Update Time!

I have been coming to the conclusion that the game really wants me to be following the main plot and wait until I have a real party before tackling some of these missions. I've been stuck on the Abandoned Castle mission for the last two days. I've spent that time failing this mission reading up on some stuff for the game. I've been dabbling in blacksmith stuff and even managed to make a Damascus weapon for Laura, though it's on hold until later since it qualifies as "too good to be used" at this early point in the game. I'm hoarding any Mullock I find since it and steel are the key to forging Damascus gear.

I did advance the plot a little and acquired a fourth party member. I also did a wacky mission that involved destroying a mansion with a magic axe. Pretty fun stuff. I did technically advance the game much further but reset because I was afraid that this might fall into one of those weird categories where some side missions may disappear if I advance the plot too much because SaGa is kind of notorious for that kind of thing. So I know I get a fifth party member rather shortly after this next story part, so I may just advance and grab him since I can only level up by doing side missions and story dungeon missions.

For those wondering why the Abandoned Castle mission has been a bitch and a half, the structure of this mission is just cruel. You have a 150 turns to finish the mission. It is three stories with close to twenty rooms per floor. The place is loaded with treasure which I've already cleared out most of it. The issue comes that you kind of have to follow a story element in this dungeon where you're chasing some Crazy Old Man who is responsible for the curse on the dungeon. The place is crawling with aggressive monster types and they will level up into their higher tier classes depending on a few factors. The dungeon has several puzzles which often require lots of backtracking to hit switches. One of them will likely take 20 turns on its own. Half my issue is just getting harassed by the monster in this dungeon and the other half is messing up trying to open locks or diffuse traps which the place is filled with. The boss of the dungeon is the Old Man's pet Wyvern who slaughtered my battered party the first time I encountered him. I whooped his ass the second time, the one time I got to that point with most of my party's LP intact since everything in this dungeon is either tanky, powerful, or both. The issue is that once you beat the boss you have to leave the castle within the allotted time frame and that is what failed me the last time. I needed maybe five more turns to escape and finally beat this silly dungeon. I'll come back with the fifth guy I feel...

Laura - Has been doing pretty good with sparking new weapon techs and really showing how fun the battle reel gets once you've acquired a few skills. As I guessed, there are higher tier abilities for the different weapon techs. She's been an Ax/Sword specialist and if I ever manage to find a decent magic based panel for her (like a Familiar) I may start having her move into the Battle Mage role I plan for her. As series tradition, she can't seem to spark any new techs from Tomahawk. She did once, but that was one of the times I got killed doing the Abandoned Castle mission. She's been a real powerhouse and has the best LP of my team at the moment, which is a bit of a problem since I tend to make her tank hits but this is one of those games where "MC death = Game Over" so I'm hoping I'll get a better tank later.

Henri - Has been my second tank character since he surprisingly has the next highest LP at 12. He also tends to parry attacks more often than poor Laura, probably due to using daggers instead of swords. I have him using Spears which has been really good for him as well. He's been sparking some good moves and Spears are once again pretty brutal. In fact I'm starting to see that piercing weapons are more consistent with doing LP damage to enemies. I'm trying to keep him light weight since it affects his ability to dodge and his speed. While the third skill for his unbreakable dagger is so-so, the fourth skill is actually pretty good and compensates better for the weapons low attack power.

Judy - Has been doing a bit better now that I've figured out how to do learn and use magic more effectively. So in order to learn magic from tablets, you have to use magic in battle. The issue is that casting takes time so magic is notoriously slow. I also think the amount of XP you get is dependent on both the type of spell you use and the tablet. She's focusing on her Forbidden Magic tome. for the moment. She has done a great job sparking moves for her bow, I'm only annoyed that heavy metal bows are the ones that start with the more useful Random Arrow skill than lighter wooden bows. One saving grace is how her staffs do learn a parry skill so that's been helpful. I am annoyed because I learned too late that enchanted weapons can't be reforged, so her awesome starting staff with Fire Arrow is now just a staff that lets me use any Fire Magic I've learned but sadly she hasn't learned any spells for that class. I did manage to find an armlet with the Purify spell so she can actually heal in my team. I'm hoping I can find a Water and Fire Tome for her once she masters her Forbidden Tome.

Michelle - Ah the new girl. Michelle hits a character archetype I always forget that I really love, and that's the character that is cursed with bad luck. You bet your ass that Ashton was my favorite character in Star Ocean 2. Like Ashton, her bad luck does actually play into her character build. She has a cursed gauntlet on her that she's trying to get rid of. I would love to get rid of it too because it's occupying her middle slot on her board and is a Negative Panel that can't be combo with any other panel for stat bonuses. So she's kind of gimped, except her starting stats are pretty damn good, she';s one of the fastest characters in the game, and she comes with a gun. Her panel selection isn't bad either except for the fact they're all in the wrong place. She has a sword panel but it's over by her magic while the Earth Magic Tome she has is where her strength is. On the other hand, her stats seem to lie, or equipment simply makes that much of difference because she's on par with Henri at least with damage and her Earth Magic is pretty good. I've already taught her Boulder and Sleep. I've even upgraded her gun for more uses, but sadly it doesn't look like guns get additional techs like other weapons, instead their reel modifies damage based on if you hit a reel that has a focused shot versus a miss panel where she fires blindly at the enemy. Her biggest draw back so far has to be pathetic LP. She has 6 in total. My ten year old squishy mage has 10. So poor Michelle has to stay in that back-row until I acquire more gear with Life Protection. She does have a serious knack for unlocking skills on her gear though. Like in the first dungeon I had her for, she was unlocking a skill for her equipment about every other battle. Did I mention she reminds me of Scorpia from the new She-Ra series? She actually says hi to monsters when you encounter them and will say Oopsiedaisey when she screws up a skill roll.

Overall, my team isn't too bad. The big change has been delving into weapon crafting a bit more and finally getting everyone geared with some better materials. Going from stone swords and Copper axes to ones made from Iron or Silver is a big boon. I just need to be careful because my team really does better with lighter gear. I'm also trying not to ignore magic and build Judy up with Michelle and Laura as backup mages. I can give Henri some enchanted items so he can cast magic as well but I'd rather focus on getting him more thief skills like higher tier panels for Lockpick and Diffuse. I may just jump further into the plot to recruit my fifth party member who looks to be the heavy hitting tank character this team desperately needs. I wonder if Laura and Henri's story is partially inspired by Albert and Sif from RS1? Henri is also a run away prince of a fallen kingdom, and Laura is a bad ass semi-replacement mom figure/bodyguard. It just reminds me of the scenario I sort of wrote for the two characters when I played them.