Grandia Part #162 - The Grandeur 1

Part 162: The Grandeur 1

Welcome back!

Dang. That is one snazzy office, considering it's on an airship.

: Heh, heh. How intriguing... so Leen has a younger, twin sister.

: Yet it makes sense, come to think of it. The Ancients made Icarian statues of four armed women.

Even the intro FMV showed two Icarians. Kind of a neat little point of continuity.

Y'know, assuming we ignore the bit where Leen was old enough to help take care of Feena, despite being her twin.

: No... I... I... I'm just a person! Let me GO!

: What are you afraid of, girl? You will be part of Operation Yggdrassil. The greatest step in human evolution!

: Justin...? Is that the name of the boy who has the last piece of the Spirit Stone?

: Coming to SAVE you is he? He shall be dealt with soon. And I will obtain the Spirit Stone.

: Justin will BEAT you! He's MUCH, MUCH stronger than YOU are!

: Heh, heh. My, my... how energetic you are my dear.

Thankfully, an alarm interrupts Baal's attempts to

: What's that noise...?

: Huh!? Justin?

Meanwhile....

Looks like Baal wasn't the only one to hear the alarm.

For some reason, I feel the urge to replay Mega Man Legends.

It's a very exciting sequence, I assure you.

Unfortunately, the ~~Gesselschaft~~ Grandeur has all of its cannons facing forward.

And our Manta takes a direct hit.

It's a good thing Justin is immune to fall damage, otherwise this might be worrisome.

: GUIDO! Are you all right?

: Well... I've felt better. Justin? Tell me why it is that I'm always falling down when you're here?

Figured some of you might enjoy this one.

: SOME people might be WORRIED about their friend at a time like this!

: Stupid pile of JUNK! I oughta just TRASH the whole ship!

You can tell it's serious when Justin starts being the pragmatic one.

: OK, OK. Only a little trashing until we find Feena, I got it.

: Anyway, ragazzi, we can no do nothing if we no get inside.

: OK. Look for Feena. And watch your backs too!

So, the Grandeur is a pretty memorable dungeon. But first....

I figure that the best thing to do with Milda's skill XP is to give one to Justin, one to Rapp, and the final to our fourth party member.

Guido keeps the Thunder Arrow, but Rapp swaps out for the Bloody Knife. After all, we're fighting a whole bunch of humans here. Surely this is the best place for it.

Also, before you start, don't miss this Fruit of Moves up here on the wall. +5 max SP is nothing to scoff at.

And with that out of the way, let's discuss the single enemy type present in this dungeon.

These guys are pretty no-nonsense. Neutral to all elements, and resist sleep. They can drop rescue sets, which restore 120 HP to the whole party, as well as Battle Helms, which give some defense and magic block resistance.

Heavy Blow is, as the name implies, a strong hit. 120 power single-target physical attack. Justin doesn't want to get hit with this.

Sword Dance is a single-target 60-power magical attack. Because magic attacks ignore defense, it'll usually wind up doing more damage than Heavy Blow.

Finally, Shocksword is a 30-power magical attack that hits the whole party. Oddly enough, it does earth-elemental damage.

They always attack in groups of three, and there are plenty of them in here. The usual strategy for this dungeon is pretty basic.

10 IF (SP > 45)
20 THEN
30 USE "DRAGON CUT"
40 ELSE
50 SAVE_POINT, RECOVER
60 GOTO 10

However, that's not really an option for us. Partially because Justin hasn't recovered between the Zil Ruins and now, and partly because Rapp really needs some magic XP.

But first, let's see how that Bloody Knife does.

Not bad. Not bad at all. Let's see how it compares to the Godspeed Knife.

That... that's well within the normal damage variance. What the heck?

Turns out that the Bloody Knife is missing the "extra damage to human-type enemies" flag.

Funnily enough, it's not the only piece of equipment from the Castle of Dreams to lie about its effect. The Death Mask says it reduces IP damage taken. Not terribly uncommon, several other pieces of armor do the same thing. Except for one minor detail: it actually increases the IP knockback the wearer receives.

Just, y'know, thought that was worth a mention.

Each of those soldiers on the field becomes a group of three in battle. There are quite a few.

Y'know, I think the only propaganda that Garlyle'd need at this point is "We're the only motherfuckers with airships".

Eh, he was only one level away.

Still needs a few more earth and water levels, though.

The Grandeur is pretty light on hidden items. This here, the Warrior's Mail, gives a decent defense boost and resists move block.

Phew. That gauntlet is done.

.... Should probably mention that, at some point during the whole thing, Justin picked up his next mace level, and learned his final tech. But we're still a ways off from that.