Part 62: DS So You had a Bad Day

DS Update 7: So You had a Bad Day


Hello, everyone! Last time, our heroes fended off an attack on Fabul Castle, but they still lost the Wind Crystal, and Rosa, for their troubles!

We can't let things stand as they are. We're off to storm Baron Castle!


Our ride is waiting patiently for us right here. Let's go!



I will.



Of course



Oh, don't you worry about that!
Take care of yourself, you hear? Why don't you take this with you?


Ooh, a shiny! That makes three now. Don't worry, I'll explain what the hell these things do very soon!


The gang all files onto the ship.

Well, time to meet the ship's crew!


Rest Easy. We'll be laying anchor in Baron before you know it!
Best not linger any longer.




Well, a salty sea dog and an enthusiastic crew! This bodes well. I'm feeling pretty good about this voyage!


And with that, the ship sets sail. You don't have to steer it or anything. Captain Salty and his crew know where they're going!


The ship turns east, then starts heading south, and our crew have a little chat.



First, we must find a man named Cid, the engineer of Baron's airship fleet. He should be able to help us.

Then let us hope he is still safe.



Ryida, ever perceptive, notices something is wrong.



No, it's nothing.

Welp, there went my good feelings about this voyage. It was nice while it lasted!


We sail a little farther south, when suddenly there's a roaring noise, and the screen begins shaking wildly!




Out of the briny deep,


a massive tail(?) surfaces, and submerges once again!



The tales were true!

It's him!

The Lord of all Waters!

Leviathan!

Leviathan is a Biblical sea monster. It is sometimes portrayed as a sea serpent, and other times a giant fish or whale. As far as sea beasts go, I think Krakens are cooler, but that's just my opinion.


Polsy


Well, that sucked.

...
Uhn... Ugh.


Cecil wearily pushes himself to his feet.







Yang?


Cecil looks around one more time, listening for a response.


Poor Cecil. This is the second time something like this has happened to him.


We are indeed all by our lonesome, and way to the southeast of our goal. Damn it. Talk about inconvenient detours!


As it is, Cecil, you might as well be the last man alive on the whole planet!


Well, we certainly can't continue on like this! We need some supplies, and maybe some directions.




... Scratch that. We are so dead. So very, very dead!


Maybe they'll be kind enough to let bygones be bygones and give us directions?


I don't suppose there's any chance he's about to give us some candy?


Oh, yeah, a black mage tried something like that back in Baron Castle. Heh, good luck, buddy!


Huh?


Shit.


And now we get to wander around town as a frog. Hurray!

Strangely, all the shop clerks will still sell their stuff to you, frog or no. Yay, capitalism!




Checking out the tavern...


What the hell, Cecil? Everywhere you go, people are scared shitless of you! What did you do to these poor people?


Oh... rampant murder and theft. Right. I forgot.


Is that what they sing around here instead of the Ghostbusters Theme?


Ah! Finally, a nice person!


Hey!


Damn, that's cold.




Great, now I'm a poisoned frog.

Oh the plus side, I guess it can't get any worse, right?


This one doesn't take no for an answer, or indeed, give you a chance to answer!

The reason for that is because...


Polsy


I was so wrong. So very, very wrong.


On the plus side, at least Pig and Frog don't stack! What would that even look like, I wonder?


This poison is starting to annoy me, though. While poisoned, every other step you take, your character flashes red and a sound effect plays. Oh, and you lose health, too.


All fixed! Well, somewhat fixed. At least Cecil's not poisoned anymore!

Now he's just a tasty, fat piggy... wait. I don't think I've thought this through very well!

A Diet Ration could cure the Pig status, but I only have one of those. Therefore...


I'll hit up the Inn instead!


Eh, it's twice the price of a Tent, but I'm not sure if Tents cure status effects...


A good night's sleep and Cecil's right as rain again! And no one tried to slit his throat while he slept, to boot!

Things are looking up! Let's chat up the rest of the townsfolk.




Wait, really? That doesn't sound very safe, lady!

To travel the Road even for the short time required is to forfeit much of one's vitality. It is no easy path.

Liking the sound of that thing less and less all the time. Thanks a lot...


Mental note, stay away from that door. Bad things are in there!


Is there even one person in this town who'll treat a lonely dark knight like a normal person?


Help!
It's the dark knight from Baron!





He's got a point, Cecil. What are we doing here?! Out of every place on the planet, what possessed us to stick around where we're hated the most?


We'd better get out of here, Cecil, or drown ourselves in that pool. One of those.


Maybe this place'll be a little friendlier?


Is that some kind of hippy shit? Because I am so not in the mood for that right now!


Well, I know who I need to talk to, in that case!


Fantastic! Things are finally looking up. Let's chat up the old geezer.





My name is Cecil, and until recently I served as Lord Captain of Baron's airship fleet. When I came before, I did so at the orders of my king- orders I lacked the courage to disobey.

You've come to apologize, then? Words do not heal wounds, dark knight, nor do they restore life's flame to those whose candles have been doused.


Cecil has nothing to say to that. What can he say?


I will hear your words.

I seek to stop a man named Golbez who has taken control of Baron.



This was no doubt part of the test that has been ordained for you.
As long as you lean upon that dark sword for strength, you've no hope of defeating the evil you face.


If you truly wish to cleanse yourself of darkness and face this man of whom you speak, then you must go to Mount Ordeals in the east. Destiny awaits you there.


Cecil, no one's buying the "friend" business! Cut it out.

This friend means much to you, doesn't she? But you must not let fear drive you to haste. The fate that hangs about your shoulders is one far greater than you know.


Should the hallowed light deem you worthy, you will become a paladin- a warrior or virtue.


Will you try where others have failed?


That's the spirit, Cecil!

Good. But you will have little chance with that dark sword alone. I shall provide two mages to accompany you.

All right! Now we're talking!

Palom, Porom!




A young girl runs up.



Where is Palom?




Augh! Where did that come from?!


I'll have you know Cecil's hygiene is impeccable, young man!

I'm only helping you because he told me to. You'd better be thankful!




They are young, and still in their apprenticeship, but I can vouch for their abilities.

What he means is that I'm Mysidia's most esteemed magical prodigy and you're incredibly lucky to have me along!

Oh Palom.



Your name is Cecil, right? Pleased to meet you.

Well, at least one of you has some manners!


She even does a little curtsy. D'awww.

Palom!


There, was that so hard?




He jumps in the air before going back to his arms behind the head "I don't give a shit" pose. I love these two.


Hell. YES! Two of my favorite party members!


Our task is clear!

Oh, and a lot of the people in town have different dialog now. Let's have a look.




Makes sense!


I have two adorable mages with me. I'm sure I'll be fine!


Oh yeah? Well, just watch me!


You, a Paladin!? You cannot mean that!

Oh I do, lady, I do!


Yep, sounds like a good idea to me!


This guy is a fucking liar. Cecil's sword kills the enemies there just as easily as anything else!

That is to say, pretty well!


Fuck yooooou!





Oh yeah, once you have Palom and Porom in your party, the townsfolk will no longer do mean things to you. Except the dancer. She'll always turn you into a pig. Forever.

Well, let's meet our new party! First, their thoughts:







You got that right, little buddy! You can burn all the zombies you want!

And now, say hello to the newest members of the crew:


First, Palom, a level 10 black mage. He comes equipped with pretty much everything he needs to roast things from the word go!


His list of spells isn't too impressive at the moment, but remember he's only level 10. He has a lot of growing to do and he'll learn plenty of spells to rain death upon his foes!


Here's his sister, Porom. She also comes with a lot of really nice gear, and a high Spirit stat to match her brother's Intellect.


Here are her spells. Again, she's only level 10. Both she and her brother will be learning plenty of spells in this update alone. Porom will be keeping us alive for the foreseeable future.

Now, onto our next order of business:


Remember these? These are the Augments we've picked up so far. We have three of them, and three party members. I'm sure you can see where I'm going with this.


First, Counter goes to Cecil. Now, any time he takes damage (I think only for physical attacks, but don't quote me on that), he'll counterattack without using his turn! You can kill things without doing anything! And since Cecil is such a tanky some-bitch, he'll be able to dish out way more damage than he takes!


When you use an Augment, you'll see a ghostly image of the person who gave it to you. This isn't too interesting for Counter, but it can get weirder...


Next, Auto-Potion goes to Porom. If she were to equip this, she'd automatically use a Potion whenever she took damage. Regular Potions only, mind. Hi-Potions and X-Potions do not work.


An image of Rosa pops up for this one. Don't worry, Rosa, we'll rescue you soon!


Lastly, Palom gets Item Lore. Item Lore is a fun Augment. It doubles the efficacy of items. So, your Potions will heal 200 HP instead of 100, for instance. This would be incredibly handy in conjunction, with, say, Edward's Salve ability! Just something to keep in mind if you're playing along at home.



We see a ghostly image of Anna, since she's the one who gave us this Augment. She probably meant for it to go to Eddie... Oh well!


Now, in order to enjoy the effects of Augments, you have to equip them in the abilities menu. Let's do that!


Here's Palom's new ability loadout. Notice I didn't put his Flame Rod on there, like I did with Rydia's weapons. I didn't have enough room to do so. You can only equip 5 abilities at a time, and one of them must be Item, annoyingly.

It's not so bad, though. I can still access Palom's Flame Rod through Items. It just takes a few more clicks, is all.

You can see Palom has a couple of unique commands, as well. I'll show those off once we get into a battle.


I slap Counter on Cecil. Now he can kill things much more efficiently!


I elect not to equip Auto-Potion because 1)It's not that great, since it only works with regular Potions; 2)It'll eat through Potions like crazy. There's not much point to having it on all the time. It doesn't hurt to equip it right before a boss fight, however...

Porom also has some nifty unique commands. They too will be shown off once I find some suitable guinea pigs!


Oh, and since Porom has no need to smack things with her staff, I replace her attack command. I'll demonstrate what that does, too.


Next, a bit of shopping. The armor shop has some nice stuff! I nab an extra Wizard's Hat. You never know when some other magically-inclined person might join the party without proper headgear!


There's also some very nice, and very expensive equipment for a knightly sort of person. Yet, Cecil cannot equip any of it! Hmm...


This fellow gives us a hint about that! Still, it couldn't hurt to pick up a couple pieces, for later. I just need a bit more cash!


The weapon shop doesn't sell anything terribly interesting. It might be a good idea to pick up an extra Flame Rod, if you've the cash. I didn't, and end up wishing I had, but it's not that big a deal.


Also, even though she's a white mage, like Rosa, Porom can't equip bows. Odd!


However, she can equip this, which we luckily had the foresight to borrow from Rosa before she got captured! (If you didn't, sorry, it's gone forever!)

It gives a hefty bonus to Porom's Spirit stat, making her an even better healer!


The item shop has some good stuff, including these! Cottages refill all of your party's HP and MP. We'll soon be outgrowing Tents so...


I sell the ones we have, except for one. I need that for something, later. You'll see!


Cottages aren't cheap, but they're mighty handy on long journeys!


I also take the opportunity to pawn some of our extra, useless shit, like these two Shadowblades Cecil no longer needs! Hello, 2,000 gil!


And those 25 Iron Arrows I bought before... In my defense, does it make any sense at all that you only ever need one? Come on!


I profit nicely from selling my cast-offs, and buy one more Cottage.


And I have enough for a Lustrous Shield,


and some Knight's Armor! I'm sure these will come in handy later!


Well, that does it for Mysidia! Time to move on.

Mount Ordeals lies to the east, like the Elder said, but let's do a bit of exploring first, shall we?


There are some new enemies here! The one to watch out for is this one: with a hefty 941 HP and a wind weakness.

You may recall Leave fought one of them in the very beginning of the game. This is their first appearance in the DS version. They're not particularly tough. You want to watch out for them for a different reason.


Before I get to that, let's play with our new toys for a bit!


Twincast works pretty much the same as it does in the GBA version. It only works if both twins use it.


While they're charging up, we get to see Cecil's new command in action! He took a hit from the Zu, so...


he gets to smack that asshole right back! As you can see, Cecil can handle Zus no problem! The Twins are pretty fragile at this stage, though, so watch their HP!


Once Twincast finishes charging, it's time for the twins to unleash hell!


Yessss, burn baby burn!


Niiiiice! I like what I see.

Naturally, it wiped out the remaining enemies. Now, Twincast is pretty sweet, but it does have some drawbacks. For one, it takes a really long time to charge, so it's not really worth it for normal battles. Two, it carries a hefty MP cost. Pyroblast there burns 30 MP from each twin. At this point, that's a large portion of the Twins' MP pool. Think carefully before casting it!


For the twins' victory pose, they jump in the air and spin around. It's pretty adorable.


Now, here's why you want to watch out for Zus: they drop a good chunk of exp!


The twins both level up from killing some birds!

Learned Pig

And Palom picks up his first new Black Magic spell!


His sister is not to be outdone! (When Porom levels up, she jumps into the air and claps her hands. Cute? You bet your ass it is!)

Learned Raise

Her first new spell is a hell of a lot more useful than her brother's. Phoenix Downs are expensive and I'm broke! Now I don't need 'em.

So, given the twins are only level 10 when they join, it's not a bad idea to spend a bit of time leveling them. Zus should give them one level a piece, easily! I didn't level them too much because I don't want to over-level myself, but bear this always in mind: this game hates you. Never forget that!


No new enemies here, I just wanted to show of Porom's healing staff.


Whatever it does, it targets the whole party. Interesting!


The effect is called Heal. I vaguely remember, I think it was in the original Final Fantasy, there was a White Magic spell called Heal. It was a weaker, full-party version of Cure.




Well, that's pretty much what the Heal Staff does, in any case. Eh, it's free, it's quick, and it gives Porom something to spam every turn if you have no other pressing business for her to attend to. It's sort of like Rosa's Pray command, in that sense, except it doesn't scale with the party's HP, and it doesn't restore MP.


And let's try out Palom's Flame Rod, while we're at it. If you go to Items and press up on the control pad, you'll automatically be taken to your equipped weapon. From there, you can use your weapon like an item, assuming it has any special effect.


The Flame Rod is just a free Fire spell.


One really nice thing about Item Lore, and a really good reason to put it on Palom: it works on attacking items as well, including weapons!




Here's the damage he does with a normal Fire spell, for comparison. Yeah. Item Lore turns Palom into a little murder machine and a decent backup healer, all in one convenient package!


Oh, and like in the GBA version, the Deathbringer Sword can sometimes cast Death on hit. You know, assuming Cecil just doesn't outright murder the shit out of whatever he's attacking (which he usually does)!


The exp you get from anything not-Zu isn't as impressive, but it's still enough to give the twins another level up!



Learned Blizzara

Ah hah! See? He's already learning the mid-level Black Magic spells! I told you he'd come along quickly.



Learned Protect

Another really useful spell! It'll definitely save your ass in this version, mark my words!


The twins have one more unique ability each, which I will show off on this unsuspecting Zu.


Palom has Bluff, while Porom has Cry.


Bluff makes Palom puff his chest out, and temporarily double his Intellect score! Use that, drop a multi-target spell, and watch the bodies fall!


Cry makes Porom well... cry. (They're just crocodile tears, though; don't worry!)


It lowers the enemy's defense. Not nearly as useful as Bluff, in my opinion,


but it does make things a bit more susceptible to being stabbed in the face!


Not that Cecil needs much help...


Oh yeah, here's how much exp Zus drop all by themselves. Your leveling needs? Totally covered! (Must resist, must resist!)



Learned Fira

Nice! I'm not sure that would do much more damage than his Item Lore-boosted Flame Rod, but at least it can multi-target!



Learned Cura

Very nice! A little piddling Cure won't do much for Cecil, but Cura certainly will!


There's Mount Ordeals, but we have one last stop to make first.


It's here, at this oddly-shaped stand of trees.




Hmm, seems like a nice place.


Well, look who it is!


What about me, you ask? Well, as you know, I've been traveling about, recording all manner of events. But after awhile, I came to realize I enjoy camping more than filming!

Oh, here we go again...


Instead, I've made it my goal to travel around the world camping in all sorts of places.



Oh, but you needn't worry! My friend who lives here in the chocobo forest has promised to take up the mantle, and continue recording the events of our time!

This means we can now access the Event Viewer from Fat Chocobo.


If you have enough to spare, might you be kind enough to help me out? I'd be willing to pay top gil.




Eh, why not? It just so happens I have exactly one spare!



Received 300 gil in exchange.

Since Tents sell for 50 gil a piece, this is a fantastic deal if you have 6 or fewer on hand. If you have 7 or more, it's a rip-off! As it is, I made a tidy profit, oh yes I did!


Until we meet again, indeed, -ingway!

Of course, what's a Chocobo Forest without-


Chocobos! The White Chocobo restores your MP, just like in the GBA version.






The generic yellow Chocobos are just adorable, encounter-free transports!


Need to get somewhere in a hurry, and don't want to deal with any pesky random encounters? A Chocobo is just what you need! I doubt I'll end up using them much, but they're cute!


That'll do it for the Chocobo,


and for this upda-


Oh goddammit! Really?


Oh, whatever! Hey, look, an Item Lore-boosted Potion! Restores 200 HP, like I said.


Oh, and Zus can drop Silver Apples, I guess? Silver Apples raise one character's max HP by 50. I'll hold onto mine for now.



Learned Thundara

That rounds out the mid-level spells! Palom should be ready to murder his way up Mount Ordeals.



Porom didn't learn any new magic that time. Oh well.




The twins are looking much better already!


OK, and now that does it for this update. Tune in next time when we scale Mount Ordeals!