Zodi Plays: Tactics Ogre The Knight of Lodis (Crime Island Adventure)

[DataNinja]

Just picked up on this... y'all do know that Avaris was a real place, right? It's the Greek name for Hut-waret, a capital of Egypt during the 15th dynasty (during which time Egypt was run by foreign conquerors). It seems the native Egyptians saw the Avaris-based rulers as illegitimate, given that they expelled them in 1550 BC, so the game's presentation of a 'kingdom of Avaris' as a hostile power isn't entirely baseless.

Ah, oops. History isn't my strong suit, and, while I did look up the "writings" that they mentioned, I didn't fact-check that part. I'm just used to groan-inducingly on-the-nose names in certain games. Mea culpa.

[LaZodiac]

Just picked up on this... y'all do know that Avaris was a real place, right? It's the Greek name for Hut-waret, a capital of Egypt during the 15th dynasty (during which time Egypt was run by foreign conquerors). It seems the native Egyptians saw the Avaris-based rulers as illegitimate, given that they expelled them in 1550 BC, so the game's presentation of a 'kingdom of Avaris' as a hostile power isn't entirely baseless.

I can't believe I've been so owned.

sorry for the delay on stuff By The Way! Tomorrow will be the first actual episode, as promised. Do note I won't be able to respond to it until Sunday night, however.

[LaZodiac]

Hey let's actually get this thing started shall we?

Zodi Plays: Tactics Ogre The Knight of Lodis 1] War-crime Island

Video Length: 20:39

With the votes tallied, it's time to begin! With the six fates decided, the adventure of Gaston, a knight of Felis (and Lodis) begins!

There really isn't much to this episode, we're still firmly in tutorial zone. Which isn't a negative thing, tactics games can be complicated if you've never played them before. Luckily, I am quite well versed in these sorts of games, even if I haven't played this one really. Immediately upon making landfall on the island of Ovis, we've been attacked by brigands hired to murder us specifically! That's uh...an auspicious start. Especially since, once we win...poor Gaston gets crossbow'd into the ocean! And for some reason we get swept away instead of landing in the chest high water around these cliffs, as demonstrated with shield-tech.

Waking up in a warm bed, it appears we've been saved...and also somehow went all the way NORTH of where we made landfall it seems? That's weird. Anyway, Ivanna, a former knight of the guys we've come here to beat up, offers to help find Rictor and company, so that's what we'll be doing next time! Hope you all enjoyed this small taste of what is to come.

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As mentioned in video I looked at the pumpkin tips in a separate video, which you can see here.

The pumpkin tips are actually pretty important stuff, but a lot of it is things we won't have to worry about for awhile. Still, it's nice to get all that reading done so now I don't have to spend a large amount of time writing or speaking about a lot of the more grittier mechanics!

That being said you'll notice that there is a Biorhythm thing like in Fire Emblem Path of Radiance. That's basically as ignore-able here as it was in that game.

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Rounding us off today, let's look at the emblems we've seen. First off, dumb Past Zodi got it wrong. Arbitration is rewarded to you for persuading FIVE enemies to join your side. It increases the chance of persuasion by 30% flat, which is really good if you intend to talk enemies into joining you. It also is some nice flavor, showing that Gaston here is a nice boy who is quite good at talking.

Don Quixote is an emblem "awarded" to you for taking 2/3rds of our hp in a single counter attack. You went up against someone who could kick your ass and they did so on YOUR TURN. It lowers your int by 10, because you're clearly an idiot.

Embodiment of Desires is given to you for picking up five war trophies (the little loot bags) before a battle ends. If you've got this emblem, buried treasure you find tends to be better. Note that this is random buried treasure, some maps have pre-set buried treasure. Still nice to have, though.

Finally, Heavenly Spirit. You get this for healing allies TWENTY times! That's a lot of healing! If you've got this emblem you can become a Priest class, and that's all it does. Note that you do need to use healing MAGIC to get this. You don't become a priest by shoving herbs in someone's face.

A lot of emblems are pretty tricky to get, but thankfully this game has a mechanic we'll talk about later (though it's briefly brought up in the pumpkin tip video) that'll help alleviate some of that.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

I never got into this game, although it is much like most of the other Tactics style games out there it seems. I'll certainly be following along as you play.

[Ninja_Prawn]

And for some reason we get swept away instead of landing in the chest high water around these cliffs

Headcanon: Gaston and Rictor spent several hours gossiping between the end of the battle and the crossbow ambush, and consequently the tide went from low to high.

[DataNinja]

Apparently we like our good guys.

Your help-voice-fairy thing is Navi? I'm not sure whether that's accidental, or you did that.
(Or, more likely, it's short for Navigation.)

That enemy came from... your ship? Well, at least you're water element, so, you should be fine in water, right?

Mermaids? What are the odds of that.

All in all, looks interesting. Though, as you mentioned, it was really more of a "watching" session, rather than playing. So, will be neat to see how it turns out.

Huh, neat that the terrain apparently changes. There's a lot of cool stuff mentioned in the tips video.

Is there anything in particular that you'd be interested in having tracked along the way?

[jindra34]

That enemy came from... your ship? Well, at least you're water element, so, you should be fine in water, right?

The guy who shoots you is implied to be the bandit you just captured. Which says a WHOLE lot about the quality of the friends you came with.

[DataNinja]

The guy who shoots you is implied to be the bandit you just captured. Which says a WHOLE lot about the quality of the friends you came with.

Ah, I missed that implication, since they were just called "Hidden Enemy". (I'll be honest, I'd not inferred that it was a capture. I thought that we'd just killed them all.)

Also, have I mentioned how much I love the "not-important-enough-to-have-a-name/we-don't-know-their-name" names that they give people in this game?

[Ninja_Prawn]

It didn't seem like an escaped captive to me either. There's no mention of prisoners or taking people alive, and the cut scene doesn't know whether you left any of the generic enemies alive or not... I think it's just another person who's been hired to kill Rictor.

[LaZodiac]

Headcanon: Gaston and Rictor spent several hours gossiping between the end of the battle and the crossbow ambush, and consequently the tide went from low to high.

Valid!

Also concerning the keeping of prisoners and stuff...we very much kill unless a cutscene shows otherwise. Different name is different guy.

[Ninja_Prawn]

On this question:

Is there anything in particular that you'd be interested in having tracked along the way?

I don't know how this game works exactly, but surely we have to track style points? Like shield bash kills, counter-attack kills, mutual kills (if that's possible), that sort of thing. What else can you do in Tactics Ogre that's worth tracking?

[LaZodiac]

On this question:



I don't know how this game works exactly, but surely we have to track style points? Like shield bash kills, counter-attack kills, mutual kills (if that's possible), that sort of thing. What else can you do in Tactics Ogre that's worth tracking?

Forgot to respond to this concern! Once we actually have units that matter, a kill counter/score card might be cool. This game never reaches Fire Emblem "twelve vs 40" levels, so it should be reasonable.

[DataNinja]

I don't know how this game works exactly, but surely we have to track style points? Like shield bash kills, counter-attack kills, mutual kills (if that's possible), that sort of thing. What else can you do in Tactics Ogre that's worth tracking?

I'm afraid that I don't have the Style Qualifications to track Style Points. I don't know what's Stylish or not.

Forgot to respond to this concern! Once we actually have units that matter, a kill counter/score card might be cool. This game never reaches Fire Emblem "twelve vs 40" levels, so it should be reasonable.

Kills, as they are, easy. Even in FE, the hardest part at that point would have just been scrolling to the correct character's box. Keeping track of what class was what for individual kills in FE, as someone who had never played before, that was more difficult. But, as long as you don't care about, say, damage dealt/received, it's easy.

The less granularity you care about, the easier it is. You having 100 units, as long as it's easy to tell them apart, and all you want is kill counts? That's a piece of cake, relatively speaking.

[Ninja_Prawn]

I'm afraid that I don't have the Style Qualifications to track Style Points. I don't know what's Stylish or not.

Well in that case, if anyone does anything stylish, I'll keep track of it myself.

[LaZodiac]

Back from the void I rise, with live commentary.

Zodi Plays: Tactics Ogre The Knight of Lodis [2] Disaster At Scabellum

Video Length: 27:40

The disaster, thankfully, is that Gaston gets jumped by a hedge wizard. But yeah, this episode is a rather...interesting fight, in that last map we only controlled Gaston so everyone could give us a tutorial on how to fight. In this map...we only control Gaston again, and from the looks of how this one played out it's so the game could give us a tutorial on how NOT to fight. It's uh...a bit chaotic, to have a bunch of guest units since the guest units have priorities. Hell if I know what they are though.

The end result of all this is that we do, in the end, meet up with Rictor and Orson! Unfortunately, this is just a nominal reunion, as they give us a large sack of cash and tell us to perform a pincher manouver on our current target, which we'll be doing next time. We'll also, next time, be showing off all the cool actual units we've received thanks to your votes on the six fates. That rules! But yeah, hope you all enjoyed, I'll see you all next time.

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Oh boy it's emblem time I didn't forget that.

Knight's Certificate: Minor correction on Past Zodi here. You don't HAVE to attack from the front on to get this, you just need to be counter attacked five times. This lets you be a knight and not much else, but that's still pretty important.

Centurion: This was surprising to get. You get it for killing three or more enemies on a map with a single person. It gives you a flat +20 strength...which is super good! Gaston can now punch up really good.

[jindra34]

Well Zodi, I can't remember if this game awards bonus money based on time. Also note there are two AI's here. And everyone who joins after the start of the battle uses the enemy AI (even when they are your guest allies). But it was nice for richter and oirson to feed you two kills. Once you ran them down.

[LansXero]

Well Zodi, I can't remember if this game awards bonus money based on time. Also note there are two AI's here. And everyone who joins after the start of the battle uses the enemy AI (even when they are your guest allies). But it was nice for richter and oirson to feed you two kills. Once you ran them down.

Thats for the bonus mode, where you get better stuff the quicker you can end it. Its a pretty cool mode.

[Ninja_Prawn]

I can't remember if this game awards bonus money based on time.

According to gamefaqs, money for story missions is fixed; the tutorial battles never give money. In 'quest mode' however, you do get more goth the quicker you finish.

Bah, getting ninja'd hurts twice as much when you've got the word 'ninja' in your forum handle...

[jindra34]

Thanks Lans and Ninja, I just wasn't sure. Because I know Ogre Battle, and Ogre Battle 64 base post battle rewards on the clock, and wanted to clarify EARLY whether this applied for Tactics: Knight of Lodis. So Zodi didn't miss out on anything too big early on, when the game is at its second most biting.

[DataNinja]

Live commentary? Well, that'll be cool. Raw, unvarnished reactions. Too bad there's no yelling for discounts here.

No, to be a Knight you need to be honourable. Which is usually a handicap, yes.

They're generic, but at least they have names. Which I really like.

To be fair, you'll be able to be a lot more tactical when you actually have control of your allies.

I see I'm not the only one that likes Aurora as a name.

3500 is only thirty five hundred, unfortunately.

Well, here's the beginning of our kill counter. Including our stabbing of Stan.

Unit	Kills
Gaston	4

Bah, getting ninja'd hurts twice as much when you've got the word 'ninja' in your forum handle...

I know that feeling.

Thanks Lans and Ninja...

Probably want to maybe not necessarily use "Ninja" on its own, as there are two of us in this case.

[Coidzor]

3500 is only thirty five hundred, unfortunately.

Which is 3 naked level 1 Soldiers with some change left over. Or 2 naked level 1 Hawkmen and change.

Basic equipment (hat, armor, weapon) would be 1080 goth for a sword boy or 1200 goth for a bow boy with a leather hat, hard leather armor, and the short sword or starting bow.

Of course, you could use Training and set them up to be able to fight unarmed until you've acquired more lucre.

[DataNinja]

Which is 3 naked level 1 Soldiers with some change left over. Or 2 naked level 1 Hawkmen and change.

Basic equipment (hat, armor, weapon) would be 1080 goth for a sword boy or 1200 goth for a bow boy with a leather hat, hard leather armor, and the short sword or starting bow.

Of course, you could use Training and set them up to be able to fight unarmed until you've acquired more lucre.

I will be 100% honest and say I am going in completely blind to this, so I had zero idea of to how much you could get with that amount. I only mentioned it because Zodi said we got 35 Thousand.

[LaZodiac]

It's time for a sleepy baby Zodi video for Ogre Tactics today.

Zodi Plays: Tactics Ogre The Knight of Lodis [3] Gaston v. Gaston

Video Length: 37:49

Yeah expect these to get pretty long after a point. Anyway, a minor correction on Past Zodi. Centurion specifically requires you to kill three enemies and NOT kill EVERY enemy, with that single unit. It's weird. As well, I mention the Heavenly Spirit emblem...it is NOT required to become a CLERIC. It is required to become a Priest/Priestess, the second tier cleric. I am correct that Kamui, our rando ninja, isn't able to be the class he is, but otherwise our cleric is actually capable of being a cleric.

Also yeah, like I said I'm not sure I'll be keeping all those four units we received. I can confirm due to recording stuff in advance that uh...we won't be. It's a little silly, you'll see. Now, what's important...let's look at the actual mechanics of the six fates and why we got what we got. The answers to our questions, ultimately, give us an overall point score of -1. That means we get two soldiers, a cleric and a ninja. This part turns out to be correct! Less correct is...we're supposed to have a rapier. Instead, astute eyed viewers will notice we have a second axe. I notice eventually, but it's...it's weird. I don't know why it's like this? Especially because according to the guide I'm using that's...not an option. It may just be that my guide is wrong however, since looking around a different guide says we get a francisca for our options. But yeah, who knows!

Now, recruitment time! Hiring soldiers in this game is...interesting, mostly in that you can only ever actually buy soldiers, beasts, and demi-humans. Soldiers are...average in many ways, so boosting their level with money is a double edged sword. We use some cash to recruit a fire element lady called Deneb for absolutely no reason at all, and we'll recruit actual patreon units...later. This unfortunately takes priority for a variety of reasons. We will also never be buying an octopus, as beasts are generally not that useful and octopi are the weakest of them. You also see me equipping Deneb with a bow and an axe. The shortbow and axe are both one handed weapons, so you can put both on your person and use both in battle. That's actually pretty neat, though it makes it so that Deneb can't use a shield. This is fine.

We also take a dip into training mode this video. Training mode is interesting, pitting your units against each other. You can turn on auto battle for this, but it's not recommended since they WILL use items and that's uh...that's a waste. I mention not to over-train, and it's...actually kinda hard to over-train, but it's still worth keeping a thought on. If you gain 20 levels in training mode, you get an emblem that lowers all your stats by -10! Very flavorful, but also nasty.

Once the training is done, we head off to...a random encounter because I said so. We don't be DIRECTLY pursuing random encounters, but if I do them I will show them off since unlike the training fights (which I also won't be making big use of) this doesn't count for our kill counters. But yes, random encounter with some soldiers and their wizard buddy. This is an otherwise inconsequential battle...minus two important facts. One, we use the Persuade option to recruit the wizard, Leon! Persuade is a difficult ability to use, but if it works you turn the target into a guest party member, and at the end of the map they'll offer to join your army. Now, persuade maxes out at 49% accuracy wise, various stacks like your class (same class boosts it) gender (opposite gender boosts it) and emblems (some increase it, some don't) influence the accuracy of persuade. So does stabbing the life out of them. Ultimately, we only end up with a 4% chance of getting Deneb to recruit the wizard...which we get, since I'm a cheater who uses save states for specific things like this. The other important thing in this fight is ONE OF THE NPCS HAS THE SAME NAME AS OUR PROTAGONIST. This CANNOT stand, and our Gaston makes a pretty convincing argument for making this guy change his name.

But yeah, that's it for this weird, weird little episode. Join us next time, for actual plot progression...and the last time we ever seen the starting generics.

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Emblem time! We got a couple emblems today!

Book of Initiation: You get this for avoiding three attacks in a row. It's pretty fancy, though all it does is let you be a swordmaster. Of course being a swordmaster is uh...really important, given it's a pretty strong class! A little tricky to get, so I'm glad to have gotten it when I did.

Self-Preservation: Another tricky emblem to get, though as you can see we can get this in training. If you kill a unit with a counter you get this emblem, and it increases your counter attack damage! A little extra boost, there's a good chance I'll get this on all my melee units eventually, just because of the nature of things.

Sniper: A surprise emblem I didn't imagine I'd get any time soon! I sorta poo-poo it in video, but Sniper gets you +10 agility which is actually pretty decent given agility determines accuracy and stuff. I will at one point be getting this on all my fighting man units just because it's that useful. To get it, you need to land 5 bow shots in a row without missing. Simple enough, though you can miss on a 99% shot if you're not lucky...

Vixen's Whisper: Persuade a male unit with a lady, and you get this emblem! It let's you become a witch, a female magic user class. We'll detail the specific...interesting points of this emblem at a later date.

[jindra34]

Okay so Zodi that little fortune thing each character has essentially reflects on their LUCK. Also on the whole, Beasts SUCK so beast tamer is also crap. Dragons are better so if you want a booster you go for the female Dragon Tamer. Also yes, swordmaster is the bread and butter of late game damage. With maybe a side of sirens. If you want to do training for levels (and not emblems) its advised to use Quest mode. gaston's Lightning Bolt was so accurate because he was technically behind the enemy, thus high hit. Also Gaston will draw lots of aggro, because the game is half spitefully and recognizes that killing Gaston will be a win.

[DataNinja]

Judging by the title, I can already tell why you found our choice of name hilarious...

I will not be counting Training kills, incidentally.
Oh, good, we seem to be on the same train of thought with that.

I assume you mean that random encounters will count for kill-count? If not, I'll change that.

Spoiler: Army

Show

Unit	Kills
Gaston	6
Allos	1
Flauros	0
Kamui	0
Thelma	0
Deneb	0
Leon	0

Ooh, dragons and dragon tamers. That sounds like fun. But also sounds like very, very late game.

[tyckspoon]

Ooh, dragons and dragon tamers. That sounds like fun. But also sounds like very, very late game.

Surprisingly early on, if my experiences with other Ogre Battle games are anything to go on - March of the Black Queen could have dragon-class monsters as part of your starting army and recruitable within the first few areas. The actual Dragoner/Dragon-tamer class was a bit harder, but that's because it required a special item to class-change the basic Beast Tamer into one - this game I believe it's a basic class on its own, the female equivalent to the first-tier Beast Tamer. It did take a while to get to the point where you could recruit real dragons instead of Wyverns and then level those dragons up into something more than basic attackers, tho.

[jindra34]

Ooh, dragons and dragon tamers. That sounds like fun. But also sounds like very, very late game.

If you want it to be good you actually have to start early game with young dragons. Then work them up through their promotions.

[tonberrian]

Using your fate you can determine when it's a good time to get one of the secret classes, and it has some minor combat effects no one cares about. Your fate will change day to day.

Thunder Flare will always have 100% accuracy. It's one of the AoE spells (as opposed to Air Blade, a missile spell, which will only ever deal damage to one square). Eventually, at... 70? intelligence, Thunder Flare will deal damage in a plus shape. Missile spells will, like that Shuriken at the edge of the building, hit obstacles (or people!) in the way. AoE spells will never have to deal with that. That's why they cost twice as much. Fire, Water, Air, and Earth all have a missile and a AoE, Virtue has just a missile, and Bane has a bunch of weird spells.

Also, on exp: You can get experience from stabbing your own team, just as much as by stabbing an enemy. And you only ever get 1 xp from doing something to a character lower level than you, 5-6 for interacting with the same level, ~11 for 1 level higher, and I THINK it's ~17 for two, ~33 for 3, and ~60 for 4 and 100 for 5 or more (and no carryover if you level up), with a multiplier for kills (that caps at 100 as well). So the most efficient way to level up your dudes in training is to have each team to have one high level character and the rest of the characters on each team wail on the high level character.

Also, random encounters levels are based on Gaston's level. So if, as a main character, he gets to a higher level than anyone else, random encounters will be that much harder.

[DataNinja]

If you want it to be good you actually have to start early game with young dragons. Then work them up through their promotions.

While that sounds neat, it does sadly sound like a pain for if one does not have dragons at the start. I do understand why there are mechanics that reward you for doing things throughout the entire game, but man is it frustrating if you don't know about it.

[tyckspoon]

While that sounds neat, it does sadly sound like a pain for if one does not have dragons at the start. I do understand why there are mechanics that reward you for doing things throughout the entire game, but man is it frustrating if you don't know about it.

With Ogre Battle, at least, part of it comes from the somewhat obscure alignment mechanisms - to reference March of the Black Queen again (because I'm not that familiar with Knight of Lodis's specific system) in order to get a higher-grade dragon you have to go hard into either the 'good' or 'evil' paths, because there is no (IIRC) top-tier 'neutral' version of the dragon. And that pretty much requires husbanding a character to that end from as early as you can, because it's very difficult to significantly modify the required stats at higher levels, and if you recruit a neutral dragon at those levels you're facing a long, frustrating, and tedious slog of abusing game mechanics to adjust them to the point that they can change into the class you want.

(One of my favorite examples of this is how you can screw yourself out of being able to promote a Wizard - it's a low-alignment class, so trends toward 'evil', but it actually has a minimum alignment. If you get below that minimum mark and, for example, zero out alignment it's very, very hard to raise it back up, so you may wind up never being able to promote that character unless you know exactly how the game manages that stat.)