip]

Yup... || shes not even mentioned during the ost about the parents arguing like why?? Shes there come one||

[languid gyro]

||He deserves everything and yet the world gives him nothing, or takes what little he has||

[pallid gull]

||they're too busy thinking about their dead son and protecting while also blaming their younger daughter 😭 ||

[wheat tulip]

I know ||shes has her own but it feels so bad ||

||Such a realistic family ugh||

[green escarp]

||no lyrics but her leitmoftif is present in the final boss music||

[languid gyro]

||Hell, even the way she painted over Aline’s Painted Clea to just become a nevron factory just further drives in how much her modus operandi seems to be to just shut her own desires and emotions away in favor of focusing solely on The Mission or what Needs to be Done (very Lune coded)||

[wheat tulip]

Is she? Thanks god

[green escarp]

||Yep! So she's still there despite not being mentioned in words. I'll let you decide if that's more tragic or not||

[wheat tulip]

Smh

[green escarp]

I'mma keep saying it: Lorien Testard is a prodigy. Such masterful musical storytelling

[wheat tulip]

Truly

[hasty halo]

Agreed

[green escarp]

unrelated rant which is why my post was edited like 5 times: I'M GONNA FIND WHOEVER DECIDED THE APOSTRAPHE KEY NEEDED TO BE NEXT TO THE ENTER KEY. AND IF THEY ARE NO LONGER WITH US I WILL USE NECROMANCY TO BRING THEM BACK SO I CAN BURY THEM AGAIN

[hoary nacelle]

ending spoilers || ive also been going crazy over the names of all the songs, this games soundtrack is just incredible and how they can reuse melodies to make you feel certain things. Une vie à t'aimer (act 2 renoir fight), Une vie à peindre (final boss renoir fight) and Une vie à rêver (song that plays before the actual scrolling credits) stick out the most to me. And then ofc the credits song being called Maelle and being the same song as Alicia (main menu song) but with different lyrics 😭 this games sountrack is just incredible ||

so many thoughts in my head right now

they are swimming like little fish

[wheat tulip]

As they should

[green escarp]

https://tenor.com/view/school-of-fish-swimming-fish-ocean-nature-gif-17097077