BrokenPromise

Symphony on High

^{No funny banner this time, fam.}

With everyone present, the briefing could begin post haste. Fritzi stood beside a projector screen that had pictures of both St Bianchi Church and Dante’s on it.

”Alright agents, we got Binky back, but GEMINI isn’t quite at full strength yet. Timekeeper is still passing out in piles of sand, and Oros the Mad has taken an interest in Cerberus. The latter wouldn’t normally be an issue, as she’s more or less treated GEMINI as a neutral party in the past and the Hand is a far more immediate danger for GEMINI operations. However, she’s recently attacked Timekeeper with the intent to kill. She can’t be left to her own devices.” She pointed at the screen beside her. ”We will be splitting up the GEMINI squad to tackle both issues in one night. Some of you will go to Dante’s, where there should be some lead as to what’s ailing Timekeeper. All of this started after he encountered a succubus there, and it’s becoming increasingly apparent that Dante’s has something to do with it all.”

”Meanwhile, an esper known as Sovereign claims that she has to bring Cerberus to St Bianchi Church, where she claims Oros the Mad is waiting for her.” Binky’s eyes wandered onto Finn. ”We suspected it was a trap, but between Orion’s interrogation and reports from the water truck incident, it seems that she ‘drove off’ Oros by making a deal with her and got further details about Cerberus from one of our own agents.”

”Against my better judgment, I’m letting Timekeeper join everyone for these operations. After the deal with the Diver, I’m unsure if I’ll be able to field enough freelancers for two full operations. Tackling these issues separately is not ideal either. If Oros is expecting us, I’d just as soon not have her change her mind and meet us at Dante’s. That said, the goal of these operations should be apparent. We need to go to Dante’s to see about slaying the monster that’s cursed Timekeeper, and we need to go to St Bianchi Church to learn more about Oros’ motivation. That said, we haven’t formed much of a battle plan yet. We haven’t looked into Dante’s and Sovereign was dropped on us very recently.” Fritzi looked at Ashley. ”Speaking of, what was your read on Sovereign? Can she be trusted to keep Cerberus safe?”

“I would say she takes the stereotype of a money-obsessed mercenary to the furthest possible extreme,” Ashley replied with a small frown. “I get the feeling that she’d fully devote herself to any possible task as long as some form of reward was waiting for her at the end of it. As for her keeping Cerberus safe,” the high-tech heroine continued. “I’m not sure I would trust her to do that, or anything else, especially if we weren’t offering her some form of compensation.”

”We are going to be hiring freelancers for these operations. Are you advising against letting her tag along, even if she’s paid to be there?”

“Well, if that’s the case, then I suppose it would be fine,” Ashley replied. “I mean, she was the one Oros tasked with bringing Cerberus there in the first place, and as long as we have some form of support on hand in the event an extraction is needed, I don’t think Cerberus will be in any additional danger than would otherwise be the case. That said,” the Knight of Tomorrow added. “If freelancers are available, I’d suggest having them compose the entire support team for the St. Bianchi op. At the very least, they’re slightly less likely to be perceived as a threat by Oros, as opposed to a team including known G.E.M.I.N.I. agents. Plus, it will allow us to put all of our admittedly-limited resources into investigating Dante’s.”

Fritzi smiled. ”Now there’s an idea! It also lets us keep Timekeeper’s situation on the down low. Meanwhile, the freelancers will jump at the chance to brag about having a close scuff with our mad esper.”

Mika scoffed. ”Really? You’re sending me out there by myself?” She looked between Fritzi and Ashley. ”Her file claims that she can see the future. I doubt she’s going to be fooled by a bunch of freelance espers. Not to mention she’s already attacked us once. It would be more suspicious not to send me in with some backup.”

Fritzi chuckled. ”You’re so animated today. I don’t see how Oros’s abilities invalidate Orion’s strategy. It does allow us to pool our resources into one operation, and if Oros is less inclined to ‘look’, we’re less likely to be discovered.” She placed a finger on her chin. ”Though if we’re trying to prevent her from looking, maybe it would be good to give you a little bit of help. Any volunteers?”

”Oh! Me!” Angelie threw an arm around Mika’s neck and gave a thumbs up. ”I’ll be Claudia’s backup! If Sovereign or Oros try anything, I’ll make sure they regret it!”

Mika sighed. ”I don’t like it, but she’ll work.” Angelie cheered before hugging Mika.

And here I thought she didn’t need any help… Ashley mused, doing her best to suppress an annoyed scowl. While she was glad Ellie would be looking after the feisty feline, the angelic agent was as distressingly far from subtle as one could get, and Ashley only hoped that her addition to such a delicate situation wouldn’t backfire catastrophically…

”I don’t anticipate Dante’s having any hired espers, so this arrangement should be fine.” She turned to the rest of the GEMINI espers. ”We have a floor plan of Dante’s, but have little information on what else you should expect. To our knowledge, they do not appear to be affiliated with the weretiger mafia. It should just be temptation and dream monsters like the succubus Timekeeper encountered. Did you have any more questions?”

“None at the present time, ma’am,” Ashley replied.

Finn shook his head. ”Nothing else I need to know at the moment.”

Estelle blinked, then shook her head. Nope, she definitely didn’t zone out for a moment there.

”In that case, we’ll prepare for deployment immediately. It shouldn’t take more than a few days to get the freelancers we need.” Fritzi shot a smile at everyone. ”You’re dismissed until then.”

Video Games: The General Discussion & Community Thread Number Two

@SleepingSilence Unless your game "glitched out" and a wall of grizzly cards appeared, you didn't encounter a scripted loss. Even so, complaining about scripted losses is a carry over from RPGS where you'd jump into a long, tedious battle and waste resources trying to beat a boss that you absolutely can't. You aren't making progress, and you're dragging out a fight when you could be experiencing the rest of the story. The thing with Inscryption is, you progress against non-game objectives carries over between deaths, and you need to be really good or "lucky" to encounter the grisly wall anyway. I'm quite confident you didn't encounter it.

The game also has an overwhelmingly positive rating on steam, with about a thousand people not recommending it to one hundred thousand that do. So if we're going to listen to the court of popular opinion (not something I typically do) then the game is absolutely worth playing.

But you don't like the game for one reason or another, and I'm fine with that. Card games aren't for everyone and they do require you to ignore certain video game conventions, like the idea that you cal always win with a good strategy. Come to think of it, rouge-lite/like games have a lot of the same quirks as traditional card games, like constantly starting from scratch and luck being a huge factor in your game.

What are you currently playing (or were until you stopped)?

@SleepingSilence

I'm not sure if you're talking about Inscryption, card games, or games in general here, so I'll answer for all three.

I've 100% inscryption, along with all of the Kacee's mod stuff. I can't remember the last other card game I've played because it's been years. Though the standouts were Hearthstone and anime Hearthstone (Shadowverse). Sadly, F2P mechanics do be F2P mechanics, and you need to play those games a lot if you don't want to spend money to be competitive. I don't play them anymore. SYNTHETIK has been the game I boot when I want a gaming fix.

Video Games: The General Discussion & Community Thread Number Two

@SleepingSilence Kinda weird that you chose to correct a typo while quoting me, but I'll take it over openly mocking me about it.

Getting back to Inscryption though, card games are inherently RNG based. You're always going to have the chance to get the very worst cards for a given situation despite having an almost air tight deck. The first few runs in Act 1 is more like a tutorial anyway. There's a lot of stuff like scripted deaths and simple barriers that prevent you from completing "the game" until you do the other, "non-game" related stuff. They drop the rouge-lite elements as soon as you go into act 2, and they don't even come back for act 3.

Also, I think I was un-alived about 6 times during my first play through of act 1, and it only happened 3 times on my second play through. While this was slightly because of RNG, I do think I understood the game better, allowing me to more reliably clear it. Ergo, you can get better.

But Inscryption is a game with a story, and the game is very much in service to the story through the entire experience. If you want to look at inscryption on its own merits as a game, then you need to play kacee's mod. Which is not a mod, but a free DLC that lets you play a more challenging, but also less scripted version of Inscryption. More cards, different starting hands to choose, different events, challenges to make the game even harder, etc. But it's still a card game and everything it entails. You can increase your odds of winning by learning about all the broken builds you can make and gradually building combos or stronger cards. Most of your duels are won through carefully selected synergies rather than the actual moment to moment card play.

But if you're the type of person that gets urked over scripted losses, or doesn't like the idea that they might have a bad run and lose regardless of how good they are (read: any true card game) then you're going to have a bad time with Inscryption no matter what.

Video Games: The General Discussion & Community Thread Number Two

Stellar Blade doesn't need to be memorable, it needs to make a profit.

Shift Up might be new to the triple A game scene, but they already have a mobile game (Nikke, Goddess of Victory) that's pretty much just a machine that prints money for them. They've built up a good reputation by being open to player feedback and giving them what they want. I'm not a huge fan of companies going on the open market, but (i'm told, but cant verify) the CEO holds almost half the company's shares and his wife is holding a bit of it too, so there shouldn't be a drastic change in the company's vision for the foreseeable future.

Thanks to the culture war, Stellar Blade is going to be a guaranteed success so long as it doesn't release as a half baked mess. Too many people are talking about it, and all that talk generates interest. There's even a demo out, and apparently it's good. I'm not sure where the Neir comments are coming from, nor have I heard this take anywhere but here. Yoko Taro said they were enthusiastic about the game, but that's because he's never been one to hide the fact that he likes sexy woman in games.

I don't really have a pony in this race. I don't have a play station, nor would I be in a rush to buy a brand new game given that 99.9% of them aren't truly finished until at least five years after release. Even if Stellar Blade bucked that trend and eventually got ported to steam, I can't say I'd rush out and buy it. It's not something I would normally play. But I'm fine with it existing in the video game ecosystem in what is sure to be a springboard for bigger and better projects from Shift Up.

Regardless of how Stellar Blade performs, I feel like it's not going to have a huge impact on the culture war. At this point, it feels like something that's going to go on forever so long as people continue perpetuating it. Both sides are dumb. Just stop talking about it.

Also anyone who doesn't like Inscryption probably doesn't like card games in general and should stop spreading their wrong opinions on the internet post hate.

Symphony on High

@GOATPlumber Holy canolie MR White, I'd live to have you. We've got a week or so before operations start, so it would be swell if you could cook something up before then.

Would you like a discord invite? And what were you planning on making?

Kurai Majokko: Tsundere Gekido

Let's start with a little intrigue, a little mystery, a little adventure.

Kurai Majokko: Tsundere Gekido

"Wow! Feels like I missed 7 months of school!”

— Suki Oyama

Few things were certain in a magical girl’s life. Going to school was one of them. If only for the occasional meetup with the rest of the detention club.

It was hard to tell where the time went. One moment you were meeting up with everyone in the club room, by the next you were nearing the end of the first school term. Where had the time gone? Suki was sure it was fall or spring just a moment ago, and now they were half way through June. Once July was over, they’d have a quick summer break before classes started up again. It wasn’t like Suki could complain. There was so much drudgery between school and everything else that she wouldn’t say no to a vacation. Of course, she’d probably end up taking a summer job, but that was neither here nor there. Regardless if she had time off or not, everyone was going to be in swimsuits. When everyone was in swimsuits, everyone was a winner. She could practically see it now…

But she would have time to enjoy the real thing when it rolled around. Right now were far more pressing matters, and Suki needed to talk about them. Boss baby was a no go, as she left school early to tend to the family pyre. Bast was equally predisposed. The girl had a way of getting confused by the most ordinary of situations. Wet-Works and Chess-Nut had been absent for a while. They weren’t locals, so it was hard to be surprised by this. They’d drop by again. Eyeball and Multi-Face were always up to something, and she never felt super secure around them. Even if Eyeball was the first detention club girl she kissed and Multi-Face was oddly clingy. This meant she would have to seek help from Rainbow, Nyx, and Bedshaker. Bedshaker was not really ideal, but she was pretty much a package deal with Nyx. Rainbow on the other hand had always been there for her and was a great partner, so including her in this emergency meeting was essential. Not only that, but it made her feel a little safer when Bedshaker was around.

The detention club didn’t typically do after school activities, not right after the school closed at least. But for what Suki needed, now was the best time to get everyone together. But she couldn’t just stand out in the open. What if Bedshaker came first?

So she laid under the table. It wasn’t a great hiding spot, but maybe Bedshaker wouldn’t notice initially? It wasn't like she had been smoking.

Kurai Majokko: Tsundere Gekido

[ ♫ ]

A Tale of Hormones

Uh, yea, this is a sort of off shoot to the canceled RP "Kurai Majokko." We just kind of felt like playing our characters more and exploring the interpersonal relationships of a lusty blood witch, a dark code enforcer, a brooding misanthropist, and an emotionless drug dealer. Who knows what sort of nonsense these delinquents are going to get into?

Event Records

☆ Shadows and Frog (Prequel)
☆ Rolling Days, Never to End (Prequel)
☆ From Ash (Prelude)

Kurai Majokko: Tsundere Gekido

They were the first one to sign up, they were just sneaky about it.

Kurai Majokko: Tsundere Gekido

@The World@Lonewolf685@Ponn Might as well re-post your character sheets in the character tab here. I'll see about getting a starter up in a few days.