Part 45: Episode XXXVI: The Keys to the World

Music: Relentless Advance



Alright, I guess we’re gonna throw down with Old Man Rhydderch. Rhydderch... Try saying that aloud. It sounds like some weird Brit slang for a STD. Ugh... You hear about Quincy? He was foolin’ around on leave and got the Rhydderch... Poor bastard.



While our party is sticking to the fair three combatant system, Rhydderch’s summoned pets are sticking around for the battle. Our first order of business is to thin the herd. But first, let’s take a look at what we have to contend with here...



The Deermon he—Deermon? Really? That’s what you named the demon deer men? Fuck you, game... The deermon shoot lightning. Since we’re not in the market for powering up any spent batteries or drained spritnite, playing the lightning rod isn’t a great option. Especially when it’s doing 125-150 HP of damage each turn they’re still alive.



On the other hand, the Summoniels, the winged creatures that look like they just missed the cut for a Shin Megami Tensei game, can shoot a volley of razor sharp feathers at a single target (or group if our party has bunched up) for 25 HP x 8 hits. Or coming close to 200 HP of damage. Can you see why we chowed down that salad to boost everyone’s HP?





Good old Blowbeat can work its magic and clear the field, since the summoned creatures only have around 200 HP each. And in the process, if we’re lucky, Rhydderch will pick up a few status ailments. Though, we absolutely cannot rely on Blowbeat to lock down this boss. Not only is he highly resistant to debuffs, he can at times, for no particular reason, just outright instantly negate debuffs like Paralysis or Confusion.

Anyway: Let’s start dealing with Rhydderch. He’s got 4208 HP we need to burn through during this battle. I’m really curious as to why everything in this game has such weird max HP values. I know for a fact enemies aren’t scaling to our level. They must have had some wonky mechanical formula to determine the average level players would be at and it spat out HP values for enemies and bosses per stage in the game. Some kind of automated bullshit was involved, of that I’m almost certain.



Anyway, this old wizard is a total dick with a medley of magic spells at his disposal. Like Demi. Aeterna has had the Demi spell for quite some time, but we’ve not seen an enemy cast it. It’s quite damaging, as it turns out.



But more annoyingly, Demi is a spell that sucks in nearby targets together. Both so they can be hit by other magic spells simultaneously (most magic does have an AOE factor to it, it’s just usually quite small.) And also it spreads out our party so AOE spells, such as Endir’s Aura, don’t work on everyone at once.



Hence why Setsuna has come in for the Healer role that had previously been filled by Endir most of the game. Cure II is just Cure but it heals the entire party guaranteed, regardless of distance.





She also has Luminaire, but of course that doesn’t work worth a damn against a wizard, who is innately super resistant to magic attacks. And it also wastes WAY too much MP. If you’re playing this yourself, I hope you stocked up on Ethers because this battle will likely burn through more of ‘em than the bulk of the game prior to this.



Partly because Ryback is a real fucker and has access to both Drain (steal a chunk of our party’s HP to heal himself) and Osmosis (steal a chunk of our party member’s MP.) He doesn’t even need to use Osmosis. He has infinite MP. He just does it to be a dick. He just steals that MP and tosses it on the floor. Wizards... Completely without morals, every last one of ‘em...



Also in Rygar’s stable of spells is Holy Light. This is also really damaging and has a mild AOE. So that’s around 200 HP gone if he happens to cast it where two characters have been drawn together by Demi.



Lastly, Rybeard can just summon more friends at will. There’s no trigger for this. He’ll just randomly decide to call in reinforcements at any point in the battle. Sure, they go down in a single Tech of any degree. But man, I’m already rationing MP as it is. Don’t make me waste it on your demon cats, grandpa.



As far as attacking Ryckert goes, physical Techs work out pretty well overall. The object of this battle is mostly just keeping everyone alive and full on MP. The best thing that can actually happens is have the Blowbeat dual-tech cause Confusion on Ryddick, since that will make most of his spells do 100-150 of HP in damage to himself for a few rounds. This is especially useful when he falls below 50% health, since he starts using this little number every turn:



Spell Stream. All this does is make him glow blue...





Oh and he also gets to use two spells in a row. Every single turn. Any of those spells we’ve seen so far. So he can just cast Demi and then Holy Light to down a good 400+ HP of damage on two-thirds of the party all at once. And he also has a single new spell at his disposal that’s a real issue here...



Stop. He can simply make any member of our party stop all function for the equivalent of about three turns if left unchecked. The only item that can cure Stop is Panaceas the cure-all debuff item. The dungeon was nice enough to throw five of ‘em at us earlier while traveling through it. But Rysaurus Rex can just use Stop for five turns in a row, along with whatever damaging spell he feels like. So hopefully, you gotta stock of ‘em. The only other thing that can cure Stop is Endir’s Aura with Momentum and hmm... I think Aeterna might have one spell that dispels debuffs that I’ve never used.

There’s actually a case use here for equipping an early weapon to prevent Rybert’s Stop fuckery. I didn’t think of this until after I beat the boss and was looking up if I’d missed any of his onslaught of magic attacks. Remember the Ribbon Chakram that Setsuna had? The one that was a Final Fantasy ribbon accessory reference and prevented all status ailments? Yep. That completely neuters Stop. And since Setsuna is essentially on heal duty instead of offense the entire time, it doesn’t handicap her too much. Good to know.



The wizard gets to use Flare now. It’s just a fire elemental of “fuck you and 200+ of your HP” just like Holy Light was earlier. He just likes to have some flair in his casting sessions.





Towards the end of this fight, I actually had the stars align and the single most useful Singularity for this battle triggered. Elemental Inflation’s mumbo-jumbo up there translates to: the party is straight up invincible to magic attacks for thirty seconds.



Just complete no-sell, 0 HP lost to everything (Stop still hits since that’s technically null-elemental, but you can’t have everything...) While ol’ Rydengard was also hit with Confusion, so he was basically just punching himself in the face for 300 HP of damage every turn. That’s probably the solitary time a Singularity will work completely in my favor in both playthroughs I’ve done of this game. So I’ll take it!





I also managed to kill him with that Singularity still going, which technically meant I took him out with every single element at once! Which on any enemy in the game would just rain you with massive amounts of materials... except bosses have fixed drops so that’s useless. Singularities is a real dumb system...


Music: Astounding Victory





In any case, that’s how Endir and the gang defeated Rhys Rhydderch and nearly a dozen of his summoned friends.


Music: Last of the Blood



Waited for the coming of this day...
Little bit of a masochist, huh?
Thou needest not kink shame.
*nods* Thou hast my blessing... As legitimate ruler, and as rightful owner of the soaring ship.





Rhydderch strikes his staff and puts on a laser light show to power up the airship. He’s been waiting hundreds of years to finally do that.



It’s BEAUTIFUL!
Yeah... I can’t take my eyes off it...
*adjusts mask* I still can’t see a damn thing... Am I missing something? It’s just got glowy bits in muddled dark outline.
Wow... I’ve never seen anything like it...
*squints and rubs eyes*
*turns back to Julienne* Young Julienne... I pray that thou wilt become a truly worthy owner to this ship...



And so we get the keys to grandpa’s car. Fuck yeah! This is actually... a SUPER important key item, as this old wizard whose name my brain simply refuses to remember will explain...



I shall make this ship proud.
This key shall awaken not only the soaring ship, but all that bears the same crest... Inside chests, and behind gates, thou shalt find greater strength... and find such strength thou must.



Pausing for a moment to elaborate. Yeah, so... Do you remember very early on in the LP I mentioned those mysterious silver treasure chests we wouldn't be able to unlock for a good long while? Yeah, their time has come. I've fully glazed over 'em from that point onward, but there are a lot of these treasure chests. Like... at least one in literally every area of the game outside the weird useless one screen zones. And there is some good loot to be had in 'em. Like unique spritnite and exclusive new weapons.

As such, I might just set a date and stream myself going on a world tour pilfering all the treasure in past areas sometime in the next few days while bullshitting about the game thus far and likely going on wild tangents about other old RPGs from back when I liked that genre. So look forward to that.



Such is the destiny of thy royal blood...
!
Later.
*begins dissipating into sparkle dust*



This seems real familiar... *slowly pivots towards Aeterna*
...



I won’t!
...
...Was there more you wished to say?
Hmm? Oh. No. Peace be to you.
Oh... I... Hmm...



...
...Oh, right. The stairs...



Alright, then. On that less than helpful ominous note... let’s jump on board our brand spankin’ new airship!


Music: A Moment of Respite



*looks around* Is there like a light switch in this dock? This is f’n ridiculous!
! Oh yeah!



*sweat drop* Why would we give it a stupid name like that? This ain’t YOUR airship, y’know!
*puffs up* Of course I know that!
But it IS mine. And what is wrong with the name “Julienne”?
Ain’t nothin’ wrong with that. The magnificent part is REAL tacky... And naming it after yerself. Especially after all that humble ruler talkin’ from before...
True enough.
Let’s be real here, Julienne is already a mouth full... Can we just start calling you Julie?
*blinks* ABSOLUTELY NOT!
Well, excuuuuuuuse me, princess!
...
It’s gonna get a bit tedious calling it the “royal airship” all the time, though, isn’t it? It’s not a very lovable name, either... Don’t you think, Julienne?
*nods* Yes, very well. You are welcome to choose a name... It was thanks to your help that I was able to win back this ship, after all!
*jumps and fist pumps* All right! Thanks!
*ponders* Now what shall we call it... Come on, Endir, help me think!
Someone actually wants to listen to my opinion for a change?
You’re a jerk. But you’re at least a smartass jerk. C’mon, help me think of something.
Alright... Hmm...



...Diange? Diange, Endir? What the fuck is this name? What does that even mean? That’s like a shitty surname name you end up with by someone making a typo writing up your great grandfather’s immigration papers on Ellis Island in the 1910s. That’s trash. I reject this airship name. And unlike the main characters, I have no problem with renaming an inanimate vehicle with no prior background ties. So it's time for some...



THREAD PARTICIPATION!

So I’ll leave it to you jerks in the thread. We’ve got TEN CHARACTERS to work with here. Make some suggestions. I’ll put any standout selections to a vote. And then potentially throw that vote in the garbage and pick whatever I think is funniest, because democracy works like shit of late.

Please BOLD any suggestions or seconding any previous suggestions, or they won’t be up for consideration. Just edit your earlier post if you like someone else's suggestion and want to echo it. It makes my life easier. Thanks! Now get to it with your awful puns and anime references, you degenerates...

TIME TO VOTE!