Flipz

"Let me renew his Blindness, it's bound to be running out." Arthur casts Blindness at Warlord Khaderin from the Front Row.

Better...I'm part of the staff. I'm a moderator on the official FTB forums. Yeah, as a general rule, if you don't give your players SOMETHING to do (even if it's just conversation) every 24 hours, they'll get bored. That's another reason I feel it's important for party NPCs to interact with the Heroes during battles--even with battles run every 24 hours, finding various ways to post "I repeat" can get boring fast. Chatty NPCs help break up the monotony, allowing you to cover delays without drawing attention to them. (Do note that if you ONLY have NPC conversation to cover with during a delay, you should try to have it happen more than JUST once every 24 hours. )

If Shawe is already raised, Arthur will cast Darkness at Khaderin from the Front Row.

Arthur views most of his actions as failures of one degree or another. Even when he brags about his accomplishments to his foes, it's only a tactic of intimidation--in his view, he ought to have failed every Quest he's ever been on, save perhaps Quest 17. That said, his biggest failure was failing to save his compatriots in the final battle of Quest 53.

"Master Shawe, are you all right? I'd appreciate if you could heal me from the Back Row. Lady Nerwen, you should probably Seal the Warlord so he can't do that again."

True, but as a Barbarian you have access to Heavy Armor, which most Cleric-classes (including Sage) don't have access to. In fact, Clerics in general end up kind of stiffed as far as good Artifacts go, unfortunately. Definitely agree Nyx is a Glass Cannon, though, just noting that you've done a good job of making sure you can last longer than you ordinarily could.

The downside of the Medal of Glory. I'm coming up on 8 Quests and I'm not even at Level 30 yet.

Because she gets Extra Critical Hits and Magic Counter is all, and she has a better selection of Artifacts to choose from as far as SP goes. She's not "broken" powerful, she just has a very strong niche she can work from. A very low-key powerbuild, if you will.

Precisely. The point of making Artifacts for others is to complement their build, not to augment one's own.

"Lord Boomingham. Take the Hoplite, please. We could use Barty right about now. Lady Nerwen, could you please Seal and Frail the Warlord?" Arthur uses a Phoenix Essence on Shawe, from the Front Row.

I did NOT enjoy the last Heroica-themed Mafia game we had. I mean, kudos to Sandy for the hosting, and the story and mechanics were really interesting and fun to mess with, but the gameplay itself made me absolutely miserable. I don't want to miss yet another major event in Heroica history, but if it were to be another Mafia or Mafia-esque game, I'd have to, for my own personal health.

She can cast all her spells through it (since weapon effects don't transfer to spells unless you're De'kra), and will heal the party on a SHIELD roll. In other words, she never has to upgrade any other weapon again. In other news, I'm down for Secret Santa. NO. Just no.

1. Haroka returned and terrorized Miranda. 2. The Proggs invaded Luosh and wreaked massive destruction. 3. You killed half the NPCs in Eubric. Oh, and Wren was there, too.

Yup, Nyx is officially the most powerful player character in the game. If she upgrades her Healing Staff instead of her other weapons, she's golden. (Granted, she'll still be taking Damage and Special Damage, but she'd auto self-heal if she got a SHIELD.) You already know my suggestion. My only further request: let people remember what a horrible Grogmas it was last year, and respond to that (i.e. the reaction of the Londoners to Christmas in "Voyage of the Damned"). Actually, I do have a second thought: it might be a good opportunity to use some of the Theatre characters again. Bilbert already comes with a top hat, so there's all SORTS of fun you could have with the crew.

"Same here, Lord Boomingham." OOC: I think we can autoroll, with Calaryl taking on Hoplite E and everyone else repeating.

The two of you are going to LOVE my Cathedral of Mercutio Quest.

Maybe a wizard did it. My theory (and, mind you, I'm still contemplating using this as the basis for a mini-game) is that the forges used by blacksmiths to reforge weapons burn a special type of rare coal/charcoal that contains tiny granules of many different pseudo-magical metals. At high temperatures, these bits of metal can "stick" to the sword, and eventually form a lighter, stronger alloy with the material of the blade. (There may be something of a magical form of damage increase as well, particularly where elementally-imbued and non-metal weapons are involved.) The reason that forging costs increase exponentially is that the blacksmith has to heat the forge to a higher temperature each time (as each successive magic alloy has a higher melting point), and the amount of gold paid serves as a convenient measure of when the forge is ready (in addition to making the blacksmith a hefty profit). (For those interested, the forging mini-game would involve trying to help this process along by directly adding different additives to the metal and/or altering the forging time in hopes of getting better results, but would work somewhat like the Safari Zone of the Pokémon games and would have a chance to decrease the item's WP/SP if the Hero gets too greedy or too reckless--and no, it's not going to appear in any of the Quests I have in the works thus far, there's no place for it.)

Best choice ever right there.

You know, we seem to spend an exorbitant amount of time arguing about power creep...how about spectacle creep?

So. I've been handed the perfect opportunity to change Arthur's face. The one-of-a-kind piece I used for Arthur was one of the major defining bits of him in the beginning (OK, I'll be honest, I was being elitist and showing off all the rare/new parts I had ), but with more QMs wanting to include the Heroes in pictures and the trouble people are having with that, I've been considering changing him for a while now. At first I thought I'd wait for an opportunity to "age him up" to a more common face piece, but then Zepher went and used the one I was planning to use to create XX. So now I'm at a crossroads. What do you guys think? Should I keep Arthur's current face? "Age up" to XX's face and damn the resemblance? Or should I try to switch to something completely different? (And in the last case, what new face should I use?)

OOC: Arthur's Emergency Essence gets him up automatically. This also means Nerwen is spared damage. As soon as Arthur falls, a clink of broken glass is heard. Simultaneously, an inky blackness splashes across his exposed flesh, before glowing bright orange. "It's all right," his voice says--though it is echoey and distant. Brilliant light still streaming from his body, he climbs to his feet and emits another bolt of darkness at Warlord Khaderin from the Front Row.

I see where you're coming from (especially with Necromancers), but at the same time this REALLY hurts the Evokers, who could only do this with one enemy anyway and whose SHIELD becomes somewhat counterproductive in a number of cases. Think about it: coming from Ranger, Evokers only gain the ability to Elemental-ize their attacks (which is good, but trivial compared to, say, Assassination or Nurturing or Favoring enemy types), whereas coming from Mage, Evokers gain...Animal Talk? Yes, they could use a bow to save Ether, but unless they happen across a REALLY good bow right before the switch, it's unlikely they'll have prepared that far ahead. Their SHIELD skill (which, let's face it, is pretty much their only unique aspect) is kind of lackluster--their primary advantage WAS the ability to have crowd control, which is hugely important for one of the most squishy Advanced Classes in existence, especially given how little SP is available to them. TL;DR the decision makes sense for the sake of Necromancers, but Evokers need a corresponding buff to make them viable again. Ah, I totally disagree with you there. Necromancers are, plain and simple, powerhouses. Imagine a Grass- and Normal-type Slaking with Sunny Day, Hyper Beam, Recover, and Earthquake, and the Ability Parenthood, and you have a rough idea of their role: takes forever to set up, but then unstoppably sweeps the opposing team once they are--but a well-prepared enemy can Super Effective them into the ground with a specifically prepared moveset. (I may have been playing Pokémon recently. :P ) They can revive through Ether (which is indeed cheaper than Phoenix Essences, by quite a bit), they can cast spells with a MULTIPLIER based on the number of undead they command, and they can deal dedicated damage. Crowd control is a bonus for them, not the point of the class--if you become a Necromancer, you do it because you want to kill stuff so you can control it.

"Mind throwing me a heal, Master Shawe?" Arthur repeats.

Endgame's right on the money. When you have Evokers and Necromancers in the party, it allows you to throw in a larger number of enemies BECAUSE you know the Heroes can counter the Free Hits, allowing for larger and more epic fights without being unfair to the party. Also remember that the undead and summons cannot ABSORB the Free Hits that remain left over, which is another level of strategy.

Caught off-guard by Throlar's maneuver, Duke Bârbêthân enters the fray as well, though he is careful to remain in the Back Row. OOC: Might as well earn the NPC some free experience. Also, holy cow, a SHIELD despite a Lucky enemy! "Indeed, a greater miracle I have not seen in quite some time." "Lady Nerwen, mind Sealing the Warlord and Frailing Lord Boomingham's next target?" Arthur again repeats his attack. OOC: Also, have I mentioned how nifty it is that Mystic Knights get to do that? There's something special about logging in to see your SP has just gotten high enough to render an enemy strike harmless. Gives me the warm fuzzies it does.