Trails of Cold Steel (and the Kiseki series in general)

[aeromancer he/him]

8 hours ago, Weltall said:

Yep, welcome to the Kiseki Nerd Corner. xD Love the avatar choice by the way. Have you played the Geofront translation of Zero yet? It's out right now if you need a fix during the wait for CS4.

And speaking of Kiseki, there have been some updates to the Hajimari website since the last time I commented on them. They added character pages based on the last round of magazine scans, some more details about the Episodes, a page for the quiz minigame and the next chapter of Three and Nine. 

It's nice to hang out with fellow fans, and there are very few people who can properly appreciate my choice of avatar. I have not played the Geofront translation, though I have played the older translation, but I would like to play the new translation. Also, Zero is a good game and Azure is an even better one, so I don't mind replaying the series.

I know very little about Hajimari because I'm absolutely terrified of CS IV spoilers, which I'm under the impression that it's not bad about, some stuff just gets spoiled by nature. Cold Steel I, for instance, spoils some of Trails in the Sky, just by the nature of the sequel, though its very little. CS III spoils the absolute crud out of it because we returning main characters running their mouths off about the ultimate fate of certain characters.

Out of curiosity, is the standard assumption here that people have played through Trails in the Sky or just have played Cold Steel?

[Weltall]

30 minutes ago, aeromancer said:

Out of curiosity, is the standard assumption here that people have played through Trails in the Sky or just have played Cold Steel?

Given that it's a pretty small group posting here, I think the standard assumption is 'wait and see what people tell you they've played and go from there'. But the general approach has been to tag things that are spoilers for a game as such rather than assuming any given game has already been played.

And yeah, Hajimari promo material can spoil some stuff by default just because it happens after CS4, and discussion of it moreso. Which is why all the stuff discussing specifics about it get tagged.

Edited July 24, 2020 by Weltall

[Briar King]

Made zero progress but I’ve booted up every day. Was afraid of this if Tsushima was good.

[Weltall]

It's Wednesday so that means more Hajimari news and this week's a big one for characters, rounding out the core Cold Steel cast. (Obvious CS4 spoilers are obvious, also Crossbell arc)

Spoiler

- Fie is brought to Crossbell for bracer work.

- Emma is doing her 'wandering witch' thing and her mother's fate is going to be a major element. The secondary plot thread in CS4 about reviving Grianos seems like it's progressing well.

- Gaius is in Nord due to 'an incident' and his role will have a great deal to do with his position in the Church and with related individuals. Maybe he'll get some of his Bro Cred back after spending two games being the most closed-mouthed of all the Dominion we've met to date... We see more of his family in screenshots.

- We've already seen Millium using Naglfar, it sounds like an Episode will involve how this came to pass and will also at least mention Airgetlam. She's returned to her old job working for the Intelligence Division.

- It sounds like Emma is going to discover some secret of Roselia's. My money's the nature of the Millstein name and how she's related to Emma and her mother, given what Roselia is. It's also mentioned that she's sensed something unusual is going on and is investigating it, along with meeting Zeit again which we've already seen. It sounds like she's dispatched Celine on some errand as well.

- Celine continues to be a tsundere- I mean cat. Wait, that's redundant...

- Fran is working towards Crossbell's independence and appears with other supporting characters. The scene in Azure's ending stills involving her will be in the game.

- Shizuku returns from Remiferia where she's been living recently. Her relationship with her father will be a major element of her story.

- The Emperor appears straight from the pages of Three and Nine but how much of the story is true and how much fiction is a mystery... well we can say for sure that the ending was a pack of lies because otherwise he's looking pretty healthy for someone who's supposed to be dead and he's got the full set of the Monarch's Regalia to boot. He's one of the leaders of the organization that Nadia and Swin used to belong to.

- The 'Beach de Vacation' minigames seem to be linked and we see a bit more of the two we've already seen. Watermelon splitting is all about timing, the water sledding event requires you to keep your balance using the control stick and unlocks progressively harder courses.

- Another MWL-linked feature is the 'Communication Event' system, which has been teased previously and will involve the PSVR (in a post-update patch). The conversations you can have with chosen characters contain a great deal of content though it seems like they won't influence the main story.

- Freddy has an minigame Episode called 'Ultimate Wilderness Food' which makes use of the normal combat system where the normal field attacks are used as 'Hunting Actions'. I'm scared...

 

Edited July 29, 2020 by Weltall

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Hajimari opening movie

Spoiler

Eh...

Some shots look good, but overall it reminds me of those cheesy machinimas you saw on youtube in the mid 2000s. "Oh, have some cutscenes in the background, have a character model walking or posed in the foreground, through in some filters, and volia".

CS3 and CS4's openings were cheap, but they felt more natural than this.

Don't have much hope it will get better. After CS3 released, Kondo said that the OP is the last thing that the devs work on, and since they were working down to the wire on CS3, they outsourced it. So long as Falcom is beholden to a yearly release schedule, where they're going to push a game out the door whether its finished or not, an OP worked on at the end of the development cycle is going to get neglected.

If we want good OPs, I think Falcom needs to hire and set aside a small team to just work on the opening, but nooo Falcom just wants to maintain a size of 50-60 people. Can't use that money to expand apparently.

 

[Weltall]

Falcom actually started outsourcing the OP movies with Tokyo Xanadu's (which was really good) and they sort of went downhill from there. Ys VIII's wasn't bad and the game kind of demanded a moodier OP than the usual Ys fare, and IX eliminated the OP entirely. Meanwhile CS3 and 4's were.... eh. You can tell what they were going for in each case and there are some good bits to them but as a whole they're just kind of disappointing. That being said, I really like what they've done here since it means keeping things in-house rather than spending the time and money on either an animated movie or paying someone else to do it. That it looks a bit cheesy is fine by me, it's not like that's new for Falcom openings.

And expanding the company just to have a dedicated team to do animations and nothing else would be a poor use of resources, since you have to pay those people to work full time and you're not going to get that money back on increased sales (nor can you cover it by increasing the price) so that's just a money sink. I would like to see a traditional OP whenever the next arc begins, but we'll have to wait and see.

Now, thoughts on the OP itself, le spoilers for Crossbell and Erebonia:

Spoiler

- Is tat Dieter in the crowd behind Rufus? And the silver-haired girl in that shot and later looks an awful lot like Ilya with a dye job which raises all kinds of questions. And she's wearing one of those Black Workshop masks...

- In the shot with McBurn in the foreground you can see two figures off to the left side and it looks very much like Schmidt is confronting Novartis. Perhaps we'll get some answers about what the Sixth Anguis' relationship is to Epstein and his disciples, since the naming convention is too big a similarity to be coincidental.

- What in the name of al that is good and holy is that thing standing behind The Emperor and why does its coloring match that of the Monarch's Regalia?

- Rean seems to be training hard against the best swordsmen he can find, now that he doesn't have his Ogre power. We've got him fighting Matteus and now Arios (in front of the shell of Lost Zem no less) and I'd be surprised if he doesn't have another rematch against Aurelia or Victor as well.

- We get a much clearer shot of the mystery mecha and I'm even more certain now that the humanoid forms of the Loa bosses are based on it (as is the Loa Erebonius concept art from CS1) and that it's the Great One in its true form as opposed to the deliberately weakened one we fought at the end of CS4.

Given the OP and what we've seen, I'm feeling pretty confident that I can call our antagonists now by route. For Rean's route, Schwarzreaner (ie, Normal Ending Rean merged with Ishmelga). For Lloyd's route, Rufus. For C's route, The Emperor. And the true form of the Great One will be the overarching big bad that all three groups have to combine forces against as the real final boss.

 

[Val the Moofia Boss]

2 hours ago, Weltall said:

Now, thoughts on the OP itself, le spoilers for Crossbell and Erebonia:

  Hide contents

Given the OP and what we've seen, I'm feeling pretty confident that I can call our antagonists now by route. For Rean's route, Schwarzreaner (ie, Normal Ending Rean merged with Ishmelga). For Lloyd's route, Rufus. For C's route, The Emperor. And the true form of the Great One will be the overarching big bad that all three groups have to combine forces against as the real final boss.

 

Hajimari pre-release info (CS4 ending spoilers)

Spoiler

The alt Rean doesn't appear to be hostile. In the previous trailer, Class VII was facing something and appeared to be distraught when the alt Rean walks out in front the group, presumably to help them out with whatever they are facing.

From what we've seen, it seems to be that Matteus is the initial antagonist of the Rean segment, with alt Rean becoming more involved to deal with the Ishmelga/Great Power later.

 

 

Edited July 31, 2020 by Val the Moofia Boss

[Weltall]

That doesn't really follow from the dialogue though. (Crossbell spoiler included)

Spoiler

Matteus is seen offering advice and dialogue in the Eisengard scene where he's fighting New Class VII has all the makings of a sparring match where he's telling everyone to take it seriously. His spoken line from the trailer is similarly philosophical and not inherently hostile. In other words, the sort of thing we've already seen between the CS protagonists and Victor or Aurelia previously. I'm not taking him any more seriously as an antagonist than I am Arios becoming one (again) because he and Rean are fighting one another in the OP.

Normal Ending Rean on the other hand was in the process of being assimilated by an eldritch abomination that wanted to lock Zemuria in an endless cycle of conflict before his apparent death, he's clearly got the visible signs of the transformation in the trailer when we see the bottom half of his face and what little we've seen of Schwarzreaner's speech pattern makes it very clear that something is wrong with him... and the one voiced line we have from him is hostile in its implications.

I mean sure, I could be wrong but it doesn't seem at all likely at this point.

 

[Zurvanight he/him]

Hajimari Opening

[Briar King]

Still zero forward progress. Tsushima is just to fun and epic to not spend all my time on. I still do a battle or 4 every day though. What is up with my attacks missing so often now? I can practically call out when I will miss. It’s really ramping up on the miss rate now. Also why is the magic so high on lvl ups? It’s like 12-14 pgs each lvl!! My magic is gonna be insane compared to my strength later in game.

[aneonfoxtribute]

Nah your magic won't outpace your regular attack. As for attacks missing I noticed that too. It got better the later in the game I got.

[Weltall]

The first two CS games have insanely overpowered S-Crafts, so you don't need to worry about magic outpacing physical damage. Actually if you want to be really pedantic it's possible to get more damage out of magic than physical attacks... in the very last dungeon. On one character. With an extremely specific setup. So for most intents and purposes, you're gonna be able to do more damage via S-Crafting than with magic, in return for the whole Delay penalty.

As for why attacks are missing, in the early game CS2 is balanced in such a way that you'll miss more often but once you get a bit further in it will basically go away. You can make things easier in the short term with Quartz/Accessories that boost accuracy.

[Briar King]

I’d love to be a magic juggernaut. It’s just a weird and crazy increase in numbers each lvl vs CS1.

The miss rate went up like crazy after I met up with someone in a windmill. As I said no progress since Tsushima released but I have been at least doing a fight each day for my consecutive days spent playing lists and the rate is super crazy now.

[Briar King]

In these 40 yrs of life I’ve seen lots of Japanese stuff subtitled and you would think I would be able to understand much more then I actually do. Yeah not the case and it’s about time I try to fix that. So I’m using YouTube to try and learn some basic things and realize I can’t speak it hardly but I’m learning a bit more to be able pick things out for sure. But rust...my southern twang/Cajun accent just butchers the spoken words.

[Briar King]

Made some verrrry minor progress today getting back to

Celdic where Machias takes off his glasses and then I went into church to start some dialogue rounds

 

Nothing groundbreaking but it marks the 1st time in 2+ weeks since starting Tsushima that I have made an effort to push forward. Thinking about getting all dialogue out the way tonight or early tomorrow before going to where I know I have to go next.

[aeromancer he/him]

On 7/31/2020 at 6:07 PM, Weltall said:

Actually if you want to be really pedantic it's possible to get more damage out of magic than physical attacks... in the very last dungeon. On one character. With an extremely specific setup. So for most intents and purposes, you're gonna be able to do more damage via S-Crafting than with magic, in return for the whole Delay penalty.

Really? The strongest build I know in CSII is a physical one, not a magical one, though it requires a ton of rare quartz and a maxed-out Master Quartz that's moderately hard to obtain. I'll explain it down below in a spoiler. But, honestly, once you get to that point, you can start one-shoting most of the bosses in CSII's final area and trivialize the game's final fight, so I'm not even sure I'd recommend using the build. I haven't played CSII recently, so I don't remember how much you can cut down on magic casting and recovery times, but in CSIII you can spam Arts like crazy with the right builds, but I didn't use offensive Arts builds that much in CSII.

On 8/1/2020 at 0:20 AM, Briar King said:

The miss rate went up like crazy after I met up with someone in a windmill. As I said no progress since Tsushima released but I have been at least doing a fight each day for my consecutive days spent playing lists and the rate is super crazy now.

It never seemed that bad for me, but I play XCOM, so every time someone misses with a basic attack my response is 'Eh. At least he didn't fire a rocket clean across the map and start a chain reaction among cars which then kills half my squad.' A Hit 1 quartz will do wonders for landing hits more often, or just use Arts with characters who have shaky hit rates.

Anyway, the ultimate build for CSII: (slight story spoilers because it requires certain crafts that aren't obtained until halfway through the game)

Spoiler

Rean Shwarzer under Ogre Mode using every multiplier quartz possible, every STR stat increasing quartz after that, the best accessories, the correct master quartz which increases damage by 150% when HP is 10% or less, and then unleashing Termination Slash - Dawn at 200 CP, which has the strength equivalent to 5S+. Normal Termination Slash - Dawn is only SSS+, but Ogre Mode turns it to 4S+ and 200 CP turns it to 5S+ The tricky part of this build is getting Rean's CP back to 200 without touching his health at all. The same exact build can be used on Laura and then buffing her strength +50%, but even though she has a higher strength stat than Rean does, sadly, at 200 CP her S-Craft is only 4S+, so her damage falls slightly short of Rean, but I prefer the Laura build because it's far easier to pull off. It's also, funnily enough, kind of how the relationship between the two is in cannon - Laura is better at swordplay than Rean is, except when Rean is using Ogre Mode, at which point Rean is basically as strong as an Enforcer.

Even using a similar build on a magic-based character, a Lost Art caps at 5S, so while Alisa or Emma might be able to get a higher ATS stat than Rean's STR stat, I'm not sure it would make up for the damage. I haven't actually ever tested it, so I might be wrong.

 

Edited August 6, 2020 by aeromancer

[aneonfoxtribute]

I don't believe that a magic build can outdamage Laura or Rean with Tauros. I refuse to believe it.

[Weltall]

Believe it.

7 minutes ago, aeromancer said:

Really? The strongest build I know in CSII is a physical one, not a magical one, though it requires a ton of rare quartz and a maxed-out Master Quartz that's moderately hard to obtain. I'll explain it down below in a spoiler. But, honestly, once you get to that point, you can start one-shoting most of the bosses in CSII's final area and trivialize the game's final fight, so I'm not even sure I'd recommend using the build.

Like I said, it's really situational and neither a physical or magical 'max damage' build really has much of a point to it because by the time you get close to that level of min-maxing you're breaking not only the ability of the game to actually display how much damage you did but well past the max HP of anything you're fighting. xD But here's the setup anyways if you're curious (CS2 final dungeon spoiler):

Spoiler

Emma with the best ATS-boosting endgame gear, maxed-out Murakumo, Hades and all the damage and ATS-boosting quartz you can give her except for her Fire-locked slot which gets Purgatorial Flame. The reason for that is that the elemental damage boost can beat the increased damage rating from the non-elemental Lost Arts, and she won't have that Art otherwise.

With that setup, you need both Towa and Vita as party members and Vita must be in a Link with Emma. Buff Emma's ATS and debuff the enemy's ADF to the max, then have Towa hit an enemy with Weakener. Next Emma or Vita needs to invoke Overdrive before Emma casts Purgatorial Flame and then you need to roll a natural 20 and get both a Critical and Vita using Boost Arts 3 on Emma as she casts. Behold, aaallllllllll the damage.

 

[Briar King]

I guess this needs to be a page I should try to remember to come back to look at in time.

[aeromancer he/him]

@Weltall I stand corrected. And that's quite frankly horrifying. Still, it's not as consistent as the physical build, so I don't think I'll be trying that anytime soon, but that's a lot of damage.

[Weltall]

Yeah, it's not consistent because of the random factor of getting Link assists and crits and it requires three characters to pull off, but when it works it works.

Oh yes, we had another round of Hajimari updates and these ones don't even need a spoiler tag:

- Falcom announced a 'Digital Deluxe Edition' that includes all the costume/attachment DLC prepaid, though they won't actually unlock until they're made available for purchase normally. The announcement also mentions one particular set of costumes which is listed as being planned to go on sale at the start of October, so it sounds like the Digital Deluxe buyers get early access to it.

- They also announced a Season Pass that grants the same access to the costume DLC to people purchasing any other edition of the game, but the Digital Deluxe one costs slightly less.

- They revealed the first round of DLC that will be available on launch day. In addition to the usual item packs there are kimono costumes for the three route protagonists, Elie and Tio, cosmetic earrings, silly fruit-themed hats, an 'Effects' set that causes sparkles, black feathers or cherry blossom petals to swirl around the character and some rather nice looking banners themed after the various countries and groups. Oh, and the comical panels from CS3 and 4 are returning as well with some gloriously silly ones.

- The second to last chapter of Three and Nine got posted.

[Eluvianii he/him]

Alright so, I just got a new laptop (it feels good to see the Shard on desktop again) and it's pretty weak by current standards I guess, but it can deal with CS I and II no problem. It can't do anything aparently with III and IV but hopefully by the time I finish CS II I'll have that sorted out. For now, I'm just happy to be back into actual new stuff (for me at least) from this world.

[Briar King]

Is CS3 and 4 more beefed up graphic wise then?

[aneonfoxtribute]

9 minutes ago, Briar King said:

Is CS3 and 4 more beefed up graphic wise then?

They look way better at least. They're still not as good as its contemporaries but compared to 1 and 2 they are a significant improvement

[Briar King]

Excellent to hear. Something for my son to look forward to. He was really starting to get into CS1 and 2 till the Tsushima pause and when I loaded up 2 this week he was like “why you playing this..”

We ll get back in eventually. I miss posting my thoughts and gripes.