Messages

Here's what I was saying about the Qudssi dialog issue:

I hate when I lose the key to my over-sized treasure chest and have no elemental attack to blast it open! It's either develop Psy Powers or stop locking it.

I'm thinking Anu might be some sort of Creator/stays out of mortals' affairs-type of deity, but I don't think Yawah exists as a god. Cygnus seems too fanatical in eradicating shadowlings and psy-capables, not to mention hiding his(?) face/identity. It seems to me that someone unknown might be pulling the strings. Someone with a grudge against the shadowlings and psy-fighters. Someone powerful, who it has taken decades to recover/build up strength... :-*

The music is one of the main reasons why I love this series. Place of Learning is my absolute favorite, especially after playing the first two RPGs. Sometimes I just sit in the library. (Though the Somnus theme feels like an old friend, after spending spending so much time there in TRPG 2).

The Great Forest theme gets honorable mention. When I'm bored/grinding, I alternate between the Forest and Deeper Downs, so I can battle with it as the background music :-).

Ah...That explains why I haven't been able to train Big Shield, Vengeance, Big Elemental Shields, or Ultimate Elemental Attack on my various games...

A few bugs in the [activated] Windows Demo (that are probably just related to new/unfinished content):
1. Talking to either Naj or La'Man once you've recruited them opens a blank/inescapable dialog window or opens a window for the last ally you spoke with (also inescapable).
2. La'Man can successfully train "Firebreath 2," but using attacks in battle doesn't raise their experience/level. Naj's attacks gain experience, but she can't learn "Frostbreath 2" :-(. Clicking on the "Learn New Skill" button does nothing.
3. During the night after the execution mission, if you click on your parents again after listening to the argument, the "you don't want to listen anymore" window is inescapable (clicking [Done] does nothing).
4. If you break out of the green Shadowling's basement, you can't re-enter the basement (probably intentional), but you also can't enter the basement with Naj/La'man. Exiting Somnus and re-entering allows you to enter the chanter-basement normally.
5. Asking Rahel for help with the Crypt 3 Riddle Door opens a blank/inescapable dialog window. (Solving it and moving on opens the world map with a new Crypt 4 location, but nothing is clickable)
6. I noticed some issues with Rahel's new dialog. I don't remember exactly what I was doing (I was playing around with all the dialog tree responses), but I remember that for the "Sorry for snapping at you earlier" dialog, the "You were a member of the Rubat clan, right?" option seemed to disappear/re-appear randomly based on previous responses. I'll try to play around and see if I can re-create it.
7. Rahel's "Bow Counter" skill randomly disappears. I think it occurs when you exit/re-start the .exe program and load a saved game (you need to retrain it).
8. Qudssi's melee damage formula seems to be Strength + Skill (9) minus 4. Is this intentional, or is his base skill level supposed to be 5..?
9. In dialog with Qudssi at headquarters, the Hero- and Qudssi- lines are reversed (Qudssi's name/portrait appears with the Hero's lines and vice-versa).
10. If you tell Qudssi "Fine, you can go" (before the execution quest), he reappears at the Prayer-Box, and you can re-do the dialog to get him to join. I know he's confused/conflicted, but that just seems fickle :-P.


Other bugs:
1. The card game exploit still exists. Double clicking a minion-targetting Psy Spell removes the psy points as normal, double clicking it again (without targetting a minion) removes additional psy points, double clicking it again when you don't have enough psy points brings up the "not enough psy points" message but still allows you to click on a minion and cast the spell (and the card remains in your hand). If you keep discarding cards, you can keep casting Fury or Cryoblast over and over.
2. After dying during the Fernatus Battle, the "You have died [Continue]" box was stuck on the screen. After dying, I clicked "Skip" for the death cinematic and reloaded the autosave rather quickly, which might have something to do with it. While the box was onscreen, I couldn't click the [Continue] button, and the battle proceeded as normal. When I won the battle, the "You won! [Done]" box appeared, and after clicking it, both boxes were gone.
3. In the Marid Stones/Tikka quest, I'm 75% sure I was able to turn in the Stones twice. The first time, I calmed Tikka and escaped the cave, then gave the stones to Umma. Then, I went back and killed Tikka (I'm greedy), and got the 200 gold reward, but I also had the "I brought you the Stones, too" option available. I skipped it, turned the Stones in to Umma, and got another 50 gold. The chest in the bottom left corner might've also been filled with gold again, but I'm not positive about that. I'll see if I can recreate it. It could be that I spared Tikka, talked to the kid but didn't turn in the Stones, and then killed Tikka/turned in the Stones, but I'm pretty sure I turned the Stones in twice.
4. I noticed the same AI problem with the Greater Ghost's CryoCross attack in the battle for the Indigo Orb. I've noticed it attacked Ghosts and treasure chests instead of attacking the player's characters. One time, I had Naj flying over the center/non-gold treasure chest, and the Greater Ghost moved 3 spaces to the left and used CryoCross, hitting nothing at all! Also, CryoCross seems to damage the treasure chests when they are one space away, but not when the Greater Ghost is two spaces away (though I believe it damages player characters when they are two spaces away from the Ghost).


P.S.
1. Pre-ordering=Best. Early-Christmas-present-to-myself. EVER.
2. "Luca'Ra'Il...Luca'Ra'Il..." "I miss the old Luca..."=Amazing.

She's not the strongest, but Luca is by far the best in terms of sheer usefulness. She can fly, restore psy points to your primary nukers (hero/Arman), plus she can use Juxtapose to set an enemy up for multiple backstabs (or save Arman's butt when he gets swarmed by enemies).

She's also the most intriguing character. We know almost nothing about her except that she's a dead tragedienne. She's also morally ambiguous. Arman might be an assassain, but his backstory shows that he definitely has a conscience. Luca, on the other hand, sucks the souls out of enemies so your forces can return from the dead and will destroy a mob of unnarmed people at your bequest.

No matter what other characters might be added, I think Luca will always have a spot in my roster.

A few bugs I've noticed:
-if you use 'Q' to rotate, any attack going up (projectile traveling cardinal north) fails to apply backstab damage. Using 'E' or the 'rotate' button still applies backstab correctly, as does 'Q' when attacking an enemy left, right, or down from your character. I've only personally noticed this with the main character's Mind Blast and Cryoblast, but I assume it carries over to all characters (as I just noticed the same bug occurs in TRPG 2!).

-in the card game, there's a glitch(/exploit) when using Psy cards that target a minion. Clicking on the psy card twice, then clicking it twice again (instead of selecting the minion target) subtracts additional psy points. If you do this until you get the "You don't have enough psy points for this card" message, then target a minion, the card's effect happens as normal, but the card remains in your hand instead of being used up. If you discard cards to restore PsP, you can keep using the same Psy card.

-not sure what you could do about this, but in a battle, if you hover over an enemy with the cursor to display their health/attacks, click and hold the mouse, then drag it over to their attacks (and release), the enemy's frame remains displayed instead of switching back to your active character (I discovered this when I was trying to see what an enemy's attacks did). If you click on the enemy's attack buttons, you can get messages like "Ravinale Guard has no target" or "Not enough Psy Points." If you move your cursor outside of the attack frame, then back, it displays the active character's attacks, but still has the enemy's name (you can control the your character and attack as normal, but the name is bugged: "Ravinale Guard causes 19 damage with Mind Blast"). The attack frame returns to normal when you move the cursor over a different enemy/character or you end your turn. Not a big deal, but I once bugged it so my active character could move, but had "already attacked" that turn (and couldn't 'Undo' or use an attack--I don't remember how, though...it was probably Griffin, since both he and most enemies have 'Melee' and it doesn't use PsP).